“I don’t think he’d be apt to set up a claim, without he was a pretty mean man,” said the deacon.
“Not even if ’twas Squire Peternot?” said Mr. Pipkin. “Guess he’d put in for his share, if there was any chance o’ gittin’ on ’t!”
“Nonsense, Pippy! If ’twas a large sum, he might, but a trifle like this,—you’re unjust to the squire, Pippy.”
“I haven’t said it was the squire’s land. But suppose it _was_? And suppose it had been a large sum,” queried Jack, “could he claim it? What’s the law?” And, to explain away his extraordinary interest in the legal point, he added, laughingly, “Just for the fun of it, I’d like to know what he _could_ do if he _should_ try Phin’s joke, and set out to get my half-dollar away!”
“I really don’t know about the law,” the deacon was saying, when Lion barked. “Hist! here comes Peternot himself! Say nothing. I’ll ask him. He’s bringing his nephew over to see us.”
“He’s kind of adopted his nephew, hain’t he, sence he heard of his son’s death?” said Mr. Pipkin. “I’ve seen him hangin’ around there.”
“No; he only wants to get him into our school next winter.”
“Ho! a schoolmaster!” whispered Phin, jeering at the new-comer. “Say, Jack! I bet we can lick him!”
“Don’t look as if he had any more backbone ’n a spring chicken,” was Mr. Pipkin’s unfavorable criticism, as the gaunt and limping squire came to the door with his young relative.
“Good afternoon, neighbor,” said the deacon, shaking hands first with the uncle, then with the nephew. “You’ve come just at the right time. We’ve a legal question to settle. Suppose Jack, here, finds a purse of money on my place; no owner turns up; now whose purse is it, Jack’s or mine?”
“Your land—your hired boy—I should say, your purse,” said the squire, emphatically.
“But suppose _you_ find such a purse on my land?”
“H’m! that alters the case. How is it, Byron? My nephew is studying law; he can tell you better than I can about it.”
Peternot thought this a good chance to bring the candidate for the winter’s school into favorable notice; and the candidate for the winter’s school made the most of his opportunity. He was a slender young man with a sallow complexion, a greenish eye, a pimpled forehead, and a rather awkward and studied manner of speaking. In rendering his opinion he was as prolix as any judge on the bench. He began with a disquisition on the nature of law, and finally, coming down to the case in point, said it would be considered a case of treasure-trove.
“What’s that?” Jack eagerly interrupted him.
“Treasure-trove is treasure found.”
“Then why don’t they say treasure found?”
“’Sh, boy!” said Mr. Chatford, good-naturedly, smiling at the youngster’s impatience of long-winded sentences and large words. “What’s the law of—treasure-trove, I believe you call it, Mr. Dinks?”
“I don’t think there’s any law on the subject,” replied the student of Blackstone, picking his teeth with a straw.
“No law! then how can such a case be decided?”
“Custom, which makes a sort of unwritten law, would here come in.”
“Well, what’s the custom?”
Thereupon Mr. Byron Dinks became prolix again, speaking of English custom, which, like English law, creates precedents for our own country. The meaning of his discourse, stripped of its technical phrases and tedious repetitions, seemed to be, that formerly, treasure-trove went to the crown; that in more modern times it was divided—in a case like this—between the finder and the man on whose premises it was found; but that he didn’t think any precedent had been established in America.
“We’re about as wise now as we were before,” remarked Phin’s elder brother Moses, standing in the kitchen door.
Mr. Chatford gave him a wink to remain silent, and said, “How are we to understand you, Mr. Dinks? To use your own expression, A finds money on B’s premises; now what would be your advice to B?”
“Supposing B is my client? I should advise him to get possession of the money, if he could. Possession is nine points of the law.”
“Well, but if he couldn’t get possession?”
“Then try to compromise for one half. Then for a quarter. Then for what he could get.”
“Very good. Now what would be your advice to A?”
“A is my client?”
“Yes, we’ll suppose so.”
Spitting and throwing away his straw, Mr. Byron Dinks said with a laugh, “My advice to A would be to pocket the money and say nothing about it; keep possession, any way; fight for it.”
“Thank you,” said the deacon, with quiet irony in his tones. “Now we know what the law is on this subject, boys.”
“I don’t see, for my part, that it differs very much from common sense,” remarked the simple-minded Mr. Pipkin, “only it takes more words to git at it.”
“I’m sure,” said the squire, “my nephew has given you all the law there is to govern such cases, and good advice to his clients. ’T ain’t his fault if people can’t understand him.”
“I guess we all understand the main point, now we’ve got at it,” said Deacon Chatford. “Hang on to your money, Jack.”
“You’ve got it,” said Jack, more deeply glad and agitated than any one suspected.
“So I have. Well, I’ll tell ye when I get home from the Basin to-night whether it’s good or not. Walk in, gentlemen.”
And the deacon entered the house with his guests.
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CHAPTER IV
IN WHICH JACK COUNTS HIS CHICKENS.
PETERNOT and his nephew took their departure, after making a short call. Then the family sat down to the supper-table, and the merits and prospects of the candidate for the winter’s school were discussed in a manner that ought to have made his ears tingle. Then, while the boys harnessed the mare and brought her to the door, the deacon changed his clothes, and at last started for the Basin.
“Don’t forget to ask about that half-dollar!” said Jack, as he held the gate open for the buggy to pass through.
“Glad you reminded me of it,—I _should_ have forgotten it,” replied the notoriously absent-minded deacon.
Jack wished he could have found some excuse for going with him, but he could not think of any.
“How can I wait till he gets back, to know about it?” thought he, as he stood at the gate and watched the buggy and Mr. Chatford’s black hat disappear over the brow of the hill.
His revery was interrupted by Moses, who, noticing the boy’s unusual conduct,—for Jack was ordinarily no dreamer when there was work to be done,—called out to him from the stable-door, “Say, Jack! you’ve got to go and fetch the cows to-night; Phin says he won’t.”
“It’s Phin’s turn,—but I don’t care, I’ll go.” And Jack set off for the pasture, glad of this opportunity to be alone, and to muse upon his wonderful discovery.
It was a beautiful evening. The air was fresh and cool, and perfectly delicious after the shower. The sky overhead was silver-clear, but all down the gorgeous west, banks and cliffs and floating bars of cloud burned with the hues of sunset. Jack’s heart expanded, as he walked up the lane; and there, in that lovely atmosphere, he built his airy castles.
“If I _am_ a rich man,” thought he, “what shall I do with my money? I’ll put it out at interest for a year or two,—I wonder how much there is! That’ll help me get an education. Then I’ll go into business, or buy a little place somewhere, and I’ll have my horses and wagons and hired men, and—” O, what a vision of happiness floated before his eyes! riches, honors, friendships, and in the midst of all the sweetest face in the world,—the face of his dearest friend, Mrs. Chatford’s niece, Annie Felton.
Then he looked back wonderingly upon his past life. “I can hardly believe that I was nothing but a mean, ragged, swearing little canal-driver only a few months ago. Over yonder are the woods where the charcoal-burners were, that I wanted to hire out to, after I had run away from the scow,—the idea of my hiring out to them! Now here I am, treated like one of Mr. Chatford’s own boys, and—with all that money, if it is money,” he added, his heart swelling again with misgivings. “Go, Lion! go for the cows,” he said; and he himself began to run, calling by the way, “Co’, boss! co’, boss!” as if bringing the cows would also bring Mr. Chatford home, with his report concerning the half-dollar.
“He won’t be there, though, for an hour or two yet,” he reflected. “What’s the use of hurrying? I shall only have the longer to wait. I wonder if that log is just as I left it!” For Jack had still a secret dread lest the unknown person who had hidden the treasure so many years ago should now suddenly return and carry it away. “I’ll cut over there and take just one peep,” he said.
So, having started the cattle upon their homeward track, with Lion barking after the laggards, Jack leaped a fence, ran across the lot where he had been at work that afternoon with Mr. Pipkin and Phin when the shower surprised them, and was soon standing alone by the log in the darkening woods. The sticks which he had stuffed into the end of the hollow trunk were all in their place. And yet it seemed a dream to Jack, that he had actually found a box of money in that old tree,—that it was there now! He wanted to pull out the sticks and go in and make sure of his prize, but forbore to do so foolish a thing.
“Of course it’s there,” thought he. “And I’m going to take care that nobody knows where it is, till I’ve got it safe in my own possession; then who can say whether I found it on Mr. Chatford’s, or Squire Peternot’s, or Aunt Patsy’s land, if I don’t tell? Let Squire Peternot claim it if he can!”
Yet Jack longed to tell somebody of his discovery. “O, if I could only tell Annie Felton, and get her advice about it!” But Annie, who taught the summer school, and “boarded around,” was just then boarding in a distant part of the district. The next day, however, was Saturday; then she would come home to her aunt’s to spend the Sunday, and he could impart to her his burning secret.
Jack stayed but a minute in the woods, then, hurrying back, rejoined Lion, who was driving the cows into the lane. Arrived at the barn-yard, he took one of three or four pails which Mr. Pipkin had brought out from the pantry, and a stool from the shed, and sat down to do his share of the milking. He had always liked that part of the day’s work well enough before; but now with a secret feeling of pride and hope he said to himself, “Maybe I sha’n’t always be obliged to do this for a living!” And he wondered how it would seem to be a gentleman and live without work.
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CHAPTER V
WAITING FOR THE DEACON.
THE milk was carried to the pantry and strained; the candles were lighted, and the family sat in a pleasant circle about the kitchen table, while, without, the twilight darkened into night, and the crickets sang. There was Mr. Pipkin showing Phin how to braid a belly into his woodchuck-skin whiplash; Mrs. Pipkin (late Miss Wansey) paring a pan of apples, which she held in her lap; Moses reading the “Saturday Courier,” a popular story-paper in those days; little Kate, sitting on a stool, piecing a bed-quilt under her mother’s eye,—sewing together squares of different colored prints cut out from old dresses, and occasionally looking up to ask the maternal advice,—while Mrs. Chatford was doing some patch-work of a different sort, which certain rents in Phin’s trousers rendered necessary. Jack sat in the corner, silent, and listening for buggy-wheels.
“I hope you won’t go climbing over the buckles and hames, on to a horse’s back, in that harum-scarum way, another time,” said the good woman, in tones of mild reproof, to her younger son.
“’T was beginning to rain, and I couldn’t stop to think,” said Phin, laughing. “Could I, Phi?”
“I should think not, by the hurry you was in to hook my ride,” replied Mr. Pipkin, with reviving resentment. “That was a mean trick; and now jes’ see how I’m payin’ ye for it! Ye never could ’a’ got a decent-lookin’ belly into this lash, in the world, if ’twa’n’t for me.”
“That’s ’cause you’re such a good feller, and know so much!” said Phin, who could resort to flattery when anything was to be gained by it. “O, look, Mose! ain’t Phi doing it splendid? It’s going to be the best whiplash ever you set eyes on.”
Mr. Pipkin’s lips tightened in a grin around his big front teeth, and he worked harder than ever drawing the strands over the taper belly, while Phin, leaning over the back of his chair, whispered to Jack, “See what a fool I can make of him!”
At that Mrs. Pipkin, who had a keen ear and a sharp temper, flared up.
“Mr. Pipkin!”
“What, Mis’ Pipkin?”—meekly.
“You’ve worked long enough on that whiplash. He’s making fun of ye; and that’s all the thanks you’ll ever get for helping him. Take hold here and pare these apples while I slice ’em up.”
“In a minute. I can’t le’ go here jes’ now,” said Mr. Pipkin.
Whereupon Mrs. Pipkin laid down her knife and the apple she was paring, and looked at her husband over the rim of the pan in perfect astonishment.
“Mr. Pipkin! did you hear my request?”
“Yes, I heerd ye, but—”
“Mr. Pipkin,” interrupted Mrs. Pipkin, severely, “_will_ you have the kindness to pare these apples? I don’t wish to be obliged to speak again!”
“What’s the apples fer,—sass?” said Mr. Pipkin, mildly.
“Pies; and you know you’re as fond of pies as anybody, Mr. Pipkin.”
“Wal, so I be, _your_ pies. I declare, you do beat the Dutch with your apple-pies, if I do say it. There, Phin, I guess you can go along with the belly now. If it’s for pies, I’ll pare till the cows come hum!”
Thus disguising his obedience to his wife’s request, Mr. Pipkin took the pan and the knife, and Mrs. Pipkin recovered from her astonishment.
“Jack might pare the apples and let Phi braid!” Phin complained, getting into difficulties with his whiplash. “Darn this old belly!” And he flung it across the room.
“Phineas! you shall go to bed if I hear any more such talk,” said Mrs. Chatford, as sternly as it was in her kind motherly nature to speak. Then looking at Jack in the corner, “How happens it you are not reading your book to-night? It’s something new for you to be idle.”
“O, I don’t feel much like reading to-night,” said Jack, whose heart was where his treasure was.
“He’s thinking about his half-dollar, waiting to know if it’s a good one,” sneered Phin.
“Shouldn’t wonder if that half-dollar had dropped out of old Daddy Cobb’s money-box,” remarked Mr. Pipkin, taking a slice of apple.
“Mr. Pipkin! these apples are for pies!” said Mrs. Pipkin, in a warning voice.
“Daddy Cobb’s money-box! what’s that?” faltered Jack, fearing he had found an owner to the coin.
“What! didn’t ye never hear tell about Daddy Cobb’s diggin’ for a chist o’ treasure? Thought everybody’d heerd o’ that. There’s some kind o’ magic about it, hanged if I can explain jest what. The chist has a habit o’ shiftin’ its hidin’-place in the ground, so that though Daddy’s a’most got holt on ’t five or six times, it has allers slipped away from him in the most onaccountable and aggravatin’ manner. He has a way o’ findin’ where it is, by some hocus-pocus, hazel-wands for one thing; then he goes with his party of diggers at night,—for there’s two or three more fools big as him,—and they make a circle round the place, and one reads the Bible and holds the lantern while the rest dig, and if nobody speaks or does anything to break the charm, there’s a chance ’at they may git the treasure. Once Daddy says they had actooally got a holt on’t,—a big, square iron chist,—but jest’s they was liftin’ on’t out he jammed his finger, and said ‘Oh!’ and by hokey! if it didn’t disappear right afore their face an’ eyes quicker ’n a flash o’ lightnin’!”
Jack listened intently to this story. He did not believe that his treasure was the one Daddy Cobb had been digging for so long, but might it not elude his grasp in the same way?
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CHAPTER VI
“ABOUT THAT HALF-DOLLAR.”
AT every sound of wheels Jack started; and more than once he imagined he heard a wagon stop at the gate. Still no deacon; would he never return? Jack watched the clock, and thought he had never seen the pointers move so slowly.
Three or four times he went to the door to listen; and at last he walked down to the gate. It was bright, still moonlight, only the crickets and katydids were singing, and now and then an owl hooted in the woods or a raccoon cried.
“There’s a buggy coming!” exclaimed Jack. He could hear it in the distance; he could see it dimly coming down the moonlit road. “It’s Mr. Chatford!” He knew the deacon’s peculiar “_Ca dep!_” (get up) to the horse.
“That you, Jack?” said the deacon, driving in.
“Yes; thought I’d come down and shut the gate after you,” replied Jack.
Mr. Chatford stopped at the house, and Jack ran to help him take out some bundles. Then the deacon drove on to the barn, and Jack hurried after him. Still not a word about the half-dollar.
“You can go into the house; I’ll take care of Dolly,” said Jack.
“I’ll help; ’t won’t take but a minute,” said Mr. Chatford. “I’ve got bad news for you.”
“Have you?” said Jack, with sudden faintness of heart. “What?”
“For you and Lion,” added the deacon. “Duffer’s got another dog. He made his brags of him to-night. Said he could whip any dog in seven counties.”
“He’d better not let him tackle Lion!” said Jack.
“I told him I hoped he wouldn’t kill sheep, as his other dog did. Take her out of the shafts; we’ll run the buggy in by hand.”
The broad door of the horse-barn stood open. Jack led the mare up into the bright square of moonshine which lay on the dusty floor. There the harness was quickly taken off. Not a word yet concerning the half-dollar, which Jack was ashamed to appear anxious about, and which he began to think Mr. Chatford, with characteristic absent-mindedness, had forgotten.
“By the way, I’ve good news for you!” suddenly exclaimed the deacon.
Jack’s heart bounded. “Have you?”
“I saw Annie over at the Basin. She wants to go home to her folks to-morrow. Would you like to drive her over? She spoke of it.”
“And stay till Monday?” said Jack, to whom this would indeed have been good news at another time.
“Yes; start early, and get back Monday morning in time for her to begin school. Then she won’t go home again till her summer term is out.”
“Maybe—I’d better—wait and go then.” Jack felt the importance of early securing his treasure, and, having set apart Sunday afternoon for that task (“a deed of necessity,” he called it to his conscience), he saw no way but to postpone the long-anticipated happiness of a ride and visit with his dear friend. Yet what if the treasure were no treasure?
“As you please,” said the deacon, a little surprised at Jack’s choice. “Moses will be glad enough to go. See that she has plenty of hay in the rack, and don’t tie the halter so short as you do sometimes. Now give me a push here,”—taking up the buggy-shafts.
“Oh!” said Jack, as if he had just thought of something,—“I was going to ask you—about that half-dollar?”
“I didn’t think on ’t,” said Mr. Chatford, standing and holding the shafts while Jack went behind,—“not till I’d got started for home. Then I put my hand in my pocket for something, and found your half-dollar. Help me in with the buggy, and then I’ll tell you.”
The deacon drew in the shafts, Jack pushed behind, and the buggy went rattling and bounding up into its place.
“Did you go back?” asked Jack, out of breath,—not altogether from the effort he had just made.
The deacon deliberately walked out of the barn, and carefully shut and fastened the door; then, while on the way to the house, he explained.
“I had paid for my purchases out of my pocket-book, or I should have found that half-dollar before. However, as I had promised you, I whipped about and drove back to the goldsmith’s. He was just shutting up shop. I told him what I wanted. He went behind his counter, lit a lamp, looked at your half-dollar, cut into it, and then flung it into his drawer.”
“Kept it!” gasped out Jack.
“Yes; ’t was as good a half-dollar as ever came from the mint, he said. He gave me another in its place.”
Jack could not utter a word in reply to this announcement, which, notwithstanding his utmost hopes, astonished and overjoyed him beyond measure. As soon as he had recovered a little of his breath and self-possession, he grasped the deacon’s arm, and was on the point of exclaiming, “O Mr. Chatford! I have found a trunk full of just such half-dollars as that!”—for he felt that he must tell his joy to some one, and to whom else should he go? But already the deacon’s other hand was on the latch of the kitchen door, which he opened; and there sat the family round the table within.
“What is it, my boy?” said Mr. Chatford, as Jack shrank back and remained silent. “Oh! you want your half-dollar. Of course!” putting his hand into his pocket.
“I don’t care anything about _that_,” said Jack. He took it, nevertheless,—a bright, clean half-dollar in place of the scratched and tarnished coin he had given Mr. Chatford that afternoon.
Mr. Chatford stood holding the door open.
“Ain’t you coming in?”
“No, sir,—not just yet.”
Jack felt that he must be alone with his great, joyful, throbbing thoughts for a little while; and he wandered away in the moonlit night.
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CHAPTER VII
HOW JACK WENT FOR HIS TREASURE.
IN the forenoon of the following day Annie Felton dismissed her little school half an hour earlier than she was accustomed to do, and went to her Aunt Chatford’s house, to dine with her relatives and prepare for the long afternoon’s ride. She was greatly surprised when told that Jack was not to accompany her.
“Did Uncle Chatford speak to him about it?” she inquired of her aunt.
“Yes, but for some reason he didn’t seem inclined to go. That just suited Moses; he was glad enough of the chance.”
“Jack has found a half-dollar, and it has just about turned his head,” remarked Mrs. Pipkin.
“A half-dollar?” repeated Annie, wondering if such a trifle could indeed have so affected her young friend. No, she could not believe it. Then why had he willingly let slip an opportunity which she had thought he would be eager to seize?
Soon the men and boys came in to dinner,—Moses in high spirits, and with his Sunday clothes on; Jack jealous and unhappy.
“Why didn’t I leave _that_ till another Sunday? or get it one of these moonlight nights?” he said to smile, and moved her lips with some sweet, inaudible meaning as she passed him; but Moses, good fellow though he was, cast upon him a look of contempt, and flourished his whip, driving proudly away beside his beautiful cousin.
[Illustration: “IT’S A GREAT SECRET.”]
Jack, much as he thought of his hidden treasure, now for the first time in his life felt the utter worthlessness of money compared with the good-will and companionship of those we love,—a truth which it takes some of us all our lives to discover.
The sight of Annie Felton always stirred the nobler part of his nature; and now, going back to the house, he began to blame himself for having taken hitherto a purely selfish view of his treasure.
“All I’ve thought of has been just the good it was going to do _me_!” And he said to himself that he didn’t deserve the good fortune that had befallen him. Now to bestow it all upon her he felt would be his greatest happiness.
“And give some to you, precious little Kate!” was his second thought, as the gay little creature came running with Lion to meet him. In like manner his benevolence overflowed to all,—even to sharp-tongued Mrs. Pipkin,—after Annie Felton had stirred the fountain.
Twenty-four hours seemed long to wait. But the time for securing his treasure at last came round. He walked to church in the morning with Phin and Mr. Pipkin, but, without saying a word to anybody of his intentions, he at noon came home alone across the fields. He found, as he expected, Mrs. Chatford keeping house.
“Why, Jack!” said she, “why didn’t you stay to Sunday school and the afternoon services?”
“Don’t you want to go this afternoon?” replied Jack, evasively. “There will be some of the neighbors riding by, who will carry you. I’ll take care of the house.”
“You are very kind to think of me,” she said. “But I don’t think of going. You’d better eat your luncheon, and go right back.”
Jack longed to tell her everything on the spot, but feared she might disapprove of his going to bring home the treasure on the Sabbath. “After all’s over, then she’ll say I did right,” thought he. So he remarked, carelessly, “There’s a new minister to-day; I don’t like him very well. I guess I’ll go over and see Aunt Patsy a little while this afternoon.”
“If you do, I’ll send a loaf of bread and one of the pies we baked yesterday,” said Mrs. Chatford.
This was what Jack expected; and it gave him an excuse for carrying a basket. He took off his Sunday clothes, putting on an every-day suit in their place, lunched, and soon after started with Lion. He made a brief visit to the poor woman, and then set out for home by way of the woods.
On the edge of Aunt Patsy’s wood-lot he paused and looked carefully all about him. Not a human being was in sight. A Sabbath stillness reigned over all the sunlit fields and shadowy woods. There were Squire Peternot’s cattle feeding quietly in the pasture. A hawk was sailing silently high overhead. As he turned and walked on, two or three squirrels, gray and black, ran along the ground, disappearing around the trunks of trees to reappear in the rustling tops, and it was all he could do to keep Lion still.
“Look here, old fellow!” said he, “remember, you are not to bark to-day!”
From Aunt Patsy’s wood-lot he entered the squire’s, stepping over a dilapidated fence of poles and brush. The snapping of the decayed branches broke the silence; then, as he listened, he heard, far off, the bells for the afternoon service begin to ring. It was a strange sound, in that wildwood solitude, so shadowy and cool, and full of the fresh odors of moss and fern.
The bells were still ringing, and their faint, slow, solemn toll filled Jack’s heart with an indefinable feeling of guilt as he reached the log where his treasure was, and reflected upon the very worldly business that brought him there.
He did not reflect long,—he was too eager for the exciting work before him. Having walked on to the farther edge of the woods, to see that nobody was approaching from that direction, he returned, and began to pull out the sticks which he had stuffed into the end of the log.
“Everything’s just as I left it, so far,” thought he. “Wonder if my money-chest will dodge a fellow, like old Daddy Cobb’s!”
The opening clear, he put on an old brown frock which he had brought in the basket, laid his hat and coat on the ground, told Lion to watch them, and entered the log headforemost. The treasure, too, was where he had left it. His body stopped the cavity so that he could see nothing in its depths, but his groping hand felt the little trunk and the coin that had fallen out of its broken end.
“I’ll take this loose money out of the way first,” thought he; “then maybe I can move the trunk.”
He had nothing but his pockets to put the coin into, and those his frock covered. “I’ll find something better,” thought he. Backing out of the log, he pulled off his shoes, and re-entered with one of them in his hand. This he filled with all the half-dollars he could find about the end of the trunk, which he then tried to move.
“It’s stuck in a heap of rotten stuff here,” he muttered, “and I shall break it more if I pull hard on it.” So he resolved to empty it where it was.
He was half-way out of the log, bringing after him his shoe freighted with coin, when he was startled by a sudden bark from Lion. Leaving his shoe, he tumbled himself out upon the ground in fearful haste, to find a stray calf in the bushes the innocent cause of alarm. For keeping guard too faithfully poor Lion got a box on the ear.
After waiting awhile, to see if anything more dangerous than the calf was nigh, Jack brought out his shoe, poured its rattling contents into the basket, which he covered with his coat, and then went back into the log. This time he took both shoes in with him, which he filled, and emptied one after the other into the basket. Another journey, another, and still another, and he began to think there was more coin than he could carry home.
“I can get it away from here, though, so nobody can tell on whose land I found it,”—which he seemed to think a very important point to gain. “I’ll leave the little trunk where it is,—only take out the money.”
He had gone into the log for the last time, and got the last of the money, filling both shoes quite full, and was bringing them out with him,—he had actually got them out, leaving one at the entrance to the opening, and holding the other in his hands,—when Lion, notwithstanding his previous punishment, uttered a very low, suppressed growl.
Jack looked up from under his tumbled hair, and there, not three yards distant, with his horn-headed cane, regarding with grim amazement the boy and his shoes full of coin, stood Squire Peternot!
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CHAPTER VIII
JACK AND THE SQUIRE.
FEARING a raid upon his melon-patch, which bad boys in the neighborhood were beginning to molest, the squire had stayed at home to watch it that Sunday afternoon. He had seen Jack with his dog and basket cross the fields, go to Aunt Patsy’s house, and afterwards enter the woods; and, feeling the interest of a stern moral censor in the conduct of all Sabbath-breaking boys, he had followed him to the hollow log. Lion’s indiscreet barking had at first served to guide him to the spot; and afterwards his equally unfortunate silence, in consequence of the punishment he had suffered for that offence, favored the old man’s stealthy approach.
To have the faintest idea of the emotions that agitated the squire at sight of Jack and the shoes full of coin,—the wrath, the surprise, the avarice,—one must have seen him as he stood there, or have heard Jack (as I have heard him many times) describe the grim and frowning figure that met his eyes.
“What’s this, what’s this, eh?” cried Peternot, taking a stride forwards. “Money! on my land!” and the gray eyes glittered. “Ha! ha! This, then, is the meaning of all that talk about _treasure-trove_ the other day!”
[Illustration: “BOY! ARE YOU A ROBBER?”]
Jack felt so stunned for the moment that he did not attempt to speak, or even to rise. He sat on the ground, guarding his shoes, keeping one hand on the rim of the basket and looking up steadily at the squire with eyes full of mingled fear and defiance.
“So, so! What have you got in your basket?” And the stiff-jointed old man stooped to remove the coat which Jack had taken the precaution to spread over it each time when he entered the log.
“Here! you just leave that alone!” exclaimed Jack, while Lion gave a fierce growl. The squire dropped the garment instantly, but he had pulled it far enough from the basket to expose its surprising contents.
“Boy!” said he, in still greater amazement, “are you a robber?”
“Like enough I am,” muttered Jack, quite willing that he should take that view of the case.
“Boy!” repeated Peternot, with awful severity, “you’ve stolen this money, and it’s my duty to have you arrested. I am a justice of the peace.” Jack changed countenance at that.
“I’ve stolen it about as much as I stole Mr. Chatford’s horse and buggy once, which you were so sure of, when they were all the while standing under the shed at the Basin, just where Mr. Chatford left them.”
“Then how did you come by so much money?”
“If you must know, I found it in this log,” said Jack, with a sudden determination to tell the plain truth, and stand or fall by it.
“How do I know but what you stole it and hid it here, so you could pretend you’d found it?”
Jack was glad now that he had not removed the trunk.
“If you can’t see by the look of this silver that it’s been hid away here longer than I’ve been in the town,” he replied, “you can just go into the log and find the trunk, that you’ll say has been there about as many years as I am old, that’s all!”
“Is there any more money in there?”
Jack was willing the squire should think there might be, nor was he sure there were not a few pieces in the rubbish about the trunk; so he said, “It belongs to me, if there is.”
“Belongs to you? You little scapegrace! By what right?”
“It belongs to me,—that is,” added Jack, “if the real owner doesn’t turn up,—because I found it.”
“Found it, on my land! You haven’t got it off from my land yet, and I forbid your taking it off. What’s left in the log you haven’t even had in your possession. I want nothing but what’s my own by a plain interpretation of law; but the law’s with me in this. If you had once fairly got the coin away without my knowledge, there might have been some question about it; but that you’ve been caught trespassing, and that you’ve no right to take anything from my premises in my presence and against my express orders, is common sense as well as common law.”
Fire and tears rushed into poor Jack’s eyes.
“And do you mean to say you’ll take all this money away from me?”
“Sartin, I do, since it don’t belong to you, not a dollar on ’t. I’ll make ye a reasonable reward, however, if you give it up without making me any unnecessary trouble.”
“What do you call a reasonable reward? Half?”
“Half! of all that money!” exclaimed the squire, in huge astonishment. “Preposterous! I’ll give ye more than liberal pay for your trouble. I’ll give ye five dollars.”
Thereupon grief and fury and fierce contempt burst from the soul of Jack. All the softening influences which had been at work upon him for the past few months were forgotten in a moment; he was the vicious, desperate, profane little canal-driver once more. Looking up through tears of rage at the startled squire, he shouted, “Go to thunder, you hoary old villain!” and followed up this charge with a volley of blasphemy and abuse, which lasted for at least a minute. By that time the squire had recovered his self-possession; so, in a measure, had Jack; and the hurricane of passion that had swept everything before it was followed by a lull of sullen hate and despair.
“That’s the kind of boy you are, is it? after all your living among Christian people!” said the old man, with a sort of grim satisfaction.
“It’s the kind of boy I was, and it’s the kind of boy such Christians as you are will make me again, if I let you!” said Jack, kindling once more. “I didn’t mean to swear, but I forgot myself. I haven’t before, since the first Sunday after I came off from the canal. That’s because I _have_ been living among Christians,—people who try to encourage a fellow and help him, by bringing out the good that’s in him, instead of grinding him down, and keeping him down, by telling him how bad he’s always been and always will be,—like the kind of Christian _you_ are!”
“Talk to me about being a Christian, you profane Sabbath-breaker!” said Peternot, choking with indignation.
“A Sabbath-breaker, am I? And what are you? I own up to what brought me here to-day, but what brought _you_ here? What keeps you here? Why ain’t you at church? Guess you consider your worldly interests worth looking after a little, if _’tis_ Sunday,—don’t you?”
“Come, come, boy! that kind of talk won’t help matters.”
“Then le’s stop it,” said Jack. “But if you come here on Sunday and try to get my money away from me, and accuse me of Sabbath-breaking because I mean to keep it, I shall have just a word to say back, you better believe!” And, still sitting on the ground, Jack held his shoes between his legs, and guarded one side of the basket, while Lion guarded the other.
“What do you want of so much money,—a boy like you?” said the squire, adopting a more conciliatory tone.
“What do you want of it,—a man like you? without a child in the world, since you drove your only son away from home by your hard treatment, and he died a drunkard and a gambler!”
The old man fairly staggered backward at this cruel blow, and uttered a suppressed groan.
“It was mean in me to say that,” added Jack, relenting; “I didn’t mean to; but you drove me to it. What do you want of more money than you’ve got already?—that’s what I meant to ask. You’re a rich man now. You’ve ten times as much as you need; what do you want of more? To carry into the next world with ye? one would think so,—an old man like you!”
“Boy!” said the trembling Peternot, “you don’t know what you’re talking about!”
“Yes, I do; I’m talking just what a good many other folks talk, only not to your face. They say, ‘There’s old Squire Peternot, seventy years old, with one foot almost in the grave,—rich enough in all conscience,—don’t use even the interest on what money he has, but lays it up, lays it up,—lives meanly as the poorest farmer in town,—never gives a dollar, except when he can’t help it, and then you’d think it hurt him like pulling his teeth,—and yet there he is, trying to get Aunt Patsy’s little house and lot away from her,—making tight bargains, screwing his workmen’s wages down to the lowest notch’; that’s what I’ve heard, every word of it, and you know that every word of it is true!”
“I have my own ideas about property,” said the squire; “and no man—no prudent man—likes to squander what’s his own.”
“And so you, with all your wealth, come and grab this money, which is all I have in the world, and offer me five dollars to give it up to you! You _are_ a prudent man! I say squander!”
“I’ll give you twenty dollars of it,—and that’s liberal, I’m sure,” said Peternot, a good deal shaken by what Jack had said, but unable, from long habit, to take his hand from any worldly goods that it chanced to cover.
“Twenty dollars!” laughed Jack, with scornful defiance. “_I_ don’t make bargains on Sunday.”
This cool sarcasm caused the worthy Peternot to wince as at the taste of some bitter medicine. “I don’t bargain on the Lord’s day, neither. But I see the necessity of coming to some sort of terms with you.”
“Very well; then you just walk off and leave me and my dog to take care of this money; those are the only terms you can come to with me.”
“But what do you propose to do, if I don’t walk off?”
“Stay here,—Lion and I,—and hang on to our _treasure-trove_. Your nephew, who knows so much about law, advised me to keep possession,—to fight for it,—and I will.”
“And do you think I’m going to give up to you, you renegade?” cried the squire. He moved to lay his hand on the basket; but there was something in Lion’s growl he didn’t like. “I’ll beat that beast’s brains out, if he offers to touch me!” he exclaimed, grasping his cane menacingly.
“I advise you not to try that little thing,” said Jack. “If you should miss your stroke, where would you be the next minute?”
The squire thought of that. His tone changed slightly.
“I don’t leave this spot till I git possession of that money!”
“All right, Squire. Sit down,—you’d better. You’ll have some time to stop, I guess. Have a peach?” And the audacious little wretch took one out of his coat-pocket. “We shall need refreshments before we get through!” As Peternot indignantly declined the proffered fruit, Jack quietly broke it open, and ate, with a relish, the rich yellow pulp. The old man accepted the invitation to sit down, however, and reposed his stiff old limbs on the end of the hollow log, not clearly foreseeing how this little adventure was to end.
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CHAPTER IX
THE SQUIRE’S PERPLEXITY AND JACK’S STRATAGEM.
A LITTLE calm reflection opened the squire’s mind to a ray of light which would certainly have dawned upon it before, had not his wits been clouded by passion. “Boy!” he suddenly exclaimed, “I believe every dollar of that money is bogus.”
“Then what’s the use of making a row over it?” was the boy’s cool retort.
“It’s the business of a magistrate to look after counterfeiters and counterfeit money,” said Peternot. But at the same time he thought, “_He_ has satisfied himself that it _ain’t_ counterfeit; his whole conduct shows it.” And the avaricious old man still laid siege to the basket.
Half an hour passed, during which time very little was said. Jack took out his knife and began to whittle a stick; perhaps he was not unwilling to show the squire that he was armed. He also put on his coat, and then his shoes, after emptying their contents into the basket.
Peternot grew more and more impatient, as he saw the afternoon gliding away. Another half-hour, and the situation still remained unchanged. “I may set here till night,” thought he, “and all night, and all day to-morrow, fur’s I know,—but what’s the use? He’ll stick as long as I do. He’s tough; he can stand anything; ye can’t starve a canal-driver. Sakes!” he exclaimed, half aloud, suddenly putting his hand into his pocket, remembering that the key of his kitchen door was there.
On leaving home he had carefully made fast all the doors and windows of his house,—his wife and nephew having gone to meeting that afternoon; and now, should they return before he did, they would find themselves locked out!
Still the old man’s cupidity would not suffer him to raise the siege.
He was taken by a fit of coughing; and, fearing to catch cold by sitting on the damp log, he got up and walked about,—frowning and striking his cane upon the ground in huge dissatisfaction and disgust. “You’re the most obstinate, unreasonable boy I ever see!” he exclaimed angrily.
“Am I?” laughed Jack. “You haven’t begun to see how obstinate I am. Wonder what you’ll think to-morrow at this time? or the next day?” And what, he might have added, would the wife and nephew think?
“Hush!” whispered the old man. “What boys are those?”
There was a crackling of sticks in a not very distant part of the woods, occasioned by a gang of four or five boys climbing Peternot’s brush fence. Jack jumped upon the log and looked.
“It’s the Huswick tribe,” said he. “There’s Dock, there’s Hank, there’s Cub,—there they all are, going over your fence like a flock of sheep!”
“The Huswicks, Cub and Dock,—Hank with ’em!” ejaculated the squire, in great excitement. “They’re the wust set of boys in town!”
“Yes, and they’re putting straight towards your house,” observed Jack.
“They’re after my melons!” said Peternot, brandishing his cane. “The rogues! I’ll larn ’em!” With a limping stride he started in pursuit, but turned back immediately. “Promise me you’ll stay here!”
Jack couldn’t help laughing at the old man’s simplicity. “Do you think I’m such a fool as to make that promise? Or even if I should, would you trust me to keep it? Come!” cried Jack, “you must have a better opinion of me than you pretend.”
“I know you have some good traits—the rogues will destroy all my melons—if I could borrow your dog—leave your basket and go with me—we’ll settle our diffikilty when we come back,” said the agitated squire.
“I’ll take care of my basket; you can look after your melons,” retorted Jack.
“I’d as lives have a passel o’ pigs in my melon-patch!” cried Peternot, striding to and fro. “Boy! I’m sure this money is bogus!—I wish I had called to ’em ’fore they got out o’ hearin’!”
“Why didn’t ye?” asked Jack.
“That might ’a’ led ’em to come here, and we don’t want anybody by the name o’ Huswick to have a hand in this business. But my melons!—Boy, be reasonable!”
“Be reasonable yourself, Squire Peternot! You’re sure this money is bogus; then why don’t you leave it and go for your melons?”
“I _ain’t_ sure,” replied the squire. “But _you_’re sure it’s good money; I see that, and you’re no fool.”
“Thank ye, sir,” said Jack, politely. And, seeing that the old man’s cupidity made him ready to believe almost anything, he added, “Now look here! If I’ll give you what money there is in the basket, will you be satisfied?”
Peternot started. “Satisfied? Sartin—I can’t tell—explain!”
“Will you take this, and leave me what there is still in the log? That’s what I mean,” said Jack, with an air of candor.
Peternot, astonished by this strange proposition, but afraid of being cheated out of a few dollars, asked, “How much is there in the log?” at the same time stooping with difficulty and peeping into the cavity.
“That’s my risk. Come, is it a bargain?”
“I thought you didn’t make bargains on the Sabbath day!”
“Well, I don’t,” laughed Jack, “unless some good man sets me the example. I’m only a boy,—it’s easy to corrupt me.”
“Corrupt you! you sassy, profane—”
“Sabbath-breaker,” suggested Jack, as Peternot hesitated for a word bad enough. “What do you say to my offer?”
“I say, if there’s money in the log, it belongs to me, the same as this belongs to me.” And the squire, impressed by the importance of having some accurate knowledge on that point, vigorously thrust in his cane.
“Your stick can’t give ye much information,” said Jack. “You’ll have to go in yourself.”
“I’m going in myself!” exclaimed the squire, sharply. “Move out of my way here.”
Jack readily made room for him, tickled to the heart’s core at the thought of the stiff-jointed old man’s going into the log.
“Grin, will ye?” said Peternot. “I s’pose you think the minute I’m in there you’ll start to run with your basket. But you can’t run fur with that weight to carry; I shall ketch ye!”
He leaned his cane by the log, laid his hat beside it, and put his head and one arm into the cavity. Then he put in his shoulders and both arms. “I can hear ye, if ye stir to move!” he cried from the hollow depths, which muffled his voice; and in his body went, leaving only the long Peternot legs sticking out.
Jack was convulsed with laughter. But all at once the idea occurred to him that practical advantage might be taken of the squire’s ludicrous situation. Up he jumped, and seizing the largest of the sticks with which he had previously stopped the mouth of the log, began to thrust them in after the squire.
“Here! oh! oh! murder!” cried the voice, now more muffled than ever, while the old man struggled violently to get out. “Oh! oh!”
“Good by!” screamed Jack, holding him, and thrusting in more sticks. “_You_ may have what’s in the log, and _I_’ll take the basket.”
[Illustration: PETERNOT IN THE HOLLOW LOG.]
“Help! ho! I’m killed!” said the voice, growing fainter and fainter.
“And buried!” Jack yelled back, laughing with wild excitement. “But you kick well, for all that!” And in went more rubbish about the old man’s heels. “How do ye like your bargain? You’ll have plenty of time to count your dollars before I send Pipkin over to help you out.”
And, having got the old man wedged so tightly into the log that he could not even kick, Jack, inspired with extraordinary strength for the occasion, caught up his basket of coin and started to run, followed by Lion.
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CHAPTER X
“THE HUSWICK TRIBE.”
RUNNING quickly behind walls and fences, the Huswick boys made a rapid raid upon Peternot’s melon-patch, and left it loaded with spoils.
“Say, Dock!” said Hank (nickname for Henry), skulking behind some bushes, “le’s put for Chatford’s orchard, and scatter rines by the way, so if we’re tracked the old man’ll think ’t was the deacon’s boys hooked his melons.”
“Go ahead!” said Dock (nickname for Jehoshaphat), carrying two fine ripe melons on his left arm while he dug into one of them with a jack-knife in his right hand. “Stoop, and keep clus to the fence!”
“No danger, old man’s gone to meetin’,” said Cub, whose real name was Richard,—his odd shape (he was ludicrously short and fat) having probably suggested the nickname.
“Me an’ Cub can go without stoopin’,” giggled Hod, the youngest (christened Horace). “See Hank! he looks like a well-sweep!”
And indeed the second of the boys, who was as wonderfully tall and lank as Cub was short and thick, bore no slight resemblance to that ornament of country door-yards.
“Hanged if one o’ mine ain’t a green one!” exclaimed Tug (short for Dwight), dashing to the ground a large watermelon, the sight of which in ruins would have made old Peternot’s heart ache.
“Guess we made a clean sweep of all the ripe ones,” said Cub. “No, you don’t!” as Tug offered to relieve him of one of his three. “I never had my fill o’ melons yit, though I’ve”—cramming his mouth while he continued to talk—“been in the squire’s patch much as once afore now.”
“You never had your fill of anything, I believe, Cub!” said Hod, with his usual giggle. “Remember when we went there in the night last year?”
“Night’s no time to go for melons,” said Cub. “Ye can’t tell a ripe one ’thout cuttin’ into ’t.”
“Yes, ye can,” said Tug; “smell on ’t. That’s the best way to tell a mushmelon.”
“Cub’s terrible petic’lar about slashin’ the ol’ man’s whoppers, all to once,” said Horace.
“Of course, for if we cut a green one we sha’n’t find it ripe next time we go,” Cub explained. “Jest look! we’re makin’ a string o’ rines all the way from Peternot’s to the deacon’s orchard!”
“There now, boys,” said Hank, “throw what rines ye got down here by the brook, an’ stop eatin’ till we git to the woods.”
Their course had been westward, until they reached the orchard. They now took the line of stone-wall which divided the squire’s land from the deacon’s, and which led northward to the corner of Peternot’s wood-lot,—Hank following Dock, Cub following Hank, Tug after Cub, and Hod bringing up the rear. In this order they entered the woods, and were hastening to find a secluded spot where they could sit and enjoy their melons, when suddenly Dock stopped.
“Thought I heard somebody,” he said to Hank, coming up.
“So did I. Lay low, boys! Git behind this log!”
Down went boys and melons in a heap, each of the brothers, as he arrived, tumbling himself and his load with the rest. There they lay, only Hank’s long, crane-like neck being stretched up over the log to reconnoitre; but presently even he thought it time to duck, and threw himself flat upon the ground with the rest.
“Keep dark!” he whispered; “it’s that Jack Hazard, that lives to the deacon’s! him an’ his big dog!”
Jack indeed it was, who had been too intently occupied in fastening Peternot into the log to notice the approach of the Huswick boys. He had thought of them, to be sure, but had supposed they would return through the woods as they went.
He was now running as fast as he could with his basket of treasure, directing his course towards the orchard, but keeping a little to the right in order to reach a low length of fence, over which he intended to climb, and then betake himself to the smoother ground of the pasture. A log lay in his way. Lion, growling, drew back from it—too late. Jack, in his headlong haste, sprang upon it, and leaped down on the other side, alighting on a frightful heap of legs and heads and watermelons. He jumped on Hank, tripped against Cub, and, falling, spilt his basket of rattling coin all over Tug and Dock and Hod. Thereupon the heap rose up as one man, astonishing poor Jack much as if he had stumbled upon a band of Indians lying in ambush.
“What in thunder!—Jerushy mighty!—half-dollars!” ejaculated Cub and Dock and Tug; while Hank stretched himself up to his full height, and Hod fell vindictively upon Jack.
“Le’ me go!” screamed Jack, taking his knee out of a muskmelon, and shaking off his assailant.
“That’s my melon,” said Hod, diving at him again furiously, “an’ you’ve smashed it!”
He was butting and striking with blind rage, when Lion bounced upon him, and actually had him by the collar of his coat, dragging and shaking him with terrible growls, when Tug and Cub and Dock—one catching Hod by the heels, one Jack, and the other Lion—disentangled the combatants.
“Where j’e git all this money?” demanded Cub.
“Found it, and I’m carrying it home,” said Jack, scrambling to pick up his scattered half-dollars.
“He’s murdered somebody for it!” cried Hank, peering in the direction of the hollow log. “I heerd him! Hold on to him, boys!” and he ran to make discoveries.
“Don’t ye do that!” said Jack, as Hod rushed to help him pick up the coin. “My dog will have hold of ye again! Watch, Lion!”
“Take that out o’ yer pocket, Hod!” said Cub, seizing his youngest brother by the neck. “Melons is fair game, but now ye’re stealin’. None o’ that while I’m around!”
Hank, meanwhile, had reached the hollow log, beside which the hat and cane were; when, hearing groans from within and seeing a pair of legs sticking out, he began at once to remove the rubbish from the opening. Dock and Tug went to his assistance; and, each laying hold of a leg while Hank pulled energetically at the coat-tail, poor old Peternot, half smothered, fearfully rumpled, and frightfully cross, was hauled out by the heels horizontally.
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CHAPTER XI
THE “COURT” AND THE “VERDICT.”
WHEN at length the squire stood upon the legs he had been drawn out by, and found himself in the presence of the Huswick boys, the recognition and pleasure were mutual.
“You scoundrels!” he began, brushing the dirt from his clothes and hair.
“What are we scoundrels fer?” said Hank, the tall one, with a comical grin on his thin, sinewy features. “Fer snakin’ ye out of the log?”
“If ye ain’t satisfied, we can pack ye in agin,” suggested Dock. But Peternot did not seem to take that view of the matter.
“How come ye in there, anyhow?” said Tug. “Was he murderin’ on ye?”
“Yes! Where is the villain? He’s got my money!” And away limped the old man in pursuit of the youthful robber and assassin.
“Them melons!” whispered Tug.
“Can’t help it now,” muttered Dock. “Hank, I wish you’d left the old fox in his hole!”
Guided by the sound of voices, and the sight of a head or two between the standing trunks, Peternot marched straight to the log behind which Jack was busy picking up his half-dollars. There were Cub and Hod watching him, while Lion watched them; there also were the stolen melons,—an interesting sight to the angry squire.
“Hullo, boys!” said Hank, leaning over the log, with one foot upon it, “where did them melons come from?”
“Do’no’,” replied Cub. “They was here when we come,—wa’n’t they, Hod?”
“Them melons come from my garden, and they come by your hands!” exclaimed Peternot. “I know it! and I’ll have ye up for trespassin’, the hull coboodle of ye!”
“Look here, squire!” said Hank, “seems to me you’re a little mite hasty. You ought to know your friends better ’n all that. Where’d you be now, if ’twa’n’t for us? In that ’ere hole. And where’ll ye be agin in less’n no time, if ye ain’t plaguy careful? In that ’ere hole!”
“He says you was murderin’ on him, Jack,” observed Tug.
“That’s a likely story!” cried the excited Jack, who by this time had got his half-dollars all back into the basket again. “Could I put him into the log? He was _in_ the log,—he was robbing _me_,—so I fastened him in and got away,—or I _should_ have got away, if I hadn’t stumbled over you fellows. Now just help me home with this money, and I’ll pay you well.”
“Help him at your peril!” said Peternot. Then, seeing the importance of securing such powerful allies, he added, “Maybe I was hasty, boys. Help me home with _my_ money, and I’ll say nothin’ about the melons.”
“That’s fair, if it’s your money,” said Hank. “Seems to be a dispute about it. Guess we’ll try the case. Come, now,—you fust, squire,—give in yer evidence whilst the court refreshes himself with a melon or two.”
So saying, Hank coolly reached over and stuck his knife into a watermelon, which he proceeded to eat, sitting on the log. “Take holt, boys,” he said, “this is lickin’ good,—wonder whose patch it come from! Yours, did ye say, squire? Guess I shall have to pay ye a visit some time. No, no, Jack! set down that basket! ye can’t leave the court with the damages ’fore the case is decided. Wal, seein’ the old man hain’t found his tongue yit, we’ll hear _your_ testimony.”
Peternot was, in fact, so choked with wrath at the sight of the five Huswick boys—for all the others had duly followed Hank’s example—sitting comfortably on the log, regaling themselves with his melons, that he could not have spoken without doing his cause great injury; and thus it happened that Jack was first heard.
[Illustration: THE “COURT” IN THE WOODS.—Page 73.]
“Now put your hand on this watermelon an’ swear’t you’ll tell the truth, the hull truth, and nothin’ but the truth,” said Hank, who had more than once seen the inside of a court-room,—perhaps unwillingly; and he handed Jack a slice of melon, which the poor fellow took with a grin and ate. “Now answer me; an’ don’t ye try to tell too much; for though they alluz make a chap swear to tell the _hull_ truth, they never let him, but shet his mouth dumb quick if he goes to let out more ’n they ask fer. Now.” (Hank took a bite of melon.) “What’s yer name?”
“Jack Hazard.”
“Ockepation?”
“I work for Mr. Chatford.”
“What did ye do ’fore that?” (Another bite.)
“I drove on the canal, for Captain Berrick.”
“How did ye happen to leave him?”
“He flung me into the canal twice in one day, which I thought was once too often, and I run away from him.”
“Poor boy?” (Hank dug into his melon again.)
“Yes; I never had anything,—I never had even a chance for myself till now.”
“Take another slice,” said Hank. “Now you’ve got a chance for yourself?”
“I thought I had; but this old man here comes down on me, and claims the money which I found in that hollow log.” And Jack, with the indulgence of the august court,—holding his second slice of melon in his hand,—poured forth his story.
“Now what have you got to say to all that?” said Hank, turning to the squire. “Have a bite? ye better,” holding out a piece of melon on the blade of his jack-knife.
Peternot declined to regale himself, and made answer: “I say what I’ve said to him,—the money (if ’t is money, though in all probability it’s bogus) was found on my premises, it has not been taken from my premises, and I forbid his takin’ it. But I’ve offered him a liberal reward for findin’ on ’t, and I offer it again.”
“Squire,” said Hank, “you’re a fair man, an’ I must say your melons are excellent. What do ye think, boys?”
Now the boys were unanimously of the opinion (with the exception of Hod) that the coin was spurious, and consequently good for nothing but to help them make their peace with Peternot. Jack saw them winking at each other, and knew their thoughts.
“You sha’n’t take it away from me!” he cried, throwing himself upon the basket. “I’ll die first! and you’ll have to kill my dog! O, I wish Mr. Chatford was here!”
“That’s the most sensible idee yit,” said Dock. “Boys, we don’t want to mix up with this business, only to see fair play. Better let the deacon settle it. He’s hum from meetin’ by this time. Go fer him, Bub; I’ll take care of your basket.”
“Will you! Won’t you let him have it? nor take it yourselves?”
“What should we take it fer? We’ve no claim on ’t, anyhow,” said Hank, who might, however, have thought and acted differently if he had believed the coin genuine. “Put, now! If I’m alive, the basket shall stay till you come back.”
“Besides, you can leave your dog,” said Cub. “He’ll watch your interest, while the squire’ll watch hisn. Be quick, for we can’t stay much longer ’n it’ll take to finish our melons.”
Notwithstanding his anxious doubts, Jack was persuaded that the best thing he could do was to run in all haste for the deacon, leaving Lion, Peternot, and the Huswick boys to watch each other and take care of the treasure in his absence.
“We’ll keep our word about the basket,” said Hank, with a droll look, as Jack disappeared over the fence; “but about the stuff that’s in ’t, this is the judgment of the court,—we allow ’t the squire’s claim is just, an’ give him the money, pervided he’ll say nothin’ ’bout the melons, but pay us a dollar apiece for helpin’ him carry it hum.”
“But we’ve engaged ’t the basket shall stay till he comes back,” Cub objected.
“An’ whatever else we do, we’re fellers that keeps our word,” added Dock, over his melon.
“Then how’s the coin to go?” demanded the exasperated squire, thinking the boys meant to dally with him until Mr. Chatford’s arrival.
“You don’ know nothin’ ’bout war,—you never see a one-hoss wagon!” said Dock, contemptuously. “Hod, off with yer breeches!”
Hod naturally objected, on strong personal grounds, to this part of the arrangement. He started to run, but Tug headed him off, and Cub seized him; when, finding that, with or without his consent, he was destined to part with the required garment for a season, the lamb of the flock yielded, and kicked off that portion of his fleece.
Cub took the trousers, and quickly turned the legs into a pair of bags by tying cords about the ankles. “Now bring on yer grist,” said he; “I’ll hold the sack open!”
“Plague on the dog!” said Tug. “He won’t le’ me tech it.”
“I can coax him. Here, poor fellow!” said Cub, patting him.
Lion did not greatly resent the patting, but the moment Cub’s hand reached for the basket, a deep growl warned him off.
“Kill the brute!” cried Peternot. “We can’t be bothered this way.”
“That’s easy enough, if you’ll pay damages,” said Dock.
“That I’ll do,—a miser’ble cur that stan’s in the way o’ my takin’ my own, on my own premises!”
“Kill him it is, then,” said Dock, looking for a club, and finding two. “Hank, you take this. Cub, you take your dirk-knife. Squire, lend Tug your cane, or use it yourself.”
“Now see here!” objected Hank. “This looks to me kind o’ mean,—half a dozen on us agin one dog! Hanged if I don’t like the looks o’ the pup, an’ I won’t have him killed.”
“What’ll ye do, then?”
“I’ll show ye.”
Lion was standing near the log, on the other side of which Hank placed himself.
“Now pretend you’re goin’ to grab the basket!”
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CHAPTER XII
HOW HOD’S TROUSERS WENT TO THE SQUIRE’S HOUSE.
HANK leaned over the log,—his lank frame and astonishing length of limb favoring the execution of his stratagem,—and seized Lion by one of his hind legs while his attention was diverted by a feigned attack upon the treasure. Finding himself caught, the dog wheeled furiously; but on the instant Hank, swinging his hind-quarters upon the log, drew them between two prongs of an upright limb, forked near the trunk, where it was easy to hold him, with his head hanging.
“Now who’s got a good stout string?”
“Here’s a whiplash in Hod’s breeches pocket!”
Tug leaped the log with it, and assisted in lashing Lion’s hind legs to the limb, below the fork in which he was suspended by his thighs. The poor fellow’s struggling and yelping were of no avail: there he was, hung.
Meanwhile Cub held his pair of bags open, and the coin was emptied into them. The squire stooped with many a groan to pick up the scattered pieces that rolled on the ground. Then the well-freighted trousers were set astride Hank’s lofty neck; at which he began to prance and kick up, in playful imitation of a colt—or should we say a giraffe?—with a strange rider.
“Now ye needn’t but one of ye go with me,” said Peternot; “or at the most two.”
“Two can’t carry all that silver,” said Cub. “We must all help. And edge along towards Aunt Patsy’s wood-lot, if ye don’t want to meet Jack and the deacon. Comin’, Hod?”
“I can’t without my breeches!” replied the discontented youth.
In no very pleasant mood he saw his trousers ride off on Hank’s shoulders,—still visible above the undergrowth after the squire and the rest of his odd escort had disappeared from view. So great indeed was Hod’s chagrin at being left behind in this way, that he found it necessary at once to set himself about some sort of mischief. First he broke open the best of the remaining melons, and ate as much as he could of them. Then he gathered up all the rinds and fragments and placed them in the basket, together with bits of rotten wood, covering the whole with the frock which Jack had left spread over the coin.
“Now when he comes he’ll think his money is there, till he looks, then won’t he be mad!” With which happy thought Hod ran and hid in some bushes, where he could watch the fun.
Meanwhile Hod’s trousers, with their legs full of coin, were shifted from shoulder to shoulder of his big brothers, as the strange procession emerged from the woods and moved across Peternot’s pasture, the squire lamely bringing up the rear. Arrived at his house, he brought out a meal-sack, and the coin was emptied into it. He then took two of the half-dollars and offered them to Hank.
“What’s that fer?” said the tall youth, stooping to look at the money as if it had been some curious insect.
“I owe ye a dollar,” said Peternot.
“So ye du,” replied Hank, “but I prefer to take my pay in money as is money, if it’s the same thing to you.”
“You yourself said you believed this was bogus,” added Dock; “an’ I don’t s’pose you want to be hauled up for passin’ it.”
Peternot felt the force of the remark, and with a long face took from his pocket-book a bank-note, which he handed to Hank.
“The same to me, if you please,” said Dock. “I said a dollar _apiece_.”
The squire protested against such extortion, but finally, reminded that he had said two of the boys might come with him, he paid Dock also. Then Cub and Tug held out expectant hands; whereat he flew into a passion.
“I don’t even know ’t the coin is good; and d’ ye think I’m goin’ to submit to any such swindle? Clear out, you melon-thieves!”
“All right!” said Cub, coolly, with his hand on the meal-sack; “but if I don’t take my dollar with me, I take this right back where we found it, and give it to the boy.”
The firm position thus taken by Cub being approved by his brothers, especially by Tug, the poor old squire saw no way but to yield, and Cub and Tug were paid.
“Now a dollar for Hod,” said Hank.
“For Hod!” roared out the squire, like a man tortured beyond endurance. “Hod didn’t come!”
“But his breeches did. A dollar for his breeches,—if that will suit you any better. And quick!” said Hank, “or the coin goes into ’em agin, an’ back to the basket.”
“I hain’t got another dollar!” said Peternot, trembling with wrath and vexation.
“You’ve a V there; we can change it,” suggested Cub.
“Take it, and may the rum ye buy with it pizen ye, you pack o’ thieves and robbers!”
“That sounds well from you, that have jest robbed a poor boy of what you more ’n half believe is good money, but which we’re dumb sure is bogus, or else we never ’d have helped ye off with it. Thieves and robbers, hey? Hear him, boys!”
Hank laughed derisively, and all went off chuckling gleefully over their Sunday afternoon’s job, while the squire, entering his house, slammed and bolted the door behind them.
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CHAPTER XIII
HOW JACK RESCUED LION, BUT MISSED THE TREASURE.
THE deacon’s folks had not got home from meeting when Jack reached the house; but he saw them coming,—Mr. Chatford, Mr. and Mrs. Pipkin, and Phin, in the old one-horse wagon. He met them at the gate, and hurriedly told his story as they were driving on to the house.
“Boy, you’re crazy!” said the incredulous deacon.
“No, I ain’t! Do come quick! They won’t wait long, and then Peternot will take the money!”
“Well, well,—I suppose I’ll go,—pretty work for Sunday, I should say!”
“It was wrong,—I ought to have told you all about it before,” said Jack, “but I thought I was doing the best thing; I didn’t want anybody to know whose land I found the money on, so _he_ couldn’t claim it.”
“Hurrah! I’ll go too!” cried Phin. “You take care of the old mare, Phi!”
“If it’s the Huswick boys, I guess I better go and see fair play,” remarked Mr. Pipkin; and he followed with the deacon, while Phin ran ahead with Jack.
The two boys reached the pasture; and now Jack, outstripping his companion, darted forward to a certain low length of fence, leaped upon it, and peered with a wild and anxious gaze into the woods.
“They’re gone! they’re gone!” he shrieked despairingly; and, tumbling over the rails, he ran through the bushes to the log.
_They_ were gone indeed; but there was his basket, just where he had left it, covered with his frock. He flew to it, and stripped off the covering; and there Phin, as he came up, found him staring in utter consternation and dismay at a peck of melon rinds and rotten wood.
“Is that yer money?” said Phin. “I don’t believe there was any: you’ve been fooling us!”
Jack threw out the rubbish, with the frantic thought that the coin must still be there.
“They’ve robbed me!” he sobbed out, when the bottom of the basket was reached and showed nothing but rinds and fragments of rotten wood.
A whining sound came to his ear; and just then Phin said, “O, just look! what’s the matter with your dog?” Jack looked, and there, half hidden by the bushes, was Lion hanging by the hips from the forked limb of the log. He sprang to rescue him. The whiplash was tied in a tight knot, and out came the boy’s knife to cut it.
This part of the fun Hod Huswick, in his ambush, had not anticipated, and did not relish.
“Here! that’s my whiplash! don’t ye cut it!” he cried; and from the bushes leaped the bare legs with their flapping linen, to the no little astonishment of Phineas Chatford.
[Illustration: JACK RESCUES LION.]
“I’ll cut it, and you too!” The whiplash was severed, and Jack, knife in hand, turned upon Hod. “What have you done with my money?”
“Hain’t done nothin’ with ’t,—I hain’t teched it.”
“Who has?”
“They took it, and stole my breeches to carry it off in, ’cause they said they’d promised you not to take the basket. They stole my whiplash, too, fer to tie the dog with; I couldn’t help myself; an’ now you’ve cut it!”
“Where’ve they gone?”
“To Peternot’s; he hired ’em to help him carry the money home.”
Then Jack saw how completely he had been outwitted and betrayed. He did not rave at his ill-luck; but to Mr. Chatford, who now approached with Mr. Pipkin, he told what had happened, and in a tone of unnatural calmness appealed to him for redress. “For if you can’t do anything for me,” he said, turning his pale face and tearless eyes at the empty basket, “I shall get my pay out of the old squire some way, if I live! Tell him he’d better look out!”
“There, there!” said the deacon, soothingly. “Don’t make any foolish threats. I think it’s most unwarrantable conduct on Peternot’s part, and I’ll see him about it.”
“Go over there right now! why can’t ye?”
“My boy, remember it’s Sunday.”
“_He_ didn’t remember it was Sunday when he got my money away!” said Jack.
“Very true,” said the deacon. “But nothing will be gained by going to him now. To-morrow I’ll see about it.”
“To-morrow!” echoed Jack, with a fierce laugh.
“Burn his house down, I would!” whispered Phin, who, notwithstanding his profession of sympathy, felt, I regret to say, a secret gratification at Jack’s loss.
“Where was ’t ye found the money, Jack?” Mr. Pipkin inquired.
Jack led the way, and all went to look at the hollow log. While they were standing about it Hod’s brothers returned. Hod ran for his trousers, but Cub, who was about to fling them at him, changed his mind and tossed them into a tree, where they lodged.
“That’s for spilin’ the melons,” said he, regarding the heap on the ground.
Hod caught up a club to throw at his amiable brother, but wisely changed his mind, and sent the missile up into the tree, in the hope of bringing down his breeches. As they did not come at the first fire, he sent club after club up after them, sputtering all the while with indignation; while his brothers walked loungingly on to the hollow log.
Jack glared at them with deep and sullen hate, without deigning to speak; but the good deacon said, “Seems to me, fellows, you’ve played off a despicable trick on this poor boy here! You ought to have protected him in his rights; but instead of that you’ve helped rob him.”
“Not much of a robbery, I guess, deacon,” replied Dock, good-naturedly. “’Twas nothin’ but a lot o’ bogus coin, no use to him nor to anybody.”
“You’re mistaken,” replied the ingenuous Chatford, letting out a secret which Jack had thought it wise to keep. “The coin was genuine; at least I’ve good reason to think so.” And he told why.
The Huswick boys looked at each other. “If that’s the case, we didn’t git so much the start of the squire as we thought we did!” muttered Dock. “On the contrary, he’s got the start of us! What do ye say, Hank?”
“It’s too late now to say anything about it; but hanged if I wouldn’t ’a’ swore the silver was no silver! I thought ’twas nothin’ but the old man’s avariciousness made him think it might be good. We let him off too easy!” And Hank appeared more than half minded to go back and make better terms with the squire.
“They hung Lion up by the heels!” said Phin, getting behind his father, for he had a chronic dread of the Huswick tribe.
“I’d tie you up by the heels too,” said Cub, with a peculiar smile, “if ’t wa’n’t Sunday!”
Whereupon Mr. Pipkin, who had been on the point of expressing an opinion, concluded to remain silent; the ruffians _might_ forget what day it was!
“Well, come, boys; I don’t see that we can do anything,” said the deacon. “We may as well go home.”
They walked back past the tree which Hod, in his imperfect attire, was still clubbing for the obstinate trousers, getting mad at them finally, and pelting them as if they were to blame for sitting there so quietly on the limb, in spite of him. Mr. Pipkin, out of respect to Jack’s grief, took up the basket and frock and carried them; while Jack lingered behind with Lion, pondering dark thoughts.
“Come, boy! you’d better go home,” said Mr. Chatford, coaxingly. “Don’t be down-hearted. It’ll turn out right or be made up to you somehow, if you meet it in the right spirit, I’m confident.”
“I’ll be there pretty soon,—I can’t go just yet,” replied Jack, dissatisfied with everybody and everything; and he wandered off by himself in the woods, brooding upon his wrongs.
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CHAPTER XIV
SQUIRE PETERNOT AT HOME.
AFTER dismissing the Huswick boys, Squire Peternot carried his bag of coin into the room which served him as an office, where he had scarcely time to place it in a corner beside a bureau, when there came a dull thump at the kitchen door. He knew Mrs. Peternot’s signal, knocking with the soft under-part of her feeble fist, and went to let her in.
She was a thin, wrinkled woman, dressed in black, with an expression of countenance almost as stern and sour as that of the grim old squire himself.
“Huh!” said she, scowling as she entered, “how happens it ye hain’t got the fire agoin’ an’ the taters bilin’?”
“I’ve had somethin’ else to think on. Where’s Byron?” replied her husband, shortly.
“Gone to the barn with the hoss, I s’pose. But he won’t unharness,—ketch him!”
“I didn’t expect he would, with his Sunday clo’es on.”
“Sunday clo’es or any clo’es on, he don’t tech his fingers to anything that’ll sile ’em, or that looks like work, if he can help it,” muttered good Mrs. Peternot, laying off her black bonnet. “You never would allow sich laziness in your own son, an’ why ye should in a nephew any more, I can’t consait.”
“Byron is a sort of visitor,” said the squire. “And if I choose to favor him,—now that we’ve nobody else to show favors to,—why shouldn’t I?”
“If you’d felt so indulgent towards _him_ when _he_ was alive, he might be with us now,” replied the discontented wife, carefully doing up her shawl before putting it away in its appropriate drawer.
By _him_ she meant their only son, whose bad habits had received so little encouragement beneath the parental roof, that he had taken them abroad with him and become their victim.
“Why must ye forever be gallin’ me with that subject?” said Peternot, with a look of anguish. “You know I did what I thought was for the best. Come, I’ll start the fire for ye, and put the pot on, if that’ll make ye any better-natered.”
“I’m good-natered enough, but I should think somethin’ had riled you up,” returned the lady. “What is it?”
“Boys have been in the melon-patch, for one thing.”
“Been in the melon-patch! when ye stayed to hum a’most a puppus to keep watch on ’t!” And the good woman, having removed her Sunday cap, false hair and all, turned her thin face and scowling brows, crowned by a few thin gray locks, in amazement on her husband. “That’s a likely story! was ye asleep, I wonder?”
Peternot made no reply, but went on kindling the fire in the open fireplace, until his nephew came in.
“I took the horse to the barn; did you want the harness off?” said that young gentleman, standing with his gloves and hat on, watching his uncle.
There was a slight affectation of foppery about Byron,—something which the plain people of the neighborhood called “soft”; and as Peternot, on his rheumatic knees before the fire, looked up through the smoke and ashes he was blowing into his face, and saw his dainty nephew stand there gloved and grinning, something of his wife’s feeling towards that nice young man came over him,—or was it only his impatience at the smoke and ashes?
“Nat’rally, I want the harness off, arter the hoss has been standin’ in ’t a good part o’ the day!” he answered, crossly.
“Oh!” said Byron; “I rather thought so, but I didn’t know.”
“I should think any fool would know that!”
“Very likely a fool would, but I didn’t happen to.” And, with the grin still on his features, the youth looked at the kneeling old man, very much as if he would have liked to give him a vigorous kick with his polished boot.
“No matter! I’ll ’tend to it,” said the squire, and went on with his blowing.
Byron smilingly withdrew.
“You never would have stood sich impudence from _him_,” said Mrs. Peternot, through the open door of a bedroom into which she had retired; “an’ why should ye from a nephew?”
The squire made no reply to this reasonable question, but, having kindled a fire and put on the pot, went out to take care of the horse. Byron meanwhile walked about the place with his fine clothes on, until supper was ready.
“Come, Byron,” then said the squire; and both went in and took seats at the little oilcloth-covered table. The supper consisted of boiled potatoes served with their skins on, thin slices of fried pork swimming in their own melted fat, and a heavy and sour kind of bread, which, by its quality and complexion, always reminded Byron of his Aunt Peternot, who seemed to have mixed up something of herself in the dough. He was blessed with a good appetite, however, and he ate heartily, notwithstanding his unpleasant consciousness of the fact—or was it only his imagination?—that the good woman watched with a begrudging scowl every morsel that went to his plate; seeming to say, “What! another tater! More bread! A second cup of tea, and sich big cups too! Seems to me I wouldn’t make a hog of myself, if I _was_ visitin’ my uncle!”
It was never a cheerful household; on Sundays it was even less sociable than on other days, and on this particular Sunday afternoon, Byron thought the cloud which hung over it unusually heavy. Something seemed to trouble his uncle, who sat grim and silent, sipping his tea scalding hot, and working his massy jaws as if the pork and potatoes had done him an injury, and he was wreaking a gloomy vengeance upon them.
“Where are you going, Byron?” the squire asked, as his nephew was about leaving the house after supper.
“Thought I’d walk out,—didn’t know but I might call at Deacon Chatford’s by and by,—I hear they have a little singing there, Sunday evenings.”
Mrs. Peternot scowled at the young gentleman, then turned and scowled at her husband, and said in an undertone: “It’s that ’ere Annie Felton, the schoolmarm! He’s arter her,—jest like all the rest on ’em!”
“Byron,” said the squire, solemnly, “I’d like to speak with you before you go out.” And he led the way to his office-room.
“Now what?” thought Byron, anxiously. “Is he going to tell me I’ve been here about long enough, and had better pack up my trunk and clear?”
“Byron,” said the squire, closing the door behind them, “it’s a subject I ought not to bring up on the Sabbath day, but it weighs upon my mind, and I’ve concluded I’d better speak to you about it. See what you think of this.” And he took from the corner behind the bureau the meal-bag with its compact but weighty contents, which he set down with a heavy chink before his nephew.
Byron, feeling greatly relieved, peeped curiously into the sack as Peternot opened it. “By mighty!” said he, surprised at what he saw, and thrusting in his hand. “Where did ye get this?”
In a few words the squire told the story. Byron in the mean time carefully tested one of the coins, cutting it with his knife and ringing it on the hearth.
“All right,” said he; “you’ve got possession. But what’s the use? ’Tain’t good for anything.”
“You think so?”
“I’m sure of it. Very well done, for counterfeiting,—but, of course!” And Byron tossed the piece back into the bag with a smile of contempt.
“Wal, that’s jest the conclusion I’ve come to,” said the squire. “I thought all along it might be bogus; and as soon as I got it fairly into my hands, I was sartin on ’t. What provokes me is the trouble it cost,—and more ’n all, the money them pesky Huswick boys gouged out of me!” And the old man groaned.
By this time Mrs. Peternot, her curiosity excited regarding the conference of uncle and nephew, came into the room, for an excuse exclaiming, “Why, squire! what have you got the house shet up so tight for?” and proceeded to open the window. “Massy on us! what ye got in the bag?”
“I told ye I had somethin’ to think on, this arternoon,” said Peternot; “and this is it.”
“It has cost him five dollars,” remarked Byron, pleasantly, “and it’s worth, as old metal, about fifty cents!”
“Wal, you have been fooled, complete!” exclaimed the old lady. “I don’t wonder ye kep’ it to yerself! Five dollars! have ye lost yer wits?”
“Come, come! I’m feelin’ uncomf’table enough about it, a’ready!” said the squire. “But there’s a possibility, yet, that it may be good money. Can’t tell. I should do jest so agin, under the sarcumstances, most likely. Any way it’s better to have it in my possession, than to leave bad boys to carry it off and pass it, as they undoubtedly would. I don’t want it to make trouble ’twixt me and my neighbors, though; and, Byron, if you are going over to the deacon’s, you might see what he has to say about it; tell him it’s counterfeit, and that I thought so—kind o’ thought so—all along, but considered it my duty—you understand?”
Byron understood, and smilingly replied that he would “make it all right” for his uncle.
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CHAPTER XV
JACK AND THE HUSWICK BOYS.
JACK—no longer the bright and cheerful lad whom we so lately saw picking up stones in the hilly pasture—went home, brooding darkly over his wrongs, and refused to be comforted by anything the good deacon and his wife could say to him.
“He robbed me, and hung up my dog by the heels,—got the Huswick tribe to help him; and here I am, alone against all of ’em, and nobody lifts a hand or says a word to help _me_!” was his bitter complaint, as he took the milk-pails after supper, and went out of the kitchen, shutting the door after him (I am sorry to say) with something like a bang.
“I’m a little disappointed in Jack,” observed the deacon, sadly.
“O, well, I don’t know,” replied his wife,—“you needn’t be; almost any boy of as much will and spirit as he has would feel so. He has been shamefully wronged,—you’ll allow that.”
“But he blames me!” said the deacon.
“Blames everybody!” struck in Mr. Pipkin, on the point of going out, but standing and holding the door open. “I don’t s’pose anything under heavens would satisfy him, Mis’ Chatford, but for me and the deacon to march over to Peternot’s, give the old reprobate a good cudgellin’, which I don’t deny but what he desarves fast enough, and lug hum the money.”
“I wish the money had been at the bottom of the sea before ever Jack stumbled upon it!” said Mr. Chatford. “I shall certainly go over and see the squire in the morning, and be plain with him,—for I do think he has acted a most dishonorable part in the matter.”
“I back ye up on that,” said Mr. Pipkin.
“A sight of good your backing up will do!” remarked Mrs. Pipkin, sarcastically. “It won’t restore Jack’s money. I don’t wonder he’s sulky,—we all set down, so quiet, talking over his loss, instead of walking straight over to the squire’s, and doing something, as I believe I should if I was a man.”
“Wish ye was one, for a little spell,” said Mr. Pipkin, showing all his front teeth. “Guess you’d make old Peternot’s fur fly! Guess he’d wish—”
“Mr. Pipkin!” interrupted Mrs. Pipkin, in a warning voice, “you’ll oblige me very much by shutting that door, with yourself on the outside!”
Mr. Pipkin still showed a considerable amount of ivory, as he turned, and said aside to the deacon, with a wink: “These ’ere women!—have to indulge ’em. No use of answerin’ back, as old Dr. Larkin, minister o’ the gospil,—six foot high, eighty year old, wore a wig, best man in the world,—said once, as he was goin’ into a house where there was a parrot, and the parrot sung out, ‘That’s an old fool!’—‘No use of answerin’ back!’ says the good old doctor,—‘hi, hi!—I often think on ’t.’”
“Mr. Pipkin,” said Mrs. Pipkin, with biting severity, pointing at the door, “will you oblige me?”
And Mr. Pipkin obliged her, chuckling as he went.
Jack sat milking a cow, with his head pressed against her flank, looking down into the pail, in which the bright streams were dancing, when Phin came into the yard.
“Say, Jack!” cried that perfidious youngster, “wasn’t it too bad, though, for you to be robbed of all that money?” although Phin’s private sentiment was that it was a capital joke. “And what do you think I overheard just now? Mrs. Pip said if she was you she would get hold of it again somehow; and father said you would have a right to take it anywhere, if you could lay hands on it; he didn’t know but ’t would be _justifiable_,—that was his word.”
“That’s all the good words do; for how can I get it?” said Jack, who, having, in his imagination, again and again, by some desperate act, overthrown his enemy and regained his lost treasure, would have been glad enough to know how his wild thoughts could be successfully reduced to practice.
He was still nourishing in his excited mind these fiery fancies, when, the milking over, he went to walk in the orchard; having all sorts of fearful adventures with the gaunt old Peternot, and always coming off triumphant with his treasure. Now he hurled him down his own cellar-way, and buttoned the door. Now he caught him, and, single-handed, tied him with a clothes-line, drawing it dreadfully tight, in the hardest kind of hard knots, and left him bound to a bed-post. Then the squire fell dead in a fit,—a judgment upon him for his wickedness,—just as he was lifting the money into his wagon in order to carry it away and sell it. Or Lion took the old man down and held him while his young master bore off the coin. Jack got the treasure in every instance,—only to wake up at last, and find that all his dreams of what he might do left him still hopelessly wronged and baffled.
He passed on through the orchard, and unconsciously drew near the scene of the afternoon’s conflict. That had still a strange attraction for him; he must once more view the spot where his hopes of fortune had been raised so high, to be followed so soon by impotent rage and despair.
As he advanced through the darkening woods,—for it was now dusk,—he heard noises in the direction of the hollow log, and thought, with a sudden wild leap of the heart, that one of his dreams of vengeance might be coming true. “It’s old Peternot! he has come back to get the rest of the money in the log! Here! keep behind me, Lion!”
Then he heard voices, and, gliding near, among the shadowy trees, perceived that it was not the squire, but some of the “Huswick tribe,” whom the hope of finding more coin had brought again to the hollow log. There were Cub and Tug and Hank; they had broken the rotten shell to pieces, laying the cavity completely open; and they now stood around it, poking in the rubbish with sticks or fingers or feet, hunting—in vain it seemed—for stray half-dollars.
“Hullo, Bub!” said Hank, “ye made a perty clean sweep on ’t, didn’t ye! Here’s the old box, but not a dollar to pay us for our trouble! That seems kind o’ mean.”
Jack did not answer, but, keeping Lion at his side, walked slowly past the group, glaring sullenly at them from under his angry brows.
“He’s afraid to speak,” said Cub.
“Afraid?” said Jack, turning and facing him. “I despise you too much to speak to you! Great lubberly fellows like you, to take the part of an old miser against one boy,—I look upon you as cowards and thieves!”
“Remember how we served your dog!” said Cub, with a malignant grin.
“Yes, I do remember it! You had to wait till I was gone before you had the courage to do even that! If you hadn’t lied to me, and got me out of the way first, you never would have taken that money,—somebody would have been hurt first!”
“Look out!” said Cub, seizing a broken branch, and advancing towards the audacious youngster.
“Come on!” cried Jack, jeeringly. “You’re big enough to cut up into six decent fellows,—if anything decent could be made out of such rubbish, but—you’d better bring fifteen or twenty of your big brothers to help you! See here!” said Jack, as the broken branch came whizzing past his head, “two can play at that game!” And he sent back a club with so sure an aim that it took the burly Cub full in the stomach. “No credit to me!” yelled Jack, alert on his legs. “Couldn’t help hitting such a big mark!”
“O, git out, Cub!” Hank called after his brother; “what’s the use? I don’t blame the boy. We’ve been hard enough on him, and now I’m goin’ to take his part. Come back here, Bub! I want to talk. You sha’n’t be hurt.”
“Hurt? as if I was afraid of him! It’s all I can do to keep my dog from his throat,—he has a grudge to wipe out! Here, Lion! Put the souls of the whole tribe of you in a balance, and my dog’s would out-weigh ’em! You could shake ’em all in a pepperbox, and not hear ’em rattle; they would have as much room in a teapot as so many crabs in Lake Erie!”
“I like your spunk, Bub!” said Hank, laughing. “And, see here! we never would have gi’n the old man the money, if we’d thought ’twas good for shucks. You know that.”
“No, I don’t know it! I believe you’re mean enough for anything.”
“That’s the talk! You’ve a right to think so. But what if we should help you now to git the money back?”
“You can’t!” exclaimed Jack.
“Can’t! you don’t know what we can do!”
“Then why don’t you go and git it?”
“’Cause we’ve no right to,—’tain’t ourn,—’t would be stealin’. But you’ve the fust claim on ’t,—_you_ could take it, and we could help ye, and then Peternot might git it back if he could.”
“I guess nobody’d get it again, if it was once in your hands!”
“There ye do us wrong,” said Tug. “We ain’t over-pe’tic’lar ’bout helpin’ ourselves to melons and sich trash where we can find it, but money is another thing.”
“And didn’t I make Hod throw down a handful of the half-dollars he was pickin’ up for ye?” added Cub.
“Which you thought was bogus,” retorted Jack,—who was, however, beginning to be impressed by these friendly suggestions.
“Of course, we should expect a little suthin for our trouble,” said Hank; “but that can all be agreed on aforehand. If you can git back the money, you won’t mind payin’ us—say—here’s me an’ Tug an’ Cub—ten dollars apiece,—that’s thirty dollars, for the resk we run?”
“But we can’t get it!”
“Mebby not, but we can try. No harm in that. It’s gittin’ dark now,—we can edge along towards the squire’s, and see what we can do. Send your dog hum; he’ll only be in the way.”
Jack was far from putting implicit trust in the honor of a Huswick, even where the serious subject of money was involved; but was not this his only chance—though a slender one—of getting back any portion of his treasure? And would he not prefer sharing it with these scamps, to leaving it peaceably in the possession of his enemy, the squire?
“If we can only find out where it is,” said Hank, “then we can be arguin’ with the old man,—for I guess he’ll let us into the house, one at a time,—an’ finally carry it off ’fore his face an’ eyes, without we can hit on some luckier way.”
Jack remembered Mr. Chatford’s word, reported to him by Phin,—that such an act on his part would be _justifiable_,—and so, regardless of the whisperings of conscience and of prudence, which nevertheless he could not quite reconcile to the course he was about to take, yielded to temptation, sent Lion home, and entered into an agreement with the Huswick boys.
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CHAPTER XVI
HOW JACK CALLED AT THE SQUIRE’S.
ABOUT an hour later several dark figures might have been seen creeping stealthily along, behind Squire Peternot’s garden wall, in the direction of the house. A dim light shone at a window, and towards this they cautiously advanced. Jack remembered how, on a former occasion, he had gone with two of these same companions,—Cub and Tug, though he did not know them then,—in a mob that was to have attacked Aunt Patsy’s house, how they had approached _her_ window, and how he had abhorred their base designs; and he could not help wondering a little at the strange chance which now made him the accomplice of such wrong-doers. He seemed to himself in the mean time much more the reckless little canal-driver of old times, than the better self which had been developed under the wholesome influences of his new home and friends.
“Now keep dark, boys,” said Hank, stopping behind some quince-bushes, “till I see how the land lays.” He stole round the edge of the bushes, to a spot that commanded a good view of the window, not more than two rods off. Being tall, he could look into it and see by the light of a dim tallow candle what was going on in the Peternot sitting-room.
“All right. Only the old man and woman. She’s jest goin’ into t’ other room,—to bed, I guess. He sets by the table, chin in his hands; book open beside him,—Bible, looks like,—but he ain’t readin’. No, she ain’t goin’ to bed,—there she comes back agin.”
“Keep still!” whispered Jack. “There’s somebody!”
Somebody approaching from the street, entering the yard, walking straight towards the house, and passing out of sight by the front corner.
“Old man’s nephew! the Dinks feller!” whispered Hank. “Comes in at the door,—says something,—old man looks up,—lights another candle; they are going to another room.”
A light now appeared at another window, which Jack, greatly excited, discovered to be partly open. Close by it grew a lilac-bush, under cover of which he drew near, and peeped. He saw the tall form of Peternot cross the room, and then heard a clatter of chairs. Growing bolder, he advanced his head still farther, and saw uncle and nephew seated between a bureau in one corner, and a table on which the light was, at one side of the room.
“Did ye see ’em? have a talk with ’em?” Peternot was saying.
“Yes,” replied Byron Dinks; “they didn’t have much of a sing,—schoolma’am wasn’t there,—not much company; but, having an eye to the winter school, thought I’d stay and make myself agreeable.”
“That’s right, that’s right, nephew. And did ye make it all smooth with Mr. Chatford?”
“I guess so; said you thought only of doing your duty in the matter; you didn’t want the money, but, knowing it was counterfeit—”
“There you went a little too fur, nephew; I didn’t _know_; but go on.”
“It was well I made the statement, however, for that brought out a surprising fact. You’ll be astonished, uncle!”
“Hey? what is it?”
“The deacon said he was gratified to know you had acted on the supposition that the coin was spurious; and he felt sure that you would be ready to do the boy justice when you found out your mistake.”
“Mistake? What mistake?”
“Coin is genuine!”
“No!”
“He says so; says he took half a dollar of it to the goldsmith, over at the Basin, and he pronounced it good; at any rate, he gave a good piece for it.”
“Nephew, you amaze me!—I—this is news—news indeed!”
The squire got up, and, turning to the corner of the room, drew forth from behind the bureau an object, the sight of which made Jack’s heart beat wildly.
“That’s it!” whispered Hank in his ear, leaning forwards, behind a branch of the lilac-bush.
Peternot opened the loosely tied sack, and uncle and nephew eagerly examined its contents.
[Illustration: JACK AT THE WINDOW.]
“It’s the tarnish that makes the silver look so bad,” said the squire. “That deceived both on us. I had all the while a strange feelin’ that the coin was good, though my reason said the contrary. It was only arter I’d got it, and had paid the Huswicks, that my reason got the upper hand, and I felt so sure ’twas bogus. I’m glad you talked with the deacon. It’s astonishing! I didn’t make so bad a bargain with the rogues, arter all! I guess we’d better keep it all together,” added the squire, as Byron seemed inclined to retain the specimens he had been handling.
“Be ye comin’, any time to-night?” called the voice of Mrs. Peternot from the adjoining room.
“She’s waitin’,” said the squire. “We was just goin’ to ’tend prayers, when you come in,—had been delayin’ a little on your account. I’ll put it back here for the present; then, arter prayers, I’ll see what had better be done with ’t for the night.”
Peternot, having returned the bag to its niche, sent his nephew out of the room before him, and followed, bearing the candle, which he blew out, to save it, as he crossed the threshold. The door was left open, however, and a dim light stole into the room from the kitchen beyond.
“Now’s your time!” whispered Hank. “I’ll put ye in there! Pass out the bag,—be still about it,—it’s all right.”
“I can’t, without making a noise!” replied Jack, trembling with excitement. “They’ll hear.”
“No, they won’t! Don’t hurry. I’ll help you. Take off your shoes.”
Jack took off his shoes and hat, giving them to Tug to hold. Still he hesitated.
“I wish they had shut the door! Wait a minute! Hark!”
“The old man is readin’ the Scriptur’s!” said Hank. “Then he’ll pray. It couldn’t have happened better. Ye could grind a scythe, when he’s prayin’, an’ he wouldn’t hear.”
Jack listened a moment, and heard the squire read in a loud, nasal tone:—
“_But know this, that if the good man of the house had known in what hour the thief would come he would have watched._”
“I _can’t_ go!” Jack whispered, turning away.
“You can!” Hank insisted. “Now or never! Your only chance. I’ll lift you up.”
“Well! lift! careful!”
Hank lifted him, and Jack went in at the window feet foremost. In a moment he found himself standing on the floor,—frightened, but alert and resolute. He did not think he had made much noise.
The squire continued reading:—
“_The lord of that servant shall come in a day when he looketh not for him, and in an hour that he is not aware of, and shall cut him asunder, and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites._”
A thrill of terror crept over poor Jack, who could not help thinking that all this applied, somehow, particularly to himself. But it was too late now to draw back, he thought.
He glided across the carpetless floor, making scarcely any noise with his bare feet, except that his ankle-bones cracked alarmingly. He did not stop until he reached the corner by the bureau; when he perceived, by the changed tones of voice, that Peternot was no longer reading, but talking,—making a few solemn comments on “the words,” as he phrased it, which they were “called to consider.” It was well for Jack that he had seen good Mr. and Mrs. Chatford at their devotions, and also known them in their daily lives, for otherwise I know not what contemptuous ideas of religion he might have received, from witnessing the family worship of the hard-hearted and worldly-minded squire.
As Peternot’s discourse was broken by intervals of silence, Jack thought, “I’ll wait till he begins to pray.” Then came a clatter of chairs: “They’re going to kneel down!” thought he, and grasped tightly the loose top of the bag. But just then, to his consternation, he heard heavy footsteps approaching; somebody was entering the room!
It was Peternot, who, feeling now a more anxious care for the coin than when he believed it to be spurious, had remembered, during his devotions (his heart being where his treasure was), that the window of the room was open, and who deemed it prudent to step in and shut it before he began his prayer.
The terrified Jack crowded himself into the corner by the bureau, and waited, breathless with apprehension, while Peternot closed the window, and turned to go out. The old man took two or three steps towards the bureau, and gave a glance in the direction of the bag; but having no light, he did not see the youthful house-breaker stuck up there in the dark niche, like a shivering ghost.
Then he went back into the kitchen, leaving the door wide open, the window closed and fastened, and Jack shut in.
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CHAPTER XVII
HOW JACK TOOK TO HIS HEELS.
IN a moment all was still in the kitchen; then, after a brief silence, Peternot began to pray, in a low, solemn tone of voice. Jack, waiting and listening in his corner, was dismayed at this, remembering what Hank had just said of the old man’s prayers.
“That’s no praying!” thought he. “I shall never dare stir, unless he puts in, and makes more noise. Is that the best he can do, I wonder?”
Peternot soon showed that he could do better, his voice rising as he proceeded in a manner that greatly encouraged Jack, who now slipped from his corner, in order to make an observation.
Venturing to peep in at the open door, he saw the squire and his wife and nephew all kneeling before their chairs in the kitchen, with their backs toward him. That he considered a fortunate circumstance: they would not see him if he closed the door.
“But if I shut it,” he reflected, “I shall be in the dark, and I may stumble over a chair! I’ll take the money to the window, and get everything ready first,—see just what I must do, and how to do it; then I’ll shut it.”
He drew the bag from the corner, lifted it by its long, loose end, and carried it across the room, casting one more glance at the kneeling group as he passed the door. Then, having set the bag down under the window, he carefully felt for the fastenings, and found the usual spring in one side of the sash. This he pressed with his thumb, and ascertained that the window would easily come open. All being ready, he stepped back, closed the door softly, without daring to latch it, however, and returned to put his plan into execution.
Pressing the window-spring, he raised the sash, and found himself at once in communication with Hank and Cub on the outside.
“Now, hand it out!” said Hank.
“Wait! a little higher,” replied Jack, still pushing up the sash. Unfortunately, it stuck in the frame, and as he still kept his thumb on the spring to prevent its snapping with a noise when it reached a notch, he could not tell when it was fast. “Now, hold it,” he said, and stooped to take up the bag.
Both Cub and Hank had hold of the sash; but as it appeared to be firm in its place, both let go of it in order to seize the treasure; and so it chanced that, between them and Jack, down came the window with a loud clatter and a rattling of glass, broken by Cub’s unlucky fingers in a fruitless attempt to prevent the accident.
Frightened by the noise, which he knew would alarm the household, Jack instantly threw up the sash again, tumbled out the bag, and was tumbling himself out, when the squire rushed into the room. The fugitive scrambled head foremost through the narrow opening, and had nearly escaped, when Peternot with a firm grip seized him by the legs.
“Byron! Wife!” roared the squire within the room. “Light!”
“Boys! help!” screamed Jack, hanging head downwards on the outside, and kicking violently with the captured members.
[Illustration: AN ABRUPT LEAVE-TAKING.]
With one hand he laid hold of the lilac-bush. Hank, returning to his assistance, caught him by the shoulder; while at the same time Byron Dinks relieved his uncle by grasping one of the unlucky legs. Hank pulled on the outside; uncle and nephew pulled on the inside; and for a moment it seemed to Jack that he must certainly break in two, if the struggle continued. It lasted but three or four seconds, and was over by the time Mrs. Peternot came with the candle. Jack succeeded first in freeing the foot held by the nephew, and then made such vigorous use of it that he quickly brought off the other. He fell to the ground, and scrambled away behind the bushes; while Peternot, shouting, “Thieves! robbers!” turned to the door, and rushed out of the house in pursuit.
Jack heard the shout, and the opening of the door, and presently the ominous sound of heavy feet coming after him! He had lost sight of Hank when he fell; and now he had not the faintest idea which way his companions had fled. Had he paused to observe and listen, he might perhaps have heard their retreating footsteps, or caught sight of their gliding forms in the darkness; but the tall form treading close at his heels left him no time for consideration. He went plunging blindly over the wall, and heard the stones rattle again as his pursuer came plunging after him.
The moon had not yet risen, and objects below the horizon were scarcely visible,—an unfortunate circumstance for Jack, whose bare feet suffered in this mad race over the rough ground. Heedless of his hurts, however, he sped on, not in the direction of his own home, but of Aunt Patsy’s house; while _thud_, _thud!_ came the footsteps behind him, nearer and nearer, he fancied. Two or three times he turned his head, and there was the dim shape striding upon his heels, with a hand outstretched to grasp him, he more than once imagined. Never before would he have believed that the old man could run so!
This strange race was brought to a ludicrous close by a rock which lay in Jack’s way, as he was making for Aunt Patsy’s woods. He tripped over it, and fell headlong; and over him fell his pursuer,—a sprawling heap.
“Hang it!” said the latter, “you come pooty nigh breakin’ my neck!” And he lay on the ground laughing, while Jack sprang to his feet.
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CHAPTER XVIII
HOW THE HEELS WENT HOME WITHOUT SHOES AND STOCKINGS.
“THAT you, Hank?”
“Yes! Didn’t you know me? What in time made you leg it so? I couldn’t hardly keep up with you!”
“I took you for old Peternot!” said the excited Jack. “I thought you got off ahead of me.”
Upon that Hank laughed again. “I knew the squire would come out; I hid by the quince-bushes till he showed himself, and then rushed out before him.”
“What was that for?”
“To lead him a wild-goose chase, while Cub and Tug got away with the money.”
“Where are they?” demanded the anxious Jack.
“Out of his reach,—that’s all I know. He didn’t foller us but a few rods; the old chap’s so lame he can’t run wuth a cent. The idee of your takin’ me for him!”
“Which way did they go? You know!” exclaimed Jack, who was in no mood for laughing at this odd mistake.
“Mebby we shall fall in with ’em, crossin’ the pastur’,” said Hank. “Ye needn’t be alarmed about your money, if we don’t. That’ll be safe. Better keep that hid somewheres, till you’re ready to dispose on ’t; for there’s no knowin’ what the old man may do. Leave that to me an’ Cub; I’ll look out for your interest.”
“Tug has got my hat and shoes!” said Jack, in sore perplexity.
“He’ll keep ’em safe,” replied Hank. “Needn’t worry.”
“My stockings!” exclaimed Jack.
“Has he got them too?”
“No; I wish he had!” For now it occurred to him that the stockings, which he certainly had on his feet before he jumped from the window, must have come off in his captors’ hands when he escaped!
“No matter; money is all right; we can afford to lose a pair of stockin’s or two,” was Hank’s consolatory remark.
He failed, however, to impress this cheerful view of the matter upon Jack, who, bareheaded, barefoot, uncertain that he should ever see his money again, felt anything but happy over the success of his rash attempt.
Hearing a low whistle not far off, Hank said, “That’s them!” and whistled in response. “One on ’em, anyhow,” as a single figure was seen approaching. “Tug?”
“Hullo!” said Tug. “Where’s Cub?”
“Ain’t he with you?” said Hank. “I told ye to keep together!”
“I thought we’d better scatter, when the old man and the Dinks feller come after us; one on ’em—I don’t know which ’twas—chased me ’bout a quarter of a mile.”
“Where are my shoes?” said Jack.
“Your shoes?” echoed Tug.
“Yes! and my hat?”
“Your hat?”
“Yes! what have you done with ’em?” cried Jack, choking with impatience and anger.
“O, to be sure! I believe I put ’em on the ground under the lilac-bush; you was so long in the room, I got tired of holdin’ on ’em; and darned if I didn’t forgit all about ’em!”
Jack was incensed at this negligence. “That’s the way you help a fellow, is it?”
“Didn’t we help you?” said Hank. “You wouldn’t have got away at all if it hadn’t been for me.”
“You!” retorted Jack; “if you had only caught me at first, when I was getting out of the window, I shouldn’t have had any trouble! But you waited till the old man got hold of me; and now I’ve lost hat and shoes and stockings and money!”
Hank answered indignantly, “Won’t you believe me when I tell you your money is all right? You sha’n’t be robbed of a dollar. I’m sorry about the stockin’s; but your hat and shoes you can find, I suppose, jest where Tug left ’em.”
“If Tug will go with me!”
“What’s the use of two goin’?” said Tug. “We’ll be lookin’ for Cub, and meet you at the corner of the woods.” To this Hank agreed.
Seeing there was nothing else to be done, Jack ran back across the pasture to Peternot’s garden, and was creeping up behind the quince-trees, when he heard a voice, and saw a glimmer of light approaching around the corner of the house. Then appeared Squire Peternot, carrying a lantern, followed by his nephew Byron, armed with a heavy club. They were looking along the ground and beating the shrubbery. Jack didn’t know whether to run away, or lie flat on the grass. While he was hesitating, he heard the old man say, “’Twas robbery, downright robbery! House-breakin’,—a clear case! The rogues have got off with their booty, but this ain’t the last on’t, they’ll find!”
“State-prison job,” replied the nephew, “if I know anything about law. The fact that a piece of property is in litigation don’t justify one claimant in entering burglariously the premises of another claimant and stealing said piece of property.”
“I’ll have out a s’arch-warrant,” Peternot declared, “and seize that coin wherever it can be found. If the deacon’s boys are mixed up in’t, they’ll find it’s a sorry business!”
Jack grew faint at heart, as he watched and listened. The men with the lantern and club passed the window through which he had escaped, and paused for a minute or more to examine the ground all about the lilac-bush. They found footprints, but he heard nothing about either hat or shoes. They then passed on, and the door closed behind them as they entered the house.
Troubled with heavy misgivings, feeling that he would give almost anything to be well out of this scrape, Jack rose and slunk away, without attempting to solve the mystery of the hat and shoes. He was no longer so anxious as he had been to get the money once more into his possession; and finding Hank and Tug faithful to their appointment, he said to them, “When you find Cub, hide the money, and keep it till you hear from me.” And he told them of the threatened search-warrant.
Hank swore fidelity to Jack’s interest; and the wretched boy,—never more wretched in mind, in all his checkered life, than at that hour,—parting from the brothers on the border of the woods, hurried home, and reached Deacon Chatford’s house just as the moon was appearing above the eastern clouds. The windows were dark; the folks had all gone to bed, leaving the kitchen door unfastened for him. He entered softly; but as he was going up to his room, the voice of Mrs. Chatford called to him, “That you, Jack?”
“Yes ’m.”
“What made you so late?”
“I didn’t think it was so late,” replied Jack; “I’m sorry if I’ve kept you awake.”
“Never mind, if you have come home all right. It was thoughtful in you to take off your shoes. I wasn’t asleep; I couldn’t help feeling anxious about you.”
How kind, how good she was! Jack, filled with a sense of guilt and dread, longed to go to her bedside and relieve his burdened heart by confessing what he had done. But just then the deacon spoke, in the impatient tone of one whose sleep had been disturbed: “Did you bolt the door?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, get quiet as soon as you can. I want to sleep.”
And Jack went on up the dark stairway to his lonely bed.
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CHAPTER XIX
HOW JACK WAS INVITED TO RIDE.
JACK was up very early the next morning; and having put fresh stockings and a pair of old shoes on his scratched and bruised feet, he went out, determined at the first opportunity to tell Mr. Chatford all that had occurred, and ask his advice.
It was a little after daybreak. Mrs. Pipkin was making a fire as he went through the kitchen; she guessed the deacon wasn’t stirring yet. Jack took the milkpails and went into the barn-yard. The cows got up, one after another, stretched themselves, flirted their tails, and waited to be milked. He placed his stool beside one of them; and there he sat milking in the cool of the morning,—keeping all the while an anxious lookout for the deacon,—when the large front gate rattled, and he saw a man trying to unfasten it.
“Lift it up a little,” said Jack.
“O, I see!” The man came into the yard; and Jack recognized one of the farmers of the neighborhood, named Sellick, rather popular among the boys as a joker and story-teller. “Didn’t know you had a new way of fastening your gates over here!” And he laughed, as he did at almost everything he said, drawing his upper lip up to his nose, and surrounding his little gray eyes with merry wrinkles. “Where’s the deacon, sonny?”
“My name ain’t Sonny,” replied Jack.
Sellick laughed at that too. “You remind me of Mose Chatford. Mose has got a little dry wit about him, sometimes. When I fust moved into the place, he was about twelve year old; and one day he had his cousin, Syd Chatford, making him a visit,—older’n he was, but a little bit of a chap; you know little Syd. I had seen Mose, but I hadn’t seen Syd before; and noticing a kind of family resemblance between ’em, I said, ‘Mose, is that one of your boys?’ meaning his folks’s, of course. But the little rascal stretches himself up,—pompous as could be, grave as a judge,—‘No, I ain’t a man of a family!’ says he, and walks on. Sassy, his daddy said, when I told him on ’t; but I joke the boys, and I’m willing they should joke me. Where’s the deacon? I’ll ask you agin, and leave off the sonny.”
Jack thought the deacon hadn’t got out yet.
“That never’ll do, never’ll do! Bad example, deacon! Airly bird ketches the worm. I shall have to give him a talking to. Fie, fie, deacon! Where’s Pip, Mr. Pip, Mr. Pipkin, Mr. Philander P. Pipkin, Esquire?” the merry man rattled away. “I’m particular to give all the names I’ve heard him called by, so as to get an answer out of you the fust time.”
“I rather think you’ll find him in the barn,” said Jack.
“You think wrong this time. I know I sha’n’t find him in the barn. Do you know why?” said the merry man, with his upper lip at his nose. “Because I sha’n’t go to the barn and look. Is that a good reason? How long before you’ll be through milking?”
“I don’t know; not very soon, unless somebody comes and helps me.”
“S’pose I help you. I can milk. I’m an old hand at it. Never shall forgit my fust trial, though! Visiting my uncle—Sunday-go-to-meeting clo’es on—he told me to look out; but I was a little smarter ’n anybody else in the world, them days: I could milk! So I took holt—both hands—milked one stream into my vest-pocket and t’ other into my eye, and quit. Thought that would do for a fust lesson.”
“I don’t know why you should help me milk,” said Jack, as Sellick was getting a pail and stool.
“’T will keep me out of mischief, while I’m waiting. Satan finds some mischief still for idle hands to do. Which cow kicks? I don’t want anything to do with a kicking cow. I used to have one, a fust-class kicker. Hit me once; thought the lightning had struck the haystack! I tried tying her leg. Tied it to an old sleigh under the shed; she kicked that to pieces. Tied it to the sill of the barn; and by George! she started to kick the barn down. Tied it then to an old grin’stone lying in the yard; and at the fust kick she sent it like a pebble from a sling right over the kitchen chimbly, quarter of a mile at least; fell into Welby’s bog; sunk so deep I’ve never thought ’t would pay to fish it out.”
“What did you do with her then?” Jack asked, trying to forget his troubles in listening to this nonsense.
“What could I do but kill her? One pail she kicked over full of milk, we never saw or heard of agin; but Dyer’s folks, live over on the North Road, about a mile off, said they had quite a little shower of milk at their house that morning,—wondered where it come from. I had a pair of boots made out of her hide; but I never could wear ’em. I was always kicking somebody, and gitting hauled up for ’sault ’n’ battery.”
Mr. Chatford now came into the yard, and saw with surprise his neighbor Sellick milking one of his cows.
“Haven’t you any milking to do at home, Sellick?”
“Yes, but the boys can do that. I’ve invited Jack here to go and ride with me; and I thought I would help him a little about his chores fust.”
“Go and ride? I haven’t heard anything about it!” said Jack.
“Didn’t I mention it? Wal, that was an oversight!”
“I thought you had come to see Mr. Chatford. You asked for him.”
“Did I? Mebby I wanted to ask him if he was willing you should go,—we must keep the right side o’ the deacon! I left my wagon at the fence below here; didn’t take it along to the gate, thinking Squire Peternot might want to hitch there.”
Jack turned pale. But the deacon said, “What nonsense are you up to now, Sellick?”
“What! do you call it nonsense for a neighbor to come and take your boy to ride? Here, Phin, come and finish this cow; she’s done, all but stripping. I wouldn’t begin another, Jack. We must be starting.”
“Squire Peternot’s at the house, wants to see ye,” said Phin to his father.
“Come, has he?” laughed Sellick. “I felt sure he would want to hitch to that post! Wal, Jack! me an’ you’s got to go over to the Basin with the squire, on business. I’m a constable, you know. Didn’t think of that, did ye? Strip her clean, Phin; it dries up a cow like Sancho, to leave a little milk in her bag.”
“Sellick!” cried the deacon, while Jack stood white and dumb with consternation, “what’s the meaning of this?”
“I’ve a writ for the boy’s arrest,” replied Sellick. “Sorry for it. A little diffikilty between him and the squire. Nice man, the squire! As it’s on his own complaint, he thought it more properer that the boy should be taken before some other justice;—a very nice man, Peternot! Him and his nephew is going over to the Basin with us,—witnesses in the case,—before Judge Garty. You shouldn’t have picked a quarrel with the old man, my son,—nice man!”
“Come, Sellick!” cried the deacon, impatiently. “No more joking. I can’t believe Peternot has taken any such step; there’s no ground for it! Why, he’s the party at fault, if anybody! What’s the charge?”
“Breaking a winder, I believe,” replied Sellick, winking at Jack. “Mis’ Peternot thought a good deal of that winder. Nice old lady, Mis’ Peternot!”
“Jack! have you been smashing their windows?”
“No!” faltered Jack.
And before he could catch his breath, to enter into explanations, the deacon exclaimed, indignantly, “Where is the squire? I’ll see what he means by following up the boy in this way!” And he strode towards the house, more angry than Jack had ever seen him before.
Sellick followed with Jack; and Phin went last, looking strangely excited, if not delighted, and calling to Mr. Pipkin at the barn, “Hurrah, Pip! come and see the fun!”
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CHAPTER XX
HOW THE SHOES AND STOCKINGS CAME HOME.
MRS. CHATFORD met her husband at the door, her kind face full of motherly solicitude. “Do tell me, what is the matter! _He_ is in the sitting-room. O Jack! I hope you haven’t been getting into any serious trouble.”
They found the squire sitting stiffly in a straight-backed chair, with his horn-headed cane between his knees, and his hat and an odd-looking bundle on the floor beside him.
“What is all this about, squire?” the deacon demanded, as poor Jack was brought in, face to face with his grim accuser. “Haven’t you got through persecuting this boy? I felt that your treatment of him yesterday was wholly unwarrantable,—tyrannical and unjust; and though I thought a little differently of it, after my talk with your nephew last night, still I am not satisfied, and I sha’n’t be, till you have done the right thing. That he said you would do; but this don’t look like it. What great crime has Jack committed, that you should send an officer of the law after him?”
“You know nothing of what you are sayin’!” replied Peternot. “If you stan’ up for the boy arter I’ve made my statements, you’re not the man I take you for. I believe you to be a respecter of the laws, and no friend of rascality. If you don’t believe what I say, there’s my nephew out there in the wagon, ready to corroborate; and if you won’t credit our words, peradventur’ you’ll be convinced by this.”
[Illustration: A CONVINCING ARGUMENT.]
He took up the odd-looking bundle from the floor, untied the corners of the coarse plaid handkerchief that enclosed it, and pulled out a pair of stockings, which he held up and shook before the eyes of the wondering group.
“Do ye know them stockin’s, Mis’ Chatford?”
“Why—sure—they—they are Jack’s stockings!” said the good woman, sadly puzzled to know how they had come into Peternot’s possession.
“And them shoes,—does anybody recognize ’em?”
“They’re Jack’s shoes!” exclaimed Phin, having taken a near view,—“his Sunday pair!”
“Now for this hat,” said the squire, holding it up on the end of his cane, “whose hat is it? Anybody know the hat?”
“I believe that and the other things all belong to Jack,” said the deacon. “What is the mystery? Come to the point at once! Jack, what is it? Why don’t you speak? Have you lost your tongue?”
The evidence against him appeared so overwhelming, and he really seemed to himself so guilty,—not because he had taken the money, but because he had made use of such means and such companions in accomplishing his object,—that poor Jack could not yet utter an intelligible word in self-defence. He was faltering out some weak denial or excuse, when Peternot interrupted him:—
“If this ain’t enough, pull off the shoes he has on and look at his feet. If you don’t find some marks of rough treatment about the ankles, I miss my calkelation.” Sellick placed the culprit in a chair, and began to take off his shoes.
“The mystery is no mystery, Neighbor Chatford,” the squire went on. “My house was broke into and robbed last night. I ketched one of the thieves by the heels as he was jumpin’ from the winder, and these stockin’s come off in my hands, as he got away; which he did by the help of his accomplices, though not till his feet and shins got some hard rubs on the winder-sill, as ye can see there now!”—Sellick at that moment holding up one of Jack’s legs, variegated with black-and-blue marks and bloody scratches, to the view of his horrified friends.
“I found the hat and shoes under the winder, when I run out arter the burglars. I looked agin with a lantern, and found tracks too big for the shoes, showing he had older confederates. He had two or three with him, at least. I’m glad to learn that Moses is away, so he couldn’t ’a’ been one on ’em; and Phineas, his mother tells me, was in bed by eight o’clock.”
“Jack!” said the deacon, fixing a terrible look on the boy.
“I haven’t robbed his house!” Jack broke forth, vehemently. “I only took what was my own. I took the money, which he had robbed me of before!”
“Broke into his house for it!”
“I got in.”
“Who helped you?”
“I can’t tell. It wouldn’t be fair for me to tell.”
“Where is the money?” demanded the squire.
“I can’t tell that, either. It was my money, and I took it. And I did only what your nephew, who knows so much about the law, advised me to do, and what Mr. Chatford himself said I would have a right to do.”
The deacon, who was inclined to condemn the boy’s fault all the more severely because he had taken his part before, regarded him with stern astonishment and displeasure.
“Did I ever say you would have a right to go to housebreaking, to get possession of what you claimed?—Don’t think, Squire, that I for a moment encouraged the boy to any such course. I didn’t approve your course, I tell you frankly. I thought you ought to have used different means for carrying your point. But I don’t uphold him. I told him expressly and repeatedly to let the matter drop until this morning, when I would see you about it.”
“You said I would be justified in taking the money wherever I could lay hands on it!” cried Jack, now fully roused to speak in his own behalf.
“Boy! Jack!” replied the deacon, regarding him with a look of mingled amazement, grief, and stern reprobation. “Take care what you say! Don’t make the matter worse by lying about it.”
“You said so—to—to Mrs. Pipkin!” said Jack, trying to remember what he seemed to be trying to invent.
“Did I say anything of the kind to you? Give the boy the benefit of it, if I did,” said the deacon, turning to Mrs. Pipkin.
“I didn’t hear you,” replied that lady, precisely. “You didn’t say as much as I _hoped_ you would say; for you knew I hadn’t words to express my opinion of Squire Peternot’s conduct.”
“Good!” said Mr. Pipkin, in a low but earnest voice, from the kitchen door. “I’m glad you said that!”
“And I shall say more, before the matter is settled!” said Mrs. Pipkin, compressing her thin lips. “For a man like Squire Peternot to come over here, and have Jack taken up for carrying off the money, no matter how he got it, is a sin and a shame! One of the richest farmers in town, and a member of the church! I believe you’d follow a penny rolling down hill to the very edge of Tophet, and burn your fingers getting it out!”
“Good agin, by hokey!” said Mr. Pipkin, at the door.
“Silence!” said the deacon, authoritatively. “Abuse is no argument. I’m trying to find out what I really said to give Jack encouragement in his iniquity, or to expose his lying.”
“Perhaps it was what Mrs. Pipkin said; he may have got it turned about a little,” said Mrs. Chatford, anxiously trying to shield the miserable culprit.
“No, it wasn’t!” Jack maintained stoutly. “He said it. I didn’t hear him, but Phin did; Phin came out when I was milking and told me.”
All eyes were now turned upon Phin; and—either because he had intentionally deceived Jack, or because, which is more probable, having confounded what Mrs. Pipkin said with what his father said, he was afraid to confess the blunder and assume his share of the responsibility—that treacherous-hearted youngster put on an air of outraged innocence, and exclaimed loudly, “O, I never said such a thing! I never said a word to him about it! Hope to die this minute if I did!”
“You did! you know you did!” And Jack, driven to desperation, advanced, shaking his fist at Phin, and passionately accusing him of falsehood.
“That will do,” said Deacon Chatford. “I’ve nothing more to say. His trying to get out of the scrape by lying, and shifting the blame first on to me and then on to somebody else, seems to me worse than the thing itself. He must take the consequences!”
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CHAPTER XXI
JACK IN DISGRACE.
“I S’POSE my nag is gitting a little mite impatient,” remarked the constable. “Shall we be driving along? Put on your shoes, sonny; not your Sunday-go-to-meeting pair; these and the other things will have to go to court with you, to be put into the evidence.”
“Hearken to me one moment!” said Mrs. Chatford, laying one hand protectingly on Jack’s shoulder, and holding her husband’s arm with the other. “Both of you! Don’t be too hard on this unfortunate boy! You know, husband, how he came to us; he was the victim of a false accusation then. Appearances are often deceitful. Remember, Squire Peternot, how you were once on the point of having his dog shot for a fault which another dog had committed. We are all liable, under the most favorable circumstances,—sometimes—to make mistakes.”
“If you think there is any mistake here, Mis’ Chatford,” answered the squire, “I must say you show a failin’ judgment.”
“I don’t doubt his taking the money. And I don’t approve of the course he took to get it, either. But forgive me if I say I think you drove him to it. It’s the old story over again,—the rich man with large flocks and herds taking the poor man’s one little lamb. Much as I condemn him for breaking into your house, I’d rather at this moment be in his place than in yours, Squire Peternot!”
“Wife! wife!” expostulated the deacon, mildly; while Peternot stood silently champing the bit of mortified pride and resentment.
“I hope to be pardoned here and hereafter, if I speak anything unjustly or in anger,” Mrs. Chatford went on; “but I must say what is in my heart. The boy has done wrong; but consider, he is but a boy. Think what he was when he was brought here, what bad influences had been about him all his life, and then acknowledge that he has turned out better than could ever have been expected of him. He has been steady, industrious, truthful, well behaved,—as good as most boys who have had the best of training. And now to cast him off for one offence,” appealing to her husband; “you will regret it as long as you live, if you do! And for you,” turning again to the squire, “at your years, with your wealth, and your knowledge of our blessed Saviour’s teachings, to drive this poor, ignorant child to transgress the law in the maintenance of his rights, in the first place, and then to execute the vengeance of the law upon him without mercy,—as I said before, I’d rather be in his place, in the eyes of Heaven, than in yours!”
Jack, who had stood sullen, despairing, full of hatred and a sense of wrong, a minute before, burst into a wild fit of sobbing and weeping at the sound of these gracious words. The deacon was touched; and even Phin looked conscience-smitten,—white about the mouth, and scared and excited about the eyes,—as he thought of his share in Jack’s disgrace.
“Mrs. Chatford,” said Mrs. Pipkin, wiping her tears with her apron, “you’ve spoken my sentiment, and you’ve spoken it better than I could, because you’re a better woman!”
“So she has, by hokey!” added the sincere Mr. Pipkin.
“I wish you could be prevailed upon to let the matter rest at present, squire,” said the deacon. “The boy has certainly done well, since he has been with us, till this unfortunate affair came up.”
“You haven’t known him!” said Peternot, striking his heavy cane upon the floor. “What’s bred in the bone will stay long in the flesh. You can’t wash a black sheep white in a day. He can put on a smooth outside, but he’s corrupt at heart as he ever was. If you could have been present with him in the woods yesterday! I never heard such profanity from the lips of mortal man!”
“Jack!” said the deacon, “do you swear?”
“I swore at him; he was robbing me; I couldn’t help it, he made me so mad!” Jack acknowledged.
“Then his leaguing himself with midnight marauders, whose names he is ashamed to confess, shows what he is!” continued Peternot. “A boy is known by the company he keeps.”
“Isn’t a man as much?” retorted Jack, blazing up again. “What company did you keep yesterday? What _day_ marauders did you league yourself with, to get the money away from me? Wonder if you are ashamed!”
“Jack! Jack! don’t be saucy!” said Mrs. Chatford.
“Let him speak out; then mebby you’ll see what the boy is,” said Peternot, chafing with anger. “He has no respect for age. He sassed me to my face yisterday as you never heard the lowest blackguard on the canal sass another. I am amazed that anybody in this house should be found to excuse or stand up for such a profane, house-breakin’, hardened little villain!”
“I don’t stand up for anything he has said or done that is wrong. But there is good in the boy, for all that,” cried Mrs. Chatford, in tones and with looks full of deep emotion, “and that I stand up for, as I would wish another to stand up for a son of mine in his place. This may be a turning-point in the boy’s life. He may be saved, he can and will be saved, if we are just and charitable towards him; but I shudder to think what may become of him if we cast him off. I fear he will go back to his old ways, and that his last state will be worse than his first. Then who will be answerable for his soul?”
“I have no ill-feelin’ towards the boy,” said the squire, coming now to a subject which he had been waiting for a favorable moment to introduce. “And if he will show that he repents of his inikity by askin’ pardon for his wholesale blasphemy, and abuse of me in the woods yisterday, and—and—give up the plunder he took from my house last night,—I don’t know,—peradventur’ I may be prevailed upon to let him off.”
“What do you say to that, Jack?” asked the deacon, anxious to see the matter settled. “Come! show yourself a brave, honest boy now, and the squire won’t be too hard on you. Give up the money, and he’ll return a fair share of it to you, I’m confident,—all you could reasonably expect, after the course you have taken to get the whole; won’t you, squire?”
“Sartin, I’ll be liberal with him; though I can’t make any bargain with a malefactor till he names his accomplices and gives up his booty.”
“And recant your falsehood about Phineas; that has hurt me more than anything else,” added Mr. Chatford, as Jack was hesitating.
“How can I recant what wasn’t a falsehood?” replied Jack.
“Take care, take care, boy!” said the deacon, warningly. “Stand here face to face with Phineas. Now, did Phineas tell you I said you would be justified in taking that money wherever you could find it?—Did you say anything of the sort, Phineas?”
“No, I never opened my lips to him about it!” said Phin, with all the vehemence of earnest innocence. “But mabby he imagined I did.”
“I didn’t imagine it!” cried Jack. “Phin Chatford, you know you said it! You are lying at this minute, if you say you didn’t.”
“Jack, what motive could Phineas have to say such a thing to you in the first place, or to lie about it now? Your story is untrustworthy, on the face of it. And I beg of you to consider again; for I can do nothing for you, if you persist with a lie on your lips.”
“It isn’t a lie. If I say I lied then, I shall be lying now.”
“I have nothing more to say. Squire, I leave him to you.” And the deacon walked mournfully away.
“If saying I am sorry I swore yesterday in the woods will do any good,” Jack continued, “I’ll say it, for I am sorry. I had made up my mind never to swear again; and I never should, but you drove me to it.”
“Stubborn and hardened to the last!” said Peternot. “He is bound to find some excuse for his conduct, somebody to shift the blame on to. Still I accept his apology, such as it is. And now, if he will give up his ill-got plunder—”
“Plunder!” echoed Jack. “Was it _your_ ill-got plunder when you took it away from me? It is my money; but I wish now I had never seen it, for a thousand times as much couldn’t pay me for what I have lost! She has lost faith in me,”—looking through his streaming tears at the retreating form of Mrs. Chatford, following her husband from the room,—“and I can never again be in this house what I have been. But I can’t give up the money; I haven’t got it, and I don’t know where it is.”
“But you know who has it?” Jack would not reply to this or to any other question tending to bring out the names of his accomplices; and the squire, losing patience at last, exclaimed, “Well, Sellick! I see no use of dallyin’ any longer here.”
“He hasn’t had his breakfast yet,” said Mrs. Pipkin. “You’ll give him a chance to eat something, I guess!” her eyes sparkling as she glanced from Sellick to the squire.
“O, sartin!” said Sellick. “I never thought of that, having had a bite myself ’fore I started. I believe in a full stumick. Come, sonny! snatch a bite; you’ll feel better.”
But Jack was too full of grief to think of food. “I shall never eat anything in this house again!” he exclaimed, with short, convulsive sobs.
Upon this, little Kate, who had been looking on with wonder and sympathy, not understanding what the dreadful trouble was, ran up to him, and threw her arms about him, exclaiming passionately, “O Jack! you will! you must! I love you, if nobody else does! But we all do! You mustn’t go away! You have been better to me than my own brothers; they plague me, but you never do!—O Mr. Peternot! he ain’t a bad boy; Jack ain’t bad! Don’t take him off to jail!”
But there was no help for the poor lad then. Peternot was inexorable. Jack made no resistance. Mrs. Chatford, returning from a last fruitless appeal to her husband, kissed him tenderly, and said what comforting words she could. Mrs. Pipkin put something into his pocket, as she bent over him; and Mr. Pipkin told him to keep a stiff upper lip. Kate clung to him with affection and wild grief. But Mr. Chatford did not come to bid him good by; and he did not say good by to Phineas.
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CHAPTER XXII
JACK AND THE JOLLY CONSTABLE.
SO Jack left the home and friends that for a brief season had been so pleasant and dear to him, and went out to take leave of another and older friend. This was Lion. He hugged and kissed the poor, faithful, affectionate creature; then, sending him to his kennel, he said to Kate, “See that he is taken good care of, won’t you? I—if I never—” But here he choked and could say no more.
[Illustration: GOOD BY, OLD FRIEND!]
“Come along, sonny,” said Sellick.
They walked on to the length of fence where the constable’s horse was hitched, mounted the wagon, and rode away, watched by more than one troubled and tearful face in the farm-house door.
Mrs. Pipkin set about her work with more than the usual fury which distinguished her on Monday mornings; while Mr. Pipkin went out to finish the milking Jack had begun.
Phin chained Lion to his kennel, saying guiltily to himself, “I ain’t to blame for his going to jail; I didn’t mean to lie; but I don’t care! folks were getting to think more of him than they do of me; and now I’ve got his dog!” Still his sense of triumph was no more like happiness than roiled and troubled waters are like some pure crystal fountain.
Mr. Chatford walked from the house to the barn and back again, and about the yard and stables, in an absent-minded way, frowning, and looking strangely uneasy in his mind. His wife, in the mean while, tried to forget her grief and anxiety in doing something for poor Jack,—packing a portmanteau of such clothes as she thought he would need if he went to jail, putting in a few books, a pin-cushion, a box of Mrs. Pipkin’s cookies, which he was fond of, and some cakes of maple-sugar, besides many little things for his comfort, or to remind him that he still had a friend.
“Now, husband!” she said, calling the deacon in to breakfast, “this must go to the Basin at once, or it may be too late. Shall Mr. Pipkin take it, or will you?”
“O, well, I suppose I will! Peternot said he would like to have me go over and identify the shoes and things; but I hate to! Strange the boy should have stuck to his lies so!” exclaimed the dissatisfied deacon. “There’s nothing I wouldn’t have done for him, if he’d shown a proper spirit.” And he sat down to eat a hurried breakfast before starting for the Basin. “I don’t see how the boy is going to get out of this scrape!”
“The best way I know o’ gittin out of a bad scrape,” remarked Mr. Pipkin, entering just then, “an’ it’s a way I’ve tried many a time—”
“How’s that?” asked the deacon.
“It’s to wake up, an’ find it’s all a dream,” replied Mr. Pipkin.
“Ah! I guess Jack would be glad enough to wake up and find this a dream, money and all!” said the deacon.
Sellick meanwhile, as he drove away with his prisoner, beguiled the time with pleasant talk.
“Don’t you think you’ve been a little too hard on our good neighbor Peternot? You shouldn’t try to git money away from a poor man like him, even if ’tis yours. A very poor man, the squire! I don’t suppose he’s wuth more ’n fifteen or twenty thousand dollars; and what’s that? If he had a hundred thousand, he’d still be the poorest man in town; for he hain’t got anything else but money and property to speak of. That’s what makes a man poor. Now, there’s Mr. and Mis’ Chatford, they would be rich with barely enough to live on. You might have robbed them, and no harm. But a poor old couple like the Peternots, for shame! Then you must consider, the squire hasn’t had the advantages of society, and a good bringing-up, and the light of the Gospil, and edication, that you’ve had. You ought to pity him, and forgive him. Good old man, the squire!”
In the midst of his wrongs and grief, Jack’s keen sense of humor was tickled by these facetious remarks, while their undertone of truth and friendliness warmed his heart.
“You’ve heard a good deal about his son Paul,” Sellick went on,—“a hard case, Paul. His great mistake was, he thought it his duty to be spending some of the money the old man was laying up. He couldn’t see the use of a great heap of gold stored away, and no good times at home; solid sunshine in the bank vaults, and gloom in the kitchen. So he went wild. The squire whipped him once, for calling him a fool, after he got to be twenty years old; tied him up to an apple-tree; I was going by, and heard the rumpus. ‘Call yer father a fool, will ye? when ye ought to say venerable father!’ says the old man, and lays on the lash. Every five or six strokes he’d stop and bawl out agin, ‘Call yer father a fool, will ye? when ye ought to say venerable father!’ Then, whack! whack! whack! ‘Call yer father a fool, will ye?’ over and over, till I got out of hearing. Not long after that the spendthrift son and the venerable father parted. Paul took to gambling for a living, and drinking for amusement,—business and pleasure combined. You brought the last news of him to town,—how he went to bed drunk one night at Wiley’s Basin, and set his room on fire, and was burnt to death, and you afterwards got his dog, that was singed trying to save his master. One would have thought the old man would feel a kindness towards you and the dog now, but—he’s a _poor man_, as I said. Paul’s bad end seemed to cut him up a good deal for a while, but now he’s taken home his nephew in his place. A plucky chap, the nephew! There’s courage for you! Me and you now wouldn’t want to go and live with—with such poor folks, ye know, and feed our souls on the old man’s hard corned beef and the old lady’s vinegar, not for any length of time, just in the hope of coming into their money when they die,—would we? Not that I wish to breathe a word agin the Peternots; dear me, no! Best kind of folks in their way, though mebby their way is a leetle mite peculiar. Hullo! there’s some of your folks!”
“It’s Mose!” said Jack, his heart swelling with a tumult of emotions as he thought of all that had happened since he watched Annie and her cousin disappear in the direction from which they were now returning.
“The schoolmarm with him, ain’t it? A re’l perty face! See! they know you. Shall we stop and talk?”
“No,—yes. O, I wish we hadn’t met them!” said Jack, wondering how he could bear to tell his dearest friend of the trouble and danger he was in, and take leave of her, in such a situation.
“Say nothing; I’ll make it all right,” said Sellick.—“Good morning, good morning, Mose! Good morning, Miss Felton. You’re having an early ride this morning; good for the appetite; makes rosy cheeks. Me and Jack’s riding out a little for our health too.”
“It makes his eyes red, if not his cheeks,” said Moses. “Where ye bound, Jack?”
“I’m going over to the Basin; Mr. Sellick asked me to ride,” replied Jack, with a smile. “They’ll tell you all about it at the house.”
“Can’t talk now; there’s Squire Peternot in the buggy close behind us,” observed Sellick. “He’ll complain of us for blocking the highway, if we keep two wagons standing abreast here when he wants to pass. Fresh for your school agin, hey, Miss Felton, this bright Monday morning? I wish we could keep you the year round. My little shavers never learned so fast or liked to go to school so well as they have this summer.”
“I couldn’t walk through the snow-drifts, to say nothing of governing the big boys,” replied Annie.
“I’ll resk the big boys!” cried Sellick. “You’d bring them to your feet, like so many whipped spaniels. Then you’ll have some smart boys on your side, to start with,—Moses, and Jack here.—You’ll go to school, I suppose, next winter?”
“If I am here; I had meant to,” faltered Jack. While Annie’s searching eyes seemed to look into his troubled heart.
“Jack! what is the matter?” she exclaimed.
“He may have engagements elsewhere,” said Sellick. “In fact, a little matter of business which he is too modest to mention,—that’s what takes us to the Basin, and it may lead to his accepting a situation. I haven’t time to explain. Good morning!” And the constable whipped up his horse just as the squire’s came close behind.
“Good by!” said Jack, as bravely as he could. Then, his grief mastering him again, as he thought how different life would be to him this pleasant morning if he had gone home with Annie in Moses’s place, as he might have done, he set his lips and teeth hard, pulled his hat fiercely over his eyes, and rode on, in his bodily form, to the Basin; while his mind travelled back, and witnessed in imagination the scene at the house, when Miss Felton and Moses should arrive and learn of his crime and his disgrace.
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CHAPTER XXIII
BEFORE JUDGE GARTY.
SELLICK drove down the main street of the village, past the blacksmith-shop, the meeting-house, and the tavern, and turned up to a hitching-post near the canal. Just beyond was the high bridge, beneath which a line-boat was passing. A wild impulse seized Jack,—to run for his freedom, and return to his old life among the rude boatmen; for anything seemed to him better than going to jail. But Sellick said quietly, “I set a good deal by you, sonny. I want to keep you close by my side, for a few hours anyway. Don’t think of parting company with me; I couldn’t possibly bear you out of my sight.”
“If you were in my place, wouldn’t you want to part company?” said Jack.
“Naterally. And if you was in mine, you’d feel as I do. Now I take it you’re a sensible boy; and you know you are only a boy; while I have twice the strength, and can run twice as fast as you can. I don’t want to be obliged to tie ye; so I hope you’ll be quiet, while we are about town together. Set in the wagon now, while I hitch the hoss.”
So Jack remained in the wagon, and carefully watched the situation, determined to miss no opportunity of escape that might possibly occur. The wagon was standing before a grocery, on the corner of the street and the canal. On the other side of the canal was another grocery, of the lowest description, where he had more than once seen his former master, Jack Berrick, fill his whiskey jug or stand and drink at the bar. Near by were some old canal stables, about the doors of which three or four drivers were currying their horses, swearing and joking. He could hear their rough language to their horses and each other, and he thought, “O, I can’t go back and be one of them! But I’ll get away if I can.”
Judge Garty’s office was in the second story of the building before which Sellick hitched his horse. “Good arrangement,” remarked the jovial constable. “Boat hands and town loafers git drunk and break the peace in the grocery down stairs; take ’em to be fined or committed, before the judge up stairs. A very good business plan.”
“I should think,” said Jack, “’t would be hard to get a drunken man up that narrow flight; ’t would be more convenient if the judge had his office in one corner of the grocery.”
“A very good notion; I’ll suggest it to him,” said Sellick. “Come now, sonny! Re’ly, you must excuse me for calling you sonny; it comes so handy.”
The “narrow flight” to which Jack alluded was a staircase built up to the second story on the outside of the building. Up this the lame Peternot and his nephew went first; then came Jack and the constable, who stood on the upper landing, while the squire, in a narrow entry beyond, shook and pounded a door which appeared to be either locked or bolted.
“He ain’t here!” exclaimed the old man, impatiently.
But just as Jack, keenly watching everything, began to hope that some advantage to him might grow out of the absence of the magistrate, Sellick exclaimed, “There he is, over the way! He sees us.”
On the opposite corner was a country store and forwarding-house, with one side on the street and the other on the canal; from the door of which Jack saw a short-legged man hurrying towards them across the way. He mounted the stairs, passed Jack and the constable, and unlocked with a key from his pocket the door which Peternot had been shaking. As he led the way into the office, Jack, who noticed everything, noticed that the key was left sticking in the lock on the outside.
“Good morning. Walk in, gentlemen,” said the judge. And, seating himself before a sloping desk placed on a common pine table, he laid off his hat, exposing a big, bald head, adorned by a couple of light tufts of gray hair over the ears, and put on a pair of steel-bowed glasses, covering a pair of very light-colored and very weak eyes, which had a habit of winking constantly.
“A case of breaking and entering,” said Peternot, introducing the business. “As ’twas my house that was robbed, and as I am the complainant, I thought it best to have the prisoner brought before you.”
The judge winked many times at Jack through his glimmering glasses, examined Sellick’s warrant, winking hard over that too, and prepared to write. By this time several village loungers, with their usual keen scent for a criminal case, began to throng the room.
Peternot, being sworn, stated circumstantially how, on the previous evening, he had been interrupted during prayer-time by burglars breaking into his house, and had caught one by the heels as he was leaping from a window, and so forth. The bundle of clothes left behind was displayed; and Jack’s legs were about to undergo examination, when he saved the court that trouble by frankly confessing himself the person who had been caught.
“The clothes have been identified by the Chatfords,” said the squire. “They will also, if necessary, be sworn to by them, when the case comes up for trial. So any further evidence with regard to them might be dispensed with, since he has confessed his crime; though I told the deacon he might be wanted here as a witness, and I’m expectin’ him every minute. My nephew will corroborate my testimony.”
“Very well, as a mere formality; though your testimony is sufficient.”
Byron Dinks having given his evidence, in the presence of an ever-increasing crowd of spectators, the judge turned to Jack, winking extraordinarily hard at him, and said, “The complaint against you, I suppose you are aware, is of a very grave character. Is there any statement you wish to make?”
Winked at by the weak-eyed judge, stared at by the group of idle spectators, and frowned upon by the relentless Peternot, Jack, standing at Sellick’s right hand beside the desk, clutched the table with his nervous fingers, caught his breath quickly, and answered in a frank, firm voice, “All I have to say is, that the money I took belongs to me more than it does to him; and I believed I had a right to it. I found it in an old rotten log; and he had robbed me of it before I took it from him. I didn’t think it was housebreaking when I got into his window; the window was open; it was broken accidentally when I was getting the money out.”
“I’ll say here,” interposed Peternot, “what I’ve said to the boy before, that if he will give up his booty and name his accomplices,—though I know perty well who they be,—I’ll accept his apology, and withdraw my complaint.”
“That’s a fair proposition,” said Judge Garty, “and both as a friend and a magistrate I advise you to take up with it. You are young; there appear to be really some extenuating circumstances in the case, and it seems hard that you should be punished.”
“It is hard!” said Jack, his voice heaving, but not breaking. “I never had a chance for myself till just a few weeks ago; and I meant to make the most of it,—I meant to do right, and be honest and true; and now this is what it comes to! But I can’t give up what he calls my booty.” His eyes flashed out proudly and defiantly: there was something in his look that said, “I can be wronged, I can be trampled on, but I won’t give in to the tyrant!” “If the money is what he wants of me, he won’t get it. I’ll go to jail, if I must.”
The magistrate winked, the spectators stared, and Peternot frowned, harder than ever. After writing a few words, Judge Garty looked up again and said, “I don’t see but what I shall have to bind you over.”
Jack, who had never heard the legal term before, turned to Sellick with a bewildered look. “Bind me over? I haven’t been bound at all yet!”
There was a general titter at his expense; and Sellick laughingly replied: “He means, you must give bonds; that is, get somebody to pledge a certain sum of money that you won’t run away, but that you’ll appear for trial when your case comes up before the county court.”
“I know!” said Jack, blushing. “That’s what you call bailing a fellow.”
“Exac’ly! Now if you can git bail, you’ll be let off till you’re wanted for trial. But if you can’t, you must stand committed,—that is, go to jail and wait there till you’re wanted.”
Judge Garty conferred in low tones with Squire Peternot,—whom Jack overheard to mutter, “Hardened little wretch! desperate character!” and then announced that he had fixed the amount of the required bonds at five hundred dollars.
“Do you know anybody who will be security for you?” he asked, winking at the prisoner.
Jack thought of Mr. Chatford,—but Mr. Chatford had lost faith in him, and could not be expected now to show him any favors. So he answered, faintly, “No, sir.” And the judge resumed his writing.
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CHAPTER XXIV
THE PRISONER’S CUP OF MILK.
THE prisoner looked anxiously at the door, and about the room, and after a little reflection said to the constable, “I’m kind of hungry. Can’t I have some breakfast?”
“Where’s the lunch Mis’ Pipkin tucked into your pocket?” said Sellick. “Here it is, all right. She knew you would come to your appetite.”
Jack had hoped to be taken down into the grocery, and at the moment he did not thank Mrs. Pipkin for her kindness.
“Can’t I have something to drink with it?” he asked. “They have milk in the grocery; I can pay for a cupful.” And he took from his pocket the solitary half-dollar, which was all the riches he could command, out of the hoard of treasure he had found so lately, and lost, and regained, and perhaps lost again forever.
“Here, sonny!” said Sellick to a boy in the crowd (every boy was “sonny” to him), “take this money and go down into the grocery and buy a cup of milk, and bring back the change, and you shall have a penny for your trouble. And be spry, for we must eat our breakfast while the judge is making out his papers.”
The lad took the money and, pushing through the crowd of loungers, passed the door, and went down the outside stairs at a rattling pace, the sound of which filled the heart of the waiting prisoner with envy.
Jack looked about him, nibbling his dry biscuit and butter, and saw that there was only one other door in the room, and that it was nailed, with a bar across it. There were three windows, one on the side of the street near the entry door, the other two overlooking the canal. He was still nibbling and studying the premises, when the lad returned.
“I hope this ain’t canal milk,” said Jack with a laugh, as he pocketed the change and took the cup, after giving the lad his penny. “They sell horrid stuff to the boats sometimes,—mostly chalk and canal-water, I believe.” He poised the cup, still munching the dry biscuit, and glanced furtively at the door. The loungers had not yet begun to leave, and there was a crowd in the way.
Sellick was saying to a village acquaintance, “I never yit lost a prisoner, and I never expect to lose one; and I never yit was afraid to take a man. Not one in fifty can run as fast as I can, and once I git holt of a chap, I jest freeze to him; ’t would take a perty good set of muscles to shake me off, and a mighty long head to outwit me.—Come, sonny, drink yer milk; judge is shaking the sand on his paper.”
Jack lifted the cup to his lips, and began to drink, but stopped suddenly, and, with his mouth full and his cheeks distended, made sounds and motions of distress, as if about to eject the liquid.
“Sour?” cried Sellick.
“’M! ’m!” said Jack, through his nose; and with milk spilling from the cup and spirting from his lips, he started for a window; while the crowd, laughing at his ludicrous plight, and anxious to avoid a sprinkling, made way before him.
It was the window on the side of the street, and it was closed. While Sellick, laughing with the rest, was stepping quickly to help him open it, Jack, beginning to choke, and appearing quite unable to control himself longer, started for the door. The mirthful constable—who had never yet lost a prisoner and never expected to lose one—turned to follow him, rather leisurely, pausing to laugh at Mr. Byron Dinks, who had received some conspicuous splashes of milk on his black broadcloth.
Jack took hold of the door, as if to steady himself, then, in an instant, darting through, pulled it after him (just missing Sellick’s fingers), turned the key on the outside, went down the stairway with flying leaps, and ran as for his life; leaving court, constable, witnesses, and spectators locked up in the room together, prisoners in his place, with abundant leisure to find something to laugh at besides him and his spilled milk!
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CHAPTER XXV
JACK’S PRISONERS.
WEAK-EYED Judge Garty, having sanded the warrant by which Jack was to have been conveyed to jail, and winked hard over it for about fifteen seconds (giving at least six winks to the second) to see that it was all right, shook it in the air at the empty space occupied a moment before by the jolly constable.
“Here! Sellick! where are you? Here’s our _mittimus_,” he was saying, when occurred the pleasant little catastrophe related in our last chapter.
The room was filled with confusion in an instant, sounds of men laughing, crying out, rushing to and fro, and clamoring at door and window.
“What’s the matter?” called Squire Peternot, in a loud, stern voice. “Where’s the constable? where’s the prisoner?”
“Gone!” answered somebody in the crowd.
“Gone?” cried Judge Garty, rising to his feet, still shaking his paper and winking blindly. “He can’t go without our warrant! Sellick knows better ’n that!”
“But the boy don’t!” cried Sellick, running to the table.
“The boy!” echoed Peternot; “where is he?”
“Gone—got away—took leg-bail,” answered several voices at once, in the general tumult. “He’s left his hat, though!”
“Why ain’t you—why don’t somebody—ketch him!” gasped out Peternot, striding towards the door.
“Screw-driver! pair of shears! anything!” said Sellick, searching the table, “to force the lock!”
“The lock? the lock?” said the judge, like one just waking from sleep in a strong light.
“Yes, man!” said Sellick, unable to take an altogether serious view of even so serious a matter; “boy has gone for more milk; ’fraid he wouldn’t find us here when he got back, so he turned the key! Tongs!” And he sprang to the empty fireplace.
Peternot reached the door, and found his nephew, Mr. Byron Dinks, standing beside it in a comical attitude.
“Why don’t you open?” cried the squire, putting on his hat.
“Can’t open!” answered Byron.
“Stand away then!”
“Can’t stand away!”
“What’s the reason you can’t?” roared the impatient old man, seizing Byron by the shoulder.
“Door is locked—I’m caught—coat-tail shut in! Look out! you’ll tear!” said Byron, anxiously holding the hinder part of his garment with one hand, and his uncle’s arm with the other.
“I should think ye was all a pack of fools!” exclaimed the squire, pushing on to the now open window, where he found several heads in advance of his own. “Le’ me come! make way here! Why don’t somebody in the street ketch him?”
“The’ ain’t nobody in the street!” giggled a youngster, taking in his head to make room for Peternot. “All the loafers are in here!”
Pressing forward, cane in hand, shouting, and thrusting several of the said loafers aside, Peternot reached the window, and, in attempting to put his head out, smashed his hat very neatly and thoroughly over his eyes. Having then with much ado got his head first out of the hat and then out of the window, he began to bellow forth, “Help! ho! fire!” And he whacked the clapboards outside with his stout cane. “Where is everybody?”
The testimony of the youngster as to all the village loafers being locked up in the room, was so near a literal fact, that not until this moment did anybody appear in answer to the cries from the window. But now three or four persons came running over the canal bridge, two or three out of the store opposite, and as many from the tavern up the street; while a fat little man rushed out of the grocery below, and turning up a face, round and red as a newly risen full moon, at the judge’s office window, screamed in a hoarse voice, “What’s the row up there?”
“Which way did that boy go?” demanded Peternot.
“What boy?” was answered back from the crowd that began to assemble below.
“Sellick’s prisoner! Run for him, some of you! He has locked us all in here! Hurry, and let us out! Help! ho!” And again the old man smote the resounding clapboards.
He had put on his hat once more; and now, accidentally knocked off by striking the window-sash, it fell, and meeting the arm and cane as they were rising vigorously to give the clapboards another blow, it flew in the air, sailed down by the corner of the grocery, and alighted softly and gently in the canal.
“Hurry!” repeated the squire, falling into some slight incongruities of speech in consequence of his very great excitement. “Ketch the door! Open the boy! Pick up—heavens and airth!—pick up my hat!”
Some hastened up stairs to the office door, to find that the escaping prisoner had seriously complicated the difficulties of the situation by carrying off the key. Others, dashing around corners, stared up and down the streets, and under the bridge, and up and down the canal, and into various dark places, including a pig-sty, Sellick’s wagon-seat, and an old molasses-hogshead half filled with rain water, standing under the eaves, without making any noteworthy discoveries. In the mean while a boatman on a passing scow drew Peternot’s hat out of the water with a pike-pole, and reached it to somebody, who placed it on the wooden head of a short post, well grooved by the friction of cables, where it was left to drip and dry.
“Bring a ladder! a ladder!” vociferated Peternot. The crowd below repeated, “Ladder! ladder!” and ran off in various directions to find one.
And now a man in a buggy was observed whipping his horse rather fast down the main street of the village.
“It’s the deacon!” cried Peternot. “May be he has seen him!”
It was Mr. Chatford indeed, who, perceiving signs of commotion at the bridge, urged on old Maje’s paces at as high a speed as that tired and faithful animal could well make after his unusual morning’s exercise with Mose and Annie Felton, and arrived on the spot just in time to be in the way of four or five ladders that came together from as many different directions. Maje turned to avoid one, and, being hit in the nose by another, backed the buggy upon some boys who were bringing a third. Men at the same time came running with fire-buckets and cries of “Fire!”
At last, after one ladder had been set up and found too short, another was erected in such haste over it that it broke the window, and also came near breaking Peternot’s head. And now, just as this mode of egress from the room was established, Sellick succeeded in forcing the obstinate lock. This was hardly done when a ragged little shaver in the street, who had been trying for a long while to tell his little story, managed to make himself heard.
“I feen him wun and fow fumfin in here!” placing his little hand on one of the lower hoops of the aforesaid molasses-hogshead, to enforce his meaning,—that he had seen Jack run and throw something in there.
This speech being at last understood and partly credited, the hogshead was tipped and the water emptied out; and there, sure enough, was Judge Garty’s office-door key, found just after the lock was forced and the useless ladder was sent crashing against the unlucky window.
But the child could give no information as to the way the fugitive had gone. Neither could Deacon Chatford, who now heard with astonishment how Jack had outwitted the witty constable, and turned the key on the court.
“The rogue!” said the deacon. “He ought not to have taken such a desperate course as that!” Yet somehow he wasn’t sorry. Riding over to the Basin, he had been greatly disturbed in his mind at the thought of Jack’s going to jail, and had seriously questioned whether it was not his duty to offer bail for him. He was a kind-hearted man, as we know; but he had lost faith in the boy’s integrity; and it was a relief to him to learn that the question of bail was settled. “Why, Sellick!” he cried, “what have you been about?”
The lately imprisoned crowd came laughing down the stairway to the street, Sellick laughing with the rest, though rather foolishly. He carefully folded Judge Garty’s warrant, and stuck it into the lining of his hat, remarking, “‘It may come in play some time,’ as the stingy man said when he laid away the bad egg in his cupboard.” Then stooping to pick up a bruised tin cup which lay at the foot of the stairs, “That’s an honest boy, deacon! He paid for the milk, and he left the cup.—This belongs to you, I believe,” handing it to the little fat grocer. “It looks like a good cup, and the milk may have been good milk, but the boy, I’m free to say, didn’t seem to be satisfied with it.—Now what’s to be done, squire? There’s no use crying for the article arter it’s spilt, ye know.”
The bareheaded old man strode past him, frowning prodigiously, and, taking his hat from the post, all wet as it was, put it on.
“Get track of your prisoner and take him!” he said impatiently. “What do ye stand dawdling here for? Somebody must have seen him!”
That was true enough. Reports were even then coming in of a youth whom women washing at their back doors had observed leaping fences and running fast across gardens and fields, away from the village. And now came shouts from down the canal, which drew the whole crowd in that direction.
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CHAPTER XXVI
THE OWNER OF THE POTATO PATCH, AND HIS DOG.
PASSING the corner of the block, where he dropped Judge Garty’s key into the hogshead of water, Jack slipped into a short, narrow alley, and turned down a back street which brought him quickly to the shore of a broad mill-pond, where it stopped. He then took to the fields.
He got on very well until, as he was crossing a potato patch, he saw, only a few rods ahead of him, a man going up from the shore of the pond, followed by a savage-looking dog. It was our old acquaintance and Jack’s enemy, Duffer,[1] a thick-set, red-faced, black-whiskered teamster, almost the last man Jack would have wished at that moment to encounter.
Footnote 1:
See JACK HAZARD AND HIS FORTUNES, Chapters XXIII. and XXIV.
He stopped running, but kept on at a fast walk, still hoping to pass the man and his dog without trouble. He was bareheaded, having left his hat behind in the court-room. That circumstance was alone sufficient to excite attention; and Duffer looked sharply at him.
“Go back there!”
“I’m in a hurry, I can’t go back,” said Jack, continuing to walk on.
“You’re on my land! you can’t cross here!”
“I can cross farther up, then.”
“No, ye can’t!” said Duffer, brandishing a long black whip which he had been trailing behind him. “I owns this ’ere land, from the pond to the street. Go back the way you come, or I lets my dorg on to ye!”
“I want to pass, and it’s as far going back to get off your land as it is going on,” said Jack, anxiously; for he could hear the shouts in the village, and he feared that pursuers were already on his track.
“You don’t cross this ’ere tater patch!” said Duffer, furiously. “I know ye! Ye had a hand in killing my t’ other dorg!”
“No, I didn’t,” said Jack. “He was killed in a fair fight with my dog,—ask Grodson! Let me go on, and I never ’ll set foot on your land again.”
And he was going on. Then the ruffian said, “The dorg ’ll take ye! Look alive, Bull!”
Jack, growing desperate, screamed back, “Let your whelp come!” and turned to face the brute.
“Sick!” said Duffer, cracking his whip, and the dog started.
Jack had in his hand a slender stick which he had picked up crossing the fields. Duffer laughed at it. “My dorg won’t mind a switch like that! Go in, Bull!”
But Jack had no thought of defending himself by striking blows with so slight a weapon. His long experience on the canal had taught him, as he afterwards said, “a trick worth two of that.”
[Illustration: “A TRICK WORTH TWO OF THAT.”]
Boldly facing the cur as he came bounding towards him, he grasped the stick firmly near the ends with both hands, and, lifting it horizontally, held it before him, about as high as his breast. Bull, as Jack had expected, leaped up and seized it with his teeth; in which exposed position he received full in his stomach so sudden and well-directed a kick from Jack’s heavy farm-shoe, that he loosed his hold and rolled over, yelping, on the ground.
“Sick him! go in! tear him!” roared Duffer, running to the rescue.
The “dorg,” however, had had his courage quite kicked out of him with his breath, and nothing could induce him to renew the attack. Whining and limping, or rather crawling, he slunk back to his master, who gave him another fierce command to “go in” and “sick,” and lastly a sharp cut with the snake-like lash, which merely sent him yelping in the opposite direction. Then Duffer, infuriated, advanced upon Jack, flourishing his whip, exactly in the way the boy had persisted in going.
Jack thereupon turned back. Duffer followed him. Jack began to run, and then Duffer began to run. Jack went tumbling over the fences, and Duffer went tumbling over the fences after him. Jack ran for liberty at first, but soon he began to run from the whip; while at each moment, as he gave signs of failing courage, Duffer’s rage and thirst for vengeance increased; for nothing so excites the valorous fury of your genuine bully, as the appearance of faint-heartedness in a foe.
Beyond the street, Jack kept the shore of the pond where it swept around towards the canal. He now regretted not having taken that course in the first place, yet he had avoided it for a good reason; there was the waste-wear in his way.
The “heel-path” side of the canal was narrowed here to a high and steep embankment; into this was set a waste-gate in a frame of strong timbers; and over the gate and the timbers the canal poured its surplus waters in a shining cascade that fell into the pond below. This was the waste-wear, crossed by a single foot-plank, in full view of the village and of the canal, for half a mile up and down. Quite near the gate, its arched top visible at the base of the embankment, was a culvert for the pond water, which there flowed under the canal into a mill-race on the other side.
Towards this conspicuous if not very dangerous place, the hatless Jack, driven back by Duffer, now ran with all his might. Once across the waste-wear, he could still hope to baffle pursuit in the orchards and woods beyond. But Duffer was too swift for him; and, feeling his own strength giving out, and the avenger of the “dorg” fast gaining on him, Jack stooped and caught up from the flat, goose-nibbled and goose-trampled pond-shore the only available missile in sight. Then, like David defying the giant of Gath, he turned, with upraised, menacing arm.
“Come on,” he cried, “and I send this at your head!”
It could not have proved a very formidable projectile, being nothing but a dirty goose-egg, but it served his purpose for the moment; Goliath, mistaking it for a stone, stopped and prepared to dodge or retreat.
“Don’t ye chuck that rock at me! I’ll drownd ye in that water if ye do!”
“Keep your distance, then,” commanded Jack, backing off.
He used often to laugh, in later years, at the ludicrous spectacle of the big-whiskered ruffian brought to a stand and put in fear by a goose-egg; but he had no leisure for laughing at the time. For now the uproar in the village, which had seemed to be subsiding, burst forth afresh in sudden cries of “Ketch him! ketch that boy!” and, looking quickly around, he saw a scattered crowd of men and youngsters running out of the village directly towards him.
Then Jack felt that his chance of escape was small; his breath was spent, and here were fresh pursuers on his track! In his rage, remembering that he might now have been a mile away had it not been for Duffer, he paused, before once more taking to flight, and discharged the goose-egg at his enemy. Long practice with pebbles and stones on the tow-path, in the days when he was a driver, had made him a good shot; wrath nerved his arm; the mark was near, and by no means small; and the result was satisfactory. He whirled and ran, leaving Duffer half stunned, staggering and spluttering and spitting, mouth, beard, and bosom variegated and dripping with the mixed yellow and white of the egg, which had struck and burst, like a bombshell, full in his face.
Jack felt that the egg was suspiciously light, and anybody within half a dozen rods might have heard it _pop_; but it was Duffer who had the strongest evidence of the vile and gassy character of its contents. Blowing and snorting, he rushed down to the pond in order to purify himself, while Jack fled.
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CHAPTER XXVII
THE RACE, AND HOW IT ENDED.
THE crowd came streaming out of the back streets of the village, not less than twenty or thirty men and boys, some intent on joining in the chase, while the rest were actuated only by an eager desire to witness the sport. It was not often that the lees of life in the quiet Basin were stirred by so exciting an incident as the locking up of a court-room full of town officials and idle spectators, and the escape of a prisoner; and it was natural that a lively interest should be felt in the end of the little romance.
About half the crowd, thinking Duffer had received a terrible wound in the head (mistaking the yolk of the egg for blood), ran down to the pond-side, where they found a large flock of geese already gathered about him, hissing and cackling at him, with outstretched necks, in a noisy and vivacious fashion, while he scraped and washed himself, and with occasional angry dashes tried to drive them away. The rest of the crowd followed Jack; and soon those who had drawn near the disabled combatant, perceiving the comical character of his injuries, turned laughing away, with the geese, and hurried to enjoy the more exciting scene at the waste-gate.
Among Jack’s pursuers was one who, although a little later at the start than many, soon by diligent use of his legs and arms worked his way into the foremost rank, and at last took the lead. This was Sellick. If not absolutely the best runner of the crowd, he had certainly the best reasons for running. He had not only lost a prisoner, but lost him under peculiar and ludicrous circumstances. And although the jolly constable was a great joker himself, he did not surpassingly relish a joke of which he was the victim. He was well aware that the fact of his having been outgeneralled by a boy would be cherished as a standing jest against him as long as he lived; but if he could retort, that he secured the runaway, and after all took him to jail, that would be some comfort. So he put forth his strength, and tried the speed of his limbs; doing then and there such extraordinary running, in the sight of the huzzaing and laughing villagers, that it passed into a proverb, and I remember hearing many years after an old farmer say of a cow that once got away from him as he was leading her home, “She run like Sellick arter Jack Hazard!”
Much of the huzzaing, I am happy to record, was for Jack. Men naturally sympathize with the weaker party in a struggle, provided they have no personal interest in it. Peternot was by no means popular; few cared for Sellick, except as a wag, whom it was fun to see circumvented; while, on the other hand, there was a general feeling that Jack, by his shrewdness and spirit, well deserved his freedom. So those who were first in the chase finally gave it up, and fell back as spectators, leaving to the constable alone the glory of recapturing his prisoner.
“Go it, little one! Put in, limber legs!” came to Jack’s ears across the corner of the pond, with many an encouraging shout and loud laugh. “Streak it! leg it! You’ll win!”
But there were many remarks of a less cheering nature, which he did not hear.
“It’s no use! Sellick ’ll have him ’fore he gets to the waste-wear!” said a shoemaker who had just left his bench and run out with his leather apron on.
“If he could only cross the waste-wear and pull up the plank behind him!” observed the tavern-keeper.
“He can’t do that; plank is spiked down,” replied a young journeyman carpenter. “But he might pitch Sellick off as he goes to cross after him,—if he only had a long pole!”
“He’s about beat out; see how Sellick gains on him!” cried Byron Dinks, clapping his hands. “He’ll have him! he’ll have him!”
“I declare, it seems too bad!” said Deacon Chatford, coming down to the shore. “Poor Jack! he has said so much about having a chance for himself, and now!”
“He has no chance with Sellick!” exclaimed Byron Dinks, gleefully. “He’s got him! He’s headed him off! He’s—Oh!”
The deacon echoed, “Oh!” and the throng of spectators broke forth in a chorus of excited oh’s and ah’s, and other exclamations of astonishment.
What had happened was this.
Jack, finding himself no match for the constable, believed that his only hope lay in reaching the canal and crossing to the tow-path. Being a good swimmer, he might gain some slight advantage by that manœuvre; while it seemed quite impossible for him to escape over the waste-wear. He reached the embankment, and went panting and staggering up the steep side; while Sellick mounted easily a rod or two nearer the village, and was at the top before him. This movement drove Jack on towards the waste-wear; but Sellick, it was plain to see, would be there first also.
“You run well, sonny!” laughed the constable; “but you’re beat!”
“Not yet!” Jack cried. And, attempting to run back down the embankment, he found himself on a steep and dangerous place over the culvert.
“Give up, give up, sonny!” said Sellick, working carefully down towards him from the top of the embankment. “Come! then we’ll go to the grocery and have another drink of milk, ’fore we take that little ride together. I guess we can find some better milk this time! Look out! you’ll fall!”
“I don’t care if I do!” exclaimed Jack, groping farther and farther down, as the constable ventured nearer. “Before I’ll let you take me—”
At that moment his foot appeared to slip; he seemed to make a feeble attempt to regain his hold, then, to avoid a dangerous fall, he threw himself clear of the masonry, and tumbled headlong into the water. It was the fall and the splash that drew forth the aforesaid exclamations from the spectators.
Sellick ran back to a safe place, and descended quickly to the edge of the pond, just in time to see Jack come up once, gasp, turn heavily in the water, and sink again. The jolly man was serious for once.
“Help!” he called. “I vum, the boy is drownding!”
There was a great rush to the spot; but, as is usually the case at such times, nobody seemed to know what to do. Some cried, “Bring a rope!” others, “Get a pole!” but neither pole nor rope was brought; nor would either have been of the least use, as the event proved.
Jack had fallen in deep water at a distance of several yards from any standing-place near the culvert. It was the intention to reach out something for him to lay hold of when he should rise in sight again. But, strange to say, good swimmer as he was, he did not reappear.
What had become of him we shall perhaps learn in the course of a chapter or two.
[Illustration: THE END OF THE RACE.]
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CHAPTER XXVIII
THE SEARCH, AND HOW IT ENDED.
CONSTABLE SELLICK was not a man devoid of feeling, for all his merry disposition. He stood gazing anxiously at the water, shading his eyes from the sun reflected in it; then, as Jack did not come up a second time, the worthy man was filled with consternation.
“Who are the good swimmers here?” he cried. “Go in after him, some one! You can dive, Len Edwards!”
“But I can’t dive like Jack Hazard,” answered Len. “I’ve seen him in the water with the Chatford boys. There’s nothing he can’t do in the water.”
“His breath was most likely beat out of his body, striking the surface,” observed Mr. Byron Dinks. “A man may strike the water in such a way, it will be like falling flat on a rock.” And Byron picked his teeth with a stem of dry grass from the bank.
“I’ll go in if Harry Pray will,” said Len.
“Well! I’ll go if you will,” replied Harry. And in the midst of the general excitement and confusion, these two enterprising young men began to undress.
Before either was prepared for a plunge, however, a third young man, who had just arrived on the spot and learned that a boy was drowned, leaped out of his clothes as if by magic; while the word ran through the crowd, “Percy Lanman! It’s Percy Lanman! He can get him!”
“Take away that rail!” shouted a clear, ringing voice.
The rail, which somebody had brought, and which Sellick was poking ineffectually about in the deep place where he had seen Jack go down, was quickly withdrawn; and the owner of the voice, white and gleaming as a living statue, sprang from the bank; a plash and a flash, and he had disappeared in the sparkling water.
He was gone about fifteen seconds, which appeared almost as many minutes to some of those who watched with intense interest for his reappearance. At length he came up again, shook the water from his dripping head and winked it from his eyes, and looked about him while he took breath.
“If he can’t find him we can’t,” observed Len, starting to put on his clothes again.
“I’m going in, anyhow,” replied Harry, moving towards the water.
“If you do I will,” said Len.
“No discoveries?” cried Sellick, anxiously.
Percy did not reply, but thrusting his head once more beneath the surface, swam slowly about with his eyes open, gazing into the sunlit depths.
Deacon Chatford groaned. “This is a sad business, Squire Peternot!”
“He shouldn’t have tried to escape an officer of the law!” was Peternot’s stern reply.
“There’s no boy here!” Percy Lanman now announced, just as Len and Harry were going in.
“’T ain’t possible!” exclaimed Sellick.
“I’m sure of it!” said Percy. “Wait a minute, and I’ll tell you where he went.”
Down he plunged again; fifteen seconds passed—thirty seconds—a minute; still he did not reappear. Suddenly Harry Pray, as he was swimming about, heard a hollow splashing sound, and shouted, “He’s in the culvert! Percy’s in the culvert!”
“That’s where the boy has gone!” exclaimed Squire Peternot.
“I thought of that!” said Sellick. “But there’s no current, the mill ain’t going, and he fell at least a dozen feet from the opening.”
Percy now came swimming leisurely out of the culvert; making for the bank, he there proceeded to put on his clothes.
“No,” said he, laughing, as Sellick questioned him, “the boy couldn’t have floated into the culvert. But he went in just as I did,—swimming under water. And it’s my opinion, if you want to find him, you’d better look for him on the other side of the canal.”
“Fooled again, Sellick!” said the journeyman carpenter. And the cry went through the crowd, “Jack’s got away! he has gone through the culvert under the canal!”
Sellick ran to the top of the bank and looked eagerly across,—a great crowd following him. Only the level tow-path met his eye, and a horizon of far-off forest-tops beyond: not even the saw-mill was visible, to say nothing of the race into which the culvert conducted the pond water. The whole country fell away in that direction towards Lake Ontario, which lay behind the billowy line of forest-tops.
To make any discoveries on the other side of the high embankments, which carried the canal over what had once been a narrow valley opening out into the broad, low country, it would of course be necessary to cross to the tow-path. But there was no bridge nearer than the village, and Sellick did not like to get wet. So he called out to the two swimmers, now diligently looking for Jack in the pond after it had been shown that he wasn’t there, “Hello! Len and Harry! go through the culvert and see what you can see!”
“Will you, Harry?” said Len.
“No, I won’t go through the culvert, for any constable!” replied Harry.
“Nor I neither, if you won’t,” said Len; the culvert being generally regarded with superstition by village bathers. “There’s water-snakes in it!”
“If the mill should start, we couldn’t swim back against the current,” Harry answered Sellick.
“Then hurry up here, and cross the canal; come, you’ve got your clothes off!” cried Sellick.
“What do you say, Harry?” asked Len.
“I d’n’ know, I do’ wanter!” replied Harry.
“Nor I neither!” said Len.
“Come, Sellick! don’t be l’iterin’ here!” exclaimed the impatient Peternot. “Either cross over, or go round by the bridge.”
“Here comes an old wheat-boat; maybe the steersman ’ll put us across,” said Sellick. “Hello!” he shouted, “lay over here!” And he called to the driver: “Do you see any boy about the race-way, or running off anywhere, down on that side of the canal?”
“I see a man going into the saw-mill,—nobody else,” answered the driver.
“Call him! tell him to come up to the tow-path.”
“Call him yourself!” And the driver cracked his whip at the towing horses.
“I shall git aground, if I go over there,” said the steersman.
“No, you won’t! Good shore! plenty of water! you’re light!”
“What’s the row, anyhow?”
Before Sellick could answer, somebody in the crowd cried, “Prisoner got away—boy—went through the culvert under the canal—constable wants to go over and git him.”
“Give ye a quarter,” added Sellick.
Slowly the bow swung over towards the “heel-path”; then the steersman, bracing himself against the tiller, carried over the stern. The boat grated hard against the shore, and immediately, not only Sellick, but at least a dozen men and boys with him, jumped and scrambled aboard.
“Ruther more passengers ’n I bargained fer,” remarked the steersman, as the boat floated off again. “Guess I shall haf to charge ye all about ten cents apiece.”
“Charge ’em what you’re a mind to, and set me across in a hurry,” replied Sellick.
“What boy is it,” asked the steersman, “and what mischief has he been up to?”
“His name is Hazard,—Jack Hazard.”
“You don’t say! I know Jack! I used to go with a scow his step-father was captain of when he was a driver; Cap’n Berrick’s scow. But I thought Jack was doin’ well, back in the country here somewhere.”
“He was, till he got into another man’s house by mistake,” said Sellick. “He ain’t a bad boy, Jack ain’t; a good feller; smart too,—smartest boy I ever see! But slippery as an eel! He’s slipped through my fingers twice to-day. But you ain’t putting us ashore!”
“Passengers hain’t paid their fare yet,” replied the steersman, coolly keeping the boat in the middle of the canal. “Tell me about Jack.”
“Lay up and I will! Here’s my quarter.”
“Ten cents,—ten cents all round; no partiality,” said the steersman, declining the proffered coin. “About Jack—I’ve knowed him off and on for a couple o’ year an’ more, and I never believed he would steal.”
“It wasn’t exactly stealing.—Hurry up with your money!—Some disputed property.—Ten cents, boys!—He believed it was his, and took it.—Why don’t you pay up, you fellows?”
Nobody but Sellick, however, seemed to think it desirable to pay money for being landed on the tow-path; and Sellick was unwilling to pay for the crowd.
“On the whole,” remarked the steersman, “I guess I won’t take your money. You may all ride up to the Basin for nothing. But you’ll have to git off on the bridge, for we don’t stop.—No, sir!” as Sellick offered to lay his hand on the tiller. “You’re a perty good-lookin’ chap, but ye can’t come that nonsense here. I’m steersman of this craft, jest about now. You’re welcome to yer ride, gentlemen, bein’ friends of Jack’s. Remember me to him, will ye, when ye fall in with him?—which I hope you won’t in a hurry. Jest give him a hand-shake and a good word from his old chum Pete. Lay down that pike-pole, mister, or I’ll lay you down!”
“I’m going ashore!” cried Sellick.
“You’ll go ashore in a way you won’t like!” said Pete; and there stood two rough, reckless-looking deck hands ready to back him.
Sellick dropped the pole with a laugh, which did not seem so spontaneous and hearty as some of the outbursts of merriment in which that mirthful gentleman had been known to indulge.
The spectators on the shore understood the movement, and, at sight of the jolly constable and his companions carried off against their will by the slow-moving wheat-boat, sent after them a chorus of jeers and laughter, in which mingled the tone of one stern and angry voice, that of Squire Peternot, who struck the “heel-path” with his heavy horn-headed cane, exclaiming, “Hang the wretches! hang the miserable villains!”
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CHAPTER XXIX
THE CULVERT AND THE CORNFIELD.
ALL these delays gave Jack time, and time was what he needed just now.
It was not until the moment when, pretending to fall, he threw himself from the masonry of the culvert, that the idea occurred to him of resorting to a little trick which he had often practised in the water with Lion, for the amusement of his companions, and of playing the part of a drowning boy. The dog that usually rescued him could be dispensed with on this occasion; but the skill of the experienced swimmer might serve him.
He had seen the culvert whilst running towards the canal; and even then the thought had flashed through his mind that, if he could once get into it, pursuit might be baffled, and his capture delayed, for at least a little while. He did not, however, suppose that it would be possible to pass through and escape, against the chances of being met and taken on the other side.
But now he thought if he could make it appear that he was drowned in the pond, then time might be gained. So, after his first plunge, he came up once, in order to catch breath and give one glance at the situation, then turned in the water and sank. Fortunately the sun on the surface dazzled Sellick’s eyes, or he might have seen a suspicious movement of the boy’s hands, and the quiet gliding away of the boy’s body through the clear depths, towards the arched opening in the masonry.
When next Jack came to the surface, he found himself in what seemed a long, narrow gallery, nearly filled with water; a low, vaulted roof just above him, and an opening at each end through which shone the light of the sky. Drops from the clammy and dripping stones fell with slow, echoing plashes in the cavernous gloom, reminding him that he was under the canal; that the great, winding, watery thoroughfare, which he had travelled many a summer, and through which the lazy boats moved, was now over his head.
Accustomed to diving as he was, a plunge at the end of an exhausting race was not a good thing for the lungs; and Jack declares that he was never so nearly dead for want of breath, as when he rose to the surface in the culvert. For a minute or more it seemed quite impossible for him to make any exertion, beyond what was necessary to keep his nose above water. But there he stayed, just moving his feet and hands, while he filled his aching lungs with drafts of air, which made him rise and sink, and sent gentle undulations and ripples along the dark culvert walls.
The cries for help came to his ears, and inspired him with fresh courage: he knew that his stratagem had succeeded. He knew, too, that it would not be long before search would be made for him in the culvert, or at the other opening. “I must be moving!” he thought.
Swimming swiftly and silently under the low vault, he passed completely beneath the canal, and cautiously put his head out on the other side. Before him was the tranquil mill-race half filled with floating saw-logs, the saw-mill at the end of it, and a low, wild country of stumpy farms and wooded swamps beyond. Nobody in sight; but he could still hear excited voices on the other side of the canal embankments.
Gliding out of the culvert, he swam to the right bank of the race, which was there built up five or six feet from the ground, crawled over it, dropped down under it, and ran along beside it till he reached the mill. He heard the shrill shriek of filing saws as he passed, and knew that the sawyer was busy. Dodging between great piles of slabs and lumber, he kept on, and soon gained the shelter of a fringe of alders that bordered the onward-flowing mill-stream. That led him into a swampy piece of woods. And so it happened that, by the time Sellick and his companions scrambled from the deck of the wheat-boat upon the bridge at the Basin, and turned back to the culvert, the fugitive was nearly a mile away.
Traversing the swamp, Jack crossed several fields and a wood-lot, and at length came out upon a recent clearing, in which a number of half-burnt stumps and log-heaps were smoking. Beyond that was a road; and on the farther side of the road was a cornfield.
“That’s the place to hide!” thought Jack; and having stopped to drink at a little spring, he crossed the road, and was soon gliding between rows of tasselled stalks and long green rustling leaves.
The piece was wet, and a part of the crop was late, and Jack observed with interest a number of good roasting ears. Being a prudent youth, he had already begun to question where his next meal was to be obtained; for although he had a little money, he had no hat, and feared to present himself anywhere bareheaded.
“I’ll help myself, as the coons and squirrels do,” said he, as he noticed the ravages of those destructive little beasts all about the field. “Hello! here’s something interesting!”
It was a scarecrow of stuffed clothes, from which a flock of noisy blackbirds flew up at his approach.
“That’s a pretty good felt hat,” said he; “wonder how it would fit _me_. Excuse me, old fellow; I need it more than you do; I’ll bring it back when I get through with it. In the mean while the blackbirds can’t respect you any less than they do now, I know!”
He pulled off the hat, gave it a good beating on the scarecrow’s outstretched wooden hand, and found that, by stuffing a few corn-husks under the lining, he could make it do very well.
“Thank you,” said he. “Now I feel as if I had traded myself off for another boy. If you’ve no objections, I think I’ll keep you company a little while. Poor company’s better than none, as they say. Oblige me by holding my coat till it dries a little.”
He hung his wet garment on the scarecrow, and walked leisurely about, selecting a few of the best roasting ears he could find. His breakfast had really amounted to nothing,—good Mrs. Pipkin’s biscuit and butter having been sacrificed with the milk he bought of the grocer,—and he was growing faint.
The excitement of his escape had left him in good spirits. For a while he was buoyed up by a wild feeling of freedom; and his old love of adventure came back upon him. The wrongs he had suffered made him reckless and defiant of the whole world.
“I’ve tried to be honest; but what’s the use?” said he. “I thought I’d got a chance for myself, and this is what it comes to! Even the deacon has turned against me! Now let ’em look out! I’ll have my pay, somehow!”
If Jack had kept near the canal, and in this mood had seen his old friend Pete comfortably riding the tiller of the wheat-boat, his whole future might have been changed by so slight a circumstance. But his good genius had not yet given him over to his own vindictive thoughts and rash resolves.
With weariness and hunger came memory and reflection. The burning sense of injury with which he thought of Peternot and Phineas Chatford, and all who had been instrumental in his disgrace, gave way to different emotions as he remembered good Mrs. Chatford, and lovely Annie Felton, and affectionate little Kate.
“O, shall I never see them again?” he murmured; and a big sob rose in his throat. And the home where he had been so happy for a few short months! And Lion! “I won’t go without Lion, anyway!” he exclaimed. “I’ll see the Huswick boys about the money, and get that if I can, and Lion anyhow!”
It was a beautiful day, mild and tranquil and hazy, with just that tinge of melancholy in it which marks the gradual change of summer into autumn. To Jack, lurking there in the silent cornfield, it seemed like Sunday. He sat down in the warm sunlight by the scarecrow, and waited for his clothes to dry.
The shrill song of the locust rose now and then on the still air, increasing for a few seconds in vehemence, then sank and ceased; and occasionally the gossip of the multitudinous blackbirds came quite near to him, as the chattering flocks settled on the corn; but he heard scarcely any other sound, until suddenly he became aware of footsteps and a rustling of leaves not far off. He sat still, and listened. Then all was quiet again for a minute or two. Then came the loud report of a fowling-piece, accompanied by a curious rattling sound close above his head. A scattering volley of small shot had cut the corn-tops all about the spot where he sat.
His first thought was that he had been shot at. But just then a cloud of blackbirds rose from the corn, and the feet he had heard approaching rushed towards them. He kept perfectly still, and saw a boy about his own size run past him, between two rows of corn, not a rod off. The young hunter might easily have discovered Jack sitting there beside the scarecrow, if he had not been so intent on picking up his blackbirds.
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CHAPTER XXX
JACK BREAKFASTS AND RECEIVES A VISITOR.
SOON Jack heard the gun in another part of the field; then a quarter of a mile off; then faintly in the far distance. Then the blackbirds came back again.
“Now,” said Jack, “I’ll see what I can do for breakfast.”
He put on his coat, filled his pockets with roasting ears, and returned towards the stump-lot where he had seen the smoking log-heaps. He had not gone far when he saw something black hop along the ground before him. It was a wounded blackbird. He gave chase, picked up a dead bird by the way, caught and killed the first, and dressed both with his jack-knife. They were plump and fat.
“Some folks think blackbirds ain’t good to eat,” said he, “but I am going to try ’em.”
Cautiously emerging from the cornfield, he crossed the road, and got over into the clearing. There he found the spring at which he had drank before, and, having drank again, he washed his hands and face and prepared his birds for roasting. He now sought out one of the half-burnt log-heaps, and, crouching beside it, opened a bed of glowing coals with a green branch which he used as a poker. A part of the branch he whittled into a spit for his birds, and then proceeded to cook his breakfast.
He burnt the corn, and likewise his fingers a little, and more than once a bird dropped from the spit into the fire; but he didn’t mind these slight mishaps. His appetite was good, and, everything being ready at last, he made a delicious meal without salt. How sweet the roasted corn was! And he laughed at the foolish prejudice of some ignorant people against the flesh of blackbirds, as he sucked the tender bones and tossed them into the fire.
All this time he kept a wary watch for intruders; and now he was not pleased to see over his shoulder a man crossing the stump-lot. He moved at a sauntering pace, and stooped now and then to examine objects on the ground; and Jack noticed that once or twice he appeared to put something into a little bag he carried in his hand.
“Maybe he won’t see me,” thought Jack. “Yes, he will, though! He’s coming straight towards me!”
He thought it best, however, to keep quiet and go on with his breakfast. He had already thrown the well-gnawed corn-cobs into the fire, and was picking the last ribs of his second blackbird, when the stranger drew near.
“You seem to be having a jolly time here, all by yourself.”
Jack looked up, and saw beside him a rather short, square-built young man, with a face strongly marked by the small-pox,—a face which, however, in spite of its blemishes, was rendered interesting and attractive by a certain lively and good-humored expression. The little bag in his hand turned out to be a handkerchief tied up by the corners, from between which peeped the green tufts and delicate plumes of some fresh mosses and ferns.
[Illustration: A NEW ACQUAINTANCE.]
“Not so very jolly,” replied Jack, perceiving at once that he had nothing to fear from a person who looked down upon him out of such pleasant and kindly eyes.
“You’d better stir your fire and burn up those cobs before old Mr. Canning comes this way,” said the stranger. “He’s a man who would have prosecuted the Master and his disciples for plucking corn in his field on the Sabbath day.”
“He can prosecute me, if he likes,” replied Jack, with a reckless laugh. “I’ve one crabbed old man after me already.”
“I thought so. Your clothes haven’t got quite dry yet, I see. Do you know, I have you to thank for a fine bath this morning?”
Jack stared. “How so?”
“I went into the pond after you.” And Percy Lanman—for it was he—proceeded to relate what had occurred at the culvert after Jack’s escape.
Jack was greatly entertained, especially by the story of Sellick and his companions carried up to the Basin by his old friend Pete, on the wheat-boat. Percy’s good-humor and sympathy had by this time quite won his confidence, and the fugitive told him in return the whole story of his misfortunes.
“I think you have been treated outrageously!” said the young man. “But yours is not so extraordinary a case of injustice as you suppose. I advise you to read history a little: you will find it for the most part only a record of wrong and oppression. Human nature is about the same to-day it always has been. Most people—I am sorry to say it—are capable of seeing only their own selfish interest in anything that concerns them. As you go through life you must expect to see friends and neighbors start out into enemies and oppressors, when their personal interest is touched. The worst of it will be, that people of whom you expect better things—who are supposed to know something of the Golden Rule, and to be actuated by feelings of justice and benevolence—will for the sake of a few dollars grasp and scramble, and show no more regard for reason and right than so many hungry wolves.”
This picture of the worst side of human society was well calculated to show Jack that his was not the only or the worst case of wrong in the world. “But what is a fellow to do?” he asked.
Percy sat down on the ground, and, opening his handkerchief, talked on, while he assorted his mosses and ferns.
“You must make up your mind, in the first place, that you have got to bear a good deal of this sort of thing in going through life. Beware of briers and thistles, but remember that they exist, and be patient when you get pricked. In reading stories of persecution and martyrdom, I always feel that I had rather be the just man who suffered for the right, than the tyrants and bigots who tried to destroy him. Be true to yourself, and nobody can do you any real, permanent harm. Let ’em rage! what do you and I care? There is something in our minds superior to all their spites. You have done what almost any boy would do, that was smart enough; and I can’t help laughing to think how you locked up the court, and afterwards went through the culvert whilst we were trying to fish you out of the pond.”
Jack laughed too, as he mechanically looked over Percy’s plants.
“But you might have done better,—you might do better now,” said the young man. And his scarred and pitted features looked somehow radiant and beautiful to Jack.
“What could I do?”
“Why, let ’em take you to jail, if they want to. What hurt will it do you? Stand up and say, ‘I thought I was right; I meant to do right; and now if you want to send me to jail, go ahead! I can stand it! I’m willing!’ Throw yourself boldly on your honesty, rest on that rock, and let ’em do their worst!”
Jack, feeling how little honesty there had been in his heart a little while before, hung his head over a sprig of fern he was twirling between thumb and finger.
“Mind, I don’t advise you to do just that, for I’m not sure you’re up to it. But if you could do it, ’t would be grand in you! People talk of good and bad fortunes; but fortunes are good or bad according to the use we make of ’em. This disgrace you are suffering now you may turn into one of the blessings of your life; or it may make a thief or a vagabond of you. Understand?”
Percy’s eyes twinkled like a clear, running brook, as they looked into Jack’s, which fell before them,—the lad remembering how really he had been a thief and vagabond in his heart, an hour ago. Yes, he understood.
“Think it over,” said Percy. “Meanwhile you will want a little money.”
“No, I sha’n’t!” cried Jack.
“But you will, though. Here’s a trifle, which you can repay when it is perfectly convenient,” added Percy, seeing that the proud boy would not accept a gift.
“Well, if you _lend_ it to me,” said Jack, receiving the jingling coin in his palm. “I’ll pay you some time. If I can only get that money of Hank Huswick! I’ll go for it this very afternoon!”
“Well, good by,” said Percy, tying up his plants. “Keep your head and heart right, and you’ll do well, whatever happens. Come to me if you want help. You know where I live.”
And he sauntered off across the field, looking curiously at every bird and plant and stone.
“How happy he is!” thought Jack, following him with yearning eyes. “And I was just so happy once! Shall I ever, shall I ever be again?”
He revisited the spring, and afterwards made a dessert of berries in a wild field hedged by raspberry and blackberry bushes; then set out to find the Huswick boys.
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CHAPTER XXXI
TEA WITH AUNT PATSY.
ALONE in her lonely little house, in the closing twilight, Aunt Patsy had put up the leaf of her rickety pine table, and, having placed upon it a pewter plate and a cracked teacup, was busy preparing her humble supper,—bending over the hearth, toasting a crust of bread on a fork, beside a simmering teapot,—when the door was softly pushed open and somebody looked in.
“Who’s there?” shrieked the old woman, dropping her toast and starting up in affright.
“Nobody but me; don’t be scared, Aunt Patsy.” And the visitor glided into the room and softly closed the door again.
“You! Jack Hazard!” she exclaimed, recovering her self-possession. “Bless ye, lad, I’m always glad to see ye. But vicious boys have played so many mean tricks on me, I’m awful skittish! It’s gittin’ so dark I didn’t know ye at fust. Or is it that odd-lookin’ hat you’ve got on?”
Jack laughed, and said he thought it must be the hat that disguised him. “It’s a borrowed one; I’m great on borrowing hats! Did I ever tell you how I made free with Syd Chatford’s once? A very quiet and accommodating gentleman was kind enough to let me take this right off from his head; he’s standing out in the open field bareheaded now, waiting for me to return it.”
“What are ye talkin’? Set down, won’t ye, and keep a poor body company for a little while? You’re jest in time to take a cup o’ tea with me, and eat a piece of Mis’ Chatford’s pie ye brought me. I wish I had a candle; but I’m too poor to indulge in luxuries. I can start up a flash of fire, though.”
“Don’t start it up for me,” replied Jack. “I prefer to sit in the dark.”
“But we must have a trifle of a blaze, to see to eat by; besides, I want a glimpse o’ your face. Friends’ faces ain’t so common a sight with me that I can afford to miss seein’ ’em when they do look in. How’s Mis’ Chatford, and dear Miss Felton?”
“They seemed to be in their usual state of health when I last saw them. I have left Mr. Chatford’s; did you know it?”
“Left—Deacon Chatford’s! Why, lad, you astonish me!” And Aunt Patsy, who was putting some chips on the fire, turned and stared at her guest. “I thought you was kind of adopted by them.”
At this the cheery tone of voice in which Jack had spoken began to fail him. “I—I thought—I hoped so—too,” he murmured, standing beside the mantel-piece. “But I have left. I can never go back there again. I’m in a bad scrape, and even if I get out of it I can’t go back; for there’s a lie between Phin and me, and of course they believe Phin and blame me,” he went on with swelling passion in his tones. “I’ve just come in to say good by to you.”
“Good by, Jack? You can’t mean it! Where ye goin’?” And the amazed old woman and the agitated boy stood facing each other in the flickering firelight.
“I don’t know! I just want to see _her_ first,—I mean Miss Felton,—and get my dog; then I’m off; no matter where. I mustn’t be seen here. You couldn’t hide me, could you, if anybody should come in? There’s a constable after me.”
“A constable! Why, what _is_ the trouble? I’ll bar the door, the fust thing!” The door was barred, and then Aunt Patsy carefully arranged her dingy window-curtains so that no spying eye could look in. “Now, here is the wood-shed; you know that well enough, often as you have been in it to split my wood for me. The door is hooked on the inside. You might slip in here, if anybody comes; and then, if I give ye a signal, spring out of that door or out of the back winder, either. But I don’t see why anybody should be s’archin’ for ye in my house!”
“Peternot knows I come here sometimes,” said Jack. “But never mind. I’ve slipped through the officer’s hands twice to-day. I’ll risk him!”
“Is it Peternot!” exclaimed the old woman, angrily. “Tell me about it! Meanwhile ye must drink a cup o’ tea with me.”
In vain Jack protested that he did not drink tea, that he wasn’t hungry, and begged her not to trouble herself for him. She removed the pewter plate and cracked cup, and, reaching the top shelf of her closet, brought down the last remnants of an old-fashioned china tea-set, a couple of plates and cups and saucers, once fair and delicate but now much defaced by wear, the edges being nicked and the original colored figures and gilding mostly gone.
While more bread was toasting, Jack began his story.
“A trunk of money!” exclaimed Aunt Patsy, interrupting him. “In Peternot’s woods! I wonder! But go on, then I’ll tell _you_ something!”
When he came to his adventure with the squire, she broke forth again, “Jest like the mean old miserly curmudgeon! He’s tried for fifteen year to git my little morsel of a place away from me; but he hain’t done it yit, and he never will, long as I’m above the sod. But go on, go on, Jack; then I’ll tell _you_ a story!”
So Jack related all that had happened, down to his encounter with Percy Lanman; by which time the toast and tea were on the table, and the old lady, though excited by the narrative, bade him sit up and share her supper. “It’s a poor show, I know,” said she, “but it’s the best I have; and I shouldn’t have all this if ’t wa’n’t for you and Mis’ Chatford.”
“This toast is all I want,” said Jack. “I went to a house about two hours ago and got a bowl of bread and milk for ten cents. The woman didn’t want to take anything, but I thought I’d let her know I wasn’t a beggar, though I felt like one; for I’d just had a wild-goose-chase after the Huswick boys and my bag of money.”
“The Huswick boys! they’re as bad as Peternot himself, though in a different way,” said Aunt Patsy, sipping her tea in the dancing light of the fire, while Jack, sitting at the table to please her, nibbled his toast.
“I’ve done three silly things, one every time I put any trust in those rascals!” said Jack. “First, when I left ’em to guard the money while I ran for Mr. Chatford; next, when I went with ’em to get it back from the old squire; and again, when I went home last night, instead of sticking tight to Hank and Tug till we found Cub and the money.”
“That seems the weakest thing you have done,” said the old woman. “Though if they meant to rob you, your follerin’ on ’em up would have done no good.”
“I thought of that; and I imagined it would have a good effect if I took Hank’s word, and made him believe I thought there was a little honor in him. He may mean well by me still; but I’m pretty sure he is dodging me on purpose. I found Dock and Hod and Tug this afternoon; and they said Hank and Cub had cleared out for a day or two for fear they would be arrested for helping me break into Peternot’s house. Tug vowed he didn’t know where they were or what they had done with the money.”
“They’re playin’ you false,” said Aunt Patsy. “But don’t mind. Now I’ll tell you my story, and you’ll see you hain’t lost so much, and they hain’t gained so much, as you and they think.”
“What do you mean?” cried Jack.
The old woman took a sip of tea and went on. “I know about that money; at least, I know somethin’ about it. You’ve heard complaints agin my fust husband,—how bad characters used to come to our house, for one thing. I don’t deny but what there was somethin’ in that, though he was a good man to me; whatever else he was, he was good to me!” And the old woman wiped away a tear. “There was one Sam Williams,—I always telled my husband he’d better have nothin’ to do with him, for I was sure he’d come to some bad end; and sure enough he did; he escaped from a constable and was shot; died of his wound in jail. This was a year or two ’fore my fust husband died; and ’twas when the officers was arter him that he come to our house one night with a little trunk of money.”
“Half-dollars?” said Jack, eagerly interrupting her.
“I believe so, though I don’t remember for sartin about that. He wanted my husband to keep it for him; but I said, ‘Don’t ye have nothin’ to do with it, if you want to keep out o’ trouble.’ Well, he stayed with us from jest arter dark one evenin’ till jest afore day next mornin’; and that was the last we ever see of him. That must ’a’ been the trunk, and he hid it in the woods. If it was,” added Aunt Patsy, looking keenly at Jack across the corner of the table, “then either Mr. Chatford or the goldsmith has made a grand mistake.”
Again Jack anxiously demanded what she meant; but just as she was about to explain herself, there came a light rap at the door. He sprang to his feet in an instant.
“Hish!” she whispered, shaking her finger at him.
She hurriedly replaced the extra plate and cup and saucer in the closet, while Jack, stepping on tiptoes, took refuge in the wood-shed. The rap was repeated just as she reached the door.
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CHAPTER XXXII
A STARLIGHT WALK WITH ANNIE FELTON.
WITHOUT removing the bar, Aunt Patsy called out, “Who’s there? What do you want?”
“I want to see you, Aunt Patsy,” answered a sweet feminine voice.
“Is it you, Miss Felton? Bless me!” And the old woman hastily unbarred the door. “To think of my keepin’ you standin’ outside! Come in, come in, you darlin’!”
In walked Annie, fresh and smiling, but casting nevertheless an anxious and wistful glance about the room.
“I have just run over from my aunt’s,” she said; “really, I can’t sit down. I thought you might have some news of our friend Jack.”
“Jack?” said the old lady, in a voice loud enough to be heard in the wood-shed. “What about Jack?”
“Has no one told you? I didn’t know but he himself—O Jack!” exclaimed Annie, joyfully, taking a quick step towards the door through which the youngster at that moment advanced into the room, “I am so glad to see you! I heard how you had got away, and I was afraid we might never see you again!”
“I couldn’t go without seeing you once more!” said Jack, trembling with emotion at this unexpected meeting. “Though I wasn’t sure you would care to see me.”
“O Jack! why not? Whatever you may have done, I shall always feel an interest in you.”
“An interest in me!” said Jack, chokingly. “Bad as I am, that’s kind!” He spoke bitterly, and drew back from her with a look of disappointment.
“My dear Jack! you are not angry with me?”
“No! you might say what you like, I could never be angry with you. But I didn’t think you would believe anything so very bad of me, just from what other people say. I hoped at least you would wait and hear my story first.” And Jack, still turning from her, wiped his quivering eyes with his sleeve.
“Have I said I believed anything very bad of you?” asked Annie, softly.
“No, but _whatever I might have done_, you said. That is, you don’t quite give me up, in spite of my awful conduct!”
“Don’t you see, Miss Felton,” cried Aunt Patsy, “he’s been so put upon and misused, he can’t be satisfied without his friends take his part in downright ’arnest? That’s nat’ral. Half-way words won’t suit him.”
“I know!” added Jack, with a passionate outburst; “Phin’s her cousin; he’s a saint, and I am a liar and a villain, of course, if he says so!”
“You know very well I don’t think Phin a saint,” replied Annie, with gentle dignity, “any more than I think you a villain. You are both boys, with the faults of boys. From all I hear, you have not done perfectly right in every respect; and I don’t think you will claim that you have. If you expected me just to pat you on the back, and say, ‘Poor Jack! good Jack! how they have abused you!’ why, then, you haven’t known what a real friend I am to you. I came here this evening, hoping to find you, and to do something for you. But if this is the way you meet me, I suppose I might as well have stayed at home.” And now _she_ turned away.
“Don’t go!” Jack entreated. “O Miss Felton! forgive me if I am unreasonable! But it seems so hard to know that _you_ think my enemies are in the right! Do you believe I would break into a house and steal; that I would make up a lie, to shift the blame to Phin or his father or any one else? I can bear to have others think so meanly of me, but not you!” And the boy’s passion broke forth in uncontrollable sobs.
She took his hand with one of hers, and laid the other kindly and soothingly upon his shoulder.
“There, there, Jack!” she said, her own voice full of emotion; “I don’t believe you would deliberately steal or make up such a lie. I know you wouldn’t!”
“And as for the money,” sobbed Jack, “I did just what Peternot’s own nephew, who is studying law, said he should advise any one to do who found treasure on another man’s land; he said, ‘Pocket it and say nothing about it; keep possession, any way; fight for it.’ That’s what I tried to do. Then after I had been robbed of it, I went to take it again, and that’s the cause of all my trouble.”
[Illustration: A TRUE FRIEND.]
“I regard Squire Peternot’s course very much as you do,” said Annie, still soothing the lad, with one hand pressing his own and the other on his shoulder, “though I’m not so angry at him. He has acted according to his nature; not according to the Golden Rule, very sure. But how few people act according to the Golden Rule, Jack! If we were to quarrel with all who fail in that respect, I am afraid we should find ourselves in difficulty with nearly the whole world. No, Jack; it’s useless to fly into a passion with everybody we see acting selfishly and meanly. It is much better to look carefully after our own conduct, and see what we may be doing that is wrong. Now I want you to walk home with me, and tell me your story by the way; then we will see what had better be done. Aunt Patsy will leave her door unbarred, so that you can come back and see her again.”
They went out together, and talked long in low tones as they walked under the starlit sky across the fields.
“Now, Jack,” said Annie, when they had reached Mr. Chatford’s orchard, and stopped beside the little brook that kept up its low liquid babble in the dark shadows that half concealed it, “I have heard your own story, and I can’t say that I blame you very much for anything you have done. You have acted naturally, but not always wisely. No doubt so much money appeared a great fortune to you, and of course something very desirable. But I am by no means sure it would have been a good thing for you to have. I’m afraid your head would have been turned by it. You were doing well enough before. You were sure of a good living, a good home, and a chance for yourself, as I have heard you say with honest pride so many times.”
“This is what my chance has finally come to!” said Jack,—“no home, no future, but a constable at my heels!”
“I can think of something that might be worse for you than all that,—_getting rich too fast_. That’s what ruins many. You were happy in slowly working your way up the ladder, happier than you could ever be again if you should suddenly find yourself at the top. The money might not have harmed you, but I am sure you could have done very well without it. Don’t regret it if it is lost. And, of all things, don’t associate yourself with bad companions or adopt unjustifiable means to gain even justifiable ends. Better submit to a little wrong. If your enemies succeed in overreaching you, so much the worse for them. Wouldn’t you rather be robbed than feel that you have robbed another? I know you would, Jack!”
“You talk just like Percy Lanman!” said the boy, his heart beginning to feel warmed and comforted.
“The young man who dove for you in the pond? I heard Mr. Chatford tell about him.”
“I saw him in the fields afterwards, and he lent me some money. He talked just as you do!” Jack declared.
“Now, Jack,” said Annie, leaning tenderly on his shoulder and looking into his face by the pale starlight, while her touch and the tones of her voice set a little stream of joy dancing and singing in his heart, like the shadowy brook at their feet, “I’m going to be frank with you; hear what I say. Don’t run away. Don’t hide. Don’t try to shirk the consequences of what you have done, but go home with me now.”
“To Mr. Chatford’s?” said Jack with a start.
“Yes, just as if nothing had happened. Aunt’s folks will receive you kindly, I know, from what they have said.”
“Never!” said Jack. “I never can enter that house again as long as there’s a lie between me and Phin. It may be natural for his father to believe him instead of me; but it’s something I never can get over. No!” he added, as she would have urged him; “I can go anywhere else, and suffer anything, before I can go back there. Besides, how long before Sellick would be after me again, and carry me off to jail?”
“Worse things than that might happen to you,” Annie replied.
“What?” said Jack.
“To go back to your former life and associates, to fall again under bad influences, and lose all the good you have gained since you have been with Uncle Chatford’s folks; that would be worse. I don’t want you to go to jail, but I’d rather see you go there innocent, than run away as if you were guilty. How proud I should be of you, if you could stand up and say, ‘I may have done wrong, but I didn’t mean to; now here I am, put me in jail if you want to!’ You would be proud of yourself too! Your face would shine as it never did before.”
“O Miss Felton!” said Jack, “that’s just the way Percy Lanman talked!”
“Get rid of all rash thoughts of revenge and wild living, and put your trust in Providence, and in your own integrity,” she went on. “Be yourself, your better self, always, and you’ll come off victorious over everything. That’s my advice, dear Jack; and if Percy Lanman gave you the same, I honor him for it. Now will you come in with me?”
“I’ll go as far as the door with you,” said Jack, “but I can’t go in; I can’t!”
As they emerged from the orchard and approached the house, they could see through a lighted window the family sitting round the evening lamp; Mrs. Chatford sewing, the deacon reading, Mr. Pipkin holding a skein of thread for Mrs. Pipkin to wind, and Phin and Moses playing “fox-and-geese,” while little Kate stood by looking over the board,—a picture of quiet domestic enjoyment that reminded poor Jack of what he had lost, and wrung his heart with grief.
“Everything is just as it was before; nobody thinks of me, nobody cares for me!” he exclaimed. “Good night!” And, moved by a wild and passionate sorrow, he broke from her gentle, restraining touch, and disappeared in the orchard.
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CHAPTER XXXIII
A STRANGE CALL AT A STRANGE HOUR OF THE NIGHT.
WANDERING to and fro among the dark and silent trees, Jack mastered his grief at length; then, remembering that he had still one faithful friend, he went to find Lion.
No affectionate whine welcomed his approach. He spoke; he stooped and looked into the gloomy and deserted kennel: no dog was there. Phin, foreseeing the possibility of Jack’s return on some such errand, had that night chained Lion in the barn, and the door was locked.
Passing again near the house, Jack cast a vindictive look through the window at Phin,—a look full of wrath and misery, which was, however, softened a little when he saw Annie, standing, bonnet in hand, and O how beautiful! talking to the family. Mr. Chatford had put aside his paper, and the women their work, and the boys their play, to listen to her. Jack knew she was talking of him; and it seemed that he could almost hear the gracious words that fell from those sweet, sad lips.
He watched until he saw all eyes turned upon Phineas, and Phineas began to cry. She went on into another room, and Mr. Chatford commenced talking to Phin. Then Phin looked up through his tears and made some violent protestation. The deacon turned with a dissatisfied countenance to his newspaper, while Phin slunk away and sat moping in a corner.
“I’d rather be in my place than in his, anyway!” murmured Jack. “I’d rather have anything done to me than _be_ mean and cowardly!”
The memory of all Annie Felton had said to him came back upon his heart, which softened more and more under the influence of that pure and gentle soul, as he walked back through the fields to Aunt Patsy’s house.
“I was dreadful ’fraid you wouldn’t come back,” said the old woman, welcoming him. “See! I’ve made up a sort of bed for you on the floor. You can sleep here every night as long as you have to dodge the constable.”
Jack, deeply affected by her kindness, regarded her with struggling emotions for some moments before he ventured to speak. Here was one of the outcasts of society, of whom it was impossible for many people to believe any good thing, who appeared to the world a hardened, embittered, hateful old hag, and nothing more; and yet how kind, how motherly even, she was to him in his trouble! Thus there are people all about us whom the world judges from having seen only one side of them, and that their worst side, while deep springs of human feeling lie hidden in their lives.
Jack murmured his thanks, and said, “I wanted to ask you more about that money. You said either Mr. Chatford or the goldsmith had made a mistake about it.”
“I’m sure on ’t,” replied Aunt Patsy. “So don’t worry over your loss. There’s no doubt but what that was Sam Williams’s trunk; and me and my husband knowed as well as we wanted to that Sam was a practised counterfeiter. Of course, the coin was bogus.”
Jack took a quick step across the room, and, returning, looked steadily at the fire.
“If I had only come and told you about it in the first place!” he said. Then after a moment’s thought, “Maybe I’ll come back and sleep on the bed you have made for me; I’ll be here again in half an hour, if I conclude to. Don’t wait for me longer than that. Good night, if I don’t come back.”
“Any time to-night, I’ll let you in!” were her last words as he left her door and disappeared in the darkness.
He walked fast down the road, passed Peternot’s house, turned the opposite corner, and kept on until he came to a farm-house standing on a gentle rise of ground near the street. He walked boldly up to the door and knocked. A large-eyed, round-faced, cheerful-looking woman appeared.
“Is the man of the house at home?” Jack inquired.
“He’s somewhere about the barn, with a lantern,” replied the woman, regarding him with some curiosity.
“I’ll find him then,” said Jack.
As he approached the barn, he saw a man with a lantern come out, leading a horse. Near the door, which he left open, he set down the lantern in the yard, and disappeared with the horse around a corner of the barn.
“He’s just going to the pasture bars,” thought Jack. “He’ll be back in about two minutes.” His resolution began to waver. “I wish I had waited till morning! Maybe ’t isn’t too late now. I’ll just slip into the barn, anyway.”
He slipped into the barn accordingly, and seeing, by the light of the lantern that shone in, a pile of clean straw in one corner, the idea occurred to him that it would make a very good bed. He couldn’t help laughing as he lay down and covered himself with it, thinking, “This is a joke I guess the joker himself would relish!”
The man presently returned, took up the lantern, looked into the barn as if to see that everything was secure, closed a door leading to an adjacent stable, and then retired, shutting the barn door after him and fastening it with a padlock.
“There’s been a boy here for you; have you seen him?” said the cheerful-faced woman when he reached the house.
“I’ve seen no boy, and I don’t want to see another for a fortnight,” replied the man, humorously; “I’ve had enough of boys! What sort of a boy?”
“He had his hat over his eyes, but he looked to me just like that Hazard boy.”
“Jack? That’s too rich! Ha, ha, ha! The idee of Jack’s giving his friend Sellick a call! Ha, ha, ha!” laughed the merry constable.
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CHAPTER XXXIV
HOW JACK WON A BET, AND RETURNED A FAVOR.
THE next morning Sellick sat milking a cow in the yard, when a clear, pleasant voice close beside him said, “Good morning, Mr. Constable!”
He had heard footsteps and the rattling of a milk-pail behind him, but had not looked around, thinking it was Billy the farm-boy coming to help him. Now he looked, however, and there stood his escaped prisoner of yesterday, smiling, with a milk-pail in one hand and a stool in the other.
“Ha! good morning, sonny!” cried Sellick, excitedly. His first impulse was to spring and seize the fugitive; his next, to sit still.
“You helped me milk yesterday morning, now I’ve come to help you,” said Jack. “I like to pay my debts.”
“That’s right! that’s fair!” said the astonished constable.
“Which is the kicking cow? I don’t want to tackle _her_!” quietly remarked Jack, surveying the little herd.
“Try that heifer with the white forefeet,” replied Sellick. “You’re an honest boy, as I said yesterday! I’ve changed works many a time with a neighbor, but I never had one return my little favors quite so prompt! You kind o’ took my breath away! Where have you been since we parted in that rather abrupt fashion yisterday?”
“O, travelling about the country a little!” said Jack, seating himself beside the heifer. “I thought I would make the most of my opportunities; I may not have another chance soon.”
“What trick is the fellow up to now?” thought the constable. “He must have settled the affair with Peternot!” So he said aloud, “Have you seen the squire?”
“Not since I left him with you in the court-room. The squire and I are not the best friends in the world, I’m sorry to say. ‘Nice old man, the squire!’ But I’ve called on him once too often.”
“Where was you last night?”
“_You_ kept me last night.”
“I kept you, sonny?” said Sellick, more and more puzzled.
“Yes; I thought it was no more than fair that you should give me a night’s lodging. I won’t ask you to board me; I pay for my own milk, you know.”
“Yes, I know!” Sellick grimaced at the recollection. “But where _did_ you sleep last night? Not under my roof!”
“Yes, I did, under your roof!” laughed Jack.
“Look here, sonny!” cried the incredulous Sellick, “I’ll bet ye a trifle on that! I believe you’re an honest boy, as I’ve said; but you couldn’t have slept under my roof without my knowing it, unless Billy smuggled you in, and he wouldn’t have dared to do it!—Here, Billy!” An old-looking, broad-shouldered, hollow-cheeked youth came into the yard. “Did you take this fellow into my house last night?”
“I never saw him on the place before,” replied Billy, “though I rather guess he’s the one Mis’ Sellick says come to the door last evening and asked for you.”
“I came to your door, and afterwards slept under your roof,” Jack insisted. “Since you offer to bet, I’ll bet ye,—well, I’m no gambler, but I’ll say my hat against a bowl of bread and milk.”
“No more milk! no more milk!” said Sellick, good-humoredly. “That cupful of yisterday soured on my stomach, if it didn’t on yours. Call it a breakfast; I’m willing.”
“All the better,” said Jack. “Now just step into your barn, and in the left-hand farther corner you’ll find a heap of straw, which you’ll agree has been slept on. There’s a pitchfork standing behind it; and there’s a bound bundle, which I used as a pillow. I walked in last evening and made myself at home, while you were leading your horse to the pasture.”
“I can believe all that,” said Sellick readily. “But my barn ain’t my house.”
“I said nothing about your house; I bet that I slept under your _roof_.”
“Sonny, I give it up! Keep on in the way you have begun, and you’ll make a joker, by the time you’re a hundred year old. But what in sixty _have_ you come here for this morning? If that’s a joke too, I can’t see it.”
“I thought you might like to finish that little ride we began yesterday. Not that I’m at all anxious about it,” Jack explained, “but your heart seemed set on it; and, thinking it over, I concluded ’t was too bad to disappoint you.”
“And you mean—” Sellick, sitting by his cow, paused to grin at the young milker in puzzled astonishment.
“Yes, I do!” said Jack laughing; “I don’t mean to spill any more milk, nor lock up any more court-rooms, nor go through any more culverts, very soon.” Then, as Sellick still looked incredulous, he added, more seriously, “I’ve thought it all over, and made up my mind to just this, if I’ve done anything to be taken to jail for, why, then, take me to jail, if you want to.”
“You’re deep!” said Sellick, still suspicious of some cunning design hidden beneath Jack’s candid avowal; “or else you’re a bigger fool than I took ye for.”
“Have it which way you like,” Jack replied. And having fairly committed himself to this open and manly course, he felt his bosom swell with honest pride and satisfaction. “Now, whatever happens,” thought he, “I’ve done what is right; I’ll be true, I’ll be my better self, I won’t lie or skulk, for anybody or anything!” Or if he did not think this, he felt it, and it made him brave and strong.
“You’re a smart boy to milk,” said Sellick, looking at the contents of Jack’s pail when it was brought to him. “If you git out of this scrape, I shouldn’t wonder if I would hire you. What do you say?”
It did not seem to Jack that he could bear to live so near Deacon Chatford’s house, and feel that he might never enter it again as he used to do. Yet such an offer was encouraging; and the confidence in him which it implied, on the part of the constable, touched his heart.
“There will be time enough to talk about that after I get out of the scrape,” he said. “I can’t make any bargain till then.”
“That’s right; that’s fair and honest. You’ll find it a fust-rate place,” Sellick went on; “good living, plenty to do, and a jolly man to work for. Do chores this winter to pay for your board, and go to school if you like; and next summer I’ll pay you wages. Think on ’t, you’d better. Now for breakfast. You’ve earnt yours, say nothing about the bet. You can milk a cow twice as quick as Billy. Good boy, but slow, is Billy; drea’ful modrit; stiddy as a yoke of oxen. Fust summer he worked for me—Talking about you, Billy,” said Sellick, as the old-looking youth overtook them on their way to the house.
Billy, looking as if he was used to being made fun of, said, “Sho!” and grinned, and hung his head.
“Telling how stiddy you be. Fust season he worked for me, I had a good deal of chopping to do over in the South Swamp. So fur off, men used to carry their dinners. Billy went over every day ’cept Sundays, all spring, till along into May, when I noticed something mighty curi’s about his face. From a straight line down his forehead and nose, all one side was tanned like an Injin’s, while t’ other was white as a lady’s.”
“Sho! ’t wa’n’t so!” said Billy.
“Fact. And this is how it happened. He went over in the morning with the left side of his face turned towards the sun as ’twas rising, and come home at night with the same side turned towards the sun as ’twas setting; worked in the shade of the woods all day, and never turned his head going and coming, ’cause he’s sich a stiddy boy.” And Sellick set the example of laughing merrily at his own wit.
“Folks that work for you don’t git a chance to come home with the sunlight on their faces,” grumbled Billy. “You keep us to work till dark, and sometimes by moonlight. You’ll find it so, if you come to work for him,” he added, turning to Jack. “’T ain’t like working for Deacon Chatford.”
As Sellick had the reputation of driving his hired men early and late, this hit told; and he made haste to change the conversation.
“Billy’s bilious. Billy’ll feel better arter breakfast. Billy’s smart at one thing, if nothing else,—knife-and-fork practice. If he worked as well as he eats, there’d be no need of his sometimes staying in the field till dark. But come in, come in; breakfast, boys, breakfast.” And he led the way into the house.
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CHAPTER XXXV
AT MR. CHATFORD’S GATE.
“HOW strange it seems,” said Mrs. Pipkin that morning, “not to have Jack around! I don’t believe I should have missed any one of you so much. Somehow I can’t get used to his being away; can you, Mrs. Chatford?”
A tear quivered in Mrs. Chatford’s eye as she replied, “I can’t be reconciled to his going in the way he did. I feel that we are responsible for the boy’s future; and if he had died I could hardly have mourned for him more than I do!”
This conversation took place at the breakfast-table, and it did not seem to help the appetites of those who heard it. The deacon shoved back his chair with a dissatisfied look; for it was an uncomfortable subject to him, firmly as he believed himself justified in withdrawing from Jack his sympathy and support.
“I’m so glad he got away!” said little Kate; “but I’m afraid they’ll catch him again!”
“Not much danger of that,” remarked Mr. Pipkin, rising slowly from the table. “A boy smart enough to do what he done yisterday, can keep clear of the clutches of the constables if he’s a mind to. I’ll resk Jack! I’d be willin’ to bet—By hokey!” he exclaimed in astonishment, looking from the window.
“What is it, Pip?” cried Moses.
“I’ve lost my bet ’fore I made it! Jack!”
“Jack!” repeated several voices at once; and there was a general rush to the windows. Annie Felton’s face flushed, while Phin’s turned suddenly pale. “Jack, and Sellick with him!” said the deacon, unpleasantly surprised. “I hoped—Couldn’t the boy keep out of the way! See what they want.”
Meanwhile Sellick, with Jack by his side in the buggy in which they began their ride the day before, had driven up to the gate and turned about.
“Hullo!” cried Moses, going out to them.
“Hullo back agin,” replied Sellick. “Fine morning. How’s the folks? Good morning, Mis’ Chatford.”
“I can’t say I’m glad to see you!” exclaimed the good woman from the door. “Poor boy! how does it happen?”
“Jack took such a shine to me yisterday,” laughed Sellick, “he couldn’t bear the separation; so he come of his own accord to renew the acquaintance this morning,—or last evening,—which was it, Jack?”
“O Jack! did you give yourself up?” cried Annie Felton, alarmed to think he might have been led by her advice to take an unwise step, until the sight of his beaming countenance reassured her.
“He’s too modest to say so, but that’s jest it,” Sellick answered for him. “I took him yisterday, and he took me this morning—by surprise. I’ve hardly got my breath yit. Bright boy, Jack! honest boy! Says he has done nothing he ought to go to jail for, but if we want to put him in jail, we can; and I vow I don’t know but what that’s the right view to take on ’t!”
“O Jack! is this so?” said Mrs. Chatford, hurrying to the side of the buggy, and seizing both the boy’s hands, while she looked up earnestly in his face.
“Yes,” replied Jack, smiling frankly, yet with quivering lips and misty eyes. “After talking with Annie last night,”—casting a glance of affectionate gratitude at the schoolmistress,—“I concluded I had been foolish. I didn’t know what I wanted to run away for. If I have done wrong, why, I’m willing to suffer for it. I know I’ve been wrong in some things. The idea of finding so much money, and then of having it taken from me, made me wild; I wasn’t myself; but I guess I’m all right now, and I hope you’ll forgive me,” he said, winking away a tear or two.
“Bless you, dear boy! what have I to forgive?” said Mrs. Chatford, while tears ran down her own upturned face.
“After all you had done for me, to think that I could be so cross and sullen to you and to everybody, because Squire Peternot had wronged me; and then to have such thoughts,—I can’t tell you what bad thoughts I have had!” Jack exclaimed, beginning to choke a little. “But they are gone now, I hope. I’m just going to take what comes, and make the best of it.”
“That is right! O Jack, I am so glad to hear you talk so! If you can go to jail in this spirit, it will do you no harm. I shall think more of you and hope more for you than ever! So will all your friends.—Phineas, come here, and tell your father to come!”
“Well, Jack! caught, after all, are you?” said Mr. Chatford, walking slowly towards the gate.
“No, sir, not caught; Mr. Sellick won’t say I’ve been caught,” replied Jack.
“No, I don’t take no credit to myself,” said Sellick; “Jack’s here of his own free will, or he wouldn’t be here.” And he told the story of Jack’s stay in the barn the night before, and his sudden appearance in the cow-yard that morning.
“I think _you_’ll be satisfied with him now,” added Mrs. Chatford; “for he has come of his own accord to make acknowledgments, and to ask our forgiveness.”
“I’m heartily glad to hear it!” said the deacon, astonished and gratified. “As I said before, his falsehood about Phineas, and his standing out so about it, seemed to me worse than anything else. I rejoice if he has owned up.”
“I’m ready to own everything that I’ve done wrong; but that is different. I wasn’t going to say anything about it; but if Mrs. Chatford meant that, when she said I had come to make acknowledgments, why, she is mistaken. I spoke nothing but the truth about Phineas, and you’ll know it some day, and then, maybe, you’ll be sorry for having accused me of lying!” Jack struggled hard to control his feelings, but now, having said this, he began to cry.
“Phineas! I told Phineas to come here,” said Mrs. Chatford, “and now where has he gone?”
“I saw him sneaking off to the barn,” said Mr. Pipkin. “He don’t seem to hanker arter a meetin’ with Jack, dono why!”
Mrs. Chatford was agitated; and the deacon appeared strangely disturbed.
“It hurt me worse than anything,” Jack resumed, wiping his eyes with his sleeve, “to have you think I would try to get out of a scrape by flinging the blame on to anybody else, and then lying about it. And that’s the hardest part for me to get over. But it’s natural you should think so. I don’t blame you. I can wait for you to find out the truth; you will some time. I’ve no ill-will against Phin, either; but I don’t want to see him or have anything to do with him. So don’t call him. I know just what he would say.”
“Well, well!” said the deacon, walking up and down the path in great trouble of mind. “No doubt, no doubt! You _may_ be honest. It’s a strange misunderstanding! I hope it _will_ be explained some day.” But it was plain to see that the good man’s prejudice against the boy was far from being overcome.
Meanwhile Moses went to the barn to find Phineas.
“What are ye sneaking off here for?” he cried. “Why don’t you go and see Jack, and own up to your lie about him? It’s your best way now.”
“Hain’t told any lie!” muttered Phineas. “Come out here to watch Lion, fear he’d get away.”
“You sha’n’t have that excuse any longer!” exclaimed the indignant Moses. “It’s too bad to keep the poor brute chained in this way!” And, pushing his brother scornfully aside, he loosed the dog. “Bellow, will you? great baby!—Clear, Lion!”
Lion “cleared”; and in ten seconds, darting past Mr. Chatford, and almost knocking Mr. Pipkin over as he encountered that gentleman standing by the gate, he leaped up on the buggy-wheel, whining, and wagging his tail, and struggling to reach his young master.
Jack reached down, and patted the large, noble head, received the caresses of the eager, affectionate tongue, and dropped a tear upon the canine nose.
“Tell Phin he needn’t keep him chained; I sha’n’t steal him,” he said.
“Fine fellow!” said Sellick; “good dog! If you come and work for me,”—in a low tone to Jack,—“bring your dog with you; I’ll keep him.”
“Peternot ought to hear to reason!” exclaimed the deacon. “Jack, why don’t you give up the money?”
“I don’t care for the money; I’d as soon give it up as not,” Jack replied, very truly. “But I don’t know where it is.” He checked a natural impulse to go on and repeat Aunt Patsy’s story. Jack was shrewd, and he did not believe that a revelation of what he knew of the spurious character of the coin would have the least effect in softening the squire’s mind towards him. On the contrary, some advantage might yet be gained by keeping the secret.
“I suppose the Huswick boys have got it,” said Mr. Chatford. “The squire had a warrant out yesterday for Cub and Hank; that’s a fact, ain’t it, Sellick?”
“I’ll say this much,” replied the constable,—“arter Jack give us the slip, we did make a call on our neighbor Huswick, and found Cub and Hank had cut stick. I never told anybody I had a warrant. You may infer what you please.”
“Does Peternot know Jack has given himself up?”
“I see the hired man as we drove by; he said the squire was tending prayers. Good old man, the squire; has prayers in his family morning and evening. I told the man to tell him; so he knows by this time. He’ll be waiting to see his young friend. And now, if you’ll hand out that little trunk you told me you had ready for him yesterday, we’ll be moving on.”
Mrs. Chatford talked earnestly with her husband aside.
“I don’t know what to do or think!” said the deacon. “I’ll see the squire again. He _must_ hear to reason!” And he walked hurriedly away towards Peternot’s house.
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CHAPTER XXXVI
THE “RIDE” CONTINUED.
MRS. PIPKIN brought out the valise which had been packed the day before. Annie followed with an armful of books.
“These will be good companions to you, if the squire doesn’t relent,” she said, as she handed them up to Jack with an encouraging smile.
“I’ve no hope of his relenting. But I don’t feel as I did yesterday,” said Jack. He glanced at the backs of the books. “I think I shall have a pretty good time to read and study, there in jail! Don’t cry, dear little Kate! I’m all right. Take good care of Lion. Good by, all! O Mrs. Chatford! Miss Felton! I shall never forget how good you have been to me!”
“Remember and read your Testament! I put it in the valise,” said Mrs. Chatford.
“And keep a good heart! I’m sure it will all turn out well. Good by, Jack!” cried Annie, as Sellick drove away.
“Go back, Lion! back!” said the boy, hastily wiping his tears. “Say good by to Moses!”
Phineas, peeping from the barn, and witnessing these farewells, almost envied Jack, as he saw him ride off with the constable; for already that wretched youngster was beginning to feel there was a worse prison for the mind than a jail,—that of its own guilty thoughts.
[Illustration: STARTING FOR THE JAIL.]
Deacon Chatford and the squire stood talking together on the roadside before Peternot’s house, when Sellick drove up. The sight of their two faces was enough for Jack. The deacon’s wore a disappointed and gloomy expression; the squire’s was grimly triumphant.
“Hold on to him this time, Sellick!” cried the old man as he limped towards the wagon, grasping with trembling hand his horn-headed cane. “If he thinks to work upon my feelin’s by this move, he’ll find he’s mistaken. I know his cunning tricks!”
“Squire Peternot,” said Jack, calmly, “I never expected to work upon your feelings. You can send me to jail, I’m willing. You can have me brought to trial, and convicted of breaking into your house, I suppose; for I don’t deny what I’ve done.”
“You see how shameless he is!” said Peternot, turning upon the deacon. “He’d as lives go to jail as not! Little he cares for public opinion, the hardened wretch!” And he struck the ground with his cane.
“If I’m sent to jail for such a thing, the shame will be on you, not on me,” Jack answered. “I should think _you_ cared little for public opinion, to push a poor boy to the wall in this way!” his voice beginning to quiver with a rising sense of his wrongs.
“Ho! that’s your game, is it?” said the squire; “to make a martyr of yourself, and excite public feelin’ agin me!”
“I never thought of such a thing!” Jack declared; and he whispered to Sellick, “Do drive along!”
Mr. Chatford was at the same time saying something in a low tone to Sellick on the other side of the buggy. Then Sellick said, “Any last word, squire?”
“My fust and last word to you is, look out for that boy!” said Peternot, sternly. “That’s all!” And he limped away towards the house.
“Jack!” then said Mr. Chatford, in an earnest tone of voice, “haven’t you a last word for me?”
“Only to say good by, and to thank you for your kindness to me—before this thing happened,” faltered the prisoner.
“Not that!” said the deacon. “But I hoped—I have declared I couldn’t do anything for you till you had retracted that falsehood about Phineas. You know, I can give bail for you, and keep you out of jail till your trial; and I will!”
“On condition that I confess to a lie?” said Jack. “Then I shall have to go to jail.”
“I can’t bear the idea of that!” said Mr. Chatford, greatly shaken.
“It don’t trouble _me_ much now,” replied Jack. “It won’t be long before the court sits. I shall have to go and have my trial then, anyway. And if you should bail me, you’d be anxious about me all the while,—afraid I might run away, and your bonds would be forfeit.”
“No, no! not now, since you’ve taken this honorable course, Jack! I’ll trust you; only—”
“Please don’t say anything more about that, Mr. Chatford! And don’t worry about me. I’ve been inside the jail; I know how it is there. I shall be well off, with these books. Good by!”
“Better let him try it a spell, deacon!” laughed Sellick, as he touched up his horse.
“The boy—somehow he makes me love him!” muttered the deacon, gazing after the buggy with troubled, yearning eyes. “I love him, and I believe him!” And he hurried home.
“Tell you what, sonny!” said Sellick, who had his own selfish reasons for cutting short this interview before it should lead to a better understanding, “I’ve thought what I’ll do. Promise to come and work for me, and I’ll go bail for you. You shall kind o’ work for your board till arter your trial; then, if you git clear, we’ll strike a bargain for a year. What do you say?”
Jack thought of his books, and of Sellick’s bad reputation as an employer, and said to himself, “If he bails me, he’ll expect me to hire out to him anyway, for whatever he chooses to pay. In a year I should be as hollow-cheeked and round-shouldered as poor Billy! Working for my board till my trial comes off, means working like a slave for nothing. I’d rather have a little time to read and study.” Then he said aloud, “I guess, Mr. Sellick, if it’s the same thing to you, I’d a little rather go to jail.”
“To jail it is, then!” said Sellick, snappishly, for he felt keenly the force of this reply; and he gave his horse a cut.
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CHAPTER XXXVII
ONE OF THE DEACON’S BLUNDERS.
FARMER CHATFORD hurried home, and, entering the house, found the three women seated in a circle, holding a solemn consultation.
Mrs. Chatford had just been saying, “I’m glad you didn’t urge him, Annie. He don’t often make up his mind in this way, but when he does it’s no use arguing with him. I had said everything I could, before, to induce him to be Jack’s bail; and when I mentioned the subject again—”
The deacon inferred, with reason, from the sudden manner in which this conversation ceased as he came in, and the scowl Mrs. Pipkin gave him, that his own conduct had been the topic of remark.
“Peternot is hard as a rock!” he said; then added quickly, addressing Mrs. Pipkin, “Call the boys, or your husband; tell ’em to harness up old Maje and put him in the buggy, while I change my clothes. I’ve thought of a little business in the city to-day.”
Mrs. Chatford and Annie exchanged glances; and the former whispered, “I knew he couldn’t be satisfied to let Jack go off so!” Then, following him to the bedroom, “I’m glad you are going! I want you to see the doctor, and tell him about Jack. _He_ will do what he can for him, I’m sure!”
“I guess there’s no danger but what Jack will have everything done for him he deserves,” was the ambiguous reply.
“Couldn’t you have any influence at all with the squire?” said Mrs. Chatford, handing him his second-best suit of clothes.
“No more than the wind that blows! Strange,” added the good deacon, “how a man can be so set in his way, and refuse to let any considerations of reason or humanity have weight with him!”
“Yes, it is, very strange,” remarked Mrs. Chatford, quietly.
“O papa!” cried Kate, running into the room, “what is it about bailing Jack? Would that keep him out of jail? and could you do it?”
“Hush, child!” said her father. “Bailing him might keep him out of jail a little while; but what will that amount to? He will have his trial all the same, when the court sits. The evidence is clear against him. He did break into Peternot’s house; and if he didn’t steal the money, he stole the bag it was in; that’s the way the squire argues. I’d bail him if that would get him clear of the scrape, but it won’t.”
Just then Mose came in haste into the house, with the astonishing announcement that two of the “Huswick tribe” wanted to see his father.
“Cub and Hank?” cried Mr. Chatford from the bedroom.
[Illustration: BRINGING IN THE TREASURE.—Page 241.]
“No; Hod and Hick.” Hick (short for Hezekiah), aged twelve, was the sixth of this interesting family of boys. “They’ve got something; I shouldn’t wonder—”
“Bring ’em in!” said the deacon, “and be quick! What can the scamps be after!”
He came out, buttoning his suspenders, just as Hod and Hick marched in through the kitchen, one behind the other, bearing a short pole on their shoulders, with a curious burden hanging from it, about midway between them. It was a common meal-bag, having a compact but evidently heavy freight at the bottom, while the loose top was twisted over the pole and made fast by a cord.
“What’s that?” demanded the deacon. “The money that’s made all this trouble!”
“Ya-a-s!” said Hod, grinning and snuffing, and rolling his head from side to side, producing no small amount of friction between his left ear and the pole. “Boys say they don’t want it. Belongs to Jack.”
The deacon, far from suspecting that the rogues had the day before tried to dispose of some of the coin, and found it after all to be worthless, marvelled at this show of honesty in a quarter where it was so little to be looked for, and exclaimed, “I declare! I can’t understand! What did they take this trouble for?”
“’C-o-o-z!” said Hod, rolling his head again, snuffing, and drawing his smeared sleeve across his nose,—actions which Hick, at his end of the pole, did not fail to imitate; for it was characteristic of these young specimens of the Huswick species, that, reckless as they appeared in their native wilds, they were pretty sure to be overcome by a grotesque bashfulness when brought within the doors of civilized beings.
“’Cause what?” demanded the deacon.
“C-o-o-z!” Hod rolled his eyes from him to Annie and Mrs. Chatford, and used his other sleeve. “Squire’s got out warrants for ’em. Take ’em to jail. They don’t want noth’n’ to do with the money; want you to make him promise he won’t have ’em took up; then he may have the money, for all them. They found it in the woods, where Jack hid it.”
“I believe that’s a lie!” said the deacon. “But no matter. I’ll make as good terms for ’em as I can. Is it all here?”
“Ya-a-s; every dollar on ’t, so they say. Slip her off, Hick!” and the two treasure-bearers lowered their burden to the floor.
The deacon hastily untied the bag, looked into it, and then as hastily tied it up again.
“Good aft’noon!” said Hod. “Aft’noon!” said Hick. And they sidled towards the door, hesitating, grinning, and smearing their sleeves.
“You can get some peaches as you go through the orchard,” the deacon called after them, as they disappeared. “Open the big chest there, mother! We’ll lock up this stuff, till Peternot can be made to hear to reason. Is the horse ready?”
Kate caught her father as he was going out. “I want to send Jack something!” she cried. “I couldn’t think of anything when he was here. But there’s that half-dollar!”
“What half-dollar?”
“My half-dollar. Don’t you know? you borrowed it of me the other day, when you wanted one to ring with Jack’s on the doorstep.”
“But I gave it back to you.”
“No, you didn’t. You put it in your pocket. You had on your old gray pants, and you haven’t worn ’em since.”
The deacon went back to the bedroom, took down the said garments from a hook, and explored the pockets.
“You’re right, my girl. Here it is now. Send it to Jack if you like. What!” looking with astonishment at the coin as he was about to give it to her.
“That ain’t my half-dollar!” the child exclaimed. “That—that’s Jack’s!”
“Massy on me! Mother, see here! How under the sun—” stammered the bewildered deacon.
“If that don’t beat all!” said Mrs. Chatford. “Feel in your other pockets.”
The deacon felt, but no other half-dollar could be found.
“Must be—I do declare!” he said, fumbling and staring. “This piece has the very scratches on it! I see! I see!”
“How is it? You said you gave this half-dollar to the goldsmith!” exclaimed Mrs. Chatford. “I don’t understand!”
“My plaguy absence of mind!” said the deacon, scratching his head with one hand while he held the coin in the palm of the other. “I must have put both half-dollars in my pocket, not thinking what I was about. Then—it was dark, you know—I gave the wrong one to the goldsmith! gave him Kate’s instead of Jack’s!”
“Then you came home and told Jack his half-dollar was a good one! O deacon! it’s you that have caused him all this trouble! He never would have quarrelled with the squire, he never would have broken into his house as he did, but for your strange mistake!”
“’Twas a plaguy blunder! Counterfeit, counterfeit, I’ll stake my life!” said the deacon, examining the coin in the bag. “Say nothing to anybody; but—See here, Moses! put it under the buggy-seat, and fling a blanket over it.”
“Now, deacon!” pleaded his wife, “do use a little more, I won’t say deception, but wisdom, more than you do sometimes! Don’t tell the squire at once all you know, for that will be just like you.”
“Think I haven’t any gumption?” cried the deacon.
“No, but you’re so honest, you never can use any sort of art or concealment, you know that! That’s very well in all ordinary business transactions; I wouldn’t have you cheat a body, for any consideration. But your blunder has got Jack into this scrape; and now don’t explain to the squire till you’ve got Jack out of it again.”
“As if I required to be told by a woman that a little shrewdness may be necessary sometimes in dealing with the world!” said the deacon. And, climbing into the buggy with unusual alacrity, he whipped away at an extraordinary rate of speed.
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CHAPTER XXXVIII
THE DEACON’S DIPLOMACY.
FIERCELY the squire was limping to and fro, between his office-room and Mrs. Peternot’s kitchen, compressing his lips, and striking the floor every now and then with his cane, as he exclaimed, “He shall lay in jail! I’ll prosecute him! State’s prison’s too good for him!” when his wife called from the window, “Squire! squire! Here’s Deacon Chatford, jest drove up; beckonin’ and hollerin’!”
“What now, I wonder?” said Peternot, as he put on his hat and went out, frowning, to meet his neighbor. “Wal! what is it, deacon?”
“I’ve thought of a plan,” said Mr. Chatford, hurriedly. “Get in here; we’ll talk as we ride. There’s not a minute to lose!”
“What plan?” demanded the stern old squire.
“For settling the difficulty.”
“The diffikilty can’t be settled, unless peradventur’ the boy gives up the money.”
“That’s just it!” cried the deacon. “He said he was willing to give it up; and now it’s fallen into my hands.”
“The treasure? in your hands?” exclaimed Peternot, limping quickly towards the buggy.
“That is,” said the deacon, remembering his wife’s injunction, to use a little worldly wisdom on the occasion,—“yes, I may say, in my hands, for I know where it is; I’ve secure possession on ’t; and I’ve resolved—But jump in! jump in! for we must overhaul Sellick before he delivers the boy up at the jail.”
“Wal, wal! This sounds like!—Wife! wife!” called Peternot, “hand out my gre’t-cut! May be cool ridin’.—In your hands? The best news yit! It’s comin’ out right, arter all! But, as you say, we must ketch Sellick ’fore he gits to the jail; the case ’ll haf to go before the gran’ jury, if we don’t.—Wife! wife! can’t ye step quick for once?”
Mrs. Peternot did “step quick for once”; out came the overcoat, and into it went the stiff-jointed old man. Then away rattled the buggy with the two neighbors seated side by side.
“Ketch ’em ’fore they git to the jail, and I can manage Judge Garty,” said Peternot. “But I must have some guarantee that the coin will be actooally restored to me, if I git the boy off.”
“If you require any other guarantee than my word of honor,” began the deacon—“Get up, Maje, go long.”
“That ought to be enough; sartin, sartin! pervided you’re sure you can put me into clear possession of the money, without any peradventur’ about it. Where is it? at your house?”
“It was brought to my house half an hour ago by two of the Huswick boys. And that reminds me,” said the deacon, “one of the conditions is, that you shall withdraw your complaint against Hank and Cub. I forgot to mention that.”
“If they’ve re’ly gi’n up the booty—but I can’t quite see into ’t!” said Peternot. “It don’t seem like the Huswick tribe to part with plunder once fairly in their hands, for fear of a writ out arter ’em. Must be they don’t know the vally of the coin.”
“Very likely!” said the deacon, dryly. “At any rate, they have sent it to me, and commissioned me to make their peace with you.” And he whipped up old Maje again.
“That seems fair. Though I own I’ve had my mind set on punishin’ on ’em, the rogues! They swindled me out of five dollars, when they carried the coin home for me; but I s’pose I can afford to forgive ’em that. So I say, if I don’t find they’ve kep’ back a part of the treasure, I’ll agree to drop the complaint.”
“And another thing, squire!” said the artful deacon. “You must do the right thing by the boy; you must do something handsome for Jack.”
“Yes, yes! sartin!” said Peternot. “I’ll make him a present; can’t say jest what, but somethin’ liberal, somethin’ fair and liberal, deacon, I promise!”
The deacon had to turn away to hide the smile upon his features. He did not press Peternot, to know what that “something fair and liberal” should be.
He now gave his attention to urging on old Maje’s paces, fearing to mar a good matter by speaking a word too much. Would not Mrs. Chatford give him a little credit for “gumption” after this? Had he not managed the affair with the sagacity of an accomplished politician? He began to wonder a little at the stupidity he had shown on some previous occasions, a man of his diplomatic ability; thinking particularly of the manner in which he had given Kate’s half-dollar to the jeweller, instead of Jack’s.
“Strange how I could have made such a blunder!” he remarked, inadvertently, to the squire.
“What blunder?” cried the squire, quickly.
Poor Mr. Chatford saw that he was on the point of letting out the very secret he had prided himself on keeping; and he lost faith in his “gumption” on the spot.
“O, I’m such a terrible absent-minded man!” he exclaimed. “I’m forever forgetting something. Remember how I drove over to the Basin that Saturday night, and walked home, never thinking of the horse and buggy, till next morning, when we thought they had been stolen, and had that famous hunt for the thieves? That’s the way Jack came to live with us. Pippy arrested him, and brought him home, and he has been with us ever since,” Mr. Chatford went on, congratulating himself on having steered clear of the dangerous rock. “Get up, Maje! don’t be so blamed lazy! There’s my nephew, Syd Chatford, crossing the road; I’ll ask him if he has seen ’em pass.”
“I heard he had applied for the winter’s school in our deestrict,” said the squire. “I hope you won’t forgit my nephew’s claims. It’ll help clear up all these diffikilties, and make us better neighbors than ever, if you’ll bear in mind that Byron was one of the fust to apply, and give him a trial.”
“I’ll do what I can,” replied the deacon; “for, really, I don’t consider Syd just the man for the place, though he is my nephew.—Here! hello! Syd!” Syd, who had crossed the street, and was walking towards the house, turned back at his uncle’s call, and approached the buggy, in a smart, stiff way.
“I haven’t a minute to talk,” cried the deacon. “Have you seen our Jack ride by with Neighbor Sellick?”
“Yes, about twenty minutes ago,” replied Syd.
“So long!” exclaimed the deacon. “Driving fast?”
“Pretty good jog,” replied Syd. “What’s to pay?”
“I declare, we must do better than this, squire, or they’ll be there first, in spite of us!” And Mr. Chatford chirped, and shouted, “Get up! go ’long!” and lashed old Maje again, to the no small astonishment of his nephew, who, gazing after the cantering horse and rattling buggy, wondered if the usually slow and quiet deacon had not been taking a glass of something strong.
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CHAPTER XXXIX
A TURN OF FORTUNE.
SELLICK had a better horse than his neighbors, and he too had been using the whip a little since Jack respectfully declined working for him, preferring to go to jail. The merry man could not help thinking what a capital anecdote this would be to relate of anybody else; but, as I have said, he did not greatly relish a joke at his own expense.
His spirits rallied a little as they entered the city, and he said laughingly, “You remind me of the man on his way to the gallows, who was offered a free pardon if he would marry a sartin woman in the crowd, not over ’n’ above handsome. He looked at her, shook his head: ‘Sharp nose, thin lips,’ says he; ‘drive on, cartman!’ So, ruther ’n work for me, you’ll go to jail! ha, ha, ha!” And Sellick began to think he would have to tell the story, much as it reflected on his reputation as an employer.
“I didn’t say just that,” replied Jack. “If going to work for you would get me out of this scrape, I’d do it. But I shall have to appear at my trial, and then, if convicted of housebreaking, have to serve out a sentence, anyway; so the little time I’ve to wait I may as well spend in jail over my books.”
“I don’t know but you take about the right view on ’t,” said Sellick, soothed by the explanation; and the horse was allowed to slacken his speed. “I thought fust you’d been talking with Billy. Billy thinks he has a hard time; but he’s slow. Me and you’d git along finely together!”
“There’s the jail!” said Jack, with a sudden sinking of the heart.
“That’s the mansion,” remarked Sellick. “The mouse-trap, I call it; easy to git in, hard to git out. You’ll have to trade hats agin now.”
The constable, who had charge of the articles which the prisoner had left at the squire’s at the time of his escape, had let him put on the hat when they started to ride over to the deacon’s; but it was necessary for him to retain it in his custody.
“Never mind,” said Jack, “I sha’n’t have much use for a hat here, I suppose. Old Scarecrow’s will do.”
“And arter your sentence, you’ll be furnished with a cap at the public expense,” added the constable, as he drove up to the door of the jail.
Jack looked with gloomy misgivings at the barred windows and massy front of the great stone building; and for a moment his spirit failed him. Had he not acted foolishly in givinz-father, Captain Berrick, there, with the other prisoners; all his endeavors to do right, and his boasted _chance for himself_, since that day; his friends left behind, whom he might never see again; the strange calamity that had overtaken him, the long confinement, the dubious future. And the poor lad burst into tears.
“Come!” said Sellick. “Here we be at the end of our journey, as the runaway pigs said, when they went on the table, roasted, for dinner. Never mind your things; I’ll hand ’em out, arterwards. Here comes the kind-hearted keeper of this tavern to welcome his guest. What! crying, sonny? Changed your mind yit?”
“No!” and Jack was himself again. “I’m ready!”—his resolution to pursue an open, upright course, and take with a brave heart whatever happened, returning like a strong tide to buoy him up.
“What’s that shouting?” said Sellick, glancing up the street. “Hello! if there ain’t the deacon and the squire coming arter us, lickety-split! Wait a minute! Le’s see what they want.”
What they wanted was soon made manifest. “Judge Garty recalls his jail warrant, or he will do it; new developments in the case!” cried the deacon, breathlessly, driving up.
“Pervided the boy consents to the arrangement,” added Peternot. “The money is in our hands: he agrees to abandon all claim on ’t.—What do you say, before these witnesses?”
“I’ve already said I was willing to do that,” said the astonished Jack. “But how—where did you find it—the coin, I mean?”
“The Huswick boys sent it over to my house. You abandon your claim to it, as the squire says, and throw yourself on his liberality, on his well-known generosity,” added the deacon, with a sly twinkle. “He has promised to do the handsome thing by you, the fair and liberal thing; and I’ve no doubt it will be all you can ask, under the circumstances.”
“If he’ll get me out of this fix, I shall be satisfied,” said Jack; “I’ll trust the rest to his—liberality, as you say.” And his heart gave such a leap of joy at the thought of getting off so easily, that he came near betraying his knowledge of the spurious character of the coin, by some mirthful demonstration.
“Now you’re reasonable; now you talk as a boy should!” cried Peternot, approvingly. “Turn about; le’s hurry back to the judge’s office, and have the matter arranged.” For the old man was as anxious to secure the treasure, as Jack was eager to regain his freedom.
“You spoke jest in time,” said Sellick. “A minute more, and the prisoner and the paper would have gone out of my hands.—No, thank you!” to the jailer; “you’re very kind, but I don’t think I shall need to trouble you this morning,—unless the boy insists on ’t?” turning to Jack.
As Jack did not insist, the two buggies were turned about and started for home; Sellick, with his fresher horse, taking the lead.
“Old Maje is perty well used up; guess the deacon never drove him quite so hard before. One thing,” added the constable, “surprises me, that both him and you should have been so willing to give up all the money, to buy off the squire. Between ourselves, he’d ’ave been glad to take one half.”
“Think so?” replied Jack, coolly. “Well, it’s too late now. Let him have it. I’ll trust to his _liberality_.”
“He’s got about as much liberality as an old sow with a litter of fourteen squealing pigs and a scarcity of swill,” was Sellick’s rather coarse but expressive comparison. “Not that I’ve the least thing agin him; nice old man, the squire! Come! what do you say _now_ to hiring to me?”
This question recalled to Jack’s mind the obstacle which lay in the way of his return to Mr. Chatford’s house, and his joy became clouded by a serious trouble.
“Come and bring your dog, you know,” said Sellick. “I’m a famous story-teller; boys all like me; we’ll have grand times together. What do you think you can earn? Four dollars a month?”
“I should hope so, twice that!” replied Jack, thinking this was perhaps the best he could do.
“Say six dollars, when you ain’t going to school.” And Sellick went on to flatter and coax the homeless lad. “Anything I can do for ye? Come, ain’t there something?”
“Yes,” said Jack, “one thing. I haven’t felt just right about this old hat I took from Mr. Canning’s scarecrow. We’ve plenty of time, _they_ are so far behind us,” casting a backward glance for the squire and the deacon. “Drive round that way, and I’ll leave it where I found it.”
Sellick consented. Taking a by-road, he crossed a bridge, and drove on the north side of the canal towards the Basin, soon striking the road which passed the Canning cornfield.
Jack jumped out at the well-remembered length of fence, which he climbed again, and, running betwixt the rustling rows, discovered the patient man-of-straw waiting, bareheaded, and surrounded by blackbirds, just as he had left him the day before.
“I wish I could return the ears of corn I took, in the same way,” he said to the constable, as he went back to the wagon; “but there are slight difficulties; so never mind!”
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER XL
THE SQUIRE’S TRIUMPH.
THEY found Judge Garty in his office; and soon after the deacon and Squire Peternot arrived. Once more Jack, but now with a lighter heart than before, stood before the weak-eyed, hard-winking magistrate, who supposed that the prisoner, having been retaken, was now to be admitted to bail.
“Not exac’ly that,” said Peternot, while Jack listened with a trembling interest. “New sarcumstances have come to light, havin’ a bearin’ on the case. I’ve an understandin’ with the boy; I’m satisfied he didn’t intend burglary; it turns out to be re’ly a trivial offence; so I’ve ventur’d to bring the officer back with him, and I want you to recall your _mittimus_, assume jurisdiction in the case, and discharge the prisoner.”
“That’ll suit him, I’ve no doubt,” said Judge Garty, winking placidly at Jack about forty times.
“It’ll suit me to be discharged,” replied Jack, with a smile, “though I can’t say I understand his talk about it.”
“A justice of the peace can’t decide in anything so serious as a burglary case,” said the deacon. “But since the complainant is convinced that it wasn’t intentional housebreaking, it is different. The justice can assume jurisdiction, that is, take the case in hand, and decide it.”
“’T will be a little irregular,” remarked Judge Garty, rubbing the top of his bald head with the feather end of his quill pen, and winking wonderfully fast. “Moreover, there’s the costs. I suppose the complainant will in this case pay the costs?”
“Sartin, sartin,” said the squire, thinking he would thus discharge all obligations to the boy he had persecuted.
Judge Garty accordingly went through the formality of putting Peternot under oath again, hearing the case, and pronouncing the prisoner discharged, all in about three minutes’ time. Then Peternot, with a grimace and a twinge, pulled out his pocket-book, and paid the following bill:—
Costs of court                                                  $2.35
Mittimus, and binding over witnesses                              .50
Witnesses’ fees and travel (2 miles each, 5 cts. a mile)         1.20
Sheriff’s fee                                                    2.50
Lock broken by sheriff after prisoner had locked up the           .25 court, and it became necessary for the court to get out
Window broken by ladder                                           .37
_____
Total                                                           $7.17
As Peternot and his nephew were the witnesses, the squire’s actual expenditures in the case amounted to five dollars and ninety-seven cents.
“Now!” said he, eager to be consoled for what had caused him such a pang, “for _your_ part of the agreement, deacon!”
“Well, come with me,” said Mr. Chatford, with a peculiar smile. “The _treasure_ ain’t far off.”
And, leading the way down the office stairs, to his buggy standing at the foot of them, he pulled up the seat, lifted a horse-blanket, and pulled from beneath it the squire’s meal-bag and its heavy freight of coin. Peternot grasped it eagerly.
“I must say, deacon, you’ve played this perty well! I’d no idee you had it with ye! I ’most wish you hadn’t made it quite so public, though,” for the usual village crowd had assembled. “I’m afraid—I—I ruther think I’ll take it over to the store and have it locked up in the safe.”
“You haven’t settled with the boy; what ye going to give the boy?” cried Sellick, comfortably patting his fee in his trousers-pocket.
“The boy!” echoed Peternot, a frown of displeasure clouding the sunshine which played for a moment over the barren and rocky waste of his features. “Arter all the trouble and expense he’s put me to? I said I’d be liberal, and I have been liberal. I’ve paid the costs of court, and got him off; for which he may thank his stars, and think himself lucky. I won’t be hard, though.” The squire put his hand into the bag, as if about to present Jack one of the rusty half-dollars; but changed his mind, and thrusting his hand into his pocket, took out a silver quarter. “Here! take that! I’ve nothin’ else to give ye.”
Jack laughed, took the coin, and immediately presented it to a shabby little old man in the crowd, who received it with quaint surprise.
“You are Mr. Canning, I believe,” said Jack.
“That’s my name, that’s my name. But what’s this for? What’s this?”
“I had to borrow a hat from your scarecrow, and take a few ears of your corn to roast, yesterday,” said Jack. “I’ve returned the hat, and this is to settle for the corn. I’m going to begin life new, and I want to begin right with everybody.”
“That’s right, that’s right! You’re welcome to the corn, though; welcome to a few ears of corn, to be sure! to be sure!” cried the shabby old man, pocketing the money, however, and walking off with it, looking, in his old-fashioned, long-tailed, tattered coat, like one of his own scarecrows out taking a little exercise.
“Come, Jack, where are you going?” cried the deacon.
“Back into the office, to find the hat I left there when I ran away.”
“I carried that home. Now let’s be going. There’ll be an outburst in a minute,” said the deacon, casting an anxious glance after Peternot, who was carrying his bag of coin into the jeweller’s shop.
“Jack is going home with me; me and him’s struck a bargain,” said Sellick.
“Fie, fie! nonsense!” said the deacon. “We can’t spare Jack; he’s going with _me_.”
“I’ll ride with you. I’d like to talk with you a little, and go home and say good by—and—and get my dog,” faltered Jack; “but you know—”
“Yes, yes! that misunderstanding between you and Phineas. O, never mind about that!”
“I must!” said Jack. “He is your son, and of course you don’t want—”
“I want what’s right, son or no son. Come along!” And the good deacon half lifted Jack into the buggy. “There’s Peternot now!”
It was Peternot, indeed, rushing out of the jeweller’s shop with wrath in his countenance and several spurious half-dollars in his hand.
“Wait! wait!” he shouted, advancing towards the buggy as fast as his limp would allow. “Deacon! how’s this? You’ve desaived, you’ve ruined me!”
“Deceived! ruined you! how so?” asked the deacon, calmly.
“He says you brought him a half-dollar to test, but not one of these!” cried the excited squire.
“Yes, yes; a blunder of mine; I was telling you how dreadful absent-minded I am, you remember.”
“These are counterfeit!”
“Are they, indeed? Well, I’m not surprised.”
“But you never told me!”
“No, squire; I’d done so much mischief by telling that the coin was genuine, I thought I’d hold my tongue, after I found out what a mistake I’d made. But I don’t see that you are ruined. You’ve given yourself some trouble and expense, in order to get the treasure into your hands, that’s all. You’ve done one good thing, though, in getting this boy off, and we appreciate it.”
[Illustration: THE SQUIRE’S TRIUMPH.]
“I’ll have him up agin!” said the squire, furiously.
“O no, neighbor! I hardly think you will. No ‘new circumstances’ have come to light in his case since you swore to your last statement; and for you to complain of him again would plainly be a case of malicious prosecution. He ain’t to blame for my blunder. _I_ deceived _him_ with regard to the coin; he hasn’t deceived anybody. Didn’t know but what it was good till this minute; did you, Jack?”
“Yes,” said Jack, with a grin. “Aunt Patsy told me last night it was some of Sam Williams’s bogus. But I thought it just as well not to say anything about it. I wanted to see how liberal he was!”
The deacon smiled, the spectators laughed, and Peternot, turning angrily on his heel, stalked back to the jeweller’s shop, where he had left his bag of “treasure.”
“Well, now we’ll go home,” said the deacon, touching up old Maje.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER XLI
HOW IT ALL ENDED.
GREAT was the joy at the farm-house over Jack’s return. Mrs. Chatford shed motherly tears on his neck; little Kate hugged him as high up as she could reach; while Mrs. Pipkin, and Mr. Pipkin and Mose, who had just come in to dinner, looked on with faces shining with delight and sympathy. Only Phin appeared not altogether enchanted with the turn affairs had taken; and the envious, hypocritical expression of his grinning face changed to genuine alarm as Mr. Chatford said, “Jack has come just to say good by, and to get his dog.”
“His dog?” cried Phin. “Our dog! He can’t have our dog!”
“It is his dog, and nobody else’s,” said the deacon, sadly. “And though I don’t want to part with either of ’em, especially since Jack has shown himself such a man, we can’t detain him; and of course he can take his dog, if he chooses. Sellick has made him an offer.”
“But you haven’t accepted it, have you, Jack?” said Mrs. Chatford.
“Not yet, but—”
“What does he go for?” demanded Phineas, disturbed at the prospect of losing Lion.
“Because you’ve lied about him, and he can’t live in the house with you!” said the deacon, with extraordinary sternness.
“I didn’t lie,” whimpered Phin. “I remember now I did say something to him like what he said.”
“Then own up that it was a lie!”
“I didn’t mean it; I wanted him to get back his money, and I thought you said _something_ of the kind.”
“You thought no such thing! O Phineas! Phineas!” And the deacon almost wept with sorrow over his son’s meanness and untruth.
“I hope you’ll forgive me; I hope he will,” whined Phin.
“I do,” said Jack, frankly, “now that you have owned up.”
“And you’ll let Lion stay?”
“Lion is all he cares for!” said Moses, with angry contempt, as Phin slunk away out of sight.
“O, here comes cousin Annie!” cried little Kate.
Jack ran eagerly to meet his dear friend, but started back on seeing at her side his new acquaintance, Percy Lanman.
The beautiful schoolmistress kissed him openly, in right sisterly fashion, and rejoiced over the good news. Percy pressed his hand warmly, and said, with that bright, good-humored look of his, “I was out botanizing, and stopped at the school-house to get news of you; and as Miss Felton was just starting to walk home, I walked with her.”
“I’m glad you did,” said Jack. “Here is the money I owe you.” Percy took it with a smile. “There! now I’ve paid all my debts, I’m even with the world, and ready to begin again!—Yes, Kate, dear Kate! I’ll stay; I’ve nothing to go for now.—Old Lion! get down, you good fellow! you silly boy’s dog!” And Jack dashed away a tear. “You are all so good to me! I never was so happy in my life!”
And yet it gave him a curious feeling, something that was not quite unclouded joy, to see his two friends, Percy Lanman and Annie Felton, standing there, smiling, side by side. Though what there was in that to trouble him I cannot precisely say; can any one guess?
Still a happy boy indeed was Jack. His great trouble had passed by; and he had no more dread of the jail, of trial and sentence. His brief experience of the cares and snares of riches had taught him wisdom, and the upright course he resolved upon at last had developed a conscious strength and manliness in his heart, richer than any fortune. He was once more in his dear home, with his dearest friends around him, their confidence in him restored, and their love for him increased. And now, not selfishly as before, but very gratefully, very lovingly, he felt that he had for the first time in his life, rightly and truly,
A CHANCE FOR HIMSELF.
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Cambridge: Electrotyped and Printed by Welch, Bigelow, & Co.
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● Transcriber’s Notes: ○ Missing or obscured punctuation was corrected. ○ Typographical errors were silently corrected. ○ Inconsistent spelling and hyphenation were made consistent only when a predominant form was found in this book. ○ Text that was in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_).
End of Project Gutenberg's A Chance for Himself, by J. T. Trowbridge

= = = PG28190 = = =
A CHAPTER OF ADVENTURES
Produced by David Edwards, Emmy and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
[Illustration: WAITING FOR HELP.]
A Chapter
of
Adventures
BY
G. A. HENTY
[Illustration: Emblem]
BLACKIE AND SON LIMITED LONDON GLASGOW AND BOMBAY
BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE
George Alfred Henty was born near Cambridge in 1832, and educated at Westminster School and Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. He volunteered for service in the Crimean War, and after some varied experiences adopted a journalistic career. He served as war correspondent of the _Standard_ during the Austro-Italian campaign of 1866, and was afterwards a correspondent in the Abyssinian War, the Franco-German War, the Ashanti War, &c. His first book for boys was published in 1868, and was followed by a long and very successful series, including _The Young Franc-Tireurs_ (1872), _In Times of Peril_ (1881), _Under Drake's Flag_ (1883), _With Clive in India_ (1884), _The Lion of the North_ (1886), _Orange and Green_ (1888), _The Lion of St. Mark_ (1889), _By Pike and Dyke_ (1890), _By Right of Conquest_ (1891), _With Moore at Corunna_ (1898), _With Kitchener in the Soudan_ (1903), and _With the Allies to Pekin_ (1904). He died in 1902.
CONTENTS.
CHAP.                                     Page
I. A FISHING VILLAGE                     5
II. CAUGHT BY THE TIDE                   15
III. A RUN FROM HARWICH                   27
IV. THE WRECK                            37
V. THE RESCUE                           46
VI. ALTERED PROSPECTS                    57
VII. ON BOARD THE _WILD WAVE_        69
VIII. ALEXANDRIA                           78
IX. THE RIOT IN ALEXANDRIA               89
X. PRISONERS                            99
XI. THE BOMBARDMENT                     110
XII. FREE                                120
XIII. AMONG FRIENDS                       131
XIV. A SET OF RASCALS                    143
XV. A THREATENING SKY                   153
XVI. OLD JOE'S YARN                      163
XVII. IN DANGEROUS SEAS                   180
XVIII. A CYCLONE                           191
XIX. CAST ASHORE                         201
A CHAPTER OF ADVENTURES
CHAPTER I
A FISHING VILLAGE
OF the tens of thousands of excursionists who every summer travel down by rail to Southend, there are few indeed who stop at Leigh, or who, once at Southend, take the trouble to walk three miles along the shore to the fishing village. It may be doubted, indeed, whether along the whole stretch of coastline from Plymouth to Yarmouth there is a village that has been so completely overlooked by the world. Other places, without a tithe of its beauty of position, or the attraction afforded by its unrivalled view over the Thames, from Gravesend to Warden Point, ever alive with ships passing up and down, have grown from fishing hamlets to fashionable watering-places; while Leigh remains, or at any rate remained at the time this story opens, ten years ago, as unchanged and unaltered as if, instead of being but an hour's run from London, it lay far north in Scotland.
Its hill rises steeply behind it; there is room only for the street between the railway and the wharves, and for a single row of houses between the line and the foot of the hill. To get into Leigh from the country round it is necessary to descend by a steep road that winds down from the church at the top of the hill; to get out again you must go by the same way. The population is composed solely of fishermen, their families, and the shopkeepers who supply their necessities. The men who stand in groups in the street and on the wharf are all clad in blue guernseys or duck smocks and trousers of pilot cloth or canvas. Broad-built sturdy men are they, for in point of physique there are few fishermen round the coast who can compare with those of Leigh.
A stranger in the place would think that the male population had nothing to do but to stand in the street and talk, but night is for the most part their time for work; although many of the bawleys go out on the day-tide also, for at Leigh the tide is all-important. For five hours in the day it washes the foot of the wharves, for seven a wide expanse of mud stretches away to Canvey Island in front, and Southend Pier to the east.
At the wells--for Leigh still depends for water on its wells--are, during the hours at which water is permitted to be drawn, lines of twenty women and girls with pails, each patiently waiting her turn. There are not many boys about, for boys require more sleep than men, and a considerable portion of their time on shore is spent in bed.
It is ten o'clock in the day; the bawleys have returned from the fishing grounds, and scores of them have anchored in the Ray--a deep stretch of water lying between the spit of sand that extends from the end of Canvey Island close up to Southend Pier, and the mud-flats of Leigh. The flats are still uncovered, but the tide is rising fast in the winding channel leading up to the village. In a few minutes there will be water enough for the boats, and already these can be seen leaving the bawleys and making for the mouth of the channel. The wind is fair, and each boat hoists its sail, white or yellow or brown, and with the crew sitting up to windward comes flying along the shallow channel, making, as they always do, a race of it home.
The boats are large and roomy, and are, as they need to be, good sea-boats; for they have at times to live in rough water that would swamp lighter craft like cockle-shells. Each boat carries two men and a boy, that being the regular crew of a bawley; although, perhaps, for rough winter work, they may sometimes take an extra hand. In the bow of the first boat that comes tearing along up to the wharf sits a good-looking lad, about fourteen years old. His face is bronzed with the sun and wind, his clothes are as rough and patched as those of the other fisher lads; but although as strong and sinewy as any of his companions of the same age, he is somewhat slighter in his build, more active in his movements, and has a more springy and elastic walk in spite of the heavy boots that he wears.
He helps the others to land several baskets of shrimps, and carry them to the railway-station hard by. They are already boiled, for the bawleys carry coppers, into which the shrimps are baled straight from the nets, so that they are in readiness to send off to town as soon as they are landed. When the baskets are all piled on the platform he crosses the line, follows it along for some fifty yards, and then enters a neat cottage facing it.
"Back again all safe, Jack?"
"All right, mother! It's been a fine night, with just enough wind, and not too much. I ought to have been in half an hour ago, but tide is late this morning."
"Lily brought word, just as she was starting for school, that the boats were coming up the creek, so your breakfast is all ready."
"And so am I, mother; though I had a piece of bread and cheese when we dropped anchor. I will just wash my hands, and be ready in a jiffey."
Mrs. Robson was a native of Leigh. Her father had been a fisherman, who had owned his own bawley; indeed, most of the boats at Leigh are the property of one of the men who work them.
Bessy Tripper--not that her real name was Tripper, but Snow; but her father for some unknown reason got the nickname of Tripper, and his sons and daughters were also called by it, and would hardly have answered if addressed as Snow--was one of the prettiest girls in Leigh; so thought William Robson, a young artist, who came down to Leigh to spend the summer there, sketching the picturesque boats as they came in and out, or lay, with their heads pointing all round the compass, on the soft mud.
He had taken lodgings at Tripper's house, and when not at work with his brush spent much of his time on board the _Enterprise_. Bessy Tripper was a conspicuous figure in the foreground of many of his sketches, and occupied as prominent a place in his thoughts. She was as sweet-tempered as she was pretty, and at last Will Robson made up his mind to marry her if she would take him. He was himself an orphan, and had no friends who had any right to object to his marrying according to his fancy, and he could therefore do as he pleased without question or comment. Bessy Tripper was quite ready to take him when he asked her, and they were married at the church at the top of the hill, and went to live at a little cottage near Dulwich.
William Robson was no genius; he had the knack of painting pretty marine sketches in water-colours. These sold readily, but at low prices; and although he was always talking of doing a great picture in oils that was to make his fortune, the picture never was painted. He was always too busy at what he called pot-boilers, which had to be sold to dealers for a trifle, in order to enable him to meet the butcher's and baker's bills. He never repented his marriage; Bessy was an admirable housewife, and made a shilling go as far as many women would a half-crown. In the summer they generally went down for a couple of months to Leigh, for her to see her friends, for him to gather a fresh stock of new subjects.
He died suddenly from the effects of a chill, and when his affairs were wound up Bessy found herself mistress of the five hundred pounds for which he had insured his life, and the furniture of the cottage. It was natural that she should return to Leigh. She had no friends elsewhere; and she knew that money went much further there than in most other places. Two hundred pounds were spent in purchasing the cottage in which she now lived, and another two hundred in buying a bawley. At Leigh, as at most other fishing places, the men work on shares--the boat takes a share, and each of the men a share--the owner of a boat supplying nets as well as the boat itself. The bawley, therefore, brought Mrs. Robson in a sum equal to that earned by a fisherman, with deductions, however, for damages to nets and spars.
In good seasons the receipts sufficed to keep her and her boy and girl comfortably; in bad seasons they had to live very closely, and she was obliged in specially bad times to dip a little into her reserve of a hundred pounds. Upon the other hand, there was occasionally a windfall when the smack rendered assistance to a vessel on the sands, or helped to get up anchors or discharge cargoes.
At the time of her husband's death Jack was ten years old and Lily eight. For two years the former attended the school on the hill, and then went as a boy on board a bawley belonging to one of his uncles.
The lad's own predilections were entirely for the sea; his happiest times had been spent at Leigh, and his father's work had kept the longing alive at other times. He would have preferred going to sea in one of the ships of which there was always such a line passing up and down the river, but he was too young for that when he first began his work on board the bawley; and as the time went on, and he became accustomed to the life of a fisherman, his longings for a wider experience gradually faded away, for it is seldom indeed that a Leigh boy goes to sea--the Leigh men being as a race devoted to their homes, and regarding with grave disapproval any who strike out from the regular groove.
"We did well this morning, mother," Jack said as he came downstairs in a clean guernsey and pilot trousers. "We had a fine haul off the lower Blyth, and not a bad one higher up. I fancy most of the boats did well. The _Hope_ was close to us, and I expect she must have done as well as we did."
"That's good news, Jack. The catches have not been heavy lately, but now they have once begun I hope that we shall have a better time of it."
The breakfast was fish, for fish is the chief article of diet at Leigh.
"Are you going to bed, Jack?"
"No, mother; I did not start until half-past one, and so I got a good six hours before I turned out. I am going to help Uncle Ben put a fresh coat of pitch on our boat. He is going to bring her in as soon as there is water enough. Tom stopped on board with him, but they let me come ashore in Atkins' boat; and of course I lent them a hand to get their fish up. We shall land our lot when the bawley comes up."
"Then you won't go out again to-night, Jack?"
"Oh, yes, we shall, mother. We shall go out with the tide as usual. We shall only do up to the water-line, and the pitch will be plenty dry enough by night. We are going to fish over by Warden Point, I think."
"I am glad to hear it," his mother said. "I always feel more comfortable when you are on that ground, as you are out of the track of steamers there."
"Uncle is talking of going down to Harwich next week."
Mrs. Robson's face fell. She had expected the news, for every year a considerable number of the Leigh bawleys go down to Harwich and fish off that port for two or three months. The absence of Jack was always a great trial to her. When he was with her she felt that he was safe, for it is an almost unheard-of thing for a bawley to meet with an accident when fishing in the mouth of the Thames; but off Harwich the seas are heavy, and although even there accidents are rare--for the boats are safe and staunch and the fishermen handle them splendidly--still the risk is greater than when working at home.
The Leigh men themselves attribute their freedom from accident in no slight degree to the fact that their boats never go out on Sunday. They are God-fearing men these fishermen, and however bad the times, and however hard the pinch, it is seldom indeed that a bawley puts out from Leigh on Sunday, save to the assistance of a vessel in distress.
The excursionists who go down in summer weather to Margate and Ramsgate scarcely think that ships could be cast away and broken up upon the hidden sands beneath the sparkling waters. They know not that scarce one of these sands but at low water is dotted with low, black timbers, and that there are few more dangerous pieces of navigation in the world than the passage up the mouth of the Thames on a wild night when a fierce gale is blowing and the snow and sleet driving before it, obscuring the guiding lights that mark the channels between the sands.
The _Bessy_--for so Ben Tripper had named his bawley, after his favourite sister--was lying on the mud just above Leigh. A fishy smell pervaded the air, for close by were the boiling-sheds, with their vast heaps of white cockle-shells. These were dug by the cocklers either from the sand at the end of the Canvey Island or on the Maplin Sands somewhere off Shoebury.
The large boats often return deeply laden with them. On reaching Leigh the cockles are thrown out in great heaps by the side of the creek, where they are covered at each tide. Here they are left to clean themselves, and to get rid of the sand they have taken in when burrowing. Two or three days later they are carried up to the boiling-houses and thrown into great coppers of boiling water. They open at once, and the fish drop from the shells. The contents of the coppers are passed through large meshed sieves, to allow the fish to pass through and retain the shells, which go to add to the heaps outside. These heaps would in time rival in size the cinder tips of the Midlands were it not that there is a use for the shells. They make splendid lime, and are sometimes taken away in barge-loads and carried to town, where they are used instead of gravel in the parks, making, when crushed, the whitest and tidiest of paths.
Before starting, Jack had put on a canvas jumper, leggings and high boots, and was soon at work with his uncle, ankle-deep in the mud. The bawleys are boats almost peculiar to Leigh, although a few hail from Gravesend and the Medway. They are from thirty to forty-five feet long, and are divided into three classes of from six to fifteen tons burden. They are very broad in comparison to their length, some of them having a beam of fifteen feet, and they carry their width almost to the stern, which is square. This gives the boats a dumpy appearance, as they look as if they had been cut short. They are half-decked, with a roomy fo'castle and a well, where the fish are kept alive. They carry one mast.
The peculiarity of their rig is that they have no boom to their mainsail, which in shape somewhat resembles a barge-sail, and, like it, can in a moment be brailed completely up. They carry a lofty topmast and large topsails, and these they seldom lower, even when obliged to have two reefs in the mainsail. They are capital sea-boats, fast, and very handy; and it requires a good yacht to beat a bawley with a brisk wind blowing. The men are keen sailors, and when the trawls are taken up and their heads turned homewards it is always a race to be first back.
Ten years ago all the bawleys were clinker-built--that is, with the streaks overlapping each other, as in boats; but the new bawleys are now all carvel-built, the planks being placed edge to edge, so as to give a smooth surface, as in yachts and large vessels. They now for the most part carry spinnakers, boomed out when running before the wind, and balloon foresails, thereby greatly adding to their speed in light winds. One peculiarity of the bawleys is that, when at anchor, the mainsail, instead of being stowed with its spars parallel to the deck, is made up on its gaff, which is then hoisted with the throat seven or eight feet up the mast, while the peak rests on the stern.
This is done to give more room on deck, and enable the men to get more easily in and out of the fo'castle. It has, however, a curious appearance, and a fleet of bawleys at anchor resembles nothing so much as a flock of broken-backed ducks.
Ben Tripper and his mate, Tom Hoskins, finished tarring the boat under her water-line soon after four o'clock in the afternoon, Jack's share of the work consisting in keeping the fire blazing under the pitch kettle.
"What time shall we go out, uncle?"
"Not going out at all, Jack. We will finish tarring her the first thing in the morning, and there are two or three odd jobs want doing."
"Will you want me, uncle? because, if not, I shall go out early with Bill Corbett cockling. His father has hurt his leg, and is laid up, so he asked me to lend him a hand. I told him I didn't know whether you were going out again to-night or whether you could spare me in the morning, but that if you didn't want me I would go with him."
"You can go, Jack; besides, you will be in early anyhow. We will do the tarring without you."
CHAPTER II.
CAUGHT BY THE TIDE.
JACK ran home.
"I thought you would have been in by two o'clock, Jack," his mother said reproachfully, "so as to see Lily before she went off to school again."
"So I should have done, mother, but I had to stick at the work until we had finished up to the water-line. Uncle Ben thought it was not worth while knocking off."
Jack's meal of bread and bacon was soon finished, then he waited a little until Lily had returned from school.
"Come on, Lil," he said, "I have been waiting to take you out with me."
"Be in by six," Mrs. Robson said.
"All right, mother! We are only just going down to the shore."
Near the little coast-guard station they came upon Bill Corbett.
"Can you come to-morrow, Jack?"
"Yes; uncle has agreed to do without me. What time are you going to start?"
"We will go out as late as we can, Jack. We can get down the creek till three anyhow, so at three o'clock you be ready down here."
"Joe is going, I suppose?"
"Oh, yes, he does to carry the cockles to the boat while we scrape them out. That is a nice bawley, that new one there; she only came in this tide. That is the boat Tom Parker has had built at Brightlingsea. He expects she is going to beat the fleet. She will want to be a rare good one if she does, and I don't think Tom is the man to get the most out of her anyhow."
"I don't reckon he is," Jack agreed. "He would never have bought that boat out of his own earnings, that is certain. It is lucky for him his uncle in town died and left him four hundred pounds. He is one of the lazy ones, he is. Half the times he never goes out at all. It is either too rough, or there ain't wind enough, or he don't think it is a likely day for fish. His mother will do a sight better now that he has got a boat of his own, and she will get someone else to work hers. I should not like to work on shares with him though he has got a new boat and gear."
"Well, I must be going," Bill said. "Shall I knock at your door as I pass in the morning?"
"You will find me there as the clock strikes three, Bill; but if I ain't, you knock."
Bill Corbett, who was a lad some two years older than Jack, strolled away. Jack and Lily sat down on the sloping stage from which the coast-guardsmen launched their boats, and began to chat to the man standing with a telescope under his arm at the door of the boat-shed. Jack was very fond of talking to the coast-guardsmen. They had not, like the fishermen, spent all their lives between Gravesend and Harwich, but had sailed with big ships and been to foreign parts. One of them had been in the China War, another had fought in India with Peel's Naval Brigade, had helped batter down the palace fortresses of Lucknow, and when in the humour they had plenty of tales of stirring incident to relate.
Jack was a favourite with the coast-guardsmen, for he possessed the virtue rare in boys of being able to sit still; and as his favourite place was the slip in front of the boat-house, and he would sit there cutting out toy boats by the hour, he generally came in for a good deal of talk with the men who happened to be on duty. This afternoon, however, the men were busy burnishing up their arms and getting everything into apple-pie order, as the inspecting officer was to come on his rounds the next morning; so Jack after a time strolled along the path between the railway and the track, Lily prattling by his side and stopping to gather wild convolvulus and grasses. The sea was out now, and the mud stretched away, glistening red and brown in the sunlight. Beyond in the Ray lay a long line of bawleys, while a score or more nearer at hand lay heeled over on the mud as they had been left by the receding tide.
To a stranger the black hulks would have looked exactly like each other; but the Leigh men could tell every boat afloat or ashore, even without looking at the number painted on her bulwarks, just as a shepherd can pick out one sheep from a flock.
"It is time to go back, Lily," Jack said at last. "Mother said we were to be in at six, and it cannot be far off that now. There is the Yarmouth steamer going up. It is about her time."
"How do you know it is the Yarmouth steamer, Jack?"
"Oh, I don't know. I know her by her look. I know pretty near all of them--the Yarmouth, the Scotch, and the Dutch boats."
"They all look to me alike."
"Ah! that is because they are a long way oft, Lily. There is a lot of difference between them when you are close. We know them all, and which whistles if we are in the way, and which will give way for us, and which will come right on without minding whether they run us down or not. The colliers are the worst for that; they just go straight on, and expect you to get out of the way, and don't mind a rap about the rule of the road or anything else. I should like to see half a dozen of those captains hanged."
"I do not think it is right to say that, Jack."
"Well, I should like to see them get five dozen lashes anyhow," Jack said, "well laid on by some of our fishermen. They would give it 'em heartily, and it would do them a world of good, and save many a life afterwards. It is too bad the way those fellows go on; they don't care a bit about running down a small craft in the dark. In the first place, they know very well that they are not likely to be recognized, and so steam straight on, and leave men to drown; and in the next, if they are recognized, they are ready to swear that black is white all round, and will take their oaths you hadn't got your side-lights burning, or that you changed your course, and that they did all in their power to prevent a collision. I wish some of the people of the Board of Trade would come down the river sometimes in sailing-boats and see the way these coasters set the law at defiance, and fine them smartly. What is the use of making rules if they are never observed? Well, here we are home, and the church is just striking six, so we have hit off the time nicely."
By eight o'clock Jack was in bed, and having acquired the fisherman's habit of waking at any hour he chose, he was at the door when Bill Corbett and his brother Joe came along. The day was already breaking faintly in the east, for the month was May.
"Going to be fine, Bill?" Jack asked.
"Dunno. Wind is blowing strong from the north, though we don't feel it here."
The water was off the flats and had sunk some distance in the creek.
"It is lower than I expected," Bill said. "Come on; come on."
"Where is she, Bill?"
"Close to the foot of the steps."
The boat had already taken ground; but Bill, getting into the water with his high boots, shoved her off. The mast was stepped and sail hoisted, and she was soon running fast down the creek.
"The boats were off an hour ago, I suppose?" Jack remarked.
"Ay, more than that. Some of them turned out at half-past one. But those whose boats were down the channel didn't go for half an hour later. Father told me. I saw him before I started. He couldn't sleep with the pain in his leg."
Twenty minutes' sailing took them down to the mouth of the creek and into the wider channel. They now turned the boat's head directly off shore, and jibed the sail, and bore off for the sands stretching away from the end of Canvey Island.
"No other boats here this morning?" Jack asked as the boat ran ashore.
"No; three or four of them went down to Shoebury last night. They say there are more cockles down there than there are here now. But father said we had best come here. I suppose he thought that Joe, you, and me, made but a poor cocklers' crew. Of course, with the wind blowing off shore, it is all right anyhow; but men never think us boys can do anything. Why, I would not mind a bit starting, us three, for Harwich. I reckon these boats are just as safe as the bawleys?"
"I think so too; but they want more handling. However, I expect we could manage it."
They had now got out their implements, consisting of a shovel, a large rake, and a couple of baskets, on shore, and fastening the boat with a grapnel, went to the place where experience had taught them it was best to dig, and were soon at work. The cockles were for the most part buried some five or six inches in the sand, and were found in great numbers; the two elder boys digging and raking while Joe picked them up, and threw them into the baskets. As these were filled Bill carried them down on his shoulder to the boat, put the baskets into the water, gave them a heave or two to wash some of the sand off the cockles, and then emptied them into the boat.
It was a broad-beamed craft, of over twenty feet long, and would carry more than a ton of cockles if filled up.
The sun had long been up, the clouds were flying fast across the sky, and the wind was working round to the east, knocking up a short choppy sea as it met the ebb, and covering the river with white horses.
The boys worked away sturdily, ceasing occasionally from their labours to go down and shove the boat further off as the tide fell. At six it was dead low. They had each brought with them a bag with some bread and cheese, and a tin of cold tea, and now sat down on the gunwale of the boat for breakfast. Having finished that meal, they continued their work till nine o'clock, by which time they had got several bushels on board.
"Look there!" Joe exclaimed suddenly; "there is a big steamer has run on to the Middle Ground."
The boys had just thrown down their spade and rake, and had agreed to knock off, and they now ran across to the outside of the strip of sand, which had by this time narrowed very considerably.
"She will get off easy enough as the tide rises," Joe said; "but they won't be able to back her off now."
"No; she does not move in the least," Jack agreed. "Her screw is working hard astern now. Look how high her head is. She has run a long way up with wind and tide and steam. She must have gone on it hard."
"She had best get a couple of anchors out astern," Bill said, "before she gets broadside on."
This was evidently also the view of the captain, as two boats were lowered and anchors got into them. But it is no easy matter to row a boat with a heavy weight in it against wind and tide; and before they had got fairly away from the vessel she had already swung round a considerable distance, and was heeling over a good deal from the force of the wind and tide. It was nearly half an hour before the boats were far enough off to get the anchors over with any effect.
"They won't dare to haul on them now," Joe said. "They would only come home. Those anchors ain't heavy enough to work her stern round. I expect when a tug comes along they will get them to help, else she will keep on driving higher and higher."
"Hallo!" The exclamation came from Jack, who now happened to look round towards the boat. They had accidentally taken their stand on the highest point of the sand-bank, and in watching the steamer had forgotten all about the tide, which, under the influence of a north-east wind, had risen with great rapidity. The patch of dry sand was scarcely fifteen yards wide, and would be entirely covered in a very few minutes.
"Look, Bill, the boat has gone!"
It was true. The grapnel, a very light one, with a short length of rope, had been thrown carelessly down on the sand when they last hauled the boat up, and as the full strength of the tide had caught the boat, it had dragged a considerable distance, and was drifting away up the Ray.
"What is to be done?" Joe exclaimed.
"Do you think we could wade along to the island, Bill?" Jack asked.
Bill shook his head. "No; there are deep channels where it would be over our heads. I can't swim a stroke, no more can Joe."
"Shall I swim to the boat, Bill, and try and get her back?"
Joe shook his head. "She is in deep water now, Jack, and the grapnel ain't holding her a bit; she will drift as fast as you can swim. But of course you can try if you like, it don't make any difference to us, for you could never beat back against this wind and tide. What fools we have been, to be sure!"
"The boats will soon be coming back now," Jack said hopefully. "There are some of them this side of the Chapman now."
Bill shook his head. "It will take them three quarters of an hour to beat up, Jack."
Jack turned and looked the other way. "Here are three of them coming in from the Nore, Bill. They will not be very long before they are up."
"They will be here before the others, Jack; but I doubt if they will be in time. Water will be breast-high before they get up, and they may drop anchor down at the mouth of the Ray, and not see us. Our best chance is the shore."
He shaded his eyes and looked steadily across at Leigh. "There is a man running from the coast-guard station," he said. "There! there are two or three others running to meet him. Now they are going back together."
The boys stood looking fixedly at the station.
"Hooray!" Jack said after a minute; "there comes the boat out of the house. Do you see they are getting her down the slip; now she is in the water." Another minute passed, and then a white sail appeared. "She is heading straight off to us, Bill. With this wind she will be here in a quarter of an hour."
But the tide was already half-way up to their knees, and the waves beginning to splash against them.
"Will they be here in time, do you think, Bill?" Joe asked.
"I hope so, Joe," Bill said cheerily. "They would be in plenty of time if it were not for the force of the tide. Still, I think it is all right."
The minutes passed rapidly; higher and higher rose the water, and the waves increased fast in size. It was as much as the boys could do to stand against the sweep of the stream.
"Bill, you had better take Joe on your shoulders," Jack said. "I have read that one man can carry another across a stream that he couldn't get over alone."
"Jump up, young un," Bill said; "and you, Jack, get off your sea-boots. You stand just behind me and hold on, I feel much steadier now that I have got Joe on my shoulders. If you feel that you are going, leave go of me, you will only pull me backward holding on; and as you can swim you are all right. You have only got to keep yourself afloat, the tide will drift you up to the island in no time."
"I don't mean to go if I can help it," Jack said. "Of course I could not swim with you two, but if you would lie on your back quiet I might manage to keep you up for a bit anyhow."
The boat, heeling far over to the breeze, was dashing along at a great pace towards them. It was a question of minutes. Jack found it extremely difficult to keep his feet, the sand seemed to be scooped out from under them by the force of the tide. The wind, which was blowing in violent gusts, added to the difficulty of withstanding the force of the current and waves.
"Don't pull, Jack," Bill said, "or you will have us over."
"I can't hold on without, Bill. Which shall I do? Swim off alone, or hold on by you till we all go together?"
"Go off by yourself, Jack; the boat will be here in five minutes now. I think I can hold on until then; anyhow, it is the best chance."
They were now waist-deep; for, little by little, as the sand gave way under their feet, they had been driven backwards towards deeper water.
"There is one other thing, Bill. Do you think you can shift Joe so as to sit on one shoulder? If I get on your other it will add to your weight."
"I will try it," Bill said; "I was nearly off my feet then. Get on to my left shoulder, Joe. Now Jack, you climb up. Yes, I think that is better. I should be all right if the sand would not slide away so much from under my feet."
Several times Jack felt Bill totter and sway; he was fast being swept back into the deeper water.
"If you do go, Bill, do you and Joe throw yourselves on your backs, and I will try and hold you up. The boat will be here in no time now."
She was indeed less than a hundred yards away when Bill exclaimed, "I am going!"
"Keep on your back, Bill!" Jack shouted as he went backwards under water.
The three came up close together. Jack seized the others by the hair, and throwing himself on his back, and striking out with his legs, tried to keep them in a similar position with their faces above water. Bill lay quietly enough; but Joe struggled to raise his head, and turning, grasped Jack round the body, and in a moment the three were under water.
Jack kept his presence of mind; he knew that the boat was close at hand, and strove, not to loosen the grasp of his companions, which was impossible, but to come to the surface occasionally for an instant.
Two or three times he managed this, and obtained a breath of air before he went under again. The last time, he saw the boat close at hand, and a rope fell across his face; but he could not free his hands to grasp it, and went under immediately. His senses were leaving him, when he felt something grasp him, and then knew no more till he opened his eyes, and found himself in the bottom of the boat with his two companions.
CHAPTER III.
A RUN FROM HARWICH.
ONE of the sailors, dripping wet, knelt beside him. "That is all right, lad; you will be yourself again directly."
Jack was already sufficiently recovered to sit up some time before either Bill or Joe showed signs of life; for, unable to swim or to take advantage of their momentary intervals of coming to the surface, they had become insensible some time before he had done so himself. The sailors rubbed their chests and hands, and at last both showed signs of returning animation.
"That was a close shave, Jack," the coast-guardsman who was at the helm said. "It was lucky I made you out with my glass when I did. It was touch and go; I saw you trying to get them on their backs. If they had kept quiet you would have managed it; but drowning people never will keep quiet."
They were now running up the Ray in pursuit of the boat, which had drifted into shallower water near the end of the island, and here the grapnel had brought it up. When they got up to it, the grapnel was raised and brought into the stern of the boat, and the coast-guard boat laid her course close-hauled for Leigh, towing the other behind her.
Before they arrived at the slip the other two boys were both able to sit up. They would have taken their boat up beyond the village, but one of the fishermen said, "You go home and change; you have done quite enough for to-day. Tom and I will take the boat up for you."
"That has been a lesson to me I shall not forget," Bill said as they walked along. "You saved our lives, Jack, there is not much doubt about that."
"Oh, I expect we should all have been fished out anyhow!" Jack replied.
"No, we should not, Jack. Anyhow, not alive. I thought just at first you were going to keep us up pretty easy, and then young Joe twisted round and got hold of you, and we all went down together. But I could feel then that somehow you were keeping us up, and I tried not to catch hold of your legs."
"You did not, Bill. I was able to use them just at first, and then, somehow, Joe got hold of them. However, we all kept together, that was a good thing. If we had separated, I don't suppose they would have got us all."
Fortunately the news of the danger Jack had run had not reached his mother, for she had been engaged in the back-room washing, and Lily had gone up to school.
At the first alarm many people had run down to the shore; the officer of the coast-guard with his glass had reported what was going on, and up to the last moment it had been believed that the boat would get to them in time, and there had been a gasp of dismay as he suddenly exclaimed, "They are down! The boat is only a few lengths away," he went on; "I expect they will get them. One of the men is standing up in the bow ready to jump."
A half-minute later he exclaimed, "There he goes! There, they are hoisting them into the boat!"
"Have they got them all, sir?"
"That I can't see; but I expect they have, for you see they have lowered the sail. Yes! they must have got them all, for none of them are standing up looking about, as they would be if one was missing."
Five minutes later the sail was hoisted again. The officer watched for a minute or two, and then closed his glass.
"They are going up the Ray," he said, "I expect they are going to tow the boat in here; she is under the island. They would not trouble about that unless those they have picked up were all right, but would be making straight back again to see what could be done for them."
The little crowd, now feeling that nothing worse than a ducking had happened to those on the sand, broke up and scattered to their houses. No one had known at first what boat it was whose occupants had got into trouble, and it was not till it was half-way back that it was made out to be Corbett's.
"Why, I thought he was ill in bed?" one said.
"So he is, but I expect his boys went out with it. It was not likely there was a man on board. No one but boys would be fools enough to get caught like that, and I should have thought Bill Corbett had too much sense."
"Why, Jack, what has happened?" Mrs. Robson asked as her son entered the house.
"Nothing much, mother; but we have had a ducking. There was a steamer aground on the Middle Ground, and watching her we forgot all about the tide, and the boat drifted away and we got caught. Of course I could swim, so there was no danger for me; but it would have gone hard with the two Corbetts if the sailor at the coast-guard station had not made us out, and their boat put off and picked us up."
"Well, go and change your clothes at once, Jack; it has taken all the colour out of your face. I will get a cup of hot tea ready for you by the time you come down."
It was not until some of her neighbours came in, and talked to her about the narrow escape her son had had, that Mrs. Robson realized that Jack's life had been in considerable danger, and it was well that she had him before her enjoying his tea before she learnt the truth.
"It is no use getting into a fuss about it, mother," Jack said cheerfully; "it is not going to happen again, you know. It has been a good lesson to me to keep my eyes open; and when I go cockling again I won't lose sight of the boat, not if there were twenty vessels ashore."
A few days later Jack started with his uncle in the _Bessy_ for Harwich. For himself he liked the life there better than at Leigh. At home men could not be said to live on board their boats. They went only for short trips, taking a meal before starting, and another on their return; but doing no cooking on board. Here they were out for longer hours, and the boat was always their home. They were more independent of the tide; and unless it and the wind were both dead against them, could at all times run out to their fishing ground, ten miles away, near the Cork lightship.
The fishing was various. Soles, whiting, and haddock were the principal fish brought up in the trawls; but there was occasionally a big skate or two in the net, and these had to be handled with considerable circumspection, as they could take off a finger or two with the greatest ease with their powerful jaws and sharp teeth. These fish were always hung up in the air for a day or two before eating, as the flesh improves by keeping; the eatable portions were then cut out, and the rest was thrown overboard. These fish were for the most part eaten by the crew; the small soles, dabs, and flounders were hawked in the town, and the rest of the take sent up to London.
There was an excitement, too, in the fishing itself, apart from that connected with hauling up the trawl and examining its contents, for the sands off this coast are dangerous, and the wrecks, that have at one time or another taken place there, innumerable. Occasionally a net would catch in one of the timbers that had perhaps been lying there a hundred years or more, and then it either came up torn into fragments, or if it obtained a really firm hold, there was nothing for it but to cut the trawl-rope and lose it altogether. In fine weather, however, this step would not be taken except as a last resource. After trying in vain to get the net and trawl up the rope would be buoyed, and the next day another attempt would be made to raise the net, the boat being assisted by three or four others. The loss of a net was a serious one, as it took ten pounds or more to replace it and the trawl-beam and its belongings.
Sometimes a storm would blow up suddenly, and then the nets had to be got on board with all speed, and the topsails lowered and mainsails reefed, and the fleet of perhaps a hundred vessels would go racing back into Harwich, there to anchor just above the Guard, or under shelter of the Shotley Spit, or a short way up the Orwell, according to the direction of the wind.
The hardest part of a Leigh fisherman's life Jack had not yet encountered, for boys are seldom taken stow-boating. Stow-boating is really sprat catching, and no one can exactly explain the meaning of the term. It is carried on in winter at the edge of the sands, far down at the mouth of the river. Boats are out for many days together, frequently in terrible seas, when the boat is more under than above the water. The work of getting up the net is heavy and exhausting, and for all this hardship and labour the reward is often exceedingly slight. Sometimes the sprats are abundant, and good pay is made; sometimes, when the winter accounts are balanced up, the crew find that their share will barely suffice to pay for their keep on board, and not a farthing is left for the support of their wives and children.
Londoners who purchase sprats at an almost nominal price know but little of the hard struggle those who have caught them have to make ends meet.
After fishing for a month, Ben Tripper said one Friday evening, "We will run up to Leigh to-morrow and spend Sunday at home. I don't think we shall lose much, for the weather looks bad, and I don't think there will be any fishing to-morrow."
"I am pretty sure there won't, Ben," his mate said. "I think that it is going to blow really hard, and that we shall get wet jackets as we go up."
"We are accustomed to that," Tripper said carelessly. "Anyhow, if it comes to blow too hard for us we can make for shelter into the Crouch or Black Water."
"Oh, we are all right as to that, Ben! It is not a question of wet jackets or sea that I am thinking of, only whether we are likely to drop anchor in the Ray to-morrow night. If I were sure of that I should not mind a dusting; but I would rather lie here quiet than have a regular day's heavy knocking about, and then have to run in to Burnham after all."
"So would I," Ben assented. "If the wind comes from anywhere to the west of south it is no use thinking about it. It has been chopping and changing about to-day, and there is no saying which way it will come when it fairly makes up its mind about it; but I think from the look of the sky this evening that it is as likely to come from the north-east as not, and in that case I allow we shall make a good passage of it."
"Ay, that is right enough," Tom Hoskins assented. "They say the run from Harwich Pier to Leigh has never been done yet by a Leigh bawley under six hours, though it has been pretty close several times. We have got the springs on now, and with the wind from the north-east we should run the six hours very close, if we didn't beat it. There are two or three of them can go faster than the _Bessy_ close-hauled, but running free I doubt if there is one can touch her."
"We will make a start at seven," Ben said. "We shall take the last of the ebb down to Walton, and then catch the flood and have it at its full strength by the time we are opposite Clacton."
Jack was delighted at the thought of spending a Sunday at home with his mother; but though it was not for him to give an opinion, he agreed with Tom Hoskins that they were likely to have a dusting on the way up. The sun had gone down angry and threatening; the stars could be only seen occasionally through driving masses of cloud, and even at her snug anchorage the _Bessy_ was rolling heavily.
Jack was out soon after dawn. There was a haze over sea and sky, and the wind was blowing strongly; it was from the north-west now, but Jack thought that it was likely to draw round to the quarter his uncle had predicted. "There must be a heavy sea on now all the way from the Swin Middle to the Nore with the wind meeting a lee tide," he said to himself; "but of course when the ebb is done it will smooth down a bit, and will be all right if the weather does not come on too thick. A fog is bad enough and a gale is bad enough, but when you get the two together I would rather be at home and in bed by a long way than on board the _Bessy_."
"Well, Jack, what do you make out of the weather?" Ben Tripper asked, as he came out from the fo'castle.
"It looks rather wild, uncle; but I think the wind is working round to the north of east, just as you thought it would last night."
"Yes; I think it is," Ben said, surveying the sky. "Well, get the fire alight at once, Jack, and get breakfast ready; we will have our meal before we start. We shall have enough to do when we are once under way. I will run down to the Naze anyhow, and then we shall see what it is like outside. If we don't like its looks we can pop back anyhow; and shall have lost nothing, for there is no shooting nets to-day, that is quite certain."
The topmast was lowered, small jib and foresail got up, and two reefs put in the mainsail; then they began to get up the anchor.
"What! are you going up home, Tripper?" shouted a man from the next boat.
"Ay, ay, lad!"
"You will get your decks washed before you get to the Mouse!"
"Do them good and save us trouble!" Tripper shouted back.
"Tell the missis if you see her she may expect to see me next Saturday if the wind is right." Tripper threw up his arm to show he understood, and then lent his aid in getting up the anchor.
"Put up the helm, Jack; the anchor is free. That is enough. Keep her jib just full and no more till we have stowed all away here." When the chain was stowed below, and the anchor securely fastened, Tripper went aft and hauled in the main-sheet. "Up with the foresail, Tom. That is it. You keep the tiller, Jack." The two men now proceeded to coil down all the ropes, and get everything ship-shape and tidy. By the time they had finished, Harwich was fairly behind them, and they were laying their course a point or two outside the Naze, throwing the spray high each time the boat plunged into the short choppy sea.
"Nice place this, Jack," his uncle said. "There is always a sea on the shallows if the wind is anywhere against tide. No wonder they call it the Rolling Ground. There, I will take the helm now. You had best get the compass up; I can't make out the point sometimes through the mist."
An hour and a quarter from the time of getting up the anchor the _Bessy_ was off the point. As soon as the ugly ledge of rocks running far out under water was weathered, Tripper put down the helm.
"Haul in the sheet, Tom. That is right; now the sail is over. Slack out--slack out all it will go; the wind is nearly dead aft. Ease off the jib-sheet, Jack. That is it. Now she is walking along."
The motion was smooth and easy now. The waves were much higher than in the shelter of the bay, but they were running easily and regularly, in nearly the same line the boat was following. Coming up threateningly behind her, they lifted the stern high into the air, passing gently under her, hurrying her along as she was on the crest, and then passing on ahead and dropping her gently down into the hollow.
"I think she would stand a reef shaken out, uncle," Jack said.
"She has got quite enough on her, Jack, and is walking along at a grand pace. Always leave well alone, lad. The squalls come up very strong sometimes, and I would not carry as much sail as we have got if she were a cutter with a heavy boom. As it is, we can brail it up at any moment if need be. We sha'n't be long getting down off Clacton. Then you must keep a sharp look-out for the Spitway Buoy. It comes on very thick at times, and it is difficult to judge how far we are out. However, I think I know pretty well the direction it lies in, and can hit it to within a cable's length or so. I have found it many a time on a dark night, and am not likely to miss it now. It will take us an hour and a half or so from the time we pass Walton till we are up to the buoy."
CHAPTER IV.
THE WRECK.
"I CAN see the buoy, uncle, over there on the weatherbow."
"That is right, Jack. I am always glad when we get that buoy; it is the hardest to find of any of them. We shall have to jibe going round it. You stand by to brail the sail up when I give the word; we might carry away the gaff at the jaws if we let the sail go over all standing now." As soon as they neared the buoy Tom Hoskins got in the oar with which the mainsail was boomed out. "Now, Jack, brail up the sail as she comes round. Haul in the sheet as fast as you can, Tom, and pay it out again handsomely as it comes over. That is the way. Now fasten the sheet and throw off the main-tack and trice the sail up pretty near to the throat.
"That will do. Slack the brail off, Jack. Now haul in the sheet a bit. You had better let the foresail down, Tom; the wind is heavy, and there is too much sea on here to drive her through it too fast."
The sea would have been far heavier than it now was in another two hours' time, but the water was still very shallow on the sands, and this broke the force of the waves. The boat was now running along the narrow channel of deep water leading between the Spitway Buoy and the Bell Buoy, and almost at right angles to the course they had before been following. The wind was almost on their beam, and even under the reduced canvas the _Bessy_ was lying far over, the water covering three planks of her deck on the starboard side. They could see the buoy, and presently could hear its deep tolling as the hammers struck the bell with every motion of the buoy.
"Ah! here is another heavy rain squall coming down. I am glad we are round the Bell Buoy before it came up. Jack, you may as well put the tea-kettle on. A cup of tea will be a comfort."
All three were wrapped up in oil-skins; but in spite of this they had a general sensation of dampness, for it had been raining more or less ever since they started. Jack was below, when he heard a far louder roar of the wind than before, and heard his uncle shout, "Brail up the main as far as you can, Tom--the jib is about all we want now!"
Jack looked out from the fo'castle. The wind was blowing tremendously, sweeping the heads off the waves and driving them into sheets of spray; then great drops of rain struck the deck almost with the force of bullets, and a minute later it came down almost in bucketfuls.
"Do you want me, uncle?" he shouted. His voice did not reach Ben's ears, but he guessed what he had said and waved his hand to him to remain in the fo'castle. Jack took off his sou'-wester and shook the water from his oil-skin, and then opening the locker where the coke was kept replenished the fire. It settled down so dark when the squall struck the boat that he could scarce see across the little cabin. Regardless of the howling of the wind and the motion of the vessel, he sat on the floor putting in stick after stick to hasten up the fire. As soon as the kettle boiled he put in a handful of tea and some sugar and took the kettle off the fire, then he got a couple of large mugs and half-filled them with tea, and sat balancing them until the fluid was sufficiently cool to be drunk. Then tying on his sou'-wester again he made his way out and gave a mug to each of the others.
"Go down below again, Jack!" his uncle shouted at the top of his voice, and although Jack was within two or three feet of him, he scarcely heard him. "There is nothing to be done at present here, and it is no use looking out for the Swin Middle at present."
Jack took a look round before he went below. Away at some distance on either hand were white masses of foam where the sea was breaking on the sands. He went up to the bow and looked ahead through the darkness, then he went back to his uncle. "I caught sight of a light right over the bowsprit."
"Ah! they have lit up then," Tripper said. "I thought they would, for it is almost as dark as night. You had best get the side-lights ready and the flareup. I don't suppose we shall want them, for if we see a steamer coming down we will give her a clear berth. They won't be able to look far ahead in the face of this wind and rain." Jack went forward again and lay down on the lockers. He thought little of the storm. It was a severe one, no doubt, but with the wind nearly due aft, and a weather tide, it was nothing to the _Bessy_, whose great beam in comparison to her length enabled her to run easily before the wind, when a long narrow craft would have been burying herself.
Presently he thought he heard his uncle shout, and getting up looked aft. Tom Hoskins was now at the helm. Tripper was standing beside him, and pointing at something broad away on the beam. Jack at once made his way aft.
"What is it, uncle?"
"I saw the flash of a gun. Ah! there it is again. There is a ship ashore on the Middle Sunk." Jack gazed in the direction in which his uncle was pointing. In a minute there was another flash.
"It is all over with her," Ben Tripper said solemnly. "The strongest ship that ever was built could not hold together long on that sand with such a sea on as there will be there now."
"Cannot we do something?"
Tripper was silent for half a minute. "What do you think, Tom? We might get there through the swashway. There is plenty of water for us, and we could lay our course there. It is a risky business, you know, and we may not be able to get near her when we get there; but that we cannot tell till we see how she is fixed. Still, if we could get there before she goes to pieces we might perhaps save some of them."
"I don't mind, Ben, if you don't," the other said. "I have neither wife nor child, and if you like to take the risk, I am ready."
Ben Tripper looked at Jack. "I would not mind if it wasn't for the boy," he said.
"Don't mind me, uncle," Jack burst out. "I would not have you hang back because of me, not for anything in the world. Do try it, uncle. It would be awful to think of afterwards, when we hear of her being lost with all hands, that we might have saved some of them perhaps if we had tried."
Ben still hesitated, when another bright flash was seen. It was an appeal for aid he could not resist. "Put down the helm, Tom," he said. "Now, Jack, help me to rouse in the sheet. That will do. Now then for a pull on the jib-sheet. Now we will put the last reef in the foresail and hoist it, slack the brail and haul down the main-tack a bit. We must keep good way on her crossing the tide." Now that they were nearly close-hauled instead of running before the wind, Jack recognized much more strongly than before how heavy was the sea and how great the force of the wind. Lively as the boat was, great masses of water poured over her bow and swept aft as each wave struck her. Her lee bulwarks were completely buried.
"Give me the helm, Tom," Tripper said; "and get those hatchways up and cover the well, and lash the tarpaulin over it. It is bad enough here, it will be worse when we get into broken water near the wreck." Most of the bawleys are provided with hatches for closing the long narrow place known as the 'well,' but it is only under quite exceptional circumstances that they are ever used. Jack and the man got them up and managed to fit them in their places, but getting the tarpaulin over them was beyond their power.
"I will throw her up into the wind," Ben said. "Haul on the weather fore-sheet as I do, and belay it with the foot of the sail just to windward of the mast. Now rouse in the main-sheet. That is right."
Quitting the tiller as the boat lay-to to the wind, Ben lent his aid to the other two, and in three or four minutes the tarpaulin was securely lashed over the hatches, and the boat completely battened down.
"Now, Jack, you had best lash yourself to something or you will be swept overboard; we shall have it a lot worse than this presently. Now, Tom, before we get well away again get the last reef in the mainsail, then we can haul the tack down taut again; the sail will stand much better so, and we shall want to keep her all to windward if she is to go through the swashway."
When all was ready the fore weather-sheet was let go, and the lee-sheet hauled taut. The main-sheet was slacked off a little and the _Bessy_ proceeded on her way. It was a terrible half-hour; fortunately the dense heavy clouds had broken a little, and it was lighter than it had been, but this only rendered the danger more distinct. Once in the swashway, which is the name given to a narrow channel between the sands, the waves were less high. But on either hand they were breaking wildly, for there were still but four or five feet of water over the sands. The sea was nearly abeam now, and several times Jack almost held his breath as the waves lifted the _Bessy_ bodily to leeward and threatened to cast her into the breaking waters but a few fathoms away. But the skipper knew his boat well and humoured her through the waves, taking advantage of every squall to eat up a little to windward, but always keeping her sails full and plenty of way on her. At last they were through the swashway; and though the sea was again heavier, and the waves frequently swept over the decks, Jack gave a sigh of relief. They could make out the hull of the vessel now looming up black over the white surf that surrounded it. She had ceased firing, either from the powder being wetted or her guns disabled.
"Which way had we better get at her, Tom?" Ben Tripper asked. "She is pretty near on the top of the sand."
"The only way we have a chance of helping her is by laying-to, or anchoring on the edge of the sand to leeward of her. They may be able to drift a line down to us. I do not see any other way. Our anchors wouldn't hold to windward of her."
"No; I suppose that is the best way, Tom. We must make the best allowance we can for the wind and the set of tide, otherwise they will never drift a line down to us. She won't hold together long. Her stern is gone as far as the mizzen, so we must be quick about it."
The wreck was evidently a sailing vessel. Her masts were all gone, her bulwarks carried away, and she lay far heeled over. A group of people could be seen huddled up in the bow as they neared her. Tom Hoskins and Jack had for the last ten minutes been busy getting the spare anchor up on deck and fastening to it the wrap of the trawl-net, which was by far the strongest rope they had on board.
"What water is there on the sand, Ben?"
"Six or seven feet on the edge, but less further on. We do not draw over five feet, so we will keep on till we touch. The moment we do so let the two anchors go. Wind and tide will take her off again quick enough. Pay out ten or twelve fathoms of chain, and directly she holds up drop the lead-line overboard to see if she drags; if she does, give her some more rope and chain."
The anchors were both got overboard and in readiness to let go at a moment's notice, the instant the _Bessy_ took ground.
The foresail was lowered and the mainsail partly brailed up, so that she had only way on her sufficient to stem the tide. As they entered the broken water Jack was obliged to take a step back and hold on to the mast. Her motion had before been violent, but to a certain extent regular; now she was tossed in all directions so sharply and violently that he expected every moment that the mast would go. Tom looked round at Ben. The latter pointed to the sail and waved his hand. Tom understood him, and going to the mast loosened the brail a little to give her more sail, for the waves completely knocked the way out of her. When she forged ahead again, Tom returned to his post.
Jack held his breath every time the boat pitched, but she kept on without touching until within some eighty yards of the wreck; then as she pitched forward down a wave there was a shock that nearly threw Jack off his feet, prepared for it though he was. In a moment he steadied himself, and crept forward and cut the lashing of the hawser just as Tom severed that of the chain. The latter rattled out for a moment. There was another shock, but less violent than the first, and then the renewed rattle of the chain showed that she was drifting astern. Ben now left the tiller and sprang forward. The jib was run in by the traveller and got down, the foresail had been cast off and had run down the forestay the moment she struck, and the three now set to work to lower the mainsail.
"She is dragging," Tom said, examining the lead-line, "but not fast."
"Give her another five or six fathoms of chain," Ben said, himself attending to the veering out of the hawser.
This done they again watched the lead-line. It hung straight down by the side of the vessel.
"They have got her!" Ben said. "Now then for the ship."
For the first time since they entered the broken water they had leisure to look about them. Those on board the ship had lost no time, and had already launched a light spar with a line tied to it into the water.
"It will miss us," Ben said, after watching the spar for a minute. "You see, I allowed for wind and tide, and the wind does not affect the spar, and the tide will sweep it down thirty or forty yards on our port bow."
It turned out so. Those on board payed out the line until the spar floated abreast of the smack, but at a distance of some thirty yards away.
"What is to be done?" Ben asked. "If we were to try to get up sail again we should drift away so far to leeward we should never be able to beat back."
"Look here," Jack said; "if you signal to them to veer out some more rope I could soon do it. I could not swim across the tide now, but if it were twenty fathom further astern I could manage it."
"You could never swim in that sea, Jack."
"Well, I could try, uncle. Of course you would fasten a line round me, and if I cannot get there you will haul me in again. There cannot be any danger about that."
So saying Jack at once proceeded to throw off his oil-skins and sea-boots, while Ben went to the bow of the boat and waved to those on the wreck to slack out more line. They soon understood him, and the spar was presently floating twenty yards further astern. Jack had by this time stripped. A strong line was now fastened round his body under his arms, and going up to the bow of the boat, so as to give himself as long a distance as possible to drift, he prepared for the swim.
CHAPTER V.
THE RESCUE.
JACK was a good swimmer, but he had never swum in a sea like this.
"If I raise my arms, uncle, pull in at once. If I see I cannot reach the spar I sha'n't exhaust myself by going on, but shall come back and take a fresh start. Let me have plenty of rope."
"All right, Jack! we won't check you."
Jack took a header, and swimming hard under water came up some distance from the boat.
"He will do it," Tom shouted in Ben's ear. "He is nigh half-way between this and the rope already."
It was, however, a more difficult task than it looked. Had the water been smooth it would have been easy for Jack to swim across the tide to the spar before he was swept below it, but he found at once that it was impossible to swim fast, so buffeted and tossed was he by the sea, while he was almost smothered by the spray carried by the wind to the top of the waves. He trod water for a moment with his back to the wind, took a deep breath, and then dived again. When he came up he was delighted to see that he was as near as possible in the line of the spar, which was towing but a few yards from him. He ceased swimming, and a moment later the tide swept him down upon it.
He had before starting fastened a piece of lashing three feet long to the loop round his chest, and the moment he reached the spar he lashed this firmly round the rope, and passing one arm round the spar lifted the other above his head. In a moment he felt the strain of the rope round his chest, and this soon tightened above the water. But Jack felt that the strain of pulling not only him but the spar through the water might be too much for it, and rather than run the risk he again waved his hand, and as soon as the line slacked he fastened it to the rope from the wreck, loosened the hitches round the spar and allowed the latter to float away. He was half drowned by the time he reached the side of the bawley, for he had been dragged in the teeth of the wind and tide, and each wave had swept clean over his head.
[Illustration: THE RESCUE OF THE PASSENGERS FROM THE WRECK]
At first those on board pulled but slowly, in order to enable him to swim over the top of the waves. But the force of the spray in his face was so great that he could not breathe, and he waved to them that they must draw him in at once. As soon as they understood him they pulled in the rope with a will, and more under than above the water he was brought to the side of the smack and lifted on board, the wind bringing down the sound of a cheer from those on board the wreck as he was got out of the water. Ben undid the line round his body, carried him downstairs, wrapped a couple of blankets round him and laid him down on the lockers, and then ran upstairs to assist Tom, who had carried the line forward and was already hauling it in.
"That is right, Tom. They have got a good strong hawser on it, I see, and there is a light line coming with it to carry the slings."
As soon as the end of the hawser came on board it was fastened to the mast. The line by which it had been hauled in was unfastened and tied to that looped round the hawser, and payed out as those on the deck hauled on it. A minute later two sailors got over the bulwarks, and a woman was lifted over to them and placed in the strong sling beneath the hawser. A lashing was put round her, and then they waved their hands and the fishermen hauled on the line. In two minutes the woman was on the deck of the smack; the lashing was unfastened and knotted on to the sling ready for the next passenger, then at Ben's signal that all was ready those on board the wreck hauled the sling back again.
Jack remained between the blankets for a minute or two. He had not lost consciousness; and as soon as his breath came he jumped up, gave himself a rub with the blanket, slipped into some dry clothes, and was on deck just as the woman arrived. She was all but insensible, and directly the sling had started on its return journey Ben carried her on into the fo'castle.
"Jack! set to work and make a lot of cocoa. There are no spirits on board; but cocoa is better, after all. Put the other kettle on and chuck plenty of wood upon the fire, and as soon as the one that is boiling now is empty, fill that up again. I should say there are twenty or thirty of them, and a pint apiece will not be too much. Take a drink yourself, lad, as soon as you have made it. You want it as much as they do."
Fast the shipwrecked people came along the line. There was not a moment to lose, for the wreck was breaking up fast, and every sea brought floating timbers past the bawley.
"It is a good job now, Tom, that we anchored where we did, instead of in the direct line of the tide, for one of those timbers would stave a hole in her bow as if she were a bandbox."
"Aye, that it would, Ben. I thought we had made rather a mess of it at first; but it is well that, as you say, we ain't in the line of the drift."
Nineteen persons were brought on board--the captain being the last to come along the line. The first four were women, or rather, the first two were women; the third a girl of ten years old, and the fourth a woman. Then came a middle-aged man, evidently a passenger. Then came ten sailors, a steward, two mates, and the captain.
"Is that all?" Ben asked as the captain stepped from the slings.
"I am the last," the captain said. "Thank God all are saved who were left on board when you came in sight. We all owe our lives to you and your men. I had little hope that one of us would live to see the night when we made you out coming towards us. But there is no time to talk. The ship cannot hold together many minutes longer, and when she breaks up in earnest some of the timbers will be sure to come this way."
"I have got the buoy with a length of rope on the chain ready to slip," Ben said, "and a spar lashed to the hawser. Now, Tom, let the chain out; I will jump below and knock out the shackle. Now, captain, if one or two of your men will lend us a hand to get up some canvas, we shall be out of it all the sooner. And please get them all except the women out of the cabin, and put them aft. We want her head well up for running before this sea."
"Now, lads, tumble out and lend a hand," the captain said. "I see you have got some cocoa here. Well, all who have had a mug come out at once, and let the others get aft as soon as they have had their share. The ladies are all right, I hope?"
"Quite right, captain," one of the men answered, "and begin to feel warm already; which is natural enough, for this cabin is like an oven after the deck of the _Petrel_."
"Now, skipper, do you give the orders," the captain said as Ben took the tiller.
"Run up the foresail and haul in the starboard-sheet. That will bring her head round."
"Now let go the cable and hawser." There was a sharp rattle of chains, and the cry "All free!"
"Slack off that weather-sheet and haul down on the lee-sheet," was Tripper's next order. "Not too much. Have you got the jib hooked on to the traveller? Out with it, then. Now, up with her. Now man the throat and peak halliards. Up with her. Slack out the main-sheet well, and boom the sail out with an oar. Trice the main-tack up as far as it will go."
The _Bessy_ was now running almost before the wind. Every moment the great waves loomed up high behind her stern, and looked as if they would dash down upon her deck, but she slipped easily away. The clouds had broken up much now, but the wind had in no way abated. A gleam or two of sunlight made its way through the rifts of the clouds, and threw light green patches upon the gray and angry sea.
"She is a splendid sea-boat this of yours," the captain said. "I would hardly have believed such a small craft would have made such good weather in such a sea."
"There are few boats will beat a bawley," Ben said. "Well handled, they will live through pretty near anything."
"I can quite believe that. Which of you was it who sprang overboard to get our line?"
"It was not either of us," Ben said. "Neither Tom nor I can swim a stroke. It was my nephew Jack--that lad who has just come out of the fo'castle."
"It was a gallant action," the captain said. "I should have thought it well-nigh impossible to swim in such broken water. I was astonished when I saw him leap overboard."
"He saw that the spar had drifted with the tide to windward of you and there was no other way of getting at it."
"I was in hopes of seeing you throw the lead-line over our line. You might have hauled it in that way."
"So we might," Ben agreed, "if we had thought of it, though I doubt whether we could have cast it so far. Still we ought to have tried. That was a stupid trick, to be sure. I allow I should have thought of it any other time; but we had had such a dusting in getting up to you that our brains must have gone wool-gathering."
"One cannot think of everything," the captain said. "You had your hands full as it was. Is there anything else I can do at present? If not, I will just go below for a minute and see how my wife and the passengers are getting on, and have a cup of that cocoa, if there is any left."
They were now in the Knob Channel, and the sea, although still heavy, was more regular. As they passed the Mouse Light-ship there were several large steamers at anchor there, but it was now a straight run down to the Nore and they held on.
Ben Tripper had already asked the captain where he would like to be landed. "I can put you either into Sheerness, Southend, or Leigh," he said. "Tide is high now, and you can land at any of them without difficulty. But you would get more quickly up to town from Southend or Leigh; and I should recommend our side, because tide will be running out from the Medway pretty strong before we get there, and when that is the case there is a nasty sea at the mouth."
"I think we cannot do better than Leigh," the captain said. "Of course I am anxious to get on shore as soon as I can to get the women into dry clothes."
"It will not make more than twenty minutes' difference whether you land at Leigh or Southend; and it is much handier for landing at Leigh, and no distance to the inn, where they can get between blankets while their things are being dried."
"Then Leigh let it be. A few minutes will make no difference one way or the other, and if they have not caught cold already they will not do so in that warm cabin."
The wind was blowing far too strongly to admit of conversation, except in shouted sentences. Fortunately there was a good supply of tobacco on board, and the rescued sailors, who had almost all a pipe in their pockets, had, after the smack was once clear of the broken water, enjoyed the consolation of a smoke.
Accustomed to look down on the water from the high deck of a large ship, they had at first felt some doubt as to the ability of the low bawley to struggle safely through the towering waves; but as soon as they saw how well she behaved, and how little water she took over the sides, they felt that all danger was over, and became disposed to look at things more cheerfully.
The steward had, as soon as he came on board, relieved Jack of his duties at the galley, and had kept the kettles going; he now served out a second supply of cocoa all round, and hung up as many of the ladies' things as they could dispense with round the fire to dry.
The passenger had remained below with the ladies. He was suffering from a broken leg, having been knocked down and swept along by the sea soon after the vessel struck. Six of the sailors and two of the mates had either been washed overboard or crushed to death when the masts went over the side.
As they passed the Nore a perfect fleet of steamers and sailing-vessels were at anchor there. Tide had turned strongly now, and there was a nasty heavy choppy sea until the _Bessy_ passed the end of Southend Pier, when she entered comparatively smooth water. In less than half an hour the sails were lowered, and she anchored some fifty yards from the coast-guard station.
The look-out there had already observed the number of people on her deck, and had guessed at once that she had taken the crew off a wreck of some kind, and as soon as the anchor was dropped their boat came alongside.
The captain had as they neared the shore asked Tripper about inns, and at once sent the crew ashore in charge of the mate, with orders to go to the "Bell," and to see that they had everything they required, saying that he would himself, as soon as the ladies were on shore, go to one of the shops and order a supply of clothes to be sent up for them.
The ladies were next taken ashore, and then the injured man carried up and placed in a boat, a stretcher being sent off for him to be laid on. A messenger had been already sent up to the doctor on the top of the hill to come down to the Ship Inn, where the party now went. The ladies had become so thoroughly warmed by the heat in the little cabin that they declined to go to bed, and having been supplied with dry garments by the landlady, they were soon comfortable.
The surgeon on his arrival pronounced the fracture of the passenger's leg, which was a few inches above the ankle, to be a simple one, and not likely to be attended with any serious consequences whatever. After setting it he bandaged it in splints, and said that although he should recommend a few days' perfect quiet, there was no actual reason why the patient should not be taken up to London if he particularly wished it.
Ben Tripper had gone with the captain, and a pile of flannel shirts, stockings, guernseys, trousers, and shoes had at once been sent up to the "Bell." Furious as was the gale, it was possible to speak so as to be heard in the street of Leigh, and Ben now learned for the first time some particulars about the wreck.
"The _Petrel_ was a seven hundred ton ship," the captain said, "and on her way home from Australia. She belongs to James Godstone & Son. There is no James Godstone now. The son is the passenger you saved; he is the owner of a dozen vessels all about the same size as the _Petrel_. His wife and daughter are two of the ladies saved. They went out with us to Australia. The girl was not strong, and had been recommended a sea voyage.
"I had been married when I was at home last time, and was taking my wife out with me; so Mr. Godstone arranged that his wife and daughter should go with me. We carried no other passengers; the other woman saved is the stewardess. Mr. Godstone himself did not go out with us, but went across by Suez and joined us there for the homeward voyage. We made a fine run home; and took our pilot on board off Deal. The gale was blowing up then; but as it looked as if it was coming from the north-east we did not care about riding it out in the Downs, or going back so as to be under shelter of the South Foreland.
"It did not come on really heavy till we were nearly off Margate, and then we got it with a vengeance. Still, as the wind was free, we kept on. Then, as you know, it came on almost pitch dark, and I think the pilot lost his head. Anyhow, as he was one of those who were drowned, we need not say whether he was to blame or not. I thought we were getting too close to the broken water, and told him so, but he said we were all right. He didn't make allowance enough, I think, for the leeway she was making, and a minute later she struck, and you can guess the rest. Her back broke in a few minutes, and her mizzen went over the side, carrying with it the pilot, my first mate, and six sailors.
"She soon after began to break up at the stern. I cut away the other two masts to relieve her, but the sea made a clear breach over her. I got the ladies and Mr. Godstone, who had been on deck when she struck and got his leg broken by the first sea which pooped her, forward as soon as I could, and managed to fire one of her guns three times. I had no hope of rescue coming from shore, but there was a chance of some ship coming up helping us; though how she was to do it I could not see. However, nothing came near until I saw your sail. I expect that any steamers coming up from the south brought up under the Foreland, while those from the north would of course take the Swin. Anyhow, it would have been all over with us had you not come to our rescue. Even when I saw you making over towards us I had not much hope, for I did not see how you could get close enough to us to aid us, and I was quite sure that no open boat could have lived in that broken water."
CHAPTER VI.
ALTERED PROSPECTS.
AS soon as the shipwrecked crew were on shore, Jack Robson landed and made his way homeward. At the railway-crossing he met his mother hurrying down, for the news that the _Bessy_ had arrived with a number of shipwrecked people had spread rapidly through the place.
"Well, Jack, so I hear the _Bessy_ has been helping a wreck. I had no idea that you would be home to-day. What in the world induced your uncle to make the run in such weather as this?"
"It was nothing like so bad when we started, mother, and as we had both wind and tide with us there was nothing to fear for the _Bessy_. We are accustomed to wet jackets, and should have got nothing worse if it had not been for our hearing guns and making for the wreck. Then we certainly had a tremendous sea, the heaviest I have ever been out in. However, we were under storm-sails and did very well. It was nasty work when we anchored in broken water near the wreck, and she jumped about so I thought the mast would have gone. However, everything held, and we managed to save nineteen people from the wreck. That is a pleasant thought, mother, and I would go through it again twenty times to do it." By this time they had reached the door of the house.
"There, run upstairs and change, Jack. I will get you some tea ready by the time you come down."
"I have had some hot cocoa, mother, and am as right as possible. Still, I shall not object to a cup of tea and something to eat with it. We had breakfast before we started at eight, and it is seven now. We thought when we hoisted sail we should be down here under the six hours, but of course going off to the wreck made all the difference. And, anyhow, we could not have driven her fast in such a sea."
By the time Jack had had his tea a comfortable glow had come over him. Now that it was all over he felt bruised and stiff from the buffeting he had gone through, and after half an hour's chat with his mother and sister, in which he told them more fully the events of the wreck, he turned into bed and slept soundly till the morning. Captain Murchison, for that was his name, came round half an hour after Jack had gone up to bed to ask him to go round to the inn, as the ladies wished to see him and thank him for his share in rescuing them, but on hearing that he had gone up to bed asked his mother to request him to come round in the morning at ten o'clock.
"You have reason to be proud of your son, Mrs. Robson," he said. "His leaping over in such a sea as that to get hold of the line from our ship was a most gallant action."
"He told me the line was tied round him, sir, so that there was no danger in it at all."
"There is always danger in such a business as that, Mrs. Robson. The force of the waves in shallow water is tremendous, and will beat a man to death if they do not drown him. Then there is the difficulty of his getting on board again when a vessel is rolling and pitching so tremendously, and the danger of his being struck by a piece of drift-wood from the wreck. I can assure you that it was a very grand action, whatever your son may have told you about it."
The next morning the gale was still blowing fiercely, although with less strength than on the previous day. Jack had heard from his mother of his appointment to go to the "Ship" with much discontent, and had at first positively refused to go.
"I hate going up to see strange people, mother, anyhow; and I am sure that I do not want to be thanked. I am glad enough to have had a share in saving all their lives, but of course it was all Uncle Ben and Tom's handling the boat that did it; I had nothing to do with it whatever, except that little swim with the rope tied safely round me. Why, it was nothing to that affair that I had with Bill and Joe Corbett."
"But you must go, Jack; the ladies naturally wish to thank you for what you did for them, and whether you like it or not you must go. It would be very rude and uncivil not to do so. They would be sure to send round here if you did not come, and what should I say except that you were so unmannerly that you would not go."
Jack twisted himself on his chair uncomfortably.
"I don't see why they shouldn't thank Uncle Ben for the lot and have done with it," he grumbled. "It is his boat and he was the skipper, and he did it all; besides, I expect the _Bessy_ will have to be overhauled before she goes out again. She came down with a tremendous crash on her forefoot, and the water was just coming up through the boards in the fo'castle when we came in. Of course it may have come in from above, but I expect she sprang a leak somewhere forward. I thought she was very low in the water when she came in, and I expect that she must have been half full aft, for she was very much down by the stern.
"We had the pump going all the time, and it was always clear water. I did not think of it at the time. We had had such a lot of water over us it was likely it might have got in through the hatches; but I feel sure now that it was a leak. Well, I suppose if I must go, I must, mother; but I hate it for all that."
However, just before Jack was about to start there was a knock at the door, and Mrs. Robson opening it saw two ladies and a girl. Immediately on their arrival the evening before, Mrs. Godstone had telegraphed home for a servant to come down in the morning by the first train, with clothes for herself and daughter, and she had arrived with them an hour before. Mrs. Godstone had therefore been enabled to resume her usual attire, and to lend an outfit to Mrs. Murchison. Jack did not in the least recognize in the three ladies the soaked and draggled women, of whose faces he had caught but a slight glimpse on the previous day.
"We have come round, Mrs. Robson," Mrs. Godstone began, "to thank your son for his share in saving our lives yesterday. We thought that it would be more pleasant to him than coming round to us at the inn."
"Thank you, madam," Mrs. Robson replied. "It was kind of you to think of it. I have had a good deal of trouble in persuading Jack to go round. He was just starting; but it was very much against the grain, I can assure you. Come in, please."
Mrs. Godstone was surprised at the tone in which this fisher lad's mother spoke, for during her thirteen years of married life Bessy Robson had lost the Essex dialect, and acquired the manners of her husband's friends. She was still more surprised at the pretty furniture of the room, which was tastefully decorated, and the walls hung with pictures of marine subjects, for Bessy had brought down bodily her belongings from Dulwich. Mrs. Godstone at once walked up to Jack with outstretched hand.
"I hope you are none the worse for your exertions of yesterday," she said. "My daughter and I have come round to thank you for the very great service you rendered us."
Mrs. Murchison and Mildred Godstone also shook hands with Jack. The former added her thanks to Mrs. Godstone's.
Jack coloured up hotly and said, "It is my uncle you have to thank, ma'am. It was his bawley, and he and Tom sailed it, and I had nothing to do with it one way or the other."
"Except when you swam out for the line," Mrs. Godstone said smiling.
"I had one tied round me, and was all right," Jack protested.
"My husband does not think it was nothing, as you seem to consider," Mrs. Murchison said; "and as he has been a sailor all his life he ought to know. He says that it was a very gallant action in such a sea as that, and, you see, we are bound to believe him."
The ladies had now taken seats. Mrs. Godstone felt a little at a loss. Had Jack's home and Jack's mother been what they had expected to find them the matter would have been simple enough, but she felt at once that any talk of reward for the service Jack had rendered them would be at present impossible.
"What a pretty room you have got, Mrs. Robson, and what charming pictures!"
"They are my husband's painting," Mrs. Robson said quietly. "He was an artist."
"Oh! I know the name," Mrs. Godstone said. "I have four of Mr. Robson's pictures in my drawing-room. I am very fond of marine subjects."
This served as an introduction, and for half an hour the conversation proceeded briskly. Then Mrs. Godstone rose.
"My husband's leg is very painful this morning," she said, "and I fear that he will have to keep his bed for the next two or three days. When he is well enough to lie down on the sofa I will come down and fetch your son, for Mr. Godstone is of course anxious to see him, and I am afraid that if I do not come round myself we shall not get Jack to the inn."
"Well, that was not so very bad, was it, Jack?" Mrs. Robson asked after her visitors had left.
"No, mother, it wasn't. You see, it was ever so much better their coming here than it would have been if I had gone to the inn, because there was you for them to talk to, so that really there was not much said to me. If it had been at the inn there would have been nothing to talk about at all, except about the wreck. Well, now that is over I will go down and see how the bawley is; but I had best change my things first. Uncle was going to get her up as high as he could at the top of the tide, so as to be able to look at her keel."
Jack found that his uncle and Tom had turned out at three o'clock in the morning, and had got the _Bessy_ as high up as possible on the sloping shore, just beyond the houses. They were standing beside her now, while Benting, the local boat-builder, was examining her bottom.
"Well, Jack, you have taken it out in sleep this morning," his uncle said.
"That I have, uncle. I never woke until eight o'clock, so I had just twelve hours' sleep."
"Nothing like a good sleep, Jack, when you have had a hard day's work; and yesterday was enough to take it out of anyone."
"Is she damaged at all?" Jack asked.
"Yes, her forefoot is sprung just where it joins the keel; she came down just on the joint."
"That will be a rather nasty job to get right, won't it?"
"Yes, Jack, Benting says she must have a new stem altogether. He does not think the keel is damaged, but the stem is cracked right through."
"That will cost a lot, won't it?" Jack said.
"Yes, it is a nasty job, Jack; because, of course, she will want a lot of fresh planks in her. In fact, she will want pretty well rebuilding forward of the mast."
"It will cost about twenty pounds to make a good job of it," Benting said as he joined them. "I shouldn't like to take the job for less, not on contract. If I did day-work it might come to a little less or a little more, I cannot say."
Jack looked anxiously up into his uncle's face, for he knew that twenty pounds was a serious matter.
"It won't be at my expense, Jack," Ben replied to his look. "Captain Murchison came down at seven o'clock this morning and had a look at her with me. I told him yesterday that I was afraid she had damaged herself on the sand, as she had made a lot of water on her way up. He said that I was to have her examined at once and get an estimate for repairing her thoroughly, and that he would undertake it should be paid. He asked what her age was. Of course I told him she was only four years old, and that I had only finished paying off the money I borrowed when I had her built, last year. He said that as she was only four years old she was worth spending the money on; but if she had been an old boat, it would not have been worth while throwing money away on her. But Benting says he can make her as good as new again."
"Every bit," the carpenter said. "She will be just as strong as she was on the day she was turned out."
"How long will you be about it?"
"I would get her done in three weeks. I will go over to Southend by the twelve o'clock train and order the timber, and you can arrange this evening whether you will have her done by contract or day-work."
Captain Murchison that evening when he returned from town, where he had gone up to report to Lloyd's the loss of the ship, had a talk with Benting, and being assured by him that the _Bessy_ would after the execution of the repairs be in all respects as stout a craft as before, arranged with him to do it for the sum he named, and to set to work immediately.
Three days later Mr. Godstone was able to be brought out on to the sofa in the sitting-room. Captain and Mrs. Murchison had gone home two days before, but the former came down again to Leigh on the morning Mr. Godstone got up. After a talk together Captain Murchison went out and fetched Ben Tripper in, and Mr. Godstone presented him with a cheque for a hundred pounds for himself and fifty for Tom Hoskins.
"We owe you our lives," he said, "and we shall never forget the service you have rendered us. Captain Murchison tells me that your boat will be as good as before after she is repaired; but if she should not be so, sell her at once for what you can get for her and order a new one, I will pay the difference. In any case I consider I owe you a boat. Whether it is five years hence or ten or fifteen, if I am alive and you want another boat I give you authority to order one of the best that can be built, and to tell them to send the bill in to me. I have not given you anything for your nephew, for I have been talking to my wife, and maybe we can serve him better in some other way."
Mrs. Godstone had indeed been in for a chat each day with Jack's mother, and had told her husband that she felt sure neither Mrs. Robson nor Jack would like an offer of money.
"The lad is very intelligent," she said, "and he and his mother are of quite a different class to the fisher people here. His father was a gentleman, and she has the manners of a lady. I should like for us to do the boy some permanent good, William."
"Well, we will see about it, my dear," her husband had said. "As soon as I am well enough to talk to him I will find out what his own wishes in the matter are."
Jack was therefore sent for after his uncle had left the inn.
"Well, my lad," Mr. Godstone said as he entered, "I am glad to see you at last and to thank you for what you did for us the other day. My wife tells me that you do not like being thanked, and as deeds are better than words we won't say much more about it. So I hear you have only been living here about two years?"
"That is all, sir; we lived at Dulwich before."
"So I hear. And your father was an artist? Have you any taste that way?"
Jack shook his head. "No, sir; I never thought of being an artist. I always wanted to go to sea."
"To go to sea--eh?" Mr. Godstone repeated, "Well, then, you have got your wish."
"Oh, I do not call this going to sea," Jack said contemptuously. "I mean, I wanted to be a sailor--not a fisherman."
"And why didn't you go then, lad?"
"Well, sir, in the first place mother did not know anyone who had to do with ships; and then her friends were all here, and she knew the place and its ways, and she thought that by buying a bawley, as she has done, in time I should come to sail her and earn my living as my uncle does. And then I don't think she would ever have agreed to my going to sea right away from her; but I do not know about that."
"Well, lad, you see the case is changed now. I have to do with ships, and Captain Murchison here commands one. At least he doesn't at the present moment, but he will do so as soon as I can buy another to supply the place of the _Petrel_. And as he saw one yesterday that he thinks highly of, I shall probably buy her as soon as she has been surveyed. So you see that difficulty is at an end. As to your mother, no doubt she would have objected to your going as a ship's-boy, but perhaps she wouldn't if you were going as an apprentice. We call them midshipmen on board our ships; I like the name better than apprentice, though the thing is about the same. Captain Murchison will, I am sure, be glad to have you with him, and will do his best to make a good sailor of you. And you may be sure that I shall push you on if you deserve it as fast as possible; and it may be that in another ten years you will be in command of one of my ships. Well, what do you say to that?"
"Oh! thank you, sir," Jack exclaimed. "I should like that better than anything in the world, if mother will let me."
"I don't think that your mother will stand in the way of your good," Mr. Godstone said. "And she must see that the prospect is a far better one than any you can have here; for after all, the profits of a bawley are not large, and the life is an infinitely harder one than that of a sailor. You had better not say anything to your mother about it until my wife has had a chat with her."
CHAPTER VII.
ON BOARD THE "WILD WAVE."
MRS. GODSTONE found no difficulty whatever in persuading Jack's mother to allow him to take advantage of her husband's offer. Mrs. Robson had at her husband's death decided at once that, with the small sum of money at her disposal, the only method she could see of making ends meet was to go down to Leigh and invest it in a bawley. She had never told Jack that she had even thought of allowing him to carry out his wish to go to sea; but she had thought it over, and had only decided on making a fisherman of him after much deliberation. The desire to keep him with her had of course weighed with her, but this was a secondary consideration. She had so decided, because it was evident that had he gone to sea it must have been as a ship's-boy. In such a rough life he would have had no time whatever to continue his studies, and would speedily have forgotten most that he had learned, and he might have remained many years before the mast before he could pass as a third mate. She thought therefore that he would do better by remaining at Leigh and becoming in time master of a bawley.
In the two years that had passed she had come to have doubts as to whether she had decided wisely. The profits of fishing were exceedingly small, and the prospects were but poor. She knew well that her husband had hoped that his son would follow some line that would maintain him in his own rank of life, and she fretted at the thought that Jack would settle down for life as a Leigh fisherman, and that Lily would probably in time become a fisherman's wife. When therefore Mrs. Godstone told her that her husband was ready to place Jack on board one of his ships as midshipman, and that he would take care he had every chance of making his way up, Mrs. Robson thankfully accepted the offer.
"The boy has always wished for a life at sea," she said; "and I am thankful indeed that he should have such a chance of getting on. I am most grateful to Mr. Godstone for his offer, and most gladly accept it."
"It is the least my husband can do, Mrs. Robson, considering the share your son took in saving his life. But you must not consider that this discharges the debt that I owe for myself and Mildred. That is another matter altogether. Now, in the first place, I am sure you must wish sometimes that your little girl could have an education of a different kind to that which she can obtain here. Now, I should like to send her to a good school where she would be well educated. We need not look farther forward than that at present. She is only ten years old now, and in another seven or eight her brother may be a second mate, and, with the prospect of becoming a captain in another three or four, would like his sister to be educated as a lady."
"You are very kind, Mrs. Godstone," Mrs. Robson said with tears in her eyes. "But in the first place, I don't think I could bring myself to part with her, and in the second, I do not like to take advantage of your kindness."
"The second reason is absurd," Mrs. Godstone said decidedly. "Suppose instead of saving all our lives your son had helped to get out anchors and had got the ship off, he would have had his share of the salvage, which might have come to many hundreds of pounds; and it is nonsense because he saved lives instead of goods there should be no reward for the service. As to your first reason, I can quite enter into it; and I know that I should not have liked to be parted from Mildred. Therefore I do not propose to send her away from you, but to do it in another way. To send your girl to a really good school will not cost less than a hundred a year, and that sum I shall be very glad to pay until she is of an age to leave school.
"Now, I understand that your principal reason in coming to Leigh was that your son should in time be able to sail your boat. That reason does not exist any longer, and you might therefore be as well anywhere else as here. Your brother can look after your interests in your boat, and you will get the same share of its profits as if you were living here. I think for your son's sake as well as your daughter's, it would be pleasanter and better that you were away from here.
"Now I am going to pay a hundred a year for your girl to be educated, but it makes no difference to me how that hundred is spent, providing she gets the education. It seems to me, therefore, that it would be better if you were to move again, say to Dulwich, where no doubt you have still friends, having lived there for so long. Then you could send her as a day-boarder in a good school for some thirty or forty pounds a year. You could still keep her with you, and have a nice home for Jack whenever he comes back from sea.
"Well, think this over. It seems to me and to Mr. Godstone to be by far the best plan for all parties. And it will be much the most pleasant to us; as I should then hope to see you often, and to see for myself how your child is getting on. Do not give an answer to me now: it will be another week before my husband can be moved up to town, so there will be plenty of time for you to look at it in all lights before you decide. I know that it will be a sacrifice for you to leave Leigh where you have so many relations and friends; but I am sure this will not weigh with you as against the interest of your children."
So saying the ship-owner's wife shook hands with Mrs. Robson and at once went out. Half-way down the street she met Jack.
"It is all settled, Jack," she said, in answer to his look. "Your mother has agreed to your going."
"Has she?" Jack exclaimed in delight. "Hurrah! Thank you so much, ma'am," and throwing his cap in the air he caught it again, and then started home at a run at the top of his speed. Bursting in at the door he was sobered instantly by seeing his mother in tears.
"My dear mother!" he exclaimed, "don't cry over it. Of course I should like to go to sea and always wanted it, still I would not think of doing it if it makes you unhappy. Although you did tell Mrs. Godstone that you consented, I will go off at once and tell them that I have changed my mind, and that on thinking it over I have concluded to stay here with you."
"No, no, Jack," his mother said, as he turned to carry his offer into effect. "It is not that at all. I am quite willing that you should go, my boy. Of course I shall miss you; but other women have to see their sons go to sea or abroad, and I shall be no worse off than they are. I am very pleased, indeed, that you should have the life you wish for open to you. There is now a far better prospect of your getting on and doing well than there was when your father consented that you should go to sea some day. I am not crying about that at all, Jack, but from pleasure, with perhaps a little pain in it, at the kind offer Mrs. Godstone has just made me with regard to Lily and myself."
And she then told Jack the proposal that had been made to her.
"And are you going to accept it, mother? Oh, I do hope you will. I have never cared for myself, but I have sometimes been so sorry when I thought that Lily would grow up so different from what my father would have wished her."
"And so have I, Jack. Boys are boys, and can to some extent make themselves what they like. Poor men's sons can, if they are steady and industrious and clever, rise in the world; rich men's sons can come down to beggary. But it is different with girls. And it always has been a great grief to me too when I have thought of Lily's future. For myself, I do not like taking the money--that you can well believe,--but for her sake I should be very wrong to refuse the offer. I shall be sorry to leave Leigh; and yet, you see, after living for thirteen years such a different life, I do not see things as I did when I was a girl, and have blamed myself often because I have felt the difference. But I have felt it, and therefore the idea of going back to Dulwich again is not so painful to me as I think it ought to be."
"Of course it is quite natural, mother," Jack said; "and it would be curious if you did not feel so after living there so long and mixing with people so different in their ways. And won't it be splendid having a nice little home like that to come back to, and Lily being educated as a lady, and I making my way on. It will be grand, mother!"
"I shall have a talk with my father and Ben," Mrs. Robson said. "My own mind is quite made up; still I should like to speak to them before I see Mrs. Godstone again."
Tripper senior and Ben quite agreed with Mrs. Robson that she ought to accept the offer.
"We shall be always glad to see you down here, Bessy, you know, whenever you like to come; but it is certainly best for you and the young ones for you to accept the offer. It is a grand thing for Lily; and though we shall be very sorry to lose you, it would be awfully foolish to say no to such a proposal as that."
At heart, perhaps Tripper senior and his son were not altogether so very sorry that Bessy should go to London. They felt that she was now not one of themselves; and Tripper senior, who was much more fond of his glass than was good for him, felt her presence in Leigh as a sort of restraint upon himself, and had often informed Ben confidentially that Bessy had grown altogether too nice for him. When, therefore, Mrs. Godstone called again at the end of the week, Bessy thankfully accepted her offer, and it was settled that she should move up to London as soon as she could find a house. She would, she knew, have no difficulty in obtaining a tenant for her present residence; for houses were scarce at Leigh, and one so conveniently situated would find many eager for it as soon as it was generally known that it was to let.
Accordingly, two days after Mr. Godstone and his wife had left Leigh, Mrs. Robson went up to town with Jack, and going down to Dulwich had no difficulty in finding a little cottage that would suit them well, and to this a fortnight later they moved up with their belongings. The very day after they moved in, Jack received a letter from Captain Murchison telling him to come down on the following morning to St. Katharine Docks, as the _Wild Wave_ had now been purchased by Mr. Godstone, and would at once be fitted out for sea.
At eight o'clock next morning Jack found himself alongside the _Wild Wave_, a fine barque-rigged ship of about eight hundred and fifty tons. A number of riggers were at work on board, and Captain Murchison was on the poop talking to an officer, whom Jack at once guessed to be the first mate.
"That's right, Jack," the captain said as the lad mounted to the poop; "nothing like getting into harness in good time. We only took possession of the barque yesterday, and have put the hands to work this morning. I thought you had better come to work at once, because there is nothing like learning things from the beginning; and if you keep your eyes open you will learn as much as to the way things should be done as you would do in six months afloat. Mr. Timmins, this is Jack Robson, who sails with us as a midshipman. He is the lad I told you of who aided in saving all our lives on board the _Petrel_. If it had not been for him and the two men with him the house of Godstone & Son would have lost its head. As the owner as well as myself owe so much to him, I am sure you will do all you can to help him to learn his work. He is not like a new hand altogether, having already had two years' experience in a fore-and-aft craft. Of course the work is very different here; still it is a capital apprenticeship, and men who can manage a bawley in such a sea as was on when the _Petrel_ was wrecked are fine sailors, and would soon be at home on any craft that ever floated."
"I will do the best I can for him, Captain Murchison, and will make a sailor out of him--never fear. There is nothing for you to do on board yet, my boy, except to keep your eyes open. Watch all that is going on. This is a rigger's job; but it is well to learn how everything is done, because you may be called upon to do it any moment. Do not be afraid of asking me questions about anything you do not understand, and do not mind if I answer you sharp if I happen to be busy when you ask me--that is my way; and I daresay the riggers, when they see that you really want to learn, will be willing enough to give you a hint or two."
"I am going ashore with him now for a couple of hours, Mr. Timmins. After that he will be at your disposal."
Jack followed the captain across the gangway on to the wharf. "I am going with you to order your outfit," the captain said. "I had intended to have done it on my own account, but Mr. Godstone would not hear of it; so I must obey orders. Your own things will do well enough until we get the riggers out of the ship and the painting done. Till then Mr. Timmins will be the only officer on board; the others will not join till she begins to take in her cargo. The second and third mates of the Petrel will sail with me again, and so will all the men who were rescued. Naturally they like a run ashore as long as they can; and there is nothing for them to do till the ship is out of the painter's hands."
Captain Murchison took Jack to an outfitter's in Fenchurch Street, and ordered him a complete midshipman's outfit. Then Jack went back to the docks, and for the rest of the day watched the operations of the riggers. With many of the processes he was already familiar, but he observed several differences in the methods pursued on board a large ship. As soon as he had come on board he had asked the first mate if there was any objection to his lending a hand if the riggers would allow him.
"None at all, my lad. An officer ought to be able to show his men how to do everything, and he can never do that if he is afraid of dirtying his hands. Of course you do know a good deal already about the serving and parcelling of ropes and stays, but likely enough they are done in a different fashion here to what they are on board a smack. I will speak to the head-rigger myself, and tell him you want to learn your business, and are ready to do anything that he likes to set you to; and as you have been already two years at the work he will not find you a lubber."
The rigger at once placed Jack at work with one of the gangs, and he worked steadily until four bells sounded, and the men knocked off.
"You need not get here till eight in the morning," Mr. Timmins said to him as he was about to leave. "The captain said you were living at Dulwich, and that it would take you an hour to get here; so as at present you are a sort of volunteer, it will be quite time enough if you are here by eight. I am glad to see that you are handy at your work; but that I expected. There is no better training for a sailor than a couple of years on board a smack. You learn to turn your hand to everything there very much better than you can on a large craft."
CHAPTER VIII.
ALEXANDRIA.
TEN days' hard work and the _Wild Wave's_ equipment was nearly complete. The riggers were to put the finishing touch to their work that evening, and the carpenters to finish all below, and were to begin in the morning scraping and cleaning the decks, and there then remained only the painting to be done. The captain's usual hour for coming on board was eleven o'clock, but the men were just knocking off for dinner when he arrived.
"Well, Mr. Timmins, when do you think we can be ready to take cargo on board?"
"Well, sir, it will take them three days to get the decks planed. They are in a beastly state, you see. She must have had a dirty lot on board her on her last voyage, and she has picked up six months' dirt in the docks. Nothing short of planing will get them fit to be seen. Then the painters will take another four days, I should say, perhaps five, as the bulwarks and all the paint on deck must be done."
"That makes eight days' work, Mr. Timmins. I suppose we cannot set the painters at work until the carpenters are done?"
The mate shook his head. "Decidedly not, if the paint is to be worth looking at, sir. It would be throwing money and time away to begin to paint as long as the chips and dust are flying about."
"If we were to get the painting on deck done directly the carpenters knock off we might do the outside while we are taking the cargo in?"
"Yes, we might do that," the mate assented; "though even then if it is anything like a dusty cargo the paint wouldn't show up as smooth and clean as one would like to see it."
"Well, we can't help that," the captain said. "I have just come from the office, and they have had an offer for a freight, part to Alexandria and part to Smyrna; but they wanted to begin to load at once. I said that was out of the question, but that I thought I could begin to take it on board next Monday."
"Well, it will be quick work, sir. However, if you can get them to put a good strong gang of carpenters on board they might get the deck finished off by Wednesday evening. Anyhow, we might have the painters on board on Thursday morning, and if they are sharp they should finish by the time they knock off on Saturday."
[Illustration: "WE ARE DESPERATE MEN AND WELL ARMED"]
"Yes. Two coats will be sufficient," the captain said; "at any rate in most places. They might send a man or two to-morrow to put a coat at once on at the gangways and other places where it is worst."
"Do you know what the cargo is, captain?"
"Mixed cargo; some railway iron for Egypt, the rest hardware and dry goods of one sort and another, but beyond that I did not hear any particulars."
"Well, captain, I think we can say that we shall be ready to take it on board on Monday. Will you get them at the office to write to the two mates to tell them to be here the first thing in the morning?
"I think you are in luck, youngster," Mr. Timmins went on as the captain left the ship to see that a strong gang of carpenters were set to work. "A trip up the Mediterranean will be a capital breaking in for you. You will hardly be out of sight of land all the way, and Alexandria and Smyrna are two ports well worth seeing. We don't very often get a jaunt up the Mediterranean now; those rascally steamers get all the work."
When the riggers had once left the ship Jack had nothing more to do, and Mr. Timmins told him that it would be no use his coming again until Monday morning.
"You will be useful then," he said, "helping to check off the cargo as it comes on board. You had better bring your chest down and take up your quarters here. I shall get the cook in on Monday, and I expect we shall all stop on board. Of course when work is over you can always go back home when you are disposed."
To Mrs. Robson's delight, therefore, Jack was able to spend the next few days at home, and also to assure her that his first voyage was to be a short one only.
All was in readiness on Monday morning. The second and third mates came on board early; the crew were not to join until the evening before sailing, as the work of loading was done by stevedores. The second and third mates were both young men. They had spoken to Jack on board the bawley, and had shaken hands with him when they left Leigh with warm expressions of gratitude, and they both greeted him most cordially as soon as they met him on the deck of the _Wild Wave_. Jack therefore commenced his career as a sailor under altogether exceptionally pleasant conditions. The captain and two of the mates were under very deep obligations to him, and Mr. Timmins had already conceived a very favourable opinion of him from his willingness to turn his hand to anything, and from his quickness and handiness.
For the next three days work went on from morning until night. Jack was stationed at one of the hatchways with the second mate checking off every box, bale, and package as it went down. The boatswain and crew came on board on the Tuesday, as there was the work of bending the sails and getting all in readiness for the start to be got through. Jack had not returned home on Monday or Tuesday night, but on Wednesday he went home to say good-bye, for the vessel was to go out of dock at noon on Thursday.
Before leaving home he donned for the first time his neat uniform, which had only come a few days before. Lily was delighted with his appearance, and his mother felt no little pride as she looked at him, and, sad as she was at the prospect of his long absence, was thoroughly convinced that the choice he had made was a wise one. Mrs. Godstone and her daughter had been down twice to call upon Mrs. Robson since her arrival at Dulwich, and on the previous Saturday Jack and his mother had gone there to dine, Captain and Mrs. Murchison being the only other guests.
After a tearful good-bye Jack started from home. On his arrival on board he found two other lads, one a year older than himself and one as much younger. Jim Tucker, the elder, had already made two or three voyages in Mr. Godstone's ships. Arthur Hill was going to sea for the first time. Jack knew that two other midshipmen were sailing in the _Wild Wave_, and found them arranging their things in the little cabin, with three bunks, allotted to them.
"Hallo! You are Robson, I suppose?" Jim Tucker began as he entered. "You have got a lot of gear here in the cabin, and you must stow it away in a smaller space than it takes up at present or we shall never fit in."
"I have not begun to stow it away yet," Jack said. "I was waiting to see how much you had both got, and which berth you were going to choose, before I began to settle at all."
"Yes, that is all right enough," Tucker answered. "Well, as I am the senior, I will take this berth under the port."
"I suppose I am next," Jack said. "I will take the top one opposite."
This being settled the lads proceeded to put things straight and stow away their portmanteaus.
As soon as they had done this they went on deck. The vessel was already warping out of the dock, and as soon as she was through the gates a steam-tug seized her and took her down the river. It was eight o'clock, and the sun was just setting, when the hawser attached to the tug was thrown off. Some of the sails had already been hoisted, for the wind was northerly. The rest were now shaken out and sheeted home, and under a cloud of white canvas--for the _Wild Wave_ had been fitted with an entirely new suit of sails--the vessel proceeded on her way. The officers were divided into two watches. The first and third mates and Arthur Hill were in one watch, the second mate and the other two lads in the other.
After the constant work on board the smack Jack found it strange as he came down the river to be walking up and down the deck with nothing to do. The _Wild Wave_ passed through a fleet of bawleys trawling off Hole Haven; he knew every one of them by sight, but the _Bessy_ was not among them.
Meals had been irregular that day with the officers, for there was much to be seen after in coiling down ropes, washing the decks, and in getting everything neatly in ship-shape. As they passed the Middle Sunk the second mate touched Jack on the shoulder.
"That's her," he said; "at least all that remains of her," and he pointed to some black timbers just appearing above the surface of the water.
"Yes; that's her," Jack said. "I heard from my uncle that they blew her up three weeks ago."
"Rather a different scene from what it was that day," the mate, whose name was Hoare, said. "I thought it was all up with us, and even when we saw you coming we hardly believed that you could get near enough to take us off; and now it is as smooth as glass."
"It was a lucky day for me, sir, that was," Jack said. "I had then nothing to look forward to, beyond sailing a bawley; now I have got the life I always wanted to follow, and every prospect of getting on."
"That you have, my lad," Hoare agreed. "It was a rare bit of luck for you that you made us out, no doubt, and a rare bit of luck for us too."
The voyage began well. The wind continued light and in the right quarter all the first week. Jack and his companions were not idle, and always went aloft with the watch when there was occasion to make any change with the sails. This was at first a trial for Arthur Hill; but Jim Tucker was an old hand at it, and Jack, who had often had to make his way up the _Bessy's_ mast when she was rolling heavily, was soon quite at home on the yards of the _Wild Wave_. For two hours every morning the three boys worked at navigation, Mr. Hoare acting as instructor.
So smooth was the sea and so slight the motion that Jack could hardly believe that he was sailing down through the Bay of Biscay, of which he had heard so much; and he was quite surprised when, on the fifth day after sailing, Mr. Hoare pointed to land on the port bow, and told him that was Portugal.
"We have had capital luck, so far," the officer said. "If the wind does but hold till we once get fairly round Cape St. Vincent, it may change as soon as it likes into any quarter except the east, and we are not very likely to get that at this time of the year."
"I should not mind a change of wind a bit, sir," Jack said; "it would bring us something to do."
"Ah, yes; after being accustomed to go about every five minutes or so on the Thames, I understand you finding this monotonous, Jack. When you have had a little more of the sea, you won't mind how much you get of fine weather and favouring winds. As for storms, I don't care if I never see another. They are very grand to read of in books, and when you have got a stout ship and plenty of sea room there is no need to be afraid; but when you are wet through for a week at a spell, and the galley-fires can't be kept going, there is very little comfort in it."
The wind changed next day to the west, and by evening was blowing hard. A good deal of the canvas was taken off, and the ship edged further away from land; but after blowing strongly the wind abated again, and the next day the _Wild Wave_ passed Cape St. Vincent and headed for the Straits of Gibraltar. As the wind still held from the west they made a rapid run, and in ten days after passing St. Vincent dropped anchor in the harbour of Alexandria.
The next day the captain said to Jim Tucker, "You three lads can go ashore after dinner to-day. There is nothing particular for you to do on board, and it is well to get a view of these foreign towns while you can. When you once get to be mates you will not have much chance to do so, for then you will have to be looking after the loading and unloading of the cargo. Come off before gun-fire. There are about as cut-throat a lot of thieves in Alexandria as in any port on the Mediterranean, and that is saying a good deal."
"It is quite possible that there will be trouble here before long," Mr. Hoare remarked at dinner.
"I saw something in the paper about it," Mr. Alston, the third mate, said; "but I did not trouble to read through the accounts. What is it all about?"
"There has been a sort of peaceable revolution," Mr. Hoare said. "The colonels of the regiments in Cairo, headed by a general named Arabi Pasha, mutinied, and the viceroy had to give way to them."
"What did they mutiny about?" the third mate asked.
"Well, in the first place they wanted privileges for the army, and in the second place they wanted a lot of Europeans who hold berths to be dismissed, and the government to be entirely in the hands of natives. It is a sort of national movement, with the army at the head of it; and the viceroy, although still nominally the ruler of Egypt, is in fact little more than a cipher in the hands of Arabi and the colonels. They say the French are at the bottom of it, and it is likely enough. They have always been jealous of our influence in Egypt. However, I do not suppose we shall interfere in the matter, unless they break regularly out and ill-treat Europeans, and threaten to seize the canal or something of that sort."
After dinner the three boys landed together in a boat. Half a dozen natives pressed round them directly they stepped ashore, and offered to act as guides; but these offers they refused, for, as Jim Tucker said, "We have only got to walk about, and we are certain to find ourselves somewhere. It will be time enough talking about taking a guide when it is time for us to make down to the port again. This is a long street, let us follow it. It must lead somewhere."
Staring into the funny little shops, and at the varying crowds, composed of people of all the nationalities of the Mediterranean, mingled with a swarm of scantily-clad natives, and women wrapped up in dark blue cotton cloths, the lads made their way along.
"What an awful place for flies!" Arthur Hill said, after brushing two or three off his cheek. "Just look at that child! Why, there are a dozen round its eyes, and it doesn't seem to mind them in the least; and there is another just the same!"
"I expect the coating of dirt is so thick that they do not feel it," Jim Tucker said. "Poor little beggars, most of them look as if they had not had a wash for the last month. The women are ugly enough, what you can see of them, and that is not much. What a rascally set the Europeans look! The Egyptians are gentlemen by the side of them. I fancy from what I have heard they are the sweepings of the European ports--Greeks, Italians, Maltese, and French. When a fellow makes it too hot at home for the place to hold him, he comes over here--
"Ah! this is more like a town," he broke off as they entered the great square. "My goodness! how hot the sun does blaze down here. I say, here is a refreshment place. Sorbette--Ices. It is lucky that they put the English. Come on, you fellows, an ice would be just the thing now."
As they came out they were accosted by an Egyptian driver. "Take a carriage, gentlemen? Drive to Sweet-water Canal. See the gardens."
"What do you say, Jack?" Tucker asked. "I suppose we may as well go there as anywhere else."
"Well, we will go there later, Tucker. One does get shade in the narrow streets; but there would be no fun in driving with this sun blazing down on us. By five o'clock, when the sun gets a bit lower, it will be pleasant enough. I vote we go into the narrow streets, where we shall get shade, and see the natives in their own quarters."
The others agreed, and turning out of the square they were soon in the lanes.
"This is not half as amusing as the Indian towns," Tucker said. "Last voyage I went to Calcutta, and it is jolly in the natives' town there, seeing the natives squatting in their little shops, tinkering and tailoring, and all sorts of things. And such a crowd of them in the streets! This is a poor place in comparison, and most of the shops you see have European names over them. However, one gets the shade; that is something."
CHAPTER IX.
THE RIOT IN ALEXANDRIA.
FOR half an hour the lads sauntered on, interested in the people rather than the shops. They bought a few things. Jack invested in half a pound of Egyptian tobacco and a gaily-decorated pipe for his Uncle Ben, two little filigree brooches, and a couple of very large silk handkerchiefs of many colours, with knotted fringes, for his mother and sister.
"I do not know what they will do with them," he said; "but they will do to put on the back of a sofa or something of that sort."
The others also made some purchases, both expending a good deal more than Jack did; but the latter said that he would keep his money for Smyrna, where probably he would get all sorts of pretty things.
They were walking quietly along, when they saw a commotion in front of them. A number of men were shouting and gesticulating angrily, and blows were exchanged.
"Let us get out of this," Jack said. "It is no good running the risk of getting our heads broken."
People were now running from the shops, while from side streets the natives poured down.
"This is a regular row!" Jim Tucker exclaimed. "Look! those fellows are all armed with big sticks. Listen! there are pistols going off somewhere else."
A moment later the natives fell suddenly upon some Europeans standing close to the boys. These drew knives and pistols, and a fierce combat at once raged.
"Come out of this!" Jim exclaimed, running into a shop close by. "We must make a bolt for it somewhere."
At that moment an Italian, armed with a pistol, rushed in from behind the shop.
On seeing the three lads he exclaimed in broken English, "Shut the door, they mean to kill us all!"
The boys closed the door, and the owner piled some boxes and other goods against it; but there was no fastening up the window, for the fastenings were outside.
"Come upstairs," the man said, and the lads followed him to the floor above.
The battle was still raging in the street. Groups of Greeks and Italians stood together, defending themselves with their knives from the heavy sticks of their assailants, but were being fast beaten down. The shrieks of women rose loud above the shouting of the combatants, while from the upper windows the cracks of revolvers sounded out as the Greek, Maltese, and Italian shopkeepers who had not sallied out into the streets tried to aid their comrades below.
"Now, have you got any arms you can give us?" Tucker asked. "This looks like a regular rising of the natives. They would never all have their sticks handy if they hadn't prepared for it."
"There are some long knives in that cupboard," the man said, "and there is another pistol my brother Antonio has got. He is sick in bed."
Just at this moment the door opened and another Italian came in in trousers and shirt.
"What is it, Joseph?"
"The natives have risen and are massacring all the Europeans."
The sick man made his way to the window.
"I am not surprised," he said, as he discharged his pistol and brought down a native who was in the act of battering in the head of a fallen man. "You said only yesterday, you thought there was mischief brewing--that the natives were surly and insolent; but I did not think they would dare to do this."
"Well, brother, we will sell our lives as dearly as we can."
The conflict was now pretty nearly over, and the two men withdrew from the window and closed the jalousies.
"Most of them are making off," Antonio said, peeping cautiously out through the lattice-work. "I suppose they are going to attack somewhere else. What are the police doing? They ought to be here soon."
But the time went on, and there were no signs of the police. The natives now began to break open the shops and plunder the contents. The two men placed themselves at the top of the stairs. It was not long before they heard a crashing of glass and a breaking of wood, then a number of men rushed into the shop.
"Don't fire, Joseph," Antonio said, "so long as they do not try to come up here. They may take away the soap and candles and other things if they choose, if they will but leave us alone."
The stairs were straight and narrow, and led direct from the shop itself to the floor above. After plundering the shop the natives departed laden with their spoil, without attempting to ascend the stairs.
"We are in an awful fix here," Jim Tucker said. "What do you think we had better do? Shall we get out at the back of the house and try and make a bolt of it?"
"I do not think that is any good," Jack replied. "I was at the back window just now, and could hear shouts and the report of firearms all over the place. No; if we go out into the streets we are safe to be murdered, if we stop here they may not search the house. Anyhow, at the worst we can make a better fight here than in the streets."
Two hours passed. At times large bodies of natives rushed along the streets, brandishing their sticks and shouting triumphantly. Some few of them had firearms, and these they discharged at the windows as they passed along.
"We ought to have had some troops here long before this," Antonio said to his brother.
The latter, who was sitting on a chair evidently exhausted by his exertions, shrugged his shoulders.
"They were more likely to help the mob than to interfere with them. The troops are at the bottom of the whole trouble."
A clock on the mantel-piece struck five, just as a fresh body of natives came down the street. They were evidently bent upon pillage, as they broke up and turned into the shops. Shouts and pistol-shots were again heard.
"They are sacking the houses this time, Joseph. Now the hour has come."
The two brothers knelt together before the figure of a saint in a little niche in the wall. The boys glanced at each other, and each, following the example of the Italians, knelt down by a chair and prayed for a minute or two. As they rose to their feet there was a sudden din below. Pistol in hand, the brothers rushed out on the landing.
"Do not try to come up!" Antonio shouted in Egyptian. "You are welcome to what you can find below, but you shall not come up here. We are desperate men, and well armed."
The natives, who were just about to ascend the stairs, drew back at the sight of the brothers standing pistol in hand at the top, with the three lads behind them. The stairs were only wide enough for one to advance at a time, and the natives, eager as they were for blood and plunder, shrank from making the attempt. Some of those who were farthest back began to slink out of the shop, and the others followed their example. There was a loud talking outside for some time, then several of them again entered. Some of them began to pull out the drawers, as if in the hopes of finding something that former searchers had overlooked, others passed on into an inner room.
"What are they up to now, I wonder?" Arthur Hill said.
"No good, I will be bound," Jim Tucker replied. "There! They seem to be going out again now."
Just as the last man passed out Antonio exclaimed in Italian, "I smell smoke, Joseph; they have fired the house! They have set fire to the room below," he translated to the lads; but even before he spoke the boys understood what had taken place, for a light smoke poured out from the inner room, and a smell of burning wood came to their nostrils.
"The beggars have done us," Jim Tucker said bitterly. "We could have held these stairs against them for an hour, but this fire will turn us out in no time."
The smoke rose thicker and thicker, and they could hear the crackling of wood.
"Let us get out of the back window, we may get off that way."
Touching Antonio's arm he beckoned him in that direction. The Italian nodded, and the party went into the back room. Antonio drew the sheets from the beds and knotted them. Jim went to the window and looked out. As he did so there was a yell of derision from below. A score of the natives had made their way through the adjoining houses, and taken up their station from behind to cut off their retreat. It needed no words to tell those in the room what had taken place. Antonio threw down the sheets and said to his brother, "Let us sally out, Joseph; the sooner it is over the better. See, the smoke is coming up through the floor already. Let us go out before we are suffocated."
"I am ready," the other replied.
Followed by the boys the brothers left the room and descended the stairs. The flames were already rushing out of the back room. There was a shout from without as the defenders were seen to descend the ladder. The boys grasped each other's hands as a final farewell, and then with set lips and knives firmly grasped followed the two Italians and dashed into the street. Sharp cracks of the revolvers sounded out, and then in an instant the mob closed round the little party. Keeping close together, cutting and thrusting with their knives, the boys tried to make their way through. The crowd was so thick, that mixed up as they were in it, the natives could not use their sticks, but drawing their knives grappled with the boys. Jack felt a sharp pain in several places; he fell, struggled to his feet again, was again struck down. He seemed to hear a voice raised above the din, then he knew nothing more.
When he recovered his senses he found that a native was stooping over him and pressing a cloth to his forehead. He lay still for a minute or two, wondering faintly what had become of him. Looking round he could see he was in a small room. An Egyptian of the better class, in buttoned-up frock-coat and light trousers, and with a scarlet fez on his head, was standing looking down at him, and was apparently giving instructions to the native, who was endeavouring to staunch one of his wounds. As soon as he took this in, the thought of his comrades flashed across his mind, and pushing the man's hand back from his forehead he struggled into a sitting position.
"Hurrah, Jack! I was afraid that they had done for you," a voice said, and he saw Tucker and Hill sitting propped up against a wall.
Two of the natives now took hold of him, dragged him along the floor, and placed him by the side of the others. Then the Egyptian said, "You keep quiet, I save your lives. If you move or make noise we kill you at once."
The lads were all faint from loss of blood, and half stupefied from the heavy blows they had received; and after a word or two of thankfulness at finding themselves all together and alive, they lay quiet. There were two or three natives in the room, and from time to time one went out or came in with news as to what was passing in the streets. Each time there was much talk among their guards, and it was evident that they were dissatisfied with the result. The outbreak, indeed, had not been, as the boys supposed, universal; had it been, the whole European population would probably have been destroyed. It was confined to a portion only of the lower part of the town. Whether it was planned or not beforehand is a disputed point.
It began in a quarrel between some Maltese and natives; but this quarrel seemed to be accepted by the latter as a signal for a general attack, and they rushed from their houses armed with heavy sticks and knives and attacked the Europeans. Rumours had for some time been current among them that the Christians intended to conquer Egypt and to put down the Mahomedan religion, and in their excited state a spark caused an explosion. It was perhaps fortunate that it came when it did, and was confined to a comparatively small part of the town; for had it spread over the whole city the loss of life would have been great indeed, for the natives had entirely their own way from three o'clock in the afternoon until seven in the evening.
The police made no attempt whatever to put down the riot. The English and Italian consuls, immediately they heard what was going on, drove together to the governor's to call upon him to send for the troops, and to take vigorous steps to restore order. They were attacked upon the way and both wounded, but they succeeded in reaching the governor's palace. By means of the strongest representations, and by telling him that he would be held personally responsible by the Powers they represented for the consequences of the disturbance, they at last induced him to act, and at seven o'clock the troops arrived and were marched through the streets, when the natives at once dispersed to their homes.
Some seventy Europeans, including ten or twelve women, were killed, and all the shops in the quarter where the riot took place, pillaged. No damage was done in the business part of the town. There the Europeans at once armed themselves as soon as the news of the riot reached them, and formed up in the square. Strong parties were landed from the ships of war, and were prepared to give so hot a reception to the mob should they come that way, that the rioters confined their work to the quarter in which it began. The Egyptians are timid people, and the population of Alexandria were not sure that the army would go to any great length against the Europeans, or that the country in general would be with them. The outbreak was therefore rather the result of the hatred existing among the lower class against the riffraff of the various nationalities gathered in Alexandria, whose conduct frequently gave good grounds indeed for the feeling entertained against them, than of deliberate intention.
How many of the natives were killed in the fight was never known; the bodies were hastily carried away and buried by their friends as soon as the rumour spread of the arrival of the troops, and only some eight or ten of their dead were found lying in the streets. The rescue of the boys was due to the presence in the mob of a wealthy bey, who lived a short distance out of the town. This man was a brother of one of the leaders of the military insurrection at Cairo, and was in close communication with Arabi and the colonels.
He had been actively preparing for a general rising against the Europeans by the propagation of stories hostile to the latter, and by exciting the greed of the lowest classes of the town by pointing out how great was the wealth they could obtain by looting the well-filled shops and warehouses. Some of his agents had assisted to bring about the riot. But he had not intended it to go so far, and had only wished to add to the excitement and ill-feeling that prevailed, by a tumult attended with loss of life upon both sides.
He was well satisfied when he saw how eagerly the natives rushed to arms, but as soon as the conflict fairly began he had sent his men among the rioters urging them not to proceed further until the army was at hand to support them. He knew that the plunder they had obtained from the small shops would only excite their desire to appropriate the contents of the rich stores in the Europeans' quarters, and was therefore well contented with what had been done. He had happened to be passing when the little party rushed from the burning house into the crowd. As they did so he caught sight of the naval uniform of the boys, and imagined that they belonged to one of the ships of war.
He saw at once that their lives might be valuable to him. If his party triumphed he could hand them over and take credit for their capture; if the great insurrection that was already planned failed, he could use them as a means of obtaining favourable terms for himself. He therefore called together two or three of his men who were in the crowd, and made his way to the scene of conflict just as the lads succumbed to their foes. With great difficulty he succeeded in rescuing them from their assailants, and then had them carried into a house hard by.
As soon as it was dark the boys were wrapped up in dark cloths and carried away through the streets. As many dead bodies were being similarly taken off by the natives no questions were asked, nor did the soldiers now scattered about interfere with their bearers. The motion started the boys' wounds into bleeding again. They had difficulty in breathing through the cloths bound round them, and when they were at last thrown heavily down upon the ground their consciousness had almost entirely left them.
CHAPTER X.
PRISONERS.
FOR two or three minutes after the door was shut and bolted not a word was spoken by the three boys. All were sorely bruised, and bleeding from many cuts and wounds, and breathless and exhausted by the way in which they had been carried along and the force with which they had been thrown down. Jack was the first to speak.
"I say, how are you both--are either of you badly hurt?"
"I don't know yet," Tucker replied. "It seems to me there is nothing left of me. I am sore and smarting all over. How are you, Arthur?"
"I don't know," Arthur said. "I wonder that I am alive at all, but I don't know that I am really much hurt."
"Well, let us try and see," Jack said.
"See!" Jim repeated scornfully. "Why, I can't see my own hand."
"Well, I mean let us find out if we can stand up and move about. We shall find out, anyhow, whether any of our bones are broken."
With some difficulty and with many exclamations of pain the lads rose to their feet.
"Are both you fellows up?" Jim asked.
"Yes."
"Well, then, we can't be very bad, anyhow. My arms are very stiff, and it seems to me that my jacket is soaked with blood, but where it comes from I do not know. I feel as if my head and face were one mass of cuts and bruises."
"That is just how I feel, Jim," Arthur replied, and Jack agreed.
"Well, this is the rummest affair!" Jim said more cheerfully, now it seemed that none of them had sustained any very serious injury. "There were we a few hours ago eating ices and enjoying ourselves stunningly; then this frightful row took place (what it was all about I have not the least idea), and just as it seemed all up with us the fellow this place belongs to (at least I suppose it belongs to him) steps in and saves us, and then we are dragged up here and chucked into this hole."
"It seems like a dream," Arthur said.
"It is a good deal too real to be a dream, it is a mighty unpleasant reality. Well, I wish there was a little daylight so that we could see what has happened to us and tie ourselves up a bit; as it is, there is nothing to do but to lie down again and try to get off to sleep. I say, won't there be a row after this, when they get to know at home what has taken place. I wonder what they are going to do with us in the morning? Do you think they mean to kill us, Jack?"
"No, I should not think there was a chance of that. This fellow would not have taken us out of the hands of the mob just for the pleasure of cutting our throats privately. Still the rough way we were carried along and thrown down here does not look as if he did it from any feeling of kindness," Jack remarked.
"No, I do not suppose he did it from kindness, Jack; anyhow, it does not look like it. Well there is no use halloing about that now, let us try and get a sleep. My head feels as if it was swollen up as big as a four-gallon keg."
Accustomed not unfrequently to get a nap when on watch under the lee of the bulwark, the hardness of the ground did not trouble the boys, and before many minutes they were all asleep.--Jack and Tucker were awakened by a shout from Arthur.
"Watch on deck!"
They started into a sitting position and looked round. A ray of sunlight was streaming in through an opening some six inches square, high up on the wall.
"Well, we are objects!" Jim said, looking at his two companions. They were indeed; their faces were bruised and stained with blood, their hair matted together. Arthur's right eye was completely closed, and there was a huge swelling from a jagged bruise over the eyebrow. Jack had received a clear cut almost across the forehead, from which the blood was still oozing. Jim's face was swollen and bruised all over, and one of his ears was cut nearly off. He was inclined to bear his injuries philosophically until Jack told him that half of his ear was gone. This put him into a furious rage, and he vowed vengeance against the whole of the Egyptian race.
"Fancy going about all one's life with half an ear. Why, every boy in the street will point at it, and one will be a regular laughing-stock. You fellows' wounds are nothing to that."
"You will have to wear your hair long, Jim; it won't be noticed much if you do."
"Don't tell me," Jim replied. "I tell you I shall be a regular sight wherever I go. I shall have fellows asking me what has happened to me. Now, had it been an arm, chaps would have been sorry for me; but who is going to pity a man for losing half an ear?"
"I don't think I would mind giving half an ear just at present for a good drink and a bucket of water to wash in."
"Nor would I," Arthur agreed.
"That is all very well," Jim grumbled. "I have lost half an ear and haven't got any water to drink."
"Well," Jack said, "I suppose they do not mean to starve us anyhow, so no doubt they will bring us something before long."
Little more was said. Their tongues were swollen, their mouths parched, they still felt dizzy and stupid from the blows they had received; so they sat down and waited. The room they were in was apparently an underground cellar, generally used as a store-room. It was about twelve feet square, and the only light was that obtained through the little opening in the wall. Jack thought as he looked at it that if one of them stood on another's shoulders he could look out and see where they were. But as that mattered nothing at present, and they were not in the mood for any exertion, he held his tongue.
In about an hour a footstep was heard descending some stairs, then bolts were undone, and two Egyptians with swords and pistols in their girdles entered. They brought with them some bread and a jar of water. Jack jumped up.
"Look here," he said, "that is all right enough to eat and drink, but we want some water to wash with. Wash, you understand?" he went on as the men looked at him evidently without comprehending. "Wash, you see,--like this;" and he went through a pantomime of washing his hands and slushing his head and face. The Egyptians grinned and nodded; they said a word to each other and then retired.
"I believe it is all right," Jack said, "and that they are going to bring some."
A long draught of water from the jar did them an immense deal of good, but none had at present any inclination to eat. Presently the steps were heard coming down the stairs again, and the men entered, bringing in a large pan made of red earthenware, and containing three or four gallons of water.
"Good men!" Jim exclaimed enthusiastically; "I will spare your lives for this when I slay the rest of your countrymen," and he shook the Egyptians warmly by the hand. "I have nothing to give you," he went on, "for they turned our pockets inside out; but I owe you one, and will pay you if I ever get a chance. Now, lads, this is glorious!"
For half an hour the three boys knelt round the pan, bathing their faces and heads. Then they stripped to the waist, and after a general wash tore strips off their shirts and bandaged the various cuts they had received on the head, shoulders, and arms. In no case were these serious, although they were deep enough to be painful.
"It's nothing short of a miracle," Jack said, "that we have got off so easily. If the beggars had not been in such a hurry to get at us that they got into each other's way they would have done for us to a certainty; but they were all slashing away together, and not one could get a fair drive at us. Well, I feel about five hundred per cent. better now. Let us get on our things again and have breakfast. I feel as if I could tuck into that bread now."
Just as they had got on their clothes the door again opened, and a gigantic negro entered. He carried with him a wooden box of the shape of a bandbox. He opened this and took out a melon and three large bunches of grapes, laid them down on the ground without a word, nodded, and went out again.
"My eye, this is first-rate," Jim said in delight. "Well, you see, it is not going to be so bad after all. That chap who brought us up here is evidently friendly, though why he should have sent us the fruit by itself instead of with the bread and water I do not know. However, never mind that now; let us set to."
The boys enjoyed their breakfast immensely. They first ate the grapes; when these were finished they looked longingly at the melon, which was a very large one.
"How on earth are we to tackle that?" Jim asked. "Our knives have gone with our other things."
"Perhaps we can find something to cut it up," Jack said, getting up and turning over the litter on the floor with his foot. For two or three minutes he searched about. "Hurrah!" he exclaimed at last, "here is a bit of old hoop-iron that will do first-rate. It is not stiff enough to cut with, but I think we can saw with it, if one takes hold of each end."
Without much difficulty the melon was cut into three parts, and devoured to the rind. Breakfast over they had time to consider their situation again.
"I expect," Jack said, "this pasha or whatever he is who has got us here is waiting to see how things go. If the Egyptians get the best of it he will hand us over to Arabi, or whoever comes to be their chief. If we get the best of it he will give us up, and say that he has saved our lives. That would account, you see, for this breakfast business. He only sent us bread and water by his Egyptian fellows, and he sent us the fruit privately by that black slave of his, whom he can rely upon to hold his tongue."
"I should not be surprised if that was it, Jack. That makes it look hopeful for us, for there is no doubt in the world who will get the best of it in the end. We may not thrash the beggars for a time. Alexandria is a big place, and there are a lot of troops here, and they can bring any number more down from Cairo by rail. The crews of the ships of war here are nothing like strong enough to land and do the whole business at once; besides, they have no end of forts and batteries. I expect it will be some time before they can bring ships and troops from England to capture this place."
"But there are the Italians and French," Arthur said. "They are just as much interested in the matter as we are, for I expect there were a good many more Italians and French killed yesterday than there were English."
"Ten to one, I should think," Jim agreed. "I don't think there are many English here, except the big merchants and bankers and that sort of thing, while all the small shops seem to have either French, Italian, or Greek names over the door. Well, if it is going on like this, we can afford to wait for a bit."
"Look here, Arthur," Jack said, "I will stand under that opening, and you get on my shoulders and look out. I don't suppose you will see much, but one likes to know where one is and which way one is looking. We know we are somewhere on the high ground beside the town. We must be looking somewhere north-east by the way that gleam of sunlight comes in. Very likely you can get a glimpse of the sea." Jack placed himself against the wall, and Jim helped Arthur on to his shoulders.
"Yes, I can see the sea," Arthur said as soon as his head reached the level of the loop-hole. "I can see the outer harbour, and several ships lying there and boats rowing about."
"Well, that is something anyhow," Jim said as Arthur leapt down again. "We shall be able to see any men-of-war that come in, and form some idea as to what is going on. How thick is the wall?" Jim went on.
"I should say quite a couple of feet thick. I could only see a small patch of the water through it."
"Then I am afraid there is no chance of our working our way out," Jim said. "The only way of escape I can see would be to spring on those two fellows who bring our food. We are stronger than they are, I am sure, and we might master them."
"I don't expect we could do it without noise," Jack said. "Besides, they have got pistols, and we certainly could not master them without their being able to shout. We might manage one easy enough, if one sprang on him and held his arms and prevented him getting his pistol, and another clapped his hands over his mouth; but the three of us could not manage two silently. Besides, I should not like to hurt them after their bringing us that water to wash in."
"No; we certainly couldn't do that," the other boys agreed.
"Besides," Jack went on, "we do not know where this staircase leads. But no doubt it goes up into the house, and when we got to the top someone would see us at once; and even if we broke through there would be such a chase we should never get away, and anyhow could not pass through the town down to the port and steal a boat. No, Jim, I don't think it is the least use in the world trying to escape that way. If we could dig through the wall and make our way out at night, and get quietly down among the sand-hills by the shore, we might manage to get hold of a boat and row out to the ships; but I do not see that there is any chance of our being able to do that when we haven't got as much as a knife among us."
Jim examined the walls. "There would not be much difficulty in working through them if we had a couple of good knives, they are made of sun-dried bricks. However, we will hunt about among this rubbish and see if we can find some more bits of iron. Anyhow, we can wait a day or two before we make up our minds about it and see what comes of it. I vote we clear up this litter a bit, and chuck it out through the opening. There is a close, musty smell in the place. The opening will be very handy for chucking everything out and keeping the place as clean as we can."
"Yes, Jim; but the rubbish will be very useful to us if we decide to try to cut our way out, as we can put a lot of brick-dust and stuff under it. It would not do to throw that out of the window, for it would be seen at once by anyone passing."
"Yes; you are right there, Jack. Well then, we have nothing to do but to take it as easy as we can."
The closest search through the rubbish did not bring to light any other piece of iron, and the bit they had used as a knife was so thin and rusted as to be altogether useless for the purpose for which they required it.
The days passed slowly. The two Egyptians brought bread and water regularly, and the Nubian as regularly additions to their meal--sometimes fruit, sometimes a dish of meat. Three bundles of maize straw were brought down the first evening to serve as beds for them, and on the following morning three or four men came down and swept up all the rubbish from the floor. Once every two days they were taken out under a guard of three men with swords and muskets, and allowed to sit down in the sun, with their backs against the wall, for an hour or two. The shipping still lay in the harbour, over which they commanded a good view; and after a few days they saw that several more vessels of war had entered it.
"I can see that the boats are going backwards and forwards to the shore," Jim said, "so there is no regular war begun yet."
"Look, Jim, over there to the right," Jack said. "There is a swarm of men at work. I believe they must be getting up a fresh battery there. That looks as if the Egyptians had made up their minds to fight."
"So much the worse, Jack. I don't mind how much they fight when we are out of their hands (we know what will come of that when it begins), but if they fight while we are here it may turn out bad for us, whichever way it goes."
CHAPTER XI.
THE BOMBARDMENT.
WHILE the riot had been going on, a considerable proportion of the European community of Alexandria had taken refuge on board the ships in the harbour, the men who remained behind to protect their property sending off their wives and children. Many returned on shore as soon as it was known that the troops had arrived, but the alarm was by no means abated when it was seen next day by the manner of the soldiers that they sympathized entirely with the rioters. In two or three days a large proportion of the garrison of Cairo arrived, and Arabi himself came to Alexandria. No steps were taken to punish those concerned in the riot, although many were known to the Europeans who had escaped.
The khedive was evidently powerless. The remonstrances of the European consuls were received by Arabi's council with contempt, and it was too evident to all that the riot had been but the beginning of a very much more serious affair. The women and children remained on board the ships; but the Europeans reopened their shops and continued business as usual, encouraged by the fact that not a day passed without vessels of war of one European power or another arriving in port. These had been despatched in all haste upon the news being received of the riot in Alexandria, and of the threatening aspect of affairs there.
In ten days after the outbreak there were in port English, French, Italian, Spanish, and German ships of war, and the European community now regained confidence, believing that with so powerful a fleet close at hand the Egyptians would not venture upon any fresh act of aggression.
Captain Murchison had been engaged in business connected with the cargo at the office of one of the principal merchants, when one of the clerks ran in with the news that there was a serious riot in the native part of the town, and it was said that the Europeans had been massacred. The office was at once closed, and the strong shutters put up. The clerks and employés were armed and placed in readiness to defend the place against an attack, and then Mr. Spratt and Captain Murchison went out to the great square to see what was going on. The greatest confusion reigned there. Numbers of women and children, the families of the Italian and Greek shopkeepers, were hurrying past on their way down to the port.
The shops and offices had been hastily closed and barricaded. The clerks of the great mercantile houses and banks were turning out rifle in hand. The wildest rumours prevailed as to the extent of the riot, and it was not until two hours after the commencement of the disturbance that the consuls, finding that they could obtain no aid from the governor, took upon themselves to summon aid from the two ships of war that happened to be lying in the port. The appearance of two hundred sailors fully armed and ready for action at once restored confidence among the Europeans, and prevented the riot from extending.
Upon his return to his ship after the arrival of the Egyptian troops and the termination of the riot, Captain Murchison was astonished and alarmed to hear that the three boys had not returned. He at once went on shore again, and remained for some hours making inquiries for them, but without obtaining any information whatever. The next morning he renewed the search. Matters had now settled down a little, and the shops were reopened. Going to the various restaurants in the great square he learned that three young officers had come in and eaten ices at one of them between two and three o'clock the day before, but he could learn nothing further.
He went to the English consul. The latter sent a dragoman with him to the head of the police, who promised to have inquiries made. The first and second mates also went on shore and joined in the search. They agreed the best way would be that they should take various streets leading from the square and inquire at every European shop if three lads in European uniform had been noticed. For some time no success attended them; but at last they met with a Maltese at whose shop Jack had purchased two little filigree brooches. He said he had noticed that after they left his shop they walked down the street which led directly to the spot where the riot had began, and where the greater proportion of Europeans had lost their lives. The two officers went down to the scene of the riot, but could obtain no further information respecting the missing lads.
The Europeans who had remained shut up in their houses while the riot was going on had all left immediately order was restored. The whole of the shops were wrecked and plundered, two or three houses had been burned down, and dark stains in the roadway showed where men had fallen and died.
"I fear there is no doubt whatever," Captain Murchison said, when the two mates reported to him the result of their inquiries, "that the lads must have been just at the spot where the riot broke out; the time at which they passed exactly answered to it. But in that case what could have become of them? Mr. Cookson has shown me the official list of the killed as far as it is known at present. Their bodies have all been found; but neither in that list, nor in the list of the wounded, is there any mention of three young English lads. If they had been killed their bodies would have been found with the others, and indeed their uniforms would have at once attracted attention."
"What in the world can have become of them? Could they have been in one of the houses that are burned?" Mr. Hoare suggested.
"I should hardly think that possible," the captain said. "Their remains would have been found, and would have been returned in the list as three persons unrecognized; but all the bodies seem to have been identified."
"Perhaps they have been carried off, and are prisoners somewhere," Mr. Timmins suggested.
"That is more likely, Mr. Timmins. They may have been taken for midshipmen belonging to one of the ships of war, and have been seized by someone in the hope of getting a handsome ransom for them. Anyhow, I cannot believe that they are dead; or, at any rate, if they have been killed, it has not been in a fight in the street, or their bodies must have been found. I am most anxious about them, but I cannot believe that the worst has happened to them."
Captain Murchison had bills printed in English, French, Italian, and Egyptian and distributed through the town, offering a reward for any information that would lead to the discovery, either dead or alive, of the missing lads. The bills met with no response. The Egyptians engaged in the attack upon the shops, who alone could have furnished information regarding the boys, were afraid to come forward, as they could not have done so without admitting their share in the massacre. As he could do nothing more, Captain Murchison left the matter in the hands of Mr. Cookson, the English consul, and a week after the riot the _Wild Wave_ sailed for Smyrna, Captain Murchison saying that he should look in at Alexandria on his way back, and that the boys if found were to await his return there. He did not write home to announce their disappearance; his belief that they must be still alive was strong, and he was unwilling to plunge their friends into anxiety and grief until a further time had been allowed to elapse.
For a long time negotiations went on between Admiral Seymour, who commanded the British fleet now at the port of Alexandria, and the government of the khedive. The ministers were really nothing more than the nominees of Arabi and the army, and the demands of the English admiral for satisfaction for the outrages, compensation to the sufferers, and the punishment of the guilty, were met with evasive answers. So threatening and insolent was the bearing of the Egyptian troops, that the greater part of the European population again left their houses and took refuge on board the ships in the harbour.
More and more peremptory became the demands of the English admiral, but still no results were obtained. Egyptian troops now commenced throwing up fortifications at points commanding the position of the British ships in the harbour. The admiral sent ashore and insisted that these works should be at once discontinued. No attention was paid to the demand. A message was then sent through the consuls warning all Europeans in the town to embark at once, and an ultimatum was despatched to the Egyptian ministry, saying that unless the works were stopped and a satisfactory answer to the demands returned before nightfall the ships would open fire the next day; in the afternoon, as no reply had been received, the men-of-war steamed out of the harbour and took up their position off the town.
The warships of the other nationalities also left the harbour; but as their governments refused to support actively the action of the English, they either steamed away or anchored at a distance as spectators of the approaching event. The various merchant-ships in harbour also sailed out, all of them crowded with fugitives from the town. The English fleet consisted of the _Invincible_, _Monarch_, _Penelope_, _Sultan_, _Alexandria_, _Superb_, _Inflexible_, and _Temeraire_, with the gun-boats _Signet_, _Condor_, _Bittern_, _Beacon_, and _Decoy_.
Nearly a month had passed since the lads had been taken prisoners. They were in absolute ignorance as to what was going on in the town, except that they had been told by one of their guards, who spoke a few words of English, that Arabi and his troops were masters of Alexandria, and that every European in Egypt would be destroyed.
"They may be masters of Alexandria at present," Jim Tucker said to his comrades as they talked the matter over, "but they won't be masters long. It is possible enough that they may cut the throats of all the Europeans in Egypt, but they will have to pay dearly for it if they do. I do not believe they will keep Alexandria long. Just look at all those men-of-war in the harbour. Why, there are white ensigns flying over a dozen of them! I suppose they are wasting time palavering at present, but when the time for action comes you see they will astonish these Egyptians."
"That fellow said this morning that there were twenty thousand troops in the town," Jack said.
"If there were a hundred thousand it would make no odds, Jack."
"It would make no odds about our blowing the place up, Jim, but it would make a lot of odds if it came to landing. I do not suppose they could land more than a couple of thousand sailors from the fleet, if they did as much, and though I have no doubt they could lick about five times their own number in the field, it would be an awkward business if they had to fight their way through the narrow streets of the town."
"Well, I suppose there will be some ships along with troops soon," Jim said. "It would take them a fortnight or three weeks to get ready, and another fortnight to get out here. Perhaps they waited a week or so to see whether the Egyptians were going to cave in before they began to get ready; but at any rate there ought to be troops here in another fortnight."
The next morning early four of their guards came down and motioned them to follow them. They were evidently in high glee. Among them was the one who spoke English.
"Come along, you English boys," he said. "Big fight going to begin. You see the forts sink all you ships in no time."
"Well, we shall see about that," Tucker muttered as they followed their guard. "Perhaps you are crowing too early, my fine fellow."
"At any rate," Arthur Hill said, "we may thank them for giving us a view of it."
The guards led them to a spot where six or seven other men, all like themselves armed with muskets, were standing or sitting on a bank which commanded a view of the port and the sea beyond it. The boys threw themselves on the ground and looked at the panorama stretched away before them. They could see the two great ports, known as the Old and New Ports, with the peninsula jutting out between them, on which stood the khedive's palace, named Ras-el-tin, and other important buildings. Beyond stretched a long spit of land parallel with the shore, and sheltering the two ports.
This spit was studded with forts, which formed the principal defences of Alexandria, although there were several forts, among them Forts Mex and Marabout, on the mainland near the mouths of the harbour. Most of these forts had been erected under the superintendence of French engineers, and were considered capable of defending the town against any naval force that could be brought against it. They were armed with heavy artillery of the best modern construction.
The ports were entirely clear of shipping, but ranged along facing the forts lay the eight British ironclads. Four of them faced the forts at Ras-el-tin and the mouth of the harbour, three lay off the Mex Batteries, and one off a fort commanding what was known as the Boghaz Channel, while the little group of gun-boats lay out beyond the line of battleships.
Further away to the east could be seen a great number of sailing-boats and steamers. Just at seven o'clock a great puff of white smoke broke out from the black side of the _Invincible_, which was carrying the admiral's flag, and even before the sound reached the ears of the little party on the hill similar bursts of smoke spurted out from the other vessels. Then came the deep roar of heavy artillery, mingled with the rushing sound of their huge missiles through the air. Almost immediately an answering fire broke out from all the batteries fringing the sea.
In a minute or two the hulls and lower masts of the men-of-war were entirely hidden in clouds of white smoke. The very ground seemed to shake with the thunder of heavy guns, mingled with which came the sharper sound of some of the smaller artillery in the forts and the long rattle of the machine-guns in the tops of the men-of-war. So terrible was the din that the Egyptians ceased their chatter and sat in awed silence. The shell from the Egyptian guns could be seen bursting over the vessels, while jets of water spurting out far to seaward in all directions marked the course of the round shot.
"It is downright awful, isn't it?" Arthur Hill said in a hushed voice. "I've often thought I should like to see a sea-fight, but I never thought it would be as terrible as this."
"No more did I, Arthur," Jack agreed. "I feel just as I have done when I have been out in the bawley and a big thunder-storm has burst overhead. If it feels like this here, what must it be on board a ship?"
"I don't believe it is half so bad there," Jim Tucker said. "They are all hard at work there at those big guns, and haven't got much time to think about it. I wish we could see what harm the shot are doing them. They have got some tremendous guns in some of the forts--pretty well as big as they are on board."
For an hour there was no change whatever in the state of things, then the little gun-boats were seen to be in motion. Steaming away to the west, they engaged the Marabout Fort, which had hitherto taken its part in the fray without any return on the part of the assailants.
"I believe the fire of the forts is slackening," Jack said. "Look at that fort at the entrance to the harbour, its outline is all ragged and uneven. I wish the wind would freshen up a bit, to let us see a little more of what is going on."
Another hour and it was evident to them all that the fire of the forts was nothing like as heavy as it had been at first, while the guns of the fleet continued to thunder as steadily as when they first commenced. At twelve o'clock several of the forts had ceased to fire altogether. At one, the gun-boats having silenced the Marabout Fort, joined the three men-of-war in the bombardment of the Mex Batteries, and the _Temeraire_, having silenced the fort at the entrance of the Boghaz Channel, joined in the attack on the Ras-el-tin and Pharos Forts.
At three o'clock there was a tremendous explosion in the Pharos Fort, and now only an occasional gun answered the fire of the assailants. This soon ceased, and at four some signal flags were seen to run up to the masthead of the _Invincible_, and instantly the fire from the British ships ceased, and a dead silence succeeded the din of battle that had continued almost unbroken for nine hours.
CHAPTER XII.
FREE.
FOR two or three hours before the cessation of bombardment flames had been bursting out from several buildings in the neighbourhood of the palace of Ras-el-tin. These being in the line of fire, had doubtless been struck by shell from the ships passing over the forts in front.
When the fire ceased the Egyptians rose and motioned the boys to return to their prison.
"Well, you see, my friend," Jack said to the man who spoke English, "you have not sunk the English vessels in a few minutes, as you talked about. Not even one of the little gun-boats; and as far as I can see from here you have not even damaged them."
The man made no reply. To him and his comrades the escape of the British ships was a mystery. That they were made of iron they understood, but had no idea of the enormous thickness of their sides; and could not even imagine that ships could be built sufficiently strong to keep out the missiles discharged by the immense cannons in the forts. That not even a mast should have been knocked away seemed to them almost miraculous. In point of fact the ships had been struck but once or twice with the shells from these massive cannon. The Egyptian gunners were unaccustomed to the use of the huge pieces, and had consequently aimed too high, and the shell had passed either between the masts or far overhead.
Upon the other hand the smaller guns had been worked with accuracy, but their missiles had dropped harmless from the iron plates of the ships. The fire of the men-of-war had, in the first place, been directed mainly against these great cannon. The machine-guns in the top had created terrible havoc among the men who were carrying on the laborious and to them difficult operation of loading them, while the huge shell from the great guns had carried wholesale destruction among them. Thus the powerful guns upon which the Egyptians had relied to beat off any attack from the sea, had been fired but seldom, and one by one had been dismounted or rendered unserviceable by the fire from the ships.
The gallantry with which the Egyptian gunners stuck to their work was the object of surprise and admiration to the British sailors. It seemed scarce possible that men could work under so tremendous a fire as that to which they were exposed. The forts were literally torn to pieces, and at the end of the day were little better than heaps of ruins scattered thickly with the corpses of the Egyptian artillerymen.
"Well, what do you suppose they will be up to next, Jim?" Arthur Hill asked when the door had again closed upon them.
"I suppose they will begin again to-morrow if these fellows have not had enough of it. You see, they hardly fired a gun for the last three hours, and as far as we could see the forts were pretty well knocked to pieces; the one at the mouth of the harbour blew up, and there were several other explosions. They held out a lot better than I thought they would do, I must say, but I cannot believe they will be fools enough to go on to-morrow."
They chatted for some time as to the chances of surrender or of resistance to the last, and as to what was likely to befall themselves; then, wearied with the excitement of the day their voices became more and more drowsy and they dosed off upon their heaps of straw. Jack was the first to wake. He sat up and looked round, puzzled for a time.
"I say, wake up, you fellows!" he exclaimed suddenly. "There is a tremendous fire somewhere."
The others sat up at once. They had been asleep for some hours and night had fallen, but there was a red glow of light in the cell.
"Here, Arthur, you jump up on my shoulders," Jim said, standing under the opening in the wall.
Arthur climbed up, and uttered an exclamation as his eyes became level with the opening. "I cannot see the town, but I think it must be all on fire; it is almost as light as day outside, the whole air is full of sparks and red clouds of smoke. It is tremendous!"
"Jump down and let us have a look," Jim said impatiently, and he and Jack had by turns a view of the scene. A quarter of an hour later the door opened suddenly and four of their guards ran in.
"Come, quick!" one of them said, and seizing the boys by their wrists they hurried them up the stairs. The house was in confusion. Men were packing up bundles and the bey giving directions in an angry voice. As soon as his eye fell on the boys he gave an order in Egyptian.
"Take off your clothes, quick!" The guard translated the order.
It was evidently no time for hesitation. The boys took off their waistcoats, jackets, and trousers, then the guard picked up from a bundle lying beside him three women's dresses, and wound them round them, bringing an end as usual over the head and falling down to the eyes. Then he put on the thick blue veil, extending across the face just under the eyes and falling down to the waist. The disguise was thus completed, and the three boys were transformed into Egyptian peasant women, of whom only the eyes were visible.
Another five minutes all were ready, and the bey with ten or twelve men and the boys started out from the house. Most of the men carried muskets, all had large bundles upon their shoulders. As they issued from the house the boys obtained a full sight of the city, and uttered a simultaneous exclamation as they did so. Half the city appeared to be in flames. A sea of fire extended from the port over the European quarter, including the great square, while in many other parts separate conflagrations were raging.
There was, however, no time to pause to examine the scene. The party hurried along until they came down upon the road leading across the narrow strip of land running between the two inland lakes. It was crowded with fugitives: mixed up pell-mell together were Egyptian soldiers in great numbers, and the population of the town--men, women, and children. For four hours they walked along. Then the throng along the road thinned; the Egyptian drums were sounding, and the soldiers turned off and lay down in the fields, ready to form into regiments again in the morning.
The rest of the fugitives, feeling that they were now beyond danger of pursuit, soon followed their example. The party to which the boys belonged kept on for a short distance further and then turned off. They followed a by-road for a quarter of a mile, and then stopped at a farm building. On their knocking at the door a peasant came out, but at a word from the bey he at once drew aside for the party to enter. The bey took possession of the cottage, and the men leaving their bundles inside threw themselves down on the ground without and were soon fast asleep. The idea that their captives might escape did not even occur to them.
The boys had thrown themselves down a little apart from the rest.
"This is a nice go," Jim said. "I suppose this chap is taking us off as hostages, and we may be dragged about like this for any time; for until an army is got together and conquers the whole country, I do not see how we are going to be released."
"I don't see what there is to prevent us going straight back again," Jack said; "we have got splendid disguises and might go anywhere."
"That is not a bad idea, Jack; but how are we to do it? Every one is coming the other way."
"Yes, I don't think we can go back by that road," Jack agreed; "but we might get round the other side of the lake, I should think."
"But how are we to do that, Jack? We do not know anything about the country."
"No, we do not know much about it, Jim; but I remember the day before we landed, when we were looking at that book Mr. Hoare lent us so as to get up something about Alexandria before we landed, there was a map of the town. I remember that the lake behind it, called Mareotis or some such name, extended some eight or ten miles to the west of the town, and is only separated from the sea by the high beach on which the Mex Forts stand. I do not see why we should not work round there, and get down on to the beach and make our way on to the town. Our fellows are sure to land to-morrow morning and take possession of it. We have passed across the isthmus between the two lakes, so the one we want to get round must lie somewhere to the north-west. Anyhow, the fire will be a guide to us. If we keep rather to the left of that we must strike the lake, and have only got to follow that to keep right."
"I am with you," Jim said. "What do you say, Arthur?"
"I am game," Arthur replied, "but let us be off at once. What time do you think it is?"
"I have no idea. I don't know how long we slept, but it was quite dark except for the fire, so it must certainly have been past eight o'clock. We set out half an hour later. I should say that it must be between twelve and one now, if not later. It will begin to get light again soon after four, so we have no time to lose."
"Well, let us crawl away as quietly as we can," Jack said. "I think those chaps are all asleep, but we cannot be too careful until we get a bit away from them."
The boys found it very difficult to crawl in their female garments, but kept on as noiselessly as possible until some distance from the cottage, then they stood up. They followed the lane until they came to the road, crossed the line of railway beyond it and swam the fresh-water canal, and then, guided by the glare of light over Alexandria, made their way across the fields. After half an hour's walking they found themselves on the shore of the lake. It was low and swampy, and they had to keep some distance from its edge. The reflection of the light on its smooth surface enabled them to follow its direction as well as if they had been walking close to it. They kept on until morning broke, by which time the glare of light above Alexandria lay due north of them.
"We had better lie up here," Jim said. "There is sure to be a village near the lake, and the first person who came across us and questioned us would find us out."
"I shall not be sorry to stop at all," Jack said, "for these loose yellow slipper things are horrid for walking in. I have tried going barefoot for a bit, but there are prickly things in the grass and I soon had to give that up."
There was no difficulty in finding shelter, for in many places belts of high rushes bordered the lake. Entering one of these for some little distance, and pressing down a lot of the rushes to make a dry bed on the damp earth, the lads lay down and were soon fast asleep. The sun was blazing high overhead when they awoke.
"My eye, isn't it hot!" was Jim Tucker's first exclamation. "It is enough to roast a fellow alive."
"It is hot," Jack agreed; "and the worst of it is there isn't anything to eat."
"No, and there is not likely to be," Jack replied, "till we get to Alexandria. There are the guns of the fleet still at it. It is evident that the forts have not surrendered. I don't see how we can possibly get along past those forts on the beach to the west as long as they hold out, besides it is not likely that there has been a landing from the ships yet, and the rabble of Alexandria will be plundering and killing. We shall be safer anywhere than there."
"So we should," Jack agreed. "But there is one thing quite certain, we cannot stop here without food or water. We might perhaps do without grub for a day or two, but certainly not without water. There is maize and grain ripe in the fields, so we shall do well enough for eating."
"I suppose they must have wells. People must drink here, Jack."
"I suppose there must be wells," Jack said doubtfully. "But, you see, the water in this lake is salt, and I should say they get no fresh water anywhere near, because the ground is so sandy. I rather expect they get it in small channels from the fresh-water canal."
"Well, anyhow, we can get water there," Arthur Hill said. "I vote we go back there again. Not of course anywhere near where the Egyptians are; though I do not know whether that would make much difference, for we should be on one side of the canal and they on the other. Still, we had better go beyond them; then we can, as you say, keep ourselves going by picking maize or corn or whatever we can find for a day or two, till we hear the firing cease."
"There are sure to be some boats somewhere on this lake," Jack said, "and we might get hold of one and go across to Alexandria some night, and reconnoitre. If we find there are no sailors or troops there, we can take to our boat and pull back again. I think it would be better to do that than to try to work round by the sea-shore, for I believe they have fortifications running across from the sea to the lake, so as to prevent the place from being attacked by a force landing beyond the forts."
"Well, I vote we set out at once," Jim Tucker said. "I am frightfully thirsty. There are very few houses as far as I can see; if we keep a sharp look-out we ought to be able to manage so as not to meet anyone. If any peasant does run against us and ask questions, so much the worse for him."
The others agreed, and they at once started across the country, which was only cultivated here and there. They laid their course so as to strike the canal at a point some miles higher up than that at which they had left it. They only saw a few peasants in the fields, and made detours so as not to come near any of these. On the way they picked a dozen heads of maize, but were too thirsty to attempt to eat them. After three hours' walking the vegetation became brighter and greener, the cultivated fields thicker, and in another half hour they stood on the bank of the canal. They went down to the edge, knelt down and took a long drink.
"Shouldn't I like a dip!" Arthur Hill said.
"We will have one, Arthur, when it gets dark; it would never do to bathe now. I do not see a soul about, but still someone might come up on the further bank at any moment, and our white skins would betray us at once. Now we have had a good drink we can hold on. We will go back again now, and sit down among the bushes and eat our corn."
When they had finished their meal the boys agreed that maize eaten raw was not by any means desirable food; however, it satisfied their hunger, and they sat discussing their plans until evening. They agreed that Arthur Hill's plan was certainly the best.
"We will give them one more day," Jim Tucker said. "I vote we stop here to-night, then have a good drink in the morning and then start back again, keeping along the canal here until we are close to the lake; then we will have another good drink and start out and walk along the lake until we find a boat, then we will hide away somewhere near it and cross after it gets dark."
It was agreed that this plan should be carried out, and after a good night's rest they started again next morning. They kept down by the foot of the bank of the canal, and followed it until they saw the lake stretching away on the left, then they went up and had another drink.
"Hurrah!" Arthur Hill exclaimed, as he picked up a broken earthenware pot, which had apparently been thrown out by some passing boat; "this will hold a quart of water. That will give us a drink each to-night."
As they walked they had heard the heavy guns still booming over the sea, and felt by no means certain that the troops had yet landed. However, they determined not to put off their expedition across the lake if they could find a boat. Carrying their jar of water carefully with them, they struck across to the lake and followed it as before, keeping a careful look-out for boats. They had proceeded about two miles along its edge, when they saw the stern of a boat projecting beyond the rushes that fringed the water's edge, and pushing more rapidly forward they came upon a beaten path through the reeds, and following this came upon a low flat boat, very roughly constructed.
"It is not much of a craft," Jim Tucker said; "but it will do for us capitally. Now, we have only to lie down and take things quietly until dark. I fancy it is about three o'clock in the afternoon now by the sun."
They lay down among a clump of bushes a short distance from the lake, and as soon as the sun had set went back to the boat again. They had already made another meal, and had finished their maize and water. They stood by the boat waiting until it should become perfectly dark, and looking across the tranquil sheet of water at the distant town, over which the smoke still hung heavily, and as the sky darkened flashes of fire could be seen. They were at last just going to get on board when they heard an exclamation of surprise behind them. Looking round they saw two natives, who had evidently come down with the intention of going out in their boat.
CHAPTER XIII.
AMONG FRIENDS.
THE astonishment of the two natives at seeing, as they supposed, three women standing with their boat, was no less than that of the boys at being thus suddenly surprised. Suspecting no harm, however, they at once moved forward, asking in Egyptian, "What are you doing here with our boat?"
"Down with them, boys?" Jim Tucker exclaimed, and at once threw himself upon one of the boatmen, while Jack and Arthur instantly sprang upon the other.
Wholly unprepared for the attack, the men were thrown down almost without resistance.
"Get some rope from the boat, Arthur!" Jim Tucker exclaimed.
Leaving Jack to hold the prostrate man, Arthur Hill jumped on board the boat, and in a minute returned with two pieces of rope. With these the arms and legs of the natives were soon firmly tied.
"Now, what are we going to do next?" Jim Tucker asked.
"It would not do to leave them here," Jack said. "If they managed to untie each other they would give the alarm, and if we had to come back we should be caught. If they could not manage to untie each other they might lie here and die. I think we had better take them with us."
"I suppose that will be the best plan," Jim agreed. "I do not know that it will make much difference in the end, for they must be left tied somewhere; still, it would certainly make it safer for us."
Accordingly the men were lifted into the boat and laid down in the bottom. Then the boys threw off the female garments, and taking the long poles punted the boat out into the lake. The water was so shallow, that it was not until they had gone more than a mile from shore that they laid in the poles and took to the clumsy oars. An hour's rowing, and the shore began to rise high in front of them. As they approached it they stopped rowing, and listened attentively.
"Now, before we go any nearer we had better gag these fellows," Jack said. "If they were to set-to to shout as soon as we had landed, our chance of getting back again would be at an end."
They tore off two strips from the cloths, rolled them up, and put them in the prisoners' mouths, putting some lashings across so that they could not get them out; then they put the men so far apart in the boat that they could not touch each other, and lashed them in these positions. This done they again wrapped themselves in their women's garments, and quietly rowed to the shore. They had but little fear of finding anyone here. The natives, if no landing had been effected from the ships, would be all engaged in the work of plundering; while if the English had taken possession of the town they would probably be keeping in their houses. No one was near when they landed, and fastening the head-rope of the boat to a stone they pushed her gently off again.
"If anyone should come along," Jim said, "it is too dark for them to see those fellows lying in the boat. Now, we must take our bearings accurately as we go along, so as to be able to find the boat again if things go wrong with us."
They had landed half a mile beyond the town, and now made their way towards it. As they came to the houses a few people were about, but no one paid any attention to the three veiled figures. The glare of light was a sufficient indication to them of the direction they should follow, for they had agreed that if a landing had been made the sailors would be certain to be at work trying to put a stop to the spread of the flames.
Presently they came to the edge of the district swept by the fire. The walls for the most part were standing, although in many cases they had fallen across the road. The heaps of rubbish inside still glowed, and now and then little tongues of fire leapt up. On they went, making their way very cautiously until they reached a wide open space surrounded by ruins.
"This is the great square," Jack said. "Look, there is the fountain still playing in the middle. There are some fires there too, and a lot of people round them."
"Let us wait a bit. If they are Egyptians we shall be in a nice mess."
They stood for some time, afraid to approach closer, then they heard a burst of laughter.
"That must be English," Jack said. "I don't believe Egyptians ever laugh like that."
"I don't think so either. Let us move a bit closer; but mind, we must be ready for a bolt if we find we are wrong."
They went quietly forward, and again stood irresolute. Presently they heard a voice call "Tom Jones!" and heard the reply "Aye, aye, sir!"
"It is all right!" Jim exclaimed joyfully, and they at once hurried forward. They soon arrived at the fire, round which three or four naval officers were sitting. The boys tore the veils from their faces and threw back the cotton cloth from over their heads, and a general exclamation of surprise broke from the officers as they saw the heads of three European boys.
"Hallo!" one of them exclaimed. "Who are you, and where do you spring from?"
"We were wounded and carried off last month, on the day of the rising," Jim said, "and have been kept prisoners ever since, sir. We got away the night after the bombardment, and have just arrived. We belong to the barque _Wild Wave_; we are midshipmen on board her."
"Well, I am glad you have got out of their hands," the officer said; "but I cannot do anything for you now. These rascals keep on setting the town on fire in fresh places, and we are just starting to put one out that began half an hour ago."
"What is this?" an officer asked, hurrying up to the spot.
"Three lads, Lord Charles, who have been kept prisoners by the Egyptians for the last month, and have just escaped. They belong to a merchant vessel, and were captured at the rising."
"Please to march off your men at once, sir; I will overtake you in a minute or two. Well, lads, what can I do for you?"
"Well, sir, you might give us something to eat, perhaps," Jim suggested. "We have had next to nothing for the last three days."
"Come along with me," Lord Charles Beresford said, and he hurried with them to another party of sailors at the further end of the square.
"Give those lads something to eat and drink," he said. "You had better stop here until I come back, lads, then I will see what can be done for you."
A kettle was boiling over a fire, and before many minutes the lads were supplied with a basin each of cocoa and a lump of bread, and felt as they ate their supper that their troubles were at an end. It required, however, more than one bowl of cocoa and a considerable quantity of bread before their appetites were appeased.
While taking their supper the boys gave to the officers gathered round them a sketch of the adventures they had gone through.
"Now that you have done your supper," one of the officers said, "I suppose the next thing you want is some clothes. The question is how to get them."
"Yes, sir; it is awful going about like this."
"Well, you are rather objects," the officer agreed with a laugh; "but I do not see what is to be done for you at present. You see, all this part of the town is burned down, and the shops in the other parts are all locked up and deserted, and most of them have already been broken into and robbed. We have no time to see about that sort of thing at present; our time is entirely occupied in fighting the fire, and in preventing these scoundrels from lighting fresh ones. There were seven or eight fresh outbreaks to-day. However, you must stop here for the present. Lord Charles Beresford will not be long before he is back, I daresay."
In another half hour the party of sailors returned, having pulled down two or three houses, and prevented the flames from spreading. Their commander at once came up to the boys, followed by a sailor bringing a large bundle.
"I have not forgotten you, youngsters. One of the houses we pulled down was a clothier's, which had by some good luck or other escaped being looted, so I told the men to pick out half a dozen suits and as many caps, and bring them on. They would only have been taken by the natives directly our backs were turned. No doubt you will find something there to fit you."
With great joy the boys seized the bundle, and going a little distance off examined its contents. After a good deal of trying on they each found things that fitted them fairly. Feeling vastly more comfortable in their new attire, they rejoined the sailors.
"I expect your ship has left long ago," Lord Charles said. "Your best plan will be to go round in the morning to the consul, Mr. Cookson. He has established himself in a temporary office just beyond the range of the fire. One of my men will show you the way. Most likely your captain will have left some message with him in case you turned up again. After you have seen him you can, if you like, come back here; I daresay I shall be able to find something for you to do. Or if you like you can be sent off to one of the steamers, where the refugees are on board."
"We would much rather stay here, sir, if we may," Jim Tucker said. "We will do anything that you like to set us to."
As they sat by the fire talking with the officers the boys learned what had happened in the town. As soon as it became evident that the fire of the ships of war was mastering that of the forts the troops and the populace began the work of plunder. The European stores were all broken into; everything portable was carried away and the furniture broken and smashed.
Fire was applied in scores of places. A considerable number of the poorer classes of Europeans had remained in their houses, being afraid to desert their possessions, and many of these houses were broken into by the mob and the inmates massacred.
It was calculated that upwards of five hundred were killed. The clerks at the Anglo-Egyptian Bank had determined to stay and defend it, and as soon as the work of plunder and massacre began a number of Europeans made for this point, and the little garrison was swelled until it numbered nearly a hundred men. The place had been attacked by the mob and soldiers; but had held out gallantly and beaten off the assailants, who had before long scattered to points where plunder could be more easily obtained.
At night a steam-launch from the fleet entered the harbour. Two or three men had landed, and making their way through the burning streets returned and reported the town was empty.
The next morning at daylight a force had landed and driven the plunderers from the European part of the town, while the ships had battered the forts that still held out. The following day a strong force of marines came ashore and patrolled the streets. At the sight of the British uniforms many doors were opened, and the wretched inmates, who had for forty-eight hours being trembling for their lives, made their way down to the water-side and went off to the ships. In the evening, a short time before the boys arrived, four hundred and fifty men had been landed from the British ships, and one hundred and twenty-five from an American man-of-war, and these at once set about the work of re-establishing order.
In the morning a sailor conducted the boys to the house where Mr. Cookson had established himself. As soon as they gave an account of themselves to him he shook them heartily by the hand.
"I am glad to see you back in safety, lads. Your captain was in a great way about your loss, and hunted high and low for you. He traced you to the spot where the riot began, but could learn nothing more; and as none of your bodies could be found, we had hopes that you had not been killed. Of course he could not delay his vessel here, and went on to Smyrna. He was going to look in here again on his way back; but as he has not done so, he probably got a freight and had to sail straight home. He asked me if you did turn up to let you have any money you required, and to do all I could for you. I can let you have the money, but I cannot do much else beyond sending you on board one of the ships outside to wait there until there is a chance of sending you home."
"Thank you very much, sir," Jim said. "We shall be glad of some money, but we do not want to go on board ship. Lord Beresford said he would give us something to do here."
"Oh, if Lord Charles said that, I need not trouble about you," the consul said. "He will find you plenty of work. How much shall I give you each?"
"I think two pounds apiece, sir, would be plenty," Jim said. "One does not like having no money; but I do not see how we are going to spend it."
The lads now went back to the square, and there waited for some hours, Lord Charles Beresford being away at work. He returned at mid-day, by which time the party in the square had cooked the dinners for their comrades. There were now two thousand sailors and marines on shore, posted in various open places, the grand square serving as head-quarters. Sailors and officers were alike blackened with ashes and dust, having been engaged in the work of pulling down houses and checking the progress of the flames.
Lord Charles called the lads to him and made them sit down and join the officers and himself at dinner, and while the meal was going on he obtained from them an account of their adventures. When they had finished he said to one of the marine officers: "Captain Archer, you are to take command of that gang of fellows over there," pointing to some two hundred natives who were gathered a short distance away, "I hope we shall have a thousand at work to-morrow morning. You can take these young gentlemen with you; they will remain under your command for the present, and you will put them on rations. It will be a great thing getting these gangs of natives at work. I shall have time now to put a stop to the looting and incendiarism. Besides, they say the Egyptian troops are approaching the town again. I only hope they will try to come in."
There was a murmur of agreement among the circle of officers. The moment the meal was over the party rose, for there was no time to waste. Captain Archer, followed by the three boys and six marines, went over to the group of natives, by whom one of the dragomans of the consulate was standing.
"These are all I could hire to-day, sir," the man said. "They are too much frightened to come out of their houses. To-morrow we shall get plenty of men. The consul told me to go with you as interpreter."
"Thank goodness for that," the captain said. "I was wondering how I was going to get them to understand me. Tell them to fall-in two and two and follow."
Through the streets, where the heat from the houses was so intense that they hurried through with their hands shading their faces, clambering over masses of fallen stonework, broken furniture, and goods of all sorts scattered about, the party made their way to the edge of the fire. Here the flames were ascending, and the conflagration was still spreading, although fortunately but slowly, for there was scarce any wind.
"Now, lads," the captain said, "set to work and get down four houses on each side of the way."
The marines set the example by entering the houses, and, running upstairs, soon managed to break their way through the tiles and emerge upon the roofs.
"Come on, darkies!" they shouted. "Don't be afraid of blacking your hands!" They at once began to throw off the tiles, and were soon joined by a score of the most active natives.
"That is right, down with them!" the captain shouted, and in a very few minutes the last tiles had fallen. As soon as the shower had ceased the whole of the contents of the houses were carried into the streets. Then the marines began with the axes and crowbars with which they were provided to tear up the floor-boards and break down the rafters and beams. Then grapnels fastened to long ropes were fixed on the top of the brickwork, a score of hands caught hold, and the lightly-built wall readily yielded to the strain, coming down in great masses. As soon as the walls had fallen the natives were set to work carrying away the beams and woodwork, and in a little more than half an hour from the time the operations commenced two heaps of brickwork and rubbish alone marked the spot where the eight houses had stood.
As soon as the work was finished the party moved on into the next street, there to repeat the operations. As parties of sailors were at work at a score of other places the operations proceeded rapidly, and by nightfall the workers had the satisfaction of knowing that the fire was completely cut off, and that there was no chance of its spreading farther. Four other outbreaks had occurred in the course of the day. In two cases the sailors arrived upon the spot before the incendiaries had made their escape. One man was shot, and four taken before the Egyptian magistrate who had been appointed to try cases, and they were, after their guilt had been fully proved, sentenced to death and summarily hanged.
The following evening, on their going round to the consulate as usual to hear if he had received any news of the _Wild Wave_, Mr. Cookson said, "I had a telegram an hour since, lads, saying that your ship arrived in the Thames yesterday, and asking if I had any news of you. I have sent off my answer, 'All here safe and well, making themselves useful and waiting instructions.' I am sure to get an answer some time to-morrow."
The next day the answer came, "Delighted at news. Tell boys remain Alexandria. Ship coming out with cargo coal."
CHAPTER XIV.
A SET OF RASCALS.
THE work of pacification had gone on steadily. It was on Thursday evening, the 13th of July, the boys had returned to the town. On the 15th Captain Fisher, who was in command of the naval party on shore, marched through the streets disarming the Egyptian soldiers, of whom there were large numbers still in the place, and had a skirmish with a strong party of them at the Rosetta gate. Lord Charles Beresford was in charge of the police arrangements, and with a force of marines and three hundred disarmed Egyptian soldiers was occupied in stamping out the fires and in arresting marauders. A large number of Arabs were also enlisted in the service.
The population now began to return to the city. Many of the lower class of Greeks and Italians landed from the vessels, and were a source of continual trouble, as they at once took to plundering what the natives had left.
On Monday morning the 38th Regiment and the third battalion of the 60th Rifles arrived in the harbour, and were at once landed. General Sir Archibald Alison also arrived and assumed the command on shore, and the following day a body of troops marched along the line of railway to Ramleh, six miles distant. Ramleh stands at the point where a narrow neck of land connects the peninsula on which Alexandria stands with the mainland. Along this narrow isthmus run the road, the railway, and the Sweet-water Canal, and here there is a pumping-station, by which water is raised to a higher level for the supply of Alexandria.
The khedive has a summer palace at Ramleh, and here are a large number of pretty villas, the summer abodes of the merchants of Alexandria. It was an important position, for here any advance upon the city from the east could be readily checked.
Thursday was a busy day for the police and troops in Alexandria, for a high wind got up and fanned the masses of embers into flames again, and serious fires broke out in several places. The boys were busily engaged all day. They acted now as aides-de-camp to Lord Charles Beresford, carrying his orders to the various working parties, and making themselves generally useful.
Lord Charles had established himself with his officers in an empty house, and the three boys had a room assigned to them here. The party all messed together. In the evening Lord Charles said to the officers, "I hear that the khedive's people have got news that Arabi is damming up the Sweet-water Canal. We shall have a deal of trouble if he does. There is very bad news, too, from the country. They say that everywhere except at Cairo the natives have risen and massacred the Europeans. Arabi has ordered all the able-bodied men in the country to join the army."
"I don't call the last part bad news," Captain Archer said. "We shall have ten thousand men here in a short time, and the more of these scoundrels that are gathered together the better, so that we can end it at one blow. If Arabi does but stand there is no doubt as to the result. The thing that would puzzle us would be for him and his troops to march away into Upper Egypt and lead us a long dance there. In this tremendous heat our fellows would not be able to march far, and it would be like a tortoise trying to catch a hare, hunting them all over the country. The more men Arabi gets together the more likely he is to make a stand and fight it out."
"There is no doubt that is the case," Lord Charles agreed. "We shall make short work of them directly Lord Wolseley and the troops arrive. However, I hope we sha'n't be idle in the meantime. There are two more regiments expected to-morrow or next day, and I expect we shall see some fighting then. The soldiers are furious at the frightful destruction that has taken place, and they will make it hot for these fellows if they get a chance of going at them. They say that they are throwing up tremendous fortifications across the isthmus."
On Sunday night the 46th Regiment arrived. The water in the canal was now sinking fast. A dam had been erected at its mouth to keep in what water it contained. Order had now been restored in the town, and the plundering had been almost put a stop to. The next morning a wing of the 60th and a squadron of mounted infantry went out beyond Ramleh. The enemy's cavalry were driven off, and there was an exchange of artillery fire between some heavy guns that had been sent out by rail and placed into position there, and Arabi's battery.
The next week was a quiet one, but on Friday the 28th a reconnaissance was made by a railway train, which Captain Fisher of the navy had plated with iron. It was manned by sailors, and carried a heavy gun and several Gatlings. The enemy on seeing it approaching came out in force, but were driven back by the guns of the train and those in the batteries at Ramleh. The reconnaissance showed that the Egyptians had erected a number of strong works across the end of the isthmus.
As the work of the bands of hired natives was now only clearing up rubbish and litter, the boys agreed that as there was no more fun to be had in the way of putting out fires, they might as well give up what they called slave-driving, and enjoy themselves until the _Wild Wave_ arrived. They had only undertaken the work as an alternative to going on board one of the crowded ships in the harbour, and as the population were now returning and the shops opening again there was no occasion for their further stay as overlookers of the scavengers. Several temporary inns had been opened by enterprising Italians for the benefit of those who on landing from the ships found their houses burned, sacked, or uninhabitable.
"I vote," Jack said the first morning that they were free to do exactly as they liked, "that we go up and have a look at our prison."
"A bright idea!" Jim Tucker said. "But that is an out-of-the-way part, Jack, and there may be some of those skulking thieves hanging about there."
"They won't catch us napping this time, Jim."
The boys had, in fact, armed themselves from the store of weapons that had been taken from the natives or found scattered about in the streets and houses. These weapons had been piled up in a shed, and as they had no owners the boys concluded that it would be as well to pick some out for themselves, having previously asked their officer to allow them to do so, as they were entirely without arms. He at once gave them permission to take what they liked, and each had taken two revolvers--a full-sized one which they wore openly in their belts, and a small one in their jacket-pockets. The precaution was by no means a useless one, as on carrying messages for their commander from one part of the town to the other they had often to pass through narrow streets. So armed the boys had no fear of being attacked when together, and after breakfast they started on their trip of exploration.
As they knew nothing of the road by which they had been taken to the house, and had again left it after nightfall, they were by no means sure as to its exact position, the only indication being the view they had obtained of the sea from its garden. When once beyond the town they found almost all the houses entirely deserted; for bands of plunderers were still pillaging everywhere beyond the range of the parties of British troops, and even after Ramleh was occupied they made their way along the shore from the direction of the Aboukir Forts, and broke into the houses and carried away their contents.
"I think this must be just about the position," Jim said at last. "I should say from the other side of that house there must be just the same view we had."
The gate was locked and closed, but the boys soon found a place where they could enter the grounds. Upon going round to the north side of the house they found that they had judged correctly, for they at once recognized the appearance of the building and the various objects in the garden.
"Here is the bank from which we watched the bombardment," Arthur Hill said. "Well, we have got better out of it than seemed likely then."
"That we have," Jack agreed. "Now, Jim, I suppose we may as well get into the house and have a look at it. I should like to get something to carry away. I don't want anything valuable, but something as a sort of memento of our prison."
"It would serve the beggar right," Jim said, "if we were to set fire to his place and burn it down."
"It might serve him right if someone else were to do it," Jack said; "but not for us, Jim. He saved our lives, you see. If it had not been for him we should never have come alive out of that street."
"That is so," Jim agreed; "but you know when we talked it over we were all of opinion that he carried us off only to act as hostages for himself."
"Well, I know we agreed that that was it, Jim; but after all we cannot be sure about it. It may have been that, but on the other hand he may really have wanted to save our lives. He would not dare treat us kindly, and was obliged to keep us imprisoned because of the fellows round him. For you know he really did treat us well. We may be sure that black fellow of his did not bring us down fruit and other things each meal without his knowledge."
"It may have been that," Jim assented, "though I doubt it. I am convinced he only carried us off and treated us well in order to get good terms for himself if things went wrong."
"Perhaps so, Jim; but whatever the reason he did save our lives, and he did treat us well, and I feel obliged to him. Now, let us look at the house. I wonder whether it is empty?"
"Oh, of course it is empty. Why, we saw all his fellows coming away with us."
"Yes, but that is no reason why it should be empty, Jim. There are lots of these plundering fellows about. We know they do not come back into the town because we have got guards at the gates, and I expect they hide up during the day in some of these deserted houses. Anyhow we may as well keep our eyes open till we know the place is clear."
Jim agreed to the prudence of the suggestion, and they went up to the house. The door opening into the garden was fastened, but the wooden shutters outside one of the windows about four feet from the ground were unfastened, and swung open as they touched them. The window inside was closed.
"Just give me a back, Arthur," Jack said. "I have no doubt I can open the fastenings."
Standing on Arthur's shoulders Jack took out his knife, and had no difficulty in inserting the blade between the frames of the window, which opened inwards, and in pushing back the slight and simple fastening. He pushed the window open, and had his foot on the sill ready to enter when he paused.
"What is it, Jack?" Jim asked impatiently.
"There is somebody in the house," Jack said in a low voice. "I can hear talking." He stepped very quietly down into the room, and a minute later the others stood beside him.
It was as Jack had said, there was a loud sound of talking somewhere in the house.
"What shall we do, Jim?" Jack whispered.
"We will go and have a look at them," Jim replied. "We have got two revolvers apiece, and are a match for a dozen Egyptians anyway; and besides, if they haven't seen us, and I don't suppose they have, as we came round at the back of the house, they will think we are officers and have got a lot of men behind us."
With their pistols drawn and cocked the boys moved quietly across the room and into a passage. The voices came from a room in the front of the house. The door was open. They crept up to it and then suddenly rushed in.
"Surrender," Jim shouted, "or we fire!"
The lads were astonished at the sight that met their eyes. They had expected to see a group of natives; instead of that they saw a party of eight or ten Greeks and Italians sitting on the ground playing cards. The room was piled with goods of all sorts--silk curtains, females' dresses, clocks, rich ornaments, choice carpets, and other articles. The fellows uttered a shout of astonishment and dismay at seeing, as they believed, three English officers suddenly appear before them; for by this time the boys had been able to rig themselves out in naval costume again. Their appearance and that of the six levelled revolvers completely paralyzed the party at cards.
"Throw down all your weapons in the centre," Jack said peremptorily. "Not a moment's delay, or we will call our men in and string you up!"
Two or three of the party understood English, and at once threw their pistols and knives into the centre of the circle; the others understanding the order from their action did the same.
"Just collect them, Arthur, and take them into the next room," Jim Tucker said, "before they have time to think about it."
Arthur stepped forward, gathered up the weapons, and carried them into the next room.
"We are all right now," Jim said in a low tone.
"Now, Arthur, you run down to the town as hard as you can and tell the first officer you meet we have got a gang of plunderers here, and ask him to bring up a guard and capture them; we will stand sentry till you come back."
Arthur without question obeyed Jim's orders: went to the front door, opened it, and ran off at the top of his speed. The prisoners now began to recover from the first panic, and to guess the true state of the case. Angry oaths were uttered, and they began to talk to each other in rapid tones.
"You had better sit still!" Jim shouted. "The first man that makes a move I will blow his brains out. Jack, you stand on one side of the circle and I will stand on the other. The first man who moves in the slightest, shoot him."
Jack moved round to the other side of the circle. The marauders, with a foe behind and another in front armed with revolvers, and themselves without weapons, did not dare to move, knowing that they would be shot down before they could gain their feet. Half an hour passed and then there was a tramp of feet heard outside, and a moment later a naval officer accompanied by Arthur and followed by a party of ten blue-jackets entered the room. In a couple of minutes the men's hands were all tied behind them, and they were led outside the house.
"You have made a fine haul, young gentlemen," the officer said as he walked from room to room. Everywhere articles of value were piled up, and it was evident that the gang must for the last fortnight have been engaged in looting all the villas and houses along the road to Ramleh. "I expect we have got the whole gang, but I will leave four men here in charge with orders to make prisoners of anyone that enters. We will lodge these scoundrels in jail, and then make our report. There is an immense lot of valuable property here, and I should think it had better be taken down into the town and kept there until claimed by its rightful owners."
Leaving the four sailors on guard, the party with the prisoners in their midst marched down again to the town, and the latter were speedily lodged in jail. On the affair being reported to Lord Charles Beresford a party of marines and natives with hand-carts were sent up to the house, and the whole of its contents brought down to an empty house in the town. Here the articles were inspected by many merchants and other owners of villas at Ramleh and near the town, and many of the articles were at once identified by them. The next day the band of plunderers were brought up before the court, presided over by one of the khedive's judges; and the boys having given their evidence, and the owners of many of the plundered villas swearing to their property, the whole band were sentenced to receive three dozen lashes apiece and to be imprisoned for two years.
The lads gained much credit by the capture, and were each presented with a handsome gold watch and chain, subscribed for by those whose property they had been the means of recovering.
CHAPTER XV.
A THREATENING SKY.
AT the end of July so large a number of troops had arrived that the services of the sailors on shore were no longer required, and with the exception of those serving with the iron-clad train they returned on board, the marines, however, still remaining in the town. On the 4th of August the lads heard that a reconnaissance would take place next day, and that there would probably be a fight. Accordingly in the evening they walked up to Ramleh, and slept for the night in one of the deserted houses. The trains soon began to arrive loaded with troops, and the boys took up their position near one of the batteries on the sand-hills, where they could obtain an excellent view over the isthmus between the lakes Mareotis and Aboukir.
The advance soon began; it was composed of six companies of the 60th Rifles, four companies of the 38th, and four of the 46th. These were to march by the canal, while seven companies of the marines moved along the railway embankment in company with the iron-clad train. The two parties were to join at the point where the canal and the railway approach closely to each other. The ground between the two embankments consisted of fields and marshy swamps.
The boys watched the 60th Rifles extending in skirmishing order, and as soon as they began to advance a movement was visible in the enemy's lines, and the Egyptians took up their position in a deep ditch across the line of advance and opened a heavy fire upon the Rifles.
The Egyptians were altogether invisible, their position being only marked by a light line of smoke rising in front of a thick jungle. Fortunately they fired high, and the boys could see that the Rifles continued advancing without much loss. When they neared the Egyptian position the supports came up to the skirmishing line, and the whole went forward at a rush. The instant they did so the Egyptians sprang from their ditch and rushed into the jungle behind.
The column was intended to advance to a white house on the canal, at the point where the railway came close to it; but its commander misunderstanding his orders stopped at a white house before he came to it. Thus the marines advancing along the embankment were left unsupported. They had been met with a hot fire from the enemy, who were posted in a large house surrounded by entrenchments, on which some guns had been mounted. The guns on the train kept up a steady fire on this position, and the marines pushing forward were soon hotly engaged by the enemy's infantry, who were massing in great numbers on both of their flanks.
As the marines were now far in advance of the other column, the order was given them to fall back. To cover this movement, Major Donald with fifty men advanced boldly close to the Egyptian position, and kept up so hot a fire that the enemy's advance was checked, while the main bodies of the marines retired steadily across the fields to the embankment, keeping perfect order in spite of the tremendous fire that was poured into them, and bringing off every wounded man as he fell. Major Donald's party then fell back rapidly and joined them.
The enemy had now brought up several batteries of artillery, which opened upon the marines, while the infantry pressed forward in heavy masses. The marines, however, aided by the musketry fire of the sailors in the train, as well as by their machine-guns and heavy pieces of artillery, kept them at bay as they fell back along the embankment, and as soon as the Egyptians came within range, the guns at Ramleh opened upon them, and they fell back to their camps, while the British columns returned to Ramleh.
The object of the reconnaissance had been served by the discovery of the strength and position of the enemy's batteries, and it was evident that it would need a large force to carry the formidable positions which guarded the isthmus.
A week later the lads, on paying their usual morning visit to the consulate, heard to their delight that the _Wild Wave_ had just been signalled approaching the harbour, which was now crowded with shipping, as steamers laden with troops were arriving every day from England. The lads hurried down to the port, and as soon as the _Wild Wave_ dropped her anchor they were alongside of her. They were very warmly greeted by the captain and officers as they came on board ship.
"Well, you young scamps," Captain Murchison said after the first greetings were over, "you have given us a nice fright. What has it all been about? for at present we have heard nothing whatever beyond the fact that you were safe; and we are prepared to put you in irons for desertion unless you can give us a completely satisfactory explanation of your absence. Mr. Timmins and myself are strongly of opinion that you simply hid yourselves till the vessel sailed, so as to be able to have a run on shore and see all that was going on."
"We are very glad we have seen it, sir," Jim said; "but I don't think it was at all our fault that we were left behind." And he then proceeded to relate to the captain the story of what had befallen them since they last met.
"Well, lads, I congratulate you on your escape, which was certainly a very narrow one. You have, I hope, all written to your friends at home to tell them everything that has taken place. It was most fortunate that your telegram from here arrived the day after we got to England, so that your friends practically received the news that you were missing and that you were safe at the same time. We had delayed sending off letters telling them that you were lost until we could receive an answer to our telegram to the consul. I went over and saw your mother and sister the same evening, Jack. Of course your mother was in some alarm at the thought of the danger she pictured to herself that you must have gone through. I told her I expected that when the row began you had hid up somewhere, and that not knowing that matters had quieted down again you had remained there until after we sailed."
The boys had all written home on the day after they had rejoined their friends in Alexandria, and had, a week before the arrival of the _Wild Wave_, received answers to their letters. An hour later an officer came off with orders that the coal was not to be discharged on shore, but that the transports would come alongside and fill up from her. For a week all hands were engaged in the unpleasant duty of discharging the coal. Steamer after steamer came alongside and took from one to three hundred tons on board, to supply the place of the coal consumed on the outward voyage. All on board were heartily glad when the work was over, the decks scrubbed and washed down, and the hose at work upon the bulwarks and rigging.
"We shall not be clean again till we have had twelve hour's rain on her," Captain Murchison said. "It is the first time so far as I know that the _Wild Wave_ has carried coal, and I hope it will be the last, so long as I command her."
"Yes, I have been feeling a good deal like a chimney-sweep for the last week, sir," Mr. Timmins remarked; "and shall not feel clean again till all my togs have been ashore and had a regular wash."
"I shall be glad to be out of this harbour," the captain said. "These tideless harbours soon get very unpleasant when there is much shipping in them. And yet I own I should like to wait to see the attack on the Egyptian position. I believe the last transports came in to-day, and as Lord Wolseley arrived two days ago, I suppose they will be at it in a day or two. However, as I sent off a telegram this morning saying that we were empty, I suppose we shall get orders this afternoon or to-morrow morning to go somewhere."
Late in the afternoon they were surprised by seeing the boats of the fleet and transports occupied in re-embarking large numbers of troops.
"Something is evidently up," Mr. Hoare said, as he stood with the lads watching the busy scene. "I suppose Lord Wolseley thinks it will cost too many lives to attack the Egyptian position in front, and that he is going to make a fresh landing somewhere along the coast so as to march round and take them in the rear. Or it may be he is going to sail up the canal and land at Ismailia; in that way, if he is sharp, he may get between Arabi and Cairo, and cut the enemy off altogether from the capital."
The next morning at daybreak the great fleet of men-of-war and transports steamed away for the East on their way to Ismailia, and the _Wild Wave_, which had got her orders late the evening before, sailed for Genoa, where she was to take on board a cargo for England. Six weeks later she entered St. Katharine's Docks, and the three midshipmen were at once released from duty. Jack had already packed up his small kit, and, taking the train to Fenchurch St. and then a bus to Dulwich, was soon home. As the ship had been signalled when she passed the Downs, he was expected, and received a joyous welcome. Great was the interest of his mother and sister in the adventures he had passed through, and they were delighted with the gold watch and the inscription, stating that it had been presented to him by merchants of Alexandria whose property he had been the means of rescuing from its plunderers.
The next morning Mrs. Robson received a note asking her to come up with Jack and Lily to dine with the Godstones. Jack learned that while he had been away Lily had been often there spending the day with Mildred, who was nearly her own age. On their arrival Mildred took her off to her own room to have tea, while Jack dined with Mr. Godstone and his wife, and after dinner had again to repeat the full story of his adventures. His stay in England was a short one, for the _Wild Wave_, as soon as she had unloaded her cargo from Italy, was chartered for Calcutta, via the Cape, and a fortnight after his arrival at home Jack was again summoned to rejoin his ship.
The _Wild Wave_ was again fortunate in her weather during the early part of her voyage, but when off the Cape encountered a heavy gale. Jack had never before seen a storm at sea, and, accustomed as he was to the short choppy waves at the mouth of the Thames, he was astonished at the size of those he now beheld. They seemed to him as large in comparison to the size of the barque as those he had before seen were to that of the smack. For three days the vessel lay to. Fortunately the glass had given notice of the approach of the storm, and all the upper spars had been sent down and the vessel got under snug canvas before it struck her, and she therefore rode out the gale with no farther damage than the carrying away of part of her bulwarks, and the loss of some hen-coops and various other of her deck gear. As soon as the gale abated sail was made, and they continued on their course.
"Glad it is over, eh, Master Robson?" the sailmaker, Joe Culver, said to Jack as he was leaning against the bulwark on the evening after the storm had subsided, looking at the reflection of the setting sun on the glassy slopes of the long swell that was still heaving. Joe Culver, or, as he was always called on board, Old Joe, was a character; he had sailed as man and boy over fifty-five years on board ships belonging to the firm; and now, although sixty-seven years old, was still active and hearty. It was a legend among the sailors that Old Joe had not changed in the slightest degree from the time he was entered in the ship's books as a boy.
"Old Joe is like the figure-head of a ship," a sailor said one day. "He got carved out of wood when he was little; and though he has got dinted about a bit, he ain't never changed nothing to speak of. If you could but paint him up a bit he would be as good as new."
Joe could have gone into quarters on shore with a pension years before, for his long service had made him a marked character; and while other sailors came and went in the service of the firm, the fact that his name had been on their books for so long a period, with but two breaks, had made him a sort of historical character, and at the end of each long voyage he was always expected to show himself at the office to have a few words with the head of the firm. He was still rated as an able seamen, with extra pay as sailmaker, but he was never expected to go aloft. In every other respect he could still do his work, and could turn out a new sail or alter an old one as well as any sailmaker on board Mr. Godstone's fleet.
As Captain Murchison remarked to the owners when he saw that Joe was this voyage to form one of his crew: "The old fellow would be worth his pay if he never put his hand to work. He keeps a crew in good humour with his yarns and stories; and if there is a grumbler on board he always manages to turn the laugh against him, and to show him to the others in his true light as a skulker and a sneak. He looks after the boys and puts them up to their duty, and acts generally as a father to them. A man like that, attached to the owners, always cheerful and good-tempered, ready to make the best of everything, and to do his work to the best of his power, is a very valuable man on board a ship. I always feel that things will go on comfortably forward when I see Joe Culver's name down in the articles."
"It was grand, Joe," Jack replied in answer to his question, "though it was very awful. I had no idea that a storm would be anything like that, or the waves so high. I have seen storms on our own East Coast, and they seemed bad enough, but they were nothing to this."
"And this weren't nothing to some storms I have seen in these latitudes, Master Robson. I have doubled the Cape two score of times, I should say--eh, more than that, coming and going--and I have seen storms here to which that which has just blown over was but a capful of wind. Why, sir, I have seen a ship laid on her beam-ends when she was not showing a rag of canvas, and even when we had cut all the masts away the pressure of wind on her hull kept her down until we thought that she would never right again. Altogether I have been wrecked eight times, and three of them was down in these 'ere latitudes. They says as my name has been on the books of the firm for fifty-five years; but that ain't quite correct, for twice it was written off with D.D. after it, but somehow or other I turned up again, just as you see. One of these 'ere businesses happened hereabouts."
"I should like to hear about it awfully, Joe."
"Well, sir, seeing it was not what you may call an everyday sort of affair, and as perhaps the yarn might give you a hint as might be useful to you if you ever gets into the same kind of fix, I don't mind if I tell you. Just at present I have not finished my work, but if you and the other two young gents like to come forward here at six bells I will tell you about it."
CHAPTER XVI.
OLD JOE'S YARN.
AT seven o'clock the three lads gathered round the old sailor forward. Joe having got his pipe to draw to his satisfaction, proceeded to relate the story of his shipwreck.
"It happened," he said, "on the very first v'yage I made as an A.B.; and proud I was, as you may guess, that I had done at last with being ordered here and ordered there, and kicked here and cuffed there. I was just twenty-one then, and as active and hearty a young chap as you would want to see; not over big, you know, and spare in flesh, but as strong and active as any on board a ship. Well, it came on to blow just about the same latitude where the storm struck us the other day, but much heavier. I never saw a worse sky in all my v'yges, and when the blow came it seemed to me there was an end of everything at once. I need not tell you about the storm; you just take the last one and pile it up about ten times, and you have got it.
"Although we were ready and prepared for it, and had snugged down till we scarce showed a rag of sail, over she went at the first blow, till we all thought as she was going to turn turtle. We cut away her main and mizzen, and at last got her before it and run. That gale blew for ten days right on end. The sea was tremendous. Over and over again we were pooped, our bulwarks were carried away, the boats smashed, the caboose and pretty nigh everything else on deck swept clean off. Five of the hands had been washed overboard, another three men were down below badly hurt, and the first-mate had his leg broke. We were all pretty well exhausted, as you may guess. Where we'd got to none knew, for we had never had a glimpse of the sun since the gale began; and it would not have made much difference if we had, because, you see, we could do nothing but just run before the wind wherever it liked to take us. But we knew anyhow we had got down into high latitudes, for the gale had been blowing pretty steady from the north-west.
"The air got bitterly cold all of a sudden; and though we could not see above a mile anywhere round us, we were pretty sure we were in the neighbourhood of ice. Towards the afternoon of the tenth day the weather cleared just a little, though the wind seemed as high as ever, and we caught sight of some big bergs. The captain, who was as good a sort as ever sailed, had done his best all along to keep up our spirits. The cook had been washed overboard in his caboose; but the skipper had kept his steward at work boiling water over a little spirit-stove he had aft, and kept a supply of hot coffee there at all hours for us; and with that and biscuits we had got on fairly well. Now he told us that he thought the gale would soon blow itself out, and that as soon as it abated enough to set a rag or two of sail he would try and bring us up under the lee of a berg.
"But it wasn't to be. It had just struck four bells, and there was a gleam of daylight; I was at the helm, with the captain, who had never lain down for above an hour at a time since the gale began, beside me. Suddenly I saw it become lighter ahead, just like a gray shadow against the blackness. I had but just noticed it when the skipper cried out, 'Good God! there is a berg straight ahead, it is all over with us!' and then he gave a shout, 'All hands on deck!'
"There was nothing to do. We could not have changed our course a point if we had tried ever so much, and the berg, as we could see in another minute, stretched right away on both sides of us.
"'You can leave the helm, Joe,' says the skipper; 'we have done all that men could do, we are in God's hands now.' I went forward with the rest, for I knew well that the only chance was to get on to the berg when she struck. It did not seem much of a chance, but it is wonderful how one clings to the hope of a few hours' more life.
"It was not five minutes from the time when we first saw the gray shadow ahead that we struck. The crash was tremendous. The mast snapped off as if it was a pipe-stem. The whole front of the ship seemed stove in, and I believe that more than half of those gathered forward were killed, either by the fall of the mast or by the breaking up of the bows. The bowsprit was driven aft, through the bits against the stump of the foremast, and did its share in the work. I was standing in the fore-chains, having got over there to avoid the fall of the mast. Though I was holding tight to the shrouds I was well-nigh wrenched from my hold. There was one terrible cry, and then the ship seemed to break up as if she were glass, and I was in the water. A great wave came thundering down on me; it seemed to me as if I was being carried right up into the air, then I felt a shock, and it was sometime before I knew anything more.
"When I came to myself it was daylight. For a bit I could not move, and I thought my ribs were staved in; but at last, after much trouble, I made a shift to work myself out and found that I was about fifty feet above the water. The wave had carried me upon its crest as it swept up the face of the berg, and just as it was at its highest had, by God's mercy, jammed me in between two pinnacles of ice, and though I daresay others had swept up as high, none of them had moved me. I sat for a time dazed and stupid, and then began to take a view of my position. The ship was gone. There was not a sign of a bit of floating timber or any of my messmates. I suppose all the wreckage had been swept away by the current.
"The iceberg had, I reckon, been floating a long time, for it was seamed all over with cracks and crevices. It had been up under a pretty hot sun before the long gale blew it and us south, and the surface was rough and honey-combed. I did not feel as grateful as I ought to have done, lads, that I had been cast up, for I saw nothing but death before me; and thought that it would have been better to have died when I lost my senses in the water than to have to die again as it were by cold or hunger on the berg. However I set-to to climb over the berg and down to the other side so as to get under its lee. It took me two or three hours of hard work, but by the end of that time my clothes were dry, and I got some spirit and hope in me again.
"Once over there I was pretty comfortable; the berg sheltered me from the wind, and the sun began to shine out a bit through the clouds, and in the afternoon, although it was still blowing hard, there was a blue sky overhead. There were a good many other bergs in sight, but none of them seemed near as big as the one that I was on. Fortunately I had a couple of biscuits in my pocket, having thrust them in there when I ran up when there was a call for an extra hand at the helm. One of these I ate, then I lay down on a broad ledge and went off sound asleep. When I awoke it was night. I was warmly clad when we struck, having my thick oil-skin over my pea-jacket, but I felt a bit cold. However I was soon off again, and when I awoke morning had broken. I ate half my last biscuit, took a drink out of a pool--I do not know whether it was melted ice or rain-water--and then climbed up to the top of the berg and looked round.
"I had not expected to see a sail, and I didn't, for we were far out of the track of ships. Still it was just possible one might have been driven south as we had been. The wind had pretty well dropped now, and the sea was going down. I could see by some small bergs near us that we were driving through the waters at a good rate. When a great mountain of ice like that, you know, gets way on it, it will keep it for a mighty long time. It did not make much difference to me which way we were going; I had only half a biscuit left, and no chance of getting more. I sat down and wondered how long I should last, and whether it would not be easier to go down and jump off into the water than to sit there and die by inches. As I was thinking I was looking at what I had taken for another big berg, away in the distance, right on the course we were making, and it suddenly came to me that it was not the same colour as the others. I looked up to see if there was a bit of a cloud anywhere about that might have thrown it into shadow, but there weren't, and at last I felt sure that it wasn't no iceberg at all, but an island.
"I jumped on my feet now quick enough. An island would be better than this berg anyhow. There might be shell-fish and fruit--though fruit did not seem likely so far south--and birds and seals. I had heard tales from others as to islands in the South Seas, and though I knew well enough that I should not find cocoa-nuts and such like, I thought I might get hold of something with which to make a shift to hold on until some whaler happened to pass along. For an hour or two I stood watching; at the end of that time I was sure it was land, and also that we were driving pretty straight towards it. As we got near I could see it was a big island that stretched right across our course, but was still a long way off. I felt sure we should ground somewhere in the night, for I had heard that icebergs drew a tremendous lot of water, and were two or three times as deep below the surface as they were above it. We were two or three hundred feet high, so unless the water kept deep right up to the island we should take ground a good way off it.
"When it got dark I went down on the other side of the berg, for I had sense enough to know that just in the same way as the masts of a ship went straight forward when she struck, the pinnacles of the berg would go toppling down towards the island when she grounded. I was hungry enough, I can tell you, that day, but I kept my last half-biscuit until the morning, so as to give me strength to swim. I dosed off for a bit, but about eight bells, as near as I can guess, I heard a deep grating sort of noise. Then I felt myself rising up. I went higher and higher, till I began to wonder whether there was any chance of the berg turning over. There was a noise like thunder as the pieces of ice broke off and went crashing down the other side. Then slowly I began to sink down again, and I should say for an hour the berg rolled up and down. Then I went off to sleep.
"As you may guess, I was on the top of the berg at daybreak, and saw we had drifted into a big bay, and had grounded about midway. The cliffs in most places rose sheer up out of the water, but here and there there were breaks, and I could see that the land beyond was rough and desolate-looking. I ate my last half-biscuit, and then made my way down to the water's edge. The shore seemed to me about half a mile away--a longish swim in cold water; but I was a good swimmer, and the sea between the berg and the land was as smooth as a pond. I took off my clothes, put them in the middle of my oil-skin and wrapped it round them, tying one of my stockings round the neck of the bag to keep it all together. I had bought the oil-skin just before I started on that voyage, and knew that it would keep out the water tidy. I could not get down nearer than twenty feet of the sea, so I dropped the bag in and then jumped.
"As I had hoped, the thing floated light. I pushed it before me as I swam, and found that by putting my hands on it it would keep me up well when I wanted to rest. However, I did not want much of that. The water was too cold to be idle in, and I never stopped swimming until I got to shore at the point I had marked out as easiest to land on. I wasn't long opening the bag and getting into my things, which were perfectly dry. My first thought was of food. While I had been swimming I thought I heard a sort of barking noise, and I wasn't long in seeing that there were a lot of seals on the rocks. I picked up a goodish chunk of stone, and then lay down and set to crawling towards them. I had heard from sailors who had been whaling that the way to kill a seal was to hit him on the nose, and I kept this in my mind as I crawled up. They did not seem to notice me, and I got close among them without their moving. Then I jumped up. There was a young seal lying not ten feet from me, and before he had time to turn I smashed down my bit of rock between his eyes, and there he lay dead.
"Raw seal's flesh ain't a sort of food as you would take for choice, but I was too hungry to think about cooking, and I ate as big a meal as ever I had in my life. Up till then I hadn't really thought as there was any chance of my being saved in the long run. Now I felt as there was, and for the first time I felt really grateful that I had not shared in the fate of my messmates, and I knelt down and thanked God for having brought me safe to shore. Then I set-to to climb up to the top of the cliffs. It was hard work, and, as I afterwards found, I had just hit, by God's mercy, on the only spot on that part of the island where I could have got up, for in most places the cliffs rose pretty near straight up four or five hundred feet above the sea.
"When I got to the top I saw that there were some mighty high hills covered with snow to the south-east, which might have been fifteen or twenty miles away. It was a dreary kind of country--rocky and desolate, with tufts of thin grass growing in the crevices of the rocks; and I saw that there was precious little chance of picking up a living there, and that if I was to get grub it was to the sea I must look for it. I thought the best thing to do was to try and find out some sheltered sort of cove where, perhaps, I might find a bit of a cave, for I knew that when winter came on there would be no chance for me in the open; so I set out to walk. I brought up with me a big hunk of flesh that would last me for three or four days, and what I had got to look for was fresh water. I walked all that day, keeping along pretty close to the edge of the cliff. I found plenty of little pools of rain-water among the rocks, and did pretty well. I was not hungry enough to tackle raw flesh that night, and had nothing to make a fire with. I had got matches in my pocket in a tight-fitting brass box which had kept them dry, but there was no fuel.
"The next morning I started again, and after walking for four or five hours came to a spot where the cliffs broke away sudden. Getting to the edge I saw that there was a narrow bay stretching some way up into the island. An hour's walk brought me to its head. Here, as I had hoped, I found a little stream running down into it. When you find a bay, most times you will find water running in at its head. The ground sloped gradually here in great terraces; the rock was hard and black, and looked as if it had been burnt. I have heard since that it was what they call volcanic. Being so sheltered there were more things growing here, wherever a little earth had gathered; and I saw some things for all the world like cabbages, and made up my mind to try them, when I got a chance, with my seal-meat.
"At last I got down near the water. Just at the head of the bay was a shelving shore, and along at the sides, as far as I could see it was rocky, and there were plenty of seals here too. Along on the beach and on the rock and on the terraces were quantities of birds--penguins, as I knew from what I had heard of them. They did not try to get out of my way, but just made an angry sort of noise. 'I will talk to you presently, my hearties,' I said; 'what I have got to do now is to look for a shelter.' It was the end of April, and I knew that it would not be long before winter would be upon me, and if I was not out of it by that time I should soon be frozen stiff. I did not go near the seals, for I did not want to frighten them. I looked about the rest of that afternoon and all next day, but I could not find what you might properly call a cave, and so determined to make use of the best place I could fix upon. This was a spot in the lower terrace, in the face of the rock. It seemed as if the lower part was softer than the upper, which was black and hard and almost like glass. Underneath this the rock had crumbled away perhaps six feet in depth.
"This soft rock was about four feet thick. It was more gone in some places than others. I chose a spot where a hole was about eight feet long, and made up my mind to close up the front of this, just leaving a hole big enough for me to crawl in and out. First of all I brought up some big stones and built a wall and filled up the crevices with tufts of grass. Then I brought up smaller stones and piled against them, shooting in sand from the beach till I had made a regular solid bank, four feet thick, against the wall. Then I levelled the bottom of the cave with sand and spread it thickly with dried grass. All this took me five days' hard work. There was no difficulty about food. I had only to go and pick up a few stones and go among the penguins and knock them over. I made a shift to cook them over fires made of dry tufts of grass.
"I had been careful not to disturb the seals. I did not want any of them until the weather got cold enough to freeze their flesh. I thought of oil from their blubber, but I had nothing to hold it. When I had finished my hut I began to hunt about to see if I could find drift-wood, but I could only find a few pieces in the cove, and gave it up, for I did not see how I could anyhow keep up a fire through the winter. Then I bethought me that the penguins could furnish me with feathers, and I set to work at them with earnest, and in a week had filled my cave two feet deep with feathers.
"Every day I could feel that it got colder, and at night there was a sharp frost; so I determined now to set-to at the seals. There were none of the sort that you get fur from, and there was not much warmth to be had from the skins, still they would do to block up the entrance to my den. I killed five or six of them, and found that some of the young ones were furry enough to make coats of. As I was sitting on the ground by them next morning, lamenting I had nothing to boil down their blubber in, an idea struck me. I might use the blubber as candles, sticking wicks into it. I set to work and stripped the blubber off all the seals, and cut it in squares of about six inches. Then I got a bit of one of the fresh skins, bent it up all round, of the right size for the squares to fit into, fastened it, and spread it on the rocks to dry. The thought of how I was to make wicks bothered me. I could not spare my clothes. At last, after trying different things, I found that some of the grass was very tough. I put a bundle of this in a pool, and let it lay there for a week; for I was a North of Ireland boy, and knew how they worked flax. At the end of that time I took it out, let it dry, and then bruised it between flat stones, and found that it had a tough fibre. I thanked God, and picked a lot more of it and put it to soak. You may guess I tried the experiment that night; I made six big wicks and put them in one of the cakes of blubber and lighted them, and found that they burned famously and gave out a lot of heat. I killed some more seals; and by the time the winter set in in earnest I had a stock of meat enough to last me for months, and two or three hundredweight of cakes of blubber.
"I had made several bowls and plates out of the seals' skins, and had fashioned myself, in a mighty rough way, some suits of young seal-skins with a hood that covered all my head and face except just my mouth and eyes. From the first I had eaten the cabbages regular with my food. I could not cook them, because I had nothing to boil the water in, and they were rather bitter to eat raw; but they were better than nothing with the flesh, and I knew that I must eat green food if I wanted to keep healthy. Among the drift-wood I had luckily found a couple of broken oars. To these I had fastened with seal sinews two sharp and strong bones, and they made very fair spears.
"By the end of May the ground was covered deep with snow, and the cold set in bitter. What had bothered me most of all was where I was to store my stock of frozen meat and blubber. I knew that there was a chance of bears coming, and that they would scent it out however I might hide it. At last I determined to put it in a hole something like that I had made into a den for myself. This hole was not like mine, on a level with the ground, but was on the face of a smooth cliff about forty feet high. I made a rope of seal-skin, fastened it to a projection in the rock over the hole, and lowered myself down. I found the place would do well, and was quite big enough for all my store, while the face of the rock was too steep to climb, even for a bear. So I carried all my stock up to the top, and climbing up and down the rope, stored it in the hole, except what I wanted for a week's consumption.
"Well, lads, I passed the winter there. However cold it was outside--and I can tell you it was bitter--it was warm enough in my den. At the very coldest time I had two of my lamps burning, but most of the time one kept it warm enough. I used to nestle down in the feathers and haul a seal-skin over me; and however hard it blew outside, and however hard it froze, I was warm there. I used to frizzle my meat over the lamp, and every day, when the weather permitted, I went out and brought in a stock of the cabbages. I always kept a good stock of blubber in the den and several bundles of my wicks.
"One night I heard a sound of snuffing outside my cave, and knew at once that the bears had come. I had thought over what I should do, and was ready for them. The hole through the bank into the cave was only big enough for me to crawl through, and I knew a bear could not come in till he had scraped it a good bit bigger. I tied a bunch of the flax to the end of one of my spears, poured a little melted grease from the lamp over it, and then drew aside the seal-skin over the entrance and peeped out.
"It was a moonlight night, and I could see a big head trying to thrust itself in at the other end of the hole. A moment later he began to scrape away at the sides. I lit the bundle of flax. It flared up fiercely, and I thrust it out full into the beast's face. He gave a roar, and off he went as fast as his feet would carry him. They tried it a dozen times if they did it once; but the torch was too much for them, and the seal bone in its middle must have given them some nasty wounds, for I generally saw blood on the snow in the morning. Whenever I went to get a fresh store of meat and blubber I could see how they had trampled on the snow at the foot of the rock, and how they had scratched its face in trying to get up at it, but it was all no manner of good. I was chased two or three times by them when I went out to gather my cabbages, but I always managed to get into my hole before they overtook me, and they had learned to give that a wide berth.
"It seemed to me that winter was never going to be over; but I was young and had good spirits and was fond of a song, and I used to lie there and sing by the hour. Then I used to go over in my mind all the v'yges I had made and to remember the yarns I had heard, and would go over the talks I had had with Jack and Tom and Harry. You would be surprised how I kept my spirits up. You see I was a young fellow, and young fellows take things cheerful and make light of what would break them down when they get older. I never had a day's illness, which I set down to them cabbages. I never saw them anywhere else, and I larnt arterwards that Kerguelen Island--for that was the place I was thrown on--was famous for them.
"When spring came and the snow melted I made up a package of forty pounds of meat, for the seals had not come yet, and started to make a tour of the island. I thought such a place as this was pretty well sure to be used by whalers in summer; and if so, I should find signs of their having been there. I made a few excursions first, and found I was pretty near the middle of the island--of course on the westerly side. I climbed a high hill, but I did not learn much except that the island was a big one, and there were hills both to the north and south that looked to me as if they must be thirty or forty miles away. As far as I could see of the west coast of the island the cliffs were everywhere precipitous; and though at the east they did not seem much better, I concluded to try that first. You see at this point the island was not more than fifteen miles across, but it seemed to bulge out both ways, and where I was looked like a sort of neck connecting two big islands. It was an awful country to traverse, all hill and rock; but after three weeks' tramping I gave a shout, for in a bay in front of me was a large hut.
"I had had a hard time of it and was pretty well done up. My meat had lasted me well enough on short rations and I had filled up on cabbages; but I was often a long time without water, having to depend entirely on melted snow in the hollows of the rocks. I hurried down to the hut; it was a rough shed evidently erected for the use of whalers, and round it were ashes of fires, empty meat-tins, and other signs of the stay of sailors here. For the next month I lived here. The birds were returning. There was a stream close at hand, and enough drift-wood on the shores to enable me to keep up a constant fire. I woke up one morning in November to see a vessel entering the bay. The crew would scarce believe me when I told them that I passed the winter on the island alone, and that I had lived for six months on seal-meat, penguins, and cabbages. I learned from them that the bay was known as Hillsborough Bay, and the cove where the whaler entered as Betsy Cove, and that it was a regular rendezvous of whalers. I fished with them all through the summer, and went home in the ship, and was soon down again on the books of Godstone & Son."
"Well, that was a go, and no mistake, Joe!" Jim Tucker said. "Fancy having to live for six months on seal frizzled over a lamp and raw cabbages! You did not tell us how you did for drink."
"Melted snow," Joe replied. "I used to fix one of the basins of dried seal-skin a foot or so above the lamp, so that it would be hot enough to melt the snow without a risk of its burning itself. Then I used to pour the water from one basin to another for half an hour. Melted snow-water is poor stuff if you don't do that. I do not know the rights of it, but I have heard tell that it's 'cause there ain't no air in it, though for my part I never could see no air in water, except in surf. I had heard that that was the way they treated condensed water, and anyhow it was a sort of amusement like, and helped to pass the time."
"Well, it is a capital story to listen to, Joe," Jack said; "but I should not like to go through it myself. It must have been an awful time, shut up in a hole with a stinking lamp, for I expect it did stink, all those months."
"It did use to smell powerful strong sometimes, lad, and many a time at first it turned me as sick as a youngster on his first v'yage; but I got accustomed to it after a bit. The great thing was to keep your wick short."
"And now about your other wreck not far from here?"
"I will tell you that to-morrow evening, lads. That was a more ordinary kind of thing. It wasn't pleasant; I don't know that wrecks ever are, but it wasn't such an out-of-the-way thing as being chucked up on to an iceberg."
CHAPTER XVII.
IN DANGEROUS SEAS.
THE following evening, as the twilight was falling, the lads again gathered round the old sailor.
"Well, lads," he began, "just as this other affair I was telling you about happened further down south, so the other was a goodish bit to the north. We were bound for the Persian Gulf, and I fancy the captain got wrong with his reckonings. He had had trouble before we sailed; had lost his wife sudden, I heard, and, more's the pity, he took to drink. He was the first and last captain as ever I sailed under as did it; for Godstone & Son were always mighty particular with their masters, and would not have a man, not for ever so, who was given to lifting his elbow. Anyhow, we went wrong; and it is a baddish place to go wrong, I can tell you, is the Mozambique Channel. There was a haze on the water and a light breeze, and just about eight bells in the morning we went plump ashore--though none of us thought we were within a hundred miles of land. There was a pretty to-do, as you might fancy; but we had to wait until morning to see where we were; then we found, when the mist lifted a bit that we were on a low sandy coast.
"We had no doubt that we should get her off so we got the boats out and the hatches off, and began to get up the cargo. We worked hard all day, and thought we had got pretty well enough out of her, and were just going to knock off work and carry out a couple of anchors and cables astern to try and heave her off, when there was a yell, and two or three hundred black fellows came dashing down on us with spears. They crept up so close before they showed, that we had no time to tumble into the boats before they were upon us. We made the best sort of fight we could, but that wasn't much. We had brought ashore muskets and cutlasses, but they had been left in the boats, and only a few of us had time to get hold of them before they were upon us. I cut and slashed as well as I could, but it was not for long; for a spear lodged in my shoulder just at the moment when a big native caught me a clip over the head with a club, and down I went.
"I fancy I was some time before I got my senses again. When I did I found that I was tied hand and foot, and was lying there on the sands, with three or four of our fellows in the same plight as myself. They all belonged to the jolly-boat in which I had come ashore. The other boat had made a shift to push off with some of its hands and get back to the ship; but I did not know that until afterwards, for I was lying down behind a hillock of sand and could not get a view of the sea. There were lots of natives about, and they seemed mighty excited. I could hear a dropping fire of muskets, and guessed that those on board were keeping up a fire on any who so showed themselves on the beach. The natives got more and more excited, and kept jabbering together and pointing away along the coast; and I guessed that some of their own craft were coming to attack the ship.
"Presently I heard one of the guns, then another and another. The shot didn't come whistling our way, so I had no doubt that the ship was attacked. For a quarter of an hour the firing went on--cannon and musketry. I could hear the yells of the natives and the shouts of our men, though I could see nothing. The natives round me were pretty near out of their minds with excitement; then they began to dance and yell, and all at once the firing ceased, and I knew that the niggers had taken the ship. I was afraid it would come to that; for you see they had lost pretty well a third of their crew in the fight on shore, and the niggers would never have ventured to attack if they had not been ten to one against them.
"We lay there all that night, and I believe I should have died of thirst if a nigger wench had not taken compassion on us and given us a drink. The next morning our ropes were undone. Our first look when we got up was naturally towards the ship. There she lay, with a dozen native craft round her. Her decks were black with niggers, and they were hard at work stripping her. No one paid much attention to us, for there was nowhere we could run to; and we sat down together and talked over our chances. We saw nothing of our shipmates; and whether they were all killed, or whether some of them were put aboard the native craft, I never knew. They were some days unloading and stripping the ship, and they had big quarrels over the division of the spoil. I think the fellows with boats did our natives out of their share, beyond what fell into their hands when they first attacked us. However, at last it was all done; then two chiefs came and had a look at us, and one took me and Tom Longstaff, and another took the other two.
"We had not done badly for eating while we were on shore, for there was several barrels of pork and biscuits among the lot we had landed, and we were free to take as much as we wanted. The other bales and boxes were all broken open and the contents made up into packets, and Tom and I and about sixty niggers, each with as much as he could stagger under, started away from the shore. It wasn't a long march, for their village lay only about six miles away. We knew it could not be far, because the women and children had come down to the beach two or three hours after the fight was over. We stopped here about a month, and then one morning the chief and four of his men started off with Tom and me. We made three days' marches, such marches as I never want to do again. Tom and I did our best to keep up; but the last day we were quite worn out, and if it hadn't been that they thumped us with their spears and prodded us up, we should never have done it.
"The place we got to was a deal bigger than the first village. We were left outside the biggest hut with the four fellows to guard us, while the chief went inside. Presently he came out again with a chap quite different to himself. He was brown instead of being black, and dressed quite different; and having been trading up in the Persian Gulf I knew him to be an Arab. He looked us over as if we had been bullocks he intended to buy, and then went into the hut again. A few minutes later our chief came out and made signs to us that we belonged to the Arab now, and then went away with his men, and we never saw him again. We had an easy time of it for the next week, and then the Arab started with a number of carriers laden with goods for the interior.
"You would scarcely believe, lads, what we went through on that 'ere journey. Many a time Tom and I made up our minds to bolt for it; and we would have done it if we had had the least idea which way to go or how we were to keep alive on the journey. We had agreed when we started that we would do our best, and that we would not put up with any flogging. We didn't much care whether they killed us or not, for we would just as leave have died as passed our lives in that country with all its beastly ways. Well, a couple of days after we had started, a big nigger driver who had been laying on his stick freely on the backs of the slaves came along, and let Tom and me have one apiece. Tom, who was nearest to him, chucked down his load and went right at him, and knocked him over like a ninepin.
"Well, some of the other drivers or guards, or whatever they call them, ran up, and there was a tidy skrimage, I can tell you. It was ten minutes, I should say, before they got the best of us; and there was not one among them but was badly damaged about the figure-head. When they had got us down they laid it on to rights, and I believe they would have finished us if the Arab had not come up and stopped it.
"'Look here,' said I, when I was able to get up on to my feet again; 'we are ready to work just as far as men can work, but if one of those niggers lays a finger on us we will do for him. You may cut us in pieces afterwards, but we will do for him.'
"I don't know whether the Arab understood just what I said, but I think he got the gist of it. He spoke sharp to his men, and they never touched us afterwards. I could not quite make out what they were taking us for, because I can say honestly we were not much good at carrying--not half as good as one of the slaves. The first day or two we carried a good manful load. Then our shoes went to pieces, and we got that footsore and bad we could scarcely crawl along, let alone carrying loads. Tom said he thought that the Arab was a-taking us to sell as curios to some fellow who had never seen white men before, and it turned out as he was right. After we had been travelling for nigh a month we came to a big village; and there was great excitement over our coming, and for two days there were feastings, while the Arab sold part of his goods to the people for gold dust and ivory.
"The chief had come to look at us the day we arrived, and we had been packed away together in a little hut. The third day he came again with the Arab, and made signs that I was his property now, while the Arab told Tom to go out and start with his caravan. It was a big wrench for us, but it were no good struggling against what was to be. So we shook hands and parted on it quietly, and what became of Tom I have never heard from that day to this; but like enough he is dead years ago.
"Well, it would be too long a story to tell you all that happened in the nine months I stopped in that village. The chief was very proud of me, and used to show me off to his visitors. I had not such a very bad time of it. I used to make myself as useful as I could. I had been a handy sort of chap, and fond of carpentry, and I made a shift with what native tools I could get to turn out tables and chairs, and cupboards, and such like. All this time I was wondering how I was ever to get back again. I used to share a hut with another slave who had been captured in war. They generally sell them to the Arab slave-dealers to take down to the coast, but this man was the son of a chief who had gone to war with the fellow who owned me, and had been killed; and he kept this chap as his slave as a sort of brag, I think.
"We got on very well together, and of course by the time we had been there six months I got to talk their lingo, and we agreed at last that we would try to make a bolt of it together. So one night--when it happened that there was a great feast in the village--we slipped away as soon as it got dark, and made south, our object being to strike one of the Portuguese stations. We armed ourselves with bows and arrows, and spears; and as many yams as we could carry. It would make a book, lads, if I was to tell you all we went through before we got there. We travelled chiefly by nights; sometimes killing a deer, sometimes getting a few yams or heads of corn from the fields of the villages we passed. We had one or two skrimages, but fortunately never ran against any strong bodies of natives. By myself I should have died before I had been gone a fortnight but Mwango was up to every dodge. He knew what roots were good to eat, and what fruit and berries were safe. He could steal up to a herd of deer without frightening them, and was a first-rate hand in making pitfalls for game.
"I didn't keep no account of time, but it was somewhere about six weeks after we had started when we came down on the banks of a biggish river. We followed it down until, two or three days later, we came on a village. There we stole a canoe, and paddling at night and lying up in the day, we came after about a week to a Portuguese post. There we were kindly received, and stopped for a month; and then I went down the river with some traders to the coast, while Mwango took service with the Portuguese. Six weeks later I was lucky enough to get a ship bound for the Cape, and there shifted into another for England. So that, young gentlemen, was the second time as I was off the books of Godstone & Son."
"Thank you very much, Joe. Some day you must give us some more yarns about it, and tell us something of your life in the village and your journey."
"I will think it over, Master Jim. It is a long time ago now, for I was not above six-and-twenty when it happened. But I will think it over, and see if I can call back something worth telling."
From that time onwards the boys had no reason to complain of dulness.
If the old man's memory ever played him false, his imagination never failed him. Story followed story in almost unbroken sequence, so that between old Joe's yarns and the ordinary duties of sea life the time passed swiftly and pleasantly. After rounding the Cape they had a spell of fine weather, until one morning when Jack came on deck he saw land away on the port beam.
"There is Ceylon," Jim Tucker said.
"I should like to land and have a day's ramble on shore there, Jim. There would be something to see there with all that rich vegetation. A very different thing from the sands of Egypt!"
"Yes, and all sorts of adventures, Jack. There are snakes and elephants and all sorts of things."
"I certainly should not care to meet snakes, Jim, and I don't know that I should like wild elephants. Still, I should like a ramble on shore. I suppose there is no chance of our getting nearer to the land."
"Not a bit, Jack. I heard Mr. Hoare tell Arthur that it was very seldom we passed within sight of the island at all. Sailors are not fond of land except when they are actually going to make a port. The further they keep away from it the better they are pleased."
"Such splendid weather as this I should have thought it would have made no difference," Jack said. "I should be glad if we were going to coast up the whole way. Why, we have had nothing but a gentle regular wind ever since that storm off the Cape."
"Yes, but it may not last all the way, Jack," Mr. Timmins, as he walked past and overheard the lad's words, said. "There is no place in the world where they have more furious cyclones than in the Bay of Bengal. Happily they don't come very often. Perhaps there is only one really very bad one in four or five years; but when there is one the destruction is awful. Islands are submerged, and sometimes, hundreds of square miles of low country flooded, the villages washed away, and a frightful loss of life. I have been in one or two sharp blows up the bay, but never in a cyclone; though I have been in one in the China Seas. That was bad enough in all conscience."
The wind fell lighter as they made their way up the coast. They kept well out from the land, and had not sighted it since leaving Ceylon. So light were the winds that it was some days before Mr. Timmins told them that they were now abreast of Madras.
"How much longer shall we be before we are at the mouth of the Hoogley, sir?"
"It depends upon the wind, lad. With a strong breeze aft we shall be there in three or four days. If we have calms we may be as many weeks."
Another week of light baffling winds, and then the breeze died away altogether and there was a dead calm. The sun poured down with great force, but the sky was less blue and clear than usual. At night it was stiflingly hot, and the next morning the sun again rose over a sea as smooth as a sheet of glass.
"I wonder what the captain and the two mates are talking about so seriously," Jack said as the three lads leant against the bulwarks in the shadow of the mainsail.
"I expect they are wondering whether the pitch won't melt off her bottom," Jim Tucker said with a laugh; "or what will happen if all the crew are baked alive. I am sure it is pretty well as hot as an oven."
"The sky looks rather a queer colour," Jack said, looking up. "You can hardly call it blue at all."
"No, it is more like a dull gray than blue," Arthur Hill said. "Hallo! What is up, I wonder?"
The captain had disappeared in his cabin, and on coming out had said a few words to Mr. Timmins, who at once went to the edge of the quarter-deck and shouted "all hands to shorten sail." The vessel was under a cloud of canvas, for every sail that could draw had been set upon her to make the most of the light puffs of wind. Some of the young seamen looked as if they could hardly believe their ears at the order; but Jack heard one of the older sailors say to a mate as they ran up the ratlines, "What did I tell you half an hour since, Bob: that like enough we should have scarce a rag on her by sunset."
The lads sprang up the ratlines with the men, for they took their share of duty aloft. Arthur's place was in the mizzen, Jim's in the main, and Jack's in the fore-top. The stunsails were first got in, then the royals and topgallant-sails. The men were working well, but the captain's voice came up loud from the quarter-deck, "Work steady, lads, but work all you can! Every minute is of consequence!"
Jack looked round the horizon, but could see nothing to account for this urgency. The sun was nearly overhead--a ball of glowing fire, and yet, Jack thought, less bright than usual, for he could look at it steadily, and its circle was clear and well defined. From that point right away down to the horizon the dull heavy-looking sky stretched away unbroken by a single cloud.
As soon as the topgallant-sails were furled the upper spars were sent down, then the courses were clewed up and two of her jibs taken off her. "Close reef the topsails!" was the next order, and when this was done, and the men after more than an hour's work descended to the decks drenched with perspiration, the ship was under the easiest possible canvas--nothing but the three closely-reefed topsails, the fore-staysail, and a small jib. Mr. Hoare and the third mate had been aloft with the men, and as soon as all were on deck the work of coiling away ropes, ranging the light spars, and tidying up began.
CHAPTER XVIII.
A CYCLONE.
"WHAT on earth is it all about?" Arthur Hill asked his comrades as the three boys gathered together after the work was done. "Why, there is not a breath of wind. Is it all done for practice, do you think?"
Jim shook his head. "I expect we are going to have one of those cyclones Mr. Timmins was speaking about the other day, though I don't see any signs of it, except the queer colour of the sky. I expect the glass must have been going down very fast. There is the captain popping into his cabin again. Well, he is not long about it," he added, as Captain Murchison hurried out again and spoke to Mr. Timmins, who immediately gave the order, "Furl mizzen and main topsails! Lower down the fore-staysail!"
"Well, there can't be more to do now," Jack said, when the order was carried out, "unless we set to work to set them all again."
"Look, Jack!" Arthur Hill said, grasping his arm and pointing away on the starboard beam.
A wall of black mist seemed to hang upon the horizon, rising momentarily higher and higher.
"The squall is coming, lads!" the captain shouted. "When it strikes her hold on for your lives. Carpenter, put a man with an axe at each of the weather-shrouds. We may have to cut away before we have done with it."
All eyes were now turned towards the bank of cloud, which was rising with extraordinary rapidity. Small portions of the upper line seemed at times to be torn off and to rush ahead of the main body, and then to disappear, suddenly blown into fragments. A low moaning sound was heard, and a line of white could be made out at the foot of the cloud-bank. The water around the ship was still as smooth as glass, though there was a slight swell, which swayed her to and fro, and caused the shrouds and blocks to rattle.
Louder and louder grew the murmur. Again the captain's voice was heard: "Hold on for your lives, lads!" and then with a scream and roar, as of a thousand railway whistles, the gale struck the ship. So tremendous was the force, that although the closely-reefed fore-topsail was the only sail that the _Wild Wave_ was showing aloft--for the jib blew from the bolt-ropes the instant the squall struck her--the vessel heeled over and over until her lee-rail was under water. Further and further she went, until the ends of the yards were under water, and the sea seemed to Jack, who was holding on by the weather bulwark, as if it were directly under his feet.
[Illustration: CAUGHT IN THE CYCLONE]
He thought that the ship was going to capsize, and had not her cargo been well stowed she must have done so. She was now almost on her beam ends, pressed down by the action of the wind upon her hull rather than her masts, and had it not been that the boys had each at the last moment twisted a rope round his body, they must have dropped into the water, for the deck afforded no hold whatever to their feet. Jack felt completely bewildered at the noise and fury of the wind. He had thought that after the gale they had passed through south of the Cape, he knew what bad weather was; but this was beyond anything of which he had the slightest conception.
Looking round he saw Mr. Timmins clinging to the bulwarks, and making his way along with the greatest difficulty until he reached the sailor stationed with the axe at the mizzen-shrouds, he saw the man rise from his crouching position, and, holding on to the bulwarks, strike three blows on the lanyards. Then there was a crash, and the mizzen-mast broke suddenly off four feet above the deck and fell into the sea.
Jack thought that the vessel lifted a little, for he could see one more streak of the deck planking. Mr. Timmins looked round towards the captain, who was clinging to the wheel. The latter waved his hand, and the mate again began to make his way forward. He passed the boys without a word, for the loudest shout would have been inaudible in the howling of the wind. He stopped at the main-shrouds again, the axe descended and the mainmast went over the side. The relief from the weight of the mast and the pressure of the wind upon it was immediate; the _Wild Wave_ rose with a surge and her lee-rail appeared above the surface, then she rose no further.
Mr. Timmins looked back again at the captain, but the latter made no sign. He could see that the pressure of the wind upon the foremast was beginning to pay the vessel's head off before it; as it did so she slowly righted until, when fairly before the wind, she was upon a level keel. Then there was a dull explosion heard even above the gale, and the fore-topsail split into ribbons. But the ship was now before the gale, and was scudding, from the effect of the wind on the bare pole and hull alone, at great speed through the water. As soon as she had righted the lads threw off their lashings, but still clung tight to the rail, and struggled aft till they stood under shelter of the poop.
"This is something like!" Jim roared at the top of his voice into Jack's ear. Even then his words could scarcely be heard.
Jack nodded. At present, even had conversation been possible, he would have had no inclination for it, for he felt stunned and bewildered. It had all taken place in ten minutes. It was but that time since the ship had been lying motionless on a still ocean. Now she was rushing, with one mast only standing, before a furious gale, and had had the narrowest possible escape from destruction. As yet the sea had scarce begun to rise, but seemed flattened under the terrific pressure of the wind, which scooped hollows in it and drove the water before it in fine spray.
Jack had read in the papers about tornadoes in America, and how houses were sometimes bodily lifted with their contents and carried long distances, and how everything above the surface was swept away as if a scythe had passed over it. He had heard these accounts discussed by the fishermen, and the general opinion in Leigh was that there was mighty little truth in them. The Leigh men thought they knew what a gale was, and what it could do. They knew that chimney-pots and tiles could be carried some distance with the wind, that arms of trees could be twisted off, and that an empty boat could be carried a considerable distance; but that a house could be bodily whirled away, was going so far beyond anything that came within their experiences as to be wholly disbelieved.
But Jack knew now as he looked round that this and more was possible. He felt the whole vessel leap and quiver as the gust struck her, and this with only one bare pole standing, and he would have been scarce surprised now had the ship herself been lifted bodily from the water. As to walking along the deck, it would have been impossible. No man could have forced his way against the wind, and Jack felt that were he to attempt to move from the sheltered spot where he was standing he would be taken up and carried away as if he were but a figure of straw. Presently Mr. Hoare came down from the poop and dived into the cabin, making a sign to the lads to follow him. He stood there for a minute panting with his exertions.
"The captain has sent me down for a spell," he said. "He and the first and Jack Moore are all lashed to the wheel. Sometimes I thought that all four of us, wheel and all, would have been blown right away. Well, lads, this is a cyclone, and you may live a hundred years and never see such another. You had better stop in here, for you might get blown right away, and can be of no good on deck. There is nothing to do. The wind has got her and will take her where it likes; we can do nothing but keep her straight. There will be a tremendous sea up before long. The water at the upper part of the bay is shallow, and we shall have a sea like yours at the mouth of the Thames, Jack,--only on a big scale.
"Our lives are in God's hands, boys; don't forget to ask for help where alone it can be obtained. Now I must be going up again. Steward, give me a glass of weak grog and a biscuit. Do you know, lads, my sides fairly ache. Once or twice I was pressed against the wheel with such force that I could scarcely breathe, and if I had been pinned there by an elephant butting me I could not have been more powerless. That is right, steward, get me my oil-skin and sou'-wester from the cabin. You had better get a kettle on over the spirit-stove, so that we can have a cup of hot cocoa when we like. Now then, I am ready for the fray again!" and buttoning himself closely up Mr. Hoare went on deck again.
Jack Moore was the next to come down. "Captain's orders, steward. I am to have a glass of grog. Well, young gentlemen, this is a gale and no mistake. I have been at sea over thirty years, and have never seen anything to be compared with it. If you get through this you need never be afraid of another; not if you live to be white-headed!"
After Jack Moore had gone up Mr. Timmins and the captain came down by turns. Each took a cup of cocoa. They said but few words to the boys, and were indeed almost too much exhausted by the struggle through which they had gone to be able to speak. The boys gathered again under the lee of the poop and watched the scene. It had changed considerably; the wind seemed as violent as ever, but the sea was no longer kept in subjection to it, and was now tossing itself in a wild and confused manner.
Another half hour and it had settled in some sort of regularity, and was sweeping before the wind in deep trough-like waves with steep sides, resembling those to which Jack had been accustomed in Sea Reach, on a gigantic scale. Soon again these were broken up, and were succeeded by a wild tumultuous sea like a boiling cauldron. The vessel was thrown violently from side to side, taking water over, now on one beam now on the other, and at times shaking from blows as if she had struck upon a rock. So sharp and sudden were her movements that the lads could not keep their feet, and again made their way into the cabin. Even here it was necessary to shout in order to be heard.
"What an extraordinary sea, Jim! I never saw anything like it before."
"That is what it's from," Jim replied, pointing to the tell-tale compass hanging from the beams overhead.
Jack glanced at it. "Why, we are running due south!"
"Aye; and I expect we have been two or three times round the compass already. That is what makes this frightful broken sea."
"Well, as long as we keep on running round and round," Jack said, "there is no fear of our running against the land anywhere."
Jim was further advanced in the study of navigation. "You forget," he said, "the centre of the cyclone is moving along all the time, and though we may go round and round the centre we are moving in the same direction as the cyclone is going, whatever that may be."
For hours the storm raged without the slightest signs of abatement. The sea was now terrific; the waist of the ship was full of water. Green seas swept over the vessel's bows, carrying everything before them, and pouring aft burst open the cabin door and deluged the cabin. By turns the boys made their way to the door and looked out.
"Come out, you fellows!" Jim Tucker shouted after one of these trips of investigation. "The men are coming out from the fo'castle. There is something to be done."
The boys came out and crawled a few steps up the poop-ladder, holding on for life as they did so. They did not attempt to get on to the poop, for they felt they would be blown away if they exposed themselves there to the full force of the wind. Looking round, the scene was terrible. The surface of the sea was almost hidden by the clouds of spray blown from the heads of the waves; a sky that was inky black hung overhead. The sea, save for the white heads, was of similar hue, but ahead there seemed a gleam of light. Jim Tucker, holding on by the rail, raised himself two or three feet higher to have a better view. A moment was sufficient.
He sprang down again and shouted in his comrades' ears, "Breakers ahead!" It needed no further words. The light ahead was the gleam of a sea of white foam towards which the vessel was hurrying. Nothing could be done to check or change her course. Had the mizzen been standing an effort might have been made to show a little sail upon it, and bring her head up into the wind to anchor; but even could this have been done the cables would have snapped like pack-threads. There was nothing for it but destruction. Jack followed Jim's example--crawled to the top of the gangway, and holding on by the poop-rail raised himself to his feet and looked forward.
Right across their bows stretched a band of white breakers, and beyond through the mist he could make out the line of a low shore. The lads descended again into the waist, and with great difficulty made their way forward to where the men were huddled together round the entrance to the fo'castle. They too had kept a look-out, and knew of the danger into which they were running and the impossibility of avoiding it.
"Is there anything to be done?" Jim Tucker shouted.
A silent shake of the head was a sufficient answer. The vessel and all in her were doomed. The officers were now seen leaving the helm and coming forward. It was a proof in itself of the hopelessness of the prospect. The vessel was indeed steering herself straight before the gale, and as there were no regular following waves there was no fear of her broaching to. The boats, that had at the commencement of the storm been hanging from the davits, were all gone or useless. One or two had been smashed to pieces by heavy seas striking them; others had been torn from their fastenings and blown clean away.
The long-boat alone remained lashed amidships on the deck. Jack pointed to her, but an old sailor shook his head and pointed to the sea. No boat could hope to live in it a minute. Once in the breakers it would be swamped instantly. The officers made their way forward.
"It is all over, lads!" the captain shouted; "but some of us may reach the shore on pieces of the wreck as she breaks up. We will get the long-boat ready for launching: some of you may cling to her. Now, lads, let us shake hands all round, and meet our fate as British sailors should do--calmly and bravely. At any rate some of us may be saved yet."
The crew of the _Wild Wave_ had been a happy one. Discipline had been good, although every indulgence had been allowed the men, and all were fond of her officers. There was a silent hand-clasp all round, and then some of the sailors followed the officers to the boat. As they did so they knew well that the order was given merely to keep them employed, for the chance of anyone being washed ashore and reaching it alive through the tremendous surf was small indeed. As they cut away the boat's cover they looked round, and a low cry broke from several of them. The ship was close to the broken water.
Every man clung to something and awaited the shock. In a few seconds it came. As she descended a wave there was a tremendous shock, followed instantaneously by a crash as the foremast went over the bow. Another and another, accompanied each time with the sound of rending timbers.
"Cut away the lashings of the boat!" the captain shouted, drawing his knife and setting the example. As he did so he touched Jack and pointed into the bottom of the boat. The lad understood him. He was to put in the plugs, which at ordinary times were left out to allow any rain-water to escape as it fell. Jack in turn touched Arthur, and the two climbed into the boat to replace the plugs.
As they did so a fiercer gust than usual struck the vessel. The lashings of the long-boat had just been cut, and the gale seized it and raised it in the air as if it had been made of paper. Jack and Arthur uttered a cry, and involuntarily clung for life to the thwarts. Over and over they were whirled. Confused, giddy, scarce knowing what had happened, they clung on. It was a sort of nightmare, and how long it lasted they knew not. Presently there was a terrific crash, and they knew no more.
CHAPTER XIX.
CAST ASHORE.
WHEN Jack opened his eyes he lay for some time wondering where he was and what had become of him. There were stars in the sky overhead, but the light was stealing over it, and he felt that it was daybreak. There was a loud, dull, roaring sound in his ears--a sound he could not understand, for not even a breath of wind fanned his cheek. At last slowly the facts came to his mind. There had been a great storm, the vessel was among the breakers, he had got into the long-boat with Arthur to put in the plugs, they had been lifted up and blown away--and then suddenly Jack sat upright.
It was light enough for him to see that he was still in the boat, but its back was broken and its sides staved in. Around him was a mass of tangled foliage, and close beside him lay Arthur Hill, the blood slowly oozing from a terrible gash in his forehead. Jack leaned over and raised him, and loudly shouted his name in his ear. With a sigh Arthur opened his eyes.
"What is it, Jack?" he asked feebly.
"We are saved, old man. We have been blown right ashore in the boat, and we have both got shaken and hurt a bit; but, thank God, we are both alive."
"Where are we?" Arthur asked, looking round.
"As far as I can see," Jack replied, "we are in the middle of a grove of trees that have been blown down by the gale, and the leaves and branches have broken our fall, otherwise we must have been smashed up. We must have been lying here for the last ten hours. It was just about six o'clock when we struck, for I looked at the clock in the cabin the last time we were down there; and as the sun will be up before long, it must be getting on for five now. Now, let us try to get out of this."
With the greatest difficulty, for they were still weak and terribly shaken, the boys made their way through the tangle of trees and branches, into which they had so providentially fallen. Both uttered an exclamation of surprise as they reached the edge of the wood: the sea was nearly half a mile away! A tremendous surf was still breaking, and for a quarter of a mile out a band of white breakers extended along the shore. There were no signs of the _Wild Wave_.
Scarce speaking a word they made their way down to the shore, with the faint hope that some of their comrades might have been thrown on the strand alive. A few bits of broken timber alone showed that a wreck had taken place; the rest had probably been swept by the current up or down the coast. They walked for half a mile and then stopped. The sea here had made a clean breach over the land, and extended as far as the eye could reach. Retracing their steps they were again stopped by a similar obstacle. Then they went inland, passed round the grove of fallen trees, and looked landward.
As far as they could see stretched a broad sheet of water, broken only by the branches of fallen trees. It was evident that a vast tract of country had been submerged by the storm, and that what was now an island upon which they stood had only been saved from a similar fate by being a few feet higher than the surrounding country. Every tree upon it had been felled, and the very surface of the soil seemed to have been torn off by the fury of the gale.
Scarcely a word had been spoken from the time they first reached the shore. The fate of their shipmates had depressed them profoundly, and as yet they could scarcely feel grateful for their own escape. Jack was the first to rouse himself from this state of despondency.
"Well, Arthur," he said, "things don't look very bright, but we must hope for the best. At any rate let us thank God for having rescued us in such a marvellous manner. It seems almost a miracle."
Both the boys were bareheaded, their caps having been blown away at the commencement of the gale, and they now stood with bended heads for some minutes silently thanking God for their preservation.
"Now, Arthur," Jack said cheerfully, "let us go down to the water and see how fast it is sinking. It was running like a sluice into the sea at both ends of this island, and I do not suppose that it will be many hours before it is gone. As soon as it is we must set out and make our way across to the land beyond it. We are sure to find some villages there and to get some sort of food after we've been down to the water. I vote we go back to the wood and lie down in the shade there. The sun will soon be unpleasantly hot, and as there is no chance of our getting a drink the sooner we are out of it the better."
The day passed slowly; the boys talked but little, and when they did so their conversation turned entirely upon their lost shipmates, for that subject occupied their thoughts far more than their present situation. Before night the water had so far sunk that only some glistening pools appeared where a broad sheet of water had before spread. Arthur was suffering much from thirst and would have started at once, but Jack persuaded him to wait until the next morning.
"We may tumble into deep holes full of mud," he said, "and should get on very slowly. Let us have a good night's sleep and start with the first gleam of daylight. We shall be able to get along fast then."
They found, however, that it was not very fast work; for the country had been cultivated and the soil was now converted into a soft mud, in which they sank up to their knees. Here and there as they went on they saw piles of mud and sunburnt bricks, with timbers projecting, and knew that these marked the site where villages or houses had stood. Among the clumps of fallen trees they saw bits of colour, and knew that these were the bodies of some of the natives. Here and there, too, they saw the carcass of a bullock. At last they found the ground under their feet much firmer.
"This has been a road," Jack said. "The flood as it went down has left three or four inches of mud on it, but it is fairly firm underneath. If we can manage to keep on this we shall get on well."
For six hours they plodded on, sometimes losing the path and floundering in the deep mud, at others regaining it and going along briskly. At the end of that time the mud was less deep, and in half an hour they were beyond the range of the inundation. Here and there a tree was still standing, and after an hour's walking they came to a village. All the houses were unroofed and many of them levelled to the ground, but the walls of a few were still erect; some natives were moving about, and a few were digging at the ruined houses, apparently searching for the remains of those buried there. They evinced no interest in the arrival of the two shipwrecked white boys, being too utterly cowed and broken to think of anything but their own misery.
"There is a well, Arthur; at least I expect it is that," Jack said, pointing to a post upon which was a long pole with a rope hanging from the end in the air.
They hurried to the spot, for both were suffering severely, and Arthur was scarcely able to speak. They found to their delight that Jack's surmise was a correct one, and hauling up the rope a bucket full of water came to the surface. Arthur was about to seize it, when Jack said, "You had better take this thing, Arthur; the natives might make a row if you drank from their bucket." Arthur seized the half gourd that Jack had picked up, dipped it into the bucket, and handed it to Jack.
"Fire away, man; you are worse than I am," Jack replied.
The gourd had to be refilled two or three times before they were both satisfied, then they went back into the village. Jack pointed to his mouth, and made signs that they wanted something to eat. The natives shook their heads apathetically and proceeded with their work. At last they went up to an old woman sitting in a chair, and rocking herself backwards and forwards. She paid no attention when Jack addressed her, but upon his holding out a shilling to her her manner at once changed. She hobbled into the house and returned with a pile of flat cakes made from some native grain.
"We shall do now," Jack said, as, munching away at the bread, they tramped on. "We must get to some place sooner or later where there is somebody who can talk English. How much money have you got, Arthur?"
"I have got two pounds," Arthur said. "I took it out of my chest while the gale was going on. I thought if we were wrecked and did get to shore it might be useful."
"I wish I had done the same," Jack said. "I have luckily got a sovereign in my pocket, for I was going to pay Joe Scales for those six light canvas trousers he made me. Well, three pounds between us is not bad; and I have got four or five shillings loose, which will do, I hope, until we get to some place where we can change our gold."
They walked on till sunset, passing several other villages by the way. All of these had suffered more or less severely by the storm, but it was evident that as they got further inland the work of destruction had been less complete. At sunset they sat down in a grove of trees still standing, the first they had passed, and there spent the night.
"That looks a good-sized place," Jack said, as late on the following afternoon they came in sight of what was evidently a town of some size. "We shall probably find someone there who can speak English."
After crossing a bridge over a river they entered the town. They addressed several people, but these shook their heads and pointed forward.
"What do they mean, Jack?"
"I am sure I don't know, unless they mean there is somebody farther on who speaks English." Presently they came to a large house. Several people were passing in and out. Jack spoke to one of these, but he shook his head and pointed indoors, "This must be the right place, Arthur."
They went into a large room, where two or three natives were sitting writing. They looked up in surprise at the two travel-stained English lads.
"Can any of you speak English?" Jack asked. One of them at once left his desk and came forward.
"I can speak English. What do you want?"
"Thank goodness!" Jack exclaimed fervently. "We are two officers belonging to an English ship that was wrecked in the storm two days ago. We believe all the rest have been drowned. We have made our way on foot across the country, and you are the first person we have met who can speak English."
At the word "officer" the clerk had assumed a more respectful attitude. "The collector-sahib went away yesterday to see what could be done and what supplies are needed; he will be back this evening. If you will follow me I will take you to the memsahib, who will see after you."
Wondering whom they were going to see, the boys followed their conductor out at the back of the house into a large garden, in the centre of which stood a pretty bungalow. In the shaded verandah a lady was sitting reading. Motioning the boys to remain where they were the clerk went forward and addressed the lady, who at once rose. He beckoned to the boys, who advanced to her as she was coming forward to meet them.
"So you have been shipwrecked, I hear?" she said. "It was a terrible gale. We did not feel it so much here, but I hear the destruction on the coast has been awful, and they say thousands of lives have been lost. Pray, come in. My husband is away, but he will be back this evening."
The boys soon found themselves seated in easy-chairs in the verandah, while white-robed servants brought them refreshments. "Now," the lady said, "tell me all about yourselves. You belong to a ship that was wrecked; whereabout did she come ashore?"
"We have not the least idea," Jack said. "We had been hours running before the gale before we were cast ashore. We have been walking for two days, and have not found a soul who could speak English until now, so that we have not the least idea where we are."
"This is Cuttack," the lady said. "It is just outside the Madras Presidency. We are only separated from it by the river Mahanuddy. You must have been wrecked somewhere between the mouth of the river and Palmyras."
"How far are we away from Calcutta, ma'am?"
"About two hundred miles," she replied. "It is a low swampy unhealthy country all the way, but you will have no difficulty in taking a passage from here in a native craft. My husband will see about that for you. Where are your companions? You surely cannot be the only two saved from the wreck?"
"I am greatly afraid we are," Jack replied; "and we were saved almost by a miracle. I hardly expect you to believe me when I tell you." He then related the events of the storm, and the manner in which they had reached land.
"It is certainly extraordinary," the lady said; "but it does not seem to me by any means impossible, for I have heard that in these terrible cyclones houses have been taken up and carried long distances, and I can quite understand the same thing happening to a boat."
An hour later Mr. Darcy the collector returned, and after hearing the boys' story said he would at once cause inquiries to be made along the coast whether any white men had been thrown up alive.
"I fear that there is but little hope," he said, "for the surf on the coast in a cyclone like that we have had is tremendous, and even were anyone to float in on a spar he would probably be dashed to pieces when he approached the shore, and if he escaped that would be carried out again by the under tow. However, I will cause every inquiry to be made. The destruction has been terrible: numbers of villages have been swept away, and I hear that a great number of native craft are missing. Of course you will stop here for a few days with us to recover from your fatigue. I will rig you out until you can get fresh clothes made."
The lads stopped for a week under the hospitable roof of Mr. Darcy. No news came of any Europeans having been washed ashore alive, though several dead bodies were reported as having been cast up at various points. At the end of the week they were rigged up afresh, and Mr. Darcy procured passages for them in a dhow, bound for Calcutta. He laughed at the idea of the boys paying for their clothes or passage, and said he was only too pleased that he and his wife should have been of service to them.
They arrived at Calcutta without adventure, and at once reported themselves to the agent of the _Wild Wave_ and told the story of her loss. Here again they experienced the warm-hearted hospitality which is so general in India, the agent taking them out to his house and installing them there until the next steamer was to sail for England. He had telegraphed upon the day of their arrival to Mr. Godstone, and received an answer requesting him to take passages home for them to England, where they duly arrived without any exciting incident.
Seven years have passed away, and Jack Robson is now second mate in one of Mr. Godstone's ships, and will be his first officer on next voyage. He has gone through many adventures since, but none approaching in interest and excitement to those which occurred on his two voyages in the _Wild Wave_. His mother still lives at Dulwich, and Lily is engaged to be married to Arthur Hill as soon as the latter attains the rank of captain. Jack is neither engaged nor married, but his mother has a strong idea that before very long he and Mildred Godstone will come to an understanding with each other.
Jack is always at the house when at home, and is treated by Mr. Godstone and his wife as one of the family. Indeed, Mrs. Godstone has as much as hinted to Jack's mother that she and her husband will offer no objection to the young sailor, but that, of course, they will wish their son-in-law to leave the sea and settle as one of the firm in London. Each time he is at home Jack makes a point of running down to Leigh and spending a few days there. "Sea-life is all very well, uncle," he says, "but for downright good sailing there is nothing in the world that to my mind beats a bawley."
*       *       *       *       *
Transcriber's Notes:
Obvious punctuation errors repaired.
Page 112, the edge of the print was not visible, the following words were filled in:
"arrival of tl" changed to "arrival of the" "of the ric" changed to "of the riot," "and alarmed t" changed to "and alarmed to"
Page 167, last letter on edge missing: "o" changed to "of" (great mountain of)
Page 184, "did'nt" changed to "didn't" (We didn't much care)
Pages 122 and 169, "dozed" spelled "dosed" in this text (dosed off)

= = = PG22112 = = =
A CHILD'S BOOK OF SAINTS
Produced by Al Haines
A Child's Book of Saints
by
William Canton
With illustrations by
T. H. Robinson
This is fairy gold, boy; And I will prove it so. --Shakespeare
Every man I will go with thee, be thy guide in thy most need to go by thy side.
London
Published by J. M. Dent & Co.
and in New York by
E. P. Dutton & Co.
First Edition, March 1906.
Reprinted May 1906.
EDITOR'S NOTE.
"A Child's Book of Saints" was first published in 1898, when Mr. Canton had already found his audience.  The book is a near successor indeed to his "W. V.: Her Book," and to "The Invisible Playmate"; and W. V. again acts as guardian elf and guide to this new region of the child's earthly paradise.  The Saints are here treated with a simplicity that is almost or altogether childlike, and with an unforced imagination which is only to be learnt by becoming as a child.  And this is perhaps why, although comparatively a new book, it has the air of something pleasantly old, and written long ago; and thus wins its way into the children's library of old favourite authors.
Mr. Canton's published works, up to January 1906, comprise:--"A Lost Epic, and other Poems," 1887.  "The Invisible Playmate: a Story of the Unseen," 1894, 1897.  "W. V., Her Book and Various Verses," 1896.  "A Child's Book of Saints," 1898, 1902.  "Children's Sayings, Edited, with a Digression on the Small People," 1900.  "The True Annals of Fairyland" (The Reign of King Herla), 1900, &c.  "In Memory of W. V." (Winifred Vida Canton), 1901.  "The Comrades: Poems, Old and New," 1902.  "What is the Bible Society?" 1903.  "The Story of the Bible Society," 1904.  "A History of the British and Foreign Bible Society," 1904.  "Little Hands and God's Book: a Sketch of the Bible Society," 1804-1904, 1905.
Contents
List of Illustrations
Women lived the life of prayer and praise and austerity and miracle
"These are the fields in which the Shepherds watched"
Hilary wondered and mused
A gaunt, dark figure, far up in the blue Asian sky
"Come not any nearer, turn thy face to the forest, and go down"
"I am not mad, most noble Sapricius"
They won their long sea-way home
"And four good Angels watch my bed, two at the foot and two the head"
And again in the keen November
The eight hundred horsemen turned in dismay
"Surely in all the world God has no more beautiful house than this"
St. Francis of Assisi
Itha rode away with her lord
King Orgulous
_A saint, whose very name I have forgotten, had a vision, in which he saw Satan standing before the throne of God; and, listening, he heard the evil spirit say, "Why hast Thou condemned me, who have offended Thee but once, whilst Thou savest thousands of men who have offended Thee many times?"  God answered him, "Hast thou_ once _asked pardon of me?"_
_Behold the Christian mythology!  It is the dramatic truth, which has its worth and effect independently of the literal truth, and which even gains nothing by being fact.  What matter whether the saint had or had not heard the sublime words which I have just quoted!  The great point is to know that pardon is refused only to him who does not ask it._
COUNT DE MAISTRE.
A Child's Book of Saints
In the Forest of Stone
Looking down the vista of trees and houses from the slope of our garden, W. V. saw the roof and spire of the church of the Oak-men showing well above the green huddle of the Forest.
"It is a pretty big church, isn't it, father?" she asked, as she pointed it out to me.
It was a most picturesque old-fashioned church, though in my thoughtlessness I had mistaken it for a beech and a tall poplar growing apparently side by side; but the moment she spoke I perceived my illusion.
"I expect, if we were anywhere about on a Sunday morning," she surmised, with a laugh, "we should see hundreds and hundreds of Oak-girls and Oak-boys going in schools to service."
"Dressed in green silk, with bronze boots and pink feathers--the colours of the new oak-leaves, eh?"
"Oh, father, it would be lovely!" in a burst of ecstasy.  "Oughtn't we to go and find the way to their church?"
We might do something much less amusing.  Accordingly we took the bearings of the green spire with the skill of veteran explorers.  It lay due north, so that if we travelled by the way of the North Star we should be certain to find it.  Wheeling the Man before us, we made a North Star track for ourselves through the underwood and over last year's rustling beech-leaves, till Guy ceased babbling and crooning, and dropped into a slumber, as he soon does in the fresh of the morning.  Then we had to go slowly for fear he should be wakened by the noise of the dead wood underfoot, for, as we passed over it with wheels and boots, it snapped and crackled like a freshly-kindled fire.  It was a relief to get at last to the soft matting of brown needles and cones under the Needle-trees, for there we could go pretty quickly without either jolting him or making a racket.
We went as far as we were able that day, and we searched in glade and lawn, in coppice and dingle, but never a trace could we find of the sylvan minster where the Oak-people worship.  As we wandered through the Forest we came upon a number of notice boards nailed high up on the trunks of various trees, but when W. V. discovered that these only repeated the same stern legend: "Caution.  Persons breaking, climbing upon, or otherwise damaging," she indignantly resented this incessant intrusion on the innocent enjoyment of free foresters.  How much nicer it would have been if there had been a hand on one of these repressive boards, with the inscription: "This way to the North Star Church;" or, if a caution was really necessary for some of the people who entered the Forest, to say: "The public are requested not to disturb the Elves, Birch-ladies, and Oak-men;" but of course the most delightful thing would be to have a different fairy-tale written up in clear letters on each of the boards, and a seat close by where one could rest and read it comfortably.
I told her there were several forests I had explored, in which something like that was really done; only the stories were not fairy-tales, but legends of holy men and women; and among the branches of the trees were fixed most beautifully coloured glass pictures of those holy people, who had all lived and died, and some of whom had been buried, in those forests, hundreds of years ago.  Most of the forests were very ancient--older than the thrones of many kingdoms; and men lived and delighted in them long before Columbus sailed into unknown seas to discover America.  Many, indeed, had been blown down and destroyed by a terrible storm which swept over the world when Henry VIII. ruled in England, and only wrecks of them now remained for any one to see, but others, which had survived the wild weather of those days, were as wonderful and as lovely as a dream.  The tall trees in them sent out curving branches which interlaced high overhead, shutting out the blue sky and making a sweet and solemn dimness, and nearly all the light that streamed in between the fair round trunks and the arching boughs was like that of a splendid sunset, only it was there all day long and never faded out till night fell.  And in some of the forests there were great magical roses, of a hundred brilliant colours crowded together, and as big as the biggest cart-wheel, or bigger.
These woods were places of happy quietude and comfort and gladness of heart; but, instead of Oak-men, there were many Angels.
Here and there, too, in the silent avenues, mighty warriors and saintly abbots, and statesmen bishops, and it might be even a king or a queen, had been buried; and over their graves there were sometimes images of them lying carved in marble or alabaster, and sometimes there had been built the loveliest little chapels all sculptured over with tracery of flowers and foliage.
"True, father?"
"True as true, dear.  Some day I shall take you to see for yourself."
We know a dip in a dingle where the woodcutters have left a log among the hazels, and here, having wheeled Guy into a dappling of sunny discs and leaf-shadows in a grassy bay, we sat down on the log, and talked in an undertone.  Our failure to find the Oak-men's church reminded me of the old legends of lost and invisible churches, the bells of which are heard ringing under the snow, or in the depths of the woods, or far away in burning deserts, or fathom-deep beneath the blue sea; but the pilgrim or the chance wayfarer who has heard the music of the bells has never succeeded in discovering the way that leads to the lost church. It is on the clear night of St. John's Day, the longest day of the year, or on the last hour of Christmas Eve, that these bells are heard pealing most sweet and clear.
It was in this way that we came to tell Christian legends and to talk of saints and hermits, of old abbeys and minsters, of visions and miracles and the ministry of Angels.  Guy, W. V. thought, might be able, if only he could speak, to tell us much about heaven and the Angels; it was so short a time since he left them.  She herself had quite forgotten, but, then--deprecatingly--it was so long and long and long ago; "eight years, a long time for me."
The faith and the strange vivid daydreams of the Middle Ages were a new world into which she was being led along enchanted footpaths; quite different from the worldly world of the "Old Romans," and of English history; more real it seemed and more credible, for all its wonders, than the world of elves and water-maidens.  Delightful as it was, it was scarce believable that fairies ever carried a little girl up above the tree-tops and swung her in the air from one to another; but when St. Catherine of Siena was a little child, and went to be a hermit in the woods, and got terribly frightened, and lost her way, and sat down to cry, the Angels, you know, did really and truly waft her up on their wings and carried her to the valley of Fontebranda, which was very near home.  And when she was quite a little thing and used to say her prayers going up to bed, the Angels would come to her and just "whip" her right up the stairs in an instant!
Occasionally these legends brought us to the awful brink of religious controversies and insoluble mysteries, but, like those gentle savages who honour the water-spirits by hanging garlands from tree to tree across the river, W. V. could always fling a bridge of flowers over our abysses.  "Our sense," she would declare, "is nothing to God's; and though big people have more sense than children, the sense of all the big people in the world put together would be no sense to His."  "We are only little babies to Him; we do not understand Him at all." Nothing seemed clearer to her than the reasonableness of one legend which taught that though God always answers our prayers, He does not always answer in the way we would like, but in some better way than we know.  "Yes," she observed, "He is just a dear old Father."  Anything about our Lord engrossed her imagination; and it was a frequent wish of hers that He would come again.  "Then,"--poor perplexed little mortal! whose difficulties one could not even guess at--"we should be quite sure of things.  Miss Catherine tells us from books: He would tell us from His memory.  People would not be so cruel to Him now.  Queen Victoria would not allow any one to crucify Him."
I don't think that W. V., in spite of her confidence in my good faith, was quite convinced of the existence of those old forests of which I had told her, until I explained that they were forests of stone, which, if men did not mar them, would blossom for centuries unchanged, though the hands that planted them had long been blown in dust about the world.  She understood all that I meant when we visited York and Westminster, and walked through the long avenues of stone palms and pines, with their overarching boughs, and gazed at the marvellous rose-windows in which all the jewels of the world seemed to have been set, and saw the colours streaming through the gorgeous lancets and high many-lighted casements.  After that it was delightful to turn over engravings and photographs of ruined abbeys and famous old churches at home and abroad, and to anticipate the good time when we should visit them together, and perhaps not only descend into the crypts but go through the curious galleries which extend over the pillars of the nave, and even climb up to the leaded roof of the tower, or dare the long windy staircases and ladders which mount into the spire, and so look down on the quaint map of streets, and houses, and gardens, and squares, hundreds of feet below.
She liked to hear how some of those miracles of stone had been fashioned and completed--how monks in the days of old had travelled over the land with the relics of saints, collecting treasure of all sorts for the expense of the work; how sometimes the people came in hundreds dragging great oaks and loads of quarried stone, and bringing fat hogs, beans, corn, and beer for the builders and their workmen; how even queens carried block or beam to the masons, so that with their own hands they might help in the glorious labour; and poor old women gave assistance by cooking food and washing and spinning and weaving and making and mending; how when the foundations were blessed kings and princes and powerful barons laid each a stone, and when the choir sang the antiphon, "And the foundations of the wall were garnished with all manner of precious stones," they threw costly rings and jewels and chains of gold into the trench; and how years and generations passed away, and abbots and bishops and architects and masons and sculptors and labourers died, but new men took their places, and still the vast work went on, and the beautiful pile rose higher and higher into the everlasting heavens.
Then, too, we looked back at the vanished times when the world was all so different from our world of to-day; and in green and fruitful spots among the hills and on warm river-lawns and in olden cities of narrow streets and overhanging roofs, there were countless abbeys and priories and convents; and thousands of men and women lived the life of prayer and praise and austerity and miracle and vision which is described in the legends of the Saints.  We lingered in the pillared cloisters where the black-letter chronicles were written in Latin, and music was scored and hymns were composed, and many a rare manuscript was illuminated in crimson and blue and emerald and gold; and we looked through the fair arches into the cloister-garth where in the green sward a grave lay ever ready to receive the remains of the next brother who should pass away from this little earth to the glory of Paradise.  What struck W. V. perhaps most of all was, that in some leafy places these holy houses were so ancient that even the blackbirds and throstles had learned to repeat some of the cadences of the church music, and in those places the birds still continue to pipe them, though nothing now remains of church or monastery except the name of some field or street or well, which people continue to use out of old habit and custom.
[Illustration: _Women lived the life of prayer and praise_]
It was with the thought of helping the busy little brain to realise something of that bygone existence, with its strange modes of thought, its unquestioning faith in the unseen and eternal, its vivid consciousness of the veiled but constant presence of the holy and omnipotent God, its stern self-repression and its tender charity, its lovely ideals and haunting legends, that I told W. V. the stories in this little book.  It mattered little to her or to me that that existence had its dark shadows contrasting with its celestial light: it was the light that concerned us, not the shadows.
Some of the stories were told on the log, while Guy slept in his mail-cart in the dappled shelter of the dingle; others by a winter fire when the days were short, and the cry of the wind in the dark made it easy for one to believe in wolves; others in the Surrey hills, a year ago, in a sandy hollow crowned with bloom of the ling, and famous for a little pool where the martins alight to drink and star the mud with a maze of claw-tracks; and yet again, others, this year,[1] under the dry roof of the pines of Anstiebury, when the fosse of the old Briton settlement was dripping with wet, and the woods were dim with the smoke of rain, and the paths were red with the fallen bloom of the red chestnuts and white with the flourish of May and brown with the catkins of the oak, and the cuckoo, calling in Mosses Wood, was answered from Redlands and the Warren, and the pines where we sat (snug and dry) looked so solemn and dark that, with a little fancy, it was easy to change the living greenwood into the forest of stone.
As they were told, under the pressure of an insatiable listener, so have they been written, save for such a phrase, here and there, as slips more readily from the pen than from the tongue.
Of the stories which were told, but which have not been written for this book, if W. V. should question me, I shall answer in the wise words of the Greybeard of Broce-Liande: "However hot thy thirst, and however pleasant to assuage it, leave clear water in the well."
[1] The year of the happy hills, 1898.
The Song of the Minster
When John of Fulda became Prior of Hethholme, says the old chronicle, he brought with him to the Abbey many rare and costly books--beautiful illuminated missals and psalters and portions of the Old and New Testament.  And he presented rich vestments to the Minster; albs of fine linen, and copes embroidered with flowers of gold.  In the west front he built two great arched windows filled with marvellous storied glass.  The shrine of St. Egwin he repaired at vast outlay, adorning it with garlands in gold and silver, but the colour of the flowers was in coloured gems, and in like fashion the little birds in the nooks of the foliage.  Stalls and benches of carved oak he placed in the choir; and many other noble works he had wrought in his zeal for the glory of God's house.
In all the western land was there no more fair or stately Minster than this of the Black Monks, with the peaceful township on one side, and on the other the sweet meadows and the acres of wheat and barley sloping down to the slow river, and beyond the river the clearings in the ancient forest.
But Thomas the Sub-prior was grieved and troubled in his mind by the richness and the beauty of all he saw about him, and by the Prior's eagerness to be ever adding some new work in stone, or oak, or metal, or jewels.
"Surely," he said to himself, "these things are unprofitable--less to the honour of God than to the pleasure of the eye and the pride of life and the luxury of our house!  Had so much treasure not been wasted on these vanities of bright colour and carved stone, our dole to the poor of Christ might have been fourfold, and they filled with good things. But now let our almoner do what best he may, I doubt not many a leper sleeps cold, and many a poor man goes lean with hunger."
This the Sub-prior said, not because his heart was quick with fellowship for the poor, but because he was of a narrow and gloomy and grudging nature, and he could conceive of no true service of God which was not one of fasting and praying, of fear and trembling, of joylessness and mortification.
Now you must know that the greatest of the monks and the hermits and the holy men were not of this kind.  In their love of God they were blithe of heart, and filled with a rare sweetness and tranquillity of soul, and they looked on the goodly earth with deep joy, and they had a tender care for the wild creatures of wood and water.  But Thomas had yet much to learn of the beauty of holiness.
Often in the bleak dark hours of the night he would leave his cell and steal into the Minster, to fling himself on the cold stones before the high altar; and there he would remain, shivering and praying, till his strength failed him.
It happened one winter night, when the thoughts I have spoken of had grown very bitter in his mind, Thomas guided his steps by the glimmer of the sanctuary lamp to his accustomed place in the choir.  Falling on his knees, he laid himself on his face with the palms of his outstretched hands flat on the icy pavement.  And as he lay there, taking a cruel joy in the freezing cold and the torture of his body, he became gradually aware of a sound of far-away yet most heavenly music.
He raised himself to his knees to listen, and to his amazement he perceived that the whole Minster was pervaded by a faint mysterious light, which was every instant growing brighter and clearer.  And as the light increased the music grew louder and sweeter, and he knew that it was within the sacred walls.  But it was no mortal minstrelsy.
The strains he heard were the minglings of angelic instruments, and the cadences of voices of unearthly loveliness.  They seemed to proceed from the choir about him, and from the nave and transept and aisles; from the pictured windows and from the clerestory and from the vaulted roofs.  Under his knees he felt that the crypt was throbbing and droning like a huge organ.
Sometimes the song came from one part of the Minster, and then all the rest of the vast building was silent; then the music was taken up, as it were in response, in another part; and yet again voices and instruments would blend in one indescribable volume of harmony, which made the huge pile thrill and vibrate from roof to pavement.
As Thomas listened, his eyes became accustomed to the celestial light which encompassed him, and he saw--he could scarce credit his senses that he saw--the little carved angels of the oak stalls in the choir clashing their cymbals and playing their psalteries.
He rose to his feet, bewildered and half terrified.  At that moment the mighty roll of unison ceased, and from many parts of the church there came a concord of clear high voices, like a warbling of silver trumpets, and Thomas heard the words they sang.  And the words were these--
_Tibi omnes Angeli._ _To Thee all Angels cry aloud._
So close to him were two of these voices that Thomas looked up to the spandrels in the choir, and he saw that it was the carved angels leaning out of the spandrels that were singing.  And as they sang the breath came from their stone lips white and vaporous into the frosty air.
He trembled with awe and astonishment, but the wonder of what was happening drew him towards the altar.  The beautiful tabernacle work of the altar screen contained a double range of niches filled with the statues of saints and kings; and these, he saw, were singing.  He passed slowly onward with his arms outstretched, like a blind man who does not know the way he is treading.
The figures on the painted glass of the lancets were singing.
The winged heads of the baby angels over the marble memorial slabs were singing.
The lions and griffons and mythical beasts of the finials were singing.
The effigies of dead abbots and priors were singing on their tombs in bay and chantry.
The figures in the frescoes on the walls were singing.
On the painted ceiling westward of the tower the verses of the Te Deum, inscribed in letters of gold above the shields of kings and princes and barons, were visible in the divine light, and the very words of these verses were singing, like living things.
And the breath of all these as they sang turned to a smoke as of incense in the wintry air, and floated about the high pillars of the Minster.
Suddenly the music ceased, all save the deep organ-drone.
Then Thomas heard the marvellous antiphon repeated in the bitter darkness outside; and that music, he knew, must be the response of the galleries of stone kings and queens, of abbots and virgin martyrs, over the western portals, and of the monstrous gargoyles along the eaves.
When the music ceased in the outer darkness, it was taken up again in the interior of the Minster.
At last there came one stupendous united cry of all the singers, and in that cry even the organ-drone of the crypt, and the clamour of the brute stones of pavement and pillar, of wall and roof, broke into words articulate.  And the words were these:
_Per singulos dies, benedicimus Te._ _Day by day: we magnify Thee,_ _And we worship Thy name: ever world without end._
As the wind of the summer changes into the sorrowful wail of the yellowing woods, so the strains of joyous worship changed into a wail of supplication; and as he caught the words, Thomas too raised his voice in wild entreaty:
_Miserere nostri, Domine, miserere nostri._ _O Lord, have mercy upon us: have mercy upon us._
And then his senses failed him, and he sank to the ground in a long swoon.
When he came to himself all was still, and all was dark save for the little yellow flower of light in the sanctuary lamp.
As he crept back to his cell he saw with unsealed eyes how churlishly he had grudged God the glory of man's genius and the service of His dumb creatures, the metal of the hills, and the stone of the quarry, and the timber of the forest; for now he knew that at all seasons, and whether men heard the music or not, the ear of God was filled by day and by night with an everlasting song from each stone of the vast Minster:
_We magnify Thee,_ _And we worship Thy name: ever world without end._
The Pilgrim of a Night
In the ancient days of faith the doors of the churches used to be opened with the first glimmer of the dawn in summer, and long before the moon had set in winter; and many a ditcher and woodcutter and ploughman on his way to work used to enter and say a short prayer before beginning the labour of the long day.
Now it happened that in Spain there was a farm-labourer named Isidore, who went daily to his early prayer, whatever the weather might be.  His fellow-workmen were slothful and careless, and they gibed and jeered at his piety, but when they found that their mockery had no effect upon him, they spoke spitefully of him in the hearing of the master, and accused him of wasting in prayer the time which he should have given to his work.
When the farmer heard of this he was displeased, and he spoke to Isidore and bade him remember that true and faithful service was better than any prayer that could be uttered in words.
"Master," replied Isidore, "what you say is true, but it is also true that no time is ever lost in prayer.  Those who pray have God to work with them, and the ploughshare which He guides draws as goodly and fruitful a furrow as another."
This the master could not deny, but he resolved to keep a watch on Isidore's comings and goings, and early on the morrow he went to the fields.
In the sharp air of the autumn morning he saw this one and that one of his men sullenly following the plough behind the oxen, and taking little joy in the work.  Then, as he passed on to the rising ground, he heard a lark carolling gaily in the grey sky, and in the hundred-acre where Isidore was engaged he saw to his amazement not one plough but three turning the hoary stubble into ruddy furrows.  And one plough was drawn by oxen and guided by Isidore, but the two others were drawn and guided by Angels of heaven.
When next the master spoke to Isidore it was not to reproach him, but to beg that he might be remembered in his prayers.
Now the one great longing of Isidore's life was to visit that hallowed and happy country beyond the sea in which our Lord lived and died for us.  He longed to gaze on the fields in which the Shepherds heard the song of the Angels, and to know each spot named in the Gospels.  All that he could save from his earnings Isidore hoarded up, so that one day, before he was old, he might set out on pilgrimage to the Holy Land.  It took many years to swell the leather bag in which he kept his treasure; and each coin told of some pleasure, or comfort, or necessary which he had denied himself.
Now, when at length the bag was grown heavy, and it began to appear not impossible that he might yet have his heart's desire, there came to his door an aged pilgrim with staff and scallop-shell, who craved food and shelter for the night.  Isidore bade him welcome, and gave him such homely fare as he might--bread and apples and cheese and thin wine, and satisfied his hunger and thirst.
Long they talked together of the holy places and of the joy of treading the sacred dust that had borne the marks of the feet of Christ.  Then the pilgrim spoke of the long and weary journey he had yet to go, begging his way from village to village (for his scrip was empty) till he could prevail on some good mariner to give him ship-room and carry him to the green isle of home, far away on the edge of sunset. Thinking of those whom he had left and who might be dead before he could return, the pilgrim wept, and his tears so moved the heart of Isidore that he brought forth his treasure and said:
"This have I saved in the great hope that one day I might set eyes on what thou hast beheld, and sit on the shores of the Lake of Galilee, and gaze on the hill of Calvary.  But thy need is very great.  Take it, and hasten home (ere they be dead) to those who love thee and look for thy coming; and if thou findest them alive bid them pray for me."
And when they had prayed together Isidore and the pilgrim lay down to sleep.
In the first sweet hours of the restful night Isidore became aware that he was walking among strange fields on a hillside, and on the top of a hill some distance away there were the white walls and low flat-roofed houses of a little town; and some one was speaking to him and saying, "These are the fields in which the Shepherds watched, and that rocky pathway leads up the slope to Bethlehem."
[Illustration: "_These are the fields in which the Shepherds watched_"]
At the sound of the voice Isidore hastily looked round, and behind him was the pilgrim, and yet he knew that it was not truly the pilgrim, but an Angel disguised in pilgrim's weeds.  And when he would have fallen at the Angel's feet, the Angel stopped him and said, "Be not afraid; I have been sent to show thee all the holy places that thy heart has longed to see."
On valley and hill and field and stream there now shone so clear and wonderful a light that even a long way off the very flowers by the roadside were distinctly visible.  Without effort and without weariness Isidore glided from place to place as though it were a dream.  And I cannot tell the half of what he saw, for the Angel took him to the village where Jesus was a little child, which is called Nazareth, "the flower-village;" and he showed him the River Jordan flowing through dark green woods, and Hermon the high mountain, glittering with snow (and the snow of that mountain is exceeding old), and the blue Lake of Gennesareth, with its fishing-craft, and the busy town of Capernaum on the great road to Damascus, and Nain where Jesus watched the little children playing at funerals and marriages in the market-place, and the wilderness where He was with the wild beasts, and Bethany where Lazarus lived and died and was brought to life again (and in the fields of Bethany Isidore gathered a bunch of wild flowers), and Jerusalem the holy city, and Gethsemane with its aged silver-grey olive-trees, and the hill of Calvary, where in the darkness a great cry went up to heaven: "Why hast Thou forsaken me?" and the new tomb in the white rock among the myrtles and rose-trees in the garden.
There was no place that Isidore had desired to see that was denied to him.  And in all these places he saw the children's children of the children of those who had looked on the face of the Saviour--men and women and little ones--going to and fro in strangely coloured clothing, in the manner of those who had sat down on the green grass and been fed with bread and fishes.  And at the thought of this Isidore wept.
"Why dost thou weep?" the Angel asked.
"I weep that I was not alive to look on the face of the Lord."
Then suddenly, as though it were a dream, they were on the sea-shore, and it was morning.  And Isidore saw on the sparkling sea a fisher-ship drifting a little way from the shore, but there was no one in it; and on the shore a boat was aground; and half on the sand and half in the wash of the sea there were swathes of brown nets filled with a hundred great fish which flounced and glittered in the sun; and on the sand there was a coal fire with fish broiling on it, and on one side of the fire seven men--one of them kneeling and shivering in his drenched fisher's coat--and on the other side of the fire a benign and majestic figure, on whom the men were gazing in great joy and awe.  And Isidore, knowing that this was the Lord, gazed too at Christ standing there in the sun.
And this was what he beheld: a man of lofty stature and most grave and beautiful countenance.  His eyes were blue and very brilliant, his cheeks were slightly tinged with red, and his hair was of the ruddy golden colour of wine.  From the top of his head to his ears it was straight and without radiance; but from his ears to his shoulders and down his back it fell in shining curls and clusters.
Again all was suddenly changed, and Isidore and the Angel were alone.
"Thou hast seen," said the Angel; "give me thy hand so that thou shalt not forget."
Isidore stretched out his hand, and the Angel opened it, and turning the palm upward, struck it.  Isidore groaned with the sharp pain of the stroke, and sank into unconsciousness.
When he awoke in the morning the sun was high in the heavens, and the pilgrim had departed on his way.  But the hut was filled with a heavenly fragrance, and on his bed Isidore perceived the wild flowers that he had plucked in the fields of Bethany--red anemones and blue lupins and yellow marigolds, with many others more sweet and lovely than the flowers that grew in the fields or Spain.
"Then surely," he cried, "it was not merely a dream."
And looking at his hand, he saw that the palm bore blue tracings such as one sees on the arms of wanderers and seafaring men.  These marks, Isidore learned afterwards, were the Hebrew letters that spelt the name "JERUSALEM."
As long as he lived those letters recalled to his mind all the marvels that had been shown him.  And they did more than this, for whenever his eyes fell on them he said, "Blessed be the promise of the Lord the Redeemer of Israel, who hath us in His care for evermore!"
Now these are the words of that promise:
"_Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb?  Yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee.  Behold, I have engraven thee upon the palms of my hands._"
The Ancient Gods Pursuing
I will now tell of Hilary and his companions, who came over the snowy passes of the Alps, and carried the lamp of faith into the north; and this was in the days of the ancient gods.  Many of their shrines had Hilary overturned, and broken their images, and cut down their sacred trees, and denied their wells of healing.  Wherefore terrible phantoms pursued him in his dreams, and in the darkness, and in the haunted ways of the woods and mountains.  At one time it was the brute-god Pan, who sought to madden him with the terror of his piping in desolate places; at another it was the sun-god Apollo, who threatened him with fiery arrows in the parching heat of noon; or it was Pallas Athene, who appeared to him in visions, and shook in his face the Gorgon's head, which turns to stone all living creatures who look on it.  But the holy Bishop made the sign of the cross of the Lord, and the right arm of their power was broken, and their malice could not harm him.
The holy men traversed the mountains by that Roman road which climbed up the icy rocks and among the snowy peaks of the Mountain of Jove, and at sundown they came to that high temple of Jove which had crowned the pass for many centuries.  The statue of the great father-god of Rome had been hurled down the ravine into the snow-drift, and his altar had been flung into the little wintry mere which shivers in the pass, and his last priest had died of old age a lifetime ago; and the temple was now but a cold harbour for merchants and soldiers and wandering men.
Here in the freezing air the apostles rested from their journey, but in the dead of the night Hilary was awakened by a clamour of forlorn voices, and opening his eyes he saw the mighty father-god of Olympus looking down upon him with angry brows, and brandishing in his hand red flashes of lightning.  In no way daunted, the Bishop sprang to his feet, and cried in a loud voice, "In the name of Him who was crucified, depart to your torments!"  And at the sound of that cry the colossal figure of the god wavered and broke like a mountain cloud when it crumbles in the wind, and glimmering shapes of goddesses and nymphs flitted past, sighing and lamenting; and the Bishop saw no longer anything but the sharp cold stars, and the white peaks and the ridges of the mountains.
When they had descended and reached the green valleys, they came at length to a great lake, blue and beautiful to look upon, and here they sojourned for a while.  It was a fair and pleasant land, but the people were rude and barbarous, and drove them away with stones when they would enter their hamlets.  So, as they needed food, Hilary bade his companions gather berries and wild herbs, and he himself set snares for birds, and wove a net to cast into the lake, and made himself a raft of pine-trees, from which he might cast it the more easily.
One night as he floated on this raft in the starlight, he heard the voice of the Spirit of the Peak calling to the Spirit of the Mere.  And the Spirit of the Mere answered, "Speak, I am listening."  Then the Mountain Spirit cried, "Arise, then, and come to my aid; alone I cannot chase away these men who are driving out all the ancient gods from their shrines in the land."  The Water Spirit answered, "Of what avail is our strength against theirs?  Here on the starry waters is one whose nets I cannot break, and whose boat I cannot overturn.  Without ceasing he prays, and never are his eyes closed in slumber."  Then Hilary arose on his raft, and raising his hand to heaven cried against the Spirit of the Peak and the Spirit of the Mere: "In the name of Him crucified, be silent for evermore, and leave these hills and waters to the servants of God."  And these creatures of evil were stricken dumb, and they fled in dismay, making a great moaning and sobbing, and the dolorous sound was as that of the wind in the pines and the water on the rocks.
Then Hilary and his companions fared away into the north, through the Grey Waste, which is a wild and deserted country where in the olden time vast armies had passed with fire and sword; and now the field had turned into wildwood and morass, and the rich townsteads were barrows of ruins and ashes overgrown with brambles, and had been given for a lodging to the savage beasts.  The name of this waste was more terrible than the place, for the season was sweet and gracious, and of birds and fish and herbs and wild honey there was no dearth.  They were now no longer harassed by the phantoms of the ancient gods, or by the evil spirits of the unblessed earth.  Thus for many long leagues was their journey made easy for them.
Now it chanced, when they had reached the further edge of this region, that as they went one night belated along a green riding, which in the old time had been a spacious paved causeway between rich cities, they heard the music of a harp, more marvellously sweet and solacing than any mortal minstrel may make; and sweet dream-voices sighed to them "Follow, follow!" and they felt their feet drawn as by enchantment; and as they yielded to the magical power, a soft shining filled the dusky air, and they saw that the ground was covered with soft deep grass and brilliant flowers, and the trees were of the colour of gold and silver. So in strange gladness, and feeling neither hunger nor fatigue, they went forward through the hours of the night till the dawn, wondering what angelic ministry was thus beguiling them of hardship and pain. But with the first gleam of the dawn the music ceased amid mocking laughter, the vision of lovely woodland vanished away, and in the grey light they found themselves on the quaking green edges of a deep and dangerous marsh.  Hilary, when he saw this, groaned in spirit and said: "O dear sons, we have deserved this befooling and misguidance, for have we not forgotten the behest of our Master, 'Watch and pray lest ye enter into temptation'?"
Now when after much toilsomeness they had won clear of that foul tract of morass and quagmire, they came upon vast herds of swine grubbing beneath the oaks, and with them savage-looking swineherds scantily clad in skins.  Still further north they caught sight of the squalid hovels and wood piles of charcoal burners; and still they pursued their way till they cleared the dense forest and beheld before them a long range of hills blue in the distant air.  Towards sundown they came on a stony moorland, rough with heather and bracken and tufts of bent; and when there was but one long band of red light parting the distant land from the low sky, they descried a range of thick posts standing high and black against the red in the heavens.  As they drew near, these, they discovered, were the huge granite pillars of a great ring of stone and of an avenue which led up to it; and in the midst of the ring was a mighty flat stone borne up on three stout pillars, so that it looked like a wondrous stone house of some strong folk of the beginning of days.
"This, too, companions," said Hilary, "is a temple of false gods.  Very ancient gods of a world gone by are these, and it may be they have been long dead like their worshippers, and their names are no more spoken in the world.  Further we may not go this night; but on these stones we shall put the sign of the blessed tree of our redemption, and in its shelter shall we sleep."
As they slept that night in the lee of the stones Hilary saw in a dream the place wherein they lay; and the great stones, he was aware, were not true stones of the rock, but petrified trees, and in his spirit he knew that these trees of stone were growths of that Forbidden Tree with the fruit of which the Serpent tempted our first mother in Paradise. On the morrow when they rose, he strove to overthrow the huge pillars, but to this labour their strength was not equal.
This same day was the day of St. John, the longest in all the year, and they travelled far, till at last in the long afternoon they arrived in sight of a cluster of little homesteads, clay huts thatched with bracken and fenced about with bushes of poison-thorn, and of tilled crofts sloping down the hillside to a clear river wending through the valley.
As Hilary and his companions approached they saw that it was a day of rejoicing and merry-making among the people, for they were all abroad, feasting and drinking from great mead horns in the open air, and shouting barbarous songs to the noise of rude instruments.  When it grew to such duskiness as there may be in a midsummer night countless fires were lit, near at hand and far away, on the hills around; and on the ridges above the river children ran about with blazing brands of pine-wood, and young men and maidens gathered at the flaming beacon. Wheels, too, wrapped round tire and spoke with straw and flax smeared with pine-tree gum, were set alight and sent rolling down the hill to the river, amid wild cries and clapping of hands.  Some of the wheels went awry and were stayed among the boulders; on some the flames died out; but there were those which reached the river and plunged into the water and were extinguished; and the owners of these last deemed themselves fortunate in their omens, for these fiery wheels were images of the sun in heaven, and their course to the river was the forecasting of his prosperous journey through the year to come.
Thus these outland people held their festival, and Hilary marvelled to see the many fires, for he had not known that the land held so many folk.  But now when it was time for the wayfarers to cast about in their minds how and where they should pass the night, there came to them a stranger, a grave and seemly man clad in the manner of the Romans, and he bowed low to them, and said: "O saintly men, the Lady Pelagia hath heard of your coming into this land, and she knows that you have come to teach men the new faith, for she is a great lady, mistress of vast demesnes, and many messengers bring her tidings of all that happens.  She bids me greet you humbly and prevail on you to come and abide this night in her house, which is but a little way from here."
"Is your lady of Rome?" asked Hilary.
"From Rome she came hither," said the messenger, "but aforetime she was of Greece, and she hath great friendship for all wise and holy men."
The wayfarers were surprised to hear of this lady, but they were rejoiced that, after such long wandering, there was some one to welcome them where least they had expected word of welcome, and they followed the messenger.
Horn lantern in hand he led them through the warm June darkness, and on the way answered many questions as to the folk of these parts, and their strange worship of sun and moon and wandering light of heaven; "but in a brief while," he said, "all these heathen matters will be put by, when you have taught them the new faith."
Up a gloomily wooded rise he guided them, till they passed into the radiance of a house lit with many lamps and cressets, and the house, they saw, was of fair marble such as are the houses of the patricians of Rome; and many beautiful slaves, lightly clad and garlanded with roses, brought them water in silver bowls and white linen wherewith they might cleanse themselves from the dust of their travel.
In a little the Lady Pelagia received them and bade them welcome, and prayed them to make her poor house their dwelling-place while they sojourned in that waste of heathendom.  Then she led them to a repast which had been made ready for them.
Of all the gracious and lovely women in the round of the kingdoms of the earth none is, or hath been, or will be, more marvellous in beauty or in sweetness of approach than this lady; and she made Hilary sit beside her, and questioned him of the Saints in the Queen City of the world, and of his labours and his long wanderings, and the perils through which he and his companions had come.  All the while she spoke her starry eyes shed soft light on his face, and she leaned towards him her lovely head and fragrant bosom, drinking in his words with a look of longing.  The companions whispered among themselves that assuredly this was rather an Angel of Paradise than a mortal creature of the dust of the earth, which to-day is as a flower in its desirableness and to-morrow is blown about all the ways of men's feet.  Even the good Bishop felt his heart moved towards her with a strange tenderness, so sweet was the thought of her youth and her beauty and her goodness and humility.
Sitting in this fashion at table and conversing, and the talk now veering to this and now to that, the Lady Pelagia said: "This longest of the days has been to me the most happy, holy fathers, for it has brought you to the roof of a sinful woman, and you have not disdained the service she has offered you in all lowliness of heart.  A long and, it may be, a dangerous labour lies before you, for the folk of this land are fierce and quick to violence; but here you may ever refresh yourselves from toil and take your rest, free from danger.  No loving offices or lowly observance, no, nor ought you desire is there that you may not have for the asking--or without the asking, if it be given me to know your wish unspoken."
Hilary and the brethren bowed low at these gracious words, and thought within themselves: Of a truth this may be a woman, but she is no less an Angel for our strength and solacement.
"In the days to come," said the lady, "there will be many things to ask and learn from you, but now ere this summer night draws to end let me have knowledge of divine things from thee, most holy father, for thou art wise and canst answer all my questionings."
And Hilary smiled gravely, not ill pleased at her words of praise, and said: "Ask, daughter."
"First tell me," she said, "which of all the small things God has made in the world is the most excellent?"
Hilary wondered and mused, but could find no answer; and when he would have said so, the voice which came from his lips spoke other words than those he intended to speak, so that instead of saying "This is a question I cannot answer," his voice said: "Of all small things made by God, most excellent is the face of man and woman; for among all the faces of the children of Adam not any one hath ever been wholly like any other; and there in smallest space God has placed all the senses of the body; and it is in the face that we see, as in a glass, darkly, all that can be seen of the invisible soul within."
[Illustration: _Hilary wondered and mused_]
The companions listened marvelling, but Hilary marvelled no less than they.
"It is well answered," said the lady, "and yet it seemed to me there was one thing more excellent.  But let me ask again: What earth is nearest to heaven?"
Again Hilary mused and was silent.  Then, once more, the voice which was his voice and yet spoke words which he did not think to speak, gave the answer: "The body of Him who died on the tree to save us, for He was of our flesh, and our flesh is earth of the earth."
"That too is well answered," said the lady, who had grown pale and gazed on the Bishop with great gloomy eyes; "and yet I had thought of another answer.  Once more let me question you: What is the distance between heaven and earth?"
Then for the third time was Hilary unable to reply, but the voice answered for him, in stern and menaceful tones: "Who can tell us that more certainly than Lucifer who fell from heaven?"
With a bitter cry the Lady Pelagia rose from her seat, and raised her beautiful white arms above her head; but the voice continued: "Breathe on her, Hilary--breathe the breath of the name of Christ!"
And the Bishop, rising, breathed on the white lovely face the breath of the holy name; and in an instant the starry eyes were darkened, and the spirit and flower of life perished in her sweet body; and the companions saw no longer the Lady Pelagia, but in her stead a statue of white marble.  At a glance Hilary knew it for a statue of the goddess whom men in Rome called Venus and in Greece Aphrodite, and with a shudder he remembered that another of her names was Pelagia, the Lady of the Sea.  But, swifter even than that thought, it seemed to them as though the statue were smitten by an invisible hand, for it reeled and fell, shattered to fragments; and the lights were extinguished, and the air of the summer night blew upon their faces, and in the east, whence cometh our hope, there was a glimmer of dawn.
Praying fervently, and bewailing the brief joy they had taken in the beauty of that dreadful goddess, they waited for light to guide them from that evil place.
When the day broadened they perceived that they were in the midst of the ruins of an ancient Roman city, overgrown with bush and tree. Around them lay, amid beds of nettles and great dock leaves, and darnel and tangles of briars, and tall foxgloves and deadly nightshade, the broken pillars of a marble temple.  This had been the fair house, lit with lamps, wherein they had sat at feast.  Close beside them were scattered the white fragments of the image of the beautiful Temptress.
As they turned to depart three grey wolves snarled at them from the ruins, but an unseen hand held these in leash, and Hilary and his companions went on their way unharmed.
The Dream of the White Lark
This was a thing that happened long and long ago, in the glimmering morning of the Christian time in Erinn.  And it may have happened to the holy Maedog of Ferns, or to Enan the Angelic, or it may have been Molasius of Devenish--I cannot say.  But over the windy sea in his small curragh of bull's hide the Saint sailed far away to the southern land; and for many a month he travelled afoot through the dark forests, and the sunny corn-lands, and over the snowy mountain horns, and along the low shores between the olive-grey hills and the blue sea, till at last he came in sight of a great and beautiful city glittering on the slopes and ridges of seven hills.
"What golden city may this be?" he asked of the dark-eyed market folk whom he met on the long straight road which led across the open country.
"It is the city of Rome," they answered him, wondering at his ignorance.  But the Saint, when he heard those words, fell on his knees and kissed the ground.
"Hail to thee, most holy city!" he cried; "hail, thou queen of the world, red with the roses of the martyrs and white with the lilies of the virgins; hail, blessed goal of my long wandering!"
And as he entered the city his eyes were bright with joy, and his heart seemed to lift his weary feet on wings of gladness.
There he sojourned through the autumn and the winter, visiting all the great churches and the burial-places of the early Christians in the Catacombs, and communing with the good and wise men in many houses of religion.  Once he conversed with the great Pope whose name was Gregory, and told him of his brethren in the beloved isle in the western waters.
When once more the leaf of the fig-tree opened its five fingers, and the silvery bud of the vine began to unfurl, the Saint prepared to return home.  And once more he went to the mighty Pope, to take his leave and to ask a blessing for himself and his brethren, and to beg that he might bear away with him to the brotherhood some precious relic of those who had shed their blood for the Cross.
As he made that request in the green shadowy garden on the Hill Caelian, the Pope smiled, and, taking a clod of common earth from the soil, gave it to the Saint, saying, "Then take this with thee," and when the Saint expressed his surprise at so strange a relic, the Servant of the Servants of God took back the earth and crushed it in his hand, and with amazement the Saint saw that blood began to trickle from it between the fingers of the Pope.
Marvelling greatly, the Saint kissed the holy pontiff's hand, and bade him farewell; and going to and fro among those he knew, he collected money, and, hiring a ship, he filled it with the earth of Rome, and sailed westward through the Midland Sea, and bent his course towards the steadfast star in the north, and so at last reached the beloved green island of his home.
In the little graveyard about the fair church of his brotherhood he spread the earth which had drunk the blood of the martyrs, so that the bodies of those who died in the Lord might await His coming in a blessed peace.
Now it happened that but a few days after his return the friend of his boyhood, a holy brother who had long shared with him the companionship of the cloister, migrated from this light, and when the last requiem had been sung and the sacred earth had covered in the dead, the Saint wept bitterly for the sake of the lost love and the unforgotten years.
And at night he fell asleep, still weeping for sorrow.  And in his sleep he saw, as in a dream, the grey stone church with its round tower and the graveyard sheltered by the woody hills; but behold! in the graveyard tall trees sprang in lofty spires from the earth of Rome, and reached into the highest heavens; and these trees were like trees of green and golden and ruddy fire, for they were red with the blossoms of life, and every green leaf quivered with bliss, like a green flame; and among the trees, on a grassy sod at their feet, sat a white lark, singing clear and loud, and he knew that the lark was the soul of the friend of his boyhood.
As he listened to its song, he understood its unearthly music; and these were the words of its singing: "Do not weep any more for me; it is pity for thy sorrow which keeps me here on the grass.  If thou wert not so unhappy I should fly."
And when the Saint awoke his grief had fallen from him, and he wept no more for the dead man whom he loved.
The Hermit of the Pillar
On one of the hills near the city of Ancyra Basil the hermit stood day and night on a pillar of stone forty feet high, praying and weeping for his own sins and for the sins of the world.
A gaunt, dark figure, far up in the blue Asian sky, he stood there for a sign and a warning to all men that our earthly life is short, whether for wickedness or repentance; that the gladness and the splendour of the world are but a fleeting pageant; that in but a little while the nations should tremble before the coming of the Lord in His power and majesty.  Little heed did the rich and dissolute people of that city give to his cry of doom; and of the vast crowds who came about the foot of his pillar, the greater number thought but to gaze on the wonder of a day, though some few did pitch their tents hard by, and spent the time of their sojourn in prayer and the lamentation of hearts humbled and contrite.
[Illustration: _A gaunt, dark figure, far up in the blue Asian sky_]
Now, in the third year of his testimony, as Basil was rapt in devotion, with hands and face uplifted to the great silent stars, an Angel, clothed in silver and the blue-green of the night, stood in front of him in the air, and said: "Descend from thy pillar, and get thee away far westward; and there thou shalt learn what is for thy good."
Without delay or doubt Basil descended, and stole away alone in the hush before the new day, and took the winding ways of the hills, and thereafter went down into the low country of the plain to seaward.
After long journeying among places and people unknown, he crossed the running seas which part the eastern world from the world of the west, and reached the City of the Golden Horn, Byzantium; and there for four months he lived on a pillar overlooking the city and the narrow seas, and cried his cry of doom and torment.  At the end of the fourth month the Angel once more came to him and bade him descend and go further.
So with patience and constancy of soul he departed between night and light, and pursued his way for many months till he had got to the ancient city of Treves.  There, among the ruins of a temple of the heathen goddess Diana, he found a vast pillar of marble still erect, and the top of this he thought to make his home and holy watch-tower. Wherefore he sought out the Bishop of the city and asked his leave and blessing, and the Bishop, marvelling greatly at his zeal and austerity, gave his consent.
The people of Treves were amazed at what they considered his madness; but they gave him no hindrance, nor did they molest him in any way. Indeed, in no long time the fame of his penance was noised abroad, and multitudes came, as they had come at Ancyra, to see with their own eyes what there was of truth in the strange story they had heard. Afterwards, too, many came out of sorrow for sin and an ardent desire of holiness; and others brought their sick and maimed and afflicted, in the hope that the Hermit might be able to cure their ailments, or give them assuagement of their sufferings.  Many of these, in truth, Basil sent away cleansed and made whole by the virtue of his touch or of the blessing he bestowed upon them.
Now, though there were many pillar-hermits in the far eastern land, this was the first that had ever been seen in the west, and after him there were but few others.
A strange and well-nigh incredible thing it seemed, to look upon this man on the height of his pillar, preaching and praying constantly, and enduring night and day the inclemency of the seasons and the weariness and discomfort of his narrow standing place.  For the pillar, massive as it was, was so narrow where the marble curved over in big acanthus leaves at the four corners that he had not room to lie down at length to sleep; and indeed he slept but little, considering slumber a waste of the time of prayer, and the dreams of sleep so many temptations to beguile the soul into false and fugitive pleasures.  No shelter was there from the wind, but he was bare as a stone in the field to the driving rain and the blaze of the sun at noon; and in winter the frost was bitter to flesh and blood, and the snow fell like flakes or white fire.  His only clothing was a coat of sheepskin; about his neck hung a heavy chain of iron, in token that he was a thrall and bondsman of the Lord Christ, and each Friday he wore an iron crown of thorns, in painful memory of Christ's passion and His sorrowful death upon the tree.  Once a day he ate a little rye bread, and once he drank a little water.
No man could say whether he was young or aged; and the mother who had borne him a little babe at her bosom, and had watched him grow to boyhood, could not have recognised him, for he had been burnt black by the sun and the frost, and the weather had bleached his hair and beard till they looked like lichens on an ancient forest-tree, and the crown of thorns had scarred his brow, and the links of the chain had galled his neck and shoulders.
For three summers and three winters he endured this stricken life with cheerful fortitude, counting his sufferings as great gain if through them he might secure the crown of celestial glory which God has woven for His elect.  Remembering all his prayers and supplications, and the long martyrdom of his body, it was hard for him, at times, to resist the assurance that he must have won a golden seat among the blessed.
"For who, O Lord Christ!" he cried, with trembling hands outstretched, and dim eyes weeping, "who hath taken up Thy cross as I have done, and the anguish of the thorns and the nails, and the parched sorrow of Thy thirst, and the wounding of Thy blessed body, and borne them for years twenty and three, and shown them as I have shown them to the sun and stars and the four winds, high up between heaven and earth, that men might be drawn to Thee, and carried them across the world from the outmost East to the outmost West?  Surely, Lord God!  Thou hast written my name in Thy Book of Life, and hast set for me a happy place in the heavens.  Surely, all I have and am I have given Thee; and all that a worm of the earth may do have I done!  If in anything I have failed, show me, Lord, I beseech Thee, wherein I have come short.  If any man there be more worthy in Thine eyes, let me, too, set eyes upon him, that I may learn of him how I may the better please Thee.  Teach me, Lord, that which I know not, for Thou alone knowest and art wise!"
As Basil was praying thus in the hour before dawn, once more the Angel, clothed in silver and blue-green, as though it had been a semblance of the starry night, came to him, and said: "Give me thy hand;" and Basil touched the hand celestial, and the Angel drew him from his pillar, and placed him on the ground, and said: "This is that land of the west in which thou art to learn what is for thy good.  Take for staff this piece of tree, and follow this road till thou reachest the third milestone; and there, in the early light, thou shalt meet him who can instruct thee.  For a sign, thou shalt know the man by the little maid of seven years who helpeth him to drive the geese.  But the man, though young, may teach one who is older than he, and he is one who is greatly pleasing in God's eyes."
The clear light was glittering on the dewy grass and the wet bushes when Basil reached the third milestone.  He heard the distant sound as of a shepherd piping, and he saw that the road in front of him was crowded for near upon a quarter of a mile with a great gathering of geese--fully two thousand they numbered--feeding in the grass and rushes, and cackling, and hustling each other aside, and clacking their big orange-coloured bills, as they waddled slowly onward towards the city.
Among them walked a nut-brown little maiden of seven, clad in a green woollen tunic, with bright flaxen hair and innocent blue eyes, and bare brown legs, and feet shod in shoes of hide.  In her hand she carried a long hazel wand, with which she kept in rule the large grey and white geese.
As the flock came up to the Hermit, she gazed at him with her sweet wondering eyes, for never had she seen so strange and awful a man as this, with his sheepskin dress and iron chain and crown of thorns, and skin burnt black, and bleached hair and dark brows stained with blood. For a moment she stood still in awe and fear, but the Hermit raised his hand, and blessed her, and smiled upon her; and even in that worn and disfigured face the light in the Hermit's eyes as he smiled was tender and beautiful; and the child ceased to fear, and passed slowly along, still gazing at him and smiling in return.
In the rear of the great multitude of geese came a churl, tall and young, and comely enough for all his embrowning in the sun and wind, and his unkempt hair and rude dress.  It was he who made the music, playing on pan's-pipes to lighten the way, and quickening with his staff the loiterers of his flock.
When he perceived the Hermit he stayed his playing, for he bethought him, Is not this the saintly man of whose strange penance and miracles of healing the folk talk in rustic huts and hamlets far scattered?  But when they drew nigh to each other, the Hermit bowed low to the Gooseherd, and addressed him: "Give me leave to speak a little with thee, good brother; for an Angel of heaven hath told me of thee, and fain would I converse with thee.  Twenty years and three have I served the King of Glory in supplication and fasting and tribulation of spirit, and yet I lack that which thou canst teach me.  Now tell me, I beseech thee, what works, what austerities, what prayers have made thee so acceptable to God."
A dark flush rose on the Goose-herd's cheeks as he listened, but when he answered it was in a grave and quiet voice: "It ill becomes an aged man to mock and jeer at the young, nor is it more seemly that the holy should gibe at the poor."
"Dear son in Christ," said the Hermit, "I do not gibe or mock at thee. By the truth of the blessed tree, I was told of thee by an Angel in the very night which is now over and gone, and was bidden to question thee. Wherefore be not wrathful, but answer me truly, I beg of thy charity."
The Goose-herd shook his head.  "This is a matter beyond me," he replied.  "All my work, since thou askest of my work, hath been the tending and rearing of geese and driving them to market.  From the good marsh lands at the foot of the hills out west I drive them, and the distance is not small, for, sleeping and resting by boulder and tree, for five days are we on the way.  Slow of foot goeth your goose when he goeth not by water, and it profits neither master nor herd to stint them of their green food.  And all my prayer hath been that I might get them safe to market, none missing or fallen dead by the way, and that I might sell them speedily and at good price, and so back to the fens again.  What more is there to say?"
"In thy humility thou hidest something from me," said the Hermit, and he fixed his eyes thoughtfully on the young man's face.
"Nay, I have told thee all that is worth the telling."
"Then hast thou always lived this life?" the Hermit asked.
"Ever since I was a small lad--such a one as the little maid in front, and she will be in her seventh year, or it may be a little older. Before me was my father goose-herd; and he taught me the windings of the journey to the city, and the best resting-places, and the ways of geese, and the meaning of their cries, and what pleaseth them and serveth flesh and feather, and how they should be driven.  And now, in turn, I teach the child, for there be goose-girls as well as men."
"Is she then thy young sister, or may it be that she is thy daughter?"
"Neither young sister nor daughter is she," replied the Herd, "and yet in truth she is both sister and daughter."
"Wilt thou tell me how that may be?" asked the Hermit.
"It is shortly told," said the Herd.  "Robbers broke into their poor and lonely house by the roadside and slew father and mother and left them dead, but the babe at the breast they had not slain, and this was she."
"Didst thou find her?" asked the Hermit.
"Ay, on a happy day I found her; a feeble little thing bleating like a lambkin forlorn beside its dead dam."
"And thy wife, belike, or thy mother, reared her?"
"Nay," said the Herd, "for my mother was dead, and no wife have I.  I reared her myself--my little white gooseling; and she throve and waxed strong of heart and limb, and merry and brown of favour, as thou hast seen."
"Thou must have been thyself scantly a man in those days," said the Hermit.
"Younger than to-day," replied the Herd; "but I was ever big of limb and plentiful of my inches."
"And hath she not been often since a burthen to thee, and a weariness in the years?"
"She hath been a care in the cold winter, and a sorrow in her sickness with her teeth--for no man, I wot, can help a small child when the teeth come through the gum, and she can but cry ah! ah! and hath no words to tell what she aileth."
"Why didst thou do all this?" asked the Hermit.  "What hath been thy reward?  Or for what reward dost thou look?"
The Goose-herd looked at him blankly for a moment; then his face brightened.  "Surely," he said, "to see her as she goes on her way, a bright, brown little living thing, with her clear hair and glad eyes, is a goodly reward.  And a goodly reward is it to think of her growth, and to mind me of the days when she could not walk and I bore her whithersoever I went; and of the days when she could but take faltering steps and was soon fain to climb into my arms and sit upon my neck; and of the days when we first fared together with the geese to market and I cut her her first hazel stick; and in truth of all the days that she hath been with me since I found her."
As the Goose-herd spoke the tears rose in the Hermit's eyes and rolled slowly down his cheeks; and when the young man ceased, he said: "O son, now I know why thou art so pleasing in the eyes of God.  Early hast thou learned the love which gives all and asks nothing, which suffereth long and is ever kind, and this I have not learned.  A small thing and too common it seemed to me, but now I see that it is holier than austerities, and availeth more than fasting, and is the prayer of prayers.  Late have I sought thee, thou ancient truth, late have I found thee, thou ancient beauty; yet even in the gloaming of my days may there still be light enough to win my way home.  Farewell, good brother; and be God tender and pitiful to thee as thou hast been tender and pitiful to the little child."
"Farewell, holy man!" replied the Herd, regarding him with a perplexed look, for the life and austerities of the Hermit were a mystery he could not understand.
Then going on his way, he laid the pan's-pipes to his lips and whistled a pleasant music as he strode after his geese.
Kenach's Little Woman
As the holy season of Lent drew nigh, the Abbot Kenach felt a longing such as a bird of passage feels in the south when the first little silvery buds on the willow begin here to break their ruddy sheaths, and the bird thinks to-morrow it will be time to fly over-seas to the land where it builds its nest in pleasant croft or under the shelter of homely eaves.  And Kenach said, "Levabo oculos--I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills from whence cometh my help;" for every year it was his custom to leave his abbey and fare through the woods to the hermitage on the mountain-side, so that he might spend the forty days of fasting and prayer in the heart of solitude.
Now on the day which is called the Wednesday or Ashes he set out, but first he heard the mass of remembrance and led his monks to the altar steps, and knelt there in great humility to let the priest sign his forehead with a cross of ashes.  And on the forehead of each of the monks the ashes were smeared in the form of a cross, and each time the priest made the sign he repeated the words, "Remember, man, that thou art dust, and unto dust thou shalt return."
So with the ashes still on his brow and with the remembrance of the end of earthly days in his soul, he bent his steps towards the hermitage; and as he was now an aged man and nowise strong, Diarmait, one of the younger brethren, accompanied him in case any mischance should befall.
They passed through the cold forest, where green there was none, unless it were the patches of moss and the lichens on the rugged tree-trunks and tufts of last year's grass, but here and there the white blossoms of the snowdrops peered out.  The dead grey leaves and dry twigs crackled and snapped under their feet with such a noise as a wood fire makes when it is newly lighted; and that was all the warmth they had on their wayfaring.
The short February day was closing in as they climbed among the boulders and withered bracken on the mountainside, and at last reached the entrance of a cavern hollowed in the rock and fringed with ivy. This was the hermitage.  The Abbot hung his bell on a thick ivy-bough in the mouth of the cave; and they knelt and recited vespers and compline; and thrice the Abbot struck the bell to scare away the evil spirits of the night; and they entered and lay down to rest.
Hard was the way of their sleeping; for they lay not on wool or on down, neither on heather or bracken, nor yet on dry leaves, but their sides came against the cold stone, and under the head of each there was a stone for pillow.  But being weary with the long journey they slept sound, and felt nothing of the icy mouth of the wind blowing down the mountain-side.
Within an hour of daybreak, when the moon was setting, they were awakened by the wonderful singing of a bird, and they rose for matins and strove not to listen, but so strangely sweet was the sound in the keen moonlight morning that they could not forbear.  The moon set, and still in the dark sang the bird, and the grey light came, and the bird ceased; and when it was white day they saw that all the ground and every stalk of bracken was hoary with frost, and every ivy-leaf was crusted white round the edge, but within the edge it was all glossy green.
"What bird is this that sings so sweet before day in the bitter cold?" said the Abbot.  "Surely no bird at all, but an Angel from heaven waking us from the death of sleep."
"It is the blackbird, Domine Abbas," said the young monk; "often they sing thus in February, however cold it may be."
"O soul, O Diarmait, is it not wonderful that the senseless small creatures should praise God so sweetly in the dark, and in the light before the dark, while we are fain to lie warm and forget His praise?" And afterwards he said, "Gladly could I have listened to that singing, even till to-morrow was a day; and yet it was but the singing of a little earth wrapped in a handful of feathers.  O soul, tell me what it must be to listen to the singing of an Angel, a portion of heaven wrapped in the glory of God's love!"
Of the forty days thirty went by, and oftentimes now, when no wind blew, it was bright and delightsome among the rocks, for the sun was gaining strength, and the days were growing longer, and the brown trees were being speckled with numberless tiny buds of white and pale green, and wild flowers were springing between the boulders and through the mountain turf.
Hard by the cave there was a low wall of rock covered with ivy, and as Diarmait chanced to walk near it, a brown bird darted out from among the leaves.  The young monk looked at the place from which it had flown, and behold! among the leaves and the hairy sinews of the ivy there was a nest lined with grass, and in the nest there were three eggs--pale-green with reddish spots.  And Diarmait knew the bird and knew the eggs, and he told the Abbot, who came noiselessly, and looked with a great love at the open house and the three eggs of the mother blackbird.
"Let us not walk too near, my son," he said, "lest we scare the mother from her brood, and so silence beforehand some of the music of the cold hours before the day."  And he lifted his hand and blessed the nest and the bird, saying, "And He shall bless thy bread and thy water."  After that it was very seldom they went near the ivy.
Now after days of clear and benign weather a shrill wind broke out from beneath the North Star, and brought with it snow and sleet and piercing cold.  And the woods howled for distress of the storm, and the grey stones of the mountain chattered with discomfort.  Harsh cold and sleeplessness were their lot in the cave, and as he shivered, the Abbot bethought him of the blackbird in her nest, and of the wet flakes driving in between the leaves of the ivy and stinging her brown wings and patient bosom.  And lifting his head from his pillow of stone he prayed the Lord of the elements to have the bird in His gentle care, saying, "How excellent is Thy loving-kindness, O God! therefore the children of men put their trust under the shadow of Thy wings."
Then after a little while he said, "Look out into the night, O son, and tell me if yet the storm be abated."
And Diarmait, shuddering, went to the mouth of the cavern, and stood there gazing and calling in a low voice, "Domine Abbas!  My Lord Abbot! My Lord Abbot!"
Kenach rose quickly and went to him, and as they looked out the sleet beat on their faces, but in the midst of the storm there was a space of light, as though it were moonshine, and the light streamed from an Angel, who stood near the wall of rock with outspread wings, and sheltered the blackbird's nest from the wintry blast.
And the monks gazed at the shining loveliness of the Angel, till the wind fell and the snow ceased and the light faded away and the sharp stars came out and the night was still.
Now at sundown of the day that followed, when the Abbot was in the cave, the young monk, standing among the rocks, saw approaching a woman who carried a child in her arms; and crossing himself he cried aloud to her, "Come not any nearer; turn thy face to the forest, and go down."
[Illustration: _Come not any nearer; turn thy face to the forest, and go down_]
"Nay," replied the woman, "for we seek shelter for the night, and food and the solace of fire for the little one."
"Go down, go down," cried Diarmait; "no woman may come to this hermitage."
"How canst thou say that, O monk?" said the woman.  "Was the Lord Christ any worse than thou?  Christ came to redeem woman no less than to redeem man.  Not less did He suffer for the sake of woman than for the sake of man.  Women gave service and tendance to Him and His Apostles.  A woman it was who bore Him, else had men been left forlorn. It was a man who betrayed Him with a kiss; a woman it was who washed His feet with tears.  It was a man who smote Him with a reed, but a woman who broke the alabaster box of precious ointment.  It was a man who thrice denied Him; a woman stood by His cross.  It was a woman to whom He first spoke on Easter morn, but a man thrust his hand into His side and put his finger in the prints of the nails before he would believe.  And not less than men do women enter the heavenly kingdom. Why then shouldst thou drive my little child and me from thy hermitage?"
Then Kenach, who had heard all that was said, came forth from the cave, and blessed the woman.  "Well hast thou spoken, O daughter; come, and bring the small child with thee."  And, turning to the young monk, he said, "O soul, O son, O Diarmait, did not God send His Angel out of high heaven to shelter the mother bird?  And was not that, too, a little woman in feathers?  But now hasten, and gather wood and leaves, and strike fire from the flint, and make a hearth before the cave, that the woman may rest and the boy have the comfort of the bright flame."
This was soon done, and by the fire sat the woman eating a little barley bread; but the child, who had no will to eat came round to the old man, and held out two soft hands to him.  And the Abbot caught him up from the ground to his breast, and kissed his golden head, saying, "God bless thee sweet little son, and give thee a good life and a happy, and strength of thy small body, and, if it be His holy will, length of glad days; and ever mayest thou be a gladness and deep joy to thy mother."
Then, seeing that the woman was strangely clad in an outland garb of red and blue, and that she was tall, with a golden-hued skin and olive eyes, arched eyebrows very black, aquiline nose, and a rosy mouth, he said, "Surely, O daughter, thou art not of this land of Erinn in the sea, but art come out of the great world beyond?"
"Indeed, then, we have travelled far," replied the woman; "as thou sayest, out of the great world beyond.  And now the twilight deepens upon us."
"Thou shalt sleep safe in the cave, O daughter, but we will rest here by the embers.  My cloak of goats' hair shalt thou have, and such dry bracken and soft bushes as may be found."
"There is no need," said the woman, "mere shelter is enough;" and she added in a low voice, "Often has my little son had no bed wherein he might lie."
Then she stretched out her arms to the boy, and once more the little one kissed the Abbot, and as he passed by Diarmait he put the palms of his hands against the face of the young monk, and said laughingly, "I do not think thou hadst any ill-will to us, though thou wert rough and didst threaten to drive us away into the woods."
And the woman lifted the boy on her arm, and rose and went towards the cavern; and when she was in the shadow of the rocks she turned towards the monks beside the fire, and said, "My son bids me thank you."
They looked up, and what was their astonishment to see a heavenly glory shining about the woman and her child in the gloom of the cave.  And in his left hand the child carried a little golden image of the world, and round his head was a starry radiance, and his right hand was raised in blessing.
For such a while as it takes the shadow of a cloud to run across a rippling field of corn, for so long the vision remained; and then it melted into the darkness, even as a rainbow melts away into the rain.
On his face fell the Abbot, weeping for joy beyond words; but Diarmait was seized with fear and trembling till he remembered the way in which the child had pressed warm palms against his face and forgiven him.
The story of these things was whispered abroad, and ever since, in that part of Erinn in the sea, the mother blackbird is called Kenach's Little Woman.
And as for the stone on which the fire was lighted in front of the cave, rain rises quickly from it in mist and leaves it dry, and snow may not lie upon it, and even in the dead of winter it is warm to touch.  And to this day it is called the Stone of Holy Companionship.
Golden Apples and Roses Red
In the cruel days of old, when Diocletian was the Master of the World, and the believers in the Cross were maimed, and tortured with fire, and torn with iron hooks, and cast to the lions, and beheaded with the sword, Dorothea, a beautiful maiden of Caesarea, was brought before Sapricius, the Governor of Cappadocia, and commanded to forsake the Lord Christ and offer incense to the images of the false gods.
Though she was so young and so fair and tender, she stood unmoved by threats and entreaties, and when, with little pity on her youth and loveliness, Sapricius menaced her with the torment of the iron bed over a slow fire, she replied: "Do with me as you will.  No pain shall I fear, so firm is my trust in Him for whom I am ready to die."
"Who, then, is this that has won thy love?" asked the Governor.
"It is Christ Jesus, the Son of God.  Slay me, and I shall but the sooner be with Him in His Paradise, where there is no more pain, neither sorrow, but the tears are wiped from all eyes, and the roses are in bloom alway, and for ever the fruit of joy is on the trees."
"Thy words are but the babbling of madness," said the Governor angrily.
"I am not mad, most noble Sapricius."
[Illustration: "_I am not mad, most noble Sapricius_"]
"Here, then, is the incense, sacrifice, and save thy life."
"I will not sacrifice," replied Dorothea.
"Then shalt thou die," said Sapricius; and he bade the doomsman take her to the place of execution and strike off her head.
Now as she was being led away from the judgment-seat, a gay young advocate named Theophilus said to her jestingly: "Farewell, sweet Dorothea: when thou hast joined thy lover, wilt thou not send me some of the fruit and roses of his Paradise?"
Looking gravely and gently at him, Dorothea answered: "I will send some."
Whereupon Theophilus laughed merrily, and went his way homeward.
At the place of execution, Dorothea begged the doomsman to tarry a little, and kneeling by the block, she raised her hands to heaven and prayed earnestly.  At that moment a fair child stood beside her, holding in his hand a basket containing three golden apples and three red roses.
"Take these to Theophilus, I pray thee," she said to the child, "and tell him Dorothea awaits him in the Paradise whence they came."
Then she bowed her head, and the sword of the doomsman fell.
Mark now what follows.
Theophilus, who had reached home, was still telling of what had happened and merrily repeating his jest about the fruit and flowers of Paradise, when suddenly, while he was speaking, the child appeared before him with the apples and the roses.  "Dorothea," he said, "has sent me to thee with these, and she awaits thee in the garden."  And straightway the child vanished.
The fragrance of those heavenly roses filled Theophilus with a strange pity and gladness; and, eating of the fruit of the Angels, he felt his heart made new within him, so that he, also, became a servant of the Lord Jesus, and suffered death for His name, and thus attained to the celestial garden.
Centuries after her martyrdom, the body of Dorothea was laid in a bronze shrine richly inlaid with gold and jewels in the church built in her honour beyond Tiber, in the seven-hilled city of Rome.
There it lay in the days when Waldo was a brother at the Priory of Three Fountains, among the wooded folds of the Taunus Hills; and every seven years the shrine was opened that the faithful might gaze on the maiden martyr of Caesarea.
An exceeding great love and devotion did Waldo bear this holy virgin, whom he had chosen for his patroness, and one of his most ardent wishes was that he might some day visit the church beyond Tiber, and kneel by the shrine which contained her precious relics.  In summer the red roses, in autumn the bright apples on the tree, reminded him of her; in the spring he thought of her youth and beauty joyously surrendered to Christ, and the snow in winter spoke to him of her spotless innocence. Thus through the round of the year the remembrance of her was present about him in fair suggestions; and indeed had there been any lack of these every gift of God would have recalled her to his mind, for was not that--"the gift of God"--her name?
Notwithstanding his youth, Waldo was ripe in learning, well skilled in Latin and Greek, and so gifted beyond measure in poetry and music that people said he had heard the singing of Angels and had brought the echo of it to the earth.  His hymns and sacred songs were known and loved all through the German land, and far beyond.  The children sang them in the processions on the high feast days, the peasants sang them at their work in house or field, travellers sang them as they journeyed over the long heaths and through the mountain-forests, fishers and raftsmen sang them on the rivers.  He composed the Song of the Sickle which cuts at a stroke the corn in its ripeness and the wild flower in its bloom, and the Song of the Mill-wheel, with its long creak and quick clap, and the melodious rush of water from the buckets of the wheel, and many another which it would take long to tell of; but that which to himself was sweetest and dearest was Golden Apples and Roses Red, the song in which he told the legend of St. Dorothea his patroness.
Now when Waldo was in the six-and-thirtieth year of his age he was smitten with leprosy; and when it was found that neither the relics of the saints, nor the prayers of holy men, nor the skill of the physician availed to cure him, but that it was God's will he should endure to the end, the Prior entreated him to surrender himself to that blessed will, and to go forth courageously to the new life of isolation which awaited him.  For in those days it was not lawful that a leper should abide in the companionship of men, and he was set apart lest his malady should bring others to a misery like his own.
Deep was the grief of the brethren of Three Fountains when they were summoned to attend the sacred office of demission which was to shut out Waldo for ever from intercourse with his fellows.  And well might any good heart sorrow, for this was the order of that office.
The altar was draped in black, and Mass for the Dead was sung; and all the things that Waldo would need in the house of his exile, from the flint and iron which gave fire to the harp which should give solace, were solemnly blessed and delivered to him.  Next he was warned not to approach the dwellings of men, or to wash in running streams, or to handle the ropes of draw-wells, or to drink from the cups of wayside springs.  He was forbidden the highways, and when he went abroad a clapper must give token of his coming and going.  Nothing that might be used by others should he touch except with covered hands.
When after these warnings he had been exhorted to patience and trust in God's mercy and love, the brethren formed a procession, with the cross going before, and led him away to his hermitage among the wooded hills. On a little wood-lawn, beyond a brook crossed by stepping-stones, a hut of boughs had been prepared for him, and the Prior bade him mark the grey boulder on the further side of the brook, for there he would find left for him, week by week, such provisions as he needed.
Last rite of all, the Prior entering the hut strewed over his bed of bracken a handful of mould from the churchyard saying, "Sis mortuus mundo--Dead be thou to the world, but living anew to God," and turfs from the churchyard were laid on the roof of the hut.  Thus in his grey gown and hood was Waldo committed alive to his grave, and the brethren, chanting a requiem, returned to the Priory.
The tidings of Waldo's grievous lot travelled far and wide through the German land, and thenceforth when his songs were sung many a true man's heart was heavy and many a good woman's eyes were filled with tears as they bethought them of the poor singer in his hut among the hills. Kindly souls brought alms and provisions and laid them on his boulder by the brook, and oftentimes as they came and went they sang some hymn or song he had composed, for they said, "So best can we let him know that we remember him and love him."  Indeed, to his gentle heart the sound of their human voices in that solitude was as the warm clasp of a beloved hand.
When Waldo had lived there alone among the hills for the space of two years and more, and his malady had grown exceeding hard to bear, he was seized with a woeful longing--such a longing as comes upon a little child for its mother when it has been left all alone in the house, and has gone seeking her in all the chambers, and finds she is not there. And as on a day he went slowly down to the boulder by the stream in the failing light, thinking of her who had cherished his childhood--how he had clung to her gown, how with his little hand in hers he had run by her side, how she had taken him on her lap and made his hurts all well with kisses, his heart failed him, and crying aloud "Mother, O mother!" he knelt by the boulder, and laid his head on his arms, weeping.
Then from among the trees on the further side of the brook came a maiden running, but she paused at the stepping-stones when she saw Waldo, and said, "Was it thy voice I heard calling 'Mother'?"
The monk did not answer or move.
"Art thou Brother Waldo?" she asked.
Raising his head, he looked at her and replied, "I am Brother Waldo."
"Poor brother, I pity thee," said the maiden; "there is no man or maid but pities thee.  If thou wilt tell me of thy mother, I will find her, even were I to travel far, and bid her come to thee.  Well I wot she will come to thee if she may."
For all his manhood and learning and holiness, Waldo could not still the crying of the little child within him, and he told the maiden of his mother, and blessed her, and asked her name.  When she answered that it was Dorothy, "Truly," said he, "it is a fair name and gracious, and in thy coming thou hast been a gift of God to me."
Thereupon the maiden left him, and Waldo returned to his hut, comforted and full of hope.
After a month had gone Dorothy returned.  Crossing the stepping-stones in the clear light of the early morning, she found Waldo meditating by the door of his hut.
"I have done thy bidding, brother," she said in a gentle voice, "but alas! thy mother cannot come to thee.  Grieve not too much at this, for she is with God.  She must have died about the time thou didst call for her; and well may I believe that it was she who sent me to thee in her stead."
"The will of God be done," said Waldo, and he bowed his head, and spoke no more for a long while; but the maiden stood patiently awaiting till he had mastered his grief.
At length he raised his head and saw her.  "Art thou not gone?" he asked.  "I thought thou hadst gone.  Thou art good and gentle, and I thank thee.  Go now, for here thou mayst not stay."
"Nay, brother," replied Dorothy, "thou hast no mother to come to thee now, no companion or friend to minister to thee.  This is my place.  Do not fear that I shall annoy or weary thee.  I shall but serve and obey thee, coming and going at thy bidding.  Truly thou art too weak and afflicted to be left any more alone."
"It may not be, dear child.  Thy father and mother or others of thy kinsfolk need thee at home."
"All these have been long dead," said Dorothy, "and I am alone.  Here in the wood I will find me a hollow tree, and thou shalt but call to have me by thee, and but lift a finger to see me no more."
"Why wouldst thou do this for me?" asked Waldo, wondering at her persistency.
"Ah, brother, I know thy suffering and I love thy songs."
"And dost thou not shudder at this horror that is upon me, and dread lest the like befall thee too?"
Then Dorothy laughed low and softly to herself, and answered only so.
In this wise the maiden came to minister to the poor recluse, and so gracious was she and humble, so prudent and yet so tender, that in his suffering she was great solace to him, bringing his food from the boulder and his drink from the brook, cleaning his cell and freshening it with fragrant herbs; and about the cell she made a garden of wholesome plants and wild flowers, and all kindly service that was within her power she did for him.
So beautiful was she and of such exceeding sweetness, that when his eyes rested upon her, he questioned in his mind whether she was a true woman and not an Angel sent down to console him in his dereliction. And that doubt perplexed and troubled him, for so little are we Angels yet that in our aches and sorrows of the flesh it is not the comfort of Angels but the poor human pitiful touch of the fellow-creature that we most yearn for.  Once, indeed, he asked her fretfully, "Tell me truly in the name of God, art thou a very woman of flesh and blood?"
"Truly then, brother," she answered, smiling, "I am of mortal flesh and blood even as thou art, and time shall be when this body that thou seest will be mingled with the dust of the earth."
"Is it then the way of women to sacrifice so much for men as thou hast done for me?"
"It is the way of women who love well," said Dorothy.
"Then needs must I thank thy namesake and my patroness in heaven," rejoined Waldo.
"Yea, and is St. Dorothea thy patroness?" asked the maiden.
Waldo told her that so it was, and rapturously he spoke of the young and beautiful saint done to death in Caesarea, and of the fruit and flowers of Paradise which she sent to Theophilus.  "And I would," he sighed under his breath, "that she would send such a gift to me."
"All this I know," said Dorothy, "for I have learnt thy song of Golden Apples and Roses Red, and I love it most of all thy songs, though these be many and sung all about the world, I think.  And this I will tell thee of thy songs, that I saw in a dream once how they were not mere words and melody, but living things.  Like the bright heads of baby Angels were they, and they were carried on wings as it were of rose-leaves, and they fluttered about the people who loved them and sang them, leading them into blessed paths and whispering to them holy and happy thoughts."
"God be blessed and praised for ever, if it be so," said Waldo; "but this was no more than a maiden's dream."
For two winters Dorothy ministered to the poor leper, and during this while no one save Waldo knew of her being in the woods, and no other man set eyes on her.  The fourth year of his exile was now drawing to a close, and Waldo had fallen into extreme weakness by reason of his malady, and over his face he wore a mask of grey cloth, with two holes for his great piteous eyes.  It was in the springtide, and one night as he lay sleepless in the dark, listening to the long murmur of the wind in the swaying pines, he heard overhead sharp cries and trumpetings, and the creaking and winnowing of wings innumerable.
Rising from his bed, he went out of doors, and looked up into the dark heavens; and high and spectral among the clouded stars he saw the home-coming of the cranes.  He sat on the bench beside his door, and watched them sail past in thousands, filling the night with a fleeting clamour and eerie sounds.  As he sat he mused on the strange longing which brought these birds over land and sea back home, year by year, with the returning spring, and he marvelled that the souls of men, which are but birds of passage in these earthly fields, should be so slow to feel that longing for their true home-land.
That day when Dorothy came to the hut, he said to her: "It is well to be glad, for, though the air is still keen, the spring is here.  I heard the cranes returning in the night."
"And I too heard them; and I heard thee rejoicing, playing on thy harp and singing."
"That could not be, sister," said Waldo, "unless in a dream.  No longer can I touch harp-string, as thou knowest."
"In truth I was awake and heard," said Dorothy; "and the song thou wast singing was of birds of passage, and of the longing of exiles to go home, and of the dark wherethrough we must pass, with cries and beating wings, ere we can find our way back to our true home-land.'"
"Nay, it must have been a dream," said Waldo, "for as I sat with my hands hidden in my gown I did but play an imaginary harp, making still music in my heart, and no song came from my lips."
"The more strange that I should hear!" replied Dorothy, smiling as she went her way.
In a little while from this the poor brother felt that the end of his martyrdom drew nigh; and as he lay feeble and faint in the shadow of the hut (for the day was clement), sighing for the hour of his deliverance, Dorothy came from the woods.  In her hand she carried a basket, and as she stood over him she said, "See what I have brought for thee."
Lifting his head weakly, and looking through the eyelets of his grey mask, Waldo saw that the basket contained three golden apples and three red roses, though still it was but early days in spring.  At sight of them he uttered a cry of gladness (for all it was a cry hollow and hoarse), and strove to rise and throw himself at her feet.
"Nay, brother," she said, "refrain; lie still and breathe the sweetness of the roses and taste of the fruit."
She gave him one of the apples, and putting it to his mouth he tasted it and sighed deeply.  In a moment all pain and suffering had left him, and his spirit was light and gladsome.  His eyes too were opened, so that he knew that Dorothy had no way deceived him, but was truly a living woman of flesh and blood like himself.  Then a heavenly peace descended upon him like a refreshing dew, and he closed his eyes for the great ease he felt.
While these things were happening, came from Three Fountains the lay-brother who brought Waldo his provisions.  Crossing the brook to set his budget on the boulder, he saw the poor recluse lying in the lee of the hut, and Dorothy leaning over him.  Wherefore he hastened across the wood-lawn, but in an instant the fair woman vanished before his eyes, and when he came to the hut he saw that Waldo was dead.  He carried the basket of flowers and fruit to the Priory, and told what he had seen; and the Prior, marvelling greatly, came to the place and gave the poor leper brother a blessed burial.
Now at this time a wondrous strange occurrence was the talk of Rome.
The year wherein Waldo died was that seventh year in which the shrine of St. Dorothea is opened in her church beyond Tiber; and the day on which it is opened fell a little while before the death of Waldo.
Behold, then, when on the vigil of that feast the priests unlocked the shrine, the place where aforetime the holy body of the martyr had lain was empty.  Great was the dismay, loud the lamentation, grievous the suspicion.  The custodians of the church and the shrine were seized and cast into prison, where they lay till the day of their trial.  On the morning of that day the church of St. Dorothea was filled with a divine fragrance, which seemed to transpire from the empty shrine as from a celestial flower.  Wherefore once again the shrine was opened, and there, even such as they had been seen by many of the faithful seven years before, lay the relics of the Saint in their old resting-place.
Now to all poor souls God grant a no less happy end of days than this which He vouchsafed to the poor leper-singer Waldo of the Priory of Three Fountains.
The Seven Years of Seeking
Here begins the chapter of the Seven Years of Seeking.
For, trying greatly to win sight of that blessed isle, the Earthly Paradise, the monk Serapion and his eleven companions hoisted sail; and for seven years they continued in that seeking, wandering with little respite under cloud and star, in all the ways of the sea of ocean which goeth round the world.
[Now this chapter was read of evenings in the refectory at supper, in the winter of the Great Snow.  While the drifts without lay fathom-deep in sheltered places, and the snow was settling on the weather-side of things in long slopes like white pent-houses, the community listened with rapt attention, picturing to themselves the slanting ship, and the red sail of skins with its yellow cross in the midst, and the marvellous vision of vast waters, and the strange islands.  Then suddenly the Prior would strike the table, and according to the custom the reader would close his book with the words, "Tu autem, Domine--But do Thou, O Lord, have mercy upon us!" and the monks would rise, with interest still keen in the wanderings of the Sea-farers.
Seeing that it would be of little profit to break up the reading as the Prior was wont to break it up, I will give the story here without pause or hindrance, as though it had all been read in a single evening at supper, and keep my "Tu autem" for the end of all.  And truly it is at the end of all that most there is need of that prayer.  So without more ado.]
Serapion and his companions were, all save one, monks of the Abbey of the Holy Face.  Not the first Abbey of that name, in the warm green woods in the western creek of Broce-Liande, but the second, which is nearer to the sunrise.  For the site of the first Abbey was most delightful, and so sheltered from the weary wind of the west, and so open to the radiance of the morning, that, save it were Paradise, no man could come at a place so gracious and delectable.  There earliest broke the land into leaf and blossom; and there the leaf was last to fall; and there one could not die, not even the very aged.  Wherefore, in order that the long years of their pilgrimage might be shortened, the brethren prevailed on the Abbot to remove to another site, nearer the spring of the day; and in this new house, one by one in due season, they were caught up to the repose of the heavens, the aged fathers dying first, as is seemly.
This then was the second Abbey of the Holy Face, and its pleasant woods ran down to the shore of the sea.  And going east or going west, where the green billow shades into blue water, the ships of the mariners kept passing and repassing day after day; and their sails seemed to cast an enchanted shadow across the cloister; and the monks, as they watched them leaning over to the breeze, dreamed of the wondrous Garden of Eden, which had not been swallowed up by the Deluge, but had been saved as an isle inviolate amid the fountains of the great deep; and they asked each other whether not one of all these sea-farers would ever bring back a fruit or a flower or a leaf from the arbours of delight in which our first parents had dwelt.  They spoke of the voyage of Brendan the Saint, and of the exceeding loveliness of the Earthly Paradise, and of the deep bliss of breathing its air celestial, till it needed little to set many of them off on a like perilous adventure.
Of all the brethren Serapion was the most eager to begin that seeking. And this was what brought him to it at last.
There came to the Abbey on a day in spring that youthful Bishop of Arimathea who in after time made such great fame in the world.  Tall and stately was he, and black-bearded; a guest pleasant and wise, and ripe with the experience of distant travel and converse with many chief men.  Now he was on his way to the great house of Glastonbury oversea, to bring back with him, if he might be so fortunate, the body of the saint of his city who had helped our Lord to bear His cross on the Way Dolorous; or, if that were an issue beyond his skill, at least some precious memorial of that saint.
Many things worthy of remembrance he told of what he had seen and heard; and no small marvel did it seem to speak with one who had stood on Mount Sinai in the wilderness.  From the top of that mountain, he said, one looked down on a region stretching to the Red Sea, and in the midst of the plain there is a monastery of saintly recluses, but no man can discover any track that leads to it.  Faint and far away the bells are heard tolling for prime, it may be, or vespers, and it is believed that now and again some weary traveller has reached it, but no one has ever returned.  The Ishmaelites, who dwell in the wilderness, have ridden long in search of it, guided by the sound of the bells, but never have they succeeded in catching a gleam of its white walls among the palm-trees, nor yet of the green palms.  The Abbot of that house, it is said, is none other than the little child whom our Lord set in the midst of His Disciples, saying, "Except ye become as little children," and he will abide on the earth till our Lord's return, and then shall he enter into the kingdom with Him, without tasting death.
Speaking of the holy places, Calvary, it might be, or the Garden of Olives and the sepulchre of the Lord, and of the pilgrims who visited these, he repeated to us the saying of the saintly Father Hieronymus: "To live in Jerusalem is not a very holy thing, but to live a holy life in Jerusalem."  And walking with many of our brethren on the shore of the sea and seeing the sails of the ships as they went by, he questioned us of the wonders of the great waters, and of sea-faring, and of the last edge of the living earth, and he said: "Tell me, you who abide within sight of so many ships, and who hear continually the song of the great creature Sea, how would it fare with one who should sail westward and keep that one course constantly?"
We said that we knew not; it were like he would perish of famine or thirst, or be whelmed in the deep.
"Ay," he said, "but if he were well provisioned, with no lack of food and water, and the weather held fair?"
That we could not answer, for it seemed to us that such a one would lose heart and hope in the roofless waste, with never a stone or tree, nor any shadow save a cloud's, and turn back dismayed; but Serapion replied: "To me it appears, your Discretion, that so bold a mariner, if years failed him not, might win to the Earthly Paradise."
"So have I heard," said the Bishop.  "Yet here would you be sailing into the west, and for a certainty the Paradise of God was in the east. How would you give a reasonable account of this?"
But we could make no reply, for we knew not; nor Serapion more than we.
"Now, watching the sea," said the Bishop, "you have marked the ships, how they go.  When they come to you, they first show the mast-top, then the sail, and last the body of the ship, and perchance the sweep of the oars, reverse-wise when they depart from you, you first fail to see the body of the ship, and then the sail, but longest you hold in sight the mast-top, or it may be a bright streamer flying therefrom, or a cross glittering in the light--though these be but small things compared with the body of the ship.  Is it not so?"
We answered, readily enough, that so it was.
"Is it not then even as though one were to watch a wayfarer on horse-back, going or coming over the green bulge of a low hill?  Were he coming to you, you would first see the head of the rider, and last the legs of the horse, and were he riding away the horse would first go down over the hill, but still, for a little, you would see the man waving his hand in farewell as he sank lower and lower."
Such indeed, we said, was the fashion of a ship's coming and going.
"Does it not then seem a likely thing," said his Discretion, "that the sea is in the nature of a long low hill, down which the ships go?  So have I heard it surmised by wise men, sages and scholars of the lights of heaven, in the cities of Greece and Egypt.  For the earth and the ocean-sea, they teach, is fashioned as a vast globe in the heights of heaven.  And truly, if indeed it be the shadow of the world which darkens the face of the moon in time of eclipse, the earth may well be round, for that shadow is round.  Thus, then, one holding ever a westward course might sail down the bulge of the sea, and under the world, and round about even unto the east, if there be sea-way all along that course."
Silently we listened to so strange a matter, but the Bishop traced for us on the sand a figure of the earth.  "And here," said he, "is this land of ours, and here the sea, and here the bulge of ocean, and here a ship sailing westward; and here in the east is the Earthly Paradise; and mark now how the ship fareth onward ever on the one course unchanged, till it cometh to that blessed place."
Truly this was a wondrous teaching; and when we questioned how they who sailed could escape falling out and perishing, they and indeed their ship, when they came so far down the round sea that they hung heads nethermost, his Discretion laughed: "Nay, if the sea, which the wind breaketh and lifteth and bloweth about in grey showers, fall not out, neither will the ship, nor yet the mariners; for the Lord God hath so ordered it that wheresoever mariners be, there the sea shall seem to them no less flat than a great grass-meadow when the wind swings the grass; and if they hang head downward they know not of it; but rather, seeing over them the sun and the clouds, they might well pity our evil case, deeming it was we who were hanging heads nethermost."
Now this and suchlike converse with the Bishop so moved Serapion that he lost the quietude of soul and the deep gladness of heart which are the portion of the cloister.  Day and night his thought was flying under sail across the sea towards the Earthly Paradise, and others there were who were of one longing with him.  Wherefore at last they prayed leave of the Abbot to build a ship and to try the venture.
The Abbot consented, but when they besought him to go with them and to lead them, he shook his head smiling, and answered: "Nay, children, I am an aged man, little fitted for such a labour.  Wiser is it for me to lean my staff against my fig-tree, and have in mind the eternal years. Moreover, as you know, many are the sons in this house who look to me for fatherly care.  But if it be your wish, one shall go with you to be the twelfth of your company.  In hours of peril and perplexity and need, if such should befall you, you shall bid him pray earnestly, and after he has prayed, heed what he shall say, even as you would heed the words of your Abbot.  No better Abbot and counsellor could you have, for he hath still preserved his baptismal innocence.  It is Ambrose, the little chorister."
Serapion and the others wondered at this, but readily they accepted the Abbot's choice of a companion.
Think now of the ship as built--a goodly ship of stout timber frame covered two-ply with hides seasoned and sea-worthy, well found in provisions against a long voyage, fitted with sturdy mast of pine and broad sail.  And think of the Mass as sung, with special prayer to Him who is the confidence of them that are afar off upon the sea.  And think of the leave-taking and blessing as over and done, and of the Sea-farers as all aboard, eleven brethren and Ambrose the chorister, a little lad of nine summers.
Now all is cast loose, and the red sail is drawn up the mast and set puffing, and the ship goes out, dipping and springing, into the deep. On the shore the religious stand watching; and Serapion is at the rudder, steering and glancing back; and the others aboard are waving hands landward; and on a thwart beside the mast stands the little lad, and at a sign from Serapion he lifts up his clear sweet voice, singing joyfully the _Kyrie eleison_ of the Litany.  The eleven join in the glad song, and it is caught up by the voices of those on shore, as though it were by an organ; and as he sings the lad Ambrose watches the white ruffled wake-water of the ship, how it streams between the unbroken green sea on either hand, and it seems to him most like the running of a shallow brook when it goes ruffling over the pebbles in the greenwood.
To those on ship and to those on shore the song of each grew a fainter hearing as the distance widened; and the magnitude of the ship lessened; and first the hull went down the bulge of the ocean, and next the sail; and long ere it was sunset all trace of the Sea-farers had vanished away.
Now is this company of twelve gone forth into the great waters; far from the beloved house of the Holy Face are they gone, and far from the blithesome green aspect of the good earth; and no man of them knoweth what bane or blessing is in store for him, or whether he shall ever again tread on grass or ground.  A little tearfully they think of their dear cloister-mates, but they are high of heart nothing the less. Their ship is their garth, and cloister, and choir, wherein they praise God with full voices through all the hours from matins to compline.
Of the bright weather and fresh wind which carried them westward many days it would be tedious to tell, and indeed little that was strange did they see at that time, save it were a small bird flying high athwart their course, and a tree, with its branches and green leaves unlopped, which lay in the swing of the wave; but whither and whence the bird was flying, or where that tree grew in soil, they could not guess.
Of what happened to them in the course of their seeking, even of that the telling must be brief, flitting from one event to another, even as the small Peter-bird flits from the top of one wave to the top of another, nor wets foot or feather in the marbled sea between; else would the story of the seeking linger out the full seven years of the seeking.
The first trial that befell them was dense wintry fog, in the dusk of which they lay with lowered sail on a sullen sea for a day and a night. When the change came, it brought with it the blowing of a fierce gale with a plague of sleet and hail-stones, and they were chased out of the fog, and driven far into the south.
Great billows followed them as they ran, and broke about the stern of the ship in fountains of freezing spray which drenched them to the skin.  Little ease had they in their sea-faring in that long race with the north wind, for every moment they looked to have the mast torn up by the root and the frame-work of the ship broken asunder.  The salt surf quenched their fire and mingled their bread with bitterness.
Aching they were and weary, and sorrowful enough to sleep, when the tempest abated, and the sun returned, and the sea rolled in long glassy swells.
As the sun blazed out, and the sea glittered over all his trackless ways, Serapion said to the chorister: "Ha, little brother, 'tis good, is it not? to see the bright sun once more.  His face is as the face of an Angel to us."
The lad looked at him curiously, but made no answer.
"Art thou ailing, or sad, or home-sick, little one, that thou hast nought to say?" asked Serapion.
"Nay, father, I was but thinking of thy words, that the face of the sun is as the face of an Angel."
"Ay!  And is it not so?"
"Nay, father.  When I have seen the sun at sunrise and at sunset I have ever seen a ring of splendid Angels, and in the midst of the ring the snow-white Lamb with his red cross, and the Angels were moving constantly around the Lamb, joyfully glittering; and that was the sun. But as it rose into the heavens the Angels dazzled mine eyes so that I could see them no more, nor yet the Lamb, for very brightness.  Is the sun then otherwise than what I see?"
Then was it Serapion's turn to muse, and he answered:
"To thy young eyes which be clear and strong--yet try them not overmuch--it is doubtless as thou sayest; but we who are older have lost the piercing sight, and to us the sun is but a great and wonderful splendour which dazzles us before we can descry either the Angels or the Lamb."
Meanwhile the Sea-farers ate and drank and spread their raiment to dry, and some were oppressed by the memory of the hardships they had endured; but Serapion, going among them, cheered them with talk of the Earthly Paradise, and of the joy it would be, when they had won thither, to think of the evil chances through which they had passed. In a low tone he also spoke to them of their small companion and his vision of the sun.
"Truly," he said, "it is as our Father Abbot told us--he has not lost his baptismal innocence, nor hath he lost all knowledge of the heaven from which he came."
As he was speaking thus, one of the brethren rose up with a cry, and, shading his eyes with his hand, pointed into the west.  Far away in the shimmer of the sea and the clouds they perceived an outline of land, and they changed their course a little to come to it.  The wind carried them bravely on, and they began to distinguish blue rounded hills and ridges, and a little later green woodland, and still later, on the edge of twilight, the white gleam of waters, and glimpses of open lawns tinged with the colour of grasses in flower.
With beating hearts they leaned on the low bulwark of the ship, drinking in the beauty of the island.
Then out of a leafy creek shot a boat of white and gold; and though it was far off, the air was so crystalline that they saw it was garlanded with fresh leaves, and red and yellow and blue blossoms; and in it there were many lovely forms, clothed in white and crowned with wreaths rose-coloured and golden.
When the Sea-farers perceived that the boat glided towards them without sail or oar, they said among themselves, "These are assuredly the spirits of the Blessed;" and when suddenly the boat paused in its course, and the islanders began a sweet song, and the brethren caught the words and knew them for Latin, they were fain to believe that they had, by special grace and after brief tribulations, got within sight of the shore they sought.
The song was one of a longing for peace and deep sleep and dreamful joy and love in the valleys of the isle; and it bade the Sea-farers come to them, and take repose after cold and hunger and toil on the sea.  Tears of gladness ran down the cheeks of several of the Seekers as they listened, and one of them cried aloud: "O brothers, we have come far, but it is worth the danger and the suffering to hear this welcome of the Blessed."
Now the small chorister, who was standing by Serapion at the helm, touched the father's sleeve, and asked in a low voice: "Have I leave to sing in answer?"
"Sing, little son," Serapion replied.
Then, ringing the blessed bell of the Sea-farers, the child intoned the evening hymn:
_Te lucis ante terminum--_ _Before the waning of the light._
The instant his fresh young voice was heard singing that holy hymn, the flower-garlands about the boat broke into ghastly flames, and wreathed it with a dreadful burning; and the radiant figures were changed into dark shapes crowned with fire; and the song of longing and love became a wailing and gnashing of teeth.  The island vanished away in rolling smoke; and the boat burned down like a darkening ember; and the Sea-farers in their ship were once more alone in the wilderness of waters.
Long they prayed that night, praising God that they had escaped the snares and enchantments of the fiends.  And Serapion, drawing the lad to him, kissed him, saying: "God be with thee, little brother, in thy uprising and thy down-lying!  God be with thee, little son!"
After this they were again driven into the south for many a day, and saw no earthly shore, but everywhere unending waters.  A great wonderment to them was this immensity of the sea of ocean, wherein the land seemed a little thing lost for ever.  And ever as they drove onward, the pilot star of the north was steadfast no longer, but sank lower and still lower in the heavens, and many of the everlasting lights, which at home they had seen swing round it through the livelong night, were now sunken, as it were, in the billows.
"Truly," said Serapion, "it is even as his Discretion the Bishop told us; whether east we sail or west, or cross-wise north and south, the earth is of the figure of a ball.  In a little while it may be that we shall see the pilot star no more;" and he was sorely troubled in his mind as to how they should steer thereafter with no beacon in heaven to guide them, and how they would make their way back to the Abbey of the Holy Face.
In their wandering they set eyes on a thing well-nigh incredible--nothing less than fishes rising from the depths of the sea, and flying like birds over the ship, and diving into the sea again, and yet again rising into the air and disporting themselves in the sun.  At night, too, they beheld about the ship trails of fire in the sea, crossing and re-crossing each other, and the fire marked the ways of huge blue fishes, swift and terrible; and the Sea-farers prayed that these malignant searchers of the deep might not rise into the air and fall ravening upon them while they slept.  In the darkness strange patches and tangles of light, blue and golden and emerald, floated past them, and these they discovered were living creatures to which they could give no names.  Often also the sea was alive with fire, which flashed and ran along the ridges of the waves when they curled and broke, and many a night the sides of the ship were washed with flame, but this fire was wet and cold, and nowise hurt a hand of those who touched it.
At last on a clear morning the little chorister came hastily to Serapion and said: "Look, father, is not yon a glimmer of the heavenly land we seek?"
"Nay, little son, it is but grey cloud that has not yet caught the sun," replied Serapion.
"That, indeed, is cloud; but look higher, father.  See how white and sharp it shines!"
Then Serapion lifted up his eyes above the cloud, and in mid heaven there floated as it were a great rock of pointed crystal, white and unearthly.  Serapion's eyes brightened with eagerness, and the Sea-farers gazed long at the peak, which rather seemed a star, or a headland on some celestial shore, so bright and dreamlike was it and so magically poised in the high air.
All day they sailed towards it, and sometimes it vanished from their view, but it returned constantly.  On the third day they came to that land.  Bright and beautiful it was to their sea-wearied eyes; and of a surety no land is there that goes so nearly to heaven.  For it rose in green and flowery heights till it was lost in a ring of dusky sea-cloud; and through this vast ring of cloud it pierced its way, and the Sea-farers saw it emerge and stand clear above the cloud, bluish with the distance.  And higher still it rose, and entered a second great cloud-ring, but this ring was white; and once more it emerged from the cloud-ring, and high over all towered the pyramid of shining stone.
"Well might it be that Angels often alight on this soaring mountain," said Serapion, "and leave it glittering with their footprints.  If life and strength be given us, thither we also shall climb, and praise God in the lofty places of the earth which He has made."
They steered the ship into a sunny bay, and Serapion having blessed the sea and the shore, they landed right joyfully.  Drawing the ship high on the beach, they chose a little grove of palm-trees beside a shallow stream for their church and cloister; but they had not been long in that spot before they saw the islanders gliding through the wood and peering out at them in great amaze.  Serapion went forth to them, smiling and beckoning them to approach, but they fled and would not abide his coming.  So Serapion returned, and the Sea-farers made themselves such a home as they might, and rested a little from their toiling.
When the day had come to evening, and the brethren were chanting vespers, the islanders returned, many hundreds of them, men and women, dusky of skin but comely and bright-eyed, and for all their raiment they wore garlands of blossoms and girdles of woven leaves.  Close they came to the Sea-farers, and gazed at them, and the boldest touched them, as though to assure themselves that these were living mortals like unto themselves.  But when they saw the little chorister, with his fair white face and childish blue eyes and sunny hair, they turned to each other with exclamations and uncouth gestures of pleasure and wonderment.  Then they hurried away and brought strange and delightful fruit--berries, and fruit in a skin yellow and curved like a sickle moon, and big nuts full of water sweet and cool, and these they laid before the lad.  Wreaths of flowers, too, they wove for him, and put them on his head and about his neck, as though they were rejoiced to see him and could not make too much of him.  The brethren were light of heart that they had come to an isle so gracious and a folk so simple and loving.
Sleep, sweet as dews of Paradise, fell upon their weariness that night, and they rose refreshed and glad for matins, which they chanted by the light of large and radiant stars flashing down through the palms.  What happened that day, however, the Sea-farers did not wholly understand till long afterwards, when they had learned the speech of the people; but out of their later knowledge I shall here make it plain.
Now in the olden time the mighty mountain of this island had been a burning mountain, and even now, in a huge craggy cup beneath the glittering peak, there was a vast well of fire and molten rock; and the peak and well were the lair of an evil spirit so strong and terrible that each year the island folk gave him a child to appease him, lest in his malignant mood he should let the well overflow and consume them with its waters of fire.
Wherefore, as this was the season of the sacrifice, the islanders seeing the little chorister, how fair and beautiful he was, deemed he would be a more acceptable offering to the spirit of evil than one of their children, whom they were heart-sick of slaying.  On this day, therefore, they came at dawn, and with many gestures and much strange speech led away the lad, and with gentle force kept the brethren apart from him, though they suffered them to follow.
In a little while the child was clothed with flowers and leaves like one of themselves, and in the midst of a great crowd singing a barbarous strain, he was borne on a litter of boughs up the ascent of the mountain.  Many times they paused and rested in the heat, and the day was far spent when they reached the foot of the lofty peak.  There they passed the night, but though the brethren strove to force their way to the lad, they were restrained by the strength of the multitude, and they knew that violence was useless.  Again in the twilight before dawn the islanders resumed the journey and came to the edge of the craggy cup, in the depths of which bubbled the well of fire.
Silently they stood on the brink, looking towards the east; but the Sea-farers, who now deemed only too well that their little brother was about to be sacrificed to Moloch, cast themselves on their knees, and with tears running down their faces, raised their hands in supplication to heaven.  But with a loud voice Serapion cried: "Fear not, dear son; for the Lord can save thee from the mouth of the lion, and hear thee from the horns of the unicorns."  The little chorister answered: "Pray for my soul, Father Serapion; for my body I have no fear, even though they cast me into the pit."
In the streaming east the rays of light were springing ever more brilliantly over the clear sea; two strong men held the lad and lifted him from the ground; an aged islander--a priest, it seemed, of that evil spirit--white-haired and crowned with flowers, watched the sky with dull eyes; and as the sun came up with a rush of splendour, he called aloud: "God of the mountain-fire, take this life we give thee, and be good and friendly to us."
Then was little Ambrose the chorister swung twice to and fro, and hurled far out into the rocky cup of the well of fire.  And a wild cry arose from the crowd: "Take this life, take this life!"--but even as that cry was being uttered the lad was stayed in his fall, and he stood on the air over the fiery well, as though the air had been turned to solid crystal, and he ran on the air across the abyss to the brethren, and Serapion caught him in his arms and folded him to his breast.
Then fell a deep stillness and dread upon the people, and what to do they knew not; but the aged priest and the strong men who had flung the boy into the gulf came to the brethren, and casting themselves on their faces before the chorister, placed his foot on their heads.  Wherefore Serapion surmised that they now took him for a youthful god or spirit more powerful than the evil spirit of the fire.  Touching them, he signed to them to arise, and when they stood erect he pointed to the abyss, and gathering a handful of dust he threw it despitefully into the well of fire, and afterwards spat into the depths.  This show of scorn and contumely greatly overawed the people, and (as was made known afterwards) they looked on the Sea-farers as strong gods, merciful and much to be loved.
Thrice did the Sea-farers hold Easter in that island, for there they resolved to stay till they had learned the island speech, and freed the people from the bondage of demons, and taught them the worship of the one God who is in the heavens.
Now though the wind blew with an icy mouth on that high peak, in the rocks of the crater it was sheltered, and warm because of the inner fires of the mountain.  So it was ordered that in turn one brother should abide on the peak, and one in a cave midway down the mountain, and one on the slopes where the palms and orange-trees are rooted among the white-flowered sweet-scented broom.  And each of these had a great trumpet of bark, and when the first ray of light streamed out of the east in the new day, the brother of the peak cried through his trumpet with a mighty voice:
_Laudetur Jesus Christus,_ _May Christ Jesus be praised,_
and the brother of the cave, having responded,
_In saecula saeculorum,_ _World without end,_
cried mightily to the brother of the palms, "May Christ Jesus be praised!"--and thus from the heights in the heavens to the shore of the sea.  So, too, when the last light of the setting sun burned out on the western billows.
Thus was the reign of the spirit of evil abolished, and the mountain consecrated to the praise of Him who made the hills and the isles of the sea.
In the strong light of the morning sun the shadow of that mountain is cast over the great sea of ocean further than a swift ship may sail with a fair wind in two days and two nights; and a man placed on the peak shall see that shadow suddenly rise up from the sea and stand over against the mountain, dark and menaceful, like the lost soul of a mountain bearing testimony against its body before the judgment-seat of God; and this is a very awful sight.
Now, having preached the Gospel, the Sea-farers strengthened their ship and launched into the deep after the third Eastertide, and having comforted the people, because they were grieved and mournful at their departure, they left them in the keeping of the risen Lord, and continued their seeking.
After this Brother Benedict, the oldest monk of their company, fell ill with grievous sickness, and sorely the Sea-farers longed for some shore where he might feel the good earth solid and at rest beneath him, and see the green of growing things, and have the comfort of stillness and silence.
With astonishing patience he bore his malady, at no time repining, and speaking never a word of complaint.  When he was asked if he repented him of the adventure, he smiled gently.  "Fain, indeed," he said, "would I be laid to rest beneath the grass of our own garth, where the dear brethren, passing and repassing in the cloister, might look where I lay and say an 'Our Father' for my soul.  Yet in no way do I repent of our sailing, for we have seen the marvellous works of God; and if the Lord vouchsafe to be merciful to me, it may be that I shall see the Heavenly Paradise before you find the Earthly."  "God grant it, dear brother," said Serapion.
On an afternoon they came to a small island walled about with high cliffs, red and brown, and at the foot of the cliffs a narrow beach of ruddy sand; but on the rocks grew no green thing, lichen or moss or grass or shrub, and no sweet water came bickering down into the sea.
On landing they discovered a gully in the cliffs which led inland, and straightway explorers were sent to spy what manner of land it was whereon they had fallen.  Within the very mouth of the narrow pass they came upon a small ship hollowed out of a tree gigantic, but it was rotten and dry as touchwood, and wasting into dust.  Within the ship lay the bones of a man, stretched out as though he had died in sleep. Outside the ship lay the bones of two others.  The faces of these were turned downward to the stones whereon they lay, but the man in the ship had perished with his eyes fixed on the heavens.  The oars and sails and ropes were all dry and crumbling, and the raiment of the men had mouldered away.
In the length of that narrow pass between the lofty cliff-walls the Sea-farers found no vestige of grass or weed, either on the cliff-sides or on the stones and shingle.  Neither was there any water, save where in the hollows of some of the boulders rain had lodged and had not yet been drunk up by the sun.  No living creature, great or small, lived in that ghyll.
Within the round of the sea-walls the island lay flat and low, and it was one bleak waste of boulder and shingle, lifeless and waterless save for the rain in the pitted surfaces of the stones; but in the midst of the waste there stood, dead and leafless, a vast gaunt tree, which at one time must have been a goodly show.  When the Sea-farers reached it, they found lying on the dead turf about its roots the white bones of yet four other men.
Much they questioned and conjectured whence these ill-starred wanderers had come to lay their bones on so uncharitable a soil, and whether they had perished in seeking, like themselves, for the Earthly Paradise. "What," sighed one, "if this were the Earthly Paradise, and yon the Tree of Life!"  But the others murmured and would not have it so.
Yet to the sick man even this Isle of the Stones of Emptiness was a place of rest and respite from the sea,--"It is still mother-earth," he said, "though the mother be grown very old and there be no flesh left on her bones"--and at first it seemed as though he was recovering in the motionless stillness and in the great shadow of the cliffs. Something of this Serapion said to the little chorister, but the lad answered: "Nay, father, do you not see how the man that used to look out of his eyes has become a very little child--and of such is the kingdom of heaven?"
"Explain, little brother," said Serapion.
"Why," said the lad, "is it not thus with men when they grow so old or sick that they be like to die--does one not see that the real selves within them look out of window with faces grown younger and smaller and more joyous, till it may be that what was once a strong man, wise and great, is but a babbling babe which can scarce walk at all?"
"Who told thee these things?" asked Serapion.
"No one has told me," replied the lad, "but seeing the little children thus gazing out, and knowing that all who would enter into heaven must become as they are, I thought it must needs be in this manner that people change and pass away to God when the ending of life is come."
On this isle the Sea-farers kept a Christmas, and they made such cheer as they might at that blessed time, speaking of the stony fields wherein the Shepherds lay about their flocks, but no fields were ever so stony as these which were littered with stones fathom-deep, with never a grain of earth or blade of grass between.  And in this isle it was that Brother Benedict died, very peaceful, and without pain at the close.  On the feast of the Three Kings that poor monk was privileged even more than those Kings had been, for not only was the Babe of Heaven made manifest to him, but his soul, a little child, went forth from him to be with that benign Babe for evermore.  Under the dead tree the Sea-farers buried him, and on the trunk of the tree they fastened a crucifix on the side on which he reposed.
The bones, too, of the dead men they gathered together and covered with stones in a hollow which they made.
So they left the island, marvelling whence all those stones had come, and how they had been rained many and deep on that one place.  Said one, "It may be that these are the stones wherewith our Lord and the prophets and the blessed martyrs were stoned, laid up as in a treasury to bear witness on the day of doom."  "It may be," said another, "that these are the stones which Satan, tempting the Lord, bade Him turn into bread, and therefore are they kept for an evidence against the tempter."  "Peradventure these be the stony places," said another, "whereon the good seed fell and perished in its first upspringing, and so they be kept for the admonishment of rash Sea-farers and such as have no long-continuance in well-doing."  But no man among them was satisfied as to the mystery of that strange isle.
On many other shores they set foot.  Most were fruitful and friendly; and they rested from their seeking, and repaired the ship, and took in such stores as they might gather during their sojourn.  Though often it befell that while they were still afar the wind wafted them the fragrance of rare spices so that their eyes brightened and their faces reddened with joyful anticipation, yet ever when they landed they found that not yet, not yet had they reached the island garden of their quest.  Men, too, of the same fashion as themselves they met with on shores far apart, but strange were these of aspect and speech and manner of life.  With them they tarried as long as they might, gaining some knowledge of their tongue, and revealing to them the true God and the Lord crucified.
In the latter time of their sea-faring they were blown far over the northern side of the great sea, in such wise that the pilot star burned well-nigh overhead in the heavens.  Here they descried tall islands of glittering rock, white and blue, crowned with minsters and castles and abbeys of glass, but they heard no sound of bells or of men's voices or of the stir of life.
Once as they were swept along in near peril of wreck, through flying sea-smoke and plagues of hail, they heard a strange unearthly music rising and falling in the blast.  Some said it was Angels sent to strengthen them; others said it was wild birds which they had seen flying past in flocks; but Serapion said, "If it be Angels, blessed be God; if it be birds, yet even they are God's Angels, lessoning us how we shall praise Him, and sing Him a new song from the ends of the earth."  Then he raised his voice, singing the psalm
_Laudate Dominum de caelis,_ _Praise ye the Lord from the heavens: praise Him in the heights,_
and the Sea-farers sang it with earnest voices and with hearts lifted up, and they were greatly encouraged.
It was in these latitudes stormy and cold that, to their thinking, the Sea-farers won nearest to the Earthly Paradise.  For, far in the sides of the north as, in the red sunlight, they coasted a lofty land white with snow-fields and blue with glacier ice, they entered a winding fjord, and found themselves in glassy water slumbering between green slopes of summer.
Down to the water's edge the shores were wooded with copses of dwarf birch and willow, and the slopes were radiant with wild flowers--harebell and yellow crowfoot, purple heath and pink azalea and starry saxifrage.  A rosy light tinged the snow on the wintry heights; and over the edge of a cliff, far up the fjord, a glacier hung, and from beneath the ice a jet of water burst forth and fell foaming down the precipice to the shore.  When they landed they found the ground covered thick with berries dark and luscious, and while they gathered these, a black and white snow-bunting flitted about them on its long wings.
A miraculous thing was this garden of summer in the icy bosom of winter, but a greater marvel still was the undying sunshine on sea and shore.
"In very truth," said Serapion, "of all places we have yet seen is not this most like to have been the blessed land, for is not even 'the night light about us,' and is it not with us as it is written of the Heavenly Jerusalem, 'there shall be no night there'?"
The Sea-farers took away with them many of the leaves and flowers of this country, and afterwards the scribes in the Scriptorium copied them in beautiful colours in the Golden Missal of the Abbey.
This was the last of the unknown shores visited by the Sea-farers. Seven years had they pursued their seeking, and there now grew on them so strong a craving for home that they could gainsay it no longer. Wherefore it fell out that in the autumn-tide, when the stubble is brown in the fields and the apple red on the bough; on the last day of the week, when toil comes to end; in the last light of the day, when the smoke curls up from the roof, they won their long sea-way home.
[Illustration: _They won their long sea-way home_]
O beloved Abbey of the Holy Face, through tears they beheld thy walls, with rapture they kissed thy threshold!
"In all the great sea of ocean," said Serapion, when he had told the story of their wandering, "no such Earthly Paradise have we seen as this dear Abbey of our own!"
"Dear brethren," said the Abbot, "the seven years of your seeking have not been wasted if you have truly learned so much.  Far from home have I never gone, but many things have come to me.  To be ever, and to be tranquilly, and to be joyously, and to be strenuously, and to be thankfully and humbly at one with the blessed will of God--that is the Heavenly Paradise; and each of us, by God's grace, may have that within him.  And whoso hath within him the Heavenly Paradise, hath here and now, and at all times and in every place, the true Earthly Paradise round about him."
Here ends the chapter of the Seven Years of Seeking.
["But do Thou, O Lord, have mercy upon us," chanted the Lector, as he closed the book.  And the Prior struck the board, and the brethren arose and returned God thanks for the creatures of food and drink, and for that Earthly Paradise, ever at their door, of tranquil and joyous and strenuous and thankful and humble acceptance of God's will.]
The Guardians of the Door
There was once an orphan girl, far away in a little village on the edge of the moors.  She lived in a hovel thatched with reeds, and this was the poorest and the last of all the houses, and stood quite by itself among broom and whins by the wayside.
From the doorway the girl could look across the wild stretches of the moorland; and that was pleasant enough on a summer day, for then the air is clear and golden, and the moor is purple with the bloom of the ling, and there are red and yellow patches of bracken, and here and there a rowan tree grows among the big grey boulders with clusters of reddening berries.  But at night, and especially on a winter night, the darkness was so wide and so lonely that it was hard not to feel afraid sometimes.  The wind, when it blew in the dark, was full of strange and mournful voices; and when there was no wind, Mary could hear the cries and calls of the wild creatures on the moor.
Mary was fourteen when she lost her father.  He was a rough idle good-for-nothing, and one stormy night on his way home from the tavern he went astray and was found dead in the snow.  Her mother had died when she was so small a child that Mary could scarcely remember her face.  So it happened that she was left alone in the world, and all she possessed was a dog, some fowls, and her mother's spinning wheel.
But she was a bright, cheerful, courageous child, and soon she got from the people of the village sufficient work to keep her wheel always busy, for no one could look into her face without liking her.  People often wondered how so rude and worthless a fellow could have had such a child; she was as sweet and unexpected as the white flowers on the bare and rugged branches of the blackthorn.
Her hens laid well, and she sold all the eggs she could spare; and her dog, which had been trained in all sorts of cunning by her father, often brought her from the moors some wild thing in fur or feathers which Mary thought there was no harm in cooking.
Her father had been too idle and careless to teach her anything, and all that she could recollect of her mother's instruction was a little rhyme which she used to repeat on her knees beside the bed every night before she went to sleep.
And this was the rhyme:
_God bless this house from thatch to floor,_ _The twelve Apostles guard the door,_ _And four good Angels watch my bed,_ _Two at the foot and two the head._ _Amen._
[Illustration: "_And four good Angels watch my bed_"]
Though she was all alone in the world, and had no girl of her own age to make friends with, she was happy and contented, for she was busy from morning till night.
And yet in spite of all this, strange stories began to be whispered about the village.  People who happened to pass by the old hut late at night declared that they had seen light shining through the chinks in the window-shutter when all honest people should have been asleep. There were others who said they had noticed strange men standing in the shadows of the eaves; they might have been highwaymen, they might have been smugglers--they could not tell, for no one had cared to run the risk of going too near--but it was quite certain that there were strange things going on at the hut, and that the girl who seemed so simple and innocent was not quite so good as the neighbours had imagined.
When the village gossip had reached the ears of the white-headed old Vicar, he sent for the girl and questioned her closely.  Mary was grieved to learn that such untrue and unkind stories were told about her.  She knew nothing, she said, of any lights or of any men.  As soon as it was too dusky to see to work she always fastened her door, and after she had had her supper, she covered the fire and blew out the rushlight and went to bed.
"And you say your prayers, my daughter, I hope?" said the Vicar kindly.
Mary hung down her head and answered in a low voice, "I do not know any proper prayers, but I always say the words my mother taught me."
And Mary repeated the rhyme:
_God bless this house from thatch to floor,_ _The twelve Apostles guard the door,_ _And four good Angels watch my bed,_ _Two at the foot and two the head._ _Amen._
"There could not be a better prayer, dear child!" rejoined the Vicar, with a smile.  "Go home now, and do not be troubled by what idle tongues may say.  Every night repeat your little prayer, and God will take care of you."
Late that night, however, the Vicar lit his lantern and went out of doors, without a word to any one.  All the village was still and dark as he walked slowly up the road towards the moor.
"She is a good girl," he said to himself, "but people may have observed something which has given rise to these stories.  I will go and see with my own eyes."
The stars were shining far away in the dark sky, and the green plovers were crying mournfully on the dark moor.  As he passed along the lantern swung out a dim light across the road, which had neither walls nor hedges.
"It is a lonely place for a child to live in by herself," he thought.
At last he perceived the outline of the old hovel, among the gorse and broom, and the next moment he stopped suddenly, for there, as he had been told, a thread of bright light came streaming through the shutters of the small window.  He drew his lantern under his cloak, and approached cautiously.  The road where he stood was now dim, but by the faint glimmer of the stars he was able to make out that there were several persons standing under the eaves, and apparently whispering together.
The Vicar's good old heart was filled with surprise and sorrow.  Then it suddenly grew hot with anger, and throwing aside his cloak and lifting up the lantern he advanced boldly to confront the intruders. But they were not at all alarmed, and they did not make any attempt to escape him.  Then, as the light fell upon their forms and faces, who but the Vicar was struck with awe and amazement, and stood gazing as still as a stone!
The people under the eaves were men of another age and another world, strangely clothed in long garments, and majestic in appearance.  One carried a lance, and another a pilgrim's staff, and a third a battle-axe; but the most imposing stood near the door of the hut, and in his hand he held two large keys.
In an instant the Vicar had guessed who they were, and had uncovered his head and fallen on his knees; but the strangers melted slowly away into the darkness, as if they had been no more than the images of a dream.  And indeed the Vicar might have thought that he really had been dreaming but for the light which continued to stream through the chink in the shutter.
He arose from his knees and moved towards the window to peep into the hut.  Instantly an invisible hand stretched a naked sword across his path, and a low deep voice spoke to him in solemn warning:
"It is the light of Angels.  Do not look, or blindness will fall upon you, even as it fell upon me on the Damascus road."
But the aged Vicar laid his hand on the sword, and tried to move it away.
"Let me look, let me look!" he said; "better one glimpse of the Angels than a thousand years of earthly sight."
Then the sword yielded to his touch and vanished into air, and the old priest leaned forward on the window-sill and gazed through the chink. And with a cry of joy he saw a corner of the rude bed, and beside the corner, one above the other, three great dazzling wings; they were the left-hand side wings of one of the Angels at the foot of the bed.
Then all was deep darkness.
The Vicar thought that it was the blindness that had fallen upon him, but the only regret he felt was that the vision had vanished so quickly.  Then, as he turned away, he found that not only had he not lost his sight, but that he could now see with a marvellous clearness. He saw the road, and even the foot-prints and grains of sand on the road; the hut, and the reeds on the hut; the moor, and the boulders and the rowan-trees on the moor.  Everything was as distinct as if it had been--not daylight, but as if the air were of the clear colour of a nut-brown brook in summer.
Praising God for all His goodness he returned home, and as he went he looked back once and again and yet again, and each time he saw the twelve awful figures in strange clothing, guarding the lonely thatched hovel on the edge of the moor.
After this there were no more stories told of Mary, and no one even dared speak to her of the wonderful manner in which her prayer was answered, so that she never knew what the old Vicar had seen.  But late at night people would rather go a great way round than take the road which passed by her poor hut.
On the Shores of Longing
It was in the old forgotten days when all the western coast of Spain was sprinkled with lonely hermitages among the rocks, and with holy houses and towers of prayer; and this west coast was thought to be the last and outermost edge of all land, for beyond there lay nothing but the vast ocean stream and the sunset.  There, in the west of the world, on the brink of the sea and the lights of the day that is done, lived the men of God, looking for ever towards the east for the coming of the Lord.  Even the dead were laid in the place of their resurrection with their feet pointing to the morning, so that when they should arise their faces would be turned towards His coming.  Thus it came to pass that the keen white wind out of the east was named the wind of the dead men's feet.
Now in one or these holy houses lived the monk Bresal of the Songs, who had followed Sedulius the Bishop into Spain.
Bresal had been sent thither to teach the brethren the music of the choirs of the Isle of the Gael and to train the novices in chant and psalmody, for of all singers the sweetest was he, and he could play on every instrument of wind or string, and was skilled in all the modes of minstrelsy.  Thereto he knew by heart numberless hymns and songs and poems, and God had given him the gift to make songs and hymns, and beautiful airs for the singing of them.  And for these things, so sweet and gentle was the nature of the man, he was greatly beloved whithersoever he fared.
A happy and holy life had he lived, but now he was growing old; and as he looked from the convent on the cliffs far over the western waters, he thought daily more and more of Erinn, and a great longing grew upon him to see once more that green isle in which he had been born.  And when he saw, far below, the ships of the sea-farers dragging slowly away into the north in the breezy sunshine or in the blue twilight, his eyes became dim with the thought that perchance these wind-reddened mariners might be steering for the shores of his longing.
The Prior of the convent noticed his sadness and questioned him of the cause, and when Bresal told him, "Why should you go?" he asked.  "Do you not love us any longer?"
"Dearly do I love you, father," replied Bresal, "and dearly this house, and every rock and tree and flower; but no son of the Isle of the Gael forgets the little mother-lap of earth whereon he was nursed, or the smell of the burning peat, or the song of the robin, or the drone of the big mottled wild bee, or the cry of the wild geese when the winter is nigh.  Even Columba the holy pined for the lack of these things. This is what he says in one of the songs which he has left us:
_There's an eye of grey_ _Looks back to Erinn far away;_ _Big tears wet that eye of grey_ _Seeking Erinn far away."_
Now the Prior loved Bresal as Jonathan loved David; and though it grieved him to part with him, he resolved that if it could be compassed Bresal should go back to his own country.  "But you must never forget us, and when you are happy, far away from us, you must think of us and give us your heart in prayer."
"Never shall I forget you, father," the Singer replied.  "Indeed, it will not be a strange thing if I shall long for you then even as I am longing for my home now; for in truth, next to my home, most do I love the brethren of this house, and the very house itself, and the hills and the sea and the dying lights of the evening.  But I know that it will not be permitted me ever to return.  The place of my birth will be the place of my resurrection."
The Prior smiled, and laid his hand gently on the monk's shoulder: "O Bresal, if it be within my power you shall have your will."
So he sent messengers to Sedulius the Bishop; and Sedulius, who also had the Irish heart with its tears of longing, consented; and not many days after the swallows and martins had gone flashing by into the north, Bresal of the Songs was free to follow as speedily as he might.
Long was the way and weary the pilgrimage, but at last he reached the beloved green Isle of the Gael, and fared into the south-west--and this is the land in which it is told that Patrick the Saint celebrated Mass on every seventh ridge he passed over.  He came at sunset on the last day of the week to the place of bells and cells among the rocks of the coast of Kerry.  In that blessed spot there is ever a service of Angels ascending and descending.  And when he saw once more the turf dyke and the wattled cells and the rude stone church of the brotherhood where he had been a son of reading in his boyhood, and the land all quiet with the labour of the week done, and the woods red with the last light of the finished day, the tears ran down his face, and he fell on the earth and kissed it for joy at his return.  It was a glad thing for him to be there once more; to recognise each spot he had loved, to look on the old stones and trees, the hills and sparkling sea, the rocky isle and the curraghs of the fisher-folk; to smell the reek of the peat curling up blue in the sweet air; for all these things had haunted him in dreams when he was in a distant land.
Now when the first hunger of longing had been appeased, and the year wore round, and the swallows gathered in the autumn, and every bush and tree was crowded with them while they waited restlessly for a moonlight night and a fair wind to take their flight over sea, Bresal began to think tenderly of the home on the Spanish cliffs overhanging the brink of the sunset.
Then in the brown days of the autumn rains; and again in the keen November when the leaves were falling in sudden showers--but the highest leaves clung the longest--and puffs of whirling wind set the fallen leaves flying, and these were full of sharp sounds and pattering voices; and sixes of sparrows went flying with the leaves so that one could not well say which were leaves and which were birds; and yet again through the bitter time when the eaves were hung with icicles and the peaks of the blue slieves were white with snow, and the low hills and fields were hoary--the memory of the Prior and of the beloved house prevailed with him and he felt the dull ache of separation.
[Illustration: _And again in the keen November_]
As the days passed by his trouble grew the greater, for he began to fear that his love of the creature was attaching him too closely to the earth and to the things of this fleeting life of our exile.  In vain he fasted and prayed and strove to subdue his affections; the human heart within him would not suffer him to rest.
Now it happened on a day when the year had turned, and a soft wind was tossing the little new leaves and the shadows of the leaves and the new grass and the shadows of the grass, Bresal was sitting on a rock in the sun on the hillside.
Suddenly there flashed by him, in a long swift joyous swing of flight, two beautiful birds with long wings and forked tails and a sheen of red and green.  It was the swallows that had returned.
For a moment he felt an ascension of the heart, and then he recollected that nearly a year had elapsed since he had seen the face of his friend the Prior for the last time in this world.  And he wondered to himself how they all fared, whether any one had died, what this one or that was now doing, whether they still spoke at times of him, but chiefly he thought of the Prior, and he prayed for him with a great love.  And thinking thus as he sat on the rock, Bresal seemed to see once more the dear house in Spain and the cliffs overlooking the vast ocean stream, and it appeared to him as though he were once again in a favourite nook among the rocks beside the priory.
In that nook a thread of water trickled down into a hollow stone and made a little pool, and around the pool grew an ice-plant with thick round green leaves set close and notched on the edge, and a thin russet stalk, and little stars of white flowers sprinkled with red.  And hard by the pool stood a small rounded evergreen tree from which he had often gathered the orange-scarlet berries.  At the sight of these simple and familiar things the tears ran down Bresal's cheeks, half for joy and half for sorrow.
Now at this selfsame moment the Prior was taking the air and saying his office near that very spot, and when he had closed his breviary, he remembered his friend in Erinn far away, and murmured, "How is it, Lord, with Bresal my brother?  Have him, I pray Thee, ever in Thy holy keeping."
As he spoke the gift of heavenly vision descended on the Prior, and he saw where Bresal sat on a rock in the sun gazing at the evergreen tree and the ice-plant about the little pool, and he perceived that Bresal fancied he was looking at these things.
A great tenderness for Bresal filled the Prior's heart, and he prayed: "Lord, if it be Thy holy will, let Bresal my brother have near him these things of which he is dreaming, as a remembrance of what his soul loveth."  Then, turning to the tree and the plant and the pool, he blessed them and said: "O little tree and starry plant and cool well and transparent fern, and whatsoever else Bresal now sees, arise in the name of the Lord of the four winds and of earth and water and fire, arise and go and make real the dream that he is dreaming."
As he spoke the trickling water and the tree and the saxifrage, and with them parcels of soil and rock, and with the pool the blue light of the sky reflected in it, rose like a cloud and vanished, and the Prior beheld them no more.
At last Bresal brushed away his tears, blaming his weakness and his enslavement to earthly affections, but the things he had seen in his happy day-dream did not vanish.  To his great amazement, there at his feet were the little pool and the ice-plant, and hard by grew the evergreen tree.  He rose with a cry of joy, "O Father Prior, 'tis thy prayer hath done this!"
And care was lifted from him, for now he knew that in his human love he had in nowise sinned against the love of God, but contrariwise the love of his friend had drawn him closer to the love of his Maker.  During all the days of the years of his exile this little parcel of Spain was a solace and a strength to him.
Many a hundred years has gone by since this happened, but still if you travel in that land you may see the ice-plant and the evergreen tree. And the name of the evergreen is the Strawberry Tree.  The ice-plant, which is also called a saxifrage, may now be seen in many a garden to which it has been brought from the Kerry mountains, and it is known as London Pride.  Botanists who do not know the story of Bresal of the Songs have been puzzled to explain how a Spanish tree and a Spanish flower happen to grow in one little nook of Erinn.
The Children of Spinalunga
The piazza or square in front of the Cathedral was the only open space in which the children of Spinalunga had room to play.  Spinalunga means a Long Spine or Ridge of rock, and the castello or little walled town which bore that name was built on the highest peak of the ridge, inside strong brown stone walls with square towers.  So rough and steep was this portion of the ridge that the crowded houses, with their red roofs and white gables, were piled up one behind another, and many of the streets were narrow staircases, climbing up between the houses to the blue sky.
On the top the hill was flat, and there the Cathedral stood, and from her niche above the great west entrance the beautiful statue of the Madonna with the Babe in her arms looked across the square, and over the huddled red roofs, and far away out to the hills and valleys with their evergreen oaks and plantations of grey olives, and bright cornfields and vineyards.
On three sides the town was sheltered by hills, but a very deep ravine separated them from the ridge, so that on those three sides it was impossible for an enemy to attack the town.  On the nearest hills great pine woods grew far up the slopes, and sheltered it from the east winds which blew over the snowy peaks.
Now on the southern side of the square stood the houses of the Syndic and other wealthy citizens, with open colonnades of carved yellow stone; and all about the piazza at intervals there were orange-trees and pomegranates, growing in huge jars of red earthenware.
This had been the children's playground as long as any one could remember, but in the days of the blessed Frate Agnolo the Syndic was a grim, childless, irascible old man, terribly plagued with gout, which made him so choleric that he could not endure the joyous cries and clatter of the children at their play.  So at last in his irritation he gave orders that, if the children must play at all, it would have to be in their own dull narrow alleys paved with hard rock, or outside beyond the walls of the castello.  For their part the youngsters would have been glad enough to escape into the green country among the broom and cypress, the red snapdragon and golden asters and blue pimpernels, but these were wild and dangerous times, and at any moment a troop of Free-lances from Pisa or a band of Lucchese raiders might have swept down and carried them off into captivity.
They had therefore to sit about their own doors, and the piazza of the Cathedral became strangely silent in the summer evenings, and there was a feeling of dulness and discontent in the little town.  Never a whit better off was the Syndic, for he was now angry with the stillness and the deserted look of the square.
In the midst of this trouble the blessed Brother Agnolo came down from his hermitage among the pine woods, and when he heard of what had taken place, he went straightway to the Syndic and took him to task, with soft and gracious words.
"Messer Gianni, pain I know will often take all sweetness out of the temper of a man, but in this you are not doing well.  There is no child in Spinalunga but would readily forego all his happy play to give you ease and solace, but in this way they cannot help you.  By sending them away you do but cloud their innocent lives, and you are yourself none the better for their absence.  Were it not wiser for you to seek to distract yourself in their harmless merry-making?  I may well think that you have never watched them at their sports; but if you will bid them come back to-day, and will but walk a little way with me, you shall see that which shall give you content and delight so great, that never again will you wish to banish them, but will rather pray to have their companionship at all times."
Now the Frate so prevailed on the Syndic that he gave consent, and bade all the children, lass and lad, babe and prattler, come to the square for their games as they used to do.  And leaning with one hand on his staff, and with the other on the shoulder of Brother Agnolo, he moved slowly through the fruit-trees in the great jars to the steps of the Cathedral.
Suddenly the joy-bells began to ring, and the little people came laughing and singing and shouting from the steep streets and staircases and alleys, and they raced and danced into the piazza like Springtime let loose, and they chased each other, and caught hands and played in rings, and swarmed among the jars, as many and noisy as swallows when they gather for their flight over sea in the autumn-tide.
"Look well, Messer Gianni," said the Frate, "and perceive who it is that shares their frolics."
As the Brother spoke the eyes of the Syndic were opened; and there, with each little child, was his Angel, clothed in white, and white-winged; and as the little folk contended together, their Angels contended with each other; and as they ran and danced and sang, so ran and danced and sang their Angels.  Which was the laughter of the children, and which that of the Angels, the Syndic could not tell; and when the plump two-year-olds tottered and tumbled, their Angels caught them and saved them from hurt; and even if they did weep and make a great outcry, it was because they were frightened, not because they were injured, and straightway they had forgotten what ailed them and were again merrily trudging about.
In the midst of this wonderful vision of young Angels and bright-eyed children mingling so riotously together, the Syndic heard an inexpressibly joyous laugh behind him.  Turning his head, he saw that it was the little marble Babe in the arms of the Madonna.  He was clapping his hands, and had thrown back his head against his mother's bosom in sudden delight.
Did the Syndic truly see this?  He was certain he did--for a moment; and yet in that same moment he knew that the divine Babe was once more a babe of stone, with its sweet grave face and unconscious eyes; and when the Syndic turned again to watch the children, it was only the children he saw; the Angels were no longer visible.
"It is not always given to our sinful eyes to see them," said Brother Agnolo, answering the Syndic's thought, "but whether we see them or see them not, always they are there."
Now it was in the autumn of the same year that the fierce captain of Free-lances, the Condottiere Ghino, appeared one moonlight night before the gates of Spinalunga, and bade the guard open in the name of Pisa.
As I have said, the little hill-town could only be attacked on the western side, on account of the precipitous ravine which divided it from the hills; but the ridge before the gate was crowded with eight hundred horsemen and two thousand men-at-arms clamouring to be admitted.  Nothing daunted, the garrison on the square towers cried back a defiance; the war-bell was sounded; and the townspeople, men and women, hurried down to defend the walls.
After the first flight of arrows and quarrels the Free-lances fell back out of bowshot, and encamped for the night, but the hill-men remained on the watch till daybreak.  Early in the morning Ghino himself rode up the ascent with a white flag, and asked for a parley with the Syndic.
"We are from Pisa," said the Condottiere; "Florence is against us; this castello we must hold for our safety.  If with your good-will, well and good!"
"We are bound by our loyalty to Florence," replied the Syndic briefly.
"The sword cuts all bonds," said the Free-lance, with a laugh; "but we would gladly avoid strife.  Throw in your lot with us.  All we ask is a pledge that in the hour of need you will not join Florence against us."
"What pledge do you ask?" inquired the Syndic.
"Let twenty of your children ride back with us to Pisa," said the Free-lance.  "These shall answer for your fidelity.  They shall be cherished and well cared for during their sojourn."
Who but Messer Gianni was the angry man on hearing this?
"Our children!" he cried; "are we, then, slaves, that we must needs send you our little ones as hostages?  Guards, here!  Shoot me down this brigand who bids me surrender your children to him!"
Bolts flew whizzing from the cross-bows; the Free-lance shook his iron gauntlet at the Syndic, and galloped down the ridge unharmed.  The Syndic forgot his gout in his wrath, and bade the hill-men hold their own till their roofs crumbled about their ears.
Then began a close siege of the castello; but on the fourth day Frate Agnolo passed boldly through the lines of the enemy, and was admitted through the massive stone gateway which was too narrow for the entrance of either cart or waggon.  Great was the joy of the hill-men as the Brother appeared among them.  He, they knew, would give them wise counsel and stout aid in the moment of danger.
When they told him of the pledge for which the besiegers asked, he only smiled and shook his head.  "Be of good cheer," he said, "God and His Angels have us in their keeping."
Thoughtfully he ascended the steep streets to the piazza, and, entering the Cathedral, he remained there for a long while absorbed in prayer. And as he prayed his face brightened with the look of one who hears joyful news, and when he rose from his knees he went to the house of the Syndic, and spoke with him long and seriously.
At sunset that day a man-at-arms went forth from the gates of the castello with a white flag to the beleaguering lines, and demanded to be taken into the presence of the captain.  To him he delivered this message from the Syndic: "To-morrow in the morning the gate of Spinalunga will be thrown open, and all the children of our town who are not halt or blind or ailing shall be sent forth.  Come and choose the twenty you would have as hostages."
By the camp-fires that night the Free-lances caroused loud and long; but in the little hill-town the children slept sound while the men and women prayed with pale stern faces.  An hour after midnight all the garrison from the towers and all the strong young men assembled in the square.  They were divided into two bands, and were instructed to descend cautiously by rope-ladders into the ravine on the eastern side of the town.  Thence without sound of tongue or foot they were to steal through the darkness till they had reached certain positions on the flanks of the besiegers, where they were to wait for the signal of onset.  Frate Agnolo gave each of them his blessing, as one by one they slid over the wall on to the rope-ladders and disappeared in the blackness of the ravine.  Noiselessly they marched under the walls of the town till they reached their appointed posts, and there they lay hidden in the woods till morning.
The Free-lances were early astir.  As the first ray of golden light streamed over the pine woods on to the ridge and the valley, the bells of the Cathedral began to ring; the heavy gate of the castello was flung open, and the children trooped out laughing and gay, just as they had burst into the square a few months ago, for this, they were told, was to be a great feast and holiday.  As they issued through the deep stone archway they filed to right or left, and drew up in long lines across the width of the ridge.  Then raising their childish voices in a simple hymn, they all moved together down the rough slope to the lines of the besiegers.  Brother Agnolo, holding a plain wooden cross high above his head, led the way, singing joyously.
It was a wonderful sight in the clear shining air of the hills, and hundreds of women weeping silently on the walls crowded together to watch it; and as they watched they held their breath, for suddenly in the golden light of the morning they saw that behind each child there was a great white-winged Angel with a fiery spear.
Then, as that throng of singing children and shining spirits swept down upon the Free-lances, a wild cry of panic arose from the camp.  The eight hundred horsemen turned in dismay, and plunged through the ranks of the men-at-arms, and the mercenaries fell back in terror and confusion, striking each other down and trampling the wounded underfoot in their frantic efforts to escape.  At that moment the hill-men who were lying in ambush on each flank bore down on the bewildered multitude, and hacked and hewed right and left till the boldest and hardiest of the horsemen broke and fled, leaving their dead and dying on the field.
[Illustration: _The eight hundred horsemen turned in dismay_]
So the little hill-town of Spinalunga was saved by the children and their Angels, and even to this day the piazza of the Cathedral is their very own playground, in which no one can prevent them from playing all the year round.
The Sin of the Prince Bishop
The Prince Bishop Evrard stood gazing at his marvellous Cathedral; and as he let his eyes wander in delight over the three deep sculptured portals and the double gallery above them, and the great rose window, and the ringers' gallery, and so up to the massive western towers, he felt as though his heart were clapping hands for joy within him.  And he thought to himself, "Surely in all the world God has no more beautiful house than this which I have built with such long labour and at so princely an outlay of my treasure."  And thus the Prince Bishop fell into the sin of vainglory, and, though he was a holy man, he did not perceive that he had fallen, so filled with gladness was he at the sight of his completed work.
[Illustration: "_Surely in all the world God has no more beautiful house than this_"]
In the double gallery of the west front there were many great statues with crowns and sceptres, but a niche over the central portal was empty, and this the Prince Bishop intended to fill with a statue of himself.  It was to be a very small simple statue, as became one who prized lowliness of heart, but as he looked up at the vacant place it gave him pleasure to think that hundreds of years after he was dead people would pause before his effigy and praise him and his work.  And this, too, was vainglory.
As the Prince Bishop lay asleep that night a mighty six-winged Angel stood beside him and bade him rise.  "Come," he said, "and I will show thee some of those who have worked with thee in building the great church, and whose service in God's eyes has been more worthy than thine."  And the Angel led him past the Cathedral and down the steep street of the ancient city, and though it was midday, the people going to and fro did not seem to see them.  Beyond the gates they followed the shelving road till they came to green level fields, and there in the middle of the road, between grassy banks covered white with cherry blossom, two great white oxen, yoked to a huge block of stone, stood resting before they began the toilsome ascent.
"Look!" said the Angel; and the Prince Bishop saw a little blue-winged bird which perched on the stout yoke beam fastened to the horns of the oxen, and sang such a heavenly song of rest and contentment that the big shaggy creatures ceased to blow stormily through their nostrils, and drew long tranquil breaths instead.
"Look again!" said the Angel.  And from a hut of wattles and clay a little peasant girl came with a bundle of hay in her arms, and gave first one of the oxen and then the other a wisp.  Then she stroked their black muzzles, and laid her rosy face against their white cheeks. Then the Prince Bishop saw the rude teamster rise from his rest on the bank and cry to his cattle, and the oxen strained against the beam and the thick ropes tightened, and the huge block of stone was once more set in motion.
And when the Prince Bishop saw that it was these fellow-workers whose service was more worthy in God's eyes than his own, he was abashed and sorrowful for his sin, and the tears of his own weeping awoke him.  So he sent for the master of the sculptors and bade him fill the little niche over the middle portal, not with his own effigy but with an image of the child; and he bade him make two colossal figures of the white oxen; and to the great wonderment of the people these were set up high in the tower so that men could see them against the blue sky.  "And as for me," he said, "let my body be buried, with my face downward, outside the great church, in front of the middle entrance, that men may trample on my vainglory and that I may serve them as a stepping-stone to the house of God; and the little child shall look on me when I lie in the dust."
Now the little girl in the niche was carved with wisps of hay in her hands, but the child who had fed the oxen knew nothing of this, and as she grew up she forgot her childish service, so that when she had grown to womanhood and chanced to see this statue over the portal she did not know it was her own self in stone.  But what she had done was not forgotten in heaven.
And as for the oxen, one of them looked east and one looked west across the wide fruitful country about the foot of the hill-city.  And one caught the first grey gleam, and the first rosy flush, and the first golden splendour of the sunrise; and the other was lit with the colour of the sunset long after the lowlands had faded away in the blue mist of the twilight.  Weary men and worn women looking up at them felt that a gladness and a glory and a deep peace had fallen on the life of toil. And then, when people began to understand, they said it was well that these mighty labourers, who had helped to build the house, should still find a place of service and honour in the house; and they remembered that the Master of the house had once been a Babe warmed in a manger by the breath of kine.  And at the thought of this men grew more pitiful to their cattle, and to the beasts in servitude, and to all dumb animals.  And that was one good fruit which sprang from the Prince Bishop's repentance.
Now over the colossal stone oxen hung the bells of the Cathedral.  On Christmas Eve the ringers, according to the old custom, ascended to their gallery to ring in the birth of the Babe Divine.  At the moment of midnight the master ringer gave the word, and the great bells began to swing in joyful sequence.  Down below in the crowded church lay the image of the new-born Child on the cold straw, and at His haloed head stood the images of the ox and the ass.  Far out across the snow-roofed city, far away over the white glistening country rang the glad music of the tower.  People who went to their doors to listen cried in astonishment: "Hark! what strange music is that?  It sounds as if the lowing of cattle were mingled with the chimes of the bells."  In truth it was so.  And in every byre the oxen and the kine answered the strange sweet cadences with their lowing, and the great stone oxen lowed back to their kin of the meadow through the deep notes of the joy-peal.
In the fulness of time the Prince Bishop Evrard died and was buried as he had willed, with his face humbly turned to the earth; and to this day the weather-wasted figure of the little girl looks down on him from her niche, and the slab over his grave serves as a stepping-stone to pious feet.
The Little Bedesman of Christ
This is the legend of Francis, the Little Bedesman of Christ.  Seven hundred years ago was he born in Assisi, the quaint Umbrian town among the rocks; and for twenty years and more he cherished but one thought, and one desire, and one hope; and these were that he might lead the beautiful and holy and sorrowful life which our Lord lived on the earth, and that in every way he might resemble our Lord in the purity and loveliness of His humanity.
Home and wealth and honour he surrendered, and the love of a wife and of little prattlers on his knees; for none of these things were the portion of Christ.
No care he took as to how he should be sheltered by night or wherewith he should be clothed by day; and for meat and drink he looked to the hand of God, for these were to be the daily gift of His giving.  So that when he heard the words of the sacred Gospel read in the little church of St. Mary of the Angels--"Provide neither gold nor silver nor brass in your purses, nor scrip for your journey, neither two coats, neither shoes, nor yet staves"--he went out and girt his coarse brown dress with a piece of cord, and cast away his shoes and went barefoot thenceforth.
Even to this day the brethren of the great Order of religious men which he founded are thus clothed, and girt with a cord, and shod with nakedness.  And this Order is the Order of the Lesser Brethren, the Fratres Minores; and often they are called Franciscans, or the Friars of St. Francis.
But as to the thought he bestowed on his eating and drinking: once when he and Brother Masseo sat down on a broad stone near a fresh fountain to eat the bread which they had begged in the town, St. Francis rejoiced in their prosperity, saying, "Not only are we filled with plenty, but our treasure is of God's own providing; for consider this bread which has come to us like manna, and this noble table of stone fit for the feasting of kings, and this well of bright water which is beverage from heaven;" and he besought God to fill their hearts with an ardent love of the affluence of holy poverty.
[Illustration: _St. Francis of Assisi_]
Even the quiet and blessed peace of the cloister and the hermitage he denied himself; for he remembered that though the Lord Christ withdrew into the hills and went into the wilderness to refresh His soul with prayer and communion with His Heavenly Father, it was among the sons of men that He had His dwelling all His days.  So he, too, the Little Bedesman, often tasted great happiness among the rocks and trees of solitary places; and his spirit felt the spell of the lonely hills; and he loved to pray in the woods, and in their shadow he was consoled by the visits of Angels, and was lifted bodily from the earth in ecstasies of joy.  But the work which he had set his hands to do was among men, and in villages and the busy streets of cities.
It was not in the first place to save their own souls and to attain to holiness that he and his companions abandoned the common way of life. Long afterwards, when thousands of men had joined his Order of the Lesser Brethren, he said: "God has gathered us into this holy Order for the salvation of the world, and between us and the world He has made this compact, that we shall give the world a good example, and the world shall make provision for our necessities."
Yet, though he preached repentance and sorrow for sin, never was it his wish that men and women who had other duties should abandon those duties and their calling to follow his example.  Besides the Order of the Lesser Brethren, he had founded an Order of holy women who should pray and praise while the men went forth to teach; but well he knew that all could not do as these had done, that the work of the world must be carried on, the fields ploughed and reaped, and the vines dressed, and the nets cast and drawn, and ships manned at sea, and markets filled, and children reared, and aged people nourished, and the dead laid in their graves; and when people were deeply moved by his preaching and would fain have followed him, he would say: "Nay, be in no unwise haste to leave your homes; there, too, you may serve God and be devout and holy;" and, promising them a rule of life, he founded the Third Order, into which, whatever their age or calling, all who desired to be true followers of Christ Jesus might be admitted.
Even among those who gave themselves up wholly to the life spiritual he discouraged excessive austerity, forbidding them to fast excessively or to wear shirts of mail and bands of iron on their flesh, for these not only injured their health and lessened their usefulness, but hindered them in prayer and meditation and delight in the love of God.  Once, too, when it was revealed to him that a brother lay sleepless because of his weakness and the pinch of hunger, St. Francis rose, and, taking some bread with him, went to the brother's cell, and begged of him that they might eat that frugal fare together.  God gave us these bodies of ours, not that we might torture them unwisely, but that we might use their strength and comeliness in His service.
So, with little heed to his own comfort, but full of consideration and gentleness for the weakness of others, he and his companions with him went about, preaching and praising God; cheering and helping the reapers and vintagers in the harvest time, and working with the field-folk in the earlier season; supping and praying with them afterwards; sleeping, when day failed, in barns or church porches or leper-hospitals, or may be in an old Etruscan tomb or in the shelter of a jutting rock, if no better chance befell; till at last they came to be known and beloved in every village and feudal castle and walled town among the hills between Rome and Florence.  At first, indeed, they were mocked and derided and rudely treated, but in a little while it was seen that they were no self-seekers crazed with vanity, but messengers of heaven, and pure and great-hearted champions of Christ and His poor.
In those days of luxury and rapacity and of wild passions and ruthless bloodshed, it was strange to see these men stripping themselves of wealth and power--for many of the brethren had been rich and noble--and proclaiming the Gospel of the love and gentleness and purity and poverty of Christ.  For not only were the brethren under vow to possess nothing whatever in the world, and not only were they forbidden to touch money on any account, but the Order itself was bound to poverty. It could not own great estates or noble abbeys and convents, but was as much dependent on charity and God's providing as the humblest of its friars.
Was it a wonderful thing that a great affection grew up in the hearts of the people for these preachers of the Cross, and especially for the most sweet and tender of them all, the Little Bedesman of Christ, with the delicate and kindly face worn by fasting, the black eyes, and the soft and sonorous voice?  Greatly the common people loved our Lord, and gladly they listened to Him; and of all men who have lived St. Francis was most like our Lord in the grace and virtue of His humanity.  I do not think that ever at any time did he say or do anything till he had first asked himself, What would my Lord have done or said?
And certain it seems to me that he must have thought of the Thief in Paradise and of the divine words Christ spoke to him on the cross, when Brother Angelo, the guardian of a hermitage among the mountains, told him how three notorious robbers had come begging; "but I," said the Brother, "quickly drove them away with harsh and bitter words."  "Then sorely hast thou sinned against charity," replied the Saint in a stern voice, "and ill hast thou obeyed the holy Gospel of Christ, who wins back sinners by gentleness, and not by cruel reproofs.  Go now, and take with thee this wallet of bread and this little flask of wine which I have begged, and get thee over hill and valley till thou hast found these men; and when thou comest up with them, give them the bread and the wine as my gift to them, and beg pardon on thy knees for thy fault, and tell them that I beseech them no longer to do wrong, but to fear and love God; and if this they will do, I will provide for them so that all their days they shall not lack food and drink."  Then Brother Angelo did as he was bidden, and the robbers returned with him and became God's bedesmen and died in His service.
Not to men alone but to all living things on earth and air and water was St. Francis most gracious and loving.  They were all his little brothers and sisters, and he forgot them not, still less scorned or slighted them, but spoke to them often and blessed them, and in return they showed him great love and sought to be of his fellowship.  He bade his companions keep plots of ground for their little sisters the flowers, and to these lovely and speechless creatures he spoke, with no great fear that they would not understand his words.  And all this was a marvellous thing in a cruel time, when human life was accounted of slight worth by fierce barons and ruffling marauders.
For the bees he set honey and wine in the winter, lest they should feel the nip of the cold too keenly; and bread for the birds, that they all, but especially "my brother Lark," should have joy of Christmastide, and at Rieti a brood of redbreasts were the guests of the house and raided the tables while the brethren were at meals; and when a youth gave St. Francis the turtle-doves he had snared, the Saint had nests made for them, and there they laid their eggs and hatched them, and fed from the hands of the brethren.
Out of affection a fisherman once gave him a great tench, but he put it back into the clear water of the lake, bidding it love God; and the fish played about the boat till St. Francis blessed it and bade it go.
"Why dost thou torment my little brothers the Lambs," he asked of a shepherd, "carrying them bound thus and hanging from a staff, so that they cry piteously?"  And in exchange for the lambs he gave the shepherd his cloak.  And at another time seeing amid a flock of goats one white lamb feeding, he was concerned that he had nothing but his brown robe to offer for it (for it reminded him of our Lord among the Pharisees); but a merchant came up and paid for it and gave it him, and he took it with him to the city and preached about it so that the hearts of those hearing him were melted.  Afterwards the lamb was left in the care of a convent of holy women, and to the Saint's great delight, these wove him a gown of the lamb's innocent wool.
Fain would I tell of the coneys that took refuge in the folds of his habit, and of the swifts which flew screaming in their glee while he was preaching; but now it is time to speak of the sermon which he preached to a great multitude of birds in a field by the roadside, when he was on his way to Bevagno.  Down from the trees flew the birds to hear him, and they nestled in the grassy bosom of the field, and listened till he had done.  And these were the words he spoke to them:
"Little birds, little sisters mine, much are you holden to God your Creator; and at all times and in every place you ought to praise Him. Freedom he has given you to fly everywhere; and raiment He has given you, double and threefold.  More than this, He preserved your kind in the Ark, so that your race might not come to an end.  Still more do you owe him for the element of air, which he has made your portion.  Over and above, you sow not, neither do you reap; but God feeds you, and gives you streams and springs for your thirst; the mountains He gives you, and the valleys for your refuge, and the tall trees wherein to build your nests.  And because you cannot sew or spin, God takes thought to clothe you, you and your little ones.  It must be, then, that your Creator loves you much, since He has granted you so many benefits.  Be on your guard then against the sin of ingratitude, and strive always to give God praise."
And when the Saint ceased speaking, the birds made such signs as they might, by spreading their wings and opening their beaks, to show their love and pleasure; and when he had blessed them with the sign of the cross, they sprang up, and singing songs of unspeakable sweetness, away they streamed in a great cross to the four quarters of heaven.
One more story I must tell of the Saint and the wild creatures.
On a time when St. Francis was dwelling in the town of Agobio, there appeared in that countryside a monstrous grey wolf, which was so savage a man-eater that the people were afraid to go abroad, even when well armed.  A pity it was to see folk in such fear and danger; wherefore the Saint, putting his whole trust in God, went out with his companions so far as they dared go, and thence onward all alone to the place where the wolf lay.
The wild beast rushed out at him from his lair with open mouth, but St. Francis waited and made over him the sign of the most holy cross, and called him to him, saying, "Come hither, Brother Wolf!  In the name of Christ I bid you do no harm, neither to me nor to any one."  And when the wolf closed his jaws and stopped running, and came at the Saint's bidding, as gentle as a lamb, and lay down at his feet, St. Francis rebuked him for the slaying of God's creatures, the beasts, and even men made in God's image.  "But fain would I make peace," he said, "between you and these townsfolk; so that if you pledge them your faith that you will do no more scathe either to man or beast, they will forgive you all your offences in the past, and neither men nor dogs shall harry you any more.  And I will look to it that you shall always have food as long as you abide with the folk of this countryside."
Whereupon Brother Wolf, by movements of body and tail and bowing of head, gave token of his good will to abide by that bargain.  And in sign that he plighted his troth to it he gave the Saint his paw, and followed to the market-place of Agobio, where St. Francis repeated all that he had said, and the people agreed to the bargain, and once more the wolf gave pledge of his faith by putting his paw in the Saint's hand.
For two years thereafter Brother Wolf dwelt in Agobio, going tame and gentle from house to house and in and out at will, doing hurt to none, but much loved of the children and cared for in food and drink and kindness by the townsfolk, so that no one lifted stone or stick against him, neither did any dog bark at him.  At the end of those years he died of old age, and the people were grieved that no more should they see his gentle coming and going.
Such was the courtesy and sweet fellowship of St. Francis with the wild creatures.
It remains yet to say of him that he was ever gay and joyous as became God's gleeman.  Greatly he loved the song of bird and man, and all melody and minstrelsy.  Nor was it ill-pleasing to God that he should rejoice in these good gifts, for once lying in his cell faint with fever, to him came the thought that the sound of music might ease his pain; but when the friar whom he asked to play for him was afraid of causing a scandal by his playing, St. Francis, left alone, heard such music that his suffering ceased and his fever left him.  And as he lay listening he was aware that the sound kept coming and going; and how could it have been otherwise? for it was the lute-playing of an Angel, far away, walking in Paradise.
Sweet new songs he made in the language of the common people, folk of field and mountain, muleteers and vine-dressers, woodmen and hunters, so that they in turn might be light of heart amid their toil and sorrow.  One great hymn he composed, and of that I will speak later; but indeed all his sayings and sermons were a sort of divine song, and when he sent his companions from one village to another he bade them say: "We are God's gleemen.  For song and sermon we ask largesse, and our largesse shall be that you persevere in sorrow for your sins."
Seeing that ladies of the world, great and beautiful, took pleasure in the songs of the troubadours sung at twilight under their windows, he charged all the churches of his Order that at fall of day the bells should be rung to recall the greeting with which Gabriel the Angel saluted the Virgin Mother of the Lord: "Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee, blessed art thou among women."  And from that day to this the bells have rung out the Angelus at sunset, and now there is no land under heaven wherein those bells are not heard and wherein devout men hearing them do not pause to repeat that greeting angelic.
In like fashion it was great delight to him (the Pope having given him leave) to make in the churches of the Order a representation of the Crib of Bethlehem on the feast of the Nativity.  Of these the first was made at the hermitage of Greccio.  Thither the peasants flocked on Christmas Eve, with lanterns and torches, making the forest ring with their carols; and there in the church they found a stable with straw, and an ox and an ass tethered to the manger; and St. Francis spoke to the folk about Bethlehem and the Shepherds in the field, and the birth of the divine Babe, so that all who heard him wept happy tears of compassion and thankfulness.
And as St. Francis stood sighing for joy and gazing at the empty manger, behold! a wondrous thing happened.  For the knight Giovanni, who had given the ox and the ass and the stable, saw that on the straw in the manger there lay a beautiful child, which awoke from slumber, as it seemed, and stretched out its little hands to St. Francis as he leaned over it.
Even to this day there is no land in which you may not see, on Christmas Eve, the Crib of Bethlehem; but in those old days of St. Francis many souls were saved by the sight of that lowly manger from the sin of those heretics who denied that the Word was made flesh and that the Son of God was born as a little child for our salvation.
The joy and gaiety of St. Francis were of two kinds.  There was the joy of love, and there was the joy of suffering for love.  And of this last he spoke a wonderful rhapsody as he journeyed once with Brother Leo, in the grievous cold of the early spring, from Perugia to St. Mary of the Angels.  For, as Brother Leo was walking on before, St. Francis called aloud to him:--
"O Brother Leo, although throughout the world the Lesser Brethren were mirrors of holiness and edification, nevertheless write it down, and give good heed to it, that not therein is perfect joy."
And again, a little further on, he called aloud:
"O Brother Leo, though the Lesser Brother should give the blind sight, and make the misshapen straight, and cast out devils, and give hearing to the deaf, and make the lame to walk and the dumb to speak; yea, should he even raise the four days' dead to life, write it down that not herein is perfect joy."
And yet a little further on he cried out:
"O Brother Leo, if the Lesser Brother should know all languages, and every science, and all the Scriptures, so that he could foretell not solely the hidden things of the future but also the secrets of the heart, write down that not therein is perfect joy."
A little further yet, and once again he cried aloud:
"O Brother Leo, God's little sheep, though the Lesser Brother were to speak with the tongue of the Angels, and know the courses of the stars and the virtues of herbs, and though the treasures of the earth were discovered to him, and he had craft and knowledge of birds and fishes and of all living creatures, and of men, and of trees and stones, and roots and waters, write it down that not therein is perfect joy."
And once more, having gone a little further, St. Francis called aloud:
"O Brother Leo, even though the Lesser Brother could by his preaching convert all the unbelievers to the faith of Christ, write down that not therein is perfect joy."
And when, after St. Francis had spoken in this manner for the space of two miles, Brother Leo besought him to reveal wherein might perfect joy be found, St. Francis answered him:
"When we are come, drenched with rain and benumbed with cold and bespattered with mud and aching with hunger, to St. Mary of the Angels, and knock at the door, and the porter asks wrathfully, 'Who are you?' and on our answering, 'Two of your brethren are we,' 'Two gangrel rogues,' says he, 'who go about cheating the world and sorning the alms of the poor; away with you!' and whips the door to, leaving us till nightfall, cold and famished, in the snow and rain; if with patience we bear this injury and harshness and rejection, nowise ruined in our mind and making no murmur of complaint, but considering within ourselves, humbly and in charity, that the porter knows well who we are, and that God sets him up to speak against us--O Brother Leo, write down that therein is perfect joy."
And perfect joy, he added, if, knocking a second time, they brought the porter out upon them, fuming, and bidding them betake themselves to the alms-house, for knaves and thieves, and nevertheless they bore all with patience and with gladness and love.  And yet again, he continued, if a third time they knocked and shouted to him, for pity of their hunger and cold and the misery of the night, to let them in, and he came, fierce with rage, crying, "Ah, bold and sturdy vagabonds, now I will pay you," and caught them by the hood, and hurled them into the snow, and belaboured them with a knotty cudgel; and if still, in despite of all pain and contumely, they endured with gladness, thinking of the pains of the blessed Lord Christ, which for love of Him they too should be willing to bear--then might it be truly written down that therein was perfect joy.
This was the perfect joy of the Saint most like to Christ of all the Saints that the world has seen.  And of all joys this was the most perfect, seeing that it was by the patient way of tears and tribulation, of bodily pain and anguish of spirit, of humiliation and rejection, that a man might come most nearly to a likeness of Christ.
Through all his gaiety and gladness and benignity he carried in his heart one sorrow, and that was the memory of the Passion of our Lord. Once he was found weeping in the country, and when he was asked whether he was in grievous pain that he wept, "Ah!" he replied, "it is for the Passion of my Lord Jesus that I weep; and for that I should think little shame to go weeping through the whole world."
Two years before his death there befell him that miraculous transfiguration, which, so far as it may be with a sinful son of Adam, made perfect the resemblance between him and the Saviour crucified. And it was after this manner.
In the upper valley of the Arno stream there towers above the pines and giant beeches of the hills a great basalt rock, Alvernia, which looks over Italy, east and west, to the two seas.  That rock is accessible by but a single foot-track, and it is gashed and riven by grim chasms, yet withal great oaks and beech-trees flourish atop among the boulders, and there are drifts of fragrant wild flowers, and legions of birds and other wild creatures dwell there; and the lights and colours of heaven play about the rock, and the winds of heaven visit it with wholesome air.
Now a great and wealthy gentleman of Tuscany, Orlando of Chiusi, gave St. Francis that mountain for a hermitage where he could be remote from men, and thither, with three of the brethren most dear to him, the Saint went to spend the forty days of the Fast of St. Michael the Archangel.
Two nights they slept on the way, but on the third day, so worn was St. Francis with fatigue and illness, that his companions were fain to beg a poor peasant to lend them his ass.  As they proceeded on their journey the peasant, walking behind the ass, said to St. Francis, "Tell me now, art thou Brother Francis of Assisi?" and when St. Francis said he was, the peasant rejoined, "Look to it, then, that thou strive to be as good as folk take thee to be, so that those who have faith in thee be not disappointed in what they expect to find in thee."  And instantly St. Francis got down from the ass, and, kneeling on the ground, kissed the peasant's feet, and thanked him for his brotherly admonition.
So onward they journeyed up the mountain till they came to the foot of Alvernia, and there as St. Francis rested him under an oak, vast flights of birds came fluttering and blithely singing, and alighted on his shoulders and arms, and on his lap, and about his feet.  "Not ill-pleased is our Lord, I think," said he, "that we have come to dwell on this mountain, seeing what glee our little brothers and sisters the Birds show at our coming."
Under a fair beech on the top of the rock the brethren built him a cell of branches, and he lived alone in prayer, apart from the others, for the foreknowledge of his death had overshadowed him.  Once as he stood by the cell, scanning the shape of the mountain and musing on the clefts and chasms in the huge rocks, it was borne in upon him that the mountain had been thus torn and cloven in the Ninth Hour when our Lord cried with a loud voice, and the rocks were rent.  And beside this beech-tree St. Francis was many times uplifted into the air in rapture, and many times Angels came to him, and walked with him for his consolation.
A while later, the brethren laid a tree across a chasm, and St. Francis hid himself in a more lonely place, where no one might hear him when he cried out; and a falcon, which had its nest hard by his cell, woke him for matins, and according as he was more weary or sickly at one time than another, that feathered brother, having compassion on him, woke him later or sooner, and all the long day was at hand to give him companionship.
Here in this wild place, in September, on Holy Cross Day, early in the morning, before the dawn whitened, St. Francis knelt with his face turned to the dark east; and praying long and with great fervour, he besought the Lord Christ Jesus for two graces before he died.  And the first was this, that, so far as mortal flesh might bear it, he might feel in his body the torture which our Lord suffered in His Passion; and the second, that he might feel in his heart the exceeding great love for which He was willing to bear such torture.
Now even while he was praying in this wise a mighty six-winged Seraph, burning with light unspeakable, came flying towards him; and St. Francis saw that the Seraph bore within himself the figure of a cross, and thereon the image of a man crucified.  Two of the six wings of the Seraph were lifted up over the head of the crucified; and two were spread for flying; and two veiled the whole of the body on the cross.
Then as the Seraph drew nigh, the eyes of Christ the crucified looked into the eyes of St. Francis, piercing and sweet and terrible; and St. Francis could scarce endure the rapture and the agony with which that look consumed him, and transfigured him, and burned into his body the similitude of Christ's Passion.  For straightway his hands and his feet were pierced through and through with nails; and the heads of the nails were round and black, and the points were bent backward and riveted on the further side of hand and foot; and his right side was opened with the deep thrust of the spear; and the gash was red and blood came dropping from it.  Terrible to bear was the ache of those wounds; and for the nails in his feet St. Francis scarce could stand and could not walk at all.
Such was the transfiguration of the Little Bedesman of Christ into His visible semblance on the holy rock Alvernia.
For two years he sustained the ecstasy and anguish of that likeness, but of his sayings and of the wonders he wrought in that time I will not speak.
In those days he composed the Song of the Sun, and oftentimes sang it, and in many a village and market-place was it sung by the brethren going two by two in their labour for souls.  A mighty hymn of praise to the Lord God most high and omnipotent was this Song of the Sun; for in this manner it was that St. Francis sang:
"Praised be Thou, my Lord; by all Thy creatures praised; and chiefly praised by Brother Sun who gives us light of day.
"Through him Thou shinest; fair is he, brilliant with glittering fire; and he through heaven bears, Most High, symbol and sense of thee.
"Praised by Sister Moon be Thou; and praised by all the Stars.  These hast Thou made, and Thou hast made them precious and beautiful and bright.
"Praised by Brother Wind be Thou; by Air, and Cloud that lives in air, and all the Weathers of the world, whereby their keep Thou dost provide for all the creatures Thou hast made.
"Praised by Sister Water, Lord, be Thou; the lowly water, precious, pure, the gracious handmaiden.
"Praised by Brother Fire, by whom Thou makest light for us i' the dark; and fair is he and jocund, sturdy and strong.
"Praised by our Sister Mother-Earth, which keeps us and sustains, and gives forth plenteous fruit, and grass, and coloured flowers.
"Praised be Thou, Lord my God, by those who for Thy love forgive, and for Thy love endure; blessed in their patience they; by Thee shall they be crowned."
As he drew nigh to his end at St. Mary of the Angels, he cried out, "Welcome, Sister Death!" and when his brethren, as he had bidden them, sang once more the Song of the Sun, he added another verse:
"Praised by our Sister Death be Thou--that bodily death which no man may escape.  Alas for those who die in mortal sin, but happy they conforming to Thy will; for these the second death shall nowise hurt."
In the tenth month, on the fourth day of the month, in the forty-and-fifth year of his age, having recited the Psalm, "I cried unto Thee, O Lord, and said: Thou art my hope and my portion in the land of the living," St. Francis died very joyfully.  At the fall of the night he died, and while still the brethren were gazing upon his face there dropped down on the thatch of the cell in which he lay larks innumerable, and most sweetly they sang, as though they rejoiced at the release of their holy kinsman.
He was buried at the great church at Assisi; but though it is thought he lies beneath the high altar, the spot is unknown to any man, and the hill-folk say that St. Francis is not dead at all, but that he lives hidden in a secret crypt far down below the roots of wall and pillar. Standing there, pale and upright, with the blood red in the five wounds of his crucifixion, he waits in a heavenly trance for the sound of the last trumpet, when the nations of the earth shall see in the clouds Him whom they have pierced.
Long after his death it was the custom of the brethren of a certain house of his Order to go chanting in procession at midnight once in the year to his resting-place.  But the way was long and dark; the weather often bleak and stormy.  Little by little devotion cooled, and the friars fell away, till there remained but one old monk willing to go on this pilgrimage.  As he went into the dark and the storm, the road among the woods and rocks grew luminous, and in place of the cross and torches and canticles of the former days, great flocks of birds escorted him on his way, singing and keeping him company.  The little feathered brothers and sisters had not abated in their love of the Little Bedesman who had caressed and blessed them.
The Burning of Abbot Spiridion
Many wonderful things are told of the Abbot Spiridion, who lived a hundred years and four and yet grew never old; neither was the brightness of his eyes dimmed nor his hair silvered, nor was his frame bowed and palsied with the weakness of age.
During the long years in which he ruled the abbey he had founded, he seemed to live less in this world than in the communion of the blessed souls of men redeemed.  The whole earth was as clear to him as though it had been of crystal, and when he raised his eyes he saw not solely what other men saw, but the vision of all that is under the heavens. And this vision of life was at once his trial and his consolation.  For it was an unspeakable sorrow and anguish to see on all sides the sin and suffering and misery of creation, and often he wept bitterly when no one dared ask him the reason of his affliction.  Yet oftentimes, on the other hand, he laughed for lightness of spirit, and bade the brethren rejoice because of the salvation of some reprobate soul, or the relief of one oppressed, or the bestowal of some blessing on the servants of God.
When it happened that a brother had been sent on a journey and was long absent, and the community was talking of him, wondering how he had fared and where he might now be, the Abbot would sometimes break silence and say: "I see our brother resting in such or such a cell," or "Our brother is even now singing a psalm as he drifts in his small boat of skins down this or that river," or, perchance, "Our brother is coming over the hill and in an hour he will be with us."
In the abbey there was a certain lay-brother, dull and slow of wit, with a hindrance in his speech; and one of the monks despised him and scoffed at his defect of nature.  This lay-brother had the care of the garden of pot-herbs and fruit-trees, and as he was toiling there one day the Abbot called the uncharitable monk to him, and said: "Come, let us see what our brother the Fool is doing."
The monk trembled when he heard those words, for he knew that his scornfulness had been discovered, and he followed the Abbot in great confusion.  In the garden they found the lay-brother planting cabbages.
"Is our brother the Fool alone?" asked the Abbot.
"Our brother is alone, father," replied the monk.
Then the Abbot touched the monk's eyes, and straightway he saw that the lay-brother was not alone: beside him were two radiant child-angels, one of whom held for him a basket containing the young plants, and the second walked to and fro playing on a lute to lighten his labour. Then, overwhelmed with shame, the monk fell on his knees, confessing his sin and promising amendment.
More strange than this is the story I have now to tell.  It happened through mischance that fire broke out in the abbey, and the flames were spreading so fiercely from one wattled cell to another that there was great danger of the whole monastery being destroyed.  With piteous cries the religious surrounded the Abbot, and besought him to intercede with God that their home might be spared.
Spiridion gently shook his head.  "The mercy of God," he replied, "has given it to another to intercede for us in our danger this day.  The holy Pontiff, Gregory, has looked out of Rome and seen us in our trouble.  At this moment he is kneeling in prayer for us, and his supplication on our behalf will avail."
Even while Spiridion was speaking, the Pope, far away in the Golden City, beheld the flames rising from the abbey, and called his household to join him in entreating heaven; and at once it was seen that the flames were being beaten to the ground and extinguished as though invisible hands were beating them down with invisible branches of trees.
Now when the brethren were made aware that the whole earth was being constantly shown thus in vision to the Abbot, they stood in sad dread of him; even the most pure and lowly-hearted were abashed at this thought that perchance every act and every vain fancy of theirs was laid bare to his knowledge.  So it came to pass that out of shame and fear their hearts were little by little estranged from him.
The Abbot was not slow to perceive the change, and he spoke of it when they met in chapter.
"Truly it is a grievous and a terrible thing," he said, "that any man should see with the eyes of the soul more than it is given the eye of flesh to see; and I pray you, brethren, beseech the Lord, if it be His will, that the vision be withdrawn from me.  But if His will it be not, beseech Him that I may not sin through seeing.  So much for myself, but as for you, dear children, why are you grieved?  Because it may be that I see you when you think no man sees you?  Am I then the only one who sees you?  Is there not at least one other--even the high God, from whom the hidden man of the heart is nowise hidden?  If you fear His holy eyes, little need you fear the eyes of any sinful man."
Such a one was the Abbot Spiridion.  His spirit passed from among men in the hundred and fifth year of his exile, in the third month of the year, on the morning of the resurrection of the Lord Christ, between the white and the red of the morning, when the brethren were singing prime.  As he listened to them singing, his cheeks suddenly became flushed with bright colour, and those who were about him, thinking he was in pain, asked if in any way they might relieve him; but he replied in a low voice, "When the heart is glad the face flowers."  In a little after that he laughed softly to himself, and so they knew that his end was gladness.
When he died there were three hundred religious in that monastery, and in his stead Samson was made Abbot of Gracedieu.
The body of Spiridion was laid in a stone coffin hard by the abbey church, and to those who had known the holy man it seemed nothing strange that the sick and afflicted should come and kneel by his grave, in the hope that by his intercession they might obtain succour in their misery.  Certain it is that the blind were restored to sight, and the sick to health, and the painful to great ease; and the fame of these miracles was noised abroad in the world till thousands came in pilgrimage to the spot, and costly gifts--gold and silver and jewels, sheep and cattle, wine and corn, and even charters of large demesnes, fruitful fields and woods and waters--were bestowed as thank-offerings to the saintly man.
Then over his tomb rose a vast and beautiful minster, and the tomb itself was covered with a shrine, brilliant with blue and vermilion and gold and sculptured flowers, and guarded by angels with outspreading wings.
At the beginning Abbot Samson was well pleased, for the great church rose like a dream of heaven, but when he perceived that the constant concourse of people was destroying the hushed contemplation and piety of the house, and that the brethren were distracted with eagerness for gain and luxury and the pride of life, he resolved to make an end. Wherefore after High Mass on the Feast of All Saints he bade the religious walk in procession to the splendid shrine, and there the Abbot, with the shepherd's staff of rule in his hand, struck thrice on the stone coffin, and three times he called aloud: "Spiridion! Spiridion!  Spiridion!" and begged him, as he had been founder and first father of that monastery, to listen to the grievance which had befallen them in consequence of the miracles he had wrought from his grave.
And after an indignant recital of their loss of humility, of their lukewarmness, of their desire for excitement and the pageants of the world, of their lust for buildings of stone and pillared walks and plentiful living, he concluded: "Make, then, we beseech thee, no sign from thy sepulchre.  Let life and death, and joy and sorrow, and blindness and disease, and all the vicissitudes of this world follow their natural courses.  Do not thou, out of compassion for thy fellow-man, interpose in the lawful succession of things.  This is what we ask of thee, expecting it of thy love.  But if it be that thou deny us, solemnly we declare unto thee, by the obedience which once we owed thee, we shall unearth thy bones and cast them forth from amongst us."
Now whether it was that for some high purpose God delayed the answer to that prayer, or whether it was the folly and superstition of men which gave to things natural the likeness of the miraculous, and even peradventure the folk lied out of a mistaken zeal for the glory of the saints, there was no abatement of the wonders wrought at Spiridion's tomb; and when the Abbot would have forbidden access to the vast crowds of pilgrims, the people resisted with angry violence and threatened fire and bloodshed.
So Samson summoned the wisest and holiest of the brotherhood, and took them into counsel.
"This thing," said he, "cannot be of God, that one of His saints, the founder of this house, should lead into sloth and luxury the children of the house he has founded.  Sooner could I believe that this is a malignant snare of the most Evil One, who heals the bodily ailments of a few that he may wreck the immortal souls of many."
Then arose Dom Walaric, the most aged of the monks, and said: "Already, Father Abbot, hast thou spoken judgment.  Grievously shall I lament what must be done; but in one way only can we root out this corruption. Let the bones of the holy man be unearthed and cast forth.  He in the high heavens will know that we do not use him despitefully, but that of two evils this, indeed, is scarcely to be spoken of as an evil."
Wherefore, in a grassy bay of the land by the river a great pile of faggots was reared, dry and quick for the touch of flame.  And the Abbot broke down the shrine and opened the tomb.
When the stone lid of the coffin had been lifted, the religious saw that, though it had been long buried, the body showed no sign of decay. Fresh and uncorrupted it lay in the sacred vestments; youthful and comely of face, despite a marvellous old age and years of sepulture.
With many tears they raised what seemed rather a sleeping man than a dead, and bore him to the river; and when they had heaped the faggots about him, the Abbot blessed the body and the fuel, and with his own hand set fire to the funeral pile.
The brethren restrained not their weeping and lamentation as they witnessed that hallowed burning; and the Abbot, with heavy eyes, tarried till the last ember had died out.  Then were all the ashes of the fire swept together and cast into the fleeting river, which bore them through lands remote into the utmost sea that hath no outland limit save the blue sky and the low light of the shifting stars.
The Countess Itha
In the days of King Coeur-de-Lion the good Count Hartmann ruled in Kirchberg in the happy Swabian land.  And never had that fair land been happier than it was in those days, for the Count was a devout Christian, a lover of peace in the midst of warlike and rapacious barons, and a ruler just and merciful to his vassals.  Among the green and pleasant hills on his domain he had founded a monastery for the monks of St. Benedict, and thither he often rode with his daughter Itha, the delight of his heart and the light of the grim old castle of the Kirchberg; so that, seeing the piety of her father, she grew up in the love and fear of God, and from her gentle mother she learned to feel a deep compassion for the poor and afflicted.
No sweeter maid than she, with her blue eyes and light brown hair, was there in all that land of sturdy men and nut-brown maidens.  The people loved the very earth she stood on.  In their days of trouble and sorrow she was their morning and their evening star, and they never wearied of praising her goodness and her beauty.
When Itha was in the bloom of her girlhood it befell that the young Count Heinrich of the Toggenburg, journeying homeward from the famous tournament at Cologne, heard of this peerless flower of Swabia, and turned aside to the Castle of Kirchberg to see if perchance he might win a good and lovely wife.  He was made welcome, and no sooner had he looked on Itha's fair and loving face, and marked with what modesty and courtesy she bore herself, than he heard joy-bells ringing in his heart, and said, "Now, by the blessed cross, here is the pearl of price for me!"  Promptly he wooed her with tender words, and with eyes that spoke more than tongue could find words for, and passionate observance, and all that renders a man pleasing to a maid.
And Itha was not loth to be won, for the Count was young and handsome, tall and strong, and famous for feats of arms, and a mighty lord--master of the rich straths and valleys of the Thur River, and of many a burgh and district in the mountains beyond; and yet, despite all this, he, so noble and beautiful, loved her, even her, the little Swabian maid who had never deemed herself likely to come to such honour and happiness.  Nor were the kindly father and mother ill-pleased that so goodly a man and so mighty a lord should have their dear child.
So in a little while the Count put on Itha's hand the ring of betrothal, and Itha, smiling and blushing, raised it to her lips and kissed it.  "Blissful ring!" said the Count jestingly; "and yet, dearest heart, you do well to cherish it, for it is an enchanted ring, an old ring of which there are many strange stories."  Even while he was speaking Itha's heart misgave her, and she was aware of a feeling of doubt and foreboding; but she looked at the ring and saw how massive was the gold and how curiously wrought and set with rare gems, and its brilliancy and beauty beguiled her of her foreboding, and she asked no questions of the stories told of it or of the nature of its enchantment.
Quickly on the betrothal followed the marriage and the leave-taking. With tears in her eyes Itha rode away with her lord, looking back often to the old castle and gazing farewell on the pleasant land and the fields and villages she should not see again for, it might be, many long years.  But by her side rode the Count, ever gay and tender, and he comforted her in her sadness, and lightened the way with loving converse, till she put from her all her regret and longing, and made herself happy in their love.
[Illustration: _Itha rode away with her lord_]
So they journeyed through the rocks and wildwood of the Schwartzwald, and came in view of the blue waters of the lake of Constance glittering in the sun, and saw the vast mountain region beyond with its pine forests, and above the forests the long blue mists on the high pastures, and far over all, hanging like silvery summer clouds in the blue heavens, the shining peaks of the snowy Alps.  And here, at last, they were winding down the fruitful valley of the Thur, and yonder, perched on a rugged bluff, rose the stern walls of Castle Toggenburg, with banners flying from the turrets, and the rocky roadway strewn with flowers, and vassals and retainers crowding to welcome home the bride.
Now, for all his tenderness and gaiety and sweetness in wooing, the Count Heinrich was a hasty and fiery man, quickly stirred to anger and blind rage, and in his storms of passion he was violent and cruel.  Not long after their home-coming--woe worth the while!--he flashed out ever and anon in his hot blood at little things which ruffled his temper, and spoke harsh words which his gentle wife found hard to bear, and which in his better moments he sincerely repented.  Very willingly she forgave him, but though at first he would kiss and caress her, afterwards her very forgiveness and her meekness chafed and galled his proud spirit, so that the first magical freshness of love faded from their life, even as the dew dries on the flower in the heat of the morning.
Not far from the castle, in a clearing in the woods, nestled the little convent and chapel of Our Lady in the Meadow, and thither, attended by one of her pages, the Countess Itha went daily to pray for her husband, that he might conquer the violence of his wild heart, and for herself, that she might not grow to fear him more than she loved him.  In these days of her trial, and in the worse days to come, a great consolation it was to her to kneel in the silent chapel and pour out her unhappiness to her whose heart had been pierced by seven swords of sorrow.
Time went by, and when no little angel came from the knees of God to lighten her burden and to restrain with its small hands the headlong passion of her husband, the Count was filled with bitterness of spirit as he looked forward to a childless old age, and reflected that all the fruitful straths of the Toggenburg, and the valleys and townships, would pass away to some kinsman, and no son of his would there be to prolong the memory of his name and greatness.  When this gloomy dread had taken possession of him, he would turn savagely on the Countess in his fits of fury, and cry aloud: "Out of my sight!  For all thy meekness and thy praying and thy almsgiving, God knows it was an ill day when I set eyes on that fair face of thine!"  Yet this was in no way his true thought, for in spite of his lower nature the Count loved her, but it is ever the curse of anger in a man that it shall wreak itself most despitefully on his nearest and best.  And Itha, who had learned this in the school of long-suffering, answered never a word, but only prayed the more constantly and imploringly.
In the train of the Countess there were two pages, Dominic, an Italian, whom she misliked for his vanity and boldness, and Cuno, a comely Swabian lad, who had followed her from her father's house.  Most frequently when she went to Our Lady in the Meadow she dismissed Dominic and bade Cuno attend her, for in her distress it was some crumb of comfort to see the face of a fellow-countryman, and to speak to him of Kirchberg and the dear land she had left.  But Dominic, seeing that the Swabian was preferred, hated Cuno, and bore the lady scant goodwill, and in a little set his brain to some device by which he might vent his malice on both.  This was no difficult task, for the Count was as prone to jealousy as he was quick to wrath, and with crafty hint and wily jest and seemingly aimless chatter the Italian sowed the seeds of suspicion and watchfulness in his master's mind.
Consider, then, if these were not days of heartbreak for this lady, still so young and so beautiful, so unlovingly entreated, and so far away from the home of her happy childhood.  Yet she bore all patiently and without complaint or murmur, only at times when she looked from terrace or tower her gaze travelled beyond the deep pine-woods, and in a wistful day-dream she retraced, beyond the great lake and the Black Forest, all the long way she had ridden so joyfully with her dear husband by her side.
One day in the springtime, when the birds of passage had flown northward, carrying her tears and kisses with them, she bethought her of the rich apparel in which she had been wed, and took it from the carved oaken coffer to sweeten in the sun.  Among her jewels she came upon her betrothal ring, and the glitter of it reminded her of what her lord had said of its enchantment and the strange stories told of it. "Are any of them so sad and strange as mine?" she wondered with tears in her eyes; then kissing the ring in memory of that first kiss she had given it, she laid it on a table in the window-bay, and busied herself with the bridal finery; and while she was so busied she was called away to some cares of her household, and left the chamber.
When she returned to put away her marriage treasures, the betrothal ring was missing.  On the instant a cold fear came over her.  In vain she searched the coffer and the chamber; in vain she endeavoured to persuade herself that she must have mislaid the jewel, or that perchance the Count had seen it, and partly in jest and partly in rebuke of her carelessness, had taken it.  The ring had vanished, and in spite of herself she felt that its disappearance portended some terrible evil.  Too fearful to arouse her husband's anger, she breathed no word of her loss, and trusted to time or oblivion for a remedy.
No great while after this, as the Swabian page was rambling in the wood near the convent, he heard a great outcry of ravens around a nest in an ancient fir-tree, and prompted partly by curiosity to know the cause of the disquiet, and partly by the wish to have a young raven for sport in the winter evenings, he climbed up to the nest.  Looking into the great matted pack of twigs, heather and lamb's wool, he caught sight of a gold ring curiously chased and set with sparkling gems; and slipping it gleefully on his finger he descended the tree and went his way homeward to the castle.
A few days later when the Count by chance cast his eye on the jewel, he recognised it at a glance for the enchanted ring of many strange stories.  The crafty lies of the Italian Dominic flashed upon him; and, never questioning that the Countess had given the ring to her favourite, he sprang upon Cuno as though he would strangle him.  Then in a moment he flung him aside, and in a voice of thunder cried for the wildest steed in his stables to be brought forth.  Paralysed with fright, the luckless page was seized and bound by the heels to the tail of the half-tame creature, which was led out beyond the drawbridge, and pricked with daggers till it flung off the men-at-arms and dashed screaming down the rocky ascent into the wildwood.
Stung to madness by his jealousy, the Count rushed to the apartment of the Countess.  "False and faithless, false and faithless!" he cried in hoarse rage, and clutching her in his iron grasp, lifted her in the air and hurled her through the casement into the horrible abyss below.
As she fell Itha commended her soul to God.  The world seemed to reel and swim around her; she felt as if that long lapse through space would never have an end, and then it appeared to her as though she were peacefully musing in her chair, and she saw the castle of Kirchberg and the pleasant fields lying serene in the sunlight, and the happy villages, each with its great crucifix beside its rustic church, and men and women at labour in the fields.  How long that vision lasted she could not tell.  Then as in her fall she was passing through the tops of the trees which climbed up the lower ledges of the castle rocks, green leafy hands caught her dress and held her a little, and strong arms closed about her, and yielded slowly till she touched the ground; and she knew that the touch of these was not the mere touch of senseless things, but a contact of sweetness and power which thrilled through her whole being.
Falling on her knees, she thanked God for her escape, and rising again she went into the forest, wondering whither she should betake herself and what she should do; for now she had no husband and no home.  She left the beaten track, and plunging through the bracken, walked on till she was tired.  Then she sat down on a boulder.  Among the pines it was already dusk, and the air seemed filled with a grey mist, but this was caused by the innumerable dry wiry twigs which fringed the lower branches of the trees with webs of fine cordage; and when a ray of the setting sun struck through the pine trunks, it lit up the bracken with emerald and brightened the ruddy scales of the pine bark to red gold. Here it was dry and sheltered, with the thick carpet of pine-needles underfoot and the thick roof of branches overhead: and but for dread of wild creatures she thought she might well pass the night in this place. To-morrow she would wander further and learn how life might be sustained in the forest.
The last ray of sunshine died away; the deep woods began to blacken; a cool air sighed in the high tops of the trees.  It was very homeless and lonely.  She took heart, however, remembering God's goodness to her, and placing her confidence in His care.
Suddenly she perceived a glimmering of lights among the pines.  Torches they seemed, a long way off; and she thought it must be the retainers of the Count, who, finding she had not been killed by her fall, had sent them out to seek for her.  The lights drew nearer, and she sat very still, resigned to her fate whatsoever it might be.  And yet nearer they came, till at length by their shining she saw a great stag with lordly antlers, and on the tines of the antlers glittered tongues of flame.
Slowly the beautiful creature came up to her and regarded her with his large soft brown eyes.  Then he moved away a little and looked back, as though he were bidding her follow him.  She rose and walked by his side, and he led her far through the forest, till they came to an overhanging rock beside a brook, and there he stopped.
In this hidden nook of the mountain-forest she made her home.  With branches and stones and turf she walled in the open hollow of the rock. In marshy places she gathered the thick spongy mosses, yellow and red, and dried them in the sun for warmth at night in the cold weather.  She lived on roots and berries, acorns and nuts and wild fruit, and these in their time of plenty she stored against the winter.  Birds' eggs she found in the spring; in due season the hinds, with their young, came to her and gave her milk for many days; the wild bees provided her with honey.  With slow and painful toil she wove the cotton-grass and the fibres of the bark of the birch, so that she should not lack for clothing.
In the warm summer months there was a great tranquillity and hushed joy in this hard life.  A tender magic breathed in the colour and music of the forest, in its long pauses of windless day-dreaming, in its breezy frolic with the sunshine.  The trees and boulders were kindly; and the turf reminded her of her mother's bosom.  About her refuge the wild flowers grew in plenty--primrose and blue gentian, yellow cinquefoil and pink geranium, and forget-me-nots, and many more, and these looked up at her with the happy faces of little children who were innocent and knew no care; and over whole acres lay the bloom of the ling, and nothing more lovely grows on earthly hills.  Through breaks in the woodland she saw afar the Alpine heights, and the bright visionary peaks of snow floating in the blue air like glimpses of heaven.
But it was a bitter life in the winter-tide, when the forest fretted and moaned, and snow drifted about the shelter, and the rocks were jagged with icicles, and the stones of the brook were glazed with cold, and the dark came soon and lasted long.  She had no fire, but, by God's good providence, in this cruel season the great stag came to her at dusk, and couched in the hollow of the rock beside her, and the lights on his antlers lit up the poor house, and the glow of his body and his pleasant breath gave her warmth.
Here, then, dead to the world, dead to all she loved most dearly, Itha consecrated herself body and soul to God for the rest of her earthly years.  If she suffered as the wild children of nature suffer, she was free at least from the cares and sorrows with which men embitter each other's existence.  Here she would willingly live so long as God willed; here she would gladly surrender her soul when He was pleased to call it home.
The days of her exile were many.  For seventeen years she dwelt thus in her hermitage in the forest, alone and forgotten.
Forgotten, did I say?  Not wholly.  The Count never forgot her.  Stung by remorse (for in his heart of hearts he could not but believe her true and innocent), haunted by the recollection of the happiness he had flung from him, wifeless, childless, friendless, he could find no rest or forgetfulness except in the excitement and peril of the battle-field.  But the slaughter of men and the glory of victory were as dust and ashes in his mouth.  He had lost the joy of life, the pride of race, the exultation of power.  For one look from those sweet eyes, over which, doubtless, the hands of some grateful peasant had laid the earth, he would have joyfully exchanged renown and lordship, and even life itself.
At length in the fulness of God's good time, it chanced that the Count was hunting in a distant part of the forest, when he started from its covert a splendid stag.  Away through the open the beautiful creature seemed to float before him, and Heinrich followed in hot chase.  Across grassy clearings and through dim vistas of pines, over brooks and among boulders and through close underwood, the fleet quarry led him without stop or stay, till at last it reached the hanging rock which was Itha's cell, and there it stood at bay; and alarmed by the clatter of hoofs, a tall pale woman, rudely clad in her poor forest garb, came to the entrance.
Surprised at so strange a sight, the Count drew rein and stared at the woman.  Despite the lapse of time and her pallor and emaciation, in an instant he recognised the wife whom he believed dead, and she too recognised the husband she had loved.
How shall I tell of all that was said between those two by that lonely hermitage in the depth of the forest?  As in the old days, she was eager to forgive everything; but it was in vain that the Count besought her to return to the life which she had forgotten for so many years. Long had she been dead and buried, so far as earthly things were concerned.  She would prefer, despite the hardness and the pain, to spend in this peaceful spot what time was yet allotted to her, but that she longed once more to hear the music of the holy bells, to kneel once more before the altar of God.
What plea could Heinrich use to shake her resolution?  His shame and remorse, even his love, held him tongue-tied.  He saw that she was no longer the meek gentle Swabian maiden who had shrunk and wept at every hasty word and sharp glance of his.  He had slain all human love in her; nothing survived save that large charity of the Saints which binds them to all suffering souls on the earth.
Wofully he consented to her one wish.  A simple cell was prepared for her in the wood beside the chapel of Our Lady in the Meadow, and there she dwelt until, in a little while, her gentle spirit was called home.
The Story of the Lost Brother
This is the story written in the chronicle of the Priory of Kilgrimol, which is in Amounderness.  It tells of the ancient years before that great inroad of the sea which broke down the high firs of the western forest of Amounderness, and left behind it those tracts of sand and shingle that are now called the Blowing Sands.  In those days Oswald the Gentle was Prior of Kilgrimol, and he beheld the inroad of the sea; and afterwards he lived through the suffering and sorrow of the great plague of which people now speak as the Black Death.
Of all monks and men he was the sweetest and gentlest, and long before he was chosen Prior, when he had charge of the youths who wished to be monks, he never wearied of teaching them to feel and care for all God's creatures, from the greatest to the least, and to love all God's works, and to take a great joy even in stones and rocks, and water and earth, and the clouds and the blue air.  "For," said he, "according to the flesh all these are in some degree our kinsfolk, and like us they come from the hands of God.  Does not Mother Church teach us this, speaking in her prayers of God's creature of fire, and His creature of salt, and His creature of flowers?"
When some of the brotherhood would smile at his gentle sayings, he would answer: "Are these things, then, so strange and childish? Rather, was not this the way of the Lord Jesus?  You have read how He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted of Satan, and how He was with the wild beasts?  All that those words may mean we have not been taught; but well I believe that the wild things came to Him, even as very little children will run to a good man without any doubt of his goodness; and that they recognised His pitifulness and His power to help them; and that He read in their dumb pleading eyes the pain and the travail under which the whole creation groaneth; and that He blessed them, and gave them solace, and told them in some mysterious way of the day of sacrifice and redemption which was drawing near."
Once when the brethren spoke of clearing out the nests from the church tower, because of the clamour of the daws in the morning and evening twilight, the Novice-master--for this was Oswald's title--besought them to remember the words of the Psalmist, King David: "The sparrow hath found an house and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may lay her young, even thine altars, O Lord of Hosts."
As for the novices, many a legend he told them of the Saints and holy hermits who had loved the wild creatures, and had made them companions or had been served by them in the lonely places of the hills and wildwood.  And in this, he taught them, there was nothing strange, for in the book of Hosea, it was written that God would make, for those who served Him, a treaty of peace and a league of love with the beasts and the birds of heaven and the creeping things of the earth, and in the book of Job it was said that even the stones of the field should be in friendship with them.
"And this we see," he would say, "in the life of the blessed Bishop Kieran of Saighir, who was the first Saint born in green Erinn.  For he wandered away through the land seeking the little well where he was to found his monastery.  That well was in the depths of a hoary wood, and when he drew near it the holy bell which he carried rang clear and bright, as it had been foretold him.  So he sat down to rest under a tree, when suddenly a wild boar rushed out of its lair against him; but the breath of God tamed it, and the savage creature became his first disciple, and helped him to fell small trees and to cut reeds and willows so that he might build him a cell.  After that there came from brake and copse and dingle and earth and burrow all manner of wild creatures; and a fox, a badger, a wolf, and a doe were among Kieran's first brotherhood.  We read, too, that for all his vows the fox made but a crafty and gluttonous monk, and stole the Saint's leather shoes, and fled with them to his old earth.  Wherefore Kieran called the religious together with his bell, and sent the badger to bring back the fugitive, and when this was done the Saint rebuked the fox for an unworthy and sinful monk, and laid penance upon him."
When the novices laughed at this adventure, Father Oswald said:
"These things are not matters of faith; you may believe them or not as you will.  Perhaps they did not happen in the way in which they are now told, but if they are not altogether true, they are at least images and symbols of truth.  But this I have no doubt is true--that when the blessed Columba was Abbot in Iona, he called one of the brethren to him and bade him go on the third day to the western side of the island, and sit on the sea-shore, and watch for a guest who would arrive, weary and hungry, in the afternoon.  And the guest would be a crane, beaten by the stormy winds, and it would fall on the beach, unable to fly further.  'And do thou,' said Columba, 'take it up with gentle hands and carry it to the house of the guests, and tend it for three days and three nights, and when it is refreshed it will fly up into the air, and after scanning its path through the clouds it will return to its old sweet home in Erinn; and if I charge thee so earnestly with this service, it is because the guest comes from our dear land.'  And the Brother obeyed; and on the third day the crane arrived, storm-beaten and weary, and three days later it departed.  Have you not also heard or read how our own St. Godrich at Whitby protected the four-footed foresters, and how a great stag, which had been saved by him from the hunters, came year after year at a certain season to visit him?"
Many legends too he told them of birds as well as beasts, and three of these I will mention here because they are very pleasant to listen to. One was of St. Malo and the wren.  The wren, the smallest of all birds, laid an egg in the hood which St. Malo had hung up on a branch while he was working in the field, and the blessed man was so gentle and loving that he would not disturb the bird, but left his hood hanging on the tree till the wren's brood was hatched.
Then there was the legend of St. Meinrad, who lived in a hut made of boughs on Mount Etzel, and had two ravens for his companions.  Now it happened that two robbers wandered near the hermitage, and foolishly thinking that some treasure might be hidden there, they slew the Saint. After a long search, in which they found nothing, they went down the mountain to Zurich; but the holy man's ravens followed them with fierce cries, whirling about their heads and dashing at their faces, so that the people in the valley wondered at the sight.  But one of the dalesmen who knew the ravens sent his son to the hermitage to see if all was well, and followed the fellows to the town.  There they took refuge in a tavern, but the ravens flew round and round the house, screaming and pecking at the window near which the robbers had seated themselves.  Speedily the lad came down with the news of the cruel murder; the robbers were seized, and, having confessed their crime, they suffered the torture of death on the wheel.
And lastly there was the legend of St. Servan, who had a robin which perched on his shoulder, and fed from his hand, and joined in with joyful twittering when the Saint sang his hymns and psalms.  Now the lads in the abbey-school were jealous of the Saint's favourite pupil, Kentigern, and out of malice they killed the robin and threw the blame on Kentigern.  Bitterly the innocent child wept and prayed over the dead bird; and behold! when the Saint came from singing nones in the minster, the robin fluttered up and flew away to meet him, chirruping merrily.
"A thoughtless thing of little blame," said the Novice-master, "was the wickedness of these boys compared with that of the monks of the Abbot Eutychus.  The Abbot had a bear to tend his sheep while he was absent and to shut them in their fold at sunset, and when the monks saw that marvel, instead of praising God they were burned up with envy and ill-will, and they killed the bear.  Ah, children, it is still possible for us, even in these days, to kill a Saint's robin and an abbot's bear.  Let us beware of envy and jealousy and uncharitableness."
In those years when Father Oswald was thus teaching his novices gentleness and compassion, he had but one trouble in his life, and that was the remembrance of a companion of his youth, who had fled from the Priory and disappeared in the noise and tumult of the world's life.  As scholars they had been class-mates, and as novices they had been so closely drawn together that each had pledged to the other that whoever died first should, under God's permission, appear to the one still left alive, and reveal to his friend all that may be told of the state of the departed.  Now hardly had they been professed monks more than a year when this brother broke his vows and deserted his habit, and fled away under cloud of night.  Oswald had never forgotten his friend, and had never ceased to grieve and pray for him.  It was the great hope and desire of his heart that, having at last proved the vanity of all that the world can give, this Lost Brother would one day return, like the Prodigal Son, to the house of his boyhood.
As the years went by Prior Anselm grew old and sickened, and at length what was mortal of him fell as the leaf that falls and is trodden in the clay; and the Novice-master was elected Prior in his stead.
Now one of the first great works which the new Prior set his hand to was the making of two large fish-ponds for the monastery.  "And so," said he, "not only shall we have other than sea-fish for our table, but in case of fire we shall have store of water at hand.  Then, too, it is a pleasant thing to look on sweet water among trees, and to watch the many sorts of silvery fish playing in their clear and silent world. And well it becomes our state of life that we should have this, for of our Lord's Disciples many were fishermen, and fish and bread were the last earthly food our dear Master ate.  Now of these ponds let the larger be our Lake of Gennesaret, and surely it shall some time happen to us that we shall see the Lord when the bright morning has come, and that our hearts shall be as a fire of coals upon the shore."
Of the earth dug out of the fish pools he piled up a high mound or barrow, and stocked it well with saplings of oak and beech, ash and pine, and flowering bushes; and about the mound a spiral way wound to the top, and from the top one saw to the four winds over the high woods of Amounderness, and on the west, beyond the forest, the white sands of the shore and the fresh sea.  When the saplings grew tall and stout, the green leaves shut out all sight of the Priory; even the tower of the church; and above the trees in the bright air it was as though one had got half-way to heaven.
Now after a little while the Prior reared on the high summit a vast cross of oak, rooted firmly amid huge boulders, and the face of our Lord crucified was turned to the west, and His arms were opened wide to the sea and to the passing ships.  And beneath the flying sails, far away, the mariners and fisher-folk could see the cross in the sky, and they bared their heads to the calvary of Kilgrimol.  So the name of our house and our Christ was known in strange waters and in distant havens.
All that climbing greenwood of the mound was alive with wild creatures, winged and four-footed, and no one was suffered to disquiet or annoy them.  To us it seemed that the Prior was as well known to all the wild things far and near as he was to us, for the little birds fluttered about him, and the squirrels leaped from tree to tree along the way he went, and the fawns ran from the covert to thrust their noses into his hand.  And in the winter time, if the snow lay deep and there was any dearth, food was made ready for them and they came in flocks and troops to the Priory, knowing well, one would think, that the Prior would be their loving almoner.
Bee-hives, too, he set up, and grew all manner of flowers, both for the use of the little brown toilers and for the joyance of the brethren; and of the flowers he spoke deep and beautiful parables too many to be told of in this book.
Now in the third year of his rule the Prior heard tidings of the companion he had never forgotten, and he took into his confidence one of the religious named Bede, in whom he had great trust, and he told him the story of their friendship.  "And now, Bede," he said, "I would have thee go on a long journey, even to the golden city of London, and seek out my friend.  He will easily be found, for men know his name, and he hath grown to some repute, and the good things of this world have not been denied him.  And in this I rejoice, for when he hath won all his heart may desire, he will the sooner discover how little is the joy and how fleeting the content.  And tell him that so long as I am Prior of this house, so long shall this house be a home waiting for his home-coming.  Bid him come to me--if but for a little while, then for a little while be it; but if he longs for rest, this shall be the place of his rest until the end.  And if these things cannot be now, then let them be when they may be."
And Bede went on his long wayfaring and found the Lost Brother, a man happy and of fair fame, and blessed with wife and child.  And the monk sat with the little maid on his knee, and even while he prayed for her and her father, he understood how it might be that the man was well content, and how that neither to-day nor to-morrow could he return to that old life of the Priory in the forest.
"Yet," said he, "tell the Prior that surely some day I shall see his face again, if it be but for mere love of him for well I know there be among the monks those who would more joyfully rend me or burn me at the stake than give the hand of fellowship to one who has cast aside the cowl."
When he heard of these things the Prior only prayed the more earnestly for the home-coming of his friend.
Now it was in the autumn of that year, at the season when the days and nights are of one length, that the great inroad of the sea befell.  The day had been stormy, with a brackish wind clamouring out of the sea, and as the darkness closed in it was with us as it is with blind men who hear and feel the more keenly because of their blindness and all that we heard was the boom of billows breaking on the long shore and the crying and groaning of the old oaks and high firs in the forest. Then in the midmost of the night we were aroused by so terrible a noise, mingled with shrieking and wailing, that we crowded to the Prior's door.  Speedily he rose, and we followed him out of doors, wondering what disaster had happened.  The moon was shining brightly; shreds of cloud were flying across the cold sky; the air was full of the taste of salt.
As we gazed about us we saw that the cloisters and the garth and all the space within the walls were crowded with wild birds--sea-fowl and crows, pheasant and blackcock, starlings and thrushes, stonechats and yellow-hammers, and hundreds of small winged creatures cowering for shelter.  And when the Prior bade us throw open the monastery gates, out of the sombre gloom of the forest the scared woodlanders came crowding, tame and panting.  No one had ever realised that so many strange creatures, in fur and pelt, housed in the green ways.  Even the names of many of them we did not know, for we had never set eyes on them before; but among those that were within our knowledge were coneys and hares, stoats and weasels, foxes and badgers, many deer with their does and fawns, and one huge grey creature of savage aspect which we took to be an old wolf.
The Prior ordered that the gates should be left open for any fugitives that might seek refuge, and he went among the wild beasts, calming them with a touch of his hand and blessing them.  Then there came a woman, with a child at her bosom and a little lad clinging to her dress, but she was so distracted with fright that she was unable to say what had happened.
When he had given directions for the care of all these strange guests, the Prior climbed up the mound through the tossing trees, and when he had reached the summit he saw to his amazement that the sea had risen in a mighty flood and poured for miles into the forest.  The huge oaks and pines of centuries had gone down in thousands, and over their fallen trunks and broken branches the white billows were tumbling and leaping in clouds of spray in the moonlight.  Happily the land sloped away to the north, so that unless the wind changed and blew against us the Priory seemed to be in no present danger.  Overhead the great cross vibrated in the storm, and the face of the Christ gazed seaward, and the holy arms were opened wide.  The sight of that divine figure filled the Prior's heart with peace and confidence.  "Whether to live or to die," he murmured, "in Thee, O Lord, have we placed our trust."
Such was the terrible inroad of the sea which broke the western forest of Amounderness.  For many a day the land lay in salt swamp till the sands were blown over it and buried the fallen timber; and afterwards the very name of Forest was forgotten, and the people called all that part the Field-lands.
Now it was in this same year that the grievous pestilence named the Black Death raged in England; but it was not till the winter had gone by that it reached Amounderness.  Then were seen those terrible days when ships sailed the seas with crews of dead men, and when on land there was burying without sorrow and flight without safety, for though many fled they could not escape the evil, and so many died that the wells of sorrow ran dry.  And because of the horror of so many deaths, it was forbidden to toll the bells any longer lest men should go mad. Often no hand could be got for love or for gold to touch the sick or to carry the departed to their graves.  When the graveyards were filled, thousands were buried, without a prayer or a last look, in deep trenches salted with quicklime, on the commons or in an open field. Many a street in many a town fell suddenly silent and deserted, and grass grew between the stones of the causeway.  Here and there fires were kept burning night and day to purify the air, but this availed little.  In many a thorpe and village all the inhabitants were swept away and even robbers and desperate vagrants were too greatly in fear of infection to enter the ownerless houses.  Sometimes in the fields one saw little children, and perchance an aged woman, trying to manage a plough or to lead a waggon.
When this trouble fell upon the people the Prior sent out various of the brethren to aid the suffering and to comfort the bereaved; but when many of the monks themselves were stricken down and died within the hour, a great dread took hold of the others, so that they were unwilling to expose themselves to danger.
The Prior rebuked them for their lack of faith and the coldness of their charity.  "When the beasts and wild creatures suffered we had compassion on them," he said; "what folly is this that we shall have care for them and yet feel no pity for men and women in their misery! Do you fear that you too may be taken off by this pestilence?  Who, then, has told you that you shall not die if only you can escape the pestilence?  Daily you pray, 'Thy kingdom come,' and daily you seek that it shall not come to-day."
He went abroad himself unweariedly with one or other of the brethren, doing such good as he was able, and when he had returned home and taken a little rest he set out once more.  Now one night as he and Brother Bede returned belated through the forest, they were startled as they approached the gate to hear the weeping and moaning of one who lay forsaken on the cold earth; and when the Prior called out through the darkness, "Be of good cheer, Christian soul, we are coming to your aid," the sufferer replied by rattling the lid of his clap-dish, and at once they knew it was some poor leper who had fallen helpless by the way.
"Patience, brother," said the Prior; and bidding his companion open the wicket, he lifted the wretched outcast from the ground and carried him in his arms into the great hall.  "Rest here a little," he said, "till we can bring you light and fire and food."
The Prior and Bede hastened to call the brethren who had charge of these matters, but when they returned with the other monks they found the great hall shining with a wonderful light and filled with a marvellous fragrance of flowers, and on the seat where the leper had been placed there lay a golden rose, but the leper himself had vanished.
Then a great joy cast fear out of the hearts of the brotherhood, and they laboured without ceasing in the stricken villages.  Many of them died, but it was without sorrow or repining, and the face of each was touched with the golden rose ere he was laid to his rest.
Now the pestilence of that year was stayed by a bitter winter, and snow lay deep even in the forest, and great blocks of ice littered the shore of the bleak sea.  And in the depth of the winter, when it drew near the Nativity, there came riding to the monastery a stranger, who asked to see the Prior.  When the Prior looked into the man's face the tears started and ran down his own, and he opened his arms to him, and drew him to his breast and kissed him.  For this was indeed the Lost Brother.  And when he had thus given him welcome, the Prior said: "I ask no questions; what you can tell me you shall tell when the fitting time comes.  But this is your home to have or to leave, for you are as free as the winds of heaven."
And the Lost Brother replied: "Wise are you no less than good.  The plague has bereft me of the child, and of the mother of the child. More I cannot tell you now."
Thus to the Priori great happiness the companion of his youth returned from wandering the ways of the world.
When the weeks passed, and still he remained a silent and solitary stranger, the religious spoke sharply among themselves of the presence of one who had broken vows and revelled in the joys of life, and had been received without censure or reproof.  Then the Prior, wrathful now even on account of his gentleness, rebuked them once again: "O eyes of stone and hearts of water, are you so slow to learn?  Have you who sheltered the wild creatures no thought for this man of much sorrow? Have you who buried the dead no prayer and no tenderness for this soul of the living?"
More than once the Lost Brother seemed to awake from a dream, and spoke of going forth again from this home or quiet, saying: "Truly this is great peace and solace to me, but I am not of you; my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor is yours my way of life.  Indeed, though I were to will it never so, I could not repent of what I have done.  Let me go; why should I be an offence and a stone of stumbling to those who are righteous among you?"
But the Prior silenced him, asking gently: "Do we distress you with any of these things?  God has His times and seasons, and will not be hastened.  At least so long as you find peace and rest here, remain with us."
"You are strangely wise and gentle," the Lost Brother answered.  "God, I doubt it not, has His times and seasons; but with me I know not at all what He will do."
It was no long while after this that the Prior fell into a grievous illness; and when he knew that his hour was drawing nigh, he besought the monks to bear him up to the foot of the cross on the mound.  There, as he looked far abroad into the earth over the tree-tops, he smiled with lightness of heart and said: "If the earth be so beautiful and so sweet, what must the delight of Paradise be?"
And behold! a small brown squirrel came down a tree, and ran across and nestled in the holy man's bosom, and its eyes were full of tears.  The Prior stroked and caressed it, and said: "God bless thee, little woodlander, and may the nuts never fail thee!"
Then, gazing up into the blue sky and the deep spaces of air above, he murmured in a low voice, "It is a very awful and lonely way to go!"
"Not so awful for you," replied the companion of his youth.  "That blue way has been beaten plain by the Lord Christ, and the Apostles, and many holy men from the beginning."
A long while the Prior lay musing before he spoke again, and then he said: "I remember me of an ancient saying which I had long forgotten. A year for the life of a--nay, I know not what any longer.  But after that it runs, And three for the life of a field; and thrice the life of a field for the life of a hound; and thrice the life of a hound for the life of a horse; and thrice the life of a horse for the life of a man; and thrice the life of a man for the life of a stag; and thrice the life of a stag for the life of an ouzel; and thrice the life of an ouzel for the life of an eagle; and thrice the life of an eagle for the life of a salmon; and thrice the life of a salmon for the life of a yew; but the Lord God liveth for ever--the Lord God liveth for ever!"
That same night the alabaster box was broken and the precious ointment poured out.  And on the Prior's breast they placed the golden rose, and under the great red hawthorn in the midst of the cloister-garth they laid him, O Lord, beneath the earth which is Thy footstool.
At the same hour in which he was taken from us there was a great crying and lamentation of the wild creatures in the forest, and the tall stags bellowed and clashed their antlers against the gates of the monastery.
In the place of Prior Oswald, Father Bede was made Prior.
Whether the spirit of Prior Oswald ever returned to earth the book does not tell, but the Lost Brother, the companion of his youth, lived in the house of Kilgrimol to old age, and in the days of Bede's rule he made a good end.
The King Orgulous
To and fro in the open cloister of Essalona walked the monk Desiderius, musing and musing.  Every now and again he stayed in his paces to feed a tall white stork and two of her young, which stood on the parapet between the pillars of the cloister; and though for the most part his dole went to the storklings, the mother was well content with his stroking of her head and soft white backfeathers.
Then he resumed his slow walk, turning over and over in his perplexed mind the questions of grace and nature, and praying for light in the obscure ways where reason groped darkling.  Meanwhile the storks stood grave and patient, as if they too had matter for deep musing.
As in this day, so in the ancient time the convent of Essalona was perched on a beetling crag on the northern side of the Sarras mountains.  There the mighty ridge, with its belts of virgin pinewood and its stony knolls and pastoral glens, breaks off suddenly in a precipitous escarpment; and, a thousand feet below, the land is an immense green plain, sweeping away to the blue limits of the north.  It is as though the sea had once on a time run up to the mountain wall and torn down the tawny rocks for sand and shingle, and had then drawn back into the north, leaving the good acres to grow green in the sun. Through the plain winds a river, bright and slow; in many places the fruitful level is ruffled with thicket and coppice; and among the far fields the white walls of farms and hamlets glitter amid their boskage. When the clear sunlight fell on that still expanse of quiet earth, one might see, in those days, the stone towers and sparkling pinnacles of the royal city of Sarras, with a soft blue feather of smoke floating over it.
Often had Desiderius let his eyes rest on the smoulder and gleam of that busy city, which was all so hushed and dreamlike in the distance, little thinking the while that one day he should dwell within its walls, and play a strange part in the deeds that men remember.
From the brink of the escarpment rises the rock of Essalona, and the convent is built on the edge of the rock, in such sort that, leaning over the parapet of the open cloister, Desiderius might have dropped a pebble sheer down to the plain below.  A single path wound up the rock to the gate, so narrow and steep that one sturdy lay-brother might have held the way with a thresher's flail against a score of men-at-arms.
[Illustration: _King Orgulous_]
Here, then, in this solitary house, Desiderius dwelt with five other brethren, all good and faithful men; but he, the youngest and yet the most learned in philosophy and star-lore and the sacred Scriptures and the books of the wise, was the most meek and lowly of heart.  No pains did he spare his body or his spirit to master the deep knowledge of divine things.  Diligent by day, he eked out the light of the stars with the lamp of the firefly, or conned his page by the dim shining of the glow-worm along the lines.
Now as he mused in the cloister he stopped short with a deep sigh, and stood before the storks, and said: "Away, happy birds; you have leave. Disport yourselves, soaring very high in the sunny heavens, or take your rest on our roofs.  I have appeased you with food; but to the hunger of my soul who shall minister?"
At his word the storks flapped their wings and rose from the parapet, and went sailing up into the sunshine; and Desiderius heard at his shoulder a most sweet and gracious voice saying: "What is thy hunger, and wherein wouldst thou have me minister to thee?"
Turning about, Desiderius saw that it was an Angel which spoke, and he fell at the bright spirit's feet, abashed and in great dread.  But the Angel raised him up, and gave him courage, saying: "O Desiderius, most dear to me (for I am thine Angel Guardian), do not tremble to tell me; but speak to me even as thou wouldst speak to a man of thy brethren."
Then said Desiderius: "Show to me and make plain, I pray thee, the mystery of the grace of God in the heart of man."
"Many are the mysteries of God," said the Angel, "whereof even the highest of the Archangels may not sustain the splendour, and this is one of them.  Howbeit, if thou wilt be patient and prayerful, and wilt repose thy trust in the Lord Christ, I will strive to show thee two pictures of thy very self--one, to wit, of the natural Adam in Desiderius, and one of the man redeemed by the blood shed for thee.  So in some wise shalt thou come to some dim light of this mystery of grace divine.  Will that suffice thee?"
"That, Lord Angel, will suffice," said the monk, bowing low before the Angel.
"Wait, then, and watch; and even in thy body and before thou diest thou shalt behold as I have said."
Therewith the Angel left him, and Desiderius was aware of but the walls and pillars of the cloister, and the bright vast plain, and, far away, the city of Sarras glittering, and the smoke sleeping like a small blue cloud above it.  And the coming and going of the Angel was after this manner.  Desiderius perceived him, bright in the brightness of the sunshine, as one perceives a morsel of clear ice floating in clear water; and when Desiderius saw him no more it was as though the clear ice had melted into the clear water.
Now after the lapse of three short years, and when he was but in his thirtieth summer, Desiderius was summoned from his cell on the lonely mountain, and, despite his tears and supplications and his protestations of ignorance and inexperience and extreme youth, made Archbishop of Sarras.  Only one answer was vouchsafed to him.  "One of thy vows was entire obedience, and the grace of God is sufficient for thee."
In that same year a horde of the fierce Avars poured out from the round green earth-walls of their mysterious stronghold, which lay beyond Danube, and, crossing the river, fell on Sarras; and clashing with that ravening horde, Astulf the King of Sarras was slain.
Ill had it then fared with the folk of Sarras, city and plain alike, but for a certain Talisso, a free-rider, who from a green knoll had watched the onset.  When he saw the slaying of the King, he plunged into the battle, cleaving his way through the ranks of squat and swarthy Avars; and heartening the men of Sarras with his ringing cheer and battle-laughter, shaped them into wedges of sharp iron and drove them home through the knotted wood of their foemen, till the Avars fled hot-foot to Danube water, and through the water, and beyond, and so reached the strait doorways of their earth-bound stronghold, the Hring.
Now, seeing that the King of Sarras had left neither child nor brother to heirship, and that their deliverer was a stalwart champion, young and nobly statured, and handsome and gracious as he was valiant, frank too and open-handed, and that moreover he seemed a man skilled in the mastery of men and in affairs of rule, the fighting men of Sarras thought that no better fortune could befall them than they should choose this Talisso for their king.  To Sarras therefore they carried him with them on their merry home-going, and having entered the free town, called the Council of Elders to say yea or nay.  With few words the Elders confirmed the choice, and the joy-bells were rung, and great was the rejoicing of all men, gentle and simple, that God had sent them so goodly a man for their ruler and bulwark.
In a week from that the city was dight and decked for the crowning of Talisso.  Garlands were hung across the streets; windows and walls were graced with green branches and wreaths of flowers; many-coloured draperies, variegated carpets and webs of silk and velvet hung from parapet and balcony; once more the joy-bells were set aswing, and amid a proud array of nobles and elders and gaily harnessed warriors the new King walked under a canopy of cloth of gold to the High Church.
There in solemn splendour the new Archbishop administered to him the kingly oath, and anointed him with the chrism of consecration, and set the gold of power on his head, and invested him with the mantle of St. Victor and girt about him the Saint's great iron sword set with many jewels on the apple and the cross.  As the Archbishop was completing these ordinances, he chanced to look full into the King's face for the first time, and as the King's eyes met his each stood still as stone regarding the other for such a space as it would take one to count four, telling the numbers slowly.  Neither spoke, and when they who were nearest looked to learn the cause of the stillness and the stoppage they saw with amazement that the new King and the new Archbishop were as like the one to the other as brothers who are twins. With a slow and audible drawing of the breath the Archbishop took up again the words of the ritual, and neither looked at the other any more at that time.
Now, having been crowned and consecrated, Talisso ascended the steps in front of the altar, and, drawing the huge blade from its sheath, lunged with it four times into the air--once to the north, and once to the south, once to the east and once to the west.  Sheathing the sword, he descended, and walking to the western portal mounted his war-horse, and paced slowly down the street, followed by a brilliant cavalcade, to the Mound of Coronation.
Urging his steed up the ascent, he drew rein on the summit, and once more bared the holy brand, and, wheeling to the four quarters of heaven, thrust it into the air in token of lordship and power inalienable; and when he rode down the Mound to his people a great cry was raised in greeting, and four pigeons were loosed.  High they flew in circles overhead, and, each choosing his own airt, darted out to the four regions of the world to bear the news of that crowning.
The first years of the new reign seemed to be the dawn of a Golden Age in the land of Sarras, and in those years no man was more beloved and honoured by the King than was Archbishop Desiderius.  As time passed by, however, and the evil leaven of unrestrained power began to ferment in the King's heart, and the Archbishop opposed and reproved him, gently and tenderly at first, but ever more gravely and steadfastly, coldness and estrangement divided them; and soon that strange resemblance which gave them the aspect of twin brothers, became a root of suspicion and dread in the King's mind, for he reasoned with himself, "What more likely than that this masterful prelate should dream of wearing the crown, he who so nearly resembles the King that the mother of either might well pause ere she should say which was her son?  A foot of iron, and a sprinkling of earth, and farewell Talisso! None would guess it was Desiderius who took his ease in thy chair."
Thus by degrees limitless power waxed into lawlessness, and suspicion and dread into moroseness and cruelty, and on this rank soil the red weeds of lust and hate and bitter pride sprang up and choked all that was sweet and gracious and lovable in the nature of the man.
Then did the wise and gentle folk of Sarras come to perceive how woefully they had been deceived in the tyrant they had crowned, and speedily it came to pass that when they spoke of King Talisso they breathed not his name, but using an ancient word to signify such insane and evil pride as that of Lucifer and the Fallen Angels, they called him the King Orgulous.  Yet if this was the mind of the better folk, there was no lack of base and venomous creatures--flatterers, time-servers, and sycophants--to minister to his wickedness and malignity.
Dark were the days which now fell on Sarras, and few were those on which some violence or injustice, some deed of lust or rapacity was not flaunted in the face of heaven.  The most noble and best men of the city were attainted and plundered and driven into exile.  Of the meaner sort of folk many a poor citizen or rustic toiler went shaven and branded, or maimed of nose and eyelids, or with black stumps seared with pitch and an iron hook for hand.  Once more the torture-chamber of the castle rang with the screams of poor wretches stretched on the rack; and the ancient instruments of pain, which had rusted through many a long year of clemency, were once more reddened with the sweat of human agony.
An insatiable lust of cruelty drove the King to a sort of madness. With a fiendish malice he fashioned of wood and iron an engine of torment which bore the likeness of a beautiful woman, but which opened when a spring was pressed, and showed within a hideous array of knives; and these pierced the miserable wight about whom the Image closed her arms.  In blasphemous merriment the King called this woman of his making Our Lady of Sorrow, and in mockery of holy things he kept a silver lamp burning constantly before her, and crowned her with flowers.
Now in the hour in which the King was left wholly to his wickedness, he doomed to the Image the young wife of one of the chief men of Sarras. Little more than a girl was she in years; sweet and exceeding lovely; and she still suckled her first babe.
When the tormentors would have haled her to the Image, "Forbear," she said, "there is no need; willingly I go and cheerfully."  And with a fearless meekness she walked before them with her little babe in her arms into the chamber of agony.
Coming before the Image with its garland of flowers she knelt down, and prayed to the Virgin Mother of our Lord, and commended her soul and the soul of her dear babe to our Lady and her divine Son; and the babe stretched out its little hands to the Image, cooing and babbling in its innocence.
Then, as though this were a spectacle to make the very stones shriek and to move the timber of the rack and the iron of the axe to human tenderness, the Image stepped down from its pedestal, and lifted up mother and child, and a wondrous light and fragrance filled the stone vault, and the tormentors fled, stricken with a mad terror.
Down from the castle and through the streets of the hushed and weeping city the Image led the mother and her babe to their own door, and when they had entered the house, and the people stood by sobbing and praying, the Image burst into flames, and on the spot where it stood there remained a little heap of ashes when that burning was done.
Judge if the land of Sarras was silent after this day of divine interposition.  Hastily summoning the Bishops of the realm, and gathering a body of men-at-arms, the Archbishop Desiderius proclaimed from the Jesus altar of the High Church the deposition of the King Orgulous.  Talisso was seized and stripped of his royal robes; a width of sackcloth was wrapped about his body, and with a rope round his neck he was led to the Mound of Coronation.  There, on the height whereon he had thrust his sword into the four regions of heaven, he received his sentence.
Standing erect in a circle on the top of the Mound the nine Bishops of the realm held each a lighted torch in his hand.  In the centre stood Desiderius beside the King deposed, and holding high his torch uttered the anathema which was to sever all bonds of plighted troth and loyalty and service, and to cast him forth from the pale of Holy Church, and to debar him from the common charity of all Christian people.  At that moment the Bishops marked with awe the strange resemblance between Desiderius and the King, and the eyes of these two met, and each was aware how marvellously like to himself was the other.  But with a clear unfaltering voice the Archbishop cried aloud the doom:
"May he be outcast from the grace of heaven and the gladness of earth. May the stones betray him, and the trees of the forest be leagued against him.  In want or in sickness may no hand help him.  Accursed may he be in his house and in his fields, in the water of the streams and in the fruits of the earth.  Accursed be all things that are his, from the cock that crows to awaken him to the dog that barks to welcome him.  May his death be the death of Pilate and of Judas the betrayer. May no earth be laid on the earth that was he.  May the light of his life be extinguished thus!"
And the Archbishop cast down his torch and trampled it into blackness; and crying "Amen, amen, amen!" the Bishops threw down their torches and trod them under foot and crushed out every spark of fire.
"Begone," said the Archbishop, "thou art banned and banished.  If within three days thy feet be found on the earth of Sarras, thou shalt hang from the nearest tree."
As he spoke the great bell of the High Church began to toll as for one whose spirit has passed away.  At the sound Talisso started; then taking the rope from his neck and flinging it on the ground with a mocking laugh, he turned and fled down the Mound and into the green fields that lie to the north.
Not far had he fled into the open country before the recklessness of the reiver and strong-thief fell on Talisso.  Entering a homestead he smote down the master, and got himself clothing and food and weapons, and seizing a horse, pushed on apace till he came to the red field where he had routed the Avars, and thence onward to Danube water.
Beyond Danube, some days' riding into the north, lay that mysterious stronghold, the Hring, the camp-city of the Avar robber-horde.  And thither Talisso was now speeding, for he said to himself: "They are raiders and slayers, and this kind is quick to know a _man_.  They will love me none the less that I have stricken and chased them.  Rather will they follow me and avenge me, if not for my sake for the sake of the fat fields and rich towns of Sarras."
Now the stronghold was a marvel in the manner of its contrivance, and in its size and strength; for it was bulwarked with seven rings, each twenty feet high and twenty feet wide, and the rings were made of stockades of oak and beech and pine trunks, filled in with stones and earth, and covered atop with turf and thick bushes.  The distance across the outer ring was thirty miles, and between each ring and the one within it there were villages and farms in cry of each other, and each ring was pierced by narrow gateways well guarded.  In the midst of the innermost ring were the tent of the Chagan or Great Chief, and the House of the Golden Hoard.  Piled high were the chambers of that house with the enormous treasure of a century of raiding--silken tissues and royal apparel and gorgeous arms, great vases and heavy plate of gold and silver, spoil of jewels and precious stones, leather sacks of coined money, the bribes and tribute of Greece and Rome, and I know not what else of rare and costly.  Long afterwards, when the Avars were broken and the Hring thrown down, that hoard filled fifteen great waggons drawn each by four oxen.
In the very manner in which Talisso had forecast it, so it fell out with him at the Hring.  The fierce, swart, broad-shouldered dwarfs with the almond eyes and woven pigtails gazed with glee and admiration on the tall and comely warrior who had swept them before his sword-edge; and when he spoke of the rich markets and goodly houses and fruitful land of Sarras their eyes glistened, and they swore by fire and water and the four winds to avenge his wrongs.
Little need is there to linger in telling of a swift matter.  Mounted on their nimble and hardy ponies, the Avars dashed into Sarras land two hundred strong, and tarried neither to slay nor spoil, but outsped the fleet feet or rumour, till in the grey glimmer of cock-crow they sighted the towers of Sarras city.  Under cover of a wood they rested till the gates were flung wide for the early market folk.  Who then but Talisso laughed his fierce and orgulous laugh as he rode at their head and they all hurled through the gates, and, clattering up the empty street, carried the castle out of hand?
Not a blow was struck, no drop of blood reddened iron or stone; and such divinity doth hedge even a wicked king dethroned that when the guards saw the tyrant once more ascending the steps of power they lowered their points and stood at a loss how to act.  But Talisso, with some touch of his pristine graciousness, bade no man flee or fear who was willing to return to his allegiance.  "First, however, of all things, bring me hither the Archbishop; bring with ropes and horses if need be; but see that not a hair of his head be injured."
Now on this same night that these Hunnish folk were pressing forward to Sarras city Desiderius saw in a dream Talisso standing before the throne of God.  On his head he wore his crown, but otherwise he was but such as he stood for sentence on the Mound of Coronation, to wit, with a rope around his neck, and naked save for the fold of sackcloth about his loins.
Beside him stood an Angel, and the Angel was speaking: "All the lusts of the flesh, and all the lusts of the eyes, and all the lusts of the will, and the pride of life this man hath gratified and glutted to surfeiting, yet is he as restless as the sea and as insatiable as the grave.  Speak, man, is it not so?"
And Talisso answered, with a peal of orgulous laughter: "Restless as the sea; insatiable as the grave."
"How then, Lord," said the Angel, "shall this man's unrest and hunger be stayed?"
God spoke and said: "Fill his mouth with dust."
Then the Angel took a handful of dust and said to Talisso: "Open thy mouth and eat."
Talisso cried aloud, "I will not eat."
"Open thy mouth," said the Angel sternly.
"My mouth I will not open," replied Talisso.
Thereupon the Angel caught him by the hair, and plucked his head backward till his throat made a knotted white ridge above the neck, and as Talisso opened his mouth, shrieking blasphemies and laughing with frantic rage, the Angel filled it with dust.
Talisso fell backwards, thrusting with his feet and thrashing the ground with his hands; his crown fell from his head and rolled away; his face grew set and white; and then he lay straight and rigid.
"Hast thou filled his mouth?"
"His mouth, Lord, is filled," the Angel answered.
This was the dream of Desiderius.
When citizens came running to the palace, and the Archbishop learned how the gates had been surprised and the castle taken, he lost no time in casting about what he should do.  He sent messengers to summon the Council of the Elders, and bade his men-at-arms fall into array.  Then he hastened to the High Church, and, after a brief prayer before the altar, girt on the great sword of St. Victor, threw over his purple cassock the white mantle of the Saint, and putting on his head a winged helm of iron, made his way to the castle where Talisso awaited his capture.
"Stay you here," he said to his men-at-arms when they reached the portals, "and if by God's blessing work fall to your hands to do, do it doughtily and with right good will."
Up the high hall of the castle, through the groups of lounging Avars he went, with great strides and eyes burning, to the dais where Talisso sat apart in the royal chair.
"Ha! well met, Lord Archbishop," cried the dethroned King, springing to his feet at the sight of him.
"Well met, Talisso," replied Desiderius in a loud voice.  "With no more ado I now tell thee that for thee there is but one end.  Thy mouth must be filled with dust."
As he spoke, Desiderius flung back his mantle and drew the holy sword. Heaving it aloft he struck mightily at Talisso.  From the King's helmet glanced the keen brand, and descending to the shoulder shore away the plates of iron, and bit the flesh.
Once more the great sword was swung up, for Desiderius neither heard nor heeded the cry and rush of the Avars; but or ever the stroke could fall Desiderius saw the Angel of Essalona by his side and felt his hand restraining the blade; and at the same instant the figure before him, the figure of the King Orgulous, grew dim and hazy, and wavered, and broke like smur blown along a wooded hillside, and vanished from his gaze.
"A little truer stroke," said the Angel, "and thou hadst slain thyself, for of a truth the man thou wast slaying was none other than thyself; as it is, thou art hurt more than need was"--for the shoulder of the Archbishop was bare, and the blood streamed from it.
Bewildered at these words, Desiderius gazed about to see if the high hall and the Avars were but the imagery of a dream.  But there in front of him stood the dwarfish tribe, with naked brands and battle-axes. These, when they looked on his face, raised a hoarse cry of terror, for they too had beheld Talisso, how at a blow of the magic sword he had fallen and perished even from the vision of men, and now they saw that he who had slain the King was himself the King.  Howling and clamouring, they broke from the hall and fled into the street; and there the men-at-arms did right willingly and doughtily the work which thus came to their hands.  Of that fierce and uncouth robber horde, which rode to Sarras two hundred strong, scarce two score saw Danube water again.
When Desiderius knew for a surety that the natural man within him was verily that King wicked and orgulous, and understood that the sins of that evil King were the sins he himself would have committed but for the saving grace of God, a great awe fell upon him, and he was abashed with a grievous dread lest the King Orgulous were not really dead and done with, but were sleeping still, like the Kings of old legend, in some dusky cavern of his nature, ready to awake and break forth with sword and fire.  Gladly would he have withdrawn to the solitude of the little convent on the beetling crag, far from the temptations of power and the splendour and tumult of life; but the same answer was given to him now as had been given to him of old: "One of thy vows was entire obedience, and the grace of God is sufficient for thee."
The Journey of Rheinfrid
On the green skirts of the Forest of Arden there was a spot which the windings of the Avon stream had almost made into an island, and here in the olden time the half-savage herdsmen of King Ethelred kept vast droves of the royal swine.  The sunny loops of the river cut clearings on the east and south and west, but on the north the Forest lay dense and dark and perilous.  For in those ancient days wolves still prowled about the wattled folds of the little settlement of Wolverhampton, and Birmingham was only the rude homestead of the Beormingas, a cluster of beehive huts fenced round with a stockade in the depths of the woods.
Among the swineherds of the King there was one named Eoves, and one day, while wandering through the glades of great oaks on this edge of the Forest, he saw three beautiful women who came towards him singing a song more strange and sweet than he had ever heard.  He told his fellows, and the story spread far and wide.  Some said that the three beautiful women were three goddesses of the old pagan world, and thought Eoves had acted very foolishly in not speaking to them.  Others said they might have been the Three Fates, in whose hands are the lives of men, and the joy of their lives, and the sorrow they must endure, and the death which is the end of their days; and they thought that perhaps Eoves had been wise to keep silence.
But when the holy Bishop Egwin heard the tale, he visited the place alone, and in the first glimmer of the sunrise, when all wild creatures are tame and the earth is most lovely to look upon, he beheld the three beautiful women, and he saw in a moment that they were the Virgin Mother Mary and two heavenly handmaidens.  "And our Lady," he used afterwards to say, "was more white-shining than lilies and more freshly sprung than roses, and the savage forest was filled with the fragrance of Paradise."
Straightway the Bishop sent his woodmen and had the aged oaks felled and the underwood cleared away; and on the spot where the beautiful women had stood a fair church was built for the worship of the true God, and around it clustered the cells of an abbey of Black Monks.  In a little while people no longer spoke of the place by its old name, but called it Eovesholme, because of the vision of Eoves.
Now when more than three and a half centuries had gone by, and Agelwyn the Great-hearted was Abbot, there was a Saxon noble, young and dissolute, who had been stricken by the Yellow Plague, and, after three days' sickness, had been abandoned by his friends and followers in what seemed to be his last agony.  For the Yellow Plague was a sickness so ghastly and dreadful that men called it the Yellow Death, and fled from it as swiftly as they might.  But in the dead and dark of the third night a beautiful Child, crowned with roses and bearing in his hand a rose, had come to the dying thane and said: "Now mayest thou see that the best the world can give--call it by what name thou wilt and prize it at its utmost worth--is nothing more than these: wind and smoke and a dream and a flower.  But though all have fled from thee and left thee to die alone in grievous plight, this night thou shalt not die."
Then he was bidden to rise on the morrow--"for strength shall be given thee," said the Child--and travel with the sun westward till he came to the Abbey of Egwin, and there he must tell the Abbot all that had befallen him.
"And the good Abbot will receive thee among his sons," said the Child; "and after that, in a little while, thou shalt go on a journey, and then again in a little while shalt come to me."
On the morrow Rheinfrid the thane rose from his bed hale and strong, but his whole nature was changed; and he made no more account of life and of all that makes life sweet--as honour and wealth and joy and use and the love of man and woman--than one makes of wind and smoke and a dream and a flower; and all that he greatly desired was to undertake the journey which had been foretold, and to see once more the Child of the Roses.
Westward he rode with the sun and came at nightfall to the Abbey of Eovesholme; and there he told Agelwyn the Abbot the story of his wild life and his sickness and the service that had been laid upon him.
The Abbot embraced him, saying, "Son, welcome art thou to our house, and thy home shall it be till the time comes for thy journey."
For a whole year Rheinfrid was a novice in the house, and when the year had gone by he took the vows.  In the presence of the brotherhood he cast himself on the pavement before the high altar, and the pall of the dead was laid over him, and the monks sang the dirge of the dead, for now he was indeed dying to this world.  And from his head they cut the long hair, and clothed him in the habit of a monk, and henceforth he was done with all earthly things and was one of themselves.
"Surely, now," he thought, "the time of my journey draws near."  But one year and a second and yet a third passed away, and there came to him no call, and he grew wearied with waiting, and weariness begot sullenness and discontent, and he questioned himself: "Was it not a dream of sickness which deceived me?  An illusion of pain and darkness? Why should I waste my life within these walls?"  But immediately afterwards he was filled with remorse, and confessed his thoughts to the Abbot.
"Have faith and patience, my son," said Agelwyn.  "Consider the many years God waited for thee, and grew not impatient with thy delay.  When His good time comes thou shalt of a certainty set out on thy journey."
So for a while Rheinfrid ceased to repine, and served faithfully in the Abbey.
In the years which followed, William the Norman came into these parts and harried whole shires on account of the rebels and broken men who haunted the great roads which ran through the Forest.  Cheshire and Shropshire, Stafford and Warwick were wasted with fire and sword.  And crowds naked and starving--townsmen and churls, men young and old, maidens and aged crones, women with babes in their arms and little ones at their knees--came straggling into Eovesholme, fleeing most sorrowfully from the misery of want.
In the little town they lay, indoors and out, and it was now that the Abbot got himself the name of the Great-hearted.  For he gave his monks orders that all should be fed and cared for; and daily from his own table he sent food for thirty wanderers whom he named his guests, and daily in memory of the love of Christ he washed the feet of twelve others, and never shrank from the unhappy lepers among them.  But for all his care the people died lamentably from grief and sickness--on no day fewer than five or six between prime and compline; and these poor souls were buried by the brethren.  Of the little children that were left to the mothering of the east wind, some were adopted by the canons and priests of the Abbey church, and others by the monks.
In his eagerness to help and solace, the Abbot even sent forth messengers to bring in the fugitives to refuge.  Now on a day that Rheinfrid went out on this work of mercy, he met at a crossway a number of peasants fleeing before a dozen Norman men-at-arms.  He raised his arm and called to them to make a stand, but they were too much terrified to heed him.  Then he saw that one of the soldiers had seized by the hair a fair Saxon woman with a babe at her bosom, and with a great cry he bade him let her go, for his blood was hot within him as he thought of the Saxon woman who had carried him in her arms and suckled him when he was but such a little child.  But the Norman only laughed and turned the point of his sword against the monk.
Then awoke the long line of thanes slumbering in wild caves and dark ways of his soul, and with a mighty drive of his fist he struck the man-at-arms between the eyes, so that he fell like a stone.  With savage curses the knave's comrades rushed in against the monk, but Rheinfrid caught up the Norman's sword, and with his grip on the hilt of it his old skill in war-craft came back to him, and he carried himself like a thane of the old Sea-wolves, and the joy of battle danced in his eyes.
Ill was it then for those marauders.  One of them he clove through the iron cap; the neck of another he severed with a sweep of the bitter blade.
And now that he was fighting he remembered his calling, and with a clear voice he chanted the great psalm of the man who has sinned: "Miserere mei Deus--Have mercy on me, O God, according to Thy loving-kindness; according unto the multitude of Thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions."
The strength of ten was in his body, and verse by verse he laid the Normans low, till of the troop no more than two were left.  These were falling back before him as he pressed onward chanting his Miserere, when a body of horsemen rode up and drew rein to watch the issue.
"By the Splendour of God!" cried the leader, as he glanced at the woman and scanned the number of the dead tumbled across the road, "it is a _Man_!"
Rheinfrid looked up at the new comer, and saw a gigantic, ruddy-faced man of forty, clad in chain mail and wearing a circlet of gold about his massive head.  At once he felt sure that he was face to face with the Master of England.  Still he kept his sword's point raised for another attack, and with a quiet frankness met the Conqueror's imperious gaze.
"Ha, monk! hast thou no fear of me?" cried William, frowning.
"Lord King, hast thou no fear of God?" Rheinfrid retorted.
For a moment the King's haughty eyes blazed with wrath, but William ever loved a strong man and dauntless, and he laughed gaily: "Nay, thou hast slain enough for one day; let us cry truce, and tell me of what house thou comest."
So Rheinfrid spoke to the King about Eovesholme, and the Abbot, and the harbouring of the miserable fugitives, and told the tale of his own fighting that day.  And the great Norman was well pleased, and afterwards he gave Agelwyn the custody of Winchcombe Abbey when the abbot of that house fell under his displeasure.  As for Rheinfrid he took the woman and her babe into the town; and many others he rescued and succoured, but he neither slew nor smote any man thereafter.
Now for eight long years Rheinfrid lived in the quiet of the cloister, striving to be patient and to await God's own time; and his daily prayer was that of the Psalmist: "How long wilt Thou forget me, O Lord? For ever?  How long wilt Thou hide Thy face from me?"
In the ninth year, after long sickness, the soul of Agelwyn passed out of the shadow of this flesh unto the clemency of God, and shortly after his death a weariness of well-doing and a loathing of the dull days of prayer beset Rheinfrid; and voices of the joy of life called to him to strip off his cowl and flee from his living tomb.
As he knelt struggling with the temptation the little Child crowned with roses stood beside him, looking at him with sad reproachful eyes. "Couldst thou not be patient a little while?" he asked.
"A little while!" exclaimed Rheinfrid; "see! twelve, thirteen, long years have gone by, and is that a little while?"
But the Child answered gravely: "An evil thing is impatience with the delays of God, to whom one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day."
And Rheinfrid knew not what reply to make, and as he hesitated the Child began to fade away.  "Do not go, do not go yet," he cried; "grant me at least one prayer--that I shall see thee again at the time I shall have most need of thee."
And the Child smiled and answered: "Thou shalt see me."
And the vision disappeared, but the fragrance of the roses lingered long in the little cell.
Then was Walter the Norman made Abbot, and forthwith he began to build a vast and beautiful minster, the fame of which should be rumoured through all the land.  Speedily he emptied the five great chests filled with silver which Agelwyn had left, and then there set in a dearth of timber and stone and money, but the Abbot bethought him of a device for escaping from his difficulties.  He took into his counsel the wise monks Hereman and Rheinfrid, because they had both travelled through many shires, and he entrusted to them the shrine containing the relics of St. Egwin, and bade them go on a pilgrimage from one rich city to another, making known their need, exhorting the people to charity, and gathering gifts of all kinds for the building of the minster.  So with lay-brothers to serve them and a horse to carry the holy shrine, the monks began their journey, and, singing joyful canticles, the brotherhood accompanied them with cross and banners and burning tapers, and set them well on their way beyond the river.
Now think of Rheinfrid and Hereman traversing the wild England of those olden times.  One day they were wandering in the depths of the woods; on another they were moving along some neglected Roman road, through swamps and quagmires.  Now they were passing hastily through the ruins of some Saxon thorpe which had been burned by the Normans, or lodging for the night as guests at some convent or priory, or crossing a dangerous river-ford, or making a brief stay in a busy town to preach and exhibit the shrine of the saint, so that the diseased and suffering might be touched by the miraculous relics.  And all along their journey they gathered the offerings which the people brought them.
"This, surely," thought Rheinfrid, "is the journey appointed me," and his spirit was at last peaceful and contented.
Now in the third week of their pilgrimage they came to a wide moor which they had to cross.  A heavy white mist lay on the lonely waste, and they had not gone far among the heath and grey boulders before Rheinfrid, absorbed in prayer, found himself separated from his companions.  He called aloud to them by their names, but no one answered him.  This way and that he wandered, still crying aloud, and hoping to discover some trace of the faint path which led over the moor.  Suddenly he came to the brink of a vast chasm, the depth of which was hidden by the mist.  It was a terrible place and he thanked God that he had not come thither in the darkness of the night.  As he gazed anxiously on all sides, wondering what he should do next, he perceived through the vapour a tall dark figure.  Approaching it, he saw that it was a high stone cross, and he murmured gratefully, "Here I am safe.  The foot of Thy cross is an ever-lasting refuge."  As he ascended the rough granite steps, he noticed how wonderfully the cross was sculptured, with a vine running up the shaft, and birds and small wild creatures among the vine-leaves, and he was able to read, in the centre, words from a famous old poem which he knew:
_Rood is my name; long ago I bore a goodly King; trembling,_ _dripping with blood._
As he read them he became aware that some one had come out of the mist and was standing near him.  "In the darkness the danger is great," said the stranger; "another step would have carried thee over the brink; and none who have fallen therein have ever returned.  But the wind is rising, and this mist will speedily be lifted."
While he was yet speaking a great draught of air drove the mist before it, and shifted and lifted it, and rolled it like carded wool, and in front all was clear, but the light was of an iron-grey transparency, and Rheinfrid saw into the depths of the chasm into which he had well-nigh fallen.
Far down below lay the jagged ridges and ghastly abysses of a gigantic crater, the black walls of which were so steep that it was impossible to climb them.  Smoke and steam rose in incessant puffs from the innermost pit of the crater and trailed along the floor and about the rocky spikes and jagged ridges.
Then, as Rheinfrid gazed, his face grew pale, and he turned to the stranger.
"What are these," he asked, "men, or little statues of men, or strangely shaped rocks?"
"They are living men and women," said the stranger.
"They seem as small as images," said Rheinfrid.
"They are very far distant from us," replied the stranger, "although we see them so clearly."
"There seem to be hundreds of them standing in crowds," said Rheinfrid.
"There are thousands and hundreds of thousands," said the stranger.
"And they do not move; they are motionless as stone; they do not even seem to breathe."
"They are waiting," said the stranger.
"Their faces are all turned upward; they are all staring in one way."
"They are watching," said the stranger.
"Why are they watching?" asked Rheinfrid; then looking up into the iron-grey air in the same direction as the faces of the people in the crater; "What huge ball is that hanging in the sky above them?"
"It is a globe of polished stone--the stone adamant, which of all stones is the hardest."
"Why do they gaze at it so steadfastly?"
"Not hard to say," replied the stranger.  "Every hundred years a little blue bird passes by, flying between them and the globe, and as it passes it touches the stone with the tip of its wing.  On the last day of the hundredth year the people gather and watch with eager eyes all day for the passing of the bird, and while they watch they do not suffer.  Now this is the last hour of the last day of the hundredth year, and you see how they gaze."
"But why do they watch to see the bird?"
"Each time the bird passes it touches the stone, and every hundred years it will thus touch it, till the stone be utterly worn away."
"Ten thousand ages, and yet again ten thousand, and it will not have been worn away," said Rheinfrid.  "But when it has been worn away, what then?"
"Why, then," said the stranger, "Eternity will be no nearer to its end than it is now.  But see! see!"
Rheinfrid looked, and beheld a little blue bird flash across the huge ball of glimmering adamant, brush it with the tip of a single feather, and dart onward.
And down in the crater all the faces were turned away again, and the crowd fell into such confusion as an autumn gale makes among the fallen leaves in a spinney; and out of the innermost pit the smoke and steam rose in clouds, till only the jagged ridges were visible; and a long cry of a myriad voices deadened by the deep distance rose like the terrible ghost of a cry from the abyss.
And this was one of the Seven Cries of the World.
For the Seven Cries of the World are these: the Cry of the Blood of Abel, and the Cry of the Deluge of Waters, and the Cry for the First-born of Egypt, and the Cry of the Cities of the Plain, and the Cry of Rachel in Ramah, and the Cry in the darkness of the ninth hour, and, more grievous than any of these, the Cry of the Doom of the Pit.
"Truly," said Rheinfrid, shivering, "one day is as a thousand years in the sight of the Lord."
"Come with me, and I will guide thee from this place," said the stranger.  And he led the way along the brink of the gulf till they came to a bridge, high and narrow and fragile, glittering like glass; but when Rheinfrid touched it he perceived it was built of ice, and beneath it ran a fierce river of fire, and they felt the heat of the river on their faces, and the ice of the bridge was dissolving away.
"How shall I pass this without falling?" asked Rheinfrid.
"Follow in my steps," said the stranger, "and all will be well."
He led the way on the slippery ice-work of the bridge, and in great fear and doubt Rheinfrid followed; but when they reached the crown of the arch the stranger threw aside his cloak and spread six mighty wings, and sprang from the bridge to the peak of a high mountain far beyond the burning river.  The bridge cracked and swayed, and pieces broke away from the icy parapet.
With a shriek of terror Rheinfrid sank down, and called upon God to help him.  Then as he prayed he felt wings growing on his shoulders, and a terrible eager joy and dread possessed him, for he felt the ice of the bridge melting away, and the water of the melting ice was splashing like rain on the river of fire, and as each drop fell a little puff of white steam arose from the place where it fell.  So, unable to wait till the wings had grown full, he rose to his feet, and attempted to follow the Angel.  But his wings were too weak to bear him, and he fell clinging to the bridge, which shook beneath him.
Once more he prayed; once more his impatience urged him to rise; and once more he fell.  And the melted ice rained hissing into the river of fire, and the quick whiffs of white vapour came up from the surface.
Then he committed himself to God's keeping, and waited in meekness and fortitude, saying, "Whether we live or we die we are in Thy charge," and it seemed to him that, so long as it was God's will, it mattered not at all what happened--whether the bridge crumbled away, dissolving like a rainbow in the clouds, or whether his body were engulfed in the torrent of burning.
Then straightway, as he submitted himself thus, his wings grew large and strong, and he felt the power of them lifting him to his feet, and with what seemed no more than the effort of a wish he sprang from narrow way of ice and stood beside the Angel on the mountain.
"Hadst thou not been twice impatient in the cloister," said the Angel, "thy wings would not have twice failed thee on the bridge.  Now, look around and see!"
Who shall tell the loveliness of the land on which Rheinfrid now gazed from the mountain?  To breathe the clear shining air was in itself beatitude.  He saw angelic figures and heard the singing of angels in the heavenly gardens glittering far below, and he longed to fly down to their blessed companionship.  Suddenly over the tree-tops of a golden glade he descried a starry globe which shone like chrysoprase, and round and round it a little blue bird flew joyously.  And so swiftly it flew that hardly had it gone before it had returned again.
Rheinfrid turned to the Angel to question him, but the Angel, who was aware of his thoughts, said, "Yes, it is the same globe, only we see it now from the other side.  Each circle that the bird makes is a hundred years; for five hundred already have you been here, but you must now return."
Then the Angel touched the monk's head, and Rheinfrid closed his eyes, and in an instant it seemed to him as though he were awaking from a long sleep.  Cold and rigid were his limbs, and as he tried to sit up each movement made them ache.  He found that he had been lying under an aged oak.  He rubbed his hands together for warmth, and a white lichen which had overgrown them peeled off in long threads.  A heavy white beard, tangled with grey moss, covered his breast, and the hair of his head, white and matted with green tendrils, had grown about his body.
Slowly and painfully he moved from tree to tree till he reached a broad road, and saw before him a bridge, and beyond the river a fair town clustered on the higher ground.  So strange a town he had never beheld before--such a town as one sees in a foreign land, built with quaint roofs and gables and curiously coloured.  As he crossed the bridge he met a woman who stared at him in amazement.  He raised his head to speak, but he had lost the power of utterance.  The woman waited; and at last with a feeble stammering speech he asked her the name of the place.  She shook her head and said she did not understand his words, and with a look of pity she went on her way.
Then down to the bridge came an urchin, and Rheinfrid repeated his question.
"This is Eovesholme," said the lad.
"That cannot be," said Rheinfrid, "for it is little more than twice seven days since I left Eovesholme, and this place is noway like the place you name."
"Nay, but it is Eovesholme," replied the lad, "and you are one of the monks who used to be here before the King pulled down the Abbey."
"Pulled down the Abbey!  Hath King William pulled down the Abbey?" Rheinfrid asked in bewilderment.
"Nay, it is bluff King Hal who has pulled the Abbey down.  Come, and you shall see."
The lad took Rheinfrid by the hand and led him through the streets till they came to the ruins.  Only one beautiful sculptured arch was left standing, but Rheinfrid had never seen it before.  They passed through and stood among a litter of stones, tumbled drums of pillars and fragments of carved mouldings and capitals.  Rheinfrid recognised the spot.  The land was the same, and the river, and the far hills, but nearly all the forest had been cleared, and the Abbey had vanished. What had happened to him and to them?
"Hast thou where to pass the night, old father?" the lad asked.
Rheinfrid shook his head sorrowfully.
"Then I will show thee a place," he said.
And again he took Rheinfrid by the hand, and let him among the ruins till they came to a flight of stone steps which led down into the crypt of the minster.  These they descended, and there was a dim light in the place, and Rheinfrid's heart beat quickly, for he knew the pillars and vaulted roofs and walls of this undercroft.
"Here you may rest peacefully and sleep well," said the urchin; "no one will venture here to disturb your slumber."
"Sorrow be far from thee, little son," said Rheinfrid, speaking he perceived that it was the Child, and that the Child's head was crowned with roses and that he carried a rose in his hand.
Then the aged monk sank on the cold stones of his old minster, faint and happy, for he knew now that he had finished his journey.  But the Child touched Rheinfrid's brow with the rose he carried, and the old man fell asleep, and all the crypt was dark.
Lighting the Lamps
Now that it was the cool of the day (when God walked in Paradise), and the straggling leaves of the limes were swaying in the fresh stream of the breeze, and the book was finished--this very book--and at last, after many busy evenings I was free to do as I pleased, W. V. and I slipped away on a quiet stroll before bedtime.
It was really very late for a little girl--nearly nine o'clock; but when one _is_ a little girl a walk between sunset and dark is like a ramble in fairyland; and after the heat of the day the air was sweet and pleasant, and in the west there still lingered a beautiful afterglow.
We went a little way in the direction of the high trees of Caen Wood, where, you know, William the Conqueror had a hunting lodge; and as we passed under the green fringes of the rowans and the birches which overhung the pathway, it was delightful to think that perchance over this very ground on which we were walking the burly Master of England may have galloped in chase of the tall deer.
"He loved them as if he were their father," said W. V., glancing up at me with a laugh.  "My history book says that.  But it wasn't very nice to kill them if he loved them, was it, father?"
We turned down the new road they are making.  It runs quite into the fields for some distance, and then goes sharp to the right.  A pleasant smell of hay was blowing up the road, and when we reached the angle we saw two old stacks and the beginning of a new one; and the next field had been mown and was dotted with haycocks.
On the half-finished road a steam roller stood, with its tarpaulin drawn over it for the night.  In the field, along the wooden fence, some loads of dross had been shot between the haycocks; lengths of sod had been stripped off the soil and thrown in a heap, and planks had been laid down for the wheelbarrows.  A rake, which some haymaker had left, stood planted in the ground, teeth uppermost; beside it a labourer's barrow lay overturned.  A few yards away a thick elderberry bush was growing dim in the twilight, and its bunches of blossom looked curiously white and spectral.
I think even W. V. felt it strange to see this new road so brusquely invading the ancient fields.  I looked across the frank natural acres (as if they were a sort of wild creature), stretching away with their hedgerows and old trees to the blue outline of the hills on the horizon, and wondered how much longer one might see the rose-red of sunset showing through interlaced branches, or dark knots of coppice silhouetted against the grey-green breadths of tranquil twilight.
When we went a little further we caught sight among the trees of some out-buildings of the farm.  What a lost, pathetic look they had!
Thinking of the stories in my book, it seemed to me that the scene before me was a figure of the change which took place when the life we know invaded and absorbed the strange mediaeval life which we know no longer, and which it is now so difficult to realise.
Slowly the afterglow faded; when you looked carefully for a star, here and there a little speck of gold could be found in the heavens; the birds were all in their nests, head under wing; white and grey moths were beginning to flutter to and fro.
Suddenly over the fields the sound of church-bells floated to us.
"Is that the Angelus, father?" asked W. V.
"No, dear; I think it must be the ringers practising."
"If it had been the Angelus, would St. Francis have stood still to say the prayer?"
"I think he would have knelt down to say it.  That would be more like St. Francis."
"And would William the Conqueror?"
"Why, no; I fancy he would have taken it for the curfew bell."
"They do still ring the curfew bell in some places, don't they, father?"
"Oh yes; in several places; but, of course, they don't cover up their fires."
"I like to hear of those old bells; don't you, father?"
As we reached the end of the new road we saw the man lighting the lamp there; and we watched him going quickly from one post to another, leaving a little flower of fire wherever he stopped.  All was very quiet, and, as he went down the street, we could hear the sound of his footsteps growing fainter and fainter in the distance.  All our streets, you must know, are lined with trees, trees both in the gardens and on the side-walks, and the lamps glittered among the leaves and branches like so many stars.  When we passed under them we noticed how the light tinged the foliage that was nearest with a greenish ash-colour, almost like the undersides of aspen-leaves.
"Isn't it just like a fairy village?" asked W. V.
On our way down our own street I pointed silently to the Forest.  High over the billowy outline of the darkened tree-tops the church of the Oak-men was clear against the weather-gleam.  W. V. nodded: "I expect all the Oak boys and girls have said, 'God bless this house from thatch to floor,' and gone to bed long ago."  Since she heard the story of the Guardians of the Door, that has been her own favourite prayer at bed-time.
Thinking of the lighting of the lamps after she had been safely tucked in, I tried to make her a little song about it.  I don't think she will like it as much as she liked the actual lighting of the lamps, but in years to come it may remind her of that delightful spectacle.
THE LAMPLIGHTER
From lamp to lamp, from street to street, He speeds with faintlier echoing feet, A pause--a glint of light! And, lamp by lamp, with stars he marks his round.
So Love, when least of Love we dream, Comes in the dusk with magic gleam. A pause--a touch--so slight! And life with clear celestial lights is crowned.
End of Project Gutenberg's A Child's Book of Saints, by William Canton

= = = PG42232 = = =
A CHILD'S DREAM OF A STAR
Produced by Greg Bergquist, Matthew Wheaton and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
A CHILD’S DREAM OF A STAR.
BY CHARLES DICKENS.
_WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY HAMMATT BILLINGS._
BOSTON: FIELDS, OSGOOD, & CO. 1871.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1870, BY FIELDS, OSGOOD, & CO., in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.
UNIVERSITY PRESS: WELCH, BIGELOW, & CO., CAMBRIDGE.
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
ENGRAVED BY W. J. LINTON.
A CHILD’S DREAM OF A STAR.
There was once a child, and he strolled about a good deal, and thought of a number of things. He had a sister, who was a child too, and his constant companion. These two used to wonder all day long. They wondered at the beauty of the flowers; they wondered at the height and blueness of the sky; they wondered at the depth of the bright water; they wondered at the goodness and the power of GOD, who made the lovely world.
They used to say to one another, sometimes, Supposing all the children upon earth were to die, would the flowers and the water and the sky be sorry? They believed they would be sorry. For, said they, the buds are the children of the flowers, and the little playful streams that gambol down the hillsides are the children of the water; and the smallest bright specks playing at hide-and-seek in the sky all night must surely be the children of the stars; and they would all be grieved to see their playmates, the children of men, no more.
There was one clear shining star that used to come out in the sky before the rest, near the church-spire, above the graves. It was larger and more beautiful, they thought, than all the others, and every night they watched for it, standing hand in hand at a window. Whoever saw it first cried out, “I see the star!” And often they cried out both together, knowing so well when it would rise and where. So they grew to be such friends with it, that, before lying down in their beds, they always looked out once again, to bid it good night; and when they were turning round to sleep, they used to say, “God bless the star!”
But while she was still very young, O, very, very young, the sister drooped, and came to be so weak that she could no longer stand in the window at night; and then the child looked sadly out by himself, and when he saw the star, turned round and said to the patient pale face on the bed, “I see the star!” And then a smile would come upon the face, and a little weak voice used to say, “God bless my brother and the star!”
And so the time came, all too soon! when the child looked out alone, and when there was no face on the bed; and when there was a little grave among the graves, not there before; and when the star made long rays down towards him, as he saw it through his tears.
Now, these rays were so bright, and they seemed to make such a shining way from earth to heaven, that when the child went to his solitary bed, he dreamed about the star; and dreamed that, lying where he was, he saw a train of people taken up that sparkling road by angels. And the star, opening, showed him a great world of light, where many more such angels waited to receive them.
All these angels, who were waiting, turned their beaming eyes upon the people who were carried up into the star; and some came out from the long rows in which they stood, and fell upon the people’s necks, and kissed them tenderly, and went away with them down avenues of light, and were so happy in their company, that, lying in his bed, he wept for joy.
But there were many angels who did not go with them, and among them one he knew. The patient face that once had lain upon the bed was glorified and radiant, but his heart found out his sister among all the host.
His sister’s angel lingered near the entrance of the star, and said to the leader among those who had brought the people thither, “Is my brother come?”
And he said, “No.”
She was turning hopefully away, when the child stretched out his arms, and cried, “O sister, I am here! Take me!” And then she turned her beaming eyes upon him, and it was night; and the star was shining into the room, making long rays down towards him as he saw it through his tears.
From that hour forth, the child looked out upon the star as on the home he was to go to, when his time should come; and he thought that he did not belong to the earth alone, but to the star too, because of his sister’s angel gone before.
There was a baby born to be a brother to the child; and while he was so little that he never yet had spoken word, he stretched his tiny form out on his bed, and died.
Again the child dreamed of the opened star, and of the company of angels, and the train of people, and the rows of angels with their beaming eyes all turned upon those people’s faces.
Said his sister’s angel to the leader, “Is my brother come?”
And he said, “Not that one, but another.”
As the child beheld his brother’s angel in her arms, he cried, “O sister, I am here! Take me!” And she turned and smiled upon him, and the star was shining.
He grew to be a young man, and was busy at his books when an old servant came to him and said, “Thy mother is no more. I bring her blessing on her darling son!”
Again at night he saw the star, and all that former company. Said his sister’s angel to the leader, “Is my brother come?”
And he said, “Thy mother!”
A mighty cry of joy went forth through all the star, because the mother was reunited to her two children. And he stretched out his arms and cried, “O mother, sister, and brother, I am here! Take me!”
And they answered him, “Not yet.” And the star was shining.
He grew to be a man, whose hair was turning gray; and he was sitting in his chair by the fireside, heavy with grief, and with his face bedewed with tears, when the star opened once again.
Said his sister’s angel to the leader, “Is my brother come?”
And he said, “Nay, but his maiden daughter.”
And the man who had been the child saw his daughter, newly lost to him, a celestial creature among those three, and he said, “My daughter’s head is on my sister’s bosom, and her arm is round my mother’s neck, and at her feet there is the baby of old time, and I can bear the parting from her, GOD be praised!”
And the star was shining.
Thus the child came to be an old man, and his once smooth face was wrinkled, and his steps were slow and feeble, and his back was bent. And one night as he lay upon his bed, his children standing round, he cried, as he had cried so long ago, “I see the star!”
They whispered one another, “He is dying.”
And he said, “I am. My age is falling from me like a garment, and I move towards the star as a child. And O my Father, now I thank thee that it has so often opened to receive those dear ones who await me!”
And the star was shining; and it shines upon his grave.
End of Project Gutenberg's A Child's Dream of a Star, by Charles Dickens

= = = PG61939 = = =
A CHILD'S DREAM OF THE ZOO
Transcribed from the 1886 edition by David Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org
[Picture: Public domain cover]
A CHILD’S DREAM OF THE ZOO,
BY
WILLIAM MANNING
* * * * *
AS RECITED BY HIM AT THE
Entertainment at the Brompton Hospital,
TUESDAY EVENING, FEBRUARY 16, 1886.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
A DREAM.
IF Artists at their easels Should ever paint the measles, I hope they’ll try and put the curious dreams in too; For when I went to bed With an aching in my head, And feeling rather red, I saw the Long-tailed Monkey, and the Keeper from the Zoo.
We had a little talk And they said “we’ll take a walk; We’ve got a Hastings Donkey that perhaps will do for you;” And though the sky was dark We made for Regent’s Park, My friends the Long-tailed Monkey and the Keeper from the Zoo.
They said “we see no reason, Though it’s late-ish in the season, Why a little picnic we shouldn’t try and do! And if you’ve no objection, We’ll make our own selection Of the many Midnight Sports in the Gardens of the Zoo!”
My word it made me stare As soon as we were there, To see so many pleasant faces that I knew, It was like a Noah’s Ark, In the middle of the Park, With nothing savage left in the creatures of the Zoo!
The dens were all unlocked, And yet I was not shocked To mingle in the throng, though my Donkey gave a bray! But the Zebra calmed his fears, And the Wild Ass stroked his ears, And promised him a Thistle as soon as it was day.
The kind Angora Goat, Now brought a little note, Which he said was sent for me from Madame Kangaroo, Who “hoped that I was well, With love from Miss Gazelle”— But _this_ I did _not_ tell My friend the Long-tailed Monkey or the Keeper from the Zoo!
Lynxes, Tigers, Leopards, Were all as tame as Shepherds, The baby Hippopotamus was playing with the Storks! The Elephants all hurried, Though not the least bit flurried, With Trunks of birthday presents for little Master Fawkes!
Badgers, Wolves, and Foxes, All had left their boxes, And coming up to me said “Johnnie, how d’ye do?” And then that old Hyena! I wish you could have seen her, And the smile of recognition she gave me at the Zoo!
The tall Giraffes and Camels, Without their daily trammels, Were cracking merry jokes with Prickly Porcupine And the funny little Monkeys, Did the work of flunkeys, Served the Bears with buns, and gave the Keeper wine!
The Serpents hugged the Rabbits! What strangely altered habits! The Eagle and the Vulture did nothing else but coo! The Cockatoos and Jays Both talked each other’s praise, Till the Snake did spring his Rattle in the Gardens of the Zoo!
The Squirrel and Baboon Went up in a Balloon; And going up the steps to get a better view, I waited just to see Professor Chim Pan Zee, Who lectured on “Man’s Origin” from the Bear-pit of the Zoo!
The Lioness and Cubs Were romping in the shrubs, While the Lion took a ramble to see a sight or two; And how the Gardens ring With cheering for the King! They’re very loyal subjects in the Kingdom of the Zoo!
The Bears they call the Polar, And Rhinoceri (the Solar!) Performed gymnastic feats with my droll old friend the Gnu! What balancing and vaulting! What double somersaulting! I never saw such acrobats—excepting at the Zoo!
The laughter came in peals From the smooth and glossy Seals, As they swallowed Flying Fish of every varied hue; And the phosphorescent light So beautifully bright, That marked their rapid flight, Made a Grand Illumination in the Gardens of the Zoo!
I could not count the faces Of all who joined the Races, But the Tortoise came in first to keep Tradition true, And the Cobra-di-Capella Seemed quite a pleasant fellah As the Keeper of the Ring at the Races of the Zoo!
Now Jumbo the “Sagacious,” So Princely and so gracious, Had lent his back capacious, To all the tribes of Monkeys who cared to see the view! With Alice as his Bride Now strutting by his side, He walked with stately stride! Oh! happiest of families within the dear old Zoo!
Now Birds of every feather Flock in haste together, In spiral column twining, Their little bright eyes shining, Their lovely plumage glittering, Their tiny tongues all twittering, To pay their nightly homage to the Owls—and Owlets too! In circles whirling high, From the Clock Tower to the sky;— A pretty sight to look at from the Terrace of the Zoo!
Birds and Beasts and Fishes, Gave me kindest wishes; I felt as much at home as I’ve often felt with you! But my gentle little Neddy Was dreadfully unsteady, And much the Wildest Animal that evening in the Zoo!
And then they had a Dance! The latest things from France! With Highland reels and jigs, quadrilles, and polkas too! And Mrs. Hippopot It made her very hot, Waltzing with the Ape in the Tunnel of the Zoo!
And when the Moon grew pale, The Peacock’s brilliant tail Shed forth its lustrous rays to light the dancers through! And how we clapped our hands At the Armadillo’s bands! They played such splendid tunes that evening in the Zoo!
Now when the Sports were ended, And all the figures blended, I heard a curious scream from a Parrot in a tree! And this is what she said: (It startled little Ned, And went right through my head!) “Polly put the kettle on, we’ll all take tea!”
This seemed so good a joke, I laughed . . . and then . . . awoke! Papa was standing near, my med’cine being due, And so I saw no more, But soon began to snore, And forgot the Long-tailed Monkey and the Keeper from the Zoo!
[Picture: Comic graphic of lady walking dogs]

= = = PG25609 = = =
A CHILD'S GARDEN OF VERSES
Produced by Juliet Sutherland Christine D. and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
_A Child's Garden of Verses_
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON
_Illustrated by Jessie Willcox Smith_
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS, _New York_
Copyright, 1905, By CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
Printed in the United States of America
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without the permission of Charles Scribner's Sons
DD-3.64[H]
Reset March 1955
[Illustration]
TO ALISON CUNNINGHAM
FROM HER BOY
_For the long nights you lay awake_ _And watched for my unworthy sake:_ _For your most comfortable hand_ _That led me through the uneven land:_ _For all the story-books you read:_ _For all the pains you comforted:_
_For all you pitied, all you bore,_ _In sad and happy days of yore:--_ _My second Mother, my first Wife,_ _The angel of my infant life--_ _From the sick child, now well and old,_ _Take, nurse, the little book you hold!_
_And grant it, Heaven, that all who read_ _May find as dear a nurse at need,_ _And every child who lists my rhyme,_ _In the bright, fireside, nursery clime,_ _May hear it in as kind a voice_ _As made my childish days rejoice!_
_R. L. S._
THE ORIGINAL
TITLE PAGE
FOR
A CHILD'S GARDEN OF VERSES
BY
JESSIE WILLCOX SMITH
[Illustration]
A CHILD'S GARDEN OF VERSES ROBERT LOVIS STEVENSON WITH ILLVSTRATIONS BY JESSIE WILLCOX SMITH
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS NEW YORK     MCMV
CONTENTS
TO ALISON CUNNINGHAM                                                 vii
BED IN SUMMER                                                          3
A THOUGHT                                                              4
AT THE SEA-SIDE                                                        5
YOUNG NIGHT-THOUGHT                                                    6
WHOLE DUTY OF CHILDREN                                                 7
RAIN                                                                   7
PIRATE STORY                                                           8
FOREIGN LANDS                                                          9
WINDY NIGHTS                                                          10
TRAVEL                                                                11
SINGING                                                               13
LOOKING FORWARD                                                       14
A GOOD PLAY                                                           15
WHERE GO THE BOATS?                                                   16
AUNTIE'S SKIRTS                                                       17
THE LAND OF COUNTERPANE                                               18
THE LAND OF NOD                                                       19
MY SHADOW                                                             20
SYSTEM                                                                22
A GOOD BOY                                                            23
ESCAPE AT BEDTIME                                                     24
MARCHING SONG                                                         25
THE COW                                                               26
HAPPY THOUGHT                                                         27
THE WIND                                                              28
KEEPSAKE MILL                                                         29
GOOD AND BAD CHILDREN                                                 31
FOREIGN CHILDREN                                                      33
THE SUN TRAVELS                                                       35
THE LAMPLIGHTER                                                       36
MY BED IS A BOAT                                                      37
THE MOON                                                              39
THE SWING                                                             40
TIME TO RISE                                                          41
LOOKING-GLASS RIVER                                                   42
FAIRY BREAD                                                           44
FROM A RAILWAY CARRIAGE                                               45
WINTER-TIME                                                           46
THE HAYLOFT                                                           47
FAREWELL TO THE FARM                                                  49
NORTH-WEST PASSAGE                                                    50
1. Good-Night                                                       50
2. Shadow March                                                     51
3. In Port                                                          52
THE CHILD ALONE
THE UNSEEN PLAYMATE                                                   57
MY SHIP AND I                                                         59
MY KINGDOM                                                            61
PICTURE-BOOKS IN WINTER                                               63
MY TREASURES                                                          65
BLOCK CITY                                                            67
THE LAND OF STORY-BOOKS                                               69
ARMIES IN THE FIRE                                                    71
THE LITTLE LAND                                                       73
GARDEN DAYS
NIGHT AND DAY                                                         79
NEST EGGS                                                             82
THE FLOWERS                                                           84
SUMMER SUN                                                            86
THE DUMB SOLDIER                                                      87
AUTUMN FIRES                                                          89
THE GARDENER                                                          90
HISTORICAL ASSOCIATIONS                                               92
ENVOYS
TO WILLIE AND HENRIETTA                                               97
TO MY MOTHER                                                          98
TO AUNTIE                                                             99
TO MINNIE                                                            100
TO MY NAME-CHILD                                                     103
TO ANY READER                                                        105
ILLUSTRATIONS
FROM DRAWINGS IN COLOR BY JESSIE WILLCOX SMITH
FACING PAGE
BED IN SUMMER                                                          4
In winter I get up at night And dress by yellow candle-light.
FOREIGN LANDS                                                           10
I held the trunk with both my hands And looked abroad on foreign lands.
THE LAND OF COUNTERPANE                                                 18
I was the giant great and still That sits upon the pillow-hill,
MY SHADOW                                                               20
He stays so close beside me, he's a coward you can see; I'd think shame to stick to nursie as that shadow sticks to me!
FOREIGN CHILDREN                                                        34
Little Indian, Sioux or Crow, Little frosty Eskimo, Little Turk or Japanee, Oh! don't you wish that you were me?
LOOKING-GLASS RIVER                                                     42
We can see our coloured faces Floating on the shaken pool
THE HAYLOFT                                                             48
Oh, what a joy to clamber there, Oh, what a place for play, With the sweet, the dim, the dusty air, The happy hills of hay!
NORTH-WEST PASSAGE                                                      50
And face with an undaunted tread The long black passage up to bed.
PICTURE-BOOKS IN WINTER                                                 64
Water now is turned to stone Nurse and I can walk upon; Still we find the flowing brooks In the picture story-books.
THE LITTLE LAND                                                         74
I have just to shut my eyes To go sailing through the skies-- To go sailing far away To the pleasant Land of Play;
THE FLOWERS                                                             84
All the names I know from nurse: Gardener's garters, Shepherd's purse, Bachelor's buttons, Lady's smock, And the Lady Hollyhock.
TO AUNTIE                                                              100
What did the other children do? And what were childhood, wanting you?
A CHILD'S GARDEN OF VERSES
[Illustration]
BED IN SUMMER
In winter I get up at night And dress by yellow candle-light. In summer, quite the other way, I have to go to bed by day.
I have to go to bed and see The birds still hopping on the tree, Or hear the grown-up people's feet Still going past me in the street.
And does it not seem hard to you, When all the sky is clear and blue, And I should like so much to play, To have to go to bed by day?
[Illustration: Mary Hans]
A THOUGHT
It is very nice to think The world is full of meat and drink, With little children saying grace In every Christian kind of place.
[Illustration: Biddy Fifine]
[Illustration: BED IN SUMMER]
[Illustration]
AT THE SEA-SIDE
When I was down beside the sea A wooden spade they gave to me To dig the sandy shore.
My holes were empty like a cup. In every hole the sea came up, Till it could come no more.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
YOUNG NIGHT-THOUGHT
All night long and every night, When my mama puts out the light, I see the people marching by, As plain as day, before my eye.
Armies and emperors and kings, All carrying different kinds of things, And marching in so grand a way, You never saw the like by day.
So fine a show was never seen At the great circus on the green; For every kind of beast and man Is marching in that caravan.
At first they move a little slow, But still the faster on they go, And still beside them close I keep Until we reach the town of Sleep.
[Illustration]
WHOLE DUTY OF CHILDREN
A child should always say what's true And speak when he is spoken to, And behave mannerly at table; At least as far as he is able.
RAIN
The rain is raining all around, It falls on field and tree, It rains on the umbrellas here, And on the ships at sea.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
PIRATE STORY
Three of us afloat in the meadow by the swing, Three of us aboard in the basket on the lea. Winds are in the air, they are blowing in the spring, And waves are on the meadow like the waves there are at sea.
Where shall we adventure, to-day that we're afloat, Wary of the weather and steering by a star? Shall it be to Africa, a-steering of the boat, To Providence, or Babylon, or off to Malabar?
Hi! but here's a squadron a-rowing on the sea-- Cattle on the meadow a-charging with a roar! Quick, and we'll escape them, they're as mad as they can be, The wicket is the harbour and the garden is the shore.
FOREIGN LANDS
Up into the cherry tree Who should climb but little me? I held the trunk with both my hands And looked abroad on foreign lands.
I saw the next door garden lie, Adorned with flowers, before my eye, And many pleasant places more That I had never seen before.
I saw the dimpling river pass And be the sky's blue looking-glass; The dusty roads go up and down With people tramping in to town.
If I could find a higher tree Farther and farther I should see, To where the grown-up river slips Into the sea among the ships,
To where the roads on either hand Lead onward into fairy land, Where all the children dine at five, And all the playthings come alive.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
WINDY NIGHTS
Whenever the moon and stars are set, Whenever the wind is high, All night long in the dark and wet, A man goes riding by. Late in the night when the fires are out, Why does he gallop and gallop about?
Whenever the trees are crying aloud, And ships are tossed at sea, By, on the highway, low and loud, By at the gallop goes he. By at the gallop he goes, and then By he comes back at the gallop again.
[Illustration]
[Illustration: FOREIGN LANDS]
TRAVEL
I should like to rise and go Where the golden apples grow;-- Where below another sky Parrot islands anchored lie, And, watched by cockatoos and goats, Lonely Crusoes building boats;-- Where in sunshine reaching out Eastern cities, miles about, Are with mosque and minaret Among sandy gardens set, And the rich goods from near and far Hang for sale in the bazaar;-- Where the Great Wall round China goes, And on one side the desert blows, And with bell and voice and drum, Cities on the other hum;-- Where are forests, hot as fire, Wide as England, tall as a spire, Full of apes and cocoa-nuts And the negro hunters' huts;-- Where the knotty crocodile Lies and blinks in the Nile, And the red flamingo flies Hunting fish before his eyes;-- Where in jungles, near and far, Man-devouring tigers are, Lying close and giving ear Lest the hunt be drawing near,
[Illustration]
Or a comer-by be seen Swinging in a palanquin;-- Where among the desert sands Some deserted city stands, All its children, sweep and prince, Grown to manhood ages since, Not a foot in street or house, Not a stir of child or mouse, And when kindly falls the night, In all the town no spark of light. There I'll come when I'm a man With a camel caravan; Light a fire in the gloom Of some dusty dining-room; See the pictures on the walls, Heroes, fights, and festivals; And in a corner find the toys Of the old Egyptian boys.
[Illustration]
SINGING
Of speckled eggs the birdie sings And nests among the trees; The sailor sings of ropes and things In ships upon the seas.
The children sing in far Japan, The children sing in Spain; The organ with the organ man Is singing in the rain.
[Illustration]
LOOKING FORWARD
When I am grown to man's estate I shall be very proud and great, And tell the other girls and boys Not to meddle with my toys.
A GOOD PLAY
We built a ship upon the stairs All made of the back-bedroom chairs, And filled it full of sofa pillows To go a-sailing on the billows.
We took a saw and several nails, And water in the nursery pails; And Tom said, "Let us also take An apple and a slice of cake;"-- Which was enough for Tom and me To go a-sailing on, till tea.
We sailed along for days and days And had the very best of plays; But Tom fell out and hurt his knee, So there was no one left but me.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
WHERE GO THE BOATS?
Dark brown is the river, Golden is the sand. It flows along for ever, With trees on either hand.
Green leaves a-floating, Castles of the foam, Boats of mine a-boating-- Where will all come home?
On goes the river And out past the mill, Away down the valley, Away down the hill.
Away down the river, A hundred miles or more, Other little children Shall bring my boats ashore.
[Illustration]
AUNTIE'S SKIRTS
Whenever Auntie moves around, Her dresses make a curious sound, They trail behind her up the floor, And trundle after through the door.
[Illustration]
THE LAND OF COUNTERPANE
When I was sick and lay a-bed, I had two pillows at my head, And all my toys beside me lay To keep me happy all the day.
And sometimes for an hour or so I watched my leaden soldiers go, With different uniforms and drills, Among the bed-clothes, through the hills;
And sometimes sent my ships in fleets All up and down among the sheets; Or brought my trees and houses out, And planted cities all about.
I was the giant great and still That sits upon the pillow-hill, And sees before him, dale and plain, The pleasant land of counterpane.
[Illustration: THE LAND OF COUNTERPANE]
THE LAND OF NOD
From breakfast on through all the day At home among my friends I stay, But every night I go abroad Afar into the land of Nod.
All by myself I have to go, With none to tell me what to do-- All alone beside the streams And up the mountain-sides of dreams.
The strangest things are there for me, Both things to eat and things to see, And many frightening sights abroad Till morning in the land of Nod.
Try as I like to find the way, I never can get back by day, Nor can remember plain and clear The curious music that I hear.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
MY SHADOW
I have a little shadow that goes in and out with me, And what can be the use of him is more than I can see. He is very, very like me from the heels up to the head; And I see him jump before me, when I jump into my bed.
The funniest thing about him is the way he likes to grow-- Not at all like proper children, which is always very slow; For he sometimes shoots up taller like an india-rubber ball, And he sometimes gets so little that there's none of him at all.
He hasn't got a notion of how children ought to play, And can only make a fool of me in every sort of way. He stays so close beside me, he's a coward you can see; I'd think shame to stick to nursie as that shadow sticks to me!
[Illustration: MY SHADOW]
One morning, very early, before the sun was up, I rose and found the shining dew on every buttercup; But my lazy little shadow, like an arrant sleepy-head, Had stayed at home behind me and was fast asleep in bed.
[Illustration]
SYSTEM
Every night my prayers I say, And get my dinner every day; And every day that I've been good, I get an orange after food.
The child that is not clean and neat, With lots of toys and things to eat, He is a naughty child, I'm sure-- Or else his dear papa is poor.
[Illustration]
A GOOD BOY
I woke before the morning, I was happy all the day, I never said an ugly word, but smiled and stuck to play.
And now at last the sun is going down behind the wood, And I am very happy, for I know that I've been good.
My bed is waiting cool and fresh, with linen smooth and fair And I must be off to sleepsin-by, and not forget my prayer.
I know that, till to-morrow I shall see the sun arise, No ugly dream shall fright my mind, no ugly sight my eyes.
But slumber hold me tightly till I waken in the dawn, And hear the thrushes singing in the lilacs round the lawn.
ESCAPE AT BEDTIME
The lights from the parlour and kitchen shone out Through the blinds and the windows and bars; And high overhead and all moving about, There were thousands of millions of stars. There ne'er were such thousands of leaves on a tree, Nor of people in church or the Park, As the crowds of the stars that looked down upon me, And that glittered and winked in the dark.
The Dog, and the Plough, and the Hunter, and all, And the star of the sailor, and Mars, These shone in the sky, and the pail by the wall Would be half full of water and stars.
They saw me at last, and they chased me with cries, And they soon had me packed into bed; But the glory kept shining and bright in my eyes, And the stars going round in my head.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
MARCHING SONG
Bring the comb and play upon it! Marching, here we come! Willie cocks his highland bonnet, Johnnie beats the drum.
Mary Jane commands the party, Peter leads the rear; Feet in time, alert and hearty, Each a Grenadier!
All in the most martial manner Marching double-quick; While the napkin, like a banner, Waves upon the stick!
Here's enough of fame and pillage, Great commander Jane! Now that we've been round the village, Let's go home again.
[Illustration]
THE COW
The friendly cow all red and white, I love with all my heart: She gives me cream with all her might, To eat with apple-tart.
She wanders lowing here and there, And yet she cannot stray, All in the pleasant open air, The pleasant light of day;
And blown by all the winds that pass And wet with all the showers, She walks among the meadow grass And eats the meadow flowers.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
HAPPY THOUGHT
The world is so full of a number of things, I'm sure we should all be as happy as kings.
THE WIND
I saw you toss the kites on high And blow the birds about the sky; And all around I heard you pass, Like ladies' skirts across the grass-- O wind, a-blowing all day long, O wind, that sings so loud a song!
I saw the different things you did, But always you yourself you hid. I felt you push, I heard you call, I could not see yourself at all-- O wind, a-blowing all day long, O wind, that sings so loud a song!
O you that are so strong and cold, O blower, are you young or old? Are you a beast of field and tree, Or just a stronger child than me? O wind, a-blowing all day long, O wind, that sings so loud a song!
[Illustration]
KEEPSAKE MILL
Over the borders, a sin without pardon, Breaking the branches and crawling below, Out through the breach in the wall of the garden, Down by the banks of the river, we go.
Here is the mill with the humming of thunder, Here is the weir with the wonder of foam, Here is the sluice with the race running under-- Marvellous places, though handy to home!
Sounds of the village grow stiller and stiller, Stiller the note of the birds on the hill; Dusty and dim are the eyes of the miller, Deaf are his ears with the moil of the mill.
Years may go by, and the wheel in the river Wheel as it wheels for us, children, to-day, Wheel and keep roaring and foaming for ever Long after all of the boys are away.
Home from the Indies and home from the ocean, Heroes and soldiers we all shall come home; Still we shall find the old mill wheel in motion, Turning and churning that river to foam.
You with the bean that I gave when we quarrelled, I with your marble of Saturday last, Honoured and old and all gaily apparelled, Here we shall meet and remember the past.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
GOOD AND BAD CHILDREN
Children, you are very little, And your bones are very brittle; If you would grow great and stately, You must try to walk sedately.
You must still be bright and quiet, And content with simple diet; And remain, through all bewild'ring, Innocent and honest children.
Happy hearts and happy faces, Happy play in grassy places-- That was how, in ancient ages, Children grew to kings and sages.
But the unkind and the unruly, And the sort who eat unduly, They must never hope for glory-- Theirs is quite a different story!
Cruel children, crying babies, All grew up as geese and gabies, Hated, as their age increases, By their nephews and their nieces.
[Illustration]
FOREIGN CHILDREN
Little Indian, Sioux or Crow, Little frosty Eskimo, Little Turk or Japanee, Oh! don't you wish that you were me?
You have seen the scarlet trees And the lions over seas; You have eaten ostrich eggs, And turned the turtles off their legs.
Such a life is very fine, But it's not so nice as mine: You must often, as you trod, Have wearied _not_ to be abroad.
You have curious things to eat, I am fed on proper meat; You must dwell beyond the foam, But I am safe and live at home. Little Indian, Sioux or Crow, Little frosty Eskimo, Little Turk or Japanee, Oh! don't you wish that you were me?
[Illustration: FOREIGN CHILDREN]
[Illustration]
THE SUN TRAVELS
The sun is not a-bed, when I At night upon my pillow lie; Still round the earth his way he takes, And morning after morning makes.
While here at home, in shining day, We round the sunny garden play, Each little Indian sleepy-head Is being kissed and put to bed.
And when at eve I rise from tea, Day dawns beyond the Atlantic Sea; And all the children in the West Are getting up and being dressed.
THE LAMPLIGHTER
My tea is nearly ready and the sun has left the sky. It's time to take the window to see Leerie going by; For every night at teatime and before you take your seat, With lantern and with ladder he comes posting up the street.
Now Tom would be a driver and Maria go to sea, And my papa's a banker and as rich as he can be; But I, when I am stronger and can choose what I'm to do, O Leerie, I'll go round at night and light the lamps with you!
For we are very lucky, with a lamp before the door, And Leerie stops to light it as he lights so many more; And oh! before you hurry by with ladder and with light; O Leerie, see a little child and nod to him tonight!
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
MY BED IS A BOAT
My bed is like a little boat; Nurse helps me in when I embark; She girds me in my sailor's coat And starts me in the dark.
At night, I go on board and say Good-night to all my friends on shore; I shut my eyes and sail away And see and hear no more.
And sometimes things to bed I take, As prudent sailors have to do; Perhaps a slice of wedding-cake, Perhaps a toy or two.
All night across the dark we steer; But when the day returns at last, Safe in my room, beside the pier, I find my vessel fast.
[Illustration]
THE MOON
The moon has a face like the clock in the hall; She shines on thieves on the garden wall, On streets and field and harbour quays, And birdies asleep in the forks of the trees.
The squalling cat and the squeaking mouse, The howling dog by the door of the house, The bat that lies in bed at noon, All love to be out by the light of the moon.
But all of the things that belong to the day Cuddle to sleep to be out of her way; And flowers and children close their eyes Till up in the morning the sun shall arise.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE SWING
How do you like to go up in a swing, Up in the air so blue? Oh, I do think it the pleasantest thing Ever a child can do!
Up in the air and over the wall, Till I can see so wide, Rivers and trees and cattle and all Over the countryside--
Till I look down on the garden green, Down on the roof so brown-- Up in the air I go flying again, Up in the air and down!
[Illustration]
TIME TO RISE
A birdie with a yellow bill Hopped upon the window sill, Cocked his shining eye and said: "Ain't you 'shamed, you sleepy-head!"
[Illustration]
LOOKING-GLASS RIVER
Smooth it glides upon its travel, Here a wimple, there a gleam-- O the clean gravel! O the smooth stream!
Sailing blossoms, silver fishes, Paven pools as clear as air-- How a child wishes To live down there!
We can see our coloured faces Floating on the shaken pool Down in cool places, Dim and very cool;
Till a wind or water wrinkle, Dipping marten, plumping trout, Spreads in a twinkle And blots all out.
See the rings pursue each other; All below grows black as night, Just as if mother Had blown out the light!
Patience, children, just a minute-- See the spreading circles die; The stream and all in it Will clear by-and-by.
FAIRY BREAD
Come up here, O dusty feet! Here is fairy bread to eat. Here in my retiring room, Children, you may dine On the golden smell of broom And the shade of pine; And when you have eaten well, Fairy stories hear and tell.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
FROM A RAILWAY CARRIAGE
Faster than fairies, faster than witches, Bridges and houses, hedges and ditches; And charging along like troops in a battle All through the meadows the horses and cattle: All of the sights of the hill and the plain Fly as thick as driving rain; And ever again, in the wink of an eye, Painted stations whistle by. Here is a child who clambers and scrambles, All by himself and gathering brambles; Here is a tramp who stands and gazes; And there is the green for stringing the daisies Here is a cart run away in the road Lumping along with man and load; And here is a mill, and there is a river: Each a glimpse and gone for ever!
WINTER-TIME
Late lies the wintry sun a-bed, A frosty, fiery sleepy-head; Blinks but an hour or two; and then, A blood-red orange, sets again.
Before the stars have left the skies, At morning in the dark I rise; And shivering in my nakedness, By the cold candle, bathe and dress.
Close by the jolly fire I sit To warm my frozen bones a bit; Or with a reindeer-sled, explore The colder countries round the door.
When to go out, my nurse doth wrap Me in my comforter and cap; The cold wind burns my face, and blows Its frosty pepper up my nose.
Black are my steps on silver sod; Thick blows my frosty breath abroad; And tree and house, and hill and lake, Are frosted like a wedding-cake.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE HAYLOFT
Through all the pleasant meadow-side The grass grew shoulder-high, Till the shining scythes went far and wide And cut it down to dry.
Those green and sweetly smelling crops They led in waggons home; And they piled them here in mountain tops For mountaineers to roam.
Here is Mount Clear, Mount Rusty-Nail, Mount Eagle and Mount High;-- The mice that in these mountains dwell, No happier are than I!
Oh, what a joy to clamber there, Oh, what a place for play, With the sweet, the dim, the dusty air, The happy hills of hay!
[Illustration: THE HAYLOFT]
[Illustration]
FAREWELL TO THE FARM
The coach is at the door at last; The eager children, mounting fast And kissing hands, in chorus sing: Good-bye, good-bye, to everything!
To house and garden, field and lawn, The meadow-gates we swang upon, To pump and stable, tree and swing, Good-bye, good-bye, to everything!
And fare you well for evermore, O ladder at the hayloft door, O hayloft where the cobwebs cling, Good-bye, good-bye, to everything!
Crack goes the whip, and off we go; The trees and houses smaller grow; Last, round the woody turn we swing: Good-bye, good-bye, to everything!
[Illustration]
NORTH-WEST PASSAGE
_1. Good-night_
When the bright lamp is carried in, The sunless hours again begin; O'er all without, in field and lane, The haunted night returns again.
Now we behold the embers flee About the firelit hearth; and see Our faces painted as we pass, Like pictures, on the window-glass.
Must we to bed indeed? Well then, Let us arise and go like men, And face with an undaunted tread The long black passage up to bed.
[Illustration: NORTH-WEST PASSAGE]
Farewell, O brother, sister, sire! O pleasant party round the fire! The songs you sing, the tales you tell, Till far to-morrow, fare ye well!
[Illustration]
_2. Shadow March_
All round the house is the jet-black night; It stares through the window-pane; It crawls in the corners, hiding from the light, And it moves with the moving flame.
Now my little heart goes a-beating like a drum, With the breath of the Bogie in my hair; And all round the candle the crooked shadows come, And go marching along up the stair.
The shadow of the balusters, the shadow of the lamp, The shadow of the child that goes to bed-- All the wicked shadows coming, tramp, tramp, tramp, With the black night overhead.
[Illustration]
_3. In Port_
Last, to the chamber where I lie My fearful footsteps patter nigh, And come from out the cold and gloom Into my warm and cheerful room.
There, safe arrived, we turn about To keep the coming shadows out, And close the happy door at last On all the perils that we past.
Then, when mamma goes by to bed, She shall come in with tip-toe tread, And see me lying warm and fast And in the Land of Nod at last.
THE CHILD ALONE
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE UNSEEN PLAYMATE
When children are playing alone on the green, In comes the playmate that never was seen. When children are happy and lonely and good, The Friend of the Children comes out of the wood.
Nobody heard him and nobody saw, His is a picture you never could draw, But he's sure to be present, abroad or at home, When children are happy and playing alone.
He lies in the laurels, he runs on the grass, He sings when you tinkle the musical glass; Whene'er you are happy and cannot tell why, The Friend of the Children is sure to be by!
He loves to be little, he hates to be big, 'Tis he that inhabits the caves that you dig; 'Tis he when you play with your soldiers of tin That sides with the Frenchmen and never can win.
'Tis he, when at night you go off to your bed, Bids you go to your sleep and not trouble your head; For wherever they're lying, in cupboard or shelf, 'Tis he will take care of your playthings himself!
[Illustration]
MY SHIP AND I
O it's I that am the captain of a tidy little ship, Of a ship that goes a-sailing on the pond; And my ship it keeps a-turning all around and all about; But when I'm a little older, I shall find the secret out How to send my vessel sailing on beyond.
For I mean to grow as little as the dolly at the helm, And the dolly I intend to come alive; And with him beside to help me, it's a-sailing I shall go, It's a-sailing on the water, when the jolly breezes blow And the vessel goes a divie-divie-dive.
O it's then you'll see me sailing through the rushes and the reeds, And you'll hear the water singing at the prow; For beside the dolly sailor, I'm to voyage and explore, To land upon the island where no dolly was before, And to fire the penny cannon in the bow.
[Illustration]
MY KINGDOM
Down by a shining water well I found a very little dell, No higher than my head. The heather and the gorse about In summer bloom were coming out, Some yellow and some red.
I called the little pool a sea; The little hills were big to me; For I am very small. I made a boat, I made a town, I searched the caverns up and down, And named them one and all.
And all about was mine, I said, The little sparrows overhead, The little minnows too. This was the world and I was king; For me the bees came by to sing, For me the swallows flew.
I played there were no deeper seas, Nor any wider plains than these, Nor other kings than me. At last I heard my mother call Out from the house at evenfall, To call me home to tea.
And I must rise and leave my dell, And leave my dimpled water well, And leave my heather blooms. Alas! and as my home I neared, How very big my nurse appeared. How great and cool the rooms!
[Illustration]
PICTURE-BOOKS IN WINTER
Summer fading, winter comes-- Frosty mornings, tingling thumbs, Window robins, winter rooks, And the picture story-books.
Water now is turned to stone Nurse and I can walk upon; Still we find the flowing brooks In the picture story-books.
All the pretty things put by, Wait upon the children's eye, Sheep and shepherds, trees and crooks, In the picture story-books.
We may see how all things are, Seas and cities, near and far, And the flying fairies' looks, In the picture story-books.
How am I to sing your praise, Happy chimney-corner days, Sitting safe in nursery nooks, Reading picture story-books?
[Illustration: PICTURE-BOOKS IN WINTER]
[Illustration]
MY TREASURES
These nuts, that I keep in the back of the nest Where all my lead soldiers are lying at rest, Were gathered in autumn by nursie and me In a wood with a well by the side of the sea.
This whistle we made (and how clearly it sounds!) By the side of a field at the end of the grounds. Of a branch of a plane, with a knife of my own, It was nursie who made it, and nursie alone!
The stone, with the white and the yellow and grey, We discovered I cannot tell _how_ far away; And I carried it back although weary and cold, For though father denies it, I'm sure it is gold.
But of all my treasures the last is the king, For there's very few children possess such a thing; And that is a chisel, both handle and blade, Which a man who was really a carpenter made.
[Illustration]
BLOCK CITY
What are you able to build with your blocks? Castles and palaces, temples and docks. Rain may keep raining, and others go roam, But I can be happy and building at home.
Let the sofa be mountains, the carpet be sea, There I'll establish a city for me: A kirk and a mill and a palace beside, And a harbour as well where my vessels may ride.
Great is the palace with pillar and wall, A sort of a tower on the top of it all, And steps coming down in an orderly way To where my toy vessels lie safe in the bay.
This one is sailing and that one is moored: Hark to the song of the sailors on board! And see, on the steps of my palace, the kings Coming and going with presents and things!
Now I have done with it, down let it go! All in a moment the town is laid low. Block upon block lying scattered and free, What is there left of my town by the sea?
Yet as I saw it, I see it again, The kirk and the palace, the ships and the men, And as long as I live and where'er I may be, I'll always remember my town by the sea.
[Illustration]
THE LAND OF STORY-BOOKS
At evening when the lamp is lit, Around the fire my parents sit; They sit at home and talk and sing, And do not play at anything.
Now, with my little gun, I crawl All in the dark along the wall, And follow round the forest track Away behind the sofa back.
There, in the night, where none can spy, All in my hunter's camp I lie, And play at books that I have read Till it is time to go to bed.
These are the hills, these are the woods, These are my starry solitudes; And there the river by whose brink The roaring lions come to drink.
I see the others far away As if in firelit camp they lay, And I, like to an Indian scout, Around their party prowled about.
So, when my nurse comes in for me, Home I return across the sea, And go to bed with backward looks At my dear land of Story-books.
[Illustration]
ARMIES IN THE FIRE
The lamps now glitter down the street; Faintly sound the falling feet; And the blue even slowly falls About the garden trees and walls.
Now in the falling of the gloom The red fire paints the empty room: And warmly on the roof it looks, And flickers on the backs of books.
Armies march by tower and spire Of cities blazing, in the fire;-- Till as I gaze with staring eyes, The armies fade, the lustre dies.
Then once again the glow returns; Again the phantom city burns; And down the red-hot valley, lo! The phantom armies marching go!
Blinking embers, tell me true Where are those armies marching to, And what the burning city is That crumbles in your furnaces!
[Illustration]
THE LITTLE LAND
When at home alone I sit, And am very tired of it, I have just to shut my eyes To go sailing through the skies-- To go sailing far away To the pleasant Land of Play; To the fairy land afar Where the Little People are; Where the clover-tops are trees, And the rain-pools are the seas, And the leaves, like little ships, Sail about on tiny trips; And above the daisy tree Through the grasses, High o'erhead the Bumble Bee Hums and passes.
In that forest to and fro I can wander, I can go; See the spider and the fly, And the ants go marching by, Carrying parcels with their feet Down the green and grassy street. I can in the sorrel sit Where the ladybird alit. I can climb the jointed grass And on high See the greater swallows pass In the sky, And the round sun rolling by Heeding no such things as I.
Through that forest I can pass Till, as in a looking-glass, Humming fly and daisy tree And my tiny self I see, Painted very clear and neat On the rain-pool at my feet. Should a leaflet come to land Drifting near to where I stand, Straight I'll board that tiny boat Round the rain-pool sea to float.
Little thoughtful creatures sit On the grassy coasts of it; Little things with lovely eyes See me sailing with surprise. Some are clad in armour green-- (These have sure to battle been!)-- Some are pied with ev'ry hue, Black and crimson, gold and blue; Some have wings and swift are gone;-- But they all look kindly on.
[Illustration: THE LITTLE LAND]
When my eyes I once again Open, and see all things plain: High bare walls, great bare floor; Great big knobs on drawer and door; Great big people perched on chairs, Stitching tucks and mending tears, Each a hill that I could climb, And talking nonsense all the time-- O dear me, That I could be A sailor on the rain-pool sea, A climber in the clover tree, And just come back, a sleepy-head, Late at night to go to bed.
GARDEN DAYS
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
NIGHT AND DAY
When the golden day is done, Through the closing portal, Child and garden, flower and sun, Vanish all things mortal.
As the blinding shadows fall As the rays diminish, Under evening's cloak, they all Roll away and vanish.
Garden darkened, daisy shut, Child in bed, they slumber-- Glow-worm in the highway rut, Mice among the lumber.
In the darkness houses shine, Parents move with candles; Till on all, the night divine Turns the bedroom handles.
Till at last the day begins In the east a-breaking, In the hedges and the whins Sleeping birds a-waking.
In the darkness shapes of things, Houses, trees and hedges, Clearer grow; and sparrow's wings Beat on window ledges.
These shall wake the yawning maid; She the door shall open-- Finding dew on garden glade And the morning broken.
There my garden grows again Green and rosy painted, As at eve behind the pane From my eyes it fainted.
Just as it was shut away, Toy-like, in the even, Here I see it glow with day Under glowing heaven.
Every path and every plot, Every bush of roses, Every blue forget-me-not Where the dew reposes.
"Up!" they cry, "the day is come On the smiling valleys: We have beat the morning drum; Playmate, join your allies!"
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
NEST EGGS
Birds all the sunny day Flutter and quarrel Here in the arbour-like Tent of the laurel.
Here in the fork The brown nest is seated; Four little blue eggs The mother keeps heated.
While we stand watching her Staring like gabies, Safe in each egg are the Bird's little babies.
Soon the frail eggs they shall Chip, and upspringing Make all the April woods Merry with singing.
Younger than we are, O children, and frailer, Soon in blue air they'll be, Singer and sailor.
We, so much older, Taller and stronger, We shall look down on the Birdies no longer.
They shall go flying With musical speeches High over head in the Tops of the beeches.
In spite of our wisdom And sensible talking, We on our feet must go Plodding and walking.
[Illustration]
THE FLOWERS
All the names I know from nurse: Gardener's garters, Shepherd's purse, Bachelor's buttons, Lady's smock, And the Lady Hollyhock.
Fairy places, fairy things, Fairy woods where the wild bee wings, Tiny trees for tiny dames-- These must all be fairy names!
Tiny woods below whose boughs Shady fairies weave a house; Tiny tree-tops, rose or thyme, Where the braver fairies climb!
[Illustration: THE FLOWERS]
Fair are grown-up people's trees, But the fairest woods are these; Where, if I were not so tall, I should live for good and all.
SUMMER SUN
Great is the sun, and wide he goes Through empty heaven without repose; And in the blue and glowing days More thick than rain he showers his rays.
Though closer still the blinds we pull To keep the shady parlour cool, Yet he will find a chink or two To slip his golden fingers through.
The dusty attic spider-clad He, through the keyhole, maketh glad; And through the broken edge of tiles Into the laddered hay-loft smiles.
Meantime his golden face around He bares to all the garden ground, And sheds a warm and glittering look Among the ivy's inmost nook.
Above the hills, along the blue, Round the bright air with footing true, To please the child, to paint the rose, The gardener of the World, he goes.
[Illustration]
THE DUMB SOLDIER
When the grass was closely mown, Walking on the lawn alone, In the turf a hole I found, And hid a soldier underground.
Spring and daisies came apace; Grasses hide my hiding place; Grasses run like a green sea O'er the lawn up to my knee.
Under grass alone he lies, Looking up with leaden eyes, Scarlet coat and pointed gun, To the stars and to the sun.
When the grass is ripe like grain, When the scythe is stoned again, When the lawn is shaven clear, Then my hole shall reappear.
I shall find him, never fear, I shall find my grenadier; But for all that's gone and come, I shall find my soldier dumb.
He has lived, a little thing, In the grassy woods of spring; Done, if he could tell me true, Just as I should like to do.
He has seen the starry hours And the springing of the flowers; And the fairy things that pass In the forests of the grass.
In the silence he has heard Talking bee and ladybird, And the butterfly has flown O'er him as he lay alone.
Not a word will he disclose, Not a word of all he knows. I must lay him on the shelf, And make up the tale myself.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
AUTUMN FIRES
In the other gardens And all up the vale, From the autumn bonfires See the smoke trail!
Pleasant summer over And all the summer flowers, The red fire blazes, The grey smoke towers.
Sing a song of seasons! Something bright in all! Flowers in the summer, Fires in the fall!
[Illustration]
THE GARDENER
The gardener does not love to talk, He makes me keep the gravel walk; And when he puts his tools away, He locks the door and takes the key.
Away behind the currant row, Where no one else but cook may go, Far in the plots, I see him dig, Old and serious, brown and big.
He digs the flowers, green, red, and blue, Nor wishes to be spoken to. He digs the flowers and cuts the hay, And never seems to want to play.
Silly gardener! summer goes, And winter comes with pinching toes, When in the garden bare and brown You must lay your barrow down.
Well now, and while the summer stays, To profit by these garden days O how much wiser you would be To play at Indian wars with me!
[Illustration]
HISTORICAL ASSOCIATIONS
Dear Uncle Jim, this garden ground That now you smoke your pipe around. Has seen immortal actions done And valiant battles lost and won.
Here we had best on tip-toe tread, While I for safety march ahead, For this is that enchanted ground Where all who loiter slumber sound.
Here is the sea, here is the sand, Here is simple Shepherd's Land, Here are the fairy hollyhocks, And there are Ali Baba's rocks.
But yonder, see! apart and high, Frozen Siberia lies; where I, With Robert Bruce and William Tell, Was bound by an enchanter's spell.
ENVOYS
[Illustration]
TO WILLIE AND HENRIETTA
If two may read aright These rhymes of old delight And house and garden play, You too, my cousins, and you only, may.
You in a garden green With me were king and queen, Were hunter, soldier, tar, And all the thousand things that children are.
Now in the elders' seat We rest with quiet feet, And from the window-bay We watch the children, our successors, play.
"Time was," the golden head Irrevocably said; But time which none can bind, While flowing fast away, leaves love behind.
[Illustration]
TO MY MOTHER
You too, my mother, read my rhymes For love of unforgotten times, And you may chance to hear once more The little feet along the floor.
[Illustration]
TO AUNTIE
_Chief of our aunts_--not only I, But all your dozen of nurselings cry-- _What did the other children do?_ _And what were childhood, wanting you?_
[Illustration]
[Illustration: TO AUNTIE]
[Illustration]
TO MINNIE
The red room with the giant bed Where none but elders laid their head; The little room where you and I Did for awhile together lie And, simple suitor, I your hand In decent marriage did demand; The great day nursery, best of all, With pictures pasted on the wall And leaves upon the blind A pleasant room wherein to wake And hear the leafy garden shake And rustle in the wind-- And pleasant there to lie in bed And see the pictures overhead-- The wars about Sebastopol, The grinning guns along the wall, The daring escalade, The plunging ships, the bleating sheep, The happy children ankle-deep And laughing as they wade; All these are vanished clean away, And the old manse is changed to-day; It wears an altered face And shields a stranger race. The river, on from mill to mill, Flows past our childhood's garden still; But ah! we children never more Shall watch it from the water-door. Below the yew--it still is there-- Our phantom voices haunt the air As we were still at play, And I can hear them call and say: "_How far is it to Babylon?_"
Ah, far enough, my dear, Far, far enough from here-- Yet you have farther gone! "_Can I get there by candlelight?_" So goes the old refrain. I do not know--perchance you might-- But only, children, hear it right, Ah, never to return again! The eternal dawn, beyond a doubt, Shall break on hill and plain, And put all stars and candles out Ere we be young again.
To you in distant India, these I send across the seas, Nor count it far across. For which of us forgets The Indian cabinets, The bones of antelope, the wings of albatross, The pied and painted birds and beans, The junks and bangles, beads and screens, The gods and sacred bells, And the loud-humming, twisting shells! The level of the parlour floor Was honest, homely, Scottish shore; But when we climbed upon a chair, Behold the gorgeous East was there! Be this a fable; and behold Me in the parlour as of old, And Minnie just above me set In the quaint Indian cabinet! Smiling and kind, you grace a shelf Too high for me to reach myself. Reach down a hand, my dear, and take These rhymes for old acquaintance' sake!
[Illustration]
TO MY NAME-CHILD
1
Some day soon this rhyming volume, if you learn with proper speed, Little Louis Sanchez, will be given you to read. Then shall you discover, that your name was printed down By the English printers, long before, in London town.
In the great and busy city where the East and West are met, All the little letters did the English printer set; While you thought of nothing, and were still too young to play, Foreign people thought of you in places far away.
Ay, and while you slept, a baby, over all the English lands Other little children took the volume in their hands; Other children questioned, in their homes across the seas: Who was little Louis, won't you tell us, mother, please?
2
Now that you have spelt your lesson, lay it down and go and play, Seeking shells and seaweed on the sands of Monterey, Watching all the mighty whalebones, lying buried by the breeze, Tiny sandpipers, and the huge Pacific seas.
And remember in your playing, as the sea-fog rolls to you, Long ere you could read it, how I told you what to do; And that while you thought of no one, nearly half the world away Some one thought of Louis on the beach of Monterey!
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
TO ANY READER
As from the house your mother sees You playing round the garden trees, So you may see, if you will look Through the windows of this book, Another child, far, far away, And in another garden, play. But do not think you can at all, By knocking on the window, call That child to hear you. He intent Is all on his play-business bent. He does not hear; he will not look, Nor yet be lured out of this book. For, long ago, the truth to say, He has grown up and gone away, And it is but a child of air That lingers in the garden there.
THE SCRIBNER ILLUSTRATED CLASSICS
THE ARABIAN NIGHTS Edited by KATE DOUGLAS WIGGIN _Illustrated by Maxfield Parrish_
THE STORY OF ROLAND by JAMES BALDWIN _Illustrated by Peter Hurd_
THE STORY OF SIEGFRIED by JAMES BALDWIN _Illustrated by Peter Hurd_
DRUMS by JAMES BOYD _Illustrated by N. C. Wyeth_
A LITTLE PRINCESS by FRANCES HODGSON BURNETT _Illustrated by Ethel Franklin Betts_
THE DEERSLAYER by JAMES FENIMORE COOPER _Illustrated by N. C. Wyeth_
THE LAST OF THE MOHICANS by JAMES FENIMORE COOPER _Illustrated by N. C. Wyeth_
ROBIN HOOD by PAUL CRESWICK _Illustrated by N. C. Wyeth_
THE ENCHANTED BOOK Edited by ALICE DALGLIESH _Illustrated by Concetta Cacciola_
ROBINSON CRUSOE by DANIEL DEFOE _Illustrated by N. C. Wyeth_
THE CHILDREN OF DICKENS by CHARLES DICKENS Edited by Samuel McChord Crothers _Illustrated by Jessie Willcox Smith_
HANS BRINKER by MARY MAPES DODGE _Illustrated by George W. Edwards_
POEMS OF CHILDHOOD by EUGENE FIELD _Illustrated by Maxfield Parrish_
THE LITTLE SHEPHERD OF KINGDOM COME by JOHN FOX, JR. _Illustrated by N. C. Wyeth_
GRIMM'S FAIRY TALES _Illustrated by Elenore Abbott_
LONE COWBOY by WILL JAMES _Illustrated by the author_
SMOKY by WILL JAMES _Illustrated by the author_
WESTWARD HO! by CHARLES KINGSLEY _Illustrated by N. C. Wyeth_
THE BOY'S KING ARTHUR by SIDNEY LANIER _Illustrated by N. C. Wyeth_
THE SCOTTISH CHIEFS by JANE PORTER _Illustrated by N. C. Wyeth_
THE YEARLING by MARJORIE KINNAN RAWLINGS _Illustrated by N. C. Wyeth_
QUENTIN DURWARD by SIR WALTER SCOTT _Illustrated by C. B. Chambers_
THE CHILDREN'S BIBLE by HENRY SHERMAN AND CHARLES KENT _Illustrated by various artists_
HEIDI by JOHANNA SPYRI _Illustrated by Jessie Willcox Smith_
A CHILD'S GARDEN OF VERSES by ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON _Illustrated by Jessie Willcox Smith_
THE BLACK ARROW by ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON _Illustrated by N. C. Wyeth_
DAVID BALFOUR by ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON _Illustrated by N. C. Wyeth_
KIDNAPPED by ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON _Illustrated by N. C. Wyeth_
TREASURE ISLAND by ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON _Illustrated by N. C. Wyeth_
THE MYSTERIOUS ISLAND by JULES VERNE _Illustrated by N. C. Wyeth_
TWENTY THOUSAND LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA by JULES VERNE _Illustrated by W. J. Aylward_
Transcriber's note
These last verses of HISTORICAL ASSOCIATIONS as found in some other editions of this book were not printed in this edition. They don't appear to be missing scans, as the page numbering remains sequential.
There, then, awhile in chains we lay, In wintry dungeons, far from day; But ris'n at length, with might and main, Our iron fetters burst in twain.
Then all the horns were blown in town; And to the ramparts clanging down, All the giants leaped to horse And charged behind us through the gorse.
On we rode, the others and I, Over the mountains blue, and by The Silver River, the sounding sea, And the robber woods of Tartary.
A thousand miles we galloped fast, And down the witches' lane we passed, And rode amain, with brandished sword, Up to the middle, through the ford.
Last we drew rein--a weary three-- Upon the lawn, in time for tea, And from our steeds alighted down Before the gates of Babylon.

= = = PG59040 = = =
A CHILD'S GUIDE TO PICTURES
Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images available at The Internet Archive)
A CHILD’S GUIDE TO PICTURES
[Illustration:
_Copyright, 1906, by Detroit Publishing Company._
View on the Seine. _Homer D. Martin._
(_Also called “The Harp of the Winds.”_) ]
A CHILD’S GUIDE TO PICTURES
BY CHARLES H. CAFFIN AUTHOR OF “HOW TO STUDY PICTURES”
NEW YORK THE BAKER & TAYLOR COMPANY 1908
COPYRIGHT, 1908, BY THE BAKER & TAYLOR COMPANY
Published, July, 1908
THE TROW PRESS, NEW YORK
CONTENTS
CHAPTER                                                             PAGE
I. THE FEELING FOR BEAUTY                                         11
II. ART AND HER TWIN SISTER, NATURE                                21
III. NATURE IS HAPHAZARD; ART IS ARRANGEMENT                        30
IV. CONTRAST                                                       40
V. GEOMETRIC COMPOSITION                                          55
VI. GEOMETRIC COMPOSITION (_Continued_)                            63
VII. THE ACTION, MOVEMENT, AND COMPOSITION OF THE FIGURE            75
VIII. THE CLASSIC LANDSCAPE                                          83
IX. NATURALISTIC COMPOSITION                                       95
X. NATURALISTIC COMPOSITION (_Continued_)                        106
XI. THE NATURALISTIC LANDSCAPE                                    117
XII. FORM AND COLOR                                                129
XIII. COLOR                                                         144
XIV. COLOR--VALUES--SUBTLETY                                       160
XV. COLOR--TEXTURE, ATMOSPHERE, TONE                              180
XVI. COLOR--TONE                                                   204
XVII. BRUSH-WORK AND DRAWING                                        219
XVIII. SUBJECT, MOTIVE, AND POINT OF VIEW                            230
ILLUSTRATIONS
FACING PAGE
View on the Seine                    _Homer D. Martin_     _Frontispiece_
La Disputá del Sacramento            _Raphael_                        56
Jurisprudence                        _Raphael_                        66
The Manitou Lunette                  _E. H. Blashfield_               86
Dido Building Carthage               _J. M. W. Turner_                92
The Sower                            _J. F. Millet_                  100
Young Woman Opening a Window         _J. Vermeer_                    108
Crossing the Brook                   _J. M. W. Turner_               118
Paysage                              _J. B. C. Corot_                128
Washington Crossing the Delaware     _E. Leutze_                     140
Prince Balthazar Carlos              _Velasquez_                     168
The Little White Girl                _J. M. Whistler_                176
The Mystic Marriage of St. Catherine _Correggio_                     192
Light and Shade                      _George Inness_                 202
Evening                              _Anton Mauve_                   246
A CHILD’S GUIDE TO PICTURES
CHAPTER I
THE FEELING FOR BEAUTY
Some of you, I expect, collect photographs of pictures in connection with your history studies. These portraits of the principal characters and pictures, illustrating great events, places, costumes, and modes of living of the period, add greatly to the interest of your reading. They bring the past time vividly before your eyes.
But it is not this view of pictures that we are going to talk about in the present book. I shall have very little to say about the subjects of pictures--partly because you can find out for yourselves what subjects interest you; but mostly, because the subject of a picture has so very little to do with its beauty as a work of art. For it is this view of a picture, as being a work of art, that I shall try to keep before you.
I remember seeing the photograph of a picture hanging in a place of honor on the wall of a girl’s room; and I asked her why she had chosen this particular one out of many that she had. You see that, in order to help anyone, you have to try to get into their minds, and find out how their minds are working; and as much of my work is with girls and boys, I try to get from them hints as to the best way of helping them. Well, this girl, let me tell you, bubbled over with life and fun, swam like a fish and climbed trees like a squirrel; but she had her thoughtful moods, when, as often as not, she would lay out her collection of photographs of pictures on the floor, and not only look at them, but think about them. And I have no doubt that she was in one of those moods, when she chose out this particular print and hung it on her wall, in order that she might see it often.
So I asked her why she had chosen it, and she said: “Because I liked it.” I asked her why? “Oh, I don’t know,” she said. Now that is just the sort of girl or boy for whom I am writing this book. Not that I think that girl would have liked her picture any better for knowing why she liked it. Then, “What is the good,” you ask, “of writing a book to help her to know?” A very shrewd question and quite to the point. Let me try to answer it.
When the girl said she did not know why she liked the picture, I think she meant that she could not put into words what she felt. It was the feeling with which the picture filled her that made her like it. I could understand what she meant, because I remembered an experience of my own. The first time that I saw Raphael’s _Disputá_, which decorates a wall in one of the rooms of the Vatican in Rome, I had set out with my guidebook, intending to study all the paintings by Raphael that decorate these rooms. I entered the first room and, I suppose, looked round the walls and saw three other paintings; but all I recall during this visit was the _Disputá_. I sat down before it and remained seated! I do not know how long, but the morning slipped away. What I thought about as I looked at the picture I cannot tell you. My impression is that I did not think at all; I only felt. My spirit was lifted up and purified and strengthened with happiness. Returning to my hotel, I read about the picture in the guidebook. It appeared that one of the figures represented Dante. I had not noticed it, and as I read on I found out other things that I had missed; that, indeed, the whole subject, so far as it could be put into words, had escaped me. I had no knowledge of what the painting was about; only I had felt its beauty.
Since then I have studied the picture and discovered some of the means that Raphael employed to arouse this depth of feeling, and the knowledge has helped me to find beauty in other things.
So, to go back to my girl friend, I would not disturb the beauty of her feeling with teachy-teachy talk, any more than I would talk while beautiful music was being played. But, suppose in a simple way I could make her understand that I, too, felt the beauty of the picture; and, as I have learned a little how to express feeling in words, should try to tell her how I felt the beauty. Might it not add to her pleasure, if she discovered that I was putting into words some of the feeling that she herself had, and perhaps suggesting other beauties that she had not felt?
Well, that is what I hope to do for you in this book, to put some ideas into your head, that will lead you to look for and find more and more beauty in pictures and in nature and in life. Ideas, mark you, not words. We shall have to use words, but words are of no account, unless they make you feel the idea contained in them.
I say feel; and you will notice I have used these words, feel and feeling, several times already. I have done so because I want to impress upon you that the enjoyment of beauty, whether in pictures or any other form, comes to us through feeling. It may lead to thinking, and perhaps should, but it does not begin with thinking or reasoning, as does, for example, algebra or geometry. Nor can we, as we say, “get it down fine,” in the way we do with the Latin declensions. When you have learned them thoroughly, you know them once and for all, and you know about them just what every other girl and boy who has learned them knows. With feeling it is otherwise. What _you_ feel is different to what _I_ feel; we can never feel alike. No two people can. So I am not going to tell you what you ought to feel about pictures; nor am I going to try and persuade you to like one and not like another. Therefore, this book would not be much help to you in passing an examination about pictures, if anything so foolish could be supposed. But I hope it may start your imagination off in a great many new directions, and help you to discover more and more of beauty not only in pictures, but in life.
For we should study pictures not solely for their own sake, but also as a means of making our lives fuller and better. If you ask me what is the most beautiful thing in the world, I shall not say art, although I am writing about pictures--but life--its fullness of possibility and abundance of opportunity. Especially young life; the lives of you girls and boys, who, as yet, have so few mistakes to regret, so much to look forward to of promise and fulfillment. What you will make of those lives of yours may depend a little upon schools and teachers, parents and friends, money and health, and many other things, but most of all upon your own wills. I wonder if you have read the life of Robert Louis Stevenson?
He had only such education as many other boys of his time had, little or no money, and very poor health. But what a deal he made of his own life and how he helped the lives of others! What a fellow he was for fun, and how he loved wisdom; a great worker and a greatly conscientious one; not satisfied unless his work was the very best that he could make it. And the reason was that he loved beauty as well as wisdom; and in his life and writings, because in his own inward thoughts wisdom and beauty went hand in hand. I know of no better example of the full life; of a life made the most of, in the best and truest sense, with gladness and strength for itself and for the lives of others. While his body sleeps on an island mountain, overlooking the vast beauty of sky and ocean, his spirit stays with us.
The secret of the fullness of Stevenson’s life was that, so far as in him lay, he left no portion of the garden of his life uncultivated. There were no waste places, every part was fruitful. He did the best that he could for his poor, weak body; kept his intellect bright with learning, his fun alert with hope, his friendships warm with sympathy; and kept his life and work sweetened and purified and strengthened by the love of beauty. He was in a high sense in love with life--his own life, the lives of others, and life in art and nature, and the abundant harvest of his garden is the love that countless men and women and children bore him and still maintain.
Such fullness of life is rare. Boys and girls, and for that matter men and women, cultivate some part of themselves, and let the rest go to waste. And the part which is most apt to be overlooked is the sense of beauty. We train our bodies and our minds, but neglect those five senses, which are just as much a part of us. It is true that men train their senses for the practical purposes of business: the watchmaker, for instance, his delicacy of touch; the tea producer, his senses of taste and smell; the mariner, his senses of sight and sound. But business, though necessary, is not everything. We do not confine the exercise of our bodies and minds to work and business, but use them also for enjoyment, and train them for this purpose. Do we not learn to swim, play ball and tennis, and practice other bodily exercises for the pure enjoyment of them? Or in our leisure moments busy our brains with study of bees, machinery, history, all kinds of difficult subjects not as work, but as a relief from work? We call them our “hobbies,” and indulge them for pleasure, and find that the pleasure improves our health and spirits, and in the end even makes us do our necessary work better, and so find more pleasure in that also. For it is in what we know best and can do best that we really take most pleasure. And though life cannot be all pleasure, yet pleasure, rightly understood, should be one of the chief aims of life. And one of the chief sources of pleasure is to be found in the beauty that reaches our minds through the senses, especially through the senses of sight and sound.
Let me illustrate in a simple way how one child will gain pleasure from her senses while another doesn’t. Both have their five senses in working order--smell, taste, touch, sight, and sound--and have been in the woods gathering flowers. They reach home. One throws her handful down on a sofa, table, or chair, or the nearest bit of furniture, and goes off to do something, or it may be nothing, leaving the flowers to wither and become an untidiness. What made her gather them? Perhaps, because she is full of health and had to run about and do something; perhaps, because she has not quite gotten over the fondness that most of us had, as babies, for breaking and tearing things. It amused her to break the big stems and tear off the vines or pull up the little plants. Or possibly she was really attracted by the beauty of the flowers, but soon tired of them, and went off to other things.
Not so, however, with her companion. She spreads a paper on the table, lays out her flowers, brings one or two vases, and settles down to the pleasure of arranging them. She picks up a flower, and while she waits to decide in which vase it shall be put, see how delicately she handles it! You can tell in a moment she has a feeling of love and tenderness toward the flower. She puts it in a vase, and then her eye travels over the other flowers to decide which shall bear it company. What color, what form of flower will match best the first one? And while she is making the choice almost unconsciously she sniffs the fragrance of that spray of honeysuckle. Well, she lingers so long over the pleasure of arranging her flowers that we have not time to stay and watch the whole proceeding; but presently, when we come back, we find the vases filled and set about the room where they will look their best; this one in the dark corner with the wall behind it; another on the window sill, so that the light may shine through the petals of the flowers. And we think to ourselves what taste the girl has! For (have you ever thought of it?) we use the word taste, which originally described only the sense of tasting things with the tongue, in order to sum up a finer use of the senses of sight and sound.
And this finer use of the senses, such as Stevenson cultivated, so that his life and works are beautiful as well as wise and good, we too may cultivate, and it is the object of this book to help us do it. I call it a guide to pictures, but I want to make it much more than that--a guide for the wonderful organs, your senses, that they may grow more and more to feel the beauty that is all about us in nature and in life, as well as in pictures and other works of art. So beauty is really our subject, beauty in nature and in art. The two are separate, though united as twin sisters.
As I write, many of you are enjoying your summer vacations, face to face with nature. The health of the mountains or the sea is in your blood; your bodies know the joy of active movement; your minds are filled with the interest of new scenes and adventures, of sports and fun with friends. But every once in a while I think it likely that your happiness is increased by something beautiful you have seen in nature. Perhaps even now, as you read these words, there comes to you the memory of some sunset, or moonlight on the water, of early morning mist creeping among the tree tops, or I know not what of nature’s beauty, suddenly revealed to you because you were in the mood to receive it.
You were in the company of a friend, and you drew your arm closer through his or hers, and both were the happier for the beauty that was before you and had entered into your hearts. Or perhaps you were alone, and the eagerness came over you to make some record of your joy--in a letter to a friend or in some poem for no eyes but your own. You felt the need to give utterance to your joy in nature’s beauty. You had in you a little of the desire that stirs the artist.
And this brings us to the other kind of beauty, which is not of nature, though it is of nature’s prompting--the beauty created by the artist. We are going to study the work of artists who create beauty in pictures. But do not make the mistake some people do, of thinking that it is only painters who are artists. An artist is one who fits some beautiful conception with some beautiful form of expression. His form of expression, or as we say, his art, may be sculpture, painting, or architecture; or some handicraft, as of metal or porcelain or embroidery; or it may be music, the composing of music or the rendering of it by instrument or voice; it may be acting or some forms of dancing; it may be poetry or even prose. The artist, in a word, is one who not only takes beauty into his own soul, but has the gift of art that enables him to communicate the beauty to others by giving it a form or body. If he be a musician, he gives it a form of sound; if a painter, a form visible to the eye. It is his power of creating a form for the beauty which he feels that makes him an artist. And in its various forms--poetry, music, painting, sculpture, architecture, and the rest--art is man’s highest expression of his reverence for and joy in beauty.
CHAPTER II
ART AND HER TWIN SISTER, NATURE
_A Work of Art is Distinguished by Selection_
In the previous chapter we talked about beauty, and noted that there were two kinds--beauty in nature and beauty in art. Let us now look a little more closely into this distinction, so that we may grasp the idea of what a work of art is.
Since what the painter puts onto his canvas is visible to the eye, it will generally represent or suggest some form in nature. So the painter is a student of nature. But not in the same way as the botanist who studies the forms of trees and plants which grow above the ground, or the geologist who explores the secrets of the earth below the ground. These we call scientists or scientific students, because the object of their study is exact knowledge of nature. They address themselves directly to our _intellects_ and teach us to _know_ the _facts_ of nature accurately; but the painter appeals first to our _sense of sight_ and helps us to _feel_ more deeply the _beauty_ of the visible world.
Unless we thoroughly grasp this difference we shall never properly understand what painters try to do, nor be able properly to enjoy their pictures. So here, at the beginning of our talks together, let us look into this difference.
We have said that the painter represents or suggests some form in nature. Sometimes he represents the actual appearance of nature, as when he paints a portrait or a landscape. At other times he suggests the possible appearance of things, which he has never seen but only imagines, as the old Italian painters did when they made pictures of St. George, killing the dragon, or of Christ in the manger, with a choir of angels hovering above. They had never seen a dragon, but from their study of the lizard, which in hot countries like Italy may constantly be seen basking on the hot rocks or darting away at your approach, they imagined a form and painted it so that it suggests an actual creature. So, for their angels, they studied the forms and movement of children, as they ran and played, with hair and skirts streaming in the wind; also the wings and the flight of birds, and the appearance of the sky. Nature was, as it still remains, the artist’s teacher. Just in what way he learns of her and uses her lessons, I am going to try and show you. But first let me remind you that nature and art, though so close together that I have called them twin sisters, are quite separate. I do so because many people confuse them together. Frequently you will hear a person say of some view of nature that it is “beautiful as a picture.” Well, very likely it is, but as we shall see, not in the same way. Or some one will exclaim, as he stands in front of a picture, “It looks like nature.” So it does; and yet it is not really like nature. Why both these remarks are in a small way true, but in the big sense not true, we shall discover, I hope, presently. Meanwhile, suppose we lay the book aside and look out of the window.
Are you living in the country or city? In either case you are looking out at nature, as the painter understands the word. For, while we who are not painters, when we talk of nature, have in mind the earth and sky and water, and the living things that move therein, as beasts, birds, and fishes, and the forms that live but do not move, trees and flowers and seaweed, for example, and also the chief of living and moving creatures--man; the painter uses the word nature in a wider sense. With him it means everything outside himself, so that it includes things made by man: streets, buildings, chairs, and tables--the thousand and one objects that man’s brain and handiwork have fashioned out of the materials of nature.
But you are waiting at the window, looking out, perhaps, upon a street--a row of buildings, many people on the sidewalks, carriages and carts, passing before your eyes; or else into the garden of your country home, with its trees and shrubs and flowers, and possibly a view of fields and hills and woods. In each case the woodwork of the window frames in the view. Move slowly backward and you will notice that the view grows smaller and smaller; advance again and the view spreads out farther and farther; step to the left and some of the view on that side disappears, but you will see more toward the other side. Imagine for a moment that the woodwork of the window is a picture frame and you are deciding how much of the outside view you will include in the picture. If you own a kodak and are in the habit of taking pictures, you move the camera or your position until the image in the “finder” seems to be about what you wish to photograph. Whether you thus use the “finder” or the window frame, you are selecting a bit of nature for a picture.
This should make clear to you one of the differences between nature and art. Nature extends in every direction all round the artist, an unending panorama from which he _selects_ some little portion to form the subject of his work of art. But he carries his selection still farther, for even in the part of nature that he has selected there is so much more than he could ever put into his picture. Take another look out of the window. What a mass of details the whole presents! And, if we fix our eye on any one of its parts, it also is made up of a number of details. It would be impossible for the artist to paint them all. And so, also, if your view from the window is a country scene and you look at one object, that elm, for example. Do you think it would be possible for an artist to paint all the scales of the bark, all the spreading limbs, much less all the little branches and twigs and the countless leaves?
As the artist cannot possibly paint everything, he must choose or select what he will leave out and what he will put in. Once more, the characteristic of art is _selection_, while that of nature is abundance. We talk of nature’s prodigality; we say that she is prodigal of her resources, flinging them around as a prodigal or wasteful man flings around his money. You know, for example, how the dandelion scatters its seeds broadcast over the lawn; how the daisies spread over the fields until the farmer calls them the “white weed”; how the woods become choked with undergrowth and the trees overhead crowd one another with their tangle of branches. The lawns and fields must be continually weeded; the woods cleared and thinned. Man, in fact, when he brings nature under the work of his hand, is continually selecting what he shall weed out and what he shall let remain. And so the artist with the work of _his_ hand--his work of art.
Suppose we make believe that we are watching an artist as he begins his work of selection. The one over there, sitting under a big, white umbrella with his easel in front of him, will serve our turn. If he will let us look over his shoulder, we shall see that with a few strokes of charcoal upon his canvas he has already selected how much of the wide view in front of him he will include in his picture. It finishes, you see, on the right with a bit of that row of trees that stand against the sky, and on the left with that small bush, so that in between is a little bit of the winding road, with a meadow beyond dotted with cows. He has squeezed some of the paint from the tubes on to his palette, and takes up his brushes. Now watch him “lay in,” as he would say, “the local colors”; that is to say, the general color of each locality or part of the scene.
The general color of the sky is a faint blue; of the trees on the right, a grayish green; of the bush on the left, a deeper green; of the meadow, a yellowish green, while that of the road is a pinkish brown, for the soil of this part of the country, we will suppose, is red clay. All these local colors he lays in, covering each part with a flat layer of paint so that his canvas now presents a pattern of colored spaces. Yet already it begins to “look like something.” We can see, as it were, the ground plan, on which the artist is going to build up his picture. But now he must stop, for his paints are mixed with oils and take some time to dry, and he cannot work over the paint while it is sticky.
A few days later we pay him another visit. He has been busy in our absence; the picture looks to us to be finished, and we begin to compare it with the natural scene in front of us. In nature those trees on the right stand so sharply against the sky that we can count their branches. Evidently the artist hasn’t, for in his picture he has left out a great many of them; indeed, he has put in only a few of the more prominent ones. See, too, how he has painted the trees; he hasn’t put in a single leaf. Instead he has represented the foliage in masses, lighter in some parts where the sun strikes, darker in the shadows. When we compare his trees with the real ones, they are not a bit the same, and yet the painted ones look all right; we can see at once that they are maples and in a general way very like the real ones.
The artist hears us talking, and he says: “My business, you see, is not to make real trees; that’s nature’s business; I’m a maker of pictures, and in them I only _suggest_ that the trees are real. I try to make you feel that these are maple trees”--and he points to that part of the picture with his brush--“and I hope also to make you feel their beauty. I don’t give you an imitation of nature, but a suggestion of nature’s truth.
“Now see,” he says, “how I have painted those cows: just a few dabs of brownish red and black and white, showing against the green of the grass. Do they suggest cows to you?” “Yes,” we say in chorus.
“Well, I hope they do,” he replies, “and that you don’t say ‘yes’ merely to please me. But if you had never seen a cow would you know from these dabs what a cow is really like?
“I am sure you wouldn’t,” he goes on without waiting for an answer; “and if the farmer gave me a commission to paint his favorite prize cow, I am sure he wouldn’t be satisfied with these dabs. And I should not blame him. No, in that case I should place the cow where I could study it closely: the long, straight line of the back, the big angle of the hips, the strong-ribbed carcass, and its covering of glossy hair, the mild liquid eyes, and damp nose. These and a great deal more I should paint, if I were near the cow. But look at those cows over yonder. They are a long way off, and consequently look very small. I can’t see in them the different points that I know a cow has; to my eyes from where I sit they look as I have painted them. For an artist does not paint what he _knows_ to be _there_, but what he can _see_ from _here_.
“Look,” he continues, picking up a tiny pointed brush. “See what happens, when I paint what I know to be there!” And with quick, deft strokes he proceeds to sharpen the lines of the back of one of his cows in the picture, and give her four very decided legs; to hang a tail; and give her horns; and titivate the head, put in an eye and make the tongue curl round the muzzle.
“Why, it looks like a toy cow!” we exclaim. And so it does.
And now, instead of intruding any longer on our artist friend’s time, let us see where our visit to him has brought us.
We have noted that one difference between nature and art is, that nature is inexhaustible in her effects, and that an artist selects from her only some little part to make his work of art. Secondly, that he does not paint the whole of what he has selected, but out of it again selects certain parts; sufficient not to imitate the original, but to suggest its appearance. Thirdly, that natural truth is not the same as artistic truth; that while the scientific man studies one thing at a time so that he may know what is there, the artist tries to obtain an impression of the whole scene, and paints each part of it, not as he knows it to be, but as he can see it from his fixed position.
By this time you can better understand that to say of nature “It is as beautiful as a picture,” is a loose way of talking. Nature is beautiful in the endless variety of its effects; a picture, for the one or two effects, choicely selected by the artist. And to say of a picture that it looks like nature is equally inaccurate, for the artist does not imitate nature but suggests it, which, as we have seen, is a very different thing.
However, I should tell you, that some painters do imitate nature. I have seen a picture in which the painter had represented a five-dollar bill, pinned on a board, and so accurately had he imitated the bill and the board that, until you were close to them and passed your hand over the flat canvas, you would not know it was a picture. And there is a story told of a Greek painter, Zeuxis, that he once imitated a bunch of grapes so exactly, that the birds flew down and pecked at it.
But, although it is a fact that a great many people think this exact imitation of nature a very fine thing, they do so because they have not seen many pictures or found out what a work of art really is. I am inclined to think that, by the time you have finished this book, if not sooner, you will look upon such examples of skill and patience as labor in vain, so far as art is concerned.
It is all very well for the _conjurer_ to boast that the quickness of his hand deceives your eye. But the aim of the artist is not deception.
CHAPTER III
NATURE IS HAPHAZARD: ART IS ARRANGEMENT
We have seen that the characteristic of nature is abundance, while that of art is selection. Now let us note another difference between the two--nature is haphazard, art is arrangement.
I do not forget that nature works by laws; that the workings of nature are not accidental, but the result of certain causes which produce certain effects; so that the operations of nature produce an endless chain of cause and effect. Thus in the fall, because the sap flows downward in the tree, the fiber of the leaf’s stalk is gradually weakened, until the leaf by degrees loses its hold on the branch, and, because everything obeys the law of gravitation, falls to the ground. But where will it fall? That may depend upon the force and direction of the wind. It may happen that the wind is from the north or from the west; that its breath is soft, or that it blows a gale. I say it “may happen” so or so; for this is our habit of speech. When we don’t understand the cause from which an effect springs, we use the word “happen,” as if the affair were an accident or chance.
But a scientific man would say that such words as “accident” and “chance” are inaccurate, and would tell us why the wind was blowing from a certain direction at a certain moment, and tell us why it was soft or fierce. And yet, why should the tiny leaf have been ready to let go just at the moment when the breeze came? Upon what particular spot will the dandelion seed, after floating far in the air, alight? We may believe that the moment and the place are controlled by one Great Mind to whom everything is plain. But to our finite minds, whose capacity to understand is limited, such things are not plain. They seem to us like chance, and their results appear to our eyes haphazard.
Compare, for example, the appearance of nature with that of a well-kept garden. The latter has straight paths, intersecting one another; trim borders with rows of lettuces and radishes; separate plots, reserved for peas, corn, spinach, potatoes, and other crops. Even the straggling vines of the cucumbers are kept within certain bounds. Everywhere is an appearance of order and arrangement, beside which the tangle of growth in the woods, or even the dotting of trees on the hillside, seems haphazard. Or look out into the street, which, as you remember, in the painter’s sense of the word is a part of nature. The city authorities have laid out the lines of the street, but the buildings vary in size and style; each one according to what happened to be the need and the taste of the man who built it. And the appearance of the sidewalk and roadway will vary from day to day and hour to hour, according to what may be the number and the character of the people and of the vehicles, as they happen to move or stand still. Compared with that garden, the appearance of the street is haphazard.
Compare two parlors. One is a medley of furniture and bric-a-brac, of all sorts of sizes and shapes and colors, picked up at auction sales, or in the shops, each because it happened to be a bargain or to strike a moment’s whim, and then set in the parlor where there happened to be room for it. The other parlor, on the contrary, shows signs of order and arrangement. There are fewer objects in it, and they have been carefully chosen and arranged for the double purpose of making the room comfortable and agreeable to the eye. It is an illustration of good taste in _selection_ and _arrangement_.
The haphazard of nature we enjoy. But the confusion of the parlor distresses us, if we have any sense of selection and arrangement. This sense the artist possesses in a marked degree, and on it he bases the making of his picture.
We have already noticed how he selects, but may have to mention it again in describing how he arranges, since the two acts are mixed up together, as when you select some flowers and then arrange them in a vase.
When we first made the acquaintance of the artist in the previous chapter, he had already, you will remember, “roughed in” with his charcoal the objects he was going to paint. We were so interested in what he had selected, that we paid little attention to the arrangement of the objects. It is this that we are now going to study.
His canvas is on the easel, its bare white surface inclosed within the four sides. He is going to fill this space, not only for the purpose of suggesting to us the appearance of the scene he has selected, but in such a way that the actual arrangement of the objects--the pattern which they make upon the canvas--shall give us pleasure. This he calls his composition. The word, as you know, if you have studied Latin, means simply “putting”, or “placing together.” But, as the artist uses it, it always means that the placing together shall produce an effect that is _pleasing to the eye_. It is only when it does, that the result can properly be called a work of art. For you will recall what we said in the first chapter, that the artist is one who fits his conception with a beautiful form. And this form is his composition.
Now, before we go any farther with the artist’s method of composition, let me invite you to do a little composing on your own account. That wall in your special room or den where you hang your favorite photographs--how is it arranged? Are the photographs pinned up higgledy-piggledy, so as to crowd as many as possible on the wall? Is your only idea just to hang them up where you can see them? Or have you placed them together in such a way that their actual arrangement, as they spot the open space of your wall, is agreeable to your eye? For, in a way, your wall, before you hung the photographs, was like the bare canvas of the artist. The four edges inclosed it; the space is yours to do with it what you wish.
Suppose, now, that you are starting with the wall bare. Your family has moved into a new house, or the old one is being repaired. There is your plaster wall, as white as the artist’s canvas. You are allowed to decide what shall be done with it. What will _you_ do with it?
Oh! you are going to choose a paper. Well, what shall it be? Yes, pretty, of course. But pretty by itself, or when your pictures are hung? For, if you choose a paper with a large pattern of many bright colors, it may interfere with the effect of the pictures. You don’t wish to do this? Then it will be well to choose a paper that is not too prominent; one that has a small pattern, or none at all, only a single tint. Some people prefer a neutral tint; one, that is to say, which is neither one thing nor the other; not very green, or blue, or red, or yellow, but rather so; some color that is difficult to define. For, because this paper does not attract particular attention, it allows the photographs, hung upon it, to show up more prominently.
However, the papering is your affair, and you have made your selection. At last the workmen, their ladders, their paste pots, and shavings are cleared out of the room and you can begin to arrange it. You have placed the furniture where it best fits in, looks best, and seems most comfortable, and now you turn your attention to each of the four walls. Once more, is the placing of the photographs to be higgledy-piggledy, “any-old-how,” just to show them, or are you going to arrange them carefully, so as to make each wall a pleasing composition?
We will suppose you decide upon the latter plan. How will you proceed? I can imagine you choosing one of two ways.
Either you will select your biggest picture, or the one you prize most, and place it in the middle of the wall, and then place the others on each side of it, so as to balance one another. Or, you will feel that such an arrangement would be too stiff and formal, too obviously balanced, and will sprinkle the pictures over the wall space, so that their arrangement is irregular and looks as if it were accidental, and yet seems balanced. For, if you are trying to arrange your pictures in the way in which they seem to you to look best, consciously or unconsciously you are working to secure a balance.
Yes, one of the principles of artistic composition is balance. Like all the principles, adapted by artists, it is founded on an instinct of human nature. Have you ever noticed that when a man carries a bucket of water, he holds the free arm away from his body? He does it by instinct, to offset the drag of the bucket on his other arm and to balance his body. Have you ever walked upon the steel rail of a railroad track? Most of us have, I imagine. We tread pretty firmly for a little while, and then we totter. Out go our arms immediately to restore our balance. We walk up and down the deck of an ocean liner, when the sea is rough, and slope our bodies to the movement of the vessel. Why? To keep our balance. If we lose it we are hurled across the deck in a very undignified fashion. On the contrary, what a beautiful spectacle is presented when a good skater balances backward and forward; perhaps an even more beautiful one, when a good dancer who feels the joy of movement sways to the rhythm of the music.
So, to maintain a balance is an instinct of human nature; to lose it produces ugly results; while beautiful ones may be secured from it, especially if the balance is rhythmic.
Another principle, then, of artistic composition is rhythm, and this, too, is founded on an instinct of human nature. Let us see what rhythm is. A small boy has found an old pot, catches up a stick, and begins to belabor the pot and make himself a nuisance. By and by he gets tired of his own noise, imagines his pot a drum, and hits it with rhythmic strokes, one following the other in measured beats. Watch how his legs begin to move to the time of the strokes, and how the other youngsters fall in behind him. Left, right, left, right, on they march; their legs and shoulders swinging to the rhythmic beat. I wonder if they know they are following an instinct, pretty nearly as old as humanity. Probably they don’t, and wouldn’t care if they did. All they know is that they are having a good time. That’s just it! And they are having the same sort of good time that the primitive man gave his friends, when he first hit on the idea of clapping his hands together in rhythm. Later on he found he could get more stirring effects and save his hands by rhythmic hammering of one piece of wood upon another. Then came along a primitive Edison who perfected the principle and put tom-toms on the market. And so, in time, music came to be invented. For the basis of music and of the pleasure that is received from it is its measured beat or rhythm.
It is, however, not only from the actual measured beat, appealing to our ear, that we gain pleasure, but also from the suggestion of rhythm to our sense of sight.
A man stone deaf can enjoy watching a dance. He has never heard a sound in his life, but his sense of sight is stirred to pleasure by the spectacle of measured repetition of the movements. Similarly, the measured repetitions of stationary objects gives us pleasure,--the measured repetition, for example, presented by the West Point cadets, as they suddenly halt, either in close formation or in open ranks. “How beautiful!” we exclaim. And it is because the Athenians realized the beauty of measured repetition and the pleasure that it gives to the sense of sight, that they surrounded their great temple, the _Parthenon_, with ranks of columns, arranged at equal distance from one another. For, though they may have learned the beauty of repetition from studying the tree stems in the woods, yet, when they built their work of art, they avoided the haphazard of nature, and introduced order and arrangement by making the repetitions measured.
Behind the columns, however, high up on the outside of the temple wall they set a frieze or band of figures. It extended clear around the temple, representing a procession of people on their way to the great festival of the goddess Athene. The remains are now in the British Museum; but, doubtless, you have seen casts of portions of it, and will recall some in which young men are riding, the head of each horse overlapping the body of the one in front of it. There is here no longer an actual measured repetition, as in the case of the columns. The bodies are not separated by exact intervals, nor do they repeat the same forms. The youths differ, so do the horses, and the actions of the forms are dissimilar. And yet the arching of the horses’ necks, the prancing of the forelegs, and the bodies of the youths swaying to the movement of the horses are so arranged, that there is no break or interruption or confusion, but the whole _seems_ to flow up and down regularly. There are no actual, measured intervals or actual repetitions, yet the feeling of both is suggested. The arrangement of the forms is rhythmic, in that it _suggests_ rhythm. And the principle of this also the Greeks found in nature, as you may, if you watch the waves rolling shoreward.
But all this while the artist’s canvas is standing white and bare upon the easel, and must continue to stand. For, when he gets to work, I want you, not only to see what he does, but feel the meaning of his intention. And we can best enter into another person’s feeling, if we have experienced something of his feeling in ourselves. So, I have rummaged among our own experiences, in order to make you feel how much we have in common with the artist. He and ourselves are creatures of like nature, with similar senses, similar sources of pleasure and pain, and similar instincts leading us to do and to like similar things. Only the artist has keener senses, and has cultivated his instincts and study of nature, and has drawn from them certain practical hints to help him create his work of art.
Among the instincts that we share with him are, as I have tried to show--first, an instinctive preference for order and arrangement; secondly, the need of balance and the pleasure we receive from it; thirdly, the increased pleasure we derive from balance, when it is accompanied with rhythmic repetitions. These are the principles on which he relies when he makes his composition. For let me repeat, and not for the last time, that the purpose of his composition is not only to suggest some scene of nature, but to make the composition itself a source of pleasure to our sense of sight.
CHAPTER IV
CONTRAST
In the previous chapter we discussed balance and repetition as elements of composition. We have now to study another element--that of contrast. This also results from a natural love of change and variety. How sick we should get of candy, if we had nothing else to eat! how tired of sunshine, if there were never a cold or wet day to make the sun seem extra beautiful by contrast! “Jack,” as we know, “will become a dull boy,” if his studies are not enlivened by play; but how worse than dull--stupid and ill-tempered--if his play were not relieved by something serious. Yes, contrast is the salt of life, without which living would be tasteless and insipid. More than this, I can hardly believe that a boy or girl can grow up to be brave and true, a really fine specimen of manhood or womanhood, unless some shadow of hardship and pain has passed over the sunny period of youth. We have to learn to take the bitter with the sweet, and it is through meeting each, as it comes along, as a part of the day’s work, that we gradually build up character.
So contrast, it seems, serves two purposes in life--it adds to the pleasure of life, and it gives force and worth to character. Its effects in art are very similar. The artist employs it to give variety and at the same time character and distinction to the pattern of his compositions.
You can find out for yourselves how he does this, if you take a piece of paper, a pencil, a pair of compasses, and a straight-edge. First draw a rectangle. This is the space to be filled or developed into a composition. Now draw a vertical line up the center of it. You will admit that this is not interesting by itself; but cut it at right angles with a horizontal line, and immediately the figure begins to have some character. Immediately, also, if you have any eye for balance--and almost everybody has--you will begin to notice that it makes a great difference at just what point the horizontal line cuts the vertical. In the first place, whether the arms of the horizontal are or are not the same length--then, at how high or how low a point on the vertical line they branch out. You can experiment with these two lines until the cross seems to you to look its best.
You could not draw anything much simpler than this figure; and yet it is sufficient to illustrate two principles of contrast in composition--first, that the contrast is interesting, and second, that it is made more interesting, when the contrasted parts are carefully balanced. Now take the compasses and, centering on the point of intersection of the two lines, describe a circle. The latter will introduce into the figure a still further contrast between curved and straight lines. And again your sense of balance will be brought into play. How far will you make your circle extend? It is for you to say, because you are trying to satisfy your own feeling for what will look best. Now, as a contrast to this circle, add four smaller ones at the extremities of the cross. Next, from the center of the big circle draw radiating lines. As a last touch of contrast, suppose you draw a segment of a circle in each of the four corners of the rectangle.
By this time we have built up a composition, the pattern of which consists of contrasts. But, as I dare say you have noticed, it also consists of repetitions. And once more I will remind you that both the repetitions and the contrasts are balanced. Contrast, repetition, and balance--these are the simple elements of composition.
Our pattern or composition is a very simple form of geometric figure. If you feel disposed, you can amuse yourself by devising other kinds of simple patterns; starting, for example, with a circle inside your rectangular space; or, selecting, to begin with, a circular frame and starting with a triangle or square inside of it, and in either case continuing to build up or embroider your design with additional features. In this way by varying the shape of your original frame and the character of the pattern that you put in it, you can go on indefinitely inventing designs. All these, I want you to observe, are geometric in character. They are based upon the figures which you find in geometry--the square, rectangle, triangle, and circle.
Now just as the acorn may in time become the great oak tree, so this simple basis of geometric design is at the root of the compositions of the great Italian pictures and of thousands of other pictures, even to our own day. Their compositions are based upon a geometric plan. The only difference is that your plan is clearly visible, while theirs is more or less disguised. The reason is that they do not fill their spaces, as you did, with simple lines, but with forms--figures, columns, buildings, draperies, trees, hills, and so on. Consequently, when we speak of the “lines” of their compositions, we often mean rather the direction which the figure, or the object whatever it may be, takes. Thus, a standing figure may take the place of your vertical line; the slightly undulating top of the hills behind it may correspond to your horizontal line; a curving group of angels, floating in the air, may suggest your circle; while your diagonal line may be replaced in the picture by the branches of a tree that spread in a diagonal direction. In other words, what you have done (shall I say?) stiffly with compasses and straight-edge, the artists do freely and loosely. Yet, I repeat it, underneath this seeming freedom, if you search for it, you will find the basis of a geometric design. This I hope to show you in the following chapter. Meanwhile, there is another use for contrast that you should know.
It is the contrast between the light and the dark parts of a picture. It is employed, in the first place, to make the objects in the picture look more real. If you fix your eyes on any object in the room or out of doors, you will observe that some parts of it are light and some dark, and that there are various degrees of lightness and darkness. It is the light on an object that enables us to see it. If there were no light on it--if it were in complete darkness, that is to say--nothing would be visible. And, while it is the light that enables us to see the object, it is the degree of light on some parts of it and the various degrees of darkness on others that enable us to realize the shape of it. In other words, the contrast of light and dark, received by the eyes, communicates to our brain the sense of form and bulk.
That it should do so seems to be the gradual result of a habit, unconsciously acquired. Those who study such things tell us that we began to perceive things, not through the sense of sight, but by the sense of touch. The baby reaches out its little hand to feel for the mother’s breast; it burrows its way to her warm body; is comforted by the feel of her arms around it. When the child is older and you present her with a doll, you may be disappointed that she does not at once show pleasure. Instead of her face lighting up with joy, as you hoped it would, she stares at the doll in rather a dull way. But presently she stretches out her hands, and takes the doll into them and begins to feel it all over, and at length clasps it in her arms against her body. It is by the sense of touch that she seems to have assured herself that the doll is “real.” When she is older, however, if you offer her a new doll, immediately her face lightens with gladness of welcome. For, in the meantime she has learned to know a doll by sight, and now when she gets it into her hands she turns it round and round that she may look at it, patting the face, however, and the dress, and lifting up the lace of the petticoats and handling the sash, because, although she has grown to recognize things by her sense of sight, she has not lost her delight in the sense of touch. Nor will she, I hope, as she grows older. Indeed, artists, knowing how much pleasure people derive from the feel of things, take great pains, as we shall see in another chapter, to paint the surfaces, or, as they suggest it, the _texture_ of objects, in such a way as to make us feel how pleasant it would be to touch them. Besides, it makes the figure seem so much more real, if they suggest to us that, if we touched the face, it would feel like flesh; or, if we could pass our hand over the dress, it would seem soft and mossy like velvet, or smooth and polished like satin.
But, to return to the contrast of light and dark. Although it is by this contrast that we get an impression of the form or bulk of an object, most people are not aware of the fact. They have grown up in the habit of recognizing things by sight, without being conscious of how they do so. They just see things. Artists, however, have had to learn the reason and how to apply it to painting.
*       *       *       *       *
The history of modern painting extends back about six hundred years. In the thirteenth century, the paintings which decorated some of the churches in Italy were painted in what is called a conventional way. That is to say, a certain custom was followed by all the painters. They represented the heads and hands of their figures, but the bodies were covered with draperies, under which there was little or no suggestion of any form or bulk. For the whole figure appeared flat. It was as if you should make a little figure of clay or paste, and then pass a roller over it, until its thickness is flattened down into nothing but length and breadth. The figures, in fact, gave no appearance of being real and lifelike because, as artists would say, there was no drawing in them. There was nothing to suggest that the figures had real bodies.
By degrees, however, people grew tired of these unlifelike figures, and a painter named Giotto (1266?-1337) became the leader of a new motive in painting. It was simply to try and make the figures look real and the scenes in which they appeared seem natural. Instead of following a convention, he used his eyes and studied nature. He was no longer satisfied to fill in the background of his picture with a flat gold tint as the conventional painters had done. He wished to increase the reality of his figures by representing them in real surroundings, sometimes in a room, sometimes out of doors. Instead of being content to make his pictures flat, representing only length and breadth, he set to work to create the suggestion of the third dimension--depth. He would try and make you feel that you could walk from the foreground of his picture, step by step, through to the background; and that, as you reached each figure or object in the scene, you could pass your hand round it and feel that it had real bulk. I said “step by step” and I lay stress on it. For what Giotto tried to represent was not merely some figures in front and then a big gap that you had to jump over before you reached the background, but what the artists call the “successive planes” of the scene--the step-by-step appearance of the scene.
Perhaps you will grasp better what this means if, when you next go to the theater, you carefully observe the scenery, representing some outdoor effect. On each side of the stage, very likely representing tree trunks, there is a series of “wings,” one behind another at a distance of say five feet, while across the stage, hanging down from the “flies,” is a series of cut cloths, representing foliage, that correspond with the wings and seem to be branches of the tree trunks. Well, these cloths and their wings correspond to the “successive planes” of a picture. They lead gradually back and you can actually walk in and out of them. But, when you reach the back cloth, you are stopped, so far as your legs are concerned. If you are sitting in the auditorium, however, your eye goes traveling on and on a long distance, for the back cloth is itself a picture, in which there is an _illusion_ of successive planes.
The artist’s word for representing the successive planes is perspective. If you stand between the rails of a trolley line or railroad and look along it, the lines seem to draw together or converge. Yet in reality you know that they are equidistant from each other all the way along. But, since our power of seeing becomes less and less as objects are farther removed from us, so to our diminishing sight the size and distinctness of the space between the rails appears also to diminish. In the same way you will observe that the width of the street seems to diminish, and the people and wagons appear smaller and smaller, according as they are seen farther and farther back in the successive planes. The houses, too--you know that if you stood in front of any of the houses, exactly facing it, the upright sides would appear to be, as they are, of equal height, and that the windows and cornice would appear in parallel horizontal lines. Yet, as you stand in the street and look along the houses on either side, they present a different appearance. In the case of each house the upright side, nearer to you, seems higher than the one farther off, and the rows of windows and the line of the cornice appear to slope downward. For the houses as they take their places in the receding or successive planes seem to diminish in size.
This, you see, is another example of what we have already said, that the artist does not paint what he knows to be facts, but the appearances, as he sees them from the point where his eyes are--his “point of sight.” You remember how in an earlier chapter that artist represented, or rather suggested the cows in the distance by a few dabs. That was how he saw them from his point of sight. I could not tell you then, but you will understand now, that he was obeying the law of perspective, and was representing the cows as they appeared in their own proper plane of the scene. Do you remember that when he drew in their horns and tails and other details, they looked like toy cows? We can now see why. They contradicted their surroundings; they no longer were at home in their own plane; their plane was a good way off, but they were represented as if close to our eyes; and, as we saw how small they were, they seemed to us like toy cows.
You see, it is entirely a matter of how things look to the eyes. The painter, as I have said, does not represent the facts as he knows them to be, but the impressions which the facts make upon his eyesight; and these impressions, by the way in which he renders them, he hands on to us. His picture is not nature, but a suggestion or illusion of nature.
Now, although Giotto had discovered that, to make you feel that you could walk back through his pictures, he must represent the successive planes, he only partly found out how to do it. It was not until nearly a hundred years later that a painter named Masaccio learned how to fill the whole of his picture with a suggestion of atmosphere, so that the objects took their places properly in their proper planes, and it was still later before artists thoroughly worked out the methods of perspective.
The greatest difficulty that they had to surmount was how to “foreshorten” their figures, or represent them in “foreshortening.” A simple way of understanding what this means is to stand in front of a mirror and stretch out your arms to left and right, like the arms of a cross. Each extends a long way. But now bring them in front of you and stretch them toward the mirror. At once they look shorter, or at any rate you cannot see their length. They appear foreshortened. Or you may practice a still more “violent” example of foreshortening, if you are able to place the mirror where you can see your body, when lying down with the feet toward it, for now the whole length of the body appears foreshortened in the mirror. The surface of the latter, you observe, corresponds exactly with the surface of a picture. It is a flat plane upon which is produced the appearance of successive or receding planes, and though you cannot see the length of your body because it is foreshortened, you are made to feel its length.
It was a long time before artists overcame the difficulty of representing this effect; and the first pictures in which it was accomplished were naturally regarded as wonders. Since it is not the purpose of this book to teach you to draw I will mention only one of the principles involved. It is the one we have already been discussing--the contrast of light and dark, or, as it is called, “chiaroscuro.” Artists soon discovered that, if an object has bulk, that part of it which is nearest to the light will reflect most light; the parts less near, less light; while the parts that are exposed to no light will appear dark. As this was how the artists saw the objects, it was so they tried to represent them. They learned to “model” the object, that is to say, to represent it as having bulk, by reproducing in their pictures the contrasts of light and dark. At first the contrasts were crude, chiefly of the very light and very dark, but by degrees the artists became more skillful and learned to represent also all the varying gradations of less light and less dark. By this time they were better able to surmount the difficulty of foreshortening.
You will see how, if you will again stand in front of the mirror and stretch out one arm toward it. The simplest test is made, if you can arrange that the light shall be directly at your back, for then it is reflected by the mirror on to the front of you. In this case you will notice that your outstretched hand receives the most light, because it is nearest to the light. If it were represented in this way in a picture, our habit of seeing the highest or brightest light on the highest or most directly exposed surface of an object would make us feel that the hand projected in front of the body.
If, however, you stand before the mirror with light falling upon you from one side, the picture in the mirror will be quite different in appearance. The light and shadow will be more broken up and diversified. Some part of your hand, it may be simply the edges of the fingers, will catch a high light, even if it is not the highest; and light probably will fall on your forearm, between the wrist and elbow, and again upon the upper part of the arm. Broadly speaking, your arm presents three planes of form--the hand, the forearm, and the upper arm. And, though to your untrained eye the light on all of these planes may seem the same, to an artist’s eye it would vary according to the angle at which the light hits the plane, or, as the artist himself would say, according to the angle of the plane. These angles vary all over the figure, as you may be able to see if you examine your picture in the mirror. To mention a few, in a general way, there are several angles around each of the shoulders, about the breast, round the neck, while the face, with its projecting nose, its receding eye sockets, its rounded cheeks and so on, presents a regular patchwork of angles of plane. Or shall I say, the whole figure presents a whole multitude of facets like a cut diamond? Only, unlike the diamond, its facets are uneven in size and irregular in shape. And just as the light on the facets, here very light and elsewhere not so light, informs us of the shape of the diamond, so do these differently lighted angles of plane, when presented in a picture, give us the suggestion of the figure’s shape.
And now study the shadows in your mirror picture. They result from the opposite of what we have been talking about. In their case the angles of plane are turned away from instead of toward the light, and some parts, such as the hollows of the folds of your dress or coat, seem to catch no light at all and to be quite dark. I expect you find it much easier to detect the various gradations of dark or shadows than those of the light. And a great many artists, especially in olden times, seem to have seen the shadows more than the lights--for they represent the former with more subtlety, that is to say, with a keener eye for variations, than they do the latter. Indeed, the subtle rendering of light is particularly an accomplishment of modern artists.
Well, if you have carefully studied your portrait in the mirror, I think you must have discovered how large a part the contrast of light and shadow plays in the appearance of the figure, and therefore, what an equally important part it plays in producing an illusion of reality in the picture. I do not forget that an artist by simply drawing an outline with a pen or pencil can also suggest to us the appearance of an object. But, if he does so, it is by the help of ourselves, for he relies on our imagination to supply what he has omitted.
Finally, before we leave the mirror portrait, I should like to ask you in which of the following ways you see it: Do you see it as a bold, simple composition of light and dark? Or are you conscious of a hundred and one little details about the clothes and face and hair and so on? The former is what artists call the “broad” way of seeing nature. Many artists see nature in this way and represent in a bold, free, broad manner simply the big general facts. Others, on the other hand, as you may be, are conscious at once of the great variety of details of which the whole is composed, and represent the subject in a highly detailed manner. Neither is _the_ right nor _the_ wrong way. Thousands of fine pictures have been painted in both ways. On the other hand, if you find you grow to like one way more than another, it will be because you yourself, as well as the artist, have the habit of receiving impressions in that way. Do not on that account think other people wrong for receiving impressions differently and therefore preferring the other sort of picture. We cannot help having preferences, but they shouldn’t prejudice us against the preferences of others.
CHAPTER V
GEOMETRIC COMPOSITION
In the previous chapters we talked about the elements of composition. We found that the composition or arrangement of figures and objects in the picture is designed by artists for two purposes: Firstly, to represent some subject; and, secondly, to represent it in such a way that the arrangement itself will be a source of pleasure. This second purpose is what makes the picture a work of art. And we found that the artist, in order to make his composition give pleasure to our sense of sight, relies upon the pleasure that we derive from repetition and contrast, and upon the instinct that we all have for keeping our balance. The elements of composition, in fact, are repetition and contrast in a state of balance, sometimes with the added charm of rhythm. We also found that one way in which artists contrive to make this balance of repetition and contrast is by playing, as we may say, upon the simple geometrical patterns of the rectangle, triangle, and circle.
Now let us study an actual example, and for the purpose I have chosen Raphael’s _Disputá_.[1] It is painted on a wall of one of the “Stanze” or suite of rooms in the Vatican, the home of the Pope, in Rome. Raphael painted many other decorations in these rooms, but this was his first one, executed when as a young man of twenty-five he had been summoned from Florence to work for the powerful pope, Julian II. Raphael had been a pupil of Perugino, and he took one of the geometrical designs that his master had already used. The pupil, however, improved upon it.
Observe, first, the shape of the space that Raphael was called upon to decorate. It is known as a lunette or moon-shape. Now it was this space and no other, that for the time being, he had to decorate. What he put into it, must be suggested by, one may almost say, must grow out of, the particular shape of this space. In fact, the outside lines of the lunette, and the lines inside, must _together_ form the pattern of the composition. Now observe how he did it. Briefly, he put into it a number of curved lines, that would repeat the curve of the outside, and sometimes also be in contrast to it. Likewise he introduced horizontal lines, to repeat the bottom edge, and vertical ones in contrast. Let us examine it more closely.
Not quite in the center but nearly so, is a small circle, on which appears a dove. This circle arrests our eye, and its effect is to make us feel very certainly that part of the composition is above it and part below. It is repeated above by a much larger circle. This is not completed; for its regularity of
[Illustration]
[Illustration: La Disputá del Sacramento. _Raphael._]
shape is interrupted by the two figures, seated one on each side. The circle seems to pass behind these till it merges with the clouds below. Both the small and the large circles repeat the outside curves of the lunette. On the other hand the curve of the clouds, and the figures seated upon them form a contrasting curve, and there is another one higher up, formed by the two groups of floating angels. In the center, above the larger circle, is a figure with a nimbus that points up, carrying our eye toward an imaginary center, somewhere outside the picture, from which start the radiating lines. So the impression of that part of the picture that we have been examining is of uplift. By successive steps the eye and, through it, the imagination, are invited to mount up.
And now for the part below the small circle, separated from what is above by an open space of clear blue sky. Do you notice that the band of figures stretching across this part takes the form of a curve, repeating the curves of the circles but contrasted with the two important curves of cloud? Its effect is to prevent one’s gaze from soaring altogether upward. This downward curve, as it were, tethers the composition to the ground firmly in the two corners. And now note that the central feature of this lower part is the altar, an equilateral, in strongest possible contrast to the curves and circles above it. That it may have still stronger emphasis, observe how its horizontal lines are repeated down to the bottom of the picture by the steps, so that the eye, as it were, mounts the steps to this central feature. Further the equilateral is again enforced and also balanced by the vertical and horizontal lines, forming a suggestion of equilateral figures in the corners. The one on the right is actually a doorway; the black part is the door. Some artists might have felt it was a drawback to have a bit thus cut out of the picture. Not so Raphael. There, as elsewhere in these rooms, he takes the doorway into his composition and makes it serve a very useful purpose of emphasising the corner, and then invents another structure to strengthen equally the corner opposite.
Now note the radiating lines of the pavement. In a general way they repeat the radiation of the lines at the top of the picture; but they are farther apart and bolder, as befits the bolder character of the lower part. Have you discovered the point from which these lines of the pavement radiate? By using a straight edge to each in turn, you will find that all the lines, if continued would meet within the little circle of ornament that stands upon the altar. To this point also the gaze of many of the figures is directed.
Some of the figures, however, are standing so that though they gaze towards this center, the lines of their bodies lead our gaze upward as well as towards the center. Then again, beside the altar is a figure with its arm pointing upward, so that our eye and imagination are not permitted to stop at the little circle. For Raphael had to bind the lower and upper parts together and make one united composition. Very easily the stretch of the sky might have divided the whole into two parts. Lest it should, he has softened the contrast of the lower and upper curves by introducing on the one side a building, on the other a low hill with delicate trees springing upward.
Now let us pause for a moment, and observe the general effect of the lines, which we can do by turning to the skeleton drawing on transparent paper. It lays bare the plan of the composition, and we can see that it is a geometric composition of repetition and contrasts, of horizontal, vertical, diagonal and curved lines, balanced so as to unite into one single impression. To myself the impression is of looking into the interior of a circular building, with a vaulted roof. I remember just such a building in Rome; the Pantheon, built in honor of all the gods, but now, as in Raphael’s time, a temple of the Church. As you enter it an altar faces you across the stretch of pavement, and the lines of the architecture, as it circles round you and above you, are very similar to these lines, while overhead the ribs or radiating lines of the vaulted ceiling suddenly stop, for there is a circular opening at the top, through which you can see the sky, and the light strikes down through it in diagonal shafts of light.
I wonder if Raphael had the Pantheon in mind when he composed this picture? Very likely, for he must have seen it; and he had a wonderful gift for receiving impressions and making use of them. And this building, both for its unusual shape and particularly from that wonderful opening, carrying one’s imagination upward from finite space to the infinite spaciousness of sky, is peculiarly impressive. It fits in also with the conception that Raphael seems to have formed of the subject which the picture commemorates.
For the name of the picture is misleading. It does not represent a dispute or argument, as the title _Disputá_ would suggest. The real subject is an allegory of the Holy Catholic Church--the Church on Earth and the Church in Heaven, the Church Militant and the Church Triumphant. And it is the idea of the Church on Earth as held by the Roman Catholic Church that is represented. You may not be a Roman Catholic yourself, any more than I am, but none the less let us try to enter reverently for a few minutes into the conception of the picture, since it will help us to see how wonderfully the composition grows out of the idea.
To the Roman Catholic the highest act of worship is the service of the Mass. Here, in consequence, the altar at which it is celebrated is made the most prominent feature of the lower part of the picture. It forms, as it were, a keystone of the arch of figures; the bishops, doctors, and faithful of the Church on Earth. Their worship is directed towards the altar on which rests the receptacle in which the Sacred Bread is reserved. On earth the Church reveres the Bread as the Body of Christ; a symbol of the Body of the risen Christ in Heaven. Above the altar hovers a dove, symbol of the Holy Spirit, through whom the Words of Holy Scripture make known the Glory of the Christ. The sacred books are borne by baby forms, “for of such is the Kingdom of Heaven.” Above the symbol of the Holy Spirit, sits enthroned the Christ, with hands uplifted, showing the wounds that the nails made. On one side sits the Virgin Mother, on the other, John the Baptist, who prepared the way before Him; while to right and left is a row of Apostles, Saints, and Martyrs. Above the circle of glory appears the figure of God the Father, with hands upraised in blessing. On either side of Him float angels and the sky is thick with baby faces of Cherubs and Seraphs, singing “Hosanna.” Down through their midst descend shafts of golden light from the far off infinite Sun of Righteousness.
Whether or not Raphael had in mind the Pantheon, his rendering of the allegory far excels the grandeur even of the beautiful temple. For his own temple is composed of earth and sky. “The Earth is His Tabernacle,” and the ceiling thereof the vault of the Heavens themselves. Suspended in it is the vision of the Holy Trinity, and the throngs of the heavenly hosts, whose praise and adoration are the mighty echo of the prayers and praises down below on earth.
Thus, you see, with what simple clearness Raphael grasped the idea that Pope Julian II asked him to commemorate. It is as logical as a proposition in geometry, and on simple principles of geometric design he built up the idea into a picture. How the simplicity of the idea has been elaborated with a variety of beautiful thoughts, and how the simplicity of the design of the structure has been hung, as it were, with rich embroideries of detail, I must leave you to search out for yourselves. If you do, you will find that each figure represents some example of repetition or contrast, each a separate beauty and meaning.
In conclusion I will ask you one question. Do you perceive the rhythm that prevails in this balance of repetition and contrast: how from the bottom of the composition the successive waves of pattern flow upward, as the thoughts of the Faithful mount in successive waves of prayer and adoration?
CHAPTER VI
GEOMETRIC COMPOSITION (_Continued_)
Here is another example of geometric composition. It is also by Raphael and is painted on one of the walls in the same room that the _Disputá_ decorates. But, while the latter’s geometric plan was very noticeable, this one is more disguised and the whole design has a much greater appearance of freedom. It is recognised by artists as one of Raphael’s most beautiful compositions, and one of the finest examples of space decoration in existence.
But before we examine the plan on which the decoration of this space has been built up, let us study the subject. It is usually called _Jurisprudence_, that is to say the principle of Law--both the making and the administering of laws. In the _Disputá_ the subject, as you remember, was _Religion_; in two of the other panels in this same room Raphael has represented _Philosophy_ and _Poetry_. Here he set himself to represent the idea of _Law_. The _idea_, you observe. In all these four panels, it is an idea, not an event or incident, that is represented; but an idea--something that has existence only in the mind. For all the subjects represent abstract ideas; ideas, that is to say, abstracted or removed from the experience of the senses. We cannot, for example, see religion or Law; nor touch, taste, smell, nor hear them. We can see the policeman on his beat, or the judge in court, or the members of the legislature--the men who, respectively, maintain, administer, and make the laws; and we can see the record of the laws in books. But the idea or principle of Law which has caused men to construct all this machinery for the making and enforcing of the laws, exists only in the mind.
Therefore, when Raphael was asked to paint the subject of _Jurisprudence_ or _Law_, something that no one has ever seen or will see, what did he do? He asked himself the question: When people have a respect for Law, how does it show itself in their acts? In the first place they are very careful in the making of the laws; they found them upon the experience of the past and shape them to fit the needs of the future; they exhibit PRUDENCE. Secondly, in the enforcing of the laws, they exhibit two qualities: FIRMNESS and MODERATION. Though they firmly uphold the law, they remember that
“earthly power doth then show likest God’s When mercy seasons justice.”
Raphael, then, determined to represent the idea of Law, by representing three of its qualities: _Prudence_, _Firmness_ and _Moderation_. These three again are abstract ideas. No one has ever seen them or will see them; we can only see the results of them, the acts which they influence man to do. So if _Prudence_, _Firmness_ and _Moderation_ have no visible shape, how could he represent them to the eye? He probably took a hint from a form of a stage play that was popular in his day. At any rate he did what the authors of these “Moralities” or “Allegories” were in the habit of doing. For they introduced as characters in their plays the Vices and Virtues; making an actor, for example, personify Gluttony or embody in his own person the idea of Gluttony. Thus, a fat man would be chosen for the part, and he would pad himself so as to look still fatter; he would make his face shining and greasy, and perhaps cover the front of his coat with grease, to suggest what a greedy and dirty feeder he was. He would come on the stage eating, and anything he had to say or do would help the audience to realise that the only thing he lived for was to stuff himself with food. This was called an embodiment or personification of Gluttony; for the idea of Gluttony was suggested in the person of the actor by the peculiarities of his body and behaviour. While the personifications of the Vices were for the most part comic, those of the virtues were beautiful or heroic, so that these Moralities or Allegories were as popular with the crowd as with people of taste. Sometimes the allegory was represented, not with figures moving about the stage, speaking and acting, but as a stationary group, in which the figures were raised on steps, so that a very imposing composition or tableau was presented. And no doubt, when these were given on a grand scale artists often arranged the spectacle.
On the other hand, the artists were not slow to adopt the same idea in their pictures. The great altarpieces and large decorations, painted by the Italian artists of the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries are to all intents and purposes allegories. Such certainly is this _Jurisprudence_ of Raphael’s. He has personified the three virtues of _Prudence_, _Firmness_ and _Moderation_. To _Prudence_ he has given two faces. One is old, for it gazes back over the long past; the other has the freshness of youth, as it peers into the future. It is looking at itself in a mirror. Why? For everything in these allegories is intended to convey a meaning to the minds of the spectators. Perhaps there are two reasons. The face is gazing at the reflection of itself, as it now is; for Prudence, besides taking note of the past and looking toward the future, must know the present. Again, since a mirror reflects what is in front of it and shows us our face as others see it, it was used by the artists as an emblem of Truth. And to know the truth is wisdom, and to act according to truth and wisdom is prudence. So, when you see a figure holding the emblem of the mirror, you may be sure the artist is personifying the idea of Truth, or Wisdom, or Prudence, or all three combined.
On the bosom of _Prudence_ is a winged head; perhaps intended for the head of Medusa, which turned to stone every one who looked at it. If so, it is an
[Illustration]
[Illustration: Jurisprudence. _Raphael._]
emblem here of the terribleness of _Prudence_, when offended. She is gentle in herself, but a terror to evil doers. At her side a baby form holds a torch. This was used as the emblem of that which enlightens the world--Learning; and suggests here that Prudence is illuminated by learning, perhaps also, that truth and wisdom and prudence are themselves lights which lighten the darkness of the world.
The figure to the right of the Torch-bearer offers _Prudence_ a bit and reins. It is with these that men control horses; so they were adopted by painters as an emblem of control; and, knowing this, we recognise that the woman who holds them is intended to personify _Moderation_. Her whole bearing suggests modesty, which is a form of moderation, for both words imply that a person has the sense to know how far it is right to go, and where it is fit to stop.
But note the figure of the woman on the right. She is of powerful build, seated in a positive sort of attitude that has nothing of the gentle retiring character of the other figures. She is a personification of _Firmness_, armed for defense, with helmet, cuirass, and greaves. But, though she carries no weapon of offense, she holds in leash one of those pumas with which the ancients used to hunt big game. She will, if necessary, pursue and pull down the law’s transgressors. Meanwhile she bears an oak branch, the emblem of strength and victory in civil life, as opposed to the laurel of war, for her victories are those of peace. The little Cupids, or _Amorini_, as the Italians call them, except the two who carry the mirror and torch, are put in simply to increase the beauty of the composition.
I have dwelt first upon the subject of this decoration, because it is a key to so many of the old paintings and to many modern ones as well. Their subjects represent abstract ideas personified, embodied in human form; the particular idea being shown by the emblems which accompany each figure. People had come to recognise that such and such an emblem indicated such and such an idea, and, whenever a painter wished to suggest that idea, he represented a figure with the familiar emblem.
Now, too, that we have grasped the meaning of this allegory of Raphael’s we can better enter into his manner of representing it. Since the idea is an abstract one, he has expressed it in an abstract way. That is to say, he has not attempted to represent real life, or the figures as doing any real thing. It is true they are life-like and their actions are quite natural; but the positions in which they have been placed were chosen in order that the arrangement of their limbs and bodies might produce an effect of beautiful rhythmic balance. Perhaps this was Raphael’s only thought, for he was above everything an artist, whose work in life it is to create forms of beauty. Yet he had a mind so ready to receive all kinds of impressions that, living as he did in a very lawless age, when men were guided more by self than justice, he may have realised how beautiful would be a reign of law and order.
Anyhow, this decoration in a wonderful way possesses just those characteristics that would belong to a state of society in which justice or justness were the natural habit and not merely a thing enforced by law. How simple life would be if every man did to others what he would have them do to him, and instead of rivalry and suspicion, what a harmony there would be! It is harmony and simplicity that are the chief characteristics of this decoration.
The simplicity is very marked. There are three principal figures. I believe, if there were nothing else but these, the balance of the composition would be complete, and certainly the allegory would be explained. But balance is not necessarily harmony. In a school debate, for instance, ten of you on the right of the room may say “aye,” and ten on the left may say “no,” to a subject which is being discussed between you. There is a balance--ten on one side, opposed to ten on the other.
But in this decoration there is harmony. You have only to look at the picture to be sure of it. You cannot detect any rivalry between the three figures, although one of them is so much more massive than either of the other two. All of them seem drawn together into one chord of feeling, the leading note of which is the head of Prudence, lifted above the heads of her companions and seen alone against the open space of the sky and in the place of chief importance--the center of the arc of space. Please remind me presently to say a word about the placing of this head, for just now I do not wish to interrupt the subject that we are considering--the harmony of the composition.
This is brought about particularly by the _Amorini_ that, as it were, bind the three figures into a garland of festoons. Note, first, the two which are on the extreme right and left. The wing and arm of the former and the inclination of the latter’s whole body suggest diagonal lines. These cut across the angles of the space, or as they say in geometry, subtend the angles; tying their two arms together and also offering a strong contrast to their direction. The baby figures also keep the composition from running away to nothing at the corners, for they serve the purpose of making the pattern curl up at each end. Or suppose we think of the pattern of the composition, as if it were partly made up of a wreath, such as we use at Christmas time to festoon our houses. Imagine a nail driven into the wall where the head of the baby on the left hand is. Attach the wreath to it. Now drive another nail into the puma’s head and between this one and the first nail, let a loop of the wreath hang down so that it follows the direction of the baby’s body and a bit of the oak stem. This direction, if you look at the picture, suggests a festoon. Now continue to make festoons--first along the arm of _Firmness_ up to the hand of the Cupid; now another from that point along the line on the Cupid’s wing and arm and up the arm of the next little figure; another from the top of the mirror, following the curve of the arm of _Prudence_ up to her head. So far, on the left side of the painting we have four small festoons. But I wonder if you can make out another one a long one, the ends of which are fastened to the head of _Prudence_ and that of the baby in the left corner. It follows the slope of the figure of _Prudence_ until it reaches her foot, the direction of which starts it across the gap between her and _Firmness_, where the line reappears, following the folds of the latter’s drapery, at first along the floor and then above her greave up to the baby’s head.
And now for the right hand side of the painting. In the first place there is a repetition of the long festoon. This one is suspended from the head of _Prudence_ to the top of the wing of the Cupid in the right hand corner. It dips down along the curve of the torch, down through the folds of _Moderation’s_ drapery to her feet and then rises up and passes round the back of the child. But hanging above this main festoon are _two_ rows of smaller ones. Firstly we find a very shallow festoon from the head of _Prudence_ to the hand which holds the bit; another from this point to the top of the head of _Moderation_. Below this, however, is again a festoon from the bit, along the droop of the reins to the hand which holds them, from which point there is still another along the arm up to the head.
Now, I do not for a moment wish you to think that Raphael chose points in his composition and then arranged that the lines of the limbs and draperies should form festoons between them. In examining his work, I am trying not to tell you how he did it, but to explain what has been done. And here, clearly visible, are what I have called, festoons. We might describe them by some other name--as ripples of movement. For as the water in some shallow brook ripples over and between the stones dancing in the sunshine, so these curves of movement, now in light and now in shadow, flow between these figures and flow over them, until the whole composition is a woven mass of rhythmic undulations. Rhythmic? Yes, it is just because these ripples or festoons present such a beautiful example of rhythm, that I have dwelt upon them. In fact it is the rhythmic movement of the composition that gives to this painting its greatest charm.
In the following chapter I shall have more to say about the rhythmic movements of the figures. Let us conclude this one with a few words about the geometric plan on which the composition of the “Jurisprudence” is based. As I have said, it is not nearly so apparent as that of the _Disputá_. The latter’s plan looks as if it might have been laid out with straight edge and compasses. It was, as I have told you, adapted from a composition by Raphael’s master, Perugino, and he, very possibly, may have adapted it from some one else’s plan; for in those days, artists did not see any harm in starting with another man’s design, and altering it a little, or perhaps making it more elaborate to suit their own purpose for the moment. But in the short time that elapsed between the painting of the _Disputá_ and the _Jurisprudence_ the pupil had made great strides. He had found his own strength and was working in the glory of it. Therefore the _Jurisprudence_ exhibits a freedom of design, which so disguises the ground plan, that it is difficult to be sure of what it is, although one still feels that it is geometrical.
The first thing we note is that the artist has strengthened the bottom line of the lunette by repetition. He has carried a stone bench along the entire width, which also serves as a seat for the figures. Do you see the advantage of making the figures seated? If Raphael had represented them in a standing position, he would have had to make them smaller in order to get them entirely into the space; and this would have lessened the feeling of bigness in the composition. So he invented a device by which he could represent them seated. Further, he has raised the bench in the center by the addition of another step, so as to lift the composition naturally in the part where the space to be decorated is highest.
Thus from the corners, or angles of the lunette there is on each side a gradual rise up to the head of _Prudence_, that suggests a pyramid or a triangle within the curved space. The same triangular effect is repeated in the pattern, made by the figures of _Prudence_ and the Cupid who holds the torch. The curve of the torch is so arranged as to balance the slope of the woman’s legs. So the geometric plan may be the repetition of a smaller, inside a larger triangle, contrasted with the curve of the lunette. On the other hand, if you look at the painting again, you notice that the Cupid with the torch is balanced by the one who holds the mirror. Their bodies have a vertical or upright direction, and then the tops of the torch and the mirror supply points which the eye seems to join by a horizontal line, so that a rectangle occupies the center of the composition as it does in the _Disputá_. This strong contrast of a rectangular form to the curve of the lunette, and then again the contrast of the diagonal lines, formed by the Cupids’ figures across the angles of the space, may be the simple geometric elements out of which this composition grew.
CHAPTER VII
THE ACTION, MOVEMENT AND COMPOSITION OF THE FIGURE
When a few pages back I spoke of the _movement_ of the figures I was using the word as artists understand it. They do not mean by it that the figure is represented as moving its limbs or body. For this they use the word “action.” They speak of the action of the figure. But when they talk of “movement” they refer to the _way_ in which the action is expressed. They mean that one, continuous stream of energy winds in and out through all the undulations of the action. Thus, in the figure of _Moderation_: the action consists in the fact that she is seated, with her legs extended to one side, while her body turns in the opposite direction, and while the hands are stretched out in the direction that the body faces, the head is turned away. If you compare the action of this figure with that of either of the others, you will see how much more complicated it is; how many more windings it makes. And an artist would say that this figure has a fine _movement_, because through all the windings or undulations of action one can feel a continuous stream of energy; so that every part of the figure contributes exactly its natural share to the action, and the lines of the figure, from the toe to the hand that holds the bit, flow continuously and harmoniously. The only way in which you can see for yourself how fine the movement is, is to study it very carefully, and by degrees you will begin to discover how wonderfully the flow of movement is expressed. It may help you, if you put yourself into the same position, that is to say, make your own body represent this action. At first it may seem a little awkward, but presently, as you adjust your body to the actions, you will find that it seems easy and natural, for you will have secured a perfect poise. And, after all, it is the perfect poise in the action of this figure of _Moderation_ that helps to make the movements so fine.
Now turn to the figure of _Prudence_. Here the action is much simpler. The body faces in the same direction that the legs extend. But it leans back a little. If you try the action yourself, you will find it difficult, for the stretching out of the legs makes you wish to bring your body forward, so as to make the balance easy. But Raphael, knowing this, has made _Prudence_ prop up her body, as it were, by leaning its weight on her left arm. Do you see how this forces up her left shoulder? The representation of this and the drawing of the arm make us feel what a pressure of weight downwards the hand has to support. Artists, you will find, usually make some one part of the figure carry the chief weight. Sometimes they may paint a standing figure in which the weight passes straight down through the figure and is supported evenly by the two feet, like a column bearing down on to its base. But, more often, they make one leg carry the chief weight, or, as in this figure, one arm. Then it becomes very interesting; first, to study the part of chief _muscular strain_, and secondly, to note how all the other parts of the action harmonise with it. For example, in this figure of Prudence, although the arm sustains the chief pressure, a considerable amount must bear down through her trunk[2] on to the seat. But, if we compare her trunk with that of _Moderation_, I think we shall feel at once that the latter is supporting the greater weight. In fact, the point of greatest muscular action in the figure of _Moderation_ is at the base of the trunk.
But to return to _Prudence_. We have noted that the left shoulder is raised higher than the right. Now observe the inclination of the head as it leans gently forward on the neck to gaze into the mirror and the easy action of the arm that holds the light mirror. Equally easy and without effort is the action of the legs. In fact, except for the firm quiet pressure on the arm, the whole figure suggests a gracious repose. Not only is the expression of the face sweetly meditative, but the same _feeling_, as the artists would say, of exquisite repose pervades the entire figure. You should learn to look for this in pictures. Do not be satisfied only with a beautiful face; but expect to find the beauty and the same kind of beauty expressed in the action and movement of the figure. For it is in this expression of feeling that an artist shows his skill.
Compare the feeling in the figure of _Moderation_. It is no less marked, though the feeling expressed is a different one. It is also quiet and gracious, but it does not suggest repose. Corresponding with the flexible, winding movement, the feeling is rather one of reaching out, as if in pleading or tender invitation. However, it is often very difficult to explain in words just what the feeling of a figure expresses; and perhaps it is better not to try to do so. The main thing for you is to get the habit of _feeling_ the feeling.
Now let us study the feeling of _Firmness_. Like that of the central figure, it suggests repose; but a repose not so much of gracious meditation, as of strength and force. In a moment, if need be, this figure would rise to its feet, thrill with alertness and put forth its strength. Meanwhile, as it sits, the line of pressure is straight down through the center of the trunk, and it is the lower muscles of the back that are supporting the chief weight. One shoulder is raised, not however, because it has to bear any pressure as in the case of the central figure, but simply because the trunk inclines a little toward the puma. Observe, though, that the head is held erect over the central line of the figure. If it were not, the feeling of firm strength in the figure would be lessened. On the other hand the face is turned to one side, in order that by its contrast of direction the movement of the whole figure may be more effective.
For, I wonder if you have noticed that the movement in every case presents a chain of contrasts and repetitions. Start, for example, with the left foot of _Firmness_, and move your finger over the direction of the figure; first up the calf of the leg to the knee; then off toward the right to the hip; then leftward up the body, then again to the right at the slope of the shoulders; then slightly to the left up the neck, and lastly note the face turned to the right. You will have found that your finger has described a series of zig-zags. If you start with the other foot, the figure will equally present a series of zig-zags, though some differ from the former ones.
Similarly, if you begin with the foot of _Prudence_, your eye travels up to the knee; then horizontally toward the lap; next up the slight backward slope of the body; then in the opposite direction, when you reach the neck and head. The contrasts in the figure of _Moderation_ are so marked, that I am sure you can make the zig-zag for yourself.
I have used the word zig-zag because I want you to feel how marked the contrasts are, and to realise that it is by means of these contrasts that an artist composes his figures. The zig-zag, however, in the actual figure has rounded angles; it is indeed rather a series of alternate curves to right and left, somewhat like the curves described by a skilful and graceful skater, cutting figures on the ice. And it is this series of curves that give the effect of rhythm as well as harmony to the figures in this picture. For, as you may have seen for yourself, the principles on which an artist composes a single figure are the same as those he uses in the composition of several figures into one picture. He relies upon repetitions and contrasts to produce a balance, which because of its rhythm of parts shall ensure a harmonious whole.
The only difference in the case of the picture is that the composition is made up, not only of figures, but of the empty spaces of the background also. As artists would say, the composition is an arrangement of full and empty spaces; and its beauty depends upon the harmony and balance between them. In the Jurisprudence, for example, it is remarkable how the space filled by the figure of _Prudence_, corresponds in size and even in its wedge shape to the empty space formed by the upper and lower step of stonework. For the rest, the quantity of space occupied by the other two figures seems to be about equal to the empty spaces around them, though the latter, instead of being solid masses are broken up and distributed. But you will notice, how large a stretch of empty space is left at the top of the lunette, so that the eye is drawn upward and the dignity of the whole decoration thereby elevated. Note also, what a quiet impressive spot the head of Prudence makes against the background of the sky. There is, as it were, nothing to disturb its gracious repose. This device of setting a figure against the background of the sky, Raphael may have learned from one of his masters, Perugino. At any rate, both employed it, with beautiful effect.
You may often see in nature the beauty of this effect; when, for example, on the top of some rising ground a tree, or a figure, or a church spire, stands against the sky. If the object is motionless, it seems to become more impressive because of the vastness of the sky. Or, should the objects be children at play (I can remember a picture of this), then their sport seems to take on more joyousness, freedom, and buoyancy, from the vastness of the sky.
And now, a short description of the way in which this decoration was painted. It is what is called “fresco,” an Italian word that means “fresh.” The name is used because the painting is done while the plaster of the wall is still fresh, that is to say, not “set” or dry. The following is the process. The wall was first covered, as in our houses to-day, with a coat of rough-cast plaster, which was allowed to dry thoroughly. In the meanwhile the artist had prepared full-sized drawings of his figures. As soon as he was ready, a thin coating of smooth-finish plaster was spread over such portion of the lunette as he could paint in a day. Upon this the drawing was placed and an assistant would go over all the lines with a blunt-pointed tool, pressing hard enough on the paper to leave a mark in the plaster underneath. There, when the paper was removed, appeared the figure, enclosed in grooved lines. Then the artist set to work and laid in the color, using paint that was mixed, not with oil, but with water to which some gluey substance was added. The plaster, you remember, was still damp, but since it contained plenty of cement, dried or “set” quickly, and as it dried, the paint dried with it, and became a part of the plaster. When it was done, the artist, if he wished, could add a few decisive strokes. The following day another portion of the lunette would be treated in the same manner and so on until the whole was painted. It is a method, you see, that left the artist no chance of fumbling over his work. He had to make up his mind beforehand exactly what he meant to do, and to do it quickly. Hence, with an artist so skilled as Raphael, the work has the extra charm that belongs to what has been done easily and fluently. You know how much pleasanter it is to listen to an easy, fluent speaker than to one who hesitates and corrects himself continually. So, too, in a work of art, the feeling that it has grown easily under the artist’s hand adds to our enjoyment of it. It seems to be a spontaneous expression of himself.
CHAPTER VIII
THE CLASSIC LANDSCAPE
We have seen in the previous chapters how Raphael built up composition from a simple geometric plan, on the principles of repetition and contrast, rhythmically balanced. Other Italian artists worked upon the same lines, and with such skill and grandeur of invention that the Italian pictures, especially of the Sixteenth Century, are still considered the finest examples of this sort of composition. It is distinguished by being what we may call “formal,” or “conventional.”
The figures are arranged, that is to say, not as you would be likely to see them in actual life, but according to a rule or formula or convention. The idea has been not to represent a real scene, but to display the figures and their surroundings in such a way as to produce an effect of beauty; sometimes a simple one, more often one of great impressiveness or magnificent splendor. The figures and other objects have been so arranged and so drawn as to furnish an orderly pattern of beauty and dignity. The subjects of the pictures might be taken from the Bible story or from the legends of ancient Greece, or be simply invented to set forth the pride that the people took in their cities--the pomp and glory of Venice, for example. But, no matter what the subject might be, the aim of the artist was first and foremost to paint a thing of beauty. And in this search for beauty he soon discovered how much depended upon the surroundings of his figures and the objects that he introduced.
When he desired the simpler kind of beauty he set his figures in lovely landscape scenery with hills and trees and winding streams; when he was bent on grander effects, he added architectural settings. For the architects of that day were erecting noble buildings with columns and arches, vaulted roofs and domes; partly in imitation of the remains of Roman architecture, but also designed in a fresh spirit of invention to fit the new purposes for which the buildings were required. Thus arose that vast temple of the Roman Church, St. Peter’s. It is what is called a classic building; because its style is in many respects like that of the old classic Roman temples, which in their turn had represented a new use of the still older classic style of Greek architecture.
The painters, then, inspired by the work of the architects, discovered how much dignity they could give to their own compositions by introducing architectural features. Sometimes they would introduce columns, or a flight of steps or a balustrade, sometimes a whole building; or represent the figures grouped in a street or square, surrounded by buildings, or often inside a building, standing under a vaulted ceiling. These are only a few of the architectural features, so freely used by the Italian painters. Let us study their value to the composition.
Some people who live in country homes are fond of flowers. They grow cluster-roses, honeysuckle, wistaria and other long-armed climbing plants over their verandahs. If they are fond of gardening and not satisfied merely with a lawn and a few shrubs, they will erect arches and trellis-work on which vines may cling and cluster. In the first place, they know that these slender, straggling plants will thrive better, if they have some support; they will not be so torn by the buffets of the wind, and their limbs and leaves and flowers will get more sunshine. Secondly, they will show to better advantage, because of the contrast of their winding, wreathing forms and irregular masses with the firm, strong, simple lines of the verandah or trellis-work. United they form a prettier composition, than would the vines and cluster-roses, if huddling in an unsupported tangle.
The principle is the same in the composition of a picture, where the vines are represented by the action of the figures. To their irregular masses of drapery and undulating lines of limbs the architecture presents at once the contrast and support of decided lines and clearly defined masses. And since the classic style of architecture, which was used, is so noble, it added nobility to the composition. Even the penny photographs of the Italian pictures will prove to you that this is so. Study them and find this out for yourselves.
Now, the example of the Italians, in this respect, was followed by other nations, especially the French. The latter continue to this day the painting of beautiful pictures in which the figures are combined with landscape and architecture. And our own American artists are doing the same thing, as you can see if you have a chance of visiting the Library of Congress, at Washington, or any other of the public buildings throughout this country, in which the walls have been decorated with mural paintings.[3]
So far we have been speaking of the use of architecture to support the figures. In time, however, artists found a new use for it. They employed it to support the landscape; which brings us to a talk about what is called the “Classic Landscape.”
Nowadays, when so many artists paint nothing else but landscape pictures, it may seem strange that the Italians of the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries used landscape only as a support for the figures. It was not because they were blind to the beautiful scenery of their own country, for, when they did introduce it into their pictures, they represented it in a very lovely way. But always as a background to the figures, which you are made to feel are the principal features of the picture. The reason is that the public for whom they painted demanded figure subjects. The Church required pictures that would bring home to the hearts of the people who could not read the beauty of the Bible
[Illustration: The Manitou Lunette. _E. H. Blashfield._]
Story; rich men and women wished to decorate their palaces with scenes from the old Greek legends; while cities adorned their public buildings with allegorical subjects in which the pride they took in their own municipal life was set forth in figures, personifying the character of its greatness. Moreover, those were stirring times in which the rivalry between the cities and between the noble families led to constant wars and plottings. Men, beginning as nobodies, rose rapidly to power. Not, as they do to-day in our country, by using their brains and energy in the peaceful pursuits of industry and trade and learning; but through brute force, guided by brains that schemed to win by fraud and violence. So it was man that, as we say, cut the chief figure in these times; man’s power and woman’s beauty. Mankind was so interested in itself that it spared little thought for the beauty of nature. It is true that architects built noble houses on sites commanding beautiful views and laid out the gardens with fountains, trees and flowers. Even this however, was for the glorification of some man or woman. But the love of nature which leads artists to paint landscapes and the public to value such pictures is a different thing. In the love of nature man forgets himself; he is absorbed in the beauty of the natural world outside himself; he is fond of nature for its own sake.
It was not until the Seventeenth Century that artists began to study and paint the landscape in this spirit. When they did so, the landscape took the first place in their pictures, and the figures, if any were introduced, became the unimportant features, kept small and put in merely to enliven the scene. By this time landscape painting, as a subject distinct in itself, branched out into two directions--the _naturalistic_ and the _formal_. The _naturalistic_ was practised by the Dutch artists, who painted the out of door life and appearance of Holland so truthfully, that to-day when we look at their pictures we can see the meadows and streams, the mills and the farms, exactly as they were three hundred years ago. But the subject of natural landscape we will study later on.
The other kind of landscape I have called _formal_ because, instead of being drawn directly from nature, it was made up, like the Italian figure pictures, according to a rule or formula or convention. Just as in those pictures the figures were represented as grander and more beautiful than people usually are in real life, and were arranged for the purpose of a handsome composition in attitudes that people do not usually assume, so with the formal landscapes. The artists tried to make them more grand and imposing than ordinary nature, and composed them according to an artificial plan. They did not in their picture represent any real scene in nature, but built up a number of natural details into a composition, constructed on a geometric plan. And especially they introduced details of classic architecture; so that these formal designs are often called _classic_ landscapes.
If you turn to the illustration you will see at once that the artist has not represented the natural landscape. The very title, _Dido Building Carthage_, shows the classic influence. The subject is taken from Virgil’s Æneid, Book I, line 420. Turner, the great English artist, who in 1815 painted this picture, had never seen Carthage; nor had he ever seen any spot on earth like the one represented here. What he had seen was the work of Claude Lorrain, a French artist of the Seventeenth Century, who lived in Italy and invented this kind of landscape. Turner himself preferred to paint the natural landscape; but, since the people of his own day admired the _classic_ landscape of Claude and his followers, he wished to prove that he also could paint like Claude, if he chose; and as well as the French artist. Therefore, when he died, he left this picture and another classic landscape, _The Sun rising in a Mist_ to the National Gallery, on condition that they should be hung alongside of two by Claude Lorrain. So, while studying this picture we are really studying the principles on which Claude built up the _classic_ landscape, and on which his followers worked for nearly two hundred years, until the love of nature won out and the _naturalistic_ landscape took its place.
The geometric plan of this picture is very simple. You can discover it by joining the upper and lower opposite corners by two diagonal lines that cut each other in the center. This produces four triangles; of which the top is given to the sky, the bottom to the water, and the two sides to the land and buildings and trees. Sky and water occupy more space than the other two parts; but since the latter are filled with details of bold design, they attract extra attention, so that the balance between the full and empty spaces is kept true.
The balance is a harmonious one. You will perhaps realise better what this means if you think for a moment of a balance that is not harmonious; for instance of a pair of hanging scales, in one pan of which there is a flat round one pound weight, exactly balancing a pound of candy in the other pan. We should not call this a harmonious balance. If we examine why it is not, it will help us to understand the meaning of harmony in composition. The reason is that there is no relation between the box of candy and the one pound weight, except that each weighs the same. On the other hand, in the picture every detail has some relation to the other details, and all are related to the whole. The whole, in fact, is a woven mass of contrasts and repetitions, in exact relation; very much as a composition of music is made up of exactly related contrasts and repetitions of sound notes. Alter one of these and there will be a discord, unless some other notes are altered to restore the harmony. Similarly if the artist had altered the shape of one of the details in his picture, or its color, or its lightness or darkness, there would have been a discord in the effect of his picture; it would no longer present the appearance of perfect oneness. He would have to alter some other parts to restore the harmony.
In studying the picture to try and discover how the effect of harmony is produced we find ourselves studying the contrasts and repetitions of which it is composed. And, first the contrasts. One big one is the contrast of the architecture with everything else in the picture--the contrast of these quiet stately masses, which seem so firm and strong, compared with the shimmering surface of the water and the tremulous mistiness of the sky; the contrast also of their decided lines with the irregular spotting of the figures, and with the irregular masses of the trees and foliage. The big tree, although it is motionless in the quiet air, seems as if a breeze would stir it; the water has ripples of motion; some of the figures appear to be moving, while others are only still for the moment, and the sky--it is palpitating with the actual stir of the atmosphere, as the upper air gradually cools and draws up the warmer air from below, and this warmer air cools into mistiness. But the buildings stand immovable and solid. While all around them either moves or could move, they seem to suggest the force and permanence of what does not change. Or perhaps we may feel that grand as the buildings are, stately and magnificent, yet the sky is lovelier, for the buildings are limited to their one size and shape, while the sky seems a part of that which has no limits or boundaries. It draws off our imagination into the mystery of distance and of the unknown. So the impressions which the contrast of the architecture arouses are not only such as the eye can see, but such also as the imagination can feel. This, no doubt, is one of the secrets of the pleasure which so many people have found and still find in _classic_ landscapes.
And now for another series of contrasts: those supplied by the lights and darks. In the original picture these contrasts would depend partly on the color of the various objects; but here, in the black and white reproduction, we may think of the pattern simply as one of very dark spots and very light ones, threaded together by others of varying depths of greyness. Again, what an important part the sky plays! It is a flood of light, against which everything forms a silhouette,[4] more or less dark, relieved by spots and streaks of light. The water, but for the pathway of reflection, is shrouded in shadow. Shadow, too, is wrapping itself round the tall building on the left, and slumbers drowsily among the trees on the opposite hill slopes. The artist, you will notice, has varied the distribution of shadows. On the left the gradation from very dark to very light is continuous. It is as if the first building struck a loud strong note, and the sound gradually diminished toward the distance. On the right, however, the foreground is lighter, and the dark gradually increases, swelling up, as they say in music, in a _crescendo_ effect and then passing in a _diminuendo_ far off into the distance. In fact, on both sides of
[Illustration: Dido Building Carthage. _J. M. W. Turner._]
the picture the arrangement of dark and light is rhythmical. I have only touched upon the broad general plan of contrasted darks and lights, and must leave you to study for yourselves the intricate and subtle effects with which the picture abounds; for example, the fine threads and little dots of light and dark that form a tangle on the left bank; or, on the right, the mass of leafage in half shadow against which the trunk of the tree shows very dark. You know the old proverb about leading a horse to the water. I can draw your attention to these things, but I can not make you feel their beauty. I think, however, I can promise you, that, if you are sufficiently interested in what we are talking about to really study this picture, to explore carefully the lighter parts and peer into the shadows to see what lurks within them, its beauty will make itself known to you.
As I myself am examining a black and white reproduction of this picture, that lies before me while I write these lines, there is music coming from the next room. It has stopped, and I wish it would begin again; for music seems to fit in with the impressions that this picture stirs in my imagination. Nor is this merely a fanciful idea. Music is one art and painting is another. They are different, it is true, but yet are sisters with much in common. And why not? For they come from the same parents--the hand and the mind of man. And through the harmony of the light and dark of which this picture is composed there floats, it seems to me, the fancy of a melody. I think it comes from out the endless distance of that sky; gently floating toward us, and crooning over the objects in the foreground, as a mother murmurs a lullaby over her baby while it falls asleep. But it is not altogether crooning, for see that tree’s dark, round mass of tone! How it thumps itself into our notice, while its force spreads up the hill, and then leaps across the water, and stirs with a different kind of energy in the dark building on the left. There is nothing of the feebleness and the helplessness of a baby in this picture. It suggests rather, big and mighty effort, growing toward the time of rest. It is not the music of a lullaby I seem to hear, but the evening hymn of sturdy workers as they cease for a little from their toil.
CHAPTER IX
NATURALISTIC COMPOSITION
In the preceding chapters we have been studying _formal_, or _conventional_, composition. We have seen how the artists arrange their groups of figures and the position and gestures of each figure according to a rule or formula or convention, the basis of which is a geometric plan, on which they build up a balance of repetitions and contrasts. And we have noted that these formal compositions are artificial arrangements; that the figures are not grouped as you might expect them to be in real life, nor in positions that men and women usually assume. And these formal compositions we have seen were also called, _classic_; the last example being the _classic landscape_ in which nature has been made to look more grand by the addition of features of classic architecture.
We reach now another principle of composition. It is the arrangement adopted by the artist, whose motive is to make his picture represent nature naturally; so I call it _naturalistic composition_. But, as we have noted before, the artist is not satisfied merely to represent nature; he wishes in the first place to make his picture a thing of beauty. Nature is not always beautiful; so he selects from nature and arranges his subject in such a way, that we shall not only recognise how true the picture is to nature, but feel also how beautiful it is as a work of art. Its beauty, you see, is founded, not upon a formal plan, but on its truth to nature.
Here for example, is _The Sower_ by the French artist, Jean François Millet. If we have ever seen a man scattering grain, we recognise at once the picture’s truth to life. But Millet’s intention was not only to make us know what the man is doing, but to create an impression on our minds that shall make us feel a sense of beauty, through the way in which the picture represents the incident. As a young man, Millet had studied the examples of Greek and Roman sculpture in the Museum of the Louvre in Paris, and learnt through them the classic principles of composition--the balance obtained by rhythmical repetition and contrast. And these principles, as we shall see presently, are applied to this figure of _The Sower_. I hope to show you that this is the secret of the picture’s beauty. Although the _action_ of the figure inside the shabby clothes is quite natural, the _movement_ is rhythmical. In fact it represents a mixture of the _classical_ and the _naturalistic_ motive.
Firstly, the _naturalistic_. We know at a glance what the man is doing. The forms in the picture, the colors, the light and shade, make an impression on the eye which is immediately telegraphed to one of the centers of the brain. The result is that we know the picture represents a man in a field sowing grain, while from the color and light in the sky, and the shadows creeping over the field, we know that it is twilight.
This direct thought stirs us to further thinking; for we recall that laborers start for their work in early morning, so this one has probably been toiling all through the day. But we notice that his actions are still vigorous, he should be tired, yet he is working as sturdily as at any time during the day; perhaps with even more energy, in order that he may finish sowing the field before the darkness comes. In fact, the arrangement of forms, colors, and light and shade has made a strong impression on the thinking part of the brain, stirring us not only to observe, but to draw conclusions. And this, of course, is what Millet meant that it should do.
But this was not all that he intended. Most people of his day must have thought it was; for nearly all the critics, or persons who are supposed to be able to judge of the value of a picture, and nearly all the connoisseurs, who are supposed to be able to appreciate its beauty, turned up their noses and shrugged their shoulders. “This is horrible!” they exclaimed. “A common laborer in his dirty clothes, doing his miserable work. Ugh! how vulgar! This is not art; for art should be concerned with beauty. Why does not the fellow paint some beautiful girl in beautiful draperies? Phew! Take the picture away, it smells of the farm.”
You see they confined their criticisms and appreciation to what the picture was about--its subject; and because they did not like the subject, they condemned the picture. They got no further than _knowing_ and _thinking_, they did not permit themselves to _feel_. But it was on their feelings also that Millet wished to make an impression. Through the arrangement of line, form, color, and light and shade he sought to stir that other part of the brain to which messages are telegraphed by the senses, with a result that we are made to _feel_. Let us analyse the composition; and see how it illustrates the principle that we have been discussing of balance, and rhythmic repetition, and contrast.
We will begin with the latter. Note, then, how the sloping line of the field cuts across the picture. This diagonal line is contrasted with the perpendicular sides of the picture, and with the upright direction of the figure of the man. It forms, however, another contrast; it divides the light from the dark. The sun has gone down behind the slope; so that, while the sky is still luminous with a lovely glow, the ground is in shadow, dreary and heavy looking. So, too, the figure of the man. The light is at his back, so that what we see of him is shrouded in gloom. Against the gloom of the ground his figure shows comparatively indistinctly, but the upper part stands very sharp against the light. There is a strong contrast between its heaviness and gloom and the lovely radiance of the waning light; while down below the figure looms out of the gloom and heaviness, as if it were a part of them that had gathered into definite shape. Yes, though his head may stand against the sky, the man is part of the earth.
Right away, is there nothing in this to make us feel? Millet, at any rate, had often felt the poignancy of contrast, in his own life and in the lives of others. He had known what it was to see his wife and children short of food, to have his own stomach empty, while his mind was full of beautiful ideas, and his cottage full of pictures, that some day men would buy, but not yet. He had seen little bright faced children standing at the open grave of the father or the mother; the happy young bride at the altar, and among the congregation the young widow; and evening after evening, as the darkness fell, the lonely figures in the field, toiling out their short lives, whilst behind them spread the everlasting beauty of the sunset, and a few miles off in Paris, where he came from, the lights were gleaming and people were making ready for pleasure, though there too, as he knew from his own experience, people starved. Yes, it is through experience that we learn to feel deeply, and it is to experience that the contrast of this picture appeals.
When we recognise that by this contrast of light and darkness, Millet sought to express the dreary routine, day in day out, early and late, of the peasant’s lot in a world where nature is so beautiful, and there can be so much beauty in life, we may imagine to ourselves what would be the effect of raising or lowering the diagonal line. To have given more lighted space, would have made the figure stand out too prominently so that it would have dominated the scene, and the scene itself would have seemed too spacious. Velasquez, in his equestrian portraits, kept the horizon line low, so that _Philip IV_, for example, or his minister, _Olivarez_, is made to appear a very important person in a very large world. But Millet wished us to feel the lowliness of the peasant, bound close to the earth in very narrow surroundings. Again, to have raised the horizon line, would have destroyed the balance between light and darkness, which now is absolutely true. This balance suggests a feeling of repose; shall I say of acquiescence in the necessity of the contrast? For Millet did not consider himself a reformer whose work is to set things right and to do away with contrasts; but an artist, whose aim was to harmonise the contrasts and to find some balance between the lights and darks of life; just as Stevenson out of his weakness and strength made his life a beautiful one.
And now let us study the lines of the figure. In the first place you will agree that they enclose a form which is unmistakably that of a man sowing grain. It was necessary for Millet to arrange the lines, in some way that should convey this impression. But there are many other ways in which they might have been arranged, so as to obtain this result. For in the act of sowing a man takes many positions and any one of these would have done, if all the artist had desired was to make us _know_ that the man was sowing. But Millet wished to do more.
As a boy he toiled in his father’s fields, so he had
[Illustration: The Sower. _J. F. Millet._]
a fellow-feeling for the peasants; and as he watched them, day after day laboring so faithfully, he found a big idea in their work. It was something like this--work is necessary, and to do our own share of it as well as we can is the big thing for each of us. And the oldest work of all and the most necessary is the growing of the wheat. To-day the seed is laid in rows by machine-drills; but in Millet’s time it was scattered by hand, just as it had been since man began to sow. This sower, then, that he watched was a descendant of a long line of sowers, stretching back to the beginning of civilisation; and still in the fields of Barbizon he was doing his humble share of the world’s necessary work. Millet felt the bigness of this idea; and in his imagination the man was no longer Jacques or Jean--a sower; he became “The Sower,” a type--a big heroic type. Then, as Millet felt him to be, so he set to work to paint him, choosing such lines as would convey this big feeling to us. Observe, first, the balance of the figure: how the weight of the body is planted almost equally on both feet. If you try to put yourself in the position, you will find that you can raise neither foot without moving the body. If you wish to raise the back foot, you must move the body forward till the weight is on the right foot; or, if you would raise this latter, you must move the body back till the weight is over the left foot. The center of gravity or of mass runs down through the body and between the legs. Now sway your body backward and forward a few times, and then bring forward the left leg in front of the right, so that the position of the feet is reversed. Now sway again forward and backward. I ask you to do this that you may feel how freely the body moves in this position. And I ask you to stride, that you may feel that the position in the picture is only a momentary one, leading on to a natural advance. For this perfect poise of the body on the feet is not a stationary one, that in time will seem stiff, but part of a moving one, that has the freedom and the naturalness of life. And the movement is a swift one. We can feel it is so from the length of the stride; for it is only when you are moving quickly, that you can take long strides, and still preserve the balanced, rhythmic swing of the body.
We have spoken of the poise of the body on the legs; now let us note the action of the right arm. The action, I need hardly say, begins with taking a handful of grain from the bag; then the arm is swung back to the right to its full extent, and then again brought back to the bag. Between these two points--that of the bag and that of the full extent--the arm is poised in motion, just as the action of the body was poised between the backward and forward motion of the legs. We can feel that the arm is moving, and, at this instant it is moving backward, for our own experience when we walk and swing our arms naturally is that each arm goes back as the leg on that side goes forward. The man’s arm will reach its furthest point backward when he brings his full weight on the right foot. In a word, the poise of the arm and the poise of the leg correspond. They present an example of repetition of balance. It is enforced, you will observe, in the composition by the arm being made parallel to the direction of the backward leg. This is another instance of repetition; and there are still others: the repetitions of the waist line, the shoulders, and the hat brim; of the bandage on the left leg, the line from the shoulder through the thigh, the apron, hanging over the arm, and of the echo, as it were, of these, in the tail of the distant ox and the arm of the driver. These repetitions, and others that you may discover for yourself, help to bind the composition together and also to make it rhythmic.
And now for contrast, we have noted the big one made by the diagonal line, dividing the composition into light and dark. Let us note those appearing in the figure. First there is the big contrast of the figure’s own diagonal line from the shoulders down through the right leg. It is contrasted most forcibly with the sides of the picture, the horizon line, and the direction of the right arm and the left leg. The latter are practically at right angles to the figure--strongest of all contrasts of line. It is to all these vigorous contrasts that the energy and assertion of the figure are mainly due. But there are other contrasts in the figure. Do you notice that the swing of the arm brings the trunk of the body, or the torso, as it is called, along with it? Swing your own arm and you will find your torso following its direction. If the man’s arm were to reach its full extension, his left shoulder would appear and his torso would front us nearly full. If his hand should reach the bag, the right shoulder would come forward until the torso would be seen almost in profile. However, neither of these extremes is presented. The swing of the torso is poised between the two. But do you observe that the swing of the torso and arms is across the path of direction of the swing of the legs? While they swing forward and backward, the arms and torso swing alternately from right to left and left to right.
Imitate this action with your own body, step forward briskly with a swinging stride and at the same time swing your arms and torso. If you feel the exhilaration of the action as I think you will, you will realise that it is the wonderful way in which Millet has suggested this contrast of the swing, that makes the action of the figure so stirring. By the contrast of its lines, it expresses energy; by the contrast of swing, so free, so rhythmic, so vigorous, it lifts us to enthusiasm.
But finally observe the position of the head and the direction of its gaze. While below it the torso and arms swing from side to side, the head is fixed, leaning a little forward in the direction of the onward movement, its eyes firmly set on what is ahead. Within the head is the brain which directs all the action of the figure. But the face is shadowed over, and through the shadow the features appear coarse and heavy. We feel that the brain, though prompting the man to do his work to the utmost, is after all a dull brain, in pitiful contrast to the vigor of the body. Heroic though the figure is in the grandeur of its free, swift movement, as grand, if you will take my word for it, as a Greek statue, yet it is but that of a humble peasant, unconscious that he is doing aught but that which he has to do.
There you have the idea as it presented itself to the imagination of Millet!
“The Sower” is a striking illustration of the point with which I started this book; that the beauty of a picture does not depend upon the subject, but upon the way it is represented.
CHAPTER X
NATURALISTIC COMPOSITION (_Continued_)
In _The Sower_, by Millet, we found that, though the composition was naturalistic, it was based upon the classic principle of rhythm of line. We shall not discover this principle in the present picture of a _Young Woman Opening a Window_. The arrangement of the figure and its surroundings is simply natural.
The picture is by Johannes Vermeer[5] of Delft, so called because this town in Holland was his birthplace and the scene of his life’s work. Born in 1632, he is one of those famous Dutch artists of the Seventeenth Century, of whom I have already spoken. We were talking of landscape painting and mentioned that in this century the art branched out in two directions. Landscape up to that time having been used as a background for figures, became then an independent art, cultivated for its own sake; and the artists treated it in two ways. On the one hand, some applied the principles of geometric composition to an artificial building up of bits of nature into what is called the formal, or classic landscape; while other painters represented the natural landscape naturally. These latter were the Dutchmen, who treated figures also in the same realistic spirit. That is to say, whether they painted portraits or figure pictures or landscapes, their aim was to represent the actual subject as they really saw it. They did not substitute an artificial arrangement for the natural appearance of people and things; nor did they try to obtain beauty by altering and improving upon nature. Their motive or purpose was to render the beauty that is actually in nature. So, for the most part, they chose subjects of familiar every day life.
This picture, for example, represents simply a glimpse of home life, of a Dutch girl in well-to-do circumstances. Perhaps the artist intended to make a portrait of her; probably his intention was only to paint a genre picture, that is to say, an incident of every day life. Not so much, however, for the sake of representing the incident, as of making it contribute to a subject of abstract beauty. How he has done this I hope we shall see presently. Meanwhile, I want you to grasp the distinction between simply representing an incident, as you or I might have seen it, if we had been present, and Vermeer’s motive of using the incident as a peg on which to hang some beauty of light and color and texture. I mean, it was the beauty of light and color and texture that made him pleased to paint this picture; and probably he would have been just as pleased if some other girl had been standing there, or some other objects had been spread upon the table.
Perhaps a familiar example will illustrate this distinction. Two people start off for an afternoon’s walk. One sets out because he wishes to call upon a friend who lives on the other side of the wood. To pay this call is the object of his walk; for the friend is building a new house. As he walks along he is busy wondering how far it is advanced, whether the plasterers have finished their work; and as he returns home he is thinking about the house he has seen and how he himself, when he builds a house of his own, will plan it differently. In fact, the incident of his friend’s being engaged in building is what interests him, and has been throughout the afternoon the motive of his walk. His companion, on the other hand, agrees to go along with him, not so much because he is interested in the house, although he is to some extent, but mostly because he loves a walk. He enjoys the exhilaration of the exercise; he is fond of the wood through which they have to pass. He will have a chance to hunt for the first signs of spring--the early skunk-cabbage, the shy peep of the violet through the dead leaves underfoot, the rose blush of the maples overhead, the piping and flicker of the first bird-arrivals and so on. The real motive of his walk is the joy of exercise and of the beauties met with on the way. Visiting the house was but an excuse.
There is the same distinction among painters. To some the representation of the incident is the main thing; to others, the rendering of the beauties which it involves. Vermeer, like the other Dutch artists, of the Seventeenth Century, belonged to the latter
[Illustration: Young Woman Opening a Window. _Johannes Vermeer._
(_Property of The Metropolitan Museum of Art._)]
class. Since, however, his subject is the peg on which he hangs his arrangement of light and color, let us begin by examining it.
A young woman is standing between a table and a window. With one hand she opens the casement while the other grasps the handle of a brass pitcher that stands in an ewer of the same material. Perhaps she is going to water some flowers that are outside on the window sill. Her costume consists of a dark blue skirt, buff-colored bodice, and a broad collar and hood-like cap of thin white linen. The table is covered with an oriental cloth, on which is a yellow jewel case, while over the blue chair lies a cloak of lighter blue. On the gray wall hangs a map. This and the table cloth may remind us, that the Dutch of that period, although they were fighting for their political liberty against Spain, found means to build ships and carry on trade across the sea with far distant countries. Possibly the girl was the daughter of some sea-captain or prosperous merchant.
Anyhow the picture, beside being a beautiful painting, is very interesting to us to-day as an illustration of the domestic life of a Dutch girl of some two hundred and fifty years ago. And the same interest belongs to all the old genre pictures. They make the past still alive to our eyes; just as the genre pictures painted to-day will show some future generation how we lived. But this, I repeat, was not Vermeer’s first thought. On the other hand, I do not wish you to think that he was not himself interested in the subject of his picture. He was, I am sure; but in another way. He, no doubt, arranged the figure with great care and carefully selected and grouped the surrounding objects. But, in placing the girl, he did not try to get the graceful lines that Raphael, for example, would have imagined. Vermeer’s desire was to keep the pose and gesture natural. In this he was simply following the general motive of the artists of his country and of that time. But his own particular motive in representing the girl in the act of opening the window was that the clear outside light might stream in at the back of her figure and blend with the dimmer light of the interior.
I said that we would study the kind of beauty that this picture possesses; and it is to be found in the rendering of the light. The Italians, busy with their grand classic compositions, would not have thought of this. Their motive was the beauty of form, arrayed in beautiful draperies, and so arranged that the figures should produce beautiful patterns of line and form. To make a motive of the beauty of natural light was a discovery of the Dutch.
They were artists, you see, and therefore in love with beauty. But they confined themselves, almost entirely, to real subjects of every day life, and accordingly had to find out the beauty that may be in these familiar things. And it was not long before they learned how much the beauty of things depends upon the light in which they are seen.
Before we go any further in our study of the picture, let us see if we cannot be sure of this from our own experience. Whether you live in a city or in the country, how differently you feel when you start out in the morning, according as the day is fine or not. Under a bright sky everything takes on a cheerfulness that is communicated to our own spirit. Let the sky become downcast and the appearance of objects becomes dulled. Often too, some familiar object that we have passed time and time again without particular notice, suddenly attracts us. How beautiful! we exclaim. If we try to discover the reason of the beauty, we shall find very likely, that it is due to some effect of light. It need not be a bright light, on the contrary, it may be a soft light, such as wraps itself around objects like a gauzy veil, when the sky is thick with vapor. Do you remember that line of Tennyson’s--“Waves of light went over the wheat”? He had been watching a field of wheat, spread out smoothly like a pale golden carpet in the yellow sunshine. Suddenly, a soft breeze passes over it, and as the stems bend their heavy heads of grain, and recover themselves, ripples of light travel across the field. The poet notes it in his memory, for a future poem. So, if we use our eyes, we may note countless examples of the beauty which is added to the simplest things by light. In fact, the changing effect of light will correspond to the changing expressions that pass over the human face.
The Dutch artists, as soon as they became really interested in the nature and life around them, quickly recognised this fact, and made it the chief motive of their pictures. They were no longer satisfied with mere realism; that is to say, to make the figure and the objects around it look as real in the pictures as they did in actual reality. They sought to render the expression of which these objects were capable, under the influence of light. If you do not understand this I think you will, if you place a bunch of flowers in some dark corner of the room, look at it a little while, and then move it to the window. Now, as the light falls upon the flowers and shines through the petals, the whole bunch is transfigured. It has taken on a new appearance of beauty. Like a face that has suddenly lighted up with an expression of happiness, the flowers seem alive with radiance. They too, have their expression and it will change with the changing of light. For look at them again toward evening, when the light is low, and their faces, not less beautiful, will show a quite different expression.
Now the light which streamed in at that window in Delft, when Vermeer painted this picture, was a very cool, pure light; one would say, from seeing the original picture, a morning light in Spring, it is so pure and fresh and fragrant. Yes, one can even feel the fragrance of its freshness, so exquisitely has the artist suggested to us the impression of the lighted air that steals into the room, filling it with purity. See, how it bathes the wall; even the bare gray becomes radiant; how it gleams on the girl’s shoulder, and filters through her cap, making it in parts transparent, so that one sees the background color through it. Note also, how it roams among the objects in the room, caressing the under part of the girl’s right arm, bringing out the softness and plumpness of her left wrist; splashing the ewer and touching the pitcher, the table cloth, and other details with glints of sparkle, like notes of gladness in a melody of tender freshness.
Even in the reproduction one can feel the freshness that pervades the room, and the delicate quality of the lighted atmosphere that envelopes the figures and fills every part of the scene. I mean, that not only is this effect of light visible to our eyes, but it also stirs in us a sentiment or feeling of gladness and refreshment. Still more will the original, if you have a chance of seeing it in the Metropolitan Museum, New York, where, though a very small picture, it is one of the gems of the collection. For there you will feel also the effect of the color, yellow, gray, and various hues of blue. They are all cool colors, the blues especially, and very pure in hue, which increases the sensation of freshness.
A moment ago I spoke of the picture as being like a melody. It will suggest to some imaginations the blitheness of a spring-song. The fact that a painting may sometimes seem to have the tunefulness or harmony of music I have already mentioned in a previous chapter. The reason is that painting and music, although different arts, have certain elements in common. Later on, when we shall speak of color, I shall try to suggest to you the correspondence between sound notes in music and color notes in painting. But for the present I will remind you of an element, common to both arts, of which we have already spoken--rhythm. In Raphael’s _Jurisprudence_, I pointed out to you the rhythm of movement in the figures. It flows through the forms of the figures in rippling, wave-like lines of direction. But nothing of that sort is apparent in Vermeer’s picture. There are repetitions and contrasts in the arrangement of the full and empty spaces; but they represent rather a pattern of spots; we are not conscious of any rhythm of line. Then, in what does the rhythm consist?
If you think of that line of Tennyson’s--“Waves of light went over the wheat,” you may perhaps discover for yourselves the kind of rhythm in this picture. To give you time to think it out, before I tell you, let me ask you, if you have noticed that in a flower-bed in the garden a number of blossoms of different colors will “dwell together in unity,” but if you pick some of these and bring them indoors and begin to arrange them in a vase, the colors will seem to clash. That they do not appear to clash in the flower bed is because the out-of-door light envelopes everything, soothes the violence of the colors and brings them all into an appearance of harmony. Similarly in this picture, the light streaming through the window brings all the different spots of color into a single harmony of effect. They are no longer separate and independent, but drawn together and united by the veil of lighted atmosphere. Of this again, we will speak when we reach the subject of color.
But the rhythm of this picture, in what does it consist? Yes, in the movement, not of form, but of light. Uniting all the colors into a single harmony, it flows in and out through the lighter and darker parts of the composition; sometimes in a broad sweeping flood, as on the wall; sometimes in little pulses of movement, as it leaps from point to point; now losing itself in the hollow of a shadow, then reappearing in the gleam of a fold; all the while streaming through the picture in a continuous ebb and flow. In fact, as we study it, we gradually find that the light does for the parts of this composition what the lines of direction did in Raphael’s--it unites them in a rhythmic movement.
Do not be disturbed, if at first reading these words convey little meaning to you; or if at first sight you do not feel the rhythm of the composition. It is there, however, and some day, if you are really going to be a student of pictures, you will feel it yourself.
For the present, if you will accept my word for it, I wish you to understand that this rhythmic effect of out-of-door light represented a new motive in painting. The Italians of the great period did not see it. It was the discovery of the Dutch realists, those artists of Holland in the Seventeenth Century, whose study was the real appearances of nature and life.[6] Their pictures were not as grand as the Italians’; for they were small in size, and were not built up on the magnificently formal plan that gives such a dignity and distinction to the Italian pictures. Nor are their subjects so heroic and impressive. They represent only the facts of every day life. Yet they have a great beauty of their own, because they rely on the inexhaustible beauty of light.
It is on this same beauty that after two hundred years artists of our own day are relying. They have gone back to the example of Vermeer and the other Dutch artists, and are applying it to the study of similar subjects. They are painting nature as it shows itself to them in its envelope of lighted atmosphere.
CHAPTER XI
THE NATURALISTIC LANDSCAPE
We come now to the other arm of the Y, about which we spoke in a previous chapter. Landscape had been used as a background to the figures, until in the Seventeenth Century some artists began to make it the chief subject of their pictures. But no sooner was landscape painting practised as a separate art than it branched into two directions. We followed one of these and saw how Claude Lorrain invented the formal, or classic landscape; taking bits of nature, some from one place, some from another, and building them up into an artificial composition, which he made more grand by the addition of classic architecture. It was not unlike the way in which a handsome house is built; the materials,--stone, wood, marble, and so on--are brought together from various places, hewed to certain shapes designed by the architect, and then put together according to the rule or formula of building. The main difference is that, though the classic landscape does not represent any actual spot in nature, it still bears a resemblance to nature. But it is nature worked over by the fancy of man, and improved according to his own idea of what is beautiful. The artist did not paint nature because he loved it as it is but because it furnished him with material for making a handsome picture. And this picture-making use of landscape continued to be popular with artists and the public well on into the Nineteenth Century.
Meanwhile the other branch of landscape painting had been started in the Seventeenth Century by the Dutchmen. They, as we have seen, were interested above everything in themselves, their own lives and surroundings. This was the state of mind of the whole people, and the artists gave expression to it in their pictures. They too, were picture-makers, who by their skill of painting and their love of beauty made their pictures beautiful works of art. But the subjects that they represented were seldom imaginary ones. They painted what they actually saw; and with so much truth that their art has been called an art of portraiture. They made portraits of people, portraits of the outdoor and indoor life, and portraits of their towns and harbors, and of the country that surrounded them. So, by comparison with the formal or classic landscape, we may call their landscapes naturalistic, for they represented nature as it actually appeared to their eyes.
But their art died with them. As soon as Holland had secured her independence, her artists began to travel to foreign countries, especially to Italy. There they set themselves to imitate the great Italians, and so far as landscape was concerned, joined in the popular taste for the classic kind. It was not
[Illustration: Crossing the Brook. _J. M. W. Turner._]
until a hundred years later, namely at the end of the Eighteenth Century, that an English artist, Constable, revived the naturalistic style of landscape. He was a miller’s son, whose boyhood had been spent amid the simple loveliness of nature. Later he went to London and studied painting; but while he worked in the big city, his heart was in the country, and he suddenly made up his mind to go back to the old scenes, and paint what he knew and loved. He had seen some of the landscapes of the old Dutchmen, and resolved that he would do what they had done. In his own words, he would be a “natural painter.”
It was not long before the example of Constable led some of the younger French artists to study the old Dutch pictures in the Louvre. They were dissatisfied with the methods of painting upheld by the older artists. It seemed to them a waste of time to set up a model in a studio, and then, instead of drawing it as they saw it, to correct it according to some standard of perfection. Nor did they find any interest in putting a number of such figures into artificial groups, in order to build up some grand composition, supposed to represent some classical subject or story of the old time. They were full of interest in the life of their own time, which was the period following the Revolution, when France felt young again and vigorous, and the young artists and poets and fiction-writers were eager to express in their work their joy in the reality of life. When life was so real and so full of promise, why should they look back to the times of the great Italians and occupy themselves with the artificial and make-believe?
Among these younger men was one, Theodore Rousseau. He was not only independent in character and determined to see things with his own eyes and to represent them as he saw them and felt them, but he had a great love of nature. This led him away from the city into the country; where he studied the skies and the trees, and all the objects of the landscape with an ever increasing love and knowledge, until he came to know nature, as few have done, and to feel toward it, as a man feels toward that which he loves best in all the world. His favorite spot in nature was that which surrounds the Palace of Fontainebleau, an ancient residence some thirty miles from Paris, of the kings of France. It is a rolling tract of ground, broken up with rocky glens and thick with forest trees, especially the oak. On the outskirts of this enchanting garden of wildness, in the little village of Barbizon, Rousseau made his home, and around him gathered other artists, fascinated by the beauty of nature. Among them was the Jean François Millet whose picture, _The Sower_, we have already studied. He for the most part painted the peasants, working in the fields or tending their flocks; but the others, among them Dupré, Corot, and Diaz, painted the landscape, while Troyon introduced cows into his pictures and Jacque, sheep. With all of them the motive was to represent nature as they saw and felt it. They are known as the Fontainebleau-Barbizon group of artists, and their example has had very great influence on modern art. I shall speak of it presently; meanwhile will continue the story of naturalistic landscape.
It is a very interesting fact that while these French artists were going straight to nature for their subjects and inspiration, some American artists, knowing nothing of the Frenchmen, were doing the same thing. A similar love of nature and longing to paint it as they saw and felt it drew them from the city to the beautiful spots that border on the Hudson River. Their leader was Thomas Cole, who made his headquarters among the hills and valleys, the waterfalls and luxuriant vegetation of the romantic Catskills. Other names are those of Thomas Doughty, Asher B. Durand, John F. Kensett. Sometimes they painted the grander aspects of the scenery; the broad Hudson sweeping past its headlands, or the lakes with their girdle of mountains; but quite as often the simpler loveliness of smiling meadows and cosy farms. But always with the sincere wish to represent, as faithfully as they could, the natural beauty that they loved.
Gradually, however, as the country expanded Westward and the pioneer spirit of the nation was aroused, American artists began to attempt bigger subjects. Church, Bierstadt, and Thomas Moran attacked the colossal wonders of the Yellowstone and the Rockies. It was no longer the beauty of nature that inspired them, so much as its marvelousness and immensity. As many people believe, they tried to do something that is beyond the power of painting to express. For on the comparatively tiny space of their canvasses they did succeed in expressing some of the appearances of nature’s grandeur, but they hardly made you feel it. I believe myself it is impossible that they should; for an artist can only make you feel in his picture something of what he himself has felt; and he must have thoroughly mastered his own feeling before he can express it. But in the presence of the stupendous works of nature, as far as my experience goes, the feeling masters ourselves. Amid the vastness of the height and depth and breadth and the grandeur and glory and marvel of it all, our spirit is swept out of us. We see the mighty volume of water coming over Niagara and hear the roar of its might; but not as we gaze into the face of a friend and listen to the voice that we have learned to know and love so well. In the one case our feeling is all brought to a center of attraction, in the other it is caught away and carried beyond our comprehension. We can only lose ourselves in wonder.
Well, artists discovered the truth of this. Constable and Rousseau lead the way, and now it is the usual habit of the landscape artists to study nature as one studies the face and form, the expression and action of a friend. One cannot know a number of friends as intimately as one or two. So they have confined their pictures to the few and simple aspects of nature; one little fragment at a time, studied with loving intimacy and represented with the faithfulness of sincere and thorough knowledge. In doing so, they have learned like Johannes Vermeer and other Dutch artists of the Seventeenth Century, that much of the beauty and almost all the expression on the face of nature are due to the effects of natural light. Light has become the special study of the modern painters of the naturalistic landscape. And they have carried it further than the other artists did. Helped by the scientific men, who have examined into the color of light, the modern artist has found out how to represent a great variety of the effects of light: cool or warm light, the light at a particular hour of the day, at a particular season of the year, and in a particular kind of weather. In fact, the light that he represents in his pictures is a faithful rendering of some one of the countless conditions of natural light.
You remember how the light in Vermeer’s picture drew all the parts of the composition into a harmonious whole and gave it rhythm. So too, in these modern naturalistic landscapes the artist has ceased to depend upon line and form in making the composition. The latter is now rather an arrangement of masses of lighted color. We will talk more about this when we come to color; for the present, it is enough to remember that we must not expect to find in modern naturalistic landscapes the same handsome patterns of composition that we find in the classical. The modern have less dignity, but a more intimate charm. We do not stand apart from the scene and admire it; we rather enter in to it and enjoy it. It is something with which we are familiar in nature, but we are made to feel a greater beauty in it through the personal feeling that the artist has put into his work. The French have a term for this kind of landscape, which well expresses the artist’s motive and the feelings which his picture inspires in us. They call it the “paysage intime.”[7] Literally translated this means “intimate landscape”; but it may be rendered more freely a landscape in which we recognise how intimately the artist has studied his subject.
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I have given you a sketch of the growth of naturalistic landscape in the Seventeenth Century up to our own day, when this branch of painting has become fully as important as that of figure subjects. Now let me briefly describe the change that has taken place in the motive of the landscape painter.
The motive, or aim of the early Dutchmen was to make their pictures resemble as much as possible the actual landscape. They were, as I have said, “portraits” of the natural surroundings. In their desire that the portraits should be lifelike these artists painted in as many of the details as they could. Moreover their point of view was objective. By “point of view” I mean the way in which they looked at the landscape; and I call it “objective,” because they looked at it simply as an object in front of them to be painted as nearly as possible lifelike. This is the usual point of view of the modern photographer. You go to him to have your portrait taken. He poses you as an object in front of his camera. His aim is to make a portrait that will be like you, and will also please you because it is a good-looking picture. He will do the same for the next person that comes to him, and for the next, and so on. All of them are simply objects to be photographed. He has no personal feeling toward any of them; his point of view is objective. But, suppose he makes a portrait of his own child. He will wish it to be more than a likeness that any one would recognise. He wants it to be a reminder in after years, when she is grown up and changed, of how she used to look as a little one, in moments when to her mother and himself she seemed more than ever a darling. To him, you see, she is not merely an object to be photographed; his point of view towards his own child is not objective; on the contrary it is influenced by his personal love for her; the picture is to be a likeness plus something more--a reflection of his own feeling. This personal kind of point of view is called “subjective,” the opposite to objective. Perhaps you will understand the difference between the two more clearly by the following sentence: “The photographer photographs Mrs. X.” The photographer is the subject of the verb, photographs, “Mrs. X.” is the object. In this case the object is of more importance than the subject because it is Mrs. X. who pays the money and has to be considered. But change the words in this way--“The father photographs his little one.” Now, so far as the taking of the photograph is concerned, the father is the more important. He is the subject of the verb, the one who is going to do something and do it his own way, so as to represent something which he, the subject, has in his mind. His point of view is entirely his own--the subjective. Observe how this will affect the way in which he takes the photograph.
The little one has just come in, we will say, from a romp in the meadow. Her hair is tumbled and the light plays through the silky strands; there is a sparkle of sunshine in her eyes; her lips are parted in a sunny smile as she stretches out to her father a podgy hand, tightly clasping a bunch of daisies. “Little love” he thinks to himself, “what a picture!” He seizes his camera, and tells her to stand still a minute. What is it, do you think that he is going to try and catch? I need hardly say it is the radiance in her face. Perhaps her podgy hand too; but first and chiefly that expression of happiness and love; for it is an echo, as it were, of the happiness and love that he feels in his own heart toward her. If he succeed, the picture will be as much an expression of his own subjective feeling toward the child, as of the child herself.
If you see what I mean you can now begin to understand how Constable, and, even more, Rousseau and the other Fontainebleau-Barbizon artists looked at nature. No longer an objective point of view, like the old Dutchmen’s, it was a subjective one. To them nature was not merely an object of which to make a portrait. It was something they loved, and, because they loved it, they painted it, and in such a way that their pictures embodied the feeling which they had for nature. They are full of the artist’s personal feeling, or as it is sometimes called, sentiment. A landscape of Rousseau’s sets our imagination working. It may represent an oak tree and a rocky boulder, half hidden in ferns and vines, some little spot in the forest of Fontainebleau. As we look at it we become more and more conscious of the strength and vigor of the tree; the firmness of its huge trunk, the mighty muscles of its brawny arms, the grip which it has upon the ground, and our imagination may begin thinking of the roots hidden below the ground. While the branches spread out to the sunshine and the air, the unseen roots reach out and grip the soil and grapple with the rocks, anchoring firmly the tree against the storms of weather and time. And perhaps we begin to feel, as Rousseau himself did, that the oak is a symbol of the might of nature; and how she silently works on regardless of the changes that happen in the lot of comparatively short-lived men. Or we look at one of Corot’s pictures of the twilight, in which the trees seem to have sunk asleep in blurs of shade against the pale, faint light that is fading from the sky; and the hush and tenderness of the daily miracle of nature’s rest steals over our spirits. It is as if we were listening to the pensive melody of some sweet lyrical poem, very gently and reverently read; such a one, perhaps, as Longfellow’s “Hymn to the Night.” On the other hand, to receive an impression like that of Rousseau’s picture, we must choose a poem that tells, not of rest, but of the grandeur of human effort, and must read it in a strong voice and confidently, as if we were sure that to be strong and faithful to the end was a grand thing.
Indeed, so many landscapes, not only by the Fontainebleau-Barbizon artists, but also by modern men who are following in their footsteps, are full of the suggestion of poetry, and we speak of them as poetic landscapes. This does not mean that they illustrate any particular poem, but that they affect one’s imagination in somewhat the same way as poetry does. The reason is that such artists have the spirit of poets. For nature arouses in them deep emotions, and their pictures, like the poet’s verses, not only describe the beauty of nature, but express the sentiment, or feeling, of their own souls.
On the other hand you must not expect to find this suggestion of poetry in all modern naturalistic landscape. There are still artists whose point of view, like that of the old Dutchmen, is objective. They are content to paint the beauty of nature simply as it shows itself to their eyes. Nor need we argue as to which is the better way, this, or the subjective point of view. We may prefer the one or the other; though, perhaps, it is better for us to keep our minds open to the beauties of both.
[Illustration: Paysage. _J. B. C. Corot._]
CHAPTER XII
FORM AND COLOR
When we began to speak about composition we continually used the words “line and form.” Gradually, however, as we left the subject of formal composition and talked of naturalistic composition, we found ourselves substituting the words “colored masses.”
It would seem then as if there were a distinction between these two things; that form was on one side of the fence and color on the other. Yet that would contradict our experience; for we know that everything which has a form or shape, visible to the eye, has also color that we can see. And most things that have color are seen to have a shape or form. Not all; for example, when the sky is a cloudless blue, or when we gaze over a distant expanse of sea. Still, as a general experience, color and form are identical. The face of a friend--you recognise it by its color as well as by the form of the features; and, should you have the sorrow of looking upon that face when it is dead, the change in the color would make you recognise the once familiar features as strangely different.
Yet, notwithstanding the identity of form and color, we find a certain separation between the two, when we come to study pictures. The reason is that some artists are more sensitive to form, others to color. As I have already said, an artist paints only the particular impression of an object which his eye receives. Every eye has its own particular way of seeing. Even the eye, most sensitive to form, will not see it as other eyes will; nor will any one color seem the same to every eye that is chiefly interested in color. This is only another way of saying that the varieties in nature are inexhaustible. Nevertheless, although no two elm trees are exactly alike, all elm trees are sufficiently similar to be recognised at once as elm trees. So with artists, some group themselves as painters of form; others, of color. In the old Italian days this distinction separated the artists of Florence from those of Venice. The Florentines--Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Raphael, among the greatest--were masters of form; the Venetians, especially in the persons of Giorgione, Titian, Tintoretto, and Paul Veronese, were masters of color. The one group saw especially the shapes of things, the other saw the world as an arrangement of spots or masses of color.
The Florentines, in consequence of their interest in form, took great pains with the outlines of their figures. The outlines were clearly defined; in the mural paintings the figures were enclosed by an actual line; and always the figure shows distinctly against the background. For, having drawn the figure very carefully, the artist did not let the color, that was afterwards laid on, lap over the line or interfere with the subtle undulations of the outline. They were in fact, a school of great draughtsmen, who relied principally on the beauty and vigor of the drawing. The Venetians, however, were great colorists, relying on color; and may be spoken of as painters rather than draughtsmen. Yet they too, of course, were masters of drawing. They could represent the action of the figure as well as the Florentines, but unlike the latter, did not care for the clear outline. On the contrary, they softened or blurred the outline slightly, in closer imitation of nature.
If, for example, you look carefully at a tree, you will not find that its shape is enclosed by a hard line. The light creeps round the edges of the trunk and of the masses of foliage in such a way that the outlines are softened or slightly blurred. It is the same with a figure seated in a room; here and there its edges may seem sharply cut out against the background, but in other parts the edges will seem to melt into the background. In other words, as we look at the figure, what we are most conscious of is not its outline, but its mass of color in relation to the other masses of color that surround it.
Now, this distinction, between the way in which the Florentines and the Venetians saw and represented objects, still appears in modern art. In fact, ever since the days of the great Italians there have been artists who relied on drawing and artists who relied on color. For over a hundred years the importance of drawing has been upheld by the great school of art in Paris maintained by the French government. One of its famous teachers, Ingres, used to tell his pupils “form is everything, color is nothing.” Perhaps he only meant by this that, as long as they were pupils, the only necessary thing for them to think about and learn to represent was form. Because to draw well is so important for any artist, and it is a thing that can be thoroughly taught and learned. The French school takes as its standard of excellence the perfect forms of classic sculpture and the great works of the Florentine artists. Although the student may be drawing from a living model whose form is not perfect, he is taught to correct the imperfections of this or that part, in order that the figure, as it appears in his drawing, may be as near as he can get it to classic perfection. But color, as we shall see presently, is so much a matter of each person’s feeling, that it is impossible to reduce the teaching of it to any method or standard. So perhaps that is what Ingres had in mind. He meant that, for the time being, his students should consider form to be everything, color nothing.
On the other hand it is generally understood that he meant much more than this, that he was telling his pupils what he himself considered to be the whole duty of an artist. Let us try and enter into his point of view.
I can imagine some of my readers saying that the phrase, “form is everything; color, nothing,” is nonsense; because color plays so important a part in our enjoyment of sight. Just think what a dreary world it would be, if everything, for instance, were a uniform gray! Quite true, and Ingres probably would have agreed. As a _man_, he no doubt enjoyed the pleasures of color. But it was as an artist that he was speaking. He was stating what he believed to be the proper subject of his own art.
In the first place he was evidently one of those artists who see the shape rather than the color of things; to whom form makes an irresistible appeal. In the second place--and mark, for this is very important--he was not thinking of how things appear in the actual world, but how they should be represented in art. He was one of those artists who are not interested in naturalistic painting; who do not profess to paint nature. On the contrary, like the great Italians, he only borrowed from nature certain materials in order to build them up into a formal composition of his own creation. He would have told you that he was not representing the works of nature but creating for himself a totally different thing--a work of art.
On the other hand, many artists will reply, that the work of art need not be a totally different thing. That they themselves, like the Dutch of the Seventeenth Century and all the modern painters of the naturalistic composition, combine the two. It is by representing nature, that they create a work of art.
Here, you see, is a sharp conflict of points of view. One group of artists, loving nature, desires to represent it; the other, perhaps not loving nature less, certainly loves art more. This latter group, therefore, tries to improve on nature, and to use it only for the creation of something that it feels to be different and superior to nature. While the one set of men wed nature to art, the other divorce art from nature. Between the two there is a Great Divide, which no amount of talking can bridge over. The only conclusion to be reached is that there is right on both sides. For the one group, because of the kind of men composing it, its own way is the right way; and for the other, for the same reason, _its_ way. We, as lookers on at the dispute, will do well to learn to see the beauty in both kinds of picture.
You may as well know the names by which the two points of view are known. With one, the _naturalistic_, we have already become acquainted. The other is called by the artists who practise it the “idealistic.” They will tell you that they paint “ideal” subjects. By those, however, who disagree with them, their point of view and method are apt to be called _Academic_.
The word ideal, used in this sense, has the meaning “more perfect than in real life.” When a person says: “The ideal way to spend a summer holiday”--we know even before he utters the next words, “would be,” that he is going to tell us something that he does not expect to enjoy. It is how he would have things, if he could arrange them according to his own idea of perfection. Now this is what the artist means when he calls his picture an ideal one.
Personally, I do not like this use of the word, because it seems to imply that this kind of picture is superior to the other. And the artists who paint this kind of picture believe that it is; we, however, who are simply students of pictures, longing to enjoy the beauty of all kinds of motive and ways of painting, will not admit this. We go back to the fact with which I started this book: that the value of a picture does not depend upon the subject but the way in which the artist has rendered it. Because a man portrays some noble incident from poetry or the Bible, or invents some scene out of his brain, it does not follow that his picture will represent a higher degree of beauty or a finer imagination than one which only represents some simple scene in nature. I will go further and say that some of the pictures of “still life”[8] by the Frenchman, Antoine Vollon, or our own American artist, Emil Carlsen, exhibit more beauty, yes, and even more imagination than many ambitious figure subjects. Why is this? How can a picture of a pumpkin and vegetables by Vollon, or one of Carlsen’s subjects, such as a creamy porcelain vase, and a lemon, and one or two other delicately colored objects on a white tablecloth, show more beauty and imagination than, for instance, an imposing picture like Leutze’s _Washington Crossing the Delaware_?
The answer is that Vollon and Carlsen exhibit more feeling for beauty and more imagination in matters that especially belong to painting, while Leutze went outside of painting. Let me explain myself. Leutze saw beauty in the heroism of Washington and his soldiers, fighting against tremendous odds for a great cause in the terrible cold of winter. His imagination was kindled by the importance of the cause and the devotion of those who fought for it. It was the facts, as they appealed to his mind, and the ideas that his mind formed about them which he tried to represent. But the special field for the artist, as I have already said, is not covered by his mind but by his eyes. It is with what he can see that he should be first and chiefly concerned--the beauty of the visible world. And his imagination as an artist is chiefly shown in the capacity that his mind has for discovering unexpected beauties and rendering them. Thus to ourselves, and even to some artists, a pumpkin may seem but a bright orange mass, with a rough or shiny rind as the case may be; an attractive spot of color and shape, a thing to be admired for a moment and then forgotten. Another artist, on the contrary, sees a great deal more in it. He sees subtle differences of color, according to the way the light falls on it, various delicate differences in the roughness or smoothness of the rind; curiously beautiful accidents of color, as it reflects the colors of other objects near it; mysteries of shadow, some deep and strong, others so faint that an ordinary eye might not detect them. These and other qualities, that his sensitive eyes perceive, create impressions in his brain that fill his imagination with a sense of beauty somewhat as music does. He cannot tell you why he enjoys it so much, or explain in words the effect it has on his imagination. The whole impression is a vision of his imagination, excited by the sense of sight, and this vision he sets to work to interpret on his canvas, in order that it may be communicated to our eyesight, and, in turn, excite our imagination. We receive from form and color feelings of pleasure that we cannot describe in words but which are not less real on that account. It is an abstract enjoyment, free from any distinct connection with words or facts. On the other hand, in _Washington Crossing the Delaware_ it is the record of facts, presented in the picture, that chiefly interests us. Neither the forms nor the arrangement of color have in themselves any separate abstract quality of beauty.
So, it is not upon the beauty of the things seen by the eyes, but upon the interest of things understood by the mind that Leutze depended. He really neglected his own proper field of painting, for that of the writer or orator. Therefore, he put himself at a disadvantage; for I think you will admit, that a good speaker or writer could describe the incident in a much more thrilling way than the picture does.
But we have strayed somewhat from our point. We were speaking of idealistic pictures, and noted that they are so called because the artist instead of representing nature as it is, corrects it and improves upon it in order to bring it up to what he considers an “ideal” standard of perfection. I mentioned that these pictures and the motive which prompts them are also called “Academic.”
The reason is that the school in Paris which teaches these principles of painting is maintained by the Academy of the Fine Arts; and its example has been followed by many other European Academies of painting. So, when we speak of a picture being Academic in character, we mean that its motive and manner of painting follow the rules laid down by the schools. To repeat a word we have frequently used before, they are based on the Academic _Formula_. Previously it was the _Classic_ formula of which we spoke. This, you remember was the rule or plan for building up a formal composition, sometimes strengthened by the introduction of classic architecture and often representing some scene or story of classic legend. And it is upon this classic formula that the Academic practice is largely based. So when a modern artist paints a picture after the fashion of Raphael’s _Jurisprudence_, we can speak of its manner and motive as being Academic, Classic, or Idealistic. Sometimes, in fact, the meaning of these words is practically the same, but not always.
For at times an Academic painter will choose an everyday subject of ordinary life, yet his picture will not be naturalistic. There are two ways in which he may miss the truth of nature. Either he will try to improve upon the actual facts, or he will leave out the light and atmosphere in which the objects appear in nature. We may find examples of both these contradictions of the natural truth in Leutze’s picture. He was trained in the Academy of Düsseldorf, a city on the Rhine; at a time when that school had abandoned Classical subjects for incidents from history, or scenes from German legends, or what it called genre-pictures of peasant life. But these last were not genre in the sense that the old Dutch pictures were. For the latter reproduced the actual habits and life of the times, whereas the Düsseldorf artists presented fancy pictures in which the peasants were grouped, as if they were taking part in some scene in an opera or other theatrical performance. This artificial treatment appears in _Washington Crossing the Delaware_.
It is supposed to represent a historical incident. Do you think it has the value of history; that the incident really happened as it is here depicted? The artist, of course, was not present; he was compelled to shape the facts of the incident according to what he had read about them, or, as I rather suspect, according to what his fancy had pictured them. History tells us that the crossing began early in the evening of December 25, 1776, and lasted until four a.m. the following morning. Does this picture represent the dimness of a winter twilight, much less the gloom of night? I might ask the further question, is any kind of natural light suggested in this picture? I feel confident the answer is “no.” Leutze probably had no thought of representing this aspect of the truth; the Düsseldorf School paid no attention to the real appearances of light; or to the effect that light would have upon the appearance of the figures. Their outlines are sharply defined; every figure is rendered with about equal distinctness; no effort has been made to represent them in relation to one another, with varying degrees of clearness and obscurity. A similar artificiality appears in the representation of the ice. It is true the lights and shadows and gleam of the surfaces of real ice have been studied; so that the painting conveys the idea of ice; but this is a very different thing from the painted blocks representing the effects of real ice, as seen in real light.
So we find that Leutze, though wishing to give us a vivid representation of the incident, has neglected a number of important facts relating to the hour of the occurrence and to the conditions of atmosphere and light, as they must have affected the appearance of the scene. He was simply not interested in these matters. Then, what of the point on which he evidently relied--the grouping of the figures in the foreground? It is a ticklish job to pull a boat through a mass of floating ice-cakes.
[Illustration: Washington Crossing the Delaware. _Emanuel Leutze._
(_Property of the Metropolitan Museum of Art._)]
Do you think that Washington and the flag-bearer would have increased the difficulty and peril by standing up? Don’t you know that to stand up in a boat even on smooth water is a foolhardy thing to do? It is a frequent cause of accident and loss of life in pleasure parties. On an occasion so serious as this would the leader have been guilty of such folly? Certainly not. Washington and every man, not actually engaged in navigating the boat, would have been sitting low down, so as to help preserve the balance and offer as little resistance as possible to the wind. Here, then, is another indifference to facts in this so-called historic picture. But Leutze did not care about facts. His motive was to bring out the heroic character of the events. So he made Washington strike a heroic attitude. It is the way in which a popular actor takes the center of the stage and strikes an attitude and waits for the applause. Leutze wanted a central figure around which to build up his composition and, in order to support the central figure, reared another behind it holding aloft the flag. Thus he wins applause, at once, for the star actor and the patriotic sentiment of the scene. In fact his composition is similar in intention and arrangement to the grouping of figures on the stage of a popular theater. It is theatrical. I do not say dramatic, but theatrical, between which two ideas there is this distinction. When we speak of a scene being dramatic we mean that the action of the plot has been vividly expressed by means that create an illusion of truth--that the characters behave as they might be expected to do in real life under the circumstances. By theatrical, on the other hand, we imply that the behaviour of the actors, instead of “holding the mirror up to nature,” is regulated so as to produce an artificial effectiveness. Such a scene we call theatrical, or stagey. And the same words, in my opinion, can be applied to this picture. For Leutze failed to realise, not only that truth may be stronger than fiction, but also that it may be more impressive than artificial effectiveness. The true word spoken in simple earnestness, the true act done simply, often move men’s imagination, where loud rhetoric and ostentatious conduct leave it cold. So, too, in a picture, a deeper sentiment may be aroused by simple truth of representation, than by a display of mock heroics.
In this picture, you will observe, we have been discussing the Academic point of view applied to the representation of an incident that really happened. The painter undertook a real subject, but has not rendered it as it would have really appeared to us, had we been there to see the event. This is a charge that can be brought against many so-called historical pictures, and against those smaller ones, the genre pictures, which are supposed to represent incidents of actual everyday life. When painted in the Academic manner they are not true to life, but artificially concocted.
On the other hand, as I have said, many Academic pictures, choosing classical or idealistic subjects, make no pretence of representing life. They try to improve on life by making their forms more beautiful than they actually are in nature; and build up compositions which must not be compared with the way in which people group themselves in real life. In such pictures we do not look for natural beauty but for that of the artist’s own invention.
So, to bring the subject to a finish, we must bear in mind that there are two distinct ways of painting a picture. If the artist has tried to represent nature, we must learn to compare it with nature; if on the contrary, he has tried to paint a subject of “ideal perfection,” we must not find fault with its unnaturalness. We may prefer the one or the other kind; but should not let our preference interfere with our judgment of the different merits of each. Until we recognise the “Great Divide” between the Academic and the Naturalistic points of view, we shall not get very far in our appreciation of pictures.
CHAPTER XIII
COLOR
It was mentioned in the previous chapter that artists may be divided into two classes: those who are particularly interested in the shape or form of what they see, and those who see the world as an arrangement of “colored masses.” It is the latter way of seeing things that we are now going to consider.
We know that everything visible to the eye has color. When we think of a garden lawn, an impression of green comes into our mind. Green, an artist would say, is the local color of the lawn--the general hue which distinguishes it from the paths and flower beds. There may be dandelions spotted about the grass; indeed it is a lucky lawn that is not overrun with them; yet, notwithstanding the yellow patches, the local color of the lawn is green. And this is true, although here and there the grass may appear yellow in the warm sunshine, or, where the shadows of the trees lie, may have a bluish tinge; or again, in the distance may appear to be almost gray. You see then, that when we begin to talk about color, we do not think only of the general hue or local color, but also of the changes which take place in its appearance, according as it is subject to light and shadow or is seen near or further off.
Now let us take another case. A woman, we will suppose, has a quantity of white cotton material which she proposes to dye blue. She buys some indigo, and puts it in a tub of water. Into this dye-bath she plunges the cotton, and then hangs it on a line to dry. When she has taken it down and ironed it, it presents a uniform hue of blue, its local color. But what happens when she has made it up into a dress? The local color remains the same; but the appearance is no longer of a uniform hue. In some parts the blue is paler or whiter than the local color, in other parts darker; for now the material is not spread out smoothly, the light no longer falls upon every part of it in the same way. The skirt, for example, hangs in folds; and the full light strikes directly only on the raised edges of the pleats. Into the hollow of the fold less light penetrates, and at different angles.
Just what do we mean by angle of light? We must remember that the rays of light coming from the sun, radiate or travel outward in straight lines, as the spokes of a wheel radiate from the hub; except that the spokes of light are not confined to a flat circle, but radiate in all directions from every part of the sun’s orb. But to return to the wheel. Let us suppose that it is a buggy’s wheel, and that the buggy is jacked up, so that we can turn the wheel easily. We will do so until one of the spokes is pointing straight down to the ground, and, to make sure that it is exactly vertical, we will suspend in front of it a string with a weight attached to its lower end. If the spoke follows exactly the direction of this plumb line, then we know that it is pointing down directly to the surface of the ground. We know, in fact, that the direction of the spoke is at right angles to the surface of the ground; or, which amounts to the same thing, we may say that the surface of the ground is at right angles to the direction of the spoke.
But what about the direction of the other spokes of the wheel? With them the plumb line will not help us. We must get a straight stick, say the handle of the stable broom. If we hold this along the direction of either of the spokes, nearest to the center one, we shall find that when the handle touches the ground, it will be at a point further off from the hub, and not at a right angle to the ground but at an acute angle. If we try the same experiment with the next spoke, we may need a longer stick, for the point where it reaches the ground will be still further from the hub, and the angle of direction will be still more acute. If we follow on to the next spoke, we shall probably find that its direction, when extended, does not reach the ground. It points above it. Perhaps it hits the barn wall; and then again comes the question: does it hit the wall at a right angle or at an acute angle? The answer to this, if you think a moment, will depend upon the position, not only of the spoke, but also of the wall. For example, the spoke may point directly at the wall, so that when you stand at the corner of the barn and run your eye along the wall, the spoke will make a right angle with the wall’s vertical direction. But the wall has another direction--a horizontal one; and this may slope away from the direction of the spoke, so that if you stand in front of the wall, your stick makes with it an acute angle. Evidently under some circumstances a single direction may make with the surface of the wall both an acute and a right angle.
By this time our experiment, which started out so simply, has become perhaps a little puzzling to follow. But I don’t mind if it has; for I wish you to realise that, although this matter of direction and angles is simple in principle, it works out in a very complicated way. The more we realise this, the more we shall realise the wonderful effects of light upon color. As a beginning, let us imagine that the hub of the wheel is a center of heat, white-hot, and that the spokes are rays of light, not stationary like the woodwork but travelling outward at great speed. The shaft of light that runs straight down and strikes the ground at right angles to the surface, would make the spot where it touches very bright. The second shaft, however as it reaches the ground further off from the hub will illumine the spot with less light. Moreover, since it hits an acute angle and is travelling fast, some of it will glance off the spot. It will be reflected from the surface back and forth, somewhat as a ball is tossed backwards and forwards from the hands of a group of children.
This fact of reflection and the fact that the so-called angle of reflection is the same as the angle of incidence, or, in other words, the angle at which the light falls upon the object, explains a familiar sight. Have you never seen, late in the afternoon, when the sun is above the horizon, a blaze upon a hill side, so bright that your first thought is it must be a house on fire? You saw it suddenly; and, if you walk a few steps to the right or left, it as suddenly disappears; to reappear, however, when you resume your former position. By this time you know it is not a fire, but the reflection of the sun from some window or tin roof. The light, striking down upon it, glances off, and, as you happen to be in the line of its angle of reflection, strikes you full in the eyes. But move your position, so as to get out of the “line of fire,” and the reflected ray passes you by without attracting your notice.
Here is another example of reflected light, which you yourself can control. Do you remember the fairy _Tinker Bell_, in “Peter Pan”; how she appeared as a patch of light, dancing over the walls? Very likely when you returned from the theater you made her appear on the walls of your home. As you sat at the breakfast table you picked up a tumbler of water, or a bright bladed knife, and moved it about until it caught the light and tossed it across the room on to the wall, where you could make the fairy hover by gently shaking the glass or knife. On the other hand by changing the position of the glass or knife you could cause her to disappear; to reappear if you wished it, on another part of the wall.
Now after considering the difference between direct and reflected light, let us go back to the blue dress. We were saying, you will remember, that the skirt no longer presented an appearance of uniform hue. For the local color of the material had become affected by the way in which the light reached the folds. On the raised edges the blue appears almost white; in the bottom of the hollows, where no light penetrates, it appears to be almost black. Meanwhile on the sloping edges of the folds there are varying degrees of lighter or darker blue, according as the material approaches nearer to the light, or recedes further from it. In other words, the light strikes the surfaces of the dress at different angles; there are varieties of reflections, and some parts of the skirt are almost entirely removed from the action of the light.
But all this time we have been speaking of light, and yet the subject of this chapter is color. Well, the reason is, that color is light and light is color. If we were shut up in a cellar from which all light was excluded, we should see no color. Our eyes would experience no sensations of sight whatever, and, if we were left there a long time, our eyes, not being used, would probably lose their sense of sight. But, if after we had been in a cellar a little while surrounded by “thick darkness” as the old English expression is--meaning a darkness so opaque that the eye cannot penetrate it--the window shutter should be opened a trifle, then immediately our eyes would experience a sensation of color. The shaft of light, cutting across the darkness, would look white; but, if it hit upon a shelf of apples, our eye would receive a sensation of green or red or yellow. If light is color, why should it seem white in one case and some other hue in another? It is because in the whiteness of light are contained all the colors of which we are conscious. Very likely you know the experiment by which the truth of this is shown. Supposing you are still in the cellar and place in the pathway of the shaft of light a prism--that is to say, a bar of glass not round or square, but triangular--what will happen? The glass being transparent, the light will pass through it. But not in a straight line; for, as it hits one of the sloping surfaces of the prism, it will be bent out of its course; and then, as it reaches the opposite sloping side, it will again be bent into another direction. So the light in its passage through the prism will have been twice bent out of its original direction; and, when it emerges, it will be no longer a single shaft of white light, but will appear as a broad band of many colored lights; red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet. We may call this succession, a scale of color lights. They correspond in hue and order to the bands or scale of colored lights in the rainbow, for the latter is the result of an act of nature, which on a very large scale is like our experiment with the prism. Only nature’s prism is formed by a bar of rain on which strikes a shaft of light through a slit in the thick upper clouds.
With this scale of colored lights scientists have made delicate experiments. They have analysed the colors more exactly; discovering, that is to say, the distinct degrees of color, for instance, between the red and the orange, as the one passes into the other; and again between the orange and the yellow, the yellow and the green, and so on. Then, after discovering the succession of monochromatic tints, as they call them, by optical instruments, they have tested the power of the human eye to discriminate, or detect the difference between these various tints. Notwithstanding that the difference between the latter is so slight, they have found that the eye is sensitive to something like two million monochromatic tints. I mention it not to trouble you with figures but to stir your imagination; for such a fact should fill us with admiration not only of the marvellous qualities of light but also of the marvellous capacity of the human eye. It helps us to begin to realise the miracle of light and the immense field of study that lies open to the artist who is a colorist, to whom, that is to say, it is the color of the visible world that most appeals.
Light, then, contains within itself all colors. When light falls upon an object, for example, a leaf, the latter absorbs some of the colors of the light and throws off others. The part thrown off in the case of the leaf is what we call its color: green, or it may be greenish yellow, or a bluish green, or in autumn, crimson. Every substance has this power of absorbing some of the light and of throwing off the rest; and it is the different chemical properties of different substances that decide which of the colors of light they will absorb and which they will throw off; or, as we say, causes them to be a certain color.
We have spoken of the human eye being sensitive to an immense variety of colors. Let us consider the meaning of sensitive. In the first place, the eye receives an impression that causes it to telegraph to the brain a record of the hue; but it means more, for the word sensitive implies a capacity to feel. In some way or other the brain receives an impression of feeling. Just how it does, I understand, is not known; but scientists tell us that these impressions of sight, while they are not quite similar to the feelings aroused by sound, have something in common. Just as some sounds give pleasure while others are disturbing, so with colors--we receive from them sensations of pain or pleasure. According to the degree of our sensitiveness to sound or color our feelings are aroused. It may be only slightly, or it may be more intensely. It is pleasant, for example, to hear the sound of the robin’s note, and, as we peep out of our bedroom window to look at him, we may catch sight of the yellow or red notes of color that the tulips are beginning to make against the dark earth. They too will give us pleasure. And in both cases our pleasure may go no further than just a little enjoyment of their note of color or sound. Or, on the other hand, they may stir our imagination. We recognise their notes as the first signs of spring. Nature in her mysterious way has whispered alike to the robin and the tulip that the rigor of winter is over; that spring is come with its birth of new life, bringing beauty and happiness in its train. And in ourselves, as we recognise the notes of spring, life leaps up with a new sense of the beauty and happiness of living. Those notes, in fact, which began by giving only simple pleasure to our ear, have stirred ideas in our minds; they have become associated in our imagination with a fuller and higher sense of life.
On the other hand, some notes of sound distress us. The unexpected discharge of a gun may strike us unpleasantly; the roar of the wind and the rain against the window fill us with melancholy; the cry of a creature in pain, even before we know whence the cry comes or the reason of it, may cut us like a knife. I mean, that sounds, quite apart from any definite thoughts that we associate with them, may hurt us. So may colors. I might illustrate this by saying that sometimes when we enter a room the color of the carpet, perhaps green with red roses as big as cabbages, and the color of the furniture, which may be of gold upholstered in blue, seem to start up and hit us a bang in the eye. But perhaps you like smart colors, so I will offer another example. Shakespeare said--
She never told her love, But let concealment, like a worm i’ the bud, Feed on her damask cheek. She pined in thought, And with a green and yellow melancholy, She sat, like patience on a monument, Smiling at grief.
Shakespeare’s opportunity of seeing pictures had been very limited. In fact, I am sure that he was not thinking of pictures when he described melancholy as “green and yellow.” Either he had an instinctive dislike of this combination that probably he could not have explained; simply he felt it to be disagreeable; or he may have associated it in his imagination with something he had observed. Perhaps for instance, since he speaks in the next line of a “monument,” he may have been thinking of the green and yellow stains on old tombstones, so that “green and yellow” suggested to him the very opposite of “damask cheek” with its rosiness of healthy life; in fact the signs of wasting and decay. Anyhow, to Shakespeare’s imagination these colors represented something disagreeable. That is the point. Colors, like sounds, may excite feelings of distress or pleasure.
And, if single notes may give pleasure, how much more a number of them. It is when a number of them are combined into a composition that a harmony is produced. The musician creates a harmony of sound, the painter a harmony of color. The secret of a harmony is the relation that the separate notes of sound or color in it bear to one another. If I try to explain this, it is not because I wish to tell you how to make a color harmony, but because I hope the explanation may help you to enjoy it. Perhaps we may get an idea of what relation means if we think of a football team. It consists of a number of individuals with separate duties. Some play forward, others half-back, quarter-back, and so on. When each member not only does his own work as well as possible but plays well into the hands of the other members, we speak of the excellence of the team work. And in nine cases out of ten it is not brilliant individual play, but fine all-round team-work that wins the game. The different members are so well related to one another, that the whole team works harmoniously.
It is similar in a harmony of colors. For perhaps you see that what I wish you to understand is not that a few bright colors make a harmony, but that it is the result of a combination. There must be team-work among the colors. They count as individual spots of color, but still more in relation to all the other colors. There may be one or more crack players--I mean predominant[9] notes of color,--but they will have colleagues or assistants--colors of the same hue but differing in degree--which will repeat or echo their effect, with variations all over the canvas. These subordinate colors and the crack ones will play in and out, backing one another up, and, as it were, passing the ball backward and forward into one another’s hands; acting in such exact relation to one another, that their efforts result in a perfect harmony of effect.
But so far we have been thinking only of one team, working out its scheme of attack and defense in practice play. There is a more complicated play, namely, when the team is pitted against a rival team. So in color. An artist will introduce rivalry, or competition into his color scheme; namely, two crack notes of color that, seen by themselves, would produce a disagreeable sensation. Why does he do so? Because he knows the value of contrast and discord; just as you know it is more fun to watch a game of football between two well-matched rival teams than the merely practice play of one of them. For now the artist is pitting one set of colors against another set; the crack players on both sides and their backers-up--the colors of different but closely related hue; and the game between them is fast and furious--an interplay of likes and unlikes, of repetitions and of contrasts. The excitement of the game results from the even balance of the two rival sets of colors, swaying backward and forward over the gridiron--I mean the canvas--massing here and there, then scattering in a burst of animation--the two teams so evenly matched that their rivalry only makes the give and take of the game more brilliantly harmonious.
Such, in a way, is the harmony of color, as it appears in the pictures of a true colorist. It has a focal point of intensity where the effect is massed, but all about it, scattered over the canvas, is the interplay of related similarities and contrasts, all of which combine into a harmonious whole.
It may help you, as it has helped me, to understand the combination of these numberless repetitions and contrasts of color, if I tell you of an experience of sound that I remember. I was one of a party walking in the Swiss mountains, and at a turn in the path we came upon a man, sitting with a gun across his knees. For a small amount this mountaineer was prepared to let off his gun. We paid, he fired. There was a sharp report--a focal point of sound--then a neighboring mountain side sent back an echo, which was caught by another that sent it back, whence again it was re-echoed from another mountain peak, and so on, back and forth, until in a moment or two, the whole mountain world resounded with a wondrous roar. From a single note of sound, which made a very slight impression had grown a multiplication of slightly differing sounds. For the first echo was slightly different to the original note, and then again the echo of this echo differed slightly, so too the echo that came next and the one that followed that, and so on through a scale of slightly varying tones, that finally merged into one huge swell of throbbing sound, as of some mighty organ music--a harmony of tumult. It was a wonderful sensation, and has helped me to realise the wonder of color harmony. For an artist generally founds his color scheme upon one or two notes of color, and then by representing the echoes of these colors, as they are reflected at different angles from the various planes of surface, gradually elaborates or works out a maze of related colors that merge into a harmony.
On the other hand it is not only by painting the interplay of reflections that an artist produces a harmony of color. There is a less complicated way, represented in Japanese prints and paintings, and in the work done by some of our artists who have adopted their method. In this case the color is flat; the objects, that is to say, are not modeled by lights and darks. The form, instead of being actually represented is only suggested. Consequently there are no reflections and the colors are laid on flatly and smoothly. But they are most carefully related to one another; both in quantity and tint. The artist, for example, may use only rose and lavender and black. But his sense of color is first shown in his choice of the particular tints of rose and lavender and black, and then secondly, in his distribution of these on the white paper. Perhaps he determines to make the black his crack player. But he wishes to produce a balance of harmony of all his colors, so he carefully considers how large a space the chief spot of black shall occupy, and then what quantity of the remaining spaces shall be occupied by the rose and lavender and the white paper. Having thus worked out the ground plan of the scheme, he may elaborate it by repeating some of the black in other parts of the picture, and by introducing echoes of the rose and lavender in the large spot of black. The echoes, in this case, you observe, are not reflections, they are simply repetitions in smaller quantities of the colors of the main spots. His composition, in fact, is a pattern of main spots, and their echoes; the whole presenting a unity and harmony because the colors are in exact relation.
And when this has been done either in a simple harmony or a more elaborate one, with the true feeling of a colorist, no alteration can be made in any part of the picture without producing a discord, destroying, that is to say, the exquisite balance of the whole. I mean, that if, for instance, you were to cut off a part of the picture in order to make it fill a frame, you would destroy the harmony of the whole. For now the relation of the colors will have been disturbed. There is no longer the same balance in the quantity of each, nor do they occupy the same related position in the composition.
In a word, as we said above, the secret of color harmony is the relation of the separate colors to one another and the whole.
CHAPTER XIV
COLOR (_Continued_)--VALUES--SUBTLETY
So far in our talk on color we have laid stress on three points: first, that color is light; secondly, that color is affected by light; thirdly, that the painter who is a colorist arranges color in relation to other colors, so as to produce a harmony.
The reason was, that I wished you not to think of color as paint. Paints, or as artists call them, pigments, are only the materials that man has invented to imitate the real thing. The real thing is nature’s color. Pigments we will speak of later.
From early ages man has been attracted by nature’s colors and has tried to imitate them in order to brighten up his own person and his surroundings. He began by smearing his own body with some form of dye or pigment, either to make himself more attractive or to strike terror into his enemies. As he became more civilised and learned to weave wool and cotton and flax, he dyed his blankets and clothing, and added gay borders and patterns to the local color. Growing more skilful in the fashioning of clay pots, and bows and arrows, and other articles of war and domestic use, he decorated them with colored designs. Little by little he learned how to imitate the beauty of nature’s coloring. But, at first, it seems to have been the brightness of color that attracted him; just as to-day, a great many children and, for that matter, grown-ups as well, prefer gay colors. Manufacturers and merchants know this. Accordingly, to suit the taste of a great many customers who still have the primitive child-man’s love of gay-colored things, they fill the markets with gaudy-colored carpets and wall-papers, and gaudily upholstered furniture, gaudy curtains, cushions and so forth. And people buy them, so that thousands of households are furnished in a way that to any one who loves nature’s coloring, seems horrible. Yes, this is a strong word. But if you will believe me, not too strong to express the feelings of distress that such parlors excite in people whose taste is more civilised. They are as much distressed, as if the parlor were filled with roosters, parrots and monkeys, all crowing, and screeching and chattering together in a horrible discord of sound.
Perhaps you do not like my hinting that people who prefer these noisy colors are not yet fully civilised. You have been taught that we are living in a very civilised age, with all sorts of modern improvements that the people of the past never thought of, much less enjoyed. This of course is perfectly true. Science and mechanical inventions have made living easier; travel is cheaper, education has advanced, books are within the reach of everybody and, best of all, we have more pity for the poor, and the sick and the afflicted, and try to make their lot less terrible. Yes, and in thousands of other ways we are more civilised. Yet, even so, we may be far from enjoying all the opportunities of civilisation that this wonderful age offers.
How many girls and boys, I wonder, who have enjoyed the benefits of a good education, when they reach the age in which they can choose for themselves what they will read, select the best books? I mean by the best books, those that in history, poetry, biography, travel, science, and fiction, really give us the best kind of knowledge of men and life. Are there not thousands of readers who are satisfied to read nothing else but the latest novel, no matter how trashy it may be? Thousands, indeed, who are not bettering their minds and lives, as really civilised people should try to do; but allowing the garden of their hearts and souls to become laid waste and barren, just as your flower garden would soon be, if you turned loose in it the poultry and the pigs.
The truth with such readers is, that, though they enjoy the blessings of civilisation, they have missed one of civilisation’s finest products. They have not _good taste_, their _taste_ is _bad_. And bad taste is like a poison. If it is allowed to remain in the system it will in time affect the whole body. None of us can make a habit of reading trash without sooner or later becoming trashy and cheap and commonplace in our thoughts, conversation, choice of friends and conduct.
However, as you are reading this book, I hope it is a sign that you do not care for trashy reading. So let us get back to the subject of taste in matters of color. If one looks back over the past, there is no doubt that as people became more civilised, one of the ways in which they showed improvement was in color taste. They gradually ceased to be attracted only by the brightness of color; they began to find beauty in the relation of one color to another; to try to produce a harmony of colors.
I wonder whether, as you have been reading, it has occurred to you to think: Why does the author object to bright colors? He says we learn to love color by studying nature’s coloring. Are there not bright colors in nature? Is it wrong to like them?
Certainly not; nor do I object to bright colors. I am often delighted with them. But, in the first place, bright colors do not look the same in nature as they do in a parlor. Secondly, art, as we have said before, is different to nature. The artist does not imitate everything he sees in nature, but from it selects this and that to make his work of art.
Nothing in our garden makes a brighter spot than the giant poppy. Its wide and flaring crimson cup, stained with the purple of its stamens, burns like a flame. I love the brave show poppies make, ranged at intervals along the borders or massed in a clump with a setting of greenery around them. For, to prevent their brilliance overpowering the garden, they need plenty of space and abundance of contrasting colors. I cannot imagine anything more noisy and gaudy than a little yard entirely filled with them. The reason they need space is that they may be surrounded with plenty of atmosphere. It is this which makes so great a difference between effects of color out of doors and indoors. Out of doors the atmosphere acts like a veil, softening the sharpness of colors and forms and helping to draw them together into a unity of effect. It is indeed, more like a succession of veils, for between us and nearby objects is a certain amount of atmosphere; while objects further off, and still further off, and further off still, are separated from us by continually increasing quantities of atmosphere. And these planes of atmosphere, as we called them in Chapter IV, act like veils of gauze through which everything is seen. As I have said, they help to subdue the colors and draw them into relation with one another, and so suggest an effect of harmony. In a room, however, especially a small one, we cannot get far enough away from objects to permit much atmosphere to come in between. There is not so much distance to lend enchantment to the view. Consequently, though we may enjoy the beauty of a few of those poppies in a bowl on our table, we should find a carpet or curtains or sofa of the same color much too gaudy and overpowering. The effect would be much as if, while the piano was being played, someone should blow loudly on a tin horn. The noise would disturb the harmony of the music; we should shut our ears or turn the tin horn disturber out of the room. So when we enter a gaudily furnished room, we should like to shut our eyes to the discord of color, and, if we had our way, would banish the disturbing objects to the junk-shop.
But now for the second reason why some of nature’s colors, beautiful in themselves, may be less so when introduced into a room or picture. For the furnishing of a room, like the composing of a picture, should, as far as possible, be a work of art, and the artist, as you recollect, does not imitate nature. He selects from nature. Out of her unlimited storehouse of form and color he chooses for his purpose some few effects at a time and combines them in his work of art; guided in his choice and arrangement by the principles of beauty he has discovered in nature, particularly by the principle of harmony. And in this respect he has an advantage over nature. For the light and atmosphere cannot choose the colors and objects which they help to harmonise. Even after they have done their best, there may be so many of those poppies that, while their colors are subdued and brought into some relation with the other colors, the relationship is still too distant--the difference between the two colors too wide--to produce a perfect harmony. But the artist, since he can pick and choose what he will put into his picture, is able to avoid this difficulty; just as a young couple when they start housekeeping can generally avoid having things that will disturb the harmonious arrangement of their parlor. I say “generally,” for sometimes, notwithstanding their own taste, they receive from some kind but tasteless friend, the present of a piece of furniture that plays the tin-horn to all their ideas of harmony. This is a hard case. They do not wish to offend Mrs. So-and-so or Aunt Jane, and yet they do not like having to live with something offensive to their own feelings!
We have said so much about the artist working for a harmony of colors, that I ought to warn you that you will not see color harmonies in all pictures. For a great many painters are not colorists. Bouguereau, for example, was interested chiefly in form. If he represented a young girl, drawing water from a well, he painted her flesh pink; her dress, perhaps, blue; the stone-work of the wall, gray; the wood work of the bucket, brown; and, if there was a bush in the picture, of course, painted it green. His only purpose in choosing this color or that color was to represent the general appearances of the figure and other objects. He only _saw_ color, never _felt_ it. He never even saw it, as it really is; or he would hardly have painted all his girls and women the same kind of pinky or creamy china-color. In fact, color to him was quite unimportant. If he could _draw_ the girl beautifully he was satisfied. So it is beautiful form we must look for in his pictures; the color does not count.
Then there is another kind of painter; Vibert, for example, whose pictures were popular in this country. He liked to paint a cardinal in a scarlet cassock, either in or out of doors. The scarlet makes a big bright spot in the pictures. Vibert was evidently fond of color; but in a very crude or unrefined sort of way. He had the primitive man’s or child’s fondness for gay or brilliant hues; and since there are many people with the same child-like instinct, he sold his pictures easily. He too, for the most part only _saw_ color. Or, if he felt it at all, only in the very simple way of liking one color better than another. Color never stirred in him deep feelings. He never felt it as a musician feels sound. He never wove the related colors into a harmony. He was a gay painter, but not a colorist.
I wonder whether you are beginning to understand the difference? What I have said may help to point the way to an understanding, but no amount of reading can make you feel the beauty of color, or enter into the feelings of an artist who is a colorist; and enjoy his work. This you can only do for yourself by using your own eyes. Nor do I mean by this that you should now and then look at a picture, or once in a while open your eyes to the beauty of nature. What I suggest is that you should get into the habit of keeping your eyes open to the beauty of the world. If you do, you will have your reward. And the more you watch out for beauty, and so train your feeling and taste, the more you will discover beauty in unexpected directions. Especially you will find that some of the most beautiful color harmonies are made up of colors, that a little while ago you would not have felt to be beautiful.
It is not difficult, for example, to enjoy the beauty of nature’s coloring when the sun is shining brightly. But, because it is so easy, some painters who are colorists will not care to represent it in their pictures. They will wait for what they call a gray day--when the sun is hidden behind clouds of mist. Or, like Corot, they will prefer the early morning or late evening, when the sky is very pale, and the colors of nature are very subdued. Or, like Whistler, who painted _The White Girl_, a girl in white, standing on a white rug in front of a white wall, they will choose some subject in which the difference between the colors is very slight. In a word they are looking, not for splendid but for subtle harmonies. Those grand Venetian colorists of the Sixteenth Century, Titian, Tintoretto, and Paul Veronese, and the great Flemish colorist of the Seventeenth Century, Peter Paul Rubens, for the most part gloried in harmonies of splendour, Velasquez, however, Rubens’s contemporary, whose life was spent in the service of Philip IV of Spain, proved himself to be one of the world’s greatest colorists by the soberness and subtlety of his harmonies. A large part of his work consisted in painting the portraits of the King, the Royal Family, and the chief State officers. The taste of the Court was opposed to bright colored costumes; indeed the prevailing colors were black and gray, with occasional touches of relief, such as blue or pale rose. Yet out of these few colors he made wonderful harmonies. To his sensitive eye a black cloak was not a mass of thick darkness. As the light shone upon the various surfaces at different angles, he discovered all sorts of nuances, as the French say, or
[Illustration: Prince Balthazar Carlos. _Velasquez._]
shades and degrees of lighter and darker black, in fact, a scale of tints out of which he composed a harmony. It was the same way with the grays and drabs. We often call these neutral colors, by which we mean that there is no particular color in them. But Velasquez did not look at grays and drabs in this way. Having to paint them he searched them for possibilities of beauty, and found them in the nuances, occasioned by the action of light. And out of the scale of these nuances he composed harmonies.
To these nuances artists have given a name--values. We know the ordinary use of the word. It represents the relation of something to a certain fixed standard. Thus, we take a dollar as a standard; and say the value of this knife is fifty cents, or of that two dollars. These knives differ in value; or, on the other hand, we may have two or more knives that correspond in value. Or, again, if some of you are arranging a picnic as a Dutch treat, one of the party may undertake to bring ten cents’ worth of eggs, another ten cents’ worth of crackers, and so on. Though every one of twenty boys and girls brings something different, the value of each contribution is the same.
Now applying this to colors, you may see that the point to which I am leading you is this. Just as the knife varies in value from other knives, so may one tint of black vary from another tint of black; one tint of red from another tint of red; one tint of yellow from another tint of yellow. Equally, since a certain quantity of crackers may have the same value as a certain quantity of cheese, so may a certain tint of red have the same value as a certain tint of yellow. But what is the standard by which one kind of color can be compared with another?
The standard of value adopted by a painter, is light. The value of any color depends upon the amount of light reflected from it. Thus, if you look at a man dressed in black, you will notice that the black upon the shoulder, or the chest, or whatever part receives the greatest quantity of light, will seem less black than those parts which receive less light. And it may be only in the hollows or shaded parts that the black looks really black. Well, each one of these separate degrees of black represents to the painter a separate value of black.
Perhaps you will say--Why this is only a repetition of what was said about the painting of reflections of light and the shadows on the blue skirt! You are right. Then--why, you ask, this new term--values? Well, it was when the modern man discovered that the painting of these reflections and shadows could be made a means of producing harmonies of color; that, indeed, harmonies could be produced out of the reflections alone, that they invented this new name. They had discovered a new principle of harmony, depending upon the varieties of light on color, and they gave to these varieties the new name of values. Not that the principle was really a new one. It was an old one discovered by Velasquez and at the same time by the Dutch--Vermeer among them.[10] But about 1860 some modern artists from studying the works of these men made a new discovery of the principle.
Before discussing the importance of the rediscovery, let us turn back to the other use of that word values. If you remember, the word is used not only of the differences in degree in tint of some one color; for example, the different values of black, of green, of red and so on, but it is also used as a standard to compare a color of one hue with a color of another hue. Let me remind you of that Dutch treat picnic to which everybody brought a contribution of equal value. I need not tell you that the ten cents’ worth of soda crackers will make a bigger parcel than the ten cents’ worth of cheese, while ten cents’ worth of----’s “fine chocolate” would make a very small parcel indeed. Now, colors differ in the same way. All colors throw off a certain quantity of light, but the amount varies.
You remember, we said that the cause of color was the fact, that light which is made up of all colors penetrates every object in nature; that each object absorbs a certain quantity of the color and throws off the remainder. And that this remainder is what appears to our eyes as the color of the object. But while we think of this remainder as color, do not let us forget that it is light. And, recollecting that color is light, we can understand that one color has more or less light in it than another.
I wish to make sure that you do understand this, so let us try to illustrate it. We are in the habit of estimating things by percentage. Suppose then that we think of the light of the sun as representing one hundred points. Scientists have discovered that objects which we call yellow absorb only some twenty of these points; that, in fact, the quantity of light thrown off by what we call yellow, or in other words its value, is some eighty per cent. What we call red, however, represents some sixty per cent. of light; green, about forty per cent.
Now supposing an artist wishes to combine these colors in a Dutch picnic; if he wishes, that is to say, to combine these colors, so that they will contribute equally to the whole composition of color. He will use a great deal less yellow than red, and less of either of these colors than green. The packet of green, like the crackers; will be bigger than the cheese, or red; the yellow, or chocolate, smallest of all.
Let us imagine a picture that will illustrate this. But before we do so I must remind you that what we are talking about is color harmonies, and particularly those harmonies of color in which the modern artist delights. He learned them, as I have said, from Velasquez, who was debarred from using brilliant colors, he learned them also from the old pictures of the Dutchmen, like Vermeer; lastly he learned them from studying the pictures and prints of the Japanese. The effect of all these examples was to make him prefer subtlety to splendour.
I have already explained the meaning of subtlety and subtle. Both are derived from a Latin word which means “finely woven”--fine spun threads of silk or linen, woven closely together into a strong but very delicate and thin fabric. So when we speak of a subtle distinction we have in mind a distinction that is very slight; as between two tints of yellow. To many eyes they will seem the same; whereas an eye more subtly sensitive to degrees of color can distinguish the difference. We may say of such an eye, that it has a very delicate sense of sight, or subtlety of vision. Subtlety implies delicacy; and when we speak of the subtlety of an artist’s color harmonies--how subtle they are--we have in mind a delicate, exquisite, refined use of color. He has not used many colors; nor obtained his effects by force of strong contrasts. On the contrary, it is by subtle relation of a few colors, by the subtle differences in their values that a harmony, distinguished by its exquisite delicacy, is produced.
Our own American artist, the late James McNeill Whistler, was one of the first of the modern artists to paint this sort of harmony. He painted four pictures of a girl in a white dress, which he afterwards entitled “Symphonies in White,” numbering them one, two, three, and four, just as a musician’s works are distinguished by a number. For Whistler felt that there is some similarity between the harmonies of color and those of sound notes, and tried in his pictures to produce subtle effects as musicians do. In one of this series he represents the girl in a white dress, standing on a white rug, before a white wall. The only variation from the white is afforded by her dark hair and the flesh coloring of her face and hands. These are what we may call “accents”--notes of color that stand out with prominence and decision. The rest is a symphony in white.
He might have made his problem easier by throwing a strong light upon the figure from one side. This would have made some parts of the dress shine out with the brightness of very high lights, and would have caused the figure to cast a shadow on the wall. This would have produced a harmony of contrasts; a bold contrast of color values, easier to paint. But Whistler was intent on something very subtle--a harmony of similarities. So he placed the figure in a dull light, that was evenly distributed over the rug, the figure, and the wall, with the result that the distinctions between the color values were very slight, very subtle. This means that it was difficult to make the different masses of white distinct from one another. The artist, you see, had to make it appear that the girl’s white figure was nearer to us than the white wall; to make us feel that, while the wall is flat, the figure has roundness and bulk; and that, while the wall is an upright surface, the rug represents a horizontal one. Yes it was indeed a very difficult problem, because the only possible way of solving it was to render the very slight differences in the quantity of light, reflected from each and every part of the white surfaces, according to the angle at which the light reached any part, and the distance each part was from the eye of the artist. And no doubt the keen mind of Whistler was interested in the subtlety of the problem. But this was not all. His feeling as an artist was equally subtle. It delighted in the subtleties of color values.
However, he also enjoyed effects of brighter color. I have asked you to imagine this picture of Whistler’s because it illustrates the first meaning of “values”--namely the different quantities of light that may be contained in one and the same color. I wish to illustrate now the other meaning of “values”--which has to do with the quantity of light contained in one color as compared with that in another color; for example, with the percentage of light contained in red as compared with that contained in blue, or green, or white, or any other color. For this purpose I have chosen the second in Whistler’s series of symphonies in white: _The Little White Girl_. You can look at the reproduction and see for yourself that part of the color scheme, or color harmony, certainly the most important part, consists of the figure of the girl in white. You will notice how it illustrates what we have been saying about the other white girl. It is evenly lighted, there are no contrasts of extreme light and dark; the dress is a woven tissue of subtly different values of white. But in this case Whistler has treated the white dress as the theme or chief motive, as a musician would say, and has woven around it a composition of variations. It is the variations that I wish you now particularly to notice. They may be put under two heads. First, the reflection of the girl’s head in the mirror; second, the various spots of color that surround her.
Suppose we begin with the latter. On the mantel-shelf, close to the flesh-color of the girl’s hand and the white of her sleeve is a Japanese jar, decorated in white and blue, and beside it a Japanese box covered with that smooth shiny surface called lacquer, and of a scarlet color, like a geranium. Down below appear the sprays of camelias with dark green glossy leaves and white and rosy blossoms. The fan repeats these colors, but with a difference. There is red in it, but of a different value to the red of the box and flowers; blue, but of another value than that on the vase; green, which differs in value from the leaves. Secondly, in the mirror is a repetition of the girl’s head and of certain colors in the room. But the reflected head, as you can see in the reproduction, is in a lower key than the real one. The colors are lower in value; there is not so much light in them; for the mirror has absorbed some of it. You may test a mirror’s appetite for light by holding your handkerchief close to it. You will see that the white of the reflection is much greyer than the handkerchief, or according to the quality of the glass, it may seem slightly blue. At any rate its value will be lower than that of the handkerchief; just as in this picture, the reflected colors of the
[Illustration: The Little White Girl. _J. M. Whistler._]
flesh and hair are lower in value than the actual head.
Now, looking at the picture, we note that the figure occupies about one half of the composition. It illustrates, as did _The Sower_, the use of a main diagonal line, though the feeling suggested by it is different. In _The Sower_, you will remember, the diagonal helped to give vigor and alertness to the figure; while here, on the contrary, its suggestion is one of very gracious quiet. For the slope of this diagonal is not so steep as in the other picture; nor do the directions of the arms and head present such abrupt contrasts. The left arm it is true, is nearly at right angles--itself a strong contrast; but it is so quietly laid along the mantel-shelf, which supports its weight, that there is no suggestion of effort. Meanwhile, the other arm, hanging so easily, is almost parallel to the main diagonal. The line also of the neck gently carries on the lines of the shoulders, and, as the head is slightly tilted back, its downward pressure is supported by the shoulder that rests on the shelf. The whole suggestion of the figure, in fact, is one of rest. There is no conscious bodily effort to interfere with the reverie in which the girl’s mind is wrapt. She may be buried in her thoughts or she may be absorbed in the beauty of the box and vase, at which she seems to be looking. “Seems,” I say, for it is difficult to be sure that she is conscious of them. Her gaze seems fixed to a far vision, as if she had begun by looking at these objects, and then, as her thoughts passed beyond them, had let the gaze of her eyes follow. She seems buried in some girlish reverie, wrapt “in maiden meditation, fancy free.” To me it is a very lovely figure not because of the features of the face--opinions may differ about the face being beautiful in the ordinary sense of having beautiful features. Its beauty to me lies in its expression; in its expression of some lovely mood of a girl’s spirit. And I find the figure beautiful, because all through it is the movement of the same expression. This must have been in Whistler’s mind when he painted her. But he was conscious, perhaps, of another side of her nature; that she had moods of brightness as well. At any rate he chose to contrast with the pensive calm of the girl herself the bright animated spots of color that surround her.
These spots of color, if you examine the picture carefully, really play the part of the shadows in the chiaroscuro of old pictures. Chiaroscuro, you remember, is the pattern of light and dark. Here the red box and the blue of the vase and the green and rose, of the camelias, yes, and even the face in the mirror, the marble shelf and fireplace--all represent the dark spots. But not dark in the old way of being shadows. They are dark as compared with the white of the dress, because their colors reflect less light than the white; their values are lower. Thus they serve the purposes of a dark contrast and yet they themselves are very light. This, in a nutshell, is what the new study of values, that was learnt from Velasquez and from Vermeer, and the other Dutchmen, really means. It has enabled the artist to be even more true to life in the representation of objects, and at the same time to make his color-harmonies purer, clearer and more transparent; in one word, luminous; permeated, that is to say, with a suggestion of light, that in nature permeates the atmosphere and brings all objects into an appearance of harmonious unity.
How this particular picture is helped by a contrast, not of the old fashioned dark and light, as in the _Descent from the Cross_ but of values of color, you can see for yourself, even from the reproduction. Still more would you realize it could you see the freshness and purity and gladsomeness of the original. Contrasts are needful in the composition of a work of art--they are one of the sources of its beauty. But imagine if you can, having shadows and darkness brought into contrast with this white robed figure! How they would contradict the expression of its exquisite purity and loveliness! As it is, the contrast of lower values does not in the least jar upon the expression; on the contrary, it gives it a greater meaning, since it suggests the atmosphere of happiness and brightness that has helped to color the beauty of the girl’s spirit.
CHAPTER XV
COLOR (_Continued_)--TEXTURE, ATMOSPHERE, TONE
In our previous talk about color we have laid great stress on the relation of one color to another. We have not thought of red, for example, as beautiful by itself, but as one of a family of colors, whose beauty consists in their relation to one another. And this related beauty we have spoken of as color harmony.
“Behold how good and joyful a thing it is, brethren, to dwell together in unity.” So said the Psalmist, and his words might be applied to the unity of colors. He did not mean that everybody shall be of a like mind; there will always be differences of character among relations and the best of friends; but they will agree to differ; and their very differences make their unity or harmony the more real and good. Such is the harmony among colors; a union of differences or contrasts, as well as of similarities; of variety of values of color related into a harmonious unity.
On the other hand, though the beauty of colors is chiefly to be found in their relations to one another, there are separate possibilities of beauty to each color. And if each displays its own share of these the general beauty of the harmony will be increased. Some of the possibilities are texture, quality, and tone.
Texture first. It is derived from the Latin word, _textum_,--something woven. Texture, in its original meaning, represents what has been produced by weaving. A lady, when she is shopping, presses the linen or silk, or cotton goods between her fingers in order to judge of their texture; whether it is closely or loosely woven, whether it is hard or smooth to the touch. Secondly, the word is used of a thing made by any other means than weaving. We speak, for example, of the texture of paper; and judge of its texture by the feel of it. Thirdly, it has come to be used of any material, whether made by man or nature. Thus we say that oak has a very close texture; glass is of firm but brittle texture; butter is greasy in texture, and so on. Finally, the word is used in a very general way to describe the character of any substance, especially the kind of surface that it has. So we say of the flesh of a healthy baby, that its texture is firm and silky; and we speak of the glossy texture of a polished table; the downy texture of a young chicken’s breast, or the velvety texture of a peach. In one word, texture is the quality of a thing that we discover by touching it.
Texture appeals to our sense of touch. It excites in us a variety of feelings, pleasant or unpleasant. I need not tell you how disagreeable the texture of sharp rocks may be to your bare feet, when you are bathing; what a relief it is to them to feel the texture of sand. Some of you, I am sure, are conscious of the pleasure you derive from handling things. You have discovered for yourselves what a lot of feeling you have in the tips of your fingers. You would enjoy handling the red box in Whistler’s picture: and your touch would be very careful and delicate. Not alone because the box is valuable, but because it is only with a delicate touch that you can appreciate the exquisite smoothness of the lacquer.
The latter is a varnish composed of the gum of a certain tree. The Japanese workman lays it over the box very thinly, and, when it is thoroughly dried, rubs the surface until it is perfectly smooth. Then he applies another coating of lacquer and again rubs, continuing the process several times, until at last, the surface shows not a single flaw or inequality, and is smooth and silky beyond the description of any words. It is only by the look of it, and still more, by the feel of it, that you can appreciate the exquisite finish of the surface; and your delight in it is mingled with almost a reverence for the patience and love of the craftsman, who could work so long and so faithfully to make this little work of art perfect in its beauty and beautiful in its perfection. Compared with this lacquer box, the texture of an ordinary polished table or piano seems coarse and commonplace.
I might go on to speak of the different kinds of sensation that you would enjoy if you touched the waxy petals of the camelia. But it is not necessary. For if you have a joy in the sense of touch I need not try to tell you about it. I will only ask you to wait a few minutes, until we see how the enjoyment derived from texture enters into the appreciation of a picture.
Meanwhile, if any of you have not as yet been conscious of getting this sort of pleasure through your fingers, let me say that this does not prove that you have no feeling for textures. I think that you have had it unconsciously; for I suspect that the pleasure that you take in flowers is not only because of their shape and color. As you have examined the beauty of roses, the texture of their petals has not escaped you. In one case, how silky; in another, how softly crumpled; in another, how delicately waxen! You may never have put these ideas into words, or even been conscious of them; but do you not see, now I mention these textures, that they have had a good deal to do with your pleasure in the roses? It may be, after all, the difference in the texture that makes you prefer one rose to another.
However, whether this be so or not, the fact remains that a great number of people derive pleasure from the textures of objects. So let us now see how the artist, who, as I have said before, has instincts and feelings like our own, takes advantage of this feeling for texture to add to the beauty of his picture.
We shall often see a picture in which the textures are not represented. Even modern pictures sometimes fail in this respect; and it is a very common fault with early American pictures, painted by artists who had not the advantage of training that the modern student enjoys. I will quote the case of John Singleton Copley, a very famous painter of the Colonial Period, who lived in Boston and made portraits of the well-to-do men and women of the time, just preceding the Revolution. Before the latter broke out, he went to England, where he spent the rest of his life and was highly thought of. His portraits are handsome as pictures for they represent men and women, mostly of elegant manners in handsome clothes. They also give the impression of being good likenesses. Yet his pictures lack animation. The figures and the costumes are stiff and hard. This is partly due to there being no suggestion of atmosphere surrounding them. The picture is not filled with air and light, as we found Vermeer’s was. But there is another reason. Copley was unskilful in the presentation of textures.
The flesh and hair, the materials of the costumes, the furniture and ornaments, present no differences of texture. All seem to have a uniformly hard surface, as if they were made of wood or tin. The result is that the whole picture seems hard and stiff--lacking in animation. If you ask me why this lack of animation is caused by the artist’s neglect of textures, I think the answer is that Copley has not given to everything in his picture its own separate, particular character. For when you come to think of it,--and the dictionary meaning of the word textures, bears me out--the character of everything depends so much upon its texture; whether it is hard or soft, smooth or rough, glossy or dull, and so on. Now, if there were a number of girls and boys in the room, all sitting round with the same dull expression on their faces, we should say that the whole group lacked animation. What makes a party animated and lively, is the fact that it is composed of a number of persons, each having a separate character to which he or she gives free play. The more easily and naturally each exhibits his or her character, the more animated and lively will be the fun of the party.
Now, do you not see how this applies to a picture? The artist invites a number of different textures to his party or composition. Surely the party will be lacking in animation if he does not bring out the special character of each. The lady’s face and hands will not contribute their full share to the animation of the whole composition, unless the character of their texture is expressed. It will not be enough to represent only the coloring of the flesh, for its beauty depends also upon its firmness and softness. Her satin dress will lose half its charm, if we are only made to see its shine and gloss. We know satin to be also soft and thin, ready to arrange itself in all sorts of delicate folds. This is a chief charm in the character of satin; and if this particular satin does not exhibit these qualities of texture, the dress will not do its proper share in helping the animation of the figure. Well! if you agree with me about the satin dress, I think that you will see that the same thing holds good of the table on which her arm is resting, and the glass vase with carnations in it that stands near her hand. Do you not think that the character of the hand will be better expressed, if the separate characters also of the polished wood, the hard shiny cut glass, and the soft velvety flowers are playing their part? They may not be so important as the woman and her dress, but in a composition as in a party, everybody must do their share, if the affair is to be a complete success.
The first great masters in the rendering of textures were the old Flemish artists of the Fifteenth Century--the brothers Hubert and Jan van Eyck, for example, and Hans Memling. Their country,--what we now call Belgium--had long been famous for its textiles. Silks, linens, cloths and velvets--its gold and silver and other metal work, its manufacture and decorating of glass. The Flemish were a nation of craftsmen, skilled in the production of the most beautiful articles of domestic use and church worship. And this love for objects of beautiful workmanship was shared by her painters. They represented them in their pictures. They painted not only the character of the men and women of the time, but the character of the life in which they lived, and did this by surrounding them with the furniture and objects that gave distinction to their lives. So the very rug on the floor, the glass in the windows, the mirror on the wall in its highly wrought frame, as well as the clothes worn by these quiet, serious men and women, have a choiceness of feeling. The room is not simply furnished, much less is it cluttered up with all kinds of tasteless Department Store “objets d’art.” Every thing in it has its own distinction of beauty, suggesting the taste and refinement of its owners, and so by its own character contributing to our appreciation of the character of the men and women in the picture.
Another great master of texture was the German artist of the Sixteenth Century, Hans Holbein the younger. He too loved things of delicate and exquisite craftsmanship and often made designs of such things for the workmen of his native city, Augsburg. So he was fond of introducing such articles into his pictures. It was a joy to him to paint them, each one with its own individual character of texture. Still, notwithstanding his love of them, he only puts them into his pictures when their character will help the character of his main subject. So, when he paints the portrait of a rich merchant of taste, like Georg Gyze in his office, he surrounds him with many objects related to his work--inkpot, seal, scissors, ledger, and can for holding string, letters, and a scale for weighing money. There is a profusion of beautifully fashioned objects, but they all by their separate characters help us to understand more fully the character of the merchant himself. On the other hand, since characterization was Holbein’s main purpose, he treats the portrait of the great scholar Erasmus, differently. Here he introduces only a small writing desk, a sheet of paper on it, and a pen in the scholar’s hand. These remind us that Erasmus was a writer; while the handsome rings on his fingers and a piece of finely woven material on the wall, tell us of another side of his character--that beside his love of learning, he had a taste for the beautiful things of life.
Looking back then over what we have been saying, we find that when the artist suggests to us the different kinds of sensation we may receive from touching things, he greatly increases the expressiveness of his pictures. By rendering or representing the textures, as well as the form and color of objects, he accomplishes at least four results. Firstly, he makes the objects more life-like; we feel as if we might really handle them and receive the sensation that such objects, if they were real, would give us. Secondly, he gives us a more keen enjoyment of their beauty; consciously or unconsciously we receive a sensation of the pleasure of handling them. Thirdly, the increased life-likeness and beauty increases the general animation of the whole picture. Fourthly, this rendering of the separate character of each object contributes to our understanding and appreciation of the character of the whole subject. To sum up, the rendering of textures suggests reality, beauty, animation, and character.
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Atmosphere we have already alluded to in previous chapters. We saw how Vermeer filled the scene of his picture with lighted air; and, in discussing color, we talked of it first as light, and then went on to study how the light which is in the air affects the light which is reflected from all objects that are visible. We found that colors differ from one another in the quantity of light they contain: in what artists call their values; the value of red, for example, being different from the value of blue or green. Also we found that each single color may have variations of value, according to the quantity and direction of the light which falls upon it.
All this, you may say, has more to do with light than atmosphere. But the two are really united. What we call atmosphere, as you know, is the volume of gases which surrounds the earth. The particles from these gases are lit up by the light. We cannot see the particles, only the reflections of light thrown off by them. But though we cannot see the particles themselves, they can interfere with our seeing of other things. It is the layers or veils of atmosphere that lie between us and a distant hill, that prevent our seeing the bright green grass on the latter and the dark green fir trees. Seen through the atmosphere, the colors of the hill appear subdued, the very form and bulk of the ground flattened and, perhaps, indistinct.
This effect of atmosphere is one of the things that we are now going to discuss. The other is that atmosphere penetrates everywhere. Suppose we begin with the second point. The atmosphere is in one respect like water; it is a fluid. It flows in and out and around about and fills the whole space that is not occupied by some other body. But have you thought what this means to an artist? Or at least to some artists; for we said that Copley’s pictures contained little or no suggestion of atmosphere. And the same may be said of a great many pictures by modern artists. They represent the form and color of things, but do not suggest that they are surrounded, or, as is often said, enveloped in atmosphere.
Why is this? Well! in the first place, as you remember, there are many artists who do not profess to represent nature. When they use nature as a model, it is for the purpose only of getting the forms of nature, and these they improve upon, as they will tell you, so as to make the forms in their picture “ideally perfect.” These “Academic” or “classic” painters[11] as I have already said, think of art as separate from nature. On the other hand, even among those who think of art as a means of interpreting nature, there are many artists who never put atmosphere into their pictures. Or, if they do, it is not nature’s atmosphere.
Then what sort of atmosphere is it? I call it a studio atmosphere, because it is manufactured in the studio. The artist, feeling the need of softening the hard outlines of his figures and of subduing any harshness of color, spreads over the picture thin layers of transparent, slightly colored varnish. Through these glazes, as they are called, the forms and colors are seen, somewhat as if you were looking at them through a piece of colored glass, and the effect is to merge or bathe them in a glow of atmosphere.
This was a usual practice with the great colorists of the Italian Renaissance. Correggio’s pictures, for example, are prized for their golden glow. It is one of the reasons of their beauty. But then, his idea was not to interpret nature. His subjects were drawn from the Bible, or the Christian religion, or Greek Mythology, and he treated them as his imagination suggested. He saw them through the glow of his own imagination, and surrounded them with a glow that seems to place them far away from actual things in a beautiful world of their own. Similarly, modern colorists, when they create pictures out of their own imagination, will suffuse them with an artificial atmosphere that helps to express the spirit of the scene. In fact, these atmospheric effects, produced by glazing, are beautiful and proper in their place. But their place is not in pictures that profess to be studies of nature. In these it is as wrong to suggest an unnatural atmosphere, as it is to leave out all suggestion of atmosphere whatsoever, which is, perhaps, the more usual fault.
Since the true rendering of atmosphere is a part of the true representation of light and color, you will not be surprised to learn that it appeared in the pictures of Velasquez and of the Dutchmen of the Seventeenth Century. We have already spoken of it in the case of Vermeer. It was from these artists that modern colorists, beginning about 1860, have learned to study the effects of atmosphere and light. They have carried the study even further than the older men. Indeed, the rendering of light and atmosphere has been the most distinct triumph of modern painting. There are two reasons for this.
One is, that with the advance of scientific studies and mechanical inventions, people have become more than ever interested in the every day facts of life; and the writers, painters, and sculptors, following with the stream, have studied more and more how to represent life and its surroundings, not as we may dream they should be, but as they are known to our actual experience. They have become ardent “realists” or “naturalists.” “Realists,” because they are occupied with what we are in the habit of calling the realities of life.[12] “Naturalists,” because they love nature and try to represent her actual appearances, as they are enveloped in and affected by light and atmosphere.
The second cause of the modern advance in rendering these qualities is again due to scientific discoveries. Scientific men have made a close study of light and color and the painters have profited by the results. Painting, in a measure, has joined hands with science.
However, now that we have seen why some artists do not put atmosphere into their pictures, and
[Illustration: The Mystic Marriage of St. Catharine. _Correggio._]
that among those who do some manufacture an atmosphere of their own, while others try to render nature’s atmosphere, let us study for ourselves the effect of atmosphere in nature. It will help us, if I begin by telling what we expect to find. First then, that the outlines of objects are softened; secondly, that the bulk of things seems flattened; and thirdly, that as objects recede or stand further off from our eyes, their forms becomes more and more indistinct and their colors change.
As to the first. Suppose you are standing on a street or country road, and a wagon passes you. While it is close in front of you, the body of the wagon and the wheels and the man driving, all are clearly outlined; you can distinguish distinctly the parts of the wagon and the character of the man’s figure, whether it is fat or thin, strong or weak-looking, and so on. But, as the wagon passes along the road, its appearance changes. At first, it is the smaller details that disappear; they have become merged in the general mass; then the outlines of this mass grow less and less distinct; you could not be sure now, unless you had seen the wagon close, exactly what its build is; nor does one part seem nearer to you than another, its bulk has become flattened, and gradually the whole affair looks to be only a patch of color against the color of the road.
Do you remember, it was as patches we saw the cows which we met early in our talk? The reason then given for their appearance was that our eyes were not strong enough to distinguish their details at such a distance. And this reason also holds good in the case of the wagon. But it is not only the distance that reduces our power of seeing, but also the layers, or veils of atmosphere that hang between us and the object. We are sure of this on a foggy day, when the mist lies low over the country or city, and trees and tall buildings loom up like blurs, and everything beyond the distance of a few hundred paces is blotted from sight. But the fog or mist is only the atmosphere more moist than usual and with its moisture condensed by cooling.
When you breathe on a mirror, the damp of your breath is condensed by the coolness of the glass. A film of mist forms over the mirror. Of an evening you may see the mist lying over the river or meadows; for the sun is gone down and the earth and air are cooling. But the upper air cools more quickly than the lower part, since the latter is still warmed by the heat stored in the earth. So, as the cooler air from above drops down, it acts like a mirror to the breath of the earth or the air that lies close over it; and this air is condensed into mist. All through the night both air and earth are cooling, but the earth more slowly, so that there is still a meeting of cooler and warmer air and consequent condensations, and the mist is hovering over the meadows when the next morning’s sun rises. As the sun mounts up, it begins to spread its warmth and the upper air is the first to feel it. Growing warm, it rises, drawing up after it the cooler air below. And as the cooler air is sucked up, the warmer air closes in behind it; until, as this circulation of cool and warm continues, the warmth at last reaches down to the mists above the earth. And then commences that beautiful sight that you may see on some summer mornings. The mists, that a while ago lay like a blanket over the sleeping earth, begin to stir, as if they themselves were awakening from sleep. They tremble a little, then slowly stretch themselves, and begin to rise to meet the warmth of day. And as they rise, little wisps of mist become detached from the main body and float up and disappear, until gradually the whole rising mass is rent asunder by the currents of warm air into shreds and wreaths, which curl and float and soar and at last lose themselves in the warmth that now wraps the earth.
Later in the day, if the weather is very hot the air, close above the ground, becomes so heated that it rises very quickly, and we see a shimmer of light upon its shifting patches. I mention this, because I wish you to think of atmosphere, not only as veils of gauze hung between us and objects we are looking at, but also as a moving, palpitating, vibrating fluid. We will talk a little more about this presently. Meanwhile, let us note some of the effects of atmosphere upon form and color.
We have mentioned that it softens the outlines of objects. This is only another way of saying that the objects appear less distinct; that even a chimney, though it cuts against the sky in strong contrast, has not really hard sharp outlines. At first sight you will think, perhaps, that it has; just as the cornices of the roofs may seem to you to have hard lines, and the windows and doorways to be sharply outlined. But they do not appear so to an artist’s eye, and will not to yours in time, if you are observant. Suppose an artist with pen and ink should draw one of these houses, using a straight edge to make the outline hard and sharp. This is how an architect draws the design of a house, because his object is to make an exact drawing for the builder to work by. But, if you have seen one of these architectural drawings, you will recognise, I think, that it does not look natural; that somehow or other it is too precise and tight and hard to suggest the appearance of an actual house. If this were his object, the architect himself would draw the house differently. He would make what is called a free-hand drawing. He would no longer represent the edges of cornices and chimneys and so on, with continuous lines; he would “break them up”; lifting his pen for a moment and leaving a tiny space of white before he continues the line; making the line thicker or thinner as he went along, and occasionally pressing on his pen to produce a dot. In these ways he will break up all the edges and outlines that they may not be too hard, but may have the less distinct appearance that the lines of the actual house present to his eye. For the same reason when he draws any bits of carving, such as the capitals of the columns of the front door, he will not represent every detail exactly, as if he were making a working drawing for the carver. He will leave out some and break up others, so that, although he plainly indicates the style and character of the ornament, it will not seem hard and sharp, but softened, and a trifle indistinct, as the capital appears to his eye. He will, in fact, make allowances for the softening effects of atmosphere.
Up to this point we have imagined the penmanship to be concerned only with the lines. Now let us see how a great pen-artist, like Joseph Pennell, or Edwin A. Abbey, would carry his drawing further. He would see the house, not as a skeleton of lines, but as a mass, part of which is silhouetted against the sky, while the rest is seen in relation to the other buildings or objects that stand near it. Each according to his own individual technique, that is to say, his own particular way of using the pen, will make his building a mass distinct from the masses of the other buildings, of the ground, and of the sky. And on the masses of buildings he will make the windows appear as they do in the actual building--namely, as patches, darker in color than the walls. All this he will do, because to his eye the different objects, under the influence of the atmosphere, appear as masses of various colors in relation to one another. More than this, when you have grown to appreciate fully the work of Pennell and Abbey, you will find that, though it is done in black and white, it seems to suggest color.
Elsewhere I have spoken of the fact that many artists, especially modern ones, see nature as an arrangement of colored spaces or masses in relation to one another. This implies that they are very little conscious of the edges or outlines of the masses. If they think of them at all, it is to try and prevent your noticing them in their pictures. They paint, for example, the head, and shoulders, and cheek of a man, a bust portrait--with a dark background. If you examine the picture closely, you will not find a sharp line, separating the head from the background. In fact the color of the hair and cheek seems to extend a little way into the dark of the background. The artist has dragged his brush round the head, so that it is impossible to say just where the background begins. The reason for this you understand, as soon as you step back and look at the picture from a short distance off. The head appears very solid; we can believe there is really a hard skull beneath the full flesh of the cheeks and the tight skin of the forehead. Yet the head does not seem to be stuck against the background, like a postage stamp on an envelope. Indeed, if the picture is well painted, the dark part is not really a background. That is to say, it is not merely something behind the head; it seems to have depth and to go back, but it also comes forward and surrounds the head. The latter does not stick out of the picture, it keeps its place back within the frame, enveloped in atmosphere that, though it is very dark, is penetrable. You feel, that is to say, that your hand could be pushed through it without coming up against some wall, as it were, that would stop it.
Now I particularly wished you to notice that the head suggested to us that hardness of the skull and the varying firmness and tightness of the flesh. For it proves that the softening of the outline will not interfere with the feeling of hardness and strength, or firmness in the mass. The effect, indeed, is to increase it, since out attention is concentrated on the head and not distracted to the outline. On the other hand, do not suppose that the softening of outlines is always intended to increase the suggestion of solidity. It may be part of an entirely opposite intention; namely, to lose sight of the idea of solidity of mass. For example, the French landscape artist, Corot, often represented the masses of the trees as soft, dark blurs against the soft light of the sky. For he loved especially the early dawn and late evening, when the light is very faint and in the hush the trees loom up like quiet spirits. He wished you to feel their presence, but not to be conscious of their solidity and bulk. He, you see, used the softened outline for a different purpose; which shows that in art, as in other matters, a single principle may be applied variously in different cases.
These tree-presences of Corot are painted very flatly. The roundness of their bulk disappears into a flat mass. It was one of the ways in which he avoided the suggestion of solidity. But here again comes in the fact that a principle may have other applications; for flatness does not necessarily make the object appear unsubstantial. A house does not look so, yet its front may be flat. And Corot, as other artists, and as you may, if you use your eyes, had discovered that in the open air all objects appear flatter than they do indoors. The reason is that in the case of a room lighted by windows, the light is always stronger near the windows than it is in parts of the room further removed. The light is unequally distributed, so that there are more shadows to throw up the bulk of objects. But out of doors the light is more diffused; more equally distributed. Moreover, we view things from a greater distance, so that more atmosphere intervenes. The effect of both these facts is to make the masses of objects seem flatter. The lawn from a little distance may look very smooth; but, when you walk over it, you find the grass needs to be cut and the bumps to be rolled before you can play croquet. That maple, too, is a sturdy, solid fellow, but as you see its mass of pale green against the darker mass of hemlock, both seem flatter than they do when you are climbing among their branches.
In speaking of the softening of outline and flattening of bulk due to atmosphere we have frequently alluded to the effect of distance on the appearance of objects. The further off the latter are, the more atmosphere will intervene, the less distinct will they appear. In the case of distant hills, the ups and downs of the ground, the bulk of the trees, even the stability and massiveness of “the everlasting hills,” may be softened and flattened into what seems to be only a faint mass of color.
Perhaps we have walked over these hills and know them to be carpeted with grass; the greens also of the maples, oaks, cypress, each with its separate hue, attracted our attention. But to-day, from a distance, all these greens are lost in a vaporous hue of blue. It is this effect of atmosphere on color that we will now talk about. It is easy to notice in the case of the hills because of the great quantity of atmosphere that intervenes between us and them. But, if there were a row of maples extending from the hills to us, so placed that we could look along their entire length, we should find the appearance of their color gradually changing, as they recede from our eyes. In a word, to the sensitive eye of the artist the colors of even nearby objects are affected by atmosphere.
Now, those hills appear to be blue; another day, they will incline more to grey; yet another day to violet or purple, or pinkish. In winter time, around New York, they would very likely take on a dry, whitish color. In fact, the color will vary according to the condition of the atmosphere and the quality of the light; depending upon how moist or dry, how warm or chill, the atmosphere may be, and whether the light is yellow or golden, grey or white, full or feeble, and so on. It is these constant variations of lighted atmosphere that give continually fresh interest to the beauty of nature. Nature never wearies us by being always the same. It is like a human face, whose expression is continually changing.
Sometimes we see a beautiful human face, with almost perfect features. But behind that beautiful mask may be a very dull, uninteresting mind. If so, the expression of the face will be passive, the opposite, that is to say, to active. It will not leap from grave to gay; kindle, sparkle, grow tender, or angry and joyful by turns. It will be--“faultily faultless, icily regular, splendidly _null_”--no expression. And we may even tire of its beauty; while a face, less perfect in features, may win us more and more and hold our interest by the charm of its continually varying expression. The more we think of it, the more do we realise that beauty depends upon expression. It is the same with nature as with the human face. Its beauty is affected by expression and this is produced by the varieties in the lighted atmosphere.
A moment’s thought will satisfy you of this. Nature’s features vary with the seasons, but change little from day to day. Every morning, during the summer vacation, the same objects greet your eye, but how differently you feel towards them, according to what we call the weather, which after all is the condition of the atmosphere. One day the familiar features of the landscape will take on an expression of gladness, some other day of dullness; and the more we study the features, the more variable will their expression appear from hour to hour, day to day, and season to season.
I spoke just now of the movement of the atmosphere. It is a fluid, that one day may be as still as a forest pool, another day may be stirred like the
[Illustration: Light and Shade. _George Inness._]
ocean. We cannot see its particles, but we do see the light reflected from them; and, I suppose, it is the differences in the appearances of the lighted reflections that make us conscious of the stillness or movement of the atmosphere on days when there is no wind. We need not be very sensitive to nature to notice these differences of the atmosphere at different seasons of the year; how, on certain winter days, the air seems absolutely motionless; while on other days it seems alert and sprightly; how in early spring it seems astir with gentle life, while in summer or autumn it may be alive with animation or heavy with drowsy languor.
The motionless air of winter has been rendered with marvellous truth by John H. Twachtman; the stir of spring by Dwight W. Tryon; the active air of summer by Childe Hassam, and its languorous drowsiness by George Inness. All these are American artists, whom I mention only as examples. For much of the beauty of modern art, both American and foreign, is due to the sensitive rendering of the variations in the atmosphere. For, the best artists now-a-days are not satisfied to paint the features of nature only; they aim to depict the varying expressions on her face. And the chief cause, as I have said, of these variations is the constant change in the conditions of the lighted atmosphere.
CHAPTER XVI
COLOR (_Continued_)--TONE
We shall frequently hear the words tone, tonal, tonality, applied to pictures. People say, for example, this picture is rich in tone; that has fine tonal qualities; another has a delicate tonality. It is rather difficult to explain what these words mean, for they do not seem to be used in the same way by everybody. However, let us try.
It is clearly a word derived from music, where its meaning is more definite. We speak of a piano’s tone, by which we mean that, though it sounds the same notes as another piano, the quality of the sounds differs. We shall be using the word quality often in the present chapter, so let us be sure we understand its meaning. It is from the Latin word _qualis_, which means of what kind. Of what kind is this piece of dress goods; what is its quality, compared with another piece, at first sight similar? Is it all wool, for example, while the other is cotton mixture? Is it softer, while the other is harder and drier? Will the one stand washing, while the other will shrink? Similarly, when the same note is struck on two pianos the tone of one may be rich, mellow, resonant, while that of the other is thin, raw, and metallic.
Why is the tone superior? You know, I suppose, that when a piano string is struck it vibrates. That is to say, it ceases to be a straight line, and becomes agitated into a series of waves. In order to increase the volume of the sound a thin layer of wood, called the sound board, is placed beneath the strings. As the string vibrates, this board vibrates in sympathy, and so the volume of sound is increased and enriched. Now the least thing may disturb the perfection of this sympathetic vibration. Accordingly, the superiority of the one piano is due to the fact that all its parts are of finer make and material, and are more perfectly adjusted to one another. They are in so perfect a relation, that there is no jar in any part, and thus the body of the instrument is a united whole.
The tone of the piano, then, is due to the perfect relation existing between the parts of the piano. Applying this idea to a picture: it would seem that tone is the result of all the colors being so perfectly related to one another, that the vibration or rhythm of the whole color-harmony is increased.
Now this is certainly, in a general way, the meaning of the word tone. So, although the word itself is new to you, the idea contained in it is not. We have talked a good deal about color-relations, rhythm, and harmony. You remember our talk on Vermeer’s picture. Well, his is a tonal picture, because of the perfect relation of all the colors to one another. It is beautiful in tone; its tonality is exquisite. And do you remember one particular feature of its exquisiteness? I pointed out to you that it is full of lighted atmosphere, and that the atmosphere seems to vibrate; that its rhythm passes through and through the picture, uniting all the masses of color into a harmonious whole. We noted the difference between this kind of rhythm and that in Raphael’s _Jurisprudence_, where the rhythm is the result of line. You could not describe that picture as tonal; for in it color plays a very unimportant part. Raphael was busied with the relations, not of color, but of line.
I have reminded you of the rhythm of atmosphere in Vermeer’s picture, because some people describe tone, as the result of fusing all the forms and colors into a whole by enveloping them in atmosphere. But I think, if you have followed our talks carefully, you will see that this use of the word tone is pretty much the same as the one we have arrived at. For you cannot see the effects of atmosphere except in relation to the coloring of nature. And I like our explanation better than this one, because it is broader, and therefore includes more. It includes, for example, all Japanese prints. Many of them exhibit no suggestion of atmosphere; yet they are always tonal in the sense that their colors are in perfect relation.
Now, let me tell you of another definition of tone, which again is included in our own. Some people will tell you that a picture is tonal, because there is some one prevailing hue of color in it. By “prevailing” we mean that some one color plays the most important part. In Vermeer’s picture, you may remember, it was blue. The girl’s skirt made a strong spot of blue. We are aware of other colors in the picture, but they play subsidiary parts. What we are most conscious of is a sense of blue throughout the picture--a prevailing tone of blue. So in Whistler’s _White Girl--Symphony in White, Number One_, there is a prevailing tone of white.
But this is only another way of saying that in each picture the colors are in a perfect relation to one another. Whether there are more or fewer colors, and whether we receive an impression of many colors or one in particular, does not really affect the question. When all is said and done, tone is the result of color relations, so arranged that they produce a rhythmic harmony.
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An artist, when he paints a tonal picture, has in mind the relative dark and light of colors, and their relative coolness and warmth. Let me explain. First the relative coolness or warmth of colors. The artist regards blue as the coolest hue. As a matter of fact violet reflects even less light than blue; still, for his practical purposes, an artist says that the cool hue is blue, and he associates with it violet and green. On the other hand, yellow, he treats as warm, and associates with it red and orange.
And, if you consider for a moment, the distinction of warm and cool hues, which is practised by artists and founded on the nature of light, appeals to our own experience. You will have no hesitation in feeling that a bunch of violets, surrounded by green leaves, gives you a feeling of coolness, as compared with another bunch composed of red and yellow poppies.
Accordingly, if an artist has made up his mind that his tonal harmony shall be a cool one, he either composes it entirely of cool hues, or sees to it that some one or all of them shall “prevail.” The warmer hues may be introduced for the sake of contrast, but very sparingly. And, of course, he will reverse his use of the hues, if he wishes the tone to be a warm one. This you could have guessed for yourselves; but I point it out because most people, I believe, prefer a warm picture. If it represents the sun setting in a mass of crimson over which the sky is orange, passing to yellow; and the effect of this warm light is shown on the surrounding trees and meadow, so that everything seems to be kindled into a dreamy warmth, we easily find the picture very beautiful. It is so attractive in its richness and mellow warmth, that the quiet coolness of that picture opposite may seem tame by comparison, and we pass it by. On the other hand, if, recognising the difference of the intention, we study the latter picture carefully, we may very likely come to admire it even more than the warmer one, by reason of the very quietness of its appeal, or because of the purity and freshness of feeling that probably pervade it.
And now for the artist’s other habit of considering the relative lightness and darkness of hues. It comes into play, whether his tonal arrangement be a cool one or a warm one. For by this means he introduces contrasts of color; and as we have pointed out, it is by contrasts as well as by similarities, that a harmony is produced.
There are two ways of considering the difference between light and dark. One is to treat it as an arrangement of _chiaroscuro_, the other as an arrangement of _values_. This is a distinction that I have already explained; but I will refresh your memory of it, in its special application to tone.
Chiaroscuro, as you remember, means light and dark. So it could be used of the light and dark of values; but, as a matter of fact, it is applied to the distribution of light and shadows, adopted by the artists of older times, and still used by many modern ones. In applying it, they represented the light, as coming from one direction, usually from behind their backs; and as striking the objects and figures in the picture at an angle, either on the right side or on the left. They also took care that the light should be concentrated or particularly bright at one spot. On the contrary, the artist who considers the light and dark of values, sees the light _in_ the scene he is painting, and observes that it pervades all parts of it.
But, to return to the chiaroscuro; its effect is to produce strong contrasts of light and shade: high lights, nearly white in the parts most exposed to the light, and shadows almost black, in the parts most removed. To offset these strong contrasts the artist uses strong hues. The pure colors of red, yellow, green, blue, may be used in large masses. The result is a tonal harmony of great richness, striking magnificence, or surprising impressiveness.
Of the last kind is Rubens’ _Descent from the Cross_. If you study a photograph of it, you will see that the light _does_ come from within the scene. It flows from the Saviour’s body; and the light, as it spreads, illumines certain parts of the surrounding figures, especially the heads and hands; just the parts in fact, in which there is most expression of feeling. The sacred Body has the pallor of death, it is almost white, while black prevails elsewhere throughout the picture, the only other colors being the flesh tints of the faces and hands, and some dull green and red. It is an admirable example of the strong contrast of black and white, and, let me add, of the amazing effect that such contrast has on the imagination. For it is a picture that arouses one’s emotions of awe and pity and reverence to an extraordinary degree; and the more you study it, the more you will realise that the source of its appeal is the chiaroscuro. The latter, though the light is within the scene, is purely arbitrary. Rubens, that is to say, did not try to imitate the effects of real light and darkness; he chose to be the arbiter or judge of how he would distribute them. And in the arrangement he had three purposes. First, he wished to secure the modeling of the figures; note the muscular force he has given to some of the men; the pathetic droop of the Virgin’s figure; and the pitiable limpness of the Saviour’s form. Secondly, he was able to make this composition of contrasts one of most impressive grandeur. Thirdly, as I have already hinted in speaking of the figures of the Saviour and the Virgin, he could by means of this superb invention of light and darkness, fill us with profound emotion.
So much for the older method of considering the relations between light and dark. The modern one, depending on the light and dark of values, derived from the example of Velasquez and of Vermeer and other Dutchmen of the Seventeenth Century, I have recently explained in connection with Whistler’s _White Girl, Symphony in White Number Two_. So I will only remind you that in this picture there is practically no contrast of shadow. The whole scene is bathed in a uniform light. But the contrast of dark is obtained by putting in certain objects, the red box, the blue vase, and so on, the values of which are lower than that of the white dress. The artist has thought of darkness, not as the result of shadow, but of certain colors being darker in themselves, because they reflect less light than others. If this is not quite clear to you, perhaps it will be, if you refer to the chapter in which this picture is discussed.
On the other hand, the modern artist, even if he works by values rather than by chiaroscuro, must often wish to paint a scene that does involve shadows. We know that the scene may be filled with light and yet there will be certain places where the light is intercepted, so that shadows are formed. Our lawn in summer is aglow with warm light, but every tree and bush casts its shadow. Or the same spot in winter is covered with snow and the air is bright with cool light; yet here and there a trunk of a tree spreads a thin layer of shadow.
But the difference is in the way the modern artist regards shadow. He has studied nature for the purpose of representing the actual effects of nature; and, in so doing, has discovered that the secret of all effects is due to the action of light. So he has learned to look at everything, shadows included, in its relation to light. A shadow to him, then, is not something different from light; it is a lessening of the light. Some of the light has been intercepted by the foliage of the tree, so that less light reaches the ground. It may be that very little light filters through the leaves. But, whether more or little, the spot from which the light has been intercepted, still contains some light. Even what we usually call the shadows have light in them.
So, while chiaroscuro is a contrast of light and dark, the contrast of values may better be described as one of light and less light.
Observe how this works. Since the modern artist sees light in shadows, he also sees color in them. And their color varies according to the quality of the light and according to the local color of the spot affected. The local color of your lawn is green; therefore, even under the trees, where little light reaches the grass, the latter will still contain a greenish hue, though the value of it will be much lower than that of the sunlit lawn. On the other hand, the hue of the shadow will also be affected by the quality of the light, differing according as the light is dull or brilliant, and as it inclines to white or yellow. This is too intricate a subject to attempt to discuss here, but I mention it in order that, if you are wide awake and interested, you may amuse yourself by studying these effects in your walks abroad.
A simple way of starting the subject is to study the hue of the shadow cast by your hand on a sheet of white paper. I am working by the light of a Welsbach burner, and the shadow of my hand is a pale reddish purple. The other day, on a bright February morning, I laid my hand on a piece of white paper and the shadow was bluish. In each case, owing to the amount of light reflected from the white paper, the shadow was very transparent, and beautiful in its delicacy and softness.
Well, this little example illustrates what artists have discovered about shadows lying on snow. They are very transparent, very delicate, and tend toward a hue of blue or plum color, according to the quantity of light.
Now to sum up our remarks on tone. When we speak of a picture having tonal qualities, we mean that the artist has so combined the related darks and lights and the related coolness and warmth of his colors that he has produced a harmony, threaded through and through with a suggestion of rhythm or vibration. And the vibration will be most felt, when the suggestion of atmosphere pervades the picture.
In the case of the _Descent from the Cross_ we have already hinted at the power of tone to arouse emotion. I may add that tone always makes a strong appeal to feeling--to abstract feeling. The tonal harmony of an opal, whose pinks and greens are suffused with creamy atmosphere, arouses in us delight, quite apart from any suggestion to our mind. The delight is one of pure feeling. Can you not see that, if an artist uses the tonal harmony of the opal as a color scheme for a picture, the harmony would still delight us in an abstract way? It would be interwoven now with the subject of his picture, and we need not try, nor do we wish to separate them. But the sentiment of the figure or the scene will be all the more tender and lovely for the harmony with which it is suffused.
I have in mind, for example, the pictures by the American artist, Thomas W. Dewing. They show you one or two women standing or sitting, apparently lost in reverie, while placed beside them may be a table and a vase and on the wall a mirror. If you ask me what the picture is about, I will say: Nothing. There is no subject to them in the sense that you can describe: who the girl is, why she is there, and what she is doing. So, instead of talking to you about the figures, I should try to draw your attention to the subtlety and beauty of the tonal harmony. I should recommend you to look at it with a mind as free from outside thoughts, as when you were looking at the opal. Then by degrees, perhaps, as the beauty of the tone winds itself about your imagination, you will begin to find some sentiment of beauty suggested by the girl herself.
What I wish you to understand is that an artist, who has the gift of composing tonal harmonies, employs them to express the abstract feelings or emotions that he has regarding his subject. A celebrated example is Whistler’s _Portrait of the Artist’s Mother_, that now hangs in the Luxembourg Gallery, in Paris. I expect you have seen photographs of it and remember that it represents an oldish lady, in a white lace cap and black gown, with her hands folded over a handkerchief on her lap. We see her figure seated in profile, in front of a grey wall. On it are two little black-framed pictures, and on one side hangs a dark green curtain.
When it was first exhibited the artist called it “An Arrangement in Black and Grey.” It may be that he did not wish to drag his Mother into publicity or make a parade of his feelings as a son. But there was another reason, a much greater one. The abstract feelings that he had for his Mother--the love, reverence, and appreciation of her dignity and tenderness--took color in his artist’s mind in an arrangement of black and grey. What a poet might have put into the rhythm and harmony of his verse, Whistler has expressed through the rhythm of a tonal harmony of color.
Another artist who was not a tonalist, might have contrived to put into the face and hands and into the lines of the figure as much dignity and gracious tenderness. But his picture would not move us so deeply as this one. For Whistler--how shall I describe it?--has woven the dignity and tenderness into every part of the canvas. The mother sits alone with her own thoughts, but all about her is the music of color, choiring the love and reverence of her son. No wonder the picture takes its hold upon us; until we see in it not a mother, but the _type_ of what the conception of Mother means to us.
Its tonal harmony is one that is distinguished by sobriety and reticence. It consists of quiet and sober colors; it does not talk to our hearts in brilliant glowing words. It moves us rather by its silence and reserve, its reticence. I mention this because, at first, perhaps, you will be more attracted by brilliant and glowing harmonies; and they are beautiful too. They may fill us, as those of Rubens do, with triumphant joy; or plunge us into poignant emotion as do Rousseau’s sunsets. But, just as our capacity of feeling knows no limits, so there is no limit to the variety of the tonal harmonies that may stir it. And we shall grow to find some of the most exalting and beautiful sensations in those harmonies that are very quiet, subtle, and that speak to our imagination in a “still small voice.”
As a farewell illustration, to sum up the meaning of the quality and expression of tone, let me return to sound tones. Have you ever thought of quality and expression in the case of your own voice? I do not mean the singing voice. Many of us do not possess this kind of voice; but we all have a speaking and reading voice. What are the quality and expression of yours? I am thinking now of the way you use it; of the quality and expression of the sounds you utter.
When you speak; do you drawl “through your nose” or chatter very quickly? Are the sounds shrill or harsh or monotonous? Perhaps you have never stopped to consider. It is astonishing how few people do. Most people think of their voice only as a contrivance for uttering words: they turn it on and off like a faucet and let the words run. How frequently one sees a pretty girl or woman, tastefully dressed and of charming manners, who is altogether pleasing as long as she keeps her mouth shut. But the moment she opens it, half her charm vanishes. There is no tone in her voice; no varieties of light and shade in the pitch of the sounds, no varieties of quietness or warmth in her speech; no rhythm of effect. Even if it is not harsh, it is disagreeably monotonous.
Or somebody else reads a passage from Shakespeare, say _The Balcony Scene_ in “Romeo and Juliet.” He is not as bad a reader as he might be; for example, he does not stumble over the words or jump over the punctuation. In fact, he reads intelligently, with considerable attention to the meaning of the speeches. And yet, after all, he reads very badly, for his voice fails entirely to bring out the music of the verse. The scene is one of the loveliest ever written, and it was written to be spoken aloud, so that the loveliness of the thought might be conveyed in sounds of corresponding loveliness. But of this our reader seems ignorant. He does not appear to know that Shakespeare intended every vowel sound to be uttered in such a way as to bring out the particular quality of its beauty; and arranged the sequence of the sounds, so that one should flow into another in an exquisite rhythm of rising and falling melody. This reader “murders” the beauty of the scene, because there is no quality in the tone of his voice and no tonal expression. Do you understand what I mean?
If you have not thought of this before, I hope you will give it some attention in future. For it is in the power of everyone of us to improve the quality and expression of our voices.
CHAPTER XVII
BRUSH-WORK AND DRAWING
Now that we have come to an end of our talk upon color, I must say a little about brushwork. I hope to show you that a good painter may use his brush in such a way that there is quality and expression in the actual strokes.
I say a good “painter,” because I am thinking of that distinction I pointed out to you, between artists who are really painters or colorists, and those who are, more strictly speaking, draughtsmen. The latter, you will remember, pay particular attention to the lines of their figures, and then in spreading the paint, are careful that it shall not interfere with the outlines. On the other hand, the man who is, strictly speaking, a painter, sees his figures as colored masses.
I tried to show you that each method is right from its separate point of view. But at the time we talked about this, we had not studied the meaning of quality and expression. So I put off telling you about the possibilities of quality and expression in line. We will talk about it now, and then return to the brushwork.
Remember, what we are to think of now is a drawing of a figure or object, represented simply in outline, with no added strokes to suggest light and shade. It may have been done with a pencil or brush, or in one of many other ways; but it is only outline. Now many people think the only purpose of the outline is to enclose the figure, so that we may see what the figure is. They may think the figure is beautiful, because it represents something of which they are fond; the plump body of a baby, for instance. But suppose the figure represents an old worn-out beggar, with long scraggy arms and bare, misshapen feet. Would they see any beauty in it? I expect not.
Yet, although there may be no beauty in the figure, there may be a great deal in the lines which enclose it. If so, the beauty of line, of which we are now talking, must be an abstract beauty; due to something in the line itself, independently of the figure with which it is associated.
Suppose you draw a line on a piece of paper. What is the result? The line has taken a certain direction, and it is of a certain kind. It is thick or thin, or it begins thin, grows thicker and then diminishes in width, or vice versa. It may be faint or distinct; firm or wavering, and so on. Which ever kind it is it will be so, either because you wished it to be of that kind, or because you couldn’t make it otherwise. In either case, it is you that have made the line what it is. If you have enough skill, you can make the line exactly what you wish.
Again, the direction of the line is the result of a movement of your hand and arm. Very likely you moved uncertainly: you were not even sure in what direction it was moving. But, if you were a skilful and practised draughtsman, don’t you suppose you could so regulate the movement of your hand and arm, that the line would take the exact direction you desired? Yes, you would have as much control over the direction and character of the line, as a musician has over the keys of a piano, over which his hands move in various directions, sounding the various notes.
But is the skill in doing this all that makes a good musician? You know that he must also play, as we say, with feeling. This means, first, that he must be able to feel the beauty of the music; secondly, that he knows how to move his arms and touch the notes so as to draw forth from them just the quality of sound that the feeling demands, and to make the whole body of sounds render an expression of the feeling.
Now, just as the feeling passes from the brain of the musician into the tips of his fingers, so it does with an artist. You will see him, as he tries to tell you about the beauty of something, circling his hand in the air, meanwhile curving his fingers and thumb, as if he were trying to grasp the beauty. It is an instinctive movement, due to his habit of expressing his conception with his hand. A sculptor will do much the same thing, only he is more apt to close his fingers and express his meaning with his thumb--the part of his hand that he uses most in modeling.
One of the most beautiful examples of feeling in the hand is illustrated in the modeling of a vase. The potter stands before a “wheel,” or table, the top of which revolves. There is a spike in it that holds in place the lump of clay. But while we watch, it has ceased to be a lump. It has grown up under the potter’s hands and is a hollow vessel, every moment changing its shape slightly, as with his fingers or the palm of his hand he brings it nearer and nearer to the design that is in his brain. He stops for a moment, and we think that he has finished. But, no, he is only criticising it. It is not yet quite as he feels it should be; and again the wheel revolves and the hand,--oh! so tenderly--coaxes the clay to receive exactly the line of beauty that he feels.
And from the potter we may gain another insight into the beauty of an artist’s line. I said that the clay grew up into the required form. And certainly if you have seen the operation, you will say that growth is just the word. Now in the line of all beautiful drawings there is the feeling of growth. Not in a metaphorical way, but most literally, the line grows under the artist’s hand, impelled by the feeling in him that he is trying to express.
Let me tell you a little experience of my own. Though I am not an artist, I have often made drawings. One day I was enlarging a piece of ornament, in which there were scrolls of acanthus leaves; big cabbagy sort of leaves, with a curving spine and crinkly edges. The chief point was to get fine winding lines into the curves. For a long time I imitated the copy as well as I could, when suddenly I seemed to feel within me just how the curve should go. It was not a matter of seeing the copy, but of feeling the actual growth in my brain. And lo! a miracle, for one moment my hand was able to do what my brain prompted. That leaf actually grew under my hand. I could feel it growing. And of course that was the best bit of the whole drawing. The rest was mechanical; this bit really lived. Well, in my case that was a miracle and has never been repeated. But in that moment I learned two things--firstly, what must be the joy of an artist in the act of creation; and, secondly, that an artist’s line may be a living growth; and, in the case of really fine draughtsmen, always is.
Since then I have watched the growth of trees and plants, and discovered, as you may for yourself, the separate beauty and character that belong to the lines of growth of each separate plant and tree. And, when you have done so, you will come back to the study of line in drawing, convinced that the beauty of line consists in its expression of life and character. Not only the life and character of the object represented, but the life and character of feeling in the artist.
Now perhaps you will realise how a drawing, though it represents only an ugly old beggar man, may be beautiful. Life, in all its forms is wonderful, even if sometimes horrible. And the expression of it by a thing so slight as a line is beautiful, because we need not trouble about the object represented, but be satisfied to enjoy only the life and character that the line expresses.
It will also help you to understand and appreciate the abstract quality of line, if you study Japanese drawings and prints. For their way of representing figures and objects is not the same as ours, nor do we always know what the subject of the picture is about. Therefore we are better able to enjoy the line in an abstract way, apart from all consideration of the things that are represented.
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After this little talk on line, we may now pass to brushwork. It is no longer the thin edge that we are to keep in mind, but the mass, great or small, as the case may be; the mass of a gown, for example, or the mass of one of its folds.
I need not tell you that an artist’s hands may be alive with feeling when he holds a brush, just as when he has a pencil in them. In fact, what we have said about feeling and expression in line may be applied to brushwork. In the case of a man who is not merely a filler in of spaces with paint, but is by instinct a painter, the brushwork grows into life beneath his hand. Sometimes he lays aside his brush and takes a palette-knife, with which to spread the paint on the surface or to scrape the part already painted. Sometimes he uses no tool at all, but kneads the paint with his thumb. Whether he employs these or other methods, is a matter of comparative unimportance. The main thing for us to realise is that, whatever means he employs, it is because he is giving expression to some feeling in his mind. There is a passage of feeling from his mind through his arm to his hand, and thence to the canvas.
The swifter the passage is, the more vitality, as a rule, will there be in the brushwork. The reason is, that in such a case the artist is sure of himself. The feeling in his mind is so clearly comprehended; he so thoroughly feels what he wishes to express, and is so sure of the way to render it, that there is no hesitation or sign of fumbling in the result. It has grown freely and naturally and the result gives us that keen and direct pleasure that we derive from what is brimful of life.
You know how stimulating it is to listen to a speaker, whose words flow from his thoughts without any humming and hawing; and whose words naturally and exactly express the thought. In such a man’s talk there is a living growth of thought. As you proceed in your study of painting you will learn to feel in brushwork either the presence or absence of such living growth.
You will find sometimes, however, that the brushwork, which at first seems very much alive, is not really a living growth. It is more like the clever tricks that you perform with your bodies in a gymnasium. It is merely an exhibition of vigor. I may liken this to the oratory of another sort of speaker, who has a great gift of the gab but very few ideas. He pours out of his mouth a stream of vigorous, showy, fine-sounding words; and fascinates you for a few minutes with the “exuberance of his verbosity.” But presently, when you come to think it over, you discover how pretentious and slip-shod the whole speech was. He was exhorting to patriotism; but, where Lincoln would have left us with a few choice thoughts, so perfectly expressed that they will remain for ever in the memory, this man has only bedecked his generalities with a confusion of words. His speech is not golden, but cheap tinsel.
Well! you will find that there are painters also, so much in love with the exuberance of their own cleverness, that they are satisfied to do nothing but make a gymnastic display of it.
You will find too, that there are others, to whom the mere manual dexterity is so objectionable, that they deliberately try to make you lose sight of any brushwork in their pictures. Whistler was one of these. He used to say that a picture is finished, when the artist has completely disguised the means by which it has been produced. He wished the expression of his feeling to reach our imagination immediately and fully, without any other consideration blocking the way or interfering with our appreciation.
His method of painting was deliberate; a little added to-day, something more another day; the whole process extending, frequently, over several years. For the feeling which he wished to express was a very subtle one, so the living growth of it, as of many things in nature, was slow. On the other hand, most of the great painters seem to have been swift workers; or at any rate their final result gives one the impression of having been executed in the vigor and glow of a swiftly working mind.
The best way to learn to appreciate brushwork is to stand close to a picture, and observe the various kinds of strokes and dabs and streaks. They seem to have no meaning. But step back. Then all or most of the separate brush marks will have disappeared. They are merged into one another and their meaning becomes clear. Then, after having thoroughly studied the effect which the artist has produced, you may again step close up to the canvas and examine the means by which he has attained it.
If it is a landscape you are studying, you will find, possibly, that the sky, which from a distance seems to be grey, is really composed of streaks of blue and pink and grey. It is, in the first place, by these streaks of the brush, and, secondly, by the infusion of several colors, that the artist has succeeded in making his sky have the appearance of atmosphere, extending far and far back. Then, if you examine the trees, you may possibly find the strokes short and stubby, so as to bring out the character of the foliage; while, what from a distance gave the impression of being simply green, is also found on closer inspection to contain many spots of other colors. It is in this way that the action of light upon the foliage has been suggested; so that the trees from a distance do not seem hard and heavy but penetrated with light and atmosphere.
In this way, stepping nearer to and further from the picture, and continually asking yourself: What is the impression that the artist wished to convey and why has he done so and so? you will soon find that you are getting an insight into the quality and expression of brushwork.
Now one word more. A little while ago I alluded to “finish.” What is “finish”? Most people think it means that every part of a picture should be brought up to a uniform degree of polish and precision. It should be sleek and shiny, like our shoes, when the man has finished shining them.
Certainly you will see many pictures that seem to justify this explanation. But as a rule they will not be examples of good painting. You remember our talk on texture. Well, only some textures are sleek and shiny and polished. So, if this whole picture is of that character, some of the textures must have suffered. Then again, life is not uniform, it does not show itself in all people and things in the same way. Therefore it is very likely that the uniform polish and precision of this picture has interfered with its expression of life. The whole thing is mechanical rather than vital.
No, you must be prepared to find in well painted pictures, all sorts of conditions of not seeming to be finished; all kinds of different styles, coarse, refined, bold, dashing, reticent, and tender, brilliant, and modest; almost as many different styles and conditions as there are painters. For a painter’s use of the brush is an expression of his own individuality and life, as well as of the life and character of the subjects he represents.
I have already told you Whistler’s definition of “finished.” It is perhaps too much a product of his own personality to be of general service. One more applicable to all kinds of painters and pictures is the following. An artist has finished his picture, when he has succeeded in making it express the feeling that inspired it. This will include Whistler’s definition, and also the practice of a Titian, a Rubens, or a Velasquez, whose brush strokes are visible to this day, as witnesses of the living growth of their conceptions.
Further it will include many pictures that to your eyes seem unfinished. They look like sketches, and, therefore, you think, cannot be considered as a finished picture. But go slowly with a thought of that sort. As you advance in appreciation you will find that many a drawing of a few lines only, and many a little picture, composed of a few touches of color, have in them more of the living growth of feeling, more of the charm of abstract beauty than thousands of so-called finished pictures, in which the original feeling, if there were any, has been submerged in an ocean of trivialities.
CHAPTER XVIII
SUBJECT, MOTIVE, AND POINT OF VIEW
At the beginning of our talks, you may remember, I told you I should not have much to say about the subjects of pictures. For I wished at the start to make you realise, that what a picture is about is of much less importance than the way in which the subject is treated. A fine subject may be treated in such a way as to make a very bad picture, while a good picture may be composed of a subject in which one is not particularly interested. In fact, I wished to help you to look at a picture first and foremost as a work of art; a thing beautiful in itself because of its composition of form and color; beautiful in an abstract way, that is to say, apart from the ideas suggested by the subject. My aim has been to try to teach you to admire a picture in an abstract way, as you admire a Japanese or Chinese vase, simply and solely for its beauty of form and color.
This is not the usual way. Most people begin by taking interest in the subject of a picture, and very many never get any further in their appreciation. On the other hand I felt that, if I could once get you interested in the abstract qualities of a picture, you would be started right, and that your interest in the subject would be sure to follow after. So our talk about subject has been put off until now.
Pictures are sometimes sorted into groups according to their subject. There are religious pictures; pictures of myths and legends or imaginary subjects; portraits; landscapes; historical pictures, like _Washington crossing the Delaware_; genre pictures or scenes of every day life; still-life subjects, representing flowers and fruits, dead birds, beasts and fishes, and objects of man’s handiwork; decorative subjects and mural paintings. But this grouping does not settle the matter, since each of these subjects can be treated in more than one way. How it is treated depends upon the motive and point of view of the artist.
So, the simplest way to grasp this matter of subject is first of all to find out what is meant by an artist’s motive and point of view. As usual, let us start with dictionary meanings of these words and then see their application to what we are discussing.
Motive, then, is that which causes a thing to move, which impels it. What is the motive power of that train? Is the power that moves it steam or electricity? What is the motive of any particular artist, the force which impels him to adopt a certain method or to work in a certain direction?
Point of view on the other hand, is the point at which a person stands to view something. You may watch a procession in the street from the point of view of a window. But the word is more often used, not of where your body stands, but of where your mind stands. According to our birth and bringing up; that is to say, as the result of what we inherit from our forebears, and have acquired by education and experience, we each have our own point of view. For example, you will not hesitate to say that your point of view is American. You read about the Panama canal. You are not only interested, but proud, because Americans are digging it. If the French, who began it, were carrying on the work, your interest in it would be less and your pride nil. When you travel abroad, at any rate for the first time, you will not be able to help making critical comparisons between the way they do things in Europe and at home. You will be apt to see everything from the point of view of an American. Your point of view is the result of your being what you are. And it is the same with an artist. Being what he is, and what he cannot help being, he has his own particular personal point of view. Being what he is, he also has his own individual motive. Through the union of motive and point of view, he sees things in his own way and in his own way is impelled to represent them.
Since each artist is a person different to all other persons, the varieties of motive and point of view are infinite. There is no end to the variety; and, as you grow older, and continue your study of pictures, you will find more and more interest in looking into and discovering just what is the particular motive and point of view of each artist. For he cannot help betraying them in his pictures, any more than you can help betraying yours, if, being a partisan of Yale, you are watching a football game between Yale and Harvard. Just as your behavior will betray your feelings, so is a picture the expression of an artist’s personal likes and dislikes. In studying pictures, therefore, you are also studying the personality of the men who painted them.
I wish you to feel that this sort of study has no limits. Its interest will last you, as long as you live. At the same time my aim is to help you to enter upon the study. And at the start everything should be made as simple as possible. So, although motives and points of view are infinite in variety, let us see if we cannot find some simple clue to the study of them. I think it may be found in dividing all artists into two big groups. On the one side, those who are inclined to represent the world as they see it to be; on the other side, those who represent things according to their own ideas. It is the great division between the _naturalistic_ or _realistic_ and the _idealistic_ motive and point of view. Some artists are naturalists, or realists; others are idealists; a great many are a mingling of the two.
This broad general distinction must be thoroughly understood. For you can see that it would be impossible to enter into the merits of an _idealistic_ picture, if you insist on approaching the study of it from the _naturalistic_ point of view. And vice versa. The only way to appreciate a picture is to approach it from the point of view of the man who painted it. We must try to enter into his mind and find out his motive and see the subject as he saw it.
When we have done so, we may not like his picture. That is another matter. Perhaps his motive and point of view, when we have discovered them, do not please us. Our own are so different, that he and we cannot really agree. Or possibly, while we agree with his motive and point of view, we do not feel that he has expressed them well. In either case, his picture is not for us. At least, not to-day; for, as we grow older, we shall find that our own motive and point of view are apt to change. We have studied more, and know more, and may find that pictures, we once did not care for, we now admire; and, on the other hand, that the pictures we once liked have ceased to please us.
Now for a talk about the difference between _naturalistic_ or _realistic_ and _idealistic_. When the art of painting began to revive in Italy at the end of the Thirteenth Century, the first aim of the artists was to make their pictures more really resemble life and nature. I have already told you of Giotto, who gave roundness and natural gestures to his figures, made the objects look more real, and suggested the depth and distance of their surroundings. Next of Masaccio, who gave his figures still more resemblance to life, and filled in their surroundings with a suggestion of atmosphere. Then I told you of Mantegna, who from the study of the remains of classic sculpture gave further naturalness of life and vigor to his figures; until, by degrees, from the observation of nature and the study of the classic sculpture, artists reached proficiency in the natural rendering of the figure. So far as form was concerned, their figures were absolutely natural. But, as yet, the _naturalistic_ motive and point of view had not included the seeing and rendering of nature’s light. That was to come later.
On the other hand, the study of classic sculpture, while helping the progress toward naturalism, had started some artists in the direction of a new motive and point of view. For now the appreciation of the antique sculpture became increased and supplemented by the study of scholars, who were translating and explaining the newly discovered writings of the Greeks and Romans. Plato was the special favorite, and the Italians of the end of the Fifteenth Century learned from him the motive of _idealism_ and the _idealistic_ point of view.
They learned from his writings to think not only of things, but of ideas. Even to consider ideas of more importance than things; especially the idea of beauty. You will remember that in speaking of Raphael’s _Allegory of Jurisprudence_, we said that Jurisprudence represented an abstract idea: the conception of what justice is in itself and of the qualities of Prudence, Firmness, and Temperance that it involves, apart from the machinery for making and administering the law. Men make laws, and some are good and some are bad. Even the good ones are not always perfectly administered. To-day, in America, our conception or idea of law is higher than our methods of putting it in practice. Everywhere, always, men’s ideals are higher than their conduct.
Ideals, then, which are the motives, resulting from ideas, represent the highest effort of man after what is best and most beautiful. Most beautiful because it is best and best because it is most beautiful.
Such was part of what artists learned from Plato. Do you see how they applied it to their art? To Leonardo da Vinci, one of the first Italian artists to become influenced by the classic spirit, the teaching appealed in some such way as the following: The idea of Beauty is separate from the things or objects in which it is manifested; just as we may have an idea of smell apart from any particular flower; or of love, apart from the object of our love. The highest ideal for an artist is to express in his pictures something of this abstract idea of beauty, to give to his figures beauty and grandeur of form and noble heads; to put them in positions of grace and dignity. He will not paint human nature as he sees it to be, with all its imperfections, but will people his pictures with a race of men and women and children of ideal beauty.
This was the motive that inspired those noble Italian pictures of the Sixteenth Century. It was from the high standpoint of abstract beauty that the artists looked at their subject. Their point of view was _idealistic_. But this was not the only thing that made their pictures noble. The artists were inspired also by a great demand on the part of the people of their day. Religion held a strong place in the hearts of the people. They called for pictures to beautify the churches and, at the same time, to teach those that could not read the beauties of religion. To-day people have learned to read, and books to a large extent serve the purpose that pictures used to do. But in those days the people needed pictures; and it was this strong need, acting like rich soil to the beautiful plant of idealism, that helped to produce these wonderful pictures. They are the most wonderful that the modern world has ever seen, just because of this union of two most strong motives--the religious need of the people and the exalted love of beauty of the artists.
But note the character of these pictures. Sometimes, for example, the Virgin is seated on a throne, surrounded by angels and apostles, saints and bishops; or at other times, Christ and his apostles are represented in some scene from the New Testament story. The first presents an entirely imaginary arrangement of the figures; the second makes no pretence to representing the scene as it may have actually occurred. The apostles, many of whom were fishermen, have heads as noble as philosophers; robes arranged in beautiful folds of drapery, and conduct themselves with the grace and dignity of some fine classic statue. Every line, every arrangement of form and space, is designed to assist in building up a composition of ideal beauty.
Or with the same motive the artist would treat some subject of Greek mythology, such as the story of Psyche. This again was a response to a strong need of the public. Not so wide a one as the religious need, but still a strong one, for among the cultivated classes there was an intense interest in the old classic myths.
Or from the same _idealistic_ point of view the artist would decorate the walls of a City Hall. To this also he was impelled by a strong public need: the desire of the citizens to express their pride in themselves and their city by means of beauty. For by this time the Italians had learned to express all their highest ideals in forms of ideal beauty.
But a change came. The Italians, long a prey to foreign enemies and quarrelling among themselves, at length lost their liberty and their pride in themselves. Other nations surpassed them in learning and culture; and even Religion lost its intense hold on the public mind. With the loss of high ideals the glory of _idealistic_ painting in Italy waned and disappeared.
But artists of other lands continued to regard the _idealistic_ painting of the Italians as a model of what came to be called “the Grand Style.” During the Seventeenth Century Spanish artists imitated it in their religious pictures. But elsewhere it was used chiefly for great works of decoration; as by Rubens in Flanders (Belgium) and Le Brun in France. The former, for example, built up a series of magnificent compositions in honor of Marie de Médicis, the wife of Henry IV of France. They are now in the Louvre in Paris. Le Brun’s vast paintings and tapestries, that decorate the palace of Versailles, were designed to extol the glory in war and peace of Louis XIV, who at the end of his long reign left his country poor and his subjects miserable.
In fact, _idealistic_ painting that had once been great, because nourished by an intense religious motive or by the motive of civic pride, had sunk to being a means of flattering the vanity of monarchs or pandering to the luxury of the idle rich. So during the Eighteenth Century it continued to languish. The form alone remained, growing less and less beautiful; the old spirit of it was dead.
A new one, however, arose and had a brief spell of life, for it was based on the awakened desire of the French people for liberty. In the years before the Revolution David painted _idealistic_ pictures. He chose his subjects from the history of the Roman Republic, in order that by the example of its patriotism he might stir his own countrymen to action. The models for his figures he took from old Roman sculpture. His pictures fitted the temper of the time and helped the cause of liberty; but when Napoleon made himself Emperor David passed into his service, and the high motive for his _idealistic_ pictures ceased.
Later painters have turned again to Italy, and by building up imposing arrangements of figures have tried to make the spirit of Italian idealism live again. They have not succeeded. Perhaps for two reasons. First, that the old Italian compositions are mostly of an allegorical character, and allegory does not interest the modern mind. We are interested in realities. Second, that those compositions were based on the beauty of form of the human figure; the artists made their forms as perfect as possible and placed them in an artificial arrangement that would produce a pattern or composition of beauty and dignity. But modern art is more concerned with rendering the natural appearances of the world; and, if it idealises them, does so, as we shall presently see, by means of light and atmosphere.
*       *       *       *       *
Meanwhile, that Seventeenth Century, in which Italian _idealistic_ painting dwindled, saw a new outburst of the _naturalistic_ or _realistic_ motive in two parts of the world; simultaneously, in Spain and Holland.
I have already told you how Velasquez in Spain and the Dutch artists devoted themselves to the study of the persons and things actually present to their eyes. They were _realists_ or _naturalists_. Holland had cut herself off from Flanders and the splendid vice-regal Court of Brussels, and her own noblemen were busy fighting for their country’s freedom. So there was no demand for her artists to paint handsome decorations. She had also cut herself off from the Roman Catholic religion; and in the churches of the Reformed Faith there was no demand for great religious pictures. These two motives were lacking; but she had another one--a very strong one--the love of country and the pride of the people in themselves. It was strong enough to produce a great school of painters of little pictures, distinguished for their great truth to nature.
Among these Dutch artists, however, was at least one who was not only a _realist_ but an _idealist_. This was Rembrandt. It is of his idealism that I will speak here; and, to illustrate it, will tell you of a small religious picture in the Louvre: _The Visit to Emmaus_. You remember that Christ in the evening of the day of his Resurrection came upon two of his disciples and joined them in their walk to the village of Emmaus. Not recognising him, they talked of what had happened. It was not until the little party had reached the inn, and the Saviour raised his hands in blessing the food, that their eyes were opened and they knew him. It is this moment that Rembrandt represented.
When you see this picture you will find no grandeur in it such as the Italian pictures have. The figures are those of poor ordinary men. Rembrandt, being also a realist, drew them from the real types of poor Jews in the Ghetto, or Jew-quarter of Amsterdam. There is nothing of imposing dignity even in the Saviour’s form and face. Whatever may be the idealism in the picture, it does not depend on form. Its motive is different from that of the Italians. Its motive is light. From Christ’s figure spreads a light. Is not one of his titles--The Light of the World? And the light, flowing from this humble figure, illumines the faces of his humble companions and, passing up to the vaulted ceiling, sheds through the gloom a mystery of tremulous glow. The picture like the subject it celebrates, is a miracle--a miracle of light.
Do you see how this was an expression of idealism? Rembrandt in studying the world around him had discovered, like other artists of his time, the beauty of light. Light by degrees represented to him the highest element of beauty in the visible world. While the great Italians had found the ideal or highest conception of abstract beauty in form, Rembrandt found it in light. Therefore, when he painted this picture and wished to show that these figures, though humble looking, were not ordinary men, and that the event was no ordinary meeting at a village inn, he proceeded to idealise the scene according to his own conception of ideal beauty. He introduced into it the beauty and mystery of light.
Please note that word mystery. A mystery is what passes beyond our knowledge and understanding, something that cannot be grasped by our mind and intelligence. Thus we speak of the mystery of life: scientists have discovered how the various forms of life have been developed on the earth, but the origin of life is still a mystery to them. Even when they have traced life back to the smallest conceivable beginning, they are as far off from knowing what started that smallest beginning into life. But because they do not know, do they say “Oh, what we do not know is not worth the knowing”? No indeed! they realise, that hidden in the mystery is a truth, even more wonderful than what they know.
Or again, some beautiful summer night by the sea-shore you are looking out over the water. The moon is low and her rays make a pathway of light. You gaze along it and at first the waves are clearly visible, heaving in the light; further off, the movement of the waves disappears; only a luminous glow remains, growing fainter and fainter, till far away it melts into that thin line where sky and water meet--the horizon. Do you know that horizon really means boundary, the limit of our sight, the point beyond which our eye has no power to see? But is there nothing beyond? If we took ship and sailed beyond that pathway of light, should we ever reach the horizon? We should only sail on to find the horizon continually beyond our reach.
Or we turn our gaze from the water to the sky. Above us, further than eye can travel, it extends. It is studded with innumerable stars. We may know the names of some of them, and have learned about their movements and their distance from the earth; but what do we know, what does any one, even the wisest and most learned, know of them, compared with our ignorance of them? It will be well for us, as we gaze into the mystery of the heavens, to be thinking less of the little knowledge that we have than of the miracle, the wonder, of what transcends man’s understanding; of the vast, impenetrable mystery that surrounds our lives. To do so will fill us with, what we call, a spiritual joy; a joy, that is to say, which goes beyond knowledge, and affects that higher capacity of feeling that, not knowing what it is, we call spirit. This highest feeling, that we call spiritual, has always in it some element of mystery. The truth of this was curiously expressed by a little girl of my acquaintance, who was very fond of having her mother read poetry to her. I asked her if she understood a certain poem. “Of course not,” was her quick reply, “what fun would there be in poetry if you could understand it?”
Well, I have spoken at length of Rembrandt, because his way of idealising a scene through the beauty and mystery of light, has become the way of modern artists. But it was not until nearly two hundred years after his death that the world came round to this way. In the mean time Rembrandt and the other Dutch painters of his Century, like Velasquez, had been forgotten. The painters were busy trying to keep alive the other notion of idealism, the Italian one, based on form. Indeed, it was not until naturalism again became popular, that idealism by means of light was renewed.
*       *       *       *       *
I have already told you of the revival of _naturalism_ at the beginning of the Nineteenth Century; how the English landscape painter, Constable, was followed by the French landscapists of the Barbizon-Fontainebleau group. You remember that their point of view was nature as it is visible to the eye, but their motive was also to express the feelings of love with which it inspired themselves.
Then, about the middle of the Century appeared Gustave Courbet who loudly proclaimed himself a _realist_. He meant by this that he was not moved by sentiment, as the Barbizon _naturalists_ were; that he believed that the only thing which concerned a painter was to paint what he could see, as it appeared to his eye alone. He wished to limit his art to what is visible to sight. So he thought it was foolish for an artist to attempt to represent a scene from the Bible or any historical subject or subject invented by the imagination. As the artist had never seen these things, he had no business, as a painter, to try and represent them. He was going outside his own art and meddling with some one else’s: the art of the writer or actor, for example.
Courbet’s point of view of _realism_ and his motive, to paint only what he could see, were carried further by another Frenchman, Édouard Manet. He had become a student of the works of Velasquez, from whom he had learnt: firstly, a new way of viewing his subject; secondly a new way of rendering what he saw. This new way of viewing the subject is what is now called “_impressionism_.”
I am sorry to have to trouble you with a new word; but I think you are prepared for it, since impressionism professes to be only a more natural and real way of seeing things. Of _seeing_ things, that is the point. It does not take account of what things are, but of the _impression_ they produce upon our mind, when they appear before our eyes. You are at work in school, and a stranger enters the class room. He converses for a few minutes with the teacher and then goes out. What sort of man was he? If there are twenty children in the class, and each, on arriving home, relates the circumstance of the visit, there will probably be twenty different impressions of the visitor’s appearance. They will agree in some points and differ in others; yet each one of the impressions may be a true one--as far as it goes. How far it goes will depend on the quickness and thoroughness of your observation. But anyhow, it will not include a great number of details; it will rather be a general impression.
If you look out of window into a street, you may see a number of figures on the sidewalks. You receive a general impression of figures, moving or standing still; some men, some women, representing various spots of one color. Now a _realistic_ painter might say, “Each one of those figures represents a real person; I will paint him as he really is; and, to do so, will ask him to stand still long enough for me to study him exactly in all his visible details.” “And if you do,” retorts the _impressionist_ painter, “you will paint something so real, that it will be too real. For you never could see these people in
[Illustration: Evening. _Anton Mauve._]
this way, if you look at them on the street. The greater part of the details would be lost in the general impression.”
Well! the more you think of it, the more right you see the _impressionist_ is--from his point of view. He says, if you are going to be natural, be really natural; if you want to make your pictures look real, make them real in a natural way. If the only thing in art is to be as like nature as possible, and to represent things only as they would appear, if you suddenly looked at them, the _impressionist_ is right. And what makes this way of looking at things particularly interesting is the fact, that it is so often the momentary effect in nature that is most beautiful: the effect that lasts but a moment, that is fugitive or fleeting, caught in an instant, before it changes to something else. You know what I mean from your own experience. A certain expression passes over your friend’s face. “Oh! if I could only photograph her now,” you exclaim; but by the time you have arranged your camera, it is gone, and cannot be brought back to order. Well, it is just that fugitive, fleeting expression of a subject that the _realist_, who is an _impressionist_, tries to represent in his pictures.
So far I have tried to explain the _impressionist’s_ point of view. Now let us consider his way of _rendering_ what he sees. The whole secret of it is the part which light plays in the appearance of things. Manet and the other impressionists, among whom Claude Monet and Whistler are the most important, see every thing, as Vermeer did, enveloped in light. But they have gone further than he.
They have studied much more closely the ever varying qualities of light, as it differs according to place and season and even time of day. Monet has painted a series of pictures the subject of every one of which is the same haystack. At least that is how some people might describe them. But, if they enter into Monet’s point of view, they would say that the real subject is not the haystack but the effect of light upon its surface, and, as the effect of light is different in every case, none of the pictures are similar to one another. Each represents a separate fugitive expression of light. Monet, in them and other pictures, has recorded with extraordinary subtlety the impression presented to his eye. For Monet’s _impressionism_ was also _naturalistic_.
Whistler, on the other hand, with no less subtlety, rendered also the impression that the things seen had made on his imagination. He was an _idealistic impressionist_. He painted, for example, a number of night-scenes, or “nocturnes,” as he called them. The actual objects in them are of less importance than Monet’s haystack, because in the dim light of twilight or night they are only faintly visible. Whistler did not wish us to be aware of the form of the bridge, or the boat, the sea and shore, or whatever the objects may be. He wished us to be conscious of them only as Presences looming up like spirit-forms in the mystery of the uncertain light. Such nocturnes as _Battersea Bridge_ and the sea-shore picture, _Bognor-Nocturne_, appeal to us like Rembrandt’s _Visit to Emmaus_. Just as the latter’s forms were humble, so the bridge itself is an ordinary sort of structure, and the sea-shore and the boats are without any unusual distinction. Yet in each case the scene has been idealised through the mystery of light, and appeals to our spiritual imagination. After two hundred years Rembrandt’s new principle of _idealisation_, founded upon the abstract beauty of light instead of on the abstract perfection of form, has been accepted by modern artists.
To a greater or less degree all artists, whether _naturalists_ or _idealists_, who are painting in the modern spirit have been influenced by Monet and Whistler. The example of these two has spread far and wide the study and rendering of light. But, while their followers agree in this motive, they are independent in their points of view. There are some whose point of view, like Monet’s, is _objective_. They are content to render the _impression_ made upon their eyes. But, as their eyes see differently from Monet’s, their pictures are different from his. Each is the record of a separate personality. Equally, while others, like Whistler are _subjective_, recording the _impression_ produced upon their minds, their pictures vary according to the character and quality of their separate minds. In fact, in later times, a notable feature of painting is its diversity of motives and points of view.
Let me try to explain this. Ever since the American and French Revolutions, there has been a gradually increasing interest in what we call individuality. The main object of these revolutions was to establish the right of each and every individual to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, and the idea of government now is to give every individual the chance of making the most of his or her possibilities. Your teachers, for example, are not running their classes as machines; they are trying to make a personal study, so far as possible, of each one of you, in order to help you to develop your particular individuality. For a long time this has been the principle of education and government. The result is that there has been a universal increase in individuality, since numbers of people who had some special possibility have had a chance to develope it. To-day, in fact, there is probably nothing that counts more than individuality. This being so it is natural that we should look for it in art. And, if we do, we shall find it.
In former times there were “schools of art.” In Italian art, we speak, for example, of the Florentine School, the Venetian School, the Roman School; or we speak of the Flemish School, and Dutch Schools and so on. In each case the artists, living in a certain city or country, had sufficient resemblance among themselves in their motives and methods of painting to produce a certain separate style. So, to-day, if an expert sees an old picture, he is able to say at once and, more often than not correctly, that it belongs to such and such a school.
But an expert of a hundred years hence, when he sees our modern pictures, will not speak of Schools. He may see at once that the picture is by an American, a German, or a French artist, for difference of race and habit of life and thought do still stamp in a general way the pictures of each separate country. But even within the limits of any one country there are as many varieties of motive and point of view as there are individuals.
So in modern times, more than ever before, there is an individual, personal note in pictures, just as there is in books. The artist makes the picture an expression of his own personal feelings. This is one reason why modern pictures are inferior to the old ones in grandeur and dignity. The older ones were not only larger in size, as a rule, but they were impersonal, like a fine building is. The architects who designed the Capitol at Washington put their own personal expression into it. But we do not feel it, as we look at their work. On the contrary, it is the impersonal, monumental dignity of the work that impresses us. But in most modern pictures, instead of what is impersonal, we receive a distinct impression of intimacy, of sharing the artist’s feeling. And it is the expression of this that we not only look for but enjoy discovering. We often speak of it as the sentiment of the picture.
This sentiment may be of all sorts and shades of feeling, “from grave to gay, from lively to severe.” It may be romantic in spirit, appealing to us through the suggestion of what is weird and surprising; it may be full of the tenderness or of the trumpet call of poetry; it may invite us to gentle reverie, or stir in us a profound and poignant emotion. But I have said enough to point your way.
*       *       *       *       *
In conclusion let me sum up the contents of this long chapter. We have seen that there are two main streams of motive and point of view; the _idealistic_ and the _naturalistic_. The former flows from the artist’s desire to represent his conception of ideal beauty, the latter from his love of nature. We have seen that they have alternately reached their highest flood, because the conditions of the times supplied a great public need to which each in turn responded. Lastly, we have seen that gradually both tendencies have undergone a change. Whereas originally both the naturalistic and the idealistic motive were concerned with form, they came to be concerned particularly with light.
Therefore, when you look at a picture, ask yourself: Has the artist simply tried to render the visible appearance, or has he also tried to make the subject interpret some feeling of his own?
If he is simply rendering the visible appearance: Has he been conscious only of form, or has he viewed the form in its envelope of lighted atmosphere? Further, has he tried to represent the visible appearance, as we should find it to be, if we studied each and every part of it separately; or he has tried to give the impression of the entire scene, as it really reached his eyes?
If he is interpreting through the subject his own feeling: What is the quality of the feeling? Does the picture simply express the artist’s consciousness of the grandeur or the loveliness of nature, or does it also interpret his feeling for the mystery of things not seen?
Here are a few hints for you in setting out to explore the vast country of motive and point of view.
THE END
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Pronounced dees-poo-táh, with the accent on the last syllable. See page 13.
[2] The body between the neck and the commencement of the legs.
[3] Mural--(Latin _murus_, a wall), having to do with a wall; in this case a decoration on a wall.
[4] In 1759 a M. de Silhouette was minister of finance, and he was so economical that the French used his name as a nickname for cheap things, among others for the profile portraits cut out of black paper, which were then popular. In time, the word came to be used for any dark mass seen against a light one.
[5] Pronounced Yo-hann-es Fair-mair.
[6] We shall find it was discovered also by the Spanish artist, Velasquez, in the same century.
[7] Pronounced pa-ee-sahje an-teem.
[8] Still life, or as the French call it “dead nature” includes, firstly, picked flowers, fruit and vegetables, and dead animals, and secondly, vases, pots, and other objects of man’s handicraft.
[9] Showing a mastery over others.
[10] Turn back to his picture and see how all this that we are now discussing is there illustrated.
[11] See page 88.
[12] Later on I shall have something to say about these so called realists. I shall say to them, as Hamlet said to Horatio, “There are more things in Heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy.”
End of Project Gutenberg's A Child's Guide to Pictures, by Charles H. Caffin

= = = PG699 = = =
A CHILD’S HISTORY OF ENGLAND
A CHILD’S HISTORY OF ENGLAND
By CHARLES DICKENS
With Illustrations by F. H. Townsend and others
LONDON: CHAPMAN & HALL, ld. NEW YORK: CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS 1905
Contents
CHAPTER I ANCIENT ENGLAND AND THE ROMANS
If you look at a Map of the World, you will see, in the left-hand upper corner of the Eastern Hemisphere, two Islands lying in the sea. They are England and Scotland, and Ireland. England and Scotland form the greater part of these Islands. Ireland is the next in size. The little neighbouring islands, which are so small upon the Map as to be mere dots, are chiefly little bits of Scotland,—broken off, I dare say, in the course of a great length of time, by the power of the restless water.
In the old days, a long, long while ago, before Our Saviour was born on earth and lay asleep in a manger, these Islands were in the same place, and the stormy sea roared round them, just as it roars now. But the sea was not alive, then, with great ships and brave sailors, sailing to and from all parts of the world. It was very lonely. The Islands lay solitary, in the great expanse of water. The foaming waves dashed against their cliffs, and the bleak winds blew over their forests; but the winds and waves brought no adventurers to land upon the Islands, and the savage Islanders knew nothing of the rest of the world, and the rest of the world knew nothing of them.
It is supposed that the Phœnicians, who were an ancient people, famous for carrying on trade, came in ships to these Islands, and found that they produced tin and lead; both very useful things, as you know, and both produced to this very hour upon the sea-coast. The most celebrated tin mines in Cornwall are, still, close to the sea. One of them, which I have seen, is so close to it that it is hollowed out underneath the ocean; and the miners say, that in stormy weather, when they are at work down in that deep place, they can hear the noise of the waves thundering above their heads. So, the Phœnicians, coasting about the Islands, would come, without much difficulty, to where the tin and lead were.
The Phœnicians traded with the Islanders for these metals, and gave the Islanders some other useful things in exchange. The Islanders were, at first, poor savages, going almost naked, or only dressed in the rough skins of beasts, and staining their bodies, as other savages do, with coloured earths and the juices of plants. But the Phœnicians, sailing over to the opposite coasts of France and Belgium, and saying to the people there, ‘We have been to those white cliffs across the water, which you can see in fine weather, and from that country, which is called Britain, we bring this tin and lead,’ tempted some of the French and Belgians to come over also. These people settled themselves on the south coast of England, which is now called Kent; and, although they were a rough people too, they taught the savage Britons some useful arts, and improved that part of the Islands. It is probable that other people came over from Spain to Ireland, and settled there.
Thus, by little and little, strangers became mixed with the Islanders, and the savage Britons grew into a wild, bold people; almost savage, still, especially in the interior of the country away from the sea where the foreign settlers seldom went; but hardy, brave, and strong.
The whole country was covered with forests, and swamps. The greater part of it was very misty and cold. There were no roads, no bridges, no streets, no houses that you would think deserving of the name. A town was nothing but a collection of straw-covered huts, hidden in a thick wood, with a ditch all round, and a low wall, made of mud, or the trunks of trees placed one upon another. The people planted little or no corn, but lived upon the flesh of their flocks and cattle. They made no coins, but used metal rings for money. They were clever in basket-work, as savage people often are; and they could make a coarse kind of cloth, and some very bad earthenware. But in building fortresses they were much more clever.
They made boats of basket-work, covered with the skins of animals, but seldom, if ever, ventured far from the shore. They made swords, of copper mixed with tin; but, these swords were of an awkward shape, and so soft that a heavy blow would bend one. They made light shields, short pointed daggers, and spears—which they jerked back after they had thrown them at an enemy, by a long strip of leather fastened to the stem. The butt-end was a rattle, to frighten an enemy’s horse. The ancient Britons, being divided into as many as thirty or forty tribes, each commanded by its own little king, were constantly fighting with one another, as savage people usually do; and they always fought with these weapons.
They were very fond of horses. The standard of Kent was the picture of a white horse. They could break them in and manage them wonderfully well. Indeed, the horses (of which they had an abundance, though they were rather small) were so well taught in those days, that they can scarcely be said to have improved since; though the men are so much wiser. They understood, and obeyed, every word of command; and would stand still by themselves, in all the din and noise of battle, while their masters went to fight on foot. The Britons could not have succeeded in their most remarkable art, without the aid of these sensible and trusty animals. The art I mean, is the construction and management of war-chariots or cars, for which they have ever been celebrated in history. Each of the best sort of these chariots, not quite breast high in front, and open at the back, contained one man to drive, and two or three others to fight—all standing up. The horses who drew them were so well trained, that they would tear, at full gallop, over the most stony ways, and even through the woods; dashing down their masters’ enemies beneath their hoofs, and cutting them to pieces with the blades of swords, or scythes, which were fastened to the wheels, and stretched out beyond the car on each side, for that cruel purpose. In a moment, while at full speed, the horses would stop, at the driver’s command. The men within would leap out, deal blows about them with their swords like hail, leap on the horses, on the pole, spring back into the chariots anyhow; and, as soon as they were safe, the horses tore away again.
The Britons had a strange and terrible religion, called the Religion of the Druids. It seems to have been brought over, in very early times indeed, from the opposite country of France, anciently called Gaul, and to have mixed up the worship of the Serpent, and of the Sun and Moon, with the worship of some of the Heathen Gods and Goddesses. Most of its ceremonies were kept secret by the priests, the Druids, who pretended to be enchanters, and who carried magicians’ wands, and wore, each of them, about his neck, what he told the ignorant people was a Serpent’s egg in a golden case. But it is certain that the Druidical ceremonies included the sacrifice of human victims, the torture of some suspected criminals, and, on particular occasions, even the burning alive, in immense wicker cages, of a number of men and animals together. The Druid Priests had some kind of veneration for the Oak, and for the mistletoe—the same plant that we hang up in houses at Christmas Time now—when its white berries grew upon the Oak. They met together in dark woods, which they called Sacred Groves; and there they instructed, in their mysterious arts, young men who came to them as pupils, and who sometimes stayed with them as long as twenty years.
These Druids built great Temples and altars, open to the sky, fragments of some of which are yet remaining. Stonehenge, on Salisbury Plain, in Wiltshire, is the most extraordinary of these. Three curious stones, called Kits Coty House, on Bluebell Hill, near Maidstone, in Kent, form another. We know, from examination of the great blocks of which such buildings are made, that they could not have been raised without the aid of some ingenious machines, which are common now, but which the ancient Britons certainly did not use in making their own uncomfortable houses. I should not wonder if the Druids, and their pupils who stayed with them twenty years, knowing more than the rest of the Britons, kept the people out of sight while they made these buildings, and then pretended that they built them by magic. Perhaps they had a hand in the fortresses too; at all events, as they were very powerful, and very much believed in, and as they made and executed the laws, and paid no taxes, I don’t wonder that they liked their trade. And, as they persuaded the people the more Druids there were, the better off the people would be, I don’t wonder that there were a good many of them. But it is pleasant to think that there are no Druids, _now_, who go on in that way, and pretend to carry Enchanters’ Wands and Serpents’ Eggs—and of course there is nothing of the kind, anywhere.
Such was the improved condition of the ancient Britons, fifty-five years before the birth of Our Saviour, when the Romans, under their great General, Julius Cæsar, were masters of all the rest of the known world. Julius Cæsar had then just conquered Gaul; and hearing, in Gaul, a good deal about the opposite Island with the white cliffs, and about the bravery of the Britons who inhabited it—some of whom had been fetched over to help the Gauls in the war against him—he resolved, as he was so near, to come and conquer Britain next.
So, Julius Cæsar came sailing over to this Island of ours, with eighty vessels and twelve thousand men. And he came from the French coast between Calais and Boulogne, ‘because thence was the shortest passage into Britain;’ just for the same reason as our steam-boats now take the same track, every day. He expected to conquer Britain easily: but it was not such easy work as he supposed—for the bold Britons fought most bravely; and, what with not having his horse-soldiers with him (for they had been driven back by a storm), and what with having some of his vessels dashed to pieces by a high tide after they were drawn ashore, he ran great risk of being totally defeated. However, for once that the bold Britons beat him, he beat them twice; though not so soundly but that he was very glad to accept their proposals of peace, and go away.
But, in the spring of the next year, he came back; this time, with eight hundred vessels and thirty thousand men. The British tribes chose, as their general-in-chief, a Briton, whom the Romans in their Latin language called Cassivellaunus, but whose British name is supposed to have been Caswallon. A brave general he was, and well he and his soldiers fought the Roman army! So well, that whenever in that war the Roman soldiers saw a great cloud of dust, and heard the rattle of the rapid British chariots, they trembled in their hearts. Besides a number of smaller battles, there was a battle fought near Canterbury, in Kent; there was a battle fought near Chertsey, in Surrey; there was a battle fought near a marshy little town in a wood, the capital of that part of Britain which belonged to Cassivellaunus, and which was probably near what is now Saint Albans, in Hertfordshire. However, brave Cassivellaunus had the worst of it, on the whole; though he and his men always fought like lions. As the other British chiefs were jealous of him, and were always quarrelling with him, and with one another, he gave up, and proposed peace. Julius Cæsar was very glad to grant peace easily, and to go away again with all his remaining ships and men. He had expected to find pearls in Britain, and he may have found a few for anything I know; but, at all events, he found delicious oysters, and I am sure he found tough Britons—of whom, I dare say, he made the same complaint as Napoleon Bonaparte the great French General did, eighteen hundred years afterwards, when he said they were such unreasonable fellows that they never knew when they were beaten. They never _did_ know, I believe, and never will.
Nearly a hundred years passed on, and all that time, there was peace in Britain. The Britons improved their towns and mode of life: became more civilised, travelled, and learnt a great deal from the Gauls and Romans. At last, the Roman Emperor, Claudius, sent Aulus Plautius, a skilful general, with a mighty force, to subdue the Island, and shortly afterwards arrived himself. They did little; and Ostorius Scapula, another general, came. Some of the British Chiefs of Tribes submitted. Others resolved to fight to the death. Of these brave men, the bravest was Caractacus, or Caradoc, who gave battle to the Romans, with his army, among the mountains of North Wales. ‘This day,’ said he to his soldiers, ‘decides the fate of Britain! Your liberty, or your eternal slavery, dates from this hour. Remember your brave ancestors, who drove the great Cæsar himself across the sea!’ On hearing these words, his men, with a great shout, rushed upon the Romans. But the strong Roman swords and armour were too much for the weaker British weapons in close conflict. The Britons lost the day. The wife and daughter of the brave Caractacus were taken prisoners; his brothers delivered themselves up; he himself was betrayed into the hands of the Romans by his false and base stepmother: and they carried him, and all his family, in triumph to Rome.
But a great man will be great in misfortune, great in prison, great in chains. His noble air, and dignified endurance of distress, so touched the Roman people who thronged the streets to see him, that he and his family were restored to freedom. No one knows whether his great heart broke, and he died in Rome, or whether he ever returned to his own dear country. English oaks have grown up from acorns, and withered away, when they were hundreds of years old—and other oaks have sprung up in their places, and died too, very aged—since the rest of the history of the brave Caractacus was forgotten.
Still, the Britons _would not_ yield. They rose again and again, and died by thousands, sword in hand. They rose, on every possible occasion. Suetonius, another Roman general, came, and stormed the Island of Anglesey (then called Mona), which was supposed to be sacred, and he burnt the Druids in their own wicker cages, by their own fires. But, even while he was in Britain, with his victorious troops, the Britons rose. Because Boadicea, a British queen, the widow of the King of the Norfolk and Suffolk people, resisted the plundering of her property by the Romans who were settled in England, she was scourged, by order of Catus a Roman officer; and her two daughters were shamefully insulted in her presence, and her husband’s relations were made slaves. To avenge this injury, the Britons rose, with all their might and rage. They drove Catus into Gaul; they laid the Roman possessions waste; they forced the Romans out of London, then a poor little town, but a trading place; they hanged, burnt, crucified, and slew by the sword, seventy thousand Romans in a few days. Suetonius strengthened his army, and advanced to give them battle. They strengthened their army, and desperately attacked his, on the field where it was strongly posted. Before the first charge of the Britons was made, Boadicea, in a war-chariot, with her fair hair streaming in the wind, and her injured daughters lying at her feet, drove among the troops, and cried to them for vengeance on their oppressors, the licentious Romans. The Britons fought to the last; but they were vanquished with great slaughter, and the unhappy queen took poison.
Still, the spirit of the Britons was not broken. When Suetonius left the country, they fell upon his troops, and retook the Island of Anglesey. Agricola came, fifteen or twenty years afterwards, and retook it once more, and devoted seven years to subduing the country, especially that part of it which is now called Scotland; but, its people, the Caledonians, resisted him at every inch of ground. They fought the bloodiest battles with him; they killed their very wives and children, to prevent his making prisoners of them; they fell, fighting, in such great numbers that certain hills in Scotland are yet supposed to be vast heaps of stones piled up above their graves. Hadrian came, thirty years afterwards, and still they resisted him. Severus came, nearly a hundred years afterwards, and they worried his great army like dogs, and rejoiced to see them die, by thousands, in the bogs and swamps. Caracalla, the son and successor of Severus, did the most to conquer them, for a time; but not by force of arms. He knew how little that would do. He yielded up a quantity of land to the Caledonians, and gave the Britons the same privileges as the Romans possessed. There was peace, after this, for seventy years.
Then new enemies arose. They were the Saxons, a fierce, sea-faring people from the countries to the North of the Rhine, the great river of Germany on the banks of which the best grapes grow to make the German wine. They began to come, in pirate ships, to the sea-coast of Gaul and Britain, and to plunder them. They were repulsed by Carausius, a native either of Belgium or of Britain, who was appointed by the Romans to the command, and under whom the Britons first began to fight upon the sea. But, after this time, they renewed their ravages. A few years more, and the Scots (which was then the name for the people of Ireland), and the Picts, a northern people, began to make frequent plundering incursions into the South of Britain. All these attacks were repeated, at intervals, during two hundred years, and through a long succession of Roman Emperors and chiefs; during all which length of time, the Britons rose against the Romans, over and over again. At last, in the days of the Roman Honorius, when the Roman power all over the world was fast declining, and when Rome wanted all her soldiers at home, the Romans abandoned all hope of conquering Britain, and went away. And still, at last, as at first, the Britons rose against them, in their old brave manner; for, a very little while before, they had turned away the Roman magistrates, and declared themselves an independent people.
Five hundred years had passed, since Julius Cæsar’s first invasion of the Island, when the Romans departed from it for ever. In the course of that time, although they had been the cause of terrible fighting and bloodshed, they had done much to improve the condition of the Britons. They had made great military roads; they had built forts; they had taught them how to dress, and arm themselves, much better than they had ever known how to do before; they had refined the whole British way of living. Agricola had built a great wall of earth, more than seventy miles long, extending from Newcastle to beyond Carlisle, for the purpose of keeping out the Picts and Scots; Hadrian had strengthened it; Severus, finding it much in want of repair, had built it afresh of stone.
Above all, it was in the Roman time, and by means of Roman ships, that the Christian Religion was first brought into Britain, and its people first taught the great lesson that, to be good in the sight of God, they must love their neighbours as themselves, and do unto others as they would be done by. The Druids declared that it was very wicked to believe in any such thing, and cursed all the people who did believe it, very heartily. But, when the people found that they were none the better for the blessings of the Druids, and none the worse for the curses of the Druids, but, that the sun shone and the rain fell without consulting the Druids at all, they just began to think that the Druids were mere men, and that it signified very little whether they cursed or blessed. After which, the pupils of the Druids fell off greatly in numbers, and the Druids took to other trades.
Thus I have come to the end of the Roman time in England. It is but little that is known of those five hundred years; but some remains of them are still found. Often, when labourers are digging up the ground, to make foundations for houses or churches, they light on rusty money that once belonged to the Romans. Fragments of plates from which they ate, of goblets from which they drank, and of pavement on which they trod, are discovered among the earth that is broken by the plough, or the dust that is crumbled by the gardener’s spade. Wells that the Romans sunk, still yield water; roads that the Romans made, form part of our highways. In some old battle-fields, British spear-heads and Roman armour have been found, mingled together in decay, as they fell in the thick pressure of the fight. Traces of Roman camps overgrown with grass, and of mounds that are the burial-places of heaps of Britons, are to be seen in almost all parts of the country. Across the bleak moors of Northumberland, the wall of Severus, overrun with moss and weeds, still stretches, a strong ruin; and the shepherds and their dogs lie sleeping on it in the summer weather. On Salisbury Plain, Stonehenge yet stands: a monument of the earlier time when the Roman name was unknown in Britain, and when the Druids, with their best magic wands, could not have written it in the sands of the wild sea-shore.
CHAPTER II ANCIENT ENGLAND UNDER THE EARLY SAXONS
The Romans had scarcely gone away from Britain, when the Britons began to wish they had never left it. For, the Romans being gone, and the Britons being much reduced in numbers by their long wars, the Picts and Scots came pouring in, over the broken and unguarded wall of Severus, in swarms. They plundered the richest towns, and killed the people; and came back so often for more booty and more slaughter, that the unfortunate Britons lived a life of terror. As if the Picts and Scots were not bad enough on land, the Saxons attacked the islanders by sea; and, as if something more were still wanting to make them miserable, they quarrelled bitterly among themselves as to what prayers they ought to say, and how they ought to say them. The priests, being very angry with one another on these questions, cursed one another in the heartiest manner; and (uncommonly like the old Druids) cursed all the people whom they could not persuade. So, altogether, the Britons were very badly off, you may believe.
They were in such distress, in short, that they sent a letter to Rome entreating help—which they called the Groans of the Britons; and in which they said, ‘The barbarians chase us into the sea, the sea throws us back upon the barbarians, and we have only the hard choice left us of perishing by the sword, or perishing by the waves.’ But, the Romans could not help them, even if they were so inclined; for they had enough to do to defend themselves against their own enemies, who were then very fierce and strong. At last, the Britons, unable to bear their hard condition any longer, resolved to make peace with the Saxons, and to invite the Saxons to come into their country, and help them to keep out the Picts and Scots.
It was a British Prince named Vortigern who took this resolution, and who made a treaty of friendship with Hengist and Horsa, two Saxon chiefs. Both of these names, in the old Saxon language, signify Horse; for the Saxons, like many other nations in a rough state, were fond of giving men the names of animals, as Horse, Wolf, Bear, Hound. The Indians of North America,—a very inferior people to the Saxons, though—do the same to this day.
Hengist and Horsa drove out the Picts and Scots; and Vortigern, being grateful to them for that service, made no opposition to their settling themselves in that part of England which is called the Isle of Thanet, or to their inviting over more of their countrymen to join them. But Hengist had a beautiful daughter named Rowena; and when, at a feast, she filled a golden goblet to the brim with wine, and gave it to Vortigern, saying in a sweet voice, ‘Dear King, thy health!’ the King fell in love with her. My opinion is, that the cunning Hengist meant him to do so, in order that the Saxons might have greater influence with him; and that the fair Rowena came to that feast, golden goblet and all, on purpose.
At any rate, they were married; and, long afterwards, whenever the King was angry with the Saxons, or jealous of their encroachments, Rowena would put her beautiful arms round his neck, and softly say, ‘Dear King, they are my people! Be favourable to them, as you loved that Saxon girl who gave you the golden goblet of wine at the feast!’ And, really, I don’t see how the King could help himself.
Ah! We must all die! In the course of years, Vortigern died—he was dethroned, and put in prison, first, I am afraid; and Rowena died; and generations of Saxons and Britons died; and events that happened during a long, long time, would have been quite forgotten but for the tales and songs of the old Bards, who used to go about from feast to feast, with their white beards, recounting the deeds of their forefathers. Among the histories of which they sang and talked, there was a famous one, concerning the bravery and virtues of King Arthur, supposed to have been a British Prince in those old times. But, whether such a person really lived, or whether there were several persons whose histories came to be confused together under that one name, or whether all about him was invention, no one knows.
I will tell you, shortly, what is most interesting in the early Saxon times, as they are described in these songs and stories of the Bards.
In, and long after, the days of Vortigern, fresh bodies of Saxons, under various chiefs, came pouring into Britain. One body, conquering the Britons in the East, and settling there, called their kingdom Essex; another body settled in the West, and called their kingdom Wessex; the Northfolk, or Norfolk people, established themselves in one place; the Southfolk, or Suffolk people, established themselves in another; and gradually seven kingdoms or states arose in England, which were called the Saxon Heptarchy. The poor Britons, falling back before these crowds of fighting men whom they had innocently invited over as friends, retired into Wales and the adjacent country; into Devonshire, and into Cornwall. Those parts of England long remained unconquered. And in Cornwall now—where the sea-coast is very gloomy, steep, and rugged—where, in the dark winter-time, ships have often been wrecked close to the land, and every soul on board has perished—where the winds and waves howl drearily and split the solid rocks into arches and caverns—there are very ancient ruins, which the people call the ruins of King Arthur’s Castle.
Kent is the most famous of the seven Saxon kingdoms, because the Christian religion was preached to the Saxons there (who domineered over the Britons too much, to care for what _they_ said about their religion, or anything else) by Augustine, a monk from Rome. King Ethelbert, of Kent, was soon converted; and the moment he said he was a Christian, his courtiers all said _they_ were Christians; after which, ten thousand of his subjects said they were Christians too. Augustine built a little church, close to this King’s palace, on the ground now occupied by the beautiful cathedral of Canterbury. Sebert, the King’s nephew, built on a muddy marshy place near London, where there had been a temple to Apollo, a church dedicated to Saint Peter, which is now Westminster Abbey. And, in London itself, on the foundation of a temple to Diana, he built another little church which has risen up, since that old time, to be Saint Paul’s.
After the death of Ethelbert, Edwin, King of Northumbria, who was such a good king that it was said a woman or child might openly carry a purse of gold, in his reign, without fear, allowed his child to be baptised, and held a great council to consider whether he and his people should all be Christians or not. It was decided that they should be. Coifi, the chief priest of the old religion, made a great speech on the occasion. In this discourse, he told the people that he had found out the old gods to be impostors. ‘I am quite satisfied of it,’ he said. ‘Look at me! I have been serving them all my life, and they have done nothing for me; whereas, if they had been really powerful, they could not have decently done less, in return for all I have done for them, than make my fortune. As they have never made my fortune, I am quite convinced they are impostors!’ When this singular priest had finished speaking, he hastily armed himself with sword and lance, mounted a war-horse, rode at a furious gallop in sight of all the people to the temple, and flung his lance against it as an insult. From that time, the Christian religion spread itself among the Saxons, and became their faith.
The next very famous prince was Egbert. He lived about a hundred and fifty years afterwards, and claimed to have a better right to the throne of Wessex than Beortric, another Saxon prince who was at the head of that kingdom, and who married Edburga, the daughter of Offa, king of another of the seven kingdoms. This Queen Edburga was a handsome murderess, who poisoned people when they offended her. One day, she mixed a cup of poison for a certain noble belonging to the court; but her husband drank of it too, by mistake, and died. Upon this, the people revolted, in great crowds; and running to the palace, and thundering at the gates, cried, ‘Down with the wicked queen, who poisons men!’ They drove her out of the country, and abolished the title she had disgraced. When years had passed away, some travellers came home from Italy, and said that in the town of Pavia they had seen a ragged beggar-woman, who had once been handsome, but was then shrivelled, bent, and yellow, wandering about the streets, crying for bread; and that this beggar-woman was the poisoning English queen. It was, indeed, Edburga; and so she died, without a shelter for her wretched head.
Egbert, not considering himself safe in England, in consequence of his having claimed the crown of Wessex (for he thought his rival might take him prisoner and put him to death), sought refuge at the court of Charlemagne, King of France. On the death of Beortric, so unhappily poisoned by mistake, Egbert came back to Britain; succeeded to the throne of Wessex; conquered some of the other monarchs of the seven kingdoms; added their territories to his own; and, for the first time, called the country over which he ruled, England.
And now, new enemies arose, who, for a long time, troubled England sorely. These were the Northmen, the people of Denmark and Norway, whom the English called the Danes. They were a warlike people, quite at home upon the sea; not Christians; very daring and cruel. They came over in ships, and plundered and burned wheresoever they landed. Once, they beat Egbert in battle. Once, Egbert beat them. But, they cared no more for being beaten than the English themselves. In the four following short reigns, of Ethelwulf, and his sons, Ethelbald, Ethelbert, and Ethelred, they came back, over and over again, burning and plundering, and laying England waste. In the last-mentioned reign, they seized Edmund, King of East England, and bound him to a tree. Then, they proposed to him that he should change his religion; but he, being a good Christian, steadily refused. Upon that, they beat him, made cowardly jests upon him, all defenceless as he was, shot arrows at him, and, finally, struck off his head. It is impossible to say whose head they might have struck off next, but for the death of King Ethelred from a wound he had received in fighting against them, and the succession to his throne of the best and wisest king that ever lived in England.
CHAPTER III ENGLAND UNDER THE GOOD SAXON, ALFRED
Alfred the Great was a young man, three-and-twenty years of age, when he became king. Twice in his childhood, he had been taken to Rome, where the Saxon nobles were in the habit of going on journeys which they supposed to be religious; and, once, he had stayed for some time in Paris. Learning, however, was so little cared for, then, that at twelve years old he had not been taught to read; although, of the sons of King Ethelwulf, he, the youngest, was the favourite. But he had—as most men who grow up to be great and good are generally found to have had—an excellent mother; and, one day, this lady, whose name was Osburga, happened, as she was sitting among her sons, to read a book of Saxon poetry. The art of printing was not known until long and long after that period, and the book, which was written, was what is called ‘illuminated,’ with beautiful bright letters, richly painted. The brothers admiring it very much, their mother said, ‘I will give it to that one of you four princes who first learns to read.’ Alfred sought out a tutor that very day, applied himself to learn with great diligence, and soon won the book. He was proud of it, all his life.
This great king, in the first year of his reign, fought nine battles with the Danes. He made some treaties with them too, by which the false Danes swore they would quit the country. They pretended to consider that they had taken a very solemn oath, in swearing this upon the holy bracelets that they wore, and which were always buried with them when they died; but they cared little for it, for they thought nothing of breaking oaths and treaties too, as soon as it suited their purpose, and coming back again to fight, plunder, and burn, as usual. One fatal winter, in the fourth year of King Alfred’s reign, they spread themselves in great numbers over the whole of England; and so dispersed and routed the King’s soldiers that the King was left alone, and was obliged to disguise himself as a common peasant, and to take refuge in the cottage of one of his cowherds who did not know his face.
Here, King Alfred, while the Danes sought him far and near, was left alone one day, by the cowherd’s wife, to watch some cakes which she put to bake upon the hearth. But, being at work upon his bow and arrows, with which he hoped to punish the false Danes when a brighter time should come, and thinking deeply of his poor unhappy subjects whom the Danes chased through the land, his noble mind forgot the cakes, and they were burnt. ‘What!’ said the cowherd’s wife, who scolded him well when she came back, and little thought she was scolding the King, ‘you will be ready enough to eat them by-and-by, and yet you cannot watch them, idle dog?’
At length, the Devonshire men made head against a new host of Danes who landed on their coast; killed their chief, and captured their flag; on which was represented the likeness of a Raven—a very fit bird for a thievish army like that, I think. The loss of their standard troubled the Danes greatly, for they believed it to be enchanted—woven by the three daughters of one father in a single afternoon—and they had a story among themselves that when they were victorious in battle, the Raven stretched his wings and seemed to fly; and that when they were defeated, he would droop. He had good reason to droop, now, if he could have done anything half so sensible; for, King Alfred joined the Devonshire men; made a camp with them on a piece of firm ground in the midst of a bog in Somersetshire; and prepared for a great attempt for vengeance on the Danes, and the deliverance of his oppressed people.
But, first, as it was important to know how numerous those pestilent Danes were, and how they were fortified, King Alfred, being a good musician, disguised himself as a glee-man or minstrel, and went, with his harp, to the Danish camp. He played and sang in the very tent of Guthrum the Danish leader, and entertained the Danes as they caroused. While he seemed to think of nothing but his music, he was watchful of their tents, their arms, their discipline, everything that he desired to know. And right soon did this great king entertain them to a different tune; for, summoning all his true followers to meet him at an appointed place, where they received him with joyful shouts and tears, as the monarch whom many of them had given up for lost or dead, he put himself at their head, marched on the Danish camp, defeated the Danes with great slaughter, and besieged them for fourteen days to prevent their escape. But, being as merciful as he was good and brave, he then, instead of killing them, proposed peace: on condition that they should altogether depart from that Western part of England, and settle in the East; and that Guthrum should become a Christian, in remembrance of the Divine religion which now taught his conqueror, the noble Alfred, to forgive the enemy who had so often injured him. This, Guthrum did. At his baptism, King Alfred was his godfather. And Guthrum was an honourable chief who well deserved that clemency; for, ever afterwards he was loyal and faithful to the king. The Danes under him were faithful too. They plundered and burned no more, but worked like honest men. They ploughed, and sowed, and reaped, and led good honest English lives. And I hope the children of those Danes played, many a time, with Saxon children in the sunny fields; and that Danish young men fell in love with Saxon girls, and married them; and that English travellers, benighted at the doors of Danish cottages, often went in for shelter until morning; and that Danes and Saxons sat by the red fire, friends, talking of King Alfred the Great.
All the Danes were not like these under Guthrum; for, after some years, more of them came over, in the old plundering and burning way—among them a fierce pirate of the name of Hastings, who had the boldness to sail up the Thames to Gravesend, with eighty ships. For three years, there was a war with these Danes; and there was a famine in the country, too, and a plague, both upon human creatures and beasts. But King Alfred, whose mighty heart never failed him, built large ships nevertheless, with which to pursue the pirates on the sea; and he encouraged his soldiers, by his brave example, to fight valiantly against them on the shore. At last, he drove them all away; and then there was repose in England.
As great and good in peace, as he was great and good in war, King Alfred never rested from his labours to improve his people. He loved to talk with clever men, and with travellers from foreign countries, and to write down what they told him, for his people to read. He had studied Latin after learning to read English, and now another of his labours was, to translate Latin books into the English-Saxon tongue, that his people might be interested, and improved by their contents. He made just laws, that they might live more happily and freely; he turned away all partial judges, that no wrong might be done them; he was so careful of their property, and punished robbers so severely, that it was a common thing to say that under the great King Alfred, garlands of golden chains and jewels might have hung across the streets, and no man would have touched one. He founded schools; he patiently heard causes himself in his Court of Justice; the great desires of his heart were, to do right to all his subjects, and to leave England better, wiser, happier in all ways, than he found it. His industry in these efforts was quite astonishing. Every day he divided into certain portions, and in each portion devoted himself to a certain pursuit. That he might divide his time exactly, he had wax torches or candles made, which were all of the same size, were notched across at regular distances, and were always kept burning. Thus, as the candles burnt down, he divided the day into notches, almost as accurately as we now divide it into hours upon the clock. But when the candles were first invented, it was found that the wind and draughts of air, blowing into the palace through the doors and windows, and through the chinks in the walls, caused them to gutter and burn unequally. To prevent this, the King had them put into cases formed of wood and white horn. And these were the first lanthorns ever made in England.
All this time, he was afflicted with a terrible unknown disease, which caused him violent and frequent pain that nothing could relieve. He bore it, as he had borne all the troubles of his life, like a brave good man, until he was fifty-three years old; and then, having reigned thirty years, he died. He died in the year nine hundred and one; but, long ago as that is, his fame, and the love and gratitude with which his subjects regarded him, are freshly remembered to the present hour.
In the next reign, which was the reign of Edward, surnamed The Elder, who was chosen in council to succeed, a nephew of King Alfred troubled the country by trying to obtain the throne. The Danes in the East of England took part with this usurper (perhaps because they had honoured his uncle so much, and honoured him for his uncle’s sake), and there was hard fighting; but, the King, with the assistance of his sister, gained the day, and reigned in peace for four and twenty years. He gradually extended his power over the whole of England, and so the Seven Kingdoms were united into one.
When England thus became one kingdom, ruled over by one Saxon king, the Saxons had been settled in the country more than four hundred and fifty years. Great changes had taken place in its customs during that time. The Saxons were still greedy eaters and great drinkers, and their feasts were often of a noisy and drunken kind; but many new comforts and even elegances had become known, and were fast increasing. Hangings for the walls of rooms, where, in these modern days, we paste up paper, are known to have been sometimes made of silk, ornamented with birds and flowers in needlework. Tables and chairs were curiously carved in different woods; were sometimes decorated with gold or silver; sometimes even made of those precious metals. Knives and spoons were used at table; golden ornaments were worn—with silk and cloth, and golden tissues and embroideries; dishes were made of gold and silver, brass and bone. There were varieties of drinking-horns, bedsteads, musical instruments. A harp was passed round, at a feast, like the drinking-bowl, from guest to guest; and each one usually sang or played when his turn came. The weapons of the Saxons were stoutly made, and among them was a terrible iron hammer that gave deadly blows, and was long remembered. The Saxons themselves were a handsome people. The men were proud of their long fair hair, parted on the forehead; their ample beards, their fresh complexions, and clear eyes. The beauty of the Saxon women filled all England with a new delight and grace.
I have more to tell of the Saxons yet, but I stop to say this now, because under the Great Alfred, all the best points of the English-Saxon character were first encouraged, and in him first shown. It has been the greatest character among the nations of the earth. Wherever the descendants of the Saxon race have gone, have sailed, or otherwise made their way, even to the remotest regions of the world, they have been patient, persevering, never to be broken in spirit, never to be turned aside from enterprises on which they have resolved. In Europe, Asia, Africa, America, the whole world over; in the desert, in the forest, on the sea; scorched by a burning sun, or frozen by ice that never melts; the Saxon blood remains unchanged. Wheresoever that race goes, there, law, and industry, and safety for life and property, and all the great results of steady perseverance, are certain to arise.
I pause to think with admiration, of the noble king who, in his single person, possessed all the Saxon virtues. Whom misfortune could not subdue, whom prosperity could not spoil, whose perseverance nothing could shake. Who was hopeful in defeat, and generous in success. Who loved justice, freedom, truth, and knowledge. Who, in his care to instruct his people, probably did more to preserve the beautiful old Saxon language, than I can imagine. Without whom, the English tongue in which I tell this story might have wanted half its meaning. As it is said that his spirit still inspires some of our best English laws, so, let you and I pray that it may animate our English hearts, at least to this—to resolve, when we see any of our fellow-creatures left in ignorance, that we will do our best, while life is in us, to have them taught; and to tell those rulers whose duty it is to teach them, and who neglect their duty, that they have profited very little by all the years that have rolled away since the year nine hundred and one, and that they are far behind the bright example of King Alfred the Great.
CHAPTER IV ENGLAND UNDER ATHELSTAN AND THE SIX BOY-KINGS
Athelstan, the son of Edward the Elder, succeeded that king. He reigned only fifteen years; but he remembered the glory of his grandfather, the great Alfred, and governed England well. He reduced the turbulent people of Wales, and obliged them to pay him a tribute in money, and in cattle, and to send him their best hawks and hounds. He was victorious over the Cornish men, who were not yet quite under the Saxon government. He restored such of the old laws as were good, and had fallen into disuse; made some wise new laws, and took care of the poor and weak. A strong alliance, made against him by Anlaf a Danish prince, Constantine King of the Scots, and the people of North Wales, he broke and defeated in one great battle, long famous for the vast numbers slain in it. After that, he had a quiet reign; the lords and ladies about him had leisure to become polite and agreeable; and foreign princes were glad (as they have sometimes been since) to come to England on visits to the English court.
When Athelstan died, at forty-seven years old, his brother Edmund, who was only eighteen, became king. He was the first of six boy-kings, as you will presently know.
They called him the Magnificent, because he showed a taste for improvement and refinement. But he was beset by the Danes, and had a short and troubled reign, which came to a troubled end. One night, when he was feasting in his hall, and had eaten much and drunk deep, he saw, among the company, a noted robber named Leof, who had been banished from England. Made very angry by the boldness of this man, the King turned to his cup-bearer, and said, ‘There is a robber sitting at the table yonder, who, for his crimes, is an outlaw in the land—a hunted wolf, whose life any man may take, at any time. Command that robber to depart!’ ‘I will not depart!’ said Leof. ‘No?’ cried the King. ‘No, by the Lord!’ said Leof. Upon that the King rose from his seat, and, making passionately at the robber, and seizing him by his long hair, tried to throw him down. But the robber had a dagger underneath his cloak, and, in the scuffle, stabbed the King to death. That done, he set his back against the wall, and fought so desperately, that although he was soon cut to pieces by the King’s armed men, and the wall and pavement were splashed with his blood, yet it was not before he had killed and wounded many of them. You may imagine what rough lives the kings of those times led, when one of them could struggle, half drunk, with a public robber in his own dining-hall, and be stabbed in presence of the company who ate and drank with him.
Then succeeded the boy-king Edred, who was weak and sickly in body, but of a strong mind. And his armies fought the Northmen, the Danes, and Norwegians, or the Sea-Kings, as they were called, and beat them for the time. And, in nine years, Edred died, and passed away.
Then came the boy-king Edwy, fifteen years of age; but the real king, who had the real power, was a monk named Dunstan—a clever priest, a little mad, and not a little proud and cruel.
Dunstan was then Abbot of Glastonbury Abbey, whither the body of King Edmund the Magnificent was carried, to be buried. While yet a boy, he had got out of his bed one night (being then in a fever), and walked about Glastonbury Church when it was under repair; and, because he did not tumble off some scaffolds that were there, and break his neck, it was reported that he had been shown over the building by an angel. He had also made a harp that was said to play of itself—which it very likely did, as Æolian Harps, which are played by the wind, and are understood now, always do. For these wonders he had been once denounced by his enemies, who were jealous of his favour with the late King Athelstan, as a magician; and he had been waylaid, bound hand and foot, and thrown into a marsh. But he got out again, somehow, to cause a great deal of trouble yet.
The priests of those days were, generally, the only scholars. They were learned in many things. Having to make their own convents and monasteries on uncultivated grounds that were granted to them by the Crown, it was necessary that they should be good farmers and good gardeners, or their lands would have been too poor to support them. For the decoration of the chapels where they prayed, and for the comfort of the refectories where they ate and drank, it was necessary that there should be good carpenters, good smiths, good painters, among them. For their greater safety in sickness and accident, living alone by themselves in solitary places, it was necessary that they should study the virtues of plants and herbs, and should know how to dress cuts, burns, scalds, and bruises, and how to set broken limbs. Accordingly, they taught themselves, and one another, a great variety of useful arts; and became skilful in agriculture, medicine, surgery, and handicraft. And when they wanted the aid of any little piece of machinery, which would be simple enough now, but was marvellous then, to impose a trick upon the poor peasants, they knew very well how to make it; and _did_ make it many a time and often, I have no doubt.
Dunstan, Abbot of Glastonbury Abbey, was one of the most sagacious of these monks. He was an ingenious smith, and worked at a forge in a little cell. This cell was made too short to admit of his lying at full length when he went to sleep—as if _that_ did any good to anybody!—and he used to tell the most extraordinary lies about demons and spirits, who, he said, came there to persecute him. For instance, he related that one day when he was at work, the devil looked in at the little window, and tried to tempt him to lead a life of idle pleasure; whereupon, having his pincers in the fire, red hot, he seized the devil by the nose, and put him to such pain, that his bellowings were heard for miles and miles. Some people are inclined to think this nonsense a part of Dunstan’s madness (for his head never quite recovered the fever), but I think not. I observe that it induced the ignorant people to consider him a holy man, and that it made him very powerful. Which was exactly what he always wanted.
On the day of the coronation of the handsome boy-king Edwy, it was remarked by Odo, Archbishop of Canterbury (who was a Dane by birth), that the King quietly left the coronation feast, while all the company were there. Odo, much displeased, sent his friend Dunstan to seek him. Dunstan finding him in the company of his beautiful young wife Elgiva, and her mother Ethelgiva, a good and virtuous lady, not only grossly abused them, but dragged the young King back into the feasting-hall by force. Some, again, think Dunstan did this because the young King’s fair wife was his own cousin, and the monks objected to people marrying their own cousins; but I believe he did it, because he was an imperious, audacious, ill-conditioned priest, who, having loved a young lady himself before he became a sour monk, hated all love now, and everything belonging to it.
The young King was quite old enough to feel this insult. Dunstan had been Treasurer in the last reign, and he soon charged Dunstan with having taken some of the last king’s money. The Glastonbury Abbot fled to Belgium (very narrowly escaping some pursuers who were sent to put out his eyes, as you will wish they had, when you read what follows), and his abbey was given to priests who were married; whom he always, both before and afterwards, opposed. But he quickly conspired with his friend, Odo the Dane, to set up the King’s young brother, Edgar, as his rival for the throne; and, not content with this revenge, he caused the beautiful queen Elgiva, though a lovely girl of only seventeen or eighteen, to be stolen from one of the Royal Palaces, branded in the cheek with a red-hot iron, and sold into slavery in Ireland. But the Irish people pitied and befriended her; and they said, ‘Let us restore the girl-queen to the boy-king, and make the young lovers happy!’ and they cured her of her cruel wound, and sent her home as beautiful as before. But the villain Dunstan, and that other villain, Odo, caused her to be waylaid at Gloucester as she was joyfully hurrying to join her husband, and to be hacked and hewn with swords, and to be barbarously maimed and lamed, and left to die. When Edwy the Fair (his people called him so, because he was so young and handsome) heard of her dreadful fate, he died of a broken heart; and so the pitiful story of the poor young wife and husband ends! Ah! Better to be two cottagers in these better times, than king and queen of England in those bad days, though never so fair!
Then came the boy-king, Edgar, called the Peaceful, fifteen years old. Dunstan, being still the real king, drove all married priests out of the monasteries and abbeys, and replaced them by solitary monks like himself, of the rigid order called the Benedictines. He made himself Archbishop of Canterbury, for his greater glory; and exercised such power over the neighbouring British princes, and so collected them about the King, that once, when the King held his court at Chester, and went on the river Dee to visit the monastery of St. John, the eight oars of his boat were pulled (as the people used to delight in relating in stories and songs) by eight crowned kings, and steered by the King of England. As Edgar was very obedient to Dunstan and the monks, they took great pains to represent him as the best of kings. But he was really profligate, debauched, and vicious. He once forcibly carried off a young lady from the convent at Wilton; and Dunstan, pretending to be very much shocked, condemned him not to wear his crown upon his head for seven years—no great punishment, I dare say, as it can hardly have been a more comfortable ornament to wear, than a stewpan without a handle. His marriage with his second wife, Elfrida, is one of the worst events of his reign. Hearing of the beauty of this lady, he despatched his favourite courtier, Athelwold, to her father’s castle in Devonshire, to see if she were really as charming as fame reported. Now, she was so exceedingly beautiful that Athelwold fell in love with her himself, and married her; but he told the King that she was only rich—not handsome. The King, suspecting the truth when they came home, resolved to pay the newly-married couple a visit; and, suddenly, told Athelwold to prepare for his immediate coming. Athelwold, terrified, confessed to his young wife what he had said and done, and implored her to disguise her beauty by some ugly dress or silly manner, that he might be safe from the King’s anger. She promised that she would; but she was a proud woman, who would far rather have been a queen than the wife of a courtier. She dressed herself in her best dress, and adorned herself with her richest jewels; and when the King came, presently, he discovered the cheat. So, he caused his false friend, Athelwold, to be murdered in a wood, and married his widow, this bad Elfrida. Six or seven years afterwards, he died; and was buried, as if he had been all that the monks said he was, in the abbey of Glastonbury, which he—or Dunstan for him—had much enriched.
England, in one part of this reign, was so troubled by wolves, which, driven out of the open country, hid themselves in the mountains of Wales when they were not attacking travellers and animals, that the tribute payable by the Welsh people was forgiven them, on condition of their producing, every year, three hundred wolves’ heads. And the Welshmen were so sharp upon the wolves, to save their money, that in four years there was not a wolf left.
Then came the boy-king, Edward, called the Martyr, from the manner of his death. Elfrida had a son, named Ethelred, for whom she claimed the throne; but Dunstan did not choose to favour him, and he made Edward king. The boy was hunting, one day, down in Dorsetshire, when he rode near to Corfe Castle, where Elfrida and Ethelred lived. Wishing to see them kindly, he rode away from his attendants and galloped to the castle gate, where he arrived at twilight, and blew his hunting-horn. ‘You are welcome, dear King,’ said Elfrida, coming out, with her brightest smiles. ‘Pray you dismount and enter.’ ‘Not so, dear madam,’ said the King. ‘My company will miss me, and fear that I have met with some harm. Please you to give me a cup of wine, that I may drink here, in the saddle, to you and to my little brother, and so ride away with the good speed I have made in riding here.’ Elfrida, going in to bring the wine, whispered to an armed servant, one of her attendants, who stole out of the darkening gateway, and crept round behind the King’s horse. As the King raised the cup to his lips, saying, ‘Health!’ to the wicked woman who was smiling on him, and to his innocent brother whose hand she held in hers, and who was only ten years old, this armed man made a spring and stabbed him in the back. He dropped the cup and spurred his horse away; but, soon fainting with loss of blood, dropped from the saddle, and, in his fall, entangled one of his feet in the stirrup. The frightened horse dashed on; trailing his rider’s curls upon the ground; dragging his smooth young face through ruts, and stones, and briers, and fallen leaves, and mud; until the hunters, tracking the animal’s course by the King’s blood, caught his bridle, and released the disfigured body.
Then came the sixth and last of the boy-kings, Ethelred, whom Elfrida, when he cried out at the sight of his murdered brother riding away from the castle gate, unmercifully beat with a torch which she snatched from one of the attendants. The people so disliked this boy, on account of his cruel mother and the murder she had done to promote him, that Dunstan would not have had him for king, but would have made Edgitha, the daughter of the dead King Edgar, and of the lady whom he stole out of the convent at Wilton, Queen of England, if she would have consented. But she knew the stories of the youthful kings too well, and would not be persuaded from the convent where she lived in peace; so, Dunstan put Ethelred on the throne, having no one else to put there, and gave him the nickname of The Unready—knowing that he wanted resolution and firmness.
At first, Elfrida possessed great influence over the young King, but, as he grew older and came of age, her influence declined. The infamous woman, not having it in her power to do any more evil, then retired from court, and, according, to the fashion of the time, built churches and monasteries, to expiate her guilt. As if a church, with a steeple reaching to the very stars, would have been any sign of true repentance for the blood of the poor boy, whose murdered form was trailed at his horse’s heels! As if she could have buried her wickedness beneath the senseless stones of the whole world, piled up one upon another, for the monks to live in!
About the ninth or tenth year of this reign, Dunstan died. He was growing old then, but was as stern and artful as ever. Two circumstances that happened in connexion with him, in this reign of Ethelred, made a great noise. Once, he was present at a meeting of the Church, when the question was discussed whether priests should have permission to marry; and, as he sat with his head hung down, apparently thinking about it, a voice seemed to come out of a crucifix in the room, and warn the meeting to be of his opinion. This was some juggling of Dunstan’s, and was probably his own voice disguised. But he played off a worse juggle than that, soon afterwards; for, another meeting being held on the same subject, and he and his supporters being seated on one side of a great room, and their opponents on the other, he rose and said, ‘To Christ himself, as judge, do I commit this cause!’ Immediately on these words being spoken, the floor where the opposite party sat gave way, and some were killed and many wounded. You may be pretty sure that it had been weakened under Dunstan’s direction, and that it fell at Dunstan’s signal. _His_ part of the floor did not go down. No, no. He was too good a workman for that.
When he died, the monks settled that he was a Saint, and called him Saint Dunstan ever afterwards. They might just as well have settled that he was a coach-horse, and could just as easily have called him one.
Ethelred the Unready was glad enough, I dare say, to be rid of this holy saint; but, left to himself, he was a poor weak king, and his reign was a reign of defeat and shame. The restless Danes, led by Sweyn, a son of the King of Denmark who had quarrelled with his father and had been banished from home, again came into England, and, year after year, attacked and despoiled large towns. To coax these sea-kings away, the weak Ethelred paid them money; but, the more money he paid, the more money the Danes wanted. At first, he gave them ten thousand pounds; on their next invasion, sixteen thousand pounds; on their next invasion, four and twenty thousand pounds: to pay which large sums, the unfortunate English people were heavily taxed. But, as the Danes still came back and wanted more, he thought it would be a good plan to marry into some powerful foreign family that would help him with soldiers. So, in the year one thousand and two, he courted and married Emma, the sister of Richard Duke of Normandy; a lady who was called the Flower of Normandy.
And now, a terrible deed was done in England, the like of which was never done on English ground before or since. On the thirteenth of November, in pursuance of secret instructions sent by the King over the whole country, the inhabitants of every town and city armed, and murdered all the Danes who were their neighbours.
Young and old, babies and soldiers, men and women, every Dane was killed. No doubt there were among them many ferocious men who had done the English great wrong, and whose pride and insolence, in swaggering in the houses of the English and insulting their wives and daughters, had become unbearable; but no doubt there were also among them many peaceful Christian Danes who had married English women and become like English men. They were all slain, even to Gunhilda, the sister of the King of Denmark, married to an English lord; who was first obliged to see the murder of her husband and her child, and then was killed herself.
When the King of the sea-kings heard of this deed of blood, he swore that he would have a great revenge. He raised an army, and a mightier fleet of ships than ever yet had sailed to England; and in all his army there was not a slave or an old man, but every soldier was a free man, and the son of a free man, and in the prime of life, and sworn to be revenged upon the English nation, for the massacre of that dread thirteenth of November, when his countrymen and countrywomen, and the little children whom they loved, were killed with fire and sword. And so, the sea-kings came to England in many great ships, each bearing the flag of its own commander. Golden eagles, ravens, dragons, dolphins, beasts of prey, threatened England from the prows of those ships, as they came onward through the water; and were reflected in the shining shields that hung upon their sides. The ship that bore the standard of the King of the sea-kings was carved and painted like a mighty serpent; and the King in his anger prayed that the Gods in whom he trusted might all desert him, if his serpent did not strike its fangs into England’s heart.
And indeed it did. For, the great army landing from the great fleet, near Exeter, went forward, laying England waste, and striking their lances in the earth as they advanced, or throwing them into rivers, in token of their making all the island theirs. In remembrance of the black November night when the Danes were murdered, wheresoever the invaders came, they made the Saxons prepare and spread for them great feasts; and when they had eaten those feasts, and had drunk a curse to England with wild rejoicings, they drew their swords, and killed their Saxon entertainers, and marched on. For six long years they carried on this war: burning the crops, farmhouses, barns, mills, granaries; killing the labourers in the fields; preventing the seed from being sown in the ground; causing famine and starvation; leaving only heaps of ruin and smoking ashes, where they had found rich towns. To crown this misery, English officers and men deserted, and even the favourites of Ethelred the Unready, becoming traitors, seized many of the English ships, turned pirates against their own country, and aided by a storm occasioned the loss of nearly the whole English navy.
There was but one man of note, at this miserable pass, who was true to his country and the feeble King. He was a priest, and a brave one. For twenty days, the Archbishop of Canterbury defended that city against its Danish besiegers; and when a traitor in the town threw the gates open and admitted them, he said, in chains, ‘I will not buy my life with money that must be extorted from the suffering people. Do with me what you please!’ Again and again, he steadily refused to purchase his release with gold wrung from the poor.
At last, the Danes being tired of this, and being assembled at a drunken merry-making, had him brought into the feasting-hall.
‘Now, bishop,’ they said, ‘we want gold!’
He looked round on the crowd of angry faces; from the shaggy beards close to him, to the shaggy beards against the walls, where men were mounted on tables and forms to see him over the heads of others: and he knew that his time was come.
‘I have no gold,’ he said.
‘Get it, bishop!’ they all thundered.
‘That, I have often told you I will not,’ said he.
They gathered closer round him, threatening, but he stood unmoved. Then, one man struck him; then, another; then a cursing soldier picked up from a heap in a corner of the hall, where fragments had been rudely thrown at dinner, a great ox-bone, and cast it at his face, from which the blood came spurting forth; then, others ran to the same heap, and knocked him down with other bones, and bruised and battered him; until one soldier whom he had baptised (willing, as I hope for the sake of that soldier’s soul, to shorten the sufferings of the good man) struck him dead with his battle-axe.
If Ethelred had had the heart to emulate the courage of this noble archbishop, he might have done something yet. But he paid the Danes forty-eight thousand pounds, instead, and gained so little by the cowardly act, that Sweyn soon afterwards came over to subdue all England. So broken was the attachment of the English people, by this time, to their incapable King and their forlorn country which could not protect them, that they welcomed Sweyn on all sides, as a deliverer. London faithfully stood out, as long as the King was within its walls; but, when he sneaked away, it also welcomed the Dane. Then, all was over; and the King took refuge abroad with the Duke of Normandy, who had already given shelter to the King’s wife, once the Flower of that country, and to her children.
Still, the English people, in spite of their sad sufferings, could not quite forget the great King Alfred and the Saxon race. When Sweyn died suddenly, in little more than a month after he had been proclaimed King of England, they generously sent to Ethelred, to say that they would have him for their King again, ‘if he would only govern them better than he had governed them before.’ The Unready, instead of coming himself, sent Edward, one of his sons, to make promises for him. At last, he followed, and the English declared him King. The Danes declared Canute, the son of Sweyn, King. Thus, direful war began again, and lasted for three years, when the Unready died. And I know of nothing better that he did, in all his reign of eight and thirty years.
Was Canute to be King now? Not over the Saxons, they said; they must have Edmund, one of the sons of the Unready, who was surnamed Ironside, because of his strength and stature. Edmund and Canute thereupon fell to, and fought five battles—O unhappy England, what a fighting-ground it was!—and then Ironside, who was a big man, proposed to Canute, who was a little man, that they two should fight it out in single combat. If Canute had been the big man, he would probably have said yes, but, being the little man, he decidedly said no. However, he declared that he was willing to divide the kingdom—to take all that lay north of Watling Street, as the old Roman military road from Dover to Chester was called, and to give Ironside all that lay south of it. Most men being weary of so much bloodshed, this was done. But Canute soon became sole King of England; for Ironside died suddenly within two months. Some think that he was killed, and killed by Canute’s orders. No one knows.
CHAPTER V ENGLAND UNDER CANUTE THE DANE
Canute reigned eighteen years. He was a merciless King at first. After he had clasped the hands of the Saxon chiefs, in token of the sincerity with which he swore to be just and good to them in return for their acknowledging him, he denounced and slew many of them, as well as many relations of the late King. ‘He who brings me the head of one of my enemies,’ he used to say, ‘shall be dearer to me than a brother.’ And he was so severe in hunting down his enemies, that he must have got together a pretty large family of these dear brothers. He was strongly inclined to kill Edmund and Edward, two children, sons of poor Ironside; but, being afraid to do so in England, he sent them over to the King of Sweden, with a request that the King would be so good as ‘dispose of them.’ If the King of Sweden had been like many, many other men of that day, he would have had their innocent throats cut; but he was a kind man, and brought them up tenderly.
Normandy ran much in Canute’s mind. In Normandy were the two children of the late king—Edward and Alfred by name; and their uncle the Duke might one day claim the crown for them. But the Duke showed so little inclination to do so now, that he proposed to Canute to marry his sister, the widow of The Unready; who, being but a showy flower, and caring for nothing so much as becoming a queen again, left her children and was wedded to him.
Successful and triumphant, assisted by the valour of the English in his foreign wars, and with little strife to trouble him at home, Canute had a prosperous reign, and made many improvements. He was a poet and a musician. He grew sorry, as he grew older, for the blood he had shed at first; and went to Rome in a Pilgrim’s dress, by way of washing it out. He gave a great deal of money to foreigners on his journey; but he took it from the English before he started. On the whole, however, he certainly became a far better man when he had no opposition to contend with, and was as great a King as England had known for some time.
The old writers of history relate how that Canute was one day disgusted with his courtiers for their flattery, and how he caused his chair to be set on the sea-shore, and feigned to command the tide as it came up not to wet the edge of his robe, for the land was his; how the tide came up, of course, without regarding him; and how he then turned to his flatterers, and rebuked them, saying, what was the might of any earthly king, to the might of the Creator, who could say unto the sea, ‘Thus far shalt thou go, and no farther!’ We may learn from this, I think, that a little sense will go a long way in a king; and that courtiers are not easily cured of flattery, nor kings of a liking for it. If the courtiers of Canute had not known, long before, that the King was fond of flattery, they would have known better than to offer it in such large doses. And if they had not known that he was vain of this speech (anything but a wonderful speech it seems to me, if a good child had made it), they would not have been at such great pains to repeat it. I fancy I see them all on the sea-shore together; the King’s chair sinking in the sand; the King in a mighty good humour with his own wisdom; and the courtiers pretending to be quite stunned by it!
It is not the sea alone that is bidden to go ‘thus far, and no farther.’ The great command goes forth to all the kings upon the earth, and went to Canute in the year one thousand and thirty-five, and stretched him dead upon his bed. Beside it, stood his Norman wife. Perhaps, as the King looked his last upon her, he, who had so often thought distrustfully of Normandy, long ago, thought once more of the two exiled Princes in their uncle’s court, and of the little favour they could feel for either Danes or Saxons, and of a rising cloud in Normandy that slowly moved towards England.
CHAPTER VI ENGLAND UNDER HAROLD HAREFOOT, HARDICANUTE, AND EDWARD THE CONFESSOR
Canute left three sons, by name Sweyn, Harold, and Hardicanute; but his Queen, Emma, once the Flower of Normandy, was the mother of only Hardicanute. Canute had wished his dominions to be divided between the three, and had wished Harold to have England; but the Saxon people in the South of England, headed by a nobleman with great possessions, called the powerful Earl Godwin (who is said to have been originally a poor cow-boy), opposed this, and desired to have, instead, either Hardicanute, or one of the two exiled Princes who were over in Normandy. It seemed so certain that there would be more bloodshed to settle this dispute, that many people left their homes, and took refuge in the woods and swamps. Happily, however, it was agreed to refer the whole question to a great meeting at Oxford, which decided that Harold should have all the country north of the Thames, with London for his capital city, and that Hardicanute should have all the south. The quarrel was so arranged; and, as Hardicanute was in Denmark troubling himself very little about anything but eating and getting drunk, his mother and Earl Godwin governed the south for him.
They had hardly begun to do so, and the trembling people who had hidden themselves were scarcely at home again, when Edward, the elder of the two exiled Princes, came over from Normandy with a few followers, to claim the English Crown. His mother Emma, however, who only cared for her last son Hardicanute, instead of assisting him, as he expected, opposed him so strongly with all her influence that he was very soon glad to get safely back. His brother Alfred was not so fortunate. Believing in an affectionate letter, written some time afterwards to him and his brother, in his mother’s name (but whether really with or without his mother’s knowledge is now uncertain), he allowed himself to be tempted over to England, with a good force of soldiers, and landing on the Kentish coast, and being met and welcomed by Earl Godwin, proceeded into Surrey, as far as the town of Guildford. Here, he and his men halted in the evening to rest, having still the Earl in their company; who had ordered lodgings and good cheer for them. But, in the dead of the night, when they were off their guard, being divided into small parties sleeping soundly after a long march and a plentiful supper in different houses, they were set upon by the King’s troops, and taken prisoners. Next morning they were drawn out in a line, to the number of six hundred men, and were barbarously tortured and killed; with the exception of every tenth man, who was sold into slavery. As to the wretched Prince Alfred, he was stripped naked, tied to a horse and sent away into the Isle of Ely, where his eyes were torn out of his head, and where in a few days he miserably died. I am not sure that the Earl had wilfully entrapped him, but I suspect it strongly.
Harold was now King all over England, though it is doubtful whether the Archbishop of Canterbury (the greater part of the priests were Saxons, and not friendly to the Danes) ever consented to crown him. Crowned or uncrowned, with the Archbishop’s leave or without it, he was King for four years: after which short reign he died, and was buried; having never done much in life but go a hunting. He was such a fast runner at this, his favourite sport, that the people called him Harold Harefoot.
Hardicanute was then at Bruges, in Flanders, plotting, with his mother (who had gone over there after the cruel murder of Prince Alfred), for the invasion of England. The Danes and Saxons, finding themselves without a King, and dreading new disputes, made common cause, and joined in inviting him to occupy the Throne. He consented, and soon troubled them enough; for he brought over numbers of Danes, and taxed the people so insupportably to enrich those greedy favourites that there were many insurrections, especially one at Worcester, where the citizens rose and killed his tax-collectors; in revenge for which he burned their city. He was a brutal King, whose first public act was to order the dead body of poor Harold Harefoot to be dug up, beheaded, and thrown into the river. His end was worthy of such a beginning. He fell down drunk, with a goblet of wine in his hand, at a wedding-feast at Lambeth, given in honour of the marriage of his standard-bearer, a Dane named Towed the Proud. And he never spoke again.
Edward, afterwards called by the monks The Confessor, succeeded; and his first act was to oblige his mother Emma, who had favoured him so little, to retire into the country; where she died some ten years afterwards. He was the exiled prince whose brother Alfred had been so foully killed. He had been invited over from Normandy by Hardicanute, in the course of his short reign of two years, and had been handsomely treated at court. His cause was now favoured by the powerful Earl Godwin, and he was soon made King. This Earl had been suspected by the people, ever since Prince Alfred’s cruel death; he had even been tried in the last reign for the Prince’s murder, but had been pronounced not guilty; chiefly, as it was supposed, because of a present he had made to the swinish King, of a gilded ship with a figure-head of solid gold, and a crew of eighty splendidly armed men. It was his interest to help the new King with his power, if the new King would help him against the popular distrust and hatred. So they made a bargain. Edward the Confessor got the Throne. The Earl got more power and more land, and his daughter Editha was made queen; for it was a part of their compact that the King should take her for his wife.
But, although she was a gentle lady, in all things worthy to be beloved—good, beautiful, sensible, and kind—the King from the first neglected her. Her father and her six proud brothers, resenting this cold treatment, harassed the King greatly by exerting all their power to make him unpopular. Having lived so long in Normandy, he preferred the Normans to the English. He made a Norman Archbishop, and Norman Bishops; his great officers and favourites were all Normans; he introduced the Norman fashions and the Norman language; in imitation of the state custom of Normandy, he attached a great seal to his state documents, instead of merely marking them, as the Saxon Kings had done, with the sign of the cross—just as poor people who have never been taught to write, now make the same mark for their names. All this, the powerful Earl Godwin and his six proud sons represented to the people as disfavour shown towards the English; and thus they daily increased their own power, and daily diminished the power of the King.
They were greatly helped by an event that occurred when he had reigned eight years. Eustace, Earl of Bologne, who had married the King’s sister, came to England on a visit. After staying at the court some time, he set forth, with his numerous train of attendants, to return home. They were to embark at Dover. Entering that peaceful town in armour, they took possession of the best houses, and noisily demanded to be lodged and entertained without payment. One of the bold men of Dover, who would not endure to have these domineering strangers jingling their heavy swords and iron corselets up and down his house, eating his meat and drinking his strong liquor, stood in his doorway and refused admission to the first armed man who came there. The armed man drew, and wounded him. The man of Dover struck the armed man dead. Intelligence of what he had done, spreading through the streets to where the Count Eustace and his men were standing by their horses, bridle in hand, they passionately mounted, galloped to the house, surrounded it, forced their way in (the doors and windows being closed when they came up), and killed the man of Dover at his own fireside. They then clattered through the streets, cutting down and riding over men, women, and children. This did not last long, you may believe. The men of Dover set upon them with great fury, killed nineteen of the foreigners, wounded many more, and, blockading the road to the port so that they should not embark, beat them out of the town by the way they had come. Hereupon, Count Eustace rides as hard as man can ride to Gloucester, where Edward is, surrounded by Norman monks and Norman lords. ‘Justice!’ cries the Count, ‘upon the men of Dover, who have set upon and slain my people!’ The King sends immediately for the powerful Earl Godwin, who happens to be near; reminds him that Dover is under his government; and orders him to repair to Dover and do military execution on the inhabitants. ‘It does not become you,’ says the proud Earl in reply, ‘to condemn without a hearing those whom you have sworn to protect. I will not do it.’
The King, therefore, summoned the Earl, on pain of banishment and loss of his titles and property, to appear before the court to answer this disobedience. The Earl refused to appear. He, his eldest son Harold, and his second son Sweyn, hastily raised as many fighting men as their utmost power could collect, and demanded to have Count Eustace and his followers surrendered to the justice of the country. The King, in his turn, refused to give them up, and raised a strong force. After some treaty and delay, the troops of the great Earl and his sons began to fall off. The Earl, with a part of his family and abundance of treasure, sailed to Flanders; Harold escaped to Ireland; and the power of the great family was for that time gone in England. But, the people did not forget them.
Then, Edward the Confessor, with the true meanness of a mean spirit, visited his dislike of the once powerful father and sons upon the helpless daughter and sister, his unoffending wife, whom all who saw her (her husband and his monks excepted) loved. He seized rapaciously upon her fortune and her jewels, and allowing her only one attendant, confined her in a gloomy convent, of which a sister of his—no doubt an unpleasant lady after his own heart—was abbess or jailer.
Having got Earl Godwin and his six sons well out of his way, the King favoured the Normans more than ever. He invited over William, Duke Of Normandy, the son of that Duke who had received him and his murdered brother long ago, and of a peasant girl, a tanner’s daughter, with whom that Duke had fallen in love for her beauty as he saw her washing clothes in a brook. William, who was a great warrior, with a passion for fine horses, dogs, and arms, accepted the invitation; and the Normans in England, finding themselves more numerous than ever when he arrived with his retinue, and held in still greater honour at court than before, became more and more haughty towards the people, and were more and more disliked by them.
The old Earl Godwin, though he was abroad, knew well how the people felt; for, with part of the treasure he had carried away with him, he kept spies and agents in his pay all over England.
Accordingly, he thought the time was come for fitting out a great expedition against the Norman-loving King. With it, he sailed to the Isle of Wight, where he was joined by his son Harold, the most gallant and brave of all his family. And so the father and son came sailing up the Thames to Southwark; great numbers of the people declaring for them, and shouting for the English Earl and the English Harold, against the Norman favourites!
The King was at first as blind and stubborn as kings usually have been whensoever they have been in the hands of monks. But the people rallied so thickly round the old Earl and his son, and the old Earl was so steady in demanding without bloodshed the restoration of himself and his family to their rights, that at last the court took the alarm. The Norman Archbishop of Canterbury, and the Norman Bishop of London, surrounded by their retainers, fought their way out of London, and escaped from Essex to France in a fishing-boat. The other Norman favourites dispersed in all directions. The old Earl and his sons (except Sweyn, who had committed crimes against the law) were restored to their possessions and dignities. Editha, the virtuous and lovely Queen of the insensible King, was triumphantly released from her prison, the convent, and once more sat in her chair of state, arrayed in the jewels of which, when she had no champion to support her rights, her cold-blooded husband had deprived her.
The old Earl Godwin did not long enjoy his restored fortune. He fell down in a fit at the King’s table, and died upon the third day afterwards. Harold succeeded to his power, and to a far higher place in the attachment of the people than his father had ever held. By his valour he subdued the King’s enemies in many bloody fights. He was vigorous against rebels in Scotland—this was the time when Macbeth slew Duncan, upon which event our English Shakespeare, hundreds of years afterwards, wrote his great tragedy; and he killed the restless Welsh King Griffith, and brought his head to England.
What Harold was doing at sea, when he was driven on the French coast by a tempest, is not at all certain; nor does it at all matter. That his ship was forced by a storm on that shore, and that he was taken prisoner, there is no doubt. In those barbarous days, all shipwrecked strangers were taken prisoners, and obliged to pay ransom. So, a certain Count Guy, who was the Lord of Ponthieu where Harold’s disaster happened, seized him, instead of relieving him like a hospitable and Christian lord as he ought to have done, and expected to make a very good thing of it.
But Harold sent off immediately to Duke William of Normandy, complaining of this treatment; and the Duke no sooner heard of it than he ordered Harold to be escorted to the ancient town of Rouen, where he then was, and where he received him as an honoured guest. Now, some writers tell us that Edward the Confessor, who was by this time old and had no children, had made a will, appointing Duke William of Normandy his successor, and had informed the Duke of his having done so. There is no doubt that he was anxious about his successor; because he had even invited over, from abroad, Edward the Outlaw, a son of Ironside, who had come to England with his wife and three children, but whom the King had strangely refused to see when he did come, and who had died in London suddenly (princes were terribly liable to sudden death in those days), and had been buried in St. Paul’s Cathedral. The King might possibly have made such a will; or, having always been fond of the Normans, he might have encouraged Norman William to aspire to the English crown, by something that he said to him when he was staying at the English court. But, certainly William did now aspire to it; and knowing that Harold would be a powerful rival, he called together a great assembly of his nobles, offered Harold his daughter Adele in marriage, informed him that he meant on King Edward’s death to claim the English crown as his own inheritance, and required Harold then and there to swear to aid him. Harold, being in the Duke’s power, took this oath upon the Missal, or Prayer-book. It is a good example of the superstitions of the monks, that this Missal, instead of being placed upon a table, was placed upon a tub; which, when Harold had sworn, was uncovered, and shown to be full of dead men’s bones—bones, as the monks pretended, of saints. This was supposed to make Harold’s oath a great deal more impressive and binding. As if the great name of the Creator of Heaven and earth could be made more solemn by a knuckle-bone, or a double-tooth, or a finger-nail, of Dunstan!
Within a week or two after Harold’s return to England, the dreary old Confessor was found to be dying. After wandering in his mind like a very weak old man, he died. As he had put himself entirely in the hands of the monks when he was alive, they praised him lustily when he was dead. They had gone so far, already, as to persuade him that he could work miracles; and had brought people afflicted with a bad disorder of the skin, to him, to be touched and cured. This was called ‘touching for the King’s Evil,’ which afterwards became a royal custom. You know, however, Who really touched the sick, and healed them; and you know His sacred name is not among the dusty line of human kings.
CHAPTER VII ENGLAND UNDER HAROLD THE SECOND, AND CONQUERED BY THE NORMANS
Harold was crowned King of England on the very day of the maudlin Confessor’s funeral. He had good need to be quick about it. When the news reached Norman William, hunting in his park at Rouen, he dropped his bow, returned to his palace, called his nobles to council, and presently sent ambassadors to Harold, calling on him to keep his oath and resign the Crown. Harold would do no such thing. The barons of France leagued together round Duke William for the invasion of England. Duke William promised freely to distribute English wealth and English lands among them. The Pope sent to Normandy a consecrated banner, and a ring containing a hair which he warranted to have grown on the head of Saint Peter. He blessed the enterprise; and cursed Harold; and requested that the Normans would pay ‘Peter’s Pence’—or a tax to himself of a penny a year on every house—a little more regularly in future, if they could make it convenient.
King Harold had a rebel brother in Flanders, who was a vassal of Harold Hardrada, King of Norway. This brother, and this Norwegian King, joining their forces against England, with Duke William’s help, won a fight in which the English were commanded by two nobles; and then besieged York. Harold, who was waiting for the Normans on the coast at Hastings, with his army, marched to Stamford Bridge upon the river Derwent to give them instant battle.
He found them drawn up in a hollow circle, marked out by their shining spears. Riding round this circle at a distance, to survey it, he saw a brave figure on horseback, in a blue mantle and a bright helmet, whose horse suddenly stumbled and threw him.
‘Who is that man who has fallen?’ Harold asked of one of his captains.
‘The King of Norway,’ he replied.
‘He is a tall and stately king,’ said Harold, ‘but his end is near.’
He added, in a little while, ‘Go yonder to my brother, and tell him, if he withdraw his troops, he shall be Earl of Northumberland, and rich and powerful in England.’
The captain rode away and gave the message.
‘What will he give to my friend the King of Norway?’ asked the brother.
‘Seven feet of earth for a grave,’ replied the captain.
‘No more?’ returned the brother, with a smile.
‘The King of Norway being a tall man, perhaps a little more,’ replied the captain.
‘Ride back!’ said the brother, ‘and tell King Harold to make ready for the fight!’
He did so, very soon. And such a fight King Harold led against that force, that his brother, and the Norwegian King, and every chief of note in all their host, except the Norwegian King’s son, Olave, to whom he gave honourable dismissal, were left dead upon the field. The victorious army marched to York. As King Harold sat there at the feast, in the midst of all his company, a stir was heard at the doors; and messengers all covered with mire from riding far and fast through broken ground came hurrying in, to report that the Normans had landed in England.
The intelligence was true. They had been tossed about by contrary winds, and some of their ships had been wrecked. A part of their own shore, to which they had been driven back, was strewn with Norman bodies. But they had once more made sail, led by the Duke’s own galley, a present from his wife, upon the prow whereof the figure of a golden boy stood pointing towards England. By day, the banner of the three Lions of Normandy, the diverse coloured sails, the gilded vanes, the many decorations of this gorgeous ship, had glittered in the sun and sunny water; by night, a light had sparkled like a star at her mast-head. And now, encamped near Hastings, with their leader lying in the old Roman castle of Pevensey, the English retiring in all directions, the land for miles around scorched and smoking, fired and pillaged, was the whole Norman power, hopeful and strong on English ground.
Harold broke up the feast and hurried to London. Within a week, his army was ready. He sent out spies to ascertain the Norman strength. William took them, caused them to be led through his whole camp, and then dismissed. ‘The Normans,’ said these spies to Harold, ‘are not bearded on the upper lip as we English are, but are shorn. They are priests.’ ‘My men,’ replied Harold, with a laugh, ‘will find those priests good soldiers!’
‘The Saxons,’ reported Duke William’s outposts of Norman soldiers, who were instructed to retire as King Harold’s army advanced, ‘rush on us through their pillaged country with the fury of madmen.’
‘Let them come, and come soon!’ said Duke William.
Some proposals for a reconciliation were made, but were soon abandoned. In the middle of the month of October, in the year one thousand and sixty-six, the Normans and the English came front to front. All night the armies lay encamped before each other, in a part of the country then called Senlac, now called (in remembrance of them) Battle. With the first dawn of day, they arose. There, in the faint light, were the English on a hill; a wood behind them; in their midst, the Royal banner, representing a fighting warrior, woven in gold thread, adorned with precious stones; beneath the banner, as it rustled in the wind, stood King Harold on foot, with two of his remaining brothers by his side; around them, still and silent as the dead, clustered the whole English army—every soldier covered by his shield, and bearing in his hand his dreaded English battle-axe.
On an opposite hill, in three lines, archers, foot-soldiers, horsemen, was the Norman force. Of a sudden, a great battle-cry, ‘God help us!’ burst from the Norman lines. The English answered with their own battle-cry, ‘God’s Rood! Holy Rood!’ The Normans then came sweeping down the hill to attack the English.
There was one tall Norman Knight who rode before the Norman army on a prancing horse, throwing up his heavy sword and catching it, and singing of the bravery of his countrymen. An English Knight, who rode out from the English force to meet him, fell by this Knight’s hand. Another English Knight rode out, and he fell too. But then a third rode out, and killed the Norman. This was in the first beginning of the fight. It soon raged everywhere.
The English, keeping side by side in a great mass, cared no more for the showers of Norman arrows than if they had been showers of Norman rain. When the Norman horsemen rode against them, with their battle-axes they cut men and horses down. The Normans gave way. The English pressed forward. A cry went forth among the Norman troops that Duke William was killed. Duke William took off his helmet, in order that his face might be distinctly seen, and rode along the line before his men. This gave them courage. As they turned again to face the English, some of their Norman horse divided the pursuing body of the English from the rest, and thus all that foremost portion of the English army fell, fighting bravely. The main body still remaining firm, heedless of the Norman arrows, and with their battle-axes cutting down the crowds of horsemen when they rode up, like forests of young trees,—Duke William pretended to retreat. The eager English followed. The Norman army closed again, and fell upon them with great slaughter.
‘Still,’ said Duke William, ‘there are thousands of the English, firm as rocks around their King. Shoot upward, Norman archers, that your arrows may fall down upon their faces!’
The sun rose high, and sank, and the battle still raged. Through all the wild October day, the clash and din resounded in the air. In the red sunset, and in the white moonlight, heaps upon heaps of dead men lay strewn, a dreadful spectacle, all over the ground.
King Harold, wounded with an arrow in the eye, was nearly blind. His brothers were already killed. Twenty Norman Knights, whose battered armour had flashed fiery and golden in the sunshine all day long, and now looked silvery in the moonlight, dashed forward to seize the Royal banner from the English Knights and soldiers, still faithfully collected round their blinded King. The King received a mortal wound, and dropped. The English broke and fled. The Normans rallied, and the day was lost.
O what a sight beneath the moon and stars, when lights were shining in the tent of the victorious Duke William, which was pitched near the spot where Harold fell—and he and his knights were carousing, within—and soldiers with torches, going slowly to and fro, without, sought for the corpse of Harold among piles of dead—and the Warrior, worked in golden thread and precious stones, lay low, all torn and soiled with blood—and the three Norman Lions kept watch over the field!
CHAPTER VIII ENGLAND UNDER WILLIAM THE FIRST, THE NORMAN CONQUEROR
Upon the ground where the brave Harold fell, William the Norman afterwards founded an abbey, which, under the name of Battle Abbey, was a rich and splendid place through many a troubled year, though now it is a grey ruin overgrown with ivy. But the first work he had to do, was to conquer the English thoroughly; and that, as you know by this time, was hard work for any man.
He ravaged several counties; he burned and plundered many towns; he laid waste scores upon scores of miles of pleasant country; he destroyed innumerable lives. At length Stigand, Archbishop of Canterbury, with other representatives of the clergy and the people, went to his camp, and submitted to him. Edgar, the insignificant son of Edmund Ironside, was proclaimed King by others, but nothing came of it. He fled to Scotland afterwards, where his sister, who was young and beautiful, married the Scottish King. Edgar himself was not important enough for anybody to care much about him.
On Christmas Day, William was crowned in Westminster Abbey, under the title of William the First; but he is best known as William the Conqueror. It was a strange coronation. One of the bishops who performed the ceremony asked the Normans, in French, if they would have Duke William for their king? They answered Yes. Another of the bishops put the same question to the Saxons, in English. They too answered Yes, with a loud shout. The noise being heard by a guard of Norman horse-soldiers outside, was mistaken for resistance on the part of the English. The guard instantly set fire to the neighbouring houses, and a tumult ensued; in the midst of which the King, being left alone in the Abbey, with a few priests (and they all being in a terrible fright together), was hurriedly crowned. When the crown was placed upon his head, he swore to govern the English as well as the best of their own monarchs. I dare say you think, as I do, that if we except the Great Alfred, he might pretty easily have done that.
Numbers of the English nobles had been killed in the last disastrous battle. Their estates, and the estates of all the nobles who had fought against him there, King William seized upon, and gave to his own Norman knights and nobles. Many great English families of the present time acquired their English lands in this way, and are very proud of it.
But what is got by force must be maintained by force. These nobles were obliged to build castles all over England, to defend their new property; and, do what he would, the King could neither soothe nor quell the nation as he wished. He gradually introduced the Norman language and the Norman customs; yet, for a long time the great body of the English remained sullen and revengeful. On his going over to Normandy, to visit his subjects there, the oppressions of his half-brother Odo, whom he left in charge of his English kingdom, drove the people mad. The men of Kent even invited over, to take possession of Dover, their old enemy Count Eustace of Boulogne, who had led the fray when the Dover man was slain at his own fireside. The men of Hereford, aided by the Welsh, and commanded by a chief named Edric the Wild, drove the Normans out of their country. Some of those who had been dispossessed of their lands, banded together in the North of England; some, in Scotland; some, in the thick woods and marshes; and whensoever they could fall upon the Normans, or upon the English who had submitted to the Normans, they fought, despoiled, and murdered, like the desperate outlaws that they were. Conspiracies were set on foot for a general massacre of the Normans, like the old massacre of the Danes. In short, the English were in a murderous mood all through the kingdom.
King William, fearing he might lose his conquest, came back, and tried to pacify the London people by soft words. He then set forth to repress the country people by stern deeds. Among the towns which he besieged, and where he killed and maimed the inhabitants without any distinction, sparing none, young or old, armed or unarmed, were Oxford, Warwick, Leicester, Nottingham, Derby, Lincoln, York. In all these places, and in many others, fire and sword worked their utmost horrors, and made the land dreadful to behold. The streams and rivers were discoloured with blood; the sky was blackened with smoke; the fields were wastes of ashes; the waysides were heaped up with dead. Such are the fatal results of conquest and ambition! Although William was a harsh and angry man, I do not suppose that he deliberately meant to work this shocking ruin, when he invaded England. But what he had got by the strong hand, he could only keep by the strong hand, and in so doing he made England a great grave.
Two sons of Harold, by name Edmund and Godwin, came over from Ireland, with some ships, against the Normans, but were defeated. This was scarcely done, when the outlaws in the woods so harassed York, that the Governor sent to the King for help. The King despatched a general and a large force to occupy the town of Durham. The Bishop of that place met the general outside the town, and warned him not to enter, as he would be in danger there. The general cared nothing for the warning, and went in with all his men. That night, on every hill within sight of Durham, signal fires were seen to blaze. When the morning dawned, the English, who had assembled in great strength, forced the gates, rushed into the town, and slew the Normans every one. The English afterwards besought the Danes to come and help them. The Danes came, with two hundred and forty ships. The outlawed nobles joined them; they captured York, and drove the Normans out of that city. Then, William bribed the Danes to go away; and took such vengeance on the English, that all the former fire and sword, smoke and ashes, death and ruin, were nothing compared with it. In melancholy songs, and doleful stories, it was still sung and told by cottage fires on winter evenings, a hundred years afterwards, how, in those dreadful days of the Normans, there was not, from the River Humber to the River Tyne, one inhabited village left, nor one cultivated field—how there was nothing but a dismal ruin, where the human creatures and the beasts lay dead together.
The outlaws had, at this time, what they called a Camp of Refuge, in the midst of the fens of Cambridgeshire. Protected by those marshy grounds which were difficult of approach, they lay among the reeds and rushes, and were hidden by the mists that rose up from the watery earth. Now, there also was, at that time, over the sea in Flanders, an Englishman named Hereward, whose father had died in his absence, and whose property had been given to a Norman. When he heard of this wrong that had been done him (from such of the exiled English as chanced to wander into that country), he longed for revenge; and joining the outlaws in their camp of refuge, became their commander. He was so good a soldier, that the Normans supposed him to be aided by enchantment. William, even after he had made a road three miles in length across the Cambridgeshire marshes, on purpose to attack this supposed enchanter, thought it necessary to engage an old lady, who pretended to be a sorceress, to come and do a little enchantment in the royal cause. For this purpose she was pushed on before the troops in a wooden tower; but Hereward very soon disposed of this unfortunate sorceress, by burning her, tower and all. The monks of the convent of Ely near at hand, however, who were fond of good living, and who found it very uncomfortable to have the country blockaded and their supplies of meat and drink cut off, showed the King a secret way of surprising the camp. So Hereward was soon defeated. Whether he afterwards died quietly, or whether he was killed after killing sixteen of the men who attacked him (as some old rhymes relate that he did), I cannot say. His defeat put an end to the Camp of Refuge; and, very soon afterwards, the King, victorious both in Scotland and in England, quelled the last rebellious English noble. He then surrounded himself with Norman lords, enriched by the property of English nobles; had a great survey made of all the land in England, which was entered as the property of its new owners, on a roll called Doomsday Book; obliged the people to put out their fires and candles at a certain hour every night, on the ringing of a bell which was called The Curfew; introduced the Norman dresses and manners; made the Normans masters everywhere, and the English, servants; turned out the English bishops, and put Normans in their places; and showed himself to be the Conqueror indeed.
But, even with his own Normans, he had a restless life. They were always hungering and thirsting for the riches of the English; and the more he gave, the more they wanted. His priests were as greedy as his soldiers. We know of only one Norman who plainly told his master, the King, that he had come with him to England to do his duty as a faithful servant, and that property taken by force from other men had no charms for him. His name was Guilbert. We should not forget his name, for it is good to remember and to honour honest men.
Besides all these troubles, William the Conqueror was troubled by quarrels among his sons. He had three living. Robert, called Curthose, because of his short legs; William, called Rufus or the Red, from the colour of his hair; and Henry, fond of learning, and called, in the Norman language, Beauclerc, or Fine-Scholar. When Robert grew up, he asked of his father the government of Normandy, which he had nominally possessed, as a child, under his mother, Matilda. The King refusing to grant it, Robert became jealous and discontented; and happening one day, while in this temper, to be ridiculed by his brothers, who threw water on him from a balcony as he was walking before the door, he drew his sword, rushed up-stairs, and was only prevented by the King himself from putting them to death. That same night, he hotly departed with some followers from his father’s court, and endeavoured to take the Castle of Rouen by surprise. Failing in this, he shut himself up in another Castle in Normandy, which the King besieged, and where Robert one day unhorsed and nearly killed him without knowing who he was. His submission when he discovered his father, and the intercession of the queen and others, reconciled them; but not soundly; for Robert soon strayed abroad, and went from court to court with his complaints. He was a gay, careless, thoughtless fellow, spending all he got on musicians and dancers; but his mother loved him, and often, against the King’s command, supplied him with money through a messenger named Samson. At length the incensed King swore he would tear out Samson’s eyes; and Samson, thinking that his only hope of safety was in becoming a monk, became one, went on such errands no more, and kept his eyes in his head.
All this time, from the turbulent day of his strange coronation, the Conqueror had been struggling, you see, at any cost of cruelty and bloodshed, to maintain what he had seized. All his reign, he struggled still, with the same object ever before him. He was a stern, bold man, and he succeeded in it.
He loved money, and was particular in his eating, but he had only leisure to indulge one other passion, and that was his love of hunting. He carried it to such a height that he ordered whole villages and towns to be swept away to make forests for the deer. Not satisfied with sixty-eight Royal Forests, he laid waste an immense district, to form another in Hampshire, called the New Forest. The many thousands of miserable peasants who saw their little houses pulled down, and themselves and children turned into the open country without a shelter, detested him for his merciless addition to their many sufferings; and when, in the twenty-first year of his reign (which proved to be the last), he went over to Rouen, England was as full of hatred against him, as if every leaf on every tree in all his Royal Forests had been a curse upon his head. In the New Forest, his son Richard (for he had four sons) had been gored to death by a Stag; and the people said that this so cruelly-made Forest would yet be fatal to others of the Conqueror’s race.
He was engaged in a dispute with the King of France about some territory. While he stayed at Rouen, negotiating with that King, he kept his bed and took medicines: being advised by his physicians to do so, on account of having grown to an unwieldy size. Word being brought to him that the King of France made light of this, and joked about it, he swore in a great rage that he should rue his jests. He assembled his army, marched into the disputed territory, burnt—his old way!—the vines, the crops, and fruit, and set the town of Mantes on fire. But, in an evil hour; for, as he rode over the hot ruins, his horse, setting his hoofs upon some burning embers, started, threw him forward against the pommel of the saddle, and gave him a mortal hurt. For six weeks he lay dying in a monastery near Rouen, and then made his will, giving England to William, Normandy to Robert, and five thousand pounds to Henry. And now, his violent deeds lay heavy on his mind. He ordered money to be given to many English churches and monasteries, and—which was much better repentance—released his prisoners of state, some of whom had been confined in his dungeons twenty years.
It was a September morning, and the sun was rising, when the King was awakened from slumber by the sound of a church bell. ‘What bell is that?’ he faintly asked. They told him it was the bell of the chapel of Saint Mary. ‘I commend my soul,’ said he, ‘to Mary!’ and died.
Think of his name, The Conqueror, and then consider how he lay in death! The moment he was dead, his physicians, priests, and nobles, not knowing what contest for the throne might now take place, or what might happen in it, hastened away, each man for himself and his own property; the mercenary servants of the court began to rob and plunder; the body of the King, in the indecent strife, was rolled from the bed, and lay alone, for hours, upon the ground. O Conqueror, of whom so many great names are proud now, of whom so many great names thought nothing then, it were better to have conquered one true heart, than England!
By-and-by, the priests came creeping in with prayers and candles; and a good knight, named Herluin, undertook (which no one else would do) to convey the body to Caen, in Normandy, in order that it might be buried in St. Stephen’s church there, which the Conqueror had founded. But fire, of which he had made such bad use in his life, seemed to follow him of itself in death. A great conflagration broke out in the town when the body was placed in the church; and those present running out to extinguish the flames, it was once again left alone.
It was not even buried in peace. It was about to be let down, in its Royal robes, into a tomb near the high altar, in presence of a great concourse of people, when a loud voice in the crowd cried out, ‘This ground is mine! Upon it, stood my father’s house. This King despoiled me of both ground and house to build this church. In the great name of God, I here forbid his body to be covered with the earth that is my right!’ The priests and bishops present, knowing the speaker’s right, and knowing that the King had often denied him justice, paid him down sixty shillings for the grave. Even then, the corpse was not at rest. The tomb was too small, and they tried to force it in. It broke, a dreadful smell arose, the people hurried out into the air, and, for the third time, it was left alone.
Where were the Conqueror’s three sons, that they were not at their father’s burial? Robert was lounging among minstrels, dancers, and gamesters, in France or Germany. Henry was carrying his five thousand pounds safely away in a convenient chest he had got made. William the Red was hurrying to England, to lay hands upon the Royal treasure and the crown.
CHAPTER IX ENGLAND UNDER WILLIAM THE SECOND, CALLED RUFUS
William the Red, in breathless haste, secured the three great forts of Dover, Pevensey, and Hastings, and made with hot speed for Winchester, where the Royal treasure was kept. The treasurer delivering him the keys, he found that it amounted to sixty thousand pounds in silver, besides gold and jewels. Possessed of this wealth, he soon persuaded the Archbishop of Canterbury to crown him, and became William the Second, King of England.
Rufus was no sooner on the throne, than he ordered into prison again the unhappy state captives whom his father had set free, and directed a goldsmith to ornament his father’s tomb profusely with gold and silver. It would have been more dutiful in him to have attended the sick Conqueror when he was dying; but England itself, like this Red King, who once governed it, has sometimes made expensive tombs for dead men whom it treated shabbily when they were alive.
The King’s brother, Robert of Normandy, seeming quite content to be only Duke of that country; and the King’s other brother, Fine-Scholar, being quiet enough with his five thousand pounds in a chest; the King flattered himself, we may suppose, with the hope of an easy reign. But easy reigns were difficult to have in those days. The turbulent Bishop Odo (who had blessed the Norman army at the Battle of Hastings, and who, I dare say, took all the credit of the victory to himself) soon began, in concert with some powerful Norman nobles, to trouble the Red King.
The truth seems to be that this bishop and his friends, who had lands in England and lands in Normandy, wished to hold both under one Sovereign; and greatly preferred a thoughtless good-natured person, such as Robert was, to Rufus; who, though far from being an amiable man in any respect, was keen, and not to be imposed upon. They declared in Robert’s favour, and retired to their castles (those castles were very troublesome to kings) in a sullen humour. The Red King, seeing the Normans thus falling from him, revenged himself upon them by appealing to the English; to whom he made a variety of promises, which he never meant to perform—in particular, promises to soften the cruelty of the Forest Laws; and who, in return, so aided him with their valour, that Odo was besieged in the Castle of Rochester, and forced to abandon it, and to depart from England for ever: whereupon the other rebellious Norman nobles were soon reduced and scattered.
Then, the Red King went over to Normandy, where the people suffered greatly under the loose rule of Duke Robert. The King’s object was to seize upon the Duke’s dominions. This, the Duke, of course, prepared to resist; and miserable war between the two brothers seemed inevitable, when the powerful nobles on both sides, who had seen so much of war, interfered to prevent it. A treaty was made. Each of the two brothers agreed to give up something of his claims, and that the longer-liver of the two should inherit all the dominions of the other. When they had come to this loving understanding, they embraced and joined their forces against Fine-Scholar; who had bought some territory of Robert with a part of his five thousand pounds, and was considered a dangerous individual in consequence.
St. Michael’s Mount, in Normandy (there is another St. Michael’s Mount, in Cornwall, wonderfully like it), was then, as it is now, a strong place perched upon the top of a high rock, around which, when the tide is in, the sea flows, leaving no road to the mainland. In this place, Fine-Scholar shut himself up with his soldiers, and here he was closely besieged by his two brothers. At one time, when he was reduced to great distress for want of water, the generous Robert not only permitted his men to get water, but sent Fine-Scholar wine from his own table; and, on being remonstrated with by the Red King, said ‘What! shall we let our own brother die of thirst? Where shall we get another, when he is gone?’ At another time, the Red King riding alone on the shore of the bay, looking up at the Castle, was taken by two of Fine-Scholar’s men, one of whom was about to kill him, when he cried out, ‘Hold, knave! I am the King of England!’ The story says that the soldier raised him from the ground respectfully and humbly, and that the King took him into his service. The story may or may not be true; but at any rate it is true that Fine-Scholar could not hold out against his united brothers, and that he abandoned Mount St. Michael, and wandered about—as poor and forlorn as other scholars have been sometimes known to be.
The Scotch became unquiet in the Red King’s time, and were twice defeated—the second time, with the loss of their King, Malcolm, and his son. The Welsh became unquiet too. Against them, Rufus was less successful; for they fought among their native mountains, and did great execution on the King’s troops. Robert of Normandy became unquiet too; and, complaining that his brother the King did not faithfully perform his part of their agreement, took up arms, and obtained assistance from the King of France, whom Rufus, in the end, bought off with vast sums of money. England became unquiet too. Lord Mowbray, the powerful Earl of Northumberland, headed a great conspiracy to depose the King, and to place upon the throne, Stephen, the Conqueror’s near relative. The plot was discovered; all the chief conspirators were seized; some were fined, some were put in prison, some were put to death. The Earl of Northumberland himself was shut up in a dungeon beneath Windsor Castle, where he died, an old man, thirty long years afterwards. The Priests in England were more unquiet than any other class or power; for the Red King treated them with such small ceremony that he refused to appoint new bishops or archbishops when the old ones died, but kept all the wealth belonging to those offices in his own hands. In return for this, the Priests wrote his life when he was dead, and abused him well. I am inclined to think, myself, that there was little to choose between the Priests and the Red King; that both sides were greedy and designing; and that they were fairly matched.
The Red King was false of heart, selfish, covetous, and mean. He had a worthy minister in his favourite, Ralph, nicknamed—for almost every famous person had a nickname in those rough days—Flambard, or the Firebrand. Once, the King being ill, became penitent, and made Anselm, a foreign priest and a good man, Archbishop of Canterbury. But he no sooner got well again than he repented of his repentance, and persisted in wrongfully keeping to himself some of the wealth belonging to the archbishopric. This led to violent disputes, which were aggravated by there being in Rome at that time two rival Popes; each of whom declared he was the only real original infallible Pope, who couldn’t make a mistake. At last, Anselm, knowing the Red King’s character, and not feeling himself safe in England, asked leave to return abroad. The Red King gladly gave it; for he knew that as soon as Anselm was gone, he could begin to store up all the Canterbury money again, for his own use.
By such means, and by taxing and oppressing the English people in every possible way, the Red King became very rich. When he wanted money for any purpose, he raised it by some means or other, and cared nothing for the injustice he did, or the misery he caused. Having the opportunity of buying from Robert the whole duchy of Normandy for five years, he taxed the English people more than ever, and made the very convents sell their plate and valuables to supply him with the means to make the purchase. But he was as quick and eager in putting down revolt as he was in raising money; for, a part of the Norman people objecting—very naturally, I think—to being sold in this way, he headed an army against them with all the speed and energy of his father. He was so impatient, that he embarked for Normandy in a great gale of wind. And when the sailors told him it was dangerous to go to sea in such angry weather, he replied, ‘Hoist sail and away! Did you ever hear of a king who was drowned?’
You will wonder how it was that even the careless Robert came to sell his dominions. It happened thus. It had long been the custom for many English people to make journeys to Jerusalem, which were called pilgrimages, in order that they might pray beside the tomb of Our Saviour there. Jerusalem belonging to the Turks, and the Turks hating Christianity, these Christian travellers were often insulted and ill used. The Pilgrims bore it patiently for some time, but at length a remarkable man, of great earnestness and eloquence, called Peter the Hermit, began to preach in various places against the Turks, and to declare that it was the duty of good Christians to drive away those unbelievers from the tomb of Our Saviour, and to take possession of it, and protect it. An excitement such as the world had never known before was created. Thousands and thousands of men of all ranks and conditions departed for Jerusalem to make war against the Turks. The war is called in history the first Crusade, and every Crusader wore a cross marked on his right shoulder.
All the Crusaders were not zealous Christians. Among them were vast numbers of the restless, idle, profligate, and adventurous spirit of the time. Some became Crusaders for the love of change; some, in the hope of plunder; some, because they had nothing to do at home; some, because they did what the priests told them; some, because they liked to see foreign countries; some, because they were fond of knocking men about, and would as soon knock a Turk about as a Christian. Robert of Normandy may have been influenced by all these motives; and by a kind desire, besides, to save the Christian Pilgrims from bad treatment in future. He wanted to raise a number of armed men, and to go to the Crusade. He could not do so without money. He had no money; and he sold his dominions to his brother, the Red King, for five years. With the large sum he thus obtained, he fitted out his Crusaders gallantly, and went away to Jerusalem in martial state. The Red King, who made money out of everything, stayed at home, busily squeezing more money out of Normans and English.
After three years of great hardship and suffering—from shipwreck at sea; from travel in strange lands; from hunger, thirst, and fever, upon the burning sands of the desert; and from the fury of the Turks—the valiant Crusaders got possession of Our Saviour’s tomb. The Turks were still resisting and fighting bravely, but this success increased the general desire in Europe to join the Crusade. Another great French Duke was proposing to sell his dominions for a term to the rich Red King, when the Red King’s reign came to a sudden and violent end.
You have not forgotten the New Forest which the Conqueror made, and which the miserable people whose homes he had laid waste, so hated. The cruelty of the Forest Laws, and the torture and death they brought upon the peasantry, increased this hatred. The poor persecuted country people believed that the New Forest was enchanted. They said that in thunder-storms, and on dark nights, demons appeared, moving beneath the branches of the gloomy trees. They said that a terrible spectre had foretold to Norman hunters that the Red King should be punished there. And now, in the pleasant season of May, when the Red King had reigned almost thirteen years; and a second Prince of the Conqueror’s blood—another Richard, the son of Duke Robert—was killed by an arrow in this dreaded Forest; the people said that the second time was not the last, and that there was another death to come.
It was a lonely forest, accursed in the people’s hearts for the wicked deeds that had been done to make it; and no man save the King and his Courtiers and Huntsmen, liked to stray there. But, in reality, it was like any other forest. In the spring, the green leaves broke out of the buds; in the summer, flourished heartily, and made deep shades; in the winter, shrivelled and blew down, and lay in brown heaps on the moss. Some trees were stately, and grew high and strong; some had fallen of themselves; some were felled by the forester’s axe; some were hollow, and the rabbits burrowed at their roots; some few were struck by lightning, and stood white and bare. There were hill-sides covered with rich fern, on which the morning dew so beautifully sparkled; there were brooks, where the deer went down to drink, or over which the whole herd bounded, flying from the arrows of the huntsmen; there were sunny glades, and solemn places where but little light came through the rustling leaves. The songs of the birds in the New Forest were pleasanter to hear than the shouts of fighting men outside; and even when the Red King and his Court came hunting through its solitudes, cursing loud and riding hard, with a jingling of stirrups and bridles and knives and daggers, they did much less harm there than among the English or Normans, and the stags died (as they lived) far easier than the people.
Upon a day in August, the Red King, now reconciled to his brother, Fine-Scholar, came with a great train to hunt in the New Forest. Fine-Scholar was of the party. They were a merry party, and had lain all night at Malwood-Keep, a hunting-lodge in the forest, where they had made good cheer, both at supper and breakfast, and had drunk a deal of wine. The party dispersed in various directions, as the custom of hunters then was. The King took with him only Sir Walter Tyrrel, who was a famous sportsman, and to whom he had given, before they mounted horse that morning, two fine arrows.
The last time the King was ever seen alive, he was riding with Sir Walter Tyrrel, and their dogs were hunting together.
It was almost night, when a poor charcoal-burner, passing through the forest with his cart, came upon the solitary body of a dead man, shot with an arrow in the breast, and still bleeding. He got it into his cart. It was the body of the King. Shaken and tumbled, with its red beard all whitened with lime and clotted with blood, it was driven in the cart by the charcoal-burner next day to Winchester Cathedral, where it was received and buried.
Sir Walter Tyrrel, who escaped to Normandy, and claimed the protection of the King of France, swore in France that the Red King was suddenly shot dead by an arrow from an unseen hand, while they were hunting together; that he was fearful of being suspected as the King’s murderer; and that he instantly set spurs to his horse, and fled to the sea-shore. Others declared that the King and Sir Walter Tyrrel were hunting in company, a little before sunset, standing in bushes opposite one another, when a stag came between them. That the King drew his bow and took aim, but the string broke. That the King then cried, ‘Shoot, Walter, in the Devil’s name!’ That Sir Walter shot. That the arrow glanced against a tree, was turned aside from the stag, and struck the King from his horse, dead.
By whose hand the Red King really fell, and whether that hand despatched the arrow to his breast by accident or by design, is only known to God. Some think his brother may have caused him to be killed; but the Red King had made so many enemies, both among priests and people, that suspicion may reasonably rest upon a less unnatural murderer. Men know no more than that he was found dead in the New Forest, which the suffering people had regarded as a doomed ground for his race.
CHAPTER X ENGLAND UNDER HENRY THE FIRST, CALLED FINE-SCHOLAR
Fine-scholar, on hearing of the Red King’s death, hurried to Winchester with as much speed as Rufus himself had made, to seize the Royal treasure. But the keeper of the treasure who had been one of the hunting-party in the Forest, made haste to Winchester too, and, arriving there at about the same time, refused to yield it up. Upon this, Fine-Scholar drew his sword, and threatened to kill the treasurer; who might have paid for his fidelity with his life, but that he knew longer resistance to be useless when he found the Prince supported by a company of powerful barons, who declared they were determined to make him King. The treasurer, therefore, gave up the money and jewels of the Crown: and on the third day after the death of the Red King, being a Sunday, Fine-Scholar stood before the high altar in Westminster Abbey, and made a solemn declaration that he would resign the Church property which his brother had seized; that he would do no wrong to the nobles; and that he would restore to the people the laws of Edward the Confessor, with all the improvements of William the Conqueror. So began the reign of King Henry the First.
The people were attached to their new King, both because he had known distresses, and because he was an Englishman by birth and not a Norman. To strengthen this last hold upon them, the King wished to marry an English lady; and could think of no other wife than Maud the Good, the daughter of the King of Scotland. Although this good Princess did not love the King, she was so affected by the representations the nobles made to her of the great charity it would be in her to unite the Norman and Saxon races, and prevent hatred and bloodshed between them for the future, that she consented to become his wife. After some disputing among the priests, who said that as she had been in a convent in her youth, and had worn the veil of a nun, she could not lawfully be married—against which the Princess stated that her aunt, with whom she had lived in her youth, had indeed sometimes thrown a piece of black stuff over her, but for no other reason than because the nun’s veil was the only dress the conquering Normans respected in girl or woman, and not because she had taken the vows of a nun, which she never had—she was declared free to marry, and was made King Henry’s Queen. A good Queen she was; beautiful, kind-hearted, and worthy of a better husband than the King.
For he was a cunning and unscrupulous man, though firm and clever. He cared very little for his word, and took any means to gain his ends. All this is shown in his treatment of his brother Robert—Robert, who had suffered him to be refreshed with water, and who had sent him the wine from his own table, when he was shut up, with the crows flying below him, parched with thirst, in the castle on the top of St. Michael’s Mount, where his Red brother would have let him die.
Before the King began to deal with Robert, he removed and disgraced all the favourites of the late King; who were for the most part base characters, much detested by the people. Flambard, or Firebrand, whom the late King had made Bishop of Durham, of all things in the world, Henry imprisoned in the Tower; but Firebrand was a great joker and a jolly companion, and made himself so popular with his guards that they pretended to know nothing about a long rope that was sent into his prison at the bottom of a deep flagon of wine. The guards took the wine, and Firebrand took the rope; with which, when they were fast asleep, he let himself down from a window in the night, and so got cleverly aboard ship and away to Normandy.
Now Robert, when his brother Fine-Scholar came to the throne, was still absent in the Holy Land. Henry pretended that Robert had been made Sovereign of that country; and he had been away so long, that the ignorant people believed it. But, behold, when Henry had been some time King of England, Robert came home to Normandy; having leisurely returned from Jerusalem through Italy, in which beautiful country he had enjoyed himself very much, and had married a lady as beautiful as itself! In Normandy, he found Firebrand waiting to urge him to assert his claim to the English crown, and declare war against King Henry. This, after great loss of time in feasting and dancing with his beautiful Italian wife among his Norman friends, he at last did.
The English in general were on King Henry’s side, though many of the Normans were on Robert’s. But the English sailors deserted the King, and took a great part of the English fleet over to Normandy; so that Robert came to invade this country in no foreign vessels, but in English ships. The virtuous Anselm, however, whom Henry had invited back from abroad, and made Archbishop of Canterbury, was steadfast in the King’s cause; and it was so well supported that the two armies, instead of fighting, made a peace. Poor Robert, who trusted anybody and everybody, readily trusted his brother, the King; and agreed to go home and receive a pension from England, on condition that all his followers were fully pardoned. This the King very faithfully promised, but Robert was no sooner gone than he began to punish them.
Among them was the Earl of Shrewsbury, who, on being summoned by the King to answer to five-and-forty accusations, rode away to one of his strong castles, shut himself up therein, called around him his tenants and vassals, and fought for his liberty, but was defeated and banished. Robert, with all his faults, was so true to his word, that when he first heard of this nobleman having risen against his brother, he laid waste the Earl of Shrewsbury’s estates in Normandy, to show the King that he would favour no breach of their treaty. Finding, on better information, afterwards, that the Earl’s only crime was having been his friend, he came over to England, in his old thoughtless, warm-hearted way, to intercede with the King, and remind him of the solemn promise to pardon all his followers.
This confidence might have put the false King to the blush, but it did not. Pretending to be very friendly, he so surrounded his brother with spies and traps, that Robert, who was quite in his power, had nothing for it but to renounce his pension and escape while he could. Getting home to Normandy, and understanding the King better now, he naturally allied himself with his old friend the Earl of Shrewsbury, who had still thirty castles in that country. This was exactly what Henry wanted. He immediately declared that Robert had broken the treaty, and next year invaded Normandy.
He pretended that he came to deliver the Normans, at their own request, from his brother’s misrule. There is reason to fear that his misrule was bad enough; for his beautiful wife had died, leaving him with an infant son, and his court was again so careless, dissipated, and ill-regulated, that it was said he sometimes lay in bed of a day for want of clothes to put on—his attendants having stolen all his dresses. But he headed his army like a brave prince and a gallant soldier, though he had the misfortune to be taken prisoner by King Henry, with four hundred of his Knights. Among them was poor harmless Edgar Atheling, who loved Robert well. Edgar was not important enough to be severe with. The King afterwards gave him a small pension, which he lived upon and died upon, in peace, among the quiet woods and fields of England.
And Robert—poor, kind, generous, wasteful, heedless Robert, with so many faults, and yet with virtues that might have made a better and a happier man—what was the end of him? If the King had had the magnanimity to say with a kind air, ‘Brother, tell me, before these noblemen, that from this time you will be my faithful follower and friend, and never raise your hand against me or my forces more!’ he might have trusted Robert to the death. But the King was not a magnanimous man. He sentenced his brother to be confined for life in one of the Royal Castles. In the beginning of his imprisonment, he was allowed to ride out, guarded; but he one day broke away from his guard and galloped off. He had the evil fortune to ride into a swamp, where his horse stuck fast and he was taken. When the King heard of it he ordered him to be blinded, which was done by putting a red-hot metal basin on his eyes.
And so, in darkness and in prison, many years, he thought of all his past life, of the time he had wasted, of the treasure he had squandered, of the opportunities he had lost, of the youth he had thrown away, of the talents he had neglected. Sometimes, on fine autumn mornings, he would sit and think of the old hunting parties in the free Forest, where he had been the foremost and the gayest. Sometimes, in the still nights, he would wake, and mourn for the many nights that had stolen past him at the gaming-table; sometimes, would seem to hear, upon the melancholy wind, the old songs of the minstrels; sometimes, would dream, in his blindness, of the light and glitter of the Norman Court. Many and many a time, he groped back, in his fancy, to Jerusalem, where he had fought so well; or, at the head of his brave companions, bowed his feathered helmet to the shouts of welcome greeting him in Italy, and seemed again to walk among the sunny vineyards, or on the shore of the blue sea, with his lovely wife. And then, thinking of her grave, and of his fatherless boy, he would stretch out his solitary arms and weep.
At length, one day, there lay in prison, dead, with cruel and disfiguring scars upon his eyelids, bandaged from his jailer’s sight, but on which the eternal Heavens looked down, a worn old man of eighty. He had once been Robert of Normandy. Pity him!
[Illustration: Duke Robert of Normandy]
At the time when Robert of Normandy was taken prisoner by his brother, Robert’s little son was only five years old. This child was taken, too, and carried before the King, sobbing and crying; for, young as he was, he knew he had good reason to be afraid of his Royal uncle. The King was not much accustomed to pity those who were in his power, but his cold heart seemed for the moment to soften towards the boy. He was observed to make a great effort, as if to prevent himself from being cruel, and ordered the child to be taken away; whereupon a certain Baron, who had married a daughter of Duke Robert’s (by name, Helie of Saint Saen), took charge of him, tenderly. The King’s gentleness did not last long. Before two years were over, he sent messengers to this lord’s Castle to seize the child and bring him away. The Baron was not there at the time, but his servants were faithful, and carried the boy off in his sleep and hid him. When the Baron came home, and was told what the King had done, he took the child abroad, and, leading him by the hand, went from King to King and from Court to Court, relating how the child had a claim to the throne of England, and how his uncle the King, knowing that he had that claim, would have murdered him, perhaps, but for his escape.
The youth and innocence of the pretty little William Fitz-Robert (for that was his name) made him many friends at that time. When he became a young man, the King of France, uniting with the French Counts of Anjou and Flanders, supported his cause against the King of England, and took many of the King’s towns and castles in Normandy. But, King Henry, artful and cunning always, bribed some of William’s friends with money, some with promises, some with power. He bought off the Count of Anjou, by promising to marry his eldest son, also named William, to the Count’s daughter; and indeed the whole trust of this King’s life was in such bargains, and he believed (as many another King has done since, and as one King did in France a very little time ago) that every man’s truth and honour can be bought at some price. For all this, he was so afraid of William Fitz-Robert and his friends, that, for a long time, he believed his life to be in danger; and never lay down to sleep, even in his palace surrounded by his guards, without having a sword and buckler at his bedside.
To strengthen his power, the King with great ceremony betrothed his eldest daughter Matilda, then a child only eight years old, to be the wife of Henry the Fifth, the Emperor of Germany. To raise her marriage-portion, he taxed the English people in a most oppressive manner; then treated them to a great procession, to restore their good humour; and sent Matilda away, in fine state, with the German ambassadors, to be educated in the country of her future husband.
And now his Queen, Maud the Good, unhappily died. It was a sad thought for that gentle lady, that the only hope with which she had married a man whom she had never loved—the hope of reconciling the Norman and English races—had failed. At the very time of her death, Normandy and all France was in arms against England; for, so soon as his last danger was over, King Henry had been false to all the French powers he had promised, bribed, and bought, and they had naturally united against him. After some fighting, however, in which few suffered but the unhappy common people (who always suffered, whatsoever was the matter), he began to promise, bribe, and buy again; and by those means, and by the help of the Pope, who exerted himself to save more bloodshed, and by solemnly declaring, over and over again, that he really was in earnest this time, and would keep his word, the King made peace.
"You have been but a short time absent this voyage," Sir Ralph said as his son and Edgar rode up to the castle.
"Truly we have been but a short time, father," Albert said, "but we have seen much. Of course the news has not yet reached you, but the army of Flanders has been utterly broken by the French. Whether Van Artevelde was killed we know not, but of the fifty thousand men who marched to battle, we doubt whether half ever returned to their homes."
"That was indeed a terrible defeat. And how bore you yourselves in the battle?"
"It was rough work, though short, father. Five other English knights were with us; four of these were killed, and one we left behind at a farm, grievously wounded. Each of us had two men-at-arms, and of the fourteen two were left behind wounded sorely, one remained in charge of his master and them, and Edgar's man here is the only one who rode to Sluys with us; the rest are dead. So, too, might we have been but for the strength and temper of our armour."
"Did not the Flemings fight sturdily, then?"
"They fought sturdily for a time, but altogether without leader or order. They took up a strong position, but impatient of an hour's delay, marched from it to give battle, and being attacked on both flanks, as well as in front, were driven into a close mass, so that few could use their arms, and, were it only to find breathing space, they had to fly."
"'Tis bad news, indeed. Had they prevailed, their alliance with us would have brought about great things, for Artevelde would have put Flanders under English protection, and between us we could have withstood all the attacks of France and Burgundy."
"Think you that Ghent will be taken, Edgar?"
"That I cannot say, Sir Ralph. However great their loss may be, the Ghentois are like to make an obstinate defence, judging from the way in which they withstood their earl with all Flanders at his back. They will know that they have no mercy to expect if they yield, and I believe that so long as there is a man left to wield arms the city will hold out. As to the other towns of Flanders, they are as fickle as the wind, and will all open their gates to the King of France, who, seeing that it is by his power alone that Flanders has been taken, will assuredly hold it as his own in the future."
"Now that you have returned, it would be well, Edgar, that you and my son should practise with the lance. 'Tis a knightly weapon, and a knight should at least know how to use it well. There is a piece of ground but a quarter of a mile away that I have been looking at, and find that it will make a good tilting-ground, and I will teach you all that I know in the matter."
Edgar thankfully embraced the offer and, after going into the castle to pay his respects to the dame and her daughter, went home with Hal Carter, whose wounds were still sore.
The news that came from Flanders to England from time to time was bad. It was first heard how terrible had been the slaughter of the Flemings after the victory, and that in all thirty-four thousand had been killed. Then the news came that Courtray, although it opened its gates without resistance, had been first pillaged and then burnt, and that Bruges had surrendered, but had been only spared from pillage by the payment of a great sum of money. None of the other towns had offered any resistance, but Ghent had shut her gates, and the French, deeming that the operations of the siege would be too severe to be undertaken in winter, had marched away, their return being hastened by the news of an insurrection in France.
The king, however, had declared Flanders to be a portion of France, and the Earl of Flanders had done homage to him as his liege lord. The news of the merciless slaughter of the Flemings, and of the cruel treatment of Courtray, aroused great indignation in England, which was increased when it was heard that all the rich English merchants in Bruges had been obliged to fly for their lives, and that all other Englishmen found in the towns had been seized by the Earl of Flanders, and thrown into prison, and their goods confiscated.
The young knights practised at tilting daily under the eye of Sir Ralph, and at the end of three months could carry off rings skilfully, and could couch their lances truly, whether at breast-piece or helm. It was nigh two years since they had first ridden to London, and both had grown tall and greatly widened. Edgar was still by far the taller and stronger, and was now an exceptionally powerful young man. Albert was of a fair strength and stature, and from his constant practice with Edgar, had attained almost as great a skill with his weapons. When they jousted they always used lighter spears than when they practised at the ring, for in a charge, Edgar's weight and strength would have carried Albert out of his saddle, and that with such force as might have caused him serious injury; the lances therefore were made so slight as to shiver at the shock.
"You are like to be employing your weapons to better advantage soon," Sir Ralph said one day on his return from London. "You know of the rivalry between the two popes, and that we hold for Urban while France champions Clement."
"Yes, sir," Edgar said; "but how is that likely to give occasion for us to betake ourselves to arms again?"
"Urban is going to use us as his instrument against France and Spain. A bull was received yesterday, of which copies have also been sent to all the bishops, calling upon Richard to engage in a sort of Holy War to this end. He has ordered that all church property throughout England shall be taxed, and that the bishops shall exhort all persons to give as much as they can afford for the same purpose. To all those who take part in the war he gives absolution from all sins, and the same to those who, staying at home, contribute to the Church's need.
"The sum of money thus raised, which, I doubt not, will be great, is to be devoted partly to an expedition against France, and partly to one under Lancaster against Spain. As it is a church war, the expedition to France is to be led by a churchman, and Urban has chosen Sir Henry Spencer, Bishop of Norwich, who, if you will remember, bore himself so stoutly against the insurgents in his diocese, as the nominal leader. The king has taken the matter up heartily, and many of the knights whom I met at Court are also well content, seeing that the war is to be conducted at the expense of the Church and not of themselves; and I doubt not that a large number of knights and gentlemen will take part in the expedition, which is of the nature of a crusade.
"More than that, I met an old friend, Sir Hugh Calverley, with whom I have fought side by side a score of times, and whose name is, of course, well known to you. He is minded also to go, partly because he hates the French, and partly because of the pope's blessing and absolution. Seeing that, I said to him, 'As you are going, Sir Hugh, I pray you to do me a favour.'
"'There is no one I would more willingly oblige, old friend,' he said.
"'My son,' I went on, 'and a friend of his whom I regard almost as a son, were knighted more than a year since, as you may have heard, for their valiant conduct in the time of the troubles here.'
"'I have heard the story,' he said. 'It is well known to all at Court.'
"'Since then, Sir Hugh, they have been over in Flanders, where they gained the approbation of Van Artevelde by their conduct, and fought stoutly at the grievous battle of Rosbecque. But hitherto they have had no knightly leader. They have gained such experience as they could by themselves, but I would that they should campaign in the train of a valiant and well-known knight like yourself, under whose eyes they could gain distinction as well as a knowledge of military affairs.'
"'I will take them with me gladly,' he said. 'They must be young knights of rare mettle, and even apart from my regard for you I should be right glad to have them ride with me.'"
Both the young knights gave exclamations of pleasure. It was hard for a knight unattached to the train of some well-known leader to rise to distinction, and there was no English knight living who bore a higher reputation than Sir Hugh Calverley, so that to ride under him would be an honour indeed. But some months passed before the preparations were complete. Throughout England the bishops and priests preached and incited the people to what they considered a Holy War. The promises of absolution of past and future sins were in proportion to the money given. In the diocese of London alone, a tun full of gold and silver was gathered, and by Lent the total amounted to what at that time was the fabulous sum of 2,500,000 francs. Thomas, Bishop of London, and brother to the Earl of Devonshire, was appointed by Urban to go with the Duke of Lancaster to Spain, as chief captain, with two thousand spears and four thousand archers, and half the money gathered was to be spent on this expedition, and the other half on that of the Bishop of Norwich.
The expeditions were to set out together, but one progressed far more rapidly than the other. The Bishop of Norwich was very popular. He was of ancient lineage, had personally shown great bravery, and was highly esteemed. Upon the other hand, the Duke of Lancaster was hated. Thus great numbers of knights and others enlisted eagerly under the bishop, while very few were willing to take service under the duke. Five hundred spearmen, and fifteen hundred men-at-arms and archers were soon enrolled under the bishop's banner. A great number of priests, too, followed the example of the bishop, threw aside the cassock and clad themselves in armour to go to the war in the spirit of crusaders.
Great numbers passed over from Dover and Sandwich in parties to wait at Calais for the arrival of their leaders. At Easter, the bishop, Sir Hugh Calverley, and two of the principal knights attended the king and his council, and swore to do their best to bring to an end the matter on which they were engaged, and to war only against the supporters of Clement. The king begged them to wait for a month at Calais, promising that he would send them over many men-at-arms and archers, and Sir William Beauchamp as marshal to the army. The bishop promised the king to do this, and he and his party sailed from Dover and arrived at Calais on April 23, 1383.
The young knights had gone up to town a month before by invitation of Sir Robert Gaiton, and had stayed with him for a week. At the end of that time he presented each of them with a superb suit of Milan steel, richly inlaid with gold, and two fine war-horses.
"It is a gift that I have long promised you," he said. "I gave orders to my agents in Italy a year since to spare neither time nor trouble to obtain the best that the armourers of Milan could turn out. The horses are of Yorkshire breed, and are warranted sound at every point."
"It is a princely present, Sir Robert," Edgar said, "and, indeed, a most timely one, for truly we have well-nigh grown out of the other suits, although when we got them it seemed to us that we should never be able to fill them properly; but of late we have been forced to ease the straps, and to leave spaces between the pieces, by which lance or arrow might well find entrance."
Sir Ralph had gone up with them and introduced them to Sir Hugh, who promised to give them two days' warning when they were to join him at Sandwich or Dover. During this week Edgar for the most part went about alone, Albert, at first to his surprise, and then to his amusement, always making some pretext or other for not accompanying him, but passing, as he found on his return, the greater portion of the time in the house, in discourse, as he said, with Dame Gaiton, but as Edgar shrewdly guessed, chiefly with Ursula, who, he found, obligingly kept his friend company while the dame was engaged in her household duties. It seemed to him, too, that on the ride back to St. Alwyth Albert was unusually silent and depressed in spirits.
Edgar himself, however, experienced something of the same feeling when he took his last farewell from the De Courcys before starting for Dover. On this occasion each took with him four men-at-arms, stout fellows, Albert's being picked men from among the De Courcy retainers, while Hal Carter had selected his three mates from among the villagers, and had, during the last three months, trained them assiduously in the use of their arms.
"How long do you think that you are likely to be away, Edgar?" his father asked, the evening before the party started.
"I cannot tell you, father, but I do not think that it will be long. If the expedition had started six months ago, it would have arrived in Flanders in time to have helped the Flemings, and with their aid the French might have been driven flying over the frontier; but I cannot see what two or three thousand men can do. We cannot fight the whole strength of France by ourselves."
"It seems to me a hare-brained affair altogether," Mr. Ormskirk said; "almost as mad, only in a different way, as the crusade of Peter the Hermit. The Church has surely trouble enough in these days, what with men like Wickliffe, who denounce her errors, and point out how far she has fallen back from the simple ways of old times, what with the impatience or indifference of no small part of the people, the pomp and wasteful confusion of the prelates, and the laziness of the monks--she has plenty of matters to look after without meddling in military affairs.
"What would she say if a score of nobles were to take upon themselves to tell her to set her house in order, to adopt reforms, and to throw aside sloth and luxury; and yet the Church is stirring up a war, and raising and paying an army of fighting men--and for what? To settle which of two men shall be pope. The simple thing would be to hold a high tournament, and to let Urban and Clement don armour and decide between themselves, in fair fight, who should be pope. They might as well do that as set other men to fight for them. I see not what good can come of it, Edgar."
"Albert and myself are of the same opinion, father. Certainly with two or three thousand men we can hardly expect to march to Paris and force the King of France to declare for our pope. Still, we shall march in good company, and shall both be proud to do so under the banner of so distinguished a knight as Sir Hugh Calverley."
"I say naught against that, Edgar; but I would rather see you start with him as knights-errant, willing at all times to couch a lance for damsels in distress. The day has passed for crusades. Surely we have had experience enough to see that solid advantages are not to be won by religious enthusiasm. Men may be so inspired to deeds of wondrous valour, but there is no instance of permanent good arising out of such expeditions. As for this in which you are going to embark, it seems to me to be the height of folly."
The next day the two young knights rode to Canterbury, and thence to Dover. The following evening the Bishop of Norwich, with his train, Sir Hugh Calverley, and other knights, arrived, and the next morning embarked with their following and horses on board three ships, and sailed to Calais. Those who had preceded them were already impatient to take the field. The news that there was to be a further delay of a month until Sir William Beauchamp with reinforcements should arrive, caused much disappointment and vexation.
"'Tis unfortunate," Sir Hugh said, one evening a few days later to the knights of his party, "that there are not more men here accustomed to war, and who have learned that patience and obedience are as needful as strong arms, if a campaign is to be carried out successfully. The Bishop of Norwich is young and fiery, and he hath many like himself round him, so that he frets openly at this delay. Moreover, Sir Thomas Trivet and Sir William Helmon are too full of ardour to act with discretion, and are ready enough to back up the bishop in his hot desire to be doing something. I regret that this army is not, like the army which fought at Crécy and Poictiers, composed of men well inured to war, with a great number of good archers and led by experienced warriors, instead of a hasty gathering of men, who have been fired by the exhortations of the priests and the promises of the pope.
"We are but a small gathering. We may take some castles, and defeat the forces that the nobles here gather against us, but more than that we cannot do unless England arms in earnest. I foresaw this, and spoke to the council when they prayed me to go with the bishop; but when they pointed out that what I said made it all the more needful that one of grave experience and years should go with him, and prayed me to accept the office, I consented."
On the 4th of May the Bishop of Norwich took advantage of Sir Hugh's absence--he having gone for two days to see a cousin who was commander of Guines--to call the other leaders together, and said that it was time they did some deed of arms, and rightly employed the money with which the Church had furnished them. All agreed with him, and the bishop then proposed that instead of entering France they should march to Flanders, which was now a portion of France. To this Sir Thomas Trivet and Sir William Helmon cordially agreed.
When Sir Hugh returned another council was called, and the matter was laid before him. Sir Hugh opposed it altogether. In the first place, they had given their word to the king to wait for a month for the promised reinforcements; in the second place, they had not come over as Englishmen to fight the French, but as followers of Pope Urban to fight those of Clement, and the men of Flanders were, like themselves, followers of Urban. The bishop answered him very hotly, and as the other knights and all present agreed with the bishop, Sir Hugh reluctantly gave way, and said that if they were determined upon going to Flanders he would ride with them. Accordingly notice was given through the town that the force would march the next morning. All assembled at the order to the number of three thousand, and marched from Calais to Gravelines.
No preparations for defence had been made there, for there was no war between England and Flanders. However, the burghers defended the place for a short time, and then withdrew, with their wives and families, to the cathedral, which was a place of strength. Here they defended themselves for two days. The church was then stormed, and all its defenders put to the sword. The news excited the greatest surprise and indignation in Flanders, and the earl at once sent two English knights who were with him to Gravelines to protest, and with orders to obtain from the bishop a safe-conduct to go to England to lay the matter before the English king and his council.
When they arrived at Gravelines the bishop refused their request for a safe-conduct, but told them to tell the earl that he was not warring against Flanders, nor was his army an army of England, but of Pope Urban, and that, although the greater portion of Flanders was Urbanist, the Lord of Bar--in whose dominion Gravelines stood--was for Clement, and so were his people. If he and they would acknowledge Pope Urban, he would march away without doing damage and paying for all he took, but unless they did so he would force them to submit. The people of Artois, however, who were French rather than Flemings, took the matter in their own hands, and twelve thousand men, under some knights from Nieuport and other towns, marched to Dunkirk and then to Mardyck, a large village not far from Gravelines.
Edgar and Albert had taken no part in the attack upon the cathedral, but remained with Sir Hugh Calverley in the house that he occupied as soon as resistance of the entry to the town had ended.
"On the field I will fight with the rest," he said, "but I will have no hand in this matter. There has been no defiance sent to the Earl of Flanders nor received from him, and 'tis not my habit to fight burghers against whom we have no complaint, and who are but defending their homes against us."
The two young knights were well pleased with this decision. It was an age when quarter was but seldom given, and wholesale slaughters followed battles, so that they had, naturally, the ideas common to the time. Still, they both felt that this attack was wholly unprovoked and altogether beyond the scope of the expedition, and were well pleased that their leader would have naught to do with it. It was, however, a different matter when they heard that an army twelve thousand strong was coming out against them, and they were quite ready to take their share in the fight.
While waiting at Gravelines several other knights had joined the army, among them Sir Nicholas Clifton and Sir Hugh's cousin, the commander of Guines, Sir Hugh Spencer, nephew of the bishop, and others.
The force consisted of six hundred mounted men, sixteen hundred archers, and the rest foot-men. They found that the Flemings had fallen back to Dunkirk, and had taken up a position in front of that town. The bishop, on approaching them, sent forward a herald, to ask them whether they were for Pope Urban or Clement, and that if they were for Urban he had no quarrel with them. As soon, however, as the herald approached, the Flemings fell upon him and killed him. This excited the most lively indignation among the English, for among all civilized people the person of a herald was held to be sacred.
The bishop and knights at once drew up the force in order of battle. The men on foot were formed into a wedge. The archers were placed on the two flanks of the unmounted men-at-arms, while the cavalry prepared to charge as soon as opportunity offered. The army was preceded by the standard of the Church. The trumpets on both sides sounded, and as they came within range the English archers poured flights of arrows among the Flemings. These advanced boldly to the attack of the foot-men. Again and again the horsemen charged down upon them, but were unable to break their solid lines, and for a time the battle was doubtful, but the English archers decided the fate of the day. The Flemings, although they resisted firmly the charge of the men-at-arms, were unable to sustain the terrible and continuous rain of arrows, and their front line fell back.
As soon as they did so the second line wavered and broke. Then the bishop with his knights and men-at-arms charged furiously down upon them, and the battle was over. The Flemings broke and fled in wild disorder, but the English pursued them so hotly that they entered Dunkirk with them. Here again and again they attempted to make a stand, but speedily gave way before the onslaught of the English. No one distinguished themselves in the battle more than did the priests and monks who were fighting on the side of the bishop, and it was said among the others that these must have mistaken their vocation, and that had they entered the army instead of the Church they would have made right valiant knights.
The English loss was four hundred, that of the Flemings was very much heavier. There died, however, among them no knights or persons of quality, for the rising was one of the people themselves, and as yet the Earl of Flanders was waiting for the King of England's reply to the message he had sent by the two knights from Sluys. The English, however, considered that the absence of any horsemen or knights was due to the fact that these remembered what terrible havoc had been made among the chivalry of France at Crécy and Poictiers, and cared not to expose themselves to that risk.
CHAPTER XVII
PRISONERS
After the capture of Dunkirk all the seaports as far as Sluys were taken by the English, who then marched to Ypres, to which town they at once laid siege, and were joined by twenty thousand men from Ghent. Their own number had swollen considerably by the arrival from England of many knights and men-at-arms, besides numbers of foot-men, attracted as much by the news of the great spoil that had been captured in the Flemish towns as by the exhortations and promises of the clergy.
Ypres had a numerous garrison, commanded by several knights of experience. The works were very strong, and every assault was repulsed with heavy loss. One of these was led by Sir Hugh Calverley. The force crossed the ditches by throwing in great bundles of wood with which each of the foot-men had been provided, and having reached the wall, in spite of a hail of cross-bow bolts and arrows, ladders were planted, and the leaders endeavoured to gain the ramparts. Sir Hugh Calverley succeeded in obtaining a footing, but for a time he stood almost alone. Two or three other knights, however, sprang up. Just as they did so one of the ladders broke with the weight upon it, throwing all heavily to the ground.
Edgar and Albert were with a party of archers who were keeping up a rain of arrows. Seeing that the situation was bad they now ran forward, followed by four of their men-at-arms, the others having charge of the horses in the camp. A few more men-at-arms had gained the ramparts by the time they arrived at the foot of the ladders, where numbers waited to take their turns to ascend.
"There is not much broken off this one, Sir Edgar," Hal Carter said; "not above three feet, I should say. We might make a shift to get up with that."
"Pick it up, Hal, and bring it along a short distance. Possibly we may be able to mount unobserved, for the fight is hot above, and the attention of the enemy will be fixed there."
Followed by their own men-at-arms, and by a few others who saw what their intentions were, they kept along at the foot of the wall until they reached an angle some thirty yards away. Searching about they found several stones that had been dislodged from the battlements during the siege. With these they built up a platform, and raising the ladder on this, they found that it reached to within a foot of the top.
"Now," Edgar said, "follow us as quickly as you can, but do not try the ladder too heavily; it has broken once, so the wood cannot be over-strong."
Then, followed closely by Albert and the men-at-arms, he ascended the walls. So intent were the defenders upon the strife going on round Sir Hugh Calverley that Edgar was not noticed until, putting his hands upon the wall, he vaulted over it. He held his sword between his teeth, and betaking himself to this fell so fiercely and suddenly upon the enemy, that several were cut down and the rest recoiled so far that Albert and the four men-at-arms were able to join him before the enemy rallied. Every moment added to the strength of the party, and as soon as some twenty had gathered behind him, Edgar flung himself upon the enemy with a shout of "_St. George! St. George!_" and, in spite of the opposition of the defenders, fought his way along the wall until he joined Sir Hugh and the little group who were defending themselves against tremendous odds.
Sir Hugh himself was seriously wounded. Two or three of his knights lay dead beside him, and had it not been for the arrival of the reinforcement the fight would speedily have terminated, for the English were so penned up against the wall that there was no footing for more to join them. The suddenness of the attack drove the enemy back some little distance, and this enabled a score of those upon the ladders to make their way onto the rampart.
"Bravely done!" Sir Hugh Calverley said, as he leant against the wall, utterly exhausted by his efforts and loss of blood. A moment later he would have fallen had not Albert sprung to his side.
"We must save Sir Hugh at all risks," he said to two of the knight's companions, who were also wounded. "Will you, sir knights, aid in lowering him down the ladder, and see that he is carried off? You have done your share. It is our turn now, and we can at least hold the rampart until he is in safety."
Leaning over, he shouted to the men on one of the ladders to descend and leave the ladder clear, as Sir Hugh was to be lowered down.
"Methinks I can carry him, Sir Albert," Hal Carter said. "I have carried two sacks of wheat on my shoulder before now, and methinks that I can carry one knight and his armour."
He took his place on the ladder, and Sir Hugh was lowered to him, and laying him on his shoulder Hal carried him safely down. The two wounded knights followed, and then Hal sprang up the ladder again. While this was being done Edgar and his party had been holding the enemy at bay. Hal was followed by some of the men-at-arms, and others poured up by the other ladders. Edgar saw that they were now strong enough to take the offensive, and as the English numbered nearly a hundred, he fell upon the enemy to the right, while Albert led another party to the left.
For some time the fury with which the English fought drove the enemy before them on either hand. Every moment they were joined by fresh men, who were now able to pour in a steady stream up the ladders. The enemy, too, were harassed by the English archers, who, advancing to the edge of the ditch, sent their shafts thick and fast among them. The town bells were clanging fiercely, drums beating, and horns sounding as the alarm spread that the besiegers had gained a footing on the walls, and great numbers of the garrison could be seen pouring along the streets leading to the threatened point.
Had there been more ladders, so that reinforcements could have arrived more rapidly, the place might have been won. As it was, it was evident that success was impossible. Edgar's party still gained ground slowly, but he saw that Albert was being pressed backwards.
"Fall back, men!" he shouted, "slowly, and keeping your face to the enemy. The odds are too heavy for us."
Foot by foot, fighting silently and obstinately, the English fell back until their party joined that of Albert, at the spot where the wall had been won. Their exulting foes pressed hotly upon them, but Edgar's sword and the heavy long-handled mace wielded by Hal Carter did such terrible execution that the rest were able to retreat in good order.
"Jump down, my men!" Edgar shouted. "You will break the ladders if you try to go by them. The ground is but soft, and the wall of no great height. Do not hurry. We will cover you and then follow."
Gradually the number of the party on the walls was lessened, as by threes and fours they leapt down; while many, getting onto the ladders, slipped rapidly to the ground. When there were but half a dozen left, Hal suddenly exclaimed: "Sir Albert has fallen--wounded!"
Edgar freed himself from his opponent of the moment by a sweeping blow, and then with a spring placed himself astride of his friend. Hal Carter joined him. The rest of their followers remaining on the wall either jumped over or were cut down. Fortunately Albert had fallen close to the parapet, and his two defenders could not be attacked from behind. For some minutes the fight continued, and then for a moment the enemy drew back astonished at the manner in which two men kept them at bay; then one of the assailants lowered his sword.
"Sir knight," he said, "you have done enough for honour. Never have I seen a stouter fighter. I pray you, then, to surrender, on promise of good treatment and fair terms of ransom to you, to the knight at your feet, and to this stout man-at-arms. I am Sir Robert De Beaulieu."
"Then I yield to you," Edgar said. "I am Sir Edgar Ormskirk, and this knight is my brother-in-arms, Sir Albert De Courcy. I yield in his name and my own, and am glad that, as fortune has declared against us, it should be to so good a knight as Sir Robert De Beaulieu that I surrender my sword."
"Keep it, Sir Edgar, for never have I seen one better wielded. No small damage, indeed, has it done us."
"The stout man-at-arms is my own retainer, and I prythee, sir knight, suffer him to remain with us."
[Illustration: SIR EDGAR AT LAST SURRENDERS TO SIR ROBERT DE BEAULIEU.]
"Assuredly he shall do so."
As soon as the parley began Hal Carter laid down his weapon, and kneeling beside Albert, unlaced his helmet.
"He lives, Sir Edgar!" he said; "he is but stunned, methinks, with the blow of a mace, which has deeply dinted his casque, though, indeed, he has other wounds."
By Sir Robert De Beaulieu's orders, four men now formed a litter with their spears. Albert was laid on it, and Sir Robert, Edgar, and Hal Carter walking in front, and half a score of men-at-arms accompanying them, they made their way to a large house where the knight lodged. Sir Robert had sent on for a leech to be in attendance, and he was there when they arrived. Hal at once took off Albert's armour.
"'Tis well for him that this armour was good," Sir Robert said. "Had it not been, it would have gone hard with him. It must be steel of proof indeed, for I saw the blow struck, and there are but few helmets that would not have been crushed by it."
"He has a deep gash near the neck," the leech said. "The lacings and straps of the helmet and gorget must have been cut by a sharp sword, and another blow has fallen on the same spot. Methinks he has dropped as much from loss of blood as from the blow on the head."
Edgar had by this time taken off his own helmet. As soon as he did so, Sir Robert De Beaulieu, who was somewhat grizzled with age, said:
"In truth, sir knight, you and your companion are young indeed to have fought so doughtily as you have done to-day; you are young to be knights, and yet you have shown a courage and a skill such as no knight could have surpassed. We had thought the affair finished when that stout knight, Sir Hugh Calverley, was down with two others, and but three or four remained on their feet. Then suddenly your party burst upon us, coming from we knew not where, and had you but been reinforced more rapidly the town would have been lost."
Edgar made no reply, for at the moment Hal Carter leant heavily against him.
"I can do no more, Sir Edgar," he murmured; "I am spent."
Edgar caught the brave fellow in his arms and supported him, while two men-at-arms, who had assisted to carry Albert in, unstrapped Hal's armour and gently laid him down on a couch. He was bleeding from half a dozen wounds, and his face was pale and bloodless. Edgar knelt by his side and raised his head.
"I will see to him, sir knight," the surgeon said. "I have bandaged your comrade's injuries, and methinks that he will soon come round."
Then he examined Hal's wounds.
"He will do," he said. "Assuredly there are none of them that are mortal; 'tis but loss of blood that ails him. I will but bandage them hastily now, for there are many other cases waiting for me, and methinks, sir, that you yourself need looking to."
"I am unhurt," Edgar said, in surprise.
"Your doublet is stained with blood from the shoulder to the wrist," Sir Robert said. "A spear-head has penetrated at the shoulder-joint and torn a gash well-nigh to the neck. 'Tis well that it is not worse."
Two of his men-at-arms had by this time taken off Sir Robert's armour also.
"You have ruined my helmet, Sir Edgar, and cut so deep a notch in it that I know not how my head escaped. You have gashed a hole in my gorget and dinted the armour in half a dozen places, and I failed to make a single mark on yours. Never was I engaged with so good a swordsman. I could scarcely believe my eyes when you lifted your vizor, for it seemed to me that you must be in the prime of your manhood, and possessed of strength altogether out of the common."
"I have practised a good deal," Edgar said, quietly, "having indeed little else to do, so it is not surprising that my muscles are hard."
At the knight's order a servant now brought in two goblets of wine. Sir Robert and Edgar then drank to each other, both draining the cups to the bottom.
Albert was not long before he opened his eyes. He looked round in wonder, and smiled faintly when he saw Edgar, who hastened to his side.
"We are out of luck this time, Albert; we are both prisoners. Still, things might have been worse. You were struck down with a mace, but the leech says that the wound on your head is of no great consequence, and that you fainted rather from loss of blood from other gashes than from the blow on the head. I have got off with a scratch on the shoulder. Hal Carter, who fought like a tiger over your body, has come off worst, having fully half a dozen wounds, but it was not before he had killed at least twice as many of his assailants with that terrible mace of his."
So far Edgar had spoken in English. He went on in French:
"This is the good knight, Sir Robert De Beaulieu, who is our captor, and will hold us on ransom."
"You may congratulate yourself, Sir Albert," the knight said, courteously, "that you had such stout defenders as your comrade here and his man-at-arms, because for fully five minutes they held the whole of us at bay, and so stoutly did they fight that we were all glad when Sir Edgar yielded himself to me. Truly, between you, you have done us ill service, for not only have you and your party killed a large number of our men, but you have enabled Sir Hugh Calverley to be carried off, and for so famous a captain we should have claimed a goodly ransom, and it would have been an honour and glory to have taken so fearless a knight. As it is, with the exception of yourselves, no single prisoner has fallen into our hands, and methinks that in all there were not more than ten or twelve in the storming party killed, while we must have lost nigh a hundred. 'Tis the first time I have fought against the English, and in truth you are doughty foemen. It was well that you came into the land but some four or five thousand strong, for had you brought an army you might have marched to Paris. Now, Sir Edgar, I will show you your room."
He led the way along a broad corridor to a large room, the men-at-arms carrying the couch on which Albert was lying.
"I should like to have my man-at-arms brought here also, Sir Robert," Edgar said. "He is a faithful fellow, and I have known him for years. He speaks but little of any language but English, and will, methinks, do better with my nursing than with any other."
In a fortnight Albert was quite convalescent, and Hal was rapidly gaining strength. Three days after they had been taken prisoner Sir Robert had said to Edgar:
"It will be best, Sir Edgar, that you should not go abroad in the streets. The townsmen here, as in other towns in Flanders, are rough fellows. They are, of course, suffering somewhat from the siege, and they murmur that any prisoners should have been taken. They say that your people showed no mercy at Gravelines and Dunkirk, which, methinks, is true enough, and that none should be given here. Yesterday some of their leaders came to the house where I was sitting in council with other knights, and represented that all English prisoners should be put to the sword at once. I pointed out to them that, for their own sakes, as many prisoners should be taken as possible. We hope to defend the town until succour comes, but were the English to capture it, and to find that prisoners who had surrendered had been killed, no mercy would be shown, but every man within the walls would be slain and the city laid in ashes.
"To this they had no answer ready, and retired grumbling. But, in any case, it were better that you did not show yourself in the street, for a tumult might arise, and your life might be sacrificed before any of us could come to your assistance."
"I thank you, Sir Robert, and will gladly take your advice. I have seen somewhat of the townsmen of Ghent and Bruges, and know that, when the fit seizes them, they are not to be restrained."
After that time Sir Robert De Beaulieu seldom left the house, and Edgar found that the doors were kept closed, and that the knight's followers and men-at-arms were also kept in the house. Several times he heard shouts in the street of "Death to the English!"
He took his meals with the knight, while Albert and Hal were served in their room. At the end of the week, however, Albert was able to join the two knights, and a fortnight later Hal was again up and about.
"I fear, Sir Robert, that our presence here is a source of trouble to you," Edgar said one day. "If it could be managed, we would gladly give you our knightly word to send you our ransom at the first opportunity, and not to serve in arms again until it is paid, if you would let us go free."
"I would do so gladly, Sir Edgar, but I fear that it would be difficult to manage. Both before and behind the house there are evidently men on the watch to see that no one passes out. My own men-at-arms have been stopped and questioned, and were you to issue out methinks that there would, on the instant, be an uproar, for so great a crowd would gather in a few minutes that even had you a strong guard you might be torn from them. You see, though some eight of us knights and three hundred men-at-arms were placed here to aid in the defence, we could do naught without the assistance of the townsmen, who have on all occasions fought stoutly. Were there to be a fray now, the safety of the town would be compromised, for the craftsmen of all these towns are as fickle as the wind. The men of Ypres fought by the side of those at Ghent at one time, and when the Count of Flanders came here, great numbers of the townspeople were executed. At present, why, I know not, they are fighting stoutly for the count, while the men of Ghent are with the besiegers; but were there to be troubles between them and us, they might tomorrow open their gates to the English."
"That I can quite believe, Sir Robert. I can only say that we are in your hands, and are ready to pursue any course that you may think best, either to stay here quietly and take the risk of what may come of it or endeavour to escape in disguise if so it could be managed."
"I would that it could be managed, for the matter is causing us grave anxiety. My comrades are, of course, all with me, and hold, that even if it comes to a struggle with the mob, the lives of prisoners who have surrendered on ransom must be defended. I suggested that we should hold counsel here, that two should remain, and that you should sally out with the others, but our faces are all so well known in the town that there would be little chance indeed of your passing undetected."
"Think you, Sir Robert, that we could pass along the roofs, enter a casement a few houses along, and then make our way out in disguise?"
"It would be well-nigh impossible. The roofs are all so sloping that no one could maintain a footing upon them."
"When it gets dusk I will, with your permission, Sir Robert, go up to one of the attics and take a look out."
"By all means do so. Escape in that manner would certainly be the best way out of the dilemma, though I much fear that it cannot be done."
When it became so dark that while he could take a view round, his figure could not be recognized at a short distance, Edgar, with Albert and Hal, went up to the top of the house, and the former got out of the highest of the dormer windows, and, standing on the sill, looked out. The roof was indeed so steep that it would be impossible to obtain a footing upon it. Its ridge was some twenty feet above the window. The houses were of varying heights, some being as much as thirty feet lower than others. Still it seemed to Edgar that it would not be very difficult to make their way along if they were provided with ropes. Descending, he told Sir Robert the result of their investigations.
"It would," he said, "be very desirable, if possible, to come down into some house which was either uninhabited, or where the people were friendly. Still that would not be absolutely necessary, as we might hope to make our way down to the door unperceived."
"There is one house which is empty," Sir Robert said, "for the owner left the town with his family before the siege began, he having another place of business at Liege, He was an old man, and was therefore permitted to leave; for he could have been no good for the defence, and there would, with his family and servants, have been ten mouths more to feed had he remained. It is the sixth house along, I think, but I will see when I go out. Once in the street and away from here, there would be no difficulty. I would meet you a short distance away, and go with you to the walls, from which you could lower yourself down. One or two of my comrades would give their aid, for, naturally, all would be pleased that you should escape, and so put an end to this cause of feud between us and the townsmen. You would, of course, require some rope; that I can easily procure for you."
"We shall want several lengths, Sir Robert, and two or three stout grapnels. We shall also want a strong chisel for forcing open a casement."
"All these you shall have; one of my men shall fetch them to-morrow."
On the following day the ropes and grapnels were brought in, and Sir Robert, who had been out, ascertained that he had been correct, and that the empty house was indeed the sixth from that he occupied. "I have been speaking with two of my comrades," he said, "and they will be with me at ten o'clock to-night at the end of the street that faces the house through which you will descend. I shall accompany you to the foot of the walls. The citizens are on guard there at night, and if they ask questions, as they may well do, my comrades will say that you are bearers of a message to the King of France to pray him to hasten to our aid. I shall not myself go up on to the walls, for were I to do so suspicion might fall upon me. Should you be interrupted as you go along the street to meet us, give a call and we will run to your assistance."
"And now as to our ransom, Sir Robert?" Edgar went on.
"Trouble not yourselves about it," he replied; "you are but young knights, and 'tis a pleasure to me to have been of service to two such valiant young gentlemen. Moreover, I consider that I have no right to a ransom, since, instead of letting you go free to obtain it, or holding you in honourable captivity until it is sent to you, you are obliged to risk your lives, as you assuredly will do, by climbing along those roofs to obtain your liberty; therefore, we will say nothing about it. It may be that some day you will be able to treat leniently some young Flemish or French knight whom you may make captive. As to your armour, I see not how you can carry it away with you, for you will have to swim the ditches; but the first time that there is a flag of truce exchanged I will send it out to you, or should there be no such opportunity, I will, when the siege is over, forward it by the hands of some merchant trading with England, to any address that you may give me there."
The two young knights thanked Sir Robert De Beaulieu most cordially for his kindness to them, and at his request gave him their word not to serve again during the campaign. This, indeed, they were by no means sorry to do, for they had keenly felt the slight paid to Sir Hugh Calverley by the haughty bishop in acting altogether contrary to his advice. They also had been thoroughly disgusted by the massacre at Gravelines, and the sack of so many towns against which England had no cause for complaint.
In the afternoon Sir Robert brought three doublets and caps for them to put over their own clothes, so that they could pass as citizens. They employed some time in wrapping strips of cloth round the grapnels, so that these would fall noiselessly onto the tiles.
At nine o'clock Sir Robert said good-bye to them and went out; and half an hour later they ascended to the upper story. They were well provided with ropes, and had made all their arrangements. Edgar was the first to fasten a rope round his body, and while this was held by his companions he was to get out on the window-sill and throw a grapnel over the ridge and pull himself up by the rope attached to it.
The others were to fasten the rope round their bodies at distances of twenty feet apart, so that if one slipped down the others could check him. Edgar took off his shoes and tied them round his neck, and then stood out on the window-sill, and threw the grapnel over the ridge of the roof; then he drew the rope in until he found that the hook caught on the ridge.
"That is all right," he said to his comrades. "Now keep a firm hold on the rope, but let it gradually out as I climb; if you hear me slipping draw it in rapidly so as to stop me as I come past the window. But there is no fear of that unless the hook gives way."
Then he swung himself up to the roof of the dormer window and proceeded to haul himself by the rope up the steep incline, helping himself as much as possible with his feet and knees. He was heartily glad when he gained the ridge, and had thus accomplished the most dangerous part of the work. He was able now to fix the grapnel firmly, and sitting astride of the roof, he called down that he was ready. It was easier work for Albert to follow him. Not only was the latter certain that the grapnel was safely fixed, but Edgar, pulling upon the rope, was enabled to give him a good deal of assistance. In two or three minutes Hal Carter joined them.
"In faith, master," he said, panting, "I had not deemed that so much of my strength had gone from me. If it had not been for the help you gave me I doubt if I could have climbed up that rope."
They now made their way along to the end of the roof. The grapnel was fixed, and Edgar slid down the rope to the next roof, which was some fifteen feet below them. They did not attempt to free the grapnel, fearing that in its fall it might make a clatter; they therefore used another to mount to the next house, which was as high as that which they had left. There was but a difference of four feet in the height of the next, and they had not to use the grapnel again until they reached the sixth house, which was ten feet below that next to it.
[Illustration: THE PRISONERS MAKE THEIR ESCAPE OVER THE ROOFS OF YPRES.]
There was light enough to enable them to make out the position of the dormer window below them, and fixing the grapnel, Edgar, aided by his companions lowering him, made his way down beside it, and knelt upon the sill, his companions keeping a steady strain upon the rope. With his chisel he had but little difficulty in prising open the casement. His companions were not long in joining him. Once inside the house they made their way with great caution. They had no means of striking a light, and were forced to grope about with their swords in front of them to prevent their touching any piece of furniture, till at last they discovered the door. It was not fastened, and passing through, and, as before, feeling the floor carefully as they went, they presently found the head of the stairs.
After this it was comparatively easy work, though a stoppage was necessary at each landing. At last, to their satisfaction, they found themselves in a flagged passage, and knew that they were on the ground floor. They made their way along the passage, and soon reached the door. It was locked with so massive a fastening that it would have been difficult to unfasten it from the outside; but with the aid of the chisel they had but little difficulty in forcing back the lock. They paused for a minute to listen, as a passer-by might have been startled by the sound of the bolts being shot in an empty house. All was quiet, however, and, opening the door cautiously, Edgar stepped out.
"The street is all clear," he said; "except half a dozen fellows watching in front of the house we have left, there is not a soul in sight." The others joined him, closing the door silently behind them. They had not put on their shoes again, so with noiseless steps they crossed the street and turned up the one that had been indicated by Sir Robert. After going a few paces they stopped, put on their shoes, and then walked boldly along. When they reached the end of the street three figures came out from a deep doorway to meet them.
"Is all well?" one asked.
This was the signal that had been agreed upon.
"All is well, Sir Robert. We have escaped without any difficulty or aught going wrong."
"The saints be praised!" the knight ejaculated. "These with me are Sir Oliver Drafurn and Sir François Regnault."
"Right glad we are, knights," one of them said, "that we can assist in giving you your freedom. A foul shame indeed would it have been had two such gallant fighters been massacred by this rascally mob, after yielding themselves to a knight."
"Truly, sirs, we are greatly beholden to you," Edgar replied, "and trust that an occasion may occur in which we may repay to some of your countrymen the great service you are now rendering us."
They had gone but a short distance further when the door of a tavern opened and twelve or fifteen half-drunken soldiers poured out.
"Whom have we here?" one of them shouted. "Faith, if they are burghers they must pay for being thus late in the streets."
"Silence, knaves," Sir François Regnault said, sternly. "What mean ye by this roystering? Disperse to your quarters at once, or by St. James, some of you shall hang in the morning, as a lesson to others that the burgesses of Ypres are not to be insulted by drunken revellers."
As by this time the speaker had moved on into the light that streamed through the open door, the soldier saw at once that it was a knight, and, muttering excuses, went hastily down the street. No one else was encountered until they reached the foot of the wall. Here Sir Robert took a hearty farewell of them. The two knights first mounted the steps to the wall.
As they reached the top a sentry close by challenged.
"France," Sir Oliver replied; "and, hark ye, make no noise. I am Sir Oliver Drafurn, and I am here with Sir François Regnault to pass three messengers over the wall, bearers of important dispatches. We do not wish the news to get abroad, so take your halbert and march up and down."
Hal Carter had brought one of the ropes, twisted round him for the purpose.
"You are on the side facing the English camp," Sir Oliver said. "Those are the lights that you see ahead. You will have three ditches to swim, and will find it cold work, but there is no other way for it."
After giving hearty thanks to the knights, the three were lowered, one at a time, and the rope was then dropped down. It was a good deal longer than was necessary for descending the wall, but Edgar, rather to the surprise of the others, had chosen it for the purpose. The first ditch was but ten yards away; it was some thirty feet across.
"Now," Edgar said, "I will cross first. I am much the strongest, for neither of you has fully recovered his strength. The water will be icy cold, therefore I will swim across first, and do you, when I am over, each hold to the rope and I will pull you across."
Short as was the distance the work was trying, for the night was bitterly cold, and the ditches would have been frozen hard, were it not that twice a day the besieged went out and broke the ice, which had now begun to bind again. At last, however, Edgar got across.
"Do you take the rope, Albert, and let Hal hold on by you, for the passage I have made is but narrow."
A few strong pulls on Edgar's part brought them across.
"It is well," he said, as they climbed out, "that the knights promised to go one each way, to tell the watchers on the walls to take no heed of any sounds that they might hear of breaking ice, for that those leaving the town were doing so by their authority."
The two other ditches were crossed in the same way, but the work was more difficult, as the besieged only broke the ice of these once a day.
"We should never have got across without your aid, Edgar," Albert said. "I could scarce hold on to the rope. My hands are dead, and I feel as if I were frozen to the bone."
"Let us run for a bit, Albert, to warm our blood. Another quarter of a mile and we shall be challenged by our sentries."
CHAPTER XVIII
A NOBLE GIFT
The pace at which the party started soon slackened, for neither Albert nor Hal Carter could maintain it. However, it was not long before they heard the sentry challenge:
"Who go there?"
"Sir Albert De Courcy and Sir Edgar Ormskirk escaped from Ypres," Edgar answered.
"Stand where you are till I call the sergeant," the man said, and shouted "Sergeant!" at the top of his voice. In five minutes a sergeant and two men-at-arms came up.
"Hurry, sergeant, I pray you," Edgar said. "We have swum three ditches, and my companions, being weakened by their wounds, are well-nigh perished."
"Come on," the sergeant said, "it is clear at any rate that you are Englishmen." He had brought a torch with him, and as they came up looked at them narrowly, then he saluted. "I know you, Sir Edgar, disguised as you are. I was fighting behind you on the wall five weeks since, and had it not been for the strength of your arm, I should have returned no more to England."
"How is Sir Hugh Calverley?" Edgar asked, as they hurried towards the camp.
"His wounds are mending fast," the sergeant said, "and he went out of his tent to-day for the first time. I saw him myself."
A quarter of an hour's walking brought them to the tent occupied by Sir Hugh and his followers. A light was still burning there, and they heard voices within.
"May we enter?" Edgar said, as he slightly opened the flap of the tent.
"Surely, that must be the voice of Sir Edgar Ormskirk!" Sir Hugh exclaimed.
"It is I, sure enough, and with me is Sir Albert De Courcy and my brave man-at-arms."
As he spoke he stepped into the tent. Two knights were there, and they and Sir Hugh advanced with outstretched hands to meet the new-comers.
"Welcome back, welcome back!" Sir Hugh exclaimed, in a tone of emotion. "My brave knights, I and my two comrades here have to thank you for our lives, for, although in truth I know naught about it, I have heard from Sir Thomas Vokes and Sir Tristram Montford how you brought the band to our assistance, and how you kept the enemy at bay, while this good fellow of yours bore me down the ladder on his shoulder; while from those who escaped afterwards we heard how you both, with but two or three others, kept the foe back, and gave time for the rest to jump from the walls or slide down the ladders. But your faces are blue, and your teeth chattering!"
"We have had to swim three ditches, and the ice having formed pretty thickly, it was no child's work."
"First, do you each drain a goblet of wine," Sir Hugh said, "and then to your tent. All your things are untouched. Knights, will you go with them and rub them down till their skin glows, and then wrap them up in blankets?" He called, and two servants came in. "Heat three bottles of wine in a bowl with plenty of spices," he said, "and carry it to these knights' tent, and take a portion to the tent of their men-at-arms for the use of this good fellow. See that your comrades rub you down," he said to Hal. "They will be glad indeed to see you back; for, although we heard from a prisoner that the two knights were alive, we knew not whether any others had been taken with them. Tell Hawkins to light two torches at once and fix them in the knights' tent, and put two others in that of the men-at-arms. Mind, Sir Edgar, once between the blankets, you stay there till morning. Your story will keep until then."
After throwing off their wet clothes, and being rubbed down until they glowed, Edgar and Albert were soon covered up in blankets, and after drinking the hot spiced wine, soon fell asleep. In the morning they related their story to Sir Hugh Calverley and the other two knights.
"'Tis Sir Edgar who should tell the tale," Albert said, "for indeed I know but little about it from the time I saw you lowered over the wall. Things went well with us for a time; we were joined by more men, and were strong enough to divide into two parties, Edgar going to the right while I went to the left. We cleared the wall for some distance, and methinks had there been ladders, so that we could have been helped more quickly, the town would have been won, but the enemy were reinforced more quickly than we were, and we began to lose ground. Then came a body of knights who beat us back till we were close to the point where the ladders were set. Then a knight made at me with a mace. I saw his arms raised, and after that I knew nothing more."
"The last man who jumped from the wall, Sir Albert, told us that he saw that you were down and that Sir Edgar and one of his men-at-arms were fighting like demons over you. Now, Sir Edgar, tell us how the matter ended."
"We made a shift to keep them back, Sir Hugh, for some five minutes, when one of the French knights offered to give us terms of surrender on ransom, and seeing no use in fighting longer when the matter could only have terminated one way, I surrendered."
Then he related the good treatment they had met with at the hands of Sir Robert De Beaulieu, and the manner in which he had enabled them to escape the fury of the rabble of Ypres, and had sent them away free from ransom.
"It was well done, indeed, of him," Sir Hugh said, warmly. "Truly a courteous and knightly action. And so you have both given your pledge to fight no more in this campaign. By St. George, I should not be ill-pleased if someone would put me under a similar pledge, for I tell you that I am heartily sick of it. Never did so disordered an army start from England. An army led by bishops and priests is something strange. Bishops have before now ridden often in battle, but never before did they assume command. Methinks when I go home that I will ask the king to give me the direction of Westminster Monastery and Abbey; at any rate I could not make a worse hand of it than the Bishop of Norwich is doing of this. And you say that De Beaulieu promised to send your armour on the first opportunity. That is, indeed, a generous action, for the armour of a prisoner is always the property of his captor, and your armour is of great value. I would that we could do something to show the good knight that we appreciate his generosity."
"We have our chains," Edgar said. "Of course we did not carry them about us when we should have to fight, and they are very heavy and of the finest workmanship. These would we gladly send to him, would we not, Albert, in token of our gratitude? Though, costly as they are, they are of much less value than the armour."
"I would gladly add something of my own account," Sir Hugh said, "seeing that you are in my train, and one does not like to be surpassed by a foreign knight. As to the matter of the ransom, that does not trouble me, and indeed, seeing that you surrendered to him, and that he felt that he could not give protection, and you had to risk your lives in getting away, it was but reasonable that he should remit it, but in the matter of the armour the case is different. I will add to your chains a reliquary which was presented to me by Pedro of Castile when I saved his life in the fight at Najarra. He told me that it contained a nail of the true cross, and that it was brought to Spain by a Spaniard of royal blood who was a knight commander of the Temple.
"I do not know how far this is true, for as one gets older one loses faith in these monkish stories of reliquaries. However, the casket is set with gems of value, and there is with it a parchment setting forth its history; at any rate it is a gift that is worthy of even a prince's acceptance. I will send it to him as a token that Sir Hugh Calverley recognizes his chivalrous behaviour to the knights who were captured while covering his carriage from the ramparts of Ypres, and, therefore, sends this gift to him in all honour and courtesy, together with the gold chains of the knights themselves. We shall not have long to wait. There are fights well-nigh every day, and when these are over there is a truce of an hour to carry off the wounded and dead."
The young knights thanked Sir Hugh for thus generously supplementing their own offering in return for their armour, but he waved it aside.
"You saved my life," he said; "or at any rate you saved me from capture, and had I fallen into their hands methinks that I should have had to pay a far heavier ransom before they let me out again."
Two days later there was heavy fighting again and much loss on both sides. It ceased as usual without any advantage being won by the besiegers. The fighting ended soon after mid-day, and at one o'clock the trumpet sounded a truce. Sir Hugh mounted, with his two knights, saying to Edgar: "It were perhaps best that you should not ride with me. 'Tis likely that the townsmen still think that you are in Beaulieu's house, and were it known that you had escaped it might bring trouble upon him and the two knights who aided your escape from the wall."
He took with him a pursuivant and trumpeter, and, riding through the English and Flemish men-at-arms, who were already engaged in carrying away the dead and wounded, he rode up to within a short distance of the wall, then the pursuivant and trumpeter advanced to the edge of the moat, and the latter blew a loud blast.
In a short time a knight appeared on the wall, and the pursuivant cried in a loud voice:
"Sir Hugh Calverley, a valiant and puissant knight of England, desires speech with Sir Robert De Beaulieu, a brave and gentle knight of Flanders."
"I am Sir Robert De Beaulieu. Pray tell Sir Hugh Calverley to do me the courtesy to wait for me a quarter of an hour, and I will then issue forth and speak to him."
At the end of that time Sir Robert rode out, and crossed the bridge which had been lowered across the ditch for the passage of the soldiers engaged in collecting the dead. He was followed by two esquires and four men-at-arms, the latter bearing something behind them on their horses. The two knights saluted each other courteously, and Sir Hugh introduced his two companions to Sir Robert.
"I am glad, indeed," the latter said to Calverley, "thus to have the opportunity of meeting one of the most famous knights in Europe. My men-at-arms are bearers of the armour of Sir Edgar Ormskirk and Sir Albert De Courcy, who are, I believe, knights riding in your train. I promised them that I would send the armour on the first opportunity, and am glad indeed that the occasion has come so speedily."
He and Sir Hugh had both dismounted after saluting each other, and the latter held out his mailed hand to the Fleming.
"Sir Robert De Beaulieu," he said, "I have heard of you as a brave and honourable knight, and you have in this matter proved yourself to be a chivalrous and generous one in thus rendering up the spoil fairly won by you, without ransom; but it is not our custom to be outdone in generosity. The armour is of no ordinary value, and, as these knights of mine were made prisoners while covering my removal when insensible and helpless, I feel that the debt is mine as well as theirs. They have begged me to give you these two chains, both, as you see, of value, and of the best Italian work. To these I add, as a token of my esteem for you, this casket, which was given to me by Don Pedro of Spain when I rode with the Black Prince to aid him in his struggle with Don Henry. As you will see by the parchment attached to the casket, it contains a nail of the true cross, brought from Palestine by a Spanish grandee who was knight commander of the Spanish branch of the Knights Templar. I pray you to accept it, not as part of the ransom for my knights' armour, but as a proof of my esteem for one who has shown himself a flower of knightly courtesy."
"It would be churlish, Sir Hugh Calverley, for me to refuse so noble a gift thus courteously tendered. I shall prize it beyond any in my possession, not only for its own value and holiness, but as the gift of so noble and famous a knight. As to the chains, I pray you to return them to your brave young knights. Never did I see men who bore themselves more gallantly, and Sir Edgar, especially, withstood with honour a score of us for some time, and at last he yielded, not because he was conquered, but to save further bloodshed. They are young, and may, like enough, some day be again made prisoners. In that case they may find the chains, which are of singular beauty, of value to them; therefore, I pray you, hand them back to them again as a token of how warmly I appreciate their bravery and conduct."
"Right gladly will I do so. As you put it in that way, Sir Robert, they will appreciate the gift as much as I do, and, as you say, maybe the chains will be useful to them some day, for they are not of those who battle for spoil, and, like myself, have refused all share in that which the army has taken in Flanders, holding that we had no cause of dispute with your people, and that our assault upon them was unfairly and unjustly made."
After some more compliments had been exchanged, the two knights grasped each other's hands courteously, remounted, and then saluting again, rode off. While the conversation had been going on, Sir Robert's men-at-arms had handed over the armour to the three retainers who had ridden behind Sir Hugh and his two knights.
Edgar and Albert were delighted at regaining their armour. It would have been impossible for them to have replaced the harness by similar suits, and, moreover, they felt that they would have been humiliated had they, on their return to England, been obliged to confess to Sir Robert Gaiton that they had lost the splendid presents that he had given them. They were less pleased at the return of their chains, but Sir Hugh assured them that it would be an act of discourtesy were they to send them back to De Beaulieu.
There was now nothing to detain them longer in the camp, and taking leave of Sir Hugh, they started the next morning, with Hal Carter and the other surviving retainers, and rode by easy stages to Gravelines, where they took ship for Dover. Instead of riding directly home, they journeyed to London, as they were bearers of a letter from Sir Hugh Calverley to the council, and one also to the king. The latter received them with marked pleasure.
"What! back from the wars, sir knights?" he said, as they handed him Sir Hugh's letter. "Surely Calverley might have chosen as his messengers some whose swords could have been better spared."
"We were chosen, your Majesty, because we had the misfortune to be taken prisoners at Ypres, and it was a condition of our release that we should take no further part in the campaign, and as we were returning in consequence, Sir Hugh committed to us this letter to yourself, and one to the council."
"Prisoners!" the king said, with a laugh; "that you had got yourselves killed would not have surprised me, but that you should surrender never entered my mind."
The two young knights coloured.
"It cannot be said that Sir Albert surrendered," Edgar said, "seeing that he was insensible from his wounds. As for myself, your Majesty, as I and one of my men-at-arms stood alone on the walls of Ypres surrounded by foes, I trust that your Majesty will see that it was wiser for me to yield, and so to have the opportunity of fighting again some day under your royal banner, than to give away my life uselessly."
"Assuredly, assuredly," the young king said, hastily. "I did but jest, Sir Edgar, for I know that so long as a chance of victory remained, you would not lower your sword. However, let me see what the stout knight says. I know already that he does not approve of the way in which the war is being carried on; and, indeed, had we thought that the headstrong bishop would have disregarded Sir Hugh's counsel and embroiled us with the Flemings, whom we regard as our allies, we should not have placed him at the head of the army, for though it is but, as the bishop maintains, a church army, and not an English army, Europe will assuredly hold us responsible for its doings."
He cut with his dagger the silk that bound the roll of parchment together.
The king read the letter carefully, and when he concluded said:
"Truly, young sirs, you have borne yourselves right gallantly and well; Sir Hugh Calverley speaks strongly indeed in your favour, and says that he owes his freedom if not his life to you. And now, tell me, think you that Ypres will be taken?"
"I fear not, your Majesty," Edgar said. "I thought that the siege of Oudenarde was worse conducted than anything I had ever read of, but the siege of Ypres is to the full as faulty. The place is strong and stoutly defended, and it can only be taken by regular works erected against it and machines placed to batter a breach. Nothing of this sort has been attempted. The troops march valiantly against the walls, but they throw away their lives in vain; and if, as is said, the French king is marching to its assistance with a strong army, there will be naught for us but to retreat to the ports unless strong aid arrives from England."
"But the bishop has some eight thousand Englishmen and twenty thousand Ghentois," the king said. "Surely we might fight and win, as our grandfathers did at Crécy."
"Yes, sire; but the English army at Crécy was commanded by a king, and was composed of good fighting men, with a great number of knights and nobles to lead them. The army in Flanders is commanded by a bishop, and there are many of the men who have gone over for the sake of plunder, and they will make but a poor stand in battle."
"My uncle of Lancaster has gathered a large force, and is ready to cross over to their aid," the king said.
"So we have heard by the way, sire, and if he joins the bishop all may be well, for his authority would be paramount, but at present he has not crossed, and unless he arrives before the King of France, things will assuredly go badly with the bishop."
"I have no doubt that Sir Hugh has set forth these matters in his letter to the council," the king said, "but assuredly Lancaster should be there in time. And now, tell me how you made your escape from Ypres."
Edgar related the circumstances.
"Your captor was an honourable gentleman," the king said, "and it is well that you escaped, for these Flemish burghers are masterful men and might well have murdered you. I must now to the council; I have summoned it to assemble. Have you been home yet?"
"No, sire. Our first duty was to bring you the letters, but, with your permission, we shall ride down into Kent tomorrow."
"Do you know that your friend Van Voorden has again returned to London? He found that he could do naught in Flanders, which at present is wholly at the orders of the King of France."
They rode first to Sir Robert Gaiton's house, where, as always, they were welcomed most warmly, and Albert narrated their adventures in Flanders, and how they still owned the armour he had given them.
After staying there for some time they went to the house where Van Voorden was lodging, having obtained his address from Sir Robert Gaiton. They had not seen him since they had parted from him in Ghent, a year before.
"I thought you intended to settle in Flanders, Mynheer," Edgar said, after the first greetings were over.
"I hoped to do so, and after I left Antwerp I went to Louvain and took a house there, but when the King of France defeated and killed Van Artevelde, and all Flanders save Ghent came under his power, the country was no longer safe for me. It was known, of course, that I was for many years here, and that I had done all in my power to effect a league between Ghent and England, so three months ago I crossed hither, leaving my wife and daughter at Louvain. I stopped for a short time at Ghent, and had much to do with bringing it about that Ghent should send an army to assist the English; but I fear that the doings of the bishop's troops--the sacking of towns by them--has so set the Flemings against England that there is no hope of a general alliance being made with Flanders.
"There were other things for which I wished to come over. I had hoped to return before this, but matters seem to be going on but badly, and if the King of France and his army defeat or drive out the bishop, his power will be greater than ever in Flanders, and in that case I shall send for my wife and daughter to come over again, and establish myself here finally."
On taking leave of them he handed a wooden box to each, saying:
"I pray you not to open these until you reach home."
The next day Edgar and Albert rode down into Kent. Great was the surprise that their presence excited when they arrived at De Courcy's castle. Aline ran down into the courtyard and embraced her brother warmly, and then, as was the custom, held up her cheek to be kissed by Edgar.
"What, tired of the wars already?" she said, laughing. "Or have you killed all your enemies? or how is it that you are here?"
"We have been prisoners, Aline," her brother said, "and have been bound to take no farther part in the war."
"Prisoners!" she repeated; "you are joking with me, Albert. Surely you and Edgar would never have surrendered unharmed?"
"Nor did we, Aline. I was cut down and stunned by the blow of a mace, and was lying insensible."
"And what was Edgar doing?" she asked, looking reproachfully at him.
"Edgar was not near me when I was struck down, Aline, but no sooner did I fall than he, with his man-at-arms, Hal Carter, stood over me and kept at bay a host of knights and soldiers, and slew so many that they were glad at last to give him terms of surrender."
The girl's face flushed, and she would have spoken had not Sir Ralph and her mother at that moment issued from the door.
"Why! what brings you home, lads?" Sir Ralph asked, heartily.
"They have been taken prisoners, father," Aline interposed, "and Albert has been wounded, and they have both been obliged to give their parole not to serve again through the war."
"That is bad news indeed," the knight said. "It means another farm gone, and perhaps two, to pay for Albert's ransom. However, it is the fortune of war. Now come in and tell us all about it; but doubtless you are both hungry, and the matter will keep till you have dined. The meal is already on the table. You are not looking much the worse for your wounds, Albert," his father went on as they seated themselves at table.
"I have been healed of them for the last month, father. I was brought down by the blow of a mace, which would have finished me had it not been for the good work put into my helmet by the Milanese armourer. Also I had a wound on the neck, but fortunately it was not very deep."
"And did you come out of it scatheless, Edgar?"
"Nearly scatheless, for I knew not that I had been wounded until the fight was over, and it was but a pike thrust that entered at the shoulder-joint and cut the flesh thence to the neck. It was but an affair of a bandage and a bit of plaster. The only one seriously hurt was Hal Carter--it was some three weeks before he began to mend. He had half a dozen wounds. Another of my men was killed and two of Albert's."
"Now let us hear all about it," Sir Ralph said when the meal was over; "that you bore yourselves well I have no doubt, but I would fain hear the details of the matter."
Albert told the whole story of the assault and the escape, interrupted by Edgar, who protested that Albert was always belittling his own doings, and giving him credit when everything had been done equally by them both.
"You blame Albert unjustly, Edgar," Sir Ralph said when the story was concluded. "Albert has behaved well, but he has neither your strength, your skill, nor your quickness. It was you who thought of carrying the broken ladder to another spot, and so taking the besieged on the wall by surprise, and you were the first to mount it. It was you who, when you saw that the case had become altogether hopeless, ordered the soldiers to save themselves, while you held the enemy at bay. Albert would like enough have been killed, had you not so stoutly defended him that they gave terms of surrender to you both. You, again, had the idea of making your escape along the roofs, and took the lead in it. There is all credit due to Albert that he well seconded you, but it was you who led. Again, it is probable that neither he nor your man-at-arms would have been able to cross those half-frozen ditches, had you not first broken the ice for them and then dragged them over. You have done wonders for Albert, but you could not accomplish miracles. You have transformed him from a weakling into a brave young knight, of whom I am proud, but you cannot give him your strength or your quickness. If you go on as you have began, Edgar, you will become a famous captain. He will remain, and will be content to remain, your companion and lieutenant. What have you in those boxes that were strapped behind your saddles?"
"I know not, Sir Ralph," Albert said. "They were given to us by Mynheer Van Voorden, and he charged us not to open them until we arrived here."
"It is a mystery, then!" Aline exclaimed. "Let us send for them and open them at once. I am glad one of the boxes was not given to me to take care of, for I am afraid I should never have had the patience to wait until I arrived here before opening it."
Sir Ralph ordered the boxes to be brought in. "They are light enough," he said, "and I should judge from their weight that they contain papers of some sort. Open yours first, Albert."
They were fastened by three skeins of silk, the Fleming's seal being affixed to the knots.
"Cut them, Albert!" Aline exclaimed, as her brother proceeded to break the seals and untie the knots.
"No, no," he said; "silk is not to be picked up on the wayside, and it will be little trouble to undo them."
Indeed, in a minute he had unfastened the knots and raised the lid. At the top lay a piece of paper, on which was written, _A slight testimony of gratitude for inestimable services rendered to yours gratefully, John Van Voorden_. Underneath was a roll of parchment.
"What have we here?" Sir Ralph said. Albert ran his eye over the crabbed black-letter writing, and gave an exclamation of surprise.
"Now, then, Albert," Aline exclaimed, impatiently, "don't keep it all to yourself. We are burning to know what it is all about!"
Albert made no reply, but continued to read. "It is an assignment to me," he said, at last, in a low and agitated voice, "of the lands, castle, messuages, tenements, etc., of Cliffe."
Sir Ralph leapt to his feet. "A princely gift, Albert! The lands are four times as large as mine, and as I have heard, a fair castle has been rising there for months past. Art sure that there is no mistake?"
"There can be no mistake in the deed, father; but can I accept such a gift at the hands of the Fleming?"
"That you can, my son, and without any hesitation. Van Voorden is known to be the richest Fleming in England. He has on various occasions lent vast sums to the king and council, and noble as the gift is, it is one that he can doubtless well afford. You have saved the lives of himself, his wife, and daughter, and he may well feel grateful. He told me when he gave you that suit of armour that it was no recognition of what he felt he owed you, and that he hoped in the future to discharge the debt more worthily. Now, Edgar, let us see what is in your box."
Edgar had been quietly untying the knots of the silk, and the box was already open. The words on the top were similar to those in Albert's box.
"Please read it, Albert," he said, handing over the parchment. "You can decipher the characters better than I can." Albert read it through to himself.
"'Tis similar to mine," he said, "and assigns you the land, manors, the castle, and all rights and privileges thereto appertaining of the hundred of Hoo."
"Bravo, bravo!" Sir Ralph exclaimed. "Another noble gift, and fully equal to that of Albert. This Fleming is a very prince. I congratulate you, Edgar, with all my heart. I had heard that Sir John Evesham had sold his estates, which comprise the whole hundred of Hoo, a year since, in order to live at Court, but none seemed to know who was the purchaser. I heard, too, that a large number of men had been employed in building a castle on the heights looking down the Medway past Upnor to Chatham. Why, lads, if you ever win to the rank of knight banneret, you will have land enough to support the dignity, and to take the field with two or three knights and a fair following of men-at-arms in your train. I have gained good sums for the ransom of prisoners, but I never had the luck to save the life of a Flemish merchant and his family."
"It seems well-nigh impossible," Edgar said.
"You must remember, Edgar, that these rich Flemings are the bankers of half the princes in Europe. You, who have been in their houses, know that they live in comfort and luxury such as none of our nobles possess. They could find the money for a king's ransom, or pay beforehand the taxes of a country. If a king can grant estates like these to his favourites, and not only the king, but many of our nobles can do so, it is not strange that one of the richest of these Flemings should make such gifts to those who have saved his life without feeling that he has in any way overpaid the service."
"I must be riding on now," Edgar said, "to carry this wonderful news to my father."
While they had been dining, Hal Carter had been getting a hearty meal in the kitchen, where he and Albert's two retainers were surrounded by all the men-at-arms, who were anxious to hear the details of the expedition. When Edgar sent down for his horse, Sir Ralph went down with him to the courtyard, and as Hal brought the horses round, the old knight put his hand upon his shoulder.
"My brave fellow," he said, "I have heard how you stood with your master across my son's body, and how doughtily you fought. Do not forget that I am your debtor, but for the present I can only say that I thank you for the part you played."
"It would have been strange, indeed, Sir Ralph, had I not hit my hardest, for my own life depended upon it, and it was not like that I should draw back a foot when Sir Albert, whom I love only next to my master, was lying there; but, indeed, it was a right merry fight, the only one that came up to my expectations of what a stiffly fought _mêlée_ would be. I would not have missed it for anything."
CHAPTER XIX
WELL SETTLED
"Well, well, well," Mr. Ormskirk exclaimed when Edgar brought the story of all that had happened since he had been away to an end, "indeed you surprise me. I know that many knights fit out parties and go to the wars, not so much for honour and glory as for the spoils and ransoms they may gain, and that after Crécy and Poictiers, there was not a single soldier but came back laden with booty and with rich jewels, gold chains, and costly armour, gathered from the host of French nobles who fell on those fields; while knights who were fortunate enough to capture counts, earls, or princes, gained ransoms that enabled them to purchase estates, and live without occasion to go further to the wars during their lives. But I never thought that you would benefit by such a chance. As it is to my mind more honourable to save life than to take it, I rejoice that you have come to your fortune, not by the slaying of enemies, but by the saving the lives of a man, his wife, and daughter, who are rich enough to reward you.
"Assuredly, if a man like Mynheer Van Voorden had fallen into the hands of the Count of Flanders, the latter would have extracted from him, as the price of his freedom, a sum many times larger than that which he has expended on the purchase of these two estates, and the building of the castles. Well, Edgar, I congratulate you heartily. You can now ride to the wars when the king's banner is spread to the winds, and do your duty to your country, but there will be no occasion for you to become a mere knight adventurer--a class I detest, ever ready to sell their swords to the highest bidder, and to kill men, against whom they have no cause of complaint, as indifferently as a butcher would strike down a bullock with a pole-axe.
"Between these men and those who fight simply in the wars of their own country, the gulf is a wide one, as wide as that betwixt a faithful house-dog and a roving wolf. When are you going to receive your new acquisition, or are you intending to ride first to London to thank the Fleming for his noble gift?"
"Assuredly, we should have first ridden to London, father, but we each found in the bottom of our boxes a short letter which we had at first overlooked. The letters were the same, save for our names. Mine ran:--
"'_Dear Sir Edgar,_
"'_It has given me very great pleasure to prepare this little surprise for you. I pray you, do not mar it in any way by returning me thanks. The gift is as naught in comparison with the service rendered. I am proceeding to the North to-morrow on business with Earl Percy, and shall not return for some weeks. When we meet next, I pray you, let there be no word of thanks concerning this affair, for I consider myself still greatly your debtor. You will find an agent of mine at your castle. He has been there some time, has made the acquaintance of all the vassals and others, and will introduce you to them as their lord. He has my instructions either to remain there to manage your affairs for six months, or for any less time you may choose. But methinks you will do well to keep him for that time, as he is a good man of business, and you will need such an one until you have mastered all the details, and can take matters entirely in your own hands._'
"So you see, father, we shall be free to start to-morrow. Sir Ralph, Lady De Courcy, and Mistress Aline will ride with us, and I trust that you will come also. We shall first go to Cliffe, which will be on our road, and, indeed, I believe that for some distance Albert's lands join mine. Then we shall go on to my castle--it sounds absurd, doesn't it, father?--and doubtless we shall be able to stay in Hoo, or if not, 'tis but two or three miles to Stroud, where we are sure to find good lodging."
"I should like to ride with you, Edgar, but it is years since I have bestridden a horse."
"We shall ride but slowly, father, for Dame De Courcy loves not for her palfrey to go beyond a walk. If you like you could bestride Hal Carter's horse, which is a strong and steady animal, and he can walk alongside, so as to be ready to catch the rein if it be needed. He will be very glad to go, for the honest fellow is in the highest delight at the news of my good fortune."
"I think that I could do that, Edgar, yet I will not go by Cliffe, but straight to Hoo. I can then travel as I like, and shall not have to join in talk with Dame De Courcy nor the others, nor feel that my bad horsemanship makes me a jest."
"Very well, father, perhaps that would be the pleasantest way for you."
"If I get there before you, Edgar, I shall stop at a tavern in the main street of Hoo. There is sure to be one there; and will rest until you come along. If Hal Carter learns that you have passed through before my arrival, I will come straight on to the castle."
Accordingly, early the next morning, Mr. Ormskirk started with Hal, and Edgar, after seeing them fairly on their way, rode over to the De Courcys'. All were in readiness for the start.
"Is not Mr. Ormskirk coming with us?" Dame De Courcy asked. "Recluse though he is, I thought he would surely tear himself from his books on such an occasion."
"He has done so, dame, and is already on the road to Hoo, under the charge of Hal Carter. 'Tis so many years since he has bestridden a horse that he said that he should be ill at ease riding with such a party, and that he would therefore go on quietly, with Hal walking beside him, and would join us when we came to Hoo."
They mounted at once. Dame De Courcy rode on a pillion behind Sir Ralph. Aline bestrode--for side-saddles had not yet come into use--her own pony. Two retainers followed, one leading a sumpter horse, with two panniers well filled with provisions and wine, together with some women's gear, in case the weather should turn bad, and a change be required at the halting-place for the night. They started briskly, and Edgar was glad that his father had gone on alone; the pace would have sorely discomposed him. Alternately walking and going at a canter they arrived in three hours at Cliffe.
"There is your castle, Albert!" Aline exclaimed. "It seems well-nigh, if not quite, finished, and is strongly posted on that hill, overlooking the whole country from Dartford to Sheerness. You will need a chatelaine before long, brother mine."
Albert laughed, but coloured a little.
"Time enough to think of that, Aline."
"Nay, I am in earnest. Many are betrothed, if not married, long before they attain your age."
"I may say the same to you, Aline. 'Tis the fashion now for girls to be betrothed between twelve and fourteen. I have been wandering about and fighting and have had no time to think of love-making."
Aline shrugged her shoulders. "You had better ask Sir Ralph and my mother for their views about me, Albert. It is not for a maid to make her own marriage, but a valiant knight like yourself can manage your own affairs, Methought perhaps that you would have to tell us that the Fleming's fair daughter was to assist you in the management of the castle that her father has given you."
"Joanna Van Voorden!" Albert exclaimed, indignantly, while Edgar burst into laughter; "why, she is well-nigh as big as her mother already, and promises to be far bigger. Thank you, Aline; if the castle and estate had been offered me on the condition that I married her, I would have had none of them."
"Well, sir, shall I make another guess?" Aline asked, mischievously.
"No, no, Aline," Albert said, hastily. "No more guessing, if you please."
They had by this time approached the castle. "Look, father!" Aline exclaimed, clapping her hands; "they must have been on the watch for us. See! they are raising a flag on that staff on the turret, and see, there are your arms blazoned on it."
"'Tis a goodly castle for its size," the knight said, as he drew rein and turned his horse so that his dame might get a better view of it. "There is a dry moat, which is lined with stonework. The walls are not very high, but they are well defended by those flanking towers, and the place could stand any sudden assault. I should say that it was about the same strength as our own. So far as I can see, the other arrangements are quite different. There is no keep, and it seems to me that the house is built rather for comfort than for defence; the windows are large, and it looks more like a Flemish house built within a castle wall than an English place of strength. Now let us ride on," and they pressed their horses forward. The gates were thrown open when they approached within a hundred yards; the drawbridge over the moat had been already lowered.
"Ride you first, Albert," Sir Ralph said; "you are lord of the place."
As they came to the head of the drawbridge, a middle-aged man of grave aspect, dressed in the garb of a citizen, appeared at the gate, and six men-at-arms, in steel caps and body armour, armed with pike and sword, drew up behind him.
The man bowed deeply to Albert. "Welcome to Cliffe Castle, sir knight," he said. "I am Nicholas Hocht, and have, by the orders of my master, Mynheer Van Voorden, been here for the last year to superintend the building of this castle, and in carrying out his other commands respecting it, with further orders to remain here, should you desire it, for the further space of six months as your steward. I received a message from him yesterday, saying that possibly you would be here to-day, and I must, therefore, have everything in readiness for you. The warning was somewhat short, but I have done my best, and I trust that you will pardon any shortcomings."
"I am much beholden to you, Master Hocht," Albert said. "You have done well, indeed, for a fairer castle and one better placed no one could desire."
The men-at-arms saluted as he rode on. Entering the gate, they were able to see the house itself. It was, as Sir Ralph had said, rather a Flemish house than a knightly castle; the lower range of windows were small and heavily barred, but above there were large casements, pointed roofs, and projecting gables. It had an air of comfort and brightness. On the top of the broad steps leading to the great door were four retainers, all similarly attired in doublets of russet cloth and orange hose. As soon as the party alighted they ascended the steps, led by the steward. When they entered the great hall a general exclamation of surprise broke from them.
They had expected to see bare walls and every sign of the place having only just left the builders' hands; instead of this everything was complete, the massive oak beams and panels of the ceilings were varnished, the walls were wainscoted, the oak floor highly polished; Eastern rugs lay here and there upon it, carved benches ran along the sides, and a large banqueting table stood in the centre; rich curtains hung by the window, and a huge fire was piled on the hearth.
"Why, this is a work of enchantment, Master Hocht," Dame Agatha said.
"I have had but little to do with it, lady," the steward replied. "The woodwork was all made in London, to my master's orders, and I had but to superintend its being placed in position."
He led them from room to room, their surprise and delight continually increasing; all were furnished richly in the Flemish style with cabinets, tables, settees, and armoires. There were hangings to the windows and rugs on the floors; everything was ready for habitation, the linen presses were full of table-cloths and napkins and sheets. The beds were ready for sleeping in, with their great bags of soft feathers, their thick blankets and silken coverlets. These more than anything else excited the dame's admiration. Never had she seen beds approaching these in softness and daintiness.
"With the exception of the furniture in the hall," Master Hocht explained, "everything has come direct from Flanders, having been selected by Mynheer Van Voorden himself, and sent by sea to Gravesend."
After having inspected the whole of the house they returned to the hall. Here the table had been spread. A silver skewer, to act as a fork, an article then unknown in England, was placed before each, and an admirable repast was served, the steward himself officiating as carver, while the four servitors carried the platters, which were of fine Flemish ware, to the guests. Albert had begged his father to take the head of the table, but the latter refused positively. He sat on one side of his son and his dame on the other. Fish of several kinds, meats, and poultry were served. All cut up their meat with their daggers, and carried it to their mouths on the point of the skewer.
Albert and Edgar had learned the use of them in Flanders. Lady Agatha and Aline said that they were charming, but Sir Ralph declared that he greatly preferred using his fingers. After the meal was concluded, water was brought round in a silver bowl, with a damask napkin for them to wipe their fingers on.
"The wine is excellent," Sir Ralph said. "You can scarcely have purchased this at Cliffe or Gravesend."
"It is from the cellar, Sir Ralph, which is well stocked with the wines of France and Spain."
"Truly, Albert," Dame Agatha said, "this is not a castle; it is a veritable enchanted palace. Mynheer Van Voorden is like one of the good genii the Saracens believe in, who can, at will, summon up from the ground a vast palace, ready built and furnished. I trust that it will not at once vanish as soon as we leave it. Were it to do so I should scarcely be more surprised than I have been at its splendour and comfort."
"Do you tarry here to-night, Sir Albert?" the steward asked, as they rose from the table.
"No, we are going to take horse at once and ride to Hoo."
"Will you take the men-at-arms with you? They have horses in the stables."
"Not to-day," Albert said. "We are a family party, and travelling quietly."
As they rode into the street of Hoo, Mr. Ormskirk came out of a tavern, where he had been resting. After greeting the ladies and Sir Ralph, he said, "I had begun to think that you must have changed your minds, and that you were not coming hither to-day. I expected you three hours ago."
"We have been viewing the marvels of an enchanted castle, Mr. Ormskirk," Dame Agatha said. "We will not tell you about them, for doubtless you will see others like them here, and it would be a pity for me to prepare you for what you are to see."
The castle was indeed in all respects an almost exact duplicate to that of Cliffe. They were received as before by the Flemish steward. There were the same number of men-at-arms and servitors, and the fittings and furnishings were as perfect as those of Cliffe. After going over it, Edgar drew Sir Ralph aside.
"Sir Ralph," he said, "the castle, perfect as it is, still lacks one thing--a mistress. I have long hoped that the time would some day come that I should ask you for the hand of Mistress Aline, but though I have been fortunate, and have won rank and some distinction, I was but a landless knight, and in no position to ask for your daughter's hand. That obstacle has now been removed, and I pray you to give her to me. I love her very truly. My thoughts have never wandered for a moment from her, and I trust that I shall be able to make her happy. Unless the banner of England is hoisted I shall go no more to the wars."
"I am in no way surprised at your request, Edgar," the knight said; "and, indeed, for the past two years my dame and I have talked this over, and hoped that it might be. I have during the past year had more than one request for her hand, but have refused them, for her mother told me she believed that Aline's fancy has long inclined towards you."
He called Dame Agatha to join him, and on hearing Edgar's request, she heartily concurred with the knight.
"Nothing could please us better," she said. "We have long regarded you almost as our son, and we need have no fear that Aline will thwart our wishes and yours. Have you spoken to your father?"
"I spoke to him last night, lady, and told him what my hopes have long been, and that Van Voorden's noble gift now rendered it possible for me to speak; that it might be some time before it could be more than a betrothal, since, although I had rank and land, I was still without money to enable me to make the castle comfortable for her abode. Now that, owing to the Fleming's generosity, this difficulty is also removed, I hope that you will not think it necessary that our marriage should be delayed."
"I see no reason at all," Sir Ralph said. "Here is everything ready for her, and no noble in England could offer so comfortable a home to his bride. The castle lacks a mistress, and the sooner it has one the better. Therefore, you can take her as soon as her mother can get her ready."
They now joined Albert, Aline, and Mr. Ormskirk, who had mounted to the top of one of the turrets and were admiring the view.
"'Tis a fair home," Sir Ralph said.
"It is indeed, father."
"What say you to becoming its mistress, daughter? Sir Edgar has asked for your hand, and has gained mine and your mother's hearty consent. What say you?"
The girl coloured up to her forehead as her father spoke. "I am ready to obey your orders, father," she said, in a low tone, "the more so as my heart goes wholly with them."
"Take her, Edgar. 'Tis not often that a young knight gains castle, and land, and bride in twenty-four hours. May your good luck continue all your life."
"You have robbed me of my chatelaine, Edgar," Albert said, after the first congratulations were over. "Aline had half promised to come and keep house for me for the present."
"You must follow Edgar's example," Sir Ralph said. "Who is it to be, lad?"
"I had intended to speak to you shortly, father, but as you ask me I will do so at once. I have seen no one whom I could love so well as Mistress Ursula, daughter of Sir Robert Gaiton, and methinks that I am not indifferent to her."
"She is a fair maid," Sir Ralph said, "and her father is a right good fellow, though but a city knight. Still, others of higher rank than yourself have married in the city, and as Sir Robert has no other children, and is said to be one of the wealthiest of the London citizens, she will doubtless come to you better dowered than will Aline, for, as Edgar knows, my estates bring me in scarcely enough to keep up my castle and to lay by sufficient to place my retainers in the field should the king call on me for service. So be it then, my son. As we have settled to sleep here to-night, it will be to-morrow afternoon before we get home. The next day I will ride with you to London, and will ask Sir Robert for his daughter's hand for you."
Not the least happy of the party at the castle was Hal Carter. He passed the afternoon in walking, sometimes round the walls, sometimes going out and making a circuit of the moat, or walking away short distances to obtain views of the castle from various points. The news that his master and Aline De Courcy would shortly be married raised his delight to the highest pitch, for it pointed to an early occupation of the castle. The thought that he, Hal Carter, was to be the captain of the men-at-arms in a castle like this seemed to him a huge joke. It was but two years before that he had been hunted as a rioter, and would have been executed if caught. That so famous a leader as Sir Hugh Calverley should have praised him greatly, and that he was now to have men under his command, seemed to him as wonderful a thing as that his master, whom he had known as a young boy, should stand high in the king's favour, and should be lord of a castle and a wide estate.
"Of course, father," Edgar said, as early the next morning he took a turn upon the battlements with him, "you will leave St. Alwyth and come here?"
"I don't think that I could do that, Edgar," Mr. Ormskirk said, doubtfully.
"You will find it very lonely there, father; and, of course, we can fit you up a laboratory here, and you can go on just the same way as you did at home."
"I do not see that I shall be more lonely than I have been for the last two years, Edgar, and, indeed, as you know, even when you were at home I lived very much my own life, and only saw you at meals and for an hour or so of an evening; therefore, your being established here will make but little difference in my life, and, indeed, whenever I feel lonely I can ride over here for a day or two. I thank you all the same, Edgar; but, at any rate, for the present I will continue to live at St. Alwyth. I have the good prior, who often comes in for a talk with me in the evening, and makes me heartily welcome should I, as I do sometimes, go to the monastery for an hour after sunset. Sir Ralph never passes my door on his way down to Dartford without dismounting and coming in. I am happy in my own life, and as long as I have health and strength shall hope to continue it. Should my interest in my work flag, or when I feel that I am getting too old for useful work, which will, I trust, be not for many years yet, I will then gladly come and end my days here."
So the matter was left for the time, and although Edgar more than once tried to shake his father's determination, and Aline added her persuasions to his, he failed to alter Mr. Ormskirk's resolution. Sir Ralph and Albert returned from London after staying there for a few days. Sir Robert Gaiton had consented willingly to his daughter's marriage with Albert, and had announced his intention of giving her a dowry greater than that which most nobles could have bestowed on a daughter. The king had expressed very great satisfaction at hearing of the gift Master Van Voorden had bestowed on the young knights, and took great interest in their approaching marriages.
"They will then have enough land for a knight banneret's feu," he said; "that pleases me much. I should, on the report of Sir Hugh Calverley, have appointed them to that rank, but at present there are no estates in my gift, and I waited till some might fall in before I appointed them. Now, however, there is no further need for delay, and I will order the patent appointing them to be made out at once, for they can now, if called upon for service, take the field with the proper following of their rank. Has Sir Edgar adopted any cognizance? Of course your son will take yours."
"I don't think that he has ever so much as thought of it, sire."
"I will talk it over with my heralds," the king said, "and see if we can fix upon something appropriate, and that is not carried by any noble or knight. When will the weddings be?"
"In two months' time, sire. Sir Robert Gaiton and his dame asked for that time. My son will, of course, be married in London, and will be wed in St. Paul's, I have not yet thought about my daughter's marriage, but it will doubtless be at the chapel in the castle."
"'Tis a pity that they could not be married together here, Sir Ralph."
"I believe that my daughter's tastes and those of Sir Edgar would incline to a quiet wedding, with just our neighbours and friends, and doubtless Albert's would also lie that way; but in this matter Sir Robert must, of course, carry out the arrangements as he wishes; and as an alderman and like to be lord mayor in two years he would wish to make a brave show on the occasion."
Before the time for the weddings approached came the news that things had gone badly in Flanders. At the approach of the French army a council was held among the leaders, and it was agreed that the allied army could not fight with any hope of success against it. Accordingly, the men of Ghent retired to their own city, and the English marched with great haste to the coast and shut themselves up in Bruckburg, while the bishop himself galloped as far as Bergues. Bruckburg surrendered on the arrival of the French army, all the English being permitted to embark with the great spoil that had been taken. Sir Hugh Calverley, whose advice throughout had been always disregarded, had ridden to Gravelines with his small body of men-at-arms and thence took ship to England. The bishop, on his arrival home, was, with the knights who had been his councillors, very badly received; for it was held that by their conduct and ignorance of affairs, and by the manner in which they had behaved in Flanders, they had brought great discredit upon England.
Sir Hugh Calverley, on the other hand, was received with honour, it being well known that all that had been done had been contrary to his advice, and that had this been followed the event would have turned out very differently. The people at large, however, considered that the blame for the ill ending of the expedition was due entirely to the delay on the part of the Duke of Lancaster in crossing over with the army under him. It was known that he had been altogether opposed to the expedition, which had prevented the one he desired from sailing to Spain, and that he was minded to bring ruin upon it by delaying, under many false pretences, from crossing to France. He had been extremely unpopular before, but this added very greatly to the ill-feeling with which he was regarded.
But, in truth, the bishop's expedition failed from its own weakness. In no case could an army so collected and led have effected any great thing; but the headstrong folly and arrogance of the bishop, and his unprovoked attack upon the Flemings, precipitated matters, and the scornful neglect of all the counsel tendered by the veteran knight who accompanied the expedition, rendered it a shameful disaster.
The marriage of Sir Edgar with Aline was celebrated a fortnight before that of the bride's brother. The ceremony took place at the castle of the De Courcys, and was attended only by neighbours and friends, and by Sir Robert Gaiton, who rode down from town and presented the bride with a superb casket of jewels.
On the following day Sir Edgar with his wife rode to his castle at Hoo, where for the first time his banner, with the cognizance chosen by the king, a very simple one, being a sword with the words "_For King and Honour_," was hoisted at their approach, while the banneret denoting Edgar's new rank flew from another tower. The number of the men-at-arms had been increased to ten, and great was Hal Carter's pride as he took his place in front of them and saluted as Sir Edgar rode in. Ten days later they started for London to attend Albert's wedding; which was celebrated with much pomp in St. Paul's, the king himself and most of the nobles of the Court being present.
Neither of the two young knights ever rode to the wars again, for in King Richard's time the royal banner was never again raised in France; and yet they were not without a share of fighting. Many depredations were committed along the coasts and at the mouths of rivers by French freebooters and lawless people, and the castles of Hoo and Cliffe were well placed for preventing such incursions by men landing anywhere in the Hundred, either from the Medway or the Thames. There was no fear of such marauders sailing up the Medway past Hoo, for Upnor Castle barred the way, and indeed Rochester was too large a place, defended as it was by its castle, to be attacked by such pirates, but below Hoo a landing could be effected anywhere, and boats with a few hands on board could row up the creeks in the marshes, pounce upon a quiet hamlet, carry off anything of value, and set the place on fire.
Such incursions had been carried far up the Thames and great damage done, but as the ships of Fowey and other places were equally busy damaging French commerce and ravaging their sea-coast, no complaints could be made to France even during the very brief period when there was a truce between the two countries. Not only from across the Channel did these marauders come, but from the islands of Friesland and Zeeland, where the inhabitants--hardy sailors to a man--were lawless and uncontrolled. After having suffered several times from these pirates, and been moved by the constant complaints of their tenants, Edgar and Albert went up to town and laid the matter before the king and council, pointing out that these attacks were becoming more frequent and general all along the coast, and praying that measures might be adopted for putting a stop to them.
"But what do you propose should be done, sir knights?" the king asked.
"I would suggest, your Majesty, that either a few fast ships should be placed at various points, such as the mouth of the Medway, Harwich, Dover, Hastings, and Southampton, that might keep a watch for these pirates, or else that some of your vassals round the coast should be appointed to keep forces of some strength always under arms, just as the Percys are at all times in readiness to repel the incursions of the Scots; but should you and the council think this too weighty a plan, we would pray you to order better protection for the Thames. It was but the other day some pirates burnt six ships in Dartford Creek, and if they carry on these ravages unpunished, they may grow bolder and will be sailing higher still, and may cause an enormous loss to your merchants by setting fire to the vessels at the wharves, or to those anchored out in the stream."
"The matter would be serious, assuredly," the king said, "and would cause so great a trouble to the citizens of London that it would be well that some means should be taken to prevent it. I will talk the matter over with the council, sir knights, and will let you know in an hour's time whether we can do aught in the matter."
When the young knights returned, the king said:
"There is a royal manor at Bromley at present vacant; 'tis of the value of fifty-six pounds a year. This we will hand over to you jointly, upon your undertaking to keep thirty men-at-arms fully equipped and ready for service, each of you; and also that each of you shall maintain, at the spots which may seem to you the most advisable, a galley with oars, in which you can put out and attack these pirates."
Edgar begged permission to consult with his friend.
"You see, Albert, we have already each of us ten men-at-arms, and the revenue of the manor should well-nigh, if not quite, pay the expenses of the others. As to the galleys, we could keep them in the little creek between Cliffe and Graves-end. It would give us employment, and should we ever be called upon to take the field, the sixty men-at-arms will make a good beginning for the force we should gather."
Albert assented, and, returning, they informed the council that they were ready to undertake the charge of keeping thirty men-at-arms each, always in readiness for service, and for fighting the pirates by land or water. Returning home, preparations were speedily made, and the men enrolled and drilled. A watch-tower was raised on an eminence that was visible from both castles, and a look-out place also erected at the mouth of the Medway. This was some sixty feet high. A great cresset was placed at the summit ready for firing, and an arrangement made with the tenants, on whose land it stood, that a man should be on watch night and day. His duty would be to keep a vigilant eye on the river, and to light the beacon if any suspicious vessels were seen coming up. The smoke by day or the fire at night could be seen at both castles, and by a pre-arranged system signals could then be exchanged between Edgar and Albert by means of the watch-tower on the hill.
Albert had two large and fast galleys constructed, for his wife's dowry enabled him to spend money more freely than Edgar. They had a good many encounters with the freebooters. Two or three times strong parties that had landed from ships were attacked by the garrisons of both castles, joined by the tenantry near, and were driven to the boats with heavy loss.
Once the beacon from the mouth of the Medway signalled that three ships had entered the mouth of that river. Edgar signalled to Cliffe, and when at ten o'clock the French landed just below Hoo, thinking to make an easy capture of the village, and, perhaps, even to carry the castle by surprise, they were allowed to ascend the hill undisturbed, and were then attacked by the sixty men-at-arms, led by the two knights, together with a number of villagers and countrymen armed with bows and bills. Although superior in numbers the French were driven down the hill with great slaughter. Only a few succeeded in regaining their ships; but the tide had not yet turned, and there was little wind. Boats were obtained at Upnor, the vessels boarded, and all on board put to the sword.
Three or four sharp engagements also took place between the galleys and the pirates ascending the Thames, and at various times rich prizes that the pirates had taken higher up the river were recovered from them; so that in time the depredations greatly abated, and the city of London presented the two knights with costly swords and a vote of thanks for the great services they had rendered to the city, and to those trading with it.
They were both too happy in their homes to care to go often to Court, but they viewed with pain the increasing unpopularity of the king, brought about by his reckless extravagance, his life of pleasure, and the manner in which he allowed himself to be dominated by unworthy favourites. Van Voorden, who had permanently settled in England, often came down with his wife and daughter to stay for a few days with them, and declared that he had never laid out money so well as that which had established two such happy households. The last few years of Mr. Ormskirk's life were spent at Hoo, where he still dabbled a little in his former occupation, but never succeeded in finding the elixir he had laboured so long to discover. On the departure of the Flemish steward, Hal Carter was appointed to the post, with the understanding that if his lord should ever ride to battle, he was to revert to the command of the men-at-arms. Hal was ignorant of figures, but he had a young assistant given him to manage this part of the work, and his honesty, his acquaintance with farming, and his devotion to his master, made up for any deficiency on that score. Both knights sent contingents under their sons to fight at Agincourt, and were only prevented from taking the field themselves by the entreaties of their wives and daughters, and by the thought that it would be as well to give their sons the opportunity of distinguishing themselves, as they themselves had done, in their early youth.
THE END.

= = = PG46338 = = =
A MEDLEY OF WEATHER LORE
Produced by Giovanni Fini, Chris Curnow and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
A MEDLEY OF WEATHER LORE
A MEDLEY OF WEATHER LORE
COLLECTED BY M. E. S. WRIGHT
"An almanack is out at twelve months day, My legacy it doth endure for aye, But take you notice, though 'tis but a hint, It far exceeds some books of greater print."
THE SHEPHERD'S LEGACY. (_John Claridge, 1670_)
Horace G. Commin, Bournemouth 1913
THE ANCHOR PRESS, LTD., TIPTREE, ESSEX.
CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFACE         5
JANUARY         9
FEBRUARY       17
MARCH          24
APRIL          37
MAY            52
JUNE           67
JULY           85
AUGUST         94
SEPTEMBER     100
OCTOBER       109
NOVEMBER      116
DECEMBER      121
INDEX         131
PREFACE
In this collection of Weather Lore and Poetry I beg to acknowledge with gratitude permission from Messrs. Macmillan to quote lines from Tennyson, Charles Turner, Alfred Austin, Matthew Arnold, Christina Rossetti, T. E. Brown, and Francis Doyle.
From Messrs. Longman and Green from Jean Ingelow, from "Four Bridges," and "An Afternoon at a Parsonage." Andrew Lang, from "A Ballade of Summer." William Morris' from "The Earthly Paradise," and "Love is Enough," and Edwin Arnold, from "Bloom of an Almond Tree."
From Messrs. Kegan Paul and Trench from Lewis Morris. From Messrs. Chatto and Windus (by the courtesy of Mr. Theodore Watts-Dunton) for the inclusion of verses by A. Swinburne, and from the Walter Scott Publishing Company for the use of Selections of R. W. Emerson and Owen Meredith. I have endeavoured to avoid infringing copyrights, but if I should have done so inadvertently I beg that my sincere apologies maybe accepted.
M. E. S. WRIGHT.
A MEDLEY OF WEATHER LORE
A MEDLEY OF WEATHER LORE
JANUARY
Ancient Cornish name for the month: Mis-jenver, cold air month.
*       *       *       *       *
Jewel for the month: Garnet. Constancy.
*       *       *       *       *
If Janiveer calends be summerly gay, 'Twill be wintry weather till the calends of May.
*       *       *       *       *
The wind of the South will be productive of heat and fertility; the wind of the West, of milk and fish; the wind from the North, of cold and storm; the wind from the East, of fruit on the trees.
_Scotland._
*       *       *       *       *
At New Year's tide The days lengthen a cock's stride.
_Proverb in the North._
*       *       *       *       *
A cold January, a feverish February, a dusty March, a weeping April, a windy May, presage a good year and gay.
_France._
*       *       *       *       *
Warwickshire countrymen to ensure good luck bow nine times to the first New Moon of the year.
*       *       *       *       *
A snow year, a rich year.
*       *       *       *       *
The blackest month of all the year Is the month of Janiveer.
*       *       *       *       *
Through all the sad and weary hours Which cold and dark and storms will bring, We scarce believe in what we know-- That time drags on at last to Spring.
*       *       *       *       *
The empty pastures blind with rain.
*       *       *       *       *
If the grass grow in Janiveer 'Twill be the worse for 't all the year.
*       *       *       *       *
A fair day in winter is the mother of a storm.
*       *       *       *       *
Under water famine, under snow bread.
*       *       *       *       *
March in Janiveer, Janiveer in March I fear.
*       *       *       *       *
A year of snow a year of plenty.
_Spain._
*       *       *       *       *
Winter time for shoeing; Peascod time for wooing.
_Devon._
*       *       *       *       *
1565
On Twelve-eve in Christmas, they used to set up as high as they can a sieve of oats, and in it a dozen candles set round, and in the centre one larger, all lighted. This in memory of our Saviour and His Apostles, lights of the world.
_Westmeath custom._
*       *       *       *       *
In the South-hams of Devonshire, on the Eve of the Epiphany, the farmer attended by his workmen, with a large pitcher of cyder, goes to the orchard, and there, encircling one of the best bearing trees, they drink the following toast three several times:
"Here's to thee, old apple-tree, Whence thou mayst bud, and whence thou mayst blow! And whence thou mayst bear apples enow! Hats-full, caps-full! Bushel-bushel-sacks-full! And my pockets full too! Huzza!"
*       *       *       *       *
OLD CUSTOM OF BLESSING APPLE TREES ON TWELFTH DAY.
Apple-tree, apple-tree, Bear apples for me: Hats full, laps full, Sacks full, caps full: Apple-tree, apple-tree, Bear apples for me.
*       *       *       *       *
"Twelfth-Day--came in a tiffany suit, white and gold, like a queen on a frost-cake, all royal, glittering, and Epiphanous."
_Elia._
*       *       *       *       *
January the fourteenth will be either the coldest or wettest day of the year.
_Huntingdon._
*       *       *       *       *
ST. ANTHONY. (_January 17th._)
It is affirmed of him that all the world bemoaned his death, for afterwards there fell no rain from heaven for three years.
ST. VINCENT. (_January 22nd. Old Style. February 3rd. New Style._)
Remember in St. Vincent's Day If the sun his beams display, 'Tis a token bright and clear, That you will have a prosperous year.
*       *       *       *       *
Winter's thunder's summer's wonder.
*       *       *       *       *
ST. PAUL'S EVE. (_January 24th._)
Winter's white shrowd doth cover all the grounde, And Caecias blows his bitter blaste of woe; The ponds and pooles, and streams in ice are bounde, And famished birds are shivering in the snowe.
*       *       *       *       *
Still round about the house they flitting goe, And at the windows seek for scraps of foode Which Charity with hand profuse doth throwe, Right weeting that in neede of it they stoode, For Charity is shown by working creatures goode. The sparrowe pert, the chaffinche gay and cleane, The redbreast welcome to the cotter's house, The livelie blue tomtit, the oxeye greene, The dingie dunnock, and the swart colemouse; The titmouse of the marsh, the nimble wrenne, The bullfinch and the goldspink, with the king Of birds the goldcrest. The thrush, now and then, The blackbird, wont to whistle in the spring, Like Christians seeke the heavenlie food Saint Paul doth bring.
_Dr. Forster._
*       *       *       *       *
ST. PAUL'S DAY.
If Saint Paul's Day be fair and clear, It promises then a happy year; But if it chance to snow or rain, Then will be dear all sorts of grain; Or if the wind do blow aloft, Great stirs will vex the world full oft; And if dark clouds do muff the sky, Then foul and cattle oft will die.
_T. Passenger._
*       *       *       *       *
OF GARDENS.
For the latter part of January and February, the mezerion tree, which then blossoms; crocus vernus, both the yellow and the gray; primroses, anemones, the early tulippa, hyacinthus orientalis, chamairis, frettellaria.
_Bacon._
*       *       *       *       *
A January spring Is worth no thing.
*       *       *       *       *
Pluck broom, broom still, Cut broom, broom kill.
_Tusser._
*       *       *       *       *
Good gardener mine, Make garden fine, Set garden pease, And beans if ye please. Set respis and rose, Young roots of those. Who now sows oats Gets gold and groats. Who sows in May, Gets little that way.
_Tusser._
*       *       *       *       *
A kindly good January freezeth pot by the fire.
*       *       *       *       *
O Winter! wilt thou never--never go! O Summer! but I weary for thy coming!
_David Gray._
*       *       *       *       *
If the robin sings in the bush, then the weather will be coarse; but if the robin sings on the barn, then the weather will be warm.
_Norfolk._
FEBRUARY
Ancient Cornish name: Hu-evral, whirling month.
*       *       *       *       *
Jewel: Amethyst. Sincerity.
*       *       *       *       *
One month is past, another is begun, Since merry bells rang out the dying year, And buds of rarest green began to peer, As if impatient for a warmer sun; And though the distant hills are bleak and dun, The virgin snowdrop, like a lambent fire, Pierces the cold earth, with its green-streaked spire; And in dark woods the wandering little one May find a primrose.
_Hartley Coleridge._
*       *       *       *       *
Fair rising from her icy couch, Wan herald of the floral year, The snowdrop marks the spring's approach, Ere yet the primrose groups appear, Or peers the arum from its spotted veil, Or violets scent the cold capricious gale.
_Charlotte Smith._
*       *       *       *       *
Candlemas shined, and the winter's behind.
*       *       *       *       *
If Candlemas Day be fair and bright The winter will take another flight; But if it should be dark and drear Then winter is gone for another year.
*       *       *       *       *
When on the Purification sun hath shined, The greater part of winter comes behind.
*       *       *       *       *
The badger peeps out of his hole on Candlemas Day, and if he finds snows, walks abroad; but if he sees the sun shining, he draws back into his hole.
_German saying._
*       *       *       *       *
On Candlemas Day if the thorns hang-a-drop, Then you are sure of a good pea crop.
*       *       *       *       *
When the wind's in the East on Candlemas Day, There it will stick till the second of May.
*       *       *       *       *
February fill the ditch, Black or white we don't care which.
_Hants._
*       *       *       *       *
All the months of the year Fear a fair Februeer.
*       *       *       *       *
The dim droop of a sombre February day.
*       *       *       *       *
There is an old proverb, That birds of a feather On Saint Valentine's day Will meet together.
*       *       *       *       *
1733.
Why, Valentine's a day to choose A mistress, and our freedom lose? May I my reason interpose, The question with an answer close? To imitate we have a mind, And couple like the winged kind.
_John Dunton._
*       *       *       *       *
I early rose, just at the break of day, Before the sun had chased the stars away; Afield I went, amid the morning dew, To milk my kine (for so should housewives do), Thee first I spied, and the first swain we see. In spite of fortune, shall our true-love be.
_Gay._
*       *       *       *       *
SHROVE-TIDE.
Beef and bacon's out of season, I want a pan to parch my peason.
_Berks._
*       *       *       *       *
Knick-knock, the pan's hot, And we are come a-shroving, For a piece of pancake, Or a piece of bacon, Or a piece of truckle cheese Of your own making.
_Hants._
*       *       *       *       *
On Shrove Tuesday night, though the supper be fat, Before Easter Day thou mayst fast for that.
_Isle of Man._
*       *       *       *       *
PANCAKE BELL. (_Congleton._)
The housekeeper goes to the huxter's shop, And the eggs are brought home, and there's flop! flop! flop! And there's batter, and butter, and savoury smell, While merrily rings the Pancake Bell.
*       *       *       *       *
So much sun as shineth on Pancake Tuesday, the like will shine every day in Lent.
*       *       *       *       *
A hoar frost, Third day crost, The fourth lost.
_Lancs._
*       *       *       *       *
BEAN SOWING.
One for the mouse, one for the crow, One to rot, one to grow.
*       *       *       *       *
Sow peason and beans in the wane of the moone, Who soweth them sooner, he soweth too soon; That they with the planet may rest and rise, And flourish with bearing, most plentiful wise.
_Tusser._
*       *       *       *       *
If February gives much snow A fine summer it doth foreshow.
*       *       *       *       *
Now set for thy pot Best herbs to be got, For flowers go set, All sorts ye can get.
_Tusser._
*       *       *       *       *
In Oxfordshire the first bee seen in February is saluted, as this is said to bring good luck.
*       *       *       *       *
THRUSH'S SONG.
"Did he do it? Did he do it? Come and see, come and see; Knee deep, knee deep; Cherry sweet, cherry sweet, To me! to me! to me!"
*       *       *       *       *
The pretty lark, Climbing the welkin clear, Chaunts with a "Cheer, here, peer, I near my dear!" When stooping thence, Seeming her fall to rue, "Adieu," she cries, "Adieu! dear Love, adieu!"
*       *       *       *       *
When after a rough and stormy day there is a lull in the wind at the going down of the sun, old men say: "Us shall have better weather now, for the wind's gone to sleep with the sun."
_Devon._
*       *       *       *       *
When a moorland shepherd meets his sheep on a winter's night coming down from the hilltops (where they prefer to sleep) he knows that a storm is brewing.
MARCH
Ancient Cornish name: Miz-merp, horse month.
*       *       *       *       *
Jewel: Bloodstone. Courage and wisdom.
*       *       *       *       *
Upon St. David's Day Put oats and barley in the clay.
*       *       *       *       *
The leeke is white and green, whereby is ment That Britaines are both stout and eminent; Next to the lion and the unicorne, The leek's the fairest emblyn that is worne.
_Harleian MS._
*       *       *       *       *
On the first of March The crows begin to search, By the first of April They are sitting still, By the first of May They are a' flown away; Croupin' greedy back again, Wi' October's wind and rain.
*       *       *       *       *
He who freely lops in March will get his lap full of fruit.
_Portuguese saying._
*       *       *       *       *
Tossing his mane of snows in wildest eddies and tangles, Warlike March cometh in, hoarse, with tempestuous breath. Through all the moaning chimneys, and 'thwart all the hollows and angles, Round the shuddering house, breathing of winter and death.
_W. D. Howells._
*       *       *       *       *
Welcome, O March! whose kindly days and dry Make April ready for the throstle's song, Thou first redresser of the winter's wrong.
_W. Morris._
*       *       *       *       *
OF GARDENS.
For March there come violets, especially the single blue, which are the earliest; the early daffodil, the daisy, the almond tree in blossom, the peach tree in blossom, the cornelian (dogwood) tree in blossom, sweetbrier.
_Bacon._
*       *       *       *       *
A frosty winter, and a dusty March, And a rain about Aperill, And another about the Lammas time When the corn begins to fill, Is worth a ploughy of gold And all her pins theretill.
*       *       *       *       *
Come gather the crocus-cups with me, And dream of the summer coming; Saffron, and purple, and snowy white, All awake to the first bees humming.
The white is there for the maiden-heart, And the purple is there for sorrow; The saffron is there for the true true love, And they'll all be dead to-morrow.
_Sebastian Evans._
*       *       *       *       *
Beside the garden path the crocus now Puts forth its head to woo the genial breeze, And finds the snowdrop, hardier visitant, Already basking in the solar ray. Upon the brooke the water cresses float More greenly, and the bordering reeds exalt Higher their speary summits. Joyously, From stone to stone, the ouzel flits along, Startling the linnet from the hawthorn bough; While on the elm-tree, overshadowing deep The low-roofed cottage white, the blackbird sits Cheerily hymning the awakened year.
*       *       *       *       *
Blank earth-baldness clothes itself afresh, And breaks into the crocus-purple hour.
_Tennyson._
*       *       *       *       *
Spring's an expansive time: yet I don't trust March with its peck of dust, Nor April with its rainbow-crowned brief showers, Nor even May, whose flowers One frost may wither through the sunless hours.
_C. Rossetti._
*       *       *       *       *
If it does not freeze on the tenth of March a fertile year may be expected.
*       *       *       *       *
In March is good graffing, the skilful do know, So long as the wind in the east do not blow: From moon being changed, till past be the prime, For graffing and cropping is very good time.
_Tusser._
*       *       *       *       *
In March and in April, from morning to night, In sowing and setting good huswives delight: To have in a garden or other like plot, To trim up their house, and to furnish their pot.
_Tusser._
*       *       *       *       *
TO THE DAFFODIL.
O Love-star of the unbeloved March, When cold and shrill, Forth flows beneath a low dim-lighted arch The wind that beats sharp crag and barren hill, And keeps unfilmed the lately torpid rill!
Herald and harbinger! with thee Begins the year's great jubilee! Of her solemnities sublime (A sacristan whose gusty taper Flashes through earliest morning vapour) Thou ring'st dark nocturns and dim prime. Birds that have yet no heart for song Gain strength with thee to twitter, And, warm at last, where hollies throng, The mirror'd sunbeams glitter.
_A. De Vere._
*       *       *       *       *
The softest turf of English green, With sloping walks and trees between, And then a bed of flowers half-seen.
Here daffodils in early Spring And violets their off'rings bring, And sweetest birds their hymns outsing.
*       *       *       *       *
When country roads begin to thaw In mottled spots of damp and dust, And fences by the margin draw Along the frozen crust Their graphic silhouettes, I say, The Spring is coming round this way.
When suddenly some shadow bird Goes wavering beneath the gaze, And through the hedge the moan is heard Of kine that fain would graze In grasses new, I smile and say, The Spring is coming round this way.
_Whitcomb Riley._
*       *       *       *       *
Oh, what a dawn of day! How the March sun feels like May! All is blue again After last night's rain.
_Browning._
*       *       *       *       *
No summer flowers are half so sweet As those of early Spring.
*       *       *       *       *
Under the furze is hunger and cold, Under the broom is silver and gold.
*       *       *       *       *
THE SPRING.
When wintry weather's all a-done, An' brooks do sparkle in the zun, An' naisy-builden rooks do vlee Wi' sticks toward their elem tree; When birds do zing, an' we can zee Upon the bough the buds o' spring-- Then I'm as happy as a king, A'vield wi' health an' sunshine.
Vor then the cowslips hangin' flow'r A-wetted in the zunny show'r, Do grow wi' vi'lets, sweet o' smell, Beside the wood-screen'd graegle's bell; Where drushes aggs, wi' sky-blue shell, Do lie in mossy nest among Thorns, while they do zing their zong At evenin' in the zunsheen.
_W. Barnes._
*       *       *       *       *
A camomile bed,-- The more it is trodden, The more it will spread.
*       *       *       *       *
Thunder in spring Cold will bring.
*       *       *       *       *
March search, April try, May will prove if you live or die.
*       *       *       *       *
March wind and May sun Makes clothes white and maids dun.
*       *       *       *       *
March does from April gain Three days, and they're in rain, Returned by April in's bad kind, Three days, and they're in wind.
*       *       *       *       *
Sun set in a clear, Easterly wind's near; Sun set in a bank, Westerly will not lack.
_Scotland._
*       *       *       *       *
In the morning look toward the south east; In the evening look toward the north west.
_China._
*       *       *       *       *
Pale moon doth rain, Red moon doth blow, White moon doth neither rain nor snow.
_Latin proverb._
*       *       *       *       *
Any person neglecting to kill the first butterfly he may see for the season will have ill luck throughout the year.
_Devon and Hants._
*       *       *       *       *
ST. PATRICK'S DAY. (_March 17th._)
Gervase of Tilbury gives a legend that on St. Patrick's Day, to do homage to him, the fish rise from the sea, pass in procession before his altar, and then disappear.
*       *       *       *       *
DIVINATION BY A DAFFODIL.
When a daffodil I see Hanging down his head t'wards me, Guesse I may what I must be: First, I shall decline my head; Secondly, I shall be dead; Lastly, safely buryed.
_Herrick._
*       *       *       *       *
Hail! once again, that sweet strong note! Loud on my loftiest larch, Thou quaverest with thy mottled throat, Brave minstrel of bleak March!
_A. Austin._
*       *       *       *       *
March twenty-first, Spring begins.
*       *       *       *       *
Where the wind is at twelve o'clock on the twenty-first of March, there she'll bide for three months afterwards.
_Surrey and Hants._
*       *       *       *       *
When the wind blows from N.E.--a uniformly dry quarter during the week of the vernal equinox--it is an all but unfailing guide to the general character of the ensuing season.
*       *       *       *       *
Our vernal signs the Ram begins, Then comes the Bull, in May the Twins; The Crab in June, next Leo shines, And Virgo ends the northern signs. The Balance brings autumnal fruits, The Scorpion stings, the Archer shoots; December's Goat brings wintry blast, Aquarius rain, the Fish come last.
_E. C. Brewer._
*       *       *       *       *
Spring is here when you can tread on nine daisies at once on the village green.
*       *       *       *       *
There is a saying that if boys be beaten with an elder stick it hinders their growth.
*       *       *       *       *
When our Lord falls in our Lady's lap England will meet with a great mishap.
*       *       *       *       *
There is a tradition amongst New Forest gipsies that you must not soap your face on Good Friday, as it is said that soapsuds were thrown in Our Lord's face on the day of His Crucifixion.
*       *       *       *       *
Thou wilt remember one warm morn when winter Crept aged from the earth, and spring's first breath Blew soft from the moist hills; the blackthorn boughs, So dark in the bare wood, when glistening In the sunshine were white with coming buds, Like the bright side of a sorrow, and the banks Had violets opening from sleep like eyes.
_Browning._
*       *       *       *       *
If apples bloom in March, In vain for 'um you'll sarch; If apples bloom in April, Why then they'll be plentiful; If apples bloom in May, You may eat 'um night and day.
*       *       *       *       *
From whatever quarter the wind blows on Palm Sunday, it will continue to blow for the greater part of the coming summer.
_Hants._
*       *       *       *       *
As many days of fog in March, so many days of frost in May, on corresponding days.
_Hants._
In Spring a tub of rain makes a spoonful of mud. In Autumn a spoonful of rain makes a tub of mud.
*       *       *       *       *
There is a tradition that twin lambs are scarce in Leap Year.
*       *       *       *       *
Sleep with your head to the North--you will have sickness; to the South--long life; to the East--health and riches; to the West--fame.
APRIL
Ancient Cornish name: Miz-ebrall primrose month.
*       *       *       *       *
Jewel for the month: Sapphire. Frees from enchantment.
*       *       *       *       *
If it thunders on All Fool's day It brings good crops of grain and hay.
*       *       *       *       *
The first thunder of the year awakes All the frogs and all the snakes.
*       *       *       *       *
MS. 250 YEARS OLD.
The first Monday in April Cain was born, and Abel was slain. The second Monday in August Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed. The thirty-first of December Judas was born, who betrayed Christ. These are dangerous days to begin any business, fall sick, or undertake any journey.
*       *       *       *       *
A wet Good Friday and Easter day Brings plenty of grass, but little good hay.
_Leicester._
*       *       *       *       *
Parsley sown on Good Friday bears a heavier crop than that sown on any other day.
Parsley seed goes nine times to the Devil before coming up. It only comes up partially because the Devil takes his tithe of it.
_Old country sayings._
Oh! faint, delicious, spring-tide violet, Thin odour, like a key. Turns noiselessly in memory's wards to let A thought of sorrow free.
_W. Story._
*       *       *       *       *
What affections the violet wakes! What loved little islands, twice seen in their lakes, Can the wild water-lily restore! What landscapes I read in the primroses looks, And what pictures of pebbled and minnowy brooks, In the vetches that tangled their shore.
_Campbell._
*       *       *       *       *
Descend sweet April from yon watery bow, And, liberal, strew the ground with budding flowers, With leafless crocus, leaf-veiled violet, Auricula with powdered cup, primrose That loves to lurk below the hawthorn shade.
_Graham._
*       *       *       *       *
Spring is strong and virtuous, Broad--sowing, cheerful, plenteous, Quickening underneath the mould Grains beyond the price of gold. So deep and large her bounties are, That one broad, long midsummer day Shall to the planet overpay The ravage of a year of war.
_Emerson._
*       *       *       *       *
In wild moor or sterile heath, Bright with the golden furze, beneath O'erhanging bush or shelving stone, The little stonechat dwells alone, Or near his brother of the whin; Among the foremost to begin His pretty love-songs tinkling sound, And rest low seated on the ground; Not heedless of the winding pass, That leads him through the secret grass.
_Bishop Chant._
*       *       *       *       *
The lark sung loud; the music at his heart Had called him early; upward straight he went, And bore in nature's quire the merriest part.
_C. Turner._
*       *       *       *       *
HOW VIOLETS CAME BLEW.
Love on a day (wise poets tell) Some time in wrangling spent, Whether the Violets sho'd excell, Or she, in sweetest scent. But Venus having lost the day, Poore Girles, she fell on you, And beat ye so (as some dare say), Her blowes did make ye blew.
_Herrick._
*       *       *       *       *
April fourteenth, first cuckoo day.
_Sussex._
*       *       *       *       *
In former times Shropshire labourers used to give up work for the rest of the day when they heard the first note of the cuckoo.
*       *       *       *       *
There is an old superstition that where one hears the cuckoo first there one will spend most of the year.
*       *       *       *       *
Use maketh maistry, this hath been said alway; But all is not alway as all men do say. In April, the koocoo can sing her song by rote, In June of tune she cannot sing a note: At first koocoo, koocoo, sing still can she do; At last kooke, kooke, kooke, six kookes to one coo.
_John Heywood, 1587._
*       *       *       *       *
ODE TO THE CUCKOO.
Hail, beauteous stranger of the grove! Thou messenger of Spring! Now Heaven repairs thy rural seat And woods thy welcome sing.
What time the daisy decks the green, Thy certain voice we hear; Hast thou a star to guide thy path, Or mark the rolling year?
_Michael Bruce._
*       *       *       *       *
"Cuckoo! cuckoo!" The first we've heard! "Cuckoo! cuckoo!" God bless the bird Scarce time to take his breath, And now "Cuckoo!" he saith. Cuckoo! cuckoo! three cheers! And let the welkin ring! He has not folded wing Since last he saw Algiers.
_T. E. Brown._
*       *       *       *       *
April fifteenth, first swallow day.
_Sussex._
*       *       *       *       *
He comes! He comes! who loves to bear Soft sunny hours and seasons fair; The swallow hither comes to rest His sable wing and snowy breast.
*       *       *       *       *
April and May, the keys of the year.
_Spanish._
*       *       *       *       *
The first Sunday after Easter settles the weather for the whole Summer.
_Sweden._
*       *       *       *       *
"The rippling smile of the April rain."
_A. Austin._
*       *       *       *       *
A cold April The barn will fill.
*       *       *       *       *
Although it rains, throw not away thy watering-pot.
*       *       *       *       *
Plant your 'taturs when you will, They won't come up before April.
_Wilts._
*       *       *       *       *
When there are many more swifts than swallows in the Spring, expect a hot and dry Summer.
*       *       *       *       *
April cold with dropping rain Willows and lilacs brings again, The whistle of returning birds, And, trumpet-lowing of the herds.
*       *       *       *       *
I met Queen Spring in the hanger That slopes to the river gray; Yestreen the thrushes sang her, But she came herself to-day.
_Bourdillon._
*       *       *       *       *
When the sloe tree is as white as a sheet, Sow your barley, whether it be dry or wet.
*       *       *       *       *
As yet but single, The bluebells with the grasses mingle; But soon their azure will be scrolled Upon the primrose cloth of gold.
_A. Austin._
*       *       *       *       *
April, pride of murmuring winds of Spring, That beneath the winnowed air, Trap with subtle nets and sweet Flora's feet, Flora's feet, the fleet and fair.
_Belleau._
*       *       *       *       *
Hark! the Hours are softly calling, Bidding Spring arise, To listen to the raindrops falling From the cloudy skies, To listen to Earth's weary voices, Louder every day, Bidding her no longer linger On her charmed way; But hasten to her task of beauty Scarcely yet begun; By the first bright day of summer It should all be done.
_A. A. Procter._
*       *       *       *       *
TO THE BLACKBIRD
Golden Bill! Golden Bill! Lo! the peep of day; All the air is cool and still, From the elm tree on the hill, Chant away: While the moon drops down the west, Like thy mate upon her nest, And the stars before the sun Melt, like snow-flakes, one by one, Let thy loud and welcome lay Pour along Few notes, but strong.
_Montgomery._
*       *       *       *       *
Fled are the frosts, and now the Fields appear Re-clothed in fresh and verdant Diaper. Thaw'd are the snows, and now the lusty Spring Gives to each mead a neat enamelling. The Palms put forth their Gemmes, and every tree Now swaggers in her leavy gallantry.
_Herrick._
*       *       *       *       *
Ye who have felt and seen Spring's morning smiles and soul enlivening green, Say, did you give the thrilling transport way? Did your eye brighten, when young lambs at play Leap'd o'er your path with animated pride, Or graz'd in merry clusters by your side?
_Bloomfield._
*       *       *       *       *
When in the Spring the gay south-west awakes, And rapid gusts now hide, now clear, the sun, Round each green branch a fitful glimmering shakes, And through the lawns and flowery thickets run (Tossed out of shadow into splendour brief) The silver shivers of the under-leaf.
_F.  Doyle._
APRIL.
Winter is so quite forced hence And locked up underground, that ev'ry sense Hath several objects: trees have got their heads, The fields their coats; that now the shining meads Do boast the paunse, lily, and the rose; And every flower doth laugh as zephyr blows, The seas are now more even than the land; The rivers run as smoothed by his hand; Only their heads are crisped by his stroke.
_Ben Jonson._
*       *       *       *       *
OF GARDENS.
In April, follow the double white violet, the wallflower, the stock-gilliflower, the cowslip, flower de liece, and lilies of all natures, rosemary flowers, the tulippa, the double peony, the pale daffodil, the French honeysuckle, the cherry-tree in blossom, the damascene, the plum trees in blossom, the whitethorn in leaf, the lilac tree.
_Bacon._
*       *       *       *       *
THE PRIMROSE.
Lady of the Springe, The lovely flower that first doth show her face; Whose worthy prayse the pretty byrds do syng, Whose presence sweet the wynter's cold doth chase.
*       *       *       *       *
ALMOND BLOSSOM.
Blossom of the almond trees, April's gift to April's bees, Birthday ornament of spring, Flora's fairest daughterling; Coming when no flowerets dare Trust the cruel outer air; When the royal kingcup bold Dares not don his throat of gold; And the sturdy blackthorn spray Keeps his silver for the May; Coming when no flowerets would Save thy lowly sisterhood; Early violets, blue and white, Dying for their love of light.
_Edwin Arnold._
*       *       *       *       *
There is a rapturous movement, a green growing, Among the hills and valleys once again, And silent rivers of delight are flowing Into the hearts of men. There is a purple weaving on the heather, Night drops down starry gold upon the furze, Wild rivers and wild birds sing songs together, Dead Nature breathes and stirs.
_Trench._
*       *       *       *       *
April! the hawthorn and the eglantine, Purple woodbine, Streak'd pink, and lily cup and rose, And thyme and marjorum are spreading, Where thou art treading, And their sweet eyes for thee unclose.
The little nightingale sits singing aye On leafy spray, And in her fitful strain doth run A thousand and a thousand changes, With voice that ranges Through every sweet division.
_Belleau._
*       *       *       *       *
The ballad-singers and the Troubadours, The street-musicians of the Heavenly City, The birds, who make sweet music for us all, In our dark hours, as David did for Saul. The thrush that carols at the dawn of day, From the green steeples of the piny woods, Linnet and meadow-lark, and all the throng That dwell in nests and have the gift of song.
_Longfellow._
*       *       *       *       *
The lark, that shuns on lofty boughs to build Her humble nest, lies silent in the field; But if (the promise of a cloudless day) Aurora, smiling, bids her rise and play, Then straight she shows 'twas not for want of voice, Or power to climb, she made so low a choice; Singing she mounts; her airy wings are stretched Towards heaven, as if from heaven her voice she fetched.
_Waller._
*       *       *       *       *
LARK'S SONG. (_Wessex._)
"Twighee, twighee! There's not a shoemaker in all the world can make a shoe for me." "Why so? Why so?" "Because my heel's as long as my toe."
*       *       *       *       *
Sweet April, smiling through her tears, Shakes raindrops from her hair and disappears.
MAY
Ancient Cornish name: Miz-me, flowery month.
*       *       *       *       *
Jewel for the month: Emerald. Discovers false friends.
*       *       *       *       *
Lo, the young month comes, all smiling, up this way.
*       *       *       *       *
The Irish say that fire and salt are the two most sacred things given to man, and if you give them away on May Day you give away your luck for the year.
*       *       *       *       *
The fair maid, who, the first of May, Goes to the fields at break of day, And washes in dew from the hawthorn tree, Will ever after handsome be.
*       *       *       *       *
It is unlucky to go on the water the first Monday in May.
_Irish saying._
*       *       *       *       *
Whoever is ill in the month of May, For the rest of the year will be healthy and gay.
*       *       *       *       *
Leave cropping from May To Michaelmas Day.
*       *       *       *       *
The last year's leaf, its time is brief Upon the beechen spray; The green bud springs, the young bird sings, Old leaf, make room for May: Begone, fly away, Make room for May.
Oh, green bud, smile on me awhile; Oh, young bird, let me stay: What joy have we, old leaf, in thee? Make room, make room for May: Begone, fly away, Make room for May.
_Henry Taylor._
*       *       *       *       *
There are twelve months in all the year, As I hear many say, But the merriest month in all the year Is the merry month of May.
*       *       *       *       *
They who bathe in May Will soon be laid in clay; They who bathe in June Will sing another tune.
_Yorkshire._
*       *       *       *       *
Come listen awhile to what we shall say, Concerning the season, the month we call May; For the flowers they are springing, and the birds they do sing, And the baziers (auriculas) are sweet in the morning of May.
When the trees are in bloom, and the meadows are green, The sweet smiling cowslips are plain to be seen; The sweet ties of Nature, which we plainly do see, For the baziers are sweet in the morning of May.
_Lancashire._
*       *       *       *       *
Summer is near, and buttercups blow, And sunshine glimmers aloft; And winds play tunes which merrily flow, Though in melody mellow and soft; Then sing the song of the green spring-time, The season of promise and bloom, When buds have birth, and the gladdened earth Awakes from her wintry tomb.
_Hogg._
*       *       *       *       *
Flowery May, who from her green lap throws The yellow cowslip and the pale primrose.
_Milton._
*       *       *       *       *
OF GARDENS.
In May and June come pinks of all sorts, especially the blush pink; roses of all kinds, except the musk which comes later; honeysuckles, strawberries, bugloss, columbine, the French marigold, flos Africanus, cherry tree in fruit, ribes, figs in fruit, rasps, vine flowers, lavender in flowers, the sweet satyrian (orchis) with the white flower, herba muscaria (grape hyacinth), lilium convallium, the apple tree in blossom.
_Bacon._
*       *       *       *       *
A lovely morn, so still, so very still, It hardly seems a growing day of Spring, Though all the odorous buds are blossoming, And the small matin birds were glad and shrill Some hours ago; but now the woodland rill Murmurs along, the only vocal thing, Save when the wee wren flits with stealthy wing, And cons by fits and bits her evening trill.
_Hartley Coleridge._
*       *       *       *       *
If you sweep the house with blossomed broom in May, You're sure to sweep the head of the house away.
*       *       *       *       *
Come out of doors! 'tis Spring! 'tis May! The trees be green, the fields be gay, The weather warm, the winter blast With all his train of clouds is past.
Mother of blossoms! and of all That's fair afield from Spring to Fall, The cuckoo, over white-waved seas, Do come to sing in thy green trees, And butterflies, in giddy flight, Do gleam the most by thy gay light.
_W. Barnes._
*       *       *       *       *
All the land in flowery squares, Beneath a broad and equal blowing wind, Smelt of the coming summer, as one large cloud Drew downward: but all else of Heaven was pure Up to the sun, and May from verge to verge.
_Tennyson._
*       *       *       *       *
Hush! hush! the nightingale begins to sing, And stops, as ill-contented with her note; Then breaks from out the bush with hurried wing, Restless and passionate. She tunes her throat, Laments awhile in wavering trills, and then Floods with a stream of sweetness all the glen.
_Jean Ingelow._
*       *       *       *       *
Dark winter is waning, Bright summer is reigning, The world is regaining, Its beauty in May.
The wild woods are ringing With birds sweetly singing, Where dewdrops are clinging To flowret and spray.
The sunshine entrances My heart when it dances, And glimmers and glances, Through greenwood so gay.
_From Celtic Lyre._
*       *       *       *       *
OLD MAY DAY. (_May 11th._)
On! what a May-day--what a dear May-day! Feel what a breeze, love, Undulates o'er us; Meadow and trees, love, Glisten before us; Light, in all showers, Falls from the flowers, Hear how they ask us; "Come and sit down."
_From Venetian._ (_Burrati._)
*       *       *       *       *
Old May Day is the usual time for turning out cattle into the pastures, though frequently then very bare of grass.
_Hone._
*       *       *       *       *
The three most unpopular saints in the calender are Pancratius, Servatius, and Bonifacius, known both in Germany and Austria as the "three icemen"; and during May 12, 13, and 14 many gardeners keep nightly watch and light outdoor fires.
*       *       *       *       *
Who shears his sheep before St. Gervatius' (or Servatius') Day loves more his wool than his sheep.
*       *       *       *       *
When the corn is over the crow's back the frost is over.
_Cheshire._
*       *       *       *       *
Go and look at oats in May, You will see them blown away; Go and look again in June, You will sing another tune.
*       *       *       *       *
The oak before the ash, Prepare your summer sash; The ash before the oak, Prepare your summer cloak.
_Dorset._
*       *       *       *       *
A windy May makes a fair year.
*       *       *       *       *
Cut thistles in May, They grow in a day; Cut thistles in June, That is too soon; Cut thistles in July, Then they will die.
*       *       *       *       *
In the middle of May comes the tail of the winter.
_France._
*       *       *       *       *
When passing o'er this streamlet, One fragrant morn in May, The meadows, wet with dewdrops, Shone bright at dawn of day; The crimson-breasted robin Was pouring forth his lay; The cuckoo's note of gladness Arose from scented spray.
The mavis warbles loudly From yonder leafy tree; The wren now joins the chorus, And chirps aloud with glee; The linnet is preparing Her cheerfulness to show, While black-cocks greet their partners With cooing soft and low.
_From Celtic Lyre._
*       *       *       *       *
May's warm, slow, yellow moonlit summer nights.
*       *       *       *       *
Among East Coast folk there is a pretty belief, very widely held, that in May, when the sea-fowl are hatching out on the saltings, Providence checks the spring tides so that they do not rise high enough to interfere with the birds. These they call by the appropriate name of "bird tides."
*       *       *       *       *
The linnet's warble, sinking towards a close, Hints to the thrush 'tis time for their repose; The shrill-voiced thrush is heedless, and again The monitor revives his own sweet strain; But both will soon be mastered, and the copse Be left as silent as the mountain-tops, Ere some commanding star dismiss to rest The throng of rooks, that now from twig or nest, (After a steady flight on home-bound wings, And a last game of mazy hoverings Around their ancient grove) with cawing noise, Disturb the liquid music's equipoise.
_Wordsworth._
*       *       *       *       *
The starlings are come! and merry May, And June, and the whitethorn and the hay, And the violet, and then the rose, and all sweet things are coming.
*       *       *       *       *
He that would live for aye Must eat sage in May.
*       *       *       *       *
A dry May and a dripping June Brings all things into tune.
_Bedford._
*       *       *       *       *
Hawthorn bloom and elder flowers Will fill a house with evil powers.
_Warwick._
*       *       *       *       *
THE SIMPLERS. (_XVIIth. Century._)
Here's pennyroyal and marigolds! Come, buy my nettle-tops. Here's water-cress and scurvy-grass! Come buy my sage of virtue, ho! Come buy my wormwood and mugwort! Here's all fine herbs of every sort: Here's southernwood that's very good, Dandelion and house-leek; Here's dragon's tongue and wood-sorrel, With bear's-foot and horehound.
*       *       *       *       *
Lazy cattle wading in the water Where the ripples dimple round the buttercups of gold.
_Whitcomb Riley._
*       *       *       *       *
When the dimpled water slippeth, Full of laughter on its way, And her wing the wagtail dippeth, Running by the brink at play; When the poplar leaves atremble Turn their edges to the light, And the far-off clouds resemble Veils of gauze most clear and white; And the sunbeams fall and flatter Woodland moss and branches brown, And the glossy finches chatter Up and down, up and down: Though the heart be not attending, Having music of her own, On the grass, through meadows wending, It is sweet to walk alone.
_Jean Ingelow._
*       *       *       *       *
MOONWORT.
There is a herb, some say, whose virtue's such It in the pasture, only with a touch, Unshods the new-shod steed.
_Withers._
*       *       *       *       *
WOOD-PIGEON.
"Coo-pe-coo, Me and my poor two; Two sticks across, and a little bit of moss, And it will do, do, do."
_Notts._
*       *       *       *       *
The pigeon never knoweth woe, Until abenting it doth go.
_Old couplet._
*       *       *       *       *
If you scare the flycatcher away, No good luck with you will stay.
_Somerset._
*       *       *       *       *
May 29th, yack-bob day.
_Westmorland._
*       *       *       *       *
May, thou month of rosy beauty, Month when pleasure is a duty; Month of maids that milk the kine, Bosom rich, and breath divine; Month of bees, and month of flowers Month of blossom-laden bowers; Month of little hands with daisies, Lover's love, and poets' praises. Oh, thou merry month complete! May, thy very name is sweet.
_Leigh Hunt._
*       *       *       *       *
When clamour that doves in the lindens keep Mingles with musical flash of the weir, Where drowned green tresses of crowsfoot creep, Then comes in the sweet o' the year!
When big trout late in the twilight leap, When the cuckoo clamoureth far and near, When glittering scythes in the hayfield reap, Then comes in the sweet o' the year!
_Andrew Lang._
*       *       *       *       *
Oh! come quickly, show thee soon; Come at once with all thy noon, Manly, joyous, gipsy June.
_Leigh Hunt._
JUNE
Ancient Cornish name: Miz-epham, summer month, or head of summer.
*       *       *       *       *
Jewel for the month: Agate. Long life, health, and prosperity.
*       *       *       *       *
When the white pinks begin to appear, Then is the time your sheep to shear.
_Old Rhyme._
*       *       *       *       *
Over the meadow, In sunshine and shadow, The meadow-larks trill and the bumble-bees drone.
_Whitcomb Riley._
*       *       *       *       *
If it raineth on the eighth of June a wet harvest men will see.
*       *       *       *       *
The broom having plenty of blossoms, or the walnut tree, is a sign of a fruitful year of corn.
*       *       *       *       *
A calm June Puts the farmer in tune.
*       *       *       *       *
A dripping June Puts all things in tune.
*       *       *       *       *
Come away! The sunny hours Woo thee far to founts and bowers! O'er the very waters now, In their play, Flowers are shedding beauty's glow-- Come away! Where the lily's tender gleam Quivers on the glancing stream, Come away!
All the air is filled with sound, Soft and sultry, and profound; Murmurs through the shadowy grass Lightly stray; Faint winds whisper as they pass: Come away! Where the bee's deep music swells From the trembling foxglove bells. Come away!
_Mrs. Hemans._
*       *       *       *       *
Pansies! Pansies! How I love you, pansies! Jaunty-faced, laughing-lipped, and dewy-eyed with glee.
_Whitcomb Riley._
*       *       *       *       *
The flower beds all were liberal of delight; Roses in heaps were there, both red and white, Lilies angelical, and gorgeous glooms Of wall-flowers, and blue hyacinths, and blooms, Hanging thick clusters from light boughs; in short, All the sweet cups to which the bees resort.
_Leigh Hunt._
*       *       *       *       *
Oh! the rosy month of June I hail as summer's queen; The hills and valleys sing in joy, and all the woods are green; And streamlets flow in gladsome song, the birds are all in tune; And Nature smiles in summer's pride, in the rosy month of June. The sixth month of the year Is the month of June, When the weather's too hot to be borne, The master doth say, As he goes on his way, "To-morrow my sheep shall be shorn."
_Somerset._
*       *       *       *       *
Here the rosebuds in June and the violets are blowing, The small birds they warble from every green bough; Here the pink and the lily, And the daffadowndilly, To adorn and perfume the sweet meadows in June; 'Tis all before the plough the fat oxen go slow; But the lads and the lasses to the sheep-shearing go.
_Sussex Song._
*       *       *       *       *
Below the hill's an ash; below The ash, white elder-flow'rs do blow: Below the elder is a bed O' robinhoods a' blushin' red; And there, wi' nunch es all a-spread, The hay-meakers, wi' each a cup O' drink, do smile to zee hold up The rain, an' sky a-clearin'.
_W. Barnes._
*       *       *       *       *
By fragrant gales in frolic play The floating corn's green waves are fann'd, And all above, broad summer day! And all below, bright summer land.
_Owen Meredith._
*       *       *       *       *
The sweet west wind is flying Over the purple sea, And the amber daylight dying On roadway, hill, and tree; The cattle bells are ringing Among the slanting downs, And children's voices flinging Glad echoes through the towns: "Oh, summer day! so soon away!" The happy-hearted sigh and say: "Sweet is thy light, and sad thy flight, And sad the words--good-night, good-night."
The wan white clouds are trailing Low o'er the level plain, And the wind brings with its wailing The chill of the coming rain; Fringed by the faded heather, Wide pools of water lie, And birds and leaves together Whirl through the evening sky. "Haste thee away, oh, winter day!" The weary-hearted weep and say: "Sad is thy light, and slow thy flight, And sweet the words--good-night, good-night."
*       *       *       *       *
'Twas one of the charmed days When the genius of God doth flow, The wind may alter twenty ways, A tempest cannot blow; It may blow north, it still is warm; Or south, it still is clear; Or east, it smells like a clover farm; Or west, no thunder fear.
_Emerson._
*       *       *       *       *
Where woodbines wander, and the wallflower pushes its way alone; And where in wafts of fragrance, sweetbrier bushes make themselves known, With banks of violets for southern breezes to seek and find, And trellis'd jessamine that trembles in the summer wind. Where clove carnations overgrow the places where they were set, And, mist-like, in the intervening spaces creeps mignonette.
*       *       *       *       *
ST. BARNABAS DAY. (_Old Style. June 21st._)
Barnaby bright, Barnaby bright, The longest day and the shortest night.
*       *       *       *       *
The ignorant believe that any person fasting on Midsummer eve, and sitting in the church porch, will, at midnight, see the spirits of the persons of that parish who will die that year, come and knock at the church door, in the order and succession in which they will die.
_Hone._
*       *       *       *       *
When mack'rel ceaseth from the seas, John Baptist brings grass-beef and pease.
_Tusser._
*       *       *       *       *
1570(?)
Then doth the joyfull feast of John the Baptist take his turne, When bonfires great with loftie flame, in every town doe burne; And yong men round about with maides doe daunce in every streete, With garlands wroughte of motherworth, or else with vervain sweete.
_Barnaby Googe._
*       *       *       *       *
'Twas midsummer; The warm earth teemed with flowers; the kingcups gold, The perfumed clover, 'mid the crested grass; The plantains rearing high their flowery crowns Above the daisied coverts; overhead, The hawthorns, white and rosy, bent with bloom, The broad-fanned chestnuts spiked with frequent flowers, And white gold-hearted lilies on the stream.
_Lewis Morris._
*       *       *       *       *
OLD KENTISH SONG.
My one man, my two men, Will mow me down the medda'; My three men, my four men, Will carry away togedda'; My five men, my six men, And there ain't no more, Will mow my hay, and carry away, And mow me down the medda'.
*       *       *       *       *
Soon will high midsummer pomps come on, Soon will the musk carnation break and swell, Soon shall we have gold-dusted snapdragon, Sweet William with his homely cottage-smell, And stocks in fragrant blow.
_Matthew Arnold._
*       *       *       *       *
SIGNS OF RAIN.
The hollow winds begin to blow, The clouds look black, the glass is low, The soot falls down, the spaniels sleep, The spiders from their cobwebs creep, Last night the sun went pale to bed, The moon in halo hid her head, The boding shepherd heaves a sigh, For see! a rainbow spans the sky. The walls are damp, the ditches smell, Clos'd is the pink ey'd pimpernel. Hark! how the chairs and tables crack; Old Betty's joints are on the rack. Loud quack the ducks, the peacocks cry, The distant hills are looking nigh. How restless are the snorting swine! The busy flies disturb the kine. Low o'er the grass the swallow wings; The cricket, too, how loud it sings. Puss on the hearth, with velvet paws, Sits smoothing o'er her whiskered jaws. Through the clear stream the fishes rise, And nimbly catch the incautious flies. The sheep are seen at early light Cropping the meads with eager bite. Tho' June, the air is cold and chill; The mellow blackbird's voice is still. The glow-worms, numerous and bright, Illumed the dewy dell last night. At dusk the squalid toad was seen Hopping, crawling, o'er the green. The frog has lost his yellow vest, And in a dingy suit is dress'd. The leech disturb'd is newly risen Quite to the summit of his prison. The whirling winds the dust obeys, And in the rapid eddy plays. My dog, so altered in his taste, Quits mutton bones on grass to feast; And see yon rooks, how odd their flight, They imitate the gliding kite, Or seem precipitate to fall, As if they felt the piercing ball. 'Twill surely rain--I see with sorrow, Our jaunt must be put off to-morrow.
An excuse for not accepting the invitation of a friend to make a country excursion.
_Edward Jenner._
*       *       *       *       *
Pondweed sinks before rain.
*       *       *       *       *
Fir cones close for wet, open for fine weather.
*       *       *       *       *
Cows and sheep lie down before rain to keep a dry place to lie on.
*       *       *       *       *
When the clouds go up the hill, They'll send down water to turn a mill.
_Hants._
*       *       *       *       *
If nights three dewless there be, 'Twill rain you're sure to see.
*       *       *       *       *
If bees stay at home Rain will soon come. If they fly away Fine will be the day.
*       *       *       *       *
1656.
If the down flyeth off colt's foot, dandelyon and thistles, when there is no winde, it is a sign of rain.
*       *       *       *       *
When a cock drinks in summer it will rain a little after.
_Italy._
*       *       *       *       *
When sheep begin to go up the mountains, shepherds say it will be fine weather.
*       *       *       *       *
Sea gull, sea gull, sit on the sand; It's never good weather when you're on the land.
*       *       *       *       *
Pimpernel, pimpernel, tell me true, Whether the weather be fine or no; No heart can think, no tongue can tell, The virtues of the pimpernel.
*       *       *       *       *
When rain causes bubbles to rise in water it falls upon, the shower will last long.
_Essex._
*       *       *       *       *
A Saturday's rainbow, a week's rotten weather.
_South Ireland._
*       *       *       *       *
A sunshiny shower Never lasts half an hour.
_Bedford._
*       *       *       *       *
When oxen do lick themselves against the hair, it betokeneth rain to follow shortly after.
*       *       *       *       *
Beast do take comfort in a moist Air: and it maketh them eat their meat better, and therefore sheep will get up betimes in the morning to feed against rain, and Cattle, and Deer, and Coneys will feed hard before Rain, and a Heifer will put up his nose and snuff in the air against Rain. Worms, vermin, etc., likewise do foreshew Rain: for Earth-worms will come forth, and Moles will cast up more, and Fleas bite more against Rain.
_Bacon._
*       *       *       *       *
To talk of the weather is nothing but folly, For when it rains on the hill, the sun shines in the valley.
*       *       *       *       *
Maayres taails an' mackerel sky, Not long wet, nor not long dry.
_Berkshire._
*       *       *       *       *
When the wind veers against the sun, Trust it not, for back 'twill run.
*       *       *       *       *
Rainbow to windward, foul falls the day; Rainbow to leeward, damp runs away.
*       *       *       *       *
When sheep do huddle by tree and bush, Bad weather is coming with wind and slush.
*       *       *       *       *
A rainbow at morn, Put your hook in the corn; A rainbow at eve, Put your head in the sheave.
_Cornwall._
*       *       *       *       *
Clouds without rain in summer indicate wind.
*       *       *       *       *
Saturday's moon, Sunday seen The foulest weather there ever hath been.
*       *       *       *       *
When the new moon comes in at midnight, or within thirty minutes before or after, the following month will be fine.
*       *       *       *       *
Saturday change, and Sunday full, Is always wet, and always wull.
_Northants._
*       *       *       *       *
If mist's in the new moon, rain in the old; If mist's in the old moon, rain in the new.
*       *       *       *       *
A fog and a small moon Bring an easterly wind soon.
_Cornwall._
*       *       *       *       *
If Saturday's moon Comes once in seven years, It comes too soon.
*       *       *       *       *
FULL MOON.
The nearer to twelve in the afternoon, the drier the moon. The nearer to twelve in the forenoon, the wetter the moon.
_Hereford._
*       *       *       *       *
When the moon is at the full, Mushrooms you may freely pull; But when the moon is on the wane, Wait, ere you think to pluck again.
*       *       *       *       *
The moon and the weather May change together; But change of the moon Does not change the weather; If we'd no moon at all, And that may seem strange, We still should have weather That's subject to change.
*       *       *       *       *
MIDSUMMER FAIRIES.
The pastoral cowslips are our little pets, And daisy stars, whose firmament is green; Pansies, and those veiled nuns, meek violets, Sighing to that warm world from which they screen; And golden daffodils, plucked for May's queen; And lovely harebells, quaking on the heath; And hyacinth, long since a fair youth seen, Whose tuneful voice, turned fragrance in his breath, Kissed by sad zephyr, guilty of his death.
_Hood._
*       *       *       *       *
The sun has long been set, The stars are out by twos and threes, The little birds are piping yet Among the bushes and the trees; There's a cuckoo, and one or two thrushes, And a far-off wind that rushes, And a sound of water that gushes, And the cuckoo's sovereign cry Fills all the hollow of the sky, Who would "go parading," In London "and masquerading," On such a night in June, With the beautiful soft half-moon, And all these innocent blisses? On such a night as this is!
_Wordsworth._
*       *       *       *       *
When the wind's in the south The rain's in its mouth.
*       *       *       *       *
No weather is ill If the wind be still.
_Old saying._
*       *       *       *       *
All through the sultry hours of June, From morning blithe to golden noon, And till the star of evening climbs The gray-blue East, a world too soon, There sings a thrush within the limes.
God's poet, hid in foliage green, Sings endless songs, himself unseen; Right seldom come his silent times. Linger, ye summer hours serene! Sing on, dear thrush, amid the limes!
_Mortimer Collins._
*       *       *       *       *
A wet June makes a dry September.
_Cornwall._
JULY
Ancient Cornish name: Miz-gorepham, head of the summer month.
*       *       *       *       *
Jewel for the month: Ruby. Discovers poison.
*       *       *       *       *
If the first of July be rainy weather, 'Twill rain more or less for four weeks together.
*       *       *       *       *
In my nostrils the summer wind Blows the exquisite scent of the rose: Oh! for the golden, golden wind, Breaking the buds as it goes! Breaking the buds and bending the grass, And spilling the scent of the rose.
_Aldrich._
*       *       *       *       *
I sometimes think that never blows so red The rose as where some buried Cæsar bled; That every hyacinth the garden wears Dropt in its lap from some once lovely head.
_Omar Khayyam._
*       *       *       *       *
OF GARDENS.
In July come gilliflowers of all varieties, musk roses, the lime tree in blossom, early pears, and plums in fruit, ginnetings, quadlins.
_Bacon._
*       *       *       *       *
A tuft of evening primroses, O'er which the mind may hover till it dozes; O'er which it well might take a pleasant sleep, But that 'tis ever startled by the leap Of buds into ripe flowers.
_Keats._
*       *       *       *       *
Now the glories of the year May be viewed at the best, And the earth doth now appear In her fairest garments dress'd: Sweetly smelling plants and flowers Do perfume the garden bowers; Hill and valley, wood and field, Mixed with pleasure profits yield.
_George Withers._
*       *       *       *       *
Blue flags, yellow flags, flags all freckled, Which will you take? Yellow, blue, speckled! Take which you will, speckled, blue, yellow, Each in its way has not a fellow.
_C. Rossetti._
Swelling downs, where sweet air stirs Blue hair-bells lightly, and where prickly furze Buds lavish gold.
_Keats._
*       *       *       *       *
Mouse-ear, or Scorpion grass, any manner of way ministered to horses brings this help unto them, that they cannot be hurt, while the smith is shoeing of them, therefore it is called of many, _herba clavorum_, the herb of nails.
_Old saying, before 1660._
*       *       *       *       *
Sweet is the Rose, but growes upon a brere; Sweet is the Junipere, but sharp his bough; Sweet is the Eglantine, but pricketh nere; Sweet is the Firbloome, but his braunche is rough; Sweet is the Cypresse, but his rynd is tough; Sweet is the Nut, but bitter is his pill; Sweet is the Broome-flowre, but yet sowre enough; And sweet is Moly, but his root is ill. So every sweet with sowre is tempered still, That maketh it the coveted be more: For easie things, that may be got at will, Most sorts of men doe set but little store.
_Spenser._
*       *       *       *       *
Where the copse-wood is the greenest, Where the fountain glistens sheenest, Where the morning dew lies longest, There the lady fern grows strongest.
_Walter Scott._
*       *       *       *       *
FAIRE DAYES: OR, DAWNES DECEITFUL.
Faire was the Dawne; and but e'ene now the Skies Shew'd like to Creame, enspir'd with Strawberries: But on a sudden, all was chang'd and gone That smil'd in that first sweet complexion.
Then Thunder-claps and Lightning did conspire To teare the world, or set it all on fire. What trust to things below, whenas we see, As Men, the Heavens have their Hypocrisie?
_Herrick._
*       *       *       *       *
Summer in the penniless can stir the frozen prayer, Summer sends a golden glow through needy bones a-while; Bright and breezy is the dawn, and soft the balmy air; Summer, 'tis the breath of Heaven, 'tis God's own gracious smile.
_From Victor Hugo._
*       *       *       *       *
The nightingale and the cuckow both grow hoarse at the rising of Sirius the dogge star.
*       *       *       *       *
Not rend off, but cut off ripe bean with a knife, For hindering stalk of her vegetive life. So gather the lowest, and leaving the top, Shall teach thee a trick for to double thy crop.
_Tusser._
*       *       *       *       *
A shower of rain in July, when the corn begins to fill, Is worth a plough of oxen, and all belongs theretill.
*       *       *       *       *
ST. SWITHUN. (_July 15th_.)
Saint Swithun's Day, if thou dost rain, For forty days it will remain; Saint Swithun's Day, if thou be fair, For forty days 'twill rain na mair.
_Scotland._
*       *       *       *       *
St. Swithun christens the apples.
*       *       *       *       *
No tempest good July, Lest the corn look ruely.
*       *       *       *       *
While wormwood hath seed, get a handful or twain, To save against March, to make flea to refrain: Where chamber is sweepid, and wormwood is strown, No flea for his life, dare abide to be known.
*       *       *       *       *
THE FLOWER GIRL.
1.
Come buy, come buy my mystic flowers, All ranged with due consideration, And culled in fancy's fairy bowers, To suit each age and every station.
2.
For those who late in life would tarry, I've snowdrops, winter's children cold; And those who seek for wealth to marry, May buy the flaunting marigold.
3.
I've ragwort, ragged robins, too, Cheap flowers for those of low condition; For bachelors I've buttons blue; And crown imperials for ambition.
4.
For sportsmen keen, who range the lea, I've pheasant's eye and sprigs of heather; For courtiers with the supple knee, I've parasites and prince's feather.
5.
For thin tall fops I keep the rush, For peasants still am nightshade weeding; For rakes I've devil-in-the-bush, For sighing strephons, loves-lies-bleeding.
But fairest blooms affection's hand For constancy and worth disposes, And gladly weaves at your command A wreath of amaranths and roses.
_Mrs. Corbold._
*       *       *       *       *
LONDON STREET-CALL. (_About 200 years old._)
Will you buy, lady, buy My sweet blooming lavender? There are sixteen blue branches a penny. You will buy it once, you will buy it twice, It makes your clothes smell so very nice. It will scent your pocket-handkerchief, And it will scent your clothes as well. Now is your time, and do not delay: Come and buy your lavender, All fresh cut from Mitcham every day.
*       *       *       *       *
I do not want change: I want the same old and loved things, the same wild flowers, the same trees and soft ash-green; the turtle doves, the blackbirds, the coloured yellow-hammer sing, sing, singing so long as there is light to cast a shadow on the dial, for such is the measure of his song, and I want them in the same place.
_Richard Jefferies._
*       *       *       *       *
ST. JAMES'S DAY. (_New Style. July 25th._)
'Till Saint James's Day be past and gone, There may be hops, or there may be none.
_Hereford._
*       *       *       *       *
July, to whom, the dog-star in her train, St. James gives oisters, and St. Swithin rain.
_Churchill._
*       *       *       *       *
Oh! golden, golden summer, What is it thou hast done? Thou hast chased each vernal roamer With thy fiercely burning sun.
Glad was the cuckoo's hail. Where may we hear it now? Thou hast driven the nightingale From the waving hawthorn bough.
Thou hast shrunk the mighty river; Thou hast made the small brook flee; And the light gales faintly quiver Through the dark and shadowy tree.
_W. Howitt._
AUGUST
Ancient Cornish name: Miz-east, harvest month.
*       *       *       *       *
Jewel for the month: Sardonyx. Insures happiness in marriage.
AUGUST FIRST. (_Loaf-mass Day._)
Day of offering first fruits, when a loaf was given to the priests in place of the first fruits.
*       *       *       *       *
At Latter Lammas, i.e. never.
*       *       *       *       *
The August gold of earth.
*       *       *       *       *
All things rejoiced beneath the sun, the weeds, The river, and the cornfields, and the reeds; The willow-leaves that glanced in the light breeze, And the firm foliage of the larger trees.
_Shelley._
OF GARDENS.
In August come plums of all sorts in fruit, pears, apricots, berberies, filberds, musk melons, monkshoods of all colour.
_Bacon._
*       *       *       *       *
AUGUST 1ST. (_Snipe shooting may begin._)
Snipe's song: "Don't take" local name for Snipe.
Nipcake, don't take, Don't take, don't take; Gie the lasses milk and bread, And gie the laddies don't take, Don't take, don't take.
_Scottish Midlands._
*       *       *       *       *
AUGUST 5TH. (_Old Style._)
St. James's Day. Oyster Day.
Who eats oysters on St. James's Day will never want.
*       *       *       *       *
Wheat sways heavy, oats are airy, Barley bows a graceful head, Short and small shoots up canary; Each of these is some one's bread--
Bread for man or bread for beast, Or at very least A bird's savoury feast.
_C. Rossetti._
*       *       *       *       *
It is always windy in barley harvests; it blows off the heads for the poor.
*       *       *       *       *
On Thursday at three Look out and you'll see What Friday will be.
*       *       *       *       *
No weather is ill If the wind be still.
*       *       *       *       *
For morning rain leave not your journey.
*       *       *       *       *
Never a fisherman med there be, If fishes could hear as well as see.
_Kent._
*       *       *       *       *
If the sage tree thrives and grows, The master's _not_ master, and that he knows.
_Warwick._
*       *       *       *       *
A garden must be looked into, and dressed as a body.
*       *       *       *       *
To smell wild thyme will renew spirits and energy in long walks under an August sun.
*       *       *       *       *
Friday's a day as'll have his trick, The fairest or foulest day o' the wick.
*       *       *       *       *
Dry August and warm Doth harvest no harm.
*       *       *       *       *
Put in the sickles and reap, For the morning of harvest is red, And the long, large ranks of the corn, Coloured and clothed as the morn, Stand thick in the fields and deep, For them that faint to be fed.
_Swinburne._
*       *       *       *       *
Summer is purple, and drowsed with repletion.
*       *       *       *       *
Now yellow harvests wave on every field, Now bending boughs the hoary chestnut yield, Now loaded trees resign their annual store, And on the ground the mellow fruitage pour.
_Beattie._ (_From_ "_Virgil_.")
*       *       *       *       *
AUGUST 16TH. (_St. Roche's Day._)
Formerly celebrated in England as a general Harvest Home.
*       *       *       *       *
Good huswives in summer will save their own seeds Against the next year, as occasion needs; One seed for another to make an exchange, With fellowly neighbourhood seemeth not strange.
_Tusser._
*       *       *       *       *
On one side is a field of drooping oats, Through which the poppies show their scarlet coats.
_Keats._
*       *       *       *       *
AUGUST 24TH. (_St. Bartholomew's Day._)
If St. Bartholomew's Day be misty, the morning beginning with a hoar frost, then cold weather will soon ensue, and a sharp winter attended with many biting frosts.
_Thomas Passenger._
*       *       *       *       *
St. Bartlemy's mantle wipes dry All the tears that St. Swithun can cry.
_Portugal._
*       *       *       *       *
...Happy Britannia!... Rich is thy soil, and merciful thy clime; Thy streams unfailing in the Summer's drought; Unmatch'd thy guardian oaks; thy vallies float With golden waves; and on thy mountains flocks Bleat numberless; while roving round their sides, Bellow the blackening herds in lusty droves. Beneath thy meadows glow, and rise unquell'd Against the mower's scythe.
_Thomson._
SEPTEMBER
Ancient Cornish name: Miz-guerda gala, white straw month.
*       *       *       *       *
Jewel for the month: Chrysolite. Antidote to madness.
*       *       *       *       *
If the woodcock had but the partridge's thigh, He'd be the best bird that ever did fly. If the partridge had but the woodcock's breast, He'd be the best bird that ever was dress'd.
*       *       *       *       *
HARVEST HWOME.
The ground is clear. There's nar a ear O' stannen corn a-left out now, Vor win' to blow or rain to drow; 'Tis all up seafe in barn or mow. Here's health to them that plough'd an' zow'd; Here's health to them that reap'd an' mow'd, An' them that had to pitch an' lwoad, Or tip the rick at Harvest Hwome. The happy zight,--the merry night; The men's delight,--the Harvest Hwome.
_W. Barnes._
*       *       *       *       *
We have ploughed, we have sowed, We have reaped, we have mowed, We have brought home every load, Hip, hip, hip, Harvest Home.
_Gloucester._
*       *       *       *       *
HARVEST TOAST.
Here's a health to the barley mow, Here's a health to the man who very well can Both harrow and plough and sow. When it is well sown, See it is well mown, Both raked and gravell'd clean, And a barn to lay it in, Here's a health to the man who very well can Both thrash and fan it clean.
_Suffolk._
*       *       *       *       *
Tramping after grouse or partridge through the soft September air, Both my pockets stuffed with cartridge, and my heart devoid of care.
*       *       *       *       *
September blow soft. Till the fruit's in the loft.
*       *       *       *       *
OF GARDENS.
In September come grapes, apples, poppies of all colours, peaches, melocotones (yellow peaches), nectarines, cornelians, wardens, quinces.
_Bacon._
*       *       *       *       *
Spring was o'er happy and knew not the reason, And Summer dreamed sadly, for she thought all was ended In her fulness of wealth that might not be amended; But this is the harvest and the garnering season, And the leaf and the blossom in the ripe fruit are blended.
_W. Morris._
*       *       *       *       *
A bloom upon the apple tree when the apples are ripe Is a sure termination to somebody's life.
*       *       *       *       *
September dries up wells or breaks down bridges.
_Portugal._
*       *       *       *       *
Many haws, many sloes, many cold toes.
*       *       *       *       *
When September thirteenth falls on a Friday, the Autumn will be dry and sunny.
_France._
*       *       *       *       *
September fifteenth is said to be fine in six years out of seven.
*       *       *       *       *
Onion skin very thin, Mild winter coming in; Onion skin thick and tough, Coming winter cold and rough.
*       *       *       *       *
Set strawberries, wife, I love them for life.
_Tusser._
*       *       *       *       *
The barberry, respis, and gooseberry too, Look now to be planted as other things do: The gooseberry, respis, and roses all three, With strawberries under them trimly agree.
_Tusser._
*       *       *       *       *
Wild with the winds of September Wrestled the trees of the forest, as Jacob of old with the angel.
_Longfellow._
That mellow season of the year When the hot sun singes the yellow leaves Till they be gold, and with a broader sphere The moon looks down on Ceres and her sheaves.
_Hood._
*       *       *       *       *
When the falling waters utter Something mournful on their way, And departing swallows flutter, Taking leave of bank and brae; When the chaffinch idly sitteth With her mate upon the sheaves, And the wistful robin flitteth Over beds of yellow leaves; When the clouds like ghosts that ponder Evil fate, float by and frown, And the listless wind doth wander Up and down, up and down:
Through the fields and fallows wending, It is sad to walk alone.
_Jean Ingelow._
*       *       *       *       *
St. Matthew. (_September 21st._) St. Matthee shut up the bee.
*       *       *       *       *
The flush of the landscape is o'er, The brown leaves are shed on the way, The dye of the lone mountain-flower Grows wan and betokens decay.
All silent the song of the thrush, Bewilder'd she cowers in the dale; The blackbird sits lone on the bush-- The fall of the leaf they bewail.
_Hogg._
*       *       *       *       *
Summer is gone on swallow's wings, And earth has buried all her flowers; No more the lark, the linnet sings, But silence sits in faded bowers. There is a shadow on the plain Of Winter, ere he comes again.
_Hood._
*       *       *       *       *
The feathers of the willow Are half of them grown yellow Above the swelling stream; And ragged are the bushes, And rusty now the rushes, And wild the clouded gleam. The thistle now is older, His stalk begins to moulder, His head is white as snow; The branches all are barer, The linnet's song is rarer, The robin pipeth now.
_Dixon._
*       *       *       *       *
Nothing stirs the sunny silence, Save the drowsy humming of the bees Round the rich, ripe peaches on the wall, And the south wind sighing in the trees, And the dead leaves rustling as they fall: While the swallows, one by one, are gathering, All impatient to be on the wing, And to wander from us, seeking Their beloved Spring.
_Adelaide Procter._
*       *       *       *       *
THE GARDEN.
What wondrous life is this I lead! Ripe apples drop about my head. The luscious clusters of the vine Upon my mouth do crush their wine. The nectarine, and curious peach Into my hands themselves do reach. Stumbling on melons, as I pass, Insnared with flowers, I fall on grass.
_Andrew Marvell._
*       *       *       *       *
ST. MICHAEL'S DAY. (_September 29th._)
In the Sarum Missal St. Michael is invoked as a "most glorious and warlike prince," "chief officer of paradise," "captain of God's hosts," "the receiver of souls," "the vanquisher of evil spirits," and "the admirable general."
_From Hone._
*       *       *       *       *
If Michaelmas Day be fair, the sun will shine much in the winter; though the wind at northeast will frequently reign long, and be very sharp and nipping.
_Thomas Passenger._
*       *       *       *       *
Fresh herring plenty Michael brings, With fatted crones (old ewes) and such old things.
_Tusser._
*       *       *       *       *
When the tenants come to pay their quarter's rent, They bring some fowl at Midsummer, a dish of fish in Lent, At Christmas a capon, at Michaelmas a goose, And somewhat else at New Year's tide, for fear their lease fly loose.
_G. Gascoigne._
*       *       *       *       *
Geese now in their prime season are, Which if well roasted are good fare: Yet, however, friends take heed How too much on them you feed, Lest, when as your tongues run loose, Your discourse do smell of goose.
_"Poor Robin," 1695._
*       *       *       *       *
If you eat goose on Michaelmas Day you will never want money all the year round.
*       *       *       *       *
OLD SAYING.
The Michaelmas moon Rises nine nights alike soon.
*       *       *       *       *
The moon in the wane, gather fruit for to last; But winter fruit gather, when Michael is past; Though michers (thieves) that love not to buy nor to crave, Make some gather sooner, else few for to have.
_Tusser._
OCTOBER
Ancient Cornish name: Miz-hedra, watery month.
*       *       *       *       *
Jewel: Opal. Hope.
*       *       *       *       *
OCTOBER FOURTH.
St. Francis and St. Benedight died 1226.
*       *       *       *       *
St. Francis and St. Benedight, Blesse this house from wicked wight From the night-mare, and the goblin That is night Good-Fellow-Robin; Keep it from all evil spirits, Fairies, weezils, rats, and ferrets: From curfew time, To the next prime.
_William Cartwright._
*       *       *       *       *
Who soweth in rain Hath weed to his pain; But worse shall he speed That soweth ill seed.
_Tusser._
*       *       *       *       *
When Autumn, sad but sunlit, doth appear, With his gold hand gilding the falling leaf, Bringing up Winter to fulfil the year, Bearing upon his back the ripened sheaf; When all the hills with woolly seed are white, When lightning fires and gleams do meet from far the sight; When the fair apple, flushed as even sky, Doth bend the tree unto the fertile ground, When juicy pears and berries of black dye Do dance in air and call the eye around: Then, be the even foul or be it fair, Methinks my heart's delight is stained with some care.
_Chatterton._
*       *       *       *       *
There is strange music in the stirring wind, When lowers the autumnal eve, and all alone To the dark wood's cold covert thou art gone, Whose ancient trees on the rough slope reclined Rock, and at times scatter their tresses sere.
_W. L. Bowles._
*       *       *       *       *
OF GARDENS.
In October and beginning of November come services, medlars, bullaces, roses cut or removed to come late, hollyoaks, and such like.
_Bacon._
*       *       *       *       *
SEED-TIME.
October's gold is dim--the forests rot, The weary rain falls ceaseless, while the day Is wrapt in damp. In mire of village way The hedgerow leaves are stampt, and, all forgot, The broodless nest sits visible in the thorn. Autumn, among her drooping marigolds, Weeps all her garnered fields and empty folds And dripping orchards, plundered and forlorn.
_David Gray._
*       *       *       *       *
AUTUMN DAYS.
Yellow, mellow, ripened days, Sheltered in a golden coating; O'er the dreamy, listless haze, White and dainty cloudlets floating Winking at the blushing trees, And the sombre, furrowed fallow; Smiling at the airy ease Of the southward flying swallow. Sweet and smiling are thy ways, Beauteous, golden, Autumn days!
Shivering, quivering, tearful days, Fretfully and sadly weeping; Dreading still, with anxious gaze, Icy fetters round thee creeping; O'er the cheerless, withered plain, Woefully and hoarsely calling; Pelting hail and drenching rain, On thy scanty vestments falling. Sad and mournful are thy ways, Grieving, wailing, Autumn days!
_Will. Carleton._
*       *       *       *       *
Moan, oh ye autumn winds! Summer has fled,
The flowers have closed their tender leaves and die; The lily's gracious head All low must lie, Because the gentle Summer now is dead.
Mourn, mourn, oh autumn winds, Lament and mourn; How many half-blown buds must close and die; Hopes with the Summer born All faded lie, And leave us desolate and earth forlorn!
_A. A. Procter._
*       *       *       *       *
ST. SIMON AND ST. JUDE'S DAY. (_October 28th._)
It is a Bedford custom for boys to cry baked pears about the town, with the following words:--
Who knows what I have got? In a hot pot? Baked Wardens--all hot! Who knows what I have got?
*       *       *       *       *
October brings the cold weather down, When the wind and the rain continue; He nerves the limbs that are lazy grown, And braces the languid sinew; So while we have voices and lungs to cheer, And the winter frost before us, Come chant to the king of the mortal year, And thunder him out in chorus.
_E. E. Bowen._
*       *       *       *       *
"Decay, decay," the wildering west winds cry; "Decay, decay," the moaning woods reply; The whole dead autumn landscape, drear and chill, Strikes the same chord of desolate sadness still.
*       *       *       *       *
Full moon in October without frost, no frost till full moon in November.
*       *       *       *       *
Hoar frost and gipsies never stay nine days in a place.
*       *       *       *       *
There are always nineteen fine days in October.
_Kentish saying._
*       *       *       *       *
An April frost Is sharp, but kills not; sad October's storm Strikes when the juices and the vital sap Are ebbing from the leaf.
_Henry Taylor._
NOVEMBER
Ancient Cornish name: Miz-dui, black month.
*       *       *       *       *
Jewel for the month: Topaz. Fidelity.
*       *       *       *       *
NOVEMBER 1ST. (_All Saints' Day._)
On All Saints' Day hard is the grain. The leaves are dropping, the puddle is full, At setting off in the morning Woe to him that will trust a stranger.
On All Saints' Day blustering is the weather, Unlike the beginning of the past fair season: Besides God there is none that knows the future.
_From the Welsh. 1792._
*       *       *       *       *
Apples, peares, hawthorns, quicksetts, oakes. Sett them at All Hallow-tyde, and command them to grow; sett them at Candlemas-tide and entreat them to grow.
_Wilts._
*       *       *       *       *
Who sets an apple tree may live to see it end, Who sets a pear tree may set it for a friend.
_Hereford._
*       *       *       *       *
Their loveliness of life and leaf At last the waving trees have shed; The garden ground is sown with grief, The gay chrysanthemum is dead.
But oh! remember this: There must be birth and blossoming; Nature will waken with a kiss Next Spring!
_Clement Scott._
*       *       *       *       *
Thorny balls, each three in one, The chestnuts throw in our path in showers! For the drop of the woodland fruit's begun, These early November hours.
_Browning._
*       *       *       *       *
There never was a juster debt Than what the dry do pay for wet; Never a debt was paid more nigh As what the wet do pay for dry!
*       *       *       *       *
A wet Sunday, a fine Monday, wet the rest of the week.
_Winchester._
*       *       *       *       *
An early winter, A surly winter.
*       *       *       *       *
ST. MARTIN'S DAY. (_November 11th._)
If Martinmas ice can bear a duck, The winter will be all mire and muck.
*       *       *       *       *
'Tween Martinmas and Yule, Water's wine in every pool.
*       *       *       *       *
If it is cold, fair, and dry at Martinmas, the cold in winter will not last long.
_Old saying._
*       *       *       *       *
Young and old must go warm at Martinmas.
_Italy._
*       *       *       *       *
Weary the cloud falleth out of the sky. Dreary the leaf lieth low, All things must come to the earth by-and-by, Out of which all things grow.
_Owen Meredith._
*       *       *       *       *
The year's on the wane, There is nothing adorning, The night has no eve, And the day has no morning; Cold winter gives warning.
_Hood._
*       *       *       *       *
The melancholy days are come, the saddest of the year, Of wailing winds, and naked woods, and meadows brown and sere; Heaped in the hollows of the grove, the withered leaves lie dead, They rustle to the eddying gust, and to the rabbit's tread. The robin and the wren are flown, and from the shrub the jay, And from the wood-tops calls the crow, through all the gloomy day.
_W. Cullen Bryant._
*       *       *       *       *
NOVEMBER 20TH. (_St. Edmund's Day._)
Set garlike and pease St. Edmund to please.
_Tusser._
*       *       *       *       *
If on Friday it rain, 'Twill on Sunday again; If Friday be clear, Have for Sunday no fear.
*       *       *       *       *
From twelve to two See what the day will do.
*       *       *       *       *
NOVEMBER 23RD. (_St. Clement's Day._)
Catherine and Clement, be here, be here; Some of your apples, and some of your beer; Some for Peter, and some for Paul, And some for Him that made us all. Clement was a good old man, For his sake give us some; Not of the worst, but some of the best, And God will send your soul to rest.
_Worcestershire._
*       *       *       *       *
NOVEMBER 30TH. (_St. Andrew's Day._)
On St. Andrew's the night is twice as long as the day.
_Portugal._
DECEMBER
Ancient Cornish name: Miz-kavardine, following black month.
*       *       *       *       *
Jewel for the month: Turquoise. Prosperity.
*       *       *       *       *
Though now no more the musing ear Delights to listen to the breeze, That lingers o'er the green-wood shade, I love thee, Winter! well.
Sweet are the harmonies of Spring, Sweet is the Summer's evening gale, And sweet the autumnal winds that shake The many-colour'd grove.
And pleasant to the sober'd soul The silence of the wintry scene, When Nature shrouds herself, entranced In deep tranquillity.
_Southey._
*       *       *       *       *
December frost and January flood Never boded husbandman good.
*       *       *       *       *
When there are three days cold, expect three days colder.
*       *       *       *       *
OF GARDENS.
I do hold it, in the royal ordering of gardens, there ought to be gardens for all the months in the year, in which, severally, things of beauty may be then in season.
For December and January, and the latter part of November, you must take such things as are green all winter, holly, ivy, bays, juniper, cypress trees, yew, pines, fir trees, rosemary, lavender, periwinkle, the white, the purple, and the blue; germander, flags, orange trees, lemon trees, and myrtles, if they be stoved; and sweet marjoram, warm set.
_Bacon._
*       *       *       *       *
If frost do continue, take this for a law, The strawberries look to be covered with straw, Laid overly trim upon crotches and bows, And after uncovered, as weather allows. The gilliflower also, the skilful do know, Doth look to be covered in frost and in snow: The knot and the border, and rosemary gay, Do crave the like succour, for dying away.
_Tusser._
*       *       *       *       *
DECEMBER 5TH. (_St. Nicholas's Eve._)
St. Nicholas, besides being the patron of children, was supposed to have provided marriage portions for portionless maidens.
Saint Nicholas money used to give to maidens secretlie, Who, that he still may use his wonted liberalitie, The mothers all their children on the eve do cause to fast, And, when they every one at night in senseless sleepe are cast, Both apples, nuttes, and peares they bring, and other things beside, As caps, and shooes and petticotes, which secretlie they hide, And in the morning found, they say, that this Saint Nicholas brought: Thus tender mindes to worship Saints, and wicked things are taught.
_From "The Popish Kingdom," 1750._ _Barnaby Googe._
St. Nicholas, Archbishop of Myra, patron saint of virgins, boys, sailors, and the worshipful company of parish clerks of the city of London.
_Hone._
*       *       *       *       *
The drooping year is in the wane, No longer floats the thistle-down; The crimson heath is wan and sere; The sedge hangs withering by the mere, And the broad fern is rent and brown.
The owl sits huddling by himself, The cold has pierced his body through; The patient cattle hang their head; The deer are 'neath their winter shed; The ruddy squirrel's in his bed, And each small thing within its burrow.
_Mary Howitt._
*       *       *       *       *
DECEMBER 21ST. (_St. Thomas's Day._)
St. Thomas grey St. Thomas grey, The longest night and the shortest day.
*       *       *       *       *
Look at the weathercock on St. Thomas's Day at twelve o'clock, and see which way the wind is, and there it will stick for the next three months.
_Warwickshire._
*       *       *       *       *
There is never a Saturday in the year But what the sun it doth appear.
*       *       *       *       *
If birds pipe afore Christmas they'll greet after.
_Scotland._
*       *       *       *       *
Mystic mistletoe flaunted, Such as the Druids cut down with golden hatchets at Yuletide.
_Longfellow._
*       *       *       *       *
William Stukeley, Arch Druid (1687-1765), says: "The Druids cut mistletoe off the trees with their upright hatchets of brass, called Celts, put upon the ends of their staffs, which they carried in their hands."
*       *       *       *       *
Mistletoe is said to be the forbidden tree in the middle of the trees of Eden.
*       *       *       *       *
If Christmas Day on Monday be, A great winter that year you'll see.
*       *       *       *       *
What chyld on that day boorn be, Of gret worscheyp schall he be.
_MS. in Bodleian._
*       *       *       *       *
If that Christmas Day should fall Upon Friday, know well all That winter season shall be easy, Save great winds aloft shall fly.
*       *       *       *       *
Easter in snow, Christmas in mud; Christmas in snow, Easter in mud.
_Germany._
*       *       *       *       *
So now is come our joyful feast; Let every man be jolly; Each room with ivy leaves is drest And every post with holly. Though some churls at our mirth repine, Round your foreheads garlands twine; Drown sorrow in a cup of wine, And let us all be merry.
_George Wither._
*       *       *       *       *
CAROL OF QUEEN ANNE'S TIME, 1695.
Thrice welcome Christmas, Which makes us good cheer, Mince pies and plum porridge, Good ale and strong beer, With pig, goose and capon, The best that may be, So well doth the weather And our stomachs agree. Observe how the chimneys Do smoke all about-- The cooks are providing For dinner, no doubt!
*       *       *       *       *
Kindle the Christmas brand, and then Till sunrise let it burn; Which quenched, then lay it up agen Till Christmas next return.
Part must be kept, wherewith to tend The Christmas log next year; And when 'tis safely kept, the fiend Can do no mischief there.
_Warwickshire._
*       *       *       *       *
DECEMBER 26TH. (_St. Stephen's Day._)
Blessed be St. Stephen, There's no fast upon his even.
_Old saying._
*       *       *       *       *
Bishop Hall says: "On St. Stephen's Day blessings are implored upon pastures."
*       *       *       *       *
DECEMBER 28TH. (_Innocents' Day, or Childermas Day._)
According to the monks, it was very unlucky to begin any work on Childermas Day, and what soever day that falls on, whether on the Monday, or Tuesday, or any other, nothing must be begun on that day through the year.
_Henry Bourne, 1725._
*       *       *       *       *
Days lengthen a cock's stride each day after Christmas.
*       *       *       *       *
Know the best season to laugh and to sing, Is winter, is summer, is autumn, is spring.
_Old Song._
*       *       *       *       *
HAGMAN HEIGH
Old Yorkshire custom for Hag- or Wood-man to go round to ask for money on New Year's Eve.
*       *       *       *       *
NEW YEAR'S EVE.
Hark, the cock crows, and yon bright star Tells us the day himself's not far; And see where, breaking from the night, He gilds the western hills with light.
With him old Janus doth appear, Peeping into the future year, With such a look as seems to say, The prospect is not good that way.
_Charles Cotton._
*       *       *       *       *
If New Year's Eve night wind blows south It betokeneth warmth and growth; If west, much milk, and fish in the sea; If north, much cold and storms there will be; If east, the trees will bear much fruit; If north-east, flee it man and brute.
*       *       *       *       *
The New Year, with its yet unacted history, Claims the homage of our last departing chime; Then we hush ourselves in awe before the mystery, Of the youngest and the freshest birth of Time.
*       *       *       *       *
The good old year is with the past; Oh, be the new as kind!
_Pope._
INDEX
A BLOOM UPON, 102
A CALM JUNE, 68
A CAMOMILE BED, 31
A COLD JANUARY, 10
A DRIPPING JUNE, 68
A DRY MAY, 62
A FAIR DAY, 10
A FOG AND A SMALL MOON, 81
A FROSTY WINTER, 26
A GARDEN MUST BE LOOKED, 97
A HOAR FROST, 21
A JANUARY SPRING, 15
A KINDLY GOOD JANUARY, 16
ALL THE LAND, 57
ALL THE MONTHS, 19
ALL THINGS REJOICED, 94
ALL THROUGH THE SULTRY, 84
A LOVELY MORNING, 56
ALTHOUGH IT RAINS, 43
AMONG THE EAST COAST, 61
AN APRIL FROST, 115
AN EARLY WINTER, 118
ANY INDIVIDUAL, 32
APPLES, PEARES, 116
APPLE-TREE, 12
APRIL AND MAY, 42
APRIL COLD, 43
APRIL PRIDE OF, 44
APRIL! THE HAWTHORN, 49
A RAINBOW, 81
A SATURDAY'S RAINBOW, 79
A SHOWER OF RAIN, 89
AS MANY DAYS, 35
A SNOW YEAR, 10
A SUNSHINY SHOWER, 79
AS YET BUT SINGLE, 44
AT LATTER LAMMAS, 94
AT NEW YEAR'S TIDE, 9
A TUFT OF EVENING PRIMROSES, 86
A WET GOOD FRIDAY, 38
A WET JUNE, 84
A WET SUNDAY, 118
A WINDY MAY, 59
A YEAR OF SNOW, 11
BARNABY BRIGHT, 73
BEASTS DO TAKE COMFORT, 79
BEEF AND BACON, 20
BELOW THE HILL, 70
BESIDE THE GARDEN PATH, 26
BISHOP HALL, 128
BLANK EARTH-BALDNESS, 27
BLESSED BE ST. STEPHEN, 128
BLOSSOM OF THE ALMOND, 48
BLUE FLAGS, 86
BY FRAGRANT GALES, 71
CANDLEMAS SHINED, 18
CATHERINE AND CLEMENT, 120
CHILDERMAS DAY, 128
CLOUDS WITHOUT RAIN, 81
COME AWAY, 68
COME BUY, 90
COME GATHER, 26
COME LISTEN, 54
COME OUT OF DOORS, 56
COO-PI-COO, 64
COWS AND SHEEP, 77
CUCKOO, 42
CUT THISTLES IN MAY, 60
DARK WINTER IS WANING, 57
DAYS LENGTHEN, 128
DECAY, DECAY, 114
DECEMBER FROST, 122
DESCEND SWEET APRIL, 39
DID HE DO IT?, 22
DRY AUGUST, 97
EASTER IN SNOW, 126
FAIRE WAS THE DAWN, 88
FAIR RISING, 17
FEBRUARY FILL THE DITCH, 19
FIR CONES, 77
FIRST CUCKOO DAY, 40
FIRST SWALLOW DAY, 42
FLED ARE THE FROSTS, 46
FLOWERY MAY, 55
FOR MARCH, 25
FOR MORNING RAIN, 96
FOR THE LATTER PART, 15
FRESH HERRING, 107
FRIDAY'S A DAY, 97
FROM TWELVE TO TWO, 120
FROM WHATEVER QUARTER, 35
FULL MOON IN OCTOBER, 114
GEESE NOW, 108
GERVASE OF TILBURY, 32
GO AND LOOK AT OATS, 59
GOLDEN BILL, 45
GOOD GARDENER MINE, 15
GOOD HUSWIVES, 98
HAGMAN HEIGH, 129
HAIL BEAUTEOUS STRANGER, 41
HAIL ONCE AGAIN, 33
HAPPY BRITANNIA!, 99
HARK! THE COCK CROWS, 129
HARK! THE HOURS, 44
HAWTHORN BLOOM, 62
HE COMES, HE COMES!, 42
HERE'S A HEALTH, 101
HERE'S A PENNY-ROYAL, 62
HERE THE ROSEBUDS, 70
HE THAT WOULD LIVE, 62
HE THAT FREELY LOPS, 25
HOAR FROST AND GIPSIES, 114
HUSH! HUSH!, 57
I DO HOLD IT, 122
I DO NOT WANT CHANGE, 92
I EARLY ROSE, 19
IF APPLES BLOOM, 35
IF BEES STAY AT HOME, 78
IF BIRDS PIPE, 125
IF CANDLEMAS DAY, 18
IF CHRISTMAS DAY, 126
IF FEBRUARY, 22
IF FROSTS DO CONTINUE, 122
IF IT DOES NOT FREEZE, 27
IF IT IS COLD, 118
IF IT RAINETH, 67
IF IT THUNDERS, 37
IF JANIVEER CALENDS, 9
IF MARTINMAS, 118
IF MICHAELMAS DAY, 107
IF MIST'S IN THE NEW MOON, 81
IF NEW YEAR'S EVE, 129
IF NIGHTS THREE, 78
IF ON FRIDAY, 120
IF ST. BARTHOLOMEW, 98
IF ST. PAUL'S DAY, 14
IF SATURDAY'S MOON, 82
IF THAT CHRISTMAS, 126
IF THE DOWN, 75
IF THE FIRST OF JULY, 85
IF THE GRASS GROW, 10
IF THE ROBIN, 16
IF THE SAGE TREE, 96
IF THE WOODCOCK, 100
IF YOU EAT, 108
IF YOU SCARE, 65
IF YOU SWEEP, 56
I MET QUEEN SPRING, 44
IN APRIL, 47
IN AUGUST, 95
IN FORMER TIMES, 41
IN JULY, 86
IN MARCH AND IN APRIL, 28
IN MARCH IS GOOD GRAFFING, 27
IN MAY AND JUNE, 55
IN MY NOSTRILS, 85
IN OCTOBER AND BEGINNING, 111
IN OXFORDSHIRE, 22
IN SEPTEMBER, 102
I SOMETIMES THINK, 85
IN SPRING, 36
IN THE MORNING, 32
IN THE SARUM, 107
IN THE SOUTH, 11
IN WILD MOOR, 39
IT IS AFFIRMED, 13
IT IS ALWAYS, 96
IT IS UNLUCKY, 53
JANUARY THE FOURTEENTH, 12
JULY, TO WHOM, 92
KINDLE THE CHRISTMAS, 127
KNICK, KNOCK, 20
KNOW THE BEST SEASON, 128
LADY OF THE SPRINGE, 48
LAZY CATTLE, 63
LEAVE CROPPING FROM MAY, 53
LOAF-MASS DAY, 94
LOOK AT THE WEATHERCOCK, 125
LO, THE YOUNG MONTH, 52
LOVE ON A DAY, 40
MAARYES TAAILES, 80
MANY HAWS, 103
MARCH DOES FROM APRIL GAIN, 31
MARCH IN JANIVEER, 11
MARCH SEARCH, 31
MARCH WIND, 31
MAY'S WARM, 61
MAY, THOU MONTH, 65
MISTLETOE IS SAID, 125
MOAN, OH YE AUTUMN, 112
MOONWORT, 64
MOUSE EAR, 87
MY ONE MAN, 75
MYSTIC MISTLETOE,  125
NEVER A FISHERMAN, 96
NIPCAKE, NIPCAKE, 95
NO SUMMER FLOWER, 30
NOTHING STIRS, 106
NO TEMPEST, 90
NO WEATHER IS ILL, 84
NOT REND-OFF, 89
NOW SET FOR THY POT, 22
NOW THE GLORIES, 86
NOW YELLOW HARVESTS, 97
OCTOBER BRINGS THE COLD, 114
OCTOBER'S GOLD, 111
OH! COME QUICKLY, 66
OH! FAINT DELICIOUS, 38
OH! GOLDEN, GOLDEN, 92
OH! THE ROSY MONTH, 69
OH! WHAT A DAWN, 29
OH! WHAT A MAY DAY, 58
OH! WINTER, 16
OH! LOVE-STAR, 28
OLD MAY DAY, 58
OLD YORKSHIRE CUSTOM, 12
ON ALL SAINT'S DAY, 116
ONE FOR THE MOUSE, 21
ONE MONTH IS PAST, 17
ONION SKIN, 103
ON ONE SIDE IS A FIELD, 98
ON ST. ANDREW'S, 120
ON SHROVE TUESDAY, 20
ON THE FIRST OF MARCH, 24
ON THURSDAY AT THREE, 96
ON TWELVE-EVE, 11
OUR VERNAL SIGNS, 34
OVER THE MEADOW, 67
PALE MOON, 32
PANSIES! PANSIES, 69
PARSLEY SOWN, 38
PIMPERNEL, 79
PLANT YOUR 'TATURS, 43
PLUCK BROOM, 15
PONDWEED SINKS, 77
PUT IN THE SICKLE, 97
RAINBOW TO WINDWARD, 80
REMEMBER IN ST. VINCENT'S, 13
ST. BARNABAS, 73
ST. FRANCIS, 109
ST. MATTHEW, 104
ST. NICHOLAS, ARCHBISHOP, 124
ST. NICHOLAS, 123
ST. ROCHE, 98
ST. SWITHUN IS CHRISTENING, 89
ST. SWITHUN'S DAY, 89
ST. THOMAS, 124
SATURDAY CHANGE, 81
SATURDAY'S MOON, 81
SEA-GULL, 78
SEPTEMBER BLOW SOFT, 102
SEPTEMBER DRIES, 102
SEPTEMBER THE FIFTEENTH, 103
SET GARLIKE, 103
SET STRAWBERRIES, 119
SHIVERING, QUIVERING, 112
SLEEP WITH YOUR HEAD, 36
SO NOW IS COME, 126
SOON WILL HIGH, 75
SOW PEASON, 21
SPRING IS HERE, 34
SPRING IS STRONG,  39
SPRING'S AN EXPANSIVE, 27
SPRING WAS O'ER HAPPY, 102
SUMMER IN THE PENNILESS, 88
SUMMER IS GONE, 105
SUMMER IS NEAR, 55
SUMMER IS PURPLE, 97
SUNSET IN A CLEAR, 31
SWEET APRIL, 51
SWEET IS THE ROSE, 87
SWELLING DOWNS, 87
THAT MELLOW SEASON, 104
THE AUGUST GOLD, 94
THE BADGER PEEPS, 18
THE BALLAD SINGERS, 50
THE BARBERRY, 103
THE BLACKEST MONTH, 10
THE BROOM, 68
THE DIM DROOP, 19
THE DROOPING YEAR, 124
THE EMPTY PASTURES, 10
THE FAIR MAID, 52
THE FEATHERS OF THE WILLOW, 105
THE FIRST MONDAY, 37
THE FIRST SUNDAY, 43
THE FIRST THUNDER, 37
THE FLOWER BEDS, 69
THE FLUSH OF THE LANDSCAPE, 105
THE GOOD OLD YEAR, 130
THE GROUND IS CLEAR, 100
THE HOLLOW WINDS, 75
THE HOUSEKEEPER, 21
THE IGNORANT, 73
THE IRISH, 52
THEIR LOVELINESS, 117
THE LARK, 50
THE LAST YEAR'S LEAF, 53
THE LEEKE IS WHITE, 24
THE LINNET, 61
THE MELANCHOLY DAYS, 119
THE MICHAELMAS MOON, 108
THE MOON AND THE WEATHER, 82
THE MOON IN THE WANE, 108
THE NEARER TO TWELVE, 82
THE NEW YEAR, 130
THE NIGHTINGALE, 89
THE OAK BEFORE THE ASH, 59
THE PASTORAL COWSLIPS, 83
THE PIGEON NEVER, 64
THE PRETTY LARK, 22
THE RIPPLING SMILE, 43
THE SIXTH MONTH, 70
THE SOFTEST TURF, 29
THE STARLINGS ARE COME, 62
THE SUN HAS LONG, 83
THE SWEET WEST WIND, 71
THE WIND OF THE SOUTH, 9
THE YEAR'S ON THE WANE, 119
THEN DOTH THE JOYFUL, 74
THERE ARE ALWAYS, 114
THERE ARE TWELVE, 54
THERE IS AN OLD PROVERB, 19
THERE IS AN OLD, 41
THERE IS A RAPTUROUS, 49
THERE IS A SAYING, 36
THERE IS A TRADITION, 34
THERE IS NEVER A SATURDAY, 125
THERE IS STRANGE MUSIC, 110
THERE NEVER WAS, 117
THEY WHO BATHE IN MAY, 54
THORNY BALLS, 117
THOUGH NOW NO MORE, 121
THOU WILT REMEMBER, 35
THREE ICEMEN, 58
THRICE WELCOME CHRISTMAS, 127
THROUGH ALL THE SAD, 10
THUNDER IN SPRING, 31
TILL ST. JAMES'S, 92
TO SMELL WILD THYME, 97
TOSSING HIS MANE, 25
TO TALK OF THE WEATHER, 80
TRAMPING AFTER GROUSE, 101
'TWAS MIDSUMMER, 74
'TWAS ONE OF THE CHARMED, 72
'TWEEN MARTINMAS, 118
TWELFTH DAY, 12
TWIGHEE, TWIGHEE, 51
UNDER THE FURZE, 30
UNDER WATER, 11
UPON ST. DAVID'S DAY, 24
USE MAKETH MAISTRY, 41
WARWICKSHIRE COUNTRYMEN, 10
WEARY THE CLOUD, 118
WE HAVE PLOUGHED, 101
WELCOME, O MARCH, 25
WHAT AFFECTIONS, 38
WHAT CHILD, 126
WHAT WONDROUS LIFE, 106
WHEAT SWAYS HEAVY, 95
WHEN A COCK DRINKS, 78
WHEN A DAFFODIL, 32
WHEN AFTER A ROUGH, 23
WHEN A MOORLAND, 23
WHEN AUTUMN SAD, 110
WHEN CLAMOUR, 65
WHEN COUNTRY ROADS, 29
WHEN IN SPRING, 47
WHEN MACK'REL, 73
WHEN ON THE PURIFICATION, 18
WHEN OUR LORD, 34
WHEN OXEN, 79
WHEN PASSING O'ER, 60
WHEN RAIN CAUSES BUBBLES, 79
WHEN SEPTEMBER, 103
WHEN SHEEP BEGIN, 78
WHEN SHEEP DO HUDDLE, 80
WHEN THE CLOUDS, 77
WHEN THE CORN, 59
WHEN THE DIMPLED, 63
WHEN THE FALLING, 104
WHEN THE MOON, 82
WHEN THE NEW MOON, 81
WHEN THE SLOE TREE, 44
WHEN THE TENANTS, 107
WHEN THE WHITE PINKS, 67
WHEN THE WIND BLOWS, 33
WHEN THE WIND'S IN THE EAST, 18
WHEN THE WIND'S IN THE SOUTH, 84
WHEN THE WIND VEERS, 80
WHEN THERE ARE MANY, 43
WHEN THERE ARE THREE, 122
WHEN WINTRY WEATHER, 30
WHERE THE COPSE, 88
WHERE THE WIND IS, 33
WHERE WOODBINES, 72
WHILE WORMWOOD, 90
WHO EATS OYSTERS, 95
WHOEVER IS ILL, 53
WHO KNOWS WHAT, 113
WHO SETS AN APPLE, 117
WHO SHEARS HIS SHEEP, 59
WHO SOWETH IN RAIN, 110
WHY VALENTINE, 19
WILD WITH THE WINDS, 103
WILL YOU BUY, 91
WINTER IS SO, 47
WINTER'S THUNDER, 13
WINTER'S WHITE SHROUD, 13
WINTER TIME, 11
YACK-BOB DAY, 65
YELLOW, MELLOW, 112
YE WHO HAVE FELT, 46
YOUNG AND OLD, 118
TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES
-Obvious print and punctuation errors fixed.
-A Table of Contents was not in the original work; one has been produced and added by Transcriber.

= = = PG66888 = = =
A MERRY SCOUT
A MERRY SCOUT
[Illustration: _Tilda and baby Maggie in her brand-new coach_]
A MERRY SCOUT
_By_
EDNA PAYSON BRETT
_Illustrated by_
GARADA CLARK RILEY
[Illustration]
RAND M^cNALLY & COMPANY
CHICAGO      NEW YORK
_Copyright, 1922, by_ RAND M^cNALLY & COMPANY
[Illustration]
Made in U.S.A.
THE CONTENTS
PAGE
A MERRY SCOUT                      7
LENDING THE BABY                  28
ROBERT’S ADVENTURE                44
SANDY’S VALENTINE                 55
[Illustration: _Davy was counting the time until he could be a real scout_]
A MERRY SCOUT
A MERRY SCOUT
He didn’t belong to any patrol--he wasn’t a real scout at all, but it wasn’t Davy’s fault. He was only nine and a half, you see, and that meant two years and six months of waiting--oh, such long waiting it seemed to Davy--before he could wear the coveted arrow-head badge of the tenderfoot scout and go hiking and camping like big Cousin Fred.
That is how the figures stood late in December. It was the summer before, at Grandfather’s, that Davy had first begun counting the time until he should be twelve. There, at the farm, he had met Cousin Fred. Fred was sixteen years old, a first-class scout, patrol leader in his home town, and a winner of the life-saving merit badge. But he had never felt too big to take Davy for a Sunday hike over the hills, relating thrilling tales of scout camp life and wood-craft; telling all about scout law, with its twelve hard things every scout must be and the daily good turn every scout must do; explaining the different badges, the oath, and the salute. What wonder that Davy wanted to be a scout most of anything in the world!
Shortly after his return in the autumn Davy determined to take matters into his own hands. Accordingly, one day, standing before his looking-glass and raising his right hand, palm to the front, he solemnly swore to the oath, all by himself; then he pinned under his jacket, right over his heart, a secret badge of his own designing. There he had worn it ever since, and considered himself as honor-bound to the oath as any scout living.
[Illustration: _Standing before his looking-glass, Davy swore to the oath, by himself_]
It was now two days before Christmas. There had been a snowstorm, clearing about noon. Davy had hailed it with whoops of delight. Now, by shoveling walks, he might earn money to get a Christmas present for Mother and Father, after all. It could not be the magnificent azalea and real leather pocketbook he had first dreamed of--that had been on the expectation of at least six snowstorms; but there was a gay little Jerusalem cherry tree for Mother, and for Dad a beauty of a tie, red and green changeable. Davy had selected them days ago--all he was waiting for was a job. What luck it should be Saturday and no school!
[Illustration: _For one reason or another, nobody seemed to need Davy’s services_]
When the one o’clock whistle blew, Davy and his snow shovel were well on their way, bound for an attractive-looking corner house out on the avenue--corner houses were twice the job of ordinary places. Davy pressed the bell button confidently. A sour-looking maid opened the door an inch, snapped out “No,” and banged it to before Davy could get out a word. He stood staring at the door for a moment, his mouth still open, but a minute later he was striding across the street to the opposite corner, once more wearing his sturdy scout smile. There, however, they kept a hired man; next door, a big boy was already at work. For one reason or another, nobody seemed to need Davy’s services, and it began to look as if Daddy and Mother might not get their Christmas gifts at all; only, Davy was determined. At last a nice little lady twinkled “yes” over her spectacles. But Davy was only on his third contract, with a shortage of ten cents staring him in the face, when the town clock struck four.
“Well, I declare, you work as if you meant business!” A jolly old man paused at Davy’s elbow. “Come up to number seventy Lexington Avenue--electric light in front--and I’ll give you a job. My pay is thirty cents. If you aren’t there by a quarter of five, I’ll take it you’ve struck something nearer by and do it myself.”
“Oh, I’ll be there, all right. Thank you, sir!” Davy’s spirits rose to the crown of his cap. The necktie and cherry tree were in sight again--and a box of candy too.
[Illustration: _Davy nearly ran down a young lady dashing along with a suitcase and an umbrella, in a frantic effort to overtake a passing trolley_]
Fifteen minutes later he was scuttling out to Lexington Avenue. As he was crossing the street, a block or two from the railroad station, he nearly ran down a young lady dashing along with a suitcase, a handbag, and an umbrella, in a frantic effort to overtake a passing trolley.
“Hey, there, hey!” yelled Davy, but the car whizzed right along.
“Oh, dear!” panted the young lady, dropping her suit case. “I’ve lost it, and there won’t be another Fletcher Avenue car for fifteen minutes.” She looked as if about to drop, herself, and Davy involuntarily stretched out a small hand to steady her.
“Thank you,” she gasped. “I do feel a little shaky, running with this heavy luggage. I believe I’ll go around the corner to the drug store and get something hot--provided I can secure a trusty young man to watch my suitcase.” She smiled confidently down into Davy’s honest face. “I’ll be back in ten minutes, in time to catch the next car.”
“Oh, you can trust me, _sure_!” Davy smiled back. A scout has to be helpful and courteous, especially to people in trouble.
“And you’ll stay right here with it and not let anyone touch it? It contains all my Christmas presents, you see.”
Davy promised with his hand over his badge, but of course she couldn’t see that away under his jacket!
He watched her anxiously as she crossed the street and turned the corner. Then he sat down on one end of the bag, his snow shovel at his feet, and began to consider.
It was now twenty-two minutes after four by the clock in the little tailor shop at his left, and he must meet his appointment at a quarter of five or lose his job. Luckily, he had planned to get there ahead of time--and she would be back in ten minutes--so he’d keep his date all right.
Trinity chimes pealed the half-hour. Eight minutes gone, and she hadn’t returned.
Now in the distance appeared a Fletcher Avenue car--_her_ car, that she would surely be back to take! It approached, passed--and she hadn’t come. Something must have happened! If he could only go around the corner and find out--but there was his promise.
Another five minutes gone--why didn’t she come? He might still make it if he ran.
The chimes rang out a quarter of five! It was all up now about the job, and he was still ten cents short on his Christmas fund, for he could not take a tip from the lady--a scout may never accept pay for a good turn. A chill wind was coming up, and it was growing darker and darker on the lonely corner. Davy stood up and stamped his feet to get out the numbness. But a scout has to be cheerful, no matter _what_, and he tried to whistle.
The town clock struck five. The little tailor came out of his little shop, rattled his big key in his door, and was gone, leaving Davy lonesomer than ever. He brushed his eyes with his coat sleeve. A scout cry? Never! But he was so cold and lonesome and disappointed about the job! He hadn’t thought that being a scout would be just like this.
Then suddenly, clearer than the chimes, he seemed to hear Cousin Fred’s cheerful voice again, reciting their favorite passage from the law: “_A scout is brave. He has the courage to face danger in spite of fear._” And Davy knew, for sure, that he wasn’t going to desert his post, no, not even if it meant an all-night watch! He turned up his coat collar and with better success started whistling again, keeping time with his toes as he paced up and down.
“Hello, pard, waitin’ fer yer airship?” A burly young tough whom Davy had noticed hanging around the opposite corner swaggered up with a cigarette in his mouth. “What yer got there? Nuggets or bombs?” giving the suitcase a kick. “Aw, say,” he added, with a crafty smile, “I’ll mind it whilst yer beat it to Jakey’s fer a bag o’ peanuts,” and he held out a nickel.
[Illustration: _Davy turned up his coat collar and started whistling_]
“Oh, no, thank you.” Davy sat down on the suitcase in a hurry. “I couldn’t think of leaving it to anyone, not even somebody I know. I promised her, you see--the young lady--to keep it till she came back. It’s got all her Christmas presents in it!” Davy added proudly.
The ruffian’s eyes narrowed. He cunningly changed his tactics. “Say, kid, what did she look like--her that belongs to the bag?”
“All kind o’ brown clothes and pretty and dreadful white in the face. Maybe you’ve seen her?” wistfully.
“Well, what do yer know!” Davy felt his arm clutched tight. “Believe _me_, pard, that young lady’s a pertic’ler friend o’ mine! And if you’ll jest remove yerself from her trunk there, I’ll be _dee_-lighted to fetch it to her. Here, I’ll stand fer her tip,” trying to slip a coin into Davy’s hand.
“No, sir!” Davy set his jaw fast and plumped down his little body more protectingly than ever over his charge.
“Aw, yer won’t, won’t yer? We’ll see,” sneered the ruffian, casting a furtive glance to right and left.
In an agony Davy followed his glance, but no help was in sight--save an approaching trolley, and that probably wouldn’t stop. Oh, if only some one _would_ come, or if he were only bigger, or had a magic sling like that David of old! But no, all unarmed he must meet _his_ giant Goliath. Was ever a true scout up against heavier odds? Then, in his dire need, he seemed to hear Cousin Fred’s voice again, “_A scout has the courage ... to stand up for the right ... against the threats of enemies ... and defeat does not down him_.”
Davy braced himself for whatever might come--and it came promptly. A sharp wrench, a vicious punch, and the suitcase was in the hands of the enemy, and Davy flattened on the ground, well-nigh winded. It was a black moment for the brave little scout. Everything lost--and what would _she_ think? And he had tried so hard!
[Illustration: _“Aw, yer won’t, won’t yer? We’ll see,” sneered the ruffian_]
Then--Ah, the trusty snow shovel, Davy’s ally that hadn’t been reckoned on. _Trip-ity-rip!_ Over it went the enemy with an ugly growl, sprawling into the gutter!
And the car _had_ stopped, depositing a broad-shouldered young man who saw what had occurred and was now making rapid strides toward Davy. The ruffian, scenting trouble, picked himself up, and limped a double-quick retreat through the shadow and around the corner--with_out_ the bag!
“Well, well, here you are, standing by your guns, just as she said you’d be!” The young man was addressing Davy, who had managed to get on his legs once more and regain his charge. “Say, but you’re game all right!” At the word of appreciation and the comradely slap on his shoulder, Davy suddenly didn’t mind any more about the long waiting, losing the job, and having the wind knocked out of him.
“You’re looking pretty white about the gills, though,” the big young man’s voice was very kind. “Beastly long ten minutes, wasn’t it? She didn’t count on fainting, you see, and that sort of thing. She’s my sister--teaches in the South--was going to spring a surprise on the family by coming home for the holidays. Here, I’ll take that ark off your hands and start you homeward. Your folks’ll be getting worried about you.”
[Illustration: _Ah, the trusty snow shovel, trip-ity-rip! Over it went the enemy_]
Oh, how Davy longed to accept the proffered release! But no, “I--I--I can’t,” he stammered. “I promised, and a scout has to keep his word.” Oh, it was hard to say “no” to this friendly young man. It took almost more courage than fighting the ruffian.
“Well, that’s a good one on me!” The big young man turned away his face to save Davy’s feelings. “A _scout_, did I hear you say?” He was quite serious now. “But you’re some way short of twelve?”
Then, of course, Davy had to tell about the secret badge, who he was, where he lived, Cousin Fred, and the encounter with the ruffian.
“Come, give us your hand, brother scout. You’re the real article, certificate or no certificate!” Davy’s small, mittened palm was taken in a mighty grip. “Now stand on the suitcase and look here”--the big young man opened his greatcoat--“on my sleeve, can you see?” taking out a pocket flashlight.
Davy saw. The badge of the scout master--a sure guarantee of all that was honorable and loyal, trustworthy and brave. It was like the coming of the Prince in fairy tales. Davy’s eyes glowed. Words failed him, but off came his right red mitten and three fingers were raised to his forehead in reverent salute. Then he quietly slipped from the suitcase, and, the weary watch over at last, joyfully resigned his charge into lawful hands.
“I say! you’re a dandy little scout, just the kind I’m looking for. And if only I were a magician, I’d hustle those next three birthdays of yours along in no time at all. But here’s your car--you’ll hear from us later. Good-by!” And with a parting slap for Davy and a nickel to the conductor, the scout master was gone.
On Christmas morning there came a package and a letter for Davy, both in the same unfamiliar hand. The package contained a most wonderful book, and the letter read:
MY DEAR LITTLE MERRY SCOUT:
Yes, that is what I have named you, for where would there have been any Merry Christmas for me but for your valiant defense of my precious bag! I am so sorry for what you had to endure on my behalf, but I am very happy to add to my acquaintance one more person who can be trusted, whatever the cost to him. Surely, never was a real, truly boy scout more faithful to his oath than my little scout of the secret order.
I hope you will enjoy the _Animal Book and Camp-Fire Stories_, by Dan Beard, National Scout Commissioner, which my brother and I are sending you as a small token of our gratitude.
We are planning to see you very soon.
Most cordially your friend, AGATHA ALDEN.
“Gee!” gasped Davy, turning rapturously from letter to book and back to letter again. “But any scout would have had to do it, wouldn’t he, Dad?”
Father, admiring his new Christmas tie before the sideboard mirror, smiled down into Davy’s earnest face reflected therein. “I should certainly say he would, my son,” he agreed, without hesitation. But the eyes he turned to Mother, across the room, were brimming over with pride.
[Illustration: _On Christmas morning there came a package and a letter for Davy_]
“_Our_ little Merry Christmas Scout,” softly responded Mother, who was tending a gay little Jerusalem cherry tree at the window. Sometimes there are bargains, you know, the last thing before Christmas, and so Davy’s ten-cent shortage didn’t matter, after all!
LENDING THE BABY
Lakeside Park was fairly a-blossom with children that bright summer morning, babies _and_ babies--chubby little boys in clean jaunty blouses, dainty little girls, fresher than the posies as they skipped about in their spick-and-span frocks--all safeguarded by grown-ups.
Bumpity-bump! Nurses, big sisters, and children turned out in a hurry to make room for Tilda, of the tenement, and baby Maggie in her brand-new coach. Tilda nodded and smiled shyly at the other little boys and girls as she pushed along the gorgeous gocart, a present that very morning from dear, freckled, carrot-headed Pete, of the same crowded tenement. Pete had made it his own self a-purpose for Maggie, out of a nice soap box and a pair of old wheels taken in trade with the rag man. And the red paint--the crowning glory of it all--he had earned doing odd jobs for Michael, the carpenter.
Wee Maggie, scrubbed to a polish, dimpled and babbled as she rumbled along. And what mattered to Tilda any longer the hot mile of dusty city walk--the tiresome journey from the tenement--now at last she had reached her beloved park? Oh, the cool, woodsy, sweet-smelling park! Here you could see such lots of the blue sky above the wavy trees and look as much as you liked at brilliant beds of geraniums and verbenas--so long as you didn’t pick them. And here, down by the ripply water, you could watch the whitest swans gliding along so elegantly, but not too superior to accept the bits of cake tossed from the bank by their young admirers.
By and by Tilda turned into a secluded path and came suddenly upon a lady seated all alone on a rustic bench. She was leaning her head on one hand and paying not a speck of attention to any of the beautiful things about her, not even to Mr. Robin, who was calling “cheer up” so insistently from the tip-toppest twig of the neighboring birch.
Deary me, what could be the matter? Tilda halted for exactly one quarter of a minute, then, dropping the cart handle, tiptoed across the grass, and, gently nudging the lady’s arm, whispered, “Are you sick, missis?”
The stranger started and glanced up, very much surprised to find a small girl in a faded, patched gingham gazing at her with solicitous gray eyes.
“Oh, no, child, I’m not ill, thank you! What made you think--but who is that little one in the wagon?” she asked with a sudden show of interest, interrupting herself.
[Illustration: _Deary me, what could be the matter?_]
“Why, that’s my baby.” Tilda grew tall with pride.
“_Your_ baby!” The sad lady very nearly smiled.
“Yes, isn’t she grand?” Tilda shoved the cart close up to the bench. “She’s Maggie. Open your mouth, Maggie, and show the missis your teeth.”
“She _is_ a dear baby,” agreed the lady wistfully, patting Maggie’s little tow head with tender fingers.
“Maybe you’ve got one at home, too?” ventured Tilda.
“N-no, not now.” The lady’s voice was, oh, so sorry! A big lump came right up into Tilda’s throat and tears had started on their way when a happy idea sent them straight back again.
In less than two shakes of a lambkin’s tail she had snatched wee Maggie from the gocart and landed her pat on the strange lady’s lap.
[Illustration: _The lady snuggled Maggie close and held out one hand to Tilda_]
“I’ll lend you my baby, missis,” she offered softly. “You can take her every day. I’ll fetch her in the gocart and”--Tilda faltered, then continued bravely--“you can make b’lieve she’s yours and not ours at all.”
“Oh, thank you, dear!” Really truly smiles now chased away the lady’s tears. She snuggled Maggie close and held out one hand to Tilda.
“Yes, indeed, I should like to borrow wee Maggie often, and you, too, little mother! You are better than the sunshine. Come sit down here and tell me all about yourself and baby.”
The stray passers-by smiled with friendly interest at the odd trio seated there so cozily on the park bench: cheery little Tilda from the tenement in her faded blue gingham, punctuating the conversation with intermittent bobbings of her funny, homemade Dutch cut; the beautiful young woman known to society as a wealthy banker’s wife--Tilda immediately had dubbed her “Fairy Godmother”--in an immaculate white costume; and wee, rosy Maggie in a pink dotted calico cuddled between them.
Fairy Godmother listened with a strange, new awakening as Tilda, with glowing eyes, went on to enumerate all her riches. First, of course, there was Maggie, the sweetest baby in the world, and dear Mother, who worked so hard to provide for them since Father’s death. Then there were her precious day school and Sunday school, the enchanted park--Tilda loved to pretend it was full of fairies--and there were Pete and the gocart, and now there was Fairy Godmother herself.
“Tilda,” a light struggled bravely through the mist in Fairy Godmother’s eyes, “this is my own baby’s birthday--darling little Anne, who was lent to us for twelve happy months, then taken back by the Father of us all. It was to this same park nurse and I used to bring her, and so I came here today to keep her birthday. But your bright little selves have shown me a better way. Yes, I’m going to borrow you both and take you to my home to help me change this day from the saddest to the gladdest day of all the year.”
[Illustration: _Shortly they were spinning along in the trolley, the gocart on the rear platform_]
Shortly they were spinning along in the trolley, with the precious gocart on the rear platform. And before Tilda had a chance to really “come to,” Fairy Godmother was saying, “Here we are.” The car stopped, the jolly conductor helped them out, gocart and all, and in a moment more Tilda found herself entering the “stylishest” house she had ever seen. She followed on tiptoe into the grand hall, up the wide stairs, and stepped straight into fairyland. It wasn’t any dream kind, either, that you wake up from right in the most exciting place. Tilda made sure of that by biting her finger hard--and it _hurt_.
Fairy Godmother deposited Maggie on the lovely blue center of the loveliest-of-all rugs--Tilda’s feet were loth to tread on any of them. Then she touched a funny little button, and, presto! it was just like Arabian Nights, excepting it wasn’t one of the _genii_ that appeared--only a pretty, rosy-cheeked woman, in the tiniest white cap and apron. She stood in the doorway, looking so surprised at the little strangers that Tilda became suddenly conscious of the patches in her gingham frock, and the places where there _should_ have been patches in her shoes.
“Norah,” reminded Fairy Godmother gently, “this is little Anne’s birthday, and these dear children have come to spend it with me and help to make it glad.”
“Yes, marm,” responded Norah. And Tilda followed her glance to the life-sized portrait of a wee blue-eyed baby as sweet--yes, as Maggie herself. Fairy Godmother had a little tête-à-tête with Norah, who soon left the room, turning as she went to send an assuring smile to the now welcome visitors.
Then Tilda and Maggie went to a wonderful concert--all the time staying just where they were. Ladies and gentlemen they couldn’t see at all came and sang to them, and whole orchestras and bands, all from the same mysterious little box, played music that set delicious thrills shivering down Tilda’s back, and her feet to beating time. Sousa’s band had just finished “El Capitan” when some sweet little chimes tinkled out in the hall.
“Come, Tilda.” Fairy Godmother picked up Maggie and led the way downstairs, out to the honeysuckle porch overlooking the garden.
[Illustration: _Tilda and Maggie went to a wonderful concert--all the time staying just where they were_]
There, as if the fairies had been at work, stood the dearest little table that ever was, on land or sea, with rosebuds in the middle and set for just three, with little rosebud dishes. My! but that was a party for any royal princess, cocoa with a lovely white foam on top, tiny three-cornered chicken sandwiches, ice cream and strawberries--two plates if you wanted them--frosted cake and candy besides, and milk for Maggie from a real silver cup! The only sorry part of it was baby Anne could not be there, too, for her own birthday. Probably heaven was just as nice, though Tilda could scarcely believe it.
After the “party” Maggie was tucked up cozily on the veranda couch for a nap, and Tilda was escorted to the garden to meet General Jack, Lady Gay, Baltimore Belles, American Beauties, and other celebrities, to say nothing of the pert little Pansy folk, who turned up their saucy faces at her. And Fairy Godmother said she might pick all the roses she wanted, her own self. Fancy it--dozens of them--red, white, and pink, like the grandest lady of the land! And every now and then, as Tilda stole a shy glance at Fairy Godmother’s glad face, her own beamed brighter than ever.
[Illustration: _Fairy Godmother said she might pick all the roses she wanted_]
An hour flew by as hours only can in Fairyland gardens.
“Honk, honk!” Tilda jumped to one side quicker than pop, it sounded so near, and Fairy Godmother, standing on the porch with wide-awake Maggie in her arms, laughed outright.
“It is talking to us, Tilda,” she explained, “and says, ‘Come out front.’”
There by the curb stood a splendid great, shiny auto, waiting for Tilda and Maggie.
Out from the front seat hopped a nice big man with a nice big smile to match, to help them all in and get them settled.
“This is ‘Fairy Godfather,’ Tilda,” introduced Fairy Godmother. “He’s heard all about you and Maggie over the ’phone.”
“I’m delighted to meet you, Miss Tilda and Maggie,” he said in a nice big voice as he held out his hand, and Tilda felt almost too magnificent to live.
Norah now came flying out with a mysterious box, which she handed right over to Tilda. Then Fairy Godfather packed in the gocart and away they whizzed for the tenement--by way of the shore.
Two hours later, when tired Mother came home from her long day’s work, a radiant and breathless Tilda met her at the door and invited her to a royal spread.
“Do have some more cake and another cup of tea,” insisted the little hostess gayly. “And just think, Mother, a trip to the country for all of us for two whole weeks! Isn’t it grand? And there’ll be cows and chickens and green grass and flowers, and the rent paid all the while we’re gone! But most the wonderfulest part of it all”--Tilda’s eyes grew starry--“was how Fairy Godmother kept getting gladder ’n’ gladder all the time. And she said ‘thank you’ to me, Mother, and Fairy Godfather did, too, ’s if _I’d_ done anything, when you know positive sure I never did one single thing ’cept lending Maggie.”
“I’m not so sure about that, dear.” And Mother patted the scraggly Dutch cut tenderly, smiling into Tilda’s questioning eyes.
ROBERT’S ADVENTURE
“Good-by, Robert,” called Mother, as she and Father drove off for the city one summer afternoon. “Don’t forget to fill the wood box, dear, and to feed the chickens.”
“Good-by,” answered the boy from the stone wall, without looking up.
Robert was discontented. He was tired of filling the wood box and feeding the chickens every day, and for only five cents a week. Five cents a week! Yes, that was all he had to spend for candy, marbles, and everything, while Timmie Marsh, who lived down the road, had a nickel about every day, and he never had to work at all.
Robert had been thinking and thinking what could be done about it, and at last he had made up his mind. He would go to Blakeville that very afternoon to old Nurse Tucker’s. He could walk four miles easily, and Nurse would be so glad to see him.
“Of course,” he said to himself, “I’ll write to Mother, so she’ll know I’m not drowned or anything. And I’ll tell her how Nurse gives me five cents for candy every day--’course she will--and how I don’t have to do any work, either. Then won’t Daddy come for me quick and say if I’ll only go back with him, I needn’t bring in the wood or feed the chickens or do anything unless I feel like it, and I can have all the money I want, besides!”
And now, as the buckboard vanished in the distance, Robert turned toward the house to carry out his plan. He could hear Mandy, the hired girl, singing at her work as he tiptoed cautiously in at the wood-shed door and up to his room.
After giving his hair one hasty stroke with the brush and putting on his Sunday shoes and stockings, he considered his toilet completed and was soon stealing out of the wood shed again, unobserved by Mandy.
A moment later Robert was skulking through the barnyard, making a bee line for the blueberry lot and the turnpike. But what made the chickens act so queerly? Mrs. Bantam, with her head cocked on one side, eyed him suspiciously as he crept along, while the great white rooster flew upon the coop and screamed right out, so loud that Robert feared the whole village would hear. “_What-you-going-to-do-oo? What-you-going-to-do-oo?_” Robert did not think best to answer, but was only more eager than ever to move on his journey.
He had no sooner struck the blueberry lot, however, than Lady Ann, the Jersey cow, started for him, and, poking out her head, exclaimed in mild surprise, “_Oo-oo! oo-oo!_”
[Illustration: “_What-you-going-to-do-oo? What-you-going-to-do-oo?_”]
And he had barely reached the road, when, to cap the climax, the sheep from the stony pasture across the way began to chide him. “_Ba-ad! Ba-ad!_” they bleated.
“No, I’m _not_ bad, either!” cried Robert almost in tears. Here he had gone cross-lots purposely to escape the villagers and now the animals were all after him! And, stuffing his fingers in his ears, he began to run.
The summer sun was blazing; still Robert kept on, though with ever-slackening speed, meeting no one but a stray dog or two and an occasional ox-team with its sleepy driver. At length he came to a big sign post which read:
BLAKEVILLE 3 MILES
“P’r’aps I’d better sit down a minute,” he said to himself. “I’m not tired, of course, and my shoes don’t hurt--only just a little bit. I guess there won’t be anybody to catch me ’way out here.” And as he sat rubbing his hands over the shoes that did not hurt, he encouraged himself with visions of the candy counter at Nurse’s village store.
“Why, Robert, little man, what are you doing so far from home?” There was no escaping an answer this time, for it was Mrs. Bronson, the minister’s wife, who stood before him.
“O--er, I’m--er going for a walk, Mrs. Bronson,” he stammered, jumping up; and, taking off his cap, he turned on his heel and started on again, never once daring to look behind.
But the Sunday shoes were soon pinching in good earnest. He could stand them no longer, so he pulled them off, and, swinging them on his shoulder, went on in his stocking feet.
Uphill and downhill he trudged. How hot the sun was! And how tired and bruised his poor feet were getting!
“I guess I’ll take another little rest,” he said as he limped across the road. “It’s nice and shady here by the brook and I _am some_ tired.”
Down upon the sweet green grass he lay. The candy counter at Blakeville was beginning to lose its charm, and--
Robert sat up in a sudden fright. A solemn voice was calling to him from the woods: “_Bubby-gu-hum! Bubby-gu-hum!_”
Robert turned fearfully, and there, on a stone in the brook, sat a great, blinking frog.
“I won’t go home, you naughty frog!” he cried. “I’m going to Nurse’s.” Then, ka-splash! and Mr. Frog had disappeared.
There was a queer buzzing in Robert’s head, and presently he was fast asleep in spite of himself.
The sun set. The little boy slept on. A cool breeze came up, and Robert tried to pull the bedclothes over him, but there weren’t any clothes to pull--and he awoke.
He sat up and looked around. What could it all mean? When finally it dawned upon him where he was, he set up a wail and then stood in bewilderment.
[Illustration: _“I won’t go home, you naughty frog,” Robert cried_]
In a moment he started in fresh horror, hearing wheels close at hand.
“Supposing it’s gypsies,” he groaned, “and they should carry me off! Oh dear! Oh dear!”
Nearer came the wheels. There was no way of escape. All he could do was to drop down beside the road and keep so still maybe they’d think he was a log of wood.
Now he heard voices. There might be twenty of them. Twenty gypsies! Could it be they were going by without noticing him? Robert hardly dared to breathe.
“Whoa there! What’s this?”
A big man leaped from the team. Robert closed his eyes and tried to pray. But all that he could think of was, “Now I lay me,” and that would never do.
A lantern was flashed in his face. “Bless my stars, if it isn’t our own Robert!”
“O Daddy, Daddy!” sobbed a frightened little voice.
Two strong arms lifted the shivering little fellow and placed him in the buckboard right beside his own mother.
“Robert, Robert!” she cried tremulously. “How did you ever get way out here at this time of night?--and in your stocking feet!”
[Illustration: “_Oh, Mother, I want to go home, and I’ll bring in the wood, and feed the chickens_”]
“Oh, Mother, I was g-going to Nurse’s and my shoes hurt and I went to sleep, but I don’t want to go there any m-more. I want to go ho-home, and I’ll bring in the wood, and f-feed the chickens every day, and you needn’t give me any m-money at all!”
Then Mother, who was a wonderful magician, understood all about it.
“Oh,” she cried softly, “supposing we had gone home by the other road!”
But Father said, “Let’s see. It isn’t too late yet. Shan’t we turn around and carry him to Blakeville?”
“Oh, no, no!” pleaded Robert, clutching his father’s arm, “I want to go _ho-ome_.”
“Humph! you’ve really changed your mind then, have you? Well if that’s the case, we’ll jog right along. Get up, Daisy.”
And Robert, snuggled there up against Mother, so safe and warm, at that moment would not have changed places with any boy living; no, not even for all the candy in the Blakeville store!
SANDY’S VALENTINE
“Tomorrow’s Valentine’s Day, Jeanie.”
“Yes, Sandy, I know.” Jeanie turned gently to the little brother, whose face was all swollen with mumps.
“Say, Jeanie, wouldn’t it be nice to have a truly valentine with lace and angels on it, like what’s in the store windows? Do you ’spose I will get one tomorrow?” he asked wistfully.
“Maybe you will, Sandy.” Jeanie smiled bravely, but her heart ached for the disappointment she feared was in store for him. How she was longing for a “truly” valentine herself, she did not breathe to Sandy.
There were many things that sadly puzzled seven-year-old Jeanie. Why should Father have gone to heaven to stay forever when they all needed him so badly? Why did the rent man come so often to take all Mother’s money as fast as she saved it? Why did the grocer never bring a turkey to their house on Thanksgiving or Christmas? And why did the postman never stop at their door, even on holidays, when he had so many packages? It seemed as if one, at least, must certainly be meant for them.
Jeanie was turning it all over in her mind now, as she made Sandy’s bed, this morning before Valentine’s Day, when suddenly a bright idea came into her head, and, darting across the room to a rickety little table, she opened the drawer and pulled out a piece of druggists’ white paper. Smoothing it out on the table, she folded the two short edges carefully together.
“It looks just like boughten letter paper now, don’t it, Sandy? But you mustn’t ask a single question, because it’s a surprise,” she said, settling herself to write. Then for thirty long minutes, Jeanie’s stub pencil crawled painfully over the white surface. It was a hard task for her, especially as Mother wasn’t at home to help with the spelling.
[Illustration: _Jeanie was turning it all over in her mind as she made Sandy’s bed_]
At last Jeanie heaved a deep sigh of relief. “There,” she said aloud, “it’s all ready now but the unvelope.” Whereupon she took from the family Bible a treasured envelope she had picked up in the street one day.
“It’s a perfectly good unvelope, all unstuck same’s a new one,” she said to herself “and a nice green stamp on it. All the matter is, it’s wrote on a little, but I can scratch that out all right.” And soon the second-hand envelope was ready and the letter tucked inside.
“I must go to school now, Sandy!” cried Jeanie, running for her coat and hat. “Mother’ll be home pretty soon. Good-by.” In a moment she was out of the door and hurrying to the mail box on the corner, where, standing on tiptoe, she dropped in the precious missive.
That noon, as Postman Green sat at dinner with his wife, he suddenly exclaimed, “Oh, I ’most forgot my valentine!” and he pulled from his pocket a sorry-looking envelope, directed to “Mister Postman himself.”
[Illustration: _Jeanie, standing on tiptoe, dropped in the precious missive_]
“From one of my young admirers on Gregory Street,” he laughed, passing it to his wife.
Mrs. Green tore it open. “Why, it’s a letter,” she said, proceeding to read aloud:
DEAR MR. POSTMAN:
I thort I wood rite you about Sandy’s valuntin; he wants one orful--one of those kind with lace and angels on it what come in unvelops. He has got the mumps and can’t go out, and Mother ain’t got any money to buy a valuntin, and father has been in heaven a long time. Won’t you plees look everywhere around the post-orfice, and in all the boxes on the lamp-posts, and see if you can’t find one for him? His name is Sandy Keith, and we live in the little brown house, number 27 Gregory Street, wher you don’t ever stop, even on Christmus. I will be looking for you at the winder tomorer noon. Plees don’t go by or cross the street this time.
From your frend,
JEANIE KEITH
“Poor little things! They mustn’t be disappointed!” cried Mrs. Green.
“Indeed, they shan’t be,” answered the postman soberly. “I’ve just thought up the nicest little scheme. I’ll tell you how it all comes out tomorrow.”
[Illustration: _The door was opened by a pale-faced little girl, leaning on a crutch_]
Late that afternoon Postman Green rang the bell of a fine stone house on Hillside Avenue. The door was opened quickly by a pale-faced little girl, leaning on a crutch.
“Only five of them for you in this mail,” laughed the postman, as she held out her hand, “but here’s a valentine _I_ got this morning I’d like you to see. I’ll call for it tomorrow.”
“Poor little rich girl!” he said to himself, as he went away. “She’ll have something new to amuse her now.”
The next noon Jeanie came home from school in a quiver of excitement. Sandy met her with a rueful face. “It ain’t come, Jeanie,” he cried reproachfully.
“But Valentine’s Day isn’t over yet,” laughed Jeanie gaily. And, dinner dispatched as soon as possible, she took her stand at the window.
At that moment, several blocks away, the postman was again stopping at the door of the great stone house.
“I’m so glad that you showed me your valentine,” the little girl on the crutch was saying, with sparkling eyes, “else I’d never have known anything about them. Thank you so much. It’s the best fun I ever had.”
It seemed a long time to Jeanie, stationed at the window, before the familiar blue coat came in sight.
“Oh, here he comes, Sandy!” she cried at last, clasping her hands tightly together, “and he sees me, and he’s waving something white!”
Jeanie flew to the door and opened it before the postman had time to ring.
“For Master Sandy Keith,” he announced, holding out a great white envelope.
“That’s him, that’s him!” cried Jeanie wildly, pointing to Sandy, who, regardless of mumps, had followed her. “Oh, thank you, Mister Postman! I knew you’d come. But where did you ever find such a big one?”
“For Miss Jeanie Keith,” continued the postman, not seeming to hear, taking from his pack another envelope as big as the first.
“Why, that’s me!” Jeanie caught her breath. “And I wanted one awful. But how did you know?” The postman only smiled.
“By the way,” he said, as he turned to go, “I’ll be stopping again before long. There’s a Christmas box that ought to have been left here nearly two months ago. I’m real sorry I’ve neglected you all this while.” Then he hurried off.
Such valentines were never seen in Gregory Street before as were set up in the window of number twenty-seven that day, nor two such bright faces as peeped out from behind.
“Do you ’spose there’s anybody in the whole world as happy as we are, Sandy?” Jeanie asked a dozen times over.
“’Course not!” responded Sandy indignantly each time.
But they did not know about the little girl on a crutch in the fine stone house, who was brimming over with joy that day because she had adopted two little stranger friends, to be their valentine the whole year round.
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:
Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_.
Superscripted letters are preceded by a carat character: M^cNally.
Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.

= = = PG21064 = = =
A MIDDY IN COMMAND: A TALE OF THE SLAVE SQUADRON
Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England
A Middy in Command A Tale of the Slave Squadron
By Harry Collingwood ________________________________________________________________________ Another excellent book by this talented nautical author.  As the title implies, it is the tale of a young man who is a midshipman in the Royal Navy's anti-slave-trade squadron.
There are the usual accidents and swimming events, but the young man secures his promotion by his distinguished performance in the capture of a slaver.
A well-written book by an author who from his actual trade understands how sailing ships are designed and built, and whose works are by that reason all the more worthy of reading.
It makes a very nice audiobook, of eleven and a half hours duration. ________________________________________________________________________ A MIDDY IN COMMAND A TALE OF THE SLAVE SQUADRON
BY HARRY COLLINGWOOD
CHAPTER ONE.
OUR FIRST PRIZE.
The first faint pallor of the coming dawn was insidiously extending along the horizon ahead as H.M. gun-brig _Shark_--the latest addition to the slave-squadron--slowly surged ahead over the almost oil-smooth sea, under the influence of a languid air breathing out from the south-east. She was heading in for the mouth of the Congo, which was about forty miles distant, according to the master's reckoning.
The night had been somewhat squally, and the royals and topgallant-sails were stowed; but the weather was now clearing, and as "three bells" chimed out musically upon the clammy morning air, Mr Seaton, the first lieutenant, who was the officer of the watch, having first scanned the heavens attentively, gave orders to loose and set again the light upper canvas.
By the time that the men aloft had cast off the gaskets that confined the topgallant-sails to the yards, the dawn--which comes with startling rapidity in those latitudes--had risen high into the sky ahead, and spread well along the horizon to north and south, causing the stars to fade and disappear, one after another, until only a few of the brightest remained twinkling low down in the west.
As I wheeled at the stern-grating in my monotonous promenade of the lee side of the quarter-deck, a hail came down from aloft--
"Sail ho! two of 'em, sir, broad on the lee beam.  Look as if they were standin' out from the land."
"What are they like?  Can you make out their rig?" demanded the first luff, as he halted and directed his gaze aloft at the man on the main- royal-yard, who, half-way out to the yard-arm, was balancing himself upon the foot-rope, and steadying himself with one hand upon the yard as he gazed away to leeward under the shade of the other.
"I can't make out very much, sir," replied the man.  "They're too far off; but one looks like a schooner, and t'other like a brig."
"And they are heading out from the land, you say?" demanded the lieutenant.
"Looks like it, sir," answered the man; "but, as I was sayin', they're a long way off; and it's a bit thick down to leeward there, so--"
"All right, never mind; cast off those gaskets and come down," interrupted Mr Seaton impatiently.  Then, turning to me, he said:
"Mr Grenvile, take the glass and lay aloft, if you please, and see what you can make of those strangers.  Mr Keene"--to the other midshipman of the watch--"slip down below and call the captain, if you please.  Tell him that two strange sail have been sighted from aloft, apparently coming out from the Congo."
By the time he had finished speaking I had snatched the glass from its beckets, and was half-way up the weather main rigging, while the watch was sheeting home and hoisting away the topgallant-sails and royals. When Keene reappeared on deck, after calling the skipper, I was comfortably astride the royal-yard, with my left arm round the spindle of the vane--the yard hoisting close up under the truck.  With my right hand I manipulated the slide of the telescope and adjusted the focus of the instrument to suit my sight.
By this time the dawn had entirely overspread the firmament, and the sky had lost its pallor and was all aglow with richest amber, through which a long shaft of pale golden light, soaring straight up toward the zenith, heralded the rising of the sun.  The thickness to leeward had by this time cleared away, and the two strange sail down there were now clearly visible, the one as a topsail schooner, and the other as a brig. They were a long way off, the topsails of the brig--which was leading-- being just clear of the horizon from my elevated point of observation, while the head of the schooner's topsail just showed clear of the sea. The brig I took to be a craft of about our own size, say some three hundred tons, while the schooner appeared to be about two hundred tons.
I had just ascertained these particulars when the voice of the skipper came pealing up to me from the stern-grating, near which he stood, with Mr Seaton alongside of him.
"Well, Mr Grenvile, what do you make of them?"
I replied, giving such information as I had been able to gather; and added: "They appear to be sailing in company, sir."
"Thank you, that will do; you may come down," answered the skipper. Then, as I swung myself off the yard, I heard the lieutenant give the order to bear up in chase, to rig out the port studding-sail booms, and to see all clear for setting the port studding-sails--or stu'n'sails, as they are more commonly called.  I had reached the cross-trees, on my way down, when Captain Bentinck again hailed me.
"Aloft there! just stay where you are for a little while, Mr Grenvile, and keep your eye on those sail to leeward.  And if you observe any alteration in the course that they are steering, report the fact to me at once."
"Ay, ay, sir!"  I answered, and settled myself down comfortably for what I anticipated might be a fairly long wait.
For a few minutes all was now bustle and confusion below and about me; the helm was put up and the ship wore short round, the yards were swung, and then several hands came aloft to reeve the gear, rig out the booms, and set the larboard studding-sails, from the royals down.  We rather prided ourselves upon being a smart ship, and in less than five minutes from the moment the order was given we were sliding away upon our new course, at a speed of some five and a half knots, with all our studding- sails set on the port side, and all ropes neatly coiled down once more. But ere this had happened I had returned to my former post on the main- royal-yard, for I quickly discovered that the shift of helm had caused the head-sails to interpose themselves between me and the objects which it was my duty to watch, and this was to be remedied only by returning to the royal-mast-head.
The skipper, in setting the new course, had displayed what commended itself to me as sound judgment.  We were at such a distance from the strangers of whom we were now in chase that even our most lofty canvas was--and would, for some little time longer, remain--invisible from their decks.  This was highly desirable, since the nearer we could approach them without being discovered, the better would be our chance of ultimately getting alongside them.  The only likelihood of a premature discovery of our proximity lay in the possible necessity, on the part of one or the other of them, to send a hand aloft; but this we could not guard against.  Captain Bentinck, therefore, hoping that _no_ such necessity would arise, had shaped a course not directly for them, but at an intercepting angle to their own course, by which means he hoped not only to hold way with them, but also to lessen very considerably the distance between them and ourselves before the sight of our canvas, rising above the horizon, would reveal our unwelcome presence to the two slavers, as we believed the strange craft to be.  It was also of the utmost importance that we should have instant knowledge of their discovery of our presence in their neighbourhood, and of the action that they would thereupon take; hence the necessity for my remaining aloft to maintain a steady and careful watch upon their movements.
I had been anticipating--and, indeed, hoping--that my sojourn aloft would be a lengthy one, for I knew that, so long as the strangers continued to steer their original course, it would mean that they remained in ignorance of our proximity to them.  But this was not to be, for I had but regained my original position on the royal-yard some ten minutes, when, as I kept the telescope steadily fixed upon them, I saw the brig bear up and run off square before the wind.  The schooner promptly followed her example, and both of them immediately proceeded to rig out studding-sail booms on both sides.
"Deck ahoy!" hailed I.  "The two strange sail to leeward have this instant put up their helms, and are running square off before the wind; they are also rigging out their studding-sail booms on both sides."
"Thank you, Mr Grenvile," replied the skipper.  "How do they bear from us now?"
"About four points before the beam, sir," answered I.
"Very good.  Stay where you are a minute or two longer, for I am about to bear up in chase, and I want you to tell me when they are directly ahead of us," ordered the skipper.
"Ay, ay, sir!" shouted I, giving the stereotyped answer to every order issued on board ship; and the next instant all was bustle and activity below me, as the helm was put up and preparations were made to set our studding-sails on the starboard side.  As I glanced down on deck I saw the captain step to the binnacle, apparently watching the motion of the compass-card as the ship paid off, so I at once directed my gaze toward the strangers, and the moment they were brought in line with the fore- royal-mast-head I sang out:
"Steady as you go, sir; the strangers are now dead ahead of us!"
"Thank you, Mr Grenvile; you may come down now," replied the captain. And as I swung off the yard I saw the skipper and the first lieutenant, with their heads together over the binnacle, talking earnestly.
Meanwhile the wind, scant as it was, seemed inclined to become more scanty still, until at length, by "six bells"--that is to say, seven o'clock--our courses were drooping motionless from the yards, the maintop-sail was wrinkling ominously, with an occasional flap to the mast as the brig hove lazily over the long low undulations of the swell--and only the light upper canvas continued to draw, the ship's speed having declined to a bare two knots, which gave us little more than mere steerage way.  And loud was the grumbling, fore and aft, when, a little later, as the hands were piped to breakfast, the breeze died away altogether, and the _Shark_, being no longer under the control of her helm, proceeded to "box the compass"--that is to say, to swing first this way and then that, with the send of the swell.  Our only consolation was that the strangers to leeward were in the same awkward fix as ourselves; for if we had no wind wherewith to pursue them, they, in their turn, had none wherewith to run away from us.
Nobody dawdled very long over breakfast that morning; for, in the first place, the heat below was simply unbearable, and, in the next, we were all far too anxious to allow of our remaining in our berths while we knew that every conceivable expedient would be adopted by the captain to shorten the distance between us and the chase.  It was my watch below from eight o'clock until noon, and I was consequently off duty; but although I had been on deck for eight hours of the twelve during the preceding night, I was much too fidgety to turn in and endeavour to get a little sleep; I therefore routed out a small pocket sextant that had been presented to me by a friend, and, making my way up into the fore- topmast cross-trees--from which the strangers could be seen--I very carefully measured with the instrument the angle subtended by the mast- head of the brig and the horizon, so that I might be able to ascertain from time to time whether or not that craft was increasing the distance between her and ourselves.  I decided to measure this angle every half- hour; and, having made my first and second observations without discovering any appreciable difference between them, I employed the interval in looking about me, and watching the movements of two large sharks which were dodging off and on close alongside the ship, and which were clearly visible from my post of observation.  At length, as "three bells"--half-past nine-o'clock--struck, I cast a glance all round the ship before again measuring my angle, when, away down in the south- eastern quarter, I caught a glimpse of very pale blue stretching along the horizon that elsewhere was indistinguishable owing to the glassy calm of the ocean's surface.
"Deck ahoy!" shouted I; "there is a small air of wind creeping up out of the south-eastern quarter."
"Thank you, Mr Grenvile," replied the captain, who was engaged in conversation with Mr Fawcett, the officer of the watch.  "Is it coming along pretty fast?" he continued.
I took another good long look.
"No, sir," I answered; "it is little more than a cat's-paw at present, but it has the appearance of being fairly steady."
"How long do you think it will be before it reaches us?" asked the second luff.
"Probably half an hour, at the least, sir," I answered.
I noticed Mr Fawcett say something to the skipper; and then they both looked up at the sails.  The captain nodded, as though giving his assent to some proposal.  The next moment the second lieutenant gave the order to range the wash-deck tubs along the deck, and to fill them.  This was soon done; and while some of the hands were busy drawing water from over the side, and pouring it into the tubs, others came aloft and rigged whips at the yard-arms, by means of which water from the tubs was hoisted aloft in buckets and emptied over the sails until every inch of canvas that we could spread was thoroughly saturated with water.  Thus the small interstices between the threads of the fabric were filled, and the sails enabled to retain every breath of air that might come along. By the time that this was done the first cat's-paws of the approaching breeze were playing around us, distending our lighter sails for a moment or two, and then dying away again.  But light and evanescent as these cat's-paws were, they were sufficient to get the brig round with her jib-boom pointing straight for the chase once more; and a minute or two later the first of the true breeze reached us, and we began to glide slowly ahead before it, with squared yards.  The men were still kept busy with the buckets, however, for, in order that the sails should be of any real service to us, it was necessary to keep them thoroughly wet, and this involved the continuous drawing and hoisting aloft of water, for the sun's rays were so intensely ardent that the water evaporated almost as rapidly as it was thrown upon the canvas.
The breeze came down very slowly, and seemed very loath to freshen; but this, tantalising though it was to us, was all in our favour, for we thus practically carried the breeze down with us, while the two strange sail away in the western board remained completely becalmed.  Of this latter fact I soon had most satisfactory evidence, for, without having recourse at all to my sextant, I was enabled, in that atmosphere of crystalline clearness, to see with the naked eye that we were steadily raising them, an hour's sailing having brought the bulwark rail of both craft flush with the horizon at my point of observation.  By this time, however, the breeze had slid some three miles ahead of us, its margin, where it met and overran the glassy surface of the becalmed sea ahead, being very distinctly visible.  At last, too, the wind was manifesting some slight tendency to freshen, for, looking aft, I saw that all our after canvas, even to the heavy mainsail which was hanging in its brails, was swelling out and drawing bravely, while the little streak of froth and foam-bells that gathered under our sharp bows, and went sliding and softly seething aft into our wake, told me that we were slipping through the water at a good honest six-knot pace.  With this most welcome freshening of the wind the necessity to keep the canvas continuously wet came to an end; and the men, glad of the relief, were called down on deck to clean up the mess made by the lavish use of the water.
Another half-hour passed, and the strange craft were hull-up, when the captain hailed me from the deck in the wake of the main rigging.
"What is the latest news of the strangers, Mr Grenvile?" he asked. "Has the breeze yet reached them?"
"No, sir; not yet," I answered; "but I expect it will in the course of the next half-hour.  They are hull-up from here, sir; and I should think that you ought to be able to see the mast-heads of the larger craft--the brig--from the deck, by this time."
Hearing this, the skipper and Mr Fawcett walked forward to the forecastle, the former levelling the telescope that he carried in his hand, and pointing it straight ahead.  Then, removing the tube from his eye, the captain handed over the instrument to the second luff, who, in his turn, took a good long look, and returned the telescope to the captain.  They stood talking together for a minute or two; and then Captain Bentinck, glancing up at me, hailed.
"Mr Grenvile," said he, "I am about to send this glass up to you by means of the signal halyards.  I want you to keep an eye on those two craft down there, and report anything particular that you may see going on; and let me know when the breeze reaches them, and whether they keep together when it does so."
"Ay, ay, sir!"  I answered.  And when the telescope came up I made myself comfortable, feeling quite prepared to remain in the cross-trees for the rest of the watch.
The breeze, meanwhile, continued steadily to freshen, and when at length it reached the two strange sail ahead of us we were buzzing along, with a long, easy, rolling motion over the low swell, at a speed of fully nine knots, with a school of porpoises gambolling under our bows--each of them apparently out-vying the others in the attempt to see which of them could shoot closest athwart our cut-water without being touched by it--and shoal after shoal of flying-fish sparking out from the bow surge and streaming away to port and starboard like so many handfuls of bright new silver coins flung hither and thither by Father Neptune.
As the strangers caught the first of the breeze they squared away before it; but I presently saw that, instead of steering precisely parallel courses, as though they intended to continue in each other's company, they were diverging at an angle of about forty-five degrees, the brig bringing the wind about two points on her port quarter, while the schooner, steering a somewhat more northerly course, held it about two points on her starboard quarter.  Thus, while they were running almost directly away from us, they were also rapidly widening the distance between each other, and it would therefore be very necessary for the skipper to make up his mind quickly which of the two craft he would pursue--for it was clear that, by this manoeuvre on their part, they had rendered it impossible for us to chase them both.
I was in the act of reporting this matter to the skipper and the second lieutenant, who were walking the quarter-deck together, when Mr Fawcett--who, with the captain, had come to a halt at my hail--suddenly reeled, staggered, and fell prone upon the deck with a crash.  The skipper instantly sprang to his assistance, as did young Christy, a fellow mid of mine, who was pacing fore and aft on the opposite side of the deck, and three or four men who were at work about some job in the wake of the main rigging; and between them they raised the poor fellow up and carried him below.  I subsequently learned--when I eventually descended from aloft--that the surgeon had reported him to be suffering from sunstroke, which was complicated by an injury to the skull sustained by his having struck his head upon a ring-bolt in the deck as he fell.
Meanwhile, during the temporary confusion that ensued on deck in consequence of this untoward incident, I employed myself in the careful measurement of the angle made by the mast-heads of the two strange sail with the now sharply defined horizon, and noting the result upon the back of an envelope which I happened to have in my jacket pocket.  I had scarcely done this when the skipper hailed me, asking whether we seemed to be gaining anything upon the strangers, or whether I thought that they were running away from us.  I replied that the breeze had reached them too recently to enable me to judge, but that I hoped to be in a position to let him know definitely in the course of the next half-hour. I then explained to him what I had done, and he was pleased to express his approval.  Meanwhile we continued to steer a course about midway between that of the two strangers, by which means it was hoped that we should be able to keep both in sight, in readiness to haul up for that one upon which we seemed to be most decidedly gaining.
The breeze still continued to freshen upon us, to such an extent that when my watch told me it was time to re-measure my angle, we were bowling along at the rate of nearly twelve knots, and the sea was beginning to rise, while our lighter studding-sail booms were buckling rather ominously.  I took my angle again, and, rather to my surprise, found that we were slightly gaining upon the schooner, while the brig was fully holding her own with us, if indeed she was not doing something even better than that.  I reported this to the skipper, who seemed to have made up his mind already as to his course of action; for upon hearing what I had to say he instantly gave orders for our helm to be shifted in pursuit of the schooner.  Then, seeming suddenly to remember that it was my watch below, he hailed me, telling me that I might come down.
Having reached the deck, I at once trotted below to make my preparation for taking the sun's meridian altitude, for it was now drawing on towards noon.
When, a little later, I again went on deck, I found that the wind had continued to freshen, and was now blowing a really strong breeze, while the sea had wrinkled under the scourging of it to a most beautiful deep dark-blue tint, liberally dashed with snow-white patches of froth as the surges curled over and broke in their chase after our flying hull.  Our canvas was now dragging at the spars and sheets like so many teams of cart-horses, the delicate blue shadows coming and going upon the cream- white surfaces as the ship rolled with the regularity of a swinging pendulum.  Every inch of our running gear was as taut as a harp-string, and through it the wind piped and sang as though the whole ship had been one gigantic musical instrument; while over all arched the blue dome of an absolutely cloudless sky, in the very zenith of which blazed the sun with a fierceness that made all of us eager to seek out such small patches of fugitive shadow as were cast by the straining canvas.  The sun was so nearly vertical that our bulwarks, although they were high, afforded us no protection whatever from his scorching rays.
The two strange sail were by this time visible from our deck, and it was apparent that, in the strong breeze which was now blowing, we were rapidly overhauling the schooner, while the brig was not only holding her own with us, but had actually increased her distance, as she gradually hauled to the wind, so as to allow us to run away to leeward of her.
The pursuit of the schooner lasted all through the afternoon, and it was close upon sunset when we arrived within range of her, and plumped a couple of 24-pound shot clean through her mainsail, whereupon her skipper saw fit to round-to all standing, back his topsail, and hoist Spanish colours, only to haul them down again in token of surrender. Whereupon Mr Seaton, our first lieutenant, in charge of an armed boat's crew, went away to take possession of the prize, and since I was the only person on board possessing even a passable acquaintance with the Spanish language, I was ordered to accompany him.
Our prize proved to be the _Dolores_, of two hundred tons measurement, with--as we had suspected--a cargo of slaves, numbering three hundred and fifty, which she had shipped in one of the numerous creeks at the mouth of the Congo on the previous day, and with which she was bound for Rio Grande.  Her crew were transferred to the _Shark_; and then--the second lieutenant being ill and quite unfit for service--I was put in command of her, with a crew of fourteen men, and instructed to make the best of my way to Sierra Leone.  My crew of fourteen included Gowland, our master's mate, and young Sinclair, a first-class volunteer, as well as San Domingo, the servant of the midshipmen's mess, to act as steward, and the cook's mate.  We therefore mustered only five forecastle hands to a watch, which I thought little enough for a schooner of the size of the _Dolores_; but as we hoped to reach Sierra Leone in a week at the outside, and as the schooner was unarmed, Captain Bentinck seemed to think that we ought to be able to manage fairly well.  By the time that we had transferred ourselves and our traps to the prize it had fallen quite dark.  The _Shark_ therefore lost no time in hauling her wind in pursuit of the strange brig, which by this time had run out of sight, and of which the skipper of the _Dolores_ professed to know nothing beyond the fact that she was French, was named the _Suzanne_, and was running a cargo of slaves across to Martinique.
CHAPTER TWO.
CAPTURED BY A PIRATE.
When, in answer to the summons of our 24-pounders, the captain of the _Dolores_ rounded-to and laid his topsail to the mast, he did not trouble his crew to haul down the studding-sails, for he knew that his ship was as good as lost to him, and the result was that the booms snapped short off at the irons, like carrots, leaving a raffle of slatting canvas, gear, and thrashing wreckage for the prize crew to clear away.  Thus, although we at once hauled-up for our port upon parting company with the _Shark_, we had nearly an hour's hard work before us in the dark ere the studding-sails were got in, the gear unrove and unbent, and the stumps of the booms cleared away, and I thought it hardly worth while to get a fresh set of booms fitted and sent aloft that night.  We accordingly jogged along under plain sail until daylight, when we got the studding-sails once more upon the little hooker and tried her paces.  She proved to be astonishingly fast in light, and even moderate, weather, and I felt convinced that had the wind not breezed up so strongly as it did on the previous day, the _Shark_ would never have overtaken her.
During the following two days we made most excellent progress, the weather being everything that one could desire, and the water smooth enough to permit of the hatches being taken off and the unfortunate slaves brought on deck in batches of fifty at a time, for an hour each, to take air and exercise, while those remaining below were furnished with a copious supply of salt-water wherewith to wash down the slave- deck and clear away its accumulated filth.  It proved to be a very fortunate circumstance that Captain Bentinck had permitted us to draw the negro San Domingo as one of our crew, for the fellow understood the language spoken by the slaves, and was able to assure them that in the course of a few days they would be restored to freedom, otherwise we should not have dared to give them access to the deck in such large parties, for they were nearly all _men_, and fine powerful fellows, who, unarmed as they _were_, could have easily taken the ship from us and heaved us all overboard.
The _Dolores_ had been in our possession just forty-eight hours, and we were off Cape Three Points, though so far to the southward that no land was visible, when a sail was made out on our lee bow, close-hauled on the larboard tack, heading to the southward, the course of the _Dolores_ at the time being about north-west by west.  As we closed each other we made out the stranger to be a brig, and our first impression was that she was the _Shark_, which, having either captured or lost sight of the craft of which she had been in chase, was now returning, either to her station or to look for us and convoy us into Sierra Leone; and, under this impression, we kept away a couple of points with the object of getting a somewhat nearer view of her.  By sunset we had raised her to half-way down her courses, by which time I had come to the conclusion that she was a stranger; but as Gowland, the master's mate, persisted in his assertion that she was the _Shark_, we still held on as we were steering, feeling persuaded that, if she were indeed that vessel, she would be anxious to speak to us; while, if she should prove to be a stranger, no great harm would be done beyond the loss of a few hours on our part.
The night fell overcast and very dark, and we lost sight of the stranger altogether.  Moreover the wind breezed up so strongly that we were obliged to hand our royal and topgallant-sail and haul down our gaff- topsail, main-topmast staysail, and flying-jib; the result of the freshening breeze being that a very nasty sea soon got up and we passed a most uncomfortable night, the schooner rolling heavily and yawing wildly as the seas took her on her weather quarter.  We saw no more of the stranger that night, although some of us fancied that we occasionally caught a glimpse of something looming very faint and indefinite in the darkness away to windward.
Toward the end of the middle watch the weather rapidly improved, the wind dropped, and the sea went down with it, although the sky continued very overcast and the night intensely dark.  By four bells in the morning watch the wind had died away almost to a calm, and with the first pallor of the coming dawn the clouds broke away, and there, about a mile on our weather quarter--that is to say, dead to windward of us-- lay the stranger of the preceding night, black and clean-cut as a paper silhouette against the cold whiteness of the eastern sky, rolling heavily, and with a number of hands aloft rigging out studding-sail booms.  The brig, which was most certainly not the _Shark_, was heading directly for us, and I did not like the look of her at all, for she was as big as the sloop, if not a trifle bigger, showed nine guns of a side, and was obviously bent upon getting a nearer view of us.  We lost no time in getting our studding-sails aloft on the starboard side, bracing the yards a trifle forward, and shaping a course that would give us a chance ultimately to claw out to windward of our suspicious-looking neighbour; but she would have none of it, for while we were still busy a ruddy flash leapt from her bow port, a cloud of smoke, blue in the early morning light, obscured the craft for a few seconds, and a round shot came skipping toward us across the black water, throwing up little jets of spray as it came, and finally sinking less than twenty yards away.
"Well aimed, but not quite enough elevation," exclaimed I to Gowland, who had charge of the deck, and who had called me a moment before. "Now, who is the fellow, and what does he mean by firing at us?  Is he a Frenchman, think you, and does he take us for a slaver--which, by the way, is not a very extraordinary mistake to make?  We had better show him our bunting, I think.  Parsons," to a man who was hovering close by, "bend on the ensign and run it up to the gaff-end."
"There is no harm in doing that, of course," remarked Gowland; "but he is no Frenchman--or at least he is not a French cruiser; I am sure of that by the cut of his canvas.  Besides, we know every French craft on the station, and Johnny Crapaud has no such beauty as that brig among them.  No; if you care for my opinion, Grenvile, it is that yonder fellow is a slaver that is not too tender of conscience to indulge in a little piracy at times, when the opportunity appears favourable, as it does at present.  I have heard that, in contradiction of the adage that `there is honour among thieves', there are occasionally to be found among the slavers a few that are not above attacking other slavers and stealing their slaves from them.  It saves them the bother of a run in on the coast, with its attendant risk of losses by fever, and the delay, perhaps, of having to wait until a cargo comes down.  Ah, I expected as much!" as another shot from the stranger pitched close to our taffrail and sent a cloud of spray flying over us.  "So much for his respect for our bunting."
"If the schooner were but armed I would make him respect it," I exclaimed, greatly exasperated at being obliged to submit tamely to being fired at without the power to retaliate.  "But," I continued, "since we cannot fight we will run.  The wind is light, and that brig must be a smart craft indeed if, in such weather as this, we cannot run away from her."
The next quarter of an hour afforded us plenty of excitement, for while we were doing our best to claw out to windward of the brig she kept her jib-boom pointed straight at us, and thus, having a slight advantage of the wind, contrived to lessen the distance between us sufficiently to get us fairly within range, when she opened a brisk fire upon us from the 18-pounder on her forecastle.  But, although the aim was fairly good, no very serious damage was done.  A rope was cut here and there, but was immediately spliced by us; and when we had so far weathered upon our antagonist as to have brought her fairly into our wake, the advantage which we possessed in light winds over the heavier craft began to tell, and we soon drew away out of gunshot.
So far, so good; but I had been hoping that as soon as our superiority in speed became manifest the brig would bear up and resume her voyage to her destination--wherever that might be.  But no; whether it was that he was piqued at being beaten, or whether it was a strong vein of pertinacity in his character that dominated him, I know not, but the skipper of the strange brig hung tenaciously in our wake, notwithstanding the fact that we were now steadily drawing away from him.  Perhaps he was reckoning on the possibility that the breeze might freshen sufficiently to transfer the advantage from us to himself, and believing that this might be the case, I gave instructions to take in all our studding-sails, and to brace the schooner up sharp, hoping thus to shake him off.  But even this did not discourage him; for he promptly imitated our manoeuvre, although we now increased our distance from him still more rapidly than before.
Meanwhile the wind was steadily growing more scant, and when I went on deck after breakfast I found that we were practically becalmed, although the small breathing, which was all that remained of the breeze, sufficed to keep the little hooker under command, and give her steerage way.  The brig, however, I was glad to see, was boxing the compass some three miles astern of us, and about a point on our lee quarter.
It was now roasting hot, the sky was without a single shred of cloud to break its crystalline purity, and the sun poured down his beams upon us so ardently that the black-painted rail had become heated to a degree almost sufficient to blister the hand when inadvertently laid upon it, while the pitch was boiling and bubbling out of the deck seams.  The surface of the sea was like a sheet of melted glass, save where, here and there, a transient cat's-paw flecked it for a moment with small patches of delicate blue, that came and went as one looked at them. Even the flying-fish seemed to consider the weather too hot for indulgence in their usual gambols, for none of them were visible.  I was therefore much surprised, upon taking a look at the brig through my glass, to see that she had lowered and was manning a couple of boats.
"Why, Pringle," said I to the gunner, whose watch it was, "what does that mean?  Surely they are not going to endeavour to tow the brig within gunshot of us, are they?  They could never do it; for, although there is scarcely a breath of wind stirring, this little beauty is still moving through the water; and so long as she has steerage way on her we ought to be able--"
"No, sir, no; no such luck as that, I'm afraid," answered the man.  "May I have that glass for a moment?  Thank you, sir!"
He placed the telescope to his eye, adjusted it to his focus, and looked through it long and intently.
"Just as I thought, Mr Grenvile," he said, handing back the instrument. "If you'll take another squint, sir, you'll see that they're getting up tackles on their yard-arms.  That means--unless I'm greatly mistaken-- that they're about to hoist out their longboat; and that again means that they'll stick a gun into the eyes of her, and attack us with the boats in regular man-o'-war fashion.  But they ain't alongside of us yet, and won't be for another hour and a half if the wind don't die away altogether--and, somehow, I don't fancy it's going to do that.  No, what I'm most afraid of is"--and he took a long careful look round--"that in this flukey weather the brig may get a breeze first, and bring it down with her, when--ay, and there it is, sure enough!  There's blue water all round her, and I can see her canvas filling to it, even with my naked eye.  And there she swings her yards to it.  It'll be `keep all fast with the boats' now!  If that little air o' wind only sticks to her for half an hour she'll have us under her guns, safe enough!"
It was as Pringle said.  A light draught of air had suddenly sprung up exactly where the brig happened to lie; and by the time I had got my telescope once more focused upon her, she was again heading up for us, with her weather braces slightly checked, and quite a perceptible curl of white foam playing about her sharp bows.  But it only helped her for about half a mile, and then left her completely becalmed, as before, while we were still stealing along at the rate of perhaps a knot and a quarter per hour.  The skipper of the brig allowed some ten minutes or so to elapse, possibly waiting for another friendly puff of wind to come to his assistance, but, seeing no sign of any such thing, he hoisted out his longboat, lowered a small gun--to me it looked like a 6-pounder-- into her, and dispatched her, with two other boats, in chase of us.  The dogged determination which animated our pursuers was clearly exemplified by their behaviour; they made no attempt to cross with a rush the stretch of water intervening between us and them, but settled down steadily to accomplish the long pull before them as rapidly as possible consistent with the husbanding of their strength for the attack when they should arrive alongside.  As they pushed off from the brig she fired a gun and hoisted Brazilian colours.
"The affair begins to look serious, Pringle," I said, as I directed my telescope at the boats.  "There must be close upon forty men in that attacking-party, and we do not mount so much as a single gun.  Now, I wonder what their plan of attack will be?  Will they dash alongside and attempt to carry us by boarding, think you; or will they lie off and pound us with their gun until we haul down our colours, or sink?"
"They may try both plans, sir," answered Pringle.  "That is to say, they may begin by trying a few shots at us with their gun, and if they find that no good I expect they'll try what boarding will do for them.  But they won't sink us; that's not their game.  It's the slaves they believe we've got in the hold that they're after; so, if they bring their boat- gun into play you'll find that it'll be our top-hamper they'll aim at, so as to cripple us.  They'll not hull us if they can help it."
"Well, they shall not set foot upon this deck if I can help it," said I. "Pass the word for the boatswain to come aft, Pringle, if you please. He will probably be able to tell us whether there are any boarding- nettings in the ship.  If there are, we will reeve and bend the tricing lines at once, and see all clear for tricing up the nets."
"Ay," assented the gunner.  "I think you'll be wise in so doing, sir; there's nothing like being prepared.  Pass the word for the boatswain to come aft," he added, to the little group of men constituting the watch, who were busy on the forecastle.
The word was passed, and presently the boatswain came along.
"Boatswain," said I, "have you given the spare gear of this craft an overhaul as yet?"
"Well, sir, I have, and I haven't, as you may say," answered that functionary.  "I knows, in a general sort of a way, what we've got aboard of us, but I haven't examined anything in detail, so to speak. The fact is, seeing that the trip was likely to be only a short one, and we've been kept pretty busy since we joined the hooker, I've found plenty else to do."
"Well, can you tell me whether there are any boarding-nettings in the ship?"  I asked.
"Boarding-nettings!" answered the boatswain.  "Oh yes, sir; I came across what I took to be a pile of 'em down below in the sail room, yesterday."
"Good!" said I.  "Then let them be brought on deck at once, and see that all is ready for tricing them up, should those boats succeed in getting dangerously near to us."
"Ay, ay, sir!" answered the man.  And away he hurried forward to attend to the matter.
Then I turned to the gunner.
"Mr Pringle," said I, "have the goodness to get the arm-chest on deck, and see that the crew are armed in readiness to repel those attacking boats."
"I hope it may not come to that, Mr Grenvile," said the gunner; "if it does, I'm afraid it'll be a pretty bad look-out for some of us, considerin' our numbers.  But, of course, it's the only thing to do." He took a look round the horizon, directed his gaze first aloft, then over the side, and shook his head.  "The sun's eating up what little air there is," he remarked gloomily, "and I reckon that another ten minutes 'll see us without steerage way."  And he, too, departed to carry out his instructions.
There seemed only too much reason to fear that the gunner's anticipations with regard to the wind would prove true; but while I stood near the transom, watching the steady relentless approach of the boats--which were by now almost within gunshot of us--I suddenly became aware of a gentle breeze fanning my sun-scorched features, and the slight but distinct responsive heel of the schooner to it; and in another minute we were skimming merrily away at a speed of quite five knots under the benign influence of one of those partial breezes which, on a calm day at sea, seem to spring up from nowhere in particular, last for half an hour or so, and then die away again.  In the present case, however, the breeze lasted nearly two hours before it failed us, by which time we had left the brig hull-down astern of us, and had enjoyed the satisfaction of seeing the boats abandon the chase and return to their parent ship.
These partial breezes are among the most exasperating phenomena which tax a sailor's patience.  They are, of course, only met with on exceptionally calm days, and not always then.  They consist simply of little eddies in the otherwise motionless atmosphere, and are so strictly local in their character that it is by no means uncommon to see a ship sailing briskly along under one of them, while another ship, perhaps less than a mile away, is lying helpless in the midst of a stark, breathless calm.  Or two ships, a mile or two apart, may be seen sailing in diametrically opposite directions, each of them with squared yards and a fair wind.  Under ordinary circumstances the fickle and evanescent character of these atmospheric eddies is of little moment; they involve a considerable amount of box-hauling of the yards, and cause a great deal of annoyance to the exasperated and perspiring seamen, very inadequately compensated by the paltry mile or so which the ship has been driven toward her destination; and their aggravating character begins and ends there.
But when one ship is chasing, or being chased by, another, it is quite a different matter; for the eccentric behaviour of these same partial breezes may make all the difference between capturing a prize, and helplessly watching the chase sail away and make good her escape.  Or, as was the case with ourselves, it may make precisely the difference between losing a prize and retaining possession of her.  Thus we felt supremely grateful to the erratic little draught of air that swept us beyond the reach of the pursuing boats; but we piped a very different tune when, some two hours later, we beheld the brig come bowling along after us under the influence of a slashing breeze, while we lay becalmed in the midst of a sea of glass and an atmosphere so stagnant that even the vane at our mast-head drooped motionless save for the oscillation imparted to it by the heave of the schooner over the swell.  We had, of course, long ere this, got the boarding-nettings up and stretched along in stops, with the tricing lines bent on, and everything ready for tricing up at a moment's notice; but, remembering the number of men that I had seen in the boats, I felt that, should the brig succeed in getting alongside, there was a tough fight before us, in which some at least of our brave fellows would lose the number of their mess; and I could not help reflecting, rather bitterly, that if the breeze were to favour us instead of the brig, a considerable loss of life would be avoided.  But that the brig would get alongside us soon became perfectly evident, for she was already within a mile of us, coming along with a spanking breeze, on the starboard tack, with her yards braced slightly forward, all plain sail set, to her royals, the sheets of her jibs and stay-sails trimmed to a hair, and every thread drawing perfectly, while around us the atmosphere remained absolutely stagnant.
I looked for her to open fire upon us as soon as she drew up within range; but although her guns were run out--and were doubtless loaded-- she came foaming along in grim silence; doubtless her skipper saw, as clearly as we did, that he had us now, and did not think it necessary to waste powder and shot to secure what was already within his power.  His aim was, apparently, to range up alongside us on our port quarter, and when at length he had arrived within a short half-mile of us, with no sign of the smallest puff of wind coming to help us, I gave orders to trice up and secure the nettings, and then for all hands to range themselves along the port bulwarks in readiness to repel the boarders. It was now too late for us to dream of escape, for even should the breeze, that the brig was bringing down with her, reach us, we were by this time so completely under her guns that she could have unrigged us with a single well-directed broadside.
Anxious though I was as to the issue of the coming tussle, I could not help admiring that brig.  She was a truly beautiful craft; distinctly a bigger vessel than the _Shark_, longer, more beamy, with sides as round as an apple, and with the most perfectly moulded bows that it was possible to conceive.  She was coming very nearly stem-on to us, and I could not therefore see her run, but I had no doubt that it was as perfectly shaped as were her bows, for I estimated her speed at fully eight knots, and for a vessel to travel at that rate in such a breeze she must of necessity have possessed absolute perfection of form.  She was as heavily rigged as a man-o'-war, and her canvas--which was so white that it must have been woven of cotton--had evidently been cut by a master hand, for the set of it was perfect and flatter than any I had ever seen before.  She was coppered to the bends, was painted black to her rails, with the exception of a broad red ribbon round her, and was pierced for eighteen guns.
When she had arrived within about half a cable's-length of us she suddenly ran out of the breeze that had helped her so well, and instantly floated upright, with all her square canvas aback in the draught caused by her own speed through the stagnant atmosphere; and now we were afforded a fresh opportunity to gauge the strength of her crew, for no sooner did this happen than all her sheets and halyards were let go, and the whole of her canvas was clewed up and hauled down together, man-o'-war fashion.  And thus, with her jibs and stay-sails hauled down, and her square canvas gathered close up to her yards by the buntlines and leech-lines, she swerved slightly from her previous course and headed straight for us, still sliding fast through the water with the "way" or momentum remaining to her, and just sufficient to bring her handsomely alongside.
"Now stand by, lads!"  I cried.  "We must not only beat those fellows off, but must follow them up when they retreat to their own ship.  She will be a noble prize, well worth the taking!"
The men responded to my invocation with a cheer--it is one of the most difficult things in the world to restrain a British sailor's propensity to cheer when there is fighting in prospect--and as they did so the brig yawed suddenly and poured her whole starboard broadside of grape slap into us.  I saw the bright flashes of the guns, and the spouting wreaths of smoke, snow-white in the dazzling sunshine, and the next instant felt a crashing blow upon my right temple that sent me reeling backward into somebody's arms, stunned into complete insensibility.
My first sensation, upon the return of consciousness, was that of a splitting, sickening headache, accompanied by a most painful smarting on the right side of my forehead.  I was lying prone upon the deck, and when I attempted to raise my head I found that it was in some way glued to the planking--with my own blood, as I soon afterwards discovered--so effectually that it was impossible for me to move without inflicting upon myself excruciating pain.
My feeble movements, however, had evidently attracted the notice of somebody, for as I raised my hands toward my head, with some vague idea of releasing myself, I heard a voice, which I identified as that of the carpenter, murmur, in a low, cautious tone.
"Don't move, Mr Grenvile; don't move, sir, for all our sakes.  Hold on as you are, sir, a bit longer; for if them murderin' pirates sees that you're alive they'll either finish you off altogether or lash you up as they've done the rest of us; and then our last chance 'll be gone."
"What has happened, then, Simpson?" murmured I, relaxing my efforts, as I endeavoured to collect my scattered wits.
"Why," answered Chips, "that brig that chased us--you remember, Mr Grenvile?--turns out to be a regular pirate.  As they ranged up alongside of us they poured in a whole broadside of grape that knocked you over, and killed five outright, woundin' six more, includin' yourself, after which of course they had no difficulty in takin' the schooner.  Then they clapped lashin's on those of us that I s'pose they thought well enough to give 'em any trouble; and now they're transferrin' the poor unfortunate slaves, with the water and provisions for 'em, from our ship to their own.  What they'll do after that the Lord only knows, but I expect it'll be some murderin' trick or another; they're a cut-throat-lookin' lot enough in all conscience!"
Yes; I remembered everything now; the carpenter's statement aided my struggling memory and enabled me to recall all that had happened up to the moment of my being struck down by a grape-shot.  But what a terrible disaster was this that had befallen us--five killed and six wounded out of our little party of fifteen!  And, in addition to that, we were in the power of a band of ruthless ruffians who were quite capable of throwing the quick and the dead alike over the side when they could find time to attend to us!
"Who are killed, Simpson?"  I asked.
"Hush, sir! better not talk any more just now," murmured the carpenter. "If these chaps got the notion into their heads that you was alive, as like as not they'd put a bullet through your skull.  They'll soon be finished with their job now, and then we shall see what sort of fate they're going to serve out to us."
I dared not look up nor move my head in any way, to see what was going on, but by listening I presently became aware that the last of the slaves had passed over the side, and that the pirates were now transferring the casks of water and the sacks of meal from our ship to their own, which--the water being perfectly smooth--they had lashed alongside the schooner, with a few fenders between the two hulls to prevent damage by the grinding of them together as they rose and fell upon the long scarcely perceptible undulations of the swell.  About a quarter of an hour later the rumbling of the rolling water-casks and the loud scraping sound of the meal-sacks on the deck ceased; there was a pause of a minute or so, and then I heard a voice say in Spanish:
"The last of the meal and the water has gone over the rail, senor capitan.  Is there anything else?"
"No," was the answer, in the same language; "you may all go back to the brig.  And, Dominique, see all ready for sheeting home and hoisting away the moment that I join you.  There is a little breeze coming, and it is high time that we were off.  Now, Juan, are you ready with the auger?"
"Quite ready, senor," answered another voice.
"Then come below with me, and let us get this job over," said the first voice, and immediately upon this I heard the footsteps of two people descending the schooner's companion ladder.  Some ten minutes later I heard the footsteps returning, and presently the two Spaniards were on deck.  Then there came a slight pause, as though the pirate captain had halted to take a last look round.
"Are you quite sure, Juan, that the prisoners are all securely lashed?" asked he.
"Absolutely, senor," answered Juan.  "I lashed them myself, and, as you are aware, I am not in the habit of bungling the job.  They will all go to the bottom together, the living as well as the dead!"
"Bueno!" commented the captain.  "Ah, here comes the breeze!  Aboard you go, Juan, amigo.  Cast off, fore and aft, Dominique, and hoist away your fore-topmast staysail."
Another moment and the two miscreants had gone.
CHAPTER THREE.
THE SINKING OF THE "DOLORES."
As the sound of the hanks travelling up the brig's fore-topmast stay reached my ear I murmured cautiously to the carpenter.
"Is it safe for me to move now, Chips?"
"No, sir, no," he replied, in a low, strained whisper; "don't move a muscle for your life, Mr Grenvile, until I tell you, sir.  The brig's still alongside, and that unhung villain of a skipper's standin' on the rail, holdin' on to a swifter, and lookin' down on our decks as though, even now, he ain't quite satisfied that his work is properly finished."
At this moment I felt a faint breath of air stirring about me, and heard the small, musical lap of the tiny wavelets alongside as the new breeze arrived.  The brig's canvas and our own rustled softly aloft; and the cheeping of sheaves and parrals, the rasping of hanks, the flapping of canvas, and the sound of voices aboard the pirate craft gradually receded, showing that she was drawing away from us.
When, as I supposed, the brig had receded from us a distance of fully a hundred feet, the carpenter said, this time in his natural voice:
"Now, Mr Grenvile, you may safely move, sir, and the sooner you do so the better, for them villains have scuttled us, and I don't doubt but what the water's pourin' into us like a sluice at this very moment.  So please crawl over to me, keepin' yourself well out of sight below the rail, for I'll bet anything that there's eyes aboard that brig still watchin' of us, and cast me loose, so that I can make my way down below and plug them auger-holes without any loss of time."
I at once made a move, with the intention of getting upon my hands and knees, but instantly experienced the most acute pain in my temple, due to the fact, which I now discovered, that the shot which had struck me down had torn loose a large piece of the skin of my forehead, which had become stuck fast to the deck planking by the blood which had flowed from the wound and had by this time dried.  To loosen this flap of skin cost me the most exquisite pain, and when at length I had succeeded in freeing myself, and rose to my hands and knees, so violent a sensation of giddiness and nausea suddenly swept over me that I again collapsed, remaining insensible for quite ten minutes according to the carpenter's account.
But even during my unconsciousness I was vaguely aware of some urgent, even vital, necessity for me to be up and doing, and this it was, I doubt not, that helped me to recover consciousness much sooner than I should have done but for the feeling to which I have alluded.  Once more I rose to my hands and knees, half-blinded by the blood that started afresh from my wound, and crawled over to where the carpenter lay on the deck, in what must have been a most uncomfortable attitude, hunched up against the port bulwarks, with his wrists lashed tightly together behind his back and his heels triced up to them, so that it was absolutely impossible for him to move or help himself in the slightest degree.
As I approached him the poor fellow groaned rather than spoke.
"Thank God that you're able to move at last, Mr Grenvile!  I was mortal afraid that 'twas all up with you when you toppled over just now.  For pity's sake, sir, cut me loose as soon as you can, for these here lashin's have been drawed so tight that I've lost all feelin' in my hands and feet, while my arms and legs seems as though they was goin' to burst.  What! haven't you got a knife about you, sir?  I don't know what's become of mine, but some of the men'll be sure to have one, if you enquire among 'em."
Hurried enquiry soon revealed the disconcerting fact that we could not muster a solitary knife among us; we had all either lost them, or had had them taken from us; there was therefore nothing for it but to heave poor Chips over on his face, and cast him adrift with my hands, which proved to be a longer and much more difficult job than I could have believed, owing, of course, to the giddiness arising from my wound, which made both my sight and my touch uncertain.  But at length the last knot was loosed, the last turn of the rope cast off, and Chips was once more a free man.
But when he essayed to stand, the poor fellow soon discovered that his troubles were not yet over.  For his feet were so completely benumbed that he had no feeling in them, and when he attempted to rise his ankles gave way under him and let him down again upon the deck.  Then, as the blood once more began to circulate through his benumbed extremities, the pricking and tingling that followed soon grew so excruciatingly painful that he fairly groaned and ground his teeth in agony.  To allay the pain I chafed his arms and legs vigorously, and in the course of a few minutes he was able to crawl along the deck to the companion, and then make his way below.
Meanwhile, taking the utmost care to keep my head below the level of the bulwarks, in order that my movements might not be detected by any chance watcher aboard the pirate craft, I cast loose the three unwounded men-- the carpenter being the fourth of our little band who had escaped the destructive broadside of the pirates--and bade them assist me to cast off the lashings which confined the wounded.  We were still thus engaged when Simpson came up through the companion, dripping wet, glowering savagely, and muttering to himself.
"Well, Chips," said I, "what is the best news from below?"
"Bad, sir; pretty nigh as bad as can be," answered the carpenter. "They've scuttled us most effectually, bored eight holes through her skin, close up alongside the kelson, three of which I've managed to plug after a fashion, but by the time I had done them the water had risen so high that I found it impossible to get at t'others.  I reckon that sundown will about see the last of this hooker; but by that time yonder brig 'll be pretty nigh out of sight, and we shall have a chance to get away in the boats, which, for a wonder, them murderin' thieves forgot to damage."
"There is no hope, you think, of saving the schooner, if all of us who are able were to go below and lend you a hand?" said I.
"No, sir; not the slightest," answered Simpson.  "If I could have got below ten minutes earlier, something might have been done; but now we can do nothing."
"Very well, then," said I; "let San Domingo take two of the uninjured men to assist him in getting up provisions and water, while you and the other overhaul the boats, muster their gear, and get everything ready for putting them into the water as soon as we may venture to do so without attracting the attention of the brig and tempting her to return and make an end of us."
While these things were being done, the wounded men assisted each other down into the little cabin of the schooner, where I dressed their injuries and coopered them up to the best of my ability with such means as were to hand; after which, young Sinclair, whose wound was but a slight one, bathed my forehead, adjusted the strip of displaced skin where it had been torn away, and strapped it firmly in position with sticking-plaster.
Meanwhile, the breeze which had sprung up so opportunely to take the brig out of our immediate neighbourhood not only lasted, but continued to freshen steadily, with the result that by the time that we had patched each other up, and were ready to undertake the mournful task of burying our slain, the wicked but beautiful craft that had inflicted such grievous injury and loss upon us had slid away over the ocean's rim, and was hull-down.  By this time also the water had risen in the schooner to such a height that it was knee-deep in the cabin.  We lost no time, therefore, in committing our dead comrades to their last resting-place in the deep, and then proceeded to get the boats into the water, and stock them with provisions for our voyage.
Now, with regard to this same voyage, I had thus far been much too busy to give the matter more than the most cursory consideration, but the time had now arrived when it became necessary for me to decide for what point we should steer when the moment arrived for us to take to the boats.  Poor Gowland was, unfortunately, one of the five who had been killed by the brig's murderous broadside of grape, and I was therefore deprived of the benefit of his advice and assistance in the choice of a port for which to steer; but I was by this time a fairly expert navigator myself, quite capable of doing without assistance if necessary.  I therefore spread out a chart on the top of the skylight, and, with the help of the log-book, pricked off the position of the schooner at noon that day, from which I discovered that Cape Coast Castle was our nearest port.  But to reach it with the wind in the quarter from which it was then blowing it would be necessary to put the boats on a taut bowline, with the possibility that, even then, we might fall to leeward of our port, whereas it was a fair wind for Sierra Leone.  I therefore arrived at the conclusion that, taking everything into consideration, it would be my wisest plan to make for the latter port, and I accordingly determined there and then the proper course to be steered upon leaving the schooner.
The _Dolores_ had by this time settled _so_ deeply in the water that it was necessary to complete our preparations for leaving her without further delay.  San Domingo had contrived to get together and bring on deck a stock of provisions and fresh water that I considered would be ample for all our needs, and Simpson had routed out and stowed in the boats their masts, sails, oars, rowlocks, and, in short, everything necessary for their navigation.  It now remained, therefore, only to get the craft themselves in the water, stow the provisions and our kits in them, and be off as quickly as possible.
The boats of the _Dolores_ were three in number, namely, a longboat in chocks on the main hatch, a jolly-boat stowed bottom-upward in the longboat, and a very smart gig hung from davits over the stern.  The longboat was a very fine, roomy, and wholesome-looking boat, big enough to accommodate all that were left of us, as well as our kits and a very fair stock of provisions; but in order to afford a little more room and comfort for the wounded men I decided to take the gig also, putting into her a sufficient quantity of provisions and water to ballast her, and placing Simpson in charge of her, with one of the unwounded and two of the most slightly-wounded men as companions, leaving six of us to man the longboat.
Simpson's estimate of the time at our disposal proved to be a very close one, for the sun was within ten minutes of setting when, all our preparations having been completed, I followed the rest of our little party over the side, and, entering the longboat, gave the order to shove off and steer north-west in company.  There was at this time a very pleasant little breeze blowing, of a strength just sufficient to permit the boats to carry whole canvas comfortably; the water was smooth, and the western sky was all ablaze with the red and golden glories of a glowing tropical sunset.
We pulled off to a distance of about a hundred yards from the schooner; and then, as with one consent, the men laid in their oars and waited to see the last of the little hooker.  Her end was manifestly very near, for she had settled to the level of her waterways, and was rolling occasionally on the long, level swell with a slow, languid movement that dipped her rail amidships almost to the point of submergence ere she righted herself with a stagger and hove her streaming wet side up toward us, all a-glitter in the ruddy light of the sunset, as she took a corresponding roll in the opposite direction; and we could hear the rush and swish of water athwart her deck as she rolled.  She remained thus for some three or four minutes, each roll being heavier than the one that had preceded it, when, quite suddenly, she seemed to steady herself; then, as we watched, she slowly settled down out of sight, on a perfectly even keel, the last ray of the setting sun gleaming in fire upon her gilded main truck a moment ere the waters closed over it.--"_Sic transit_!" muttered I, as I turned my gaze away from the small patch of whirling eddies that marked the spot where the little beauty had disappeared, following up the reflection with the order: "Hoist away the canvas, lads, and shape for Sierra Leone!"
Five minutes later we were speeding gaily away, with the wind over our starboard quarter and the sheets eased well off, the gig, with her finer lines and lighter freight, revealing so marked a superiority in speed over the longboat, in the light weather and smooth water with which we were just then favoured, that she was compelled to luff and shake the wind out of her sails at frequent intervals to enable us to keep pace with her.  Meanwhile, the pirate brig, which, like ourselves, had gone off before the wind, had sunk below the horizon to the level of her lower yards.  I had, between whiles, been keeping the craft under fairly steady observation, for what Simpson had said relative to the behaviour of her captain, and the attitude of doubt and suspicion which the latter had exhibited when leaving the _Dolores_, had impressed me with the belief that he would possibly cause a watch to be maintained upon the schooner until she should sink, with the object of assuring himself that none of us had escaped to tell the tale of his atrocious conduct.  As I have already mentioned, the _Dolores_ happened to founder at the precise moment of sunset, and in those latitudes the duration of twilight is exceedingly brief.  Still, following upon sunset there were a few minutes during which the light would be strong enough to enable a sharp eye on board the distant brig, especially if aided by a good glass, to detect the presence of the two boats under sail; and I was curious to see whether anything would occur on board the brig to suggest that such a discovery had been made.  For a few minutes nothing happened; the brig's canvas, showing up clear-cut and purple almost to blackness against the gold and crimson western sky, revealed no variation in the direction in which she was steering; but presently, as I watched the quick fading of the glowing sunset tints, and noted how the sharp silhouette of the brig's canvas momentarily grew more hazy and indistinct, I suddenly became aware of a lengthening out of the fast- fading image, and I had just time to note, ere they merged into the quick-growing gloom, that the two masts had separated, showing that the brig had shifted her course and was now presenting a broadside view to us.  That I was not alone in marking this change was evidenced a moment later when, as we drew up alongside the gig, which had been waiting for us, Simpson hailed me with the question:
"Did ye notice, sir, just afore we lost sight of the brig, that he'd hauled his wind?"
"Yes," said I, "I did.  And I have a suspicion that he has done so because he had a hand aloft to watch for and report the sinking of the schooner; and that hand has caught sight of the boats.  If my suspicion is correct, he has waited until he believed we could no longer see him, and has then hauled his wind in the hope that by making a series of short stretches to windward he will fall in with us in the course of an hour or two and be able to make an end of us.  He probably waited until we had been lost sight of in the gathering darkness, and then shifted his helm, forgetful of the fact that his canvas would show up against the western sky for some few minutes after ours had vanished."
"That's just my own notion, sir," answered Simpson, "I mean about his wishin' to fall in with and make an end of us.  And he'll do it, too, unless we can hit upon some plan to circumvent him."
"Quite so," said I.  "But we must see to it that we do not again fall into his hands.  And to avoid doing so I can think of nothing better than to shift our own helm and shape a course either to the northward or the southward, with the wind about two points abaft the beam; by doing which we may hope to get to leeward of the brig in about two hours from now, when we can resume our course for Sierra Leone with a reasonable prospect of running the brig out of sight before morning.  And, as she was heading to the northward when we last saw her, our best plan will be to steer a southerly course.  So, up helm, Simpson, and we will steer west-south-west for the next two hours, keeping a sharp look-out for the brig, meanwhile, that we may not run foul of her unawares."
We had been steering our new course about an hour when it became apparent that a change of weather was brewing, though what the nature of the impending change might be it was, for the moment, somewhat difficult to guess.  The appearance of the sky seemed to portend a thunderstorm, for it had rapidly become overcast with dense masses of heavy, lowering cloud, which appeared to have quite suddenly gathered from nowhere in particular, obscuring the stars, yet not wholly shutting out their light, for the forms of the cloud-masses could be made out with a very fair degree of distinctness, and it would probably also have been possible to distinguish a ship at the distance of a mile.  It was the presence of this light in the atmosphere, emanating apparently from the clouds themselves, that caused me rather to doubt the correctness of the opinion, pretty freely expressed by the men, that what was brewing was nothing more serious than an ordinary thunderstorm, for I had witnessed something of the same kind before, on the coast, but in a much more marked degree, it is true; and in that case the appearance had been followed by a tornado, brief in duration, but of great violence while it lasted.  I therefore felt distinctly anxious, the more so as it was evident that the wind was dropping, and this I regarded as a somewhat unfavourable sign.  I hailed Simpson, and asked him what he thought of the weather.
"Why, sir," replied he, "the wind's droppin', worse luck; and if it should happen to die away altogether, or even to soften down much more, we shall have to out oars and pull; for we must get out of sight of that brig somehow, between this and to-morrow morning."
"Undoubtedly," said I.  "But that is not precisely what I mean.  What is worrying me just now is the question whether there is anything worse than thunder behind the rather peculiar appearance of the sky."
He directed his glance aloft, attentively studying the aspect of the heavens for a few moments.
"It's a bit difficult to say, sir," he replied at last.  "Up to now I've been thinkin' that it only meant thunder and, perhaps, heavy rain; but, now that you comes to mention it, I don't feel so very sure that there ain't wind along with it, too--perhaps one of these here tornaders.  And if that's what's brewin' we shall have to stand by, and keep our weather eye liftin'; for a tornader'd be an uncommon awk'ard customer to meet with in these here open boats."
"You are right there," said I, "and for that reason it is especially desirable that the boats should keep together for mutual support and assistance, if need be.  You have the heels of us in such light weather as the present, and might very easily slip away from and lose sight of us in the darkness; therefore I think that, for the present at all events, in order to avoid any such possibility, you had better take the end of our painter and make it fast to your stern ring-bolt.  Then you can go ahead as fast as you please, without any risk of the boats losing sight of each other."
This was done, and for the next two hours the boats slid along in company, the gig leading and towing the longboat, although of course the towing did not amount to much, since we in the longboat kept our sails set to help as much as possible.
It was by this time close upon three bells in the first watch, and notwithstanding the softening of the wind I came to the conclusion that we must have slipped past the brig, assuming our suspicion, that she had hauled her wind in chase of us, to be correct.  I therefore ordered our helm to be shifted once more, and our course to be resumed in a north- westerly direction.
Half an hour later the wind had dropped to a flat calm, and Simpson suggested that, as a measure of precaution, in view of the possibility that the brig might still be to the westward of us, we should get out the oars and endeavour to slip past her.  But I had for some time past been very anxiously watching the weather, and had at length arrived at the conclusion that, if not an actual tornado, there was at least a very heavy and dangerous squall brewing away down there in the eastern quarter, before which, when it burst, not only we, but also the brig, would be obliged to run; and, since she would run faster than the boats, it was no longer desirable, but very much the reverse, that we should lie to the westward of her.  I therefore decided to keep all fast with the oars for the present, and employ such time as might be left to us upon the task of preparing the boats, as far as possible, for the ordeal to which it seemed probable that they were about to be subjected.
I was far less anxious about the safety of the longboat than I was about that of the gig, which, being a more lightly built and much smaller craft, and excellent in every way for service in fine weather and smooth water, yet was not adapted for work at sea except under favourable conditions; and in the event of it coming on to blow hard I feared that in the resulting heavy sea she would almost inevitably be swamped.  I therefore turned my attention to her in the first instance, causing her to be brought alongside the longboat and her painter to be made fast to the ring-bolt in the stern of the latter, thus reversing the original arrangement; my intention being that, in the event of bad weather, the longboat should tow the gig.  This done, I caused Simpson to unstep the gig's single mast and lay it fore and aft in the boat, with the heel resting upon and firmly lashed to the small grating which covered the after end of the boat between the backboard of the stern-sheets and the stern-post, while the head was supported by a crutch formed of two stretchers lashed together and placed upright upon the bow thwart, the whole being firmly secured in place by the two shrouds attached to the mast-head.  Thus arranged, the mast formed a sort of ridge pole which sloped slightly upward from the boat's stern toward the bow.  The lugsail was then unbent from the yard, stretched across the mast, fore and aft--thus forming a sort of tent over the open boat for about two- thirds of her length from the stern-post,--and the luff and after-leach of the sail were then strained tightly down to the planking of the boat outside, by short lengths of ratline led underneath the gig's keel.  The result was that, when the job was finished, the gig was almost completely covered in by the tautly stretched sail, which I hoped would not only afford a considerable amount of protection to her crew, but would also keep out the breaking seas that would otherwise be almost certain to swamp her.
So pleased was I with the job, when it was finished, that I determined to attempt something similar in the case of the longboat.  This craft was rigged with two masts, carrying upon the foremast a large standing lug and a jib, and a small lug upon the jigger-mast.  These latter, that is to say the jigger-mast and the small lug, we stretched over the stern-sheets of the longboat in the same way as we had dealt with the gig, leading the yoke lines forward on top of the sail, so that the steering arrangements might not be interfered with.  And finally, we close-reefed the big lug and took in the jib, when we were as ready for the expected outfly as it was possible for people in such circumstances to be.
That something more than a mere thunderstorm was impending there could now be no possible doubt.  The strange light of which I have spoken, and which had seemed to emanate from the clouds, had now vanished, giving place to a darkness so profound that it seemed to oppress us like some material substance; and the silence was as profound and oppressive as the darkness--so profound, indeed, was it that any accidental sound which happened to break in upon it, such as the occasional lap of the water against the boat's planking, the scuffling movement of a man, or the intermittent flap of the sail as the longboat stirred upon a wandering ridge of slow-moving swell, smote upon the ear with an exaggerated distinctness that was positively startling to an almost painful degree.  I accounted for this, at the time, by attributing it in part to the peculiar electrical condition of the atmosphere, and partly to the fact that we had all been wrought up to a condition of high nervous tension by the conviction that something--we did not quite know what--was impending, for which we were all anxiously on the watch, and that, in the Cimmerian darkness which enveloped us, we were obliged to depend for adequate warning, upon our hearing alone, which caused us to resent and be impatient of all extraneous sounds.  That this was to some extent the case was evidenced by the fact that, our preparations finished, we had, as with one consent, subsided into silence, which was broken only in a low whisper if anyone felt it necessary to speak.
Suddenly, as we all sat waiting for the outburst of the threatened storm, a long-drawn, piercing cry pealed out across the water, apparently from a spot at no very great distance from us.  It was, although not very loud, the most appalling, soul-harrowing sound that had ever smote upon my ears, and a violent shudder of horror thrilled me from head to foot, while I felt the hair bristling upon my scalp as I listened to it.  Three times in rapid succession did that dreadful, heart-shaking cry come wailing to our ears, and then all was silence again for perhaps half a minute, when the men about me began to ask, in low, tense whispers, whence it came, and from what creature.  To me, I must confess, the sounds seemed to be such as might burst from the lips of a fellow-creature in the very uttermost extremity of mortal terror. But that could scarcely be, for how could mortal man have approached us within a distance of some two hundred yards in that breathless calm, unless, indeed, in a boat--of which there had certainly been no sign in any direction half an hour before.  And if one were disposed for a moment to admit such a possibility, whence could a boat come?  The pirate brig had been the only craft in sight when darkness fell, and it was scarcely within the bounds of probability that anything then out of sight beneath the horizon could have drawn so near to us during the succeeding hours of darkness.  Or again, admitting such a possibility, what dreadful happening could have wrung from human lips such blood- curdling sounds?  We were all eagerly discussing the matter, some of the men agreeing with me that the sounds were human, while others stoutly maintained that they were supernatural, and boded some terrible disaster to the boats, when our discussion was abruptly broken in upon by the sound of rippling water near at hand, as though a craft of some kind were bearing down upon us at a speed sufficient to raise a brisk surge under her bows, and the next instant the voice of San Domingo pealed out in piercing tones, eloquent of the direst terror:
"Oh, look dere eberybody!  Wha' dat?"  And with a howl like that of a wild beast he rose to his feet and made a frantic dash aft for the stern-sheets, fighting his way past the other men, and trampling over the unfortunate wounded in the bottom of the boat, quite beside himself with fright.
And indeed there was some excuse for the negro's extraordinary behaviour; for, intense as was the darkness that enveloped us, the water was faintly phosphorescent, and we were thus enabled to discern indistinctly that, less than a hundred yards distant from us, a huge creature, which, to our excited imaginations, appeared to be between two and three hundred feet long, had risen to the surface and was now slowly swimming in a direction that would carry it across the bows of the longboat at a distance of some fifty feet.  I frankly confess that for a moment I felt petrified with horror, for the creature was streaming with faintly luminous phosphorescence, and thus, despite the darkness, it was possible to see that it was certainly not a whale, or any other known denizen of the deep, for it had a head shaped somewhat like that of an alligator--but considerably larger than that of any alligator I had ever seen--attached to a very long and somewhat slender neck, which it carried stretched straight out before it at an angle of some thirty degrees with the surface of the water, and which it continually twisted this way and that, as though peering about in search of something. Suddenly it paused, lifted its head high, and looked straight toward the boats, and at the same moment a whiff of air came toward us heavily charged with a most disgusting and nauseating odour, about equally suggestive of musk and the charnel-house.  Its eyes, distinctly luminous, and apparently about two feet apart, were directed straight toward the longboat, and the next instant it began to move toward us, again stretching out its neck.
Instinctively I sprang to my feet and whipped a pistol out of my belt, cocking it as I did so.
"Out pistols, men, and give it a volley!"  I cried; and the next instant a somewhat confused pistol discharge shattered the breathless silence of the night.  My own fire I had withheld, waiting to see what would be the effect of the men's fire upon the monster.  Whether any of them had hit it or not I could not tell, but beyond causing the creature to pause for an instant, as though startled by the flashing of fire, the volley seemed to have had no effect, for the horrid thing continued to approach the boat, while the disgusting odour which it emitted grew almost overpowering.  It must have been within ten feet of the boat when I aimed straight at its left eye, and pulled the trigger of my pistol. For an instant the bright flash dazzled me so that I could see nothing, but I distinctly heard the "phitt" of the bullet, felt a hot puff of the sickening stench strike me full in the face, and became aware of a tremendous swirl and disturbance of the water as the huge creature plunged beneath the surface and was gone.
CHAPTER FOUR.
THE BOATS IN A TORNADO.
We had scarcely begun to settle down again, and regain the control of our nerves after this distinctly startling adventure, when the dense canopy of black cloud overhead was rent asunder by a flash of lightning, steel-blue, keen, and dazzlingly vivid, that seemed to strike the water within a dozen fathoms of us, while simultaneously we were deafened by a crackling crash of thunder of such appalling loudness and violence that one might have been excused for believing that the very foundations of the earth had been riven asunder.  So tremendous was the concussion of it that I quite distinctly felt the longboat quiver and tremble under its influence.  And the next instant down came the rain in a regular tropical, torrential downpour, causing the sea to hiss as though each individual drop of rain were red-hot, and starting us to work at once in both boats with the balers, to save our provisions from being ruined.  I happened to be looking away in a westerly direction when the flash came, and despite its dazzling vividness I caught a momentary glimpse of the pirate brig in that direction, and not more than a mile distant from us. None of the others in the boats appeared to have seen her, for no one said a word; and I only hoped that no eye on board her had happened to be turned toward us at the moment, or they could not have failed to see us; and she was altogether too near for my liking.  I said nothing, for it seemed unnecessary to disturb the men by informing them of her whereabouts; and I comforted myself with the reflection that when the squall should come--as come it now must in a very few minutes,--she, like ourselves, would be compelled to scud before it; and as she would run two feet to our one, she would soon run us out of sight.
We had not long to wait.  After the deluge of rain had lasted some three minutes it ceased as abruptly as it had begun, and for the space of perhaps half a minute there was no sound to be heard save the trickling and dripping of water from the drenched sails of the boats.  Then, far away to the eastward there gradually arose a low moaning, and a sudden fierce puff of hot air struck us for an instant, filling the sails of the longboat with a loud flap and leaving them hanging motionless again.
"Here it comes, lads," cried I.  "Out with your starboard oars, and get the boat's head round.  That will do.  Lay them in again; and one hand tend the mainsheet here aft."
The moaning sound rapidly grew in intensity until it became first a deep roar, like the bellowing of a thousand angry bulls, and finally a deafening shriek, while away to the eastward a long line of white, foaming water became visible, rushing down toward us with incredible rapidity.  The next instant the squall struck us, and the white water boiled up high over the sterns of the boats, burying us so deeply that for a moment I thought it was all over with us, and that, despite our precautions, we must inevitably be swamped.  But the good canvas of which the longboat's sails were made fortunately withstood the strain, as also did the stout hemp rigging which supported the mast, and as the furious blast swooped down upon us we gathered way and were the next moment flying to the westward before the hurricane, our bows buried deeply in the boiling surge.  And now we had good reason to congratulate ourselves upon the fact that we in the longboat had taken the gig in tow, for the strain of the smaller boat kept the longboat's stern down, and in a great measure counteracted the leverage of the mast which tended to depress and bury our bows, but for which I feel convinced that the longboat, stout craft though she was, would have been driven under by the tremendous force of the wind and swamped by an inrush of water over the bows.
The outfly was accompanied by a furious storm of thunder and lightning, the illumination of which was most welcome to us, for it enabled us to see where we were going, and incidentally revealed to us our enemy, the pirate brig, scudding away to leeward under a goose-winged fore-topsail, and with her topgallant-masts struck.
We now had reason to congratulate ourselves upon the foresight which had suggested to us the idea of partially covering in the boats with their sails as a protection against the inroads of the sea; for within ten minutes of the outburst not only was the air full of flying sheets of spindrift and scud-water that, but for the precaution referred to, would have kept us busily baling, but in addition to this a short, steep, tumultuous sea was rapidly rising, which at frequent intervals rose above the boats' gunwales, and would have pooped us dangerously had the boats been left in their ordinary unprotected condition.  As it was, beyond a pint or so of water that occasionally made its way inboard despite all our precautions, and needed to be baled out again, we had no trouble.
The first fury of the squall lasted about a quarter of an hour.  During that time the thunder and lightning were incessant, but afterwards they gradually died away, while the wind moderated to a steady gale; and it was by the illumination of the last flash of lightning that we caught sight of the brig hove-to on the starboard tack, under a storm-staysail, with her head to the northward.  The sight of her thus was a great relief to me, for it seemed to indicate that we had been fortunate enough to escape detection, and that we need have no great fear of interference from her, since the fact of her having hove-to so early indicated a keen desire on the part of her captain to remain as near as possible to the coast.
As the night wore on the sea rapidly became higher and more dangerous, our difficulties and embarrassments increasing in proportion.  Our chief difficulty arose from the necessity to keep the gig in tow, for with the rising of the sea this speedily became more dangerous to both boats, from the frequent fierce tugs of the painter that connected the two boats together.  The rope was a new and stout one, and there was not much fear that the boats would break away from each other, but the strain set up by the alternate slackening and tautening of the painter, as first one boat and then the other was urged forward by the 'scend of the sea, was tremendous, and strained both craft to a positively dangerous degree.  Yet it was not possible for us to cast the gig adrift, for, had we done so, we should at once have run away from and lost her in the darkness; that is, unless she had set her own sails, and this, of course, could not have been done without depriving her of the protection of them as a covering against the breaking seas, which would have resulted in her being instantly swamped.  But at length matters became so serious with us both that it was evident that something must be done, and that very quickly too; for some of the drags were so violent that they threatened to tear the stern out of the longboat, which was by this time leaking badly.  After considering the matter, therefore, most carefully, I decided upon a course of procedure that I hoped might better our condition somewhat.  It happened that among the stores which we had hurriedly stowed away in the longboat when preparing to leave the schooner was a drum of lamp oil, which we intended to use in our binnacle lamps at night, and which we thought might perhaps also prove very useful for other purposes as well, and this I now ordered the men to find for me.  Fortunately it was easy to get at it, and it was soon produced.  It was a full can, and had never been opened; therefore I gave instructions that, instead of drawing the bung, it should be punctured with a sufficient number of holes to allow the oil to ooze through pretty freely.  This done, I instructed the men to clear away the longboat's painter and to bend it securely round the boat's oars in such a manner as to make a sort of sea-anchor of them, leaving about a fathom of the end of the painter clear to which to bend on the oil-can. Then, when everything was ready, I shouted to Simpson in the gig, telling him what I proposed to do, and giving him his instructions, after which we in the longboat hauled down the jib, and, watching our opportunity, rounded-to, threw overboard our sea-anchor, with the oil- can attached, and took in our remaining canvas.  This business of rounding-to was a very delicate and ticklish job, for had the sea caught us broadside-on we must inevitably have been capsized or swamped; but we were fortunate enough to do everything at precisely the right moment, with the result that the two boats swung round, head-on to the sea, without accident, and without shipping very much water.
The oars, lashed together in the middle, and kept squarely athwartships by means of a span, afforded, after all, only the merest apology for a sea-anchor, and barely gave just sufficient drag to keep the boats stem- on to the sea without appreciably retarding their drift to leeward; but it was none the worse for this, since, with their drift scarcely retarded, they rode all the more easily; and presently, when the oil began to exude from the can and diffuse itself over the surface of the water, there was a narrow space just ahead of us where the seas ceased to break, with the result that in the course of ten minutes we were riding quite dry and comfortable, except for the scud-water that came driving along.  This, however, we soon remedied by converting our mainsail into a kind of roof, strained over the lowered mast, similar to the arrangement in the gig, after which, save for the extravagant leaps and plunges of the boats, which were very trying to the wounded, we had not much to complain of.
The gale reached its height about four o'clock on the following morning, at which hour it was blowing very hard, with an exceedingly heavy and dangerous sea, in which the boats could not possibly have lived but for the precautions which had been taken for their preservation; and even as it was, we repeatedly escaped disaster only by the merest hair's- breadth, and by what seemed to be more a combination of fortuitous circumstances than anything else.  Taken altogether, that night was one of the most tense and long-drawn-out anxieties that I had ever, up to then, experienced.  About two bells in the morning watch the gale broke, and from that moment the strength of the wind moderated so rapidly that by eight bells all danger had passed, the boats were riding dry, and we were able to get breakfast in peace and comfort--all the greater, perhaps, from the fact that when day dawned the pirate brig was nowhere to be seen.  By nine-o'clock the wind and sea had both moderated sufficiently to enable us to resume our voyage.  I therefore, with some difficulty, secured an observation of the sun for the determination of our longitude, and we then proceeded to re-bend our sails, step the masts, and get under way, steering to the northward and westward under double-reefed canvas.  Finally, about noon, we were able to shake out our reefs and proceed under whole canvas, the sea by that time having almost completely gone down, leaving no trace of the previous night's gale beyond a long and very heavy swell, in the hollows of which the two boats continually lost sight of each other.
But although, by the mercy of Providence, we had weathered the gale, we had not by any means escaped scathless, for when we had once more settled down and had found opportunity to overhaul our stock of provisions, it was found that, despite our utmost precautions, an alarmingly large proportion of them had become damaged by rain and sea water, to such an extent, indeed, that about half of them had been rendered quite unfit for use, and we therefore threw that portion overboard, since there was obviously no advantage in wasting valuable space in the preservation of useless stores.  And I did this the more readily, perhaps, because I calculated that, despite this heavy loss, we should still have enough left to carry us to our destination--provided that we were not detained by calms on the way.
We made excellent progress all that day, our reckoning showing that at three o'clock that afternoon we had traversed a distance of just forty miles since getting under way that morning, which distance was increased to fifty-eight by sunset.  Moreover we had done well in another way, for the wounded had all been carefully looked after, and their hurts attended to as thoroughly as circumstances would allow, with the result that at nightfall each man reported himself as feeling distinctly better, notwithstanding the night of terrible hardship and exposure through which all had so recently passed.
The sunset that evening was clear, promising a fine night, while the wind held steady and fair.  We were consequently all in high spirits at the prospect of a quick and pleasant passage to Sierra Leone.  But as the night advanced a bank of heavy cloud gradually gathered on the horizon to the northward, and the wind began to back round and freshen somewhat, so that about midnight it again became necessary to double- reef our canvas, while the sea once more rose to such an extent that the boats were soon shipping an unpleasant quantity of water over the weather bow.  Moreover the wind continued to back until we were broken off a couple of points from our course; so that, altogether, it finally began to look very much as though we were in for another unpleasant night, though perhaps not quite so bad as the one that had preceded it. It is true that we were not just then in any actual danger, for, after all, the strength of the wind was no more than that to which the _Shark_ would show single-reefed topsails.  But it was more than enough for us, under the canvas which we were carrying, and I had just given the order to haul down a third reef when one of the men who was engaged upon the task of shortening sail suddenly paused in his work and gazed out intently to windward under the sharp of his hand.  The next moment he shouted excitedly:
"Sail ho! two points on the weather bow.  D'ye see her, sir?  There she is.  Ah, now I've lost her again; but you'll see her, sir, when we lifts on the top of the next sea.  There--now do you see her, sir, just under that patch of black cloud?"
"Ay, ay, I see her," I answered; for as the man spoke I caught sight of a small dark blur, which I knew must be a ship of some sort, showing indistinctly against the somewhat lighter background of cloud behind her.  She was about two miles away, and was steering a course that would carry her across our bows at a distance of about a quarter of a mile if we all held on as we were going; and for a moment I wondered whether it was our enemy the pirate brig again putting in an appearance.  But an instant's reflection sufficed to dissipate this idea, for, according to all the probabilities, the pirates ought by this time to be well on toward a hundred miles to the eastward of us, while the stranger was coming down, with squared yards, from the northward.
"We must contrive to attract the attention of that craft and get her to pick us up," I cried.  "Have we anything in the boat from which we can make a flare?"
A hurried search was rewarded by the production of a piece of old tarpaulin that we were using as a cover and protection to our stock of provisions; and a long strip of this was hurriedly torn off, liberally sprinkled with the oil that still remained in the drum, twisted tightly up, and ignited.  The flame sputtered a bit at first, probably from the fact that sea water had penetrated to the interior of the drum and mingled to a certain extent with the oil; but presently our improvised flare burst into a bright ruddy flame, which lighted up the hulls and sails of the boats and was reflected in broad red splashes of colour from the tumbling seas that came sweeping steadily down upon us.
All eyes were now eagerly directed toward the approaching ship, of which, however, we entirely lost sight in the dazzling glare of our torch.  But when, after blazing fiercely for about a couple of minutes, until it was consumed, our flare went out and left us once more in darkness, there was no answering signal from the stranger, which was coming down fast before the steadily strengthening breeze.
"Make another one, lads, and light it as quickly as you can," I cried. "We must not let her slip past us.  Our lives may depend upon our ability to attract her attention and get her to pick us up.  But what is the matter with them aboard there that they have not seen us?  Their look-outs must be fast asleep."
"She's a trader of some sort, sir; that's what's the matter with her," answered one of the men.  "If she was a man-o'-war, or a slaver, there'd be a better look-out kept aboard of her.  If I had my way them chaps what's supposed to be keepin' a look-out should get six dozen at the gangway to-morrer mornin'."
"Hurry up with that flare, lads," I exhorted.  "Be as quick with it as you like."
"Ay, ay, sir! we shall be ready now in the twinklin' of a purser's lantern," answered the man who was preparing the torch.  "Now, Tom, where's that there binnacle lamp again?  Shield it from the wind with your cap, man, so's it don't get blowed out while I sets fire to this here flare."
The man was still fumbling with the flare when the stranger, which was now about half a mile distant, suddenly exhibited a lantern over her bows, which her people continued to show until we had lighted our second flare, when the lantern at once disappeared.  A couple of minutes later she was near enough for us to be able to make her out as a full-rigged ship of some seven hundred tons; and presently she swept grandly across our bows, at a distance of about a cable's-length, and, putting her helm down, came to the wind, with her main-topsail to the mast, finally coming to rest within biscuit-toss of us to windward.
As she did so we became aware of a man standing on her poop, just abaft the mizzen rigging, and the next moment a hail through a speaking- trumpet came pealing across the water.
"Ho, the boats ahoy!  What boats are those?"
"We are the boats of the slaver _Dolores_, captured by the British sloop-of-war _Shark_, and subsequently attacked and destroyed by a pirate," replied I.  "We have been in the boats nearly thirty hours, and several of our people are wounded.  We hoped to make our way to Sierra Leone, but narrowly escaped being swamped in a gale last night.  I presume you will have no objection to receive us?"
The ship being apparently British, I naturally expected to receive an immediate and cordial invitation to go on board; but, to my intense surprise, and growing indignation, there ensued a period of silence as though the man who had hailed us was considering the matter.  I was just about to hail again when the individual seemed to arrive at a decision; for he hailed:
"All right; bring your boats alongside."
We accordingly dowsed the sails, threw out our oars, and pulled alongside.
As we approached the lee gangway, which had been thrown open to receive us, and about which some half a dozen men were clustered, with lighted lanterns, the man who had hailed us before enquired:
"Will your wounded be able to come up the side; or shall I reeve a whip with a boatswain's-chair for them?"
"Thanks," I replied, "I think we may be able to manage, if your people will lend us a hand."
"How many do you muster?" asked the stranger, presumably the master of the vessel.
"Ten, all told," I answered, "of whom six are more or less hurt.  We were fifteen to start with, but five were killed by the fire of the pirate."
"I'm afraid you've had a bad time, takin' it all round," said our interlocutor.  "Stand by, chaps, to lend the poor fellers a hand up over the side."
"What ship is this?"  I asked, when at length I went up the side and found myself confronted by a very ordinary-looking individual, attired in a suit of thin, rusty-looking blue serge, with a peaked cap of the same material on his head, who extended his hand in cordial welcome to me.
"The _Indian Queen_, of and from London to Bombay, twenty-three days out, with passengers and general cargo," he answered.
"Well," said I, "I am exceedingly obliged to you for receiving us; for, to tell you the truth, after the experiences of last night, I am very glad to find a good, wholesome ship once more under my feet.  Open boats are all very well in their way, but they are rather ticklish craft in which to face such a gale as we had last night."
"By the by," he said, "are those boats of yours worth hoisting in?"
"Yes," I said, "they are both very good boats, and it would be a pity to send them adrift if you can find room for them."
"Oh, I dare say we can do that," he answered.  "Besides, the skipper might have a word or two to say about it if we was to turn 'em adrift. By the way, Mr--er--"
"Grenvile," I prompted, continuing--"I must apologise for not having sooner introduced myself.  I am senior midshipman of the _Shark_, and was prize-master of the slaver _Dolores_, which I had instructions to take into Sierra Leone."
"Just so; thank'e," answered the man.  "I was going to say, Mr Grenvile, that--well, our skipper's a very queer-tempered sort of a man--he was second mate when we left home--and as like as not he may kick up a row about my receivin' you aboard--indeed it wouldn't very greatly surprise me if he was to order you all over the side again; so I thought I'd just better give ye a hint, so as you may know what to expect, and how to act."
"Indeed, I am very much obliged to you for your timely warning, Mr ---" said I.
"Carter's my name--Henry Carter," was the reply.  "I'm actin' as chief mate now, but I was third when we left London."
"I understand," said I.  "But this captain of yours--he is an Englishman, I presume, and I cannot understand the possibility of his raising any objection to your receiving a party of distressed fellow- countrymen aboard his ship.  And how comes he to be in command, now, if he was only second when you left home?"
"Well, sir, it's like this," answered Carter, starting to explain.  Then he interrupted himself suddenly, saying:
"Excuse me, sir; I see that the hands are about to sway away upon the tackles and hoist in the boats.  I'll just give an eye to them, if you don't mind, and see that they don't make a mess of the job."
With the assistance of the _Shark's_ people the boats were soon got inboard and stowed, after which my boats' crews were bestowed in the forecastle and the steerage, there happening by good luck to be just sufficient vacant berths in the latter to accommodate the wounded.  This matter having been attended to, the mate remarked to me:
"There's a vacant cabin in the cuddy; but the stewards are all turned in, and it would take 'em some time to clear it out and get it ready for you; so perhaps you might be able to make do with a shakedown on the cabin sofa for to-night; or there's my cabin, which you're very welcome to, if you like, and I'll take my watch below on a sofa."
"Thank you very much for your exceedingly kind offer," said I, "but I couldn't think of dispossessing you of your own cabin, even for a single night.  The sofa will serve my turn admirably, especially as I had no sleep last night, and not much during the night before.  But, before I go below, I should like to hear how it comes about that the man who was second mate of this ship when she left England is now master of her.  To bring about such a state of affairs as that you must have lost both your original skipper and your chief mate."
"Yes," answered Carter, "that's exactly what's happened.  We've had what the newspapers would call a couple of tragedies aboard here.  First of all, the skipper--who looked as strong and healthy a man as you'd meet with in a day's march--was found dead in his bed, on the morning of the fifth day out; and, next, the chief mate--who of course took command, and was supposed to be a total abstainer--was found missin', as you may say, when the steward went to call him, one morning--he'd only been in command four days, poor chap; and the mate--that's our present skipper, Cap'n Williams--gave it out that he must have committed suicide, while in liquor, by jumpin' out of the stern window--which was found to be wide-open, on the mornin' when poor Mr Mowbray was reported missing."
"Very extraordinary," commented I, stifling a prodigious yawn.  "And now, Mr Carter, with your kind permission I will go below and lie down, for I feel pretty well tired out."
"Ay, that I'll be bound you do," agreed Carter.  "This way, Mr Grenvile, and look out for the coamin'--it's a bit extra high."
And, so saying, he led the way into a very handsome saloon under the ship's full poop.
The craft was not a regular Indiaman--that is to say, she was not one of the Honourable East India Company's ships,--but, for all that, she was a very handsome and comfortable vessel, and her cuddy was most luxuriously fitted up with crimson velvet sofas, capacious revolving armchairs screwed to the deck alongside the tables, a very fine piano, with a quantity of loose music on the top of it, some very handsome pictures in heavy gold frames screwed to the ship's side between the ports, a magnificent hanging lamp suspended from the centre of the skylight, with a number of smaller lamps, hung in gimbals, over the pictures, a handsome fireplace, with a wide tiled hearth, now filled with pots of plants, a capacious sideboard against the fore bulkhead, a handsome carpet on the deck, and, in fact, everything that could be thought of, within reason, to render a long sea voyage comfortable and pleasant. The saloon occupied the full width of the ship, the sleeping cabins being below.
With pardonable pride Carter turned up the flame of the swinging lamp-- which was the only lamp burning at that hour of the night--to give me a glimpse of all this magnificence.
I quite expected that, having, as it were, done the honours of the ship, Carter would now turn down the lamp and leave me to myself; but he still lingered in an uncertain sort of way, as though he would like to say something, but did not quite know how to begin; so at length, to relieve his embarrassment, I said:
"What is it, Mr Carter?  I feel sure you want to tell me something."
"Well," said he, "it's a fact that I have got something on my mind that I'd like to get off it; and yet I dare say you'll think there's nothing in it when I tells you.  The fact is, our present skipper's a very curious sort of chap, as I expect you'll find out for yourself afore many hours has gone over your head.  Now, I want you to understand, Mr--er--Grenvile, that I'm not sayin' this because he and I don't happen to get on very well together--which is a fact; I'm not jealous of him, or of his position, because I couldn't fill it if 'twas offered to me--I'm not a good enough navigator for that,--but I think it's only right I should tell you that, as like as not, he'll not only blow me up sky-high for pickin' you and your men up, when he finds out that you're aboard, but, maybe--well, I dunno whether he'll go quite so far as that, but he may refuse to let you stay aboard, and order you to take to your boats again.  Now, if he should--I don't say he will, mind you, but if he should do any such thing, take my advice, and don't go.  I don't know how he may be to-morrow.  If he kept sober after he turned in he'll be all right, I don't doubt; but if he took a bottle to bed with him--as he's lately got into the habit of doin'--the chances are that he'll turn out as savage as a bear with a sore head; and then everybody, fore and aft--passengers and all--will have to stand by and look out for squalls!"
"Thanks, Mr Carter, very much, for mentioning this," I said.  "You gave me a pretty broad hint as to what I might expect, out there on deck, just now, and you may rest assured that I shall not forget it.  And you may also rest assured that, should he so far forget what is due to humanity as to order me to leave the ship, I will flatly decline to go."
"Of course, sir, of course you will, and quite right too," commented Carter.  "But I'm glad to hear ye say so, all the same.  It'll be a great comfort to me--and to the passengers too--to feel that we've got a naval officer aboard, if things should happen to go at all crooked.  And now, Mr Grenvile, havin' said my say, I'll wish ye good-night, and hope you'll be able to get a good sound sleep between this and morning."
And therewith Carter at length took himself off.  But before he was fairly out on deck I was stretched at full length on the sofa, fast asleep.
CHAPTER FIVE.
SOME STRANGE HAPPENINGS.
I was awakened by the entrance of the stewards, who, at six bells on the following morning, came into the saloon to brush and dust up generally, and lay the tables for nine-o'clock breakfast.  The head steward apologised for waking me, and informed me that there was no need for me to disturb myself, also that Carter had informed him of my presence, and commended me to his care.  But I had slept like a log, and felt thoroughly refreshed; I therefore went out on deck, and betook myself forward to the eyes of the ship, where I stripped and indulged in the luxury of a shower-bath under the head-pump.
It was a most glorious morning, the sun was shining brilliantly, with a keen bite in his rays already, although he was but an hour high; and there was a strong breeze blowing from the northward, under the influence of which the ship was reeling off her ten knots, under a main topgallant-sail.  But I was greatly surprised to see that, instead of steering south, we were heading in for the coast, on a south-westerly course.  I made some remark upon this to Carter, who again had the watch, to which he replied:
"Well, you see, sir, it's a fancy of the skipper's.  He's got some sort of a theory that, by hugging the coast close, and takin' advantage of the sea and land breezes, as they blows night and mornin', we shall do rather better than we should by thrashin' to wind'ard against the south- east trade.  I don't know whether there's anything in it myself, but it's the first time that I've ever heard of the notion.  But there he is--and in a blazin' bad temper, too, by the looks of him!  Shall I take you aft and introjuce you to him?"
"Certainly," said I.  "If we are to have any unpleasantness, let us have it at once, and get it over."
There was, however, to be no unpleasantness--just then, at all events-- except in so far as poor Carter was concerned; for when he and I went aft to where Captain Williams--a tall, powerful-looking, and rather handsome man in a barbaric sort of way, with a pair of piercing black eyes, and an abundant crop of black, curly hair, with beard and moustache to match--was standing on the quarter-deck, just outside the entrance of the saloon, the captain stepped forward, and, extending his hand, bade me welcome to his ship with every sign of the utmost friendliness.  But he gave poor Carter a terrific wigging for not having called him when the boats were first sighted, and for receiving us on board without first consulting him.
"For how could you know, Mr Carter," he said, "that the boats were not full of pirates?  Less unlikely things than that have happened, let me tell you; and when you come to know this coast as well as I know it, you will be rather more chary of receiving a couple of boats' crews professing to be distressed seamen."
"Oh," said I, "as to that, Mr Carter took pretty good care to satisfy himself as to our _bona fides_ before permitting us to come alongside! At all events he made sure that we were British, and I think there are very few Britons who take kindly to piracy."
"Perhaps not, sir, perhaps not; at least I hope that, for the credit of our countrymen, you are right," answered the skipper.  "At the same time there are many foreigners who speak English well enough to answer a hail, and I want to impress upon Mr Carter the fact that it was his duty to call me, under the peculiar circumstances, and to allow me to decide as to the advisability of admitting two boat-loads of strangers aboard my ship.  Please don't do it again, sir."
Whereupon poor Carter promised to be more circumspect in future, and slunk away with very much the aspect and manner of a beaten dog.  I felt very sorry for the man, for, even admitting that the skipper was right-- as he certainly was--I thought it would have been in very much better taste if he had taken an opportunity to point out to his subordinate, in private, the imprudence of which he had been guilty, instead of administering a reprimand in the presence of a stranger.  Apart from that it appeared to me that there was not very much wrong with the man, and the question arose in my mind whether, despite the protest that Carter had thought it necessary to address to me, he might not be to some extent prejudiced against his skipper.  And this feeling was somewhat strengthened when, as, in compliance with Captain Williams's request, I gave him an account of our recent adventures, he informed me that the ship carried a doctor, and at once sent a messenger to that functionary, informing him that some wounded men had been taken on board during the night, and requesting him to give them his best attention forthwith.
As the skipper and I stood talking together, the passengers, who had learned from the stewards that we had been picked up during the night, came hurrying up on deck, one after another, full of curiosity to see the individuals who had joined the ship under such interesting circumstances; and I was duly introduced to them.  To take them in what appeared to be the recognised order of their social importance, they were, first, General Sir Thomas Baker, his wife, Lady Hetty Baker, and his rather elderly daughter, Phoebe, returning to India from furlough; Mrs Euphemia Jennings, the young wife of an important official, who had just left her only boy--a lad of five years of age--with friends in England, for his health's sake, and with her a niece of her husband--a Miss Flora Duncan, a most lovely girl of about sixteen.  Then came Mr and Mrs Richard Morton, people of some means, who were going to India to try their fortune at indigo planting, under the auspices of a friend and former schoolfellow of the husband, and who had sent home glowing accounts of the great things that might be done in that way by a man of energy with a reasonable amount of capital; and with them went their three children, Frank, Mary, and Susie, aged respectively eleven, eight, and six years.  And finally, there were Messrs. Fielder, Acutt, Boyne, Pearson, and Taylor--five young men ranging from seventeen to twenty-one years of age, who were going out to take up appointments in the Company's service.  All these people were very kind and nice to me, but I could not help being secretly amused at the fiery energy with which the general denounced what he characterised as "the criminal carelessness" of Captain Bentinck in turning me adrift in an unarmed schooner with a crew of only fourteen hands.
"By Jove, sir, I call it little short of murder," he shouted.  "The idea of asking you--ay, and expecting you--to take a fully-loaded slaver into port with only fourteen men to back you up, and no guns!  The man ought to be ashamed of himself!  But it is just like you navy fellows; you are constantly asking one another to do things which seem impossible!"
"Yes, sir," I said demurely, "and not infrequently we do them."
"Do them!" he exploded.  "Yes, I will do you the credit to admit that you never know when you are beaten; and that, I suppose, is why the blue-jackets so often succeed in performing the apparently impossible. But that in no way weakens my contention that your captain was guilty of a piece of most culpable negligence in sending you away without furnishing you with a battery of guns with which to defend yourself and your ship!"
Fortunately, at this moment the breakfast bell rang, and, the general and his wife leading the way, we all trooped into the saloon and seated ourselves at the elegantly furnished and bountifully provided breakfast tables.
During the progress of the meal I of course had a further opportunity to observe the behaviour of the skipper, and when I rose from the table I was obliged to confess to myself that I was puzzled, for I had been quite unable to arrive at any distinct impression of the character of the man.  For while, on the one hand, his manner to me was cordial, with the somewhat rough and unpolished geniality of a man of a coarse and violent temperament striving to conquer his natural disposition and render himself agreeable, I could find no fault with the arrangements he proposed to make for my own comfort and that of my men.  And his expressions of sympathy with us in our misfortunes were everything that could be wished for; but, somehow, they did not ring true.  Thus, when in the course of the conversation--which, as was very natural under the circumstances, rather persistently dwelt upon my little party and our adventures--Captain Williams chose to express his gratification at having fallen in with us and rescued us from a distinctly perilous situation, while his words were as kind and sympathetic as could have been desired, the expression of his countenance seemed to say, almost as plainly as words could speak: "I devoutly wish that you had all gone to the bottom, rather than come aboard my ship!"  And I continually found myself mentally asking the question: "Which am I to believe--this man's words, or the expression of his eyes?  Is he sincere in what he says, and is he the unfortunate possessor of an expression that habitually gives the lie to his words; or is he, for some sinister purpose of his own, endeavouring to produce a false impression upon us all?"  It was quite impossible to find a satisfactory reply to these questions, yet I found a certain amount of guidance in the manner of the passengers toward him; I noticed that every one of them, with the exception of the general, seemed to quail beneath his gaze, and shrink from him.  As for the general, despite his somewhat boisterous manner, he was a gentleman, a soldier, and evidently a man who knew not what fear was, and it appeared to me that he was distinctly distrustful of Captain Williams.
At length, by patiently watching, I succeeded in finding an opportunity to divert the conversation from myself and my party; I saw the skipper glance upward toward the tell-tale compass that hung in the skylight, and as his gaze fell again it encountered my own.  Instantly a most malignant and ferocious expression swept into his eyes.  Undeterred by that, however, I composedly remarked:
"I see, Captain, you are heading in toward the coast; and Mr Carter informs me that you propose to test practically a rather interesting theory that you have formed as to the advantages of the alternate land and sea breezes over those of the regular trades."
"Yes," he growled, "I do.  But Mr Carter has no business to discuss my plans or intentions with anybody.  I have warned him more than once to keep a silent tongue in his head; but the man is a fool, and will get himself into very serious trouble some day if he doesn't keep his weather eye lifting!"
"Well," I said, "you must not blame him in this case, for the fault--if fault there has been--was mine.  I observed the alteration in the ship's course as soon as I stepped out on deck this morning, and remarked upon it, and it was merely in reply to my remark that Mr Carter explained your intentions."
"Well," he answered, "it is a rather fortunate thing for you that I happen to have such intentions, for it affords you a chance to get transhipped into one of your own craft, instead of having to go on with us to Capetown, as you would almost certainly have been obliged to do if I had followed the usual plan and stretched away over toward the South American coast."
"Quite so," I agreed; "it certainly has that advantage, as occurred to me the moment that Mr Carter explained your theory.  And it has the further advantage that, should you find you do not make quite such good progress as you hope, you will be well to windward when you eventually decide to stretch offshore into the trade wind."
"Then you think my idea has something in it?" he demanded.
"Something--yes," I agreed; "but I doubt very much whether, taking everything into consideration, you will find that the advantages are worth consideration."
The skipper did not agree with me, and forthwith plunged into a fiery defence of his theory which lasted until some time after we had all risen from the table and adjourned to the poop.  In fact, he so completely monopolised my attention up to tiffin time that I was scarcely able to find time to go forward and enquire into the condition of the wounded, and had no opportunity at all to improve my acquaintance with the passengers.
After tiffin, however, the captain retired to his cabin, instead of going on deck again, and as I stepped out of the saloon on to the quarter-deck I felt a hand slide into my arm, and, turning round, found the general alongside me.
"Am I right," said he, as he linked his arm in mine, "in the impression that you do not think very highly of Captain Williams's rather peculiar theory concerning the advantage of `keeping the coast aboard'--as I believe you sailors term it--rather than following the usual rule of making the most of the south-east trade wind?  You are pretty well acquainted with this coast, I suppose, and your ideas on the subject should be of value."
"Well," said I, "the fact is, Sir Thomas, that I do not think very highly of the captain's theory.  In theory, no doubt, the idea appears somewhat attractive, but in actual practice I should be inclined to say that the uncertainty of the weather close inshore will probably be found to tell against it.  If the sea breeze could be absolutely depended upon to blow every day and all day long, and the land breeze to blow every night and all night long, there would undoubtedly be something in it. But my experience is that these phenomena are not to be depended upon. It often happens that when, according to all the rules, either the sea or the land breeze should be piping up strongly, there is an absolute, persistent calm.  Nevertheless, from a purely personal point of view, I am glad that the skipper intends to test his theory, because it will afford me the opportunity to shift myself and my party into one of the ships of the slave-squadron, some one of which we are pretty certain to fall in with before long."
"Ah!" remarked the general, with a curious indrawing of his breath.  "I was rather afraid that such might be the case."  He paused for a few seconds, and then, taking a fresh grip of my arm, continued: "Do you know, my young friend, I am rather hoping that we shall not fall in with any of the ships of the slave-squadron, and that consequently you and your men will be obliged to go on with us at least as far as Capetown. It is, perhaps, a bit selfish of me to entertain such a wish, but I do, nevertheless."
"Indeed!" said I.  "May I ask why, general?"
"Of course you may, my dear boy," he answered.  "It is a very natural question.  Well, the fact is that certain very curious happenings have taken place on board this ship since she sailed out of the Thames."  And he proceeded to repeat to me the story that Carter had already told me as to the disappearance of the original captain and his successor. "Now," he continued, "Captain Matthews's death may have been a perfectly natural one.  I don't say that it was not, but up to the hour of his death he looked strong and healthy enough to have lived out the full term of his life.  Moreover, he was a most temperate man in every respect.  I have, therefore, found it very difficult indeed to discover a satisfactory explanation of his very sudden demise.  And, between you and me, although Burgess, the ship's surgeon, has never said as much in words, I firmly believe that the occurrence puzzled him as much as it did me; indeed, his very reticence over the affair only strengthens my suspicion that such is the case.  But, puzzling as were the circumstances connected with Captain Matthews's death, I consider that those associated with the death of Mr Mowbray, who took command of the ship in place of Captain Matthews, were at least equally so.  Mr Mowbray was a man of some thirty-five years of age, very quiet, unassuming, and gentlemanly of manner; a married man with, as I have understood, a small family to provide for, and consequently very anxious to rise in his profession; ambitious, in his quiet, unassuming way, and evidently a thoroughly steady and reliable man, for I understand that he had served under Captain Matthews for several years.  No one of us ever saw him touch wine, spirits, or drink of any description; yet only four days after he had attained to what we may consider the summit of his ambition, by securing the command of this fine ship, he was missing. Williams, our present skipper, offers us the exceedingly improbable explanation that the poor fellow jumped out of his cabin window, and was drowned, while intoxicated.  I do not believe it for a moment, nor do any of the rest of us.  For my own part I very strongly suspect foul play somewhere, and the very extraordinary explanation which Williams offers of the occurrence only strengthens my suspicion that--well, not to put too fine a point upon it, that he knows more of the matter than a perfectly honest man ought to know.  And, in addition to all this, Williams is a secret drunkard, and a man of most violent and ungovernable temper, as you will see for yourself ere long.  You will therefore not be very greatly surprised to learn that since he took the command there has been a great deal of uneasiness as well as unpleasantness in the cuddy; and I, for one, am rejoiced to find a naval officer and a party of man-o'-war seamen on board.  For I know that after what I have said you will keep your eyes and ears open, and will not hesitate to interfere if you see good and sufficient reason for so doing.  You navy fellows have a trick of cutting in where you consider it necessary without pausing to weigh too nicely the strict legality of your proceedings.  And if perchance you occasionally step an inch or two beyond the strict limits of the law, you are generally able to justify yourselves."
"What you have just told me, general," said I, "was also told me briefly by Carter last night, and he, too, seemed to consider it necessary to warn me that the skipper is a somewhat peculiar man.  Naturally, after such a warning, I have been keeping my eyes and ears open, and I confess that I find the man something of a puzzle.  Carter quite led me to anticipate the possibility that Williams might order us down the side into our boats again, instead of which, so far as words, and even deeds, are concerned, I have not the least fault to find.  But all the time that he was saying kind things to me this morning, his eyes and the expression of his face belied him."
"Aha! so you noticed that, did you?" observed the general.  "Yes, it is quite true; you have very precisely expressed what we have all noticed at one time or another.  His eyes belie the words of his lips very often, that is to say when he chooses to be civil, which is not always. When I saw him this morning I quite believed we were in for a particularly unpleasant day, for he had all the appearance of a man in a very bad temper, but for some reason he has seen fit to behave himself to-day.  But never fear, you will soon have an opportunity to see what he is like when he chooses to let himself go.  His behaviour is then that of a madman, and I am sometimes inclined to believe that he really is mad.  But suppose that he should do as Carter suggests he may, and order you and your men to quit the ship, will you go?"
"Most certainly not," said I.  "I will only leave this ship when I can transfer myself and my men to some other by means of which I can speedily rejoin my own ship."
"That's right, that's quite right, my boy," approved the general. "Well, I am glad that I have had this little talk with you, for it has eased my mind and put you on the alert.  And now, come up on the poop, and make yourself agreeable to the ladies; they will not thank me for monopolising so much of your time and attention."
I took the hint, and followed him up to the poop, where the whole of the cuddy passengers were assembled, the ladies occupied with books, or needlework, or playing with the children, while the men lounged in basket chairs, smoking, reading, or chatting, or danced attendance upon the ladies.  I first paid my respects to Lady Baker and her daughter, as in duty bound, and then drifted gradually round from one to another until I finally came to an anchor between Mrs Jennings and her niece, Miss Duncan.  But I observed that in every case, whatever the topic might be upon which I started a conversation, the talk gradually drifted round to the subject of the skipper and his peculiarities, from which I arrived at the conclusion that, after all, Carter and the general must have had some grounds for the apprehensions that they had expressed to me.
Now, of our party of ten who had been received on board the _Indian Queen_, six of us were wounded, and of those six three were so severely hurt as to be quite unfit for duty, and the other three, of whom I was one, were able to do such deck duty as keeping a look-out, taking a trick at the wheel, and so on, but, excepting myself, were scarcely fit to go aloft just yet.  But I did not think it right or desirable that those of us who were in a fit state to work should eat the bread of idleness.  I had therefore seized the opportunity afforded by my talk with the skipper that morning to suggest that my four unwounded and two slightly-wounded men should assist in the working of the ship; as for myself, I said that I should be very pleased to take charge of one of the watches, if such an arrangement would be of any assistance to him. This, of course, was quite the right and proper thing for me to do, and although the ship carried a complement of thirty hands, all told, I was not in the least surprised that Williams should accept, quite as a matter of course, my offer of the men, three of whom he placed in the port watch, and three in the starboard, the latter being under the boatswain, a big, bullying, brow-beating fellow named Tonkin.  But he declined the offer of my personal services, saying that he could do quite well without them.  This arrangement having been come to, I made it my business to speak to the boatswain, into whose watch the two slightly-wounded men had been put, informing him of what had passed between the skipper and myself, and requesting him not to send the wounded men aloft, as I did not consider that they could safely venture into the rigging in their partially disabled condition.  And I also cautioned the men not to attempt to go aloft, should the boatswain happen to forget what I had told him, and order them to do so, taking care to give them this caution in Tonkin's presence and hearing in order that there might be no mistake or misunderstanding.
I was therefore very much surprised, and considerably annoyed, when, as we were all gathered together on the poop that same evening, during the first dogwatch, I heard the sounds of a violent altercation proceeding on the fore-deck, and, on looking round, discovered that the disputants were one of my own men and the boatswain, the latter of whom was threatening the other with a rope's-end.  Without waiting to hear or see more I instantly dashed down the poop-ladder and ran forward, pushing my way through a little crowd who had gathered round the chief actors of the scene; and as I did so I became suddenly conscious of the fact that the men among whom I was forcing my way were a distinctly ruffianly, ill-conditioned lot, who seemed more than half disposed to resent actively my sudden appearance among them.
"Now then, Martin," I said sharply, "what is all this disturbance about, and why is the boatswain threatening you with that rope's-end?"
"Why, sir," answered Martin, who was suffering from a grape-shot wound in the leg, "I understood you to say this morning as none of us as is wounded is to go aloft; yet here's this here bo's'un swears as he'll make me go up and take the turn out o' that fore-to'gallan' clew, instead of sendin' one of his own people up to do it.  I couldn't climb the riggin' without bustin' this here wound of mine open again--"
"Of course not," I answered.  "I thought I had made it clear to you, Tonkin," turning to the boatswain, "that I do not wish any of my wounded men to be sent aloft.  That man is in no fit condition to go up on to the topsail-yard."
"Ain't he?" retorted the boatswain in a very offensive manner.  "While he's in my watch I'm goin' to be the judge of what he's fit to do, and what he's not fit to do; and I say he's quite fit to do the job that I've ordered him to do.  And he's goin' to do it too, or I'll know the reason why.  And, what's more, I won't have no brass-bound young whipper-snappers comin' for'ard here to interfere with me and tell me what I'm to do and what I'm not to do; and I hope that's speakin' plain enough for to be understood, Mr Midshipman What's-your-name.  Now then," he continued, turning to Martin again, "will you obey my orders, or must I make yer?"  And he took a fresh grip upon the rope's-end with which he was threatening the man.
"Drop that rope's-end at once, you scoundrel!"  I exclaimed angrily; for I saw by the man's manner, and by the approving sniggers of the men who surrounded us, that he had been deliberately and intentionally insulting to me, and that unless I took a firm stand at once the ship would speedily become untenable to my men and myself.  "You must surely be drunk, Tonkin, or you would never dream of--"
"Drunk am I?" he exclaimed savagely, wheeling suddenly round upon me. "I'll soon show you whether I'm drunk or not," and he raised the rope's- end with the manifest intention of striking me across the face with it. But before the blow could fall there was a sudden rush of feet; the sniggering loafers who hemmed us in were knocked right and left like so many ninepins, and, with a cry of "Take that, you dirty blackguard, as a lesson not to lift your filthy paws again against a king's officer," Simpson, our carpenter's mate, an immensely strong fellow, dashed in and caught the boatswain a terrific blow square on the chin, felling him to the deck, where he lay senseless, and bleeding profusely at the mouth.
"Put that man in irons!" bellowed a furious voice behind me; and, turning round, I beheld the skipper glaring like an infuriated animal past me at the carpenter's mate, who was standing with clenched fists across the prostrate body of the boatswain.
"For what reason, pray, Captain Williams?" demanded I indignantly.  "I do not know how long you have been here, for I did not hear you approach, but unless you have but this instant come upon the scene you must be fully aware that it was your boatswain who started this disgraceful brawl.  His behaviour was absolutely brutal, and--"
I got no further; for while I was still speaking the villain suddenly seized me round the waist, and, being much more powerful than myself, pinned my arms close to my sides.  "Here," he exclaimed to one of his own people standing by, "just lash this young bantam's arms behind him, and seize him to the rail, while I attend to the other."  And before I well knew where I was I found myself securely trussed up, and saw Simpson, Martin, and another of my men, fighting like lions at bay, finally overborne by numbers and beaten senseless to the deck.
"You will be very sorry for this outrage before you are many days older, Captain Williams," I said as the fellow presently came and planted himself square in front of me.
"Shall I, indeed?" he sneered, thrusting his hands deep in his trousers pockets, and balancing himself on the heaving deck with his legs wide apart.  "What makes you think so?"
"Because I will report your conduct to the captain of the first man-o'- war that we fall in with on the coast, and you will be called upon to give an account of yourself and your behaviour."
"And supposing that we don't happen to fall in with any of your precious men-o'-war, what then?" he demanded.
"Why," said I, "it will merely mean that your punishment will be deferred a few days longer until we arrive at Capetown; that is all."
"Ah!" he retorted, drawing in his breath sharply.  "But supposing you should happen to go overboard quietly some dark night--"
"Like poor Mowbray, for instance," I cut in.
"Mowbray," he hissed, turning deathly white.  "Mowbray!  Who has been talking to you about Mowbray?  Tell me, and I'll cut his lying tongue out of his mouth!"
"Brave words," I said, "very brave words, but they would not frighten the individual who told me the history of poor Mr Mowbray's mysterious disappearance through the stern window."
"Tell me who it was, and what he said?" he demanded hoarsely.
"No," I answered him.  "I will reserve that story for other ears than yours."
"Very well," he said.  "Then I promise you that you shall not live to tell that story."  And turning to one of the men who were standing by, he said:
"Cast this young cockerel loose, take him down to his cabin, lock him in, and bring the key to me."
And two minutes later I found myself below in a very comfortable cabin that had been cleared out and prepared for me, locked in, and with no company but my own rather disagreeable thoughts.
CHAPTER SIX.
STRANDED!
What were Williams's ultimate intentions toward me I found it quite impossible to guess, for, beyond the fact that he kept me carefully locked up in the cabin that he had assigned to me, I suffered no further violence at his hands, a steward bringing me an ample supply of food when the meal hours came round.  I tried to ascertain from this fellow how my men were faring in the forecastle; but my attempt to question him caused him so much distress and terror that, at his earnest request, I forebore to press my enquiries.  And as soon as the man had taken away the empty plates and dishes that had contained my dinner, I stretched myself out on the very inviting-looking bed that had been made up in the bunk, and, being exceedingly tired, soon fell asleep.  I slept all night, and did not awake until the steward entered next morning with my breakfast.
I rather expected that, after a night's calm consideration of his exploit, Williams would have come to the conclusion that discretion was the better part of valour, and would have taken some steps toward the patching up of a truce; but he did not, and I spent the whole of that day also locked up in the cabin, and seeing no soul but the steward who brought my meals to me.
It was somewhat late that night when I turned in, as I had slept well all through the previous night and did not feel tired; and even when I had bestowed myself for the night I did not get to sleep for some time, for I felt that we must by this time be drawing close in to the coast; and supposing we should fall in with a man-o'-war, how was I to communicate with her if this man was going to keep me cooped up down below?  True, I might succeed in attracting the attention of those on board such a ship by waving my handkerchief out of my cabin port if we happened to pass her closely enough for such a signal to be seen, and if she happened also to be on the starboard side, which was the side on which my berth was situated; but I was very strongly of opinion that, after what had happened, Williams would take especial care to give an exceedingly wide berth to any men-o'-war that he might happen to sight.
At length, however, I fell into a somewhat restless sleep, from which I was awakened some time later by sounds of confusion on deck--the shouting of orders, the trampling of feet, the violent casting of ropes upon the deck, the flapping of loose canvas in the wind, the creaking of yards, and the various other sounds that usually follow upon the happening of anything amiss on board a ship; and at the same time I became conscious of something unusual in the "feel" of the ship.  For a moment I was puzzled to decide what it was; but by the time that I had jumped out of my berth and was broad awake I knew what had happened. The ship was ashore!  Yet she must have taken the ground very easily, for I had been conscious of no shock; and even as I stood there I was unable to detect the least motion of the hull.  She was as firmly fixed, apparently, and as steady, as though she had been lying in a dry dock.
I went to the side and put my face to the open porthole.  I saw that the night was clear, and that the sky overhead was brilliant with stars; and by twisting myself in such a way as to get a raking view forward I fancied I could see in the distance something having the appearance of a low, tree-clad shore.  I also heard the heavy thunder of distant surf; but alongside the ship the water was quite still and silent, save for a soft, seething sound as of water gently swelling and receding upon a sheltered beach.
I seated myself upon the sofa locker, and strove to recall mentally the features of the several rivers that we had visited, but could fit none of them to the dimly-seen surroundings that were visible from the port out of which I had looked.  The one thing which was certain was that we were in perfectly smooth water, and the entire absence of shock with which the ship had taken the ground was an indication that she was certainly in no immediate danger; but beyond that the situation was puzzling in the extreme.  The snug and sheltered position of the ship pointed strongly to the assumption that we had blundered into some river in the darkness; yet when I again looked out through the port the little that I was able to see was suggestive of beach rather than river, and that we were not very far from a beach was evidenced by the loud, unbroken roar of the surf.  Then there was the puzzling question: How did we get where we were?  What were the look-outs doing?  What was everybody doing that no one saw the land or heard the roar of the surf in time to avoid running the ship ashore?
As I continued to stare abstractedly out through the port it struck me that the various objects within sight were growing more clearly visible, and presently I felt convinced that the dawn was approaching.  And at the same moment I became aware that a broad dark shadow that lay some fifty yards from the ship's starboard side, and which had been puzzling me greatly, was a sandbank of very considerable extent, so considerable, indeed, that, for the moment, I could not make out where it terminated. Meanwhile the hubbub on deck gradually ceased, and I surmised that the canvas had been taken in.
The transition from the first pallor of dawn to full daylight is very rapid in those low latitudes, and within ten minutes of the first faint heralding of day a level shaft of sunlight shot athwart the scene, which became in a moment transfigured, and all that had before been vague and illusory stood frankly revealed to the eye.  The sandbank now showed as an isolated patch about two hundred yards wide and perhaps half a mile long, with what looked like a by-wash channel of about one hundred yards wide flowing between it and the mainland, the latter being a sandy beach backed by sand dunes clothed with a rank creeper-like vegetation, and a few stunted tree tops showing behind them.  As the ship then lay with her head pointing toward the south-east, I was able, with some effort, to get a glimpse of a mile or two of the shore; and now that daylight had come I could see the surf breaking heavily all along it, and also upon the seaward side of the sandbank upon which we appeared to have grounded.
Feeling quite reassured as to the safety of the ship, I sat down on the sofa locker and endeavoured, by recalling the courses steered and the distances run since we had been picked up, to identify the particular spot on the coast where we now were.  But it was no use; my memory of the charts was not clear enough, and I had to give up the task.  But I felt convinced that we were somewhere in the Gulf of Guinea.
As I sat there on the locker, thinking matters over, and wondering what would be the outcome of this adventure, I became so absorbed in my own thoughts that I gradually lost all consciousness of my surroundings, and was only brought back to myself by the sounds of a sudden commotion on deck, loud outcries--in which I thought I recognised the voice of the skipper,--a great and violent stamping of feet, and finally an irregular popping of pistols, followed by a sudden subsidence of the disturbance. This, in turn, was followed by sounds of excitement in the cabins on either side of the one which I occupied, and in the distance I could hear the general shouting at the top of his voice.  I gathered that the passengers were only now beginning to realise that something was wrong with the ship, and were turning out and dressing hastily.  A few minutes later I heard the sounds of cabin doors being flung open, and hurried footsteps went speeding past my cabin toward the companion way which led up to the main-deck.  Then the general's voice breezed up again, from the saloon above, in tones of angry remonstrance, followed by a tremendous amount of excited talk, amid which I thought I once or twice caught the sounds of women's sobs.  It was evident that something very much out of the common had happened, and I came to the conclusion that it was high time for me to be at large again and taking a hand in the proceedings; I therefore whipped out my pocketknife, and without further ado proceeded to withdraw the screws that fastened the lock to the door. Five minutes later I found myself in the main saloon, and the centre of an excited and somewhat terrified group of passengers.
"Ah!" exclaimed the general, as I made my appearance.  "Now, perhaps, we shall get at something practical.  Here is young Grenvile, who, being a navy man, may be supposed to know how to deal with an awkward situation. Here is a pretty kettle of fish, sir," he continued, turning to me. "The ship is ashore!  The captain has blown his brains out--so they say! And, last but not least, the crew, headed by the boatswain, has mutinied against the authority of Mr Carter--whom they have thrust in here among us--and absolutely refuse to listen to reason in any shape or form!  Now I ask you, as an officer in his Most Gracious Majesty's navy, what is to be done, sir; what are the proper steps to be taken to extricate ourselves from this infernal predicament?"
"The first thing, general," said I, "is to let me hear Carter's story, which will probably give me a fairly accurate idea of the precise situation of affairs.  Where is he?"
"Here I am, Mr Grenvile," replied the man himself, edging his way toward me through the crowd.
"Now," said I, "please tell us precisely what you know about this very extraordinary affair."
"Well, sir," was the answer, "I really don't know so very much about it, when all's told; but I'm not very greatly surprised.  The way that things have been going aboard this ship, ever since poor Cap'n Matthews died, has been enough to prepare a man for anything, mutiny included.  I had the middle watch last night, and, as you know--or perhaps you don't know--it was very overcast and dark all through the watch, so it's not very surprisin' that I saw nothing of the land, even if it was in sight--which I doubt, seein' that it's low--and Cap'n Williams, who ought to have known that we was drawin' in close upon the coast, never gave me any warning of the ship's position, or said anything about keepin' an extra good look-out, or anything of that sort.  Consequently, when the bo's'un relieved me at four o'clock this mornin', I didn't pass on any particular caution to him.  As a matter of fact I hadn't a notion that we were anywhere near the land!  Consequently, when the commotion of haulin' down and clewin' up awoke me, and when, upon rushin' out on deck to see what was the matter, I found that the ship was ashore, I was regularly flabbergasted!  But I hadn't much time for surprise, or anything else either, for the skipper was on deck and in charge; and I must confess that the cool way in which he took everything made me think that he wasn't nearly so surprised at what had happened as by rights he ought to have been.
"Well, we hauled down, clewed up, and furled everything, by which time the daylight had come, and we were able to get a view of our whereabouts.  So far as I could make out we seemed to have blundered slap into the mouth of some river, and to have grounded on the inner side of a big sandbank that had formed right athwart it at a distance of about a quarter of a mile to seaward of the general trend of the shore line.  We couldn't have managed better if we'd picked the berth for ourselves; for we're lyin' in perfectly smooth water, completely sheltered from the run of the surf; and nothin' short of a stiff on- shore gale would be at all likely to hurt us.
"The skipper said something about lightening the ship, and ordered the bo's'un to clear away the boats and see all ready for hoistin' 'em out, and directed me to go down into the fore-peak and rouse out all the hawsers I could find down there, and send 'em up on deck.  I was busy upon this job, with half a dozen hands to help me, when suddenly we heard a terrific rumpus on deck, and the sounds of pistol firing; and when I jumped up on deck to see what all the row was about, there was that villain Tonkin, with a pistol still smokin' in his hand, talkin' to the men and tellin' 'em that as the ship was ashore, and the cap'n gone, all hands were free to please themselves as to whether they'd stick to the hooker or not, and that, for his part, he meant to have a spell ashore for a day or two before decidin' what next to do.
"Just at that point I interrupted him by askin' what he meant by sayin' that the cap'n was `gone'; to which he replied that the skipper had shot himself and then jumped overboard--which I don't believe, Mr Grenvile, not for a moment, for if I'm not very greatly mistaken I saw the scoundrel wink at the men as he told me the yarn.  And he added that, that bein' the case, every man aboard was his own master, and free to do as he pleased; and if I had anything to say against that, I'd better say it then.
"And I did say it; I told him and all hands that, as to everybody now bein' his own master, that was all nonsense; for if the skipper was indeed dead--and it would be my business to find out just exactly how he died--the command of the ship devolved upon me, and I intended to take all the necessary steps to get her afloat again and to carry her to her destination.  I thought that that would settle it; but it didn't, by a long chalk, for Tonkin turned to the men and says:--
"`Look here, shipmates all, I for one have had quite enough choppin' and changin' about of skippers in this hooker,' he says; `and,' says he, `so far as I'm concerned I don't want no more.  I've nothin' to say again' Carter there, but I'm not goin' to acknowledge him as skipper of this packet, and I don't fancy as how any of you will, either.  Of course,' he says, `if there's any of you as is anxious to have him for skipper, and wants to go heavin' out cargo and runnin' away kedges, and what not, under his orders, instead of goin' ashore with me into them woods, huntin' for fruit, he's quite at liberty to do so, I won't say him nay; but you may as well make up your minds now as any other time whether you'll stick to him or to me; so now what d'ye say, shipmates--who's for Carter, and who's for Tonkin?'
"And I'll be shot, Mr Grenvile, if every mother's son of 'em didn't declare, right off, without hesitatin', for him!  Whereupon he ordered me in here, and told me not to dare to show my nose out on deck again until I had his permission, or he'd have me hove over the rail.  And I was to tell the passengers that they might go up on the poop if they liked; but that if e'er a one of 'em put his foot on the main-deck he'd be hove overboard without any palaver.  Now, what d'ye think of that, sir, for a mess?"
"Have any of them been drinking, think you?" asked I.
"Well, yes, sir, I think they have," answered Carter.  "That is to say, I think that most of 'em have been pretty well primed--just enough, you know, to make 'em reckless.  But there was none of 'em what you'd call drunk; not by a long way."
"And were any of my men among them?"  I asked.
"Oh no!" was the answer.  "Your men--but I forgot--you don't know what's happened to them.  The whole lot of 'em, sound and sick alike, are locked up in the steerage--Simpson, Martin, and Beardmore bein' in irons."
"And what about the steerage passengers?"  I asked.  "Where are they?"
"Why," answered Carter, "there are only five of them, all told.  Two of them--Hales and Cruickshank--both of whom are thoroughly bad characters--have chummed in with Tonkin and his lot; while Jenkins, with his wife and daughter, are in their own cabins in the steerage.  Mrs Jenkins and her daughter, Patsy, have been busy acting as nurses to your wounded men, under Dr Burgess's instructions, ever since you came aboard us, and they are doing very well."
"That is good news," said I, "and I will see that the two women are properly rewarded for their trouble.  Now let us see how we stand.  How many do the mutineers muster, all told?"
"Twenty-five, or twenty-seven if we count in Hales and Cruickshank," answered Carter.
"And how many do we muster on our side?" said I.  "Let me just reckon up.  First of all, there are nine of my men and myself, that makes ten. Then there is yourself, Mr Carter--eleven.  What about the stewards?"
"Oh, they are all right, and so is the cook.  They'll all do their work as usual," answered Carter.
"Ay, no doubt," answered I; "but what about their fighting qualities, if we should be obliged to resort to forcible measures with the mutineers?"
"Ah," said Carter, "if it comes to fighting, that's another matter!  The stewards are youngsters, with the exception of Briggs, the head steward, and would stand a pretty poor chance if it came to a fight with the forecastle hands.  But Briggs--well, he's in the pantry, perhaps we'd better call him and hear what he has to say for himself."
The head steward was a man of about thirty-five, well-built, and fairly powerful; and upon being questioned he professed himself willing to place himself unreservedly under my orders, and also to ascertain to what extent we might rely upon his subordinates.  That brought our fighting force up to an even dozen, to which were speedily added the general and Messrs. Morton, Fielder, Acutt, Boyne, Pearson, and Taylor, all of whom professed to be eager for a scrimmage, although, in the case of the last-mentioned five, I had a suspicion that much of their courage had its origin in a desire to appear to advantage before Miss Duncan. However, that brought us up to nineteen--not counting the three under- stewards--against twenty-seven mutineers.
The next question was as to weapons.  The mutineers were each of them possessed of at least a knife, while it was known that Tonkin and some six or seven others had one or more pistols, and it was also speedily ascertained that they had secured all the pikes and tomahawks belonging to the ship.  Moreover, there were such formidable makeshift weapons as capstan-bars, marline-spikes, belaying-pins, and other instruments accessible to them at a moment's notice.  If, therefore, it should come to a hand-to-hand fight, our antagonists were likely to prove rather formidable.
On our own side, on the other hand, I possessed a brace of pistols, with five cartridges, and my sword.  My men also had had their cutlasses and pistols, together with a certain quantity of ammunition; but these were not to be reckoned upon, for I considered it almost certain that, after putting my three men in irons, Tonkin would take the precaution to secure the arms and ammunition belonging to all of them.  Then the general also had his sword and pistols, while each of the other men possessed at least a sporting gun--and, in the case of three of them, pistols as well,--but unfortunately all these were down in the after- hold among their baggage, and could not be got at so long as Tonkin and his gang were in possession of the deck.  Thus the only weapons actually available for our party were my own, and it needed but a moment's consideration to show that ours was a case wherein strategy rather than force must be employed.
"Well, then, gentlemen," said I, when we had all become agreed upon this point, "it appears to me that the situation resolves itself thus: The mutineers have expressed their determination to go ashore, and until they have done so we can do nothing beyond holding ourselves ready for action at a moment's notice.  And meanwhile we must all wear an air of the utmost nonchalance and unconcern; for if we were to manifest any symptoms of excitement or interest in their movements, there are, no doubt, some among them who would be astute enough to observe it, and thereupon to become suspicious.  Let them leave the ship, as many as may please to go--and the more the better; and as soon as they are fairly out of sight I will release my men, and we will then set to work to get your firearms up out of the hold, and take such further steps as may be necessary to subdue the mutineers upon their return, and bring them once more under control.  Probably we shall only find it necessary to get Tonkin into our hands to break the neck of the revolt and bring the rest of the men to reason.  And now I think it would be a very good plan if a few of you were to go up on the poop and take a quiet saunter before breakfast, just to let the men see that you do not stand in any fear of them, and at the same time you can take a good look round, with the object of reporting to me what you see.  As for myself, I shall keep below for the present.  There is nothing to be gained by reminding Tonkin of my presence in the ship, and if he were to see that I was at large and among you again, he might so far modify his arrangements as to make matters even more difficult for us than they are at present."
"Quite right," approved the general.  "I agree with every word that our young friend here has said.  He appears to have got a very good grip of the situation, and his views accord with my own exactly.  We shall doubtless be obliged to come to fisticuffs with those scoundrels forward before we can hope to extricate ourselves from this very awkward situation.  But it would be the height of folly to precipitate a fight before we are fully prepared.  And now, gentlemen, I am going up on the poop.  Come with me who will; but I think that, for the present at least, the ladies had better remain below."
And thereupon he and the five young griffins made their way up on deck at short intervals, while Mr Morton and I did our best to comfort and encourage the weaker members of the party.  Not that they needed very much encouragement--I will say that for them,--for, with the exception of poor little Mrs Morton, who was very much more anxious and frightened on behalf of her children than on her own account, the ladies showed a very great deal more courage than I had looked for from them; while, as for Mrs Jennings and Miss Duncan, they very promptly came forward to say that if there was any way in which they could possibly render assistance I was not to hesitate to make use of them.
While we were all still talking together in the saloon, Briggs, the chief steward, entered in a state of great indignation, and, addressing himself to Carter, informed him that the men demanded fried ham and various other dainties from the cabin stores for breakfast, and upon his venturing to remonstrate with them had darkly hinted that unless he produced the required provisions at once, together with several bottles of rum, it would be the worse for him.
"What do you say, Mr Grenvile?" demanded Carter, appealing to me. "Shall we let them have what they ask for?"
"Certainly," I said, "seeing that at present we are not in a position to refuse them and make good our refusal.  Let them have whatever they ask for, but be as sparing as you possibly can with the grog; we do not want them to have enough to make them quarrelsome, or to render them unfit to go ashore."
"It goes mightily against the grain with me to serve out those good cabin stores to such a pack of drunken loafers as them, sir," remonstrated Briggs.
"Never mind," said I.  "We are in their hands at present, and cannot very well help ourselves.  You shall have your revenge later, when we have got the rascals safe below in irons."
So they had what some of them inelegantly described as "a good blow-out" that morning in the forecastle, while we were having our own breakfast in the cabin; and, so far as drink was concerned, Tonkin was wise enough to see to it that, in view of their projected trip ashore, no man had more liquor than he could conveniently carry.
And while we sat at breakfast the gentlemen who had been on deck gave us the result of such observations as they had been able to make from the poop, which, after all, did not amount to much, the only conclusion at which they had arrived being that we were ashore on the inner edge of a sandbank which had formed athwart the mouth of a river, the extent of which could not be seen from the ship in consequence of the fact that there were two points of land, one overlapping the other, which hid everything beyond them.  These two points, the general added, were thickly overgrown with mangroves, and the land immediately behind was low and densely wooded, coconut trees and palms being apparently very plentiful, while a few miles inland the ground rose into low hills, from the midst of which a single mountain towered into the air to a height of some five or six thousand feet.
We were still dawdling over breakfast when we heard sounds of movement out on deck, and presently Briggs, who had been instructed to reconnoitre from the pantry window, which commanded a view of the main- deck, sent word by one of the under-stewards that some of the mutineers were getting tackles up on the fore and main yard-arms, while others were employed in clearing out the longboat, which was stowed on the main hatch; and a few minutes later the cook came aft with the intelligence that he had received imperative orders to kill and roast a dozen fowls for the men to take ashore with them, and also to make up a good-sized parcel of cabin bread, butter, pots of jam, pickles, and a dozen bottles of rum, in order that they might not find themselves short of creature comforts during their absence from the ship.  This seemed to point to the fact that they intended to undertake their projected excursion in the longboat instead of taking the two gigs--a much greater piece of luck than I had dared to hope for,--and also suggested an intention on their part to make a fairly long day of it.  I did not hesitate to instruct Briggs to see to it that their supply of grog should on this occasion be a liberal one, for the longer they remained out of the ship, the more time we should have in which to make our preparation.
The weather was intensely hot, and the mutineers manifested no inclination to exert themselves unduly.  It was consequently almost eleven o'clock in the forenoon ere the longboat was in the water alongside, and another quarter of an hour was spent over the making of the final preparations; but at length they tumbled down over the side, one after another, with a good deal of rough horseplay, and a considerable amount of wrangling, and pushed off.  The general and three or four of the other passengers were on the poop, smoking under the awning--which they had been obliged to spread for themselves,--and observing the movements of the men under the cover of a pretence of reading; and when the longboat had disappeared the general came down to apprise me of that fact, and also of another, namely, that the steerage passengers Hales and Cruickshank, and two seamen, armed to the teeth with pistols and cutlasses--the latter at least, in all probability, taken from my men--had been left behind for the obvious purpose of taking care of the ship and keeping us in order during the absence of the others.
CHAPTER SEVEN.
WHAT BEFELL THE MUTINEERS.
This was rather serious news, and none the less vexatious because it did not take me altogether by surprise.  The general opinion had been that all hands were bent upon going ashore, and that the ship would be left at our mercy; but this had certainly not been my own view, for I could not believe that a man of Tonkin's intelligence--realising, as he must, the enormity of his offence in not only himself breaking into open rebellion against lawful authority but in inciting others to do the same--would be so rashly imprudent as to leave us free, for a period of several hours, to release my men and to take such other steps as might occur to us for the suppression of the mutiny.  I had felt quite certain that somebody would be left on board to keep us under supervision and restraint, but I had calculated upon the mutineers considering two men sufficient--and also a little, perhaps, upon the difficulty that would be experienced in inducing more than two, at the utmost, to forego the anticipated enjoyment of a run ashore.  But here were four recklessly unscrupulous men, powerful, determined fellows, fully armed, left behind to be dealt with by us; and the only weapons that we could muster among us were my sword and pistols.  True, we might be able to lay our hands upon a few belaying-pins; but to attack with such weapons four men armed with pistols meant that somebody would almost certainly get hurt, and that I was most anxious to avoid, if possible.  Besides, if it came to a fight, there was always the possibility that the reports of the pistols might be heard by some of the party who had gone ashore, and cause them to hurry back before we were ready to receive them fittingly.  Upon enquiry I learned that the four men had arranged themselves, two in the waist--one of them on each side of the ship--and two forward near the fore-rigging, where they could command the entrance of the steerage quarters.
The general, who was brimful of courage, was fuming with indignation at what he termed "the confounded impudence" of the men in presuming to mutiny, strongly advocated an immediate attack with such weapons as came to hand, but I deprecated that step for the reasons already mentioned, and suggested that quite possibly a little consideration and discussion might enable us to hit upon some plan involving rather less risk.
Carter at once suggested that we should try the experiment of plying the men with drink, in the hope of making them intoxicated; and as I considered that this was a case wherein the end justified the means, the plan was at once adopted, Briggs undertaking to carry out to the guard a bottle of especially strong brandy for their delectation.  But although they looked at the liquor with very longing eyes, their suspicions at once became aroused, and they roughly ordered him to take it away.  And when, instead of doing this, Briggs put down the bottle and left it within their reach, one of them immediately took it up and flung it overboard, where, it may be incidentally mentioned, it was instantly dashed at and swallowed by a shark, to the no small astonishment of those who witnessed the occurrence.
This scheme having failed, another was suggested, this time by the ship's surgeon.  Briggs, the chief steward, had thus far not had his freedom in the least degree interfered with.  It was understood that in the discharge of his duty he must necessarily pass to and fro at frequent intervals between the cabin and the cook's galley--the occupant of which, it may be mentioned, though a surly sort of fellow, and as discontented with everything as ships' cooks generally are, had declared himself absolutely neutral,--and up to the present he had been allowed to do so without let or hindrance.  The doctor's plan, therefore, was that he was to go forward to the steerage, as though on a professional visit to the wounded men, and Briggs was at the same time to go forward to the galley to discuss with the cook the arrangements for the cuddy dinner that evening.  Then, as soon as they were fairly forward, Carter and I were to sally forth together and grapple with the two men in the waist, at the same time whistling to apprise the doctor and Briggs, who, upon hearing the signal, would rush upon and grapple with the two men on the forecastle.  The idea was, not to provoke a fight, but to overpower and secure these four men without giving them an opportunity to create an alarm by firing their pistols.  We four, therefore, were simultaneously to pinion and hold them until others, coming to our assistance, could help us, if necessary, to secure and disarm them. This plan, we at once decided, was quite promising enough to be worth a trial; and accordingly we forthwith proceeded to put it into execution.
First of all, as arranged, the doctor sallied forth, with a number of bandages and other materials in his hands, and demanded admission to the steerage, which, after some slight demur, was accorded him.  Then Briggs, who had been watching the progress of events from the pantry window, sauntered casually forward and stood by the door of the galley, where he proceeded to discuss with the cook the advisability of killing a pig.  And finally Carter and I, having allowed a minute or two to elapse, walked calmly out on the main-deck together, smoking a cigar apiece, and laughing and talking as though we were acting in pure absent-mindedness.  Our perfect coolness, and apparent want of the slightest appearance of concern, so completely staggered the two guards in the waist that they allowed us to get within a couple of fathoms of the one on the port side before it dawned upon them to interfere; and then Cruickshank, the man on the starboard side, dashed across the deck to the support of his companion, at the same time shouting to us in very bellicose accents:
"Here, you two, get back, d'ye hear?  What d'ye mean by settin' foot on this part of the deck against Mr Tonkin's express orders?  Now hook it, sharp, or--"
The moment that the fellow was fairly clear of the hatchway, and on the port side of the deck, I raised my hand to my lips, spat out my cigar, and sent a single shrill, but not loud, whistle along the deck, and then sprang straight at my immensely powerful antagonist, while Carter manfully tackled his own man.  And at the same instant the doctor and Briggs sprang upon the pair who were keeping guard on the forecastle. As arranged, none of us attempted to do more than just pinion each his own particular antagonist and prevent him from drawing his weapons, trusting to the others to help us to master and secure them.  And gallantly those others backed us up, for at the sound of my whistle, young Acutt--a fine, athletic young giant--dashed out of the cabin and, without paying any attention to the writhing and struggling quartette in his way, dodged us and rushed forward to the galley to prevent cookie from interfering, while Fielder, Boyne, Pearson, and Taylor--the other four young griffins--rushed with equal celerity to the support of the doctor, Briggs, Carter, and myself.  My own particular man struggled savagely in his endeavour to free himself from my grasp, and, being a much heavier and more powerful man than I was, pinned me up against the rail and threw his whole strength into a determined effort to break my back, in which effort he would have very speedily succeeded had not Boyne quickly felled him to the deck and stunned him by a well-directed blow from an iron belaying-pin.  To disarm and securely bind the fellow was the work of but a minute or two, and then, breathless with our exertions, and, so far as I was concerned, in considerable pain, Boyne and I stood up and looked about us to see how the others were faring. Looking, first of all, near home, we saw Hales pinned up against the rail, with young Pearson taking his weapons away from him, while Carter was busily engaged in seizing him up, the general meanwhile standing by and pointing my drawn sword at his throat to discourage him from any ill-advised attempt at resistance; while the doctor and Briggs, with the assistance of Fielder and Taylor, were also busily engaged in securing their respective men.  The ship was ours! and now it only remained for us to take promptly such steps as were necessary to retain possession of her when the other mutineers should see fit to return.
The first thing to be done was to release my own men from confinement, and this we instantly did, when I had the great satisfaction of discovering that, thanks to the skill of Doctor Burgess, and the assiduous nursing of Mrs Jenkins and her daughter Patsy, all our wounded, except two, were so far convalescent as to be quite fit for ordinary duty, while the other two were also doing so favourably that they could be made useful in a variety of ways provided that they were not called upon to undertake any very severe physical exertion.  Thus I very soon found myself at the head of a little band of nine armed and resolute men, each of whom was prepared to do my bidding to the death if called upon.
We now lost no time in hustling our four prisoners down into the fore- peak, where they could do no harm, and where, after being securely clapped into irons, they were bade to make themselves as comfortable as they could on top of the ship's stock of coal, while one of my men who, from the comparatively severe character of his wounds, was least likely to be of service to us in other directions, was stationed in the forecastle above, fully armed, to keep an eye upon them, and see they got into no mischief.  This little matter having been satisfactorily arranged, we next got the hatches off the after hatchway, and roused the passengers' baggage on deck, from which the respective owners at once proceeded to withdraw such weapons and ammunition as they possessed; after which we struck the various packages down into the hold again and put on the hatches.
We now mustered seventeen armed men, all told, each of whom was provided with a firearm of some kind, while my own nine men, myself, and the general boasted sidearms as well.  Carter had no weapons of his own, neither had the doctor nor Briggs, but three of the youngsters possessed a brace of pistols each, which they were quite willing to lend; and with these Carter, the doctor, and Briggs were promptly armed.  This brought our number up to twenty against the twenty-three away in the longboat; and since we possessed the advantage over the mutineers that we had the ship's deck as a fighting platform, I thought that we might now regard ourselves as masters of the situation.  Nevertheless I did not feel disposed to neglect any further advantages that we might happen to possess--for not all of our party were fighting men, and I did not know how the civilians might behave in a hand-to-hand fight.  I therefore at once began to look round with the object of ascertaining what further means of defence the ship afforded.  She was pierced for twelve guns-- six of a side; but the only artillery that she actually carried was a pair of 6-pounder brass carronades, the carriages of which were secured one on either side of the main-deck entrance to the saloon.  I suspected that these pieces had been put on board by the owners more for the purpose of signalling than as a means of defence, but I now gave them a very careful overhaul, and came to the conclusion that they were good, reliable weapons, and capable of rendering efficient service.  But when I came to question Carter about ammunition he could tell me nothing, as he had not been aboard the ship when her cargo was stowed.  However, at my suggestion he now took possession of the skipper's cabin, and proceeded to give it a thorough overhaul, with the result that in a short time he reappeared with a key in his hand, attached to which was a parchment label inscribed "Magazine".  This was strong presumptive evidence in favour of the supposition that a magazine existed somewhere aboard the ship, and a little further search resulted in its discovery abaft the lazarette.  With all due precautions we at once proceeded to open this receptacle, and found, to our very great satisfaction, that it not only contained a supply of signal rockets, but also a liberal supply of powder cartridges for the signal guns, and a dozen stands of muskets, together with a goodly number of kegs, some of which contained powder, while the remainder were full of bullets.  This was a most fortunate discovery indeed, especially in so far as the muskets were concerned, for the possession of them at once gave us a definite and very decided advantage over the mutineers.  The muskets were forthwith conveyed on deck, together with a supply of powder and three kegs of bullets, and also a dozen cartridges for the guns.  The afternoon was by this time well advanced, and we might look for the return of the mutineers at any moment.  We therefore loaded the carronades with five double handfuls of musket balls apiece--about a hundred bullets to each gun--in place of round shot, and, running them forward, mounted them on the topgallant forecastle as being the most commanding position in the ship.  Then we loaded the muskets and placed them in the rack on the fore side of the deck-house, which completed our preparations.  And now all that remained was to keep a sharp look-out, and, while doing so, determine upon the policy to be pursued when the returning longboat should heave in sight.
Having personally seen that our preparations were all as complete and perfect as it was possible to make them, and having also posted Simpson and Martin, two of my own men, armed with muskets, as look-outs, on the forecastle, I at length went aft to the poop, where all the passengers were now gathered, and where I saw the general and Mr Morton engaged in earnest conversation with Carter.  As I made my way leisurely up the poop-ladder the general beckoned to me to join the little group, and then, as I approached, Carter turned to me and said:
"Mr Grenvile, the general, Mr Morton, and I have been discussing together the rather curious state of affairs that has been brought about aboard this ship by this unfortunate mutiny; and we are fully agreed that, as matters stand, you are the most fit and proper person to take charge until things have been straightened out.  Of course I don't forget that, in consequence of the death of Cap'n Williams, I'm now the cap'n of this ship; but, as I've just been tellin' Sir Thomas and Mr Morton, here, I've never had any experience of fightin' of any kind, and as like as not if I was to attempt to take the lead, where fightin' is concerned, I should make a bungle of it.  Now, you seem to be quite at home in this sort of thing, if you'll excuse me for sayin' so; you knew exactly what was the right thing to be done, and have really been in command the whole of this blessed day, although you've pretended that you were only helpin', as you may say.  Then you've got nine trained fightin' men aboard here who'll do just exactly what you tell 'em, but who wouldn't care to have me orderin' them--to say nothin' of you-- about.  So we've come to the conclusion that, so far as the fightin' and all that is concerned, you are the right man to be in command, and I, as cap'n of this ship, hereby ask you to take charge and deal with the trouble accordin' as you think best."  I bowed, and then turned to the other two, saying: "Sir Thomas and Mr Morton, it occurs to me that you two, in virtue of the fact that you are in a sense doubly interested in this matter--since it not only involves you in your own proper persons but also in the persons of your wives and families--are entitled to express an opinion upon this proposal of Captain Carter's, and that I, as a naval officer, ought to give your opinion my most serious consideration.  Am I to understand that you are in full and perfect agreement with Mr Carter in this proposal which he has just made to me?"
"Most assuredly we are, Mr Grenvile," answered the general.  "Captain Carter is a merchant seaman, and no doubt a very excellent man in that capacity; but he now finds himself face to face with a difficulty such as merchant captains are, fortunately, very seldom called upon to face, and naturally he feels somewhat at a loss.  You, on the other hand, are, by your whole training, well qualified to deal with the situation, and, in view of the important interests involved, Captain Carter--and we also--would like you to assume the command."
"Very well," said I, "I will do so, and will use my utmost endeavours to extricate ourselves from this difficulty.  I already have a plan for dealing with the mutineers when they return, which I think ought to prove successful, and that, too, without any need for fighting; but I shall require the assistance of the gentlemen passengers to enable me to make an imposing display of force."
"That is all right, my boy," answered the general cordially; "we will willingly place ourselves under your orders without reserve; so tell us what you would have us do, and we will do it."
"Well," said I, "we may now expect the mutineers to return at any moment, and we must be ready for them when they appear.  I will therefore ask you all to have your weapons at hand; and when the longboat heaves in sight the ladies must immediately go below, out of harm's way, while you distribute yourselves along the bulwarks, with your firearms levelled at the boat.  You must arrange yourselves in such a manner that the mutineers may be able to see that you are all armed, and prepared to fight if necessary.  By this means I hope to overawe them and bring them to reason."
I then completed all my arrangements, being careful to take Carter into my full confidence, and treat him in every respect as master of the ship, assuming for myself rather the character of his first lieutenant than anything else--and then all that remained for us to do was to sit down and patiently await the return of the mutineers.  But the time sped on, the hour of sunset arrived, and darkness fell upon the scene without any sign of the longboat, and I began to feel somewhat uneasy as to the safety of the absentees, for we were in a lonely, and, so far as my knowledge went, an unfrequented part of the coast; and I had heard some rather gruesome stories as to the doings of the natives, and of the treatment that they were wont to mete out to white men--shipwrecked sailors and others--who happened to be so unfortunate as to fall into their hands.  And as the hours drifted past without bringing any news, I at length grew so anxious that I began to consider very seriously the advisability of sending away a boat in search of the missing men.  After fully discussing the matter with Carter, however, I came to the conclusion that our first duty was to take care of the ship and her passengers, and that the mutinous crew must be left to look after themselves.  Finally, having set a strong anchor-watch, I went below and turned in.
Daylight arrived, noon came, and still there was no sign of the absentees, and in a fever of anxiety I made my way up to the fore-royal- yard, from which lofty elevation I made a careful survey of the inland district.  But there was very little to see beyond a two-mile stretch of a broad, winding river dotted with tree-grown islets here and there. The country itself was so densely overgrown with bush and trees that nothing upon its surface was to be seen.  As to the longboat, she was nowhere visible; but I was not much astonished at that, because, from the glimpse that I was able to catch of the river, I had very little doubt that its characteristics were precisely those of all the other rivers in that region, namely, a somewhat sluggish current of water thick with foul and fetid mud, swampy margins overgrown with mangroves, and numerous shallow, winding creeks, mangrove-bordered, discharging into it on either side; and it was highly probable that, failing to find a firm bank upon which to land along the margin of the river itself, the mutineers had proceeded in search of such a spot up one of the creeks. There were no canoes to be seen on that part of the river's surface which was visible from my look-out, and the only suggestion of human life anywhere in the neighbourhood was to be found in what I took to be a thin, almost invisible, wreath of smoke rising above the tree tops at a spot some two miles distant.  That wreath of smoke might, of course, indicate the position of the mutineers' bivouac; but, on the other hand, it might--and I thought this far more likely--indicate the location of a native village; and if the latter suspicion should prove to be correct I could not but feel that the situation of the mutineers was one full of peril.
Having taken a careful mental note of everything that I had seen, I descended the ratlines, and, making my way aft, invited Carter, the general, and Mr Morton to join me in the main saloon, which happened just then to be vacant.  When we arrived there, I told my companions what I had seen, and what I feared, and then laid before them a proposal that I should take the ship's galley--a very fine six-oared boat--and, with my nine men, and one of the carronades mounted in the bows, go in search of the missing men.  But neither the general nor Morton would hear of this for a moment.  They were quite willing that a boat should be dispatched to search for the longboat and her crew if the matter could be arranged, but they very strongly protested against the idea that I and all my nine fighting men should leave the ship, which, they pointed out, would be at the mercy of the mutineers if we were to miss them and if they were to get back before us; or, possibly, which would be still worse, open to an attack from hundreds of savages should the natives by any chance have discovered us and observed our helpless predicament.  I was pointing out to them that this stand which they were taking rendered the idea of a search impossible, since I considered it neither wise nor prudent to dispatch a weak search party, and that I could not dream of ordering any of my own men away upon such an expedition in the command of anyone but myself, when I heard a call on deck, and the next moment Simpson presented himself at the entrance of the saloon to say that the longboat was in sight, pulling hard for the ship, but that, so far as could be made out, there were only five men in her!  Whereupon, with one accord we all dashed out on deck and made the best of our way to the topgallant-forecastle, which afforded a good view of the approaching boat.  It was now a few minutes past three o'clock, ship's time.
Arrived on the forecastle, I snatched the telescope from the hands of the look-out as he flourished the instrument toward the boat, with the remark:
"There she comes, sir, and the buckos in her seem to be in a tearin' hurry, too.  See how they're makin' the spray fly and the oars buckle! They're workin' harder just now than they've done for many a long day, I'll warrant."
Levelling the instrument upon the approaching boat, I saw that, as Simpson had informed me, there were only five men in her, who, as the look-out man had observed, were pulling as though for their lives.  The boat, although a heavy one, was positively foaming through the water, and the long, stout ash oars, which the men were labouring at, bent and sprang almost to breaking point at every stroke.
"There is something very seriously wrong somewhere," said I gravely, "and those fellows are bringing the news of it.  Let them come alongside, Simpson; but muster the _Sharks_ at the gangway to disarm those men as they come up the side, should they happen to have any weapons about them."
Two minutes later the longboat dashed alongside, and as the men flung in their oars, the man who had been pulling bow sprang to his feet and yelled:
"Heave me a line, mates, and for God's sake let us come aboard.  We want to see Mr Carter, quick!"
"All right, my bully boy," answered Simpson.  "Here's a line for ye; look out!  But don't you chaps be in too much of a hurry now; the orders is that you're to come up the side one at a time.  And if you've got any such little matter as a knife or a pistol about you, just fork it over. Thank'e!  Next man," as the man climbed inboard and without demur drew an empty pistol and his knife from his belt and handed them over.
"Now then, my lad," said I, as the fellow faced round and confronted me, "where are the rest of the men who left this ship yesterday?  Out with your story, as quick as you please."
"Where are the rest!" he repeated, with white and quivering lips, while his eyes rolled and his voice rose almost to a scream.  "Why, some of 'em are dead--lucky beggars! and t'others are in the hands of the savages, away there in the woods, and are bein' slowly tormented to death, one at a time, while t'others is forced to look on and wait their turn.  At least that's how I reads what I've seen."
"And how come you five men to be here?"  I demanded.  "Have you managed to escape from the savages, or were you not with the rest when they were taken?"
"Why, sir," answered the fellow, "it's like this here--"
"Stop a moment," I interrupted him.  "Tell us your whole story, as briefly as possible, from the moment when you pushed off from the ship's side yesterday.  Then we shall get something like a clear and coherent account of what has happened."
"Yes, yes, that's right, Grenvile," agreed the general as he stood beside me, very upright and stern-looking, his lips white, but the eager light of battle already kindling in his eyes.  "It will be a saving of time in the long run."
"I certainly think so," said I.  "Now, my man, heave ahead with your yarn."
"Well, sir," resumed the man, "we shoved off from the ship's side-- three-and-twenty of us, as you know--but, beg pardon, sir, I forgot--you wasn't on deck--"
"Never mind about that, my lad," interrupted I; "go ahead as quickly as possible.  You shoved off from the ship and pulled away into the river. What happened then?"
"Nothin' at all, sir," was the reply.  "We just pulled into the river, and as soon as we was fairly inside we started to look round for a spot where we could get ashore; but, try where we would, we couldn't find nothin' but soft mud that wouldn't have bore the weight of a cat, much less of a man.  But while we was huntin' for a place we came across a narrer creek, just wide enough for us to pull into; and Tonkin up's hellum and says as we'll try in there.  So we pulled along for a matter of nigh upon a mile, when all at once the creek comes to an end, and we find the boat's nose jammed in among a lot of mangrove roots.  Then pore Jim Nesbitt ups and volunteers to try and scramble along the mangroves and see if he can find a spot firm enough for us to land upon; and when he'd been gone about a quarter of a hour he comes back again and says he've found a place.  So, actin' upon Tonkin's orders, each one of us grabs a fowl, or a bottle, or what not, and away we goes in pore Jim's wake; and presently out we comes at a place where the mangroves stopped and the bush began, and where the mud was hard and firm enough to walk upon, and a little later we comes upon a sort of path through the bush, follerin' which we presently comes into a little open space where there was nothin' but grass, with big trees growin' all round it, and there we brought ourselves to an anchor, and cried `Spell ho!'
"Then we had some grub and a drop or two of grog, and a smoke, and then some of us stretched out on the grass to have a snooze; but the ants and creepin' things was that wishious and perseverin' that we couldn't lie still for two minutes on end; so we all gets up and starts huntin' for fruit.  But the only fruit we could find was cokernuts, and they was to be had, as many as we wanted, just for the trouble of shinnin' up the trees.  So we ate nuts and drank the milk--with just a dash of rum in it now and again--until we didn't want any more; and then we laid ourselves down again, and in spite of the ants and things some of us had a good long sleep.  I felt just as sleepy as the rest, but I couldn't get no peace at all on the ground, so I looked round and presently made up my mind to go aloft in a big tree that was standin' not far off.  That tree to look at was as easy to climb as them there ratlins, but somehow it took me a long time to shin up it and find a comfortable place where I could get a snooze without fallin' from aloft; but by and by I came athwart a branch with a big fork in it, reachin' out well over the open space where the other chaps were lyin' about, and, wedgin' myself into the fork, I was very soon fast asleep.
"When I woke up it was pitch dark, exceptin' that somebody had lighted a big fire in the middle of the open space, and there was our lads all lyin' round fast asleep.  I felt cold, for the night had turned foggy, and I was tryin' to make up my mind to climb down and get a bit nearer to the fire when a most awful yellin' arose, and the next second the place was chock-full of leapin' and howlin' niggers flourishin' great clubs and spears, and bowlin' over our chaps as fast as they got up on to their feet.  A few of our people managed to get up, hows'ever, and they got to work with their pistols and cutlasses, and I let fly with my pistol from where I sat up aloft among the branches, and bowled over an ugly, bald-headed old chap rigged in a monkey-skin round his 'midships, and carryin' a live snake in his hand.
"The loss of this old cock seemed to have a most astonishin' effect upon the other niggers, for whereas the minute afore they'd been doin' all they knew to kill our chaps, no sooner was this old party down than all hands of 'em what had seen him fall stops dead and yells out `pilliloo' to t'others, when, dash my wig if the whole lot of 'em didn't just make one jump upon our people--them that was still alive I mean--and beat their weapons out o' their hands, after which they lashes 'em all together, with their hands behind 'em, and marches 'em off into the bush, some twenty or thirty of 'em stoppin' behind to make sure that all of our lads as was down was also dead.  And d'ye know how they did that, sir?  Why, by just choppin' off their heads with great swords made of what looked like hard wood!
"Seven of our pore chaps lost the number of their mess in this way, and then the savages cleared out, carryin' the heads away with 'em, and leavin' the bodies lyin' scattered about the place.  I waited up in my tree until the murderin' thieves had got clear away, and then I starts to climb down, intendin' to foller 'em and find out what they meant to do with the white men as they'd took away alive with 'em, when, as my feet touched the solid ground once more, dash my wig if these here four mates of mine didn't drop out of some other trees close at hand.  They'd been worried wi' the ants and what not, same as I was, and, seein' me shinnin' up a tree, they'd gone and done likewise, and that's the way that we five escaped bein' massicreed.
"Then the five of us goes to work and holds a council o' war, as you may say; and we agreed that two of us should foller up the savages to find out what game they was up to, while t'other three should go back to the boat and take care of her.  But, seein' that away from the scattered embers of the fire it was so dark that you could hardly see your hand before you, we agreed that 'twas no use attemptin' to do anything until daylight; so we got up into our trees again, and held on where we were in case any o' them savages should come back.  And a precious lucky thing it was that we thought of doin' so, for--it's the solemn truth I'm tellin' you, gen'lemen--we hadn't very much more'n got settled back on our perches when back comes about a dozen o' them savages, creepin' out from among the trees as quiet as cats, and starts searchin' the whole place up and down as though they'd lost somethin'.  My mates and me reckoned it up that them niggers had seen us and counted us some time yesterday, and had found, after the massacree, that we wasn't all accounted for, and so they'd come back to look for us.  It was a fort'nit thing for us that we was pretty well hid by the leaves, also that the niggers didn't seem to think of lookin' for us up in the trees, and by and by, just as the day was breakin', they took theirselves off again.
"When they'd got fairly away out o' our neighbourhood I climbed down again, and the others follered suit; and Mike, here, and I made sail along the path that the niggers had gone, while the other three topped their booms for the boat, the onderstandin' bein' that they was to get her afloat and swung round all ready, and then wait till Mike and me j'ined 'em.
"Well, Mr Carter, sir, and gen'lemen, Mike here and me follered along the path that the savages had took, for a matter of a couple o' mile, when we hears a tremenjous hullabaloo of niggers shoutin', and tom-toms beatin', and dogs barkin', and what not, so we knowed that we was pretty close aboard a native village, as they calls 'em, so we shortened sail and got in among the bushes, creepin' for'ard until we could see what was happenin'.  And when at last we was able to get a pretty clear view, the sight we saw was enough to freeze a man's blood.  They'd got all our chaps lashed to stakes set up in a clear, open space in front of the village, and one of the pore unfort'nit fellers was stripped stark naked and bein' tormented by a crowd o' niggers what was puttin' burnin' splinters between his fingers, and stickin' 'em into his flesh, and pourin' red-hot cinders into his mouth, what they'd prised open by thrustin' a thick stick in between his jaws; and the shrieks as that unhappy man was lettin' fly was just awful to listen to; but the savages seemed to enjy 'em, for they just yelled with delight at every shriek. Mike and me we turned as sick as dogs at what we seen; and presently Mike grabs me by the hand and says: `Let's get back to the ship, mate, and report.  P'rhaps the skipper'll forgive us for what we've done, and persuade the navy gent to fit out a hexpedition to rescue the others.' So away we came as fast as we could, but when we got to the boat she was aground, and we had to wait a long time until she floated.  But here we are, sir; and oh, gen'lemen, for the love o' God do somethin', if ye can, to save them pore chaps what's bein' tormented to death over there."
CHAPTER EIGHT.
THE RESCUE.
For a few seconds after the close of the man's harrowing account there was a dead silence among us.  Then the general, wiping the perspiration from his face, turned to me and said:
"Grenvile, my friend, this is a situation for you to grapple with, and a very difficult situation it is, I confess.  For, on the one hand, those unhappy men must be rescued at all hazards, while, on the other, it is equally imperative that the ship and those in her should be protected from a possible, not to say very probable, attack by the savages.  Now, what is to be done?  Of course you will understand that I am ready to play any part that you may assign to me, but I may be permitted to suggest that I should probably be more useful in leading the shore expedition than in any other way."
"Thank you, general.  Yes, no doubt you are right, but it is a very difficult situation, as you say, and I must have a moment or two to think it out."
Then, turning to the five horrified seamen who had returned in the longboat, I ordered them to go forward and get the cook to give them something to eat and drink, for I should be in need of the services of all of them sooner or later, while one of them would have to come with me in the boat as a guide.
The five men whom I addressed--all thoughts of mutiny having by this time been most effectually frightened out of their heads--turned and slouched away forward as meekly as lambs; and the moment that they were gone I was surrounded by an excited crowd of passengers, all of whom had come down from the poop to listen to the story of the five returned seamen, and every one of them had some more or less unpractical suggestion to make.  It was rather unfortunate that they had all heard what had passed, for the very graphic narrative, told by an eye-witness, of the gruesome happenings of the past night, and the powerful suggestion of what was probably taking place at that moment away yonder in the woods, had so acted upon the vivid imaginations of the women that one or two of them were visibly upon the very verge of hysterics, while all were more or less in a state of mortal terror as to what might be their fate should the natives take it into their heads to attack the ship.  For, that the presence of so many white men as they had encountered would suggest to the astute native mind the idea that a ship was somewhere near at hand was so exceedingly likely that it might almost be accepted as a foregone conclusion.  But, terrified though the women were, they behaved marvellously well, and quietly retired when I requested them to do so in order that we men might be left free to discuss details together.  But, even while the chatter was raging round me at its most excited pitch, my mind was busy upon the details of the only plan that was at all feasible.  Our entire available fighting force, counting in the whole of the male passengers, the surgeon, Briggs and his three assistants, Jenkins the steerage passenger, the cook, and the five men who had escaped from the savages, amounted to thirty.  It was, of course, quite impossible to form, from the account of the five escaped seamen, anything like an accurate estimate of the numbers of the savages, but I believed I should be quite safe in setting them down at not less than three hundred.  There were also the four prisoners; but I reflected that as they had not suffered the harrowing experience of the five escaped men, they would probably be still in much too insubordinate a frame of mind to be of any use, and I therefore determined to leave them where they were for the present.  I reckoned, however, that not a man would leave the village, either to attack the ship or for any other purpose, until the gruesome sport upon which they were at that moment engaged had been played out to an end; and I therefore came to the conclusion that I should be quite justified in throwing the balance of strength into the land expedition.  I accordingly divided my force into two equal parts, placing Simpson in charge of the ship and entrusting him with her defence, with a small crew composed of the surgeon, the four stewards, the cook, Jenkins the steerage passenger, Messrs. Morton, Fielder, Acutt, Boyne, Pearson, and Taylor, and one of my own men named Sharland, whose wounds rendered him useless for arduous land service, although he might be made very useful at a pinch aboard the ship.  This left, for the landing expedition, the general, Carter, myself, and seven _Sharks_, and the five men who had escaped in the longboat.  Thus each force consisted of fifteen men.  But I considered that the landing force was far the more formidable of the two, since we numbered among us nine trained fighting men; while, in the improbable event of an attack upon the ship, the party left on board her would have the advantage of the deck as a fighting platform, and, if hard pressed, the saloon and deckhouses to which to retreat.  I also left them all the muskets and boarding pikes, as well, of course, as their own personal firearms, and the two brass carronades.  As for us, the general and I each had a sword, the _Sharks_ carried a cutlass apiece, and every man of us also had a brace of pistols in his belt, and a pocketful of cartridges.  But what I most trusted to for the creation of a good, wholesome panic among the savages was a dozen signal rockets which I had found in the ship's magazine.
Our arrangements being now complete, the general bade a hasty good-bye to his wife and daughter, who bore themselves very bravely upon the occasion, and we all tumbled down over the side into the longboat--into which Briggs had already, with commendable forethought, passed a large basket of provisions for the sustenance of ourselves and such of the mutineers as we might be fortunate enough to rescue.  It was nearly two o'clock in the afternoon when we shoved off.
It took us but a few minutes to reach the river entrance, passing through which we presently found ourselves in a broad, lagoon-like expanse of water, some two miles long by about a mile wide, dotted here and there with small, tree-clad islands, some of which might have been as much as ten or twelve acres in extent, while others were mere heaps of mud just large enough to support a clump of half a dozen or so of coconut trees and a tiny thicket of bamboo.  The greater part of this lagoon was evidently very shallow, for dotted about here and there were to be seen partially submerged trunks of trees and other debris that appeared to have been swept down into their present position by some bygone flood, and had ultimately grounded on the mud; but there was just sufficient current and wind to reveal a deep-water channel of about two hundred yards wide, running in a fairly straight line through the lagoon toward its most distant extremity.  There were numerous objects dotted about the surface of the lagoon, which, at a distance, had all the appearance of floating logs, but which, when we drew near to them, proved to be, in almost every instance, the heads of basking alligators. And before we had been in the river ten minutes we were startled by a huge black bulk breaking water close alongside the boat, which turned out to be a hippopotamus.
"Now, Higgins," said I, "whereabout is this creek of yours?  I see no sign of it thus far."
"Oh, it's some way on ahead yet, sir!" answered the man.  "Keep her straight up through the deep-water, sir, please.  I'll tell you when we comes in sight of it."
That the unfortunate mutineers had penetrated some distance into the country soon became evident, for we traversed the entire length of the lagoon and fully a mile of the river after it had narrowed down to about a quarter of a mile in width ere we sighted a break of any kind in the thick entanglement of mangrove trees that lined the margin of the stream.  But even this, so Higgins informed us, was not the creek of which we were in search, and which he believed lay nearly a mile farther up the stream.  Of the one actually in sight he denied any knowledge, and I soon became convinced that it had escaped the notice of the mutineers.
The break in question was on the northern bank of the river--that is to say, on the same side as the creek of which we were in quest; and when first sighted it was about a quarter of a mile distant.  As we drew nearer to it I saw that a deep-water channel led straight to it from the main deep-water channel, at a point about half a cable's-length distant; and I kept my eye upon the spot, as the creek gradually opened out, for I could not help thinking that it presented an almost ideal spot wherein a slaver might conceal herself.  And, as I watched, I suddenly saw a column of thick smoke shoot up above the tree tops at a point that I estimated to be not much more than two hundred yards from the mouth of the creek, and in the direction toward which the latter seemed to be trending, while at the same moment the blare of horns and the dub-a-dub- dub of tom-toms was borne faintly to our ears by the fitful breeze.
"Oars!" cried I sharply.  "Silence, fore and aft, and listen all of you!"
The men instantly laid upon their oars, and as the boat went surging along with the "way" that she had on her, we all distinctly heard, above the quiet lap and gurgle of the water against her planking, the sounds of which I have spoken, with an occasional swelling of the sound which conveyed the idea of many human voices raised in a monotonous kind of chant.
"How much farther do you say this creek of yours is, Higgins?"  I demanded.
"Why, sir," answered the man, "I should say as it's the best part of a mile higher up.  Ain't it, Mike?"
"Ay, about that, I should think," answered Mike, swinging round on his thwart and shading his eyes with his hand as his gaze searchingly swept the river bank.  And the other three escaped mutineers expressed a like opinion.
"And what was the general trend of the direction which you took when you followed the savages?" asked I.
"Why," answered Higgins, instantly catching my meaning, "it was westerly, sir; wasn't it, Mike?  Don't ye remember that the run of the creek itself was some'at down-stream?  And when we went a'ter the savages we kept on bearin' away towards the left, didn't we?  Depend on't, sir, that there smoke is where the village lies, and that row that we hears is made by the savages doorin' the tormentin' of one of our pore unfort'nit shipmates!"
I was of the same opinion myself.  That creek away on our port bow appeared to lead so nearly in a direct line toward the point from which the smoke was rising, and seemed to offer such a temptingly short cut to the village where the diabolical work was undoubtedly going forward, that I determined to take the slight risk of being mistaken, and make for it forthwith.  I therefore gave the coxswain orders to starboard his helm a bit and feel his way cautiously in over the mud, and the oarsmen to give way and keep strict silence.
In another minute, or less, we had passed out of the main deep-water channel, and were gliding through the shallow water that covered the flat mud-banks on either side of the stream, the men dipping their oars deep at every stroke to get timely warning of our approach to water not deep enough to float the boat.
"No bottom yet, sir," reported the stroke-oar at frequent intervals; and at each report the coxswain starboarded an extra half-point or so, until at length the boat's nose was pointing straight for the mouth of the creek, and at every stroke of the oars the fiendish uproar of horns, tom-toms, and shouting--or chanting, whichever it was--seemed to come to our ears more distinctly, and with more ominous import.
At length the boat entered the creek, or canal, and I at once gave orders for all hands who had cutlasses to draw them, and for every man to look carefully to the priming of his pistols.  This having been done, we pulled ahead once more, and now the rapidity with which the mingled sounds that were guiding us increased in volume told us that we were quickly approaching the scene of action.  And presently, as though to dissipate any doubt that might still be lurking in our minds, we distinctly heard, at frequent intervals, the piercing scream of a man in mortal agony!
"Do you hear that, Grenvile?" whispered the general through his set teeth.  "Why, man, those cries make one's blood run cold to listen to them!  How much farther do you mean to go before landing?"
"I shall go on until we bring the sounds abeam of us," I whispered back. "We are moving very much faster here than we should ashore, especially when it comes to creeping through those mangrove tree roots; so I will get as close to the place as I can before landing.  Oars!"
For at that moment we swept round a rather sharp bend in the stream, and I caught a glimpse, at no great distance ahead, of what I thought looked very much like the stern of a canoe projecting from among the trees on our port.  I held up my hand for silence.  We were so near to the scene of action now, that, had we raised a shout, we should instantly have attracted attention and, maybe, have temporarily suspended whatever operations might be proceeding.  But my party was altogether too weak to justify me in incurring any risks; there appeared to be but one life in immediate jeopardy ashore there, whereas any premature alarm might result in the loss of several of the rescuing party, and possibly the complete failure of the expedition.  No, my strongest hope lay in the possibility of effecting a complete surprise; so I hardened my heart, held up my hand to enjoin the most perfect silence, and whispered the coxswain to sheer the boat a little closer to the port bank.  Then, as the boat seemed to have plenty of "way" on her, I ordered the "stroke" to pass the word to lay in the oars noiselessly, and for those in the bows to stand by with the boat-hook and the painter.
These orders had just been obeyed, and we were gliding along in absolute silence, when, a short distance ahead, I caught sight of a break in the mangroves that looked wide enough to admit the boat, and I signed to the coxswain to point our stem for it.  A few seconds later we slid into a kind of cavern, formed of the overarching branches of a belt of mangroves, and, gliding along a narrow canal of about sixty feet in length, we finally brought up alongside a good firm bank of soil, on which there was room enough for us all to land.  Our movements were effectually masked by a thin belt of scrub, which appeared to be all that intervened between us and the three or four hundred yelling and chanting natives who were now making the air ring and vibrate within a short hundred yards of us.  At the same time I became aware that the agonising shrieks, as of one in mortal agony, had ceased.
The din of discordant sounds was now so tremendous that there was no very especial need for the observance of any great amount of caution on our part, yet we disembarked with scarcely a sound, and I drew our little party up in two lines, the _Sharks_ being placed in the front rank, and the others immediately behind them.
"Now, men," said I, "I have just one last word of caution to give you before we attack.  Remember that we have not come here for the express purpose of fighting the natives, but to rescue our fellow-countrymen; therefore my orders are that as soon as this is accomplished a retreat is to be at once made to the boat, no man pausing except to support a comrade who may be in difficulties.  I propose to begin the attack by discharging the whole of these rockets as rapidly as possible into the thick of the crowd of natives, and then to charge upon them with sword and cutlass, reserving our pistol fire for emergencies.  I hope by this plan to scatter the savages and cause their retirement for at least a few brief minutes, during which we must dash in, cut loose the prisoners, and retire with them to the boat.  There must be no more fighting than is actually necessary to enable us to accomplish our purpose."
The general patted me approvingly on the back.  "Excellent, my lad, excellent," he whispered.  "There spoke the prudent commander.  I foresee that you will do well in your profession.  And now, let us get on."
"One moment, general, if you please," said I.  "I want to reconnoitre before advancing into the open."
"Right," he answered.  "And I'll go with you."
I nodded consent, and at once led the way toward the screen of bush that interposed between ourselves and the village.  The distance to be traversed was merely some sixty or seventy yards, and to cover this we were obliged to make our way through some sparsely-scattered mangroves. It took us less than a minute to accomplish the journey, and then we found that the bush was much less dense than it had appeared to be, since we were enabled without the least difficulty to penetrate it to a spot where our whole party could comfortably stand, and where the intervening screen was so tenuous that, ourselves unseen, we could see everything that was happening in the village.  This was so obviously the proper spot from which to make our attack that the general at once went back to bring up the men, while I remained to make such few observations as the brief time at my disposal would permit.
I found that we were on what might be termed the right front of the village, which was a tolerably important place, consisting of some two hundred roomy huts, constructed of wattles and sun-baked clay, and thatched with palm leaves.  The huts, however, had no interest for me now; it was the scene that was being enacted in the wide, open space in front of the village that riveted my attention.  This space was occupied by a crowd of fully a thousand blacks--men, women, and children--most of whom were practically naked, and all of whom were slowly circling in a weird kind of dance round a small area, in the midst of which were planted eleven stout stakes at distances of about fifty feet apart. These stakes were, of course, upright, and stood about ten feet high. It was therefore easy enough to count the stakes, but owing to the dense crowd which surrounded them it was exceedingly difficult to distinguish whether or not anything, or anybody, was attached to them.  But I found no difficulty in arriving at a tolerably accurate surmise as to the purpose of these stakes, for four of them were charred quite black, as though by the action of fire, while a thin wreath of pale brownish-blue smoke still eddied and circled about one of the four.  The tone of the chant now being sung by the savages was very different from that which had reached our ears while in the open river; it was more subdued, and did not convey that suggestion of savage exultation that had been the dominant note of the other, and I also now noticed that the deafening clamour of horns and thumping of tom-toms had ceased.  The idea conveyed to my mind was that one act in a drama of absorbing interest had closed and that another was about to open.  But I had no time for further observation, as the general now came up with the men, and we at once proceeded to make our final arrangements for an instant attack.
"Now, lads," said I, "you see those hundreds of dancing savages.  I want you to plant your rockets in such a manner that they will rake through the whole crowd; and if they should finish up by setting fire to the huts, so much the better.  Fire the rockets, one after another, as rapidly as possible, and the moment that the last rocket has been fired we will spring out into the open and make a dash for those posts, to which I believe we shall find the missing men secured.  Use your cutlasses as freely as may be needful, but reserve your pistols for an emergency.  Then, having cut our men loose, we must all retire in a body to the boat, and get out of the creek as quickly as possible.  Now, are you all ready?  Then begin to fire the rockets."
With a preliminary sizzle, and a strong odour of burning powder, the twelve rockets tore, weirdly screaming, in rapid succession, out of the clump of bush into the thick of the crowd of dancing savages, ricochetting hither and thither as they encountered some obstacle, scattering showers of fire in every direction, and finally exploding with a loud report many of them having previously embedded themselves in the dry thatch of the huts.  The effect of the discharge was tremendous and cumulative!  As the first rocket plunged into the throng a sudden silence ensued, and every savage stood death-still, gazing with eyes of horror upon the hissing fiery thing as it darted hither and thither inflicting painful burns and bruises wherever it went.  Then, long before the first had run its course, the second was also among them, playing similar antics, and working havoc like the first; and then out swooped the third at them, driving the whole party crazy with terror, and producing a state of utterly indescribable confusion.  As the fourth rocket tore out of the midst of the belt of bush a general yell of dismay arose, and then ensued a regular stampede, the natives knocking down and falling over each other in their frenzied efforts to escape from the onslaught of the fiery monsters.  Before the last rocket had sped there was not a savage to be seen, the whole swarm of them, down to the children even, having somehow managed to make their escape into the adjacent bush, from which their cries of terror could still be heard proceeding, while several of the huts were already bursting into flame. In the midst of the deserted open space the eleven upright stakes were now plainly visible; four of them, alas! black and half-consumed with fire, with great heaps of still smouldering and faintly smoking ashes-- in the midst of which were discernible the calcined fragments of human skeletons--around their bases, while to each of the other seven was bound the naked body of a white man!
"Now, forward, lads!" cried I, dashing into the open with drawn sword in my hand.  "Cut loose those seven men, and then form up ready for a retreat to the boat.  If we are quick we may do all that we came to do before the savages return."
It was but a run of a few hundred yards from the bush to the posts, and in another minute we were around them, cutting and hacking at the multitudinous coils of tough creeper which bound the prisoners to the posts; and in another couple of minutes the last man had been released. Dazed and speechless at the suddenness of their deliverance from a lingering death of frightful torment, such as they had beheld inflicted upon four of their unfortunate companions, the rescued mutineers were being hurried down to the boat.  To bundle them in pell-mell, scramble in ourselves, and shove off was the work of but a few brief minutes; and presently we found ourselves once more in the creek, with our bows pointed river-ward, and eight men straining at the oars as we swept foaming past the interminable array of mangroves, with their gaunt roots, like the legs of gigantic spiders sprawling out into the black, foul-smelling water.
"Well," exclaimed the general, taking off his Panama hat and mopping his perspiring head and face with a huge red-silk handkerchief, "that is a good job well done, and without the loss of a man, too--except, of course, the unfortunate four that we were too late to save.  You have managed the affair exceedingly well, young sir, as I shall be happy to bear witness at another time and place.  I have somehow--I don't quite know why--had a sort of prejudice against the navy; but a service which trains youngsters like yourself to do such work as I have seen done to- day can't be wholly bad."
"Bad, sir!"  I exclaimed.  "The navy bad?  Why, on the contrary, although perhaps it is not absolutely perfect, it is the most glorious service that a man can possibly enter, and I am proud to belong to it. [See note.] But we must not crow yet over our success.  Those savages will probably be rallying by this time, since they find that they are not being pursued, and if they should choose to follow us along the banks of the creek they may yet make us smart for our boldness."
"Ay," agreed the general, "they may; but somehow I don't fancy that they will.  Those rockets seemed to frighten them pretty well out of their skins, and I don't believe that they will get over their terror in a hurry.  By Jove, sir, that was a brilliant idea of yours--those rockets!"
Meanwhile the rescued men were crouching in the bottom of the boat, silent, some of them with their faces buried in their hands, some lying back as though dazed, with their eyes closed.  And one of these last, I noticed, had the fingers of his two hands locked together, and his lips were moving, as though he prayed, or were returning thanks to God for his deliverance.  Presently he opened his eyes, and his gaze met mine full.  I noticed that he flushed slightly, as though ashamed at having been detected, so I nodded to him and said:
"No need to be ashamed, my good fellow, if you were thanking God for His mercy.  We have, every one of us, abundant reason to be thankful to- day."
"Yes, sir," said he, "and I even more, perhaps, than the rest.  They was makin' ready to begin upon me when you broke in upon 'em."  And therewith he burst into a violently hysterical passion of tears, the result, doubtless, of the reaction arising from his sudden and unexpected rescue from the horrors of a death from protracted torment, such as he had witnessed in the case of the other four.  For it now appeared that--without harrowing the reader's feelings by entering into unnecessary details--the sufferings of one or two of the unfortunate men must have been prolonged to the extent of quite three hours.  The ringleader, Tonkin, had been, singularly enough, the man who had been subjected to certain peculiar refinements of torture which, while inflicting what one could readily conceive would be the most excruciating agony, were not of a nature to produce death save by the long-drawn-out process of physical exhaustion.  We spoke such comforting words to the poor creatures as we could think of, at the same time not forgetting to administer a little much-needed stimulant and food.  The production of the latter reminded us all that we felt atrociously hungry and thirsty, and as soon as we were safely clear of the creek and once more in the main channel of the river, we fell to upon the basket of provisions that Briggs had so thoughtfully provided for our refreshment.
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Note: What would Grenvile have thought of the much more perfect service of the present day, I wonder?--H.C.
CHAPTER NINE.
A NIGHT ATTACK.
We arrived safely alongside the ship just as the sun was dipping beneath the western horizon, to the great relief and joy of those whom we had left on board, and we learned with much satisfaction that nothing whatever of an alarming character had transpired during our long absence.  The occupants of the cuddy were very naturally anxious to be furnished with the fullest details of our afternoon's adventure; but I left the telling of that to the general, and retired below to indulge in the luxury of a good wash and a complete change of clothing before sitting down to dinner.
That the tragic occurrences of the day had put an effectual end to the mutiny was, of course, a foregone conclusion, and I was not at all surprised to learn that, within a quarter of an hour of our return, the men--having doubtless consulted together in the forecastle--had come aft in a body to express to Carter their contrition for their insubordinate behaviour, and to request that they might be allowed to turn-to again, at the same time giving the most elaborate assurances of good behaviour in the future.  As a matter of fact it soon became perfectly clear that there would never have been a mutiny at all but for Tonkin, who was its sole instigator, as well as the murderer of the unfortunate Captain Williams, who had provoked the turbulent boatswain to the highest pitch of exasperation by his alternations of jovial good-fellowship with truculent arrogance of demeanour.  Poor Carter seemed to find it a little difficult to make up his mind how to deal with the matter, as he confessed to me somewhat later that same evening; but I pointed out to him that, the chief offender having been removed, there was exceedingly small likelihood of any recurrence of insubordination, especially as the men had really nothing to complain of, either in their treatment or in the matter of their food.  Looked at after the event, the outbreak wore very much the appearance of an impulsive act on the part of the men, skilfully engineered by Tonkin for some evil purpose of his own, now effectually frustrated.  I therefore advised Carter to let them resume duty, with the distinct understanding that upon their own behaviour during the remainder of the voyage would it depend whether or not they were called to account for their disastrous act of insubordination. These arguments of mine, coupled with the hint that we should need the services of all hands to protect the ship--should the natives take it into their heads to attack her--and also to get her afloat again, convinced him; and he at once had them aft and spoke to them in the terms which I had suggested.
But although the ugly and awkward incident of the mutiny was ended we were by no means "out of the wood", for the ship was still hard-and-fast aground--having apparently run upon the sandbank on the top of a springtide--and it looked more than likely that it would be necessary to lighten her considerably before we could hope to get her afloat again. Meanwhile there were the savages to be kept in mind.  Had our lesson of the afternoon brought home to them a good, wholesome realisation of the danger of meddling with white men? or had it, on the other hand, only inflamed them against us, and made them resolve to wreak a terrible revenge?  The question was one which we felt it impossible to answer, and meanwhile all that we could do, while in our present helpless condition, was to keep a bright look-out, night and day, and to hold ourselves ready for any emergency.
Needless to say, Carter and I both took especial care to see that there was no slackness or negligence on the part of the anchor-watch that night, the whole of the duty being undertaken by my own men, while I was up and about at frequent intervals all through the night.  But the hours of darkness passed uneventfully, and when dawn appeared there had been neither sight nor sign of savages anywhere near the ship.
At six o'clock that morning the usual routine of duty was resumed on board, the hands being turned up to wash-decks and generally perform the ship's toilet before breakfast, and I noticed with satisfaction, as I went forward to get my usual shower-bath under the head-pump, that Carter had caused the four prisoners to be released from the fore-peak. I believed that the rest of the hands might now be safely trusted to keep that quartette in order.
Immediately after breakfast in the forecastle the hands were again turned up, and a good stout hawser was bent on to the kedge anchor, which was then lowered down into the longboat and run away out broad on the ship's port quarter.  The other end of the hawser was then led forward along the poop and main-deck to the windlass, which we believed would be better able than the capstan to withstand the strain that we intended to put upon it.  This done, the hawser was hove taut, and the main hatch was then lifted and a quantity of cargo was hoisted out and deposited in the longboat alongside, all the other boats also being lowered into the water.  By the time that the longboat was as deep as she would swim it was close upon high-water, and the men were then sent to the windlass with orders to endeavour to get another pawl or two. This they succeeded in doing, the ship's quarter being by this time slewed so far off the sandbank that she now lay, with regard to the general run of it, at an angle of nearly forty-five degrees; and then the windlass positively refused to turn any further, even to the extent of a single pawl.  The men therefore left it, as we felt that nothing was to be gained by snapping the hawser, which was now strained to the utmost limit of its endurance.  The fully-loaded longboat was now dropped astern, and the longboat of the _Dolores_, in which we had been picked up, and which, it will be remembered, Carter had felt impelled to hoist inboard--was brought alongside in her place, and she, too, was loaded as deeply as it was safe to venture.  It was noon by this time, the tide had turned, the ship remained immovable, and the men's dinner- hour had arrived; the second longboat was therefore dropped astern, and the hands knocked off for their midday meal.
In addition to her longboat the _Indian Queen_ carried a jolly-boat, a dinghy, and four very fine, roomy gigs, two of which hung in davits in the wake of the mizzen rigging while the other two were supported on a gallows that stood abaft the mainmast.  It will be seen, therefore, that, even apart from the longboat and gig of the _Dolores_, this ship was very well supplied with boats, only two of which--the two longboats--were thus far loaded.  The gigs, although they were of course of much smaller capacity than the longboats, and having fixed thwarts were not so adaptable for the purpose of temporarily receiving cargo, were nevertheless capable of being made very good use of, and in the afternoon they were brought alongside and loaded one after another, until all four of the ship's own gigs were as deep in the water as it was prudent to put them, when they also were dropped astern, leaving only the dinghy, and the gig of the _Dolores_, unutilised.  The dinghy, of course, was too small to be of any use as a temporary receptacle of cargo, and I felt that it would be unwise to deprive ourselves of the services of the remaining gig for other purposes.  I therefore decided, in conjunction with Carter, that if it should prove necessary to lighten the ship still further, we would discharge the two longboats on to the sandbank--a considerable area of which remained dry even at high-water-- and then strike another cargo down into the empty boats.  But as it was by this time within half an hour of sunset, and the men had been working very hard all day, we arranged to let them knock off and, after clearing up the decks and replacing the hatches, to take a good rest, in view of the possibility that we might be obliged to call upon them during the night, should the savages elect to become troublesome.
Night fell calm and gracious upon the scene, the air breathless, and the sky without a cloud, but with a thin strip of new moon hanging in the western sky in the wake of the vanished sun.  The anchor-watch was set, and by the time that I had taken a bath and changed my clothes the dinner-hour had arrived, and we all gathered round the "hospitable board" which Briggs and his satellites had prepared for us.  Everybody was in the best of spirits, for the men had not only worked well but had also displayed a very manifest desire to eradicate, by their behaviour, the bad impression that had been produced by their recent lamentable lapse from the path of rectitude.  Excellent progress had also been made in the task of lightening the ship, and, finally, the savages had shown no disposition to interfere with us.  There was consequently a good deal of lively chatter during the progress of the meal, and when it was over the piano was opened and we had some very excellent music.  The ladies having retired, I rose to go out on deck and take a final look round ere I turned in; but before I went I thought it desirable to say a word or two of caution.
"Gentlemen," said I, "we have just come to the end of a very delightful evening, and I hope that you will all enjoy an unbroken night's rest. There is no reason, so far as I can see, why you should not; but we must none of us forget that, so long as the ship remains where she now is, she is exposed to the possibility of attack by the savages.  Therefore, while I do not ask you to keep a watch, or even to remain awake, I strongly urge you to keep your weapons beside you, ready loaded, so that if, by any unfortunate chance, it should be necessary for us to call upon you to assist in defending the ship, you may be able to respond without delay."
"Umph!" grunted the general.  "Better tell us exactly what you mean, Grenvile.  We are all men here, so you can speak quite plainly.  Have you observed anything to-day indicative of a disposition on the part of the natives to attack us?"
"No, general, I have not," said I, "and I know of no reason why we should not have a perfectly quiet and undisturbed night's rest as we did last night.  I merely thought it advisable to give you a word of warning, because I know the natives all along this coast to be treacherous in the extreme, and very much given to doing precisely what you least expect them to do.  Beyond that I see no cause whatever for uneasiness, believe me.  Good-night, gentlemen, sound sleep and pleasant dreams to you."
When I stepped out on deck I found that the character of the weather had changed during the three hours or so that I had spent in the cuddy.  The young moon had, of course, set some time before; the sky had grown overcast and seemed to be threatening rain; the clouds were sweeping up from about south-south-west, and a light breeze, that seemed likely to freshen, was blowing from that direction, driving great masses of chill, wet fog along before it of so dense a character that it was scarcely possible to make out the foremast from the head of the poop-ladder. Altogether it threatened to be a distinctly unpleasant night for the unfortunate men whose duty it would be to keep a look-out through the hours of darkness.  Carter, in a thick pilot-cloth jacket, was walking to and fro on the poop, with a short pipe stuck in the corner of his mouth, when I joined him.
"Hullo, Carter," I said, "this is a change of weather with a vengeance! When did it happen?"
"Why," answered Carter, "the fog closed in upon us just after sunset, the same as it has done every night since we've been here; but the breeze has only sprung up within the last half-hour.  Looks as though 'twas going to freshen too."
"So I think," said I.  "How is it coming?  Broad off the starboard bow, isn't it?"
"Yes; about that," agreed Carter.
"And the tide is rising, is it not?"  I continued, the freshening breeze having suggested an idea to me which I in turn wished to suggest to my companion.
"Ay, risin' fast," answered he.  "It'll be high-water about midnight, I reckon."
"Just so," I agreed.  The idea which I wished to suggest to him had clearly not yet dawned upon him--although it ought to have done so without any need of a hint from me,--so, without further beating about the bush, I said:
"Now, don't you think, Carter, that, with this nice little breeze blowing from precisely the right direction, it would be quite worth while to loose and set the square canvas and--"
"Throw it all aback," he cut in as at last he caught my idea.  "Why, of course I do, Mr Grenvile, and thank'e for the hint.  It'd be a precious sight more helpful than the kedge, and I'll have it done at once."  And he started to go forward to call the men.
"What about your cables?" said I.  "Have you got them bent and an anchor ready to let go if she should happen to back off the bank?"
"No," said he, coming to a halt again.  "We've been so busy with one thing and another, you know.  But I'll have it done as soon as we've got the canvas on her."
"Better do that first, hadn't you?"  I suggested.  "I wouldn't trust the kedge to hold her in a breeze with all her square canvas set."
"N-o, perhaps not," he agreed dubiously.  "Well, then, I'll get the port cable bent and the anchor a-cockbill ready for lettin' go before touchin' the canvas.  How would that be?"
"Much the safest, I think," said I.  "But let us both go for'ard and see what is the exact state of affairs there.  And what is the state of the hawser?  Ah, still quite taut!" as I tested its tension with my foot.
Arrived upon the forecastle we found both anchors stowed inboard and the cables below; but, all hands being called, including the _Shark's_, we made short work of the business, for while one gang went below and cleared away the cable, another roused it up on deck and rove it through the hawse-pipe, ready for bending, and a third got the anchor outboard. Then, while Jones, the _Shark's_ boatswain's mate, and his party bent the cable and got everything ready for letting go, in case of need, Carter's men climbed into the rigging, and, beginning at the topgallant- sails, loosed all the square canvas, overhauled the gear, and saw everything clear for sheeting home and hoisting away.  To set the canvas and trim the yards aback was now the work of but a few minutes, and it was soon done, with the immediate result that the ship, from having a slight list to starboard, came upright, with just the slightest possible tendency to heel to port.
"Now, Mr Carter," said I, "the ship's bilge is no longer bearing upon the sand.  I think, therefore, that if I were you I would send all hands to the windlass, and let them endeavour to get another pawl or two. That canvas is doing good work up there, and it may be that if we helped it a bit with a pull on the hawser she would come off."
"Ay," agreed Carter; "so she might, and we'll try it.  Man the windlass, lads, and see if you can move her at all.  Half an hour's work now may get the ship afloat, and so save ye a good many hours breakin' out cargo to-morrow."
"Ay, ay, sir!" answered the men, cheerfully enough, considering that they had been awakened out of a sound sleep and dragged out of their warm bunks to come up and work in the chill, pestilential fog after having worked hard all day.  "Tail on to the handles, my bullies, tail on and heave.  Heave, and raise the dead!" shouted the man Mike, who had been one of the lucky five to escape capture by the savages.
They got their first pawl easily enough, then another, and another, by which time the hawser was once more as taut as a bar.  But, as I lightly rested my foot upon it, to test its tautness, I felt it very gradually slackening, which meant one of two things, either that the kedge was coming home--which I thought improbable--or that the ship was very slowly sliding off the bank.  So I cried to the men, who had desisted from their efforts for fear of parting the hawser:
"There she gives!  Heave away again, lads, and keep a steady strain on the hawser.  It wants half an hour yet to high-water."
The men again threw their weight alternately upon the levers, and once more the great pawl clanked once, twice, thrice; then a long pause and another clank, then a further pause.  But my foot was still on the hawser, and I felt that it was steadily, although very slowly, yielding, and there was a moment when I could almost have sworn that I felt the ship jerk ever so slightly sternward.  So I ventured to stimulate the men a little further.
"Hurrah, lads," I cried, "there she moves!  Hang to her!  One complete turn of the windlass and she's all your own!  Heave again."
"Heave!" responded the men hoarsely, flinging their whole weight upon the elevated lever, while those opposite grasped the corresponding depressed handle, and, gripping the deck with their naked toes, bent their backs and bore upward until every muscle in their straining bodies cracked again; and "clank-clank" spoke the pawl again, and yet again "clank".  Then, after another long, heaving and straining pause, "clank" again, a shorter pause and again "clank--clank--clank"; and then, as the men struggled and fought desperately with the stubborn windlass, the ship jerked perceptibly twice, the pawls spoke in quicker succession, the ship surged again, and with a wild hurrah from the men, as the levers suddenly yielded to them and began to leap rapidly up and down, the _Indian Queen_ gathered way and slid off into deep-water.
"Well there with the windlass!" cried Carter delightedly.  "Let go your to'gallant and topsail halyards and sheets; man your clewlines; fore and main clew-garnets.  Stand by to let go the anchor!"
"Ay, ay, sir!" was the response from the topgallant forecastle.  "All ready with the anchor.  Stand clear of the cable!"
Meanwhile the merchant crew were clewing up and hauling down to the accompaniment of the usual cries.  What, therefore, with Carter's commands, the seaman's calls, and the violent flinging down of ropes upon the deck, there was a very considerable uproar going on upon deck, and I was not at all surprised when the general, clad in a dressing- gown, emerged from below with his sword in one hand and his pistol in the other, to enquire what all the racket was about.
I explained the situation to him, and he was expressing his great gratification at the fact that the ship had been got afloat again, when Carter gave the order to let go the anchor.
"All gone, sir," answered Jones as a heavy splash sounded under the ship's bows, instantly followed by a yell of:
"A large canoe--two of 'em--three--four--there's a whole fleet of canoes closing in round us, sir."
"Where away?" demanded I, unceremoniously breaking away from the general and dashing forward to the topgallant forecastle, up the ladder of which I scrambled with considerable loss of shin-leather.
"There, sir, d'ye see 'em?" responded Jones, sweeping his arm in a wide circle as he pointed into the fog wreaths that were whirling round us.
The fog and the darkness together rendered it extremely difficult to see anything, but by dint of peering I at length distinguished several shapeless dark blotches at a distance of about fifty fathoms from the ship, arranged apparently in the form of a wide semicircle on the side of her opposite to that on which lay the sandbank.  Jones, however, was not quite right in his statement that they were closing in upon us, for they appeared to be lying quite stationary, or at least were only paddling just sufficiently to avoid being swept away by the sluggish tide that was running.  But there was very little doubt in my mind that we had very narrowly escaped an ugly surprise, and I was by no means certain that we might not yet look to be attacked.  My view of the situation was that the natives had gathered about us in the hope that, in the fog and darkness, they might be able to steal alongside and climb aboard in such overwhelming numbers as to secure possession of the deck and overpower us by taking us by surprise, and that they had been restrained from making the attempt only by the sounds of bustle and activity that had accompanied our endeavours to get the ship afloat.
"Lay down from aloft all hands at once!" shouted I, sending my voice pealing up through the fog to the figures that were to be dimly-seen sprawling on the yards and dragging at the heavy festoons of canvas. "And you, Jones, find me a musket as smartly as you can."
"Musket, sir?  Ay, ay, sir! here's one," answered the man, fishing one out from some hiding place and thrusting it into my hand.  Lifting the piece to my shoulder I levelled it in the direction where the canoes seemed to be congregated most thickly, and, aiming so as to send the bullet flying pretty close over the heads of the savages, pulled the trigger.  I distinctly heard the "plop" of the bullet as it struck the water, but beyond that all was as still as death.  Meanwhile, at my call, the men aloft had come sliding down the backstays and were now mustering on the fore-deck awaiting further instructions.  And at the same moment the general came forward to announce that he had quietly called the men passengers, who would be on deck in a moment, bringing their firearms with them.
"I will place myself at their head, Grenvile," he said, "and if you will tell me how we can most helpfully assist you I will see to the details of any task that you may assign to us."
"A thousand thanks, general," answered I.  "You, perhaps, cannot do better than muster your men on the poop, and if you detect any disposition on the part of the canoes to close in upon the ship, fire into them without hesitation.  This is no time for half-measures; we must deal decisively and firmly with those fellows, or we shall find ourselves in a very awkward predicament."
"Right; I agree with you there, and you will not find us wanting, I hope," responded Sir Thomas, as he turned to walk away aft.
"Simpson, San Domingo, and Beardmore, come up here on the topgallant forecastle," called I; and at the call up came the men, with the inevitable answer of "Ay, ay, sir!"
"Simpson," said I, "I want you and San Domingo to take charge of this port carronade, while you, Jones and Beardmore, attend to the starboard one.  The ship has now swung to her anchor, and is lying fairly steady; so when once you have trained the pieces they will not need much alteration.  Run them both close up to the rail, and depress the muzzles so that the discharge will strike the water at a distance of about fifty yards, which will afford room for the charge to spread nicely.  If a canoe approaches within that distance, fire upon her.  I will arrange for more ammunition to be sent to you at once."
I then descended to the main-deck, and, finding Carter, arranged with him that he should descend to the magazine with one of my men, who could be trusted to be careful, and send up an ample supply of ammunition. This done, my next act was to range the crew of the ship along the main- deck, port and starboard sides, with muskets in their hands, giving them strict injunctions to fire upon any canoe that they might see attempting to approach the ship.
All these arrangements, which have taken a considerable time to describe, really occupied but two or three minutes, during which not a sound of any description had come from the canoes, which, however, could occasionally be caught sight of, dimly showing when the mist wreaths thinned for a moment.  Meanwhile, our own dispositions being complete, a tense silence reigned throughout the ship, broken only by an occasional low muttered word from one man to another.
Suddenly a shrill whistle pealed out from somewhere in the fog away on our port hand, followed, the next instant, by a thin, whirring sound in the air all about the ship, accompanied by sharp, crisp thuds here and there along the bulwarks, and a thin, reedy pattering on the decks.  An object of some sort fell close to my feet, and, upon groping for it, I found that it was an arrow.  At the same moment a loud, fierce, discordant yell burst out all round the ship, and the rattling splash of innumerable paddles dashed into the water, reached our ears.
"Here they come; here they come!" cried the men, and a musket flashed out of the darkness down in the waist of the ship.
"Steady, lads; steady!" cried I.  "Don't fire until you can see what you are firing at, and take good aim before you pull the trigger!"
But at that moment a whole host of canoes came dashing at us out of the fog and darkness, and a sharp, irregular volley of musketry rattled out fore and aft, in the midst of which bang! bang! rang out the carronades, almost simultaneously.  The discharge was immediately followed by a most fearful outcry of shrieks and groans, and two large canoes, which had received the contents of the carronades, paused in their rush, and went drifting slowly past us on the tide, heaped with the motionless bodies of their crews, and in a sinking condition.  But this in nowise checked the rush of the other canoes, which came foaming toward us, with half their crews plying their paddles, while the other half maintained a fierce fire with their bows and arrows.
"Reload those carronades on the forecastle," cried I, "and then train them to rake the main-deck, fore and aft.  Half of you in the waist retreat to the topgallant forecastle, the other half to the poop, and defend those two positions to the last gasp.  Let me know when those carronades are ready, and be careful so to depress their muzzles that none of the charge will reach the poop."
So saying I made a dash for the main-deck entrance of the saloon, which I locked, slipping the key into my pocket.  Then I followed the rest of the party up on to the poop, and bade them pull the two poop-ladders up after them.  The poop and topgallant forecastle thus formed two citadels, of a sort, capable of being pretty fairly defended, except in the face of an overwhelming force.
"Now, lads," cried I, "load your muskets again, and pepper the savages as they swarm in over the bulwarks; and if we cannot turn back the rush by that means, I look to you, Simpson and Jones, to sweep the main-deck clear with the carronades.  But do not fire them until you see that it is absolutely necessary in order to save the ship.  Here they come; now, lads, stand by!"
As the last words left my lips the leading canoes dashed alongside, and the next instant some thirty or forty savages could be seen scrambling over the bulwarks and leaping down on the main-deck.  They seemed somewhat disconcerted at finding no one to oppose them, and paused irresolutely as though not quite knowing what to do, and perhaps fearing a trap of some sort.  Meanwhile others came close upon their heels; while the general and his volunteers suddenly found their hands full in repelling an attack upon the poop by way of the mizzen chains.  As for that part of the crew that had retired to the poop at my order, I formed them up along the fore end of the structure; and now, as, one after another, they reloaded their muskets, they and their comrades on the topgallant-forecastle opened a brisk, if somewhat irregular, fire upon the multitude of savages who came pouring in over the bulwarks into the waist of the ship.  By the light of the musketry flashes I saw several of the savages throw up their arms and fall to the deck--so many of them, indeed, in proportion to the number of shots fired, that I felt convinced many of the bullets must be doing double or triple duty.  But for every savage who fell at least half a dozen fresh ones came in over the bulwarks to take his place, and I soon recognised that such musketry fire as ours must be absolutely ineffectual to deal with the overwhelming odds brought against us.  And how warmly I congratulated myself that I had not been foolish enough to attempt anything like a systematic defence of the waist of the ship.  Had I done that we should have all been exterminated within the first minute of the attack.  As it was we were doing very well--at our end of the ship, at all events; for although the savages quickly recovered themselves after the first moment of astonishment at finding nobody on the main-deck to oppose them, and began to pour in a hot fire of arrows, not one of our party--who were somewhat scattered, and were all lying down, most of them behind some sort of shelter--was hit.
By the time that the attack had been raging some five minutes, however, there must have been quite three hundred savages crowded on the main- deck, between the poop and the topgallant forecastle, and the affair began to wear a very serious aspect for us defenders; for by this time the blacks were making desperate efforts to climb up on to the poop and carry it by escalade, and a few of us had sustained more or less serious hurts in resisting them.  The critical moment, when we must either conquer or go under, was close upon us, and I was about to call to Simpson to ask whether they were ready on the forecastle with the carronades, when his voice rose above the din, hailing:
"Poop ahoy!  Look out there, aft, for we're goin' to fire.  We can't hold out here another half a minute."
"Very well," I answered, "fire as soon as you like; the sooner the better!"  And I then added:
"Jump to your feet, everybody on the poop, and run as far aft as you can, or shelter yourselves behind the companion or skylight--anywhere, until they have fired the carronades!"
We had just time to make good our rush for shelter--leaving the natives who were endeavouring to storm the poop evidently much astonished at our sudden and inexplicable retreat--when the two carronades barked out simultaneously; and the terrific hubbub of shouts and yells down in the waist ceased as though by magic, to be succeeded the next instant by surely the most dreadful outburst of screams and groans that human ears had ever listened to.  The carnage, I knew, must have been terrific, but it would not do to trust to the effect of that alone, we must instantly follow it up by action of some sort that would complete the panic already begun; so I shouted:
"Hurrah, lads; now down on the main-deck, all of us, and drive the remainder of the savages over the side before they have had time to recover from their dismay!"  And, seizing hold of the first rope that came to hand, I swung myself off the poop down on the main-deck, and began to lay about me right and left with my sword, the remainder of our party, fore and aft, instantly following my example.  For a few seconds the savages who still stood on their feet--and how very few there seemed to be of them!--appeared to be too completely dazed by what had happened to take any steps to secure their safety; they even allowed themselves to be shot and struck down without raising a hand to defend themselves! Then, all in a moment, their senses seemed to return to them, and the panic upon which I had reckoned took place; they glanced about them and saw, that, whereas a minute before the deck upon which they stood had been crowded with a surging throng of excited fellow savages all striving to get within reach of those hated white men, it was now heaped and cumbered with dead and dying, with only a stray uninjured man left here and there; and incontinently, with shrill yells of terror, they made for the bulwarks and tumbled over them, careless, apparently, whether they dropped into a canoe or into the water, so long as they could effect their escape from that awful shambles.  Many of them, of course, dropped into the canoes, and made good their escape; but the splashing and commotion alongside, and the frequent shrieks of agony, told only too plainly that many of them, in their haste, had missed the canoes and fallen into the water, where the sharks were making short work of them.  As for us, as soon as the panic set in, and the retreat was fairly under way, we held our hands, allowing the poor wretches to get away without further molestation; and in two minutes from the moment of that terrible discharge of the carronades not a native remained on the deck of the _Indian Queen_ save those who were either dead, or too severely injured to be able to escape.
CHAPTER TEN.
I REJOIN THE "SHARK."
As soon as all the savages who could leave the ship had gone, we roused out as many lanterns as we could muster, lighted them, and hung them in the fore and main rigging, or stood them here and there along the rail, preparatory to going the rounds of the deck and beginning the gruesome task of separating the dead from the wounded.  And, while this was doing, the general, who claimed to possess some knowledge of surgery, retired to the main saloon, and having roused out Mrs Jenkins and her daughter Patsy, and impressed them into his service as assistants, proceeded to help Burgess to attend to the wounded of our own party, of whom I was one, an arrow having transfixed me through the left shoulder so effectually that the barbed point projected out at my back.  I had received the wound a moment before the discharge of the carronades, and had been scarcely conscious of the hurt at the moment; but a man cannot plunge into the thick of a melee with an arrow through his shoulder and not know something about it, sooner or later; and the hurt had quickly become very painful and inflamed.  The doctor declared that mine was the worst case of all, and insisted that I should for that reason be the first treated; I therefore submitted, with a good grace--for there were many matters calling for my immediate attention; and in a few minutes the head of the arrow was carefully cut off, the shaft withdrawn from the wound, and the wound itself carefully washed and dressed.  Then, with my arm in a sling, and my jacket loosely buttoned round my neck, I went out on deck to see how matters were proceeding there.
Only seventeen living bodies were found among the prostrate heaps with which the decks were cumbered.  These seventeen, after Burgess had done what he could for them, we placed in one of the many empty canoes that still remained alongside the ship, and towed the craft into the river, where we moored her in such a position that she would be likely to attract the attention of the natives, and thus lead to an investigation of her, and the rescue of her cargo of wounded, which was as much as we could do without exposing ourselves to very grave--and, to my mind, quite unnecessary risk.  This, however, was not done until the return of daylight enabled us to see what we were about.
The dead having been got rid of, and our own wounded attended to, all hands turned in to secure a little very necessary rest, the deck being left in charge of an anchor-watch consisting of Messrs. Acutt, Boyne, Pearson, and Taylor, who very kindly volunteered to see to the safety of the ship during the few remaining hours of darkness, pointing out that it would be perfectly easy for them to rest during the day, while the crew of the ship were engaged in doing what was necessary to enable us to make an early start from the spot which had brought so much adventure into the lives of all, and had been so disastrous to some of our little community.
At daylight all hands were called, and the first work undertaken was the removal, as far as possible, of all traces of the preceding night's conflict.  By dint of hard labour we at length succeeded in so far effacing the stains that the ordinary eye would scarcely be likely to identify them as what they really were, which was, at all events, something gained.  There were other marks, however, which it was impossible to obliterate, such as the scoring of the deck planks and the pitting of the mahogany and maple woodwork forming the fore bulkhead of the poop by bullets which had formed part of the charges of the two carronades when they were fired to rake the main-deck; and these we were obliged to leave as they were.
Having succeeded in thus far straightening up matters that the lady passengers could venture on deck without too violent a shock to their susceptibilities, the hands knocked off to go to breakfast.  The meal over, the kedge was weighed and stowed, and then the boats were brought alongside, one after another, and the process of striking cargo back into the hold was vigorously proceeded with.  This work was of course done by the ship's crew under Carter's supervision, and I and my own little party of men thus had an opportunity at last to treat ourselves to a much-needed rest.  Indeed, so far as I was concerned, Burgess insisted that I should at once turn in, and remain in my bunk until he should give me leave to rise, or, in such a climate as this, he would not be answerable for my life!  As a matter of fact I had already begun to realise that, with the pain of my wounded shoulder, and exhaustion arising from want of sleep, I could not hold out much longer; and I felt more than thankful that, after the hot reception we had given the natives, there was not much probability of any further fighting.  I therefore gladly retired to my cabin and, having swallowed a composing draught which Burgess mixed for me, slept until the following morning, when I felt so much better that the worthy medico rather reluctantly consented to my rising in time to sit down with the rest to tiffin. That same evening, by dint of hard work, the crew succeeded in completing the stowage of the last of the cargo, securing the hatches, and hoisting in the boats before knocking off; and somewhat later, that is to say about three bells in the second dogwatch, Carter availed himself of the springing up of the land breeze to lift his anchor and stand out to sea under easy canvas.
On the following morning, when I went on deck, the _Indian Queen_ was out of sight of land and standing to the southward under all plain sail, with nothing in sight but the heads of the topsails of a brig which, hull-down in the south-western quarter, was stretching in toward the coast, close-hauled on the port tack.  We took very little notice of this craft at the time, for she was then too far distant to show much of herself, even when viewed through the ship's telescope, while her yards were so braced that only the edges of her sails presented themselves to our view; but, remembering our recent experiences with a brig at a spot not very far distant from where we then were, I strongly advised Carter to keep a wary eye upon her movements.  The land breeze was then fast dying away, and I thought it quite possible that we might have an opportunity to see a little more of the stranger when the sea breeze should set in.
That same sea breeze set in while we in the cuddy were sitting down to breakfast; and when, after the meal was over, we all adjourned to the poop, I found Carter regarding the stranger with some little uneasiness through the telescope.  As I joined him he handed me the instrument, saying:
"Just take a squint at her, Mr Grenvile, and tell me what you think of her.  To my mind she seems to be steering in such a way as to close with us, and I should like to have your opinion upon her."
I accordingly took the instrument, and soon had the stranger sharply focused in the lenses.  She was then broad on our starboard bow, and was still hull-down, but she had risen just to the foot of her fore course, which was set, while the mainsail hung in its clewlines and buntlines, and was running down with squared yards, but had no studding-sails set. And, as Carter had remarked, she seemed to be steering in such a manner as to intercept us.  She was a brig of about the same tonnage as the _Shark_, of which craft she somehow reminded me sufficiently to invite a closer and more detailed scrutiny, and presently I was able to make out that she flew a pennant; she was consequently a man-o'-war.  It is true that the _Shark_ was not the only brig on the West African station: the British had two others, and we knew of three under the French pennant; but the craft in sight was not French--I could swear to that--and the longer I looked at her the more firmly convinced did I become that she was none other than the dear old _Shark_ herself.  I could not be absolutely certain of her identity until her hull should heave up clear of the horizon, but that jaunty steeve of bowsprit and the hoist and spread of those topsails were all very strongly suggestive of the _Shark_.  As I lowered the glass from my eye I happened to glance forward, and caught sight of Jones and Simpson seated forward on the topgallant forecastle, smoking their pipes as they animatedly discussed some topic of absorbing interest, and, catching their eyes, I beckoned them to come aft to the poop.
"Take this telescope, Jones, and have a good look at that brig," said I, as they climbed the poop-ladder, hat in hand; "then pass the instrument to Simpson, and let him do the same.  Then tell me what you both think of her."
The two men took the instrument, one after the other, and ogled the stranger through it with the greatest intentness; but I could see clearly that, even before Simpson took over the instrument from the boatswain's mate, the latter had already arrived at a pretty definite conclusion with regard to her.
"Well," said I, when at length Simpson had ended his scrutiny and handed back the instrument to me, "what do you think of her?"
"Why, sir," answered Simpson, "if she ain't the _Shark_ she's own sister to her; that's all I can say."
"And you, Jones, what is your opinion?"  I asked.
"Why, just the same as the carpenter's, sir," answered Jones.  "She's the _Shark_, right enough.  I knows the steeve o' that bowsprit too well to be mistook as to what that brig is.  She's the _Shark_; and we shall have the pleasure of slingin' our hammicks aboard of her to-night!"
"I verily believe you are right," said I.  "At all events we shall know for certain in the course of another half-hour; and meanwhile you can do no harm by going forward and passing the word for the _Sharks_ to have everything ready for shifting over, should our surmise prove to be correct."
"So you really think that yonder brig is your own ship?" remarked Carter, when the two men had gone forward again.  "Well, if it should prove to be so, I shall be very sorry to lose you, and so will all of us."
"Lose!  Lose whom?  I hope we are not going to lose anybody.  We have already had losses enough, this voyage, goodness knows!" exclaimed the general, emerging from the companion at that moment.
He had evidently caught a word or two of what Carter had been saying, and wanted to know all about it.
"Why, Sir Thomas, Mr Grenvile believes that brig yonder to be his own ship, the _Shark_," answered Carter.  "And if it turns out that he's right, of course he and his men will be rejoinin' directly.  And I was just sayin' that we shall all be very sorry to lose him."
"Sorry! by George I should say so!" cut in the general.  "It would have been a precious bad job for everybody in this ship if we had not been lucky enough to pick up him and his men.  Why, sir, we should, every man jack of us, have been dead as mutton by this time.  So you think that craft yonder is your ship, do you?" he continued, turning to me.  "Well, if she is, you will have to join her--that goes without saying.  But Carter here speaks no more than the truth when he says that we shall all be very sorry to lose you--I know that I shall be.  And if it should be that we must say good-bye to you now, that must not be the end of our acquaintance, you know; that will never do.  You and I have fought side by side, my boy, and I shall expect you to write to me from time to time to let me know how you are getting on; and I will write to you also, if you can give me an address from which my letters can be forwarded on to you.  This will be my address for the next year or two, probably."  And, producing a card, he scribbled something upon it and handed it to me.
"And now," he continued, "about rejoining this ship of yours.  Would it be possible for me to accompany you on board?  I should like to make the acquaintance of your captain, and have a little talk with him."
I very clearly understood that the kind-hearted old fellow wished to do me a good turn by making a much more favourable report of my conduct than it would be possible for me personally to make; and I was not so foolish as to regard lightly or neglect any help of which I could legitimately avail myself in my professional career.  I therefore said:
"Oh yes, Sir Thomas, I have no doubt that it can be very easily managed; and I am quite sure that Captain Bentinck will be delighted to see you. You can go aboard in the same boat with us, and your return to this ship can be afterwards arranged for."
"Right!  Then that is settled.  Now I will leave you, for there is a little matter that I wish to attend to before you and your people leave the ship."
And with a very kindly smile and nod the old gentleman turned and left me, and presently I noticed that he was deep in conversation with first one and then another of the passengers who were now mustering on the poop.
Meanwhile the breeze was freshening and the two craft were nearing each other fast, the brig gradually edging a little farther away to the southward at the same time, by which means she by this time presented so nearly a perfect broadside view of herself to us that we could see the end of her gaff, to which we presently saw the British ensign run up. And now there was no longer any doubt as to her being the _Shark_, for her figurehead--consisting of a gilt life-size effigy of the fish after which she was named--could be distinctly made out, glittering under the heel of her bowsprit.  In reply to her challenge we of course lost no time in running up our own ensign; but beyond doing that there was no need for further signalling, for it was by this time clearly evident that she intended to speak us.  And presently my little party of nine came marching aft, bag and baggage, to the lee gangway, where they stood waiting in readiness to go down over the side, San Domingo depositing his kit temporarily in the stern-sheets of the longboat while he hurried down into my cabin to get my few belongings together.
The negro had just returned to the deck with these when the _Shark_, ranging up within a biscuit-toss of us, hailed:
"Ship ahoy! what ship is that?"
"The _Indian Queen_, of and from London to Bombay, with passengers and general cargo," replied Carter.  "We have an officer and nine men belonging to you on board, sir.  Will you send a boat for them, or shall we lower one of ours?"
"Is that Mr Grenvile that stands beside you, sir?" asked a voice which I now recognised, despite the speaking-trumpet, as that of Captain Bentinck himself.
"Yes, sir," replied I for myself; "and I have nine men with me, the survivors of the prize crew of the _Dolores_."
I saw the skipper turn to Mr Seaton, who stood beside him, and say something, to which the other replied.  Then the former hailed again.
"Very glad to find that you are safe, Mr Grenvile," he shouted.  "You had better take room and heave-to, and we will do the same.  You need not trouble about a boat; we will send one of ours."
Carter flourished an arm by way of reply, and then gave the order: "Main tack and sheet let go!  Man the main clew-garnets and trice up!  Lay aft, here, to the main braces, some of you, and stand by to back the mainyard!  Down helm, my man, and let her come to the wind!"
At this moment Sir Thomas came up to me and said:
"Grenvile, my lad, come down on to the main-deck with me a moment, will you?  I have a word or two that I should like to say to your men before they leave the ship."
"Certainly, Sir Thomas," said I; and down we both trundled to where the little party of _Sharks_ stood lovingly eyeing the movements of their ship, and, as is the manner of sailors, abusing her and all in her the while.
"My lads," said the general, as they faced round at our approach, "you are about to leave us and return to your own ship, where I doubt not you will receive a warm and hearty welcome from your messmates.  But before you go I wish, on behalf of myself and the rest of the passengers of the _Indian Queen_, to express to you all our very high appreciation of the splendid manner in which you have conducted yourselves while on board this ship, and, still more, of the magnificent services which, under the leadership of your gallant young officer, Mr Grenvile, you have rendered not only to the owners and crew of the ship, but also to us, the passengers.  There can be no manner of doubt that, under God, and by His gracious mercy, you have been the means, first, of rescuing the bulk of the crew from death of a nature too horrible to contemplate, and secondly, ourselves, the passengers, from a fate equally horrible.  By so doing you have laid us all under an obligation which it is utterly impossible for us adequately to requite, particularly at this present moment; but it is my intention to go on board your ship to express personally to your captain my very high opinion of the conduct of each one of you.  And meanwhile the passengers as a body have deputed me to invite your acceptance of this bag and its contents, amounting to ninety sovereigns--that is to say, ten pounds each man--as a very small and inadequate expression of our gratitude to you.  I wish you all long life and prosperity."
"Thank'e, Sir Thomas, thank'e, sir; you're a gentleman of the right sort, you are--ay, and a good fighter too, sir; we shan't forget how you went with us into that village, away yonder, to help save them poor `shell-backs'," and so on, and so on.  Each man felt it incumbent upon him to say something in reply to Sir Thomas's speech, and, still more, by way of thanks for the handsome gift that had come to them through him.
By the time that this pleasant little ceremony of the presentation was over, the two vessels were hove-to, and Carter, who of course saw and heard what was going on, must needs come down and have his say also.
"Mr Grenvile, and men of the _Shark_," he began, as soon as the general's back was turned, "I've been very pleased to see what's just been done, and I'm only sorry that I've no power to do as much on my own account.  But, whereas I'm now cap'n of this ship, I was only third mate when we hauled out of dock at London, consequently I've no money of my own for makin' presents, and such money as is in the ship belongs to the owners, and I've no power to spend it otherwise than in certain ways, as I dare say you all understand.  But I agree with every word that the general said about your splendid conduct, and savin' the lives of my crew and passengers, and all that, and when we get back home I will of course see the owners and report everything to them, and if they're the men I take 'em to be they'll be sure to do the handsome thing by you. As for me, I can only thank you all very heartily for all the help you've given me."
The _Shark's_ boat came alongside just then, and the men passed down their "dunnage" into her amid a brisk fire of good-humoured chaff from their shipmates, and such enquiries as: "Hello, Jim, haven't you got so much as a monkey or a parrot to cheer us up with?" and so on.  Then they followed their belongings down the side, and stowed themselves away in the boat, while I was busy saying adieu to the occupants of the poop, all of whom expressed their deep regret at parting with me.  Then I sprang down into the boat, the general followed, and we shoved off amid much cheering from the forecastle, and much waving of hats and pocket handkerchiefs from the poop.
The pull from the ship to the brig was a short one, and in a few minutes I had the satisfaction of finding myself once more standing on the deck of the _Shark_.
"Come on board, sir," I reported, touching my hat to the captain, who, with the first lieutenant, was standing on the quarter-deck near the gangway as I entered.
"You have taken us rather by surprise, Mr Grenvile," remarked the skipper, gravely acknowledging my salute.  "I quite expected that you would be at Sierra Leone by this time.  I see that you are wounded, and you appear also to have lost some men.  These circumstances, coupled with the fact of your coming to us from yonder ship, lead me to fear that matters have gone very seriously wrong with you and your prize."
"They have indeed, sir, I am sorry to say," answered I.  "But before I tell you my story, sir, will you permit me to introduce to you General Sir Thomas Baker, one of the passengers aboard the _Indian Queen_, who has expressed a desire to have some conversation with you."
"Very pleased to make your acquaintance, Sir Thomas," remarked the skipper, exchanging salutes with the general, and then offering his hand.  "Perhaps you will do me the favour to step below to my cabin with me, and we can then have a chat together.  Meanwhile, Mr Grenvile, if one may judge from your appearance, the sooner you report yourself to the surgeon the better it will be for you."  And, as I touched my hat and retired, he led the way below, closely followed by the general.
"Well, Grenvile, here you are," exclaimed Morgan, as I entered his cabin.  "I have been expecting you, for I saw you come up the side. What is the extent of the damage, and what have you done with the _Dolores_?  Which is the worse, your shoulder or your head?  Shoulder, eh?  Well, let me help you off with your jacket and shirt.  Easy does it!  There, now sit down in that chair and make yourself comfortable, while I cooper you up.  Have they a surgeon aboard that ship?  This shoulder of yours appears to have been attended to very passably.  Now, spin your yarn while I give you an overhaul."
I gave a brief account of myself and of what had befallen us since leaving the _Shark_, while Morgan patched me up, and his work and my yarn came to an end about the same time.
"Well," said he, as I rose to leave the cabin, "I don't think the skipper will have much fault to find with you when he hears your story. You couldn't help the loss of the schooner, and, upon the other hand, there seems to be very little doubt that you saved the _Indian Queen_ from destruction, and her passengers and crew from a very terrible fate. I expect that jolly old buffer, General what's-his-name, has come aboard with the express purpose of making a confidential report to the skipper upon your conduct, and if his story at all bears out your own it ought to do you some good.  Now, I'm going to put you on the sick list for a day or two; you have been worked quite hard enough of late, and wounded too.  You must take care of yourself for a little while.  You need not stay below, you know, but you must not go on duty, for you are not fit for it; that shoulder of yours needs looking after, or it will give you a good deal of trouble.  Come to me again at eight bells this afternoon."
From the surgeon's cabin I made my way to the midshipmen's berth, where I received as boisterously hearty a welcome as mid could desire; but I had been there scarcely five minutes when San Domingo, who had already installed himself in his former berth, popped his head in at the door and said, with a broad grin:
"Mistah Grenvile, sah, de first leptenant wishes to see you on deck, sah."
Leaving my shipmates itching with curiosity to hear the yarn which I had just begun to spin, I made my way up to the quarter-deck, where I found Mr Seaton in charge, both ships still remaining hove-to.
"Ah, here you are, Grenvile!" exclaimed the first luff as I stepped up to him and touched my hat.  "I am anxious to hear the story of your adventures since you left us, but I understood that the captain had sent you below to the surgeon.  Have you seen him?"
"Yes, sir," said I; "I have been with him for quite half an hour, while he dressed my wounds.  He has put me on the sick list, sir."
"Which is about the best place for you, I should think, judging from your looks," answered my companion.  "And, of course," he continued, "the wily old Welshman availed himself of the opportunity to extract your story from you--trust Morgan for that!  However, he has only weathered on me to the extent of half an hour or so, and I'll get even with him yet before all's done.  Now, heave ahead, my lad, and give me the whole yarn, from clew to earing."
Whereupon I had to go through my story a second time, and when I had come to the end I began to reckon up mentally how many times more I might reasonably be expected to tell it, for the fact was that I was already becoming a little tired of it.
"Thank you, Grenvile," said Mr Seaton, as I brought my yarn to a conclusion.  "A most interesting yarn, and an exceedingly exciting experience.  Of course it is not for me to mete out praise or blame in my official capacity, that is to say, it is for the captain to do that; but, unofficially, and merely as a friend, I may perhaps venture to say that so far as I can see you have nothing with which to reproach yourself and have much to be proud of.  It is unfortunate that you should have lost five of your number, and I am particularly sorry that Mr Gowland should have been among them, for Mr Gowland was a particularly trustworthy and reliable navigator; but no one could possibly have foreseen that you would have been attacked by that piratical slaver.  Ah, here come the captain and your friend the general!  What a fine-looking old fellow the general is!"
They came straight toward where the first luff and I were standing; and as they approached, Captain Bentinck said:
"Well, general, since you are quite determined not to stay to lunch with us, let me at least introduce my first lieutenant to you before you go." Sir Thomas very courteously expressed the pleasure that it would afford him to make Mr Seaton's acquaintance, and the introduction was duly made.  Then the captain said:
"Sir Thomas has been giving me a very full and detailed description of everything that has happened since you joined the _Indian Queen_, Mr Grenvile, and the recital has afforded me a great deal of pleasure.  You appear to have handled an extremely difficult situation with equal courage and discretion, and I may as well say at once that, so far as that part of your adventure is concerned, I am quite satisfied.  Sir Thomas has also had something to say about that part of your adventure which relates to the loss of the _Dolores_"--and here I thought I detected a twinkle of amusement in the skipper's eye, brought there possibly by a repetition of the General's frank criticism of my commanding officer's conduct in turning us all adrift in an unarmed vessel--"from which I gather that you were in no way to blame for that unfortunate occurrence."
"I think you will be confirmed in that opinion, sir, when you have heard Grenvile's own version of the occurrence, as I have," said Mr Seaton. "The whole affair appears to have been just one of those that no one could possibly have anticipated."
"Well, I must bid you all adieu," said the general, "for I have kept poor Carter waiting a most unconscionable time, and I see him marching to and fro upon his poop yonder in a state of terrible impatience. Good-bye, my dear boy, and God bless you, for you are a downright good lad in every way!  Don't forget to write to me, and keep me posted as to how you are getting on.  Good-bye, Captain Bentinck!  I am delighted to have had the very great pleasure of making your acquaintance, and I am much obliged to you for listening to me so patiently.  Good-bye, Mr Seaton; good-bye, good-bye!"  And the old gentleman bustled away, beaming benignantly upon all and sundry, and made his way down into the boat, which meanwhile had been hauled-up to the gangway.  Five minutes later the boat returned to the _Shark_, and was hoisted to the davits, and the two craft filled away upon their respective courses, with mutual dips of their ensigns, and much waving of white pocket handkerchiefs from the poop of the _Indian Queen_.
That I should be called upon to relate my story yet once again--this time to the captain--was, of course, inevitable; but he was considerate enough to defer the recital until dinner-time that evening, when the second lieutenant, the master, and myself were guests at his table.  He was very kind and sympathetic in the matter of the loss of the _Dolores_, which he admitted was inevitable under the circumstances, and warmly reiterated his expressions of satisfaction at everything that I had done aboard the _Indian Queen_.
CHAPTER ELEVEN.
A SUCCESSFUL BOAT EXPEDITION.
That same evening we made the land from the mast-head just before sunset, and four hours later came to an anchor off the mouth of a river, the bar of which had too little water on it to permit of the passage of the _Shark_.  Our visit to this spot was the result of certain information which the skipper had acquired a few days previously from the master of a palm-oil trader hailing from Liverpool, upon the strength of which he rather hoped to be able to take by surprise an especially notorious slaver which had long eluded our cruisers, but which was now stated, upon fairly reliable authority, to be somewhere on the coast, and was believed to have entered this particular river.
The canvas having been snugly furled, the boats, under the command of the first lieutenant, the master, the boatswain, and the gunner, were manned, armed, and dispatched into the river, the whole expedition being, of course, under the command of Mr Seaton, in whose boat went Peter Christy, one of the midshipmen, while young Keene, another midshipman, contrived to smuggle himself down into the master's boat. Of course I applied for leave to go with the expedition, but, being on the sick list, was peremptorily forbidden even to dream of such a thing, for Morgan, our surgeon, declared that in my run-down condition I was utterly unfit to face the risks of exposure to the fever-laden fog which would certainly be encountered in the river.  The night was not especially favourable for an expedition intended to take ships by surprise; for although the sky was somewhat cloudy, it was by no means sufficiently so to obscure very materially the light of the moon, which was then in her first quarter.  But she would set shortly after midnight, and meanwhile her light would facilitate the passage of the boats across the bar, after the accomplishment of which the plan was to endeavour to discover the position of the vessel that we were after--or, failing her, any other craft that might be in the river--and then ambush the boats until the moon had gone down.  We gave the boats a cheer as they pulled away, and watched them until they vanished in the shadowy obscurity inshore; after which, as we expected to see nothing more of them until daylight, the watch was piped down, and going below I turned in.  The night, however, was intensely hot, and the atmosphere of the midshipmen's berth intolerably stuffy.  I therefore slept but poorly, and was up and down, at intervals of about an hour, all through the night, listening for the sound of firing, and hoping that perchance the reflection of gun-flashes on the clouds might indicate that the boats had found their quarry.  Once or twice, about three o'clock in the morning, some of us who, like myself, were on the qui vive, thought we caught the muffled sound of distant firing coming off to us on the damp night breeze, but the everlasting thunder of the surf on the sand a mile away was so loud that we might easily have been deceived.  That something important, however, was happening ashore was evident, for about this time we saw the reflection of a brilliant glare in the sky which lasted nearly an hour, and then gradually died down.
At seven o'clock the next morning all our doubts were set at rest by the appearance of two craft--a slashing brig and a very smart-looking little schooner--coming out over the bar with the _Shark's_ boats in tow; and ten minutes later they rounded-to and anchored close to us.  We now had an opportunity to take a good look at our prizes, and it needed no second glance to assure us that both were perfectly superb examples of the shipbuilder's art.  Long, low, and extraordinarily beamy, they carried spars big enough for craft of twice their tonnage, upon which they spread an area of canvas that made some of us stare in amazement, and which, combined with their exquisitely perfect lines, gave them a speed that enabled them to defy pursuit.  The _Dona Inez_, as the brig was named, was a craft of three hundred and eighty-six tons register, and drew only ten feet of water aft; while the _Francesca_--the schooner,--on a tonnage of one hundred and twenty, drew only six feet. That they had been built for the express purpose of slave traffic was apparent at the first glance; and they were, moreover, completely fitted for that traffic, for they had slave-decks, and had manacles, meal, and water on board, but no slaves.
The report of Mr Seaton, the first lieutenant, who presently came aboard, was eminently satisfactory.  The expedition had succeeded in locating the two ships on the previous night before the setting of the moon, and had then lain in ambush behind a point only some two cables lengths from their prey until about two o'clock the next morning, when, with muffled oars, they had pulled alongside the two craft simultaneously, boarded them without resistance, surprised and overpowered the anchor-watch, and secured the crews under hatches.  This having been done, and prize crews having been placed in charge of both vessels, the remainder of the party, led by Mr Seaton, had landed and captured an extensive slave factory, the occupants of which were evidently preparing for the reception of a large coffle of slaves, and set fire to it, burning the whole place to the ground.  And all this had been accomplished at the cost of only two men slightly-wounded.  The expedition had thus been completely successful, for the _Dona Inez_ was the craft the capture of which had been its especial object, while we had secured in addition a second prize and had destroyed a factory.
Immediately after breakfast the captain proceeded to make his arrangements with regard to the prizes.  First of all, the crew of the _Francesca_, were transferred to the _Dona Inez_, and, with the crew of the latter vessel, safely confined in her hold; then the prize crews were strengthened; and, finally, the brig was placed under the command of Mr Fawcett.  Then the captain sent for me.
"Mr Grenvile," said he, "I am going to prove to you, by placing you in command of the _Francesca_, that the loss of the _Dolores_ has in no wise shaken my confidence in you.  I remember, of course, that you are on the sick list; but I have consulted the surgeon relative to my proposed arrangement, and he assures me that a few days at sea will be far better for your health than remaining on the coast aboard the _Shark_.  Your duties will be easy, for I intend to send with you Jones and Simpson, the boatswain's and carpenter's mates, who were with you in the _Dolores_, and a rather stronger crew than you had in that craft. You may also have Mr Keene to keep you company.  You will sail in company with the brig, which will be under the command of Mr Fawcett, and since I learn that both craft, contrary to the ordinary usage of slavers, are heavily armed, you are not likely to suffer molestation this time on your voyage to Sierra Leone."
"Thank you, sir!" said I.  "I am very much obliged to you for your continued confidence in me, which you shall find has not been misplaced; and, as to my health, I really think I shall get well quicker at sea than I should by remaining here on the coast.  May I have San Domingo again as cabin steward, sir?"
"Why, yes, certainly, if you like, Mr Grenvile," answered the captain good-naturedly.  "The fellow is rather a good man, I believe, and he appears to have taken a particularly strong fancy to you.  By the way, there is one thing that I omitted to mention, Mr Grenvile, and that is that you will have to be your own navigator should you and the brig by any chance part company, for Mr Freeman will accompany Mr Fawcett in the brig.  But the master tells me that you are a very reliable navigator; you therefore ought not to have any difficulty upon that score.  And now you had better run away and turn yourself over to your three-decker."
I dived down into the midshipmen's berth, and found my shipmate, Keene, there also, although really he ought to have been on deck.
"Pass the word for San Domingo," said I to the sentry on duty outside. And as the man duly passed the word, I turned to Keene and said:
"Now, then, young man, hurry up and get your kit ready as fast as you please.  You are to come with me in the _Francesca_."
"No!" exclaimed the youth with incredulous delight.  "You don't really mean it, do you, Grenvile?  You're only having me on."
"Indeed I am not," answered I.  "The skipper has just told me that I may have you.  He thinks that a little real hard work in a small vessel will do you a lot of good, and there I fully agree with him," I added grimly.
"Oh, hard work be hanged!" exclaimed the lad joyously.  "I'm not afraid of hard work, as you very well know, Dick.  And it will be simply glorious to get away from the taut discipline of the _Shark_ for a little while, to say nothing of the possibility of another such adventure as your last.  But a pirate won't have it all his own way this time if he attempts to meddle with us, I can tell you, for the schooner mounts eight long nines, and carries a long eighteen on her forecastle. I say, Grenvile, can't we manage to have a little cruise on our own account?  The skipper would forgive us, I'm sure, if we were lucky enough to take in a prize or two."
"Not to be thought of, my friend," answered I severely.  "We are to make the best of our way to Sierra Leone--the best of our way, do you understand?  Besides, the brig and we are to sail in company; and Fawcett won't stand any nonsense, even if I were disposed to listen to your suggestion."
At this moment San Domingo came along.  "You want me, Mr Grenvile?" he asked.
"Yes, San Domingo," said I.  "Get the kits of Mr Keene and myself ready, and also your own, as quickly as possible.  We are all to go aboard the schooner."
"Yes, massa, sartinly.  I hab um ready in nex' to no time," answered the negro, with an expansive smile of joy irradiating his face.  "P'rhaps we hab anoder adventure!  Who can say?" he muttered to himself.
It was getting well on toward noon when, both prizes having been thoroughly overhauled, and such deficiencies as were discovered made good from the stores of the _Shark_, Mr Fawcett and I formally took over our own respective commands, and the three craft weighed and made sail in company.
I confess that I felt in exceedingly buoyant spirits, and the pain of my wounds was completely forgotten as, with young Keene beside me, I stumped fore and aft on the short quarter-deck of the schooner and keenly compared her behaviour with that of her bigger companions.  The sea breeze was piping up strong, and there was enough sea running to render the advantage all in favour of the two brigs; yet, notwithstanding this, we were able to spare the _Shark_ our topgallant- sail and still keep pace with her.  But, good as was the schooner, the _Dona Inez_ was better; so much better, indeed, that, in order to avoid running away from us, Fawcett was obliged not only to furl both topgallant-sails, but also to take a single reef in both topsails, while, even then, the brig persisted in creeping ahead, and had to be constantly checked by keeping the weather leaches of her topsails a- shiver.  She was undoubtedly a wonderful craft, and doubtless Fawcett was extremely proud of her.  I fear that poor Captain Bentinck felt somewhat disgusted at the indifferent figure that the _Shark_ was cutting, compared with the other two craft, for he quite unexpectedly made the signal to part company, fired a gun, and went in stays preparatory to bearing away on a southerly course.  A few minutes later San Domingo emerged from the companion with the news that luncheon was ready.
"Very well," said I.  Then to Simpson, who had charge of the deck: "Keep your eye on the commodore, Mr Simpson, and if he should signal, let me know.  And, by the way, you might set the topgallant-sail; I think she will bear it."
"Ay, ay, sir!" answered Simpson with a grin at the "Mr" which I had given him.  "Away aloft there two hands and loose the to'ga'nt-sail. Cast off the clewlines and buntlines, and see all ready to sheet home and hoist away!"
Followed by Keene I dived through the companion, descended the ladder-- which was in reality a staircase,--and entered the little vessel's main cabin.  This was the first time that either Keene or I had been below, and as we passed through the doorway giving access to the apartment, and looked round it, we began to understand the meaning of the negro's ecstatic grin as he stood aside to permit us to enter.  The cabin was a very roomy one for so small a vessel, being about fifteen feet long, and about the same width at the fore end, tapering away aft, of course, in accordance with the shape of the vessel.  It was not, however, the size of the cabin so much that arrested our attention as the general effect of extreme elegance which the apartment presented.  The man who was responsible for its fitting up must have been an individual of distinctly sybaritic tastes.  To begin with, the lockers that ran fore and aft on either side were luxuriously soft and comfortable to sit upon, and were upholstered in rich crimson velvet, with thickly-padded backs of the same material, carried high enough to afford a soft cushion for the back of the head of the sitters to rest upon.  They were wide enough to form a most comfortable couch, and were evidently intended to serve that purpose, for at each end they were furnished with a great pile of richly embroidered silken cushions.  The lining of the cabin above these couches, or lockers, was of bird's-eye maple, highly polished, and divided up into panels by pilasters of polished satinwood, the centre of each panel being occupied by a large circular port or scuttle of very thick, clear glass, set in a stout gun-metal double frame so arranged that the ports could be opened for the admission of air.  Above these ports handsome rods of polished brass, with ornamented ends, were screwed to the panelling, and from these rods depended miniature curtains of crimson velvet, fringed with bullion, which could be drawn when necessary to exclude the too ardent rays of the sun.  On one side of the door in the fore bulkhead stood a very handsome sideboard of polished satinwood, surmounted by a mirror in a massive gilt frame worked into the semblance of a ship's cable, and on the other stood an equally handsome bookcase, well filled with--as we afterwards ascertained--beautifully bound books--romances, poems, and the like--in the Spanish language.  The after bulkhead was adorned with a very fine trophy, in the form of a many-rayed star, composed of weapons, such as swords, pistols, daggers, and axes.  The skylight was very large, occupying nearly half the area of that part of the deck which was over the cabin, and in the centre of it hung a large and exceedingly handsome lamp of solid silver, suspended by massive chains of the same metal, while one end of the skylight was occupied by a barometer hung in gimbals, and the other by a tell-tale compass.  Such an elegant little apartment naturally demanded that all its appointments should correspond, and so they did, for the table--which we afterwards found to be made of solid walnut, polished to the brilliance of a mirror--was covered with an immaculate tablecloth of snowy damask, upon which glittered a table equipage of solid silver, cut glass, and dainty porcelain, with a handsome silver centrepiece filled with recently cut flowers, apparently gathered no later than the previous day in the flower-clad forest on the margin of the river which we had just left.
We gasped with amazement--as well we might--at the sight of this little interior, glowing and sparkling with its evidences of almost palatial luxury, and seated ourselves in silence, for words completely failed us, although it is not a very easy matter to reduce a British midshipman to a condition of speechless astonishment.  Nor indeed did we long remain in that abnormal state, for, after gazing about him for a moment with open mouth and protruding eyes, Keene burst out with:
"Here, you, San Domingo, you black villain, don't stand there grinning until the corners of your mouth reach back under your ears, but come forward and explain yourself.  Where did you find all these things, eh?"
"Massa Keene," protested the negro, "it not right dat young gentleum should call deir faithful servant a `black willain' after him hab work hard to make um conf'ble and keep um bert' tidy aboard dat dirty old _Shark_.  Mos' ungrateful to call black gentleum a willain after all dat I has done for you.  You has hurt my feelin's, sah!"
"Have I?" said Jack.  "Well then, I'm sorry, San Domingo, and apologise most profoundly and profusely and perpetually and peremptorily and--all the other `pers' and `pros' that you can think of.  Now, how is that for a salve to your wounded feelings, eh?"
"Dat all right, sah," answered the black.  "Quite proper dat one gentleum should 'polergize to anoder.  I accep's your 'polergy, sah, mos' gratefully, and will say no more 'bout it.  But it not pleasant, sah, for to be called `black willain' after I hab take de trouble to do all dat"--waving his hand toward the table--"for de pleasure and satisfaction ob--"
I thought it time to interfere and put a stop to the negro's garrulity; so I cut in with:
"Yes, that is all right, San Domingo; but Mr Keene has apologised most fully and handsomely, so we may now regard the incident as closed.  At the same time I would remind you that you have not yet replied to Mr Keene's question as to where you found all these gorgeous table appointments."
"Yes, sah, dat quite true, Mistah Grenvile," replied our sable attendant.  "Well, sah, I find dem all in de steward's pantry--where else?  Ah, gentleum, dis is wery different from de appearance ob de table in de midshipmen's berth aboard de _Shark_, eh?  No tin cups and plates here, sah; no rusty old bread barge; no battered old coffeepot; no not'ing ob dat sort.  And I t'ink, gentleum, dat if you is pleased wid de table 'pointments dat you will be equally so wid de grub dat I shall hab de honour to place before you.  Dis luncheon is not'ing much, just a fresh-cut ham"--lifting a dish-cover--"and a cold boiled tongue"--lifting another.  "But dere is fine white biscuit, such as you nebber see aboard de _Shark_, and on dat sideboard I hab a prime cheese--"
"Yes, everything is most excellent, San Domingo," said I, again interrupting the fellow.  "Now, Keene, what do you say?  Will you have some ham, or some tongue, or a little of both?"
"Thanks!" answered Jack.  "I will take a great deal of both if you don't mind, for somehow I've managed to find an enormous appetite."
Having finished our meal, we went on deck again.  We found that during our absence below the breeze had moderated very considerably, to such an extent, indeed, that Simpson had just sent a hand aloft to loose the royal and main-topmast staysail, and another to cast loose the gaff- topsail.  He was moved thereto, no doubt, by the fact that the brig, which had fallen somewhat astern of us, was also making sail.  We had acquired the habit of regarding the _Shark_ as a decidedly fast ship, but the manner in which the _Dona Inez_ and our own little schooner slid through the water was a revelation to us all, especially when the wind fell quite light, as it did toward the close of the afternoon.  Then, indeed, when our speed had dwindled to about four knots, and our canvas collapsed at every roll of the vessel for lack of wind to fill it, we were able to hold our own with the brig; while still later, when the wind had fallen so light that the horizon had become invisible and the oil-smooth surface of the ocean showed scarcely a wrinkle in its satin- smooth folds to indicate that there was still a faint movement of the atmosphere, we gradually drew ahead of our consort, at the rate of about half a knot per hour, and even contrived to retain command of our little barkie, and keep her head pointed the right way, when the brig had begun to box the compass.
It continued calm until shortly after midnight that night, when a faint breathing came creeping up to us from the eastward, to which we spread our studding-sails, and, an hour later, we were bowling merrily along at a speed of nine knots.  The wind not only held through the night, but freshened with the sunrise, and throughout that day and the succeeding night our speed never fell below eleven knots, while for an hour or so, when it breezed up especially strong, our log showed that we were doing close upon fourteen.
With the dawn of the third day after we had parted company with the _Shark_ we found ourselves about two miles distant from our consort, both vessels steering to the north-westward, with the wind well over our starboard quarter, and our starboard studding-sails set.  The wind was blowing a moderate breeze, there was a long but very regular sea running, and we were doing ten knots very comfortably, the little _Francesca_, sliding over the long liquid hills and down into the broad valleys as easily and buoyantly as a sea gull.  We in the schooner were showing every rag we could spread, but the brig had her royals stowed, in order that she might not run away from us.
At seven o'clock San Domingo entered my cabin with a cup of chocolate, informed me as to the state of the weather, the whereabouts of the brig, and so on, and intimated that it was time for me to turn out if I wished to indulge in my usual luxury of a salt-water bath under the head-pump. I accordingly tumbled out, and, going on deck, made my way forward along the heaving planks into the eyes of the little vessel.  I was just about to place myself under the clear sparkling stream of salt-water that gushed from the spout of the pump when the sound of a loud snap overhead caused me to look aloft, and I saw that the royal halyard had parted, and that the yard was sagging down with its own weight, and the sail bellying out with the pressure of the wind in it.  Jones, the acting boatswain, who had charge of the deck, instantly observed the trifling mishap, and shouted an order for the sail to be temporarily clewed up, and for a hand to go aloft and bend the halyard afresh.  Meanwhile I proceeded to take my bath, and was giving myself a vigorous towelling afterwards, when the man who had gone aloft hailed the deck with the cry of:
"Sail ho! about two points before the starboard beam."
"What does she look like?" demanded the boatswain.
"She's a tidy-sized brigantine or schooner, sir, for I can see the head of her topgallant-sail and gaff-topsail.  She's steerin' pretty much the same way as ourselves, by the look of her."
"Very well, that'll do.  Look alive with that royal halyard there.  We don't want the commodore to signal, askin' us how long we're goin' to take over the job."
"I'll have all ready to sway away in less than a minute, sir; it's been rather a awk'ard job," answered the man.
"Mr Jones," I shouted, "be good enough to signal the commodore that there is a strange sail in the northern board, will you?"
"Ay, ay, sir!" answered Jones; and he dived below for the signal book, which was kept in the main cabin.  A minute later we had temporarily hauled down our main-topmast staysail, to permit a clear view of our flags, and were busily exchanging signals with the brig.  Meanwhile, having dried myself, I went below to dress.
Presently a heavy footstep sounded on the companion ladder and a bunch of horny knuckles rapped at my state-room door.  "Come in," I cried, and as the door opened Jones poked his head in.
"Commodore's signalled us to haul our wind half a p'int, sir," he reported.
"Very good, Mr Jones; have the goodness to do so," I said, and the boatswain vanished.
Upon returning to the deck after the completion of my toilet I found that the brig had, like ourselves, hauled-up half a point, and set her royals, with the result that she was slightly increasing her distance from us.  This change, slight though it was, in the course of the two vessels, caused the stranger and ourselves gradually to approach each other on lines that converged at a very acute angle, and I surmised that Fawcett had set his royals with the twofold object of increasing the speed of his approach toward the stranger, and of avoiding the awakening of any suspicion on the part of that stranger which the sight of a ship with her royals stowed in such moderate weather might be likely to arouse.
By midday we had raised the stranger sufficiently to enable us to see the whole of her royal and just the head of her topgallant-sail from the deck, while from our royal-yard the whole of her canvas was visible down to the top half of her foresail; we were therefore in a position to pronounce not only that she was a brigantine, but also that she was a slashing big craft, probably quite as big as the _Dona Inez_.  As the afternoon wore on, however, we seemed to be raising her no higher, and I came at length to the conclusion that, like ourselves, she had slightly hauled her wind, thus manifesting a distinct if not very strongly marked desire to avoid any closer acquaintance with us, which, in its turn, went far to confirm me in a suspicion which had already arisen within my mind that she was a slaver, probably from the Bonny or the Gaboon, with a cargo of "black ivory" on board.  All the afternoon I maintained a close watch upon the commodore, with the aid of the splendid telescope which we had found aboard the schooner, momentarily expecting him to make some signal which would indicate that he shared my suspicions; but none came, and at length it dawned upon me that he was purposely abstaining from holding any communication with me, lest by doing so he should strengthen any suspicion which the stranger might be entertaining as to our character.  But I noticed that at eight bells in the afternoon watch he again altered his course, hauling up another point; and without receiving any signal from him I promptly did the same.
That we were gradually overhauling the chase was evident from the fact that we were slowly raising her, while she was unable to head-reach upon us; and at sunset we could see the foot of her topsail from the deck while she had not altered her bearing from us by so much as a quarter point since we had last hauled our wind.  And if we in the _Francesca_ were gaining upon her, the _Dona Inez_ was doing so in a still more marked degree, that craft being, at the time last-mentioned, quite eight miles ahead of us, and about two points on our weather bow.  The question now arose in my mind whether she would endeavour to dodge us during the night?  She would find it exceedingly difficult to do so, for there was now a good moon in the sky, affording sufficient light to enable a man with keen eyes to keep a craft at her distance from us in sight without very much trouble; but, on the other hand, there was a very heavy mass of cloud banking up to windward and fast overspreading the sky.  This would obscure the moon later, and perhaps for a time cut off enough of her light to give the stranger a chance, should he wish to avail himself of it.  I therefore sent one of the keenest-sighted men I had with me up on the topsail-yard as soon as it began to grow dusk, with instructions to keep his eye on the stranger and immediately report to me should he happen to lose sight of her.  For we knew, both from hearsay and experience, that the slavers were as wily as foxes, and were in the habit of adopting all sorts of queer expedients to evade pursuit. Not content, therefore, with sending a hand aloft to watch the stranger, I maintained an almost continuous watch upon her myself from the deck with the aid of the _Francesca's_ excellent telescope, which was both a day and a night glass.
Meanwhile the cloud bank continued steadily to overspread the heavens, and at length obscured the moon, shutting off so much of her light that it immediately became difficult in the extreme to discern the chase any longer, even with the assistance of the telescope; and I was not in the least surprised when, a minute or two later, the look-out aloft hailed to say that he had lost sight of her.  But I had not; I could still see her through the glass, although with momentarily increasing difficulty as the pall of cloud crept onward across the sky, ever cutting off more and still more of the moon's light; and at length the moment arrived when I also was compelled to admit to myself that I could no longer see her.  I removed the telescope from my eye for a minute or two to give my strained and smarting eyeballs a rest, and closed my eyelids in order to completely exclude from them even such dim and uncertain light as still remained; then, knowing exactly where to look for the stranger, I once more pointed the instrument in that direction, searching the horizon closely and carefully for the smallest blur that might betray her.  But the effort was useless; she had vanished.
CHAPTER TWELVE.
AN EXCITING CHASE.
Now arose the question: What has become of the chase; had we simply lost sight of her in the growing obscurity, and was she still steering the same course as when last seen, or had her captain availed himself of that obscurity to put in practice some trick in order to give us the slip?
I brought the telescope to bear upon the _Dona Inez_, in the hope of gathering from her actions some clue as to whether or not she still held the chase in view; she was carrying on, holding to her original course, and the inference to be drawn from this was that those aboard could still see the stranger.  But, even as I looked, a string of lanterns soared up to her peak, from which position they were hidden from the chase by the intervention of the brig's head-sails, and when the signal was at length complete I found, as I had quite expected, that it was a question as to whether we still held the stranger in view.  This signal I answered in the negative, by means of a whip from the lee lower yard- arm, keeping the lanterns quite low, in the hope that they would thus escape the observation of the chase, and I then got a second signal from the commodore, which read:
"Steer as at present for one hour, then, failing further orders, haul wind to north-east."
This signal I acknowledged in like manner as the first, and, while doing so, saw that the brig had taken in her studding-sails and hauled her wind.  I noted the time, and found it to be close upon seven o'clock. Half an hour later, while Keene and I were below at dinner, the faint boom of a distant gun came floating down the open skylight to our ears, and Simpson, who had charge of the deck, poked his head down through the opening to make the report:
"Commodore signalling again, sir!"
Snatching the signal book from the locker upon which it had been thrown, I dashed upon deck, and presently, by the light of the binnacle lamps, deciphered the signal as follows:
"Tack to south-east."
"Right!" said I, "answer it.  In studding-sails, Mr Simpson, and then heave about on the port tack.  Keep your eye on the commodore, and also keep a bright look-out to windward for any sign of the chase."
By the time that I got below again, and was once more seated at table, the schooner was in stays, and immediately afterwards the long, easy, floating and gliding movement of a vessel running off the wind was exchanged for the quick, violent, jerking plunge and heavy lee lurches of the same craft driven under a heavy pressure of canvas into a high and steep head-sea.  Ten minutes later I was again on deck.
"I was just thinkin', sir, of takin' in the to'garns'l," remarked Simpson as I joined him on the weather side of our tiny quarter-deck, where he was engaged in a futile endeavour to avoid the heavy showers of spray that were now flying over our weather bow and as far aft as the mainmast.  "She's got a good deal more than she can comfortably carry, and there's nothin' to be gained by whippin' the sticks out of her.  I believe she'd travel quite as fast, and a good deal easier, if that to'garns'l was stowed, sir."
"Any sign of the chase yet, Mr Simpson?" said I.
"No, sir, not when I looked last, there wasn't," answered the carpenter. "The mischief of it is that there's no knowin' where to look for her, and it's as much as a man can do to make out the commodore in this murk."
"Where is the commodore?" demanded I.
"Out there, dead to wind'ard of us, and about four mile away," answered Simpson.  "Better take in the to'garns'l, hadn't we, sir?" he continued, cocking his eye aloft to where in the dim light the spar could be faintly seen whipping and buckling like a fishing rod at every mad plunge and heave of the sorely-overdriven little vessel.  That she was being overdriven was perfectly evident, not only from the tremendous quantity of water that she was shipping forward at every furious dive into the head-sea, but from the steep angle of her decks, which sloped at an inclination of fully forty-five degrees with every lee roll, and from the cataracts of green water that poured in over her lee rail upon every such occasion; her decks, indeed, to leeward were so flooded that no man could have passed along them to leeward without imminent risk of being washed overboard.
"Yes," said I at last, "clew up your topgallant-sail, Mr Simpson, and the topsail also while you are about it.  You are right, the ship is being over pressed, and I believe that what we may lose by taking the square canvas off her will be more than made up to us by our gain in weatherliness.  She will look up nearly a point higher under her fore- and-aft canvas only, and go along very nearly as fast."
Simpson needed no second bidding.  He thought as I did on the matter, and the result proved us correct, for while there was no perceptible diminution in the schooner's speed due to the loss of her square canvas, she looked higher and went along much more easily and comfortably than she had done before, "Now for a look at the commodore," said I, when we had snugged down the little vessel, and I took the telescope from the beckets in which it hung in the companion way.
Yes, there she was, dead to windward of us, driving along, as I could just make out, under her main topgallant-sail; but all was perfectly dark on board her, and there was no sign of the slaver that I could see. But I presumed that they had her in sight from the brig, or we should have heard something from the latter.  For it was at this time very dark, and blowing strong, and the conditions generally were such that the matter of as little as even two or three miles might make all the difference between seeing and not seeing the stranger.
Eight bells came, the watch was called.  Jones, the boatswain, relieved Simpson, and the latter, bidding me good-night, went below.  I explained to Jones our reasons for taking the square canvas off the ship, and he was graciously pleased to express his approval.
"Yes, sir," he said, "I believe you've done the right thing.  Even now the little hooker have got all that she can comfortably carry, and if you was to pile more on to her you'd do no good, but only strain her all to pieces, and open her seams.  The fact is, Mr Grenvile, that these here shallow, beamy craft ain't intended to sail on their sides; bury 'em below their sheer-strake and they begins to drag and to sag at once. We're doin' quite as well as can be reasonably expected in such a sea as this, as is proved by the way that we're keepin' pace with the commodore.  I'll just take his bearin's, for the fun of the thing, and see how much he head-reaches on us durin' the next hour."  Saying which he trotted aft to the binnacle and very carefully took the bearings of the brig, which we both made to be exactly east-south-east.
The hour sped, with no sight or sign of the chase to cheer us, and then Jones and I went to the binnacle to take the bearings of the _Dona Inez_ once more.  The boatswain was a long time getting the bearing to his satisfaction, for the little vessel was leaping and plunging most furiously, and the compass-card was none too steady in the bowl; but at length he stepped back from the binnacle with an air of triumph, exclaiming:
"There, Mr Grenvile, what d'ye make of that, sir?"
Whereupon I, in turn, stepped up to the binnacle, and with equal care took the bearing.
"I make it east and by south, half south," said I.
"And east and by south, half south it is!" answered Jones exultantly. "Which means, sir, that we've head-reached on the brig to the extent of half a p'int within this last hour, and that, too, in a breeze and a sea so heavy that the brig ought to walk away from us hand over hand.  Well, I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it myself; but seein' is believin', I have heard say.  And more than that," he continued, taking up the glass and levelling it at the _Dona Inez_, "I'm blest if I don't believe as we're weatherin' on her too.  Take this glass, Mr Grenvile, and tell me whether you don't think as we've drawed up a bit closer to the commodore since eight bells struck."
To humour the fellow I took the telescope, as requested, and certainly when I got the brig focused in the lens her image appeared to be more distinct and also perceptibly larger than it had been when I last looked at her.
The hours sped on without change of any sort, except that when at length midnight arrived there was no longer any room to doubt that, since we had taken in our square canvas, and thus relieved the overdriven little hooker, we had steadily, if somewhat slowly, head-reached and weathered upon the commodore; and then, as there seemed to be no prospect of any further news from our consort that night, I went below and turned in, leaving instructions that I was to be called at once, without fail, should anything occur to render necessary my presence on deck, or should the commodore exhibit any further signals.  In less than five minutes I was fast asleep.
I was awakened next morning by the loud knocking of the steward at my state-room door.
"Six bells, Mistah Grenvile, sah; and here is your coffee," announced San Domingo, as he stood balancing the cup and saucer in his hand and swaying to the still lively movements of the schooner, although it struck me at once that she was not nearly so lively in her motions as she had been when I turned in at midnight.  I raised myself in my bunk and peered through the closed scuttle that was let into the side of the ship.  The little craft was still lying over far enough to cause the sea to wash up over the glass and obscure the view occasionally, but there were nevertheless intervals of quite long enough duration to enable me to note that the morning was overcast and lowering, with a decided thundery look in the sky, and that the sea had gone down very considerably while I had been lying asleep.
"Well, San Domingo," I said, "are there any signs of the chase?  And where is the commodore?"
"De chase, sah, am about four mile to wind'ard ob us, bearin' about half a point abaft de beam, and de commodore am 'bout a mile and a half astern of us."
"Astern of us--the commodore astern of us, did you say?" exclaimed I incredulously.
"Yes, sah," answered the black, quite unmoved, "dead astern ob us.  We hab both weadered and head-reached on him durin' de night."
"Has he made any signals since I came below?" asked I.
"Not dat I am aware ob," answered the fellow.  "But, if massa wish, I will go on deck and ask Mistah Simpson."
"No, never mind," said I.  "No doubt Mr Simpson would have called me had such been the case.  What canvas are we under?"
"All plain sail, to de royal, sah."
"Very well, that will do," said I, taking the cup and draining it. "Find me my bath towel, San Domingo, and then you may go."
A minute later I was on deck, still in my sleeping rig, and looking about me.  The weather was pretty much as I had judged it to be from the glimpse that I had caught through my state-room port.  As San Domingo had said, the _Dona Inez_ was about a mile and a half so dead astern of us that her two masts were in one, while, in the precise position which the negro had indicated, there lay a fine, spanking brigantine thrashing along under a perfect cloud of canvas to her royal, which, by the way, appeared to have as much hoist, and nearly as much canvas on it, as our topsail.
"Nothing to report, sir," said Simpson, coming up to me as I emerged from the companion.  "We made out the chase about two bells this morning; but I did not call you, sir, as she showed no signs of shiftin' her helm.  And the commodore haven't said a word all night.  I reckon he'll be a bit surprised when he sees where we are."
"To tell you the truth, Simpson, I am `a bit surprised' myself," said I. "She is a wonderful little craft to have beaten the _Inez_ as she has done, and that, too, in a strong breeze."  And, turning away, I went forward and took my usual salt-water bath.
"Now," I meditated, as I took up a position beneath the spout of the head-pump, and signed to the man in charge to get to work, "the rule in chasing when one is abreast, but to the leeward of the chase, is to tack.  I don't like to tack without instructions from my superior officer, because I don't know what his plans may be, and he may have some scheme of his own for the circumventing of our friend yonder; but if I do not hear anything from him by the time that I am ready to go below and dress I will just take the small liberty of asking for instructions.  For of course the brigantine is quite aware by this time that the brig and we are running in couples, therefore there need be no further squeamishness on my part as to an interchange of signals between the brig and myself."
My douche at an end, I walked aft again, and, pausing at the head of the companion ladder, said to Simpson:
"Mr Simpson, be good enough to get out the flags and--"
The carpenter was balancing himself upon the dancing deck as I spoke, with the telescope at his eye, looking at the brig, and I had got so far in my speech when he interrupted me with the exclamation:
"Signal from the commodore, sir!"
"What is it?"  I asked.
He read out the flags to me, and I said:
"All right! acknowledge it."  And I dived below into my cabin, where I at once turned up the signal in the code book.  It consisted of the one word "Tack!"
Hastily closing the book again, I dashed up the companion ladder and shouted to Simpson:
"Mr Simpson, 'bout ship at once, if you please.  And when you are round upon the other tack, and have coiled down, let the men clear away the long gun on the forecastle and get up a few rounds of ammunition.  We may perhaps get a chance to have a slap at that fellow a little later."
"Ay, ay, sir!  Hands 'bout ship!" roared Simpson.  And as I descended again to my state-room to dress, I heard him give the order to "down helm".  The next moment the little hooker rose to an even keel, with a terrific slatting of canvas and whipping of relaxed sheets as she came head to wind; then, after a vicious plunge or two, head-on, into the long seas, she paid off on the opposite tack and heeled over to port. The shivering and slatting of the canvas, with the accompanying tremor of the hull, ceased, and the long, easy, floating plunges and soarings were resumed as she again settled easily into her stride.
"Long gun all ready, sir," reported Simpson when at length I stepped out on deck fully dressed.  "Shall we try a shot?"
"Too far off," said I; "we should not get anywhere near her.  Still, yes, you may waste a charge just by way of letting the fellow understand that we are in earnest.  Give the muzzle a good elevation, and so aim that he may see that we want to pitch a shot across his forefoot.  And at the same time let him see the colour of our bunting."
The shot was accordingly fired and our ensign hoisted; but, so far as the former was concerned, we might as well have saved our powder, for the ball, although very well aimed, fell a long way short.  But it had the effect of causing her to show her colours, which proved to be French.  We fired no more, for there was nothing to be gained by wasting ammunition, and it was quite clear that the stranger had no intention of heaving-to until absolutely compelled to do so.  We held on, therefore, uneventfully, until we were fairly in the brigantine's wake, and then tacked again, without waiting for orders from the commodore.  It was by this time eight o'clock; the watch was called, the boatswain came aft to relieve Simpson, and San Domingo appeared, with the announcement that breakfast was ready.  Before going below, however, I ordered young Keene to bring up my sextant, with which I very carefully measured the angle between the brigantine's main-topmast head and the top of her transom. When I had secured this I clamped the instrument and laid it aside for reference later.  Then I instructed Jones to pick out the best helmsman he could find in his watch and send him aft to the tiller, explaining my reason for so doing.
"After our performance of last night," said I, "I think we need have no fear as to our ability to overhaul that brigantine.  But I want to do more than that; I want not only to overhaul her, but also to eat out to windward of her, so cutting off her escape in that direction.  And, to accomplish this, and thus bring her the sooner to action, if she means to fight, we must have a thoroughly good man at the tiller, one who will let her go along clean full, yet at the same time coax and humour the little barkie every inch to windward that he can."
"Yes, sir, I perfectly understands," answered the boatswain.  "I knows exactly what you wants, Mr Grenvile, and I've got the very man for the job.  I'll see to it, sir."  And he took the tiller rope out of the hands of the man who was steering, giving him instructions to "send Bill Bateman aft."
I found young Keene in high feather at the prospect of a tussle with so formidable an opponent as the brigantine promised to be, and we dispatched our breakfast in double-quick time, after which my lighthearted companion got out his pistols and proceeded to clean and load them carefully in anticipation of the moment when they might be needed.  And when this was done he went forward to supervise personally the sharpening of his sword by the armourer.  Meanwhile I took my sextant on deck, and had another squint through it at the chase.  It was satisfactory to find that we were overhauling her rapidly.  Then, having secured an observation of the sun for the determination of our longitude, I gave orders to clear for action, an operation which, in the case of so small a hooker as the _Francesca_, was a very simple matter. We had just completed all our preparations comfortably when Jones called my attention to the fact that the commodore was in stays, and presently she was round on the other tack and heading well up for us.  But so far had we gained on her that, when at length we crossed her hawse, there was quite two miles of clear water between us.  I commented upon this singular fact to Jones, remembering that when we parted company with the _Shark_ the _Dona Inez_ was distinctly the better sailer of the two, while now we were beating her in her own weather.
"It's not very difficult to understand, sir," answered Jones.  "The fact is that then we didn't know this here little beauty, and how to get the best out of her, while now we does.  That's all that there is about it."
And, as I could not otherwise understand the phenomenon, I was obliged to accept that explanation, and be satisfied with it.
Six bells arrived, by which time the commodore was once more in our wake, having tacked again, while we had clawed out about half a mile to windward of the chase, and drawn so close to her that I determined to try the effect of another shot from the long eighteen upon her.  The gun was accordingly reloaded, carefully trained, and the schooner luffed sufficiently to bring the gun to bear clear of our head gear.  At the proper moment the gunner, who was squinting along the sights, gave the order to fire.  The linstock was applied, the gun exploded, shaking the little vessel to her keel, and as the helm was put up to keep her away again, all eyes were strained to note the effect of the shot.  It struck the water fair and true close astern of the chase, but without doing any damage, so far as we could see.  But it was soon apparent that it had fallen too close to her to be pleasant, for the next moment her fore- rigging was alive with men, who swarmed up on to her yards as she put her helm up and kept away upon a south-westerly course, with the wind well over her port quarter.  And that her skipper was a taut hand, who kept his men well up to the mark, was immediately afterwards evidenced by the wonderful man-o'-war-like rapidity with which they rigged out their studding-sail booms, and set a whole cloud of studding-sails on their port side.
"Up helm and keep her away!"  I shouted as I saw what the brigantine was at.  "Away aloft there and out booms--get the larboard stu'n'sails upon her as quick as you please, lads.  Steady as you go," to the man at the helm.  "How's her head?"
"Sou'-west and by west, half west, sir," answered the man.
"Keep her at that," said I.  The course which we were then steering was about half a point higher than that of the brigantine, and by following this I hoped to drop into her wake again in due time without losing any ground.
We were now once more running off the wind, and the quick, jerky motions of the schooner had given place to a series of long, easy, buoyant, floating movements, much more conducive to accurate shooting than those which had preceded them.  I therefore resolved to try the effect of at least one more shot from the long gun, especially as it became apparent that the brig had at last found herself upon her best point of sailing, and was gradually creeping up to us, while I was anxious to have to myself the honour and glory of bringing the brigantine to action without the assistance of the commodore.  I therefore gave orders to reload the forecastle gun, and to aim high, with the object of disabling the chase aloft, and so clipping her wings.  The gun was accordingly made ready and, at the proper moment, fired, the gunner waiting until a surge had swept under the little vessel and she was just settling into the trough in the rear of it, with her stern down in the hollow and her bows pointing skyward.  Again came the flash, the jarring concussion, the jet of white smoke; and a moment later young Keene, who, in his excitement, had scrambled half-way up the fore-rigging, to note the effect of the shot better, gave a cheer of exultation.
"Hurrah!" he yelled; "bravo, Thompson! well shot--clean through his topsail, and a near shave of clipping the topmast out of her."
We presently fired again, this time cutting the royal stunsail sheet and setting the sail violently flapping, with the result that it had to be taken in before the sheet could be spliced.  But we were not to be allowed to have matters all our own way very much longer, for while we were reloading the long gun a jet of flame, followed by a puff of white smoke, like a little wad of white cotton wool, suddenly leaped from the brigantine's stern port, and a 9-pound shot came whistling overhead, neatly bringing down our fore topgallant-mast, with all attached, on its way.  We were now in a very pretty pickle, forward, for it was our wings that were clipped, much more effectually than we had clipped those of the chase; and now, too, the commodore came romping up to us, hand over hand.  We were, however, not yet beaten, by a long way, and while a good strong gang was at once sent aloft to clear away the wreck, we on deck kept up a brisk and persistent fire upon the chase with our long gun. But whether it was that Thompson's hand had lost its cunning, or that the flapping and banging of the wreckage overhead disconcerted him and spoiled his aim, certain it is that we made no more hits just then.
By the time that our wreckage had been cleared away, and everything made snug aloft once more, the commodore had forged ahead of us, and had begun to open fire, the brigantine returning his fire briskly from one stern port while she peppered us from the other.  And presently a further misfortune, and this time a very serious one, overtook us, it happening that we both fired at the same instant, and while our shot clipped off the brigantine's topmast-studding-sail boom like a carrot, close in by the boom-iron, his shot passed through our topsail, so severely wounding the topmast on its way that, before anything could be done to save the spar, it snapped short off about half-way up its length; and there we were again, hampered with a further lot of wreckage to clear away.
Meanwhile the commodore, profiting by the damage that we had inflicted upon the brigantine, rapidly overhauled her.  The two craft maintained a brisk fire upon each other until, the _Dona Inez_ having ranged up alongside the chase, they both took in their studding-sails and went at it, hammer and tongs, broadside to broadside.  This continued until, the brig's fore-topmast having been shot away, she broached-to and ran foul of the brigantine, to which she promptly made herself fast by means of her grappling irons.  And the next moment the cessation of the gun fire, the flashing of cutlass blades in the sun, and the popping of pistols told us that the boarders were at work.
"Avast there with the long gun!"  I cried.  "Boarders, stand by!  Mr Keene, have the goodness to take charge.  Stand by your halyards, men, and be ready to settle away everything, fore and aft, as we range alongside.  Stand by also with your grappling irons.  Mr Keene, we will range up on the brigantine's port side."
"Oh, Dick, you might let me go with you, old chap; I've got my sword sharpened and my pistols ready expressly for the purpose of boarding!" pleaded Jack.
"Can't possibly, my dear boy," answered I.  "Somebody must look after the schooner, and you're that somebody; so please say no more about it. Now, lads," I continued, "we must make short work of this business; for if these craft lie alongside each other for ten minutes, in this sea, they will grind each other to pieces, and we shall all go to the bottom together.  So strike, and strike hard, the moment that you find yourselves on the enemy's decks.  Mr Jones, tell off six men to remain in the schooner with Mr Keene."
Five minutes later and we were within half a cable's-length of the brigantine, on the decks of which a fierce and stubborn conflict was still raging; and it appeared to me that the commodore and his party were finding all their work cut out to avoid being driven back on the deck of their own ship.
"Settle away fore and aft," I cried.  "Main and fore halyards, peak and throat; jib halyards, let go; man your downhauls; and then muster in the waist, starboard side.  Steady, Jack, starboard you may; steady, so. Now stand by your grapnels--heave!  Hurrah lads, follow me, and take care that none of you drop between the two hulls!"
The next instant we were all leaping and scrambling, pell-mell, in over the bulwarks of the brigantine and leaping down on her decks, which were already slippery with blood and cumbered with killed and wounded. Fortunately, by boarding on the brigantine's port side, as we did, we took her crew in their rear, which so greatly disconcerted them--while our appearance imparted fresh courage to the commodore's party--that after vainly striving to stand against us for nearly a minute, some flung down their weapons and cried for quarter, while the remainder made a clean bolt of it forward and darted down the fore scuttle, which we promptly closed upon them.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN.
SIERRA LEONE.
The brigantine was ours, and, my first thought being for the safety of all three of the craft, I at once gave orders for the grappling irons to be cast loose, and for the brig and schooner to haul off to a safe distance.  Then, looking round the deck of the brigantine, I noticed Freeman, the acting master of the _Dona Inez_, away aft, with his coat off, and one of his own men binding up the wounded arm of the officer. I hastened aft.
"Not seriously hurt, Freeman, I hope?" said I.
"Hullo, Grenvile, that you?" he returned.  "No, thanks; rather painful, but not very serious, I hope.  By Jove, but those Frenchmen fought stubbornly; if you had not come up in the very nick of time it would have gone pretty badly with us, I can tell you.  You seem to have come off scot free, by the look of you."
"Yes, I am all right, thanks--not a scratch," said I.  "But where is Mr Fawcett?  I don't see him aboard here."
"No," answered Freeman, "poor chap! he is below, aboard the brig, and I am afraid it is a bad job with him.  The last broadside that this craft fired into us was at pretty close quarters, as you perhaps noticed, and the skipper was very severely wounded by a large splinter--abdomen torn open.  Hamilton, the assistant surgeon, is greatly afraid that it will go badly with him."
"By Jove," said I, "I am awfully sorry to hear that!  Could he see me, do you think?"
"I really don't know," answered Freeman; "Hamilton is the man of whom you must ask that question.  Your best plan, I think, will be to go aboard as soon as possible.  Meanwhile, I suppose you will take charge and make all necessary arrangements."
"Certainly," I said.  "You, of course, will take command of the brig, and Keene must take command here, with just enough men to enable him to handle the ship, which, by the by, has a full cargo of slaves aboard, I perceive."  There could be no possible doubt as to this last, for there was a thin, bluish-white vapour of steam curling up through the gratings which closed the hatchways, the effluvium emanating from which was almost unendurable.
"You," I continued, "had better get back aboard the brig and set your crew to work to repair your damages aloft as quickly as possible--all other damage must remain until we arrive at Sierra Leone.  I will do the same as soon as I have seen the prisoners properly secured.  Our own damages are but slight, and as soon as I have put matters in train aboard the schooner I will send Simpson and a party aboard here to see to things, while I go aboard you to hear what Hamilton has to say.  But we shall have to use the brigantine's boats, I expect, to get back to our own craft.  I have not left enough hands with Keene to enable him to send a boat."
This arrangement we duly carried out; but, owing to one delay and another, it was nearly three o'clock that afternoon when I was able to pay my promised visit to the brig, by which time Hamilton had coopered up all his most serious cases and was able to spare me a moment.
"Ah, Grenvile," he exclaimed, as I descended into the brig's cabin, which, by the way, was almost as sumptuously arranged as that of the _Francesca_, and which the medico was then using as a surgery.  "I am glad to see you and to learn that you don't need any of my delicate attentions!  The skipper is very anxious to see you, poor chap, but he would not signal for you to come aboard, as Freeman told him that you intended coming as soon as possible, but that, in the meantime, you had your hands pretty full looking after things in general.  This affair has been as sharp a thing of its kind as I have ever known, I think."
"And how is he now, Hamilton?  Do you think he can see me without detriment to himself?"  I asked.
"Certainly, if he is not asleep, as to which I will investigate," was the reply.  "It will not harm him to see you," continued Hamilton; "on the contrary, it may do him good.  For I fancy that he wishes to arrange certain matters with you, and when he has done that he will perhaps be able to compose himself and give himself a chance.  Not that I think there is much hope for him; I tell you that candidly.  But for pity's sake don't let your manner to him betray the fact that we are taking a very serious view of his case.  If we can get him ashore, and into the hospital alive, he may perhaps pull round; so pray shove ahead with your repairs as fast as possible, and carry on like fury when you fill away again."
"Trust me," said I.  "If `carrying on' will _get_ him ashore alive, I'll do it.  And now perhaps you had better ascertain whether I can see him or not, for the sooner I am free again to look after matters the sooner shall we be able to make a start."
Without further loss of time Hamilton tiptoed to the door of the skipper's state-room, and, having very gently turned the handle and looked in, beckoned me to enter.
"Mr Grenvile to see you, sir," said the surgeon, ushering me in.
"Ah, Mr Grenvile, come in; I am glad to see you," said the poor fellow, extending his hand to me.  "Make room for yourself on that sofa locker there; never mind my clothes, pitch them down anywhere, I shall never want them again."
"Oh, I don't know, sir!" said I, affecting to misunderstand him, as I took the garments one by one and hung them upon hooks screwed to the bulkhead.  "This coat, for instance," said I, holding it up, "will clean very well, I should think, but the waistcoat and trousers--well, I'm afraid you will need new ones, for these seem to be past repairing."
"You misunderstand me, Grenvile," he said.  "But never mind, we'll not talk about that just now; I have other and more important matters that I wish to speak about.  And first of all, as to our losses, I fear they have been very heavy, have they not?"
"No, sir," said I.  "On the contrary, they are very light indeed, compared with those of the enemy.  We have lost only five killed and eleven wounded, your case being the most serious of the latter, and Hamilton tells me that he hopes to have all hands of you up and as hearty as ever within the month."
"Does he--does he really say that?  God be thanked for that good news!" exclaimed the poor fellow with more energy than I could have expected from a man presenting such a ghastly appearance as he did.  For his cheeks were sunken, and white as chalk, and his lips were quite blue. "The fact is, Grenvile," he continued, "that I don't want to die yet, if I can help it; not that I am not prepared to die, if it be God's will to take me, for, thanks be to Him, I am ready to go at any moment, if the call should come, as all men should be, especially soldiers and sailors, who are peculiarly liable to receive their summons at a moment's notice. No, it is not that, but I should like to live a little longer, if it might be so, for--for many reasons, the chief of which is that I have a wife at home--whose--whose heart--"
The dear fellow was getting a little excited, I saw, and that, of course, would be bad for him, so I cut in:
"Never fear, sir," I exclaimed cheerily.  "You will ride this squall out all right, I've not a doubt of it.  You must not judge by your present feelings, you know.  Just now you are exhausted with loss of blood and the pain of your wound, but I intend to carry on and get you ashore and in hospital within the next three days, please God, and once you are out of this close cabin, and in a nice airy ward, with proper nurses to look after you, you will begin to pull round in a way that will astonish you. You are in no danger, sir; Hamilton told me so, and I should think he ought to know."  It was useless to lie unless it were done boldly, and I inwardly prayed that my pious fraud might be forgiven.
"Well, well, I hope so," the poor fellow gasped.  "At all events I will try to hold on until we arrive, and then perhaps I may get my step.  If I got that--"
"Get your step, sir?"  I cut in again.  "Of course you will get it!  I only wish I were half as certain of getting the ten thousand a year that my uncle has promised to leave me when he dies.  Get your step?  Why, sir, it is as good as in your pocket already."
"You think so?" asked he doubtfully.  "I wish I could feel as sure of it as you do, my boy--ay, I wish I could feel as sure of it as I am that you will get your commission--for get it you shall, if anything I can say will help you to it.  And that reminds me, Grenvile, that I wish to say how perfectly satisfied and highly pleased I have been with your conduct and gallantry in this affair.  You handled your schooner with the very best of judgment, and indeed, but for you the fellow might have slipped away from us altogether.  I will take care to make that quite clear to the commodore in my report to him."
I thanked him very heartily for his exceedingly kind intentions toward me, and then we passed on to the discussion of certain other matters, with the details of which I need not weary the reader; and when I left him, an hour later, Hamilton assured me that his patient, although exhausted with his long talk, was none the worse, but rather the better, for my visit.  "You have taken him out of himself, diverted his thoughts into a more cheerful channel, and it has done him good.  We must play up that `step' business to the very last ounce," he concluded.
When I went on deck, upon leaving poor Fawcett, I was gratified to find that the making good of damages aboard the brig was progressing apace, and that Freeman would be ready to make sail about sunset, while aboard the prize they were all ataunto again, with the damaged sails unbent and sent down, and fresh ones bent in their place.  The schooner also had sent up and rigged a new topmast, set up the rigging, got the yards across, and the topsail set, with topgallant-sail and royal all ready for sheeting home.  I therefore at once proceeded on board my own little hooker and packed Master Jack off, bag and baggage, to take charge of the prize, to that young gentleman's ineffable pride and delight.  Then, as soon as all was ready we made sail in company, and, carrying on day and night, arrived at our destination without further adventure early in the afternoon of the third day after our engagement with the slaver.
I had, of course, during the passage, made frequent enquiries each day as to the progress of poor Fawcett, but the best news that they could give me was that, while he seemed to be no worse, he was certainly no better.  As soon, therefore, as the anchors were down I went alongside the brig, and having dispatched a messenger ashore in the schooner's gig with a message to the hospital authorities, proceeded with the difficult and delicate job of conveying the invalid ashore.  To facilitate this the carpenter of the brig had, under Hamilton's supervision, prepared a light but strong framework, somewhat of the nature of a cot, with stout rope slings attached thereto, and when all was ready for the patient's removal this was placed on the cabin table, and six stout fellows then entered the state-room, and, carefully lifting the wounded man, bed and all, out of his bunk, gently carried him into the main cabin and laid him, just as he was, on the cot or stretcher.  This we fortunately accomplished without seriously discomposing our patient, and the surgeon then administered a soothing draught, the effect of which was to put the sufferer to sleep in a few minutes.  Hamilton having foreseen that it would be practically impossible to convey the stretcher and its burden up on deck by way of the companion ladder without injury to the patient, had caused some planks to be removed from the fore bulkhead, thus making a passage into the main hold, through which we now carried the stretcher, laying it gently down on the slave-deck immediately beneath the main hatch.  Then the slings of the concern were hooked on to a tackle which had been lowered down the hatchway, and our patient was next not only hoisted up through the hatchway, but also slung over the side and lowered down into the stern-sheets of a boat waiting alongside to receive him.  The rest was easy; we pulled ashore, lifted our burden--still on the stretcher--out of the boat, and carried him up to the hospital, where he was at once placed in a bed that had been made ready to receive him.  And all this without awaking him, so that when at length he opened his eyes it was to find himself comfortably settled in a fine, light, airy ward, with one of the hospital surgeons re-dressing his wound.  The change did him immediate good, and before I left the building I had the satisfaction of learning that there was a possibility of his recovery, although very little likelihood that he would ever be fit for active service again.  Meanwhile the rest of the wounded, or rather such of them as it was deemed advisable to place in the hospital, had also been taken ashore, and I was free to attend to other matters.
It is not necessary to describe in detail the conduct of all the business that I found it would be necessary for me to transact.  Suffice it to say that I had a most satisfactory interview with the commodore of the station, at the end of which he complimented me very highly upon what he was pleased to designate as "the sound judgment and great gallantry" with which I had played my part, not only in the capture of the brigantine, but also in the affair of the _Indian Queen_.  And, as a crowning mark of his approval, he presented me with an acting order as lieutenant, with an assurance that I might trust to him to see it confirmed.  Emboldened by this favourable reception on the part of the great man, I ventured to hint that I believed poor Fawcett's recovery would be greatly hastened if he could be reasonably assured of getting his promotion, to which the old fellow very kindly replied:
"Leave that to me, my lad, leave that to me; I am not so very old yet that I am not able to remember how you youngsters feel in the matter of promotion, or to sympathise with you.  I shall probably be seeing Mr Fawcett to-day, and I venture to hope that my visit will do him more good than all the doctors in the hospital.  Come and dine with me to- night; I want to hear the story of that _Indian Queen_ affair in a little more detail, and there are other matters upon which I may have something to say to you.  And bring your shipmate--what did you say his name is?  Keene--ah, yes, bring Mr Keene with you!"
Full of elation at the good news that I felt I had to communicate to Fawcett, I hurried to the hospital, and found, to my regret, that he was not quite so well, having exhibited some symptoms of a relapse, and the doctor therefore seemed at first somewhat disinclined to let me see him. But upon explaining to him that I had a little bit of very good news to communicate, he said:
"That, of course, makes a great difference.  Yes, you may see him, for five minutes, which I suppose will be long enough to communicate your good news, and then come away again.  You know your way up.  Look in here on your return, and let me know the result of your interview."
I went up, and found the poor fellow looking very haggard and ill, but he brightened up somewhat upon my entrance; perhaps he read good news in my jubilant expression.
"Well, what is it, Grenvile?" he said.  "You look as though you have something good to tell me."
"I have," said I, pretending not to notice his altered looks.  "I have, although perhaps I am not acting quite fairly by the commodore in forestalling him.  He is coming to see you, sir, and, although he did not absolutely state as much in so many words, I have not the slightest doubt that he intends to give you your step.  He has given me an acting order, and he therefore cannot, in common fairness, withhold your promotion from you.  But naturally he would not take me into his confidence and categorically state his intentions toward you before mentioning the matter to you.  But I feel as certain that you will get your step as I do that I am at this moment sitting by your bedside."
"Well, that is good news indeed, and I thank you for so promptly bringing it to me," exclaimed the invalid.  "And I must not forget to congratulate you, Grenvile, upon your good luck, which, I tell you plainly, I think you fully deserve.  But, although an acting order is an excellent thing in its way, you will have to pass before you can get it confirmed, you know.  Have you served your full time at sea yet?"
"Yes," said I; "completed it last month.  But it is rather awkward about having to pass, though.  I fear there is very little likelihood of my being able to go for my examination here."
"That is as may be," returned the lieutenant.  "Anyhow, you cannot get away from here just yet; and it may be--I don't say it will, but it may be--that an opportunity may occur before you leave.  How did the commodore treat you; did he seem fairly favourably disposed to you?"
"Yes, indeed," said I.  "`Fairly favourably' hardly describes his manner to me.  I should have spoken of it as `very favourably'."
"Well, I am right glad to hear it, and I congratulate you most heartily. You say that the old boy is coming to see me.  Now, understand, boy, if I can put in a good word for you without shoving it in, bows first, and knocking the old gentleman's eye out with the flying-jib-boom, I will."
The worthy fellow was now quite a different man from what he had been when I entered the room a few minutes earlier; I therefore thought this a favourable opportunity to top my boom and haul off; so, thanking him very sincerely for his kind intentions in my favour, I shook hands and bade him good day, promising to look in again upon him on the morrow.
Keene and I duly dined with the commodore that evening; and when the cloth had been removed, and the servants had retired, the old gentleman said:
"Well, Mr Grenvile, I called upon your friend Fawcett this afternoon, and had a fairly long chat with him, in spite of the doctors.  The poor fellow will never be of any further use afloat, I am afraid; but he may yet do good service ashore if those fellows can patch him up sufficiently to enable him to go home.  And I think they will; yes, I think they will.  He was very much better when I left than when I arrived;" and the old boy's eyes twinkled good-humouredly.  "It is wonderful," he continued, "what a little promotion will do for a man in his condition.  Talking of promotion, I mentioned to him that I had given you an acting order, at which he seemed greatly pleased; and he said several things about you, young gentleman, which I shall not repeat, but which I was very pleased to hear, since they all go to confirm the good opinion of you that I have already formed.  But he reminded me that before your acting order can be confirmed you must pass your examination.  Now, do you feel yourself to be in trim to face the examiners at any moment?"
"Yes, sir," said I, "provided, of course, that they don't try to bother me with `catch questions' of a kind that have no real bearing upon one's practical capabilities.  I have worked fairly hard from the moment when I first entered the service; my character will bear investigation; I am a pretty good seaman, I believe; and Mr Teasdale, our master aboard the _Shark_, was good enough to report to the sk-- to Captain Bentinck, only the other day, that I am a trustworthy navigator."
"Good enough to take a ship across the Atlantic, for instance, without assistance?" asked the old gentleman.
"Yes, sir," said I.  "I would not hesitate to take a ship anywhere, if required."
"Good!" exclaimed the commodore; "I like your confident way of speaking. I like to see a young fellow who believes in himself.  Well, well, we shall see, we shall see."
Then he asked me to relate to him the whole story of the loss of the _Dolores_ and of the _Indian Queen_ incident, "from clew to earing", as he put it; and I told him the complete yarn, as he sat cross-legged in his low lounging chair, with a cheroot stuck in the corner of his mouth, listening, nodding his head from time to time, and frequently breaking in with a question upon some point which he wished to have more fully explained.  He also put Master Jack pretty completely through his facings, so that, when at length we rose to go, he had acquired a very fair amount of information relating to us both.
The Mixed Commission sat a few days later to adjudicate upon our prizes, with the result that all three were duly condemned; and we thus became entitled to a very nice little sum of prize money, for there was not only the value of the three craft, but also the head money upon the brigantine's cargo of slaves.  Upon the declaration of judgment by the court the three vessels were promptly advertised for sale by auction, and brought to the hammer some three weeks later.  As it was well known that all three were exceptionally fast craft the competition for their possession was expected to be particularly brisk, and the event justified the expectation, for upon the day appointed for the sale the attendance was a record one and the bidding remarkably spirited.  To such an extent, indeed, was this the case that many of the knowing ones present hazarded the confident conviction that some of the bidders present would probably be found--if the truth about them could but be ascertained--to be secret agents of slavers, and that the vessels would, at no very distant date, be found to be employed again in their former trade.  The brig was the first craft offered for sale, and after a very spirited competition she was ultimately knocked down to a Jew marine- store dealer at a very handsome figure.  Then followed the brigantine, which also realised an exceedingly satisfactory price.  With the disposal of this craft the competition slackened very considerably, which was not to be wondered at, for the schooner, although a smart little craft, was not nearly so valuable--especially from a slave trader's point of view--as either of the others; yet when she was at length knocked down she went for her full value, and, on the whole, the parties most intimately concerned had every reason to be very well satisfied with the total result of the sale.  It was not until the next morning that the fact was allowed to leak out that the _Francesca_, had been purchased into the service.  Meanwhile I had practically nothing to do, and I therefore spent most of my time in study, preparing myself for my examination, so that I might be ready to avail myself of the first opportunity to pass that should present itself.  I filled in the gaps by visiting Fawcett at the hospital, and I was pleased to find that since the cheering visit of the commodore he had been making very satisfactory progress.
It was on the afternoon of the day succeeding the sale of the prizes that the commodore sent for me.
"Well," said he when I presented myself, "I suppose you are beginning to feel rather tired of kicking your heels about ashore here, are you not?"
"Yes, sir," I said, "I must confess that I am, especially now that Mr Fawcett seems to be progressing so satisfactorily toward convalescence. I had hoped that the _Shark_ would have been in ere this; for although I have not been altogether wasting my time, I feel that I am not earning my pay; moreover, I prefer a more active life than I am leading here."
"Quite right, young man, quite right," approved the commodore.  "Nothing like active service for an ambitious young fellow like yourself.  I understand that you have been working up for your examination lately. Well, to be quite candid with you, I don't think your chances of passing here are very bright--not because I consider you unfit to pass, mind you, but because it may be some time before an opportunity offers.  But that is a misfortune which, perhaps, may be remedied.  You have heard, I suppose, that your schooner has been purchased into the service?"
"Yes, sir, I have," said I, all alert in a moment, for I hoped that this abrupt reference to the transaction boded good for me.  "And I was exceedingly glad to hear it," I went on, "for she is a very smart, handy little vessel, and may be made exceedingly useful in many ways."
"So I thought, and therefore I bought her," remarked the old gentleman. "It was my original intention to have made her a tender to the _Shark_-- in which capacity she would no doubt have proved, as you say, exceedingly useful; and I may further tell you that, subject to Captain Bentinck's approval, I intended to have put you in command of her.  But certain news which has reached me this morning has altered all my plans concerning her, at all events for the present, and instead of making her a tender to the _Shark_ I now propose to send her across to the West Indies with dispatches of the utmost importance.  You will therefore be so good as to proceed on board forthwith and take the command, give all her stores a thorough overhaul, and report to me what deficiencies, if any, require to be made good in order to fit her for the voyage across the Atlantic.  I have issued instructions for your former crew to be turned over to her from the depot ship, and it will be as well, perhaps, for you to take over half a dozen extra hands from the late prize crew of the brig.  I should like to be able to give you Mr Freeman as master, but I can't spare him; so you will have to be your own navigator.  By the way, what sort of a navigator is Keene?"
"Oh," I said, laughingly, "he can fudge a day's work as well as most people, sir!"
"Ah," said the old gentleman, "I wonder whether you boys will ever be brought to understand that `fudging' is no good, except to bamboozle the master!  How would any of you manage if by chance it fell to you to take a ship into port, and you could only `fudge' a day's work?  Well, you shall take him with you; but hark ye, my lad, for his own sake you must make him stick to his work and do it properly, so that he may be ready for any emergency that may happen to come along.  Come and dine with me to-night, and bring the young monkey with you.  I'll talk to him like a Dutch uncle, and see if I can't stir him up to a sense of his responsibilities.  One word more, my lad.  An opportunity to pass may occur while you are over yonder; and if it does, I very strongly advise you to seize it."
"Be assured that I will, sir," exclaimed I.  "And--oh, sir, I really don't know how to express my gratitude to you for giving me such a splendid--"
"There, there, never mind about that, boy," interrupted the old fellow hurriedly.  "I know all that you would say, so there is no need for you to repeat it.  As to gratitude, you can best show that by proving yourself worthy of the trust that I am putting in you, as I have no doubt you will.  Now, run along and get aboard your ship, and the sooner you can report yourself ready for sea, the better I shall be pleased with you.  Don't forget to-night--seven sharp!"
I was probably the most elated young man on the West Coast that afternoon as I hurried from the commodore's presence and made my way aboard the sweet little _Francesca_, where I found the whole of my former crew, Keene included, already installed.
"Hullo, Grenvile, what is the meaning of this?" was his enquiry as I went up the vessel's low side and passed through the gangway.  "What's in the wind?  Here have we all been turned over at a moment's notice, and there are already rumours floating about that we sail to-night."
"No," said I, "it is not quite so bad as that, but it means that we are bound to the West Indies at the earliest possible moment, and it also means, Jack, you villain, that I have received strict orders from the commodore to work you down until you are as fine and as sharp as a needle.  You will hear more about it to-night, my lad, when you and I go to dine with him, so stand by and look out for squalls!"
"The West Indies?  Hooray!" cried Jack.  "The land of beauty and romance, of solitary cays with snug little harbours, each of them sheltering a slashing pirate schooner patiently waiting for us to go and cut her out; the land of fair women and hospitable men, the land of sugar plantations, lovely flowers, and delicious fruits, the land of-- of--"
"Disastrous hurricanes, furious thunderstorms, yellow fever, poisonous reptiles, the horrible mysteries of voodoo worship, and so on, and so on," I cut in.
"Oh, you be hanged!" retorted Jack recklessly.  "It's a precious sight better than this pestilential West Coast at all events, say what you will.  And as to work, that's all right; I don't care how hard you work me in reason, Dick.  I know that I've been an atrociously lazy beggar, always more ready to skylark than to do anything useful, but I'm going to turn over a new leaf now; I am, indeed--you needn't look incredulous; I've wasted time enough, and I intend now to buckle to and make myself useful.  And the commodore may `jacket' me as much as he pleases to- night--I know I deserve it--and I'll say nothing, but just promise to be a good boy in future.  He's a jolly, kind-hearted old chap, and I don't care who hears me say so!"
"Well done, Jack!" said I; "I've not heard you talk so much in earnest for a long time.  But, joking aside, I am very glad indeed, old fellow, to hear that you are going to turn over a new leaf.  As you very truly say, you have wasted time enough; the moment has arrived when, if you wish to make headway in your profession, as I suppose you do, you must begin to take life seriously, and realise that you were not sent into the world merely to skylark, although skylarking, within reasonable limits and at the proper time, is possibly a harmless enough amusement."
CHAPTER FOURTEEN.
THE PIRATE BRIG AGAIN?
We duly dined with the commodore that night, and I was able to promise him that he should have my complete requisition before noon the next day, at which he expressed himself much pleased.  And after dinner, when the cloth had been drawn and the servants had retired, the dear old gentleman gave us both a very long and serious talking-to, which did us both a great deal of good, and for which I, at least, and Jack, too, I believe, felt profoundly grateful.  We were a pair of very sober lads when at length we bade him good-night and made the best of our way aboard the saucy little _Francesca_.  Jack and I got to work at daylight next morning, and by dint of really hard labour I was not only able to keep my promise of the previous night to the commodore, but to do rather better, for it was barely eleven o'clock when I entered his office and handed him my requisition.  He read it very carefully through from beginning to end, asked me if I felt quite certain that it embodied the whole of my requirements, and, upon my replying that I was, at once signed it, bidding me to be off at once to get it executed and then to report to him.  I saw that he was very anxious for me to get away as quickly as possible, and I therefore went straight from him to the various people concerned, and badgered them so unmercifully that the bulk of my requirements were alongside that same evening, while by breakfast-time on the following morning the last boatload had come off, and I felt myself free to go ashore, leaving Jack in charge, and report myself ready for sea.
I was at the office even before the commodore that morning, and he expressed himself as being much gratified at the expedition with which I had completed my preparations.  Then he unlocked his desk, and, extracting two packets therefrom, said, as he handed them to me:
"There are your written instructions, and there are the dispatches, which I charge you to take the utmost care of and guard with your life, if necessary, for they are of the most vital importance.  So important, indeed, are they that I tell you frankly I should not feel justified in entrusting them to so youthful an officer as yourself, had I anybody else that I could send.  But I have not, therefore I cannot help myself, and I have every confidence that you will do your very utmost to carry out my instructions in their entirety.  These are, that you proceed to sea forthwith, and make the best of your way to Kingston, in Jamaica, carrying on night and day, and pausing for nothing--nothing, mind you, for this is a matter in which hours, ay, and even minutes, are of importance.  If you should happen to be attacked you must of course fight, but not otherwise, remember that!  And if there should be any prospect of your being captured, wait until the last possible moment, until all chance of escape is gone, and then sink the packet.  Remember, it must on no account be allowed to fall into the hands of the enemy. And upon your arrival at Kingston you are at once to make your way to the admiral, let the hour be what it will, day or night, and place the packet in his own hands.  There, I need say no more now, for you will find all these matters fully set out in your written instructions.  And now, good-bye, my boy, and God speed you safely to your destination!  I know not what may lie before you on the other side, or whether we shall ever meet again in this world; but remember that in me you will always find a friend ready to help you to the best of his ability, and who will always be glad to hear of your welfare.  Good-bye, lad, and God bless you!"  And, with a hearty grip of his honest old hand, he dismissed me.
Half an hour later we were under way and beating out to sea, showing every rag that we could stagger under, toward the belt of calm that separated the sea breeze from the trade wind that was blowing briskly in the offing.  And so profoundly impressed was I with the urgency of the matter that had been entrusted to me that when at length we shot into the calm belt, rather than lose time by waiting for the trade wind to work its way inshore to the spot where we were lying, I ordered out the sweeps, and, turning the little hooker's nose to the westward, swept her out until we caught the true breeze.  Then it was "out studding-sails to windward", and away we went again at racing speed.  Luckily, nothing had been done by the Government people to spoil the little beauty's sailing qualities; she was precisely as she had been when engaged in her original nefarious trade, except that her slave-deck had been taken out of her; and long before sundown we had run the African coast clean out of sight, to the joy of all hands, fore and aft.
We had but one adventure, if indeed it could be called such, on our passage across the Atlantic, and that occurred on our eighth day out from Sierra Leone.  Up to then we had sighted nothing, and had had a very fine passage, the trade wind blowing fresh enough all the time to enable us to maintain an average speed of nine knots throughout the passage.  But on the day of which I am now speaking, about six bells in the afternoon watch, we sighted a large sail ahead, and, some ten minutes later, another, following in the wake of the first.  Both were, of course, hull-down when we first sighted them, and broad on our port bow, standing to the northward close-hauled on the starboard tack, but as they were carrying on heavily, and we were travelling fast, we rapidly rose each other, and it then became evident that the second craft, a very fine and handsome brig, was in pursuit of the other, which was a full-rigged ship, apparently a British West Indiaman.  This surmise of ours as to the nationality of the leading ship was soon confirmed, for as we rushed rapidly down toward the two we hoisted our colours, in response to which she immediately displayed the British ensign, following it up by hoisting a series of signals to her mizzen royal-mast-head which, when completed, read:
"Stranger astern suspected pirate."
Here was a pretty business indeed, and a very nice question for me to decide on the spur of the moment.  What was my duty, under the circumstances?  On the one hand, here was a British merchantman, doubtless carrying a very valuable cargo, in imminent danger of being captured and plundered, and, possibly, her crew massacred, for the brig was overhauling the Indiaman hand over hand; while on the other were the explicit and emphatic instructions of the commodore to pause for nothing.  It was certain that unless I interfered the Indiaman would be captured, and every instinct within me rose up in protest against the idea of leaving her to her fate, while the words of the commodore were: "If you should happen to be attacked, fight, but not otherwise".  I reflected for a moment or two, and then decided upon my course of action.  If we went on as we were going we should pass very close to the Indiaman, but if we shifted our helm about a point to the southward we should pass quite close to the brig.  I therefore determined to make that very slight deviation from my course, and see what would happen.  I could not hope to divert the brig from her chase of so valuable a prize as the ship, but it was just possible that I might, by opening fire on the pursuer, be lucky enough to bring down a spar or otherwise damage her sufficiently to afford the Indiaman a chance to escape.  I therefore ordered the helm to be shifted, and gave instructions for the crew to go to quarters, to double-shot the broadside batteries and to open fire on the brig with our long eighteen the moment that we should come within range.  That moment was not long deferred, and presently Thompson, the gunner, shouted:
"I think we can about reach him now, sir."
"Then fire as soon as you are ready," replied I.  "And aim at his spars. It is far more important to shoot away a topmast than to hull the fellow."
"Ay, ay, sir!" answered Thompson, and I saw him stoop behind the gun, directing the gun's crew with his hands as he squinted along the sights of the weapon.  Another second or two, as the schooner rose over the back of a swell, he fired.  The aim was a splendid one, but the elevation was scarcely sufficient, for the shot struck the craft's weather bulwarks fair between the masts, making the splinters fly.
"Excellent!"  I exclaimed.  "Admirable!  Don't alter your elevation, Thompson, for we are nearing him fast.  Try again, as quick as you like."
The gun was reloaded, and again fired; but this time, whether due to over-eagerness or some other cause, the gunner made a bad shot, the ball striking the water astern of, and some distance beyond, the brig.  Then, while the men were reloading, nine jets of flame and smoke leapt simultaneously from the brig's side, and nine round shot tore up the water unpleasantly close under our bows.
"How would it do to train the guns of the port broadside forward, and return his compliment?" asked Keene, who was standing close beside me.
"No, Jack, on no account," said I.  "I am saving up those two broadsides for a possible emergency, and if we were to fire now there would be no time to reload before we are down upon him.  But go you, my hearty, and see that the guns of the starboard broadside are so trained as to concentrate their fire on a point at about fifty yards' distance."
At this moment our Long Tom spoke again, and the next instant a loud cheer broke from our lads, for the shot had taken the brig's fore- topmast just below the sheave of the topsail-tye, and away went the fore-topsail, topgallant-sail, and royal over to leeward, while the flying and standing jibs and the fore-topmast staysail collapsed and drooped into the water under her forefoot, with the result that she instantly shot up into the wind.
"Well done, Thompson!"  I cried.  "That will do with the long gun.  Now stand by the starboard battery, and, as we pass under her stern, slap the whole broadside into her."
The pirates, if such indeed they were, for the brig showed no colours, proved themselves to be a remarkably smart crew, for the wreckage had scarcely fallen when her fore-rigging and jib-boom were alive with men laying out and aloft to clear away the wreck.  The Indiaman was now safe, for she would be away out of sight long before the brig could repair damages sufficiently to resume the pursuit, and if the skipper of the ship were as smart as he ought to be it would be his own fault if he allowed the brig to find him again.  But I wished to make assurance doubly sure, and therefore, as we swept close past the disabled craft, at the imminent risk of being dismasted by her broadside, which, however, her people were too busy to fire, we slapped our starboard broadside right into her stern, with the extremely satisfactory result that a moment later her mainmast tottered and, with all attached, fell over the side, while the screams of the wounded rent the air.  We must have punished her very severely indeed, for all that we got in reply was one solitary gun fired out of her stern port, which did no damage; and a quarter of an hour later we were out of her reach and not a ropeyarn the worse for our encounter.  But I took very particular notice of the brig while we were near her, and although she was differently painted, having nothing now in the way of colour to relieve her jet-black sides save a narrow scarlet ribbon, I could almost have sworn that she was the identical brig that had destroyed the _Dolores_.
We made the island of Barbados shortly before noon on the following day, and passed its southern extremity, soon after four bells in the afternoon watch, at the distance of about a mile, getting a peep into Carlisle Bay as we swept past without calling in.  There were several men-o'-war and a whole fleet of merchantmen lying at anchor in the bay, off Bridgetown, which led me to conjecture that a large convoy had either just arrived from home or was mustering there for the homeward passage.  The trade wind still favouring us, and blowing a brisk breeze, we sighted Saint Vincent that same afternoon, and passed its northern extremity about midway through the second dog watch; and finally, on the fourth day after passing Barbados, we made the island of Jamaica, and anchored off Port Royal just as eight bells of the afternoon watch was striking.
The moment that the anchor was down I jumped into the gig and, leaving Jack in charge, pulled ashore, in the hope of finding the admiral in his office, although I feared that the hour was rather late.  By the luckiest possible chance, however, it happened that, being exceptionally busy just then, he had deferred his departure for Kingston, and I caught him just as he was about to leave.  The old gentleman seemed a good deal put out at finding that he was still to be further delayed and, with a gesture of annoyance, broke the seal of the packet containing the dispatches and began to read the first one, standing.  Before he had read much above a dozen words, however, his look of vexation gave place to one of astonishment, and that, in turn, to one of intense satisfaction.  "Well, I'll be shot!  Most extraordinary!  Aha!  I begin to see light.  Yes, yes, of course...  Capital! splendid!  I know how to checkmate 'em.  Only just in time though, by Jove!"  I heard him mutter as he read on, at first almost inaudibly, but louder and louder as his excitement grew, until he had completed the perusal of the principal document.  Then he turned it over again and looked at the date, looked at it as though he could scarcely believe his eyes.  Finally he turned to me and said:
"On what date were these dispatches handed to you, young gentleman?"
I told him.
"Do you mean to say, sir, that you have made the passage across in a fortnight?" he demanded.
"Yes, sir," I said.  "But we happened to be exceptionally favoured in the matter of weather, and I have carried on day and night; in fact the studding-sails have never been off her from the moment when I squared away until I took them in for good about an hour ago."
"What is your name, young man?" was the next question, for as yet he had only read the dispatch, leaving the covering letter and other documents for perusal at his leisure.
"Very well, Mr Grenvile--good name that, by the by--excellent name-- name to be lived up to," he remarked when I had answered him.  "Come and dine with me at the Pen to-night.  I should like to have a little further talk with you.  Seven o'clock sharp."
Returning on board, I found that during my absence the health officers had been off, and had at first manifested a very decided disposition to make things exceedingly unpleasant for me because I had gone ashore before receiving pratique.  However, the explanation afforded by Jack, that I was the bearer of important dispatches for the admiral, coupled with the fact that we had a clean bill of health, had mollified them, and as a matter of fact I heard no more about it.
Having effected a change of clothing, I hailed a shore boat to come alongside, and in her proceeded to Kingston.  The Admiral's Pen is situated some distance up the hill at the back of the town, and as I had no fancy for walking so far I decided that, if possible, I would hire some sort of conveyance to take me there.  The question was: Where was I to obtain one? for although there were plenty of vehicles in the streets I could see no sign of the existence of such an establishment as a livery stable anywhere.  At length, after I had been searching for nearly half an hour, I decided to enquire, and, looking about me for the most likely and suitable place at which to do so, I saw a large two- story building, the lower portion of which seemed to consist of offices, while, from the mat curtains which sheltered the balcony above, and the tables and chairs which stood therein, I guessed that the upper floor was the private part of the establishment.  A glazed door giving access to the ground-floor part of the building bore upon it in gilt letters the words:
"Todd & McGregor, General Merchants."
I decided to enter.  I found myself in a large warehouse-like place reeking of many odours, those of sugar and coffee predominating, while whole tiers of bags containing these commodities were stacked against the side walls, a huge conglomeration of miscellaneous goods and articles lumbering the remainder of the floor.  Picking my way through these, I reached the back part of the building, which I found partitioned off to form an office, wherein a number of men, some in gingham coats and some in their shirt sleeves, were busily at work writing letters or inscribing entries in ledgers and day books.  At my entrance one of them glanced up and then came forward, asking what he could do for me.  I stated my difficulty, upon which he said:
"There certainly are livery stables in Kingston at which you could hire a vehicle to convey you to the Pen; but I think it will be quite unnecessary for you to do so upon the present occasion, for I happen to know that our Mr Todd is engaged to dine with the admiral to-night-- indeed I believe he is at this moment dressing, upstairs.  And I am sure he will be delighted to give you a seat in his _ketureen_.  If you will be good enough to give me your card I will take it up to him at once."
"Oh but," said I, "it is quite impossible that I can thus trespass upon the kindness of a total stranger!"
"Not at all," answered my interlocutor.  "Mr Todd will be only too pleased, I assure you.  And as to `trespassing upon his kindness', this must surely be your first visit to this part of the world, or you would not talk like that.  Have you been long in?"
"I arrived this afternoon only, with dispatches from the West Coast," said I.
"And you have never been in the West Indies before?  Ah, that accounts for it!  Now, if you will kindly take a seat and let me have your card, we can arrange this little matter in very short order."
What could I do, under such circumstances, but hand over my card, still protesting?  Two minutes later my new acquaintance reappeared with an invitation for me to walk upstairs.  I was ushered into a large room, with the light so greatly dimmed by the closed jalousies, and the bare floor polished to such a glass-like slipperiness by the daily application of beeswax that I first ran foul of a chair, and then very nearly foundered in the endeavour to preserve my balance.  I thought I caught a sound somewhat like that of a suppressed titter, but could not be certain.  I, however, heard a very gentle and musical voice say:
"How do you do, Mr Grenvile?  I am very pleased to make your acquaintance.  Lucy, dear, please throw open the jalousies.  We are so dark here that Mr Grenvile cannot see where he is."
Then, as the jalousies were flung back and the evening light streamed into the apartment, I became aware of a rather stout lady--very pale, but still good-looking, although she had probably passed over to the shady side of forty--standing before me with outstretched hand, waiting patiently for me to take it, while a young woman of about twenty years of age was advancing upon me from the window.  With easy grace the elder lady introduced herself as Mrs Todd, and the young lady as her daughter Lucy.  Then she invited me to be seated, explaining that her husband was dressing and would join us in the course of a few minutes.  As a matter of fact it was about twenty minutes before Mr Todd--a typical Scotsman from head to heel, and speaking as broadly as though he had just arrived from `Glesca' instead of having been a resident in Kingston for a quarter of a century--made his appearance.  But I certainly did not regret the delay, for those twenty minutes were among the most pleasant that I had ever spent in my life.  Mrs Todd soon proved herself to be one of those gentle, kindly-mannered, sweet-dispositioned women with whom one instantly finds oneself on the most friendly and cordial terms, while Miss Lucy with equal celerity revealed herself as a sprightly, high-spirited maiden without a particle of artificiality about her, bright and vivacious of manner, with plenty to say for herself, but at the same time thoroughly sensible.  As for Mr Todd, he was, as I have said, a typical Scotsman, but I ought to have added "of the very best sort", for from beneath his superficial businesslike keenness and shrewdness the natural kindliness and geniality of his disposition was constantly peeping through.  As an instance of this I may mention that within five minutes of my meeting him he was insisting upon my making his house my home for as long a time as I might be on the island, which invitation his wife and his daughter were seconding with an earnestness that left me no room to doubt its absolute sincerity.  And I may as well say, here and now, that when I subsequently put the hospitality of this delightful and warm-hearted family to the proof, so far from the performance falling short of the promise, I could not have been treated with greater kindness and consideration--ay, and I may even add, affection--had they been my own nearest relatives.
We--that is to say, Mr Todd and myself--arrived at the Pen a few minutes before seven o'clock, and were forthwith ushered into the drawing-room, where we were received in most hospitable fashion by Sir Timothy and Lady Tompion, and where we found already assembled several captains and other officers from the men-o'-war then in harbour, with a sprinkling of merchants from Kingston and planters from the neighbouring estates, all very genial, jovial characters in their several ways. Having first introduced me to Lady Tompion, and allowed me a minute or two to pay my respects to her, Sir Timothy very kindly made me known to the officers and other guests present.  Dinner having been announced, we all filed into the dining-room and took our places.  The dinner was a distinctly sumptuous affair, and included many very delicious dishes and viands with which I then made my first acquaintance.  But I need not dwell upon this part of the entertainment.  Let it suffice to say that I enjoyed myself amazingly, the more so, perhaps, from the fact that everybody, from Lady Tompion downward, seemed to be vying with each other to put me at my ease and make me feel comfortable.  Later, however, I found that I was mistaken as to this.  People were not making any special effort in my behalf, but were simply exhibiting that remarkable geniality and friendliness of feeling that appears to be engendered by breathing the air of this lovely island.
At length the moment arrived for us to make our adieux and go; but when I stepped up to Lady Tompion to say good-night she exclaimed:
"Oh, but you are not going back to your ship, or to Kingston either, for that matter, to-night.  Sir Timothy intends you to sleep here, and I have already made all the necessary arrangements.  The fact is," she explained in a lower tone of voice, "that he wants to have a long chat with you, so Mr Todd will have to excuse you for this once.  I see that he has already made up his mind to carry you off prisoner to his own house, but he must defer that until next time."  This with a most charming smile to Mr Todd, who was standing close by waiting to say good-night.
The guests having departed, Sir Timothy led the way into his study, and, having invited me to make myself comfortable in a cane lounging chair, while he settled himself in another, said:
"Since parting from you at Port Royal this afternoon I have found an opportunity to read the private letter from the commodore which accompanied his dispatch, and what he said therein respecting yourself has greatly interested me; I have therefore arranged for you to sleep up here to-night in order that I may have the opportunity for a quiet chat with you.  I may tell you, young gentleman, that the commodore's report of your conduct upon certain occasions has very favourably impressed me, so much so, indeed, that I am more than half-inclined to keep you here, instead of sending you back--but we shall see, we shall see.  Now, just give me a detailed account of your entire services from the time when you first entered the navy, and tell it me as you would to any ordinary friend, for this conversation is not official; it is not a report from a midshipman to an admiral, but just a friendly chat between an elderly gentleman and a young one."
Thus encouraged I got under way and spun my yarn as best I could, Sir Timothy interrupting me from time to time to ask a question or to elicit from me an explanation of some point which I had not made quite clear. We sat there talking until close upon three o'clock in the morning, and when at length we rose to retire to our respective rooms, Sir Timothy remarked:
"Well, Mr Grenvile, I have listened to your story with a great deal of pleasure and satisfaction, and what you have told me has fully confirmed me in my half-formed determination to keep you here on the station for the present.  Come to me at my office down at Port Royal, at--let me see--yes, say three o'clock to-morrow, or, rather, this afternoon, and I shall then have something more to say to you.  Oh, and there is another matter upon which I intended to speak to you!  I understand, both from the commodore and yourself, that you are anxious to pass, so that your acting order as lieutenant may be confirmed.  Now it happens, very luckily for you, that an examination of midshipmen has been arranged for next week; it will take place aboard the _Achilles_, and I would strongly recommend you to send in your papers at once, for, from what you have told me to-night, I have no doubt that you will be able to pass without the slightest difficulty.  And now, good-night!  Breakfast will be on the table at eight o'clock sharp."
On the following afternoon I landed on the wharf at Port Royal, and entered the admiral's office at the moment when "six bells" were being struck aboard the flagship.  The old gentleman was busy at the moment signing a number of papers, but he paused for a moment to wave me to a seat, and then resumed his labours.
Presently, having completed the signing of the papers, Sir Timothy delivered them to the secretary, who was waiting for them, and then, unlocking and opening a drawer in his desk, he withdrew a somewhat voluminous bundle of documents, which he placed on the table before him.
"These," he said, "are letters and dispatches from merchants here in Kingston, as well as Bristol, Liverpool, and London; underwriters; and the Admiralty at home, all drawing my attention to the fact that of late--that is to say, during the last three or four months--certain ships, both outward and homeward bound, have failed to arrive at their destinations.  It is suggested that, since during that period there has been no weather bad enough to explain and account for the loss of these well-found ships, their failure to arrive may possibly be due to the presence of a pirate, or pirates, operating somewhere among the islands, or perhaps in the waters of the western Atlantic.  A very considerable amount of exceedingly valuable property has thus mysteriously disappeared, and strong representations have been made to Whitehall that vigorous measures should be taken to solve the mystery, with the result that I have been ordered to investigate.  These orders arrived about a week ago, but up to the present I have been quite unable to obey them, for the very good and sufficient reason that every ship at my disposal is needed for work even more important than the hunting down of hitherto merely supposititious pirates.  Your adventure, however, with the Indiaman and her mysterious pursuer, goes to prove that there actually is a pirate at work, and I must take immediate steps to put a stop to his activity.
"And this brings me to my most serious difficulty.  I have no vessel available for the service excepting your schooner, and no officer, except yourself, whom I can place in command of her.  You must not feel hurt, young gentleman, if I say that, under ordinary circumstances, I should as soon think of attempting to fly as of confiding so difficult and dangerous a service to a mere midshipman.  But what the commodore has written concerning you, supplemented by what I heard last night from your own lips, encourages me to hope and to believe that, young as you are, you may yet prove worthy of the confidence that I have decided to repose in you.  You appear to be one of those rare young men who carry an old head upon young shoulders; you have proved yourself capable of thinking for yourself, and of possessing the courage to act upon your own responsibility; you exhibited very sound judgment and resource in that affair of the _Indian Queen_, and also in the affair of the Indiaman, which you certainly saved from capture.  I am therefore going to take upon myself the responsibility of giving you a roving commission to hunt down and destroy that pirate.
"Your greatest difficulty will of course be to find her.  Fortunately for everybody concerned, you clipped her wings so effectually that she will be unable to do any more mischief until she has refitted; and, to do this, she will have to go into port somewhere.  Your first task, therefore, will be to endeavour to discover the whereabouts of that port, and I therefore advise you to spend a few days, while your schooner is renewing her stores, overhauling spars and rigging, and so on, in making diligent enquiry among the craft arriving in port, with the object of ascertaining whether any of them happen to have sighted a disabled brig, and, if so, where, and in what direction she was steering.  In the event of your securing a clue by this means, you will at once proceed to the port toward which she would appear to be steering, and continue your investigations there.  If you should in this way be fortunate enough to get upon her track, you will of course follow up the clue, and act as circumstances seem to direct; but if not, you will have to prosecute your search and enquiries until you are successful.  The service is an exceedingly difficult one to confide to so young a man as yourself; but, young as you are, you seem to possess the qualities necessary to ensure success; and, should you succeed, the achievement will tell heavily in your favour.
"Now, that is all that I have to say to you at present, except that you had better get to work forthwith.  Report progress to me here from time to time, and let me know when your schooner is again ready for sea.  You had better allow yourself a full week for enquiries here, and if at the end of that time you have failed to learn anything, we must consider what is the next best thing to be done.  And do not forget your examination."
CHAPTER FIFTEEN.
WE SAIL IN SEARCH OF THE PIRATE.
Having received my dismissal from the admiral, I returned to the _Francesca_, and, summoning the purser, gave him instructions to overhaul his stores and prepare a requisition for everything necessary to complete for a two months' cruise.  Then, sending for the boatswain, gunner, and carpenter, I in like manner instructed them to overhaul the hull, spars, standing and running rigging, and the contents of the magazine, and to report to me all defects or shortage of stores in their respective departments, and, generally, to prepare the little craft in every way for the task that lay before her.  Then, there still remaining a couple of hours of daylight, I jumped into the gig again and pulled aboard four vessels that had arrived during the day, for the purpose of enquiring whether any of them had sighted or fallen in with the disabled brig.  As was to be expected, I met with no success, but I was not in the least disappointed, for I had anticipated no other result; indeed I calculated that the ordinary slow-sailing merchantman who might perchance fall in with the pirate could scarcely be expected to reach Kingston until at least three or four days after the _Francesca_.  Then, availing myself of the very pressing invitation that I had received from my new friend Mr Todd, I made my way to his house, where I spent a most delightful evening with him and his family.  Upon learning that I expected to remain a full week in port, these good people at once proceeded to plan for my benefit a number of pleasure jaunts to places of interest in the neighbourhood; but I was far too profoundly impressed with the importance of the task assigned to me, and the responsibility that rested upon my young shoulders, to avail myself of their very great kindness further than to spend an evening or two with them.
I divided my time pretty evenly between the schooner--personally seeing that no detail was overlooked in preparing her for her important task-- and the various craft that arrived in the port from day to day.  Keene, eager to assist, undertook to penetrate, in mufti, the lower and more disreputable parts of the town, and to haunt the wharves upon the chance of picking up some small item of information relating to the mysterious brig which might prove of service to us.  But all our efforts availed us nothing, for on the eighth day after our arrival we were no better off than we had been at the beginning.  I contrived, however, to filch the few hours that were necessary to enable me to go up for my examination, with the result that I passed with flying colours, so the examiners were kind enough to say.  My good friend Sir Timothy at once confirmed my acting order and presented me with the commission which bestowed upon me the rank of lieutenant in his Most Gracious Majesty's navy.
On the evening of the eighth day after our arrival at Port Royal I went ashore to report to the admiral the discouraging fact that I had failed utterly to obtain any information whatever from any of the inward-bound ships relative to the piratical brig, for none of them, apparently, had sighted the craft.  Moreover, Jack Keene's enquiries were practically as unsuccessful as my own; for although he had encountered one or two doubtful characters frequenting the low taverns near the wharves, who seemed to have some knowledge of such a vessel, it was all vague hearsay, and quite valueless.  But although we had failed so entirely to obtain any information, the ship's company had been kept busily at work, with the result that the schooner was now as perfect in every item and particular of hull and equipment as human hands could make her.  I therefore wound up my report with the statement that we were ready for sea, and could sail at literally a moment's notice.
"So much the better," remarked the admiral, "and, since there is nothing to be gained by further delay, you had better make a start forthwith, so that you may be able to work your way out through the channel and secure an offing before nightfall.  Now, have you formed any plans for the conduct of this cruise?"
"Only those of the most general character, sir," replied I.  "According to my reckoning the brig is by this time very nearly, if not quite, at the rendezvous, where she will refit.  I fear, therefore, that there is not much likelihood of my falling in with her for some time to come-- until she has refitted and is once more at sea, in fact.  But, in order that I may not throw away a possible chance, my idea is to stretch out toward the middle of the Caribbean, and, having arrived there, to work to windward over the track that the brig would have to follow if she were making her way toward the head of the Gulf.  Then, if I fail to fall in with her, it may be worth our while to overhaul the Grenadines-- there must be several small islands among them well adapted as a rendezvous for a pirate, and there is just a possibility that we may find her there.  Failing that, I do not see that I can do anything else than work out clear of the islands and haunt the ground where the tracks of the inward- and outward-bound trade meet, since it seems to me that that is the spot where we are most likely to find the brig when she resumes operations."
"Excellent!" exclaimed the old gentleman, approvingly.  "You have thought out the identical scheme that suggested itself to me, and I hope that by following it you will succeed in laying the fellow by the heels. Speak every craft that you may fall in with, make enquiries whenever you have the chance, and perhaps you may be lucky enough to pick up a slaver or two, and so make the cruise a profitable one in a double sense; for if that surmise of yours should happen to be correct, that this pirate brig is the identical craft that stole the slaves from your prize--the _Dolores_--and afterwards destroyed her, the fellow may have played the trick on other slavers, in which case they will be glad enough to give any information that may lead to his capture.  And now the sooner that you are off the better, for you will have none too much daylight in which to work out clear of the shoals.  So, good-bye, my lad, and good luck to you!  Take care of your ship, your crew, and yourself, and bring the fellow back with you as a prize."
So saying, with a hearty handshake the old gentleman dismissed me, and a quarter of an hour later the saucy little _Francesca_, in charge of a pilot, was turning to windward on her way out to the open sea.
The sea breeze lasted us just long enough to enable us to clear the shoals and handsomely gain an offing of about three miles.  Then it died away and left us wallowing helplessly in the heavy swell that was running.  Meanwhile the sun sank beneath the horizon in one of those blazes of indescribable glory of colour which seem to be peculiar to the West Indies.  The darkness closed down upon us like a shutter, and the stars leapt out of the rapidly darkening blue overhead with that soft, lambent, clarity of light which is never beheld save in the tropics. Then, after tumbling about uncomfortably for nearly an hour, we felt the land breeze, and, squaring away before it, soon ran off into the true breeze of the trade wind.
The following three weeks passed uneventfully in carrying out the first part of the programme upon which Sir Timothy and I had agreed, including a very careful but fruitless search of the entire group of the Grenadines, between Grenada and Saint Vincent.  After this we proceeded toward the spot which was to be our cruising ground, and called at the little town of Kingstown, in the latter island, for a few hours, in order to replenish our supplies and lay in a stock of fruit.
Thus far we had been favoured with splendid weather, but on the fifth day out from Saint Vincent I observed that the barometer and the wind were falling simultaneously, and by sunset the trade wind had died away to nothing.  The western half of the sky looked as though it were on fire, and the horizon in that quarter was piled high with great smears of dusky, smoky-looking cloud, heavily streaked with long splashes of vivid orange and crimson colour.  As a spectacle it was magnificent, but the magnificence was gloomy, sombre, and threatening beyond anything that I had ever beheld.  Nevertheless, I had seen skies not altogether unlike it before, and my experience had taught me that such gorgeously lurid displays of colour always portended the approach of bad weather, very frequently of the hurricane type.  Furthermore, my "Sailing Directions for the West Indies" warned me that we were now in a part of the world which is subject to such terrific outbreaks of atmospheric strife.  I therefore resolved to take time by the forelock.  Fortunately in such small craft as schooners the amount of work involved in the operation of "snugging-down" is not great, and in less than half an hour we had got our yards and topmasts down on deck and the whole of our canvas snugly stowed, with the exception of the foresail, which, having been close-reefed, remained set, so that we might retain some sort of command over the vessel.
Meanwhile the calm continued, but although the regular swell showed some disposition to subside, a heavy cross-swell was rapidly rising, which caused the schooner to plunge and roll in a jerky, irregular manner, and with such violence that at length it became almost impossible to stand without holding on to something, while to attempt to move about became positively dangerous.  To add still further to the unpleasantness of the situation, the little hooker was constantly shipping water so heavily over her rail, bows, and taffrail that we were frequently up to our knees in it, although all the ports had been opened to allow it to run off.
We contrived to complete all our preparations before it became too dark to see; and it was well for us that we did so, for when the darkness came it was a darkness that might be felt, for it was as though we were hemmed in by great black walls which might be touched by merely stretching forth one's hand, while the heat of the stagnant atmosphere was so oppressive as to cause the perspiration to pour from us in streams.  This disagreeable state of affairs continued without break of any kind until about five bells in the first watch, when a cry of astonishment and alarm broke from the watch on the forecastle-head at the sudden appearance on the bowsprit of a ball of light of a sickly greenish hue, which I immediately recognised as a corposant, although I had never seen one before, but had frequently heard them spoken of and described.  It was certainly a weird and uncanny sight to behold under such circumstances, and was well-calculated to strike awe into the minds of superstitious seamen, both from the suddenness and the mystery of its appearance, and from its ghostly and unnatural aspect as it poised itself out there on the end of the spar, clinging tenaciously thereto, and alternately flattening and elongating as it swayed in unison with the violent movements of the schooner.  And while the men were still gaping at it, open-mouthed, its sickly radiance faintly illuminating their faces and causing them to wear the horrible aspect of decomposing corpses, two others appeared, one on each of the lower mast-heads.  For perhaps two minutes, or it might have been a little longer, these last two ghostly lanterns swayed and lengthened and contracted with the wild plungings of the little craft.  Then the one on the foremast-head let go its hold and went drifting away astern until it was lost to sight, while the one on the mainmast-head came gliding down the spar until it reached the flooded deck, and vanished as though extinguished by the washing of the water.  While this was happening, the corposant on the bowsprit-end also let go its hold and came floating inboard along the spar, causing a regular stampede of the watch, who incontinently came rushing aft as far as the mainmast, to get out of the way of their uncanny visitor, which, however, vanished as it reached the knightheads.
"Ah," remarked the gunner, who had charge of the watch, "that means that we're in for a heavy `blow', sir!  I've seen them things often enough afore, and I've always noticed that when any of 'em comes inboard, like them two, extra bad weather is sure to foller.  I partic'larly remembers a case in p'int when I was up the Mediterranean in the old _Melampus_. We was--"
"Listen!"  I broke in unceremoniously, as a low, hoarse murmur became audible above the voice of the gunner, the monotonous swish and splash of the water across the deck and in over the bulwarks, and the creaking and groaning of the ship's timbers.  "Surely that is the wind coming at last!"
At the same moment a gust of hot air came screaming and scuffling over us, square off the starboard beam, causing the foresail to fill suddenly with a report like that of a gun, and careening the schooner to her covering board.
"Hard up with your helm, my man; hard up, and let her pay off before it!"  I shouted to the man at the helm, while the sound that I had heard increased rapidly in volume, and a long line of white foam, rendered luminous by the phosphorescent state of the water, appeared broad on our starboard beam, sweeping down upon us with appalling velocity. Fortunate was it for us that a preliminary puff had come to help us, for it lasted just long enough to permit the little hooker to gather steerage way and partially to pay off, far enough, that is to say, to bring the onrushing hurricane well over her starboard quarter.  Indeed, had the gale happened to strike us square abeam, and with no way on the ship, I am convinced that she must have inevitably turned turtle with us.  As it was, when, a few minutes later, the wind swooped down upon us with the fury of a famished wild beast leaping upon its prey, and with a mad babel of terrifying howls and shrieks that utterly baffles description, the little vessel heeled down beneath its first stroke until her lee rail was buried, and the water rose to the level of her hatchway coamings; and but for the fact that she was at that moment not only forging ahead, but also paying off, there would have been an end of all hands, then and there.  For what seemed to be, in our anxious condition, a veritable age, but which was probably no more than a brief half-minute, the little vessel lay there, quivering in every timber, and seemed paralysed with terror, as though she were a sentient thing.  The wind yelled and raved through her rigging, and the spindrift and scud- water--showing ghostly in the phosphorescent light emitted by the tormented waters--flew over us in blinding, drenching showers.  Then, with a sudden jerk the schooner rose almost upright and, with the water foaming about her bows to the level of her head rails, she sped away to leeward at a pace that seemed absolutely impossible to even so swift a craft as she had proved herself to be.
We scudded thus before the gale for nearly an hour, when, availing ourselves of a temporary lull in its fury, we brought the schooner to the wind and hove her to on the starboard tack; but, even then, so tremendous was the force of the wind that, although she showed to it nothing but a close-reefed foresail, the little vessel was buried to the level of her rail.
So violent was the first swoop of the hurricane that the surface of the ocean was as it were crushed flat by it, and the slightest irregularity that presented itself was instantly torn away and swept to leeward in the form of spray.  Thus for the first hour or so it was impossible for the sea to rise.  At the end of that time, however, the tormented ocean began to assert itself, and, although their crests continued to be torn off by the violence of the wind, the seas steadily rose and gathered weight, until by midnight the little _Francesca_, was being hove up and flung about as violently as a cork upon the surface of a turbulent stream.  And now another of the schooner's many good qualities revealed itself, for, despite the furious violence of both wind and wave, the little craft rode the raging seas as buoyantly and as daintily as a sea gull, and shipped not so much as a spoonful of water, excepting, of course, such as flew on board in the form of spray.  Even of that small quantity we had very little after the schooner had been brought to the wind, for the tremendous pressure of the gale upon her spars and rigging, and upon the small area of her close-reefed foresail laid her over at so steep an angle, and caused her to turn up so bold a weather side, that most of the spray flew clean over her and was swept away to leeward.
The temporary lull in the gale, of which we had taken advantage to heave-to the schooner, lasted only just long enough to enable us to accomplish that manoeuvre.  It was well for us that we availed ourselves so promptly of the opportunity, for no other occurred; on the contrary, after that brief lull the gale seemed to increase steadily in fury to such an extent, indeed, that at length I felt that I should not have been in the least surprised had the schooner been blown bodily out of the water and whirled away to leeward like an autumn leaf.
Needless to say, that night was one of intense anxiety to me, for the responsibility for the safety of the schooner, and all hands aboard her, rested entirely upon my shoulders.  I had already done all that was possible in the way of precaution, while I felt that, despite the magnificent behaviour of the little craft, an exceptionally heavy sea might at any moment catch her at a disadvantage and break aboard her, in which event she would most probably founder out of hand.  So great, indeed, was my anxiety that I found it impossible to quit the deck for a moment, although my subordinates were thoroughly steady, trustworthy men, and had far more experience than myself.  With the men forward it was totally different.  Their minds were thoroughly imbued with the seaman's maxim: "Let those look out who have the watch," and those whose watch it was below turned in without the slightest hesitation or qualm of anxiety, trusting implicitly to those in charge of the deck to do everything that might be necessary to ensure the safety of the ship.
To me it seemed as though that terrible night would never end, and even when at length the hour of dawn arrived there was no perceptible amelioration in the conditions.  The darkness remained as intense as it had been at midnight, and it was not until eight bells--in this case eight o'clock in the morning--that a feeble glimmer of daylight came filtering through the opaque blackness of the firmament over our heads, dimly revealing the shapeless masses of flying cloud and scud, and permitting us to view our surroundings for a space of about a quarter of a mile.  But, contracted as was our view, it was more than sufficient to impress us with a deep and overwhelming sense of the impotence of man in the presence of God's power as manifested in this appalling demonstration of elemental fury.  Now, even more than during the hours of darkness, did we appear to be constantly on the point of being lifted out of the water by the terrific strength of the wind.  As often as the schooner was hove up on the summit of a sea, and thus exposed to the full force of the hurricane, we could feel her tremble and perceptibly lift when the wind struck her beneath her upturned bilge.  As for the sea, I had never seen anything like it before, nor have I since.  When people desire to convey the idea of an exceptionally heavy sea they speak of it as running "mountains high".  In the case of which I am now speaking the expression appeared to be no exaggeration at all, for as wave after wave came sweeping down upon us with uplifted, menacing crest, looking up to that crest from the liquid valley in front of it seemed like gazing up the side of a mountain which was threatening to fall upon us and crush us to atoms.  Indeed, the wild upward sweep of the schooner, heeling almost to her beam ends as she was flung aloft upon the breast of the onrushing wave, was an experience terrifying enough to turn a man's hair grey.  Yet, after watching the movements of the schooner for about half an hour, and noting how, time after time, when the little barkie seemed to be trembling on the very brink of destruction, she unfailingly came to in time to avoid being overwhelmed, I grew so inured to the experience that I found myself able to go below and make an excellent breakfast with perfect equanimity.
It was about five bells in the forenoon watch, and it had by that time grown light enough for us to discern objects at a distance of about a mile, when, as the schooner was tossed aloft to the crest of an exceptionally gigantic wave, Simpson--whose watch it was--and I simultaneously caught sight for a moment of something that, indistinctly seen as it was through the dense clouds of flying scud-water, had the appearance of a ship of some kind, directly to windward of us.  The next instant we lost sight of it as we sank into the trough between the wave that had just passed beneath us and that which was sweeping down upon us.  When we topped this wave soon afterwards, we again caught sight of the object, and this time held her in view long enough to identify her as a large brigantine, hove-to, like ourselves, on the starboard tack, under a storm-staysail.  Unlike ourselves, however, she had all her top- hamper aloft, forward, and seemed to be making desperately bad weather of it.  The glimpses that we caught of her were of course very brief, and at comparatively long intervals, for it was only when both craft happened to be on the summit of a wave at the same moment that we were able to see her.  Yet two facts concerning her gradually became clear to us, the first of which was that she was undoubtedly a slaver--so much her short, stumpy masts and the enormous longitudinal spread of her yards told us,--the second was that she was steadily settling down to leeward at a more rapid rate than ourselves, as was only to be expected from the fact that she was exposing much more top-hamper to the gale than we were.  It would not be long, therefore, before she would drive away to leeward of us, probably passing us at no very great distance.
Now, although we were fully convinced that the craft in sight was a slaver, yet we had no thought whatever of attempting to take her just then, for the very simple reason that to do so under the circumstances would be a manifest impossibility.  In such an awful sea as was then running we could only work our guns at very infrequent intervals and with the utmost difficulty, while, if we were to hit her, we would do so only by the merest accident.  And even if we could contrive by any means to compel her to surrender to us, we could not take possession of her. Our interest in her was therefore no greater than that with which a sailor, caught in a heavy gale, watches the movements of another ship in the same predicament as his own.
Meanwhile, by imperceptible degrees she was steadily driving down toward us, until at length she was so close, and so directly to windward of us, that I almost succeeded in persuading myself that there were moments when I could catch, through the strong salt smell of the gale, a whiff of the characteristic odour of a slaver with a living cargo on board. Nor was I alone in this respect, for both Simpson and the man who was tending the schooner's helm asserted that they also perceived it.  But now a question arose which, for the moment at least, was even more important than whether she had or had not slaves aboard, and that was whether she would pass clear of us or not.  She had settled away to leeward until she had approached us to within a couple of hundred yards, and as the two craft alternately came to or fell off it alternately appeared as though the stranger would pass clear of us ahead, or fall off and run foul of us.  The moment had arrived when it became necessary for one or the other of us to do something to avert a catastrophe; and as those aboard the brigantine gave no indication of a disposition to bestir themselves I ordered Simpson to have the fore-staysail loosed and set, intending to forge ahead and leave room for the other craft to pass athwart our stern.  The fore-staysail sheet was accordingly hauled aft, and four men laid out on the bowsprit to loose the sail.  This was soon done, and then, when we next settled into the trough of the sea, and were consequently becalmed for the moment, the halyards were manned and the sail hoisted.  The brigantine was by this time so dangerously near to us that, even when we were both sunk in the trough of the sea, it was possible for us to see her mast-heads over the crest of the intervening wave, and I now kept my eye on these with momentarily increasing anxiety, for it appeared to me that we were in perilous proximity to a hideous disaster.  And then, as the schooner swept upward on the breast of the oncoming wave, I saw the spars of the brigantine forging slowly ahead as the ship to which they belonged fell off, and my heart stood still and my blood froze with horror, for it became apparent that the two craft were sheering inward toward each other, and that nothing short of a miracle could prevent the brigantine from falling foul of and destroying us.  For as her spars rose higher into view I saw that her people, too, had set their fore-staysail, and that the two craft, impelled by their additional spread of sail, were rushing headlong toward each other.
A Middy in Command--by Harry Collingwood
CHAPTER SIXTEEN.
SOME VICISSITUDES OF FORTUNE.
"Hard up with your helm," I shouted, "hard over with it; we must take our chance of being swamped.  Better that than that both craft should be destroyed."  And, dashing aft, I lent my assistance to the man who was tending the helm.
Then ensued a breathless, hair-raising fifteen seconds, during which it seemed impossible for the schooner and the brigantine to avoid a collision--in which case they must have sunk each other out of hand. Then, when the two craft were not more than fifteen feet apart, the schooner's head fell off, she turned broadside-on to the sea, and, our people smartly hauling down our fore-staysail, the brigantine drew slowly ahead and clear of us, our bowsprit-end missing her mainboom by the merest hairbreadth, and the danger was over.  But during that minute or so of frightful suspense, which the stranger's crew had spent in rushing madly and aimlessly about the decks, execrating us in voluble Spanish, an opportunity had been afforded us to ascertain that the brigantine was named the _San Antonio_, and that she was beyond all question a slaver, with a cargo on board.
We contrived to avoid her without shipping so much as a drop of water, thanks mainly to the fact that the brigantine had served, at the critical moment, as a floating breakwater for us.  Putting our helm down again the moment that we were clear of her, we came safely to the wind again on her weather quarter.  Had we allowed matters to remain as they were before our narrow escape, the _San Antonio_ would soon have parted company with us, for, as I said before, she was driving to leeward much more rapidly than we were.  Now that would not suit me at all, for since I had made certain that she was a slaver, I was determined to capture her as soon as the weather should moderate sufficiently to allow us to do so.  Therefore, when she had drifted about half a mile to leeward of us, I gave instructions that the helm should be eased up as often as opportunity permitted.  The result of this was that we contrived to make our own lee drift amount to about the same as hers, thus maintaining no more than a bare half-mile of water between us.
Shortly after noon the gale broke, the sky quite suddenly cleared, and an hour later we were able to set the fore-staysail and shake a reef out of the foresail in order to steady the ship.  Although the sea was still running too high to permit of our bearing up and running down to the brigantine, we managed to edge down a little nearer to her, so that by eight bells in the afternoon watch we had reduced the distance to something like the eighth part of a mile.  At this distance we were able to maintain a pretty close watch upon the craft, and half an hour later we detected signs indicative of a determination on the part of her crew to make sail.  Evidently they distrusted us as a neighbour, and were desirous of putting a little more water between us and themselves. Seeing this, I took a long look round to ascertain what our chances might be should we attempt to bear up and run down to her.  There was still a very high, steep, and dangerous sea running, to attempt to run before which would be hazardous in the extreme; for should we happen to be pooped by even a single one of them, the least that could happen to us would be that our decks would be swept, and very possibly we should lose several men overboard, to save whom would be impossible in that mountainous sea, while it was quite on the cards that the schooner might be swamped out of hand and go to the bottom with all the crew.  But I remembered that among our stores there was a quantity of lamp oil, and I believed that a few gallons of this, towed astern in a porous bag, would smooth the water sufficiently to prevent the seas from breaking aboard during the short time that we should need to enable us to run down to the brigantine, and I gave orders to have such a bag prepared and dropped over the stern.
Meanwhile the crew of the brigantine had not been idle, for scarcely had I given the order to prepare the oil bag when her people proceeded to set their jib, close-reefed topsail, and double-reefed mainsail, with the evident determination of escaping from our neighbourhood with as little delay as might be.  I thereupon ordered our colours to be hoisted and a shot to be fired across her forefoot as a gentle hint for her to remain where she was.  To my surprise--for slavers do not often fight when they find themselves opposed to a superior force--the brigantine promptly replied to our single shot by letting drive at us with her starboard broadside of four 9-pounders, none of which, however, came near us, for the sea was altogether too high to allow of accurate shooting.  For this reason I refrained from firing a second time, but replied to our antagonist by making sail, for it now appeared as though she had some hope of escaping to windward by outsailing and weathering upon us.  Evidently her people did not know the little _Francesca_!  The first quarter of an hour of the chase sufficed to prove that the _San Antonio_ could not possibly escape us in the manner that her people had evidently believed would be successful.  Not only did we outsail her, but we also contrived to edge down upon her to within about a cable's- length, when her skipper deliberately opened fire upon us with his broadside guns, apparently with the hope that a lucky shot would knock away a spar or two aboard us, and thus compel us to abandon the chase. But this was a game that two could play at, and since the rascal seemed determined not to yield without a fight we cleared away our Long Tom and proceeded to return his compliments.  To shoot with any degree of accuracy in such a sea was impossible, and I was particularly anxious to avoid hulling the fellow, for I knew that this would mean the killing of several of the unfortunate slaves in her hold.  I therefore gave instructions to the men working the gun to exercise the utmost care, and to fire only when they could be reasonably certain that their shot would not strike the brigantine's hull.  By observing this precaution we at length succeeded in shooting away his fore-topmast, and thus rendering him helpless to continue his flight.  Whereupon, like a sensible fellow, he ran the Spanish flag up to his gaff, allowed it to flutter there for a moment, and then hauled it down again in token of his surrender.
Our chance encounter with the brigantine thus ended satisfactorily enough, so far as we were concerned.  However, it was not until the next morning that the weather had moderated sufficiently to enable us to take possession of our prize, when we found that we had captured a very smart vessel of two hundred and sixty-five tons measurement, with a cargo of three hundred slaves on board, bound for Havana.  I lost no time in turning her over to Jack Keene, with a prize crew of twelve men, with instructions to take her into Port Royal for adjudication, and to await there the arrival of the schooner.  Before parting company I seized the opportunity to question the crew of the _San Antonio_ as to the brig of which I was in search, but they professed to know nothing whatever of her.
By midday all signs of the hurricane had disappeared, the sea had gone down, and the trade wind had returned, blowing briskly out from about east-north-east.
It was therefore a fair wind for the prize, and half an hour after I had secured a meridian altitude of the sun for the determination of our latitude Master Jack bore up, dipped his colours, and squared away.
Now ensued a fortnight of uneventful and wearisome cruising along the parallel of 21° north latitude, and between the meridians of 62° and 74° west longitude, that being the line upon which I thought it most likely that I might encounter the pirate, or at least gather some news of him. During that period we sighted and spoke not far short of forty sail, of one sort and another, both outward and homeward bound, but learned not a word that would furnish us with a clue to the whereabouts of the craft that we were so anxiously seeking.  I was beginning to fear that our quarry had betaken himself to some other cruising ground altogether, when one morning, at dawn, Simpson, who had charge of the watch, sent down word to say that there was a brig in sight that he would very much like me to come up and look at, as he seemed to recognise her. Accordingly, without waiting to dress I tumbled out of my bunk and made my way up on deck.  We were on a bowline under short canvas at the time, to the eastward of the Silver Bank, the tail of which we had cleared about an hour before, while the stranger was apparently hove-to dead to windward of us, and hull-down from the deck.
There was not much to be learned by looking at the stranger from the level of the deck.  I therefore slung the glass over my shoulder and made my way aloft as far as the main cross-trees, from which a full view of her was to be obtained.  But before so much as taking a single look at her through the telescope, her behaviour assured me that she must be either a ship of war, or a craft of decidedly suspicious character.  For no ordinary trader would be lying hove-to, just where she was; the inference therefore was indisputable that, if not a man-o'-war, she must be lurking just off the entrance of the Windward Passage for some unlawful purpose.  If by any chance the craft in sight should prove to be the one that we were after, I believed that I should be able to recognise her upon my first glimpse of her through the telescope.  When I got aloft and brought my instrument to bear upon her, I found, however, that she was just in the very thick of the dazzle of the newly risen sun, and it was not until I had been aloft quite a quarter of an hour that I was able to see her at all distinctly.  Even then I could discern no details of painting; I could not make out whether her hull was painted black or green, whether she had painted ports, or merely a narrow ribbon, or had neither.  She showed against the strong light of the eastern horizon simply as a dainty jet-black silhouette, rising and falling lazily upon the long swell.  But after looking long and steadfastly at her I came to the conclusion, in the first instance, that she was not a man-o'-war, and, in the next, that her general shape and style of rig were sufficiently familiar to justify me in the belief, or at least the suspicion, that I had seen her before.  At all events it was my obvious duty to get near enough to her to enable me to ascertain what business she had to be lying-to just where we had happened to find her, and I accordingly gave Simpson instructions to make sail, and then see all clear for action.
It was evident that, whatever might be the character of the stranger, those aboard her were fully as wide awake as ourselves, for no sooner did we start to make sail than she did the same, with a celerity, too, that would not have disgraced a man-o'-war.  Within five minutes of my having given the order to make sail, both craft were thrashing hard to windward, under all plain sail to their royals.  And then we were not long in discovering that, fast as was the _Francesca_, the stranger appeared to be nearly if not quite as fast, although we in the schooner seemed to be rather the more weatherly of the two.  This, however, might simply mean that the skipper of the brig was intentionally allowing us to close very gradually with him, in order that he might have the opportunity to get a nearer look at us, and so be enabled to form a better judgment regarding our character, while making his own preparations, if indeed he happened to be the craft for which we were looking.  And of this I became increasingly convinced as we gradually neared the brig; for although she was now painted dead black to her bends, without any relief whatever, of colour, there were certain little details and peculiarities of shape and rig that I felt convinced I had seen before.
At length, about three bells, that is to say half-past nine-o'clock, in the forenoon watch, the skipper of the brig seemed to have made up his mind to a definite course of action, for he suddenly put up his helm, squared away, and came running straight down for us.  Whereupon we in the schooner at once went to quarters, cast loose the guns, opened the powder magazine, and got a good supply of ammunition up on deck, at the same time hoisting our colours.  The stranger, apparently, was not quite so willing as ourselves to display the hue of his bunting; at all events we saw none.  But this might have been due to the fact that his gaff-end was obscured from our view by the spread of his topsails.  When about half a mile to windward of us the brig, which we could now see was a most beautiful craft, suddenly rounded-to, clewed up her courses and royals, hauled down her flying-jib, and, throwing open her ports, let fly her whole broadside of 9-pounders at us, the shot humming close over our heads and considerably cutting up our rigging.  And at the same instant a great black flag went soaring aloft to her gaff-end!
"So," said I to Simpson, who was standing close beside me, "that clears the ground and enables us to know just where we are.  With that black rag staring us in the face there is no possibility of making a mistake. Return his fire, lads, as your guns come to bear, and be careful not to throw a single shot away.  Aim at his spars first; then, when we have crippled him, we will close and finish him off."
But in talking thus I was reckoning without my host, for the brig carried more than twice our weight of metal in her broadside batteries, and a long thirty-two on her forecastle as against our own long eighteen.  In a word, I soon found that I had caught a Tartar, for her crew were quite as nimble as our own, and quite as good shots, which was worse.  Thus, when it came to playing the dismantling game, which seemed to be the object of both craft, we soon found that we were suffering much more severely than our antagonist.  The skipper of the brig saw this quite as clearly as we did, and presently, believing that he had us completely in his power, he bore up and ran down toward us, with the evident intention of boarding.
"Mr Simpson," said I, "that fellow looks very much as though he intended to lay us aboard.  That ought to suit us a great deal better than playing at long bowls, so please have both broadsides and the long gun double-shotted, and we will give him everything we can as he ranges up alongside, and then board him in the smoke, instead of waiting for him to board us."
"An excellent plan, sir, I think," answered Simpson.  "Boardin' and bein' boarded are two very different things; and although them chaps may be ready enough to follow their skipper on to our decks, it'll take a good deal of the fight out of them if they finds that we're beforehand with 'em, and that they've got to defend their own ship instead of attackin' us.  I'll go and see everything ready to give 'em a warm reception when they comes alongside."
We were not long kept in suspense, for, to do the pirates justice, they came on to the attack with every symptom of perfect fearlessness, and we had only just sufficient time wherein to make our preparations when, taking a broad sheer, the brig rounded-to and shot alongside us.  At the moment when she was within about a fathom of us, her bulwarks lined with swarthy, unkempt-looking desperadoes, holding themselves in readiness to fling themselves in upon our decks, I gave the word to fire, and the whole double-shotted broadside--with a charge of canister on top of it, which Simpson had quietly ordered to be rammed home on top of the round shot--went crashing into her, making a very pretty "general average" among her crew, and among her spars and rigging.  The crew of boarders seemed to have been swept out of existence, and so severely wounded were her masts that the shock of her collision with the schooner, a moment later, sent both of them over the side, fortunately into the sea instead of across our decks; and there she lay, a sheer hulk, secured to us by the grappling irons which our people had promptly hove, and quite unable to escape.
"Hurrah, lads," I shouted, "we have her now; she cannot escape us! Boarders, follow me!"  And away we all went, helter-skelter, over our own bulwarks and those of the brig into the thick cloud of smoke that hung over the brig's decks, completely obscuring them and everything upon them.
I quite expected to find that our final broadside, in addition to bringing down the brig's masts, had swept her crew practically out of existence.  I was therefore most disagreeably surprised to discover that, despite the havoc which we had undoubtedly wrought, and the evidences of which became clearly visible as the breeze swept the smoke away, the pirates still numbered at least two to our one, and were apparently in nowise dismayed at the havoc which that last broadside of ours had wrought; on the contrary, they received us with the utmost intrepidity, and in an instant we of the _Francesca_ found ourselves hemmed in and pressed so vigorously that, instead of sweeping the decks and carrying the brig with a rush, as I had fully expected we should, it was with the utmost difficulty that we were able to hold our ground at all.  The pirate captain, easily distinguishable among the rest by his good looks and the smartness of his dress, was here, there, and everywhere apparently at the same moment, urging on and encouraging his men in fluent Spanish, while he defended himself from the simultaneous attack of three of our people with consummate ease.  He fought cheerfully, joyously, like a man who enjoys fighting, with a reckless jest on his lips, but with a ferocity that was terrible to behold. Twice I crossed swords with him.  On the first occasion I had hardly engaged when I was so severely jostled that I suddenly found myself completely at his mercy, and gave myself up as lost, for his sword was descending straight upon my defenceless head as his eyes glared tiger- like into mine, when, apparently through sheer caprice, he diverted his stroke, and, instead of cleaving me to the chin, as he could easily have done, vigorously attacked the man next to me; while on the second occasion, which occurred a minute or two later, he contented himself with simply parrying my thrust, and then permitted himself to be separated from me by a rush of our men.  For ten long minutes the fight raged most furiously on the brig's deck, fortune sometimes favouring us for a moment and then deserting us in favour of the pirates.  The battle occasionally resolved itself for a moment into a series of desperate single combats, during which men savagely clutched each other by the throat and stabbed at each other with shortened weapons, and then merged again into a general melee in which each man seemed to strike recklessly at every enemy within reach, regardless of his own safety.  And then, while the fight was still in full swing, I suddenly received a terrific blow on the top of my skull and fell senseless upon the deck.  My last conscious sensation was that of being trampled remorselessly under foot by a furious rush of men.
When at length I recovered my senses I found that I was lying, undressed, in a cot, suffering from a nerve-racking headache of so violent a character that I could scarcely endure to open my eyes to the brilliant sunlight that flooded the cabin of which I was an occupant. For the first minute or two after my recovery my senses were so utterly confused that I found it impossible to recall anything that had happened save that, somehow, I had been struck down in a fight.  Gradually, as I lay there wrestling with the state of confusion in which I found myself plunged, my memory returned, and I recollected everything up to the moment when I had been struck down on the deck of the pirate brig.  Then I began to look about me, with the view of ascertaining where I was.  I found that the exceedingly roomy and comfortable cot in which I was lying was slung from the beams of an equally roomy and luxurious cabin which was furnished with a degree of mingled elegance and comfort that was seldom found afloat in those days, and indeed is very far from being common even now.  The whole of the after end of this cabin was occupied by a series of windows of semi-elliptical shape, beyond which the sparkling sea could be seen, and through which a delicious, balmy, refreshing breeze was blowing.  A broad locker arrangement, handsomely worked in choice mahogany, stretched right athwart the cabin immediately beneath the stern windows, and upon this stood several beautiful flowering plants in pots of elaborately hammered brass, this locker forming the top of a long sofa, or divan, upholstered in crimson velvet, which also stretched across the full width of the cabin.  The interior paintwork of the apartment was a rich, creamy white, imparting a deliciously cool and bright appearance to it.  The furniture which it contained, and which consisted of, among other less important matters, a table of elaborately carved mahogany, a large bookcase full of books, many of which were in sumptuous bindings, a rack containing about a dozen charts, four chairs, each one of different pattern from all the others, and a very fine, thick carpet, was all exceptionally good.  The only fault that I could find with it was that it lacked uniformity of design, and suggested the idea that it had been acquired in a more or less haphazard way and at different times and places.
By the time that I had completed my survey of the cabin in which I lay I had sufficiently regained the control of my senses to realise that I was certainly not aboard the _Francesca_; and, that being the case, where was I?  Undoubtedly aboard the pirate brig, on the deck of which I had been struck down senseless.  And then arose the question, what had become of the schooner and my shipmates?  Had they been captured, sunk, or driven off?  That the fight was over, and had probably been over for some time, was evident; for although there was a sound of much movement on the deck overhead, with the jabber of many voices in Spanish, intermingled with frequent calls and commands, the stir and bustle were of that quiet and orderly character which conveyed to my practised ear the suggestion that the people on deck were engaged upon the task of repairing damages.  For a moment the idea presented itself to me that we might possibly have proved the victors, and that the brig was in our possession, but it was dispelled the next moment by the reflection that, had such been the case, the speech on deck would have been English, not Spanish, and I should probably not have been left unattended.  As my mental balance gradually recovered itself, so did my anxiety touching the fate of the _Francesca_ and my comrades intensify, until at length I felt that I could endure the suspense no longer, but must turn out and investigate for myself.  I accordingly made an effort to raise myself in my cot, but instantly sank back with an involuntary groan, for not only did the effort result in an immediate and severe attack of vertigo, but I also became aware of the fact that, in addition to the injury to my head, I had received a very painful hurt in the left breast, close above my heart.  To get up and dress, as I had intended, was obviously impossible, and the only thing to be done, therefore, was to remain where I was until somebody should come to me.
I lay thus for perhaps a quarter of an hour longer, fretting and fuming at my helplessness, and still more at my ignorance of what had happened to the schooner, when the door of the cabin opened softly, and a rather good-looking young Spaniard approached my cot on tiptoe.  Seeing that my eyes were open, and probably detecting a look of rationality in them, he smiled as his fingers closed gently upon my wrist to feel my pulse.
"So, senor," he said, "you have recovered your senses at last!  There was a moment when I almost began to fear that you would slip through my fingers."
"And pray, senor, who may you be, and where am I?"  I asked.
"To reply to your questions in their regular order, senor," answered the Spaniard, "I am Miguel Fonseca, the surgeon of this brig, the name of which is the _Barracouta_; and you are the prisoner, or the guest, I am not quite sure which, of her commander, Captain Ricardo."
"Captain Ricardo!" repeated I.  "What is his other name?"
"Ah, senor, that I cannot tell you!  We know him only as Captain Ricardo," answered my companion.
"Thank you very much for your information," said I.  "But there are one or two matters of much greater importance to me than your captain's name.  Can you tell me, for instance, what has become of my schooner and her crew?"
"Assuredly, senor," answered the surgeon.  "We beat her off, with great loss, and, taking advantage of the fact that you had dismasted us with that last venomous broadside that you poured into us just as we ran alongside you, your people made good their escape.  But I doubt very much whether they will ever reach a port; indeed it is most probable that they have all gone to the bottom by this time, for the schooner was terribly cut up, and appeared to be making a great deal of water when she hauled off and made sail."
"They will get in all right, senor," said I.  "I have very little fear of that.  If they managed to get from under your guns without being sunk, they will somehow contrive to keep the schooner afloat until they reach a port.  And now perhaps you can tell me how it is that I happen to be here.  Does your captain take care of his wounded prisoners and nurse them back to health, as a rule?"
"By no means, senor," answered Fonseca with a grin.  "His usual practice, after a fight, is to fling the wounded and dead alike to the sharks, while the unwounded are afforded the option of joining us or-- walking the plank.  Why he has made an exception in your case, senor, is more than I can tell; it is a mystery which I will not attempt to fathom.  Nor should I care to hazard a guess as to whether his action bodes you good or evil; all I know is that he happened to be standing by when, after the retreat of your schooner, our people were clearing the decks of the dead and wounded, and that when you were about to be thrown overboard he suddenly interposed and ordered you to be taken below and placed in his own cot, my instructions being to attend to your hurts at once, before attending to even the most seriously injured of our own people."
"Um! that is rather queer behaviour, isn't it?"  I commented.  And, as Fonseca nodded, I continued: "And pray, when did this happen?"
"About five hours ago, immediately after the fight," was the answer.  "I have been attending to our own wounded during the interval, and have only just finished with them.  I am afraid I shall lose a good many of them.  Your men fought like fiends, and struck some very shrewd blows; indeed there was a moment when I began to think that Captain Ricardo had made a serious mistake in determining to run down and lay you aboard. For a minute or two it looked very much as though our people were about to give way before you, and indeed I believe they would have done so but for the fact that your men grew discouraged and gave way when you fell. But this will not do at all; here am I talking to you when it is of the utmost importance that you should be kept perfectly quiet.  Now, not another word, if you please, but allow me to dress your wounds afresh."
And so saying he softly opened the cabin door and said something in a low voice to someone who was apparently waiting outside.  Then, closing the door again, he returned to the side of my cot and began, with very gentle fingers and a light touch, to remove the bandages that were wrapped about my breast and shoulder.
"This," he said, "is your most serious injury--a pike wound; when did you get it?"
"I have really not the slightest idea when or how I got it," I answered. Then I stopped suddenly, for, as I spoke, I suddenly remembered that when I sprang aboard the brig, at the head of the boarders, I was conscious for a moment of having received a violent blow on the chest, the memory of which, however, had instantly vanished in the excitement of the fierce struggle that promptly ensued.  "Yes," said I, "that must have been it."  And I related the occurrence just as it had happened.
Just then a low tap came on the cabin door, and in response to Fonseca's bidding a young mulatto lad entered, bearing a large basin of warm water, towels, bandages, lint, and other matters.
"Good!  Now stand you there, Francois, and hold the basin while I foment the wound," ordered Fonseca, who forthwith proceeded to bathe and patch me up in the most careful and skilful manner.
"There!" said he, when he had at length attended to my hurts and made me tolerably comfortable.  "I think you will do pretty well now for an hour or two.  The wound in your breast looks very much inflamed, but that is only to be expected from the character of the weapon with which it was inflicted.  But I have applied a lotion which ought to allay the inflammation somewhat, and I will prepare you a nice, soothing, cooling drink, of which you may take as much as you please; and when you have finished it, Francois, who will remain here to look after you, will bring you a further supply.  But what you now need more than anything else is sleep; so, if you should experience the slightest inclination that way, please yield to it without hesitation.  And now, senor, I will bid you _adios_ for the present, but will come and have another look at you before dark."
And, so saying, he withdrew from the cabin as quietly as he had come.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.
RICARDO THE PIRATE.
I must have slept for at least three hours, and probably much longer, for when I awoke, with a start, I discovered that night had fallen, the cabin lamps were lighted, and a man whom I at once recognised as the pirate captain was leaning over me and gazing at my face with an intentness that was doubtless the cause of my abrupt awakening.  As I opened my eyes he started back as though detected in some act of which he felt ashamed; then, recovering himself, he again bent over me, and, to my astonishment, said, in perfect English:
"Well, young gentleman, I hope you are feeling all the better for your long sleep?"
"Thanks, yes," I said.  "At least the intolerable headache from which I was suffering a few hours ago has almost entirely passed away, but this wound in my breast is still exceedingly painful, more so, I think, than when your surgeon patched me up."
"Ah," he said, "I am sorry to hear that!  Fonseca must come and look at you again.  He told me that it was likely to prove troublesome, but if we can avoid gangrene until the ship gets in, I think we shall pull you through all right."
"It is very kind of you to concern yourself as to my welfare, and also somewhat inexplicable that you should do so," said I.  "You are the captain of this ship, are you not?"
"Yes, for the present," he answered.  "For how long I may be permitted to retain that position is quite another affair.  I am given to understand that the men are extremely dissatisfied that I should have spared your life--our motto, you must know, is: `Dead men tell no tales', and we have acted in strict accordance with it thus far, which doubtless accounts for the immunity that we have so long enjoyed.  Yours is the first life that I have ever spared."
"Thank you!"  I said.  "I suppose I ought to feel very much obliged to you, but somehow I do not.  This disaster has absolutely ruined my prospects in the service, so you might just as well have killed me outright.  And, by the way, why have you spared me?  Your surgeon informed me that you spare only those who join you.  I hope you don't anticipate the possibility that I shall join you?"
My companion laughed heartily, yet there was a slight ring of bitterness methought in his laugh.  "No," he said, "I have not spared you in the hope that you will join us; we have managed thus far to do fairly well without your assistance, and I am sanguine enough to believe that, even should you decline to throw in your lot with us, we shall continue to rub along after a fashion without it.  No, that was not my reason for sparing you.  By the by, what is your name, if I may presume to ask?  It is rather awkward to be entertaining a guest whose name, even, one does not know."
"My name," I answered, "is Grenvile--Richard Grenvile, and I am a lieutenant in his Britannic Majesty's navy."
"Quite so!" remarked my companion caustically, "I guessed as much from your uniform.  You bear a good name, young sir, a very good name.  Are you one of the Devon Grenviles?"
"Yes," I answered, "I am Devon all through, on both sides.  My mother was a Carew, which is another good old Devonshire family."
"Ah!" ejaculated Ricardo, as he called himself, with a quick indrawing of his breath, as though what I had said had hurt him, though how it should have done so was quite inexplicable.  "I could have sworn it! Lucy Carew!  Boy, you are the living image of your mother!  I recognised the likeness the moment that we came face to face, when you boarded us; and I have three times spared your life on that account--twice while the fight was in progress, and again when my people would have heaved your still breathing body to the sharks!"
"Good heavens!"  I exclaimed, "is it possible that you can ever have known my mother?"
"Ay," answered Ricardo, "extraordinary as it may appear to you, I once knew your mother well.  However," he broke off hurriedly, "this is not the moment in which to become reminiscent; your wound is troubling you, I can see.  I will call Fonseca to dress it afresh; meanwhile, be under no apprehension as to your safety.  I will protect you with my own life, if necessary, although I do not think it will quite come to that."
And, so saying, he left the cabin, to return a few minutes later, accompanied by the surgeon and his assistant, Francois, the mulatto boy. With the utmost care on the part of Fonseca, and to the accompaniment of sundry maledictions in Spanish, muttered under his breath by Ricardo as I involuntarily winced now and then during the process, my wound was laid bare and carefully examined.  It was by this time terribly inflamed and horribly painful, and I seemed to gather, from the grave and anxious look on Fonseca's face, that he regarded it as somewhat serious.  He said nothing, however, but gave it a very thorough fomentation, dressed it, and carefully bound it up again.  This done he administered a sleeping draught, and left me in charge of Francois, to whom he gave certain whispered instructions which I could not catch.  When he presently retired, Ricardo followed him out of the cabin, and I saw him no more that night, for the sleeping draught, though somewhat long in operating, had its effect at last, and I sank into a feverish, troubled sleep, in which I was vexed by all sorts of fantastic fancies, in some of which my mother and the man Ricardo seemed to be associated together most incongruously.  Then there were moments when I seemed to awake to find Ricardo and Fonseca bending over me anxiously, and others in which I appeared to be sitting up in my cot and talking the veriest nonsense to Francois, who, on such occasions, seemed to be entreating me, with tears in his eyes, to lie down again and remain quiet.  Then ensued further phantasmagoria of the most extravagant description, of which I subsequently remembered little or nothing save that I seemed to be consumed with fever, that liquid fire was rushing through my veins instead of blood, and that I was continually tormented by an unquenchable thirst.
This state of discomfort endured for ages--apparently; in reality, however, it lasted only a week, at the end of which period I emerged from my delirium to find myself comfortably, nay, luxuriously, disposed upon a large bed in a spacious room overlooking an extensive garden, gorgeous with strange and brilliant-hued flowers and fragrant with their mingled perfumes, which sloped very gently down to a sandy beach, beyond which was visible, through the wide-open casements of the apartment, a wide stretch of landlocked water, in the centre of which floated the hull of a vessel that I had no difficulty in identifying as the _Barracouta_.  The room which I occupied was elegantly furnished.  Its walls were decorated with several oil paintings that, to my uneducated eye at least, appeared to be exceedingly good, and dotted about the room here and there were little tables upon each of which stood a vase of magnificent flowers.  This was the scene upon which my eyes opened as I awoke from the first natural sleep that had visited me since that disastrous day when I had been struck down upon the deck of the pirate brig, and I lay for some minutes motionless, drinking in the beauty and the delight of it all, and revelling lazily in the sensation of relief from pain and fever that I was now enjoying.
Then, as I unconsciously sighed with excess of pleasure, I became aware of a slight movement beside the bed, and, glancing round, I perceived a middle-aged negress bending over me and looking anxiously into my eyes.
"_Bueno_!  The senor is himself again at last!" she exclaimed in accents of great satisfaction as she placed her cool hand upon my brow for a moment, and then proceeded to smooth my rebellious locks with a tenderness that was almost caressing.  "Yes," she continued, "the fever has quite gone, and now the senor has nought to do save to get well and strong again as soon as possible."  She spoke in Spanish, and her accent and manner were those of one who had been accustomed all her life to associate with cultured people.
"Who are you, pray?"  I demanded in the same language, "and where am I?"
"I am Mammy," she answered, "the old nurse of the senorita, and Senor Ricardo's housekeeper.  And you are now in Senor Ricardo's own house-- ay, and in his own room, too!  What is the young English senor to Senor Ricardo, I wonder, that he should be cared for thus?"
I scarcely knew whether this last remark was in the nature of a soliloquy, or whether I was to take it as a question addressed to me, but I treated it as the latter, and replied:
"I really do not know, Mammy, but--stop a moment; let me think--yes--I seem to remember--or did I dream it?--that Captain Ricardo said he-- had--once known my mother!  But, no, that cannot be possible, I must have dreamed it--and yet--no--that part of it scarcely seems to be a dream!"
"No matter, no matter," answered Mammy musingly; "we shall doubtless know the truth sooner or later.  Now, senor, it is past the time when you ought to have taken your medicine, but you were sleeping so peacefully that I could not bring myself to wake you.  Take it now; it is a sovereign remedy for all kinds of fever; I never yet knew it to fail; and then, if you are thirsty, you may have just one glass of sangaree!"
I took the potion and swallowed it obediently; it had an intensely but not altogether disagreeable bitter taste; and then I quaffed the generous tumbler of sangaree that the old lady handed me.  Oh, that sangaree!  I had never tasted it before, and though I have often since then drunk the beverage I have never again enjoyed a draught so much as I did that particular one; it was precisely my idea of nectar!
"Aha!" quoth the old woman as she watched the keen enjoyment with which I emptied the tumbler, "the senor likes that?  Good! he shall have some more a little later.  Now I must go and see to the making of some broth for the senor; it is his strength that we must now build up."
And, so saying, the old nurse glided softly out of the room, leaving me to enjoy the glorious scene that was framed by the wide-open window at the foot of my bed.
I had lain thus for perhaps five minutes when the door of the room again opened, and there entered a young girl of some sixteen years of age-- that was her actual age, I subsequently learned, but she looked quite two years older,--who came to the side of the bed and stood looking down upon me with large, lustrous eyes that beamed with pity and tenderness. Then, as she laid her cool, soft hand very gently upon my forehead, she said, in the softest, sweetest voice to which I have ever listened:
"Oh, Senor Grenvile, it is good to see you looking so very much better. You will recover now; but there was a time--ah, how long ago it seems, yet it was but yesterday!--when we all thought that you would never live to see the light of another day.  It was Mammy, and her wonderful knowledge of medicine, that saved you.  Had not the captain realised your critical state, and driven the men to incredible exertions to get the ship into harbour quickly, you could not have lived!"
"Senorita," said I, "how can I sufficiently thank you for the kind interest you exhibit in an unfortunate prisoner--for that, I suppose, is what I am--"
"No, senor, oh no; you are quite mistaken!" interjected my companion. "At least," she corrected herself, "you are mistaken in the character of your imprisonment.  That you certainly are a prisoner, in a sense, is quite true; but I hope--that is, I--do--not think--you will find your imprisonment very intolerable."
"All imprisonment, whatever its character, must be intolerable, it seems to me," I grumbled.  Then, checking myself, I exclaimed: "But do not let us talk about myself.  Do you mind telling me who you are?  Your face seems familiar to me, somehow, yet I am certain that I have never before seen you.  Are you, by any chance, Captain Ricardo's daughter?"
The girl's face clouded somewhat as she answered: "No; oh no, I am not Captain Ricardo's daughter!  I am an orphan; I have never known what it is to have either father or mother, and I am a prisoner--like yourself, yet I do not find my state by any means intolerable.  Captain Ricardo has been kindness itself to me, indeed he could not have been more kind to me had I really been his daughter."
"Ah," said I, "I am glad to hear it, for your sake!  He seems a strange man, a very curious commingling of good and evil traits of character-- kind and gentle to you--and, thus far, to me--yet relentlessly cruel and bloodthirsty in the prosecution of his accursed calling.  And your name, senorita, will you not tell me that?"
"Oh, yes, certainly!  Why should I not?" answered my companion.  "I am called Lotta--Carlotta Josefa Candelaria Dolores de Guzman.  And your name is Dick, is it not?"
"Why, certainly it is!"  I exclaimed.  "But how in the world did you know that?"
"Because," she answered, "when you were brought ashore yesterday, Captain Ricardo sent for me, and said: `This young fellow is Dick Grenvile, the son of a once very dear friend of mine; and I want you, Lotta, and Mammy, to do your utmost to nurse him back to health and strength again.'"
"And you and Mammy have been doing so with marvellously satisfactory results," said I.  "And that, I suppose, accounts for the fact of your face seeming familiar to me; I probably saw you once or twice during my delirium?"
"Yes," she admitted, "you certainly did see me--once or twice."
"Well, Lotta--I suppose I may call you Lotta, may I not?  Senorita sounds so very formal, does it not?"  I suggested.
"Oh, yes, certainly!" assented my companion.  "And I may call you Dick, may I not?  Senor sounds so very formal, does it not?"  Her quaint mimicry of my earnestness of manner was irresistibly droll.
"Of course you may," I agreed eagerly.  "Well, Lotta--now, let me remember--what was it I was about to say?  Oh, yes, of course--how came you to be a prisoner in the power of this man Ricardo?"
"Very simply, yet in a manner that you would scarcely credit," was the reply.  "You must know that my mother died just after I was born, my father when I was just two years old.  Up to then Mammy had looked after me, but when my father died his estates were taken in charge by some people whom my father had appointed to look after them--what do you call those people--?"
"Trustees, we call them in England," I suggested.
"Yes," assented Lotta, "they were my father's trustees, and my guardians, empowered to look after my interests and manage the estates until I should arrive at the age of eighteen.  When I was seven years of age the trustees decided to send me over to Old Spain to be educated, and I accordingly went, in charge of the wife of one of them, with Mammy to look after me.  I was educated at the convent of Santa Clara, in Seville, where I remained until my fourteenth birthday, when I was taken out of the convent and placed on board a ship bound to Havana, my guardians having decided that I had received as much education as was necessary, and that the time had arrived when I ought to return to Cuba and take my place as mistress of my household and owner of the vast estate of which I was the heiress.  Then a terrible misfortune befell us: the ship on board which I was a passenger caught fire, and was utterly destroyed, and everybody was obliged to take refuge in the boats.  Then, to add still further to our misery, a gale sprang up, and the boats became separated.  We suffered dreadfully during that gale, and were several times in the greatest danger of being drowned.  Then, when the gale was over, the sailors in our boat knew not in which direction to steer, and so we went drifting aimlessly hither and thither, not knowing where we were going, but hoping, day after day, that a ship would come in sight and pick us up.  And very soon our food and water became exhausted, and our sufferings intensified to such an extent that some of the men went mad and threw themselves into the sea. As for me, I became so weak at last that I lost consciousness, and did not again revive until I found myself on board the _Barracouta_, with Mammy looking after me.  We arrived here before I was well enough to walk, and here I have remained ever since, that is to say, nearly two years."
"Well," I exclaimed, "that is a most extraordinary story, extraordinary not only from the fact of your having been the heroine of such a terrible adventure, but even more so from the circumstance that you were rescued and have been taken care of ever since by Ricardo.  One would have thought that it would have been the most natural thing in the world for him to have callously left you all to perish.  How many of your boat's crew were alive when he picked you up?"
"Only two sailors, and Mammy, and myself," answered Lotta; "and I afterwards heard that the sailors had joined Ricardo."
"And have you never had any desire to escape and seek the protection of your guardians?" demanded I.
"Only at very rare intervals, and even then the feeling was not very strong," was the extraordinary answer.  "You see," Lotta explained, "I am perfectly happy where I am.  This is a most lovely spot in which to live, the most lovely that I have ever seen; and Ricardo is kindness itself to me during the rare periods when he is `at home', as he calls it.  I have never expressed a wish that he has not gratified, I have every possible comfort, and, what with my guitar, my garden, my morning and evening swim, and making clothes for myself, I find so much occupation that I do not know what it is to have a wearisome moment. And, now that you have come to be a companion to me, I cannot think of anything else to wish for."
The charming _naivete_ of this remark fairly took my breath away; but I was careful that the girl should not be allowed to guess, from my manner, that she had said anything in the least remarkable.  Before I could reply, the sound of approaching footsteps became audible, and Lotta remarked:
"Now, here comes Fonseca, and I suppose I shall have to go.  But I will come back again when he leaves you."
As she rose to her feet the door opened, and the Spanish surgeon entered.
"Good morning, senorita!" he exclaimed.  "How is our patient?  Vastly better, Mammy tells me.  I see she is busy preparing some broth for Senor Grenvile, but he must not have it until I have thoroughly satisfied myself that it would be good for him.  Well, senor," as he seated himself on the side of the bed and laid his fingers upon my pulse, "you are looking rather more like a living being than you were twenty-four hours ago.  Mammy's medicines are simply marvellous, I will say that for them, although the old witch will not tell me of what they are composed.  Um! yes; eyes bright--almost too bright--pulse strong but decidedly too quick.  You have been talking too much.  That will not do. The senorita"--she had slipped out of the room by this time--"must either stay away, or not talk to you.  Now, let me look at your wound." And he proceeded very carefully to remove the dressings.
This, it appeared, was progressing very satisfactorily, so he re-dressed it--my broken pate had healed itself, and needed no further looking after,--administered a sleeping draught, and then retired, after informing me that I could have Mammy's broth later, but that, in the meantime, sleep was of more value and importance to me than food.  He had not been gone ten minutes before I was fast asleep.
Several days elapsed, and I never saw Ricardo, although I was told by Lotta and Mammy that he had frequently looked in upon me while I slept. Thanks to good nursing, I was making very satisfactory progress, although still far too weak and ill to be able to rise from my bed. Meanwhile I was able to see, by simply looking out of my bedroom window, that the _Barracouta_ was being rapidly refitted--so rapidly, indeed, that I conjectured Ricardo must have made a point of always keeping an entire spare set of masts, spars, rigging, and sails on hand, in readiness for any such emergency as that which had arisen in connection with his fight with the _Francesca_.
At length, when I had been ashore nearly a fortnight, I noticed that the brig was once more all ataunto and apparently ready for sea.  That same night Ricardo entered my room, and, having made exhaustive enquiries as to the state of my health, took a seat by my bedside, with the air of a man who purposed to indulge in a long chat.
"This last fortnight has done wonders for you," he said.  "Thanks to the unremitting care of Lotta and Mammy, I think you will now be able to pull round without any further attention from Fonseca.  And that reminds me to tell you that we go to sea at dawn to-morrow, and of course Fonseca goes with us.  But he assures me that you now need nothing but good nursing and good feeding to restore you completely, and those Lotta and Mammy will be able to give you.  You will not mind my leaving you in their charge, I hope?"
"Oh, no," I said, "not at all!  Indeed, I have to thank you for quite an extraordinary amount of kindness.  You could scarcely have done more for me had you been my father."
"You think so?" he said.  "Good!  I am glad to hear you say that, because--ah, well, it is useless to think of that now!  By the way, is your mother still living?"
"She was when I last heard from home," said I, "and I hope she will live for many long years to come."
"I say amen to that," answered this extraordinary man.  "When next you see her, say that Dick Courtenay saved your life--for her sweet sake. And tell her also that, despite everything that was said against me, I was innocent.  She will understand what I mean and will believe me, perhaps, after all these years.  Ah," he continued, springing to his feet and striding up and down the room, "if she had but believed me at the time, I should never have become what I now am!  Had she had faith in me, I could have borne everything else--shame, disgrace, dishonour, ruin--I could have borne them all.  But when to the loss of those was added the loss of her esteem, her respect, her love, it was too much; I had nothing left to live for--save revenge; and by heaven I have had my fill of that!"
"Do you actually mean to say that you were once my mother's lover?"  I gasped.
"Ay," he answered bitterly, "her accepted lover.  And I should have been her husband but for the accursed villainy of one who--but why speak of it?  The mischief is done, and is irremediable."
"Surely you do not pretend to suggest that my father--?"  I ejaculated.
"No, certainly not!" he replied quickly.  "Do not misunderstand me.  It was not your father who was my enemy, oh no!  He was my rival for a time, it is true, but he was also my friend, and the very soul of honour.  Oh no! the loss of your mother's love was merely one of many results of a piece of as consummate villainy as ever dragged the honour of a British naval officer in the mire.  But, pshaw! let us speak of other things.  I suppose you have wondered what are my ultimate intentions toward you, have you not?  Well, I will tell you.  You once reproached me with having ruined your professional career.  My dear boy, have no fear of anything of the kind.  It was your misfortune, not your fault, that we were too strong for you, and if Sir Timothy Tompion--oh yes," in answer to my look of surprise, "I know Sir Timothy quite well, and he knows me, or thinks he does!--if Sir Timothy had only known that he was sending you out to fight the _Barracouta_, he would have given you, if not a bigger ship, at least twice as heavy an armament, and twice as strong a crew.  So, when he comes to hear your story, he will not blame you for failing to take me; have no fear of that.  Therefore, because I feel convinced that your ill-success in your fight with me will in nowise prejudice your professional prospects, it is my intention, all being well, to take you to sea with me next trip, and either put you ashore somewhere whence you can easily make your way to Port Royal, or else to put you aboard the first ship bound for Kingston that we may chance to fall in with.
"But to provide against any possibility of your fortunes going awry, I have decided to make you my heir; therefore--stop a moment, please; I think I can guess what you would say--that you positively refuse to have anything whatever to do with wealth acquired by robbery and murder. Quite right, my dear boy, it is precisely what I should expect--ay, and wish--you to say.  But when I was an Englishman I sometimes used to hear people say that `circumstances alter cases'; and this is one of them. The wealth that I propose to bequeath to you has not been acquired by me through any objectionable practices, it came to me through the merest accident, and nobody is aware of its existence save Lotta and myself. If it is indeed a pirate hoard, as is not at all unlikely, there is nothing to prove that such is the case; nor, assuming for the moment that it is so, is there anything to tell us either the name of the pirate who got it together, or the names of those from whom he took it. And, in any case, if it is the spoils of a pirate gang, they must have operated about a hundred years ago; and since they are now all undoubtedly dead and gone, as also are those from whom it was taken, you have as much right to it as anybody, and may as well have it.  Lotta will show you where it lies concealed; and, since I shall never make use of it, you are at liberty to help yourself to the whole of it as soon as you please.
"There is one thing more that I wish to say to you.  It is about Lotta. By the way, what do you think of Lotta?" he interrupted himself to enquire.
"I think she is the sweetest, most charming, and most lovely girl that has ever lived!"  I exclaimed enthusiastically, for I had fully availed myself of my opportunities for making her acquaintance, and had fallen over head and ears in love with her, although I have hitherto refrained from saying so, because this is not a love story, but one of adventure.
"Ah!" exclaimed Ricardo grimly; "yes, I see the inevitable has happened! Well, well, I have nothing to say against it, nor will your mother, unless she has greatly altered since I knew her.  However, to revert to Lotta, I am afraid that, without in the least intending it, I have done that poor girl a very serious wrong.  We fell in with the boat in which she, Mammy, and two Spanish sailors were starving, just as a light air of wind had dropped to a dead calm; as a matter of fact we drifted right up alongside the boat, so that it became impossible to avoid taking those who were living out of her.  Even pirates have their gentle moments occasionally, and the sight of those four, perishing of hunger and of thirst, in a craft that had literally drifted alongside us, was more than we could endure; therefore we hauled them up out of the boat, brought them round, cared for them--and they have been inmates of my house ever since.  Lotta seemed quite content to remain; she never murmured, never expressed the slightest desire for a life different from that which she was living ashore here.  And where Lotta was content, Mammy was supremely happy; therefore--well, I got fond of the child, and resolutely refused to allow my thoughts to turn in the direction of sending her away from me.  But your coming has altered everything, I can see that.  When you go, she will have to go too; she would never be happy here again without you, that is certain.  Moreover, my eyes have been opened of late to the great wrong that I have been doing her.  She is a rich heiress, and ought now to be in possession of her property. Therefore, when I return--by which time you will doubtless be quite well again--I will give you the charge of Lotta and Mammy, and ask you to see that the former is safely placed in the care of her guardians.  While I am away this time I will arrange a plan by which these matters can be brought about, and will explain everything to you upon my return.  And now I think I have said everything that I had to say, and will therefore bid you good-night, and good-bye, since we shall sail at daybreak, and all hands, myself included, will sleep aboard to-night.  I hope that when I return, which will probably be in about a month from now, I shall find you quite well and strong again."
And as Ricardo pronounced the last words he rose, with the evident intention of going.
"One moment, please," I said hastily; "pray do not go just yet.  You have been doing all the talking thus far, now I wish to say a word or two."
"By all means," he answered with a laugh, as he resumed his seat.  "Say on.  I promise you my very best attention."
But, now that it came to the point, I suddenly found myself hesitating; I had spoken upon the spur of the moment, with a very definite purpose in my mind, but quite unexpectedly I found myself entirely at a loss for words.  At length, seeing Ricardo's look of surprise at my hesitation, I plunged desperately _in medias res_.
"Look here," I stammered, "I--that is to say--oh, hang it, I find it very difficult to know how to begin!  I want very particularly to say something to you, and I want to say it, if I can, without hurting your feelings--"
Ricardo laughed grimly.  "Say on, without fear," he remarked; "don't stop to pick and choose your words.  In my time I have been compelled to listen to words that have seared my very soul, words that drove me desperate, and made me what I am.  You can scarcely have anything to say that will hurt me more keenly than I have been hurt already; moreover, I have now grown callous, so say on without fear."
The intense and concentrated bitterness with which he uttered those last few words gave me courage; moreover, I felt certain that my companion would recognise the kindly feeling which actuated me, so without more ado I proceeded:
"What I wish to say is this.  You have somehow contrived to convey to my mind the impression that you are a very deeply injured man, that you have been driven to the adoption of your present mode of life by some great and terrible wrong; moreover, you have been kind to Lotta, and especially kind to me; and, lastly, your references to your former friendship with my mother have been such that it has been impossible for me to avoid feeling very deeply interested in you.  Now, why should you not abandon your present mode of life?  You say that you possess treasure which has come into your possession by perfectly honest means, and to which, to use your own words, you have as much right as anybody. Why not take that treasure then, and go away to some part of the world where you are not known, and there begin life afresh?"
"Ah!" said Ricardo, "I have asked myself that question more than once without obtaining a satisfactory answer to it.  I should like to do so, were it possible, for I am very heartily sick of the life that I am now leading.  There was a time when, soured and embittered by as cruel a wrong as man could inflict upon his fellow man, I believed that I could find consolation, if not actual happiness, in the wreaking of my vengeance upon every Englishman whom I could get into my power, or whose wealth I could take from him by force; but that time has long passed, the revenge which I believed would be so sweet has turned to dust and ashes in my mouth, and now I am so weary of life that the bullet or steel that should rid me of it would be more welcome than any other earthly thing.  When it is too late, I have begun to realise the full depth of my villainy, and to see what a contemptibly cowardly creature I have been in permitting myself to seek such an ignoble method of revenge as piracy.  But, as I said, it is now too late, yes, too late--"
"Surely not," I broke in.  "Have you forgotten the homely old adage that `It's never too late to mend'?  What you have done can never be undone, it is true, but it can be repented of, and reparation can be made, if not directly to the persons injured, yet by doing good to others where you have the opportunity.  Will you not think the matter over again, and this time with the determination to arrive at a right decision?"
"I will think it over, certainly," he said.  "As to arriving at `a right decision', that is as may be.  If I can see my way to such a decision it may be that I shall take it.  I will consider the matter while I am at sea, and I promise you that no wrong shall be done during the progress of this cruise if I can possibly help it, and I think I can.  For I always make a point of confining the navigation of the ship strictly to myself; nobody aboard ever knows where we are until I choose to tell them, and it will therefore be easy for me to take the brig to some spot where there is little or no chance of our falling in with other craft. Then, perhaps, if we can cruise for a month or six weeks without taking a prize, the men may be content to accept their share of the booty, and disband, especially as I should tell them that they may divide my own share between them.  And now, good-bye, with many thanks for your sympathy!"
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.
THE TREASURE CAVE.
When I awoke, rather late, the next morning, after a somewhat troubled and restless night, traceable, no doubt, to my long conversation with Ricardo, the _Barracouta_ had vanished, and nothing remained to mark her late anchorage save the buoy to which she had been moored.
And now ensued a period of almost perfect bliss to me, for I had by this time reached that precise stage of convalescence where all danger is past, yet in which the patient is still so very far from being well that he must be waited upon, hand and foot, and tended with as much solicitude as though he were an utterly helpless babe; and such attention I was afforded in its most perfect and acceptable form by Lotta and Mammy.  Small wonder is it, therefore, that my progress toward recovery was rapid, and that in just a month from the day on which the _Barracouta_ sailed I should find myself strong enough to admit of my rising from my bed and donning my clothes for an hour or two.  I was now practically myself again, save that I was so weak as to need support whenever I attempted to stand; but, with Lotta on one side, and Mammy on the other, I was soon able, not only to totter from one room to another, but even to get into the garden for a few minutes, and sit there in a comfortable basket chair, drinking in renewed health and strength with every breath of the soft, warm, deliciously perfumed air.
We now began to look daily, nay hourly, for the return of the brig, and I ventured to indulge in the hope that, when she came, I should have the satisfaction of learning that my last conversation with Ricardo had borne good fruit, and that he had decided to abandon piracy, and to devote the remainder of his life to doing good, as some sort of atonement for the countless shocking crimes of which he had been guilty. Meanwhile my strength came back to me fast from the moment when I was able to get into the open air, and within another fortnight I was practically my former self again.
It is scarcely needful to say that during this long and tedious period of my convalescence I had enjoyed many a long and confidential chat both with Lotta and with Mammy, and sometimes with both together; thus, by the time that even Lotta was fain to pronounce me once more quite well, and in no further need of nursing, we had very few secrets from each other, and I had confided to her all my earnest hopes regarding Ricardo, in which hopes she cordially joined me.  I also told her what Ricardo had said as to my becoming his heir, and taking possession of his private hoard of treasure, which naturally led to an arrangement being made for an early visit to its hiding place.  This hiding place, it appeared, was situated in a large natural cavern in a secluded spot on the shore of the bay, and was the spot wherein Ricardo had originally found it hidden.  To me, this had a sound of very great insecurity; but Lotta informed me that, so far was this from being the case that, well as she knew the locality of the cavern, she was often greatly puzzled to find the entrance.
At length, on a certain afternoon we two set off to find this mysterious hiding place and inspect the treasure, which, according to Lotta's description, promised to be of absolutely fabulous value.  We passed down through the garden for almost its entire length, then bore away through a side path to the left, in order, as my companion explained, that we might avoid the "shipyard" and, more particularly, the men working therein.  Ricardo had most rigorously enjoined Lotta, on several occasions, never to expose herself to the view of these men, or in any wise remind them of her presence in the settlement.  But, to speak the truth, I am very strongly inclined to believe that, at all events on this particular occasion, Lotta was very much more anxious for my safety than she was for her own.  Be that as it may, we avoided the shipyard by the simple process of passing along the back of it, through Ricardo's private garden; and I am compelled to say that I was astonished beyond measure at the completeness of the establishment, as I then saw it for the first time.  It was a perfect dockyard in miniature, with warehouses, capstan-house, mast house, rigging shed, sail loft--in fact every possible requisite for keeping not only one but as many as three or four craft in perfect order.  And, from what I saw in passing, I judged that there must be at least fifty men regularly employed about the place!  No wonder that the _Barracouta_ was a busy ship, and her depredations of the most extensive character; they would need to be to maintain adequately such an establishment in working order.
Upon leaving the precincts of the garden we plunged into a wood that completely veiled our movements from the men working in the yard, and upon emerging from it we found ourselves at the edge of a low cliff, down the face of which a path zigzagged to the beach.  The yard now was completely hidden from us--and we from it--by a jutting shoulder of the cliff.  Descending to the beach, we found ourselves on a narrow expanse of firm, white sand, the whole of which it was evident was covered at high-water, and which was now so hard that we scarcely left any indication of our footprints upon it.  Traversing this for about a quarter of a mile we entered a sort of labyrinth of huge masses of sandstone that had fallen to the beach from time to time, from the steep and now lofty cliff that impended overhead.  Here we were most effectually sheltered from prying gaze by the enormous masses of rock between which we wound our devious way for perhaps a hundred yards, until Lotta stopped with the remark:
"Now, Dick, we have reached the end of our journey.  Look about you and see whether you can find the entrance to the cave which we have come to visit."
I looked diligently round me, this way and that, but could see absolutely nothing that in the least degree resembled an opening in the rock, and at length somewhat impatiently said so.
"Neither do I," laughed my companion; "I shall have to look for it, as usual.  It is somewhere about here," she continued, pointing to a series of horizontal ledges that ran along the face of the cliff just opposite where we stood.  Moving forward, I saw Lotta stoop down to examine the ledges; then she moved slowly along the cliff face for a distance of a few yards, when, to my amazement, she suddenly vanished before my very eyes.  I sprang forward until I reached the spot at which she had disappeared, but was still unable to see anything of her.
"Lotta!"  I cried anxiously, "where are you? what on earth has become of you?"
"I am here, Dick," answered the girl, her voice seeming to issue from the ground at my feet.  Then, for the first time, I noticed that there was what appeared to be a slight dip in the inner edge of the ledge, but which, upon closer inspection, proved to be a fissure, just wide enough for a man to squeeze through, and it was into this fissure that Lotta had dropped.  I promptly followed her, and presently, when my eyes had become accustomed to the dim twilight of the place, I found that we were in a small, cave-like hollow of the rocky cliff, measuring about eight feet in each direction, and floored with very fine, dry sand.  But of the treasure there was no sign that I could discover, in any direction-- unless it were artfully concealed in one or more of the many small holes or recesses that I saw here and there in the rocky walls.  Lotta observed my perplexity and laughed heartily.
"Well, Dick, where is the treasure?" she banteringly demanded.  "Surely it is not so very difficult to find, now that you have been told of its existence?"
"Oh, I'll find it, never fear, young woman!"  I answered; "but I confess that it is so ingeniously concealed that I doubt whether anyone ignorant of its existence would find it, except by the most extraordinary accident."  And therewith I proceeded to grope and feel about in the various fissures and cavities with which the rocky walls of the small cavern were honeycombed, but without success.  At length, to my great chagrin, I was obliged to abandon the search and confess myself beaten.
"Yet it is very simple--when you know!" remarked Lotta, in high glee at my discomfiture.  "Follow me!"  And, dropping upon her hands and knees, she proceeded to crawl into one of the cavities that I had been searching, and which I should have declared was not nearly capacious enough to receive a full-grown man.  Nevertheless Lotta completely disappeared within it, and I after her.  When I had fairly entered the cavity I found that what had appeared to be its back wall, and which gave it the appearance of being only about two feet in depth, was really one of two side walls, a narrow passage turning sharp off to the right, just wide enough and high enough to travel through comfortably on one's hands and knees.  It wound round in what seemed to me to be about a half-circle of about fifty yards in diameter, and its inner end gave access to an enormous cavern, very roughly circular in shape, and about four hundred feet across in either direction.
It was a most extraordinary place.  One of the peculiarities was that, instead of being pitchy dark, as one would naturally expect it to be in such a place, the whole interior was suffused with a very soft greenish twilight, quite strong enough, when one's eyes became accustomed to it, to permit one to see from one end of the cavern to the other with quite tolerable distinctness.  Where the light came from it was impossible to say, for the roof of the cavern appeared to be formed, like the walls, of solid rock; but from the fact that shafts of light were plainly visible overhead, issuing from the walls and roof, I conjectured that the light entered the cavern through rifts in the rock, and that its greenish tinge was imparted to it by the foliage through which it filtered prior to its passage through the rifts.  Greater surprise was in store, for presently I discovered that the walls were literally covered with sculptured figures of men and animals, done in high relief, and about life-size.  The sculptures appeared to be records of hunting and fighting episodes, and were executed with great vigour and skill. In reply to my astonished enquiries, Lotta informed me that Ricardo attributed this work to the original Caribs, and very probably he was right.
The treasure was all neatly arranged in a recess near the narrow passage by which we had entered the cavern, and a pretty careful inspection of it soon convinced me that Ricardo had been only speaking the truth when he assured me that, although it was probably the booty of some dead-and- gone gang of pirates, he had certainly had no hand in its accumulation. For everything bore unmistakable evidence of having lain where it was for a great many years--probably at least a hundred, if one might judge by the dates on a few of the coins which I examined, and which formed part of the treasure.  The man who accumulated the store must have been an individual of a very enterprising nature, for there were great piles of strong, solid wooden cases packed to the brim with doubloons and pieces-of-eight; two hundred and eighty-five gold bricks, weighing about forty pounds each, every brick encased in the original raw-hide wrapper in which it was brought down from the mines, now hard and dry and shrivelled; quite a large pile of rough, shapeless ingots of gold and silver, conveying the suggestion that at various times large quantities of gold and silver plate and jewellery had been run through the melting pot; and, finally, a leather bag containing not far short of a peck measure of gems of every conceivable description, all of the stones being cut, and evidently taken from pieces of jewellery of various kinds that had probably been broken up and melted.  I had not the most remote idea of the value of the whole, but I was convinced that it must be something fabulous, and I afterwards learned that I was right.
We spent nearly two hours in the cave, partly because there was so much of interest there to engage our attention, and partly because of its delightfully cool temperature, which was a positive luxury after the extreme heat of the house, both by day and by night.  Before we left the cave to return to the house, Lotta half-jestingly proposed that we should stock the place with provisions, and use it as a place of abode whenever the heat became unduly oppressive.  Although the suggestion was made more in jest than in earnest, the idea became so attractive, when we proceeded to discuss it further, that on the following day we actually took steps to carry out the proposal.  We spent the best part of the day in stocking the cavern with provisions, rugs, and so on, to such an extent that we could easily have endured a week's siege there, had it been necessary, for a good supply of excellent water had been found percolating through the rock in a small side passage off the main cavern.  And thereafter we regularly spent a great part of each day in the cavern, always making it a rule to take with us a little more of everything than we really needed.
At length, when a period of two full months had elapsed since the sailing of the _Barracouta_, with no sign of her return, I began to feel somewhat anxious.  I was now practically as well in health as I had ever been in my life, and I began to pine for a return to active service.  I was also desirous of seeing Lotta safely removed from her present dubious and somewhat dangerous surroundings into that position which was hers by right.  To achieve these two results it was necessary that I should get away from where I was, either by the fulfilment of Ricardo's promise to me, or by some other means.  To get away from where I was! As that expression occurred to me I suddenly remembered that I had not the faintest idea where I was; and, since Lotta was as ignorant as I was on the subject, I determined to ascertain by some means exactly where this little paradise of a spot was situated.  And, as a first step toward this, I ascertained roughly the latitude of the spot, by means of a quadrant that I found in Ricardo's room, as a result of which I discovered that I was undoubtedly somewhere on the island of Cuba. Since there were only two spots on the coast line of the island that could possibly have this precise latitude, I very soon managed, by reference to one of Ricardo's charts, to determine that the rendezvous was on the north side of the island; nay, I was able without difficulty to identify the precise spot on the chart.
Another week passed, still with no sign of the return of the _Barracouta_, and my impatience to get back to civilisation and friends grew so acute that I was seriously entertaining the idea of stealing a boat from the dockyard and making my escape in her.  The only consideration which caused me to hesitate was, that as I fully intended to take Lotta and Mammy with me, I did not care to expose them to the perils and discomforts of a boat voyage until every other resource had failed.
A few more days had passed, when, about two o'clock one morning, I was rudely awakened by some individual who had entered my room and was roughly shaking me by the shoulder.  I started up in bed and, quickly gathering my confused wits together, recognised the voice that was addressing me as that of Fonseca, the surgeon of the _Barracouta_!
"Hullo, Fonseca," I exclaimed, "where in the name of fortune have you sprung from?  Is the _Barracouta_ in?"
"Yes, Senor Grenvile," he answered, "we have just arrived.  At the peril of my life I took advantage of the bustle and confusion, attendant upon her coming to an anchor, to slip quietly over the side and swim ashore, in order that I may warn you to rise at once and make your escape while you may, taking the senorita and the old woman with you, if you would save their lives, or that which is perhaps even dearer than life to the senorita!"
"Why," I ejaculated, as I sprang out of bed and started groping for the materials with which to strike a light, "what has happened, then, that it should be necessary for us to fly for our lives?  Ricardo?  Is he--?"
"Stop!" exclaimed Fonseca, laying his hand upon my arm as I was about to light a candle; "don't do that!  You must dress and make your preparations in darkness; for should Dominique see the house lighted, as he could scarcely fail to do, he would leave everything and come ashore at once rather than that you and the senorita should slip through his fingers.  Yes, Ricardo is dead.  We have sighted nothing in the shape of a sail from the time that we left here; as a result of which the men rapidly grew discontented.  Dominique and Juan, who have long been jealous of Ricardo and envious of his power, took advantage of this and incited the crew to mutiny.  The precious pair made their way to Ricardo's cabin and murdered him in his sleep; then, when his dead body had been first exhibited to the men and afterwards tossed overboard, Dominique offered himself as captain in place of Ricardo, and, as he happened to be the only reliable navigator among us, he was chosen, with Juan as his lieutenant.  That done, it was decided to abandon the cruise forthwith and bear up for the rendezvous, in order to lay in a fresh stock of necessaries before undertaking another cruise.  But I soon discovered that, so far as Dominique was concerned, the restocking of the ship was only a pretext to enable him to return here at once for quite another purpose, namely, to put you effectually out of the way by drawing a knife across your throat, and to possess himself of the senorita.  Now, Dominique is a villain without a single redeeming trait of character; there is no love lost between him and me; and therefore, since I have taken something of a fancy to you, and have no desire to see Senorita Lotta the victim of such a consummate scoundrel and blackguard as Dominique, I determined to give you a word of warning, if possible; and here I am.  Now I don't know where you and the senorita can hide yourselves, but hide you must, and that forthwith, for friend Dominique may turn up at any moment; and if he finds you and the lady here, no earthly power can save you.  I think that perhaps if you were to take to the woods for a time, it would be your best plan; and I would help you, so far as lay in my power, by--"
"You are a good fellow, Fonseca," interrupted I, grasping his hand, "and I will not forget what you have done to-night.  I know of a place where, I think, we can hide safely for a day or two, and I will take the senorita and Mammy there with me.  And, look here, why should you not join us?  You must surely be quite tired of leading such a life as this, and--"
"Tired!" he broke in; "tired is not the word to express my loathing of it!  I never liked it; would never have had anything to do with it if I could have helped it, but I was compelled by Ricardo to join, and I have never since had a chance to escape."
"Well, you have one now if you care to join us," I said.  "While you have been talking my brain has been working, and I have already thought of a scheme for getting away from here.  Will you join us?"
"Most willingly, senor," answered Fonseca.  "I will stand by you through thick and thin; and should you succeed in enabling me to escape, my eternal gratitude will be yours."
"Very well then," said I, "that is settled.  Now if you have any valuables among your personal belongings in your quarters ashore here, that you particularly wish to take away with you, be off at once and get them, and then rejoin me here.  As for me, I must go and call Mammy at once, and direct her to arouse and warn the senorita.  Now be off with you, and return as quickly as possible."
So saying I hustled him out, and forthwith hastened away to the little room which I knew was occupied by the negress.  This I entered without ceremony, and, arousing the old creature, acquainted her as briefly as possible with the situation of affairs, and directed her to arouse Lotta forthwith.  Then I returned to the room which I had been occupying--and which was actually Ricardo's own sleeping apartment--and busied myself in collecting together some half a dozen charts which were scattered about the room, and which, I thought, might be useful, as well as Ricardo's quadrant and a copy of the current _Nautical Almanac_.  By the time that I had got these and one or two other matters together, Fonseca had returned, and a few minutes later Lotta and Mammy appeared, the latter loaded with a huge bundle of wraps and spare clothing belonging to her beloved mistress.  Having enquired whether they were now ready for instant flight, and received a prompt affirmative reply, I gave the word to evacuate the premises, and we forthwith filed out into the garden, shaping a course for the treasure cave, which I had determined should be our place of refuge until we could perfect our plans for effecting an escape.  As it happened, we were not a moment too soon, for we had traversed little more than half the length of the garden when the sound of voices in somewhat boisterous conversation not far ahead first brought us to an abrupt halt, and then caused us to retire precipitately from the path to the shelter of some coffee bushes close at hand, behind which we silently crouched until the speakers had passed on up the path. They were Dominique and Juan, both somewhat the worse for drink, and consequently speaking in a considerably louder key than was in the least degree necessary.  As they passed us and pursued their way up toward the house it was not at all difficult to divine from their conversation the fate which they had planned for Lotta, as well as for me.
The moment that they were far enough beyond us to permit of our doing so with safety, we again emerged upon the path, down which we pursued our way, silent as shadows, arriving, some ten minutes later, at the point where it became necessary for us to turn off through the wood on our way toward the cave.  At this point I paused for a moment to look back at the house, and as I did so I noticed a faint light suddenly appear in one of the rooms.  Our friends Dominique and Juan had evidently arrived there and were lighting up the place, prior, as they doubtless fondly anticipated, to giving us a pleasant little surprise.  As I continued to watch, the light suddenly grew brighter; they had found a lamp and lighted it, and were now in the room which I had been wont to occupy.  A minute later the light vanished from that particular room, and almost immediately showed from the window of another, which, from its position, I conjectured must be that which Lotta had occupied.  That our flight had by this time been discovered seemed pretty evident, for the house was rapidly lighted up in every room, and it was not difficult to conjecture that the two half-drunken ruffians were prosecuting a heated and vigorous search for the missing ones.  And that this was actually the case soon became evident from the fact that the French casement of the room that had been mine suddenly flew open, and a man, whom I presently identified as Juan, came staggering and stumbling down the path at a run, alternately yelling curses at us, the missing ones, and shouting to some person or persons unknown to come up to the house forthwith "as the birds had flown!"  Whereupon I swung quickly upon my heel, and, plunging into the wood, hastened after my companions, whom I overtook just as they were about to enter the cave.  Arrived at our destination we lighted a candle for a few minutes to enable us to make such hasty preparations as were absolutely necessary, and then, stretching ourselves out upon the soft, sandy floor, composed ourselves to finish the slumbers that had been so rudely interrupted.
CHAPTER NINETEEN.
AN AUDACIOUS SCHEME.
It seemed that I had scarcely closed my eyes ere I was aroused by Mammy, who informed me that it was broad daylight, and that breakfast was quite ready, whereupon, starting to my feet and shaking the fine sand from my clothing, I looked at my watch and was amazed to discover that it was nearly eight o'clock.  I accordingly hurried away to the spot at which the spring gushed out of the rock, hastily performed my ablutions, and returned to where the others awaited me before falling-to upon a most appetising meal which Mammy had prepared from the various viands with which we had so luckily stocked the place.  Everything was cold, of course, for now that our flight was known it would never have done to risk lighting a fire for the mere pleasure of having hot chocolate for breakfast, lest some errant wreath of smoke should betray the locality of our hiding place, and lead to a search that might possibly result in our capture.  But, cold though the meal was, it was none the less welcome; and when we had finished I rose to my feet with the announcement that I intended to go forth upon a reconnoitring expedition.  Against this decision Lotta at once protested most vigorously, in which protest she was joined by Fonseca, who very generously offered to go in my stead.  He declared that in the untoward event of an unavoidable encounter with any of the men, the consequences to me would certainly be fatal, while for him they would probably amount to nothing worse than a somewhat severe cross-questioning as to how he managed to get ashore without using a boat, and what were his reasons for such extraordinary haste.  These questions he believed he could answer satisfactorily without difficulty.  But I was anxious to get all my information at first hand, to see everything with my own eyes, in order that I might be able to frame my plans with certainty.  I therefore put aside their objections, and, forbidding any of them to leave the cave until my return, sallied forth, observing every possible precaution against being seen or being taken unawares.
Upon emerging from the entrance to the cave, after having first taken a most careful look round, I made my way, with much circumspection, to the crown of a high knoll or ness, jutting out a little way into the bay, from which I believed I should be able to get a good view of the "yard", and ascertain, in the first instance, what might be happening in that direction.  The crest of this knoll was crowned with a thick and tolerably extensive clump of bushes, screened by which I hoped to be able both to see and hear anything that might happen to be transpiring among the various sheds, and at the same time to keep an eye upon the brig where she lay at her buoy, about half a mile from the shore.  When, however, I reached my hiding place I was disappointed to find that I was considerably farther away from the wharf and the buildings than I had expected; and that while I could see pretty well what was happening down there, as well as command an excellent view of the brig, I could hear nothing save an occasional shout; and it was even more upon what I should hear than upon what I should see that I depended for the necessary information upon which to base my plans.  But there was a spot at some distance down the front of the slope which I thought would suit my purpose admirably if I could only reach it without being seen, and I at once determined to make the attempt.  It was a somewhat peculiarly shaped outcrop of rock with a hollow in the middle of it, and I believed that if I could but gain its shelter without discovery I should be able to see from it nearly as well as from where I was, while I should certainly be able to hear very much better.  The only question was how to get there.  And after very carefully examining my surroundings from the shelter of my screen of bushes I came to the conclusion that my only plan would be to descend to the beach again by the way that I had come, enter the wood as though I intended to return to the house, and skirt it until I came very nearly to its far end, when, by concealing myself in a thick and extensive bed of ferns, I might reasonably hope to gain the desired spot without any very great difficulty or danger.  Accordingly, having first carefully looked about me to assure myself that I need not fear being seen, I cautiously emerged from my hiding place, and as cautiously made my way down to the beach again, from which it was easy to gain the shelter and concealment of the wood.  Another ten minutes found me, heedless of the danger of snake bites, painfully wriggling my way through the bed of ferns, lifting my head above the fronds occasionally to make sure that I was steering a straight course; and twenty minutes later saw me safely ensconced in my hiding place, from which I could both see and hear distinctly without being seen.
For nearly an hour it appeared as though I had had all my trouble for nothing, for the people on the wharf and in the sheds seemed to be going about their regular daily business with that perfect deliberation and entire absence of hurry which is so characteristic of the Spanish seamen.  I was beginning to consider seriously the question whether, after all, it might not be advisable for me to endeavour to approach the house, and even perhaps enter it, in my quest for information, when I saw Dominique and Juan suddenly appear upon the wharf and enter a small dinghy, in which they pulled off to the brig.  Then, as the tiny craft approached the _Barracouta_ a few figures appeared on deck, and by the time that the dinghy reached the brig's side all hands seemed to have mustered on deck.  Evidently they had been taking matters easy aboard her to celebrate their return to harbour.  Almost immediately after the arrival of the new captain and his lieutenant on board, the boatswain's whistle sounded, and a minute later both gigs and the cutter were lowered, and all hands apparently got into them and gave way for the shore.  Ten minutes later they landed on the wharf and drew themselves up into some semblance of rank and file.  I noticed that every man carried a brace of pistols, as well as the usual long, murderous-looking knife, in his belt.  Then Juan stepped forward and started to ring a large bell that was suspended from a gallows-like arrangement, and immediately a number of men came swarming out from the various sheds and formed up facing their comrades, who had just come ashore from the brig. I carefully counted these last, and found that, including Dominique and Juan, they mustered forty-two.  The others totalled up to fifty-six.
When the last man appeared to have presented himself, Dominique gave the order:
"Call over the roll, if you please, Senor Juan."
And therewith Juan, drawing the roll from his pocket, proceeded to call each man by name.  Each briefly responded by declaring himself to be "Present!"  Then, every man apparently having been accounted for, Dominique stepped forward and said:
"My lads, I have called you off from your regular work this morning to engage in a man hunt, or rather a hunt for two women and two men.  You will not need to be reminded by me that one of our chief and most recent causes of dissatisfaction with Ricardo was his extraordinary behaviour in connection with that young sprig of a naval officer whom we captured when we engaged the British war schooner _Francesca_.  Instead of heaving the young cub overboard to the sharks, as he ought to have done, our late chief, for some extraordinary reason which he never condescended to explain to us, chose to keep the young fellow alive, and not only so, but also to give the surgeon the strictest injunctions to nurse him back to health.  This was so totally at variance with his usual practice that, as I have already explained to some of you, there could only be one reason for it, and that reason, I have never had the slightest doubt, was that he had formed a plan to betray us all into the hands of the British.  By saving the young officer's life he hoped not only to use him as a channel of negotiation with the British authorities, but also to purchase immunity from punishment for himself. And having secured this, he would seize the earliest opportunity after our execution to return here and quietly possess himself of the immense hoard of treasure that we have accumulated by years of toil and peril. It was because I was thoroughly convinced of this that I did away with Ricardo; for it was his life or ours that hung in the balance.  But it was not sufficient to put Ricardo out of the way of doing us a mischief; the young English officer remained, and still remains, and until he also is removed there can be no safety for any one of us; and it was this knowledge that caused me to abandon our cruise and return here.
"And now, what do I find?  Why, that he, the Senorita Lotta, and the old nurse have disappeared!  Now, I want you to note particularly the significance of this last fact, that not only have those three disappeared, but so has Fonseca!  What does this mean?  Why, without doubt it means that the surgeon also was in the plot with Ricardo against us, and that we have him also to reckon with.  How or when he disappeared I cannot tell you, but we know that he was with us in the brig when we executed Ricardo.  He must therefore have slipped ashore in some mysterious manner immediately upon our arrival, and have warned the Englishman, who thereupon must have taken to flight, carrying off the girl, her nurse, and Fonseca with him.
"It is these four persons that I want you to hunt down and bring back to the rendezvous.  They cannot have gone very far, and they cannot get away, for, as some of you are aware, it is impossible to make one's way very far inland from here; we are completely shut in on the landward side by inaccessible cliffs.  But the Englishman does not know this, and I am by no means certain that either the girl or the surgeon knows it. I am therefore of opinion that they will all be found endeavouring to make their way into the back country by way of False Gap.  I want you all, therefore, to spread yourselves in such a way that some one or another of you must inevitably find them, either by overtaking them, or by intercepting them on their return when they find it impossible to escape landward.  I will go with you, but as a measure of precaution, Juan, with half a dozen men, will secrete themselves in the house yonder, in order that, should we by any strange chance miss the fugitives, they may be taken when they return to the house, as they must, sooner or later, in search of food.  And one man will remain here on the wharf, as a watchman and look-out; not that I think there is the slightest likelihood of the fugitives coming this way, but it is good generalship to take every possible precaution.  And if you, Jose, who are to remain here, should chance to sight any of the runaways, just ring the yard bell, and wait for those in the house to join you.
"Now, men, I hope you understand me; those four persons must be found and brought back to me; the Englishman, alive or dead.  The other three must be brought back to me alive, and, the girl at least, absolutely uninjured; and remember that in the case of Fonseca, the less he is injured the more acutely will he suffer from the punishment that I intend to inflict upon him for his treachery!  Now, forward all; to the house first, and from there spread yourselves over the country in the direction of False Gap.  March!"
Thereupon the whole party, with the exception of one solitary individual, whom I took to be Jose, who was told off to keep watch and ward upon the wharf, filed off along the wharf and up the pathway that led to the house from which we had fled but a few hours before.  It took them some twenty minutes to reach the bungalow, and ten minutes later I saw a mob of men issue from it and disappear inland.  For a few minutes their shouts could be heard as they called to each other, and then a dead silence fell upon the scene, broken only by the chirping and "chirring" of the myriads of insects that haunted the bushy growth with which the whole face of the country was covered, and the occasional call of a bird.  As for Jose, his first act, upon being left to himself, was to scrutinise carefully the whole face of the visible country, under the sharp of his hand, and then seat himself in the shadow of the capstan- house, light his pipe, and abandon himself to the soothing influence of the "weed."
Now the happenings of the last hour had set me thinking hard.  First of all, there was Dominique's remark about the impossibility of anyone escaping inland.  During the period of my convalescence I had seen enough of the country, while wandering about in Lotta's company, to convince me that this statement might be quite true, although Lotta had never said a word to lead me to believe that she was aware that it was so.  And if there was no possibility of escaping landward, the only alternative was to escape by going out to sea.  But a boat voyage was an undertaking not to be rashly entered upon, especially where a woman was in the case; the inconvenience and discomfort, to say nothing of the danger, of such an attempt were such as to make me pause long and consider the matter very seriously in all its bearings before determining to engage in such a venture.  Yet something must be done; we could not continue to inhabit the cavern indefinitely; a way of escape must be found; for after what had fallen from Dominique's lips while addressing his men, I felt that there was no such thing as safety for any of us while we remained within arm's reach of that miscreant.  The most serious feature of the case, so far as a boat voyage was concerned, was that even the biggest of the available boats, which was one of the _Barracouta's_ gigs, was much too small to justify me in the attempt to make the passage to Jamaica in her; for should the breeze happen to pipe strong, the boat could not possibly live in the boisterous sea that would at once be knocked up.  If, on the other hand, the brig's longboat had happened to be in the water, or some other craft big enough to accomplish the voyage in safety--I pulled myself up suddenly, for a distinctly audacious idea had at that moment occurred to me as well worthy of consideration.  Why not take the brig herself?  True, she was a big craft for two men to handle, but if she could but be got safely out to sea, and beyond the reach of pursuit by boats, she could be sailed under such short canvas that one man could take care of her for a whole watch without very much difficulty.  The trouble would be to get aboard her, get her under way, and take her out to sea without being detected and pursued, unless--and here I pulled myself up again, for another audacious idea had occurred to me.
I looked at Jose--he appeared to be in a distinctly drowsy condition, if indeed not already asleep, overpowered by the heat, and lulled to slumber by the unwonted quiet of his surroundings.  Then I looked carefully around me to see whether I could detect any traces of the man- hunters, but saw none; they were all undoubtedly well out of the way by this time.  I pulled myself together and braced myself up for immediate action, for it suddenly dawned upon me that I was never likely to have a more favourable opportunity to carry my bold scheme into effect than that which at that moment presented itself to me.  I quietly emerged from my place of concealment and, once more crouching low among the ferns, crept slowly and with infinite caution toward the somnolent Jose, gradually working my way round until I could just see him clear of the corner of the capstan-house.  Some twenty minutes of this work brought me right up to the gable end of the building, from which position I again reconnoitred Jose.  He was unmistakably fast asleep, and therefore practically at my mercy.  But as I had no intention of killing the man, if I could possibly avoid so extreme a measure, I must have the wherewithal to bind him securely, and that could undoubtedly be obtained in the capstan-house.  I therefore removed my shoes and, carrying them in my hand, stole on tiptoe round the corner of the building, keeping a wary eye on the sleeper as I did so.  Presently I slipped noiselessly in through the open door, and found myself in a long, spacious apartment abundantly stored with ponderous hempen cables and hawsers, anchors of various sizes, piles of sails neatly stopped up, quantities of chain of various kinds, coils of rope, sufficient, it appeared to me, to fit a new gang of running rigging to a dozen ships like the _Barracouta_, bundles of blocks, single, double, threefold, and sister, dangling from the beams--in fact almost every conceivable article that could possibly be needed in the fitting out of a ship.  There was part of a coil of brand-new ratline close to my hand, which would serve my purpose admirably, I therefore whipped out my knife and cut off as much as I required, seized a double handful of oakum and a belaying-pin with which to form a gag, cut off a length of marline with which to secure the gag in place, and then, having made a running bowline in the end of my length of ratline, I stole, still in my stocking feet, to the door, and very cautiously peered out at Jose.  The man was sound asleep, seated on the ground with his back propped against the wall of the capstan-house, his legs stretched out straight in front of him, his arms hanging limply at his sides with the backs of his hands resting on the ground and turned palm upward, his head sunk on his breast, and his pipe, fallen from his mouth, lying in his lap.
Silently and stealthily I crept toward him until I stood by his side; then, without pausing a moment, I dropped the noosed ratline over his shoulders, at the same moment grabbing him by the collar and dragging him forward to allow the noose to drop to his middle, hauling it taut as it did so, and thus confining his arms to his sides.  Then, as he opened his mouth with the evident intention of letting out a yell, I popped the belaying-pin wrapped in oakum into his mouth, at the same time hissing into his ear: "Be silent as you value your life!"  Then, turning him over on his face, I rapidly trussed him up in such a fashion that I felt confident he would never get free again, unaided; and finally I dragged him inside the capstan-house, adjusting the gag in such a manner that, while not interfering unduly with his comfort, it would effectually prevent him from raising an alarm.  And then, having assured myself that I had nothing to fear from him, I hurried off and made the best of my way to the cave, where I found its occupants suffering the greatest uneasiness in consequence of my prolonged absence.
A few hasty words from me sufficed to put them in possession of my plans, and then, gathering up such few personal belongings as we had brought with us, we left the cavern and hurried away to the wharf, which we managed to reach unobserved, and temporarily concealed ourselves in the capstan-house, where Jose was found still safely trussed up.  Then, leaving Lotta, Fonseca, and Mammy in the building, I sallied out to make my final arrangements, which I hoped to do without interference, since that part of the wharf where I was operating was not visible from the house.  But there was, of course, the risk that those in the house might at any moment take it into their heads to come down to the wharf to see how Jose was faring, and it was therefore of the utmost importance that what I had to do should be done quickly.
I walked to the edge of the wharf and looked over.  The two gigs and the cutter of the _Barracouta_ were lying alongside each other at a flight of steps about half a dozen fathoms away, the only other boat which I could see afloat lying just astern of them.  But there were several boats hauled-up high and dry on the wharf, and these would need thinking about with reference to the scheme that I had in my mind.  Slipping down the landing steps, I cast adrift three out of the four boats, and re- moored them in a string, one to the stern of another, so that by manning the leading boat, we could tow the others after us.  Then I returned to the capstan-house and proceeded to look for a carpenter's maul, which I quickly found.  I was now ready for what I fondly hoped would prove to be the last act in our little drama, and was about to give the word to march, when Fonseca, who appeared to have been speaking to Jose, stayed me.
"Senor Grenvile," he said, "I have just been exchanging a few remarks with our friend Jose here, who has made certain representations to me that I think demand your consideration.  He quite understands, of course, that we are about to attempt to escape, and he fully recognises that he has no power to prevent us.  But he contends that if we go off and leave him here, Dominique will certainly torture him to death as a punishment for permitting himself to be taken by surprise; and from what I know of Dominique, I am afraid poor Jose has only too good reason for his apprehension.  That being the case, he implores us to take him with us, even if we afterward deliver him up to the authorities, since he would infinitely rather be hanged than remain here at the mercy of Dominique.  What say you, senor; do you feel inclined to accede to his request?"
I looked at Jose.  The poor wretch was evidently in a paroxysm of terror, and was muttering eagerly behind his gag, while he gazed up at me with eyes that were eloquent with pleading.
"Take the gag out of his mouth," said I, "and let me hear what he has to say.  But upon the first attempt to raise his voice, brain him with the belaying-pin.  We must have no trifling now."
Fonseca at once removed the gag, and Jose instantly burst forth with a perfect torrent of prayers for mercy, intermingled with the most earnest and graphic representations of what would happen to him if left behind.
"I would take you with us willingly, Jose," I said, "if I could be assured that you would be faithful to us; but--"
"Oh, senor, do not doubt me, I implore you!  Take me with you, senor; and if you feel that you cannot trust me, put me in irons when we get on board.  But I swear to you, senor, that I will indeed be faithful to you.  Take me, senor, and try me!"
"Very well," I said, "I will.  But you must not expect me to trust you too much at first.  Therefore, Fonseca, put the gag back into his mouth, for the moment, and then cast his feet adrift, so that he can walk down to the boats instead of being carried.  And while you are doing that, I will take a final look outside, and attend to a certain little matter before we leave."  And, so saying, I picked up the maul and walked out of the building.
A careful look all round satisfied me that there was nobody in sight; and as for the party up at the house, it was about time for their midday meal, and they were probably getting it.  I therefore made my way to the spot where the hauled-up boats were lying, and deliberately smashed in two or three of the bottom planks of each, thus rendering them quite unserviceable for the moment.  Then, returning to the capstan-house, I gave the word to march, and the whole party, now five in number, including Jose, filed across the wharf and down the steps into the leading gig; the painter was cast off, and Fonseca and I taking an oar apiece, we pushed off and, with the other three boats in tow, made our way slowly toward the brig.
And then, suddenly, a dreadful apprehension seized me.  "By Jove, Fonseca," I exclaimed, "I have never thought of it until this moment, but what is going to happen if there are any people left aboard the brig?  I have been quite taking it for granted that all hands came ashore this morning, but of course I cannot be at all sure that they did."
"I presume you did not by any chance notice, senor, precisely how many men landed, did you?" demanded Fonseca.
"Yes," said I, "I did.  And, including Dominique and Juan, they numbered forty-two."
"Forty-two!" repeated Fonseca.  "Now, just let me think."  He considered for about a minute, and then said:
"So far as I can remember, senor, forty-two should include all hands. But, all the same, it will not be amiss to approach the ship warily, and get aboard, if possible, noiselessly.  Then, once aboard, we can soon ascertain whether anyone is there.  And if perchance there should be, it cannot be more than one or two at most, whom we can probably overpower if we once get a footing on deck."
A few minutes later we opened out the house clear of the wood, and I kept my eye on it, wondering how long it would be ere we should attract the attention of Juan and those with him.  They must have seen us almost immediately, for in less than a minute we saw half a dozen men rush out on to the gallery that ran all round the building, and stand staring straight at us, evidently talking excitedly together the while; then, as with one accord, they set off racing down the path at breakneck speed toward the wharf, shouting to us and gesticulating wildly as they ran. But we took matters very quietly, knowing that there was not a boat left that would swim, or, as we believed, that could be made to swim without a couple of hours' work being done upon her.  Then I turned my gaze toward the brig; for I argued that since their cries reached us quite distinctly, they must also reach the brig, and if anyone had been left aboard her those cries would soon create an alarm, and we might expect to see some movement on board her.  But we saw nothing, the craft maintained the appearance of being absolutely deserted, and five minutes later we stole up alongside and quietly scrambled aboard her by way of the main chains.
CHAPTER TWENTY.
HOW THE ADVENTURE ENDED.
As I dropped in over the rail and alighted upon the deck, I flung a quick glance along it, fore and aft, in search of some trace of occupation, but there was nothing to indicate that anyone had been left on board.  I stole forward and listened intently at the fore scuttle, but there was no sound of movement down in the forecastle, nor could I catch any suggestion of deep breathing or snoring, as would probably have been the case had an anchor-watch been left on board, and, ignoring its responsibilities, gone below and turned in.  But, determined to make quite sure, I swung my legs over the coaming and quietly dropped down into the close, pungent-smelling place.  For a moment I could see nothing, for the only light entering the forecastle came down through the hatch, and my eyes were dazzled with the brilliant light of the outer world; but presently my sight came to me and I saw that all the bunks and hammocks were empty, and that the apartment contained nothing more dangerous than a heterogeneous assortment of clothes, boots, oilskins, and other articles common to seamen.  I therefore made my way on deck again and ran aft, where I encountered Fonseca just emerging from the cabin, where he, like myself, had been on an exploring expedition, which, like mine, had proved fruitless.  As we met and exchanged news my eyes wandered away shoreward, and I noticed that Juan and his companions had reached the wharf, and seemed to be busying themselves about one of the upturned boats which I had taken the precaution to stave.  Upon getting the ship's glass I had no difficulty in discovering that they were busily engaged in an attempt to patch up and make her serviceable, with the evident intention of coming in pursuit of us.
"By Jove, Fonseca," I exclaimed, "we must bestir ourselves or those fellows may nab us after all.  Jump down into the gig, cast Jose adrift, and bid him come aboard instantly; we have not a moment to lose."
And as I spoke I made a dash at the trysail brails, cast them off, and proceeded to drag upon the fall of the outhaul tackle.  Presently Fonseca returned with Jose, and both lent a hand with a will, the latter seeming to be quite as anxious as any of us to avoid being taken by his former companions.  Then, rushing forward, I laid out on the jib-boom and cast loose the inner jib, which Fonseca and Jose at once proceeded to hoist.  Then, hauling the jib-sheet over to windward, we cast off the slip by which the brig was, as usual, secured to her buoy, and I then ran aft and put the helm hard down.  The brig was now adrift, and with stern way on her; but with the helm hard down she soon paid off, when we hauled aft the lee jib-sheet, and she at once began to forge ahead. But, unfortunately for us, it was almost a dead beat of nearly two miles out to sea, with not very much room to manoeuvre in.  If, therefore, the people ashore happened to be specially handy with their tools they might yet get their boat repaired in time to give us trouble; for, smart ship as the _Barracouta_ undoubtedly was, the small amount of sail which we now had set was only sufficient to put her along at about two knots in the hour, or barely to give her steerage way.  But she carried a main- topmast staysail which was a fine big sail, the stay reaching from the main-topmast cross-trees down to the foremast within about ten feet of the deck, and this sail we now got on her, with great advantage, her speed at once increasing to nearly four knots.  But under this canvas I soon found that she griped rather badly; that is to say, she required an undue amount of weather helm to hold her straight to her course.  We therefore loosed and set the fore-topmast staysail, after which she not only practically steered herself, but further increased her speed to not far short of five knots.  We had now as much canvas set as we three men could very well manage, and quite enough to keep us going so soon as we should get outside.  My only anxiety was lest we should have trouble with the people before we could pass out clear of the heads into the open ocean.  Once there I knew that we could easily run away from any rowboat that they could launch.  And that reminded me that we had no less than four boats towing behind us, and that they retarded our speed to a quite perceptible extent.  Summoning Fonseca and Jose to my assistance, therefore, and showing Lotta how to manipulate the helm in such a manner as to keep the brig going through the water, we hauled-up first one gig and then the other, and succeeded in hoisting them to the davits.  The other two we also hauled alongside, and, dropping a couple of cold shot through their bottoms cast them adrift.
By the time that all this was done we had drawn well over toward the southern shore of the bay, and the moment had arrived for us to heave in stays.  I was just a little anxious as to this manoeuvre, having my doubts as to whether the brig would stay under such short canvas as that which she now had set; but upon putting the helm down all my apprehensions were at once set at rest, for she came round like a top. But I was fully confirmed in my conviction that it would be unwise to attempt to get any more canvas on the vessel, for although the trysail worked itself the two stay-sails and the jib proved to be quite as much as we three men could well manage.
Having made a long "leg" across the bay, we now had to make a short one; and no sooner were we round than I took another look at Juan and his party through the telescope, just to see how they were getting on.  To my amazement they appeared to have already executed some sort of repair of the boat that they had been working upon, for as I brought the glass to bear upon them I saw that they had turned her over and were carrying her down to the water's edge, with the evident intention of launching her; and while I stood watching they actually got her afloat.  Then, while one man got into her and immediately started baling, the remaining five hurried off to the wharf, and, disappearing into one of the sheds, presently reappeared, carrying oars, boat-hook, rudder, bottom boards, stretchers, and other matters of boats' furniture.  These they carried down to where the boat was lying, and having placed them in position, jumped in and pushed off.
"By Jove, Fonseca, they are after us already!"  I exclaimed.  "Now if they have managed to make a good repair of that boat they will overhaul us before we can get clear of the bay.  And that will mean a fight, for I certainly do not mean to give in if I can help it; and if we can muster half a dozen muskets and a few rounds of ammunition we ought to be able to keep those fellows from coming alongside, we having the advantage of the deck to fight from.  See, they know well what they are about; they are not attempting to follow us, but are pulling straight for the entrance, keeping close under the lee of the land."
"Yes, I see," answered Fonseca as he took the telescope from me and applied it to his eye.  "But I see also, senor, that one man is kept busy baling with a bucket, so it is evident that the boat leaks badly; and it may be that before they can overtake us they will be obliged to give up and go back to save the boat from swamping under them."
"Possibly," I agreed.  "Nevertheless I think it would be only wise of us to take every reasonable precaution.  Therefore I shall feel obliged if you will be good enough to go below and look out a dozen muskets--you will doubtless know where to find them--and, having found them, load them with ball and bring them up on deck to me."
"Certainly, senor; there will be no difficulty about that," assented Fonseca.  "I will go at once."  And he forthwith vanished down the companion way.  A quarter of an hour later he returned with six loaded muskets in his arms, which he deposited upon the stern-grating, and then went below for the remaining half-dozen.
Meanwhile we had been slipping quite nimbly across the bay, and by the time that Fonseca had returned with the second lot of muskets we had neared the land sufficiently to render it necessary for us to heave about again.  By the time that we had tacked and were full again the boat had neared us to within about a mile, and it became a practical certainty that, unless something quite unforeseen occurred, we should be obliged to fight our passage out to sea.  But we were now making a "long leg" again, leaving the boat almost astern of us, and going at least as fast through the water as she was, if not somewhat faster.  Then, as I stood at the wheel steering, with my thoughts wandering away into the past, an idea suddenly entered my head, and I said to Fonseca:
"By the way, Fonseca, can you tell me whether this is the brig that, some six months ago, attacked a little schooner called the _Dolores_ over on the Guinea coast, and, after taking a cargo of slaves out of her, scuttled her in cold blood, leaving the survivors of her crew to go down with her?"
The man looked at me in consternation.  "Why, how on earth did you come to know of that rascally transaction, senor?" he demanded.
"Because," said I, "I happened to be in command of the _Dolores_ at the time, and was one of those who were left to perish in her.  She was a prize, and I had been given charge of her, with orders to take her to Sierra Leone."
"How extraordinary!" he exclaimed.  "And, pray, how did you manage to escape, senor?"
I told him the whole story, concluding by saying: "I have had a rod in pickle for this brig ever since.  I vowed then that I would find and take her; and, having succeeded thus far, I am not going to allow myself to be baffled by half a dozen men in an open boat."
When we next went about I saw that we were heading well up for the narrow passage which formed the entrance of the bay; but the boat had made such good progress that it was quite an open question whether she or the brig would first reach it.  I believed that if we could reach it with a lead of even so little as a quarter of a mile we could get out without coming to blows; but should the boat succeed in approaching us any closer than that, I foresaw that she must inevitably overtake us in "the narrows", which would be the very worst place possible for us, since we were beating out against the trade wind, and the spot that we were now approaching was so exceedingly narrow that there was scarcely width enough for even so smart a vessel as the _Barracouta_ to work in it.  We should no sooner be about and nicely gathering steerage way than down the helm would have to go again, and we should have our hands quite sufficiently full in looking after the ship just there without the additional worry of being obliged to drive off a boat.  I therefore determined that should there presently prove to be any doubt about the matter I would edge away down upon the boat and have it out with her while we still had room in which to manoeuvre the ship.
The brig and the boat were now approaching each other on courses that converged at about right angles, the boat being on our lee bow, but drawing ahead at a pace which threatened to bring her unpleasantly near us if it did not actually carry her across our forefoot.  But as we drew nearer I noticed that, despite the continuous baling that was going on aboard the boat, she had settled so deeply in the water that she could scarcely hope to keep afloat another half-hour, and the idea came to me that if I could avoid her for that length of time I need fear no further trouble from her, for she would simply swamp with her crew and leave them to swim for their lives.  I carefully examined the shore through the telescope to see whether there was a spot on which our pursuers could beach their boat and get rid of the water by the simple process of turning her over and pouring the water out of her, but I could see no such spot; the whole shore, right out to the narrows, was steep-to, with a confused fringe of great masses of rock upon which it would be quite impossible to haul up a boat.
As the two craft drew close together it became increasingly doubtful whether we should be able to avoid the boat unless by the adoption of some especial measures, and at length I saw that when the time should arrive for us to heave in stays our pursuers would have actually cut us off.  I therefore stood on until we had arrived within about a hundred yards of them, by which time they were dead ahead of us, and lying upon their oars, waiting for us to endeavour to pass them, when I calmly put the brig's helm hard up, instead of down, and we wore round on the other tack, going back over pretty nearly the same ground that we had traversed a few minutes before, to the intense disgust and disappointment of Juan and his companions, who had evidently quite made up their minds that they had us fairly caught.  The moment that our manoeuvre had so far developed as to be understood, the occupants of the boat sent up a yell of execration, and began to shout all manner of dreadful threats at us, while they frantically strove to get their crazy boat round in order to come after us in chase.  But it soon became apparent that, the boat being in a waterlogged condition, and the oarsmen almost worn out with fatigue, our pursuers had not a ghost of a chance of overtaking us.  They, as well as we, recognised this when it was all but too late.  Then it dawned upon them that we might evade them with the utmost ease, for practically as long as we chose, by simply repeating our last manoeuvre until their boat should sink under them--an event, by the way, which they could not much longer defer.  After pursuing us, therefore, for nearly a mile, they suddenly abandoned the chase, and, turning the boat's head in the direction of the wharf, devoted their efforts to the successful accomplishment of their return. We did not wait to see how they fared, but, as soon as they were fairly out of our way, tacked again, and half an hour later found ourselves fully employed in negotiating the exceedingly difficult navigation of the narrows, which we successfully accomplished after several exceedingly close shaves of the rocks that border the passage on either hand.  Half an hour of this work sufficed to take us clear, when we emerged into another funnel-shaped channel leading into the open water of the Bahama Channel.  It was close upon eight bells of the afternoon watch when we finally went out clear of everything, by which time we were all quite ready for the appetising meal that Mammy, arrogating to herself the duties of cook, had prepared for us in the ship's galley.
Under our short canvas it took us the best part of three days to beat up to Cape Maysi, the easternmost extremity of Cuba, which we safely weathered about four bells in the forenoon watch on the third morning after our escape.  Then, the weather being fine, with the wind well over our port quarter for the run through the Windward Channel across to Morant Point, we ventured to get a little more canvas on the craft, setting both topsails, which quickened up our speed to close on seven knots.  The weather continuing fine all through that day and the succeeding night, we sighted the broken water on the Formigas Bank the next morning at breakfast-time, and passed it a quarter of an hour later.  At noon of that same day we sighted Morant Point, the easternmost extremity of the island of Jamaica, and rounded it two hours later.  A pilot boarded us about six bells, off Yallahs Point, and finally we entered Port Royal harbour, and let go our anchor, on the very last of the sea breeze, just as the bell of the flagship was striking four in the first dog watch.
Now that we had actually arrived I could see that Fonseca and, still more, Jose felt a considerable amount of anxiety as to what was likely to befall them in consequence of their connection with so notorious and formidable a pirate as Ricardo, but I was able pretty well to reassure the surgeon, at least, for he had told me his story, and I believed it would not be very difficult for him to satisfy the authorities that he had been compelled to join the pirates, and had never been permitted the least chance to effect his escape on those rare occasions when the _Barracouta_ had been obliged to call at an ordinary port.  Further, there was the fact, to which of course I could bear personal testimony, that he had warned Lotta and myself of the fate designed for us by Dominique and the rest, after the death of Ricardo, and had most loyally aided us to effect our escape.  So far as Jose was concerned I did not feel quite so sure of being able to screen him, but I told him that I believed I could at least ensure that his punishment should not be more severe than that involved in his compulsory entry on board a British man-o'-war--for he, too, had loyally done his fair share of work on the passage round to Port Royal.  The fellow, however, took care to leave nothing to chance, for some time during that same night he contrived to entice a boat alongside, and in her made his way to Kingston, where he vanished.
I made no attempt to go ashore or otherwise communicate with the admiral on the night of our arrival, for I had been on deck practically the whole time of our passage, snatching an hour or two of sleep when and how I could, and I felt that now I was entitled to, and should be all the better for, a thorough good night's rest.  But the next morning I was up betimes, and, having breakfasted, went ashore in a shore boat and presented myself for admittance at the admiral's office, so as to catch him as soon as the old fellow should arrive from Kingston.  Prior to this, however, I had sighted and identified the little _Francesca_, lying about half a mile farther up the harbour, looking as smart and saucy as though she had never been mauled by a pirate.  There were very few people moving so early in the morning, and I hastened to take shelter in the office, as I was anxious to avoid meeting any of my former friends or acquaintances until I had first had an interview with Sir Timothy.
It was getting well on toward eleven o'clock when at length his barge dashed up alongside the wharf, and he came bustling along toward his office, smartening up this, that, and the other person who did not seem to be infusing a proper amount of energy into his work as he came along.
As he entered I heard the office messenger say something to him in a low tone, to which he responded:
"What?  Nonsense! you must be mistaken, Mooney, or else you have been drinking this morning."
"Not a drop, your honour, has passed my lips this mornin'," I heard the man answer.  "And furthermore, sir, the gentleman's inside this minit, waitin' to see ye."
The next moment Sir Timothy entered, and I rose to my feet.
"Well, I'll be shot, so it is!" he gasped.  Then he grasped me by the hand and shook it heartily, exclaiming: "Welcome back to Port Royal, my boy, welcome back!  And now, sit down and tell me in half a dozen words, for I'm frightfully busy this morning, where you have been, and what you have done with yourself."
Thereupon I resumed my seat, and spun my yarn, not in half a dozen words exactly, but as briefly as possible, confining myself to the statement of just the leading facts and incidents, and reserving the details for a more suitable occasion.  But I mentioned Lotta, and ventured to ask Sir Timothy's advice as to how I should proceed in the matter of procuring her lodgment and so on until her trustees could be communicated with and she could be restored to their charge.
"Oh, as to that," answered Sir Timothy, "there need be no difficulty at all!  You must dine with me at the Pen to-night, of course, so that you can give me your yarn at full length, and you had better bring the young lady with you.  Lady Mary is the best person to decide what to do with her."
Accordingly, that afternoon I took Lotta ashore with me, and, having looked in upon the Todds on our way, and, needless to say, received a most hospitable and friendly welcome, hired a ketureen and drove her up to the Pen, where Lady Mary, having been previously prepared by her husband, forthwith took possession of her and carried her off to her own private room, from which she reappeared no more until dinner-time, when to my amazement Lotta was led forth to be presented to the assembled company, attired in a rig which Lady Mary and her maid had devised upon the spur of the moment, and in which the senorita looked so surpassingly lovely that the sight of her fairly took my breath away.
Sir Timothy, with that inherent kindness of heart which was one of his most pronounced characteristics, took care that I was the hero of the evening, making me spin my yarn in detail to him and his guests; and at the end thereof awarding me a great deal more praise than I was in the least entitled to.  Lotta and I slept at the Pen that night, and after all the guests had left, we four, that is to say Sir Timothy, Lady Mary, Lotta, and I, resolved ourselves into a sort of council.  It was ultimately arranged that Lotta was to remain at the Pen as the guest of Lady Mary and Sir Timothy until her trustees could be communicated with, and arrangements made with them for her to return and take possession of her home and property, and that I, meanwhile, was to resume command of the _Francesca_, and in her proceed to the pirate rendezvous and destroy the place utterly, making prisoners of all who should be found about the place, and, of course, taking care to bring back whatever booty the pirates might have been found to have accumulated.  It is proper to say here that I did not consider it necessary to mention to Sir Timothy anything about Ricardo's private store of treasure hidden in the cave. I felt that Ricardo had been perfectly right when he said that I had as good a right as anybody to that, and I was quite determined that it should be Lotta's and mine, to bring about which result I felt that my best plan would be to keep the whole matter to myself.
It happened that the _Francesca_ was quite ready for sea, and there was therefore nothing to wait for except a few necessary articles of clothing for myself.  Accordingly, within forty-eight hours of my arrival in Port Royal, aboard the _Barracouta_, I was at sea again in the schooner, on my way to demolish the lair of the pirates.  Carrying on heavily we arrived in the bay on the afternoon of the second day out, and anchored in such a position that not only the wharf and the various sheds, but also the bungalow, were within range of the schooner's guns. Then, while one-half of the crew remained on board to take care of the vessel, and guard against the possibility of the pirates playing off my own trick upon me and stealing the schooner, the other half, armed to the teeth, accompanied me ashore and proceeded to collect and convey to the schooner all the booty of every kind that we could find, and which seemed worth carrying off.  Not a pirate appeared to say us nay; indeed, a little investigation soon made it apparent that my act of running away with their brig had caused them to take the alarm and make their escape in certain of the boats which I had damaged.  Plain evidence was discovered of the fact that they had hurriedly repaired four of their boats and had gone off, carrying away with them all their portable booty in the shape of coin, bullion, jewellery, etcetera, and leaving only that which was too bulky to be stowed in their boats.  We found sufficient of the latter, however, in the shape of valuable merchandise, to load the schooner very nearly down to her covering board; having stowed which safely away, we set fire to the whole place, and never left it until every building, including the bungalow, had been utterly destroyed.  And thus ended my long and persistent pursuit of one of the most pestilent and formidable gangs of pirates that had haunted the Atlantic and West Indian waters for many years.
There is very little more left me to say.  Sir Timothy was good enough to award me a great deal more praise for my conduct over this affair than I felt that I at all deserved, although my conscience was not tender enough to cause me to refuse the promotion that soon afterwards followed.
Lotta remained with Sir Timothy and Lady Mary for nearly two months, during which I was afforded ample opportunity to enjoy her society and bask in her smiles; and at the end of that period her guardians came over from Cuba and took her back with them for the purpose of placing her in possession of her magnificent estate, which comprised several thousand acres of the finest tobacco-growing district in the island. But before she went an arrangement had been come to between her and myself that we were to marry as soon as I had attained my post- captaincy, which occurred within a couple of years, thanks to the interest which Sir Timothy was good enough to take in me, and the opportunities which he constantly afforded me for gaining step after step "up the ratlines".  Needless to say I took an early opportunity to pay yet another and a final visit to Ricardo's rendezvous for the purpose of securing the treasure which he had bequeathed to me, and which I cautiously, and bit by bit, as opportunity offered, converted into money, which I safely invested in the public funds.
As for Fonseca, I was able to make such representations on his behalf as secured him complete immunity from prosecution for his connection with the pirates; and a firm friendship rapidly sprang up between us which ended in his establishing himself as a medical practitioner in Cuba, in the district in which Lotta's estates were situate; and he is now one of the most popular and prosperous physicians in the island.

= = = PG24615 = = =
A MIDDY OF THE KING: A ROMANCE OF THE OLD BRITISH NAVY
Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England
A Middy of the King, by Harry Collingwood.
________________________________________________________________________ The young hero of this tale is Dick Delamere, who was already a midshipman, on leave, but who receives a letter from the Captain of the Europa, recalling him to join the ship at Portsmouth.  The date of the events that ensue is the very late eighteenth century.
The first few chapters cover the events while the Europa is on patrol in the Chops of the Channel and the Bay of Biscay.  The British are hostile to the French and to the Dutch, and there are engagements with vessels of these nations.  Thereafter the vessel sails to the West Indies, where one of the problems is to exterminate the pirates infesting those waters.  The book describes, possibly fairly accurately, the life of a midshipman of those days and in those waters.  At one point Dick receives a very serious head-wound, but recovers with good treatment in the Naval Hospital.  On the whole the book has echoes of the immortal works of Captain Marryat, which I am sure our author had studied very carefully.
Collingwood has exceptional powers of description, and this book makes a good read, and, of course, a good audiobook.
CHAPTER ONE.
H.M.S. EUROPA.
I had just dismounted before the rather imposing main entrance to Delamere Hall, situate close to the west Dorset coast, and had handed over my horse to Tom Biddlecome, the groom who had accompanied me in my before-breakfast ride down to the beach for my morning dip, when my father appeared in the portico.
"Good morning, Dick," he greeted me.  "I suppose you have been for your swim, as usual.  How did you find the water?"
"Grand, sir," I replied; "just the right temperature to put new life into one.  Another week, at this rate, ought to see me as well as ever I was."
"Well, your present appearance is scarcely that of an invalid, I must confess," he remarked laughingly.  "If you were called upon to submit to a medical examination, I fancy the verdict would be that there is not very much the matter with you.  And I am very glad that it is so; for I have just received a letter from my friend Vavassour, in which he informs me that he has been posted to the new frigate _Europa_, launched last week at Portsmouth and now fitting-out; that he has entered your name on her books; and that, if you feel sufficiently recovered to resume duty, he would very strongly advise you to proceed to Portsmouth at once and assist in the operation of fitting-out, as he is of opinion that by doing so you will gain a considerable amount of knowledge that will be of the utmost value to you when you come to sit for your examination.  Now, what is your opinion?  Do you think you are sufficiently recovered to do as Vavassour suggests; or should I write and ask him to--"
"By no means, my dear father," I interrupted hastily.  "I am quite well, and perfectly fit for duty in every respect; indeed, I feel sure that, having advanced so far along the road to recovery, a return to a life of greater activity than that which I have been living of late will be positively beneficial to me.  Of course I shall be very sorry to leave you again to a life of solitude."
"Do not think of that, Dick," interrupted my father in his turn.  "I assure you that my life here is not nearly so lonely as you seem to imagine.  True, there are not many neighbours, but what there are, are eminently satisfactory; also I have my horses, my dogs, my gun, and my rod for outdoor companions, and books to exorcise the loneliness of my evenings; so that you see I am not at all badly off.  No doubt I shall miss you after you are gone, my son; but this is not the time to study one's own feelings.  Britain just now needs every one of her sons who can strike a blow in her defence; and when I look at your empty chair I shall at least have the pride and satisfaction of knowing that, wherever you may be, you are upholding the honour of your country and your name. Well, well," he sighed, "let us get indoors and to breakfast.  There is a letter also for you from Vavassour, and you will be curious to learn what he has to say to you."
Whereupon, linked arm in arm, my father and I entered and made our way to the breakfast room, where we seated ourselves, and were soon busy with the viands placed before us.  The letter to which my father had referred lay beside my plate; and, having obtained his permission, I at once broke the seal and glanced at its contents, for I was full of curiosity to learn in detail the splendid news which my father had outlined to me as he stood in the portico.
But before proceeding further with this veracious history it will be well that I should say a word or two about myself, by way of formally introducing myself as it were to the reader, in order that if he feels inclined to follow my fortunes, as set forth in the following pages, he may know just who I am and how matters were standing with me at the moment when this story opens.
To begin, then, I was the only son of Sir Richard Delamere, of Delamere Hall, in the county of Dorsetshire; Baronet, Justice of the Peace, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera; and some sixteen and a half years before the date at which this story starts I had received the name of Richard, after my father, at the baptismal font in the fine old church in the village of Delamere, that nestles snugly in the valley about a mile to the north-eastward of the Hall.
I never knew my mother, for she died in giving me birth; and my father, who adored her living, and revered her memory, was some years older before he fully forgave me for being the unwitting cause of her premature departure from this world.  And in this I could sympathise with him as soon as I came to years of understanding, for she was not only, as everybody who had known her asserted, of a most amiable and loveable disposition, but--as her portrait in the big library bore witness--a most lovely woman.
But although I was unfortunate enough never to have known a mother's love, I do not think I was actually very much the worse for the loss; for upon my mother's death her place was most ably and conscientiously filled by my aunt Griselda, my father's maiden sister, who faithfully did her duty both by my father and me until she too passed away when I was about eleven years old, by which time my father had completely conquered his original resentment toward me, and we had become all that father and son ought to be to each other.
Then, after receiving the best education that it was at that time possible for a lad to receive, I had entered the navy as a midshipman, at the age of fourteen, and had gone out to the Mediterranean in the old _Colossus_, two-decker, under the command of Sir Percy Fitzgerald, where, for some two and a half years, we spent our time partly in chasing the French up and down the great inland sea, and partly in blockading the port of Toulon, under Sir John Jervis.  It was while engaged upon this latter service that I was so seriously wounded in the head by a flying splinter that I was invalided home to recover, the _Colossus_ being opportunely ordered to England at the same time to undergo a general overhaul and refit.
Of course I had not been in the navy for more than two years without making a few friends, among the staunchest of whom I reckoned Mr Henry Vavassour, the first lieutenant of the _Colossus_, and also a friend of my father.  This officer was a very dashing fellow, a prime seaman, and a cool, courageous, resolute leader of men--he had frequently been mentioned in dispatches--and I was therefore not at all surprised to learn, as I now did, that he had gained his post rank and had been given the command of a fine ship.  His letter to me ran as follows:
"My dear Delamere--I think you will be glad to learn that their Lordships have been pleased to promote me, bestow upon me post rank, and give me the command of the new frigate _Europa_, just launched at Portsmouth.  She is an exceedingly fine ship of 1216 tons, mounting 38 guns; and, with smart officers and a good crew, I think she ought, given ordinary luck, to render an excellent account of herself.
"I have been allowed to nominate all my own officers, and I have therefore entered you on the ship's books, not only for your father's sake, but also on account of your excellent behaviour while aboard the _Colossus_; and if, as I hope, you have sufficiently recovered to join, you will again meet one or two of your former shipmates on the quarter-deck of the new ship.
"If you feel fit for duty I would very strongly advise you to join at the earliest possible moment, as at present the _Europa_ has only her three lower-masts stepped.  She is in the hands of the riggers, and I am of opinion that it would be of the utmost service to you if you could be on the spot to witness the process of rigging; you would thus obtain at first hand an insight into details, which will assuredly stand you in good stead when you come to present yourself for examination.  I ought, perhaps, to inform you that in the event of your deciding to act upon my advice it will be necessary for you to take up your quarters temporarily aboard the receiving hulk, but this inconvenience will be more than compensated by the knowledge that you will gain.  For myself, I am putting up at the `George' in the High Street, and it will be well for you to report yourself to me there upon your arrival.  I have written to your father, explaining everything; I need therefore add nothing to this beyond the expression of the hope that you may be able to avail yourself to the fullest extent of this splendid opportunity for gaining a great deal of most useful knowledge in a very short time.--Yours sincerely, Henry Vavassour."
When I had finished the perusal of this exceedingly kind and friendly letter I passed it over to my father, who in his turn read it carefully through, and then passed it back to me with the question:
"Well, Dick, my boy, what do you think of it?"
"Simply, sir, that if you approve I will at once write to Captain Vavassour, thanking him heartily for his very great kindness, and telling him that I will start for Portsmouth to-morrow," I said.
My father regarded me, rather wistfully I thought, for a few moments, and then said:
"Very well; be it so.  Write your letter, by all means, and I will enclose a few lines in it.  And,"--suddenly, in a much more cheerful tone of voice, as an idea seemed to suggest itself to him--"I'll tell you what I'll do, Dick, I'll run over to Portsmouth with you, and stay for a few days.  A little change will do me good; and I should like very much to see this new ship of yours, as well as to meet Vavassour again, whom I have not seen for quite a number of years.  Yes, certainly, I will go over with you."
Thus it was arranged.  We wrote and dispatched our letters, spent the remainder of the day in making our preparations, and started on our journey soon after ten o'clock the next morning, posting it all the way to Portsmouth, where we arrived at six o'clock the same evening, and put up at the "George," where Captain Vavassour had established himself.  Of course, it was scarcely in accordance with strict naval etiquette for me, a mere midshipman, to presume to quarter myself in the hotel that my captain honoured with his patronage, but the circumstances were exceptional in so far as that I was with my father; moreover, it was to be for but one night, and the skipper was far too fine and manly a fellow to take notice of so insignificant a breach of the unwritten law as I was committing.  My father and I dined with him that night, incidentally making the acquaintance of Mr Malcolm Adair, the _Europa's_ first lieutenant; and on the following morning, immediately after breakfast, I proceeded on board the receiving hulk, reported myself, then returned to the shore and made my way to Number 3 basin, in which the frigate was undergoing the process of being rigged and prepared for sea.
I had not served for two and a half years in the Mediterranean without learning something of what constituted a good model of a ship, and I no sooner set eyes upon the _Europa_ than I fell violently in love with her.  She had been launched flying light, and then had been hauled under the masting-sheers to have her three lower-masts stepped, after which it had been necessary to move her to another part of the basin in order to make way for another ship.  She had occupied her new berth five days when I first saw her, during which the carpenters, joiners, and painters had been busily employed in finishing off her internal fittings; and when first I beheld her the dockyard people were in the act of warping her across the basin to still another berth, where she was to receive her ballast; thus when my eyes first rested upon her she was floating high out of the water, and I was afforded an excellent opportunity to view and criticise her lines.  She was somewhat shallow of hull and flat in the floor, to give her a light draught of water, but to compensate for this she was extraordinarily "beamy," which had the twofold effect of imparting great stiffness under canvas, and affording fine roomy decks.  Her sides were as round as an apple--not an inch of "straight" anywhere in them--and, despite her unusual breadth, her lines were the finest and most beautiful that I had ever seen.  She carried a full poop, the interior of which constituted the captain's quarters--roomy, light, and airy; and as I noted the length and solidity of her lower-masts the idea occurred to me that, if the remainder of her spars were to be in proportion, her sail-spread, combined with her perfect lines, ought to give her such exceptional speed as would enable her to do just as she pleased with an adversary.
As soon as she was alongside and made fast I went on board and had a good look at her interior, not forgetting to inscribe my name legibly on the most conveniently situated locker in the midshipmen's berth, after which I watched the operation of shipping and stowing her ballast. There was not much of interest or instruction in this part of the work, but when, on the following day, I witnessed the execution of the apparently impossible task of getting the tops aloft and over the mastheads, and was afterwards initiated into the mysteries of measuring for and laying off rigging, getting it into position and setting it up; and beheld the rapidity and assured certainty with which the three bare lower spars were equipped with shrouds, stays, caps, etcetera; the topmasts rose into place, were rigged and fidded; how the yards were sent aloft and secured; and how, in short, the entire fabric became rapidly converted from a mere empty shell into a complicated yet marvellously perfect structure that needed but smart officers, a well-disciplined crew, and the breathing of the winds of heaven to make of her, not only the most beautiful and wonderful product of human skill, but also a formidable self-contained engine of warfare, I mentally confessed that not only was seamanship a most fascinating science, but also that sailors were the most ingenious and adaptable specimens of the entire human race.
The work of fitting-out was pushed forward with all possible expedition. A bare three weeks, therefore, from the day of my arrival in Portsmouth, saw the _Europa_ all ataunt, with royal-yards across, sails bent, stores of all descriptions on board and stowed, water-tanks filled, guns mounted, and, in fact, ready for sea in every respect, except that her crew were not on board, and her magazines were empty. Then she was warped out of the basin, her crew turned over to her from the receiving hulk, and she was taken out to Spithead to receive her powder.  During all this time my father had remained at Portsmouth, quartered at the "George," spending as much as possible of his time with me in the dockyard; and after the work of the day was over I generally-- by favour of Mr Adair, the first lieutenant--dined and spent the evening with him, the discipline of the receiving hulk not being very severe, and nobody caring much at what time I went aboard at night so long as I was present at muster next morning.  But on the day that the crew were turned over, and the ship was taken out to Spithead, these little indulgences came to an end; for the frigate was no sooner at anchor than, before the powder hoy arrived alongside, Captain Vavassour came off, the crew were mustered, and he read his commission and hoisted his pennant, from which moment the strictest naval discipline became the order of the day.  Nevertheless, when at the conclusion of the above-mentioned ceremony the skipper ordered his gig and returned to the shore, I obtained leave to accompany him, upon condition that I reported myself on board again by eight o'clock.  I therefore again, and for the last time during that cruise, dined with my father, after which he accompanied me to the Hard, bade me a most affectionate good-bye, and stood watching the wherry which was conveying me off to the ship, until the boat passed out of the harbour and we vanished from his sight.  Not until long afterward did I know that, instead of starting for home the next morning, as he had talked of doing, he crossed over to Gosport the first thing after breakfast, walked to Haslar, and stationed himself on the beach at Gilkicker Point, watching the frigate until she had got under way and passed out of sight to the southward and eastward.
The next morning, at daylight, Blue Peter was hoisted at the fore-royal masthead and a gun fired as a signal that the ship was about to sail; boats were hoisted in and stowed, stock was brought alongside, and the order was given to clear the ship of strangers--sailors' wives and sweethearts who had come off to say a last good-bye, bumboat women who were making a final desperate effort to obtain a settlement of their accounts, and tradesmen of all kinds engaged upon the same errand or intent upon palming off upon the men otherwise unsaleable stock.
Shortly after ten o'clock Captain Vavassour came on board, immediately after which the hands were piped to "up anchor"; and within half-an-hour we were under way and standing out toward Saint Helens, under all plain sail, before a light northerly breeze.
We had not been under way a quarter of an hour before it became apparent to everybody on board that the _Europa_ was going to more than justify the exceedingly favourable opinion that we had already formed of her; for, light as was the wind, she slid through the water at a speed that fairly astonished us, her keen stem cleaving the short Channel surges cleanly and with very little noise or fuss, and leaving behind her a wake so smooth and so little disturbed that at a distance of a quarter of a mile it vanished altogether.  And when, an hour or so later, having made a good offing, the skipper ordered her to be hauled to the wind on a taut bowline for a short time, to test her speed under those conditions, and then put her about, she went to windward and tacked like a yacht.
Our cruising-ground was a fairly extensive one, stretching from the longitude of Cape la Hague on the one hand to longitude 10 degrees West on the other, and from latitude 50 degrees North to Cape Finisterre; in other words, it embraced the chops of the Channel and the whole of the Bay of Biscay; and our duty was to protect British commerce on the high seas, and harry the enemy generally.  The wide limits of our cruising-ground, and the fact that, for the moment at least, we were free to go whither we pleased within those limits, was a source of the keenest gratification to all hands, for it was just within that area that the privateers of the enemy were then displaying the most activity and doing the greatest amount of mischief; and we were all looking forward hopefully to the prospect of making plenty of captures and recaptures.  But those of us who had been shipmates together in the old _Colossus_ found an additional source of gratification in the speed of our new craft; for whereas in the _Colossus_--which was possibly the slowest ship ever launched--we had done plenty of chasing, we had never been able to catch anything unless all the conditions were strongly in our favour; while now we hoped to find the state of affairs very much the opposite.
It was not only upon the speed of the _Europa_, however, that we built our hopes of success; for not only was she an unusually fast vessel, but she carried an exceptionally heavy armament for a ship of her class, namely, twenty-four long 24-pounders on her main-deck, and fourteen long 8-pounders on her quarter-deck and forecastle; while, to crown all, her crew consisted of two hundred and ninety-two men--every one of whom had voluntarily entered.  Furthermore, of those two hundred and ninety-two men, no less than one hundred and sixty-five had been aboard the _Colossus_, and had joined after being paid off from that craft; while, on the quarter-deck, the skipper, Mr Galway the second lieutenant, Mr Trimble the master, Maxwell the master's-mate, Gascoigne a midshipman, Mr Purvis the gunner, and myself had all been shipmates together in the same craft.
Having manoeuvred the ship for close upon two hours, with the view of testing her speed and handiness in varying circumstances, so far as was possible under the existing conditions of wind and sea, we bore up and shaped a course for Cape la Hague, which we made just before nightfall. Then, as the breeze seemed inclined to freshen a trifle, rendering the ship more manageable in the strong tides that sweep that part of the coast, the Captain determined to search the bight at the bottom of which lies the French port of Saint Malo, just then notorious for the number of privateers which it fitted out and sent to sea.  We accordingly passed in about half-way between Alderney and the mainland, maintaining an offing from the latter of about eight miles, and took in our royals and topgallantsails.
Passing inside the Chausey Islands, breakfast-time the next morning found us off the town, in the harbour of which we saw a number of small fishing and coasting craft, but nothing of importance; we therefore hauled up to the westward, set our topgallantsails, and boarded the fore and main tacks, in order to work out clear of Brehat and secure a good offing; for the glass was dropping, the breeze freshening, there was a "greasy" look about the sky to windward that seemed to portend a blow, and we were on a lee-shore.
As the morning advanced the portents became more pronounced; the wind increased to such an extent that we first had to stow our topgallantsails again and then single-reef the topsails, and a very nasty short, choppy sea quickly got up, into which the frigate plunged viciously to the height of her figurehead, sending deluges of spray over her weather cathead and into the hollow of her foresail until the canvas was darkened with wet half-way up to the yard, while it thickened up away to windward until it became impossible to distinguish anything beyond the distance of a mile, and the wind backed on us until it was out from about North-North-West, with the result that, when at length we made the land, it stretched right athwart our hawse and reached away to windward, as far as the eye could penetrate the mist.
There was nothing for it but to 'bout ship and haul off on the other tack; the crew were therefore piped to stations and the helm eased down, when the ship swept grandly up into the wind and went round like a top, holding her way in a style that delighted as much as it surprised us, and staying almost as quickly as the men could swing the yards.
Eight bells of the afternoon watch had just struck when, the weather clearing suddenly, we made the island of Guernsey, some eight miles ahead, and Jersey somewhat more distant, two points before our starboard beam; and at the same moment two craft were made out, about six miles away from us and broad on our weather-beam, coming down before the wind under a heavy press of sail, and heading as though bound for Saint Malo. They were within half a mile of each other, and appeared to be in company.
The instant that they were seen there was a general rush for telescopes on the part of all the officers on deck; and after a protracted scrutiny of them the general consensus of opinion was that they were a French privateer and a British merchantman which she had captured.  Coming down toward us, end-on as they were, it was not easy at first to determine their rig, but both were large ships, one of them being of about six hundred tons, while the other appeared to be fully as big as ourselves. That their eyes were as sharp as our own very soon became evident; for while we were still peering at them through our glasses, we saw a string of flags go soaring aloft on board the smaller craft of the two, and immediately afterward both vessels slightly altered their course, the bigger of the two hauling up a couple of points to the southward and shaping a course that would carry her across our stern at a distance of about two miles, while the other very smartly clewed up her topgallantsails, took a single-reef in her topsails, and slightly hauled her wind, as though with the purpose of intercepting us.  This action on their part at once confirmed our suspicions as to their respective characters, and at the same time enabled us to determine that they were both full-rigged ships.
"The smaller will be the privateer, and, therefore, in all probability the faster vessel of the two, Mr Adair," said the skipper.  "We will accordingly tackle him first; for I think we can polish him off in time to catch the other fellow before he can get into port.  Beat to quarters, if you please, sir, and show our colours."
The first lieutenant gave the order, the drum rattled out its summons, and the ship at once became a hive of activity; the decks were cleared of everything that could possibly interfere with the efficient working of the guns; the guns themselves were cast loose, the half-ports knocked out, screens put up, the magazine opened, powder and shot passed up on deck, cutlasses and pistols served out to the crew, and, in short, every preparation made for battle.  Our ensign was streaming out in the breeze, as flat as a board, from the mizen peak, but neither of the strangers had thus far condescended to show us the colour of their bunting.  They had now definitely parted company, the larger of the two edging in for the land with the evident intention of reaching a port, while the other, having hauled her wind, was as evidently preparing to cover the retreat of her prize by engaging us in a running fight and drawing us off-shore to the northward.
CHAPTER TWO.
THE PRIVATEER AND HER PRIZE.
The smaller of the two craft, having hauled close to the wind, upon the same tack as ourselves, and about two miles dead to windward of us, now hoisted French colours, and fired a gun of defiance, the shot from which, however, fell a long way short of us.  We did not attempt to reply to this challenge, for although our long 24-pounders would probably have reached the other ship, the skipper considered the distance too great for our fire to be effective, while the motion of the frigate was so violent that the chances were against our being able to make a hit at all, and Captain Vavassour was noted for the strength of his objection to the wasteful firing away of ammunition.  For the moment, therefore, he contented himself with testing the respective speed and weatherliness of the two ships.
We very soon discovered that, so far as these two qualities were concerned, we had caught a Tartar; for although within the first ten minutes of the test it became apparent that we were head-reaching upon the craft to windward, our advantage was so slight that we could scarcely hope to get within effective range of her in less than two hours at least, while during the whole of that time the bigger of the two strangers would be proceeding in the opposite direction at such a rate as would render her ultimate escape a practical certainty.
The skipper looked long and anxiously, first at one craft, then at the other, and finally at the barometer; then he rejoined the first lieutenant, who was giving his attention almost exclusively to the chase to windward.
"This won't do at all, Mr Adair," he said.  "That fellow is going through the water almost as fast as we are, and is holding as good a luff.  At this rate we shall not get to grips with him before dark, which will probably mean losing the big fellow, if not both of them.  I see that the barometer is inclined to rise; we will, therefore, shake the reef out of the topsails, and set the fore and main-topgallant sails.  If it becomes a question of `carrying-on,' I think we ought to have the best of it by a long way."
"Ay, I'm no sayin' ye may no be richt, sir," answered the first lieutenant; "but it'll be an unco strain upon the spars to set thae to'gallants'ls; our new rigging has stretched until it's all hangin' in bights, as ye may see for yoursel' by lookin' at it.  Still, it may be worth the tryin': but will ye no see what we can do under whole topsails before settin' the to'gallants'ls?"
"I think not," said the skipper.  "We have not the time to spare for tentative measures; and although, as you truly say, the rigging has badly stretched, I think it has scarcely stretched sufficiently seriously to imperil the spars.  We shall sail all the better for a little spring and whip in the masts, unless I am greatly mistaken; therefore have the goodness to make sail at once, sir, if you please."
In the face of so decided an opinion as this there was of course nothing further to be said, and five minutes later the _Europa_ was leaping and plunging madly through the short, choppy Channel seas, with her topmasts and topgallant-masts whipping like fishing rods under the strain of the increased canvas, while the whole of her fore-deck was deluged with the spray that came in over the weather cathead, in cataracts that leapt almost as high as the foreyard.  The chase lost not a moment in following our example, and setting the same canvas as ourselves; but scarcely ten minutes had elapsed before the correctness of the Captain's judgment became manifest, for within that brief space of time it was seen that we were fast head-reaching and weathering upon the Frenchman, who was evidently overpowered by his too heavy press of canvas.
A quarter-of-an-hour later Captain Vavassour gave the order to tack; and while the frigate was in stays, plunging bows under, and quivering to her keel with the furious slatting of her canvas as she swept up into the wind, we had the satisfaction of seeing the Frenchman's mizen-topmast go over the side.
"Now we have him!" ejaculated the Captain, in a tone of exultation. "With his mizen-topsail gone he will no longer be able to maintain so close a luff as ourselves, and within half-an-hour we shall be able to do as we please with him."
That the stranger was strong-handed, and that she carried a thoroughly well-disciplined crew was evident; for by the time that we had paid off on the other tack and had swung our foreyard, her mizen rigging was full of men busy upon the task of clearing away the wreck of the topmast, while others were equally busy in clewing-up and furling the fore-topgallantsail and hauling down and stowing her flying-jib, to enable her to maintain as good a luff as possible.  But desperate as were their efforts they could do nothing with us now, at least upon a wind; therefore when we next tacked--which was the moment that we were fairly in her wake--she suddenly put up her helm, squared away dead before the wind, and proceeded to set studdingsails on both sides.
The Captain rubbed his hands and chuckled with delight as he saw this.
"Up helm and after her, Mr Adair," he exclaimed.  "It is the very thing I could have wished for; she must be a veritable witch at sailing, if she can beat us before the wind.  But we will set our port studdingsails only, to start with, if you please; for if, as I expect, we have the heels of her, I will haul up a point or two and endeavour to close with her to point-blank range."
Another three minutes saw us both sweeping away to leeward like meteors, the chase about a mile distant, broad on our port beam, with studdingsails set on both sides, from her royals down; while we, with studdingsails set to port only, were edging rapidly in upon her, while fully holding our own with her in other respects.  And, oh, what a relief it was to feel the long, easy, floating motion and the level keel of a ship running before wind and sea, in exchange for the short, savage digging into a head sea, with its accompaniments of drenching showers of spray, sickening lee lurches, and a whole gale of wind buffeting one in the face and doing its utmost to drive one's teeth down one's throat.
The Captain's expectations relative to the frigate's behaviour on the new point of sailing were quickly verified; so quickly, indeed, that within a quarter of an hour we found ourselves within easy range of the chase--a fact which was brought home to us by a shot from her passing within a foot of our hammock rail and whizzing between our fore and mainmast.
"Now, Mr Adair," said the skipper, "you may see what you can do with her.  Let the captains of the guns try their hands upon her individually, doing their best to cut up her spars and rigging.  We want to capture, not to sink her; she is far too fine a ship to be sent to the bottom, therefore spare her hull as much as possible."
The first lieutenant went down on the main-deck and personally repeated the Captain's instructions; and before he returned to the quarter-deck the first of our long 24-pounders spoke its message, the shot passing through the stranger's foresail and narrowly missing the mast.  Then our 8-pounders got to work, and very soon we saw loose ropes'-ends streaming out on board her, showing that our fire had not been wholly in vain, although, so far, no damage worth speaking of had been done.  Nor were the Frenchmen idle; on the contrary, they fired about four guns to every one of ours, but after that first shot of theirs they appeared to have become flurried and excited, and their aim correspondingly wild; at all events, although some of their shot came near us, while one or two actually flew over us, not one of them came near enough to do us a ropeyarn's worth of damage.
With our own men it was very different; the more often they fired the cooler did they seem to become; and it was amusing to see the eagerness with which, after firing, they watched the effect of each shot, with the evident purpose of correcting their aim next time.  The result of this caution on their part soon became apparent, for we had scarcely fired a dozen shots when we saw the stranger's fore-topmast go swooping over the bows; and the next minute she broached-to, losing her main-topgallant-mast and snapping every one of her studdingsail booms in the process.
"Cease firing!" shouted the skipper.  "In studdingsails, Mr Adair; clew up and furl your royals and topgallantsails; in flying-jib; and then haul your wind, if you please.  The fellow will surely not hold out any longer."
He did, though, pluckily maintaining a fire upon us with two guns run out through his stern ports--evidently hoping to disable us, while his crew worked like demons in their efforts to clear away the wreckage; and it was not until we ranged up on his weather quarter, within biscuit-toss, and threatened him with the whole of our starboard broadside, that he hauled down his colours and surrendered.
The heavy sea that was now running rendered the task of taking possession of the prize exceedingly difficult; nevertheless, by the exercise of the utmost skill and care, the first and second cutters, under the command of Mr Howard, our second lieutenant, and O'Brien, one of the midshipmen, at length managed to get alongside and put a prize-crew of thirty-two men on board her.  The boats quickly returned to the ship with the intelligence that the prize was the twenty-six-gun privateer _Belle Marie_ of Saint Malo, carrying a total crew of two hundred and thirty men, of whom eighty-seven were at the moment away in prizes, forty of them being on board the British East Indiaman _Masulipatam_--the ship which had by this time passed out of sight in the southern board.  The weather conditions being unfavourable for the transfer of the Frenchmen from the prize to the frigate, without the loss of a great deal of valuable time, Captain Vavassour hailed Mr Howard, instructing him to confine the prisoners below, and then, with the aid of the carpenter's crew which we were about to send him, to repair damages as well as he could, and make the best of his way to Portsmouth.  It was almost dark by the time that all the necessary arrangements were completed and the boats once more hoisted in, when we wore round and shaped a course which we hoped would enable us to intercept and recapture the Indiaman before she could reach Saint Malo.
This course brought the wind about three points abaft the starboard beam; it was consequently a leading wind, therefore, the business being pressing, we not only showed all plain sail, to our topgallantsails, but also set topmast and lower studdingsails to windward, the yards being braced slightly forward.  This was a heavy press of canvas to pile upon the ship, with the wind where it was, and so heavy a sea running, but the Captain evidently considered--as, indeed, did we all--that the circumstances justified a certain measure of recklessness, for we had all observed that the _Masulipatam_ was, at all events when going free, almost as fast a ship as the _Belle Marie_; and haste was necessary if we would overtake her before she reached her port.
By four bells in the first watch the wind had moderated sufficiently to permit of our setting all three royals, as well as the weather topgallant studdingsails; and half-an-hour later we sighted the craft of which we were in pursuit about four points on our starboard-bow.  She was then about twelve miles distant, and only just distinguishable with the aid of our best night glasses; and the fact that we were still so far astern of her seemed to render it exceedingly doubtful whether she would not, after all, make good her escape.  The fear that she would do so was still further strengthened when at midnight we made Cape Frehel light, with the chase still leading by a full eight miles; the only chance in our favour being that, as the bearing of the light proved, the Indiaman was some three miles to windward of her course, and would have to bear away for it, while we were heading for Saint Malo as straight as we could go.  As the night passed on, however, our hopes rose somewhat, for the weather cleared, while the wind softened down; and with the softening of the wind it became apparent that we were gaining more rapidly.
As the time wore on so did the chase grow increasingly exciting, our hopes every moment strengthening, until at length, by three bells in the middle watch, they had merged into a conviction that nothing short of a miracle could save the Indiaman from recapture.  Some such conviction must also have forced itself upon the mind of the officer in charge of her, for just after four bells had been struck we saw him suddenly take in his studdingsails and haul his wind, having apparently decided that he must inevitably be taken if he persisted in his endeavour to get into Saint Malo.  By the direction in which he was now steering it seemed probable that he had determined to seek shelter in one of the indentations to the westward of Frehel, many of which were at that time defended by earthwork batteries for the protection of the French coasting craft from our cruisers and privateers.
This move on the part of the Indiaman's prizemaster proved the man to be possessed of both sagacity and foresight, for it threw us at once some four miles to leeward of him and compelled us forthwith to take in our studdingsails and brace sharp up in order to follow him, while he was now so close to the land that there was every prospect of his being able to get in and anchor under the shelter of a battery before we could overtake him.  And that, in the end, was precisely what occurred; for when at length we weathered Cape Frehel we were just in time to see him entering Pleher Bay, where he presently rounded-to, clewed up his canvas, and let go his anchor.
Naturally, Captain Vavassour was not the sort of man to see a possible rich prize riding at anchor in the enemy's waters without making a determined attempt to secure possession of her; we therefore stood boldly in after the Indiaman until we arrived within half a mile of the entrance of the bay--at that point about two miles across--when two batteries of six guns each, built upon opposite headlands forming the entrance to the bay, opened fire upon us, and with such effect that within five minutes we had been hulled seven times, and had lost two men killed and five wounded.  This afforded the skipper all the information that he just then required, namely, the fact that batteries existed, and also the exact position and strength of them--it now appearing that they were armed with 32-pounders.  We therefore hove about and got out of range again as quickly as possible; for, as the Captain said, it was no good returning the fire of earthwork batteries; we might have plumped into them every shot we had on board without doing them a farthing's-worth of damage, while, had we attempted to force a passage into the bay with the frigate, they might easily have sunk us.
But the fun was not yet over; as a matter of fact it had really not begun--the affair of the batteries was merely the overture of the little drama which was taking shape in the skipper's brain.  We stretched off the land until we were about three miles distant from the mouth of the bay, and then the ship was hove-to and preparation was made for the dispatch of a cutting-out expedition; that is to say, an attack upon the Indiaman by the frigate's boats, with the object of overpowering her prize-crew, cutting her cables, and bringing her out of the harbour.
The launch, yawl, and the two cutters were the boats told off by the Captain for this service, and as soon as the frigate was hove-to the fighting crews of these boats--consisting of the very pick of the ship's crew--were piped away, the boats hoisted out, and the preparation of the craft for the service which they were about to undertake proceeded with. Each of the boats named possessed, as part of her fighting equipment, a gun mounted in the bows upon fore-and-aft slides, those belonging to the launch and yawl being 18-pounder carronades, while the first and second cutters each mounted a 12-pounder.  As soon as the boats were in the water they were taken charge of temporarily by their respective coxswains--the best four men in the ship--who at once proceeded to supervise the shipping and mounting of the guns, each coxswain assuring himself, by personal inspection, that this important piece of work was properly executed.  The amount of shot likely to be required was next passed down into the boats and carefully stowed upon the bottom-boards, every precaution being taken to provide against it breaking adrift with the rolling and pitching of the boats.  The chests containing cartridges for the guns and ammunition for the small-arms were next passed in and stowed, and finally a couple of beakers of water were placed in each boat, together with a small quantity of spirits for use, if necessary, in reviving the wounded.  This completed the preparation of the boats for the projected expedition, and was done by the ordinary crews of the boats, the fighting crews meanwhile busying themselves in examining the flints of their pistols, fitting new ones where necessary, loading the pistols and sharpening their cutlasses.
At length the coxswains reported the boats ready, whereupon the officers told off to command them went down the side and carefully inspected them, satisfying themselves that nothing had been forgotten.  Then the members of the expedition were mustered on the quarter-deck and inspected by the first lieutenant, who examined each man's weapons and equipment before passing him for service.  The officers appointed to proceed upon the expedition were Mr Adair, the first lieutenant, in charge of the launch and in supreme command of the entire expedition; Mr Trimble, the master, in charge of the yawl; Mr Purvis, the gunner, in the first cutter; and Mr O'Donnel, the boatswain, in the second.  In addition to these there also went Mr Burroughs, the assistant surgeon, and myself in the launch, and a midshipman in each of the other boats. As I anticipated the possibility of hot work before all was done, I took the precaution to discard my dirk and to provide myself, in place thereof, with a ship's cutlass and a pair of loaded pistols.
The inspection at length satisfactorily ended, the first lieutenant reported to the Captain that all was ready; the Captain--who had already arranged his plans with the officers commanding--gave the word to man boats and shove off, and in another couple of minutes we had started, and the frigate had filled away and was heading to seaward.
Not so the boats.  The Captain and Mr Adair, discussing together the plan of operations, had come to the conclusion that it would not be of the slightest use to attempt to bring out the Indiaman in the face of those two batteries which had already given us so convincing a taste of their quality; it had therefore been arranged that, upon shoving off, the boats should be formed into two divisions for the purpose of attacking the batteries and spiking the guns.  This, accordingly, was now done, the launch and first cutter forming the starboard division, destined to attack the battery on the western headland, while the yawl and the second cutter, led by the master, constituted the port division, the mission of which was to silence effectively the battery on the eastern headland of the harbour.  The first lieutenant and the master made a few brief final arrangements, and then the divisions separated, each steering for its own proper headland, the senior officer leading and the other following close behind, so as to show as inconspicuously as might be on the dark surface of the water, and thus, if luck favoured us, take the Frenchmen unawares.
Meanwhile, the night was passing rapidly away; for we had scarcely got clear of the frigate when seven bells of the middle watch was struck, and, it being then the middle of August, we might expect daylight very shortly, when a surprise would at once become an impossibility; the word was therefore passed for the oarsmen to give way at top speed, and away we all went, as if for a wager, the two divisions heading respectively south-west and south-east, in the hope that we might get close enough in with the land to escape detection, and even possibly to land, before the coming dawn betrayed us.
Now, although we were travelling at racing pace, our progress was practically noiseless, the only sounds being the dip of oars in the water and the lap and gurgle of the water about the boats' bows, Captain Vavassour having already had the oars of these boats fitted to work in rope grummets shipping over a single stout pin, instead of in the usual rowlocks, and since much care had been used to render the grummets tight-fitting, while the leathers had been well greased, there was none of the usual rattle of oars in rowlocks,--a sound which in quiet weather may often be heard at an almost incredible distance,--nor, thanks to the greasing of the leathers, was there any creaking or grinding of the oars against the pins; and of course no conversation was permitted beyond an occasional whispered order to the coxswain.
In this fashion, then, we pulled shoreward, the distance to be traversed being about three miles; and when at length the dawn broke and there was light enough to enable us to see where we were, we--the starboard division--found ourselves about a quarter of a mile distant from the beach, with both batteries shut out from our view by a slightly projecting bluff; and, thus far, nothing had occurred to lead us to suppose that we had been either heard or seen.  As for the frigate, she had disappeared, probably behind Cape Frehel; there was nothing, therefore, so far as we could see, to put the French on the alert, or to alarm them in any way.  We, therefore, now headed the boats straight in for the beach, catching a momentary glimpse as we did so of the other division, apparently doing the same thing.
The beach for which we were heading was composed of firm red sand, sloping rather steeply down into the water, and the sea was smooth; we, therefore, rushed them in until they were high and dry for nearly a quarter of their length, the men leapt out over the bows on to the dry sand, and then, with two boat-keepers in each boat to look after them, they were shoved off again, with orders to keep afloat, and, if threatened, to pull off to a safe distance and await our return.
Our little party, officers included, mustered forty-one men, the second division consisting of three less; and no sooner were we all landed than Mr Adair led us right up to the foot of the low cliffs that bordered the beach, so that it was impossible for any one to detect our presence unless by standing on the very verge of the cliff and looking directly down upon us.
The next thing to be done was to reconnoitre the battery that we intended to attack, and ascertain the easiest way to get inside it. This duty was confided to me, I being the youngest and, presumably, the most active of the party, while--as I afterwards learned--the Captain had assured Mr Adair that both my courage and my discretion might be relied upon.
"Ye clearly understan', noo, Maister Delamere, precisely what ye hae to dae?" observed the first luff, when concluding his instructions to me. "Oor business is tae tak' yon wee bit battery, and to spike the guns. But we're to dae't wi'oot loss o' life on oor ain part, if possible; ye'll therefore approach the place cannily and get as close up to it as maybe wi'oot bein' discovert; and, that done, ye'll be pleased tae keek roun' and ascertain if there's ony way o' gettin' intil it wi'oot haein' to stor-r-m it.  If we can creep up and tak' the gairrison by surprise, sae muckle the better.  Noo, gang awa' wi' ye, laddie; tak' care o' yersel! and get back as soon as ye can, no forgettin' that if ye fin' yoursel' in trouble, ye're to fire a pistol, and we'll come to your help."
I touched my hat and, turning upon my heel, proceeded forthwith to scramble up the steep face of the cliff, helping myself up by driving my drawn cutlass deep into the stiff clay soil of which the cliff was composed.  Reaching the top without much difficulty, I found myself upon somewhat uneven ground, the surface of which sloped slightly down toward the land.  The soil was clothed with short, thick grass and closely overgrown with dense clumps of furze bushes, which I at once perceived would afford excellent cover for the approach of our men.  Somewhat to my discomfiture, however, I saw a flock of sheep grazing at no great distance inland, while about a mile away to the south-west was a small village, in the single street of which I could perceive people already moving about.  Clearly, we had no time to lose if we wished to take our friends the enemy by surprise; availing myself, therefore, to the utmost extent of the cover of the furze bushes, I set off in the direction of the battery, which I presently sighted about half a mile away.  Stooping low as I ran from bush to bush, and peering cautiously round each before venturing to start for the next, I soon found myself within about thirty yards of the battery, which I saw to be a crescent-shaped affair, facing eastward and thus in conjunction with the battery on the opposite point, completely commanding the entrance of the bay.  It was in reality a brick-work structure, consisting of four chambers with arched roofs supporting a gun platform protected by a parapet pierced with embrasures, the brick-work in its turn being protected by an earth-bank thrown up in front of it in the form of a glacis.  It mounted six 64-pounders; and the chambers beneath the gun platform I took to be the magazine, general store-room, and soldiers' quarters.  The gun platform was approached at either end by a good wide flight of steps; and beside each gun was a goodly pile of shot, while sponges, rammers, handspikes, and the rest of the paraphernalia for loading and training the guns reposed in brackets fixed to the inner face of the parapet.  Two sentries were stationed upon the gun platform, pacing to and fro, and evidently keeping a sharp lookout to seaward, and a number of artillerymen were performing their morning ablutions, brushing their clothes, etcetera, in the paved space before the chambers.  Strangely enough, the back of the battery was left perfectly open and unprotected by either wall or fence; there was therefore absolutely nothing to prevent its being rushed from the land side.  I counted the men in sight to the number of thirty-three, but concluded that there must be others somewhere inside the chambers; and then, having acquired all the information possible under the circumstances, made the best of my way back to where Mr Adair and the rest of our party impatiently awaited me.
CHAPTER THREE.
A CUTTING-OUT EXPEDITION.
In as few words as possible I reported to the first lieutenant the extent of my discoveries, and, in return, received his tersely-expressed commendation of my efforts; after which he briefly addressed his followers, explaining to them the importance of making the attack as complete a surprise as possible, and pointing out the necessity for availing ourselves to the utmost possible extent of the cover afforded us by the gorse bushes while approaching the battery.  Then, having told off six of the men for the especial duty of spiking the guns--one man to each gun--he directed me to lead the way, stationing himself alongside me.
Three minutes later the entire party were on top of the cliffs, where we paused for a moment to reconnoitre the ground afresh, and get our breath after the exertion of climbing; then we moved slowly and cautiously forward again, allowing plenty of time for each man to creep across the open spaces from one patch of cover to the next, until in the course of some twenty-five minutes all hands of us were lying down behind a large clump of bushes, some twenty yards from the battery, which I had previously fixed upon as a convenient point from which to start our final rush.  Here another brief pause was made, which Mr Adair, kneeling behind a bush, utilised to count heads and make sure that all hands had come up; when, having satisfied himself upon this point, he drew his sword, flourished it over his head as a signal, and, springing to his feet, led us all at top speed in a charge upon the unprotected rear of the battery.
The wild cheer of our lads as they broke cover and rushed across the narrow open space which still separated them from the battery was evidently the first intimation to the garrison that anything was wrong, for our sudden appearance seemed to take them absolutely by surprise, with the result that something very like a panic ensued among them.  A few, after staring at us agape and motionless for a second or two, as though unable to comprehend what we were after, came to life and took to their heels, attempting to bolt out of the battery before we could reach it.  But our lads quickly stopped them by spreading out in front of them and driving them back at the point of the cutlass; others, seeing the impossibility of retreat in that direction, dashed into one of the chambers beneath the gun platform, slamming the door behind them, regardless of the fact that they were shutting out many of their comrades, and barricading themselves against attack, as we could hear by the sounds proceeding from the inside; while, as for the two sentries on the platform, they simply fired their muskets in the air, flung them down, and vaulted over the parapet on to the glacis, thus making good their escape.  The six men charged with the duty of spiking the guns dashed straightway up the steps leading to the gun platform, and at once proceeded to the execution of their task, leaving their comrades below to deal with the garrison; and in less than five minutes the battery was in our possession, and the six guns effectually spiked.  True, a few of the artillerymen who had retreated to the interior of the structure thrust muskets through the windows of the chamber and snapped them off at us; but they speedily gave that up and surrendered at discretion upon my approaching a broken window and shouting through it, by Mr Adair's orders, the information that we were about to explode the magazine, and that they had better come out if they did not wish to perish amid the ruins.
When all hands upon both sides were mustered it was found that we had gained possession of the battery without the least injury to either side.  The French officer was then directed to march his men--who were of course disarmed--to the village which I had seen earlier in the morning, and which we now learned was called Erquy; and as soon as they were fairly out of the battery the magazine was broken open, the powder barrels rolled together in the middle of the room, the heads knocked out, and a train laid from barrel to barrel, while another party of our men was busily engaged in bringing the six spiked guns together in a cluster immediately over the magazine.  A quarter-of-an-hour sufficed to complete these preparations, when one end of a long fuse was buried in one of the barrels of powder, the remainder of the fuse being carried as far as it would go across the paved yard.  The men then fell in and, under my command, marched out of the yard and took the way along the cliffs toward the boats, while Mr Adair and the gunner remained behind to fire the fuse and ensure the destruction of the battery.  We had been gone about ten minutes, and had almost reached the spot where we were to make our descent to the beach, when the earth shook and jarred violently beneath our feet, a dull, heavy _boom_ burst upon the morning silence, a fierce gust of wind suddenly swept over us, and, looking back, we saw an enormous dim-coloured cloud, heavily charged with hurtling debris, dismounted cannon, and masses of shattered brick-work, hovering over the spot where the battery had been.  Two minutes later the first luff and the gunner, breathless and panting, came running up to us, and we all plunged down the cliff-face together.  The boat-keepers, seeing us coming, headed the boats in toward the beach; and within another five minutes we were once more afloat and pulling quietly alongshore toward the mouth of the bay, intently watching, meanwhile, for some indication of the whereabouts of the other division.  We had not long to wait, for we had scarcely pulled a quarter of a mile when the battery on the other headland blew up; and presently the yawl and second cutter came into view from behind the point, pulling hard for the mouth of the bay.
There was, of course, no possibility of further secrecy in regard to our movements, for the blowing-up of the two batteries would sufficiently advertise the presence of an enemy in the neighbourhood, while the fact of having been chased by the frigate during the preceding night would give the Indiaman's prize-crew a tolerably accurate idea of where we came from, and what were our ultimate intentions.  We, therefore, made no pretence of concealing ourselves, but--a nice little westerly breeze having sprung up with the rising of the sun--boldly laid in our oars, stepped the boats' masts, and hoisted the sails, by doing which we reckoned upon getting over the ground at greater speed while conserving the strength of our contingent for the attack upon the Indiaman.  The master and his party were unable to follow our lead in this respect, for the wind which was fair for us was dead in their teeth; but, on the other hand, we had about two miles more than they to cover.  It thus happened that the two divisions of boats arrived at the entrance practically at the same instant, the port division leading only by just barely time enough to step their masts and set their canvas for the run into the bay before we joined them.
The Indiaman was anchored well inshore, about a mile and a half inside the headlands; and as we reached along toward her under sail, with the boats in line abreast, and about thirty fathoms apart, we saw that the prize-crew were busily engaged in preparing to resist our attack, the guns being all run out, while an attempt was being made to fix up a boarding netting on the ship's starboard, or seaward, side.  I had brought my telescope along with me in the boat, believing that it might possibly prove useful, and I now focussed it upon the Indiaman with the object of getting some definite idea of the extent of the preparations being made against us.  I had no sooner done so than I made the discovery that there was no netting triced up on the port or shoreward side of the vessel, the Frenchmen apparently taking it for granted that we should dash alongside on the side nearest to us.  I immediately reported this discovery to the first lieutenant, at the same time mentioning my idea as to the explanation of the omission, whereupon, having first satisfied himself as to the accuracy of my statement, he hailed the other boats, ordering them all to board the ship on her port side.
When we had arrived within about three-quarters of a mile of our quarry she opened fire upon us with round and grape, first firing single guns, and finally whole broadsides, whereupon we diverged well to port and starboard, compelling her to train her guns so far fore and aft, that at length only her two bow guns could be brought effectively to bear, and although a few shot passed through our sails, while the first cutter's mast was shot away, the boats themselves were untouched, and finally the two divisions passed respectively athwart her bows and stern, and shot up alongside her on her inshore side without a single casualty.
The launch hooked on under her bows, and the first cutter made fast to her fore chains, while the yawl grappled her by the mizen chains, and the second cutter by the main.  She stood high out of the water, though not so high but that one way or another we were all able to scramble into her channels, from whence it was not difficult to make our way inboard.  The French must have felt very foolish when they found us attacking them upon their unprotected side, yet they defended their prize with the utmost gallantry, and for nearly ten minutes the fight raged with great fury.  But when once our lads had all contrived to scale the ship's high bulwarks and establish themselves upon her decks they would take no refusal; there was a tremendous popping of pistols and muskets for the first minute or two, and a good deal of smoke drifting hither and thither; then, with wild hurrahs, the Europas dashed forward, cutlass in hand, cutting, slashing, and pointing; the air resounded with cheers, oaths, execrations, and shrill screams of pain; the decks grew slippery with blood, prostrate bodies tripped us up here and there, and then, suddenly, the Frenchmen flung away their weapons and dived below, leaving us the victors of the fight and in undisputed possession of the ship.
To disarm those prisoners who had not already abandoned their weapons, and to secure them in the forecastle, was the work of but a few minutes, after which our boats were veered astern and secured by their painters; the hands jumped aloft and loosed the canvas, then slid down to the deck by way of the backstays to sheet home and hoist away; the cable was cut, and a few minutes later the ship had canted and was standing out to seaward under topsails, topgallantsails, jib, and spanker, while the wounded were being separated from the dead and carefully tended by Burroughs, the assistant surgeon, and a small party told off to help him.
Then came the question of the "butcher's bill," upon going into which we found that we had one man killed and five wounded--two of them rather seriously; while the French casualties amounted to four killed and eleven wounded--three of the latter so seriously that Burroughs questioned whether they would outlast the day.
A few minutes after we had cleared the harbour the frigate appeared in sight from behind Cape Frehel, and half-an-hour later our prize--the H.E.I. Company's ship, _Masulipatam_, of 1196 tons register, with a full cargo of Indian produce, homeward-bound from Bombay to London--was hove-to under her lee quarter, while Mr Adair had gone on board to make his report.  Previous to this, however, I had gone below into the ship's saloons, at the first luff's order, to see how the passengers fared, we having gathered, from the crew of the _Belle Marie_, that they had been left on board.  I found them all, to the number of forty-three, men, women, and children, including some half-dozen native nurses, securely locked in their several cabins; and glad enough were they to be released, and to learn that the ship was once more in British hands.  It appeared that they had been captured three days before in the Bay of Biscay, and had been not too well treated by their captors, having been robbed by them of all their money, jewellery, and other valuables, to say nothing of other indignities to which they had been subjected.  So far, however, as their stolen property was concerned, I was able to reassure them with the statement that Captain Vavassour would undoubtedly take immediate steps to have it found and restored to them. Having done which, and excused myself upon the plea of urgent business-- coupled with a suggestion that the ladies should remain below until the more gruesome evidences of the recent conflict could be effaced--I hurried away to the other end of the ship and effected the release of her officers and crew, who at once ascended to the deck and assisted our own lads to put matters to rights.  Fortunately, there were no damages to make good; within half-an-hour, therefore, of joining the frigate, Captain Vavassour had made all his dispositions, placing the prize in charge of Mr Galway, the third lieutenant, with a small prize-crew, in addition to the vessel's own officers and crew; and we made sail in company for Portsmouth, the skipper having decided to see our valuable prize safe into a British port before losing sight of her.  This we happily accomplished, anchoring at Spithead shortly after ten o'clock in the morning of the following day, without having sighted anything in the shape of an enemy.  We fell in, however, with the _Belle Marie_, off the Needles, Mr Howard having contrived to get up and rig excellent jury fore and mizen-topmasts during the passage; thus, by shortening sail somewhat upon the frigate and the Indiaman, we were enabled to complete the run to Spithead in company, the _Europa_ making a brave show as she glided along to the anchorage, escorting her two valuable prizes, both captured within one short week from the beginning of our cruise.
The moment that the anchors were down Captain Vavassour ordered his gig, and went ashore to deliver his dispatches and make his report to the admiral, and I went with him, in charge of the boat, taking with me a letter which I had found time to write to my father, acquainting him with the good fortune that had befallen us.  I walked up from the Sallyport to the admiral's office with the skipper, carrying his dispatch-box for him, and leaving the boat in charge of the coxswain; for although, under ordinary circumstances, such a proceeding would probably have resulted in the loss of the whole boat's crew, the amount of prize-money which we had made within the last two days completely banished all thought of desertion in the minds of the men.
Of course the fame of our brilliant double exploit soon spread all over the towns of Portsmouth and Gosport, and although men were at that moment very hard to get, several of the ships in harbour being so short-handed as to be unable to go to sea, it was no sooner made known that we required a few more hands to complete our complement than we had more offers than we had room for.  We remained at Spithead only three days, during which we replenished our stock of water, provisions, and ammunition, and then we were once more dispatched by the admiral to our former cruising-ground.
But during that brief interval one or two interesting changes had occurred.  In the first place the _Belle Marie_, having been surveyed, was reported to be a practically new ship, perfectly sound, and in every respect admirably adapted for service in the navy; she was therefore purchased by the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, and ordered at once into harbour to undergo such alterations as were deemed necessary, and to refit.  Next, Captain Vavassour had spoken so highly in his dispatches of the admirable tact and ability displayed by Mr Adair in his conduct of the expedition against the French batteries, and afterward in the cutting-out of the Indiaman, that our first luff had at once received his promotion and been appointed to the command of the prize--renamed the _Sparta_.  This of course created a vacancy on board the _Europa_, which was filled by Mr Howard, who became our new first luff, while Mr Galway also stepped up a ratline and became second.  The vacancy created by the promotion of Mr Galway was not filled, but we had no doubt that it would ultimately fall to O'Brien, our senior mid, who was within a month of having served his full time, and to whom an acting order was given.  These several changes were in the highest degree satisfactory to all hands of us, for it obviated the necessity for the introduction of strangers among us, while we felt that promotion had gone to the right persons, namely, those who had actually earned it. It is true that, short as our acquaintance with him had been, we were all exceedingly sorry to lose Mr Adair, but our sorrow in this respect was quite counterbalanced by our pleasure in the knowledge that he thoroughly deserved his promotion, and that one more ship's company would be made happy under the rule of a good captain.  In this connection I must not omit to mention that, thanks to the highly favourable report that Mr Adair had made of my conduct in the matter of reconnoitring the battery, and afterwards, Captain Vavassour had been pleased to name me in his dispatches, much to the delight of my father, as I subsequently learned.
We sailed again from Spithead on the fourth day after our arrival, and nothing of importance occurred for quite a fortnight, during which we were kicking about in the chops of the Channel, keeping a bright lookout all the while for anything that might chance to come in our way, whether in the shape of captured British merchantmen, privateers, French merchantmen, or otherwise.  But luck seemed to be against us, for we sighted nothing but craft flying the British flag, and most of those were men-o'-war.  At length, however, the skipper grew disgusted, and determined to see whether better fortune awaited us farther afield. Accordingly, having sighted Ushant broad on the lee-bow, and some ten miles distant, at eight o'clock on a certain morning, with the wind out at about North-West, we stood on until we had brought the island well over our lee quarter, when the helm was shifted, the ship kept away a couple of points, a small pull taken upon the weather braces, and away we went booming into the Bay of Biscay, heading toward Cape Finisterre. We had experienced fresh breezes, but fine, clear weather, from the moment when we had left the Isle of Wight astern; but on this particular day, shortly after noon, the sky became overcast and gloomy, with a thick, murky appearance to windward that portended a change for the worse.  This, however, did not greatly trouble us, for with Ushant out of sight astern, the ship heading South-West by compass, and the wind two points free, we had nothing to fear beyond such discomfort as was inseparable from the heavy sea that was now fast getting up.  As the day wore on, however, the mercury began to drop rather rapidly; the thickness to windward increased, and it began to rain; the wind freshened steadily, a high, steep sea got up, and everything appeared to threaten a particularly dirty and unpleasant night.  By the end of the first dog-watch the wind had increased to half a gale, the sea had drawn abeam, and the ship was rolling her lee hammock-rails under.  The Captain, therefore, ordered the topgallantsails to be clewed up and furled, the flying-jib to be stowed, and a couple of reefs to be taken in the topsails; for, as he remarked, we were not bound anywhere in particular, were in no hurry, and might as well snug the ship down for the night while we had daylight enough left to see what we were doing.
The night closed down upon us early, and so dark that we could not see as far as the length of the ship, there being no moon, while the light of the stars was completely obscured by the dense canopy of storm-wrack that overshadowed us, the only objects visible outside the bulwarks being the faintly phosphorescent heads of the breaking seas as they swept down menacingly upon us from to windward; the air was raw and chill, although it was only the first week in September; the decks were wet and sloppy with the driving rain and spray; and those of us who were on watch looked thoroughly miserable as, encased from head to foot in oilskins and sou'westers, we paced to and fro, availing ourselves to the utmost of such shelter as was afforded by the bulwarks and the boats stowed on the booms.  By midnight the wind had further increased to such an extent that sail was still further reduced, the courses being taken off the ship, the jib stowed, and the mizen brailed in, leaving nothing set but the three double-reefed topsails and the fore and main-topmast staysails.  Yet, unpleasant as was the weather, we had at least one consolation: the ship behaved splendidly, sailing fast through the water, and going along as dry as a bone, save for the spray that was blown from the crests of the waves and came driving athwart our decks in blinding and drenching showers.
When at length the day broke, it revealed the ship hove-to under close-reefed fore and main topsails, and fore-topmast staysail, the central object in the midst of a grey and desolate picture, the dreary character of which it would be difficult to surpass.  It was now blowing a whole gale from the South-West, the wind having backed during the night; the sky was an unbroken expanse of dark, slate-coloured cloud athwart the face of which tattered shreds of dirty grey vapour rapidly swept; the sea, of an opaque greyish-green tint, ran high and steep, crested with great curling heads of pallid froth, flecked here and there with fragments of seaweed, and our horizon was restricted to a circle of little more than a mile in diameter by the driving mist and rain.  It was, in short, a thoroughly disagreeable day, and I was by no means sorry that it was my forenoon watch below.
I had just finished breakfast when a cry of some sort from the deck reached us in the midshipmen's berth; but the straining of the ship, the howling of the wind through the rigging, and the constant crash and gurgle of the water outside rendered it indistinguishable.  We heard the answering call of the officer of the watch--also indistinguishable--and were beginning to arrive at the conclusion that the matter, whatever it might be, did not concern us, when the shrilling of the boatswains' pipes, followed by the hoarse bellow of "Hands, make sail!" caused a general stampede for the deck, upon reaching which we learned that during a momentary clearance of the atmosphere a brief glimpse had been caught of a large ship, about a mile to leeward, steering north, under topgallantsails, and that from her general appearance, brief though the sight of her had been, she had been judged to be French.  The officer of the watch had, of course, as in duty bound, reported the matter to the Captain, who was at the moment in his cabin, taking breakfast; and the skipper, having heard Mr Galway's story, had promptly given the order to bear up and make sail in chase.
The decks, which but a few minutes earlier had presented such a dreary, deserted appearance, now became in a moment a scene of the most animated bustle and activity.  The Captain and first lieutenant--the latter with a speaking-trumpet in his hand--were both on deck, the skipper on the poop gazing eagerly into the thickness to leeward under the sharp of his hand in search of the now invisible stranger; barefooted seamen sprang nimbly hither and thither, some to the braces, some out on to the jib-booms, and others into the rigging on their way aloft to loose the furled canvas; the helm was put up, the fore yard swung, and the after yards squared as the ship paid off; and in less than a minute the yards were alive with men casting off gaskets, untying reef-points, overhauling gear, and generally preparing to clothe the frigate with canvas.  By the time that she had paid square off before the wind all was ready, the loosened canvas was bellying out as though impatient to be doing its duty once more, loosened ropes were streaming in the gale, the men had laid in off the yards, and the three topsails went soaring away to the mastheads simultaneously; the fore and main tacks were boarded and the sheets hauled aft; the topgallantsails were in like manner all sheeted home and hoisted at the same instant, the two jibs went sliding up their stays, slatting thunderously the while and threatening to snap the booms, until their sheets were tautened, and away flew the _Europa_, like a started fawn, leaping and plunging through and over the mountainous seas, with a bow-wave roaring and foaming to the height of her hawse-pipes, and with the wind broad over her larboard quarter.
To any one unaccustomed to the sea the change thus wrought in the course of a few short minutes would have seemed marvellous, almost miraculous, indeed; for whereas while we were hove-to, head to wind and sea, the plunging of the ship had been so furious that it was only with the utmost difficulty even the most seasoned among us could maintain our footing; while the howling and shrieking of the wind aloft, and the savage force with which it struck us when the frigate rolled to windward, irresistibly suggested the idea that we were in the grip of a hurricane; now, when we were scudding away almost dead before it, the gale seemed to have suddenly softened to the strength of no more than a moderate breeze; there were no repetitions of those sickening lee lurches as the ship was flung aloft on the steep breast of a mountainous, swift-running sea, but, in place of it, a gentle, rhythmical, pendulum-like swinging roll, and a long, easy, gliding rush forward, with an acre of foam seething and hissing about our bows as those same steep, mountainous seas caught us under the quarter and hurled us headlong forward with our bow-wave roaring and boiling ahead of us, glass-smooth, and clear as crystal.
There were but two drawbacks to our satisfaction, one of which was that the weather still remained so exasperatingly thick that we had not been able to get a further glimpse of the strange ship, while the other was that we only knew our position very approximately, and that by dead reckoning only.  This last would have given us no concern at all had we been heading to the southward, for in that direction there was plenty of sea room; but we had now turned round and were rushing back northward-- north-north-east by compass, to be exact; and we knew that somewhere ahead of us--whether on the port or the starboard-bow we were not at all certain--were the terrible Penmarks; and, beyond them, the jutting Pointe du Raz, Douarnenez Bay, Pointe de Saint Mathieu, and the dangers that lurk between Ushant and the mainland, all bad enough in themselves, but with an added terror due to the furious currents that swirl round that part of the coast, and of the direction of which one can never be quite certain.
That some such thoughts as these were disturbing the skipper's equanimity soon became apparent, for after pacing the deck thoughtfully for some time he suddenly looked up, and seeing me standing half-way up the poop-ladder, straining my eyes into the thickness ahead in a vain endeavour to get a glimpse of the chase, he called me to him.
"Is it your watch, Mr Delamere?" said he.
"No, sir," answered I, touching my hat, "but I thought I should like to get a sight of the fellow we're after before going below."
"Thank you," he said; "your zeal is very commendable; but I daresay we can muster eyes enough to maintain a lookout without keeping you on deck in your watch below.  However, since you are here, perhaps you will oblige me by finding the master and asking him if he has made up his reckoning to eight bells.  If he has, request him to be good enough to bring it, with the chart, to me, here, on the quarter-deck.  If he has not, say that I shall be obliged if he will do so at once."
"Ay, ay, sir," answered I, touching my hat again as I turned away to descend the hatchway.
CHAPTER FOUR.
THE FRENCH 50-GUN SHIP.
I found Mr Trimble in his cabin, in the very act of laying off the ship's position on the chart, after working up his reckoning.  I delivered my message, and by way of reply the master rolled up his chart, tucked it under his arm, seized pencil, dividers, and parallel ruler, and started for the deck, with me close in his wake--for I shared the skipper's anxiety to know whereabout we were.
"Ah! here you are, Mr Trimble," exclaimed the Captain, as the master's head and shoulders rose above the combings of the hatchway.  "Have you made up your reckoning?"
"Yes, sir," answered the master, "and pricked her off.  We are just about here, by dead reckoning."  And he made an effort to spread open the chart on the capstan-head.  But the paper was stiff from being almost continuously rolled up; moreover, the wind was troublesome--the two circumstances combining to render it almost impossible for the good man to do as he wished unaided.  I saw his difficulty, and, stepping forward, seized the two top corners of the chart and held them down, while the skipper gripped the third corner, and Trimble the fourth.
"There we are, sir--or thereabout," explained the master, pointing with his pencil to a dot surrounded by a small circle, on the paper, with the date written alongside it.
"I see," remarked the skipper thoughtfully, as he intently studied the open chart.  "I suppose," he said presently, "you have made ample allowance for leeway, and for our drift while hove-to?"
"Yes, sir," answered the master.  "I have allowed a point and a half for leeway, and three knots drift, both of which I reckon are above rather than below the mark."
"Y-e-es," agreed the skipper reflectively; "yes, she will not have made more than that, I should think.  And you have, of course, also allowed for tide and current."
"For both, sir," assented the master; "but, of course, you clearly understand, Captain Vavassour, that the currents hereabout are very irregular.  I therefore wish you to accept the position of the ship, as there laid down, as merely approximate."
"Yes, I quite understand," answered the skipper.  "Now, assuming that position to be correct, Mr Trimble--and we can do nothing else, I think--how far are we from the Penmarks, and how do they bear?"
The master took his dividers, measured the distance, applied the instrument to the margin of the chart, and announced the distance--"Seventy-six miles."
"Good!" ejaculated the skipper.  "And their bearing?"
The master laid his parallel ruler down on the chart, with its edge passing through the dot representing the ship's position, and also through the Penmarks; then he carefully slid the ruler along the surface of the chart until that same edge passed through the centre of the compass diagram, and read off the bearing--"No'th-east, half east."
The skipper turned sharply round to the quartermaster.
"How's her head, quartermaster?" he demanded.
The quartermaster glanced into the compass-bowl and answered, "No'-no'th-east, sir!"
"Excellent!" exclaimed the skipper.  "Why, at that rate, Mr Trimble, we shall pass outside Ushant, if we keep on as we are going now."
"No doubt, sir," answered the master.  "But in my opinion," he continued, "that's where the fellow we sighted a while ago is bound to," and he laid his forefinger on that part of the chart where the word Brest was legibly printed.
"Ah!" ejaculated the skipper, "you are likely enough to be right.  But he shall never get there, even if I have to drive the frigate under water to stop him.  Hang it!  I wish the weather would clear, if only for a moment, and allow us to get a sight of him.  Thank you, Mr Trimble; that will do."  And he released his hold upon the chart, allowing the corner he had been holding to spring back and curl up.  I did the same, and, as the ship took a somewhat heavier roll than usual, glanced out over the bulwarks at the racing, foam-capped surges that reared themselves alongside; and at that moment, as if in direct response to the skipper's forcibly expressed wish, the haze thinned away somewhat to starboard, revealing, square abeam, and apparently about a mile away, a dim, misty, grey shape faintly showing up through the thickness to starboard.
"Sail ho!"  I cried excitedly, pointing her out; "there she is, sir." And even as the words passed my lips there came a shout from the lookout on the forecastle of "Sail ho!  A large ship, broad on our starboard beam."
"Ay, ay, I see her--the glass, quick, Mr Delamere," answered the skipper.  I jumped for the telescope, drew the tube, and handed it over to the impatient hand outstretched to receive it.  By a piece of good fortune the atmosphere inshore of us just then thinned away still more for a few minutes, enabling us to get a tolerably distinct view of the stranger.  Captain Vavassour, glass in hand, sprang up the poop-ladder, and, with feet planted wide apart to give himself a good grip of the heaving deck, applied the telescope to his eye.  I followed him, that I might be at hand if required.  For a long two minutes he stood intently studying the stranger, and speaking to himself the while.  "A 50-gun ship," I heard him mutter, "and a Frenchman at that--steering a parallel course to ourselves; yes, very likely making for Brest.  Rather a stiff customer to tackle, perhaps, but I'll not let that stop me."
He removed the instrument from his eye, and, seeing me at his elbow, handed it back to me.  "Thank you, Mr Delamere," he said.  "I shall not require you again, so you had better go below, especially as there is a probability that we may have a busy afternoon."  Then he descended to the quarter-deck, where the second lieutenant and the master were standing talking together near the capstan, and gave the quartermaster the order to keep away a point to the eastward, which would have the effect of causing us to converge gradually upon the Frenchman.
When I went on deck at eight bells it was to find that the atmosphere had thickened again, to such an extent, indeed, that although it was estimated that we must now be within half a mile of the French ship, there was not the faintest trace of her to be seen.  The skipper, however, considered that he was now as close to her as he desired to be; he therefore ordered the course to be changed back to North-North-East, and, at the moment when I gained the deck, was giving Mr Howard instructions to let the men have their dinner, and then to put out the fires and clear for action.
The keenness of the crew to get to work was evidenced by the fact that although the men's dinner was now ready, it was with the utmost difficulty that they could be persuaded to go below and eat it; and when at length they went, in obedience to the Captain's imperative orders, they returned to the deck in less than ten minutes, and at once set to work of their own accord to put the ship into fighting trim.
It was evident to me that the master was greatly disappointed at not having been able to get a sight of the sun at noon, and I could not help thinking that, as the time passed on, he was not only disappointed but was beginning to grow more than a trifle anxious, especially as shortly after midday the weather became more gloomy and the wind freshened very considerably.  He betook himself to the poop, up and down which he paced rapidly, with his hands behind his back, and his eyes fixed abstractedly on the deck, except when he raised them from time to time to gaze long and piercingly ahead.
At length four bells struck, and almost immediately afterward, with a further freshening of the wind, the atmosphere cleared sufficiently to afford us another glimpse of the French ship, which suddenly appeared, with almost startling distinctness, about three-quarters of a mile distant, bearing one point before our starboard beam.  A dozen eager voices at the same moment reported her reappearance, and the Captain sprang up on the poop to get another look at her.  He was immediately joined by the master, who seemed to be making some very earnest representation to him; but what it was I could not hear, for I was now down on the quarter-deck and had no valid excuse for approaching any nearer.  However, whatever it may have been, Captain Vavassour was evidently disinclined to listen to it, for I saw him once or twice shake his head most determinedly, pointing at the same time at the French ship, which still remained distinctly in view.  Finally the skipper left the poop and joined Mr Howard on the quarter-deck, conversing very animatedly with him for about five minutes.  It was while he was thus engaged that the master suddenly called down to him the intelligence that the stranger had hoisted French colours, upon which he gave the order for our own colours to be hoisted, and, jumping up on the poop, I went to the flag-locker, drew out our big ensign, bent it on to the halliards, and, with the assistance of the master, ran it up to the mizen peak.
Meanwhile, our men had long been at quarters, and the ship ready for action.  I was, therefore, not surprised to see the first lieutenant descending to the main-deck, evidently for the purpose of conveying the skipper's final instructions to the captains of the guns.  It was going to be a running fight, and we were about to open the ball.  But the Frenchmen snatched that honour from us, for as I was descending from the poop to the quarter-deck after having hoisted the ensign, I saw a jet of flame and a cloud of smoke burst from the stranger's port side, and immediately afterwards a heavy shot flew humming high over our mastheads.  Almost immediately afterward three of our starboard main-deck guns spoke simultaneously, and, as the smoke from them swept away ahead of us, I heard the captain of the aftermost quarter-deck gun cry out that all three shots had hulled the French ship, for he had seen the splinters fly in three distinct places.  Then, at brief intervals, the remaining guns of our starboard main-deck battery were fired; but seemingly without doing very much damage.
The firing now became brisk on both sides, but the French fired much quicker than we did, the reason being--as I afterward learned--that our Captain had given the most imperative orders to the first lieutenant that the gun-captains were not to fire until they had made sure of their aim; and the wisdom of this soon became manifest; for while the French fired upon an average three shots to our one, the damage sustained by us was very trifling, while it was not long before the French ship's sails and rigging became a good deal cut up--to such an extent, indeed, that we were obliged to clew up our topgallantsails, in order to avoid running too far ahead of our adversary.
Suddenly, the simultaneous discharge of three or four of our main-deck guns was followed by a cheer of delight from our lads, and, jumping upon the carriage of one of the quarter-deck guns, I was just in time to see the French ship's mizenmast fall forward, dragging down the main-topgallant-mast with it and passing through the main topsail and mainsail in its fall, splitting them from head to foot.  There was at once great confusion on board the Frenchman, and, being thus deprived in a moment of all her after-sail, she immediately fell square off before the wind, or about three points more to the eastward than the course we were steering.
"Hurrah! we have her now," exclaimed the skipper, delightedly rubbing his hands.  "Up with your helm, quartermaster, and follow her.  Weather braces, Mr Galway; square the yards, and set your topgallantsails again.  The land cannot be far off, and now she must strike or we will drive her ashore.  Jump down on to the main-deck, Mr Delamere, and request Mr Howard to train his starboard guns as far forward as they will go, and then to rake her every time we luff."  (The change in the relative positions of the two vessels caused by both of us squaring away dead before the wind was that the French ship was now almost stern-on to us, broad on our starboard-bow, and about half a mile distant.)
I sprang down the ladder on to the main-deck, and there found the first luff superintending the working of our heavy guns.  The men had all stripped to the waist to obtain the utmost possible freedom of movement while hauling upon the tackles and flourishing their handspikes, sponges, and rammers, and, generally speaking, had discarded their hats, knotting bandanna handkerchiefs round their heads in place of them. They were all eager to get to closer quarters with the enemy, and were as merry as crickets, bandying jests with each other in the intervals of toiling at the guns.  I delivered my message, and at the same time seized the opportunity to inquire whether any casualties had occurred on that deck.  Mr Howard informed me that there had been none thus far; and with this information I returned to the quarter-deck and reported to the Captain.
Brief as had been my visit below, I found upon my return from it that a material alteration had occurred in the relative positions of the two vessels during the interval; we were gaining upon the chase hand over hand, and had shortened the distance between her and ourselves to a short quarter of a mile, which was as close as we wished to go, the skipper having now determined to keep to windward--that is to say, astern--of the Frenchman, and alternately to luff and bear away, passing athwart and athwart her stern on opposite tacks, raking her first with one broadside and then the other, pouring in both round shot and grape. He was in the act of giving orders to clew up the topgallantsails and to haul down a couple of reefs in the topsails, so that we might not gain any farther upon the chase, when I went up to him to make my report, and as soon as he had finished I delivered it, and was again sent down to Mr Howard to acquaint him with Captain Vavassour's plan, at which he expressed the utmost satisfaction, immediately ordering the men in the port battery, which had not yet been engaged, to stand to their guns.
Upon my return to the quarter-deck, after this second visit below, the men were laying in off the yards, after having hauled down a couple of reefs in the topsails, and as soon as they were down on deck the sail-trimmers were sent to the braces, the helm was gently ported, and the frigate was gradually brought to the wind on the starboard tack, exposing her port broadside to the French ship, and as we went surging athwart the enemy's stern the whole of our port battery, both main and quarter-deck guns, was discharged into her, raking her fore and aft. Then our helm was eased up; the frigate paid off, came gradually to the wind on the port tack, and as we again crossed her stern the French ship got the full contents of our starboard battery, with destructive effect, if one might judge by the battered appearance of her stern, her quarter-gallery being shot to pieces and every one of her stern windows broken; thus showing that pretty nearly the whole discharge must have entered her hull and raked her decks from aft forward.
But now that we had adopted the plan of alternately coming to the wind and bearing away again, we began to realise, for the first time, how hard it was blowing; for, when hauled to the wind, the ship was so heavily pressed down by her canvas that at every lee-roll the main-deck port sills were brought down to within a few inches of the boiling sea, and the task of working the guns effectively taxed the skill of the seamen to the utmost; so much so that Mr Howard presently sent up a message to the skipper to ask whether it would be possible to relieve the ship to the extent of taking the mainsail off her.
Captain Vavassour immediately issued the necessary orders; the clew-garnets, buntlines, and leech-lines were manned at the moment that the ship was running off the wind, the tack and sheet were eased up, and the great sail, the most powerful in the ship, was handsomely clewed up, as the men appointed to furl it made their way aloft.  The relief to the frigate was immediately apparent; she at once became more lively and buoyant, and, if her speed was decreased at all, the decrease was inappreciable.
This manoeuvre was executed during the time that the frigate's head was being directed to the southward, for the purpose of giving the French ship the contents of our port battery for the second time; and the guns had just been discharged when, as the smoke blew away, we saw that our antagonist had put her helm down and was trying to come to the wind upon the port tack, with the object, as we supposed, of returning our fire. But as her head swept sluggishly round and she began, with apparent difficulty, to come-to, her mainmast went over the side, and she fell off again without having fired a single gun.  The sight of the falling mast was greeted by our lads with an enthusiastic cheer, and then our helm was put up to wear round upon the other tack, when the master--who all this time had been anxiously pacing the poop--suddenly ran to the head of the poop-ladder and shouted, "She strikes, sir! she strikes!" and jumping upon the breech of a gun, I saw the tricolour being slowly hauled down from the ensign staff upon which it had been hoisted when her mizenmast fell.  The Captain, too, sprang up beside me in time to see the flag go fluttering in over the taffrail as it was hauled down.
A tremendous volley of cheering greeted the intelligence of our success; but our joy was short-lived, for the cheering had scarcely died away and the men turned to secure the guns, when the master came rushing down the poop-ladder and, addressing the skipper, said:
"It is no wonder that the fellow has hauled down his colours, sir.  He has made the land, and will be ashore in ten minutes!  See, sir, if you will look intently past him you will catch occasional glimpses of leaping whiteness--there, it clears somewhat--do you see the breakers inshore of him?  Ay, and now you may also see the loom of the land through the haze!"
The skipper sprang half-way up the poop-ladder, glanced ahead, and finally ascended to the poop, from whence he could get a clear and uninterrupted view ahead and to leeward; then, holding on his hat with one hand while he shaded his eyes with the other, he stared intently to leeward.
"By Jove!  Trimble," he exclaimed to the master, who had followed him, "you are right; those are breakers, and that is the land yonder without a doubt.  But where in the world are we, man?  We must be miles to leeward of your reckoning."
"Yes, sir," answered the master; "there is no denying that.  But you must remember, if you please, that the wind headed us and broke us off a couple of points some hours ago, which has made a lot of difference. Then there is no doubt that this strong breeze, blowing dead on shore, has created a powerful in-set, sending us bodily to leeward.  I have been exceedingly anxious for the last hour or two, for I know this part of the French coast well, and am fully aware of its extremely treacherous character."
"But where are we, man; where are we?" demanded the Captain, with more than a trace of anxiety and impatience in the tones of his voice.
"Ah, sir, I could tell you better if it would only clear enough to let us see some of the details of the coast more distinctly," answered the master, in tones of anxiety equal to the Captain's own.  "But," he continued, "although I cannot say, to within a few miles, precisely where we are, I have not the slightest doubt that we are somewhere within the limits of Audierne Bay."
"Audierne Bay! and the wind blowing half a gale from the sou'-west!" ejaculated the skipper, with a note of something approaching to dismay.
"Yes, sir, Audierne Bay," repeated the master.  "It is only there that we could possibly have come within sight of the land at this hour of the day.  Perhaps you would like me to bring up the chart, Captain Vavassour."
"Yes; pray do so," answered the skipper.
The master had scarcely disappeared down the hatchway, on his way to his cabin, when the French ship--which, having made an ineffectual effort to round-to, had fallen off again and had continued to run dead to leeward--suddenly broached-to; a terrific sea struck her on her port quarter, turning her broadside-on to us, and her foremast went over the side.  Instantly a dozen voices shouted excitedly--"The Frenchman is ashore, sir!"
Yes, there was no doubt about it; for now every sea as it rolled in made a clean breach over her, and we could see her lift to it, rolling over at every blow almost to her beam-ends.
"Ay," muttered the skipper--I was close at his elbow, having followed him that I might be at hand if required--"ay, she is ashore, fast enough, and she will never come off again, for an hour of such pounding as she is now getting will make an end of her.  We shall be very lucky indeed if we do not follow.  Hillo!  Mr Delamere, is that you?  Just find Mr Howard, and say I shall be obliged if he can come to me on the quarter-deck."
"Ay, ay, sir," I answered, touching my hat as I started down the poop-ladder.  I guessed that I should find the first lieutenant on the gun deck, and there he was, superintending the securing of the guns--a task which needed to be done very carefully and thoroughly; for now that the ship had been brought to the wind she was rolling and pitching most furiously, and if one of our long 24-pounders should chance to strike adrift, the consequences might very easily be disastrous.  I delivered the Captain's message, and then followed the first lieutenant on deck, where he joined the skipper and the master, who were already standing at the capstan, with the chart spread open before them on its head.  I had no good and sufficient excuse for lingering near them, and therefore passed over to the lee-side of the deck, as became a well-trained midshipman; consequently I only caught a word here and there as I staggered fore and aft in the lee scuppers.  I heard the Captain say something about "Audierne Bay," and then, a little later, the master said something about "land takes a westerly trend--Penmarks;" and, finally, the Captain, as though closing a discussion, said, "Very well, then, we will try her, while there is still room, and the sooner the better.  Get the mainsail on her again at once, Mr Howard."
I surmised, from this last remark on the part of the Captain, that we were about to make an attempt to tack ship; and indeed it was full time for something to be done, for the breakers were now distinctly visible for a space of about two miles on the lee beam, and they seemed to be rather trending out athwart our bows.  It would, therefore, soon be necessary to get the ship round on the other tack, either by staying or wearing, so it would be wise to make the attempt while there was still room to resort to the second expedient, should the first fail.
A few minutes later the mainsail was once more set; and no sooner was the tack boarded and the sheet dragged aft than we felt the difference, which was tremendous.  For whereas we had before been going along comfortably enough, despite the heavy rolling and pitching, the moment that she felt the extra pressure, due to the expansion of this large area of canvas to the gale, she lay down to it, until at every lee-roll the muzzles of the quarter-deck guns were buried in the boiling yeast that foamed and swirled giddily past to leeward, and sometimes surged in through the ports, filling the lee-scuppers knee-deep with water.  And whereas we had before ridden buoyantly over the head seas, with nothing worse than an occasional shower of spray flying in over the weather cathead, the frigate now plunged her bows savagely right into the very heart of them, quivering to her keel with the violence of the shock, raising a very hurricane of foam and spray about her figurehead, and shipping the green seas in tons over her forecastle at every dive, while the main tack groaned like a giant in torment as it seemed to strive to tear up the very deck of the ship.
"Keep her clean full, quartermaster, and let her go through it," ordered the skipper.
"Ay, ay, sir; clean full it is," answered the quartermaster, as he gave her an extra spoke of the wheel, while the Captain and the first lieutenant stood together close by the weather bulwarks watching her behaviour, the latter grasping a speaking-trumpet in his hand.
At length, after some eight or ten minutes of suspense, the skipper spoke.  "Here comes a `smooth,' and now I think you may try her, Mr Howard."
"Ay, ay, sir," answered the first luff, and, placing the trumpet to his lips, he shouted, "Hands, 'bout ship!"
_Wee-wee-wee-wheetle-eetle-eetle-we-e-e_, shrilled the boatswains' pipes, followed by the hoarse bellow of "Hands, 'bout ship!" and up came the men, hurrying to their several stations.  The first lieutenant paused an instant, flinging a lightning glance fore and aft the deck, cried "Ready ho!" through his trumpet, then turned to the quartermaster and said:
"Ease your helm down gently to start with, quartermaster; we will sail her round as far as we can."  Then, keenly watching the behaviour of the ship as she swept up into the wind, he presently signed with his hand, "Hard down!" and cried through his trumpet, "Helm's a-lee!" whereupon the fore and fore staysail sheets were let go and overhauled.  Meanwhile a party of men on the poop had dragged the spankerboom as nearly amidships as they could get it.  Presently the square canvas was all a-shiver, slatting furiously and causing the ship to tremble to her keel.  "Raise tacks and sheets!" was the next order; and now came the critical moment and the question--Would she hold her way long enough to cant in the proper direction?  And, as luck would have it, just then there came hissing and foaming down upon us a particularly heavy sea, into which the frigate dived until she was all a-smother for'ard.  Yet, notwithstanding this, her head continued to sweep round--slowly, it is true; still--"Mainsail haul!" bellowed the first luff through his trumpet, and round swung the after yards, the men bracing them well up and rounding in on the main-sheet.  Now her head was beginning to pay off, but slowly.  The first lieutenant dashes up on the poop and looks over the side--she has begun to gather stern-way.
"Shift over your helm, quartermaster," he shouts; "over with it!" and stands breathless, awaiting the result.  "Ah! that's better, now she pays off freely," and presently the main topsail fills with a loud flap. "Fore tack--head bowlines--of all haul!" yells Mr Howard, and the head yards sweep round and are braced hard up, the fore and main tacks are boarded, the weather braces steadied taut, the weather lifts bowsed up, the bowlines hauled, and away goes the saucy _Europa_ on the other tack, having stayed triumphantly in a wind and sea that would have compelled most ships to wear.
CHAPTER FIVE.
THE EUROPA HAS A NARROW ESCAPE.
"Splendidly done, Mr Howard; a very fine bit of seamanship!" exclaimed Captain Vavassour, when at length the frigate was fairly round, and was once more going through the water; "you must allow me to compliment you; to tack ship successfully in such a wind and sea as this is no mean feat, in my opinion, and the slightest error of judgment, a single second of hesitation, must have resulted in failure."
"Thank you, Captain Vavassour," answered the first luff, flushing with pleasure at the skipper's praise.  "I feel intensely gratified at your appreciation.  But you really make too much of it, sir; it is not I to whom the merit actually belongs, but to the ship herself--she works as handily as a little boat; and I had such perfect confidence in her that I really longed to try the experiment; although I grant you that I do not know another ship with which I should care to make the same attempt under similar conditions."
"No, indeed," agreed the Captain.  "Still, it is only by making these experiments with a new ship that we can learn just how far she may be depended upon to do a certain thing at a critical moment, and the lesson is a most useful one to learn.  It seems inclined to clear a bit, I think, for surely that is the French ship I see yonder--there, just clear of the fore-rigging."
"Yes, sir, that is she, beyond a doubt," answered the first lieutenant. "And I fancy we shall see her a good deal more distinctly a few minutes hence, when we bring her more abeam.  The driving of a big chap like that ashore, without so much as a single casualty on our part, ought to be a feather in our cap, I think, for she is as good as a lost ship; she will never again leave that berth."
"No," agreed the skipper, "I do not believe she will; indeed it appears to me that--The glass if you please, Mr Delamere."
I handed him the instrument and he applied it to his eye for a full minute or more.
"Yes," he continued, handing over the telescope to Mr Howard, "I think I am not mistaken; take a squint at her yourself, Howard, and tell me whether she does not look as though her back had already broken."
In his turn the first luff peered long and earnestly through the tube. At length, lowering it from his eye, he said:
"It is rather difficult to speak with absolute assurance, sir, for the sea breaks so violently over her that it is almost impossible to get a sight of the whole of her hull at any given moment; still I am inclined to say that not only is her back broken, but that she has actually parted in two amidships.  If you will look at her very carefully I think you will agree with me that her hull shows a distinct twist, and that her after-end has a much heavier list than her bows."
At this moment eight bells struck, and as the midshipman who was to relieve me was already on deck, and as I was pretty nearly wet through with the spray that the frigate was now throwing over herself in drenching showers, I went below to change and to get a cup of hot coffee.
The two succeeding hours, constituting the first dog-watch, brought a material change for the worse in the condition of the weather; for while the haze had cleared away, enabling us to see the land distinctly to leeward, some six miles distant, the wind had increased to such an extent that sail had been reduced to close-reefed topsails and reefed courses, while the sea had risen in proportion and was now so heavy that the frigate was literally smothering herself forward at every plunge. The fact was that she was being terribly over-driven; yet the skipper had no alternative.  He dared not relieve the ship of another inch of canvas, for we were on a lee-shore, and embayed, the land astern curving out to windward so far that its farthest visible projection bore a full point on our weather quarter, while our charts told us that beyond that point the dreaded Penmarks stretched out still farther to windward. Moreover it was almost as bad ahead, for although Point du Raz, some seven miles distant, then bore nearly three points on the lee-bow, we knew that stretching out to seaward from that point there was a dangerous reef, with only a comparatively narrow passage between it and the equally dangerous reef stretching out to the southward and eastward from the Isle de Seins, and it was an open question whether we should be able to fetch that passage and pass through it.  To all appearance Captain Vavassour was perfectly calm and collected, yet he looked decidedly grave, and I thought it seemed rather portentous that the master should be his companion.  The latter appeared to be doing most of the talking, and it was clear to see that he at least was distinctly anxious.  At length, apparently by way of reply to a few words from the Captain, he went below and, a minute or two later, returned to the deck with his chart under his arm; then, with a long look into the binnacle, he and the skipper passed into the cabin together.  I immediately seized the opportunity to take a squint myself at the compass, noting the exact bearing of the point on the lee-bow and the direction in which the ship was heading.  Then I went down below into the midshipmen's berth, where Maxwell, the master's-mate, was laboriously endeavouring to translate some French book with the aid of a grammar and a dictionary.
"Here, drop that, Maxwell," I exclaimed, "and let us have a look at your chart, that we may see what the next hour or two has in store for us. If I am anything of a physiognomist the master is fervently wishing that he was at home with his wife and family to-night, instead of where he is, while the skipper, too, looks anything but cheerful.  They have both gone into the cabin, and Trimble has taken his chart with him."
"Well, there is no particular reason why he should not do that, is there?" demanded Maxwell.  "And why should he be especially anxious now, more than at any other time?  Things are all right on deck, aren't they?"
"Ay," answered I, "up to a certain point they are.  But reach down your chart, and produce your parallel ruler and dividers, my hearty; I want to get some sort of notion of what is ahead of us."
"What, are you frightened too, then?" demanded Maxwell, as he pushed away his books and reached up for the chart.
"No, certainly not," answered I.  "But it is indisputable that the ship is embayed on a lee-shore, and that it is blowing a whole gale of wind. If, therefore, there is a prospect of our being obliged to swim for our lives presently, I should like to know it."
"Oh, hang it all, man, it surely is not nearly so bad as that, is it?" demanded the mate, as he spread the chart out on the table.
"Oh, isn't it?" retorted Gascoigne, another midshipman, who had just come below in time to hear the tail-end of my remark and Maxwell's reply to it.  "It is evident that you have not been on deck within the last hour, or you wouldn't say that.  Why, man alive, if you would just pull yourself together enough to become conscious of the antics of the hooker you would understand that she is being driven as no ship ought to be driven without good and sufficient cause.  There,"--as the frigate plunged dizzily, rolling at the same moment almost over on her beam-ends and quivering violently throughout her whole fabric at the shock of the sea that had struck her, while plates, pannikins, cups and saucers, knives and forks, books, candles, and a heterogeneous assortment of sundries flew from the racks and shelves with a clattering crash, and constituted a very pretty "general average" on the deck--"what d'ye think of that, my noble knight of the sextant?"
"You just gather up that wreckage, my son, and put the unbroken things back into their places," exclaimed Maxwell.  "Also, clap a stopper upon your jawing tackle, younker; you have altogether too much too say, for a little 'un.  Here, you Fleming--" to another mid, who was lying upon a locker with his hands clasped under his head by way of a pillow--"rouse and bitt, my hearty, and make yourself useful for once in a way; grab the corners of this chart and hold them down to the table until I give you a spell.  That's it.  Now then, Delamere, what is it that you want to know?"
"First of all," I said, "prick off the ship's position as it was a quarter of an hour ago.  There is Point du Raz.  Very well: when I came below it bore exactly North 3 quarters East by compass, distant, say, seven miles.  Mark off that bearing and distance, to start with."
Maxwell did so, making a little dot with his pencil on the chart.
"There you are," he said.  "Now, what next?"
"The ship was heading North-North-West," I said.  "What I want to know is, Are we going to weather that point; and, if so, what lies beyond it?"
"Ah!" exclaimed Maxwell, as the critical nature of our situation began to dawn upon him, "I see--or, rather, we shall see in a minute or two. Gascoigne, were you on deck when the log was last hove?  If you were not, you ought to have been, you know, and--"
"I was," interrupted Gascoigne.  "She was doing a bare seven, and making two and a half points leeway."
"Whew!" whistled Maxwell; "two and a half points!  That's bad.  The old girl ought to be ashamed of herself.  No self-respecting frigate ought ever to make more than two points leeway."
"Oh, oughtn't she!" jeered Gascoigne.  "You just go up on deck and see how every sea that hits her knocks her bodily to leeward, and you'll tell a different story, my friend."
"Well, well, I'll take your word for it this time, young man, just to encourage you a bit, you know.  Now, let's see how that works out.  How did you say she was heading, Delamere?"
"Nor'-nor'-west," I repeated.
"Nor'-nor'-west," echoed Maxwell, seizing his parallel ruler and applying it to the chart.  "And two and a half points of leeway, applied to the right, makes it north, half east; while Point du Raz bears--or bore--north, three-quarters east.  Um!  It's going to be `touch and go' with us, I am afraid, at that rate; for while she will doubtless weather the point itself all right, there is that out-jutting reef, which is as likely as not to bring us up with a round turn."
"And supposing we should be lucky enough to scrape past," I inquired, "is there anything beyond that we need worry about?  I am almost certain that I heard the master say something about `Les Stevenets,' or some such name."
"Les Stevenets," repeated Maxwell--"yes, of course; there they are, about two and a half miles to the nor'-west of the point.  But I don't see why old Trimble need worry about them, for if we can't weather them there is plenty of room for us to pass them to leeward, after having done which we shall have plenty of time to decide upon our next move. That is our critical point."  And he put his finger on Point du Raz. "I'm going on deck to see how things look."
So saying, Maxwell rolled up his chart, put it and his instruments away, turned up the collar of his jacket, and sprang up the ladder, Gascoigne, Fleming, and I following him.
Upon our arrival the first thing I noticed was that the Captain, the first luff, and the master were all standing together close under the shelter of the weather bulwarks, apparently holding a sort of council of war.  The weather, I thought, looked somewhat more promising than it had done when I went below; for the sky to windward had broken, displaying a very wild and stormy sunset, it is true, yet the fact that the heavy, lowering canopy of cloud had broken up at all seemed to indicate that the worst would soon be over.  But it was still blowing very heavily, and while the atmosphere was now quite clear of mist, permitting us a view to the extreme confines of the horizon, everything--the wild, tumultuously heaving sea to windward, and the land ahead and to leeward--showed a preternaturally hard outline.  Point du Raz was now about three miles distant and bore about a point, or maybe a trifle more on the lee-bow, with the surf breaking furiously upon the reef which projected beyond it, while the leeward extremity of the reef jutting out from the easternmost extremity of the Isle de Seins lay dead ahead, smothered in boiling surf, the passage between the two reefs now looking alarmingly narrow.  And it was through that passage we must win safety!
I was of course on the lee-side of the deck, so I could only catch an occasional disconnected word of what passed between the trio to windward, but I presently gathered that the master seemed to be endeavouring to persuade the skipper to wear ship while we still had room enough to execute that manoeuvre; but Captain Vavassour appeared to be objecting, upon the plea that, once on the other side of the point, we had nothing more to fear, whereas, should we wear ship now, we should be heading for the Penmarks as soon as we got round upon the other tack, and should reach them, and be faced with the task of weathering them during the hours of darkness.  The skipper, it was evident, was all for grappling with the nearest danger, for the reason that we should at least have light enough to see what we were doing; and Mr Howard seemed to side with him.
"But, sir," remonstrated the master desperately, "have you considered what must inevitably happen if a flaw of wind should come round that point, at the critical moment, and break us off, as it is likely enough to do?"
"Well, n-o," answered the Captain slowly, "I had not thought of that, I must confess, for I do not believe that such a thing is at all likely to happen.  But I am very much obliged to you for mentioning it, Mr Trimble, for `forewarned is forearmed,' and in circumstances like the present it is our bounden duty to take every possible precaution for the safety of the ship.  I am still of opinion that unless something unforeseen--such, for instance, as the occurrence which you have just suggested--should happen, we shall weather the point, and go clear; but, to provide against anything of that sort, Mr Howard," turning to the first luff, "be good enough to see everything ready for club-hauling the ship.  Have the best bower-cable ranged, double-bitt it, and stopper it at, say, thirty fathoms.  Mr Galway--where is Mr Galway?  Mr Delamere, be good enough to find Mr Galway, and say I want him--or--no, tell him that it may be necessary to club-haul the ship, and request him to muster the carpenter and his mates below, ready to cut away the best bower at the instant that I give the word.  Then come back to me; I may want you."
"Ay, ay, sir," I answered, touching my hat; and away I went, heading for the second lieutenant's cabin.  I met him just coming out, somebody having already passed the word that the Captain wanted him.  I delivered the skipper's message, received his assurance that all should be ready, and then returned to the quarter-deck.
Presently Mr Howard returned to inform Captain Vavassour that his orders had been carried out.
"Very well, sir," answered the skipper.  "Let the men go to their stations for tacking ship.  Hands by the best bower-anchor!  Oblige me, Mr Howard, by seeing personally that the anchor is all ready for letting go, and also that it is let go on the instant, should I give the order.  If at the last moment it should become necessary to club-haul, I will personally take charge.  Mr Delamere, find one of the boatswain's mates and station him below at the main hatchway, in such a position that he can see you on deck here, with instructions to wind his call to cut the cable the moment that he receives the signal which I will pass on to you."
The critical moment was now close at hand; the point which we were endeavouring to weather was less than a mile ahead, and still far enough on the lee-bow to justify the hope that we might yet go clear.  But the scene, generally, was of so alarming a character, and our situation was so critical, that even the bravest man there might well have been excused if he failed to regard it altogether without apprehension.  For it was now blowing harder than ever, the sea was breaking with absolutely appalling fury on the reef--speaking eloquently of the fate that awaited us all in the event of failure--and the over-driven ship, so heavily pressed down by her canvas that the lee-side of her quarter-deck and waist was all afloat, groaned and complained in every timber as she literally fought her way through the opposing seas, smothering herself forward so completely at every mad plunge that those who were standing by to let go the anchor had been compelled to lash themselves firmly at their posts to avoid being washed overboard.  Add to all this the fierce shriek and howl of the wind through the rigging aloft, the groaning of the masts in their partners, and of the main tack, as the ship rolled to windward, the thunderous shocks of the seas as they smote our bows and shattered into blinding sheets of spray that flew as high as the foretop and drenched the lee clew of the topsail, and the sight of the spars bending and whipping to the terrific strain that they were called upon to bear,--remembering, too, that if anything should carry away just then it would mean the utter destruction of the ship and the loss of all hands,--and the reader may be able dimly to picture the feelings that animated the ship's company of the _Europa_ on that occasion.
Even the skipper looked a shade paler than usual as he slowly brought the speaking-trumpet from behind him and prepared to raise it to his lips.  We were now so near the reef that we could hear the hollow booming thunder and crash of the sea breaking upon it; its outer extremity was within half-a-cable's length of our lee-bow, and it was evident that, even if all went well, it was going to be "touch and go" with us, when suddenly the ship came upright and the sails flapped with a report like the discharge of a 32-pounder!  That fatal flaw of wind round the Point, which the master had foreseen, had come upon us.
Up went the trumpet to the Captain's lips, and from it issued the bellowing call of--"Hands, 'bout ship!  Ready oh, ready!  Down helm, quartermaster!  Stand by to let go at the word, Mr Howard!"
"Ay, ay, sir!" came the response, faintly heard above the howl of the wind, the thunder of the surf on the rocks to leeward, the heavy "slosh" of a sea in over the bows, and the hair-raising slatting of the canvas overhead.
The ship, in obedience to her lee-helm, had come up about a point, still forging ahead, and bringing the outer extremity of the reef broad on our lee-bow, when suddenly the canvas, with a terrific report, filled again, and the ship careened to her bearings.
"Up helm, quartermaster, hard up with it, and let her go off again!  We shall do it yet, by Jupiter!" ejaculated the skipper, in a voice that quivered with excitement, while the master, who had been standing close by all the while, sprang to the wheel and lent his strength to put it over.
"Steady the wheel," was the next order, as the ship paid off again, and once more began to gather way; "thus and no nearer, quartermaster; keep her full, and let her go through the water!  What are you about, sir?"-- as the ship suddenly griped and the weather leach of the fore-topsail shook.
"It is the undertow--the recoil of the surf from the reef that is hawsing her bows up into the wind, sir," explained the master, as he strained at the wheel, with the sweat trickling down from underneath the rim of his hat.  "There--now she falls off again--steady as you go."
As the master let go the wheel, took off his hat, and drew forth a pocket-handkerchief to wipe his streaming visage, the end of the reef drew fair abeam, and so close that I could almost have leaped from the main rigging into the boil of surf that seethed and hissed and swirled about the black fangs of rock that showed here and there above water. But the danger was over, for as the ship went plunging and surging past one could see how, every time she lifted, she was, as it were, dragged bodily to windward by the strong undertow, and a minute later the reef was astern, but fast working out on the weather quarter, showing quite clearly how exceedingly narrow had been our escape.
"Hold on there with the anchor, Mr Howard!" shouted the skipper.  The first lieutenant waved his hand and came aft, wet to the skin, and his clothes streaming with water as though he had been overboard--as indeed he had, to all intents and purposes; for while standing on the forecastle, waiting for the order to let go the anchor, he had been quite as much under water as above it.
"That is as narrow a squeak as I have ever beheld, sir," he exclaimed, as he joined the skipper.  "If it had not been for that half-board that we involuntarily made, we should never have done it."
"No," agreed the skipper; "I believe that not even the undertow would have saved us.  However, `all's well that ends well,' so we will first take the mainsail off her, Mr Howard, and then you may splice the main-brace and call the watch.  Let her go along clean full, quartermaster; there is nothing to leeward now that we need be afraid of.  How's her head?"
"Nor'-nor'-west, sir," answered the quartermaster.
The clewing-up and stowing of the mainsail, without allowing it to thresh itself to ribbons, was a task of no little difficulty, considering the violence with which the gale was still blowing; but our first luff was seaman enough to accomplish it without mishap.  No sooner was it off the ship than she once more resumed her former buoyancy of motion, lifting easily over the seas, with only an occasional sprinkling of spray upon the forecastle, instead of ploughing furiously through them and drowning the whole of the fore-deck, as she had been doing during her endeavour to work out to windward of Point du Raz; so great, indeed, was the improvement in our condition generally that, although it was still blowing very heavily, we all felt as though we had suddenly passed into fine weather after our recent buffeting.
Some three-quarters of an hour later we passed Les Stevenets.  I believe we might have weathered them had we really made a serious effort to do so, but there was no need.  In this case, unlike that of Point du Raz, we had the option of going to leeward if we chose, and the skipper _did_ choose.  He had evidently had enough of close shaves for one day, and the moment he recognised that we should have another if he made the attempt to weather that group of rocks, he ordered the helm to be put up, and we passed to leeward of them, giving them a good wide berth.  We had no stomach for again viewing surf-washed rocks at such close quarters as we had been fated to do that day.
By the time that we were well clear of Les Stevenets night had fallen; but for the previous hour the sky had been gradually clearing, so that by the end of the second dog-watch it was a fine, clear, star-lit night. The wind, too, was distinctly moderating; while the sea, although still very high, was longer, more regular, and not quite so steep as it had been; in a word, the gale had broken, and by midnight we were once more under courses and single-reefed topsails.  By the end of the middle watch we were able to shake out the reefs in our topsails and set the topgallantsails, after which we hove about and headed south once more, passing well to windward of the Isle de Seins and its outlying reefs about noon next day.
CHAPTER SIX.
WE CAPTURE A DUTCH FRIGATE.
About a fortnight later, being at the time off Cape Ortegal, cruising under short canvas, we sighted at daybreak a brig in the offing, to windward, steering south, under a press of sail.  She was, at the moment of discovery, some eight miles distant, and from her general appearance, and especially from the cut of her canvas, we judged her to be French, and a man-o'-war.  We accordingly at once made sail, and hoisted the private signal, of which no notice was taken; we therefore concluded that our suspicions relative to her nationality were well founded, and crowded all sail in chase.  No sooner was this act of ours perceived by the stranger than--the weather being fine, and the wind a moderate breeze from West--she hauled her wind and, bracing sharp up, endeavoured to make her escape to windward; the weather conditions, however, were ideal for the frigate, and we overhauled the brig so rapidly that by ten o'clock in the forenoon we were within gunshot of her; whereupon we hoisted our colours and fired a shot across her forefoot as a polite hint to her to heave-to.  Her reply to this was to pour in her broadside of seven 8-pounders, the shot from which flew over and between our masts, doing us no damage whatever.  Upon perceiving which, and noticing also that we were about to return the compliment by firing our starboard broadside at her, she hurriedly ran up the French ensign and as hurriedly hauled it down again, at the same time backing her mainyard in token of surrender.  We thereupon closed with her and took possession, our prize proving to be the fourteen-gun brig _Gironde_, bound from Brest to Toulon.  We transferred her crew of seventy to the frigate, and sent her home in charge of Mr Galway, the second lieutenant, and a prize-crew; but before parting company we learned, from certain papers on board her, that on the 19th of the previous month (August) a treaty of alliance, offensive and defensive, between France and Spain, had been signed at Madrid.  We were thus at war with Spain, as well as with the Dutch and the French--a piece of news which our lads greeted with cheers of delight when it was communicated to them, for it gave them another enemy to fight--and to conquer.
We were now at practically the southern extremity of our cruising-ground, with the land plainly in view to leeward.  Captain Vavassour--who seemed of late to have contracted a marked dislike for anything resembling a lee-shore--therefore decided to work well off the land, until the frigate had gained the track of homeward-bound ships; and there to lie in wait for anything that Dame Fortune might be disposed to send us; in pursuance of which resolution we made sail, upon a taut bowline, as soon as the _Gironde_ had parted company, cracking on, and working out an offing of about a hundred miles by daylight the next morning.
The day dawned fresh and clear, with an almost cloudless sky, a moderate breeze from about West by South, and very little sea overrunning the long, regular Biscay swell; it was, in short, perfect Atlantic weather, and about as complete a contrast as could well be imagined to the conditions which had prevailed during our late experience in Audierne Bay.
The weather being of so fine and settled a character, we had been carrying our royals all through the night; but shortly after the Captain made his appearance on deck, at eight bells in the morning watch, the breeze freshened up perceptibly; whereupon, a good offing having been secured, the word was given to clew up and furl all three royals; and a minute or two later the hands were aloft and out on the yards, rolling up the canvas.  It was while they were thus engaged--the ship being at the time on the starboard tack, and consequently heading to the southward--that a hail came down simultaneously from the fore and main royal-yards to the effect that a couple of sail were in sight, broad on the lee-bow.  To an inquiry on the part of the first lieutenant as to what they looked like, the answer was returned that it was impossible to say just then, as the strangers were so far away that, even from the lofty elevation of the observers, the heads of their royals were only just clear of the horizon.
Mr Howard cast an inquiring eye about him, and his gaze fell upon me.
"Mr Delamere," he said, "you have a good glass.  Just jump below and get it, if you please, and then shin up as far as the main royal-yard and see what you can make out concerning those strangers."
I did as directed, the hands who had been aloft meeting me in the maintop on their way down.
"What do the strange craft look like, Simmons?"  I asked of the smartest of the party.
"Well, sir," he replied, "as we told Mr Howard, a few minutes ago, we can't make much out of 'em as yet; they'm too far off for that.  But I've got pretty good eyes, Mr Delamere, and I think when you brings that glass o' yours to bear on 'em that you'll find one on 'em's got her r'yals stowed, while t'other has hers set.  Likewise I've a sort of a notion that if you stays aloft for a matter o' ten minutes or so you'll find that there's three on 'em, instead o' two; at all events just as I was layin' 'im off the yard I thought I catched a glimpse of somethin' showin' now and again that looked like the canvas of another craft just liftin' over the 'orizon."
"Thanks, Simmons," said I, "I'll keep a lookout for number three.  If she really exists, she ought to declare herself unmistakably within the next few minutes.  By the bye, I suppose they are heading this way?"
"To the best o' my knowledge and belief they be, sir," the man answered. "We wasn't on the yard long enough to make exactly sure, but it seemed to me that, even durin' the minute or two that elapsed after we first catched sight of 'em, they lifted a bit."
"Thanks," I said again.  "We shall soon see."  And I sprang into the topmast rigging and proceeded on my way aloft, while Simmons swung himself down over the rim of the top.
I soon reached my destination and seated myself comfortably on the royal-yard, with my back resting against the mast under my lee.  From this elevation the strangers were distinctly visible to the naked eye, for the atmosphere was as clear as crystal; and, even before I had established myself to my liking, my unaided sight had assured me that Simmons' supposition was correct, and that there were three sail, instead of two, to the southward; for the object that the topman had only believed he saw elusively appearing and vanishing on the verge of the distant horizon now stood out clear and sharp as a tiny patch of canvas, showing milk-white in the morning sun, well clear of the other two.  I soon brought my telescope--an exceptionally powerful instrument--to bear upon the three patches of canvas that gleamed like tiny shreds of fleecy, summer cloud upon the sharply-ruled edge of the dark-blue sea, and at once discovered that Simmons had been so far right that one of the craft had indeed her royals stowed, and not only that but her topgallantsails also, while the other two appeared to be showing every cloth they could possibly spread, including--as I soon made out-- topgallant studdingsails.
Presently, when I had been working away with my telescope for a minute or two, a hail came floating up to me from the deck below of--
"Royal-yard, there! what have you been able to make out respecting the two strange sail to leeward?"
Looking down past my left shoulder, I saw the skipper and the first lieutenant both gazing upward at me.  It was the latter who had hailed.
"There are three of them, instead of two, sir," I answered.  "And while two of them are carrying royals and topgallant-studding sails, the third has her royals and topgallantsails stowed; from which I infer that two of them are merchantmen, while the third is a man-o'-war--probably a frigate."
A short confab between the Captain and Mr Howard ensued upon the communication of this bit of information; then the skipper hailed:
"How do they bear, now, Mr Delamere?  Do they seem to be drawing out athwart our hawse at all?"
"They bear about two and a half points on our lee-bow, at this moment, sir," I replied.  "And I think that, if we hold all on as we are going now, we shall weather the leading ship--the one that I take to be a frigate--by about half a mile.  They are rising fast, sir--the heads of the leader's topsails are just beginning to show; and if the breeze continues as fresh as it is now we ought to be abreast of them in about,"--I made a rapid calculation--"an hour and a half from this."
Another brief interchange of remarks between the Captain and the first luff followed this communication, then the latter hailed again--
"Thank you, Mr Delamere.  That will do for the present.  You had better come down and get your breakfast."
My estimate as to the time at which we should close with the strangers was not far out; for when, having snatched a hasty breakfast, I again went on deck, the heads of the leading stranger's topsails were visible above the horizon, she having made sail about a quarter-of-an-hour earlier and hauled to the wind a trifle, as though to intercept us; and as I emerged from the hatchway the drummers began to beat to quarters, Mr Percival, the third lieutenant, having gone into the fore-topmast crosstrees to reconnoitre, and from that lofty outlook having not only confirmed my conjecture as to the leading ship being undoubtedly a frigate, but also expressed his conviction that she was a foreigner.
By the time that we were all ready to engage, if need were, the strange frigate was hull-up; and as she had hauled her wind still farther, and threatened to weather us if we did not mind what we were about, we tacked ship, when it soon became apparent that the _Europa_ was much the faster vessel of the two; we, therefore, stood on until we were sure of our ability to pass across the other vessel's bows upon the next tack, when we went about again, and at the same time hoisted our colours.  To this challenge the stranger promptly replied by hoisting Dutch colours, thus declaring herself to be an enemy, which declaration our lads greeted with three mighty cheers.
Both ships were now close-hauled, on opposite tacks, the Dutchman heading to the northward upon the port tack, while the _Europa_, on the starboard tack, was heading up high enough to render it certain that we should be able to cross his bows at about the distance of a cable's length.  It was Captain Vavassour's intention to do this, if he could, pouring in a raking broadside at the proper moment; but the Dutchman soon let us know that he was not to be caught so easily, for when he arrived at about four points on our lee-bow he suddenly went in stays, giving us his starboard broadside as he did so, and the next moment a storm of 32-pound shot came hurtling about our ears, crashing through our bulwarks, killing two men and wounding five poor fellows, besides cutting up our rigging a good deal.  We immediately luffed and returned the compliment, giving him the whole of our port broadside, main-deck and upper-deck guns; and when the smoke blew away we had the satisfaction of seeing that we had shot away his jib-booms, thus depriving him of a considerable amount of head-sail at a most critical moment.  Moreover, the loss of his jibs caused him to miss stays and hang in the wind so long that, taking advantage of the opportunity, Captain Vavassour bore up, and, passing close athwart his stern, raked him most effectively with our starboard broadside, receiving only four shot from the Dutchman's stern-chasers in return.
Meanwhile, the Dutch crew went to work with most praiseworthy courage and activity to clear away the wreck, and so to reduce the amount of their after-sail as to get their ship once more under command; but before they could succeed in doing this we had kept away far enough to give ourselves room to tack, had gone about again, and once more crossed our antagonist's stern, raking him a second time most destructively, at close quarters, with our port broadside, double-shotted.  This discharge must have played havoc with his crew, for when at length he had paid off sufficiently to bring his starboard broadside to bear, he was only able to fire a little more than half his guns, while they were so indifferently aimed that only three or four of the shot struck us.
We now had a very great advantage over our antagonist, from the fact that all our spars were intact, while he was greatly hampered by the loss of so much head-sail; but the advantage did not remain with us very long, for at the next exchange of broadsides down came our fore-topmast, at the same instant that the Dutchman's mizenmast went over the side. This put us both upon nearly equal terms, the advantage being rather on the side of our antagonist, if anything; and now we went at it, hammer and tongs, making a running fight of it, broadside to broadside, as fast as the men could load and fire.  Now, too, it began to dawn upon us that we had caught a Tartar, for the Dutchman mounted forty guns--32-pound and 28-pound carronades--against our 24-pounders and 8-pounders, while the close range at which we were fighting--about a pistol-shot distance--enabled her heavier metal to punish us severely.  But our lads cared very little about this, it appeared, one of them remarking to another in my hearing that an 8-pounder could kill quite as effectively as a 32 at short range, and for his part he would as soon be killed by one as the other.  This appeared to be the spirit animating all hands, for they toiled away at their guns, loading and firing with the utmost rapidity, and cheering at every broadside, whether of their own or the enemy.  But the work was too hot to last very long.  When we had been engaged about half-an-hour we noticed that our antagonist's fire was perceptibly slackening, and when at length we contrived again to pass across her stern, and deliver another raking double-shotted broadside, she hauled down her colours and hailed that she surrendered.  The word was at once passed to cease firing, and the battle ended, for which I, at any rate, was not at all sorry; for there had been moments when it appeared to me as though we were both bent upon emulating the famous Kilkenny cats, who fought until nothing but their tails remained!
Now came the task of taking possession of the prize.  Investigation revealed the fact that, out of all our boats, only two were in a fit state for immediate service, namely, the second cutter and the Captain's gig, the others having been all more or less damaged by the enemy's shot; the skipper therefore ordered the former to be lowered, directing Mr Percival, the third lieutenant, to go away in her, taking with him as many men as she would carry.
"Mr Delamere," continued Captain Vavassour, "you had better accompany Mr Percival, bringing back the boat with a couple of hands as soon as you have obtained all the essential information.  Be as quick as you can, if you please, because I want to be off after those other two craft."
"Ay, ay, sir," answered I, as I turned away to go below and fetch my dirk; and a couple of minutes later we were clear of the _Europa_ and pulling away toward the Dutchman, the skipper's injunction to me to hurry being emphasised by the fact that as I passed through the gangway I caught sight of the carpenter and his mates busily engaged upon the task of routing out a new topmast from among the assortment of spare spars that we carried.  Meanwhile the other two craft of which the skipper had spoken, and which had all the appearance of being Dutch Indiamen under the convoy of the frigate, had hauled their wind as soon as the action began, and were now some four miles dead to windward, heading about North-West, and cracking on with the evident intention of getting out of sight, if possible, before we could repair damages sufficiently to proceed in pursuit.
Five minutes sufficed us to span the narrow stretch of water that separated us from our late antagonist; and upon climbing the side we were received at the gangway by an officer of some twenty-five years of age, whose head was swathed in a blood-stained bandage, and who handed his sword to Percival with a dignified bow.  This officer, who spoke English quite well, informed us that the ship which we had captured was the Dutch frigate _Gelderland_, of forty guns, homeward-bound from the East Indies with the two ships in sight under convoy.  He further informed us that his name was Van Halst, and that at the beginning of the action he had been third lieutenant, whereas, in consequence of the heavy loss inflicted by our raking broadsides, he was now the ship's commanding officer.
Indeed, it appeared that our fire had been fearfully destructive, for in addition to the damage that had been apparent from the _Europa's_ decks, we now beheld dismounted guns, shattered, blood-splashed bulwarks, cut rigging hanging everywhere in bights, and shot-scored decks cumbered with dead and dying men--a veritable shambles.  Mynheer Van Halst could not tell us the precise extent of the ship's losses in killed and wounded, for there had been no time thus far to ascertain it.  The sound members of the crew were still busily engaged in the terrible task of separating the wounded from the slain, and conveying the former below to be attended to by the surgeon; but he told us that she had begun the action with a complement of three hundred and ten officers and men, and that he believed, from what he had seen, quite half of them must have been put _hors de combat_.
Now that the fight was over and his ship taken, poor Van Halst began to show signs of the stress and strain of the engagement; he gradually turned ghastly pale; his lips quivered from time to time to such an extent that, for the few seconds during which the paroxysm lasted, he was scarcely able to articulate.  He staggered as he stood talking to us, and at length Percival, who could ill afford to waste time in conversation, gently led him into the handsome cabin under the poop, deposited him on a sofa, found a decanter of brandy and gave him a good stiff dose to revive him, and left him there, with a kindly injunction that he was not to attempt to move until he, Percival, returned.
Having thus disposed, for the time being, of our principal prisoner without, as we hoped, hurting his feelings, the third lieutenant and I took rapid stock of the condition of our prize, Percival mentioning such items of information as he wished to have reported to the skipper, while I jotted them down in my pocket-book, together with such other notes as I believed might be found of interest.  Thus, we examined the boats and found three of them absolutely intact, while a fourth could be rendered serviceable in about half-an-hour by the carpenter--our shot having taken effect for the most part on the main-deck.  Then we quickly surveyed her stock of spare spars, and came to the conclusion that all her damages in that direction might be made good, except so far as her mizenmast was concerned; she would consequently have to go home brig-rigged, or at best as a barque.
Meanwhile, from the moment when our people first set foot upon her deck they had fallen to upon the work of clearing away the wreckage, saving all that was worth saving, and knotting and splicing rigging, leaving the Dutch crew to look after their wounded comrades and convey them below to the surgeon.  At length, after I had been aboard about half-an-hour, I was ready to return to our own ship; I therefore ordered two hands down into the boat alongside, and shoved off for the _Europa_, noting, with great satisfaction as I did so, that the breeze was fast dropping, and that the two Indiamen were still hull-up, not having made very much progress to windward during the time that I had been aboard the prize.
Upon regaining the _Europa's_ deck I found it a scene of feverish yet perfectly ordered activity.  Everybody was busily engaged in one way or another upon the task of making good the damage to our spars and rigging by the enemy's shot; a strong gang upon the forecastle had already cleared away the wreck of the fore-topmast, having removed from it, practically uninjured, everything that had been attached to it in the shape of other spars, rigging, and so on--such, for example, as the topgallant-masts and royal-masts, with their sails, yards, and rigging, the topsail-yard and topsail, the cap, crosstrees, and topmast rigging; and the carpenter and his mates had already got the new spar fitted and ready for pointing; while practically all our cut gear had been either knotted or spliced.  As for our casualties, I was delighted to learn that they were very light, taking into consideration the determination with which our adversary had fought, our loss in killed and wounded amounting to eight of the former and twenty-two of the latter, of which only seven cases were regarded by the surgeon as really serious.
Captain Vavassour was up on the poop, talking to the master, when I passed in through the gangway.  I, therefore, at once made my way to him and, having reported myself in due form as "Come on board, sir," proceeded forthwith to make my report, referring from time to time to my pocket-book in order to assure myself that I was omitting nothing.
"Thank you, Mr Delamere," the skipper said when I had finished; "you seem to have brought me a very full and complete report--complete enough, at all events, to give me a pretty clear idea of the state of affairs aboard the prize.  From what you tell me, I judge that Mr Percival will have his hands full for some hours to come; is not that so?"
I answered that that was precisely how the matter appeared to me.
"Very well," he said.  "Then as soon as the carpenter has finished here he must go aboard the prize, taking with him as many men as Mr Howard can spare.  You shall go with him, remaining aboard the _Gelderland_ until the able-bodied portion of her crew can be transferred to this ship, when you will undertake that piece of work, using, if need be, to facilitate the operation, such of the prize's boats as will float.  You had better find Mr Howard and acquaint him with this arrangement, and then tell the carpenter what I want him to do.  It appears to me that Mr Lucas is now almost, if not quite, ready to turn over to the prize. If so, you had better take him across."
Away I trotted, and presently found the first lieutenant on the forecastle, supervising the labours of the boatswain and the carpenter, the latter of whom was just putting the finishing touches to his part of the work.  I delivered both my messages, picked out fifteen more men to go aboard the prize,--that being all that Mr Howard could spare,-- hustled them, with the carpenter and his crew, down the side, and presently found myself again aboard the prize.
Here, short as had been the duration of my absence, I found a great improvement in the appearance of things.  Mr Percival and his gang had been working like demons, and had made great advances toward a general clearance of the wreckage--so much so, indeed, that he was quite ready for the Carpenter to start work at once; while, as for the Dutch crew, they had completed their task of carrying below their killed and wounded, and were busily engaged in washing down the main-deck and otherwise obliterating, as far as might be, the evidences of the recent battle.  I allowed them to finish this job--although I knew the skipper to be very anxious to be off in chase of the two Indiamen--for I had noticed, while crossing over to the prize on the last occasion, that the wind had fined away to a mere zephyr, and that the Indiamen were still hull-up; while there was every appearance of the weather falling stark calm within the next hour or two.  I, therefore, told myself that, taking everything into consideration, there was really no great need for hurry.  But I had not to wait very long, for within half-an-hour the Dutchmen had done all that was possible for them to do; and by noon I had completed my somewhat disagreeable task of transferring all the prisoners to the _Europa_, taking with me, on my last trip, the Dutch surgeon's report upon the losses incurred by the _Gelderland_ during the action.  These, as anticipated by Van Halst, were exceedingly heavy, the killed numbering thirty-two, while the wounded totalled no less than one hundred and thirty-one, of whom at least ten were so desperately hurt that there was little hope of their outlasting the night.
By the time that all this was done, Mr Howard had got our new fore-topmast on end and rigged, the topsail-yard aloft and secured, and the topsail, fore-topmast staysail, and jib set, when we at once filled on the ship and hauled our wind in pursuit of the Indiamen, Mr Percival having received orders to follow us as soon as he could make sail.  Then we piped to dinner, all hands having spent a most strenuously busy morning.
At four bells in the afternoon watch the wind had fined down to such an extent that the frigate was making no more than a bare four knots through the water, although we had by this time got up the fore-topgallant and royal-masts again and were once more under all plain sail; while, as for the two Indiamen, built as cargo-carriers rather than for speed, they appeared to scarcely have steerage-way, and seemed to maintain their luff only with the utmost difficulty--indeed, there were times when they fell so broad off as to present their full broadsides to us.  But although their capture might now be regarded as practically certain, they were evidently not disposed to yield without making some sort of a struggle for liberty, for they were on opposite tacks, one of them having gone about; the idea, of course, being to separate and widen their distance as much as possible in the hope that by so doing one of them at least might escape, even if the other were captured.  Captain Vavassour, however, did not allow these tactics to disconcert him in the least; he fixed upon one of them as the object of his pursuit--altogether disregarding the movements of the other, meanwhile--and devoted all his efforts to close with her, with the result that by two bells in the first dog-watch we were within gunshot of our quarry, when a shot was pitched across his forefoot as a gentle hint to him to heave-to.  But he declined to take the hint, and it was not until we sent a shot whistling between his masts that the sturdy old Mynheer could be convinced of the impossibility of escape, when he hoisted his colours to the peak only to instantly haul them down again and back his mainyard in token of surrender.
"Mr Delamere," said the Captain, "I shall be obliged to send you to take possession of that ship.  Take the cutter, therefore, with a dozen men--armed, of course--and proceed on board at once.  You may take Mr Millet (another midshipman) with you, who, with a couple of hands, can bring back the boat and any message which you may find it necessary to send.  You will have to depend upon the Dutch crew, principally, to work the ship for you until I can make further arrangements.  As soon as you have shoved off I shall proceed in pursuit of the other ship, and you had better follow me, so long as there is wind enough for you to do so; and you must use your own judgment as to the most opportune moment for sending away Mr Millet and the boat."
A quarter of an hour later, followed by Jack Millet and my crew of twelve, I clambered in over the bulwarks of the motherly old craft that we had brought-to, and formally took possession of the _Haarlem_, Dutch East Indiaman, of 965 tons, homeward-bound from Batavia, full to the hatches with a rich cargo of Eastern produce, and a cuddy-full of passengers who seemed to take their capture very philosophically, especially when I explained to them that they might rely upon being left in undisturbed possession of all their strictly personal effects.  With the skipper, however,--a most dignified old fellow, white-haired, and bronzed by nearly half a century of the sea life,--it was different.  It appeared that he was part-owner of the ship, having sunk the entire savings of a lifetime in the purchase of fifty shares and a quantity of the cargo in her hold; and although he did his utmost to face his misfortune as a brave man should, the tears started to his eyes as he explained to me that the capture of the ship would leave him and his _frau_ absolutely penniless in their old age.  I endeavoured to soften the blow to him as much as possible by sympathetically murmuring some idiotic platitude about "the fortune of war," but of course it was no good; the poor old fellow simply shook his head and ejaculated--"Ay--the fortune of war!  It is all very well for you, young sir, who depend upon war to provide you with a career, to talk like that; but think of the thousands who are ruined and whose hearts are left desolate by war; think of the parents who have to mourn the loss of sons cut down by war in the very flower of their manhood, and all because our rulers cannot agree!  I tell you, sir, that if all men were what they should be-- honourable, honest, upright, and faithful followers of Christ--there need be no war."
To which I replied that doubtless this was true; but that if we should be compelled to wait for the abolition of war until mankind became perfect, I had a conviction that neither he nor I would live to see it.
CHAPTER SEVEN.
WESTWARD HO!
When, through the captain of the _Haarlem_, as interpreter, I explained to the Dutch crew that it was my intention to call upon them to continue to work the ship, they seemed disposed at the outset to refuse; but I soon brought them to a more reasonable frame of mind by giving them the choice of remaining in their own forecastle and enjoying the liberty of the _Haarlem's_ deck, on the one hand, and being transferred to the frigate and confined below, on the other, when it took them but a few minutes to make up their minds that the first alternative was by far the more desirable of the two.
Having arrived at this understanding I filled away, and, with the cutter in tow, stood after the _Europa_, which was now in full pursuit of the second Indiaman--the _Schelde_, of 950 tons, also from Batavia, and with an even more valuable cargo than that carried by the _Haarlem_, as I now learned from the chief mate of the latter.  But oh, it was weary work to attempt to turn to windward in a light breeze in the deep, bluff-bowed, squat-sterned, Dutch-built _Haarlem_, after my experience of the smart, lively, swift-sailing British frigate; it was, therefore, with a feeling of the utmost satisfaction that shortly before the end of the second dog-watch I heard the _Europa_ once more booming out her summons to surrender, and saw the mainyard of the _Schelde_ swing slowly aback in response.  For now, the business of taking possession of this third prize once over, we could at least bear up and crowd sail for home, with a free wind to help us over the ground; for by this time Mr Percival had so far made good the damage sustained by the _Gelderland_ that he once more had the vessel under command, and was working out toward us on the port tack.  And from what I could see of the behaviour of the ship it appeared to me that, even in the guise of a brig, she would be quite able to hold her own with the slow-moving Indiamen.
The _Schelde_ and the frigate having hove-to, we were able to close with them in the course of about an hour, when I sent away Jack Millet and two men in the cutter with my report to Captain Vavassour, giving him the name, tonnage, and nature of the cargo of the _Haarlem_, together with such other particulars as I thought he would like to know, and also acquainting him with the fact that the Dutch crew had consented to work the ship.  Meanwhile the _Europa_ had taken in all her light sails and clewed up her courses, with the evident intention of keeping close company with her prizes.
As soon as the _Schelde_ had been taken possession of, and a prize-crew put on board her, Captain Vavassour sent away his gig to me, in charge of young Millet, with written instructions that I was to remain in charge of the _Haarlem_, retaining Jack to help me, and to crowd all sail for Plymouth, taking care to keep in close touch with the rest of the squadron.  Jack--good boy--upon receiving his instructions to join me, had had the sense and forethought not only to bring along his own dunnage but mine also; and as soon as we had hoisted in the two chests I sent back the gig, and we proceeded to make ourselves comfortable by taking possession of two staterooms in the cuddy that by good fortune happened to be vacant.
It was close upon four bells in the first watch when at length, all arrangements being completed, the _Europa_ hoisted the night signal for us to make sail, upon which, the wind having meanwhile freshened up again a trifle, we wore round and, crowding all sail upon the two Indiamen, shaped a course for Ushant.  I remained on deck until I had seen the topgallant, topmast, and lower studdingsails set aboard my command, and then, having had a busy and very tiring day, turned over the charge of the deck to Bateman, a steady old quartermaster who had been spared to me by Mr Howard, laying strict injunctions upon him to keep a very sharp eye upon the Dutch crew, and then turned-in.  Five days later, at daylight, we made the land, and came safely to anchor in Plymouth Sound, just as the breakfast-bell was being rung on board the two Indiamen.
The appearance of the _Europa_ in the Sound, accompanied by three prizes, one of which was a more powerful vessel than herself, created great excitement ashore, and we were speedily surrounded by a whole flotilla of boats, the occupants of which clamorously besought permission to come on board and dispose of, either by sale or barter, the varied assortment of goods and commodities that they had brought off; but the strictest orders had been given that no strangers were on any account to be allowed on board, and that no boats or other craft were to be permitted to come alongside, or even approach the prizes; we were, therefore, obliged to possess our souls in patience, and see fresh meat, soft tack, and many other dainties that we would gladly have purchased, taken back to the shore again.  Two days later, however, the prizes were taken into the Hamoase and their crews landed, after which the prize-crews returned to the _Europa_, where the joyous news was communicated to us that we were to proceed at once to Portsmouth to refit.  We weighed forthwith and stood up channel with a slashing westerly breeze, arriving at Portsmouth on the following day, when all hands were turned over to the guardship, and the frigate was taken into dock.
I obtained leave, without the slightest difficulty, and spent a very happy month with my father, at the expiration of which I was notified that the _Europa_ was once more ready for sea, and was requested to join forthwith.
On this occasion I left home and journeyed down to Portsmouth alone, my father happening at the time to be suffering from an attack of gout which, while not sufficiently serious to be alarming, was nevertheless painful enough to preclude travelling.  Upon arriving at my destination I called at the George Hotel, where Captain Vavassour usually put up, with the intention of reporting myself to him, but, learning that he was on board the frigate, I at once proceeded to the harbour and, engaging a wherry, transported myself and my belongings to Spithead, where the _Europa_ lay at anchor.  I was just in time to catch the Captain and report myself before he left the ship for the night, and then I descended to the midshipmen's berth, where I was joyously welcomed by my former shipmates.
Upon inquiring for the latest news, it appeared that certain changes had occurred in the personnel of the ship since we had last all met together.  For instance, Mr Howard had most deservedly obtained his promotion and been given a command, while Mr Galway now reigned in his stead aboard the _Europa_.  As second and third lieutenants we had two new men, namely, Mr William Gadsby and Mr Edward Sutcliffe, both of whom seemed to have made a fairly favourable impression, on the whole, although--as was, perhaps, only natural--the occupants of the midshipmen's berth seemed just a little inclined to regard them askance as newcomers of whom but little was thus far known.  But when, an hour or so later, I again went up on deck and, through Mr Galway, made the acquaintance of the new men, I speedily came to the conclusion that though our new second luff might possibly turn out to be rather a "taut hand," and perhaps a little inclined to be intolerant of the practical joking to which midshipmen are so prone, yet, on the whole, we should not have much cause to regret the arrival of either himself or Mr Sutcliffe among us, for both of them impressed me as being exceedingly well-bred men.  Whether or not they would turn out to be capable seamen, however, was a matter which only time and more intimate association would prove.
As I have already intimated, the frigate had been reported as ready for sea when I received orders to join her; and so she was, save in one most important particular, namely, that she was short-handed.  For although, upon our arrival home, all hands had been turned over to the guardship and placed upon her books while our own ship was in the hands of the dockyard people, the admiral had drawn upon them pretty freely, in order to enable other ships to complete their complement and go to sea; so that when the time came for the _Europa_ to receive back her crew, it was found that she was nearly fifty men short of her full number.  This was all the more unfortunate, in that we had very little time left us in which to make up the deficiency; for we were to sail in three days' time for Plymouth, there to form part of the escort of a large fleet of merchantmen and transports bound to the West Indies under convoy.  But now it was that our new second and third lieutenants showed their mettle, for on the very night of my arrival on board they organised two formidable pressgangs, which they led ashore, one party landing at Portsmouth and the other at Gosport; and between them they managed to make a clean sweep of pretty nearly all the crimps' houses within a radius of four miles of the harbour, returning to the ship shortly before daylight the next morning considerably battered and the worse for wear--for they had been engaged in a series of desperate hand-to-hand fights--but bringing with them sixty-three fine, able-bodied merchant seamen, who had been in close hiding while awaiting a berth.  A few of these men had already served on board a man-o'-war, and they did not need very much persuasion to induce them to enter again; when the ball having once been set rolling, as it were, the rest followed suit in little batches of twos and threes until by midday the whole of them had "volunteered," and we had completed our complement.
At daylight, on the third morning after my arrival on board, Blue Peter was hoisted, the fore-topsail was loosed, and a gun was fired as a signal that we were about to proceed to sea; and from that moment until the anchor was lifted all was bustle and confusion--hoisting in and securing the boats, stowing away stock of all descriptions, and clearing the ship of women--wives and sweethearts of the crew--and traders who were anxious to obtain a settlement of accounts.  The Captain's gig had been sent ashore immediately after breakfast; and about ten o'clock she returned, bringing off Captain Vavassour; the boatswains piped "All hands up anchor!" and half-an-hour later we were bowling away down the Solent before a fine easterly breeze.
We arrived in Plymouth Sound the next morning, and found assembled there about one hundred and twenty sail of merchantmen bound to various ports on the other side of the Atlantic, in the safe convoy of which to their destination we were to take part.  We also found my old ship _Colossus_, the frigate _Astarte_, of thirty-six guns, and two 14-gun-brigs--the _Hebe_ and the _Naiad_--at anchor outside the merchant fleet, being the remaining ships of the squadron detailed for convoy duty.
On the day following our arrival at Plymouth the wind shifted and blew hard from the south-west, with almost continuous rain.  As these weather conditions prevailed for eight consecutive days, we remained at anchor, awaiting a change of wind, since it was useless to take to sea a fleet of merchantmen, the greater number of which were so deeply laden and such poor sailers that it would have been impossible for them to make any progress against a wind that was blowing dead in their teeth. During this period of inaction some thirty additional sail arrived at the rendezvous, anxious to avail themselves of the protection of convoy; when, therefore, on the ninth day the weather cleared and the wind hauled round from the south-east, the merchant fleet of which we were to take care during their passage across the Atlantic numbered in all exactly one hundred and fifty-four sail.
The change of weather occurred shortly after midnight, with a steadily rising barometer; at daylight, therefore, the commodore fired a gun and hoisted the signal to weigh, and by eight o'clock the leading ships in the fleet were under way and beating out to sea, led by the _Colossus_, their departure being hastened by much firing of guns and continuous displays of signal flags.  The two gun-brigs went out with the first of the fleet, their duty being to marshal the merchantmen into something like order when they got outside; but the _Astarte_ and ourselves remained at anchor to quicken up the movements of the laggards and expedite matters generally; and a hard time we had of it, for so short-handed were some of the vessels that we were obliged to send working-parties on board them to assist in making sail and breaking their anchors out of the ground.  But by noon the last of them were fairly under way, and as soon as they had passed outside of us we too weighed and stood out after them, flitting hither and thither, hailing first this ship and then that, with imperative orders for them to crowd sail.  But oh, what weary, heart-breaking work was this business of whipping-in; for so sluggish were some of the craft that it seemed as though they would never be able to make their way out to the main fleet, which was by this time hove-to in the offing.  However, by eight bells in the afternoon watch we had contrived to hustle the last one out to windward of the Eddystone, when the commodore made the signal to fill away; and off we all went, with the wind a couple of points free, the weather braces checked, and the slower coaches among the merchantmen with all their larboard studdingsails set.  Then came a signal from the commodore to regulate rate of sailing by that of the slowest craft in the fleet and to keep as close together as prudence would permit; and, finally, a signal to the men-of-war to take the stations assigned to them and to keep a sharp lookout for marauders.  This last signal was made purely as a matter of form and duty, and not because it was actually necessary; for although none of us had sighted any suspicious-looking craft on our way round to Plymouth, we felt pretty certain that news of the assembling of the convoy, and of its probable sailing date, would find its way across the Channel, and that, sooner or later, we should discover that a few enterprising privateers were hovering upon its skirts, watching for a favourable opportunity to cut in and secure a prize or two.
The south-easterly wind held long enough to enable us and our charges to get well clear of the Channel and to the southward of Ushant before it changed, and then it gradually veered round until it came out strong from the north-west, when away we all went for Madeira, the slowest ships carrying every rag of canvas that they could stagger under, while the faster craft were unwillingly compelled to shorten down in order that all might keep together, while as for ourselves and the _Astarte_, the utmost that we could show, without running ahead of our station, was double-reefed topsails.
We sighted and passed Madeira on the eighth day out from Plymouth, and two days later, to our great joy, picked up the "Trades," blowing fresh; and thus far we had not sighted a single suspicious sail.  Most of us were of opinion that, having been permitted to come thus far without interference, we were now safe, and that with a strong trade-wind wafting along even the slowest coaches among us, at a pace of from six to seven knots an hour, our troubles were all over.  But the more knowing ones shook their heads, smiled compassionately at our ignorance, and said, "Wait a bit!"
And they were right.  For at daylight on a certain lovely morning, when we were, by our reckoning, some three hundred and twenty miles from the island of Barbadoes, upon going up to the main-topmast crosstrees to take a look round generally, and count the number of sail in sight, I discovered that at last the wolves had entered our fold and were already playing havoc with it.  For, to start with, one of our finest and fastest merchantmen had hauled out from the main body, and under a heavy press of canvas was already hull-down in the south-eastern board, being evidently in possession of a prize-crew, while, in the thickest of the ruck, was a very large brigantine, under exceedingly short canvas, yet keeping pace with the slow-sailing merchantmen, first sheering alongside one and hugging her affectionately for a few minutes, and then turning her attention to another and doing likewise.  But this was not all, for on the northern flank of the convoy there was a small full-rigged ship, which I felt certain was a stranger, apparently pursuing the same tactics as the brigantine; while far away to the north were both our man-o'-war brigs cracking on in chase of five craft--whether a portion of our convoy or not, I could not at the moment say--which seemed to be manoeuvring with the deliberate purpose of drawing the brigs away from the convoy and so affording the brigantine and the ship an opportunity to put in a good morning's work unmolested.
"On deck, there!"  I hailed.  "There are two strange sail astern which seem to be running alongside and taking possession of a number of our craft; one large ship is heading south-east and already hull-down from the crosstrees here; and the two brigs--the _Hebe_ and the _Naiad_--are about fifteen miles off, in the northern board, chasing five other craft."
"Thank you, Mr Delamere," answered the first lieutenant.  "Can you count the number of merchantmen in sight?"
"I'll try to do so, sir," I replied; "but I'm afraid it will be a little difficult, for they are all bunching together, astern, as though for mutual protection, in a manner that is very confusing."
"Still, I shall be glad if you will do your best to get the information," hailed the first luff; to which I replied, as in duty bound--"Ay, ay, sir; I'll have a try."
Therewith I set to work upon my somewhat awkward task, in the middle of which some of the merchantmen began firing their signal guns to attract our attention.  The example seemed contagious, for in about five minutes the popping of their 4-pounders was almost continuous, and the smoke became as thick as though a small battle were raging, while ship after ship hoisted the signal for "Enemy in sight!"  At length, after being compelled to begin my work all over again two or three times, I managed to complete my count, making of them one hundred and forty-eight.  This number I reported to the first lieutenant, down on deck.
"Does that include the six craft which appear to have parted company, Mr Delamere?" hailed Mr Galway.
"No, sir," I replied; "it is the number which are still sailing in convoy."
The first lieutenant conferred for a few minutes with the Captain, who had meanwhile been sent for, and had come on deck, and then hailed again, directing me to come down.
Meanwhile a good deal of signalling had been proceeding between the _Colossus_, ourselves, and the _Astarte_; and just as I reached the deck the order was given to make sail, the two frigates having been instructed to chase the strangers, and for us, in addition, to pursue and recapture the large ship which had by this time vanished altogether in the south-eastern board.
We at once hauled our wind and, acknowledging the signal from the commodore, crowded sail, standing to the southward upon the port tack. We set everything to our royals, although the moment that the ship was brought upon a wind, and the yards braced sharp up, we became conscious of the fact that the Trades were blowing quite strong enough to justify us, under ordinary circumstances, in keeping our topgallantsails stowed. But this was no time for prudence; valuable property was being stolen under our very noses--ay, and murder being committed, too, for aught that we could tell to the contrary--and the marauders must be caught and punished; we therefore cracked on, pressing the beautiful frigate to the utmost limit of her endurance.
And, oh, what a joyous, exhilarating sensation it was to feel the ship alive once more, as it were, heeling steeply over to the shrill piping of the strong salt breeze, bounding from wave to wave, plunging her sharp stem deep into the heart of each oncoming surge, and cleaving its indigo crest asunder in a perfect storm of sparkling foam above which played a miniature rainbow, after being compelled for weeks to moderate our paces to those of the sluggish merchantmen!
Our shift of helm brought that portion of the convoy, in the midst of which the big brigantine was pursuing her nefarious trade, square upon our weather-beam, but as we were now going off practically at right angles to the course steered by the convoy, and as both they and we were sailing at a good rate, our relative positions very quickly altered; and as the brigantine had not yet seen fit to haul out from among the merchantmen, we were beginning to hope that she was too busily employed to notice our movements, and that, before she did so and took the alarm, we should gain the weather-gage of her.  But no, they were not going to be quite so easily caught as all that!  It happened, however, that at the precise moment when we hauled out from the main body she had run alongside a large transport, carrying troops out to the West Indies; and the officers on board her, having got timely notice of what was happening, had prepared for her visit by turning up the soldiers, some five hundred in number, serving out ball cartridge to them, and causing them to crouch low behind the bulwarks.  Then, just as the brigantine ranged up alongside to board, the soldiers at a blast from the bugle had poured in a fire of musketry that had literally swept her crowded decks and filled them with killed and wounded, causing her to haul off in a tremendous hurry, the soldiers continuing to gall her until she contrived to escape by hauling her wind and interposing some of the other ships between herself and the transport.  But, even as it was, when at length she hauled out clear of the convoy, and proceeded to make sail, she was a good three miles to windward of us, though about three points abaft the beam.
Of course we heard faintly the rattling crash of the musketry volleys, and were thus able to make a pretty shrewd guess as to what was happening, but it was not until the brigantine had cleared the convoy, and began to make sail, that we could form any idea of the extent to which she had been punished by the soldiers.  For these picarooning craft usually go as heavily manned, in proportion to their tonnage, as a man-of-war, and are generally able to make sail quite as smartly.  But now sail was made as slowly aboard her as though she had been a short-handed merchantman, seven hands only--for I counted them through my glass--going aloft to shake out the reefs from her topsail, and to loose her topgallantsail and royal, while two more appeared to be as many as could be spared to lay out and loose her standing and flying-jibs.  But when at length she was under all plain sail, like ourselves, we saw that we should have our work cut out to catch her, for she developed a most extraordinary turn of speed, although the strong breeze and heavy sea were all in our favour.
By the time that she had got the reefs out of her immense mainsail, and had set an enormous gaff-topsail above it, we had drawn so far ahead of her as to bring her a couple of points upon our weather quarter, whereupon we tacked, the advantage gained being solely due, I imagined, to the slowness of her crew in making sail.  When we were round, and full upon the other tack, she was still quite three miles distant, and bore about a point on our lee-bow; but of course she very soon drew out athwart our hawse, and now everything seemed to depend upon which was the more weatherly craft of the two.  Seen from the fore-topmast crosstrees--to which I ascended for the purpose of getting a good look at her--she appeared to be one of those immensely beamy, shallow craft, copied from the slavers; and those vessels, I knew, although they generally sailed like witches, were often anything but weatherly.  Yet I had heard of vessels thus modelled for the sake of securing speed, and fitted with a very deep keel to ensure weatherliness, where light draught of water was not a consideration; and it remained to be seen whether the brigantine was a craft of this class.
Now that all her canvas was at length set, the heavy loss of men that she had sustained was no very serious disadvantage to her; for with one good man to steer her, she would sail as well with a dozen hands as with a hundred on deck, and there could be no doubt that she was going very fast through the water.  The point now was whether, as we converged toward each other--as we were now doing, the two craft being on opposite tacks--we could persuade her, by means of our bow guns, to give in, and so save us the time that would be consumed in a long stern-chase.
Mr Purvis, the gunner, believed that we could, and, having obtained permission from the Captain to try his hand, soon proved himself right by shooting away the chase's fore-topgallant-mast, when the loss of topgallantsail, royal, and flying-jib so far reduced her speed that it quickly became evident she must either strike or run the gauntlet of our entire broadside.  She wisely chose the former alternative; and twenty minutes later she was hove-to, with her topsail aback, on the _Europa's_ lee quarter.
CHAPTER EIGHT.
THE AUDACIEUSE PRIVATEER.
"Mr Delamere," said Captain Vavassour, "take a dozen men, and Mr Gascoigne, and secure possession of that brigantine, if you please. Stay a moment,"--as, touching my hat, I was about to dive below for my chest--"you had better have with you Simmons and Henderson, as two out of your dozen, to take charge of the watches, and take also two extra hands to bring back the boat.  I will remain hove-to until you have secured your prisoners below--I have not time to tranship them now; and when you have done that you will be pleased to bear up and join the convoy.  Now, be as quick as you can, young gentleman, for I am anxious to be off after that merchantman yonder."
"Ay, ay, sir," I answered, touching my hat and turning away to secure my crew.  I first found Simmons, the carpenter's mate, and Henderson, a quartermaster, and informing them of the Captain's arrangement, desired them to pick out the best ten men they could lay hands upon, arm them, and get them into the cutter with their bags and hammocks, and then make their own preparations,--by which time Gascoigne and I would be ready,-- then I bundled below, found Gascoigne, and set to work to get my own chest and bedding ready.
Ten minutes later the boat was lowered and at the lee gangway; and in another ten minutes we were aboard the prize.
We were received at the brigantine's gangway by a most ruffianly-looking individual, with his left arm in a sling, and his otherwise bare head bound up in bandages through which the blood was even then oozing.  As he proffered his sheathed sword he introduced himself as Monsieur Jules Despard, chief mate of the French privateer brigantine _Audacieuse_, of Dunquerque, mounting sixteen long 18-pounders, and a long 32-pounder on her forecastle, and originally carrying a crew of one hundred and fifty-six men, of whom twenty-five were away in the Indiaman that had vanished in the southern board, while twelve more were aboard one of the vessels of which the gun-brigs were in chase.  "Of the remainder, monsieur," he said, "there are but fourteen, beside myself, who are fit for duty.  The others, including Captain Le Mesurier, have either been killed outright or severely wounded in the murder-trap which that dastardly transport of yours set for us.  It was a base, cowardly act of theirs to permit us to approach them within biscuit-toss, and then shoot us down like--"
"Do you think it was more cowardly than for so heavily armed and manned a vessel as this to range up alongside of and attack a perfectly defenceless craft like the Indiaman which you surprised in the darkness, monsieur?" demanded I.  "But," I continued, "I have no time to argue the point just now.  Henderson,"--to the quartermaster--"just jump below and see if you can find a spot where the prisoners may be safely confined."
"Ay, ay, sir," answered Henderson, touching his hat, as he turned away to inspect the forecastle.  Our friend, Monsieur Jules Despard, appeared to understand English quite well, for as soon as Henderson had vanished he said:
"I presume, monsieur, you have full authority from your captain to accept the parole of such of us as are willing to give it?  For myself, I--"
"No, monsieur," I answered, "I have received no such authority; on the contrary, my orders are to confine you all below, for the present at all events and until an opportunity shall occur to transfer you to the frigate."
"But, monsieur, that order surely does not apply to the officers of the ship, as well as the men?" remonstrated the Frenchman.  "It is usual to make a distinction--"
"Pardon me, monsieur," I interrupted, "but you do not appear to understand.  Is this ship a man-o'-war, or is she merely a privateer? Do you or do you not hold a commission?"
"The ship, of course, is a privateer--a letter-of-marque, as I have already had the honour to inform you," answered Despard; "therefore--"
"Precisely," I cut in.  "Doubtless you recognise the difference.  But whether you do or not matters nothing; my orders are definite and precise, and it is my duty to carry them out.  Should you desire to make any representation to Captain Vavassour, when the frigate rejoins, I shall be happy to transmit it to him; but meanwhile--" and I shrugged my shoulders expressively.
"Very well, Monsieur Enseigne de bateau," he returned, glowering at me savagely, "if you are determined to inflict upon me the indignity of confinement, instead of accepting my proffered parole, I cannot help it. But possibly we may meet again under reversed conditions, and should we do so you will find that my memory for injuries is a good one."  And he turned and walked forward, wearing a most ferocious scowl, and hissing execrations between his set teeth.
A minute or two later Henderson returned to the deck with the intelligence that he had found a fine store-room abaft the fore-peak which could be cleared out in a few minutes, and which would afford ample room for such of the prisoners as it would be necessary to put under restraint.  Upon hearing this I went down below with him, leaving Simmons in charge of the deck, and personally inspected the place, which appeared to be excellent in every way for the proposed purpose.  I, therefore, gave him orders to take five men and clear the place out forthwith, after which he was to get the prisoners below and secure them.  And while he was doing this I went aft to the cabin in search of writing materials wherewith to pen a brief report to Captain Vavassour.
The brigantine was built with a monkey poop, extending from the taffrail to within about eight feet of her enormous mainmast, and the main cabin, with the captain's and first and second mates' staterooms, as also the steward's pantry, lay beneath this.  This was a most excellent arrangement, for otherwise, the vessel being extraordinarily beamy and very shallow, there would have been scarcely head-room enough abaft in the ship's run for cabins; whereas the addition of the four-feet height of poop afforded delightfully lofty and airy cabins for the size of the vessel.  I found, upon going below, that the chief and second mates' staterooms were situated respectively on the starboard and port sides of the ship, forward of the foot of the companion ladder, with the steward's pantry between them, a window in each cabin, pierced through the front of the poop, affording the occupant an excellent view of whatever might be happening out on deck.
About three feet abaft the foot of the companion ladder a transverse bulkhead extended for the entire width of the ship, and in the centre of this bulkhead was a door which gave access to the cabin.  Opening this door and passing on, I found myself in the main cabin, which was an exceedingly roomy and pleasant little apartment, of the full width of the ship, well lighted by a large skylight in the deck above as well as by half-a-dozen large circular ports in the sides.  The furniture consisted of a handsomely carved sideboard on one side of the door, balanced by a well-stocked book-case on the other; there were cushioned lockers running fore and aft along the sides of the ship, and a beautifully polished mahogany table, draped with a handsome tablecloth, occupied the centre of the cabin.  In one part of the book-case I found a massive inkstand well supplied with pens, and also an abundant supply of stationery; I accordingly sat down and penned my report to Captain Vavassour.
I had but just completed this document when Henderson came down to acquaint me with the fact that all the prisoners who were in the least likely to give trouble were securely lodged below; I, therefore, sealed my report and, taking it on deck, handed it over to one of the two men who were to take the boat back to the frigate, and dispatched them; and a few minutes later--the _Europa_ having meanwhile shifted her berth and hove-to again close to leeward of us--the boat passed under the frigate's stern and disappeared from our view.  Seeing the boat coming, Mr Galway had manned the tackle-falls in readiness, and a minute later she was run up to the davits, the boatswain's pipe shrilled out, the mainyard was swung, and away went the beautiful craft, like a hound released from the leash, in pursuit of the vanished Indiaman, leaving us to our own devices.
Now we had time to look about us and note the effects of the brigantine's disastrous encounter with the transport.  Truly these were terrible enough, in all conscience; for although as soon as the uninjured portion of the crew had made sail upon the vessel, in their unavailing effort to escape, they had employed themselves in separating the wounded from the dead and carrying the former below to the cockpit-- where the ship's surgeon was then busily engaged in attending to their hurts--there had not been time enough for them to complete their task, and the slain and wounded still cumbered the decks to such an extent that when, upon the departure of the frigate, I gave the order to bear up and stand after the convoy, our lads could scarcely get at the sheets and braces without trampling some of them under foot.  They were everywhere--between the guns, about the hatchways, and especially on the forecastle and in the wake of the port fore-rigging, where they had grouped themselves thickly preparatory to boarding, and where they lay literally in heaps, while the bulwarks were splashed with blood from end to end of the ship, and the lee scuppers were still running with it. She had ranged up on the starboard side of the transport, consequently the dead and wounded lay thickest on the port side of the brigantine; but a few of the crew had apparently run round to shelter themselves under the lee of the longboat--which was stowed on the main hatch--after receiving the first or second volley, and the closeness and deadly character of those volleys was borne witness to by the fact that the boat was literally riddled with bullet-holes, the missiles having evidently passed through and through her and probably laid low every one of those that we found on her starboard side.  And if further evidence were needed it was to be found in the fact that the starboard bulwarks-- almost as high and solid as those of a man-o'-war--were pitted with bullets, "a long way closer together than the raisins in a sailor's plum-duff," as Henderson caustically remarked.
Our first duty was of course to aid the wounded who had not already been attended to; therefore, while Simmons and three hands busied themselves aloft in clearing away the wreck of the fore-topgallant-mast, the remainder of the prize-crew set about their gruesome task, even Gascoigne lending a hand, while I took the wheel.  But the dead were out of all proportion to the wounded, as we soon discovered, for when every individual exhibiting the slightest sign of life had been found and carried below, it proved that they numbered altogether only thirty-three out of a total of one hundred and nineteen, which was the ship's complement when she attempted to capture the transport.  Deducting the fourteen prisoners whom we had confined below, the remainder, representing the killed, amounted to no less than seventy-two!  These the hard necessities of the case demanded that we should launch overboard without delay, and this we did, getting rid of the whole of them before closing with the convoy.
This done, and the wounded all conveyed below, we had time to think of ourselves, and make arrangements for our own comfort during the coming night.  There was no difficulty about this, Gascoigne and I arranging to sling our hammocks in the late captain's stateroom, which left the chief and second mates' staterooms available for Simmons and Henderson.  As for the men, they simply screened off a portion of the mess-deck near the main hatchway, and slung their hammocks there, the wounded being accommodated in that portion of the mess-deck forward of the screen. The ship had no hold, in the usual acceptation of the term; that is to say, there was no space for the stowage of cargo, she having been built as a fighting ship pure and simple, the space below the mess-deck being only comfortably sufficient to accommodate the ballast, water-tanks, provisions, and stores generally; thus, although so heavily manned, there was ample room aboard her for the whole of her crew.
The captain's stateroom, wherein Gascoigne and I took up our quarters, was an exceedingly comfortable apartment--a perfect palace, indeed, compared with the midshipmen's berth aboard the _Europa_.  It was situated abaft the main cabin; was, like the latter, the full width of the ship, and measured about twelve feet fore and aft.  It was lighted by windows reaching right athwart the stern, as well as by a small skylight in the deck above, the combination of the two affording admirable facilities for ventilation.  It was very neatly and comfortably, though not extravagantly, furnished--a standing bedplace, with a commodious chest of drawers beneath it, on the starboard side, being balanced by a book-case with drawers for charts on the port side, together with a sort of cabinet in which the ship's chronometers and the captain's sextant were kept.  A set of cushioned lockers ran athwart the after-end of the cabin, between the bedplace and the book-case; there was a wash-stand and toilet-table at the foot of the bunk, and a table occupied the centre of the apartment immediately beneath a handsome shaded lamp which hung, suspended by brass chains, from the skylight. The deck was comfortably carpeted; the chest of drawers was well-stocked with clothing; and a few garments, together with an oilskin coat, leggings, and sou'wester, hung from brass hooks screwed to the fore bulkhead.
When I went on deck again after a brief sojourn below, I was met at the head of the companion ladder by Simmons, who, touching his hat, said:
"What about breakfast, Mr Delamere?  We've been too busy to think about it, up to the present; but I believe we can find time to snatch a mouthful of food and drink now; and the men are beginnin' to ask what's the latest news from the galley."
"Ay, to be sure," I answered.  "I was just wondering what is the matter with me; but, now that you come to mention it, it means that, like the men, I want my breakfast.  Is the galley fire lighted?"
"Yes, sir," answered Simmons, "and the coppers full of cocoa.  But we don't know where to find the eatables; and Henderson an' I have been thinkin' that it wouldn't be a bad plan to have the ship's cook and steward up from below and make 'em work for their livin'."
"Certainly," I agreed; "have them up at once, Simmons, by all means, and tell them--No, they will probably not understand you; send them aft to me, and I will tell them what I want done."
A few minutes later the two Frenchmen were brought up on deck to me, and I explained to them that I wanted them to exercise their usual functions,--at which they seemed highly pleased; and small wonder, either, for it was certainly more pleasant to work and be free, than to be cooped up below in idleness.  Half-an-hour later we piped to a somewhat belated breakfast, and a very excellent one it was, too--far better than what we had been accustomed to aboard the frigate; and we came to the unanimous conclusion that in whatever other respect the French might be ignorant, they at least understood the art of living well.
Breakfast over, Simmons went to work and routed out a spare fore-topgallant-mast, which he prepared for sending aloft, while the rest of the watch were busy clearing away the wreck forward; and by the time that the new spar was ready for swaying aloft we had overtaken the rest of the convoy, when the commodore sent away a boat, with the first lieutenant of the _Colossus_ in her, to receive my report.  This I wrote out and handed to him, retaining a copy to be handed to Captain Vavassour; and after a little chat together our visitor instructed me to retain command of the prize until the return of the _Europa_, and meanwhile to take the place of that ship to assist in the protection of the convoy.  He also informed me that during our absence the _Astarte_ had captured the ship privateer that had been so busy on the outskirts of the convoy a few hours before, while the boats of the _Colossus_ and the _Astarte_ had recaptured no less than five merchantmen that had been taken possession of by the marauders.  As for the _Hebe_ and the _Naiad_, they had vanished in the northern board, and as yet there were no signs of their return.
Two days later we arrived at Carlisle Bay, Barbadoes, the _Europa_ overtaking us in the offing, in company with the recaptured merchantman of which she had gone in pursuit; while on the evening of the same day the two gun-brigs also arrived, bringing in with them the five vessels which they had started to recapture; thus the little squadron of privateers which had waylaid us, and had made such a bold bid for booty, not only gained nothing but lost their own ships as well, together with a good many lives.  But the heaviest loss of all was that sustained by the unfortunate _Audacieuse_ in her blundering attack upon the transport; for in addition to the seventy-two killed which we found on board her when we took possession, nine more had died of their wounds before we anchored in Carlisle Bay.  The remaining twenty-four wounded, together with those who had been hurt on board the other prizes, were taken ashore and lodged in the hospital at Bridgetown, while the whole of the prisoners were transferred to the _Colossus_.  Gascoigne and I fully expected that we should now be ordered to rejoin the _Europa_, but instead of this, to our great delight, we were ordered to remain on board, our crew being increased to twenty-six--that being as many as Captain Vavassour could possibly spare us.
We remained in Carlisle Bay just twenty-four hours; which period we utilised by refilling our water-tanks, laying in a bountiful stock of fruit, vegetables, and poultry, together with as much fresh meat as we believed we could possibly consume before it went bad; and then, leaving in the bay such ships as were bound for Barbadoes, we sailed again for the various islands to which our charges were bound, leaving some at every halting-place, until in the fulness of time we arrived at Port Royal, and the thirty sail or so that remained under our protection were safely moored in Kingston harbour.
We remained at anchor in Port Royal harbour a full week, during which the first lieutenant was more than generous to me in the matter of leave, whereby I was enabled to twice dine and spend the night at the Admiral's Pen, meeting there and making the acquaintance of several military officers from Up Park Camp as well as a number of exceedingly jovial, hearty, hospitable civilians--planters, merchants, and so on, from Kingston and the surrounding neighbourhood.  This was my first experience of the West Indies, and after the glorious scenery of the island and the marvellous luxuriance, beauty, and strangeness of the tropical vegetation which everywhere clothed it, I think that what impressed me most was the amazing hospitality of its inhabitants, who positively seemed to vie with each other in their efforts to show us kindness.  Did any of us want the loan of a horse or vehicle to make an excursion into the country, we had but to hint at our requirements and we might take our choice of a dozen which were instantly placed at our service; while invitations to dine and spend the night or longer, to join picnics and shooting parties, were literally showered upon us in such abundance that it would have needed at least six months' leave to have enabled me to avail myself of them all.  Thus, in addition to the two nights I spent under the Admiral's hospitable roof, I passed one night--and might have passed many more--at Up Park Camp, and three whole days and nights visiting sugar plantations at Saint Thomas-in-the-Vale in the centre of the island.  Then came our orders to sail, and I was obliged to bid a regretful farewell to my many kind friends; not, however, until they had extorted from me more promises than I could ever hope to fulfil that I would visit them and make a long stay when next I found myself in the island.
Our orders were to cruise in the Caribbean generally, and among the Lesser Antilles, for the protection of our own commerce and the destruction of that of the enemy; and during the succeeding six months we performed this duty, varied by occasional brief visits to Port Royal and Barbadoes, making a few unimportant captures, but meeting with no adventures worth recording.  It was through one of these captures that we first got news of the surrender of the island of Trinidad (on the 17th of February 1797) to the combined naval and military forces under Rear-Admiral John Harvey and Lieutenant-General Sir Ralph Abercromby.
It was some six weeks after the occurrence of the above event that, while cruising off Cape Gallinas, on the Costa Firme, with our head to the westward, we found ourselves so nearly becalmed that it became necessary for us to set all our flying kites in order to retain steerage-way.  The night fell intensely dark, for the moon, well advanced toward her third quarter, rose late, while the sky had gradually become overcast, great masses of heavy cloud having worked up against the wind, threatening one of those violent thunderstorms which are so frequent in this particular part of the world.
The storm gathered slowly, and when I put in an appearance on deck to stand my watch, at eight bells of the second dog-watch, it had not yet broken, although an occasional faint flicker of sheet-lightning, away to the eastward, warned us that we might expect it to do so within the next hour or so.  At the moment of my appearance on deck, however, there was no very immediate prospect of an outbreak, for the wind although light was steady, and the frigate, close-hauled on the port tack, was creeping along at the rate of about three knots per hour, while the gleams of sheet-lightning were exceedingly faint and infrequent, occurring at about ten-minutes' intervals.  Very gradually the brilliancy of the flashes, as well as their frequency and duration, increased, until, by two bells, the glimmer of some of them endured for perhaps as long as three seconds, during which the entire sky, with its enormous, fantastic cloud-shapes, from horizon to zenith, was lit up with a faint sulphurous blue glare, strongly suggestive of the idea that we were afloat in the heart of an enormous cavern, momentarily illuminated by the burning of a port-fire.
It was during the flickering of one of these somewhat prolonged gleams that the lookout on the forecastle-head reported:
"A small sail, three points on the weather-bow, headin' to the east'ard, close under the land."
Mr Galway at once sprang up on the poop, and I followed, both of us intently staring in the direction indicated by the lookout; but the transient gleam had by this time flickered itself out, and we might as well have been staring at a vast curtain of black velvet, for all that we could see.  However, by patiently waiting, and persistently staring in the proper direction until the next flash came, we at length contrived to get a momentary glimpse of her, a dozen voices at least exclaiming at the same instant:
"There she is!"
"Did you see her, Mr Delamere?" demanded the first luff, as the darkness again enwrapped us.
"Yes, sir," I answered.  "I caught a momentary glimpse of her."
"And what did you make her out to be?" he asked.
Now, it is surprising how much detail the trained eye of a sailor will grasp, even in the brief space of time occupied by a gleam of sheet-lightning; it is due in part, I think, though certainly not wholly, to what scientists describe as "persistency of vision," or the phenomenon which causes an image to remain imprinted upon the retina of the eye for a quite appreciable period after the object has vanished. But I am certain that there is more in it than that, though precisely what it may be I cannot tell; suffice it to say that I was able to answer unhesitatingly:
"A brigantine, sir, of about two hundred tons, under all plain sail. Very low in the water, and a decidedly suspicious-looking customer."
"Just so," answered Galway.  "Exactly what I made her out to be.  Have the goodness to step down and report the matter to Captain Vavassour, if you please."
There was no need, however; for the Captain, who had been reading in his cabin, had heard voices, and had come up on deck to see what was the matter.  Then ensued another brief but intensely exasperating period of waiting until another flash came and once more betrayed the stranger's whereabouts.  It came at length, and revealed her still standing to the eastward, and so close under the land that, but for the momentary illumination of her sails by the lightning, she would undoubtedly have slipped past us unseen.
"Ah, yes, there she is; I see her!" exclaimed the skipper.  "Wait until we are abreast of her, and then tack, Mr Galway," he continued.  "No doubt they can see us a great deal more distinctly than we can see them, and if we tack now, they will doubtless do the same, with the result that they will be both to windward and ahead of us.  But if we wait until she gets fairly past us, it will be a point in our favour, because if she stands on we can gradually edge down upon her."
"She seems to be moving through the water very fast, light as is the wind," remarked the first lieutenant.  "Ten minutes ago she was broad on our weather-bow, while now she is almost abeam.  I expect we shall find that she is quite as fast as ourselves."
CHAPTER NINE.
THE PIRATE BRIGANTINE.
We watched the stranger as she was revealed at uncertain but decreasing intervals by the silent sheet-lightning, which was now flickering up all round the horizon, affording us momentary glimpses of the great lowering cloud-masses that overhung our mastheads as though ready to fall and crush us, the shining undulations of the swell, with the small overrunning ripples caused by the faint breathing of the breeze, the distant land, and the brigantine sliding furtively along within its shadow.  When at length she had drawn to a bearing two points abaft our beam, the Captain gave the word to tack; and when, three minutes later, we were fairly round, the yards braced up, sheets hauled aft, and the frigate gathering way on the starboard tack, the stranger lay straight ahead of us.
Of course, we had taken the precaution to wait until immediately after a lightning flash before putting our helm down, and, as it happened, the next gleam did not occur until several minutes after we had tacked; the probability, therefore, was that the stranger would know nothing about our manoeuvre until the scene was again illuminated.  The question that now interested us was--how would her people act when they made the discovery that we had shifted our helm and were standing in their direction?  There were three alternatives open to them.  First, they might follow our example--tack, and endeavour to escape to windward if they believed their vessel speedy enough to succeed.  Secondly, they might haul their wind and enter the Gulf of Venezuela, along the shores of which there are two or three shallow inlets, in one or the other of which they might take refuge and anchor, in the hope of being able to defend their ship successfully against a boat attack.  And, thirdly, if they were perfectly honest--of which we had our doubts--they might proceed steadily on their way, taking no notice of us and our movements. When we next got a sight of them the third alternative seemed to be their intention, for, so far as we could discover, they had started neither tack nor sheet; we therefore proceeded to edge down very cautiously and very gradually toward her, keeping her about a point on our lee-bow.
Now we discovered that our task was not going to be nearly so easy as we had at first thought, for in the very light breath of wind that was then blowing--and which was wholly insufficient to keep our lower canvas "asleep"--the stranger undoubtedly had the heels of us, slipping along so fast, indeed, that within a quarter of an hour of tacking we were running off with the wind abeam and our weather braces checked, instead of being upon a taut bowline, as we had been at the beginning of the chase.
Meanwhile the expected storm, though it had been brewing long, showed unmistakable signs that it was not going to keep us waiting very much longer, for the sheet--lightning was flickering almost incessantly, while a low, deep muttering of distant thunder occasionally made itself heard.  The storm seemed to be working up astern of us, for presently a dazzlingly vivid flash of chain-lightning rent the darkness over our weather quarter, quickly followed by a deep, hollow, reverberating peal of thunder that rumbled like the echo of a seventy-four's broadside. Another and another quickly followed, each nearer than that which had preceded it; and presently, far away astern of us, we saw advancing toward us a sort of wall of vapour, the lower edge of which gleamed white and phosphorescent as the wind in it lashed the surface of the water into foam.
"Hands, shorten sail!" was now the word.  The watch sprang to their stations, coils of rope were lifted off their pins and flung to the deck; then in rapid succession followed the orders:--"Royal and topgallant halliards and sheets let go; clew up and furl!  Hands by the weather braces; square the yards!  Raise main tack and sheet; man the main clew-garnets, buntlines, and leech-lines; clew up cheerily, lads! Up helm, quartermaster, and let her go off.  So; steady as you go. Hands by the topsail halliards!  Brail in the mizen!  Haul down the flying-jib!  Here it comes!"
The squall swooped down upon us with a weird, shrieking howl, and a dash of wet that was half rain and half spray; and the next moment, with a tremendous creaking and groaning of timbers and gear, with all three topsail-yards on the caps, and with the chain bobstay half-buried in the foam that heaped itself up about our bows, away went the frigate, like a startled sea-bird, speeding down-wind upon the wings of the squall, enveloped in a sheet of rain that was more than half salt water, with the lightning flickering and darting all round her, and the thunder crashing overhead in a continuous booming roar.
The squall lasted very nearly three-quarters of an hour; but long before that time had elapsed the weather ahead had cleared sufficiently to enable us again to catch sight of the brigantine, now about two points on our starboard-bow, running dead before it, like ourselves, under nothing but a close-reefed topsail and reefed foresail.  She was still maintaining her distance from us in the most wonderful manner; but was now--possibly in consequence of having been compelled by the squall to bear up--steering as though to enter the Gulf of Venezuela.  We contrived to gain a little upon her by carefully watching our opportunities and making sail by degrees as the squall blew itself out; but in that respect her people were fully as wide awake as we were, and made sail with a boldness and rapidity which most conclusively proved that she was very strongly manned, and, therefore, not in the least likely to be the harmless, innocent trader that they would doubtless have liked to persuade us she was.  She was hugging the land so closely that some of us were of opinion that her skipper intended to run her ashore and take to his boats if it should prove impossible to avoid capture in any other way; but the Captain did not believe this, and the master also seemed to be of his opinion.
"His object," said Trimble, "is undoubtedly to get round Point Espada and fairly into the Gulf.  If he can succeed in that, there are plenty of little coves, especially along the western shore, in which he might anchor and, sheltered from our guns, bid defiance to a boat attack."
"Ah!" observed the skipper, with much meaning.  "Well, we shall see.  It is perfectly evident that he is anxious to keep out of our clutches, which desire argues a guilty conscience on his part, and only makes me the more determined to overhaul him.  Confound it, here comes the rain again!  Mr Gascoigne, have the goodness to slip into my cabin and desire my steward to bring my oilskins on deck.  Or, stay, the fellow will have turned-in by this time; I will get them myself."
The rain came swooping down upon us with the tail-end of the squall, and for a quarter of an hour it was so thick that we could see nothing a couple of ships'-lengths outside the bulwarks.  Then it cleared away, the clouds dispersed, the stars came out, the wind dropped to a moderate breeze, and presently the moon, with nearly half her disc in shadow, crept up above the horizon, flooding the heaving waters with ruddy gold that quickly changed to silver as the satellite climbed high enough to clear herself of the vapours that distorted her shape and imparted to her the colour of burnished copper.
But where was the brigantine?  Ahead, abeam, on our quarter we looked, but nowhere could we discern the faintest trace of her.  We had lost sight of her a bare quarter of an hour, and in that brief space of time she had contrived to vanish as completely as though she had gone to the bottom in deep-water, leaving not so much as a fragment of floating wreckage to furnish a clue to her fate.
The skipper was as much puzzled as he was annoyed, and in his perplexity he turned to the master.
"What do you think has become of her, Mr Trimble?" he demanded.  "She cannot have gone ashore and broken up so completely in a quarter of an hour that no sign of her would remain.  We should see something at least in the nature of wreckage to give us a hint of what had happened.  Yet I see nothing; although if she had been stranded, either purposely or by accident, her wreck ought to be away in there somewhere about abreast of us.  And there are no off-shore dangers, are there?"
"The nearest that I know of are The Monks, away out here, some twenty-five miles to the nor'ard and east'ard of us," answered the master.  "The coast inshore of us is, of course, a bit rocky, but there is nothing, so far as I know, in the nature of hidden dangers to cause the wreck of the brigantine.  No, sir, it is my belief that there is some snug little secret cove, known to the skipper of that brigantine, and that he took advantage of the rain squall to slip into it, in the hope of dodging us."
"Ah!" said the skipper, "yes; that is, after all, the only feasible explanation of his disappearance.  He is neither ahead nor astern nor to seaward of us; therefore he must be hidden somewhere inshore.  Mr Galway,"--to the first lieutenant--"we will shorten sail, if you please, with the ship's head off the land, remaining in sight of the coast until daylight, when we shall perhaps be able to discover the hiding-place of that brigantine."
This was done, and during the remainder of the night the _Europa_, under her three topsails, jib and spanker, stood off and on, never going farther from the shore than a distance of six miles, and very gradually working her way back to--as nearly as we could guess it--the spot where we had lost sight of the brigantine.  As the night wore on all traces of the recent storm passed away; the sky cleared, the moon and stars beamed down upon us in tropical splendour, affording us an ample sufficiency of light to enable us to maintain an effective watch upon the coast, and ensure that the stranger did not creep out from her place of concealment and give us the slip.  The _terral_, or land wind, overpowered by the recent squall, once more resumed its sway and piped up strongly, bringing off to us the warm, fragrant odour of land and vegetation.
At length the day dawned, the sun soared into view above the eastern horizon, and with the coming of the light some half-dozen of the best telescopes in the ship were brought to bear upon the line of coast that lay about five miles distant on our port beam.  I happened to be the lucky possessor of an exceptionally good instrument--a present from my father--and I had not been long at work with it when I discovered what was unmistakably a small indentation in the coast-line, sheltered and all but concealed by two headlands which approached each other so closely that, viewed from a distance, they appeared almost to overlap. I immediately directed the first lieutenant's attention to the spot, at the same time handing him my glass, and he presently picked it up.  He agreed with me that it was undoubtedly a cove, or tiny bay of some sort, but was rather of the opinion that it was too small to afford shelter to a vessel of the dimensions of the missing brigantine.  Nevertheless, since it was the only opening that we could discover, and was, moreover, about the spot where the stranger had disappeared, it was determined to give the place an overhaul, and the helm was accordingly eased down, the yards braced in, and we began to work in toward it.  Then the fighting boats' crews were told off to overhaul the boats and prepare them for service, yard and stay tackles were got aloft for the purpose of hoisting out the launch, the boat-guns were slung all ready for lowering over the side as soon as the boats should be brought alongside, ammunition boxes were brought on deck, and, in short, every preparation was made for a boat expedition; after which all hands were piped to breakfast.
By the time that this meal was finished the frigate had worked in to within about a mile from the shore, at which point she ran into a calm, the land-breeze having died away.  The boats were then got into the water and brought to the gangway, the guns were lowered down and secured to platforms in the bows of the launch and the two cutters, shot was passed down and stowed on the bottom-boards on either side of the keel, the ammunition boxes were stowed in the stern-sheets, and then, all else being ready, those who were to take part in the expedition were mustered for inspection prior to being dispatched on what was likely enough to prove a dangerous errand.  But little recked any of us of possible danger; on the contrary, if an onlooker had judged only by the satisfied smirk which our countenances wore, it might have been supposed that we were all bound ashore for a day's holiday in the woods.
The expedition was to be under the command of Mr Gadsby, the second lieutenant, who would go in the launch; the first cutter was to be commanded by Mr O'Donnel, the boatswain, and the command of the second cutter was entrusted to me.  We mustered fifty altogether, including marines; and when at length, after having been carefully inspected by the first lieutenant, we were given the word to shove off, the men who were left behind sprang into the rigging and sped us on our way with a hearty cheer.
We took it very easily as we pulled shoreward, in line abreast, for it was by this time scorching hot, and it was important that the men's strength should be husbanded to the utmost extent, in view of the possible fight that might be awaiting us at the end of our journey; but I kept a sharp lookout ahead, for, although the country in sight showed no sign of habitations, there was no knowing how soon a masked battery on one, or perhaps each, of the headlands might declare itself by dropping a few shot among us.  Nothing, however, happened to hinder our progress over the glass-smooth surface of the water, and in the course of about twenty minutes we reached the opening between the two headlands, and found ourselves in the mouth of a small, practically land-locked cove of some twenty acres in area, with our friend the brigantine in the very centre of it, with four anchors down--two ahead and two astern--with boarding nettings triced up, ports open, guns run out--eight long 12-pounders in each battery--and her starboard broadside bearing full upon the entrance!
"There she is!" exclaimed a dozen eager voices in chorus; and, while the words were still upon our lips, eight jets of flame burst from her side, followed by eight wreaths of whirling white smoke that instantly commingled, forming a curtain that completely hid her long low black hull from us, and as a shower of grape came hurtling about our ears I saw a big black flag go slowly soaring up to her main truck!
"A self-confessed pirate, by the Piper!" exclaimed Fred Gascoigne, who had calmly crawled out from under the bow-sheets of my boat when we were half-way between the frigate and the shore.  "Now--"
"Give way, men!" shouted Gadsby, springing to his feet in the stern-sheets of the launch, and waving his sword above his head.  "Give way, and get alongside before they can fire again.  Gunners, fire slap at his bulwarks, and we'll board in the smoke.  Marines, fire in through the open ports.  Hurrah, lads, put your backs into it!"
At that moment, as the smoke of the brigantine's broadside thinned away and permitted us again to catch a glimpse of her hull, I noticed a peculiarity about the craft that seemed to offer us a very important advantage; her captain had, in fact, committed the same oversight as the Frenchman in Pleher Bay, and I instantly hailed:
"Launch ahoy!  Do you notice, Mr Gadsby, that she has no nettings triced up on her port side?  Apparently they are making certain that we intend to go alongside on her starboard side, and--"
"By Jove!  Yes, you are right, Delamere," answered Gadsby.  "We will board her on the port side.  First cutter on the port quarter; second cutter on her port bow.  Keep up your fire, marines.  Now, gunners, as soon as you are ready, blaze away!"
The three boat-guns spoke at almost the same instant, and so close were we now to our quarry that our grape-shot literally tore her starboard bulwarks to pieces, and a terrific outburst of shrieks and yells that instantly followed upon the discharge bore eloquent evidence to the terrible havoc that it had wrought among her crew.  The moment that we had fired the boats separated, the first cutter making a wide sweep to port in order to pass under the brigantine's counter, while we sheered away to starboard to get under her bows, the launch passing outside of us in order to get a fair run for the brigantine's waist.
Another minute and we were all alongside and hooked on, and then began a most terrific struggle; for the brigantine seemed crowded with men.  We had evidently taken them all a little by surprise, by boarding on her inshore side instead of that side which was presented to us upon entering the cove.  It was clear that, like the prize-crew of the Indiaman in Pleher Bay, they had never expected us to think of pulling round under her bows and stern, instead of dashing straight alongside; but of course it was a very easy matter for the pirates to cross the deck from one side to the other as soon as they discovered our intention; and this they did, lining her bulwarks from her head-rails to her taffrail, popping at us with muskets and pistols, thrusting at us with pikes and cutlasses, and hacking at our hands and heads as we endeavoured to climb her side and force our way over her bulwarks and in on deck.  But our lads were not to be daunted by any resistance, however desperate.  As we surged up alongside they dropped their oars, allowing them to slide overboard and tow by the lanyards, and drawing pistol and cutlass, leapt to their feet and, with a wild cheer, sprang on to the boats' gunwales and thence to any foothold that they could find, snapping their pistols in the faces of any who dared to show their heads above the rail; while the marines thrust their bayonets through the open ports into the legs of any individual who happened to be within their reach, thus disconcerting the aim of many an otherwise deadly stroke. For a few breathless seconds all was fire, smoke, and fury, pistols cracking, steel rasping upon steel, cheers, execrations, groans, the dull crunching sound of cutlasses sheering through muscle and bone, the heavy fall of the stricken on deck, the scuffling of feet, and shouts of defiance exchanged between the contending parties; then a few of us contrived to get in on deck, forcing back the pirates and making room for those who followed us, until all who were not too severely hurt to climb the ship's side were inboard.  There ensued a deadly hand-to-hand fight in which quarter was neither asked for nor given.  The pirates seemed to number about three times as many as ourselves, and were a truly desperate set of ruffians, fighting--as they well knew--with halters round their necks, and doubtless preferring to die in the heat of battle rather than perish ignominiously upon the scaffold.
For a few minutes we had all our work cut out to retain the slight advantage that we had gained.  But gradually our lads drove their antagonists back until the latter were all grouped together in a dense mass round the mainmast, with our people hemming them in on every side and pressing them into such a compact crowd that at least half of them were unable to strike an effective blow.  They did what they could, however, by hurling their empty pistols into our faces over the heads of their comrades, and I was busily engaged in defending myself from the attack of a herculean negro when one of these heavy missiles struck me, the hammer taking me fairly in the centre of the forehead and so nearly stunning me that for a moment I all but lost consciousness and was completely thrown off my guard.  The next second a terrific blow crashed down upon my bare head--my hat having been lost earlier in the melee-- and I fell to the deck, my last conscious sensation being that I was being trampled upon and by, as it seemed to me, an innumerable crowd of people.  Then I swooned.
When I recovered consciousness I found myself in my hammock, in the sick-bay aboard the frigate, with a number of companions in misfortune around me.  At first I felt too utterly miserable to take much interest in anything, for my head, swathed in bandages, was aching and smarting so consumedly that for the first quarter of an hour or so I could not bear even the subdued light that entered through the open ports, and was obliged to keep my eyes closed; moreover, I was parched and burnt-up with fever, as weak as a cat, and consumed with an intolerable thirst. I attempted to turn in my hammock, but was unable to do so, and as I still struggled one of the sick-bay attendants came to my side and asked if he could do anything for me.  I gasped out something to the effect that I was perishing of thirst, whereupon he brought me a pannikin of tepid water, dipped from a bucket that stood near one of the open ports, and, raising me in my hammock, placed it to my lips.  Tepid and insipid as it actually was, I thought I had never tasted anything half so delicious, and I not only drained it to the last drop, but asked for more.  This, however, he declined to give me without the surgeon's direct permission, having, as he explained to me, been warned that when I awoke I should probably be suffering severely from thirst, but that I was only to be given a very limited quantity of liquid at the outset and until the surgeon had had an opportunity to examine further into my condition.  The man, however, reported the fact of my return to consciousness; and shortly afterward Wilson, the surgeon, came down to see me.
Wilson's "bedside manner" was somewhat bluff, but, nevertheless, judicious; for I had once heard him say, in a confidential moment, that he always, upon principle, made light of his patients' aches and ailments, as he had discovered, by long experience, that this had a good effect upon the invalids, causing them to believe that there was never anything very seriously wrong with them, and thus calling in the aid of their imagination to assist in the curative process.  This was illustrated in his behaviour toward me upon the occasion of which I am now speaking.  He came and stood by the side of my hammock, looking down upon me with a whimsical expression as he took my wrist in his hand and pressed his fingers lightly upon my pulse.
"Put out your tongue," he ordered abruptly, and I did so obediently.  He glanced at it for a few seconds, then remarked:
"Humph! not much the matter with you, I see.  How d'ye feel?"
I explained that my head was giving me excruciating pain, and that I felt burnt-up with fever and thirst; at which he laughed.
"Pooh! pooh!" he exclaimed, "that's nothing.  Thank your lucky stars that you have got off so lightly as you have.  Some of the poor fellows here have lost a limb or two, while others of the boarding party have lost the number of their mess altogether.  Yours is simply a broken head; and, since your skull appears to be abnormally thick, I daresay it will very soon mend again.  Aches badly, does it?  Ah, well, that is an excellent sign; but perhaps you had better remain on the sick list for a few days, and keep to your hammock until the pain passes off--no good going on duty while you are blind with headache, you know.  And--yes, now that I am here and you are awake I may as well look at your wound again."
He walked over to the screen, put his head round the end of it, and called sharply:
"Sentry, pass the word for Mr Burroughs to come to me; and ask him to bring a basin of hot water, a sponge, a roll of bandage, and anything else he thinks I am likely to want.  Tell him that I am going to dress Mr Delamere's head."
Then, returning to my side, he drew out his penknife and with quick, gentle fingers proceeded to cut away a number of stitches that kept the bandage in place, and when at length he had unwound it he flung it deftly away behind him, though not so deftly but that I caught a glimpse of it out of the corner of my eye and saw that it was drenched with blood.  By the time that he had removed the bandage, gently clipping away, with a pair of scissors, the hair that stuck to it here and there, Burroughs, the assistant surgeon, had turned up with hot water and a number of odds and ends, and Wilson took the sponge in his hand, saying:
"Now, I shall probably hurt you a little; but don't yell, if you can help it, because if you do you will disturb the poor fellows around you. So set your teeth and, if you feel anything, just grin and bear it.  I will be as gentle as I can."
And he was gentle--no man could have been more so; nevertheless, during the next quarter of an hour he inflicted so much agony upon me as he extracted little splinters of bone with his forceps, and so on, that long before he had finished I was drenched with perspiration, and felt so sick that I finally swooned again; and he completed his operation upon my senseless body.
That night, I afterward learned, I passed in a state of high delirium, and for several days I had only a very vague idea of where I was and what was happening around me; my predominating sensations being that the top of my head was on fire and blazing furiously, while I was consumed by fever and a thirst that was almost as exquisite a torture as the pain of my head.  The only radical difference between the two was that when I was permitted to quench my thirst that particular form of torture was alleviated for a few brief seconds, while the other was continuous and distracting almost to the point of being unendurable.  It seemed to me that I lay for an age in that suffocating sick-bay, every moment of the time being heavy with indescribable torment; but as a matter of fact I was there little more than forty-eight hours, the skipper cracking on for Jamaica, in order that several bad cases--of which I was one of the worst--might have the advantage of the lofty, airy wards of the naval hospital at Port Royal, where we arrived on the morning but one after our attack upon the pirate brigantine.  I may as well complete the story of that adventure by saying--what I only learned afterward--that we captured the vessel, with a loss to ourselves of five killed, and eighteen wounded, of whom seven--including myself--were so badly hurt that Wilson gravely doubted whether we should ever pull round.  As for the pirates, out of a crew of one hundred and twenty-six men, twenty-three were found dead on her deck after we had taken her, and fifty-four were wounded, some of them so desperately that no less than eleven of them died before we anchored in Port Royal harbour.  The remainder were in due course brought to trial for piracy, and found guilty.  Five of them were hanged at Gallows Point, while the rest were condemned to work on the roads in chains for the remainder of their miserable lives.
CHAPTER TEN.
ASHORE--INVALIDED.
I have a hazy recollection of suddenly finding myself on deck, still in my hammock; and then, a few minutes later, of being in a boat.  Finally, when I next came to myself I discovered that I was no longer in my hammock, but in a bed--a delightful spacious comfortable bed in which there was room for one to stretch oneself, change from one side to the other, and otherwise obtain a little temporary relief when lying long in one posture had become wearisome.  Then, instead of being enveloped in stiflingly hot blankets, I lay upon one fragrant, cool, snow-white sheet, with another over me, the bed enclosed by mosquito-netting, and a deliciously cool breeze streaming into the long ward through several wide-open, lofty windows, one of which, immediately opposite the foot of my bed, afforded me an excellent view of a considerable portion of Port Royal harbour, with the Apostles' Battery, crouching at the foot of the Salt Pond Hills, almost immediately opposite, on the other side of the water.  One of the hospital orderlies, who was on duty in the ward, came to the side of my bed at once upon finding that I was awake, and gave me a long, satisfying draught of lemonade, cool and exquisitely refreshing, after which I think he must have summoned the doctor to me, for a few minutes later that individual came lightly to the side of my bed, thrust his hand beneath the sheet and felt my pulse.
I afterward learned that this was Dr Loder, chief of the medical staff in the Port Royal Naval Hospital.  And oh! what a difference there was between him and Wilson, the _Europa's_ surgeon.  The latter was bluff, hearty, and slightly inclined to be boisterous in manner; while Dr Loder's every word and every movement, nay his whole appearance, suggested peace, quietness, and perfect restfulness, as well as--by some subtlety of manner--a vague but none the less distinct impression that things were going well with one.  He was a tall and rather thin man, with dark-brown hair, beard, and moustache; he was bald on the top of his head, and wore gold-rimmed spectacles through which his fine dark eyes beamed down upon his patients with an expression of sympathy that was in itself as good as a tonic.  He asked me a few questions in a quiet, almost caressing tone of voice, gave the orderly who had me in charge certain instructions, and then, patting me gently upon the shoulder, assured me that I should soon be all right again, in a tone of voice that, quiet as it was, somehow seemed to carry absolute conviction with it.
As a matter of fact I really did begin to mend practically from that moment--so rapidly indeed that on the twenty-third day after my admission the wound in my head had so far healed that the bandages were discarded--and three weeks later I was discharged into the guardship cured, the _Europa_ having gone to sea again some time before.
But the guardship was no place for me, weak and shaken as I then was by my long and serious spell of illness; and although the Admiral might well, in the press of daily affairs, have been excused had he forgotten so unimportant a detail as the state of my health, he did not; on the contrary, he invited me to spend a week at the Pen, to recuperate, during which his wife, Lady Agnes, was a second mother to me and a hospital nurse combined.  From that moment there was no lack of invitations for me to go into the country and regain my strength, my former acquaintances one and all hunting me up and reminding me of several almost forgotten promises that I would visit them.
As the frigate was not expected to return to Port Royal for at least two months, and as, although discharged from the hospital, I was as yet by no means fit for duty, I had not the slightest difficulty in obtaining a month's leave, which I spent most enjoyably with friends whose estates were situated in Saint Thomas-in-the-East and on the northern slopes of the Blue Mountain Range.  It is no part of my purpose to enter into a detailed description of life on a Jamaican sugar plantation, nor will I attempt to convey to the reader any definite idea of the Jamaicans' hospitality.  Let it suffice to say that I never spent a happier month anywhere, and that the planters, with all their jollity, light-heartedness, and love of fun, were the most genial, kindly, hospitable folk I ever met with, each of them vieing with all the rest in an amicable contest who should show me the most kindness and attention.  I went among them an almost total stranger; when I left, I felt as though I were parting with as many brothers and sisters.
Upon reporting myself to the Admiral, at his office, he received me very kindly, asked whether I felt fit to return to duty--to which I replied with a most emphatic Yes--informed me that the _Europa_ was not expected for another month at least; then invited me to dine with him that evening at the Pen, and spend the night there.
His table was, as usual, well filled with guests, but they were all civilians, excepting some three or four military officers over from Up Park Camp.  The navy was entirely unrepresented, save by myself, the reason being, as I soon learned, that the French, Dutch, and Spanish were all exceedingly active in and about the Caribbean, and there were not enough of our own ships to cope with them; consequently every available craft of any sort flying the British pennant had been sent to sea, and was being kept there.
At length, when all the guests had left the Pen, and Lady Agnes had retired for the night, Sir Peter invited me to accompany him to the broad gallery, covered by a veranda, which stretched right athwart the front of the house, from end to end, and directed one of his negro servants to carry out to it a small table, a box of cigars, a jug of sangaree, and two wicker basket-chairs wherein we seated ourselves preparatory, as I surmised, to a more or less confidential chat of some sort, though what, of such a nature, so important a personage as the Port Admiral could possibly have to say to an insignificant mid like myself, I could not divine.
Sir Peter, however, was not the sort of man to beat about the bush; if he had anything to say he generally said it without any circumlocution, and he did so now.  Selecting with care a cigar for himself, lighting it, and pouring out a couple of tumblers of sangaree, he settled himself in his chair, and began by remarking:
"Well, young gentleman, so you have quite recovered from the effects of your wound, eh?--and feel fit and ready for duty once more?"
"Yes, to both questions, Sir Peter," I answered.  "But I think I understood you to say that the _Europa_ is not expected to return to Port Royal for at least another month--"
"So I did," interrupted the Admiral; "and the question is, What are you going to do with yourself meanwhile?  This is no time for an officer to idle about ashore, you know."
"No, sir," I responded, "it certainly is not, and I am exceedingly glad that you have broached the subject, for it affords me an early opportunity to do what I have had it in my mind to do, namely, to ask you whether you cannot find me some better employment than kicking my heels aboard the guardship until the frigate returns."
"Ah!" commented Sir Peter, "so that was what you had in your mind, was it?  Have you served your time yet?"
"Yes, sir," I replied, "with nearly three months to spare."
"Good!" remarked my companion.  "But of course you have not passed yet? You have not had an opportunity.  Have you your log-books with you?"
"Yes, sir," I answered.  "When I was sent ashore to the hospital, Captain Vavassour was good enough to send with me all my belongings."
"Where are they--the log-books, I mean--now?" demanded Sir Peter.
"They are aboard the guardship, with the rest of my things," I answered.
"Very well," returned my companion.  "You had better go down to Port Royal with me in the morning, and bring your log-books ashore for me to look at.  I have a scheme in my head for employing you, but I am not at all sure whether you are fit to undertake a duty of so exceedingly responsible a character as that which I have in my mind; although I don't hesitate to tell you, youngster, that Captain Vavassour gave you a most excellent character in every respect.  What sort of a navigator are you?  I suppose, like most other young gentlemen, you can fudge a day's work well enough to pass muster, eh?"
I laughed.  "I am afraid, sir," I replied, "that too many of us would rather fudge than take the trouble to do our day's work properly.  But I got out of that lazy trick some time ago; and now I will not turn my back upon any lad of my own age, whether midshipman, or master's-mate, where navigation is concerned."
"Ah!" he remarked, "that sounds all right.  Tell me, what can you do in navigation problems?"
"I can do Plane, Traverse, Middle-Latitude, and Mercator's Sailing," I answered.  "I can also do a Day's Work; I can use my quadrant with accuracy; can find the Latitude by a meridian altitude of the sun, moon, or a star; can find the error and rate of the chronometer, and also the longitude by it; can determine the variation of the compass; can find the longitude by a `lunar'; can do the Pole Star problem; and--well, I think that is about all, sir, thus far."
"And a very creditable `all,' too," answered the Admiral, evidently well pleased.  "And what about your seamanship?" he continued.
"I believe I am pretty good at that too, sir," I said.  "I was at Portsmouth, in the dockyard, every day during the fitting-out of the frigate, and watched the whole process of rigging her.  When I first saw her she had nothing standing but her three lower-masts."
"Well," remarked Sir Peter, "you ought to have picked up a little knowledge relative to the spars and rigging of a ship during that time. But _did_ you?  That is the question.  Come, I'll put you through your facings a bit, if you are not too sleepy.  Supposing that it became necessary for you to get the maintop over the masthead, how would you go to work?"
I considered a moment, recalled the operation as I had witnessed it, and then proceeded to describe what I had seen.
"Yes; very good," commented my companion.  "Now, get your lower rigging into place, and set it up."
I described how I would do that; and also answered several other questions, apparently to his satisfaction.
"Very well," he said, "that's all rigger's work; exceedingly important to know, of course, but still not exactly seamanship.  Now, young gentleman, suppose yourself to be in command of a fine frigate--as I hope you will be some day, please God.  You are turning to windward in a fresh breeze, under all plain sail, and it becomes necessary to tack. Describe the various evolutions."
I did so; and then the old gentleman gradually took me, still aboard my suppositious frigate, through a rapidly freshening breeze into a regular hurricane, until I had got the ship hove-to under bare poles, with a tarpaulin lashed in the weather mizen rigging, and then he shook hands with me and dismissed me to my room.
The next morning, immediately after first breakfast, we got under way in the Admiral's ketureen--a sort of gig with a roof to it--and drove down to the wharf at Kingston, where the barge, a fine boat, was waiting for us.  The sea-breeze had set in and was piping up merrily, and in about three-quarters of an hour we were alongside the dockyard wall at Port Royal.  Here the Admiral left me, with instructions to go off aboard the guardship at once, and bring my log-books ashore for his inspection. This I did, but it was nearly noon before Sir Peter was ready to attend to me, and even then it was after all but a cursory glance that he bestowed upon my books.  But, cursory though it was, what he saw appeared to satisfy him, for he was good enough to express his approval as he closed the books and pushed them across the table to me.
"Very good, very good indeed," he remarked; "far more creditable than mine were when I was your age, I am afraid.  I consider you a most promising young officer, and am going to take you under my wing, because I believe you will do me credit.  Nay, boy, I want no thanks,"--as I broke in somewhat incoherently in an attempt to express my gratitude--"at least, not in the form of words," he continued; "words are often spoken under the influence of a strong momentary impulse, and forgotten almost immediately afterward.  But if you should desire to show that you are grateful to me for what I intend to do for you, you cannot exhibit it more acceptably than by justifying the very great trust that I am about to repose in you.  And I believe you will, for, young as you are, you have proved yourself to be made of the right stuff; you have made good use of your time, and have as much knowledge in that curly pate of yours as many officers of twice your length of service possess.  Now, I am not telling you this because I want to make you conceited--far from it; it is simply because I want you to understand that I have formed a very high opinion of you, and that I expect you to live up to it.  D'ye understand that, youngster?"
"Quite clearly, Sir Peter," I answered.  "It is exceedingly kind, and most encouraging on your part that you have spoken so frankly as you have, and I can assure you that I am not in the least likely to entertain an unduly high opinion of myself in consequence of it.  On the contrary, I am afraid that you have formed altogether too favourable an opinion of me and my qualities; but I shall remember that opinion, and will do my utmost to justify it."
"Very well," he answered; "no man can say more than that, and if you fulfil your promise I shall be perfectly satisfied.  And now, as to the work upon which I propose to employ you.  You must know that there is more work--a good deal more work--to be done on this station than there are ships to do it; consequently, although every ship at my disposal is now at sea, I am continually receiving complaints that the commerce in West Indian waters is inadequately protected.  I have applied for additional ships, but have been told that there are none to spare, and that I must do the best I can with what I have.  The fact is that the Caribbean and its approaches are not only swarming with privateers, but I have too much reason to believe that there is a strong gang of out-and-out pirates at work as well.  I was in hopes that the capture of that pirate brigantine by the _Europa_ would put an end to all that kind of work, but it has not; indeed, it has scarcely made any appreciable impression upon the number of outrages of a distinctly piratical character that are being constantly reported to me.  I am, of course, not now alluding to vessels that have gone temporarily missing, for they may in most cases be traced to the operations of the enemy; but I refer to those which vanish utterly, leaving no trace of any kind behind them to hint at their fate; and also to those other craft which are fallen in with, derelict, from time to time, plundered, and bearing indications that an attempt has been made to destroy them, either by scuttling them, or setting them on fire.  Privateers don't do that sort of thing, you know.  If they capture a ship they generally put a prize-crew aboard her and send her into the nearest port belonging to them.  Pirates, however, endeavour to escape identification by destroying all traces of their handiwork and butchering the unfortunate crews of the vessels.
"A case of this kind came to light only last week.  The _Kingston Trader_ of Bristol, with a very valuable cargo and five thousand pounds in specie, has been overdue about a month, and her consignees have been worrying me accordingly.  Last Friday a small turtling schooner arrived from the Windward Passages, reporting that they had seen a wreck ashore near Tete de Chien on the island of Tortuga, off the north-west coast of Saint Domingo.  They launched their pirogue, and succeeded in getting close enough to the wreck to identify her as the missing _Kingston Trader_, and also to ascertain that she had been on fire, most of her upper works having been consumed.  That is the third case of an almost identical kind that has occurred within the last two months, and I am convinced that it is the work of pirates.
"Now, young gentleman, I am going to give you the job of finding those pirates and bringing them to book.  It is work for a _man_, I know, but I have not a man to spare; and I am convinced, from the way in which you answered my questions last night, and from the character which Captain Vavassour has given you, not only that you are a very capable young officer, but also that you have your full share of sound common sense and self-reliance--that you are, in fact, quite as likely to give a good account of yourself over this business as would many a much older man.
"Therefore, since you are certain to pass with flying colours as soon as an opportunity to present yourself for examination offers itself, I intend to give you an acting order as lieutenant, to place you in command of a small schooner with a good strong crew, and to send you off upon a roving commission to do your best to put down these piratical outrages that are so frequently occurring under our very noses.  Now, what d'ye think of my scheme, youngster?  Is the job too big for you to tackle?"
"No, sir," I answered; "certainly not too big.  The only thing I fear is that I may not be sufficiently experienced to execute so responsible a duty as efficiently as it ought to be executed.  But I will do my very utmost, Sir Peter, I can promise you that; and if I can only have with me one or two thoroughly steady, reliable men to help me with an occasional word of advice, I believe we shall be able to give a very good account of ourselves."
"Yes," returned Sir Peter, "I believe so too, otherwise I would not dream of sending you.  As to experience, well, there is only one way of gaining it, and that is by actually doing a thing; it is rather a rough school, perhaps, but it is the only one in which you can thoroughly learn your lesson, and I am glad to see that you have no idea of shirking it.
"And now, as to this seventy-four of yours.  She is a fore-and-aft schooner of one hundred and ten tons, said to have been built at Baltimore.  She is something of a freak, her designer having apparently turned his lines end for end and put his bows where his stern should be, and _vice versa_.  Nevertheless, his theory seems to have been sound, for I'm told that she is a perfect witch for speed, especially in light weather, and speed is one of the qualities which you must have.  She was caught smuggling, and was condemned to be sawn in two; but I thought we might perhaps be able to find a better use for her than that, so I have postponed the operation.  She is called the _Wasp_, and if you have as much enterprise as I give you credit for, you ought to make her sting to some purpose.  You will find her in Hulk Hole, and--Stop a minute."  He rang a bell and a messenger entered.
"Jones," said Sir Peter, "have you any idea where the master-attendant is?"
"Yes, sir," answered the man, "he was outside on the wharf not half a minute ago."
"Then, please, see if you can find him," said the Admiral, "and request him to come here to me.  Carline is a very decent fellow," he continued, as soon as the messenger had vanished.  "I'll get him to take you aboard and show you the craft--he has the keys of the companion and fore-scuttle, I believe--and you and he can talk matters over together and decide what she will need to fit her for service.  Ah! here is Carline.  Good morning, Mr Carline.  This is Mr Delamere, whom I am going to send out in charge of the _Wasp_, to see what he can do toward putting a stop to these repeated piracies.  I want you to take him aboard and let him have a thorough good look at the schooner; after which you and he can draw up a list of what is needed to render her fit for the work which she will have to do.  And now, good morning, Mr Delamere.  Come up to the Pen to dinner to-night; then you can report to me what you think the craft requires."
"So the Admiral's going to fit out that smugglin' schooner and send you to sea in her, eh?" remarked the master-attendant as soon as we got outside.
I replied that I quite understood that to be Sir Peter's intention.
"Oh, well," he observed, "I don't know how you'll get on with her; she's a queer one to look at, and I expect she'll want some learnin' before you'll be able to handle her properly.  Have you had any experience in a fore-and-after?"
"Only in boats," I replied.  "The barge of my old ship, the _Colossus_, was rigged as a fore-and-aft schooner, and I've sailed her many's the time; and I suppose all fore-and-afters are handled in pretty much the same way.  The matter of mere size won't make very much difference, I imagine."
"Well, I expect you'll find the _Wasp_ a bit different," observed my companion; "she's such a queer model, you see--everything about her is exactly the opposite of what we think it should be.  She has tremendous beam, and no draught of water worth speakin' of; an outrageously long tapering bow, and a short, squat stern--But there, you'll see her presently.  But there's no doubt about it, she can sail--there's nothing in this harbour that can look at her; and as for working, why, I've been told that she has been known to be round and full on the other tack twenty seconds after puttin' the helm down!"
"Well, that is good news at all events," I remarked.  "I like a nice, smart-working ship--Why, Henderson, where in the world did you spring from? and how is it that you are not away in the frigate?"  I exclaimed, as we encountered a figure that was perfectly familiar to me.
"For the same reason as yourself, Mr Delamere," answered the man, touching his hat.  "I was on my beam-ends in the hospital when she went to sea--bowled over in the scrimmage wi' that brigantine, same as you was."
"And where are you, and what doing now?"  I demanded.
"Why, sir, I'm aboard the guardship, along wi' another or two of our chaps as was discharged from the hospital about the same time as I was," answered the man--formerly one of the _Europa's_ quartermasters.
"Oh, indeed," I replied, very much surprised, for I had not known that there were others as well as myself put ashore from the frigate; "and are you all ready for duty again?"  I asked.
"Ay, that we are, sir," answered Henderson, "and shall be glad enough to get to sea and have a mouthful of fresh air once more.  This bein' in harbour is all very well for a change, but a man soon gets enough of it; and, a'ter all, it ain't half so comfortable as bein' at sea."
"Then in that case," said I, seeing my way to getting one good hand, at least, "perhaps you may be willing to volunteer for a little schooner that the Admiral is going to give me to go pirate-hunting in?"
"Ay, that indeed I will, Mr Delamere, and glad of the chance," answered Henderson heartily; "and perhaps, sir," he added, "I could help you to two or three more good men, if so be as you happen to want 'em."
"Well, I think it more than likely that I shall," said I, "so just keep your eyes open in that direction.  I shall no doubt see you again to-morrow or next day, when we can have a further chat."
Henderson touched his hat and turned away, and the master-attendant and I made our way along the wharf to the landing-steps.  Here he directed four men to jump down into his gig and spread the cushions in the stern-sheets, while he went into his office to procure the keys which were to afford us access to the interior of my "seventy-four," as the Admiral had jestingly called her.  Then, descending the steps and taking our places in the gig, Carline seized the yoke-lines, gave the word to shove off, and away we went, across the upper end of the harbour and through the boat channel, past Gallows Point, whereon stood the stout posts and beam from which the five ringleaders of the pirates taken aboard the brigantine had been launched into eternity.
CHAPTER ELEVEN.
H.M.S. WASP.
We sighted the _Wasp_ immediately upon rounding Gallows Point.  She was lying quite by herself, down in the most southerly bight of the Hole, and little more than a cable's length from the beach; consequently we had a clear, uninterrupted view of her the moment that we cleared the Point; and she was lying broadside-on to us, with her head pointing to the southward.
The first thing that impressed me about her was her diminutiveness; in comparison with some of the craft lying in the Hole she looked little more than a mere boat, and the idea of actually going to sea and attempting serious work in such a cockle-shell struck me as little short of an absurdity.  But that feeling wore off a bit as we closed with her; and the next thing to attract my attention was the great beauty of her outline.  She sat very low upon the water; had an abnormally long, overhanging counter; and her spring, or sheer, was so great that, low as she sat, her bow stood high and dominant above the water.  She was painted black from her rail to her copper, the top edge of which was about six inches above her load-line; and she had only her two lower-masts and her bowsprit standing.  But her masts were magnificent sticks, lofty enough, apparently, to spread all the canvas that she could possibly carry, without any need of topmasts, and both spars were stepped well forward; the mainmast, indeed, seemed to be almost amidships, giving one a very clear idea of the enormous area which her mainsail would present when fully set.  It was not, however, until we got close to her, and Carline caused his boatmen to pull slowly round her, that I detected what the Admiral and the master-attendant meant when they had spoken of the freakish peculiarities of her model; then, indeed, it became apparent that her designer had, as Sir Peter had said, literally turned her lines end for end, as it were.  For she had absolutely no "straight of breadth" at all; her sides were as round as an apple, and her long bow, shaped like a wedge with curved instead of straight sides, with just a suggestion of hollowness of the water-line as it approached the stem, started almost as far aft as the point where her mainmast was stepped; while her run, instead of fining away toward the stern-post like the tail of a fish, was quite full, sweeping round under her counter in a semicircle.  Then it was that I understood why her counter was so abnormally long; it was not merely a fancy on the part of her designer, intended to give her a smart, rakish appearance, it was for the purpose of giving her, despite the fulness of her run, a clean, easy delivery.  Yes, as I looked at her critically, studying her lines from every possible point of view, I could believe that she would prove a quite extraordinary sailer; for there was nothing in that long, keen bow for the water to grip, the knifelike stem would sheer into it, and the gently expanding sides would shoulder it aside with scarcely any resistance, leaving it to close in again aft about her stern-post with a nip that would add to her speed, just as one may make a nut spring from one's fingers by merely pressing upon it.  And she would be a good sea-boat, too, for the bow flared out over the water in such a fashion as to lift her over any sea, however steep.  Yes, I liked the outside look of her amazingly, and no longer thought the idea of going to sea in such a craft mere folly; on the contrary, I longed for the moment when I should have the opportunity to test her capabilities.
Having scrutinised the exterior of my new command to my heart's content, we went alongside and boarded her.  Her gangway was open; and so little freeboard did she show at this point--Carline measured it and found it to be exactly four-feet--that we were able to spring from the boat's gunwale to the schooner's deck without difficulty, and without the need for a side-ladder.  I had by this time quite forgotten my first impression of diminutiveness in connection with the craft, and the moment that I passed through the gangway and stood upon her deck I gained a new impression, namely that of spaciousness.  For she was extraordinarily beamy; her hatchways were small, and there was nothing in the way of fittings of any kind to cumber up her decks; indeed, so far as actual room to move about upon was concerned, her quarter-deck seemed to be quite as spacious as that of the _Europa_.  She was flush-decked fore and aft, and abaft the immensely lofty mainmast there was nothing but the companion, with a seat and lockers on either side of it, a fine big skylight, a very handsome brass binnacle, and the wheel. Her bulwarks were only three feet high, with a fine, solid teak rail; and she was built of hard wood--oak and elm--throughout, and copper fastened.
Carline having unlocked the companion doors, we went below, and found ourselves in a really beautiful little cabin, elegantly fitted up, painted white and gold, well lighted and ventilated from above by the big skylight, and with three large, circular ports on each side as well. There were nice wide, comfortable lockers on each side, running fore and aft, and a fine, solid, handsomely carved mahogany table in the centre; but the cabin looked bare, for all the fittings of every kind had been removed and put into store.  Then, abaft the main cabin, there was a small but exceedingly comfortable-looking stateroom, with standing bedplace, drawers beneath, wash-stand, etcetera, and lighted by two circular ports, one at the head and one at the foot of the bedplace, which ran athwartships.
From the cabin we passed into the main hold; and I saw at once that this could easily be fitted up and converted into a berth-deck for all hands by merely running a few deck beams across, laying a deck, and running up a bulkhead.  We spent the whole morning aboard, making voluminous notes of the various alterations that would be needed to fit the little vessel for the new service to which she was destined; and that same afternoon she was unmoored, taken alongside the wharf, and a strong gang of dockyard workmen went aboard to begin upon the most obviously necessary work, such as taking out her ballast prior to giving her interior a thorough cleaning, and so on.
That night, at the Pen, after the guests had all left, Sir Peter called upon me to give an account of my day's doings, to tell him what I thought of the _Wasp_, and to produce and read my list of alterations needed to complete the equipment of the schooner.  Of all of these he graciously approved, adding a few suggestions of his own; and on the following morning, after going on board the hooker with me and examining her inside and out, he gave orders for the whole of the work to be proceeded with forthwith.  As there were no other ships in port refitting at the moment, it was a slack time at the dockyard, and almost the whole of its resources were available to expedite the work, in consequence of which the schooner was ready for sea a fortnight from the day on which I first boarded her.
Meanwhile, the Admiral had made out and presented to me my acting order; while, for my own part, I had been busy all day and every day, either at the dockyard, superintending the work being done to the _Wasp_, or in hunting up a crew for her.  And as I attached very considerable importance to the quality of my crew, and was quite determined to have the very best I could obtain, a large proportion of my time was spent in hunting for good men.  Here it was that I found the services of Henderson, late quartermaster of the _Europa_, of especial value, for not only did he enter for the schooner, as he had promised he would when I ran up against him as I was on my way to pay my first visit to the _Wasp_, but, being equally as anxious as myself to have the little vessel well manned, he had persuaded four good men--like himself formerly of the _Europa_, wounded in our fight with the brigantine and now convalescent--to join, thus forming at a stroke the nucleus of a first-rate crew.  But he had done a good deal more than this; for in addition to the four men above referred to there were aboard the guardship about a dozen others recently discharged from the hospital and only requiring a few days of pure ocean air to set them on their pins again, and he had persuaded these also to enter.  Even this, however, did not complete my obligations to the guardship, for there were aboard her three midshipmen, an assistant surgeon, and a captain's clerk, all of whom had been separated from their ships from some chance cause, and I secured them all; the eldest of the midshipmen--named Willoughby--as master, while the other two, very quiet, respectable lads, named respectively Dundas and Hinton, I took more for their health's sake than for any other reason.  The assistant surgeon was named Saunders--him I shipped as surgeon--while Millar, the captain's clerk, came with me as purser; I obtained a gunner's warrant for Henderson, to his great delight; and my remaining officers consisted of a fine, smart boatswain's mate, named Pearce, who came as boatswain, and a carpenter's mate named Mills, who came as carpenter.  In addition to these, I had a cabin steward, a cook, and a crew of forty-four men and four boys; I therefore regarded myself as excellently equipped, so far as my crew were concerned.  Unfortunately, the schooner was too small to carry an armament to which such a fine crew could do full justice, the utmost that she would carry, with anything like safety, being six long expounders; and even with the weight of these on her deck she seemed to be just a trifle more tender than I altogether liked.  It was, however, the best that we could do with her, and with that I had to be content.
Having reported the schooner as ready for sea, and received my orders from the Admiral, we slipped from Number 9 buoy on a certain morning, immediately after breakfast, and proceeded to work out to sea, under single-reefed mainsail, foresail, fore staysail, and Number 2 jib, in the teeth of a fiery sea-breeze that made the palms at Port Royal Point assume the aspect of so many umbrellas turned inside-out, and whirled the sand up from the Palisades in blinding clouds to deposit it again in the harbour and add to the magnitude of the shoal that is steadily encroaching upon the deep-water area.
The little hooker became lively and began to pull at her cable, as though impatient to be off, the moment that the hands tailed on to the throat and peak-halliards of her immense mainsail, and proceeded to hoist away; and when, having set the sail--which, by the way, was beautifully cut, and stood as flat as a board--we slipped, and hauled aft the jib-sheet, she heeled to the pressure of the wind as though preparing to spring, and, with a little swirl of water about her sharp stem as she paid off, proceeded to gather way, and the next moment was sheering through the smooth water of the harbour like a hungry dolphin in pursuit of a shoal of flying-fish.  With all her sheets flattened-in she came-to until she was looking up within three points of the wind, careening to her bearings and sweeping as rapidly and almost as noiselessly as a wreath of mist driving to leeward, the only sound she made being a soft hissing at her cutwater as her sharp bow clove the ripples and ploughed up a glass-like sheet of water on either side of it.  So closely did she hug the wind that we were able to shave close past the red buoy which marks the edge of Church shoal, handsomely weathering Number 2 buoy, skimming across the De Horsey Patch, and shaving past the buoy on the Harbour shoal.  By this time we were out from under the shelter of Port Royal Point, and were beginning to feel the first of the jump that the sea-breeze was kicking up outside; but it appeared to make practically no difference in our speed, our abnormally long, keen, wedge-like bow seemed to cleave the seas without effort or resistance as they came at us, while the flaring overhang lifted the little craft buoyantly over them, with nothing worse than a small playful flash and patter of spray in over the weather cathead to tell of the encounter.  It would be difficult to say whether astonishment or delight was the feeling that predominated in the breasts of all hands of us, fore and aft, as we stood watching the really marvellous performance of the little clipper while beating out of harbour.  It was not her speed only--although that seemed phenomenal, for she swept past every other craft that was going our way as though they had been at anchor; her weatherliness astounded us quite as much as did her speed, for she looked up a good three points higher than did our square-rigged neighbours, while her oil-smooth wake trailed away astern as straight as a ruled line, with no apparent inclination to trend a hairbreadth towards her weather quarter.  She seemed to make no leeway at all!
"Well!" exclaimed Henderson, who was standing by me, close abaft the weather main rigging, watching--as I was--the rapid sliding past us of the various objects ashore, "I've heard people speak of a ship as sailin' like a witch, but I'm only now comin' to rightly understand just exactly what that expression means; it means goin' along precisely as if you was shot out of a gun!  Why, Mr Delamere, I don't believe as there's anything afloat that can touch us--not, at all events, in moderately smooth water.  What we shall do in a heavy sea remains to be seen; and we shall soon find that out, I reckon, for it's all foamin' white away out there in the offing; but I've a notion that she'll go over it all like a duck, provided that we don't drive her too hard. Look at that, sir,"--as the schooner leapt from the crest of a sea into the hollow beyond, and the foam buzzed and boiled to the level of her lee head-rail and then went glancing away dizzily aft--"ain't that just perfectly beautiful?  Never shipped a drop, she didn't!  And there again!  My eyes! but she _is_ a beauty, and no mistake."
"She is certainly behaving wonderfully well," I admitted, my voice all a-quiver with pride.  "How does she steer?  Is she easy on her helm?"  I demanded of the man at the wheel.
"Gripes just the leastest bit in the world, sir, but nothin' worth speakin' about.  I could steer her wi' one hand," answered the man; and to prove his words he placed one hand behind him and kept it there for a minute or two while he grasped a spoke of the wheel with the other.
We had by this time brought the Beacon shoal about one point abaft the weather-beam, and I was of opinion that we could weather it on the next tack; I therefore gave the word, "Ready about--Helm's a-lee!" and directed the helmsman to ease down the helm.  He let go the wheel for a moment, and the little hooker at once came to the wind with her head-sails slatting and threshing as she spilled the wind out of them; then he began to pull the wheel over toward him, and with one terrific dive into a sea that came rushing at her, and which she split into two showers of diamond spray that leapt half as high as her foremast before it came driving aft in a shower that nearly drenched us to the skin, round she swept like a gun upon its pivot, and was full again upon the other tack almost before we could blink our eyelids.  The beauty of a fore-and-after is that she practically works herself, all that is needed being three or four hands on the forecastle to trim over the jib and fore sheets as she comes round.  It was simply child's play compared with the complicated manoeuvres that attend the working of a full-rigged ship, and Henderson laughed aloud in his delight at the simplicity of it.
"Why, Mr Delamere," he declared, "it's like sailin' the _Europa's_ launch, only easier.  The launch never stayed as smartly as that, not so long as I've knowed her!"
We weathered the Beacon shoal, with room to spare, as I expected we should; and then kept away, with slightly eased sheets, for the passage between Gun and Rackum Cays, after negotiating which we shaped a course for Cow Bay and Yallah Points, off the latter of which we arrived shortly after six bells in the forenoon watch had struck.  Still hugging the coast as closely as possible, we arrived off Port Morant about four bells in the afternoon watch, about which time we found the sea-breeze to be merging gradually into the Trade-wind and heading us so badly that at length we were obliged to heave about and head off-shore.  Here we soon got into such a boil of a sea that the little hooker threatened to smother herself, and it became necessary for us to haul down a second and a third reef, and to take the jib off her, after which she went along quite comfortably, shipping nothing worse than an occasional sprinkling of spray over her weather-bow.  At eight bells of the second dog-watch we handsomely weathered Morant Point on our way out through the Windward Channel, it being my purpose to work out through the Caycos Passage, and then cruise to and fro athwart and to windward of the Windward Passages--that being the cruising-ground which I believed the pirates would be most likely to haunt.
Shortly before daybreak, on the third morning after leaving Port Royal, we found ourselves rapidly drawing into smooth water--so rapidly, indeed, that Pearce, the boatswain, whose watch it was, came down in some alarm and roused me out, fearing that Willoughby, the midshipman who was acting as master, had made a mistake in his reckoning, and that we were about to blunder on to some danger or another.  I was able, however, to set the good man's mind at rest by explaining that we were doubtless drawing in under the lee of the Caycos Bank, and that therefore the water might naturally be expected to smoothen. Nevertheless, feeling that I had had a good night's rest, and understanding from Pearce that day would dawn in less than half-an-hour's time, I turned out and, slipping into my trousers and jacket, went up on deck.  And very glad I was that I had done so, for I was thus enabled to observe a very curious natural phenomenon, which one might knock about in those seas for years without seeing, for the simple reason that the circumstances must be favourable or the phenomenon is not visible.
The Caycos Bank is a shoal lying some sixty-eight miles off Monte Christi, on the north coast of Hayti.  It measures about the same distance from its north-western to its south-eastern extremity, and is about sixty-two miles across from east to west at its widest point; it is consequently of considerable extent, and from the fact that the depth of water over it ranges from six feet to eighteen feet it is not without its dangers, and must be approached with due caution, especially during the hours of darkness.  In daylight the danger is not nearly so great, because the north-eastern and north-western edges of the shoal are fringed by a number of cays among which the sea breaks heavily, while the whole surface of the shoal is white water.  And it is this same white water which gives rise to the phenomenon above referred to, locally known as "Bank Blink."  It is simply the reflection of the phosphorescence of the water in the clouds above; and the darker and more overcast the night, the more distinctly is the reflection seen. The phenomenon is, of course, quite natural and easily to be accounted for, yet its occurrence can scarcely be regarded as less than providential; for there can be no doubt whatever that its appearance in the sky has often been the means of warning navigators that they were approaching this danger, and so causing them to haul off in time to avoid shipwreck.
Upon the night in question, when I first saw it, I found, upon going on deck, that the darkness was profound, the sky being so completely obscured by clouds that not so much as a single star was visible.  But away to windward, ranging from about two points on the weather-bow round to square abeam, the clouds from almost overhead to within some fifteen degrees of the horizon were faintly yet quite perceptibly tinged greenish hue, the tinge being strongest about midway between our weather-bow and beam.  Pearce had noticed it, it appeared, when I came to question him about it, and had thought that it might possibly portend a change of weather until he had looked at the barometer and found it inclined to rise; then he had become alarmed by the smoothing of the water, which seemed to him far more portentous than the light on the clouds.
I had not been on deck more than a quarter of an hour when the blackness under the lower edge of the bank blink away over our starboard cathead began to pale, first to a cold slaty-grey, and from that, by rapid gradations, to a rich purple, then to crimson, and from crimson to an orange tint so deep as to be almost scarlet, beneath which the horizon loomed out black as ink, the intervening space of water lightening, as it swept toward us, until at the distance of a couple of miles it became a livid bluish-white.  This marked the western edge of the shoal, and sufficiently accounted for the smoothing of the deep-water in which we were sailing.
As the orange light spread north and south from the point at which it had originated, at the same time reaching upward from the horizon, the bank blink began to fade, or rather to become merged in and overpowered by it; and the shapes of the heavy, lowering clouds that overhung us began to reveal themselves, their lower edges here and there suddenly flushing into hues of the richest yet most delicate rose that rapidly strengthened first into scarlet and then to burning gold as the rays of the yet unrisen sun smote upon them.  Presently, in the midst of the rich orange light that was now flashing up on the eastern and north-eastern horizon, there emerged a shape of indigo, practically flat-topped, but with two small protuberances, one at each end, which, by a stretch of the imagination, might be termed hills, rising to a height of perhaps sixty or seventy feet.  This was the island of West Caycos, the most westerly of the cays on the bank, and ten minutes later we were under its lee and within less than a cable's length from the beach.
But what a change had taken place in the aspect of sea and sky during those ten minutes!  As we stood, spellbound, watching the gorgeous changes of colour that were taking place along the eastern horizon, a broad ray of white light, the edges slightly tinged with violet, suddenly shot vertically aloft from the horizon, piercing the cloud-masses as though with the thrust of a spear; and as though there had been magic in the touch those cloud-masses at once began to break up and melt away, assuming, ere they vanished, every conceivable tint of the rainbow, from the deepest and richest hue of purple, through crimson and scarlet, to purest molten gold.  And while these wonderful changes of colour were taking place, shaft after shaft of living, quivering light flashed into the sky, radiating like the spokes of a wheel against the warm primrose tints of the horizon--merging by imperceptible degrees into the pure, delicate azure of the sky revealed by the breaking up and dissolution of the clouds--to be followed, a few seconds later, by the appearance above the horizon of a great rim of blazing, palpitating golden fire, the level rays from which shot along the tumbling surface of the ocean, splashing it with a million scintillating points of dazzling light, as the crests of the tiny wavelets curled over and broke under the whipping of the freshening breeze.  Then, while we still stood watching, a gauzy veil of rain--"the pride of the morning"--swept down upon us, blotting out the glories of the sunrise for a brief minute or two, then driving away to leeward, leaving our sails and deck dark with wet, and revealing the sun, now fully risen, and the sky clear and pure to windward.
With the freshening of the breeze we rapidly brought West Caycos first abeam and then on our weather quarter, while the high land of Providenciales grew upon the weather-bow.  Here we were very nearly getting into an exceedingly awkward scrape, for while I went below to prepare for my morning bath under the head-pump, after witnessing the magnificent sunrise that I have endeavoured to describe, the wind suddenly fell light and died away; and then, while I was dressing after my bath, the sea-breeze suddenly sprang up, blowing half a gale; and there were we, not three miles from the land, with as dangerous a stretch of lee-shore as is to be found in all this region abeam of us. Fortunately the schooner's extraordinary weatherliness stood us in good stead, and enabled us to claw off, but for which we should probably have left her bones, if not our own, there.  Our mid-afternoon observations showed us to be in latitude 22 degrees 21 minutes North, and longitude 71 degrees 57 minutes West, which position I considered far enough out for our purpose; we therefore hove about and, under short canvas, proceeded to work our way slowly to the southward and eastward, on the lookout for anything that might chance to come our way.
For several days after this nothing of moment occurred.  Finally we found ourselves some two hundred miles to the northward and eastward of the Mona Passage, and I was debating within myself whether to bear up and go back over the ground which I had just traversed, or to continue on and have a look at Porto Rico.  But while I was thinking over the question, the lookout in the fore crosstrees reported a sail to windward, quickly succeeded by several others, whereupon we made sail and shaped a course that would enable us to get a somewhat clearer view of them, and, if necessary, to intercept them.
The lookout aloft soon reported that the leading ship was under short canvas, while those which immediately followed her were covered to their trucks, and showing studdingsails as well, from which piece of information it was not difficult for me to guess that the strangers to windward consisted of a convoy of merchantmen, with its escort of men-o'-war.  This conjecture of mine soon proved to be correct, for within half-an-hour of their first appearance the leading ships were in sight from the deck, and we made out the biggest of them to be a 74-gun ship, the others in sight obviously being merchantmen.  As we closed, with ensign and pennant hoisted, the commodore signalled me to come alongside and send a boat aboard, which I did, going in the boat myself to see what news I could pick up.  I thus learned that the ship I had boarded was the _Goliath_, the captain of which was the commodore of the squadron of convoying ships, consisting of--in addition to the _Goliath_--the frigates _Tourmaline_ and _Spartiate_, and the gun-brigs _Vulcan, Wolverine, Spitfire_, and _Tortoise_; the convoy consisting of three hundred and eighty-seven sail of all sorts, bound to the various West Indian ports.  I informed the commodore of the nature of the duty upon which I had been sent out by the Admiral on the station, and inquired whether any suspicious craft had been sighted during the passage; to which he grimly replied in the affirmative, but added that they had all been accounted for, and would be found, with prize-crews aboard them, in the main body of the fleet.  I stayed on board the seventy-four for a couple of hours, gathering what news the inmates of the ward-room could give me; during which the _Wasp_, under boom-foresail and fore-staysail only, easily kept company with the ponderous two-decker, looking in comparison with her "no bigger as my thumb," as the negroes would say.  She excited a great deal of curiosity, on account of her very peculiar model, and likewise a very considerable amount of admiration as she swept along lightly and buoyantly as a seagull over the long undulations of the heavy swell that was running.  It was the first time that I had ever beheld her under sail, from outside her own bulwarks, and although, looked down upon from the lofty poop of the _Goliath_, she seemed to be the merest cockle-shell, small enough to be hoisted inboard and stowed upon the two-decker's main hatch, there was still a look of staunchness about her that, coupled with the beauty of her form and the rakish sauciness of her entire appearance, made me feel very proud of the fact that I commanded her, as well as very anxious for an opportunity to show of what she and her crew were capable.
Having extracted all the information I could obtain--which, after all, was not very much--I made my adieux, descended the side, stepped into my boat, and returned to the schooner.  Upon rejoining her, we made sail and hauled to the wind, in the hope of finding some picarooning craft hanging on to the skirts of the convoy; but although we hovered in the wake of the latter until the very last of them had disappeared beneath the southern horizon, our hopes were vain; and, finally, I decided to bear up for the Navidad, or Ship Bank, proceed through the Sea of Hayti as far as the entrance of the Windward Channel, and then, if still unsuccessful in my search for traces of the pirate, to work my way back to the Atlantic by the Crooked Island Passage, exploring some of the cays in Austral Bay on the way, they seeming to me to afford considerable facilities for the establishment of a pirate depot.
CHAPTER TWELVE.
WHAT THE GUNNER SAW.
Two mornings later--the _Wasp_ being at the time off Ysabelica Point, which is the most northerly point of the island of Hayti--I was awakened by young Dundas, one of the two midshipmen whom I had on board.  He entered my cabin, laid his hand lightly on my shoulder, and, as I started up at his touch, said:
"I beg your pardon, Mr Delamere, for entering your cabin, but I knocked twice and you did not seem to hear me.  The gunner is sorry to have you disturbed, sir, but he would be very much obliged if you would come on deck for a minute or two."
"Very well," said I; "I will be up in a brace of shakes.  Just turn up the lamp, if you please, youngster, and let us have a little more light on the subject.  Ah! that's better, thanks.  Kindly hand me those unmentionables.  I say, Mr Dundas, there doesn't seem to be very much wind.  What's the weather like?"
"Stark calm, sir; smooth water, and as dark as the inside of a cow," answered the lad.
"Does the weather look threatening, then; or what does--?  But never mind; those shoes, if you please.  Thanks.  That will do.  Now I am ready.  Away you go, youngster."
Preceded by the lad, I passed into the fore-cabin and thence up on deck, where, as Dundas had picturesquely intimated, the darkness was profound and the air breathless, save for the small draughts created by the flapping of the great mainsail to the gentle movements of the schooner upon the low undulations of the swell.
As I stepped out on deck I heard Henderson's voice close at my elbow, although the man himself was invisible.
"Sorry to have been obliged to disturb you, Mr Delamere," he said, "but something's happened that I thought you ought to know about."
"Yes?"  I remarked interrogatively.  "Well, what was it, Henderson?"
"Well, it's like this here, sir," he replied.  "We've been becalmed this last hour or more, durin' which the schooner have been boxin' the compass, while it's been that close and muggy that one don't seem to have been able to get air enough to breathe.  And the closeness made me feel so drowsy that, to prevent myself from droppin' off to sleep, I've been obliged to keep on my feet, pacing fore and aft atween the main cabin skylight and the main riggin'.  The watch have coiled theirselves away somewheres, and I don't doubt but what they're snatchin' a cat-nap--and I haven't troubled to disturb 'em, sir, for the lookout on the fo'c's'le is keepin' his eyes skinned.
"Well, a few minutes ago--it may be five, or it may be ten--I'd just swung round to walk aft from the main riggin' when, as my eyes travelled away out here over the port quarter, I got the notion into my head that there was somethin' goin' on down there, for it seemed to me that I'd got a glimpse--out of the corner of my eye, as it might be--of a small sparkin', like--like--well, hang me if I know what it was like, unless it might be twenty or thirty pistols or muskets all being fired close after one another."
"Ah!"  I ejaculated.  "And did you hear any sound, Henderson--anything like that of distant firing, for instance?"
"No, Mr Delamere; not a sound, sir," answered the gunner.  "But then," he continued, "that ain't very surprisin' when you comes to think of it, for just listen to what's goin' on aboard here--the old hooker ain't so very noisy, I'll allow; still, what with the rustlin' of the canvas overhead, the patter of the reef-points, the creakin' of the jaws o' the mainboom, the clank o' the wheel-chains, and the wash and gurgle of the water alongside with the roll of her, there's not much chance of pickin' up sounds comin' from a distance, is there, sir?"
"No, that is true, there is not," I admitted.  "Did you see, or hear, anything else, Henderson?"  I asked.
"No, sir; never another thing," answered the gunner.  "And I'd like ye to understand, Mr Delamere, that I wouldn't care actually to stand up in court and swear that I really saw what I told ye; for, as I explained, I only caught the thing out o' the tail-end of my eye, as it might be, and then 'twas gone again, and I saw nothin' more.  But the impression that I really had seen something was so strong that I felt it was my duty to report it."
"Of course; you did perfectly right," I agreed; "particularly in view of the task that has been given us to do.  Did the lookout see anything of this appearance of flashes?"
"No, sir," answered Henderson; "he didn't.  Nat'rally he wouldn't, for he was keepin' a lookout ahead and on either bow, while this here flashin' showed--if it really did show at all, and wasn't my imagination--out there over the port quarter."
"Quite so," I concurred.  "Under those circumstances he would not be in the least likely to see the appearance.  Did it occur to you to take the bearing of the spot where you thought you saw those flashes?"
"Yes, sir, it did," answered Henderson.  "I stood, just for a second or two, to see if there was any more comin': and then, not seein' anything, I went straight to the binnacle and took the bearin', which I found to be nor'-west and by west, half west."
With one consent we both walked aft to the binnacle and peered into it. The schooner had swung several points while the gunner had been spinning his somewhat long-winded yarn, for the bearing which he gave now lay about a point over the starboard quarter.  I stared into the blackness in that direction, but could see nothing.  Then I got the night glass and, setting it to my focus, raised it to my eye, pointing it out over the starboard quarter and sweeping it slowly and carefully to right and left.  For a minute or two I saw nothing; then, as I swept the tube along what I judged to be the line of the horizon, a tiny smudge of radiance--so dim as to be scarcely more than a suggestion--seemed to float athwart the lenses and was gone again.  There is probably nothing in ordinary life much more difficult than to pick up and retain in the lenses of a telescope, levelled by hand, a spark of light so minute and faint as to be invisible to the unaided eye in the midst of the surrounding darkness, and the difficulty is enhanced when the attempt is made from the deck of a small vessel oscillating though ever so gently on the ridges of a long, low-running swell, and for the life of me I could not again find the feeble glimmer that had seemed to swim athwart the instrument, try as I would.
"It is no good, Henderson," I said at last, abandoning the attempt in despair, and handing the telescope over to him.  "I am almost certain that for a single instant I caught a faint blur of light away out there; but I cannot find it now.  Take the glass, and see if you can meet with any better success.  But verify your bearing before you do so."
The schooner had swung a point or two further round by this time, and the bearing now lay broad over the starboard beam, in which direction Henderson pointed his glass.  Meanwhile Dundas, the midshipman who had called me, had slipped down below and brought his own telescope on deck, and was working away with it, but neither he nor the gunner met with any luck; and I was about to try my hand again when a slight lessening of the intensity of the darkness away down in the eastern quarter indicated the approach of dawn.  In those low latitudes the transition from night to day, and _vice versa_, is extraordinarily rapid, occupying but a few minutes; and, even as we stood watching, the pallor strengthened and spread to right and left and upward, suggesting the stealthy but rapid withdrawal of an infinite number of dark gauze curtains from the face of the firmament, until presently the eastern quadrant of the horizon became visible, the pallid sea showing like a surface of molten lead, sluggishly undulating like the coils of a sleeping snake, while overhead stretched an unbroken pall of dark grey cloud that seemed to promise a drenching downpour of rain before long.
The light from the east stole upward among the clouds and westward along the surface of the sea with amazing rapidity, yet to our impatience its progress seemed exasperatingly slow, for away down in the west the darkness was still profound.  And yet, even as we gazed, that darkness seemed to become diluted, as it were, with the advancing light that we could almost see sliding along the surface of the water, until suddenly, as though emerging from an invisible mist, a ghostly object appeared, grey and elusive, against the background of darkness, and with one voice we all three shouted:
"There she is?"
Yes, there she was--a large ship, about seven miles away, lying becalmed, like ourselves, with all plain sail set, to her royals and flying-jib.  For perhaps half a minute after our first sight of her the light was too weak and uncertain to enable us to discern details; but as we kept our telescopes persistently bearing upon her, first one distinctive feature and then another became revealed.
"She's a full-rigged ship, lying broadside-on to us, Mr Delamere," announced young Dundas.
"So I perceive," I returned somewhat dryly.  "And I notice, also, that she has swung with her head to the southward."
"She's a big lump of a craft, not very far short of 900 tons, I should say," commented Henderson, with his eye still glued to the eye-piece of the schooner's glass.  "And," he continued, after a slight pause, "I reckon she's a foreigner; that high poop and them deep-curvin' headboards never took shape in a British shipyard, I'm prepared to swear to that.  Looks to me like a Dutchman.  What do you think, Mr Delamere?"
"I agree with you that she is undoubtedly a foreigner," answered I; "but I don't think she is Dutch--there is too much gilding and gingerbread-work about her quarters for that.  There,"--as the sun broke through the clouds and showed his upper rim above the horizon, flashing a long, level beam along the surface of the water, striking the stranger and causing the stern of her to blaze into a sudden flame of glittering radiance--"do you see that, Henderson?  Her quarter is a solid mass of painted and gilded carving.  The Dutchman is too economical, too fond of the dollars to lavish so much gold-leaf as that on the adornment of his ship; he prefers to put the money into extra bolts and fastenings.  No; that fellow is a Spaniard, or I'm greatly mistaken!"
"Spaniard, or Dutch, or French, it don't make much difference to us, Mr Delamere," answered the gunner, as he replaced the telescope in the beckets; "she'll give us a nice little bit o' prize-money as soon as the breeze comes and enables us to run down alongside her."
"Ay, that she will--if she doesn't happen to be a man-o'-war--and I don't believe she is," I answered, as I again levelled my glass at her. "No," I continued, "she is no man-o'-war, although I see she shows a set of teeth; but there are not many of them, they are all small pieces, and half of them may be quakers, for what we can tell to the contrary.  She is a Spanish West Indiaman, I believe, bound, no doubt, to Cartagena, or some other port on the Main; and she has probably come in through the Handkerchief, or Turks Islands Passage.  Well, there does not seem to be much chance of the wind coming just yet, Henderson, so you had better get your head-pump rigged and muster your scrubbers; meanwhile I will have my bath, as usual, and then get dressed, so as to be all ready by the time that the breeze comes."
When eight o'clock and breakfast-time arrived there was no perceptible change in the aspect of the weather, which remained stark calm; while the heavy pall of cloud that had shrouded the night sky had thinned away to a kind of dense haze in the midst of which the sun throbbed--a great shapeless splotch of misty light that, notwithstanding its partial veiling, still contrived to impart a scorching quality to the breathless atmosphere.
As I ascended to the deck after breakfast I found Pearce, the boatswain, whose watch it now was, apparently waiting for my reappearance.  He held the schooner's glass in his hand, and had evidently spent practically the whole time since eight bells in watching the stranger.
"I've been thinkin', Mr Delamere," he began, "how would it be to get the boats out and go after that chap?  We could do it quite comfortable--take possession of her, leave a prize-crew aboard her, and get back to the schooner again before dinner."
"No doubt," I agreed.  "But why should we trouble to get the boats into the water and fatigue the men by a long pull in this sweltering heat? That ship can't get away from us without wind; and if I am any judge of the looks of a vessel we shall walk up to her as if she were at anchor as soon as the breeze comes.  She is a good seven miles away, a pull of an hour and a half at the least in this weather, and at the end of it the men would be too tired to face resistance effectively, if it were offered--as it very possibly might be.  No, I really do not see any necessity to dispatch the boats, just yet at least; do you?"
"Well, 'pon my word, Mr Delamere, I don't know," answered Pearce, scratching his head with a puzzled air.  "The way you puts it there don't seem to be no sense at all in doin' of it.  And yet, I don't know, sir.  The fact is, I'm a bit puzzled about that there ship.  Here are we, regularly boxin' the compass, our jibboom pointin' first this way, then that, and then t'other, while that ship haven't veered nothin' to speak of all the time that I've been on deck; she've pointed steady to the south'ard ever since I first set eyes on her, and it seems to me that she've altered her bearin's a bit.  I suppose it ain't likely that she've got her boats into the water, towin' on t'other side of her, have she?"
"Good gracious, man, no, surely not!"  I ejaculated.  "What in the world should they do such a mad thing as that for?  What effect would two, or even three, boats have on a big heavy ship like that?  They could never hope to tow her below the horizon and out of sight of us before the wind comes; and, if not, why should they tire themselves to death by making such an attempt?  I admit that it is rather strange that her head should point so steadily in one direction while we are boxing the compass; but she probably draws twice as much water as we do, and that may have something to do with it."
I took the telescope from Pearce's hands and again levelled it at the stranger.  She was still lying broadside-on to us, showing us her port side, and her yards were braced sharp up on the starboard tack, as though--assuming her to have come in through one of the passages--she had had a wind from the westward, while the breeze which had brought us where we were had been from the eastward.  The peculiarity of this now struck me for the first time, but it carried no particular significance to my mind beyond the suggestion that possibly she might, after all, be homeward instead of outward bound.  But as I stood scanning her through the lenses it gradually dawned upon me that her people seemed to be extraordinarily busy, for I could detect indications that quite a large number of men were actively moving about her decks; and presently, to my astonishment, I noticed that she had a tackle at her mainyard-arm; and while I was still wondering what this might be for, I saw a large case rise slowly above the level of her bulwark and then vanish again, apparently over her rail.
Then, in a second, illumination came to me and I understood everything. There was a craft of some sort alongside her, completely hidden from our view by her hull and canvas, braced as sharp up as possible, and undoubtedly there were boats in the water on the other side of her, employed to keep her broadside-on to us and thus keep the other craft hidden from us; moreover, certain portions of her cargo were being hoisted out and transferred to the hidden vessel.  The inference was obvious: the hidden craft was a pirate which had somehow managed to sneak up alongside and surprise her in the pitchy darkness of the early hours of the morning--Henderson had actually caught a glimpse of the very act of capture--and now she was being plundered by the audacious scoundrels under our very eyes.
I laid down the glass and looked sharply round the horizon.  The atmosphere was distinctly thickening, to such an extent, indeed, that the sun was now almost blotted out, and there was a greasy look about the sky that seemed to portend bad weather.  The sea was still glass-smooth, not the faintest suggestion of a catspaw to be seen in any direction; but there was a certain gloomy, lowering appearance over the western horizon that appeared to promise a breeze before long.  It might be hours, however, before it came, and we could not wait for it; for robbery, and very possibly violence, ay, even cold-blooded murder, was being perpetrated at that moment, and speedy intervention was imperative.  I felt horribly vexed that we should all have allowed ourselves to be hoodwinked so completely; for although the device was undoubtedly quite clever, the conviction would insist upon forcing itself upon me that I had attached altogether too little importance to the gunner's story of those mysterious flashes, seen "out of the corner of his eye."  I told myself that that story ought to have aroused my suspicions, ought to have conveyed a distinct suggestion to my mind; and that, if it had, we should have detected the ruse almost with the first appearance of daylight.  This, however, was not the moment for reproaches, either of myself or others, it was the moment for action; and I turned sharply upon the boatswain.
"Mr Pearce," I said, "on the starboard side of that ship there is another craft, completely hidden from us by the hull and canvas of the stranger, and cargo is being hoisted out of the one and transferred to the other.  That means that an act of piracy is being perpetrated; and we have been commissioned for the express purpose of suppressing piracy. It is as likely as not that the hidden craft is the identical vessel that we have been sent out to capture, but in any case our duty is clear; we must get up within striking distance and interfere without a moment's loss of time.  Now, the question in my mind is this: Should we man and arm boats, and send them away; or should we rig out our sweeps and attempt to sweep the schooner up to the scene of action?  Under ordinary circumstances I should be for dispatching the boats; but I don't quite know what to make of the weather.  There is no sign of a breeze in any direction at the present moment, but that lowering appearance away to the westward may mean wind; and if it does, it may come down very strong.  Should it do so, it would bother the boats, and enable the pirates to slip away; on the other hand, the wind may not come away for several hours yet.  This is one of those occasions when experience is valuable, and I shall be glad to have your opinion as to which plan is the better."
Pearce, meanwhile, had been peering through the glass again; but when I finished speaking he laid it down and turned to me.
"'Pon my word, Mr Delamere, it's very difficult to say," he answered. "While you've been talkin' I've been lookin' at that ship away yonder, and I believe, sir, as you're right about there bein' another craft alongside of her, although they've so managed things that they might ha' stayed all day as they are without our bein' any the wiser, if we hadn't kept on watchin' 'em.  Yes; it's a hact of piracy, right enough, I haven't a doubt; and, as you says--what's the best thing to be done?"
He paused and gazed earnestly toward the increasing appearance of thickness and greasiness in the western quarter, carefully studying its aspect for a full minute or more; then he turned to me again.
"I don't like the look of it at all, Mr Delamere," he said.  "There's bad weather brewin' yonder--I'm sure of it--but how long it'll be before it comes no man can say; it may be hours, or it may be on us within the next half-hour or so.  What does the barometer say?"
We both stepped to the open skylight and peered down through it at the barometer, which hung in gimbals from the fore transom.  The mercury was falling rather rapidly.
"Yes," Pearce continued, "I don't like the look of it, sir, and I shouldn't like to take the responsibility of advisin' of you to send the boats away.  For, ye see, Mr--"
"Yes," I interrupted, cutting ruthlessly in upon the man's speech, "I see quite clearly, boatswain, that you and I are of one mind upon that point, therefore there is no need to discuss it further, and we will at once proceed to action.  Call all hands if you please, Mr Pearce."
The next moment the shrill chirruping of Pearce's pipe and his gruff bellow of "All hands ahoy!" resounded throughout the little vessel, and our decks at once became a scene of animation.  The galley fire was extinguished, although the cook was by this time busy upon the preparation of the men's dinner; screens were fastened up round the hatchways, the magazine was opened, powder and shot were passed up on deck, and the guns were cast loose and loaded, the men dancing about the decks with the glee and activity of schoolboys preparing for a day's amusement.  Then, as soon as we were all ready for action, the heavy sweeps were rigged out, four men to each sweep, and the schooner's bows were pointed straight for the stranger.  To overcome the inertia of the little vessel, and get way upon her, was laborious work, and the men, stripped to their waists, were soon streaming with perspiration; but after the first five minutes' toil, during which we worked up a speed of about three knots, it proved a comparatively easy matter to keep her going.
It soon became evident that a keen watch upon our movements was being maintained by the pirates; for no sooner had it been made apparent that we intended to close with the strangers than all attempts at further concealment were abandoned, the ship's courses were clewed up, her yards were squared; to facilitate the hoisting out of cargo, additional tackles were got aloft, and all the signs of greatly increased activity on board her at once became manifest.  It now also became apparent that some means had been resorted to for the purpose of keeping her broadside presented to us and her hull interposed between us and the pirate vessel, and that these means had now been abandoned as of no further avail; for within the next ten minutes she swung stem-on to us, and we saw that there was indeed another craft alongside her--a slashing big topsail schooner, immensely beamy, with all her canvas clewed up and furled, and her decks cumbered with bales and packages of all sizes and descriptions, which were being hoisted out of the big ship's hold and lowered over the side with feverish activity.  As the two craft swung round, revealing the presence of the second vessel, our lads gave a cheer of delight and exultation, and applied themselves with such fierce energy to the toil of working the heavy sweeps that they churned the glassy surface of the ocean into a long double row of miniature whirlpools, that went swirling and frothing away from the blades of the sweeps into the wake of the schooner, to the distance of a full quarter of a mile.
Fortunately, however, they were not compelled to toil very long at this exhausting labour; for when we had progressed about a mile a few catspaws came stealing along the surface of the water from the westward, while a dark line gradually extended along the western horizon and advanced steadily in our direction, the catspaws meanwhile multiplying and spreading until, within a quarter of an hour of their first appearance, the sails of the strange ship were wrinkling and flapping to quite a pleasant little breeze.  The moment that this happened the pirate schooner cast off and made sail with the rapidity and precision of a man-o'-war, thus demonstrating that she was manned by an exceptionally strong and efficient crew.  As soon as she was clear of the ship she was brought to the wind, under an enormous spread of exquisitely cut canvas, and away she went, close-hauled on the port tack, heading to the northward at a pace which made us gape with astonishment; while the ship, with squared yards, gathered stern-way and first fell broadside-on to us, then gradually paid off until she was before the wind, when down she came driving toward us, yawing so broadly to port and starboard that it was easy to see she had nobody at her helm, which seemed to point pretty clearly toward the presumption of tragedy.  A quarter of an hour later the catspaws were ruffling the surface of the water here and there all round us, and stirring our canvas at rapidly decreasing intervals, with the true breeze coming fast and close behind them; we, therefore, laid in our sweeps, put the helm up, trimmed our sheets on the port tack, took a long pull and a strong pull upon the halliards all round, and paid off just in time to receive the first of the true breeze into the hollows of our canvas, when, heeling over to the extent of a strake or so, away we too went, with a merry buzzing and seething of water under our bows and along our bends.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN.
THE WASP FIGHTS THE PIRATE SCHOONER.
The pirate schooner--a craft of apparently two hundred tons or more, very long and low on the water, painted dead black, with immensely tall, wand-like masts, and an enormous spread of canvas--was now slipping along fast through the water, heading to the northward, and some six miles dead to windward of us.  It was a long start, and I foresaw that, fast as the little _Wasp_ undoubtedly was, unless something quite unforeseen occurred, a good many things might happen before we could get alongside the enemy.  Why such a big powerful vessel--she showed seven ports of a side, and there was something suspiciously like a long 32-pounder on her forecastle--should turn tail so ignominiously and run from a little shrimp of a craft like the _Wasp_ I could not imagine, though I was to receive enlightenment upon that point before long.  Our immediate business, however, was not with her, but with the big ship that was coming yawing down the wind toward us.
She was now about five miles distant, and as she came driving along, now stem-on, with her square canvas full, and anon sweeping round until she presented one or the other of her broadsides to us, with only her fore-and-aft canvas drawing, we were enabled to get a very good view of her.  She was a big craft, of from nine hundred to a thousand tons, perhaps, and at a distance might very well have been mistaken for a man-o'-war.  But she was evidently not that, for she showed only four guns of a side upon her upper-deck, and they were but small, apparently not more than 6-pounders.  She was very heavily rigged, with a wide spread to her lower yards, but the heads of her square sails narrowed away to such an extent that her royal-yards looked to be scarcely more than ten feet long.  Her hull was painted bright yellowish-brown, with a broad white ribbon round it, and her bottom was painted white, with a black stripe between it and the brown, but below the water-line the white paint was foul with barnacles and sea grass, as we could see when she rolled.  She carried, by way of figurehead, the image of a female saint, very elaborately painted and gilded, with a good deal of gilded scroll-work round about it, and her stern and quarters were also elaborately carved and gilded.  Her topsides tumbled home enormously, her width on deck being little more than half that at her water-line. Surmounting her stern there was a great poop lantern, almost big enough for a man to stand in.  A rough painting of the Crucifixion adorned her fore-topsail.  She showed no colours; but she was Spanish, beyond a doubt, and most probably, as I had at first surmised, a West Indiaman.
We manoeuvred the _Wasp_ in such a manner as to close with the stranger, as nearly as possible without incurring the risk of being run into and sunk by her in one of her wild sheers, and at the proper moment the schooner was hove-to, the quarter-boat lowered, and with four hands in her, armed with pistols and cutlasses, I jumped in and pulled away for the other craft.
Carefully watching her movements, we contrived to get alongside and hook on without very much difficulty; and then all hands of us swarmed up her towering side and tumbled in on deck, with our drawn pistols in our hands, for there was never any knowing what ghastly trick a pirate might play, or what fiendish trap he might set--they were capable of anything and everything--therefore it behoved us to be wary; but nothing happened.  There was not a soul on deck to interfere with us, or to demand our business; and the first thing we did was to put the helm hard over and lay the mainyard aback as she came to the wind.  Then I ascended to the poop and took a comprehensive glance round me.
The circumstance that thrust itself most obtrusively forward, demanding immediate notice, was that the main hatchway was gaping wide-open, with a tackle dangling down it from the main-stay, evidently for the purpose of hoisting cargo out of the hold.  All round the hatchway the deck was littered with bales and cases of every description, some of them intact, as they had come up out of the hold, while others had been ripped or wrenched open and their contents scattered hither and thither about the decks.  There was a cask lying on its bilge, its head knocked out, and perhaps a gallon or so of port wine still in it, while all round about it the deck was dark, wet, and reeking with the fumes of the spilt wine. But there were other and more sinister stains than those of wine on the planks--there were great splashes of blood here and there on bulwarks and deck, much of which was partially hidden by the scattered cargo; but the scene was not nearly so sanguinary or revolting as I had expected to find it, for there were no ensanguined, mutilated corpses to shock the eye, or harrow the imagination, by the sight of their hurts.
Nor, for that matter, were there any living people on board the ship, either in cabins or forecastle, although there was abundant evidence that both had had their full complement of occupants.  The forecastle, for example, was lumbered up with the chests of the seamen, boots, caps, and various other articles of clothing lying scattered about the deck, while oilskins, sou'westers, and more clothing hung from pegs and nails driven into the timber walls; the bedding in the bunks also was disarranged, as though the men had just rolled out of them; and a large copper slush lamp, suspended from a deck beam, still burned, smoking and flaring to the roll of the ship upon the swell.  The confusion here was merely normal, and such as is always to be found in a ship's forecastle; but the grand saloon presented a very different and terribly suggestive appearance.  The whole place was a scene of dreadful disorder and violence, a carouse seeming to have been succeeded by a life and death struggle.  For the massive mahogany table was bare, while the cloth that should have covered it lay upon the carpeted deck in a confused heap in the midst of a medley of smashed decanters, glasses, and viands of various descriptions, while the reek of spilled wine, mingled with the odour of gunpowder and tobacco smoke, filled the air; one or two of the handsome mirrors that adorned the cabin were smashed, the cracks radiating from the point of fracture right out to the frame; two or three discharged pistols and a broken sword lay among the debris on the carpet; some of the rich velvet cushions had been torn off the locker and then kicked under the table; and a number of men's, women's, and children's garments lay scattered about the apartment.  Nor was this all.  The doors of the staterooms on either side of the saloon stood wide-open, hooked back to the bulkheads; and here again the bedding was all in disorder, as though the occupants had leapt hurriedly from the bunks under the influence of some sudden alarm; trunks and boxes were standing open--some of them overturned--and their contents scattered all over the cabin, as though the receptacles had been rummaged in search of jewellery or money, or both.  And the soft white linen sheets that formed part of the bedding in one of the cabins was deeply and horribly smeared with scarcely dry blood, with which also the mattress underneath seemed to be soaked!  The captain's cabin--or what I took to be such-- had likewise been rifled, the charts having been taken from the racks, the chronometer from its padded well in the book-case, and the sextant had vanished, as well as the ship's papers.  But we were able to ascertain her name and port of registry, for it was engraved upon the broad brass rim of her steering wheel, and upon her bell: "_Santa Brigitta_, Santander."
It was evident that there were no living persons on board this fine but ruthlessly despoiled ship, or if there were, they must be in hiding; and with the view of testing this latter point I now swung myself down through the open hatchway leading to the lazarette, believing that that would be the part of the ship wherein a person might most successfully hide and evade capture.  I was no sooner down in this gloomy receptacle, devoted to the stowage of the ship's cabin stores, than I saw that it too had been rummaged, if not actually rifled; but I could detect no sign indicative of the presence of a person, or persons, in hiding; and although I shouted until I was hoarse, no sound save the furtive scurrying of rats reached me by way of reply.  But presently, as I stood listening, and my ears became accustomed to the subdued creaking and groaning of the vessel's framework and cargo, another sound came to me-- the sound of gurgling, bubbling water; and making my way toward it as best I could down between the casks and cases that cumbered the place, I suddenly dropped down into a void, and found water--salt water, surging and washing to and fro with the movements of the ship, to the height of my knees.  I tried to find the source of the inflow, but I was now down in the ship's run, standing upon her steeply sloping side, and I speedily realised that the points of influx were already so far beneath the surface as to be entirely beyond my reach; and the water was coming in fast, too, for even as I stood there I could feel it creeping insidiously up my legs.  The scoundrels had evidently followed their usual custom and had scuttled the ship, in order that no tangible evidences of their crime might remain.
Until I made this discovery it had been my intention to put a prize-crew on board her and send her into Port Royal; but with one or more-- probably half-a-dozen--bad leaks below the water-level, and utterly beyond our reach, this plan was no longer feasible; and now the only thing to be done was to leave the unfortunate craft to her fate, proceed in chase of the authors of the mischief, and do our utmost to bring them to book.  I therefore scrambled up out of the lazarette into the main saloon, made my way out on deck again, and, summoning my boat's crew, descended the deserted ship's side, and pushed off on my way back to the _Wasp_.
But it was with something akin to shock that I looked back at the _Santa Brigitta_, as the boat sped across the short space of water that separated her from the schooner.  For although we had only been aboard her a short half-hour, she had settled perceptibly during that time; so deeply, indeed, that as I looked at her I felt convinced she must have been scuttled forward as well as aft, and that the water must be pouring into her from at least a dozen auger-holes.  At that rate she would sink long before we could get out of sight of her, although the breeze was now perceptibly stronger than it had been when I boarded the ill-fated ship.
By the time that I had regained the deck of the _Wasp_, and that craft was once more under way, the pirate schooner was hull-down on the north-western horizon, nearly ten miles away.  But light breezes and smooth water, such as we had at the moment, constituted absolutely ideal weather for the _Wasp_; it was under precisely such conditions that her marvellous sailing powers showed to the utmost advantage, and, smart as the other schooner had revealed herself to be, I had very little doubt as to our ability to overhaul her and bring her to account.  We therefore piled upon the little hooker every rag that we could find a spar or stay for, brought her to the wind, flattened-in her sheets until her mainboom was almost amidships, and generally made all our preparations for a long chase to windward.
But although the weather was at the moment everything that could be desired, from our point of view, I did not by any means like the look of it; the hazy appearance of the atmosphere, far from clearing, was steadily increasing in density, the sun had by this time vanished altogether, and the appearance of gloom away down to the westward was now deepening and, at the same time, working round into the northern quarter of the heavens.  Also, the mercury was dropping quite rapidly.
My chief anxiety now was to overhaul the pirate schooner and bring her to action before nightfall; for, with bad weather threatening, unless we could succeed in doing this, there was every likelihood of her giving us the slip during the hours of darkness.  A stern-chase is proverbially a long chase, and a chase to windward is apt to be even longer, while a start of some ten miles, under such circumstances, must necessarily prove a heavy handicap to the pursuing vessel; nevertheless I was not without hope that, difficult as our task threatened to be, we might yet accomplish it.  For it still wanted nearly an hour to noon, the _Wasp_ was slipping along through the water like a racer, and was looking up a full point nearer the wind than our antagonist, and, early as it yet was to form such a conclusion, I felt almost certain that we were head-reaching as well as weathering upon the chase.
As soon as it became apparent that some hours would probably elapse before we could go into action, I gave orders for the guns to be secured and the galley fire to be lighted again, in order that the men might not be deprived of their usual dinner; and this meal was just nicely over when, to our utter amazement, the chase suddenly hoisted the black flag, bore up, and with squared yards came running down with the obvious intention of coming to close quarters with us; whereupon we once more made ready for battle, at the same time shortening sail to our ordinary working canvas.  At first I was distinctly puzzled to account for or understand this sudden change of tactics upon the part of the pirates; but a remark of Henderson's seemed to offer a tolerably plausible explanation of it.
"Depend upon it, sir," he suggested, "they only hauled off to give themselves time to stow away the plunder that cumbered their decks when they shoved off from the Spaniard.  They wouldn't want to go into action with a lot of bales and cases hamperin' their movements; but now that they've got everything snugly stowed under hatches, they're comin' down to try conclusions with us; and if they really mean business we've a very tidy little job afore us."
"Ay," I assented; "that schooner will prove a very tough nut to crack, Henderson; she carries more than twice our weight of metal, even if I am mistaken in supposing that I saw a long gun on her forecastle; and she appears to be very strongly manned.  Our only chance will be to engage her at close quarters, lay her aboard, and carry her by boarding."
"D'ye think they'll be such fools as to let us do that, sir?" caustically demanded the gunner, chewing hard upon his quid, in his evident perplexity.
"N-o," I returned dubiously; "I don't suppose they will--if they can help it.  But that is our only chance, all the same, and we must bend all our energies to accomplish it.  And there is no particular reason why we should not, so far as I can see, unless of course we are unfortunate enough to have a spar or two knocked away.  Good shooting is what is going to decide this fight, Henderson; and we must hope that ours will be better than theirs."
"Ay," agreed the gunner, "there's no harm in hopin' that; but--" He shook his head, and spat vigorously over the side by way of expressing the doubts that were worrying him.
As it turned out, his doubts and apprehensions were by no means without foundation, for when our antagonist arrived within range of her long 32--I was not mistaken as to that matter--she hauled her wind, and opened fire upon us with it, making very excellent practice, too; although it was not until she had fired six shots at us that any of them actually came near enough to do us any damage, and then the shot only passed through our foresail, making a neat hole in the canvas, but doing no further mischief.  Her previous attempts, however, had come close enough to us to prove that she had at least one excellent gunner on board her, for every one of the shot fell within two or three fathoms of us at the utmost; and when a man shoots so well at long range he is bound to score a few hits, sooner or later.  And this was precisely what Henderson and I most feared; for so long as the pirates chose to play the game of long bowls they might blaze away at us at their leisure, and in perfect safety, their 32-pound shot flying over and over us at a distance far beyond the range of our 9-pounders.
What we now had to do was to shorten the distance between ourselves and our antagonist as quickly as possible, and bring her within reach of our guns before we sustained any very serious damage from her long gun, if fortune would so far favour us; and I thought that possibly I might here be able to make one of the _Wasp's_ peculiarities very useful.  This peculiarity consisted in the fact--which we had by this time had many opportunities of observing--that, in smooth water, such as then prevailed, the little vessel would, if properly handled, shoot quite an extraordinary distance to windward while in stays; and I had it in my mind to utilise this peculiarity now by making a series of very short boards, getting good way upon her, and then easing her helm very gently down, allowing her to shoot the maximum possible distance to windward every time that we hove about.  I mentioned the idea to Henderson, but he had not very much faith in it; his idea being that of most old salts, that the best way to work to windward was to break tacks as seldom as possible; he agreed, however, that it might perhaps be worth while to make the experiment and see what the result would be.  We accordingly put my plan into practice, with such good effect that half-an-hour later we had actually succeeded in working up near enough to the pirate to bring her within range of our own guns.  But meanwhile she had been most assiduously pegging away at us, in the first instance with her long gun only, but latterly with her 12-pounders--of which she mounted seven in each battery--as well, and we had by no means come off scathless, having been hulled three times, and losing two men killed and five wounded before a single shot of ours had reached her, though our spars had thus far escaped, and our rigging had not suffered to any very serious extent.
With our arrival within range of our own guns, however, matters began to be a little more lively; we were fortunate enough to have some half-a-dozen very excellent shots among us, and these men now began to make play, each man being evidently anxious to win for himself the proud distinction of being the champion shot of the ship, with the result that daylight began to show here and there through the pirate schooner's canvas, severed ropes streamed out from the spars, and the splinters began to fly on board her.  Then a particularly lucky shot struck her main-masthead fair, just above the nip of her lower rigging, and the next moment down came her main-topmast, with its huge gaff-topsail, while the peak of her mainsail drooped until the gaff hung almost up and down.
"Hurrah, lads!"  I cried exultantly; "now we have her.  See how she pays off!  She is bound to come to leeward now; she cannot help herself. Down helm, Mr Willoughby, and let her go round.  Stand by to give her our starboard broadside as we cross her bows.  Slap it right into the eyes of her--Phew! that's a nasty one," as a shot from her 32-pounder came along, smashing right through both our quarter-boats, cutting their keels clean in half, tearing a great gap in the bottom planking of each, filling the air in the immediate neighbourhood with splinters, and whizzing so close past my head that the wind of it whipped my hat off and overboard.
The two craft were now not more than a short half-mile distant, and fast approaching each other, the pirate's loss of after-sail causing her to fall broad off and come foaming down toward us, despite obvious efforts to keep her to the wind, while we on our side were making the most desperate efforts to get to windward and thus secure the advantage of the weather-gage, which, in a sea-fight, often means so much.  Conned by Willoughby, who was acting master, the lively little _Wasp_ swept round into the wind, fore-reaching magnificently in stays, and then paying smartly off on the starboard tack; and as she did so our three starboard pop-guns barked out, one after the other, and I saw the splinters fly white as the shot struck, close together, about half-way between her starboard hawse-pipe and her cathead, just at the precise moment when she was dead end-on to us.  The shot must have raked her from end to end, and quite a small uproar of yells and shrieks that came floating down from her to us on the wings of the freshening breeze told us that they had wrought a very fair amount of execution on board her.  But it was evident that her captain knew his business, for the next moment several hands sprang into her fore-rigging; her topsail, topgallantsail and royal were clewed up and furled with exemplary celerity; her jib was hauled down and stowed, and she was again brought to the wind, while half-a-dozen hands swarmed aloft to her mainmast-head to clear away the wreck of her topmast and to pass strops round the shattered stump, to hook the peak-halliard blocks to, and enable them to sway away the peak of the mainsail again.  And all the while that this was doing they maintained their fire upon us with the most ferocious energy, and alas! with very deplorable results to the little _Wasp_ and her crew, for we were by this time so close to each other that it was practically impossible for either side to miss; and now it was that her superior weight of metal began to tell.
Our casualties were by this time becoming serious, for we had already lost nine men killed outright, while every moment more wounded were being taken down into my cabin, where Saunders, the surgeon, was working like a nigger, affording temporary relief--he could do no more just then--to the injured.  We were still devoting all our energies to the task of getting to windward of our antagonist, and firing at her as fast as our leaping guns could be loaded, in the endeavour to disable her, when they succeeded in bringing her again to the wind, and as she rounded-to they gave us their whole broadside of seven 12-pounders, with a shot from their long 32-pounder by way of make-weight.  The result was absolutely disastrous, for as the iron shower hurtled about our ears there was a crashing, tearing sound aloft, and away went both our masts over the side, the foremast shot away close to the deck, while the mainmast went about half-way up its length.  Nor, bad as this was, was it all, for poor Willoughby, who was standing by my side, had the top of his skull literally shot away, and fell dead into my arms.  The next moment the carpenter came to me with the report that we had been hit between wind and water by a 32-pound shot, and that the schooner was making water fast.
The pirates cheered with ferocious glee as they saw the plight to which they had reduced us, and their captain--a tall, handsome scoundrel, with a very Spanish-looking cast of countenance--had the impudence to leap up on the rail of his vessel and hail us, demanding to know whether we had struck!
"No!"  I shouted back fiercely; "and we never will to such a hang-dog, murderous set of scoundrels as man that schooner.  Do your worst, you villains.  You have the advantage of us this time, but when next we meet it will be my turn!"
"You crow loudly, young cockerel," retorted the pirate captain scornfully, "but if your men are wise they will leave their guns and go below, for I swear to you that if they fire another shot I will sink you!"
"Sink us, then, and be hanged to you!"  I yelled back in reply.  Then in my exasperation I whipped a pistol out of my belt, and levelling it at him, pulled the trigger.  But he did not mean to be shot if he could help it,--preferring, I suppose, to take the risk of being hanged later on,--and the moment that he saw what I would be at he sprang off his perch so hurriedly that he fell headlong to the deck, while our lads sent up a howl of savage derision.
"Put a charge of grape in on top of your round shot, lads," I ordered, "and blaze away as fast as you can load.  The _Wasp_ has lost her wings, but her sting remains, and we'll make those scoundrels feel it yet before we have done with them!"
The men responded to this with a loud, fierce hurrah, and turned to their guns again as cheerfully as though they were still certain of victory, although there was probably not a man there who did not by that time realise that the chances were all against the gallant little schooner ever reaching port again.
The battle now raged with absolutely maniacal fury, the two schooners being by this time within biscuit-toss of each other, the pirate schooner lying on our weather-beam.  The guns--so hot that they threatened to leap over the low rail into the sea--were loaded and fired as fast as the men could serve them, and, fighting at such close quarters, the carnage on both sides was frightful, the bulwarks of both vessels being practically shot away, and the guns and those who served them left absolutely defenceless.  Our deck was like a shambles--there seemed to be more dead than living upon it--and the scuppers were all spouting blood, while the pirates were in scarcely better case, although it was now apparent that they had originally outnumbered us by something like three to one.  How long the matter would have continued in this fashion it is impossible to say, but after we had thus been fighting almost hand to hand for about a quarter of an hour, during which the pirate schooner gradually drew ahead of us, a lucky shot from one of our guns brought down her mainmast, when she fell broad off, passed across our bows, raking us severely as she went, and then drove rapidly away to leeward, her people having apparently at length come to the conclusion that they had had all that they wanted in the way of fighting.
The moment it became certain that the fight was over I sank down upon the breech of the nearest gun, mopped the blood and perspiration from my face, and tried to understand the scene of ruin and carnage that surrounded me; for, with the cessation of the turmoil and excitement of battle, everything seemed suddenly to assume the inconsequence and unreality of a dream.  I could not quite realise that the shot-torn, blood-bespattered wreck over which my gaze wandered wonderingly was the erstwhile smart and dainty little schooner of which I had been so proud, or that those maimed and disfigured forms lying broadcast about the deck were really dead men; also, my head ached most consumedly, there was a loud buzzing in my ears, the silence--or rather the comparative silence that succeeded to the continuous, sharp explosions of the guns, the excited shouts of the men, and the cries of the wounded--seemed weird, uncanny, unnatural; for now there were no sounds save the wash of the water alongside, an intermittent groaning--cut into now and then by the sharp cry of a man under the hands of the surgeon--coming up through the smashed skylight, and the low murmur of the men speaking to each other from time to time where they had flung themselves down exhausted between the guns.  The fact was that I was suffering from the reaction that was inevitable after so fierce and protracted a fight--the battle having lasted for over an hour--and I felt that I must bestir myself or I should become light-headed, or hysterical, or something equally foolish. I, therefore, rose to my feet, called to the steward to bring me a glass of water--the water-cask which usually stood on deck having been smashed to staves early in the fight--and then gave orders for the men to secure the guns.  I also sent young Hinton down below to ascertain and bring me the particulars of our casualties.
Thus far we had all been much too strenuously engaged, and our attention too fully occupied, to take note of the weather; but now, as I glanced round at the lowering heavens and observed their threatening aspect, I bethought me that, fatigued though we all were, there still remained an abundance of work to be done in preparation for the storm that was evidently brewing.  For the sky was now completely overcast with a pall of dense, livid, purplish, slate-coloured cloud that clearly portended a gale; the wind was coming in hot, fierce, intermittent puffs that scourged the sea into miniature foam-flecked waves for a few seconds at a time and then dropped almost to a calm again, and upon looking at the barometer I saw that the mercury had fallen almost half-an-inch since I had last looked at it shortly before the commencement of the fight.  The Spaniard had vanished, and the pirate schooner was still running away to leeward.
Presently young Hinton, the midshipman whom I had sent below to ascertain the extent of our casualties, came up to me with a list in his hand which he had himself prepared, Saunders, the surgeon, being at that moment far too busy to spare time for the making up of returns; and from this list I learned the appalling news that, of our entire complement of fifty-eight, all told, we had lost no less than seventeen killed, and thirty-two more or less severely wounded, leaving only a poor paltry nine of us untouched, of whom I was one.  Fortunately, of the thirty-two wounded only about half of them were hurt severely enough to be rendered totally unfit for duty; but that was bad enough in all conscience, with the ship dismantled and leaking, and something very like a gale threatening.
I had just finished the perusal of young Hinton's list when Henderson and the carpenter came up on deck, the former bringing with him the keys of the magazine, which he had secured, in accordance with an order which I had sent down below to him, while Mills was fresh from his examination of the ship's interior.  His report was anything but reassuring, for the news he brought was to the effect that we had been hulled no less than seventeen times, four of the shot that had hulled us being 32-pounders, one of which and two of the pirate's 12-pounders had struck us between wind and water.  He added that he had plugged the holes as well as he could, but that there was nearly three feet of water in the hold, that the little ship was very severely strained, and that she was making water at the rate of nearly eight inches an hour!
CHAPTER FOURTEEN.
THE END OF THE WASP.
It was clear that in the face of such a report as that, and the threatening sky that frowned down upon us, it was not a moment in which to indulge in thoughts of rest, however loudly our poor aching bodies might clamour for it.  There was much to be done to secure our own safety and that of our injured and helpless comrades, and very little time in which to do it; I therefore directed Pearce, the boatswain, to pipe all hands to splice the main-brace; and when this had been done the little band who were still capable of doing duty were divided into three parties--one of which, under Henderson, was stationed at the pumps, with orders to work at them until they sucked; while a second and much smaller party, under the leadership and guidance of the carpenter, was given the task of temporarily securing the various openings in the deck against the possible influx of water--both the skylight and the companion having been completely wrecked by shot; the third party, under Pearce, the boatswain, devoting itself to the task of clearing away the wreck of the spars, and securing as much as possible of the wreckage in order that we might have the wherewithal to give the schooner a jury rig that would enable us to take her into port.  The pirate schooner, meanwhile, had continued to run away to leeward upon a course that would carry her to the northern coast of Hayti in a few hours.
The work went slowly forward--it could not be otherwise with men so utterly exhausted as were the little moiety of the _Wasp's_ crew who survived that desperate fight, many of them smarting with the wounds that they had received--and meanwhile the weather grew ever more threatening, stimulating us all to exertions of which I am confident we should have been utterly incapable under more placable circumstances. Not that there was very much to find fault with at the moment, for it was not exactly blowing hard; but the gusts, which for the last hour or more had been sweeping over us, now from this quarter and anon from that, were steadily growing more frequent and stronger, while the sky had become black as night.  But before night actually fell we had made shift to pump the schooner dry, the hatches were battened down, the skylight and companion openings had been protected, after a fashion, and we had cleared away the wreck of the mainmast, saving the spar and all attached; and, having done this, the men declared that they must have a meal and some rest before they could again turn-to.  And I felt that their claim was just; for indeed they had done wonders, taking all things into consideration.  I had not the heart to spur them to further effort just then, for I had worked with them and, therefore, knew from personal experience how utterly exhausted they must feel, and how impossible it would be to get further useful work out of them until they had rested for an hour or two.  Indeed, there did not appear to be any good and sufficient reason why I should call upon them for more hard work just then.  It is true that much that I intended to do still remained undone, the most important task of all being the getting up of something in the nature of a jury rig; but, short-handed as we now were, that would prove a very formidable task--much too formidable and too protracted to justify the hope that it could be accomplished before the expected gale came; and as I considered the question, and talked it over with Henderson and the boatswain, it seemed that if it could not be completed beforehand, it would really be better on the whole to defer it until after the gale had blown over; I, therefore, gave the order to knock off work and get supper and a rest.  Two minutes later the decks were deserted, save by myself, and I was bracing myself up to keep a lookout as best I might.
I felt bound to acknowledge to myself that our situation was very much the reverse of satisfactory; for there we were, totally dismasted, strained and leaking badly, our crew exhausted, and only nine of us unwounded, the land barely twenty-five miles to leeward of us, and, to crown all, a heavy gale springing up.  Fortunately, we had been able to make all the provision that was possible to meet the impending struggle--for the wreck of our mainmast was now inboard, while the lanyards of the fore-rigging had been cut away on both sides; and the wreckage of the foremast was now under the schooner's bows, attached to the hull by the stays only, so that it served as a floating anchor, to which the little vessel was already riding head to wind.
I allowed the men two hours in which to rest and refresh themselves, and then once more summoned them on deck; for upon sounding the well I found that, although the schooner had been pumped dry before we had cried "Spell-ho!" there was now eighteen inches of water in her; and I was determined that this leak should be kept down by frequent spells of pumping.  It would never do to have the little hooker waterlogged while battling for life in a gale, as there was little doubt that she would be in the course of the next few hours.
In fact, while the men were still toiling at the pumps we got our first real taste of it.  For up to that moment the wind had been coming in a steadily-increasing succession of scuffling gusts, each more fierce than its predecessor, first from this quarter of the compass, and then from that, with quite moderate breezes in between, mostly from a northerly direction, that sometimes moderated almost to a calm.  But now, after a somewhat longer spell than usual of the moderate breeze, the wind quite suddenly increased in force to that of a full gale, swooping down upon us in a mad scuffle that twirled the little craft about like a teetotum for a minute or two as it howled and raved around us, lashing the whole surface of the sea into one unbroken sheet of foam and spray, and then it settled down and began to blow great guns from the northward, whipping up a nasty short, choppy sea into which, within ten minutes, the little schooner was plunging to the height of her hawse-holes.
This however, as it turned out, was only the beginning of it; for when once the gale had fairly broken loose it steadily grew more furious, with the result that in about half-an-hour we were plunging bows under, while, to add to our difficulties, the violent motion strained the little vessel and opened her seams to such an extent that, so far from getting the pumps to suck, it needed the utmost exertions of all hands, working in quick relays, to keep the leak from gaining upon us.
Clearly, it would never do to permit such a state of things as that to continue, for the only partially rested men would soon become exhausted by the laborious toil of the pumps; and then what would become of us? I, therefore, summoned a council of war, consisting of the gunner, the carpenter, and the boatswain, to whom I explained my view of the situation, and asked their advice.  It was my opinion--founded upon our experiences during the recent fight--that if the pirate schooner was to be tackled successfully, it would have to be by a bigger craft than the _Wasp_, or, at all events, that if the _Wasp_ was to be again employed against the pirates, she would certainly have to be equipped with a very much heavier armament; her insignificant little array of six 9-pounders could never be expected to cope successfully with the other craft's fourteen 12-pounders and her long 32.  Therefore, I argued, since our present armament could never be of further use to us, so far as the pirates were concerned, while at the present moment they were doing much to make the schooner strain herself to pieces, and were indeed actually imperilling her safety and that of all on board her, why not throw them overboard, and so relieve the little vessel of their weight and give her the best possible chance to weather the gale?  Henderson and the boatswain were rather opposed to this plan, the gunner suggesting, as an alternative, that we should cut adrift from the wreckage that was holding us head to wind, and endeavour to get before the wind and scud; and to this view they still adhered, even after I had pointed out to them that the island of Hayti constituted a lee-shore only some twenty-five miles distant, upon which we must inevitably be dashed before morning if we adopted their plan.  The carpenter, however, took my view that we must lose the guns in any case if the schooner went ashore, and probably the ship and our lives as well; while by making a timely sacrifice of the guns there was at least a possibility of saving the ship.  We were thus two to two; and as I was absolutely convinced that the plan advocated by the gunner and the boatswain involved the destruction of the ship and the drowning of at least as many of the poor fellows below as were too seriously injured to be capable of taking care of themselves, I unhesitatingly decided in favour of my own alternative, and at once gave the order to throw the guns overboard without further ado.
Watching our opportunity, therefore, and taking advantage of the roll of the ship, we launched our 9-pounders overboard, one after the other, until all six of them had vanished in the ocean depths; and the increased liveliness of the little vessel at once demonstrated her relief at the loss of so much weight from her deck.
The carpenter had just sounded the well, and had announced the joyous news that at last the pumps were gaining upon the leak--which announcement was greeted with a feeble cheer from the now utterly exhausted men, who had for so long been toiling at the almost hopeless task of clearing the ship of the inflowing water--when a sudden and dreadful change occurred in the weather.  The wind, which had been blowing a whole gale a moment before, fell dead in an instant, an appalling darkness overspread the firmament, and the atmosphere suddenly became so rarefied that it seemed impossible for one to draw a full breath; the sea, which a moment earlier had been breaking furiously, ceased to do so, and instead began to leap high into the air, falling back with a splash that, in the sudden stillness, seemed positively terrifying, and the schooner, swinging broadside-on, rolled so furiously that she momentarily threatened to turn bottom-up, while those of us who were on deck had to seize hurriedly the first fixed portion of the vessel's framework that we could lay hands on, to save ourselves from being pitched overboard like a shot out of a catapult.  To continue pumping under such circumstances was impossible, for it needed both hands and all one's strength to merely hold on.
"Now what's goin' to happen, I wonder!" growled the gunner, who was clinging with me to a belaying-pin in a part of the rail that still remained intact in the wake of the main rigging.  "I can understand a gale o' wind, Mr Delamere, but this here sudden calm don't seem natural to me."
"It is not natural," said I; "the mere look of the sky is sufficient to assure us of that.  There is something behind it, you may be certain, though what it is I am sure I cannot say; possibly it may be a fresh outfly from some other point of the compass, or it may end up with a violent thunderstorm, though I do not think it will; that sky--"
"No, no," interrupted Henderson, "there's no thunder there, sir, ye may take my word for it.  Listen, Mr Delamere!  D'ye hear that?"
I thought for an instant that he was directing my attention to the pitiful cries and moans that were being extorted from the unhappy wounded down below as they were flung hither and thither by the furious lurches of the schooner, and I was about to make some sort of reply when a low moaning smote upon my ear, increasing with appalling rapidity to a fierce medley of sounds, in which the savage roars of maddened beasts and the shrieks and wailings of mortally terrified human beings seemed to be about equally mingled; a long line of phosphorescent white appeared upon the northern horizon, showing up with ghastly distinctness against the background of black scowling sky; a fierce scuffle of hot wet wind swept over us and was gone again, leaving a taste of salt upon our lips, and with a deafening howl, as of concentrated fury, the tempest leapt upon us, filling the air with drenching spindrift and scudwater, while, taking the schooner fair abeam, it heeled her over until the water was up nearly level with the coamings of her hatchways. For nearly a minute she lay thus, and despite the fact that she was dismasted I believed that she was about to turn turtle with us, when gradually, as the drag of the wreckage ahead brought her round head to wind again, she righted to an even keel once more and rode almost as still as though she were in harbour, while the spindrift and scudwater raked her decks fore and aft like a continuous tempest of small shot, which stung our faces and hands so severely that it was literally impossible to face it, and turning our backs to it and dropping upon our hands and knees, we were driven to creep for shelter wherever we could find it.
The sea had gone down as though by magic, for such was the power of the wind that the slightest irregularity of surface, the slightest lift of a wave, was at once torn off and swept away to leeward in the form of spray so dense that it was impossible to see farther than a few yards in any direction.  And perhaps the worst and most terrifying feature of the whole experience was that there was nothing to be done--nothing that we could possibly do to abate the peril of our situation; we were as absolutely helpless as though we had been bound hand and foot, and could merely crouch impotently waiting for the end, whatever it might be.
But it was not possible for matters to continue very long as they were; the hurricane endured only for about twenty minutes, and then moderated to the strength of a heavy gale, whereupon the sea began to rise again with frightful rapidity; and half-an-hour after the first stroke of the hurricane the schooner was pitching bows under, and shipping increasing quantities of water at every plunge.  And now, as we once more bestirred ourselves, we were confronted with a fresh calamity.  For our makeshift protection of the damaged companion and skylight, as well as the fore-scuttle, had been swept away, probably at the first stroke of the hurricane, although not one of us had observed it, and already vast quantities of water were pouring into the little vessel's interior, principally through the fore-scuttle.  We had scarcely made this alarming discovery when Saunders, the surgeon, who had remained below through all the hubbub, busily engaged in attending to the wounded, came up on deck and confirmed our worst fears by informing us that the schooner was rapidly filling, the water having already risen to the level of the cabin floor!
It was now obvious that the little ship was doomed; the hurricane, coming so close upon the heels of the fight, and smiting us before we had had time to repair our damages, was proving too much for her; she was strained and battered all to pieces, and nothing that we could do out there, short-handed, and buffeted by that pitiless wind and sea, could avail to save her.  She was doomed, and now the utmost that lay in our power to do was to make some sort of provision for our own safety and that of our wounded shipmates.
Yet, when one came to consider the question, what could we do?  Our boats, badly damaged by the shot of the pirates in the first place, had been utterly destroyed and swept away by the first furious stroke of the hurricane; while by the same agency our decks had been swept clear and clean of everything not actually bolted down, except the wreckage of the mainmast, which we had lashed firmly to ring bolts in the deck before the gale arose.  There was that wreckage, it is true, and also the wreckage of the foremast under the bows; if it could possibly be got alongside, a raft of sorts might perhaps be constructed out of that, and there our resources would end.  But there was no time for pondering and consideration, whatever was done would have to be done at once; I therefore called the gunner, the carpenter, and the boatswain to me, hastily explained to them my ideas as to the construction of a raft, and bade them muster all available hands and get to work forthwith, while Millar (the purser) and the cabin steward were instructed to get together as large a quantity of provisions and water as possible, wherewith to stock the structure when finished.
Now that the wind had moderated from hurricane force to that of a heavy gale, the sea rose with really startling rapidity, and was already running so high that when we came to set about the task of cutting adrift the wreckage of the foremast, with the idea of hauling it alongside and utilising it in the construction of a raft, it at once became evident that the time for undertaking such a piece of work was already past; for even alongside the schooner, and partially under her lee, the wreckage would be swept so violently by the breaking seas that it would be impossible for men to go over the side and work upon it without being washed off and drowned; we were, therefore, compelled to abandon that part of our plan and turn our attention to the construction of a raft on deck which would float clear when the battered hull sank from under our feet.  But alas I even that was not to be; for we had scarcely got the wreckage of the mainmast cut adrift from its lashings, and were busily engaged in arranging it, with the topmast and the mainboom, in the form of a triangle as a base upon which to construct a platform, when it happened that the schooner, having just surmounted a sea, got pinned down by the head, in consequence of all the water in her rushing forward as she settled down, stem-on, into the succeeding trough.  At this critical moment a yell of dismay from the carpenter caused us all to look up from our work, and we beheld him, with his eyes almost starting from their sockets, glaring and pointing ahead.  A single glance in that direction sufficed to account for his terror.  For there, sweeping down upon us with deadly implacability, towered a perfect mountain of a sea, its front almost as steep as the side of a house, and its foaming, hissing crest reared threateningly aloft as high as our lower-mastheads--had they been standing.  It was at once apparent to us all that, pinned down as the schooner was at that moment, by the bulk of the water in her interior having concentrated itself in the fore part of her, she could not possibly lift in time to rise over the summit of that on-sweeping sea, it must inevitably break on board her, sweep her from stem to stern, and send her to the bottom!  For a second we all stood, petrified with consternation; then, with a yell of "Hold on everybody for your lives!"  I dashed to the companion opening and shouted to those below, "On deck, all hands of you; up you come, men, this instant; you have not a second to lose!"
A dreadful, wailing cry of despair floated upward from below in response to my warning, and was echoed by the people on deck as that awful liquid mountain hovered above us, seeming to pause for an instant, as though in sentient enjoyment of our helplessness and terror.  The next moment its crest curled over and the whole mass of water seemed to hurl itself headlong upon the hapless schooner, foaming in over her bows and burying them fathoms deep in its heart.  I felt the poor shattered hull quiver and tremble beneath me like a frightened thing as the giant wave smote her, and then I was seized by the on-rushing water, swept off my feet, overwhelmed, whirled helplessly hither and thither in the midst of a medley of whirling wreckage, flying ropes'-ends, and struggling men. Opening my eyes I beheld the hull of the schooner, a short distance away, standing almost perpendicular, and slowly gliding downwards, bows first.  Even as I looked she vanished into the dark profundity beneath, and then I directed my glances above me.  It seemed that I was fathoms deep, for the phosphorescent foam that boiled overhead looked almost as far aloft as a frigate's lower yard; and by the same ghastly phosphorescent light I could distinguish vaguely a number of swirling objects, some of which appeared to be merely inanimate wreckage, while others looked like struggling human beings.  Then, suddenly conscious of the fact that I was within the influence of the downward draught of the sinking schooner, and was being dragged down after her, I instinctively struck upward desperately with hands and feet, fighting to return to the surface.  I must have been dragged down to a very considerable depth, for I presently lost sight of the phosphorescent light on the surface caused by the breaking of the seas, and found myself involved in pitchy darkness, struggling madly, and with my lungs almost bursting.  How long this awful struggle lasted I have no means of determining; probably it was much less than a minute, but the time seemed to drag itself out first to minutes, then to hours, and finally I lost all idea of time, all sense of my terrible situation, all recollection of the dreadful catastrophe that had just happened, and found myself, as in a vivid dream, re-enacting many a long-forgotten episode of earlier days.  Then, in a moment, all these scenes vanished, and I was suddenly--I knew not how--on the surface, gasping for breath, half smothered with the seas that were breaking over my head, and convulsively clutching a rope that had somehow found its way into my grasp.  Gradually it dawned upon me that this rope must be fast to something--for it alternately tautened and slackened with the sweep and swirl of the sea--thereupon I proceeded to haul cautiously upon it, with the result that I presently found myself alongside the floating wreckage of the mainmast.  With some difficulty I at length managed to drag myself up and get astride this substantial spar; and then, finding that it did not roll over and throw me off, as I more than half feared it would, I gradually worked my way along it until I found myself close up against the crosstrees.  And then I thought I perceived the reason why the spar maintained its stability so well.  The mainsail had been set when the mast was shot away, and the gaff, with the sail attached, still retained its position on the mast, the main halliards having somehow jammed in the block, and this it evidently was that prevented the spar from capsizing.  The rope by which I had hauled myself alongside the spar proved to be the end of the peak-halliards, and I thought that if I made this fast, and so prevented the peak from sagging, I should secure still further the stability of the wreckage; I accordingly did so, knotting the bight round one arm of the crosstrees, and then firmly lashing myself to the same arm with the loose end of the halliard.
I was now much better off than when I first found myself overboard, for I had a stout spar to support me, and might remain afloat until I fell off from exhaustion; moreover, even when my end of the spar was submerged--as of course it very frequently was--I was never buried deeper than my armpits, while there were moments when I was hove up clear out of the water altogether.  Besides, the water was quite warm. I was therefore by no means uncomfortable, notwithstanding my situation.
Having made myself secure, I next began to look about me with the view of ascertaining how many of my companions in misfortune had survived the catastrophe; for I had not a doubt that a few at least would be as lucky as myself.  But to my horror I found that I was the sole occupant of this particular mass of wreckage; and although I shouted at the full power of my lungs until I was hoarse, in the hope that if there were any more survivors they would hear me and thus be guided to the same refuge that I had gained, the sole response was the howling of the gale and the hissing wash of the breaking seas.  True, there was a moment when I fancied that I heard a faint shout in reply to my cries, but I concluded that it was only imaginary, for I did not hear--or fancy that I heard-- it again.  Then, as opportunity offered, I looked about me in quest of other wreckage, thinking that possibly there might be a few fragments to some of which one or more of my shipmates might be clinging, but the darkness was so intense that I could not see farther than some two or three fathoms in either direction; and indeed it was only the faint phosphorescent light given off by the breaking seas that enabled me to see anything at all, even at that short distance.  The thought occurred to me that, as whatever floating wreckage there might be would all drive in the same direction, possibly I might be more fortunate in the morning; and with this reflection I composed myself as well as I could to rest, for I was by this time literally half-dead with fatigue.
So utterly exhausted was I that, despite my desperate plight, I believe I actually did lose consciousness in sleep at brief intervals during that terrible night, for the dawn came very much more speedily than I had dared to hope, and with its appearance the gale broke, the wind perceptibly moderating with the rising of the sun.  As soon as it was light enough to permit objects to be distinguished I aroused myself from the lethargy that seemed to have gripped me, and proceeded to search the heaving surface of the ocean as well as my aching eyes would allow.
As a matter of fact, there actually were a few small scattered fragments of wreckage floating at no great distance from me, but there was no sign of a human being, far or near.  Then I scanned very carefully the horizon in every direction, but particularly to the northward, in the hope of discovering a sail of some sort heading toward me; but the horizon was bare, save to the southward, where the high land of Hayti loomed up with startling and quite deceptive distinctness.  Although I had hoped that I might perchance be so fortunate as to sight a sail, the hope was a very feeble one, and my disappointment by no means acute, for I was perfectly well aware that I was many miles too far to the eastward to render the appearance of a sail of any sort in the least degree probable.
With the pangs of hunger beginning to assail me, and not the smallest fragment of any kind of food wherewith to relieve them, I began for the first time to realise fully the exceeding awkwardness of my situation, and to realise, too, that if deliverance was to come to me I must bestir myself and do what might be possible to meet it, for to remain passively lashed to that inert piece of drifting wreckage might very well mean a slow and agonising death by starvation.  Yet, after all, what could I do?  The land was my nearest refuge, and that, I considered, must be at least twenty miles distant, altogether too far to dream of swimming to it, although I rather prided myself upon my prowess as a long-distance swimmer.  But twenty miles!  The idea was ridiculous, especially in that heavy sea, in my exhausted condition, without food, and with no means of getting any.  I looked rather longingly at the smaller fragments of wreckage floating in my neighbourhood; if I could but secure one of them of sufficient size to support me partially, yet not large enough materially to hamper my progress through the water, I might perhaps with its aid be able to accomplish the distance, great though it was, before my strength entirely gave out.  But the run of the sea and their greater buoyancy were already widening the distance between them and the comparatively massive piece to which I had lashed myself, and I regretted that it had not occurred to me earlier to abandon the mainmast in favour of one of them the moment that the light of dawn revealed them to me.
I struggled into a standing position on the spar that supported me, steadying myself upon my somewhat precarious perch by grasping the arms of the crosstrees, and carefully examined such fragments as came within my ken with the heave of the sea.  The detached pieces, which seemed to consist mostly of pieces of planking, with what looked very like a hatch, were all floating together, pretty much in a bunch, with only a few fathoms of water separating any two pieces; I thought that if I could but get in among them surely I ought to be able to find a piece that would serve my purpose.  The point that worried me was whether, in my exhausted state, and in so heavy a sea, I dared make the attempt to swim unaided the comparatively short distance that separated me from those coveted fragments; but I reflected that, if I had not the strength to achieve so simple a feat as that, I should certainly never be able to accomplish the longer swim, even with the advantage of a support; the choice seemed therefore to lie between the risk of drowning on the one hand, and that of starvation upon the other; and it took me but a moment to decide in favour of the former.  Yes, I told myself, better in every way to drown than to starve, and the sooner the matter was decided, the better.
To give myself the best possible chance I flung off my jacket and kicked off my shoes, retaining only my shirt and trousers.  Then, casting off the lashings by which I had secured myself to the shattered mainmast, I stood up, and carefully took the bearings of the _flotsam_ relative to the sun, to guide me when swimming.  This done, I poised myself upon the spar preparatory to diving off the mast, and had raised my hands above my head, when not half-a-dozen fathoms away, and immediately between me and the spot for which I was bound, I saw the dorsal fins of two enormous sharks sculling quietly to and fro, as though to blockade me and cut me off from my only hope of escape.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN.
MY VOYAGE ON THE HATCH.
I pulled myself up just in the nick of time, for in another second I should have made the plunge, and that would have meant death, a horrible death; for the splash which I should have made upon entering the water must have inevitably attracted the attention of the monsters and brought them upon me with a rush.  It almost appeared as though some malicious influence was at work to prevent my escape, as though fate was against me!  Yet, after all, it was not fate that was to blame, but my own dullness in not perceiving my chance and availing myself of it the moment that it presented itself.  If instead of vacillating, as I had done, I had promptly taken the plunge, I should have accomplished my short swim before the sharks had made their appearance and cut off my retreat.  When I first sighted the detached fragments of wreckage the distance which separated them from me was trifling; now it was at least double as far, and was increasing rapidly; soon it would pass out of sight altogether and my last hope would be gone.
I stood watching those two sharks as they swam lazily to and fro between me and the fast receding wreckage.  It really looked as though they were aware of my presence, had divined my purpose, and were determined to frustrate it.  For what seemed at least half-an-hour, but was probably not more than ten minutes, the voracious fish tacked this way and that, approaching me a little nearer every tack, until at length they were so close that I could have leapt upon the back of the nearer one, so close that I could distinctly see their entire bulk; and the sight turned my blood cold, for they were veritable monsters, one of them being fully twenty feet long from snout to the tip of the unevenly fluked tail, while the other was perhaps three feet shorter.  And there was now no room to doubt that they were fully aware of my existence, for every time that they passed me their great goggle eyes glared at me hungrily with an expression which seemed to say--"All right, my boy; you may hold on there as long as you like: but we will wait for you, and get you at last."
I began to cast about in my mind for some means by which I might drive the creatures away.  I had a knife with a long, strong, sharp blade, attached to my neck by a lanyard, and I looked about me to see if there was anything available which I could convert into a spear by lashing the knife to it; but there was nothing; and I was still puzzling my brain when suddenly the two fish paused in their patrol, swung quickly round, and the next instant made sail dead to windward, as though they had just caught the scent of some especially tempting morsel.
Now, if ever, was my time, I told myself; the brutes had undoubtedly left me, there were no other sharks in sight, and every second was precious; therefore, without allowing myself an instant for pause and hesitation, I quietly slid off the mainmast into the water and struck out smoothly and steadily for a certain knoll ashore, in line with which I had last seen the floating fragments that I desired to reach.
It was still blowing quite fresh, and there was a very heavy sea running; but it no longer broke badly, and it was in my favour, every sea that overtook me flinging me forward at least a couple of fathoms, so that I made excellent progress, as I ascertained when I turned for a moment to glance back at the mass of wreckage that I had just abandoned. I saw also that, whatever happened, I must keep on, there must be no thought of turning back, for while the run of the sea was helping me grandly in my progress to leeward, it was powerful enough to render return to my late refuge an impossibility; I, therefore, set my teeth and, with my eyes fixed upon the distant knoll which was to serve me as a guide, struck out with a long, quiet, steady stroke that I knew from experience I could maintain for hours on end, if need were.  Of course, I kept a very sharp lookout for the wreckage that I was aiming for, but saw nothing of it for a long time, and more than once a qualm of something very nearly approaching terror seized me, as the idea suggested itself that possibly I had missed my goal, and was every moment leaving it farther behind me.  I was fast approaching a state of panic that might very easily have resulted in fatal consequences, when it suddenly occurred to me that, of course, it would be quite impossible for me to see those insignificant fragments of flotsam, unless they and I each happened to be hove up on the crest of a wave at precisely the same moment, and the reflection so far steadied my nerves that I was able successfully to combat the almost irresistible impulse to put forth my whole strength in a frantic struggle to increase my speed through the water and quickly settle the question one way or the other.  My reward came to me some ten minutes later when, as I went soaring up on the breast of an unusually high wave, I caught a momentary glimpse of what was undoubtedly a small piece of plank of some sort floating in the midst of a lacework of foam on the crest of a wave immediately in line with the knoll by which I was directing my course, and which, like everything else at a greater distance than some fifty or sixty fathoms, I could only see when on the summit of a wave.  But the fragment of plank still seemed to be a terribly long way off, my strength was beginning to flag, and despair was again gripping at my heart when, as I rose upon the next sea, I was cheered by the quite unexpected sight of a considerable quantity of wreckage not more than a hundred fathoms distant.  The sight renewed my courage, my composure returned; I was once more calm enough to be able to husband my remaining strength and employ it to the best advantage; I found myself steadily gaining upon the objects of my pursuit; and finally, after a long and dreadfully exhausting struggle, I arrived in the midst of the wreckage.
The first thing I came to happened to be a seaman's chest, which had undoubtedly floated up through the hatchway when the schooner foundered. It floated deep, for in addition to being full of water it evidently contained several articles of the usual kind which a sailor takes to sea with him; but it had a sufficient reserve of buoyancy to afford me an appreciable measure of support, and I clung to it while recovering my breath and resting my wearied limbs after my long swim; it also enabled me to look round at my leisure and make up my mind as to which of the objects in sight would best serve my purpose.  There was one of the halves of the wheel grating floating at no great distance from me, but it was a small, thin affair, made of oak, possessing no very great amount of buoyancy, and, although it would undoubtedly be better than nothing at all, I quickly came to the conclusion that there were other pieces that would serve my purpose better.  There was, for instance, a hatch--probably one of the main hatches; and after some consideration I decided that I could not do better than secure possession of it.  But I wanted something else as well; I could not resign myself to the idea of merely supporting myself upon it and passively allowing the wind and sea to take me whithersoever they would; there was land in sight, and it was my purpose to reach it, if possible, therefore I required something in the nature of a paddle wherewith to propel my hatch and guide it in the right direction; and presently I saw a piece of splintered plank, about four-feet long and six inches wide, which looked more suited to my purpose than anything else in sight.  I had by this time quite recovered my breath, and was also somewhat rested; I, therefore, abandoned the chest without more ado, and, swimming first to the piece of plank, secured possession of it, and then, pushing it before me, headed for the hatch, which I soon reached.
To climb up on the hatch was a very much more difficult feat than I had imagined it would be, for my first efforts merely resulted in causing it to turn over; but at length, having considered the matter a little, I managed partly to guide it under me, and partly to climb up on it, until I had it fairly under me, when, to my great delight, I found that it was just buoyant enough to support my weight, and that by carefully seating myself cross-legged, tailor fashion, in the exact centre of it, I could keep it right side up.  I next experimented with my makeshift paddle, and although the hatch proved so terribly crank that I was several times in imminent danger of capsizing by the mere sway of my body from side to side, I presently acquired the trick of keeping my balance, and found, to my great delight, that I could actually progress, although only slowly and at the cost of great exertion.
Strangely enough, I had not thus far suffered very greatly from thirst, although something like eighteen hours had elapsed since the last draught had passed my lips; but my sense of hunger was by this time painfully acute.  I had no means, however, of satisfying my gnawing craving for food, and I, therefore, addressed myself to the task of paddling my tiny raft shoreward, fully convinced that the only hope of saving my life lay in reaching the land before the scanty remains of my strength became exhausted.
I estimated, from the height of the sun above the horizon, that it was about nine o'clock in the morning when I fairly started upon my shoreward voyage, and the exasperating slowness with which I drew away from the rest of the wreckage caused me to put my speed through the water at not more than a mile an hour at the utmost, while the grey misty appearance of the land for which I was making convinced me that it must be at least twenty miles distant; I had, therefore, something like another twenty-four hours of continuous laborious paddling before me before I might once more hope to feel the solid earth beneath my feet, and find something--were it no more than a little wild fruit--wherewith to stay my hunger.  But this was not all: the skin of my hands had become so exceedingly soft and tender through long immersion in the water that the sharp edges of the board which I was using as a paddle quickly caused them to blister, and although I paused long enough in my labours to enable me to trim those sharp edges away with my knife, and to work the board into somewhat more convenient shape, the blistering process continued until within about an hour my palms were quite raw, and smarting most atrociously from the salt in the water.  Moreover, I had lost my hat, and the sun struck down so fiercely upon my unprotected head that I was soon nearly delirious with headache and the throbbing of my old wound, received in the attack upon the pirate brigantine on the Costa Firme.  Still, headache or no headache, blisters or no blisters, there was the land, yet a long distance off, and it had to be reached before my strength gave out, or my life would pay the forfeit; so I set my teeth and paddled doggedly on, hour after hour, my hunger ever growing keener, while now I began to experience in addition the torments of thirst, my whole body became racked with aches and pains as though I had been unmercifully bruised and beaten, my head throbbed until it seemed as if it would burst open, and, as for my hands, they at length felt as though the rough paddle were white-hot iron; I had certainly never in all my life before experienced such a complication of agonising pains.  And, despite it all, the land seemed to draw never an inch nearer.
I think I must at length have become light-headed, for gradually a feeling stole over me that everything--my surroundings, my situation, and my suffering--was unreal; that I was the victim of a peculiarly ghastly and horrible nightmare; and that I should by and by be wakened fortunately to find that I was in my own bunk, and that the events of the past twenty-four hours had been nothing more than an exceptionally vivid and realistic dream.  From this state I was partially aroused by seeing a number of glittering objects start out of the sea all round me, while at the same instant I was conscious of receiving a sharp blow on the chest, when, on looking down into my lap, I saw a fine flying-fish wriggling and flapping there, making a gallant but ineffectual effort to hoist himself out of the hollow formed by my crossed legs, and return to the water.  For a second or two I stared stupidly down at the struggling creature, and then it seemed to dawn upon my dazed faculties that here at last was food, something that would at least mitigate for a time the fierce pangs of my gnawing hunger, and in a very frenzy of eagerness I clutched the unfortunate fish and bit savagely into its writhing body!
Yes, I know that the idea is inexpressibly repugnant, even revolting, yet I solemnly declare that never in my life before had I tasted anything so exquisitely delicious as that raw fish, never had I so keenly enjoyed a meal.  I am glad to believe that there will be very few who can sympathise with or appreciate my enjoyment; for, reader, you must have experienced the first agonies of starvation--which are the worst--before you can do so.  But, revolting or not, I am profoundly convinced that I owe my life to that meal, for my senses returned to me at once upon its completion; and although with them there also returned a full appreciation of the acuteness of my physical discomfort, I felt distinctly revived and reinvigorated.  Moreover, with the full return of my senses I became aware that, after all, my painful efforts had not been nearly so ineffectual as I had imagined them to be, the land being now appreciably nearer than it had been at daylight that morning, a few of its bolder details being now visible.
And now once more I was sufficiently rational to take cognisance of the flight of time.  I was not at all certain of my bearings, but I felt that the sun must certainly have crossed the meridian--that the eternity of suffering through which I had passed could never have been compressed into a short half-hour or so--and if I was correct in this surmise the hour must be somewhere about three o'clock in the afternoon.
Three o'clock in the afternoon!  And the land still so far away that many further hours of toil and agony must be endured ere I might hope to reach it!  My brain reeled again at the mere prospect of it, and in a perfect frenzy of despair I resumed my paddle, crying aloud mad, incoherent prayers to God that He would either send me help in my extremity, or mercifully put an immediate end to my sufferings.  Then another thought came to torment me: in something like three hours the sun would set, darkness would encompass me about, and if the sky should become obscured with clouds and the stars be hidden, how should I continue to find my way?  At that idea I looked about me--my mind had been too confused, and too busily occupied with other matters to take intelligent note of the weather during the last few hours--and I was somewhat relieved to observe that the sky was now clear, save for a few scattered, solemnly drifting clouds, that the weather had a tolerably settled appearance, that the wind had moderated to quite a gentle breeze, and that the sea had gone down very considerably and was no longer breaking.  This certainly was a point in my favour, since I was not any longer in momentary peril of being capsized or washed off my frail ark; but the advantage was to a certain extent counterbalanced by the fact that the run of the sea was not materially helping me.
Wearily yet desperately I continued to ply my clumsy paddle, first on this side and then on the other, and with alarming rapidity my sufferings seemed to grow in acuteness until I found myself moaning and uttering short, sharp cries of distress with every movement of my body, ay, and with every breath I drew; for now, to add to my discomfort, I suddenly became aware that my lungs were in some way affected, and that the mere act of breathing seemed to tear them asunder.  Yet, though my situation appeared to be so utterly hopeless, I doggedly persevered in my efforts, telling myself over and over again, out loud, that if I would but hold out long enough I must, in the natural order of things, eventually reach the shore and succour.  I think it was about this time that I finally lost control of myself, for thenceforward I was conscious that I was continually talking to myself--in a hoarse, guttural croak, that even now I shudder to call to mind--now arguing, now encouraging, now reproaching myself, until at length my ideas wandered away to all sorts of incongruous subjects; and by turns I detected myself laughing, singing, praying, apostrophising the sun, the clouds, the distant land, and even the spirits of my drowned companions, whom I imagined to be crowding round me and trying to drag me off the floating hatch.  I was aware, in a vague, impersonal fashion, of the gradual decline of the sun toward the west, of his disappearance beneath the horizon, and of the fact that just as the outlines of the land ahead were fading into the gathering darkness a small spark of light sprang into view somewhere in the direction that I was steering for, and then suddenly all grew black about me, there was a singing in my ears--and oblivion.
When consciousness returned, and I opened my eyes, I found myself stretched upon a bed in a large and lofty room, very barely furnished, there being nothing in the apartment save the bed upon which I lay, a large old-fashioned wardrobe, a dressing-table, a small round table by my bedside, and two massive carved chairs upholstered in stamped leather which showed signs of having seen many years of service.  It was night, apparently, for the only illumination came from a large handsome lamp that had the appearance of being wrought out of silver.  One of the two chairs in the room stood by the side of my bed, and was occupied by a very respectable-looking negress of some forty years of age, or thereabout, sound asleep.  Two jugs, one of porcelain and one of cut glass, stood on the table, in company with a large tumbler and a cup with a spoon in it.  The glass jug was three-parts full of lemonade, if my eyes did not deceive me, and the sight of it suddenly caused me to become acutely conscious of the fact that I was athirst.  Had the negress been awake I would have asked her to give me a drink, but seeing that she was sleeping the sleep of the just I decided to help myself, and with that intent essayed to raise myself in bed.  But I might as well have attempted to lift the house itself, for when I came to move I discerned, to my consternation, that I was so weak I could scarcely stir hand or foot, much less raise my entire body.  In my alarm and distress I unwittingly gave vent to a feeble groan, which, faint as it was, proved sufficient to arouse my attendant, who stirred in her chair, adjusted her turban, and then, rising to her feet, leaned over the bed and peered down into my face.  For some seconds she stood thus, when-- her eyes having adjusted themselves to the rather dim light of the lamp--she perceived that I was awake.
"Ah!" she murmured, in a half whisper, in Spanish, "the Senor is at length himself again, thanks be to all the blessed saints!  And how are you feeling, Senor?"
"Very thirsty," I replied, in the same language, which I spoke fairly well, and to my amazement, though I had intended to speak out loud, my voice was no more than a scarcely audible whisper, which the negress had to bend her head to catch.
"_Bueno_!" she ejaculated, with every evidence of keen satisfaction; "the Senor is thirsty--and he has the Spanish.  He shall drink, and then,"--she laid her hand upon my forehead, and I now discovered, to my further astonishment, that my head was swathed in bandages--"yes, then the medicine, and more sleep."
So saying, she filled the big tumbler with lemonade--how delicious it looked with the thin shreds of lemon and the leaves of mint floating on its surface!--passed her arm very gently beneath my shoulders, raised me to a semi-sitting posture, and applied the tumbler to my lips.
Oh! how good, how delicious, how refreshing was that long, cool draught; how grateful to the parched palate its exquisite acidity of flavour! You talk of nectar; but my belief at that moment was that nectar was merely lemonade under another name!  I smacked my lips audibly as I gasped for breath after emptying the tumbler, and my sable friend smiled with satisfaction.  Then, still holding me, she poured about a wine-glassful of very dark-brown--almost black--liquid from the porcelain jug into the cup and presented it to me.  This, too, I drank, for I was still thirsty; but the "medicine" was by no means so palatable as the lemonade, being of an exceedingly pungent, bitter taste, and I am afraid I made a rather wry face as the negress removed the cup from my lips.
"Ah!" she murmured smilingly, "the Senor does not like that so well as the lemonade, but it is nevertheless the better drink of the two, for it will kill the fever in his blood and give him back his strength, while the lemonade merely refreshes."
Then, as she gently laid me back on my pillow, and adjusted the sheet-- my only covering--about my throat, she continued: "Now the Senor must sleep; and when he awakes Mama Elisa will have some nice nourishing broth ready for him--very good, ah! very good indeed, to make him strong again."
Whether it was the comfort and refreshment that followed the slaking of my thirst, the effect of the medicine which my kind-hearted nurse had administered, or the cooling night breeze that swept in through the open window and played freely over me, I cannot say,--possibly it might have been a combination of the three,--but, whatever the cause, true it is that my head was scarcely back on the pillow before I sank into a profound and most refreshing sleep, refreshing both to mind and body; for during the hours of unconsciousness that followed my brain remained absolutely quiescent, and I was no longer disturbed or harassed by the vague yet terrifying phantasies, dim memories of which had haunted me during the few minutes of my wakefulness.
When I next opened my eyes the room in which I lay was flooded with brilliant sunshine, that streamed in through a large open window in the wall that faced me, and which also freely admitted an indescribably refreshing breeze, richly laden with the mingled perfumes of a tropical garden.  A spray of rose bush, laden with magnificent crimson blooms, swished to and fro before the window, swayed by the breeze, and wafted dashes of its scent-laden breath toward me; and beyond it there stretched a vista of flowering shrubs, orange and banana trees, the straight smooth stems of palms, part of the gigantic trunk of a silk-cotton tree springing from a smooth sward of guinea grass; and beyond it again a thicket of bamboo, the delicate feathery foliage of which closed the view.  Splendid butterflies flitted hither and thither, a few humming-birds, poised upon their swiftly-fanning wings, hung over the flowering plants, like living gems, sipping the nectar of the blooms; and occasionally a brilliant green lizard would dart along the broad window-sill in chase of a fly.
For several minutes I lay quite motionless, lost in admiration of the beauty of the picture upon which my eyes rested, and inhaling long breaths of the perfumed air that played about me; then a swiftly awaking consciousness that I was distinctly hungry caused me to turn my head toward the chair which Mama Elisa had occupied when I fell asleep.  The chair was still occupied, not by Mama Elisa, however, but by a quadroon girl of about seventeen years of age, clad in the usual garb of the coloured women, namely, a sort of loose chemise of white cotton, and a petticoat, printed in a kind of Paisley pattern, which reached to a little below her knees.  Her long black hair hung in two thick plaits down far below her waist; she wore massive gold earrings in her small shapely ears; a necklace of big amber beads encircled her finely-modelled neck, and her otherwise bare feet were shod in low-cut crimson morocco slippers.  When I first glimpsed her she was leaning back in a chair, idly waving a palm-leaf fan, while her fine dark eyes gazed abstractedly, and with a somewhat sad expression, methought, upon the brilliant picture presented by the open window; but as I stared she started to her feet and bent over me, gazing intently into my eyes; then she laid her soft, shapely hand for a moment upon my brow, withdrew it again, and murmured, in pure, rich Castilian:
"The Senor is better.  He has slept long and well.  His skin is cool; the fever has gone.  And he is hungry; is it not so?"
I nodded.
"Good!" she exclaimed, with a smile of satisfaction that disclosed two rows of small, perfectly-shaped teeth.  "I will go and tell Mama Elisa."
And before I could say a word, or ask a question, she had vanished through a door in the wall against which stood the head of my bed.
A minute later in came Mama Elisa, smiling all over her honest, still good-looking face, bearing in her hands a large, massive tray, which looked as though it might be solid silver.  This tray was draped with a cloth of snow-white damask, upon which were symmetrically arranged a small silver bowl, the steaming contents of which emitted a most savoury, appetising odour, a spoon, a small cruet, a plate upon which lay a slice of white bread and another of dry toast, and a wine-glass containing some liquid of a rich ruby colour, that might possibly be port wine.
"Aha!" she cheerily exclaimed, as she placed the tray and its contents upon the table by the side of the bed, "it is easy to see that the Senor is better; his eyes are brighter; the long sleep has done him good.  And now he needs only plenty of nourishing food and careful nursing to set him again upon his feet.  Teresita tells me that you are hungry, Senor-- which is another good sign.  Do you think you could take a little broth, Senor?"
I replied that I had very little doubt upon that point, whereupon the good soul proceeded to crumble a small quantity of the bread into the steaming bowl, after which, slipping her arm under my shoulder and very tenderly raising me, she supported my body against her ample bosom as she fed me from the bowl, a spoonful at a time, coaxing me between whiles to nibble at the toast.  The broth was delicious, whatever it might have been made of--I was in no mood to ask the question--and to my own surprise and Mama's intense gratification I consumed it--in quantity about half-a-pint--to the last drop, and also ate about half a slice of toast.  Then came the wine-glass of ruby-coloured liquid, which proved to be, as I had anticipated, port wine, rich and generous, seeming to fill me with new life.  And when I had finished my meal and had drained another bumper of lemonade, Teresita was summoned to assist in the process of washing my face and hands and inducting me into clean linen, after which followed another long sleep.
My progress toward recovery was now rapid, although I soon learned that my escape from death had been little short of miraculous.  Naturally, as soon as my reason returned to me, and I was strong enough to engage in conversation, I began to inquire where I was, and how I came to be there; but for the first three or four days after the events above described my nurses, Mama Elisa and Teresita, refused to tell me anything save that I was with friends.  But at length, when I had so far recovered as to be able to sit up in bed without assistance, Mama Elisa took compassion upon me and proceeded to satisfy my curiosity.  She informed me first, that the gale in which the _Wasp_ foundered had occurred more than three weeks previously!  Then she proceeded to say that on the second day after the gale had moderated, the sea having by that time gone down sufficiently to permit the fishermen once more to proceed to sea in their canoes, one Tomasso, a negro--formerly a slave but now a freeman, in the service of Senor Don Luis Fernando Maria Calderon y Albuquerque, owner of the Bella Vista estate--had sallied forth from a certain small cove on the estate for the purpose of procuring a supply of fish, as usual.  After having been thus engaged for some hours, with very scant success, Tomasso had decided to try his luck farther out; and while padding to seaward his attention had been attracted by the appearance of something floating about a mile away. Paddling in that direction, in the hope that what he saw might be worth picking up, he had at length come alongside the hatchway, with me upon it, in a state of collapse.  The negroes on the island had risen in insurrection against the whites only some six years previously, while slavery had been abolished only about four years, the relations between the blacks and the whites on the island were consequently still greatly strained, and many a negro, finding one in that helpless state, would have callously left me to die.  Tomasso, however, luckily for me, was not one of that sort: he had always been well treated by his master, and therefore felt no animus against the whites; consequently as soon as he found that a spark of life still remained in my body, he transferred me to his canoe and, abandoning for the moment all further thought of fishing, paddled back to the shore.  Then, hauling his canoe up on the beach, he had hastened to the house and acquainted his master, Don Luis, with his find.  The latter, a generous, humane, high-spirited fellow, and as noble a specimen of the Spanish hidalgo as one need wish to meet, at once hastened down to the cove and, upon perceiving my condition, gave immediate orders that I was to be carried up to the house, put to bed, and everything possible done to save my life.  The nearest reliable doctor being at Santiago, over forty miles distant, on the other side of the mountains, he had quickly decided to put me in the hands of Mama Elisa, born upon his estate, of amply proved fidelity, and marvellously skilled in the use of herbs and the treatment of disease, with the result that, having battled for a fortnight with the raging fever that almost immediately developed itself, she had at length triumphantly brought me to the point of convalescence.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN.
A NIGHT ALARM.
Having heard Mama Elisa's story, the next thing I wanted was, naturally, to see Don Luis and thank him for his extraordinary kindness to me, a stranger, and more than that, an enemy.  Accordingly, upon being informed of my desire, and learning from Mama Elisa that I was now well enough to receive a visitor, my host presented himself at my bedside that same evening, and expressed the very great pleasure he felt at finding me making such good progress toward recovery.  He accepted my expressions of gratitude with much graciousness, professed himself happy to have been the means of saving the life of a fellow creature, begged me to regard himself, his house, and everything that belonged to him as entirely at my service for as long as I might be pleased to make use of them, and then said he would be glad to learn how I came to be in the plight in which Tomasso had found me, if I felt equal to the task of telling the story.  I thought that, for a moment, he looked a trifle disconcerted when I mentioned the fact that I was a British naval officer; but, if so, the expression was quickly suppressed, and he listened with deep attention and much sympathy to my story of our falling in with and boarding the _Santa Brigitta_, our subsequent fight with the pirate schooner, and the foundering of the _Wasp_ during the gale.
Somewhat to my surprise, he was quite a young man, scarcely more than thirty years of age.  I had somehow got it into my head that, being the owner of so fine an estate as Bella Vista, he must of necessity be at least a middle-aged, if not an elderly man; but I understood when he explained that the estate had originally been purchased, and afterwards developed, by his father, who, I now learned, had perished in the insurrection of 1791.
At length, after we had been chatting together for fully an hour, Mama Elisa intervened, protesting that I had been sufficiently excited for one day, and quite unceremoniously ordered her master out of the room; upon which Don Luis, laughing heartily at his favourite servant's brusqueness, shook me cordially by the hand, hoped I should soon be well enough to quit my sick chamber, and informed me that he would now do himself the pleasure to visit me for a few minutes daily, if only for the purpose of assuring himself that Mama Elisa had not poisoned me with any of her vile concoctions.  After which parting shot at Mama he effected a masterly retreat.
From this time onward I mended rapidly, and on the sixth day after Don Luis's first visit I was well enough to rise from my bed and leave my room for an hour or two.  And now I should have been in a ludicrous difficulty in the matter of clothes--for the scanty garments in which I had come ashore were not only ruined by long immersion in sea water, but were also in rags--had it not been for the fortunate circumstance that Don Luis and I were, as nearly as possible of the same height, which enabled him generously to place his wardrobe at my disposal.  But while Don Luis was a fine, square-shouldered, well-built fellow, I had shrunk to little more than a skeleton, so that although the clothes fitted me well enough as to their lateral dimensions, in other respects they made me look pretty much of a scarecrow, and I could not avoid seeing the ghost of a smile flickering in Don Luis's eyes when, upon my first appearance in public, so to speak, he presented me in due form to his wife, Dona Inez.  But there was no smile on that sweet lady's lips, nor in her eyes as they fell upon me and noted the evidences of suffering in my hollow cheeks and wasted form; on the contrary, she was at once all commiseration and sympathy as she expressed her gratification that it had fallen to the lot of one of her people to find me in the hour of my need, and to bring me to the shelter of her roof instead of leaving me to perish, as might very well have happened had the fisherman who found me been any other than Tomasso.
She was quite a young woman, not more than twenty-five, I thought; a typical Spaniard, with dark melting eyes shaded by very long, curving lashes, an immense quantity of black glossy hair, a clear colourless skin, _petite_, handsome, and exceedingly graceful in her every movement; but, even better than all that, she was kind, gentle in her manner, tender-hearted and sympathetic, and appeared to be absolutely idolised by every man, woman, and child upon the estate.
She received me in her drawing-room, a fine, lofty, spacious apartment occupying approximately half the width of the front part of the house, the other half being occupied by the dining-room, between which and the drawing-room there was a fine hall, roomy enough to be used as a lounge, and very cool and pleasant, since the house stood on the slope of a hill, facing north, and overlooking the sea, while the wide front door stood always open, freely admitting the sea-breeze.  The drawing-room was a really handsome room, the floor being of some very beautiful native wood, polished to the brilliancy of a mirror, and covered here and there with mats, rugs, and skins; the walls, of polished satin-wood, arranged in panels, were hung with a few very fine pictures; a few small tables, loaded with miniatures and native curiosities, were arranged apparently haphazard about the room; there was a large, low couch, and about a dozen lounging chairs, and a piece of fancy work and a very handsome guitar lay upon the couch.
The large French casement was wide-open, giving access to a wide gallery reaching right athwart the house from side to side, and shaded from the direct rays of the sun by an overhanging veranda; and into this gallery I was taken, inducted into a low, spacious basket chair, well equipped with cushions, and made thoroughly comfortable: the Senora seating herself on one side of me, and Don Luis establishing himself on the other, each of them obviously doing their utmost to make me feel thoroughly at home.  And oh! it was good to sit out there feeling the soft, warm breeze playing about me, to drink in the perfume-laden air, and to gaze abroad upon the sun-bathed, gently sloping lawns interspersed here and there with neat, symmetrically shaped flower-beds, gay with luxuriant, rainbow-tinted blooms, to watch the tall palms swaying as the wind swept through their clashing fronds, to note the magnificent butterflies and the brilliant-plumaged birds flitting hither and thither, with the blue foam-flecked sea, mottled with rich purple cloud shadows, stretching away to the far horizon.  I was allowed to sit there for two hours, drawing in renewed health with every breath; and then Mama Elisa and Teresita, her lieutenant, swooped down upon me, declaring that I must not be further fatigued, and marched me back to my room, put me to bed, gave me a dainty little meal of broth and the breast of a roasted chicken, administered a stiff dose of some new concoction, characterised chiefly by its superlative nastiness, and then left me to go to sleep, which I did with amazing promptitude.
This sort of thing continued for a fortnight, my "sitting-up" time being gradually extended until on the fourteenth day Mama Elisa, my medico-in-chief, pronounced me well enough to turn out for second breakfast and to stay up for the remainder of the day.  Then, as I gradually recovered my strength, came little walks in the company of Don Luis, Dona Inez, or perhaps both together, at first for a few yards only, as far as a certain flower-bed and back, then to some point near at hand from which a specially charming vista was to be obtained, and finally up into the mountains for a distance of a mile or so.
By the time that this stage of my convalescence was reached I had arrived at the conclusion that it was high time I should think of relieving my kind benefactors of my company, and return to duty, and on a certain day I took advantage of the circumstance of being alone with my host to mention the matter, and to ask him if he could put me in the way of obtaining a passage back to Jamaica, explaining that although, as he was aware, I had not a single coin in my possession, I could pay my passage-money immediately upon my arrival at Port Royal.
"My dear fellow," said Don Luis, laying his hand almost affectionately upon my shoulder, "I knew of course that this must come, sooner or later; we could not reasonably expect to keep you with us always--you naturally desire to return to your profession and your duty as early as possible; but do you not think that you are just a little hasty, a little over-eager, in mentioning this matter to me so soon?  After all, you know, you are by no means well, as yet; your strength is no doubt equal to a leisurely walk of two or three miles about the neighbourhood; but do you really think that you are strong enough to return at once to the hardship and exposure of a sailor's life?"
"Yes," I said; "I certainly think so; indeed, I believe I am a great deal stronger than you seem to imagine.  Besides, it is quite possible that I may not be sent to sea again immediately upon my return; there may be no ship for me just at the moment when I next turn up at Port Royal, and in that case I may have a short spell of shore duty before again going afloat.  But, in any case, I am anxious to return and report to the Admiral the unfortunate result of my encounter with the pirates, and undergo my trial by court-martial for the loss of the _Wasp_."
"Your trial by court-martial?" he gasped.  "Surely you do not mean to say that your countrymen will be so cruel as to treat you as a criminal, simply because you were inadequately equipped to cope with an overwhelmingly superior force, and because, after beating off that force, a storm happened to arise ere you had time to make suitable preparation for it?  The idea is monstrous, absolutely monstrous!"
I was about to explain to Don Luis that it is a custom of the British Navy to try the officers who are unfortunate enough to lose their ship, no matter what the circumstances may be, but he would not let me speak; he was so full of indignation at what he evidently considered the rank injustice of the thing, and so eager to avail himself of the lever which it seemed to afford for pressing home upon me a certain proposition which he now sprang upon me, that he would not suffer me to utter a single word by way of explanation.
"Wait, my dear fellow, wait!" he exclaimed.  "What you have just told me affords me the opportunity to mention what Dona Inez and I have discussed together more than once, without any real hope, however, of being able to bring it to pass.  Now, however, I find that if you go back you must surrender yourself a prisoner, and be tried as a criminal for what was certainly no fault of yours, I will speak what is in my mind.  Why go back at all?  Why not give up the sea, remain here, and be my trusted friend and right-hand man in the management of the estate?  I very badly need some one like yourself, some one in whom I can place the most absolute trust; for the estate is altogether too big for me to manage single-handed; and my overseers, while they are good enough men in their way, and no doubt understand their business, are scarcely the kind of men whom I could put upon an equality with myself, or admit to the house and to intimacy with Dona Inez.  You, however, are different; you are a gentleman, and although an Englishman--"
"Thanks, Don Luis; a thousand thanks for your extraordinarily friendly and generous proposal," I interrupted; "but what you suggest is impossible.  I must return to Port Royal, at all costs; my honour demands it.  And, as to your exceedingly kind offer, all I can say is that not even to accept it would I give up a profession to which I am so greatly attached, and of which I am so inexpressibly proud.  I am afraid I shall never be able to make you and the Senora understand how deeply moved I am, how profoundly grateful for this really remarkable proof of your kindly feeling toward me, but--"
"Quite so," interrupted my companion, again laying his hand upon my shoulder; "you need say no more; I think I understand.  Since you feel that you really must go I will not make any further effort to tempt you, but, on the contrary, will do everything I possibly can to assist your wishes.  I will ask you, however, my dear young friend, not to make any reference to this conversation in the presence of Dona Inez; for I am convinced that if she were to become aware that I had actually made this proposal to you, and that you had felt yourself bound to reject it, she would be profoundly disappointed."
We then changed the subject, Don Luis promising to send one of his negroes into the little town of Puerto Plata, some twenty miles distant, to make inquiry as to the possibility of my being able to obtain passage on board one of the small vessels that occasionally traded between that port and Kingston.  At the same time the generous fellow gave me to understand that his purse was entirely at my disposal for the purpose of defraying all necessary expenses, and that the loan could be repaid at my own convenience.
The negro messenger was duly dispatched on the following morning; and then, as he was not expected back until the evening of the third day, I had to possess my soul in patience; meanwhile Don Luis, who seemed to have taken a most extraordinary liking for me, allowed matters on the estate practically to look after themselves while he and Dona Inez gave themselves up almost entirely to me, taking me short walks into the adjacent country, and showing me as much as possible of its beauties.
It was on the second night after the occurrence of the above-recorded conversation--or rather in the early hours of the following morning-- that I was awakened out of a deep sleep by the sound of galloping hoofs, evidently approaching the house, and before I had found time to rub the sleep out of my eyes and sit up in bed, wondering meanwhile what such unusual sounds might portend, I heard the animals sweep past the end of the house and pull up, with much snorting and scattering of gravel, before the front door; and the next moment footsteps--apparently of several people--were heard ascending the front steps, crossing the wide gallery running along the front of the house, and entering the hall by way of the front door, which stood open day and night, except in bad weather.  Then a strong voice pealed out, in Spanish--and methought there was a note of panic in it--
"Hola, there!  Don Luis--Don Luis, where are you, man?  Arise, I pray you, and at once.  I have momentous news for you."
"Who is it?  What is it?"  I heard Don Luis exclaim, and then came the creak of the bedstead in the adjoining room as the good man leapt from it; and I heard him busy with the flint and steel, endeavouring to obtain a light.
"It is I--de Mendouca," answered the strange voice, "I and my family. The negroes from the mountains are out again, and, being warned that they were making for Montpelier, I abandoned the place, took horse, and came on here to warn you."
"_Ave Maria_!"  Don Luis exclaimed, as he seemed to be scrambling into his clothes.  "The negroes out again!  I heard that they were showing signs of unrest.  I will be with you in a moment.  Nay, do not be alarmed, _carissima_, the danger is certainly not immediate; you will have ample time to rise and dress at your leisure."
"Oho!" thought I.  "Danger, eh?  It is time for me to be making a muster."  I therefore rolled out of bed and, without waiting to strike a light, felt for my clothes, scrambled into them, and made my way to the entrance hall just as Don Luis, having joined his unexpected visitors, had succeeded in lighting the great hall lamp.
The strangers were five in number, and I was hurriedly presented to each of them in turn.  First, there was Don Esteban de Mendouca, a tall, thin, cadaverous-looking man, with intensely dark eyes, a thin crop of hair, exceedingly long moustache with thin, drooping ends, and a pointed Vandyke beard, all dark, but beginning to be sprinkled with grey.  Then there was Dona Christina, his wife, a small woman, as dark as her husband, but with a perfectly preserved complexion--fat, and fifty if a day.  Next there was Don Pedro de Mendouca, Don Esteban's elder son, a very proud and haughty-looking man of about twenty-seven years of age; Don Silvio, his brother, some three years younger, and exceedingly like his elder brother, but with a much more agreeable expression of countenance; and lastly, but by no means least in attractiveness, Senorita Eugenia, Don Esteban's daughter, a most lovely young woman of about seventeen years of age, exquisitely fair, and with a pair of melting blue eyes.  They all acknowledged the introduction with that stately courtesy which seems natural to the Spaniard; and then, as Don Esteban began his brief story, I had time to take a good look at them all.  It was easy enough to see that they had risen from their beds and fled in the utmost haste, for the toilette of each had been very inadequately performed; but despite this the predominating impression which they produced upon me was distinctly favourable.  Indeed, the only thing of which I in the least disapproved was the demeanour of Don Pedro de Mendouca, which struck me as being a good deal more haughty and arrogant than there was any excuse for.  The circumstance that, I think, surprised me most was that these people should have fled in such apparent unreasoning panic, abandoning a fine property and absolutely all that they possessed, excepting the horses they had ridden and the clothes they stood up in, to a parcel of lawless negroes.  I was soon to learn, however, that it was not lack of courage that had inspired their flight.
"I have no doubt, Don Luis," began Don Esteban, "that you, like myself, have heard rumours of late that the negroes up in the mountains were again beginning to show signs of unrest.  But, so far at least as I was concerned, those rumours have been so exceedingly vague and contradictory that I paid little or no attention to them; for, as you are, of course, aware, scarcely a month passes over our heads but some story of an impending outbreak reaches us.  Yet it has never come, and I think we have at last all grown to regard the rumours as mere idle talk, without foundation or justification.  Consequently I was not only very greatly surprised, but also distinctly incredulous, when one of my house boys aroused me shortly after midnight to-night with the intelligence that the negroes were actually out, and that practically all my own people had abandoned their huts and gone forth to join them!  It was this latter circumstance which alarmed me; and when, a little later, I had verified the statement I came to the conclusion that the time for action had arrived, and accordingly we saddled up and came away without further ado.  As we came along my sons and I discussed the situation, and ultimately decided that the proper thing, and also the best thing, would be to make for Bella Vista in the first instance, inform you of the facts, and learn your views as to the situation."
"Were you able to learn in what strength the blacks have turned out?" demanded Don Luis.
"No," answered Don Esteban, "I was not; but we know from experience that when they begin these raids they usually divide themselves into a number of small bands, attacking in several directions simultaneously, and depending upon being reinforced by the negroes on the estates which they purpose to attack.  Thus, for example, whatever may have been the original strength of the band which set out to attack Montpelier, they have already been augmented by two hundred of my people.  Probably they now muster about two hundred and fifty altogether--not more, I should say.  Ah! look yonder.  Do you see that blaze?  That is Montpelier. They have already plundered the house and set it on fire, so you see we did not get away from it any too early."
Looking out through the open door at the back of the house, which could be seen from the hall, we beheld a small, flickering spark of fire, well up on the lower slopes of the mountain, which, even as we gazed, waxed in size and brilliancy.  Snatching up a powerful telescope that always hung ready to hand in the hall, and bringing it to bear upon the spark, I was able to make out that it was indeed a large house, from the windows and thatched roof of which flames were bursting in momentarily increasing volumes, while round about it a crowd of negroes were apparently dancing a dance of savage delight at the destruction which they were effecting.
"Yes," I said, as I laid down the glass, "that is undoubtedly your house, Don Esteban; I distinctly remember Dona Inez pointing it out to me while we were out for a walk about a week ago."
At this moment Dona Inez, fully attired, emerged from her room, and there was instantly a cordial interchange of salutations between her and our visitors.  Then she turned to me and asked:
"What was that I heard you say just now, Don Ricardo?  Surely not that Montpelier is in flames?"
"I deeply regret to say that you heard aright, Senora.  Look yonder; you may see the blaze for yourself.  And the blacks are dancing round it like so many demons," I answered.
Dona Inez clasped her hands together and wrung them in distress.
"Oh, Don Esteban--Dona Christina--I am so sorry for you all," she exclaimed.  "It is horrible; and they will be here next.  What do you intend to do, Luis?  Must we really run away and leave this beautiful place to be destroyed and ourselves ruined?  Is there nothing that can be done to save it?"
"I will not go so far as to say that," answered Don Luis; "on the contrary, I am strongly indisposed to abandon it without a struggle. What say you, Don Ricardo?" turning to me.  "You are a fighting man; do you think this house is capable of being defended successfully against an armed but undisciplined rabble of some three hundred blacks?"
"That depends entirely upon how strong a garrison you can muster, my dear friend," answered I.  "So far as the house itself is concerned I believe that, given, say, a couple of hours for preparation, it might be put into a very excellent state of defence; but that would be no good at all unless you could raise a garrison of, let us say, thirty fighting men, and at least as many non-combatants to act as loaders, ambulance party, and so on."
"Thirty fighters, and thirty non-combatants," returned Don Luis. "Surely that might be managed.  Why, my `boys' number more than three hundred, nine-tenths of whom were born and bred upon the estate.  A few of them might possibly desert--perhaps twenty-five per cent of them, to put the figure at its very highest; but I feel certain that the bulk of them would stand by me through thick and thin; they have everything to lose and nothing to gain by going over to the outlaws.  Oh yes, I am convinced that there should be no difficulty in the matter of raising a sufficient number of fighters."
"So far, then, so good," said I.  "The next question is that of weapons--firearms especially.  I am afraid, my dear Don Luis, you will scarcely be able to raise thirty guns, with adequate ammunition for the same."
"Ah, true," answered Don Luis, "I had not thought of that.  Still--now, let me think a moment--"
"I may as well tell you here," cut in Don Esteban, "that although we could not see our way to defend Montpelier successfully, my sons and I have each brought our guns with us, and they of course will be available, should you decide to make a stand and defend the house."
"But, my dear Don Esteban, you will need them for your own protection on your way to--to--wherever you propose to make for; unless, of course, you choose to throw in your lot with us, which would perhaps be scarcely more dangerous than the attempt to reach one of the towns.  For the news of this rising will spread among the negroes like wildfire, and--"
"Precisely," cut in Don Esteban again.  "That is exactly my own thought. Therefore, if our presence here will not embarrass you we will gladly remain and take our chance with you."
"My dear Don Esteban," exclaimed Don Luis, "let me hasten to assure you that nothing could possibly give me greater satisfaction than to have the assistance of yourself and your two gallant sons at this critical juncture in my fortunes."
"Then that is settled," exclaimed I, breaking in rather ruthlessly, I am afraid, upon Don Luis' compliments, for which, I considered, there was scant time just then.  "That makes three guns to start with.  Now, how many more can we muster?"
"Four of my overseers have two guns each, while the remaining two have one each," answered Don Luis.  "And each of them possesses a brace of good serviceable pistols in addition.  Then, as for me, you must know, my dear Don Ricardo, that firearms are rather a weakness of mine; whenever I see an especially good gun I buy it, if I can, consequently I have a very fair selection in my gun-room, probably about twenty in all, as well as a few brace of pistols, duelling and otherwise."
"Oh, but that is excellent," I exclaimed; "far better than I dared expect.  And as to ammunition?"
"I think you will find that we have as much of that as we are at all likely to need, for I always make a point of keeping an ample supply in stock," answered Don Luis.
"Good!" answered I.  "The next point to determine is the identity of your garrison.  First, there is Don Esteban and his two sons; that makes three.  Then there is you and myself--five.  Will your six overseers fight, think you, Don Luis?"
"Oh yes, without a doubt," answered Don Luis.  "They are most excellent fellows, and devoted to me."
"Then, so far, we muster eleven," said I.  "We want nineteen more fighters, and at least thirty good, steady non-fighters, men who can be depended upon to retain their coolness and do exactly as they are told during the confusion and excitement of a fiercely contested fight.  Now, Don Luis, can you lay your hand upon forty-nine men of the kind I have indicated--men who are trustworthy enough to be admitted inside these walls at a moment when treachery on the part of any one of them would probably be fatal to us all?"
Don Luis flushed and looked almost angrily at me as I suggested the possibility of treachery on the part of any of his people.
"Really, Don Ricardo," he exclaimed, "put as you put it, you almost make me tremble at the vastness of the responsibility that I am about to undertake.  But you shall see.  I will at once go down to the huts, choose my men, and bring them up here for your approval."  And with that shot at me he walked out at the back door and disappeared into the darkness, while Don Silvio, at his father's request, went out to lead the horses round to the stables, and bring in the guns.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.
THE ATTACK ON BELLA VISTA.
Some twenty-five minutes later Don Luis returned; and so colourless were his lips, so wild his eyes, so dreadfully agitated his entire appearance that I saw in a moment something had gone very radically wrong somewhere.  Dona Inez saw it too, and approaching, laid her hand soothingly upon his arm as she anxiously asked:
"What is it, Luis?  What is the matter, _mi querido_?  Tell me; I can bear it."
"I could never have believed it!" ejaculated Don Luis, clasping his hands in front of him and wringing them, in his distress and disappointment.  "I have always believed every one of my negroes to be absolutely faithful to me; yet now, upon the news that the outlaws are out, more than half of them have left me, and quite possibly will, an hour or two hence, be joining in the attack upon this house.  The ungrateful wretches, the--!"
"Precisely," I cut in; "they are all that and more.  But what about those who remain?  Are any of them trustworthy enough to be permitted to assist us; or must we do the best we can without them?"
"Oh no," answered Don Luis emphatically.  "Thank God, I can trust every one of those who remain.  And, as for the forty-nine whom I have chosen to come into the house to help us--well, I am going to demonstrate the extent of my faith in them by placing all our lives at their mercy.  Oh yes; I have no shadow of doubt, so far as they are concerned."
"Very well, then," said I; "in that case they had better be admitted at once, for all our defences have still to be made.  What are you going to do with those who are not wanted?"
"I have given them instructions to go away and conceal themselves in the woods until we have beaten off the attack," answered Don Luis.  "Then they will return and help us to put right whatever damage may have been done during the fight."
"Will they?" thought I.  "I very much doubt it!"  But I kept my doubts to myself, and turned instead to another matter.
"The next thing that we have to consider is the safety of the ladies," said I.  "What is to be done with them during the fight?"
Don Luis looked at me rather blankly.
"The ladies!" he ejaculated.  "But surely, my dear Don Ricardo, they will be more safe in this house than anywhere else, will they not?"
"It all depends," I answered.  "If you think it would be safe for them to start on horseback for the nearest town, either alone or escorted by a few of the most trusty of your negroes--"
"Oh no, no!" exclaimed Dona Inez and Dona Christina in the same breath; "you must not propose anything of that kind, Don Ricardo.  We will not be separated from our husbands.  If they are to face danger, we will face danger with them."
Then Don Luis broke in.  "I do not altogether like your suggestion that the ladies should attempt to make their way to the nearest town," he said.  "For, you see, we have no means of knowing what is the state of the intervening country.  An hour ago I might have deemed the suggestion an excellent one, but now, after the shameless desertion of half my own `boys,' I know not what to think."
"I suppose there is no snug, secret place of concealment, such as a cave, or something of that sort, the existence of which is known only to yourselves?"  I suggested.
"The very thing!" exclaimed Don Luis enthusiastically.  "There _is_ such a place, and its existence and locality are known to absolutely no one but Dona Inez and myself--"
"It is useless to speak of it," interrupted Dona Inez in a tone of finality.  "I will not go there, or anywhere else; I remain here with you, Luis.  If Dona Christina, or Dona Eugenia would like to go, let them do so by all means."
But Dona Christina and Dona Eugenia were quite as emphatic as their hostess in their determination not to be separated from their men-folk; so that question was very soon settled.  After that there was nothing to be done but to call up our black auxiliaries, and put the house in as efficient a state of defence as the means at our disposal permitted; and this we at once proceeded to do.
Don Luis seemed naturally to look to me to take the lead in our warlike preparations; and this I as naturally did, finding that he had only very hazy notions of how to set to work.  In the first place, the house itself was excellently adapted for defence, the outside walls being built of stone, and about two feet thick, to keep out the heat, while the roof was tiled; there was consequently very little danger of the place being set on fire from the outside, and ourselves burnt out of it. Its chief weakness consisted in the exceptionally large size of the door and window openings; but I thought I could see a way to minimise that evil.  While out walking with Don Luis and his wife, I had noticed a spot that I remarked at the time might be very easily converted into an excellent sand and gravel pit; while only a few days prior to the eventful morning when Don Esteban de Mendouca and his party had burst in upon us with the news of the negro outbreak, Don Luis had received a large consignment of new sacks destined to receive the crop of coffee, cocoa, and other products that were at that moment coming forward upon the estate.
Now, the moment that the question of defending the house was raised, these sacks and the sand pit came into my mind.  The first thing I did, therefore, was to get hold of the six overseers, instruct them to organise into gangs the blacks who still remained on the estate: equip one party of them with pick and shovel; set a second party to bring the sacks from the store, as required; a third party to fill the sacks with the gravel and sand as excavated; and the remainder to carry the filled sacks up to the house on hand-barrows and arrange them in the door and window openings under my direction.  While this was being done, Don Luis produced his stock of firearms and ammunition; then he, Don Esteban, and Don Pedro set to work to clean them, oil the locks, and generally put the weapons in reliable working order; while Don Silvio, aided by his sister and Dona Inez, lighted a fire in the dining-room and went to work upon the task of casting bullets for the pistols, it proving upon examination that only a very small stock of these remained on hand. And, lastly, while Mama Elisa and Teresita busied themselves in the detached kitchen, cooking an ample supply of food for the little garrison, Dona Christina so far laid aside her dignity as to prepare the dining-room table and set it for breakfast; for day was by this time breaking, and we had decided that it would be sound policy to snatch a meal, if possible, before the fight began.
My scheme of defence consisted in blocking up all the door and window openings throughout the building with a good substantial wall of sand-bags, leaving here and there small loopholes just wide enough to admit of a musket being pointed through them.  My musketrymen would be stationed at these loopholes, each man having an assistant who would stand by to pass him a fresh cartridge and bullet as soon as his weapon was discharged; and of course the musketrymen and their assistants would be moved from room to room as required, according to the point against which the attack was most strongly directed.  I considered that we ought to stand a very good chance of making an effective defence, because it would be exceedingly difficult for our assailants to force a way into the building so long as our sand-bag walls stood firmly, and I believed it would require more courage than a negro possessed to charge home to them and overthrow them in the face of such a fire as we could direct upon them from the advantageous position which we should occupy. Moreover, we should possess the important advantage of being almost completely protected from their fire, and consequently should be able to take aim coolly and collectedly, while they would be fully exposed, there being no better cover for them than a few scattered bushes here and there, which I determined to remove, should there be time after our more important defences were complete.
At length, after some two hours of the most strenuous work that those negroes had ever performed in their lives, we had done everything that it was possible to do; so, first stationing a dozen of our best men at various commanding points, to act as pickets and give us timely warning of the approach of the enemy, we went to breakfast, most of us with excellent appetites, although I am bound to admit that the ladies did not eat much.  When the meal was over, without any news from our pickets, I went out through an opening that we had purposely left in the front door barricade, and took a good look round.  Passing from picket to picket, I questioned each man closely as to whether he had seen any signs of the enemy; but they all replied in the negative.  Indeed, although I carefully scanned every open space I could see, even examining it with the telescope, not the faintest indication of lurking danger could I anywhere discover, although Montpelier was by this time a mere smouldering ruin, to all appearance utterly deserted.
I was about to return to the house to inquire whether, after all, we might not have taken too much for granted in assuming as a certainty that Bella Vista would be attacked, when one of the pickets uttered a shout and, raising his hand, pointed.  I looked in the direction indicated, and there, sure enough, I beheld a party of negroes marching confidently toward the house.  How many there were I could not tell--for they were just then winding their way through thick detached masses of scrub beyond the boundaries of the estate--but the confident manner of their approach led me to suppose that they believed they were quite strong enough to achieve an easy conquest of the place.
Raising a whistle to my lips, I blew a shrill call, not only as a warning to those in the house to be on the _qui vive_, but also as a signal for the pickets to fall back; then, when I had made sure that the latter were all on the run toward the house, I brought my telescope to bear upon the approaching party, with the view of learning a little more concerning their equipment and, if possible, their numbers.
The first thing that impressed me with regard to them was that they were a remarkably fine, stalwart-looking set of men, hard, wiry, and full of endurance, as indeed might be expected from the history of them which I had gathered by snatches from Don Luis during our preparations that morning.  It appeared that they were practically all runaway slaves, or the descendants of such, who had made good their escape from the various plantations on the island before slavery was abolished a few years prior to the date of this story.  These men had established themselves in mountain fastnesses, so difficult of approach and so easy to defend that, although the attempt had often been made, it had been found impossible to dislodge them.  In those mountain fastnesses they had increased and multiplied prodigiously, raising their own cattle, growing their own corn, and supporting themselves generally in a state of comfort, if not of actual luxury, that to those who had not seen it, seemed incredible.  To them fled every criminal, for every desperate character in the island found welcome and a safe sanctuary among them. Of course, they were all outlaws; their hand against every man, and every man's hand against them; and of late--that is to say, within a year or so of the time of which I am now writing--they had adopted a policy of sallying forth from their mountain retreats at irregular intervals, attacking isolated plantations, looting and destroying the buildings, and either murdering or carrying off captive the whites; their avowed intention being to terrorise and drive every white person off the island and make it their own.  Although most of them had been brought up in the Catholic religion, it was said that they had all reverted to heathenism, and were addicted to the practice of voodooism, snake worship, and other hideous barbaric rites.
But although the physique of the men was good enough, I did not think very much of their equipment.  It appeared that about every fourth man of them carried a firearm of some kind, with powder flask suspended by a cord round his neck, and bullet pouch attached to his belt, while the remainder carried cutlasses, pikes, and, in some cases, axes, cane knives, or even scythe blades lashed to the end of long poles.
Having learned as much of the approaching enemy as it was possible for me to ascertain without exposing myself to the risk of capture by having my retreat cut off, I retired in good order to the house, pausing at the detached kitchen on my way, and ordering Mama Elisa and Teresita to hasten at once to the house, with such provisions as they had been able to prepare.  I waited until they were fairly on the way, and then set fire to the place, for it was within about sixty yards of the house, and would have afforded excellent cover for a dozen sharpshooters who, from its shelter, might have galled us rather severely.  It was a flimsy structure, the walls built of wattles plastered with mud, while the roof was of thatch; by the time, therefore, that I reached the house it was blazing furiously, and a quarter of an hour later was a mere heap of smouldering ashes.
The sight of the blazing kitchen caused the approaching outlaws to raise a shout of triumph--possibly they were under the impression that the building had been fired by some of the negroes belonging to the estate who were about to join forces with them and had already begun the work of destruction--but when they saw me retiring toward the house their shouts quickly changed their note from triumph to anger, and several of them who carried guns halted, dropped on one knee, and proceeded to take pot shots at me.  A few of their bullets came quite near--indeed, much too near to be pleasant; but the bulk of them flew wide, and I made good my retreat to the house, untouched, and was at once admitted by my friends, who immediately proceeded to block up with sand-bags the aperture by which I had entered.
The moment that the motley army of our assailants came close enough to the house to enable them to see that it had been put into a state of defence, they halted, and some half-a-dozen of them clustered about an immensely tall and powerful-looking negro who was attired in the stained and somewhat tattered uniform of a Spanish infantry colonel, and wore a sword buckled about his waist, with a pair of big horse pistols thrust into his belt.  Apparently they were conferring together as to what was to be done under the unexpected circumstances; for it now appeared that, so completely had they succeeded in terrorising the whites, serious resistance to their raids had practically become a thing of the past.
The appearance among the attacking force of the big negro above-mentioned seemed to fill Don Luis and Don Esteban with consternation, for they recognised him at once as the chief of the outlaws, and a man with a reputation for ruthless savagery that had caused his name to become a word of terror among the whites on the island, only to be mentioned with bated breath.
"It is Petion himself!" gasped Don Esteban in accents of dismay, "and if we should be so unfortunate as to fall into his hands after resisting him, our fate will be too dreadful for description!  Would it not be better," he suggested, with quivering ashen lips, "that we should surrender at discretion, without attempting resistance?  If we do so we shall probably be shot, out of hand; but even that would be preferable to being carried off into the mountains, and there dying a lingering death by torture, as we know that many other whites have done who have dared to resist Petion."
"No, certainly not!" answered Don Luis with decision.  "I will never agree to it.  Our young friend, Don Ricardo, here, seems to be of opinion that the house is capable of being defended effectively, and he ought to know, since fighting is his trade.  And I do not suppose that the mere fact of Petion's appearance among our assailants is going to make him alter his opinion.  Is it, Don Ricardo?"
"By no means," said I.  "Rather the other way about.  For if we can only contrive to bowl over Mister Petion--"
Don Esteban uttered an ejaculation of horror.  "Kill Petion!" he exclaimed.  "My good sir, I most fervently hope that no one in this house will be so ill-advised as to attempt Petion's life.  For if anything were to happen to him his followers would be so incensed, so utterly maddened with fury, that they would simply pull the place down about our ears, and drag us out from among the ruins to die a death of unimaginable horror!"
"My dear Don Esteban," I retorted, "do you really believe that those fellows will fight any the more courageously if their leader happens to be slain?  Because I do not; on the contrary, I am firmly convinced that if the head is destroyed the body will also lose vitality, and very speedily collapse.  Therefore I, for one, shall make it a point of honour to do my best to kill Petion, if he will only afford me the chance, and I very strongly recommend that the rest should do the same. If Petion falls, his followers will very soon be discouraged."
"Yes, yes, I quite agree with you, Don Ricardo," exclaimed Don Luis. "Nothing is so likely to discourage those fellows as to see their leader fall, therefore let us kill Petion, if we can--although he is popularly believed to bear a charmed life."
"It will need a very much more potent charm than any that he is at all likely to possess to stop a bullet, if I can only get a fair shot at him," I exclaimed.  "But, come, gentlemen, let us get back to our posts. We must watch their every move now, or they may take us unawares and play us some very ugly trick."
Our dialogue had lasted less than five minutes; but, brief as it was, it had outlasted the consultation between Petion and his lieutenants, who, I was annoyed to find upon returning to my point of observation, had retired and were now out of sight.
A period of suspense lasting nearly ten minutes now ensued, at the end of which a whistle sounded shrilly from somewhere, and at the sound of it the whole band of outlaws, numbering somewhere about four hundred, suddenly broke cover and, with a yell, came charging down upon all sides of the house, firing as they ran.  Their aim was not bad, considering that none of them paused to bring their pieces up to the shoulder, but just pointed the weapon in the direction of the house and pulled the trigger while still on the run.  But although we heard several of the bullets strike the walls and roof, not one came through our loopholes, or penetrated to the interior of the house, and none of us were hit. The next second an irregular, straggling sort of volley rattled out from the house by way of reply; but I could not see that anybody was a penny the worse for it, at least on that side of the house where I was stationed.  So far as I was concerned, I had not attempted to fire, having made up my mind that I would not pull trigger during the fight until I could be certain of making a hit; but the negro who had been told off to help in the defence of the window at which I was stationed had simply thrust his musket through his loophole and blazed away, apparently without taking the trouble even to sight along the barrel.
"My friend," I said, digging him savagely in the ribs, "which of those fellows was it that you aimed at?"
"Which of them, Senor?" he echoed in astonishment.  "I did not aim at any one in particular; I simply fired my piece, believing that the bullet would be certain to hit some one."
"Just so," I retorted.  "Well, that is not at all the way to win a fight, for, you see, your bullet has hit no one.  Next time you shoot, aim straight at some particular individual, and make sure that your gun is pointing straight before you pull the trigger.  For example--you see that big man running straight toward us, the man with the scythe on the end of a pole?  Well, keep your eye on him for a moment, and see what happens."
The man in question was coming straight for our window, with the intention, probably, of attempting to dislodge some of the sand-bags and force his way into the house.  He was only about ten yards away when, having carefully covered his chest with my two sights, I gently pressed the trigger.  When the smoke blew away the fellow was lying motionless upon his face, and some twenty others who had been following him had come to an abrupt halt, and were gazing with indecision, first at the house and next at him.
"Another cartridge, quick!"  I whispered, thrusting my hand out behind me.  A small, soft hand met mine, thrusting a cartridge between my fingers, and glancing hastily over my shoulder, in some surprise, I saw that it was Teresita who had established herself as my assistant.  The next moment I had bitten off the end of the cartridge, poured the powder down the barrel, thrust the empty paper after it by way of a wad, and was ramming a bullet home on top of all.  Then, peeping through the loophole as I cocked the lock, I saw that a party of four of his comrades had picked up the stricken man, and were just about to carry him away, while the others were in full retreat for a clump of bushes not very far away, probably for the purpose of securing cover while they reloaded their weapons.  The four bearers, however, were still within easy range, and, taking careful aim for a moment, I caught one of them fair between the shoulders, and down he went on top of the man who was being carried away.  The other three at once took to their heels and ran, but did not finally get away scot free, for I snatched the now reloaded musket from my assistant's hand and was lucky enough to bring one of them down with a shot in the leg, though he was up and limping away the next instant.
"There," I said to the negro who was supposed to be helping me; "you see how it is done?  Very well; see to it, my friend, that you make no more misses."  And he did not; or, at least, not very often.  Meanwhile, the firing from the other rooms had been proceeding pretty briskly, though with what results, so far as the other three sides of the house were concerned, I could not tell.  But it had been fairly effective on my side of the building; for, in addition to the three men for whom I had accounted, there were five motionless figures lying on the grass within view of my loophole, while I had seen others go staggering away palpably hit.  I imagined that the outlaws were somewhat disconcerted at finding so many guns in the house, and had not very much stomach for a fight, wherein it was possible that a good many of them might get very seriously hurt.  Hitherto, it appeared, the utmost resistance which they had met with had amounted to nothing more formidable than a few hasty, ill-aimed shots, followed by the immediate retreat of the defending party.  But this adventure upon which they were now engaged was quite a different matter.  Here was a good, solidly built house, constructed of materials which it was scarcely possible to set fire to from the outside, well barricaded, and evidently full of resolute men quite determined to sell their lives dearly.  Oh yes, this was quite different, and it looked as though they did not half like it, for, having failed in that first rush, they had now withdrawn out of range and were apparently discussing some new scheme of operations.  During this pause I visited the other rooms in succession to see how the occupants had been faring, and what measure of success they had met with.  The result of my inspection was the discovery that twenty-seven of the attacking party had lost that number of their mess, while nearly double as many had been more or less seriously hurt in that first rush; which was quite as good as could reasonably have been expected; and it seemed fully to account for the shyness which the enemy was now exhibiting.  I stated what had happened at my own window, urged every man individually to keep quite cool, and to take careful aim before pulling trigger; and then returned to my post, just in time to see some sixty negroes emerge from the bush bearing the trunk of a palm-tree which they had cut down, and which they were apparently about to employ as a battering-ram with which to batter in some of our defences.  The men in the adjoining room saw it at the same moment, and instantly, in spite of the warning which I had so recently given, two shots rang out from the window at which they were stationed.  The range, however, was too long, and nobody was hurt.  Hurrying from my own room into the one from which the shots had come, I found that it was occupied by one of the overseers and a negro.  I was engaged in giving them as severe a lecture as my knowledge of Spanish permitted, when there was a sudden call for all hands from the front of the house, and, rushing round, I saw that a party of about a hundred of the enemy were charging across the lawns in open order, leaping from side to side as they came, in a manner admirably adapted to render our aim utterly ineffective.  A man was crouching at every loophole in the room, with the barrel of his piece projecting through it, and even as I entered one of the pieces spoke, ineffectively.  The man who fired was Don Pedro, and he turned from the loophole with a savage execration at his failure.
"It is not of the slightest use to attempt to pick them off at long range while they are jumping about in that fashion," I exclaimed.  "Wait until they are so close that you can make sure of them, and then shoot. To drop them at twenty yards, or even ten, or five, is just as effective as though you bowled them over at a hundred.  And as each man fires, let him step aside and make room for another."
While I was thus exhorting my companions I stepped to the loophole which had just been vacated by Don Pedro, and thrust the muzzle of my weapon through it, sighting along the barrel.  There was an individual coming toward me, jumping from side to side like the rest, first to the right, then to the left.  I watched him for a moment or two, and noticed that each spring of his to the left brought him exactly in line with a tall, slender tree stem, some distance in his rear; I, therefore, aimed straight for this stem, and then waited until he made his next spring to the left, when I pulled the trigger, and down he toppled.  Almost at the same instant three or four other shots rang out, and each proved sufficiently well aimed to reach its mark.  A few seconds later another half-dozen shots followed, and down went four more of the charging negroes.  The effect was instantaneous; at least half of them halted, in manifest indecision, some wheeled abruptly round and fled, and only about a dozen of the boldest maintained their rush.  Another quick discharge brought even these to a halt, with the loss of four of their number; and while they stood, hesitating whether to advance or retreat, we peppered them again, to their manifest astonishment and consternation--possibly they thought that, with our guns empty, they were reasonably safe for a minute or so--whereupon they turned and fled, leaving six of their comrades prostrate on the ground.  At this moment a cry from Teresita sent us all with a rush, helter-skelter, to the room which I had originally undertaken to defend; and here we found a critical state of affairs indeed.  For while we had all been engaged in checking the rush upon the front of the house, the party with the palm-tree battering-ram had, under cover of various patches of vegetation, stolen up to within a hundred yards of the side, and were now manifestly preparing to make a rush across the open, bearing their battering-ram with them.  Thanks, however, to Teresita's warning cry, we were just in good time to pour in a brisk fire upon them almost before they had fairly started upon their rush, and three or four men went down, throwing the others into momentary confusion, which afforded us the opportunity to treat them to a second volley.  As this second volley crashed out I, having reloaded my weapon, stepped forward to take my place at a loophole just vacated by some one else, and as I did so I observed that the whole party had been thrown into great confusion by the second volley, the tree trunk having fallen to the ground, or been dropped.  That, however, was not all; the negro dressed in Spanish infantry uniform had come to the front and was standing stock still, with his back toward the house, haranguing the battering-ram contingent and apparently urging them to pick up the tree again and make another attempt.  The opportunity was too good to be lost, for he was within long range, and it was quite worth while to throw away a shot on the chance of hitting him; I therefore levelled my piece, aiming steadily at an imaginary point about two inches immediately above his head--feeling certain that, with this amount of elevation, I should get him somewhere--and pulled the trigger.  The smoke of the discharge obscured my view for a second or two, but a wild shout of triumph from those in the next room told me that my shot had been successful; and then, as the smoke drifted away, I saw the fellow lying prone on the ground, with his men standing staring at him, as though fascinated, yet seemingly afraid to approach and attempt to raise him.  As I stood, still peering through the loophole at the scene, my empty piece was gently withdrawn from my hand by some one behind me, and a loaded one substituted for it, whereupon I chose another mark and fired, bringing that man down also. This second casualty, at such long range, seemed to galvanise the party into sudden life; for, raising their weapons, they poured in a straggling, irregular, but ineffective volley, as though in obedience to an order, and then turned and raced for the nearest cover, followed by a few dropping shots, which at least served to freshen their way, if it did nothing else.
The entire attacking party now took cover, and opened fire upon the house at long range.  Apparently they possessed little or no skill in the use of firearms, for, although a few shots struck the house, not one of them came anywhere near the loopholes, and every one of the garrison remained unscathed.  Our foes were amply strong enough to have carried the building by assault had they but possessed the courage and resolution to charge across the open, right up to the house, and tear down but a single one of our barricades; but they had already learned by experience that this meant certain death to some of them; and while, if report did not belie them, they were all ready enough to take the lives of others with every accompaniment of the most atrocious cruelty, there was apparently none among them willing to contribute to the success of his party by sacrificing his own.  This innocuous fusillade of the house continued for nearly two hours, during which we made no pretence of reply except when some individual, in a temporary access of courage, attempted to slip across from one piece of cover to another situated a few yards nearer the house, when he was immediately subjected to a volley that either laid him low, or sent him scuttling back, like a scared rabbit, to his former place of refuge.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.
CAPTURED BY THE NEGRO OUTLAWS.
At length, about ten o'clock in the forenoon, the fire of the outlaws ceased, and for aught that we could tell to the contrary they might have abandoned the attack altogether and retired.  But the situation was one of far too much peril to permit us to take anything for granted; while, therefore, the main body of our party, so to speak, seized the opportunity thus afforded to snatch a hasty but much-needed meal, a watcher, with loaded weapon, was stationed at each door and window of the house, with instructions to maintain a sharp lookout, and immediately to report any movement that he might detect on the part of the enemy.
But the minutes passed, the meal was concluded, and still everything remained tranquil; so perfectly tranquil, indeed, that at length we could come to but one of two conclusions--either the outlaws had withdrawn altogether, or they were elaborating some scheme for a renewed attack of a particularly deep and cunning character, of the nature of which it behoved us to secure some hint of information, by hook or by crook.
I suggested that I should go forth alone, and, keeping well in the open in order that I might be effectively covered by the guns of the others in the event of anything in the nature of treachery being attempted, take a look round in the immediate neighbourhood of the house, and endeavour to ascertain what the outlaws were doing, or, if they had gone, what had become of them.  At first no one would listen to the suggestion; it was denounced as too utterly hazardous to be entertained for a moment; and when I pointed out that it could only be hazardous if the enemy still remained upon the ground, Don Silvio proposed, by way of amendment, that the men should all sally forth in a body, for mutual protection.  But to this I would not agree, arguing--very reasonably, I think--that if the outlaws had departed it would be as safe for me to go forth as for the whole of us; while, if treachery happened to be afoot, the safety of the female portion of the party absolutely depended upon the men remaining in the house ready to defend it in the event of a renewed attack.  These arguments of mine, coupled with the necessity, which everybody at length recognised, for us to make a move of some sort, finally prevailed; and about noon I left the house, armed with a musket and a brace of pistols, all loaded, and fortified by some item of advice from each of my companions.
My first act was to examine carefully the bodies that lay round about the house, taking those that lay nearest at hand, and then passing on to the others.  The result of this examination was the discovery that the fallen numbered in all sixty-seven, fourteen of whom were still alive, but so seriously injured that they had been unable to withdraw to the safety of cover.  I inquired of each of these men what had become of their companions, but they were unable to answer me; they could but groan--"_Agua, agua, por amor de Dios_!"
I informed them that they should be supplied with water, and otherwise looked after, as soon as I had satisfied myself that their friends had retired and that no further danger from them was to be apprehended; but I at the same time reminded them that they could scarcely expect much consideration from people whom they had so wantonly attacked.  When at length I came to the body of Petion I found that life was extinct, the fellow having been shot clean through the heart I was somewhat surprised that his followers had made no attempt to carry off his body; and that they had not done so I took to be a sign of pretty thorough demoralisation on their part I conducted my examination of the ground with the utmost circumspection; for I knew not at what moment a volley might rattle out at me from one or another of the large clumps of ornamental shrubs that were scattered about here and there upon the lawns, or the still larger masses of bamboo, palmetto, and other wild vegetation that at one particular spot was still allowed to flourish almost within musket-shot of the house; but nothing happened, and no sign of the enemy was to be discovered; I, therefore, at length came to the conclusion that, finding the house was not to be captured except at the sacrifice of a very considerable number of lives, the outlaws had withdrawn, and were now on their way to attack some estate, the owners of which were incapable of making so resolute and effective a defence as ourselves.
I began to wonder in which direction our assailants had gone, remembering that much of the effectiveness of the defence of Bella Vista had been due to the early warning given by Don Esteban de Mendouca, which had afforded us the time to make the necessary preparations; and it occurred to me that if the route taken by the outlaws could be determined, it might be possible to pass on the warning, and so enable somebody else to prepare a warm reception for them.  I, therefore, proceeded to examine the ground carefully, quartering it now in this direction and now in the other, in search of some mark or sign which should furnish us with a clue.  Nor was my search by any means barren of results, for after a time I came to a spot where the guinea grass had been well trampled, indicating, to my mind, that this was the point where the various divisions of the attacking party, including their wounded, had rallied, and from which they had begun their retreat.  And in this belief I was fully confirmed, a little later, by finding that the footmarks led away in a direction that gradually trended round toward the back of the house, past the coffee plantation, and so back toward the mountains.
Now, if they had decided to retreat to their mountain fastnesses, there was no need to trouble further about them, at least for the moment.  But in my walks in the same direction with Don Luis I had noticed several paths which, I had been informed, led to certain plantations in the neighbourhood; and it was of course quite possible that the brigands might be making for one of these; I, therefore, determined to follow up the trail while it was fresh, and endeavour to obtain some definite clue to their actual destination.  My first idea was to return to the house, acquaint the occupants with the result of my investigations thus far, inform them as to my further plans, and then retrace my steps to the spot where I at that moment stood; but I reflected that to do all this meant the loss of some twenty minutes or more, which might make all the difference between success and failure to my plan, so I determined to push on at once, and immediately proceeded to do so.
I had not proceeded very far before I had conclusive evidence that I was on the right track by coming upon a wounded negro, who lay fair in the middle of the path, groaning piteously as he clasped his head, swathed in a blood-stained bandage, between his hands.  I asked him if he was badly hurt.
"_Si, senor_," he answered; "hurt to the death, I fear, unless I can obtain speedy help.  I could walk no farther, and my companions have abandoned me.  Take me to the house, I pray you, Senor, and let my hurt be attended to.  It will be horrible to die here alone in the open; moreover, the ants will find me before long, and consider what my fate will then be."
Dreadful enough, no doubt, if the man were as bad as he considered himself to be.  But I did not believe he was; for though his voice seemed feeble enough when he began to speak it distinctly gained in strength as he went on, and I very speedily came to the conclusion that his weakness was more than half imaginary; also I was not very greatly disposed to be tender-hearted over the sufferings of such fiends as these negro outlaws had proved themselves to be; instead, therefore, of responding to his appeal I asked him curtly:
"Which way have your companions gone?"
"Straight up toward the mountains," he answered, pointing upward along the path in which I was standing.
"Very well," I said.  "It is necessary that I should verify your statement; I am, therefore, going on a little farther.  But I shall soon be back; and I will then help you to the house and have your wound attended to, although that will avail you little, for I warn you that you and the rest of the wounded will be handed over to the authorities forthwith.  And that means for you, death upon the gallows."
The fellow grunted.  "Even that will be less disagreeable than being devoured alive by the ants," he answered.
Without bandying further words with him I continued my way up the path, which took a rather sharp turn a few yards farther on.  As I rounded the bend I was somewhat surprised to see two more men lying in the road: one of whom seemed to be either dead or in a swoon, while the other appeared to be almost in a state of collapse.
"The inhuman villains," I thought, "to abandon their wounded in this heartless fashion!  Surely they might have somehow made shift to carry off their injured comrades with them, for they must be fully aware that if the unfortunate wretches fall into the hands of the authorities they will meet with short shrift.  Well, we seem to have punished them rather more severely than I had thought; I should not be very greatly surprised if I find a few more poor beggars in the same plight before I have finished my walk."
With these thoughts uppermost in my mind I approached the prostrate figures, one of whom was moaning most piteously, while the other lay still, with half-closed eyes staring upward at the sky.
"Well, _picaro_," I said to the man who was moaning, "what is the matter with you?"
"Oh, Senor," he gasped, "for the love of God help me to get into the shadow of yonder bush.  I am perishing of thirst, and this scorching sun is adding to my torments.  If you will raise me to my knees perhaps I can manage to crawl to--Ah, good!  I have him!  Quick, Jose, help me! He is strong as a horse, and--So, that is right; now kneel upon him while I lash his wrists together.  And Miguel,"--as the man I had left in the road a minute before came running up--"take the gun and those pistols, they will be safer in your hands than in his."
The surprise was perfectly managed.  Completely taken off my guard by the admirably assumed helplessness of the three scoundrels, I was easily captured.  For as I incautiously laid down my gun for a moment to place my hands under the arms of the moaning hypocrite who had begged me to assist him, the rascal flung his arms and legs round me, pinning me in a grip that for the moment held me helpless, and dragged me to the ground, rolling over on top of me, while the other, springing with equal suddenness into vigorous life and activity, also flung himself upon me and held me face downward in the sandy soil while his comrade swiftly bound my hands behind my back with the long silken sash which he had rapidly unwound from his waist.  While he was doing this up came the third man, who had been so dreadfully afraid of being devoured alive by the ants, and took possession of my weapons.  Now, when it was too late, the truth dawned upon me; the villains, far from being seriously hurt, were as sound as I was, and had simply been left behind in feigned helplessness upon the off-chance that some one of the whites might incautiously venture out, as I had done, with the object of ascertaining where the retreating brigands were actually going, and thus be captured.
Oh! how I execrated my folly, now that it was too late, and I was being hurried along the rough path by the jubilant trio who had captured me and who were in a great hurry to rejoin the main body of outlaws.  And how fervently I hoped and prayed that none of the rest of the whites at Bella Vista might be as foolish as I had been.  My thoughts went back to the wounded men lying scattered here and there round the house and within musket-shot of it, and for a moment my soul sickened with dread as I thought of what might happen if they too were merely shamming.  But the fear was only momentary; I remembered that the hurts of every one of them were visibly, indisputably real, serious enough to disable and render them harmless; and I hoped that my failure to return would put the whole household upon its guard and, by demonstrating to them my imprudence, open their eyes to the fact that all danger was not necessarily over because the brigands had withdrawn.
My companions were in high feather at having achieved my capture, and extolled the shrewdness of a certain Mateo--who, I gathered from their remarks, was their new chief, in place of the deceased Petion--in having devised so ingenious a trap as the one into which I had unsuspectingly fallen.  Moreover, they endeavoured to beguile the way by drawing vivid word-pictures--presumably in the hope of frightening me and enjoying my terror--of the unspeakable torments that would be inflicted upon me by way of appeasing the manes of those of their comrades who had fallen in the attack upon the house.  Truly I might very well have been excused had I blenched at the prospect which, according to them, lay before me; for if they were to be believed, it was not an hour or two, but several days of excruciating suffering which I might expect.  However, I did not by any means believe all that they said.  They might be clever enough actors, so far as shamming being wounded was concerned, but in the finer art of inflicting suffering in anticipation they were mere clumsy bunglers, for they lacked that finer sense of dissimulation which endows a man with the power of lying with conviction; they allowed their motive to become apparent; and, seeing this, I disappointed them by laughing in their faces.  Besides, whether what they said was truth or falsehood, I was not going to afford a trio of sable outlaws the satisfaction of boasting that they had succeeded in frightening an Englishman.
Enlivening the way with such conversation as I have hinted at, we trudged along the upward path for a distance of about a mile and a half, when we suddenly came upon a wide-open space where the main body of the outlaws had halted to rest and refresh themselves, and also, as I soon became aware by the trend of the general conversation, to determine whether they should return to their head-quarters, or proceed to attack some other estate in the immediate neighbourhood.
My appearance, in the character of a prisoner, was the signal for a great yell of ferocious delight on the part of the outlaws, immediately followed by a brisk fusillade of scurrilous, ribald jests concerning the sport that they would have with me upon their return to their mountain stronghold; and so bloodcurdling were the suggestions thrown out by some of those fiends that I confess a qualm of fear surged over me for a second or two; for I saw at once that, unlike my captors, these ruffians were not endeavouring merely to frighten me, but were in deadly earnest. Not that I feared death; no man who ever knew me could dub me coward. In the heat of battle, or under most ordinary circumstances I can face death--ay, and have faced it a hundred times--without a tremor; but to be triced up, helpless, and to have one's strength sapped and one's life slowly drained away by a long drawn-out succession of unspeakable torments is a prospect that I venture to say few can bring themselves to face without some manifestation of discomposure.  Although my cheeks and lips may have blanched for a moment, I permitted no further and greater sign of fear to escape me.  I returned their glances of fiendish ferocity with an unquailing eye, and listened to their diabolical jests in apparently unruffled silence, as I was conducted through their ranks by my captors toward a small hillock, overshadowed by a gigantic _bois immortelle_, upon which sat a negro in solitary state, appeasing his hunger by wolfishly tearing, with his strong white teeth, the flesh from three or four roast ribs of goat which he grasped with both hands.
I do not think I ever encountered a lower, or more bestial type of humanity than was this man.  He was a pure-blooded black, of almost herculean proportions, and evidently of enormous strength, as are many of the pure-blooded West African negroes; but one completely lost sight of his splendid physique in contemplation of the expression of low cunning and ferocious cruelty that blazed out of his small, narrow eyes and contorted his wide, flat nostrils, his thick, blubber lips, and his unnaturally prominent chin and jaws; he was the very embodiment and picture of all the most savage and debasing passions that characterise the worst specimens of humanity, and reminded me of nothing so much as a combination of snake, tiger, and monkey clothed in the outward semblance of a human form.  "Heaven have mercy upon the unfortunate who stirs this brute to anger!" thought I.  He was undoubtedly well aware of the feelings of horror and repulsion that he inspired in the breasts of others, and seemed rather to pride himself upon it, I thought; for as I was led forward into his presence he paused in his wolfish feeding and glared upon me with an expression of concentrated malignity that seemed to freeze the very marrow in my bones.  But I believed that he was deliberately striving to frighten me, and horrified though I actually was, I was determined he should not have the satisfaction of feeling that he had succeeded.  I, therefore, steadily returned his stare with all the coolness and nonchalance I could summon to my aid, and after the lapse of a full minute or more he turned his glance aside to one of the men who held me, and said:
"Well, Carlos, my ruse succeeded, it would appear.  But it is a poor sort of capture that you have made; I hoped you would contrive to get hold of Don Luis, or at least of Don Esteban, or one of his sons; but who is this?  He is a mere boy!"
"True, he is," answered the man addressed as Carlos--the scoundrel who had taken advantage of an appeal to my humanity to catch me unawares. "But," he continued, "boy though he is, he is as strong as a young lion, and will afford us sport for three or four days, if things are carefully managed; and after that--" He added a few words in some language that I did not understand.
"But who is he, and what is he?" snarled the other.  "He does not look like a Spaniard."
"He is not a Spaniard," answered Carlos.  "Pepe, one of the Bella Vista `boys' who joined us last night, told me that there was a young Englishman in the house who had been found by old Tomasso, Don Luis' fisherman, floating about on a piece of wreckage, nearly dead, and had been brought ashore by him and, at Don Luis' orders, taken up to the house and nursed back to health by Mama Elisa; and without doubt this is he."
"Is this so?" demanded the quintessence of ugliness, turning his gaze upon me.
"It is," answered I.  "And perhaps it may prevent misunderstanding and attachment of blame to the wrong people if I explain that it is I who am responsible for the defence of Bella Vista and the losses that you have sustained.  It was I who supervised the erection of the barricades, and who also arranged the plan upon which we fought."
"A-h!" he breathed, and the note of diabolical malignity with which he contrived to imbue that single word sent a shudder of fear through me, so intense was it.  "Then, perhaps," he continued, "you may be able to tell us whose hand it was who slew Petion, our late leader?"
"As well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb," thought I, and answered at once "Yes.  As a matter of fact I am responsible for that, too; and I am glad of it.  It was my finger that pulled the trigger that sent the bullet through his heart; and my only regret is that you did not stay long enough to enable me to send a few more of you after him."
Carlos, my captor, actually released my arm and stepped a pace away, the better to gaze upon me, so astounded was he at the unimaginable rashness of my speech.  And, to speak truth, I was astounded at myself; I knew perfectly well that I was in all probability only adding fuel to the flame which would ultimately consume me, yet some perverse influence altogether beyond my control seemed to urge me to speak as I did, whether I would or no.  And, strangest circumstance of all, my words, instead of evoking from my questioner the white-hot explosion of wrath that I fully expected, seemed to gratify the man rather than otherwise, for he grinned appreciation as he gazed into my flashing eyes.  Then a thought seemed to suddenly strike him.
"You were picked up floating upon a piece of wreckage, you say?" he remarked.  "Now, I wonder whether, by any chance, that piece of wreckage happened to belong to the British man-o'-war schooner that engaged a pirate schooner a few miles in the offing, about a month or two ago?"
"It did," I answered.  "It belonged to His Britannic Majesty's schooner _Wasp_, which foundered in the gale that sprang up immediately after the engagement; and I, her commander, was, so far as I know, the only person saved."
"You her commander!" he reiterated incredulously.  "Why, you are only a boy!"
"Nevertheless, what I have told you is the truth," I answered.
The fellow sat considering this statement for so long a time that I began to wonder whether perchance it was destined to affect my fate in any way.  At length, however, he appeared to have arrived at a decision, for, drawing a greasy notebook from one pocket and a stub of pencil from another, he proceeded with much labour to indite a communication of some kind upon it, which, when completed, he folded in a peculiar way and handed to Carlos, at the same time giving him, in a tongue with which I had no acquaintance, what I took to be certain instructions.  Whatever the nature of the communication may have been it appeared to meet with Carlos' emphatic disapproval, for he began to argue strenuously with the other, the argument lasting some ten minutes and rapidly growing more heated, until finally something was said that apparently convinced him of the futility of further dispute on his part.  Then he suddenly desisted and, seizing me by the arm, dragged me away to a spot where we were somewhat isolated from the rest of the camp, where he left me in charge of his companions Jose and Miguel while he went off elsewhere. His absence, however, was of but brief duration, for presently he returned, followed by two other negroes who bore in a large calabash an ample supply of boiled rice, roasted yams, and substantial portions of roast goat mutton, which they deposited on the ground within easy reach of us before they departed and left us to ourselves.
As soon as they had gone fairly out of ear-shot Carlos turned to me and, pointing to the provisions, said, as he released me from my bonds:
"Help yourself, and eat freely, Senor Englishman, for we have a long march before we are likely to again see a decent meal."
"Indeed!"  I exclaimed.  "Is your camp, or head-quarters, or whatever you call it, so far off, then, as that would seem to imply?"
"We are not going to head-quarters," he replied rather tartly; "and you may thank the good God that it is so; for, whatever may be your mode of death, you may accept my assurance that it will not be anything like so protracted or unpleasant as that which awaited you among the mountains yonder."
"Well," said I, "that at least is good hearing.  But if we are not going to head-quarters, pray where are we going?"
"My orders from Mateo, our new chief--whose beauty doubtless impressed you," he replied, with a grin, "are to conduct you down to the coast and deliver you over to his very good friend Manuel Garcia, the pirate, whose schooner _Tiburon_ you and your crew punished so severely when-- according to your own admission, mind--you engaged her some little time ago.  Mateo is under the impression that Garcia would be peculiarly gratified to find in his power the officer who commanded the schooner which mauled the _Tiburon_ so severely; so, as you have confessed that you are the man, he has decided to make a present of you to his friend, and to take the risk of the rumpus that will certainly arise when the band learns that it is not to have the pleasure of amusing itself with you."
"And how far is your friend Garcia's lair from here?"  I demanded.
"Not very far," was the answer.  "But it will take us until close upon sunset to do the distance, because Mateo prefers that we should not start until the rest of the band are on the move.  He fears that if you were seen going toward the sea, instead of up into the mountains, some of our `lambs' might begin to ask awkward questions, and insist upon your accompanying them.  Therefore, if you feel at all tired, you had better avail yourself of the present opportunity to snatch a little sleep."
As a matter of fact I did not feel in the least tired, but I wanted an opportunity to think quietly over this change in my prospects; I, therefore, gladly accepted the suggestion made by Carlos and, stretching myself out beneath the shade of an adjacent clump of bush, closed my eyes and, before I knew it, was fast asleep.
I was awakened by the sound of many voices and the stir of many feet, and sat up to see that the whole band of marauders was in motion; and ten minutes later there was nothing to betray their presence save a cloud of dun-coloured dust rising into the air over the tops of the bushes.  It appeared to me, however, that instead of wending their way toward the mountains they were bearing away in a westerly direction toward a spot where, at a distance of some eight or ten miles, I knew a group of extensive and prosperous plantations existed.  As soon as the last of the stragglers had vanished, Carlos rose to his feet and said:
"Now, Senor Englishman, if you are sufficiently rested we will be moving; because, if it should be noticed that you are not among them, some of our people might return to look for you; and it would be very bad indeed for you if they should do that--and find you."
"I am quite ready," I answered, as I sprang to my feet; and in another minute our little party also--consisting of Carlos, Jose, Miguel, and myself--had disappeared from the scene.
Our way lay in precisely the opposite direction to that taken by the raiders; that is to say, while they marched toward the west, we followed a narrow, winding footpath that, if it could be said to have any definite direction at all, trended toward the east.  For three hours we trudged steadily onward, Carlos, with one of my pistols in his belt, in addition to his own weapons, walking on one side of me, with Jose, similarly equipped, on the other, while Miguel, with my gun upon his shoulder, brought up the rear.  For several miles we traversed the lower slopes of the range, winding hither and thither but steadily working our way eastward, now passing over sterile, rocky ground, sparsely dotted here and there with clumps of thorny scrub, and anon opening out a glorious prospect of gently undulating, fertile country, dotted with plantations,--the smoke-blackened roofless walls of some of the mansions built on them clearly suggesting a recent visit from the late Petion and his fellow-outlaws,--and, beyond all, the grand old ocean, blue, save where darkened by the drifting cloud shadows, and flecked here and there with white from the scourging of the trade-wind.  At length, however, when the sun had declined to within a span's length of the western horizon, we bore away sharply toward the north, and presently came in sight of an indentation in the coast which, at the first glimpse, had the appearance of being land-locked; but which, as we approached it more closely, I saw was really a nearly circular bay about a mile in diameter, the entrance of which was most effectively masked by a small islet stretching completely across it and leaving only two narrow passages, one to the east and the other to the west of it.  A small felucca lay at anchor a cable's length from the shore; and when at length we reached the lip of the basin-like depression, the bottom of which formed the bay, or cove rather, I perceived, to my amazement, that a sort of village of quite respectable extent had been built along its southern margin, some of the buildings being so large that I at once set them down as storehouses.  A number of people were moving about the buildings; and quite a dozen boats were hauled up on the beach above high-water mark.
And now I noticed a very remarkable peculiarity in connection with the cove: the sides of the basin wherein it lay consisted everywhere of perfectly vertical cliffs, some two hundred feet high, so that, look where I would, I could at first discover no way down into it.  Looking a little closer, however, I presently became aware of an exceedingly narrow and dangerous zigzag path traversing the cliff-face, about a quarter of a mile farther on, and toward this we at once made our way. A quarter of an hour later, having first encountered a sentry at the upper end of the path, to whom Carlos whispered some password which I could not catch, we found ourselves safely at the base of the cliff and at the extreme end of the village.  Arrived here, we directed our steps toward the most important-looking house in the place, at the door of which Carlos knocked.  An ancient, frosty-headed negro responded to the knock and, in reply to Carlos' question, stated that Don Manuel Garcia was at the moment away in the schooner, but that Senor Fernandez was, as usual, in charge of the settlement, and possibly might do as well; to which suggestion Carlos assented, whereupon we were ushered into a large bare room, furnished in such a manner as to suggest the idea that it was chiefly used as a council chamber, and the door was shut upon us.
CHAPTER NINETEEN.
IN THE PIRATE'S STRONGHOLD.
Here we waited nearly half-an-hour, at the conclusion of which a door at the upper end of the chamber opened, and a tall, rather good-looking man, dressed entirely in white, entered.  At his appearance Carlos sprang to his feet and, saluting, handed over the note which Mateo had scrawled.  The stranger, who was none other than "Don" Victor Fernandez, Captain Manuel Garcia's second-in-command, took the note, read it, glanced at me curiously, and then nodded curtly to Carlos and his companions.
"Good!" he ejaculated.  "The Captain will highly appreciate the thoughtfulness of your new chief, Mateo, in sending him this Englishman. In his name I desire to tender his warmest thanks to Mateo, and request you to convey them, with every expression of his highest consideration. Do you leave us to-night, or will you remain until the morning?  If the latter--"
"_Mille gracias, senor_!" answered Carlos; "we should greatly like to stay here for the night, and rest, for this day has been an exceptionally trying and fatiguing one for us; but Mateo's instructions that we should rejoin him at the earliest possible moment were imperative and must not be neglected.  But if we may be permitted to stay long enough to share your people's supper, we will gladly do so."
"So be it," answered Fernandez.  "Find Pacheco, and tell him that you will sup in the great hall with the rest of the hands, and then request him to come to me."  Whereupon Carlos and his two fellow-cut-throats saluted and retired.
For a minute or two after the departure of the trio, Fernandez sat meditatively regarding me in silence, twisting and turning Mateo's note in his fingers meanwhile.  At length, with just the ghost of a smile flickering over his features, he said, tapping the note in his hand:
"The worthy Mateo tells me that you were the officer in command of the little schooner that gave the _Tiburon_ such a severe dressing down a little while ago.  Is that really the fact?"
"Yes," I answered, "I am proud to say that it is."
"Well," he returned, "I can scarcely credit it.  Why, you are only a boy!"
"So people are constantly reminding me," I retorted.  "But in the British Navy boys soon learn to do men's work."
"So it would appear," assented my interlocutor, apparently in nowise offended at my brusque method of answering him.  "And you are an Englishman, of course.  What is your name?"
I told him.
"Well, Senor Delamere," he said, "it is perhaps a lucky thing for you that Captain Garcia went to sea four days ago in the refitted _Tiburon_, and that he may possibly not return for nearly a month.  Had he been here at this moment I do not for an instant believe that he would have given you the chance that I am going to offer you; for he has vowed that if ever he can lay hands upon you he will make such an example of you as will strike terror to the heart of his every enemy.  Of course I sympathise with him to a great extent, for he has never in his life had such a trouncing as you gave him with that ridiculous little schooner of yours; and, apart from other considerations, his self-love has been very severely wounded.  Therefore, being a man who never forgets nor forgives an injury, he will not be satisfied until he has salved his wounded pride by making you pay in full in a manner that will cause every sailor in West Indian waters to shudder with horror.  But I am not vindictive-- as he is; I am always willing to subordinate revenge to the good of the community, by which, of course, I mean our community, the little republic which at present is bounded by the cliffs which enclose this cove, but which in process of time is destined to include the whole of this magnificent island of Hayti and--who knows?--possibly the entire group of islands now known as the West Indies.  And you, young as you are, have proved yourself to be a formidable enemy; you have courage, resolution, and apparently all the other qualities that go to the making of a successful leader; therefore I think it a thousand pities that you should be wasted, uselessly expended, in the mere gratification of a petty revenge which will benefit nobody anything; on the contrary, I am convinced that we should gain immensely by making you one of ourselves-- Nay, do not interrupt me, please; hear me to the end before you attempt to reply.  In the absence of Garcia I am supreme here; I can secure your election as a member of our band, and once a member, you are absolutely safe from Garcia, for it is one of the rules of our brotherhood that `One is for all, and all are for one;' private jealousies and animosities are absolutely forbidden, and the punishment for transgressing this law is _death_, let the offender be who he will.
"Now, that is one argument in favour of your joining us.  But there are others.  We are weak, as yet, it is true; but that is because, as a community, we are still very young.  We are, however, gaining strength almost daily; every capture we make adds to our numbers, because we give our prisoners the choice between joining us, and--death; and nine of every ten choose the former.  Also, we are rapidly accumulating wealth, which is power; and with the power which unlimited wealth will give us, added to the power of constantly increasing numbers, all things are possible to us, even to the conquest of the world!  Now, a lad of your intelligence ought to be able to see, without much persuasion, how tremendous an advantage it will be to belong to such a formidable band as we shall soon become, therefore I put it to you in a nutshell--Will you join us?"
Upon discovering the direction in which my companion's arguments were trending, my first impulse had been to interrupt him indignantly by declaring that I saw through his purpose, and would have naught to do with it.  But he would not permit me to do this; he insisted upon saying his say to the end; and while he was doing this I had time for reflection.  I perceived that the man was an enthusiastic visionary possessed of such boundless ambition that he was able to see nothing except the impossible goal which he and his fellow-leaders had set before themselves.  I saw that this fellow Fernandez, at all events, had dwelt upon the mad scheme of conquest, first of Hayti, then of the West Indian Islands, and ultimately, as he had declared, of the whole world, until it had become an obsession with him in which all difficulties were swept away and his gorgeous dream had seemed to be a thing already almost within reach.  It occurred to me that by pretending to listen to this dreamer, to appear to treat his dreams as though it was possible for them to eventually materialise, and to seem to weigh the proposal seriously which he had made to me, I might gain time enough to mature some plan of escape, and to put it into effect before the return of the _Tiburon_ and my arch-enemy Garcia; and while, as a general rule, I most emphatically disapprove of everything that savours of deception, I felt that, taking all the circumstances of the case into consideration, I should be perfectly justified in practising such dissimulation as might be necessary to extricate myself from the exceedingly awkward situation in which I now found myself.
Therefore when, with eyes ablaze with enthusiasm, Fernandez flashed the question at me, "Will you join us?"  I hesitated just for a second or two, and then replied:
"I suppose you hardly expect me to answer offhand so momentous a question as that, do you?  It is all very well, of course, for you, who have given the matter much careful thought, to feel so confident as you do that your plans are capable of realisation, but with me it is very different; the entire idea is absolutely new to me, and--if I may be permitted to say so--looks little short of chimerical."
"But it is _not_ chimerical," Fernandez impatiently insisted; "on the contrary, it is perfectly feasible and, as we have planned it, absolutely certain of realisation."
There is no need for me to repeat at length all the arguments that this man adduced in support of his contention; let it suffice me to say that I listened to him with deep attention--for I wanted to learn as many particulars as I possibly could concerning the plans of this extraordinary band, with a view to future contingencies--and when at length I left his presence I believe I also left him under the impression that he had more than half convinced me of the advisability of acceding to his proposal.
Meanwhile the man Pacheco, in obedience to the command conveyed through Carlos, had been patiently waiting in the antechamber for the summons to appear and receive the commands of Fernandez concerning me; and now, the interview being at an end, the former was called into the room.
"Pacheco," said Fernandez, "this young gentleman is Senor Delamere, the officer who commanded the small British man-o'-war schooner that lately attacked the _Tiburon_.  His vessel foundered in the gale that sprang up immediately after the action, and he contrived somehow to make his way to the shore, where he was nursed back to health and strength in the hacienda of Bella Vista, belonging to Senor Don Luis Calderon y Albuquerque.  That hacienda was attacked by Petion and his band in the early hours of this morning, and--as Carlos has doubtless already told you--Petion was killed during the attack, while Senor Delamere subsequently fell into the hands of Mateo, Petion's second-in-command, who very thoughtfully sent him on to us.
"Now, Senor Delamere, being, although still very young, a naval officer of considerable experience and undoubted courage, will be an acquisition of the utmost value to us if we can but succeed in inducing him to join us--and I have hopes, very great hopes of doing so.  I, therefore, want you to take him in charge for the present, showing him the utmost consideration, and allowing him free range of the settlement,--since it will be impossible for him to escape,--because I desire him to become thoroughly acquainted with all our resources, and to see for himself the perfection of all our arrangements for securing the success of our great enterprise."
I could scarcely believe my ears when I heard Fernandez give this extraordinary and, as I deemed it, most imprudent order.  It seemed too good to be true!  Why, if the foolish man had but known it, there was nothing I could possibly have more ardently wished for than liberty to range freely the settlement and become fully acquainted with all its resources!  If I had ever dreamed of such a possibility as this it would not have needed that I should be brought a prisoner to the place; I should have been but too eager to make my way to it voluntarily.  But, of course, it was much better as it was, for now all that I had to do was to keep my eyes and ears wide-open, learn everything I possibly could, and, generally, make the very best use of my time before the return of Garcia, while humouring Fernandez to the top of his bent in his delusion that he would ultimately convince me of the advantage of joining the band.  Moreover, I believed I should not have much difficulty in accomplishing this last; for, although I was at first somewhat at a loss to understand his great eagerness to secure me as a recruit, it became perfectly intelligible when I learned a little later on that the only weak point in the entire scheme consisted in the extreme scarcity of trained sailors capable of undertaking the more important executive duties.  Seamen, of the kind to be found in a ship's forecastle, they possessed, not exactly in abundance, but sufficient for their ordinary necessities; but it appeared that, apart from Garcia, his first lieutenant, and one other, they had not a single navigator among them; and it was easy to understand that, if anything untoward should happen to either of these men, the activities of the brotherhood would be seriously crippled, while a fatality that swept the whole of them away might well mean the utter ruin of all their hopes.  I did not learn this quite at once, for it seemed to be the one item of information upon which Fernandez desired me to remain ignorant; but, mingling freely with everybody, as I was permitted to do, it was impossible for them to prevent the secret from ultimately leaking out, and I had not been in the settlement more than three days before I became acquainted with it, and with a good many other things as well.
For instance, I learned that of the three navigators which the community boasted, two--namely, Garcia and another--were on board the _Tiburon_, while the third was in command of a most respectable-looking brig, which, provided with a complete set of false papers, was engaged in conveying to various ports such portions of the cargoes of plundered ships as were not needed by the pirates themselves, disposing of the same for cash, and procuring with that cash such commodities as were required from time to time.  The felucca that lay at anchor in the bay had also been similarly employed; but she was now idle, the man who had commanded her being with Garcia in the _Tiburon_, in place of an officer who had been killed in the action with the _Wasp_.
At the time of my arrival this extraordinary pirate settlement, or community, consisted of some forty seamen of various nationalities-- except Englishmen--who had thrown in their lot with Garcia, Fernandez, and the rest; and about a hundred others who, although not seamen, were most useful for the performance of such strictly shore duty as the erection of houses, the loading and discharging of the trading brig, the storage of the various commodities needed by the community, the working up of rough spars into spare masts, yards, booms, etcetera, for the brig and schooner, the making of spare sails for the same, and, in short, the execution of all those multitudinous kinds of work that are essential to the comfort of man in his civilised condition.  And exceedingly comfortable the rascals made themselves, for the houses were well-built, and in many cases beautifully furnished; also they enjoyed many luxuries, procured either from the cargoes of plundered ships, or purchased out of the proceeds of the sale of such plunder as they did not require for their own use.
It was not long before I discovered that there was a mystery of some sort attaching to the felucca that lay at anchor in the bay.  I had made more than one attempt to go on board her, with the object of giving her an overhaul, but each attempt had been quietly met and frustrated in such a way that I soon grew to understand I could not persist further without exciting grave suspicion, which was the one thing of all others that I most desired to avoid.  For it was this felucca that I regarded as my only possible means of escape from the pirates, and, that being the case, it was of the utmost importance that I should do nothing to betray the thought that lurked at the back of my mind.  She was a fine, sturdy-looking little craft, measuring somewhere about sixty tons; and I felt that if I could but once get aboard her, and get enough sail hoisted to take me out to sea, the most difficult part of my adventure would be over; for Jamaica lay to leeward, and I could not very well lose my way, even if I were compelled to go to sea without a chart.  It is true that the rig of a felucca--namely, a single latteen-sail, its head stretched along an enormously long, tapering yard, hoisted to the top of a stout, stumpy mast raking well forward--is not precisely the rig that I would willingly choose to go to sea alone with; but beggars must not be choosers, and it seemed to me to be Hobson's choice--that or nothing.  I must therefore make up my mind to face the difficulties of the rig and do the best I could with it, or remain until Garcia's return, and so miss my only chance.  Of course, there was just the bare possibility that I might find a man, or even two or three, willing to share the adventure with me--for I could scarcely believe that every member of the community had quite willingly joined it without compulsion of any kind--but I had no intention of jeopardising my chances of success by making inquiries, of however cautious a character.  If such men were to be found it would have to be almost by pure accident; meanwhile it was for me to make my plans in such a manner that, if necessary, they could be carried out single-handed.
But it was imperative that I should visit the felucca, by hook or by crook; and since I had already discovered that it could not be managed during the day, there was nothing for it but to make the attempt at night.  Now, I was in Pacheco's charge, he was responsible for me, and although I was nominally free to come and go as I would, it was not long before I discovered that it was practically impossible for me to get out of his sight for more than five or ten minutes at a time, except at night time, when I was granted the privilege of a small room to myself in his house.  Even then, for the first week of my sojourn, I could scarcely stir in my bed but at the creaking of it he would be at my door, inquiring why I was moving, and whether I required anything, the questioning being, I fancied, simply for the purpose of assuring himself that I was still in the room.  But as the days--or rather the nights-- went on his vigilance gradually relaxed, for I so shaped my speech as to convey the impression that, at least in my own mind, I had practically decided to join the band.  It was this, perhaps, that so far threw him off his guard as to betray him, on a certain night, into the indulgence of his favourite vice, which was a too-marked devotion to the rum bottle.  For several nights in succession--ever since I had been placed in his charge, in fact--he had been perforce compelled to remain perfectly sober in order that he might keep a strict watch upon me, but at length when, while we were sitting at table together, taking supper, I allowed him to believe that I had finally decided to go to Fernandez the next morning and take the oath, he ventured to celebrate my conversion by drinking my health in a stiff nor'wester of rum and water--rather more rum than water.  That act of weakness was his undoing, for at the first taste of the spirit after his forced abstention he completely lost all control of himself, and could no more refrain from taking a second tumbler than he could have flown.  The second naturally led to a third, and the third to a fourth; whereupon, recognising that my chance was at hand, I yawned twice or thrice most portentously, complained of fatigue, and retired to my room, he following as far as the door and locking me in, as was his custom before going to his own room.  But that troubled me not a whit, for the house was of one story only, and to slip out of it by way of the open window was almost as easy as walking out through the door, once my gaoler became so deeply wrapped in sleep that my stealthy movements would not awake him.
I moved quite carelessly about the room for a minute or two, and then flung myself heavily upon the bed, fully dressed; and as I did so I heard Pacheco go tiptoeing clumsily back to the table, stumbling against a chair on the way, and muttering imprecations at his own clumsiness as he went.  A further gurgling of liquor being poured into a glass followed, then a deep sigh of satisfaction as the glass was emptied, the bang of it as it was noisily replaced on the table, and finally the man's staggering footsteps along the floor as he made his way to his own room.  Then came the kicking off of his shoes, followed by other sounds indicative of the fact that he was undressing, a heavy creaking of the bedstead as he flung himself upon it, and, a minute or two later, deep snoring.
But it was still much too early for me to think of making a move, for sounds reached me from the outside which told me that quite a number of people were still up and about; I therefore waited, with such patience as I could muster, until these had all ceased, and then allowed something like another half-hour to elapse, in order to make all sure-- for this was a case where it were better to be half-an-hour late than half-a-minute too early, and by undue haste spoil everything.
At length, however, the complete absence of all sound suggestive, of human movement outside, and the steady, regular, resonant snore of Pacheco in the next room, encouraged me to make my preliminary move, which I did by rising, slowly and with infinite caution, to a sitting position on my bed.  This done, I next got off the bed altogether, not, however, without causing the thing to give forth sundry most alarming creaks, each of which brought my heart into my mouth.  But the snoring in the next room went on steadily, without pause or break, and two minutes later I found myself standing, barefooted, outside my window, ready to scramble back into the room upon the first suggestion of danger.  Nothing happened, however; and with my shoes in my hand I next proceeded to creep very cautiously round to the front of the house.
The night was clear, with no moon, but the sky was brilliant with stars affording even more light than I really wanted; and at length, having peered cautiously round me and noted that the buildings were all dark, showing that the inhabitants had retired to rest, I stole slowly, crouching, across the open and so down to the beach.  Among the boats drawn up on the sand there was a small Norwegian boat, much used as a dinghy, and consequently not drawn as far up on the beach as the others; this was the craft that I was on the lookout for, and by and by I found her, half afloat, and secured by her painter to a small anchor dug well into the sand.  Lifting the anchor with the utmost care, I noiselessly deposited it in her bows, and then, making sure that her oars were in her, I lifted her bow and slid her off the sand until she was fairly afloat, when I gently turned her round, gave her a vigorous push, and scrambled in over her stern, taking care to do everything without noise. Then, throwing out an oar over the stern, I headed the boat in the direction of the scarcely visible felucca, and proceeded to scull off to her.
Thus far everything had gone smoothly and without the ghost of a hitch, but the really difficult part of my enterprise was still to come.  I estimated that a good four hundred miles lay between the cove and Port Royal harbour, which distance, at an average speed of six knots, would take me the best part of three days and nights to cover, under the most favourable conditions.  To do this, I should need both food and water, and I had not the most remote idea whether either was to be found on board the felucca, although I hoped they might be, for I had seen half-a-dozen men go off to her regularly every day, for some purpose which I could not divine, unless perchance it were to pump her out.  But food and water were absolutely necessary to ensure my success, and unless I could find at least a sufficiency to last me three days, I must return and take measures to provide a supply; for to start without would be simply courting disaster.  That, however, was a point which could only be settled upon my arrival on board.
Taking the matter very easily, husbanding all my strength for the exceedingly difficult task of getting the felucca under way single-handed--in the event of all things conspiring to render such a decided step justifiable--and sculling so gently that I scarcely raised a ripple on the highly phosphorescent water, I at length glided quietly up alongside the felucca and, taking the end of the boat's painter with me, climbed in over the vessel's low bulwarks, passed the dinghy astern, made her fast, and forthwith proceeded to overhaul the craft which I had thus surreptitiously visited.
My first visit was to her tiny cabin, the companion door of which I found unlocked.  But when I got below it was so intensely dark that I could see nothing, and I felt that at all costs I must have a light, or it would be morning, and my flight would be discovered long before I could learn all that I wanted to ascertain.  I, therefore, went on deck again, loosed the immense sail, and spread a fold of it over the small skylight in order to mask the light in the cabin--should I be fortunate enough to obtain one--and then went forward to the forecastle to hunt for a lantern of some sort.  I found the fore-scuttle not only closed, but also secured by a stout iron bar, the slotted end of which was passed over a staple and secured by a padlock.  Fortunately, however, the individual who had last visited the little vessel had been too careless or too lazy to remove the key from the lock, therefore all I had to do was to turn the key, remove the padlock from the staple, throw back the bar, lift off the cover, and my way down into the forecastle was clear.  But I had no sooner lifted off the hatch cover and was preparing to descend than, to my utter consternation, I became aware of the fact that the forecastle was inhabited.  For as I flung my leg in over the coamings I distinctly heard a sound of stirring, followed, to my amazement, by the drowsy muttering of a voice in English, grumbling:
"What the blazes do they want now; and who comes off here at this time o' night?  'Taint time to turn out yet, I'll swear, for I don't seem to have been asleep more'n five minutes!"
English!  Then the speaker must certainly be a friend, and without more ado I dropped down into the little forecastle, exclaiming:
"Hillo, there!  Who are you, my friend; and what the dickens are you doing locked up here in this forecastle?"
"Who am I?" retorted the voice.  "Why, I'm an Englishman; my name's Tom Brown, and the name of my mate here is Joe Cutler; both of us late of His Britannic Majesty's schooner _Wasp_, what foundered in a gale o' wind somewheres off this here coast a while since.  We was picked up off a bit of wreckage by the crew of this here hooker--what turned out to be something in the piratical line--and brought into harbour.  And since we've been here we've been made to work like niggers because we wouldn't jine the `brotherhood,' as they calls theirselves.  Latterly we've been kept aboard this here feluccer, because it appears that there's some chap ashore there as they don't want to see us.  Ay, and if it comes to that, perhaps you're the chap.  Seems to me as I've heard your voice before.  Who are you at all, gov'nor?"
"My name is Delamere," I replied, "and I commanded--"
"Of course, of course," interrupted Brown; "Mr Delamere it is!  I knowed that I knowed that voice of yours, sir.  Here, you Joe, rouse and bitt, man; here's the skipper come to life again.  Half a minute, sir, and we'll have a light.  Joe, you lighted the `glim' last; what did ye do wi' the tinder-box?"
The two men were broad awake, out of their bunks, and bustling about almost before one could draw a breath, and the next moment they had lighted a lantern, in the dim glimmer of which they stood up side by side, saluting, as I stared into their faces scarcely able to credit such a stupendous piece of good fortune as the unexpected discovery of these two men, not only Englishmen, but actually members of my own late crew!
"My lads," I exclaimed, as they stood before me at attention, "I am more glad than I can express, not only to find that you, like myself, have managed to escape with your lives, but also that you are here, aboard this felucca.  For I fully intended to make the somewhat desperate attempt to escape in her single-handed; but the presence of you two men puts a very different complexion upon the affair.  What I might have been wholly unable to accomplish alone, we three can together manage with ease.  There is only one possible difficulty in our way: Can you tell me whether there happens to be any food and water aboard this craft?"
"Yes, sir," answered Brown, "there's both, for we're fed every day out of the ship's stores.  There's the scuttle butt on deck nearly full o' water, and there's grub down in the lazarette, but how much I don't know."
"Then let us go at once and ascertain," said I, "for my escape may be discovered at any moment, and naturally this would be where they would first look for me.  Mask that lantern with your jacket, one of you, and bring it along aft.  Every second is now of importance to us."
It took us but a few minutes to penetrate to the little vessel's lazarette, where we found an ample supply of provisions of all kinds for a much larger crew than ourselves and a much longer voyage than we contemplated.
"Very well," I remarked, as I ran my eye over the array of biscuit and flour barrels and the casks, some of which were branded "prime mess beef," while others contained potatoes and sundry other commodities, "that will do; we shall certainly not starve during the next few days, whatever else may happen to us.  Now clap on that hatch again, and we will go on deck, slip the cable, and make sail without further ado."
CHAPTER TWENTY.
THE BEGINNING OF THE END.
As I turned to quit the cabin I suddenly became aware that a bell was furiously jangling somewhere; and, dashing up the companion ladder to the deck, I discovered that the sounds proceeded from the shore, where lights were beginning to flash, one after the other, in rapid succession until the whole settlement appeared to be awake and stirring.
"On deck, both of you, at once!"  I shouted, sending my voice down through the open companion.  "Never mind about the hatch; leave everything as it is, for the moment, and clap on to these main halliards; there is an alarm of some sort ashore, and if it happens to be that they have discovered me to be missing, they will come off to this felucca the first thing.  Yes, and by Jove, if I am not mistaken there is a boat shoving off already.  Look, lads,"--as the two men came tumbling up on deck--"is that not the sparkle of oars in the water, there, right in the heart of that deep shadow?"
"Ay, sir, it do look uncommon like it, and no mistake--yes; that's the sea fire shinin' to the stroke of oars, right enough," exclaimed Cutler. "And they're comin' along as though they meant business, too!  Mr Delamere, it'd be a good plan, sir, if you was to jump for'ard and cast that cable off the bitts while Tom and me here sees about mastheadin' this here yard; there won't be so very much room to spare atween us by the time that this here hooker's paid off and gathered way."
"You are right, Joe, there will not," answered I; and, dashing forward to the windlass bitts, I proceeded to throw off turn after turn of the stiff hempen cable that held the felucca to her anchor, until the last turn was gone and the flakes went writhing and twisting out through the hawse-hole; then, as the end disappeared with a splash I dashed aft and rammed the tiller hard over to port--noticing, as I did so, that a large boat, pulling eight oars, was less than a hundred fathoms distant from us, and coming up to us hand over hand.  Then, catching a turn of the main-sheet round a cleat, I jumped forward again to where the two seamen were dragging desperately at the halliard which hoisted the heavy sail.
"Put your backs into it, men," I cried, as I tailed on to the fall of the tackle; "there is a large boat close aboard of us!  It will be `touch and go' with us, even if we are able to scrape clear at all."
Fiercely we dragged at the fall of the fourfold tackle that formed the working end of the halliard, and at each pull the great, heavy, swaying yard slid a few inches up the short, thick mast, as though reluctantly, while away on our weather quarter we heard the fierce shouts of the men in the approaching boat as they encouraged each other, punctuated by the quick jerk of the oars in the rowlocks, and the swish of the water as the oar-blades clipped into it.  With the passage of every second those menacing sounds drew appreciably nearer, dominating even the thunderous rustle and slatting of the sail that slowly climbed into the air over our heads, while the felucca, now fast gathering stern-way, and at the same time paying off, was driving steadily down toward the boat at a rate that seemed to render our capture inevitable.
At length, with a final jerk that made the little craft tremble to her keel, the big single sail filled, and the felucca careened to her bearings, as her canvas caught the full pressure of the wind.  At the same instant I heard an oar-blade clatter as it was hastily laid in, and an exultant cheer arise from immediately under our counter.
"Catch a turn with the halliards, quick, and then lay aft," I gasped. "The villains are alongside, and will be in over our quarter before we can do anything to prevent them if we are not smart."
As I spoke I passed the rope under, then over, a belaying-pin before surrendering it to Cutler to complete the operation of belaying, and then bounded aft, followed by Tom Brown, who had snatched a handspike from the rack as he passed it.  My first act was to drag the tiller over to windward and pass a turn of the tiller rope round the head of it, to help the felucca to pay off; for she was now gathering headway.  Then I sprang to the taffrail and looked over it.  The pursuing boat had actually overtaken us, and the man who pulled "bow," having laid in his oar, had grabbed the gunwale of the small boat in which I had come off from the shore--and which I had dropped astern upon boarding the felucca--and was now hauling his own boat up alongside her, while some half-dozen of his companions had risen to their feet and were scrambling into the smaller boat, apparently with some idea of climbing aboard us by shinning up her painter.  But the felucca had by this time gathered way, and was moving so fast through the water that it was as much as the man could do to hold on, and quite beyond his power to haul the one boat any closer to the other.  For a couple of breathless seconds longer he hung on desperately, and then, with a yell of savage disappointment, was obliged to let go, while somebody in the stern--I fancy it must have been Fernandez--seeing how things were going, shouted to the crew to throw out their oars again and give way.  But before this could be done the big boat was half-a-dozen fathoms astern, and we were leaving her so rapidly that for her to overtake us was a manifest impossibility. Meanwhile the small boat, with six men in her, was towing astern of the felucca, with her nose raised high in the air and the water bubbling and boiling up to the level of the top of her transom, and even slopping in over it occasionally, so that it was impossible for any of her occupants to move, lest by so doing they should cause her to fill and swamp.  The said occupants therefore did what they could in the way of relieving their feelings by vigorously anathematising us in good sonorous Spanish, and explaining, in short, pithy sentences, the sort of treatment that we might confidently look for when next they got us into their power.  Then one of them happened to remember that all this time a brace of loaded pistols were sticking in his belt, whereupon he whipped them out and blazed away at us, his companions promptly following suit, but, luckily, without doing us the slightest injury.
By this time the felucca was rapidly nearing the weathermost extremity of the island that guarded and masked the entrance of the bay, and presently we weathered it handsomely and bore up to pass out to sea, gliding between the two Heads a minute later.  We were now fairly outside, and with the first plunge of the little vessel's sharp stem into the surges that met us as we swept into the open sea a yell of dismay arose from the occupants of the boat astern, who cried out that they were being swamped, and implored us, for the love of all the saints, to cast them off before they were washed out and drowned.  I could not resist the temptation to retort that even, if that happened, they would still be getting less than their deserts; then, adding that I hoped I should soon have the pleasure of seeing them all hanged at Gallows Point, I cast off the painter and set them adrift, leaving them to get back into the cove as best they could, with only one pair of small oars among them.  We stood on, close-hauled, until we had gained an offing of about three miles, when we put the helm down, tacked, and lay-to, it being my intention to remain off the entrance of the pirates' cove until daylight, in order that I might obtain bearings and landmarks, which would enable me to identify the locality of the spot upon my return to destroy the settlement--as I was determined to do.
It was well that I took this precaution, for when daylight came we found that, so admirably had nature masked the cove, it was impossible for us to discover it until we again stood close in; and even then we could by no means make sure of the spot until we were within a cable's length of it.  Then, however, by means of a carefully taken set of compass bearings, I obtained the means which would enable me to run in from a distance and hit off the place with unerring precision.
We duly arrived in Port Royal harbour early on the fourth morning after our escape from Pirate Cove--as by common consent we called it--our passage being of a perfectly uneventful character.  As may be supposed, I kept a sharp lookout for the arrival of the Admiral from Kingston; and the moment that his barge hove in sight I hailed a shore boat--the felucca not possessing a boat of any kind--and landed for the purpose of making my report.
He was surprised, but at the same time very pleased to see me, shaking me warmly by the hand as the office messenger closed the door behind me, after showing me into his presence.
"Well, youngster," he exclaimed, "I am very glad to see you back again, all alive and kicking; for to tell you the truth you have been absent so long that I had given you and the _Wasp_ up for lost.  Well, and what luck have you had?  Strange that I did not notice the little schooner at anchor as I came down; for I have been on the lookout for her now a long while."
"Ah!"  I replied; "I am grieved to say, Sir Peter, that you will never again set eyes on the _Wasp_, for she lies at the bottom of the Sea of Hayti, with all her crew, I am afraid, save myself and two others."
"Tut, tut, tut!" exclaimed the Admiral; "that is bad news indeed.  Tell me how it happened."
As briefly as possible I related the entire history of the cruise, including my adventures upon the island of Hayti, and my escape from the pirates, winding up by pointing out the felucca, which lay in full view of the office window.
The old gentleman remained silent and sunk in deep thought for several minutes after I had concluded my story, shaking his head occasionally as he thought the matter over.  At length, however, he looked up, and said:
"It is a sad business, very sad, losing all those poor fellows, but I do not blame you, boy, in the least; you did what you could, and did it very well, too!  To fight and beat off so immensely superior a force as that of the pirates was a very creditable feat, I consider; and all might have been well had it not been for that gale springing up at so inopportune a moment.  Well, well, it cannot be helped; these things happen sometimes, in spite of all that we can do.  But there is generally a lesson to be learned from every mishap, if we will but look for it, and the lesson conveyed in this case is that we made a mistake in the arming of the _Wasp_.  Instead of fitting her with those six long 9-pounders, we ought to have mounted a long 18 and a long 32 upon her deck, then you would have been able to play a game of long bowls with the pirates and fight them upon practically equal terms.  As it was, you were badly peppered before you could reach her at all with your own guns.  Well, it cannot now be helped; the little hooker is gone, and there's an end of it.  Now, the thing to consider is what is next to be done.  What is your own idea?  You have been among the rascals, and know their strength; I suppose you have some sort of a notion of how they can best be circumvented, eh?"
"Yes, sir," I said.  "It seems to me that there are two ways of dealing with the pirates.  One way is, to waylay their schooner at sea, capture her, and then go into the Cove and destroy the settlement.  To do that effectively we must have a vessel as fast, as heavily armed, and as strongly manned as their own craft--"
"Which we don't happen to possess just now, worse luck!" cut in the Admiral.  "What is your other plan?"
I explained the alternative scheme--which I regarded as the more effective of the two--in pretty full detail; and as I unfolded it I saw the old gentleman's eyes begin to sparkle.  When at length I came to an end he dashed his fist down upon the table, and exclaimed with enthusiasm:
"That's the plan, boy; that ought to do the trick!  But I've no vessel to spare you, so you'll have to take the felucca, and do the best you can with her.  Strictly speaking, you know, I ought to put you under arrest, and not employ you again until after you have been tried for the loss of the _Wasp_; but the circumstances are such that we cannot afford to waste time in mere formalities just now; and I will take the responsibility of sending you to sea again at once.  You will be a bit crowded aboard the little hooker, I'm afraid, but that can't be helped; and if all goes well it ought not to be for long.  Now, go and find Carline, talk over the matter with him, and then come up to the Pen to dinner to-night--seven o'clock, sharp--and report to me what you have arranged."
I took the hint, and went, very well pleased, on the whole, with the result of my interview.  For I must confess that I had gone to that interview not altogether without trepidation; it was quite possible--I had told myself--that the Admiral might find fault with the manner in which I had engaged the pirate schooner; he might have picked holes in my tactics, or something of that sort; he might even have considered that the _Wasp_ might have been saved, after the fight, had we acted otherwise than we did; but, to my great relief, there was not a word of blame from him; on the contrary, he had murmured a word or two of approval here and there while I had been telling my tale, and was now about to prove his undiminished confidence in me by entrusting me with the command of another expedition against the same formidable foe.  I could not possibly have hoped for a more favourable reception.
I soon found the Master-Attendant, and inexorably button-holed him while I explained what I wanted done, although the poor man was frightfully busy just then, several ships being in harbour, refitting after having been in action with the enemy.  But, let him protest as he might, I would not release him until he had agreed to do everything that I required; the result being that when the dockyard men knocked off work to go to dinner that day, the felucca was already alongside the wharf, and more than half her ballast out of her; while, when the dockyard bell rang at six o'clock that night, signalling the cessation of work for the day, her hold had been swept clean, a quantity of dunnage laid in it, and four 68-pounders stowed on the top thereof, well packed up all round to prevent them from shifting when the craft was at sea.  But although I remained on the spot until the last moment, supervising matters in order that everything might be done to my satisfaction, I still managed to reach the Pen by seven o'clock--a smart sailing boat up to Kingston, and a ketureen from thence out to the Pen being my means of conveyance.
Sir Peter was as much surprised as pleased when I reported to him the amount of progress that I had made during the day.
"It is wonderful!" he exclaimed.  "How in the world did you manage it?"
"Simply by sticking to the Master-Attendant, and so preventing him from doing anything else until he had attended to my requirements," I replied.
The Admiral laughed in enjoyment of the picture his mind conjured up of the Master-Attendant vainly trying to shake me off.
"Poor Carline!" he remarked.  "How he must have suffered before he could bring himself to the point of setting aside all his other work to attend to you.  He is a good man, a most excellent fellow in every way; but he has one fault--he allows himself to be too much trammelled by routine. With him everything, irrespective of its importance, must be attended to in its proper order; and now that you have jolted him out of his groove it will be days before he will be able to get comfortably back into it."
I have no doubt Sir Peter was right, but I did not wait to see; all I know is that by noon the next day I had brought the unhappy man into the frame of mind that caused him to yield prompt attention to my requirements, rather than waste valuable time in a fruitless endeavour to evade them; with the result that, three days later, the felucca was ready for the next expedition which I was to lead against the pirates.
The moment that my preparations were complete I reported to the Admiral, and received his formal instructions to proceed to sea at once; and that same evening we weighed and stood out of harbour with the first of the land-breeze.  We now had to make a passage to windward; and although I hugged the southern coast of Jamaica as closely as I dared, thus availing myself to the fullest possible extent of the land-breeze as far as Morant Point, it was not until daybreak of the ninth day after sailing from Port Royal that we arrived off the entrance to the Pirate Cove.  Here we were baffled for a couple of hours, waiting for the springing up of the sea-breeze; but we caught the first breathing of it, and took it in with us, arriving at the anchorage about one bell in the forenoon watch.
My plan of campaign was perfectly simple.  I intended to enter the Cove, and, if the pirate schooner should happen to be in harbour, run straight alongside her, and board before her crew should have time to clear away their guns and bring them to bear upon the felucca.
I had a strong enough crew to do this, and had no doubt as to our ability to carry the schooner in the face of the most determined resistance that the pirates could offer.  Then, the schooner captured and her crew safely confined below, the establishment ashore would have no alternative but to surrender at discretion, or be annihilated by the schooner's guns.  There was only one weak point that I could see in this scheme, which was that a considerable number of the men constituting the shore portion of the establishment might escape into the interior of the island, unless some means were devised to prevent them.  It was, however, not very difficult to accomplish this; for it will be remembered that there was but one way of entrance to--and egress from-- the Cove on the land side, namely, a narrow and very dangerous zigzag path down the face of the perpendicular cliff, a gap in which, wide enough to prevent all effectual possibility of passage that way, might easily be made by the explosion of a bag of powder.  The preparations for the little expedition which was to accomplish this piece of work were made during the time that we were lying becalmed off the mouth of the Cove; and when at length we entered, a boat, containing four seamen in charge of a midshipman, who had been most carefully instructed concerning the precise nature of the duty which he was to perform, was cast adrift, just inside the Heads, but outside the islet which masked the entrance.  While they pulled away for the shore we in the felucca stood on into the Cove, every man of us with his sword or cutlass girded to his waist, and a brace of loaded pistols thrust into his belt, standing ready to leap aboard the schooner--should she happen to be in the roadstead.
We had no sooner cleared the islet, however, and fairly entered the Cove, than we discovered that the schooner was not in harbour, and that consequently we should be obliged to adopt the modification of plan which I had devised in view of such a very possible contingency.  But although the _Tiburon_ was not in the Cove, the anchorage was not tenantless, a brig of some two hundred and seventy tons being moored therein, while apparently every boat belonging to the settlement, as well as her own, was passing to and fro between her and the shore, those bound shoreward being loaded to the gunwale, while those coming from it were light.  At the first glimpse of this somewhat unexpected sight, I jumped to the conclusion that the vessel was a prize; but almost instantly I remembered that, in addition to the _Tiburon_, the pirates owned a brig, by means of which they disposed of such captured booty as they did not require for their own use, purchasing with the proceeds other goods of which they stood in need; and I had very little doubt that the craft before us was the brig in question.  Be that as it might, our first task was, obviously, to secure possession of the vessel; and the felucca was accordingly at once headed for her.
So busily employed were the pirates aboard the brig in the task of hoisting out cargo and striking it into the boats alongside that we were quite half-way across the bay before they discovered our presence, although the people ashore, who were unloading the boats, did their utmost to warn their comrades, by hailing and pointing.  But no sooner was the felucca seen and recognised than the whole place was thrown into a state of consternation.  The alarm bell ashore was rung, the people made a dash for their weapons, and then, tumbling the goods haphazard out of the boats on to the sand, sprang in and pulled might and main for the brig, while those on board her swarmed up out of the hold and down over the side into the half-loaded or empty boats, and gave way for the shore in a very panic of confusion.
But although the brig was moored well in, so that the boats passing to and fro might have but a short distance to travel, we in the felucca were alongside and had secured undisputed possession of the vessel before the boats with their armed crews had traversed half the distance between her and the shore; seeing which, the occupants paused and drew together, as if to confer and to await further developments.  Of this brief pause we promptly availed ourselves by getting the brig under way and working her and the felucca out toward the entrance, when, much to our astonishment, the boats with one accord turned round and pulled back to the beach.  This unexpected action on their part was a great relief to me, for I had fully expected that they would make a concerted effort to recapture the brig, or the felucca, or both, by boarding, in which case we should have had our hands full, and must almost certainly have lost a few men.  But probably they believed the felucca to be armed with cannon, and fully expected to be received with liberal doses of grape and canister, which would fully account for their sudden and unexpected display of prudence.  Be that as it may, we were allowed to work both craft out to sea without molestation; when, having hurriedly overhauled our prize and found that she was amply provisioned for a much longer voyage than that to Port Royal, I put her in command of my second midshipman, with a prize-crew of ten men, and, giving him instructions to report to the Admiral without delay, dispatched him forthwith.  Then, transferring myself and the remainder of my following back to the felucca, we re-entered the Cove and came to an anchor outside of but close to the islet that masked the entrance, and in such a position that the little craft could be warped right in alongside a bit of cliff that dropped sheer down into the water.  We had scarcely done this when a deep, hollow _boom_, echoing and re-echoing along the face of the cliff that enclosed the Cove, told us that the party which had been dispatched to breach the road up the face of the cliff, and so cut off the retreat of the pirates toward the interior of the island, had accomplished its task.
Time was now all important to us; for, of course, we could not tell at what moment Garcia, the arch-pirate, and his crew in the _Tiburon_, might put in an appearance upon the scene; and we had a few very important preparations to make before we could consider ourselves ready to deal with him; therefore we had no sooner let go the felucca's anchor than we lowered the only other boat that we had brought with us, and ran warps away to the shore of the islet, securing them to such rocks as were most convenient for our purpose.  This done, we warped the little craft right in alongside the cliff, and made her secure; after which our next task was to carry ashore two stout hawsers which we had brought with us for the purpose, and convey them to the top of the cliff under which the felucca lay moored.  Then we rigged a pair of sheers over the vessel's hatchway, and proceeded to hoist our 68-pounders out of the hold--one at a time, of course.  Then, having got the first gun on deck--already prepared in Port Royal dockyard, by being encased in a stout cylindrical packing of planks--we passed the bights of our two hawsers round it, one at each end, and with all hands tailing on--except one, whom we set to watch as a sentinel--proceeded to parbuckle it up the face of the cliff.  It was a stiff job, but, all our preparations having been made beforehand, everything went without a hitch; and when we knocked off work for the night all four guns were landed, together with their carriages; while, so far as we could discover, the pirates ashore remained in absolute ignorance not only of our doings but also of our whereabouts.
The same night, waiting until the darkness was sufficient to hide our movements from the pirates ashore, the gunner, the boatswain, the carpenter and I ascended to the highest point of the little islet, in search of a suitable spot upon which to construct our projected battery, and were fortunate enough to find it on the very summit itself.  It was, indeed, perfectly ideal for its purpose, for it commanded not only the whole of the interior of the Cove, with the settlement ashore, but also both entrances, and the open sea, for a space of about a mile.  And it possessed the further advantage that it needed but very little labour to completely adapt it for our purpose.  So eager was I to complete our preparations that I would fain have set the men to work upon it that night; but they had already done extraordinarily well in getting the four guns landed and mounted upon their carriages; I therefore decided, though somewhat reluctantly, to let them have a long, unbroken night's rest; and when the next day arrived I was glad that I had been wise enough to do so, for they came to their work fresh, and laboured with a will.  As for me, I spent the night doing sentry-go, for I fully expected to receive a visit from the shore some time during the hours of darkness.  But nothing happened; and when at length day dawned and I was relieved, I was inclined to believe that our efforts to conceal our presence on the island from the pirates had been successful.
With the dawning of a new day, however, the critical period was past, and I cared very little whether the inhabitants of the settlement did or did not discover our whereabouts.  We, therefore, got all hands to work the moment that it was light enough to see; and by the time that the pirates ashore began to show themselves, two of our four 68-pounders were in place on the spot which we had chosen for our battery, and were ready to open fire at a moment's notice.  But the Cove was too small, and the islet too close to the settlement for us to conceal our whereabouts or our movements, when once we began to work upon the summit, where we were in full view of every eye within a range of a couple of miles; and the pirates ashore had not been on the move more than half-an-hour before it became apparent that our presence had been discovered.  The indications that this was the case were clear and unmistakable; the alarm bell clanged out its summons, and instantly all work ceased and every man was seen to be hurrying toward the building in which I had been interviewed by Fernandez upon my arrival in the settlement.  This could mean but one thing, namely, a speedy attack upon the islet; and in anticipation of this we hastened the completion of our preparations, so that we might be quite ready to meet that attack when it came.  Our first business was to get the remaining two guns into position, and bring up to the battery our entire stock of ammunition. This did not cost us more than half-an-hour's strenuous labour, at the completion of which all hands went to work to tumble a sufficient quantity of ballast into the felucca to enable her to stand up under sail; and the moment that this was done I sent her out to sea, with a midshipman and four hands on board--in order that she might not fall into the hands of the pirates--with instructions to return only when the British ensign should be displayed from the battery.
Scarcely was the felucca under way when the sentinel who had been left in the battery, to keep watch upon the movements of the pirates ashore, summoned us to our posts; and upon our arrival there we at once saw that our preparations had not been completed a moment too soon.  For, as we topped the hill that obstructed the view of the Cove from the seaward side of the islet, we saw the whole male population of the settlement, numbering about one hundred and forty, marching down to the beach, with the evident intention of embarking in their boats and pulling off to attack us.  With the aid of my telescope I could distinctly distinguish the figure of Fernandez, who was assuming the direction of operations; and I could not but admire the strictness of the discipline which he appeared to exercise over his followers, for the fellows seemed amenable to his briefest order.  They possessed exactly twenty boats in all, ranging in size from a craft capable of accommodating forty men down to the little Norwegian dinghy in which I had made my escape, and it was evident that every man of the party had been previously told off to some particular boat; for upon their arrival at the beach the hitherto compact body at once dissolved into twenty separate detachments, each of which made its way, in a perfectly orderly manner, to a particular boat; the whole flotilla being launched and manned at Fernandez' word of command.  This done, the boats were turned round with their bows pointing straight for the islet, and--again at the word of command--the oars, as one, dropped into the water and the expedition advanced to the attack in a long straight line.
The boats had not so much as a single gun among them, their crew being armed simply with cutlass, pistol, and musket; I therefore felt no apprehension at all concerning the result of the coming conflict, but rather a somewhat unaccountable pity for the unfortunate wretches who seemed to be quite unaware that they were advancing to their doom.  But this singular feeling of pity was quickly swamped by the reflection of the fate that would certainly be ours, should we by any chance be foolish enough to let the pirates get the better of us; and since it was important that we should make the utmost of our opportunities, I gave orders for the four guns to be loaded with grape and carefully aimed at the four largest boats.  This was done, and the four pieces spoke their deadly message almost simultaneously, the smoke momentarily obscuring our vision, while the thunder of the discharge echoed and re-echoed round the cliffs in a long series of slowly decreasing reverberations. But long before these had died away the breeze had swept aside the pall of smoke that hid the boats from us, and we saw that, so carefully had the guns been aimed, each shot had taken effect, the four boats at which they had been discharged being now mere shapeless masses of wreckage, among which a few men struggled, here and there, to keep themselves afloat.
The casualties among the pirates must have been appalling, for I estimated that those four boats, being the largest in the entire flotilla, must have contained at least half the total number of men comprising the expedition, and, so far as I could ascertain, with the aid of my telescope, the survivors of the four crews scarcely numbered a dozen in all!  Of course the nearest boats at once closed in upon the wreckage, with the object of rescuing those few survivors, and in so doing some half-a-dozen of them became bunched close together for about a minute.  Such an opportunity was too good to be missed, and our guns having meanwhile been smartly loaded again, two of them were brought to bear upon the bunch, and simultaneously discharged.  The result of these two shots was scarcely as effective as that of the previous discharge-- possibly because the gun-captains had become a little flurried and excited--nevertheless two of the boats aimed at were blown to pieces, while two or three of the others showed signs of more or less serious damage, and the occupants were thrown into such dire confusion that, abandoning all further effort to save their comrades, they took to their oars and seemed intent only upon getting apart as quickly as possible, an example which was immediately followed by the remaining boats, the crews of which opened out until there was at least a couple of fathoms of clear water separating boat from boat.
For a few seconds I was under the impression that the havoc thus quickly wrought by our guns had so far discouraged the pirates that they intended to abandon the attack upon the islet--for there were several very evident signs of hesitation among them--but presently, apparently in response to the exhortations of Fernandez, who pulled along the line in a fast gig, the oars dipped once more, and the remnant of the flotilla most gallantly resumed its advance, amid cheers and yells of encouragement and defiance that clearly reached us on the islet.
CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.
THE EXTERMINATION OF THE PIRATES.
Nothing could possibly have been better, from our point of view, than the foolhardy gallantry of the pirates in thus persistently pressing home their attack upon the islet, for the advantage was all on our side, and must remain so until the enemy had landed and come to hand-grips with us; and it was imperative that, in order to ensure our own success, as many as possible of our foes should be put _hors de combat_ before the fight became a hand-to-hand melee.  It certainly seemed, at the first blush, to be rather cowardly to pelt the poor beggars with grape while they were unable to strike a blow in return; but the feeling was, after all, one of very weak, false sentimentality.  Every man of them was an outlaw and, even if not yet an actual murderer at least a potential one, and a consorter with cruel, cowardly brutes in human shape who would destroy without mercy if they were not themselves destroyed--who were, in fact, worse than wild beasts; for whereas the latter take life merely to satisfy the cravings of nature, the average pirate slew for the sheer love of slaying, and in order that he might gratify the unnatural lust that caused him to revel in the sight of human suffering.  Therefore, after the first qualm of reluctance, I felt no compunction in ordering the gunners to ply their weapons upon the advancing enemy with all the skill at their command.  And right willingly did the men obey my order, sponging, loading, priming, pointing, and firing with the fell determination of men who knew that they must slay or themselves be slain; aiming so carefully that every shot was made to tell with disastrous effect; so that the advancing boats gradually fell into confusion as shot after shot whistled through them, sinking a boat here, shattering another there, and killing or maiming so many of her crew that she could neither advance farther nor retire, but lay upon the water a mere drifting, blood-bespattered wreck. Had the distance between the beach and the islet been half as far again as it actually was, there can be no doubt that the entire expedition would have been swept out of existence; as it was, nine out of the twenty boats which left the settlement survived to reach the islet, and were grounded upon the beach just below the battery.  As the keels grated in upon the shingle their crews sprang out, dragged the boats well up, so that they would not go adrift, and then, sinking upon one knee, emptied their muskets at us, to cover the landing of their comrades; we, on our part, holding our fire in readiness to meet the rush upon the battery that was now imminent.
Here Fernandez, still unwounded, exhibited the only bit of sound generalship that had distinguished the attack; for instead of allowing his men to charge up the slope promiscuously as they landed, to be cut down or bowled over by our pistols, in detail, he ordered them to form up, in single file and open order, until the last boat had arrived, probably guessing that we were without muskets, and knowing that he and his men were for the moment beyond pistol-shot.  Then, after allowing them time to recharge their muskets, and a minute or two additional in which to recover their breath and prepare for the desperate up-hill rush at the battery, he gave the word to advance, himself leading the way, while we, with naked cutlass in one hand and pistol in the other, crouched behind our low breastwork, watching the toiling figures scrambling and struggling up the steep, almost precipitous slope.
They had advanced about half-way, and Fernandez, still leading, was just about within pistol range, when I rose to my feet, sprang up on the low earth parapet which we had constructed, raised my sword above my head, and, in as loud and authoritative a voice as I could command, shouted, in Spanish:
"Halt!"
Then, as the advancing pirates wavered and hesitated, in astonishment at my unexpected action, I continued:
"Fernandez, and you others, I call upon you to throw down your arms and surrender, in order to prevent the further sacrifice of life.  You can do no good by persevering further in this futile attack, for we are the masters of the situation, and we can shoot down every man of you before it will be possible for you to reach the spot where I stand.  To push on will simply mean--"
_Crack_!  One of the pirates, crouching behind another, had coolly levelled his musket and taken a pot shot at me, the bullet passing through my hat and searing my skull like a white-hot wire, so that I toppled over with the shock and fell back into the arms of one of my men.  The yell of savage joy raised by the pirates at the sight of my fall was echoed by my own men as they sprang to their feet, intending to leap over the low parapet and charge down upon the advancing foe to avenge me.  But I was not really hurt, and, shaking off the grip of the man who held me, I cried out in time to stay them, adjuring them, by all that they held dear, to stand fast where they were, and finish the fight in the battery itself.  And splendidly they obeyed me, although they might well have been excused had they ignored my command; for the firing of that musket-shot served as the signal for a general fusillade on both sides, in the course of which four of our men fell.  But ours was the commanding position, and by the time that the pirates had emptied their muskets and pistols at us we had brought them to a standstill, with more than half their number down.  After that there was no possibility of further restraining our lads, nor, indeed, was there any need.  We, therefore, poured out over the low earthwork and down the few yards of slope that still intervened between us and the enemy, and the next moment were engaged in a hand-to-hand, life-and-death conflict, neither side expecting or giving quarter.  For the few seconds that it lasted it was warm work, the pirates fighting desperately--since they knew that, if taken alive, the halter awaited them--and then, in the space of a minute it was all over.  The last of our foes was down--as well as a few more men on our own side--and we who remained unhurt stood gasping for breath, and mopping our perspiring brows as we glared hungrily about us for more foes to conquer.  But there were none; and presently pulling ourselves together, we gathered up our own wounded and carried them to such shade as could be found, where the surgeon's mate, who formed one of our company, at once got to work upon them, attending to their hurts. Meanwhile the ensign was hoisted as a signal to the felucca to return to the harbour; and then such of us as could be spared went out to disarm the wounded pirates and afterwards afford them such relief as lay in our power, while others again gleaned the weapons and ammunition of the fallen, recognising that they might possibly be useful in our fight with the crew of the _Tiburon_ later on.
Then, having made all arrangements for the conduct of the work on the islet during the next few hours, I took the two largest boats that had survived the passage across the waters of the Cove, and with a dozen men, armed to the teeth, under the leadership of myself and the boatswain, pulled away to the settlement, to see how matters stood in that direction.  As I had anticipated, there was not a man left in the place--not even a boy above fourteen years of age; every male above that age had been detailed to take part in the attempt to capture the islet, which Fernandez had fully recognised to be the key of the entire position.  And now, of the hundred and fifty who had taken part in the disastrous attempt, every one was either slain, or lay wounded in our hands.
While I was taking stock generally of the situation, so to speak, and making my further plans, the boatswain, assisted by the seamen whom we had brought ashore with us, made a careful and systematic search of every building in the place, removing every weapon, everything that could be used as such, and all ammunition, and transferring them to the two boats prior to our return to the islet.  There were not many weapons, and not a very great quantity of ammunition; but there was more than we could conveniently stow in the boats.  We, therefore, took a portion of it out to about the middle of the bay and there threw it overboard, returning for the remainder and conveying it to the islet. The most important result of our visit to the shore, however, consisted in the information, freely given me by one of the women, that, so far as she had been able to gather from the conversation of the men, the _Tiburon_ and her crew might be expected to arrive in the Cove at any moment.
By the time that I and my party got back to the islet the day was well advanced, the felucca had returned to the Cove and was now anchored inside the islet, close to its southern shore, and the surgeon, although still busy among the wounded pirates, had doctored up the whole of our own wounded and made them comfortable.  As might have been expected from the peculiar character of the engagement and the enormous advantage of position which we enjoyed, our casualties were singularly light, consisting only of five killed and nine wounded.  But in the case of the pirates there was a very different story to tell.  I had ascertained, while ashore, that they left the settlement one hundred and fifty strong; and now all that remained of them amounted to just thirty-seven wounded, of whom at least one quarter would probably succumb to their hurts.  Those thirty-seven I caused to be put into the boats, as soon as they had, been attended to, and conveyed to the settlement, where I turned them over to the care of the women folk, who, I thought, would probably be able to give them more attention and better nursing than we could hope to afford.  The next day, at the urgent request of several of the women, I also caused our own wounded to be taken ashore, where, under the supervision of the surgeon, they were taken in hand and most tenderly cared for.  The dead--both our own and as many as we could find belonging to the pirates--were hastily sewn up in canvas, weighted, and launched overboard from the felucca, which was taken well out to sea for the purpose.
It was about three bells in the forenoon watch, on the fifth day after the attack upon the islet, that two sail were sighted by the lookout, standing in toward the Cove; and half-an-hour later I was able to identify one of them as the infamous _Tiburon_, while the other was a large craft, apparently British, judging by her build and the cut of her canvas; doubtless a capture.
We had long ago made every possible preparation to give the pirate schooner a warm reception upon her arrival, going even to the length of surrounding our battery with a parapet and masking the latter by covering it with sods of growing grass.  We had now, therefore, nothing to do but patiently to await the arrival of the enemy, confident that he would sail right into the Cove, unsuspectingly, and never get so much as a hint of our presence until we should open fire upon him.
As we had planned so matters turned out; the two vessels entered the Cove together and simultaneously came to an anchor, the big craft--upon the stern of which we descried the words Berwick Castle: Bristol-- anchoring about a cable's length east of the schooner and, very fortunately for those chiefly concerned, well out of our line of fire.
We waited until we saw the anchors of both vessels splash into the placid waters of the Cove, and heard the rumble of their cables as they smoked out through the hawse-pipes; then, while the gunners brought the four 68-pounders, loaded with round shot and grape, to bear upon the crowded deck of the pirate schooner, another party raised a rough flagstaff, to which a British ensign had been nailed, and dropped its heel into a socket already prepared for it.  Even then it was nearly a minute before our presence was discovered by the pirates, who were at that moment busily clewing-up and hauling down their canvas preparatory to stowing it.  But the boatswain, the gunner, and I all had our telescopes focussed upon the schooner, keenly watching every movement on board her, and it was not long before I recognised upon her quarter-deck, issuing orders and generally carrying himself with an air of authority, the handsome rascal who, during the fight between the _Tiburon_ and the _Wasp_, had hailed us asking whether we had struck. Almost on the instant of recognising him I saw a man run up to him, excitedly say something to him, and point toward the islet.  The handsome rascal--who was without doubt the pirate captain, Manuel Garcia himself--stood, stared amazed for a few seconds at the islet, and then made a dash for the companion, from which he withdrew a telescope, which he levelled in our direction.  For perhaps a quarter of a minute he kept the tube steadily pointed toward us; then with a gesture of mad ferocity he dashed the instrument to the deck, and, seizing his speaking-trumpet, placed it to his lips.  The effect was an instant stoppage of the operation of clewing-up and hauling down aboard the _Tiburon_, while every eye in her was, as by one impulse, directed toward the islet.  But the pause endured only for a space of a few seconds, just long enough to enable the gazers to identify the flag flying on the islet as the British ensign, thereupon everybody seemed to be galvanised into instant, breathless activity again.  Now, however, the former processes were reversed; the men who were already half-way aloft, intent upon furling the canvas, started to return to the deck, others sprang to the sheets and halliards and began to sheet home and hoist away as if for their lives, and, in short, it was evident that the pirates contemplated getting under way again and attempting to escape out to sea.
It was at this moment that the boatswain, who still had his glass focussed on the schooner, cried out:
"They're goin' to cut her cable, Mr Delamere!  Look, sir, and you'll see a chap hurrying for'ard with an axe in his hand."
"Is that so?"  I exclaimed.  "Then bring Number 1 gun to bear on the schooner's forecastle and sweep it clear.  Quick, before they can cut her adrift!  It will never do to have her drifting all over the Cove."
I was interrupted by the crashing report of Number 1, which, with the others, had already been most carefully trained upon the schooner; and as the smoke blew away we saw the vessel's port bulwark, all about the cathead, thickly dotted with white marks where the shot had struck, while the forecastle, which had been crowded with men a moment before, was now clear; not so much as a single head showed above the rail.
"Give them the other three guns, as quick as you please; and keep up your fire, with grape only, until you receive further orders," I cried. And almost as the words left my lips the other three guns bellowed their terrible message, in response to which the men on the _Tiburon's_ deck seemed to shrink and disappear.  But although a good many of them went down, enough were still left to enable them to man their port broadside of seven 12-pounders, as well as their long 32; and with astounding rapidity they brought the whole of these guns to bear upon the spot from which the jets of flame and smoke issued, marking the position of our guns, while they defiantly ran up the black flag to their main truck.
Now the action raged fast and furious, both sides loading and firing as rapidly as they could, although I continually exhorted our own gunners to give themselves plenty of time to take careful aim.  The enemy quickly got our range to a nicety, and their shot came screaming about our ears and plumping into our earthen rampart in an almost continuous shower, blinding us with the dust and dirt that they threw up, and occasionally sending the splinters flying in all directions when the shot happened to strike a stone.  Yet, marvellous to relate, although several of us were suffering from severe contusions caused by those flying splinters of rock, not one of us was, thus far, actually disabled, while, within ten minutes from the beginning of the firing, that of the schooner slackened perceptibly, showing plainly how severe was the punishment which we were inflicting upon her.  This was further exemplified by the fact that presently a man was seen to be hailing the _Berwick Castle_, in response to which two boats were lowered, and, crowded with men, pulled over to the schooner.  Thus reinforced, the _Tiburon's_ fire breezed up again for a few minutes; then it gradually slackened again; and finally, when the action had been in progress some twenty minutes, it died away altogether, the black flag being slowly and reluctantly hauled down, a minute later, in token of surrender.
"Cease firing, lads," I cried; "the schooner has struck.  Now, while the guns' crews remain here, ready to open fire again, if need be, the rest of us will go aboard and take possession."  And, with a wild cheer, some thirty of us leaped the ruins of our parapet and dashed headlong down the steep slope to the little strip of beach where half-a-dozen boats were drawn partly up out of the water.
To pounce upon those boats, rush them afloat, and then tumble helter-skelter in over the gunwales was the work of seconds only; then, throwing out the oars, away we went for the pirate schooner, keeping well apart, in case of a treacherous resumption of firing on the part of the pirates.  But nothing occurred, everything remained silent--almost ominously so--on board the schooner, one head only showing above the torn and splintered bulwarks--that of a man who, apparently wounded, clung to the main-topmast backstay, seeming to watch our approach.  As we drew nearer that head gradually assumed a recognisable appearance in my eyes, until at length I felt convinced that it was that of Garcia himself.  Suddenly, as I watched, the fellow disappeared, not as though he had sunk to the deck exhausted but rather as though he had gone elsewhere at a run, and with his disappearance a strong suspicion of some diabolical treachery on his part gripped me.  I wrestled with it for a few seconds--until in fact we were within half-a-dozen fathoms of the schooner's side; then, influenced by some irresistible impulse, I sprang to my feet and shouted:
"Hold water all! we will go alongside the ship first, and see what is the state of things there.  The schooner is safe; she cannot escape; but while we are aboard her who can tell what may be happening aboard the ship?  Round with the boats, men, and pull alongside the Englishman!"
With one accord the boats swept round and headed for the _Berwick Castle_, and a couple of minutes later we were alongside and swarming up her lofty sides.  I was in the act of swinging in over her rail, in the wake of her main rigging, when a terrific concussion shook the vessel from stem to stern, a loud _boom_, like the explosion of a pent volcano, rent the air, and, looking in the direction of the sound, we saw a vast sheet of flame and smoke suddenly burst from the schooner; her masts, guns, and a vast quantity of debris--among which we recognised some thirty or forty human bodies--went hurtling high into the air; her sides opened out, showing her ribs here and there black against the white flame; and then the torn and dismembered hull sank in the midst of the seething waters of the Cove, followed by the plunging debris as it came down again after its flight into the air.  My instinct had warned me aright; the man I had seen was, beyond all doubt, Garcia himself; and he had fired the vessel's magazine in the hope of blowing us all into the air with him as we boarded!
"By the Living Jingo, sir, that was a lucky thought of yours to order us to board this ship first!" gasped the boatswain, with white and quivering lips, as he clung to the rail.  "Where would we all ha' been if we'd gone on and boarded that schooner, as we at first intended to?"
As soon as our somewhat shaken nerves would permit we proceeded to search the _Berwick Castle_, in the hope of finding some at least of her crew, but there was no trace of them beyond the seamen's chests in the forecastle and the clothing of the master and officers in their respective cabins, all of which showed signs of having been made free with by the captors; the crew had vanished, to the last man, having doubtless been offered, in accordance with the pirates' usual policy, the alternative of service under the black flag, or--death.  And apparently, to their eternal honour, they had chosen the latter.
My story is done, for there is no need to weary the reader with prosaic details regarding the arrangements which I made for the removal of the women from the pirate settlement prior to its destruction, or how the latter was accomplished.  Let it suffice me to say that the destruction was so thorough and complete that no encouragement was left for other pirates to adopt the place as a rendezvous; and, so far as I am aware, no other pirates ever attempted to do so.
We sailed for Port Royal that same afternoon, about two hours before sunset; and just as the great luminary was about to sink gorgeously beneath the western horizon the wind failed us and afforded me the opportunity to do something which I very greatly desired to do, namely, to call upon my friends Don Luis and Dona Inez, the two warm-hearted friends who had played the Good Samaritan, and treated me with such generous hospitality, when I had been brought to their house, more dead than alive, after the loss of the _Wasp_.  Thus far I had had no opportunity to pay them a visit, but now, by a lucky chance, the wind happened to fail us when we were within a couple of miles of the shore, and almost exactly abreast of Bella Vista, which was distinctly visible from the deck of the _Berwick Castle_, in the strong light of the setting sun.
I took my glass and carefully examined the shore, found the beach upon which I had been landed, saw that the water was smooth enough to permit of my landing, and recognised that here was an opportunity to visit my friends, and express my gratitude for all that they had done for me, which might never occur again.  Next, I turned my glass upon Bella Vista itself, and saw that the doors and windows were opened, the latter draped with curtains, and I fancied I could even make out one or more persons seated under the shadow of the veranda; it was pretty certain, therefore, that my friends were at home, and I at once made up my mind to visit them, as I felt that I might with safety, for the calm would last about two hours, and then the land-breeze would spring up, and the _Berwick Castle_ could then work close inshore and heave-to until I should rejoin her.
My preparations were soon made, and within ten minutes of arriving at my decision to go ashore, having left the boatswain in charge and given him all necessary instructions, I was in the boat and heading for the beach. Of course it was quite dark some time before the boat's keel grated upon the sand; but that fact did not greatly trouble me, for I knew my way quite well, and had very little difficulty in finding the path which led up to the house.
The building was by this time lighted up, and as I approached I heard voices, among which that of Don Luis was easily distinguishable.  Then, as I ascended the steps which led up to the gallery running round the house, I heard Dona Inez speak, and the next moment she stepped out through the drawing-room window, and caught sight of me.
For a moment she stopped dead, with a startled look in her eyes; then, with a little scream of delight she darted forward, seized my hands, and impulsively kissed me on both cheeks in the Spanish fashion, much to my embarrassment.
"Luis--Luis," she cried, still holding my hands, "come hither quickly, _caro mio_, and see the most welcome sight that you have seen for many a day!"
"Why, yes, of course I will," responded Don Luis.  And the next moment he too stepped out on to the gallery, straight up to me, and, like his wife, kissed me!
"Welcome! a thousand welcomes, my dear Don Ricardo!" he exclaimed, snatching my hands from his wife's clasp.  "But where on earth have you sprung from?"
"From yonder," I answered, pointing to seaward where the lantern at the _Berwick Castle's_ gaff-end shone like a star through the darkness.
"Well, you are just in time for dinner," he exclaimed, "so come in. There are others here who will rejoice to once more see you whom we thought dead long ago."  And as these two dear, warm-hearted, impulsive friends dragged me in through the open window I became aware that the entire Mendouca family were in the drawing-room; and by them, too, I was very cordially welcomed, though, naturally, with a little more restraint than that displayed by Don Luis and his wife.
Oh! what a dinner that was, and how genuinely delighted they all were to see me--not excepting Mama Elisa and Teresita, both of whom insisted upon seeing me when they learned that I was in the house.  Of course I had to relate to them in detail everything that had happened to me, from the moment when I went forth to reconnoitre on the memorable day of the attack on Bella Vista by the blacks, and many and loud were the ejaculations of amazement as I reached the most telling points of my story.  It appeared that they had waited anxiously for my return, and had only finally given up hope at nightfall, by which time they had arrived at the conclusion that the blacks had got me and carried me away into the mountains to torture me to death.  They told me that they had mourned for me as for a brother, and their delight at finding I still lived convinced me of the truth of the assertion.  Later I learned that the Mendouca family were still enjoying Don Luis' hospitality, pending the rebuilding of Montpelier.
It was not until after ten o'clock that night that I succeeded in dragging myself away from Bella Vista, and only then upon the promise, which I most willingly gave, to keep in touch with them by letter, and repeat my visit as often as possible.  But so far as the latter part of my promise was concerned, fate was against me, for I never again was privileged to meet any of them.
It was six bells of the first watch when I reached the _Berwick Castle_, by which time the land-breeze was piping up strong; and as soon as the boat was hoisted to the davits we filled away for Port Royal, where we arrived in due course, and landed our prisoners, to the number of twenty-three.  Three weeks later they underwent their trial for piracy on the high seas, and, the evidence against them being overwhelming, they were all hanged at Gallows Point a fortnight after their conviction.
As for me and my crew, we obtained full and even generous recognition for our exploit, the merchants of the various West Indian islands combining together to present me with an exceedingly handsome service of plate, and to subscribe to a purse the contents of which was to be divided _pro rata_ among the other officers and men of the expedition. The Admiral was good enough to express unbounded satisfaction at what he was pleased to term "the unusual skill and discretion" with which the task of exterminating a most formidable nest of pirates had been carried out; and he took considerable pains to afford me an early opportunity, not only to undergo the formalities of a court-martial for the loss of the _Wasp_, but also to pass my examination.  Immediately after this latter event he presented me with my commission to a crack frigate; and in her I subsequently saw much exciting service, lasting up to the short-lived peace of Amiens, toward the end of the year 1801, by which time I had attained to the rank of post-captain.  But although many of my subsequent experiences as an officer of the British Royal Navy were sufficiently strange and exciting, it was never again my lot to cross swords with a pirate; for "pirating" became an occupation to be shunned, so far as the West Indian waters were concerned, for several years after the memorable example made by the British Government in the inexorable hunting down and destruction of the notorious Garcia, the pirate of Hayti, and his formidable band.
End of Project Gutenberg's A Middy of the King, by Harry Collingwood

= = = PG21070 = = =
A MIDDY OF THE SLAVE SQUADRON: A WEST AFRICAN STORY
Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England
A Middy of the Slave Squadron A West African Story
By Harry Collingwood ________________________________________________________________________ This was one of the last books written by "Harry Collingwood".  The copy we worked from was very clearly printed, but with one very major problem - the text was printed far too close to the centre of the book. Therefore the book could not be scanned using the regular book-scanner, but rather it was done using the scanner in flat-bed mode.  However, the results were quite good, with the text coming through very clearly, and only the hyphens needing a good amount of checking.  The hyphens get affected by the cleaning-up process which takes out the unwanted dark patches on the scans.
The book is exactly according to the title.  Remembering that "Harry Collingwood" was in real life a naval architect, you can take good note of the way he handles nautical terminology.  Other contemporary authors were good, but in this respect Collingwood is a real master.
It makes a good audiobook, so you ought to enjoy it very greatly.  NH. ________________________________________________________________________ A MIDDY OF THE SLAVE SQUADRON A WEST AFRICAN STORY
BY HARRY COLLINGWOOD
CHAPTER ONE.
A SOUND THROUGH THE DARKNESS.
"Phew!" ejaculated Mr Perry, first lieutenant of His Britannic Majesty's corvette _Psyche_, as he removed his hat and mopped the perspiration from his streaming forehead with an enormous spotted pocket-handkerchief.  "I believe it's getting hotter instead of cooler; although, by all the laws that are supposed to govern this pestiferous climate, we ought to be close upon the coolest hour of the twenty-four! Just step aft to the skylight, Mr Fortescue, and see what the time is, will ye?  It must surely be nearing two bells."
"Ay, ay, sir!"  I dutifully answered; and, moving aft to the skylight, raised the canvas cover which had been placed over it to mask the light of the low-turned lamp which was kept burning all night in the fore cabin, and glanced at the clock which, screwed to the coaming on one side of the tell-tale compass, balanced the barometer which, hung in gimbals, was suspended on the other side.  The clock marked the time as two minutes to five a.m., or within two minutes of two bells in the morning watch.
Dropping the canvas screen back into place, I was about to announce the time to my superior officer, when I thought I caught, through the faint creak of the ship's timbers and the light rustling of the canvas aloft, a slight, far off sound, like the squeak of a sheave on a rusty pin. Therefore, instead of proclaiming the time aloud, I stepped quietly to the side of the first luff, and asked, almost in a whisper--
"Did you hear anything just then, sir?"
"Hear anything?" reiterated Mr Perry, unconsciously lowering his usually stentorian voice in response to the suggestion of secrecy conveyed by my whisper; "no, I can't say that I did.  What d'ye mean, Mr Fortescue?"
"I mean, sir," I replied, "that I thought I caught, a moment ago, a sound like that of--ah! did you hear _that_, then, sir?" as a voice, uttering some words of command, apparently in the Spanish language, came floating to us, faint but clear, across the invisible water upon which the _Psyche_ lay rolling almost imperceptibly.
"Ay, I did," answered Mr Perry, modulating his voice still further. "No mistake about that, eh?  There's a craft of some sort out there, less than a mile distant, I should say.  Did you catch the words?  They sounded to me like some foreign lingo."
"No, sir," I replied, "I did not quite catch them, but, as you say, they appeared to be foreign, and I believe they were Spanish.  What about striking two bells, sir?  It only wanted two minutes--"
"On no account whatever, Mr Fortescue," hastily interrupted my companion.  "On the contrary, have the kindness to slip for'ard and caution the watch not to sing out, or make the slightest noise, on any account, but to come quietly aft if they happen to have anything to report.  And when you have done that, kindly go down and call Captain Harrison."
"Ay, ay, sir!"  I answered; and, kicking off my shoes, lest the sound of them upon the deck should reach the stranger through that still and breathless atmosphere, I proceeded upon my twofold errand.
But it is time to tell the reader where the _Psyche_ was upon this dark and stifling night; what she was doing there; and why the precautions above referred to were deemed necessary.
As has already been mentioned, the _Psyche_ was a British man-o'-war. She was a sloop, armed with fourteen long 18-pounders; and carried a crew which had originally consisted of one hundred and thirty men, but which had now been reduced by sickness and casualties to one hundred and four, all told.  She was a unit in the somewhat scanty Slave Squadron which Great Britain had stationed on the West African coast for the suppression of the infamous slave-trade; and when this story opens-- namely, about the middle of the year 1822--had been upon the station nearly two years, during the whole of which period I, Richard Fortescue, hailing from the neighbourhood of the good town of Plymouth, had been on board her, and now held the responsible position of senior midshipman; being, at the above date, just turned seventeen years of age.
The _Psyche_ was a fine, stout, roomy, and comfortable craft of her class; but about as unsuitable for the work upon which she was now engaged as could well be, for she was a converted merchant ship, built for the purpose of carrying the biggest possible cargo that could be packed into certain prescribed limits, and consequently, as might be expected, phenomenally slow.  To commission such a vessel to chase and capture the nimble craft that were usually employed to transport the unhappy blacks across the Atlantic was simply a ghastly farce, and caused us, her unfortunate crew, to be the laughing-stock of the entire coast.  Yet, considering all things, we had not done so very badly; for realising, early in the commission, that we need never hope for success from the speed of our ship, we had invoked the aid of strategy, and by dint of long practice had brought the trapping of slavers almost up to the level of high art.  Consequently the _Psyche_, despite the disabilities arising from her astonishing lack of speed, had acquired a certain reputation among the slave-dealing fraternity, and was as intensely detested by them as any ship on the station.
At the moment when the reader first finds himself a member of her crew the _Psyche_ was lying near the mouth of the Benin river, some two miles off the shore and about twice that distance from the river's mouth, at which point we had arrived at midnight; having made our way thither in consequence of "information received," which led us to believe that a large ship was at that moment in the river taking on board a full cargo of blacks.  We had drifted down to the position which we then occupied under the impulse of the last of the land-breeze, which had died out and left us becalmed some two miles short of the precise spot for which we were aiming.  Still, we were near enough for all practical purposes, or believed that we were; for we thought that if a thoroughly smart look- out were maintained--and we had grown to be adepts at that sort of thing--it would be impossible for a slaver to attempt to slip out of the river without our becoming cognisant of the fact.  And now, to return to my story.
Having first stolen forward and warned the watch that a craft of some sort was within hearing distance of us, and that they were therefore carefully to avoid crying out, or making any other sound that might betray our presence, I returned aft, in the same cautious manner, and was on the point of descending the companion ladder to call the captain, when _ting-ting_ came the soft chiming of a ship's bell, mellowed by distance, from somewhere in the offing, evidencing--or so it seemed to me--the fact that the stranger had not as yet discovered our proximity.
The skipper, accustomed to being disturbed at all hours of the night, awoke at the first touch of my knuckles upon his cabin door.
"Yes!" he called; "what is it?"
"There is a strange craft not far from us, sir," I answered; "and Mr Perry considered that you should be apprised of the fact.  We know nothing whatever about her, except that she is there; for the night is so intensely dark that we have been unable to catch the faintest glimpse of her, but we have just heard them strike two bells aboard her.  We have not struck our own bell, sir, thinking--"
"Yes, of course, quite right," interrupted the skipper, as he landed with a soft thud on the floor of his state-room.  "Tell Mr Perry that I'll be on deck in a brace of shakes."
He followed close at my heels up the companion ladder, having paused only long enough to slip into his nether garments, and came groping blindly out on deck.
"Phew!" he muttered, as he emerged from the companion; "it's as dark as the inside of a cow.  Where are you, Mr Perry?"
"Here I am, sir; close alongside you," answered the first luff, stretching out his hand and lightly touching the skipper's arm.  "Yes," he continued, "it certainly _is_ dark, unusually so; so dark that I am in hopes of keeping our presence a secret from the fellow out yonder until you shall have decided what is to be done."
"Mr Fortescue tells me that you have not seen anything of him thus far," remarked the captain.  "Whereabout is he, and how far off, do you reckon?"
"Somewhere away in that direction," indicated the lieutenant, with a flourish of his arm.  "As to the distance--well, that is rather difficult to judge.  Sound travels far on such a night as this; but I should say that the craft is not more than half a mile distant, or three-quarters, at the utmost."
"Um!" commented the captain meditatively.  "I suppose it is not, by any chance, the craft which we are after, which has slipped out of the river in the darkness, eh?"
"I should scarcely think so, sir," answered Perry.  "A man would literally have to be able to find his way about blindfolded to attempt to run out of the river on such a night as this.  No, I am inclined to think that it is some inward-bound craft, becalmed like ourselves.  We caught the sound of some order spoken on board her when we first became aware of her presence, and Mr Fortescue here was of opinion that the words used were Spanish, although the distance was too great to enable us to distinguish just what was said."
"Ay," responded the skipper; "two out of every three slavers doing business on this coast are either Spaniards or Portuguese.  Now, the question is, What are we to do with regard to our unknown friend out yonder?  Either she is, or is not, the craft that we are on the look-out for.  If she _is_, we must take her, by hook or by crook, before the sea-breeze sets in and gives her the chance to run away from us; and that means a jaunt in the boats.  On the other hand, if she is not the craft that we are after, she is still in all probability a slaver, and in any case will doubtless pay for an overhaul, which again means a boat trip.  Therefore, Mr Perry, be good enough to have the hands called, and the boats got into the water as silently as possible.  If the men are quick we may be able to get away, and perhaps alongside her, before the dawn breaks.  I will take charge of this little pleasure-party myself, and you can stay here and keep house during my absence."
"Ay, ay, sir," answered Perry, in tones which clearly betrayed his disappointment at the arrangement come to by the skipper.  "I will put matters in hand."
"Yes, do," returned the skipper; "and meanwhile I will go and dress.  It shall be your turn next time, Perry," he chuckled, as he turned away to go below again.
"Ay," grumbled the lieutenant to himself, but audibly enough for me to hear.  "Same old yarn--`your turn next time, Perry.'  This will make the third time running that I have been left behind to `keep house,' but there's not going to be a fourth, I'll see to that; it is time that this child stood up for his rights.  Now, Mr Fortescue, have the goodness, if you please, to pass the word for all hands to arm and man boats; and to be quiet about it, too, and show no lights."
"Ay, ay, sir," I briskly responded, as I turned to hurry away; "I'll see that our lambs don't bleat too loudly.  And--I suppose--that I may take it for granted that--"
"That you will make one of the `pleasure-party'?" interrupted the lieutenant, with a laugh, as he put his disappointment and ill-humour away from him.  "Oh, yes, I suppose so.  At all events there will be no harm in making your preparations; the captain is pretty certain to take you."
Still on my bare feet, I hurried forward and found the boatswain.
"That you, Mr Futtock?"  I inquired, as I made out his burly form.
"Ay, ay, Mr Fortescue, it's me, right enough," was the answer.  "I presoom, sir, it's another boat job, eh?  You heard that bell?"
"We did, Mr Futtock; yes, we heard it distinctly, seeing that we don't `caulk' in our watch on deck," I retorted.  "Yes, it's another boat affair; so be good enough to have all hands called at once, if you please.  And kindly make it your personal business to see that nobody raises his voice, lets anything fall, or otherwise creates row enough to wake the dead.  This is going to be a little surprise visit, you understand."
"Ay, ay, Mr Fortescue, I understands," answered Futtock, as he moved toward the open hatchway; "I'll see that the swabs don't make no noise. The man that raises his voice above a whisper won't go.  That's all."
"Just one word more, Mr Futtock," I hastily interposed, as the boatswain stepped over the coaming to descend the hatchway.  "You may do me a favour, if you will.  Kindly ask the armourer to pick me out a nice sharp cutlass, if you please.  You can bring it on deck with you when you come up."
To this request the boatswain readily enough assented; and matters being thus far satisfactorily arranged I descended to the cockroach-haunted den wherein we mids. ate and slept, to find that little Tom Copplestone--who shared my watch, and who was a special favourite of mine because of his gentle, genial disposition, and also perhaps because he hailed from the same county as myself--having overheard the conversation between Mr Perry and myself, had already come below and roused the occupants of the place, who, by the smoky rays of a flaring oil lamp that did its best to make the atmosphere quite unendurable, were hastily arraying themselves.
"Murder!"  I ejaculated, as I entered the pokey little place and got my first whiff of its close, reeking, smoke-laden atmosphere; "put out that abominable lamp and light a candle or two, somebody, for pity's sake. How the dickens you fellows can manage to breathe down here I can't understand.  And, boy," to the messenger outside, "pass the word for Cupid to bring us along some cocoa from the galley."
"There's no need," remarked Nugent, the master's mate, as he struggled ineffectively to find the left sleeve of his jacket.  "The word has already been passed; I passed it myself when Master Cock-robin there," pointing to Copplestone, "came and roused us out.  And, as to candles, I'm afraid we haven't any; the rats appear to have eaten the last two we had in the locker.  However--ah, here comes the cocoa.  Put the pot down there, Cupid--never mind if it _does_ soil our beautiful damask table- cloth, we're going to have it washed next time we go into Sierra Leone. And just see if you can find us a biscuit or two and some butter, will ye, you black angel?  Here, avast there,"--as the black was about to retire--"produce our best china breakfast-set before you go, you swab, and pour out the cocoa."
The black, a herculean Krooboy, picked up when we first arrived on the Coast, and promptly christened "Cupid" by the master's mate, who, possibly because of sundry disappointments, had developed a somewhat sardonic turn of humour, grinned appreciatively at Nugent's sorry jest respecting "our best china breakfast-set," and proceeded to rout out the heterogeneous assortment of delf and tin cups, basins, and plates that constituted the table-equipage of the midshipmen's berth, poured out a generous allowance of cocoa for each of us, and then departed, with the empty bread-barge, in quest of a supply of ship's biscuit.  By the time that Cupid returned with this, we had gulped down our cocoa and were ready to go on deck.  I therefore helped myself to a couple of biscuits which, breaking into pieces of convenient size by the simple process of dashing them against my elbow, I crammed into my jacket pocket, and then rushed up the ladder to the deck, leaving my companions to follow after they had snatched a hasty bite or two of food; for there was now no knowing when we might get breakfast.
Upon my arrival on deck I found the hands already mustering under the supervision of the first lieutenant, and a moment later I encountered the boatswain, who handed over to me a good serviceable ship's cutlass-- worth a dozen of the ridiculous little dirks which were considered suitable weapons for midshipmen--which I promptly girded about my waist. At this moment all was bustle and animation throughout the ship, yet so sedulously had we been trained to act in perfect silence that I am certain the stealthy footfalls of the men hurrying to their stations, and the whispered words of command, were quite inaudible at a distance of twenty yards from the ship.  Within a minute or two, however, even these faint sounds had subsided, the crew were all mustered, and the first lieutenant, assisted by a quartermaster who carried a carefully masked lantern, was carefully, yet rapidly, inspecting each man's weapons and equipment, scrutinising the flints in the locks of the pistols, and otherwise satisfying himself of the efficiency of our hurried preparations.  While the inspection was still in progress the captain came on deck, with his sword girded to his side and a brace of pistols thrust into his belt, and stood quietly looking on until the inspection was completed and Mr Perry had reported that everything was in order.
Then the skipper announced that he would personally lead the attack in his own gig, manned by eight oarsmen, a coxswain, and a midshipman-- myself; while the first cutter, manned by sixteen oarsmen, a coxswain, and a midshipman--Jack Keene--was to be commanded by Mr Purchase, the second lieutenant; and the second cutter, with twelve oarsmen, a coxswain, and Nugent, the master's mate, was to be under the command of the boatswain.  Thus the attacking party was to consist of forty-five persons, all told, which was as many, I suppose, as the skipper felt justified in taking out of the ship under the circumstances.
Then ensued a busy five minutes, during which the boats were being noiselessly lowered and manned, the oars muffled, and every possible precaution observed to enable us to take our unseen but doubtless vigilant enemy unawares.  This was just then regarded as of especial importance, for at the time of which I am now writing the traffic in slaves was regarded as piracy, and rendered its perpetrators liable to capital punishment, in consequence of which almost every slaver went heavily armed, and her crew, knowing that the halter was already about their necks, resisted capture by every means which their ingenuity could devise, whenever they had the chance, and often fought with desperate valour.
As I hurried aft to attend to the lowering of the gig, which hung from davits over the stern, a hand was suddenly laid upon my arm, and, turning, I found myself confronted by Cupid, the Krooboy servant who "did for us" in the midshipmen's berth.  His eyes were aglow with excitement, he carried a short-handled hatchet, with a head somewhat bigger and heavier than that of a ship's tomahawk, in his hand, and he was naked, save for a pair of dungaree trousers, the legs of which were rolled up above his knees.
"Mr Fortescue, sar, I fit for go in dem boat wid you, sar," he whispered eagerly.
"Yes, I quite believe it, Cupid," I replied.  "But you know perfectly well that I cannot give you permission to join the gig's crew.  If the captain had been anxious to have the pleasure of your company I feel sure that he would have mentioned the fact.  Besides, if you should happen to be killed, what would become of us poor midshipmen?"
A suppressed chuckle, and a gleam of white teeth through the darkness, betrayed Cupid's appreciation of the compliment subtly conveyed in the suggestion that the budding admirals inhabiting the midshipmen's berth aboard H.M.S.  _Psyche_ would suffer, should he unhappily be slain in the impending conflict, but he hastened to reassure me.
"No fear, sar," he whispered.  "Dem slaber no lib for kill me.  I, Cupid, too much plenty black for see in de dark; an' if dey no see me, dey no kill.  Savvey?  _Please_, Mr Fortescue, sar.  I no lib for fight too much plenty long time."
"Look here, Cupid," I replied.  "It is no use for you to ask me for permission to go in the gig, for I cannot give it you.  But,"-- meaningly--"if you were to stow yourself away in the eyes of the gig it is just possible that the captain might not notice you until we had got too far from the ship to turn back.  Only don't let me see you doing it, that's all."
"Dat all right, sar," answered the black, with a sigh of extreme content.  "If you no look for dem Cupid you no see um."  And he turned and ostentatiously walked away forward.
The boats having been gently and carefully lowered into the water without a splash, or so much as a single tell-tale squeak from the tackle-blocks--the pins and bushes of which were habitually overhauled at frequent intervals and kept well lubricated with a mixture of melted tallow and plumbago--the crews took their places, each man carefully depositing his drawn cutlass on the bottom-boards between his feet, and we shoved off with muffled oars, the three boats pulling abreast, with about a ship's length between each; so that if perchance we should happen to be seen, we should present as small a target as possible to aim at.
We pulled slowly and with the utmost caution, for the twofold reason that we had not yet caught sight of our quarry and only knew in a general sort of way that she was somewhere to seaward of us, and because we were anxious to avoid premature discovery from the splash of our oars.  It was of course perfectly right and proper that we should observe all the precautions that I have indicated; for if we could but contrive to creep up alongside the stranger without being detected, it would undoubtedly mean the prevention of much loss of life.  But, personally, I had very little hope of our being able to do so; for the night was so breathlessly still that, if any sort of look-out at all were being kept aboard the stranger--and slavers usually slept with one eye open--they must surely have caught some hint of our proximity, careful as we had been to maintain as complete silence as possible while making our preparations.  Besides, as ill-luck would have it, the water was in an unusually brilliant phosphorescent condition just then, the slightest disturbance of it caused a silvery glow that could be seen a mile away; and, be as silent as we might, the dip of our oars and the passage of the boats through the water set up such a blaze as could not fail to betray us, should a man happen to glance in our direction.
At length, when we had pulled about half a mile, as nearly as I could judge, I detected a slight suspicion of a softening in the velvety blackness of the sky in the eastern quarter.  It brightened, even as I looked, and a solitary star, low down in the sky, seemed to flicker, faintly and more faintly, for half a dozen seconds, and then disappear.
"The dawn is coming, sir," I whispered to the skipper, by whose side I was sitting, "and in another minute or two we ought to--ah! there she is.  Do you see her, sir?"  And I pointed in the direction of a faint, ghostlike blotch that had suddenly appeared at a spot some three points on our port bow.
"Where away?" demanded the skipper, instinctively raising his hand to shade his eyes; but he had scarcely lifted it to the height of his shoulder when he too caught sight of the object.
"Ay," he exclaimed, "I see her.  And a big craft she is, too; a barque, apparently.  Surely that cannot be the craft that we are after?  Yet it looks very like her.  If so, she must have slipped out of the river with the last of the land-breeze last night, and lain becalmed all night where she is.  Now what are the other boats about that they have not seen her?  Parkinson," to the coxswain, "show that lantern for a moment to the other boats, but take care to shield it with--ah! never mind, there are both their lights.  Give way, men.  Put me alongside under her mizen chains, my lad.  Either side; I don't care which."
While the captain had been speaking the faint, ghostly glimmer that I had detected had resolved itself into the spectral semblance of a large ship clothed from her trucks down with canvas upon which the rapidly growing light of the advancing dawn was falling and thus rendering it just barely visible against its dark background of sky.
In the tropics day comes and goes with a rush, and, even while the skipper had been speaking, the object which had first revealed itself to me, a minute earlier, as a mere wan, ghostly suggestion had assumed solidity and definiteness of form, and now stood out against the sky behind her as a full-rigged ship of some seven hundred and fifty tons burthen, her hull painted bright green, and coppered to the water-line. She was lying stern-on to us, and sat deep in the water, from which latter fact one inferred that she had her cargo of slaves on board and had doubtless, as the skipper conjectured, come out of the river with the last of the land-breeze during the previous night, and had remained becalmed near us, and, we hoped, quite unaware of our proximity all night.  She was now within a cable's length of the boats, but, lying as she was, dead stern-on to us, we in the gig were unable to see how many guns she carried, which was, however, an advantage to us, since, however many guns she might mount on her broadsides, she could bring none of them to bear upon us.  We saw, however, that she carried two stern- chasers--long nine's, apparently--and now, in the hope of dashing alongside before those two guns could be cast loose and brought to bear upon us, the captain stood up in the stern-sheets of the gig and waved his arm to the other boats as a signal to them to give way--for, with the coming of the daylight we could not possibly hope to remain undiscovered above a second or two longer.
Indeed the boats' crews had scarcely bent their backs in response to the signal when there arose a sudden startled outcry on board the ship, followed by a volley of hurried commands and the hasty trampling of feet upon her decks.  But we were so close to her, when discovered, and the surprise was so complete, that her crew had no time to do anything effective in the way of defence; and in little over a couple of minutes we had swept up alongside, clambered in over her lofty bulwarks, driven her crew below, and were in full possession of the _Dona Isabella_ of Havana, mounting twelve guns, with a crew of forty-six Spaniards, Portuguese, and half-castes, constituting as ruffianly a lot as I had ever met with.  She had a cargo of seven hundred and forty negroes on board, and was far and away the finest prize that had thus far fallen to the lot of the _Psyche_.  So valuable, indeed, was she that Captain Harrison decided not to trust her entirely to a prize crew, but to escort her to Sierra Leone in the corvette; and some two hours later, having meanwhile made all the necessary dispositions, the two craft trimmed sail with the first of the sea-breeze and hauled up for Sierra Leone, where we arrived a week later after an uneventful passage.
CHAPTER TWO.
IN THE FERNAN VAZ RIVER.
While we were awaiting the formal condemnation of the _Dona Isabella_ by the Mixed Commission, and the trial of her crew upon the charge of piracy, Captain Harrison, our skipper, busily employed himself, as was his wont, in hunting up information relative to the movements, present and prospective, of the slavers upon the coast.  And this was not quite so difficult to do as might at first be imagined; for, Sierra Leone being the headquarters, so to speak, of the British Slave Squadron, the persons actually engaged in the slave-trade found that it paid them well to maintain agents there for the sole purpose of picking up every possible item of information relative to the movements and doings of that squadron.  For it not unfrequently happened that, to those behind the scenes, an apparently trivial and seemingly quite worthless bit of information, an imprudent word dropped by an unwary officer respecting one of our vessels, enabled the acute ones to calculate so closely that they often succeeded in making a dash into some river, shipping a cargo of slaves, and getting clear away to sea again only a few hours before our cruisers put in an appearance on the spot.  And in the same way our own officers, by frequenting, in disguise, the haunts of the slavers and their agents, very often succeeded in catching a hint that, carefully followed up, led to most important captures being made.  It was, indeed, through a hint so acquired that we had been put upon the track of the _Dona Isabella_.
Now, our own skipper, Captain Harrison, was particularly keen upon this sort of work, and was exceptionally well qualified to achieve success in it.  For, in the first place, he was a West Indian by birth, being the son of a Trinidad sugar-planter, and he consequently spoke Creole Spanish as fluently as he did his mother tongue.  Also his physical characteristics were such as to be of the greatest assistance to him in such enterprises; for he was tall, lean, and muscular, of swarthy complexion, with thick, black, curly hair, and large, black, flashing eyes, suggesting that he carried a touch of the tar-brush, although, as a matter of fact, he had not a drop of negro blood in him.  He was a man of dauntless courage, knowing not the meaning of fear, and absolutely revelling in situations of the most extreme peril, yet gifted with quite as much discretion as was needful for a man entrusted with heavy responsibilities involving the lives of many of his fellow-men.  He never sought danger for danger's sake alone, and never embarked in an enterprise which his reason assured him was hopelessly impracticable, but, on the other hand, he never hesitated to undertake the most perilous task if he believed he could see a way to its successful accomplishment.  It was his habit to assume a variety of disguises in which he would haunt the third and fourth rate taverns of Freetown, especially patronised by the slave-dealing fraternity, and mingling freely with these gentry, would boldly express his own views, adopted, of course, for the occasion, upon the various matters affecting the trade, or discuss with them the most promising schemes for baffling the efforts of the British cruisers.  He had noticed, very early in his career as an officer of the Slave Squadron, that it was always the _British_ who constituted the _bete noire_ of the slavers; the French they feared very little; the Americans not at all.
These little incursions into the enemy's territory Captain Harrison conducted with consummate boldness and skill, and with a considerable measure of success, for it was quite a favourite amusement of his to devise and suggest schemes of a particularly alluring character which, when adopted by the enemy, he of course triumphantly circumvented without difficulty.  There was only one fault to find with this propensity on the part of our skipper, but in my humble judgment it constituted a serious one.  It was this.  Captain Harrison's personality was a distinctly striking one; he was the kind of man who, once seen, is not easily forgotten; and I greatly dreaded that some day, sooner or later, the reckless frequenter of the low-class Freetown taverns would be identified as one and the same with the captain of H.M.S.  _Psyche_, who was of course frequently to be seen about the streets in the uniform of a British naval captain.  Indeed I once took the liberty of delicately hinting at this possibility; but the skipper laughed at the idea; he had, it appeared, the most implicit faith in his disguises, which included, amongst other things, a huge false moustache of most ferocious appearance, and an enormous pair of gold earrings.
We had been at Sierra Leone a little over a fortnight, and our business there was just completed, when the skipper came aboard on a certain afternoon in a state of the highest good-humour, occasioned, as soon transpired, by the fact that he had succeeded in obtaining full particulars of an exceptionally grand _coup_ that had been planned by a number of slavers in conjunction, which they were perfectly confident of pulling off triumphantly.
It appeared, from his story, that intelligence had just been received of the successful conclusion of a great slave-hunting raid into the interior by a certain King Olomba, who had recently returned in triumph to his town of Olomba, on the left bank of the Fernan Vaz river, bringing with him nearly three thousand negroes, of whom over two thousand were males, all in prime condition.  This information having reached the slavers' agents at Sierra Leone through the mysterious channels by which news often travels in Africa, an effort of quite exceptional magnitude was to be made to get at least the two thousand males out of the country at one fell swoop; the present being regarded as an almost uniquely favourable opportunity for the accomplishment of this object, for the reason that the _Psyche_ was just then the only ship which could by any possibility interfere with the scheme.  And in the event of her happening to put in an inopportune appearance on that part of the coast at the critical moment--as she had a knack of doing, in the most unaccountable manner--she was to be decoyed away from the spot by the simple process of dispatching to sea a certain notorious schooner well-known to be in the trade, but which, for this occasion only, was to have no slaves or slave fittings or adjuncts on board, and after a chase of some two or three hundred miles to the southward, was to permit herself to be caught, only to be released again, of course, after an exhaustive overhaul.
It was an admirable scheme, beautifully simple, and could scarcely fail to achieve complete success, but for the fact that Captain Harrison had contrived to obtain full particulars of it, and therefore knew exactly how to frustrate the plan.  His plot was as simple as that of the slavers: he would proceed in the _Psyche_ to the scene of operations, and when the decoy schooner made her appearance she would be permitted to go on her way unmolested, while a boat expedition would be dispatched up the river to the town of Olomba, where the vessels actually engaged in shipping the two thousand blacks would be captured _flagrante delicto_.
Naturally we were all thrown into a high state of jubilation at the receipt of this intelligence; for it promised us a slice of good luck of such magnitude as very seldom fell to the lot of a single cruiser.  To convey two thousand negroes across the Atlantic at once would necessitate the employment of at least three large ships, the value of which might be roughly calculated at, upon the very lowest estimate, ten thousand pounds each, or thirty thousand pounds in all, besides which there would be the head-money upon two thousand negroes, amounting altogether to quite a nice little sum in prize-money for a cruise of probably less than a month's duration.  Oh, how we chuckled as we pictured to ourselves the effect which the news of so magnificent a _coup_ would create upon the minds of the rest of the Slave Squadron. The _Psyche_, from her phenomenal lack of speed, and general unsuitability for the service upon which she was employed, had, with her crew, become the butt and laughing-stock of every stupid and scurrilous jester on the coast, and many a time had we been made to writhe under the lash of some more than ordinarily envenomed gibe; but now the laugh was to be on our side; we were going to demonstrate to those shallow, jeering wits the superiority of brains over a clean pair of heels.
Of course we were all in a perfect fever of impatience to get to sea and make the best of our way to the scene of action, lest haply we should arrive too late and find the birds flown; but the skipper retained his coolness and would permit nothing to be done that could by any possibility suggest to the slavers the idea that the faintest hint of their audacious scheme had been allowed to get abroad.  He insisted that we had plenty of time and to spare, and actually remained in harbour three whole days after the information had reached him.  Then, on the morning of the fourth day, we weighed and stood out to sea, beating off the land against the sea-breeze until we ran into the calm belt between the sea-breeze and the trade-wind.  Here we remained motionless for more than an hour until the trade-wind gradually ate its way inshore and reached us, when we ran right out to sea until we had sunk the land astern of us.  Then we hauled up to the southward on a taut bowline, and, under easy canvas, made our leisurely way toward the mouth of the Fernan Vaz river, off which we arrived five days later, making the land from the masthead about an hour before sunset.
All that night, the whole of the next day, and all the night following we remained hove-to under topsails, jib, and spanker, dodging to and fro athwart the mouth of the river, with a man on the main-royal yard, during the hours of daylight, to give us timely notice of the appearance of the craft which was to play the part of decoy; while with the approach of nightfall we made sail and beat in to within a distance of some three miles of the coast, running off into the offing again an hour before daylight.  At length, when we had hung upon the tenterhooks of suspense for close upon forty hours, and were beginning to fear that the captain, in his resolve to cut matters as fine as possible, had overdone the thing and allowed the quarry to escape, we were gladdened by the hail from aloft of--
"Sail he!  A large schooner just comin' out o' the river, sir."
"Ay, ay," answered the first lieutenant, whose watch it happened to be. "Just keep your eye on her, my lad, and let me know how she steers when she is clear of the bar."
We were heading to the southward at the time, and were about three miles south of the river entrance, and some sixteen miles off the land; by pretending therefore not to see her for the next quarter of an hour or so, and keeping the _Psyche_ still heading to the southward, we should afford the stranger an excellent opportunity to secure a sufficient offing to make good her escape.  Then we would heave about, make sail in chase, drive her off the coast, and work in as close to the river's mouth as we dared venture, when the ship was to be brought to an anchor, and the boats manned, armed, and dispatched into the river.
Meanwhile, as previously arranged, Captain Harrison was aroused, and informed of the fact that the decoy schooner, or what was assumed to be such, had made her appearance and was now fairly at sea, steering a little to the northward of west under a heavy press of sail; and close upon the heels of the returning messenger the worthy skipper himself appeared.  He sprang upon a gun-carriage and peered intently shoreward under the shade of his hand; but only the upper canvas of the stranger was visible from our deck; and he impatiently hailed the look-out aloft to give him a detailed description of the vessel.  The fellow in the cross-trees happened, however, to be a poor sort of unintelligent fellow, and could say very little about the craft beyond stating the fact that she was a schooner, painted black; that she sat deep in the water, showed an immense spread of canvas, and appeared to be very fast.
"I have no sort of doubt that yonder schooner is the craft whose duty it is to draw us off the coast and leave the way clear for the other fellows to get out to sea," he said.  "But I should like to have a somewhat better description of her than that `sodger' up aloft there seems able to give."
He glanced round the deck and his eye fell upon me.
"Ah, Mr Fortescue," he exclaimed, "you will doubtless be able to do what I want.  Just slip down into my cabin; you will find my glass hanging above the head of my bunk.  Throw the strap of it over your shoulder, and shin up alongside that fellow in the cross-trees; take a good look at the stranger; and report to me any peculiarities that you may detect in her, will ye."
"Ay, ay, sir," I replied, touching my hat; and five minutes later I was sitting in the main-topmast cross-trees, with the long barrel of the telescope steadied against the topmast-head, and my eye glued to the eye-piece.  From this elevation I commanded a complete, if distant, view of the low land about the river entrance, with its fringe of mangrove trees running away inland, the sand hummocks, sparsely clothed with coarse, reedy grass and trailing plants, and the endless line of the surf-beaten African beach.  Also through the skipper's powerful lenses I obtained a most excellent view of the strange schooner, from her trucks to her water-line, including such details as I could have discerned with the naked eye at a distance of about half a mile.  I saw, for example, that, as the look-out had already reported, she was a large schooner--I estimated her to be one hundred and eighty tons burthen at the least; I verified the statement that her hull was painted all black from the rail to the top of her copper; that she showed an enormous spread of canvas; and that she sat very low in the water.  But I noticed a few other peculiarities as well; I saw that her bowsprit was painted black, while her jib-booms were scraped and varnished; that her foremast, fore- topmast, and fore-topgallant and royal-mast were varnished, while the mast heads were painted black, and that the whole of the mainmast, from the cap down, was painted _white_, which was a peculiarity that ought to have been sufficient to identify her as far as one could see her.  And so it was; for the moment that I reported it the skipper hailed--
"Thank you, Mr Fortescue; that will do; you may come down.  Or--hold on a minute.  Is the stranger far enough out of the river to enable her to get clear away, think ye?"
"She is fully a mile from the mouth of the river, sir," I answered.
"Ah, that will do, then, thank you; you may both come down," answered the skipper.  And as I swung myself down through the cross-trees to the topmast rigging, I heard him give the order to "Wear ship and make sail."
Five minutes later the _Psyche_ was heading to the northward, close- hauled on the port tack, under all plain sail to her royals, doing nearly seven knots, and laying a course that, with nice steering, would just enable us to fetch the river's mouth handsomely without breaking tacks.  The schooner, meanwhile, was romping along at a pace of at least twelve knots per hour, on the starboard tack, throwing the spray over her weather bow to half the height of her lower yard, and shaping a course which would enable her to pass us at a distance of fully eight miles dead to windward.  We allowed her to go on her way unmolested.
It was just noon when, having arrived off the mouth of the river, we made a flying moor of it, letting go the first and then the second bower anchor in ten fathoms, at a distance of about one and a half miles from the shore, and at a spot from which the river mouth and perhaps half a mile of the river itself were in plain view.  The town of King Olomba, it was understood, was situated at a distance of about thirty-two miles from our anchorage; and as the captain was anxious that the journey should be made at an easy pace, so that the men might arrive comparatively fresh, and in fit condition for the rather stiff bit of work that lay at the end of it, eight hours were to be allowed for the passage of the boats to their destination.  And as it was highly undesirable that the expedition should be unduly exposed in the boats to the pestiferous effects of the miasmatic night-fogs which gather upon most of the West African rivers after sunset, it had already been arranged that the attacking party should not start until the following morning, at an hour which would enable us to reach the scene of operations in time to make a reconnaissance and arrange the plan of attack by nightfall.  The remainder of that day was therefore employed in getting the boats ready, stocking them with three days' rations of provisions and water, overhauling the boat guns and slinging them ready for lowering, filling the ammunition boxes, sharpening cutlasses, fixing new flints to the pistols, where necessary, and generally completing our preparations.  We also sent down royal and topgallant yards and housed the topgallant-masts, in order that, should it by any chance come on to blow heavily from the westward during our absence the ship might ride the more easily at her anchors.  We also made preparation, in view of the foregoing contingency, for backing the bowers with the two stream anchors, and otherwise made every possible preparation for the safety of the ship during our absence; for the expedition in which we were about to engage was one of very considerable importance, and the task which we had set ourselves to perform was so formidable that, in order to insure success, it would be necessary to employ practically the entire ship's company, leaving the vessel in charge of the second lieutenant and only enough hands to keep a look-out and perform such tasks as, for example, the letting go of the stream anchors in case of necessity, the paying out of the additional amount of cable, the keeping of the ship reasonably clean, and so on.
On the following morning, having washed decks and partaken of breakfast, the hands were mustered and inspected, the boats lowered, guns secured in the bows of the launch, pinnace, and first and second cutters, ammunition boxes passed down, masts stepped, sails cast loose, yards hooked on, and, in short, everything made ready for a start.  Then we went down over the side and took our places in the boats to which we were severally appointed, the captain going as usual in his own gig, while Mr Perry, the first luff, was in command of the launch; Mr Hoskins, the third lieutenant, commanding the pinnace; Mr Marline, the master, having charge of the first cutter, while Mr Tompson, the gunner, commanded the second cutter.  The skipper took me, as he generally did, in his own boat, but the other three mids. were left on board the _Psyche_ to keep Mr Purchase company.  For the rest, Nugent, the master's mate, went with the first lieutenant, while Peter Futtock, the boatswain, accompanied the third lieutenant in the pinnace.
We mustered ninety all told, and were none too many for the work that we had undertaken to do, which was--to capture three, if not four, large ships; capture and demolish the shore batteries which the slavers very frequently erected for the defence of their strongholds; and also, most likely, fight King Olomba and a whole flotilla of war canoes.  The task was indeed a formidable one; the more so that we, the attacking party, would be, at least at the beginning of the fight, huddled closely together in boats, while our antagonists would have all the advantage of roomy decks to move about on, and steady gun platforms from which to pour in their fire, to say nothing of a tremendous superiority in point of numbers.  We thought nothing of all this, however; we were going to have a change from the monotony of shipboard life; we should be certain to see new sights of a more or less interesting character; there was the excitement and exhilaration of a stiff fight awaiting us at the end of our journey; and, finally, there was the prospect of a pocketful of prize-money as a wind-up to the whole affair.  What more could any reasonable individual desire?
Like most African rivers, the Fernan Vaz has a bar, but the sea breaks upon it only when the wind blows fresh from the north-west, owing to the fact that as far up as the town of Olomba the river flows parallel to the line of coast, being separated from the open Atlantic by a low, sandy peninsula, varying from one to three miles in breadth, terminating in a spit which ordinarily shelters the bar from the rollers, leaving a narrow channel of unbroken water, wide enough to enable a couple of craft of moderate tonnage to pass each other comfortably.
And well was it for us that this was the case; for as we approached the river's mouth we saw that the ground-swell was rapidly increasing in weight, and that the surf was breaking upon the beach with such violence that if it happened to be also breaking upon the bar it would be quite useless for us to attempt to enter the river.  Indeed, so formidable did the appearance of the surf at length become that the captain ordered the rest of the boats to heave-to, while we in the gig went ahead to reconnoitre and inspect the condition of the bar.  This was a bit of work for which the gig was peculiarly well adapted, for she was a beautifully modelled boat, double-ended, with a long flat floor--a splendid sailer, and a boat which would claw off a lee shore in almost any weather, the skipper having had her fitted with a good, deep, false keel.
The wind was blowing a moderately fresh breeze from the westward at the time, thus, the rest of the boats having hove-to, it did not take us very long to run in far enough to get a sight of the bar.  This was a rather trying experience for the nerves of us all; for the surf was pounding on the beach ahead of us in a constant succession of towering walls of water, that reared themselves to a height of fully thirty feet ere they curled over and broke in thunder so deafening that we presently found it impossible to make our voices heard above its continuous roar. But the skipper, standing up in the stern-sheets, soon detected the smooth, narrow strip of unbroken water, and directed the coxswain to shift his helm for it.  I sprang up on a thwart and waved a small white flag as a signal to the other boats to fill away and follow us; and as soon as we had reached the very middle of the channel we rounded-to and lowered our sail, remaining where we were to act as a guide to the other boats.
Keeping our position with the aid of a couple of oars thrown over to enable us to stem the out-flowing current, which we now began to feel, we allowed the other boats to pass in over the bar and reach the smooth water before us; then, hoisting our sail again, we followed them in and presently resumed our position at the head of the line.
The change from the scene of wind-flecked blue sea, stately march of the swell, and thunderous roar and creaming froth of the breakers outside to the oil-smooth, mud-laden, strong-smelling river, with its tiny, swirling eddies here and there, its mangrove-lined banks, and its silence, through which the roar of the surf came to us over the intervening sand spit, mellowed and subdued by distance, was so marked that, although this was by no means my first experience of that kind of thing, I found myself rubbing my eyes as though I were by no means certain that I was awake; and I noticed others doing the same.  A sharp word from the skipper, however, cautioning all hands to maintain a smart look-out, soon brought to us the realisation of our surroundings; for the river here was narrow, being not more than half a mile wide, with a number of small islets dotted about it, any one of which might prove to be the hiding-place of a formidable foe.  When at length we had passed these without interference, and had reached the point where the river began to widen out somewhat, we were no better off, but rather the worse; for here the stream was encumbered with extensive sandbanks, to avoid which we were compelled to approach the margin of the river so closely that a well-arranged ambush might have practically annihilated us before we could have effected a landing through the thick, viscid mud and the almost impenetrable growth of mangroves that divided the waters of the river from the solid ground of the shore.  Fortunately for us, the slavers appeared unaccountably to have overlooked the admirable opportunities thus afforded for frustrating an attack; or possibly, as we thought, it was that they had fully relied upon the power of the decoy schooner to draw us away from the coast, and thus leave the way free for them to escape.
The passage of this part of the river occupied us until noon, and was rather trying to the nerves of all hands, for not only were we constantly exposed to attack by the slavers, but there were the natives also to be reckoned with; and these, as we all knew, had a most objectionable habit of using poisoned arrows, the slightest wound from which was invariably followed by death after some eight to twelve hours of dreadful suffering.  Shortly after noon we emerged from these natural entanglements into a long reach of the river where the stream expanded to a width of some three and a half miles, with a narrow deep-water channel running about midway between the banks.  Here we were quite free from any possibility of ambush of any kind; and with a sigh of intense relief the captain gave the word to pipe to dinner.
About four o'clock in the afternoon we arrived at a point where the river again narrowed to a width of about a mile; but some two miles farther on it again widened out, and changed its direction, trending away almost due east, or about at right angles to its former course; and this, according to the information in the skipper's possession, indicated that we were nearing our destination.  Drawing from his pocket a sketch chart which he had already consulted several times during our passage up the river, he again studied it intently for several minutes, carefully comparing the configurations delineated upon it with our actual surroundings; then, apparently satisfied with the result, he refolded the paper, returned it to his pocket, and directed the coxswain to bear away a couple of points toward a projecting point--which we afterwards discovered to be the western extremity of an islet--on the far side of the river.  As we approached the spot for which we were heading it became apparent that there were two islets instead of one between us and the river bank; and a quarter of an hour later the gig, with the rest of the flotilla following her, glided in between these two islets, and, lowering her sails, made the signal for the other boats to anchor.
The boats were now completely concealed from all possible observation, for we soon saw that the islets between which we were anchored consisted merely of mud-banks thickly overgrown with mangroves, and absolutely uninhabitable even by natives; for there did not appear to be an inch of ground upon either of the islets sufficiently solid to support even a reed hut, while the mangroves were tall enough and grew densely enough to hide the boats from all possible observation from the mainland.  The only question which now troubled us was whether the presence of the boats in the river had already been observed.  If the slavers had placed absolute confidence in the success of their plan to draw us away from the coast by means of the decoy schooner, they might not have troubled to keep a look-out; but if they were as cautious as such gentry usually are, and had left nothing to chance, it would be scarcely possible for the approach of the boats to have passed undetected.  This was the question to which the captain was now going to seek an answer.
CHAPTER THREE.
AT THE CAMMA LAGOON.
Distant about a mile from our hiding-place, there was, according to the captain's rough sketch map, a small peninsula enclosing a little bay, or creek, at the inner extremity of which was situated King Olomba's town; and it was here that we were led to believe we should find the slavers busily engaged in shipping their human cargoes.  And truly, as seen from the boats, the ingenuity of man could scarcely have devised a more perfect spot whereat to conduct the infamous traffic; for the configuration of the land was such that boats, entering the river merely on an exploring expedition, without having first obtained, like ourselves, special information, would never have suspected the existence of the creek, or of the town which lay concealed within it.  Nor would it have been possible to detect the presence of slave craft in the creek; for the peninsula which masked it was thickly overgrown with lofty trees which would effectually conceal all but the upper spars of a ship, and these would doubtless be struck or housed while she was lying in the creek.
The skipper having explained to the officers in command of the other boats what he intended to do, and given them instructions how to act in the event of certain contingencies arising, the gig's crew manned their oars, and we pulled away in the direction of the peninsula, which we reached in the course of a few minutes.  Now our real troubles began, for our object was not only to reach the peninsula but also to land upon and walk across it until a spot could be found from which, unseen ourselves, we could obtain a clear view of the creek and everything in it, and upon approaching the shore of the peninsula we discovered that, in common with as much of the river bank as we had yet seen, it consisted, first of all, of a wide belt of soft, fathomless mud overgrown with mangrove trees; the mud being of such a consistency that to attempt to walk upon it would mean being swallowed up and suffocated in it, for a sixteen-foot oar could be thrust perpendicularly into it with scarcely any effort, although when one of the men incautiously tried the experiment, it was only with the utmost difficulty that he was able to withdraw the oar, so tenaciously did the mud cling to it.  Yet it was not sufficiently liquid to allow of the gig being forced through it, even if the thickly clustering mangrove roots would have permitted of such a proceeding.  The only alternative left to us, therefore, was to endeavour to reach solid ground by clambering over the slippery mangrove roots, with the possibility that at any moment one or another of us might lose our footing, fall into the mud, and be swallowed up by it.  However, "needs must" under certain circumstances, the skipper and I therefore scrambled out of the boat--taking Cupid with us to search out the way and carry a small coil of light line in case it should be wanted--and proceeded cautiously to claw our way like so many parrots, over and among the gnarled and twisted roots of the mangrove trees, the Krooboy leading the way, leaping and swinging himself with marvellous agility from tree to tree, while we followed slowly in his wake, as often as not being obliged to make a slip-rope of the line to enable us to cross some exceptionally wide or awkward gap.  In this manner, after about half an hour's arduous toil, with the perspiration pouring out of us until our clothes were saturated with it, while we were driven nearly frantic by the attacks of the mosquitoes and stinging flies that beset us by thousands, and could by no means be driven away, we contrived at length to reach soil firm enough to support our weight, and, some five minutes later, the solid ground itself.
But, even now, our troubles were only half over; for after we had crossed the peninsula we still found it impossible to discover a spot from which the interior of the creek could be seen without laying out upon the roots of the mangrove trees that bordered the inner as well as the outer shore of the peninsula, the wearisome business of crawling and climbing had therefore all to be gone over again, with the result that the sun was close upon setting before we had reached a spot from which a clear view of the entire creek could be obtained.  And then we had the unspeakable mortification of discovering that the expedition must result in failure; for, save a few canoes, the creek was innocent of craft of every description--_there were no slavers in it_!  Moreover, the so- called town of King Olomba consisted only of about fifty miserable native huts in the very last stage of sordidness and dilapidation; and there was no sign that a slave barracoon had ever existed near the place.
The captain stared across the water as though he found it quite impossible to believe his eyes.  Then he drew the sketch map from his pocket and once more studied it attentively, muttering to himself the while.  Finally he sat himself down upon a knot of twisted roots, with his back against the trunk of the tree, and, spreading the sketch wide open on his knee, beckoned me to place myself beside him.
"Just come here and look at this map, Mr Fortescue," he said, and he spoke with the air and in the tones of a man who is so utterly dazed with disappointment that he begins to doubt the evidence of his own senses.  "Just give me your opinion, will ye.  I cannot understand this business at all.  This map, although only a free-hand sketch, seems to me to be perfectly accurate.  There, you see, is the mouth of the river, just as we found it; there are the little islets that we passed immediately after getting inside; there are the dry mud-banks; and there, you see, the river widens out, in precise accordance with our experience; here it narrows again at the bend; there is where the boats are lying concealed; and this," laying his finger upon a particular part of the sketch, "is the creek that we are now looking at; and there is the town of Olomba.  It all seems to me to be absolutely correct.  Does it not appear so to you?"
"Certainly, sir," I answered.  "The sketch answers in every particular to what we have seen since entering the river--answers to it so perfectly, indeed, that it might have been copied from a carefully plotted survey."
"Exactly," assented the skipper.  "Yet it is nothing of the kind; for with my own eyes I saw it drawn from memory by a man whom I happened to meet in one of the third-rate hotels in Freetown, which are frequented by the masters and mates of palm-oil traders and the like.  I happened to hear him mention that he had been in and out of the Fernan Vaz at least a dozen times, in his search for cargo along the coast, so I waited until the people with whom he was talking had left him, and then I entered into conversation with him, finally inducing him to furnish me with this sketch."
"And was it from him, sir, that you also obtained the information upon the strength of which you determined upon this expedition?"  I asked.
"Oh, no," answered the skipper.  "I had that from quite a different source, in a very different kind of house.  The people who told me about King Olomba's raid, and the plans laid by the slavers for carrying off the prisoners, were slavers themselves; and they told me of the scheme because they believed me to be the master of a slaver waiting for information from the Senegal river.  The cream of the joke was that these fellows should have told me--_me_, the captain of the _Psyche_-- that the scheme had been carefully planned with the express object of putting the _Psyche_ upon a false scent and so getting her out of the way while the negroes were being shipped."
"Yet there seems to have been something wrong somewhere, sir," I ventured to suggest.  "But it is not with your map; that appears to be marvellously accurate for a mere free-hand sketch; there is no attempt at deception apparent there.  This creek that we are looking at is undoubtedly the one shown on your map, and there is King Olomba's town, precisely in the position indicated on the sketch; the assumption therefore is that the man who drew the map for you was dealing quite honestly with you.  The misleading information, consequently must, it appears to me, have come from the others; as indeed is the case, seeing that they led you to believe that you would find at least three or four large ships in the creek, whereas there are none."
"That is perfectly true," concurred the skipper.  "Yet I quite understood my informants to say that they were the persons who had formulated the scheme."
"I suppose, sir," said I, giving voice to an idea that had been gradually shaping itself in my brain, "it is not possible that the people who were so singularly frank with you happened to recognise you as Captain Harrison of H.M.S.  _Psyche_, and gave you that bit of information with the deliberate purpose of misleading you and putting you upon a false scent, in order that while you are searching for them here they may have the opportunity to carry out their scheme elsewhere? Their story may in the main be perfectly true, but if by any chance they should have happened to recognise you it would not be very difficult for them to substitute the name of the Fernan Vaz for that of some other river, and to mention King Olomba instead of some other king."
"N-o-o," said the skipper dubiously; "it would not.  Yet I cannot see why, if they had recognised me, they should have gone to the trouble of spinning an elaborate yarn merely to deceive me.  It would have been just as easy for them to have knifed me, for there were seven of them, while I was quite alone.  No, I don't quite see--"
"Do you not, sir?"  I interrupted with a smile.
"I do.  I see quite clearly two very excellent reasons why they did not resort to the rough and ready method of the knife.  In the first place, these fellows attach a ridiculously high value to their own skins, and never seem to imperil them when an alternative will serve their purpose equally well; and although they were seven to one, if they really recognised you they would know perfectly well that, while the ultimate result of a fight would probably be in their favour, you would certainly not perish alone; and I suppose none of them were particularly anxious to accompany you into the Great Beyond.  And, apart from that, they would know quite well that were the captain of a British man-o'-war to go a-missing there would be such a stir among their rookeries that soon there would be no rookeries left.  Oh, no, sir! glad as they might be to put you quietly out of the way if they had the chance, depend upon it the last thing that they would dream of would be to attempt anything of the sort in Sierra Leone."
"Well, well, well, perhaps you are right, young gentleman, perhaps you are right.  You seem to have quite a gift for reasoning things out," replied the skipper, as he pocketed his map and hove himself up into a standing position.  "But it is high time that we should get under way, for the sun is setting, and we shall have all our work cut out to find our road back to the boat.  Do you think you will be able to find the gig, Cupid?"
"Yes, I fit, sar," answered the Krooboy.  "But we mus' make plenty haste; for dem darkness he come too much plenty soon, an' if we slip and fall into dem mud we lib for die one time."
"Ay, ay," answered the skipper, with an involuntary shudder at the hideous fate thus tersely sketched by Cupid; "I know that, my lad, without any telling; so heave ahead as smartly as you like."
And therewith we started upon our return journey with all speed; striding, leaping, slipping, and scrambling from root to root, Cupid leading the way, I following, and the skipper bringing up the rear, until at length we stood upon solid ground once more.  But by this time not only had the sun set but the dusk was gathering about us like a curtain, while star after star came twinkling out from the rapidly darkening blue overhead, and the foliage of the trees that hemmed us in on every side was changing, even as we stood and watched while recovering our breath, from olive to deepest black.  Now, too, we were beset, even more pertinaciously than before, by the myriads of mosquitoes, sand flies, gnats, and other winged biting creatures with which the islet swarmed; to say nothing of ants; indeed it almost seemed as though every individual insect upon that particular patch of soil and vegetation had scented us out and, having found us, was quite determined that we should never escape them alive.  When presently we again began to move, it seemed impossible to take a single step without tripping over a land-crab's hole, or treading upon one of the creatures and hearing and feeling it crackle and writhe underfoot.  Ugh! it was horrible.
All these unpleasantnesses were sharply accentuated by the darkness, which fell upon us like a pall; for now the stars began to be obscured by great black clouds that came sweeping in from seaward, while the increasing roar and swish in the boughs overhead seemed to indicate that the wind was freshening.  Progress was difficult enough, under such conditions, while we were traversing solid ground and had no special need to pick our footsteps; how would it be, I wondered, when it came to our re-crossing the belt of mangroves and mud that lay between us and the gig?  Then, to add still further to our difficulties, the dank, heavy, pestilential fog that rises from the tropical African rivers at nightfall began to gather about us, and in a few minutes, from being bathed in perspiration from our exertions, we were chilled to the bone, with our teeth chattering to such an extent that we could scarcely articulate an intelligible word.
"Plenty too much fever here come," remarked Cupid, while his teeth clattered together like castanets.  "Sar, you lib for carry dem quinine powder dat dem doctor sarve out dis morning?"
"Certainly, Cupid," jibbered the skipper.  "M-m-many thanks for the hint.  M-m-m-mister Fortes--ugh! t-t-take a p-p-pow-ow-der at once."
I did so, and handed one to the Krooboy, who simply put it, paper and all, into his mouth, and swallowed the whole.  Having done this, Cupid announced, as well as his chattering teeth would permit, that in view of the fog and the intense darkness it would be simply suicidal for us to attempt the passage of the mangroves without a light, and that therefore he proposed to make his way alone to the gig, not only to reassure her crew as to our safety, but also to procure a lantern.  And he enjoined the skipper and me to remain exactly where we were until he should return.  After an absence which seemed to be an age in duration, but which was really not quite three-quarters of an hour, he reappeared, accompanied by the coxswain of the boat and two other seamen, who brought along with them a couple of lighted lanterns.  Thus reinforced and assisted, we got under way again, and eventually, after a most fatiguing and dangerous journey, reached the boat and shoved off into the stream.  The gig was of course provided with a boat compass, and we knew the exact bearing of the spot where the other boats lay hidden; but we already knew also how complicated and confusing was the set of the currents in the river, and how hopeless would consequently be any attempt to find our friends in that thick fog.  We therefore did not make the attempt, but, pushing off into the stream until we were clear of the mosquitoes and other winged plagues that had been tormenting all hands for so many hours, let go our anchor in one and a half fathoms of water, and proceeded to take a meal prior to turning-in for the night.
Never in my life before, I think, had I spent so absolutely uncomfortable a night.  What with the rats, cockroaches, fleas, and other vermin with which the ship was overrun, to say nothing of the complication of stenches which poisoned the atmosphere, the midshipmen's berth aboard the _Psyche_ was by no means an ideal place to sleep in, but it was luxury compared with the state of affairs in the gig.  For aboard the _Psyche_ we at least slept dry, while in the boat we were fully exposed to the encroachments of that vile, malodorous, disease- laden fog which hemmed us in and pressed down upon us like a saturated blanket, penetrating everywhere, soaking our clothing until we were wet to the skin, chilling us to the very marrow, despite our greatcoats, so that we were too miserable to sleep; while it so completely enveloped us that, even with the help of half a dozen lanterns, we could not see a boat's length in any direction.  As the foul water went swirling away past us great bubbles came rising up from the mud below, from time to time, bursting as they reached the surface, and giving off little puffs of noxious, vile-smelling gas that were heavy with disease-germs.  Yet, singularly enough, when at length the morning dawned and the fog dispersed, not one of us aboard the gig betrayed the slightest trace of fever, although, among them, the other boats mustered nearly a dozen cases.
Our first business, after once more joining forces, was to pull into the creek and call upon his Majesty, King Olomba; but, upon interviewing that potentate, through the medium of Cupid, who acted as interpreter, it at once became evident that our worthy skipper had been made the victim of an elaborate hoax--even more elaborate, indeed, than we at the moment expected; for the king not only vigorously disclaimed any propensity toward slave-hunting or slave-dealing, but went the length of strenuously denying that the river was ever used at all by slavers; also he several times endeavoured to divert the conversation into another channel by pointedly hinting at his readiness to accept a cask of rum as a present, to which hint the skipper of course turned a deaf ear.  Then, having got out of the old boy all the information that we could extract--which, when we came to analyse it, amounted to just nothing--we carefully searched the bush in the neighbourhood of the town, to see if we could discover anything in the nature of a barracoon, but found no trace whatever of any such thing.
Having drawn the creek blank, the skipper next determined to search a spot known as the Camma Lagoon, some twelve miles farther up the river; and, the sea-breeze having by this time set in, we stepped the masts and made sail upon the boats, creeping up the river close to its northern bank in order to dodge the current as much as possible.
Upon reaching the lagoon we found it to be in reality a sort of bay in the north bank of the river, some five and a half miles long by about three and three-quarter miles wide, with an island in the centre of it occupying so large an extent of its area that at one spot the creek behind was barely wide enough to allow the passage of a vessel of moderate tonnage.  The eastern extremity of this creek, however, widened out until it presented a sheet of water some two miles long by about a mile and a half in width, with a depth of water ranging from two to three fathoms.  Furthermore, the island itself and the adjacent banks of the river were thickly wooded, affording perfect concealment, behind which half a dozen slavers might lurk undetected; and altogether it wore, as seen from the river, the aspect of an exceedingly promising spot.  We therefore lowered the boats' sails, unshipped their masts, and, keeping a bright look-out all round us, pulled warily into the lagoon at its eastern extremity.
For the first mile of our passage we detected nothing whatever of a suspicious character; but upon rounding the eastern extremity of the island and entering the widest part of the lagoon we sighted two large canoes paddling furiously up the creek, about a mile ahead of us.  The captain at once brought his telescope to bear upon these craft, and with its aid discovered that each canoe was manned by about forty black paddlers, while the after end of each craft was occupied by some ten or a dozen men in European dress, most of whom appeared to be armed with muskets.  These men had the appearance of being either Portuguese or Spaniards, and their presence in such a spot could mean but one thing, namely, that there was a barracoon somewhere near at hand.  The skipper accordingly gave the order to chase the two canoes, to which the boats' crews responded with a cheer, and laid themselves down to their oars with such a will that they almost lifted the boats out of the water. But we had scarcely traversed a distance of half a dozen boats' lengths when, upon opening up a little indentation in the shore of the mainland, we saw before us a substantial wharf, long enough to accommodate two fair-sized craft at once, with a wide open space at the back of it upon which stood some eight or ten buildings, one of which was unmistakably a barracoon of enormous size.
With another cheer the course of the boats was at once diverted toward the wharf; and we had arrived within less than a hundred yards of it when the deathlike silence which had hitherto prevailed ashore was pierced by a shrill whistle, in response to which the whole face of the bush bordering the open space at once began to spit flame, while the air around us hummed and whined to the passage of a perfect storm of bullets and slugs, among which could be detected the hum of round shot, apparently nine-pounders, the gig weathered the storm unscathed; but upon glancing back I saw that the other boats had been less fortunate, there being a gap or two here and there where a moment before a man had sat, while certain of the oars were at that moment slipping through the rowlocks to trail in the water by their lanyards a second later.  Here and there, too, could be seen a man hastily binding up a wounded limb or head, either his own or that of a shipmate.
The skipper sprang to his feet in the stern-sheets of the gig, and drew his sword.
"Hurrah, lads!" he shouted.  "Give way, and get alongside that wharf as quickly as you can.  Then let every man run his hardest for the shelter of the buildings, carrying his musket and ammunition with him.  One hand remain in each boat as boat-keeper, who must crouch down under the shelter of the wharf face.  Mr Fortescue, stick close alongside me, please; I shall probably want you to carry messages for me."
"Ay, ay, sir," I answered; and the next moment the voice of the coxswain pealed out: "Oars! rowed of all!" followed by the clatter of the long ash staves as they were laid in on the thwarts, and the gig, still leading the other boats, swept up alongside the low wharf and hooked on.
With a yell of fierce delight, and eyes blazing with excitement, Cupid, the Krooboy, bounded up on the wharf, and extended one great black paw to assist the skipper, while in the other he grasped his favourite weapon, an axe, the edge of which he had carefully ground and honed until one could have shaved with it; in addition to which he wore a ship's cutlass girded about his waist.  Moreover he had "cleared for action," by stripping off the jacket and shirt which he usually wore, and stowing them carefully away in the stern-sheets of the boat; so that his garb consisted simply of a pair of dungaree trousers rolled up above his knees and braced tight to his waist by the broad belt from which hung his cutlass.
In a second the gig was empty save for her boat-keeper, and her crew were racing for the shelter afforded by the barracoon, where, as I understood it, the captain intended to announce his arrangements for clearing the enemy out of the bush.  But when we had accomplished about half the distance between the edge of the wharf and the barracoon there came a sudden splutter of fire from the windows of the other buildings-- which were so arranged as to enfilade the whole of the open space--and in a moment we once more found ourselves in the midst of a storm of flying bullets.  The skipper, who was a pace ahead of me, stumbled, staggered a pace or two, and fell headlong upon his face, where he lay still, while his sword flew from his grasp with a ringing clatter.  At the same moment the two cutters dashed up alongside the wharf, and their crews came swarming up out of them, to be met by another murderous discharge from the enemy lurking in the bush.
I came to a halt beside the skipper, and looked round me.  A couple of yards away stood Cupid, who, it seemed, had just caught sight of the captain as he fell, and had pulled himself up short.
"You, Cupid," I shouted, "come back here, sir, and lend me a hand to get the captain back into the gig."
The fellow came, and stooping over the skipper's body raised it tenderly in his arms.
"All right, Mistah Fortescue, sar," he said; "you no trouble.  I take dem captain back to de gig by myself, and find Mistah Hutchinson," (the surgeon).  "But it no good, sar; he gone dead.  Look dere."  And he pointed to a ghastly great hole in the side of the skipper's head, just above the left ear, where a piece of langrage of some description had crashed its way through the poor fellow's skull into his brain.  It was a horrid sight, and it turned me quite sick for the moment, accustomed though I was by this time to see men suffering from all sorts of injuries.
"Very well," I said; "take it--the captain, I mean--back to the gig, anyway, and do not leave him until you have turned him over to Mr Hutchinson; who, by the way, is in the launch, which I see is just coming alongside.  I will find Mr Hutchinson and send him to you."  And away I hurried toward the spot where I saw the launch approaching, for the double purpose of reporting to Mr Perry the news of the captain's fall, and dispatching the surgeon to see if life still remained in the body.
The first luff was terribly shocked at the news which I had to tell him; from a distance he had seen the skipper fall, but had hoped that it was a wound, at most.  But this was not the moment for unavailing regrets; the fall of the captain at once placed Perry in command and made him responsible for the fate of the expedition.  He therefore gave orders for the guns which were mounted in the bows of the launch, pinnace, and first and second cutters to be cast loose and landed, the men not engaged in this work being placed under the command of the third lieutenant, with instructions to load their muskets and keep up a constant fire upon the windows of the various buildings.  Then, as soon as the guns were landed, two of them were loaded with double charges of grape, for the purpose of clearing the bush of the hidden foe, while the remaining two were double shotted and then run close up to the barricaded doors of the buildings, which were thus blown in, one after the other.  As each door was blown in the building to which it belonged was stormed; the enemy, however, contriving to effect an exit by the rear as our lads poured in at the front.  In ten minutes the whole of the buildings were ours, without further casualties on our side; after which we set them on fire and, waiting until they were well alight, retired in good order to the boats, in which we hauled off far enough to enable us to effectively cover the burning buildings with our musketry fire and thus defeat any attempt to extinguish the flames.  An hour later the entire settlement was reduced to a heap of smouldering ashes; whereupon we pulled away round to the main stream once more by way of the back of the island, in search of further possible barracoons, but found none.
Our loss in this affair, considering its importance, was comparatively slight, amounting as it did to two killed--of whom one was the skipper-- and seven wounded.  But we were a sorrowful party as we left the lagoon behind us and found ourselves once more in the main stream and on our way back to the ship; for Captain Harrison was beloved by everybody, fore and aft, and we all felt that we could better have spared any one else than him.
CHAPTER FOUR.
THE WRECK OF THE PSYCHE.
Our journey down the river was a very different affair from that of our upward passage; for whereas in the latter we had been compelled to force our way against an adverse current, we now had that current favouring us; thus it came about that although the sun had passed the meridian when the boats emerged from the Camma Lagoon, after destroying the slave factory therein, it yet wanted an hour to sunset when the gig, still leading the rest of the flotilla, entered the last reach of the river and we once more caught sight and sound of the breakers beyond the bar.
Mr Perry, the late first lieutenant, who now, by the death of Captain Harrison, had automatically become acting captain of the _Psyche_, had turned over the command of the launch to the master's mate, for the return passage, and was in the gig with me; and as we drew nearer to the river's mouth I noticed that he rose in the stern-sheets of the boat and glanced somewhat anxiously to seaward.  For a full minute or more he stood gazing under the sharp of his hand out across the sandbank as it seemed to glide rapidly past us, its summit momentarily growing lower as the gig swept along toward the point where the dwindling spit plunged beneath the surface of the water, and, as he gazed, the expression of puzzlement and anxiety on his face rapidly intensified.  By this time, too, his action and attitude had attracted the attention of those in the boats astern, and, glancing back at them, I saw that Nugent, in the launch, and Hoskins, the third lieutenant, in the pinnace, had followed his example.  Naturally, I did the same, wondering meanwhile what it was at which they were all looking so intently, when Mr Perry suddenly turned upon me and demanded, almost angrily--
"I say, Mr Fortescue, what has become of the ship?  D'ye see anything of her?"
"The ship, sir?"  I echoed dazedly--for, with the question, it had come to me in a flash that we ought by this time to be able to see at least the spars of the _Psyche_ swaying rhythmically athwart the sky out over the low sandbank, if she still lay at anchor where we had left her;--"the ship?  No, sir, I confess that I can't see her anywhere. Surely Mr Purchase cannot have shifted his berth, for any reason? But--no," I continued, as the absurdity of the suggestion came home to me--"of course he hasn't; he hasn't enough hands left with him to make sail upon the ship, even if he were obliged to slip his cables."
At that moment a hail of "Gig ahoy!" came from Nugent aboard the launch; and, glancing back at him, we saw him pointing at some object that had suddenly appeared on the ridge of the spit, away on our port quarter. It was a man, a white man, a seaman, if one might judge from his costume, and he was waving a large coloured handkerchief, or something of the kind, with the evident object of attracting our attention.  While we still stood at gaze, wondering what this apparition could possibly mean, another man appeared beside him.
"Down helm, and run the boat in on the bank," ordered our new skipper. "I must see what this means."
"Flatten in, fore and aft, and stand by to let run your halyards!" ordered the coxswain, easing his helm down; and as he spoke I stepped upon the stern thwart with the object of getting a somewhat more extended view over the sandbank.  But there was nothing to be seen-- stay! why was the spray from the surf flying so much higher in one particular spot than elsewhere?  And that spot appeared to be about abreast of that part of the bank where the two men were standing.  I stood a moment or two longer, seeking an explanation of the phenomenon, and then fell headlong over the man who was sitting upon the aftermost thwart gathering in the slack of the mainsail as the yard came down; for at that moment the gig grounded on the bank and shot a quarter of her length high and dry with the way that she had on her.  As I picked myself up, rubbing my barked elbows ruefully, to the accompaniment of a suppressed snigger from the boat's crew, Mr Perry, with a brief "Make way, there, lads," sprang upon the thwarts and, striding rapidly from thwart to thwart, rushed along the length of the boat, placed one foot lightly on the gunwale, close to the stem head, and leaped out on to the sand, with me close at his heels.
Together we raced for the crest of the spit; but even before we had reached it the terrible truth lay plain before us.  For there, about a quarter of a mile to the southward of us, on the seaward side of the spit, lay the _Psyche_, hard and fast aground, dismasted, and on her beam-ends, with the surf pounding at her, and her spars and rigging, worked up into a raft, floating in the swirl alongside the beach; while on the shore, opposite where she lay, the little company that had been left aboard to take care of her laboured to save such flotsam and jetsam as the surf flung up within their reach.
For a full minute the new skipper, thus by a cruel stroke of malicious fortune robbed of the command that had been his for such a few brief hours, stood gazing with stern, set features at the melancholy scene. Then he turned to me and said--very quietly--
"Mr Fortescue, be good enough to go down to Mr Hoskins, and request him, with my compliments, to take the boats back up the river until they are abreast the spot where the wreck lies, and there beach them; after which, leaving a boat-keeper to watch each boat, he will take the men over to the other side of the spit to assist in salving such matters as may come ashore.  Having delivered this message, you will please join me yonder."  And he pointed to where the little group of men were toiling on the beach.
"Ay, ay, sir!"  I answered.  And, touching my hat, I turned and hurried down to the river bank, alongside which the other boats were now lying, with lowered sails, evidently awaiting orders.  Meanwhile Mr Perry strode off over the ridge in the direction of the wreck.
I quickly found Mr Hoskins and delivered my message, with the result that the entire flotilla pushed off again and headed up-stream, one of the men having landed upon the narrow spit and ascended to its ridge in order that he might notify the boats' crews when they should have arrived at the spot on the seaward side of which lay the wreck; while I, burning with curiosity to learn how the disaster had been brought about, hurried after the skipper.  As he walked, while I ran, I managed to overtake him at the precise moment when Mr Purchase, who had been left by Captain Harrison in charge of the ship, met him at a little distance from the spot where the party of salvors were at work.
"Mr Purchase," said the skipper, as the two men met and halted, "I deeply regret to inform you that Captain Harrison is dead--killed this morning, with one other, while gallantly leading us to the attack of a strongly defended slave barracoon.  We have both bodies in the boats, yonder, and it was my intention to have buried them at sea to-night; but that, I perceive, is no longer possible.  And now, sir, perhaps you will be good enough to explain to me how the _Psyche_ comes to be where I see her."
"Ah, sir!" answered Mr Purchase, removing his hat and mopping his forehead in great perturbation of spirit, "I wish I could tell you.  All I know--all that _any_ of us knows, so far as I have been able to ascertain--is that we were cut adrift--both cables, sir, cut through as clean as a whistle--and allowed to drive ashore!"
"Cut adrift?" reiterated the captain incredulously.  "_Cut adrift_? Really, my dear Purchase, you must excuse me if I say that I utterly fail to understand you.  How the mischief could you possibly be cut adrift from where you were anchored; and by whom?  You surely do not intend to insinuate that any one of the ship's company--?"
"No--no; certainly not," interrupted Purchase.  "Nothing of the kind. Let me tell you the whole yarn, Perry; then you will be as wise as myself, and can give me your opinion of the affair, which I admit is most extraordinary.
"Nothing in the least remarkable occurred for some hours after the boats left the ship yesterday morning.  I stood aft and watched you through the starboard stern port until you had all safely crossed the bar and disappeared behind the sand spit; and then I set the hands to work upon various small jobs; after which I went round the ship and satisfied myself that everything was perfectly safe and snug on deck and below. Then, feeling tolerably certain that you would not return until to-day at the earliest, and that consequently it would be necessary for me to be up and about during the greater part of the coming night, I went below and turned in all standing, to get as much sleep as possible, leaving the boatswain's mate in charge of the deck, together with midshipmen Keene and Parkinson.
"The day passed quite uneventfully; everything went perfectly smoothly; the ship rode easily to her anchors; and there had been nothing to report.  But about two bells in the first dog-watch I noticed that the sky was beginning to look a bit windy away down in the western quarter-- nothing to speak of, you understand, or to cause any uneasiness; but it made me take a look at the barometer, and I saw that it had dropped a trifle since eight bells; and at the same time the wind was distinctly freshening and the swell gathering weight.  All this, of course, meant more wind within the next few hours; I therefore kept a sharp eye on the barometer; and when at four bells I found it still dropping I decided to let go the two stream anchors, as a precautionary measure, while we had light enough to see what we were doing; and this I did, at the same time paying out an extra fifty fathoms on each cable, after which I felt that we were perfectly safe in the face of anything short of a hurricane."
The new skipper nodded his approval, but said nothing; and Purchase proceeded with his story.
"Well, as you probably noticed, shortly after sunset the wind breezed up quite strongly; but I was not in the least uneasy, for the barometer had ceased to drop before eight bells, and, although the sky was overcast and the night very dark, there was nothing threatening in the look of the weather, and it was only occasionally that we really tautened out our cables.  Still, I made up my mind to remain on deck all night, having had a good spell of sleep during the day.
"As the night wore on and the wind held fresh but steady, I felt that after all I really need not have let go the streams, for the bowers alone would have held us quite easily against six times as much wind and sea as we had; you may therefore perhaps be able to picture to yourself my amazement and consternation when, a few minutes before six bells in the middle watch, I became aware that the ship was adrift and fast driving down toward the breakers!"
"How did you discover that the ship was adrift?  Did you feel her cables parting?" demanded the skipper.
"No," answered Purchase; "we never felt anything of that kind; but I suddenly noticed that she was falling off and canting broadside-on to the wind and sea, so I knew at once that something was wrong--that in fact we had, in some incomprehensible way, struck adrift.  I therefore sang out to Thompson, the boatswain's mate, to pipe all hands to make sail, intending to run her into the river, if possible.  But by the time that we had got the mizzen and fore-topmast staysail upon her, and were loosing the main-topmast staysail, we were in the first line of breakers; and a moment later she struck heavily.  Then a big comber came roaring in and broke over us, lifted us up, swept us shoreward a good twenty fathoms, and we struck again, with such violence this time that all three masts went over the side together.  After that we had a very bad half-hour, for every roller that came in swept clean over us, carrying away everything that was movable, smashing the bulwarks flat, and hammering the poor old barkie so furiously upon the sand that I momentarily expected her to go to pieces under our feet.  To add to our difficulties, it was so intensely dark that we could not see where we were; true, the water all round us was ablaze with phosphorescence, which enabled us to discern that land of some sort lay about a couple of cables' lengths to leeward of us, but it was quite indistinguishable, and the water between us and it was leaping and spouting so furiously that I did not feel justified in making any attempt to get the men ashore, especially as we were then being swept so heavily that we had all our work cut out to hold on for our lives.  About half an hour later, however, the tide turned and began to ebb, and then matters improved a bit.
"But it was not until daybreak that we were able to do anything really useful; and then all hands of us got to work and built a raft of sorts, after which we got up a good supply of provisions and water, sails to serve as tents, light line, and, in short, everything likely to be useful, and managed to get ashore without very much difficulty.  But before I left the ship I had the cables hauled in through the hawse- pipes, and examined them most carefully.  They were both unmistakably cut through--a clean cut, sir, evidently done with a sharp knife--at about the level of the water's edge."
"Most extraordinary!" commented Perry.  "And I presume nobody saw anything, either immediately before you went adrift or afterwards--no boat, or anything of that kind, I mean--to account for the affair?"
"No," answered Purchase, "nothing.  Yet I was not only wide-awake and on the alert myself, but I took care that the anchor watch should be so also; for I felt the responsibility of having such a ship as the _Psyche_ to take care of, with only twenty hands, all told, to help me."
"Of course," agreed the skipper.  "And did you succeed in getting everybody ashore safely?"
"Yes, thank God!" answered Purchase fervently.  "We are all safe and sound, and very little the worse for our adventure, thus far."
"Ah! that at least is good news," remarked Perry.  "Well," he continued, "there is one very melancholy duty demanding our immediate attention, Mr Purchase, namely, the interment of Captain Harrison and the other poor fellow who fell during the attack upon the barracoon to-day.  I will see about that matter personally, by choosing a suitable spot and getting the graves dug, for we shall soon have the darkness upon us. Meanwhile, you will be good enough to get tents rigged and such other preparations made as may be possible for the comfort of all hands, and especially the wounded, during the coming night; for we have all had a very trying day, and it is imperative that we should secure a good night's rest.  Mr Fortescue, come with me, if you please."
Now, during the progress of the foregoing conversation the boat party had not been idle; for, as soon as the fact of the wreck had become known to them, Mr Hoskins, the third lieutenant, seeing how matters stood, had grappled with the situation by causing the guns, ammunition, and stores of all kinds to be landed from the boats, and the craft themselves to be hauled up high and dry upon the beach on the river-side of the sand spit; and then, leading his men over the ridge, to where the others were at work upon the salving of wreckage from the surf, he had detailed a party to pick out from among the pile of heterogeneous articles such things as were most needed to meet our more immediate wants, and carry or drag them up the slope to the spot which Henderson, the surgeon, had already selected as the most suitable spot for a camp.
It was toward this party that Mr Perry and I now directed our steps; and when we had joined it the skipper, picking out a dozen of the most handy men, gave them instructions to provide themselves with tools of some sort suitable for the purpose of digging a couple of graves in the loose, yielding sand above the level of high-water mark; and while they were doing this, under my supervision, my companion wandered away by himself in search of a suitable site for the graves.  As a matter of fact there was very little in the nature of choice, the entire spit, or at least that portion of it which we occupied, consisting of loose sand, sparsely covered, along the ridge and far a few yards on either side of it, with a kind of creeper with thick, tough, hairy stems and large, broad leaves, the upper surface of which bristled with hairy spicules about a quarter of an inch long.  This plant, it was evident, bound the otherwise loose drifts and into a sufficiently firm condition to resist the perpetual scouring action of the wind; it was in this portion of the spit, therefore, that Mr Perry gave orders for the two graves to be dug; and presently my little gang of twelve were busily engaged in scooping out two holes, some twenty feet apart, to serve as graves. They were obliged to work with such tools as came to hand, and these consisted of splintered pieces of plank, the boats' balers, and some wooden buckets that had come ashore.
Under such circumstances the task of excavation was distinctly difficult, the more so that the sand ran back into the holes almost as fast as it was scooped up and thrown out; but at length, by dint of strenuous labour, a depth of some three feet was reached just as the sun's rim touched the western horizon and flung a trail of blood athwart the tumble of waters that lay between.  Then, the exigencies of the occasion admitting of no further delay, the task was suspended; all hands knocked off work; and, the bodies having meanwhile been enclosed in rough coffins very hastily put together by the carpenter and his mate, we all fell in; the gig's crew shouldered the late captain's coffin, while six of his mates acted as bearers to the other dead man; and, with Mr Perry leading the way and reading the burial service from a prayer-book, which it appeared he always carried about with him, we marched, slowly, solemnly, and bare-headed, up the slope of the sand spit to the spot which had been selected for the last resting-place of the dead.  Arrived there, the two coffins were at once deposited in their respective graves, when the new captain, standing between the two holes, somewhat hurriedly completed the ritual--for the light was fading fast; whereupon, after bestowing a final parting glance at the rough, uncouth box which concealed our beloved chief's body, we all turned slowly and reluctantly away to retrace our steps back to the apology for a camp which was to shelter us for the night, leaving a fresh party of workers to fill in the graves.
In neither arm of the British fighting service do men unduly dwell upon the loss of fallen comrades, for it is quite justly held that the man who yields up his life in the service of his country has done a glorious thing, whether he falls in a pitched battle deciding the fate of an empire, or in some such obscure and scarcely chronicled event as the attack upon a slave factory.  He is, where such is possible, laid in his last resting-place with all the honourable observance that circumstances permit, and his memory is cherished in the hearts of his comrades; but whether his fame pass with the echo of the last volley fired over his grave, or outlives the brass of the tablet which records his name and deeds, there is no room for grief.  Wherefore, when we got back to camp and had made the best possible arrangements for the coming night, there was little reference in our conversation to the tragic events of the past twenty-four hours; Mr Perry took up the reins of government, and matters proceeded precisely as they would have done had Captain Harrison been still alive and among us.
Our "camp" was, naturally, an exceedingly primitive affair; our living and sleeping quarters consisting simply of sails cut from the yards and stretched over such supports as could be contrived by inserting the lower ends of spars or planks in the sand and lashing their upper ends together.  These structures we dignified with the name of "tents."  The exigencies of the situation did not permit of the observance of such nice distinctions of rank in the matter of accommodation as exist under ordinary conditions, it therefore came about that we of the midshipmen's berth were lodged for the night in the same tent as the ward-room officers, and consequently we heard much of the conversation that passed between them, particularly at dinner.  This meal--consisting of boiled salt beef and pork, with a few sweet potatoes, and a "duff" made of flour, damaged by sea water, with a few currants and raisins dotted about here and there in it--was served upon the _Psyche's_ mizzen royal stretched upon the bare sand in the centre of our "tent"; and we partook of it squatted round the sail cross-legged on the sand, finding the way to our mouths by the light of four ship's lanterns symmetrically arranged one at each corner of the sail.
Naturally enough, Mr Purchase--now ranking as first lieutenant _vice_ Mr Perry, acting captain--having told the tale of the happenings which had resulted in our becoming castaways, was anxious to hear full particulars of what had befallen the boat expedition; and this Mr Perry proceeded to relate to him as we sat round the "table."  When he had finished there was silence for a moment; then Purchase looked up and said--
"Don't you think it very strange that your experiences throughout should have accorded so ill with the information that Captain Harrison acquired at so much trouble and personal risk?  Hitherto it has always happened that such information as he has been able to pick up has proved to be accurate in every particular."
"Yes," agreed Mr Perry, "it has.  I've been thinking a good deal about that to-day; and the opinion I have arrived at is that Harrison played the game once too often, with this result--" and he waved his right hand comprehensively about him, indicating the tent, the makeshift dinner, and our condition generally.
"What I mean is this," he continued, in reply to Purchase's glance of inquiry.  "The poor old _Psyche_, as we all know, was a phenomenally slow ship, yet her successes, since she came on the Coast, have been greater and more brilliant than those of any other vessel belonging to the squadron.  And why?  Because she had a trick of always turning up on the right spot at the right moment.  Now it seems to me that this peculiarity of hers can scarcely have escaped the notice of the slave- trading fraternity, because it was so very marked.  I imagine that they must often have wondered by what means we gained our information; and when at length the thing had become so unmistakable as to provoke both conjecture and discussion it would not take them long to arrive at a very shrewd suspicion of the truth.  When once the matter had reached this stage discovery could not possibly be very long delayed.  Captain Harrison was undoubtedly a well-known figure in Sierra Leone; he was of so striking a personality that it could not be otherwise, and I am of opinion that at length his disguise was penetrated.  He was recognised in one of those flash places in Freetown that are especially patronised by individuals of shady and doubtful character; and a scheme was devised for his and our undoing which has succeeded only too well.  In a word, I believe that the whole of the information upon which he acted when arranging this most unfortunate expedition was carefully fabricated for the express purpose of bringing about the destruction of the ship, and was confided to him by some one who had recognised him as her captain. I believe, Purchase, that you were cut adrift last night, either by the individual who spun the yarn, or by some emissary or emissaries of his who have a lurking-place somewhere in this neighbourhood; and, if the truth could be got at, I believe it would be found that the schooner which we saw come out of this river on the day before yesterday--and which the captain was led to believe was a decoy intended to draw us off the coast--was actually chock-full of slaves!"
"By Jove!" ejaculated Purchase.  "What a very extraordinary idea!"
"I don't think so at all," cut in Hoskins, before Mr Perry could reply. "It may seem so to you, Purchase, because it has just been presented to you, fresh and unexpectedly, as it were.  But when we arrived at King Olomba's town yesterday morning, and found neither slaves nor barracoon there, I must confess that I was visited by some such suspicion as that of which Captain Perry has just been speaking, although in my case it did not take quite such a concrete and connected form.  To my mind there is only one thing against your theory, sir," he continued, turning to the skipper, "and that is the existence of the factory on the lagoon."
"Yes," agreed the captain, "I admit that to be somewhat difficult to account for.  And yet, perhaps not so very difficult either; because if the fellows who gave Captain Harrison the information upon which he acted happened to have a grudge against the owners of that factory they would naturally be more than glad if, while groping about in search of the imaginary slavers and barracoon, we should stumble upon the real thing and destroy it.  All this, however, is mere idle conjecture, which may be either well founded or the opposite; but there is one indisputable fact about this business, which is--unless Mr Purchase is altogether mistaken, which I do not for a moment believe--that the _Psyche_ was last night cut adrift from her anchors and wrecked by somebody who must have a lurking-place in this immediate neighbourhood; and I intend to have a hunt for that somebody to-morrow."
CHAPTER FIVE.
THE BATTLE OF THE SAND SPIT.
As the evening progressed it became evident to me that our new captain had developed a very preoccupied mood; he fell into long fits of abstraction; and often answered very much at random such remarks as happened to be addressed to him.  He appeared to be turning over some puzzling matter in his mind; and at length that matter came to the surface and found expression in speech.
"Mr Purchase," he said, "I have been trying to put two and two together--or, in other words, I have been endeavouring to find an explanation of the puzzle which this business of the wreck of the _Psyche_ presents.  I can understand quite clearly that poor Captain Harrison was deliberately deceived and misled by certain persons in Sierra Leone in order that the ship might be cast away.  But why _here_ particularly?  For if my theory be correct that the supposed decoy schooner actually sailed out of this river with a full cargo of black ivory, there must certainly be a barracoon somewhere close at hand from which she drew her supplies; and the people who planned the destruction of the sloop could scarcely have been so short-sighted as to have overlooked the fact that such a happening would leave us here stranded in close proximity to a slave factory which, presumably, they would be most anxious should remain undiscovered by us.  That is the point which I cannot understand; and I have come to the conclusion that my theory with regard to the schooner must be altogether wrong, or there must be something else in the wind--that, in short, the wreck of the sloop is only a part instead of the whole of their plan."
"But what about the barracoon which you destroyed to-day, sir?" asked Purchase.  "Might not that be the place from which those fellows draw their supplies of slaves?"
"It might, of course," admitted the skipper; "but, all the same, I do not believe it was.  For the people who supplied Captain Harrison with false information would surely know enough of him and his methods to be certain that, failing to find anything in the nature of a slave factory at King Olomba's town, we should not leave the river again until we had thoroughly explored it; and if they knew the river at all they would also know that the factory on the Camma Lagoon could scarcely be overlooked by us.  No; in my own mind I feel convinced that the factory which we destroyed to-day was not the one in which those fellows are interested; there is another one somewhere in the river; and I will not leave until I have discovered and destroyed it.  But that only brings me back to the point from which I started, and once more raises the question, Why did they cast us away within a few miles of this other factory which I am persuaded exists?  Is it that the place is so strongly fortified that they are confident of our inability to take it? Or is there something else at the back of it all, of which we have not yet got an inkling?"
Purchase shook his head hopelessly.  "Upon my word, sir," he answered, "it is quite impossible for me to say.  When you come to put the matter like that it becomes as inexplicable as a Chinese puzzle.  What is your own opinion?"
"I haven't been able to form one at all," answered the skipper.  "But the matter is puzzling enough to convince me that it would be folly on our part to assume that the casting away of the ship is the beginning and ending of the adventure; therefore we will neglect no precautions, Mr Purchase, lest we find ourselves landed in an even worse predicament than our present one.  Our first and most important precaution must be to maintain a strict watch throughout the night.  It need not be a very strong watch, but it must be a vigilant one; therefore each watch will be kept under the supervision of an officer who will be responsible for the vigilance of the men under him.  Moreover, all hands must see that their muskets and pistols are loaded and ready for instant action; for it would not be a very difficult matter to surprise this camp of ours sometime during the small hours.  Just come outside with me and let us take a look round."
The result of the above conversation and the "look round" was an arrangement that the night was to be divided into five watches of two hours each, beginning at eight o'clock in the evening and ending at six o'clock in the morning; each watch to consist of twelve men, fully armed, who were to act as sentries, half of them being detailed to watch the river in the neighbourhood of the boats, while the other half kept watch and ward over the land approach to our encampment, being stretched across the narrow isthmus in open order from the water's edge on the river-side to that on the sea-side.  Each watch was commanded by an officer, with a midshipman under him; and the general orders were to fire a single shot at the first sign of anything of an alarming character, and then retire upon the camp, if an attack should threaten to cut off the outpost from the main body.
The first watch was taken by the captain, with me for his subordinate; and I was given the command of the party of six guarding the shore approach to the camp, while the skipper took the party mounting guard near the boats, as it was his opinion that if danger threatened it was most likely to come by way of the river.
My instructions were to march my men out to a distance of not more than two cables' lengths from the camp, and there take such cover as might be possible.  At first sight it did not appear that there was the least bit of cover of any description available, for the spit or peninsula on which we were encamped was just bare sand for a distance of fully a mile from the spot whereon our camp was pitched, and then there began a growth of scrubby bush which gradually became more dense as one proceeded in a southerly direction; but I solved the difficulty by causing each man to scoop a little pit for himself in the loose sand, in which it was easy for him to crouch perfectly concealed particularly as there was no moon, and the light from the stars was not strong enough to reveal objects at a distance much beyond a quarter of a mile.
The first, second, and third watches passed uneventfully; but the fourth watch was little more than half through when--about a quarter after three o'clock in the morning--the whole camp was roused from its slumbers by the sound of musket-shots, one from the party guarding the boats and the river approach, quickly followed by three in rapid succession from the contingent that occupied the sand pits stretched across the neck of the peninsula.  Then three or four more shots from the river party spurted out, and it began to dawn upon us that the matter threatened to be serious.  Of course none of us had thought of discarding any of our clothing that night, the second shot therefore had scarcely pealed out upon the night air before we in the camp were upon our feet, with our weapons in our hands, and all drawn up in regular array ready for the next move in the game, with the skipper in command.
"Where are Mr Fortescue and Mr Copplestone?" demanded the captain, looking about him, as soon as the first momentary bustle was over.
"Here I am, sir," answered I, stepping forward and mechanically touching my hat; and "Here I am, sir," answered Tom Copplestone, suddenly appearing from nowhere in particular.
"Mr Fortescue," ordered the captain, "take to your heels and run out to Mr Nugent as fast as you can; ascertain from him the reason for the firing from his party; ask him whether he requires any assistance; and then return to me with his reply as quickly as possible.  Mr Copplestone, you will run down to the boats with a similar message to Mr Marline."
Away we both went, as fast as we could lay legs to the ground, Copplestone down-hill toward the river beach, and I along the sand spit, making upward gradually toward the ridge as I ran.  Running in that fine, heavy sand was, however, horribly exhausting work, especially to one whose only mode of taking exercise was to stump the lee side of the quarter-deck during his watch, and I was soon so completely blown that, with the best will in the world to hurry, I was brought to walking pace. But before I had made twenty fathoms from my starting-point two more shots rang out from the party by the boats, and a moment later one of the boat guns began to speak.  I looked out over the river, striving to discover what the disturbance was about, and thought I could dimly make out several dark blurs on the faintly shimmering surface of the water, which I conjectured must be canoes, but I could not be sure; meanwhile my business was not with them, whatever they were, but with Nugent and his party, from whom, as I struggled along, two more musket-shots cracked out almost simultaneously.  Then, down by the river-side, a second shot roared from a boat gun, and this time before the ringing report of the piece died away I distinctly heard a crash followed by loud shrieks and much splashing out somewhere on the surface of the river.  A few seconds later, panting and gasping for breath, I staggered up to a figure which I had made out standing upright and motionless on the crest of the spit, and found it to be Nugent, with his drawn sword tucked under his right arm while with both hands he held his night glass to his eye.
"Who goes there?" he demanded sharply, wheeling round and seizing his sword as he heard the noise of my panting behind him.
"Friend!"  I answered.  "The sk---captain desires to know why you are firing, out here, and whether you require any assistance."
"Oh! is that Fortescue?  All right.  Just take my night glass, will you, and sweep the face of the spit carefully at about two hundred yards distance from here.  Then tell me if you can see anything," answered Nugent.  "And, if it comes to that, why are the others firing, down by the boats?"
"Can't say for certain," I answered, as I took the proffered night glass and raised it to my eye, "but I believe some suspicious canoes or boats have hove in sight, and they are just giving them a hint to keep their distance."
"Ah! just so," returned Nugent.  "Now _we_ are firing because, although we can't be absolutely certain in this darkness, we think that there is a body of men out there who would be not altogether disinclined to rush the camp, if we gave them the opportunity; so we are just potting at them--or what we fancy to be them--whenever we get a clear enough sight of them, just as a hint that we are awake.  But as to assistance--n-no, I don't think we need any, at least not at present.  Should we do so, later on, I will blow a blast on this whistle of mine."  And he produced from his pocket a whistle possessing a particularly shrill and piercing note, with which he had been wont to summon Cupid to the midshipmen's berth aboard the _Psyche_, when that individual's presence had been needed with especial urgency.
"Well, d'ye see anything?" he demanded, after I had been peering through his glass for a full minute or more.
"I am really not at all certain whether I do, or not," I answered, still working away with the glass.  "I thought, a moment or two ago, that I caught sight of something in motion for an instant, but it is so abominably dark, as you say, that--but stay a moment, what is that dark mass out there stretching across the ridge?  I don't remember having noticed anything there before nightfall."
"Dark mass?" reiterated Nugent; "what dark mass d'ye mean?  There is nothing out there, so far as I--"
"By Jingo! but there is, though, sir; I can see it myself now, wi' the naked eye!" exclaimed a seaman who was crouching in a sand pit a yard or so distant from where Nugent and I were standing.  "There, don't ye see it, Mr Nugent, stretchin' athwart the back of the spit?  Why, I can make it out quite distinctly."
"Give me the glass," demanded Nugent, snatching the instrument from me and applying it to his eye.  For some eight or ten seconds he peered intently through the tube, then exclaimed excitedly--
"Ah, now I have it.  Yes, by Jove, Fortescue, you are right, there _is_ something out there; and it looks like--like--ay, and it _is_, too--a body of blacks creeping along toward us on their stomachs!  Why, there must be hundreds of 'em, by the look of it; they reach right across the spit!  Yes, we shall certainly want help, and plenty of it, to keep those fellows at arm's length.  I thought it was only some twenty or thirty when I first made them out.  Yes, cut away to the skipper, Fortescue, as hard as you can pelt; tell him what you've seen; and say that I shall be obliged if he will kindly send me as many men as he can spare.  That disturbance down by the boats seems to have ceased, so he ought to be able to send us a pretty strong reinforcement."
"All right," I said; "I'll tell him, and then comeback with the men." And away I went back through the heavy sand at racing pace, and delivered my message.
The captain listened patiently to my breathless and somewhat disconnected story, and then turned to Mr Purchase, who was standing close at hand, and said--
"Mr Purchase, have the goodness to take the entire port watch, and go out to Mr Nugent's assistance.  But do not allow your men to fire away their ammunition recklessly, for we have very little of it.  Let no man pull trigger until he is quite certain of hitting his mark."
"Ay, ay, sir!" answered Purchase.  "Port watch, follow me."  And away he and his following trudged into the darkness.  I was making to join them, but the skipper happened, unfortunately, to see me, and called me back.
"No, no, Mr Fortescue," he said; "you and Mr Copplestone will please remain with me.  I may want one or both of you to run messages for me presently."
So we remained.  But I at once ranged up alongside Copplestone, for I was anxious to hear the news from Marline, down by the boats.
"Well, Tommy," I said, "what was old Marline blazing away at?  Whatever it was, he managed to hit it, for I heard the smash."
"Yes," answered Copplestone.  "But it was more a case of luck than of good shooting, for it is as dark as a wolf's mouth.  Some of his men, however, had eyes keen enough to see that there was a whole flotilla of boats, or canoes, or something of that sort, hovering in the river and manoeuvring in such a fashion as to lead to the suspicion that they had designs upon our boats, so he dosed them with a few charges of grape, which caused them to sheer off `one time,' as Cupid is wont to remark. What was the row with Nugent?"
"Lot of niggers creeping along the spit on their stomachs toward him," I answered.  "Got some idea of rushing the camp for the sake of the plunder in it, I expect.  But now that Mr Purchase and the port watch have gone out to back him up I think we need not--hillo! that sounds like business, though, and no mistake."
My ejaculation was caused by a sudden cracking off of some six or eight muskets, one after the other, closely followed by a heavy if slightly irregular volley, and the next instant the air seemed to become positively vibrant with a perfect pandemonium of shrieks, howls, yells, and shouts as of men engaged in close and desperate conflict.  The skipper pricked up his ears and clapped his hand to his sword-hilt; then he turned to where Tommy and I were standing close beside him.
"Mr Copplestone," he said, "take twenty men--the first you can pick-- and go with them to support Mr Marline, for I fancy he will need a little help presently.  The rest of us are going out to support Mr Purchase and Mr Nugent."
"Ay, ay, sir," answered Tommy.  He picked out the first twenty men he could lay hands on and taarched them off to join Mr Marline's "picnic," as he expressed it, and the rest of us went off at the double to take part in the scrimmage that was proceeding in the neighbourhood of the sand pits.  And a very pretty scrimmage it was, if one might judge from the tremendous medley of sounds that reached us from that direction. The firing was now very irregular and intermittent, but there was plenty of yelling and shrieking mingled, as we drew nearer to the scene of the fray, with sounds of gasping as of men engaged in a tremendous struggle, quick ejaculations, a running fire of forecastle imprecations, the occasional sharp order of an officer to "Rally here, lads!" dull, sickening thuds as of heavy blows crashing through yielding bones, and here and there a groan, or a cry for water.  It was evident that the fight had resolved itself into a desperate hand-to-hand struggle; and it seemed to me that our lads were being hard put to it to hold their own. But the worst feature of the whole affair, to my mind, was that the darkness was so intense that it was almost impossible to distinguish friend from foe.
We reached the scene of the struggle so much sooner than I had expected that it was impossible to avoid the conclusion that our people were being steadily forced back in the direction of the camp; and this I afterwards found to be correct; but the appearance of the skipper with his reinforcements soon put another face upon the matter.  It was evident that the foe--consisting of some hundreds of negro savages had been under the impression that they were fighting the entire strength of the British, but when we came up they at once discovered their mistake, which, with the knowledge that, for aught they could tell, there might be further reinforcements waiting to take a hand in the game, somewhat damped their courage.  Not by any means at once, however; indeed it was not for perhaps two or three minutes after our appearance upon the scene that the first actual check upon their advance occurred.  For they appeared to number seven or eight to every one of us, and moreover they were all picked warriors in the very prime of life, brave, fierce, determined fellows, every one of them, and well armed with spear, shield, war-club, and, in some cases, a most formidable kind of battle- axe.
"Spread out right and left, and cut in wherever you can find room," ordered the skipper as we plunged, stumbling and gasping, into the midst of the fray.  And there was no difficulty in obeying this order; for, narrow as the sand spit was, it was yet too wide for Mr Purchase and the port watch to draw a close cordon across it; there were gaps of a fathom or more in width between each of our men, and those gaps were rapidly widening as some poor wretch went down, transfixed by a broad- bladed spear, was clove to the shoulder by the terrific blow of an axe, or had his brains dashed out by a war-club.  But as our contingent arrived each man chose an enemy--there was no difficulty in doing that-- and pulled trigger upon him, generally bringing him down, for we were too close to miss; after which it became literally a hand-to-hand fight, some using their discharged muskets as clubs while others flung them away and trusted to their cutlasses, and one or two at least--for I saw them close alongside me--depended entirely upon the weapons with which nature had provided them, first dealing an enemy a knock-out blow with the clenched fist and then dispatching him with one of his own weapons. As for me, I still had the brace of pistols and the cutlass with which I had provided myself when setting-out upon our ill-starred boat expedition up the river, and I made play as best I could with these, bowling over a savage with each of my pistols and then whipping out my cutlass.  For a time I did pretty well, I and those on either side of me not only holding our ground but actually beginning to force the enemy back; but at length a huge savage loomed up before me with his war-club raised to strike.  My only chance seemed to be to get in a cut or a thrust before the blow could fall, and I accordingly lunged out at his great brawny chest.  But the fellow was keen-eyed and active as a cat; he sprang to one side, avoiding my thrust, and at the same instant brought down his club upon my blade with a force that shattered the latter like glass and made my arm tingle to such an extent that for the moment at least I was powerless in the right arm.  Then, quick as thought, he swung up the huge club again, with the evident determination to brain me.  Disarmed and defenceless, I did the on'y thing that was possible, which was to spring at his great throat and grip it with my left hand, pressing my thumb hard upon his wind-pipe.  But I was like a child in his hands; he shook me off with scarcely an effort; and as I went reeling backward I saw his club come sweeping down straight for the top of my head.  At that precise instant something seemed to flash dully before my eyes in a momentary gleam of starlight, a sharp _tchick_ came to my ears, a few spots of what felt like hot rain spattered in my face, and the great savage, his knees doubling beneath him, reeled backward with a horrible groan and crashed to the sand, with Cupid's axe quivering in his brain, while the club, flying from his relaxed grasp, caught me on the left forearm, which I had instinctively flung up to defend myself, snapping the bone like a carrot, and then whirling over and catching me a blow upon the head that stretched me senseless.  But before I fell I had become conscious that through the distracting noises of the fight that raged around me I could hear the sound of renewed firing spluttering out from the direction of the boats.
When my senses returned to me the day was apparently some three or four hours old, for the shadows of certain objects upon which my eyes happened to fall as I first opened them were, if anything, a trifle shorter than the objects themselves, which was a sure indication that the sun stood high in the heavens.  I was lying, with a number of other people, in the large tent-like structure which the ward-room officers had used on the preceding evening; and Hutchinson, the ship's surgeon, was busily engaged in attending to the hurts of a seaman who lay not far from me.
This was the first general impression that I gained of my surroundings with the recovery of consciousness; the next was that my left arm, which was throbbing and burning with a dull, aching pain from wrist to shoulder, was firmly bound up and strapped tightly to my body, and that my head, which also ached most abominably, was likewise swathed in bandages.  I was parched with thirst, which was increased by the sound of a man drinking eagerly at no great distance from me, and, turning my head painfully in the direction of the sound, I saw Jack Keene, a fellow-mid., administering drink out of a tin pannikin to a man whom I presently recognised as Nugent, the master's mate, who, poor fellow, seemed to be pretty near his last gasp.
"Jack," I called feebly, "you might bring me a drink presently, when you have finished with Nugent, will you?  How are you feeling, Nugent?  Not very badly hurt, I hope."
I saw Nugent's lips move, as though attempting to answer me, but no sound came from them, while Keene, glancing towards me, shook his head and laid his finger upon his lips as a sign, I took it, that I should not attempt to engage the poor fellow in conversation.
"All right, Fortescue," he said, in a low voice, "I'll attend to you in a brace of shakes."
He laid Nugent's head very gently back upon a jacket which had been folded to serve as a pillow, and then, refilling the pannikin from a bucket which stood close at hand, he came to me.
"Feeling bad, old chap?" he asked, as he raised my head and placed the pannikin to my lips.  I emptied the pannikin before attempting to reply, and then said--
"Not so bad but that I might easily be a jolly sight worse.  Bring me another drink, Jack, there's a good boy; that was like nectar."
"Ah; glad you enjoyed it," was the reply.  "But you'll have to wait a spell for your next drink; Hutchinson's orders to me are that water is to be administered to you fellows very sparingly, as it is drawn from the river and is probably none too wholesome.  What are your hurts?"
"Broken arm and a cracked skull, so far as I know," I answered.  "What's the matter with poor Nugent?"  I added, in a whisper.  "He looks as though he is about to slip his cable."
Jack nodded.  "Yes, poor chap," he whispered.  "No chance of his weathering it.  Ripped open by one of those broad-bladed spears.  Can't possibly recover.  Well, I must go and look after my other patients; I'm acting surgeon's mate, you know."
"Surgeon's mate!"  I ejaculated.  "Why, you surely don't mean to say that Murdoch has been bowled over, too, do you?"
"No; not so bad as that," answered Jack.  "He's away with the rest in the boats.  The skipper's gone to pay a return visit to those fellows who beat up our quarters last night.  And now I really must be off, you know.  Go to sleep, if you can; it will do you all the good in the world."
Go to sleep!  Yes, it was excellent advice, but I did not seem able to follow it just then; the throbbing and aching of my arm and the racking pain of my sore head were altogether against it, to say nothing of the continuous groaning and moaning of the injured men round about me, and the occasional sharp ejaculations of agony extorted from the unfortunate individual who happened at the moment to be under the surgeon's hands. So, instead, I looked about me and endeavoured to form some idea of the extent of our casualties during the past night.  Judging from what I saw, they must have been pretty heavy, for I counted twenty-three wounded, including myself, and I realised that there might be others elsewhere, for the tent in which we lay was full; there did not seem to be room enough for another patient in it without undue crowding.  And even supposing that we comprised the sum total of the wounded, there must have been a large proportion of dead in so desperate an affair as that of the past night.  I estimated that in so obstinately contested a fight as that in which we had all sustained our injuries, and against such tremendous odds as those which were opposed to us, there must have been at least half as many dead as wounded, which would make our casualties up to thirty-five; a very heavy percentage out of a crew that, owing to various causes, was already, before this fresh misfortune, growing short-handed.  When to these came to be added the casualties sustained on the preceding day in the attack upon the barracoon, it seemed to me that our new captain would have little more than a mere handful of men available for service on this fresh expedition upon which he had embarked--for I did not suppose that he had gone off taking with him every sound man and leaving the camp and the wounded entirely unprotected and exposed to a renewed attack by the savages.
After about an hour's absence Jack came back to me again and gave me another draught of water, which so greatly refreshed me that the excitement and uneasiness under which I had been labouring since his first visit gradually subsided, my aches and pains grew rather more tolerable; my thoughts grew first more placid and then gradually more disconnected, wandering away from the present into the past and to more agreeable themes, my memory of past incidents became confused, and finally I slept.
I must have slept some three or four hours; for when I awoke it was undoubtedly afternoon; Hutchinson had completed his gruesome labours and was sitting not very far away entering some notes in his notebook, and a few of the less seriously wounded were sitting up partaking of soup or broth of some kind out of basins, pannikins, or anything of the kind that came most handy.  The sight of these people refreshing themselves reminded me that I was beginning to feel the need of food, and I called out to the doctor to ask if I might have something to eat and drink.  He at once rose up and came to me, felt my pulse, looked at my tongue, and prescribed a small quantity of broth, which Jack Keene presently brought me, and which I found delicious.  I may here mention that several days later I became aware that this same broth--the origin of which puzzled me at the moment, though not enough to prevent me from taking it--had been prepared from a kind of tortoise, the existence of which in large numbers on the spit Hutchinson had accidentally discovered that very morning, and in pursuit of which he had sent out two of the most slightly wounded with a sack, and instructions to catch and bring in as many of the creatures as they could readily find.
While I was taking my broth the worthy medico stepped to where Nugent was lying and bent over the poor fellow, feeling his pulse and watching his white, pain-drawn face.  Then, rising softly, he went into a dark corner of the tent, where, it appeared, his medicine-chest was stowed away, and quickly prepared a draught, which he brought and held to the lips of the patient, tenderly raising the head of the latter to enable him to drink it.  Then, having replaced the sufferer's head upon the makeshift pillow, he bent over and murmured a few words in the dying man's ear.  What they were I know not, nor did I catch Nugent's response, but the effect of the brief colloquy was that Hutchinson drew from his pocket a small copy of the New Testament and, after glancing here and there at its opened pages, finally began to read, in a clear voice and very impressively, the fifteenth chapter of the first epistle to the Corinthians, reading it through to the end.  As he proceeded I saw poor Nugent slowly and painfully draw up his hands, that had lain clenched upon the sand beside him, until they were folded upon his breast in the attitude of prayer.  And when at length Hutchinson, with a steady voice, but with the tears trickling down his cheeks, reached the passage, "But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory," Nugent's lips began to move as though he were silently repeating the words.  The chapter ended, Hutchinson remained silent for a few moments, regarding his patient, who he evidently believed was praying.  Suddenly Nugent's eyes opened wide, and he stared up in surprise at the canvas roof over his head as though he beheld some wonderful sight; the colour flowed back into his cheeks and lips, and gradually his face became illumined with a smile of ecstatic joy.
"Yes," he murmured, "thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory--_the victory_--victory!"  As he spoke his voice rose until the final word was a shout of inexpressible triumph.  Then the colour ebbed away again from cheeks and lips, a film seemed to gather over the still open eyes, the death-rattle sounded in the patient's throat, he gasped once, as if for breath, and then a look of perfect, ineffable peace settled upon the waxen features.  Nugent's gallant soul had gone forth to join the ranks of the great Captain of his salvation.
CHAPTER SIX.
WE FIND NEW QUARTERS.
It was about half an hour after Nugent's death that young Parkinson, who had been engaged somewhere outside the tent, came in and said to Hutchinson--
"The launch, under sail, and with only about half a dozen hands in her, has just hove in sight from somewhere up the river.  None of the other boats seem to be in company, but as she is flying her ensign at the peak,"--the launch, it may be mentioned, was rigged as a fore-and-aft schooner--"I suppose it's all right."
"It is to be hoped so," fervently responded the medico; "goodness knows we don't want anything further in the nature of a disaster; we've had quite enough of that sort of thing already.  Could you distinguish the features of any of the people in the boat?"
"No, sir," answered the lad.  "I hadn't a glass with me.  Is there such a thing knocking about anywhere here in the tent, I wonder?"
"Yes," answered Hutchinson.  "You will find Mr Nugent's somewhere about.  It was picked up and brought in by the fatigue-party this morning.  You might take it, if you can find it, and see if you can distinguish an officer in the boat.  The glass ought to be somewhere over there."
Parkinson went to the spot indicated, and proceeded to rummage among the heterogeneous articles that had been recovered from the scene of the previous night's fight, and soon routed out the instrument of which he was in search, with which he went to the opening of the tent, from which the launch was by this time visible.  Applying the telescope to his eye, he focussed it upon the fast-approaching boat and stared intently through the tube.
"Yes," he said at length, "I can make out Mr Purchase in the stern- sheets, with Rawlings, the coxswain, alongside of him; and there is Cupid's ugly mug acting as figure-head to the boat.  The beggar is grinning like a Cheshire cat--I can see his double row of ivories distinctly--so I expect there is nothing much the matter."
Presently, from where I was lying, the launch slid into view, coming down-stream at a great pace under whole canvas, and driven along by a breeze that laid her over gunwale-to.  She was edging in toward our side of the river; and as I watched her movements, her crew suddenly sprang to their feet, apparently in obedience to an order; her foresail and mainsail were simultaneously brailed up at the same moment that her staysail was hauled down, then her helm was put up and she swerved inward toward the beach, upon which she grounded a minute later.  Then Mr Purchase rose to his feet, sprang up on the thwarts, and, striding from one to the other, finally sprang out upon the beach, up which, followed by Cupid, he made his way toward our tent.  A couple of minutes later he stood in the entrance, waiting for his eyes to accustom themselves to the comparative darkness of the interior.
"Well, doc.," he exclaimed cheerily, "how have things been going with you to-day?"
"Quite as well as I could reasonably have expected, taking all things into consideration," answered Hutchinson.  "Poor Nugent has passed away--went about half an hour ago--but the rest of the wounded are doing excellently.  How have things gone with you, and where are the others?"
"Left them behind busily preparing quarters for you and your contingent," answered Purchase.  "We have had a pretty lively time of it, I can tell you, since we left here this morning.  Searched both banks of the river for a dozen miles or more, exploring creeks in search of the gentry who attacked us from the river last night, and who undoubtedly put the savages up to the shore attack upon the camp, and eventually found them snugly tucked away in a big lagoon about twelve miles from here, the entrance of which is so artfully concealed that we might have passed it within a hundred fathoms and never suspected its existence.  Splendid place it is for carrying on the slave traffic; large open lagoon, with an average of about fifteen feet of water everywhere; fine spacious wharf, with water enough for ships to lie alongside; two spanking big barracoons; and a regular village of well- built houses; in fact, the finest and most complete slave factory that I've ever seen.  Well-arranged defences, too; battery of four nine- pounders; houses loop-holed for musketry; and a garrison of about a hundred of the most villainous-looking Portuguese, Spaniards, and half- breeds that one need wish to meet.  They were evidently on the look-out for us--had been watching us all day, I expect--and opened a brisk fire upon us the moment that we hove in sight.  Luckily for us their shooting was simply disgraceful, and we managed to effect a landing, with only two or three hurt.  But then came the tug-of-war.  The beggars barricaded themselves inside their houses, and blazed away at us at short range, and then, of course, our people began to drop.  But Perry wouldn't take any refusal; landed the boat guns, dragged them forward, and blew in the doors, one after the other, stormed the houses, and carried them in succession at the sword's point.  After that it was all plain sailing, but very grim work, doc, I can tell you; our people had got their blood up, and went for the Dagoes like so many tigers.  It lasted about a quarter of an hour after we had blown the doors down, and I don't believe that more than a dozen of the other side escaped.  Of course we, too, suffered heavily, and there are a lot of fresh cases waiting for you, but Murdoch is working like a Trojan.  And now I have come to fetch you and your contingent away out of this; there is a fine, big, airy house that Murdoch has turned into a hospital, where the wounded will be in clover, comparatively speaking; so, if you don't mind, we'll get to work at once and shift quarters before nightfall."
No sooner said than done.  As I had surmised, a party of twenty unwounded men, under the boatswain, had been left behind by the skipper to look after the camp when he had gone away early in the morning, and these men were now called in to convey the most seriously wounded down to the launch, while the less seriously hurt helped each other; and in this way the whole of the occupants of the camp were got down to the launch and placed on board her in about twenty minutes.  Then Hutchinson caused his medicine-chest to be taken down to the boat, together with such other matters as he thought might be useful; and, lastly, poor Nugent's body was taken down and reverently covered over with the ship's ensign, which had been saved, laid on a rough, impromptu platform on the thwarts amidships--the other poor fellows who had fallen in the fight had been buried before the setting-out of the boat expedition, I now learned.  A final look round the camp was then taken by Purchase and Hutchinson; a few more articles that were thought worth preserving from possible midnight raiders were brought down; and then we got under way and stood up the river, keeping in the slack water as much as possible, in order to cheat the current.
It was within an hour of sunset when Purchase, who had been standing up in the stern-sheets of the boat, intently studying the shore of the right bank of the river for some ten minutes, gave the order to douse the canvas and stand by to ship the oars; and as he did so he waved his hand to the coxswain, who put down his helm and sheered the boat in toward what looked like an unbroken belt of mangroves stretching for miles along the bank.  But as the launch, with plenty of way on her, surged forward, an opening gradually revealed itself; and presently we slid into a creek, or channel, some two hundred feet wide, the margins of which were heavily fringed with mangroves, and at once found ourselves winding along this narrow passage of oil-smooth, turbid water, in a stagnant atmosphere of roasting heat that was redolent of all the odours of foetid mud and decaying vegetation.  This channel proved to be about a mile long, and curved round gradually from a north-easterly to a south-easterly direction, ending in a fine spacious lagoon about eight miles long by from three to four miles wide at its widest point, arrived in which we once more felt the breeze and the sails were again set, the boat heading about south-east, close-hauled on the port tack, toward what eventually proved to be an island of very fair size, fringed with the inevitable mangroves, but heavily timbered, as to its interior, with magnificent trees of several descriptions, among which I distinguished several very fine specimens of the _bombax_.  Handsomely weathering this island, with a few fathoms to spare, and standing on until we could weather a small, low-lying island to windward of us on the next tack, we then hove about and stood for the northern shore of the lagoon, by that time some five miles distant, finally shooting in between the mainland and an island nearly two miles long, upon which stood the slave factory that our lads had captured earlier in the day.  The whole surface of this island, except a narrow belt along its southern shore, had been completely cleared of vegetation; and upon the cleared space had been erected two enormous barracoons and, as Purchase had said, a regular village of well-constructed, stone-built houses raised on massive piers of masonry, and with broad galleries and verandahs all round them, evidently intended for the occupation of the slave-dealers and their dependants.  A fine timber wharf extended along the entire northern side of the island, with massive bollards sunk into the soil at regular intervals for ships to make fast to; half a dozen trunk buoys occupied the middle of the fairway; and the whole settlement was completely screened from prying eyes by the heavy belt of standing timber that had been left undisturbed on the southern shore of the island.  I had thought that the factory on the Camma Lagoon represented the last word in the construction of slave-dealing establishments; but this concern was quite twice as extensive, and more elaborately complete in every respect.
By the time that we invalids were landed it was close upon sunset, and under Purchase's guidance we were all conducted up to the largest house in the place, where, in one of the rooms, Murdoch was still hard at work attending to the batch of patients that were the result of that day's work.  We, the new arrivals, however, were shepherded into another room, where fairly comfortable beds were arranged along the two sides, and into these beds the worst cases were at once put and turned over to Murdoch's care, while Hutchinson promptly pulled off his coat and took up Murdoch's work in what might be termed the operating-room.  I, however, was not considered a bad case, and was accordingly placed in another smaller room, or ward, along with about half a dozen others in like condition with myself.
While these arrangements were proceeding, a fatigue-party had been busy at work in a secluded spot chosen by the skipper, at some distance from the houses; and before we, the wounded, had all been comfortably disposed of for the night, the dead Nugent included--were laid to rest with such honourable observance as the exigencies of the moment would permit.
The casualties in this last affair were, of course, by no means all on the British side; we had suffered pretty severely in the three affairs in which we had been involved since the departure of the boat expedition from the ship, our total amounting to eleven killed and twenty-six wounded; but the losses on the part of the enemy had been very considerably greater, their dead, in this last fight alone, numbering nineteen killed, while thirty-three wounded had been hurriedly bestowed in one of the houses, to be attended to by the surgeons as soon as our own people had been patched up; thus Hutchinson and Murdoch were kept busy the whole of that night, while Copplestone, Keene, and Parkinson-- the three uninjured midshipmen--were impressed as ward-attendants to keep watch over our own wounded, and administer medicine, drink, and nourishment from time to time.
It was a most fortunate circumstance for all hands that this last factory had been discovered and captured; for we were thus provided with cool, comfortable living quarters, instead of being compelled to camp out on the exposed beach opposite the wreck; and to this circumstance alone may be attributed the saving of several of the more severely wounded, to say nothing of the fact that we now occupied a position which could be effectually defended from such attacks as that to which we had been exposed on the spit during the previous night.  Moreover, it relieved the captain of a very heavy load of anxiety, since, but for the fortunate circumstance of this capture, he would have had no alternative but to have continued in the occupation of our makeshift camp on the spit, it being impossible for him to undertake a boat voyage to Sierra Leone with so many wounded on his hands.  It is true that he might have sent away the launch, with an officer and half a dozen hands, to Sierra Leone to summon assistance; but his ambition was not to be so easily satisfied.  We had done splendid service in capturing two factories and destroying one of them--the second would also, of course, be destroyed when we abandoned it--but the loss of the _Psyche_ was a very serious matter, which must be atoned for in some shape or another; and he soon allowed it to be understood that he was in no particular hurry to quit our present quarters, where the wounded were making admirable progress, and the sound were comfortably housed, while provisions of all kinds were plentiful and the water was good.  But this, excellent as it was in itself, was by no means all; with two such perfectly equipped factories as we had found upon the river it was certain that the slave traffic on the Fernan Vaz must have assumed quite formidable proportions; and it was the skipper's idea that before our wounded should be lit to be moved, one or more slavers would certainly enter the river, when it would be our own fault if we did not capture them.
The most careful dispositions were accordingly made, with this object in view; the gig, in charge of an officer, was daily dispatched to the entrance of the lagoon in order that, herself concealed, her crew might maintain a watch upon the river and report the passage of any vessels upward-bound for the Camma Lagoon, while, so far as our own quarters were concerned, everything was allowed to remain as nearly as possible as it was before it fell into our hands, in order that, should a slaver arrive at the factory, there should be nothing about the place to give the alarm until it should be too late for her to effect her escape.  As a final precaution, a sort of crow's-nest arrangement was rigged up in a lofty silk-cotton tree which had been left standing in the screening belt of timber along the southern shore of the island, in order that a look-out might be maintained upon the approach channel during the hours of daylight, and timely notice given to us of the approach of slavers to the factory of which we were in occupation.
A full week elapsed from the date of our desperate fight on the sand spit, with no occurrence of any moment save that, thanks to the skill and indefatigable exertions of Hutchinson and Murdoch, all our wounded were doing remarkably well, two or three of them, indeed, having so far recovered that they were actually able to perform such light duty as that of hospital ward-attendants; while the unwounded had been kept perpetually busy at the scene of the wreck, salving such matters as were washed ashore, and transferring everything of any value to our quarters. Meanwhile, the ship had parted amidships, and was fast going to pieces, so that our labours in that direction were coming to an end, and in the course of another week or two there would be nothing more than a rib showing here and there above water, and a few trifles of wreckage scattered along the beach to tell to strangers the story of our disaster.  The enemy's wounded also, who were sharing with us the attentions of the surgeon and his mate, were doing well upon the whole, although there had been some half a dozen deaths among them, and there were a few more, whose hurts were of an exceptionally severe character, with whom the issue still remained doubtful.
It chanced that among these last there was a negro who seemed gradually to be sinking, despite the utmost efforts of Hutchinson to save him; and this individual, named M'Pandala, had latterly evinced a disposition to be friendly and communicative to Cupid, our Krooboy, who had been told off for hospital duty in the house occupied by the enemy's wounded; and at length--it was on the tenth day of our occupation of the island, and I was by this time well enough to be out and about again, although still unable to do much on account of my disabled arm--this negro made a certain communication to Cupid which the latter deemed it his duty to pass on to me without loss of time.  Accordingly, on the evening of that day, after Cupid had been relieved--he was on day duty--he sought me out and began--
"Mr Fortescue, sar, you know dem M'Pandala, in dere?" pointing with his chin toward the house in which the wounded man was lodged.
"No, Cupid," I answered.  "I cannot truthfully say that I enjoy the honour of the gentleman's acquaintance.  Who and what is he?"
Cupid grinned.  "Him one Eboe man," he answered, "employed by dem Portugee to cook for and look after dem captain's house.  He lib for die, one time now; and 'cause I been good to him, and gib him plenty drink when he thirsty, he tell me to-day one t'ing dat I t'ink de captain be glad to know.  He say dat very soon--perhaps to-morrow or next day, or de day after--one big cauffle of slabe most likely comin' here for be ship away from de coas'; and now dat he am goin' to die he feel sorry for dem slabe and feel glad if dem was set free."
"Whew!"  I whistled.  "That is a bit of news well worth knowing--if it can be relied upon.  Do you believe that the fellow is telling the truth, Cupid?"
"Cartain, Mr Fortescue, sar," answered the Krooboy, with conviction. "He lib for die now; what he want to tell me lie for?  He no want debbil to come after him and say, `Hi, you M'Pandala, why you tell dem white men lie about slabe cauffle comin' down to de coas'?  You come along wid me, sar!'  No, he not want dat, for cartain."
"When did he tell you this, Cupid?"  I demanded.
"'Bout two hour ago," answered Cupid.  "He say to me, `Cupid, I lib for die to-night, and when you come on duty to-morrow you find me gone.  So I want to tell you somet'ing now, before it too late.'  And den he tell me de news, Mr Fortescue, sar, just as I tell it to you, only in de Eboe language, which I understand, bein' well educate."
"All right," said I.  "In that case you had better come with me at once to the captain, and we will tell him the yarn.  The sooner he hears it the better.  Did he tell you where the cauffle was coming from, and which way?"
"He say," answered Cupid, "dat dem cauffle am comin' down from de Bakota country, where 'most all de slabe sent from dis place come from; and dere is only one way for dem to come here, t'rough de bush ober de oder side ob de water.  Den dey bring dem across to de island in dem big flat-bottom punt dat lay moored up by de top end ob de wharf."
We found the captain in the store with Mr Futtock, the boatswain, overhauling the various articles salved from the wreck, and as soon as he had seen all that he desired, and was ready to leave the building, I got hold of him and repeated the yarn that Cupid had spun to me, the Krooboy confirming and elaborating my statement from time to time as I went on, and answering such questions as the skipper put to him.  When at length we had brought the yarn to an end the captain stood for some minutes wrapped in deep thought, and then said--
"This is a very valuable piece of information that you have managed to pick up, Cupid: and if it should prove to be well founded I will not forget that we owe it to you.  It is too late now, Mr Fortescue, to do anything in the matter to-night, for it will be dark in less than half an hour; but the first thing to-morrow morning you and Cupid here had better take the dinghy, pull across to the mainland, and endeavour to find the road by which the cauffle will come--there ought not to be very much difficulty in doing that, I should think.  And, having found it, it will be well for the pair of you to proceed along the road on the look- out for some suitable spot at which to ambush the party, after which the rest should be easy.  There is, however, another matter that needs consideration.  How are we to ascertain the precise moment at which to expect the arrival of the slave-dealers?  Because it will be hardly desirable to take a party out, day after day, and keep them in the bush all day waiting for the cauffle to come along.  We are all doing excellently well here; but two or three days spent in the bush would very possibly mean half the party being down with fever."
Here Cupid, bursting with pride and importance at finding himself, as it were, a member of a council over which the captain was presiding, struck in--
"You jus' leabe dat to me, sar.  Suppose you gib me leabe to go, I take ration for, say, free day, and go off by myself into de bush to meet dem cauffle.  Dhen when I hab met dem I soon find out when dem expec' to arribe here, and I come back and tell you."
The skipper regarded the black doubtfully.
"But," he objected, "if you fall in with them, my man, the traders are as likely as not to shoot you; or, if not that, at least to seize you and chain you on to the cauffle.  Then how could you let us know when to expect the beggars?"
"No fear ob dat, sar," answered Cupid with a grin.  "I shall take care dat dem do not know I, Cupid, am anywhere near dem.  Dem shall neber suspec' my presence, sar; but I shall be dere, all de same, and shall take partikler care to hear eberyt'ing dat dem say, so dat we may know exactly when to expec' dem.  And when I hab learned dat piece of information, I shall hurry back so as to let you know as early as possible.  I don' t'ink dat dere is much fault to find wid dat plan, sar."
"No," answered the skipper, smiling at the black's eagerness and excitement, "provided, of course, that you are quite confident of your ability to carry it through."
"You trust me, sar; I'll carry it through all right, sar," answered Cupid, in huge delight at being specially entrusted by the skipper with this mission.  "You hab but to gib me leabe to go, and I will undertake to carry out de enterprise to your entire satisfaction."
"Very well," said the skipper, now struggling manfully to suppress his inclination to laugh outright at the man's high-flown phraseology; "let it be so, then.  Mr Fortescue, I leave it with you to arrange the matter."  And he turned away.
On the following morning, Cupid having called me at daylight, I snatched a hasty breakfast of cocoa and biscuit, and then wended my way to the wharf, where the Krooboy, in light marching order, with three days' rations--which he proposed to supplement on the way, if necessary--tied up in a gaudy bandana handkerchief, awaited me in the dinghy. Scrambling down into the boat with some circumspection--for my broken arm, although knitting together again nicely, was still rather painful at times, and very liable to break again in the same place if treated roughly--I took my place in the stern-sheets, whereupon Cupid, giving the little cockle-shell a powerful thrust off from the wharf wall, threw out the two tiny oars by which the boat was usually propelled, and proceeded with long powerful strokes to row across to the mainland, at this point a bare half-mile distant.  As we went the black informed me that, with the view of ascertaining a few additional items of information of which he had thought during the night, he had looked into the ward wherein his friend M'Pandala had been lodged, but had discovered, as he indeed more than half feared, that the Eboe had quietly slipped his moorings during the night and passed on into his own particular "happy hunting grounds."  But he added cheerfully that, after all, it really did not greatly matter; he would probably be able to obtain the required information in some other way.
Arrived at the other side of the inlet, it became necessary for us to search the shore for the spot at which the bush road debouched, and this we eventually found with some difficulty, for, like everything else connected with the factory, it had been very carefully arranged with the object of screening it from casual observation.  But once discovered, our difficulties in that respect were at an end, for we found that it ran down into a tiny indentation in the shore, just sufficiently spacious to accommodate two of the large flats or punts at a time, with firm ground, sloping gently down into the water, affording admirable facilities for the rapid embarkation of large numbers of people.
Hauling the dinghy's stem up on this piece of firm sloping ground, and making fast her painter to a convenient tree, as a further precaution, Cupid and I set out along the firm, well-beaten path, some six feet in width, which had been cleared through the dense and impenetrable bush that hemmed us in on either hand, tormented all the while by the dense clouds of mosquitoes and other stinging and biting insects that hovered about us in clouds and positively declined to be driven away.
We walked thus about a mile and a half when we came out upon an open space, some ten acres in extent, through which the path ran.  This cleared space had evidently been caused by a bush fire at no very distant date, for a few charred trunks and portions of trunks of trees still reared themselves here and there; but the undergrowth had all been burned away down to the bare earth, and was now springing up again, fresh and green, in little irregular patches, all over the open area. The spot would serve admirably for an ambuscade, for while it was sufficiently open to permit of straight shooting, there was cover enough to conceal a hundred men, or more, at need.  But what made the place especially suitable for our purpose was the fact that away over in one corner of the clearing there grew a thick, dense belt of wild cactus, newly sprung up, fresh, tough, and vigorous, every leaf being thickly studded with long, strong, sharp spikes growing so closely together that nothing living would dare to face it, or attempt to force a passage through it--or, at all events, if they should be foolhardy enough to try it once they would not attempt it a second time.  It immediately occurred to me--and Cupid promptly corroborated my view--that if our party could but find or make a way in behind this belt of cactus, they would be at once in a natural fort from which it would be impossible to dislodge them, and after further careful investigation a passage was found through the bush by which our lads could easily gain access to the interior of the cactus fort, and hold it against all comers.  There was therefore no need to search farther; the place was admirably adapted to our requirements; and, once satisfied of this, I bade Cupid proceed on his way in quest of the approaching cauffle, while I leisurely wended my way back to the dinghy and, with a single oar thrown out over the stern, sculled myself back to the factory.
CHAPTER SEVEN.
LA BELLE ESTELLE.
My first act upon my return was, of course, to report the result of my reconnaissance to the captain, who, after hearing what I had to say, came to the conclusion that he would personally inspect the spot which I had selected as the scene of the proposed ambuscade; and accordingly, ordering the second cutter to be manned, we pushed off, taking Mr Hoskins with us, and towing the dinghy, which was to be left on the other side for the convenience of Cupid, upon that individual's return.
When we at length reached the place the skipper was so pleased with it that he at once determined to set a strong party to work upon it, partly to keep the hands employed--there being by this time very little to do at the factory--and partly that the necessary preparations might be completed at the earliest possible moment.  Accordingly he gave Hoskins, who was to have charge of the working-party, the most elaborate instructions as to how to proceed and what to do.  The work was put in hand that same day; and when Hoskins and his party returned to quarters that night the former reported that the whole of the work absolutely necessary to insure the success of the ambuscade had been done, and that only about another hour's work, on the following day, was required to complete the whole of what the skipper had ordered.
The next day, accordingly, the party crossed to the mainland to complete the preparation of the ambuscade, returning, in good time for dinner, with the report that all was now done, and that the spot was ready for occupation at a moment's notice.  As it happened, it was just as well that we had acted with such promptitude and expedition, for the men were still engaged upon their mid-day meal when Cupid was seen returning in the dinghy.  The fellow had evidently travelled fast and far, for he was smothered in dust, and so done up that he could scarcely drag one leg after another--there is nothing that puts one out of walking condition more quickly than being pent up for long periods on board a ship.
But, despite his fatigue, he was puffed up with pride and importance, for he had accomplished the mission upon which he had been despatched, and in a very satisfactory manner, too.  His report was to the effect that he had travelled at a good pace all through the preceding day, and that at nightfall, while still plodding forward, keeping his eyes wide open, meanwhile, on the look-out for a suitable camping spot, he had suddenly detected in the air a smell of burning wood and dry leaves, and, proceeding cautiously a little further, had become aware of a low, confused murmuring, as that of the voices of many people, together with a brisk crackling sound which he at once recognised as that of camp fires.  A minute or two later, having meanwhile taken cover, he sighted the camp, which proved to be, as he had of course expected, that of the slave-traders and their unhappy victims.
The caravan, or "cauffle," had just camped for the night, and its members were busily engaged in preparing the evening meal, Cupid was therefore able to approach the camp closely enough to catch a great deal of the conversation of the slave-traders, as well as to make a pretty accurate guess at their number and that of their victims.  Later on he was able to ascertain the exact number of the former, which totalled eighty-two, while the slaves he estimated to number from a thousand to fifteen hundred.  Maintaining his concealment, but steadily working his way ever closer to the camp fire, the Krooboy ultimately wriggled himself into a position so close to the spot where the chiefs of the band had seated themselves that he was able without difficulty to catch every word spoken by them; and although his knowledge of the Spanish and Portuguese languages was exceedingly limited, yet by listening patiently to everything that was said during the somewhat dilatory progress of the meal, and afterwards while the leaders smoked and chatted prior to turning-in for the night, he was able to gather that the remaining distance of the journey was to be divided into three marches, the last of which was to bring the party to the shore of the lagoon pretty early in the afternoon of the day following that of Cupid's return to us.
Then, having learned this, the Krooboy had waited until the leaders of the expedition had bestowed themselves for the night, and the occupants of the camp generally were settling to rest after the hot and toilsome march of the past day, when he cautiously left his place of concealment and, mingling with the unhappy captives, had contrived to communicate to several of them the joyful news that in due time, and upon their arrival at a certain spot already fixed upon, the cauffle would be ambuscaded and the dealers and escort attacked and captured, after which the slaves would be released and supplied with food and water to enable them to return to their homes.  He did this, he said, not only to comfort and encourage them but also to put them on their guard against falling into a panic at the critical moment and getting themselves hurt.
The skipper listened very carefully to this story, cross-examined the narrator upon several points, and then dismissed him to get food and rest.  That same afternoon the captain, accompanied, as before, by Lieutenant Hoskins, again visited the place of ambush, and presumably made final arrangements for the capture of the cauffle, but what they were I did not know, for I was left behind, with Tompson, the gunner, in charge of the factory, with instructions to overhaul our stock of arms and ammunition, and see that everything of that kind was made perfectly ready for the next day's work.
When the next day arrived and all hands were mustered for inspection prior to the choosing of the ambuscading party, I learned to my disgust that I was to be left behind, with the other invalids, to look after the factory, Hutchinson having reported that I was not yet fit for duty, although, like a full dozen others who had been hurt in one or another of our recent fights, I was able to be up and about, and to attend to matters not requiring the use of both arms.  But the slave-traders were known to be, as a general rule, determined fellows, and it was certain that, in the present case, with such a rich haul in their possession, they would fight desperately in defence of their booty.  The skipper therefore determined to take only sound men with him, concluding that "lame ducks" would be more of a hindrance than a help to him.
With envious eyes I watched the departure of the skipper and his party-- in three boats, namely, the launch and the first and second cutters--and then walked moodily away from the wharf to perform a duty inspection of the sick wards.  The place wore an unnaturally quiet and deserted look, as I crossed the great open space between the wharf and the building which we had converted into a hospital; for there was nobody about excepting a round dozen or so of convalescents, well enough to sit out on the gallery under the shade of the verandah, and the solitary watcher, perched aloft in the crow's-nest which we had rigged among the topmost branches of one of the most lofty trees on the island, in order to maintain a watch upon the lagoon, and give us timely notice of the approach of a slaver.
Sauntering quietly along, for the heat was already intense, I entered the hospital building and proceeded with the usual daily inspection of the wards, which I found were to-day in Murdoch's charge, Hutchinson having been detailed to accompany the skipper's party.  The invalids were all doing excellently, thanks, no doubt, in a great measure, to the fine, airy room in which they had been bestowed; some, indeed, were so far advanced toward recovery that Murdoch had given three or four of them permission to leave their beds and go into the open air for an hour or two, and these were now assisting each other to dress.  I completed my rounds, both of this building and also of that in which the wounded prisoners were lodged, and was just leaving the latter when I caught sight of one of the convalescents hurrying toward me at a great rate, in the full glare of the sunshine, in direct defiance of the medico's standing order that none of them were on any account to leave the shadow of the verandah.  But this man had a very excellent excuse for his breach of the rules, for the moment that he saw me he first took off his hat and waved it to attract my attention, and then flourished it in the direction of the look-out tree, glancing toward which I caught sight of the fluttering fragment of scarlet bunting which was the prearranged signal that a slaver had entered the lagoon and was approaching the factory!  A moment later the look-out himself, having descended the tree, came hurrying along to make his report.
"Well, Edwards," I exclaimed, as the man came bustling up to me, and saluted, "I see you have made the signal that a slaver is approaching. What sort of a craft is she; and how far off?"
"She's a very tidy and smart-looking brig, sir, measurin' close upon three hundred ton, by the look of her; and she's headin' straight for the eastern end of this here island, clewin' up and furlin' as she comes.  She was under topsails and to'ga'nts'ls when I shinned down out of the crow's-nest, yonder; and I reckon she'll reach the anchorage in about another twenty minutes or so," reported the man.
"Very good," I answered.  "Now, go back to your look-out, and put that piece of red bunting out of sight as quickly as possible; for if those slaver fellows should happen to catch sight of it they may suspect something and be on their guard; which won't do; for, with only a few convalescents to help me, our sole chance of capturing them lies in the use of stratagem."
Then, as the man turned away and hurried back to his post, I crossed the open space between the wharf and the buildings, and, giving the convalescents instructions to arm themselves at once and to stand by to show themselves when called upon, I entered my own quarters and hastily shifted from my uniform into a somewhat soiled suit of "whites" and a pith hat that had doubtless once been the property of one of the former inhabitants of the place--and which I had appropriated in view of some such contingency as the present--and otherwise made such preparations as were possible for the suitable reception of our expected visitors.
We had only just barely completed our preparations when the strange brig, under topsails and fore-topmast staysail, came sweeping round the eastern extremity of the island, bracing sharp up as she did so and making a short "leg" athwart the anchorage, toward the mainland.  Then, tacking very smartly, even under such short canvas as she was showing, she headed well up for the line of buoys which had been laid down as moorings, and, splendidly handled, presently came up head to wind, settling away both topsail-yards to the caps as she did so, and, while her crew clewed up the topsails and hauled down the staysail, glided, with the way which she still had on her, up to the weathermost buoy, to which a hawser was promptly run out and made fast.  Then, as about a dozen hands climbed into the fore and main rigging and made their leisurely way aloft for the purpose of rolling up the topsails, a light, handsome gig was dropped into the water from the starboard quarter davits and presumably hauled alongside the gangway; but this I could not see, as she was presenting her port broadside to us--which, by the way, I noticed, was garnished with five grinning twelve-pounders.  She was a most beautiful vessel, lying long and low upon the water, her hull painted all black, from her rail to her copper, relieved only by a single narrow white stripe running along her sheer-strake from her white figure-head to the rather elaborate white scroll-work that decorated her quarter.  She was grandly sparred, with very heavy lower-masts, long mastheads, painted white, very taunt topmasts, topgallant and royal- masts, stayed to a hair, with a slight rake aft, and accurately parallel, and enormously long yards.  The French ensign floated lazily from the end of her standing gaff.
As I stood under the shade of the verandah, admiring this sea beauty, the gig came foaming round under her stern, propelled by four oarsmen, and with a white-clad figure in the stern-sheets, and headed toward the wharf, alongside a flight of steps in which she presently ranged, and hooked on.  Then the white-clad figure in the stern-sheets rose and, leisurely climbing the steps to the level of the wharf, revealed itself as that of a man somewhat over middle height, broadly built, with hair, beard, and moustache of raven black, and a skin tanned almost to the colour of that of a mulatto by long exposure to sea-breezes and a tropical sun.  His age I roughly estimated as somewhere about forty.
With a swaggering sea roll he came striding across the wide arid space between the wharf side and the buildings, puffing at a big black cigar as he walked, and glancing about him curiously, as though he could not quite understand the utter quietude and deserted aspect of the place. Apparently, however, this was not sufficiently marked to arouse his suspicion, for he betrayed no hesitation as he made straight for the house under the broad verandah of which I stood in full view, watching his approach.  As he came within speaking distance he slightly raised his broad-brimmed pugaree-bound Panama hat, for a moment, exclaiming, in execrable Spanish:
"Good-morning, senor! what has happened that I see nobody about?  And where is Senor Morillo?  I would have speech with him."
Raising my hat in reply, I answered, in the same language: "I deeply regret to inform you, senor, that Morillo is indisposed--down with a slight attack of fever, in fact; and, as for the rest, they are away in the bush on the other side, whither they have gone to help bring in the cauffle which is due to arrive this afternoon.  But will you not step in out of the sun?"
"Thanks!" answered the stranger, ascending the gallery steps.  "I am sorry to hear of my friend Morillo's indisposition.  A _slight_ attack of fever, I think you said.  Is he too ill, think you, to talk business? If not, you will perhaps have the extreme kindness to tell him that Captain Lenoir of _La Belle Estelle_ has arrived and would like to see him."
"Assuredly I will, senor," I answered politely.  "Pray step inside here, out of the heat, and be seated, while I convey your message to Senor Morillo."
So saying, I flung open the door of an inner room, and stood aside for him to enter.
Quite unsuspectingly he stalked in through the open door, removed his hat and laid it upon the table, flung himself into a basket-chair, and, withdrawing an enormous silk pocket-handkerchief from his pocket, proceeded to mop the streaming perspiration from his forehead.  At the same moment I whipped a loaded pistol from my pocket, aimed straight at his left eye, and, as he stared at me in amazement, said--
"You are a dead man, Captain Lenoir, if you move so much as a muscle. You are my prisoner, senor.  No,"--as I saw by the expression of his eye that he had it in his mind to suddenly spring upon and disarm me--"not a movement, I pray you.  To attempt what you are thinking of would be fatal, for upon your slightest motion I will pull the trigger and blow your brains out; I will, as surely as that you are sitting there." Then, slightly raising my voice, I called--
"Collins, bring your party into this room; and do not forget to bring along that length of ratline that I told you to have ready."
"Ay, ay, sir," answered Collins; and the reply was followed by the shuffling sound of several pairs of feet, the owners of which came shambling into the room the next moment, with naked cutlasses in their hands, while one of them carried, in addition, a length of some three or four fathoms of ratline.
Meanwhile, I had never for the smallest fraction of a second withdrawn my gaze from Captain Lenoir's eyes, or allowed the barrel of my pistol to waver a hair's-breadth from his larboard optic, for I knew that if I did he would be upon me like lightning.  But although he dared not move his limbs he was not afraid to use his tongue, angrily demanding what I meant by perpetrating such an outrage upon one of Senor Morillo's best customers, and vowing that he would not be satisfied until he had seen me flogged within an inch of my life for my insolence.  Then, when I explained to him the actual state of affairs--while Collins and another man securely lashed his hands together behind his back--his temper completely got the better of him, and he raved, and shrieked curses at us until we were perforce compelled to gag him lest his cries should reach the men in the boat and give them the alarm.  However, we very soon secured and silenced him; and then, having marched him out at the back of the house and secured him in a remote hut by himself, I gave Collins fresh instructions, after which I sauntered across the open space of blistering sunshine to the edge of the wharf, and looked down into the boat.  The four men had already made fast her painter to a ring in the wharf wall, and were now lolling over the gunwale, staring down into the deep, clear water at the fish playing about beneath them, and chatting disjointedly as they sucked at their pipes.
"It is thirsty work sitting there and grilling in the sun, is it not, lads?" said I in French.  "Come up to the house and drink Senor Morillo's health in a jug of sangaree; and then Captain Lenoir wants you to carry down some fruit and vegetables that Senor Morillo has given him for the ship's use."
"_Bien_! we come, monsieur," they answered with one accord; and the next moment they were all slouching toward the house, a pace or two in my wake.  I traversed a good three-quarters of the distance from the wharf to the house, and then halted suddenly and smote my forehead violently, as though I had just remembered something.
"Dolt that I am," I exclaimed in French, "I had almost forgotten! Indeed I have completely forgotten something--your mate's name.  I have a message for him."  And I looked the man nearest me straight in the eye.
"Ah!" he ejaculated; "monsieur doubtless means Monsieur Favart, our chief mate--"
"Of course," I cut in.  "Favart is the name.  Thanks!  Go you on to the house and walk straight in; you will find your friends awaiting you.  As for me--" I flung out my hand with an expression of disgust, and turned back as though to return to the wharf edge.  But as soon as the quartette had fairly entered the house and I was assured, by certain subdued sounds, that they had fallen into the trap that had been set for them, I turned on my heel again, and presently found the four prisoners in process of being secured.
"I am sorry, lads," I said to them in French, "that I have been compelled to resort to subterfuge to make prisoners of you, but, you see, we are all invalids here, and not strong enough to take your ship by force; and therefore, since it is imperative that we should have her, I have been compelled to use guile.  However, I will keep my word with you in the matter of something to quench your parched throats; and if you choose to be sensible, and make no foolish attempts at escape, you shall have no reason to complain of harsh treatment."
"Ah, Monsieur Anglais, if we had but known--" answered one of the Frenchmen, with a rather rueful smile.  "However," he continued, shrugging his shoulders, "although you have contrived to get hold of us--and the captain--you have not yet got the ship; and before you can get her you will be obliged to use a great deal more guile than sufficed for our capture; for Monsieur Favart is a sharp one, I assure you, and not to be so very easily deceived."
"I can well believe it," I answered lightly.  "All the same, I am very much obliged to you for the hint, and will do my best to profit by it."
Whereupon, as I turned on my heel to quit the house, the garrulous Frenchman's three shipmates fell upon him, figuratively, tooth and nail, heaping reproaches upon the unhappy man's head for having warned me against the chief mate's astuteness.  I did not wait to hear how the matter ended, but, leaving the house briskly, as though I were the bearer of an important message, I hurried across to the wharf and, dropping into the dinghy, cast off her painter and sculled her across to _La Belle Estelle_, alongside which I coolly went, and, making fast the painter, ascended the gangway ladder and stepped in on deck before anybody condescended to take any notice of me.  There were some twenty men, or thereabout, busying themselves about the deck in a very leisurely manner, taking off hatches, hauling taut the running rigging, and so on, under the supervision of a very smart, keen-looking man, dressed, like the skipper of the ship, in white.  This man I took to be Monsieur Favart, the chief mate; so stepping up to him where he stood, at the break of the monkey poop, I raised my hat politely and said:
"Have I the pleasure to address Monsieur Favart, the chief mate of this vessel?"
"Certainly, monsieur," he answered, bringing his piercing black eyes to bear upon me.  "And who may you be, my friend, that you find it necessary to ask such a question?  I thought I had been here often enough to enable every dweller upon yonder island to at least know Jules Favart by sight.  But I do not seem to remember ever having seen you before."
"You have not, monsieur," I answered.  "I am quite a new recruit, and only joined just in time to witness the destruction of that pestilent British man-o'-war, the wreck of which you doubtless observed as you entered the river."
"We did," he answered; "and we guessed, of course, that it was the wreck of the _Psyche_.  So that affair came off all right, eh?  Well, I didn't very well see how it could possibly fail, for we all had a hand in the devising and arranging of it, and we chopped and trimmed away at the plan until I flatter myself that it was as perfect as human ingenuity could make it.  But I take it that you did not come aboard here to discuss that matter with me?"
"No, indeed," I answered.  "My business with you has reference to quite another affair.  I bring a message to you from Captain Lenoir, who is at present discussing with Senor Morillo the matter of the expected arrival of the cauffle this afternoon.  We find ourselves in something of a difficulty over that matter; and your arrival in the nick of time proves most opportune.  For you must know that when the _Psyche_ was cut adrift and came ashore, her crew were compelled to camp on the beach, yonder; and Senor Morillo considered that the opportunity to give the English a thorough drubbing was far too good to be let slip; he therefore attacked them in the dead of night, and punished them severely; but I regret to say that our side also suffered very heavily, with the result that a good many of our best men are at this moment on the sick list and unfit for duty.  This puts us in a very awkward position; for the cauffle that is arriving is a big one, and rather difficult to handle--so we learn. Therefore, in order to avoid all possibility of trouble, Senor Morillo has arranged with Captain Lenoir that the latter shall land his crew to lend a hand in keeping the slaves in order when they arrive; and my instructions from the captain are to request that you will at once land, bringing all hands except the idlers with you."
"I understand," answered Favart.  "Very well.  When is the cauffle expected to arrive?"
"It may heave in sight at any moment," I answered.  "Therefore it is advisable that you should lose no time in obeying Captain Lenoir's instructions."
"Trust me, I am not a man to lose time," answered Favart with a boisterous laugh.  "Lenoir knows he may rely upon me.  I suppose we ought to go fully armed?"
"Captain Lenoir said nothing about that," I answered.  "No, I don't think there will be any need for you to arm yourselves.  Anyhow, if weapons are needed we have plenty ashore."
"Very well; so much the better," observed Favart; "for it has just occurred to me that the skipper has the keys of the arms chest in his pocket, and we could not get at the weapons, even though we should require them ever so urgently.  All right; you may tell the captain to expect me at once.  But perhaps you would prefer to remain and go with us--I see that you are one of the lame ducks.  Did you get that hurt in the fight with the English?"
"Yes," said I--"a broken arm.  It is getting better fast, however; and I dare say I can scull the dinghy back, as I sculled her off, unless you will be charitable enough to give me a tow."
"Of course I will, with the utmost pleasure," answered Favart.  And away he bustled forward, shouting an order for all hands to lay aft and get a couple of boats into the water.  It was a very great relief to me to be rid of the fellow for a few minutes, for, truth to tell, the interview was beginning to get upon my nerves a bit; I could see that the French seaman's estimate of his chief officer was just, and that Favart was indeed "a sharp one."  True, I had managed to hoodwink him, thus far, but I was in constant dread of saying or doing something that might awaken his suspicions, in which case all the fat would at once be in the fire; for I had placed myself absolutely in his power, and I judged him to be a man who would take a terrible revenge, should he prematurely discover that something was wrong.  Moreover, if his suspicions should once be aroused, and verified, not only did we stand to lose the ship-- which I was quite determined to capture--but with twenty stout seamen at his back he was fully capable of recapturing the factory and releasing all the prisoners, when we should find ourselves in a very pretty mess. Thus far, however, everything seemed to be going admirably, and I told myself that all I had to do was to keep my nerve and neither say nor do anything to excite suspicion; indeed it was this consideration that caused me to hang about aboard _La Belle Estelle_ rather than hurry away ashore again as soon as I had delivered my message.
There was a great deal of fuss and bustle on board the brig, while the Frenchmen were clearing away and lowering the boats; then, with a vast amount of jabber, they went down the side, took their places, and shoved off, with me and my dinghy in tow.
Now came the critical moment when everything must be won or lost; for, personally, I had done all that was possible, and the rest depended entirely upon the intelligence of the little party of seamen to whom I had entrusted the carrying out of my plan; I had explained that plan to them, and directed them what to do and precisely when to do it, and I was also decoying the enemy into the trap prepared for them; but I foresaw clearly that if my men acted prematurely, and thus gave the alarm, or, on the other hand, allowed the psychological moment to pass before they put in an appearance, the whole affair was likely enough to end in a ghastly tragedy.
But while I reflected thus the boats traversed the space of water between the brig and the wharf, and ranged up alongside the landing steps.  Then, with more excited jabber and shouting, the Frenchmen tumbled over the gunwales and up the steps to the top of the wharf, where they stood in a bunch, waiting for further orders.  As the last of them ascended the steps, with me bringing up the rear, I glanced across the water toward the spot where I expected the cauffle to appear, and pretended that I caught sight of a cloud of dust rising beyond the trees.  As a matter of fact there really was an effect of sunlight that might very easily have been mistaken for a dust cloud, and it was this appearance that gave me the inspiration to act as I now did.
"Look!"  I exclaimed excitedly to Favart, pointing at the same moment across the water--"do you see that cloud of dust yonder?  That is undoubtedly the cauffle coming along the road; and we must hurry with our arrangements, or we shall be too late.  This way, Monsieur Favart, if you please.  Come along, lads!"  And I led them all at a rapid rate across the open space and into the compound belonging to the smallest barracoon.
"Straight across, and into the barracoon itself," I panted, making a great show of hurry and excitement; and the Frenchmen streamed through the gate like a flock of sheep.  As the last man entered, I flung the gate to, dropped the bar into its place, and blew a piercing blast on a whistle which I carried.  Then, replacing the whistle in my pocket, I drew forth a pistol, and placed my back against the gate.
At the first sound of the whistle the Frenchmen halted abruptly, instinctively guessing that it was a signal of some sort, while Favart turned in his tracks and flung a fierce glance of inquiry at me. Something in the expression of my face must have given him the alarm, I think, for after a prolonged stare he suddenly came striding toward me.
"Halt, monsieur!"  I cried sharply, levelling the pistol at him. "Another step, and I fire!  Look behind you."
He did so, and beheld eighteen English sailors, armed with muskets, cutlasses, and pistols, file out of the open door of the barracoon and draw up as if on parade.
"What does this mean, monsieur?" demanded Favart, glaring at me murderously.
"Simply that you and your men are my prisoners, monsieur," answered I. "Nay, do not move, I beg you,"--as the Frenchmen seemed to be preparing for a rush.  "The man who moves will be shot dead without further warning.  It is useless to dream of resistance, for my men are fully armed, while you are not; therefore, to save unnecessary bloodshed, I beg that you will at once surrender.  You see the force of my argument, I am sure, Monsieur Favart?"
"I do," he answered grimly; "and of course we surrender, since there is nothing between that and being shot down.  But, oh, if I had only suspected this when you were aboard the brig--!  Well, what do you want us to do?"
"Have the goodness to march your men into the barracoon, monsieur," said I.  "It is but for half an hour or so, until I can make other arrangements for your disposal.  I assure you I have not the remotest intention of detaining you there."
Favart turned and said a word to his men, and the whole party then wheeled and shambled away across the compound and into the open door of the barracoon, which was immediately shut and locked upon them.
CHAPTER EIGHT.
ANOTHER STROKE OF LUCK.
Having captured the Frenchmen, the next item on the programme was to so arrange matters that they might be at once transferred to other and more comfortable quarters--thus leaving the barracoon free for the reception, if necessary, of the unfortunate slaves now close at hand without running any risk of their getting the better of my little band of invalids.  This was not a very difficult matter, for there were plenty of slave irons about the place; and, having procured the necessary number of sets, I had the Frenchmen out of the barracoon, four at a time, ironed them, and then marched them out of the compound to a large empty shed which would answer the purpose of a prison most admirably. In less than half an hour I had the entire party secured and in charge of an armed guard of two men; and now all that remained to be done was to obtain possession of the brig.
To accomplish this, I chose the soundest eight of the party who had assisted in capturing the Frenchmen, and, leading them to the wharf steps, ordered them down into the French captain's gig, which was, of course, still lying alongside the wharf.  Then, stepping into the stern- sheets myself, we pushed off and headed for the brig, which we boarded a few minutes later without let or hindrance, the small number of hands still remaining on board having apparently gone below and turned in the moment that they saw the chief mate clear of the ship.  At all events when we ascended the gangway ladder not a soul was to be seen; our lads therefore quickly clapped on the hatches, beginning with the fore- scuttle, and the brig was ours.  Then, having made sure that the half- dozen or so of prisoners down in the forecastle could not get loose again, I went up and hauled down the French flag, hoisting it again to the gaff-end beneath an English ensign which I found in the flag-locker. I thought that the sight of the brig, with the two ensigns thus arranged, would be an agreeable sight and afford a pleasant surprise to our people when they returned from capturing the cauffle.
It had just gone five bells in the afternoon watch when the skipper's party hove in sight at the spot where the bush path led down to the creek, and where their boats were moored.  The brig, of course, at once attracted their attention, and, looking through the ship's telescope at them, I made out Captain Perry standing alone on a little projecting point, staring hard at her, as though he scarcely knew what to make of her; I therefore ordered four hands into the gig, and, rowing across to where he stood, explained matters.  My story took quite a quarter of an hour to tell, for he continually interrupted me to ask questions; but when I had finished he was good enough to express his most unqualified approval of what I had done, winding up by saying--
"I may as well tell you now, Mr Fortescue--what indeed I had quite made up my mind to before the performance of this exceedingly meritorious piece of work--that it is my intention to give you an acting order as third lieutenant, Mr Purchase and Mr Hoskins moving up a step, as well as myself, in consequence of the lamented death of Captain Harrison."
Of course I thanked him, as in duty bound; and then he informed me that the ambuscade had been completely successful, the entire cauffle having been captured with the exchange of less than a score of shots; and that although three of the slave-traders had been killed and five wounded, not one of our own men had been hurt.  But he added that the unhappy blacks were so completely worn out with their long march down to the coast that it would only be rank cruelty to release them at once, and that he had therefore decided to house them in the barracoons and give them a week's complete rest before starting them back on their long homeward march.
"And now, Mr Fortescue," he concluded, "since that English ensign aboard the prize has done its work, have the goodness to haul it down, and keep the French flag flying, if you please; I quite expect that we shall have two or three more ships here to help in the conveyance of this huge cauffle of slaves across the Atlantic; and I do not wish them to be alarmed and put on their guard--should they come upon us unexpectedly--by seeing a vessel riding at anchor with the signal flying that she has been captured by the English."
This was, of course, sound common sense, and I lost not a moment in returning to the brig and making the required alteration in the arrangement of the flags.  That being done, it occurred to me that it would be a wise thing to clear the remainder of the French crew out of the vessel; and this I also did; afterwards assisting in transporting the miserable slaves across the channel to the island, and helping to arrange for their comfort and well-being during the night.  They were, without exception, what the slave-dealers would doubtless have called "a prime lot"--numbering fifteen hundred and eighty-four, of whom less than two hundred were women; but they were all worn to skin and bone with the fatigue and hardship which they had been called upon to endure on the march from their own country down to the coast, and were so dead-beaten with fatigue that they appeared to have sunk into such a state of apathy that even the prospect of immediate rest, plenty of good food, and a speedy restoration to liberty seemed insufficient to lift them out of it.  But after they had been made to bathe and thoroughly cleanse themselves from the dust and other impurities of the march, prior to being housed in the barracoons, they seemed to pluck up a little spirit,--a salt-water bath is a wonderful tonic,--and later on in the evening, when a plentiful meal was served out to them, they so far recovered their spirits as to begin to jabber among themselves.  It was close upon sunset before the last batch had been ferried across to the island and lodged in the barracoons; and then, in accordance with an order from the skipper, I took a working-party on board the brig, and, casting her off from the buoy to which she had been moored, warped her in alongside the wharf and made her fast there.
The next two days were entirely devoid of incident; but we were all kept busy in attending to the unfortunate captive blacks, supervising the bathing of them in batches, inducing them to take a moderate amount of exercise in the barracoon compounds, feeding them up, and nursing the sick--of whom, however, there was luckily a singularly small percentage. But on the morning of the third day, before the gig had started upon her daily cruise of surveillance of the river, the look-out whose turn it was for duty in the crow's-nest had scarcely ascended to his lofty perch in the tree when he hurried down again with the intelligence that three craft--a ship, a barque, and a large brigantine--were in the offing and making for the mouth of the river.  Whereupon Mr Purchase volunteered to go aloft, taking me with him as aide-de-camp, to keep an eye upon the strangers, and to transmit intelligence of their movements from time to time.  The skipper promptly accepted the offer and, besides, arranged a system by which I was to write Mr Purchase's messages, carry them from the crow's-nest to the ground, and deliver them over to one of two midshipmen in waiting, who would at once scamper off with it, while I ascended the Jacob's ladder again for further information, to be transmitted by the second midshipman--if, meanwhile, the first had not had time to return.  This system acted admirably, for it kept the captain fully informed of the course of events, and at the same time left him quite free to attend to such preparations for the reception of the three craft as he might deem necessary.
These preparations were beautifully simple, consisting merely in the arming of every man capable of taking part in what would probably prove to be a fairly stubborn fight, manning the boats with the fighting contingent, and then remaining concealed until the approaching craft had come up to the anchorage and made fast to the buoys,--as we fully expected that they would,--when the boats were to make a simultaneous dash at all three craft and carry them by boarding, while we invalids were left to look after the prisoners and see that they did not break out and create a diversion in favour of their friends.
Meanwhile the land-breeze was fast dying away in the offing, while the sea-breeze had not yet set in, consequently, when the approaching craft arrived within about two miles of the river's mouth they entered a streak of glassy calm, and lay there, rolling heavily, with their sun- bleached canvas napping itself threadbare against their masts and rigging, thus affording us an excellent opportunity to get breakfast at leisure, and fortify ourselves generally against the stress of the coming struggle.
We had just comfortably finished our meal, and Captain Perry had completed his final dispositions, when the look-out who had temporarily taken Mr Purchase's place in the crow's-nest came down with the intelligence that the sea-breeze was setting in, and might be expected to reach the becalmed craft within the next ten minutes; whereupon the first lieutenant and I returned to our post of observation to watch the progress of the approaching slavers, and report upon it from time to time.
Upon regaining our perch we saw that the brigantine, which was the outermost craft of the three, had just caught the sea-breeze and, having squared away before it, was coming along almost as fast as the breeze itself; then the barque and the ship caught it within a minute of each other, and presently all three of them were racing straight for the mouth of the river.  But they were still a long way off, and, owing to the many twists and turns in the course of the river, would have nearly twenty miles to travel before they could reach the anchorage.  And when, some time later, having safely negotiated the bar and entered the river, they arrived at the point where they would have to shift their helms to enter the N'Chongo Chine Lagoon--where we were patiently awaiting them-- we saw that only two of them, the barque and the brigantine, were coming our way, while the ship continued on up the river, presumably bound to the Camma Lagoon, where poor Captain Harrison had lost his life in the attack upon the factory.  This was a distinct relief to us; for although all our wounded were doing remarkably well, the number of men actually in fighting trim was so small that to tackle the three vessels simultaneously would have been an exceedingly formidable job, whereas we felt that the capture of two of them was well within our powers. Moreover it would be comparatively easy to take the ship upon her return down the river, which would doubtless happen immediately upon the discovery of the destruction of the factory to which she was evidently bound.
Despite the zigzag course that the two approaching craft would have to steer, the sea-breeze afforded them a leading wind all the way to the south-east end of the island, which we occupied; consequently after leaving the river and entering the lagoon they came along at a very rapid rate, the brigantine seeming to be rather the faster craft of the two.  Meanwhile the skipper, being kept fully informed of the progress of the approaching vessels, had caused our prize, _La Belle Estelle_, to be warped far enough off from the wharf wall to allow of our boats being placed in ambush between her and the wharf, where they now lay, with their officers and crew already in them, waiting for the moment when the word should be given for them to dash forth from their hiding-place.
At length the brigantine, with the barque less than a cable's length astern of her--both of them flying Spanish colours at their gaff-ends-- arrived within a mile of the spot where it would be necessary for her to luff up in order to fetch the anchorage, whereupon Purchase and I descended from our look-out, and, having made our final report to the skipper, went our several ways--the first to take command of the pinnace in the impending attack, and I to place myself at the head of the convalescents, my duty being to assist as might be required, and to see that the prisoners did not seize the opportunity to become troublesome.
The prisoners were all confined in outbuildings at the rear of the settlement, and it was there that my little band of armed convalescents were assembled; consequently I was obliged to station myself where I could keep an eye upon and be in touch with them.  Yet I was quite determined that, even though I must keep one eye upon my own especial command, and the buildings over which they were mounting guard, I would also witness the attack upon the approaching slavers.  Ultimately, after two or three unsuccessful attempts, I succeeded in finding a spot from which I could accomplish both objects, and at the same time sit comfortably in the shadow of a building.
A few minutes later, from behind the belt of trees and scrub that extended along the whole southern shore of the islet, I beheld the end of the brigantine's flying-jib-boom slide into view, with the flying- jib, recently hauled down, napping loosely in the wind; then followed the rest of the spar, with the standing jib also hauled down, and a couple of men out on the boom, busily engaged in stowing it; then her fore-topmast staysail, beautifully cut and drawing like a whole team of horses, swept into view, followed by the fore part of a very handsome hull bearing the foremast, with the topsail still set, the topgallantsail and royal clewed up and in process of being furled, and the course hanging from the foreyard in graceful festoons.  Finally came the remaining length of hull with the towering mainmast supporting a mainsail as handsomely cut and setting as flat as that of a yacht.
She was a most beautiful vessel, sitting very low in the water, and therefore, perhaps, looking even longer than she actually was.  She was broadside-on to me, so I could not see what amount of beam she showed; consequently it was a little difficult to estimate her size, but, judging from her general appearance, I put it down at about two hundred and twenty tons.  She was painted a brilliant grass green from her rail to her copper, and showed four ports of a side, out of which peered the muzzles of certain brass cannon that I decided were probably long nines.
The vessel reached across the narrow channel and went in stays quite close to the tree-clad northern shore of the lagoon--thus at once exhibiting her own exceedingly shallow-draught of water and her skipper's intimate knowledge of the locality--just as the barque in turn hove in sight.  This last vessel had nothing at all remarkable in her appearance, except perhaps that her canvas was exceptionally well cut, but she was by no means a beauty, and to the eye presented all the characteristics of the ordinary merchantman, being painted black, with a broad white band round her upon which were depicted ten painted ports. But these appearances of honesty were deceptive, for despite the general "motherliness" of her aspect she was almost as speedy a ship as the brigantine, although she had by this time shortened down to her two topsails and fore-topmast staysail.  Also, with the aid of my telescope, I was able to discern, above the blatant pretence of the painted ports, six closed ports of a side, which I had no doubt concealed as many cannon.
The brigantine, tacking as smartly and handily as a little boat, came round and headed well up for the weathermost buoy, to which she made fast a few minutes later, with the barque close upon her heels.  Until the latter had also made fast to a buoy--the one astern of the brigantine--a dead silence reigned over the settlement, broken only by the shouts of the people on board the two new arrivals as they went noisily about their work of clewing up, hauling down, and furling their canvas; but the moment that the barque was fast to her buoy and the men who had bent the cable to the buoy had returned on board, there arose a sudden rattle and splash of oars, and our concealed boats swept out from their hiding-place between the brig and the wharf and made a dash for the two craft, half of them going for the brigantine while the other half struck out for the barque.
The surprise, admirably managed by the skipper, was complete; for the greater part of the crews of the two vessels was aloft furling the canvas at the moment when our boats appeared; and although their appearance served as a signal for the men aloft to swing themselves off the yards and descend to the deck by way of the backstays, yet before they had time to arm themselves and prepare for an effective resistance our lads were alongside and swarming in over the low rails of the two craft; and a very brief scuffle sufficed to place them in possession of both.  Upon inspection, they proved to be undoubted slavers, for they were not only fitted with slave-decks, but had a full supply of water and meal on board; in fact they were ready for the immediate reception of their human cargo, which, but for our interference, they could have shipped and gone to sea again in a very few hours.
The barque was named _Don Miguel_, of three hundred and forty-seven tons measurement, hailing from Havana; with a crew of fifty-six, all told; and she mounted twelve twelve-pounders, with an ample supply of ammunition for them in her magazine.  The brigantine rejoiced in the name _El Caiman_.  She was a trifle bigger than I had estimated her to be, her papers showing her tonnage to be two hundred and thirty.  She carried a crew of forty; and mounted eight beautiful brass long nines on her broadsides, as well as a long eighteen pivoted on her forecastle. She hailed from Santiago de Cuba, and was quite a new ship; whereas the _Don Miguel_ was nearly twenty years old, and leaked like a basket when heavily pressed by her canvas, as some of us soon discovered.
None of our people were hurt in the scrimmage which resulted in the capture of these two craft; as soon, therefore, as their crews had been taken out of them and securely confined, Captain Perry made ready to sally forth and capture the ship which had gone up the river, and which might be expected to return immediately upon discovering the destruction of the factory on the Camma Lagoon.  It was regarded as just possible that, finding the up-river factory destroyed, her captain might make his way to our anchorage, in the hope of securing a cargo from our factory; but, on the other hand, it was also possible that he might get an inkling of our presence somewhere in the river, and go straight to sea again, preferring to try his luck on some other part of the coast. There was just sufficient time for our lads to get a meal in comfort before the moment arrived for them to shove off and make their way to the mouth of the lagoon in order to intercept, and prevent the escape of, the returning ship; the skipper therefore gave orders to pipe all hands to dinner, and while the meal was in progress he made his dispositions for the forthcoming expedition.
As before, I was left in charge of the convalescents to take care of the sick and see that the prisoners--now, of course, considerably augmented in numbers by our most recent captures--did not get into mischief.  But although I was not permitted to participate in the fun, I was in no mood to lose it altogether; I therefore waited patiently until the little flotilla of boats had started--and my services on their account were no longer required--and then, having first gone the rounds of the place and satisfied myself that everything was perfectly safe, I slung my telescope over my shoulder and made my way aloft to the crow's-nest, wherein I comfortably settled myself, and, levelling my glass over a big branch that served admirably as a rest for it, prepared to watch the progress of the boats and, as I hoped, witness the capture of the ship.
The crow's-nest was rigged among the topmost branches of the highest tree on the islet, the view obtainable from it was very extensive, embracing an arc of the horizon of nearly one hundred and eighty degrees, which included, on my far right, the mouth of the river, some twenty miles distant, and a few miles of the offing beyond, while stretching away to the left of that point, toward the southward and eastward, could be traced the entire course of the river as far as the native town of Olomba, and thence onward to the Camma Lagoon, while the near and middle distance was occupied by the waters of the N'Chongo Chine Lagoon, with--in the present instance--the boat flotilla carrying on under a heavy press of canvas to fetch the passage giving access to the river.
I watched these for some time, observing with interest the gallant manner in which the captain's gig, under a spread of canvas that was manifestly too much for her in the roaring sea-breeze that was now blowing, struggled along and contrived to still retain the lead of the bigger and more powerful boats; and then I began to search the river for signs of the returning ship, for I calculated that by this time she must have arrived at her destination and discovered the destruction of the factory; so it was a question what the skipper of her would do upon making the discovery.  That she was not in the Camma Lagoon was pretty evident, for almost the whole expanse of that sheet of water was in full view from my look-out, and I could scarcely have failed to see her, had she been there; I therefore carefully inspected the course of the river more toward Olomba, and presently I caught a glimpse of her upper canvas sliding along past the belt of mangroves and bush that bordered the river.  She was beating down against the sea-breeze, with a strong current under her lee bow hawsing her up to windward, and was making very rapid progress.
Then I allowed my glances to return to the boats, and wondered whether those in them could see the ship.  I came to the conclusion that they could not, being by this time too far over toward the other side of the lagoon, and consequently too close in to the mangroves to be able to see over them.  I now most ardently wished that I had thought of arranging to display a signal warning them of the approach of the ship, for it would be a piece of information very useful for them to possess under the existing circumstances; but I had not, so there was no use in worrying about it.  And even as I came to this conclusion the gig, still leading, disappeared within the narrow channel giving access to the river, and was quickly followed by the other boats, until the whole had vanished.
And now I could but guess what was happening in the channel, and watch the movements of the ship.  By the time that the last of the boats had disappeared, and I was free to again direct my attention to the larger craft, she had worked down the river as far as the entrance of the creek giving access to Olomba; and when she next hove about I soon saw, by the length of time that she was holding on the same tack, that she was making a long "leg" down the main channel of the river.  But she still had some ten miles of river to traverse before she would reach the spot at which it had been arranged that the boats should lie in ambush for her; and, fast as she was travelling, I estimated that it would take her at least an hour to cover that distance.  I therefore drew out my watch, noted the time, and then set myself patiently to await the course of events, keenly watching her movements meanwhile.  I noticed that, thanks to the exquisite cut of her canvas, she was looking well up into the wind, and I thought it possible that, with this advantage, she might perhaps reach the spot where the boats were awaiting her, without breaking tacks, which would be an advantage for our people, for it would throw her so close to the place of ambush that it would cause the attack almost to take the form of a surprise.  And so it did, as I afterward learned; for when at length her skipper was compelled to put his helm down and go about, in order to avoid grounding on the mud of the eastern bank of the river, the ship was in the very mouth of the creek wherein our boats were lurking; and while the ship was in stays, and all hands of her crew were busily engaged in tending the tacks, sheets, and braces, our people dashed alongside and took her almost without striking a blow.
CHAPTER NINE.
WE LEAVE THE FERNAN VAZ.
Of course nothing of this was perceptible from my look-out in the crow's-nest; the only thing of a suggestive character that came to my notice was that when, looking through my telescope, I saw the ship hove in stays, I observed that the operation of swinging the after yards seemed to be only partially performed, while the head sails remained aback for an unconscionable length of time, from which I concluded that at that precise moment events were happening on board her.  When, some five minutes later, I saw her yards trimmed, and presently observed her come about again and bear away for the lagoon, instead of holding her luff down the river, I was able to make a pretty accurate guess as to what had happened.  I remained aloft, however, until she slid through the narrow channel leading from the river into the lagoon, when I saw that she had all our boats towing astern of her in a string; whereupon I descended, for I knew that to betoken the fact that she was now in the possession of our people.
She came along very fast, and as she drew nearer I saw that she was an exceedingly handsome vessel, by far the most handsome, indeed, that I had ever seen.  She was frigate-built, seven hundred and forty tons measurement, her three masts accurately parallel, raking slightly aft, and stayed to a hair, while her snow-white canvas was more beautifully cut than that of many a yacht.  She was painted black all over--hull, masts, and yards; and her royal yards hoisted close up under the trucks, like those of a man-o'-war.  If she was anything like as good as she looked we had secured a prize that was indeed worth having.
The skipper had instructed me that he might possibly bring the prize directly alongside the wharf, and that I was to make all the necessary preparations to assist in the operation.  I accordingly turned out my contingent and mustered them on the wharf, at the next berth ahead of that occupied by _La Belle Estelle_, with an ample supply of hawsers and heaving-lines at the bollards; and by the time that I was quite ready the ship was in sight, luffing round the point and hauling up for the anchorage.  But instead of making a board across to the mainland, as all the others had done, the skipper kept his helm down until she was all a- shiver, when everything was let go at the same instant, the square canvas shrivelled up to the yards, the fore and aft canvas was brailed in, or hauled down, and then, as a strong party of men sprang aloft and laid out upon the yards, the beautiful craft came sliding along, with the way which she still had on her, straight for the wharf.  The skipper had calculated his distance to a nicety, for her momentum was sufficient to bring her handsomely up to her berth, but not enough to impose any undue strain upon the hawsers in checking her and bringing her alongside; this part of the work being done by my gang, while the men who had captured her were still aloft busily furling the canvas.
As soon as she was securely moored and a gangway plank rigged, I went aboard and had a good look at our latest acquisition.  There could be no doubt as to the fact that she was a slaver; for her slave-decks were already fitted, and she carried all the requisites, including meal and water, for the transport of a very large cargo of slaves.  She was, in fact, the largest slaver I ever saw, and had accommodation to--I had almost said _comfortably_--carry at least eight hundred slaves.  She was Spanish; named the _Dona Josefa_; hailed from Havana; was oak-built, coppered, and copper-fastened; was a brand-new ship, worth half a dozen _Psyches_; and her cabin accommodation aft was the most spacious and elegantly fitted that I had ever seen.  She was armed with eighteen twenty-four pounders, and carried a crew of ninety-eight, all told.  She was, in short, a most formidable ship; and, but for the fact of our having taken her by surprise as we did, she might have bade defiance to the slave squadron for years, and paid for herself twenty times over.
Naturally, the skipper was in high feather at so brilliant a series of successes as we had met with, for he had not been altogether without his anxious moments as to what might be the result of the inevitable court- martial that awaited us all for the loss of the _Psyche_; but he flattered himself that the authorities could not possibly be hard upon officers who brought in four such rich prizes as ours.
And now there began to be general talk about leaving the river and reporting ourselves at Sierra Leone; for not only had we ships in plenty to accommodate all hands, but those among us who were most experienced felt that, after having made such a clean sweep as we had, it was exceedingly unlikely that there would be any more chances to capture either slaves or ships in the Fernan Vaz for some time to come.  Still, it would not be possible for us to go quite at once; for even now there remained several matters to be attended to, the most important being the disposal of the blacks whom we had captured from the slave-traders. Although these had come a long distance down from the interior, there was no doubt that they would be able to find their way back to their homes; whereas, if we carried them to Sierra Leone, the chances were that they would never see either home or relatives again.  Therefore although, strictly speaking, it was our duty to take them to Sierra Leone with us, the skipper decided to strain a point, if necessary, and give the poor wretches the opportunity to decide for themselves which alternative should be adopted.  Accordingly, the question was put to them, through Cupid, with the result that they decided, unanimously, to return by the way that they came rather than trust themselves to the tender mercies of the sea, which none of them had seen, and few had heard of, before.  But they begged a few days longer in which to rest and recuperate before they were despatched on their long journey; and this the skipper cheerfully accorded them, although he was now all anxiety to get away.
After the negroes had been given a full week in which to recover their health and strength, they were mustered early on a certain morning, given a good breakfast, allowed to load themselves up with as much meal as they chose to take, furnished with a few boarding-pikes and cutlasses from the prizes wherewith to defend themselves on the way, and transported across the harbour and fairly started upon their journey. Then, having already completed our own preparations for departure, our prisoners were apportioned out among the four prizes, put down in the holds on top of the ballast and made perfectly secure, and the officers and men then proceeded to take up their quarters on board the vessels to which they had severally been appointed by the skipper.
The captain himself naturally took command of the _Josefa_, with Mr Purchase as his first lieutenant; Mr Hoskins was given the command of the _Don Miguel_, with Copplestone and Parkinson from our old midshipman's berth to bear him company and keep him from becoming too completely satisfied with life; Mr Marline, the master, was placed in charge of _La Belle Estelle_, with the boatswain's mate to assist him; and, lastly, the skipper was good enough to show his confidence in me by giving me the brigantine to navigate to Sierra Leone--our common destination--with the gunner's mate and Jack Keene as my deck officers.
As there was not very much room in the anchorage for manoeuvring, we got under way in succession, the _Josefa_ taking the lead, followed by _Don Miguel_, after which went _La Belle Estelle_, while _El Caiman_, with her canvas set, strained at the cable which secured her to the buoy, as though she were afraid of being left behind.
But _I_ had a duty to perform before I cast off from the buoy at which the brigantine was straining; therefore, while the other vessels got under way, I and my boat's crew stood on the wharf and quietly watched them go.  Then, as soon as the brig was fairly clear of the anchorage, I went, with two of my boat's crew, to the leewardmost building of the settlement and set light to a little pile of combustibles that had been carefully arranged in each room, finally thrusting a blazing torch into the thatch upon quitting the building.  And in the same way we proceeded to each building in turn, until the entire settlement, barracoons and all, was a roaring furnace of flame.  Then, bidding my crew get down into the boat and stand by to shove off in a hurry, I proceeded to a certain spot and set fire to an end of slow match that was protruding from a box sunk into the ground near the wharf face, after which I picked up my heels and scampered off, best leg foremost, for the boat, into which I sprang, without much consideration for my dignity, and gave the word to shove off.  The boat's crew, who were fully aware of my reasons for haste, lost no time in obeying the order, and the next instant we were foaming away toward the brigantine, from the deck of which the hoarse voice of Tasker, the gunner's mate, now reached us, bawling an order for those for'ard to "stand by to slip!"  But before we were half-way across the intervening stretch of water a dull "boom" resounded astern of us, and a length of some fifty feet of wharf face suddenly leapt outward and fell with a heavy splash into the water, followed, about half a minute later, by a second "boom" and splash, then a third, fourth, fifth, and so on, until the entire wharf was completely destroyed and the whole place a ghastly, fire-swept ruin.  Then we, too, turned our backs upon what, a short time before, had been one of the most extensive, important, and conveniently situated slave factories on the whole of the West Coast, and made sail to rejoin our companions.  We overtook them about half a mile outside the bar; and when I had signalled the commodore that my mission of destruction was fulfilled, he hoisted a general signal setting a course of north-west by west for Cape Palmas; and, when this had been acknowledged, hoisted another to "try rate of sailing."  This, of course, was the same thing as giving the word for a race, and, the weather being moderate at the time, we each at once proceeded to pile upon our respective commands every rag of canvas that we could find a yard, boom, or stay for.
The race proved an exceedingly interesting and exciting event, for all the vessels were fast.  The wind being off the land, the water was smooth for the first three or four hours of the race; and during that time there was scarcely a pin to choose between the _Josefa_ and the brigantine, first one and then the other contriving to get the lead by a length or two, while the brig and the barque also made a neck-and-neck race of it but very gradually dropped astern until, by the time that we had run the land out of sight, the _Josefa_ and the brigantine were leading by nearly a mile, which lead we very gradually increased.  By this time, however, the breeze had freshened up considerably, and the sea had got up, whereupon the _Josefa_ displayed so marked a superiority that she had to take in all three royals and her mizzen topgallantsail to avoid running away from the rest of us.  But, contrary to my expectations, _El Caiman_, which was an exceedingly beamy, shallow vessel, behaved so well under the new conditions that we also could spare the barque and brig our royal and still keep ahead of them.
The weather remained fine, and we made a very quick and pleasant passage to Sierra Leone, where our arrival under such unusual conditions, and the report of our doings and adventures, created quite a sensation. Also we happened to arrive at a most opportune moment; for there were three British men-o'-war in harbour at the time, and we were, therefore, able to undergo at once, and on the spot, our trial by court-martial for the loss of the _Psyche_, instead of being obliged to return to England for the ordeal.
The trial took place on the fourth day after our arrival; and, as a matter of course, those of us who had been away in the boats at the time of the wreck were acquitted and exonerated from all blame.  But poor Purchase, who had been left in charge of the ship, was not so fortunate, the Court finding that, in the first place, he had been negligent in that he had not maintained a sufficiently careful look-out to preserve the ship from being maliciously cut adrift; and that, in the second place, he had let go the two stream anchors prematurely and before the actual necessity for such a precaution arose, but for which act he would have had the stream anchors available to let go when he discovered that the ship was adrift, and might thus have checked her shoreward drift long enough to permit of other measures being taken for the safety of the ship, even if the streams had not brought her up altogether.  For these acts of negligence the prisoner was sentenced to be reprimanded, to lose two years' seniority, and to be dismissed his ship!  Fortunately for Purchase, the sentence was not quite so severe as it sounded, for the _Osprey_--one of the men-o'-war in harbour--happened to have a vacancy for a lieutenant, and the Commodore, after hearing Purchase's story of the disaster from his own lips, unhesitatingly gave him the appointment.
The fact of the three ships being in port also suggested to me the possibility of getting through my examination, forthwith; I therefore ventured to speak to Captain Perry about it, who very kindly explained my desire to the Commodore.  The Commodore, in turn, caused a few inquiries to be made, when it was ascertained that, among the three ships, there were sufficient midshipmen desirous of passing to justify the arrangement of an examination; and within the next fortnight I had the satisfaction of finding myself a full-blown lieutenant.
Meanwhile, the Mixed Commission had condemned all four of our prizes--as indeed they could not avoid doing--and the crews were sentenced to long terms of imprisonment with hard labour in chains upon the roads.  Then there arose the question of replacing the _Psyche_ on the station; and at the earnest representation of Captain Perry the Commodore was induced to take upon himself the responsibility of purchasing the _Josefa_ into the service, rechristening her the _Eros_, and commissioning her under the command of Captain Perry, who at once arranged for the whole of the officers and crew of the _Psyche_ to accompany him.
Then, arising out of the loss of the _Psyche_, another matter was brought to the fore which was destined to exercise a very important influence upon my fortunes.  This matter had reference to the dearth of shallow-draught vessels in the slave squadron vessels capable of following the slavers in over the bars of the African rivers and fighting them upon equal terms.  At the moment in question we had not a ship in the squadron drawing less than fourteen feet of water; consequently, when a slaver entered a shallow river, or a river with a shallow bar, such a course of procedure as that which had led up to the loss of the _Psyche_ was imperative; and it was very strongly felt that the time had arrived for an improvement in the conditions.  The result was that _El Caiman_ also was purchased into the service, rechristened the _Dolphin_, and placed under my command with a crew of sixty, all told; of whom, however, Jack Keene, midshipman, and Tasker, the gunner's mate--who in his new ship held the rank of gunner--were the only individuals with whom I had already been shipmate; the rest were a motley crowd indeed, collected out of the gutters and slums of Freetown. The _Dolphin_, it was arranged, was to act in the first instance as tender to the _Eros_; but, later, might perhaps be detached for certain special work which was just then beginning to attract the attention of the authorities.
There was, however, still another matter that was at that moment forcing itself upon the attention of the Commodore; and that was the doings of two craft which were pursuing the nefarious business of slavers, with a measure of audacity that was only equalled by the impunity with which they worked.  They were said to be sister ships, undoubtedly built from the same model, most probably launched from the same stocks, and made to resemble each other so absolutely in every respect, down to the most insignificant detail, that it was impossible to distinguish one from the other, excepting at close quarters.  But one was an American--named the _Virginia_, hailing from New Orleans, and manned by a Yankee crew--while the other--the _Preciosa_--sailed under the Spanish flag, and was manned by Spaniards.  They were phenomenally fast vessels, and simply laughed at the efforts of ships of the squadron to overtake them; but they had been caught in calms on three or four occasions, and boarded by means of boats; when, by a curious freak of fortune, if the boarding party happened to be British, it always proved to be the American that they had boarded; while, if the boarders happened to be American, it was the Spaniard that they found themselves meddling with.  Thus, as there was no treaty existing between Spain and the United States of America on the one hand, and England and the United States on the other, conferring mutual rights of search and capture, the vessels had thus far escaped. But now, with two such speedy craft as the _Eros_ and the _Dolphin_, it was confidently hoped that the Spaniard at least would soon be brought to book; when, there being no possibility of further confusion, it was believed that the Americans--who, in consequence of repeated disappointments, had manifested a disposition to leave both craft severely alone--might be induced to renew their interest and speedily capture the _Virginia_.
As soon as Captain Perry learned that his special mission was to put a stop to the operations of these notorious vessels, he made it his business to institute exhaustive inquiries in every direction, with the object of acquiring the fullest possible information relative to their movements.  Although he had been unable to learn anything very definite he had finally come to the conclusion that at least one of them--which one he could not be certain--was now well on her way to the other side of the Atlantic; so he reasoned that if we proceeded with all despatch to the West Indies, and maintained a careful watch upon the mouth of the Old Bahama Channel, we should be almost certain to fall in with one or the other of them upon her next eastward trip.
Accordingly, on a certain day, the _Eros_ and the _Dolphin_ sailed in company from Sierra Leone, and, having made a good offing, caught the trade-wind, blowing fresh, to which we in the _Dolphin_ showed every rag of canvas we could set, while the _Eros_ kept us company by furling her royals and letting run the topgallant halliards from time to time when she manifested a disposition to creep away from us.  We did the run across in the quickest time on record, up to that date, making the Sombrero in a fortnight, almost to the hour, from the moment of leaving Sierra Leone, without starting tack, sheet, or halliard--so far as the _Dolphin_ was concerned--during the entire passage.
But now, with the Sombrero in sight and Anegada only about one hundred miles ahead, we felt that we were practically on our cruising ground; the _Eros_ therefore shortened sail to her three topsails and jib and signalling to the _Dolphin_ to do the like in proportion and to close, requested me to proceed on board for fresh orders.  I was glad enough to obey these instructions, particularly the one relative to shortening sail, for the past fortnight of "carrying on" had been a distinctly anxious time for me; moreover it was a pleasant change to find myself on the comparatively spacious deck of the _Eros_, and once more surrounded by the familiar faces of my former shipmates.  There was scant time, however, for the interchange of greetings, for Captain Perry was in a perfect fever of anxiety to complete his arrangements, and I was no sooner through the gangway than he hustled me off to his handsome and delightfully cool cabin under the poop, where, over a large-scale chart of the West Indies, he explained to me in much detail the course of action that he had planned for the two craft.  This, in brief, consisted in the adoption of measures which enabled us, while remaining within signalling distance of each other all day, to keep an effective watch upon a stretch of sea some forty miles wide--over which we felt certain the vessel of which we were in search must sooner or later pass--while at sunset we were to close and remain in touch all night.  This, of course, was an excellent plan so far as it went, but it was open to the objection that the craft for which we were on the look-out might slip past us unobserved during the night.  That, however, was something that could not be helped; moreover, there was a moon coming which would help us, and according to Captain Perry's calculations one or the other of the two craft was almost certain to turn up ere that waxing moon had materially waned.
And turn up she did, shortly after midnight on the fifth night following our arrival upon our cruising ground.  The moon was by that time approaching her second quarter, was well above the horizon by sunset, and was affording enough light to enable us to distinguish the rig and chief characteristics of a vessel eight miles away.  To my very great gratification it was the look-out aboard the _Dolphin_ who first sighted her, she being at that time hull-down in the south-western quarter and reaching athwart our hawse on the starboard tack; thus as the _Eros_ and ourselves were hove-to, also on the starboard tack, she rapidly neared us.  At first the only thing that we could clearly distinguish was that she was a full-rigged ship--as were the _Virginia_ and the _Preciosa_-- but, even so, there were certain details connected with her rig which, while not being exactly peculiar, corresponded with similar details referred to in the description of the two notorious slavers, as ascertained by Captain Perry; I therefore made a lantern signal to the _Eros_--under the shelter of our mainsail, so that the stranger to leeward might not see our lights and take the alarm--calling attention to the fact that there was a suspicious sail in sight to the south-west; and this signal was simply acknowledged without comment.  But I saw that almost immediately afterwards the _Eros_ swung her main-yard, boarded her fore and main tacks, and hauled to the wind with the object, of course, of preventing the strange sail from working out to windward of us; and a few minutes later I got a signal from the commodore instructing me to remain hove-to for the present, and, later, to act as circumstances might require.
The stranger was under all plain sail, to topgallantsails, and was slipping through the water like a witch; but I had very little fear of her outsailing the _Eros_, for, fast as that ship had been when she first fell into our hands, the skipper had improved her speed on a wind nearly a knot, merely by a careful readjustment of the ballast; and now she fully justified my faith in her by handsomely holding her own, and perhaps rather more, but this I could scarcely judge, for since we remained hove-to, the others rapidly drew away from us.
I waited with what patience I could muster until the stranger had worked out to a position some five miles ahead of us, and two points on our lee bow, and then I determined to wait no longer, for I felt that if, perchance, anything were to happen aboard the _Eros_--if, for example, she were to carry away or even spring a spar--and the trade-wind was piping up strongly--our unknown friend might very easily give us the slip; I therefore gave orders to swing the foreyard and make sail, piling on the brigantine everything we could show, even to the royal and flying-jib.  And it was well that we did so, for half an hour later, strangely enough, my fears with regard to the _Eros_ were realised, an extra heavy puff of wind snapping our consort's fore-topgallant-mast short off at the cap, and causing her to luff sharply into the wind with her big flying-jib dragging in the water under her forefoot.
That the stranger was not anxious to make our closer acquaintance at once became apparent, for no sooner did her people perceive the accident that had befallen the _Eros_--which was within a minute of its occurrence--than they put down their helm, tacked, and endeavoured to slip away out to windward clear of us both.  The _Dolphin_, however, was doing exceptionally well just then, the combination of wind and sea seemed to exactly suit her, and I felt that, although I had perhaps unduly delayed taking action, we could more than hold our own with the stranger provided that it blew no harder--and I therefore held on grimly, presently receiving a signal from the _Eros_ to take up the chase, which she would resume as soon as she had repaired damages.
Shortly afterward the stranger reached out across the bows of the _Eros_, beyond cannon-shot, and although the skipper fired two blank charges and a shotted gun to bring her to she took no notice, a fact which made me more determined than ever, if possible, to get within speaking distance of her.
The _Eros_, meanwhile, having cleared away her wreckage, had stowed her mizen topgallantsail, brailed up her spanker, and filled away again; and when we passed her, some three-quarters of an hour later, and about a mile to windward, they had already sent down the stump of her topgallant-mast and had prepared the topgallant rigging for the reception of the new spar.
The moment that we arrived in the wake of the stranger we tacked and stood directly after her; and we had not been on the new tack more than ten minutes when I found, to my great gratification, that the _Dolphin_, despite the exceeding shallowness of her hull, was quite as weatherly a vessel as the chase, which was now nearly four miles ahead of us.  But it was not until we had been in direct pursuit of her for a full hour that I was able to assure myself that we were undoubtedly gaining on her.
Yes, we were gaining on her, but it was _so_ slowly that it was not until sunrise next morning that we were within gun-shot of her; and now, in response to our first shot, she let fly her royal and topgallant halliards, flowed her jib-sheet, and backed her main-yard to allow us to come up with her.
As, still carrying on, we rapidly approached the handsome craft, I was busily engaged, with the aid of my glass, in discovering, one after the other, the various points of resemblance between her and the vessels that had been described to us, and I could have kicked myself with vexation when, in answer to the hoisting of our ensign, we saw the Stars and Stripes of the United States flutter out over her taffrail and go soaring aloft to her gaff-end.  And almost at the same instant, she now being out of the dazzle of the sun, I was able to read, legibly inscribed on her stern, the words "Virginia.  New Orleans!"  With the usual perverse luck that had attended the efforts of the British, we had dropped upon the wrong ship of the pair; the _Virginia_ was American, and we had no power to interfere with her.  Nevertheless, having gone so far in the matter as to bring her to, I was determined to board her and get a sight of her papers; a Spanish vessel might hoist American colours if she happened to find herself in a tight corner and believed that she might thereby escape.  While, as for the name--ah! that certainly was a difficulty not to be easily got over; a ship could scarcely change the name painted on her stern as easily as a chameleon changes his colour, without affording some indication that the change had been made.  Still, the slavers were up to all sorts of extraordinary dodges, and--well, I would at least inspect the _Virginia's_ papers, and satisfy myself that they were in order.
CHAPTER TEN.
THE VIRGINIA OF NEW ORLEANS.
Having arrived within pistol-shot of the chase, we hove-to to windward of her, lowered a boat, and I proceeded to board her.  As we swept round under her stern, in order to reach her lee gangway, I took a good look at the name on her counter.  Yes; there was nothing of pretence or fraud about it, so far as I could see; the words were not only painted upon the wood, but were actually cut deep into it as well; and, furthermore, the paint had all the appearance of having been applied at the same time as that on the rest of her hull.
Upon our arrival alongside I was somewhat surprised to observe that the crew had not taken the trouble to throw open the gangway, or put over a side ladder; I had therefore to watch my opportunity and scramble aboard by way of the main chains.  The _Virginia_ was a very fine craft indeed, measuring quite eight hundred tons, and carrying a fine, lofty, full poop, by the rail of which stood a typical Yankee, eyeing me with even greater malevolence than the Yankee of that day was wont to exhibit toward the Britisher.  He was tall, lean, and cadaverous, with long, straight, colourless hair reaching almost to his shoulders, and a scanty goatee beard adorning his otherwise clean-shaven face.  His outer garments, consisting of blue swallow-tail coat with brass buttons and white kerseymere waistcoat and trousers--the former also trimmed with brass buttons--seemed to have been made for a man many sizes smaller than himself; for the coat was distinctly short at the waist, while the sleeves terminated some four inches above the wrist; his waistcoat revealed some two inches of soiled shirt between its lower hem and the top of his trousers; and the latter garments did not reach his bony ankles by quite three inches.  He wore an enormous stick-up collar reaching almost to the level of his eyes; his head was graced by an old white beaver hat of the pattern worn by the postboys at that period, and the nap looked as though it had never been brushed the right way since it had been worked up into a hat.  On his feet he wore white cotton stockings or socks and low-cut slippers; he carried both hands in his trousers pockets, and his left cheek was distended by a huge plug of tobacco, upon which he was chewing vigorously when I scrambled in over the rail and leaped down on the deck.  As I did so I raised my hat and courteously bade him good-morning.
Instead of returning my greeting, he ejected a copious stream of tobacco-juice in my direction so dexterously that I had some difficulty in avoiding it, and then remarked--
"Waal, my noble Britisher, what the tarnation mischief do yew mean by firin' them brass popguns of yourn at me, eh?  What right have yew to shoot at a ship flyin' the galorious Stars and Stripes?  D'ye see them handsome barkers of mine?"--pointing to a fine display of eighteen- pounders, six of a side, mounted in the ship's main-deck battery. "Waal, I was in more'n half a mind to give ye a dose from them in answer to your shot; and yew may thank my mate here, Mr Silas Jenkins, for persuadin' me outer the notion!  And what d'ye want, anyway, now that yew're here, and be hanged to ye?"
"I have taken the liberty to board your ship for the purpose of getting a sight of your papers," I answered.  "Our information is that there are two sister ships--this vessel, and a Spanish craft named the _Preciosa_ which are doing a roaring trade in carrying slaves across the Atlantic; and it is part of my duty to lay hands on the _Preciosa_ if I can.  Your vessel answers to her description in every particular save that of name and the flag she flies; and therefore, having fallen in with you, I felt that I should not be doing my duty unless I boarded you and inspected your papers."
"Waal, I'll be jiggered!" exclaimed the skipper, turning to his mate. "Hear that, Silas?  I'll bet yew ten dollars the critter calls hisself a sailor, and yet he can't tell the difference between the _Virginia_ and the _Preciosa_ without lookin' at their papers!  I'll tell ye, stranger, where the difference is between them two vessels.  One on 'em has V-i-r- g-i-n-i-a, N-e-w O-r-l-e-a-n-s cut--_cut_, mind you--and painted on her starn, and she flies that galorious flag that's floatin' up thar," pointing to the American ensign fluttering from the gaff-end--"while t'other has the words P-r-e-c-i-o-s-a, H-a-v-a-n-a cut and painted on hern, and she flies a yaller flag with two red bars.  I know, because I've seen her--ay, most as often as I've seen the _'Ginia_!  Now, sonny, d'ye think ye'll be able to remember that little lesson in sailormanship that a free-born American citizen has been obliged to give ye?"
I laughed.  "Thank you for nothing," said I.  "And now I will trouble you for a sight of those papers that we were speaking of."
"I'll be darned if yew will, though, stranger!" he snapped.  "No, sirree; not much, I don't think!  Why, yew're even more ignorant than I thought yew was, and I must teach ye another little bit of yewr business.  Why, yew goldarned Britisher, d'ye know that yew haven't got no right at all to stop me from pursooin' my v'yage, or to demand a sight o' my papers?  Supposin' I was to report this outrage to my Gover'ment, what d'ye suppose would happen?  Why, our men-o'-war would just up and sink every stinkin' Britisher that they comed across!"
"Ah, indeed!"  I retorted sarcastically.  "Very well; now we'll have a look at those papers; after which you may take whatever steps you deem fit."
"And supposin' I refuse?"--began the skipper.  But the mate, seeing, I imagine, that I would take no denial, seized his irate superior by the arm and, leading him right aft, conversed with him in low tones for nearly five minutes, at the end of which time they both came forward to the break of the poop, and the skipper, descending the poop ladder, remarked ungraciously:
"Waal, since nothin' less than seein' my papers 'll satisfy ye, ye'd better come into my cabin, and I'll show 'em to yew."
Whereupon I followed him in through a passage which gave access to a fine, airy poop cabin, plainly but comfortably fitted up, and seated myself, uninvited, upon a cushioned locker while my companion went alone into his state-room, returning, a minute or two later, with a large tin box, the contents of which he laid upon the table.
"Thar they are," he exclaimed, pushing them toward me; "look at 'em as long as yew like!  I guess yew won't find nothin' wrong with 'em."
Nor did I.  I inspected them with the utmost care, and ultimately came to the conclusion that they were genuine, and that the ship was undoubtedly the _Virginia_, and American.
"Waal," exclaimed the Yankee skipper, when I at length refolded and handed the papers back to him, "are ye satisfied, stranger?"
I intimated that I was.
"Then git out o' here, ye darned galoot, as quick as you knows how," he snarled, "and thank your lucky stars that I don't freshen yewr way wi' a rope's end!"  Then, suddenly changing his tune, as he followed me out on deck and saw me glance round, he remarked:
"Purty ship, ain't she? and roomy for her size.  Guess I can stow away all of seven hundred niggers down below, and not lose more'n twenty per cent of 'em on an ordinary average passage.  And the _Preciosa_ is the very spit of this here craft--built in the same yard, she was, and from the same lines; there ain't a pin to choose atween 'em.  Now, if yew was only lucky enough to fall in with _her_, stranger, I guess she'd be a prize worth havin', eh?"
"She would!"  I agreed.  "And, what's more, my friend, we mean to have her, sooner or later."
"Yew don't say!" he jeered.  "Waal, I guess yew'll have to fight for her afore you git her.  And yew'll have to find her afore yew can fight for her, won't yew, sonny?  And p'rhaps that won't be so very difficult, a'ter all, for when I next see my friend Rodriguez--that's the cap'n of the _Preciosa_--I'll tell him that yew're out arter him, and maybe he'll lay for yew; for Rodriguez hates the Britishers 'most as bad as I do, and I'm sure he'd enjy blowin' _El Caiman_ outer the water now that she's fallen into yewr hands.  He and Morillo was great friends; and I reckon he'll feel bound to avenge Morillo's loss.  Yes; I'll tell him, for sure.  And I'll also tell all the others on the Coast to keep a bright look-out for the brigantine.  Waal, so long, stranger.  I'm bound for the Congo, if yew're anyways anxious to know."
The foregoing remarks were made as he followed me to the waist and watched my progress over the rail and from the main chains into my boat; and the last item of information was yelled after me when we had put about twenty fathoms of blue water between the boat and the ship.  As I flourished my hand by way of reply to his jeers, he turned away and I heard his harsh, nasal accents uplifted in an order to his crew to "Swing the main-yard; haul aft the jib-sheet; and sway away them t'gallan' and r'yal yards."
Profoundly disappointed at my non-success, and bitterly mortified at the insults to which I had been subjected by boarding the Yankee, I moodily returned to the _Dolphin_ and, upon mounting to the deck, ordered the gig to be hoisted and the helm to be put up in order that we might return to the _Eros_, the royals of which were now just rising above the horizon to the westward.  Three-quarters of an hour later we were again hove-to, and I was once more in the gig, on my way to report to Captain Perry the result of my pursuit.
To say that the commodore was also deeply disappointed is only stating the bare truth; yet I was not more than half-way through my narrative before I saw that some scheme was taking shape in the back of his mind. He questioned me very closely indeed upon certain points, one of his questions having reference to the point of the possibility of effecting a change in the name of the ship displayed upon her stern, it being evident that a suspicion had arisen in his mind that the two ships might, after all, be one and the same craft, sailing under different flags as circumstances might require.  To speak the truth the same suspicion had once or twice crossed my own mind, but had been completely dissipated by my visit to the _Virginia_; I was quite convinced there could be no possible tampering with the name on the stern, while the papers were undoubtedly genuine, and the crew were as undoubtedly genuine Yankee as were the papers.  Yet, despite all this, the fact that such a suspicion had arisen in Captain Perry's mind caused it to recur in my own; I was therefore very glad when he finally said:
"Thank you, Mr Fortescue.  You appear to have executed your mission very effectively, and to have done everything that I should have done, had I been there.  Of course I should have preferred to have been there myself; but--well, I have no doubt the result would have been precisely the same.  Now, having found the _Virginia_, I am minded to send you after her, to keep an eye upon her and also to drop a friendly hint to any Yankee cruiser that you may happen to fall in with; for, although you cannot touch her, they can; and they ought to be exceedingly grateful for a hint that will ensure them against making any further mistakes.  Yes; you shall follow her up, every inch of the way; go into the Congo with her, and, unless there is some very strong reason against it, come out again with her and follow her right across the Atlantic to her destination, wherever it may be.  And while you are doing that, I-- confident that you are keeping the _Virginia_ under observation--will look out for the _Preciosa_, and endeavour to nab her.  Go and have a yarn with Mr Hoskins while I prepare your written instructions."
The skipper was much longer than I had anticipated over the job of drafting his written instructions to me, and Hoskins and I therefore had an opportunity to discuss the situation at some length.  I ventured to voice the suspicion that, for some inexplicable reason, so persistently suggested itself to me that the _Virginia_ and the _Preciosa_ might possibly be one and the same vessel, despite the weighty evidence against such a supposition, but the first lieutenant laughed at the notion, which he pronounced in the highest degree fantastic.
"No," said he, "I do not think you need worry about that, Fortescue. But, all the same, you will have to keep your weather eye lifting, on this expedition upon which the captain is about to despatch you.  For, from your account of him, I judge the skipper of the _Virginia_ to be an exceptionally vindictive individual, with a very strong animus against us `Britishers,' as he calls us, and such men are apt to be dangerous when provoked, as he will pretty certainly be when he discovers that you are following and watching him.  Therefore, be on your guard against him, or he may play you one of those ghastly tricks that the slavers are apt to play upon the slave-hunters when the latter chance to fall into their hands.  In my opinion you are rather too young and inexperienced to be sent alone upon such a job."
"Nevertheless," said I, "one must acquire one's experience in some way before one can possess it; and I suppose there is no way in which a young officer can learn so quickly as by being placed in a position of responsibility.  After all, there is no danger in this forthcoming expedition, so far as I can see; it is but to follow and keep an eye upon a certain ship, and do what I can to promote her capture.  But I will keep your warning in mind, never fear.  And now I suppose I must say good-bye; for here comes Parkinson, the captain's steward, doubtless to say that my instructions are ready."
It was even as I had anticipated; Parkinson was the bearer of a message summoning me to the skipper's cabin, where my written instructions, having first been read over to me, in order that I might be afforded an opportunity to seek explanation of any doubtful points, were placed in my hands, and I was dismissed; the skipper's final order to me being to carry on and, if possible, overtake the _Virginia_, thereafter keeping her in sight at all costs until the remainder of my instructions had been carried out.  Ten minutes later I was once more on the deck of the _Dolphin_, and giving orders to make sail, the signal to part company having been hoisted aboard the _Eros_ the moment that my boat left her side.
Having braced up on the same course as that steered by the _Virginia_ when last seen, and crowded upon the brigantine every square inch of canvas that her spars would bear, I sent a hand aloft to the royal yard to take a look round and see whether he could discover any sign of the chase; but, as I had more than suspected, she had completely vanished; and my first task was now to find her again.  To do this, two things were necessary; the first being that we should follow precisely the same course that she had done; and the second, that we should sail fast enough to overtake her.  I therefore ordered the boatswain at once to get up preventer backstays, fore and aft, to enable our spars to carry a heavy press of sail; and then went to my cabin, where, with a chart of the Atlantic spread open before us upon the cabin table, Jack Keene and I discussed the knotty question of the course that should be steered to enable us once more to bring the _Virginia_ within the range of our own horizon.
The point that we had to consider was whether our Yankee friend would or would not anticipate pursuit.  If he did, he would probably resort to some expedient to dodge us; but if he did not there was little doubt that he would make the best of his way to his port of destination, which, if he spoke the truth, was the Congo.  Now, we were well within the limits of the north-east trade-winds, the wind at the moment blowing, as nearly as might be, due north-east, and piping up strong enough to make us think twice before setting our topgallantsail; it was therefore perfectly ideal weather for so powerful a craft as the _Virginia_, which might dare not only to show all three of her topgallantsails but also, perhaps, her main-royal.  We therefore ultimately came to the conclusion that, the weather being what it was, our friend the Yankee would shape a straight course for Cape Palmas, with the intention of then availing himself of the alternate sea and land-breezes to slip along the coast as far as the Congo--that being the plan very largely followed by slavers on the eastward passage--and that he would only be likely to deviate from that plan in the event of his actually discovering that he was pursued.  Consequently we determined to do the same; and I issued the necessary orders to that effect.  We were not very long in getting our preventers rigged, after which we not only set our royal and flying-jib, but also shifted our gaff-topsail, hauling down Number 3, a jib-headed affair, and setting Number 2 in its place, a sail nearly twice as big as the other, with its lofty, tapering head laced to a yard very nearly as long as the topmast.  Then, with her lee rail awash--and, in fact, dipping deeply sometimes, on a lee roll--and the lee scuppers breast-deep in water, the _Dolphin_ began to show us what she really could do in the matter of sailing when called upon; reeling off a steady eleven knots, hour after hour, upon a taut bowline; the smother of froth under her bows boiling up at times to the level of her lee cat-head, and her foresail wet with spray to the height of its reef-band.  It was grand sailing, exhilarating as a draught of wine, maddening in the feeling of recklessness that it begot; but, all the same, I did not believe that we were doing more than perhaps just holding our own with the _Virginia_; it was not under such conditions as those that we were likely to overhaul her; our chance would come when, as we gradually neared the equator, the wind grew more shy and fitful. Nevertheless, I kept a look-out in the fore-topmast cross-trees throughout the hours of daylight, to make sure that we should not overtake her unexpectedly.
We carried on all through that night, and the next day, and the next, with the breeze still holding strong, yet there was no sign of the chase; and, meanwhile, the carpenter informed me we were straining the ship all to pieces and opening her seams to such an extent that the pumps had to be tended for half an hour at a time twice in each watch; while the boatswain was kept in a perpetual state of anxiety lest his rigging should give way under the strain.
At length, on the afternoon of the fourth day after parting from the _Eros_, the wind began to moderate somewhat rapidly, with the result that by sunset our lee scuppers were dry, although we still had all our flying kites aloft; and that night the watch below were able to bring their mattresses on deck and sleep on the forecastle, a luxury which had hitherto been impossible during our headlong race across the Atlantic. And now I began to feel sanguine that before many hours were over we should see the mastheads of the _Virginia_ creeping above the horizon somewhere ahead of us; for I felt convinced that, in the moderate weather which we were then experiencing, we had the heels of her.
But when the next morning dawned, with the trade-wind breathing no more than a gentle zephyr, the look-out, upon going aloft, reported that the horizon was still bare; which, however, was not to say that the chase might not be within a dozen miles of us, for the atmosphere was exceedingly hazy, and heavy with damp heat which was very oppressive and relaxing, to such an extent, indeed, that the mere act of breathing seemed to demand quite an effort.  After taking my usual morning bath under the head pump, I made my way below to my state-room to dress, and found Keene sitting in the main cabin, on one of the sofa lockers, attired only in shirt and trousers, perspiring freely, and in a general state of limpness that was pitiable to behold.
"Morning, skipper!" he gasped.  "I say, isn't this heat awful?  Worse, even, than that on the Coast, I think!  And what has become of all the wind?  I say, I suppose we haven't made a mistake in our reckoning, and run down on to the Line unbeknownst, have we?"
"If we have," said I severely, "the mistake is yours Master Jack; for, as you are very well aware, I have been entrusting the navigation of this ship to you."
Which, by the way, was only true in a certain sense; for while I had given the young man to understand that, for his own benefit and advantage, I intended to make him perform the duty of master, and hold him responsible for the navigation, I had taken care to maintain a strict check upon his calculations and assure myself that he was making no mistakes.  Of which fact he was of course quite aware.  Wherefore his reply to my retort was simply to change the subject with some celerity.
"I say, old chap," he remarked, "you look awfully cool and comfy.  Been under the head pump, as usual, I suppose.  Upon my word, if it were not for the possibility--not to say the extreme probability--of being snapped up by a shark, I should like to go overboard in a bowline and be towed for half an hour.  And--talking of sharks--have you noticed how often we have seen the beggars following us since we have been in this ship?  I suppose her timbers have become saturated, as it were, with the odour of the slaves she has carried, and so--but, hillo! what has happened to the barometer?"
I glanced at the instrument, which, together with a tell-tale compass, swung from the skylight transoms, and saw that the mercury had sunk in the tube to the extent of nearly an inch since the last setting of the vernier; and, as it was our custom in the Slave Squadron at that time to set the instrument at 8 o'clock a.m. and 8 o'clock p.m., it meant that the mercury had fallen to that extent during the night!  What was about to happen?  I had observed nothing portentous in the aspect of the weather, while on deck, unless, indeed, the softening away of the trade- wind and the hazy condition of the atmosphere might be regarded as portents.  Yet that could hardly be, for I had observed the same phenomena before, yet nothing particular had come of it.  I decided to have a talk with Tasker, the gunner's mate, and get his views on the matter; he was a man of very considerable experience, having been a sailor before I was born; I therefore at once entered my cabin, and proceeded to dress; after which I returned to the deck, where Tasker was officer of the watch.  I found him sitting aft on the stern grating, replacing his socks and shoes, which he had removed from his feet at four bells in order to take a leading part in the matutinal ceremony of washing decks.  I had already seen him a little earlier that morning, and exchanged greetings with him; I therefore at once, and without any circumlocution, plunged into the subject by asking:
"What do you think of the look of the weather, Mr Tasker; is there anything unusual about it, in your opinion?"
Tasker rose to his feet and cast a prolonged glance at the sky before replying.  Then he said slowly:
"I can't say as I sees anything much out of the common about it, so far, Mr Fortescue.  The wind's dropped a bit more than's quite usual, certainly; but I don't know as there's very mich in that.  And then there's this here thickness o' the hatmosphere--well, that may or may not mean somethin', but I don't see anything alarmin' about it just yet. Why d'ye ask the question, sir?  Is the glass droppin' at all?"
"It has dropped nearly an inch since it was set last night," I answered.
"Phew!  Nearly an inch since eight bells last night!" ejaculated the old salt, with an air of concern.  "That means, sir, that it have fallen that little lot since midnight; for I looked at it then, when Mr Keene relieved me, and it hadn't dropped nothin' then."
"Then what is going to happen?"  I demanded.  "Are we going to have a hurricane?"
"I should say yes, Mr Fortescue, most decidedly," answered Tasker. "And yet," he continued, again carefully scanning the sky, "I must confess I don't see nothin' very alarmin' up there at present.  I s'pose the mercury bag haven't sprung a leak, by no chance, have it?  This here sudden drop reminds me of a yarn a shipmate of mine once told me about a scare he had when he was in the sloop _Pyramus_ in the Indian Ocean, outward bound to the China station.  The scare started with a sudden fall of the barometer, just as it might be in this here present case, and it went on droppin' until the skipper began to think he was booked for the biggest blow as ever come away out o' the 'eavens.  He started by sendin' down royal and t'gallan' yards and housin' the t'gallan' masts.  Then, as the mercury still went on droppin', he shortened sail to close-reefed fore and main taups'ls, sent the t'gallan' masts down on deck, and housed the topmasts.  While this work was goin' on the mercury kept fallin' until it sank out o' sight altogether; and the skipper had actually given the order to furl the taups'ls and send the yards and masts down when the cabin steward happened to make the discovery that the mercury bag had busted and the mercury from the barometer was rollin' in little balls all over the cabin floor!  My mate told me that the time in which they got that there _Pyramus_ ataunto again, that day, and the royals upon her, was never a'terwards beaten!"
I could not avoid a good hearty laugh at this quaint story of a phenomenal fall of the mercury in a barometer; for it was easy to conjure up a picture of the rapidly growing alarm and dismay of the captain as he watched the steady and speedy shrinkage of the metallic column, and of the feverish anxiety and haste with which he would proceed with his preparations to meet the swoop of the supposedly approaching typhoon, as also of his disgust at the discovery that all his alarm and anxiety had been brought about by the unsuspected leakage of a leather bag!  But the story served as a hint to me; what had happened once might happen again; and I forthwith retired to the cabin and carefully examined our own instrument to discover whether, haply, such an accident had occurred in our case.  But no, the bag into which the base of the glass tube was plunged was perfectly sound and intact; and, meanwhile, during my brief colloquy with Tasker a further fall of a full tenth had occurred.  I lost no time in returning to the deck.
"The scare is quite genuine this time, Mr Tasker," I said; "there is no leakage in our mercury bag to account for the heavy drop; moreover, the drop has increased by a full tenth.  Therefore, although the present aspect of the weather may not be precisely alarming, we will proceed to snug down at once, if you please, in view of the fact that the crew we carry is not precisely what might be called efficient, and will probably take an unconscionably long time over the work."
"Ay, ay, sir," answered Tasker.  "I expect the mercury ain't droppin' exactly for nothin', therefore, as you says, we'd better be makin' ready for what's in store for us."  Then, facing forward, he gave the order:
"Clew up your royal and t'garns'l, furl 'em, and then get the yards down on deck.  Hurry, you scallywags; the more work you does now, the more time for play will you have a'ter breakfast."
The "snugging down" process occupied us until nearly four bells of the forenoon watch; but when at length it was completed we felt that we were prepared to face anything, our royal and topgallant-mast and all our yards being down on deck, the fore and main-topmasts and the jib-boom housed, the great mainsail snugly stowed and the heavy boom securely supported in a strong crutch, and the ship under fore and main storm staysails only.
CHAPTER ELEVEN.
THE END OF THE DOLPHIN.
By the time that all this had been accomplished, the wind had fallen away to a dead calm, and the only sounds audible were the creaking and groaning of the ship's timbers, the loud rattle of the cabin doors below upon their hooks, the wash of the sea alongside and under the counter, the constant irritating _jerk-jerk_ of the tiller chains, and the violent rustle and slatting of the staysails, as the _Dolphin_ rolled her channels under in the long, oily swell that was now running.  But, so far as the aspect of the sky was concerned, there was no more sign of the threatened storm than there had been when I first went on deck that morning--except that, maybe, the haze had thickened somewhat, rendering our horizon still more circumscribed, and the heat had increased to such an extent that, as Keene had remarked, one would gladly have gone overboard to escape it but for the sharks, several of which were cruising round us, while three monsters persistently hung under our counter in the shadow of the ship's hull, hungrily ogling those of us who chanced to lean over the taffrail to get a glimpse of them.  Yet, when, for want of something better to do, Jack Keene and I got a shark hook and, baiting it with a highly flavoured piece of pork out of the harness cask, sought to inveigle one of the monsters into swallowing it, they disdained to even so much as look at it, merely glancing upward at us, when we deftly dropped the bait upon one of their broad, shovel noses, as though to say:
"No, no, my hearties!  No rancid pork for us, thank you, when, by exercising a little patience, we may, with luck, get a chance to learn what one of you jokers tastes like."  The enervating effect of the heat seemed to be as strongly revealed in them as it was in ourselves.
The sun still flamed in the heavens when, shortly before noon, Jack and I brought our sextants on deck with the object of measuring his meridian altitude above the horizon; but we were only able to obtain a very approximate and wholly useless result, for, when we came to try, we found that the sun appeared in our instruments merely as a shapeless glare of light, while the horizon was wholly indistinguishable.  Then, by imperceptible degrees, the sun, like the horizon, became obliterated, and the atmosphere stealthily darkened, as though a continuous succession of curtains of grey gauze were being interposed between us and the sky.  Meanwhile the barometer was still persistently declining, although not quite so rapidly as during the early hours of the morning.
It was about six bells in the afternoon watch when, with a sudden darkening of the sky, that came upon us like the gloom of night, it began to rain--a regular tropical deluge, sluicing down upon us in sheets, as though the bottom of a cloud had dropped out; and within less than a minute our decks were more than ankle-deep in warm fresh water, and our scuppers were running full.  The downpour lasted for perhaps a minute and a half, and then ceased as abruptly as though a tap had been turned off, and we heard the shower passing away to the northward of us, leaving us with streaming decks and dripping canvas and rigging.  But, although the rain had come and gone again in the space of a couple of minutes, the darkness intensified rather than otherwise, and presently we heard a muttering of distant thunder away down in the southern quarter, followed, after a while, by a further dash of rain, lasting for a few seconds only.
Then, all in a moment, and without any further warning, the blackness overhead was riven by the most appallingly vivid flash of lightning that I had ever seen, accompanied--not followed--by a crash of thunder that temporarily deafened all hands of us and caused the ship to quiver and tremble from stem to stern.  Then, while we were all standing agape, our ears deafened by the thunder and our eyes blinded by the glare of the lightning, a fierce gust of hot wind swept over us, filling our two staysails with a report like that of a cannon and laying the ship over to her sheer-strake.  Tasker, who was again officer of the watch, at once sprang to the wheel and assisted the helmsman to put it hard up; but almost before the ship had begun to gather way the first fierceness of the gust had passed, leaving us little more than a fresh breeze.  I therefore went aft and shouted to them--for they were as deaf as I was-- to bring the vessel up to her course again, when we began to move through the water at a speed of some five knots.
That first terrible flash of lightning and crash of thunder was, however, only the beginning of the most awful electric storm that it has ever been my fate to witness, the sky, now black as night, being rent in half a dozen different directions at once by fierce, baleful flashes, green, blue, crimson, and sun-bright, while the bombarding of the thunder was absolutely terrifying, even to us who were by this time growing quite accustomed to tropical storms.  With it there came frequent short, sharp, intermittent bursts of rain that swept across our decks, stinging the exposed skin like shot, and enshrouding everything beyond a couple of fathoms away in impenetrable obscurity.  Now, too, there came, at irregular but quickly recurring intervals, savage gusts of wind that smote the ship as though she had been but a child's toy, heeling her down until her lee rail was awash, and holding her thus for two or three minutes at a time, then easing up for a short space, the "easing up" intervals, however, steadily growing more abbreviated, while the gusts that invariably followed them rapidly grew in intensity and fury, until after the passage of one that had pinned us down for three or four minutes, with our lee sheer-poles buried in the smother, I thought that the time had arrived to heave-to, and gave the order to do so.  Nor was I any too soon; for the sea was rapidly rising, and a quarter of an hour later we probably could not have accomplished the feat without having had our decks swept.  The gale now rapidly increased in intensity, the gusts of wind ever growing stronger and more furious, and succeeding each other more rapidly, until at length the intervals between them became so brief as to be practically imperceptible, the strength of the wind now being equal to that of a heavy gale, and momentarily growing stronger as gust after gust swooped down upon us. The blinding, drenching showers that occasionally swept us were no longer composed of fresh water only, for there was a strong mingling of salt-water in them that was none other than the tops of the waves, torn off by the terrific blasts of wind and hurled along horizontally in the form of vast sheets of spray.  The sea, meanwhile, was rising with astounding rapidity, taking into consideration the fact that, as just stated, the height of the combers was greatly reduced by the enormous volumes of water that were scooped up from the ocean's surface by the fury of the wind; moreover the sea was short, steep, and irregular, much more nearly resembling the breakers on a coast in shallow water, than the long, regular, majestically moving seas of the open ocean.  The _Dolphin_, therefore, despite her beautiful model and the reduction of her tophamper, was beginning to make exceedingly bad weather of it, frequently burying herself to her foremast, and careening so heavily that during some of her lee rolls it was impossible to maintain one's footing on deck except by holding on to something.
At length, about four bells in the first watch, the lightning, which had hitherto almost continuously illuminated the atmosphere, suddenly ceased altogether, and the night grew intensely dark, the only objects remaining visible being the faintly phosphorescent heads of the seas, flashing into view and gleaming ghostly for a moment before they were torn into spray by the violence of the wind and whirled away through the air to leeward.  Then, with almost equal suddenness, there came a positively startling lull in the strength of the wind, and the ship-- which had for some hours been laying over to it so steeply that movement about her decks was only to be achieved with great circumspection and by patiently awaiting the arrival of one's opportunity--suddenly rose almost to an even keel.  I seized the chance thus afforded me to claw my way to the skylight and glance through it at the barometer, illuminated by the wildly swaying lamp which the steward had lighted when darkness fell, but, to my intense disappointment, the mercury, which had steadily been shrinking all day, exhibited a further drop since the index had been set at eight o'clock that evening.
"We have not yet seen the worst of it," I shouted to Tasker, who, although it was now his watch below, had elected to remain on deck and bear me company.  "The glass is still going down."
"I'm very sorry to hear it, Mr Fortescue," he answered.  "I don't like the look of things at all.  The ship has been most terrible uneasy for several hours now, and I'm afraid we shall find that she's been strainin' badly.  It might not be amiss to sound the well; and if, as I fear, we find that she's been takin' water in through her seams, I'd advise--"
His further speech was cut short by a terrific blast of wind that swooped down upon us like a howling, screaming fiend, without a moment's warning.  So violent was it that Tasker and I were both swept off our feet and dashed to the deck, where I brought up against the cabin companion with a crash that all but knocked the senses out of me, while the gunner's mate disappeared in the direction of the lee scuppers.  The yelling and screaming of the wind was absolutely appalling, the volume of sound being such that nothing else could be heard above it; and in the midst of the din I became vaguely conscious that the ship was going over until she lay upon her beam ends, with her deck almost perpendicular, and the water up to the level of her hatchways.
For a few seconds I lay where I was, on the upturned side of the companion, listening to the water pouring into the cabin with every lee roll of the ship, and endeavouring to pull together my scattered faculties; then, dimly realising that something must be done to relieve the ship if we would not have her founder beneath us, I scrambled to my feet and, seizing a rope's end that came lashing about me, dragged myself up to the weather rail, clinging to which I slowly and painfully worked my way forward, shouting for the carpenter as I did so.  At length, arrived at the fore rigging, I came upon a small group of men who had somehow contrived to climb up to windward and out upon the ship's upturned side, where they were now desperately hacking away with their knives at the lanyards of the weather fore rigging.
"That's right, lads!"  I exclaimed, whipping out my own knife and lending a hand; "we must cut away the masts and get the ship upright again, or she will go down under us.  Where is the carpenter?  Let him bring along his axe.  He will do more good in one minute than we can in ten."
"I'm afraid, sir, as Chips has gone overboard with some more when the ship was hove down.  But I'll see if I can get into the fo'c's'le and lay my hand upon his axe," answered one of the men.
"Do so by all means," I returned; "and be quick about it.  I would go myself, but you will know better than I where to find the axe; and even moments are precious just now."
They were, indeed; for it was easy to tell, by the feel of the ship, that she was becoming waterlogged, and every gallon of water that now poured into her seriously decreased our chances of saving her.  But it was bad news to learn that the carpenter, "with some more" men, had been lost overboard when the ship was thrown upon her beam-ends; yet, when I came to recall the suddenness of the event, the surprising thing was that any of us had survived it.  This reminded me of Tasker, and set me wondering whether he had been as fortunate as myself, or whether that last awful lurch had been as fatal to him as it had been to some others among us.
Meanwhile we continued to hack away with our knives at the lanyards, and presently, after what appeared to have been a terribly protracted interval, but which was probably not more than a couple of minutes, the last lanyard parted with a twang, and the next instant, with a crash heard even through the terrific hubbub of the gale, the foremast snapped close off by the deck and plunged, with all attached, into the boil to leeward.  Then we breathlessly waited, hoping that, thus relieved, the ship would recover herself, and for a moment it almost seemed that she would do so; but just at the critical moment the gale swooped down heavier than ever, and at the same instant an extra heavy sea struck her, and down she lay again, as though too tired to struggle further.
"It is no good, men," I cried, "she won't rise.  Lay aft, and cut away the mainmast also.  It is our only chance!"  And, therewith, we all crawled along the ship's side--escaping being washed off or blown overboard only by a series of miracles, as it seemed to me--until we arrived at the main chains, where we had something to cling to, and where the channel-piece partially sheltered us.  Here we at once got to work with all our energy upon the weather main lanyards, and, the man with the axe presently joining us, in a few minutes the mainmast also went over the side.
"Now, inboard with you, men, as smart as you like," I cried.  "If she is going to rise at all she may do so quite suddenly, in which case we run the risk of being hove overboard if we remain here."
We all scrambled in on deck, steadying ourselves by such of the running rigging as we could lay hold of; and we had scarcely done so when the hull partially recovered its upright position, not quite so suddenly as I had expected, yet with a quick righting movement that left our decks knee-deep in water.  I sprang to the companion and strove to close the burst-open doors and so prevent any further influx of water to the cabin; but the heavy washing sounds that came up from below told me that my efforts were already too late to be of any service, for the cabin seemed to be flooded to almost half the height of the companion ladder, and the sluggish motions of the ship told me eloquently enough that she was perilously near to a foundering condition.  I therefore rallied the men and bade them get to work at the pumps forthwith; and it was then that I discovered, to my horror, that, of our complement of sixty, we had lost no fewer than fourteen, including my messmate, poor Jack Keene, and Tasker, the gunner's mate, all of whom must have gone overboard when the vessel was thrown down on her beam-ends!  It was a most deplorable affair, and I was especially grieved at the loss of my light-hearted chum; but that was not the moment for indulgence in useless lamentation, and I busied myself in doing what might be possible to provide for the safety of the ship.
First of all I got a strong gang to work at the pumps in two relays, each taking a spell of ten minutes pumping, followed by an equal length of time for rest.  When I had fairly started these, and saw the water gushing in a clear stream from the spouts of both pumps, I set the rest to work cutting away all the rigging which still held the wreckage of the masts attached to the hull, leaving the fore and fore-topmast stays untouched, my intention being that the drift of the hull should bring the wreckage under the bows, where, being held fast by the stays, it should form a sort of floating anchor to which the ship should ride head to wind and sea.  Thus we might hope that she would no longer ship water in such quantities as to threaten her safety.  After nearly an hour's hard labour we succeeded, during which it appeared to me that the men were making little or no impression upon the amount of water in the hold.  But, as I had hoped, when once we had brought the hull head to wind she no longer shipped water in any very alarming quantities; and after watching her carefully for some minutes I came to the conclusion that we might safely venture to open the after hatchway and supplement the efforts of those at the pumps by baling with buckets.
Before starting the pumps I had taken the precaution of having the well sounded, with the result that we had discovered the depth of water in the ship's interior to be three feet ten inches, as nearly as could be ascertained; but the violent motions of the hull had rendered anything like really accurate sounding an impossibility, and the same cause now precluded us from ascertaining with certainty whether the leak was gaining upon the pumps or _vice-versa_.  One thing was perfectly certain, and that was that if the pumps were gaining upon the leak at all, it was but slowly.  If that should prove to be the case, it would mean that there was something the matter more serious than the mere straining of the ship; possibly a butt or a hood-end had been started.
It was by this time close upon midnight, and there were times when I almost succeeded in persuading myself that it was not blowing quite so hard as it had been, although the difference--if difference there were-- was certainly not very strongly marked; the sea, however, still continued to rise, and was now running higher than I had ever before seen it.  Yet the poor, sorely battered _Dolphin_ rode it reasonably well, all things considered; although there were times when the water in her interior, happening to become concentrated in the fore part of her just as she should be rising to a sea, pinned her down by the head to a dangerous extent, causing the sea to come in, green, unbroken, and like a miniature mountain, over her bows.  When this threatened to occur it became necessary to watch her narrowly, and if the danger seemed to be imminent we hurriedly replaced the after hatches, otherwise we should very quickly have been swamped.
When the pumping gangs had been at work for about an hour they complained of exhaustion, and I accordingly relieved them to the extent of setting them to work with the buckets and putting two fresh gangs at the pumps; yet, although these men worked pretty energetically, it soon became evident that we were not gaining anything upon the leak, and as time passed on it became exceedingly doubtful whether the leak were not rather gaining upon us.  Moreover, as the sea continued to rise the vessel's movements became more laboured, and she again began to take the water aboard in such dangerous quantities that at length we were reluctantly compelled to abandon our baling operations, and close the hatches to prevent the heavy seas from reaching her interior.
In this fashion the seemingly endless night at length wore itself away and the lowering dawn came, disclosing to us the true seriousness of our condition.  There we were, aweary, hollow-eyed, haggard-looking little band, sodden to the very bones of us with long hours of exposure to the pitiless buffeting of rain and sea, our flesh salt-encrusted, our eyes bloodshot, our hands raw and bleeding with the severe and protracted work at the pumps, adrift in mid-ocean upon a mastless, sorely battered, and badly leaking hulk, with her ballast shifted and a heavy list, tossed helplessly upon a furiously raging sea that seemed instinct with a relentless determination to overwhelm us, toiling and fighting doggedly against the untiring elements, in the hope that, perchance, if our strength held out, we might keep the now crazy, straining, and complaining fabric beneath us afloat long enough to afford us some chance of saving our lives.  Yet the hope was, after all, but a slender one; for with the coming of daylight we were able to see that our plight was very considerably worse than we had dreamed it to be during the hours of darkness; for _then_ we had believed that the loss of our masts and the springing of a somewhat serious leak represented the sum total of our misfortunes; while _now_ we saw, to our unspeakable dismay, that, with the solitary exception of the longboat, the whole of our boats were so badly damaged as to be altogether beyond our ability to repair; of two of them, indeed, nothing save the stem and stern remained dangling forlornly from the davit tackles.  But that, bad though it was, was not the worst; for it was no longer possible for us to blind ourselves to the fact that the leak was gaining upon us inexorably, and that, even though we should continue to toil with unabated energy, we could not keep the ship afloat longer than a few hours more, at the utmost.
And then what were we to do?  The longboat, fine boat though she was, when stocked with even a meagre supply of provisions and water, would not accommodate more than twenty-five men, and I gravely doubted whether she would live ten minutes in such a sea as was then running, with half that number in her.  Still, with the exception of such a raft as we might be able to put together, she was all that we had, and half an hour of daylight sufficed to show me that no time must be lost in making preparations to quit the slowly foundering ship.  Yet it would not do for us to leave the pumps for a moment; one gang must, at all costs, be kept hard at work pumping out as much as possible of the water that was pouring in through the open seams, otherwise the leak would gain upon us so rapidly that the ship would settle from under us long before we were ready to face such a catastrophe.  I therefore at once set about the formulating of my plans and carrying them into effect.  First of all, while one gang kept the pump-brakes clanking and the clear water spouting out upon our streaming deck, I got another gang to work at launching the guns overboard as the roll of the ship permitted--and this, I was glad to see, eased the poor labouring craft quite perceptibly.  This done, all hands, except those at the pumps, went to breakfast, the meal consisting of hot coffee sweetened with molasses, and ship's biscuit, more or less sodden with salt-water--for with the coming of daylight and the preparation of breakfast the unwelcome discovery had been made that the salt-water had got at the provisions and gone far toward spoiling them.  Then, as soon as the first gang had finished breakfast, they relieved those at the pumps, who in their turn took breakfast and next proceeded to clear away the longboat and prepare her for launching, by providing her with a proper supply of oars and thole-pins, her rudder and tiller, masts and sails, and then carefully stowing her stock of water and provisions.  But when all this was done it was still blowing too hard--although the worst of the gale seemed to be over--and the sea was altogether too rough to allow of our attempting to launch her.  We therefore next got to work upon a raft, first of all lashing all our spare spars together as a sort of foundation, and then, upon the top of this, lashing the hen-coops, gratings, a few planks that the carpenter had stowed away down below, and, finally, some lengths of bulwark that we cut away for the purpose.  This raft, when completed, was a fairly roomy affair, affording space enough to stow away some thirty people, together with a good supply of provisions and water, which we now proceeded to get up from below and stow; the cook, meanwhile, industriously boiling as much beef and pork as he could crowd into his coppers.  Then we knocked off and piped to dinner; and while we were getting this--probably the last meal of which we should ever partake aboard the poor old _Dolphin_--our hearts were gladdened by a sudden burst of sunshine breaking through the clouds, and half an hour later the sky to windward was clear, the sun was shining brilliantly and pouring his welcome warmth upon our chilled bodies and saturated clothing, while the gale had broken and was fast moderating, having already declined to the strength of a double-reefed topsail breeze.  The sea, too, was no longer raging like a boiling cauldron; yet, even so, it was still too heavy to justify us in attempting to launch either the longboat or the raft.
And now, at the very moment when it was most necessary that the crew should preserve an orderly and obedient disposition, they suddenly broke into open mutiny, flatly refusing to work any longer at the pumps; declaring that the ship was good for at least another hour, and that before that had passed we should all be safely away from her; that there was no sense in wanting to keep the ship afloat longer than there was any absolute need for; and that the time had now arrived when they must begin to think of saving their own personal belongings.  When I attempted to remonstrate with them and point out the folly of their behaviour they became virulently abusive, and declared that if I wanted the pumps kept going I might keep them going myself--and this although I had already done considerably more than my fair share of that back- breaking labour.  Therewith they abandoned the pumps and betook themselves forward to the forecastle, from which there shortly afterward came floating to my horrified ears loud peals of maudlin laughter, mingled with snatches of ribald songs and coarse jests, whereby I came to know, all too late, that, while getting up the provisions from below, some of them must have broken into the spirit-room and possessed themselves of a very considerable supply of rum, upon which they were now fast drinking themselves into a condition of reckless indifference to the awful danger that threatened them.  Anything, I thought, was better than this; therefore, having first gone down below and brought up the chronometer, my sextant, and a chart of the Atlantic, and stowed the whole carefully in the stern-sheets of the longboat, loaded my pistols, and girded my sword to my side, I went forward to the fore-scuttle and, putting my head into it, shouted in as cheery a tone as I could summon:
"Now then, lads, tumble up on deck, all hands of you.  We have still a great deal to do, and very little time to do it in; therefore let us see about getting the longboat into the water, and the raft over the side. There will be time enough to rest when we are safe away from the wreck."
"All ri', schipper, don' you worry," bawled a great hulking Dutchman in reply.  "Dere's blendy of dime yet; and ve're nod going do move undil ve've vinished dhis grog."
Then another--an American this time--took up the tale, shouting, "Go 'way, little man, go 'way!  Wha' d'you mean, anyway, by comin' here and disturbin' gen'lemen when they're busy?  Come in and have a drink with us, youngster, just to show that you're not stuck up.  I guess we're all equals in this dandy little barkie; yes, sirree!  I'm a free-born 'Murican, I am, an' just as good as you or any other blamed Britisher, and don' you forget it.  So, if you won' come in an' have a drink, take your ugly-lookin' mug out o' the daylight, d'ye hear?"
To emphasise this polite request the man seized a heavy sea boot from the forecastle deck and hove it at me, with so poor an aim that instead of hitting me he dashed it into the face of an Englishman who happened at the moment to be drinking rum out of a pannikin.  The blow dashed the pannikin out of the man's hand, and splashed the fiery spirit all over his face and into his eyes; and the next instant, with a low, fierce growl of concentrated ferocity, he sprang to his feet and struck the free-born 'Murican a smashing blow under the chin that sent him sprawling.
"You have no time to waste in fighting, lads," I cried, for I felt that the ship was fast settling under our feet.  But my voice was completely drowned in the babel of angry yells that instantly arose, for it appeared that the men were, after their own fashion, rivals for leadership in the forecastle, and each man had his own partisans, every one of whom instantly took up the quarrel of his own favourite, and in another moment the whole of them were at each others' throats, like so many quarrelsome dogs.
"Let the drunken, mutinous brutes fight it out among themselves," I muttered disgustedly as I turned and walked away.  "They will get a sobering-up before very long that will astonish them, or I am greatly mistaken!"
As I walked aft I could tell, by the feel of the ship, that her race was nearly run--although I did not at that moment dream how very near to her end she was--and I paused abreast of the longboat to satisfy myself that she was quite ready for launching out through the wide gap that we had made in the bulwarks when cutting them away to provide material for the construction of the raft.  The gripes, I saw, had been cast off, and the boat was supported solely by her chocks, upon which she stood upright on the main hatchway.  Suddenly, stooping down, a small spot of bright light in the deep shadow under the boat caught my eye, and looking closer I saw that some careless rascal had omitted to put in the plug, and that the bright spot of light was caused by the sun shining down through the unplugged hole in the boat's bottom.  With a muttered objurgation of the fellow's carelessness, I climbed into the boat and, stooping down, sought for the plug.  I was seeking for perhaps two or three minutes before I found it, but as I was about to abandon the search, and hunt for a suitable cork out of which to cut another, my eye fell upon the missing plug, and I at once inserted it and proceeded to drive it tightly home.  I had just completed the job to my satisfaction when I felt the ship lurch heavily.  There was a sudden, violent rush and wash of water, and I sprang to my feet barely in time to see the boat caught up on the crest of a sea that came sweeping, green and solid, through the gap in the starboard bulwarks, and carried clear and clean out through the corresponding gap in the port side!  The longboat had launched herself; and before I could collect my senses, or lift a hand, I found myself adrift alone, some twenty fathoms to leeward of the doomed ship, and driving farther away from her every moment.
CHAPTER TWELVE.
ALONE IN THE LONGBOAT.
To seize one of the long, heavy ash oars that formed part of the boat's equipment, fling the blade over the stern, and jerk the oar into the sculling notch, with the idea of sculling the boat back to the wreck was, with me, the work of but a second or two; but although I contrived, with some labour, to get the boat's head round toward the _Dolphin_, and to keep it pointed in that direction, I soon discovered--as I might have had the sense to know--that to scull a big heavy boat like the longboat to windward against such a strong wind and so heavy a sea was a task altogether beyond the power of a single man, however strong he might be; for every sea that swept down upon the boat sent her surging away a good half-dozen fathoms to leeward.
Finding this attempt useless, I at once hauled the oar inboard again, and proceeded to ship the rudder, which task I at length accomplished, with some difficulty owing to the violent motion of the boat; then I shipped the tiller; and next proceeded to loose the boat's canvas, with the idea of beating back to the ship.  But here again I found myself seriously hampered and delayed by the circumstance that, when equipping the boat, the men had only half done their work.  The boat was rigged as a fore and aft schooner, setting a main trysail, fore trysail, and a staysail secured to the head of the stem; and while the masts had been stepped and the shrouds set up hand-taut, I found, upon casting loose the sails, that they had omitted to obey my instructions to close-reef them, and since the wind was still blowing altogether too hard for the boat to carry anything more than close-reefed canvas I lost quite ten minutes in reefing and setting the mainsail and staysail--I dared not attempt to set the foresail also, for I did not believe that the boat could carry it.  And when at length I had got the canvas set and the boat fairly under way, I found, to my consternation, that I had driven a good half-mile to leeward of the ship, by which time, their quarrel, I suppose, being over, the men had left the forecastle and, finding that I had gone adrift in the longboat, were making frantic signs to me to return.
But I soon discovered that, even now, with the boat under canvas, to beat back to the ship was an impossibility; for the boat had not been built for sailing to windward in a strong breeze; she was the ordinary type of ship's longboat, constructed to carry a heavy load in proportion to her dimensions, with a long, flat floor, bluff bows, and with only some three inches of exposed keel; and while she might possibly, with skilful management, have been made to work to windward in very moderate weather, she now, with so strong a wind and so heavy a sea to battle with, drove to leeward almost as rapidly as she forged ahead.  Nor did I dare to press her with any more canvas, for she was already showing more than was at all prudent, the stronger puffs careening her to her gunwale and taxing my seamanship to the utmost to prevent her from filling. Under such circumstances, with the boat demanding my utmost vigilance to keep her afloat, it will be readily understood that I was only able at intervals to cast a momentary glance toward the ship to see how she was faring, and even then it was not always possible for me to catch a glimpse of her because of the mountainous seas that interposed themselves between her and me.  At length, however, when I had been adrift about half an hour, I got a chance to take a fairly long look to windward at a moment when the longboat was hove up on the crest of an unusually lofty wave; but the ship was nowhere to be seen; nor did I again catch sight of her, or even of the raft; and the only conclusion at which I could arrive was that she had gone down and taken all hands with her.
But, in such a mountainous sea as was then running, the horizon of a person in a boat is naturally very restricted, and I knew that, although I had failed to catch a glimpse of either the wreck or the raft, the latter at least might be afloat, and my plain duty was to remain in the neighbourhood so long as there was any chance of falling in with it; I therefore watched my opportunity and, seizing a favourable moment, wore the boat round on the other tack and, again bringing her to the wind, went back as nearly over the ground I had already traversed as was possible.  But although I kept a sharp look-out, and wore round every half-hour, I saw nothing, no, not even so much as a fragment of floating wreckage, to indicate what had actually happened; nor did I ever hear of any of my late crew being picked up.
It was about four bells--two o'clock--in the afternoon watch when I last saw the wreck; and I beat about, remaining as near the spot as I could, until sunset.  Then, having failed to fall in with or sight either the wreck or the raft, I came to the conclusion that I had seen the last of my mutinous crew, and that the time had arrived when I was quite justified in abandoning any further effort to find them, and might look after my own safety.
The weather, by this time, had improved very considerably; the wind had been slowly but steadily moderating, and the sea, although still tremendously high, was not now breaking dangerously; the sky also had cleared and was without a cloud; there was therefore every prospect of a fine night, with a further steady improvement of the weather; the boat was no longer dangerously pressed by the amount of canvas that she was carrying, and I felt that I need be under no immediate apprehension regarding the future.  Moreover my clothes had by this time dried upon my body, and I felt quite warm and comfortable.  But I was both hungry and thirsty, for the so-called dinner that I had snatched aboard the _Dolphin_ had been a very hasty and meagre meal.  I therefore hove the boat to, by lashing the tiller hard down and hauling the staysail sheet to windward, and then, finding that she rode quite comfortably and was taking care of herself, I proceeded to rummage among my stock of provisions, and soon had a hearty meal set out before me on the after thwart.
By the time that I had finished my supper night had fallen, the stars were shining with the brilliance that they only display in the tropics, and I was beginning to feel the need of sleep; I therefore took a final look round, satisfied myself that all was right and that nothing was in sight, and then, heartily commending myself to the care of my Maker, I stretched myself out on the bottom-boards, and was almost instantly asleep.
To say that I slept soundly that night would scarcely be speaking the truth; for, although I had pretty well satisfied myself before I lay down, that the weather was improving and that therefore I had little or no cause for immediate apprehension, a sailor quickly acquires the trick of maintaining a certain alertness, even in the midst of his slumbers, since he knows that the weather is his most formidable and treacherous enemy, against which he has always to be on his guard; and this faculty of alertness is of course especially active when, as in my own case, he has only himself to depend upon.  Consequently I never completely lost consciousness throughout that night, the rush of the wind, the hiss of the sea, the occasional sprinkling of spray were all mechanically noted, and whenever the heel of the boat appreciably exceeded its normal angle I at once became momentarily awake; yet, notwithstanding this, when on the following morning--the first rays of the newly risen sun smote upon my closed eyelids, informing me of the arrival of a new day, I at once arose, refreshed and vigorous, and ready to face any emergency that the day might bring.
My first act was to kneel down and return thanks for my preservation through the night and seek the protection and guidance of God throughout the day; after which I leaned over the boat's gunwale and freely laved my head, face, and hands in the clear salt-water.  Then I set about preparing for myself the most appetising breakfast that my resources would permit; and while I was doing this and discussing the meal I carefully reviewed the entire situation, with a view to my arrival at an immediate decision as to my future proceedings.
The chart which I had with me showed the position of the _Dolphin_ at the moment when my last observations were taken; and from this information I was able to deduce the approximate position of the spot where the vessel had foundered.  This spot, I found, was, in round figures, one thousand miles from Sierra Leone, and fourteen hundred miles from the island of Barbadoes; but whereas Sierra Leone was almost dead to windward, Barbadoes was as directly dead to leeward; and a little calculation convinced me that while it would take me about thirty-six days to beat to windward the shorter distance, I might cover the longer, running pleasantly before the wind, in about twenty-four days, allowing, in both cases, for the boat being hove-to throughout the night to enable me to obtain necessary rest.  Fortunately, I had with me not only the chart of the North Atlantic, but also a chronometer, sextant, nautical almanac, and boat compass; I was therefore equipped with every requisite for the efficient navigation of the boat, and had no fear of losing my way.  I could consequently without hesitation choose what I considered to be the most desirable course, and it did not need any very profound reflection to convince me that this was to make the best of my way back to Barbadoes.  I accordingly put up my helm, kept away before the wind, shook out all my reefs, and went sliding away to the westward, easily and comfortably, at a speed of some six knots per hour.
The weather had by this time reverted to quite its normal condition; the trade-wind was blowing steadily, the sea had gone down, and I had nothing worse than a somewhat heavy swell to contend with; I therefore felt that, unless I should be so unfortunate as to fall in with another gale, there was no reason at all why I should not reach my destination safely, and without very much discomfort.  My only trouble was that, running, as the boat now was, with the wind so far over the starboard quarter, I dared not release my hold upon the tiller for an instant, lest she should broach-to and, possibly, capsize.  Whenever, therefore, it became necessary for me to quit the helm for the purpose of taking an astronomical observation, or otherwise, I had to heave-to, and, occasionally, to shorten sail while doing so, which kept me pretty actively employed, off and on, all day.  Thus, about nine o'clock in the morning, I had to heave-to and leave the boat to take care of herself while I secured observations of the sun for the determination of the longitude; the same procedure had to be adopted again at noon when I took the sun's altitude for the determination of the latitude; and the preparation of a meal involved a further repetition of the manoeuvre. Thus I had no time to feel lonely, at least during the hours of daylight; but after nightfall, surrounded and hemmed in by the gloom and mystery of the darkness, with no companionship save that of the multitudinous stars--which, to my mind, never betray their immeasurable distance so clearly as when one is in mid-ocean--with the sough and moan of the night wind and the soft, seething hiss of the sea whispering in one's ears, the feeling of loneliness becomes almost an obsession, the sense of all-pervading mystery persistently obtrudes itself, and one quickly falls into a condition of readiness to believe the most incredible of the countless weird stories that sailors love to relate to each other, especially when this condition of credulity is helped, as it sometimes is, by the sudden irruption of some strange, unaccountable sound, or succession of sounds, upon the peaceful quietude and serenity of the night.  These sounds are occasionally of the weirdest and most hair-raising quality; and while the startled listener may possibly have heard it asserted, time and again, by superior persons, that they emanate from sea birds, or from fish, he is perfectly satisfied that neither sea birds nor fish have ever been known to emit such sounds _in the daytime_, and the strain of superstition within him awakes and whispers all sorts of uncanny suggestions, the sea bird and fish theory being rejected with scorn.  Moreover, those harrowingly mysterious sounds seem never to make themselves audible save when the accompanying circumstances are such as to conduce to the most startling and thrilling effect; thus, although I had now been knocking about at sea for more than three years, and had met with many queer experiences, I had never, thus far, heard a sound that I could not reasonably account for and attribute to some known source; yet on this particular night--my second night alone in the longboat--I was sitting comfortably enough in the stern-sheets, steering by a star--for I had no lantern wherewith to illuminate my compass--and thinking of nothing in particular, when suddenly a most unearthly cry came pealing out of the darkness on the starboard beam, seemingly not half a dozen yards away, and was twice repeated.
I felt the hair of my scalp bristle, and a violent shudder thrilled through me as those dreadful cries smote upon my ear, for they seemed to be the utterance of some human being in the very last extremity of both physical and mental anguish, the protest of a lost soul being wrenched violently out of its sinful human tenement, cries of such utter, unimaginable despair as the finite mind of man is unable to find a cause for.  Yet, despite the agony of horror that froze my blood, I instinctively thrust my helm hard down and flattened in the sheets fore and aft; for the thought came to me that, perchance, a few fathoms out there, veiled from sight in the soft, velvet blackness of the night, some poor wretch--a victim, like myself, to the fury of the late gale-- clinging desperately to a fragment of wreckage, might have caught a glimpse of the longboat's sails, sliding blackly along against the stars, and have emitted those terrible cries as a last despairing appeal for help and succour.  Accordingly, as the boat swept round and came to the wind, careening gunwale-to as she felt the full strength of the night breeze in her dew-sodden canvas, I sprang to my feet and, clapping both hands funnel-wise to my mouth, sent forth a hail:
"Ahoy, there! where are you?  Keep up your courage, for help is at hand. Where are you, I say?  Let me but know where to look for you and I'll soon be alongside.  Shout again; for I can see no sign of you.  Ahoy, there!  _Ahoy_!!  Ahoy!!!"
The sound of my own voice, coming immediately after that terrible thrice-repeated cry, seemed somehow comforting and reassuring, and I now awaited a reply to my hail with a feeling in which there was more of curiosity than horror.  But no reply came; and I once more lifted up my voice in tones of appeal and encouragement.  Then, since I failed to evoke any response, I put the boat's helm down, and tacked, the conviction being strong within me that I could hit off, to an inch, the exact spot from which those dreadful sounds had come.  So firmly convinced, indeed, was I of my ability to do this that when the boat came round I left the staysail sheet fast to windward, eased off the fore sheet, and stood by, leaning over the lee gunwale, in readiness to seize and haul inboard the drowning wretch who, I was fully persuaded, must be now almost under the boat's bilge.  But, although the starlight was sufficiently brilliant to have betrayed, at a distance of seven or eight yards, the presence of such an object as a man clinging to a piece of floating wreckage, I could see nothing, no, not even so much as a scrap of floating weed.  That I was bitterly disappointed--and also somewhat frightened--I freely admit; for I had somehow succeeded in convincing myself that those terrifying sounds had issued from the throat of a human being so close at hand that I could not possibly fail to find him; yet I had _not_ found him; had failed, indeed, to find the slightest suggestion of his presence; and if those sounds had not a human origin, _whence came they_?  It was the mystery of the thing, as well as the weird, unearthly character of the cries, that sent a thrill of horror through the marrow, and made me almost madly anxious to find an explanation.  I worked the boat to and fro athwart those few square yards of ocean for a full hour or more, and shouted myself hoarse, until I at length most unwillingly abandoned the search, and squared away to place as many miles as possible between myself and that unhallowed spot ere I attempted to sleep.
It must have been past midnight before I had so far thrown off the feeling of horror induced by the uncanny experience that I have related as to admit of my contemplating seriously the idea of securing some rest; and even when at length I did so, and had completed all my preparations, such as shortening sail and heaving-to, it was still some time before oblivion came to me.  But when it did, it was complete, for the weather was fine and had a settled appearance, the boat lay-to most admirably and took perfect care of herself, and altogether I felt so absolutely safe that there seemed to be no need at all for that peculiar attitude of alertness during sleep to which I have already alluded; my need of sound, refreshing slumber was great, and I lay down, determined to satisfy that need while the opportunity presented itself, and let myself go completely.
Yet, although I had surrendered myself to sleep with the settled conviction of my absolute safety, and the feeling that my repose would continue until broken by the first rays of the morrow's sun, I awakened suddenly while it was yet quite dark and when, as it seemed to me, I had only been asleep a very few minutes.  And my awakening was not that of a person who gradually passes from sleep to wakefulness because he has enjoyed a sufficiency of rest; it was an abrupt, instant transition from complete oblivion to a state of wide-awake, startled consciousness that caused me to leap to my feet and gaze wildly about me as my eyes snapped open to the star-lit heavens.  And as I did so I became aware of a rapidly growing sound of leaping, splashing, gurgling water, and a humming as of wind sweeping through tightly strained cordage, close to leeward.  There was no need for me to pause and consider what was the origin of these sounds; I recognised them instantly as those given forth by a sailing ship sweeping at a high speed through the water, and I sprang forward clear of the mainmast to where the stowed foresail permitted me a clear and uninterrupted view to leeward.  The next instant three dreadful cries in quick succession--exactly reproducing, tone for tone, those terrifying sounds that had so startled and unnerved me only a few hours earlier--burst from my lips; for there, almost within reach of my hand, was the black, towering mass of the hull and canvas of a large ship bearing straight down upon the longboat, and aiming accurately to strike her fair amidships.  So close was she that her long slender jib-boom, with the swelling jibs soaring high among the stars, was already over my head, the phosphorescent boil and smother from the plunge of her keen bows already foamed to the gunwale of the longboat.  A startled shout rang out upon the heavy night air from somebody upon her forecastle in response to those weird cries of mine, and above the hissing wash and gurgle of the water under her bows I caught the sound of naked feet padding upon her deck-planking, as the rudely awakened look-out sprang to peer over the topgallant rail.  But before the man could reach the spot for which he sprang the ship was upon me, and as her cutwater crashed into the frail hull of the boat, rending it asunder and flinging the two halves violently apart to roll bottom upward on either side of the swelling bows, I leapt desperately upward at the chain bobstay, caught it, shinned nimbly up it to the bowsprit, and made my breathless way inboard, to the terror and astonishment of some twenty forecastle hands who had evidently been startled out of a sound sleep by the sudden outcries and commotion under the bows, and into the midst of whom I unceremoniously tumbled.
The excited jabber which instantly arose among my new shipmates at once apprised me that I was aboard a vessel manned by Frenchmen.  A single quick glance aloft sufficed to inform me that she was barque-rigged, and probably of about three hundred and fifty tons measurement.  The excited and astonished watch crowded round me, regarding me curiously--and, methought, with looks not wholly devoid of suspicion.  They were, one and all, beginning to deluge me with questions, when an authoritative voice from the poop broke in with a demand to be informed what all the disturbance on the forecastle was about.  Whereupon an individual among the crowd who surrounded me, and who might have been, and indeed proved to be, the boatswain, took me by the arm, and bluntly suggested that I had better accompany him aft to Monsieur Leroy, the chief mate, and explain my uninvited presence aboard the barque.
It was, of course, the only thing to be done, and I accordingly turned and walked aft, with my arm still firmly grasped by the individual who had made the suggestion, and who seemed to regard me as his prisoner, until we reached the poop ladder, up which I was somewhat unceremoniously hustled, to find myself in the presence of a broad, sturdily built man of about middle height, who stood at the head of the ladder, with his feet wide apart, lightly balancing himself to the roll and plunge of the ship.  There was a lighted lamp hanging in the skylight some two or three fathoms away, and as this man stood between me and the light, which somewhat feebly gleamed out through the skylight on to the deck, I was unable to see his features or the details of his dress; but as he stepped back and somewhat to one side to make way for me the light fell full upon me, and, feeble as it was, it sufficed to show him my uniform.
"Ah!" he exclaimed sharply, "a British naval officer, if I am not very greatly mistaken.  Pray, monsieur, where did you come from; and are there any more of you?"
"I came in over the bows, a minute ago, out of a boat that--thanks to the blind look-out that your people seem to keep--you ran down and cut in two.  And there are no more of us; I was the only occupant of the boat," I answered.
"The only occupant of the boat!" he exclaimed in astonishment.  "You amaze me, monsieur.  Is it permissible to inquire how you, a British officer, come to be adrift, quite alone, in a boat, in the middle of the Atlantic?"
Whereupon I told him briefly the story of the loss of the _Dolphin_, very imprudently adding the information that she was a unit of the Slave Squadron, and that I was her commander.
"Ah!" he commented, incisively, when I had finished.  "An exceedingly interesting story.  Captain Tourville will be pleased that we have picked you up when he hears the news to-morrow.  Meanwhile, by lucky chance we happen to have an unoccupied state-room into which I will put you for the remainder of the night.  Thoreau,"--to the man who had conducted me aft--"take this gentleman below to the cabin; then turn out the steward and tell him to put some bedding into the spare state-room, but to be silent about it lest he disturb the captain.  And now, monsieur, permit me to bid you good-night.  I trust you will rest well."
The man Thoreau, who seemed to be an individual of exceedingly glum and taciturn disposition, thereupon signed to me to follow him, and led the way down the poop ladder and through an open door in the front of the poop which gave access to a narrow passage, some eight feet long, at the end of which was another open door giving access to the ship's main cabin.  This was a fairly roomy and comfortable apartment, plainly but tastefully fitted up, with a mahogany table running lengthwise down the middle, through the centre of which the mizenmast passed down to the depths below.  A row of seats upholstered in red Utrecht velvet, and with swinging backs, was secured, on each side of the table, to the deck, between which and the sides of the cabin ran narrow strips of carpet.  The sides and ends of the cabin were formed of bulkheads, the fore bulkhead being occupied by a sort of sideboard on each side of the entrance door, while against the after bulkhead stood a very handsome pianoforte, open, with a quantity of music in a stand beside it.  There was a door to the right of the piano, which, I conjectured, led to the captain's state-room, right abaft; and the side bulkheads, which like the rest of the woodwork of the cabin were painted in white enamel, were each pierced by two doors, close together, which, I had no doubt, gave access to state-rooms.  My surmise as to this arrangement was proved true, a few minutes later, by the steward, an ugly, shock-headed, taciturn individual, who, still more than half asleep, presently came stumbling into the cabin with a bundle of bedding, which, having with silent care opened the aftermost door on the port side, he flung into the dark state-room and then motioned me to enter; it appeared that he intended me to make up my own bed.  Well, that was no very great hardship; but I should have liked a light to enable me to see what I was about, and I turned to ask my surly friend for one, but he had already turned his back upon me and was in full retreat to the forecastle to finish his interrupted night's rest.  I therefore opened out the bundle and found that it consisted of a straw mattress, a flock pillow, and a pair of blankets, all of which I at once proceeded to arrange in the bunk, as best I could, by the dim light which entered the open door from the main cabin.  Then I most thankfully removed my clothes--for the first time since the springing up of the gale--tumbled into the bunk, and at once fell fast asleep.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN.
IN THE POWER OF A MADMAN.
The sounds of water being freely sluiced along the deck overhead, and of the vigorous use of holystones and scrubbing-brushes immediately following thereupon, awoke me on the following morning, and I opened my eyes to find the rays of the newly risen sun flashing off the heaving surface of the ocean through the open scuttle of the state-room which I occupied.  Although I could not have been asleep more than three or four hours at most, I awoke wonderfully refreshed, and the memory of what had happened to me during the night instantly returning, I at once sprang out of the berth, determined to avail myself forthwith of the renewed opportunity of starting the day by taking a salt-water bath under the head pump.  It took me but a few seconds to make my way out on deck, where I found the watch, under the supervision of the second mate, as I presumed, busily engaged in the operation of washing decks, while the fresh, invigorating trade-wind, sweeping in over the port cat-head, hummed and drummed with an exhilarating note through the taut weather rigging and into the hollows of the straining canvas overhead.  The weather was brilliantly fine, the clear, deep azure of the sky merely flecked here and there with a few solemnly drifting puff-balls of trade- cloud, and the ocean of deepest blue sweeping in long, regular, sparkling, snow-capped surges diagonally athwart our bows, from beneath which the flying-fish continually sprang into the air and went flashing away on either hand, like handfuls of bright silver dollars new from the Mint.  Merely to breathe such an exhilarating atmosphere, and to feel the buoyant, life-like lift and plunge of the straining, hurrying ship, were joys unspeakable, and I felt in positively hilarious spirits as I danced up the poop ladder to greet the officer of the watch, and prefer my modest request for a minute's use of the head pump.
The individual whom I assumed to be the officer of the watch was a young fellow apparently not very much older than myself, attired in a somewhat dandified style of semi-uniform, bare-footed, and with his trousers rolled up above his knees.  It was he who was sluicing the water about the poop so freely, while half-a-dozen of the crew vigorously plied the holystone and scrubber under his directions, and my first quick glance round the decks sufficed to show that the holystoning process was confined to the poop only, the cleansing of the main-deck seemed to be accomplished sufficiently by the application of the scrubber only.  The exuberant buoyancy of my spirits suffered a sudden and distinct check as I glanced at the faces of those about me, which, without exception, seemed to belong to the lowest and most depraved class of seamen-- sullen, brutal, reckless, resembling, more than anything else, in air and expression, an assemblage of wild beasts, whose natural ferocity has not been eradicated but is held in check, subdued, and daunted by the constant exercise of a ferocity even greater than their own.  The aspect of the young man whom I conceived to be the officer of the watch was even more repellent than that of his subordinates; and it was in distinctly subdued tones that I bade him good-morning and preferred my request to be allowed to take a bath under the head pump.
He did not respond to my salutation, but, carefully placing upon the deck the bucket which he had just emptied, stood intently regarding me, with his feet wide apart and both hands upon his hips.  He remained silent for so long a time that the men about him suspended their operations, regarding him with dull curiosity, while I felt my patience rapidly oozing away and my temper rising at the gratuitous insolence of his demeanour, and I was on the point of making some rather pungent remarks when he suddenly seemed to bethink himself, and said, in accents that were apparently intended to convey some suggestion of an attempt at civility:
"So you are the British naval officer that Monsieur Leroy told me about when I relieved him, are you?  And you want a bath, do you?  Very well; go and take one, by all means.  And, hark ye, Monsieur Englishman, a word in your ear.  Take my advice, and after you have had your bath get back to your cabin, and stay there until the captain has been informed of your presence in the ship; for if he were to come on deck, and unexpectedly see you, the chances are that he would blow your brains out without thinking twice about it.  He is not quite an angel in the matter of temper, and I may tell you that he is not too well disposed toward Englishmen in general, and English naval officers in particular.  Now be off, get your bath, and scuttle back to your cabin as quickly as may be."
"I am much obliged to you for your warning, monsieur," said I, "and I will act upon it.  Do you care to increase my obligation to you by stating why your captain has such a--prejudice, shall we call it, against British naval officers?"
"Well," replied my new acquaintance--whose name I subsequently learned was Gaston Marcel--"for one thing, this ship, which is his own property, is employed in the slave-trade, and Captain Tourville has already suffered much loss and damage through the meddlesome interference of your pestilent cruisers.  But I believe he has other and more private reasons for his hatred of your nation and comrades."
So that was it.  After having suffered shipwreck, I had been run down and narrowly escaped with my life, only to fall into the hands of a Frenchman--and a slaver at that!  Now, most slavers were little if anything better than pirates; they were outlaws whose crimes were punishable with death; trusting for their safety, for the most part, to the speed of their ships, but fighting with the desperation of cornered rats when there was no other way of escape; neither giving nor asking quarter; and, in many cases, guilty of the most unspeakable atrocities toward those hapless individuals serving in the Slave Squadron who were unfortunate enough to fall into their hands.  This was especially true in the case of those who carried on their nefarious traffic under the French flag; for they were, almost without exception, West Indian Creoles, most of whom bore a dash of negro blood in their veins, therefore adding the inherited ferocity of the West African savage to the natural depravity of those to whose unbridled passions they owed their being.  If, as was more than likely, I had fallen into the power of one of these fiends, my plight was like to be desperate indeed.  I came to the conclusion that I could not do better than act upon the advice of the second mate, and abide the issue of events with as much equanimity as I could muster.  Accordingly, as soon as I had taken my bath I returned to the state-room which had been assigned to me by the mate, and there remained _perdu_, awaiting the moment when that somewhat formidable individual the captain should be pleased to send for me.
The approach to my state-room was, it will be remembered, through the main cabin; and as I passed through the latter the ugly, shock-headed steward, more ugly and more shock-headed now, in the garish light of day, than he had been when he presented himself fresh from his hammock on the night before--was down on his hands and knees busily engaged in scrubbing the cabin floor, while the strips of carpet and the table- cloth were rolled up and placed upon the table, the beautifully polished surface of which was partially protected by a large square of green baize.  I bade the fellow good-morning; but he took no more notice of me than if I had never spoken; so I passed on and entered my sleeping apartment, closing the door behind me.  I then proceeded to dress leisurely and perform my toilet as well as the means at my disposal would permit, but when it is remembered that I had no change of linen, and owned only the clothes which I happened to be wearing when I was washed off the wreck, it will be readily understood that when I had done all that was possible to render myself presentable the result still left much to be desired.
The steward finished the washing and swabbing of the cabin deck, and then retired, returning about half an hour later--by which time the planks were dry--to relay the strips of carpet, replace the table-cloth, and arrange the table for breakfast, producing, somewhat to my surprise, a very elegant table-equipage of what, seen through the slats which formed the upper panel of my cabin door, appeared to be solid silver and quite valuable china.
He had barely finished his task when seven bells struck on deck, and prompt upon the last stroke the door in the after bulkhead was thrown open and a man issued from it, and, passing rapidly through the cabin, with just a momentary pause to glance at the tell-tale barometer swinging in the skylight, made his way out on deck.
I caught a glimpse of him, through the slats in the top panel of my door, as he passed, and judged him to be about thirty years of age.  He was rather tall, standing about five feet ten inches in his morocco slippers; very dark--so much so that I strongly suspected the presence of negro blood in his veins--with a thick crop of jet-black hair, a luxuriantly bushy beard, and a heavy thick moustache, all very carefully trimmed, and so exceedingly glossy that I thought it probable that the gloss was due to artificial means.  The man was decidedly good-looking, in a Frenchified fashion, and was a sea dandy of the first water, as was evidenced by the massive gold earrings in his ears, the jewelled studs in the immaculate front of his shirt of pleated cambric, his nattily cut suit of white drill, and the diamond on the little finger of his right hand, the flash of which I caught as he raised his hand to shield his eyes from the dazzle of the sun when glancing at the barometer.
I heard his voice--a rather rich, full baritone--addressing the second mate, but could not distinguish what was said, at that distance and among the multitudinous noises of the straining ship; and a few minutes later the door opposite my own, on the other side of the cabin, opened, and Monsieur Leroy, the chief mate of the ship--to whose slackness of discipline I was chiefly indebted for being run down during the previous night--emerged and followed his chief out on deck.  I recognised him in part by his figure, and in part by the fact that he was evidently an occupant of one of the state-rooms adjoining the main cabin, which would only be assigned to an officer of rank and consideration.  As I now gained a momentary glimpse of him he appeared to be about thirty-seven years of age, broadly built, his features almost hidden by the thickly growing beard, whiskers, and moustache that adorned them, and out of which gleamed and flashed a pair of resolute but good-natured eyes as black as the bushy eyebrows that overshadowed them.  He was dressed in a coat and pair of trousers of fine, dark-blue cloth, and, like the captain, wore no waistcoat.  His shirt, thus exposed, however, unlike that of his superior, was made of coarse linen woven with a narrow blue stripe in it.  Also, like his captain, he wore no stockings on his slippered feet.
While I was speculating what the captain's behaviour toward me would probably be, the steward unceremoniously flung open my cabin door, and in surly tones curtly informed me that the captain desired to see me at once upon the poop.  He stood aside to permit me to pass, waved a directing hand toward the passage leading out on deck, and then busied himself in putting a few finishing touches to the arrangement of the table.
When, in obedience to this summons, I stepped out on deck, the washing down had been completed and the planks were already practically dry; the running gear had been carefully coiled down; the brasswork polished; mops, swabs, and scrubbing-brushes stowed away; and the crew were mustered on the forecastle, partaking of breakfast.  They glanced curiously at me as I emerged on to the quarter-deck, and one of them said something that excited a burst of sardonic laughter from the rest, disregarding which I sprang lightly up the poop ladder and found myself in the presence of a group consisting of the captain and the two mates. The countenances of the latter expressed much annoyance and some perturbation, particularly that of Leroy, the chief mate; but the look of savage ferocity on the captain's face was positively fiendish, and enough to strike terror into the heart of even the boldest who might find himself in the power of such an individual.  My hopes of considerate, or even of ordinarily merciful, treatment from one of so vindictively ferocious a character as this man seemed to be at once sunk to zero; yet I was not minded that any Frenchman should enjoy the satisfaction of saying that he had frightened me.  I therefore assumed a boldness of demeanour that I was very far from feeling, and bowed with all the ease and grace that I could muster.  Then addressing the captain I said:
"Good-morning, Captain Tourville.  I am afraid that the hard necessities of misfortune compel me to claim from you that succour and hospitality which the shipwrecked seaman has the right to ask--"
"Stop!" shouted Tourville, as, with clenched fist, he stood seeming about to spring upon me; "I admit no such right, especially of an Englishman.  The English have ever been my most implacable enemies. Because, forsooth, I choose to earn my living by following a vocation of which some of them disapprove, they must needs do their utmost to ruin me, and by heaven they have very nearly succeeded, too!  Who are they that they should presume to thrust their opinions down the throats of other people?  If their own countrymen choose to be led by the nose and are willing to submit to their dictation, well and good, it is nothing to me; it is their own affair, not mine.  But what right have they to dictate to other nations, to say you shall do this, and shall not do that?  I tell you that it is nothing short of monstrous, and I am ashamed of France that she has submitted to be thus dictated to.  But if my country is so weak as to tolerate interference from a foreign Power, I am not.  I claim to judge for myself what is right or wrong, and to be governed by my own conscience.  I am a slaver, and I care not who knows it!  And I will continue to be a slaver as long as I please, despite the disapproval of a few English fanatics.  But let those beware who dare to interfere with me, and especially those Englishmen who have done their utmost to ruin me!  You, monsieur, are one of them; by your own confession you belong to an English man-o'-war engaged in the suppression of that trade by which I am striving to make a living; and do you suppose that because you happen to have suffered shipwreck you are entitled to claim from me succour and hospitality, and ultimate restoration to your own people in order that you and others like you may do your utmost to ruin me?  I tell you no!  I do not admit the claim; you are an enemy--an implacable enemy--and you shall be treated as such. The fact of your shipwreck is merely an accident that has placed you in my power, and you shall die!  I will revenge upon you some few of the countless injuries that I have suffered at the hands of your accursed countrymen!"
"Shame upon you, monsieur!"  I cried.  "Are you coward enough to revenge yourself upon a mere lad like myself?  I will not ask you what your crew will think of you, but what will you think of yourself, in your calmer moments, when you come to reflect--"
"Silence, boy!" he thundered; "silence, you English dog!  How dare you speak--" Then, suddenly interrupting himself, he turned to the chief mate and exclaimed:
"Leroy, have that insolent young puppy confined below in irons until I can make up my mind how to dispose of him."
The chief mate approached and took me by the arm.  "Come with me, Monsieur John Bulldogue," said he, not unkindly, as he led me away; "and do not allow yourself to be more anxious as to your fate than you can help.  I tell you candidly that I cannot form the slightest idea what that fate will eventually be; many men, knowing the skipper as well as I do, would no doubt say that you will be thrown to the sharks before you are an hour older--and it may be; yes, it certainly may be; for you are the first who has ever dared to assume a defiant attitude toward him and he is an inordinately vain man, as well as a man of unbridled temper. But, somehow, I am inclined to think that your defiance, which some people would say must seal your fate, will be more likely to tell in your favour than against you.  Yes; although you have the misfortune to be an Englishman, I really think I may venture to encourage you to hope for the best.  Now, here we are; and here comes Moulineux with the irons.  I must obey orders and see that they are put on you; but make yourself as comfortable as you can; and I will send you down some breakfast presently.  And, monsieur, you may rely upon my goodwill; I admire courage wherever I see it, whether in friend or in enemy, and you have proved that you possess it.  If I find it in my power to do anything to help you, I will."
The place in which I now found myself confined was a small apartment that was apparently used upon occasion as an auxiliary store-room, for there were a number of barrels and cases of various sizes in it, as well as what had the appearance of being spare sails.  As the place was constructed in the depths of the ship, and considerably below the level of the water-line, there was no window to give light to it, the only light which reached it being as much as could find its way down through the partially open hatchway, some ten feet above.  I was therefore able to observe my surroundings only very indistinctly even after I had been some time in the place and my eyes had become accustomed to the gloom of it.  The mate was as good as his word in the matter of breakfast, a man bringing down to me a most excellent and substantial meal after I had been incarcerated for nearly an hour.  I discussed the food with relish, for I was hungry, and then sat impatiently awaiting the moment when my fate should be made known to me.  But hour after hour passed without word or sign from the man who held my destiny in the hollow of his hand; and it was not until late in the afternoon that the carpenter appeared and, removing my irons, requested me to follow him.  He conducted me up the steep ladder leading to the main-deck and into the main cabin, where Captain Tourville was sitting alone.  There was silence for a full minute after the carpenter had ushered me into the cabin and closed the door behind me.  Tourville remained seated at the end of the table, with one hand clenched on the cloth before him, while with the other he plucked quickly and impatiently at his thick beard and then combed it through with his fingers, "glowering" moodily at me meanwhile, in an absent-minded fashion, as though he scarcely realised my presence.  At length he pulled himself together with an effort, and, pointing to the lockers, said:
"Be seated, monsieur, and have the kindness to tell me who and what you are; and how you come to be on board my ship.  I have only heard my chief mate's story as yet."
Whereupon I proceeded to give him the required information, as briefly as possible, not omitting to mention the fact of my being an officer of the Slave Squadron; for I had already stated this to the chief mate, and from what had transpired earlier in the day I knew that he, in turn, had communicated the information to his captain.  That what I told him did not appear greatly to increase his state of irritation seemed proof enough that he had already learned all the material facts, and I congratulated myself upon having shown him that I was not to be frightened into the suppression of any portion of my history, no matter how damaging its effect might be expected to be upon my interests.  When I had told him everything he remained silent for quite two or three minutes, drumming the table meditatively with his fingers.
At length he looked up from the table, at which he had been moodily glowering, and said:
"Monsieur Fortescue, I thank you for the evident frankness with which you have told your story; and, in return, feel that you are entitled to some explanation of what you must doubtless have deemed my very extraordinary conduct of this morning.  It is unnecessary for me to enter into details, but I may inform you that I have suffered irreparable loss and injury at the hands of the English.  They have chosen to regard the method by which I earn my living as unlawful, and on no less than four occasions have brought me to the verge of ruin at the moment when I was upon the point of realising a handsome competence. They have persecuted me relentlessly, confiscated my property, slain my two brothers in action, and would have hanged me ignominiously, had I not been fortunate enough to effect my escape from them; and it was an Englishman who--well, that is a story into which I need not enter with you; let it suffice to say that the injuries which I have suffered at the hands of your countrymen have been such, that the mere name of Englishman excites me to a very frenzy of anger and hate, in which I am really not responsible for my actions.  Now, the question is: What is to be done with you?  I tell you candidly that your life is not safe for a moment while you remain on board this ship.  Even as you sit there the memory of all that I have suffered at the hands of your countrymen so strongly moves me that I find it exceedingly difficult to refrain from blowing your brains out--"
"But, monsieur," I interrupted, "pardon me for suggesting such a thing, but are you not surrendering yourself to a very childish weakness?  Is it possible that you, a man in the very prime of life and apparently in perfect bodily and mental health, can be so utterly devoid of self- control that because you have suffered injury, real or imagined, from--"
"_Sacre_!" he interrupted, starting savagely to his feet; "there is no question, monsieur, as to the reality of the injuries that I have suffered at the hands of your hateful countrymen--"
"Very well, monsieur," I cut in, speaking very quietly, "for argument's sake I will admit, if you like, that your injuries are both real and deep.  Still, does it not seem to you absurdly illogical that because certain persons have injured you, you must yield to this insane craving to wreak your revenge upon somebody else who has had no hand in the infliction of those injuries?"
"Quite possibly; I cannot tell," answered Tourville.  "It may be that I _am_ mad on this one particular point.  But I do not admit the soundness of your argument, monsieur.  You contend that you personally have not injured me.  That may be perfectly true.  But you admit that you belong to the Slave Squadron; and it is at the hands of that same squadron that I have suffered much of the injury of which I complain.  Now it is impossible for me to discriminate between the individuals in that squadron who have injured me, and those who have not; and I therefore contend that I am perfectly justified in wreaking my vengeance upon any of them who chance to fall into my power.  And, in any case, if I should blow out your brains I shall at least have rid myself of one potential enemy.  Therefore--"
And to my immeasurable surprise the man calmly drew a pistol from his belt and levelled it across the table straight at my head.  I sprang to my feet with the idea of flinging myself upon and disarming him, for I could no longer doubt the fellow was stark, staring mad upon this one particular point; but before I could get at him the weapon exploded, and the ball, passing so close to my head that I felt it stir my hair, buried itself in the panelling of the cabin behind me.  With a savage snarl he raised his hand, and would have dashed the heavy pistol-butt in my face; but by that time I was upon him, and, seizing his throat with one hand, while I wrenched the weapon from his grasp with the other, I bore him to the deck, and planted my right knee square in the middle of his chest, pinning him securely down.
"You treacherous, murderous scoundrel!"  I cried.  "How shall I deal with you?  You are as dangerous as a wild beast!  If I were to beat your brains out with the butt of this pistol I should only be treating you as you deserve!  And I will do it too as sure as you are lying there at my mercy, unless you will swear by all you hold sacred that you will never again attempt my life, and that you will set me ashore, free, at the first port at which we touch.  Will you swear that, or will you die?"
"I swear it, monsieur," he gasped.  "Release my throat and let me rise, and I swear to you by the Blessed Virgin that I will declare a truce in your favour, and that you shall leave this ship as soon as a suitable opportunity offers."
I relaxed my grasp upon his throat, and permitted him to regain his feet, whereupon he looked at me for some moments with an expression of surprise, not altogether unmingled, methought, with fear.  Then, bowing profoundly, he said:
"Leave me, monsieur, I beg of you.  I will send for you again, a little later."
I passed out of the cabin, and made my way up on to the poop, where I found Monsieur Leroy, the chief mate, in charge of the watch.  He nodded to me as I ascended the poop ladder, and when I joined him in his fore- and-aft promenade of the weather side of the deck, jerked his head knowingly toward the skylight and remarked:
"In his tantrums _again_?  Ah! quite as I expected.  It is rather unfortunate for you, monsieur, that you happen to be an Englishman, for the mere mention of the word to him has the same effect as exhibiting a red rag to a bull: it drives him perfectly frantic with rage."
"So it appears," remarked I dryly.  "What is the cause of it?  Have you any idea?"
"No," answered the mate.  "I doubt whether anybody knows; perhaps he does not even know himself.  Of course I have heard him speak of the losses which he has sustained through the interference of the ships of the Slave Squadron; but we who elect to make our living by following a vocation which civilised nations have agreed to declare unlawful must be prepared to be interfered with.  For my own part I have no particular fault to find with those who have undertaken to suppress the slave- trade.  We go into the business with our eyes open; we know the penalties attaching to it; and if we are foolish or unskilful enough to permit ourselves to be caught we must not grumble if those penalties are exacted from us.  I like the life; I enjoy it; it is full of excitement and adventure; and when we succeed in outwitting you gentlemen the profits are handsome enough to amply repay us for all our risk and trouble.  It is like playing a game of skill for a heavy wager; and I contend that no man who is not sportsman enough to bear his losses philosophically should engage in the game.  But that is not precisely what ails the skipper; he takes his ill-luck grievously to heart it is true, but he insists that he has other grievances against the English as well; and, whatever they may be, they seem to have partially turned his brain."
"Partially!"  I objected.  "Why, the man is as mad as a March hare.  He absolutely loses all control of himself when he allows his temper to master him, and becomes more like a savage beast than a man!"
"Ay, that is true, he does," agreed Leroy.  "But, hark ye, monsieur, let me give you a friendly hint--you have escaped unharmed thus far, therefore I believe you may consider yourself reasonably safe; but in case of any further outbreaks on the captain's part, take especial care that you give him no reason to suppose that you are afraid of him; that is the surest road to safety with him."
"Upon my word I believe you are right," said I.  "At all events that is the road which I took with him just now, for I pinned him down to the cabin deck, and threatened to beat his brains out.  Yet here I am, alive, to speak of it."
"Good!" ejaculated the mate.  "If you did that you are all right; I believe that if there is one thing he admires more than another it is absolute fearlessness.  Show him that you do not care the snap of a finger for him and he will forgive you anything, even the fact that you are an Englishman."
I walked the poop with Monsieur Leroy for a full hour, chatting with him and learning many things very well worth knowing; and while I was chatting with him I kept my eyes about me, carefully noting all the particulars and peculiarities of the barque, with a view to future contingencies.  Among other things I learned that she was named _La Mouette_; that she was of three hundred and sixty-four tons register; that she mounted fourteen twenty-eight pound carronades on her main-deck and four six-pounders on her poop; that she carried a complement of one hundred and seventy men; and that she was then bound into the river Kwara for a cargo of slaves to be conveyed to Martinique, or Cuba, as circumstances might decide.
At the end of about an hour I was once more summoned to the cabin, where I found Tourville sitting at the table.  The man had now completely regained his self-control; he was perfectly calm, and waved me courteously to a seat on the cabin sofa, which I took.
"Monsieur Fortescue," said he, "I shall not mock you or myself by pretending to excuse or apologise for my recent outbreak of violence, for it is due to a weakness which I am wholly unable to conquer, and which may, quite possibly, get the better of me again.  If it should, I must ask you to kindly be patient and forbearing with me, and to keep out of my way until the fit has passed.  What I particularly wish to say to you now is that you are from this moment perfectly safe so long as it may be necessary for you to honour my ship with your presence.  But, since you will naturally desire to rejoin your own ship as speedily as possible, I propose to tranship you into the first vessel bearing the British flag which we may chance to fall in with--provided, of course, that she is not a ship of war.  Should we happen to fall in with a British man-o'-war, my course of action will be guided by circumstances; I shall not feel myself justified in trusting to her captain's magnanimity to let us go free after delivering you safe on board her; but should the weather be fine enough to allow of such a proceeding without risk to you, I will give you a boat in which you may make your own way on board her.  Meanwhile, I beg that you will regard yourself as my guest, free to come and go in this cabin as you please, and to take your meals at my table; and I have also made arrangements for your greater comfort in the state-room which Leroy assigned to you when you came aboard last night.  I trust that these plans of mine will be agreeable to you."
I replied that they were not only perfectly agreeable to me, but that I regarded them as exceedingly generous--taking all the circumstances of the case into consideration; that I regretted his violent antipathy to Englishmen, as I feared that, in consequence of it, my presence could never be otherwise than exceedingly disagreeable to him, but that during my enforced sojourn aboard _La Mouette_ I would strive to render my nationality as little obtrusive as possible, and that I trusted we might very soon be fortunate enough to fall in with a craft of some sort into which he could transfer me.  To which he replied that he fervently hoped so too, for both our sakes; then directing my attention to a case of books attached to the after bulkhead, on the opposite side to that occupied by the piano, he rose, bowed, and retired to his own cabin.  As for me, I went out on deck and resumed my conversation with Leroy, telling him what had passed, and begging him to keep a sharp look-out for vessels; for that since Captain Tourville made no attempt to disguise his uneasiness at my presence on board his ship I was quite determined to tranship into the first craft that we might happen to fall in with, provided, of course, that she did not happen to be of questionable character--for I had no inclination to jump out of the frying-pan into the fire by going aboard another slaver.
The mate fully agreed with me as to the wisdom of leaving the ship as soon as possible; indeed I soon discovered that, even after what had passed between Tourville and myself, he was still very far from satisfied that there might not be further trouble ahead.  "If such should unfortunately come," said he, "you must maintain a bold front, and show him that you are not to be so easily frightened.  When his fits are upon him he very strongly reminds me of a wild beast which hesitates to attack so long as one faces it boldly, but springs the instant that one's back is turned."
I considered this very excellent advice, singularly applicable to the circumstances, and determined to act upon it.  At eight bells I was summoned below to supper, and found the cabin brilliantly lit, and the table a picture of dainty elegance in the matter of equipage and of choice fare.  Captain Tourville was evidently no ascetic in the matter of eating and drinking, and the meal to which we immediately sat down was quite as good as many that I have partaken of ashore in so-called first-class hotels.
Tourville seemed at first to be in imminent danger of relapsing into one of his black moods, for he was distrait and inclined to be silent; but I was determined not to permit this if I could help it.  I therefore persisted in talking to him, trying him with subject after subject, until I discovered him to be an enthusiast upon the arts of painting and music--in both of which I also dabbled, in an amateurish way.  As soon as I spoke of these his brow cleared, he threw off his gloom, and spoke fluently and with evident knowledge of his subject, with the result that the meal which had begun so inauspiciously ended quite pleasantly.  Nay, more than that, as soon as the cloth was drawn this extraordinary man opened the piano and, sitting down to it, played piece after piece, sang several songs, and finally invited me to sing, the result being that, on the whole, the evening passed with far less constraint than I had anticipated.
The next morning, while Tourville was engaged in taking his sights for the longitude and working them out, he suddenly complained of feeling ill, sent for Leroy, gave him certain instructions, and then took to his bed.  By noon it became evident that he was in for a smart attack of malarial fever, to which it appeared he was very subject; and when I turned in that night the mate volunteered the information that he feared the skipper was going to be very ill.
Tourville's condition on the following morning amply justified Leroy's foreboding; he grew steadily worse, became delirious, and at length grew so violent that about mid-day the mate considered it necessary to remain with him constantly, lest in his madness he should rise from his bed and fling himself through the stern windows into the sea.  One result of this was that I offered to take Leroy's watch, from eight o'clock to midnight, an offer which was gratefully accepted; but as we were running down before a fair wind there was nothing for me to do beyond maintaining a good look-out, and I thus found it unnecessary to give the crew any orders or to interfere with them in any way.  For the next three days Tourville's condition was such that the constant presence of some one in his cabin, night and day, to watch over him and guard against the possibility of his doing himself an injury, became an absolute necessity, and Leroy, the chief mate, and Thoreau, the boatswain, shared this duty between them.  I volunteered to assume nursing duty in the place of Leroy, but my offer was declined, the chief mate rather drily remarking that the presence of an Englishman by the captain's bedside was scarcely likely to accelerate the patient's recovery, while some of his ravings were of such a character that it was better for all concerned that I should not hear them.  But, he added, if I would be complaisant enough to keep his watch for him, he would esteem it a very great favour.  Of course I could do no less than accede to this suggestion with a good grace.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN.
H.B.M.S.  GADFLY.
I had been on duty as Leroy's deputy for two whole days when it fell to my turn to keep the middle watch, that is to say, the watch which extends from midnight to four o'clock in the morning.
When, upon being called by Marcel, the second mate, I went on deck to relieve him, he informed me that the wind had been steadily dropping all through the first watch, and expressed a fear that we were about to lose it altogether.  This did not in the least surprise me, for we were now at about our lowest parallel, and on the border at least of, if not actually within, the belt of practically perpetual calms that exists about the Line, which are the sources of so much delay, vexation, and hard work to the mariner.  That the wind had dropped very considerably since I had turned in was evident to me even before I reached the deck, for, upon turning out of my bunk to dress after being called, I had immediately noticed that the ship was almost upon an even keel, while the inert "sloppy" sound of the water alongside that reached my ears through the open port of my cabin told me that we were sailing but slowly.
The night was intensely dark, for the moon was but one day old, and had only barely revealed herself as a thin line of faint pearl in the evening sky for about half an hour before she followed the sun beneath the horizon, there was not a star to be seen in the whole of the visible firmament, and there was a feeling of hot, muggy dampness in the air that made me shrewdly suspect the presence overhead of a pall of rain- charged vapour, which would account for the opacity of the darkness which hemmed us in and pressed down upon us from above.
As Marcel curtly bade me good-night and went below upon being relieved, after giving me the course to be steered, and expressing his forebodings concerning the weather, I walked aft, glanced into the binnacle, and inquired of the helmsman whether the ship still held steerage-way, to which he replied that she did, and that was about all, the man whom he had relieved at eight bells having informed him that the log, when last hove, had recorded a speed of barely two and a half knots.  He also volunteered the opinion that we were booked for a heavy downpour of rain before long, significantly glancing at the same time at the oilskins and sou'wester which he had brought aft with him.
As the time dragged slowly along the heat seemed steadily to grow more oppressive, and the difficulty of obtaining a full breath greater; the perspiration was streaming from every pore of my body, and I felt almost too languid to drag one foot after the other as I moved about the deck. That the sick man also was affected unfavourably was evident, for his shouts came up through the after skylight with positively startling distinctness as his delirium grew more acute.
At length, just after two bells had struck--and how dreadfully clamourous the strokes sounded in that heavy, stagnant air--the helmsman reported that the ship was no longer under command; and presently she swung broadside-on to the swell, rolling heavily, with loud splashing and gurgling sounds in the scuppers, with a swirling and washing of water under the counter, frequent vicious kicks of the now useless rudder, accompanied by violent clankings of the wheel chains, loud creakings and groanings of the timbers, heavy flappings and rustlings of the invisible canvas aloft, with fierce jerks of the chain sheets, and, in short, a full chorus of those multitudinous sounds that emanate from a rolling ship in a stark calm.  The helmsman, no longer needed, lashed the wheel and, gathering up his oilskins, slouched away forward, muttering that he was going to get a light for his pipe; and I let him go, although I knew perfectly well that he had no intention of returning uncalled; for, after all, where was the use of keeping the man standing there doing nothing?  I therefore contented myself by calling upon the hands forward, from time to time, to keep a bright look-out, and flung myself into a basket-chair belonging to the skipper.
Sitting thus, I gradually fell into a somewhat sombre reverie, in the course of which I reviewed the events that had befallen me during the short period that had elapsed since the _Dolphin_ and the _Eros_ had parted company.  I went over again, in memory, all the circumstances connected with the loss of the brigantine, the hours I had spent alone in the longboat, her destruction and my somewhat dramatic appearance among the crew of _La Mouette_, my reception by her mad captain, and then fell to conjecturing what the future might have in store for me, when I was suddenly aroused to a consciousness of my immediate surroundings by a sort of impression it was no more than that--that I had heard the sound of a ship's bell struck four times--_ting-ting_, _ting-ting_--far away yonder in the heart of the thick darkness.  So faint, such a mere ghost of a sound, did it seem to be that I felt almost convinced it was purely imaginary, an effect resulting from the train of thought in which I had been indulging; yet I rose to my feet and, walking over to the skylight, peered through it at the cabin clock to ascertain what the time might actually be.  _It was on the stroke of two o'clock_!  Therefore if, as I had assured myself, the sounds were imaginary, it was at least a singular coincidence that they should have reached me just at that precise moment.  I walked to the fore end of the poop, upon the rail guarding which the ship's bell was mounted, and sharply struck four bells, after which I again called to the crew forward to maintain a sharp look-out.
"Now," thought I, "if those sounds originated outside my own imagination some of those fellows for'ard will certainly have heard them, and will mention it."  But my call elicited nothing more than the stereotyped "Ay, ay, sir!" and a faint momentary shuffling of feet--meant, no doubt, to convey to me the impression that the look-outs were on the alert and then deep silence, as before, so far as any report of suspicious sounds was concerned.  I stood for quite two minutes listening intently for any further sounds out of the darkness, but none came to me, nor could I detect any light or other evidence of another craft in our neighbourhood.  At length, fully confirmed in my conviction that my imagination had been playing a trick with me, I returned to the chair in which I had been sitting, and there finished out the watch, merely leaving my seat to strike six, and finally eight, bells.  But I placed my chair in such a position that while still sitting in it I could keep my eye on the clock, and as the hands crept round its face, marking first three and then four o'clock, I strained my listening powers to their utmost in the hope that those elusive bell-strokes might again come stealing across the sea to me, but without result.  When four o'clock came round, after striking eight bells with perhaps a little more vigour than usual, I called Marcel, resigned the deck to him, and went below.
Yet, although I had felt drowsy enough on deck, and although Tourville's ravings had ceased and he seemed to have fallen asleep, when I flung off my clothes and stretched myself on top of the bedding in my bunk, expecting to instantly drop off to sleep, I found, to my annoyance, that I had never been less inclined to slumber than I was just then.  The fact was that in spite of myself those ghostly tinklings were still worrying me.  Were they, or were they not, imaginary?  If they were-- well, there was an end of it.  But if they were not imaginary; if, as I now perversely began to think, they were actual sounds, then it followed, of necessity, that there must be a craft of some sort not very far from us.
If this were the case, what, I asked myself, was she likely to be?  She could but be one of three things--either a trader, a slaver, or a craft belonging to the Slave Squadron; the chances, therefore, were about even that on the morrow I might be able to effect my escape from _La Mouette_--always provided, of course, that those strokes of the bell had been real.  For if the craft on board which they had been struck happened to be a trader, the odds were in favour of her being British; and the same might be said presuming her to be a man-o'-war.  On the other hand, she might of course be a slaver; in which case I was fully resolved to endure the ills I had, rather than fly to others which might conceivably be worse.
Thinking thus, and worrying myself as to the best course to be pursued in certain eventualities, I lay there restlessly tossing first to one side, then to the other, until at length, sitting up in my bunk and putting my face to the open port in quest of a breath of fresh air, the fancy took me that the darkness was no longer quite so opaque as it had been, nay, I was sure of it, for by putting my face right up against the circular opening I was enabled to catch an occasional transient gleam of faint, shifting light that I knew was the glancing of the coming dawn upon the back of the oily swell that came creeping up to the ship; while, by directing my glances higher, I found that I was able to make out indistinctly something of the outline of the great black cloud- masses that overhung us.
In those latitudes the dawn comes as quickly as the daylight vanishes, day comes and goes with a rush--thus within five minutes of the time when I first glanced out through the port there was enough light abroad to reveal a louring, overcast, thunder-threatening sky, an inky, oil- smooth, sluggishly undulating sea, and a long, low schooner with tremendously taunt masts raking over her stern, and not an inch of canvas set, lying broadside-on to us at a distance of some two miles to the eastward.  When I caught my first glimpse of her she was very little more than a black blur standing out against the background of scarcely less black sky; but even as I sat looking at her the light grew, her outline sharpened and became clear and distinct, and my heart gave a great bound of delight as the conviction forced itself upon me that I knew her.  Yes, that long low hull, with its abnormal length of counter, and its bold sheer forward, the high, dominating bow with its excessive rake of stem, and the peculiar steeve of the bowsprit were all familiar to me.  I had seen and noted them before while in Sierra Leone harbour, and I was convinced that the craft was none other than the British man- o'-war schooner _Gadfly_, armed with eight 12-pound carronades and a long 32-pound pivot-gun on her forecastle, with a crew of eighty men under the command of Lieutenant Peters, than whom there was not a more dashing and enterprising officer on the Coast.
I had just arrived at the above conclusion when I heard one of the barque's crew hailing the poop; I could not distinguish what was said, but I presumed that it had reference to the schooner, for immediately upon the hail I heard the creaking of the basket-chair on the poop, as though Marcel was just hoisting himself out of it, and presently his reply came floating down through the skylight, "Ay, ay; I see her." Then I heard the soft shuffling of his footsteps overhead and guessed that he was getting hold of the telescope wherewith to examine the schooner.
Ten minutes later, perhaps, I heard the second mate leave the poop and enter the cabin, and I concluded that he had come down to report the schooner to Leroy; but, to my surprise, instead of doing that, he came straight to my cabin door and knocked softly.  I at once guessed that he wished to question me about the stranger, but it was no part of my policy to let him know that I had already seen and made up my mind about her, I therefore feigned to be sound asleep, and did not reply.  Then he knocked a second time more sharply, whereupon I started up and responded in a drowsy tone of voice, "Hillo! who is it?  What's the matter?"
"Monsieur Fortescue," Marcel responded, murmuring through the slats in the upper panel of the door, "I want you on deck, quick!"
"Oh, indeed," I replied, still affecting drowsiness; "what for?  Is there anything wrong?"
"Please come up at once, monsieur," he returned, with a note of impatience in his voice.  "When you come on deck you will understand why I want you."
"Very well," I grumbled, "I will be up in a brace of shakes;" whereupon my disturber departed.
But his conversation with me, brief as it had been, and quietly as it had been conducted, had evidently aroused Leroy, for as I emerged from my cabin he stepped out of his and we proceeded to the poop together, the chief mate expressing his surprise that Marcel should have called me instead of him.  Of course I had a very shrewd idea as to the reason, but it was my cue to feign ignorance, and I did so.
By the time that Leroy and I reached the poop the sun must have risen-- although there was no sign of him to be seen through the dense canopy of cloud that completely obscured the heavens--for the light had strengthened so much and the atmosphere was so clear that every detail of the distant schooner was plainly distinguishable even to the unassisted eye.  Marcel was again examining her through the glass; it was therefore only natural that Leroy's and my own glances should turn toward her as soon as our heads rose above the level of the rail. Neither of us said anything, however, until Marcel took the glass from his eye, when, seeing Leroy, he said:
"What d'ye think of her, monsieur?  I have taken it upon myself to turn out Monsieur Fortescue to see whether he can tell us anything about her?"
"_I_?"  I ejaculated.  "What the dickens should I know about her?  That she is a slaver anybody can tell with half an eye,"--as a matter of fact the _Gadfly_ had been a slaver in her time, but having been captured, had been purchased into the Service--"but her skipper is a sensible fellow, evidently; he doesn't believe in threshing his canvas threadbare in a calm, so he has furled it."
"Permit me," said Leroy, taking the telescope from Marcel and placing it to his eye.  He looked long and anxiously at the distant schooner, and at length, with an "Ah!" that spoke volumes, passed the glass over to me.
I understood at once from that expressive "Ah!" that Leroy knew and had recognised the vessel, and that my pretence of ignorance would no longer serve any good purpose.  I therefore determined to abandon it and to make a virtue of necessity by frankly admitting my knowledge.  For if Leroy recognised the schooner, as I was certain he had, he would be fully aware of the fact that I, as an officer of the Slave Squadron, must necessarily know her too.  After regarding her attentively through the lenses, therefore, for more than a minute, I passed the glass back to the chief mate with the quiet remark:
"Yes, I believe I recognise her now that I come to see her distinctly. If I am not mistaken she is the British man-o'-war schooner _Gadfly_, and her presence yonder affords Captain Tourville an opportunity to fulfil his promise of transhipping me.  He promised me that, should such a case as this occur, he would give me a boat in which to transfer myself; and that small dinghy of yours will be just the thing."
"Y-es," returned Leroy meditatively.  "He promised you that, did he?  I remember your telling me so.  But, unfortunately for you, he never said a word upon the matter to me, and he is far too sick just now to be worried about that or anything else.  I am very much afraid, therefore, Monsieur Fortescue, that you will be obliged to let this opportunity pass; for, you see, I could not possibly take it upon myself to release you and give you even the dinghy without first receiving definite instructions from the captain."
"Oh, come, I say, Leroy, you surely don't mean to insinuate that you doubt my word, do you?"  I remonstrated.  "I hope you don't pretend--"
"I do not pretend or insinuate anything," Leroy retorted, somewhat impatiently; "I merely state the fact that I have received from Captain Tourville no such instructions as those you mention, and without such instructions I dare not comply with your wishes."
"Ha, ha!" jeered Marcel.  "You will have to curb your impatience, Monsieur Englishman.  It is evident that we are not yet to lose the pleasure of your society."
To this I replied nothing, but turned remonstratingly to the chief mate, urging him to at least do me the favour to go down and see if the captain chanced to be awake, and if so, to put the matter to him.  But he would not listen to my suggestion, insisting that, even if Captain Tourville happened to be awake, he was far too ill to be troubled over any such matter.  Suddenly it came to me that, despite all his past apparent friendliness, he was, for some unknown reason, anxious that I should not be released.  Seeing, therefore, the utter uselessness of further argument, I desisted, and turned away, bitterly disappointed.
Not, of course, that with Leroy's refusal all hope of deliverance was to be abandoned.  By no means.  So long as the _Gadfly_ remained in sight there was always a chance; for if I knew anything of Lieutenant Peters, he was not the man to let us go without giving us an overhaul, and then my chance would certainly come.  It was the duty of the ships of the Slave Squadron to stop and examine the papers of _every_ ship encountered in those waters, and I was certain that Peters would not be likely to make an exception in our favour; while, if Leroy resisted, as, of course, he would--well, it would simply mean that _La Mouette_ would be captured.
Meanwhile Leroy and Marcel were eagerly consulting together, and presently the second mate left the poop, went forward, and quietly called all hands.  Then, as soon as the crew were all on deck, they were ordered to clear for action, the guns were cast loose, the magazine opened, and powder and shot were passed up on deck; the arms' chests were brought up, cutlasses and pistols were served out--a brace of the latter to each man; pistols and muskets were loaded, pikes cast adrift and distributed, and, in short, every preparation was made for a fight, except that the guns were not then loaded.  The second mate had been the moving spirit in all these preparations, Leroy, meanwhile, remaining on the poop and intently watching the schooner through the telescope.
By the time that the preparations for battle were complete it was close upon seven bells, and the order was given for the crew to get breakfast, and for that meal to be also served in the cabin.  A few minutes later the steward came along with a pot of cocoa in one hand and a covered dish in the other, and Leroy, coming aft to where I stood moodily pondering, thrust his hand under my arm and said, with all apparent good-nature:
"Now, don't sulk, _mon cher_, but come down and have some breakfast. Unless I am greatly mistaken the _Gadfly_ is about to send us her boats, and then you may perhaps be able to return in them.  But do not build too much upon the chance, for as soon as they come within range I shall open fire upon them with round and grape; and if we cannot sink them before they get alongside, why, we shall deserve to be hanged, that's all."
"Thank you, monsieur," I answered, "but I have no appetite for breakfast just now, and, with your permission, will remain on deck rather than go into that suffocating cabin, merely to watch you and Marcel eat."
"_Eh, bien_! as you please," he returned, with a shrug of the shoulders. "I will not ask you to keep a look-out for me, because I can do that quite well from the windows of the captain's cabin; and," looking round, "I do not think you can do any mischief up here.  You are sure you will not come down?  Very well, then, _an revoir_!"
Now, to be left on deck, practically alone, was a bit of luck that I had not dared to hope for; and the fact that I had been, coupled with what Leroy had said about the boats, gave me an idea upon which I immediately acted.  We were still lying broadside-on to the _Gadfly_, and I had not the least doubt that on board her a constant watch was being kept upon the barque; glancing round hurriedly, therefore, and observing that all hands on the forecastle were busy with their breakfast, I slipped over the side into the mizzen chains, where I could stand without being seen from inboard, and, removing my jacket, so that my white shirt-sleeves might show up clearly against the barque's black side, I forthwith began to semaphore with my arms, waving them up and down for about a minute to attract attention.  Then, without knowing whether or not I had been successful, I proceeded to signal the following message:
"_La Mouette_, slaver, armed with fourteen 28-pound carronades and four 6-pounders.  Carries one hundred and seventy men.  Attack with your long thirty-two; boats too risky!"
Then, donning my jacket again, I returned inboard just in time to see Marcel's head appear above the level of the poop.
"Hillo!" he exclaimed; "I was wondering what had become of you.  What have you been doing over the side?  Considering whether you should attempt to swim across to the _Gadfly_?"
"Yes," answered I boldly, seizing at once upon the suggestion thus given.  "But I have thought better of it," I continued.  "There are too many sharks about.  Look there!" and I pointed to a dorsal fin that was sculling lazily along half-a-dozen fathoms away.
The man looked at me suspiciously for several seconds, then walked to the side and looked over into the chains, but of course there was nothing to be seen.  Then, muttering to himself, he returned to the cabin, presumably to finish his breakfast.
He had scarcely disappeared, and I was looking round for the telescope, when a flash of flame and a cloud of white smoke suddenly burst from the schooner's forecastle, and presently a 32-pound shot dashed into the water within half-a-dozen fathoms of our rudder.  "Good shot, but not quite enough elevation!" muttered I, delighted at this indication that my message had been noted and was being acted upon; and then came the sullen _boom_ of the gun across the water.  I went to the skylight and quite unnecessarily reported, "The schooner has opened fire!"
"_Sacre-e-e_!"  I heard Leroy exclaim between his teeth.  "The one thing that I was afraid of!  He has thought better of sending his boats, then!"
Marcel answered something, but what it was I could not catch, and then the pair of them came racing up on deck.  They had scarcely arrived when another shot came from the schooner, crashing through the bulwarks just forward of the fore rigging, dismounting a gun, and playing havoc with the men who crowded that part of the deck.  Five were killed outright and nine wounded by that one shot and the splinters that it created. Leroy at once called the crew to quarters and ordered them to return the schooner's fire; but the latter was too far off for either the carronades or the 6-pounders to reach her; and my spirits began to rise, for if the schooner could only continue as she had begun she would soon compel _La Mouette_ to strike.  And there was every prospect of this happening, for the _Gadfly_ had now got our range to a nicety, and shot after shot hulled us, playing the very mischief with us, dismounting another gun, strewing our decks with killed and wounded, and cutting up our rigging, but, most unfortunately, never touching our spars.  Leroy stamped fore and aft the deck, cursing like a madman, shaking his fist at the schooner, glowering savagely at me, and whistling for a wind.
"Give me a breeze!" he shouted; "give me a breeze, and I will run down and blow that schooner out of the water!"
Presently his prayer was answered, but not quite as he desired; for, while we watched, the clouds broke away to the eastward, and presently we saw a dark line stealing along the water toward the schooner.  Ten minutes later all hands aboard her were busily engaged in making sail, and by the time that the wind reached her she was all ready for it. Then, as it filled her sails, she put up her helm and squared away for us, running down before the wind and yawing from time to time to give us another shot.  But it was a fatal mistake; she should have continued to play the game of long bowls, in which case she could have done as she pleased with us; by keeping away, however, and running down to us, she gave Leroy just the chance he wanted; he waited until she was well within range of his carronades, and then, double-shotting them and watching his opportunity, he gave her the whole of his starboard broadside, and down came her foremast and main-topmast.  At the same moment another shot came from the schooner, badly wounding our main- topmast above the cap, and the breeze reaching us almost immediately afterward, the spar went over the side, dragging down the mizzen topmast and the fore-topgallant-mast with it.  The result of all this was that while the schooner broached to and rode by the wreck of her foremast as to a sea anchor, _La Mouette_ fell broad off and refused to come to the wind again; consequently the distance between the two vessels rapidly widened until both were out of range, and the firing ceased.
Thus ended the fight; and I presume that the two craft soon passed out of sight of each other and did not again meet, during that voyage at least, for there was no more firing from _La Mouette_ while I remained aboard her.  But what transpired during the rest of the voyage I was destined to know very little about, for scarcely had the firing ceased when Captain Tourville, thin, weak, and emaciated, crept up on the poop. He had a pistol in his hand, and no sooner did his gaze fall on me than he levelled the weapon at me and fired it point-blank.
Fortunately for me, the man's hand was so unsteady that the ball flew wide; but the report brought the mates and half-a-dozen men to us with a rush to see what was the matter.
"Take that young scoundrel," exclaimed Tourville, pointing at me with a finger that trembled with rage as much as with weakness, "put his hands and his feet in irons, heave him down on the ballast, and leave him there until I give you further instructions."
CHAPTER FIFTEEN.
IN THE HANDS OF SAVAGES.
The order was promptly obeyed; and in a few minutes I found myself, heavily ironed, in the pitchy darkness of the lower hold, squatted disconsolately upon the bed of shingle which constituted the ballast of the vessel.
And what a situation for a young fellow of less than twenty years of age to be in!  The ship of which I had been placed in command lost-- foundered in mid-ocean, and, only too probably, all hands lost with her. Our fate would never be known; it would be concluded that one of the mysterious disasters that so frequently befall the seaman had overtaken us; we should be given up as lost; and there would be an end of us all, so far as our fellow-men were concerned.  For whatever hopes I might once have entertained of escaping from this accursed ship, I had none now.
That Tourville would not be satisfied with anything short of taking my life, I was convinced; and very soon I began to feel that I did not care how soon he sated his vengeance; for confined below in the heat and darkness of the stifling hold, with no resting-place but the hard shingle for my aching body, breathing an atmosphere poisonous with the odour of bilge-water, with only three flinty ship-biscuits, alive with weevils, and a half-pint of putrid water per day upon which to sustain life, and beset by ferocious rats who disputed with me the possession of my scanty fare, I soon became so miserably ill that death quickly lost all its terrors, and I felt that I could welcome it as a release from my sufferings.
How long I remained in this state of wretchedness I cannot tell, for I soon lost count of time and indeed at last sank into a state of semi- delirium; but I think from subsequent calculations it must have been about ten or twelve days after the date of my incarceration that I was aroused once more to a complete consciousness of my surroundings by observing that a change had occurred in the motion of the ship.  She no longer pitched and rolled as does a vessel in the open sea, but slid along--as I could tell by the gurgling sound of the water along her bends--upon a perfectly even keel except for the slight list or inclination due to the pressure of the wind upon her sails.  I conjectured that she must have arrived at the end of her voyage and entered the Kwara river, a conjecture that was shortly afterward confirmed by the sounds on deck of shouted orders and the bustle and confusion attendant upon the operation of shortening sail, soon followed by the splash of an anchor from the bows and the rumble of the stout hempen cable through the hawse-pipe.  Then ensued a period of quiet of several hours' duration, broken at length by the appearance of the carpenter and another seaman who, having removed my irons, gruffly ordered me to follow them up on deck.
I felt altogether too wretchedly ill, and too utterly indifferent respecting my fate, to ask these men any questions, but contrived, by almost superhuman exertion, to climb up the perpendicular ladder which led to the deck; and when I presently emerged from the foetid atmosphere of the hold into the free air and dazzling sunshine of what proved to be early morning, I was so overcome by the sudden transition that I swooned away.
I must have remained in a state of complete unconsciousness for several hours, for when at length I again opened my eyes and looked about me the sun was nearly overhead, and I was lying unbound in the bottom of a long craft that my slowly returning senses at length enabled me to recognise as a native dug-out canoe.  She was about forty feet long by four feet beam and about two feet deep; and was manned by thirty as ferocious- looking savages as one need ever wish to see.  They were stark naked, save for a kind of breech-clout round the loins, and squatted in pairs along the bottom of the canoe, plying short broad-bladed paddles with which they seemed to be urging their craft at a pretty good pace through the water.  A big, brawny, and most repulsive-looking savage, who was probably the captain of the craft, sat perched up in the stern, steering with a somewhat longer and broader-bladed paddle, and urging his crew to maintain their exertions by continually giving utterance to the most hair-raising shrieks and yells.
It was the fresh air, I suppose, that revived me, even as, after my long sojourn in the noisome hold of the slaver, it had prostrated me by my sudden emergence into it, and I presently became conscious that I was feeling distinctly better than I had done for some time past.  For a minute or two I lay passively where I was, in the bottom of the canoe, blinking up at the pallid zenith, near which the sun blazed with blinding brilliancy; and then, no one saying me nay, I slowly and painfully raised myself into a sitting posture and looked about me.
We were in a typical African river, about three-quarters of a mile wide, with low bush-clad banks bordered by the inevitable mangrove, while beyond towered the virgin tropical forest, dense, impenetrable, and full of mystery.  The turbid current was against us, as could be seen at a glance; I therefore knew at once that we were paddling up-stream.  But whither were we bound; of what tribe or nation were the negroes who manned the canoe; and how had I come to be among them?  Had Tourville, with a greater refinement of cruelty than even I gave him credit for, handed me over to the tender mercies of these savages, to work their bloodthirsty will upon me, instead of himself murdering me out of hand? If so, what was to be my ultimate fate?  I shuddered as I put this question to myself, for I had been on the Coast quite long enough to have heard many a gruesome, blood-curdling story of the horrors perpetrated by the African savages upon those unhappy white men who had been unfortunate enough to fall into their hands.
But I was not going to allow myself to be frightened or discouraged by dwelling upon stories of that kind; I was feeling so far better that the desire to live had returned to me.  I even experienced some slight sensation of hunger, and there was no doubt at all as to the fact that I was parched with thirst.  I therefore turned to the savage who was flourishing the steering paddle and, first pointing to my open mouth, went through the motions of raising a vessel to it and drinking.  The man evidently understood me, for he shouted a few--to me quite unintelligible--words, whereupon one of the paddlers about the centre of the canoe laid in his paddle for a few moments, did something dexterous with a spear and a brownish-grey object the size of a man's head, and a minute later my lips were glued to a luscious cocoa-nut, the extremity of which had been deftly struck off with the blade of the spear, disclosing the white-lined hollow of the cup within brimming with a full pint or more of the delicious "milk," which I swallowed to the last drop.  Then, breaking off a strip of the husk and using it as a spoon, I proceeded to scrape out and hungrily devour the soft creamy fruit that lined the shell, and thus made the most satisfying and enjoyable meal that had passed my lips for many a day.  Shortly afterward, the strength of the ebb current increasing so greatly that we were able to make scarcely any headway against it, our steersman headed the canoe in toward the western bank of the river, and we presently entered a narrow creek up which we passed for a distance of about a quarter of a mile until we reached a practicable landing-place, when the canoe was secured to a stout mangrove root, and all hands stepped out of her, the steersman taking the precaution to draw my attention to the spears and bows and arrows with which his party were armed, as a hint, I suppose, of what I might expect should I be foolish enough to attempt to escape. We pushed our way through the thick bush for a distance of about a hundred yards, and then reached a small open space, where we bivouacked; a party of ten disappearing into the bush, while the rest remained to kindle a fire and, evidently, to look after me and make sure that I did not give them the slip.  At length, after the lapse of about half an hour, the party who had vanished into the bush returned, singly or by two's and three's, some bringing in a monkey or two, others a few brace of parrots, one man a big lizard like an iguana, another a fine deer, until each of the ten had contributed something to the common larder, when the fire was made up, a plentiful supply of food cooked, and all hands set to with a will, each apparently animated by a determination to show all the others how much solid food he was capable of putting out of sight at a sitting.  They very civilly offered me a choice of their dainties, and I accepted a tolerably substantial venison steak, broiled over the fire by being suspended close over the glowing embers upon the end of a stick.  Off this I contrived to make a fairly hearty meal, after which, following the example of the others, I stretched myself out in the long grass under the shadow of a big bush, and quickly fell into a deep sleep.
I was aroused from my slumbers, some hours later, by my savage companions, who intimated to me, by signs, that the moment had arrived for us to take our departure, and we accordingly wended our way back to the canoe, taking our surplus stock of food with us, and, embarking, soon found ourselves once more afloat on the placid bosom of the broad river, the downward and opposing current of which had by this time greatly slackened under the influence of the flood tide which was evidently making fast.
Keeping well out toward the centre of the stream, and paddling steadily, we now made rapid progress in a northerly direction, the river gradually widening and shoaling as we went, until, by the time of sunset, we found ourselves progressing up a comparatively narrow deep-water channel with wide expanses of shallow water on either side of us, dotted here and there with dry patches of mud or sand upon which crocodiles lay basking, in some cases in groups of as many as six or eight together, while occasionally the great head of a hippopotamus appeared for a moment, only to vanish again with a little eddying swirl of the mud-charged water as the creature dived.
While the sun still hovered a degree or two above the tree-tops on the western bank of the stream, the moon, now nearly full, sailed gloriously into view above the clumps of vegetation that shrouded the eastern bank; and the gradual transition from the ruddy, golden light of the dying sun to the flooding silver of the brilliant moon, with the ever-changing effects that accompanied the transition, presented a spectacle of enchanting beauty such as I had never up to that time beheld, even at sea.  But, beyond a low muttered word or two and a grunt, apparently expressive of deep satisfaction at the appearance of the unclouded moon, the savages took no notice of the magical loveliness of the scene; and while I sat entranced and practically oblivious of everything else, they merely paddled the harder, conversing in low tones among themselves.  Of course I did not understand a single word of what was said, yet, so much did I gather from the glances that they flung about them, and the emphasis and accent of their speech, that I shrewdly suspected them of anticipating the possibility of attack from the shore.
This suspicion was strengthened, a little later on, by the fact that as we approached a certain bend in the river our timoneer edged the canoe in toward the eastern bank, until we were completely plunged in the deep shadow of the vegetation that grew right down to the water's edge, as though he were desirous of escaping observation; at least there was no other reason that I could think of for such a manoeuvre, for by this time the current was running up quite strongly, and under ordinary circumstances it would have been to our advantage to have remained in mid-channel, where the full strength of it would be felt.  But if this was his object he was only partially successful; for we presently arrived abreast of a bay, or it may have been the wide entrance of a creek, many of which branched off the main stream on either hand, where the forest receded so far that, for the distance of fully half a mile, we were compelled to traverse a space of water completely flooded by the brilliant rays of the moon, and before we had accomplished half the passage a quick ejaculation of mingled annoyance and dismay from the steersman caused me to glance toward the western bank, from an opening in which half-a-dozen canoes were darting out with the evident determination to intercept us if possible.  Fortunately for us, however, we had already passed the spot from which the pursuing canoes were emerging, this spot now bearing well upon our port quarter; but, on the other hand, our pursuers would presently obtain an important advantage over us, since they would soon reach the deep channel, where the upward current was now running strongly.  I feared that when they arrived in that channel they would turn the bows of their craft up-stream and avail themselves of the advantage afforded by the strong current to endeavour to pass ahead of us and cut off our retreat; but in the eagerness of their pursuit they seemed to lose sight of this advantage, for they continued to head straight for us, while we, impelled by the full strength of our thirty paddles, now plied with desperate energy by our freely perspiring crew, gradually drew out and threw our pursuers still further on our quarter.  Yet they were steadily nearing us, and I did not see how we could scrape clear without something in the nature of a fight.
All this time we were heading straight for a low, heavily timbered point which marked another turn in the course of the stream, and I could see that our people were straining every nerve to get round this point before being overtaken.  At length, with a mighty stirring up of the mud by our deep-plunging paddles in the shallow water, we shaved close round this point and almost immediately afterwards darted into a narrow creek so completely overgrown with vegetation that the boughs of the mangroves and other trees united over our heads, forming a sort of tunnel, the interior of which was so opaquely dark that it was scarcely possible to see one's hand before one's face.  Yet our helmsman seemed to know the place perfectly, for he stood boldly on, urging the crew to continue their exertions.  At length, after we had traversed a full hundred yards or more of the creek, we sighted a spot ahead where, doubtless in consequence of a wind-fall, or some similar phenomenon, the dense bush had been levelled, leaving room for a patch of clear moonlight, some ten yards in circumference, to fall full upon the channel of the creek, revealing every object, even the smallest, within its boundary with a clearness and distinctness that was positively startling.  Arrived here, the canoe was sheered in alongside a spot where the mangroves grew thickly, and some twenty of our crew, laying in their paddles, hastily seized their bows and arrows and, springing ashore, swiftly vanished into the adjacent deep shadow, while the canoe, with the remainder of us on board, pushed across the patch of moonlight into the darkness beyond, where she was forced beneath an overhanging mass of foliage, in such a manner as to lie perfectly concealed.
Hardly had this been accomplished when we heard from the river the exclamations of our pursuers, startled at our sudden and, at first, inexplicable disappearance.  But it did not long remain inexplicable; some sharp eye soon detected the entrance of the creek and suspected that we were concealed therein, for, after a few minutes spent in animated discussion by the occupants, the pursuing canoes were heard cautiously approaching.  It was evident that their knowledge of the creek was not nearly so complete as that of our own steersman, for whereas we had contrived, despite the pitchy darkness, to navigate the crooked channel without running foul of anything, we could hear the continual swishing of foliage and the bumping of the canoes as they encountered the overhanging branches or collided with the mangrove roots on one side or the other.  We were thus able to follow the progress of their approach with the utmost precision, and the moment that the leading canoe--a craft manned by some twenty most villainous-looking savages--emerged from the darkness into the patch of brilliant moonlight, she was greeted with a murderous discharge of arrows at short range which put the greater part of her crew _hors de combat_.  She was closely followed by another canoe of about the same size, the occupants of which were treated to a similarly warm reception.  A warning shout from one of the survivors of this second discharge was raised in time to save those behind from pushing forward to meet a similar fate, and now the quick twanging of bowstrings and loud shouts from those ashore and afloat told that a fierce battle was raging.  But our people, from the advantage of their position, had very much the best of it, and at length the pursuers were beaten off and compelled to retreat precipitately, with the loss of nearly two-thirds of their number and two canoes, which, with their wounded occupants, were left in our hands, while our party escaped absolutely unscathed.  The wounded of the enemy, numbering eleven, would have met with but short shrift at the hands of their captors, but for the interposition of the man whom I have termed our timoneer, who seemed to be a petty chief.  This individual carefully examined his prisoners and found that three of them were so severely wounded as to afford little hope of their recovery; these three he therefore despatched with the most callous sang-froid by driving his broad-bladed spear into their throats, after which they were flung over the side; the remaining eight, who appeared to be only temporarily disabled, were trussed up, hand and foot, with thin, tough, pliant creeper, cut from the adjacent jungle, and bestowed, without much consideration for their comfort, in the bottom of our canoe.  The captured canoes were then sunk by means of a few large stones placed in them to take them down, and then heeled until the water flowed in over their gunwales, when they quickly vanished beneath the turbid, foetid waters of the creek.  This done, our people made preparations for the continuation of their journey.
But our leader, whose knowledge of the river seemed intimate enough to entitle him to a certificate as branch pilot, had no inclination to incur the risk of leaving the creek again at the point where we had entered it, and thus very possibly falling into a cleverly arranged ambuscade.  On the contrary, he proceeded to push boldly on up the creek for a distance of several miles, much to my astonishment, for the waterway generally was so narrow as scarcely to afford room for two canoes to pass abreast, and I was momentarily expecting that this creek, like so many others of the African rivers, would abruptly end in a mud- bank overgrown with mangroves.  Contrary to my anticipations, however, when a dozen times or more the banks closed in upon us in such a manner as to suggest that our further progress was about to be stayed, we would suddenly emerge into a comparatively wide channel, and push merrily on for a mile or more ere we encountered our next difficulty.  In this manner we must have traversed a distance of nearly twenty miles when, to my amazement, and also that of most of the canoe's crew, I think, we suddenly emerged from the tunnel-like channel that we had been navigating for something like five hours, and found ourselves once more in what was undoubtedly the main stream of the river, and so far away from the spot at which we had diverged from it that it was nowhere to be seen.  The moon had by this time risen so high in the sky as to be almost directly overhead; there was therefore little or no shadow on either bank of the river to shroud us from observation, nevertheless we continued to cling closely to the eastern bank for several miles further--the tide having now turned and being against us--until at length, the current becoming too strong for us, our leader found a practicable landing-place, and all hands, except the unfortunate prisoners of war, scrambled ashore and, hastily lighting a fire, disposed ourselves to sleep around it.
Now, it will probably be thought by many that I was submitting to my uncertain fate with far greater philosophy than wisdom; but this was by no means the case.  The fact was that I had no sooner awakened to the consciousness that I was a prisoner in the hands of African savages than I made up my mind that I could not too soon effect my escape from them; for although I have just spoken of my fate as uncertain I felt that, in reality, there was very little uncertainty about it.  It was so rarely that a white man fell into the hands of the negro savages that when one had the misfortune to do so they generally made the utmost of him.  And that "utmost" was usually something in which prolonged and agonising torture figured largely.  But it would obviously be worse than useless to attempt to escape until an opportunity occurred of at least a fair prospect of success; for to attempt and _fail_ meant the extinguishment at once of all further hope.  And, up to the present, I had not had a ghost of an opportunity.  My captors had taken good care of that, although they had been kind enough to leave me unbound.  But now, when all hands must be feeling the effect of fatigue after several hours of strenuous labour at the paddles, and were likely to sleep soundly, it was possible that, by biding my time, I might be able to steal off to the canoe and cut the bonds of the captives who had been so callously left in it, when it would be strange indeed if, out of gratitude for my release of them, they were not willing to help me to make my way back to the mouth of the river, where I should of course have to take my chance of finding a ship the master of which would be willing to receive me on board.  It was not, perhaps, a very brilliant prospect, but I felt that it was at least preferable to that to which I might look forward if I remained in the company of my present owners; and accordingly when my sable companions disposed themselves to sleep, I apparently did the same, but summoned all my energies to aid me in the task of resisting the tendency toward somnolence that I felt stealing over me.
But this was not nearly so easy as I had believed it would be.  If I closed my eyes for a few seconds a delicious languor seized me, my thoughts began to wander, and it was only by an almost painful effort that I succeeded in, as it were, jerking myself back to full consciousness.  My intention was to remain awake until all my companions had become wrapped in slumber, and then effect my escape from them; but to my chagrin I found that while it was almost impossible for me to remain awake, my captors or owners--I scarcely knew which to consider them seemed restless, watchful, and all more or less upon the alert. Finally, while waiting and watching for signs that they were succumbing to the influence of the drowsy god, I lost all control of myself and sank into a profound and delicious slumber.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN.
KING BANDA.
How long I remained steeped in that delightful and refreshing sleep I did not then know; but when at length I awoke with a violent start the embers of the fire were merely smouldering, while the snorts and snores that were emitted by the recumbent figures grouped around it seemed to indicate that the fateful moment had arrived when I might make a bid for liberty with some prospect of success.  It was now very much darker than it had been when I sank into involuntary slumber, for the moon had swung so far over toward the west that at least two-thirds of the small clearing which we occupied were enveloped in deep shadow, but I observed with some dismay that my path to the canoe lay directly across the patch that was still bathed in the moon's rays.  That, however, could not be helped; I could not afford to delay until the moon had sunk low enough to throw the entire clearing into shadow, for with the setting of the moon would come dawn and sunrise.  I therefore determined to start upon my attempt forthwith, and, as a first step, rolled myself over, away from the fire, as though stirring in my sleep.
I was now lying with my back to the fire, and could therefore not see my companions or observe what effect, if any, my movement had had upon them; but I resolved not to fail for want of caution, so I made no further attempt to withdraw myself for the next ten minutes, but confined myself simply to a few restless movements, as though--which was actually the case--I was being worried by the swarms of minute creeping and biting things with which the spot abounded.  Then, at the end of about ten minutes from my first movement, I ventured again to roll over in the same direction as before, which once more brought me with my face toward the fire.  I now opened my eyes cautiously and carefully surveyed my surroundings.  Not one of the black figures about the fire appeared to have altered his position in the slightest degree, so far as I could perceive, while the snoring and snorting still proceeded as vigorously as ever.  I lay quite still for two or three minutes, and then, as everything seemed perfectly safe, and I had not too much time to spare, I decided that I might venture upon a somewhat more rapid mode of progression.  I accordingly raised myself upon my hands and knees, and proceeded to crawl very cautiously toward the canoe, looking back from time to time to see if I were observed.
It was while I was thus engaged in looking back, while still creeping forward, that, as I put forth my right hand, it fell upon something cold and clammy that stirred beneath my touch, and the next instant I felt a sharp pricking sensation in the fleshy base of my right thumb.  Like lightning I snatched my hand away, threw myself backward and sprang to my feet with an involuntary cry; and as I did so I indistinctly caught sight of a small wriggling object in the long grass that seemed to vanish in a flash.  It was a snake, and it had bitten me!  Yes, there was no mistake about that, for as I lifted my hand to my eyes there was light enough for me to see two drops of blood, about a quarter of an inch apart upon my right hand.  Upon the spur of the moment I clapped the wounded part to my mouth and sucked vigorously, spitting out such blood as I was able to draw from the wound, and this I continued to do industriously for the next hour or more.  But my chance of escape was gone for that night at least; for my cry brought the whole of the savages to their feet as one man, with their weapons grasped and ready for instant use.  Some half-a-dozen of them, seeing me upon my feet, sprang toward me and surrounded me with angry cries, but I did not of course make the slightest attempt to run; on the contrary, I showed them my wounded hand, and, with two fingers of my left hand extended, made a motion as of a snake striking his fangs into my flesh.  The individual whom I took to be the chief of the little party thereupon led me back to the fire, and thrusting two or three dry twigs into the smouldering ashes, fanned the latter into a blaze with his breath, thus causing the twigs to ignite.  Then, using these twigs as a torch, he carefully examined my wounded hand, shook his head as though to indicate that I had no chance, cast the blazing twigs to the ground, and saying a few words to his companions, lay down and again composed himself to sleep, an example at once followed by his companions.  I, however, remained awake, diligently sucking my wounded hand, which soon began to swell and grow acutely painful, the throbbing pain extending all the way up my arm, right to the shoulder.  The pain at length became so acute that I could sit still no longer, I therefore sprang to my feet and began to pace to and fro; but I had no sooner done so than half-a-dozen of the savages were beside me, not exactly interfering with me--for I think they understood pretty clearly what was the matter with me--but making it perfectly plain that they were watching me, and that only a certain amount of freedom would be permitted me.  Whether they really understood that I was actually attempting to effect my escape when the snake bit me, I was never able to determine.
At length the dawn arrived, day broke, the sun rose, and a few of the savages, taking their bows and arrows, went off into the bush to forage, as I surmised; and a little later they returned, one after the other, each bringing some contribution to the common larder, while others busied themselves in collecting fresh wood and rebuilding the fire. While they were thus engaged, one of the party, who happened to pass near the spot where I had been bitten, suddenly uttered a most dreadful yell, grasped his left foot, looked at it a moment, and then began with furious haste to search about in the long grass, which he pushed apart with the blade of his spear.  A few seconds later he fell to stabbing the ground, as it seemed, savagely, finally stooping down and picking up the still writhing halves of a snake that had been cut clean in two by a blow of his spear.  It was not at all a formidable-looking creature, being not more than eighteen inches long and perhaps three inches girth about the thickest part of its body.  But it was an ugly, repulsive- looking brute, its head being heart-shaped, and its body almost the same thickness for the greater part of its length, terminating in a short, blunt tail.  Its ground colour was a dirty grey, upon which occurred large, irregular blotches or markings of dull black with a few splashes of brilliant red here and there.  The fellow who had fallen upon it with such ferocity, and who had evidently been bitten by it, brought the two writhing fragments and flung them into the fire, in the midst of which they writhed still more horribly.  Then seizing a good, stout, brightly- glowing brand from the fire, he coolly sat down and applied the almost white-hot end to the wound, which was in his left instep.  I do not think I ever saw anything more heroic than this act of the savage, for though the flesh hissed and smoked and gave forth a most horrible odour of burnt flesh, the man never winced, but calmly and deliberately cauterised the bite with as much care and thoroughness as though he had been operating upon somebody else.  But that he was not insensible to his self-inflicted torture was very evident from the fact that in a few seconds he was literally drenched with the perspiration that started from every pore of his body.
While this was happening, the leader of the party had hurriedly raked from the fire the scorched and blistered half of the snake to which the head was attached, and, seizing it by the neck, squeezed it until the jaws were forced open, revealing two long, slender, needle-like fangs projecting from the upper jaw.  Holding this horrible object between the finger and thumb of his right hand, he approached me, and, before I had the least idea of what he intended to do, seized my wounded hand and approached the head of the still living reptile so closely to it that it was easily to be seen that the two tiny punctures in my flesh were exactly the same distance apart as the snake's fangs, the inference being that this was the identical reptile that had bitten me.  Having satisfied himself of this, the man flung the loathsome object back into the heart of the fire, where it was soon consumed.
I was by this time suffering the most dreadful agony, my hand and arm were so terribly swollen that they had almost lost all semblance to any portion of the human anatomy, while the two punctures made by the poison fangs were puffed up, almost to bursting, and encircled by two rings of livid grey colour.  The throbbing of the limb, as the blood forced itself through the congested passages, can only be compared to the pulsing of a stream of fire, and I am certain that, had I been within reach of qualified surgical assistance at the moment, I should have insisted upon having the limb removed, as I was convinced that the pain of amputation would have been less acute than that from which I was suffering.  Needless to say, I had no appetite for food when it was offered me a little while afterward; but I felt thirsty enough to drink the river dry, and quaffed several cocoa-nuts with an ecstasy of delight that almost caused me to forget my pain--for the moment.
Breakfast over, the word was given to re-embark, and we all wended our way back to the canoe.  I do not know whether it was deliberate intention, or merely the result of accident, but I could not help noticing that during the short journey from our camping-place to the spot where the canoe had been left, there were always three or four savages quite close to me, who appeared to be keeping a very careful watch upon my movements, as though they more than half suspected me of a desire to give them the slip; but I was by this time suffering such excruciating agony that, for the time being at least, all thoughts of escape were completely banished from my mind.  I had become quite convinced that the bite was going to prove fatal, and my only subject of speculation was how many more hours of torture I was doomed to endure before merciful death would come to my relief.  But after we had been afloat for about half an hour, and were once more speeding up the river as fast as the sturdy arms of the paddlers could urge us, I suddenly became violently sick, the paroxysm lasting for nearly ten minutes; and when I had in some degree recovered from the exhaustion attendant upon this attack, I was equally surprised and delighted to find that the pain and throbbing in my arm were distinctly less acute; and from that moment, as much to the astonishment of the savages as of myself, my symptoms rapidly improved, until by evening I was so far free from pain as to be able to sleep for several hours, although the swelling did not entirely subside until nearly forty-eight hours later.  But meanwhile my fellow-sufferer, the savage who had also been bitten, and who had resorted to the heroic method of cauterising his wound, had been all day steadily developing symptoms similar to my own before the curative attack of sickness, his foot and leg, right up to the hip, had swollen to an enormous size and become so stiff that when the moment arrived for us to disembark for the night he was unable to move, and begged most piteously--as I interpreted the tones of his voice and his actions--to be left in the canoe all night, to fight out the battle between life and death alone and undisturbed.
The next morning, when we went down to the canoe, the poor fellow was not only dead, but his whole body was swollen almost out of human semblance, presenting in that and other respects a most shocking and revolting spectacle.  We took the corpse with us until we had reached the main channel of the river, and there flung it overboard.  We had scarcely left it fifty fathoms astern when there arose a sudden violent commotion in the water about it, and a second or two later it disappeared from view, dragged down by the voracious crocodiles with which the river swarmed.
I was by this time quite free from pain, and apart from a feeling of extreme debility, which I had endured for some hours on the previous day, I was not much the worse for the alarming experience that I had undergone.  The death of the savage who had been bitten after me, and undoubtedly by the same reptile, conclusively proved how very narrow had been my escape from a similar fate; and I naturally fell to wondering how it was that he had succumbed to his injury while I had recovered from mine.  For it seemed to me at the moment that the remedial measure which he had adopted ought, from its very severe and drastic character, to have proved much more efficacious than my own; whereas the opposite was the case.  But upon further reflection I came to the conclusion that while I had proceeded to suck the poison from the wound _at once_, or within a second or two of its infliction, the savage had wasted at least a minute in pursuing and slaying his enemy before cauterising his wound, and that this minute of delay, accompanied as it was by somewhat violent action on the part of the injured man, had sufficed for the poison to obtain a strong enough hold upon his system to produce fatal results. Whether or not this is the correct explanation I must leave to those who are better qualified than myself to judge.
Day after day we steadily pursued our course up the river, which, for the most part, retained the same dreary, monotonous aspect of low, bush- clad, mangrove-lined banks, and practically the same width, save where, at occasional intervals, it widened out and became dotted with islands, some of considerable size.  At length we arrived at a point where the land on the western bank rose into a range of hills some eight or nine hundred feet high, densely clothed with vegetation to their summits. This range of hills extended northward for a distance of about thirty miles before it once more sank into the plain; but before it sank completely out of sight astern more high land was sighted ahead, and two days later we found ourselves navigating among some very picturesque scenery, with high land on both sides of us, some of the peaks being twelve to fourteen hundred feet high.  Late in the evening of the second day after entering upon this picturesque stretch of the river we arrived at a point where the stream forked into two of apparently equal width and depth, one branch striking away to the eastward, while the other continued its northerly course.  Here my savage companions proceeded with the utmost caution, frequently landing and sending one or two of the party away to reconnoitre, and otherwise behaving as though they feared attack; but after a slow and anxious progress of some twenty hours' duration they seemed to consider the danger as past, and once more pressed boldly forward.
By this time I had completely recovered, not only from the effects of the snake-bite--at which my companions seemed greatly astonished--but also from the hardship and privation which I had experienced during the latter part of my voyage aboard _La Mouette_, and had begun to think very seriously of how I was to effect my escape from those who held me captive.  Not that I was ill-treated by them, far from it; I enjoyed the same fare as themselves, and was never asked to share their labours, and that, I take it, was as much good treatment as I could reasonably expect under the circumstances.  But I knew that they were not hampering themselves by taking me and their other prisoners this long journey up the river--much of the paddling being done against the stream--merely for the pleasure of enjoying our society.  My intuition assured me that their action had a more sinister motive than this, and in any case I had no desire to penetrate the interior of equatorial Africa; therefore so soon as I felt that my health and strength were sufficiently restored to allow of my attempting the long and perilous journey back to the sea alone, I began to consider the question of escape.  But the longer I thought of it the less became my hope of success; for I very soon discovered that under no circumstances whatever were my custodians disposed to allow me to stray a yard out of their sight.  Without imposing any actual restraint upon me, they invariably so contrived that, if I made the slightest attempt to withdraw myself from them, three or four of the most active of the party, always well armed, had occasion to go in precisely the same direction as myself.  That, however, was not my only difficulty; for, assuming for a moment the possibility of my being able to give the savages the slip, how was I, a white man, alone, unarmed, and with no means of obtaining food, to make my way down more than two hundred miles of river, flowing through a country every inhabitant of which would undoubtedly be an enemy, whose delight it would be to hunt me to death?  I told myself that if I could obtain a small, light, handy canoe and weapons, even though they should but consist of a bow and arrows, the situation would not be altogether hopeless--for I possessed a very fair share of pluck and resource; but I felt that before I could effect my escape from my watchful custodians, and obtain these necessities, I might find myself in so dire a strait as to render them and all else valueless to me.  Yet I would not suffer myself to feel discouraged, for I recognised that to abandon hope was to virtually surrender myself tamely to the worst that fate might have in store for me, and this was by no means my disposition; I therefore continued to keep my eyes wide open for an opportunity.
But, watch as I might, the opportunity never presented itself, nor, thanks to the watchfulness of my companions, could I make one; so the time dragged on until, after a river voyage of more than three weeks, we one evening, about two hours before sunset, entered a creek important enough to suggest the idea that it might possibly be a small tributary of the main river.  After paddling up it for a distance of about two miles we suddenly hove in sight of a native town of considerable size built upon the north bank of the creek, upon an area of ground that had been completely cleared of all undergrowth, but was well shaded by the larger trees which had been allowed to stand.  That the town was of some importance, as well as of considerable size, I surmised from the fact that, with a few exceptions, the habitations, instead of being of the usual circular, bee-hive shape common to most native African towns, were of comparatively spacious dimensions and substantial construction, being for the most part quadrangular in plan, with thick walls built of substantial wattles, interwoven about stout poles sunk well into the ground and solidly plastered with clay which, having dried and hardened in the sun, had become quite weather-tight, protected as they were from the tropical rains by a thick thatch of palm leaves, with which also their steep sloping roofs were covered.  The average size of these huts was about twenty feet long by twelve feet wide and eight feet high to the eaves; but there were others--about fifty of them altogether-- surrounded by and cut off from the rest by a high and stout palisade-- the points of the palisades being sharpened, in order, as I took it, to render the fence unclimbable--which were not only considerably larger and more substantial in point of construction, but which, as I afterward had opportunity to observe, evidenced some rude attempt at decoration in the form of grotesquely carved finials affixed to the roofs.  This part of the town, situated in its centre, and covering, perhaps, a space of forty acres, was, I afterwards learned, the habitation of King Banda, his Court, the principal officers of his army and household, and the priests, whose temple, or fetish-house, stood on the opposite side of the square to that occupied by the "palace" of the king.
"I--I could not help it," murmured poor Hilda. With one hand she was tightly grasping the edge of the little basket-carriage.
"Stop, there is father," she exclaimed suddenly. "Let me go to him. I--I can bear him to tell me if there is anything wrong."
In an instant she reached the Rector's side. Her arms were round his neck, her head on his shoulder, and she was sobbing her heart out on his breast.
"My dearest Hilda, my darling!" exclaimed her father. "What is the meaning of all this? Why are you so dreadfully unhappy, my child?"
"Tell me, father, I can bear it from you. Is she--is she dead?"
"Is who dead?"
"Ju--Judy."
"No; what has put that into your head? But your little sister is very ill, Hilda. I am not so much alarmed about her as your Aunt Marjorie is, but I confess her state puzzles me. I saw Dr. Harvey to-day, and I don't think he is satisfied either. It seems that for some reason the child was over-excited last night--there was difficulty in getting her off to sleep, and she cried in a very distressing and painful way. I was obliged to sit with her myself. I held her hand, poor little darling, and had a prayer with her, and--toward morning she dropped off into a sleep."
"And," continued Hilda, "she was better when she awoke, wasn't she? Do say she was, father. You showed her Jasper's telegram the very instant she awoke, and of course she got much better immediately."
"My dear Hilda, the strange thing about Judy has yet to be told; she has not awakened--she is still asleep, and this prolonged and unnatural sleep disturbs Dr. Harvey a good deal."
"I had better go to her at once, father. I think the doctor _must_ be mistaken in thinking sleep bad. When Judy sees me sitting by her bedside she will soon cheer up and get like her old self. I'll run to her now, father: I don't feel half so much alarmed since you tell me that she is only asleep."
The Rector gave vent to a troubled sigh; Hilda put wings to her feet, and with the lightness and grace of a bird sped toward the house.
"Hilda, Hilda!" called her husband. He had taken a short cut across some fields, and was now entering the Rectory domain. He thought it would be quite the correct thing for his wife to wait for him. Surely she would like to enter her family circle with him by her side. "Hilda, stop!" he cried, and he hurried his own footsteps.
But if Hilda heard she did not heed. She rushed on, and soon disappeared from view inside the deep portico of the old house.
Two or three moments later she was sitting without her hat and jacket, and with a pair of noiseless house-slippers on her feet, by Judy's bedside.
All the preparations which had been made with such care and pains by Babs the night before were still making the nursery look pretty. The little china animals sat in many funny groups on the mantelpiece. The white and blue violets lay in a large bowl on a table by Judy's side. One of the little sleeper's hands was thrown outside the counterpane. Hilda touched it, and found that it burned with a queer, uncomfortable dry heat.
"But how quietly she is sleeping," said Mrs. Quentyns, looking up with tears in her eyes at Aunt Marjorie; "why are you so solemn and sad?--surely this sleep must be good for her."
"My dear, Dr. Harvey calls Judy's state more stupor than sleep. He says the most extraordinary things about the child ... that she has been over-excited and subjected to a severe mental strain, and he fears mischief to the brain. But surely he must be wrong, for nothing _could_ exceed the quiet of our life at the Rectory since the money has gone and you have left us, and no one could have been less excited in her ways than Judy has been since your marriage. I can't make out what Dr. Harvey means."
"I think I partly understand," said Hilda; her voice had a choking sound. "Don't talk so loud, Aunt Marjorie," she said impatiently; "you will wake her--you will disturb her."
"But that is what we wish," interrupted the old lady. "The doctor says we must do everything in our power to rouse her. Ah, and here he comes; he will speak for himself."
"I am glad to see you, Mrs. Quentyns," said Dr. Harvey. "Your not coming last night when the child expected you was a grave mistake, but better late than never."
He stopped speaking then, and bent over the little sleeper.
"Draw up the blind," he said to Aunt Marjorie, "let us have all the light we can. Now don't be frightened, Mrs. Quentyns--I am not going to hurt the child, but I must examine her eyes."
Hilda felt as if she could scarcely restrain a stifled scream as the doctor lifted first one lid and then the other, and looked into the dark depths of the sweet eyes.
"The child has got a shock," he said then. "I feared it when I called early this morning. I don't say for a moment that she will not get better, but her state is very precarious. I should like you to nurse her altogether, Mrs. Quentyns; much depends on her seeing you by her side when she wakes."
"I shall never leave her again," said Hilda, in a stifled tone.
The doctor's practiced ear caught the suppressed hysteria in her voice.
"Come, come," he said cheerily, "you have nothing to blame yourself for. The little one has evidently felt your absence in a remarkable manner."
"Really, doctor, you are quite mistaken," began Aunt Marjorie. "What I principally noticed about Judy was her great quietness and docility since Hilda left. She scarcely spoke of her sister, and seemed content to sit by my side and read fairy stories. She used to be such a very excitable, troublesome sort of child. If you ask me frankly, I think Hilda's absence did her good."
The doctor looked from the old lady to the young.
"I must adhere to my first opinion," he said. "The child has missed her sister. Now that you have come, Mrs. Quentyns, we will hope for the best."
He went out of the room as he spoke, and Aunt Marjorie followed him.
Hilda dropped on her knees by Judy's cot.
"Oh, my God, forgive me," she cried, in a broken anguished prayer. "I did wrong to leave my little Judy. Oh, God, only spare her life, and I will vow to you that _whatever_ happens she shall never leave me in the time to come. Whatever happens," repeated Hilda, in a choking voice of great agony. Then she rose and took her place beside the child's bed.
A couple of hours passed by. The door was softly opened, and Quentyns stole into the room. He had been very much shocked by the doctor's account of the child, and his face and tone expressed real sympathy as he came up to Hilda.
"Poor little Judy!" he said, bending over her. "What a queer excitable little mite it is."
Hilda beat her foot impatiently.
"Well, my darling," continued Quentyns, not noticing his wife's suppressed agitation, "she will soon be all right now you have come. Lunch is ready, Hilda, and you must be weak for want of food. Come, dearest, let me take you down to the dining room."
"Oh, no, Jasper! I can't leave Judy; and please, please don't talk so loud."
"The doctor does not wish her to be kept _too_ quiet, Hilda; and surely, my dear, you are not going to starve yourself!"
"Aunt Marjorie will send me something to the dressing room; I can't be away from Judy even for one minute. There is no saying when she will awake, and I must be with her when she does."
Quentyns smothered an impatient exclamation. After a pause he said gently:
"As you please, dear; I will bring something up myself to the dressing room for you," and he stole on tip-toe out of the room.
Nothing could be more patient than his manner, and Hilda reproached herself for the feeling of irritation which his presence gave her.
There came a sigh from the bed--the faintest of sounds; Mrs. Quentyns turned her head quickly, and saw to her rapture that Judy's big greeny-gray eyes were wide open and fixed earnestly on her face. There was no surprise in the pretty eyes, nor any additional color in the pale little face.
"Hilda," said Judy, "I _thought_ it was only a bad dream--you never went away, did you?"
"I am never going to leave you again, Judy," replied her sister; "never, never, as long as we both live. I vow--I promise--nothing shall part us, nothing except death."
Hilda flung herself on her knees by the child's bed, and burst into hysterical sobs.
CHAPTER XII.
HILDA'S ENGAGEMENT RING.
My heart is heavy for scorn, Mine eyes with impatient tears, But heaven looks blue through the cherry-blooms, And preaches away my fears.
--EMILY PFEIFFER.
Contrary to the doctor's fears, and in accordance with Hilda's hopes, Judy grew better. A weight had been lifted from her heart--her starved affections were nourished and soothed once more. Hilda scarcely ever left her room, and Hilda's presence was perpetual sunshine to the child.
No one could possibly have behaved better than Quentyns did during this trying time. A certain feeling of compunction had visited him when he discovered how real Judy's illness was. He was assailed by a momentary pricking of his conscience, but as the little girl quickly grew better, and was soon pronounced by the doctor to be quite out of danger, it was but natural that an active man of the world like Quentyns should wish to return to town, should find the quiet Rectory simply unendurable, and also that he should wish to take his young wife with him.
The Quentyns arrived at Staunton Rectory on a certain Wednesday, and on the following Sunday evening Quentyns thought the time had arrived for him to speak to Hilda about their return to town. He had not seen much of her during the days which had intervened, and he was obliged now to send Babs with a message to Judy's room to ask his wife to come to him.
Hilda was reading aloud to Judy when Babs entered the room, and said in her important, calm way:
"Jasper wants you, Hilda, and you are to go to him this minute."
Hilda could read beautifully, and Judy had lain in a dream of rapture, listening to the beloved voice as it told the old story of Christian and his pilgrimage. Now the wistful, distressed look crept back into her face.
"Never mind, dear," said Hilda, bending forward and kissing the child. "I shall not be long away."
Quentyns was waiting for his wife in the large conservatory which opened into the drawing room. It was nearly empty of flowers and plants now, but was still a pleasant place to lounge about in.
"Well, my love," he said in his pleasant tone. "Why, how pale you look, Hilda. I am not going to scold you, darling--oh, no, not for the world; but I haven't got too much of your society during these last few days. I don't blame you, and I am not jealous; but if you _could_ spare me half an hour now, there are one or two things I want to talk over with you."
"Of course I can spare you half an hour, Jasper, or an hour for that matter, if you want it," replied Hilda cheerfully. "Judy is much, much better to-night, and I am feeling quite happy about her."
Hilda slipped her hand through her husband's arm as she spoke; he gave the little hand an affectionate squeeze and drew his wife close to his side.
"I am glad Judy is better," he said. "What I have to propose will be quite convenient then, Hilda. I want to go back to town by the first train in the morning. I have heard from Rivers, and----What is it, my love? You really do look very pale. You are overdoing yourself, and I cannot allow it. Now that Judy is better you must rest. I shall get Dr. Pettifer to look you up and give you a tonic when we get back to town."
"Stop, Jasper," said Hilda suddenly. "I am not tired nor worn out in any way. I look pale now because my heart beats--because----Jasper, I cannot go to town with you to-morrow. I know you must go; of course, I quite understand that; but I am not going--not until Judy is well enough to be moved."
Quentyns did not reply for several seconds, then he said in a gentle tone, which did not betray an atom of his true feeling:
"I half expected you to say something of this sort, Hilda; I cannot pretend that I am not sorry. The fine weather is coming on; the London season will soon be at its height. I do not mean for a moment to imply that we can avail ourselves of what is termed a season in town, but for a poor and struggling man it is essential that he should leave no stone unturned to introduce himself to those persons who can and will help him. The influential sort of people who can materially assist me in my career are now in London, Hilda. You, my darling, are an excuse for many valuable introductions. You see, therefore, that not alone from an affectionate point of view you ought now to be with me. But," continued Jasper, looking straight ahead of him, and fixing his fine, intelligent eyes on the distant landscape, "I waive all that. I understand that you do not wish to leave Judy until she is fit to be moved to the seaside. If she maintains the progress she is now making, Dr. Harvey will probably allow Aunt Marjorie to take her away at the end of the week. I shall have you home on Saturday at the latest, Hilda."
"Yes," said Hilda. "I hope so, but--but, Jasper, you still fail to understand me. When Judy goes away, she is not going to the seaside--she is coming with me to London--to Philippa Terrace. It is a promise, and I--I won't--I can't go back from it. I stand or fall by my promise, Jasper--I wish to say so now once for all."
"You stand or fall by your promise!" repeated Quentyns. "What an extraordinary remark. One would suppose, my darling, that I was an ogre or the worst sort of tyrant. I always told you that Judy should come to stay with us for a few weeks when we had a room to receive her in. If matters progress as satisfactorily as I hope, we shall have a snug, prettily furnished, little spare room by the end of the present season. I promise you, Hilda, that Judy shall be its first tenant."
Hilda laid her hand with a sort of trembling, nervous impatience, on her husband's arm.
"I have made a mistake--I have been a coward," she said. "Even now, Jasper, you don't a bit understand me. Long ago, when mother died, she left Judy in my charge. I ought never to have married and left her. Judy is not an ordinary child, and she suffered. When I went away her heart was starved. She could not live with a starved heart. In my absence, my little Judy nearly died. She is better now--she is recovering because I am with her. I am never going to leave her again while she lives."
"Hilda, what nonsense you talk," said Quentyns, with temper in his tone. "If Judy lives to grow up, she will marry like other girls--and will leave you of her own accord."
"If she does," replied Hilda, "that alters the case, but until she leaves me by her own wish or marries, she is in my charge. I will not be parted from her, Jasper. I shall not return to Philippa Terrace until I can bring her with me."
"Is that really your final decision?" said Quentyns--he turned round now and looked at his wife; his face was very cold, its expression carefully veiled. He was intensely anxious not to show even a trace of ill-temper. His words were guarded. "Is that your final decision, Hilda?" he said, and there was a fine withering sort of sarcasm in his voice. "Do you mean seriously to desert the husband you married not three months ago for the sake of a child's whim? Is that the way you keep your marriage vow?"
"No, no, Jasper! I want to be true to you both. I made two vows, and I want to keep them both. Help me, Jasper; I am not a bit a strong-minded girl, I am just very loving. My heart is full of love to you and to Judy. Help me to do this--help me to love you both, to serve you both. Go back to town to-morrow and furnish the spare room, and I will bring Judy back with me on Friday or Saturday."
"I said I should not run in debt. I have no more money to spend on furniture at present. You don't really care for me, Hilda, or you would never speak as you do. But, once for all, I will not be drawn into a path which simply means ruin for the sake of any woman, and for the ridiculous fancies of any child. I will buy no furniture until I can pay for it. That ends the matter, my dear. If you are determined to stay at the Rectory for the summer, they will all, I am sure, be charmed to have you, and I will try and run down as often as I can. I need not say that I think you are making a most grave mistake, but a willful woman must e'en have her way, I suppose. Ah, and here comes the Rector, he has just returned from evening service."
Quentyns went toward the door of the conservatory, which he flung open. Mr. Merton was just entering his drawing room.
"One moment, Jasper--one moment," said Hilda; she rushed after her husband, her face was like death, her eyes were blazing with passion.
"Your cruel words make anything possible," she said. "I made two vows before God, and I will keep them both. There, this was costly, I presume. You spent money on it--sell it again, and buy the furniture that you will not go in debt for."
She thrust her engagement ring into Quentyns' hand and rushed away.
CHAPTER XIII.
JUDY'S ROOM.
An ear that waits to catch A hand upon the latch.
--DORA GREENWELL.
"Here is a letter from Jasper, Hilda darling," said Aunt Marjorie, coming into Judy's bedroom two or three days after the events mentioned in the last chapter. "I know the hand-writing, dear. How strong and manly it looks. I do love a manly hand, don't you?"
Hilda did not reply. She rose from her seat by Judy's side, and taking her husband's letter, walked to the window, and, standing with her back to the light, opened it eagerly. Her face was a little pale and worn, and her eyes had tired lines under them. No one had noticed any change in her, however. Judy was fast recovering--each day her spirits rose, her appetite improved, her strength grew greater. She was to be taken into Hilda's old boudoir to-day, and Babs was importantly moving the beloved china animals, arranging flowers, and getting the room ready for the great event.
Aunt Marjorie, after her usual fashion, fussed over Judy while Hilda read her letter. It was brief, but somehow it gave the young wife unexpected hope and pleasure:
"MY DEAREST WIFE:
"Pray forgive me for not writing sooner, but I have been exceedingly busy since I returned to town, and have dined each night with Rivers at his club. I send a hasty line now to say that you can bring Judy back to Philippa Terrace whenever she is strong enough to be moved, as I have given Shoolbred full directions with regard to furnishing the spare room, and have just had a letter from him to say the goods will be delivered to-day.
"Pray don't tire yourself more than is necessary. And believe me,
"Your affectionate husband, "JASPER QUENTYNS."
"Judy," said Hilda--she turned eagerly, the old lovely color mantling her cheeks, and the brightness of hope filling her eyes. "Isn't Jasper good, Judy? I have just heard from him--he says the furniture is coming in for your room to-day. We can go back to town as soon as ever Dr. Harvey thinks you strong enough to be moved, my pet."
"Which won't be this week," interrupted Aunt Marjorie. "It would be the sheerest madness. Has Jasper proposed such a thing, Hilda? If so, I can only say how like a man. In about a fortnight, this dear child may be the better for change of air.... I have no doubt too that Dr. Harvey will be pleased to have a London opinion about her. There may be a weakness of the heart's action. I never am easy about people who faint off suddenly. Now, Judy, why do you flush up? you know you oughtn't to listen when Auntie talks to Hilda about you. Go on reading your pretty story book, my love. Yes, Hilda, I should like the child to see a first-class physician. You know your mother's heart was not strong. He will doubtless order cod-liver oil, but for my part I prefer cream."
"I know something better than cream for Judy--don't I, my pet?" said Hilda, turning to her little sister with her bright smile.
"And so do I," replied Judy. "Oh, Hilda, to think of living with you in your own little house! Oh, Hilda, I'm _too_ happy--I am so happy that my heart aches. It aches with pleasure."
Judy's thin arms were flung round her sister's neck. Her lips pressed Hilda's soft young cheek, her eyes looked into Hilda's. It seemed to them both at that moment that soul answered to soul.
"Now what nonsense this is," said Aunt Marjorie in her fussy tones. "Judy, I hope Hilda is not going to encourage you in silly sentimental talk of that kind. You say your heart aches with pleasure. Really, my dear, I have no patience to listen to you. I should like to know what a child like you knows about heart-aches--you, who have been brought up in what I may call the very lap of luxury. For, Hilda, I have made it the object of my life ever since poverty came to us, to prevent even the slightest shadow of its wings touching the children. They have had their excellent governess, and their warm schoolroom and snug bedroom. I cut down one of my own fur cloaks to give them really nice winter jackets, and I took special care that the schoolroom table should be as liberal as ever. It is impossible, therefore, for me to understand Judy's silly words about her heart aching."
Aunt Marjorie left the room, and Judy still softly rubbed her cheek against Hilda's.
"But my heart did ache," she said after a pause--"it aches with joy now, and it did ache--oh, it kept crying, it felt starved without you, Hilda."
"I understand--yes, I understand," replied Hilda.
"You don't mind what Aunt Marjorie says then?"
"Not about you, my own little love."
"Hilda, I did really try very, very hard not to fret."
"The effort was too much for you, my Judy; but never mind, the pain and the parting are all over now. Isn't it kind of your new brother--isn't it kind of dear, dear Jasper--to get the nice little room furnished and ready for you, darling?"
"Yes, Hilda. Has he gone in debt for the furniture? You told me long ago that the room would have been furnished and that I should have come to you, but there was no money left, and Jasper would not go in debt. Has he really gone in debt now, just to please me?"
"No, my love, no--we have managed. You must not ask inquisitive questions. All is right now, and we shall be very happy together."
Dr. Harvey was highly pleased, when he heard that his little patient was going to London with her sister. He was a man with plenty of observation, and he could read between the lines much better than poor obtuse old Aunt Marjorie.
"You are the right physician for your little sister, Mrs. Quentyns," he said. "I prophesy that Miss Judy will become perfectly strong and well in a short time under your care. Yes, there will be nothing to prevent her traveling to town on Saturday next, if you really wish it. The weather is extraordinarily mild for the time of year, and a change will do Judy more good than anything else."
Hilda wrote a joyful letter to her husband that day.
"You are to expect us both on Saturday," she said. "Oh, Jasper, how happy your letter has made me. How good--how really good you are. Please forgive me if I was a little hasty with you the other evening. I know you will never regret, darling husband, helping me to keep both my vows--the vow I made to you, and the vow I made mother. No one ever had a more loving wife than I shall prove to you, and no one ever had a dearer little sister than you will find my Judy when you really know her."
"Her Judy, indeed!" murmured Quentyns, when he read his wife's letter at his breakfast-table on the following morning. "Tiresome little piece--she'll never be _my_ Judy, however much she may be Hilda's. Well, I suppose I must make the best of a bad job, but if I had known beforehand that that wretched sentimental child was to be tacked on to us, I'd have thought twice.... No, I wouldn't though, I love Hilda well enough to bear some inconvenience for her sake; but if she thinks this step will really add to our happiness, she'll soon find her mistake. Fancy her asking me to sell her engagement ring! I can never get over that. Things can't be quite the same again--it's impossible. Well, well, more than one friend has told me I'd wake from my dream of bliss some day. I have, with a vengeance--it has been something of a shock too. Heigho! I am not going to _look_ like defeat, anyhow. Of course, too, I'll be just the same to Hilda outwardly. Ah, there's Susan--I'd better speak to her and get her to tell cook. This is Thursday--they'll be here in two days."
"Susan," as the neat parlor-maid entered the room, "I have had a letter from your mistress. She is coming home on Saturday, and will bring little Miss Merton with her. Have the things come from Shoolbred's yet?"
"The furniture, sir, for the spare room? Yes, it arrived yesterday, and the man is coming to lay down the carpet and put up the curtains this morning."
"Well, Susan, you get the room ready, and have the bed well aired, and tell me if there's anything more wanted--the child has been ill, and she'll require every comfort. Mrs. Quentyns will wish the room to look as nice as possible. I know nothing about these matters--see to it, Susan, will you?"
"Yes, sir; you may depend on me and cook to do everything right----"
"And tell cook about your mistress. Let me see, they'll be home between five and six on Saturday evening. I shan't dine at home to-night, and if a telegram comes for me, I want you to wire to my city address. This is it."
Quentyns left the house, and Susan and the cook spent a busy day in dusting, polishing, sweeping, and cleaning.
The little spare room looked very sweet and bright with the simple tasty furniture which Quentyns had chosen. The small bed was inviting in its white draperies. The furniture, painted in artistic greens, had a cool and young effect. The room looked like a child's room, and Susan and cook were in ecstasies over its appearance.
"Master _'ave_ taste and no mistake," said cook. "But why don't he come and look for 'isself at all we have done, Susan? So natty as everything looks, and the furniture master's taste and all. Won't missis be pleased! But why don't he come and say what he thinks of how we has put the things, Susan?"
"Never you mind," said Susan. "Master knows as the arranging of furniture is woman's province--there's no fussing in him, and that's what I likes him for."
Saturday arrived in due time, and the little house in Philippa Terrace was in apple-pie order.
As Quentyns was leaving for town that morning, Susan waylaid him.
"What hour shall I tell my missis that we may expect you home, sir?" she asked. "Mrs. Quentyns and the little lady will be here by six, and the very first thing my missis will ask is, when you are coming in."
"Say," began Quentyns--he paused. "I'll write a line," he said; "you can give it to your mistress. I shan't be in to dinner to-night, and cook had better prepare tea for Mrs. Quentyns and Miss Merton, with fish or chops or something of that sort. I'll write a line--I'm glad you reminded me, Susan."
Quentyns went into his tiny little study, and wrote a few hasty words.
"DEAR HILDA: I have some important work to get through to-night, and shall not be back early. I have the latch-key, so no one need sit up. I shall dine at the club with Rivers. Go to bed early if you are tired.
"Your Affectionate Husband."
This letter was handed to Hilda on her arrival. She was too excited and too interested in getting Judy into the house, and showing her all the pleasant arrangements made for her comfort, to read it at first; but when her tired little sister was safe in bed, and Hilda had seen her enjoying a cup of tea, with some toast and a new-laid country egg, then she took Jasper's note out of her pocket.
She was in her own room, and she hesitated for a moment before she opened it. She had a kind of premonition that there was pain in it. Her home-coming had made her happy, and even while she was opening the envelope of Jasper's letter she was listening for the click of his latch-key in the hall-door lock.
He was always home in good time on Saturdays, and surely he would make extra haste to-night in order to give his wife and his little sister a hearty welcome.
Hilda's was the most forgiving nature in the world. During that scene in the conservatory at Little Staunton she had lost her temper with her husband, but she felt quite sure now that her hasty words must be forgotten. As she forgave absolutely, so would he. Why had he written to her therefore? Why was he not here? She pulled the note out of its envelope, and read the few words that it contained.
It is not too much to say that her heart sank down, down, very low indeed in her breast. She became conscious for the first time in her life of that heart-hunger, that absolute starved sort of ache which had so nearly wrecked Judy's little life. This was the first pang of pain, but the ache was to go on and become worse presently.
Hilda was a very patient sort of woman, however, and it did not occur to her to cry out or make a fuss. She read the note twice, then put it into her pocket and went downstairs.
"Tell cook that I don't want any dinner," she said to Susan; "I will have my tea upstairs with Miss Judy. Tell her not to get dinner, as Mr. Quentyns is obliged to be out this evening."
"Hilda," called Judy's weak little voice from out of her luxurious white bed; "Hilda, do come here a minute."
Hilda went immediately into the room.
"I am so happy and so sleepy," said Judy. "I'm like a bird in a nest--oh, I am so snug. Jasper will be coming in presently, won't he, Hilda? and you'll want to be with him. I shan't need you at all to-night, Hilda darling; I'm going to sleep very soon, and I just sent for you now to say that you mustn't come up to me after dinner--you must stay with Jasper and let him amuse you. I am sure you want lots of amusement after all the dull nursing you have had. Go and put on your pretty dinner dress now, Hilda, and then come and look at me and say good-night. I am so awfully happy, and I just want one kiss from you before I go to sleep."
"But you don't want to go to sleep yet, little puss," said Hilda, in her most cheerful tone; "at least I hope you don't until I have had my tea. I want to have my tea with you, darling, so I hope you don't mind putting up with my company for a little longer."
"As if I could mind--you know better. But, Hilda, if you have tea now you won't be hungry for your dinner."
Judy puckered her dark brows with anxiety.
"I'm not going to have dinner."
"You aren't--not really! then what will Jasper say?"
"I've had a little letter from Jasper, darling; he is obliged to be out late on business, and won't dine at home to-night. Ah, here comes Susan with another new-laid egg for me, and some fresh toast. Now I am going to have a delightful little supper in your company, Judy, and then I shall settle you for the night."
Hilda talked faster than was her wont; there was an additional rose-color in her pretty cheeks, and a brighter light than usual in her soft brown eyes. She laughed and jested and made merry over her egg and toast.
"How pretty you look!" said Judy, with a heart-whole sigh of admiration and content.
She saw nothing wrong, and Hilda kissed her and left the room a few minutes later.
She was still wearing her heavy traveling-dress, but after a moment's reflection she went into her bedroom, and quickly changed it for a pale silk dress of the softest shade of rose. This dress was a special favorite of her husband's; he used to liken her to a rosebud in it, and said that no color more truly matched the soft tender bloom of her young face.
Hilda put on the rose silk now, arranged her dark hair picturesquely, and going downstairs to the little drawing room, occupied herself for an hour or more in giving it some of those delicate touches which make the difference between the mistress of the house being at home and away.
It was a very warm evening for the time of year, but Hilda had a fire lit in the grate. The shaded lamp shed a softened golden glow in its accustomed corner of the room, and Jasper's favorite chair was placed ready for his reception; then Hilda sank down into her own easy-chair, and taking up a book, tried to read.
Susan came presently into the room.
"Oh, Susan," said her mistress, "I was about to ring for you. It has struck ten o'clock; you and cook are to go to bed, please; I will wait up for Mr. Quentyns."
"If you please, ma'am," said Susan.
She stopped and hesitated.
"Yes, Susan?" answered Mrs. Quentyns, in a gentle interrogative tone.
"If you please, ma'am, master has been very late coming home when you was in the country--not till past midnight most nights."
"Thank you, Susan; but Mr. Quentyns will probably be in earlier to-night, and I wish to remain up. Go to bed, and tell cook to do the same. Oh, and please, I should like Miss Judy to have a cup of tea brought to her room at eight to-morrow morning. Good-night, Susan."
The parlor-maid withdrew.
"And don't she look beautiful as a pictur," she muttered under her breath. "Pore young lady, I doubt if she's pleased with master though. Him staying away and all on the first night as she comes back. I wouldn't set up for him ef I were her--no, that I wouldn't; I wouldn't make so little of myself; but she's proud, too, is Mrs. Quentyns, and she don't let on; no, not a bit. Well, I respect her for that, but I misdoubt me if all is right atween that pair."
Susan went upstairs to confide her suspicions to cook. They talked in low whispers together, and wondered what the mystery could be which was keeping Quentyns from his pretty wife's side.
In the meantime, in the silent house the moments for the one anxious watcher went slowly by. Her novel was not interesting--she let it fall on her knees, and looking at the little clock on the mantelpiece, counted the moments until eleven should strike. She quite expected that Jasper would be home at eleven. It did not enter for a moment into her calculations that he could be absent on this first night of her return beyond that hour. When the eleven musical strokes sounded on the little clock, and were echoed in many deeper booms from without, she got up, and opening the drawing-room door, stepped out into the little hall.
Footsteps kept passing and passing in the street. Cabs kept rolling up to other doors and rolling away again. Jasper must surely arrive at any moment.
Hilda softly opened the hall door, and standing on the steps, looked up and down the gas-lit street. If Jasper were walking home he would see her. The lamp light from within threw her slim figure into strong relief. A man passing by stopped for an instant to look at her.
Hilda shut the hall door hastily in fear and distress. The man had looked as if he might say something rude. She returned to her little drawing room, and sitting down by the dying fire stared fixedly into its embers until her eyes were full of tears.
Between twelve and one Quentyns let himself softly into the house with his latch-key. He was immediately attracted by the light in the drawing room, the door of which was slightly ajar. He came into the room at once, to find Hilda lying back in her easy-chair, fast asleep. She was looking pale--all her pretty roses had fled. Quentyns' first impulse was to fold her in his arms in an embrace of absolute love and reconciliation.
What a pity it is that we don't oftener yield to our first impulses, for they are as a rule whispered to us by our good angels.
Quentyns bent forward, and lightly, very lightly, touched the sleeper's soft hair with his big hand. That touch was a caress, but it startled Hilda, who woke up with a cry.
"Oh, Jasper," she said, looking at him with alarm in her eyes, "you--you are home! I didn't mean to go to sleep, and--what is it, Jasper?"
"Kiss me, Hilda; I am glad you have returned," said Quentyns. "But another night, if I should happen to be late, you must not sit up for me--I hate being waited for."
CHAPTER XIV.
THE LITTLE RIFT.
No backward path; ah! no returning; No second crossing that ripple's flow: Come to me now for the mist is burning: Come ere it darkens; Ah, no; ah, no!
--JEAN INGELOW.
Jasper Quentyns was quite certain that he was behaving admirably under circumstances of a specially trying nature.
Judy's advent in the house gave him no small annoyance. Hilda's behavior about Judy, her fit of sudden passion, above all the relinquishing of her engagement ring, had cut him to the quick. He was proud, sensitive, and jealous; when, therefore, he could smile at Judy and chat in light and pleasant tones to his wife, when he could remark on the furniture in the spare room, and make many suggestions for the comfort of the little sister-in-law whom he detested, he was under the impression that his conduct was not only exemplary but Christian.
It was true that he went out a good deal in the evenings, not taking Hilda with him as had been his original intention, but leaving her at home to enjoy the society of the child who had brought the first cloud into his home.
"I am going to dine out to-night, Hilda," he would say. "A man I know particularly well has asked me. Afterward he and I may go to the theater together. You won't mind of course being left, as you have Judy with you?"
"Oh, no, dear!" she replied, on the first of these occasions; and when Jasper came to say something of this sort two or three times a week, Hilda's invariable gentle answer was always that she did not mind.
Jasper was kind--kindness itself, and if she did feel just a trifle afraid of him, and if she could not help knowing all over her heart that the sun did not shine now for her, that there was a cloud between her husband and herself, which she could neither brush away nor penetrate, she made no outward sign of being anything different from the cheery and affectionate Hilda of old. There were subjects now, however, which she shrank from touching on in Jasper's presence. One of them was her engagement ring, another the furniture in Judy's room. That ring she had been told by more than one connoisseur was worth at least fifty pounds, and Hilda was certain that the simple furniture which made Judy's little room so bower-like and youthful could not have cost anything approaching that sum. Still Jasper said nothing about giving her change out of the money which he had spent, and Hilda feared to broach the subject of the ring to him. Another topic which by a sort of instinct she refrained from was Judy herself. When Jasper was in the house Hilda was always glad when Judy retired to her own room. When the gay little voice, happy now, and clear and sweet as a lark's, was heard singing snatches of gay songs all over the house, if Jasper were there, Hilda would carefully close the door of the room he was sitting in.
"Not now, Judy darling," she would say, when the child bounded eagerly into their presence. "Jasper is just going out--when he is out I will attend to you. Go on with your drawing in the dining room until I come to you, Judy."
Judy would go away at once obedient and happy, but Hilda's face would flush with anxiety, and her eyes would not meet her husband's. So between each of these young people there was that wall of reserve which is the sad beginning of love's departure; but Hilda, being the weaker of the two and having less to occupy her thoughts, suffered more than Jasper.
On a certain evening when Judy had been a happy resident of No. 10 Philippa Terrace for over a month, Quentyns was about to leave his office and to return home, when his friend Tom Rivers entered his room.
"Have you any engagement for to-night, Quentyns?" he asked abruptly.
"None," said Jasper, visible relief on his face, for he was beginning to dislike the evenings which he spent with a wife who always had a sense of constraint over her, and with the knowledge that Judy's presence was only tolerated when he was by. "I am at your service, Tom," said Jasper. "Do you want me to go anywhere with you?"
Rivers was a great deal older than Quentyns, he was a very clever and practical man of the world. He looked now full at Jasper. He had not failed to observe the eager relief on his friend's face when he asked if he had any engagement. To a certain extent Jasper had made Rivers his confidant. He had told him that Hilda's little sister, who had been so ill and had given them all such a fright, was staying now at Philippa Terrace.
Rivers shrewdly guessed that Hilda's little sister was scarcely a welcome guest, as far as Quentyns was concerned. Rivers had taken a fancy to pretty Mrs. Quentyns. With a quick mental survey he saw again the picture of the young wife on the night when he had dined at Philippa Terrace.
"She did not look perfectly happy," he thought. "I hope Quentyns is good to her. I seldom saw a more charming face than hers, but with such eyes, so full of expression, so full of that sort of dumb, dog-like affectionateness, she must, she will suffer horribly if there comes a cloud between her husband and herself. Quentyns is the best of fellows, but he can be dogged and obstinate--I hope to goodness there's nothing up in that pretty little home of theirs."
Aloud Rivers said abruptly, "I had thought of asking you to dine at the club with me, and then we might have gone to see Irving in _Henry VIII._,--a friend has given me two stalls,--but on second thoughts I can dispose of those tickets. What I should really like best is to come home with you, Quentyns, and have the pleasure of another chat with your wife. I want to hear you both sing too--I seldom heard two voices better suited to go together. May I invite myself to dinner to-night, Jasper?"
"Oh, certainly," said Jasper, after a moment's awkward hesitation. "I'll just wire to Hilda, if you don't mind."
"Not at all," said Rivers; "but remember, I am coming to take pot-luck."
Jasper ran off to the nearest telegraph office.
Rivers saw that his proposal was anything but welcome, but for that very reason he was determined to carry it out.
An hour later he found himself standing in the pretty drawing room in Philippa Terrace, talking to the most charming little girl he had ever had the pleasure of meeting.
Quentyns had run up at once to his room, and Hilda had not yet put in an appearance, but Judy, who was sitting on a sofa reading "Sylvie and Bruno," jumped up at once and came forward in her shy but self-possessed little way to meet her sister's guest.
"How do you do?" she said. "Where would you like to sit?"
"I prefer standing, thank you," said Rivers. He smiled at Judy and held out his hand. "So you are the young mutineer," he said suddenly.
Judy's big eyes looked up at him in surprise--she was dressed in a green silk frock, with a broad golden-brown sash round her waist. Her dress was cut rather low in the neck, and she had several rows of golden-brown beads round her throat. The quaint dress suited the quaint but earnest little face.
"What do you mean by calling me such a queer name?" said Judy.
"I am a great friend of your brother-in-law's," said Rivers, now dropping into a chair and drawing the child toward him, "and he has told me all about you--you mutinied when Mrs. Quentyns went away--it was very wrong of you, very wrong indeed."
"You can't judge anything about it," said Judy, the sensitive color coming into her face; "you are on Jasper's side, so you can't know."
"Of course I'm on Jasper's side, he's an excellent fellow, and a great friend of mine."
"I don't like him," said Judy; "it isn't to be expected I should."
"Of course not, you wouldn't be a mutineer if you did."
"I wish you wouldn't call me by that horrid name," said Judy. "I can't quite understand what it means, but I'm sure it's disagreeable."
"A mutineer is always a disagreeable person," continued Rivers, looking with his pleasant eyes full at the child. "He is in a state of rebellion, you know. People aren't nice when they rebel against the inevitable."
"What's the inevitable?" asked Judy.
"The inevitable!" repeated Rivers. "The inevitable," he continued gravely, "is what has to be met because it cannot be avoided. The inevitable stands directly in a person's path; he can't go round it, he can't jump over it, he has just to meet it bravely and make the best friend he possibly can of it."
"Oh," said Judy, "that sounds like a fairy tale. Babs and I love fairy tales, particularly the old, old ones--the Jack the Giant Killer sort--you understand?"
"Jack the Giant Killer had lots of inevitables to meet," pursued Rivers.
"Yes, of course," said Judy; "now I know what you mean as far as dear Jack was concerned, but I don't know what you mean about me."
"Well, you see, Miss Judy--you don't mind my calling Jasper's little sister Miss Judy?"
"Oh, don't talk of him," said Judy, a frown between her brows.
"But I must if I'm to explain my meaning to you, for he's the inevitable."
"Now what _do_ you mean?--you're the most puzzling sort of grown-up person I ever met!"
"And you're the most intelligent sort of little person I ever met. Now let me explain matters to you. Your sister is very pretty, isn't she?"
"Pretty?" said Judy meditatively--"pretty is such a common sort of word--if you call flowers pretty, Hilda is, I suppose, but she's much, much more than pretty."
"I understand. I'm quite sure I understand you perfectly. And your sister is good too, and sweet?"
"Oh, yes!" Judy's eyes filled with tears, she blinked her eyelashes and looked out of the window.
"Well, now," said Rivers, and his voice was quite tender, for Judy's manner and attitude touched him wonderfully. "Well, now, you see it was inevitable that some man should love a woman like your sister, and want to make her his wife, and wish to take her altogether to himself. It was inevitable, also, that a woman with a gentle heart like Mrs. Quentyns should love this man in return and want to devote her life to him."
"Don't!" said Judy, suddenly; "I understand you now, I don't want you to say another word." She crossed over to the window and stood there with her back to Rivers, looking gravely out.
Hilda came down in her rose-colored silk, and Rivers did not wonder that Judy thought of the flowers when she looked at her.
Hilda was unfeignedly glad to see him, and they had a pleasanter evening than any since Judy's advent in Philippa Terrace. Rivers paid a great deal of attention to the smallest and youngest member of the party, and not only completely won Hilda's heart by so doing, but induced Quentyns to look at his little sister-in-law with new eyes, and to discover for the first time, that under certain conditions that wistful little face could be both lovely and charming.
"Remember about the inevitable," said Rivers, as he bade the child good-night.
"What did Mr. Rivers mean, Judy?" said Hilda. "Oh, Judy, what flushed cheeks!--I did wrong to let you sit up, but you seemed so happy--you seemed to take such a fancy to Mr. Rivers."
"He was disagreeable to me--very disagreeable," said Judy, "but I liked him."
"And what did he mean by reminding you of the inevitable?" continued Hilda.
"It was in that way he was disagreeable," replied Judy. "I can't explain, Hilda darling; good-night--I am going to bed now."
That evening, in their own room, Hilda came suddenly to her husband's side.
"Jasper, don't you think you might forget about it now?" she said timidly.
"Forget about what, Hilda?" He had been genial and pleasant until she began to speak; now his face stiffened in every outline, and the look came over it which always took poor Hilda's courage away.
"We were so happy to-night," she began in a faltering voice--"we had quite the best evening we have had since----" here she hesitated.
"Since Judy came," pursued Jasper. "Yes, that goes without saying, there were four of us--even the dearest friends are dull when there are three, and of course Rivers is capital company, he's quite the best fellow all round I ever met."
"Oh, yes!" said Hilda, a little impatiently, "but I don't want to talk of him. Jasper dear, let us forget, let us--oh, let us be as we were before."
Tears choked her voice, she turned her head away.
"I am so tired," she said suddenly; "I am the sort of girl who wants sunshine, I am so tired of being without it."
"When you talk in that metaphorical style I fail to understand you," said Quentyns. "There's not the least cloud between us that I am aware of, and if you are not in the sunshine, Hilda, I am afraid it is your own fault. I have done everything in my power to meet your wishes. You profess great love for me, and great love for your sister, and now you have us both, what can you possibly want besides?"
"Only your forgiveness, your complete and full forgiveness."
"I have nothing to forgive, my dear. You do your best--no one can do better than their best."
"No," said poor Hilda, with a sigh. She did not add any more.
"I trust you are not going to turn into a fanciful sort of woman," said Quentyns, half an hour later. "If there's a person in the world who irritates me it's a woman with whims, a woman who has a grievance."
"Oh, no, Jasper! I won't have a grievance," she replied humbly.
CHAPTER XV.
THREE IS TRUMPERY.
The crown must be won for Heaven, dear, In the battle-field of life: My child, though thy foes are strong and tried, He loveth the weak and small; The Angels of Heaven are on thy side, And God is over all!
--ADELAIDE PROCTOR.
Judy's life was sunshine, and therefore Judy got quickly well; she was like the birds and the flowers--give her sunshine enough, and she would sing like the birds and bloom like the flowers. Hilda was her sun, and now she was always basking herself in the beloved presence. Her cup of happiness was full, and such contentment reigned in her little heart that no moment was dull to her, and time never hung heavy on her hands.
Hilda was just as sweet and loving as of old, and really, now that she lived in the house with him, Jasper, her _bête noire_, the awful big brother-in-law who had come and stolen her treasure away, seemed to make but little difference in her life; it was almost nicer being with Hilda in London than being with Hilda at the old Rectory--she seemed to get more undivided attention from her sister than when that sister was the Rector's right hand in his busy life, and when Judy had to learn lessons with Babs, and walk with stupid, non-comprehending Miss Mills.
Now Judy learned rapidly, for Hilda was her teacher; and how delightful that lunch was which was also Judy's early dinner, when she and her sister sat _tête-à-tête_, and talked always, always of old times.
If visitors dropped in at tea-time Judy could afford, in her generous happiness, to give them a little of her fascinating Hilda's attention, for so often now there were heavenly evenings to follow, when that _bête noire_ the brother-in-law was not coming home, and the two sisters could be alone.
Judy loved the cozy sort of tea-dinners which began those evenings, and then the long talk afterward in the lengthening twilight, when she sat on a stool at Hilda's feet, with her head pressed up against Hilda's arm, and her happy heart beating close to the other heart, which was all her world.
On those evenings too Hilda came upstairs and tucked her up in her white bed, and said, _Now I lay me down to sleep_ to her, just as she used in the old nursery at home, after mother died.
It was an understood thing, although no words had passed between the two--it was an understood thing, that on the evenings when Jasper was at home, Hilda should not come upstairs to Judy. This seemed a perfectly fair and just arrangement, they were both in full accord on the subject; but Judy could not help loving those days when she might have her sister all to herself the best.
On the morning after Rivers had dined in Philippa Terrace, as Jasper was preparing to go out as usual, Hilda ran into the little hall to give him a last word; she left the door of the dining room ajar, which was not her invariable custom, and Judy, sitting at the breakfast table, found herself in the position of an eavesdropper.
"You are coming back to dinner to-night?" asked the wife.
Jasper had been visited with some slight qualms of compunction that morning, as he noticed how much paler Hilda's face was than when first he had married her, so he put his arm round her neck now, and looking at her with something of his old tenderness, said gently:
"Do you really wish it?"
"Jasper, how can you doubt?" she replied. "All the moments you are away from me are long and wearisome."
"Long and wearisome," repeated Judy softly to herself in the breakfast parlor. Some of the color fled out of her face now; she lost her appetite for the bread-and-butter and marmalade which she was eating.
"You don't find three trumpery," pursued Jasper. Then he added with a little sigh, "I wish I didn't; but I'll come home, Hilda, if you wish it. Good-by, my dear. Stay, stop a moment; suppose I take you to the play to-night. Judy won't mind going to bed a little earlier than usual."
Just at that moment Hilda started and looked round; she heard a slight noise, and wondered if Susan were coming upstairs. The sound which disturbed her was made by Judy, who, awaking suddenly to the knowledge that she was an eavesdropper, had risen from the breakfast table and had gently closed the dining-room door.
"Of course Judy doesn't mind being left," said Hilda in a joyful tone. "I should love to go out somewhere with you, Jasper. I really do want a little bit of change."
"Very well, my love; I'll take tickets for something amusing, and be home to dinner at six."
Quentyns went out, and Hilda danced back to the dining room. Her husband had been kind, with something of the old tender kindness, and her heart leaped up like a flower answering to the sun.
Judy was standing by the window looking out.
"Isn't it a lovely day, pet?" said Hilda, coming up to her. "Suppose we give ourselves a holiday, and go to the Academy together. I have not been there yet this year, and you have never been in all your life, puss. You know how you love pictures; fancy room after room full of pictures--all sorts, good, bad, and indifferent; all colors in them; all sorts of subjects depicted on the canvases. There's a treat for my little artist--shall I give it her?"
"Yes, Hilda, I'd like to go with you very much."
"Are you tired, dear, your face is so grave?"
"No, darling, I'm not at all tired."
"Well, we'll give ourselves a holiday. Run up and put on your pretty green cloak, and that big black hat with the green velvet. I want you to look as picturesque as possible. I want to be proud of you."
Judy suddenly flew to Hilda, clasped her arms round her neck, gave her a passionate hug, and then rushed out of the room.
"What's the matter with the child?" thought the elder sister for a brief moment, "she was so bright yesterday, and even this morning, but now she's dull, although she tries to hide it. I wonder if I ought to give her some more of her tonic. Well, well, whether Judy is grave or gay, I cannot help feeling very happy at the thought of going out with Jasper once more."
Hilda gave all directions with regard to the nice little dinner which was to precede the play. She found a story book which Judy had not yet read, and left it in the drawing room ready for her entertainment when she was away; then, dressed also in her best, she went out with her little sister, and, calling a hansom from the nearest stand, drove to Burlington House.
As usual the great exhibition was crowded with all sorts and conditions of men--the fashionable, the studious, the artistic, the ignorant, were all to be found there. Judy had a passion for art. She was an artist by nature, down to the tips of her sensitive little fingers. No sooner did she find herself in the midst of all the pictures, than whatever cloud made her a little graver than usual took to itself wings and flew away.
Her pertinent remarks, her eager criticism, shrewd, observant, often strangely to the point, aroused the attention of some of the bystanders; they smiled as the pretty child and the beautiful girl walked slowly by together. Judy's intelligent face was commented on; the pathetic, eager, wistful eyes seemed to make their way to more than one heart. Hilda, thinking of her evening with Jasper, was quite her old self, and people thought what a happy pair the two were.
In the third room they suddenly came face to face with Rivers.
"What a bit of luck!" he said, going up at once to them. "Now, Mrs. Quentyns, I shall insist upon taking you to lunch somewhere. Miss Judy, how are you? what do you think of our national picture fair?"
"Some of the pictures are lovely," she replied.
"Some!" he retorted, raising his brows. "You don't mean to say you are setting yourself up as a critic."
"Judy is an artist by nature," said Hilda for her. "Hark to her remarks with regard to the two dogs in that picture."
"They are meant to move, but they are perfectly still," said Judy; "if I drew them, I'd"--she puckered her brows--"oh, I'd see that they were gamboling about."
A young man, who was standing not far off, turned away with a red face--he happened to be the unfortunate artist. Bitter hatred of Judy filled his heart, for some of the people who were standing near tittered aloud, and remarked for the first time that the dogs were wooden.
Rivers walked with Mrs. Quentyns and Judy through the different rooms: he was an art connoisseur himself, and even dabbled in paint in a dilettante sort of fashion. He drew Judy on to make remarks, laughed and quizzed her for some ideas which he considered in advance of the times, for others which were altogether too antiquated for him to pass unchallenged.
"Oh, how Stanmore would like to hear you," he remarked, naming one of the pet artists of the New Art school. "Why, Judy, you are a democrat; we should have no Academy if we listened to you, you little rebel; but then, I forgot, of course you are a mutineer--you are true to your character through everything."
Hilda scarcely listened as the young man and the child chatted and laughed together, her heart was dwelling altogether in the future. She fancied herself even now driving to the play by her husband's side; she saw the pretty dress she meant to wear; in her mind was reflected as in a picture the image of her fair self, and the image also of the man who was still in her heart lover as well as husband. No matter for the present cloud, he was still her lover. She wondered if he would give her another tender glance, and if, as they sat side by side when the curtain was up and the actors were moving about on the stage, he would touch her hand with his, and show her in that way that she was forgiven.
"If he would only understand that I must keep both my vows," she murmured, "if I could only get him to really comprehend that much, much as I love my Judy, I would rather be alone with him--that is, I would rather be alone with him, if it makes him unhappy to have my sweet little Judy in the house. But how happy she is since I brought her home; how gay her voice sounds now."
"I said you were a mutineer," laughed Rivers. "I know by your manner that you will never put up with the inevitable."
"Don't!" said Judy; Hilda was looking at a lovely landscape, a friend she knew came up and spoke to her. "Don't!" said Judy, turning and looking full at the young man; her eyes were grave, her childish face grew suddenly white and drawn. "Perhaps I am going to give up being a mutineer," she murmured.
CHAPTER XVI.
A LITTLE GIRL AND A LITTLE CROSS.
Love that hath us in the net, Can he pass, and we forget? Many suns arise and set, Many a chance the years beget. Love the gift is love the debt. Even so.
Love is hurt with jar and fret. Love is made a vague regret. Eyes with idle tears are wet. Idle habit links us yet, What is love? for we forget: Ah, no! no!
--TENNYSON.
Mrs. Quentyns and Judy enjoyed their lunch with Rivers. They went into the Park afterward for a short time, and then Hilda, remembering that the hours were flying, and that she must be dressed and ready to receive her husband before six that evening, bade the young man a hasty good-by, and drove home with Judy.
"I am so glad you are going to the play," said the little girl. "Why don't you often go--why don't you constantly go out in the evening?"
"If I did, Judy, what a dull time you'd have."
"You're quite mistaken, Hilda; I shouldn't be dull at all. You don't know how I like story-books, and Susan is such a nice girl. She has got brothers and sisters at home, and she tells me about them when you are out. I am never lonely; I couldn't possibly be sad in the same house with you. If I saw you once or twice a day it would be enough for me--it would really."
"My dear little pet," laughed Hilda, "how solemnly you are talking, what a frightfully earnest tone has got into your voice, and how you are puckering your poor little forehead. I have only one thing to say in reply to your generous wish to leave me so much by myself, namely, that I should find it extremely inconvenient and extremely lonely to have you in the house and only see you twice a day."
"But suppose I weren't with you at all, Hilda--suppose I were still at the Rectory."
"That would be different," said Hilda, in a light tone; "you would be in your natural home, and I----"
"But you _would_ be lonely if I were away from you, Hilda; do say you'd be fearfully lonely!"
The passion in Judy's voice was unnoticed by Hilda.
"I'd miss you, of course, my pet," she said; "but I do declare that stupid driver is taking us wrong. Oh, if he goes up that way it will be such a round that I shall be late for Jasper's dinner. Poke your parasol through the little window in the roof, Judy, and stop him, do."
Judy obeyed, the driver received his directions in due course, and a moment or two later Hilda and Judy were standing in the little hall at Philippa Terrace. Quentyns came suddenly forward.
"Why, Jasper, you have come back already," said the wife. "It isn't five yet, but I--I can dress in no time. Have you got the tickets?--where are we going?"
"Come into the drawing room, Hilda, I want to say a word to you," said Quentyns.
"Run upstairs and take your things off, Judy," said Hilda. She followed her husband into the little drawing room and shut the door. "Well?" she said. Her voice was still gay, but a little, just a little, of the old fear was creeping back into her heart.
"I am ever so sorry, Hilda, to disappoint you," said Quentyns, "but when I went to town this morning I absolutely forgot an engagement I made a week ago. I have to go down with two or three men to Richmond. We are to dine at the Star and Garter, and afterward Philip Danvers has asked me to go home with him. The Danvers are charming people--have a beautiful house on the river, and everything in the best possible style. I should rather like to cultivate them. It is never a good plan to throw over friends who may be influential; still, if you really wish it, Hilda, I'll come home to-night and make some sort of excuse to Danvers--wire to him that I am ill, or something of the kind. Of course it is too late for me to get tickets for the play, but if you would like me to stay at home, I'll--I'll do it--so there!"
Hilda's face, which had been white, was now flushed.
"Why didn't you tell me this morning?" she said. "Why did you forget? I spent a day of hope, and now--now----" Her eyes filled with sudden tears, she bit her lips and turned away.
Her action, which seemed almost pettish, annoyed Quentyns.
"You needn't cry," he said. "I never supposed you could be so childish. Do you think I forgot on purpose? I was looking forward to my time at Richmond, but it slipped my memory that this was the day. You needn't cry, however, for if you have suddenly taken such a frantic desire for my society, it is at your service. I shall go out and wire to Danvers, and be back again in half an hour."
After all, Mrs. Quentyns had plenty of self-control. The annoyance and distress in her voice had altogether left it when she spoke again.
"Of course you must go, Jasper," she said. "You don't suppose for a quarter of an instant that I should stand in your way. Let me go up with you and help you to put the things you want into a bag, and you will want some tea before you start. I'll ring and tell Susan to prepare it. Now come along, dear; I'm glad of course that you are having this pleasure."
As Hilda ran upstairs her manner was once more quite cheerful. Quentyns, however, whose conscience was smiting him, although he didn't know it, could not help acting more or less like a bear with a sore head.
"I shouldn't have accepted the invitation," he said, "upon my word I shouldn't, did I not know that you would have Judy to keep you company. You know I haven't that passion for children you have, and----"
The door was closed behind the two.
"Don't say any more," said Hilda, in a frightened sort of voice. "I told you I was glad that you were to have the pleasure. Now which bag will you take? Will the small Gladstone be large enough?"
Ten minutes later Quentyns had left the house in a hansom, and Hilda went up to Judy's room.
"Come downstairs, darling," she said, "we are to have another long evening all to ourselves. What a good thing I've got my sweet little sister to stay at home with me. Judy, this was to be a festive night, and I had quite a festive dinner prepared. Suppose we keep the occasion, although we are only to be by ourselves. You shall dine with me to-night, Judy, and we'll both dress for dinner. You shall wear white, for you look so sweet in white, and I'll do the same."
"Have you got the old India muslin dress that you used to wear at the Rectory before--before there was a Jasper?" said Judy, in a queer, steady kind of little voice. "If you have that old India muslin that father loved and Aunt Marjorie loved, and that Babs and I used always to say you looked like an angel in, will you put it on to-night, Hilda?--will you wear that dress once again?"
"What a queer thing!" replied Hilda. "I never threw the old muslin away. I think I can poke it out of some depths somewhere; and it is so soft that, if I shake it out and hang it up for about half an hour, it will be quite presentable. Yon funny Judy, why do you wish to see me in that dress?"
"You were all mine when you wore that dress last," said Judy.
"I am always yours, my dearest. But don't let us talk sentiment; let us make ourselves smart, and let us come downstairs and be happy. We'll imagine that we are at a very gay party; heaps and heaps of other people in the room, but we two, as is sometimes the case, are more or less alone in the crowd. We are so completely one that other people scarcely affect us. We can talk together, and whisper old secrets about the garden, and Babs, and the animals, and the organ in the church, and the funny chorister-boy who would never sing in tune; we can talk of all these things, although there are throngs and throngs around us, for in a crowd those who love each other often find the best sort of solitude. Come down, Judy, come down, and let's be happy!"
"How flushed you are, Hilda; are you well?"
"Yes; I never felt better."
"You look awfully pretty; you look quite lovely."
"What a dear little flatterer you are! Does it really matter whether I look pretty or not? Aunt Marjorie would scold you, child, for praising my looks to my face; she would say you were encouraging vanity."
"And I should tell her to her face that I was not," answered Judy stoutly. "It's right to look beautiful; it's copying the flowers. Now run and put on your India muslin dress, Hilda."
Hilda left the room, and half an hour later the two sisters met in the little drawing room. There were fresh flowers in the vases; and a great bowl of primroses, which Aunt Marjorie had sent from the Rectory, was placed on the little table in the square bay-window.
Judy in her white dress stood near the flowers. She took up one, and in an absent sort of fashion pulled it to pieces. Susan announced dinner, and the sisters dined together in great state, and with apparent enjoyment. Hilda joked about everything, and Judy, catching up her spirit, did likewise.
"Let us imagine, just for to-night, that I am grown-up," she said; "treat me as if I were your grown sister--not your little sister--Hilda."
Hilda felt in the humor to comply with any request Judy made.
"We will have our coffee in the drawing room," she said. "Black coffee for me, please, Susan, but bring in a little jug of cream for Miss Judy's. Now, dearest," turning to the child, "don't forget that the play is going on; we have dined out with numbers, oh, numbers of guests, and now we are in the large assembly-room, alone in the crowd, happy because we are together."
Judy had thrown herself back into a deep arm-chair in the little drawing room while Hilda was speaking; her eyes had a sort of starry radiance about them, her cheeks were slightly flushed, her cloudy soft brown hair was thrown back from her white brow.
Hilda moved about the room; she was restless notwithstanding the enforced calm she was putting upon herself. Judy smiled when Hilda spoke, but in her heart certain words kept repeating themselves--they had repeated themselves like a sort of mournful echo in that poor little heart all day.
"All the moments you are away from me are long and wearisome," Hilda had said to her husband. "All the moments."
And then he had said to her:
"You don't find three trumpery. I wish I didn't!"
"So I'm the trumpery," thought Judy to herself. "I'm three. And all the moments while Hilda is away from Jasper are long and wearisome. Poor Hilda! poor darling! how well she hid it all from me; how good, how very good she has been to me; but I'm glad I know. It was a lucky, a very lucky thing that the door of the breakfast room was left slightly open this morning, and so I was able to hear Jasper's words."
"How silent you are, dearest," said Hilda, looking at the child.
"I beg your pardon," said Judy, jumping up. "I was thinking."
"Think aloud then, sweet. Let me share your pretty thoughts."
"But they are not pretty, Hilda; and I think I'd rather no one shared them. Now let us talk about old times--about the dear old times before there was a Jasper."
"Judy," said Hilda, "there is just one thing I should like to say to you. Even if it gives you pain, I ought to remind you, my darling, that Jasper is my husband; that I love him. Oh! Judy, Judy, my heart aches with love to him. My heart aches because I love my husband so much."
Judy clenched her hands; a great wave of crimson swept over her face. Hilda had hidden her own face in her hands, and did not notice the child's agitation. Presently the little sister's hand softly touched her forehead.
"And you're lonely to-night, poor Hilda, because your Jasper is away?"
"Yes, Judy, it's true. I'm afraid even to tell you how lonely I am."
"And you've been trying to seem cheerful, just to please me."
"And to please myself too," said Hilda, starting up and wiping the tears from her eyes. "There, we won't talk about it any more; we'll go on pretending that we are having an awfully jolly time."
"You're very brave, Hilda," said Judy; "and when people are brave, things generally come right. Now, may I sit on your knee, just as if I were a baby instead of a tall girl with long legs? _I_ wouldn't make you unhappy, Hilda darling. When there's an inevitable I must face it; I must, and you will see that I will. Jack the Giant Killer shan't beat _me_ over difficulties when I've made up my mind."
"Judy, your face is flushed, and your eyes are too bright; that strong coffee was bad for you, you won't sleep to-night."
"I dare say I shan't sleep; but now let us talk of old times."
"Only for a few moments, dear; you look so excited that I shall not rest until I see you safely in bed."
Judy laughed, and declared stoutly that she never felt better.
Half an hour afterward she went up to her pretty little bedroom, Hilda promising to follow her in about a quarter of an hour, if she possibly could.
When the elder sister entered the room, she found Judy standing by her bed in her frilled night-dress.
"You will get cold, love--do get into bed," said Hilda.
"I want to say my prayers to you, Hilda, if you don't mind," said Judy, "just as I used when I was a very little girl."
"Of course, darling, if you wish it."
Hilda sat down, and the little sister knelt at her knee.
The old baby prayers were said aloud; but suddenly, in the midst of them, Judy bent her head and murmured something which Hilda could not hear.
She jumped up a moment later and put her arms round her sister's neck.
"You won't be lonely long, Hilda," she said. "It will be all right; you'll see it will be as right as possible. I am glad you are fond of Jasper. I am really, really, awfully glad."
"Good-night, my darling," said Hilda, kissing her. She went out of the room with tears in her eyes.
"Poor little Judy, how little she knows," thought the elder sister; "how very little she knows what a cloud there is between Jasper and me. Oh, if it goes on much longer, I think my heart will break!"
In the meantime, in her pretty white bed, Judy was murmuring an old text to herself:
"He that taketh not up his cross and followeth after Me, cannot be My disciple."
Once, long ago, the Rector had explained this text, or rather given a shadow of its meaning to the child.
"Followeth after Me," she murmured; and a vision came to her of One who, in the great cause of Love, had taken up His cross, even to death.
She wiped the tears from her eyes, and fell asleep.
CHAPTER XVII.
JUDY'S SECRET.
Be strong to _hope_, oh, Heart! Though day is bright, The stars can only shine In the dark night. Be strong, oh, Heart of mine, Look towards the light!
--ADELAIDE PROCTOR.
The next morning Judy was down specially early to breakfast.
Her cheeks were slightly more flushed than usual, and her eyes, to anyone who watched them closely, had a determined, almost hard, expression in them. Hilda, however, was too much occupied with her own sad thoughts to take any special notice of the child.
"You look well, Judy," she said, giving a quick glance at her. "Now come to breakfast, dear, I've a good deal to do afterward."
"Are you going out, Hilda?" asked Judy.
"No, I'm going to be busy all the morning over my accounts; they've got into the most disgraceful muddle, and I want to put them straight. I shall be in the drawing room, for I keep all my household books in the davenport there. I mean to give you a holiday, Judy, but perhaps you won't mind reading some of your history to yourself, and doing a few sums this morning."
"Of course not," said Judy brightly. "Shall I make you some toast, Hilda? This in the toast-rack is so soft and flabby--do let me, Hilda."
"If you like, dear, you may. It is lucky there is a fire, but I must tell cook to discontinue them, the weather is getting so warm."
Judy was an adept at making toast, and it was an old fashion at the Rectory that Hilda's toast should be made by her, on those blissful red-letter days when the elder sister had tea with the little ones in the nursery.
Judy wondered as she delicately browned that toast, and scorched her own little cheeks, if Hilda would remember the old days, and the toast which she used to make her; but Mrs. Quentyns seemed to be in a sort of brown study that morning, and thanked the child absently when the crisp hot toast was put on her plate.
"Jasper will be home quite early to-day, won't he, Hilda?" inquired Judy.
"I don't know, Judy--yes, I suppose so."
"I'm sure he'll be home early," repeated Judy with confidence; "perhaps he'll take you to the play to-night, and perhaps you'll be awfully happy."
"Oh, don't talk about it, Judy," said Hilda, in a weary voice; "we must all make up our minds to face the fact that there's a great deal _more_ than mere happiness in the world. What is happiness? It's only a small part of life."
"I don't think it is going to be a small part of your life, Hilda; but now I'm not going to idle you any more, for you want to get to your accounts."
Judy ran out of the room. As she was going slowly upstairs, she paused once to say softly to herself:
"It's all happening beautifully; I ought to be glad. Of course I am glad. '_He that taketh not up his cross._' I'm glad that text keeps running in my head, it makes me so nice and strong."
Susan was doing out Judy's room when the little girl ran into it. Judy was fond of Susan, and Susan of her, and the girl stopped her work now to listen to the child's eager words.
"Susan, do you think Mrs. Quentyns would let you come out with me for a little this morning, for about an hour or an hour and a half?"
"Well, miss," said Susan, "it aint Monday, which is the day to get ready for the laundry, nor yet Wednesday, when I turns out the drawing room, nor Friday, which is silver day--there's nothing special for Thursday; I should think I could go with you, Miss Judy, and it will be a treat to take you about. Is it Mme. Tussand's you has a hankerin' for, Miss?"
"No, no, Susan, I'm not going to any exhibition; it's a secret--I'll tell you when we're out."
"The Doré Gallery, perhaps?" suggested Susan.
"No, it's nothing of that sort; I'll tell you when we're out."
"Very well, miss, I'm proud to be at your service whatever it is."
"I'll run down now and ask my sister if you may come with me, Susan."
Judy threw her arms round Hilda as she was coming up from the kitchen premises.
"Hilda, the day is so fine!"
"No, Judy, you mustn't tempt me to go out. I really have to get those accounts straight, they quite weigh on my mind."
"So you shall, Hilda darling; but I was wondering if after I've read my history and done my sums, and a little bit of writing I want to get through, if you'd let Susan--if you'd let Susan take me out."
"Susan!" repeated Hilda, "but I can go with you myself this afternoon."
"I know, only I do so want a run on this fine morning, and Susan says it's not laundry day, nor drawing-room day, nor silver day; it's Thursday, which is nothing special; she can come, may she, Hilda?--do say yes."
"It's not like you, Judy," said Hilda, "to be in this impatient state. I would rather you did not propose plans to the servants without first consulting me, darling, it rather puts them out of their place; but as you have done it, and as you are the best of dear little girls, I suppose I must say 'yes' on this occasion. If Susan hurries with her work, she may take you out: but of course you won't be very long, will you?"
To this question Judy made no reply. She gave Hilda a tight clasp and a fierce kiss, and rushed away.
"Susan, you're to hurry with your work, for you may come," she shouted, almost boisterously, to the parlor-maid, and then she ran down to the dining room and shut the door behind her.
"It's happening beautifully," she murmured again; "how lucky that I never spent godmother's sovereign. And now to write my letter to Hilda. I'm not going to waste my time crying, there'll be time enough for that by and by--that's if I want to cry, perhaps I shan't. When I think of how very happy Hilda will be, perhaps my heart will sing. But now for the letter--Hilda mustn't find it too soon; I'll put it under her pin-cushion, then perhaps she won't see it for some hours after I've gone, but now I must write it."
Judy took out her own little blotting-book, placed a sheet of paper before her, and began laboriously, with little fingers which rapidly got ink-stained, to put a few words on the paper.
"DARLING HILDA,
"You'll be s'prised when you get this. I'm going home. I'm quite well now, and I'm not going to fret, but I'm going to be _really_ happy. Good-by, Hilda; I love you awfully.
"Your "JUDY."
This little note was put into an envelope, and sealed with some precious red wax, and before she left the house Judy found an opportunity to put it under Hilda's pin-cushion.
"It doesn't tell her a bit what I think, nor what I feel," murmured the poor child. "But it's best for her just to suppose that I _want_ to go home. She'll be happy all the sooner if she thinks that."
Susan was rather elated at escaping housework, and at being allowed to go out so early in the morning. She was especially fond of Judy, and would do anything in the world for her. Now, therefore, principally on Judy's account, but also in the hope that the baker might happen to see her as she passed his shop, she put on her very smartest hat and her very best jacket, and patiently waited in the front hall for Judy's appearance.
Hilda came out of the drawing room to see the two as they went off.
"You had better take an omnibus, and get out at Kensington Gardens," she said to the maid. "I shall expect you back in time to get lunch ready, Susan. Judy pet, give me a kiss before you go."
Judy had lost her roses now, her face was pale, and there were dark shadows under her big eyes. Her little voice, however, had a very stout, determined tone about it.
"Good-by, Hilda," she said; "one kiss--two, three kisses, Hilda; it is good of you to let us out,--and we are going to be so jolly. Good-by, darling Hilda."
"Good-by, Judy," said Hilda.
She kissed the child, but in a pre-occupied manner--the cloud which weighed on her heart was oppressing her, and dulling her usually keen perceptions where Judy was concerned.
"It's all the better," thought the little girl, "it's easier to say good-by when she's not extra loving."
Hilda went back to her accounts, and Judy and Susan walked down the terrace, and turning the corner were lost to view.
They had gone on a little way, and Susan was about to hail a passing omnibus, when Judy suddenly put her hand on the servant's arm.
"Susan," she said, "I am going to tell you the secret now. You'll be _sure_ to keep it?"
"Well, of course, miss, I'll do my best--I hope I aint one of the blabbing sort."
"I don't think you are, Susan--you look as if a person could trust you. I'm going to trust you with a most important thing."
"Very well, miss--I'll be proud I'm sure; but hadn't we better stop that 'bus--there's the conductor looking at us."
"Does that 'bus go in the direction of Waterloo Station?" asked Judy.
"Waterloo--bless you, Miss Judy--I don't know whether it do or not. I don't s'pose so for a quarter of a minute. Waterloo is miles from here--that I do know. But it's nothing to us where Waterloo is, miss, it's to Kensington Gardens we're going, and the 'bus has gone on now, so there's no good our worrying ourselves about it. Another will pass us in a minute. There are plenty half empty at this hour of the day."
"I wish you would stop talking, Susan, and let me explain what I mean," said Judy, almost fretfully. "It's to Waterloo I want to go, not to Kensington Gardens. Do you hear me--do you understand what I'm saying?"
"I suppose you're joking me, Miss Judy. My missis said we were to go to Kensington Gardens."
"Please, Susan, stop for a minute. I want to say something very important. _I am going home._ That's the secret. I am going home to Aunt Marjorie and to father, and my little sister Babs, and the way home is by Waterloo, so I must get there. Now do you understand? That's the secret--I am going home to-day."
Judy's face was so pale, and her words so intensely earnest, that Susan saw at last that the secret was no joking matter, but something real and hard to bear.
"Now I wonder what the little dear is up to," she said under her breath.
"You know, Miss Judy, pet," she replied aloud in as soothing a voice as she could command, "that you don't really mean to run away like that,--for it is running away to go back to your home, and never say a word to Mrs. Quentyns, and she so wrapped up in you, and your room furnished so prettily and all."
Judy had to gulp down a sob before she answered Susan.
"I didn't expect you to understand me," she said with a dignity which made a deep impression on the maid. "I'm not running away, and I'm doing right not wrong. You don't suppose it's always very pleasant to do right, but sometimes one can't think about what's pleasant. I wouldn't have asked you to help me at all, Susan, but I don't know how to get to Waterloo Station. Of course I came from there with my sister, but I didn't notice the road we took, nor anything about it. I know we were a long time in a cab, so I suppose the station is a good way from Philippa Terrace. What you have got to do now, Susan, is to obey me, and not to ask any questions. I really know what I'm about, and I promise that you shan't get into any trouble."
But to Judy's surprise Susan was firm.
"I won't have hand nor part in the matter," she said; "I was told to take you to Kensington Gardens, miss, and it's there we've got to go, or we'll turn round and go back to Philippa Terrace."
For a moment or two Judy felt afraid that all her plans were in jeopardy. She might of course call a cab on her own account, and trust the driver to take her safely to her destination; but brave as she was, she had scarcely courage for this extreme step; besides, the driver of the hansom might take it into his head to listen to Susan's strong objections, and even if he did obey Judy, Susan would go back to Philippa Terrace, and tell Hilda everything, and then Hilda would follow Judy to Waterloo, and prevent her going home at all.
The strongest feeling in the child's mind was a desire to be safe back in the Rectory before Hilda knew anything about her determination.
"Then she can't do anything," thought Judy. "She'll have nothing for it but to make herself quite happy with Jasper again."
Suddenly an idea came to her.
"I won't argue with you any more, Susan," she said. "I suppose you _think_ you are doing right, and if you do, of course I can't expect you to act in any other way. If you knew everything that is in my heart, I am quite sure you would help me; but as you don't, I must think of something else. You know Mr. Rivers, don't you--the gentleman who dined at Philippa Terrace two nights ago?"
"Yes, miss, of course."
"My sister and I took lunch with him yesterday," continued Judy. "He is a very nice gentleman; he's a great friend of Mr. Quentyns."
"Oh, yes, miss, I'm aware," replied the maid.
"He lives in chambers," continued Judy. "I don't in the least know what chambers means; but he asked me to go and see him some day and have lunch with him. He wrote his address on a piece of paper and gave it to me, and I have it in my purse. My sister said I might certainly lunch with Mr. Rivers. Now, Susan, I intend to go to him to-day. So please call a hansom, and I shall drive there at once. You can come or not as you please. If you prefer it you can go home; but of course I'd rather you came with me."
Susan deliberated. Certainly Miss Judy was in a very queer condition, and it would be as much as her place was worth to take her to Waterloo; but to drive with her to the chambers of that nice gentleman who was, she knew, one of her master's greatest friends, seemed a shifting of responsibility which was quite a way out of the dilemma, for not for worlds would Susan do anything really to hurt the child's feelings.
"All right, miss," she said after a pause; "even that seems queer enough, but Mr. Rivers can explain matters himself to my missis. Here's a nice 'ansom with a steady horse. Stop, driver, please, stop! Draw up here by the lamp-post. Now, miss, shall I get in first and give you a hand?"
"No, Susan; I can get into a hansom without anyone helping me."
"Drive to No. 10 Johnson's Court, Lincoln's Inn Fields," said Judy, in a clear voice to the man; and then she and Susan found themselves bowling away farther and farther from West Kensington, from Judy's pretty bedroom, from Hilda and her love.
In an incredibly short space of time they arrived at their destination; the driver pulled up his horse at No. 10 Johnson's Court, with an _esprit_ which Judy would have much admired had her thoughts been less pre-occupied.
She jumped out with alacrity, declining Susan's assistance, and asked the man what his fare was. He named a sum which Susan took into her head to consider exorbitant, and which she loudly objected to Judy's paying; but the little girl gave it without a moment's hesitation, and the next instant was running up the stairs to Rivers' chambers.
What might have happened had that gentleman been out no one can say; Judy's heroic impulse might after all have come to nothing, and Jasper might still have had to complain of that three, which means trumpery, invading his house; but it so happened that Rivers was in, and, busy man that he was, comparatively disengaged. When Judy inquired for him he was standing in his clerk's room, giving some directions. At the sound of her voice he looked up, and with a start and smile of delight came forward to welcome her.
"I am very glad to see you," he said; "how kind of you to remember your promise."
Then, seeing by her face that Judy's poor little heart was very full, he took her into his private room, and desired Susan to wait in the clerk's room.
"Now, Jack the Giant Killer, what is it?" said Rivers; "what's the matter?"
"I told you," said Judy; "I told you yesterday, that _perhaps_ I was going to stop being a mutineer. Well, I have stopped. I thought you'd like to know."
"So I do, Judy," said Rivers. "I am proud to be acquainted with a little girl who has such immense control over herself. I should like to hear how you have contrived to get out of the state of rebellion into the state of submission. I know of course that you have been killing a giant, but I am interested in the process."
"I'm killing the giant by going home," said Judy, standing very erect by Rivers' table, and pushing back her shady hat from her white forehead. "I am going home, back to Little Staunton Rectory. I see what you mean, that it's better--better for Jasper and Hilda, to be without--without _me_. I pretended not to understand you the other night, but I don't pretend any longer now; and yesterday evening, when Hilda and I were all alone, for Jasper had gone away down to Richmond, I--I made up my mind. Hilda doesn't know anything about it."
"Sit down, Judy," said Rivers. "I cannot tell you how I respect you."
[Illustration: "I'D RATHER STAND, PLEASE." P. 222.]
"I'd rather stand, please," said Judy. "Hilda doesn't know," she continued, "and she _mustn't_ know until I am safe back at Little Staunton Rectory. Susan--you know Susan, she's Hilda's parlor-maid; well, Susan came out with me this morning, and I coaxed her very hard to take me to Waterloo, but she refused. I don't quite know how to get there by myself, so now I want to know if you will take me?"
"Certainly I will," said Rivers. "What is more, I'll go with you to the Rectory. I have nothing special to do to-day, and it will be quite a pleasure to spend a little time in your company. Do you know anything about the trains, and what is the name of the station we have to go to?"
Judy named the one nearest to the Rectory.
"You had better sit down for a moment," pursued Rivers. "I have an 'A B C' here, so I can tell you in a moment which is the best train to take. Now, what is the matter?"
"Only, Mr. Rivers, Hilda must not know anything--anything about it until I am safe home. Can this be managed?"
"I have very little doubt that it can. I shall go out now and speak to Susan and send her away. Thank you, Judy, for coming to me; I would do anything for you, because you are brave, and I respect and admire all brave people."
CHAPTER XVIII.
GIANT-KILLER.
And the Prince, seeing that it was of no use to remonstrate, bowed and retired.
--THE GOLDEN BRANCH.
Susan came home and told her mistress that Judy was spending the day with Mr. Rivers.
"What an extraordinary thing for the child to do!" said Hilda.
"She said, ma'am, that Mr. Rivers asked her to lunch, and that you knew about it."
"Yes; but why did she not say something to me when she was going out? It is so unlike Miss Judy to keep a thing of that sort to herself."
Susan made no reply. She was no longer responsible, and was only too anxious not to betray the child.
"Mr. Rivers says he'll take the best care of her, ma'am," she said, after a pause.
"Well, go and take off your hat, Susan, and lay the lunch," said Hilda, feeling still more puzzled, but not caring to pursue her inquiries any further.
She had a sense of aggrievement and a feeling of added loneliness as she sat down to her solitary lunch. She missed Judy, and wondered at her sudden want of confidence; but soon the deeper trouble which Jasper's conduct had caused returned to trouble her, and she forgot her little sister in the sadness of her thoughts.
She spent a long and very lonely afternoon indoors, for she had not the heart to go out, and besides, she expected Judy home every minute.
She thought it likely that Rivers would take her somewhere after lunch, but surely he would bring her back to Philippa Terrace in time for tea. Hilda ordered some cakes which she knew were special favorites of Judy's to be ready for this meal; and then she sat in her pretty little drawing room, and tried to divert her thoughts over the pages of the latest novel which had arrived from Mudie's.
It was either not specially interesting, or Hilda found it difficult to concentrate her attention. She flung the book on her knee, and sat absorbed in what Judy and Babs called a brown study. She was startled out of her meditations by Susan bringing in the tea-tray and the little kettle and spirit-lamp.
"Did Mr. Rivers say when he would bring Miss Judy home?" she asked of the maid.
Susan colored and hesitated slightly in her reply.
"No, ma'am; he said nothing at all about coming home," she answered.
Hilda noticed her hesitation, but did not wish to question her further. After the servant left the room, however, she began for the first time to feel both impatient and uneasy with regard to her little sister.
"If Judy is not here by six o'clock," she said to herself, "I will go to Lincoln's Inn Fields in search of her. How extraordinarily impatient she was to go out this morning; and how very odd of her to insist on going to Mr. Rivers', and to say nothing at all to me about it; and then how queer--how more than queer--her not having yet returned. My sweet little Judy, the most thoughtful child who ever breathed--it is unlike her to cause me anxiety of this sort."
Hilda did not care for the social little meal which was generally so lively when Judy was present. Immediately afterward she ran upstairs to put on her bonnet and jacket; and as she was going out, left a message with Susan.
"If Miss Judy and Mr. Rivers come," she said, "please say that I have gone to Lincoln's Inn Fields, as I felt anxious about the child being so long away."
"Yes, ma'am," said the servant.
"Whistle for a hansom for me, please, Susan."
Susan did so; and half an hour afterward Hilda was making inquiries at Rivers' chambers with regard to his whereabouts. The clerks there could give her no definite information. Mr. Rivers had gone out with a little lady soon after twelve o'clock, and had told them not to expect him back that day.
"I shall find Judy at Philippa Terrace when I go home," thought Mrs. Quentyns. "It was thoughtless of her not to tell me how long she would be out--it was wonderfully unlike her. Still, of course, she will be at home now."
But when Hilda returned no Judy was there to greet her; but her husband's face was seen looking somewhat impatiently out at the drawing-room window. He came at once to help his wife out of the cab, and entered the house with her.
"Where were you?" he asked. "It is nearly time for dinner."
"I won't be a moment getting dressed, Jasper; but--but--I am anxious about Judy."
Quentyns had meant to be specially nice and kind to Hilda after his evening's pleasure, but he felt it impossible now to keep the glib, sarcastic words back.
"I might have known when I saw that fretful look on your face, that Judy was the cause. Now, what is her latest transgression?"
"Oh, there is a telegraph-boy," said Hilda eagerly. "What--what--oh, _is_ there anything wrong?"
She rushed to the hall-door herself, before Jasper could prevent her. Susan, coming into the hall to answer the imperative double knock, was sent back to the kitchen regions, in a cross voice, by her master.
"Really, Hilda," began Quentyns, "your impetuosity is most undignified. I must say that these kinds of scenes are----Now, what is the matter, my love--tears again. A coming home of this sort is not the most cheerful sort of thing, you must allow."
"Oh, Jasper, Jasper, I'm not even listening to you," said poor Hilda. "What can be the matter? what can be wrong? Here's a telegram from Mr. Rivers. He says--see what he says.
"'Little Staunton Rectory. Have brought Judy home. Will call and see you soon after ten this evening. Rivers.'"
"Rivers!" repeated Jasper.
His voice grew thoughtful; he did not like Rivers, of all men, to be mixed up in his domestic affairs. Rivers, at least, must keep him on a pedestal, and know nothing of his weaknesses--of that infirmity of temper which he struggled against, and yet, in Judy's presence, could not conquer. He forgot all about Judy herself in his wonder as to how Rivers had got mixed up in the matter.
Hilda had seated herself on the sofa, and still holding the open telegram in her hand, was trying furtively to wipe away her fast-falling tears.
"I wish you'd stop crying, Hilda," said her husband. "There's nothing to alarm you in this telegram--nothing whatever. If Judy is with a man like Tom Rivers, she's as safe as child can be."
"But she has gone home, Jasper; she has gone home to the Rectory, without even telling me."
"Well, my dear, it's impossible for me to explain away the vagaries of that most eccentric child. I presume, however, that Rivers has a key to the mystery, and as he says he will call here after ten o'clock, we shall know all about it then. No amount of discussion can explain it in advance. So, Hilda, perhaps you will go upstairs and get ready for dinner. I'm frightfully hungry."
Hilda rose wearily and left the room at once.
"I think I can guess something--just something of what it means," she said to herself. "My little Judy--my brave little Judy!"
Judy's letter was lying hidden all this time under the large pin-cushion on Hilda's dressing table, but as it was not seen, its contents, which would have explained a good deal, were of course not known.
The dinner which followed this unhappy beginning of the evening was as dismal and constrained as if poor "trumpery" were still present.
Quentyns, like most men who work hard all day, was particular about this meal, and to-night of all nights cook had not sent up the soup to his satisfaction, nor the _entrée_ seasoned to his taste. It was all one to Hilda just now what she ate, but Quentyns pushed his plate impatiently away, and kept on referring to the excellent dinner he had had the night before at the Star and Garter. He spoke of his evening as delightful, and of the house of the new friend where he had slept as altogether irreproachable.
Hilda felt that he was talking at her all the time, but she had not the heart to reply to him. The dismal little meal came to a mournful end, and the two went into the drawing room to wait for Rivers' arrival.
Hilda took up a handkerchief she was embroidering for Judy, and took special pleasure in putting in new and exquisite stitches as her thoughts centered themselves in dull wonder and pain round the child. Quentyns became absorbed in the contents of a novel. He read for half an hour--he was by no means in a good humor, and now and then his eyes were raised to look over the top of the book at his wife. There was a patient sort of suffering about her which irritated him a good bit, as he could see no possible reason to account for it. He asked her one or two questions, which she answered in an abstracted manner.
No, he certainly had not bargained for this sort of thing when he married. Hilda was not only pretty, but she could be, when she liked, sufficiently intellectual to satisfy his requirements. He was fastidious and had peculiar views with regard to women. He hated the so-called clever women, but at the same time he despised the stupid ones. To please him a woman must have tact--she must quickly understand his many moods. She must sympathize when he demanded sympathy, and when he showed by his manner that he wished to be left alone, she must respect his desires. Hitherto, Hilda had abundantly fulfilled his expectations. If Judy had not been in the house, all that he had ever dreamed of in his married life would have come to pass. But to-night, although Judy was not there to intermeddle, Quentyns felt that, for all the good his wife was doing him, he might as well be a bachelor at his club.
"My dear," he said with some impatience, and forgetting himself not a little, "do you know that you have made precisely the same remark now five times? I did not quarrel with its brilliancy the first time I heard it, but on the fifth occasion I will own that it gave me a certain sense of _ennui_. As I see that your thoughts are miles away, I'll just run round to the club for a bit and find out if there is anything going on."
Hilda raised her eyes in some surprise. A certain expression in them seemed to expostulate with Jasper, but her lips said nothing; and just at that moment a hansom was heard to bowl up rapidly and stop with a quick jerk at the door. A moment later Rivers entered the drawing room. He came up at once to Hilda with the air of a man who has a message to deliver.
"Judy hopes you got her note long ere this, Mrs. Quentyns."
"Her note--no; I have not received any," replied Hilda.
"She wrote to you this morning, and put the note under the pin-cushion in your room."
"How romantic and Judy-like!" said Quentyns suddenly. "Quite the correct thing, according to the old-fashioned novels. When the heroine elopes she always leaves a note under the pin-cushion."
"How do you do, Jasper? I did not notice you until this moment," said Rivers. He gave the other man a sharp glance, which suddenly made him feel queer and small. "The only thing old-fashioned that I notice about Judy," he said, "is her noble unselfishness. She has gone home because--because--I think you can both guess why; an explanation would only be disagreeable. She begged me to tell you, Mrs. Quentyns, that she meant to be really _perfectly_ happy at home, and she hoped you and Jasper would follow her example here. Poor little Giant Killer! she slew an enormous giant to-day, and there are few people I respect as I do that dear little soul. I saw her safely to the Rectory, as, when she came to me, I thought it best to humor what was more a noble inspiration than a child's whim. I will say good-night now."
Hilda scarcely said a word while Rivers was speaking. When he left the room, however, she stood still for an instant, listening intently. Jasper had gone out to see his friend into his hansom. Would he come back? He did for a moment.
"Don't sit up for me, Hilda," he said; and there was a tone in his voice which caused her heart to sink down low, very low indeed.
She heard the door slam behind him, and then she knew that she was alone. The servants had gone to bed--to all intents and purposes she was absolutely alone in the silent house.
So Judy's sacrifice was in vain. Judy had thought, by absolutely sacrificing herself, that she could bring this husband and wife together. It was not to be.
Hilda fell on her knees and buried her burning face in the sofa cushions.
"Oh, Judy, little Judy!" she sobbed. "Oh, Judy, what shall I do? My pain is greater than I can bear."
She knelt in this position for a long time. Her little sister's face was distinctly seen in her mental vision; Judy seemed surrounded by a sort of halo--but what of Jasper? Had all the love which united these two hearts vanished like a dream? Was he never coming back to her? Would he always misunderstand her? Oh, if she thought that, she would not stay with him--she would go back to the Rectory and to Judy, and forget her golden dream and turn back again to the old life. For three months she would have been a wife. She would forget that time. She would own to Jasper that she had made a mistake. She would be Hilda Merton once more. Alas! alas! that could not be. Vows and ceremonies tied her. She had stood beside the altar and given herself away. There was no going back on that step. Jasper was not the Jasper of her dreams. He must have a small mind not to understand Judy, and she had married him because she thought his mind so big and his heart so great. After all, Judy was far greater than Jasper.
"My little Judy," she murmured again, and then she sank down a pitiable, weak, inconsolable figure on the hearth-rug close to the expiring fire. She thought over the scenes of the last night and longed to have them back again.
"If Judy's arms were round me, I should not feel so lonely," she murmured. "Oh, Jasper, how can you turn from me? How can you fail to understand that my heart at least is big enough to love both Judy and you?"
The lamp burnt dimly and the fire went completely out. Hilda presently fell asleep in the darkness, and now a moonbeam shining into the drawing room and falling across her tired face made it look white and unearthly, almost like the face of a dead girl. It was in this attitude that Quentyns found her when he came back somewhere between one and two o'clock.
His conscience was reproaching him, for Rivers, an old friend, had not failed to give him a little spice of his mind; but he was just in that irritable condition where repentance is almost impossible, and when self-abasement only leads a man into further wrong-doing.
When he saw Hilda's tired face, he said to himself with a sort of laugh:
"If I don't encourage this sort of thing, I shall doubtless be more and more of a tyrant in the eyes of my good wife and that precious fastidious child and Rivers. Well, well, I cannot see the beauty of voluntary martyrdom. If Hilda weren't quite such a goose, she would have gone to bed two hours ago, instead of falling asleep here to the utter disregard of her health and personal appearance."
So Quentyns, looking cross and uninterested, shook his wife not too gently; spoke in a commonplace tone, out of which he purposely excluded every scrap of emotion, and asked her how much longer she wanted to sit up.
Hilda stumbled to her feet without a word. She went upstairs and to bed, but although her husband quickly slept, she lay awake until the morning.
She came down to breakfast, looking tired and fagged. There were black lines under her eyes, and when Quentyns asked her what was the matter, she not only owned to a headache, but burst into tears.
When a man is thoroughly cross, nothing irritates him more than tears on the part of his wife, and Quentyns now so far forgot himself as to rise hastily from the breakfast table and leave the room, slamming the door behind him. He put in his head a moment later to nod to his wife and say good-by.
"If I'm late, don't wait dinner for me," he said, and then he left the house. Hilda had plenty of time to wipe her tears away in the deserted breakfast room. The pain at her heart was almost greater than she could bear. Her gentle nature was stirred by what she considered gross injustice on the part of her husband.
"He does not care for me any more," she muttered. "I thought him great and brave and good. I know he is clever; I suppose he is great, and perhaps even good; but I am too small and too little for him--I fail to understand him, and he does not love me any more. Oh, if only little Judy had stayed with me I should not feel as broken-hearted as I do at present. if only little Judy had stayed with me, I should loneliness of my life?"
At this moment Hilda's dismal meditations were interrupted by the sound of carriage wheels, which not only came rattling down the little street, but stopped at the hall door. She started up in a fright, pushed back her disordered hair from her flushed face, and the next moment found herself in the voluminous embrace of Jasper's aunt, Lady Malvern.
"My dear," exclaimed that good lady, "I must apologize for not looking you up sooner, but I have been particularly busy; for Cynthia, my eldest girl, has just got engaged and we are to have a wedding in the autumn and all kinds of fuss; but I have not forgotten you, Hilda, and I have just come to carry you off for the day. It is a lovely day, and we are all going to drive to Richmond to picnic in the park. Run upstairs, my love, and put on your hat and gloves. I mean to carry you off immediately."
"But Jasper has just gone to town--he will be so sorry to have missed you," said Hilda.
"Well, I suppose I can endure life even though I have missed Jasper," said Lady Malvern with a laugh. "In any case I want you, and so does Cynthia. Cynthia has taken a great fancy to you, Hilda; so run away and get ready. I will send a wire to your husband to come down and join us later on. There now, will that content you, you poor, devoted little soul?"
Hilda smiled and a faint color came into her cheeks.
"Run up to your room, my dear," said good-natured Lady Malvern. "Be as quick as ever you can getting into the prettiest costume you have, for we are to be quite a gay party, I can tell you. Now run off, dear, run off, and pray don't keep me waiting a moment longer than you can help."
Lady Malvern was the sort of person who never could bear anyone to say "no" to her, and Hilda at first unwillingly, but presently with a sort of elation and even defiance which was altogether foreign to her gentle nature, prepared to make herself smart for her unexpected gayety. She went upstairs, pulled out one of her prettiest trousseau dresses, and, with hands that trembled, began to array herself in it.
Meanwhile Lady Malvern sat perfectly still in the tiny little dining room, with a somewhat troubled look on her good-tempered face.
"Now, what has Jasper been doing?" she said to herself. "That sweet child doesn't look happy. Marks of tears round her eyes, flushed cheeks--very low spirits. Dear, dear! this will never do. Not more than three months from the wedding-day."
Lady Malvern had seen very little of her nephew since his marriage. She knew nothing, therefore, about Judy; but she was just that fussy, good-natured, hearty sort of body who could not bear anyone with whom she came in contact to be miserable.
"I must set this right somehow or other," she said to herself. "Jasper doesn't understand Hilda, and Hilda is wretched, and thinks, poor dear little goose, that the sun will never shine again, and that life is practically over for her. She does not know, how could she, poor darling, how many rubs married people have to live through, and how jolly and comfortable they are notwithstanding them. Well, well, I am glad I called. I must set things right between this pair, whatever happens."
Lady Malvern little guessed, however, that she personally was to have very little to do with smoothing the rumpled rose-leaves in Hilda's and Jasper's lives.
When Mrs. Quentyns returned to the little dining room the flush on her cheeks and the softened look in her sweet eyes but added to her beauty, and when she found herself bowling away through the pleasant spring air in her kind friend's company, in spite of herself, her spirits could not help rising.
Lady Malvern had a house in Hans Place, and there Cynthia and two younger girls were waiting for them.
The day was a perfect one, very warm and summery for the time of year, and the young people all agreed that it was by no means too early in the season to enjoy themselves even in this _al fresco_ fashion.
They were to end with tea at the "Star and Garter," and they all started off now for this day's pleasure in the highest spirits.
Hilda was quite young enough to enjoy such a proceeding immensely. As space divided her from her little home in Philippa Terrace her spirits rose, and now, if Judy had only been by her side, she would have felt perfectly happy.
By the time they reached Richmond Park all trace of tears and sorrow had left her charming face, and she was one of the brightest and gayest of the company.
No one could make herself more useful than Hilda, and when her husband appeared on the scene, he was a good deal astonished to see her flying lightly about, ordering and directing the arrangements of the picnic dinner. Her gay laughter floated to his ears on the summer breeze, her cheeks were bright, her eyes shining. In short, she looked like that charming Hilda who had won his heart in the old Rectory garden not a year ago.
Hilda was busily helping to concoct a salmon mayonnaise, when, raising her eyes, she met her husband's gaze. He smiled back at her a look of approval and love, and her heart rose considerably.
There were other people present besides Jasper who thought Mrs. Quentyns a very beautiful young woman. There were others waiting to show her the most polite and gracious attentions, and these facts considerably enhanced her value in her husband's eyes. In short, he began to fall in love with his wife over again, and Judy for the time being was forgotten by this pair.
The day passed all too quickly, and at last the moment arrived when the little party must turn their steps homeward.
"You must both come home and have supper with us," said Lady Malvern to her nephew and his wife. "Oh, yes, I shall take no denial; and now, Jasper, will you drive Cynthia and her sister back to town? I mean Hilda to accompany me."
Jasper was all smiles and good-humor. He was willing to accede to any arrangement which could add to the pleasures of the day, and Hilda, in whose heart a faint hope had lingered that she and her husband might have gone home together, followed Lady Malvern to her carriage with a little sigh. The whole party was soon driving home. Lady Malvern and Hilda had a small victoria to themselves. As soon as ever they left the rest of the party, the older woman turned and gave a full glance at the girl by her side.
"Hilda," she said suddenly, "you look better than you did this morning."
"Oh, I feel better," she replied. "You have done me lots of good," she continued, raising her eyes with an affectionate light in them to Lady Malvern's kind face.
"I am delighted to have helped you, my love," replied the elder lady; "and now, Hilda, I want to say something. You have been married very little over three months. It is a very common illusion with girls to imagine that married life is a time of perpetual bliss."
Hilda opened her lips to say something, but Lady Malvern interrupted.
"My dear," she said, "you must hear me out. Married life is not a bed of roses, and the first year which a young couple spend together is generally the hardest of all."
"What do you mean?" asked Mrs. Quentyns. "Why the first year?"
"Because, my dear, the glamour is gradually being removed. The girl is finding that the hero whom she married is a right good fellow, but still that he is human; that he has his faults and his aggravations; that he needs to be humored and consulted and petted, and to have his smallnesses--yes, my dear, mark the word, his smallnesses--attended to. The husband is making similar discoveries with regard to the lovely angel whom he took to his arms. She, too, is mortal--affectionate, of course, and sweet and womanly, and ten thousand times better than a real angel would be to him, but still with her faults, her tempers, and her fads. The young couple discover these things in each other during the first two or three months of married life. All their future happiness depends on how they both act, under the influence of these discoveries. They have got to learn that, though they are made one by the priest, they are both of them distinct individualities. If they are to be happy together, they must both give and take. I know a married couple who are now the happiest, prosiest, most attached old pair in the world, who went through no end of storms during their first eventful year. But they learned a lesson and profited by it. The wife does not now think her husband the greatest hero that ever set foot on this earth, and the husband does not call his wife an angel; but I think, if their love were analyzed, it would be found greater, deeper, and more tender than that early glamour which was love, but was not equal to the love tried by fire which comes later in life. Now, my dear, you will forgive my little lecture. If you had need of it, ponder my words; if not, forgive an old woman for worrying you. Hilda, what a sweet, pretty little house you have! I always knew that my nephew Jasper had good taste. I am so truly glad that you have the same."
While Lady Malvern was speaking, Hilda pulled down her veil, and struggled hard to keep the tears from her brown eyes. She could not quite manage this, however, and Lady Malvern, giving her a half-glance, saw that her eyelashes were wet.
She did not add any more in words, but she made up her mind to help the young girl by every means in her power.
They drove on rapidly. The horses were fresh, and they were getting over the ground with great rapidity, when a quickly approaching train startled one of the horses. At the same time a man on a bicycle darted round the corner, and before he could help himself, knocked against the carriage. The double shock was enough for the affrighted horses. They plunged, reared, and became unmanageable, and the next moment the little victoria was overturned, and Lady Malvern and Mrs. Quentyns were flung with some violence on the pavement. Lady Malvern was not severely hurt, and she sprang almost immediately to her feet, but the fright and fall had stunned Hilda, who lay white and still on the ground without any attempt at movement. The usual crowd of course collected, and it was on this scene that Quentyns, in high good-humor, and forgetting for the time being that there was a crumpled rose-leaf in the world, suddenly came with some more of the picnic party. As a matter of course, they all drew up. Quentyns was driving a high dog-cart. He sprang to the ground and ran into the midst of the crowd. Then for the first time he realized what had happened. His young wife, looking as if she were dead, was lying in Lady Malvern's arms. Lady Malvern was seated on a doorstep. Some men were hastily coming forward with a shutter.
"My God!" exclaimed Quentyns; "is she dead?"
"No, my dear boy, no--only stunned," said Lady Malvern. "Here, take her into your own arms, Jasper. You are stronger than I. Let her see your face first when she opens her eyes. No medicine will be so reviving as that."
Here a woman came up and spoke to Lady Malvern.
"I shall be only too pleased to have the young lady brought into my house, madam," she said. "A very good doctor lives just round the corner, and he can be summoned at once."
"Yes, yes; send for him immediately," said Quentyns.
He strode into the house with his light burden. Hilda was laid upon a sofa, and in a few moments the doctor arrived. He felt her all over and said that no bones were broken, and that no severe injury of any kind had occurred, but both fall and shock had been very severe. He counseled her being left undisturbed in her present condition until the morning.
"Then I will go home," said Lady Malvern. "You will look after her yourself, Jasper?"
"Need you ask?" he replied. He followed his aunt to the door as he spoke.
"Hilda had a narrow escape of her life," said Lady Malvern, looking full at her nephew as she spoke. "How sudden and awful it all was! There were we chatting together, and thinking no more of danger than if such a thing did not exist, when all in an instant came that awful bolt from the blue. I shall never forget the swinging of the carriage and the way the horses looked when they plunged and kicked about, or the white piteous face of your sweet little Hilda, who would not scream nor show any outward sign of terror. I thought it was all over with both of us--I did really, Jasper. I cannot tell you how thankful we ought to be that things are no worse."
"You are sure then that Hilda is not in danger?" queried the young man in a tremulous voice.
"No, no; what did you hear the doctor say, you silly boy? Perhaps the best thing that could have happened to Hilda was this accident, dreadful as it was for the moment. Perhaps--well, Jasper, I think you must know what I mean."
"Has Hilda been talking about me?" asked Jasper, a wave of red mounting to his brow.
"Talking about you?" replied his aunt, now thoroughly angry; "only in the way that Hilda can talk of those whom she loves best on earth. Jasper, you are the luckiest man in the world, and if you don't contrive to make that sweet child the happiest woman, I for one will have nothing to do with you again."
"No fear, no fear, if she loves me in that way," murmured Jasper.
He turned abruptly on his heel and went back to the room where his wife lay. He was a very proud, reserved man, and even in moments of the deepest agitation would scarcely reveal his real sentiments. But that moment, when he had looked at his wife's white face and had thought that she was dead, had shaken his whole nature to its very depths. He made a discovery then that nothing in all the world was of any real value to him compared with Hilda's love.
"I have acted like a brute to her," he murmured. "Rivers was right. She's too good for me--she's fifty times too good for me. My God, how white she looks as she lies there! Suppose the doctor is wrong. Why doesn't she speak or move? Why do they make so little of this continued unconsciousness? I think I'll go for some further advice. Oh, my darling, my darling, if you are dead, if your sweet life has been taken, I shall never forgive myself--never!"
But just then there was a faint stir of the heavily fringed lids which lay against Hilda's white cheeks. The next moment the sweet brown eyes were opened wide, and Hilda looked into her husband's face.
"What has happened?" she asked drowsily. "I don't remember anything. Where are we?"
"Together, Hilda," he replied; "together. Does anything else really matter?"
"Oh, no, no!" she said, with a catch in her voice.
*       *       *       *       *
Next day Mrs. Quentyns was so far convalescent as to be able to return to the little house in Philippa Terrace. Jasper, of course, accompanied her. They had found a good deal to say to each other, between the moment when she had opened her eyes the night before and now. Both had some things to confess--both had some words of forgiveness to crave from the other. So complete now had been the interchange of soul and of love between this pair that it seemed impossible that anything could ever separate such warm hearts again.
"And it has been all Judy's doing," said Jasper as they sat that evening in the little drawing room.
"What do you mean?" asked his wife.
"Why," he answered, "if Judy had not brought matters to a crisis by going away, we might have drifted further and further apart. But now we must have her back again, Hilda. She has fulfilled her mission, dear little soul, and now she must have her reward."
"No," said Hilda, in a firm voice. "Judy shall have her reward, but not by coming back. She did right to go. I could never, never have sent her away, but she did right to go."
"Do you mean to tell me, Hilda, that you could be perfectly happy to live without her?"
"With you," she said, laying her hand on his arm, and looking into his face with her sweet eyes shining through tears.
He put his arms round her and kissed her many times.
"Jasper," said Hilda after a few minutes, "I think the first wrong step that I took--the first beginning of that unhappy time--was when I lost my temper down at Little Staunton and gave up my engagement ring."
"No wonder you lost your temper when I was such a brute about everything," said Quentyns. "It was my fault."
"No, no; it was mine."
"Have you missed the ring, Hilda?"
"Missed it?" she held up her slender finger. "My heart has been empty without it," she said.
"Then let me put it on again for you."
"Can you? Is--isn't it sold?"
"Of course not. Do you think that I could sell that ring?"
"But--but the furniture in Judy's room?"
"When I saw that you must have Judy with you, Hilda, I went into debt for the furniture. Oh, never mind all that now, my darling--the debt is paid in full a week ago, and I have the receipt in my pocket. Now I am going upstairs to fetch the ring."
CHAPTER XIX.
GOOD OMENS.
And so the shadows fall apart, And so the west winds play; And all the windows of my heart I open to the day.
--WHITTIER.
Mildred Anstruther was paying a visit at the Rectory on the day that Rivers and Judy walked in. Rivers was a very striking-looking man, and all the Rectory people were so devoured with curiosity about him, and so interested in all he said and did--in his reasons for coming down to Little Staunton, and in his remarks about the Quentyns--that Judy's own return to the family circle passed into utter insignificance. She was there--they had none of them expected her, and as she chose to come back, she was welcome of course.
It was a lovely day, and the whole party were out in the garden, when Rivers and his little charge entered their midst.
Judy wore her green cloak and pretty black shady hat. There was a new sort of picturesqueness about her, which Aunt Marjorie noticed in an abstracted way; she put it down to "the polish which even a short residence in the metropolis always gives;" she had not the faintest idea that it was due to the dignity which a noble action can inspire.
Judy greeted everyone quite in her old manner, and was rather glad that she was not fussed over, but taken quite as a matter-of-course.
Aunt Marjorie was too anxious about the cream for Rivers' tea to give serious thoughts to anyone else just then. But when the young man had departed to catch the return train to London, then a few questions were asked of Judy.
"I thought you were going to live with Hilda," said Mildred, looking curiously at the child.
Mildred was standing a little apart from the others, and Judy, whose face was pale, for the suffering of her self-sacrifice was still causing her heart to ache horribly, looked full at her, and said in a low voice:
"That turned out to be a mistake, so I've come home."
"You brave little darling!" said Mildred, understanding everything like a flash; she stooped and kissed Judy on her forehead.
Babs came rushing into the midst of the group.
"Judy, Judy, I want you," she cried.
"What is it?" asked Judy.
"There's a butterfly coming out of a chrysalis in the butterfly-case; come quick--he's moving his tail backward and forward--he'll soon be out; come quick and see him."
The dull look left Judy's eyes; they sparkled with a sudden, swift, childish joy.
She took Babs' hand, and they rushed away, right round to the back of the house where the butterfly-case stood.
"Let's take him out, poor darling," she said; "let's put him on a leaf, and watch him as he gets out of his prison."
Her eyes grew brighter and brighter; she bent low to watch the resurrection which was going on.
After all the chrysalis and the butterfly were emblems. They were good omens to Judy that love and hope were not dead.
THE END.

= = = PG68873 = = =
A CENTURY OF CHILDREN'S BOOKS
A CENTURY OF CHILDREN’S BOOKS
A CENTURY OF CHILDREN’S BOOKS
BY FLORENCE V. BARRY B. LITT.
METHUEN & CO. LTD. 36 ESSEX STREET W. C. LONDON
_First Published in 1922_
PREFACE
This book was begun at Oxford before the War, when I had the great privilege of being a student in Sir Walter Raleigh’s class. Through his generous encouragement, it was continued at intervals and under many difficulties; and if he had not found some things to like in it, I should hardly venture to put it forth in its present shape.
It is true that the interest of great men in little books (a token of romance since the eighteenth century) is no gauge of public favour; but the history of children’s books is in some sort a record of childhood. Lovers of children may be willing to look through the shelves of old nurseries, if only for the portraits.
The farther one goes upon such small business, the more intricate it seems; and although I began with some knowledge of the treasures that Mrs. Field had unearthed in her study of _The Child and His Book_, I had no idea there were so many of these books, or that I should find it so difficult to choose. In this I was helped by the older reprints, by the collections of Mr. E. V. Lucas, and later by Mr. Harvey Darton’s chapter in the _Cambridge History of English Literature_.
The book itself is a poor acknowledgment of my gratitude to Oxford: to Sir Charles Firth and Mr. Nichol Smith for their advice and criticism; to the late Mr. R. J. E. Tiddy and Mr. Percy Simpson for help in the early stages; to Miss Helen Darbishire, Miss Janet Spens, and not least to my fellow students at Somerville who, in the midst of serious things, found time to be amused.
F. V. B.
CONTENTS
CHAP.                                          PAGE
INTRODUCTION                                1
I. CHAP-BOOKS AND BALLADS                     13
II. FAIRY TALES AND EASTERN STORIES            35
III. THE LILLIPUTIAN LIBRARY                    58
IV. ROUSSEAU AND THE MORAL TALE                85
V. THE ENGLISH SCHOOL OF ROUSSEAU            105
VI. DEVICES OF THE MORALIST                   122
VII. SOME GREAT WRITERS OF LITTLE BOOKS        147
VIII. MISS EDGEWORTH’S TALES FOR CHILDREN       175
IX. THE OLD-FASHIONED GARDEN OF VERSES        194
APPENDIX A.—NOTES AND EXTRACTS                  224
”    B.—CHRONOLOGICAL LIST                  250
A CENTURY OF CHILDREN’S BOOKS
INTRODUCTION
To open a child’s book nowadays is to discover some part of that unknown world which touches experience at so many points. The city beyond the clouds, the underground country, all the enchantments of woods and islands are open to the little traveller. From _The Water Babies_ to _Peter Pan_ there has been little else in nursery tales but the stuff of dreams.
It is hard to believe that the child who read the story of Rosamond and the Purple Jar, less than a hundred years ago, had no curiosity about dream countries, no sense of poetry in nature; yet the first sign of a romantic movement in children’s books was the printing of unknown or forgotten fairy tales under the title of _The Court of Oberon_, in 1823. The actual awakening came later, with the nature stories of the Howitts and the imaginative nonsense of Edward Lear.
A century of little books had passed before a child could read fairy tales without shame, and the taste for true “histories” prevailed long after Miss Edgeworth had written her last sequel.
For although there were eighteenth century chap-books that kept alive old tales of chivalry, these had no proper place on the nursery shelves. Books written for children were always designed to instruct as well as to amuse, and it was only because the human interests of the eighteenth century included children that it became a century of children’s books.
Those that survived the use of their first owners,—a little company in old sheepskin or flowered paper covers,—are either treasured by collectors or hidden away in some old library; but some of the best are still to be had in reprints and collections of “Old-fashioned” or “Forgotten” children’s books.
The new generation, pressing forward to discover more of the dream country, cares little for tales that reflect the quiet schooling of its ancestors; yet the most moral and instructive of these books mark the child’s escape from a sterner school. It was on his way to the Child’s Garden that he passed through this town of Georgian dolls’ houses, where, indeed, he found some rare and curious things.
In the earlier centuries a child made shift with such tales as his elders chose to tell him. There were few books that he could call his own, and those were devised to advance him in knowledge or courtesy. Yet the monks of the eleventh and twelfth centuries had a way of turning the natural instincts of children to account. They taught Latin by means of imaginary conversations, and put the raw material of wonder tales into their instructive “Elucidarium”, a sort of primitive “Child’s Guide” which told of fabulous beasts and gave miraculous accounts of heaven and earth.
The successors of these old schoolmasters devised a book for parents which they might share with their children. This was the _Gesta Romanorum_, a collection of stories put together in Latin about the fourteenth century to serve as texts for “Moralities”. It became the popular story-book of the Middle Ages, and a woodcut in the early editions shows a whole family gathered round the fire on a winter night telling stories to pass the time.
This was no book for children, even in the days before nurseries; yet it contained variants of the Arabian Tales, a story that Chaucer afterwards used for his “History of Constance”, and two strands of the _Merchant of Venice_ plot.
Travellers’ tales, also shared between men and children, filled a gap between the truthful records of King Alfred and Caxton’s new-discovered wealth of romance. Marco Polo and other voyagers brought back stories and fables from the East; Sir John Mandeville wrote of “the Meruayles of Ynde and of other diuerse Coûtries”. These cross the border between truth and fancy much as children do; but children knew them only from hearsay.
Caxton alone, had he been so minded, could have filled a child’s library; for besides his _Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye_, he printed Sir Thomas Malory’s _Noble Histories of King Arthur_ with many romances of his own translating and legends and lives of Saints. He was actually the first printer and editor of the very books which Locke, in the eighteenth century, prescribed for children: Æsop’s _Fables_ and _The History of Reynard the Fox_; but Caxton intended none of these for children. The _Fables_ showed men their follies; and _Reynard_ was then a satire that ridiculed unjust rulers under the figures of beasts. For children, he chose the kind of books that their parents would buy: the instructive _Parvus et Magnus Chato_, with its woodcut print of a monastery school; _Stans Puer ad Mensam_, a museum of quaint formalities, and _The Book of Courtesy_, addressed to “Lytyl John” in “tendre enfancye”.
Thus early did grown-up persons monopolise the pleasures of fiction, while they prepared handbooks of learning and courtesy for youth. Chaucer, it will be remembered, wrote a scientific treatise instead of a story for his little boy; and _The Babees Book_, designed for the royal wards and pages of the fifteenth century, had not a word of romance or fable; nothing but precepts of fair behaviour, and lessons that should teach those “Bele Babees” how to give their reasons smoothly, “in words that are gentle but compendious”.
There were many such books, nor were they all confined to children of gentle birth. _The Book of Courtesy_ was for the sons “of gentleman, yeoman or knave”, and Symon’s _Lesson of Wisdom_ (1500) “for all manner children”.
As for Caxton’s successors, they were content with his ideas about children’s books; it was simply a choice between manners and learning. Wynkyn de Worde, though he printed the splendid romance of _Bevis of Southampton_, gave his child-readers a “Wyse Chylde of Thre Year Old” that could answer the fearful question: “Sage enfaunt, how is the skye made?”; and William Copland produced _The Secret of Secrets of Aristotle_, “very good to teach children to read English”, while he lavished the adventures of Guy of Warwick upon their parents.
It is true that the child of the sixteenth century had much to compensate him for a lack of books. If he dwelt in the country, he saw _Robin Hood_ and _St. George_ played out upon the village green, or if in a town, he might meet with strange merchantmen in any street. He lived in an age of practical romance, and could match you the exploits of Guy or Bevis any day from the adventures of his neighbours. Moreover the Elizabethan child, if he could not read the old stories, at least had a chance of hearing them set to a new measure. Puttenham in his _Art of English Poesie_ (1589) writes of the “Blind Harpers and such like taverne Minstrels” who sang “stories of old time” to ballad tunes: “the tale of Sir Topas, the reportes of Bevis of Southampton, Guy of Warwick, Adam Bell and Clymme of the Clough, and such other old romances or historical rimes”.
But a boy had to evade his schoolmaster before he could listen to such things; and the schoolmaster saw to it that he had no English story-books. The new learning, which poured out its treasures for scholars, meant little more to the average boy than longer hours of study and more stripes; and reformers in education, although they looked upon him as a creature of promise, and were concerned to make his lot more bearable, came no nearer than their predecessors to the secrets of his mind.
Companies of schoolboy-players,—the children of the Chapel, or of Paul’s—might make the most of such plays as they could understand; and the Queen’s wards had times of “honest recreation” when they might tell each other stories; but their hours with tutors and music-masters would astonish the youth of these days.
Perhaps the happiest child of the great age of romance was the truant who could follow some pedlar along the road. For the pedlar’s songs were more enthralling than his “unbraided wares”; and he had ballads, such as “The Two Children in the Wood” and “Chevy Chace”, that a child could paste upon his nursery walls.
There was at least one writer who recognised the pedlar’s claims, and made him the hero of an instructive book. This was Thomas Newberry, who in 1563 wrote “A booke in English metre, of the great Marchaunt man called Dives Pragmaticus, very pretye for chyldren to rede: wherby they may the better, and more readyer, rede and wryte Wares and Implements, in this World contayned”.
This merchant knows all crafts and deals in every kind of wares; but he does it in the manner of Autolycus, calling all men to come and buy. His “Inkyll, crewell and gay valances fine” perhaps made copy for _A Winter’s Tale_; his “ouches, brooches and fine aglets for Kynges” might lie in the pack with
“Bugle bracelet, necklace amber, Perfume for a lady’s chamber”;
and though he had neither songs nor ballads, he spoke in verse and could find poetry in the “chyselle” and “blade” which Stevenson, more than three centuries later, praised in his _Child’s Garden_:
“A chisel, both handle and blade, Which _a man who was really a carpenter made_.”
It was a hard day for the men of the road when the Roundhead prevailed over King Charles. Had the Puritans been gifted with the worldly wisdom of old religious orders, the pedlar’s songs, interpreted as allegories, would have passed, with a word or two altered here and there; as it was, many of these poor merchants were reduced to carrying tracts that reflected the gloomy spirit of the times. But the seventeenth century garlands still preserved some of the older ballads, and the true Autolycus was never without copies of _Tom Thumb_, _The Wise Men of Gotham_, and other chap-books for the unregenerate. He suffered the penalties of rogues and vagabonds, and the child shared his disgrace.
George Fox, in his _Warning to all Teachers_, condemns, among other sins of children, “the telling of Tales, Stories, Jests, Rhimes and Fables”. The doctrine of Original Sin left no hope of grace by means of books. Courtesy, as concerning the mere outward forms and carriage of a child, was held of no account, and instruction itself was abandoned in favour of “Emblems”, “Warnings”, and morbid “Examples for Youth”: such books, for example, as James Janeway’s _Token for Children_, which contained “an exact account of the conversion, holy and exemplary lives and joyful deaths of several young children”: a literature of denial and negation.
And yet the greatest child’s book of the age was written by a Puritan. John Bunyan was the first to reconcile the claims of religion and romance, and he never could have written _The Pilgrim’s Progress_ if he had not been a good customer of the pedlar in his youth. But in writing it, Bunyan had no more thought of children than Caxton when he printed the stories of King Arthur. Both were thinking of grown-up children. And when, some eight years later, Bunyan tried his hand at a _Book for Boys and Girls_, he made it a mere collection of “Emblems” in doggerel verse. The alternative title, _Country Rhimes for Children_, seems to refer to certain farmyard creatures which he introduced to point analogies even more absurd than those of the old monkish Bestiaries; but the monks had sirens and other wonderful things in their natural history. There is nothing to atone for the dulness of these rhymes; any child would be better entertained in the Interpreter’s House.
After the Restoration, the pedlar had a better market for his books, but he also came upon new enemies; for it was then that members of the Royal Society were beginning to question those “strange and wonderful Relations” which simple folk, seeing them in print, received as true.
When Shakespeare’s shepherdess asked the pedlar “Is it true, think you?” he answered “Five justices’ hands at it, and witnesses more than my pack will hold”; but these men of letters and science accepted no evidence save that of their own reason, and this was fatal to the common matter of chap-books. It is the more surprising that one of their number should have been an unacknowledged maker of children’s books.
John Locke was the first to apply the methods of the Royal Society to education. He cared neither for creeds nor grammars, followed Montaigne in denouncing the pedantry of the old schoolmasters, and held with Rabelais that “the greatest clerks are not the wisest men.”
It is true that his concern for literal truth made him a very imperfect reader of children’s minds. He never understood the part that imagination plays in a child’s life, and his plan of education allows no scope for it; yet he understood children so well on the practical side that every eighteenth century writer of little books quoted his maxims, despised romance and produced “fables” that made a certain appeal to childish interests while they proved the advantages of common sense.
Locke’s book, _Some Thoughts concerning Education_, which he published in 1693, was put together from the letters he had written during his exile in Holland, to Edward Clarke; but it suggests notes rather than letters. Locke so condenses the human element that it reads like a book of educational prescriptions. The key is to be found in the letters of his friends, and in the records of his pupil, the third Lord Shaftesbury, author of the _Characteristics_. Locke was the first earl’s friend and medical adviser, and for a time had taught his son; the third earl came to him as “Mr. Anthony” at the age of three, and was his “more peculiar charge” till he was twelve years old. After the grandfather’s death, they sent him to Westminster, entirely against Locke’s wish, for he hated schools; but when “Mr. Anthony” came to write about his childhood, he had not a good word for “pedants and schoolmasters”; only for Mr. Locke to whom, next his “immediate parents”, he owed “the highest gratitude and duty”.
Men do not write thus of tutors who were not their friends; and doubtless others could have said the same of Locke: the younger brothers of Lord Shaftesbury, the Dutch Quaker’s little boy, Arent Furly, a kind of foster-child of his in Holland, or little Frank Masham, his last pupil, who was between four and five when Locke came to live with his family. They all owed him good health and a happy childhood, and it does not appear that they hankered after the forbidden joys of romance.
Locke’s belief in physical training was a welcome contrast to the average tutor’s insistence upon books. He put aside the rod, invented games for his pupils and, as soon as possible, treated them as “rational creatures”.
By reversing the order of Books of Courtesy, he relieved them of rules and maxims. Virtue stood first in his judgment, then wisdom, then breeding, and learning last. At heart he was not less concerned for manners than the old masters of courtesy; but he thought they could only be acquired by habit and good company. It is the more curious to find him, in another part of the book, assuming that the right kind of tutor could teach Virtue and Wisdom as another might teach Latin. Locke himself came as near as a man could to his ideal of a tutor more wise than learned, a man of the world that knew how to bear himself in any company; and it mattered little to his pupils that such a tutor could not be found for every child.
Intelligent parents found in his published _Thoughts_ some confirmation of their own experience, and his very inconsistencies made his ideas seem the more reasonable to them. For it cannot be denied that Locke, although he believed in teaching children not what, but how to think, yet fell into the error of impressing facts upon their memory, and facts that could only be learned from books. His Irish friend Molyneux, on whose advice the _Thoughts_ were put together, brought up his little boy according to Locke’s plan, and proved that the system could produce a rival to Wynkyn de Worde’s Wyse Chylde: one that at five years old could read perfectly and trace out upon the globes “all the noted parts, countries and cities of the world”. At six, his knowledge was incredible, he was “obedient and observant to the nicest particular”, and his father believed that no child “had ever his passions more perfectly at command”.
There is nothing in Locke’s theory to account for the encyclopædic knowledge of this child; but in practice he had replaced Latin and Greek with Geometry, Chronology, the use of the Globes, and even some part of “the incomparable Mr. Newton’s” Philosophy, so far as it was justified by “Matter of Fact”.
This helps to explain the little pedantries of later children’s books, although many of these do not go beyond Locke’s directions for teaching a child to read.
“There may be Dice and Play-things with the letters on them,” he says, “to teach Children the Alphabet by Playing; and twenty other Ways may be found, suitable to their particular Tempers, to make this Kind of Learning a Sport to them. Thus Children may be cozen’d into a Knowledge of the Letters....”
If this smacks of artifice, there is no question of his wisdom about essentials: “If you have any Contests with him, let it be in Matters of Moment, of Truth and Good Nature; but lay no Task on him about A.B.C.”
About books he is very plain: when “by these gentle Ways” a child begins to read, “some easy pleasant Book, suited to his Capacity should be put into his Hands, wherein the Entertainment that he finds might draw him on, and reward his Pains in Reading, and yet not such as should fill his Head with perfectly useless Trumpery, or lay the Principles of Vice and Folly. To this purpose I think Æsop’s Fables the best, which being Stories apt to delight and entertain a Child, may yet afford useful Reflections to a grown Man; and if his Memory retain them all his Life after, he will not repent to find them there, amongst his manly Thoughts and serious Business”.
Then, after recommending an _Æsop_ with pictures in it, he adds: “_Reynard the Fox_ is another Book I think may be made Use of to the same Purpose”. Talking beasts that can be made the mouthpiece of a moralist are Locke’s nearest approach to the supernatural. In another place, he admonishes parents to preserve a child’s mind “from all Impressions and Notions of _Spirits_ and _Goblins_, or any fearful Apprehensions in the Dark”. Thus the child is to be protected from ghost-stories or fairy-tales and “cozen’d” into reading what will be useful to him when he is a man.
Locke knew no other books in English “fit to engage the liking of children and tempt them to read”; and indeed there were few to know. _The Seven Wise Masters of Rome_ is an example of what was thought fit for children. This was a very old sequence of Eastern parables first printed by Wynkyn de Worde. Francis Kirkman, who translated it from the French in 1674, declared that it was “held in such estimation in Ireland that it was always put into the hands of young children immediately after the horn book”. English copies were common; but the tales had less interest for children than those of the _Gesta_. “Pedants and Schoolmasters” must have conspired to keep it in print.
Thus at the close of the seventeenth century the greater number of children, if they read anything, amused themselves with chap-books or broadsheets,—all of which, doubtless, came under Locke’s ban as “perfectly useless Trumpery”; and for those that read no books, in spite of Locke, there were still tales “of Sprites and Goblins”.
CHAPTER I
CHAP-BOOKS AND BALLADS
Children and the Supernatural—Steele’s Account of a boy’s reading—Characteristics of chap-book “histories”—Folk-lore and legendary settings—_The History of Friar Bacon_—_Fortunatus_—Other chap-book survivals—The Georgian Autolycus—Travellers’ tales—A great chap-book—Books for men and children—Chap-books and ballads—Treatment of romances—The fairy world—Legend and history—Border and Robin Hood ballads.
Steele’s account of his two god-children[1] (perhaps the choicest of his _Tatler_ papers) discovers the weak point of Locke’s philosophy. Nothing could so shake a blind faith in Æsop as the frank words of Steele’s little boy who, at eight years old, although he was “a very great Historian in Æsop’s Fables”, declared “that he did not delight in that Learning, because he did not believe they were true”.
His sister Betty defied Mr. Locke upon another side, for she dealt “chiefly in Fairies and Sprights”; and would “terrifie the Maids with her Accounts” till they were afraid to go up to bed.
Now, neither of these children had the least difficulty about the supernatural. The boy could have believed in beasts that talked; but he detected the man inside the lion’s skin: the man that pointed a moral. These _Fables_, once understood as ridiculing the follies of mankind, were no longer “true”; but there were other stories of the boy’s own choosing which, though full of magic, were true to the spirit of their kind.
Steele says he had “very much turned his studies for about a Twelvemonth past into the Lives and Adventures of _Don Bellianis of Greece_, _Guy of Warwick_, the _Seven Champions_, and other Historians of that Age”.
Not only does the sympathetic godfather enter into these literary adventures, as Mr. Locke, with all his wisdom, never could have done, but he knows the virtue of an unpointed moral: the boy, he says, “had made Remarks, which might be of Service to him during the Course of his whole Life. He would tell you the Mismanagements of _John Hickathrift_, find Fault with the passionate Temper in _Bevis of Southampton_ and loved _St. George_ for being the Champion of _England_; and by this Means had his Thoughts insensibly moulded into the Notions of Discretion, Virtue and Honour”.
In the reign of Anne, these stirring “Histories” were a part of every pedlar’s stock-in-trade. They were sold at fairs or hawked from door to door; and a boy that could never stumble through the maze of a seventeenth century folio might read as many romances as he had halfpence. Some had been among the earliest printed books. They were mostly from French originals, though Sir Bevis and Sir Guy had been “_Chevaliers d’Angleterre_” from the beginning. The chap-book _Seven Champions_ and _Life and Death of St. George_ were both based on Richard Johnson’s _History of the Seven Champions_, a medley of other romances in which Caxton’s “Saynt George of Capadose” had become St. George of Coventry. But the romance spirit was cosmopolitan, born of the Crusades, and foreign champions like Don Bellianis of Greece were hardly less popular.[2]
Late writers varied the old adventures; but the chap-book printer, who did his own editing, cut down the heavy matter of the folios to a bare chain of incidents. His words were few and ill-chosen, he had neither style nor grammar; but the core of interest was sound: the stories touched the imagination of his readers like ballads and fairy tales.
Gallant Knights came straight from the fields of France to the magnificence of Eastern cities; youths, setting out from the English towns, adventured among dwarfs and Saracens, giants and dragons, and won their knighthood by the way.
If the hero never failed to subdue his enemies and win a lady of surpassing beauty, there was still a doubt (enough to keep the reader curious) whether a rival would snatch her from him and put him upon a more dangerous adventure to win her back; or whether, if they fared on together, they would meet an enchanter or a giant first.
Repetition seldom tires a child. The feats of Acquitaine could be repeated at Damascus; and the wood-cuts in the chap-books proved that Montelion and Parismus could fight in the armour of Don Bellianis or St. George. Nor was it a chance association of the pedlar’s pack which threw these champions into the company of a village strongman, John Hickathrift, more commonly called Tom; for although Hickathrift fought with a cart-wheel and axle-tree for shield and sword, he could beat the best of them at giant-killing.[3]
The romances, indeed, are full of the common stuff of folk-lore. If the hero blow a trumpet at a castle-gate, a giant may be expected; if he blow it at the mouth of an enchanted cave, a prophetic voice replies, or if he enter the cave by chance, he may find the prophecy inscribed on a pillar of sapphire—the prelude, in _Don Bellianis_, to the coming of the Enchantress through a pair of ivory gates.
A hundred folk-tales tell of the Princess rescued from a dragon; transformation is an affair of every day: Don Bellianis slays a magician “in the shape of a griffin”; St. Denis, in the _Seven Champions_, is transformed into a hart, the Princess of Thessaly into a mulberry-tree; and St. David sleeps seven years in an enchanted garden—the Magic Sleep of the fairy tales. Nor is the champion of romance without his wonderful sword or cloak.
The Sword “Morglay” (no more than a stout weapon in the old version of _Sir Bevis_) is called “wonderful” in the chap-books. Don Bellianis draws a magic sword from a pillar, as Arthur pulled his out of the stone; St. George has invincible armour; and the later _History of Fortunatus_ is the tale of a Wonderful Purse and a Wishing Cap.
But whoever looks upon a child as a pure romantic, has learned but half his lesson; for in many tales that have stood the test of time, there is little interest outside sheer matter of fact; and even the romances owed something to legendary settings which touched a borderland of truth. To know that Bevis lived in the reign of Edgar, that Guy, returning from his pilgrimage, found King Athelstane at Winchester, beset by the Danes, would confirm a child’s belief; but the little reader of chap-books knew more than this; he could give the exact measurements of Tom Hickathrift’s grave in Tilney Churchyard, knew where to find Guy’s armour and his porridge-pot at Warwick, and never doubted that Bevis built Arundel Castle for love of his horse.
It might be done indeed, for such a horse: no mere product of a wizard’s cunning, but a steed fit to carry a champion: alive as the persons of the romances never were. He figures in every adventure, carries the thread of the story from point to point, and yet stands out, a very symbol of romance.
The chap-book writer makes no picture of the knighting of Bevis, and never mentions his shield with the three blue eagles on a field of gold; but he remembers well enough how the Saracen King’s daughter, Josian the fair, presented Bevis with the sword “Morglay” and the “wonderful steed called Arundel”.
From that point the story goes to a sound of hoofs; and though the King betrayed Bevis into the hands of his enemy and gave the horse Arundel to Bevis’s rival, King Jour, and though Bevis lay in a dungeon for seven years, Josian herself was not more faithful to him than Arundel; for when at last he escaped, and came, disguised as a poor pedlar, to the castle of Jour, Josian knew him not; but Arundel, hearing his master speak, “neighed and broke seven chains for joy”.
As to the men and women of romance, they borrowed life from their adventures, but apart from these, were mere types of strength or beauty. The original portraits, though vague, were not without poetry: the impression of “The Squyere Guy” has a hint of Chaucer:
“Feyre he was and bryght of face, He schone as bryght as ane glace.”
The chap-book writer contents himself with the remark that King Ermine was “prepossessed with Guy’s looks”. He bestows more care on the heroine, Felyce, but covers the faint outline with his trowel. Felyce, once
“the Erlys Doghtur, a swete thynge”,
becomes “this heavenly Phillis, whose beauty was so excellent that Helen the pride of all Greece might seem as a Black a Moor to her”.
Many striking situations and dramatic incidents of the older stories are lost in the chap-books, for want of picture-making phrases and live speech. A name here and there, such as Brademond, King of Damascus, would lift a boy like a magic carpet, and set him down among Saracen pavilions; bare facts might call up pictures; there was the ransom of King Jour,—“Twenty tun of gold and three hundred white steeds”; but the unlettered writer shirked most of the details which, in telling the story aloud, he would express by gestures. The fine fight with the dragon, in _Guy of Warwick_, makes but a paragraph in the chap-book; the monster’s head is off before the fight is well begun. Not even a “picture of the dragon, thirty feet in length, worked in a cloth of arras and hung up in Warwick Castle for an everlasting monument” could make amends for this.
Yet a child, making his own pictures out of the poor phrases of these writers, might have in his mind’s eye something not unlike the images of the old translator: the boy Bevis on a hillside with his sheep, looking down at the Castle “that should be his”; the four Knights selling him to the Saracen merchantmen; or the giant Ascapart wading out to the ship, with Bevis and Josian and the horse Arundel tucked under his arm.
These stand in clear outline, and, in the roughest shape, have suggestions of pathos or incongruity; but they pass at once into action, which is what a child wants: the boy comes down from the hill, forces his way into the castle and attacks the usurper with his shepherd’s crook; the Saracens carry him overseas, and set him in the way of adventure; Ascapart proves himself “a mariner good at need”, hoists sail and brings his master and mistress safely into harbour.
Laughter is rare in the romances, but this story of Ascapart has a humour of its own. Bevis, having beaten the giant, spares his life on condition that he becomes his servant; and in the course of their adventures the vanquished rescues the victor, the servant picks up his master and carries him about like a toy. Such a feat measures the great creature more effectually than the exact method of the chap-book writer: “thirty Foot high and a Foot between his eyebrows”.
Another “famous History” which came with these into the chap-books, was that of _Valentine and Orson_, first printed by Wynkyn de Worde, and reprinted at the close of the nineteenth century as an “old fairy tale”. It has some novel features besides the usual stage properties of romance. Of the twin brothers separated in childhood, one is brought up at Court and trained in knightly exercises; the other carried off by a bear and nourished with her cubs. This is a foretaste of _The Jungle Book_:
“In a cave, the bear had four young ones, among whom she laid the child to be devoured, yet all the while the young bears did it no harm; but with their rough paws stroked it softly. The old bear, perceiving they did not devour it, showed a bearish kind of favour towards it, inasmuch that she kept it and gave it suck among her young ones for the space of one year”.
The second chapter records how the bear’s nursling, Orson, grew up into a Wild Man, and how the young knight Valentine, his brother, meeting him in a wood, won a victory of skill against strength; after which, still unconscious of their relationship, he tamed the Wild Man and taught him the arts of chivalry.
The more magical elements of the story have a flavour of the East, and doubtless belong to the older strata of Eastern romance. The adventure of the Dwarf Pacolet suggests the tale of the “Magic Horse” in the _Thousand and One Nights_; for by his art this dwarf, who was an Enchanter, “had contrived a horse of wood, and in the forehead a fixed pin, by turning of which he could convey himself to the farthest part of the world”.
Many such marvels, related during the Middle Ages by merchants or Crusaders returning from the East, had been caught up in the weavings of romance; but it is a sort of magic that has little to do with the myth-making power of childhood. Pacolet’s flying horse is made of wood; the touch of its hoof never brought water from a mountain-side. It represents the magic of ingenuity which comes half-way between pure romance and the practical marvels of a scientific age.
Indeed, it is but a step from the flying horse of Eastern tales to Roger Bacon’s horseless chariots and flying “instruments”. The “Learned Friar”, a clerk of Oxford in the thirteenth century, foretold many things to be performed by “Art and Nature”, wherein should be “nothing magical”. Yet he studied such strange matters that he was persecuted for practising magic, and the chap-books set him down a conjurer. The Enchanted Head of Brass which in _Valentine and Orson_ reveals the parentage of the brothers, reappears in the _Famous History of Friar Bacon_, as the Brazen Head, wrought in so many sleepless nights by the Friar and his brother-in-magic, Friar Bungay.
Greene, in his play of _Fryer Bacon and Fryer Boungay_ (1591), follows this well known tract,[4] which came down with few changes to the eighteenth century. Here the old magic machinery goes with the light movement of a popular tale. The Brazen Head should have disclosed a secret whereby Friar Bacon “would have walled England about with brass”; but the stupidity of his servant Miles prevented it. For when the two magicians, worn out with toil, lay down to sleep, they set him to watch the Head, commanding him to call them the moment it should speak; and he, the while, kept up his spirits “with tabor and pipe and song”.
When at last the Head spake these words: “Time Is,” and no more, Miles, understanding nothing by that, fell to mockery: “If thou canst speak no wiser, they shall sleep till doomsday for me. Time is! I know Time is, that you shall hear, Goodman Brazen Face!”
So saying, he fitted the words to the tune of “Dainty, come thou to me”, and sang for half-an-hour. Thereupon the Head spake again, saying two words and no more: “Time Was”; whereat the Simpleton railed afresh, and another half-hour went by.
Then the Brazen Head spake again, these words: “Time is Past”, and then fell down; and presently followed a terrible noise, with strange flashes of fire, so that Miles was half-dead with fear.
“Out on thee, villain,” cried Friar Bacon, “thou hast undone us both; hadst thou but called us when it did speak, all England had been walled about with brass, to its glory and our eternal fame.”
Locke’s followers were never tired of setting the “plain Magique of tru Reason’s Light” against Friar Bacon’s conjurings. There were later moralists who recognized the Wizard as a pioneer of science; but these would have none of his magic, and rejected all tales of undeserved good fortune.
Wordsworth alone had the courage to tum a child loose in the enchanted woods. He praised _The History of Fortunatus_, which is more like “Aladdin” than any tale of chivalry. By sheer luck the Spendthrift finds a Galley of Venice lying at anchor and gets his choice of gifts. These vanished like fairy gold in the hands of his sons, and children remembered little else but his Wishing Cap and his Purse that never was empty. Yet Fortunatus was a name to conjure by, and the pure spirit of adventure was in his first setting out, as the woodcut shows, “with a Hawk in his Hand”.
It seems odd that the eighteenth century child should have ballads about King Arthur and his Knights, but no account of them in prose. Malory’s “Noble Histories”, like the once famous cycles of Amadis and the Palmerins, escaped the chap-book writers; but they had one or two relics of the old _Historyes of Troye_, in which Priam’s palace had become an enchanted castle, and Hector a knight errant.
The pedlar had no chronology. Patient Grissel, fresh from a new translation of Boccaccio, was a lady of the eighteenth century, and what pleased the country fireside of 1700 still pleased it in 1760. The tales that Mr. Burchell gave the children in _The Vicar of Wakefield_ might have come out of a chapman’s bundle in almost any part of the century: “the story of the Buck of Beverland, with the History of Patient Grissel, the Adventures of Catskin and then Fair Rosamond’s Bower.”
Among other “useless Trumpery” were riddles, nonsense-books and farcical tales of rogues or simpletons.[5] These are full of the topsy-turvy nonsense that children love, and the coarse jests from which they were seldom guarded. The older stories, even when they deal with everyday life, give it a romantic flavour. The Cobbler feasts with the King; the Valiant London Prentice leaves his shop on London Bridge, and sets out to joust with eastern princes. A Tudor pedlar, Tom Long, in the course of his absurd adventures, visits the Cave of the Seven Sleepers, whose story makes a welcome interlude:
“Coming to the town, they found everything altered, the inhabitants being other sort of people than they were the night before. So, going to buy food, the people refused to take their money, saying they knew not the coin; but enquiring further, found that since their being there, three generations had been dead and the fourth was in being”.
Tom Long was the puppet of a nonsense-book; but other chap-books, following Deloney, told the “true histories” of industrious fortune-makers who were not out of place in a commercial age; and the life of an eighteenth century pedlar was plain enough to pass for truth. An account (in a late Stirling tract)[6] of the “Flying Stationer”, Peter Duthie, shows that he took up his trade in 1729, when he was eight years old, and was upon the road for eighty years—a Georgian Autolycus, known for his quaint wit “in every city, town, village and hamlet in great Britain”. At some time, perhaps, he sold “lives” of his brethren Dougal Graham and John Cheap the Chapman, whose story was “moralised” by Hannah More.
The traveller is always a romantic figure. No amount of fact can take the pleasure of expectation and surprise out of a journey, and the setting of most chap-books was a journey by land or sea. The “Flying Stationer” asked no more for the Wonderful Voyages of Sir John Mandeville than for the rough yarn of a ship-wrecked sailor.
This last, if it pointed a moral, might serve a double purpose, for the old allegories were dying out, except in burlesques. Abstractions always had a way of coming alive when they set foot on English ground, and _The History of Laurence Lazy_, of “Lubberland Castle in the County of Sloth” was no mere allegory of Idleness, but the tale of a scapegrace who, to the joy of all children, got the better of the Schoolmaster, the Squire’s Cook and the Farmer. His “Arraignment and Trial” in the Town Hall of “Never Work” was a triumphant apology for idlers; yet a scene like this may have suggested the symbolic trial of Christian and Faithful in the Town of Vanity.
That splendid chap-book, _The Pilgrim’s Progress_,[7] is built up of such things. Bunyan’s reading, outside the Bible (although he counted it among his sins) had acquainted him with romances, tales of magic and enchantment, “histories” of live persons; and all these, or nearly all, were concerned with adventures upon the road.[8]
Bible stories and Christian legends were common in Bunyan’s youth. There was a versified “history” of Joseph and his Brethren, and the beautiful legend of the Glastonbury Thorn was as well known as that of _The Seven Sleepers_ or _The Wandering Jew_.
But _The Pilgrim’s Progress_ dealt in terms of unmistakable experience with the journey that every man must go; the figures of its allegory were live persons, such as a man might meet upon any road, and its setting changed as the way ran through towns and villages, past fields and sloughs and thickets, over hills where the surest-footed might fall “from running to going and from going to clambering upon his hands and knees, because of the steepness of the place”, or beside rivers that ran through meadows and orchards, with lilies underfoot, and above, “green trees with all manner of fruit”.
These things give place at certain points, as they do in life, to the scorched plains of torment, the overwhelming Shadow of Death, or, where the river and the way for a time part, to the Dungeon of Despair. There are glimpses by the way of strange and beautiful lands, of vineyards and mountains upon which “the sun shineth night and day”; but here also is the road running through the midst of the country to a city more splendid than the cities of romance, for “it was builded of pearls and precious stones, also the streets thereof were paved with gold”.
The child would start on this journey with some knowledge of his bearings, for, like Bunyan, he had set out on an earlier pilgrimage with Guy of Warwick.[9] At the Palace Beautiful, he would remember how Montelion had been armed by nymphs, and at Doubting Castle, how Bevis had escaped from his prison in Damascus.
No knight ever strove with giant or dragon as Christian struggled with Apollyon; none of the Seven Champions had encountered the dangers of this road. Yet these were adventures that might happen to a man in the midst of his ordinary business; that much a child might understand beneath the surface of romance which for him is the chief matter of the book.
This was the first of three great books which pleased both men and children in the eighteenth century. The others are _Robinson Crusoe_[10] and _The Travels and Adventures of Captain Lemuel Gulliver_.[11] Each, in its own kind, is a _Voyage Imaginaire_ and the unwrought matter of all three was to be found in chap-books. The tale of the shipwrecked man had never been told with such apparent truth as in _Robinson Crusoe_. Readers of the chap-book history of Drake, who were familiar with accounts of “Monsters and Monstrous People”, would read this sober journal as the purest matter of fact; nor was there anything beyond belief in Gulliver’s adventures, to anyone who knew the pedlar’s book of _Sir John Mandeville_. For here, among greater marvels, was a notable account of giants and pigmies.
The island setting of _Robinson Crusoe_, the figure of Friday, the footprint in the sand, belong to the world of romance; so do the giants and dwarfs of _Gulliver_. Yet in both books, the things that happen are human and practical; the setting gives scope for the chief interests of the century: men and morals and matters of fact. Defoe pointed his moral, and as an afterthought explained the Voyage of Robinson Crusoe as an allegory of his life; Swift used the contrary device of satire. But no child was ever concerned with an under-sense, where he could follow every turn of the adventure. A philosopher would not have discovered Crusoe’s allegory, and a child is more likely to suspect satire in _Reynard the Fox_ than in _Gulliver_.
The adventures of Lilliput and Brobdignag are the convincing “history” of a nation of Tom Thumbs and a nation of Blunderbores; only a little Gradgrind would question their truth. A child reading _The Pilgrim’s Progress_ is himself the Pilgrim; in the adventure of the island he is the shipwrecked man; and in the Travels, first the big man upon whose body the little men climb with ladders, then the little man, paddling his toy boat to amuse the giants.
These books, like the romances, were for little men as well as big ones; but their authors renewed the old devices by a masterly simple style. They made pictures such as were never found in chap-book prose, and rarely in tales that had passed into ballad form.
*       *       *       *       *
The eighteenth century pedlar had fewer ballads than his predecessors; yet those he had, like the songs of Autolycus, were “for man or woman, of all sizes”.
Ballad tunes, from Shakespeare to Wordsworth, were “Food for the hungry ears of little ones,” and there is something in the simple conventions of ballads that suggests the story-telling of a child. Those printed ballads, “darling songs of the common People”, which Addison found upon the walls of eighteenth-century houses, attracted him by their classic simplicity, but the two he liked the best: “Chevy Chase” and “The Two Children in the Wood”, had been the joy of Elizabethan nurseries.[12]
Most of the chap-book stories were sung as ballads. “The Seven Champions”, “St. George”, “Patient Grissel” and “The London Prentice” were all in the _Collection of Old Ballads_ printed in 1723, with “The Noble Acts of King Arthur” from Malory;[13] and others were reprinted in Percy’s _Reliques_ (1765) from a folio manuscript of the seventeenth century.
The ballad maker, dealing with romances, preferred short episodes. A tedious story would never go to his quick measures; but by laying his chief stress on speech and movement, or adding a refrain, he made a thing quite unlike the short versions of the chap-books, and gave a certain dramatic unity to the separate parts.
Thus the incident of “Guy and Colebrande”, in Percy’s folio, had been chosen from _Guy of Warwick_, and the ballad of St. George, in the Collection of 1723, deals only with the dragon story. Some ballads, it is true, cover a sequence of adventures. “The Lord of Lorn,”, like _Bevis of Southampton_, gives the whole story of a child robbed of his inheritance: a shepherd boy that should have been a lord; and the scene changes from Britain to France and back again; but so much is told in dialogue that the story dances to its end:
“Do thou me off thy sattin doublett Thy shirtband wrought with glistering gold, And doe mee off thy golden chaine About thy necke so many a fold.
“Do thou me off thy velvett hat. With fether in that is so ffine; All unto thy silken shirt That’s wrought with many a golden seam.
...
“‘What must be my name, worthy Steward? I pray thee now, tell it me:’ ‘Thy name shalbe Pore Disaware, To tend sheepe on a lonelye lee.’”
Of the fairy world revealed in “Thomas Rymer”, the ghostly suggestion of “The Wife of Usher’s Well,” there is no trace till the close of the century. The true ballads of Elfland are more song than story, and rise by suggestion above the simplicity of fairy tales:
“O they rade on and farther on, And they waded rivers abune the knee And they saw neither sun nor moon, But they heard the roaring of the sea.”
The breath of enchantment is rare in English ballads. There is nothing in print before Scott’s _Minstrelsy_ like the magic of these lines; but Percy reprinted a sixteenth century ballad, “The Mad-Merry Prankes of Robbin Goodfellow” which Puck himself might have sung:
“From Oberon in Fairyland The King of ghosts and shadows there, Mad Robbin I at his command Am sent to view the night-sports here. What revell rout Is kept about In every corner where I goe I will oresee And merry be And make good sport with ho, ho, ho.”
This is the triumphant laughter of a child. The “shrewd and knavish sprite” has neither the delicacy of smaller fairies nor the courtly dignity of his master. He is the spirit of childish mischief: greeting night-wanderers “with counterfeiting voice”, shape-changing, “whirrying” over hedges and pools, or playing tricks on lads and lasses at village feasts. “Hobgoblin” or “sweet Puck”, half-child, half-fairy, he roams the English country,
“Through woods, through lakes, Through bogs, through brakes, Ore bush and brier”,
and boasts of greater powers.
There is no doubting either voice or words:
“More swift than lightning can I flye And round about this ayrie welkin soone. And in a minutes space descry Each thing that’s done belowe the moone”.
There are two more fairy songs in the _Reliques_: one given “with some corrections” from a seventeenth century garland, the other, Bishop Corbet’s “Farewell” to the fairies. The first contradicts the second, for obeying the invocation
“Come, follow, follow me You fairy elves that be”,
a team of little atomies appear, proving that they were never out of England since Shakespeare wrote, but “unheard and unespy’d”, were gliding through Puritan key-holes and spreading their feasts while the Bishop was composing his lament,
“Farewell, rewards and fairies!”
Yet these, like Robin Goodfellow, are spirits of Earth; they eat more than fairy bread. A mortal surely suggested the details of their feast, but they dance a fairy measure:
“The grasshopper, gnat and fly, Serve for our minstrelsy; Grace said, we dance awhile, And so the time beguile; And if the moon doth hide her head, The gloe-worm lights us home to bed.
“On tops of dewie grasse So nimbly do we passe; The young and tender stalk Ne’er bends when we do walk: Yet in the morning may be seen Where we the night before have been.”
Rhymed nursery tales seldom show the true ballad quality. The only children’s stories in the Collection of 1723 are “The Children in the Wood”, and “Sir Richard Whittington”: the one a true ballad, newly licensed and approved by Addison; the other (also mentioned in the _Spectator_) taking precedence of such rhymes as “Catskin” and “Tom Thumb” for a popular grafting of the romance of Fortune upon a stock of historical fact.
Southern ballad-printers favoured the merry or tragic themes of legend and history,[14] and if few of their songs had the trumpet-note of “Chevy Chase”, they lacked neither freshness nor vigour. Some, like “the Blind Beggar’s Daughter of Bednall-Green”, gave a fresh turn to Elizabethan traditions, and made up for indifferent workmanship by a plentiful force of rhythm. Late nursery poets could not better this trick of the ballad-maker’s:
“It was a blind beggar that long lost his sight, He had a fair daughter of beauty most bright; And many a gallant brave suitor had she, For none was so comely as pretty Bessee.”
Another of these old broadsides, “Johnny Armstrong’s Last Good Night” appeared among Dryden’s Miscellanies in 1702, in the Collections of 1723 and 1724, and again in Evans’s _Old Ballads_ (1777).
“The music of the finest singer is dissonance,” wrote Goldsmith, “to what I felt when our old dairymaid sung me into tears with Johnny Armstrong’s last Good Night or the Cruelty of Barbara Allen.”
These are the true stuff of ballads; but a child cares most about action, and, asked to choose between them, would be pretty sure to call for the Border Song.
The story of John Armstrong, which came down to prose in the chap-books, has points in common with “Robin Hood”, but John and his “Merry Men” have no touch of Robin’s careless humour. They fight like the heroes of Chevy Chase, and ask no quarter:
“Said John, Fight on, my merry men all, I am a little hurt, but I am not slain. I will lay me down for to bleed a while Then I’le rise and fight with you again.”
The pirate song of “Sir Andrew Barton”[15] is a sailor’s variant of this. Lord Howard defies Sir Andrew upon the high seas much as Erle Percy, in despite of the Douglas, takes his pleasure in the Scottish woods. There was never a better fight on shore, and when at last the pirate falls to an English bowman, he repeats the border cry:
“‘Fight on, my men!’ says Sir Andrew Barton, ‘I am hurt, but I am not slain; I’le lay mee downe and bleed awhile, And then I’le rise and fight again’.”
Sir Andrew stands out from his fellows, though the portrait is not to be compared with Robin Hood’s; and the king himself speaks his epitaph:
“‘I wo’ld give a hundred pound,’ says King Henrye ‘The man were alive as he is dead!’”
Another of these narrative ballads, “Adam Bell”,[16] has a forest background that suggests Robin Hood:
“Merry it was in grene forest Among the leves grene Where that men walke both East and West Wyth bowes and arrowes kene.”
The full title, “Adam Bell, Clim of the Clough and William of Cloudesley”, has a sufficing rhythm, and the story is good; not unlike a Norse Saga, where they set fire to the outlaw’s house, and like _William Tell_, where Cloudesley splits an apple on his son’s head at six score paces.
But the true Robin Hood ballads take a child into his own country, and he finds it peopled with his friends. From the first stanzas of “The Curtall Friar”, he is Robin’s man:
“In summer time, when leaves grow green And flowers are fresh and gay Robin Hood and his merry men _Were disposed to play_.”
In this play-humour, the outlaws themselves are children, as every child is by nature an outlaw. They know better than to take life for a serious business. To them, as to a child, it is one long and absorbing game of make-believe.
Robin, like Fulk Fitz-Warine or Hereward, could play at any trade—a potter, a beggar, a shepherd, a fisherman. His band were mostly men who had forsaken some dull craft for this great game of hiding and hunting and robbery. In the midst of active enjoyment, they set themselves to redress the unequal balance of fortune; but they never doubted their own solid advantages over sheriffs and abbots,—the people who dwelt in towns and cloisters, and had forgotten how to play.
Early collectors of the eighteenth century found no ballads that echoed the sound of the greenwood:
“notes small Of Byrdis mery syngynge”,
or that made pictures of the deer shadowed in green leaves; but there were imitations of the older songs, and the setting was always implied.
After 1765, there must have been children who knew the prelude to “Guy of Gisborne”, from Percy’s _Reliques_:
“When shaws been sheene and shradds full fayre, And leaves both large and longe, It is merrye walking in the fayre forrest, To heare the small birdes songe.
“The woodweele sang and wold not cease, Sitting upon the spraye So lowde, he wakened Robin Hood In the greenwood where he lay.”
A child cares little about landscape for its own sake, but much for the things which it suggests. Here, the setting is essential to the game these outlaws are playing; they are as much a part of it as the deer they chase. The beauty of the forest and the song of birds lead on to the adventure; but they are as nothing compared to the romantic fact that this is a place where any man may meet with Robin Hood.
In the same way, a child appreciates character as it affects the course of events. Robin Hood’s men are neither an army nor a clan; they join his company of their own free choice, after proof of sportsmanship; and the chief of them—Little John, Scarlett and Much the miller’s son, are distinct personalities. The result is a spirit of individual adventure which gives the stories unusual interest and variety.
The earliest songs of Robin Hood had grown into a ballad-epic, “A Lytell Geste of Robyn Hood”,[17] in which Robin’s character was proved in talk and incidents, and further shown by the story-teller’s comments on his courage and gentleness, his respect for women, his love of the forest; but gentle attributes failed to impress the writers of eighteenth century broadsheets. They recall the more obvious traits by a few epithets:
“I will you tell of a bold outlaw,”
or
“A story of gallant brave Robin Hood Unto you I will declare.”
Taking the rest for granted, they deal directly with Robin’s combats and escapes, his farcical adventures with bishops and beggars, his daring rescues; and in these, the quality that comes uppermost is the roguish humour which above all distinguishes him from the conventional knight of chivalry.
A single attempt to connect him with the romances—the late ballad of “Robin Hood and the Prince of Aragon”—marks the difference of kind; for though Robin kills the prince, and John and Scadlock bag a giant apiece, they move like live men among shadows.
The children of the eighteenth century did not meet the outlaws of the “golden world”. They knew the Curtal Friar and Alan a Dale, and what happened when Robin Hood
“Weary of the Wood-side And chasing of the fallow deer,”
tried his fortunes at sea. They had two ballads at least that varied old themes of the _Geste_, “Robin Hood and the Bishop” and “The King’s Disguise”. And Little John was their friend,—not of course, the old Little John who praised the season in the words of a poet; but “A jolly brisk blade right fit for the trade”, more like the scapegrace in a popular “History”.
_Robin Hood’s Garland_, printed in 1749, gave a mere collection of stories for the sequence of the _Geste_, and many chap-books copied it in prose; but a rough cadence is better than none, and Robin Hood was first praised in a ballad.
The chap-books, indeed, were no more than the dead leaves of romance; it took the vivid play of a child’s fancy to revive them; but whatever the ballad-maker touched,—fairy tale or legend or history,—he made a new thing of it: a story to sing or tell, but short enough to be sung or told many times over.
CHAPTER II
FAIRY TALES AND EASTERN STORIES
Unwritten fairy tales—“Child Rowland”—Traditional matter and printed books—_The History of Thomas Hickathrift_—Giants and Dwarfs—Logic and Realism in _Tom Thumb_—Lack of Magic in English Folk-tales—Whittington and his Cat—Perrault’s _Contes_—The partnership between Youth and Age—English versions—“Court” adaptations and “moral” fairy tales—Eastern stories—The “little yellow canvas-covered book”—Nursery criticism—Aladdin and Sinbad—The “Oriental Moralist”—Traditional tales moralised: _Tom Thumb_ and _Robin Goodfellow_—_The Two Children in the Wood_—_The Enchanted Castle_.
Fairies were not altogether unknown in the Age of Reason, though the Royal Society kept no record of their delicate transactions. The little Betty of Steele’s paper, who terrified the maids with her accounts of “Fairies and Sprights”, must have learned them, as children do, from the “Grasshoppers’ Library”; for the pedlar had no such tales in print.
They were sometimes told as a mixture of ballad and fairy tale—a story with snatches of ballad rhyme. Children guarded them jealously, passing them on word for word, with none of the slips that a printer would have made.
Such a tale was “Child Rowland”, first set down by Jamieson in 1814,[18] as an old country tailor told it to him when he was seven or eight years old. But that old tailor had heard it in his own childhood, and so, doubtless had his great-grandfathers in theirs; for this tale of the three brothers seeking their lost sister, of her being stolen by the King of Elfland and kept under a spell, is the same that Shakespeare quoted in _King Lear_:
“Child Rowland to the dark tower came, His word was still ‘Fie, foh and fum, I smell the blood of a British man’.”
A child would remember the giant-formula, though he forgot every word of that “easy pleasant Book, suited to his Capacity” which Mr. Locke prescribed for him; he would remember the whole exquisite story: how the youngest brother found his sister, and what passed between them (most of it in rhyme) and how he fought with the Elf-King and broke the spell.
If Child Rowland had been the only story of its kind, Mr. Locke had yet to reckon with the fancies that a child might weave for himself out of common experience: the moving tree that casts the shadow of a pursuing giant, the wind that wears an invisible cloak, the enchanter sun who can pave any road with gold. These baffled all his efforts to drive fairies out of the nursery.
But printed tales, before Perrault, were few enough: in prose, the giant killers, “Hickathrift” and “Jack”; in rhyme, “Catskin” and “Tom Thumb” and “Whittington”. Like printed ballads, they favoured themes of action and reality. Catskin, the English Cinderella, did without a fairy godmother; Tom Thumb, although he tilted with the knights of the Round Table, never saw Fairyland till he died, and Whittington’s cat was a mere mouser, a poor relation of Puss in Boots.
The truth is that a child never asks himself whether a tale belongs to the dream world or to the world of reality, because either will serve his turn, and either may be true. Any setting convinces him if the adventure hold; and a tale that lost its imaginative colouring in the chap-books might regain it in a winter night.
Between 1690 and 1790, there is little change in “The Pleasant History of Thomas Hickathrift”,[19] and not a trace in print of the “astonishing image” that Coleridge remembered: the “whole rookery that flew out of the giant’s beard, scared by the tremendous voice with which this monster answered the challenge of the heroic Tom Hickathrift”.[20] The nearest thing to it (in a chap-book of 1780) is the likening of the giant’s head, when it was off, to “the root of a mighty Oak.” But this image of the monstrous beard, a piece of pure myth, if it were not the addition of some imaginative teller, came down from a time when childlike men invented it to explain the giant shapes of trees. A child, recognizing the analogy, feels the same shock of surprise and pleasure as his forest-dwelling ancestors, and finds in this play of likeness and contrast, the source and sustaining interest of all giant tales. For there never was a giant without dwarfs to measure him, nor a dwarf that had not his giant; nor indeed is Jack’s fight with Blunderbore a more engrossing spectacle than Tom Thumb dancing a Galliard on the Queen’s left hand.[21]
Yet there is little of the fairy about Tom Thumb. He is a real child, mischievous, even thievish,—taking advantage of his size to creep into other boys’ cherry-bags and steal. His one poor trick of magic is to hang pots upon a sunbeam, his one adventure into romance, a mock-heroic episode at King Arthur’s court.
When Dr. Johnson “withdrew his attention” from the great man who bored him and “thought about Tom Thumb”, the escape was not from dull facts into a world of dreams, but from the pedantry of words into a simple realism.
Given a little creature in a land of giants, Tom’s experiences are strictly logical. He stands on the edge of a bowl in which his mother is mixing batter, and falls in. When his mother goes milking, she ties him to a thistle, and he is swallowed by a cow. A raven that spies him walking in a furrow carries him off “even like a grain of corn”.
As for his life at Court, there is example for it, “Tom being a dwarf”; nor was he the first mischief-maker to find his way there, nor the first poor man’s son that overcame his betters. But his method of attack was new; no champion in the annals of romance had beaten Sir Launcelot, Sir Tristram and Sir Guy with no other weapon than a laugh.
At Court, Tom bears himself as to the manner born; wears the King’s signet for a girdle, creeps nimbly into the royal button-hole, and finds a place, sooner than most courtiers, “near his Highness heart”. At home, he is still the gentle scapegrace beloved of village folk. If he craves a boon of the King, it is to relieve the wants of his parents: and the boon,
“as much of silver coin As well his arms could hold”,
amounts to the great sum of _threepence_,
“A heavy burden which did make His weary limbs to crack.”
There is a kind of natural magic in all this that a child can grasp without the help of a magician. Tom Thumb although he is wingless, can wear a fairy dress: an oak-leaf hat, a spider-woven shirt, hose and doublet of thistle-down and
“shoes made of a mouse’s skin And tann’d most curiously”.
Small creatures that creep among grass-blades seem to have furnished the rhymer with analogies. Tom’s house is but half a mile from the court, yet he takes two days and nights to make the journey; he sleeps in a walnut-shell, and his parents feast him three days upon a hazel-nut,
“that was sufficient for a month For this great man to eat”.
“A few moist April drops” are enough to delay his return, till his “careful father” takes a “birding trunk” and with a single blast, blows him back to court.
Last comes the notable account of his death, which tells how the doctors examined him through “a fine perspective glass” and found—
“His face no bigger than _an ant’s_, Which hardly could be seen”.
The rhyme is a dwarf epic, perhaps begun by some child that had found an ant-hill, or a thistle taller than himself; carried on, with a phrase here and a picture there from older tales, by the “careful father”, who set it to the unequal beat of little feet at his side.
But no child could endure the unhappy end. A second part and a third (both sorry imitations of the first) brought the “little knight” back to fresh adventures; and even the printers of instructive books understood the value of his name on a title-page.
Catskin,[22] long forgotten through the more glorious transformations of her French sister, could hold Dr. Primrose’s children with the old theme of disguise and changing fortune. Five parts in verse gave her whole history: how she was banished, like Cordelia, by an angry father; how she disguised herself in a hood of Catskin, and took service in a great house; how (following here the very print of the Glass Slipper) she went to the ball and danced with a Knight; and how, one day when she forgot her Catskin hood, the Knight, discovering her “in rich attire”, fell in love with her and married her.
English folk-tales, compared with others more magical, are like the toys that a child will make for himself out of a stick, beside the fine inventions of a conjurer; they appeal chiefly to practical interests, and leave much to the imagination. Jack killed Cormoran and Blunderbore and the giant with two heads before anybody thought of giving him a cap of knowledge, or shoes of swiftness, or even a magic sword. These things were the addition of a Second Part.
Indeed, a tale never was so plain that it gathered no colour in the telling. There was an old story of Whittington without a Cat,[23] and how the cat got into the story was more than the whole Society of Antiquaries could tell, though it met together in 1771 expressly to discuss the problem. In our own time, most antiquaries are agreed that the Cat found its way from Genoa or Persia or Portugal,—no matter whence,—and that it is a piece of folk-lore grafted upon authentic biography. Try as they will, they can get little nearer to the heart of the matter than Mr. Pepys, when he watched the puppet-show of Whittington at Southwark Fair, “which was pretty to see”, and remarked “how that idle thing do work upon people that see it, and even myself too”.
The very truth underlying the modest fable of the Cat and the song of Bow Bells, had more power than the Wishing Hat of Fortunatus, and would have carried more fanciful embellishments; but it is never safe to lose sight of the double paradox of childish imagination—that reality is romance, romance, reality. If “_Cendrillon_” had never been done into English, Catskin or Cap o’ Rushes might have worn the Glass Slipper and ridden in a Pumpkin Coach. As it fell out, the little kitchen-maid surpassed them both,—the girl whose ragged dress was transformed at a touch into “_drap d’or et d’argent, tout charmarez de pierreries_.”
Cinderella’s biographer was no less a person than Charles Perrault, a member of the French Academy, and a friend of La Fontaine. He also wrote the famous “histories” of little Red Riding Hood and the Sleeping Beauty, of Hop o’ my Thumb (a distant kinsman of Tom Thumb), Puss in Boots, and others who have lived so long in English nurseries that their French names are forgotten.
In his youth, Perrault had rebelled against the formal education of his day, and when he was little short of seventy, he turned from his serious works and produced a children’s book by which he is still remembered.
Fairy tales, indeed, were already popular in France, but they had become a part of that fantastic world into which the Court of Louis XIV had been transformed: a world of courtly shepherds and shepherdesses, who told “_Contes des fées_” (“_mitonner_”, Madame de Sévigné says they called it) to prove that they had gone back to the Golden Age.
His knowledge of children alone might have carried him through, but his choice of a collaborator was an act of genius. When in 1697, the _Contes_ were collected and published,[24] it was not to M. Perrault of the Academy that the “_privelège du roy_” was granted, but to his ten-years-old son, Perrault Darmancour. The device of anonymity was common among the early writers of children’s books, and some critics have suggested that it was beneath the dignity of an Academician to acknowledge the authorship of fairy-tales; but Mlle. L’Héritier, Perrault’s niece, who contributed one tale to the book, declared, before it was published, that little Darmancour could write fairy-tales “with much charm”; and Mr. Andrew Lang, following M. Lacroix, believed that the boy had a real share in the book. He detected the actual note of a child’s voice in the dialogue:
It is the language of fairy-tales; and that, of course, is child’s talk. But the father’s part is clear in the artistic handling of the tales, in the addition of “_Moralités_” after the manner of Æsop, and in asides of laughter or comment intended for grown-up ears,—a sly dig at the lawyers in “_Le Maître Chat_”, or at women, through the Ogre’s wife in “_Le Petit Poucet_”.
Some such partnership between youth and age there must be in all real children’s books; whether it be arranged between them is another matter. The wise writer will always take hints from the child, will remember the way he turns his phrases, the tones of his voice, the things that interest him; but if he remember his own childhood, it may serve as well.
These stories are all memories of childhood. As their more intimate title, “_Contes de ma Mère Loye_”, suggests, they were handed down for centuries, gathering new features by the way, till this boy of Perrault’s had them from his nurse. But no child could have written them as Perrault wrote. “Cinderella”—the “story of stories”: the boy could repeat it word for word; but if he had tried to set it down, he would have lost the thread at the point of transformation. Those dramatic strokes of the clock would have been forgotten in the music of the ball. This balance, this art of simplicity is the work of a man,—an academician, the writer who, in a French “Battle of the Books”, took up the cause of the Moderns against the Classics, and yet lived in the kindly reasonable humour that belongs to the Augustan Age.
Perrault’s _Contes_ are essentially romantic; the Sleeping Beauty gives place only to Persephone,—she and her sleeping household, shut in by the great hedge of thorns; but every tale has quaint human touches which puts it precisely at the right angle to life: the little girl, her basket of goodies, and the sick grandmother, all things of experience; and then, with a quick turn of the “World Upside Down”—_the Grandmother that was really a Wolf_ in bed. A nurse might have told it well enough; but the artist knew the true colours, the just economy of lines, and the point where one could turn from the pictures and listen for talk.
Perrault must have followed every footstep in the tales with the eager sympathy of the boy at his side. Together they hid with Little Thumb under his father’s stool, and heard the poor parents’ desperate shift to be rid of their children. They were with the tiny hero when he filled his pockets full of small white pebbles, and made the trail by which he and his six brothers found their way home; and they joined in the hopeless search of the second adventure, when Little Thumb dropped crumbs instead of pebbles, and the birds ate them. That brings the story to the very heart of interest: when the hungry boys, lost in the forest at nightfall, fancied they heard on every side of them the howling of wolves coming to eat them up. For then Little Thumb, the youngest and smallest and cleverest of them all “climbed up to the top of a tree, to see if he could discover anything; and having turned his head about on every side, he saw at last a glimmering light, like that of a candle, but a long way from the forest.” This is matter of romance, though there is nothing in it beyond Nature. But—that “glimmering light” threw its beams from _an Ogre’s window_, and there was yet to come the Adventure of the Seven League Boots: those boots that would fit a foot of any size, from the Ogre’s to Little Thumb’s; in which either Perrault _père_ or Perrault _fils_ could go seven leagues at a step.
No copy remains of the first translation of Perrault’s tales by Samber (1729),[25] nor of John Newbery’s edition; but a seventh edition appeared in 1777, under the title of “Mother Goose’s Tales”, and an eighth in 1780. At the close of the century, Harris printed another, “Englished by G. M. Gent”, of which copies are still found. The book fits a very small hand, and though every trace of gold be rubbed off the covers, the Dutch paper pattern can still be seen through diamond patches of colour. The frontispiece shows an old woman with her distaff, seated by the fire, telling stories to a group of children; and there are quaint woodcuts in the text.
The welcome given in court circles to fairy-tales marked the beginning, or rather, a special phase of romantic interest; but this had little to do with children. Such tales, originally simple, caught the elaborate grace of their new setting, and borrowing variations from the newly-translated eastern stories, ran into an endless series in the _Cabinet des Fées_. In English they were represented chiefly by the _Contes_ of Madame la Comtesse D’Aulnoy, which were translated before Perrault’s.[26] These were common as nursery chap-books in the second half of the century.
Nothing could be more unlike the simplicity of Perrault. Madame D’Aulnoy’s stories are rich in embroideries of the folk-tale themes. She makes something very like a novel of her “_L’Oiseau Bleu_”; but the adventures of the bird-lover are well known in such ballads as “the Earl of Mar’s Daughter”, and no artifice can hide the traces of an old “_cante-fable_”. The wicked step-mother of all fairy-tales transforms the prince into a bird; but the spy set to watch the princess at last falls asleep, and then the princess opens her little window and sings:
“_Oiseau bleu, couleur de temps,_ _Vole à moi, promptement_”.
“These,” explains Madame la Comtesse, “are her own words, which it has been thought best to keep unchanged”. Elsewhere she is less concerned for her originals. Her “_Finette Cendron_” (the English “Finetta”) is an odd mixture of Perrault’s “Cinderella” and “Little Thumb”, in which both stories are spoilt.
Gold and silver are the meanest ornaments in these fairy novels; they have much of the glitter of a transformation scene. When the colours fade, there is only a confused memory of the setting; but fairies and talking animals remain. Children are not likely to forget “The White Cat”, “The Hind in the Wood”, or that lurker in dark corners of the nursery, “The Yellow Dwarf”.
As the century advanced, grown-up persons from time to time ventured into the unknown regions of romance; and it is odd to find that the more thrilling their discoveries in poetry and fiction, the more determined they were to hide them from children, or to cloak them with moral applications.
The rhymed “_Moralités_” which Perrault added to his tales were a tactful concession to public opinion. No moralist ever succeeded in reforming Puss in Boots, though one, early in the nineteenth century, claimed him as the ancestor of a _Moral Cat_. It is clear, however, that Perrault, left to himself, would have trusted his readers to find their own morals; for in the dedication to his _Contes_ he says: “they all contain a very obvious moral, and one that shows itself more or less according to the insight of the reader.”
The task of reconciling parents and children upon the vexed question of the supernatural was achieved by Madame le Prince de Beaumont, with her educational or moral fairy-tales.
Allegorical persons often appeared in the court adaptations with names and images drawn from classical authority. Mlle. L’Héritier had already foisted into the old folk-tale of “Diamonds and Toads” a fairy called “_Eloquentia Nativa_”; but Madame de Beaumont’s tales were simpler and more convincing. From the parental point of view she had undoubted advantages over her predecessors in the fairy-tale, for, in the words of an editor of the _Cabinet des Fées_, she “devoted herself entirely to the education of children”.
Born in 1711, six years after the death of Madame D’Aulnoy, she spent a great part of her life in London. Her _Magasin des Enfans_, published in 1757,[27] properly belongs to the type of moral miscellany introduced by Sarah Fielding’s Governess[28]; but the schoolroom setting could not spoil fairy-tales which, however obvious their moral purposes, had refreshing touches of humour. In her intercourse with English children, Madame de Beaumont had somehow acquired a belief in the educational value of nonsense.
Charles Lamb’s rhyme of “Prince Dorus” is simply an adaptation of Madame de Beaumont’s “_Prince Désir_”; her story of “The Three Wishes” found in so many chap-books, is a well-known “droll”, and there are playful touches in her most serious tales.
Yet a child might venture a protest on discovering that the little white rabbit in “_Prince Chéri_”, that leaps into the King’s arms as he rides hunting, is an educational fairy in disguise; and it is impossible not to sympathise with the prince who, in spite of a ring that pricks whenever he is naughty, becomes a scapegrace, and has to undergo a Circeian transformation ere he is reformed.
Like all successful _gouvernantes_, Madame de Beaumont can be severe. Her fairy in “_Fatal et Fortune_” deserves a place in Spartan folklore; this is how she answers the mother who pleads for a son doomed to misfortune:
“_Vous ne savez pas ce que vous demandez. S’il n’est pas malheureux, il sera méchant!_”
One at least of Madame de Beaumont’s tales is worthy of Perrault. “Beauty and the Beast” would decide her title to nursery fame, if she had written nothing else. In 1740, Madame de Villeneuve had spun out the same theme at extraordinary length; but the story as children know it first appeared in the _Magasin des Enfans_, and it bears all the marks of a genuine folk-tale.
It was late in the century before the Arabian tales,[29] translated from the French of M. Galland in 1708, appeared in English children’s books. In France, they received a welcome surpassing that of the fairy-tales, and produced a fantastic literature of supposed translations, in which Eastern imagery and the incidents of Western folk-lore were curiously mixed. Yet the new pattern was not altogether incongruous. Dwarfs and magicians were the stock figures of romance; the Quest of the Talking Bird, Singing Tree and Yellow Water was but a variant of the Fortune-Seeker’s adventures; the Magic Mirror a commonplace of fairy-tales; and there were old ballads, like “The Heir of Linne”, with Arabian, Persian and Turkish variants.
Eastern stories, nevertheless, had more in common with Court fairy-tales than with those of natural growth. They were woven, like oriental carpets, for Kings’ palaces, and the “Folk” elements were simply repeated as a part of the design. Children as yet knew nothing of these visions of splendour and terror, which turned the French Court from its pose of simplicity, and coloured the whole fabric of the _Cabinet des Fées_.
But the British tendency to moralise was never stronger than in the eighteenth century, and eastern fables and aphorisms were rich in illustrations of philosophy. Thus, for the greater part of the century, the English oriental tale was moralised, and if children came into any part of their legacy, it was either by courtesy of the moralist, or through illicit traffic with the pedlar.
Neither Steele nor Johnson mentions these tales among children’s books; but the “precious treasure” of Wordsworth’s childhood, a “little yellow canvas-covered book”,[30] although it was but “a slender abstract of the Arabian tales,” was within the reach of other children. Wordsworth tells how he and another boy hoarded their savings for many months to buy the “four large volumes” of “kindred matter”. Failing in resolution, they never got beyond the smaller book; yet this, if it had only the tales of the Merchant and the Ginni, the Fisherman, the Sleeper Awakened and the Magic Horse, would build them a city of dreams. Whereas it almost certainly contained the Voyages of Sinbad,[31] and the two apocryphal tales, never doubted by children, “Aladdin” and “The Forty Thieves”.
Such a book was a maker of magicians. The child that possessed it found himself richer than Ali Baba, for he knew the magic formula that would open all the treasure-caves of the East. He was the shipmate of Sinbad, that sailor of enchanted seas; the fellow of Aladdin, possessing the ring and lamp that gave him mastery over slaves “terrible in aspect, vast in stature as the giants”, who could carry him a thousand leagues while he slept, or build in a single night a palace “more splendid than imagination can conceive”.
The tastes of Wordsworth and his schoolfellows were probably more catholic than those of the little De Quinceys, who discussed in the nursery the relative merits of the _Arabian Nights_, and dared to question the judgment of Mrs. Barbauld, “the queen of all the bluestockings”, because she preferred “Aladdin” and “Sinbad” to all the rest.[32] Most children would agree with her, for even the cave where they measured gold like grain lacks the splendour of the garden in which the trees “were all covered with precious stones instead of fruit, and each tree was of a different kind, and had different jewels of all colours, green and white and yellow and red.”
The palace, though all its storeys were of jasper and alabaster and porphyry and mosaics, was not half so dazzling as this garden of jewels.
As to “Sinbad”, it may be, as De Quincey judged, “a mere succession of adventures”; to a child, it is a second Odyssey. The giant that throws masses of rock at Sinbad’s raft is a brother of the Cyclops; Proteus is one with the Old Man of the Sea. But the adventures of Odysseus are plain and straight compared with the extravagant splendours of this merchant-adventurer. He walks by a river of dreams (which is yet a real river) till he finds the tall vessel that pleases him; but once afloat with black slaves and pages and bales of merchandise, he cares less for the occupation of traffic than for “the pleasure of seeing the countries and islands of the world”.
This is the very desire of the child; nor did dream-islands ever yield romance in greater profusion. One, indeed, is no island, but a great fish, on whose back the sand has been heaped up till trees have grown upon it; no sooner is the sailors’ fire alight than the solid ground sinks under their feet. In another, Sinbad descries from the top of a tree a “white object of enormous size”, the egg of a Roc, that gigantic bird whose wings obscure the sun.
Sir John Mandeville might have set down the adventures of the rhinoceros and the elephant, the valley of diamonds or the river of jacinths and pearls; but his account could never compare with this for reality.
These voyages among the islands, from El-Basrah to Sarandib, though they are set down in the language of myth, are as easy to trace upon a map as the wanderings of Odysseus between Troy and Ithaca. Nor is the Eastern story-teller without a Homeric interest in things seen and discovered, both great and small: a thousand horsemen clad in gold and silk, or a letter sent by the King of Sarandib to Harun Er-Rashid, written “on the skin of the Khawi, which is finer than parchment”, in writing of ultramarine.
The quality of realism is indeed one of the distinguishing features of Eastern romance. Sinbad’s account of the building of his raft from the planks and ropes of the wrecked ship almost reads like an entry in Crusoe’s journal, and there is the characteristic opening which simulates a narrative of fact: “In the time of the Khalifeh, the Prince of the Faithful Harun Er-Rashid, in the city of Baghdad”. All the sounds and colours of the East are in the setting of these tales, all the details of life and traffic; and yet it is never out of keeping with the supernatural. Wizards and fairies simply move among the natural inhabitants of bazaars or palaces,—a thing in no way surprising to a child; and forms of enchantment surpassing the illusions of a dream rise up in existing cities.
In a realistic age, such a setting would atone for the elements of unreality; yet the authors of the _Tatler_ and _Spectator_ (those gentle schoolmasters of grown-up children) held it of less account than the aptness of the stories to “reflection” and philosophy. For this they could forgive “that Oriental extravagance which is mixed with it”; but the more philosophical the tale, the less it needed a real background and moving figures. Vague allusions took the place of description, and incidents were turned to illustrate particular virtues or to point the arguments of Mr. Locke. Thus treated, the stories were said to be “writ after the Eastern manner, but _somewhat more correct_.”
Johnson followed the same method, but with more profound philosophy, in the _Rambler_; and it was in this “moralised” form that Eastern tales came, straight from the pages of the _Spectator_ and the _Rambler_, into the first books which John Newbery devised “for the Amusement and Instruction” of children.
Thus the story of Alnascar, the Persian Glassman,[33] is printed in the last section (“Letters, Poems, Tales and Fables”) of _A Museum for Young Gentlemen and Ladies_: or, _a Private Tutor for little Masters and Misses_ (1763); and the _Twelfth Day Gift_ (1767) has Johnson’s tale of Obidah and the Hermit,[34] here called “The Progress of Life”.
Nor was there any attempt to choose the lighter and more entertaining stories for children. Such a tale, for example, as Will Honeycomb’s of Pug’s adventures (_Spectator_, 343), which Addison borrowed from the _Chinese Tales_, never found its way into the early children’s miscellanies, though Mrs. Barbauld, at the close of the century, produced a somewhat similar series of adventures in _Evenings at Home_.
In France, as in England, there were Eastern tales which came half way between the romance of pure adventure and the “Moral Tale”. Marmontel chose an Eastern setting for two of his stories; but English writers for children not unnaturally preferred Johnson’s “oriental” examples of conduct and duty, and were willing to sacrifice interest to moral significance.
Johnson himself would have advised them better. “Babies do not want to hear about babies,” he told Mrs. Thrale; “they like to be told of giants and castles, and of somewhat which can stretch and stimulate their little minds.”[35]
He expressly warned her against the nursery editions which contained, as a substitute for genuine romance, his own moralised “Eastern tales”. But the Great Cham’s remarks upon children’s books were not published with his works, and parents went on buying the books which he declared that children never read.
Mrs. Sheridan’s _Nourjahad_ (1767) appeared as a nursery chap-book in 1808, and Miss Edgeworth, in her tale of “Murad the Unlucky” (one of the _Popular Tales_), gives similar contrasted examples of wisdom and folly.
Minor moralists were unnumbered. Mr. Cooper, the author of _Blossoms of Morality_, having by his own account “accidentally met with a French edition of the Arabian Nights during a trip on the Continent”, and being “induced to wade through it, having no other book at hand”, was so far moved by the entertainment as to select and adapt some of the tales “for Youth”, under the title of _The Oriental Moralist_.[36]
A remark at the close of “Prince Agib and the Adamantine Mountain” gives a fair example of his treatment: “It may not be amiss to remind my youthful readers that an unwarrantable curiosity, and a degree of obstinacy too natural to young people, were the causes of the third Calender losing his eye”.
The author of _The Governess_; or, _Evening Amusements at a Boarding School_, though she allows Persian stories, admits that whenever she found “a sentiment that would answer her purpose”, she did not hesitate to “make it breathe from the lips of the Eastern Sage”.
_The Grateful Turk_, one of Thomas Day’s moral tales, appeared in the same year as Mrs. Pilkington’s _Asiatic Princess_, and Miss Porter followed with _The Two Princes of Persia_, “adapted to youth”. Alluring titles, such as “The Ruby Heart” and “The Enchanted Mirror” were another means of recommending improving histories.
Yet the oriental tale suffered less than native romance and folk-lore, by this sort of adaptation. Perhaps the Jinn, being “the slaves of him who held the lamp”, or “of him on whose hand was the ring”, were more helpless than other spirits in the power of the Moralist.
English fairies were not so submissive; indeed they played strange tricks with the little didactic works that bore their names.
Already (in 1746) Tom Thumb had turned pedagogue and published his “Travels”,[37] a barefaced introduction to Topography. _Tom Thumb’s Folio_ (1768) was followed in 1780 by _Tom Thumb’s Exhibition_, “being an account of many valuable and surprising curiosities which he had collected in the course of his travels, for the instruction and amusement of the British Youths”.
This is somewhat more entertaining than the “Travels”, having an odd humour of its own; but the Tom Thumb of the Exhibition has changed his fairy dress for a schoolmaster’s gown, and lies in wait for pupils “in a large commodious room at Mr. Lovegood’s, number 3 in Wiseman’s Buildings, at the upper end of Education Road”.
Here he examines, under the lens of an “Intellectual Perspective Glass”, the unreasonable things which please a child. For example, unripe apples or gooseberries thus scrutinized, “instantly appear to be changed into a swarm of worms and other devouring reptiles”.
From this it is tempting to infer that the same merciless glass had discovered, instead of the traditional wren or robin, that “little feathered songster called the _Advice Bird_” which a child might see at the Exhibition. Such a lens, focussed upon Whittington’s Cat, would doubtless prove it a figment, or applied to a magic sword, might instantly change it to a piece of rusty iron.
Old ballads suffered the same transforming process. Robin Goodfellow,[38] dragged from his haunts to show “a virtuous little mortal” the way to Fairyland, took on the likeness of a Philosopher, the better to fool his victims.
Fairyland, he asserts, is “neither a continent nor an island, and yet it is both or either. It exists in the air, at a distance of about five feet and a half or six feet at most from the surface of the Earth”.
The solution of this pleasing riddle is found in a diagram of the human frame, whereon the Fairyland of Philosophy is shown to exist nowhere but in a man’s head, hard by those notable tracts, the “Land of Courage” and the “Land of Dumplins”.
A knavish sprite, this, who can find matter for jests in a fairy revolution; for by his account, “the reigning Monarch Fancy, and Whim, his royal Consort” have usurped the throne of Oberon; and Imagination is their eldest son.
In such an age, the boldest outlaw would have much ado to rescue Robin Hood; and since Robin could point but a one-sided moral, the writer of little books forgot his virtues and published his “Life” as a “Warning-piece”. He, forsooth, “did not know how to work”, had “neglected to learn a trade”, and being justly outlawed, skulked with his “gang” in Sherwood Forest, living “_what they called_ a merry life”.
_The Two Children in the Wood_ afforded ampler scope for moral contrasts. Addison’s praise had included even the pretty fiction of the robins, on the authority of Horace and his doves; but the makers of toy-books were not satisfied with this. They expunged the robins and prepared two prose versions of the ballad, one expanding the story into a novel of domestic life, and the other marring it with a happy ending.[39]
The novel, an amusing medley, deals in an underplot with the adventures of the wicked Uncle at sea, laying bare a past about which the ballad was silent; the rest is concerned with the home life of the two children, and contains a chapter of stories told for their benefit. At the end (by way of reparation, perhaps) the ballad itself is printed. The novelist carries enough moral ballast to float it all, and anticipates its effect in rhyme:
“The tender Tale must surely please. If told with sympathetic ease; Read, then, the Children in the Wood, And you’ll be virtuous and good.”
But of all these “restorations”, none was a greater outrage than the attempt of a nursery moralist to rebuild the Enchanted Castle of Romance.
“The History of the Enchanted Castle; or, The Prettiest Book for Children” appeared in Francis Newbery’s list in 1777, and was reprinted for Harris early in the nineteenth century. On the title page it is further described as “the Enchanted Castle, situated in one of the Fortunate Isles and governed by the _Giant Instruction_. Written for the Entertainment of little Masters and Misses by Don Stephano Bunyano, Under-Secretary to the aforesaid Giant”.
The wheel has come full circle: folk-tales, ballads, romances, not one of the forms of popular literature has escaped. Here at last is the giant himself surrendering his stronghold to the moralist, delivering up captives and stolen, treasure, engaging Secretaries, and parcelling out the Enchanted Castle into a Picture Gallery, Museum and Library.
The parallel between the Giant Instruction and Giant Despair is sufficiently obvious; but the giant’s under-secretary, with official sagacity, turns it to account. He boldly proclaims himself “a distant relation of the famous John Bunyan, the pious and admired author of the _Pilgrim’s Progress_”, and proceeds to explain the symbolic pictures and curiosities in the Castle, after the manner of Mr. Interpreter.
Yet there is one rare thing among the oddities of this little book; a statement of aim which involves direct criticism of existing children’s books. This betrays the Giant’s intention to make children “as capable of thinking and understanding what is what (according to their years) as their Papas and Mammas, or as the greatest Philosophers and Divines in the whole Country”.
To this end it is forbidden to present even “very little Masters and Misses” with “idle nonsensical stories” and “silly unmeaning rhymes”.
It is little wonder that Wordsworth, remembering
“A race of real children; not too wise, Too learned, or too good....”,
denounced moralist and pedagogue, and cried in vain for the old nursery tales:
“Oh! give us once again the wishing-cap Of Fortunatus, and the invisible coat Of Jack the Giant-killer, Robin Hood And Sabra in the forest with St. George!”
CHAPTER III
THE LILLIPUTIAN LIBRARY
Locke and the baby Spectator—Gulliver in the nursery—The children’s bookseller—_A Little Pretty Pocket Book_, _The Circle of the Sciences_ and _The Philosophy of Tops and Balls_—Mr. Newbery’s shop in St. Paul’s Churchyard—_The Lilliputian Magazine_—“The History of Mr. Thomas Trip”—Nursery “Richardsons”—_Mother Goose’s Melody_—“A very great Writer of very little Books”—_The History of Goody Two-Shoes_ as an epitome of the Lilliputian Library—The question of Goldsmith’s authorship—Late “Lilliputians”—The Wyse Chylde in many rôles—_Juvenile Trials_—_The Juvenile Biographer_—Lilliputian Letters—A hint of revolution—The new _Tatler_ and _Spectator_—A farthing sugar-paper series—Lilliputian books in the provinces.
For every parent that read Locke’s _Thoughts_, a hundred took his ideas at second hand from _The Spectator_. Many, indeed, seem to have confused his notion of childhood with the description of the baby Addison, who threw away his rattle before he was two months old, and would not make use of his coral until they had taken away the bells from it.
It was no new thing to regard a child as a small man or woman. Since Shakespeare’s time, children had followed the fashions of their elders. But the tastes of grown-up Elizabethans were not so different from those of children. Never, until the eighteenth century, had a child been taught to think and act like a man of middle age. The little Georgian walked gravely where his for-bears danced, and was expected to read dwarf essays, extracts from Addison and Pope, and little novels after Richardson.
Swift’s engrossing pictures of Lilliput had no sooner captured the nursery than grown-up persons began to fancy themselves in the part of Gulliver stooping to instruct a little nation; and the logical outcome of this was a “Lilliputian Library”.
The ingenious artist of an older generation, who could put “all th’ Iliads in a Nut” must have passed on his secret to the makers of toy-books; and of these the first and greatest was John Newbery, a descendant of the very Newbery who, in the sixteenth century, had published the rhyme of the “great Marchaunt Man”.
There is no better portrait of John Newbery than the one drawn by Goldsmith in _The Vicar of Wakefield_. That “good-natured man” with his “red pimpled face” who befriended Dr. Primrose when he lay sick at a roadside inn, was “no other than the philanthropic bookseller of St. Paul’s Churchyard, who has written so many little books for children”.
Goldsmith was writing for Newbery between 1762 and 1767, and on more than one occasion he, like his Vicar, “borrowed a few pieces” from the kindly publisher. He could not have chosen a more graceful way of thanking him, nor one more likely to give him pleasure, than by thus imitating Mr. Newbery’s own method of internal advertisement, associating him with those “little books for children”, and adding that “he called himself their friend, but he was the friend of all mankind”.
The rest of the passage recalls Dr. Johnson’s caricature of Newbery as “Jack Whirler,” in _The Idler_:
“Overwhelmed as he is with business, his chief desire is to have still more. Every new proposal takes possession of his thoughts; he soon balances probabilities, engages in the project, brings it almost to completion and then forsakes it for another.”
But Goldsmith again lays stress on his pet project:
“He was no sooner alighted but he was in haste to be gone; for he was ever on business of the utmost importance, and was at that time actually compiling materials for the history of one Mr. Thomas Trip.”
An account of John Newbery’s career would itself furnish matter for a children’s book. He was a very Whittington of booksellers—a farmer’s son who made his way in the world “by his talents and industry and a great love of books”. Every day of his life was an adventure, and he never lost his Pepysian interest in men and things. Goldsmith’s story of the inn (or its counterpart) might almost have come out of the pocket-book in which Mr. Newbery kept a record of his journey through England in 1740, with notes of his various “projects” and purchases.[40]
It was at Reading, where he had begun his trade of printer and publisher, that he produced his first children’s book: _Spiritual Songs for Children_, by one of the many imitators of Dr. Watts;[41] but the genuine “Newberys” appeared after he settled in London, first at the Bible and Crown, without Temple Bar, and afterwards at the famous little shop in St. Paul’s Churchyard.
He began with miscellanies—quaint imitations of the periodicals, announced by whimsical “advertisements”, and professing the aims and methods of John Locke: _A Little Pretty Pocket Book_ (1744),[42] and _The Lilliputian Magazine_, advertised in the _General Evening Post_, March 4, 1751.
Two quotations in the _Pocket Book_ suggest a connection between two prevailing interests of the day, Education and Landscape-gardening. The first is from Dryden:
“Children, like tender Osiers, take the Bow And as they first are fashioned always grow”;
the second from Pope:
“Just as the Twig is bent the Tree’s inclined, ’Tis Education forms the vulgar Mind”.
But the prefatory letter addressed “To all Parents, Guardians, Governesses, etc.”, illustrates the difference between the “fashioning” of trees and children. It is all pure Locke:
“Would you have a virtuous Son, instil into him the Principles of Morality early.... Would you have a wise Son, teach him to reason early. Let him read and make him understand what he reads. No Sentence should be passed over without a strict Examination of the Truth of it.... Subdue your children’s Passions, curb their Temper and make them subservient to the Rules of Reason; and this is not to be done by Chiding, Whipping or severe Treatment, but by Reasoning and mild Discipline.”
So much for the Parents who bought the _Pretty Pocket Book_. The rest is a judicious mixture of Amusement and Instruction for its readers. There are alphabets big and little, “select Proverbs for the use of children”, _Moralités_ in plenty; but by the precise authority of Mr. Locke, there are also pictures of sorts, songs and games and rhymed fables. There is even a germ of the “Moral Tale” in accounts of good children, set down somewhat in the manner of seventeenth century “Characters”.
Between this and _The Lilliputian Magazine_ came an instructive “Snuff-box” series: The _Circle of the Sciences_,[43] described in the Advertisement as “a compendious library, whereby each Branch of Polite Learning is rendered extremely easy and instructive”. But the Newbery Pedant is never quite serious. When, later, he sets himself to adapt the Newtonian System “to the Capacities of young Gentlemen and Ladies”, he does it in a _Philosophy_ of _Tops and Balls_,[44] and seems immensely diverted by this notion of making the Giant Instruction stoop to play.
In 1745 John Newbery left the Bible and Crown, and set up at the Bible and Sun, near the Chapter House in St. Paul’s Churchyard. By this time he had become “a merchant in medicines as well as books” and had acquired a partnership in the sale of the famous fever powders of his friend Dr. James, which he advertised with other remedies in his nursery books, often working them into the story.
Like all really busy people, he could always find time for a new enterprise; but the “little books” were no mere relaxation from serious work. His son says that at this time he was “in the full employment of his talents in writing and publishing books of amusement and instruction for children”, and adds that “the call for them was immense, an edition of many thousands being sometimes exhausted during the Christmas holidays”.[45]
This, in fact, was a favourite “project” of Mr. Newbery’s, never forsaken for another, but continued up to the time of his death.
One can imagine him, delighted as Mr. Pepys with his puppet show,—inspecting the woodcuts, examining different patterns of Dutch flowered paper for the binding, deciding the exact size (4 inches by 23⁄4) for the biography of Mr. Trip; or watching the young apprentices (these paper covers were painted by children) each filling a row of diamond spaces with his appointed colour.
His next venture was _The Lilliputian Magazine_[46] announced as “an attempt to amend the World, to render the Society of Man more amiable, and to re-establish the Simplicity, Virtue and Wisdom of the Golden Age”.
Details of the proposed method are set forth in the following “Dialogue” between a gentleman and the Author:
_Gentleman_: I have seen, Sir, an Advertisement in the Papers of the Lilliputian Magazine to be published at Three Pence a Month: pray, what is the Design of it?
_Author_:    Why, Sir, it is intended for the Use of Children, as you may perceive by the Advertisement, and my Design is, by Way of _History_ and _Fable_, to sow in their Minds the Seeds of Polite Literature and to teach them the great Grammer (_sic_) of the Universe: I mean the Knowledge of Men and Things.
The framework of the book suggests a combination (in miniature) of the Royal Society and the Spectator Club; for the various Pieces are submitted to a Society of young Gentlemen and Ladies (including a young Prince and several of the young Nobility) presided over by little Master Meanwell (who by reading a great many Books and observing everything his Tutor said to him, acquired a great deal of Wisdom).
The “Histories” and “Fables” that follow are not mixed from Mr. Locke’s prescription. They are amusing parodies of Mr. Newbery’s (or his contributor’s) reading from the _Spectator_ and _Gulliver_ and Richardson’s novels. Not even Gulliver escapes the moralising tendency, and Lilliput (here translated to the “Island of Angelica”) is a new Utopia, where no man is allowed more money than he needs. The inhabitants are so little removed from common experience that they appear to be “no more than a gigantic Sort of Lilliputian, about the size of the Fairies in Mr. Garrick’s Queen Mab”.[47]
Locke would have scorned the fanciful descriptions of this _Voyage Imaginaire_; nor would “A History of the Rise and Progress of Learning in Lilliput” (which precedes it) have pleased him better; he never could have understood the sly humour of its author.
Indeed, but for the date, there might be some truth in the suggestion that Goldsmith edited _The Lilliputian Magazine_. For among its contributions was that notable “History of Mr. Thomas Trip” in which his philanthropic bookseller was engaged; and in the “History”, a rhyme of “Three Children Sliding on the Ice”[48] that Goldsmith might well have invented to temper the virtues of Mr. Trip; for indeed, this hero, though he scarcely overtops Tom Thumb, is the Wyse Chylde in little: “whenever you see him, you will always find a book in his hand”.
But Goldsmith was not yet in London when _The Lilliputian Magazine_ appeared; the rhyme of “Three Children” is now said to be John Gay’s; and it was Goldsmith himself who named John Newbery as Tommy Trip’s biographer.
The other contributions are mere attempts to fit children of middle age with little novels of morality and sentiment,—surely not the least flattering imitations of Richardson.[49]
First comes the “History of Florella, sent by an unknown Hand (and may, for aught we know, have been published before)”, and after an interval for further reference and collation, “The History of Miss Sally Silence, communicated by Lady Betty Lively”. But neither the story nor the sentiment rings true. As yet, the Lilliputian novel has no life: and all that there is to be said of Miss Sally is condensed in her epitaph:
“Here lie the Remains of the Duchess of Downright: Who, when a Maid, was no other than Sarah Jones A poor Farmer’s Daughter. From her Attachment to Goodness she became great. Her Virtue raised her from a mean State To a high Degree of Honour and Her Innocence procured her Peace in her last Moments. She smiled even in Agony And embraced Death as a friendly Pilot Who was to steer her To a more exalted State of Bliss.”
Here the author, as if doubting his effect, adds a direct appeal:
“Little Reader, Whoever thou art, observe these her Rules And become thyself A Copy of this bright Example.”
It was somewhere between 1760 and 1765, when a latent spirit of romance was beginning to move the grown-up world, that the children’s bookseller turned his attention to Nursery Rhymes.
Some of these were already in print. _Tommy Thumb’s Pretty Song Book_[50] had appeared in 1744: two tiny volumes in Dutch flowered boards, of which the second only has survived. This was a great advance on the song-books commonly given to children as soon as they could read; but there is something more than the usual nonsense and rhythm in the Newbery rhymes. The very title: _Mother Goose’s Melody_,[51] brings them into touch with the first book of fairy-tales; and indeed those two voices (the child’s and the man’s) can be heard here as in Perrault—a merry new partnership of song and laughter—, the one piping high in lively see-saw, the other declaiming a mock-learned “Preface”, fitting each rhyme with an ironic “Note” or “Maxim”, burlesquing the commentators and setting the wit of nursery sages against the wisdom of the pedants.
The editor of _Mother Goose’s Melody_, although the Preface declares him “_a very great Writer_ of very little Books”, has none of that contempt for “Nonsense” which philosophers are apt to show. He traces “the Custom of making Nonsense Verses in our Schools” to “the Old British Nurses, the first Preceptors of Youth”, and speaks of them with evident respect. Yet he shows no bias towards the more imaginative absurdities. It is the use of a rhyme for ironic comment, or its lyric quality that directs his choice.
The song about Betty Winckle’s Pig that lived in clover (“but now he’s dead and that’s all over”) is annotated thus: “A Dirge is a Song for the Dead; but whether this was made for Betty Winckle or her Pig is uncertain—no Notice being taken of it by Cambden or any of the famous Antiquarians”.
This is “Amphion’s Song of Eurydice”:
“I won’t be my Father’s Jack I won’t be my Mother’s Jill I will be the Fiddler’s Wife And have Musick when I will. T’other little Tune T’other little Tune Prithee, Love, play me. T’other little Tune.”
And this the comment (in small type, for Parents): “Those Arts are the most valuable which are of the greatest Use”.
Such gentle irony would be lost upon the serious student of Lilliputian Ethics. Grown-up wiseacres and little philosophers must have puzzled their heads in vain over some of these “Maxims” and exclaimed at the effrontery of a Writer, however “great”, who, after suggesting that an unmeaning rhyme “might serve as a Chapter of Consequence in the New Book of Logick”, could add (in a note upon “Margery Daw”): “It is a mean and scandalous Practice among Authors to put Notes to Things that deserve no Notice. (Grotius)”.
There is no direct evidence of Goldsmith’s hand in this; but he was well acquainted with nonsense-songs, and Miss Hawkins, writing of her childhood in a letter, connects him with a nursery-rhyme: “I little thought”, she says, “what I should have to boast when Goldsmith taught me to play Jack and Gill by two bits of paper on his fingers.”
If this “very great Writer of very little Books” was not Goldsmith, it is an extraordinary coincidence that the rhyme in the Preface should be the same that he sang to his friends on the first night of _The Good Natur’d Man_, and “never consented to sing but on special Occasions”—which runs thus:
“There was an old Woman tossed in a Blanket, Seventeen times as high as the moon, But where she was going no mortal could tell. For under her arm she carried a Broom, Old Woman, old Woman, old Woman, said I, Whither, ah whither, ah whither so high? To sweep the Cobwebs from the Sky, And I’ll be with you by and by.”
There is only one Lilliputian book that has been attributed to Goldsmith with the consent of his biographer, and that is Mr. Newbery’s masterpiece, the quaint and original _History of Goody Two-Shoes_.[52]
Here is the characteristic notice that appeared in _The London Chronicle_ (December 19-January 1, 1765):
“The Philosophers, Politicians, Necromancers, and the Learned in every Faculty are desired to observe that on the 1st of January, being New Year’s Day (Oh, that we may all lead new lives!), Mr. Newbery intends to publish the following important Volumes, bound and gilt, and hereby invites all his little Friends who are good to call for them at the Bible and Sun, in St. Paul’s Churchyard: but those who are naughty are to have none”.
Here follows a list of the “important Volumes”: “The Renowned History of Giles Gingerbread: a little Boy who lived upon Learning;” Easter, Whitsuntide and Valentine “Gifts”; “The Fairing”; and after these an announcement of greater interest, that “there is in the Press and speedily will be published, either by Subscription or otherwise, as the Public shall please to determine, The History of Little Goody Two-shoes, otherwise called Margery Two-Shoes”.
The “Gifts” are so many variants of the Lilliputian Miscellany,[53] and as to _Giles Gingerbread_, there is nothing about him to attract a child, unless his name should conjure up a flavour of those gingerbread books sold at Fairs, which could be eaten when the reading grew tedious. The story (made to fit a penny chap-book) tells, without digression, how young Gingerbread learnt to read, that he might have a fine coach and emulate the success of one Sir Toby Wilson, who also was a poor man’s son.
But _Goody Two-shoes_, though it offers a similar prize for self-help, teaches no such politic morality. Indeed, it shows what can be done with the babies’ novel, by a writer who understands children and has a winning gift of humour; but for all that, it presents in epitome the whole Lilliputian Library.
The title-page at once proclaims its likeness to those records of triumphant virtue, the nursery “Richardsons”; the “Introduction” is a miniature essay on land-reform. Mr. Welsh, who reprinted _Goody Two-Shoes_ in 1882, found an exact picture of the Deserted Village in the Parish of Mouldwell, where little Margery’s father suffers the “wicked Persecutions” of Sir Timothy Gripe and “an overgrown Farmer called Graspall”.
A passage at the close of the “Introduction” certainly lends some colour to the idea that it was a half-playful study of Goldsmith’s, for his serious argument:
“But what, says the Reader, can occasion all this? Do you intend this for children, Mr. Newbery? Why, do you suppose this is written by Mr. Newbery, Sir? This may come from another Hand. This is not the Book, Sir, mentioned in the Title, but the Introduction to that Book; and it is intended, Sir, not for those Sort of Children, but for Children of six Feet high, of which ... there are many Millions in the Kingdom”.
The change, after all, is merely from Lilliput to Brobdignag,—a voyage that represents no more difficulty to the editor than to Gulliver himself.
It is in Lilliputian pedagogy that the writer of _Goody Two-Shoes_ has so completely outdistanced his fellows.
For although none of them could produce a more whole-hearted supporter of Locke’s theories than “little Two-Shoes”, she wastes no time in abstract reasoning, but puts them at once into practice.
No sooner did she learn to read (and that was startlingly soon) than she began to teach her companions, and finding them by no means so quick nor so diligent as herself, she cut out of several pieces of wood ten “Setts” of large letters and ten of small (all printed very clear in the text); “and every Morning she used to go round to teach the Children with these Rattletraps in a Basket—_as you see in the Print_”.
The letter-games of Goody Two-Shoes were doubtless among the “twenty other Ways” hinted at by Mr. Locke when he described his own, in which “Children may be cozen’d into a Knowledge of the Letters”. There are minute directions for playing them in the chapter that tells “How little Two-Shoes became a _trotting Tutoress_”.
Nor is virtue (the philosopher’s chief concern) neglected for this matter of mere learning. There are lessons and reflections enough for the old “Schools of Virtue”; but little Margery’s true piety makes amends for her preaching and saves her from the prudential excess of the “little Boy who lived upon Learning”. When she admonished the sick gentleman for his late hours by the example of the rooks, she forced him to laugh and admit that she was “a sensible Hussey”. The Reader (more often admonished) does the same.
In this blending of morality and humour, the author is only following the practice of eighteenth century novelists. His morality (in the main, very sound and reasonable) hangs by the humour of separate incidents; yet these, together, form a sequence of moral and “cautionary” tales. There is, for example, the warning against useless display in the account of Lady Ducklington’s funeral,—“the Money they squandered away would have been better laid out in little Books for Children, or in Meat, Drink and Cloaths for the Poor”;—against superstition,—the story of the ghost in the church, or the dramatic Witch story of the Second Part; and there are parallel examples of kindness and good sense.
A small child would make his first reading by the woodcuts (which are much like a child’s drawings): here, first, are little Margery and her brother, left, like the Children in the Wood “to the Wide World”; here is Tommy Two-Shoes (at an incredibly tender age) dressed like a little sailor—“_Pray look at him_”,—and there again, wiping off Margery’s tears with the end of his jacket—“_thus_”—and bidding her cry no more, for that he will come to her again when he returns from sea. He is much blurred in this picture—perhaps with tears.
At this point the story goes back to the frontispiece: by far the best picture of Margery, in a setting of trees and fields, with a little house on one side of her and a church in the distance. She is wearing her _two shoes_ for the first time (for until a charitable good man gave her a pair, she had but one): “stroking down her ragged Apron _thus_”, and crying out: “_Two Shoes, Mame, see two Shoes_”.
Next comes that serious business of Letters and Syllables. But Somebody (with a Basket of Rattle-traps) is at the door.
“Tap, tap, tap, who’s there?” (It might have been Red Riding-Hood! “_Toc, toc! Qui est là?_”) But it is only little Goody Two-Shoes, greeting her new scholar in the same childish voice.
Thus the little one gets through the lessons and proverbs of the next few pages, and at Chapter VI, which tells “How the whole Parish was frighted”, knows the triumph and delight of reading.
“Babies do not want to hear about babies”, said Dr. Johnson; but he was never, like Goldsmith, intimate with the Nursery in all its moods, and it did not occur to him that his favourite Tom Thumb was but a child seen through the diminishing-glass of a woodcut.
This, moreover, is a story that _grows up_ in the reading. At Chapter VI, there is no more baby-talk. These are mature, even elderly villagers who are so “frighted” at the idea of a ghost in the church: the argument is between the Parson, the Clerk and the Clerk’s Wife:
“I go. Sir, says William, why the Ghost would frighten me out of my Wits.—Mrs. Dobbins too cried, and laying hold of her Husband said, he should not be eat up by the Ghost. A Ghost, you Blockheads, says Mr. Long in a Pet, did either of you ever see a Ghost, or know any Body that did? Yes, says the Clerk, my Father did once in the Shape of a Windmill, and it walked all round the Church in a white Sheet, with Jack Boots on, and had a Gun by its Side instead of a Sword. A fine Picture of a Ghost truly, says Mr. Long, give me the Key of the Church, you Monkey; for I tell you there is no such Thing now, whatever may have been formerly.—Then taking the Key, he went to the Church, all the People following him. As soon as he had opened the Door, what Sort of a Ghost do you think appeared? Why little _Two-shoes_, who being weary, had fallen asleep in one of the Pews during the Funeral Service, and was shut in all Night——”.
Such incidents would make even a grown-up reader forget the Lilliputian context.
Nor is the Second Part (as in other “Histories”) of less interest, although it presents the dutiful contriving little Two-shoes as “Principal of a Country College—for instructing little Gentlemen and Ladies in the Science of A.B.C.”. A formidable theme, if her inventive genius could not produce any number of variations upon Mr. Locke’s method of playing at schools.
A reference to the _Spectator_ at the close of Part I would make Mistress Two-Shoes a predecessor of Shenstone’s Schoolmistress; but this is clearly an anachronism. The village Dame as Shenstone studies her, still sits
“disguised in look profound And eyes her fairy-Throng, and turns her Wheel around”;
whereas Goody Two-Shoes, knowing that “Nature intended Children should be always in Action”, places her letters and alphabets all round the school, so that everyone in turn is obliged to get up to fetch a letter or to spell a word.
Her children have forgotten the hornbook, and with it, doubtless, “St. George’s high Achievements” which used to decorate the back. It was Shenstone’s Dame who kept “tway birchen Sprays” to reclaim her pupils’ wandering attention from St. George. But Mrs. Margery ruled “by Reasoning and mild Discipline”, and could dispense with these.
“Her Tenderness extended not only to all Mankind, but even to all Animals that were not noxious”. Such humanity alone (notwithstanding the reservation) sets her above the poet’s heroine, to whose credit he could only place
“One ancient Hen she took Delight to feed The plodding Pattern of this busy Dame, Which ever and anon as she had need Into her School begirt with Chickens came.”
Indeed, Mrs. Margery surpasses Æsop and Tommy Trip in her manner of pressing Beasts and Birds into the service of Education.
Locke, whose imagination had stopped short at pictures of animals, would have detected the insidious workings of romance in a school where the ushers were birds, where a dog acted as door-keeper and a pet lamb carried home the books of the good children in turn.
Yet in another place, the youthful Dame shows herself a mistress of utilitarian argument:
“Does not the Horse and the Ass carry you and your burthens? Don’t the Ox plough your Ground, the Cow give you Milk, the Sheep cloath your Back, the Dog watch your House, the Goose find you in Quills to write with, the Hen bring Eggs for your Custards and Puddings, and the Cock call you up in the Morning——? If so, how can you be so cruel to them, and abuse God Almighty’s good Creatures?”
Thus the creatures are protected chiefly for their services; Nature, as yet, is no more than a useful and necessary background. It is still Humanity that counts.
As to Romance, the writer’s attitude must be judged by default. There is but one reference to Fortunatus and Friar Bacon to indicate a preference for works of Reason and Ingenuity.
This follows one of those quaint interludes that prove the quick wit and hide the laughter of Mistress Two-Shoes. In her character of village peacemaker, she contrives a “Considering Cap”, “almost as large as a Grenadier’s, but of three equal Sides; on the first of which was written, I may be wrong; on the second, It is fifty to one but you are; and on the third, I’ll consider of it. The other Parts on the out-side, were filled with odd Characters, as unintelligible as the Writings of the old Egyptians; but within Side there was a Direction for its Use, of the utmost Consequence; for it strictly enjoined the Possessor to put on the Cap whenever he found his Passions begin to grow turbulent, and not to deliver a Word whilst it was on, but with great Coolness and Moderation.... They were bought by Husbands and Wives, who had themselves frequent Occasion for them, and sometimes lent them to their Children. They were also purchased in large Quantities by Masters and Servants; by young Folks who were intent on Matrimony, by Judges, Jurymen, and even Physicians and Divines: nay, if we may believe History, the Legislators of the Land did not disdain the Use of them; and we are told, that when any important Debate arose, _Cap was the Word_, and each House looked like a grand Synod of Egyptian Priests.”
After this, lest the old spells should work upon some unguarded child, Friar Bacon is called in, to advertise this “Charm for the Passions” in a letter of advice:
“What was Fortunatus’ Wishing Cap when compared to this?... Remember what was said by my Brazen Head, _Time is, Time was, Time is past_: now the _Time is_, therefore buy the Cap immediately, and make a proper Use of it, and be happy before the _Time is past_”.
The Learned Friar has burnt his books, and there is an end of Magic. Mrs. Margery has no dealings in a “Gothick Mythology of Elves and Fairies”; her Familiars are the tame creatures of her household, she does her conjuring by the legitimate powers of Science. And when, through her cleverness in contriving a weather-glass to save her neighbours’ hay, she is accused of witchcraft by the people of other parishes, her advocate, like a true Lilliputian, defends her with the arguments of Addison and Goldsmith.[54]
This witch-story is the climax (if such a haphazard little plot can have a climax) and it gives a masterly last touch to the heroine’s portrait.
She is standing with all her pets about her, when Gaffer Goosecap (full of the weather-glass mystery) comes to spy upon her:
“This so surprised the Man that he cried out a Witch! a Witch! upon this she laughing, answered, a Conjurer! a Conjurer! and so they parted; but it did not end thus, for a Warrant was issued out against Mrs. Margery, and she was carried to a Meeting of the Justices, whither all the Neighbours followed her”.
At the trial her triumph is complete. Even her judges join in the laughter when she produces the weather-glass and cries: “If I am a Witch, this is my Charm”.
The writer, whoever he was, had little to learn from Rousseau. Miss Edgeworth herself could not have invented a more reasonable and intelligent heroine.
It is easy to see why Charles Lamb put _Goody Two-Shoes_ among “the old classics of the Nursery”[55], and no matter for wonder that it should be set down to Goldsmith.
For apart from that hint of _The Deserted Village_ in the “Introduction”, it has living characters, natural speech and incidents of genuine comedy. The playful tenderness of the first chapters suggests Goldsmith’s treatment of children, and the whole theme is near enough to his idea of a story “like the old one of Whittington _were his Cat left out_”[56]. For if he ever had written such a story and managed to keep the cat out of it, he would certainly have repented and introduced some other animal in its place, or with native inconsistency, might have multiplied it into a menagerie such as Goody Two-Shoes kept. The idea of talking animals had once attracted him, and if he could write a good Fable, why not a “History”?
Forster records Godwin’s “strong persuasion” that Goldsmith wrote _Goody Two-Shoes_, and Godwin, himself a publisher of children’s books, may have had good reason for his belief; yet there is no certain evidence to confirm it, nor will the book, as a whole, bear all the claims of its admirers.
Nichols, in his _Literary Anecdotes_,[57] associates this and other “Lilliputian Histories” with the brothers Griffiths and Giles Jones, and family tradition credits Giles with _Goody Two-Shoes_ as well as _Giles Gingerbread_ and _Tommy Trip_; but if, as Goldsmith would have it, Mr. Newbery was the real author of _Tommy Trip_, there is no reason why he should not have had a hand in the rest. _Goody Two-Shoes_, in fact, has several turns of speech and grammatical slips which occur in John Newbery’s journal;[58] nor is it at all unlikely that Goldsmith, the friend of Giles Jones and Newbery, contributed such lively matter as the ghost and witch stories, or so quaint a fancy as the “Considering Cap”.
John Newbery’s successors[59] carried on the tradition, but at his death the great period of “Lilliputian Histories” was past. Their numbers were always increasing, but they were mostly imitations and moralised echoes of folklore like _Tom Thumb’s Exhibition_ or _The Enchanted Castle_.
Yet there are a few late “Lilliputians” that have the true Newbery touch, and even a fresh spice of satire. _The Lilliputian Masquerade_,[60] though it goes back to _Gulliver_, belongs to the age of the Pantheon and Almack’s, and its gay “Masks” (all “Lilliputians of Repute”) include two romantic surprises. For in the company of Sir William Wise and Sir Francis Featherbrain of Butterfly Hall, there is the unexpected figure of a Beggar “singing merrily”, and one undoubted harbinger of the New Age—a little hero of Blake and of Charles Lamb,—the Chimney Sweeper, new as yet to the mystery of his “cloth”.
In the meantime, a whole section of the dwarf library was devoted to the Wyse Chylde in a variety of rôles. Following that “Rise and Progress of Learning in Lilliput”, there came a formidable crowd of little Philosophers, little Statesmen, little Judges, little Divines and (to keep an accurate record of their careers) little Historians and Biographers.
“Self-Government” in the Schoolroom (by no means, as some may suppose, a present-day innovation) made its first appearance in _Juvenile Trials_,[61] the acknowledged device of a Tutor and Governess who prescribe it as a “Regimen” for their “unruly Pupils”, and thus, profiting by the wisdom of Cato, induce the authors of great evils to remove them.
This is the first hint of a Lilliputian Republic: the logical outcome of Locke’s principles in a revolutionary age. The Lilliputians give their best support to the new Government and throw themselves with zest into their parts.
Little Judge Meanwell who, though but twelve years old, has “all the Appearance of Gravity and Magistracy”, in a long robe and full-bottomed wig, anticipates parental criticism by reminding the public that “neither Vanity, nor Ambition, nor the Desire of governing Others at an Age in which he stands so much in Need of being governed himself, has raised him to this Office, which he cannot execute but with Regret”.
He adds (doubtless after consultation with his Leaders) that the Trials, as the result of their “wisest Deliberation”, are by no means to be treated as “the Sport of Boys and Girls”.
The Tutor and Governess take full advantage of the scheme, and after the royal ceremony of inauguration, leave the unruly ones to the judgment of their peers. Perhaps it is this unwonted freedom which lets loose a stream of live and humorous dialogue; for no sooner do the “Trials” begin than these Lilliputians betray the natural propensities and dramatic instincts of real children.
Mr. Newbery himself could hardly have drawn better pictures of country life, or spoken better dialect than the Farmer in one of these “trials”. In another (which suggests the ordeal of the Knave of Hearts) the evidence is not unworthy of Defoe,—the Prosecution putting in a plan of the kitchen where the stolen plum-cake was baked; and a third,—the case of Miss Stirling _versus_ Miss Delia, “for raising Strife and Contention among her Schoolfellows”—is wholly “conveyed” from Sarah Fielding’s _Governess_,[62] a source that may explain many unexpected features in the book.
But the old standards of Authority are restored in _The Juvenile Biographer_,[63] a collection of “characters” in moral contrast, with a “Bust of the little Author” as frontispiece. Some account of him at the end, had it been prefatory, would have prepared the reader for much of his philosophy. Throughout the book he speaks plain Prig,—a development that might be foreseen in one who “when he came to be breeched, laid aside all juvenile Sports”. His playfellows think him “a dull heavy little Fellow”, he is “a very poor Hand at Marbles, Trap Ball or Cricket, and little attentive to Play”; when other boys are engaged in strife, he retires into a corner with some little Book.
No doubt he is a very proper person to record those juvenile virtues and foibles that might escape a natural child,—to discern the “Thought, Prudence and admirable Needlecraft” of Miss Betsey Allgood, to speculate upon the literary ancestry of Master Francis Bacon, or to deprecate the failings of that “genteel Child,” Miss Fiddle-Faddle, who “at seven Years of Age, could spend a whole Forenoon at her Glass, and devote an Hour to pitching upon the proper Part of her Face to stick that Patch on”. This “little Author” is, in fact, a reincarnation of the Baby Spectator.
There is a year or two between these “Lives” and the first book of Lilliputian “Letters”. No children’s novel followed Richardson so closely as to adopt the letter form; but Locke had expressly advised that children should write letters “wherein they should not be put upon any Strains of Wit or Compliment, but taught to express their own plain easy Sense”, and had further recommended that when they were perfect in this, they might, “to raise their Thoughts”, have Voiture’s letters set before them as models.[64]
The Lilliputian editor, loth to await the child’s readiness for Voiture, adapted Locke in his own fashion, and devised new models for the Nursery, which should admit the usual “Characters” and “Reflections” of the miscellanies, and at the same time give a suggestion of reality to formal dialogues.
However full these letters might be of grown-up sentiment, their very directions and signatures gave proof (convincing to a child) of the editor’s good faith.
_The Letters between Master Tommy and Miss Nancy Goodwill_, published by Carnan and Newbery in 1770, was revised in 1786 with “the Parts not altogether properly adapted to the Improvement and Entertainment of little Masters and Misses expunged”.[65] What remains, however, shows no change in style or substance; the Lilliputian features are intact. As the editor observed: “The epistolatory Style here adopted is that which little Masters and Misses should use in their Correspondence with each other” (not that which they naturally would fall into) and it is designed “to regulate their Judgments, to give them an early Taste for true Politeness and inspire them with a Love of Virtue”.
The “Holiday Amusements” described in the letters seem to be “regulated” on the same plan (the editor had obviously forgotten his own); and it is something of a relief to find Master Tommy (whose relationship to the Juvenile Biographer is close) warning his sister and her schoolfellows against the cult of nursery bluestockings.[66] He hopes they are “not going to turn Philosophers”; if they are, he will put them in mind of their needles, their pins and their thread papers. “Leave these Subjects” advises this lordly midget, “to us Boys (I was going to say Men) and we may perhaps now and then condescend to give you some short Lectures upon those Matters”.
Miss Nancy, schooled in the sisterly virtues, responds with Persian stories, references to Mr. Addison, quotations from Pope, and (to clear herself of any suspicion of the bluestocking heresy) a present of worked ruffles. Upon this, he, with restored confidence, imparts an allegorical dream, an instructive story and a “Dissertation on the Value of Time” which closes on this characteristic note:
“But of all the Diversions of Life, there is none so proper to fill up its empty Spaces as the reading useful and entertaining Authors. For this Reason, my dear Nancy, you will receive by the next Coach, Mr. Newbery’s _Circle of the Sciences_, and such other of his Books as I apprehend could anyway contribute to your Instruction and Amusement.”
There is one letter, and one only, in which Master Tommy forgets his Philosophy and lets the Child in him escape:
“O, my dear Nancy, how shall I tell you that my sweet Kite which boasted of the two finest glass Eyes perhaps ever seen, which was so crowded with Stars and which cost me such immense Labour, is lost.”
The revised edition was doubtless an attempt to keep pace with the rival firm of John Marshall; for between the two issues (about 1777) they had printed a new collection under the title of _Juvenile Correspondence_,[67] which in some ways was better adapted to Locke’s original plan, as well as to the theories of Rousseau.
The very fact that these letters are “suited to Children from four to above ten Years of Age”, and that their aim is to encourage “a natural Way of Writing”, implies a change in the general view of education; yet it would be rash to assume that the writer had more than a passing acquaintance with Rousseau, or that she (this writer is almost certainly a woman) drew any clear distinction between childhood and youth. The whole design of _Juvenile Correspondence_ is Lilliputian; its aim is expressed almost in the exact phrase of the Royal Society, and its origin (apart from the Goodwill “Letters”) can be traced to a remark of Pope’s (quoted in the book) that he “should have Pleasure in reading the Thoughts of an Infant, could it commit them to Writing as they arose in its little Mind”.
Moreover the children who write the letters, instead of developing on Rousseau’s lines, become more Lilliputian with each year of growth.[68] All the natural touches are in the letters of the younger ones; from five to seven, they would pass for living children. Indeed, the first letter “from Miss Goodchild, a little more than seven Years of Age to her Brother nearly five” suggests that the next generation of Lilliputians will refuse to grow up so soon:
“Would you think it? I am sitting in a little Room full of Books, with a Desk for Reading and my Papers round me, as if I were a Woman! _But I am not so silly as to forget that I am but a little Girl_,
and, my dear Brother,
Your loving Sister, JANE GOODCHILD.”
This is the first sign of revolution. The puppets are still content to play their parts, but they refuse to believe in them. Instead, they begin to assert their own “Gothick Mythology”, and are no longer so “subservient to the Rules of Reason” as to despise the name of Fairies.
Miss Goodchild “could talk all day of the Play” (Mr. Garrick’s “Fairy Tale” from Shakespeare).[69] She actually quotes the song beginning: “Come follow, follow me, ye fairy Elves that be” from an Entertainment “full of Fairies”, and confesses that she and Jenny were ready to jump up and join in the chorus, singing:
“Hand in Hand we’ll dance around For this Place is Fairy Ground.”
But the book is full of contradictions; nothing in it bears out the promise of those early letters. Master Gentle, at the age of seven, is delivered into the hands of Mr. Birch who, as his name forebodes, believes neither in Reasoning nor mild Discipline; and at ten, Mr. Birch’s pupils become little monsters of virtue and precocity. They are Lilliputians of a larger growth, but they certainly are not boys. This book, moreover, lacks the Newbery touch of comedy. Its humour is mostly unconscious, as in the account of a father who asks permission to read his son’s letters, where the boy confides to a friend that he feels “like the Swain in Shenstone: ‘_fearful, but not averse_’”.
Among the numberless books for children printed between 1780 and 1810, there were three which, although they discarded the nursery badge of “Flowery and Gilt”, and had little in common with the Newbery miscellanies, followed Lilliputian precedent in form and title.
These were the _Juvenile Tatler_ (1783), the _Fairy Spectator_ (1789) and the _Juvenile Spectator_ (1810).[70] The first two are among the earliest books that show the influence of Marmontel and Madame de Beaumont; they therefore are no true Lilliputians: the third mimics Addison’s method with absolute fidelity, and sparkles with the satirical spirit of its original; yet this too breaks loose from Lilliputian convention; it has almost enough sanity and wit to be called a nursery Jane Austen.
These three will be seen to better advantage with others of their kind.
A strong revival of romance in children’s books would have driven out the Lilliputians at the close of the eighteenth century; but the progress of Theory prevented it, and produced, with a fresh crop of moral tales, innumerable reprints.
Canning’s amusing paper in the _Eton Microcosm_ (June 11, 1787),[71] did more than mark the vogue of those tiny “16 mo’s” at Mr. Newbery’s and “the Bouncing B, Shoe Lane”: it was also a tempting advertisement; and in the early nineteenth century small Londoners who could not rise to the splendours of “twopence Gilt” might buy their own New Year and Easter Gifts at Catnach’s or the “Toy and Marble Warehouse” in Seven Dials, for a half-penny, or even (with covers of rough blue sugar-paper) for a farthing.[72]
In 1779 Saint, the north-country Newbery, had printed a Newcastle edition of _Tommy Trip_, and between 1790 and 1812, the entire Lilliputian library was revived in the York chap-books by Wilson and Spence. Other provincial booksellers, following these, began to improve their stocks of school-books and battledores with pirated “Newberys”; and some, like Rusher of Banbury, retouched old rhymes and tales with local colour. It was Rusher who restored the tradition of _Giles Gingerbread_ with the _History of a Banbury Cake_;[73] and in the childhood of Queen Victoria, his little shop was still famous for toy-books.
CHAPTER IV
ROUSSEAU AND THE MORAL TALE
Locke and Rousseau—A New Conception of Childhood—Rousseau’s Theory of Education—Parent and Tutor, Artificial Experiences, Books, Handicrafts, Attitude to Nature and Humanity—The Infallible Parent—Marmontel’s _Contes Moraux_—Berquin’s _L’Ami des Enfans_—_The Looking Glass for the Mind_—Madame d’Epinay’s _Conversations d’Emilie_—Madame de Genlis and her Books—French Lilliputians: _Le Petit Grandison_ and _Le Petit La Bruyère_.
Rousseau, even when he repeated Locke’s precepts, caught the ear of a wider public because he appealed not so much to reason as to feeling, and instead of commending his doctrines by argument, charged them with warmth and eloquence.
Locke had been before him in exposing the shams and pedantry of schoolmasters, as in striving for a more natural method of education; but he carried out his task in a quiet professional way, regarding the child as a patient in need of a new regimen, but never setting him on a pedestal.
It was Rousseau’s inspiration to take the beauty and promise of childhood for his text, to make the child stand forth as the hope of the race, the centre of all its aspirations, the proof of its powers.[74] Thus his philosophy acquired the dignity of a new faith; and yet the child lost nothing of his personal and human interest, for in Rousseau’s scheme, he was the very core of a new conception of family life. There could be no better setting for a natural education than the family, no simpler unit of fellowship; and Rousseau drew persuasive pictures of the child at successive stages of his growth,—pictures which writers of moral tales reproduced with modifications of their own, and a greater or less amount of theory.
For there was this great difference between Locke and Rousseau, in their effect on children’s books: that Locke, beyond encouraging Fables, did no more than furnish a toy library with his _Thoughts_; whereas Rousseau taught two generations of writers to substitute living examples for maxims.
In making Emile an orphan, Rousseau was guarding against interference with his experiment; it is no part of his doctrine that a child should be brought up by any but his parents, unless they are unable or unwilling to do their duty. Then, indeed, a Tutor must be found, though he will never be required, after the manner of tutors, to instruct. A child needs no other teacher than Experience, no schoolroom but the open country which is also his playground; all that the tutor need do is to enter into his interests and amusements as an equal, and watch over him while he educates himself. This marks a revolutionary change in the attitude of the Philosopher to the Child. Locke’s theory of habit, his practice of reasoning with children, have no place in the new scheme. Rousseau would as soon have a child be five feet in height as to have judgment at the age of ten. Children, he declares, are incapable of reason, Nature meant them to be children before they become men. To forget this is to force a fruit that has neither ripeness nor savour, to produce old infants and child-philosophers.
Rousseau hits hard and straight at the pedantic mania for instruction that filled the early miscellanies with Geography, Chronology and other studies “remote from man and especially from the child”. Emile must never be allowed to cheat himself with words. He shall learn nothing by heart, not even Fables; for these he is sure to misinterpret. And how is a child to grow up with any respect for truth, if his first book teach him that _Foxes speak and speak the same language as Ravens_?
With Words and Fables, Rousseau dismisses all the inventions of primitive imagination that find their natural place in a child’s mind.
At twelve, Emile hardly knows what a book is. He has spent his whole life in the country, with a tutor whom he regards as a playfellow. In climbing among rocks and trees and leaping over brooks, he has learnt to measure himself with his surroundings and has lost all sense of danger. No human will has ever opposed him, and since it is useless to fight against circumstance, he submits to necessary evils, and bears pain without complaining.
Emile is stronger and more capable than other children; yet conscious of his dependence on others, of his need of protection. Abstract terms, such as duty and obligation, mean nothing to him, nor will he practise the empty forms of courtesy; but he has the basis of all good breeding, being candid and fearless, but neither arrogant nor self-conscious.
From twelve to fifteen, Emile’s education is equally practical. Curiosity moves him to experiment and discovery, and thus he learns the simple truths of science without teaching. Locke’s belief in utility was not greater than Rousseau’s. The word “useful”, he says, is the key to the whole situation. Emile is always to test his discoveries by the question “What is this good for?” and things which do not satisfy this test are of no account. The tutor still attends the boy like his shadow, never seeming to influence the course of events; but since Nature cannot be trusted to adapt herself to his scheme, he now finds it necessary to contrive artificial experiences which Emile accepts as natural.
Rousseau sees nothing inconsistent in this use of artifice by which the Child of Nature, though wholly dependent on the will of his tutor, thinks he is governing himself; yet everything is so planned and so foreseen that he does nothing of his own choice.
It is here that Rousseau grudgingly admits the need of books; but he takes care to restrict his Emile to a single book which deals chiefly with practical affairs. “What is this wonderful Book? is it Aristotle? is it Pliny? is it Buffon? No, it is _Robinson Crusoe_.”
Here at any rate, Rousseau made no mistake. Had Emile been free to choose, this is precisely the book he would have chosen, though for less philosophical reasons; and the very fact that it fits Rousseau’s scheme of education is a proof that the scheme is sound. Robinson Crusoe, alone on his island, with neither house nor tools, gradually providing for his needs; it is Rousseau’s allegory of the triumph of man, and failure of civilisation. Emile cannot understand this yet, but the book will be a touchstone for his taste and judgment, and serve him and his tutor as a text for all their talk on the natural sciences. The boy’s interest is wholly practical; but it stimulates “the _real_ castle-building of that happy age when we know no other happiness than necessity and freedom”. Of free and imaginative castle-building, Rousseau has no notion, but Emile will know his Robinson Crusoe all the better, if he is allowed to act the story.
“I would have his head turned by it,” says Rousseau, “and have him always busy about his Castle, his goats and his plantation.... I would have him imagine he is Robinson himself.”
It is the reality of drama that appeals to the educator; the hint was not lost upon writers of children’s books.
And now, since Emile cannot remain always in his island, it is time to recall him to everyday life. His natural interest in handicrafts will smooth the transition. The tutor goes with him from shop to shop, that he may understand the division of labour among men. Thus he learns more in an hour than from a whole day’s explanation. And lest this should be only surface knowledge, he must learn some trade (for choice a carpenter’s) which will guard him against common prejudice, and make him independent of fortune.
Rousseau keeps the road so clear for his young traveller that he is not afraid of chance encounters. In these years, Emile is to learn nothing of the relations of man to man. His heart is not to be touched by suffering nor his imagination kindled by the “living spectacle of Nature” which Rousseau himself paints in such glowing colours. Eloquence and poetry are wasted on a child. Moral and spiritual teaching can safely be left till his sixteenth year. Up to that point Emile has studied nothing but the natural world. He has little knowledge, but what he has is real and complete. Simple surroundings have taught him to be content with what he has and to despise luxury, which, according to Rousseau, is the secret of true happiness. His body is strong and active, his mind unprejudiced; he has courage, industry, self-control,—all the virtues proper to his age.
Rousseau’s disciples had some excuse for disregarding one of his chief discoveries: the distinction between childhood and youth. It was obviously impossible to draw a hard and fast line between the two stages, and Rousseau would not give an inch to individual difference. Thus his followers were either forced back upon precedent, or had to trust to their own experience of children. On the one hand, they clung to the old encyclopædic methods; on the other, they transferred Rousseau’s provisions for youth and manhood to an earlier stage. Experience taught them that a child could be stirred by other motives besides prudence and self-love, that moral and spiritual influences in early childhood were not to be ignored, that there were such things as childish imagination and sympathy.
The greater number of moral tales owe their very existence to Rousseau’s inconsistency; for although he had exposed the fallacy of maxims and fables, he found no better substitute than the Example of a perfect Parent or Tutor—a man without passion or prejudice, detached and colourless, who, without seeming to guide or correct, should watch the child’s every movement and on occasion teach Nature herself how to go about her business.
The first generation of Emile, which proved Rousseau’s theory of Childhood, disposed, once for all, of the Infallible Parent in real life. A child might suspect that it was a literary rather than a practical idea, and the few parents who, after a vigorous course of self-discipline, felt equal to the part, would find it easier to sustain by proxy in a moral tale. They decided, at any rate, to ignore Rousseau’s veto upon books for children under twelve, and writers quickly rose to the demand for a new sort of Fables, wherein the Child of Nature, walking in the shadow of the Perfect Parent, acquired a measure of wisdom and philanthropy beyond his years. Such tales, inspired by the Emile, are a satirical comment on the writing of books to prove that books are useless.
Marmontel, though he did not write for children, was an admirable guide for lesser moralists. His vivid character-contrasts, dramatic incidents and humorous treatment of every-day life taught them that art might not be thrown away upon a child’s book, if it only served to keep alive interest and curiosity. The “Good Mother” and “Bad Mother” of the _Contes Moraux_[75] supplied useful variants of the good and bad child, and the “School for Fathers” encouraged the writers of little books to venture satirical comments on the faults of parents.
It is true that Marmontel’s types are less convincing when reduced for the nursery and coloured by Rousseau. “The School for Fathers” turned out a uniform pattern of the Infallible Parent, and “The Good Mother”, “_La femme comme il y en a peu_”, assuming the proportions of her virtues, cast a monstrous shadow over two generations; yet there were books that reflected Marmontel’s wise moderation, his sympathy with youthful follies, all that was implied in the motto of his bon Curé, “_Moins de prudence et plus de bonté_”.
The Nursery had its Marmontel in Armand Berquin, better known by the name of his most famous book, _L’Ami des Enfans_,[76] an addition that no man deserved better then he. Like Perrault, Berquin owed his reputation to a book that he wrote for children; but times had changed: education had now become of so much consequence that the writer of children’s books was regarded as a public benefactor. Perrault the Academician had never openly acknowledged the _Contes_ of 1697; but in 1784, Berquin’s _L’Ami des Enfans_ was crowned by the French Academy.
Perhaps it was well for Berquin that by this time fairies were discredited in France, and Perrault was gone from his old shelf, so that no child could choose between them. As it was, children of all sizes and conditions, with and without tutors, but all equally ignorant of magic, read Berquin’s stories and read them again. Something of his own sweetness and humour got into his book; they felt that he loved and understood them, and those who lived near him used to crowd round him, eager for a word or a handshake, whenever he came out of his house.
Berquin’s book owes something to Weisse’s _Der Kinderfreund_, from which he took some of the stories, as well as to the writings of Campe and Salzmann; but no German ever pointed a moral with such playful grace.
There is hardly a point in Rousseau’s argument that Berquin does not illustrate; but he does it in a perfectly natural way, drawing the events out of simple situations, and showing delightful glimpses of childish character.
Marmontel’s “Bad Mother”, with her blind and cruel preference for one of her two children, is easily recognised in the story of “_Philippine et Maximin_”. His device of moral contrast appears in every variation of Rousseau’s theme.
These are mostly little studies in black and white: Industry opposed to Idleness in “The Two Apple Trees”; a rational education preferred to riches in the story of Narcisse and Hippolyte; the character-contrast grafted on fable in a similar study of two dogs.
Emile’s gentle consciousness of his dependence on others (one of his more amiable traits) is shown in the docility of Prosper, who, by accepting the gardener’s advice, finds in due season ripe strawberries of an exquisite flavour hanging from his plants. “Ah, had I only planted some in my garden,” cries the brother who jeered at him. Whereupon the generous one replies: “You can eat them as if they were your own.”
M. Sage, who might be Emile’s tutor, believes that if he can make his boy Philippe content with what he has, instead of longing for things which he cannot get, he will do more for his happiness than by leaving him untold wealth.
When the boy envies a rich man’s garden, his father says that he himself possesses a finer one. Taking Philippe by the hand, he leads him to the top of a hill that overlooks the open country. “Shall we soon come to our garden, papa?” the boy asks eagerly. “We are already there!” answers M. Sage.
Rousseau himself was not a greater lover of gardens than Berquin. Gardening is the theme of half his stories: “_Le rosier à cent feuilles et le genêt d’Espagne_”; “_Les cerises_”; “_Les tulipes_”; “_Les fraises et les grosseilles_”; “_Les deux pommiers_”; the greater number deal with country life and have their setting in the family.
The tale of the farmer who brings a jar of candied fruits to his landlord’s children, is an eloquent sermon against ill-breeding and prejudice.
This is a sequence of moral contrasts. First, the insolent treatment of the farmer by the two boys is set against their little sister’s courtesy, then contrasted with the simple friendliness of their father; and the corresponding scene of their entertainment at the farm is drawn with the same delicate point. The two boys are compared with the farmer’s sons, more capable, even more accomplished than themselves; and stung to shame by the generosity and natural courtesy of their host.
Farming, according to Rousseau, is the most honourable of industries. After farmers he places blacksmiths and carpenters. Berquin brings his children into a natural contact with men of various crafts, the farmer, the blacksmith, the mason. They watch the building of a house and learn the need for division of labour. He can dispense with Rousseau’s artifice. He never hampers himself with theory, but allows Emile’s virtues to appear in common adventures with men and birds and animals.
Clementine, who loads the little peasant girl with useless gifts, learns, in a dialogue with her mother, to serve the real needs of her protegée; the dentist’s visit to Laurette and Marcellin is a test of courage; “_Le menteur corrigé par lui-même_” becomes a champion of truth.
Foolish wishes and false judgments are corrected according to Rousseau’s plan. Little Fleuri, who, as each new season arrives, would have it last for ever, is made to set down his fickle desires on his father’s tablets, and, faced in Autumn with his Winter, Spring and Summer wishes, decides that all the seasons of the year are good. Armand would cut away the brambles that take toll of the sheep’s wool, but in the nesting season, discovers how the wool is used.
Berquin cannot bring himself to judge the things that are merely beautiful by Rousseau’s standard of utility. Lucette, when she finds gay flowers in a place where her father planted those “_tristes oignons_”, learns with astonishment that these were tulip-roots; and Berquin allows her to rejoice where a rigid Rousseauist would have compared the uses of flowers and vegetables.
“The time of faults is the time for fables,” said Rousseau; but he put it late, when Emile was no longer a child. Berquin knows what happens in nurseries: that Josephine will forget to feed her canary, that Firmin and Julie will eat forbidden cherries, that Ferdinand, all frankness and generosity, if he cannot control his temper, will be a danger to his friends, and Camille if they give her the chance, will tyrannise over the whole family.
The remedies are mostly found in the natural consequences of these things; but Berquin brushes aside Rousseau’s strict law of necessity with a light mischievous touch; nor does he ever sanction the plan of governing a child by letting him suppose he is the master.
“The Children who wanted to govern themselves”, having tried it, do not wish to repeat the experiment; and Camille is completely reduced by the officer who advises her Mother to give her _a uniform and a pair of moustaches_, in which she can more appropriately indulge her fancy for ordering people about.
These children of Berquin’s are less hard and self-reliant than Emile. Even the good ones are not unnatural. There is little Alexis on a showery day in June, running first down to the garden to look at the sky, and then back, three steps at a time, to the barometer—only to find that the two are in league against him; and the eight-years-old Marthonie, a delicious picture in her white linen dress, a pair of morocco shoes on her “dear little feet”, and her hair, dark as ebony, hanging in loose curls on her shoulders; Marthonie, who insisted on being dressed for a picnic in a frock of the prettiest apple-green taffetas, with rose-coloured ribbons and shoes—and came home hatless and draggled, a tearful Cinderella with one shoe left in the mud. The Mother who met her thus and only said, “Would you like me to have another silk frock made up for you to-morrow?” owes her wisdom to Rousseau, but her playful irony to Berquin and Marmontel.
Berquin’s parents are nearly infallible, but he does not give them every point in an argument. In the affair of Charlotte and the watch, for example, it is not always M. de Fonrose who scores.
Charlotte invents a dozen reasons for wanting a watch, and her inexorable parent disposes of them all, till she is forced back on Rousseau’s final position. A watch must needs be a _useful_ possession, since her Papa, philosopher as he is, cannot do without it. This, obviously, is a point to Charlotte. If she wants the thing for its _usefulness_, it is hers. The sudden capitulation is too much for Charlotte. She suspects her Papa of badinage. Not at all; he is perfectly serious. She will find the watch hanging from the tapestry by the side of his bed.
_Charlotte_: What! that ancient thing, that King Dagobert perhaps used for a pot to feed his dogs?
_M. de Fonrose_: It is a very good one, I assure you. They were all made like that in your grandfather’s time. I regard it as an heirloom. But in giving it to you, I shall not let it go out of the family, nor shall I lose sight of it when I see you wearing it.
_Charlotte_: But what will other people say, who are not my grandpapa’s descendants?
Few English children could buy the first translation of Berquin, in twenty-four volumes. A selection, including many little dramas for three or four persons, appeared later under the title of _The Children’s Friend_; but the true English version was the admirable _Looking Glass for the Mind_[77] adapted by Mr. Cooper for E. Newbery and illustrated by John Bewick’s inimitable cuts. Alexis transfers his best grace to Bewick’s “little Anthony”, standing a-tiptoe on a chair to read the barometer; Caroline walks as proudly as Marthonie in her finery; and the four little pupils of Mademoiselle Boulon are not less French for their English names.
It is odd, considering Rousseau’s attitude to the education of girls (for in his account of Sophie he reverses the whole method of Emile’s training) that the trilogy of educational romance, begun with Emile, should have been completed by two women.
Madame d’Epinay, Rousseau’s friend and benefactress, published her _Conversations d’Emilie_[78] at his request, and Madame de Genlis, in _Adèle et Théodore_,[79] worked out her own scheme of practical education on his principles.
Of the two, Madame d’Epinay is more faithful to Rousseau, and so great was the interest aroused by the _Emile_, that she was awarded the French Academy prize for “a work of the greatest benefit to humanity”.
She herself declared that her book contained “neither a plan of education, nor any connection in the ideas”; yet it is plain that Emilie follows Emile like an obedient younger sister.
An age that believed in freedom and equality could not long stand by the privilege of sex, and Emilie, although she suffers some of the restrictions imposed on Sophie, shares the natural education of Emile, and is taught to practise most of his virtues. She gains her knowledge, as he does, from experience; Nature is the wise Mistress who refuses her request for more lessons, and had Emilie’s mother followed her own inclination, it is likely that the little girl at ten years old “Would not yet have known how to read.”
As it is, she is allowed to spend ten years (for Emile’s twelve) in jumping and running, and her enlightened Parent (the counterpart of Emile’s guardian) believes that the time has not been wasted. Not that Emilie is ever allowed to forget Rousseau’s Salic Law concerning obedience and restraint. She is sternly snubbed for romping with her brothers, and after a disastrous adventure with a beautiful green ladder, admonished that “the modesty of her sex requires a decorum which should restrain the giddiness and warmth even of childhood”. This sends her back to her doll, the care of which has so far exercised her ingenuity that her mother “will not oppose a continuation of it for some time to come”. And to Sophie’s sewing and embroidery, Emilie adds a new amusement: that of passing these instructive conversations on to her doll.
Thus even “moments of relaxation” are to be employed by a vigilant mother in order to form the understanding of her child. There is no escape for little Emilie, she must be educated every minute of the day. Her play is always under supervision, always liable to interference and criticism. Her mother, usually her sole companion, is present at all interviews between Emilie and other human creatures.
The book is, in one sense, a simplified _Emile_, intended for children as well as parents; but Madame d’Epinay has not a vestige of Berquin’s humour to help her along the “paths of pleasure and amusement”. These repeated portraits of Emilie and her mother look dull indeed beside Berquin’s dainty groups, and her insistent doctrine almost hides the one beauty of the book: the character of Emilie.
There is no merit in Madame d’Epinay’s fancy portrait of herself as the Perfect Parent, but Emilie is lifelike, and holds out for a number of years in her stronghold of childhood. It is only on the eve of her tenth birthday that she remarks resignedly, “To-morrow will be an important day. When I rise, _I shall no longer be a child_”.
The tyranny of reason had, in fact, begun much sooner, when Emilie, curious about her own small part in the Universe, learnt that _in time_ she would become a Reasonable Being.
_Emilie_: But what am I now, being but a child?
_Mother_: How! You are _five years old_ and have not yet reflected on what you are! Endeavour to find out yourself.
_Emilie_: I cannot think of anything!
This is a priceless opportunity to impress the lesson of dependence,—to prove that it is only by mildness, docility and attention that she can hope for a continuation of help and protection.
Punishment, says the Maternal Governess, is proper only for intractable and servile dispositions; but she is willing, before Rousseau, to correct faults by means of Fables.
This is how she deals with her pupil after a courageous burst of naughtiness:
_Mother_: Take a book from that shelf: that which you see at the end of the second lowest shelf.
_Emilie_: Is it this, Mamma?
_Mother_: Yes, bring it to me.
_Emilie_: Mamma, it is Moral Tales.
_Mother_: So much the better; it will amuse us.
_Emilie_: Which shall I read?
_Mother_: The first.
_Emilie_: Oh! Mamma.
_Mother_: What now?
_Emilie_: It is—Let us read the second. Mamma.
_Mother_: Why not the first?
_Emilie_: Mamma, it is “The Naughty Girl”!
_Mother_: Well, we shall see if it bring to our recollection any of our acquaintance.
_Emilie_: Must I read it aloud?
_Mother_: Without doubt; and pronounce distinctly.
(The very snap of the consonants can be heard.)
Madame d’Epinay was too true a disciple of Rousseau to follow him slavishly. Not only did she ignore his strictures upon reading, through the fear of being singular, and still more that of making an unfortunate experiment, but she was even ready to tolerate myths for the sake of morality, and to compare them with modern instances; on the other hand, it must be confessed that she only once talked of fairies, and regretted it afterwards.
Emilie herself has a child’s love of fairies; but she is made to reason about them:
“Mamma, you will make me umpire between you and the fairies,” says the intelligent little person, making the most of her dull game; and she obediently works it out against herself: “They were, perhaps, two fairies and a genii I met this morning. Well, no matter, Heaven bless them, I say, you are the fairy Luminous and have _disenchanted me_!”
The Mother never shrinks from this grave responsibility. Berquin, though he made war upon ghosts, was wise enough to let the fairies alone. At least he could laugh like one of them. But Madame d’Epinay, in her first Conversation with Emilie, finds it hard to be amused, and in the twelfth, the little girl declares: “_In my whole life I never saw you play at anything_”.
This, indeed, is a mother that sends Love himself to school:
_Emilie_: Mamma! Mamma! Let me come and kiss you.
_Mamma_: Most willingly; but you will tell me upon what account!
Madame de Genlis’s _Adèle et Théodore_, published in the same year as _Emilie_, gives her interpretation of Rousseau in the form of correspondence with a mother who desires to be enlightened, but as yet clings to the ordinary customs of Society:
“You prevent your children till the age of thirteen from reading Telemachus, Fontaine’s Fables and all such books, yet you would inspire them with a taste for reading! What books would you give them instead of those I have mentioned? Are they only to read the Arabian Nights and Fairy Tales till they are thirteen?”
The answer gives the author’s convictions about children’s books:
“I neither give my children Fairy Tales to read nor Arabian Nights; not even Madame d’Aulnoy’s Fables, which were composed for this purpose. _There is scarcely one of them which has a moral tendency._”
To provide works “proper for infancy” she wrote _Les Veillées du Château_,[80] tales which carry Rousseau’s theories along a facile stream of conversation and incident. Adèle, until she is seven, is allowed to read no other books. “I shall then”, says Madame de Genlis, “give her the Conversations of Emilie, a book you have often heard me praise, and this will employ her till she is eight.”
The apparent generosity to her rival, however, did not prevent the writer of _Adèle et Théodore_ from attributing the success of _Emilie_ to the good will of the Encyclopædists. “Madame d’Epinay was a philosopher,” she remarks, “and took good care not to talk of religion to her Emilie.”
It is certainly true that Madame de Genlis had many qualifications for her task which Madame d’Epinay lacked; and when for a moment she allows herself to forget her theories, there are glimpses of autobiography in her books. Her own life, in fact, was the most interesting of her tales, and the rest are interesting chiefly for reflections of it.
No child could have reproached Madame de Genlis with never playing at anything. She had an extraordinary childhood, and her early years in the quiet Château of St. Aubin were filled with unusual interests.[81] At eight years old she dictated little romances and comedies to her governess, and amused herself by playing schoolmistress to some Burgundian peasant children who came to cut rushes under her window; at eleven she was the chief attraction of her mother’s theatrical fêtes. It was characteristic of the society of the day to seek refuge in private theatres from political and social realities; most owners of country houses had their own companies composed of friends and neighbours, and thus Félicie, before her twelfth year, had mixed freely with gentlefolk and villagers, and had shown the aptitude for teaching and acting which marked her whole career. Her dramatic talent, indeed, might be said to cover all her other activities, for with her, teaching was little more than a favourite and particularly successful rôle. She was active, curious and enterprising as any child; before her marriage she was an accomplished harpist and fluent writer; afterwards she acquired a knowledge of literature, anatomy, music and flower-painting; but there were other occupations which fitted her even better to be the exponent of Rousseau’s theories. Writing in the _Memoirs_ of her early married life, “I endeavoured”, she says, “to gain some insight into field-labour an gardening. I went to see the cider made. I went to watch all the workmen in the village at work, the carpenter, the weaver, the basket maker”.
Rousseau thought her the most natural and cheerful girl he had ever met. Their friendship was short, but she never wavered in her loyalty to his teaching, and could say at the age of seventy, “What I pride myself on, is knowing twenty trades, by all of which I could earn my bread.”
In 1777, Madame de Genlis was made governess to the daughters of the Duchess of Chartres, for whom, with her own children, she established a school at the Convent of Belle Chasse. Her success was so great that, in 1782, the Duke of Orleans took the unusual step of appointing her as “governor” to his three sons. The result fully justified his courage and silenced the critics who ridiculed this new method of using revolutionary theory to educate princes.
The Duke purchased a country estate at St. Leu, and here the boys made experiments in chemistry, studied botany, practised gardening, carpentry, and other forms of handwork. But Madame de Genlis did more than play the part of Rousseau with three Emiles. She handed on to her pupils the delights of her own childhood. These boys could laugh at Emile marooned in his island. They played out a dozen different Voyages in the park of St. Leu; and had a theatre of their own in which they acted moral plays from the _Théâtre d’Education_.[82]
Madame de Genlis had long ago added authorship to her list of trades and had written stories for the children of Belle Chasse. It was easy enough to invent new ones for St. Leu. “There is no great wisdom required in the composition,” she declared, “but only Nature and common sense.”
Doubtless her books deserved Madame Guizot’s criticism, “_toujours bien et jamais mieux_”. She is discursive, even garrulous, and often loses the thread of the story in moral dialogues; but there are tales in the _Veillées du Château_ that suggest her own enjoyment of the “delicious life” with her children; and if none of them betray her love of mischief and adventure, it is but a fresh proof that she was acting a part, that she could not move freely under the cloak of the Infallible Parent. For in actual life she could take either side in a moral contrast, bear her part in the maddest pranks, assume every virtue of a heroine and hide with complete success a thousand faults.
Her books, after all, were simply properties reserved for her parts of Moralist and Schoolmistress. She dramatised the theories of Rousseau, and although her wonderful energy hardly atoned for her lack of depth and soundness, she left a rich legacy of device and suggestion to those who could use it better.
Rousseau’s affinity to Locke on the side of theory, and to Richardson in sentiment may account for some common features of French and English tales, but it does not explain the writing of “Lilliputian” books by two such authors as Berquin and Madame de Genlis.
There is, of course, no great difference between “writing down” Rousseau’s doctrine for children, and making miniature versions of Richardson and La Bruyère; but Berquin’s humour should have saved him from _Le Petit Grandison_,[83] and Madame de Genlis might have reflected on the undramatic qualities of _Le Petit La Bruyère_.[84] Berquin’s Lilliputian hero reveals himself in letters to his mother as a perfect miniature of Sir Charles Grandison, not less insufferable for his youth; and the little _La Bruyère_ is made up of conventional homilies: “Of Reading, Study and Application”; “Of Personal Merit”; “Of the Heart” (introduced by a quotation from Marmontel); “Of Insipidity” (perhaps evoked by the other platitudes).
It was Rousseau himself who saw that the subject of education was entirely new, even after Locke’s treatise, and would be new after his own. The closest of his followers overlooked his chief discovery.
CHAPTER V
THE ENGLISH SCHOOL OF ROUSSEAU
Effects of Rousseau’s teaching in England—Henry Brooke’s _Fool of Quality_, the English _Emile_—Thomas Day: his connection with the Edgeworths—_Sandford and Merton_—_Little Jack_—Theory and Romance: Philip Quarll as a Rousseauist—_The New Robinson Crusoe_—Madame d’Epinay and Mary Wollstonecraft: _The Original Stories_—Blake’s illustrations—Traces of Marmontel and Madame le Prince de Beaumont in _The Juvenile Tatler_ and _The Fairy Spectator_.
In England, Rousseau’s teaching had more effect on the actual life of the family than on books. Children, no longer cramped by the old pedantries, began to show unexpected powers of action and self-control, and parents, relieved of their harsher duties, chose to make friends rather than philosophers of their children.
It was only in books that theorists could represent this genuine progress by the make-believe of impossible children and perfect parents. Most writers of children’s books were theorists of one sort or another, and now that they had begun to draw from life, they tried to make it fit their theories. Thus the new books were hardly less didactic than the old.
Some reflect Johnson’s hostility to Rousseau, others support the new ideas with definite religious teaching, and many that present the Child of Nature as an existing type, endow him with the precocious wisdom of a Lilliputian. There is hardly a book among them, even among the many adaptations of French stories, in which the setting and characters are not plainly English.
The most consistent of all Rousseauists was Thomas Day,[85] the author of _Sandford and Merton_,[86] and he owed the success of his book at least as much to his own observations and experiments, as to Rousseau.
Much of its interest, moreover, can be traced to the example of an English novelist; for in choosing some pieces for children from Henry Brooke’s _Fool of Quality_, Mr. Day had been so struck by its simple and vivid style as to regret that Brooke himself had not written books for children; and it is clear that, while the theory of _Sandford and Merton_ came direct from Rousseau, many dramatic situations, which are the life of the story, were suggested by _The Fool of Quality_.[87]
This, indeed, was a book after Rousseau’s own heart. The hero, Henry Earl of Moreland, is an English Emile quickened out of knowledge by more natural and livelier adventures. Brought up by a foster-mother among village children, he stands for the virtues of a natural education, against a brother bred at home in the luxurious fashion of the time. The scene of his first visit (at five years old) to his parents, is a satire on Society, and the farcical turn of his adventures brings the romance of theory into touch with the novel of life and humour. This little Harry is the most natural child of fiction; like Emile at a later stage, he knows nothing of the respect due to people of rank, and is quite unmoved by his unusual surroundings; but as yet he has no philosophy; he values things as children do, for what they mean to him. A laced hat is useless as a head-covering, but an effective missile for playing ducks and drakes among the wine-glasses; when he gets astride a Spanish pointer and rides him among the company, he sees no reason to dismount because the dog, growing outrageous, rushes into a group of little masters and misses and overthrows them like ninepins; and when he has crowned the adventure by throwing down a fat elderly lady and three men, he arises and strolls leisurely about the room “with as unconcerned an aspect as if nothing had happened amiss, and as though he had neither art nor part in this frightful discomfiture”.
Emile, a much older boy, at his dinner party, received a hint from his mentor, and for the rest of the meal “philosophised all alone in his corner” about luxury, superior all to the grown-up guests. The little Harry, merely unhappy at having to hold his knife and fork “just so” and say so many “my lords and my ladies”, very naturally cries, “I wish I was with my mammy in the kitchen.” Neither then nor at any other time does he seem conscious of superior wisdom; but Theory hangs upon the foolishness of his mother. An uncle, whimsical rather than didactic, but none the less a moralist, fills the place of Rousseau’s tutor, and later, when the boy appears in clothes “trimmed like those of your beau insects vulgarly called butterflies,” this humorist so impresses him with the comparison of that “good and clever boy called Hercules” who was given a poisoned coat to wear, that Harry rips and rends the lacings of his suit and runs down to obey a summons “with half the trimmings hanging in fritters and tatters about him.”
Where Emile was controlled and self-centred, Harry is all impulse and warmth of heart. He fights like a little tiger to avenge his brother or to punish some young scamp, and cares little for the opinion of his fellows; yet he shows the greatest tenderness to animals or persons in distress. His mother, seeking proof of his wits and finding him ready to give away all his clothes except his shirt, decides that “there is but the thickness of a bit of linen between this child and a downright fool”, and so leaves him to his more discerning father.
At times, the author, preoccupied with social and political ideals, so neglects the story that even his lively humour can scarce restore it; yet he can forget Rousseau’s theories in scenes that he invents to illustrate them; nor does he ever accept a theory without proof. To the philosopher’s contention “that self-love is the motive to all human actions”, Brooke answers in the words of the estimable Mr. Meekly, “Virtue forbid”; and his own philosophy is the sounder for a trustworthy ballast of religion and patriotism.
Among minor digressions are a dialogue about toys, another on ghosts, and some of the “thousand little fables” by which Harry’s uncle, “with the most winning and insinuating address, endeavoured to open his mind and cultivate his morals”. One of these, “The Fable of the Little Silver Trouts”, has a tenderness that sets it apart from common fables. It reads like an Irish folk-tale moralised by some good priest.
If Henry Brooke could have passed on his gifts of humour and sympathy to the writers of children’s books, they would have known better than to tie life down to theory. As it was, they were mostly obsessed by the desire to teach, and preferred Mr. Day’s model of a faultless hero to one like the Fool of Quality, who actually discovered two boys within him, one “proud, scornful, ostentatious and revengeful”, the other “humble, gentle, generous, loving and forgiving”.
This English Emile was a moral contrast in himself, an anomaly that might weaken every “Example” in moral tales.
Thomas Day would have no such compromise between good and evil. Moral truths were best expressed by distinct types. To combine these in one person was to confuse the issue. Mr. Day lived, as he wrote, to prove his theories, and whenever the unknown quantity of human nature thwarted him, went back to them with unshaken confidence. A great part of his life was given to works of active benevolence, and his death was no less consistent than his life; for he died in trying to prove that a young horse could be tamed by kindness.
Only once he seems to have acted in what must have seemed to him an irrational way, and that was at the request of the lady (Miss Elizabeth Sneyd) whom at that time he hoped to make his wife. With his natural propensity to improve and educate, he had asked her, in preparation for their future life, to forgo many pleasant and harmless diversions which seemed to him useless or unreasonable. Miss Sneyd, with proper spirit, suggested that a French dancing-master might help Mr. Day to overcome certain faults of deportment which displeased her, and so nice was his sense of justice, that he actually crossed to France and spent some time in a hopeless experiment. Nobody could have taught Mr. Day to dance; perhaps the lady knew it. Such graces as he managed to acquire only provoked her to say that she liked him better as he was before, and he retired to console himself with philosophy.
His next venture promised better success. He resolved to educate two orphan girls upon Rousseau’s plan, so that, in time, one of them might fill the place he had intended for Miss Sneyd. But Nature again proved herself too strong for Philosophy. The children quarrelled, refused to be educated “in Reason’s plain and simple way”, and could not be cured of shrieking when their guardian frightened them to test their courage. As they grew up, he was forced to admit another failure; but he clung to his theories, and oddly enough lost nothing of his belief in the reasonableness of “female character”. A later pupil of his more than justified this confidence. Richard Lovell Edgeworth, although he had been Day’s successful rival in love, was still his friend, and used to send his little daughter Maria to spend her holidays with him. By that time Mr. Day had found a lady who could endure his ways, and was settled in Essex, busy with schemes for the benefit of his poor neighbours.
Maria Edgeworth, fresh from a conventional boarding school, was quick to appreciate his odd humours and philosophic mind. She obediently swallowed his doses of tar-water, submitted to the severest tests in exact reasoning, and under his influence, acquired that intense regard for truth which stamped all her later writings. Yet it was not through any theories derived from him or from her father that she became the greatest writer of Moral Tales, but through her own experience of life and character; and her work for children must be considered apart from her Rousseauist principles. Mr. Day, indeed, whose ideal of womanhood was in some ways little in advance of Rousseau’s, did his best to crush her first effort (the translation of _Adèle et Théodore_) by expostulating with her father for encouraging it; but Maria was too much his pupil to give way to a prejudice based solely on his horror of “female authorship”.
Mr. Day was fully alive to the want of good books for children; not only did he put his own talents at their service, by contributing to Mr. Edgeworth’s instructive serial _Harry and Lucy_,[88] but he found the task so interesting that it grew into an independent volume, three parts dissertation and experiment, and the fourth a fresh effort to express life in terms of theory.
Doubtless he found it a relief to work out in a book the experiments which he had found so disconcerting in practice: to show, as the result of his system, a super-Fool of Quality,—a farmer’s son, instead of a nobleman’s,—and to make his foil the spoilt child of rich parents. These are the two children, Harry Sandford and Tommy Merton, “introduced as the actors” to give interest and coherence to Mr. Day’s collection of lessons and stories.
When he says they are “made to speak and behave according to the order of Nature,” “Nature” must be understood to mean the “natural” result of Theory; for it is only the Bad Boy who, in his naughtiness, is a real child of Nature. The Good Boy of the Moralist is a stock figure of allegory, but the Bad Boy lives; a hundred models will serve for his portrait. He is the real hero of _Sandford and Merton_, as Satan is of _Paradise Lost_.
Thus, even in a book, human nature was too much for Mr. Day; and yet his Good Boy, Harry Sandford, is something more than the good half of the Fool of Quality. His virtues, although superhuman, are not unlike those of the youthful Thomas Day; but under the guidance of Mr. Barlow, that insufferable model of the Perfect Tutor, he exhibits the mature head of Mr. Day on young shoulders, and so becomes the mouthpiece of Rousseau, the lay-preacher of Mr. Barlow’s sermons, and the chief instrument of the Bad Boy’s reformation.
There is a note of English severity in Mr. Day’s reading of Rousseau. His notion of self-control is stricter than anything in the _Emile_: “Mr. Barlow says we must only eat when we are hungry and drink when we are dry”; he is utterly intolerant of wealth: “The rich do nothing and produce nothing, the poor everything that is really useful”. Mr. Barlow, Harry Sandford and the amiable Miss Simmons take it in turns to express Mr. Day’s opinions of the idle and frivolous pastimes of Society. Mr. Barlow was “an odd kind of man who never went to assemblies and played upon no kind of instrument,” he was “not fond of cards” and preferred relating moral histories. Harry Sandford found the theatre “full of nothing but cheating and dissimulation;” and when the youthful guests of Tommy’s house-party were preparing for a Ball, “Miss Simmons alone appeared to consider the approaching _solemnity_ with perfect indifference”.
Much of this is autobiography. Under the figure of Miss Simmons’s uncle, Mr. Day, in fact, discloses himself: “a man of sense and benevolence, but a very great humorist”. It is his humour to look at the world as his poor boy looks at the rich man’s house:
“To the great surprise of everybody, he neither appeared pleased nor surprised at anything he saw.”
Many incidents of the story, which, like the fight between Harry and Master Mash, owe little to Henry Brooke, may be taken as reminiscent of Mr. Day’s boyhood; for although he has a true instinct for drama, he is incapable of pure invention.
“The originality of the author” he says “is a point of the least consequence in the execution of such a work as this”. Harry Sandford refusing to betray the hare to the huntsman, or at loggerheads with the “little gentry”, is the Fool of Quality; but when he discusses the World with Miss Simmons, he is a brother of the philosophic Emile.
Mr. Day borrows many of his instructive details from Rousseau: the juggler, who taught Emile the use of magnets by means of an artificial duck, conspires with Mr. Barlow and Harry to teach the uninformed Tommy Merton; but there are other experiments more practical than Rousseau’s, which suggest actual experience and the co-operation of Mr. Edgeworth. These alternate with short tales introduced according to what Mr. Day calls the “natural order of association”; but their effect is to weaken the genuine interest of the enveloping story. “The Gentleman and the Basket Maker”[89] gains nothing by the Good Boy’s elocution; Leonidas shakes himself free from Mr. Barlow’s patronage.
Yet, with all these digressions, children found matter of interest in _Sandford and Merton_ for another century. The most didactic parents could not have controlled the choice of so many nurseries, nor would Mr. Day accept a grown-up verdict without the children’s assent. “If they are uninterested in the work”, he wrote in his preface, “the praises of a hundred reviewers will not console me for my failure”.
The truth is that persons who stand no higher than Mr. Barlow’s knee can go through the book without seeing much of him.
The simple story of “Little Jack”, no less characteristic of Day, appeared in _The Children’s Miscellany_: (1787),[90] but may have been written earlier. The moral is quite explicit; “that it is of little consequence how a man comes into the world, provided he behaves well and discharges his duty when he is in it”; but Jack’s life begins at the edge of experience, when he is suckled by a goat; and later, his duty leads him into many adventures which, although they appear true, happen in a romantic setting of foreign countries.
Thus theorists, without acknowledging romance, may use it for their own purposes. Robinson Crusoe’s island lent enchantment to Emile’s most practical employments, and Rousseau’s followers chose two wholly romantic figures to point their arguments against society. The negro, cut off from his own people, freed from his oppressors, is a striking and pathetic mark in the midst of his white brothers. He now becomes a type of the Natural Man, and a hero of children’s books.[91] The second witness against social institutions is that first friend of children, the shipwrecked sailor-man in his island, who still holds them by the spell of circumstance, even while he repeats the strange jargon of revolutionary doctrines.
Mr. Day had transcribed, along with extracts from _The Fool of Quality_, “some part of Robinson Crusoe”, without any serious additions; but Philip Quarll the Hermit, one of Crusoe’s earliest successors, appeared in _The Children’s Miscellany_ as a Rousseauist philosopher.
The original chap-book of 1727[92] has no suggestion of theory, but it points out one vital difference between Philip Quarll and Crusoe. Quarll actually comes to love his solitude and loses all desire to return to his own country.
To the theorist, this proved him a forerunner of Rousseau, and the editor of 1787 could furnish him with the latest version of the creed. He begins by reflecting (as Rousseau did with _Robinson Crusoe_) on the edifying spectacle of shipwrecked men, “deprived in an instant of all the advantage and support which are derived from mutual assistance ... obliged to call forth all the latent resources of their own minds”; and then remarks that the story “whether real or fictitious, is admirably adapted to the illustration of the subject”.
The poetical language of this hermit, so unlike Crusoe’s plain story, suggests the influence of Saint Pierre, whose descriptions of scenery were more elaborate but less vigorous than Rousseau’s. “Feathered Choristers” entertain him “with melodious harmony;” Nature “puts on her gay enamelled garb and out of her rich wardrobe supplies all vegetables with new vesture.”
In such phrases, the philosophic hermit exalts Solitude at the expense of Society.
There is much unconscious humour in the account of the hermit’s efforts to overcome Nature, for although he has some of Crusoe’s practical ability, he trusts rather to theory. Depressed at the persistent hatred of a tribe of monkeys, for whom he has dug roots, he meditates on its cause, and deciding that he must have forfeited their respect “by hiding the beauty of his fabric under a gaudy disguise”, he discards the irrational garments which distinguish men from monkeys, and presents in his own person Rousseau’s Natural Man.
A friendly monkey, “Beau Fidèle”, plays the part of Friday, and the “surprising tractability and good nature” of this beast, contrasted with the ingratitude of a shipwrecked sailor, strengthen the general argument.
This is how the Philosopher, after fifteen years in his island, apostrophises a ship that suddenly appears:
“Unlucky invention! That thou shouldst ever come into men’s thoughts! The Ark which gave the first notion of a floating habitation, was ordered for the preservation of man, but its fatal copies daily expose him to destruction”; and when the sailors fail to take him off, “despite a sudden impulse to return”, he reflects upon his good fortune in having escaped the world, and counts his own situation happier than theirs. There is, of course, no Footprint in the Sand; yet the tale has romantic features. A child might skip most of the descriptions, but he would remember the white-bearded hermit and his monkey-servant in their hut built of growing trees. Crusoe had no such leaf-tapestry on his walls; and there is a map of Philip Quarll’s island which is a formulary of romantic truth; for in it may be seen (at A) the place where the Hermit was cast away, and at B, the place where Mr. Dorrington (who discovered him) landed; at E, the Hermit’s Lodge, and at K, the lake between the Rock and the Island.
The new _Philip Quarll_ with all its absurdities was better reading for Children than _The New Robinson Crusoe_ (Campe’s _Robinson der Jüngere_, translated into English from the French in 1788).[93] Crusoe’s ship never carried a heavier cargo than Campe’s tiresome family, who break up the story with their dull colloquies; but the book is a fresh proof that these philosophers had to call in the old masters to enforce their lessons, and could discover no more attractive theme than the old one of voyages and islands.
The English _Conversations of Emily_ appeared in the same year as _The Children’s Miscellany_. Four years later, Mary Wollstonecraft, full of theories for the better education of girls, assumed the mantle of Madame d’Epinay, or rather placed it on the shoulders of a Representative whom no touch of human weakness could redeem from the hard grip of Reason: Mrs. Mason, a monstrous creation of her own.[94] It would be impossible to paint Mrs. Mason’s portrait. Nothing softer than granite could suggest her outline. Compared with her, Emily’s Mother is all kindness and indulgence. Her two charges, Mary and Caroline, are mere wax tablets whereon she records her impressions of virtue. Their very faults are placed upon them like labels, for Mrs. Mason to remove. Emily, though she was her mother’s “friend”, was a real child, pleased and amused by formal Nature lessons and unimaginative stories, since nothing better might be had; playing with dolls, “jumping, running about and making a noise”.
Mary, in the _Original Stories_, has to prove that she can “regulate her appetites”, before Mrs. Mason says: “I called her my friend, and she deserved the name, _for she was no longer a child_.” Mary and Caroline have no mother; Mary Wollstonecraft had no confidence in parents. She called in Mrs. Mason, a sort of moral physician, to make good the defects of a casual up-bringing. Mrs. Mason, true to the _tradition d’Epinay_, “never suffered them to be out of her sight”. She exhibited every excellence that she exhorted them to attain; and that none of her perfections should escape their notice, she discoursed upon these at intervals. Her success is inevitable and complete. She conducts her pupils through carefully selected experiences; she conducts the reader through the book. She never hesitates or doubts; she never betrays surprise.
The Tales were written “to illustrate the Moral”: it is thus that Mrs. Mason answers “the Ænigma of Creation”. She sees everything, understands everything, explains everything.
“‘I declare I cannot go to sleep’, said Mary, ‘I am _afraid of Mrs. Mason’s eyes_’.”
Mrs. Mason conforms and makes everybody else conform to her moral formulæ: “Do you know the meaning of the word Goodness?” she asks. “I see you are unwilling to answer. I will tell you. It is, first, to avoid hurting anything; and then to continue to give as much pleasure as you can.”
Three chapters are given to “the treatment of animals”. The children are allowed to read Mrs. Trimmer’s _Fabulous Histories_,[95] and to read it “over again” to a little friend, if they can make her understand that _birds never talk_.
In the _Original Stories_, pleasure is administered like medicine. Benevolence is a chief part of Mrs. Mason’s Theory; she is resolutely, almost sternly benevolent. Joy is never admitted without a dispensation from Reason. When the children have acted “like rational creatures”, Mrs. Mason allows them two lines of joy:
“Look, what a fine morning it is. Insects, birds, and animals, are all enjoying this sweet day.”
Blake snatched the words eagerly for his frontispiece. His “illustrations” are a touchstone for Mary Wollstonecraft’s imagination. _He could not draw Mrs. Mason._ In her place he introduces a central figure of his own, meditative, sweet, and firm; spiritual, even decorative, as Mrs. Mason never was. Yet he, like the rest, was dominated by the monstrous original; his Masonic Symbol appears in every picture. The children are his own; he dresses them to order, but makes haloes of their little round straw hats.
This author has an effective manner of disposing landscape to correspond with her sombre or determinedly joyful moods. Blake does not attempt the moonlight scene that moves Mrs. Mason to discourse upon her gloomy past, and present resignation. “I am weaned from the world, but not disgusted,” she observes. Such a state of mind would be unintelligible to Blake. But he manages to convey something of the formal desolation of the ruined Mansion-house, to which Mrs. Mason brings the children “to tell them the history of the last inhabitants”. They cling about her, and one looks back in a vain hope of escape, for “when they spoke, the sound seemed to return again, as if unable to penetrate the thick stagnated air. The sun could not dart its purifying rays through the thick gloom, and the fallen leaves contributed to choke up the way and render the air more noxious”. A heavy atmosphere is characteristic of the book; it suggests the German _Elements of Morality_, which Mary Wollstonecraft translated two years later. The promise of romance in the settings of Mrs. Mason’s stories is never fulfilled.
Blake was oppressed by her realistic solution of the mystery of the unseen harper. He followed the “pleasing sound” in his own way, and discovered the player for himself: not Mrs. Mason’s explicit and tangible old man, but a spirit harping under a starry sky.
Neither Thomas Day nor Mary Wollstonecraft could have written a “Lilliputian” book; and even the author of the _Juvenile Tatler_ and _Fairy Spectator_, whose titles suggest the old traditions, turns back only to copy the types of Marmontel, the moral fairy tales of Madame le Prince de Beaumont.
_The Juvenile Tatler_,[96] by Mrs. Teachwell (Lady Fenn) is a collection of moral dialogues and dramas: “The Foolish Mother”, “The Prudent Daughter”, “The Innocent Romp”, and others suggested by Marmontel. But the characters are wholly English. The Innocent Romp is a feminine counterpart of the Bad Boy.
The other persons of this drama (real people too) are Mr. Briskly, a Widower, whom Marmontel would have called “The Foolish Father”; Mrs. Freeman, his sister, “The Wise Aunt”; Miss Prudence Freeman, her daughter, “The Good Cousin”.
Lady Fenn’s humour is English, like her characters: she invents amusing pranks for her heroine, and is original in admitting a girl to the masculine pastime of mischief.
A very natural dialogue between the Foolish Father and the Wise Aunt prepares the reader for the entrance of the Romp. Her latest offence has lost her an eligible suitor. Chasing the housemaid with a rotten apple, she has just thrown it full in the face of Lord Prim, alighting from his coach to pay his compliments to her, on her return from school. Thus announced, she enters, fresh from an excursion into a neighbour’s garden by way of the wall. Questioned about the visible traces of this adventure, she confesses that she fell from the top of the wall, and adds that she would like to fall twenty times if she could be sure she was not seen, and _to make her cousin Prudence fall too_. “La! Cousin,” she cries, with seductive enjoyment, “’tis delightful! Just like flying.” (A cautious foot-note explains: “This was written before the invention of Air Balloons.”)
When the author has a doubt about the moral influence of her heroine, she inserts a corrective foot-note.
The Romp, it is disclosed by her Aunt, not content with dressing the cat in baby-linen to play at a mock-christening, disguised herself as an old woman, and carried it to Mr. Starchbland, the Curate. Upon this there are three separate comments: The Foolish Father’s _“A profane trick”_; The Wise Aunt’s “She thought no further than the surprise it would be to the person who should lift up the mantle and possibly”——Oh, excellent Wise Aunt!—“_possibly_, the roguery of getting the parson scratched.” And, last, the foot-note, to avert parental criticism: “_Let it not be supposed that Miss B would suffer the Sacred Rite to begin_”.
The author’s sympathies are with the Aunt (she was an aunt herself). So the Wise Aunt carries off her niece to undergo a moderate process of conversion. The Foolish Father, who “dotes” upon his daughter “when she is neatly dressed and tolerably sedate”, is obviously drawn from life.
_The Fairy Spectator_,[97] “By Mrs. Teachwell and Her Family”, is Mrs. Argus transformed into the Benevolent Educational Fairy of Madame de Beaumont. Here is a characteristic bit of dialogue:
_Mrs. Teachwell_: You know that stories of Fairies are all fabulous?
_Miss Sprightly_: Oh, yes! Madam.
_Mrs. Teachwell_: Do you wish for such a Fairy Guardian?
_Miss Sprightly_: Very much, Madam.
_Mrs. Teachwell_: Why, my dear?
_Miss Sprightly_: _Because she would teach me to be good._
A world where all fairies are “fabulous” is, of course, a world without dreams. When Miss Sprightly weeps on rising, because she cannot banish the thought of “the most pleasing dream which she ever had in her life”, the inexorable Mrs. Teachwell meets the situation with a simple formula: “Idle girl, make haste!” The Fabulous Beings whom she admits on sufferance are not more fairylike than “the smallest wax doll.”
Two lines from _The Fairy Spectator_ betray the Rousseauist’s attitude to Fairyland:
“I will write you a Dialogue in which the Fairy shall converse, and _I will give you a Moral for your Dream_.”
CHAPTER VI
DEVICES OF THE MORALIST
Family authorship—Limitations of the little novel—the English setting in early woodcuts: Thomas and John Bewick—the first school-story: Sarah Fielding’s _Governess_—Stories of country and domestic life: _The Village School_ and _Jemima Placid_—Other school-stories—Nature and Truth in _The Juvenile Spectator_—Adventures of animals—Mrs. Trimmer’s _Fabulous Histories_—_The Life and Perambulation of a Mouse_—_Keeper’s Travels_—_The Kitten of Sentiment_—Adventures of things: _The Silver Threepence_ and the _Pincushion_.
The great writers for children were neither Lilliputian nor Rousseauist. They emerged from a good company of aunts and mothers who, with a sprinkling of fathers, were driven into anonymous authorship by the demands of their own families: minor moralists, without any special gifts of art or imagination, who managed to draw live pictures from their own little world, and hit upon simple devices for holding attention and exciting interest.
They were mostly innocent of Theory, but an intimate acquaintance with the Child of Nature taught them in one way or another to avoid the unpardonable sin of dulness.
Little novels, following their grown-up prototypes with unequal steps, had their own limitations of setting and character. A nursery or a schoolroom is always a nursery or a schoolroom, and varies only according to particular houses and inhabitants. The few ways of escape (by a window, a chimney or a keyhole) into fairyland, were blocked in most eighteenth century houses, and the persons of moral tales, however lifelike, were apt, from contact with a narrow circle, to assume familiar characters.
Adventures of the milder sort might happen on the road to school, but the only changes of scene were from parlour to schoolroom, or from town to country. Any effort to exceed these by travels abroad landed the unsophisticated author in a hopeless confusion of unknown tongues and half-remembered directions.
And yet there was something in these English settings to compensate a child for the loss of fairyland, if not to set his feet in the track of it. Authors chiefly concerned with character were apt to give the briefest indication of a background; but before 1780, there were woodcuts that implied more than the words of the story.
Thomas Bewick had cut his first blocks for the York and Newcastle chap-books, and although he soon passed on from these to a wider study of Nature, they were enough to seal the fate of the old slovenly pictures in children’s books.
As a boy, Bewick had filled the margins of his school-books and covered the hearthstones of his mother’s cottage with drawings of the men and beasts that he knew about his native village[98]; and these he reproduced later in the cuts for chap-books and fables.
He could never draw fairies. The “Pigmy Sprite” in Gay’s _Fables_[99] is not half so fairy-like as the little spinning-wheels and brooms of the corner-pieces; but his drawings of trees and meadows, rocks and pools, show the “fairy ground” of his own happy childhood.
It was thus that he gave a new meaning to the country setting which was now a recognised feature of moral tales. A writer might demand no more of Nature than that she should provide the Industrious Boy with fruit in season; but Bewick caught her among the corn ricks or at the corner of a lane, and she herself took up the parable.
The younger brother, John, who began by adapting some of Bewick’s drawings, is better known as an illustrator of children’s books. Between 1790 and 1820, there are few cuts that do not show some trace of his influence, and many of those in the smaller chap-books,—_The Adventures of a Pincushion_, for example, and _The Life and Adventures of a Fly_,[100]—have been attributed to him.
In a sense, John was more imaginative than his brother, quicker to appreciate subtleties of character and expression. There is hardly less truth of detail in the Lime-walks and rose-gardens of _The Looking Glass for the Mind_ than in Thomas Bewick’s village scenes; but the little figures are more graceful and courtly, the backgrounds more delicate.
John Bewick’s illustrations to _The New Robinson Crusoe_ gave shape to Rousseau’s vague ideal; but his pictures of English children in their natural surroundings were a literal return to Nature. And although they were in complete accord with the changed attitude of the story-writers, they proved (to the confusion of Theorists) that the new Philosophy had made little impression on the familiar moods of Nature and childhood.
The School-setting, however cramped, was a source of wider interest than the alternative parlour or nursery. It varied, according to the fortunes of the persons concerned, from the Village School (commonly built on the _Two-Shoes_ foundation, but without its Lilliputian features) to the Academy for young Ladies or Gentlemen: an exclusive community which had received its traditions from Sarah Fielding’s notable little book _The Governess_; or, _The Little Female Academy_[101] published some fourteen years before Rousseau’s _Emile_.
Writing in the first decade of Lilliputian books, the author of _David Simple_ anticipated Rousseau with a gallery of children’s portraits, and showed that the Child of Nature could survive pedantic forms as well as theories.
Madame le Prince de Beaumont chose the same framework for her _Misses’ Magazine_;[102] Charles and Mary Lamb used it to connect the separate stories of _Mrs. Leicester’s School_; Mrs. Sherwood seized upon the book itself and revised it ruthlessly, and a host of anonymous writers copied Miss Fielding’s method and envied her genius.
Half periodical, half novel, _The Governess_ was a perfect medium for “Instruction and Amusement”. It contains sermons, fables, Oriental-Classic stories and a moralised romance in the style of the _Cabinet des Fées_.
Of the Governess herself, whose name of Mrs. Teachum became a popular pseudonym for instructive writers, it must be confessed that she is a Presence hardly less dominating than Mrs. Mason. To the mature reader, who is uncomfortably conscious of having met her in real life, she is more formidable than any lay-figure of a theorist. Her husband, described as “a very sensible Man who took great Delight in improving his Wife,” having completed his task, disappears from the story and leaves her to pass on his improvements, to the “nine young Ladies commited to her Care.” She is “about forty Years old, tall and genteel in her Person, though somewhat inclined to Fat,” and her “lively and commanding Eye” (more human, if less hypnotic than Mrs. Mason’s) “created an Awe in all her little Scholars, except when she condescended to smile and talk familiarly with them.”
Theorists, working upon this Paragon, extracted the more human elements; but the children escaped, like Hop o’ my Thumb out of the Ogre’s house.
The long line of authentic portraits that extends from Miss Fielding to Miss Edgeworth is of one family, and it is doubtful whether any amount of “practical education” could have improved some of Mrs. Teachum’s pupils, restricted as these were to “Reading, Writing, Working and all proper Forms of Behaviour”.
The naughty children in books, as in life, can take care of themselves, but it needs a writer of unusual tact to make the good ones live. Miss Fielding’s good children are more to her credit than the “Rogues” who figure in some of her best scenes; but there is nothing in the book quite so amusing as her “Account of a Fray begun and carried on for the Sake of an Apple, in which are shown the sad Effects of Rage and Anger.”
Mrs. Teachum, entering unexpectedly, produces a sudden calm in which the losses on all sides can be counted:
“Each of the Misses held in her right hand, fast clenched, some Marks of Victory. One of them held a little Lock of Hair, torn from the Head of Her Enemy, another grasped a Piece of a Cap which, in aiming at her Rival’s Hair, had deceived her Hand and was all the Spoils she could gain, a third clenched a Piece of an Apron, a fourth of a Frock. In short, everyone unfortunately held in her Hand a Proof of having been engaged in the Battle. And the Ground was spread with Rags and Tatters torn from the Backs of the _little inveterate Combatants_”.
Here is a satirical scene not unworthy of Fielding’s sister, yet not too subtle for her audience. (The Ladies Caroline and Fanny, new to their titles, are visiting Miss Jenny Peace.):
“Lady Caroline, who was dressed in a pink Robe embroidered thick with Gold and adorned with very fine Jewels and the finest Mechlin lace, addressed most of her Discourse to her Sister, that she might have the Pleasure every Minute, of uttering ‘Your Ladyship’, in order to show what she herself expected. Miss Jenny, amused by their insolent Affectation, addressed herself to Lady Caroline with so many Ladyships and Praises of fine Clothes as she hoped would have made her ashamed”.
Nobody who reads the book can suspect Miss Fielding of more than a distant admiration for Mrs. Teachum. Her own sympathies are clearly with the old dairywoman who, when the children were rebuked for a want of tact in their remarks to her, replied: “O, let the dear Rogues alone, I like their Prattle,” and taking Miss Polly (the youngest) by the hand, added: “Come, my Dear, we will go into the Dairy and skim the Milk pans.”
There is a kind of story-telling, touched with the same wise playfulness, which is not beyond the talents of average aunts. Two such there were, sisters-in-law, Dorothy and Mary Jane Kilner, whose stories, published in Dutch flowered covers, were as popular after 1780 as the earlier Newberys. There is some doubt about their respective pseudonyms, but the family records ascribe the signature “M. P.” to Dorothy and “S. S.” to her sister, which establishes Dorothy as the author of _The Village School_.[103]
Her stories grew naturally out of a happy and uneventful life spent in the little Essex Village of Maryland Point, and her best critics were the nephews and nieces for whom she wrote. But she was in the habit of sending her books to “the Good Mrs. Trimmer” for criticism, and it seems likely that she wrote _The Village School_ to help that lady in her work of teaching poor children to read.
“M. P.” (she borrowed the initials of her village) is in some sort a nursery Crabbe. There is not an incident in her story outside a country child’s experience: no Babes-in-the Wood opening, no clever animals, no romance of improbable good fortune. This is the “clean pleasant village” of every-day life. The schoolmistress, Mrs. Bell, believes in simple virtues, but has no theories. Boys and girls learn to read, and girls to spin, knit stockings and sew. They are grouped quite simply, as in some old-fashioned print, and M. P., having borrowed Miss Fielding’s device of labelling them with symbolic names, uses it to avoid the complexities of character. Jacob Steadfast and Kitty Spruce are predestined to carry off the prizes which Betsy Giddy, Master Crafty and Jack Sneak inevitably lose; and a child is content with the main distinctions of Good and Bad.
The story, slight as it is, reveals M. P. as an aunt who is not indifferent to “Flowers picked out of the Hedges, Daisies and Butter Flowers”; who can make garlands and enjoy a singing-game,—the right sort of game for village schools:
“What we have to do is this _All bow, all courtesy and all kiss_; And first we are our Heads to bow As we, my Dear, must all do now; Then courtesy down unto the Ground, Then rise again and all jump round.”
“You cannot think” she concludes, “how pretty it is when they mind to sing and dance in the right time.”
This was an aunt who, in her own century, deserved some such tribute as Stevenson’s:
“Chief of our Aunts—not only I But all your dozen of nurslings cry— What did other children do And what were Childhood, wanting you?”
_Jemima Placid_,[104] variously ascribed to Dorothy and Mary Jane, is woven of the same simple stuff. George Frere, writing in 1816 to his brother Bartle[105], bore witness to its practical effect on one nursery. They evidently came to it in turn, at a particular age. “You”, he wrote, “are more of a philosopher than I am and can bear these things better, and yet I have read _Jemima Placid_ since you have, but you have made the best use of it”.
A Rousseauist might have overlooked the philosophy in this little book,—the annals of a parsonage family, in which all the characters are individuals and friends of the writer; for there is not an ounce of theory in it. Jemima herself is neither a pedant nor an infant prodigy. She is never expected to reason about her own development. Her philosophy is of the older sort that comes of gentle discipline, and she is “placid” not through pleasing no one but herself, but in spite of other people’s unjust or exacting ways. It is doubtful whether she would have been very different under the Eye of Mrs. Mason, but assuredly she would have been less happy. No theoretic Child of Nature ever was so happy as Jemima with her brothers.
The scene of parting, when the little girl (six years old) goes to London, is an introduction to these three:
“I wish you were not going” says Charles, “for I put this box and drove in these nails on purpose for you to hang up your doll’s clothes, and now they will be no further use to us.” William bids her not cry, and promises to write about the young rabbits. “And, Jemima,” adds Charles more tactfully, “I wish I was going with you to London, for I should like to see it, ’tis such a large place, a great deal bigger than any village which we have seen; and they say the houses stand close together for a great way and there are no fields or trees....”
It is the same village, seen from a different standpoint, narrowed on the one hand to the record of a particular house, on the other, varied by journeys and visits to town.
Old customs survive with the flowered covers of the book, and the next few lines bring _Jemima Placid_ into touch with her predecessors. For in London there is a great number of shops, and to be sure, among other things, Jemima must bring back “Some little books which we can understand, and which ... may be bought at Mr. Marshall’s _somewhere in some churchyard_, but Jemima must inquire about it.”
The little things that make up a child’s life happen with natural inconsequence. What gives the book a hold is the author’s unaffected truth and tenderness, the modest philosophy which hides under simple speeches or incidents.
Who but Jemima Placid, the unhappy guest of two spoilt London cousins, could comfort herself under unjust reproof with “the rough drawing of a little horse, which Charles had given her on the day of her departure and which she had since carefully preserved.”
It is no wonder that her brothers are loth to welcome the Londoners on their return visit; but “S. S.” can make her own “Book of Courtesy”, and she refreshes it with the comments of real boys. William answers his father’s rebuke with disconcerting logic: “You always tell me that the naughtiest thing I can do is to tell lies, and I am sure I am very sorry they are come, for I like Jemima to ourselves: so pray, Sir, what would you choose I should do?”
There is not a trace of the “Juvenile Correspondent” in Charles’s letters to Jemima; but the sentiment of humanitarians is mere vapouring compared with this boy’s account of how they found the dog shot by a game-keeper and buried him under the Laylock tree.
“‘Poor Hector! I shall hate Ben Hunt as Long as I live for it!’
‘Fy Charles’ said my father. ‘_Hector is dead, Sir_,’ said I, and I did not stay to hear any further.”
Elizabeth Sandham, who wrote somewhat later “for the Children of former Schoolfellows”, claimed a wider influence for the story of school life. “A school”, she says, “may be styled the world in miniature. There the passions which actuate the man may be seen on a smaller scale.”
On this assumption, she ventured into the unknown microcosm of a boys’ school,[106] where even Miss Edgeworth came to grief; but her book was a model for some hundreds of school stories in which ambitious, studious or mischievous boys play impossible parts. She was more at home in a later study of schoolgirls[107]: careful sketches, brightened by satirical remarks; but the moral is too obvious. Miss Sandham’s sense of humour was too slight for effective relief.
An admirable miscellany, which brings genuine adventure and comedy into the school setting, is _The Academy; r, a Picture of Youth_,[108] published in 1808 by a Scottish schoolmaster who, in his preface, claims to have taught “all ranks, from the peer’s son to the children of the lower orders.” His taste is hardly less catholic than his experience, for he not only adds satirical and dramatic scenes to the old fables and admonitions, but adapts Berquin to an English atmosphere, and is ready to sympathise with the shepherd, the labourer, the old man and his horse. The book is a medley of old manners and new sentiments, in which the characters, although they stand for familiar types, earn some rights of personality by individual acts and speeches.
This author is indebted to Smollett for a trick of making his characters talk in the language of their callings. Young Tradewell’s father consigns him to the Rector’s care “per the bearer,” as if he were a bale of merchandise; and a nautical father advises a son who has “gone a little out of his course” to “sail clear of faults”, but if at any time he is driven into them, to “be a brave boy and steer honourably off.”
Satire in Children’s books is apt to miss its mark. Some parents who bought this _Picture of Youth_ must have felt like the old gentleman of the story, who was furious at a clever caricature of himself until somebody assured him that it was intended for his neighbour. Restored to good humour by similar means, they would doubtless enjoy these burlesques: the foolish indulgent mother, the sporting squire who laughs at his son’s escapades, the parents who teach their boy “to recite passages with tragic effect from our best poets”.
The Rector’s rational methods recall _Sandford and Merton_; but the book is for older lads. The Bad Boy of _The Academy_ is more like a hero of Picaresque romance, and the Good Boy (the son of a naval officer, destined for the Service) is a new figure in moral tales; a pupil “highly acceptable to the Rector” for his own sake; the more so, perhaps, for the fresh memory of Trafalgar.
English people have an inherent power of reconciling opposites, which perhaps comes of their being a mixed race. The most revolutionary writers were held back by some thread of ancient custom, and those who clung to the older modes of thought were not without some broadening influence. “Nature” and “Truth” were still the accepted ideals of literature, although the meaning of both had changed; and _The Juvenile Spectator_,[109] which applied Addison’s method of character-drawing to the nursery, used it with a new understanding of childhood.
Mrs. Arabella Argus,[110] its author, adds piquancy to her general scheme by introducing herself as a Grandmother. Doubtless she was old enough to remember Lilliputian traditions; but she was also too young to forget the newer counsels of sanity and freedom. Like Addison, she begins by describing herself and her aims, but so far is she from admiring the model of the Baby Spectator, that she directs her brightest satire against “little prodigies” and child-philosophers.
She is “an old woman, but not an old witch nor yet a fairy”; and without resorting to anything so irrational as magic, she is able to set forth secret information upon “Nursery Anecdotes, Parlour Foibles, Garden Mischief and Hyde Park Romps”.
Now, a Newbery writer might have dealt with the first two of these items; but he never could have countenanced such portents of revolution as “Garden Mischief” and “Hyde Park Romps”.
The letters which Mrs. Argus receives from children show nothing like the decorum of the Goodwill Correspondence.
Here is one from a typical Bad Boy (which however, Mrs. Argus contrasts with another, “couched in terms of becoming timidity”, from a girl):
“To Mrs. Argus,
“A friend of Mamma’s says that you are very clever at finding out the faults of children, pray tell me mine, for if you are as cunning as she says you are, I need not mention them to you. I am certain I know you; don’t you walk in the Park sometimes? I am sure you do, though, and you have a very long nose; my sister Charlotte and I hope you will answer this directly, for we are in a great hurry to be satisfied about you.
“Your’s
CHARLES OSBORN.”
Mrs. Argus gives sound and pleasantly pointed advice in her replies, though she loses more than one laugh to modern readers in her care for propriety.
“Will you be so good” she writes in one postscript “as to tell your brother that the word _Thump_ which occurred in his letter appears to me an expression unworthy of a well-educated child.”
Yet she surprises a pugnacious grandson with the novel argument that so few things are worth fighting about; and shows a genuine sympathy with boyish pranks.
Her remarks upon fairy tales are a juvenile version of Addison on the “Lady’s Library”. She knows exactly what sort of writing pleases some children; how “the eager eyes of a little story-loving dame glisten with delight” at a promising opening, and the lover of fairy tales “wishes, just to gratify her curiosity, that there were really such creatures as fairies”. Yet she is so far persuaded that “an early course of light reading is very prejudicial to sound acquirement”, that she rejects any story without the hall-mark of a “Moral”.
*       *       *       *       *
A favourite device for connecting the haphazard events of ordinary life (and one that embellished the bare truth) was borrowed from current satires. _The History of Pompey the Little; or, the Life and Adventures of a Lap-Dog_[111] became a model for stories in which an animal, telling the story of its life, acts as an observer and critic of human conduct.
Humanitarians and lovers of nature, taking up this form, produced more or less faithful studies of birds and animals; and critics who objected to fables, or thought satire dangerous had nothing to say against this mixture of Natural History and Morality.
Doubtless the stricter guardians of youth looked askance at such a defiance of Reason; but the “Creatures” had an immense influence in the Nursery: their morals were vouched for by Æsop and all his tribe. After all, it was only a new way of presenting the old lessons, and the sternest parent could hardly reject so engaging a tutor as a Robin or a Mouse.
Miss Fielding’s _Governess_ had not a larger following of School Stories than Mrs. Trimmer’s _Fabulous Histories_[112] produced in moral tales of birds and beasts. This little book, better known by its later title, _The History of the Robins_, was suggested by Mrs. Trimmer’s children, which may account for its being her only imaginative work. The children, taught during walks in the fields and gardens “to take particular notice of _every object_ that presented itself to their view”, were able, by a natural process of elimination, to develop a chief interest in animals, and “used often to express a wish that their Birds, Cats, Dogs etc., could talk, that they might hold conversations with them”. Their mother, instead of rebuking them for so irrational a desire, adapted the idea of talking birds to her own theories of morality and for once managed to see things from a child’s point of view.
Her own childhood had never been anything but middle-aged. At ten she wrote like a grown-up person, and her youth was spent in the company of people much older then herself. Dr. Johnson, meeting her as a girl of fifteen at Reynolds’s, was so much struck by her behaviour that he invited her to his house next day, and presented her with a copy of _The Rambler_.[113] This may have had its effect upon a style developed in formal “correspondence” under her father’s direction; at any rate, her diction remained pompous and conventional. Mrs. Trimmer “composed” works as she “indited” letters. In “composing” _Fabulous Histories_, she “seemed to fancy herself conversing with her own children in her accustomed manner”; but that was because she was accustomed to converse, not talk.
The children, secure in the possession of a “kind pussy Mamma”, never noticed it; to them it was the most natural thing in the world that birds should converse in the same way.
In their family relations, the robins are passable understudies of the excellent Mr. and Mrs. Trimmer and their children; but the introduction of a human family as their patrons and protectors restores them to the shape of birds. For the first time in the history of children’s books, the real centre of interest is transferred from the conduct of children to such matters as living in a nest and learning to fly.
Here is a good example of Mrs. Trimmer’s style:
“When Miss Harriet first appeared, the winged suppliants approached with eager expectation of the daily handful which their kind benefactress made it a custom to distribute”.
On the human side, Mrs. Benson, a kind of domestic Mrs. Teachum, presides over the morals of a son and daughter. Her interest in education is almost equal to Mrs. Trimmer’s, who “wearied her friends by making it so frequently the subject of conversation”; but benevolence softens her utilitarian morality. When Master Frederick rushes to the window to feed his birds and forgets to bid his Mamma good-morning, she admonishes him thus:
“Remember, my dear, that you depend as much on your Papa and me for everything you want, as these little birds do on you; nay, more so, for they could find food in other places; but children can do nothing towards their own support; they should therefore be dutiful and respectful to those whose tenderness and care they constantly experience.”
The Robin family is more than half human. Nestlings, distinguished by the expressive names of Robin, Dicky, Flapsy and Pecksy, exhibit all the faults of children. But there is a world of difference between Mrs. Trimmer’s treatment and that of the fabulist. She has learned to look at a nest of birds from a child’s point of view; what is infinitely more novel and surprising, she actually shifts her ground and considers the Benson household _from the standpoint of a bird_. It is here that so many of her imitators lost the trail; and thus it is that their books were soon forgotten, while hers was read with delight for a century.
The adventure of the nestlings and the gardener has something of the fascination of _Gulliver_. This is Robin’s description of the “Monster” who visited them in their mother’s absence:
“.... Suddenly we heard a noise against the wall, and presently a great round red face appeared before the nest, with a pair of enormous staring eyes, a very large _beak_, and below that a wide mouth with _two rows of bones_ that looked as if they could grind us all to pieces in an instant. About the top of this round face, and down the sides, hung something black, but _not like feathers_”.
The children dragged Mrs. Trimmer from her didactic throne: they even made her talk their language. Her own style is reserved for the parent birds, and in discussing important matters, the young ones imitate them.
“This great increase of family”, says the Robin to his mate, “renders it prudent to make use of every means for supplying our necessities. I myself must take a larger circuit.” The Mother bird thus addresses her penitent son: “I have listened to your lamentations, and since you seem convinced of your error, I will not add to your sufferings by my reproaches.”
All this can be endured for the sake of so many delightful incidents. For a child can climb up the ivy and creep under the wing of the mother bird. He can join the nestlings in their first singing-lesson, follow them in their first flight, and best of all, he can look at the great world beyond the nest with their wondering eyes:
“_The orchard itself appeared to them a world._ For some time each remained silent, gazing around, first at one thing, then at another; at length Flapsy cried out: ‘What a charming place the world is! I had no conception that it was half so big!’”
_The Life and Perambulation of a Mouse_[114] was Dorothy Kilner’s contribution to the literature of talking beasts. The author is discovered in a frontispiece, seated at a little round table, in a mob-cap and kerchief. Her quill has just reached the end of the second line. Erect in a box of wafers, the Mouse, with extended paw, is dictating the story of his life.
This “chief of aunts,” snow-bound in a country house with many “young folk,” takes up her pen at their request, to attempt her autobiography.
“I took up my pen, it is true”, she writes, “but not one word toward my appointed task could I proceed....
‘Then write mine, which may be more diverting’, said a little squeaking voice.”
Few “Introductions” were so promising, and the story (apart from inevitable lessons) keeps its promise.
Four mice, Nimble (the narrator) and his brothers Longtail, Softdown and Brighteyes, correspond to Mrs. Trimmer’s nestlings; over whom, to a child’s mind, they have one advantage: they are _outlaws_, repeating in miniature the adventures of Robin Hood.
To be sure, they lack the outlaw’s chief virtues, for they fly at the approach of an enemy, and rob rich and poor alike. And although such creatures could always be excused in the words of Dr. Watts:
“_For ’tis their Nature too_,”
a problem remains to puzzle the wit of a little philosopher: how it happens that creatures so keenly alive to human errors are blind to the iniquity of eating a poor woman’s cake, a present from her foster-son, or the solitary candle that lights a poor man to bed. For indeed, these mice are unsparing critics of cowardly, cruel and overbearing children; they have a full repertory of moral and cautionary tales; they preach sermons on human courage and honour.
The child of action puts aside all questioning, jumps nimbly into a mouse’s skin and makes a fifth on these marauding expeditions. He scuttles along behind the wainscot, buries himself in the most delicious of plum cakes, outwits the footman, narrowly escapes the trap and thrills at his first sight of the cat.
In a mischievous mood, he can hide in a lady’s shoe, or wake the children and hear them wonder what it was. There are Eastern adventures to be had among “spacious and elegant apartments”, where he can choose from “a carpet of various colours” a flower that will hide him, and crouch motionless at a passing footstep; and when there is a price upon his head, or the house catches fire, there are still more thrilling adventures of escape.
Should a critic remark that these things do not make up one quarter of the book, a child may tell him that he does not mind sermons and, for that matter, can preach them himself.
*       *       *       *       *
In 1798, one of the most realistic animal stories appeared: _Keeper’s Travels in Search of his Master_,[115] the adventures of a dog. Its author, Mr. Kendall, wrote other books, mostly about birds;[116] but _Keeper’s Travels_ was the only serious rival to _Fabulous Histories_.
If any parent had scruples about talking beasts, here was a book that could be put into a child’s hand with perfect safety. No eighteenth century writer could help making an animal reason as if he were human; but this is a real dog, wagging and whimpering his way through the book, and if he does not speak, the story is not a whit less interesting for that.
From the time that he loses sight of his master on a market-day by being “so attentive to half a dozen fowls that were in a basket”, his adventures are entirely natural and probable.
Keeper is never too human for belief: he does nothing that any dog might not do; yet he makes a good hero,—sticking to his quest in spite of pain and hunger, refusing comforts and saving the lives of children. Mr. Kendall sums up his hero’s virtues in a quotation from Cowper, for those who are “not too proud to stoop to quadruped instructors”. He was not the only lover of animals to quote a humanitarian poet. The author of _The Juvenile Spectator_ in her quaint _Adventures of a Donkey_,[117] has these lines from Coleridge below the frontispiece:
“Poor little foal of an oppressed race! I love the languid patience of thy face: And oft with gentle hand I give thee bread, And clap thy ragged coat and pat thy head.”
The Autobiography of a Cat was a more delicate task, a psychologist could not explain the workings of its mind, although a careful observer might record its more intelligible movements; but since every cat is a critic of human character, there was nothing in the way of sermon or satire that it could not achieve.
Elizabeth Sandham’s _Adventures of Poor Puss_[118] is a very literal story, setting off the philosophy of “two four-footed moralisers” on a sunny wall; but the anonymous author of _Felissa; or, the Life and Opinions of a Kitten of Sentiment_[119] produced a masterpiece in this kind.
Felissa is a Kitten of Satire as well as of Sentiment. This Author adopted the form of _Pompey the Little_ in order to ridicule cant and affectation in general, and Rousseau’s doctrine in particular; yet the chief aim of the book (as the title-page shows) is to turn a child’s thoughts from the hackneyed problems of juvenile conduct:
“We’ll have our Mottoes and our Chapters too, And brave the Thunders of the dread Review: _Misses no more o’er Misses’ Woes shall wail,_ _But list attentive to a Kitten’s Tale_.”
The heroine’s pedigree goes back to Perrault; she actually claims descent from “that noble, excellent and exceeding wise Cat ... who owed his honours to the liberality and gratitude of the celebrated nobleman the Lord Marquis of Carabas”; and indeed she resembles her ancestor as much in “Genius and Discretion” as she excels him in Morals. She is one that might have sat on Dr. Johnson’s knee; her remarks upon Rousseau would have delighted him. Describing the Countess of Dashley, her little mistress’s mother, she says that this lady “had been advised by a French gentleman, one Mr. Rousseau, to suffer her children to remain foolish till seven or eight years of age, when, he said, they would grow wise of their own accord”, a plan “so easy and delightful” that she immediately adopted it.
Felissa’s satire has the prettiest effect of innocence. One moment she is all kittenish mischief, the next, lost in wonder at the lady of fashion who spares half a moment on the way to her carriage to peep in at her little girl.
“For my part,” declares the Kitten, “my eyes were so dazzled by her dress and her diamonds, and so alarmed by some feathers that grew out of her head, in a manner which I had never witnessed before, but in my old master’s cockatoo at the Castle (and she never wore hers so high), that it was some minutes before I could recover myself.”
The episode of a mock-christening, which recalls the _Juvenile Tatler_, serves to change the scene. Felissa, provoked to scratch, is sent down in disgrace to a country Rectory, where she enjoys a quiet interval; but before long, the Bad Nephew gets the better of the Good Midshipman, and the kitten runs away.
She now seeks a refuge in the house of “the most charitable woman living”, where, taking up her old part of unconscious critic, she discovers that charity may be a mere cloak for display; and coming thence to another house, ventures into the library of a Man of Sentiment whose portrait would have pleased Rousseau’s enemies.
“I crept behind a huge folio to recover my fright and, as usual, set about rendering my person neat and attractive, in expectation of soon becoming visible. My new master, it was evident, could never have been instructed on this subject; for as I peeped at him from behind my folio, I thought that he was the dirtiest and most disagreeable man I had ever seen in my life; and wished from my heart, that my nice clean father and mother had had the education of him. He was short and thick, and by no means pretty; of an ill complexion, and his face very far from clean; _all his skins_, likewise, were of a bad colour, _both his shirt skin and his outer-skin_, which seemed much out of repair....”
She is irresistible, this Felissa: reassured to find the sentimentalist writing an _Ode to Mercy_; listening “with her ears pricked up, _as if she had been watching for a mouse_,” while he reads it to his daughter; puzzled by the extraordinary fact that “the more she appeared distressed, the more pleased her father seemed to be.” It is even more unaccountable that a young lady of so much sensibility should turn a starved kitten out of doors. “But kittens are easily puzzled”, and Felissa runs into fresh adventures on her way to a happy ending.
Her fortune is almost too modest for a descendant of Puss in Boots: no more than the blessings of an Establishment and many friends; but the chief of these is the daughter of an officer “who lost his invaluable life in the memorable battle which deprived our country of the gallant and lamented Nelson.”
She, of course, marries the promoted Midshipman, and the Kitten, having attained a certain seniority, and finding little scope for her sly wit, devotes herself to the instruction and amusement of little _Felissae_. If a story could end better, let the Wyse Chylde show how.
*       *       *       *       *
Adventures of things, a variation of the same idea, were mostly derived from Charles Johnstone’s novel, _Chrysal; or, the Adventures of a Guinea_.[120]
If small coins might be supposed to talk as well as great ones (and moralists saw no reason against it), a silver Threepence,[121] the equivalent of a guinea in juvenile commerce, could relate transactions at the Village Shop or at the corner of St. Paul’s Churchyard which, if less thrilling than the Guinea’s, were more creditable to those concerned.
Other subjects of these stories had a greater fascination for unworldly youth. These were things that a child would play with or carry about: a Doll, a Pegtop or a Pincushion, which, from their intimate association with the family, were in a position to discuss its affairs.
“S. S.” designed her _Adventures of a Pincushion_[122] “chiefly for the use of young ladies,” little thinking that old ones would turn back with delight to these records of domestic life in their great-grandmothers’ time.
It seems that the proper place for a pincushion (that essentially feminine possession) was the pocket; but there were occasions, making for adventure, when it was put into a workbag by mistake, or “lent to Miss Meekly to fasten her Bib”, and then it was sure to be carried off in another pocket to another house.
One effect of the book, unforeseen by its gentle author, was doubtless to increase the number of lost pincushions; for never, until it was published, had little Misses suspected what secret critics and inveterate gossips they carried about with them, disguised in harmless taffetas.
Rarely indeed is this watchful companion at a loss for information, but once (when S. S. decides to skip a scene) it remarks:
“The ladies now retired to dinner, but I am ignorant of what passed there, as I was left upon a piece of embroidery.”
As for the woodcuts, they may well be John Bewick’s; they follow each turn of the author’s quiet humour. Any little Miss could tell at a glance that Martha was personating the Music Master and Charlotte teaching the rest to dance. These pictures show everything but the colours, and for that matter, nobody shrank from painting the Green Parlour, when the pincushion declared that “the furniture was all of that colour”. Bewick Collectors have never understood the fatal attraction of “plain” cuts.
“S. S.”, justifying her simple narrative in a preface (and thinking, perhaps, of _Chrysal_), admits that “the pointed satire of ridicule might have added zest to her story”, but thinks it unfit for children.
“To exhibit their superiors in a ridiculous view is not the proper method to engage the youthful mind to respect. To represent their equals as objects of contemptuous mirth is by no means favourable to the interest of good nature. And to treat the characters of their inferiors with levity, the author thought, was inconsistent with the sacred rights of humanity.”
The criticism is a thought too serious. Ridicule is not always a bad method of dealing with children’s faults; “S. S.” herself could use it on occasion. Had she forgotten the Wagstaffs’ party in _Jemima Placid_, or the delightful mischief of the dressing of Sally Flaunt, in which the Pincushion played a chief part?
It is really a question of treatment; a wooden sword is sharp enough for the nursery. If children are simply tickled by incongruities or miss the point altogether, it is because the satirist has an eye on the grown-up part of his audience. But, as “S. S.” points out, there is a danger that incidents will be dragged in for satirical ends “without any cause to produce them”; and, true to her own simple canon of art, she decides “to make them arise naturally from the subject”, though it increase the difficulties of her task.
The Preface shows a concern for form which is rare in these modest writers; and the method justifies itself.
It is extraordinary that so much food for profit and enjoyment could be stored in the shelves of old-fashioned houses.
CHAPTER VII
SOME GREAT WRITERS OF LITTLE BOOKS
The fallacy of Disguise—Qualities of the “great” writers—Mrs. Barbauld’s literary lessons: _Hymns in Prose_—_Evenings at Home_—A new vein of romance—Charles Lamb’s attack on the Schoolroom: Science and Poetry—The _Tales from Shakespeare_—“Lilliputian” attitude of the Lambs—_The Adventures of Ulysses_—_Mrs. Leicester’s School_—The Taylors of Ongar: Imagination and spiritual life—Method of work—_The Contributions of Q. Q._—“The Life of a Looking Glass”—Mrs. Sherwood: the struggle between imagination and dogma—_The Infant’s Progress_—_The History of the Fairchild Family_.
Disguise is of little advantage to a writer, least of all to a writer of children’s books. For although he has many invisible cloaks to choose from, Sharp-Eyes and Fine-Ear are hot upon his track. They recognise the pedant under his “Mask of Amusement”, they judge the Moralist by the standard of his own Bad Boy, and are no more impressed by the Perfect Parent or Tutor than birds by a scarecrow, when once they have found out that it is not alive.
A writer may be just as sincere in acknowledging the reality of wonders as in finding matter of interest in everyday things, if he express his own point of view; but the maker of puppets or bogeys has given up his personality and disguised his voice. He may be forgiven if he can reveal himself at odd moments by individual gestures, as the whimsical editor of a Lilliputian “Gift” would sometimes peep out in his preface; no single lapse will be remembered against him: the “Children’s Friend” atoned for one little Grandison by many lifelike portraits.
But the great writers were those that lived most fully in their stories. It was no more essential that they should write nothing else but children’s books than that a mother should never go outside her nursery; for as every man (unless he be a pedant or a monster) has something of the child in him, so every child likes to enter into the talk and business of men. There never was a good child’s book that a grown-up person could not enjoy; and the habit of “talking-down” to children, whether in books or in life, is more fatal to understanding and friendship than the abstract reasoning of the Lilliputians. When Johnson praised Dr. Watts for his condescension in writing children’s verses, he did him an injustice, for no man could have taken a little task more seriously. As to Mrs. Barbauld,[123] had she deserved half the abuse of her critics, she never would have found favour in so many nurseries.
De Quincey, who was evidently well-disposed towards the “Queen of all the Blue-stockings” (in spite of her misguided preference for Sinbad) says that she “occupied the place from about 1780 to 1805 which from 1805 to 1835 was occupied by Miss Edgeworth.” At any rate she was a pioneer in the art of writing for children, and Miss Edgeworth had a genuine admiration for her work.
But although there was a certain likeness in the aims and ideas of these two, each had her own qualities, which were the outcome of essential differences in character.
Mrs. Barbauld had grown up among the boys of her father’s school, and in her youth was as active and mischievous as a boy. There is a story told of how she escaped an importunate suitor by climbing an apple-tree in the garden and dropping over the wall into a lane. Miss Edgeworth, in the same situation, would have walked out by the gate.
It is true that none of Mrs. Barbauld’s stories show this spirit of mischief: she was playful only in light verse or talk or letters; but she made her personality felt in a romantic attitude to life and Nature, which, although it did not much affect her choice of subjects, made her style unusually free and moving.
She had no children of her own, but adopted a nephew, “little Charles”, for whom she wrote most of her stories; and at Palgrave, where she and her husband had a school, she was the mother, tutor and playfellow of the boys.
The tutor, indeed, comes out in all her stories; the playfellow and the mother are not always there. Yet she was dominated neither by facts nor theories. A deep sense of spiritual truth underlay her teaching, and her feeling for the poetry of Nature was the nearest approach to a Renaissance of Wonder in children’s books.
It may be doubted whether the famous _Hymns in Prose_[124] ever appealed to children as it did to their parents. Mrs. Barbauld entirely disagreed with Rousseau’s principle that there should be no religious teaching in early life, and that a young child cannot appreciate natural beauties; but she also rejected Paley’s crude idea of the Creator as a sort of Divine Mechanic,[125] which some writers preferred to the neutral deism of Rousseau.
She held that children’s thoughts should be led from the beauty of the flower to the wonder of creation.
“A child”, she says, “to feel the full force of the idea of God, ought never to remember when he had no such idea.” It must come early, with no insistence upon dogma, in association with “all that a child sees, all that he hears, all _that affects his mind with wonder or delight_.”
“Wonder” was a word unknown to educational theorists, who believed that everything could be discovered or explained. It is her use of those words “wonder” and “delight” which sets Mrs. Barbauld apart from other writers of little books, for it shows something like the spirit of romantic poetry.
The revealing power of the poet was never hers. She feels, but cannot show a child as many wonders as he could find for himself in the nearest hedgerow. The _Hymns_ are a kind of compromise between “Emblems” and pictures of Nature. There are no far-fetched analogies: the parable of the Chrysalis anticipates Mrs. Gatty;[126] and the language, though rhythmic, is free from the conventional phrases which spoil some of Mrs. Barbauld’s “prose-poetry.”
Any mother might use the same images to give her child a first idea of the love of God:
“As the mother moveth about the house with her fingers on her lips, and stilleth every little noise that her infant be not disturbed; as she draweth the curtains around its bed and shutteth out the light from its tender eyes; so God draweth the curtains of darkness around us, so He maketh all things to be hushed and still that His large family may sleep in peace.”
But it was the Tutor in Mrs. Barbauld that made her choose prose; for although she was a facile verse-writer, she was better acquainted with Latin hexameters than with ballads, and doubted whether children should be allowed to read verse “before they could judge of its merit”.
Her best work is certainly in _Evenings at Home_[127], the popular miscellany which she and her brother, Dr. Aikin, brought out in parts between 1792 and 1796.
“Sneyd is delighted with the four volumes of _Evenings at Home_”, wrote Miss Edgeworth in 1796, “and has pitched upon the best stories—‘Perseverance against Fortune,’ ‘The Price of a Victory’, ‘Capriole’”.
It would take an Edgeworth boy to amuse himself with “The Price of a Victory”, a logical exposition which robs soldiering of its romance; or with “Capriole”, the tale of a little girl and her pet goat; but “Perseverance against Fortune” fills a whole “Evening” with adventures that most boys would read. The hero is sold as a slave, pressed into the Navy and suffers many other hardships before he succeeds as a farmer. Yet he is a mere type of the persevering man. The story amounts to little more than a clear statement of what happened, with pictures of what was there. It was the matter of these tales that chiefly interested Miss Edgeworth. She approved of arguments against the cruelties of war, she wept with the little girl over her lost pet, she heartily admired the good farmer for his patient industry and liked to picture his fields, fenced off from the “wild common”, his “orchards of fine young fruit trees”, his hives and his garden.
Sneyd Edgeworth had had a “practical education” and kept the family traditions. Another boy, perhaps, would have chosen “Travellers’ Wonders,” though the traveller confessed that he never met with Lilliputians, nor saw the black loadstone mountains nor the valley of diamonds; or, if these “voyages” were too tame, there were “The Transmigrations of Indur”, adventures of a man, an antelope, a dormouse, a whale,—centred in one person by the mystery of transmigration.
Mrs. Barbauld wrote without apology of “the time when Fairies and Genii possessed the powers which they have now lost”. Nobody reading “Indur” would suspect her of a design to teach Natural History; but she never forgot her profession and there are more lessons than stories in her books.
The average boy would submit to a talk about Earth and Sun, or Metals, or the manufacture of Paper, rather than read “Order and Disorder, a _Fairy Tale_”, and doubtless, in those days, boys were less impatient of Instruction; but a lesson never can be a story. A hundred stories could be written on Stevenson’s text:
“The world is so full of a number of things. I’m sure we should all be as happy as kings”;
but the authors of _Evenings at Home_ chose instead the encyclopædic ideal of “Eyes and no Eyes”, and produced a series of object lessons. What was worse, Mrs. Barbauld, in her anxiety to be clear, made the fatal mistake of “talking down”.
Charles Lamb, writing to Coleridge in 1802, bitterly resents her popularity: “Goody Two Shoes” he says, “is almost out of print. Mrs. Barbauld’s stuff has banished all the old classics of the nursery, and the shopman at Newbery’s hardly deigned to reach them off an old exploded corner of the shelf when Mary asked for them. Mrs. Barbauld’s and Mrs. Trimmer’s nonsense lay in piles about. Knowledge, insignificant and vapid as Mrs. Barbauld’s books convey, it seems must come to a child in the shape of knowledge; and his empty noddle must be turned with conceit of his own powers when he has learnt that a horse is an animal, and Billy is better than a horse, and such like, instead of _that beautiful interest in wild tales_, which made the child a man, while all the time he suspected himself to be no bigger than a child. Science has succeeded to poetry no less in the little walks of children than with men. Is there no possibility of averting this sore evil? Think what you would have been now, if instead of being fed with tales and old wives’ fables in childhood, you had been crammed with Geography and Natural History!”
Lamb is so clear upon the main issue that he cannot be just to the “instructive” children’s book. He loved the tales of his own childhood, with their “flowery and gilt” and all their delightful oddities.
For that, and because he understood the gentle humour of the “Lilliputians”, he forgot whole pages of “instruction” in _Goody Two Shoes_, and placed it on a level with the “wild tales” of romance and adventure.
Had Mary and he read _Fabulous Histories_ together, or “The Transmigrations of Indur”, he might have allowed some “old exploded corner of a shelf” to the schoolroom authors; at any rate he would not have written:
“Hang them! I mean the cursed Barbauld crew, those blights and blasts of all that is human in man and child!”
Science had succeeded to poetry. “The little walks of children” ran through Botanical Gardens; but there is no doubt at all that children, those amphibious breathers of romance and realism, enjoyed it.
Lamb’s quarrel with the Schoolroom was something of a paradox. He took the side of the Romantics against the Scientists; and yet wrote children’s books at the suggestion of the arch-theorist Godwin, who, as his publisher, naturally had some influence upon his choice. It was doubtless through Godwin that, instead of following the traditions he admired, he began by “adapting” greater works, and went on to write about children from a grown-up point of view.
The greater number of the _Tales from Shakespear_[128] are Mary’s; but she and Charles lived and wrote in such accord, that there is no marked difference in the style. His, of course, are freer and more graceful.
“I have done Othello and Macbeth,” he writes to Manning (May 10th, 1806), “and mean to do all the tragedies. I think it will be popular among the little people, besides money. It’s to bring in sixty guineas.”
Now it is one thing to turn a child loose in an old library,—he will forage for himself and will seldom choose any but wholesome fare. It is quite another to provide him with such stories as “Measure for Measure”, “Othello” and “Cymbeline”; to simplify the philosophy of _Hamlet_ and weaken the grim magnificence of _Lear_.
The raw material of the plays would not attract many children, and those who were ready for Lamb’s _Tales_ might have gone to Shakespeare himself.
It is clear, then, that the Lambs were Lilliputian in their attitude to children. Yet they were wise in their generation; for in 1805 (when they began to write the _Tales_) a boy of twelve was playing Romeo, Hamlet and Macbeth to crowded houses at Covent Garden and Drury Lane.[129]
The “little people” of the day were incredibly mature. To know them, in the delicate studies of Charles and Mary Lamb, is to find the limits of Rousseau’s influence. For in spite of the pioneer work of Mr. Day, and the activities of the whole “Barbauld crew”, these were Lilliputians, the children of Lilliputians. Lamb’s _Tales_ must have been infinitely more diverting than most of the books they read; and if some, more childlike than the rest, flinched at the tragedies, they could turn to the magician Prospero, the fairies of _A Midsummer Night’s Dream_, or the trial between the Merchant and the Jew.
After all, the Lambs understood the vital qualities of the stuff they used. Who would not choose these tales rather than “The Price of a Victory”? They are not lessons, but literature, and that is why children are still reading them.
Lamb’s next venture was surer.
“Did you ever read my Adventures of Ulysses,[130] founded on Chapman’s old translation of it?” he asks in a letter to Barton, “for children or men. Chapman is divine, and my abridgment has not quite emptied him of his divinity.”
A prose version of Homer, if he had gone straight to the Greek, would have been still better; there was no good reason for turning Chapman into prose, although Lamb could do it gently.
But Mrs. Barbauld’s “nonsense” fades into insignificance beside the matter of this book, and her remarks about “wonder and delight” have not half the meaning of Lamb’s phrase “_for children or men_.”
These were “adventures” that had been told in the childhood of the Greek people. Lamb knew they were a natural food for children, trusted his instinct and defied his publisher.
In the matter of catering for children, Godwin was constrained on the one side by his theories, on the other by the parents who bought the books.
Not every parent professed his hard and cold philosophy, but they were mostly concerned for morals, and if any lacked interest in the more serious problems of education, they were the more likely to be caught by some prevailing pose of “Sensibility”. It did not follow, if they allowed their children to read “Othello”, that they would approve of the primitive survivals in Homer; nor did these in the least agree with Godwin’s exalted theories of the uncivilised mind. He would have had Lamb soften his account of the Cyclops devouring his victims, and the putting out of the monster’s eye, which Lamb called “lively images of shocking things”. This is the point where Art and Theory must part company.
“If you want a book which is not occasionally to shock”, wrote Lamb, “you should not have thought of a tale which was so full of anthropophagi and wonders. I cannot alter these things without enervating the book, and I will not alter them if the penalty should be that you and all the London Booksellers should refuse it.”
Lamb had good reason to trust his sister’s judgment where children were concerned. Their partnership in the making of little books was one-sided, and in a letter to Barton, Charles confessed that he wrote only three of the stories in _Mrs. Leicester’s School_:[131] “I wrote only the Witch Aunt, the First Going to Church and the final story about a little Indian girl in a ship”. But there are many subtle touches in the rest which suggest his hand, and if one may hazard a guess at their manner of working, Mary wrote little that they did not first discuss together, and revised much with his help. The framework of the book is all that connects it with Miss Fielding’s _Governess_; there is nothing of her bright objective treatment.
This, indeed, is not a child’s book at all, but a book of child-thought and experience, full of insight and tenderness, revealing everywhere the pathos of childhood.
Charles and Mary lived their childish days over again in these stories. They forgot that as children they had not seen things in the same light. They forgot (those days had been short for them) that children, however precocious, are not concerned with their own thought-process, but with life and movement and adventure. And so their stories are really essays about children: essays that let the grown-up reader into some of the little people’s secrets. If it were possible for children to see themselves with the eyes of men and women, then _Mrs. Leicester’s School_ might be to them what the _Essays of Elia_ are to their parents. As it is, no child could appreciate the irony of innocence which runs through the book like a refrain.
A suggestion of Wordsworth, in the story of “Elizabeth Villiers”, can hardly be accidental. The little girl has learnt to read from her mother’s epitaph, and her sailor uncle, just home from sea, finds her in the churchyard rehearsing her lesson.
“‘Who has taught you to spell so prettily, my little maid?’ ... ‘Mamma,’ I replied; for I had an idea that the words on the tombstone were somehow a part of mamma, and that she had taught me.” The uncle, who knows nothing of his sister’s death, asks for her and turns in the direction of the house. “You do not know the way, I will show you,” says the child, and she leads him to the grave.
There is a similar pathos, not less beyond the insight of most children, in Elinor Forester’s account of her father’s wedding-day:
“When I was dressed in my new frock, I wished poor Mamma was alive to see how fine I was on Papa’s wedding-day, and I ran to my favourite station at her bedroom-door.”
But there is another motif in the book which, although its chief appeal is to grown-up sympathies, might satisfy a child’s love of contrast and surprise: the strangeness of familiar things; the romance of the unromantic.
Emily Barton is a little Cinderella, carried off by her father (whom she has forgotten) from the house of relations who have neglected her. A postchaise takes the place of the pumpkin-coach, a new coat and bonnet do humble duty for a ball-dress.
Thus equipped, she jumps into the chaise “_as warm and lively as a little bird_”. Mary Lamb has a store of such tender phrases.
The home that most children take as a matter of course, is a palace of delight to this little girl. Tea is a feast.
“Whenever I happen to like my tea very much, I always think of the delicious cup of tea Mamma gave us after our journey.”
The father and mother, loved by other children without thought, are a King and Queen of romance:
“Mamma, to my fancy, looked very handsome. She was very nicely dressed, quite like a fine lady. I held up my head and felt very proud that I had such a papa and mamma.”
A ride through the London streets becomes a royal progress. In her exile, the child has had no toys: “the playthings were all the property of one or other of my cousins”. Now she appreciates the joy of ownership. Not toys alone, but little books are purchased, and by a mischievous turn, Mr. Newbery’s old device is turned against his successors: “Shall we order the coachman to the corner of St. Paul’s Churchyard, or shall we go to the Juvenile Library in Skinner Street?”
This is far removed from the dramatic realism of the Edgeworth School. It is the difference between the facts and the poetry of everyday life.
There is more poetry (but less that a child would take) in Charles Lamb’s story of the little four-years-old girl in Lincolnshire and her “first going to church”.
The house is too far from a village for the family to attend church, until they are able to set up “a sort of carriage”. But the child is attracted by “the fine music” from the bells of St. Mary’s, which they sometimes hear in the air. “I had somehow conceived that the noise which I heard was occasioned by birds up in the air, or that it was made by the angels, whom (so ignorant I was till that time) I had always considered to be _a sort of bird_.”
The bells calling Susan to church give the story a spiritualised Whittington touch. The ride to church and the child’s first impressions are wonderfully described.
“I was wound up to the highest pitch of delight at having visibly presented to me the spot from which had proceeded that unknown friendly music: and when it began to peal, just as we approached the village, it seemed to speak _Susan is come_, as plainly as it used to invite me _to come_, when I heard it over the moor.”
Here again, things that most children disregard, from thoughtless familiarity, appear strange and delightful to the lonely child. “All was new and surprising to me on that day; the long windows with little panes, the pillars, the pews made of oak, the little hassocks for the people to kneel on, the form of the pulpit with the sounding board over it, gracefully carved in flower work.”
Akin to this is the theme of changed fortune: privileges only recognised when lost. It is the moral (never pointed in these tales) of “Charlotte Wilmot” and “The Changeling”. The child of the ruined merchant describes her first night in the house of his poor clerk. The moon, often watched in happier days, is now a symbol of misfortune:
“There was only one window in the room, a small casement, through which the bright moon shone, and it seemed to me the most melancholy sight I ever beheld.”
Poetry, not fact, is again the chief element in the story of the “little Indian girl in a ship”. Her gentle, imaginative sailor-nurse gives her no Natural History or Geography. He turns her thoughts to “the dolphins and porpoises that came before a storm, and all the colours which the sea changed to”; she is never troubled about the genus of the one or the causes of the other. If Lamb had set down this sailor’s tales, as no doubt he would have told them to a child, he could have made a real children’s book, of “the sea monsters that lay hid at the bottom, and were seldom seen by man; and what a glorious sight it would be, if our eyes could be sharpened to behold all the inhabitants of the sea at once swimming in the great deeps, as plain as we see the gold and silver fish in a bowl of glass”.
In the same way a visit to the country is not made the subject of lessons on rural occupations or botany. As a matter of fact, Grandmamma’s orchard is a fairy place where pear-trees and cherry-trees blossom together, and bluebells come out with daffodils. The profusion of these flowers and the sound of their names might attract a child that yet would miss the best touches:
“Sarah was much wiser than me, and _she taught me which to prefer_.... I was very careful to love best the flowers which Sarah praised most, yet sometimes, I confess, I have even picked a daisy, though I knew it was the very worst flower, because it reminded me of London and the Drapers’ Garden!”
Here Mary might have aimed a gentle shaft at the hated instructive writers, who taught children “which to prefer”; but there is no double intention in Sarah.
Only one story, “The Changeling”, has really dramatic moments. There is a miniature _Hamlet_ scene in this, a “little interlude” played by children, which causes the wicked nurse to betray herself. A child would enjoy it better than the _Tales from Shakespear_. But the little girl who frightens herself into believing that her aunt is a witch is best understood by readers of “Witches and Other Night-Fears”; little Margaret, reading herself into Mahometism and a fever would be less interesting to small folk than the book, _Mahometism Explained_, which she found in the old library, “as entertaining as a fairy-tale”. The humour is too subtle for children, they would enjoy the picture of Harlow Fair better than that quaint account of the grave physician puzzled over an extraordinary case, “he never having attended a little Mahometan before”.
And so it is with the pictures of child-life. The grown-up reader has the best memory for Emily Barton (very young indeed) at her first play. Emily herself remembered that it was _The Mourning Bride_; but she was so far confused between this “very moving Tragedy” and “the most diverting Pantomime” which followed it, that she made a strange blunder the next day.
“I told Papa that Almeria was married to Harlequin at last, but I assure you I meant to say Columbine, for I knew very well that Almeria was married to Alphonso; for she said she was in the first scene.”
At the back of the grown-up mind, besides, there are pictures to help in the reading. Charles and Mary, instead of Emily Barton, reading the tomb-stones, looking up at the great iron figures of St. Dunstan’s Church,[132] or talking over their first visit to Mackery End (too long ago for Charles to remember); Mary at Blakesmoor with the old lady who had “no other chronology to reckon by than in the recollection of what carpet, what sofa cover, what set of chairs were in the frame at that time”. Or John Lamb, the father, taking a walk to the Lincolnshire village, “just to see how _goodness thrived_.”[133]
*       *       *       *       *
Ann and Jane Taylor cherished ideals clearer and much simpler than the Lambs. They had no tragedy to darken their youth; the struggle with poverty (very real at first) was lightened by the cheerful co-operation of a whole family. They were all engaged upon the father’s craft of engraving; they all (father, brothers, sisters, even the mother) wrote.[134] They were “directed” (a phrase of their own) by an unquestioning religious faith which simplified and solved all the problems of life. The narrowing influence of the village was counteracted by breadth of intellect and by individual genius. There was, of course, nothing to supply the generous education of London life, or the exquisite literary discernment of the Lambs; but Jane Taylor showed, even in her books for children, a power of enjoyment and a sense of humour that is sometimes associated with intensely serious beliefs. She was untouched by popular philosophy, and adhered to the literary traditions of the school of Pope; but the world of the spirit was more real to her than earth itself; her work has rare qualities of spiritual insight and imagination.
This does not apply, of course, to the simple rhymes which were the sisters’ first literary venture. Mary Lamb could make waistcoats while she was “plotting new work to succeed the Tales”. The intricate process of engraving demanded more attention. They were not free till eight o’clock, and had household duties besides; but, as Ann says, “a flying thought could be caught even in the midst of work, or a fancy ‘pinioned’ to a piece of waste paper.”
Some of the rhymes (there is more to be said of them) were written too easily or too hastily to be of much account, but there are points in favour of a method that makes writing a relaxation, and allows no time for second thoughts.
The _Original Poems_[135] have a spontaneity and freshness that take a small child at once. The sisters never lost the secret of writing for children, because they could always think with them. Ann, the eldest, had mothered the family, and afterwards brought up a family of her own; yet she wrote at _eighty_: “The feeling of being a grown woman, to say nothing of an _old_ woman, does not come naturally to me”.
Many writers (especially moralists) try to hold a child’s attention beyond its power. Jane Taylor in this, as in other matters, understands her audience.
“I try to conjure up some child into my presence, address her suitably, as well as I am able, and when I begin to flag, I say to her, ‘_There, love, now you may go_.’”
Jane was the genius of the family. “Dear Jane had no need to borrow, what I could ill afford to lose,” said the gentle Ann, of some good thing which had been attributed to her brilliant sister.
The habit of “castle-building” caused Jane many heart-searchings. She was as stern with herself as Bunyan; she magnified all her little failings (or supposed failings) into sins. “I know I have sometimes lived so much in a _castle_ as almost to forget that I lived in a _house_, and while I have been carefully arranging aerial matters _there_, have left all my solid business in disorder _here_.”
It was absurd, of course, to accuse a Taylor of disorder; but the distrust of imagination was characteristic. She valued imagination only so far as it interpreted spiritual truth. The great difference between Jane Taylor and the realists was that her reality had no connection with materialism. To her, the life of the spirit was the greatest reality. A thing was real or unreal according to its intrinsic worth. Her sharpest satire was poured upon the material benevolence of philosophy, “_the light of Nature-boasting man_”, or the poet who could
“Pluck a wild Daisy, moralise on that And drop a tear for an expiring gnat.”
True benevolence, so her creed ran,
“... rises energetic to perform The hardest task, or face the rudest storm.”
Duty and sacrifice are her watchwords. The search for happiness brings only “The lessons taught at Disappointment’s knee.” Earth is wonderful, but men misuse it, seeking worthless things in their madness; yet:
“The soul—perhaps in silence of the night Has flashes, transient intervals of light; When things to come without a shade of doubt In terrible reality stand out. ... These are the moments when the mind is sane.”
_The Essays in Rhyme_[136] are for grown-up readers, but they state with perfect clearness the ideals that inspired her work for children.
Under the pseudonym of “Q. Q.”, Jane Taylor contributed for six years to the _Youths’ Magazine_,[137] and her best pieces (afterwards collected) were “for children or men.”
“_The young are new to themselves; and all that surrounds them is novel._”
“Q. Q.” gives them short moral tales, full of point and humour: really “entertaining” moral tales, and brilliant little character-studies. They read, and begin to know themselves. She introduces them to “Persons of Consequence” (one, “little Betsy Bond, daughter of John Bond, the journeyman Carpenter”). She sets forth a contrast: the old Philosopher, so wise that he is humble, and the Young Lady, just leaving School, who considers herself “not only perfectly accomplished but also thoroughly well-informed”; or the two brothers, one of whom writes a clever essay on self-denial, while the other practises it. Youth is left to judge between them.
The most arresting of these “Contributions”, “How it strikes a Stranger”, inspired Browning’s poem “The Star of my God Rephan.” A stranger from another planet, finding himself upon Earth, is filled with interest and wonder at what he sees. He enters readily into the pleasures of the new life, and remains thoughtlessly happy till he is faced with the unknown fact of death.
They refer him to the priests for an explanation.
“How!” he replies, “then I cannot have understood you; do the priests only die? Are not you to die also?” When he understands, he regards death as a privilege and refuses to do anything “inconsistent with his _real interests_.” The Adventure is described with a wonderful force of imagination; but the lesson strikes upon youthful ears like the voice in _Everyman_:
“Everyman, stand still. Whither art thou going, Thus gaily?”
Some, not yet ripe for this encounter, would turn for comfort to the bright and imaginative “Life of a Looking Glass,” and revive their more childish interest in the “adventures of things”.
The Glass, “being naturally of a reflecting cast,” would catch, but not hold the restless attention of very little persons. It was for those past the stage of actual belief in talking things, who came back to it with a new perception of imaginative correspondences.
The tranquil passage of the story (so perfectly adapted to the “speaker”) is broken now and then by a flash of wit. There is nothing extraordinary about the incidents: that the writer admits; but she never fails “to give the charm of novelty to things of everyday”, and chooses her pictures not so much for moral ends as because they would be likely to persist among the “reflections” of a looking-glass.
First, the large spider in the carver and gilder’s workshop “which, after a vast deal of scampering about, began very deliberately to weave a curious web” all over the face of the glass, affording it “great amusement.” There is something in the responsive brightness of the thing that gives immediate sanction to the idea of its being _amused_. Then, the lively apprentice who gave it “a very significant look”, which it took at the time for a compliment to itself. And then a succession of images in quick movement reflected from a London Street. “The good-looking people always seemed the best pleased with me”, it remarks, with a sly gleam, “which I attributed to their superior discernment.”
After this, the scene changes to one of almost lifeless calm; the “best parlour of a country house, whose Master and Mistress see no company except at Fair time and Christmas Day.”
“Perhaps I should have experienced some dismay”, remarks the glass, “if I could have known that I was destined to spent _fifty years_ in that spot.”
The younger the reader, the more endless such an interval would seem; yet if any had patience to follow the tale at its own pace, they might enjoy the fashion of that parlour: the old chairs and tables, the Dutch tiles with stories in them, that surrounded the grate, and the pattern of the paper hangings “which consisted alternately of a parrot, a poppy and a shepherdess—a parrot, a poppy and a shepherdess”. The repeated phrase suggests the length of days. “The room being so little used, the window-shutters were rarely opened; but there were three holes cut in each, in the shape of a heart, through which, day after day and year after year, I used to watch the long dim dusty sunbeams streaming across the dark parlour.”
Youth cannot wait for description, but these words translate themselves into light and shade.
Here is the mistress of that parlour, ready dressed for church on a Sunday morning, trotting in upon her high-heeled shoes, unfolding a leaf of the shutters and standing straight before the looking-glass. She turns half round to the right and left to see if the corner of her well-starched kerchief is pinned exactly in the middle. The glass has turned portrait painter. “I think I can see her now”, it says, “in her favourite dove-coloured lustring (which she wore every Sunday in every Summer for seven years at the least) and her long full ruffles and worked apron”. Then follows the master, who, though his visit was somewhat shorter, never failed to come and settle his Sunday wig before the glass.
Thus half a century goes by, with the imperceptible movement from youth to age. The glass is reset in a gilt frame to suit the fashion of new times; once more it reflects young faces and vibrates with the laughter of youth.
Jane Taylor could be didactic on principle, but she was a true artist and knew that virtue is best recommended by its visible effects.
The looking-glass, “incapable of misrepresentation,” cannot help showing errors and vanities; but having acquired “considerable skill in physiognomy”, discovers more than the mere outside. Its last study is almost a “Character”:
“There was, of course, in a few years, some little alteration, but although the bloom of youth began to fade, there was nothing less of sweetness, cheerfulness and contentment in her expression. She retained the same placid smile, the same unclouded brow, the same mildness in her eye (though it was somewhat less sparkling) as when it first beamed upon me ten years before.”
This is the Princess of the Moral Tale. She gives a last glance at the looking-glass in her bridal dress, and leaves it to its memories.
“Sometimes my dear mistress’s favourite cat will steal in as though in quest of her; leap up upon the table and sweep her long tail across my face; then, catching a glimpse of me, jump down again and run out as though she was frightened.”
There is no “moral”, only this epilogue in dumb-show to repeat the theme of change.
The humour of the looking-glass has an undersense of pathos; but this is not the pathos of _Mrs. Leicester’s School_. It would touch a child directly, like a picture without words.
Books had no more to do with Jane Taylor’s love of Nature than with her understanding of her fellow creatures. She looked out of a diamond-paned window upon quiet Essex fields and “a tract of sky”.[138] The sky, always the most beautiful thing in a flat country, was to her more productive than the soil of the realists. But she loved gardens too, and caught the individuality of flowers. Ann’s _Wedding Among the Flowers_[139] is less amusing than Jane’s “fable” of the envious weed that shoots up till it overtops the fence, and then, provoked by the beauty of the flowers in the next garden, twists the chief beauty of each into a defect:
“Well, ’tis enough to make one chilly To see that pale consumptive lily Among these painted folks. Miss Tulip, too, looks wondrous odd, She’s gaping like a dying cod; What a queer stick is Golden-Rod! And how the violet pokes!”
Flowers are _persons_ to Jane Taylor. She loves them as friends: “the good, gay and well-dressed company which a little flower garden displays”.
“Science has succeeded to poetry,” said Lamb. Jane Taylor did not think them incompatible. Her “old retired gentleman” could look at his garden from two points of view:
“a part of the pleasure which now in my old age I derive from my flowers arises, I am conscious, from the distant yet vivid remembrance they recall of similar scenes and pleasures of my childhood. My paternal garden seems still to me _like enchanted ground_, and its flowers like the flowers of Paradise. I shall never see the like again, vain as I am of my gardening! Those were _poetry_, these are botany!”[140]
Imaginative power in the Taylors illuminated their religious conceptions. In Mrs. Sherwood,[141] it struggled against the formulæ of rigid doctrine. From six to thirteen, she learned her lessons standing in the stocks with an _iron collar_ round her neck. When it was taken off (seldom, she says, till late in the evening), she would run for half a mile through the woods, as if trying to overtake her lost playtime. It says much for the quick recoveries of youth that she was a happy child. Stanford Rectory, where she spent her “golden age”, was surrounded by woods and hills that seem to have become a part of her before the iron collar was imposed. She built huts and made garlands with her brother; they acted fairy tales in the woods: tales of “dragons, enchanters and queens”. She remembered her mother teaching them to read from “a book where there was a picture of a white horse feeding by moonlight”, a print of pure romance. She remembered the wonder-tales told on dark winter evenings by “a person vastly pleasant to children” who came across the park “in a great bushy wig, a shovel hat, and a cravat tied like King William’s bib”.
And yet, when she began to write books for children, after some years of married life in India, she put on an iron collar of her own accord, to set forth the dire consequences of Original Sin. When (perhaps late in a chapter) she took it off, her imagination could conjure up no fairies; but working upon the memories of her own childhood, it brought life into the tale.
Mrs. Sherwood wrote an extraordinary number of children’s books; many were published by Houlston the Quaker as chap-books.[142] The sternest and most uncompromising dogmatism cannot crush the life out of them, nor weaken the vivid pictures they contain. Her first journey across the hills to Lichfield, when she was a child of four, had made a deeper impression on her mind than all her Indian travels. She had fresher memories of the English hills than of “the Indian Caucasus hanging as brilliant clouds on the horizon”. The quiet inland life that is the chief matter of her autobiography[143] is reflected in most of her stories. She is not concerned with any wider interests; great events pass unnoticed, as they do in some nurseries; but whenever Mrs. Sherwood remembers her Doctrines, she goes back to the Warnings and Examples of the seventeenth century. There is a grim shadow on her nursery wall, and in the midst of the most innocent employments, her little people shrink and cower. This spectre stood over her when she tampered with a book which children of all ages understand and enjoy. She accepted _The Pilgrim’s Progress_ as a part of her creed; her knowledge of it accounts for the fine simplicity of her style. Yet in her _Infant’s Progress from the Valley of Destruction to Everlasting Glory_,[144] there is not a giant nor a castle to atone for her bane on “toys” which the strictest philosopher would pass as harmless and instructive. Her poor little pilgrim suffers a martyrdom of denial in a juvenile Vanity Fair:
“Then I saw that certain of these teachers of vanities came and spread forth their toys before Humble Mind, to wit, pencils, and paints, maps and drawings, _pagan poems_ and _fabulous histories_, musical instruments of various kinds, with all the gaudy fripperies of modern learning.”
Some of these things had been the delight of Mrs. Sherwood’s youth; but in her passion for dogma, she forgot the white horse and the fairy tales, and persuaded herself that an iron collar was the only protection against vanity.
Her adaptation of Sarah Fielding’s _Governess_[145] shows the same Puritan intolerance. The book had been in her own nursery library, along with _Margery Two-Shoes_, _Robinson Crusoe_ and “two sets of fairy tales.” Yet she expurgated all but one of the “moral” fairy tales allowed by Mrs. Teachum, and inserted in their place “such appropriate relations as seemed more likely to conduce to juvenile edification.”
It is likely (and for her children’s sake to be hoped) that Mrs. Sherwood’s practice was kinder and more cheerful than her precepts. _The Fairchild Family_,[146] the best known, and the best of her books, is full of interest and reality; and in this, the setting is her home and the persons are her own children.
To enjoy it, a child must skip solid pages of doctrine, and would do well besides to skip most of the stories read by the Fairchild Family out of little gilt books which “the good-natured John” brought them from the Fair.
These were chap-books, but of a sort only less forbidding than those the pedlar carried in Puritan days. John gave the largest to Lucy and the other to Emily. “‘Here is two pennyworth, and there is three pennyworth,’ said he.
‘My book,’ said Emily, ‘is the History of the _Orphan Boy_![147], and there are a great many pictures in it; the first is the picture of a funeral.’
‘Let me see, let me see!’ said Henry, ‘_oh, how pretty!_’”
Late editors flinch at the inhumanity of the punishments, and usually omit the gibbet story which, at the outset, throws a horrible shadow on the book. There has been a quarrel in the nursery; the children are penitent, they have been forgiven; but Mr. Fairchild deems it necessary to give them a concrete illustration of the fate of one who has failed to control his passions. He takes them to “Blackwood” (so far off that little Henry has to be carried) and shows them the body of a murderer hanging from a gibbet. “_The face of the corpse was so shocking that the children could not look upon it_”.
It is to be supposed that children who survived this kind of treatment could be happy, since there was little left to excite their terror. Henry, when he steals a forbidden apple, is threatened with fire and brimstone and locked up in a dark room. The very frightfulness of all this would defeat its end, for if a child could live through it, and look up the next morning at an unclouded sky, or take his part in the cheerful concerns of men, the thing would come, in time, to have no meaning for him. It is clear that this happened with the Fairchild Family. They act and talk (save when they are made the mouthpieces of older persons) like healthy and ordinary children. They even dare to be naughty in an ordinary way. No sooner are Mr. and Mrs. Fairchild called away from home, than original sin begins to assert itself. This chapter is “_On the Constant Bent of Man’s Heart towards Sin_”.
Emily and Lucy play in bed instead of getting up: “Emily made babies of the pillows, and Lucy pulled off the sheets and tied them round her, in imitation of Lady Noble’s long-trained gown.” There is no encouragement for the dramatic games of children, any more than for dancing, in Mrs. Sherwood’s books.
Then Henry announces hot buttered toast for breakfast; they hurry down “without praying, washing themselves, combing their hair, making their bed, or doing any one thing they ought to have done.”
After breakfast they take out their books, but they have eaten so much that they “cannot learn with any pleasure”. A quarrel is checked by Henry’s discovery of a little pig in the garden. The three at once give chase. Another “juvenile” _Pilgrim’s Progress_, this:
“Now, there was a place where a spring ran across the lane, over which was a narrow bridge, for the use of people walking that way. Now the pig did not stand to look for the bridge, but went splash, splash, through the midst of the water; and after him went Henry, Lucy and Emily, though they were up to their knees in mud and dirt.” Mrs. Sherwood had caught the live clearness of Bunyan’s pictures.
A neighbour (one of the unregenerate, whom the children have been forbidden to visit) kindly dries their clothes; she also regales them with cider, “and as they were never used to drink anything but water, it made them quite tipsy for a little while.”
The good-natured John, discovering their condition, calls them “naughty rogues”. He gives them dinner and ties them to their chairs, but afterwards relents and allows them to play in the barn, where he thinks they can do no more mischief. Here they let down a swing which they are only supposed to play with when Papa is present; Emily falls out of it and narrowly escapes being killed.
At this point Mr. and Mrs. Fairchild quite unexpectedly come home. The children fall upon their knees and fade once more into unreality.
Thus Mrs. Sherwood replaces the iron collar after her bursts of freedom. It is hardly a disguise. It does not change her personality, it simply keeps her rigid.
Even Mrs. Fairchild had enjoyed some interludes; but that was when she was little and naughty. She actually confessed to her Family that “a little girl employed about the house” had tempted her on one occasion _to climb a cherry-tree_.
Afterwards her aunts talked to her whilst she cried very much. “Think of the shame and disgrace”, said they, “of climbing trees in such low company, after all the care and pains we have taken and the delicate manner in which we have reared you!”
But she also remembered and quoted the words of that “little girl employed about the house”:
“Oh, Miss, Miss! I can see from where I am all the town and both the churches, and here is such plenty of cherries! Do come up!”
This is a prose foretaste of _The Child’s Garden_.
CHAPTER VIII
MISS EDGEWORTH’S TALES FOR CHILDREN
Life at Edgeworthstown—Educational adventures—_Practical Education_—First stories—_The Parent’s Assistant_—New elements—“Waste Not, Want Not”: the Geometric plot—“Little plays”—Settings of the tales—Practical interests—Characters—“Little touches”—_Early Lessons_—“The Purple Jar”—_Harry and Lucy_—“Nonsense in season”—_Moral Tales_—Qualities of Miss Edgeworth’s tales—“_La triste utilité_”—The Edgeworth fairy—Dr. Johnson as the fairies’ champion—Miss Edgeworth and her predecessors—The magic of science and life.
Maria Edgeworth was sixteen years old when her father brought her to his Irish estate of Edgeworthstown.[148] Her childhood had been full of quiet preoccupations, and it argues much for the impersonal methods of Mr. Day that, although he had grounded her in Rousseau’s theory, she was in no way dominated by it.
At Edgeworthstown, her ideas were brought into wholesome touch with reality. The life was almost adventurous after those quiet years in Oxfordshire and London. Her father gave her a real share in managing the estate and she was soon acquainted with many sides of Irish character; but all her affections and interests were centred in the family, and in this lay the secret of her power as a writer of children’s books.
Mr. Edgeworth had brought up his eldest boy upon Rousseau’s exact plan, a more unfortunate experiment than Mr. Day’s; for this child of Nature would neither teach himself nor learn from others; but his brothers and sisters gained more than he lost by it: the system was modified for them, and Emile’s solitary employments found a place among the cheerful occupations of a big family.
The children were so happy and so busy that Mr. Edgeworth could say in a letter to Dr. Darwin:
“I do not think one tear per month is shed in this house, nor the voice of reproof heard, nor the hand of restraint felt”.
He encouraged Maria to record their educational adventures, and her own translation of _Adèle et Théodore_[149] may have suggested the idea of a book. The two volumes of _Practical Education_, published in 1798, with the names of Richard Lovell and Maria Edgeworth on the title page, mark the beginning of the long partnership which she called “the joy and pride of my life”.
What her books might have been without her father’s influence may be conjectured from what they are; this is truer of the children’s books than of the novels. She had no need of theory. Clear intelligence, warm and ready sympathies, carried her straight to the centres of childish thought. A little brother, Henry, had been her especial charge, and from him she learned what might have escaped her in the general business of the family.
She scribbled her first stories on a slate, read them to the children and altered them to suit their taste. Those they liked best were printed in 1796 at Mr. Edgeworth’s suggestion,[150] and when the little outside public called for more, fresh stories were produced on the same co-operative plan and published in the six volumes of 1800.
“The stories are printed and bound the same size as _Evenings at Home_,” wrote Miss Edgeworth to her cousin (Feb. 27, 1796), “but I am afraid you will dislike the title; my father had sent _The Parent’s Friend_, but Mr. Johnson has degraded it into _The Parent’s Assistant_, which I dislike particularly from association with an old book of Arithmetic called _The Tutor’s Assistant_.”
There is Geometry, if not Arithmetic, in the book. The pattern is symmetrical: the tales are constructed to fit the morals; but the Edgeworths recognised the chief faults of didactic books for children, and made the first definite attempt to deal with them.
“To prevent the precepts of morality from tiring the ear and the mind”, says Mr. Edgeworth in the preface, “it was necessary to make the stories in which they are introduced in some measure dramatic; to keep alive hope and fear and curiosity by some degree of intricacy.”
This is the best that can be done where the moral is so explicit; and the device of intricacy serves to divert attention from a too exact correspondence between cause and effect.
In Miss Edgeworth’s clear and well-ordered world the results of choice and action are inevitable; but her plots (she was the pioneer of plot in children’s books) involve a puzzle, and in the solution there is always an element of surprise.
That Bristol merchant in “Waste Not, Want Not,”[151] who invited his two nephews to stay with him, in order to decide which of them he should adopt, bears more than a chance resemblance to Mr. Day. If the two boys had been girls, the story might have been his own; but in literature, as in life, Mr. Day was prone to digress; he never could have followed the relentless order of events from the untying of the two parcels by Hal and Benjamin (the Merton and Sandford of this drama) to its logical result. There is a cumulative fatality about this which puts it beyond question.
No sooner has the inconsequent Hal watched the careful untying of Ben’s parcel, and cut the whipcord of his own “precipitately in sundry places” than the uncle gives them each a top.
“And now” (a child never could resist the interruption). “And now, _he won’t have any string for his top_!”
The improvident one, however, finds a way out by spinning it with his hat-string (the consequence of this is deferred); and then, after whipping the banisters aimlessly with the cut string, drops it upon the stairs. Little Patty, his cousin, running downstairs with his pocket-handkerchief (which he is in too desperate a hurry to fetch himself), falls down a whole flight of stairs; and the assiduous Ben, hunting for her lost shoe, finds it _sticking in a loop of whipcord_.
For a time, the string theme is allowed to drop, but it comes up again as a chief agent of the catastrophe. Hal, on his way to the Archery-meeting stoops to pick up his ball and loses his hat. (“The string, as we may recollect, our wasteful hero had used in spinning his top”.). Running down the hill after it, he falls prostrate in his green and white uniform into a treacherous bed of red mud, and becomes the laughing-stock of his companions.
Last and bitterest of all, he sees his prudent cousin replace a cracked bow-string and win the contest by drawing from his pocket “an excellent piece of whipcord”. Not a reader but echoes, with additions, the unfortunate Hal’s exclamation: “_The everlasting whipcord, I declare!_”
This single strand goes in and out with the shuttle-motion of a nursery rhyme:
_This is the string that Hal cut._ _These are the Stairs_ _That lay under the String_ _That Hal cut._ _This is the Child_ _That fell over the Stairs—etc._
With it are interwoven character-incidents that echo the title-motto and harp on the note of Rousseau and Henry Brooke: the choice of the two boys between a warm great-coat and a green and white uniform, which culminates with perfect logic in Ben’s loan of the despised coat to cover Hal’s spoilt finery; and the minor choice between queen-cakes and keeping one’s halfpence to give to a beggar.
It is the strong point of Miss Edgeworth’s contrasts that her bad children are never attractive, and her good ones hardly ever impossible.
Hal is no villain; but there is no glamour about his naughtiness: he is greedy and boastful as well as improvident; a child is not moved to emulate him. The real villains are dishonest or cruel or insolent, never simply thoughtless or self-willed.
But the good children are a positive triumph. Only Miss Edgeworth could make a boy live that untied knots to save string, chose an overcoat instead of a gay uniform and had money to spare for good works. This Ben is as natural as his pleasure-loving cousin.
The moral, for all its insistence, never hides a picture: the house, the Bristol streets and shops, the scene in the Cathedral, where they listen to a robin that has lived there for so many years; and Ben and his uncle admire the stained-glass windows, but Hal looks bored. These are drawn to the life.
“_Cannot one see a uniform and a Cathedral both in one morning?_”
Every other boy in the Edgeworth family was a Ben, and would endorse this catholicity of interest.
It is odd that Miss Edgeworth’s “little plays”[152] should be among the least dramatic of her works. They were, in fact, stories dramatised to fit the family “_théâtre d’éducation_,” and the dramatist, intent upon her lesson, trusted her little company to create their parts. The link with Madame de Genlis is of the slightest, for although the Edgeworth children were being educated more or less upon the model of St. Leu, their plays and stories were not in the least like any that Madame de Genlis had written.
To Miss Edgeworth, truth was the first law of writing, and she must have felt the want of sincerity that came between Madame de Genlis and her books.[153]
Her own stories are essentially dramatic; there is life in every word of dialogue,—but the characters need no artificial light. A painted background was a poor substitute for her usual settings, villages that rang with the sounds of honest labour, fields and orchards full of children: a realist’s Arcadia.
The little town of Somerville (in “The White Pigeon”), which in a few years had “assumed the neat and cheerful appearance of an English village”, is in fact a picture of Edgeworthstown. It is only when the writer allows her characters to stray outside the bounds of her own knowledge that the scenery begins to shake. Her school stories would hardly convince an outsider;[154] the Neapolitan setting of “The Little Merchants” is ludicrously out of keeping with so moral a community.
But all this is nothing to a child. His interest centres round the objects that make pictures in the mind, the business he can imitate.
Berquin understood the practical interests of children, but he had not Miss Edgeworth’s keen eye for things that “draw”. The purple jar in the chemists’ window, the coloured sugar-plums of the little merchants, the green and white uniform. Berquin’s children were never so independent as these. His orphans were adopted; Miss Edgeworth’s keep house by themselves in a ruined castle, and ply their trades of knitting and spinning and shoe-making with the rhythm of a singing game. The finding of a treasure among the ruins is a freak of romance that holds the imagination even while the coins are being weighed and marked.
Goody Grope, the old treasure-seeker who demands her share of the orphans’ luck, is the only Irish study, but other characters would connect these stories, if they were not so frankly acknowledged, with the author of _Castle Rackrent_ and _The Absentee_: Mrs. Pomfret, that lesser Malaprop, with her “_Villaintropic Society_” and “_drugs and refugees_”; Mrs. Theresa Tattle; Mademoiselle Panache, the milliner-governess, betrayed by her mouthful of pins.
Emma and Helen Temple,[155] drawn without reference to a System, and left to develop each in her own way, would pass for sedate and early types of “Sense and Sensibility”; it pleased Miss Edgeworth the better that she could allow a measure of sense to Sensibility.
She has many variants of these types: the wise sister and playful brother; the well-informed brother with a thoughtless sister, the wise or thoughtless one with a foolish or a prudential family. Not one of them is quite like any other. Nobody could mistake Laura, Rosamond’s good sister[156] for the equally sensible Sophy, sister to Frederick and Marianne.[157]
Rosamond, with her filigree basket, would have repeated the lesson of Charlotte and the watch, but unlike Charlotte, she made the useless thing as a birthday present for somebody else. The worst that can be said of Miss Edgeworth’s young people is that they sometimes (from the very reasonableness of their up-bringing) assume an attitude of “civil contempt” towards ordinary folk. They understand too soon the dangers that arise in education from a bad servant or a silly governess, and are too fond of arguments and encyclopædias. These are annoying traits in otherwise natural and pleasant persons, for although they are prigs in matters of knowledge or conscience, they have a very sound sense of values and can even be merry when it is not unreasonable to laugh.
Sir Walter Scott said that Miss Edgeworth was “best in the little touches.”[158] Children always find this out. They love the robin that sings in the Cathedral, the child that shared her bread and milk with the pig, the “little breathless girl” who ran back to thank Simple Susan for the double cowslips and violets, crying, “_Kiss me quick, for I shall be left behind_.”
The smallest parts are played in character, in spite of the didactic purpose and the clock-work plot. This story of “Simple Susan” is not unlike a Kilner pastoral; but the colours are fresher, the lines more definite.
“When the little girl parts with her lamb” said Scott, “and the little boy brings it back to her, there is nothing for it but just to put down the book and cry.”
But perhaps his great love of children made him read more pathos into the story than is actually there. Few readers cry over these tales. They reflect the temper of the Edgeworth family.
_Early Lessons_[159] records the schooling of these children. Maria had scarcely discovered “the warmth and pleasure of invention” when her father recalled her to the Schoolroom. She set about straightening her bright intricate patterns to make reading books for the little ones, much as Dr. Primrose’s daughters cut up their trains into Sunday waistcoats for Dick and Bill.
To turn from the _Parent’s Assistant_ to _Early Lessons_ is to agree with Byron that there ought to have been a Society for the Suppression of Mr. Edgeworth.
And yet there is something to be said for these chosen and deliberate little scenes. Acquaintance prospers where there is no plot-interest to engross attention. The “little boy whose name was Frank” steps as naturally into the story as he would into a familiar room. He is so obviously a real little boy that it is even possible to believe in his virtues:
“When his father or mother said to him, ‘Frank, shut the door,’ he ran directly and shut the door. When they said to him ‘Frank, do not touch that knife,’ he took his hands away from the knife, and did not touch it. He was an obedient little boy.”
There is something arresting in this.
Frank’s doings and his sayings are a model of simplicity; but nobody could say of him what Charles Lamb said of Mrs. Barbauld’s little boys. As surely as any critic is disposed to laugh at Frank, he finds himself watching with involuntary interest while Frank pulls the leg of the table, and finds out what would have happened to the tea-cups if he had not been such “an obedient little boy”. His adventures, moreover, are not all among the tea-cups. He is interested in a carpenter and in kites, and he has a more than usually good eye for a horse. What really distresses the reader is that he is never allowed out of school; his most casual experience contributes to his mental and moral advancement. Chestnuts, glow-worms, the flame of a candle and other enchanting things are impounded for object lessons. Frank’s father and mother are his tutor and governess; the only poetry they mete out to him comes from Dr. Darwin’s _Botanic Garden_[160], and is “correlated” to Natural History; and after that it has to be explained. For when Dr. Darwin sings of a moth’s “trunk”, little Frank understands by that “a sort of box”; when his mother repeats:
“Alight, ye beetles, from your airy rings”,
he asks (not without reason) “What does that mean, mamma?” But the explanation would have come without asking. The Governess is giving a lesson, the tutor is at her elbow; and because you should never laugh in lessons, it is all rather serious.
But here, as in every school, are the children; the rest hardly counts. Here, for example, when a child has made friends with Frank, is Rosamond, who will make him forget all these lessons.
Readers of _The Parent’s Assistant_ had met her before, with a filigree basket. Here she is again, “about seven years old”, walking with her mother in the London streets, a very figure of childhood.
The mother disposes one by one of her bright interests: The toys (“_all_ of them”), the roses in the milliner’s window, the “pretty baubles” in the jeweller’s shop. And then:
“‘Oh mother! oh!’ cried she, pulling her mother’s hand; ‘Look, look! blue, green, red, yellow and purple! O mamma, what beautiful things! Won’t you buy some of these?’” (It was a chemist’s shop, but Rosamond did not know that.)
Her mother answered, as before:
“What use would they be of to me, Rosamond?” It is the purple jar that takes the child’s fancy. Driven to invent a _use_ for it, she thinks she could use it for a flower pot, but that was no part of her desire.
The story of Rosamond and the Purple Jar was meant to celebrate the usual triumph of the Perfect Parent; but every child knows it is Rosamond who triumphs; and this is the point where the Perfect Parent makes her first mistake. She does not warn Rosamond, she only _hints_:
“Perhaps, if you were to see it nearer, if you were to examine it, you might be disappointed”.
Now, Frank had his chance. They took away the tea-cups before he let down that table-leaf. But nobody helps Rosamond. The little reader follows, in close sympathy, as she goes on unwillingly, keeping her head turned “to look at the purple Vase till she could see it no longer”. And as she goes, it transpires that her shoes “are quite worn out”. That it should come to this, points to some pre-arrangement by the Perfect Parent. The occasion presents a unique opportunity for choice:
“Well, which would you rather have, that jar or a pair of shoes?” The parental Economist cannot buy both; she makes Rosamond understand that she will not have another pair of shoes that month.
Thus the purple jar repeats the theme of the filigree basket and the green and white uniform.
What Rosamond was never told, and what she could not reasonably have been expected to deduce, was that the beautiful purple colour was not in the glass. A child cannot forgive injustice; all Rosamond’s friends (and all children are her friends) cry out that it “wasn’t fair”. They all say, “She wouldn’t have chosen the jar if she had _known_”; and they are right. But the story goes on relentless. Rosamond, sweet and unquestioning, survives the whole painful experience and hopes at the end of it that she will be “wiser another time”; but the Perfect Parent has lost all the prestige she ever had with children. She lost it before her callous and unintelligent question, “Why should you cry, my dear?” But that sealed her fate.
“I _love_ Rosamond”, said a little twentieth-century girl, not long ago, “but, oh, how I _hate_ that mother!”
Miss Edgeworth drew none of her portraits from a single original; but she often sat to herself for some part of them, and at least one likeness was recognised by the family. Writing in her sixtieth year to her aunt, of the “great progress” she is resolved to make, she adds: “‘_Rosamond at sixty_,’ says Margaret.”
*       *       *       *       *
_Harry and Lucy_, begun by Mr. Edgeworth and continued at intervals with Maria’s help, was finished by her in 1825[161]. The four volumes, she says, complete the series of “Early Lessons”, in which Harry and Lucy had already figured; but although her drawings of the two children add colour to the book, it is really an oblation, on Mr. Edgeworth’s behalf, to the Giant Instruction.
At this stage, it is true, there is a laboratory as well as a museum in the giant’s castle; he can illustrate the marvels of steam and suggest experiments with electricity. Yet this is only a more practical Circle of the Sciences. The children’s voices are trained to the question and answer of a “Guide to Knowledge”; their lives are marked off in lesson-periods. Even when a dull journey offers the means of escape, these little captives hug their chains. They never travel without books, and when there is nothing to observe from the carriage windows, they find education in the forests of the Oroonoko, where the plague of flies affords “an inexhaustible subject of conversation.”
The “Grand Panjandrum” could never come better than into this juvenile Cyclopædia.[162]
Mr. Foote’s “droll nonsense” pleases Miss Edgeworth chiefly because it was invented to test a man’s memory; yet she can tolerate nonsense, at any rate when there is no danger of its being confused with sense.
They are all there: “the Picninnies and the Joblillies and the Garyulies, and the Grand Panjandrum himself with the little round button at top.” Lucy laughs and enjoys it, Harry calls it “horrible nonsense”; but their father’s opinion is final, and Miss Edgeworth agrees with him:
“It is sweet to talk nonsense in season. Always sense would make Jack a dull boy.”
*       *       *       *       *
The didactic purpose, which hampers the story-teller at every turn, becomes more irksome as an audience passes from childhood into youth. Fixed patches of light and shade appear unnatural; the critical eyes of youth are open to devices that passed unnoticed in the nursery.
Miss Edgeworth’s _Moral Tales_, “for young people of a more advanced age”,[163] followed Marmontel into his own province; but Marmontel drew his lessons from the world as he found it; Miss Edgeworth fits her world to her father’s theories.
Here again she has admirable portraits: the Quixotic Forester, a new and convincing likeness of Thomas Day; Angelina, that mirror of “romantic eccentricities”; Mademoiselle Panache, little changed since her first appearance, but here balanced by a “good French Governess”. The unconscious satire of Lady Catherine is twice barbed:
“I don’t want to trouble you to alter his habits or to teach him chemistry or _any of those things_.”
Yet here, as in _Early Lessons_, the persons walk gingerly, after the manner of Berquin’s little boy who kept the skirts of his coat under his arms, “for fear of doing any damage to the flowers”. The paths of the Edgeworth garden are purposely narrowed that their doings may “neither dissipate the attention nor inflame the imagination.”
Miss Edgeworth’s books fitted into her busy life as a natural occupation for long evenings. She wrote in the common sitting-room with the family about her, not one of them under any constraint, but talking freely, as if she had been sewing instead of novel-writing. It was characteristic of her that she could turn to children’s books in the midst of the Defender troubles. An Irish rising claimed no more attention than the play and laughter of the children. She could refer to it in a letter, and pass on to the next domestic detail without wasting a moment in “useless reflection”. That is precisely the mood of her stories. The _Moral Tales_, addressed to an emotional age, do not merely ignore the common forms of “Sensibility”; they take no account whatever of the stronger affections and more vigorous manifestations of life: a thing scarcely tolerable to generous youth. In the nursery books, this equanimity has its uses. It enables her to deal with one thing at a time, to select from a mass of details the particular things that a child would waste time in choosing. Nothing worries or puzzles her; she sees the world in clear and simple pictures, and reduces the inconsequent thoughts of children to a relentless order.
Her little figures stand out in firm outline and bright colour, and the background is interesting chiefly as it gives occupation or the means of life.
Madame de Staël was thinking of the _Tales of Fashionable Life_, when she said:
Flowers in Miss Edgeworth’s garden (she is a true lover of flowers) are beautiful symbols of human care and industry; but they never encroach upon vegetables.
Rosamond was a rebel. “Mustard-seed, compared with pinks, carnations, sweet-peas or sweet-williams, did not quite suit Rosamond’s fancy.”[165]
Miss Edgeworth had chosen those flowers for Rosamond, but the Perfect Parent knew better. When the sweet thing planned a labyrinth of Crete “to go zig-zag—zig-zag” through one of her borders, she was reasoned out of it for the sake of some little green things that were going to be mignonette, and when she and Godfrey were thinking of digging a pond, a shocked voice cried:
“What! in the midst of your fine bed of turnips?”
Romance dies hard; but the odds were against Rosamond:
“And now, Mamma, _lay out_ my garden for me, as Godfrey says, exactly to your own taste; and I will alter it all to-morrow to please you.” This would be Emily and her mother over again, if it were not so like Maria and her father.
*       *       *       *       *
Dealing with a criticism by her cousin, Colonel Stuart, Miss Edgeworth wrote: “I _know_ I feel how much _more is to be done, ought to be done_, by suggestion than by delineation, by creative fancy than by facsimile copying”; but she wisely stuck to her own method. It is where she touches the magic circle that she is “spell-stopp’d.” When Laura reads the fairy-tale to Rosamond (she is only allowed _one_), her passage into an unreasonable world is marked by a change of diction. The Edgeworth fairy is “inexpressibly elegant”; her flowing robe is “tinctured with all the variety of colours that it is possible for nature or art to conceive”. But there is nothing supernatural about her. She is merely a new specimen for the Museum, to be “contemplated with attention”, like the others. The result, recorded in a scientific note, proves her a creature of flesh and blood:
“Small though she was, I could distinguish every fold in her garment, nay, even _every azure vein that wandered beneath her snowy skin_.”
Dr. Johnson and Miss Edgeworth took opposite sides on this question of the supernatural; and since experience proves that both were right, both must have been wrong.
Mr. Edgeworth attacked the Doctor’s belief that “babies do not want to hear about babies”, and Maria proved it a fallacy; but neither disposed of his claim for “somewhat which can stretch and stimulate their little minds.”
Mr. Edgeworth’s questions are not arguments: “why should the mind be filled with fantastic visions, instead of useful knowledge? Why should so much valuable time be lost? Why should we vitiate their taste and spoil their appetite, by suffering them to feed upon sweetmeats?”[166]
Dr. Johnson could have answered him, and perhaps Mr. Edgeworth knew it, for he adds:
“_It is to be hoped that the magic of Dr. Johnson’s name will not have power to restore the reign of fairies._”
There was no great danger, so long as Miss Edgeworth upheld the republic of common sense; but when at last she laid down her pen, all the spirits whose existence she had denied rose up and denounced her ineffectual successors.
Thus she brings the first century of children’s books to a natural close. She gathers up the loose ends of the old stories and weaves them into a bright and symmetrical design. The pattern is not wholly original: it was set by Marmontel, followed by Berquin, attempted by Madame de Genlis and the English Rousseauists; but Miss Edgeworth brought it to perfection, expressing traditional themes in terms of reason and benevolence.
The dramatic realism which marks her stories was the keynote of English ballads and folk-tales; she found a substitute for romance in the wonders of science. Roger Bacon, that wizard of the chap-books, appears as a forerunner of the Royal Society. Harry and Lucy know him as the discoverer of gunpowder, the inventor of the camera obscura, the prophet of flying-machines.[167]
In Miss Edgeworth’s tales, science has not merely succeeded to poetry; it has changed the enchanter’s instruments. The Balloon is the new Pegasus, or the Flying Horse of the Arabian Tales; the Magician still cries “New lamps for old;” but it is Davy’s lamp that he carries.
Rosamond, when she cannot explore the India Cabinet, is encouraged to look for wonderful things in her own house; which indeed was Miss Edgeworth’s own practice. Her “Enchanted Castle” was the home of her aunt, Mrs. Ruxton,[168] and Aboulcasem’s treasure was not more marvellous to her than a friend’s “inexhaustible fund of kindness and generosity.”
With the Lilliputians she had more in common than she would have acknowledged.
“When I was a child,” wrote Mr. Edgeworth in the third volume of _Early Lessons_, “I had no resource but Mr. Newbery’s little books and Mrs. Teachum.”[169] He is too conscious of the superiority of the new children’s books to do justice to Mistress Two-Shoes; yet she, with her little scholars and her weather-glass, was Miss Edgeworth’s Lilliputian prototype. Simple Susan could have compared notes with little Two-Shoes upon good and bad landlords, and in some of Miss Edgeworth’s stories there are prudential maxims that recall _Giles Gingerbread_ and _Primrose Prettyface_.
Some of Rosamond’s features may be traced in the portraits by Miss Fielding, the Kilners and Mary Lamb. The quaint miniature of Goody Two-Shoes has the same grave intelligent look. If this little person, so wholly unconscious of her charm, can be regarded as an English type, then Emilie could not have been altogether French.
Like Madame d’Epinay, Miss Edgeworth let Rousseau’s lifeless image of the parent or tutor stand between her and her readers. They listened to the talk of other children, but seldom heard her voice. “Little touches” in the _Letters_[170] would have made them better acquainted, for here she spoke freely, showing both tenderness and humour, making adventures of common incidents,—a journey or a visit to friends.
“I nearly disgraced myself”, she wrote, after a visit to Cambridge,[171] “as the company were admiring the front of Emmanuel College, by looking at a tall man stooping to kiss a little child.”
This betrays her attitude to art and life.
If she never understood the “fairy Way of Writing”, it was because she had built a school upon the fairy circles of her village green. Her children were so happy in and about the village that they never discovered an enchanted wood. They planted trees instead of climbing them; they knew all the roads to Market, but nobody showed them the way to Fairyland.
When at last the “reign of fairies” was restored, children burst into an unknown world of adventure and poetry. Ever since that little boy of Shenstone’s suffered for love of St. George, the fairies have fought shy of schools. It remains to be seen whether they will hold their own with modern pedagogues; but they are still in league with the poets, and the understanding between them is this: that the child, once having tasted fairy bread, can spend but half his time upon solid earth. The rest he must have in the Land of Dreams.
CHAPTER IX
THE OLD-FASHIONED GARDEN OF VERSES
_The Spectator_ on Gardens—“Cones, Globes, and Pyramids”—Good counsels in rhyme—Verse in the Schoolroom—Didactic rhymes—Dr. Watts’s _Divine and Moral Songs_—_Puerilia; or, Amusements for the Young; Gammer Gurton’s Garland_ and _Songs for the Nursery_—The Sublime Truant—Rules and prescriptions—_Original Poems for Infant Minds_—The old garden and the new—Jane Taylor’s verses—_Poetry for Children_, by Charles and Mary Lamb—_The Butterfly’s Ball_ and other festivals—Miss Turner’s cautionary rhymes—“Edward, or Rambling Reasoned on”—The triumph of nonsense and rhythm.
“I think there are as many Kinds of Gardening as of Poetry”, wrote the Spectator. His own garden ran into the “beautiful Wildness of Nature”; he valued it more for being full of blackbirds than of cherries, and very frankly gave them fruit for their songs.[172]
Nature, regarded as a landscape gardener of more than ordinary skill, was even allowed to work under authority in the domain of poetry; but she neglected one corner of it, and there the trees were still clipped after the old fashion into “Cones, Globes, and Pyramids.” This little fenced-off portion was the eighteenth century Child’s Garden of Verses. The only way out of it was by a narrow gate in the midst of a Yew hedge, and of this only good nurses kept the key.
In the lane outside, the pedlar hawked his wares; the old ballads could still be heard, the seven lamps of enchantment burnt bright at nightfall.
But inside the garden there were curious knots, with flowers of the older sort and fragrant herbs. As time went on, some of the trees were allowed to grow as they would; the open country could be seen through gaps in the hedge, and the children began to make friends with travellers upon the road.
Good counsels had run into rhyme from the beginning, that they might hang together among wandering thoughts. Thus might the _Whole Duty of a Child_ be remembered.[173] It gave, in short couplets, without figure, all the matter of later exemplary and cautionary verse; and since the lines were spoken in the person of the counsellor, there was a certain dramatic interest added; for he that repeated the lines assumed the part of Monitor.
This is one of the secrets of a child’s pleasure in didactic rhymes. School, dull enough in itself, becomes a live thing the moment it passes into the world of make-believe, and words of caution and authority are a delight when spoken in character.
Pedagogues and guardians of youth discovered in rhythm and rhyme a means of teaching facts otherwise unrelated. Emblem writers, feeling the weakness of their strained symbolism, clutched eagerly at an effectual prop. Emblems without verses had some measure of attraction, for if no natural correspondence seemed to exist between a hypocrite and a frog, or between an egg and a Christian,[174] the things had an interest of their own, and excited curiosity as to possible connections; but without rhymes, it would have been impossible to pair them aright.
Verse, brought as an accessory into school, twinkled a small mirror of imagination. Figures lurked in the letters of the alphabet; rhymed riddles were to be had for the piecing together of syllables. _A Little Book for Little Children_ (1702)[175] had these elements of interest; _The Child’s Week’s Work_[176] was further lightened by a wide uncurtained schoolroom window, set so low that very small persons could stand a-tiptoe, and get new lessons from the creatures of earth and air. The very moderation of the writer invites acceptance:
“Come, take this Book Dear Child, and look On it awhile and try What you can find To please your Mind; _The Rest you may pass by_.”
But most of it is too good to pass by; the moral is lost in little phrases of real music, albeit the rhymer ties himself to words of one syllable:
“Birds in the Spring Do chirp and sing With clear, shrill and sweet Throats; Some hop, some fly, Some soar on high, Each of them knows its Notes.
“Hear you a Lark? Tell me what Clerk Can match her; he that beats The next Thorn-Bush May raise a Thrush Would put down all our Wayts.”
Other “clerks” were appointed henceforth to the business of instruction. Rhymed sermons grew up in the midst of hymns of praise; these were marked by a forcible and rousing emphasis. If the voice of the Pharisee be heard no less distinctly than that of the Sluggard, in Dr. Watts’s Divine and Moral Songs[177], it rises at times into something like a glow of patriotism:
“I would not change my Native Land For rich Peru with all her Gold; A nobler Prize lies in my Hand Than East or Western Indies hold.”
Beneath the severity which his doctrine inspired, the learned Doctor had a genuine tenderness for children, a legacy not despised by the greatest and most revolutionary of his successors, William Blake. His Cradle Hymn, beginning:
“Hush! my dear, lie still and slumber; Holy Angels guard thy bed;”
is remembered the better for Blake’s Cradle Song. In the old conventional but rhythmic fashion, he too could sing of lambs and children.
There is no answer to strictures on the more common errors of the nursery; they are so obvious that admiration halts before the power of rhythm that could give them life. Here and there comes a thought fresh turned:
“How proud we are, how fond to shew Our Clothes, and call them rich and new! When the poor Sheep and Silkworm wore That very Clothing long before.”
The old indiscriminate approval that gave Dr. Watts a place of honour on the nursery shelf, started the echoes along two centuries. Critics could neither silence the triumphant march of the verse nor dispute a ring of sincerity that it has.
Few poets of the old-fashioned Child’s Garden failed in loyalty to its first planter; but editors made Lilliputian anthologies and filled “Poetical Flower Baskets” from other sources. Early in the new century, the author of _The Butterfly’s Ball_ fell by his frivolous choice from the company of the elect:
“The Butterfly, an idle thing, Nor honey makes, nor yet can sing.”[178]
He encouraged a spirit of revolt, and talking beasts of divers kinds broke into the garden.
Of the old order, John Marchant was welcome, despite his lack of originality, for a trick of rhythm which he had learnt from Dr. Watts, and apart from this, as a champion of children’s games. He had “Songs for Little Misses”, “Songs for Little Masters”, and “Songs”, varying the martial beat of Dr. Watts, on “Divine, Moral and Other Subjects”.[179]
Children, he is persuaded, would be “delighted with the Humour of them because _adapted to their own Way of thinking and to the Occurrences that happen within their own little Sphere of Action_.”
Stevenson could not give a more detailed picture of these “occurrences”; it is in the region of childish thought that his predecessor drifts into an uncharted sea. He knows nothing of the little mythologies of children; there are no imaginary countries, no “Unseen Playmate”, no dreams. It is the difference between the old garden and the new, which is of the child’s own planting.
There was a truant in the _Babees’ Book_[180] who sang:
“I wolde my master were an hare & all his bokis houndis were & I myself a joly hontere.”
In the years between this and _Puerilia_, no child was encouraged to put his own thoughts into rhyme; but Marchant’s “Little Miss” is heard “Talking to her Doll”, “Working at her Sampler”, “playing on her Spinet”, even “learning to dance”. The “little Master” of 1751 whips his top, flies his kite and goes a-birds’-nesting in verse, when he is released from Arithmetic and the Languages.
But the world of Make-believe is still unknown to grown-up travellers: a mystery jealously hidden by the child from unsympathetic eyes.
A doll, in the matter-of-fact view of Mr. Marchant, is a “mere painted piece of wood”:
“Legs thou hast, and tho’ they’re jointed, Yet one Step thou canst not walk; Head there is to thee appointed, Yet thou canst not think or talk.”
The rudest image could not be such a dead thing to a child. The author is upon enchanted ground, and blind to all its wonders.
He is safer following the needle in a child’s hand, tracing the “odd and various” crochets upon a sampler, or drawing a moral from the building of a “Pasty Pye”.
To music, whether of kit or spinet, he can keep time. “Miss learning to dance”, in her saque and hooped petticoat, is a bewitching figure, and the musician, though his skill is not great, contrives not to put her out:
“How pretty ’tis to dance! To curtsey and advance And wave about my Hands To sound of Kit. My Steps true Measure keep, Thus lightly do I trip, Along the Floor I sweep With nimble Feet.”
“Master”, watching a Puppet-show, plays Gulliver at the Court of Lilliput, surveys the “pigmy Troop” and makes appropriate reflections.
A boy’s kite carries this quaint versifier for a moment into the upper air. Even there his fancy cannot support itself; he snatches a simile for the sake of the rhyme, then takes a header to earth and fastens on his moral:
“He that soars a Pitch too high, Riding on Ambition’s Wings: Sudden in the Dirt may lie; Pride its Shadow ever brings.”
But the Kite actually rises, waving a “knotty Tail,” seeming now “a little Cloud,” now “no bigger than a Spoon”; the birds play round her or mistake her for a hawk, and the boy, were his string long enough, “_would send her to the Moon_.”
The rhymes of _Mother Goose’s Melody_ and _The Top Book of All_ were wild flowers that sowed themselves in the midst of herbaceous borders. Two garlands of folk-songs for children grew out of the same soil. The date of _Gammer Gurton’s Garland_ is unknown.[181] A Bodleian copy in flowered covers has some rhymes from _Mother Goose_; but the most daring “Lulliputian” would not have chosen the fairy theme of impossible tasks:
“Can you make me a cambrick shirt, _Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme_: Without any seam or needle work? And you shall be a true lover of mine.”
Here, also, is the singing-game of “London Bridge,” and “A very pretty little Christmas Carol:”
“God bless the Master of this house The Misteress also And all the little Children That round the table go And all your kin and kinsmen That dwell both far and near: I wish them a merry Christmas And a happy New Year.”
Ritson reprinted _Gammer Gurton_, with additions, in 1810; but in the meantime an unknown editor had collected new “Songs for the Nursery”,[182] and adapted them “to favourite national Melodies”.
This is the biggest gap in the hedge. Here, at last, is the open country,—the cuckoo’s song:
“The Cuckoo’s a bonny bird; She sings as she flies; She brings us good tidings And tells us no lies: She sucks little birds’ eggs To make her voice clear And never cries Cuckoo! Till Springtime of the year.”,
the daffodil:
“Daffy-Down-Dilly is new come to town With a yellow petticoat and a green gown.”,
and the song of the North Wind:
“The north Wind doth blow And we shall have snow And what will poor Robin do then? Poor thing!
“He’ll sit in a barn And keep himself warm And hide his head under his wing, Poor thing.”
It is even more surprising to find, in this trim garden, a nursery lyric that calls up the very spirit of child-thought:
“How many miles is it to Babylon? Three score miles and ten. Can I get there by candle-light? Yes, and back again.”[183]
There are no other songs like these. _The Poetical Flower Basket_[184] represents the Lilliputian tradition that prevailed between 1760 and 1789: rhymed fables, epigrams and inscriptions from poets who never wrote for children, and the story of “Inkle and Yarico” in verse.
Of Blake[185], it is difficult to speak in such a company. He was a winged thing hovering over little formal beds of lavender, catching for a moment an echo of children’s voices repeating the creed of “The Little Black Boy,” dropping a tear for the Chimney-Sweeper, then flying off unseen and unheard to sing his own songs of joy and love, too much a child to suffer the interruptions of other children; scarcely to be understood by those who were dreaming their own dreams under the noses of the pedagogues. A Pied Piper who never offered his services to the community; a sublime truant from every school. Of the realistic faith that could map out a Geography of Heaven, he had no knowledge; yet Laws and Moralities were the burden of some songs that had touched him. There is a magic in the simplest form of verse that may quicken the beat of a child’s heart, and endow little forgotten rules and prescriptions of the nursery with unexpected significance. If Blake could have alighted in the starlight outside a window and heard Ann Taylor putting one of her children to bed, he might have come in and acknowledged the existence of naughtiness, just for the pleasure of being forgiven. Some voices can sweeten the longest homily, and the culprit waits patiently for the kiss that must come when the sermon begins:
“And has _my darling_ told a lie?”[186]
There is a triumphant contradiction in so tender a severity; a very rainbow of promise:
“Do you think I can love you so naughty as this,[187] Or kiss you all wetted with tears?”
“Idle Mary” can pass it all on to her doll. Later on, when she looks down from the height of the first speaker, she understands how forgiveness and hope came with a sudden rush at the end:
“Oh, Mary, this will never do! This work is sadly done, my dear, And then so little of it too! You have not taken pains, I fear.
“Oh no, your work has been forgotten. Indeed you’ve hardly thought of that; I saw you roll your ball of cotton About the floor to please the cat.
...
“The little girl who will not sew Should neither be allowed to play; _But then I hope, my love, that you_ _Will take more pains another day_.”[188]
The authors of the _Original Poems_[189] wore the laurels of Dr. Watts “with a difference.” They remembered all his tunes, they played variations on most of his themes, but they added songs of their own. In these, Walter Scott caught a note of poetry, and wrote to thank “the Associate Minstrels”. Miss Edgeworth, who cared less for rhythm, praised them for other excellences. The songs were a means of gentle intercourse between these writers and “that interesting little race, the race of children” for whom they had “so hearty an affection”.
The child of the new garden can join hands, “through the windows of this book”, with the child of the old. Ann and Jane and Adelaide were the great aunts-in-literature of Louis Stevenson. A hundred years before him they sang of stars and sun, of day and night and play in gardens. The contrast is the greater because not one or two, but all their poems turned upon “the whole Duty of Children”. Instead of following a child “up the mountain sides of dreams”, they were intent on pointing out to him a world of greater Reality.
The dream world lies all about Stevenson’s “Garden”, there is no hedge to separate it from ordinary roads and rivers; they all lead to Fairyland. Yet this most practical dreamer could speak in the very accents and call up the _silhouettes_ of his gentle predecessors at any moment.
It is impossible to read of “The friendly cow all red and white”,[190] without thinking of Jane Taylor’s
“Thank you, pretty cow that made Pleasant milk to soak my bread.”[191]
The child in her garden looked up and wondered at one star; that other child in the hundred-years-distant garden, escaped at bedtime to watch “thousands and millions of stars”.
Who would recognise the theme of Stevenson’s “Wind” symphony, under the old title of “The Child’s Monitor”?[192] Yet the first two lines proclaim it:
“The wind blows down the largest tree _And yet the wind I cannot see_—”
The wind that brings mystery into the new Garden was an emblem of human thought in the old. Stevenson’s myth is a real product of the child mind:
“O you that are so strong and cold, O blower, are you young or old? Are you a beast of field and tree, Or just a stronger child than me?”
There could be no such heathen explanation for Adelaide O’Keefe. The Wind took shape as an allegory in her day: it changed into the Voice of Conscience, it became an ever-watchful angel:
“Thus, _something_ very near must be, Although invisible to me; Whate’er I do, it sees me still, O then, Good Spirit, guide my will!”
In another place the four elements are considered in a modestly scientific light.[193] They balance a juvenile version of _The Seasons_. Nature is regarded from the old didactic point of view. Spring, when “the Creatures begin their employ” invites to industry; the Idle who in Summer “love best in the shade to recline” are admonished by the active joys of haymaking; the innocent hare is remembered in the hunting season, and in Winter, Charity sits by a glowing hearth and comforts itself with the sophistries of Dr. Watts for the unequal distribution of faggots.
These are but echoes; there are many touches that give the personal records of keen and watchful eyes:
“I saw a leaf come tilting down, From a bare wither’d bough; The leaf was dead, the branch was brown, No fruit was left it now:
“But much the rattling tempest blew, The naked boughs among: And here and there came whistling through A leaf that loosely hung.
...
“I saw an old man totter slow, Wrinkled, and weak, and grey. He’d hardly strength enough to go Ever so short a way.”[194]
The leaf and the old man had been seen and remembered, the one for the sake of the other. There were times when Ann, in her gentle way, came very near the heart of things. The three could not have sung so well together if they had not practised different parts. Jane, comparing her own verses with the rest, modestly explained: “I allow my pieces to rank as the _leaves_ which are, you know, always reckoned a necessary and even pleasing part of the bouquet.”
The comparison is hardly just, or if so, they are bright leaves, more striking, though fewer than the flowers.
There is a crisp touch about her simplest work. The verses are better turned than Adelaide’s or Ann’s. She is content to take her subjects from the common stock of moral tales[195], to arrange her nursery pictures in twos and fours; but in spite of convention, her “Morning” is a Reveillé:
“O come, for the bee has flown out of his bed, To begin his day’s labours anew; The spider is weaving her delicate thread, Which brilliantly glitters with dew.
...
“Awake, little sleeper, and do not despise Of insects instruction to ask, From your pillow with good resolution arise, And cheerfully go to your task.”
“Evening”, the companion picture, is no more original; in due order all the properties of Morpheus move before tired eyes; sheep, and the parting linnet and the owl, the setting sun, the friendly moon that peeps through the curtain. Children know them all, and for that reason, the cradle-movement of the verse is the more soothing. Conventional portraits, “The Shepherd Boy” and “The Gleaner” stand out in clear simplicity, one on each side of the nursery mantel-piece, as “Evening” and “Morning” go over the bed. But when all the pictures are arranged, some of the figures walk out of them and begin to dance upon the floor.
“The Creatures” are never mere moral messengers. Jane has the same eye for character in beasts as in flowers or children. “The Toad’s Journal” in _Q. Q._ is a better example of this than any of her nursery pieces. This “venerable reptile”, supposed to have been found alive in the ruins of an Egyptian temple, records the events of his _first thousand years_:
“Crawled forth from some rubbish and wink’d with one eye; Half opened the other, but could not tell why; Stretched out my left leg, as it felt rather queer, Then drew all together and slept for a year. Awaken’d, felt chilly—crept under a stone; Was vastly contented with living alone. One toe became wedged in the stone like a peg, Could not get it away—had the cramp in my leg: Began half to wish for a neighbour at hand To loosen the stone which was fast in the sand; Pull’d harder—then dozed as I found it no use;— Awoke the next summer, and lo! it was loose.” ...
The next sleep (“for a century or more”) gives time to dream; the dreamer, awakened,
“Grew pensive—discovered that life is a load; _Began to be weary of being a toad_:”
It is a daring moralist who laughs at her own moral:
“To find a moral _when there’s none_ Is hard indeed—_yet must be done_:”
The moral, just because “_there’s none_,” presses the unspoken analogy:
“Age after age afforded him To wink an eye or move a limb, To doze and dream;—and then to think Of noting this with pen and ink; Or hieroglyphic shapes to draw, More likely with his hideous claw; Such length of days might be bestowed On something better than a toad! Had his existence been eternal, What better could have filled his journal?”
To go back to the Nursery (the Original Poets were scarcely more than children when they wrote), Jane’s talking beasts quickened the old stuff of fables by a new sense of likeness and incongruity. The spider and his wife (Jane loved spiders) are as real to a child as any married couple of his acquaintance. He follows their fortunes with personal concern; he would forego a feast to dine with them:
“One day when their cupboard was empty and dry His wife, (Mrs. Hairy-leg Spinner,) Said to him, ‘Dear, go to the cobweb, and try If you can’t find the leg or the wing of a fly, As a bit of a relish for dinner’”.
The Cow and the Ass, meeting where the child may see them on any summer day, reconcile nonsense and natural history. The small actor can take both parts, and laughs the more at his own drollery.
“‘Take a seat,’ cried the cow, gently waving her hand. ‘By no means, dear Madam,’ said he, ‘while you stand.’ Then stooping to drink, with a complaisant bow, ‘Ma’am, your health,’ said the ass:—‘Thank you, Sir,’ said the cow.”
Thus laughter crept into the garden under the eye of Caution and Example, and, for his coaxing ways, was allowed to stay as a probationer.
*       *       *       *       *
Charles and Mary Lamb wrote their _Poetry for Children_[196] as a task. It was probably suggested by Mrs. Godwin, anxious to rival the publishers of _Original Poems_. In a letter to Coleridge (June, 1809), Lamb says: “Our little poems are but humble, but they have no name. You must read them, remembering they were task-work; and perhaps you will admire the number of subjects, all of children, picked out by an old Batchelor and an old Maid. Many parents would not have found so many.”
The Lambs could do nothing together without enjoying it; they could not speak in a child’s voice, and had almost forgotten the way to Babylon, but there are fewer subtleties of child-thought here than in _Mrs. Leicester’s School_. The verses are full of practical interests. The humour of the writers brought tenderness and delight to the “task”, and children, who are quick to catch the note of sympathy, would feel this without understanding it.
Lamb had already tried his hand at children’s rhymes. In 1805 he had written _The King and Queen of Hearts_[197], a careless and farcical impromptu which he sent by carrier to “Mr. Johnny Wordsworth”, begging his “acceptance and opinion”.
It is not easy to decide his exact share in _Poetry for Children_. The pieces reprinted in 1818[198] are not children’s poems. One of them, “To a River in which a Child was drowned”, was suggested by the translation of a Spanish ballad in Percy’s _Reliques_. “Love, Death and Reputation” was recognised by Swinburne as a translation from Webster’s _Duchess of Malfi_.
Lamb seems to have amused himself now and then by casting fragments of mature flavour into this jar of nursery simples.
Of children, but assuredly not for them is the beautiful “Parental Recollections” which suggests understanding as well as love:
“A child’s a plaything for an hour; Its pretty tricks we try For that or for a longer space; Then tire and lay it by.
“But I knew one that to itself All Seasons could controul, That would have mock’d the sense of pain Out of a grieved soul.
“Thou, straggler into loving arms Young climber up of knees, When I forget thy thousand ways Then life and all shall cease.”
Charles Lamb knew the Child that Wordsworth reverenced: the child of imagination
“... _that to itself_ _All seasons could controul_”.
The verses he would have repeated in that child’s company were nonsense rhymes or metrical “wild tales”; not without a song or two from Shakespeare (after the wise example of Mother Goose); for he never could keep the things he loved best out of talk or writing.
_Poetry for Children_ was written to fit parental ideals, just as stories were sometimes invented to accompany stock illustrations; yet Lamb’s gay humour played pranks here and there, as in the gratulatory ode, “Going into Breeches”:
“Joy to Philip, he this day Has his long coats cast away And (the childish season gone) Puts the manly breeches on. Officer on gay parade, Red-coat in his first cockade, Bridegroom in his wedding trim, Birthday beau surpassing him, Never did with conscious gait Strut about in half the state, Or the pride (yet free from sin) Of my little Manikin: Never was there pride or bliss, Half so rational as his. Sashes, frocks, to those that need ’em— Philip’s limbs have got their freedom— He can run, or he can ride, And do twenty things beside, Which his petticoats forbade: Is he not a happy lad?”
And is not this a mischievous poet, that dares sympathise thus openly with nursery vanities? A dangerous man, with a tendency to romantic, unlawful sentiment. He places the revolutionary effusion between two tender and wholly innocent little poems of Mary’s.[199] It should have been pilloried instead in a column facing “George and the Chimney Sweeper”, by Adelaide O’Keefe:[200]
“His petticoats now George cast off, For he was four years old; His trousers were nankeen so fine, His buttons bright as gold,— ‘May I,’ said little George, ‘go out My pretty clothes to show? May I, papa? May I, mamma? ’ _The answer was_—‘_No, no!_’”
Here, retribution is foreshadowed in the first stanza, if a second glance be given at the title.
In another mood. Lamb could sit patient under his reverend predecessor, or give new life to an old text:
“In your garb and outward clothing A reserved plainness use; By their neatness more distinguish’d Than the brightness of their hues.
“All the colours in the rainbow Serve to spread the peacock’s train; Half the lustre of their feathers Would turn twenty coxcombs vain.
“Yet the swan that swims in rivers, Pleases the judicious sight; Who, of brighter colours heedless, Trusts alone to simple white.
“Yet all other hues, compared With his whiteness, show amiss; And the peacock’s coat of colours Like a fool’s coat looks by his.”
Lamb’s instincts were all against the timid doctrine of cautionary tales. A sermon is a thing that may be borne, even enjoyed, at the appointed hour; but there is no escape from regulations which cramp and restrict every natural movement. Philip is not encouraged to eschew games and concentrate on “little books”; he is not warned on promotion that all the things he wants to do are dangerous; he may play Baste the Bear, Leap-frog, Foot-ball and Cricket, he may run in the snow, he may even
“_Climb a tree, or scale a wall,_ _Without any fear to fall._”
If a branch will not bear his weight,
“If he get a hurt or bruise, To complain he must refuse, Though the anguish and the smart Go unto his little heart.”
It was at this point that some of the trees in the Child’s Garden put forth new shoots and began to grow into their natural shapes.
But there was no revolt against wholesome discipline; traditional virtues were still honoured in verse, cleanliness as well as courage:
“Come, my little Robert near— Fie! what filthy hands are here— Who that ere could understand The rare structure of a hand, With its branching fingers fine, Work itself of hands divine,
...
“Who this hand would choose to cover With a crust of dirt all over, Till it look’d in hue and shape Like the fore-foot of an Ape?”
The romance of antiquity induces reverence for Age:
“My father’s grandfather lives still, His age is fourscore years and ten; He looks a monument of time, The agedest of aged men.”
These were town-bred poets; Nature figures only in side-glances. “The Ride” gives the town child’s delight in fields, but two children are the real subject of the picture. The Rainbow, regarded from a honeysuckle bower, is sweet after a tempest, but it is a messenger of earth: each precious tint is dear to Mary Lamb, “which flowers, which fields, which _ladies wear_.” The robe of Iris is unwoven to find the colours of gardens, of living things, and of the human face. The magic bridge is dissolved with “half of its perfect arch” yet visible.
“The Boy and the Skylark” is the most revolutionary of these pieces. Bees and lambs, ants and silkworms, had been noted for the docility with which they entered into the business of human improvement. This sky-lark asserts the independence of his race. He scorns the limitations of human imagination which conceives of “the feathered race” as serving the little ends of man. Richard, hearing the lark’s song, confesses his sin, under the impression that the “little bird” will betray him, as indeed Dr. Watts and all Lilliput would have had him believe.
This, says the bird, is folly “fit to move a sky-lark’s mirth.”
“Dull fool! to think we sons of air On man’s low actions waste a care, His virtues, or his vices; Or soaring on the summer gales, That we should stoop to carry tales Of him or his devices!
“Our songs are all of the delights We find in our wild airy flights, And heavenly exaltation; The earth you mortals have at heart Is all too gross to have a part In sky-lark’s conversation.”
Mrs. Trimmer would have been inexpressibly shocked at this bird’s attitude; Ann Taylor would have been grieved that he was not more friendly; Jane might have seen his point of view. But this lark is a literal poet; there is no attempt here to interpret a real ecstasy of song. The poem is but an argument that hits a popular fallacy. This is still the voice of the town and of common sense. The Spectator might have said as much for the birds that sang in his cherry trees.
There is only one fairy in _Poetry for Children_; fairies, like dreams, were outside the pale of the Garden. This one is a spirit of the age, but springs from the brain of a child. Little Ann was a friend of Mary Lamb’s, and knew what the poet “prettily” wrote about Titania; but because she had not been admitted to fairy Society, it was entirely natural that she should project into fairyland the most diminutive creature of her acquaintance (an Edgeworthian method of setting imagination to work upon experience) and describe the “fabulous being” to her friend:
“‘You’ll confess, I believe, I’ve not done it amiss.’ ‘Pardon me,’ said Matilda, ‘I find in all this Fine description you’ve only your young sister Mary Been taking a copy of here for a fairy.’”
There is a thrill of adventure in the true tale of a child that took an adder for a “_fine grey bird_”, and shared with it, in perfect fearlessness, his breakfast of bread and milk; children laugh over the odd choice of the little Creole who saw a crowd of dancing chimney sweepers on a May morning, thought they were his fellow countrymen, and became ambitious for a sooty coat. These stories could have been told as well in prose; but the charming fancy called “The Desert” is a feast of the nursery muse:
“With the apples and the plums Little Carolina comes, At the time of the dessert she Comes and drops her last new curt’sy; Graceful curt’sy, practis’d o’er In the nursery before. What shall we compare her to? The dessert itself will do. Like preserves she’s kept with care, Like blanch’d almonds she is fair, Soft as down on peach her hair, And so soft, so smooth is each Pretty cheek as that same peach, ... Whiter drapery she does wear Than the frost on cake; and sweeter Than the cake itself, and neater, Though bedeck’d with emblems fine, Is our little Caroline.”
Studies of children, in the warm and tender colouring of personal reminiscence, are the chief matter of the book; children do not appreciate the love and insight that makes it poetry; they will not stand still to trace, in these portraits of brothers and sisters, a likeness to the gentle authors. Grown-up persons, acquainted with the family history, understand the little girl’s patience over her broken doll and her studied kindness to “dear little craving selfish John”.
There is a bending-down in many of the poems that only grown-up persons understand; the writers stoop to conquer childish reserve, not at all in the disconcerting manner of Wordsworth, though they sometimes adopt his way of recording the result:
“Lately an Equipage I overtook, And help’d to lift it o’er a narrow brook. No horse it had except one boy, who drew His sister out in it the fields to view. O happy town-bred girl, in fine chaise going For the first time to see the green grass growing. This was the end and purport of the ride I learn’d, as walking slowly by their side I heard their conversation....”
The “task” is forgotten in the pleasure or pathos of such incidents:
“In a stage coach, where late I chanc’d to be, A little quiet girl my notice caught; I saw she look’d at nothing by the way, Her mind seem’d busy on some childish thought.
“I with an old man’s courtesy address’d The child, and call’d her pretty dark-eyed maid And bid her turn those pretty eyes and see The wide-extended prospect. ‘Sir,’ she said,
“‘I cannot see the prospect, I am blind.’ Never did tongue of child utter a sound So mournful, as her words fell on my ear. ...”
Mary Lamb’s poem “The Two Boys”, quoted by Lamb in “Detached Thoughts on Books and Reading”, records an incident of Martin Burney’s youth:[201]
“I saw a boy with eager eye Open a book upon a stall, And read, as he’d devour it all, Which, when the stall-man did espy, Soon to the boy I heard him call ‘You, sir, you never buy a book. Therefore in one you shall not look.’ The boy pass’d slowly on, and with a sigh He wish’d he never had been taught to read, Then of the old churl’s books he should have had no need.”
This is an unexpected link with Stevenson; the proprietor of the shop “which was dark and smelt of Bibles” (that quaint store-house of romance)[202] is a reincarnation of this bookstall man; he repeats the old growl in prose:
“I do not believe, child, that you are an intending purchaser at all!”
To compare these verses with Stevenson’s is to discover an essential difference. The Lambs had the same delight in memories, but they looked back with tenderness to a childhood which they had been forced to leave behind. Stevenson was a boy to the end. The Child in his Garden is heard singing his own deeds. These gentle Olympians looked down at
“Horatio, of ideal courage vain,”
saw him now as Achilles, brandishing his sword, now Hector in a field of slaughtered Greeks, or the Black Prince, driving the enemy before him; but lest vain imagination should grow bold upon encouragement, he must strike his milk-white hand against a nail, and seal the moral with his blood:
“Achilles weeps, Great Hector hangs his head, And the Black Prince goes whimpering to bed.”
The “Mimic Harlequin” who transforms a whole drawing-room full of furniture into matter of imagination is brought back to reality by his practical mother:
“You’ve put the cat among my work, and torn A fine lac’d cap that I but once have worn.”
Yet in another rhyme, the monitress relents, and indulging the idle fancies of Robert, allows him, though late for breakfast,
“To sit and watch the vent’rous fly Where the sugar’s piled high, Clambering o’er the lumps so white, _Rocky cliffs of sweet delight_”.
There is not enough of this to make a book of children’s poetry. Romance knocked timidly at the gate and tendered a moral as the price of admission; but it would be a dull child that could not find him somewhere in this corner of the garden.
The two small volumes had a short life; some of the pieces were reprinted in collections, but the book failed to hold its own against Mr. Roscoe’s bright fancy, _The Butterfly’s Ball_[203], written for the birthday of his little boy Robert, and set to music by order of their Majesties for Princess Mary.
Children responded with one accord to the invitation of the first couplet:
“Come take up your Hats, and away let us haste To the Butterfly’s Ball and the Grasshopper’s Feast.”
Here was an entertainment which made no demands on attention or understanding, which had no “moral”; it was all pure enjoyment. The rhymes were as simple as any in _Mother Goose’s Melody_; the pictures, early efforts of Mulready’s[204], presented the various creatures in glorious independence, no more constrained by laws of proportion than the inhabitants of a willow-pattern landscape. They come, a gay and irresponsible procession, with a hint of fairy-land for all their reality:
“A Mushroom their table, and on it was laid A Water-Dock leaf, which a Table-Cloth made.”
There is “the sly little Dormouse” and “his blind Brother the Mole”; the Frog (found still in the same attitude by Alice in Wonderland) and the Squirrel, who watches the feast from a tree. The rest are mostly winged:
“... the Gnat and the Dragon-fly too, With all their Relations, Green, Orange, and Blue.”
The Harlequin Spider performs feats on the tight line, a giant Bee hovers over an absurdly inadequate hive, a snail bigger than either offers to dance a Minuet; and at nightfall the Watchman Glow-worm is ready with his light.
The feast is soon done, but for a third reading it can be got by heart.
“A Sequel”, _The Peacock “At Home”_,[205] appeared in the same year, with a frank and humorous acknowledgment of its predecessor’s success. A pleasing mystery about its authorship was solved some years later in the preface of “_The Peacock and Parrot on their Tour to discover the Author of ‘The Peacock At Home’_.”
“A path strewed with flowers they early pursued, And in fancy, their long-sought Incognita viewed. Till, all their cares over, in _Dorset_ they found her, And, plucking a wreath of green bay-leaves, they crowned her.”
Mrs. Dorset, thus discovered, was a sister of Charlotte Smith, the writer of _Minor Morals_ and _Rural Walks_.
All the birds left out of the Butterfly’s Ball, including foreigners, such as the Taylor Bird and Flamingo, were guests of the Peacock. They offered a variety of absurd analogies.
_The Lion’s Masquerade_, rhymed in the same quaint humour, was a sort of Æsop in Ranelagh:
“The guests now came thronging in numbers untold, The furious, the gentle, the young and the old, In dominos some, but in characters most, And now a brave warrior, and then a fair toast. _The Baboon_ as a _Counsellor_: Alderman Glutton: A Lamb, Miss _in her teens_, with her aunt, an old mutton. It was easy to see, as this couple past by, The Wolf, very cunningly, cast a sheep’s eye.”
A guest of unusual interest is the “_Great Hog in Armour_” who stalks, in Mulready’s illustration, like the ghost in Hamlet, under a full moon; and there is a Bear in the “character” of Caliban,
“... loaded with wood, His bones full of aches, from Prospero’s rod.”
Those were great naval days; the English sailor is represented by a Mastiff:
“Britannia receiv’d him with mark’d condescension And paid him all night, most distinguish’d attention.”
Bewick’s beasts and birds forsook their natural haunts and danced in the most carefully preserved parterres. They came in their thousands, of all sizes and nationalities. “W. B.” followed Mrs. Dorset with _The Elephant’s Ball_, and the Season was extended till all “the Children of Earth and the Tenants of Air” were exhausted. Children ran out of the Lambs’ quiet parlour into a garden of perpetual Feasts. What could come better after the Butterfly’s Ball than a Wedding Among the Flowers?
But there was still an old-fashioned lady, one Miss Elizabeth Turner, who held aloof, wielding the rod of Dr. Watts. With the perversity of their race, the Lilliputians fell into step as they approached her, and listened to her warnings with a fearful joy. She told them, in simple numbers, how Miss Sophia would not wait for the garden gate to be opened, and demonstrated by her fall, that “little girls should never climb”; she expected them to believe that every little boy with a craving for adventure must share the fate of one who
“Once was pretty Jack And had a kind Papa; But, silly child! he ran to play Too far from home, a long, long way, And did not ask Mama. So he was lost, and now must creep Up chimneys, crying, Sweep! Sweep! Sweep!”
Poor Jane and little Tom excited a thrill as “cautionary” Babes in the Wood. They succumbed to the fatal fascination of scarlet berries:
“Alas! had Tommy understood That fruit in lanes is seldom good, He might have walked with little Jane Again along the shady lane.”
Small listeners decided privately that Peter was an indifferent sportsman to turn the red-hot poker against himself; they would prove at the first opportunity that he bungled the thing. But when other children cried, it amused them to agree with Miss Turner that
“A rod is the very best thing to apply When children are crying and cannot tell why!”
The names of her two little books[206] have no obvious connection with the verses. She explains _The Daisy_ in a _Cowslip_ rhyme:
“Like the flow’ret it spreads, unambitious of fame, Nor intrudes upon critical gaze.”
But names are pictures to a child: daisies and cowslips should have a place in his garden. In open defiance of the calendar, these were succeeded by _The Snowdrop_ and _The Crocus_. Mary Elliott suffered herself to be turned by the Muse from Precept and Example; she added _The Rose_[207] to this serial garland. Little feet went willingly after her, for she led the way through a village, and visited many friends. At the window of the village shop they loitered together, forgetting all the penalties of pleasure-seeking in a glory of gingerbread, candy, little gilt books and many sorts of toys:
“How many bright eyes have I seen Examine each article o’er, Still looking, while pausing between The window and latch of the door.
“For well the young customers know The Dame does not like to be teased, And when indecision they show, Cries ‘children can never be pleased!’
“Such grumbling, however, is borne While thus she displays such nice fare, And her threshold, uneven and worn Proves how many footsteps go there!”
The Giant Instruction sent a few spies into the garden, disguised as poets. Wise children saw through the deception at once; others, lured into encyclopædic mazes, yawned while the guide recited “Edward, or Rambling reasoned on”,[208] and described the delights of town for the benefit of those who hankered after foreign travel:
“The pictures in the Louvre Display their bright perfections, But we should first manœuvre To see some home collections.
...
“The Royal Institution Gives knowledge, taste and skill, And change without confusion Attends its lectures still.
“Some folks have wished to be Whole years in the Museum: So much there is to see, No fear it should _ennui ’em_.”
The unconscious humorist rambles thus through a dozen stanzas. But the last lines are drowned by the voice of the Pedlar at the door. He is singing new rhymes to old tunes: _Whimsical Incidents_, _Cinderella in Verse_, _Mother Hubbard_, _Dame Trot_ and _Goody Flitch_.[209] The Lady of Ninety who wrote _Dame Wiggins of Lee_[210] must have heard him singing in her youth.
Nonsense rhymers, whipped out of the Court of Stupidity, found a refuge in the purlieus of the child’s garden; nobody recognised them as descendants of the citizens of Cockayne, or suspected that they would one day be honoured as predecessors of Edward Lear. Yet who shall gauge their influence on the character of Englishmen, or decide how far the eccentricities of certain theorists depended on the exclusion of nonsense from the nursery?
The History of the _Sixteen Wonderful Old Women_[211] came too late for Mr. Day:
“There was an Old Woman from France Who taught grown-up Children to dance, But they were so stiff, She sent them home in a miff, This sprightly Old Woman from France.”
While Mr. Edgeworth was “explaining” poetry to children, and later, when Young Reviewers were being taught to “dissect poems”,[212] the Pedlar was still singing for truant minds. If he knew nothing of poetry, at least he knew enough to let it alone; and his songs were good to dance to, which every child knows is an excellent thing in songs.
FOOTNOTES
[1] _The Tatler_, No. 95.
[2] See Appendix A. I. Note on these and other romances.
[3] _The History of Thomas Hickathrift_, 1750 (?). See below. Chapter II and Appendix A. II.
[4] See Appendix A. I. Note on _Dr. Faustus_.
[5] See Appendix A. I. Note on Nonsense Books.
[6] For details of this and of other tracts, see Appendix A. I.
[7] First edition, 1678.
[8] See Introduction to _The Pilgrim’s Progress_ (Methuen) by Prof. C. H. Firth.
[9] Richard Graves, in the _Spiritual Quixote_ (1772), likens the adventures of Christian to those of Jack the Giant Killer and John Hickathrift.
[10] Published 1719. Abridged 12 mo. in the same year. See Note on _Philip Quarll_, Appendix A. I.
[11] First edition, 1726.
[12] _Spectator_, Nos. 70, 74 and 85. See Appendix A. I.
[13] See further Appendix A. I.
[14] See Appendix A. I.
[15] See note on sea songs and ballads—Appendix A. I.
[16] First printed by W. Copland.
[17] First printed by Wynkyn de Worde.
[18] _Illustrations of Northern Antiquities_, by Weber, Jamieson and Scott.
[19] Printed from the earliest extant copies, and edited by G. L. Gomme. (_Chap-books and Folk-lore Tracts_, First Series, 1885).
[20] See Coleridge’s _Biographia Literaria_, Vol. II., Ch. XVIII. (1870 ed.).
[21] A Douce chap-book of _Tom Thumb_ (verse) is “corrected after an old copy, printed for F. Coles”. This has a note on an earlier edition (1621).
[22] (_a_) “The Wandering Young Gentlewoman, or Catskin (complete)”. W. Armstrong, Liverpool, n.d. (early 19th c.) (_b_) “Catskin’s Garland, or the Wandering Young Gentlewoman”, in five parts (verse). Printed and sold by T. Cheney, Banbury, n.d.
[23] For a full account of ballads and prose chap-books, see the introduction to “The History of Sir Richard Whittington”, edited by H. B. Wheatley (Chap-books and Folk-lore Tracts, 1885). See Appendix A for references in the _Tatler_, _Spectator_, etc.
[25] The original English translation is advertised in the _Flying Post_, or _Weekly Medley_ for June 7, 1729, “printed for J. Pope at Sir Isaac Newton’s Head, the corner of Suffolk Street, Charing Cross—just published (very entertaining and instructive for children, with cuts to every tale). Done into English from the French by Mr. Samber.”
[26] (_a_) _Tales of the Fairys._ Translated from the French. For T. Cockerill, 1699. 12s. (_b_) The collected Works of Madame D’Aulnoy, published by John Nicolson, at the King’s Arms, and at the Cross Keys and Bible in Cornhill, 1707.
[27] Translated into English _c._ 1770. 3rd edition 1776.
[28] See below, Chap. VI.
[29] The _Arabian Nights’ Entertainments_. Translated into French from the Arabian MSS. by M. Galland of the Royal Academy, and now done into English. For A. Bell, 1708, 12mo. (8 vols.). See Appendix A. II.
[30] See Wordsworth’s “Prelude”, Book V.
[31] _The History of Sinbad_ was published as a nursery chap-book by E. Newbery (between 1779 and 1801) at 6d.
[32] See De Quincey’s _Autobiographic Sketches_, Vol. I, Ch. III. “Infant Literature,” pp. 121-125.
[33] See _Spectator_, 535.
[34] _Rambler_, 65.
[35] _Anecdotes of Johnson_ (1786) by Mrs. Thrale (aft. Piozzi).
[36] _The Oriental Moralist, or the Beauties of the Arabian Nights’ Entertainments_: “Translated from the original, accompanied with suitable reflections, adapted to each story”. London, E. Newbery, c. 1796.
[37] _The Travels of Tom Thumb over England and Wales_, “containing Descriptions of whatever is most remarkable in the several Counties, interspersed with many pleasant Adventures that happened to him personally during the Course of his Journey. Written by Himself.” London, 1746. Price 1s. 6d. bound.
[38] _Robin Goodfellow_, “A Fairy Tale written by a Fairy, for the amusement of all the pretty little Faies and Fairies in Great Britain and Ireland”. Printed for F. Newbery, 1770.
[39] See Appendix A. II.
[40] Mr. Charles Welsh in _A Bookseller of the Last Century_, gives a full account of John Newbery and his work. There is a complete list of the Newbery Books in the Appendix.
[41] By J. Wright. Second edition, 1738.
[42] The “Advertisement” is quoted in Appendix A. III.
[43] Advertised in the _Penny London Post_, January 18, 1745.
[44] Adv., April 9th, 1761. See Appendix A. III.
[45] From Francis Newbery’s Autobiography.
[46] Advertised in the _General Evening Post_, March 4, 1751, Price 3d. Additions in Appendix A. III.
[47] An “Entertainment” later performed with Garrick’s “Fairy Tale from Shakespeare” (1777). See p. 82, Note 2.
[48] See note in Appendix A. III.
[49] See Appendix A. III.—Novels abridged or adapted for children.
[50] See Appendix A. III.
[51] Title-page, etc. in Appendix A. III.
[52] First edition, April, 1765. Others in Appendix A. III.
[53] For details of the _Valentine’s_ and _Twelfth Day Gifts_, see Appendix A. III.
[55] See below. Chap. VII.
[56] _The Bee._ Nov. 10, 1759—“On Education.”
[57] See Note in Appendix A. III.
[58] Examples in Appendix A. III.
[59] Some account of them, and of the later “Lilliputian” books is given in Appendix A. III.
[60] Mentioned in Carnan’s list of 1787. For details see Appendix A. III.
[61] _Juvenile Trials_ “for robbing orchards, telling fibs and other heinous offences—Embellished with Cuts. By Master Tommy Lyttleton, Secretary to the Court”. T. Carnan, 1781. Another edition—Lond. for T. Carnan, 1786.
[62] See below, Chapter VI.
[63] _The Juvenile Biographer_, “containing the lives of little Masters and Misses, both good and naughty. Price three-pence”. E. Newbery’s list, 1789. The first edition must have been earlier, since a New England edition was published in 1787. See Appendix A. III.
[64] Vincent Voiture (1598-1648). See _Some Thoughts Concerning Education_, § 189. Pope also praised Voiture.
[65] Printed for T. Carnan in St. Paul’s Churchyard, 1786.
[66] This advice suggests a sly hit at the conversation-parties of the bluestockings, some of whom became writers of children’s books.
[67] _Juvenile Correspondence; or letters suited to Children from four to above ten Years of Age._ In three Sets. 2nd edition, London, John Marshall, n.d. (_c._ 1777). For details of another collection by Lucy Aikin (1816), see Appendix A. III.
[68] The letters of real children were even more mature. See Appendix A. III.
[69] Called here “_A Midsummer Night’s Dream_”. This must have been Garrick’s _Fairy Tale in Two Acts, taken from Shakespeare_, played at the Haymarket in 1777. “The young Princes and Princesses” mentioned as having been at the play, were the children of George III, then between the ages of three and fourteen.
[70] See below—Chapters V and VI.
[71] See further—Appendix A. III.
[72] For nursery-books printed by Catnach and Pitts, see Appendix A. III.
[73] _The History of a Banbury Cake_, “An entertaining Book for Children”. Banbury, printed and sold by J. G. Rusher, Bridge Street, 1d., n.d.
[74] Rousseau’s _Emile_ was published in 1762. Translated into English, 1763.
[75] Contributed to _Le Mercure_ (c. 1758). Translated into English “by a Lady” (Miss Roberts), 1763. Translated by Mrs. Pilkington and illustrated by Bewick, 1799.
[77] _The Looking Glass for the Mind; or, Intellectual Mirror_; “being an elegant collection of the Most Delightful little Stories, and Interesting Tales: chiefly translated from that much admired Work, L’Ami des Enfans. With seventy-four Cuts, designed and engraved on Wood, by J. Bewick.” First published 1787. E. Newbery’s list, 1789. Reprinted in 1885, with an introduction by Charles Welsh.
[78] _Les Conversations d’Emilie_, crowned by the French Academy in 1783. Translated into English. London, John Marshall, 1787.
[79] _Adèle et Théodore (3 tomes)_, Paris, 1782. Translated (3 vols.), London, 1783.
[80] _Les Veillées du Château._ 1784. Translated by T. Holcroft, Dublin, 1785. See Appendix A. IV, for an account of Mrs. Pilkington’s _Tales of the Cottage_, 1799.
[81] See Mr. Austin Dobson’s account of Madame de Genlis in _Four Frenchwomen_. London, 1890.
[83] Translated into English as _The History of Little Grandison_. “By M. Berquin, Author of _The Children’s Friend_.” London, printed for John Stockdale, 1791. (Price one shilling.) Frontispiece by John Bewick.
[85] See Appendix A. V.
[86] _The History of Sandford and Merton_, “A work intended for the use of children”. London. For L. Stockdale, 1783-6-9 (3 vols.). The book was reprinted all through the nineteenth century.
[87] The first volumes were published in 1766, the fifth not till 1770, when an abridged chap-book version also appeared. Charles Kingsley edited a reprint in 1872.
[88] See below, Chapter VIII.
[89] This story had appeared in _The Twelfth Day Gift_, and was very popular in pre-revolutionary days.
[90] _The Children’s Miscellany_. London, printed for John Stockdale, 1787. It included “The Gentleman and the Basket Maker”. “Little Jack”, printed separately, became a favourite chap-book.
[91] See Appendix A. V.
[92] _The Hermit; or, the Unparalled (sic) sufferings and surprising adventures of Mr. Philip Quarll, an Englishman, who was lately discovered by Mr. D—— upon an uninhabited island in the South Sea_, etc. London, 1727. For other editions see Appendix A. V.
[93] _The New Robinson Crusoe_, 4 vols. London, 1788.
[94] _Original Stories from Real Life_, “with Conversations calculated to Regulate the Affections and Form the Mind to Truth and Goodness”. By Mary Wollstonecraft. London. Printed for J. Johnson, 1791 (Illustrated by William Blake). Reprinted, Oxford, 1906, with five of Blake’s illustrations. Intro. Mr. E. V. Lucas.
[95] See below—Chapter VI.
[96] Dated (1783) by a reference to “the invention of Air Balloons”, quoted below. Earliest edition seen: _The Juvenile Tatler_, “by a Society of Young Ladies under the Tuition of Mrs. Teachwell.” London, J. Marshall. 1789.
[97] _The Fairy Spectator; or, The Invisible Monitor._ By Mrs. Teachwell and her Family (Eleanor, Lady Fenn). London. J. Marshall. 1789.
[98] See the _Memoir of Thomas Bewick_ (1862). See also Mr. Austin Dobson’s account in _Thomas Bewick and His Pupils_ (1884)
[99] _Fables, by the late Mr. Gay._ In one Volume complete. Newcastle, T. Saint, etc., 1779.
[100] See below—Appendix A. VI.
[101] _The Governess; or the Little Female Academy_, “calculated for the entertainment and Instruction of Young Ladies in their Education. By the Author of _David Simple_.” London, printed for A. Millar, over against Catharine Street in the Strand. The Third Edition, Revised and Corrected, 1751.
A second edition had been printed in 1749. Miss Fielding’s novel, _David Simple_, had appeared in 1744.
[102] _Le Magasin des Enfans, par Madame le Prince de Beaumont._ 2nd ed. 1757. Translated into English in 1767 as _The Young Misses’ Magazine_. See Appendix A. VI.
[103] _The Village School_, “interspersed with entertaining stories.” By M. P. 2 vols. Price 1/-. From a list of “New Books for the Instruction and Amusement of Children”. London, J. Marshall _c._ 1788. (At the back of a copy of _Primrose Prettyface_, inscribed “Thomas Preston,” with date March 22nd, 1788). See Appendix A. VI.
[104] _Jemima Placid; or, the Advantage of Good-Nature_, etc. By S. S. Price 6d. Marshall’s List, _c._ 1788.
[105] See _John Hookham Frere and his Friends_, by Gabrielle Festing. Nisbet, 1899. Jemima Placid is ascribed in a foot-note to “_Miss Dorothy_ Kilner.”
[106] _The Boys’ School; or, Traits of Character in Early Life._ A Moral Tale by Miss Sandham. London, printed for John Souter at the School Library, 73 St. Paul’s Churchyard, 1800. See Appendix A. VI.
[107] _The Schoolfellows, a Moral Tale._ By the author of _The Twin Sisters_, etc. 1818.
[108] _The Academy; or, a Picture of Youth._ London, G. Harris, and Darton and Harvey. Edinburgh, W. Bury, 1808.
[109] _The Juvenile Spectator_, “Being observations on the Tempers Manners and Foibles of Various Young Persons. Interspersed with such lively matter as it is presumed will amuse as well as instruct.” By Arabella Argus. London, W. & T. Darton, 1810.
[110] For other books by Mrs. Argus, see Appendix A. VI.
[111] A satire on well-known persons of the day, by F. Coventry, 1751.
[112] _Fabulous Histories_, “Designed for the Instruction of Children, Respecting their Treatment of Animals”. By Mrs. Trimmer. London, Printed for J. Johnson, etc., J. Harris and others. 1786. Eighth edition (dedicated to “H.R.H. Princess Sophia”, then a child of nine), 1807.
[113] See _Some Account of the Life and Writings of Mrs. T._ Further details in Appendix A. VI.
[114] _The Life and Perambulation of a Mouse._ By M. P. 2 vols. Price 1/-. _c._ 1788.
[115] _Keeper’s Travels in Search of his Master._ By Edward Augustus Kendall. London, E. Newbery, 1798.
[116] See Appendix A. VI.
[117] _The Adventures of a Donkey._ By Arabella Argus, Author of _The Juvenile Spectator_. London, W. Darton, 1815.
[118] London. J. Harris, 1809. See Appendix A. VI.
[119] _Felissa; or, the Life and Opinions of a Kitten of Sentiment._ J. Harris, 1811. Reprinted, Methuen, 1903.
[120] _Chrysal; or, the Adventures of a Guinea._ By Charles Johnstone (1760).
[121] _The Adventures of a Silver Threepence_, “containing much Amusement and many Characters with which young Gentlemen and Ladies ought to be acquainted”. Adorned with cuts. Burslem, J. Tregortha, n.d. (Dutch flowered bds.) For other “adventures” of things, see Appendix A. VI.
[122] _The Adventures of a Pincushion_, “Designed chiefly for the Use of Young Ladies”. By S. S. Price 6d., Marshall’s list, _c._ 1788.
[123] Anna Laetitia Aikin (afterwards Mrs. B.). See the Memoir by A. L. Le Breton, 1874. Her sister Lucy was the author of _Juvenile Correspondence_ and other children’s books.
[124] _Hymns in Prose for Children_, 1781. This was preceded by Mrs. B.’s _Lessons for Children_, a first reading-book. (1780).
[125] _Harry Beaufoy; or, The Pupil of Nature_, by Maria Hack (1821), was written to illustrate Paley’s doctrine.
[126] Mrs. G., the mother of Mrs. Ewing, published her _Parables from Nature_ between 1855 and 1871.
[127] Published in six volumes (1792-1796) and frequently reprinted during the nineteenth century.
[128] Written 1805-1806. Published by M. J. Godwin, at the Juvenile Library, Skinner Street, 1807. 2nd Edition, 1809.
[129] William Betty, “the celebrated Young Roscius”, appeared in Belfast, Dublin and London, between 1803 and 1805. A “Biographical Sketch” of him, by G. D. Harley, appeared in 1804.
[130] Published by M. J. Godwin, at the Juvenile Library, Skinner Street, 1808. Mentioned in the European Magazine for November, 1808. See Appendix A. VII.
[131] _Mrs. Leicester’s School; or, the History of Several Young Ladies, Related by Themselves._
Written 1808. Published 1809. 2nd edition, 1809. Mentioned in the _Critical Review_ for December, 1808. See Appendix A. VII.
[132] See the note in “Emily Barton”, Vol. III of the _Works of Charles and Mary Lamb_, edited by Mr. E. V. Lucas.
[133] See Appendix A. VII.
[134] See _The Family Pen_, edited by Isaac Taylor, Jun., 1867. See further, Appendix A. VII.
[135] See below, Chapter IX.
[136] Published June, 1816.
[137] From Feb., 1816, to the end of 1822. Collected as “_The Contributions of Q. Q. to a Periodical Work_”, with some pieces not before published. By the late Jane Taylor. 2 vols. London. B. J. Holdsworth, St. Paul’s Churchyard, 1824.
[138] From a letter of J. T.’s, describing her room.
[139] _The Wedding Among the Flowers_ (verse) by Ann Taylor, 1808.
[140] See “Spring Flowers”, No. XXX of _The Contributions of Q. Q._
[141] Martha Mary Butt (afterwards Mrs. Sherwood), 1755-1851. See _The Life and Times of Mrs. Sherwood_, edited by F. J. Harvey Darton. London, 1910.
[142] See Appendix A. VII.
[143] Reprinted by Mr. Darton in his _Life and Times of Mrs. S._
[144] _The Infant’s Progress from the Valley of Destruction to Everlasting Glory._ By Mrs. Sherwood, author of _Little Henry and his Bearer_, etc., etc. Houlston, 1821. Composed in India, 1814.
[145] _The Governess; or, the Little Female Academy._ “By Mrs. Sherwood.” See Appendix. A. VII.
[146] _The History of the Fairchild Family; or, the Child’s Manual._ “Being a Collection of Stories calculated to show the Importance and Effects of a Religious Education”. By Mrs. Sherwood. London. Printed for J. Hatchard and sold by F. Houlston & Son, Wellington, 1818.
[147] _The Orphan Boy; or, a Journey to Bath._ By Mary Elliott. See Appendix A. VII.
[148] See Helen Zimmern’s _Maria Edgeworth_, 1883.
[149] Never published, as Holcroft’s translation appeared before it was ready (1785).
[150] _The Parent’s Assistant; or, Stories for Children._ By “M. E.” London, Joseph Johnson, St. Paul’s Churchyard. 3 vols. 12 mo. published in 2 parts. Announced in the _Monthly Review_ for Sept., 1796. See Appendix A. VIII.
[151] “Waste Not, Want Not; or, Two Strings to Your Bow.” P. A. Vol. III.
[152] “Old Poz” (P. A. Vol. II) was the only play published early. Others, written between 1808 and 1814, appeared in _Little Plays for Young People_; “Warranted Harmless”. By Maria Edgeworth. London, Baldwin & Cradock. 1827. See Appendix A. VIII.
[153] A letter from Maria Edgeworth to Mary Sneyd (March 19, 1803) describing her visit to Madame de Genlis, suggests a want of sympathy between them. See Appendix A. VIII.
[154] See Appendix A. VIII.
[155] The two sisters, contrasted with the frivolous Lady Augusta in “Mademoiselle Panache”.
[156] The first tale of Rosamond: “The Birth-day Present”. (P. A. Vol. I.)
[157] See “The Mimic”. (P. A. Vol. II.)
[158] A remark of Scott’s to Mrs. Davy, quoted in Lockhart’s _Life_.
[159] First edition (2 Vols.) 1801. A continuation in 2 volumes was published in 1815. See Appendix A. VIII.
[160] _The Botanic Garden; a Poem, in Two Parts._ Part I containing The Economy of Vegetation. Part II, The Loves of the Plants. With Philosophical Notes. 1789.
Quoted in Appendix A. VIII.
[161] Begun by Mr. Edgeworth and Mrs. Honora Edgeworth, to follow Mrs. Barbauld’s _Lessons for Children_. The first part was printed for use in the family.
[162] _Harry and Lucy_, Vol. II. “Young Travellers.” A piece of pure nonsense composed by Samuel Foote, comic actor and playwright. (_c._ 1720-1777). See Appendix A. VIII.
[163] First edition, 1801.
[164] Madame de Staël made this criticism to M. Dumont.
[165] _Early Lessons_, Vol. II.
[166] See Mr. Edgeworth’s preface to _The Parent’s Assistant_.
[167] _Harry and Lucy_, Vol. III (4th ed. 1846).
[168] Writing from Black Castle, Mrs. Ruxton’s house, in 1803, Miss E. calls it “this enchanted castle”.
[169] See Mr. Edgeworth’s “Address to Mothers”, _Early Lessons_ (Vol. III). a list of books which he mentions is given in Appendix A. VIII.
[170] See _The Life and Letters of Maria Edgeworth_, edited by A. J. C. Hare.
[171] In a letter to C. Sneyd Edgeworth, May 1, 1813.
[172] _Spectator_, No. 477. Sat. Sep. 6. 1712.
[173] MS. Bodl. 832. There is a reprint in the _Babees’ Book_ (E.E.T.S.)
[174] See Bunyan’s _Book for Boys and Girls; or, Country Rhimes for Children_, 1686. See Appendix A. IX.
[175] See Appendix A. IX.
[176] By William Ronksley, 1712. See Appendix A. IX.
[177] _Divine Songs for Children_, by the Rev. Isaac Watts, D.D., 1715. _Divine and Moral Songs for Children_, 10th ed., 1729.
[178] “The Butterfly”, by Adelaide O’Keefe. See below. _Original Poems_ by the Taylors and A. O’K.
[179] _Puerilia; or, Amusements for the Young._ “Consisting of a Collection of Songs adapted to the Fancies and Capacities of those of tender Years, and taken from their usual Diversions and Employments: also on Subjects of a more elevated Nature. Divided into three Parts, viz.: I. Songs for little Misses. II. Songs for little Masters. III. Songs on Divine, Moral and other Subjects, etc.” By John Marchant, Gent.
London, Printed for P. Stevens and sold by the Booksellers in Town and Country. 1751.
[180] Preserved in a Balliol MS. Quoted by Mrs. E. M. Field in _The Child and His Book_.
[181] _Gammer Gurton’s Garland; or, The Nursery Parnassus._ “A choice Collection of pretty Songs and Verses for the Amusement of all little Children.”
Stockton. Christopher and Jennett, n.d.
[182] _Songs for the Nursery_, “collected from the Works of the most renowned Poets and adapted to favourite national Melodies.” London, printed for Tabart & Co. at the Juvenile and School Library, 157, New Bond Street, 1805 (price sixpence).
[183] See Appendix A. IX. for a reference by R. L. Stevenson.
[184] _The Poetical Flower-Basket; or, The Lilliputian Flight to Parnassus._ price 4d., in Dutch flowered bds. n.d. (_c._ 1780).
[185] Blake’s _Songs of Innocence_ appeared in 1789.
[186] “To a Little Girl That Has Told a Lie”, by Ann Taylor. (Original Poems, Vol. I. See below.)
[187] From the same: “For a Naughty Little Girl.”
[188] “Idle Mary”. See _Rhymes for the Nursery_. By the authors of _Original Poems_. London, Darton & Harvey. 1806.
[189] _Original Poems for Infant Minds._ By Several Young Persons. London, printed for Darton & Harvey. 1804. (7th edition). The authors were Ann and Jane Taylor and their friend Adelaide O’Keefe.
[190] “The Cow”, in _A Child’s Garden of Verses_, by R. L. Stevenson. 1885.
[191] “The Cow”, by Jane Taylor: the first piece in _Rhymes for the Nursery_.
[192] By Adelaide O’Keefe. Compare “The Wind” by R. L. S.
[193] Poems on “Fire”, “Air”, “Earth” and “Water”, by Ann Taylor. _Original Poems._ Vol. II.
[194] “The Yellow Leaf”, by Ann Taylor.
[195] See Appendix A. IX.
[196] _Poetry for Children_, “Entirely Original. By the Author of Mrs. Leicester’s School. In 2 Vols. 18 mo., ornamented with two beautiful Frontispieces. Price 1s. 6d. each, half-bound and lettered.” Published by Mrs. Godwin in 1809.
See Appendix A. IX.
[197] Printed for Thomas Hodgkins. London, 1805.
[198] See Appendix A. IX.
[199] “The Lame Brother” and “Nursing”.
[200] _Original Poems_, Vol I.
[201] See Appendix A. IX.
[202] “A Penny Plain and Twopence Coloured,” by R. L. S. _Memories and Portraits._ Paper XIII.
[203] _The Butterfly’s Ball and the Grasshopper’s Feast_, by Mr. Roscoe. Illustrated with Elegant Engravings. London, Printed for J. Harris, Successor to E. Newbery, at the Original Juvenile Library, the Corner of St. Paul’s Churchyard, 1807. Facsimile reprint, with introduction by Charles Welsh, Griffith and Farran, successors to Harris, 1883.
[204] Mulready, whose history was told in _The Looking-Glass_ (See below, Appendix A. VIII), was supposed to have drawn these illustrations in his childhood.
[205] For this and other sequels to _The Butterfly’s Ball_, see Appendix A. IX.
[206] _The Daisy; or, Cautionary Stories in Verse_, 1807.
_The Cowslip; or, More Cautionary Stories in Verse_, 1811.
For additions, reprints and imitations, see Appendix A. IX.
[207] _The Rose_, Containing Original Poems for Young People. By their friend Mary Elliott.
[208] From _Mamma’s Verses; or, Lines for Little Londoners_, said to have been suggested by _Original Poems_. Brentford, P. Norbury, n.d.
[209] See Appendix A. IX.
[210] See Appendix A. IX.
[211] See Appendix A. IX.
[212] See Appendix A. IX.
APPENDIX A.
I.
[Sidenote: p. 14. 1.]
_List of chap-book romances and tales in order of reference._
(1) Bevis of Southampton.—First English edition, Wynkyn de Worde (a fragment, n.d.)
Chap-book: _Sir Bevis of Southampton_, London, n.d.
(2) Guy of Warwick.—First English edition, W. Copland (1548-68).
Chap-book: _Guy, Earl of Warwick_, n.d. (_c._ 1750).
(3) The Seven Champions of Christendom.—By Richard Johnson (1596).
Chap-book: London, n.d. (_c._ 1750).
(4) Don Bellianis of Greece.—Earliest edition, 1598. Black Letter.
Chap-book: The History of Don Bellianis of Greece, London, n.d. (_c._ 1780).
(5) The Famous History of Montelyon. By Emanuel Forde (1633).
Chap-book: The History of Montellion, London, n.d.
(6) Parismus, the Renowned Prince of Bohemia.—1598. Black Letter.
Chap-book: London, n.d. (_c._ 1760).
(7) The History of Fortunatus.—Stationers’ Register (1615).
Chap-book: London, n.d. (eighteenth century).
(8) Valentine and Orson.—French edition, 1489. Two editions by W. Copland.
(9) Friar Bacon.—Greene’s play, mentioned in Henslowe’s Diary under the years 1591-2 was based on an earlier tract. Eighteenth century chap-book: London, n.d.
(10) The Historyes of Troye.—Caxton, 1477. Folio Black Letter.
Chap-book: _Hector, Prince of Troy_, London, n.d.
(11) Patient Grissel.—Chap-book: The History of the Marquis of Salus and Patient Grissel, London, n.d. (_c._ 1750).
(12) The King and the Cobbler.—Chap-book: London, n.d. (King Henry VIII).
(13) The Valiant London Prentice.—“Written for the Encouragement of Youth” by John Shurley. For J. Back, B.L.
Chap-book: “Printed for the Hon. Company of Walking Stationers”, London, n.d. (after 1780).
(14) _Tom Long the Carrier_ (with woodcut of Tudor pedlar), London, n.d.
(15) “The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus”, a mediæval tale in Caxton’s _Golden Legende_.
(16) _The History of Laurence Lazy_, London, n.d. (eighteenth century).
(17) _Joseph and his Brethren._—Chap-book: London, n.d.
(18) The Glastonbury Thorn (Joseph of Arimathea).—Wynkyn de Worde, n.d.
Chap-book: The History of Joseph of Arimathea, n.d. (_c._ 1740).
(19) _The Wandering Jew_, etc.
Chap-book (dialogue), London, n.d.
[Sidenote: p. 20. 1.]
Another chap-book of this sort is The History of Dr. John Faustus (Aldermary Churchyard, n.d.).
“A Ballad of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus, the Great Congerer”, was entered in the Stationers’ Register in 1588; and Marlowe produced his play in 1589.
[Sidenote: p. 22. 1.]
The humour of “topsy-turveydom” dates back to the fourteenth century _Land of Cockayne_, and survives to-day in nursery-rhymes and “drolls”. “The Wise Men of Gotham” was still popular in the eighteenth century. This famous nonsense-book was written by Andrew Boorde, and a Bodleian copy is dated 1630.
[Sidenote: 2.]
(a) _Memoirs of the late John Kippen_, “to which is added an Elegy on Peter Duthie, who was for upwards of eighty years a Flying Stationer”.
(b) Mr. R. H. Cunningham, in a note prefixed to his _Amusing Prose Chap-books_ (1889) gives an account of a book-pedlar, Dougal Graham, who hawked books among Prince Charlie’s soldiers in the ’45, and afterwards became an author and printer of chap-books.
[Sidenote: p. 25. 1.]
_The Adventures of Philip Quarll_, by Edward Dorrington (1727) was probably inspired by _Robinson Crusoe_. It was afterwards used to illustrate revolutionary theory. See Chapter V.
[Sidenote: p. 26. 1.]
(a)“Chevy Chase”, praised by Sir Philip Sidney for its “trumpet note”, was included in Dryden’s Miscellanies, 1702, in the Collection of 1723 and in Percy’s Reliques, 1765.
(b) The ballad of “The Two Children in the Wood” was printed in 1597 as “The Norfolk Gentleman, his Will and Testament”, etc. There is a prose chap-book of 1700, “to which is annex’d the Old Song upon the same”.
The ballad is included in the collection of 1723.
[Sidenote: p. 27. 1.]
“The Noble Acts of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table; with the Valiant Atchievements of Sir Launcelot du Lake. To the Tune of, _Flying Fame_”.
The first stanza (of which Falstaff quotes the first line in Henry IV, Part 2) runs thus:
“When Arthur first in Court began, And was approved King, By Force of Arms great Victories won, And conquest home did bring”.
The episode is from Malory.
Other ballads based on romances in the Collection of 1723 are: “St. George and the Dragon”, “The Seven Champions of Christendom”, “The London Prentice” and “Patient Grissel”.
The Percy Folio includes “King Arthur and the King of Cornwall”, “Sir Lancelott of Dulake”, “The Marriage of Sir Gawaine”, “Merline”, and “King Arthur’s Death”.
[Sidenote: p. 30. 1.]
(a) Legendary ballads in the Collection of 1723 include: “Fair Rosamond”, “King Henry (II) and the Miller of Mansfield”, “Sir Andrew Barton’s Death”, “King Leir and his Three Daughters”, “Coventry made free by Godiva”, “The Murther of the Two Princes in the Tower”, “King John and the Abbot of Canterbury”.
Many others deal with historical themes, such as “The Banishment of the Dukes of Hereford and Norfolk”, or with famous battles. “King Henry Fifth’s Conquest of France” probably belongs to the reign of George I.
(b) “The Blind Beggar’s Daughter” was adapted from a favourite Elizabethan ballad, “Young Monford Riding to the Wars”.
There is a prose chap-book, printed by T. Norris, London, 1715.
[Sidenote: p. 31. 1.]
Other sea-ballads in Child’s collection are:—“The Sweet Trinity” (or, “The Golden Vanity”).—Pepys, 1682-5; “Captain Ward and the Rainbow”,—Roxburghe and Aldermary copies; “The Mermaid” (or, “The Seamen’s Distress”).—Garland of 1765, etc.; “Sir Patrick Spens”.—Percy’s _Reliques_, 1765, Herd’s _Scottish Songs_, 1769, and Scott’s _Minstrelsy_, 1803.
II.
[Sidenote: p. 40. 1.]
There is a list of great men given in _The Tatler_ (No. 67), Sept. 13, 1709; and in No. 78, one Lemuel Ledger writes to put Mr. Bickerstaff in mind of “Alderman Whittington, who began the World with a Cat and died with three hundred and fifty thousand Pounds sterling”.
_The Spectator_ (No. 5) March 6, 1711, says that “there was once a Design of casting into an Opera the Story of Whittington and his Cat, but that Mr. Rich abandoned the Idea for Fear of being overrun by Mice which the Cat could not kill.”
Suspicion seems to have been cast on the cat in the second half of the century, and it is interesting to find Goldsmith (“On Education”, 1759) advocating instead of romances “the old story of Whittington, _were his cat left out_” as “more serviceable to the tender mind than either Tom Jones, Joseph Andrews, or a hundred others, where frugality is the only good quality the hero is not possessed of”.
Mr. Wheatley in his _Chap-books and Folk-lore Tracts_, notes that in 1771 the Rev. Samuel Pegge brought the subject of Whittington and his Cat before the Society of Antiquaries, “but he could make nothing at all of the Cat”.
[Sidenote: p. 48. 1.]
Other early editions of the Arabian Tales: 1712 and 1724.
The translation of the _Arabian Nights_ was followed by English versions of Pétis de la Croix.
_The Persian Tales, or the Thousand and One Days_ appeared in 1714, and was followed in the same year by _The Persian and Turkish Tales Compleat_.
The pseudo-translations of Gueullette were translated into English in 1725, as _The Chinese Tales, or the Wonderful Adventures of the Mandarin Fum-Hoam_.
[Sidenote: p. 56. 1.]
Moralised ballad-stories:—
(a) Robin Hood, J. Harris, London, n.d. (_c._ 1807).
(b) _The Tragical History of the Children in the Wood_, “containing a true Account of their unhappy Fate, with the History of their Parents and their unnatural Uncle. Interspersed with Morals for the Instruction of Children. To which is added the favourite Song of the Babes in the Wood. Embellished with Cuts.” London, n.d.
(c) _The Children in the Wood_ (_Restored by Honestus_). J. G. Rusher, Banbury, 1⁄2d. (_c._ 1810).
III.
[Sidenote: p. 60. 3.]
“According to Act of Parliament (neatly bound and gilt) a little Pretty Pocket Book, intended for the Instruction and Amusement of little Master Tommy and pretty Miss Polly, with an agreeable Letter to read from Jack the Giant-Killer, and also a Ball and Pincushion, the Use of which will infallibly make Tommy a good Boy and Polly a good Girl”, etc.
[Sidenote: p. 62. 1.]
_The Philosophy of Tops and Balls_ is explained as “The Newtonian System of Philosophy adapted to the Capacities of Young Gentlemen and Ladies, and made entertaining by Objects with which they are intimately acquainted”.
[Sidenote: 3.]
_The Lilliputian Magazine; or, the Young Gentleman and Lady’s Golden Library._
From the preface:—“the Authors concerned in this little Book have planned out a Method of Education very different from what has hitherto been offered to the Public: and more agreeable and better adapted to the tender Capacities of Children”.
[Sidenote: p. 64. 1.]
In Mr. John Newbery’s list for 1762, _A Pretty Book of Pictures for little Masters and Misses_ has the alternative title of “Tommy Trip’s History of Beasts and Birds, with a familiar Description of each in Verse and Prose”.
To this was added “The History of little Tom Trip himself, his Dog Jowler, and of Woglog the Great Giant”.
This was the earliest edition known to Mr. Welsh; but an edition of 1752 was afterwards discovered and noted in _The Times Literary Supplement_, Dec. 18, 1919, under “Notes on Sales”. This seems to be the first edition of _Tommy Trip’s History_; but an earlier account of him is given in _The Lilliputian Magazine_, first advertised in 1751. Goldsmith came to London after his travels on the Continent, in 1756, so that he could not have written _Tommy Trip_, although the rhyme of “Three Children”, as Mr. Welsh observed, is remarkably like the “Elegy on a Mad Dog”.
[Sidenote: 2.]
_Note on Novels and Plays abridged or adapted for children_:—
Among these were _Pamela; or, Virtue Rewarded_, with a prefatory address “To the Parents, Guardians and Governesses of Great Britain and Ireland”. (E. Newbury’s list, 1789); and _Tom Jones, the Foundling_ (the story of his childhood only), published about 1814 by Pitts of Seven Dials, with a foreword to the “little Friends” for whom it was designed.
Plays were also fashioned into children’s books. Garrick’s Masque from Dryden’s _King Arthur_ (1770) produced a “Lilliputian” romance closely modelled on Dryden: _The Eventful History of King Arthur; or, the British Worthy_. London, printed for H. Roberts & W. Nicholl. Price 6d., in Dutch paper boards. (A.S. Kensington copy is dated 1782.)
Early in the 19th century, the story of _Cymbeline_ was published as _The Entertaining History of Palidore and Fidele_, in flowered covers, for the “amusement and instruction of youth”.
[Sidenote: p. 65. 1.]
(a) _Tommy Thumb’s Pretty Song Book_. Vol. II. “Sold by M. Cooper, according to Act of Parliament”.
The frontispiece shows a boy playing a flute and two girls seated with a book of songs. At the foot of each page is a musical direction: “Recitatio”, “Toccato”, “Vere Subito”, etc. At the end are two cuts, one a portrait of the writer “Nurse Lovechild”, the other advertising _The Child’s Plaything_, with the date 1744, and the following rhyme:—
“The Child’s Plaything I recommend for cheating Children into Learning Without any Beating.”
(b) The author of _The Little Master’s Miscellany_ (1743) condemns the popular song-books, and instead of these, provides children with moral dialogues, “On Lying”, “On Fishing”, “On Death”, “On Detraction”, “On the Tulip”, etc.
(c) John Marchant in his _Puerilia; or, Amusements for the Young_ (1753) offers a better substitute for the “Ribaldry” which he complains that children are “instructed to con and get by Heart” as soon as they can read,—“to trill it with their little Voices in every Company where they are introduced”.
See above.—Chapter IX.
[Sidenote: 2.]
_Mother Goose’s Melody; or, Sonnets for the Cradle_, in Two Parts. “Part I.—The most celebrated Songs and Lullabies of the old British Nurses, calculated to amuse the Children and excite them to sleep; Part II.—Those of that sweet Songster and Muse of Art and Humours, Master William Shakespeare. Adorned with Cuts and illustrated with Notes and Maxims, historical, philosophical and critical.”
The addition, in Part II, of Shakespeare’s songs makes a fitting sequel for older children.
A facsimile of the New England edition of 1785 was printed in 1892, with the following description:—
“The original Mother Goose’s Melody, as issued by John Newbery of London, _circa_ 1760; Isaiah Thomas of Worcester, Mass., _circa_ 1785, and Munro and Francis of Boston, _circa_ 1825. Reproduced in facsimile from the first Worcester edition, with introduction and notes by William H. Whitmore. To which are added the Fairy Tales of Mother Goose, first collected by Perrault in 1696, reprinted from the original translation into English by R. Samber in 1729. Boston and London,—Griffith, Farran & Co., 1892.”
(b) Another early book of rhymes is _The Top Book of all for little Masters and Misses_, “Containing the choicest Stories, prettiest Poems and most diverting Riddles, all wrote by Nurse Lovechild, Mother Goose, Jacky Nory, Tommy Thumb and other eminent Authors ... also enriched with curious and lovely Pictures, done by the top Hands, and is sold only at R. Baldwin’s and S. Crowder’s, Booksellers in Pater Noster Row, London, and at Benjamin Collins’s in Salisbury for 2d. (Date, on woodcut of a shilling, 1760).”
(c) A later Miscellany, _Mirth without Mischief_ _c._ 1790, has similar rhymes.
[Sidenote: p. 67. 1.]
A third edition of _Goody Two-Shoes_ appeared in 1766, in Dutch flowered boards, “printed for J. Newbery at the Bible and Sun in St. Paul’s Churchyard. Price 6d.” This was reproduced in facsimile with an introduction by Charles Welsh, by Griffith and Farran, successors to Newbery and Harris, in 1881.
Later editions: 1770.—T. Carnan & F. Newbery, Jun.; 1783.—T. Carnan; 1786—Isaiah Thomas, Worcester, Mass. (First Worcester ed.); 1793.—Darton & Harvey, Gracechurch St.; 1796 (with MS. note by Mr. J. Winter Jones), 32 mo.
Penny chap-book edition (_c._ 1815).—J. Pitts, Seven Dials: “The Toy and Marble Warehouse”. Many “modernised” editions were printed during the 19th century; the last recorded, in 1884; and G.T.S. was included in Charlotte Yonge’s _Storehouse of Stories_ (1870).
[Sidenote: p. 68. 1.]
(a) From Carnan’s list, 1787.—“The Valentine’s Gift; or, the whole History of Valentine’s Day, containing the Way to preserve Truth, Honour and Integrity unshaken. Very necessary in a trading Nation. Price sixpence, bound.”
A later edition (Kendrew, Glasgow, _c._ 1814) in the S. Kensington collection, has significant additions:—
“The Valentine Gift; or, a Plan to enable children _of all Denominations_ to behave with Honour, Integrity and Humanity. To which is added some Account of old Zigzag, and of the Horn which he used to understand the Language of Birds, Beasts, Fishes and Insects. The Lord who made thee made the Creatures also; thou shalt be merciful and kind unto them, for they are thy fellow Tenants of the Globe.—Zoroaster.”
(b) _The Twelfth Day Gift_ (advertised April 18, 1767). The title-page of the 1783 edition is as follows:—
“The Twelfth Day Gift; or, the Grand Exhibition, containing a curious Collection of Pieces in Prose and Verse (many of them Originals) which were delivered to a numerous and polite Audience on the important Subjects of Religion, Morality, History, Philosophy, Polity, Prudence and Economy, at the most noble the Marquis of Setstar’s by a Society of young Gentlemen and Ladies, and registered at their request by their old Friend Mr. Newbery. With which are intermixed some occasional Reflections and a Narrative containing the Characters and Behaviour of the several Persons concerned.
Example draws where Precept fails And Sermons are less read than Tales.
London: Printed for T. Carnan, Successor to Mr. J. Newbery in St. Paul’s Church Yard. Price one shilling.”
In an enveloping cautionary story, there is some account of a gigantic Twelfth Day Cake; but the book consists chiefly of “Pieces”, which include the story of “Inkle and Yarico”, taken by Addison from Ligon’s _Account of Barbados (Spectator_, No. 11), “versified by a Lady”, Addison’s hymns; Pope’s Universal Prayer; “The Progress of Life”, an Eastern story from the _Rambler_; Parnell’s “Hermit”; the character of Antiope from Fénélon’s _Telemachus_, translated in 1742, and the King’s speech to Westmoreland (Henry V. iv. 3), a sign of the revived interest in Shakespeare.
This is almost a perfect specimen of the Lilliputian Miscellany.
[Sidenote: p. 76. 1.]
From Nichols’s _Literary Anecdotes_ (1812-16):—“It is not perhaps generally known that to Mr. Griffith Jones, and a brother of his, Mr. Giles Jones, in conjunction with Mr. John Newbery, the public are indebted for the origin of those numerous and popular little books for the amusement and instruction of children which have been ever since received with universal approbation. The Lilliputian histories of Goody Two-Shoes, Giles Ginger-bread, Tommy Trip, etc., etc., are remarkable proofs of the benevolent minds of the projectors of this plan of instruction, and respectable instances of the accommodation of superior talents to the feeble intellects of infantine felicity.”
[Sidenote: 2.]
Examples of grammatical faults in _Goody Two-Shoes_:—
Ch. vi.—“She was in Hopes he _would have went_ to the Clerk.”
Ch. viii.—“Therefore she laid very still.”
Part II. Ch. iii.—“Does not the Horse and the Ass carry you and your Burthens; don’t the Ox plough your Ground?”
John Newbery’s private memoranda show mistakes of the same kind.
[Sidenote: 3.]
(a) John Newbery died in 1767, when the business was divided into two branches, one under his son Francis, in partnership with T. Carnan, the other under Francis Newbery the nephew, whose widow Elizabeth succeeded him in 1780. T. Carnan afterwards set up on his own account.
(b) In the curious “appendix” to _Goody Two-Shoes_, there is “an Anecdote respecting Tom Two-Shoes, communicated by a Gentleman who is now writing the History of his Life”. This is the chief incident in _Tommy Two-Shoes_, published at the close of the century by Wilson and Spence of York.
Imitations only mark the distinction of the Newbery books. Many were published by John Marshall (_c._ 1780). These include _The Orphan; or, the Entertaining History of Little Goody Goosecap_; and _The Renowned History of Primrose Prettyface_, “who, by her Sweetness of Temper and Love of Learning, was raised from being the Daughter of a poor Cottager, to great Riches and the Dignity of Lady of the Manor.... London, printed in the Year when all little Boys and Girls should be good”, etc.
One copy is inscribed “Thos. Preston, March 22nd, 1788”. If this be the date of purchase, the book may be earlier; but it may be the date of the child’s birth.
[Sidenote: 4.]
“The Lilliputian Masquerade: recommended to the Perusal of those Sons and Daughters of Folly, the Frequenters of the Pantheon, Almack’s and Cornelly’s. Embellished with Cuts, for the Instruction and Amusement of the rising Generation. Price of a Subscription Ticket, not Two Guineas, but Two Pence”.—Carnan’s List for 1787.
The Masquerade was “occasioned by the Conclusion of Peace between those potent Nations the Lilliputians and Tommy-thumbians”, after a quarrel “concerning an Affair of no less Importance than whether, when a Cat wagged her Tail, it was a Sign of fair or foul Weather”; and the Peace had been made by “an old Lady _whose Name was Reason_”.
A later edition in Dutch paper covers (probably after 1800) published by P. Norbury at Brentford, has no reference to the Pantheon, etc., but is recommended by the couplet:
“Behind a Mask you’ll something find To please and to improve the mind.”
[Sidenote: p. 78. 2.]
First Worcester edition: _The Juvenile Biographer_, “containing the Lives of little Masters and Misses. Including a Variety of Good and Bad Characters. By a little Biographer.... Worcester, Mass. Printed by Isaiah Thomas and sold at his Book Store. Sold also by E. Battelle, Boston, 1787.”
[Sidenote: p. 81. 1.]
_Juvenile Correspondence_; “or, Letters designed as Examples of Epistolary Style, for Children of both Sexes”. By Lucy Aikin. 2nd Edition. London, for Baldwin, Cradock & Joy, Paternoster Row, and R. Hunter, St. Paul’s Churchyard, 1816.
Miss Aikin’s aim was to supply children with “juvenile equivalents of Gray, Cowper and Lady Mary Wortley Montague”; but the influence of Mrs. Barbauld adds natural touches not found in “Lilliputian” books.
[Sidenote: p. 82. 1.]
_A Father’s Memoirs of his Child_, by Benjamin Heath Malkin (1806), contains letters written by a child from his third to his seventh year (1798-1802).
The little boy, Thomas Williams Malkin, born in October, 1795, died when he was seven. His father, beginning the _Memoirs_, says: “It is not intended to run a parallel of his infancy with that of Addison in his assumed character of Spectator, who ‘threw away his rattle before he was two months old, and would not make use of his coral until they had taken away the bells from it’”; but the disclaimer proves that he was conscious of the parallel.
On his own showing, he had made the child into a “little Philosopher” who never had so much as a rattle to throw away, whose first toy was a box of letters. The boy’s letters show a pathetic struggle between natural simplicity and the artificial system on which he was being trained. Some are more precocious and pedantic than any in _Juvenile Correspondence_.
The tendency of parents to encourage stilted “epistolary patterns” was shown earlier in the childish letters of Mrs. Trimmer (See _The Life and Writings of Mrs. T._)
[Sidenote: p. 83. 2.]
Canning deals with the Newbery books much as Addison does with the ballads, though Canning’s classical parallels are not serious. He begins by recommending to novel-readers, instead of “the studies which usually engross their attention”, the “instructive and entertaining Histories of Mr. Thomas Thumb, Mr. John Hickathrift and sundry other celebrated Worthies; a true and faithful account of whose adventures and atchievements may be had by the Curious and the Public in general, price two-pence gilt, at Mr. Newbery’s, St. Paul’s Churchyard, and at some other Gentleman’s whose name I do not now recollect, the _Bouncing B., Shoe-Lane_”. (This refers to John Marshall’s sign of the “Great A and Bouncing B”.)
He identifies “Tom Thumb” with Perrault’s “Little Thumb”, and draws a parallel between that hero and Ulysses; and between the Ogre and Polyphemus, comparing the incidents in a mock-heroic vein. There is no trace of the “Lilliputian” Hickathrift which he mentions.
[Sidenote: p. 84. 1.]
“Jemmy” Catnach, and “Johnny” Pitts of the “Toy and Marble Warehouse”, were rival printers of ballads and chap-books in Seven Dials.
Catnach’s nursery books include rhymed versions of Perrault’s Tales, _The Butterfly’s Ball_, _The Tragical Death of an Apple Pie_ (a very old alphabet rhyme) and various “gifts”. (See Charles Hindley’s _History of the Catnach Press_, 1886.)
Pitts printed a penny edition of _Goody Two-Shoes_ (_c._ 1815). His farthing books include _Simple Simon_ and other nursery rhymes.
John Evans, another Seven Dials printer, also published a farthing series including _Dick Whittington_, _Cock Robin_ and _Mother Hubbard_. (See Edwin Pearson’s _Banbury Chap-books_, etc., 1890.)
IV
[Sidenote: p. 91. 1.]
Armand Berquin was born in France in 1749. He refused an appointment as tutor to the son of Louis XVI. Towards the end of his life he was denounced as a Girondist, and driven into exile. He died in 1791.
Mr. Charles Welsh gives a most interesting account of him in his introduction to the reprint of _The Looking-Glass for the Mind_, published by Griffith, Farran, Okeden and Welsh, 1885.
[Sidenote: p. 100. 1.]
Mrs. Pilkington, writing “on the Plan of that celebrated work _Les Veillées du Château_, by Madame de Genlis”, produced _Tales of the Cottage; or Stories Novel and Amusing for Young Persons_, printed for Vernor & Hood in the Poultry, and sold by E. Newbery, 1799.
She was the wife of a naval doctor, and became governess to a family of orphans, for whom she wrote. Other books published for her by E. Newbery include _Biography for Boys_, 1808; _Biography for Girls_, 1809; _Marvellous Adventures; or the Vicissitudes of a Cat_, and a translation (abridged) of Marmontel’s _Contes Moraux_.
[Sidenote: p. 102. 1.]
_Le Théâtre d’Education_ was followed, in England, by Hannah More’s _Sacred Dramas_ (1782).
Moral plays by the German Rousseauists, Engel and Weisse, were translated in _The Juvenile Dramatist_ (1801), and _Dramas for Children_, imitated from the French of L. F. Jauffret, by the Editor of Tabart’s _Popular Stories_, was printed for M. J. Godwin, at the Juvenile Library, Skinner Street, in 1809. The table of contents includes “The Curious Girl;” “The Dangers of Gossipping”; “The Fib Found Out”; “The Little Coxcomb”.
These educational dramas are no more dramatic than the average moral tale. They may be regarded as a result of Rousseau’s realism, an effort on the part of educators to use the dramatic instincts of children to impress the lesson.
V
[Sidenote: p. 106. 1.]
Thomas Day (1748-1789) was educated at the Charter House and Corpus Christi College, Oxford. He was an intimate friend of Richard Lovell Edgeworth, although he had paid his addresses in turn to Honora and Elizabeth Sneyd, afterwards the second and third Mrs. Edgeworth.
Day was a member of Dr. Darwin’s literary circle at Lichfield, and was the author of verses and political pamphlets. The third edition of his poem “The Dying Negro” was dedicated to Jean Jacques Rousseau.
[Sidenote: p. 113. 2.]
_The History of Prince Lee Boo_ (1789) is an early example of this interest in coloured races. Children’s books of the early nineteenth century include many stories of the Slave Trade and adventures of Negroes. Some of the most popular were _The Adventures of Congo_ (1823); Mary Ann Hedge’s _Samboe; or, the African Boy_ (1823); _Radama; or, the Enlightened African_ (1824).
[Sidenote: p. 114. 1.]
Third edition, 1759; new version in _The Children’s Miscellany_, 1787; Children’s chap-book in Dutch flowered boards, _c._ 1789: _The English Hermit; or, The Adventures of Philip Quarll_, “who was lately discovered by Mr. Dorrington, a Bristol Merchant, upon an uninhabited Island, where he has lived above fifty years, without any human assistance, still continues to reside and will not come away. Adorned with cuts and a Map of the Island”. London, John Marshall. Price Six Pence bound and gilt. (Inscribed “Margaret H. Haskoll, (Au. 14th, 1789).”) Other editions: 1795, 1807, 1816.
The 1807 edition, repeated in Newcastle, York and Banbury chap-books, has cuts attributed to Bewick.
VI
[Sidenote: p. 124. 1.]
_The Life and Adventures of a Fly_, “supposed to have been written by himself”. Price Sixpence. (E. Newbery’s list, 1789.)
Another edition, with cuts by John Bewick, was printed in 1790 (_Bewick Collector_).
[Sidenote: p. 125. 2.]
_The Young Misses’ Magazine_ was reviewed in the _Critical Review_, Aug., 1757. It consists of “Dialogues of a wise Governess with her Pupils”, and was almost certainly inspired by Miss Fielding’s _Governess_. The studies of Madame de Beaumont’s pupils, under the names of _Ladi Sensée_, _Ladi Spirituelle_, _Ladi Tempête_, etc., although they represent types, are made from life.
Madame de Beaumont also wrote “_Moral Tales_”, designed to counteract supposed dangers in Richardson’s novels. “The whole,” she says, “is drawn from the pure source of Nature, which never fails to move the heart.”
[Sidenote: p. 127. 1.]
Other books by “M. P.” include:
_Anecdotes of a Boarding School_, _Anecdotes of a Little Family_, and _Letters from a Mother to her Children_.
See below:—“Adventures” of things, by “S. S.”
[Sidenote: p. 131. 1.]
Other stories by Elizabeth Sandham are:
_The Happy Family at Eason House_, 1822; _The History of Elizabeth Woodville_, 1822; _The Orphan_, n.d. and _The Twin Sisters_, n.d.
[Sidenote: p. 133. 2.]
Other books by Arabella Argus:
_The Adventures of a Donkey_ (1815); _Further Adventures of a Donkey_ (1821); _Ostentation and Liberality_ (1821).
[Sidenote: p. 136. 1.]
(a) On the occasion of a literary dispute at Reynolds’s house, Mrs. Trimmer, then Miss Kirby, fifteen years old, produced from her pocket a copy of _Paradise Lost_. Johnson marked his appreciation of the incident as recorded above.
(b) From 1802 to 1804, Mrs. Trimmer edited _The Guardian of Education_ (published monthly) which exercised a kind of censorship over children’s books. A reference by Mrs. T. to Perrault’s _Tales_, which she had read as a child, called forth the criticism of a correspondent who denounced “Cinderella” in particular as encouraging envy, jealousy, vanity and other evil passions in children. Mrs. Trimmer’s principles forced her to agree with this stern moralist.
[Sidenote: p. 140. 2.]
Bird stories by Mr. Kendall include:
_The Crested Wren._ E. Newbery, 1799; _The Swallow_. E. Newbery, 1800; _The Sparrow and The Canary Bird_ are also mentioned in _The Stories of Senex; or, Little Histories of Little People_, by the same author.
[Sidenote: p. 141. 2.]
Elizabeth Sandham also wrote:
_The Adventures of a Bullfinch._ J. Harris, 1809.
and _The Perambulations of a Bee and a Butterfly_, 1812.
[Sidenote: p. 144. 2.]
Other “adventures” of things:
_The Adventures of a Silver Penny._ Price 6d. E. Newbery. (Advertised in the London Chronicle, Dec. 21-29, 1787, “just published”); _The Adventures of a Doll_, by Mary Mister, 1816; _Memoirs of a Peg Top_, by S. S. Author of _The Adventures of a Pincushion_. Marshall’s list, _c._ 1788.
VII
[Sidenote: p. 155. 1.]
In the preface to _The Adventures of Ulysses_, Lamb says: “This work is designed as a supplement to the Adventures of Telemachus”; and in a letter to Manning (1808) he says it is “intended as an introduction to the reading of Telemachus”.
Fénélon’s _Télémaque_ (1699) which, like his _Fables_ and _Dialogues des Morts_, was written for his pupil, the grandson of Louis XIV, was translated into English in 1742. It is a kind of sequel to the fourth book of the _Odyssey_, describing the further adventures of Telemachus in search of his father. Fénélon turned his “adventures” into a moral tale, and Lamb, in his preface, also lays stress on the moral of his book.
[Sidenote: p. 156. 1.]
At the back of the third edition of _Mrs. Leicester’s School_ is a list of “new books for children”, published by M. J. Godwin, at the Juvenile Library, Skinner Street. Many of these are school texts, some by Godwin, writing under his pseudonym of “Edward Baldwin”. Others include the _Tales from Shakespear_; the _Adventures of Ulysses_; _Poetry for Children_; _Stories of Old Daniel_; _Dramas for Children_, from the French of L. F. Jauffret; Mrs. Fenwick’s _Lessons for Children_ (a sequel to Mrs. Barbauld’s); and Lamb’s _Prince Dorus_.
_Stories of Old Daniel_, which has been attributed to Lamb, has the alternative title “_or Tales of Wonder and Delight_”. It contains “Narratives of Foreign Countries and Manners”, and was “designed as an Introduction to the study of Voyages, Travels and History in General”: a sufficient proof that Lamb had nothing to do with it.
[Sidenote: p. 161. 2.]
The passage in “Susan Yates” runs thus:
“Sometimes indeed, on a fine dry Sunday, my father would rise early, and take a walk to the village, just to see how _goodness thrived_, as he used to say, but he would generally return tired, and the worse for his walk.”
Mr. Lucas points out that Charles Lamb’s father came from Lincolnshire, and that the saying was probably his.
[Sidenote: 3.]
Isaac Taylor, the father, was the author of several moral and instructive tales for youth.
Jefferys Taylor, the brother of Jane and Ann, wrote _Æsop in Rhyme_ (1820); _Harry’s Holiday_ (1822); and other books for children.
[Sidenote: p. 170. 1.]
(a) Some of Mrs. Sherwood’s most popular books were: _Little Henry and his Bearer_ (her first book) _c._ 1815; _The History of Henry Milner_ (4 parts) 1822-1836; _The Little Woodman and his Dog Cæsar_ (1819).
Many of the chap-books were written for stock illustrations.
(b) Mrs. Cameron, Mrs. Sherwood’s sister, was also a prolific writer of children’s chap-books; but these are undistinguished in style and matter. (See B. M. collections under title: “Cameron’s Tales”.)
[Sidenote: p. 171. 1.]
The introduction to Mrs. Sherwood’s version of _The Governess_ states that “the little volume was published before the middle of the last century, and is said to have been written by a sister of the celebrated Fielding”.
[Sidenote: p. 172. 1.]
Mary Elliott (afterwards Mrs. Belson), a Quaker, wrote many other tales for children. Among these are: _Precept and Example_ (_c._ 1812); _The Modern Goody Two Shoes_ (_c._ 1818); _The Adventures of Thomas Two Shoes_: “being a sequel to the Modern G. T. S.” (_c._ 1818); _The Rambles of a Butterfly_ (1819); _Confidential Memoirs, or the Adventures of a Parrot, a Greyhound, a Cat and a Monkey_ (1821).
Priscilla Wakefield, another Quaker, was the author of _Mental Improvement_, _The Juvenile Travellers_ and other instructive books.
VIII
[Sidenote: p. 176. 2.]
The Stories in _The Parent’s Assistant_ (1845) are:—
Vol. I. Lazy Laurence; Tarlton; The False Key; The Birth-day Present; Simple Susan.
Vol. II. The Bracelets; The Little Merchants; Old Poz; The Mimic; Mademoiselle Panache.
Vol. III. The Basket Woman; The White Pigeon; The Orphans; Waste Not, Want Not; Forgive and Forget; The Barring Out; or, Party Spirit; Eton Montem.
A modern edition, with an introduction by Anne Thackeray Ritchie, was published by Macmillan in 1903; and a selection, _Tales from Maria Edgeworth_, with an introduction by Mr. Austin Dobson (Wells, Gardner, Darton & Co.), appeared in the same year.
[Sidenote: p. 180. 1.]
_Little Plays_ (1827) contains “The Grinding Organ” (written May, 1808); “Dumb Andy” (written in 1814) and “The Dame School Holiday”.
“Old Poz” and “Eton Montem” in _The Parent’s Assistant_, are also in dialogue form.
[Sidenote: 2.]
From the letter to Mrs. Ruxton (March 19, 1803), describing a visit to Madame de Genlis in Paris:
(a) “... She looked like the full-length picture of my great-great-grandmother Edgeworth you may have seen in the garret, very thin and melancholy, but her face not so handsome as my great-grandmother’s; dark eyes, long sallow cheeks, compressed thin lips, two or three black ringlets on a high forehead, a cap that Mrs. Grier might wear,—altogether an appearance of fallen fortunes, worn-out health, and excessive, but guarded irritability.”
(b) From the same letter:
“... Forgive me, my dear Aunt Mary, you begged me to see her with favourable eyes, and I went to see her after seeing her ‘Rosière de Salency’” (a play in the _Théâtre d’Education_) “with the most favourable disposition, but I could not like her.”
At this time it would seem that the old countess was soured by neglect and disappointment.
[Sidenote: 3.]
The school stories in the _P. A._ are: “The Bracelets” (an early story of a girls’ school); “The Barring Out” and “Eton Montem”, both theoretic studies of schoolboys.
[Sidenote: p. 183. 1.]
The four volumes of _E. L._ contain the following stories:
Vol. I. The Little Dog Trusty; The Cherry Orchard; Frank.
Vol. II. Rosamond; Harry and Lucy.
Vol. III. The Continuation of Frank and part of the Continuation of Rosamond.
Vol. IV. The Continuation of Rosamond and of Harry and Lucy.
These were followed by _Rosamond: a Sequel to Rosamond in “Early Lessons”_. 2 vols., 1821; and _Frank: a Sequel to Frank in “Early Lessons”_. 3 vols, 1822.
[Sidenote: p. 184. 1.]
Dr. Darwin attempted to deal poetically with matter of Science; but his couplets show all the worst features of eighteenth century verse. The passage quoted in _Frank_ (E. L., Vol. I.) runs thus:—
“Stay thy soft murmuring waters, gentle rill; Hush, whispering winds; ye rustling leaves, be still; Rest, silver butterflies, your quivering wings; Alight, ye beetles, from your airy rings; Ye painted moths, your gold-eyed plumage furl, Bow your wide horns, your spiral trunks uncurl; Glitter, ye glow-worms, on your mossy beds; Descend, ye spiders, on your lengthen’d threads; Slide here, ye horned snails with varnish’d shells; Ye bee nymphs, listen in your waxen cells.”
[Sidenote: p. 187. 1.]
The lines, repeated to test Harry’s power of attention, are these:—
“So she went into the garden to cut a cabbage leaf, to make an apple-pie; and at the same time a great she-bear coming up the street, pops its head into the shop. ‘What! No soap?’ So he died, and she very imprudently married the barber; and there were present the Picninnies, and the Joblillies, and the Garyulies, and the grand Panjandrum himself, with the little round button at top; and they all fell to playing the game of catch as catch can, till the gunpowder ran out at the heels of their boots.”
“The Great Panjandrum Himself” was later “pictured” as a schoolmaster in cap and gown, by Randolph Caldecott.
[Sidenote: p. 192. 1.]
Children’s books recommended by Mr. Edgeworth in his “Address to Mothers” (E. L. Vol. III):—
“Fabulous Histories”; “Evenings at Home”; Berquin’s “Children’s Friend”; “Sandford and Merton”; “Little Jack”; “The Children’s Miscellany”; “Bob the Terrier”; “Dick the Pony”; “The Book of Trades”; “The Looking-glass, or History of a Young Artist”; “Robinson Crusoe”; “The Travels of Rolando”; “Mrs. Wakefield on Instinct”; _parts_ of White’s Natural History of Selborne; and _parts_ of Smellie’s Philosophy of Natural History.
_The Dog of Knowledge; or Memoirs of Bob the Spotted Terrier_ (1801) and _Dick the Pony_ were by the same author.
_The Book of Trades_ is a modern equivalent of _Dives Pragmaticus_ (see above—Introd:)
_The Looking-glass_, etc., by “Theo Marcliffe”, is the story of the early life of Mulready the painter, written by Godwin under this pseudonym.
IX
[Sidenote: p. 195. 2.]
A revised and abridged edition of Bunyan’s “Rhimes” appeared in 1701, under the title: _A Book for Boys and Girls; or, Temporal Things Spiritualised_.
A ninth edition was published in 1724 under the new title _Divine Emblems; or, Temporal Things Spiritualised_.
[Sidenote: 3.]
_A Little Book for Little Children_, “wherein are set down in a plain and pleasant Way, Directions for Spelling and other remarkable Matters. Adorned with Cuts. By T. W.” (Thomas White).
London, printed for G. O. and sold at the King in Little Britain.
[Sidenote: p. 196. 1.]
_The Child’s Week’s Work_; “or, A Little Book so nicely suited to the Genius and Capacity of a little Child, both for Matter and Method, that it will infallibly allure and lead him into a Way of Reading, with all the Ease and Expedition that can be desired.” By William Ronksley. London, printed for G. Conyers and J. Richardson in Little Britain, 1712.
[Sidenote: p. 201. 2.]
R. L. Stevenson quotes this rhyme in the lines “To Minnie” (_A Child’s Garden of Verses_, pp. 130-1):
“Our phantom voices haunt the air As we were still at play; And I can hear them call and say: ‘_How far is it to Babylon?_’
“Ah far enough, my dear, Far, far enough from here— Yet you have farther gone! ‘_Can I get there by candlelight?_’
“So goes the old refrain. I do not know—perchance you might— But only children hear it right, Ah, never to return again!
“The eternal dawn, beyond a doubt, Shall break on hill and plain, And put all stars and candles out, Ere we be young again.”
[Sidenote: p. 206. 2.]
Few of the themes are original. Two by Adelaide O’Keefe, “The Boys and the Apple Tree” and “The Vine”, are verse readings of stories in _The Looking Glass for the Mind_. So also is “The Two Gardens” by Ann Taylor.
[Sidenote: p. 208. 1.]
_Poetry for Children_ was praised in the _Monthly Review_ for Jan., 1811, but soon went out of print. The original edition was lost sight of until 1877, when it was sent from Australia “a courteous and most welcome gift from the Hon. William Sandover” to Mr. R. H. Shepherd. (See the Introduction to Mr. Shepherd’s reprint.—Chatto & Windus, 1878.)
In the meantime, twenty-two of the pieces had been preserved in a _First Book of Poetry_ printed by W. F. Mylius, a master at Christ’s Hospital, “For the Use of Schools. Intended as Reading Lessons for the Younger Classes.” This was mentioned in the _Monthly Review_ for April, 1811.
[Sidenote: p. 209. 2.]
The following poems were reprinted in the 1818 edition of Lamb’s Works:—
“To a River in which a Child was Drowned”; “The Three Friends”; “Queen Oriana’s Dream”.
[Sidenote: p. 216. 1.]
Lamb says that Martin Burney read _Clarissa_ in snatches at a book-stall, until discouraged by the stall-keeper. He adds: “A quaint poetess of our day has moralised upon this subject in two very touching but homely stanzas”.
[Sidenote: p. 219. 1.]
(a) _The Peacock “At Home.”_ “A Sequel to the Butterfly’s Ball. Written by a Lady and illustrated with elegant engravings”. Harris, successor to E. Newbery, 1807.
(b) _The Lion’s Masquerade._ “A Sequel to the Peacock ‘At Home’. Written by a Lady.” London, J. Harris, etc., 1807.
(c) _The Elephant’s Ball and Grand Fête-Champêtre_: Intended as a Companion to those much admired Pieces, The Butterfly’s Ball and The Peacock “At Home”. By W. B. London, J. Harris, etc., 1807.
Facsimile reprints by Charles Welsh, 1883.
[Sidenote: p. 221. 1.]
(a) _The Daisy_, “Adapted to the Ideas of Children from four to eight years old”—was illustrated with 30 copperplate engravings.
(b) _The Cowslip_ was announced as “By the Author of that much admired little work entitled The Daisy”. Both were published by Harris, and reprinted with introductions by Charles Welsh in 1885.
(c) Imitations were:—
_The Snowdrop; or, Poetry for Henry and Emily’s Library._ By a Lady. Harris, 1823 (3rd edition); and _The Crocus; or, Useful Hints for Children_, “being Original Poems on Popular and Familiar Subjects”. London, R. Harrild, 1816.
[Sidenote: p. 223. 1.]
_The Journey of Goody Flitch and her Cow_, a variant of _Old Mother Hubbard_, 1817.
[Sidenote: 2.]
_Dame Wiggins of Lee and Her Seven Wonderful Cats_, “A Humorous Tale. Written Principally by a Lady of Ninety. Embellished with sixteen coloured Engravings. Price one shilling”. London, Dean & Munday, 1823.
The rhyme was reprinted by Ruskin, who admired its strong rhythm.
[Sidenote: 3.]
_The History of Sixteen Wonderful Old Women_, “Illustrated by as many Engravings, exhibiting their principal Eccentricities and Amusements”. London, Harris & Son, 1821.
[Sidenote: 4.]
_Readings on Poetry._ By Richard Lovell Edgeworth and Maria Edgeworth (London, 1816), followed the plan used with the Edgeworth children. No word or phrase is allowed to pass without explanation.
This may have inspired the author of _The Young Reviewers; or, the Poems Dissected_. London, William Darton, 1821.
APPENDIX B
_Chronological List of Children’s Books from 1700 to 1825_
The List shows only books studied in the foregoing chapters. It includes no undated chap-books.
[Sidenote: A.D. 1700.]
Anon. The History of the Two Children in the Wood.
[Sidenote: 1701.]
Bunyan, John. A Book for Boys and Girls; or, Temporal Things Spiritualised.
[Sidenote: 1702.]
White, Thomas. A Little Book for Little Children (12th edn.).
[Sidenote: 1708.]
Chap-books mentioned in _The Weekly Comedy_ (Jan. 22): Jack and the Gyants, Tom Thumb, etc.
[Sidenote: 1709.]
Romances given in Steele’s paper (Tatler, Nov. 15-17): Don Bellianis of Greece, Guy of Warwick, The Seven Champions, etc.
[Sidenote: 1712.]
Anon. The Child’s Week’s Work.
[Sidenote: 1715.]
Watts, Isaac. Divine Songs for Children.
[Sidenote: 1727.]
Anon. The Hermit; or, Philip Quarll.
[Sidenote: 1738.]
Wright, J. Spiritual Songs for Children. (2nd edn.)
[Sidenote: 1743.]
Anon. The Little Master’s Miscellany.
[Sidenote: 1744.]
Anon. A Little Pretty Pocket Book.
Anon. Tommy Thumb’s Pretty Song Book. 2 vols.
[Sidenote: 1745-66.]
Anon. The Circle of the Sciences.
[Sidenote: 1746.]
Anon. The Travels of Tom Thumb.
[Sidenote: 1749.]
Fielding, Sarah. The Governess; or, The Little Female Academy (2nd edn.).
[Sidenote: 1751.]
Anon. The Lilliputian Magazine.
Marchant, John. Puerilia; or, Amusements for the Young.
[Sidenote: 1752.]
Anon. A Pretty Book of Pictures for Little Masters and Misses; or, Tommy Trip’s History of Beasts and Birds.
[Sidenote: 1760.]
Anon. The Top Book of All for Little Masters and Misses.
[Sidenote: 1760-65.]
Anon. Mother Goose’s Melody; or, Sonnets for the Cradle.
[Sidenote: 1761.]
The Philosophy of Tops and Balls. (Adv. Apr. 9.)
[Sidenote: 1765.]
Anon. The Renowned History of Giles Gingerbread: a Little Boy who lived upon Learning.
Anon. The History of Little Goody Two-Shoes.
[Sidenote: 1767.]
Anon. The Twelfth Day Gift: or, the Grand Exhibition.
[Sidenote: 1768.]
Anon. Tom Thumb’s Folio.
[Sidenote: 1770.]
Anon. The Letters between Master Tommy and Miss Nancy Goodwill.
Anon. Robin Goodfellow; “A Fairy Tale written by A Fairy”.
[Sidenote: 1777.]
Anon. The History of the Enchanted Castle; or, The Prettiest Book for Children.
[Sidenote: _c._ 1777.]
Anon. Juvenile Correspondence; or, Letters suited to Children from four to above ten years of age.
[Sidenote: 1780.]
Anon. The Poetical Flower Basket.
Anon. The Governess; or, Evening Amusements at a Boarding School.
Barbauld, Anna Laetitia. Easy Lessons. Hymns in Prose for Children.
[Sidenote: _c._ 1780.]
Cooper, W. D. The Oriental Moralist.
[Sidenote: 1781.]
Anon. Juvenile Trials.
[Sidenote: 1782.]
Anon. The History of King Arthur (from Dryden).
Anon. Oriental Tales: The Ruby Heart and The Enchanted Mirror.
More, Hannah. Sacred Dramas.
[Sidenote: 1783.]
Day, Thomas. The History of Sandford and Merton, Vol. I.
[Sidenote: _c._ 1783.]
Fenn, Eleanor (Lady Fenn). The Juvenile Tatler.
[Sidenote: 1786.]
Day, Thomas. Sandford and Merton, Vol. II.
Trimmer, Sarah. Fabulous Histories.
[Sidenote: 1787.]
Anon. The Adventures of a Silver Penny.
Anon. The Juvenile Biographer (New England edn.).
Anon. The Lilliputian Masquerade.
Day, Thomas. The Children’s Miscellany.
[Sidenote: _c._ 1787.]
Anon. The Adventures of a Silver Threepence.
[Sidenote: 1788.]
Kilner, Dorothy (“M. P.”). The Life and Perambulation of a Mouse.
The Village School.
Kilner, Mary Jane (“S. S.”). The Adventures of a Pincushion.
Jemima Placid; or, The Advantage of Good-Nature.
Memoirs of a Peg Top.
[Sidenote: _c._ 1788.]
Anon. The Renowned History of Primrose Prettyface.
[Sidenote: 1789.]
Anon. The Adventures of Philip Quarll (adapted).
Anon. The History of Prince Lee Boo.
Anon. The Life and Adventures of a Fly.
Cooper, W. D. Blossoms of Morality.
Day, Thomas. Sandford and Merton. Vol. III.
Fenn, Eleanor (Lady F.). The Fairy Spectator.
[Sidenote: _c._ 1789.]
Tom Thumb’s Exhibition.
[Sidenote: 1790.]
Anon. Mirth without Mischief.
Kilner, Dorothy (?). Anecdotes of a Boarding School.
[Sidenote: 1791.]
Wollstonecraft, Mary. Original Stories from Real Life.
[Sidenote: 1792-96.]
Aikin, A. L. and J. (Mrs. Barbauld and Dr. Aikin). Evenings at Home. 6 vols.
[Sidenote: 1794-5.]
Wakefield, Priscilla. Mental Improvement. 2 vols.
[Sidenote: 1796-1800.]
Edgeworth, Maria. The Parents’ Assistant; or, Stories for Children.
[Sidenote: 1798.]
Kendall, Edward Augustus. Keeper’s Travels in Search of his Master.
[Sidenote: 1799.]
Kendall, E. A. The Crested Wren.
Pilkington, Mrs. M. S. Biography for Girls. Tales of the Cottage.
[Sidenote: 1800.]
Kendall, E. A. The Stories of Senex; or, Little Histories of Little People.
The Swallow.
Pilkington, M. S. The Asiatic Princess.
Porter, Jane. The Two Princes of Persia.
Sandham, Elizabeth. The Boys’ School.
[Sidenote: 1801.]
Anon. The Dog of Knowledge; or, Memoirs of Bob, the Spotted Terrier.
Edgeworth, Maria. Early Lessons. 2 vols. Moral Tales.
Wakefield, Priscilla. The Juvenile Travellers.
[Sidenote: 1802.]
Pilkington, M. S. Marvellous Adventures; or, the Vicissitudes of a Cat.
[Sidenote: 1804.]
Taylor, Ann and Jane; and O’Keefe, Adelaide. Original Poems for Infant Minds.
[Sidenote: 1805.]
Anon. Songs for the Nursery.
Lamb, Charles. The King and Queen of Hearts.
[Sidenote: 1806.]
Taylor, A. & J.; and O’Keefe, A. Rhymes for the Nursery.
[Sidenote: 1807.]
Anon. The Children in the Wood (moralised).
Anon. Robin Hood (moralised).
B., W. The Elephant’s Ball.
Dorset, Mrs. C. A. The Lion’s Masquerade. The Peacock “At Home”.
Lamb, Charles and Mary. Tales from Shakespear.
Roscoe, William. The Butterfly’s Ball and the Grasshopper’s Feast.
Turner, Elizabeth. The Daisy; or, Cautionary Stories in Verse.
[Sidenote: 1808.]
Anon. The Academy; or, a Picture of Youth.
Anon. Stories of Old Daniel.
Lamb, Charles. The Adventures of Ulysses.
Pilkington, M. S. Biography for Boys.
Taylor, Ann. The Wedding among the Flowers.
[Sidenote: 1809.]
Lamb, Charles and Mary. Mrs. Leicester’s School. Poetry for Children.
Pilkington, M. S. Biography for Girls.
Sandham, Elizabeth. The Adventures of a Bullfinch.
The Adventures of Poor Puss.
[Sidenote: 1810.]
Argus, Arabella. The Juvenile Spectator.
Ritson (ed.). Gammer Gurton’s Garland.
[Sidenote: 1811.]
Anon. Felissa; or, The Life and Opinions of a Kitten of Sentiment.
Lamb, Charles. Prince Dorus.
Turner, Elizabeth. The Cowslip; or, More Cautionary Stories in Verse.
[Sidenote: 1812.]
Elliott, Mary (formerly Belson). Precept and Example.
Sandham, Elizabeth. The Perambulations of a Bee and a Butterfly.
[Sidenote: 1815.]
Argus, Arabella. The Adventures of a Donkey.
Edgeworth, Maria. Early Lessons. Vols. III and IV.
[Sidenote: _c._ 1815.]
Sherwood, M. M. Little Henry and his Bearer.
[Sidenote: 1816.]
Aikin, Lucy. Juvenile Correspondence.
Anon. The Peacock and Parrot on their Tour to discover the Author of The Peacock “At Home”.
Edgeworth, Richard Lovell and Maria. Readings on Poetry.
Elliott, Mary. The Orphan Boy; or, A Journey to Bath.
Mister, Mary. The Adventures of a Doll.
[Sidenote: 1818.]
Elliott, Mary. The Modern Goody Two Shoes. The Adventures of Thomas Two Shoes.
Sandham, Elizabeth. The School-fellows.
Sherwood, Martha Mary. The History of the Fairchild Family.
Taylor, Jefferys. Harry’s Holiday.
[Sidenote: 1819.]
Elliott, Mary. The Rambles of a Butterfly.
Sherwood, M. M. The Little Woodman and His Dog Cæsar.
[Sidenote: 1820.]
Sherwood, M. M. (ed.). The Governess.
[Sidenote: 1820.]
Taylor, Jefferys. Æsop in Rhyme.
[Sidenote: 1821.]
Anon. The Sixteen Wonderful Old Women.
Anon. The Young Reviewers; or, The Poems Dissected.
Argus, Arabella. Further Adventures of a Donkey.
Ostentation and Liberality.
Edgeworth, Maria. Rosamond, A Sequel to Rosamond in Early Lessons.
Elliott, Mary. Confidential Memoirs; or, the Adventures of a Parrot, a Greyhound, a Cat and a Monkey.
Hack, Maria. Harry Beaufoy; or, The Pupil of Nature.
Sherwood, M. M. The Infant’s Progress.
[Sidenote: 1822.]
Edgeworth, Maria. Frank. A sequel to Frank, in Early Lessons.
Sandham, Elizabeth. The Happy Family at Eason House. The History of Elizabeth Woodville.
[Sidenote: 1823.]
Anon. The Adventures of Congo.
Anon. The Court of Oberon; or, The Temple of the Fairies.
Hedge, Mary Ann. Samboe; or, the African Boy.
Lady of Ninety, A. Dame Wiggins of Lee and her Seven Wonderful Cats.
[Sidenote: 1824.]
Hedge, Mary Ann. Radama; or, the Enlightened African.
Taylor, Jane. The Contributions of Q. Q. 2 vols.
Taylor, Jefferys. The Little Historians.
[Sidenote: 1825.]
Edgeworth, Maria. Harry and Lucy “concluded; being the last part of Early Lessons”. 4 vols.
_Foreign Books and Translations_
[Sidenote: 1707.]
D’Aulnoy, Madame la Comtesse. Collected Works.
[Sidenote: 1708.]
The Arabian Nights’ Entertainments; Translated from the French of M. Galland.
[Sidenote: 1708.]
[Sidenote: 1722.]
Æsop. Fables. Croxall’s edition.
[Sidenote: 1729.]
Perrault, Charles. First English translation by R. Samber.
[Sidenote: 1742.]
Fénélon, François de Salignac de la Mothe. Adventures of Telemachus. 2 vols. 1st French edn. 1699.
[Sidenote: 1757.]
Beaumont, Jeanne Marie Le Prince de. Le Magazin des Enfans. 2nd edn. 2 vols. Translated as the Young Misses’ Magazine. (Adv. Critical Review, Aug.)
[Sidenote: 1763.]
Marmontel, Jean François. Moral Tales. Translated by Miss R. Roberts.
[Sidenote: 1775.]
Beaumont, J. M. Le P. de. Moral Tales. Trans. Anon. 2 vols.
[Sidenote: 1779.]
Genlis, Madame la Comtesse de. Le Théâtre d’Education.
[Sidenote: 1782.]
Genlis, Madame de. Adèle et Théodore.
[Sidenote: 1782-3.]
Berquin, Armand. L’Ami des Enfans.
[Sidenote: 1783.]
Berquin, Armand. The Children’s Friend. Translated by M. A. Meilan. 24 vols.
Epinay, Madame d’. Les Conversations d’Emilie.
Genlis, Madame de. Adelaide and Théodore. Trans. Anon. 3 vols.
[Sidenote: 1784.]
Genlis, Madame de. Les Veillées du Château.
[Sidenote: 1786.]
Marmontel, J. F. Contes Moraux collected.
[Sidenote: 1787.]
Berquin, Armand. The Looking-Glass for the Mind. (Selections from L’Ami des Enfans. ed. Cooper.)
Epinay, Madame d’. Conversations of Emily. Trans. Anon.
[Sidenote: 1788.]
Campe, J. H. Robinson der Jüngere. Trans. as The New Robinson Crusoe.
[Sidenote: 1791.]
Berquin, Armand. The History of Little Grandison. Trans. Anon.
[Sidenote: 1792.]
Salzmann, C. G. Elements of Morality. Trans. from the German.
[Sidenote: 1801.]
Engel, J. and Weisse, F. The Juvenile Dramatist. (Educational plays, trans. Anon.)
Genlis, Madame de. Le Petit La Bruyère translated as La Bruyère the Less.
[Sidenote: 1809.]
Jauffret, L. F. Dramas for Children. “Imitated from the French of L. F. J. By the Editor of Tabart’s Popular Stories”.
[Sidenote: 1823.]
Grimm, J. L. C. and W. C. Popular Stories.
Other children’s books of the 18th and 19th centuries are given in Mr. F. J. Harvey Darton’s bibliography: Cambs. Hist. of Eng. Lit. Vol. XI, Chap. XVI.
There is also a useful list of Essays, Magazine Articles, etc.
_Printed in Great Britain by Jarrold Sons, Ltd., Norwich._
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= = = PG42024 = = =
A CUP OF SWEETS, THAT CAN NEVER CLOY: OR, DELIGHTFUL TALES FOR GOOD CHILDREN
Produced by Dianna Adair, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
A CUP OF SWEETS, THAT CAN _NEVER CLOY_: OR, DELIGHTFUL TALES FOR _GOOD CHILDREN_.
BY THE AUTHOR OF GODMOTHER'S TALES, &c. &c.
FOURTH EDITION.
_LONDON._
PRINTED FOR J. HARRIS, SUCCESSOR TO E. NEWBERY, AT THE ORIGINAL JUVENILE LIBRARY, THE CORNER OF ST. PAUL'S CHURCH YARD.
1810.
_E. Hemsted, Printer, Great New-street, Gough-square._
[Illustration: The Curious Girl.
Away she threw the peg--up went the cover of the Basket--and whizz--out flew a beautiful White Pigeon.
_Published Nov. 1st. 1803, by J. Harris corner of St. Pauls Church Yard._]
CONTENTS.
Page
_Curiosity_                                       1
_The Unsettled Boy_                              11
_Cecilia and Fanny_                              21
_Henry_                                          33
_Maria; or, the Little Slattern_                 40
_Frederick's Holidays_                           51
_The Little Quarrellers_                         60
_The Vain Girl_                                  68
_The Young Gardeners_                            78
_The Whimsical Child_                            85
_Edward and Charles_                             94
_The Truant_                                    104
_Jealousy_                                      115
_Edmond_                                        121
_The Ghost and the Dominos_                     129
_Fido_                                          143
_The Reward of Benevolence_                     150
_Jemima_                                        162
_The Trifler_                                   171
_The Cousins_                                   177
_The Travellers_                                189
_The Strawberries_                              200
A CUP OF SWEETS.
CURIOSITY.
Arabella fancied there could be no pleasure in the world equal to that of listening to conversations in which she had no concern, peeping into her mamma's drawers and boxes, and asking impertinent questions. If a parcel was brought to the house, she had no rest till she had found out what was in it; and if her papa rung the bell, she would never quit the room till the servant came up, that she might hear what he wanted.
She had been often desired to be less curious, and more attentive to her lessons; to play with her doll and her baby-house, and not trouble herself with other people's affairs: but she never minded what was said to her, and when she was sitting by her mamma, with a book in her hand, instead of reading it, and endeavouring to improve herself, she was always looking round her, to observe what her brothers and sisters were doing, and to watch every one who went out or came into the room.
She desired extremely to have a writing-master, because she hoped, that, after she had learnt a short time, she should be able to read writing, and then she should have the pleasure of finding out who all the letters were for, which the servant carried to the post-office; and might sometimes peep over her papa's shoulder, and read those which he received. One day perceiving her mamma whisper to her brother William, and that they soon after left the room together, she immediately concluded there must be something going forward, some _secret_ which was to be hid from her, and which, perhaps, if she lost the present moment, she never should be able to discover. Poor Arabella could sit still no longer; she watched them from the window, and seeing that they went towards a gate in the garden, which opened into the wood, she determined to be there before them, and to hide herself in the bushes near the path, that she might overhear their conversation as they passed by. This she soon accomplished, by taking a shorter way; but it was not very long before she had reason to wish she had not been so prying; for the gardener passing through the wood with an ill-natured cur which always followed him, seeing her move among the bushes, it began to bark violently, and in an instant jumped into her lap.
She was very much frightened, and, in trying to get away, without intending it, gave him a great blow on the head; in return for which he bit her finger, and it was so very much hurt, and was so long before it was quite well again, that her friends hoped it would have cured her of being so curious; but they were much mistaken. Arabella's finger was no sooner well, than the pain she had suffered, her fright, and the gardener's cur, were all forgotten; and whenever any thing happened, let the circumstance be ever so trifling, if she did not perfectly understand the whole matter, she could not rest or attend to any thing she had to do, till she had discovered the mystery; for she imagined _mysteries_ and _secrets_ in every thing she saw and heard, unless she had been informed of what was going to be done.
Some time after her adventure in the wood, she one morning missed her brother William, and not finding him at work in his little garden, began directly to imagine her mamma had sent him on some secret expedition; she resolved, however, on visiting the whole house, in the hope of finding him, before she made any inquiry, and accordingly hunted every room and every closet, but to no purpose. From the house she went to the poultry-yard, and from thence to the lawn, but William was no where to be found. What should she do!--"I will hunt round the garden once more," said she; "I must and will find him, and know where he has been all this time; why he went without telling me, and why I might not have been intrusted with the secret. I will not eat my dinner till I find him, even if he does not return till night."
Arabella returned once more to the garden, where at length, in a retired corner which she had not thought of visiting, she found her brother sleeping under a large tree. He had a little covered basket by his side, and slept so soundly, that he did not move when she came near the place, though she was talking to herself as she walked along, and not in a very low voice.
"Now," thought the curious girl, "I have caught him: he must have been a long way, for he appears to be very warm and tired; and he has certainly got something in that basket which I am not to see, and I suppose mamma is to come here and take it from him, that I may know nothing of it. Mamma and William have always secrets, but I will discover this, however--I am determined I will."
She then crept softly up to the basket, and stopped down to lift up the cover, afraid almost to breathe, lest she should be caught; and looking around to see if her mamma was coming, and then once more at her brother, that she might be certain he was still asleep, gently she put her hand upon the basket, and, without the least noise, drew out a little wooden peg, which fastened down the cover. "Now," thought she, "Master William, I shall see what you have got here." Away she threw the peg, up went the cover of the basket, and whizz--out flew a beautiful white pigeon.
A violent scream from Arabella awoke William, who, seeing the basket open, the pigeon mounted into the air, and his sister's consternation, immediately guessed what had happened, and addressed her in the following manner:
"You see, my dear Arabella, the consequence of your curious and suspicious temper: I wished to make you a present to-day, because it is your birthday, but you will not allow your friends to procure you an agreeable surprise; for nobody in the house can take a single step, or do the least thing, without your watching and following them. I know you have long wished to have a white pigeon, and I have walked two long miles in all this heat, to get one for you. I sat down here, that I might have time to contrive how I should get it into the house without your seeing it, because I did not wish to give you my present till after dinner, when papa and mamma will give you theirs; and whilst I was endeavouring to think on some way to escape your prying eyes, I was so over-powered with fatigue and heat, that I fell fast asleep; and I see you have taken that time to peep into my basket, and save me any farther trouble. You have let my present fly away: I am sorry for it, my dear sister, but you have no one to blame but yourself; and I must confess that I am not half so sorry for your loss, as I am for the fate which attends two poor little young ones which are left in the basket, and who, far from being able to take wing, and follow their mother, are not old enough even to feed themselves, and must soon perish for want of food."
William's words were but too true; the poor things died the next morning, and Arabella passed the whole day in unavailing tears, regret, and sorrow.
THE UNSETTLED BOY.
"I do not think, at last, that I shall like to be a surgeon," said Gustavus to his papa, as he trotted by his side on his little poney. "Edward Somerville is to be a clergyman: and he has been telling me that he is to go to Oxford, and then he is to have a living, and will have a nice snug parsonage-house, and can keep a horse, and some dogs, and have a pretty garden; whilst I shall be moped up in a town, curing wounds, and mending broken bones--I shall not like it at all."
"It was your own choice," answered his papa; "but if you think you should like better to take orders, I am sure I have no objection."
Three months after this conversation, Gustavus being invited to accompany some friends to see a review, he returned home with his little head so filled with military ideas, that he was certain, he said, nothing could be so delightful and so happy as the life of an officer; and that travelling about and seeing different places was better than all the snug parsonage-houses in England. But, not many months from that time, going with his papa to Portsmouth, to visit his elder brother, who belonged to the navy, he was so struck with the novelty of the scene (having never seen a man of war before), thought there was so much bustle and gaiety in it, that it must be the pleasantest life in the world, and earnestly requested that he might be allowed to go to sea.
His papa now thought it time to represent to him the folly and imprudence of being so unsettled. "My dear boy," said he, taking him affectionately by the hand, "if you continue thus changing your mind every three months, you will never be any thing but an idle fellow, and your youth will be lost in preparations for different professions; or, should you remain long enough fixed to have entered into any line of life, you will not be long before you will desire to quit it for another, of which you will probably be entirely ignorant, and by that means ruin your fortune, and expose yourself to ridicule.
"You make me recollect two boys I once knew, and whose story has often been the subject of conversation, in a winter's evening, at the house of an old clergyman, from whom I received the first principles of the virtuous education my father had the goodness to bestow upon me.
"Robin was the son of a farmer who lived in the village; his uncle kept a grocer's shop in the next market town, and had a son named Richard. They were very clever boys, both understood the business they had been bred to extremely well, and, at the age of sixteen, were become very useful to their parents; but about that time they took it into their heads to grow tired of the employment they were engaged in, and to wish to change places with each other; Robin fancying that he should like extremely to be a grocer, and Richard, that nothing could possibly be so pleasant and agreeable as working in the fields.
"The two fathers, who wished for nothing so much as the happiness of their children, were much grieved at this whim; for they very well knew, that all they had been learning could be of no use to them, if they were now to change their situations, and would be exactly so much time and labour lost, and every thing was to begin again; but Robin and Richard thought differently, and said they could not see that there was any thing to learn.
"Their fathers desired they might change places for one month, and agreed that if in that time they saw no reason why they should not remain, the one to learn the business of a farmer, and the other to serve in a grocer's shop, they would willingly consent to indulge them in their inclination; and accordingly, on the day on which Richard was sent out to work in a large turnip field, Robin, decorated with a pair of white sleeves, and an apron before him, was placed behind his uncle's counter.
"The first day he did nothing but grin and stare about him, dip his fingers in the jars of honey, and fill his pockets with currants, raisins, and figs, and he thought it pleasant enough; but the moment he was set at work, he found himself so aukward, that, if he had not been ashamed, he would have begged to return immediately to his plough and his spade. Notwithstanding his earnest endeavours, he could not by any means contrive to tie up a pound of rice, for when he had folded the paper at one end, and, as he thought, secured it, he let it run out at the other; and something of the same kind happening to every thing he undertook, the shop was strewed from one end to the other with rice, tea, and sugar; and his uncle told him he was only wasting his goods, and doing mischief, without being of the smallest use. If he was sent out with any parcels, he was sure to lose his way, and ramble about whole hours together, till somebody was sent in search of him. No one pitied him; he was the jest of the whole family; and, before half the month was expired, he begged in the most earnest manner, that he might return to the farm.
"Richard, who had never been much exposed either to heat or cold, desired his uncle would excuse his working till the cool of the evening; but the farmer laughed at him, and asked him if he thought that would be the way to get his work done. He was therefore obliged to go out and attempt something, but his whole day's work might have been done in a couple of hours by a country boy of twelve years of age, and would also have been much better done, for poor Richard did not know what he was about.
"At five o'clock he said he must go and get his tea; but his uncle told him they never drank any such slops, and promised him a good mess of porridge for his supper, if he made haste to finish his work.
"Richard _could not_ work; he had done nothing right, and the next day he found it worse and worse; he did not know even how to handle a spade, much less how to make use of it. He sauntered about, with his arms across, the whole long summer's day, doing nothing, yet tired and uncomfortable: he had nobody to speak to--he could not find one idle person; even his aunt, when he went to seek her, was busy in her dairy, and told him to go and mind his business, and not lounge about and disturb those who were inclined to work.
"Every creature he saw had some employment which they understood, and appeared to take pleasure in, whilst he, unable to do the same, and weary of wandering alone, from the garden to the field, and from the field to the garden, wished a thousand times he had never quitted his father's shop, where, being able to act his part as well as other people, he felt himself of some consequence: now he was nobody, he was in every one's way, and all were tired of him.
"Robin and Richard were glad to return to their own homes, and re-assume their former employments, in which they prospered so well, that they never after felt the least inclination to quit them, and are at this time living in ease and plenty, respected and esteemed by their friends and neighbours."
CECILIA AND FANNY.
Cecilia went to spend a month with her aunt in the country. She was very much pleased at being in a place where she could run in the garden and in the fields as much as she liked, but she would have been much happier if her sister had been with her; and Fanny, who fancied she should have no pleasure in any thing without the company of her dear Cecilia, was tired of her absence, and longed for her return, before she had been two days gone.
They could both write tolerably well, and Cecilia, the week after her arrival at her aunt's, addressed the following letter to her sister:
"MY DEAR FANNY,
"I wish mamma could have parted with us both at the same time, that we might have rambled about together in my aunt's beautiful gardens, and in the fields and meadows which surround the house: but I believe I am wrong in forming such a wish, for she would then be left quite alone, and that I do not desire on any account; if I did, I should appear very selfish, and as if I thought of nobody's pleasure except my own, and that I should be extremely sorry for.
"I am sure you will like to know that I am very happy at my aunt's, and how good and kind she is to me. All the long border behind the summer-house is to be called our garden, and it is now putting in order for us; and when neither of us are here, my aunt says the gardener shall take care of it: it is full of beautiful rose-trees and flowering shrubs; and Thomas is planting many more, and sowing mignonette, and other seeds, so that when you come here, you will find it quite flourishing.
"My aunt sends me very often with Biddy to walk by the sea-side, and I have found a number of very pretty shells and sea-weeds, which I shall bring you, and a great many curiosities which I have picked up on the beach. I never saw such things before, and I am sure you never did. We never see any thing where we live but houses and pavement--here I have seen the mowers and the haymakers, and I know how to make hay, and how butter is made, and many other things.
"Good night, my dear Fanny! Pray give my duty to dear mamma, and believe me,
"Your most affectionate sister,
"CECILIA."
Fanny was delighted at receiving this letter, and wrote the following answer to her sister:
"MY DEAR CECILIA,
"How glad I am to hear that you are so happy in the country! I should certainly like very much to be with you, but not to leave mamma alone; and she is so good, that I am not half so lonely as I thought I should be in your absence. Only think, my dear sister! she has bought me the sweetest little goldfinch you ever saw, and it is so tame, that the moment I come near the cage, it jumps down from its perch to see what I have got for it.
"But this is not all: she has taken me to a shop, and bought me a great many pretty prints, which I am sure you will have great pleasure in looking at when you come home. We have been twice at M---- to spend the day; and indeed, my dear Cecilia, I have had a great deal of pleasure, though perhaps not quite so much as you have had in your fields and meadows, and among your haymakers; but mamma says we may be happy in any place if we choose it, and will determine to make ourselves contented, instead of spending our time in wishing ourselves in other places than where we are: and I am sure she is very right, for if I were to fret and vex myself because I am not in the country, and you do the same because you are not in town, my goldfinch and my prints, my pleasant walks in the gardens at M----, and all mamma's kindness, would be lost upon me, and you would have no pleasure in your little garden, or in looking at the haymakers, your shells, your sea-weeds, or any of the curiosities you meet with.
"Pray, dear Cecilia, let me have one more letter from you before you come home, and do not burn mine, for I shall like to see how much better I write next year; and so will you, I dare say, so I shall lock up your letters in my little work-trunk.
"Mamma desires her best love to you. Give my duty to my aunt, and believe me
"Your affectionate sister,
"FANNY."
It was almost a fortnight before Fanny heard again from her sister, when one morning a basket, covered very closely, and a small parcel, with a letter tied upon it, were brought up stairs, and placed upon the table before her. The letter was from her sister, and contained the following words:
"MY DEAR FANNY,
"You would have heard from me much sooner, but I waited to write by George, whom my aunt told me she should be obliged to send to town on business. He brings you a basket of strawberries from her, with her love to you: fourteen of them are from _our_ garden, and I assure you I had a pleasure in picking them, which I cannot describe: they are in a leaf by themselves, and I beg you will let me know if they are ripe and sweet, for I did not taste them; I was determined to send you all the first. I send you also a little parcel of shells and sea-weeds, and when I am with you, I will teach you how to make very pretty pictures of them, as my aunt has had the goodness to teach me.
"I have been very happy here, though I could not persuade myself to believe it possible when I first came, because I could not have mamma and you with me; but I shall remember her advice, and always endeavour to be pleased, and find amusement where I am, and with what I have, instead of fretting, like our cousin Emily, because she had not a blue work-bag instead of a pink one, or because see had an ivory toothpick-case given to her when she was wishing for a tortoise-shell one.
"My aunt says, that children who do so are so very tiresome, that they make themselves disliked by every body, and that they are never invited a second time to a house, because people are generally tired of their company on the first visit.
"I hope I shall see you and my dearest mamma next week; but you may write to me by George, for I shall be very much disappointed if he returns without a letter from you.--Adieu! dear Fanny.
"I am affectionately yours,
"CECILIA."
Fanny had only time to write a short note to her sister, which George called for soon after dinner; and Cecilia's return the following week, put an end to the correspondence for that time. The two sisters were extremely happy to meet, though they had not made themselves disagreeable, and teased people with their ill humour when they were separated; and they were very well convinced, that if they had done so, they should have suffered by it, and have been very uncomfortable.
The following summer Fanny paid a visit to her aunt, and had the pleasure of finding their little garden in such good order, and so many strawberries in it, that she could send her sister a basket-full. She could work very neatly; and her aunt having given her a large parcel of silks, riband, twist, and gold cord, she made the prettiest pincushions that ever were seen, to send to her mamma, her sister, and her cousins.
Cecilia was extremely fond of drawing, and was so attentive to her lessons during her sister's absence, that she had a portfolio full of pretty things to shew her on her return.
No little girls in the world could be happier than Cecilia and Fanny, and the reason of it is very plain: they were always obedient to their mamma's commands, kind to the servants, and obliging to every body; always contented with what they had, and in whatever place they happened to be; and never fretful and out of humour for want of something to do, for they had endeavoured to learn every thing when they had an opportunity of doing so, that they might never be at a loss for employment and amusement.
HENRY.
Henry was the son of a merchant of Bristol: he was a very good-natured, obliging boy, and loved his papa and mamma, and his brothers and sisters, most affectionately; but he had one very disagreeable fault, which was, that he did not like to be directed or advised, but always appeared displeased when any body only hinted to him what he might, or what he ought not to do; he fancied he knew right from wrong perfectly well, and that he did not require any one to direct him.
He was the most amiable boy in the world, if you would let him have his own way: he never heard any body say they wished for a thing, that he did not run to get it for them, if it was in his power; and no one could be more ready to lend his toys to his brothers and sisters, whenever they appeared to desire them: but the moment he was told not to stand so near the fire, or not to jump down two or three stairs at a time, not to climb upon the tables, or to take care he did not fall out of the window, he grew directly angry, and asked if they thought he did not know what he was about--said he was no longer a baby, and that he was certainly big enough to take care of himself.
His friends were extremely sorry to perceive this fault in his disposition, for every body loved him, and wished to convince him, that, though he was not a baby, he was but a child; and that if he would avoid getting into mischief, he must, for some years, submit to be directed by his papa and mamma, and, in their absence by some other person who knew better than he did: but he never minded their advice, till he had one day nearly lost his life by not attending to it.
A lady, who visited his mamma, and who was extremely fond of him, met him in the hall on new year's day, and gave him a seven shilling piece to purchase something to amuse himself.--Henry was delighted at having so much money; but instead of informing his parents of the present he had received, and asking them to advise him how to spend it, he determined to do as he liked with it, without consulting any body; and having long had a great desire to amuse himself with some gunpowder, he began to think (now he was so rich) whether it might not be possible to contrive to get some. He had been often told of the dreadful accidents which have happened by playing with this dangerous thing, but he fancied _he_ could take care, _he_ was old enough to amuse himself with it, without any risk of hurting himself; and meeting with a boy who was employed about the house by the servants, he offered to give him a shilling for his trouble, if he would get him what he desired; and as the boy cared very little for the danger to which he exposed Henry, of blowing himself up, so as he got but the shilling, he was soon in possession of what he wished for.
A dreadful noise was, some time afterwards, heard in the nursery. The cries of children, and the screams of their maid, brought the whole family up stairs: but oh! what a shocking sight was presented to their view on opening the door! There lay Henry by the fireside, his face black, and smeared with blood; his hair burnt, and his eyes closed: one of his little sisters lay by him, nearly in the same deplorable condition; the others, some hurt, but all frightened almost to death, were got together in a corner, and the maid was fallen on the floor in a fit.
It was very long before either Henry or his sister could speak, and many months before they were quite restored to health, and even then with the loss of one of poor Henry's eyes. He had been many weeks confined to his bed in a dark room, and it was during that time that he had reflected upon his past conduct: he now saw that he had been a very conceited, wrong-headed boy, and that children would avoid a great many accidents which happen to themselves, and the mischiefs they frequently lead others into, if they would listen to the advice of their elders, and not fancy they are capable of conducting themselves without being directed; and he was so sorry for what he had done, and particularly for what he had made his dear little Emma suffer, that he never afterwards did the least thing without consulting his friends; and whenever he was told not to do a thing, though he had wished it ever so much, instead of being angry, as he used to be, he immediately gave up all desire of doing it, and never after that time got into any mischief.
MARIA;
OR,
THE LITTLE SLATTERN.
Little Maria B---- was so slatternly, and so careless of her clothes, that she never was fit to appear before any body, without being first sent to her maid to be new dressed. If she came to breakfast quite nice and clean, before twelve o'clock you could scarcely perceive that her frock had ever been white: her face and hands were always dirty, her hair in disorder, and her shoes trodden down at the heels, because she was continually kicking them off.
At dinner no one liked to sit near her, for she was sure to throw her meat into their laps, pull about their bread with her greasy fingers, and never failed to overset her drink upon the table-cloth.
One day her brother ran into the nursery in great haste, desiring she would go down with him immediately into the parlour, and telling her, that a gentleman had brought a large portfolio, full of beautiful prints of all kinds of birds and animals, which he was going to shew to them, if they were ready to come to him directly, for he could not stay with them, he said, more than half an hour.
Poor Maria was in no condition to shew herself; she had been washing her doll's clothes (though her maid had desired her not to do it, and had promised to wash them for her, if she would have patience till the afternoon), and had thrown a large basin of water all over her; after which, wet as she was, she had been rummaging in a dirty closet, where she had no kind of business, and was, when her brother came into the nursery, covered with dust and cobwebs.
Susan was called in haste to new-dress her; but she was so extremely careless of her clothes, and tore them so much every day, that one person was scarcely sufficient to keep them in order for her. Not a frock was to be found, which had not the tucks ripped, and the strings broken, nor a pair of shoes fit to put on; her face and hands could not be got clean without warm water, and that must be fetched from the kitchen; then she had to look for a comb, Maria had poked hers into a mouse-hole, and had been rubbing the grate with her brush: in short, by the time all was ready, and she was dressed, a full hour had slipped away without her perceiving it.
Down stairs, however, she went, opened the parlour-door, and was just going to make a fine courtesy to the gentleman and his portfolio, when to her very great surprise and mortification, she perceived her mamma sitting alone, at work by the fire. The gentleman had shewn his prints to her brothers and sisters, made each of them a present of a very pretty one, and had been gone some time.
When her aunt came from Bath, she brought her a nice green silk bonnet, and a cambric tippet, tied with green riband. Maria was very much delighted with it, and fancied she looked so well in it, that she could not be prevailed upon to pull it off; but she soon forgot that it was new and very pretty, and ought to be taken care of; she thought of nothing, when she could escape from her maid, but of getting into holes and corners; and having rambled into an old back kitchen, and finding herself too warm, she took off her pretty green bonnet, and threw it down on the ground, but recollecting something she had now an opportunity of doing, ran away in great haste, and left it there.
When she was asked what she had done with her bonnet, she said she did not know, and the servants lost their time in seeking for it; for who would have thought of looking for a young lady's bonnet in a dirty back kitchen?
There, however, it was found, with a black cat and four kittens lying asleep in it, and so entirely spoiled, that it could never be worn any more; and she was obliged to wear her old bonnet a great many months longer, for her mamma was extremely angry with her, and would not buy her a new one; nor did she deserve to have one, till she could learn to take more care of it, and not leave it about in such dirty places.
It is not very usual to see young ladies wandering about by themselves in stables and outhouses, but Maria had very great pleasure in it, and never lost the opportunity when she could get away without being seen; and she was so dirty, and had so often her clothes torn, that she was frequently taken by strangers for some poor child sent on an errand to the servants.
One day, when she was passing through the gate to see who was coming down the lane, a little boy upon an ass, who came up from the sea-side every week with fish, seeing her there doing nothing, called out, "Here, hark! you little girl, open the gate, I say--come, make haste, do not stand there like a post. What! are you asleep?"
Maria was so much ashamed, that she could not move, but hung down her head, and the boy (who had a mind to make her save him the trouble of getting off from his ass) continued to talk to her in the polite manner in which he had begun: "Why, you little dirty thing! open the gate I say--if you do not, I will tell the cook of you, and she will tell Madam, and I shall get you turned out of the house."
Thus was Maria B---- continually mortified by one person or another, and losing every pleasure and amusement which her brothers and sisters were indulged in, because she was never ready to join in them. They often went to walk in the charming woods and meadows which surrounded the house, and were sometimes sent with their maid to carry comfortable things to their poor sick neighbours, from whom they received in return a thousand thanks and prayers to God for their happiness; but Maria could have no share in either, for she was never with them, and they knew nothing of her.
Once, when their grandpapa sent his coach to fetch them to dine with him, Maria was not to be found; and, after seeking her all over the house to no purpose, they at length caught her in the garden with a watering pot, which she could hardly lift from the ground, her shoes wet and covered with mould, her frock in the same condition, and her hands and arms dirty quite up to the elbows. Her mamma positively declared that the horses should not be kept a moment longer, the coachman was desired to drive on, and Maria was left to spend the day in the nursery from whence she was ordered not to stir.
There she spent a melancholy day indeed, for she had no means of amusing herself to make time pass lightly on: she had no pleasure in reading, so that all the pretty books which had been bought for her were of no use; she could not play with her doll, for it had no clothes, they were all lost or burnt; and she had suffered a little puppy to play with her work-bag, till both that and the work which was in it, thread-case, cotton, and every thing else were all torn to pieces. The only thing she found to do, was to sit down by the window, look at the road and cry, till her brothers and sisters returned, and then she had the mortification of hearing them recount the pleasure they had enjoyed, talk of the curiosities their grandpapa had shewn them in the great closet at the end of the gallery, and of seeing all the pretty things they had brought home with them, and of which she might have had her share if she had been of their party.
FREDERICK'S HOLIDAYS.
"I wish," said Frederick to Mr. Peterson, "I could be with my aunt in town to spend the holidays; I shall be so tired here in the country, I shall not know what to do with myself. Two of my schoolfellows live in the next street to my aunt, and they will be going with their papa to the play, and to Astley's, and to walk in the Park, and will have so much more pleasure than I shall have--why, I might as well be at school, as here sauntering about the fields."
"You are not very civil," answered Mr. Peterson. "When you came from Barbadoes last year, and had no other acquaintance, you liked very well to be with me in the holidays: however, if you desire it, my dear Frederick, you shall go to your aunt's, that you may be near your little friends, and I will write to their papa, to request that he will give you leave to be with them as much as possible, that you may partake of all their pleasures, for I do not think you will have a great deal in your aunt's house; you know she is always ill, and cannot have it in her power to procure you much amusement."
Frederick was accordingly sent to town, and his first wish was to pay a visit to his two friends in the next street. His aunt's servant was ordered to conduct him to the house, and he was shewn immediately up stairs; but, instead of meeting with those he expected, he found their papa alone in the drawing-room, sitting at a table covered with papers, and apparently very busy.
On inquiring for his schoolfellows, he was very much surprised at being informed that they were gone into the country: "for," said their papa, "they would not have liked to be confined at home all their holidays, and I should have had no time to run about with them; they might as well have remained at school as have been here; but where they are gone they will enjoy themselves; they will spend a week at their grandfather's, and from thence go to my good friend, Mr. Peterson's, where they will have all the pleasure and amusement they can possibly wish for."
Frederick was so vexed and disappointed that he could not open his lips, but made a low bow, and returned to his aunt, whom he found just risen to breakfast. She was quite crippled with rheumatism, and had so great a weakness in her eyes, that she could not bear the light, and would only allow one of the windows to have a little bit of the shutter open.
In this dismal room, without any thing to amuse himself with, was poor Frederick condemned to spend his holidays: his aunt made him read to her whenever she was awake, and it was only when she dropped asleep for half an hour in her easy chair, that he could creep softly to the other end of the room, and peep with one eye into the street, through the little opening between the shutters.
Poor Frederick now sincerely repented having been so rude and ungrateful to Mr. Peterson, and wished a thousand times a day he had been contented to stay at his house; he would have been very happy to have had it in his power to return, but dared not propose it to his aunt, and would also have been ashamed to appear before Mr. Peterson.
After many melancholy days, and tedious evenings, spent in lonely solitude, he at length saw the happy morning which was to end his captivity. "What a foolish boy I have been!" thought he, as he was putting his things together. "The day of my return to school is my first holiday, and the preparations I am making for it the only pleasure I have felt since I left it. In the country, where I might have enjoyed the liberty of running in the fields in the open air, I was discontented and restless; and I left it, to shut myself up in a sick room. I am now going back to school, to have the pleasure of hearing how agreeably all my schoolfellows have been spending their time, whilst I shall have nothing to recount to them, but how many phials were ranged on my aunt's chimney-piece, and how many hackney-coaches I could see with one eye pass through the street."
Frederick was very right; he found his two little friends just arrived, and who, for a whole week, could speak of nothing but the pleasure they had enjoyed at Mr. Peterson's. They told him of their having being several times on the river on fishing-parties, of two nice little ponies which had been procured for them, that they might ride about in the shady lanes, and round the park, and of the beautiful houses and gardens they had been taken to see in the neighbourhood.
They had a great many very pretty presents, which they shewed to Frederick, and which they had received from their friends, who had been pleased with their behaviour, and had desired they might be allowed to pay them a visit at the next vacation.
Frederick could never forget how much he had lost by his folly; he knew he had been wrong, and, as he was not a bad boy, he was not ashamed to acknowledge it, but wrote a very pretty letter to Mr. Peterson, begging him to forgive the rudeness he had been guilty of, and telling him how much he had suffered by it; assuring him that he would never again desire to quit his house to go to any other, and saying, that he never should have done it, if he had not been a foolish restless boy; that he had been severely punished for his fault, and hoped he would think it enough, and grant him his pardon as soon as possible.
Mr. Peterson readily complied with his request, and invited him, the next time he left school, to accompany his two little friends to his house, where they spent a month in the midst of pleasure and amusement; sometimes riding the ponies to the top of a hill, from whence they could see the hounds followed by the huntsman, and several gentlemen on horseback; at other times assisting their good friend to entertain his tenants with their wives and children round a Christmas fire in the great hall: in short, Frederick was so happy, that he never once thought of Astley, the Park, or the play, or had any desire to quit Mr. Peterson in search of other amusements.
THE LITTLE QUARRELLERS.
Margaret and Frances lived with their papa and mamma in a pretty white house on the side of a hill; they had a very large garden which led into a meadow, at the bottom of which ran a beautiful river.
Every body thought them the happiest children in the world, and certainly they might have been so, if their dispositions had been more amiable; for their papa and mamma were very fond of them, and indulged them in every thing proper for their age, and their friends were continually bringing them presents of toys and dolls, or some pretty thing or other.
They had each a little garden of their own, full of sweet flowers and shrubs, currants, gooseberries, and strawberries. Margaret had a squirrel, in which she took great delight, for it would jump joyfully about its cage whenever she came near it, and would eat nuts and biscuit out of her hand; and Frances had a beautiful canary-bird in a nice gilt cage, which awoke her every morning with a song, and told her it was time to rise. Margaret's nurse had brought her a white hen with eight little chickens, and Frances had the prettiest bantams that ever were seen.
Their mamma sent them to walk with their maid every evening, either over the hill where the sheep and cows were feeding, or along the side of the clear river, to pick up pebbles, to hear the merry songs of the fishermen, and see the boats pass with the market-people, going to the town with their fruit and their vegetables. Sometimes their papa took them in his pleasure-boat across the river, to eat strawberries and cream at a farm-house; and sometimes they were permitted to accompany their mamma when she went to dine with her friends in the neighbourhood.
It is scarcely to be believed, that two children who might have lived so happily, should have found their greatest pleasure in tormenting each other; and though, before their parents and strangers, they appeared to be all sweetness and good-humour, that they should have been continually contriving how to vex and teaze each other. The moment they were alone, they did nothing but fight and quarrel, and dispute about trifles.
Not contented with this, whenever they were displeased, they did not care what mischief they did, but tried, by every means in their power, to vex each other, by spoiling and destroying every thing which came in their way. Margaret was quite delighted when she had been running over all Frances's garden, and treading down every thing which was growing in it; and Frances, to be revenged on her sister, never failed to go directly and pull up all her flowers by the roots, throw stones at her little chickens, and tear her doll's clothes to pieces.
One day when they had had a great quarrel about some foolish thing not worth mentioning, Margaret was so extremely angry, that she got her mamma's ink-stand, and threw the ink all over her sister's work, and then walked out of the room, leaving it on the table, Frances, who was gone to ask her mamma for some thread, no sooner returned to the parlour, and found her work in so sad a condition, but guessing immediately how it came so, instead of seeking for her sister, and telling her in a gentle manner how wrong she had acted, and begging that all their quarrels might be ended, and that they might live together as sisters should do, and endeavour to make each other happy, instead of spending their time in vexing and teazing each other--instead of doing this, the malicious girl thought of nothing but how she might be revenged; and watching for a favourable opportunity, she seized on a fine damask napkin which had been given to Margaret to hem and mark, threw it down on the hearth, contriving to let one end of it lie over the fender, and then began to poke the fire as violently as she could, hoping some of the cinders would fall upon it, and burn a few holes in it. Her wish was soon accomplished, and even beyond what she desired, for the napkin was in an instant in a blaze, and the house in danger of being burnt to the ground. Terrified almost to death, she began to scream for help, and the whole family were immediately assembled in the parlour; Margaret among the rest, with the bottom of her frock covered with ink, though she had not perceived it, and which too plainly shewed who had done the first mischievous exploit.
They were now both strictly examined, and their tricks soon discovered: their papa and mamma watched them very narrowly, and found that they were quite different when alone, to what they appeared when in their presence; and they no longer treated them with the kindness and indulgence they had hitherto done. Their gardens were taken from them, the squirrel and the canary-bird given away, and the white hen, with her little brood of chickens, sent back to the nurse: they were deprived of all their amusements, and they had lost the good opinion of their parents and friends, for the servants had told their story to every body they met with, and they were never mentioned without being called the Sly Girls, or the Little Quarrellers.
THE VAIN GIRL.
Caroline was trifling away her time in the garden with a little favourite spaniel, her constant companion, when she was sent for to her music-master; and the servant had called her no less than three different times before she thought proper to go into the house.
When the lesson was finished, and the master gone, she turned to her mamma, and asked her, in a fretful and impatient tone of voice, how much longer she was to be plagued with masters--said she had had them a very long time, and that she really thought she now knew quite enough of every thing.
"That you have had them a very long while," answered her mamma, "I perfectly agree with you; but that you have profited so much by their instruction, as you seem to imagine, I am not so certain. I must, however, acquaint you, my dear Caroline, that you will not be _plagued_ with them much longer, for your papa says he has expended such large sums upon your education, that he is quite vexed and angry with himself for having done so, because he finds it impossible to be at an equal expense for your two little sisters; I would therefore advise you, whilst he is so good as to allow you to continue your lessons, to make the most of your time, that it may not be said you have been learning so long to no purpose."
Caroline appeared quite astonished at her mamma's manner of speaking, assured her she knew every thing perfectly, and said, that if her papa wished to save the expense of masters for her sisters, _she_ would undertake to make them quite as accomplished as she herself was.
Some time after this conversation, she accompanied her mamma on a visit to a particular friend who resided in the country; and as there were several gentlemen and ladies at the same time in the house, Caroline was extremely happy in the opportunity she thought it would give her of surprising so large a party by her drawing, music, &c; and she was not very long before she gave them so many samples of her vanity and self-conceit, as rendered her quite ridiculous and disgusting.
She was never in the least ashamed to contradict those who were older and better instructed than herself, and would sit down to the piano with the utmost unconcern, and attempt to play a sonata which she had never seen before, though at the same time she could not get through a little simple song, which she had been three months learning, without blundering half a dozen times.
There lived, at about the distance of a mile from Mrs. Melvin's house, a widow lady, with her daughter, a charming little girl of thirteen years of age, on whose education (so very limited was her fortune) she had never had it in her power to be at the smallest expense: indeed, her income was so narrow, that, without the strictest economy in every respect, she could not have made it suffice to procure them the necessaries of life; and was obliged to content herself with the little instruction she could give to her child, and with encouraging her as much as possible to exert herself, and endeavour to supply, by attention and perseverance, the want of a more able instructor, and to surmount the obstacles she would have to meet with.
When Caroline heard this talked of, she concluded immediately that Laura must be a poor little ignorant thing, whom she should astonish by a display of her accomplishments, and enjoyed in idea the wonder she would shew, when she beheld her beautiful drawings, heard her touch the keys of the piano, and speak French and Italian as well as her own language; which she wished to persuade herself was the case, though she knew no more of either than she did of all the other things of which she was so vain and conceited.
She told Mrs. Melvin that she really pitied extremely the situation of the poor unfortunate Laura, and wished, whilst she was so near, she could have an opportunity of seeing her frequently, as she might give her some instruction which would be of service to her. Mrs. Melvin was extremely disgusted with the vanity of her friend's daughter, and wishing to give her a severe mortification, which she thought would be of more use to her than any lesson she had ever received, told her she should pay a visit the next morning.
The weather was extremely fine, and the whole company set forward immediately after breakfast, and were soon in sight of a very neat but small house, which they were informed belonged to the mother of Laura. A little white gate opened into a garden in the front of it, which was so neat, and laid out with so much taste, that they all stopped to admire it, for the flowers and shrubs were tied up with the utmost nicety, and not a weed was to be seen in any part of it.
"This is Laura's care," said Mrs. Melvin; "her mamma cannot afford to pay a gardener, but hires a labourer now and then to turn up the ground, and, with the help of their maid, she keeps this little flower garden in the order in which you see it; for by having inquired of those who understand it (instead of fancying herself perfect in all things), she has gained so much information, that she has become a complete florist."
They were shewn into a very neat parlour, which was ornamented with a number of drawings. "Here," says Mrs. Melvin, "you may again see the fruits of Laura's industry and perseverance; she has had no instruction, except the little her mamma could give her, but she was determined to succeed, and has done so, as you may perceive; for these drawings are executed with as much taste and judgment as could possibly be expected of so young a person, even if she had had the advantage of having a master to instruct her. The fringe on the window curtains is entirely of her making, and the pretty border and landscape on that fire-screen is of her cutting."
Caroline began to fear she should not shine quite so much as she had expected to do, and was extremely mortified when Laura came into the room, and was desired to sit down to the piano, at hearing her play and sing two or three pretty little songs, so well and so sweetly, that every one present was delighted with her.
She scarcely ever dared, after this visit, to boast of her knowledge; and if she did, Mrs. Melvin, who was her real friend, and wished to cure her of her vanity, never failed to remind her of the little she knew, notwithstanding all the money which had been expended upon her education, in comparison to Laura, who had never cost her mamma a single shilling.
THE YOUNG GARDENERS.
Charles, William, and Henry, had a large piece of ground given to them to make a garden of. Their papa gave them leave to apply to the gardener for instruction as often as they pleased, but not to expect any assistance from him or any other person: they were to put it in order, and keep it so by their own labour.
"I know," said Charles to William, "that we shall never agree with Henry; he is such an odd boy, that I really believe when once the garden is put in order, he will be contented to walk about and look at it, without ever touching any thing, for he is always quarrelling with us because we have no patience, as he calls it."--"Yes," replied William, "it is very true. Do you remember how angry he was when his bantam hen was hatching her chickens, and we helped to pull them out of the eggs! Who would have thought we should have killed any of them! I am sure I did not; but they were so long, I could not bear to sit there all day waiting for them. I think, Charles, we had better give him his share of the ground, and let him do as he will with it, and you and I will make a pretty garden of the rest, and manage it as we think proper."
This being settled, and the ground fairly divided, they all three went to work with the utmost alacrity. They rose with the lark in the morning, turning up the earth, and clearing it of stones and rubbish; but Henry by himself had got his garden laid out in beds and borders, ready for planting, before Charles and William together had half done theirs: they could not determine how to do it; the borders were too narrow, and must be made broader; this bed must be longer, and that shorter; so that what they did in the morning, they undid in the evening, and their piece of ground lay in confusion and disorder, long after Henry had planted his borders with strawberries, and his beds were sown with annuals, and filled with pretty flowers and bulbous roots.
Charles and William had at length got their garden laid out in tolerable order, and, in other hands, it might soon have been in a very flourishing state; for their papa had given them leave to remove several pretty shrubs from his into their garden, and consequently it already wore a pleasant appearance. Two days had, however, scarcely elapsed, before these whimsical boys were tired of the manner in which their tree, &c. were planted, and longed to remove them.
"This little cherry-tree," said William, "will surely look better at the corner of the wall."
"That it will," answered Charles, "and will grow better there, I dare say; and the rose-trees, do observe how ill they appear at the end of that border--who would ever have thought of planting rose-trees in such a place?"
"Nobody," said Charles, "and we had better change them directly, or it will be supposed we know nothing of gardening, and we shall be laughed at for pretending to it."
No sooner said than done; the plants and flowers were removed, and, in about a week from that day, were all put back into their former places.
When their seeds were just beginning to appear above the ground, they fancied that bed would do better for something else, and in less than five minutes the spade was brought, the bed turned up, and all the little flowers, which were springing up so strong and promising, were destroyed without pity.
What a different appearance did the two gardens make in the month of June! Charles and William saw, with sorrow and regret, that theirs was nothing more than a piece of waste ground; they had removed their trees and shrubs so often, that they had all perished; and not having patience to let their seeds come up and grow into blossom, their beds had nothing in them.
Henry's garden was beautiful; there was not the smallest bit of it but had some pretty flower or fruit-tree growing in it: every part was blooming and sweet; and his two brothers discovered, when too late, that without perseverance and steadiness, nothing can be accomplished, and that unless they came to a determination to follow the good example their brother Henry set before them on this occasion, as on all others, their minds would, like their garden, be uncultivated and waste.
THE WHIMSICAL CHILD.
Mr. and Mrs. Clermont invited their little niece, Elizabeth Sinclair, to spend a month with them in the country. Mr. Clermont was extremely fond of children, but his partiality to their company never extended to any who had been improperly and foolishly indulged, and were whimsical and discontented; and had he known that his sister had suffered her little girl to have those disagreeable qualities, he never would have asked her to his house; but he had been two years abroad, and knew nothing of her.
The day on which she was expected, her uncle and aunt went to meet her, and were very much pleased with her appearance, as well as the affectionate manner in which she returned the caresses they bestowed upon her. She was extremely pretty, had fine teeth, fine hair, and a beautiful complexion; and Mr. Clermont said to his wife, "I shall be delighted to have this sweet little creature with me, and to shew all my friends what a charming niece I have." But he was not long in changing his opinion, and very soon discovered that her beauty, much as he had thought of it, did not prevent her being the most disagreeable girl he had ever met with.
She was no sooner in the house than she complained of being too warm, then too cold, and a minute after, too warm again--too tired to sit up, yet not choosing to go to bed--wishing for some tea, and then not liking any thing but milk and water--now drinking it without sugar, then desiring to have some, and, after saying she never supped, bursting into tears because she was going to be sent to bed without supper.
"I perceive I was mistaken," said Mr. Clermont; "this _sweet little creature_ will be a pretty torment to us, if we permit her to have her own way; but I shall put a stop to it immediately."
Accordingly, the next day at dinner, he asked her if she would be helped to some mutton, but she refused it, saying she never could eat any thing roasted. "Then, my dear," replied Mr. Clermont, "here is a boiled potatoe for you; eat that, for you will have nothing else."
Elizabeth was extremely disconcerted, and thought, if she had been at home, her mamma would have ordered half a dozen different things for her, rather than suffer her to eat any thing she disliked, or to dine upon potatoes. She made a very bad dinner, and was cross and out of humour the whole evening.
The next day at table Mr. Clermont offered to help her to some boiled lamb; but Elizabeth, according to her usual custom of never liking what was offered to her, said she could not eat lamb when it was boiled. "So I expected," said Mr. Clermont, "and (taking off the cover from a small dish which was placed next to him) here are some _roasted_ potatoes, which I have provided on purpose, fearing you might not happen to like the rest of the dinner."
Elizabeth began to cry bitterly, but her uncle paid no kind of attention to her tears, only saying that if she preferred a basin of water-gruel, she should have some made in an instant. She was extremely hungry (having quarrelled with her breakfast, and had nothing since), and perceiving that her tears were not likely to produce any good effect, was glad to dine very heartily on lamb and spinage, and to eat some currant tart, which she had said she could not bear even the smell of. She insisted, however, on returning to her mamma immediately, saying she would not stay any longer in a house where she was in danger of being starved, and was sure her mamma would be very angry if she knew how she was treated.
"I am sorry to inform you, my dear niece," said Mr. Clermont, "that you must endeavour to put up with it at least a month or six weeks, for your mamma is gone into Wales on business of consequence, and will not be at home to receive you till that time is expired."
This was sad news for Elizabeth; she was extremely unhappy, and wished a thousand times she had never quitted her own home, where she was indulged in all her whims, and where every one's time was employed in trying to please and amuse her; "And now," thought she, "on the contrary, I never have any thing I like, and my uncle appears to take pleasure in teazing and vexing me from morning to night." Finding, however, that she must either eat what was provided for her, or suffer hunger, and conscious that she had no _real_ dislike to any thing in particular, though she had a great pleasure in plaguing every body about her, she thought it advisable to submit, and consequently dined extremely well every day, whether the meat was roasted or boiled, stewed or fried.
One day, when she was going with her uncle and aunt to take a walk to the next village, a poor miserable woman, with a child in her arms, and followed by two others, met them at the gate, and begged, for God's sake, they would take pity upon her and her helpless infants, who she said had not tasted food since the foregoing day.
Cold meat and bread being immediately brought out to them, both the woman and her children seized upon it with so much eagerness, that they might really be believed to be almost famished.
Mr. Clermont desired Elizabeth would observe them attentively, and, after making her take particular notice of the joy with which the poor people were feasting on the scraps that came from their table, asked her if she thought she ever again could, without being guilty of a dreadful sin, despise, as she frequently had done, and refuse to eat of the wholesome and plentiful food which, through the great goodness of God, her friends were enabled to provide for her.
Elizabeth was struck with her uncle's words, and with the sight before her; she felt that she had, by her ingratitude and unthankfulness to God, rendered herself very undeserving of the comforts he had bestowed upon her, and of which the poor children she was then looking at stood so much in need; and she never, from that day, was heard to find fault with any thing, but prayed that she might in future deserve a continuance of such blessings.
EDWARD AND CHARLES.
Mr. Spencer sent for his two sons, Edward and Charles, into his closet; he took each of them by the hand, and drawing them affectionately towards him, told them he was going to undertake a long journey, that he hoped they would be very good boys during his absence, obedient and dutiful to their mamma, and never vex or teaze her, but do every thing she wished them to do; he also desired them to be kind to poor Ben, and to recollect, that, though his face was black, he was a very good boy, and that God would love him, whilst he continued to behave well, just as much as if his skin were as white as theirs, and much more than he would either of them, unless they were equally deserving of his love, as black Ben had rendered himself by his good-natured and amiable disposition.
Edward and Charles both promised their papa that they would do every thing he desired, but they were not _both_ equally sincere: Edward could with difficulty hide his joy, when his papa told him he was going from home, for he was a very naughty boy, and had no inclination to obey any body, but to be his own master, and do as he liked, to get into all kinds of mischief, and kick and cuff poor Ben whenever he pleased.
Thinking, however, it would be proper to appear sorry for what he was, in reality, extremely glad of, and seeing poor Charles take out his handkerchief to wipe away his tears, when he was taking leave of his papa, he pulled out his also; but it was not to wipe his eyes, but to hide his smiles, for he was so happy at the thought of all the tricks he could play, without having any one to control him, that he was afraid his joy would be perceived, and his hypocrisy detected.
Mrs. Spencer's health was so indifferent, that she seldom quitted her apartment, so that she knew very little of the behaviour of her sons. Edward, as soon as he had breakfasted, usually took his hat, and went out without telling any one where he was going, or when he should return.
One day, when he was gone away in this manner, and Charles was left quite alone, he went up stairs to his mamma, and asked her leave to take a walk in the fields; and away he went with his favourite dog, for he had no other company, and he said, "Come along, Trimbush, let us take a ramble together; my brother always quarrels and fights with me, but I know you will not, my poor Trimbush: here, my poor old fellow, here is a piece of bread which I saved from my breakfast on purpose for you."
Charles had not walked very far, before he thought he heard Ben crying; and thinking it very probable that his brother was beating him, he went as fast as he possibly could towards the place whence the sound came. There he found poor black Ben with a load of faggots upon his back, almost enough to break it, and Edward whipping him because he cried, and said they were too heavy.
Charles began immediately to unload the poor boy; but Edward said, if he attempted to do so, he would break every bone in his skin: he was, however, not to be frightened from his good-natured and humane intention, and therefore continued to take off the faggots, telling his brother, that if he came near to prevent him, he would try which had most strength; and as Edward was a great coward, and never attempted to strike any body but the poor black boy, who dared not return the blow, he thought it proper to walk away, and leave his brother to do as he liked. When they met afterwards, and Charles offered to shake hands with him, saying he was sorry for what he had said to him, and begged they might be good friends, he appeared very willing to forget what had passed, and assured him he forgave him with all his heart; but his whole thoughts were employed in finding out some way to be revenged on his brother, and he had soon an opportunity of doing what might have cost him his life, though it is to be hoped he was not quite wicked enough to desire it.
Walking one morning by the side of the river, he begged Charles to get into a little boat which lay close to the shore, to look for a sixpence which he pretended to have left in it, and began to sob and cry, because he was afraid he had lost his money. Charles, who was always glad to oblige his brother, jumped into the boat with the utmost readiness, but in an instant the wicked Edward, having cut the rope by which it was fastened, away it went into the middle of the river, and no one can tell whither it might have been driven, or what terrible accident might have happened, if the wind had been high, and had not the good affectionate Ben stripped off his clothes, and plunged into the river to go to Charles's assistance.
Ben could swim like a fish, and was soon within reach of the boat, which, by getting hold of the end of the rope, he brought near enough to the shore for Charles to jump out on a bank.
Edward fancied, that, as his mamma knew nothing of his tricks, and as he was certain Charles was too good-natured to tell tales, his papa would never hear of them: but he was very much mistaken. Old Nicholls, the butler, had observed his behaviour, and as soon as his master returned, took the first opportunity of telling him of every thing which had passed in his absence.
Mr. Spencer now recollected that he had been much to blame in keeping his sons at home, and determined to send them both to school immediately: he observed, however, that they were not equally deserving of kindness and indulgence, and that it would be proper and just to make Edward feel how much he was displeased by the accounts he had received of his conduct: he was therefore sent to a school at a considerable distance from home, so far off, that he neither came home at Christmas nor Whitsuntide, nor saw any of his friends from one year to the other; he was not allowed to have any pocket money, for his papa said he would only make an ill use of it; nor had he ever any presents sent him of any kind.
Charles was only twenty miles from his father's house, and was always at home in the holidays: he had a great many things given to him on new year's day, and his papa brought him a little poney that he might ride about the park; and he always let poor Ben have a ride with him, for he loved him very much; and Ben, who was a grateful, kind-hearted boy, did not forget how many times Charles had saved him from his wicked brother, and would have done any thing in the world to give him pleasure.
THE TRUANT.
"What will become of us to-morrow?" exclaimed a boy at M---- school, to little George Clifton, as they were undressing to go to bed. "I am so frightened, that I shall not be able to close my eyes."
George, who was very sleepy, and had no inclination to be disturbed, scarcely attended to what he was saying; but, on being asked how _he_ thought to get off, and how _he_ should relish a good sound flogging, if he could not excuse himself, he thought it time to inquire into his meaning, and was informed that some of the boys had that evening been robbing the master's garden, that they had taken away all the fruit, both ripe and unripe, and had trodden down and destroyed every thing.
George said he was very sorry for it, but he had no fears on his own account, for he could prove that he had drank tea and spent the whole evening at his aunt's, and was but just returned before their hour of going to bed; but Robert assured him, that all he could say would avail him nothing, and that he was very certain he would not be believed; and moreover, that the master had declared, as he could not discover the offenders he would punish the whole school: "And for my part," said Robert, "I am determined not to stay here, to suffer for what I do not deserve. I can easily slip out of this window into the yard, and at the dawn of day I intend to set off; and shall be many miles from M----, when you are begging in vain for forgiveness of your hard-hearted master."
George, who, though a good boy in other respects, had a very great dislike to the trouble of learning any thing, and had been sent to school much against his inclination, thought this an excellent opportunity of leaving it, and had no doubt, but having such a melancholy story to recount of the injustice of his master, added to the many hardships he fancied he had already endured on different occasions, he should be able to prevail upon his papa to keep him at home; and imagined, that, when he grew up to be a man, he should, by some means or other, have as much learning and knowledge as other people, without plaguing himself with so many books and lessons. Robert had therefore very little difficulty in persuading him to accompany him, which he had no reason to wish for, but that he knew he had always a good deal of pocket-money, which he hoped to get possession of, and cared very little, if once he could carry that point, what became of poor George. He knew him to be quite innocent, and also that the master was well acquainted with the names of the boys who had done the mischief, and consequently had no thought of punishing the whole school; but he was a wicked boy, had been the chief promoter of the robbery, long tired of confinement, and determined to run away. At four o'clock in the morning they got out of the window into the yard, jumped over a low wall, and were soon several miles from the school.
Poor little George began, before it was long, to grow very tired; he was hungry also, and had nothing to eat. Robert asked him if he had any money, and said he would soon procure him something to eat, if he would give him the means of paying for it; but the moment he had got his little purse in his hand, he told him that he must now wish him a good morning; that he was not such a fool as to go home to get a horsewhipping for having run away from school, but should go immediately to Portsmouth, where he should find ships enough ready to sail for different parts of the world, and would go to sea, which was, he said, the pleasantest life in the world; and making him a very low bow, he set off immediately across the fields towards the high road, and was out of sight in an instant.
George began to cry bitterly; he now repented having listened to this wicked boy's advice, and would have returned to school if he could; but he did not know the way back again, and, if he had known it, would have been afraid to see his master. He wandered on the whole long day, without seeing any body who thought it worth their while to stop to listen to his tale; and at length, towards the close of evening, quite ill for want of eating, and so tired that he could no longer stand, he seated himself by the side of a brook, and leaning his head upon his hand, sobbed aloud.
An old peasant returning from his labour, and passing that way, stopped to look at him, and perceiving that he was in much distress, went up to the place where he was sitting, and inquired kindly what ailed him.
"I am a naughty boy," said George, "and do not deserve that you should take notice of me."--"When naughty boys confess their faults, they are more than half cured of them," replied the old peasant. "Whatever you have done, I am sure you repent of it, and I will take care of you."
He then took him by the hand, and led him to his cottage, which was very near, and where he found an old woman spinning near the window, and a young one sitting with two pretty little girls and a boy, whom she was teaching to read: they had each a book in their hand, and were so attentive to their lessons, that they scarcely looked up when the door was opened.
"There," said the old peasant, "sits my good wife, this is my daughter, and these are her children: we are poor people, and cannot afford to spend much money on their education, but they are very good, and endeavour to learn what they can from their mother, and get their lessons ready against the hour they go to school in the morning, that they may make the most of their time, and not rob their parents by being idle."
"Rob their parents!" exclaimed George. "Yes, rob them," replied the old man. "Would it not be robbing their father and mother, if they allowed them to squander their money upon them in paying for their schooling to no purpose?"
George wiped the tears from his eyes, and said he was afraid he was a very bad boy; but he was sorry for it, and would endeavour to mend, if his papa could be prevailed on to pardon what was past. He then told the old man all that had happened, and how the wicked Robert had enticed him to run away from school; but he was so hungry, and so fatigued, that he could hardly speak or hold up his head. The young woman gave him a large bowl of milk and bread, and put him into a neat, clean bed, where he slept soundly till eight o'clock the next morning, when, after a comfortable breakfast, the good peasant accompanied him to his father's house, and said so much in his favour, and of the sorrow he had shewn for his ill behaviour, that he was immediately forgiven.
He was, at his own desire, taken back to school, where he entreated his master to pardon the little attention he had paid to his books, and the instruction he had been so good as to give him; as also his elopement, a fault he had, he said, repented of almost as soon as he had committed it.
The master readily forgave him upon his acknowledging his error, and assured him, that, though he always punished those who deserved it, he knew very well how to distinguish the innocent from the guilty, and that, whilst he behaved like a good boy, he would have no reason to fear his anger.
JEALOUSY.
Rose was eight years of age when her sister Harriet was born: she was extremely fond of the baby, watched its cradle whilst it slept, and was never tired of looking at it, and admiring its little features; but she could not, without pain, observe, that she was no longer, as she had been accustomed to be, the _sole_ object of her mamma's care and attention.
Harriet must not be left a moment! Harriet must not be disturbed! And even if her mamma had the head-ach, and Rose was not suffered to go into her room, the little stranger was admitted. She concluded that she was no longer loved by any body, for even the servants were, she fancied, more occupied with her little sister than with her, or any thing which concerned her; and before she was ten years of age, she was become so very jealous and fretful, that she took no pleasure in any thing, nor was it in the power of any one to please or amuse her.
One day walking in the garden with her mamma, who carried the little Harriet in her arms, and coming to a part of it where several tall and far-spreading trees afforded them a pleasant shade from the heat of the sun, they stopped to enjoy its coolness. The gardener was ordered to bring them some cherries, and they sat down on the grass to await his coming: the little one, however, had no inclination to be so long still, and her mamma, to please and keep her quiet, lifted her up, and seated her on the bough of a tree which spread above their heads.
Rose immediately changed colour; her countenance, which a moment before was tolerably cheerful, now became gloomy and sullen; she leaned her cheek upon her hand, and her eyes followed them, expressing nothing but discontent and jealousy.
Her mamma was not long before she perceived the angry glances thrown upon her, and asked her, in a tone of displeasure, what they signified? "I cannot help fearing," said Rose, "that you no longer love me, now that you have another little girl. I remember, when you played with me all day; I was then continually on your knee, and every thing you had was brought out to amuse me; the servants also thought of nothing but how to give me pleasure; but now I go neglected about the house, and nobody minds me: it is true, I have every thing I want, and my papa and you are always buying me toys and pretty things of one kind or another; and I have often some of my little friends, whom you allow me to invite to drink tea, and spend the afternoon with me; but----"
"But," interrupted her mamma, "I no longer take you upon my knee like a baby, or carry you in my arms; nor have I strength sufficient to lift you up, and place you upon the bough of a tree, to please and make you quiet, as I have done by your little sister. You forget, I imagine, that you are ten years old, and that if I were to treat you in the same manner as I do a child of two, we should both be laughed at by every creature who might happen to see us. Reflect, my dear Rose, and do not suppose, that, because the helpless age of this little darling demands more care and attention than is necessary to you--because, being her nurse, I am obliged to have her often with me, when the company of another would be troublesome and inconvenient to me--do not fancy, my love, from these circumstances, that you are less beloved by either your papa or myself; but that as you increase in years, we shall shew our affection to you in a very different way to that in which we now do; as at present we treat you much otherwise than we did when you were of the age of your sister Harriet.
"I have long observed, with much uneasiness and concern, the fretfulness and discontent you have exhibited in your countenance at every mark of tenderness and care shewn to your sister. If you suffer this humour to grow upon you, it will be observed by every body, and you will then, in reality, be disliked and shunned by all your acquaintance, though at present it is only in your own fancy that you are so. Recollect yourself in time, re-assume your cheerfulness, assist me in taking care of this sweet child, instead of being angry at the attention I shew her; and be assured that we feel an equal affection towards you both, though we do not think it proper to treat you, my dear Rose, as we do a baby of two years old."
EDMOND.
"What an unlucky boy I am!" said Edmond, running towards his papa, whom he had been seeking over all the house and gardens. "My grandmamma has changed her mind about going to my uncle's, and, instead of taking me with her to spend a fortnight at his house, when I had set my heart upon it, I must content myself at home, she says, and wait for another opportunity. Every thing goes wrong with me--it was but last week that the pigs got into my little garden, and destroyed every thing in it."
"Stop! stop!" interrupted his papa, "and, before you complain of your evil destiny, recollect, that if you had not heard the pigs in your garden, and ran in haste to drive them out of it, you would not have seen your little brother, whom you seized by the arm on the very edge of the pond, and who, in another moment, would probably have fallen into it, and would have been drowned before any of the family had missed him. It is not impossible but that you may have cause to rejoice some time hence at what now appears to you such a mighty disappointment."
His papa's words were soon verified: for not more than ten days had elapsed after this conversation, when they received a letter which filled them with the severest affliction. A servant belonging to his uncle had caught a dreadful putrid sore throat and fever, of which he died almost immediately, and which had infected the whole family. Edmond heard with the utmost grief, that one of his cousins was no more, and that the other lay in so dangerous a state, that his life was despaired of: and he did not fail to offer his unfeigned thanks to God for having preserved him from the danger to which he would have been exposed, if his grandmamma had not suddenly changed her intention of going to his uncle's: he determined also, that he would never, in future, complain of any trifling disappointments he might chance to meet with, or find fault, as he had too often done, with the arrangements of Providence; but conclude, that, however extraordinary many things might appear to him, being ordered by Him who knows best what is fit for us, they must, some way or other, sooner or later, turn to our advantage and happiness.
Edmond, in the long walks he took with his papa, often met with things which appeared to him very strange, and which (notwithstanding the resolution he had made, and the rule he had laid down never to find fault) made him thoughtful, and wish to know why they were permitted.
An old man, who was universally esteemed in the village, had been involved in perplexity and trouble, as it appeared to him, very unjustly. He was tenant to a rich man, and had been long and comfortably settled in a prosperous way in a little farm, which lay in a fertile and beautiful valley belonging to his large estate.
The rich man was hard-hearted and revengeful, and, taking a dislike to poor old Davis on some very trifling occasion, had turned him out of the farm at so short a notice, that he had had the utmost difficulty to find a place to take shelter in. He had a great deal of trouble in removing his cattle and his poultry, his corn and his hay-mows, and every thing belonging to his farm; and said he was sure it would be a couple of years before he should be able to recover the expense and loss of time; and Edmond, who never went into the village without paying him a visit, and loved to chat with him and his old dame, never heard them talk of it without thinking is was, at least, _a pity_ that he had met with so great a misfortune.
The winter was very severe, the snow fell fast, it was deep, and lay very long on the ground. Davis was obliged to take his cattle in from the fields, and feed them entirely on hay; his poultry required the utmost care and attention, and every thing in his garden was in danger of perishing. "This is a sad winter for poor old Davis," said Edmond to his papa; "I am afraid it will put him another year behind hand; I wish he had not been driven from that flourishing farm in the valley."
"I wish so too," replied his papa, "if it would have been more for his good to have remained there--but God knows best!"
The spring returned, the snow melted, torrents of water fell from the hills--the brooks swelled, and overflowed the meadows--every thing was inundated: the farm in the valley was entirely destroyed, and all the cattle with which the rich man had stocked it were drowned. Davis, on his hill, had felt the sharpness and biting frost of winter; he had heard the wind roar, and the rain beat against his casement: but when the snow melted, he felt no ill effects from it, but turned out his cattle, which he had sheltered whilst it lay on the ground, to feast on the fresh herbage which had been preserved under it.
"I perceive now," said Edmond, "that I have been once more mistaken, and that, instead of thinking Davis an object of pity, I should look upon him as a fortunate man. If he had remained in the valley, his whole property would have been destroyed, and he would have been a beggar: now he has but to be doubly attentive to his labour, and he will soon recover the expense of his removal: he will then be just as well as he was, and he might this day have been without a morsel of bread, or a shilling to purchase one."
THE GHOST AND THE DOMINOS.
Sophy Benson, when she was only eleven years old, could write, read, draw, and play on the piano-forte, better than any little girl of her age in the whole neighbourhood; she was obedient to her papa and mamma, affectionate to her brothers and sisters, and would do any thing to oblige her friends, except going up stairs after night, staying in the garden alone a moment after the dusk of the evening, or going to bed before her sister. On these points, though she really wished to shew a readiness to do as she was desired, and had often attempted to do so, she never had been able to find resolution sufficient to carry her through with it; for she had heard of ghosts, giants, fairies, and monsters of divers kinds, and was never an instant alone in the dark, without expecting to see one or the other; concluding, it must be imagined, that it was customary with those gentlemen and ladies to pay their visits, each with a wax taper in their hands, to exhibit their persons by.
Sophy had a brother, a good-natured boy, one year younger than herself, whom she always contrived to get to accompany her when she had any thing to fetch from her chamber after night; but unfortunately, she had repeated so many terrible stories to him (to shew that she was not afraid without reason), that poor Harry soon became almost as great a coward as his sister; and they found, that whenever they had occasion to go out of the parlour after candlelight, it was necessary to procure a third person to be of their party, for they no longer thought themselves in safety together.
It may be thought a fortunate circumstance, that the infection did not spread, or the whole family would soon have been obliged to move in a body; but there was little danger of any thing so ridiculous: it was, on the contrary, much to be wondered at that a sensible girl, like Sophy Benson, should have been capable of such a weakness, and that she never gave herself time to reflect, that there could not be the smallest foundation for the silly fears with which she had filled her head.
Her mamma had taken a great deal of pains to endeavour to convince her of the folly of indulging herself in such ridiculous fancies, but it was to no purpose; her imagination was continually making her see strange sights, and hear extraordinary noises; and though she exposed herself to the ridicule and laughter of her elder brothers and sisters, when her giant proved to be a tree, and her dismal groans to be occasioned by the noise of a door or a window-shutter on a stormy night: still she went on in the same way, and had made poor little Harry as foolish as herself.
Whenever she was alone, either in the house or garden, a moment later than she liked to be, her heart immediately began to beat, and she flew like lightning to seek protection; her hands clasped, her elbows squeezed close to her sides, and her head hung down--and in this way, every object she glanced her eyes upon appeared to her fancy something extraordinary: had she but summoned resolution to take a second look, she must have laughed at her own folly.
One evening she came screaming into the parlour, and assured her mamma that she had had the greatest difficulty to escape from a hideous creature, who, with outspread arms, was on the point of seizing her, and begged the door might be locked immediately. Her mamma, and her brothers and sisters, laughed immoderately at her strange story, which mortified her extremely; but they could not prevail on her to _shew_ them where she had seen the terrible creature: she could, however, tell them the exact spot, though she endeavoured to dissuade them from venturing to go to it; but she could not prevail on any of them to be frightened, and they soon discovered the monster, with its outspread arms, to be nothing more than the horse on which the servant had been beating her papa's coat.
One evening, when the moon shone bright and fine, and Sophy and Harry had a very great desire to fetch a box of dominos which was in the nursery, and which they well knew they should not have, unless they went themselves to fetch it, after sitting half an hour, whispering and endeavouring to assume sufficient courage for so great an undertaking, they at length determined to go, for they were tired of having nothing to amuse themselves with, and had still a long winter evening before them.
Quaking through fear, and holding as fast as they possibly could by each other's hand, they ascended the stairs, got into the passage which led to the nursery, and were just going to open the door, when Sophy recollected, that if Harry was seen by her maid, she should be finely laughed at, and asked if she dared not venture to take a step without having him to protect her; she therefore begged he would wait at the door whilst she went into the nursery to fetch the dominos; but Harry would not hear of such a thing, and said he would not stay in the passage alone on any account whatever.
Sophy was so desirous of appearing courageous to her maid, that she tried every means she could think of to engage Harry to wait for her; told him she would not be a moment, that the moon shone as bright as day--but all was to no purpose, till by promising to give him her little box of colours, and her ivory cup and ball, she at length prevailed upon him to consent.
She walked into the nursery with an air of unconcern and boldness not at all usual to her; but it was quite lost, for Mary was not there and she knew not how to venture so far as a closet at the other end of it, to take out the box of dominos, but was on the point of calling Harry to come to her, when thinking the maid might be in the next room, she wished, if possible, to save her credit. With trembling steps she advanced towards the closet, reached it without any _terrible accident_, and having opened the door, began to grope about for the box: it was neither on the first shelf nor the second, and passing her hand along the third, it fell upon something colder than stone.
Afraid of being laughed at, she determined not to scream, but with the utmost expedition quitted the nursery, without thinking of the dominos, and went to join her brother; but she had no sooner reached the passage, than she saw (too plainly she saw it to believe it to be the effect of fear) a figure dressed in long white robes, having one arm extended towards her, entirely covered with black, and in a low tremulous voice, it called "Sophy, Sophy, Sophy."
This was the most alarming and terrible adventure she had ever met with; and if she had command enough over herself not to scream when she touched the unaccountable cold thing in the closet, she now could shew no such fortitude; but sinking on the floor, for her knees could no longer support her weight, she screamed so loud, that the poor ghost, who had been as much terrified as herself, throwing aside his white robes, ran towards her for protection, crying, "Sophy, Sophy! my dear Sophy! is it you?--Oh dear! I thought it was all over with me; I have been almost smothered since you left me, and really thought I was going to be buried alive."
Mary, who heard the bustle, now made her appearance with a light, and, perceiving what had happened, became extremely angry, asking them if they imagined she had nothing to do but to wash their linen, to have it pulled about the dirty passage. "And here is my black silk handkerchief!" exclaimed she in a violent rage.--"Did I wash it so well in small beer, to make it look nice and fresh, for you to twist it about your arm, master Harry? Pray look what a condition you have made it in."
Harry looked extremely foolish, when he discovered that the only danger with which he had been menaced, was that of taking cold by having been covered with wet linen. The truth was, that, when his sister left him, he was so much afraid of being alone, that though he longed for the colours, and the cup and ball, he thought he was paying much too high a price for them, and almost repented of his promise. Willing, however, to gain the two things he most wished for, he determined to bear the lonely situation he was left in, but fancied if he could get away from the door, and place his back against the wall, he should be much safer, and more out of the way of danger.
Endeavouring by these means to secure himself, and shutting his eyes, that he might not see any thing disagreeable by the light of the moon, whose beams reflected different objects along the wall, he unfortunately stepped upon the end of a line, on which Mary had hung to dry the whole labour of the day, and having entangled his feet in it, by some means or other gave it such a jerk, that the nail sprung out, and in an instant poor Harry was half smothered under the weight of a quantity of wet linen, which he concluded (agreeably to the wonderful and surprising histories his sister had recounted to him) could be nothing less than some giant, who was going to bury him alive.
When Mary visited the closet, her anger rose to a prodigious pitch; for Sophy, in groping about for her box of dominos, had not only dirtied her fingers and hands, but had left the marks of them on Mary's new-washed caps and handkerchiefs, which she had put aside on a plate, till she could find time to iron them.
The whole story was repeated in the parlour, and the evening spent in mirth at the expense of the cowards.
FIDO.
Paulina going to spend the afternoon with her little cousins, arrived at their door at the very instant that they were dragging out a poor little dog, once so great a favourite that it was fed with every kind of nicety, and reposed, when it was inclined to sleep, on a beautiful silk cushion.
"What are you going to do with poor Fido?" inquired Paulina.
"Oh, the nasty thing!" replied her cousin Emily. "Pray look how ugly it is grown--I would not keep it in the house on any account--I am going to give it to those boys you see at the gate: I do not care what they do with it: my brother Charles has given me a most beautiful little creature--come in, and I will shew it to you."
"Stop, stop, for pity's sake!" exclaimed Paulina, "Pray do not give poor Fido to those boys, to be worried and tormented to death; let me have him; I will carry him home to my hospital, and will take care of him as long as he lives."
Fido had unfortunately strolled into the kitchen (where certainly neither young ladies nor their dogs can have any business), when the cook was very busy in getting ready for dinner, and (I hope without intending such a piece of cruelty) she had thrown a quantity of boiling water over the poor little creature's head and back, and scalded him in so terrible a manner, that no one thought he could have lived through the day.
Emily was so angry with the cook, and shed so many tears when she beheld the agony of her favourite, that one would have thought she had the best heart in the world, and that she had a very great regard for it; but as soon as it was recovered, and she saw it had lost one eye, and that all the side of its head, and its whole back, was without hair, she could not bear the sight of it: it was turned out of the parlour, and kicked about by every body, glad to pick up any bone it could meet with, and to sleep in a corner on straw, instead of the silk cushion it had been accustomed to; and, at length, had not Paulina arrived in time to save it, would have been given to half a dozen unfeeling boys, who would soon have destroyed it.
Paulina was very little pleased with her cousin Emily on this occasion, for her own disposition was very different: she was so humane, so kind to every body and every creature in distress, that she was beloved by all who knew her; she had quite a little hospital of sick and lame animals and birds: a dog, which had had its leg broken by being caught in a gin; a cat with one ear, the other having been bitten off by a large mastiff; and a blind squirrel; she had a little goldfinch in a cage, which had had its wings torn off by a cat, and as it could no longer fly down from its perch to drink, and return when it liked, she had contrived a little ladder, on which it could hop up and down without any difficulty; a blackbird, almost frozen to death, which she had picked up in the snow, but which never recovered the use of one of its legs, sung very merrily, however, in its cage, for it was well fed and taken care of; and one or two blind cocks, which she had bought from boys who had been fighting them, and were going to throw at them, by way of _finishing the fun_ (as they called it); and several lame hens, become so by some accident or other, lived comfortably in her little poultry-yard, for she took care to feed all her pensioners herself, and never trusted the care of them to any other person.
Paulina had great pleasure in procuring every comfort she could for her poor animals; and her papa and mamma, to encourage her kind and humane disposition, increased her pocket-money, that she might be able to purchase barley for her poultry, and seed for her birds: her brothers also, who were at school, often sent her presents for that purpose. As she grew up, her humanity was shewn to her fellow-creatures in distress, as much as it had been in her childhood to the dumb creation; and as God had given her the means of doing good, she freely indulged herself in acts of kindness, for which she received a thousand thanks and blessings wherever she appeared: she was beloved by all her neighbours, both poor and rich, every thing prospered with her, and she was happy and contented, as she deserved to be.
THE REWARD OF BENEVOLENCE.
Mrs. Clifford being particularly satisfied with the attention her three children, Alfred, Robert, and Helen, had for some time past paid to their lessons, and to the instruction of their masters, told them she would treat them with a charming walk in the woods on the opposite side of the river: and that, if they would carry some bread or biscuits with them, she thought they should have no difficulty in finding a house where they might procure some milk, and instead of returning home to drink tea, she would spend the whole afternoon and evening in rambling about with them.
This was charming news for the young folks, who took care not to give her the trouble of waiting for them, for they were all three ready at least half an hour before the time she had appointed for their departure, which they looked forward to with the utmost impatience; and the moment Mrs. Clifford joined them in the hall, away they all went, with joyful hearts and cheerful faces, through the field, and down the long lane, which led to the ferry.
"This is very pleasant, mamma," said Alfred; "I think I should never be tired of walking in the fields and woods; yet I must own I do long for winter, that we may purchase the magic lantern we are to have. I think, with the guinea grandpapa has given each of us, and what we had before in our little purses, we shall be able to have a very large one."
"O dear!" exclaimed Helen, "how delightful it will be to be able to see it as often as we please, and to show it to our friends; and, mamma, do you know that Robert is to be the person who shews it, for he says he can talk just like the man who came to our house last year."
"So I can," answered Robert; "and I wish it was bought, that you might hear what a long story I shall tell you about the sun and the moon, and the King of Prussia and his hussars, and the cat and the cook! I would rather have a magic lantern, than any thing in the whole world!"
Chatting in this manner, and amusing themselves by looking at different objects as they passed along, they found themselves at the ferry before they expected it; and the boat being just ready to put off, they stepped into it, and seated themselves with several others, who were going over to the other side of the river.
Their attention was very soon drawn to a poor woman, who with an infant on her knee, and a little girl and boy by her side, whom she frequently kissed and pressed to her bosom, wept as if her heart was breaking. As soon as they were landed, Mrs. Clifford stopped the woman, kindly inquired into the cause of her distress, and was immediately informed by her, that she had lately lost her husband, who, having been long in an ill state of health, and unable to work, had left her incumbered with several debts, which she had not the means of paying; and that though she laboured very hard, and had discharged some of the small ones, a hard-hearted man, to whom she owed six guineas, declaring he would not wait a day longer, had that morning seized upon her furniture, and all her little property, determined, as he said, to have his money before six o'clock, or to turn her and her children out to sleep in the high road, or where they thought fit.
She had been, she told Mrs. Clifford, to an uncle of her husband's, who lived at the market-town, begging him to take pity upon her and her innocent children: "but, Madam," added she, "he was deaf to my entreaties, and turned me from his door, and I am now going home to see all my things taken from me; and what will become of us this night, God alone can tell!"
Mrs. Clifford was extremely affected by this melancholy tale, and walked with the poor unhappy woman to her cottage, where they really found two ill-looking men taking down the bed, and packing up the furniture. The poor creature began to wring her hands and cry bitterly, and the children, though they did not understand what the men were going to do, clung to their mother, and would not move from her side.
Alfred, Robert and Helen were, however, old enough to understand perfectly well the distress of the poor woman, and the misery and wretchedness to which she and her helpless children were exposed; and, fortunately for her, their tender and compassionate hearts immediately prompted them to endeavour to relieve her. The pleasure they had promised themselves in purchasing a magic lantern, and in being in possession of such an amusement for the long evenings of the approaching winter, appeared to them very trifling in comparison to the delight of snatching this poor family out of the hands of the unfeeling wretches they had to deal with; and leading their mamma into the little garden, earnestly entreated her to take the three guineas their grandpapa had given them, as well as the contents of their little purses, and employ the whole to relieve the poor woman, and begged her in the most pressing manner to make up the deficiency.
Mrs. Clifford pressed them tenderly to her heart, expressing the greatest satisfaction at the resolution they had taken, and assuring them she would make up the sum with the greatest pleasure, and that the proof they now gave of their feeling and humanity made them dearer to her than ever; adding, that she was certain four-and-twenty hours would not pass before they would be rewarded for their goodness.
The men were immediately stopped, the debt discharged, and the furniture replaced in proper order: the poor woman knew not how to express her joy, and her gratitude; she scarcely knew what she was doing, but at length recollecting herself, entreated Mrs. Clifford and her children to be seated, and accept of such refreshment as she had to offer them. Her little table was soon covered with a cloth as white as snow; and fresh milk, eggs, butter, and a nice brown loaf were set before them, of which they partook with great satisfaction.
They did not quit this little family till a late hour, and could talk of nothing on their way home but the pleasure they felt in the reflection of having left them so happy; of how they had been delighted when they saw the two hard-hearted men walk out of the cottage, and how differently the poor woman and her children would pass the night, to what they might have expected. Alfred said, the good action they had done that afternoon would be the pleasantest they could have to talk of in the winter evenings; and Robert was of opinion that a visit now and then to the cottage (which their mamma had promised them) would afford prettier stories for him to repeat, than any thing he could tell of the King of Prussia or his hussars. As for Helen, she declared that her heart was so light, and she felt herself so happy and joyful, that she could almost jump over the moon.
They retired to rest in this pleasant disposition, and told their mamma the next morning, that they had never been so happy in their lives; that they went to bed, thinking on the good they had done, and, after thanking God, who had given them the means of doing it, they had immediately fallen into a sweet sleep; that the moment they awoke, they had found themselves in the same happy humour, pleased with themselves, and with every body they saw; and were very well convinced that the magic lantern could never have procured them one quarter of the pleasure which they now felt, and which would be renewed every time they visited the poor woman at the cottage, and whenever they recollected her story.
"I told you, my children," said Mrs. Clifford, "that four-and-twenty hours would not pass before you would be rewarded; and you must now, I am certain, be well convinced, that the heart-felt pleasure arising from the reflection of such an act of kindness and benevolence to a fellow-creature in distress, is the greatest and most solid reward that could possibly have been bestowed upon you, far superior to, and more lasting than any satisfaction you could have procured by laying out your money in any other way."
JEMIMA.
Mrs. Franklin, a widow lady of very considerable fortune, inhabited an elegant house on Richmond Hill, kept a number of servants, and had the most splendid equipage in the whole neighbourhood. She had an only daughter, to whom she was fondly indulgent, and on whom she determined to bestow the best education that could possibly be procured for her, let the expense be what it would.
Jemima was a very amiable child; and if she had been so fortunate as to have been placed under the care of any one a little more disposed than her mother was to combat her fancies and want of resolution, she would not have had to regret the immense sums squandered upon her to no kind of purpose, nor to wish she could recal (as she often vainly did) the time she had trifled away in doing nothing.
It must appear very extraordinary that this should have been the unhappy fate of a little girl, who wished so much to profit by the instruction procured for her, and had the greatest desire to be an accomplished woman; but Jemima wished to be accomplished, without having the _trouble_ of making herself so, and possessed neither the _resolution_ nor _perseverance_ so absolutely necessary to the attainment of the perfection she aimed at.
She began every thing with eagerness and alacrity; but the most trifling difficulty which came in her way put a total stop to her progress, and she immediately persuaded herself that it was not possible she ever should be able to surmount them.
She had from her infancy been extremely fond of drawing, and desiring to be instructed in that agreeable art, one of the first masters was procured for her: she had in a very short time succeeded in copying, with tolerable correctness, the first things he gave her to do; and the greatest hopes were entertained of her making a great proficiency in what she appeared to prefer to every other amusement. The master now gave her some other drawings to copy, which required a little more attention and study, and she began to find difficulties in her way, which she had not foreseen: she tried them twice--they were pretty well, but not perfect; a few faults still remained, which her master pointed out to her. Jemima concluded she _never_ should do them better; and as he insisted that she could not proceed till she had made herself mistress of the trifles he objected to, she determined to give up all thoughts of drawing figure, and apply herself entirely to landscape.
She was delighted with this new employment; her master had the sweetest drawings of trees, cottages, and rivers, that had ever been seen! She should never be tired of copying such pretty things, and she was sure she should not meet with half the difficulties which were to be found in drawing figure.
She made outlines of several trees, and had she but been possessed of perseverance enough to have perfected herself in that part, before she attempted to go farther, all would have been easy and pleasant; but Jemima knew nothing of perseverance or patience, and insisted on having a finished landscape to do directly; and the master, to shew her how incapable she was of executing such a thing, indulged her in her fancy: but when he endeavoured to explain to her the nature of perspective, light and shadow, and several other rules necessary for her to understand, Jemima dropped the pencil from her fingers. She had not perfectly comprehended his meaning, and wanted resolution to question him, and endeavour to make it clearer, and once more concluded she never should be able to make any thing of it, and that it would be much more prudent to turn to some other pursuit.
Accordingly the drawing-master was dismissed; and all the money her mamma had paid him for his attendance, for quantities of paper, pencils, chalk, and (which was of much more consequence, and which no sum could recal) the loss of her own precious time, were thrown away to no purpose. But Jemima did not mean to stop here; she should do very well without drawing, she said, and she would give all the time she had intended to employ that way entirely to music, and had no doubt, but that by the time she was sixteen she should be quite a proficient; was very sorry she had so long neglected her piano forte, and requested of her master that he would bring her some better music than the simple easy lessons she had been playing, assuring him that she intended to apply very seriously. But, alas! she had no better success in this than in her drawing; difficulties obtruded themselves whatever she turned to, and when she quitted the piano for the harp, and from the harp returned to the piano, she found herself just in the same predicament.
The music was given up for the French and Italian languages, geography, and botany, all of which ended in the same way: nothing was to be learnt without a sufficient stock of perseverance and resolution to surmount the obstacles which lay in the way; and as the _smallest_ was quite enough to stop Jemima's progress, it is not to be wondered at (as she was allowed to have her own way in every thing) that at the age of sixteen, though what would have been a comfortable independence to many, had been spent upon her education, that she knew no one thing in the world.
At twenty she had but too much cause to repent of her folly: her mother, by lawsuits, and other unforeseen events, lost the greater part of her fortune, and was obliged to retire into a remote part of the country; and in that lonely place what a comfort and amusement would she have found in music or drawing, had she but endeavoured, when she had so good an opportunity, to perfect herself in either! But she had nothing to do, no means of employing herself agreeably, but spent her time in loitering about from one window to another, tired of herself, and tiring every body who saw her.
THE TRIFLER.
William was come home to spend the holidays; but he had scarcely time to speak to his papa and mamma, before he ran out to visit his poultry, his rabbits, and his little garden; and from thence to the village, to see his nurse, and then to the cottage of old John, who had taught him how to catch birds, make little fishing-nets, and how to take care of his tame rabbits.
He found the poor old man in the utmost grief and consternation; a recruiting party had come into the village, and had enticed his son away from him. He had enlisted: he was gone from his aged father, who had no other comfort in the world: he depended upon him for his support, for he was a strong, healthy, hard-working young man; and John was grown old and infirm, and could no longer work to maintain himself.
"My dear young master," said he, "I am almost broken-hearted; a trifle of money would engage the sergeant to give him up, if I could get it before they take him to the magistrate at the next town; and he, poor boy! desires no better, for they had made him drink more than he is accustomed to do, or he never would have thought of leaving me: the moment he was sober he repented of it; but it is too late--I have no money, and they will soon be gone. Wretched old man that I am! what will become of me?"
"Pray do not grieve so, old John," said William; "I will return to my papa directly, and I am very sure he will not leave you in distress. I will be back again in half an hour, so pray be comforted--your son shall not be taken from you." And away he went, fully intending to do as he had said he would; but unfortunately William was not to be depended upon, for he continually deferred to another time what ought to be done at the moment, and trifled away hours in which he had engaged to render little services to people who depended upon his promises.
It is scarcely to be credited, that, anxious as he appeared to relieve the poor old man's distress, he should, before he got half way to his papa's house, if not _forget_ the errand on which he was going with so much seeming expedition, at least suffer a new object to draw off his attention from the principal part of it; and that he should accept of an invitation to dine, without once recollecting, that, unless the business could be settled immediately, the recruiting party would have left the village, and poor John would be abandoned to misery and distress.
Meeting with two young gentlemen who lived in the neighbourhood, and being invited by them to go and dine at their house, their servant was dispatched, whilst they amused themselves in the wood; to ask his papa's leave; and as it was readily granted, and he did not return till evening, the recruiting party had left the village many hours before old John had the means sent him of procuring his son's discharge.
William was extremely grieved when he perceived the sad effects his neglect had occasioned, the agony of the poor old man, and the anger of his papa, who, after threatening to send him immediately back to school, took this opportunity of making him recollect how many times he had brought trouble and distress upon different persons by the unpardonable fault he was continually committing, through his trifling, unsteady disposition, and assured him, that if he suffered so bad a custom to grow up with him, he would be pointed out as a man on whose word no one could place the smallest confidence, and whose promises were of no value--a frivolous, despicable character, with whom no worthy people would associate. He then ordered his chaise to be got ready, and went over to the market town; the magistrate was his particular friend, and he had the pleasure (though not without some difficulty) of freeing the young man, and of sending him home to comfort and support his aged and afflicted father.
THE COUSINS.
Priscilla lost her mother when she was very young: her father was in the East Indies, and she was taken home by his sister, Mrs. Hamilton, who loved her for his sake, and shewed her the greatest kindness and attention; but her daughters, Emily and Lucy, were not both equally kind to their cousin. Lucy was very fond of her, but Emily was jealous and envious, and could not bear the marks of tenderness bestowed upon her by her mother.
Priscilla had a most affectionate heart, and would cry for hours together, when she thought she had done any thing to make her cousin angry; which she imagined must certainly be the case (though she could not recollect what it could possibly be), for it never entered into her head that any one could be displeased with her, when she had done nothing to offend them, and little suspected, that when she was praised by her aunt for her even temper and constant good humour, for her attention to her lessons, and the progress she made in every thing she undertook to learn, her kind and gentle manner towards the servants, and her charity and humanity to her fellow-creatures in distress: she had no idea that those praises increased the dislike which the ill-natured Emily had conceived to her the moment she came into the house, who, instead of endeavouring to imitate her good qualities, took every method in her power to cast a shade over them, and to fill every one's head with tales to her disadvantage.
As they grew older, Emily's dislike to her cousin increased every hour, as did the amiable Priscilla's endeavours to soften it by every mean she could employ, and by seeking every opportunity of obliging her. If Emily had any work to do, of which she appeared tired, Priscilla was sure to be ready to finish it for her: if she wished for a nosegay, Priscilla would search over the whole village till she had procured the prettiest and sweetest flowers to make one for her; but all was to no purpose--she hated her the more for the trouble she took to please her.
One day Mrs. Hamilton returned from the town, where she had been to purchase different things to send to her sister in Scotland; and, amongst the rest, a very beautiful netting-box, which she intended as a present to her, was shewn to the young ladies, and greatly admired by all three. It was extremely delicate, and, after they had sufficiently examined its beauty, it was placed on a small table, with positive orders from Mrs. Hamilton that it should not be touched; but returning in the evening from the house of a friend in the neighbourhood, with whom she had dined, and recollecting that curiosity might lead some of the servants to open it, she took it up in the paper, as it lay on the table, and locked it in a bookcase.
The following day, being busily employed in packing up the things she had purchased for her sister, and thinking to put some cotton into the little netting-box, to preserve the winders and other things from rubbing, how was she surprised at perceiving that the lining was green instead of pale pink, and that several parts of it were totally different from that which she had purchased the day before!
Lucy said she was very sure it was not the same box her mamma had shewn to them; Emily was of the same opinion: but Priscilla only blushed without saying a word.
"Somebody has broken my box, and replaced it with another not half so pretty," said Mrs. Hamilton in an angry tone; "I had positively forbid either of you to touch it, and I insist on knowing which of you has done this mischief."
"I am afraid," said Emily, pretending to feel extremely for her cousin's confusion, "that poor Priscilla has had the misfortune to break it; and indeed, mamma, if you will but observe how she blushes, and that she has not a word to say in her own defence, you need not have any doubt of the matter."
Priscilla assured her aunt that she had never touched her box after she had shewn it to her; Emily gave the same assurance with regard to herself, and Lucy declared that she had not been in the room where it was, from the time that her mamma went out, till she returned in the evening.
Mrs. Hamilton, determined to know the truth, asked the young ladies what use they had made of the guinea they had each received on new year's day, saying her box had cost that sum, and could not have been replaced without an equal one.
"Here is mine," eagerly exclaimed Emily, "in my little work-trunk."
"Half of mine, my dear mamma," said Lucy, "you will recollect, I paid for a box of colours, and some drawing paper; and here is the other half in my purse."
"And where is _your_ guinea, Priscilla?" demanded Mrs. Hamilton.--"And what is the reason, that, instead of shewing the same readiness with your cousins to clear yourself, you only blush and hang down your head, without speaking a single word?"
"I cannot produce my guinea," answered Priscilla; "but believe me, my dear aunt, when I assure you that I never touched your box."
Emily, who had her reasons for wishing the subject might be dropped, though not from any motive of tenderness for her cousin, now earnestly intreated her mamma not to inquire any farther into the matter, as it only distressed the _poor thing_, and would make her utter a thousand falsities. But old Martha, their maid, who had stood all the time pinching the strings of her apron, clasping her hands together, and then lifting them up to heaven, with many other gestures which marked her impatience, now no longer able to contain her indignation, burst out like thunder, and asked Emily how she could possibly stand there, looking her mamma in the face, and presume to talk of _falsities_, when she must be conscious she was at that moment guilty, not only of a most terrible and wicked falsity, in accusing an innocent person of the fault she had herself committed, but was also making the most ungrateful return that any one could be capable of, for an action which certainly deserved the greatest praise, and which she must be conscious she owed to her cousin's generosity and kindness. She then proceeded to acquaint her mistress, that walking with Priscilla round the garden, about half an hour after she had left the house, and coming near the parlour window, which happened to be open, they had perceived the netting-box lying on the marble hearth, broken into a dozen pieces, and Emily with her back towards them, picking them up; that Priscilla had, in a low whisper, entreated her in the most earnest manner not to speak; and that having stood a little aside, they had seen her go and throw all the pieces into the pond in the front garden, and then run up stairs as fast as possible.
"The dear Miss Priscilla," continued old nurse, "then begged me, as the greatest of all favours, to go immediately into the town, to the shop where you had bought the netting-box, and with _her_ guinea to get one exactly like it: and this I did to oblige her, and because it never was in my power to refuse her any thing she asks, though I must say I thought Miss Emily little deserved her kindness; for this is but one out of a hundred stories she has told of her, and ill-natured tricks she has played her, in return for her constantly doing every thing she could to oblige her, and for the trouble she has taken so many times to hide her faults. I thought the box I purchased so exactly like yours, Madam, that I concluded you never would discover what had happened; and Miss Priscilla was quite happy in thinking you would be spared the vexation of knowing it had been broken, and her cousin the anger which she would have incurred, by disobeying your orders. We were, however, disappointed; but Miss Emily must have guessed, when her cousin could not produce her guinea, what use she had made of it; and that was the reason why she wished you to drop the subject, for she might well suppose her falsity and ill nature must at length be made known to you."
It is almost needless to add, that Emily entirely lost her mamma's good opinion; Priscilla lived very happily from that time, affectionately beloved by Mrs. Hamilton and her cousin Lucy, and doated on by old Martha, who never forgot to entertain her friends and acquaintance with the story of the broken netting-box, so disgraceful to Miss Emily, and so much to the honour of her darling Priscilla.
THE TRAVELLERS.
At six o'clock on a fine morning in the beginning of September, Mrs. Cecil, with her daughter Matilda, stepped into a post-chaise in order to begin a journey towards London.
The house she had for some time inhabited stood in a distant and romantic part of Wales, many miles from the public road, so that they could advance but slowly, and often walked up steep hills, and over craggy mountains, either from regard to their own safety, or because they were tired of the carriage.
Matilda, after riding a whole day, wished she could perform the remaining part of the journey on foot, and often urged her mamma (even when the roughness of the road did not render it necessary) to get out of the chaise, that she might run up a rising ground, look round her, and pick up and examine a number of different things which caught her eye and struck her fancy; and Mrs. Cecil, who walked but slowly, was often left far behind, whilst her daughter made little excursions, and amused herself by talking to the country people.
The second day after their departure from home, she told her mamma she had, in one of her rambles into a narrow lane, seen a poor boy in great danger of being beaten by a woman who appeared to be mistress of a small cottage adjoining to that at the door of which he stood, and who threatened to lay a stick (which she held in her hand) over his shoulders, if ever he dared to touch her pears again. "But," said Matilda, "the boy insisted that they were not her pears, but his father's, and that he was in his father's garden when he picked them from a bough which hung down almost into his mouth."
Mrs. Cecil observed, that it would indeed have been a hard case if the boy had been punished by a neighbour for eating his father's pears; but when Matilda farther informed her, that the woman said the tree grew in _her_ garden, and that the bough with which he had made so free, because it hung over the wall, was a part of it, she said that entirely altered the case; and asked Matilda, whether, when her sister had lost one of her gloves, and that it was found to have slid into _her_ drawer, she thought that accident made it her property, or whether it still belonged to her sister? or whether, if the little rose-tree, of which she was so fond, should in another year extend its branches so much, as to spread over a corner of her sister's garden, she imagined it would give her a right to pluck all the roses which hung in her way, or whether she should not look upon them as _her_ roses, as much as those which were growing on the other parts of it? Matilda perceived she had been wrong, and thanked her mamma for shewing her her error.
The travellers arrived towards evening at the foot of a steep craggy hill, and in compassion to the poor horses, they determined to walk to the top of it. On gaining the summit, they saw an extensive common lying before them; and Matilda, who was accustomed to make observations, and to reflect on every thing she saw, and who never lost an opportunity of gaining information, asked her mamma if she did not think it a great pity, that any part of the world should remain so barren and uncultivated, and, as it appeared to her, so intirely useless; wishing, at the same time, she had the power to change the whole common in an instant into flourishing corn-fields and beautiful gardens.
Mrs. Cecil was just beginning to tell her daughter, that nothing was made which could be said to be entirely useless, when the post-boy came running up to inform her, that one of the wheels of the chaise was broken to pieces, and he did not know what he should do to get it up the hill.
"This is a sad accident indeed!" said Mrs. Cecil, "and I know not what any of us are to do, for I do not see a single habitation near us."
"Bless you! my lady," answered the boy, "do but please to turn about, and you will see plenty of habitations. I be no stranger here; and though there be no gentlefolks live in the place, I will be answerable for finding you a clean, neat cottage, with homely fare, but a hearty welcome. The first you see, over there by the trees, belongs to my aunt: do, Madam, please to walk up to it, whilst I go seek for two or three men to help me up with the _chai_."
During this speech, Mrs. Cecil had turned her head, and was very agreeably surprised at seeing, very near the spot where she stood, a little cluster of neat cottages among some trees, which, on ascending the hill, she had not perceived, having been equally struck, as Matilda was, with the extent of the plain before them.
They proceeded, as the post-boy had desired them, to the first cottage, where they found a woman busily employed in preparing her husband's supper, whilst four pretty little children, with ruddy complexions and smiling faces, were eating milk with wooden spoons out of a large bowl which was placed in the midst of them.
The good woman received them very kindly, and offered them every thing her cottage afforded, such as milk, whey, brown bread, eggs, and some common but ripe and relishing fruit. Matilda expressed much wonder, that she found the means of procuring even the necessaries of life on a bleak, wild common; and was extremely surprised when the woman assured her that the common, which she seemed to think so little of, was what furnished them with the greater part of the comforts they enjoyed: telling her also, that if it were more fertile, and were to be inclosed and cultivated, it would be quite lost to them, because they were too poor to be able to rent even the smallest portion of it. "As it is," added she, "all the cottagers on this little spot have a right to feed their cattle, and to cut turf for their winter fire. Neither my cow nor my goats cost me any thing; we have a little garden, which, between my husband and myself, is kept in pretty good order, and produces as many vegetables as we can make use of. I have plenty of poultry, which I carry to market, and have milk to feed my pig; so that we have nothing to wish for, but that God may preserve our health, and continue to us the blessings we enjoy."
Matilda was astonished at this account, and made many observations to her mamma on the pleasure of finding people happier than she expected, which gave her the greatest satisfaction, as they were convincing proofs of the goodness of her disposition: and she did not fail to observe to her, that the mixture of fertile vallies, barren mountains, hills, woods, and plains, with which the earth is diversified, each in various ways, and at different seasons of the year, are productive of good to the industrious.
Mrs. Cecil and Matilda were obliged to pass the night in the cottage: the next morning the wheel of the chaise being repaired, and having satisfied the good woman for the trouble they had given her, and made some little presents to her children, they continued their journey; and being but a short distance from a small village, through which lay the high road to London, they arrived at that city without any accident, or meeting with any thing farther, worthy of being related.
THE STRAWBERRIES.
Constance, Julia, and Dorothy had obtained their mamma's leave to spend the afternoon with a young lady who lived at the distance of a mile and a half from their house; and as soon as they had dined, their maid being ordered to attend them, they set forward down a shady green lane, and across the fields.
Nothing could be more agreeable and pleasant than the weather, or more beautiful than the way they had to go; the hedges were full of the sweetest flowers, and the birds sung with more than usual harmony. Susan, the maid, was quite delighted; she stopped every moment to look around, and admire the beauties which presented themselves to her eyes on every side.
Not so her young ladies: they had each a reason why they could neither enjoy the fragrance of the flowers, the music which echoed from every bush, nor any of the beauties which surrounded them.
Constance was so afraid of the smallest worm which happened to lie in her path, was so terrified at every fly which passed her, that she could enjoy nothing. She walked on, with her eyes bent on the ground, watching each blade of grass, and stepping with the utmost precaution, expecting every moment to be stung to death, or bit by some dangerous insect.
Julia had passed the whole time of dinner in bewailing the loss of a cold chicken on which she had set her heart; but her dear little pussy having wandered into the pantry in search of a mouse, and being just as fond of cold chicken as her young mistress, and thinking it preferable to the finest mouse (perhaps because it was a greater rarity to her), this ill-bred pussy had dragged it away into a corner, where, if she did not eat it all at one meal, she had leave to finish it the next day.
Julia had lost her dinner: disappointed of her cold chicken, she saw nothing else on the table (though there were several dishes which the rest of the family commended extremely) which she could possibly eat of. She was too nice to eat any thing common, and had persuaded herself that nothing but delicacies agreed with her: she could not taste either beef or mutton, or ever dine without fish, lamb, or poultry; she hated the winter because there were no vegetables to be had but potatoes, and was delighted when the season came for her to dine on green peas, cauliflower, and asparagus.
The delicate Julia often rose hungry from table; and as this had been the case on the day of their walk, she was sick and uncomfortable, sauntered along, complaining at every step, and, had she not suddenly recollected having a nice biscuit in her pocket, would probably have been unable to proceed.
Dorothy troubled herself as little as her sisters about the birds or the flowers, the lowing of the cattle, or the fine prospect. Naturally indolent, and hating to move from her place, she was much less inclined to do so after dinner, than at any other time of the day; for she had no objection to either beef, mutton, or potatoes, and would (if she had been suffered to do so) eat of all three, and as many more different things, as much as would have been sufficient, either of them, for the dinner of any child of her age.
"Come, Miss Dorothy," cried Susan, "do pray walk a little faster. Dear me! how heavy do you trudge along, with your arms hanging down by your sides! Why, you will not take the trouble to lift your feet from the ground--pray look what a dust you raise at every step. Come, take me by the arm--look, what a pretty wood this is we are got into, and--oh dear! what a quantity of strawberries there are upon that bank. Do you see how beautiful and red they appear among the brambles and dry sticks which lie over them?"
The very idea of something to eat was sure to rouse Dorothy. Constance and Julia also advanced to look at the strawberries; they were very tempting, and they each wished to taste them, but there were difficulties in the way not likely to be conquered.
Julia's desire for them soon vanished, for she recollected that she had neither cream nor sugar, without which she did not think them eatable.
Dorothy said they were very good without either, and she wished she had a good basket-full, she would soon shew them how well she liked them; but they could not be got at without removing the brambles and wood, which appeared to have been purposely laid over them, to preserve them till they were ripe; and Dorothy, after taking away three or four sticks, and a bush or two, began to puff and blow, as if she had been running a race, and declared she could do no more, much as she wished for the strawberries, if it would save her life.
"How can you be so extremely lazy?" exclaimed Constance, eager to get at the tempting fruit. "You cannot bear to take the least trouble, Dorothy--come, let me help you; I should be sorry to leave them. What a beautiful scarlet they are, and how finely they smell!--Come, come, let us remove these brambles."
Dorothy had thrown herself upon the grass, declaring she could not stir; and Susan, who was well acquainted with the dispositions of her three young ladies, determined not to interfere.
Constance began very briskly to take away the brambles; but she had scarcely uncovered a few of the strawberries, when a small insect, which she had disturbed, flew out of a bush directly against her, entangled its little wings in her hair, and almost frightened her into fits. She ran to Susan in the most terrible alarm, insisting that a hornet had got into her hair, and that she should be stung to death in an instant. She prevailed upon her sisters to leave the spot immediately, and nobody could persuade her but that she had disturbed a hornet's nest, and had had a most miraculous escape.
They spent the afternoon with their young friend much in the usual manner; each of them constantly meeting with something or other to disturb them and spoil their pleasure.
Returning in the evening through the wood, they saw a group of little boys and girls sitting under the trees, and eating strawberries; some had their hats full, some held them in their hands, and others in little baskets of their own making.
Susan asked them where they had gathered so many strawberries. "Why there," answered one of the boys, "where you see the bushes and brambles all in a heap. We covered them up above a week ago, to let them ripen; but I wonder we did not lose them all, for somebody has been here, I am sure, though I suppose they did not see the nice strawberries, or they never would have been such fools as to leave them: but it was well for us that they were so blind."
"And whom did you get to take the trouble to remove all those things for you?" inquired Dorothy, as she hung on Susan's arm with all her weight.
"Lauk-a-day! Miss," said the boy, grinning in her face, "to be sure you be joking. Do you call that trouble?"
Constance said he was very right; that it certainly could be _no trouble_; but she really wondered they had not been terrified from attempting to get at the strawberries, when they saw what a number of frightful and dangerous creatures were creeping and flying about them. And now the whole party not only grinned, but laughed aloud; and Julia told her sisters they had better not make such foolish observations, which only served to make the children laugh at them: that it was ridiculous to suppose they should think it a labour to remove a few brambles, or that they should be so weak as to be afraid of harmless flies and worms; but she must say, she was a little surprised that they did not go home with their strawberries, and get some cream and sugar to eat with them: no house in the country was without cream; there could be no difficulty in getting a bit of sugar, and it would make them so nice, that they would never afterwards relish them alone.
"That would be very unfortunate," replied a girl some years older than the others (who only noticed Julia's speech by redoubled peals of laughter), "for we should lose many such a treat as we are now enjoying, if we were to take such a foolish whim into our heads. Pray, Miss, do you imagine that my mother keeps a cow, to give us the cream to eat with strawberries? No! no! she sells her butter, and buys us clothes with the money. I wish you could all three spend a month in our cottage, you would learn to be glad enough of having one nicety, without wishing to add another to it; and to know that those who choose to eat must learn to work, and not call trouble that which is no more than play. You would also perceive, after spending two or three days on your knees in weeding the corn or the garden, that you are in no danger of being either stung or bit by innocent flies or caterpillars, and that till you get rid of all your foolish fancies, you will have no pleasure in any thing in the world, but that all your happiness and comfort will be sacrificed to whim, indolence, and weakness?"
THE END.
E. Hemsted, Printer, Great New-street, Gough-square.

= = = PG73098 = = =
73098
Transcriber's note: Unusual and inconsistent spelling is as printed.
[Illustration: FOUND AT LAST]
A Gypsy Against Her Will
Or, Worth Her Weight In Gold
BY
EMMA LESLIE
AUTHOR OF "Gytha's Message," "How the Strike Began," "Shucks," &c.
BLACKIE AND SON LIMITED LONDON, GLASGOW, AND DUBLIN
CONTENTS
CHAP.
I. LIZZIE'S HOME
II. AT THE FAIR
III. THE FORTUNE-TELLER
IV. ONE SUMMER SUNDAY MORNING
V. THE WAX-WORK SHOW
VI. ANOTHER MYSTERIOUS DISAPPEARANCE
VII. REPENTANCE
VIII. CONCLUSION
A GYPSY AGAINST HER WILL.
CHAPTER I.
LIZZIE'S HOME.
"NO, I won't put up with it; there are plenty of places for a girl now-a-days, and I don't see why I should be expected to bear with people's tempers and never speak up for myself."
"Now, Lizzie, be reasonable. Perhaps there are more places to be had, but a girl never does any good for herself who is always changing." And as she spoke, Mrs. Betts took another hot iron down from the fire, and recommenced smoothing out the shirt that was spread on the board before her.
"But, Mother, why should I have to put up with people's crossness?" demanded the girl in an imperative tone.
"We all have something to put up with, Lizzie. Do you think it's pleasant for me to have to take in washing, just to make ends meet, because your father's work is so bad just now?"
The girl cast her eyes carelessly upon the fine white shirt her mother was ironing.
"I shouldn't mind doing that," she said; then all in a minute she started up alert and eager. "Oh! Mother, that's just the very thing; why shouldn't I come home and help you with the washing and ironing?" she exclaimed.
"Because I couldn't afford it, my girl," said her mother quietly.
"But you could get a bit more work—another family's washing, and then you could manage, Mother," said Lizzie in the same eager tone. She wondered she had not thought of it before; but now this way of escape from the necessity of going to service had occurred to her, she was not going to let it slip. "We could manage beautifully; I'm sure we could, Mother," she said earnestly. "I've learned some things since I've been in service, and you'd find I could help you a good deal more than you expect."
"You ought to be more handy. You have been out nearly a year now, and if you had kept all the time in your first place you would have been worth something by this time; for Mrs. Roberts prides herself on turning out good servants."
"Oh! Yes, I daresay; but what girl would put up with her fidgety ways?" said Lizzie.
"Many girls are glad to get the chance. Look at Mary Russell, she has been there ever since you left, and her mother tells me she is learning to cook and make pastry quite nicely."
"Oh! Well, let her. It's no good crying over spilt milk. Mrs. Roberts never taught me cooking, and I don't suppose she ever would if I'd stopped with her fifty years. Now, Mother, say I may give warning as soon as I go back, and let me come and help you instead of looking for another place."
But Mrs. Betts shook her head. "No, no, Lizzie," she said; "your father wouldn't like it. You must try to put up with Mrs. Spencer's temper; and be careful how you do your work, and then she will not be cross with you."
"You don't know her," snapped Lizzie; "nobody ever can please her. The girl next door told me as good as that the first day I went."
"Very well; if you knew your mistress was hard to please you should have been more careful not to offend her. Just think of it—you have had three places in less than twelve months! The first was dull, and your mistress too particular. You would go where there was children: before you had been a month in the nursery you could not bear the fretful baby—"
"Well, it was a cross little thing; you know that yourself, Mother," interrupted the girl.
"Well, perhaps it was cross; but then your mistress was very kind and considerate, and you might have put up with the baby's fretfulness for a little while longer. I tell you, Lizzie, that go wherever you may, there will be something to put up with. The world isn't a bed of roses for anybody, I can tell you; and if you don't have one thing to try you, it will be another."
"Yes, I daresay it will," said Lizzie, folding over the corner of the ironing-cloth; "but still I don't see why I should have to put up with strange people's tempers when I can help you at home."
"But I don't want you at home," remonstrated her mother. "The little bit of washing I have got I can manage by myself, and I cannot afford to keep a great girl like you."
"But you could get some more, I daresay," persisted Lizzie; "and then—"
But here the talk was interrupted by the entrance of her father, and she thought it would be best not to say any more about it at present.
"Where's Jack?" she asked, looking round for her brother, as her father set down his basket of tools which her brother usually carried.
Mrs. Betts looked up from her ironing, too, in a questioning manner. "There's nothing wrong, is there?" she said a little anxiously.
"No, no, Mother, there's nothing wrong but this: that we've only made about a couple of hours to-day between us, and Jack heard of a place that was vacant at the foundry, and so he's gone to see about it."
"But you couldn't do without Jack, Father, could you?" said Lizzie. "I thought you always wanted a boy for a soldering job, and you said the other day he was getting so handy you wouldn't know what to do without him."
"But I shall have to do without him if there's no work to be got," said her father with something like a growl, as he seated himself by the fire.
Mrs. Betts sighed and turned to her ironing again. "Don't you be late, Lizzie," she said; "and try all you can to please your mistress."
"Ah! Don't you be giving up this place just as things are at their worst at home," said her father by way of emphasis to his wife's remark.
Lizzie nodded her head but made no reply. She had begun to make a plan for her future, which her father's words did not in the least alter. She did not like service, she had made up her mind about that now, and she intended to get out of it as soon as she could, and do something that would afford her more liberty than she could have while out in a situation. She had not thought about living at home again until her mother mentioned the washing, but she caught at this as affording a chance for her return.
She bade her mother and father good-night, and went out, but she was in no hurry to go back to her mistress; and so, when she saw a friend at the corner of the street, she was quite eager to enter into conversation, and even to turn back and go with her on her errand.
"Why didn't you meet me on Sunday, as you promised, Emma?" she said in a reproachful tone.
"I couldn't get out. Three of the children were so poorly, and now the baby is quite ill," said the girl.
"And you stayed in for that?"
"Of course I did. How could I leave them?"
"Hadn't they got a mother?" demanded Lizzie.
"What makes you ask such a question as that? You know they have; and she's a kind considerate mistress, too," said Emma.
"Oh yes, very kind," said Lizzie with something like a sneer; "very kind she must be, to keep a poor girl in all day on Sunday—the only day she has a chance of getting out to see her friends."
"But she didn't keep me in," retorted Emma warmly. "She said I could go out as usual; but poor little Ethel cried so when she saw me with my bonnet on, that I said I would stay in. And I know mistress was glad enough about it; for she was able to go and lie down and get an hour's rest, while I kept the children quiet in the nursery."
"Well, Emma Russell, you are a muff! Anybody may know it's your first place!" exclaimed Lizzie scornfully. "To think of taking your things off after you had got ready to go out, and sitting down to mind a pack of cross children. Well, it's what I wouldn't do."
"Well, I would; and I'll do it again next Sunday if they don't get better."
"Oh! I daresay you'll do it every Sunday in future," said Lizzie with a short mocking laugh, "your mistress will take care of that, never fear. If you stop at home one Sunday, she'll think you can stay every Sunday."
"No, she won't," replied Emma. "And if she did, I'd rather put up with it than have the poor children crying for me as soon as my back was turned."
"Pack of rubbish! Let them cry, and let their mother quiet them," said Lizzie. "I tell you what it is, Emma,—it is girls like you who spoil places, and make mistresses expect so much of girls. I know—I've seen it."
Her companion laughed. "One would think you had been out at service ten years instead of ten months," she said.
"I've seen enough in ten months, though, to sicken me of service; and I don't mean to put up with it much longer."
"What are you going to do then, Lizzie?" asked her companion in some curiosity.
"Oh! I don't know yet; but I shan't stay in service much longer. Are you going back to your place now? Because we may as well walk together if you are, and I can tell you what I've been thinking of."
"Wait a minute until I go in and ask Mother if she's made my new aprons; for I want them to wear, and mistress said I might come and ask about them."
"You've never been buying more new aprons, Emma?" exclaimed her friend. "I'm sure you wanted a new hat more than aprons."
"I'm sure I didn't," contradicted Emma. "A new hat! And I only had that the beginning of the summer, and have just worn it on Sunday afternoons. I mean to make that last all the winter with a bit of new dark ribbon."
"Well I wouldn't spend the money in buying coarse aprons," retorted Lizzie. "Now make haste, and I'll wait for you," she said as they reached the door of Emma's house.
She would not go inside, for she did not like Mrs. Russell (she thought she was too strict with Emma); and so she paced up and down the street for the ten minutes Emma was chatting. She ought to have been back at her home—her mistress would be sure to scold her, for she was told that she could go out for an hour to see her mother, but not to stay longer, as she would be wanted. She remembered something of this just as Emma joined her, and she said:
"Come, make haste, I ought to be home by this time."
But she forgot her hurry when the broad lighted street was reached, where tempting displays of ribbon and lace were spread out in the shop windows.
"Do stop a minute and look at this hat, I'm going to ask Mother to make me one like it," said Lizzie catching her companion by the arm, and drawing her towards the brilliantly-lighted shop.
Emma paused a minute to look at the hat Lizzie was so anxious she should see, but she did not stay to admire it. "I want to get back," she said; "I am afraid the children will wake up while I am out."
"Oh! Bother the children; surely you can stay a minute. Just look at that lace, isn't it cheap? I mean to buy some out of my next money."
Emma paused again to look for a minute where she was directed. "I can't see the fun of looking at things we are never likely to want, and never shall be able to buy," she said.
"But I mean to buy them some day," said Lizzie. "I don't believe in dressing a dowdy fright, and spending all my money in coarse aprons."
"But you can't do without tidy holland aprons, and you can do without lace," laughed Emma.
"But I can't, and I won't; and that's another reason why I hate service. A servant mustn't dress nice, or wear anything like her mistress; and she must wear caps and white aprons that cost no end of money, just to please other people, and I won't do it."
"But what will you do?" asked Emma. "Girls don't go to service for the fun of the thing, of course. If Mother could keep me at home, she would be very glad to have me help her with the children; but she can't afford it, now there are so many of us."
"Well, my mother will have to afford it. There are only two of us besides Mother and Father; and now Mother's began to take in a bit of washing, I know she wants me at home to help her."
"Well, if she wants you at home, of course you ought to go," said Emma. And then she suddenly added, "I say, Lizzie, do you think she would take a bit more washing?"
"I'm sure she would if she could get it. That's just what we want. Why did you ask?"
"Because my mistress wants to find somebody that will do ours without tearing the clothes so much. Last week one of my collars and two of baby's pinafores were torn all to pieces."
"Oh! Do speak for Mother to have it, Emma," said her friend eagerly. "I know she would be very particular, and she can iron shirts beautifully."
"If she can iron shirts nicely, and don't tear the clothes, she will be sure to do very well for us," said Emma; "and I'll speak to mistress about it to-morrow."
"Oh! You are a dear. If you will do that, I shall be so glad," said Lizzie.
Emma was surprised to find her friend so eager about this.
They had paused at the top of the street where Lizzie lived to have the last bit of talk about the washing, and Emma turned away after saying "good-night," but the next instant Lizzie was beside her again.
"I shall come a little way down this road with you," she said.
"Won't you be late? I thought you wanted to get back," said her companion, walking sharper now to make up for the time she had wasted looking in at the shops.
"Oh! It don't matter," answered Lizzie lightly. "When do you think you will know about the washing?" she asked.
"Well, I'll speak about it to-morrow morning if I can, and tell you when I get out on Sunday what she says about it."
"Mind you do get out next Sunday. I walked up and down this road for an hour last Sunday afternoon waiting for you."
"Oh! I shall be able to come next Sunday I should think. For the children will be better I hope, and there will be nothing to hinder me," said Emma; and then she once more bade her friend "good-night," and turned homeward without any further delay.
Lizzie had been out nearly two hours instead of one, and her mistress had been put to some inconvenience, and was very cross when she got back.
"I told you I could only spare you for an hour, Elizabeth," she said as she opened the door to her young maid of all work. "You have been out nearly two hours. Where have you been all this time?"
"Home," answered Lizzie with a toss of her head.
"But surely your mother would not keep you so long? Did you tell her I could only spare you for an hour to-night?"
"No; I didn't think it mattered."
"Now, Elizabeth, if you stay here you must obey me," said the lady sharply; for her manner was so provoking she felt strongly inclined to give her notice to leave there and then.
It was just what Lizzie was wishing she would do; but Mrs. Spencer, out of compassion for her mother, resolved to try and bear with her a little longer, hoping the girl's own good sense would be sufficient to convince her of the folly of what she was doing.
"You ought to try and do as you are told, for your mother's sake if not for your own," went on the lady in a reasoning tone, while Lizzie stood stretching the elastic of her hat, looking as indifferent and defiant as she well could.
"There! You had better go to the kitchen and set the supper tray," she said at last, finding she could make no impression upon her; and Lizzie walked along the passage, swinging her hat as she went in a manner totally indifferent.
In reality, she was disappointed. She had made up her mind that her mistress would be so vexed because she was late that she would give her warning to leave as soon as she went home, and that this had not happened provoked her considerably. She threw her hat down in the corner of the kitchen, dashed the knives out of the tray on to the table with as much clatter as she could, snatched the plates from the rack and set them on the tray without wiping them, and smashed a tumbler lifting it from the shelf.
The breaking of the glass seemed to have a calming effect upon her temper, and she was moving about more quietly when her mistress came in to see what was broken.
"Another tumbler, Elizabeth?" she said, taking up one of the broken pieces.
"Another! I haven't broke one before," said the girl gruffly.
"Didn't you break one last week?" queried Mrs. Spencer. "And didn't I tell you then that you would have to pay for the next out of your own money?"
"But I didn't say I'd do it," answered Lizzie pertly.
"No! But I shall expect it done; and therefore I shall stop sixpence—the value of it—out of your next month's money."
"Then I won't stop here," said Lizzie, throwing down the salt spoon she had in her hand. "I'm not going to work hard for my money, and then buy your glasses with it, and—"
But her mistress turned round and walked out of the kitchen, leaving Lizzie to rave at the walls if she pleased; for she closed the door as she went out, so that no one should hear what the foolish girl said.
CHAPTER II.
AT THE FAIR.
MRS. SPENCER did not speak to Lizzie again that night; she thought it would be best to wait until the girl was in a better frame of mind.
So the next morning, when breakfast was over, and a suitable opportunity offered, she said, "Elizabeth, are you sorry for what took place last night?"
Instead of answering Lizzie picked up the corner of her apron, and began twisting it round her fingers.
"We must come to some understanding with each other, you know," went on the lady; "because I cannot keep you if you are determined to go on as you have been doing this last month. The first month you were with me you did very well indeed, and beyond showing you how I liked things done, you gave me no trouble; but since then, scarcely a day has passed but I have had to find fault with you."
"If I don't suit, I'd better go," said Lizzie sullenly.
"But do you know what that will mean for you, my girl?" asked the lady. "You have made a bad beginning of life as it is, and if you leave me, it will make things worse. You have already had three situations within twelve months, and for a girl to be constantly changing her places like that, proves that there must be something amiss with her."
"No! It ain't me; it's the places," said Lizzie.
"Well now, tell me frankly why you left your first place," said Mrs. Spencer. "I don't like to see a girl act so foolishly as you are doing. It will end in trouble for you by and by, I feel sure."
"I must take my chance of that, I suppose," said the obstinate girl still twisting at her apron.
"But you have not answered my question, and I should like to know why you left your first place," reiterated the lady. "You left your last on account of the children, but I have heard that there were no children where you lived first."
"No; but the place was hard, and I thought I'd like to go where there were children. I want an easy place where—where—"
"Where the work is put out, I suppose," said the lady with a smile. "Well, I can assure you, there are no such places as that to be got, Elizabeth; and so you had better make up your mind to settle down here until you have earned a character, and are able to take a better situation."
"There's nothing amiss with my character," said Lizzie in an indignant tone.
"Cannot you see that you are making your character anything but what it should be by so frequently changing? People will say you are so discontented, it is useless to take you into their homes; and the better the place may be, the less likely they are to give you a trial. Now, make up your mind to turn over a new leaf, and stay where you are for a year. If you will promise to do this, I will look over the past, and give you another trial; for I am thinking of the sort of character I should have to give you, if you left me now."
"Oh! You needn't trouble about that," said the girl pertly, "I shan't want you to give me a character. I'm not going to service again."
"Not—going—to—service—again!" repeated Mrs. Spencer in great astonishment. "Why, your Sunday-school teacher told me that your mother was so thankful you were out, for your father's work had been so very slack lately."
Lizzie hung her head, and looked rather foolish.
"What do you think of doing, if you are not going to service again?" asked the lady.
The question had to be repeated more than once before Lizzie would answer, but at length she muttered, "I'm going home to help Mother with the washing—she takes in washing now."
The lady looked puzzled; but still this did not seem such an unreasonable thing, only she thought it was rather a short-sighted business to take the girl away and put her to the wash-tub when she could do so much better for herself in service.
This she thought was a question for her mother to consider, however; and so she said no more to Lizzie upon the subject, but resolved to call and see her mother about it.
So an hour or two afterwards, just as Mrs. Betts was busy ironing, she was surprised by a visit from Mrs. Spencer, and greatly astonished when she heard the errand upon which she had come.
"I told her distinctly last night that I could not have her at home, and her father said the same thing," said the poor woman looking greatly troubled over the account the lady gave of Lizzie's behaviour. "I'm very much obliged to you, ma'am, for the trouble you have taken with her; and if you could persuade her to stop with you I should feel very grateful. Tell her, ma'am, she can't come home—we can't afford to keep her; and as to taking in washing and having her home to do it, why, I might as well be without it."
"I think you are wise in trying to induce her to stay in service," said the lady; and she went back to see what she could do with the foolish girl, who seemed bent upon running into trouble, and causing distress and anxiety to her friends.
She did not know what to say when she heard that her mistress had been to see her mother.
"What did you want to go for?" she said sullenly. "I know Mother will want me at home, for she is going to have some more washing, and so I should like you to suit yourself by this day month," added Lizzie.
"No, Elizabeth; I shall not take your warning," said her mistress firmly. "You must try and do better in future, and for your mother's sake put up with what you do not like."
"I hate service, and I never shall like it," said Lizzie, now beginning to cry; but she did not say any more about leaving, and her mistress hoped things would smooth down, and she would grow reconciled when she found it was impossible for her to go home to live.
On Sunday, Mrs. Betts told her again she must not think of giving up her situation. She had heard from Emma Russell about the new washing, and had seen her mistress, and she had told her that Emma was so kind to the children, so considerate and obliging, that she intended to buy her a new dress as soon as the children get better.
"She came soon after your mistress was here; and I could not help comparing the two accounts I had heard, and wishing it was my girl that was being praised," added poor Mrs. Betts.
"I don't," said Lizzie doggedly. "I might be quite as good as Emma, but nobody would ever think any more of me for it; and so I mean to take things easy. It's Emma's luck to be thought so much of," she concluded.
"Luck has nothing to do with it," said Mrs. Betts. "She has earned a character for being good-natured and obliging, while you have got one for discontent. I tell you, though, that you must be contented where you are, for I cannot and will not have you at home, though this fresh washing has come in," concluded her mother.
So Lizzie went back feeling greatly disappointed and very unhappy; for she had made up her mind that when her mother got this washing, she would certainly be compelled to have her home in spite of what she had told her mistress. In fact, the foolish girl began to think it was entirely owing to her, that her own plans had failed. If she had not gone to her mother as she did, Lizzie felt sure that, having secured the washing for her, she could easily have persuaded her that it was best to give up her place and come home to help with it; but the premature disclosure of these plans had spoiled them altogether.
So it was in no pleasant mood that she went back on Sunday evening. And far from resolving to try and do better in future, she made up her mind to do all she could to vex and annoy her mistress. By this means, too, she might be able to compel her mother to let her go home, and once at home, she would turn over a new leaf, and be so steady and industrious, that her mother would not want to part with her again.
Just as she was about to turn into the street where she lived, her attention was attracted by half-a-dozen caravans that slowly rolled along the road, a group of men and women talking loudly in dispute beside them.
Lizzie paused a minute to look at the gaudily-painted picture on the outside of one, when an elderly red-faced woman stepped up to her.
"My dear, can you tell me the way to Snowfields?" she said.
Lizzie's head was full of the pictures painted on the caravan, and she wondered whether she could go and see the wax-work figures they represented.
"Are these shows going to Snowfields?" she said, after she had taken some pains to point out the way to the woman.
"Yes, my dear, we shall be there for a week; and if you like to come round some evening and ask for Mrs. Stanley, why, you shall see the wax-works, and maybe have your fortune told if you can bring a bit of silver with you, just to cross your hand with," said the woman.
Lizzie looked doubtful. "I haven't got much money," she said in a faltering tone.
"Oh! A little bit will do, my dear; or an old silver spoon that your mother has thrown away."
The silly girl felt flattered that the woman should think her mother was rich enough to throw away old silver spoons, and went on holding her head a trifle higher, while the woman hurried to overtake her friends, smiling as she thought how easy the girl could be taken in.
Lizzie reached home in a rather better mood than when she set out on her walk, and was altogether more pleasant and obliging during the next day; so that her mistress thought the advice she had doubtless received at home had made some impression upon her, and that she had resolved to do better in future.
So when on Wednesday morning she asked if she might go out for an hour in the evening, Mrs. Spencer thought it would encourage her to persevere if she let her have some relaxation, and so gave her permission, but told her not to stay out so late as she had done the previous week.
As soon as the tea-things were cleared away, Lizzie went upstairs to dress herself; for she had made up her mind to go as smart as she could to see Mrs. Stanley. She had trimmed the sleeves of her dress with white lace, and tacked a broad piece round the neck, and put on her best hat and gloves, thinking to impose still further on the woman's notion that she was a lady.
She was careful to button her black cloth jacket close when she went out, so that her mistress did not notice how smart she had made her frock look; but before she got to Snowfields, she took it off and carried it across her arm.
There was little fear that she would meet Emma Russell or any of her friends on the road to Snowfields; for this was a piece of waste ground lying at the back of the town, and altogether out of the way of the general traffic, although there seemed a good many people on their Way thither this evening.
Fortunately, or rather unfortunately, there was no one walking along the road who recognized Lizzie, and she reached the ground feeling quite elated over her success so far. She had brought sixpence—all the money she possessed, and she carefully pulled out her lace ruffles, drew up her gloves, and put on an air that she thought must convince everybody of her right to be considered a lady.
The business of the evening was just beginning when she reached the ground. There was a steam roundabout, a stall for shooting at a target, besides the wax-work show, in front of which a girl about her own age, dressed in red velveteen and spangles, walked up and down a narrow platform in front of the picture that had caught her attention on Sunday night, and expatiated on the wonders to be seen inside.
Lizzie stood still to have another look at the picture; for it was nearly dark on Sunday, and only a few of the most glaring points could be seen. And as she looked, she noticed that the name of "Stanley" appeared on the show, and over the roundabout—in fact, the whole fair seemed to belong to the Stanleys, so that Lizzie felt doubly glad she had put on her best frock to visit a lady of such wealth and importance.
After looking about her for some minutes, hoping to see Mrs. Stanley appear from behind some of the caravans, Lizzie stepped up to the edge of the platform, and tried to make the girl understand that she wanted to speak to her, but the din of the steam roundabout, the crack, crack, bang, bang, of the rifles, and the grinding of an Italian organ just inside the wax-work exhibition itself, made this perfectly impossible, and all the notice the girl vouchsafed to her, was to call in a louder tone:
"Walk up, ladies, walk up, the performance is just about to begin. Only one penny to see all the wonders of this marvellous exhibition." And as she repeated these words, the girl moved the gilded stick she carried in front of the gaudily-painted picture, and walked on in lofty disregard of Lizzie's beseeching looks.
At last, as there seemed no other way open to make her arrival known to the lady she was in search of, Lizzie went up the few steps, and presented herself to the man who was taking money in front of the curtain that hung over the entrance to the show.
"I want to see Mrs. Stanley, if you please," she said, putting on her most ladylike air.
The man looked at her with a puzzled expression, and just at that moment the curtain was pushed aside, and two or three boys and girls came out of the exhibition, looking very hot, and bringing an overpowering smell of sawdust and paraffin with them.
"You want to see Mrs. Stanley," said the man slowly, looking the girl all over, and noting every point about her dress and appearance. "And what may you want her for?" he said, resting his elbows on the little green baize-covered table the more easily to look at the girl more closely.
She drew herself up and looked indignant. "I have come to see her," she said; "she told me to come on Sunday evening."
"Oh! She did, did she? Well, then, it's all right, I s'pose. Only she ain't got time to see many visitors, I can tell you, young lady;" and then the man poked his head inside the curtain and called, "Tottie, Tottie, come here."
A pale cross-looking girl, dressed in bright pink tarlatan, came presently to the front.
"What do you want now?" she demanded.
"Open t'other door and call your mother; here's a lady come to see her," and Lizzie thought she saw the man wink as he spoke.
Certainly the girl stared at her before she dropped the curtain and went to open the door.
This show did not seem to be largely patronized, in spite of the pictures and the shrill invitations to "walk up, walk up" constantly uttered by the girl outside. People seemed to prefer riding on the wooden homes and swans of the roundabout or shooting for nuts.
In a few minutes the girl in pink came back, and said shortly, "She's to go round."
"Rosina, Rosina," called the man, still sitting with his elbows on the table.
But if Rosina heard, she did not choose to answer the call, until in her regular walk up the little platform she came near the entrance, and then putting her head round she said sharply, "What now?"
"Just show this lady the way round to the general's quarters," he said in a lofty tone, and he motioned Lizzie to go down the steps again.
And the girl with the wand in an equally dignified manner pointed to a little opening between the caravans, which gave access to the space at the back, where horses were tethered, ugly lurcher dogs sprawled about, and the kitchen arrangements for the whole fair seemed to be carried on. But a neatly painted caravan, with pretty lace curtains at the little windows, stood in the midst of the nondescript litter, and at the door stood the woman she had seen on Sunday night.
Lizzie gave another pull at her lace and gloves, and Mrs. Stanley, who noticed it, said in a less boisterous tone than she usually adopted, "So you've kept your promise, miss, and come to see the show people."
"Yes," said Lizzie, in the most languid tone she could assume. "I've come, but I shan't be able to stop long."
"Oh! That's a pity now; for I might ha' showed yer all the sights o' the fair, besides telling your fortune. You've brought the bit of silver I spoke about, ain't yer?"
"Yes, I've brought sixpence," said Lizzie.
"Well, come up here now, and we'll shut the door and have a quiet chat to ourselves," said the woman; and Lizzie, feeling very much gratified at this distinction, went up the little flight of steps.
She was amazed when she stepped inside to find herself in a cosy little room, with a bright carpet on the floor, a chintz-covered sofa at the opposite end, and chairs ranged along the sides, and a mahogany table in the centre.
"You see, I've got a tidy room to ask a lady into," said the woman, placing a chair for her guest and one for herself near the table.
"Ye-es, I did not think these places were so comfortable," said Lizzie, lost in amazement at her surroundings.
"Well, miss, I wouldn't tell everybody, but I must confess the show business isn't bad for making money. This is very well when we're on the road, but you should see our winter quarters. Oh! We're in clover in the wintertime. Like the bees, we make our honey or money in the summer, and spend it in the winter. And now for the bit of silver to cross the palm with. Take off your gloves, my dear, and hold your hand up to the light so that I can see the lines, and then we'll have a look at the cards and see what they say," and Mrs. Stanley produced a dirty pack of cards from her capacious pocket, and proceeded to shuffle them.
CHAPTER III.
THE FORTUNE-TELLER.
"WELL, to be sure!" And in well-feigned astonishment, Mrs. Stanley threw down the cards and looked at Lizzie, who sat close by, watching the performance with great interest.
"What is it—what is the matter?" she asked.
"What is the matter?" repeated the woman. "Why, you've got such a lucky hand, that I ought to have half-a-crown for telling it; and if you can't give it me now, you must remember me when you're a rich lady riding in your carriage in silks and satins."
"Oh! Yes, I will," said Lizzie with a smile of supreme satisfaction, taking up her gloves and preparing to put them on again.
"Wait a minute, my dear. I'll go through the cards once more, just to be certain there's no mistake about it, and maybe I shall be able to tell which way the riches are coming—whether from mother and father, uncle or aunt."
But Lizzie shook her head at this suggestion.
And the woman, watching her, presently said, "No, it ain't through either of these ways it'll come; and it won't be just yet either, for I can see you'll travel a bit and see the world—a good deal more of it than this little town can teach you."
While she was saying this the woman was moving the cards about, and pretending to read her predictions from those she turned up; but she kept her eyes on Lizzie, watching her face more than the cards. After this mummery had been gone through for several minutes, she suddenly threw down the cards with an angry expletive.
"If I wasn't afraid it 'ud turn out like that," she exclaimed, thumping the table with her clenched fist.
"Why, what is it?" said Lizzie with whitening lips, "Am I to be a servant after all?"
"Well, it won't last long. I see by the cards you are in service now, though nobody would think it to look at you. People say fortunetellers are deceivers, and they may be sometimes; but it's the stars are at fault. And I'll tell you how, my dear. A wise woman looks at a hand, and she sees fortune writ there plain as the nose on your face, then she turns up the cards and sees fortune there again, and of course she thinks it safe enough, and she tells the party, for it's taken her some time to find out this much, and she don't stop to look no further, 'cos there's no time to spare to learn any more, and so the thing that ought to be done ain't known nothing about—ain't made itself seen, 'cos it wants looking for, and so a fortune's lost. Ah! Many a fortune's lost that way, my dear."
"But have you found out all about it for me?" asked Lizzie quickly; for it was getting dark now, and she had a long way to go home.
"Yes, my dear. I've got to the bottom of the matter at last, though it seemed as though the stars didn't want to disclose all their secrets about you;" and she went on talking about the "stars" as though they were intimate friends of hers, who could not resist her blandishments when she was determined to wring their secrets from them.
"But you have not told me what I am to do," said Lizzie, rising from her seat at last, and drawing her gloves over her fortunate hands.
"No, my dear. Because it's rather a disappointing thing I've got to tell you; and I'm soft-hearted enough to feel sorry when I see a girl disappointed, and maybe lose the fortune that's waiting for her, because she can't make up her mind to stretch out her hand and lay hold of it."
"Oh! I'm not like that," said Lizzie. "I'd get it, I know, if I had the chance!"
"Well, my dear, you certainly have got the chance. The fortune's there sure enough, but I can see it'll never drop into your lap. It wants seeking. You must go and meet it, for it will never come to you in this miserable town, nor while you are in service; I can see that plain enough."
"But what am I to do?" said Lizzie in a tone of perplexity.
"Well, I ain't quite clear about that yet," said the woman. "I must study the cards and the stars a bit deeper; such things as that ain't found out in a hurry."
"Oh! But I can't stop any longer," said Lizzie in a tone of alarm; for as she spoke a church clock struck nine, and she ought to have been home by this time.
"No, no, you can't stay to-night, I know that, my dear; but still I should be sorry for you to lose this fortune when you are willing to get it."
While she was speaking the woman took down her bonnet and shawl from the peg and put them on. "I'll walk back with you," she said; "for it's hardly safe for a pretty girl like you to be so late. And as we go along, we'll think of a plan to meet again; for I take a great interest in young people, 'specially them as are the favourites of the stars, as you are."
"I expect I shall catch it when I get home," said Lizzie, looking round the lighted fair as they stepped out beside the wax-work show.
"Never mind, my dear, it won't be for long," said Mrs. Stanley; "the stars speak plain enough on that. You've but a short time to be in service, that's plainly writ—over six months I should say, but under a year."
"Then it won't be long," said Lizzie in a relieved tone; "for I've been out ten months."
"Ah! I thought it was about that time Jupiter indicated, and I should say it'll end in a few days now."
"The sooner the better," said the girl; "for I hate service."
"Of course you do, my dear; the fortune that hangs over you won't let you settle to it as other girls can. And now let us see about our meeting again. I suppose you won't be able to get out any more this week?"
"Not till Sunday," replied Lizzie with a sigh.
The woman reiterated it. "That's awkward," she said; "for I shall be miles away from here by that time."
"But—but you won't go away till you've told me what I've to do to get this fortune?' she said.
"Well, my dear, I'll help you to get it, if I can," said the woman in a tone of benevolent pity; "but, you see, I'm only the servant of the stars like the rest of mankind, and I must move on at their bidding, and I know I've got to go the last thing on Saturday night, or first thing on Sunday morning. I tell you what, though," she said, as though she had just thought of something, "I might come and see you one night about dusk. Is there a side gate at your house?"
"Yes," said Lizzie eagerly; "and my mistress will be out to-morrow night, and I shall be alone. So if you come about eight o'clock, you might tell me what I ought to do, and I'll pay you well for your trouble when I get my fortune."
"Of course you will, my dear. You'll be worth your weight in gold by and by, and able to help old Mother Stanley and a good many people besides."
And she talked of the splendid silk dresses she would wear, and the number of servants and carriages she would keep, and the grand things she would do for all her friends by and by, until the silly girl's head was completely turned; which was exactly what the artful woman designed, for this would enable her to carry out the plan she had formed when she first saw Lizzie, and the discontent on her face told her she was dissatisfied with her lot in life, and ready to incur any risks to change it.
Mrs. Stanley went to within a few yards of the house where Lizzie lived, carefully noted its appearance, and then turned back, laughing to herself over the girl's folly, and how easily she had been taken in.
She was careful to be near the house about eight o'clock the next night, and, as she expected, she soon saw Lizzie peeping out of the side gate looking for her. She held up her finger warningly as she drew near, and looked up and down the street to make sure no one was watching her, and that no policeman was in sight, and having satisfied herself that nobody was about, she darted inside the gate and carefully bolted it after her, and then followed Lizzie to the comfortable little kitchen at the side.
"Well, my dear, I've had a deal of trouble to find out all you wanted to know," she said, seating herself in the chair Lizzie had placed ready for her. "Are we all alone—is that woman who calls herself your mistress safe out of the way?"
"Yes, she's gone out to supper," said Lizzie, "and will not be home till ten o'clock, and master has gone with her."
"Master?" repeated the woman in a scornful tone. "Didn't I tell you, you'd soon be worth your weight in gold, and able to buy these half-and-half people up over and over again. Take that horrid cap off, my dear. I do hate to see a lady who is on the edge of coming into a fortune in a thing like that," and Mrs. Stanley loosened her own bonnet-strings and unpinned her shawl by way of making herself comfortable, while Lizzie took off the obnoxious cap and put it out of sight.
"My dear, you've got lovely hair. You'll set off the jewels and satins you'll wear by and by," said the woman, apparently lost in admiration of the girl as she seated herself at the other side of the table, and prepared to listen to the further unfoldment of her "fortune."
"Now you want to know what secrets the stars have disclosed since I saw you last," went on Mrs. Stanley. "Well, my dear, it's all summed up in one word—travel. You've got to travel—to go right away from this dull out of the way misfortuned place; for I can see plain enough that the malefic stars rule over this town, and the sooner you're out of it the better."
"But how am I to go?" asked Lizzie in some anxiety. "My mother and father and all my friends live here, and I don't know where else to go."
The woman crossed her arms and looked at Lizzie. "Ain't there nobody as knows you anywhere—not in London or some other big city?" she said.
The girl shook her head dolefully. "I haven't got a friend in the world outside of this town," she said.
"Well, now, that is unfortunate. And worth your weight in gold you'll be by and by," said her visitor, as if in great perplexity.
"Could—could you help me to get away, do you think?" asked the girl with some hesitation in her tone.
It was just what the woman had been waiting for, but she would not appear eager about it. "Well, suppose we talk it over a bit," she said in apparent reluctance. "Are you quite sure you ain't got no friends outside this town?"
"Yes, quite sure; and I haven't a penny in the world unless my mistress pays me my month's wages to-morrow," said Lizzie with tears in her eyes.
"Well, perhaps she'll pay you; and then you can go by yourself and seek your fortune," said Mrs. Stanley.
But the girl shook her head. "I shouldn't know where to look," she said. "I don't know anything about the stars; but if I could come with you, I should be sure not to miss it."
"That's true enough," said the woman meditatively; "but do you think your friends would agree to the plan?"
"I shouldn't ask them," said Lizzie, smiling at the absurdity of such a suggestion. "My mother thinks there is nothing better than service for a girl like me, and so I'm sure she wouldn't let me look for anything else, if she could help it. No! If I am to come with you, I should take care not to let anybody else know about it, or hear where I am until I get my fortune. Then, of course, I shall want to come back and help them all. I shall set my father up in a good business, and let my brother Jack learn to be an engineer."
"Of course you will help your friends, my dear, when you get your fortune; and it will be a pity to lose it for the want of going to seek it."
"I won't lose it," said Lizzie confidently, "if you will only let me come with you."
"Very well; as it seems the only way we can do it, perhaps you'd better. You know what sort of a place you'll have to travel in. But I shall have to coax my husband over to let you join us."
"Do you think he will object?" asked Lizzie anxiously.
"Well, if you get your wages to-morrow it can be managed easily enough I think; for you can pay that to him for your travelling expenses. How much did you say you would have?"
"Twelve shillings," answered Lizzie.
"Only twelve shillings! It ain't much, my dear to pay us for the risk and trouble, and—"
"Oh! But I will pay you for that by and by, Mrs. Stanley," interrupted Lizzie. "I will give you the twelve shillings as a little present."
The woman smiled to think how completely she had duped the silly girl, and how bitterly she would repent her folly by and by. But she took care not to betray any of these thoughts now. She only said, "Ah! When you are worth your weight in gold, my dear, you will be a generous friend, I know."
"Yes, that I will," said Lizzie, feeling sure that it would be easy to do this when she had plenty of money to do as she liked with.
"Now, then, we must talk about how you are to get away," said practical Mrs. Stanley, who was beginning to grow tired of the comedy. "How many clothes have you got?"
"Shall I have to bring my clothes with me?" said the girl, a little disappointed at this prospect.
"Yes, you must bring your clothes to wear until you can get better."
"I thought I should so soon get the silk dresses you spoke about, I need not trouble myself with these common things," and Lizzie looked down disdainfully at the neat print dress she wore.
Mrs. Stanley, however, regarded the dress with different feelings. "Those clothes are too good to leave behind," she said. "You might give them to me, and it would help make up for the cost of your journey."
"Very well, you shall have them then. But how am I to carry my box if nobody is to know I am going away?" she suddenly asked. "Am I to go with you to-night?"
"No, no, that'll never do. You must meet me about a mile out of the town by six o'clock on Sunday morning," said Mrs. Stanley quickly.
"But how am I to carry the box?"
"You must leave the box behind. Only bring all your clothes except your caps, you won't want them any more," said the woman.
"It'll be a big bundle to carry," said Lizzie, mentally passing in review the new underlines and cotton frocks, to say nothing of the hats and jackets that were included in that one word "clothes."
"I might take some of them with me to-night, if you like," said Mrs. Stanley in an indifferent tone.
"Oh! If you would not mind doing that, I could get away easier on Sunday morning," said Lizzie. "I will go up and pack up my clean clothes, and I can put on my best frock to come in."
"No, no, that won't do," said the woman; who thought that a girl like Lizzie, dressed in her best frock so early in the morning, would be sure to attract attention. Besides, the best frock and hat might possibly be recognized by someone she might meet, and so, to make sure that this risk was not incurred, she suggested that the best frock and hat, and as many underclothes as she could put up, should be taken away that night.
"I'll bring you a bonnet and shawl to wear on Sunday morning. One that will screen your face so that nobody shall see who you are, as they might do if you wore one of your own hats," said Mrs. Stanley.
"I wish I could go with you to carry the bundle," said Lizzie, as she lighted the candle to go to her bed-room, which was at the top of the house. "I won't be long," she said as she left the kitchen.
"Don't hurry, my dear; mind you bring all the things," said her visitor.
And while she was speaking, she untied her shoes, and before Lizzie was up the first flight of stairs she had taken a long wax taper from her pocket, lighted it at the kitchen gas, slipped off her shoes, and then crept into the dining and drawing rooms. She looked all round these to see if there was anything worth stealing among the ornaments, but only found a small silver fruit knife, which she instantly transferred to her pocket.
But she examined the window shutters at the back, and the fastenings of the street door, with a good deal of care, and then went back to the kitchen, put on her shoes again, and looked over the locks and bolts of the back door.
She was seated in the chair just where she had been left when Lizzie came down again with the bundle in her hand.
"I must be going now," she said rising from her seat. "I will bring the bonnet and shawl to-morrow night about nine o'clock, and throw it over the gate; and you must get away from here soon after five on Sunday morning, and walk to the first milestone on the London road. We shall be along there about six, and then we can hide you out of sight. But mind, if a policeman should be near you, just walk on, and don't even look at me or the caravans till I speak first."
Lizzie gave the required promise, and so they parted.
CHAPTER IV.
ONE SUMMER SUNDAY MORNING.
LIZZIE fastened the back gate securely after her visitor had departed, and returned to her little kitchen well pleased with her evening's work. She put on her cap, thinking that a day or two more only would she have to wear the odious thing, and then she fell to contemplating the grandeur that awaited her. She forgot her supper, forgot the ordinary duties of turning down the beds and making things tidy for the night—forgot everything but the visions conjured up by Mrs. Stanley's ready tongue.
Mrs. Spencer returned earlier than she was expected, and that brought Lizzie back to her present surroundings. For when the lady went upstairs, and saw the bed-room was just as she had left it, she made up her mind that the girl was incorrigible, and would have to be discharged.
"What have you been doing all the evening?" she exclaimed, when Lizzie went up in answer to her call. "I shall have to send you home, I am afraid, unless you behave very differently. Now, understand this, Elizabeth, I give you notice to-night to leave this day month; but if you choose to turn over a new leaf, and do your work in a proper manner, I shall not wish to part with you."
Lizzie tossed her head in an indifferent manner, but made no reply.
Her mistress paid her month's wages the next morning, but deducted sixpence for the broken tumbler as she had threatened, which greatly offended the girl, for she had made up her mind to take the whole twelve shillings to Mrs. Stanley.
On Saturday night, she went to bed as early as she could, for she was afraid of oversleeping herself the next morning. Five o'clock was an early hour to be astir; but she must contrive to dress and be out soon afterwards, for she was to join the Stanleys a mile beyond the town by six. The bonnet and shawl that she was to wear had been thrown over the gate on Friday night, and she had that safely tucked away in her almost empty box. The few remaining articles of her wardrobe she made into a bundle before she went to bed, and then lay down and tried to go to sleep.
But for once sleep refused to come to her eyes. She lay tossing on her pillow, her mind full of doubt now as to whether she had done a wise thing in deciding to run away with this woman. Conscience spoke, and told her it was a wrong and foolish thing to do; but she assured herself she must go on now in the path she had chosen, for she had no clothes to wear, and, therefore, she could not turn back.
A more uncomfortable night Lizzie never spent. She turned from side to side, but sleep she could not; and at last, when she heard the church clock strike two, she decided that she must not go to sleep now, for fear she should not wake up in the morning until it was too late to join her new adviser.
If the silly girl had only known it—could only have peeped a little way into the future, she would have seen that this would have been a merciful interposition of Providence; but she took care not to close her eyes again. She sat up in bed, and then got a light and a book to read. But the book did not interest her, and so she dressed herself in the clean clothes she had put ready. She made this occupy as much time as possible, and brushed and combed her hair for nearly an hour before plaiting it up again. In this way, the time went until daylight came, and then she heard several church clocks strike five, which was the signal for her to go down-stairs.
She put on her bonnet and shawl, but carried her boots in her hand, as well as the bundle, and she did not venture to put on her boots until she was safe outside the back door. There was only the bolt of the garden gate to draw then, and she would be free—free, and on her way to meet the splendid fortune that awaited her!
Once outside and in the street, Lizzie walked on with less fear, though her own echoing footsteps this still Sunday morning almost frightened her. There was not a creature to be seen, not even a milkman had made his appearance yet, and Lizzie had walked some distance before the slow heavy tread of a policeman was heard on the echoing pathway.
Of course he took no notice of the girl, and could not see her face under the close-fitting black silk bonnet, that had evidently been made for some very old lady.
So she sped on, and just as the first strokes of six were sounding through the quiet morning air, Lizzie caught sight of the line of caravans slowly lumbering down a side road from the other end of the town.
She waited for them to come up, and in a few minutes Mrs. Stanley joined her. The woman looked carefully up and down both roads, but finding there was nobody but their own party in sight, she stopped the horse of the smartest-looking caravan, and told the girl to jump in as quickly as she could.
She soon clambered up the steps into the little parlour where she had had her fortune told, and the key was turned upon her, and the horse jogged on again.
For some time Lizzie sat listening to the shaking furniture, and trying to still the throbbing of her head, which now began to ache violently. At last she lay down on the couch hoping to be able to sleep, but the shaking and bumping of the clumsy vehicle effectually prevented that.
At last, about ten o'clock, the whole cavalcade came to a standstill, after a few more bumps and shakes that threatened to overturn them every time, and then, looking out of the little window, Lizzie could see they were at the side of a large common, and preparations were being made for breakfast.
It did not disturb her at first that no one came to unfasten the door. She expected Mrs. Stanley would bring her breakfast as soon as it was ready. Of course they would not expect her to share in the rough-and-ready meal they would provide for themselves. Mrs. Stanley knew what was in store for her—the fortune that awaited her, and would contrive to get the meal as nicely served in consideration of her coming glory.
So Lizzie flattered herself, while she kept down the pangs of hunger which began to make themselves felt in spite of her headache. But an hour passed, and from the glimpse Lizzie could get from the window it seemed as though the meal was over, for boys and girls were lying about on the common, or helping to fetch water for the horses.
At last she concluded they must have forgotten her, and she began rattling the door to try and get out or attract attention. They must hear her, she felt sure, for women's voices sounded quite close; but it was some time before the door was opened.
Then Mrs. Stanley thrust in her head exclaiming, "Now then, what is it?"
Lizzie was annoyed. This was not the sort of greeting she expected to receive. "I should like some breakfast," she said, in a tone intended to be haughty and indignant.
"I daresay you would," said Mrs. Stanley with a short laugh, and then she shut and locked the door again, and left her prisoner to her meditations.
Lizzie waited and waited, but no breakfast came, and at last she lay down on the little sofa and cried herself to sleep.
Repentance had commenced. She had begun to forget her greatness and grandeur under the pangs of hunger and neglect, such as she had thought would never fall to her share again, and there was no room in her small mind for any other feeling than self-pity before she went to sleep. She had not wholly given up faith in the fortune-teller yet. To give up such high hopes all at once would be impossible. But she was angry with Mrs. Stanley, and thought she ought to treat one whom she knew was a favourite of the stars with more consideration.
Not one thought of the poor mother, who, even now, was almost wild with grief and dismay at her sudden disappearance, ever crossed Lizzie's mind yet.
She slept for two or three hours, and was rudely awakened by being rolled off the couch on to the floor. She screamed out loudly, thinking something dreadful had happened. But if her screams were heard, no notice was taken of them; and at length Lizzie regained sufficient consciousness of the past, aided by her present surroundings, to understand that they were on the road again. But looking up, the girl saw that there was a change in the aspect of the place. The windows were only half the size they were before she went to sleep; for now only a few inches at the top admitted daylight, and most of the place was in semi-darkness.
She crept across the jolting van, aided by the rattling furniture, until she reached the door, which she tried to open, but found it was still locked as before.
She began to doubt the kind intentions of her supposed friend now, and burst into tears, still rattling the handle of the door to attract the attention of her jailers.
It was some time, however, before anyone came near her. They were journeying at a good pace, faster than they had come along in the morning; and the thought suddenly came to Lizzie that perhaps some one was in pursuit of her, and they were trying to get out of the way.
Miserable as she was, this thought made her drop the handle of the door, for she did not want to be captured and taken home just as the promised fortune was within her grasp. No, no; anything but that. She would bear this hunger that was gnawing her with what patience she could muster, for fear her rattling the door-handle should attract the attention of anyone passing by.
They were passing through a town, she fancied now, by the sounds that met her ears every now and then, for she could see nothing but the sky from the narrow slits of window left unshuttered. She was left to the miserable company of her own thoughts for an hour or two longer, then the whole cavalcade came to a standstill again, and presently the door was opened.
"I suppose you want your dinner now, don't you?" said Mrs. Stanley as she came in. She carried a couple of thick slices of bread and dripping in her not over-clean hands, which she laid upon the table.
The girl put out her hand to take it; for it was nearly twenty-four hours since she had tasted food, and she was ravenously hungry.
But the woman put her hand upon it before she could do this. "Don't be in a hurry," she said with a grim smile; "we'll settle up first. Give me that twelve shillings your mistress gave you."
Lizzie put her hand into her pocket and took out her purse, not daring to disobey, for the woman's looks almost frightened her.
She turned the silver out into her hand and counted it. "There ain't twelve shillings here," she said throwing the purse on the table. "Come, hand out the other sixpence!"
"I haven't got it," said Lizzie, beginning to cry again.
"What have you done with it, then? Don't tell me no lies, or my Tom shall give you a taste of the horsewhip."
Faint from hunger, and broken-spirited already at her forlorn condition, Lizzie could only sob out her story of the broken tumbler. The woman pretended not to believe such a tale, and made it the excuse for insisting that Lizzie should strip herself that she might search her clothes. To protest was useless; the girl was soon made to do as she was told. And when her nice neat garments, that her mother had taken such pains to make for her, lay in a heap near the door, the woman suddenly opened it and kicked them out, then took a bundle from under her arm which Lizzie had not noticed before, and threw them at her feet.
"You can put them on when you're tired of being without," she said with a short laugh.
Lizzie kicked the clothes from her indignantly. She would not even unroll the bundle to see what it contained, but cowered down upon the couch, feeling herself insulted and outraged, and for the first time suspecting the good intentions of the woman in whose power she had placed herself. She would go away from them, if she was to be treated like this, she thought—she so soon to be a lady to have her clothes taken away from her. She forgot the food on the table in her anguish over this indignity, and sat huddled together crying for nearly an hour before she even looked at the garments that had been provided for her.
She was shivering with cold by that time, and looked eagerly round for the old woollen shawl she had worn in the morning. But it was nowhere to be seen now. Mrs. Stanley had taken that away with her. A little longer she sat crying and bemoaning her sad fate, then she stooped and unrolled the bundle of clothes.
The sight of the coarse, ragged, ill-washed garments brought on a fresh storm of sobs and tears, and Lizzie turned from them in disgust, sobbing out:
"Oh, mother, mother! I wish I was with you now."
But it was herself she pitied—no thought for the pain and anguish she was causing that dear mother came to Lizzie yet.
Cold at length compelled her to put on these evil-smelling garments, and when she was dressed, she ate the bread and dripping and turned to the door again. It opened at her touch now, and Mrs. Stanley, who seemed to be busy at needlework, although it was Sunday evening, was sitting on the steps.
"Eh? You're dressed at last, then," she said. "Your tea is nearly cold, I reckon. Here, Mollie," she called, "bring that mug of tea for the lady," and then Mrs. Stanley broke into a mocking laugh as she surveyed the "lady" in her ragged garments standing at the door of the caravan.
Lizzie retreated inside as the girl brought the tea, for she was ashamed to be seen in such a guise. The girl set down the tea at the top of the steps, and then returned to her employment of breaking up walnut shells into a steaming pot that hung over a fire of brushwood.
Lizzie was thirsty, and eagerly took the half-cold tea. It was weak and smoky, had been slightly sweetened with coarse sugar, but had not a drop of milk in it. The vile decoction almost made her sick after she had swallowed it, and she asked if she could not have some water to drink.
"Water! What next, I wonder? Where do you think we are to get water for you in this place?" said Mrs. Stanley, who sewed on steadily at the pink dress she was making.
Lizzie looked round then, and saw that they were on a wide desolate heath; but she learned from the talk of the men, who were lounging about smoking short black pipes, that they were not going to stay here long, but would recommence their journey again in an hour or two, and would travel on all night in order to reach some race-course in time to commence business the next day.
Was it there she was to meet her fortune, Lizzie wondered. She had heard of "races," and knew they were somehow connected with horses, but beyond this the girl's ideas were of the vaguest description, and she sat there in the doorway of the van wondering how she would have to set about the business.
She was startled by the girl superintending the steaming pot suddenly calling out:
"It's done."
"All right, turn it out to cool," said Mrs. Stanley without looking up from her work.
The whole mess was turned into a pail the next minute, and then the girl lounged off to join her companions, who were quarrelling with some boys of the party over the division of some apples one of them had stolen from a neighbouring orchard.
After a little while, Mrs. Stanley turned and glanced at Lizzie still sitting listlessly in the doorway.
"You can come out of that now," she said gruffly.
But Lizzie had no desire to be seen in her present costume, and said rather shortly, "I don't want to."
"That don't matter. You come out as I tell you, and go and give yourself a good wash in that pail," nodding as she spoke to where the girl had emptied the contents of the pot.
Lizzie looked alarmed. She had always prided herself on her white skin, and she knew the juice of walnut shells would stain it brown.
"Come on," called the woman roughly, seeing her hesitate.
The girl came slowly down the steps.
"If you please, I would rather not," she said meekly, all the pertness taken out of her now.
She stood still at the bottom of the steps, and looked imploringly at the woman she had deemed her benefactor. For answer, Mrs. Stanley dropped her work, seized Lizzie by the arm, and, before she was aware of it, had ducked her head into the pail of warm dye. She let her raise it for a minute or two that the air might dry it a little, and then dipped it again. This process she repeated two or three times, then thrust her arms in, and held her over it while she bathed her neck.
When she had finished she said, "There! Now you'll do. Your own mother wouldn't know you by the time your hair is cut."
And saying this, she returned to her work, leaving Lizzie to do as she pleased now.
CHAPTER V.
THE WAX-WORK SHOW.
WHEN the cavalcade was ready to move on again, Lizzie found she was not to occupy the parlour caravan where she had been all day, but was to sleep in another van, on some sacks of straw that were stowed in odd nooks between the wooden horses and swans of the steam roundabout.
In fact, it seemed that the whole company stowed themselves away for the night among the various portions of the show and shooting gallery that were packed in the wagons. Two or three other girls about her own age shared the strange bed-room with Lizzie, one of whom had a bad cough, and kept the rest awake a good deal.
Foolish Lizzie was too miserable to sleep. Her rough bed was not like the comfortable one she had hitherto had, neither was she used to sleep in her clothes as it seemed was the custom among her new friends. Then her companions were rough, and jeered at her when they found she was crying, so that altogether she really had very much to pity herself over now.
But the rudest shock came when all was quiet, and when apparently the rest were asleep. Lizzie was lying near the door of the van, and it seemed as though one or two persons were smoking outside, from the smell that came through the cracks of the door. They were moving at a slow pace over a tolerably smooth road, so that there was not much jolting, and Lizzie could hear pretty distinctly what was said by those sitting outside.
"Well, missis, what do yer think o' this gal now?" asked a man's voice.
"Just what I thought before—she'll be worth her weight in gold to us by and by, when she's broke in a bit."
"Ah! How do you make that out?" asked the man between the slow puffs of tobacco smoke he emitted from his mouth.
"How? Why, just this way. Our Tottie is well-nigh broke up with being among the wax-works so much, an' if she ain't soon took out of it, she'll be ill. But took out now, as I mean she shall be, she'll soon pick up enough of what I can teach her from the cards, and the lines on the hand, to tell a good fortune, and that'll pay better than all the wax-works, specially among the gents at the races, for Tottie'll pick up good looks when once she's out o' that beastly wax-work van."
"Eh! You're a deep un, Mother Stanley," said the man with a short admiring laugh.
"You've got to be in these days," said the woman.
"An' so you persuaded the little fool to join our company to release Tottie."
"Ah! But I didn't tell her that," put in Mrs. Stanley.
Lizzie knew her voice now, and sat up on her sack of straw to listen more intently. "I told her she'd be worth her weight in gold, but I didn't tell her I should have the handling of it, and of course she thought it would be for herself. I knew my lady the moment I set eyes on her. I could see by the way she looked that Sunday night, she'd be ready to do anything for the chance of getting away from steady work, so I laid my plans according. Bless you, it wasn't much trouble to persuade her, she was ready to swallow any bait and—"
"But I've heard you say you'd never take a gal away from her mother. Ain't this one got no friends?" asked the man.
"None as she cares for, or she'd ha' been none so ready to run away," said the woman.
"And you think there ain't no fear o' them making a fuss about her?" said the man a little cautiously.
"I didn't say that, now. If you asks me what I think, I say, keep a sharp eye on her these races, and then we'll get as far off as we can before we stops at another fair, and then we'll have to keep our eyes open. My belief is, after looking over all her clothes, she's got a good mother, and one as'll take no end of trouble to get her back, though she don't deserve it."
"How do you know that, Mother Stanley?" asked the man.
"How do I know it? Did she ever once say she couldn't go away 'cos of worrying her mother; not a bit of it. She thought more about the fine duds I talked of than ever she did about her mother; and when I see that, I thought to myself I'll have you, my lady, to save my poor Tottie, and teach you a lesson too before I've done with you."
"There ain't no fear but what you'll do that," said the man laughing again.
"No, there ain't; and you'll have to help me. You'll keep your eyes on her when she's talking about the wax figgers, and see she ain't up to no sly tricks with anybody. I've took care of her money, and I'll look sharp after her," concluded Mrs. Stanley.
Lizzie sat and listened in horror-struck amazement to this revelation. It was too dreadful to be believed at first. She felt sure Mrs. Stanley must be joking, and then tried to persuade herself she was telling her husband this tale just to induce him to let her remain with them for a little while.
But although she whispered to herself half aloud, "It can't—it can't be true," something spoke with more convincing power in the depths of her own spirit, and a sickening sense that the woman had spoken the truth stole over her, and well-nigh benumbed her faculties. She was too wretched to cry and sob, or indulge in any outward manifestation of sorrow, but her heart ached with a sense of desolation that well-nigh overwhelmed her.
The voices ceased outside, and her companions snored, and groaned sometimes as the clumsy vehicle lurched on one side as they passed over an extra rough piece of the road; but smooth or rough, it made no difference to Lizzie. The blessed relief of sleep came not to her that night.
And the morning dawned and they drew up at the corner of a common to give the tired horses some refreshment, and prepare a hasty breakfast for those who had been up all night.
No notice was taken of Lizzie. She was allowed to wander about among the dogs, horses, and children; but she knew she was being watched by more than one pair of deep dark eyes, and that it would be useless for her to try to escape even if she knew her road home again.
No; she could not escape in these ragged garments. She must wait and watch, and try to get some of her own clothes back again. Ah! What a fool she had been to give these up so readily. What would she not have given to have the last few days of her life over again? She wrung her hands in anguish as she walked up and down the common and thought of it all.
They did not make a long halt at this place. Only long enough to refresh the tired beasts, and the men who had been driving them all night, and then they were on the road again; for they were to reach the race-course by ten o'clock, and they still had several miles to travel. If Lizzie had cherished any lingering hope that the words she had heard in the night were not true in actual fact, she was quickly undeceived; for just before they started on their journey again she was summoned to the parlour van, where she found Mrs. Stanley busily sewing at the old pink tarlatan dress previously worn by Tottie, but which the woman now proceeded to try on her.
"Didn't I tell you that you'd be wearing a smart frock soon?" she said with a grim smile as she proceeded to fasten the soiled tumbled dress, which she had been enlarging so as to make it fit Lizzie's plump figure.
The girl looked at it with disgust. "I don't call this a fine dress," she said; "and it isn't the sort—"
A ringing box of the ears cut short this speech. "Take that," said the woman, as she sent the girl reeling across the room from the blow. "If your mother had given you a few tastes of this sort of thing, I shouldn't be bothered with you."
Lizzie checked the tears that rose to her eyes, and was about to say she need not be bothered with her, she would go home again, but a look at the woman's face convinced her that it would be more prudent to hold her tongue about this; and so she resolutely kept silent, and was careful to stand still while the woman finished the work of fitting on the dirty-fine frock.
When the race-course was reached, everybody set to work to help get the shows set up, and the steam roundabout set going, and as soon as the wax figures were dusted and set in their places, Lizzie was dressed in the pink frock, and received her first lesson in the duties of her new office.
Mrs. Stanley went round the show with a cane in her hand, with which she pointed at the different figures ranged along each side, making Lizzie repeat each sentence after her.
"Now, ladies and gentlemen," bawled the woman, "this is Lady Jane Grey, who had her head cut off for trying to kill Queen Mary, and this is Mrs. Manning who murdered another man in London. What!" she exclaimed, as Lizzie touched her on the shoulder to suggest that the historical information concerning Lady Jane Grey was not quite accurate.
"Lady Jane didn't try to kill Queen Mary," repeated Lizzie, who began to think her lot might not be quite so hard.
"Perhaps you'll tell me Mrs. Manning didn't try to kill a man in London, and wasn't hung in a black satin dress afterwards," said the woman scornfully.
"I don't know anything about Mrs. Manning," said Lizzie shrinkingly, as she caught sight of the angry glare in the woman's eyes.
"No, nor you ain't wanted to know anything," retorted Mrs. Stanley. "You ain't wanted to teach them as has been in the show business nigh on twenty year, but just do as you're told, and learn the lesson as it's taught yer."
And then she resumed her march round the show, giving the various figures names and characters in a jumbled-up fashion that perfectly amazed Lizzie. For she could read, while no one else in the company had ever mastered its difficulties beyond spelling words of three letters; and so the account of those the figures were intended to represent had been received verbally by Mrs. Stanley, when she bought them second-hand of a man who was going out of the business. Whether the original accounts at all agreed with those she now gave out, it would be hard to decide. She stuck to it that her version was the only correct one.
While Lizzie, who had read a good many of the books from the Sunday-school library, had learned a very different account of the various historical personages who were supposed to be represented at this wax-work exhibition, and it was difficult to disentangle the true from the false when it came to her turn to go round and repeat the lesson she had received.
"Lady Jane Grey was beheaded on Tower Hill for—"
"There ain't nothing about Tower Hill in it," roared Mrs. Stanley. "You nasty obstinate hussy, I'll give you such a taste of horsewhip, if you don't mind what I say to you, that you'll be one big ache all over when you go to bed to-night."
Lizzie looked at her tyrannical mistress and shivered, for she knew she would not hesitate to put her threat into execution, and so she tried harder to remember the garbled accounts delivered by Mrs. Stanley. In the case of Mrs. Manning and other murderers, who figured largely in the show, she had little difficulty in giving the exact account delivered by her mistress, because she had no preconceived ideas to get rid of, never having heard their names before, but when "Bloody Mary" was credited with cutting the disputed child in halves, it was so clear that the figure of Solomon had somehow disappeared from this scene, that Lizzie once more ventured a remonstrance.
But a sharp cut with the cane that Mrs. Stanley still carried, soon reduced her historical knowledge to a quiet acquiescence in the dictum of its latest exponent, and the next being murderers again, Lizzie got on better.
One more round, and then Mrs. Stanley, with a critical eye to Lady Jane Grey and Bloody Mary, pronounced her deliverance "pretty well."
These two, however, had to be repeated, and then Lizzie was left to make a further acquaintance with the hideous waxen effigies, while Mrs. Stanley went off to superintend the preparations for dinner.
Lizzie had had nothing but a few slices of bread and dripping by way of food since the previous Saturday, but to-day she had a good dinner of beef-steak and new bread, and felt better prepared for the opening of the show after she had eaten it.
This corner of the race-course, where they had taken up their quarters, was just like the fair-ground she had visited the previous week. She recalled the disgust she had felt when standing outside the faded red curtain across the doorway, and first smelt the sawdust and paraffin fumes with which the atmosphere was charged. Now that the lamps were all alight, and the back door closed, and the show ready for business to commence, the recollections of that scene was brought forcibly back to her recollection by the smell that almost immediately pervaded the place.
What a fool she had been! She did not need anyone else to tell her, that in trying to escape from the duties of her own station in life, she had thrown herself into a slavery that was ten times worse than anything she could have imagined possible when she was in a comfortable place of domestic service.
She might have relapsed into tears of self-pity over the plight she had brought herself into, but there was Stanley at the door, and if he took a less active part in the management of affairs than his wife, he would not fail to tell her of anything Lizzie might do that was not calculated to promote the "business."
Now, tears in the attendant at a wax-work show, whose lot in life is supposed to be as rosy as her gaudy dress, would never do; and when the man, thrusting his head behind the curtain, saw Lizzie sitting down in one corner looking very woe-begone and tired, he roared out:
"Come now, that won't do! Just jump up and be brisk, and look lively, not like a monkey going to be hung!"
Then the curtain dropped, and above the loud bawling of, "Walk up, walk up, ladies and gentlemen, and see the best sight at the races," she could hear the clatter of feet outside, and the rattle of halfpence, and the next minute a little knot of rough boys, laughing and chaffing each other, pushed their way into the show, and Lizzie's work began. But her voice trembled now that she was in the actual presence of her first audience, and she faltered so much that one of them called out:
"Come, speak up, young woman."
The next minute, Stanley's head was pushed in, and he said sharply: "Come, be brisk there, and show the gentlemen round the show."
"I am," gasped Lizzie; but she was obliged to seize hold of the rail behind which the figures were ranged, to support herself for a minute or two. But the faintness went off, and Lizzie went on with her description until this party of visitors had gazed their fill at the glass-eyed, wooden-faced monstrosities, and by the time they had departed, another party had gathered and were waiting to be admitted, and when they had filed in, Lizzie began again, and once more detailed how Lady Jane Grey tried to kill Queen Mary, and "Bloody Mary" ordered the child brought before Solomon to be divided.
She could see a grim smile on the faces of one or two visitors as they listened to these wonderful details, but she did not dare alter her statements in the least, for fear of the horsewhipping that would certainly follow upon such a breach of discipline, and so she repeated the words at last in the same mechanical tone Tottie had adopted, and scarcely knew what she was saying before the weary day came to an end.
Round and round she went, repeating the words to various parties of visitors; for they were new-comers to this race meeting, and the wax-work show was a novelty that everybody wanted to see. So business was brisk all day, and far into the night, to Mrs. Stanley's great satisfaction and her victim's intolerable disgust.
Her head ached, her back ached, her feet ached, her throat was sore and parched from bawling incessantly amid the fumes of paraffin, and when at last, the hour of release came, and she could take off her tawdry finery and lie down on the sack of straw that was thrown in at the back door as soon as the last visitor had departed, she could only stretch out her arms and sob out:
"Oh, mother! I wish I had died before I ran away from you."
Mrs. Stanley was well pleased with her day's work and the store of pence that had been collected at the entrance, and she set open the back door that Lizzie might have some share in the feasting and merry-making that always went on among themselves after a good day's business.
But Lizzie had no heart for merry-making, and the coarse jests and riotous laughter would rather have disgusted than pleased her, even if she had been well. Neither did she care for the bountiful supper of tripe and onions that was handed up to her. She felt too sick and sore to eat; she only longed for rest, and to be able to go back to her mother and the situation she had so rashly left.
But the next day, the same dreary round had to be gone through, and the next, and the next, for a sort of fair was held after the races were over, and then they journeyed on again, farther and farther from the spot to which the runaway was longing to return.
CHAPTER VI.
ANOTHER MYSTERIOUS DISAPPEARANCE.
WHEN Lizzie's flight was discovered, her master went at once to tell her mother and father, and advised that Mr. Betts should go with him and inform the police of what had happened.
This was done, and by ten o'clock that Sunday morning, every policeman in the town had received instructions to look after a girl in a straw hat carrying a bundle.
But, as we know, Lizzie was not likely to be met with near any of the routes these policemen would traverse; and so Jack and her father, as well as her master and mistress, went in vain to the police-station for news of her, for no one had seen a girl answering such a description as was given, within reach of the town that day. From sheer inability to sit still and do nothing, Jack and his father had gone in search of her themselves.
Emma Russell was visited, and asked all sorts of questions; but beyond the fact that Lizzie did not like service, and wanted to go home and help her mother with the washing, she knew nothing. Certainly she had never heard her say anything about going away. She had not seen her for a week; for although they had arranged to meet and walk home together on Wednesday, and Emma had waited at the corner of the road for her, Lizzie never came, and she, Emma, had been obliged to run all the way home to make up for the time she had wasted in waiting.
Jack pondered over this; for, although there seemed nothing in it likely to lead to the solution of the mystery at first, taken in connection with another little bit of information that he learned during the day, it might have some important bearing in the case.
Lizzie had been out that Wednesday evening, he heard; for someone had seen her hurrying in the direction of Snowfields with her best hat on, and another friend had seen her leave the fair, talking to a stout woman dressed in a plaid shawl. The friend had not spoken to Lizzie, for he thought the woman might be a neighbour who had come to take care of her, as it was rather late for a girl like Lizzie to be out.
So Jack's next quest was for this woman, and he went home to ask his mother which of the neighbours wore a plaid shawl. And the garments usually worn by everybody they knew were discussed; but only about two had ever been seen in plaid shawls, and they were by no means stout individuals.
But still Jack went to make inquiries of them, for he was ready to catch at any straw that was likely to afford a clue to the heart of this mystery; but, of course, he met with blank disappointment. Neither of these people had seen Lizzie lately, nor had they been near Snowfields for some months.
So he had to turn homewards once more, with the dreary tale of failure written on his face. Lizzie's mistress, however, could give some confirmation of the fact about her being out late on Wednesday, and that she had given her notice to leave in consequence of her carelessness the next night, hoping that this might have the effect of making her more careful in future, which if it did, she had told her, she would look over the past and let her stay.
This confirmation of the fact that Lizzie had gone to the fair instead of going home, made Jack persistently cling to the idea that Lizzie's disappearance was somehow connected with the fair-folks. He had learned from the police that most of the vans that had stood here bore the name of Stanley, but beyond this he could learn nothing. They laughed at him when he suggested that they had run away with his sister. Girls of fifteen, able to talk and walk, could not be carried off against their will; and, besides:
"What could these gypsy folks do with a girl like her?" the policeman asked.
Jack shook his head. The question puzzled him, but still he held on to his notion. He knew the disappearance of his sister was somehow connected with these fair-folks, and he tried to find out where they were going next, that he might go after them.
But nobody could tell him this; for nobody had troubled themselves about these nomadic people, who came and went without exciting much notice or much remark. The steam roundabout and all the shows were in full swing on Saturday night, and they had entirely disappeared by seven o'clock on Sunday morning, leaving nothing but dirt and refuse behind.
"Yes, and it was early on Sunday morning that Lizzie went away," said Jack to the man who gave him this information. "Her mistress called her at half-past seven, but she was gone; and the back door and back gate were unfastened, so that she went early too."
The police, however, had formed quite another theory to account for the girl's disappearance. They did not condescend to tell anybody what this was; but it came out in a day or two, that her mistress had lost a silver fruit knife, which she was certain she had used a day or two before the girl went away, and left it in the sideboard drawer.
Of course, as this article had been missed, other articles might have been taken also; and when her poor mother heard of this, and that her only girl was branded as a thief, her grief and distress was increased tenfold. As for her father, it well-nigh killed him. The mental depression caused by want of employment had already begun to affect his health, and now he seemed to give up all hope and desire for life. So long as there was any chance of finding Lizzie in the town, he tramped on unweariedly; but when this failed, and the discovery was made that the silver fruit knife was missing, and must have been taken by Lizzie, the poor man uttered a groan of anguish and fell back in his chair like one demented. He made no further effort to find Lizzie. She was lost, he said—lost beyond recovery.
Her husband's failing health now imposed a double burden upon poor Mrs. Betts; for he was soon unable to move from his chair beside the fire, and had to be waited on like a confirmed invalid. Jack, however, was young and strong, and he was very angry at the charge of theft being brought against his sister. He loved her still in spite of appearances being so much against her. She was foolish, he admitted—all girls were; but Lizzie had never stolen that knife, he was sure, and he would go in search of her though he had to tramp all over England before he found her.
Lizzie's dearest friend, Emma, applauded his resolution. She too was quite sure Lizzie would never steal the knife. And if she never came back, her character ought to be cleared, and her brother ought to do all he could, as nobody else was able to do much.
So after a week had passed away in fruitless searchings and inquiries, Jack shouldered his father's basket of tools and set off on tramp to look for work and look for his sister.
He was two years older than Lizzie; but, although little more than a lad himself, he had learned the trade of a whitesmith in all its branches, and was a skilful and steady workman. He could hang a bell, repair a lock, stop a leak in a water pipe, and do many other odd jobs. And after taking counsel with his mother, he set off on the Monday morning, determined to earn his bread at least by the use of his tools. His mother gave him a shilling or two—all she could spare, and bread enough to last him through the day.
She parted from him with tears, and many injunctions to be careful and write to her as soon as he had any news of Lizzie. And although some of their friends looked upon his plan as a harebrained scheme, still it was a comfort to the poor mother to think someone had gone in search of her foolish girl, and any day might bring tidings of her now Jack had fairly set off.
She tried to cheer her husband with hopes of Jack getting a good job of work while he was searching for Lizzie; for, though work was scarce here, it did not follow that it must be so everywhere. Her Jack was a steady lad, and a master would soon learn to know his value and be glad to employ him.
This was her constant theme when with her husband. For she wanted to draw his mind away from its continual brooding over Lizzie and the missing knife, for it was the only chance of saving him from sinking into hopeless melancholy, the doctor said—for a doctor had been called in to attend him since he had been so much worse.
The poor man would listen to his wife's cheery, hopeful words, and appear to dwell upon them for a few minutes, but, left to himself, he would soon relapse into his former hopeless despondency, and murmur half aloud, "Our girl is lost—quite lost now."
Meanwhile, Jack having ascertained by which route the fair-folks had left the town, took the same road in pursuit of them. He did not ask for work at all the first day, but was careful to inquire at the public-houses he passed whether they had seen some show and gypsy vans pass by that way about a week before.
Of course, in many instances people had forgotten all about this fact, even if they paid any attention to it at the time, and so it was not easy to glean any intelligence of them now. But by persistent inquiries, and explaining why he was so anxious to trace them, Jack learned enough to convince him that he was on their track, and now he must be careful not to lose the trail. A boy showed him where they had lighted a fire on the heath, and by noting this and other marks upon the grass, the lad thought he should be able to detect where they had been in other places.
By the time he reached the next town, he was tired out, and had eaten most of the bread and cheese his mother had tied up in a handkerchief for him. So he decided to look out for a job of work that would earn for him a supper and a night's lodging, and he was fortunate enough to find something he could do almost as soon as he entered the town.
An old man was struggling with a restive horse, and Jack, seeing he was in some danger, put his basket of tools down in a place of safety, and ran to his assistance.
It seemed that the lock of the stable door was broken, and the horse had kicked away the frail fastening the old man had put up to keep the door closed, and so had got out and had broken through a hedge into a neighbouring garden.
"I can mend the lock, perhaps," said Jack. "Let me look at it."
"I wish you could, my lad," said the man; "for it's a good strong lock, though it is old-fashioned."
"Well, we'll tie up the horse, and then I'll soon have the lock off, and see what's amiss with it."
The animal, finding it was no use to resist any further, gave up the struggle, and allowed himself to be led into the stable and secured there, while Jack fetched his basket of tools and set to work to take off the lock.
It was a large old-fashioned thing, very dirty and rusty, and the spring quite ruined.
"It will take me an hour or two to clean it, and I must get a new spring for it; but when that is done, the lock will be as good as ever," said Jack, rubbing off some of the rust with his finger as he spoke.
"How much will it cost to do it up? It's worth a dozen of any new-fangled sort I could buy now," added the man.
Jack turned it over and looked at it again. "I'll do the work for a shilling, if you'll buy the spring," he said. "It won't cost much; only twopence or threepence," he added.
"All right! You shall do it then; and I'll fetch a cup of tea and a bite of bread and butter for you that you may get it done before dark. You leave your tools here, and go and get the spring." And he told Jack where he would find a shop that was likely to supply it, and gave him sixpence to pay for it.
"You'll do no good with that old lock," said the ironmonger when he saw what Jack wanted the spring for.
"Oh, yes, I shall. It's clumsy, but it's a good lock, and worth taking some trouble over."
The man turned it about, and looked at it again. "I tell you what," he said, "if you can make that lock answer, I'll give you work to-morrow."
"Thank you, I'll be glad of a day's work; and when I've finished this job, I'll bring it to you to look at it," said Jack.
He ran back with the spring he had bought, and very soon had the lock to pieces, and was busy cleaning the different parts of it. This sort of work he had often done for his father, and he did not mind the trouble of rubbing, and scrubbing, and scraping that was required to remove the rust. It took him a long time to clean the old thing thoroughly, and make it serviceable again; but the lock was a good one and worth the trouble, and when at last Jack had got it all fitted together again, he was delighted to find that it would work as easily as possible.
"Now, I want to show it to the man at the shop where I bought the spring," said Jack, as he looked at his work triumphantly. "He'll give me a job to-morrow, he says, if I make anything of this."
"All right! You shall show it to him; and you may tell him from me, he ain't got a lock in his shop like it," said the old man, who was very proud of his clumsy lock.
Jack carried it to the smith's, who was just putting up his shutters, and told Jack to wait in the shop until he had finished.
So Jack spread his arms on the counter, as he was in the habit of doing, and his eyes went roving round until they lighted on something he had not expected to see in a little smith's shop like this.
"I say, mister," called Jack, as soon as the man appeared, "where did you get that silver knife? It's a fruit knife, ain't it?"
"Yes, I believe it is. But what do you want to know about it for?"
Then Jack told of his sister's mysterious disappearance, and how she was accused of stealing a knife just like this one.
"Where did you get it?" he asked eagerly.
"Well, I bought it about a week ago, of a woman who brought it into the shop to ask if I could tell her whether it was silver. She had just picked it up as she came across the heath, she said."
"Was she a stout woman, wearing a plaid shawl?" said Jack.
Yet why he asked the question he could not tell, for would it not be a confirmation of Lizzie's guilt, if it could be proved that the woman she was seen leaving the fair with, and the one who sold this knife, were the same person?
The man looked at the lad's anxious face, and said cautiously: "I don't want no bother with the police. If you know anything about the knife, why, I'll let you have it for what I gave for it."
But Jack shook his head to this proposal. "I haven't got any money to spare," he said; "but I should like you to show it to the police, and tell them where you got it."
But the "bother" of having anything to do with the police almost frightened the man, and it was not until Jack had appealed to him, and told him about his father's illness and his mother's despair, that he would consent to lock it up in his desk, and keep it out of sight until he should hear more about the business from Jack by and by.
Then he looked at the lock, and offered Jack employment at once. But the lad explained how he had left home in search of his sister, and could not give up the quest until he had learned something about her. He would stay in the town through the following day, and do a few odd lobs that were ready, and make inquiries as to whether anyone had seen the gypsy vans passing through the town, and which route they had taken.
He went back to fasten the lock on the stable door, wondering at the chance or providence that had sent him to the shop where that knife was to be seen. He felt sure that it was the one that had been taken from Mrs. Spencer's house; but the fact that the woman who had sold it was the same one who was seen leaving the fair with his sister seemed to connect her directly with the theft.
Poor Jack pondered over this as he screwed on the lock securely, and afterwards, when he went in search of a cheap lodging for the night. He could think of nothing but the finding of this knife, which, simple as it was, seemed almost as mysterious, as he thought over it, as the disappearance of Lizzie herself.
He got a bed, but having had a good tea, he would not spend any of his money on supper to-night; for he did not know what he might want before Lizzie was found.
So he went to work the next morning as he had promised, but pushed his inquiries about the gypsy vans, and whether anyone had seen a stout woman dressed in a plaid shawl.
"Why, yes! And she had a red face, and a red rose in her bonnet," said one gossiping woman, who heard Jack's question about this.
"And was she with people who had gypsy vans?" asked Jack eagerly.
"To be sure she was—owns some of them herself, I believe," said his informant. "Leastways it was said she did when they put up here for one winter."
"These people stayed here all the winter?" said Jack, thinking the woman could surely tell him all about them, and where they were likely to be found now.
But no! It seemed this woman could give him just enough information to make him desirous of knowing more, but there she had to stop. They had stayed in this neighbourhood all the previous winter, but had gone away in the spring, and had not been seen since until the previous week, when they passed through the town again. But where they had gone now, she did not know, and probably they did not know themselves, she told Jack.
So the lad finished his work for that day, took his money at night, and started off early the next morning in pursuit of these people, who, he felt sure, knew something of his sister, if they had not actually carried her off with them.
About the middle of that day, he picked up a little strip of a print dress that struck him as being familiar, and he decided to send a little piece of it in a letter to his mother, and ask her if it was not a piece of Lizzie's frock.
He had found it on the side of a common, near a spot where a fire had evidently been lighted, and which bore other traces of being used as a camping-ground for a short time. He wished now he had followed them up sooner, but still he was thankful for this small proof that he was on the right track still.
And when he reached the village beyond, he got writing materials, and sent off a piece of the rag he had picked up, by way of cheering his mother, and giving her fresh hope that Lizzie might yet be found.
CHAPTER VII.
REPENTANCE.
JACK was elated over the success that had attended his efforts thus far. And although at the little village where he passed the second night of his wanderings, he could hear nothing of the cavalcade of vans, or which road they had taken, he felt so sure he was on the right track that he went on again the next day, and again saw traces of a camp-fire, which reassured him. And he felt confident now that he should soon overtake the company he was in search of.
He had to spend his money for food and lodging now, and, careful as he was, the last shilling was changed on Thursday, and he seemed no nearer finding his sister than when he first started from home.
He must have lost the track of those he was in search of, too, he began to fear; for he could hear nothing of fair-folks or show-vans in the town he had now reached. The only gypsy vans that had been seen in that neighbourhood were the travelling hawkers, who sold brooms, brushes, baskets, and mats, and displayed their wares outside the vans. Two of these had perambulated the neighbourhood a few days previously, he was told; and he began to fear that he must have been misled by the camp-fires of these itinerant dealers, and so lost the trail of those he was in search of.
So there was nothing for it but to look about for work where he was. But Jack was not so successful here as he had been at the first town he made his stopping-place.
Nobody wanted a lock mended or a pipe repaired, or at least they did not feel disposed to employ a stranger like this lad. So the poor fellow was soon reduced to great distress, and began to fear he should have to sell some of his tools for subsistence, when he met a gentleman who was in search of a workman who could stop a leaky pipe at once. No one he had met with could undertake to do it until the next day, and therefore he was glad to employ Jack.
He soon did the job, neatly and effectively, and the gentleman was so pleased with the way it was done, that he gave him a bath to repair and paint, and several other articles of domestic use to put in order, which he did in an outhouse the next day.
By this means a few shillings were earned, and the week came to an end. And on Sunday, he started off on another route; for he had heard of a fair being held a few miles off, and he did not doubt that the Stanleys would make for this point, and here he should catch them.
But alas for his hopes! He reached the fair-ground in time to see the close of the frolic, but no van bore the name of Stanley, and no one had seen any shows answering to the description of theirs.
Weary and disheartened, the poor fellow decided to stay here long enough to receive a letter from his mother, and hear how she and his father were, and whether the bit of rag he had sent home in his last letter was a piece of Lizzie's frock.
So again he went in search of work. The gentleman for whom he had done the repairing had kindly written a letter giving his name and address as reference, and stating what he had done for him in the way of repairs. He had likewise recommended him to go to a certain shop in the High Street, where he himself was known to the proprietor, and it so happened that they were pressed with work just then, and glad to take on an extra hand, especially as he was recommended by some one so well known.
So Jack decided to stay there for a week or two, and earn a little money before he went any further. The answer to his letter came in due course from his mother, who was very glad to have heard from her boy. She was well, she said, but there was very little improvement in his father's condition. The bit of stuff he had sent in his previous letter was certainly a piece of one of Lizzie's frocks, and looked as though it had been torn off the hem at the bottom. They had received no news of her, and the police seem to have given up all hope of tracing her now, wrote poor Mrs. Betts.
And Jack could read the unwritten prayer these words contained, and he said aloud as he read them: "Never fear, Mother, I don't mean to give up the search till I have found these people, and make them tell me what they have done with her."
And this assurance he sent to his mother that night, telling them at the same time that he had got work that might last a week or two, and that he intended to stay there and save a little money to travel with. There was some chance that they might come to a fair that would be held in a neighbouring town in a few weeks' time; for he had made it his business to inquire about all the fairs that were held within a dozen miles of this place.
To hear that the bit of rag he had found was a piece of his sister's frock was some encouragement at least, for it proved that if she was not actually with them, they must know something about her.
So Jack went on with his work, and proved himself a steady, capable, painstaking workman, giving satisfaction to his employer, and making himself helpful and agreeable to his fellow-workmen. He made no secret of the errand that had brought him into the neighbourhood, and all who heard his story sympathized with him, and many wrote to friends at a distance asking them to notice all the travelling companies of show people that came near them, and to give information at once if any of the name of Stanley should appear.
Jack was thankful indeed for these efforts made on his behalf; for as he was earning money now, if news came that the vans he was in search had appeared in a certain neighbourhood, he could go by railway to some point near the place, and so reach them before they had time to get away.
So he wrote and told his mother of all this, and that he thought he could not do better than stay where he was, as work was brisk; another thing, as winter was coming on now, they might be expected to turn up at their old quarters nearer home, in which case, they would doubtless soon hear of them and Lizzie too.
But, although he wrote thus hopefully to his mother, he could not help growing bitter against his sister as the weeks went on and no news came from her. Whatever her motive might have been for going away, surely she might have written a line to assure her mother of her safety. She could write, she knew her mother's address, whereas they were cut off from all knowledge of her or where she might be found.
She was a wicked cruel girl, he assured himself sometimes, and at others he made up his mind she had been killed or was kept in such close confinement somewhere that she could not communicate with anyone. On the whole, he was more inclined to take this view of the matter; in which case, he agreed she could not be travelling with this gypsy party, or she could surely find some opportunity of making her escape, if she had wished to do so, or of writing a letter if she had felt so disposed.
He and Lizzie had both attended Sunday-school; but it was small comfort to him at first to think of what he had learned there—that God cares for his people, and had promised to protect them in all dangers and difficulties.
Lizzie had learned this; but she had clearly placed herself in the way of temptation and danger, and how could she expect that God would take care of her then. At length, however, he began to understand, through his own love for the silly wilful girl, that God would not cease to care for her and protect her because she had been foolish and wilful, but it might well be that he would punish her for what she had done; and who could tell, but that in letting her have her own way for a little while, he was going to teach her the folly of her wilfulness and discontent? For Jack knew all about this, and had often tried to reason her out of it.
This view of the matter comforted the poor fellow a good deal; and when he kneeled down at night, he never failed to pray for Lizzie as well as his mother and father, beseeching God to guide and protect her wherever she might be, and to bring her home safely at last. It helped to make him patient under this long weary waiting for news. For although he contrived to go to several fairs during the autumn, in the hope of seeing the Stanley vans, they never appeared at any of the places, and, indeed, it seemed as though the whole company had vanished from the sight of living men.
If the police had only tried to trace them when they first went away, they would doubtless soon have been found. But they scouted the notion of gypsies running off with a girl of fifteen, and never would entertain it, though Mrs. Betts went to them with the scrap of rag Jack had found, and assured them it was a piece of one of Lizzie's frocks. They questioned and cross-questioned her as to where this piece of stuff had been found, and when they learned that it had been picked up on a common at some distance, and not in the immediate neighbourhood of the fair-folks, they simply declined to take any action in the matter, and assured the anxious mother that these people were not likely to have run away with her daughter.
Meanwhile poor Lizzie was having a hard time of it, and, in addition to the actual hardships of her lot, was most unhappy now upon her mother's account; for she felt sure that her mysterious disappearance would be a source of great anxiety to her. She had not thought of this at all at first. But then it must be remembered that she anticipated having a fortune soon after she left home; and to be able to write and tell her mother she was a rich lady would compensate her, she thought, for any anxiety she might have suffered.
Lizzie had learned by this time how vain that hope had been from the very first. It was hard to give it up—to think that the miserable life she had entered upon was to have no end. But when she thought of her mother, and the unhappiness she had caused her, she could not but feel that it was a just punishment for her ingratitude and discontent.
How gladly she would have gone back to Mrs. Spencer's now, to escape from her present masters and mistresses; for the whole company she was with, contrived to make poor Lizzie feel that she was their slave, since she would not be their companion and join in their riotous fun. Her refusal to do this at first was scarcely noticed. Mrs. Stanley said she was bound to be sulky when she found the promised fortune was never likely to fall into her hands. And so, during the time they were on the race-course, they left her a good deal to herself, and if she was tired, she was allowed to rest in peace when the show was closed for the night.
But it would not do to let her continue this mode of behaviour any longer. She had joined their company of her own free will, and they would put up with no fine-lady airs. If they chose to be jolly when they were in luck, why, they were not going to have her sour face spoiling their pleasure, nor should she set up for being better than they; and she was told this plainly before they reached the next halting-place, which was on the borders of Scotland. Here a popular fair was held every year, and by dint of hurrying they contrived to reach the fair-ground on Sunday night, and had the shows and roundabouts ready to commence business early on Monday morning.
They had to be up nearly all night, and when the necessary work was at length accomplished, Mrs. Stanley brought out a bottle of gin and a glass, to treat all the company to a dose before they lay down for the few hours' rest that they might hope to snatch before the business of the next day began.
"No, thank you," said Lizzie, when the woman came to the door of the van whore she had thrown herself down on a sack of straw to try and get a little rest.
"Take it," said the woman. "It'll do yer good."
"No, thank you," repeated Lizzie. "I promised Mother once I would never drink anything like that."
"Ha, ha! That's a good un, that is," said Mrs. Stanley with a harsh laugh. "A lot you care for your mother, don't yer. You needn't think to come it over me with that tale. I don't mean to put up with no more o' them obstinate tricks. You best take hold o' this glass, and drink down every drop o' this gin."
Lizzie hesitated for a moment. Should she yield and drink it for peace sake. She sat up on her sack of straw, and by the dim light of the tallow candle which she carried she looked in the angry inflamed face of Mrs. Stanley.
"I can't drink it," she said firmly, after a pause. "If I never see my mother again, I won't break this one promise I gave her."
"Now, look here. I'm your mother now, and your my gal—remember that; and all as I tell you to do you've got to do. Ah! And call me 'Mother' too," said the angry woman, forgetting all prudence in her passion.
Now Lizzie, as she trudged at the side of the van that day, had been comparing her own dear unselfish mother with this woman, who seemed to consider that her children only existed to be a source of gain to her. For poor sickly Tottie had been provided with a large basket filled with laces, buttons, servants' caps, and various small articles, that would afford her an excuse for calling at the various houses they passed, where she could also offer to tell fortunes to those silly enough to listen to her. The girl had begged and pleaded that she did not feel well enough to do this, and did not sufficiently understand the business of fortune-telling; but her mother would take no excuse. Money must be got in, she said; and, now she had secured another girl for the show, Tottie must make money with her basket.
Lizzie had heard the altercation between mother and daughter, and it brought forcibly before her mental gaze her own dear mother, and the care that had been taken of her—Lizzie—when she was ill once. And so to be asked now to use the precious sacred name of "mother" to the woman who had so cruelly deceived her, was too revolting to be thought of.
"No, no, I will never do that," she said passionately, carried away by the strong feeling that the woman's words had evoked.
"What? You dare to tell me you won't do a thing I bid you do!" said the woman in a tone of wrath. "Now I say you shall call me 'Mother,' and shall say it now too!" exclaimed the virago, setting down the glass of gin she held in her hand, and stepping inside the van to take summary vengeance on the girl who had defied her.
Several others of the company had gathered round by this time, and Stanley himself, who knew what was impending, elbowed his way to the front. He did not often interfere with his wife's management, for he knew she could do it a good deal better than he could, but when he saw she was likely to spoil a chance of making money for the sake of her temper, he would put in a word of reason.
So following her into the van, he laid his hand upon her shoulder, and whispered, "Look here now, don't you go and spile that gal for her day's work to-morrow, jist for the sake of your temper. She's to be worth her weight in gold to us, yer know; but she won't be worth a brass farthing if yer kicks up a row with her, and whacks her as you've whacked Tottie sometimes."
"Now, you go down and mind yer own business, and let me manage this young vixen my own way," said the woman, speaking very loud, and giving her husband a push that almost sent him down the steps of the van. He caught hold of the door-post, however, and saved himself, and then seized his wife's arm as she picked up a heavy leather strap to beat Lizzie with.
"Don't be a fool now," he hissed in her ears. "Don't you know the police are about, and if she screams, they'll come to know what's a matter."
"What do I care for the police? They can't do nothing to me. I didn't carry her off. She came to me and begged me to be a mother to her, 'cos she couldn't abide her own mother, and the hard place she was at," said Mrs. Stanley, turning upon her husband, and flourishing the strap in her hand still.
"Well, never mind; we don't want no police round here now. We want an hour's pitch before the work begins," said the man in a reasoning tone.
"And I mean to be a mother to that gal," said Mrs. Stanley, still shaking the strap at her threateningly.
"You put that strap down and come away. If you lay her up, as you will do if you once begin, you'll be sorry for it yerself to-morrow. If you hadn't had a drop too much out of that bottle, you wouldn't begin a row just as we've come to a fresh place. Do you want us to get kicked off the ground before the fair begins?" demanded Stanley.
He was beginning to lose his temper now. He did not often venture to interfere with anything his wife thought fit to do; but he knew well enough that she would never have taken this course if she had not drunk pretty freely, and the idea that money might be lost, all through this fit of temper, provoked him.
"I'll give it to her," said Mrs. Stanley still threateningly, but in wavering tones now.
"All right! Give it to her as much as you like when the fair is over, and it won't interfere with business," said the man.
"Ah! And I will," said Mrs. Stanley, dropping the strap and looking vengefully at Lizzie. "I'll let her know whether she's to defy me as she did her other mother. I'll teach her a different lesson, I'll warrant," and she slowly turned and went down the steps after her husband.
Lizzie crept back to her hard dirty bed trembling in every limb, but firm in her resolve neither to drink gin nor call this woman "mother." She might beat her, but she would never yield. And that night Lizzie kneeled down at the side of her sack, and prayed to God to help her, and to comfort and help the dear mother she had forsaken.
CHAPTER VIII.
CONCLUSION.
IN spite of the dreadful threats held before her by Mrs. Stanley, Lizzie went to sleep almost as soon as she lay down again on her unsavoury bed, and slept until the noise of the dogs and first shrieks of the steam whistle roused her. She jumped up then and threw open the door of the van, and began shaking the dresses of the ghastly wax figures, and whisking off the dust with a feather brush. Then she washed herself at a pail of water where the other girls had already gathered, and put on the pink tarlatan dress ready to begin her dreary work of the day.
After a hasty breakfast of dry bread and weak coffee, that had been allowed to get nearly cold, Lizzie took her place beside Lady Jane Grey, ready for the first group of visitors.
This fair lasted nearly the whole week, and as the weather was fine, and the wax-work show fairly successful, Mrs. Stanley's temper somewhat improved, and Lizzie began to hope she might escape the threatened beating after all. That such a beating as alone would satisfy Mrs. Stanley would kill her now she felt sure, for she was no longer the rosy healthy girl she was when she left home. She had begun to grow thin and careworn, and though the walnut-juice dye had changed the colour of her skin so that she could no longer look white, she began to look yellow and sickly, instead of the "nut-brown maid" Mrs. Stanley had designed she should be. This was especially noticeable when this week's work was over; for the confinement in the sickening atmosphere, and the fatigue of walking continually round the close confined space within the van, told upon the girl's strength so severely, that the last night of the fair she could scarcely do her treadmill task, and when at last the door was closed, and the steam whistle screeched its final blast, the poor girl sank down upon the floor more dead than alive.
"Here now! Just have a drop o' this, Lizzie," said a voice that sounded a long way off to the girl lying half-fainting on the floor of the van. She could hear the same voice repeat the words in the tones of entreaty and command, but she had no power to rouse herself or even open her eyes. At last her head was raised, and some fiery liquid poured down her throat that nearly choked her, and then she knew it was the hateful gin she had been made to swallow.
"No, no," she gasped, pushing the glass away from her when Tottie would again have put it to her lips.
"Look here, Liz, it ain't no good holding out agin it," said the girl persuasively. "I know what this wax-work van is. It just pumps the life out of ye, and the only thing to keep you going is a little drop o' gin. Mother always gave me a drop when I was here," she added.
But Lizzie still shook her head. "I promised Mother I never would touch it," she whispered faintly.
"Yes; but you can't keep a promise like that now," said Tottie. "Mother knows you can't keep on without it, and she says you must take it."
But Lizzie still shook her head. "I couldn't," she said. "I've been a wicked girl to my poor mother, but I'll just hold on to this; because it's the last and the only thing I can do for her."
"You're a fool then," said Tottie roughly; "and you'll just have to take your chances with Mother."
At that moment the van door was pushed open again, and Mrs. Stanley thrust her head in.
"Has she took it, Tottie?" she asked.
"Yes, she's had most of it," said the girl, holding up the glass to let her mother see that there was not much left in it. In point of fact, only the first few drops had been swallowed by Lizzie, the rest having been purposely spilled on the floor of the van by Tottie. But it served the purpose she had in view, and poor Tottie had never been taught the sin of lying.
Mrs. Stanley stood for a moment looking at the heap of tumbled pink tarlatan lying motionless on the floor, and her daughter, noticing the anxious look that came into her eyes, said in an indifferent tone:
"You'll have to serve her out some other way. A whacking will about do for her now. She's caved in quicker than I did."
"Humph! She'll never be worth her weight in gold to us after all, I'm afraid," grumbled Mrs. Stanley.
"You'll have to let her take it easy if she's ever to be any good," remarked Tottie. "I thought I'd get her bed in and make her comfortable," she added, handing the glass she held to her mother.
"All right. Bring her round if you can, for she does this show business very well, and you are getting on at the fortune-telling."
Saying which Mrs. Stanley went to see after some other business that needed her attention, leaving the two girls together.
If Lizzie heard what passed, she was too weak to notice it, and only roused herself again when Tottie dragged in her sack of straw, and tried to lift her on to it.
"Don't, don't!" she gasped, for every movement was so painful that she only desired to be left alone.
"But you must get this fine frock off," said Tottie, unhooking the pink tarlatan as she spoke. "I don't want another row with you and mother; and she'll be here again presently, and not so mild as she was the last time."
Lizzie knew what she meant, and roused herself sufficiently to draw her arms out of the sleeves as Tottie pulled them. No such luxuries as nightdresses were allowed her now, although she had brought her own with her. But Tottie contrived to get a blanket to cover her, and then, having made her as snug and comfortable as she could, she made haste out to the supper party, who had already commenced their meal.
They were not going to pack up to-night, for there was no hurry for them to be on the road again; and so there would be a feast with plenty of drink, and a probable fight at the end, which did not frighten Tottie as it did Lizzie, for she had been used to such scenes all her life. She did not care much for the carousing though now, for her cough was troublesome; and she decided to go and lie down beside Lizzie, where she should be sure to be quiet for the night.
Poor Lizzie made up her mind she was going to die before the week came to an end. Indeed she was very ill, and was allowed to lie on her straw bed in the van for some days. And Tottie sat beside her most of the time, and when she was able Lizzie talked to her about what she had learned at Sunday-school, and the dear mother and father and brother she had left behind.
Tottie was amazed to hear that her companion had a comfortable home with Mrs. Spencer, as well as kind considerate parents; for how she could leave these for the miseries of a life among gypsy folks, was more than she could comprehend.
"You mean to say you could live in a tidy house, and have meals regular, and go to bed every night, and yet want to live such a life as ours!" she exclaimed.
"I didn't know what your life was like," explained Lizzie. "I thought I was to have a fortune if I came with you. And I did so want to be able to wear fine ribbons, and lace, and grand dresses that servants can't have. And it was thinking about these things so much that made me dissatisfied with my place, and I thought if I could only get away from service, I should be happy. You may well say I was foolish," added the girl, with the tears in her eyes. "I was foolish and wicked too, I can see it plain enough now."
"Would you like to go back to that place again?" asked Tottie in a whisper, and cautiously looking towards the door as she spoke. They were jolting along the road now, travelling further into Scotland in the hope of finding it more profitable to them than England had been lately.
"It's no good thinking about going back," said Lizzie. "I've got no clothes, nor no money, and we get further and further away every day. Another thing, I should be ashamed to let people know what a fool I was, and—"
"Well, I'd go back if I'd got such a mother and a good place of service to go to," said Tottie. And then she added hastily, "But don't you go yet, Liz; promise me you won't go yet!"
Lizzie looked at her in surprise. "I'm not likely to get the chance," she said.
"But promise me you won't go if you do get the chance. Not—not till I'm gone!" whispered Tottie.
Lizzie looked at her companion, and for the first time she noticed how greatly the girl had changed during the last few days. The weather had grown colder, and the air was sharp and bleak, and Tottie coughed almost incessantly.
"Are you worse?" she asked in a tone of concern as the girl again broke into a violent fit of coughing.
When she could speak the girl gasped out, "I'm going to die, Liz. I'm not afraid now, since you told me about God and Jesus Christ; 'cos he knows everything, and he knows I've never had a chance here. And there's lots like me. So he must have a school of some sort up there, where he teaches gals like me. I've give up the gin since you told me he didn't like it. But I'd like you to stop with me till he comes to fetch me, and after that, you get back to your mother as fast as you can, and tell her not to grieve, and not to scold ye, for God sent you to bring a message to a poor gal, who couldn't have learned nothing about him if you hadn't run away from her."
"But-but Tottie, you ain't so very bad, are you?" said Lizzie in a little alarm. "You've had a cough you know a long time."
"Yes, I have; and I'm just upon wore out," said the girl gaspingly.
Neither dreamed how near the end was for poor Tottie when they had this talk, but a few weeks of wandering in the bleaker air of Scotland hastened the work of destruction that had been slowly going on in the outer shell of the girl's being, and one day when it was a little colder than usual, and Tottie's cough consequently rather more violent, she broke a blood vessel.
The sight alarmed Mrs. Stanley, and she ran for a doctor; for they were just outside a large town then, where a fair was to be held the following day. Tottie was carried to the parlour van, which was only used to receive company and tell fortunes. And doubtless this removal, when the poor girl was in such a critical condition, greatly aggravated the danger, although the place was more comfortable. The doctor came, and ordered that the van should be drawn on to the nearest piece of waste ground and there remain still. The fair-ground to which they were bound was on the other side of the town, and though Mrs. Stanley protested that the invalid could and must go there, the doctor was equally firm, and said she would be guilty of murder, if she moved the van further while Tottie was so bad.
"This girl can stay with her," he said. "She is not fit to do anything at the fair. Have you got a cough too?" he asked Lizzie.
"I've got a little cold, sir," said Lizzie.
"Yes, I can see you have; so you had better stop here and nurse this girl and yourself too, and I will send you both some medicines," saying which the doctor took up his hat and went away.
Mrs. Stanley fretted and fumed, and declared she could not do without Lizzie at the wax-works; but her husband, who lingered near, reminded her that they had better shut up the wax-works for a day than get into a row, and this doctor would be sure to make a fuss if they did not do what he ordered.
So after a good deal of grumbling, the van was drawn up on the quiet spot the doctor had pointed out, and the rest of the show properties went on to their destination.
Mrs. Stanley could not afford to stay with the girls, and as the bleeding had almost ceased now, she persuaded herself that Tottie would soon be better; and so, telling them she should come back as soon as the shows were set up, she followed the rest of the party.
Tottie had lain still and white, and taken no notice of what was going on while her mother and the doctor was speaking, but as soon as the door closed and they were left to themselves, she opened her eyes and looked at Lizzie eagerly. Lizzie knelt down beside the couch, and put her ear close, but it was a minute or two before she could make out what the murmured whispers could mean.
But at last she managed to make out these words: "Write—letter—quick—money—in—my—frock," and she laid her hand on the bosom of the ragged old dress she wore, and Lizzie, feeling it, found two or three sixpences tied up in a loose piece of the lining.
"Go—quick—get—paper," gasped the invalid, when she saw the sixpences in Lizzie's hand.
But Lizzie would not leave her friend for this now. "I'll hide it in my frock," she said, transferring it to a similar receptable in her own dress; "and I'll write, never fear."
But help was nearer than either of them supposed. Just as it was getting dark, and Lizzie stood at the door watching for the doctor's boy to bring the promised medicine, she saw a weary-looking lad trudging along the road with a basket of tools on his back. A second look convinced Lizzie that it was no other than her brother Jack, and she called eagerly:
"Jack, Jack, don't you know me?"
Jack stopped and almost staggered. There was one of the vans he had been so long in search of; but he did not recognize the girl in the fluttering rags, either by voice or appearance.
Lizzie clambered down while her brother was staring at her, and ran up to him.
"Don't you know me, Jack?" she said again, laying her hand on his shoulder.
"Is it Lizzie?" gasped the lad, looking earnestly at her.
"Oh! Jack, how is mother?" was the answer, as she burst into tears and threw herself into his arms. "Will she ever forgive me, do you think, for being such a wicked girl?"
"Yes, that she will," said Jack, as soon as he had recovered a little from his astonishment; and then he looked at the solitary van. Lizzie told him then how it was she had been left behind, and that Tottie had given her some money that she might write and tell her mother where she was.
"I can't leave her, Jack," she whispered, as they walked back to the van together hand in hand. "I promised her I'd stop with her—"
"Lizzie, Lizzie," called a faint but clear voice.
And Lizzie darted into the van, and kneeled down by Tottie's side.
"I'm going, Lizzie; they've sent an angel for me, and I can't stop here no longer. You go home to your mother."
"I'm going, Tottie. My brother has just come for me," said Lizzie, taking the dying girl's hand and pointing to Jack who had followed her into the van.
She turned her eyes upon him for a moment and whispered, "You are her brother?"
"Yes," said Jack; "and I don't mean to leave her again."
"Thank God!" came faintly forth; and then there was a fluttering sigh, and poor Tottie Stanley, the real Tottie who had been shut up in a suffering body so long, went out of that travelling van up to the home God has prepared for girls who have had no chances of knowing him here.
Lizzie burst into tears when she saw what had happened, and Jack turned to the door again.
Just then the doctor's boy came up, and took two bottles of medicine out of his basket and handed them up to Jack.
But instead of taking them he said, "Stop a minute, I want to speak to you;" and then he told him what had happened, and how he had come in search of his sister and just found her. "Now I want you to show me where your master lives," he added. "Come, Lizzie," he called; "I am going to this doctor, and you must go with me."
So Lizzie shut the door of the van and came down to Jack, still crying for the friend who had just left her. The slow-witted boy was amazed, but readily consented to show the brother and sister where his master lived.
The gentleman was a little surprised to hear Tottie had gone so soon, but still more to hear the tale the brother and sister had to tell.
"You had better get away from them as quickly and quietly as possible," he said. "You see you went with them of your own accord," he added, speaking to Lizzie, "and the only thing they could be accused of was stealing this fruit knife."
Lizzie's ragged forlorn appearance touched the gentleman's heart.
"I scarcely knew her when she called me," said Jack, when he made some comment upon this.
"And you say your father is ill from anxiety about her?" said the gentleman meditatively.
Lizzie stood shrinking back, softly crying, for she was so ashamed of her folly now, so sorry for the mischief she had caused, that she hardly liked to look the gentleman in the face while he and Jack were talking about her.
"I tell you what, my lad. You write to your parents to-night, and tell them you have found your sister, but she is not quite well enough to come home at once. I will write an order for her to be admitted to the hospital to be nursed up a bit, and meanwhile my sister shall try and get a few clothes together for her to go home, and look a little more like a respectable servant than she does now."
So Lizzie was taken at once to the hospital, put into a warm bath, and then went to a clean comfortable bed, such as she had scarcely hoped to sleep in again.
A week of comfortable rest and good food did much to restore Lizzie to her old appearance outwardly, but the real Lizzie was greatly changed from the thoughtless, discontented girl who ran away from her home and her duty that summer Sunday morning. By God's providence she had been changed, and henceforth she might be "worth her weight in gold;" but in a different way from that which either she or Mrs. Stanley intended.
The doctor got a few decent clothes, and gave Jack the money for her railway fare home—he had earned enough to pay for himself—and so, at last, the brother and sister returned; and Lizzie was thankful indeed when she heard that Mrs. Spencer was willing to give her another trial, since it had been clearly proved that she had not stolen the fruit knife.
To her mistress in after years, she proved "worth her weight in gold;" for no one could be more steady and reliable, more cheerful and content, than Lizzie was after her three months' sojourn with the gypsies.
THE END.

= = = PG24645 = = =
A HARUM-SCARUM SCHOOLGIRL
Produced by Suzanne Shell, Casey Peel and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
A HARUM-SCARUM SCHOOLGIRL
[Illustration: "COULD YOU DO ME A KINDNESS, MISS?" SHE ASKED _Page 252_]
A HARUM-SCARUM SCHOOLGIRL
BY
ANGELA BRAZIL
_Illustrated by John Campbell_
NEW YORK FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY PUBLISHERS
_Copyright, 1920, by_
FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY
_All rights reserved_
Contents
CHAP.                              Page
I. A PIXIE GIRL                   9
II. STARS AND STRIPES             23
III. A PENNILESS PRINCESS          39
IV. THE RUSH-BEARING              51
V. DIANA DARES                   65
VI. FRENCH LEAVE                  77
VII. LAND GIRLS                    91
VIII. ARMISTICE DAY                108
IX. DIANA'S ENGLISH CHRISTMAS    128
X. A FIT OF THE BLUES           141
XI. DIANA TO THE RESCUE          153
XII. DIANA BREAKS OUT             167
XIII. CRUSOE ISLAND                178
XIV. SPOOKS                       195
XV. JOY-RIDING                   207
XVI. A FAMILY CREST               219
XVII. THE GREEN-EYED MONSTER       235
XVIII. DIANA'S FOUNDLING            247
XIX. AMBITIONS                    259
XX. A TANGLED PLOT               271
Illustrations
Page
"COULD YOU DO ME A KINDNESS, MISS?" SHE ASKED _Frontispiece_
"O-O-O-OH! HOW GORGEOUS TO BELONG TO A HIGH-FALUTING FAMILY THAT'S GOT LEGENDS AND GHOSTS!"                    48
WE SET OFF AND RODE ALL THE MORNING                      144
ITS COWL FELL BACK, AND DISCLOSED A WELL-KNOWN AND DECIDEDLY MIRTHFUL COUNTENANCE                       200
A HARUM-SCARUM SCHOOLGIRL
CHAPTER I
A Pixie Girl
"If I'd known!" groaned Winifred Cranston, otherwise Wendy, with a note of utter tragedy in her usually cheerful voice. "If I'd only known! D'you think I'd have come trotting back here with my baggage? Not a bit of it! Nothing in this wide world should have dragged me. I'd have turned up my hair--yes, it's _quite_ long enough to turn up, Jess Paget, so you needn't look at it so scornfully; it's as nice as yours, and nicer! Well, I tell you I'd have turned up my hair, and run away and joined the 'Waacs' or the 'Wrens', or have driven a motor wagon or conducted a tramcar, or scrubbed floors at a hospital, or done anything--_anything_, I say!--rather than stay at the Abbey without Mrs. Gifford."
"It's pretty stiff, certainly, for the Head to go whisking away like this," agreed Magsie Wingfield, sitting on the other shaft of the wheelbarrow. "And without any notice either! It leaves one gasping!"
"Stiff? It's the limit! Why didn't she give us decent warning, instead of springing it on to us in this sudden fashion? I feel weak!"
"There wasn't time," explained Sadie Sanderson, who, with Violet Gorton and Tattie Clegg, occupied, in a tight fit, the interior of the wheelbarrow. "It was all done at a day's notice. Geraldine's been telling me the whole history."
"Well?"
"Mr. Gifford got suddenly exempted, and was made Governor of some outlandish place with an unpronounceable name in Burma. He telegraphed to Mrs. Gifford to join him at Marseilles, and go out with him. So she went--that's the long and the short of it!"
"Went and left her school behind her," echoed Vi.
"I call it simply running away," commented Wendy. "Why couldn't she have stopped to arrange things--say till Christmas--and then followed him?"
"It's some tiresome red-tape business at the War Office. They'd give her a passport to travel out _with_ him, but not to join him afterwards, so she thought she'd better take the opportunity and go out with him while she could. It must have been a terrific scramble for her to get off. I believe she just bundled her things together and bolted, and left the school to Miss Todd."
"Will she ever come back?"
"I shouldn't think it's likely now."
"Then we're left for evermore to the tender mercies of Toddlekins?"
"That's just about the size of it. Toddlekins has taken the whole thing over."
"She's been longing and yearning to seize the reins and drive the coach ever since she came," commented Tattie.
"Well, she's got her chance now."
"And she'll use it, too! You bet there'll be changes!"
"Changes! There are changes already, although Mrs. Gifford can hardly have reached Marseilles yet."
"It's going to be a queer term," grunted Wendy.
The five girls were sitting in a retired corner of the garden at Pendlemere Abbey. On one side, above the tops of the rhododendron bushes, they could see the tall, twisted chimneys and flagged stone roof of the old house; on the other side, below the lawn and across the paddock, gleamed the silver waters of the lake, with its banks of rushes and alders, and beyond lay a range of grey hills that seemed to melt away into more distant peaks that merged into the mists on the horizon. It was a beautiful view, and on this hazy September afternoon, with the hidden sun sending long shafts of light from behind radiant masses of cloud, it formed a prospect that should have afforded keen æsthetic satisfaction to anybody who cared to look at it. Usually the girls appreciated its changeful glories, but to-day--this first day of a new term--they were too much taken up with their own grievances to think about scenery. In fact, they sat huddled together in the wheelbarrow with their backs towards the view.
It had certainly been a considerable shock to the girls to find, on arriving after the holidays, that their popular Principal had deserted them in so sudden a fashion. It was not indeed the first surprise which she had given them. Two years before she had been Miss Housman, with a purely educational outlook in life, and a horizon bounded by her school; but Cupid, who plays strange pranks even with head mistresses, brought her fate along in the shape of a major from the temporary camp by the lake, and shot his arrows with such deadly aim that the whole romantic business--courtship, engagement, and war wedding--took place in the course of a few weeks, almost under the very noses of her interested pupils. They had gone home for their Easter holidays much thrilled about her engagement ring, and had returned to school to find her a war bride, with her husband already in the trenches. When the excitement of choosing her a wedding present was over, matters seemed to settle down pretty much as before. Except in an increased anxiety for news from the front, Mrs. Gifford had differed in no degree from Miss Housman. To the school the Major was a mere abstraction; his leave had always occurred during the holidays, and up to this time his existence--apart from the element of romance with which it invested their head mistress--had not affected the atmosphere of Pendlemere in the least. It had occasionally occurred to some of the girls to question what would happen when the war was over, but they generally ended by deciding: "He'll have to come and live here, I suppose, and turn the junior room into a smoke-room". Some of the more imaginative had even ventured the suggestion that he might teach drilling and Latin. It never struck any of them that instead of settling down at the school he would want to whisk away his bride to the other side of the world. The unexpected had happened, however. Pretty Mrs. Gifford had decided that the claims of matrimony outweighed all consideration for her pupils, and had gone without even a good-bye, leaving Miss Todd to reign in her stead.
There was no doubt that Miss Todd was admirably fitted to fill the post. Possibly, unknown to the girls, she had been gravitating towards it ever since her principal's hasty war wedding. Certainly she was ready, with the utmost calm, to take over the school at the critical moment, and transfer the connection from Mrs. Gifford's name to her own. She was a woman of decided character, at her prime intellectually and physically, tremendously interested in reconstruction problems, and longing to try some educational experiments. So far, her ambitious schemes had been much hampered by her Head. Mrs. Gifford, pleasant and popular both with girls and parents, had clung to old-fashioned methods, and had been very difficult to move in the matter of modern innovations. She had always put on the curb when the second mistress's fertile imagination had pranced away on Utopian lines. To an ardent spirit, steeped in new race-ideals, and longing for an opportunity of serving her generation, it was a proud moment when she suddenly found herself in a position to carry out her pet schemes unchecked. On this first day of the new term she moved round the school with the satisfaction of an admiral reviewing a battleship.
It was much to Miss Todd's credit that she was able to take her fresh duties quite calmly, and without any fuss or exhibition of nerves. She was not a nervy woman, to begin with, and she had made a great point of cultivating self-control. With her tall figure, clear grey eyes, bright complexion, and abundant chestnut hair, she made a very favourable impression upon those parents who had brought their daughters back to school in person. At the moment when Wendy, Sadie, Tattie, Magsie, and Vi were sitting grousing in the wheelbarrow, Miss Todd, in the drawing-room, was completing an arrangement which was largely to affect their future.
"It's very short notice, of course," she was saying. "But, as it happens, there's a vacant bed, and I can manage it perfectly well."
"That's just a real relief to me!" replied a pleasant American voice from the sofa. "We can't take Diana with us to Paris, and I don't want to burden my cousin with her, so I said to my husband: 'There's nothing for it but school, only it must be a good one'. Well, we motored along to the nearest clergyman, introduced ourselves, and asked him to recommend a real first-class, high-toned British school that would take in Diana, and he said: 'Why, there's one on the spot here--you needn't go any farther!' Time was getting short, so we brought her right along. I must say I'm satisfied with all I've seen, and the talk I've had with you, and I feel we're leaving her in good hands. My cousin, Mrs. Burritt, will send over the rest of her things from Petteridge, and if there's anything else she needs please get it for her. Well, Steve, if we've to catch that 4.30 train, we must be going."
The tall dark gentleman in the arm-chair consulted his watch and rose hastily.
"Just time if we put on some speed; but the roads are execrable," he vouchsafed.
The central figure around whom this conversation had revolved had been sitting in the window gazing at the view over the lake. She now turned her head sharply, with an inscrutable expression in her dark grey eyes, and, walking across to her father, linked her arm in his. He bent down and whispered a few rapid words into her ear. Her mother patted her on the shoulder reassuringly.
"You're going to have a good time, Diana. Why, I expect you won't be wanting us to come back, you'll be so happy here. Address your letters under cover of the American Embassy, Paris, till we send you the name of our hotel. Good-bye! Be a good child and a credit to us."
The leave-taking was perhaps purposely cut short. Mr. and Mrs. Hewlitt each bestowed a swift kiss upon their daughter, then made a hasty exit to their waiting car, and were whirled away in the direction of Glenbury Station and the 4.30 train, and their ultimate destination of Paris.
Ten minutes later Lennie Browne, one of the juniors, disturbed the quintette on the wheelbarrow with a message.
"Miss Todd's sent me to find you," she announced. "You've got to come and make friends with a new girl."
Sadie, Vi, and Tattie quitted their seats so suddenly that Magsie and Wendy, still resting on the handles, came croppers on to the grass. Wendy rolled over into a comfortable position, and did not trouble to rise.
"Bunkum!" she remarked incredulously. "Don't try to rag _me_, Lennie Browne, for it won't come off. As it happens, I asked Toddlekins half an hour ago, and she said there were _no_ new girls. There!"
"Well, there's one now, at any rate."
Wendy looked at her pityingly, and shook her head.
"Lennie, you're a decent kid, but you're not clever. If you'd really wanted to have us on successfully, why didn't you try something more out of the common? You've a great lack of imagination. Anybody--yes, _anybody_--could have thought of inventing a new girl!"
"But I _haven't_ invented her--she's really here! She walked with me as far as the sundial, and I left her sitting on the seat while I went to look for you. I said I wouldn't be a minute. Why, there she is!--come to see what's become of me."
The quintette turned hastily, to find themselves confronted with an absolute endorsement of the truth of Lennie's statements. A stranger of about fourteen was walking towards them, or perhaps "shambling" would be a better description of her method of progress. She stooped badly, swung her arms in an awkward fashion, and shuffled her feet along the grass; her eyes were vacant, her chin was retreating, and her mouth was set in a foolish smile. For a full ghastly minute she stood and stared at the girls, and they, in utter and amazed consternation, could not think of a single intelligent remark with which to break the silence. Magsie was the first to recover herself.
"You--you've only just come, I suppose?" she gasped, as politely as she could.
The stranger gave a sickly giggle.
"Are you my new schoolfellows?" she asked in a low creaking voice. "Miss Todd said you'd be pleased to see me, and I must make friends with you. I've been wanting a bosom friend, so I'll just pick one of you out. Let me see"--running her vacant eyes over the group and singling out Wendy--"I may as well choose you as anybody. Are you ready to be my chum?"
Wendy flushed scarlet, and, jumping up from the grass, brushed some dead leaves from her dress.
"It's too soon to think about chums yet," she returned. "You haven't even told us your name, and you don't know ours. Where do you come from?"
"That means, I suppose, that you don't want me for a friend!" rasped the creaking voice. "Don't you like the look of me? What's wrong with me now? Please tell me, for I'd really like to know. I'm just crazy to make friends."
In huge embarrassment Wendy and her companions stared at the extraordinary stranger. She bore their united gaze without flinching. She even turned round slowly, so that they might have an adequate view of her foolish profile, protruding lips, and retreating chin.
"Do tell me what's wrong with me?" she repeated.
No one volunteered a criticism, and for another whole minute there was dead silence. Then a brisk voice remarked:
"Would this style suit you better now, I wonder?"
The girls caught their breath in amazement. The stooping, slouching figure had suddenly straightened itself up, the protruding lips had set into a small, neat mouth, the receding chin had come forward, and the vacant eyes were twinkling with mirth. Instead of a half-idiotic, and wholly unattractive, specimen of girlhood, a very charming little personality stood before them. The transformation was so utter that at first the audience simply gaped, then with one accord they exploded into laughter and words.
"Oh, I say!"
"You fraud!"
"I really thought you were dotty!"
"How _did_ you do it?"
"You looked too awful for words!"
"You haven't told us your name yet!"
"Can you do it again?"
The stranger curtsied, dropped her jaw, set her eyes in a glassy stare, and, resuming the creaking voice, bleated forth:
"Thank you! Thank you for welcoming me! I'm called Miranda Jane Judkins, and I come from Conic Section Farm, Squashville, Massachusetts. Which of you wants to chum with me? Don't all speak at once!"
"Oh, for goodness' sake drop that awful face! It absolutely gives me spasms!" hinnied Magsie. "It's the very image of a village idiot who used to terrify me when I was a kiddie. Don't look at me with those horrid eyes! I shall have a fit!"
"Look here, you mad thing!" said Vi. "Can't you tell us who you really are?"
"Miss Judkins."
"No, no! Your real name! Stop ragging!"
Once more the half-witted, shambling figure gave place to a sparkling, self-possessed, laughing young witch of fourteen, who with another mock curtsy introduced herself.
"Diana Hewlitt--quick-change artiste. Entertainments arranged at any moment. Reserved seats, five shillings. Proceeds to the Red Cross Fund. Oh, I believe at first I really _did_ take you in!"
"You did," admitted Wendy; "because, of course, we weren't expecting it. We shall know you better now, and be prepared. I say, you're rather a sport! Where have you turned up from? Miss Todd said only an hour ago there weren't any new girls."
"No doubt she told the truth. There weren't then! Why, an hour since we were just half-way between Glassenrigg and Scawdale, pelting along at about double the speed limit. Miss Todd didn't even know of my existence. I've been dropped upon her like a bolt from the blue. I must say I admired the calm way she fixed up to take me, all in ten minutes. Most Britishers wouldn't have fallen in so quickly with Dad's lightning methods, but she seemed to understand right away."
"Are you American, then?"
"Rather! I was born under the Stars and Stripes. Never saw England till we crossed this summer. Dad's just been called over to Paris, and d'you know, they've let Mother go with him, but they wouldn't give _me_ a passport. Wasn't it real mean of them? I do think the War Office is the limit! Well, of course, the question was: what could be done with me. I said: 'Leave me at Petteridge'. But Mother said: 'No; I'm not going to dump you on Cousin Coralie; she'd be down with nervous exhaustion at the end of a fortnight. School's the place for you, and we've got to rake round and find a school in double-quick time'. Dad nodded, and just rang up and ordered the car, and we started out with no more idea than the man in the moon where I was going to be landed. I'm glad fate tossed me here, though. It looks nice; kind of a real old-world flavour about the place, somehow. I'm crazy on old things--Scott's novels, you know, and castles, and all the rest of it. When I heard this was called Pendlemere Abbey, I said: 'That'll do! Take me there!' So here I am!"
"It takes one's breath away," commented Tattie. "I don't know that I'd like to be whisked off to school in such a precious hurry myself."
"It's rather as if the pixies had dropped you," laughed Vi.
"Right you are! I guess I'm a pixie sort of girl. Please don't expect 'prunes and prism' from me, for you won't get them!"
"I don't know that we want them," chuckled Wendy.
"That takes a weight off my mind, then," twinkled Diana. "I like mediæval abbeys and black beams and raftered roofs, and even ghosts; but I don't know that I exactly want mediæval schoolgirls."
"Don't alarm yourself," said Wendy, clapping her on the shoulder. "I assure you you'll find us all absolutely and entirely modern and up-to-date."
CHAPTER II
Stars and Stripes
If Diana was possessed with a passion for antiquities, she might certainly congratulate herself that a kindly fate had popped her into such an appropriate spot as Pendlemere Abbey. It offered every attraction to those in search of the romantic and picturesque. The Cistercian monks who had founded it in the thirteenth century had exhibited their proverbial good taste in the choice of a situation. It was built on rising ground above the lake, and commanded a glorious view across the fells. The garden, with its hill-side of rhododendrons, its clumps of sweet-smelling pines, and its borders of such hardy flowers as did not mind the nip of the northern air, ran steeply from a flat terrace towards the lake, where it ended in a landing-stage and a locked boat-house. Its orchard linked branches with the apple-trees of a neighbouring farm. The house itself, though preserving the name and the traditions of the Abbey, had been converted during Tudor times from religious to lay uses. Very little of the old monks' building remained intact, though evidences of it cropped up in unexpected quarters. There were the remains of a piscina in the pantry; a groined arch roofed the back kitchen; two carved stone pillars supported the fire-place in the dining-room; a Gothic doorway led into the courtyard, and the remnants of some ancient choir stalls were fitted as a window-seat on the stairs. The Tudor and Elizabethan periods had left more permanent traces, and, though later architects had played havoc with the simplicity of the style, they had not altogether destroyed its sixteenth-century appearance. The greater part was built of northern stone, with mullioned windows, twisted chimneys, peaked gables surmounted with stone balls, and a roof of flat slabs of the same yellow-brown stone that formed the walls. A section of black and white timbered Elizabethan work, a Queen Anne wing, and some early Victorian alterations made a strange conglomeration of styles of architecture; but the roses and ivy had climbed up and clothed ancient and modern alike, and Time had softened the jarring nineteenth-century additions, so that the whole now blended into a mellow, brownish mass, with large, bright windows enclosed in a frame of well-clipped greenery.
There was accommodation in the roomy old house for twenty boarders, and though no day pupils were supposed to be received a special exception had been made in the case of Meg and Elsie Fleming, the Vicar's daughters, who arrived every morning by nine o'clock, and Nell Gledhill, whose governess brought her each Friday afternoon for dancing-lessons. So far the school had jogged along very happily under Mrs. Gifford's mild regime. Fathers and mothers had sometimes shrugged their shoulders and hinted that her methods were old-fashioned, but they always added that the tone of the place was so excellent, and the health of the pupils so well looked after, that there was really no just cause for complaint. Miss Todd, sitting in her study, and writing twenty neat, well-thought-out letters to explain the sudden transfer of the school, assured parents that, while preserving all the traditions of her predecessor, she hoped to introduce a modern element of progress in keeping with the needs of the day. "I realize that we must march with the times," she wrote; and she meant it. She began her innovations on that very first day. Several disconsolate seniors congregated on the upper landing viewed change number one with dismay.
"But Mrs. Gifford promised that Geraldine and Ida and I might have the East room," urged Nesta Erskine. "It was all arranged last term, and we clubbed together to buy a bookcase. What are we to do with it if we're separated? It belongs to us all three."
"I can't help it; those are Miss Todd's orders," answered Miss Beverley briskly. "Your names are on cards pinned on to the doors of your new rooms. Pass along at once, and find your quarters and begin to unpack. Don't stand here blocking up the passage! Yes, Betty? Miss Hampson wants to speak to me? Tell her I'm coming now."
As Miss Beverley bustled away the seniors moved slowly and forlornly along the landing in quest of billets. It reminded them of finding their places in an examination-room. Their names were unquestionably on the doors in black-and-white, but their distribution called forth a storm of indignant comment.
"I'm actually put with Tattie Clegg and Jess Paget!"
"And I'm boxed up with Dorothy, and Nora Haddon, and Glynne Hamilton!"
"Why, we're all mixed up with the kids!"
"Look here, you know, we can't stand this kind of thing!"
"Somebody had better go to Miss Todd!"
"It's no use; I've just been," said Loveday Seton, joining the group of malcontents. "We had it all out in the study, and she listened quite kindly and politely, but she was firm as nails. She says it's an experiment for the sake of good tone, and she hopes it will work well. We seniors are sandwiched up with intermediates and juniors so that our influence may permeate through the school."
The five listeners groaned.
"Couldn't we permeate enough during the daytime?" sniffed Ida. "I don't see what influence I can have while I'm asleep. I call it a jolly nuisance to be saddled with three kids in one's room."
"Of course you have your curtains."
"What's the use of curtains? A cubicle's only semi-private after all. What it means is that we seniors are always on duty policing those juniors. What a life!"
"Where are you put, Loveday?" asked Geraldine.
"In the little ivy room upstairs. There are two beds, and I'm to act mentor to this new American girl who's just arrived."
"Poor you! What's she like?"
"I don't know. I haven't seen her yet, but I wish she were at Jericho."
In a decidedly ruffled frame of mind, Loveday passed along the landing, and climbed the stairs that led to the ivy room. She found her room-mate already in possession, and with her belongings half-unpacked. Photos adorned her dressing-table, a large American flag draped the mirror, and her bed was spread with odds and ends. She smiled broadly as Loveday entered.
"So here you are!" she greeted her. "Goody! What a relief! I've been worrying about what you'd be like, and just praying you wouldn't have spectacles and talk with a lisp. Miss Todd gave me to understand you were a peach, and I might think myself in luck to room with you, but you never can trust head mistresses till you see for yourself. She's told me the truth, though, after all. Yes, I like you right straight away, and I always make up my mind about people, slap bang off at once."
Loveday stared in surprise at the impetuous little figure kneeling beside the big trunk. Diana's dark-grey eyes shone like stars, her oval face, if not exactly pretty, was piquant and interesting, her light-brown hair curled at the tips. It was, of course, an unheard-of liberty for a new girl, and an intermediate to boot, thus to address a senior, but the greeting was spontaneous and decidedly flattering. The grey eyes, in fact, expressed open admiration. On the whole, Loveday decided to waive ceremony and tradition for the nonce.
"We've been put together for the term, so we must make the best of each other," she conceded, more graciously than she had intended to address the interloper. "I'm glad to see you've kept to your own side of the room, and haven't overflowed into mine."
"No fear!" chuckled Diana. "I've been at school before, and learnt not to spread myself out. We're on rather a short allowance of space, aren't we? Are these drawers all I've got? I shall have just to wedge my things in. There's my cabin trunk to come yet."
"You may have three pegs in the landing cupboard, and a locker in the cloak-room, but anything else will have to be stored in the box-room. I should think you had enough clothes there to last you a year, instead of wanting another trunk full."
Diana shook her head.
"They're all mixed up. We packed in half an hour. I just flung in the first things that came to hand. Cousin Cora promised to send on the rest of my luggage after me. If she doesn't, I'd best 'phone."
"You'd have a little difficulty to do that," said Loveday dryly.
"D'you mean to say there's no 'phone here, or"--looking round the room--"no electric light either?"
"Certainly not. We go to bed with candles."
"Well! I wanted mediæval ways, and it looks as if I was going to get them. It'll be rather a stunt to go to bed by candle-light. Are there any ghosts about this place? Or skeletons built into the wall? Or dungeons with rusting chains? Or mysterious footsteps? Oh! I thought there'd have been at least something spooky in a house that claims to be six hundred years old."
Diana's cabin trunk arrived in the course of a few days. She sorted out a selection of her numerous belongings, arranged them in her limited number of drawers, and consigned the surplus back to her boxes to be stored in the attic. This done, and a telegram received to announce the safe arrival of her father and mother in Paris, she seemed prepared to settle down. Her fellow intermediates, biased largely by her generosity in the matter of chocolates, gave her, on the whole, a favourable reception. Wendy even went further, and proffered friendship.
"You're just the jolly kind of girl I like," she explained. "I think we might have some topping times together, and wake up the school. Things are apt to get a little dull sometimes."
Diana nodded intelligently.
"I know. It was just the same at my last school. Everyone got into a sort of stick-in-the-mud mood, and one felt it was only _kind_ to stir them up. I guess I did it!"
"I shouldn't wonder if you did," twinkled Wendy. "I vote we make an alliance, and, if one of us thinks of any rather ripping rag, she just tells the other, and we'll play it off together."
"Right you are! Let's shake on it!" agreed Diana, extending a small, slim hand, with a garnet birthstone-ring on the middle finger.
The little American did not fit into her niche at Pendlemere without encountering a certain amount of what her schoolmates considered necessary discipline for a novice. She had to go through an ordeal of chaff and banter. She was known by the sobriquet of "Stars and Stripes", or "The Yank", and good-natured fun was poked at her transatlantic accent. She took it good-temperedly, but with a readiness of repartee that laid the jokers flat.
"One can't get much change out of Diana," commented Magsie, after an unsuccessful onslaught of teasing.
"I think she's a scream," agreed Vi.
The baffling part of the new schoolmate was that her powers of acting were so highly developed that it was impossible to tell whether she was serious or playing a part. She "took in" her teasers times out of number, and in fairness they deserved all they got. Towards the end of the first week she came into the intermediate room one morning fondling a letter.
"From Paris," she vouchsafed. "Dad and Mother have got anchored at last. The journey must have been a startler. Paris is so full of Americans, it's like a little New York."
"Why do you call it 'Parr-is'?" sniggered Sadie.
"It's more like the French than your way of saying it, at any rate," retorted Diana smartly. "This letter's been four days in coming through."
"You might give me the stamp."
"Certainly not. You don't deserve it. I wish I were in Paris, too. Yes, I shall call it 'Parr-is'. I'm beginning to want some of my own folks."
"I've never met any Americans, except you," volunteered Vi. "What are they like?"
"What do you imagine they're like?"
"Like the pictures of 'Uncle Sam', with a limp shirt front, and a big tie, and a goatee beard. I want to meet some real out-and-out Yankees."
"Won't your cousins from Petteridge ever come over to see you, Di?" asked Magsie.
"Perhaps they may, sometime," replied Diana thoughtfully. "I should say it's quite within the bounds of possibility, considering they only live ten miles away."
"Gee-whiz! I guess I'd just admire to make their acquaintance!" mocked Vi. "I reckon they'll be _some_ folks!"
Diana's eyes were fixed upon her with an inscrutable look, but she answered quite calmly:
"I'll take care to introduce you if they come."
It was in the course of the next few days that a parcel for Diana arrived from Petteridge Court. What it contained nobody saw except herself, for she did her unpacking in private. Judging from certain outbursts of chuckling, the exact cause of which she steadily refused to reveal, the advent of her package gave her profound satisfaction. The next Saturday afternoon was wet: one of those hopelessly wet days that are apt to happen in a land of lakes and hills. Banks of mist obscured the fells; the garden walks were turned to running rivers, the bushes dripped dismally, and cascades poured from the gutters. The school, which had been promised a country tramp, looked out of the windows with woeful disappointment. The seniors consoled themselves by holding a committee meeting, from which all but their elect selves were rigidly excluded. The juniors took possession of the play-room, and relieved their spirits by games which made the maximum of noise. Several of the intermediates peeped in, but, finding the place a mixture of a bear-garden and the Tower of Babel, they retired to the sanctuary of their own form-room, where they sat making half-hearted efforts to read or paint, and grousing at the weather.
"Is _every_ Saturday going to be wet?" demanded Magsie in an injured voice.
"Seems like it!" mourned Jess Paget. "Of course it can be beautifully fine on Friday, when we have to stop in and do dancing; and it just keeps all the rain for Saturday. I call it spiteful! I wish I knew what to do with myself. I'm moping."
"Get a book out of the library."
"I loathe reading."
"Do some painting."
"You know I can't paint."
"Go and romp with the juniors."
"I'd as soon spend an hour in a monkey-house."
"Then I can't do anything for you, I'm afraid. You'll just have to mope."
"Where's Sadie?" asked Peggy Collins. "She promised to give me back my crochet-needle, and I can't get on without it."
"She went off with Diana and Wendy half an hour ago. I saw them running upstairs together. Don't flatter yourself she'll remember about your crochet-needle."
"I know she won't--the slacker! I shall just have to go and rout her up, and make her find it. Oh, kafoozalum! It's a weary world!"
Peggy rose languidly, stretched her arms, and strolled in the direction of the door, which at that identical moment opened to admit the missing Sadie.
"Here, you old blighter, where's that crochet-needle?" demanded Peggy impolitely.
"Bother your crochet-needle! I've no time to go and hunt for it now. I say, girls!" continued Sadie excitedly; "anybody know what's become of Diana? She's wanted. Those American cousins of hers have turned up. I told them she was in here, and they're waiting outside the door. Oh!"
Sadie's exclamation was caused by the door, which she had carefully closed suddenly opening, and nearly knocking her over. Apparently the visitors did not approve of being left to wait in the passage, and judged it expedient to make an entrance.
"Excuse me if we walk right in," said a nasal-toned voice; "but I was told we'd find Miss Diana Hewlitt in here."
The five girls, scattered about the room, stared for a second in blank amazement at the intruders. They were certainly unlike any other visitors who had ever come to Pendlemere. The speaker was a little, short, wiry man, in a slack-fitting, brown tweed suit, with a rather obtrusive striped tie. His raggy, grey beard straggled under his chin and up to his ears; his eyes twinkled through a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles; in defiance of European etiquette, he wore his hat over a crop of rough, grey hair. Clinging to his arm was a very stout lady in a green coat and a velvet turban adorned with feathers. She also was grey-haired, and her features were somewhat obscured by a thick, black veil. The most prominent thing about her was a large and obtruding tooth, which gave her somewhat the appearance of a good-natured walrus; she held a morocco-leather satchel in her unoccupied hand, and wore a large feather-boa round her neck.
Magsie, to her eternal credit, was the first to remember her manners, and offer some sort of a greeting to the extraordinary strangers.
"Er--good afternoon!" she stammered. "I'm afraid Diana isn't here. Shall--shall I go and fetch her?"
"Well, now, I'd call that real elegant of you," returned the stout lady heartily. "We can't stay long, and we don't want to waste time."
"Cora, I guess we'd best introduce ourselves," observed the gentleman, gently disengaging her from his arm. "We're Mr. and Mrs. Elihu Burritt of Petteridge Court. I reckon you're Diana's schoolfellows? Pleased to meet you, I'm sure."
"Did you have a wet drive?" asked Jess Paget, making a desperate and most gallant attempt to pump up some item of conversation.
The stout lady shook her head eloquently.
"I _do_ say that in the matter of weather a British wet day just about takes the cake!" she replied.
Her voice was slightly tremulous and muffled; perhaps the weather agitated her. Moreover, her large tooth seemed to cause her some inconvenience--it wobbled visibly as she spoke.
"If Diana don't turn up, I guess we'll have to be getting on," ventured Mr. Elihu Burritt, pulling out a big watch and consulting it. "We've got to call at the drug store at Glenbury, and time presses."
"Magsie's gone to fetch her. Peggy, you go too, and hurry her up. Won't you sit down while you're waiting?" asked Jess, pulling forward two chairs.
The visitors seated themselves, that is to say, they sank heavily down, and planted their hands on their knees. Their eyes took an interested review of the embarrassed faces of the girls, then they suddenly collapsed into gurgles of laughter. An instant wave of comprehension swept through the room.
"Diana and Wendy!" exclaimed a chorus of voices.
Mr. Elihu Burritt was guffawing to such an extent that his hat, and the venerable locks stitched inside it, tumbled to the ground, revealing a crop of brown hair. Mrs. Cora had lost her tooth altogether, and her turban was tilted to a most disreputable angle. She slapped her partner on the back, and commanded, between sobs of mirth:
"Elihu--stop laughing! I guess we'd best wangle ourselves off!"
But the girls had crowded round to examine the details of the costumes.
"They're topping!" they approved. "Absolutely A1! Can't think how you did it! Diana, where did you get those togs?"
"Sent to Petteridge for them," exulted Diana. "They came in that parcel. It's an old suit of Cousin Hugh's. I told Cousin Coralie I wanted it to dress up in. The beard's just made out of tow, and so's Wendy's hair. Flatter myself I came up to your expectations of a real backwoods Yank. I wonder if I'd take in Miss Todd. I'd give a hundred dollars to try. But it might be rather a risky experiment. Don't you think my old girl is a peach? I'm nuts on her!"
"I simply shouldn't have known you, Wendy," said Jess. "How did you make yourself so fat?"
"I'm stuffed out with all sorts of things," laughed Wendy. "Vests, and nightdresses, and stockings, and anything we could lay our hands on. I'm specially padded over the shoulders. The toque is one of Diana's hats turned inside out with some feathers pinned on. The tooth? Why, that was a piece of india-rubber tucked inside my lip. It was fearfully difficult to make it stick, I can tell you. It kept jiggling about when I tried to talk. Elihu, old man, shall we dance a tickle-toe?"
"Stop, you mad creatures! If you make such a racket you'll be bringing Bunty down upon us," interposed Magsie, as the masquerading couple twirled each other round and round. "If you want to be ready in time for tea, you'd better go and get out of those weird garments."
"I'd like to go down to tea in them," declared Diana. "What a lovely sensation they'd make! Magsie, just peep out and see that the coast is clear before we make a dash for it along the passage. It might upset Bunty's nerves if she met us."
As it happened, during the very next week Diana received a visit from her cousins, Mr. and Mrs. Burritt of Petteridge Court. They arrived in their Daimler car, and lunched with the school. They were the very epitome of cultured and polished America, and the girls raved over them. After half an hour of their company, seven intermediates had determined to mould themselves absolutely on the lines of "Cousin Coralie", and to marry exact replicas of Mr. Burritt. It was felt that ambition could soar no higher.
"I'm glad you like them," said Diana, as she stood on the steps with some of her friends watching the Daimler pass out through the gate. "I thought you would--when they really turned up. That was why I wanted you to see 'Cousin Elihu' and 'Cousin Cora' first. They were more your idea of typical Americans, weren't they? Ah!"--shaking her head commiseratingly--"that's because you benighted Britishers just don't know anything about the _real_ America."
CHAPTER III
A Penniless Princess
Miss Todd, sitting at her desk in her study, with a row of the very latest publications on the most modern theories of education in a bookcase so near that she could stretch out her hand for any particular one she wanted, rapidly reviewed some of her new experiments. First and foremost came the plan of sandwiching seniors and juniors together in their bedrooms. She hoped the influence of the elder girls would work like leaven in the school, and that putting them with younger ones would give them the chance of developing and exercising their motherly instincts. She tapped her book with her pencil as she mentally ran over the list of her seniors, and considered how--to the outside view of a head mistress--each seemed to be progressing.
"It's difficult to foster just the spirit one wants in them--it depends so largely on the girl," she decided.
And there she was right--the girl made all the difference. Hilary Chapman had listened to her remarks on "the mother instinct", and had walked straight into her dormitory, tow-rowed her young room-mates for their untidiness, snapped at their excuses, and sent them downstairs with a snubbing, returning to the bosom of the seniors ruffled, but with a strong sense of having performed her obvious duty. Betty Blane, Erica Peters, and Peggy Collins, comparing injured notes, viewed the matter from a different angle.
"Calls herself a mother, does she? Jolly more like a step-mother, I should say," objected Erica.
"Pretty grizzly to be boxed up with Hilary for a whole term," lamented Betty.
"I'm _not going_ to be 'mothered' by her," proclaimed Peggy with energy. "She's only two years older than I am, and yet from the airs she gives herself you'd think she was Methuselah."
"You don't _look_ like her daughter," remarked Betty, who was literal-minded to a fault.
Peggy made an eloquent grimace.
"I'm an undutiful one, at any rate," she laughed. "I'm afraid Hilary will find me somewhat of a handful."
Up in the little ivy room, however, matters were going somewhat better. Diana and Loveday, after a few minor differences, dovetailed both their possessions and their dispositions so as to admit of the least possible friction. It was fortunate for Diana, for she had a side to her character that would have bristled into porcupine quills had she been placed with Hilary. Loveday's particular temperament soothed her down.
"I'm falling in love with her," she admitted to Wendy. "I was taken with her, of course, the moment I saw her, but I believe now I'm going to have it badly. I think she's beautiful! If there were a Peach Competition, she'd win at a canter."
Such a pandering to the "pomps and vanities" as a Beauty Show was certainly not an item in the list of new experiments at Pendlemere, but there was a general consensus of opinion that Loveday held the palm in the matter of looks. She was a fair, slender girl, with delicate features, a clear complexion, and a quantity of long flaxen hair. She spoke prettily, but without affectation, and always gave an impression of great refinement. The wistful look that sometimes shaded her blue eyes was, on the whole, attractive.
"She's like a picture I once saw of Eve just turned out of Paradise," commented Diana, sitting with Wendy and Tattie in the window-seat on the stairs.
"Not half a bad shot," said Wendy. "In fact, it just about hits the mark. In a way, Loveday _is_ turned out of Paradise. That's to say, I suppose, if her grandfather hadn't gambled, the Abbey would have belonged to her."
"What Abbey?"
"Why, this, of course, stupid!"
"Do you mean to say Loveday's folks used to _own_ this place?"
"They did. Owned it for hundreds of years. They were an old Border family, and mixed up with the rebellion of 1745, and all sorts of interesting things. Loveday's grandfather was the regular old-fashioned sporting kind of squire you read about in books. He gambled the whole property away. I suppose it used to be a fine place in his day. I've heard he kept eight hunters, and always had the house full of guests while his money lasted. Then there was a grand smash up, and everything had to be sold--house, horses, furniture, and all. He went abroad and died of a broken heart--never smiled again, and all that sort of thing, you know."
"How fearfully romantic!" gasped Diana. "Of course it was his own fault for gambling, but still one feels sorry for him. Did Loveday live here too when she was little?"
Wendy shook her head.
"I shouldn't think so. I believe it happened ever such a long time ago; before she was born, even."
"Couldn't her father get it back?"
"I suppose not. Besides, he's dead too. Loveday is an orphan. She's neither father nor mother."
"Where does she live, then, when she's at home?"
"With an uncle and aunt--her mother's relations. But she never talks very much about them, so we fancy they're not particularly nice to her. She has no brothers or sisters. I think she feels lonely, if you ask my opinion, but she's too proud to say so."
"And Pendlemere ought to be hers! How romantic!" repeated Diana. "I wanted to stay in a real old-fashioned mediæval British house, and here I'm plumped into a story as well. It's most exciting! What's going to happen next? Is Loveday going to get it back? Will she marry the man who owns it? Or will somebody leave her a fortune? Or will she find a lost will? How do stories generally end?" continued Diana, casting her mind over a range of light literature which she had skimmed and half forgotten.
Wendy disposed of each of the suggestions in turn.
"There isn't anybody to leave her a fortune; and what's the good of finding a will when the place is sold? The present owner is a fat old fellow of fifty, with a wife already, and, even if _she_ died, I shouldn't think Loveday would want to marry him. He has three daughters older than she is, and he's quite bald."
Diana looked baffled. Her romantic plan of restoring the fortunes of the Seton family through matrimony certainly did not seem hopeful.
"I'm fearfully sorry for Loveday," confided Tattie. "I know something about her, because some friends of ours live near her aunt. They say she gets very much snubbed; her cousins make her feel it's not her own home. She wants to go to college, but it's doubtful if she'll be able. Nesta Erskine says Loveday is just _counting_ on a career. She wants to be independent of her aunt."
"It must be horrible to be snubbed," commented Diana thoughtfully.
She had admired Loveday before, but now she looked at her room-mate with new eyes. To Diana there was something fascinating about the idea of a "penniless princess".
"Do your ancestors go right slap-bang back to the Conquest?" she asked interestedly, while she was undressing that evening.
"Well, not quite so far as that," smiled Loveday, diligently brushing a flaxen mane ripply with plaiting. "But I believe there were Setons in the fourteenth century, long before they had the Abbey from Edward the Sixth's commissioners. There are all sorts of stories and legends about them, of course."
"What kind of stories? Do tell me! I'd just admire to hear. I'm crazy on Border ballads and legends. Tell me, while I fix my hair."
"Well, there was little Sir Rowland. When he was only six years old his father was killed in one of the battles of the Wars of the Roses. They were Lancastrians, and the Yorkists seized his estate, and Rowland was only saved from the fury of the conquering party by the devotion of his nurse. She managed to hide him in a secret place in the tower till there was an opportunity to escape, and then she got him away to her father's house in the midst of a wild tract of forest. He lived there, disguised as a forester, for years and years, and helped to cut wood and to hunt, and only two or three people knew the secret of his birth. He used to go errands sometimes to the great Hall of the neighbourhood, and there he saw Lady Anne, the beautiful daughter of Lord Wharton, and fell desperately in love with her. One day when she was out riding he was able to save her from the attack of an infuriated stag, and I suppose she was very grateful, and perhaps showed her feelings too plainly, for her father shut her up in a turret-room, and ordered her to marry somebody whom she didn't like at all. I don't know what would have happened, but just then Henry VII came to the throne, and one of his first acts was to restore Sir Rowland Seton to his possessions and dignity. Lord Wharton must have thought him an eligible suitor then, for he was allowed to marry the Lady Anne, and take her away to his castle. Their tomb is in Dittington Church. He was killed at the Battle of Flodden, and one of his sons with him.
"There's a romantic story, too, about Sir Roderick Seton, who lived at the Abbey here in the days of Charles I. He had a stone seat made, and put just by the front door. The first person who sat on it was a lovely girl named Katherine, and he said to her: 'Katherine, you have sat on my seat, so you must give me three kisses as toll'. Not very long after he went away to London, leaving his brother William to look after the estate. Then civil war broke out, and he joined the Royalist forces, and followed the young King Charles into exile. After the Restoration he journeyed north, and came on foot to his old home. It was years and years since he had left there, and nobody had had any tidings about him, or knew whether he was alive or dead. He found his brother William, who was now married to Katherine, sitting with her and their two children on the stone seat by the door. He asked them for a night's lodging, and, though they did not know who he was, they took him in and treated him kindly. Next morning he asked his hostess to accompany him to the door, and, pointing to the stone seat, said:
"'It is many years since I had three kisses from the dame who first sat on it.'
"She recognized him then, and ran joyously to call the rest of the household. His brother at once wished to hand over the keys to him, but he would not accept them. 'I am old and childless,' he said. 'All I ask here is bed and board till you carry me to the churchyard.' He lived with them for some years, and devoted himself to study. The people of the neighbourhood venerated him as a sage, and after his death he was supposed on very special occasions to appear and give the family warning of future trouble. They say he was seen before the Battle of Culloden, and several times during the Napoleonic wars; but of course I can't vouch for that--it's only legend."
Diana, sitting up in bed with the curtains of her cubicle drawn aside to listen, gave a long-drawn, breathless sigh.
"O-o-o-oh! How gorgeous to belong to a highfaluting family that's got legends and ghosts. I'm just crazy to hear more. What about the house? Aren't there any dungeons or built-up skeletons or secret hiding-places? There _ought_ to be, in a real first-class mediæval place like this."
Loveday was plaiting her flaxen hair into two long braids; she paused with the ribbon in her hand.
"I don't know--as you say, there ought to be. I've often wondered--especially since----" She hesitated.
"Since what?" urged Diana, scenting the beginning of a mystery.
"Since something that happened once."
"When? Oh, _do_ tell me!"
"I've never told anybody."
Diana hopped out of bed, and flung two lace-frilled arms round her room-mate, clinging to her with the tenacity of a young octopus.
"Oh, Loveday! Ducky! Tell me! I shan't let you go till you promise. Please! please!" she entreated.
"If you strangle me I can't tell anything. Get back into bed, Diana! I don't know whether it was really important, but it may have been. It happened when I was quite a little girl. I had a slight attack of measles, and of course I was kept in bed. Mother was nursing me, and one afternoon she went out to do some shopping and left me to have a nap. I wasn't sleepy in the least, and it was horribly dull staying there all by myself. I remembered a book I wanted to read which was in the dining-room bookcase, so I did a most dreadfully naughty thing: I jumped up, put on my dressing-gown and bedroom slippers, and ran downstairs to fetch _At the Back of the North Wind_. I opened the dining-room door and marched in, and then I got a surprise, for seated in a chair by the fire was a stranger. He looked as much surprised as I was.
"'Hallo!' he said. 'We go to bed early in this part of the world, don't we? Or are we only getting up?'
"I walked to the fire and warmed my hands, and looked at him calmly. I was a funny child in those days.
"'It's neither,' I answered. 'I've got measles.'
"'Then please don't give them to me,' he laughed. 'I assure you I don't want them. Look here! I called to see your father, or, failing your father, your mother. They're both out, and I've been waiting half an hour for either of them to come in. I can't stay any longer. Will you give them a message from me? Say I've been over at Pendlemere Abbey, and that I've made a most interesting discovery there. If they care to communicate with me, I'll tell them about it. Here's my card with my address. Now I must bolt to keep an appointment. You'll remember the message?'
[Illustration: "O-O-O-OH! HOW GORGEOUS TO BELONG TO A HIGH-FALUTING FAMILY THAT'S GOT LEGENDS AND GHOSTS!"]
"He flung his card on the table, went out of the room, and I heard the hall door bang after him. I stood for a moment thinking. If I gave this message, Mother would know that I had been out of bed and downstairs, and I should be sure to get a tremendous scolding. I was a naughty little girl in those days; I took the card, flung it on the fire, seized _At the Back of the North Wind_ from the bookcase, and tore upstairs again. Of course I caught cold, and had rather a serious relapse which puzzled everybody. No one except myself knew the reason, and I took good care not to tell. Only six months afterwards I lost both my father and mother, and went to live with my aunt at Liverpool. What became of the stranger I don't know. I didn't even remember his name."
"You weren't living at the Abbey then?"
"No, no! We never lived at the Abbey. It was sold before I was born. I believe at that time it was empty, and a caretaker used to allow tourists to look through it. I suppose that gentleman was a tourist."
"What had he found?"
"That's a question I've asked myself a hundred times. Was it a sliding panel or a secret door? Or was he simply some antiquarian crank who wanted to prove that the Abbey was of Norman origin, or built on a Roman foundation? How I wish I hadn't forgotten his name! When I heard that Pendlemere had been turned into a school I begged my aunt to send me here. For a long time she wouldn't, and I went to a day-school. Then two years ago she and uncle decided to send me to a boarding-school, so again I asked to come here, and after a great deal of urging they let me. I hoped I might find out something. I'm always hunting about, but I've never yet made the 'interesting discovery'."
"Where have you looked?" asked Diana, immensely thrilled.
"Oh, everywhere! I've tapped panels, and pushed bits of carving to see if they'd move, but they're all absolutely firm and solid. I've had no luck."
"I'll go exploring on my own."
"Well, if you do, don't tell the other girls. I hate to pose as a sort of turned-out heiress, and have them pitying me. If they knew I was hunting for hiding-places, I believe some of them would rag me dreadfully. I should never hear the last of it. They'd always be pretending they'd found something, just to tease me."
"And yet you ought to have been the heiress," mused Diana.
"It's no use talking about being an heiress when the place was sold before I was born," returned Loveday rather bitterly. "I've told you this, but I trust you not to go blabbing it all over the school. If you're ready, I'll blow out the candle. Miss Hampson will be round in a minute."
CHAPTER IV
The Rush-bearing
Among Miss Todd's modern principles of education was the sensible theory that if you can once get a girl interested in a subject she will learn without any labour, and that self-acquired knowledge is far more readily retained than facts which are crammed down one's throat. More especially she applied this to history. Instead of making it a dry catalogue of dates of kings and battles, she tried to show the gradual evolution of the British nation from the barbarism of the Stone Age to present-day civilization. She dwelt much on folk-lore, ancient customs and traditions, and especially encouraged the study of all local legends and observances. In this she found an ally in the new vicar who had lately come to the church at Pendlemere, and whose daughters, Meg and Elsie, attended the school as day-girls. Mr. Fleming was an enthusiastic antiquarian, and revelled in the history of the neighbourhood. He went round his parish collecting information from the oldest inhabitants with regard to vanished and vanishing customs, and took notes for a book which he hoped to write upon the folk-lore of the northern counties. In the heat of his ardour he suggested the revival of several quaint old festivals which had once held time-honoured places in the calendar of the year. First and foremost came the Rush-bearing. In ancient days it had been the custom of the parishioners to cut bundles of rushes, and, walking in procession to the church, to strew the floor thickly with them as a covering for the winter. They would be left till the spring, and cleared away in time for Easter. This old ceremony had long fallen into disuse, and was only remembered by village patriarchs as one of the yearly events of their far-away childhood.
Though it might not be desirable once more to strew the floor with rushes, Mr. Fleming suggested that it would be a pretty idea if the girls at Pendlemere School were to cut some bundles of them, tie them with ribbons, and carry them into the church on the date of the old festival, as a memorial of the past observance. Anything so interesting as going out to cut rushes appealed to the girls, and they readily adopted the suggestion. Miss Todd decided to turn the afternoon into a kind of natural history and antiquarian excursion.
"The rushes by the lake are not very easy to get," she explained, "but there are beauties growing on Fox Fell. We'll have a ramble there on Saturday, take our lunch, and bring back our bundles. Then we can plait our ribbons at our leisure on Monday, in time for the festival on Tuesday. Who wants to go? Anybody who likes may stay at home."
A rustle passed round the room, for nobody was anxious to be left out of the fun. Rambles were considered special treats at Pendlemere, and smiles decorated twenty faces at the prospect. At Geraldine's suggestion they did their Saturday prep. in Friday's recreation time.
"And get all your practising finished too," she urged. "If we can tell Miss Todd that our work's quite squared up, she'll let us stay out longer; but you know her. If there's a single girl who hasn't learnt her literature, or made up her music list, the whole crew of us will have to come trotting back. I'd be sorry for that girl!" Geraldine looked round the room grimly. "I should give her a very unpleasant time myself, and I expect the rest of you would, too. She'd richly deserve all she got."
Warned by the head girl's awful threat, tasks were completed in good time, and promptly by half-past ten the school, in a uniform of brown jerseys, brown tam-o'-shanters with orange tassels, strong boots, lunch-wallets slung over their shoulders, and sticks in their hands, were prepared, like a group of pilgrims, to make their start. Spot, the fox terrier, escorted them, barking his loudest. Meg and Elsie Fleming joined them in the village; so with Miss Todd and Miss Beverley they formed a party of twenty-four. They set their faces towards the fells, and stepped out briskly. They were not bound to walk in a crocodile, but, though some progressed in groups, most of the girls gravitated into pairs. Diana and Wendy linked arms as naturally as two pieces of mercury merge together in a box. Their spirits, usually high, were to-day at bubbling-over point: they laughed at everything, whether it was a joke or not.
"It's my first real mountain walk in England," announced Diana.
"Oh! I'm glad you allow they _are_ mountains," said Sadie, coming up from behind. "You've been bragging so hard about America, that I thought perhaps you'd consider them hillocks."
"They _are_ hillocks compared with the Rockies," flashed Diana. "I'm not going to give way an inch about America, so there!"
"All right, Uncle Sam, brag away. Everything over there is ten times bigger and better than here--the apples are the size of pumpkins, and the brooks are so wide you can't see across them, and it takes you years to ride round a single farm! We know! You needn't tell us again."
"I wasn't going to!" retorted Diana. "What's the use, when you can make it all up for yourself?"
"Oh! my invention's nothing to yours. I expect you're telling Wendy some startlers. I'm going to walk with Vi, she's more interesting than you two."
"What's the matter with Sadie?" asked Diana, as their schoolmate ran on to catch up Violet.
"Jealous!" said Wendy, shaking her head sagely. "She has these attacks sometimes, and I know the symptoms. She doesn't like to see you and me walking together. Last term she and I and Magsie and Tattie were in Dormitory 4. Magsie and Tattie did the 'twin cherries on one stalk' business all the time, so in self-defence Sadie and I had to chum, though we squabbled six times a day. I'm not going to be monopolized now, so she needn't think it. Let her chum with Vi if she likes, I'm sure I don't care. Hallo! Which stile do we go over here, I wonder?"
The two girls had lagged behind, so that the rest of the party, walking at the brisk pace set by Miss Todd, had passed on in front. Wendy mounted each stile in turn, and surveyed the prospect of fields and high hedges. There was not a solitary tam-o'-shanter to be seen from either of them. In much doubt she hesitated.
"It'll probably be to the left, because I know we have to go through that wood over there before we get out on to the fells," she conjectured.
"I can't help you," said Diana. "Is it any use tossing for it?"
They ventured to the left, and, after walking over three fields, found themselves in a narrow lane which terminated in a pond. It was such an evident cul-de-sac that there was nothing for it but to turn back. When they again reached the stiles they found Geraldine sitting upon the right-hand one. Her expression was thundery, and her greeting the reverse of cordial.
"Where _have_ you been, you two stupids? Why can't you keep up with the rest of us instead of side-tracking like this? Here you're keeping the whole party waiting, and I've had to turn back to hunt you up."
"Sorry to be on the earth!" apologized Wendy; "but we missed our way."
"Then it's your own fault, for we left the gipsy trail for you as plain as plain could be. Some people have no eyes!"
"What gipsy trail?"
Geraldine pointed laconically to the grass.
There, just by the right-hand stile, lay two crossed sticks. They were placed in a most obvious position. It was a marvel how they had escaped notice.
"You may well stare!" commented Geraldine with sarcasm.
"I believe I did see them," said Diana, "but I didn't know what they meant."
"Didn't know! Why, Sadie told you! I sent her on purpose. Miss Todd said we were to leave the gipsy trail at every doubtful place."
"Sadie never told us. She never said a single word."
"You probably didn't listen. Well, I can't argue it out now, the others are waiting, and Miss Todd's furious. Come along as fast as you can."
Diana and Wendy considered that the summary scolding which they received from Miss Todd, who was in too big a hurry to listen to any excuses, was entirely Sadie's fault, and a point to be settled up with her later. At present she scuttled on ahead, conveniently out of their way.
"Just let her wait!" vowed Wendy darkly.
It was necessary to step along briskly if they meant to accomplish the walk which Miss Todd had in her mind's eye, and anybody who has ever acted leader to a party of twenty-four knows the difficulty of making everyone keep the pace.
"I believe Toddlekins would like to rope us all together as if we were Swiss mountaineers," giggled Magsie, "or a gang of prisoners clanking chains. It's rather weak if one can't even stop to pick a flower."
They had passed through the wood by now, and were on the open fells. The view was gorgeous. The October sun flooded the landscape and showed up the wealth of autumn colour: tree-crested crags, ravines with brawling brooks, stretches of heather-clad moor, banks of faded bracken, rugged rocks and stony hill-crests were spread on the one hand, while to the west lay a distant chain of lakes, embosomed in meadows green as emerald, and reflecting the pale autumn sky in their smooth expanse. At the top of the first fell, Miss Todd called a halt. They had reached number one of the objects she had set in the day's programme. It was a pre-historic cromlech--three gigantic stones reared in the form of a table by those old inhabitants of our island whose customs and modes of worship are lost in the mists of antiquity. The storms and snows of many thousand years sweeping round it had slightly displaced the cap stone, but it stood otherwise intact, a grey, hoary monument to the toil of the short, dark neolithic race who once hunted on these self-same fells. The girls crowded round the cromlech curiously. It was large enough for four of them to sit underneath, and several crammed in as an experiment.
"Was it an altar?" asked Stuart.
"The altar theory is exploded now," said Miss Todd. "It is generally recognized that they were burial-places of great chiefs. The body would be placed inside, with stone weapons and drinking-cups, and any other articles the man had loved when he was alive. Then a great heap of stones and earth would be piled over and round it, to keep out the wolves which were the terror of early man. The weather, and perhaps farmers, have taken away the mound, and laid bare the cromlech; but look! here is one that is almost in its natural position."
The girls turned, and saw close by a rocky mound that jutted from among the crags. In its side was a small opening, just large enough to squeeze through. Miss Todd had brought candle and matches, and personally conducted relays of girls into the chamber within. They went curiously or timorously as the case might be.
"Is there a skeleton inside? I don't know whether I _dare_," shivered Tattie. "It's like going into a grave, and I'm scared to death."
"Don't be silly!" said Geraldine, who, with Loveday and Hilary, was making her exit. "There's nothing inside it. It's only like a cave."
"You're sure bogeys won't catch my legs?"
"Stop outside, if you're afraid."
"It's like a fairy-tale, and going into the gnome's hill," fluttered Magsie.
Everybody was determined to have a peep, and even Tattie mustered up sufficient courage to screw through the narrow portal, though she squealed in the process, and clung tightly to Magsie's hand. Diana and Wendy were among the last to effect the investigation. By that time the piece of candle was guttering out, and Miss Todd, tired of acting show-woman, returned to the open air, and gave marching orders.
Diana and Wendy, rather fascinated with the "Goblin Hole", as they called it, lingered, poking their noses inside the entrance.
"I didn't go in," said a voice behind them. Turning, they saw Sadie's face, interested, and half-regretful.
"Then you've lost your luck," said Diana decisively. "If you go in and turn round three times inside, you can have a wish, and it's bound to come true. You'd better do it. You've just time."
"In the dark?" hesitated Sadie.
"Quick! Go on!" urged her companions, standing back to make way for her. "Here are the matches."
Sadie struck a match, and cautiously ventured forward. The moment she was well inside Diana motioned to Wendy, and, catching up a piece of wood that lay on the ground, tilted it like a door across the entrance, and piled some stones against it. Then the pair fled. They heard an agonized shriek behind them, but they turned deaf ears to it.
They were half-way down the heathery hill-side when a very ruffled and indignant Sadie overtook them.
"Hallo! I thought you'd gone to live with the goblins," exclaimed Diana cheerfully.
"You're a pair of BEASTS!" exploded Sadie.
"Don't mench! What kind of beasts, please? Young gazelles or kittens?"
"Pigs would be more like it!" snapped Sadie. "To think of shutting me up alone in that bogey-hole! I might have lost my reason."
"Didn't fancy you'd go stark staring mad as fast as all that," chuckled Diana. "It didn't take you very long to push that door down."
"If we see any symptoms of insanity cropping out in you, we'll know the reason," added Wendy smartly.
"And you see it's been very good for you to know what it feels like to be left behind," rubbed in Diana. "You never told us about that gipsy trail dodge. Tit for tat's my motto."
"I think you're the two horridest girls in the school! I sha'n't speak to you again. You may consider yourselves funny, but no one else does," said Sadie witheringly, as she flounced away to hang on to Geraldine's arm, and pour her woes into the head girl's not too willing ear.
It was a good hour's walk from the cromlechs to Birk Water, the lake where they intended to pick the rushes. The path was the merest track, and the tramp through the heather and over rough and rugged stones well justified the thick footgear upon which Miss Todd had insisted. Birk Water was a lovely little mountain tarn lying under the shadow of Fox Fell, a smooth, grassy eminence down which hurried a noisy stream. They found a sheltered place in the sunshine on the bank, and sat down to eat their lunch. Hard-boiled eggs and cheese sandwiches tasted delicious in the open air, and for a special treat there was an apple apiece. In normal times the supply of apples was liberal, but this year the crop had failed, and they were rare dainties.
"I sympathize with Eve," said Wendy, munching blissfully. "It must have been a very great temptation, especially with 'knowledge' thrown in. Just think of being able to eat an apple that would teach you all your dates and French verbs."
"There weren't any dates then, unless they counted the geological periods; and the Tower of Babel came later, so the French language wasn't invented," objected Tattie.
"Oh! don't be so literal-minded. I never meant that Eve sat at a desk and wrote exercises. I'm only telling you I like apples."
"Well, so do I, and yours is a bigger one than mine."
"It won't be long, don't you worry yourself. It's getting 'small by degrees and beautifully less'."
The slopes of the hill were slightly marshy, and grew a crop of remarkably tall and fine rushes. They were much easier to gather than those on the borders of the lake. The girls had brought knives, and, when lunch had vanished to the last crumb, they dispersed up the hill-side to reap their rush harvest.
"If they're not all wanted for the church, I vote we ask Miss Todd to let us put some down on the schoolroom floor," said Diana, hacking away cheerfully. "I'd just admire to know what they feel like under one's feet. It would take one back about five centuries."
"Spiffing! We'll ask her! Get as many as you can carry, and tell the others. They'd be far more interesting than linoleum. Think of being able to swish one's toes about in them. I hope the church won't want too many."
"It oughtn't to claim more than its tithe. I suppose it's entitled to a tenth of every harvest, if we stick strictly to the old customs," smiled Loveday, whose arms were already filled with a sheaf of green and orange.
On the open side of the fell the wind blew strongly, and it was a struggle to toil upwards. The school tacked instead towards the sheltered bank of the stream, and with one accord broke into Scotch songs. Geraldine, in a full contralto, was singing "Green grow the rashes, O". Betty Blane's chirpy voice proclaimed "I'm ower young to marry yet",--a self-evident proposition, as she was only thirteen. Stuart and Loveday were crooning "Flowers of the Forest" as a kind of soprano dirge, which was drowned by a chorus of juniors roaring "Auld Lang Syne".
"We twa hae paidled i' the burn Frae mornin' sun till dine",
chanted Diana after them. "And that's just what I want to do. I've never had a chance yet to 'paidle' in a British burn."
"You won't to-day, then," said Geraldine, who chanced to overhear, and stopped her singing to interpolate a remark. "Shoes and stockings aren't allowed off, except in the summer term."
"Green grow the rashes, O! Green grow the rashes, O! The sweetest hours that e'er I spent Were spent among the lassies, O!"
Diana stood frowning as Geraldine passed along, carolling at the pitch of her voice.
"What nonsense!" she growled. "Who made such a silly old rule? I'm not going to keep it."
"It's quite as warm to-day as it sometimes is in summer," agreed Wendy.
"I believe it's only 'swank' on Geraldine's part, because she's head prefect. I _shall_ paddle! Just because she said I mustn't. Come on, Wendy! Let's scoot into this hollow and enjoy ourselves. Geraldine makes me feel real bad when she bosses. I want to go and break all the rules I can."
CHAPTER V
Diana Dares
If Diana--a modern Eve--hankered after the apples of new experiences, Wendy succumbed to her persuasions as readily as Adam. The little purling brook was attractive, mistresses and prefects were safely out of sight, and schoolmates, if they chanced to appear on the scene, might be bribed not to blab. In a twinkling laces were unfastened, and two stout pairs of boots stowed away among the stones, each with its stocking tucked inside; while two pairs of bare feet went splashing joyously into the brook. It was fun paddling in the little pools and scrambling over the rocks, waving a foot occasionally into a foaming fall, and dancing out on to the grass when the water grew too cold to be endured any longer. They wandered for some distance up the hill-side, supremely happy, though taking care not to allow their exuberant spirits to overflow into song. So far not a soul seemed to have noticed them--they were enjoying the sweets of undiscovered crime. Suddenly through the clear autumnal air rang out the shrill, bubbling call of the regimental whistle with which Miss Todd was wont, on country walks, to collect her scattered flock. The two sinners jumped so uneasily that Wendy slipped from a stone and splashed into a pool, with rather disastrous consequences to her skirt.
"We'd best go back and find our boots," she said, hurriedly wringing the water from the brown tweed.
They had not realized how far they had roamed up the stream, and the length of the way back surprised them. It is not an easy matter to hurry over slippery stones, though they made what speed they could, urged by another summons from the whistle.
"I think this was the place," declared Diana, at last arriving at landmarks that seemed familiar. "I left mine just over there."
Both girls sought their hiding-places, but, to their utter dismay, the boots were missing. They searched about here, there, and everywhere, but not so much as the tab of a lace could be found. Meanwhile the whistle sounded impatient blasts.
"What _are_ we to do?" flustered Wendy. "Toddlekins will be furious if we don't go; and yet how _can_ we go without our boots?"
"We must have mistaken the place," gasped Diana. "Perhaps it was farther down."
"No, no! I'm certain it was just here."
"Well, we're in a pretty fix, at any rate."
"T-r-r-r-r-ee-ee!" came again from the fell side. To disobey the summons deliberately was open mutiny. An agitated voice on the bank called to them.
"Wendy and Diana, can't you hear the whistle? Come this instant!"
It was Stuart Hamilton, who stood beckoning violently.
"We've lost our boots," wailed Wendy.
"Then come without them. Miss Todd has sent me to find you. Hurry up!"
It was a scratchy and painful performance to hurry through heather and over sharp stones to the spot where the school was assembled. Miss Todd stood staring at them as they approached, with her "report yourself in my study" expression. They felt their bare legs and feet most embarrassingly conspicuous, and wished that fickle fashion had clothed them in longer skirts.
"What is the meaning of this?" asked the Principal, eyeing their uncovered extremities severely.
"We've--we've--lost our boots," stammered Diana, speaking for both.
"And why were your boots taken off? You were aware of the rule, for I happen to know that you had just been reminded of it." (Here Wendy fixed a reproachful gaze on Geraldine, who coloured slightly.) "You've deliberately disobeyed orders, and you will be confined to 'bounds' for a fortnight. It's absolutely essential in our country rambles that discipline should be kept up, and any girl who breaks rules will stay at home next time. You deserve to walk back with bare feet, but Miss Beverley will give you your boots. Put them on at once!"
It was horrible to have to sit down upon the heather and pull on stockings and boots under the critical supervision of twenty-two pairs of eyes. Diana's lace broke, and Wendy's fingers seemed all thumbs. Miss Todd superintended till the last knot had been awkwardly tied, then she gave the signal for marching. Considerably crestfallen, the delinquents dropped towards the rear.
"Did Geraldine sneak?" whispered Wendy to Violet.
"No, it wasn't exactly her fault--it was Spot really. He routed out the boots, and began barking and worrying them, and Miss Beverley rushed up to see what he'd got--she thought he'd caught an otter or a water-rat. When she saw it was boots--well----"
"She knew she'd caught us," finished Diana.
"She took the boots straight to Miss Todd, and Toddlekins blew her whistle and counted us over like sheep to find who was missing. Then she asked who'd seen you last, and if anyone had given you leave to wade. She dragged it all out of Geraldine. I don't think Gerry would have told on her own."
"Spot!" said Diana, turning reproachful eyes on that panting specimen of the canine race. "I used to think you a dinky little dog, but I'm out of friends with you now. It's a real mean trick you've played us. Oh! you needn't come jumping up on me and licking my hand. What possessed you to unearth those boots? 'Bounds' for a whole fortnight! And I wanted to go to Glenbury on Wednesday. It's too disgusting for words! Vi, d'you think if I looked an absolute hallowed saint all Sunday, and Monday, and Tuesday, Miss Todd would let me go to Glenbury? My name's down for the exeat, you know."
Violet regarded Diana for a moment or two as if making mental calculations.
"You couldn't do it," she decided at last. "You couldn't look the least tiny, weeny atom like a saint if you tried till doomsday. Saints ought to be thin and wan, with straight noses and fair hair parted in the middle. You're rosy and substantial, and your nose isn't straight, and your hair's too brown, and as for your eyes--they've a wicked twinkle in them the whole time. No, my good girl, whatever else you may do, you won't succeed in looking saintly."
"Well, I guess I've got some bounce in me, certainly," agreed Diana. "But I thought perhaps if I went about on tiptoe and whispered, and"--hopefully--"I could keep my eyes half-shut, couldn't I?"
Violet shook her head decisively.
"That twinkle would ooze out of the smallest chink, and besides, even if you managed to look a saint, that wouldn't influence Toddlekins. You don't know her yet. Once she says a thing she sticks to it like glue. _She_ calls it necessary firmness in a mistress, and _we_ call it a strain of obstinacy in her disposition. In the old days we could get round Mrs. Gifford, but now Toddlekins rules the show, you may as well make up your mind to things and have done with it. What she says is kismet."
"Why do you want to go to Glenbury?" asked Jess.
"Oh! just a reason of my own," evaded Diana.
"You'll very likely get an exeat the week after," consoled Violet.
"It would be no use to me then," said Diana dismally.
The procession of rush-bearers, each carrying a good-sized sheaf in her arms, wound down the hill-side to go back to Pendlemere by a different route. This was a wild track over the moors, past the old slate-quarry, where rusty bits of machinery and piles of broken slates were lying about, then over the ridge and down by Wethersted Tarn to the gorge where the river took its rise. Here a stream of considerable force thundered along between high walls of rock. It was a picturesque spot; rowan-trees hung from clefts in the crags, their bright berries rivalling the scarlet of the hips and haws; green fronds of fern bent at the water's edge, and brilliant carpets of moss clothed the boulders. At one point a great tree-trunk, a giant of the fells, rotten through many years of braving the strong west wind, had fallen and lay across the torrent. It stretched from bank to bank like a rough kind of natural bridge, with the stream roaring and foaming only six feet below. The girls scrambled over its upturned roots, and stood looking at the straight trunk and withered branches that lay stretched before them.
"Shouldn't care to venture across there," said Loveday with a shiver.
"It looks particularly slippery and horrid," agreed Geraldine.
"The water must be so very deep down there," said Hilary.
"I don't believe there's one of us who'd go across for a five-pound-note," said Ida. "What offers? Don't all speak at once!"
The girls smiled, and were turning away to follow Miss Todd, when Geraldine stopped and held up a finger.
"What's that noise?" she asked.
"I don't hear anything but the stream," said Ida doubtfully.
"I do, though," said Diana, who with Wendy and Vi had joined the seniors. "It sounds like somebody whimpering."
"I'm going down the bank to see."
The others followed Geraldine, and swung themselves down to the water level. Sitting under the arch formed by the roots of the tree was a small boy of about seven, rubbing two swimming eyes with two grimy little fists and sobbing lustily.
"Hallo! What's the matter here?" said Geraldine briskly. "Where do you come from, and why don't you go home? Are you lost?"
At the mention of "home" the little fellow's tears redoubled, and the whimper rose to a roar. Ida sat down on the rock beside him, and tried to comfort him. It was a difficult process to get any coherent or sensible replies to her questions, but after considerable coaxing, and a last piece of chocolate which Wendy fortunately fished from her pocket, she managed to wring from him that his name was Harry, that he lived at a farm on the other side of the torrent, that he had come down to the river with several other boys, and that they had dared him to cross by the fallen tree. Once over, he was too frightened to go back, and, after waiting and calling to him for some time, the other boys had run away. How was he going to get home?
The situation was difficult, for there was no bridge across the river for many miles. Unless the child could go back the way he had come, it was a problem what was to be done.
"You were a silly boy ever to try to cross," said Geraldine sententiously.
"They said I durstn't!" sobbed the small sinner.
"Oh, don't scold him!" pleaded Diana. "I do know so exactly how he felt. I've often been dared to do things myself, and done them, though I shivered."
"Well, you'd surely never do such a silly thing as cross that tree?"
[Illustration: TWO PAIRS OF BARE FEET WENT SPLASHING JOYOUSLY INTO THE BROOK]
"Wouldn't I? I believe I'm going to do it now."
"Diana!"
"He's got to get home somehow. Look here, Harry!"--Diana knelt on the pebbles, and put her arm round the little blue-jerseyed figure--"suppose I were to go too, would you dare to cross again? We'd both crawl on our hands and knees."
The sobs stopped, while Harry took a swift survey of her face. Apparently he found it satisfactory.
"If you'll go first," he stammered.
"Then come along--we've no time to waste," said Diana, springing up and giving him her hand.
"Diana! You surely don't mean----" began Geraldine in eager remonstrance.
"Yes, I do!" interrupted Diana. "I've done worse things before, and I'm not scared. Come on, Harry! We'll have you home in forty cracks."
The girls did not attempt to interfere. They stood and watched while Diana hauled the little boy up the bank. Perhaps each secretly wished she were capable of such a piece of pluck. Though the tree was tall enough to span the stream, its bole seemed very narrow to form a bridge, and the rounded surface made it all the more slippery; the few branches here and there were of little help. Diana hoisted up her protégé, then going in front of him began to crawl across on her hands and knees, speaking to him all the time, so as to encourage him to follow her. Beneath them the water foamed and roared over the rocks: to slip would mean to be whirled into the depths of a dark pool below. It was a slow progress, but inch by inch they crept along till the most dangerous part was passed, and they had reached comparative safety. The girls cheered when at last Diana scrambled to her feet and lifted Harry on to dry ground. A path led up the side of the gorge, and along this he set off at full speed for home. His preserver stood looking after him for a minute or two, and then she turned to re-cross her perilous bridge. Six hands were stretched out to help her as she completed the venturesome journey.
"You're a trump, Di!"
"_I_ daren't have done it!"
"You've been a guardian angel to that child!"
"Was it _very_ awful?"
"I can't think how you managed it!"
"I nearly screamed when you reached the middle!"
"It felt worse coming back than going," said Diana, brushing her skirt, which had suffered considerably. "Somehow I minded it more. Well, it's over now! We'd better be getting on, hadn't we?"
"Yes, indeed; the others will think we're lost," agreed Geraldine.
The t-r-r-ee-ee of the whistle was sounding from the far distance, so the girls made a spurt and hurried along to catch up the rest of the party. Geraldine, in virtue of her office as head prefect, briefly explained to Miss Todd the cause of the delay.
"I shouldn't have let you do it, Diana, if I had been there," said the Principal. "But I've no doubt the little boy's mother is blessing you. We should have had to take him to Pendlemere with us, and have sent somebody from the village to take him home. There would have been no other way. Remember, though, that I'm responsible for you to your parents, and I really can't allow these harum-scarum tricks. Suppose there had been an accident!"
"Dad knows me, and he wouldn't have blamed you," said Diana cheerily. "He says I'm like a cat with nine lives, or a bad halfpenny that always turns up again. I've done worse things than this."
"Then you won't do them while you're at this school," returned Miss Todd firmly, motioning her to walk along in front with Geraldine.
On Monday afternoon, with the aid of some ribbons, the girls made their rushes into pretty little sheaves. They plaited bands for them, and twisted them securely. Miss Todd, much interested, superintended their operations.
"You may pick some flowers from the garden to-morrow, and put garlands round them," she suggested. "We're reviving a most ancient custom that dates back to the early days of Christianity in Britain. Pope Gregory IV recommended that on the anniversaries of the dedication of churches wrested from the Pagans, the converts should build themselves huts with the boughs of trees round their churches, and celebrate the day with feasting. The rush-bearing is probably the last relic of that ancient ceremony. At one time there was always a village feast in connection with it, though it degenerated at last into a sort of rustic saturnalia, and had to be suppressed."
"Old customs are very interesting," said Diana, staring at the Principal with wide-open, steady eyes.
"I'm glad you find them so."
"It's nice to see them _all_ kept up. If we have the rush-bearing to-morrow, oughtn't we--just to revive an old ceremony--to have the feast as well?"
A rustle passed over the school at Diana's temerity. Miss Todd returned the steady gaze, then the corners of her mouth twitched.
"You've stated the case very accurately. As a matter of fact, I have ordered seed-cake and scones, and have invited the Vicarage people to tea."
CHAPTER VI
French Leave
The sheaves of rushes were duly carried into the church, and stacked artistically in the deep window-sills, where they gave somewhat the effect of a harvest festival. The girls were eager to lay bundles of them in the particular pews occupied by the school, but the verger, who looked askance at the whole business, and whose wife was hovering about with a broom to sweep up bits, vetoed the suggestion so emphatically that the Vicar, wavering with a strong balance towards ancient custom, hastily and regretfully decided in the negative. Neither would Miss Todd allow them to be strewn upon the schoolroom floor, although Diana ventured to suggest the advisability of practical study of mediæval methods.
"There are some things best left to imagination," replied the Principal dryly. "For instance, there would be no need to dispense with forks, and let you hold mutton bones with your fingers at dinner, in order to demonstrate fourteenth-century manners, nor to bleed you every time you had a toothache, to test ancient practices of medicine. If you're so very anxious to skip a few hundred years, I have, in an old Herbal, a prescription to cure 'swimming in ye heade and such like phantasies'. It consists mainly of pounded snail-shells, mixed with boiled tansy and snippings from the hair of an unbaptized infant born between Easter and Michaelmas. Any one who wishes has my permission to try it."
"No, thank you!" said Diana, screwing up her mouth. "Unless," she added hopefully, "I might go out and gather the tansy. We saw some growing on the way to Fox Fell."
"There's a fine clump at the bottom of the garden, so you needn't go out of bounds to get it," replied Miss Todd, glancing at her pupil with eyes that clearly saw through all subterfuges.
The Principal was determined that Diana and Wendy, having deliberately broken a rule, should suffer the just consequences, and she did not intend to remit one jot or tittle of the punishment she had inflicted. "Bounds" at Pendlemere were sufficiently extensive to allow ample exercise, and any farther excursions must be deferred till the end of the appointed fortnight.
Diana, looking at the exeat list which hung in the hall, shook her head at sight of her own name scored through with a blue pencil.
"Just to think that removing my boots and stockings for ten short minutes should have cut me off from going to Glenbury," she philosophized. "I was only 'laving my feet', as the poets say. Nymphs always did it in classical times. Indeed, I don't suppose they ever had boots and stockings to take off, so they could paddle as they pleased."
"They had a warmer climate in Greece," sniffed Wendy, who had a bad cold in her head as the result of her paddling; "and I suppose they were accustomed to it. If there is anything you want particularly in Glenbury, Magsie's going, and I expect she'd get it for you."
"I don't know whether she could."
"What is it you want?"
Diana hesitated, then whispered in Wendy's ear:
"Three packets of Turkish cigarettes."
"O-o-o-oh!"
Wendy's eyes were wide. Diana nodded determinedly.
"But what do you want them for?"
"That's my own business."
"You surely don't _smoke_!"--in a horrified voice.
"I don't want them for myself--I'll tell you that much."
"For whom are they, then?"
"I shan't tell you!"
"Magsie would never dare to bolt into a tobacconist's and buy cigarettes."
"I was afraid she wouldn't," said Diana sadly.
"And you'd better be careful yourself if you go to Glenbury next exeat day. Toddlekins would draw the line at cigarettes. You wouldn't like to get expelled?"
"I don't know that I'd very much care," sighed Diana.
She revenged herself for her enforced seclusion by clumping noisily about the passages, till Miss Todd, hearing the racket, dropped a significant hint as to the necessity of compulsory felt slippers for girls who had not learnt to walk lightly. So, fearing that the Principal might really carry out this threat, Diana betook herself to the garden, and expended her superfluous energy on a fast and furious set of tennis. Having lost three balls, she left Vi and Peggy to look for them, and, still in a thoroughly bad temper, strolled round the corner of the house. On the front drive she saw a sight that set her running. Exactly opposite the door stood the car of her cousin, Mrs. Burritt. It was empty, but the chauffeur, at the top of the steps, was in the very act of handing two envelopes to the housemaid.
"Anything for me, Thompson?" cried Diana eagerly.
"Yes, miss. Letter for you, and one for Miss Todd," replied the man, touching his cap.
Diana seized hers from Edith, the maid, devoured its contents, and clapped her hands.
"I'll be ready in five minutes, Thompson!" she exclaimed, and fled indoors.
Half-way down the corridor she nearly ran into Miss Todd, emerging from her study with an open letter in her hand.
"Where are you going, Diana?"
"Cousin Cora's asked me for the night! She's sent the car for me. My cousin Lenox is there on leave!" panted Diana.
"So I understand from Mrs. Burritt's letter, but I certainly cannot allow you to go."
"Not go?"
Diana's face was a study.
"I had no authority from your father and mother to allow you to accept invitations."
"But I _know_ they'd let me! Oh, Miss Todd, I simply _must_!"
"That's for me to decide, Diana, not you, and I say 'no'."
Mistress and pupil looked at each other squarely. Miss Todd's mouth was set in a firm line. Evidently she considered that she was fighting a campaign against Diana, and she meant to carry this outpost. Diana had the sense to realize her defeat. She drooped her lashes over her eyes.
"May I send a note to Cousin Cora?" she asked in a strangled voice.
"You can if you wish, and I'll write to her myself, and explain that it is against our rules."
Murmuring something that sounded dangerously like "Strafe rules!" Diana darted upstairs for blotting-pad and fountain-pen. She frowned hard while she scribbled, thumped the envelope as she closed it, then ran down to give it into the personal charge of the chauffeur. She would have added some comments for his benefit, had Miss Hampson not been standing upon the doorstep.
"You're not coming, miss?" enquired Thompson civilly, but with evident astonishment.
"_No!_" grunted Diana, turning indoors and clumping down the hall past Miss Todd's study with footsteps heavy enough to justify the demand for felt slippers.
She was too angry at the moment to mind what happened, and the Principal, who was wise in her generation, allowed her to stamp by unchallenged.
At tea-time, at preparation, at evening recreation, and at supper Diana sat with a thunder-cloud on her face. When she went to bed it burst. She squatted in a limp heap on the floor and raged at fate.
"I'm sorry, but you're really making a most fearful fuss!" said Loveday, whose sympathy and sense of fitness were playing see-saw. "It's one of the rules of the school that we don't go away for odd holidays. We may have Friday to Monday at half-term, but even Mrs. Gifford never let anyone off in the middle of the week to stay a night. You're only served the same as everybody else. Why can't you take it sporting?"
"You don't understand!" wailed Diana, mopping her moist cheeks.
"Do get up from the floor, at any rate. It looks so weak to be huddled up like a bundle of rags. You haven't brushed your hair yet. Don't be a slacker, Diana!"
Thus morally prodded, Diana rose dejectedly, put on her bedroom slippers, and took the hair-brush which her room-mate handed. She did not like to be called a slacker, particularly by Loveday. The atmosphere was not altogether harmonious: she felt as if their thoughts were running round in circles, and had not yet met at a mutual angle of comprehension.
"Loveday doesn't understand me--she thinks me a spoilt cry-baby!" she kept repeating to herself, and the mere fact of realizing that attitude in her companion prevented her from trying to explain the situation. Hair-brush drill proceeded in dead silence, only broken by an occasional gasping sigh from Diana, which echoed through the room about as cheerfully as a funeral dirge. Loveday stared at her once or twice as if about to make a remark, but changed her mind; she dawdled about the room, opening drawers and rearranging her possessions. When at last she was ready to put out the light she paused, and turned to the other cubicle. Diana lay quietly with her nose buried in the pillow. Loveday bent over her and dropped a butterfly kiss on the inch of cheek visible.
"Poor old sport! Was I rather a beast?" she said; then, hearing Miss Beverley's patrol step in the passage, she dabbed the extinguisher on the candle and hopped hastily into bed.
All night long Loveday had uneasy and troubled dreams about Diana. They met and parted, and quarrelled and made it up; they did ridiculous and impossible things, such as crawling through tubes or walking on roofs; they were pursued by bulls, or they floated on rivers; yet always they were together, and Loveday, with a feeling of compunction and no sense at all of the ridiculous, was trying with a sponge to mop up Diana's overflowing rivers of tears that were running down and making pools on a clean table-cloth. She awoke with a start, feeling almost as if the sheets were damp. Stealthy sounds came from the next cubicle, and the candle was lighted there.
"What's the matter, Diana?"
"S-h-s-h!"
"Aren't you well?"
"Yes, I'm all right."
"What is it, then?"
As a grunt was the only answer, Loveday got up and drew aside the curtains. Her room-mate was ready dressed, and was in process of combing her light-brown locks and fixing in a slide.
"What the dickens are you up to, child?" ejaculated Loveday in amazement.
Diana turned quickly, pulled Loveday down on to the bed, flung an arm round her, and laid a fluffy head on her shoulder.
"Oh, _do_ be a sport!" she implored.
"But what do you want to do?"
"Look here--it's like this! I'm such a duffer at explaining, or I'd have told you last night. My cousin, Lenox Clifford, has come over to England with the American contingent. He has just thirty-six hours' leave, and he rushed over to Petteridge to see the Burritts. Lenox and I were brought up together; I've stayed whole months with them when Uncle Carr had a ranch in New Mexico. It was Lenox who taught me to ride, and to fish, and to row, and to skate. There's no one in the world so clever as Lenox! It's his birthday to-day. It was for him I wanted to get those cigarettes--I thought he'd like them in camp. I couldn't think of anything else to send him that he could pack among his kit. Well, he's going off this week to the front, and, as likely as not, he'll be killed right away, and I'll never see him in this world again. It makes me crazy to think of it. He's only ten miles away, and I mayn't even say good-bye to him. Lenox, who's called me his 'little indispensable' ever since I was four! If he was killed, and I hadn't had one last word with him, I'd break my heart. Yes, I would! You English girls are so cold--you laugh at me because I feel red-hot about things."
"We're not cold really. I didn't understand," said Loveday. "You never told me all this about your cousin. Does Miss Todd know he's just off for the front?"
"Cousin Coralie said so in her letter. That's what made me so furious. I wouldn't have asked to go to Petteridge just for the sake of a holiday; but when it's a case of seeing Lenox, perhaps for the last time, I'm desperate. Rules are cruel things!"
"I do think Miss Todd might have made a special exception," said Loveday, hugging the agitated little figure that clung to her. "I'm sure Mrs. Gifford would have let you go. It's because Miss Todd is new, and also because, when once she's said a thing, she sticks to it. You were kept to 'bounds'."
"I know. But, Loveday, I'm going to break them this morning. I must say good-bye to Lenox whatever happens. I'm going to cycle over to Petteridge--now don't talk, for I've planned it all out. I can climb down the ivy, and I left Wendy's bicycle outside last night on purpose. I shall be back by half-past seven."
The audacity of the proposal nearly took Loveday's breath away.
"But--but----" she remonstrated.
"No buts," said Diana, getting up and putting on her tam-o'-shanter.
"But, you silly child, you'll never do it in the time, and they won't be up when you get to Petteridge."
"Won't they? I rather guess they will! I told Cousin Cora I was coming to breakfast at six o'clock, and they must send me back in the car, bicycle and all."
"Did you put that in the letter you sent by the chauffeur?"
"Yes. Miss Todd didn't ask to read it. I reckon they'll have a nice little meal waiting. If I can manage to slip in here before the gong sounds for prayers, nobody need know a word about it except you, Loveday, and I trust you not to tell."
"It's frightfully against my conscience," faltered Loveday doubtfully.
"Oh! Suppose you had a brother or a cousin of your own who was going out to the front, wouldn't you want to say just one word of good-bye? Especially when you hadn't seen him for a year! It isn't as if I were doing anything that Father and Mother would be angry about. And Cousin Cora will send me back in the car."
"It really is red-tape of Miss Todd," murmured Loveday yieldingly.
"Then you'll promise? Oh, good! What a sport you are! Help me on with my coat. No, I don't need a scarf--it's quite warm. I must take my watch, though."
The girls drew aside the curtains and looked out of the window. It was only about half-past four; the stars were shining, and there was a thin, horned moon hanging in the east, its radiant rim turned towards the spot where the day would break. No hint of dawn was yet in the air, though curlews were calling from the meadows by the lake. Bushes and garden paths were plainly distinguished in the starlight.
"It'll be light soon," said Diana, "and, at any rate, I can see quite well enough to ride. I shall just enjoy spinning along."
"Be careful going down hills," urged Loveday. "By the by, you're on the early practising-list this morning--had you forgotten?"
"Oh, kafoozalum! So I am! Suppose Bunty comes to see why the piano's silent? Well, I can't help it! I'm going! Do the best you can for me, won't you?"
The close ivy which grew up the side of the house had stems as thick as tent-posts. Diana let herself down over the sill, found a footing, and descended hand over hand with the agility of a middy. Wendy's bicycle was leaning against the wall at the bottom. She took it, and waved good-bye to Loveday, then walked along the side-path that led to the gate. A minute later she was free-wheeling down the hill that led through the village in the direction of Petteridge Court. Loveday, shaking her head, went back to bed.
"I'm thankful I'm not a prefect, or I should have felt bound to stop her," she reflected. "If I'd had a brother or a cousin whom I hadn't seen for a year, and who was just off to the front, I declare I'd have done it myself. I don't blame her! But there'll be a row if Bunty doesn't hear her scales going."
Exactly at a quarter to eight o'clock a Daimler car whisked through the village, and stopped by the gate of Pendlemere Abbey. A small figure hopped from it, and the chauffeur handed out a bicycle, then drove away at full speed. Girl and bicycle crept through the laurels to the side door, whence the former fled upstairs like a whirlwind. From the intermediates' room came the strains of the Beethoven sonata with which Loveday was at present wrestling. Diana, wrenching off coat and hat in her bedroom, paused to listen.
"Bless her!" she muttered. "She's actually gone and taken my place! What an absolute trump she is!"
It was not until morning school was over that the confederates had the slightest chance to compare notes.
"Well, did you see him?" asked Loveday, when at last they met in their bedroom to brush their hair for dinner.
Diana's eyes filled with tears.
"Yes, and Cousin Cora said she was glad I came. She lost her own boy, you know--he went out with the American Red Cross, and was killed when a Zepp. bombed the hospital. That's two years ago now. I wouldn't have missed saying good-bye to Lenox for worlds. I'd quite a nice ride to Petteridge. It got light directly, and the hills looked beautiful in the dawn. Loveday, you did my practising for me!"
"Not exactly _for_ you! I took your half-hour, and you must take mine instead, from half-past four till tea-time."
"Right-o! But did Bunty come in?"
"Yes; and I told her I wanted to go out with Nesta this afternoon. So I do."
"You don't think anybody suspects?"
"Not a soul!"
Diana came close, and laid a hand on her room-mate's arm.
"Loveday, I'll never forget what you've done for me to-day--_never_! If I ever get the chance to do anything for you in return, you bet I'll do it, no matter _what_ it costs me! You've been a real mascot. There isn't a girl in the school who'd have played up better, certainly not among the seniors. I do think you're just ripping! Did Bunty look _very_ surprised to see you at the piano?"
"She did, rather; but I asked her if Nesta and I might have an exeat this afternoon to go to the Vicarage. Mrs. Fleming gave us an open invitation, you know, to come and see her sketches."
"What a brain! You really are too lovely!" chuckled Diana.
CHAPTER VII
Land Girls
With the bond of such a secret between them, Diana and Loveday cemented a firm friendship. To be sure, Loveday's conscience, which was of a very exacting and inquisitorial description, sometimes gave her unpleasant twinges like a species of moral toothache; but then the other self which also talked inside her would plead that it was only sporting to screen a schoolfellow, and that no one but a sneak could have done otherwise. She sincerely hoped that Diana had escaped notice both going and returning, and that no busybody from the village would bring a report to Miss Todd. If the matter were to leak out, both girls would get into serious trouble--Diana for running away, and her room-mate for aiding and abetting her escapade. That she was really in some danger on her account gave Loveday an added interest in Diana. She began to be very fond of her. The little American had a most lovable side for certain people, on whom she bestowed the warmth of her affection, though she could be a pixie to those who did not happen to please her. With the seniors in general she was no favourite. She had more than one skirmish with the prefects, and was commonly regarded as a firebrand, ready at any moment to set alight the flame of insurrection among turbulent intermediates and juniors.
"Diana's at the bottom of any mischief that's going!" proclaimed Geraldine one day, after a battle royal over an absurd dispute about the tennis-court.
"And the worst of it is, she makes Wendy just as bad!" agreed Hilary warmly.
"Wendy wasn't exactly a saint before Diana came," put in Loveday.
"Oh, you always stand up for Diana! I can't think what you see in her--a cheeky little monkey, I call her!" Geraldine was still ruffled.
"She has her points, though."
"She'll get jolly well sat upon, if she doesn't take care," muttered Geraldine, who held exalted notions as to the dignity of prefects.
It was at the beginning of the second week in October that Miss Todd, in whose brain ambitious projects of education for the production of the "super-girl" had been fermenting, announced the first of her radical changes. She had not undertaken it without much consultation with parents, and many letters had passed backwards and forwards on the subject. Most, however, had agreed with her views, and it had been decided that at any rate the experiment was to be tried. Pendlemere, which so far had concentrated entirely on the Senior Oxford Curriculum and accomplishments, was to add an agricultural side to its course. There was to be a lady teacher, fresh from the Birchgate Horticultural College, who would start poultry-keeping and bee-keeping on the latest scientific principles, and would plant the garden with crops of vegetables. She could have a few land workers to assist her, and the girls, in relays, could study her methods. Miss Todd, who in choosing a career had hesitated between teaching and horticulture, snatched at the opportunity of combining the two. She was bubbling over with enthusiasm. In imagination she saw Pendlemere a flourishing Garden Colony, setting an educational example to the rest of the scholastic world. Her girls, trained in both the scientific and practical side of agriculture in addition to their ordinary curriculum, would be turned out equipped for all contingencies, either of emigration, or a better Britain. She considered their health would profit largely. She explained her views to them in detail, painting rose-coloured pictures of the delights in store for them in the spring and summer. The girls, very much thrilled at the prospect, dispersed to talk it over.
"Is Pendlemere to be a sort of farm, then?" asked Wendy.
"Looks like it, if we're to keep hens and bees, and grow all our own vegetables! Bags me help with the chickens. I love them when they're all yellow, like canaries. Toddlekins hinted something about launching out into a horse if things prospered."
"A horse! Goody, what fun!" exulted Diana. "I just _adore_ horses! Bags me help with stable-work, then. I'd groom it instead of learning my geography or practising scales. I say, I call this a ripping idea!"
"Don't congratulate yourself too soon," qualified Magsie. "You'll probably find the geography and the scales are tucked in somehow. All the same, I think it sounds rather sporty."
"It will be a change, at any rate, and we'll feel we're marching with the times."
"When does the 'back-to-the-land' teacher come?"
"On Friday, I believe."
Miss Chadwick, the graduate of Birchgate Horticultural College, who was to run the new experiment, arrived at the end of the week, and brought two students as her assistants. They were a fresh, jolly-looking trio, with faces rosy from open-air work, and serviceable hands which caused a considerable flutter among those of the school who went in for manicure. At tea-time they talked gaily of onion-beds, intensive culture, irrigation, proteids, white Wyandottes, trap-nests, insecticides, sugar-beets, and bacteria. Miss Todd, keenly interested, joined in the conversation with the zeal of a neophyte; Miss Beverley, the nature-study side of whose education had been neglected, and who scarcely knew a caterpillar from an earthworm, followed with the uneasy air of one who is out of her depth; the school, eating their bread-and-butter and blackberry jam, sat and listened to the talk at the top end of the table.
"It sounds rather brainy," commented Diana in a whisper.
"Yes," replied Wendy, also in a subdued tone. "Poor old Bunty's floundering hopelessly. Did you hear her ask if they were going to cultivate cucumbers in the open? I nearly exploded! I believe she thinks pineapples grow on pine-trees. She's trying _so_ hard to look as if she knows all about it. I'll be sorry for the infant cabbages if she has the care of them."
"It wouldn't be her job, surely."
"I'd agitate for a 'Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Vegetables' if it were. I believe I'm going to adore Miss Chadwick! She looks so sporty. She wrinkles up her nose when she laughs, just like a baby does."
"The little dark student with the freckles is my fancy."
"Oh! I like the other, with the bobbed hair."
Miss Chadwick, with her assistants Miss Carr and Miss Ormrod, brought a new and decidedly breezy element into the school. They spent Saturday in reviewing the premises, and on Monday they set to work. The girls, who as yet were only in the position of onlookers, watched the operations, much thrilled. All sorts of interesting things began to arrive: portable hen-houses packed in sections, chicken-coops, rolls of galvanized wire netting, iron stakes, the framework of a greenhouse, and a whole cargo of tools. The three enterprising ladies seemed to have some knowledge of carpentry, and at once began to fit parts together and erect sheds. Their sensible land costumes excited admiration and envy.
"It's what I mean to do when I grow up," resolved Magsie. "Did you see the way Miss Carr ran up that ladder? And she's begun to thatch the roof so neatly. She does it far better than that old man from the village who potters about. I'm just yearning to try my hand at thatching. I wish Miss Carr would let me!"
While they were busy getting the place in order, Miss Chadwick and her assistants declined all offers of inexperienced help, assuring the girls that they would have their "jobs" given them later on, when there was time to teach them. This did not at all content the enthusiastic spirits who were burning to throw lessons to the winds and spend their days in mixing putty, lime-washing hen-houses, and fixing up wire netting. They hung about disconsolately, snatching at such opportunities of assistance as holding ladders or handing nails.
"You _might_ let me tar the roof of the chicken-coop," begged Wendy. "I'd just love to let it all squelch on, and I adore the smell!"
But Miss Carr, who the day before had rashly allowed Diana the use of the lime-wash pail, was firm in her refusal.
"I haven't time to show you how, and I don't want things spoilt. Put down that tar-brush, Wendy! If you get smears on your skirt, you'll never get them off again."
"I don't see where _we_ come in!" groused Wendy. "I thought we were to learn agriculture."
"You won't learn it by dabbing tar on the end of your nose," laughed Miss Carr.
In the course of a few weeks, however, the preliminary stages were over. Some fowl-houses and runs were finished, and their feathered occupants arrived and took possession. A consignment of spades, rakes, and hoes was delivered by the carrier, and arranged by the students in the new tool-shed. Miss Carr announced herself ready to begin her course of instruction. To the girls the crowning-point of the preparations was the opening of several large boxes posted from a London shop. They contained twenty land costumes in assorted sizes. The excitement of trying them on was immense. Twenty little figures in smocks and gaiters went capering about the school, wild with the fun of the new experiment, and feeling themselves enthusiastic "daughters of the soil".
"It was A1 of Toddlekins to let us have a 'land uniform'."
"Couldn't do any decent work without, I should say."
"I believe Miss Carr insisted on it."
"Sensible woman!"
"It feels so delightfully business-like."
"Shall we win green armlets?"
"I'm just dying to start and dig!"
"And I want to climb a tree!"
Miss Chadwick and her students set to work methodically. They gave classroom lectures on the principles of agriculture, and practical demonstrations in the garden. The girls learnt the constituents of soils, and also how to trench; the theory of scientific poultry-raising, and the actual mixing of the food. They prepared plots that would be sown in the spring, cleared and rolled paths, planted bulbs, and divided roots of perennials; they sawed wood, lifted rhubarb, and helped to prepare a mushroom bed. It was all new and exciting, and there was a spice of patriotism mixed up with it. They felt that they were training to be of some service to the community.
"It's fearfully weird," said Wendy, writing her essay on _Insect Pests_, "to have to find out whether your insect has a biting or a sucking mouth, so as to know whether you must spray the beastie direct, or apply poison to the plant. I'd feel rather like a dentist examining their jaws."
"I heard of an editor in America," laughed Magsie, "who got his 'answers to correspondents' mixed up, and in reply to 'how to kill a plague of crickets' put 'rub their gums gently with a thimble, and if feverish, administer Perry's Teething Powders'; while to 'Anxious Mother of Twins', he gave the advice: 'Burn tobacco on a hot shovel, and the little pests will hop about and die as dead as door-nails'."
"You always fix these yarns on America," pouted Diana. "It sounds a great deal more like one of your British editors."
To some of the girls the greatest event of all was the arrival of the horse and trap which Miss Todd had decided to add to her establishment. Pendlemere was some distance from the station and from Glenbury, the nearest town, and she thought it would be a great convenience to be independent of carriers and able to fetch supplies for themselves. Diana, keenly interested, was allowed by Miss Ormrod to make the acquaintance of "Baron", the pretty chestnut cob, and even to help in his toilet. Diana loved horses, and used the curry-comb with enthusiasm, talking to Baron in what she called "horse language"--a string of endearing terms that on the whole he seemed to appreciate.
"I'd just adore to drive him!" she sometimes hinted; but Miss Ormrod always ignored the hint, and, instead of offering her the reins, never even invited her into the cart. Diana would stand watching wistfully when Baron was harnessed, and the governess car would start out on a pilgrimage to the town. She considered that a practical part of her education was being obviously neglected.
"If we could each keep a pony and go for rides on the hills, it would be ripping!" she sighed.
"Goody! What a circus we'd look!" said Vi, who did not take so kindly to horsemanship, and preferred a car.
Early in November, Miss Todd, having some urgent business to transact, went up to London for a few days, leaving Pendlemere in the hands of Miss Beverley. The school jogged along without any mishaps during her absence. She was expected home upon the Thursday. On Wednesday afternoon, which was a holiday, Miss Chadwick, Miss Carr, Miss Ormrod, and Miss Hampson mounted bicycles, and rode away with a party of seniors to Glenbury. The juniors, by special invitation from Mrs. Fleming, went to tea at the Vicarage. Two intermediates were in bed with a mild form of "flu", and the remainder amused themselves as they liked best. Peggy sat indoors, doing pen-painting; Vi brought stones for a rockery; Sadie and Magsie played a set of tennis on the cinder court; Diana and Wendy, who had asked to join the cycle party, and had in consequence received a severe snub from Geraldine, wandered about the garden like unquiet spirits.
"It's the limit to be an intermediate!" groused Wendy gloomily. "Seniors and juniors get all the fun! Did you ever hear of _our_ form being taken to do anything special while the others stopped at school? Of course you didn't, because we never are! The seniors get first innings, and we only have the crumbs that are left, and those juniors are treated like babies though they're nearly as tall as we are. I'm fed up with it!"
"We'd better have a demonstration--parade the corridor with a placard: 'Fair play for Intermediates! Equal treats for all!'" suggested Diana, who was always ready with ideas.
"Much good it would do us! We should only get sat upon by everybody. Hullo! Here's Peggy wandering down. What's the matter with you, chucky? You look disturbed."
"I hate coming out in a wind," said Peggy, holding her hands over her rumpled hair. "I say, did you, or did you not see Miss Chadwick, Miss Ormrod, _and_ Miss Carr bike off to Glenbury? Are they all three gone?"
"Of course they're gone!"
"You saw them with your own eyes?"
"Helped to blow up their tyres, which we thought was really saintly, when we weren't asked to go with them," said the still injured Wendy.
"Well, it's a pretty go they're all off! Bunty's just had a telegram from Toddlekins. She's coming back this afternoon, and wants the trap to meet the four-thirty train."
"She should! She's in a precious hurry to leave her beloved London. Whence this thusness?"
"I don't know. She's coming, at any rate," said Peggy, rather crossly. "Bunty sent me to find out if everybody had really gone. Toddlekins will have to get a taxi, that's all. Whew! I'm being blown to bits! I want to get back to my pen-painting. I'm making a birthday present for my cousin. Ta-ta!"
Diana stood watching Peggy's retreating figure as the latter raced up the garden and into the house.
"Toddlekins will be rather savage not to be met," she commented.
"Yes; she's so keen on the trap, and the amount it saves in taxis and carriers."
"It does seem rough on her, especially when she's sent a telegram. Look here, old thing, let's take it to meet her ourselves!"
"What? You and me?"
"Why not? I can drive, and I know how to harness Baron. I have helped to put him in the trap heaps of times. Bunty? Best not tell her anything about it; she's always such a scared rabbit, and she'd only have fits!"
Wendy's eyes shone like stars.
"It _would_ be a stunt! Fancy driving in state to the station and fetching Toddlekins! She'd be pleased to save a taxi."
"Bless her, she shall! We'll show her that her girls have some spirit and self-reliance at a crisis. It's only making a practical demonstration of our new agricultural course! What's the use of learning if you can't apply it at the right moment? Run and fetch our coats and hats and gloves, that's a cherub, while I go and tell Baron all about it."
Wendy, much thrilled, and fired with the excellence of Diana's notion, went indoors, and, taking elaborate precautions not to meet anybody, secured outdoor garments worthy of the occasion. She rolled them in a Union Jack for camouflage, and bore them off to the stable.
"I've brought 'bests'," she said. "Toddlekins wouldn't thank to be met by two Cinderellas!"
Diana was standing with her arms thrown round Baron's neck, whispering sweet nothings into his twitching ear. If he did not understand the substance of her remarks, he realized the force of her affection, and kept rubbing his nose against her shoulder in a sort of caress, very gently catching her jersey with his lips and pulling it.
"I've told him, and he's delighted to go," declared Diana. "He's just pining for a run. It's so dull for him standing here with no one to talk to. It takes away his appetite. He'll enjoy his supper twice as much when he comes back. Won't you, dear old man?"
"We mustn't be all day about starting. If you've finished making love to him, let's get out the trap."
"Right you are!"
Diana was perfectly capable of accomplishing what she had undertaken. She took down the harness, led Baron out into the yard, and proceeded to put him into the shafts in quite a professional fashion. She looked over all the straps, fetched the whip, donned the garments which Wendy had brought, and proclaimed herself ready.
"We'll go out quietly by the back way," she chuckled. "Open the gate; that's a mascot!"
There was nobody to say them nay, so in a few minutes they were trotting briskly along the Glenbury Road. Diana was a capital little Jehu, and held the reins with a practised hand. Baron, perfectly conscious of who was driving him, behaved admirably. The girls felt their spirits at high-water mark. They had certainly scored over the rest of the school, and secured a superior jaunt to anybody. Moreover, it was a pleasant afternoon to be out. The weather, which for some days had been damp, had changed to windy. Long, dappled mare's-tail clouds stretched across the pale November sky, and every now and then the sun shone out between them. The glory of the autumn tints had been blown away, but the infinitely intertwined, almost leafless boughs of the woodlands had a beauty apart from foliage. Bushes covered with crimson masses of hips or haws foretold a hard winter; birds twittered restlessly in the hedgerows; and the withered leaves came whirling along the road with a scurrying, rustling sound as of the little footsteps of innumerable fairies. A seed-vessel of the sycamore, flying like a miniature aeroplane, struck Diana full in the face. She picked it up as it fell on her coat, and put it in her pocket.
"I shall keep it as my mascot," she said. "It was evidently meant for me, so it will bring me luck. Do you believe in luck?"
"Very much, sometimes, but I don't often have any."
"We've got it to-day, though. Baron's going splendidly. I think the wind excites him. You wouldn't believe he'd been out every day this week. He's as fresh as a daisy. What's the time? I can't get to my watch."
"Quarter past four."
"Gee whiz! We must hurry ourselves. We've to be waiting at the station by half-past. Baron, can you put on a spurt?"
They were bowling along a good macadam road and down hill, so that Baron did not object to the extra strain put upon his legs. The spire of Glenbury Church loomed ahead; in a few more minutes they began to see the roofs of the houses. They crossed the bridge over the river, turned the corner by the King's Arms Inn, and were trotting at a good pace along Castle Street, when suddenly Wendy's side of the trap dipped down. There was a horrible jarring and grinding, and horse and governess car seemed to be trying to practise sliding. With great presence of mind, and also strength of arm, Diana pulled Baron up.
"We've lost our wheel!" she gasped.
A crowd immediately collected round the little carriage, which stood lop-sided in the gutter. One passer-by held the horse, another helped Diana and Wendy out; a boy came running up with the wheel that had danced across the street. People stood at shop doors and stared. Sympathetic voices asked if the girls were hurt. Several connoisseurs were feeling Baron's legs. In that most critical and agitating situation, who should be seen riding up from the town but a group of ten cyclists, led by Miss Chadwick, and displaying the familiar hatbands of Pendlemere School. Diana and Wendy turned the colour of boiled beetroot. The cyclists dismounted in a body, and Miss Chadwick, staggered at the amazing spectacle of the wreck before her, took over instant possession. She tilted her bicycle against a lamp-post, sent a boy for a blacksmith, and began to unharness Baron. When he was clear of the shafts, and being led away by a friendly ostler, she demanded explanations. Diana supplied them briefly. Miss Chadwick looked at her keenly, but forbore to comment before the crowd.
"Miss Ormrod and I will stay in town and come back with Miss Todd," she said, with compressed lips. "You and Wendy can ride our bicycles. Miss Carr, will you please go as quickly as you can to the station and explain to Miss Todd what has happened. The train must be in by now. I think, Miss Hampson, you'd better take the girls on."
It was ignominious to be thus dismissed, and to be forced to mount machines and cycle back to school, instead of having the proud distinction of driving the head mistress. Diana and Wendy felt their feathers fall considerably, especially when they contemplated the fuller explanations which must inevitably follow.
It was quite dark before Miss Todd arrived in the mended cart. She and Miss Chadwick and Miss Ormrod had tea together in the drawing-room.
Later in the evening Diana and Wendy received orders to report themselves in the study. They entered with sober faces. Outside, a band of thrilled intermediates, who had listened with bated breath to the account of the adventure, hung about and discussed possible punishments. Miss Todd was not a mistress to be trifled with, and the trap was her latest toy. It was nearly half an hour before the door opened, and two very subdued and crushed specimens of girlhood issued, mopping their eyes.
"She says Miss Chadwick knew the wheel wasn't safe, and had gone to get a fresh pin for it," volunteered Wendy with a gulp. "But how could _we_ know that? She doesn't believe in practical demonstrations of our lessons, or in self-reliance; she says we've just to do what we are told. She got quite raggy when Diana mentioned it. We mayn't go near the stable for a week, and we've each to learn ten pages of poetry by heart."
"Ten pages! What an atrocious shame!" sympathized Vi. "It'll take all your recreation time this week."
"I know it will, and I wanted to do some sewing."
"She never said _what_ poetry," put in Diana, her moist eyes suddenly twinkling. "I'll learn something out of the _Comic Reciter_--the very maddest and craziest one I can manage to find."
CHAPTER VIII
Armistice Day
Diana had a fairly retentive memory, and learned poetry without much trouble. By far the hardest part of her punishment was to be forbidden to visit the stable for a week. She was sure Baron would miss her, and that, though he might receive other offerings of bread and carrots, he would be looking out and pricking his ears in vain for the friend with whom he had grown to be on such intimate terms.
Miss Chadwick, much annoyed at the accident to the cart, treated Diana distantly. Instead of smiling at her when she came into the room, she would look round her or over her head, and flash recognition to somebody else. It was humiliating to find herself out of favour, especially as it was noticed and commented on by her form-mates, all of whom were candidates for Miss Chadwick's friendship. Wendy, toiling away at her punishment task and grumbling at its difficulty, was not at all a cheerful companion. Moreover, it rained--rained for two days and nights without stopping; rained as it only can rain in a northern and mountainous district in the month of November. The fells were covered with mist, rivers ran down the garden paths, and from the eaves came a continual and monotonous drip-drip-drip. Diana, whose letters from Paris had been delayed, and who was home-sick in consequence, vibrated between a fit of the blues and a wild outbreak of spirits. She had reached the stage when she must either laugh or cry. She wandered restlessly round the schoolroom on Saturday afternoon, while the others were amusing themselves with reading, painting, or sewing.
"What a quiet set you are!" she raged. "Anyone would take you for 'Miss Pinkerton's Academy for Young Ladies'! Why can't you wake up? This is the dullest hole I've ever been in in my life. Magsie, stop that eternal sewing, and be sporty! You look like a model for 'gentle maidenhood'. I want to stick a pin into you, to see what would happen."
"Draw it mild, Stars and Stripes," answered Magsie, biting off the end of her cotton. "And be careful about experiments with pins, or something more may happen than you quite bargain for."
"I don't care! Anything for an excitement! I want some fun, and there'll be a shindy if I don't get it. Wendy! Vi! Sadie! Do brace up and be sports! Let's go on the upper landing and let off steam. It's better than moping here."
Diana, by sheer force of will, carried the day, detached her friends from their several occupations, and bore them, three steps at a time, up the stairs to the top story. The upper landing was long, and had a polished oak floor; it looked gloomy on this wet afternoon, and the rain made a continual patter on the roof. In Diana's eyes, however, it afforded a field for enterprise.
"I've a gorgeous idea!" she purred. "We'll pretend the floor's a skating-rink. I've borrowed Loveday's roller skates, and we'll take it in turns."
That roller skates were hardly meant for indoor amusement did not occur to the girls. They agreed with enthusiasm. In order to share the pleasure Vi and Sadie each buckled one on, and began a series of glides, punctuated by pushes from the other foot. Wendy and Magsie, not to be outdone, began to slide down the polished floor, and Tattie, who had powers of invention, fetched a cake of soap and a sponge, and perfected their activities by making a slippery course along the boards.
"It's like Alpine sports," exulted Wendy, taking a turn with one of the skates, and skimming at top speed. "Can't you just imagine you're in Switzerland? I want to make snowballs. Oh! why can't we do some toboganning? I'd like to go tearing down a hill on a bob-sleigh. It would be priceless."
"You shall do next best to it, my child," said Diana cheerily. "Trust your granny to find the way for you. I've coasted indoors before now. Wait a second, and you'll see!"
She disappeared, and in a short time returned with her drawing-board.
"You just squat on this," she explained, "and you go skimming down the stairs like a water-chute. It'll be prime!"
"O-o-o-oh!"
"You _are_ priceless!"
"Great is Diana of the Americans!"
The improvised bob-sleigh worked admirably, and if it happened to catch, there was always the banister to clutch at. Its popularity eclipsed even that of the soap-slide and the roller skates. The fun waxed fast and furious, not to say noisy. Bumpings and bursts of laughter began to echo downstairs on to the lower stories. Miss Hampson, coming to unlock the jam-cupboard in preparation for tea, stood for a moment in the corridor, listening like a pointer. Then she thrust the key into her pocket and dashed to the upper regions, just in time to behold Wendy, with scarlet cheeks and flying hair, coasting down the stairs on a drawing-board. For a moment Miss Hampson was without words. She stared, gasping, at Wendy, who hurriedly picked up both herself and the drawing-board, and stood at attention. The sporting party on the upper landing would gladly have melted away had there been any possible cover, but there was not. Vi and Sadie had not even time to kick off their roller skates. Miss Hampson's keen eyes took in every detail of the trails on the polished oak floor, and the soap-slide. Then they focused on Diana.
"I can imagine who's been the instigator of all this!" she said sharply. "We've never been accustomed to such doings at Pendlemere before. Miss Todd will be appalled at the damage you've done to the floor. Go downstairs to the schoolroom at once, and remember that this landing is prohibited in future. I'm astonished that all of you don't know better!"
It was on the following Monday that tidings of the armistice were proclaimed. The girls heard the church bells ringing when they were in the middle of morning lessons, and unanimously "downed books and pencils" and trooped to the front door, where Miss Todd was verifying the good news from the butcher boy. For five minutes the school went wild; everybody joined hands and danced in a circle on the drive, shouting "Hurrah!" After all the long suspense and anxiety the relief was stupendous. There was hardly a girl who had not some relation at the front over whose safety she might now rejoice. That the shadow of more than four years had at length been removed, seemed almost too good to be true. Miss Todd and Miss Beverley had gone indoors to find all the available stock of bunting; Miss Chadwick was already climbing on a ladder up the porch to hang the Union Jack over the threshold.
"We ought each to have a flag of our own," said Geraldine, who was intensely patriotic. "I'm going to ask Miss Todd if we may go and buy some."
Wild schemes for celebrating the day floated in the air, varying from a picnic to a bonfire.
"The ground is too wet yet for either," decreed Geraldine. "How could we tramp over the fells when everything's a quagmire? And if you think you can light a bonfire with damp wood, you're jolly well mistaken. We'll collect sticks, and have one when they're dry. I plump for a flag-hunt. There must be some in the shops."
Geraldine's suggestions were generally received with favour at head-quarters. Miss Todd felt that the school was fizzing over, and must find some outlet for its excitement. An expedition to Glenbury to buy flags seemed feasible. They could have an early lunch, and start immediately afterwards. Those who possessed bicycles could ride, and the rest could walk a mile to Athelton village and catch the motor-omnibus which passed there. Everybody was satisfied with the arrangement, and the cyclists dispersed to oil their machines and pump tyres. Miss Todd and Miss Chadwick were going in the trap; even Spot, with a bow of red, white, and blue ribbon tied to his collar, was to accompany the party.
Diana did not possess a bicycle, so Wendy, out of sheer good-fellowship, decided to lend hers to Sadie and to take the omnibus, so that she herself might go in company with her chum. Nine girls and a mistress started off in good time for Athelton, slightly in advance of the cyclists, who expected to meet them in Glenbury. Even in the village of Pendlemere and the little hamlet of Athelton people were making peace rejoicings: flags hung from windows, and children ran about blowing tin trumpets, whistles, and mouth-organs. A string of small urchins had improvised a band, and paraded proudly along, banging on tin trays and old kettles, and yelling the National Anthem. Men talked eagerly together outside the post office; women stood at their doors and watched, some radiant and excited, and some quieter, with a heartache behind the smile, as they thought of those lads who would not come marching home with the others.
The wild weather of the last few days seemed to have rolled away with the war clouds. The sky was flecked with blue, and the trees by the roadside were hung all over with drops that sparkled in the sun like jewels. The brook that ran down from the fells was tumbling along in a great brown stream, thundering under the bridge; robins, hopping in the wet hedgerows, twittered their plaintive little autumn song. A woman picked a marigold from her battered, rain-sodden garden, and handed it over the wall to Wendy. Everybody seemed to want to speak, even to strangers, and to tell how many of their relations had served in the war.
At last the omnibus, ten minutes late, came rumbling along, and stopped to pick up passengers. The school scrambled in, and with difficulty found places. It was a jolting journey, much crammed up among country people with baskets, but it was fun, even though the rattling almost shook them off their seats, for all the passengers seemed so good-tempered and jolly. On their arrival at Glenbury they found the town _en fête_, with bunting hanging across the streets, and large banners decorating the public buildings. The pavements were so full that the crowd overflowed into the road. The cyclist members of the Pendlemere party had arrived first, and had already bought flags, which they pinned in their hats. The motor-omnibus contingent rushed off immediately to secure any that were left, and to try to get some sweets. Miss Todd, who had put up the cart at the Queen's Hotel, met them as they were emerging from the confectioner's, sucking pear-drops and toffee.
"You're lucky, for sweets are scarce," she commented. "Thanks very much--I won't have one just now. Where are the others? Can you find them? I'm going to take you all up the church tower to get a bird's-eye view of the town. It will look nice to-day, with the flags out, and we ought to be able to see for miles round."
Glenbury Church was almost as large as a cathedral, and possessed a steeple which was a landmark for the neighbourhood. It was possible to ascend as far as the flying buttresses, and to walk round a stone causeway that encircled the tower just where the spire tapered up. The entrance was in the nave, through a small oak door studded with nails. The verger, aged, wheezy, and inclined to conversation, admitted them.
"You'll get a fine view," he said huskily; "you ought to be able to see the prison and the cemetery, and, with luck, the lunatic asylum as well. It's over amongst the trees to the east of Chatford. You can't miss it if the sun's shining on the roof. There's been a-many folks up to-day."
The narrow corkscrew staircase was old and worn, and seemed to twist round and round in an absolutely endless ascent as the girls toiled up its hundred-and-eighty-six steps. To add to their difficulties, parties of people kept coming down, and the problem of passing was difficult; it could only be accomplished by the school flattening itself against the walls while the descending sightseers gingerly made their way round the narrow centre of the staircase. Tiny lancet windows here and there let in streams of sunshine, but most of the pilgrimage was made in a decidedly "dim religious light". Everyone's knees were aching when at last they emerged through a small door on to the causeway. They were standing on a flat terrace edged by a stone parapet just tall enough to allow them to lean their arms on it and look over. Above them rose the spire, tapering thinner and thinner till its slender point ended in a weather-cock. Below, the town lay spread out like an architect's design. They could see the roofs of all the buildings, and the streets, and the lawns, and the pond in the park; all seemed viewed at an unusual angle, for they were gazing down on the tops of things. Round the town stretched miles of misty woods and fields, melting into the grey haze of the fells. The objects of attraction mentioned by the verger--the jail, cemetery, and lunatic asylum--were not particularly conspicuous, and nobody was very anxious to localize them. The girls walked all round the causeway, so as to get the view at every point.
"I suppose Pendlemere's over there?" said Diana, pointing a brown-gloved finger in the direction of the fells.
"Yes; you can see the road we came by in the 'bus," explained Stuart. "It winds round by Athelton. There's a much shorter way back, though, if we were walking. Do you see that white farm-house on the hill above the park? Well, you go through the fold-yard, across a field, and down a lane, then there's a straight path over the moor, right to Pendlemere. It saves two miles at least. Hilary and Nesta and I walked it once with Miss Todd."
"Dinky, I should guess."
"Nice in summer, but it might be pretty wet now."
Most of the girls agreed that coming down steps was rather worse than going up. Their ankles ached when they reached the bottom. The old verger was taking the sixpences of another party of tourists, and telling them, in his wheezy voice, to look out for the cemetery, the jail, and the lunatic asylum--to him evidently the three prime points of interest in the landscape. Spot, who had been fastened by his leash to the railings outside, greeted the girls with noisy enthusiasm. Diana untied him, and gave him a pear-drop.
"Bless him! He wants a bit of candy as well as the rest of us. He's a 'booful' dog with his patriotic ribbon on his collar. Stop barking, that's a cherub boy, or you'll drive your Auntie Diana crazy!"
There was a short interval of shopping after the excursion up the tower, and then Miss Todd pulled out her watch, compared it with the church clock, and declared it was time to be returning. The motor-omnibus, which started from Shipham, five miles away, was due in Glenbury at a quarter to four. Miss Hampson marched her contingent to the market-place, where it always stopped to pick up its passengers. Already quite a crowd was waiting for it--people who had come in from the neighbouring villages to see the peace rejoicings. There was no policeman to insist on an orderly queue, so when the great scarlet vehicle lumbered up, a wild scramble ensued. Some of the Pendlemere girls were pushed in amongst the jostling throng, and some were elbowed out. Wendy, Diana, and Miss Hampson, at the tail-end of the crush, tried to scramble on to the step. The conductress, a brawny woman in uniform, stopped them.
"Only room for one more," she shouted; "and I can't take that dog!"
"But we'd stand!" entreated Miss Hampson piteously.
"They're standing as it is! Can't take more than the 'bus is registered for, or we'd break down at the hills. Room for one! Which of you's coming? Be quick! I can't wait all day!"
It was a matter that had to be decided in a moment. Miss Hampson, knowing that seven of her girls were already packed in the omnibus, felt that she must go and escort them. She turned desperately to Wendy and Diana, and panted:
"Miss Todd won't have started yet. Run to the 'Queen's'. She'll take you back in the trap."
Then she allowed herself to be hustled inside by the impatient conductress.
The two girls left behind stood staring for a minute after the retreating omnibus. Spot, straining at his leash, barked his loudest.
"Well, I don't envy them their drive. They're packed like sardines," commented Wendy.
"I guess we've got the best of it," agreed Diana.
Evidently the next thing to be done was to walk to the Queen's Hotel and report themselves, to Miss Todd. Diana was even beginning to speculate whether she could advance any possible argument, such as a desire to save strain on her mistress's arm, whereby she might induce the Principal to allow her to take the reins and drive Baron home. They went along Westgate, and turned the corner of Hart Street; in another two minutes they would have been in Castle Street. Then fate interfered. From a narrow alley on the right came sounds resembling explosives, and three small boys, yelling gleefully, shot out into the road. Wendy, pausing to ascertain the cause of the excitement, ejaculated the one word, "Squibs!"
"Gee whiz! You don't mean to say they've got fireworks!" exclaimed Diana. "Then I'm not going back till I've bought some. Here, sonny!"--catching a bare-headed urchin by the shoulder--"tell me where you got those squibs, and I'll give you my last bit of candy. Mrs. Cobbes's in Beck Street? Where's Beck Street? Is it far? You ought to come and show us for that big bit of candy."
"Can't! Got to go 'ome to my tea," returned the youth, whose small teeth were already in the toffee. "Cobbes's is down there!" pointing an arm like a sign-post in the direction of a by-street.
Diana and Wendy did not even wait to discuss the expediency of thus side-tracking. The magic lure of fireworks drew them on, and with one accord they trotted off to seek Mrs. Cobbes's shop. It took a little hunting about and asking to find it; and then Mrs. Cobbes was stout and slow, and seemed to need an eternity of time to wrap up their purchases in an old piece of newspaper.
"We shall have to hurry!" said Diana, emerging at last, hugging her parcel, and dragging Spot away from the pursuit of an impudent and provocative tabby cat, with a torn ear, that was spitting at him from the railings.
They did hurry. They nearly ran up Jessamine Street and Vine Street, and clattered up the steps behind the post office into Castle Street, and tacked through the crowd into the yard of the Queen's Hotel. A whole row of conveyances was standing with shafts down, but the familiar governess car was not among them. Perhaps it had been put inside the coach-house.
"Miss Todd's trap, did you say?" replied the ostler, removing the fag-end of a cigarette from his lips. "Why, she's gone! I harnessed her only five minutes ago!"
Here was a blow indeed! They had never expected Miss Todd to drive away without them, though, considering that she did not know they had been left behind by the omnibus, she was scarcely to be blamed for doing so. The two girls looked serious as they walked into the street again. Somehow they felt aggrieved.
"If the rest haven't started, Magsie and Vi might take us behind them on their bicycles," suggested Wendy dubiously. "Hodson's would know if they've gone. They were to call for some parcels there."
It proved a forlorn hope. The girl behind the counter assured them that a party on bicycles, wearing brown tam-o'-shanters, had come and claimed their purchases, and ridden off up the street ringing their bells. The next motor-omnibus would come through at seven. It was always crowded, and no doubt would be particularly full to-night.
"There's nothing else for it, Di--we shall have to walk," said Wendy blankly.
"Whew! It's a pretty good step."
"Six miles."
"Je-hoshaphat!"
"Well, it's no use waiting for the 'bus. We should never get places."
"Let's take that short cut that Stuart was talking about. She said it saves two miles."
"What a brain wave! It's only a quarter past four. We'd be home long before dark. You can walk four miles an hour, can't you?"
"Ra-ther!"
So they turned across the park, and up the hill to the white farm, and through the fold-yard, and over the field, and along the lane on to the open moor. They felt decidedly pleased with themselves, for it was far nicer here than plodding along the high road. The ground was not so wet as Stuart had prognosticated; indeed the path was quite firm and well trodden, and in parts was even paved with stones. Spot, released from his leash, careered about like a mad creature. Diana could not help dancing a few steps, and Wendy, though she was growing hungry, stopped grousing to admire the view. The sun, a red ball among grey masses of mist, was sinking behind the fells, and a golden glow tipped the brown, withered heather. The whole atmosphere seemed to reflect peace. Overhead, little radiant clouds stretched themselves into the semblance of angels' wings moving lightly across the evening sky. To watch them was like gazing at the portals of a heavenly world.
The girls walked along as briskly as they could, but on the rough moorland path it was impossible to keep the pace at four miles an hour. They were going uphill, and, unless they went in single file, one of them, owing to the narrowness of the track, was obliged to keep stepping into the heather. At the top of the crest they dipped down again into a high, narrow valley between two fells. It was swampy here, and in places there were quite wide pieces of water to jump across. The path, which had been growing worse and worse, finally separated into a fork. The girls came to a halt, and stood looking first at one track, then at the other. They were in doubt which to choose, for each looked equally bad. They had turned so often that they had rather lost their sense of locality.
"I should think Pendlemere must be over there," said Wendy, pointing to the right, but looking frankly puzzled.
"Well, you know the place better than I do," answered Diana, following her lead.
So they went to the right, through a small thicket of hazel-bushes, over some rocks, and on up the bleak fell-side. The sun had disappeared, and the little golden angels' wings had given place to sombre, grey clouds. It was growing distressingly dark. A spot or two of rain began to fall. The path, degenerated into a mere sheep track, was increasingly difficult to trace. Though neither would admit it, both the girls felt uneasy. They could not recognize any familiar landmarks to show them their whereabouts. Suppose darkness came on, and found them still wandering about on the moor?
"Do you think we've come the right way?" asked Diana at last.
Wendy looked round in the fading light, hoping against hope to see the corner of Pendlemere gleaming below her in the valley. By now it certainly ought to be visible. Nothing in the shape of a lake, however, appeared in the landscape; only an interminable waste of brown heather under threatening rain-clouds.
"No," said Wendy, with a shake in her voice. "As a matter of fact, I believe we're lost."
Diana was plucky as a rule, but she was very tired now, and hungry as well. Two somethings that may have been rain-drops splashed down her cheeks; she turned her face away from Wendy as she wiped them off.
"What's to be done?" she asked huskily.
"Go back, I suppose. Goodness knows where this will lead to!"
"We ought to have taken that other turning."
"It's too dark to go that way now. We'd better get back to Glenbury, and try for the 'bus."
Very soon the girls realized that it was getting too dark even to distinguish the path at all. They stumbled blindly on through the heather, conscious only that they were going downhill, but whether they were really retracing their steps or not, it was impossible to tell. Spot, whose spirits had failed him, followed at their heels. Faster and faster fell the darkness; the girls linked arms to avoid getting separated. They were both thoroughly frightened. Would they be obliged to spend the night upon the moor? If there were only some means of finding the way back to Glenbury!
Suddenly, a long distance in front of them, a light flashed out, as though a candle had been placed in a cottage window. Hope revived. If only they could reach some human habitation, they could ask to be directed. They dragged their tired feet along, splashing in the dark through puddles, sinking in soft ground, or stumbling over stones. It seemed an interminable tramp before at last they struck the end of a wall, and, feeling their way with their hands, groped along till they reached a gate. The next moment they were rapping with their knuckles on a door.
It was opened by a thin, middle-aged woman, who stared at them in suspicious amazement as they asked to be directed to Glenbury; then, seeing that they were only girls with their hair down their backs, she cautiously invited them to come in. They accepted thankfully. After the dark and the damp outside, the farm-kitchen seemed a haven of refuge.
A little boy, who had been sitting by the fireside, sprang up at their entrance, and faced them with wondering eyes. Something in the small figure seemed familiar. Diana's mind galloped rapidly back to a day in late September when she had crawled along a tree-trunk across a racing torrent, with a frightened, blue-jerseyed atom of humanity creeping behind her.
"Gee-whiz! I guess you're Harry!" she exclaimed heartily.
The mental thermometer of the kitchen, which had stood at about freezing-point, suddenly thawed into spring. Harry, recognizing his former friend in need, hastily explained to his mother, who turned to the girls with a light in her face.
"I've always wanted to thank you," she said to Diana; "but I never knew who it was who'd helped Harry home that day. Sit you down, both of you, by the fire. You'll let me make you a cup of tea?"
Rest, warmth, and tea were what the tired girls craved. They sat on the settle, with a little round table in front of them, and ate the scones and blackberry jam that with true northern hospitality were piled on their plates. Harry's father came in presently, and, after a whispered conversation with his wife in the back-kitchen, offered to take a lantern and escort the girls back to Pendlemere.
"It's a goodish step, but you're rested now, maybe, and it's no use risking missing the 'bus at Glenbury, and having to walk it after all."
A very tired Diana, and an equally weary Wendy arrived at the school just when Miss Todd was getting absolutely desperate about their absence. She had sent Miss Chadwick to Athelton to meet the seven o'clock omnibus, and the teacher had returned to report that they had not come on it. Miss Todd forbore to scold two such limp wrecks, and sent them straight upstairs, with orders for hot baths, bed, and basins of bread-and-milk. Explanations were reserved for next day, and they did not get off scot free by any means. Miss Todd had an aggravatingly mathematical mind. She calculated the time the omnibus left the market-place, the exact moment when she herself started in the trap from the Queen's Hotel, the distance between these two given points, and in how many minutes at the rate of not less than three miles an hour two ordinary walkers should accomplish it. The answer left ten whole minutes to spare, and of that ten minutes of the afternoon she demanded a strict account from Diana and Wendy.
The sinners, whose bones still ached after their adventure, appeared in such crushed spirits that they did not receive the entire scolding their head mistress had intended, and were for once dismissed with a caution.
"She didn't say we mightn't go to the bonfire," sneezed Wendy, on their way down the passage. Wendy as usual had taken a cold in her head.
"I kept the squibs dry, thank goodness!" sighed Diana. "Nobody knows about them yet, so we'll let them off as a surprise. Won't they all just jump when they hear them? I'm looking forward to that bonfire as the event of my life!"
CHAPTER IX
Diana's English Christmas
Diana had fondly hoped that the armistice meant an immediate declaration of peace, that her father and mother would return post-haste from France, take her away from Pendlemere, and cross at once to America, so that they might spend Christmas in their own home. To her immense disappointment, nothing so nice happened. The peace conferences were lengthy. Mr. and Mrs. Hewlitt remained in Paris, and did not even speak of booking passages to New York. They wrote instead to make arrangements for Diana's holidays in England. It was at first decided that she should spend the time with her cousins, the Burritts, but influenza broke out so badly at Petteridge Court that all in a hurry the plans had to be changed. It ended in Diana passing Christmas with the Flemings at Pendlemere Vicarage. So far she had scarcely realized Meg and Elsie Fleming. They came to school daily, and she had seen them among the juniors, and remarked that they were "sweet kids". She was now to meet them at nearer acquaintance, and not only Meg and Elsie, but Monty, Neale, and Roger as well.
They were an interesting and lively family, and after a preliminary half-hour of painful politeness, they thawed over schoolroom tea, and adopted her into their midst. Monty, the eldest, was an eccentric, clever lad in spectacles, fond of making scientific and chemical experiments, which generally ended in odours that caused the others to hold their noses and open the schoolroom windows, top and bottom. He had a philosophical mind and a love of argument, and would thrash out questions for the sheer fun of debate in a growling sort of tone that was not really bad-tempered, only put on.
Neale, six months older than Diana, was a bright, jolly-looking boy, with a freckled nose and chestnut hair that rather stood on end. As regards book-learning, the less said about his attainments the better, and he had an unpleasant half-hour in his father's study, explaining details of his school report; but in all practical matters he was ahead of Monty. He was a thorough young pickle, up to endless pranks, and determined not to let time hang heavy on his hands during the holidays.
Roger, the youngest, a smart little chap of nine, followed in the wake of his brothers, poking interfering fingers into Monty's chemical messes, or acting scout for Neale's escapades. At the end of twelve hours Diana felt that she knew them perfectly, and had shaken down into a place of her own amongst them.
Six young people home for the holidays are apt to turn a house upside down, and it was fortunate for Mrs. Fleming that she had an easy-going and happy-go-lucky disposition, and could view with comparative equanimity the chaos that reigned in the schoolroom. To Diana it was delightful; she preferred a floor littered with shavings, a table spread with paints, plasticine modelling-clay, and other descriptions of mess, and chairs encumbered with books and papers, to the neatest, tidiest room where everything you want is put away out of reach in cupboards.
"When I heard I was coming to the Vicarage, I thought: 'My, I guess I won't have to bounce there!' But you're a real set of sports," she assured her new friends.
"Well, I don't think we're exactly what you'd call prim and proper," chuckled Meg.
There were still a few days before Christmas, and the energies of the whole family were focused on decorations. There were not many people in the village with leisure to help, so most of the work fell upon the Flemings. They tramped down to the church, bearing great armfuls of evergreens, strings of holly-berries, and texts cut out in paper letters. The girls sat in a pew and twisted garlands of yew and laurel, which the boys, with the aid of a short ladder, fastened round the pillars. Mrs. Fleming was fitting panels of cotton wool on to the pulpit, and sprinkling them with artificial frost.
"We ought to have lots of flags about the place this Christmas," said Monty, "to make it a sort of victory celebration as well. I'll put two or three over the organ, and stick some round the monuments. What I'd like would be to see our huge Union Jack hanging down over that blank wall there."
"Well, why don't you put it?" enquired Diana, looking up from her wreath-twisting.
"All very well, madam, but how am I going to get it there? That's a little detail which escapes your feminine observation. Please to note the height of our ladder and the height of that wall, and compare the difference."
"I'd get up on to that passage and fix it," nodding to the triforium.
"Would you, indeed, Miss America? I rather think I see you toddling along there, with a drop of thirty feet below you."
"Do you dare me to?"
"You're brave enough down here in a pew, but I don't believe any girl would have the head for that. Women aren't steeple-jacks!"
"You needn't speak so scornfully. There may be a few steeple-jennies among them!"
"No fear," laughed Monty, turning away.
Diana said nothing more, but as she went on with her wreath her thoughts were as busy as her fingers. She was more silent than usual at lunch, and slipped away quickly afterwards, leaving the family talking round the fire. First, she ran upstairs to the corner of the upper landing, where she knew the big Union Jack was kept. She rolled it into a tight bundle, tucked it under her arm, then tore off to the church. She found herself alone there, for none of the other decorators had returned. It was exactly the opportunity she wanted. The bunch of keys was hanging in the big door. She pulled them out, and carried them to the tiny door by the chancel steps. This she unlocked and flung open, disclosing a steep, winding stair. Almost on her hands and knees Diana scrambled up, and up, and up till she reached the triforium, the narrow stone gallery that ran round the church under the clerestory windows. The first few yards were safely protected with arches, pillars, and a balustrade, but after that came a stretch of about twenty feet with no parapet at all. The gallery was only twenty-four inches wide; on the one side was the wall, on the other a sheer drop of about thirty feet. Diana paused, and set her teeth. She did not dare to walk it, but she knelt down and crawled along till she reached the next piece of balustrade. Then she unrolled her Union Jack, and, tying it by its cords to the pillars, arranged it so that it hung down into the church and covered the exact spot of blank wall that Monty had indicated. She had just finished when she heard footsteps in the porch. Not wanting to be caught by the Vicar, she began to crawl back in the same way as she had come. Perhaps the sense that someone might be watching her from below unnerved her, for the return journey seemed far worse than the outward one had done. She did not venture to look down, but kept her eyes on the wall. Half-way she was suddenly seized with a horrible paroxysm of dizziness. For a moment or two she lay flat, too frightened to move, while her giddy head seemed to be spinning round. With a supreme effort she mastered the sensation, and crawled on, inch by inch, till she once again reached safety. With rather tottering knees she came down the winding staircase, and through the small door to the chancel steps. Mrs. Fleming, Meg, Monty, and Neale were standing by the lectern when she appeared. Mrs. Fleming was white as chalk; the others were staring open-mouthed, with a queer strained look in their eyes.
"Well, I've done it, you see!" said Diana jauntily.
The Flemings gazed at her without speaking. Monty went and locked the door of the staircase and put the keys in his pocket. The silence was embarrassing.
"I think it looks very nice hanging there," declared Diana, nodding at her Union Jack.
"My dear," said Mrs. Fleming in a shaky voice, "if you knew what I suffered when I saw you creeping along the triforium you couldn't speak so lightly. It isn't right to risk your life in this fashion."
Diana tried to carry the matter off airily, but the boys were grumpy and would not speak. Meg kept looking at her with a peculiar expression, as if she were recovering from a shock. Altogether, Diana felt that her deed of daring had fallen very flat. She was annoyed that no one congratulated her upon it. She considered that for a girl of fourteen it was rather a record. Monty would not be able to sneer at "Miss America" again. She strolled in a casual way past the font which he was decorating, and made a final effort to wring from him the appreciation she craved.
"There _are_ some steeple-jennies in the world!" she remarked, staring upwards at the clerestory.
Monty picked up another piece of holly, placed it deliberately in position, and then turned his spectacles on Diana.
"And there are more jenny-asses in it too than I should have expected!" he answered pointedly.
When Diana had undressed that evening Mrs. Fleming came into her room to say good-night, and sat down for a minute on the edge of her bed.
"Have you thought, dear," she said, "what it would have meant to Mr. Fleming and me to have been obliged to write to your father and mother and tell them you were lying dead, or, worse still, a cripple with a broken spine; and what your father's and mother's feelings would have been at the news?"
Diana turned her face away.
"Thoughtlessness can sometimes amount to heartlessness in its lack of consideration for others."
"Monty dared me to do it."
"He never dreamed you actually would. Besides, are you going to do every idiotic, silly thing that every foolish person says you dare not? I thought you were more sensible, Diana! Remember, we are responsible for you during the holidays, and I wish to return you whole to your parents. We use every reasonable precaution to take care of you, but I can't calculate on safeguarding you as if you were a baby of three."
Diana drummed her fingers on the pillow. Mrs. Fleming waited a moment, then tried a different tack.
"I'm not very strong, Diana. My heart is weak, and I'm afraid for some days I shall feel the effect of the shock you gave me this afternoon. I don't believe you're the kind of girl who'd deliberately want to make me ill."
Diana wriggled round, but her head was bent down.
"Remember that we care about you, dear. It would grieve us very much if the slightest little accident were to happen to you. We want you to have jolly holidays here, and to go back to school safe and well, with, I hope, a happy remembrance of the Vicarage."
Two soft arms were thrown round Mrs. Fleming's neck.
"I'd do anything for _you_, though I hate to be a molly-coddle!" whispered Diana. "I'm most fearfully sorry if I've really made you feel ill!"
*     *     *     *     *
The decoration of the church was only one of the incidents of Christmas; there were other things to be done before the festival arrived. The Flemings liked to preserve old traditions, and finding that their little American guest was very keen on all the details of a genuine British Yule-tide, they did their best to satisfy her. Mrs. Fleming used the cherished half-pound of currants--which in the war-time shortage of dried fruits was all the grocer could send her--to make the frumenty and spiced cakes that from time immemorial had been eaten in that northern district to celebrate the feast of the Nativity. A Yule-log was sawn and placed upon the dining-room fire, and a huge bough of mistletoe hung up in the hall.
"We ought to have the Waits to make it just perfect!" said Diana.
"I believe some of the choir used to go round carol singing once," said Meg, "but it's been given up. The mothers said the girls caught cold, and they stayed out too late, so it was put a stop to. It's a pity in a way. Mrs. James was saying only the other day that she quite missed them, and so did Mrs. Holmes. They both said Christmas wasn't what it used to be."
The pupils of Diana's eyes were growing large and round and shining, as they always did when her fertile mind was evolving new ideas. She seized Meg's arm.
"Oh, I've got such a brain-wave!" she confided. "Look here! Why shouldn't we be Waits? We've learnt all those Christmas carols at school. Let's go round and sing them. It would be ripping fun!"
The idea appealed to Meg and Elsie, and, rather to the astonishment of the girls, the boys also took it up with enthusiasm, and volunteered their assistance. They enlisted the help of the village schoolmistress, and some of the most tuneful among her pupils, and all on the spur of the moment made up their company.
"What always spoils carol singing," said Monty sententiously, "is that everybody's generally so beastly out of tune. They don't seem able to keep the pitch without a harmonium."
"Pity we can't carry a harmonium with us!"
"Why shouldn't we?" suggested Neale. "I don't mean I'm going to haul the thing on my back, so you needn't grin. I've a better notion than that. We'll see if the Blackwoods will lend us a cart. Put the harmonium inside, hang up a lantern to see by, and there you are, with a movable concert platform ready to take round where we like."
The others looked at Neale with admiration. It was such a very brainy idea, they wondered they had never thought of it for themselves. Time was short, as the performance was to be that evening, so they dispersed to make their arrangements. Ted Blackwood, a member of the church choir, agreed to bring his father's cart.
"I'll take t'owd mare," he grinned. "Shoo's steady, and won't bolt when th' harmonium starts. Aye, I've a big stable lantern as 'ull do too."
Here indeed was an excitement for a young American visitor. Diana could hardly wait till tea was over and darkness fell. Fortunately it was a fine evening, with a hint of frost in the air, so the expedition would not be damped by rain. Mrs. Fleming insisted upon all the party being very warmly clad, and brought out an old picture of "The Waits" to demonstrate that the use of mufflers was an integral part of the ceremony. Diana, to her delight, was lent a Red Ridinghood cloak of Meg's, clad in which she felt that she had stepped back at least three centuries, and was walking in the days of the Stuarts.
"I might be one of the pilgrims in the _Mayflower_!" she exclaimed. "What would Dad give to see me? I wish you were coming too," she added to Mrs. Fleming.
"I'm too busy, child, to-night," said Mrs. Fleming, kissing the roguish little face framed in the red hood. "Enjoy yourselves, chicks! And, Diana,"--with a warning finger held up--"_don't_, please, do anything desperately amazing!"
"I'll be an absolute model of mild mediæval maidenhood," promised that damsel, with twinkling eyes.
They went first to the Blackwoods' farm, then, when Ted had harnessed "t'owd mare", they proceeded with the cart to the schoolhouse, and, after a good deal of heaving and hauling, lifted in the harmonium and a stool for Miss Simpson, the schoolmistress, to sit upon while she played. The rest of the party having joined them, they jogged along to the first house on their list, that of Mrs. Holmes at the Old Grange Farm. They drew up the cart outside the door, placed lanterns on the harmonium, and saw Miss Simpson settled at the instrument--a matter of some difficulty, as the cart sloped, and the stool was inclined to slide away. Ted held the old mare by the bridle, in case the music might revive her youthful spirits and cause her to bolt. The others grouped themselves round the cart. Miss Simpson struck up, and through the keen night air rang out the cheerful strains of "Christians, awake!" The Holmes family opened the door in quite a state of excitement, and listened with much appreciation while "Good King Wenceslas", "The First Nowell", and other old carols were sung. They insisted on bringing the party indoors for slices of Yule cake, and would have given them hot coffee as well, but Monty, who wished to visit other houses, declared they had not time to wait while it was made. So they tramped on to the James's farm, where they had an equally hearty reception, and were regaled with cocoa, currant bread, and cheese.
It was a unique experience, trudging along country lanes with a cart and lanterns, with hoar-frost under foot, and a few stars winking in a misty sky, then standing in the cold night air to sing their carols. Diana felt that she could never forget it, and that the shrill voice of little Jack Greenhalgh warbling
"Nowell! Nowell! Nowell! Nowell! Born is the King of Israel!"
would always be associated with her idea of Christmas.
She had her fill of old-world customs, for she was allowed, by special favour, to go into the belfry and help for one brief minute to pull a bell. And after service on Christmas morning she stood in the church porch and watched the distribution of the "roth shillings", which, in accordance with the terms of an old charity, were handed over to "twelve worthy widows resident within the bounds of the parish". She helped in the afternoon at the schools, where a big tea-party and Christmas-tree were given to the children of the village, and joined nobly in the games that were played afterwards, tearing round at "Drop the Handkerchief", or pulling at "Oranges and Lemons", with unflagging energy.
"Have you had a nice Christmas Day, childie, away from all your own people?" asked Mrs. Fleming, holding Diana's face between her hands as she said good-night, and looking at her critically for signs of home-sickness.
But Diana's eyes were without a suspicion of moisture, and her voice was absolutely cheerful as she answered:
"Yes, thanks; just topping!"
CHAPTER X
A Fit of the Blues
The interest of experiencing a real old-fashioned English Christmas had kept Diana's spirits up at fizzling-over point, but directly the festival was over, her mental barometer came down with a run, and landed her in a bad fit of the blues. There were several reasons for this unfortunate plunge into an indigo atmosphere. First, the inevitable reaction after the over-excitement of breaking up, sending off presents and cards, and duly celebrating the Yule-tide feast. Diana was a highly-strung little person, whose nerves were apt to get on edge, and who made the common mistake of trying to live too fast. Her father's "lightning methods", which she much admired and imitated, were decidedly wearing to her vitality, and left her sometimes like a squeezed orange or an india-rubber ball that has lost its bounce. Then secondly, the French mails had been delayed, and, since the holidays began, Diana had not received a single parcel, letter, or even solitary picture post card from her parents in Paris. The blank was great, and though the Flemings assured her that foreign posts were irregular, and that the whole of her correspondence would probably arrive together in one big cargo, she nevertheless could not rid herself of the uneasy impression that illness or accident to father or mother might be the cause of the delay. Reason three, a hackneyed but very present trouble was the weather. The English climate had behaved itself during the first days of the holidays, and had shown Diana quite a story-book aspect of Christmas, with a light fall of snow on the fells, hoar-frost on all the plants and ferns in the garden, and the sun a red ball seen through a rime-tipped tracery of trees. After that, however, it revenged itself in rain, steady rain that came down from a hopelessly grey sky without the least glint of sunlight in it. It was very mild too; the air had a heavy languor that made everybody feel tired and disinclined for any exertion. Mrs. Fleming spread the table with sewing, and sighed at the largeness of the task which faced her. The Vicar shut himself in his study, and pinned a notice on the door stating that nobody must disturb him. Monty retired to develop photos; Neale, clad in a mackintosh, went out into the wet; Meg and Elsie buried themselves in books.
Diana, feeling that life was utterly drab, wandered from room to room doing nothing. She could not settle to sew, read, paint, write letters, or any normal employment, and had not even the patience to try to put together a jig-saw puzzle. She missed Wendy and her other chums amongst the intermediates, and was almost tempted to wish herself back at school. Her piquant little face with this new _triste_ aspect was a sorry spectacle, and Mrs. Fleming watched her uneasily.
"I hope the child isn't going to be home-sick," she said to herself. "I shall be sorry we took her in if we can't make her happy."
It was evident that something must be done, and something beyond the ordinary resources of books and dissected puzzles. Mrs. Fleming cudgelled her brains. Her few days' acquaintance with her young visitor had taught her that Diana needed judicious handling. It was no use making palpable efforts to interest her. In her pixie moods she seemed almost to resent it.
"I believe the secret of Diana is to switch her thoughts off herself on to other people," ruminated Mrs. Fleming. "Instead of trying so hard to amuse her, I shall ask _her_ to amuse _us_."
She waited till her guest, who had taken an aimless prowl round the house, returned once more like a wandering will-o'-the-wisp to the dining-room, then she tackled her.
"Diana, I want you to do something very kind. I'm in low spirits to-day, and feeling as stupid as an owl. I believe we all are--Meg and Elsie, and the boys, and even the Vicar! I'd give anything for something to buoy me up and to look forward to. Suppose, after tea, we were to make a circle round the fire and tell stories--really jolly stories that we'd prepared beforehand. We'd each take the rest of the day to think them out. If possible, they must be personal experiences; things that have actually happened to ourselves. You must have had adventures in America, I'm sure, that would interest us immensely. I'm just longing to hear about your life out there. Can't you write down a few notes, and give us a really good yarn? You've no idea how much I'd enjoy it."
Diana stopped whistling, and stood with her mouth screwed into a button. Her grey eyes were fixed on Mrs. Fleming speculatively.
"I didn't know grown-up ladies ever got bored stiff!" she remarked at last.
"They do horribly sometimes; indeed the more middle-aged they are the more they need cheering up, I think. They don't like 'getting on in years'."
"I guess you want me to act jester."
"That's exactly the role I'd like to assign to you."
The twinkle was slowly coming back to Diana's eyes, and the dimples to the corners of her mouth. The effect was like sunshine bursting through a rain-cloud.
"I guess I'll try if I can remember anything to startle you, if you're out for sensations. It's a kind of literary society, isn't it? Can you lend me a pencil, please, and some waste paper? I don't know what I've done with my blotter. Thanks! Now I'm going right up to my bedroom to sort of ruminate."
Mrs. Fleming's prescription for low spirits acted like a charm. Diana spent most of the rest of the day scribbling. She came down to tea looking quite elated. The others tried to question her, but she refused to be drawn. "Wait and see!" was all she would vouchsafe.
[Illustration: WE SET OFF AND RODE ALL THE MORNING]
It was cosy in the drawing-room when the family collected and made a circle round the log-fire. By unanimous vote Diana's story was given first innings, and, seated in a basket-chair near the lamp, she opened her manuscript.
"I thought I'd rather read it than tell it, if you don't mind," she said. "I'm a duffer sometimes at telling things. Before I start off, though, I'd best explain who folks are, or you won't understand. Uncle Carr Clifford had a ranch in New Mexico, and I used to go and stay there months. They always kept a special pony for me to ride. Her name was Darkie, and she was just a peach. I used nearly to live on her back. Lenox, my cousin, would take me all round the ranch. I'd great times. Well, it was when I was staying at Buller's Creek (that was Uncle Carr's ranch) that this happened. Have I made it clear?"
"Crystal! Bowl ahead!"
So Diana began:
"THE LOST PONY
"I had been staying some weeks at Buller's Creek, and one morning, when I came down to breakfast, Lenox ran into the veranda. He looked fearfully excited.
"'Do you know,' he cried, 'that Darkie's missing from the stable?'
"We all sprang up at the bad news, and Uncle Carr whistled. Darkie was my special pet, and, apart from that, she was the best pony on the ranch. How had she got out of the stable? Lenox had tied her up himself the night before. Either some malicious person must have let her loose or, worse still, some one must have stolen her.
"'I believe it's Lu Hudson!' declared Lenox and Uncle Carr nodded.
"Lu Hudson, whom most people called 'Spanish Lu', was the owner of the next ranch, and a very disagreeable neighbour. He was a big, rough, dark, hot-tempered fellow, with a bad reputation for picking quarrels and using his revolver. He and Uncle Carr were continually having lawsuits about the boundary of their ranches, and his sheep were constantly trespassing on the Buller's Creek ranges. He had the greatest admiration for Darkie, and several times had asked to buy her, but Uncle Carr had always curtly refused to part with her. The last time there had been trouble about the boundary, Spanish Lu had sworn that he would pay Uncle Carr out, and he was just the sort of desperate fellow to keep his word. Of course the first thing to be done was to ride round the ranch and see whether Darkie could be found anywhere.
"'I'm sorry I can't look after the matter myself to-day,' said Uncle Carr; 'but Jake and I have to get off to the mart at Louisville. She may have strayed, but it's not likely. I don't believe you'll find her.'
"As soon as Uncle and Jake, the herdsman, had started off in the buggy, Lenox saddled Whitefoot, his own pony, to go in search of Darkie. I begged and prayed and implored to go too, so finally they let me have my way, and saddled Jap for me, a brown pony, quiet and steady, though not so clever as Darkie. Coonie, a little half-caste boy, went with us.
"'The air feels heavy this morning,' said Aunt Frances, as we were starting. 'If a storm comes on, make for cover. Don't try to get home across the prairie till it's over.'
"The sun was shining, and we did not think the weather looked at all like a storm. I rather laughed at Auntie as she fastened a wrap on to my saddle, with instructions to wear it if I felt cold. Lenox had the lunch-basket, and also a small axe, which he always took with him when going round the ranch.
"We set off and rode all the morning, but never a trace of Darkie was to be found. We ate our lunch in a stony little glen, where a stream flowed down from the ridge above. I was very keen on getting wild flowers, and while our ponies rested, I wandered up the bank of the stream, gathering myself a posy. I went on and on, much farther than I intended. At the very head of the glen was a natural barrier of rock, with a few steep steps leading on to a kind of plateau at the top. This spot, I knew, marked the boundary between my uncle's ranch and that of Spanish Lu. The glen was the property of Buller's Creek; the farther side of the ridge belonged to the Hudson range, and the plateau was neutral ground.
"Something, I don't know what, impelled me, as I stood there, to give the long-drawn, peculiar whistle with which we always called Darkie. To my astonishment, a whinny came from the plateau above. In another moment I was scrambling up the rock steps. There, tied to a cedar-stump, was Darkie. She recognized me at once, and whinnied again. There was nobody in sight. I did not even stop to think of Lu Hudson. I just ran to Darkie and untied her, and took her by the bridle. It was a fearful business to lead her down the rock steps, but she was as surefooted as a mule, and together we managed it somehow. The boys nearly had a fit when I made my appearance with the missing pony. It was pretty plain, so they said, that Spanish Lu must have stolen her and taken her there for safety, intending to come back and fetch her. Where was he now? The answer came unexpectedly.
"'What's that smoke there?' asked Coonie.
"Lenox and I turned to look in the direction in which he pointed. A grey haze was mounting from the horizon.
"'It's more like dust than smoke,' said Lenox. 'I wouldn't mind betting it's sheep.'
"Who could have the impudence to be driving sheep on to the Buller's Creek range? It seemed more than probable that Lu Hudson had broken his pledge, and was again trespassing on his neighbour's property. Lenox and I looked at each other. If Spanish Lu were within short distance of us, the sooner we got Darkie safely home, the better.
"'I'll ride her, and you lead Jap,' I decided.
"We started off at once. As we got out of the glen and on to the prairie we could see in the distance an immense flock of sheep, herded by two men on horseback. We were too far from them to recognize faces, but the general appearance of one of them suggested Spanish Lu.
"'They're grazing east of the ridge, in spite of what the judge settled!' exclaimed Lenox angrily. 'If I hadn't to take care of you and Darkie, I'd go and tell them what I think of them.'
"It seemed no use running our heads into danger, and perhaps having Darkie wrenched from us, so we made off east towards home. We had only gone about a mile when suddenly the sky to the west behind us turned black. In a few minutes we were in the thick of a terrific blizzard. My first instinct was to give Darkie her head and fly for the ranch, but Lenox caught at my bridle.
"'Ride back to the glen!' he shouted.
"Lenox knew enough about prairie blizzards to prevent him from trying to find our way home through this one. On the open plains, where the wind has full sweep, a blizzard is a thing to be dreaded. Though we had to face the storm to ride back to the glen, it was the safest thing to do, for we were not far away, and we should find shelter there. With our heads down, and sharp scraps of ice beating on our saddles, we urged our ponies along. Suddenly we caught sight of a great moving mass coming on with the storm. It was the immense flock of sheep, that had stampeded before the blizzard, and were drifting along across the prairie. Lenox stood up in his stirrups, and shouted to Coonie:
"'Ride over there, and we'll turn them into the glen!'
"Coonie understood in a second, and so did I. Unless we could drive the sheep into shelter, undoubtedly the whole number would perish in the storm. Lenox thrust Jap's bridle into my hand, and dashed ahead. In a few minutes he and Coonie had succeeded in turning the leaders towards the entrance of the creek, and after them swept the rest of the flock. We followed into the sheltered glen, and, dismounting from our ponies, found a nook under a projecting piece of rock. There were some tree-stumps about, and Lenox set to work to chop them with his axe, and soon made a roaring fire. How glad I was that Aunt Frances had made me bring the wrap! I should have been frozen without it. Even by the fireside the air was bitter. What must it be like out in the open prairie, we wondered? We had not sat long in our sheltered nook before we heard voices, and two figures, covered with ice and snow, made their appearance leading horses. They staggered to our camp-fire, half exhausted by the violence of the storm. Though his hair and his beard were white with snow, we had no difficulty in recognizing Spanish Lu. He thawed for a little, and then spoke to his herdsman.
"'The sheep!' he gasped.
"'They're all here,' answered Lenox in triumph. 'We saw them, and turned them into the creek.'
"Spanish Lu stared at us as if he could hardly believe his eyes.
"'You kids! You turned the whole herd?'
"I expect he felt pretty grateful, for, if it hadn't been for Lenox and Coonie, several thousand of his sheep would certainly have been lost, and, as it was, they were safely grazing in shelter. When the storm was sufficiently over for us to venture home, he led out Darkie himself and helped me to mount. Neither he nor we said a word about her loss, though we were perfectly certain he must have taken her from the stable.
"After that day he kept his sheep to his own side of the ridge, and, though he was never a pleasant neighbour, Uncle Carr wasn't obliged to go to law with him again about the boundary of the two ranches. So we felt that Darkie had patched up peace, particularly as we didn't accuse Lu Hudson of taking her. Horse-stealing is a very serious crime in the West, so I expect he thought he had got off uncommonly well."
"And what became of Darkie?" asked Meg, as Diana's manuscript came to a rather abrupt end.
"Uncle Carr gave up the ranch when he went into Congress, and Darkie and all the other ponies were left at Buller's Creek. She wouldn't have been happy off the prairie, or I'd have begged to have her. Lenox? Why, he's still in France; but I suppose he'll be demobilized soon, and going back to Harvard. He wants to be a professor, not a ranchman. He's a fearfully clever boy. Now, I've read my story, and I'm waiting for yours. Who's going to come next?"
"After such excitements as horse-stealing and a blizzard, our poor little adventures would seem very tame," said Mrs. Fleming, voicing the general feeling of the family, each member of which was showing a plain desire to shirk. "Suppose we keep our stories for another evening, and play games now? Meg, get pencils and paper, and we'll have a round of 'telegrams'."
CHAPTER XI
Diana to the Rescue
Next morning the postman arrived quite laden with parcels and letters addressed to "Miss Diana Hewlitt". As Mrs. Fleming had prophesied, everything came at once, and her young guest spent a busy and ecstatic half-hour opening her various packages. Scent, French chocolates, Parisian embroideries, gloves, ribbons, and other dainty vanities such as girls love were raved over and spread forth on the table, while Diana devoured the contents of her letters. From one large envelope she drew forth a photograph of a lovely lady in evening-dress.
"It's Mother! Oh, how perfectly sweet! And the very image of her, too!" she cried, handing the photo to Meg for admiration.
Her fit of the blues had utterly vanished, and she was in a rose-coloured mood to-day. Meg, leaning over the table, deeply interested in the parcels, looked critically at the picture of the bright-eyed lady with the soft coils of fair hair.
"She's not like you, Diana."
"No. A thousand times better looking than I am!"
"I suppose you're like your father?"
"Yes, so people say, though I can't see it myself."
"How pretty she is--and how young! She might almost be your sister. And yet I suppose she must be middle-aged."
"What do you mean by 'middle-aged'?" demanded Diana sharply.
"Why, anything over thirty! I call _my_ mother middle-aged."
"Do you?"
"Of course!" (Meg was still examining the photo.) "What a perfectly glorious dress to be taken in! And I adore her necklace. She's like the pictures one sees in _The Queen_. It must be lovely to have a pretty mother."
Diana was looking at Meg with an unfathomable expression in her grey eyes.
"Don't you call your mother pretty, then?" she asked.
"Oh, yes! she's a darling; but she's had her day. She's not a society beauty, is she?"
"N-n-n-o, I suppose not," said Diana thoughtfully.
The boys came into the room just then; the conversation was interrupted, and Meg probably forgot all about it. Diana, however, did not. At lunch-time she critically studied her hostess's features, and mentally compared them with those of the photo which had arrived that morning from Paris.
"I don't believe Mrs. Fleming is really any older than Mother," she decided. "She's been very pretty some time, but she's let herself go. It's a pity. All the same, I could shake Meg!"
An impression that had been gathering in Diana's mind ever since she arrived at the Vicarage now shaped itself into definite form. She did not like the attitude of her friends towards their mother. They were devoted to her, but their love lacked all element of admiration. Mrs. Fleming had made the common mistake of effacing herself utterly for the sake of her children. She had dropped her former accomplishments, even the music in which she had once excelled, and made herself an absolute slave to her household. So long as Meg and Elsie wore pretty frocks she cared nothing for her own dress; she never bought a new book or took a holiday; her interests were centred in the young people's achievements, and she had become merely the theatre of their actions. Going away seldom, and reading little, had narrowed her horizon. She often felt her ideas were out of date, and that she was not keeping up with the modern notions her children were imbibing at school. They always spoke with more respect of their teachers' opinions than of hers, and would allude to subjects they were learning as if they did not expect her to understand them. Sometimes they assumed little airs of patronage towards her. Among themselves they occasionally referred to her as "Only Mother!"
Diana, thinking it all carefully over, raged mentally. "I guess I've got to make those Flemings admire their mother!" she said to herself. "Just how to do it beats me at present, but I don't give up. I'd like to fix her hair for her if I dared. She strains it back till she looks like a skinned rabbit, and her dresses were made in the year one, I should say. She's a dear, all the same, though. If she could only be cured of feeling on the shelf, she'd grow ten years younger."
Having set herself the surprising undertaking of rejuvenating Mrs. Fleming, Diana went warily to work. It would certainly not do to reproach Meg, Elsie, and the boys for lack of appreciation of their mother; they would simply have stared in utter amazement. Somehow, by hook or by crook, she must be made to shine, so as to command their honest admiration. Diana catalogued her personal attractions:
1. A really quite classical nose.
2. A nice, neat mouth.
3. Good teeth.
4. A pretty colour when she gets hot or excited.
5. Quite fascinating brown eyes.
6. Hair that would be lovely if it were only decently done, instead of scooped away and screwed into a tight knob at the back.
Anybody with these points might make so much of them, if they only knew how to use them properly. Diana wondered if it would be possible to buy a book on the secrets of fascination. It was just the element that was lacking. Putting personality aside, she began probing into the extent of her friend's mental equipment. She induced her to bring out the water-colour sketches of former years, and even wrung from her a half promise that some day--when the weather was nice, and if she had time--she would paint a picture of the church.
"The boys would each like a sketch of their mother's to take to school with them," decreed Diana. "Monty would have his framed and hang it in his study, and show it to all his friends as _your_ work."
"Why, so he might," said Mrs. Fleming, looking much surprised. The idea had evidently never occurred to her before.
From painting, Diana passed to other accomplishments. Mrs. Fleming rendered the accompaniments to Elsie's violin pieces and Meg's songs with a delicacy of touch that revealed the true musician.
"I wish you'd play something to me," begged Diana one day when the girls' practising was over and their mother was rising from the piano.
"_I_, my dear child! I never play now."
"Why not?"
"I gave up my music long ago, when I got married."
"You haven't forgotten it, though."
"Well, not altogether, of course. I'm a good reader still."
"Please!" urged Diana.
And, to content her impetuous visitor, Mrs. Fleming gave in. She pulled a volume of Chopin from the stand, and began the twelfth nocturne. It was years since she had played it, but as she touched the keys the old spirit crept back into her fingers, and the notes came rippling out delicately and easily. Diana, sunk back in the recesses of the long basket-chair, listened fascinated. She loved music when it was of a superior quality, and she did not often get the chance of hearing playing such as this.
"More! More!" she begged, when the nocturne came to an end.
The ice once broken, Mrs. Fleming, as much to her own astonishment as to that of the family, actually revived her interest in the piano. She hunted out her old pieces and began to practise them. She said it was to amuse Diana, but it was evident that enjoyment was mixed with her philanthropy. As a girl she had studied under a good master, and she had much natural talent. She would improvise sometimes, and even compose little things of her own.
"Why, my dear," said her husband, peeping into the drawing-room one evening just at the conclusion of the "Moonlight Sonata", "this takes me back to the time when we were engaged! I've been sitting listening in my study."
Diana, squatting on one foot in the corner of the sofa, clapped her hands softly. She liked the Vicar, but she thought his antiquarian researches monopolized the conversation at meal-times. It was quite nice to hear him express appreciation for some other line than his own. Diana had a scheme in her mind, and, when she judged the time was ripe, she proposed it suddenly and boldly in the face of the whole united family of Flemings. It was nothing more or less than that Mrs. Fleming should play a solo at the concert which was to be held at the schools on the 10th of January. In vulgar parlance, she "shot her bird sitting", plumped the idea upon her, and dragged forth an acceptance before--as the poor lady afterwards protested--she had time to realize what she was undertaking.
"Certainly. Why not?" confirmed her husband. "We badly want some more items on the programme. I shall put you down for two solos."
"But what _can_ I play?" remonstrated Mrs. Fleming.
"Oh, Mother, you know heaps of things! Don't be absurd!" reproved Meg.
"I guess we'll have a rehearsal to-night, and choose your star pieces," said Diana, with shining eyes.
So far, so good. Her plot had answered admirably. The family took it almost as a matter of course that "Mother" was to perform at the concert, though it had never occurred to any of them to ask her to do so.
"She's a very good pianist," said Meg airily to Diana.
"Glad you think so!" rapped out Diana, with an emphasis that made Meg stare and whisper afterwards to Elsie that she couldn't quite somehow get at the back of "Stars and Stripes".
It was a mighty matter to select the two solos. Mrs. Fleming, flustered and bewildered at this unexpected dive into publicity, hesitated among many pieces. As she could not make up her own mind, Diana made it up for her.
"We want the 'Moonlight Sonata' for one, and Chopin's 'Ballade in A flat' for the other," she decided. "They're classical, but they're so exquisite that I guess even the old women will enjoy them. Then for the encores you could play----"
"Encores!" gasped Mrs. Fleming feebly.
"Why, of course there'll be encores! Schubert's 'Hedge Roses' for one, and that nocturne of your own for the other. It'll just about take the house!"
So Mrs. Fleming, with an extraordinary feeling that she had somehow been whisked back to her school-days, sat practising in the drawing-room, with Diana, curled up in the corner of the sofa for audience. It was a dream-world for them both. Diana had been reading _Stories of the Great Composers_, and now she knew the hearts of the musicians she could enter more fully into the meaning of their music. She had fallen, utterly and entirely, under the magic spell of Chopin; the lovely, liquid melodies thrilled her like the echo of something beyond her earthly experience, and seemed to go soaring away into regions she had not yet explored, regions of breathless beauty, though only entered by the gates of sorrow. She would read Alfred Noyes's poem on Chopin as she sat listening to the haunting, bewitching rhythm of the "Ballade in A", and the ring of the poetry merged itself into the glamour of the music, so that ever afterwards she connected the two.
"'Do roses in the moonlight glow Like this and this?' I could not see His eyes, and yet--they were quite wet, Blinded, I think! What should I be If in that hour I did not know My own diviner debt?"
or
"Wrapped in incense gloom, In drifting clouds and golden light; Once I was shod with fire, and trod Beethoven's path through storm and night: It is too late now to resume My monologue with God."
"I don't wonder Chopin had his piano carried out into the fields!" she commented. "I don't believe he could have composed in the house. You hear the wind blowing through his pieces, and see the tassels of the laburnum-tree he was sitting under swaying about in it."
The concert was an annual gaiety which most of the people in the neighbourhood attended, and was generally much above the average of village performances. North-country folk are musical, and this district of the Pennines had produced many voices that passed on to cathedral choirs. Instrumental music, also, was appreciated and understood, and before the war there had been quite a good little orchestra in the parish. When Mr. Fleming drew up his programme, he knew the audience for whom he was catering, and did not fill it entirely with coon songs and ragtimes. Diana, to whom the affair loomed as the main event of the holidays, discussed at the Vicarage the eternally feminine question of dress.
"No one ever comes very smart," Mrs. Fleming assured her.
"But one likes to see the performers in something pretty," pleaded Diana. "It makes it so much more festive, doesn't it?"
"Mother, you intend to go in evening-dress, don't you?" said Meg.
Mrs. Fleming had intended nothing of the sort, but urged on by the girls, she took a review of her wardrobe. She shook her head over the result.
"I haven't anything at all except that grey silk, and it's as old as the hills. Why, I got it for my sister's wedding, when Roger was a baby!"
"But fashions come round again," said Diana, who, with Meg and Elsie, had been allowed to watch what came out of the big ottoman in the spare bedroom. "Why, this dress is the very image of the picture of one in that magazine Mother sent me from Paris! It only wants the sleeves shortened and some lace put in, and the neck turned down to make it lower, and then a fichu put round. Here's the very thing! I'd fix it for you if you'd let me. I'd adore to do it."
No one knew exactly how Diana managed to work matters, but for this occasion she took over Mrs. Fleming's toilet, and that astonished lady resigned herself into her hands. She was a natty little person, with exquisite taste, and by the aid of some really good lace, which the ottoman yielded, she managed to transform the grey silk dress into a very creditable imitation of the Parisian fashion-plate. She even dared to venture a step further without offending.
"I often help Mother fix her hair when she's going out, and she calls me her little _coiffeuse_. I'm crazy to try yours, if I may."
"'In for a penny, in for a pound,' I suppose, you young witch!" acquiesced Mrs. Fleming, letting her enthusiastic guest have her way.
So on the evening of the concert Diana shut herself up in her hostess's bedroom with a pair of crimping-irons and some curling-tongs. She covered up the result with a light gauze veil.
"Don't let them see you till you get to the concert," she implored, helping her friend to put on her cloak. "I want them to get a real surprise. I guess it will make them sit up!"
The parish hall was quite full that evening, and the platform was prettily and appropriately decorated with flags and plants in pots. There was a sprinkling of local gentry on the front benches, and Miss Todd, who had returned after the holidays, and was entertaining some visitors at the Abbey, brought her whole house-party. The villagers had turned up in full force, thoroughly prepared to enjoy themselves. The Fleming family sat at the end of the second row, and watched as the audience filed in.
"Where's Mother?" asked Elsie.
"She's in the performers' room, talking to Miss Watson," vouchsafed Diana, chuckling softly to herself.
Then the concert began. There was a madrigal by the choir, and a glee for four male voices, and a duet for soprano and mezzo, and then came the item for which Diana was waiting:
The Moonlight Sonata, ....... _Beethoven_.
MRS. CARISBROOK FLEMING.
The curtain at the back of the platform was drawn aside, and a lady entered--a lady who was palpably nervous, but oh, so pretty! Her brown eyes shone like two stars, and her cheeks were the colour of the knot of carnation ribbon that fastened the lace fichu of her dress. Her lovely bronze hair was parted on one side, and rippled lightly over her forehead; it looked the very perfection of glossy fluffiness. She wore a moonstone pendant set in dull silver that matched the shimmering grey of her dress. The piano had been drawn to the front of the platform, and she took her place. Then the magic music began. Diana knew her friend could play well, but she had never heard her reach this pitch before. The audience listened as if spell-bound, and, when the last note died away, broke into a storm of applause. There was no question about their enthusiasm, and an encore was inevitable. They stamped heartily, indeed, for a second encore, but Mrs. Fleming refused to return to the platform, and sent on the next performer instead. The "Ballade in A flat", in the second part of the programme, was an almost greater success, and produced shouts of "Brava!" from the back of the hall. Pendlemere people could appreciate good music, and showed their approval with north-country heartiness.
The Fleming family sat during the performance gazing as if they could scarcely believe the evidence of their own eyes and ears. Diana had calculated upon giving them a surprise, and she had certainly done so. Apparently it was a very pleasant one, to judge from the expression on their faces.
As the crowd filed out from the benches at the close of the concert, Diana found herself walking behind Meg, who was speaking to a friend.
"That 'Moonlight Sonata' was beautiful!" Ada Davis was saying. "And Mrs. Fleming looked so charming to-night! How nice to have such a pretty, clever mother!"
"I'm _awfully_ proud of her!" agreed Meg, with unction.
"Humph! High time you were!" sniffed Diana behind.
At the door the Vicar was helping his wife into her cloak. He put it round her with quite a gallant little air, and offered her his arm as they stepped out into the starlight together.
"I hardly know you to-night, Sylvia. You excelled yourself!" he remarked.
"'Sylvia'!" Diana triumphed inwardly. "That's the first time I've ever heard him call her anything except 'Mother'. If _I_ get married, I'll want my husband to call me 'Diana', even if I've a dozen children to be 'Mother' to! I guess Mrs. Fleming has hopped off the shelf to-day, and I just hope to goodness she'll never go back."
CHAPTER XII
Diana Breaks Out
Diana went back to school in the wildest and most rampageous of spirits. She felt that she just had to let off steam somehow. She seized Wendy's hand, tore with her to the very top of the house and down again, then careered along the corridor in such a mad, not to say noisy stampede, that Miss Todd issued from her study like a lion from its lair, and fixed the culprits with the full concentrated power of what the girls called her "scholastic eye".
"Winifred and Diana," she remarked in calm, measured tones, "if I have to remind you again about walking quietly in the passages, it will mean forty lines for you both, and I should be sorry to have to give punishments on the first day of term."
The tempestuous pair, very much sobered down, tip-toed away, and went to unpack their possessions in their separate dormitories. Diana found Loveday in the ivy room, and burst in upon her with as much of the bubbling-over spirits as she dared to exhibit, hugging her till she nearly choked her.
"I've missed you loads, Loviekins!" she assured her. "It felt queer to be in bed, and not have you on the other side of a curtain. I used to wake up in the night and begin to speak to you out of sheer force of habit. I wanted my 'little elder sissie' awful bad sometimes! Did you miss me the least tiny atom? Do you care that much for your 'pixie girl'?"
"Of course I missed you, darling! I'm just delighted to see you again! It's nice to be back. I haven't enjoyed the holidays _very_ much. I never do----"
"I know," said Diana sympathetically, as Loveday hesitated. "I could read that between the lines, in your letters. You wrote me absolutely ripping letters! I loved them! You were a dear to write so often. It must have taken heaps of time."
"I'd nothing very much else to do," sighed Loveday, disengaging herself gently from Diana's arms. "Let me go, child! I haven't half finished my unpacking, and you haven't even begun yours yet."
"_Bust_ the unpacking!" said Diana naughtily. "I don't feel inclined to be tidy; I shall just shovel armfuls of things out, and pitch them anyhow into the drawers. Yes, Loveday Seton, I feel like that! I'm 'fey' to-day, as the Scotch say, and must 'dree my weird'. Don't quite know exactly what that means; but I guess I've got a little pixie imp dancing around inside me, and he's going to make me do something crazy. There's no help for it! It's kismet!"
"And Miss Hampson is also kismet!" said Loveday, leaving her own box and coming to the rescue of Diana's garments, which were being literally pitched into the drawers with no regard at all for their condition. "Look how you're crushing your blouses! Go and sit on the bed, and let me do it. There! What a baby thing you are! You're more like four than fourteen!"
"It pays," said Diana serenely, squatting cross-legged on her bed, while Loveday's neat hands arranged her possessions. "If I were a sedate, goody-goody, 'old-beyond-her-years', staid sort of a person, you'd never spoil me as you do. I'll try to practise it if you like, though. Anything to please you! How would this do?"
Diana's mobile face suddenly underwent a quick change. The corners of her mouth were drawn down, her eyelids drooped, while her eyes were cast upward in a sort of sanctimonious squint.
"Don't!" implored Loveday, almost hysterically. "Oh, suppose your face were to stick like that! You'd look the most abominable little Pharisee. I'd hate you!"
"You like your pixie-girl best? Then, that settles it! Now, if you ever scold me again about anything, I'll put on the Pharisee face; so I warn you. You've got to choose between them. Yes, I know I'm a handful--I always have been--but, perhaps, it's good for you, Loveday mine: develops your character, and makes you more patient and persevering, and--and----"
"You're the cheekiest little imp on the face of the earth!" interrupted Loveday. "Get up, this minute, and come and finish your own work. I've something else to do besides unpack for you. If Miss Hampson comes and finds my box still half full----"
"She'll say how slow you've been, and what a nice, tidy child Diana is! Don't try to look 'proper', Loveday! It doesn't suit your style of beauty. Yes, put my collars away, too, or I shall only crush them. There! Very well done! First prize for order! I think you're absolutely topping, if you ask me!"
All that evening, and all the next morning, Diana's spirits continued to fizz. She might possibly have worked them off out-of-doors, but the British climate was against her; once more the fells were swathed in their familiar garments of mist, and the rain came pitter-pattering down on the roof of Pendlemere Abbey, and falling from the eaves in a monotonous drip, drip, drip. It was drawing afternoon, and promptly at half-past two intermediates and juniors would be due in the studio to go on with the various copies and models on which they were engaged. It was now shortly after two o'clock, and the school was amusing itself for the half-hour between meal-time and lessons. During that brief interval Diana, so to speak, "popped her cork".
"Hallo, America! You're looking rather weedy, standing on one leg like a marabou stork!" quizzed Sadie. "What's the matter with you?"
"Your beastly, abominable British climate!" retorted Diana. "It goes on rain, rain, raining till I'm fed up. I want to get away somewhere, and see something different from just school. I wasn't born for a convent!"
"I should think not!" chuckled Vi.
"But I'm in one, and I'm tired of it! I'm tired of you all! Yes, I mean what I say!"
"Draw it mild, Stars and Stripes!" warned Sadie.
"I don't care! School's dull, and I'm bored stiff. I'll wake things up somehow; see if I don't!"
"What'll you do, old sport?"
"Ah! _Just wait and see!_" nodded Diana, putting down the foot that had been twisted round her leg, and stamping to get rid of the pins and needles that followed her cramped position. "It's just possible I may turn philanthropist, and give you all a dinky little surprise," she added casually, as she strolled towards the door.
The studio was a large room on the upper story, with the orthodox north windows and top-light, in the shape of a skylight. It was fitted with desks and easels, and round its walls was a row of casts on pedestals. The girls liked drawing afternoon well enough, but they were not in any particular hurry to go upstairs and take out boards and pencils. It was not until twenty-five minutes past two that Wendy, Vi, Sadie, and Peggy came leisurely along the top landing. They opened the door of the studio in quite an every-day manner, and walked in. Then they all four stared and ejaculated:
"O-o-o-oh!"
"Jehosh-a-phat!"
"I say!"
"Good night!"
They might well exclaim, for a very startling and unanticipated spectacle greeted them. The classic heads of the casts had lost their dignity. Apollo wore a tam-o'-shanter cocked rakishly over his left ear; Clytie had on a motor veil; Juno and Ceres were fashionably arrayed in straw hats; a wreath of twisted paper encircled the intellectual brow of Minerva; Psyche peered through spectacles; Perseus was decked with a turban; and, worst of all, the beautiful upper lip of Venus sported a moustache. Armed with a pointer stood Diana, ready, like Mrs. Jarley of the famous waxworks, to act show-woman.
"Walk up! Walk up, ladies and gentlemen!" she began glibly. "This isn't funny at all, it's calm and classical. Greek art up-to-date is what I call it. If Apollo had lived in this British climate I guess he'd have needed a tammy to keep his hair in curl; and Psyche must have been short-sighted when she blundered about hunting for Cupid; she'd have found him in a decent pair of spectacles, poor girl! Clytie suffered from earache, and couldn't motor without a veil; as for Venus, it's giving her the vote that's forced a moustache; she's sent for a safety-razor, but it hasn't arrived yet."
More girls had come in during Diana's explanation, and they wandered round the room in explosions of laughter.
"Why has Perseus got a turban on?" demanded Tattie.
"Because his hair grew thin on the top, and even Tatcho didn't fetch up another crop of curls, and Andromeda so objected to seeing him bald that there was nothing for it but to turn Moslem and wear a turban. He did it in self-defence, because she threatened to buy him a dark wig, and he said it would make him look like a Jew."
"That's _my_ hat!" objected Vi, pointing to the straw that decorated Juno.
"Excuse me--hers! The lady's gone on the land, working like a nigger digging the ground for the potato crop. You see, Jupiter hasn't got demobilized yet, and----"
The flower of Diana's eloquence suddenly withered and dried up as if electrocuted. In the doorway, above the heads of the giggling girls, appeared a vision in pince-nez--an avenging vision that passed rapidly through the several stages of amazement, consternation, and wrath.
"Di-ana _Hew_litt!" snapped Miss Hampson. "Go down and report yourself _instantly_ to Miss Todd. This is simply disgraceful! Girls, take your seats! Tattie and Vi, help to remove those--those----" The irate mistress paused for a word, but, failing to find one adequate to the occasion, began instead, her fingers trembling with indignation, to strip the turban from the classic head of Perseus.
Dead, awful silence reigned in the room. Not a girl dared to giggle; a few began nervously to sharpen pencils, but most sat and stared while the casts were denuded of their trappings. Miss Hampson removed the moustache from Venus as if she were apologizing to that deity for sacrilege, and, with her own handkerchief, wiped away from the lovely lip the seccotine which had attached the masculine appendage to the Queen of Beauty. She rolled up the hats in the towel which had served as turban, set her pupils to work at their copies, then marched sternly downstairs to lay the full enormity of the case before the justly-shocked ears of Miss Todd. Nobody ever heard exactly what happened in the interview; no coaxing or persuasion would induce Diana to disclose details even to Wendy or Loveday, but it was generally understood in the school that Miss Todd had "spoken her mind". One result loomed large, and that was the punishment. It was absolutely unique. Perhaps the Principal was tired of giving poetry to learn or lines to write, and considered that confinement to bounds was not very good for a girl's health, so she devised something else to act as a discipline. For a week Diana was condemned not to wear evening-dress. It was a far greater trial than it sounds. Each night before supper the school changed into pretty frocks, and, when the meal was over, spent a pleasant hour together at recreation. With everybody else in festive attire, it was terrible for Diana to be obliged to come downstairs in her serge skirt and jersey, the one Cinderella of the party. Most especially trying was it on Saturday, when chairs and tables were pushed back in the dining-room, and dancing was the order of the evening. Poor Diana, in her thick morning-shoes, stood forlornly in a corner, refusing all offers of partners, but watching wistfully as the others whirled by. Miss Hampson, whose wrath was of the short, explosive kind that quickly turns to softness of heart, was understood to murmur something to Miss Todd about the impossibility of waltzing in anything but dancing-slippers; but the Principal's mouth was set firm, and she would not remit the least atom of the sentence till it was paid to the uttermost farthing.
If Diana looked wistful, she nevertheless bore her punishment with dignity. She was a girl of spirit, and she did not mean to betray, even by the blink of an eyelid, how much she cared. Geraldine, Hilary, and Ida had rubbed in her ostracism, and certain impudent juniors had enjoyed themselves with witticisms at her expense. To these she must preserve an attitude of sang-froid. But up in the ivy room, when she went to bed, the mask fell off. The Diana that cuddled in Loveday's arms was a very different Diana from the don't-care young person of downstairs. Loveday--who understood her now--consoled and kissed where a term ago she would have scolded. There are some dispositions that can only be managed by kisses.
"It wasn't as if I'd taken a hammer and smashed the wretched old casts!" sobbed Diana. "I really didn't do them any damage; even the seccotine was easily sponged off Venus. But Miss Todd talked and talked as if I'd done something irreligious in church. I'd never do that, you know! Would I, now? She said I had 'an irreverent mind'. I don't believe she'll ever _quite_ forgive me. And oh, Hilary has been so nasty! Thank goodness, dancing evening's done with! I've only Monday and Tuesday nights to go through now, then the whole wretched week will be over. I suppose I'm to be allowed to wear my Sunday clothes to-morrow? If I mayn't, I'll sham ill and stop in bed. I won't go to church in my brown coat and tammy, and have Mr. Fleming and everybody staring at me. I just _couldn't_! I'd die!"
"It's all right about that--don't you worry! I asked Miss Hampson, and she said: 'Certainly, Sunday clothes'. I'll speak to Hilary, and try to get her to leave you alone. As for those kids, just leave them to me; I'll tackle them, and tell them what I think of the way they behaved to-night--the young wretches! I fancy I'll make them squirm!"
"You mascot! Miss Todd says I've been utterly and entirely spoilt. Do _you_ think I have?"
Loveday took the piquant little face between her two hands and looked a moment into the upturned grey eyes.
"Yes," she decided. "You're undoubtedly a spoilt darling--but you're a darling all the same," she added softly under her breath.
CHAPTER XIII
Crusoe Island
When the days grew a little finer, and it was possible to venture out of doors without being almost drowned, Miss Chadwick began to put the "Principles of Agriculture" into practical application. All through the winter she and her assistants--Miss Carr and Miss Ormrod--had worked in all weathers looking after the poultry, the pony, and the new greenhouse, but it was only at rare intervals that it had been possible for the school to turn out and do digging in the garden. The "Land Classes" had, however, been studying the scientific side of the matter. They had analysed soils, estimated the rainfall, and examined the germination of seeds; they understood such mysterious terms as bacteria, protozoa, cotyledons, trenching and ridging, cross-fertilization and spermatozoids, and had some elementary acquaintance with the theory of the rotation of crops. They felt like full-fledged farmers when Miss Chadwick wrote on the black-board such questions as:--
"How far apart should different kinds of orchard trees be planted to ensure enough sunlight?"
"Explain a method of testing seeds."
"What effect has transplanting on a seedling?"
"Describe the difference in structure between a corn-stem and a rose-stem. Make a cross-section drawing of each."
They tried experiments, such as planting in a box six beans with the scarred ends down, and six with the scarred ends up, and noted the results from day to day; they placed blotting-paper between two panes of glass, with seeds next to the glass, put the apparatus in water, and demonstrated the growth of roots; they started one plant in the dark, and another in a light place, grew identical peas in moist cotton or saw-dust, broke the seed leaves from specimen beans to observe what happened, and compared the results of distilled water and tap water as nourishment.
Everybody agreed, however, that it was much more interesting to put on their land costumes and work out-of-doors. Miss Chadwick, whose methods were on the newest lines, taught rhythmic digging, which is far less fatiguing than anyhow exertions, and was very particular about the position of the body and the action of the spade. Miss Todd, looking on with huge satisfaction, felt that she was cultivating girls as well as vegetables, and that her educational experiment promised elements of success. Certain special pupils were allowed to help to attend to the poultry--a coveted honour as soon as the fluffy chickens and ducklings began to be hatched; others were being trained to understand bee-keeping; it was rumoured in the school that Miss Todd's ambition even soared so high as buying a cow.
"Where would she keep it, though?" asked Tattie, who was practical.
"I don't know, unless on the lawn," ventured Jess.
"Whew! It would spoil the tennis-courts."
"Well, I suppose she could hire a field. It would be ripping fun to learn to milk."
"Don't flatter yourself you'd have the chance. The seniors get all that kind of fun, and we poor intermediates only get the spade work. I've never been allowed to feed the chickens once, no--not _once_--and I think it's jolly hard luck!"
"Well, after the way you stuck your fingers into the bee-hive, I should think Miss Ormrod would hardly trust you to feed a sparrow!"
"What nonsense! I was only investigating!"
"Oh, I dare say! It sounds very grand when you put it that way. Miss Ormrod called you 'Meddlesome Matty', and said you deserved to be stung!"
One great advantage of the farming operations, in the eyes of the younger girls, was that so many materials were left lying about, and it was quite possible to obtain a considerable amount of enjoyment from them. A plank placed over a tree-trunk made quite a good see-saw; the new back gate was a delightful one to swing upon; and, when Miss Ormrod's back was turned, it was a favourite amusement to place a ladder against the potting-shed wall, climb to the ridge of the roof, and then slide down and give a flying jump to the ground. There was an old bucket inside the potting-shed upon which Diana had her eye; she had schemes that centred round that bucket. It had holes drilled in its sides, and had been used during building operations to light a fire in. She was determined it should be used for that purpose again.
Down by the brink of the lake was a boat-house that belonged to the school. It was kept carefully locked, and Miss Todd had the key. Since she had taken over the school she had allowed no one to use the boat--a grievance at which the girls sometimes grumbled. There was a small landing-stage at the edge of the water, and only six feet away from this was a sort of island formed of some willow-stumps and a little soil. It was a tiny place, hardly worthy to be called an island, and yet for Diana it held an immense attraction. She wanted to get on to it. She went down one day with Wendy, Peggy, and Vi, and they took the plank which had been used for a see-saw, fixed it as a bridge from the landing-stage to a willow-stump, and then walked across and took possession. Their new property was only about as large as a good-sized dining-table, but they were immensely pleased with it.
"We'll bring down the Stars and Stripes and hang them up!" exulted Diana.
"The Union Jack, you mean!" corrected Wendy. "Can't run up even an Allied flag on British soil without first claiming it for the King! I'd like to have a picnic here!"
"That's exactly what's in my mind," agreed Diana, waiving the question of the colours. "And I've got a brain-wave. We'll carry the bucket over, light a fire, and cook something. Wouldn't it be rather ripping?"
"A1!" beamed Peggy and Vi.
"Crusoe Island", as the girls named their willow-clump, might certainly claim the doubtful distinction of being the smallest British possession in the world, but it was an important one in the eyes of its owners. They duly brought down the Union Jack and the American flag, and--as a concession to Diana--planted them side by side on its scanty soil. They decided not to tell seniors or juniors anything at all about it. Of course, in a vague way, the whole school knew of its existence, but nobody had troubled before to land on its few yards of surface. It was well hidden by the boat-house, so that any operations there were not visible from the garden or orchard. The rest of the intermediates, admitted with many cautions of silence into the secret, approved whole-heartedly; the form squatted in a circle on their territory, linked little fingers, and pledged themselves into a sort of Crusoe Society. Everybody felt that the first thing to be done was to hold an inauguration feast. They borrowed the bucket, filled it with coal and coke from the greenhouse, and carried it successfully over the plank to the island.
"So far so good!" purred Diana. "We've got our fire!"
"But not our feast!" qualified Wendy.
"We shall have to be jolly careful to dodge those juniors," advised Jess. "If they see us carrying out cups they'll be on the scent directly."
"We mustn't risk it. Besides, Barker would be sure to catch us in the pantry, and make a clamour if we took cups; we must manage without things from the house."
"There's a large biscuit-tin lid in the hen-yard," suggested Sadie. "If we washed it very well, it would do as a frying pan."
"Good biz!"
"What could we fry?"
The commissariat question was indeed the problem of problems. The village was unfortunately out of bounds, so that, except on stated occasions, when they were escorted by a mistress, the girls were unable to do shopping "on their own". There are ways, however, of crawling through even the most barbed-wire fence of rules.
"Toddlekins never told us we weren't to ask anybody else to do shopping for us," said Wendy demurely. "When you've not been told not to do anything, you're not disobedient if you don't do it--oh! I'm getting rather in a muddle, but you know what I mean."
They did, and they grinned approval.
"There's a little boy working on the next farm," continued Wendy. "I've smiled and waved to him over the hedge sometimes. I believe he'd do _anything_ for me. If you can stump up some cash, I'll get him to run an errand for us. He's picking stones out of the field at this present moment--at least, to be absolutely truthful, he was, ten minutes ago, and I don't suppose he's stopped. If I go to the orchard fence I can call to him."
The circle looked at Wendy with admiration. They had not before realized the riches of her resourcefulness. Each promised to contribute sixpence, and told her where to find their purses, so that they need not arouse suspicion by visiting their dormitories in a body.
"We'll be lighting the fire while you get the prog," they assured her.
So Wendy departed on her foraging expedition, collected the necessary funds after much hunting in various drawers and coat pockets, hurried to the orchard, and climbed the fence. Freddie Entwistle was still steadily engaged in the rural occupation of ridding his father's field of superfluous stones, but he kept an eye on the horizon, and at the sight of Wendy's beckoning finger he flung duty to the winds.
"D'you want me?" he grinned, as he came panting across the newly ploughed earth.
"Yes," said his siren sweetly. "I want you badly. Will you go to the village and buy something for me?"
"I don't mind. What shall I get?"
"Half a pound of biscuits and something to fry."
"Bacon?" suggested her swain laconically.
"N-n-no. We had bacon for breakfast."
"Kippers or ham?"
"I don't think kippers; but really it must be anything you can get. Here's the money. If there's any change, take it out in sweets."
"Right you are! I'll be as sharp as I can."
"It's something to have a knight-errant who's prepared to relieve a maiden in distress," reflected Wendy, seating herself on the fence to await the return of her chivalrous squire.
He came back in course of time with his pockets bulging with parcels, evidently very proud of himself for having executed his lady's commands. Her thanks and a commission of sweets left him radiant. He returned to his stone-picking, living in a dream.
The party on the island received Wendy with enthusiasm. The fire was burning beautifully in the bucket, the tin had been scoured with sand and well washed, large ivy leaves had been picked to serve as plates, and the company had their penknives ready.
"It's sausages!" exclaimed Wendy, opening one of the parcels; "and he's actually bought some lard to fry them in. What a brain--and only twelve! That boy'll be a general some day, if he doesn't die of over-cleverness. Biscuits to eat with them, my children, and some chocs. for dessert. I beg to propose that we accord a hearty vote of thanks to Freddie Entwistle."
"For he's a jolly good fellow! For he's a jolly good fellow!"
began Jess; but Diana promptly squashed her.
"Stop that noise! D'you want to give the whole show away, and have Lennie, and Nora, and Betty, and all the rest of the kids swarming down upon us? Anybody who can't keep quiet will be made to walk the plank. Yes, and splash into the river at the other end of it! We wouldn't pick you out either; we'd let you drown!"
"Then I'd sing 'For he's a jolly good fellow' as my 'dying swan song'," protested Jess. "The kids are far enough away. No one can hear us."
She took the hint, all the same, and did not allow her enjoyment to bubble over into music. Instead, she helped Wendy to prick the sausages with a penknife and place them on the temporary frying-pan. The biscuit-tin lid just fitted nicely over the bucket. In a few minutes there was a grand sound of fizzling, and a most delicious scent began to waft itself over the waters of the lake. The best of a bucket-fire is that everybody can sit round it in a circle and superintend the cooking operations. Eight penknives prodded the sausages so often that it was a wonder they were not all chopped to pieces before they were done. At last the connoisseurs declared they were brown enough, and they were carefully and mathematically halved and served on biscuits.
"Delicious!" decreed Tattie, critically.
"Couldn't have been better if Toddlekins had reared the piglets on our own farm," chimed in Peggy.
"Diana, you haven't taken a bite yet," commented Wendy.
"I'm not sure that I want any. I think I'll only have a biscuit, after all."
"Not want any? Not want the lovely sausages that I risked so much to get? Diana Hewlitt, what's the matter with you?"
"Oh, nothing--only----"
"Only nothing, I should say! Eat up that piece of sausage double quick, if you value my friendship."
"Suppose you eat it for me? That would be sentiment."
"No, it wouldn't; you must eat it yourself. There'll be a shindy if you don't. Our first feast! It's a sort of ceremonial!"
"Not 'the cup of brotherhood' but 'the sausage of sisterhood'!" hinnied Jess.
Diana looked doubtfully at the two inches of brown, porky substance on her ivy-leaf plate, and sighed.
"I feel like the elephant at the Zoo when they offered him his hundredth bun: It may kill me, but it's a beautiful death," she demurred. "Well, if you're all nuts on my having some, I guess there's nothing else for it. Here goes! What a life!"
"The Sisterhood of the Sausage," murmured Jess fatuously.
"Don't make such a fuss; you know you're enjoying it, old sport," said Wendy. "It isn't every day in your life you can come and have a blow-out on Crusoe Island."
*     *     *     *     *
On Thursday morning Diana, who had been restless and fidgety in the night, awoke with a rash all over her face and chest. Loveday, much alarmed, would not allow her to get up till the authorities had seen her, and fetched Miss Todd. The Principal, dismayed at the prospect of infection in the school, mentally ran over the gamut of possible diseases from scarlatina to chicken-pox, ordered Diana to stop in bed, and sent at once to Glenbury for the doctor.
Now it happened that Dr. Hunter was himself in bed, suffering from a severe attack of influenza, and, as it was extremely difficult for him, at a few hours' notice, to secure the services of a really competent medical man as locum tenens, he had been obliged to put up with a Hindoo doctor who was sent by the London agent in answer to his urgent telegram. It was a case of "any port in a storm", and though Dr. Jinaradasa's qualifications might be such as only just to satisfy the board of the Royal College of Surgeons, it was better to send him to look after the patients than to leave them utterly unattended. Therefore, when the neat little two-seater car drew up at Pendlemere Abbey it was not the bluff, rosy-cheeked Dr. Hunter who stepped out of it, but a foreign-looking gentleman with a very dark complexion. He explained his presence to Miss Todd, who gasped for a second, but recovered herself, received him gratefully, and conducted him upstairs to view his patient. Diana, I regret to say, behaved like the spoilt child she really was. She buried her head under the bedclothes, and at first utterly refused to submit to any examination. Miss Todd coaxed, wheedled, stormed, and finally pulled the clothes away by force and displayed the rash to the dark, lustreless eyes of Dr. Jinaradasa. He asked a few questions--which Diana answered sulkily--took her temperature, felt her pulse, and retired downstairs to talk over the case with Miss Todd, leaving a very cross and indignant patient behind him. Ten minutes afterwards the door of the ivy room swung gently open, and Wendy's interested and sympathetic face made its appearance.
"Di!" she whispered impressively; "I'm coming to see you, even if it's smallpox you've got. I'm supposed to be practising, but I just did a bolt. Well, old sport, you do look an object, I must say!"
Diana hitched herself higher in bed.
"You needn't be afraid. I'm not infectious," she remarked.
"They say you've got measles," ventured Wendy.
"Measles!" snorted Diana scornfully. "That's all they know about it. I've told them till I'm tired that it's nettle-rash. I've had it before. I always _do_ get the wretched thing when I eat sausages. They sort of poison me. It'll go away all right if they only let me alone. What did Miss Todd want bringing that black doctor up to see me? I had nearly forty fits when he came marching into my room."
"Well, he says you've got measles at any rate, and Toddlekins is in no end of a state. Thinks it's going to spread all through the school. D'you know she's making arrangements to send you to the Fever Hospital? They're to come and fetch you away in the ambulance."
"_What!_ The idiots! I tell you I _haven't_ got measles. I won't go! Do you think I'm going to let myself be bundled off to the Fever Hospital just because an ignoramus of a Hindoo doctor doesn't know his business sufficiently to tell nettle-rash when he sees it? Rather not! I'd show fight first!"
"They'll roll you in blankets and carry you downstairs!" thrilled Wendy.
"They'll do nothing of the sort--I'll take good care of that. I wouldn't be easy to carry if I kicked, even inside blankets. I never heard of such an outrageous thing in all my life. I've some bounce left in me yet, and I'll use it--see if I don't! Measles, indeed! I wonder he didn't say it was hydrophobia."
"Well, whatever it is, you're to be taken to the Fever Hospital; they've ordered the ambulance. I'm awfully sorry, old sport! It's hard luck on you. I must scoot now, and go back to my practising, or I shall have Bunty on my track. Bye-bye!"
Wendy vanished, leaving Diana alone and most upset. She considered that she was being treated abominably. She longed to telegraph to her parents, but she knew that was impossible.
"Whatever happens, I'm not going to that wretched Fever Hospital," she said to herself. "I'm sure Cousin Cora wouldn't like me to be taken there. Why shouldn't I go to Petteridge? They're all well again from the 'flu'. What a brain-wave! I declare I will, and tell Cousin Cora all about it!"
Diana was nothing if not impetuous. She jumped up immediately, and began a hasty toilet. She was just three-quarters through with it when she heard footsteps on the stairs. She immediately whisked her nightdress on over her clothes, and popped into bed just three seconds before Miss Todd entered the room. The excitement of such a rush made her face more flushed than ever. Miss Todd came and looked at her critically.
"Yes, the rash is coming out very nicely," she observed.
"It's nettle-rash, not measles!" affirmed Diana defiantly.
"That's for the doctor to decide, not you. I'm afraid you must have caught it the day you went in the omnibus to Glenbury. It takes nearly a fortnight to incubate."
Diana shivered with anxiety lest Miss Todd should wish to inspect the progress of the rash on her chest as well as on her face, and thus discover that she was half clothed beneath her nightdress, but fortunately the head mistress did not descend so far in her investigations. Instead, she turned to Diana's drawers, and began filling a hand-bag with various necessaries. She did not mention the Fever Hospital, probably judging it better not to prepare the patient beforehand, but to wait until the ambulance arrived. Diana, of course, knew why she was collecting the garments, but feigned to ignore the matter, and made no comment. She wished Miss Todd would be quick and go. She was so terribly afraid that the ambulance might drive up before she had the chance to make her escape. Flight seemed certainly preferable to a struggle.
The mistress at last found a sufficiency of nightdresses and other garments, and, telling Diana to keep herself covered up and warm, took her departure.
The moment she was safely out of the way the invalid sprang up and resumed her interrupted toilet. Diana had suffered from nettle-rash several times before, and the treatment had not included stopping in bed or even staying indoors. Her complaint was really more in the nature of dyspepsia. She felt as if fresh air would do her good. She did not dare to walk downstairs in case she might meet anybody, so she decided to adopt the method she had found effective last autumn, and climb out through the window and down the ivy. Lessons were in progress, so nobody would be in the garden to watch her, except Miss Carr and Miss Ormrod, who would probably be engaged with the horse or the hens. She swung herself out, therefore, and let herself down by the thick stems. Then she dodged round the house to the bicycle-shed. She did not yet possess a machine of her own, but Wendy's stood handy, and she knew her chum well enough to borrow it. She wheeled it through the back gate, fortunately without meeting Miss Carr, and then set off at top-speed for Petteridge Court.
Mrs. Burritt was naturally much surprised to see her young cousin turn up in so unexpected a fashion, and with a rash on her face, but she did the most sensible thing in the circumstances: she put Diana to bed, and sent to Dunswick for a doctor. He arrived during the course of the afternoon, and, after a careful examination of his patient, pronounced her complaint to be nettle-rash.
"There's not a doubt about it!" he declared. "You need not be in the least afraid that it's measles."
Armed with a medical certificate to that effect, Mrs. Burritt motored over to Pendlemere Abbey to patch up peace with Miss Todd. Partly for reasons of health, and partly to let the storm blow over, she kept Diana at Petteridge until the rash had entirely disappeared and the girl seemed in her absolutely normal condition. Mrs. Burritt took her back on the understanding that bygones should be bygones, and a fresh start should be made without any reference to former delinquencies.
Miss Todd received Diana quite amiably, but insisted upon her having a carbolic bath, and herself washed her hair with strong disinfectant soap. The clothes she had worn disappeared mysteriously for some days, and were then returned from the stoving department of the Glenbury Sanitation Office. Diana made no comments at head-quarters, but laughed to herself.
"I'm sure Toddlekins believes I've had measles," she confided to Wendy.
"Of course she does. She said she hadn't the least doubt about it, and that you hadn't eaten anything which could have caused you to have nettle-rash."
"What would she say if she knew about the sausages?" queried Diana.
CHAPTER XIV
Spooks
March had come, and even in the northern mountainous region of the Pennines, where snow lingers long after it has melted in more favoured districts, winter had begun to make way for spring. The snowdrops--January flowers in Wales or Cornwall, fair maids of February in most counties--were late bloomers at Pendlemere, and were never in their prime till St. Patrick's Day. They made up for their tardy arrival by their luxuriance. They grew almost wild in the orchard, and spread like a white carpet over the grass, tossing fairy bells in the wind. Diana, promoted to help Miss Carr in the spraying of apple-trees, paused in her work to look round and revel in nature's re-awakening. She was a sun lover, and the long months of perpetual mist and rain had tried her very much. She had, to be sure, kept up her spirits in spite of weather; still, the sight of fleecy, white clouds scudding across a blue sky, and the sound of the missel-thrush tuning up on the bare branch of the plum-tree were particularly cheering. Hedge-sparrows twittered among the shrubs, and rooks were busy flying with large twigs in their bills to repair their nests in the elms near the church. In the March sunshine the lake glittered like gold.
"I wonder if it looked just like this when the old monks lived here," said Diana. "Did they see exactly what we do now?"
"Pretty much the same, I expect," answered Miss Carr rather abstractedly. "The lake and the fells would be there, and probably most of the farms, though the buildings would be different in those days. The lay brethren would attend to the land just as we do. I dare say they dug in this very orchard, and grew herbs in the same place where we're going to plant our potatoes."
"It's a pity we can't call up a vision of them!"
"No, thank you!" said Miss Carr, who was a practical person, and not given to romance. "I've not the slightest desire to see spooks. I'm quite content with modern life, and don't want fourteenth-century ghosts gliding about the place. Get on with your work, Diana! I'm more concerned with apple-trees than with the old monks."
When Diana got an idea into her head, however, it was apt to stick. She had a lively imagination, and she liked to picture what the Abbey had once been. She read the account of it in the local guidebook and in Chadwick's _Northern Antiquities_, which she borrowed from the library, and she further devoured Scott's _The Monastery_. Steeped in this mediæval atmosphere, she began to tell the girls such vivid stories of the doings of the brethren that they almost believed her. She invented several fictitious characters: Brother Amos, Brother Lawrence, Brother John, and Prior Andrew, and gave a most circumstantial account of their adventures.
"How do you know what they used to do?" asked Jess, much impressed.
"I guess I sort of feel it," said Diana. "It's almost like remembering."
"Some people think we come back to earth and live again. Were you one of the old monks, Di?"
"She must have been an unholy one, if she was!" interrupted Sadie. "Anybody less like a monk than 'Stars and Stripes' I couldn't think of!"
"There were all sorts, of course. I've told you Brother Lawrence was up to tricks sometimes, and got the discipline. The Prior used to be down on him, just as Toddlekins is down on us. He was more sinner than saint. That's why he can't rest quietly."
"Doesn't he rest?" Jess's voice held a note of uneasiness.
"No, I don't think he does. I've a kind of feeling that he haunts the place, coming back to find out what it's like now."
"An earth-bound spirit!" gasped Jess.
"Yes, he's got some sins to expiate, you see."
The conversation was growing creepy. Sadie, Tattie, Jess, and Peggy, who with Diana were squatting near the schoolroom fire in the gloaming, moved a little nearer together. There is comfort in physical contact. The fact that Brother Lawrence was entirely an invention of Diana's did not relieve the tenseness of the situation; she had talked about him so often that she seemed to have conjured him up. They could almost see his white habit gliding along the corridor, and his unsaintly eyes gleaming from under his cowl. They began to wish he had behaved better during his lifetime, or at any rate that he had not chosen to revisit the scenes of his old sins.
"If I were really to see him I'd have forty fits!" shivered Peggy, who was a superstitious little soul who threw spilt salt over her left shoulder, and curtsied religiously to the new moon.
"It isn't everybody can see ghosts," declared Diana. "You've got to have the psychic faculty. Some people can feel they're there, even when they can't see them."
"Oh, that would be _far_ worse! It would be awful to know something was in the room, and not be able to see it!" exploded Jess. "Tattie, may I come and sleep in your bed to-night?"
"There's not much room, but you can if you like," conceded Tattie; "so long as Geraldine doesn't find out."
"I'll creep in when she's asleep."
It was all very well for Diana to people the corridor with imaginary monks; she knew they were images of her own creation; the more weak-minded of her form mates, however, were frankly frightened. Nothing spreads more readily than a ghost scare. Sadie, Jess, and Peggie were bolting squealing along the passage one evening, when they almost collided with Geraldine. She seized Jess by the arm, and pulled her into the radius of the lamplight, nodding to the other two to follow.
"I want a word with you," she said. "It's high time you stopped this ridiculous nonsense. I don't know who started it, but it's getting the limit. Oh, yes! I know you go creeping into Tattie's bed when you think I'm asleep, and you daren't walk upstairs alone. I'm not as blind or deaf as you seem to suppose. You're putting silly ideas into juniors' heads. Whoever heard of the Abbey being haunted? Such stuff! You'll be afraid of your own shadows next. Do try to be more strong-minded! I really shouldn't have expected----"
Geraldine stopped, because something like a whirlwind suddenly descended the stairs and stampeded towards them. It resolved itself into Diana--Diana with scarlet cheeks, shining eyes, and face simply bubbling over with excitement.
"Hallo! I say!" she jodelled, "What _do_ you think?" Then she saw Geraldine, and halted dead.
"Come here!" commanded the head girl. "I want to talk to you too about this absurd spook scare. It's mostly among you intermediates, and the sooner you get it out of your silly heads the better. Pity you can't find something more sensible to talk about. Why don't you read, and fill up your empty brains? There are heaps of good books in the library, if you'd only get them out. You spend all your spare time gossiping."
"We _do_ read!" retorted Diana, taking up the cudgels for the maligned intermediates. "I've just read _The Monastery_, and that's all about a ghost called 'The White Lady of Avenel'. It's _grand_ where she rides the sacristan's mule down the river and sings:
'Merrily swim we; the moon shines bright. Good luck to your fishing! Whom watch ye to-night?'
There are heaps and loads of ghost tales in the guide book and in Chadwick's _Northern Antiquities_, and those are all books Miss Todd _told_ me I might read. She said they were 'educational'."
"She didn't mean you to take the ghosts seriously, though, any more than you'd believe in the gods of Greece because you were learning classical literature. Why, you'll tell me next that you expect to see the fairies."
"I'm not sure that I don't!"
"Then you're a bigger goose than I thought you. Really, at fourteen! I'm astonished at all of you. You don't see _me_ running squealing away from supposed ghosts. Don't let me catch you being such little idiots again."
Having finished her harangue, and having, as she thought, thoroughly squashed the folly of the intermediates, Geraldine proceeded on her way, happily oblivious of the faces they were pulling behind her back.
"I'd like to see _her_ squeal and run," grunted Jess.
[Illustration: ITS COWL FELL BACK, AND DISCLOSED A WELL-KNOWN AND DECIDEDLY MIRTHFUL COUNTENANCE]
"So should I," agreed Sadie. "She's always _very_ superior. By the by, Stars and Stripes, what were you just going to tell us?"
"Nothing particular."
The next morning the Teenie Weenie workmen set off for the little girl’s house, followed by a number of the little people who were curious to see the bear. As the little girl had been taken out for a walk, the coast was clear, and the little men started to work at once, while the rest wandered about examining a doll’s house and many other toys which stood about the room.
The Teenie Weenies jacked up the bear, fitted in a lead pencil for an axle, bolted together the broken wheel, and in a short time the little men had made the toy as good as new.
When the little girl came back from her walk and found the mended toy she was very happy, and she wondered many, many times just who had fixed the broken bear.
[‡Illustration: Boy and pencil]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
THE INVENTION
“I’LL bet that little girl has wondered many times how her bear was mended,” chuckled the Old Soldier, as he stirred up the fire with a big darning needle which the little folks used for a poker.
“She must consider it quite a mystery,” said the Lady of Fashion.
“Speaking of mysteries,” cried the Turk, “does anybody know what the Dunce is up to?”
The Dunce had been locking himself up in his room for the last few days, in a most mysterious way. He seemed very important and he refused to answer questions.
“I’ll bet he is building something,” ventured the Cowboy. “He’s been hammering away all day.”
“I saw him sneaking along this morning with a cork on his shoulder,” said the Cook.
[‡Illustration: Barrel]
“Well just give him a little time and we’ll find out,” remarked Grandpa, nodding his head wisely. “He’s swelling up so with importance he’ll have to tell pretty soon or he will bust.”
Grandpa was right, for that very evening the Dunce arose from his chair at the teenie weenie supper table and said: “Ladies and gentlemen, I have just finished a great invention and, if I can find some deep water near by, I will be glad to show you something astonishing.”
“Three rousing cheers for Thomas Edison Dunce!” shouted the Clown, and the cheers were given with such a will that the squirrel, who lived near the shoe house, came running over and looked in the window to see what the noise was all about.
As the weather was quite cool, the Teenie Weenies thought it would be wise to try the Dunce’s invention indoors. So it was decided to go to the big house across the street, where plenty of water could be found in the bathroom. As soon as breakfast was over the next morning the Teenie Weenies hurried over to the house and climbed up to the washstand. After a lot of hard work they got the faucets turned and filled the bowl with water. The Dunce then took two corks from a big package that the Sailor had helped him carry, and strapped them tightly to his feet.
“Now, ladies and gentlemen,” shouted the Dunce, “I will show you how easy it is to walk on water.”
Letting himself down into the water by the chain to the stopper, the Dunce stepped bravely out toward the center of the bowl. But—as soon as he let go of the chain he lost his balance and fell over, kersplash, into the water! The corks, being so light, pulled his feet to the top of the water, and kept them there, and if the Turk and the Sailor had not promptly dived in after him the Dunce would probably have been drowned.
“G-G-G-Golly.” spluttered the Dunce, as he sat dripping, but safe, on the edge of the bowl, “it d-d-didn’t w-wo-work, did it?”
[‡Illustration: Dunce in the water]
The Teenie Weenies had lots of fun teasing the Dunce about walking on the water, and it was many days before he heard the last of his wonderful invention.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[‡Illustration: Drum]
THE GREAT BALL
THERE was some great secret in the air. For some time there had been much stir in and about the Teenie Weenie village beneath the rose bush. There were many secret meetings between the General and the Lady of Fashion, who seemed to be the leading spirits of it all. The Turk and the Cook and Gogo, under the direction of the Lady of Fashion, spent many days in the cellar of a certain house not far from Shoehurst. The Lovers’ bungalow was closed to all gentlemen callers every afternoon for several weeks, and it was reported that the little ladies who gathered there were sewing with might and main.
“By heck, it ’pears to me that there is somethin’ mighty queer goin’ on ’round here,” remarked Grandpa as he shuffled into the Chinaman’s laundry one afternoon. “Such carryin’s on I haven’t seen for a long time.”
“Allee same muchee slecrets,” said the Chinaman, putting down his tiny iron and pushing out a chair for his visitor.
“Secrets!” shouted the old man. “Why, bless my soul, the air is full of ’em, and I reckon it’s some of those new fangled ideas of the Lady of Fashion; she’s always up to somethin’ or t’other.”
“Allee same we fine out if we wait long enough,” laughed the Chinaman.
“Well, I ’spect you’re right,” growled Grandpa, “but we never did have any carryin’s on like that when I was a youngster.”
It wasn’t long before all the Teenie Weenies knew what the secret was, for one morning they each received a tiny invitation written neatly in the dainty hand of the Lady of Fashion.
It was a very formal invitation to a grand ball in the cellar of a certain house.
There was much excitement among some of the little men, for it was whispered about that those who attended the ball were supposed to wear full dress suits and several of the little chaps had none. However, the Old Soldier, who was quite a good tailor, came to their rescue and everybody was provided with a dress suit, or “fish and soup suit,” as Grandpa called them.
The ball was to be the most fashionable thing that ever had been given in Teenie Weenie land, and all the little folks could hardly wait for the appointed day.
The ball was to be given on the head of a drum which lay in a cellar not far from the shoe house. A paper box, which was found in the cellar, was pulled up beside the drum. Onto it steps were built up to the head of the drum. By cutting a door in the box it made a wonderful place for the little guests to leave their wraps, and a curtain, strung across the center of the box, gave the little ladies a snug place to powder their tiny noses. The head of the drum made a fine dance floor, and around the edges comfortable seats were placed.
It took quite a lot of argument to get the Dunce and Gogo to act as footmen, for they wanted to wear dress suits like the rest, but when they found out that they were to help the Cook serve the ice cream they were very willing.
The day of the ball the excited Teenie Weenies started to scrub and clean themselves many hours before the time set for the party, and a cleaner set of little folks never was seen.
At 9 o’clock the guests began to arrive and they were received at the top of the stairs by the Lady of Fashion and the General. Great candles flooded the place with light, and the Old Soldier, Paddy Pinn, and the Cowboy furnished music for the dancing.
At first the guests were rather stiff and formal, but the Dunce relieved the situation by falling down stairs with a tray full of dishes. The little people laughed right out loud when they saw the Dunce wasn’t hurt, and from that moment on every one enjoyed themselves as they never had before.
A wonderful lunch was prepared by the Cook, and the footmen passed around dainty sandwiches, cocoa, lemonade, and ice cream.
All the Teenie Weenies attended the ball, except Grandpa, who stayed home and took care of the Lover Twins, and everyone said that the ball was the greatest event that had ever taken place in the Teenie Weenie social world.
“We had a wonderfully fine time, Grandpa,” cried the Doctor when the little folks returned from the ball.
“And we had awful good things to eat,” announced the Dunce. “See, I’ve brought some home for you,” and the little fellow uncovered a tiny dish filled with ice cream.
“Once I went to a party,” said Grandpa, dipping into the ice cream. “It was along in March in forty-nine—” But the little folks were too tired to listen to the story and they trudged off to bed, leaving the old gentleman to finish his ice cream and story by himself.
[‡Illustration: Mirror]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
A MOST UNLUCKY MOUSE
“WELL,” yawned Mr. Mouse, rolling off his soft cotton bed, “I think I’d better go out and see what I can find for breakfast; we haven’t a bit of cheese or bread in the house.”
“Now do be careful, dear,” warned Mrs. Mouse, “and please don’t go near that nasty old trap under the steps.”
“All right, I’ll be careful,” laughed her husband and he hurried down the long hall which connected their home with a large cellar where all sorts of good things could usually be found. But on this particular morning Mr. Mouse found food very scarce and he was forced to climb about in many places in search of breakfast. While walking along the edge of a basket he chanced to see some crumbs of bread on the steps near by, and wishing to make a short cut he decided to leap onto an empty fruit jar that stood near, and from there onto the steps. He made a mighty leap onto the jar, but before he could balance himself he slipped and fell in.
[‡Illustration: Mouse]
His cries for help could not be heard, and it was some time before Mrs. Mouse, who had been alarmed at his absence, found the poor fellow.
“Oh, dear me! By the great cat’s tail! This is most awful!” exclaimed Mrs. Mouse, bursting into tears.
[‡Illustration: Jar]
“Go tell the Teenie Weenies!” shouted her husband. “They will come and help me out.”
Mrs. Mouse ran over to the shoe house, and climbing up the front steps she rapped so hard that she scratched half the paint off the tiny door. Between bursts of tears Mrs. Mouse told the Teenie Weenies about her husband and the little people promised at once to help.
“Dear Mrs. Mouse,” said the Lady of Fashion, trying to comfort the tearful mouse, “you must calm yourself. You must try to be calm.”
“Great cat’s claws!” exclaimed Mrs. Mouse, “I’d like to see you be calm with a husband in a fruit jar,” and she burst into another fit of crying as she hurried back to her imprisoned husband, followed by the Teenie Weenies.
The Teenie Weenies quickly put up a ladder which they had brought with them, and the Doctor was soon lowered into the jar, where he found the poor mouse had two badly sprained legs. The General ordered the big windlass brought up, and when a derrick had been built on top of the fruit jar out of three strong clothespins the injured mouse was bundled into the biggest teenie weenie tablecloth and pulled out.
As it was late the Teenie Weenies decided to make the poor mouse as comfortable as possible, for it was quite a long way to the mouse’s home, and they thought that after a night’s rest he could stand the trip with less pain.
[‡Illustration: Clothespin]
The little men made him a soft bed under the cellar stairs, and after he had eaten a Welsh rarebit, which the Cook brought to him, he fell into a sound sleep with Mrs. Mouse sitting watchfully by his side.
“We’ll be over early in the morning and take your husband home,” said the General, and the Teenie Weenies started back to the shoe house, for it was fast growing dark.
[‡Illustration: Soup]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
MRS. MOUSE ASKS A FAVOR
IT WAS quite late when the Teenie Weenies arrived at the shoe house, and it was almost nine o’clock when the little people had finished their supper.
“Well, we’d better all get to bed,” said the General, pushing his chair back from the table, “for we have got to be out bright and early in the morning and take Mr. Mouse back to his home.”
Gogo and the Turk helped the Cook wash up the supper dishes, and half an hour later every single Teenie Weenie was sleeping peacefully in his teenie weenie bed.
The Teenie Weenies had been asleep only a short time when they were awakened by a loud squeaking and scratching at the front door.
“Who dat?” cried Gogo, putting his head out one of the tiny windows.
“Its me,” answered Mrs. Mouse. “Oh dear me.”
“What’s the trouble?” asked the General, joining Gogo at the window.
“Oh gracious me,” wailed Mrs. Mouse, “I’m scared half out of my senses, for I’m afraid that old cat that lives next door might get in the cellar, and to think what would happen to my poor crippled husband just frightens me half out of my wits.”
“We’ll not desert you, madam,” said the General kindly. “We’ll come over immediately and take your husband home.”
The Teenie Weenies soon dressed themselves, and Gogo hurried over to the hospital to call the Doctor.
“Hadn’t we better take along one of the wagons?” asked the General, when the Teenie Weenie physician arrived.
“A wagon wouldn’t do,” answered the Doctor. “We could never take Mr. Mouse home in a wagon. Why, it would jar the poor mouse’s injured legs until he couldn’t stand the pain.”
“Great grief!” cried the General, “how in the name of ripe cherries are we going to move him?”
“Very simple matter,” said the Doctor. “We can carry him in a hammock, which we can make out of a sheet or tablecloth. This can be hung on a pole and we can carry him on our shoulders.”
“I know where there’s a pole that will be just the thing,” shouted the Turk. “Come on, Gogo, and we’ll get it.”
The two Teenie Weenies hurried away in the darkness and presently they returned with a long handled paint brush.
The Cook brought out an old tablecloth and the little men set out for the cellar where the poor mouse lay.
It was dark, but the little fellows found their way without trouble, for Teenie Weenies can see almost as well as owls in the dark and in a short time they arrived safe and sound.
[‡Illustration: Stretcher for the bird]
The injured mouse was soon put into the tablecloth and the ends were made fast to the brush handle. Six of the strongest Teenie Weenies were chosen to carry the mouse and they gently lifted the brush handle to their shoulders. The Teenie Weenies moved off carefully towards the mouse’s home, which lay at the far end of the cellar.
The Dunce walked at the side of the hammock and carried the mouse’s long tail over his shoulder, in order to keep it from dragging on the floor, for the poor fellow’s spirits were mighty low and his tail would drag.
The mouse was carried through a hole in a brick wall, which was the entrance to his home, and laid gently on a bed of soft cotton. The Lady of Fashion helped Mrs. Mouse nurse her husband back to health and the Doctor called almost every day, while the Cook made all sorts of dainty dishes for the invalid.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
THE SCOTCHMAN GOES SOUTH
THE Doctor had been very busy for some time. First the mouse, who had fallen into the fruit jar, needed a great deal of attention. The mouse lived quite a distance from the hospital and the Doctor called on him once a day for two weeks. Then a squirrel fell sick and the Doctor had to call on him for several days. The twins had the mumps and the Scotchman complained of the rheumatism.
The Scotchman’s trouble caused the Doctor considerable thought. He worried over it for some time and then decided to take the matter up with the General. Taking his tall hat from its peg behind the office door he hurried over to the shoe house.
“General,” he said as he stepped into the teenie weenie library and closed the door softly, “I’d like to speak to you for a few minutes.”
“Go right ahead, Doc,” said the General, throwing aside his work.
“It’s about the Scotchman,” said the Doctor, dropping into a teenie weenie rocking chair. “Scotty was troubled with rheumatism in his legs last winter, and the pain has started again this fall.”
“It’s all on account of his wearing those short kilt skirts, and going around in his bare knees,” cried the General anxiously.
[‡Illustration: Teenie Weenie on bird]
“Yes, I know it is,” answered the Doctor. “I’ve tried to get him to wear trousers during the winter weather, but he will not do it. So, he’s got to go south to spend the winter, where there’s no cold weather, or he’ll be sick.”
[‡Illustration: Standing around]
“How in the world will he ever get down south?” asked the General.
“Oh, I’ve fixed that up all right,” said the Doctor. “You know our friends, the birds, always go south for the winter?”
“Yes,” nodded the General.
“Well, I was talking to a bird this morning, and she told me that she was starting south in a few days. I told her about our Scotchman, and she said that she would be glad to take him along. She said that he could ride on her back. She promised to look after him, and said she would bring him north again in the spring.”
The General thought the plan a good one, and Scotty was told to pack his grip, and be ready to go by the end of the week.
The Teenie Weenies were greatly excited over the news. The Lady of Fashion mended all the Scotchman’s clothes, and made him three tiny new shirts for the trip. The Chinaman washed everything he had that could be washed, starched and ironed his new shirts beautifully, and the others did all they could to make him comfortable and happy.
“Oh my,” said the Dunce, when he heard the news, “I wish I had rheumatism, too, so I could go along.”
The Teenie Weenies were up at the first break of day the morning that the Scotchman was to go. At the promised hour the bird flew up to the shoe house and lighted on the lawn.
“All aboard for Dixie,” cried the bird, and the Teenie Weenies all swarmed out with the Scotchman among them.
“Here,” shouted the Cook, running out with a big, neat package. “Here’s your lunch. I put in all the things you like best.”
“Jimminie,” muttered the Dunce, as he hungrily watched the lunch being forced into the Scotchman’s already overflowing grip, “I just do wish I was a-goin’!”
“We’ll send your trunk to you by mail,” shouted the Cowboy as the Scotchman climbed up on the back of the bird.
“All right,” cried Scotty. “Thanks and good-by to everybody.”
The bird spread her wings and gently rose from the ground. The Teenie Weenies stood shouting good-bys, and waving hands and handkerchiefs, till bird and Scotchman were lost to sight in the blue sky overhead.
[‡Illustration: Scotchman’s suitcase]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
FIRE! FIRE! FIRE!
“F-f-f-f-f-fire! F-f-f-fire!” shouted the excited Dunce, as he dashed up to the shoe house, gasping for breath.
“Where? What?” cried the General popping his head out of the front door.
“Over t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-to th-th-th-th-th-th—”
“Great guns!” shouted the General, throwing up his hands in despair. “The house or whatever it is will burn down before you are able to tell us where the fire is. Out with it. Where is the fire? Quick!”
“It’s it’s over t-t-t-t-to th-th-th-th-the Lovers’ house,” gasped the Dunce, just as the Teenie Weenie fire engine and hook and ladder dashed up to the shoe house.
“To the Lovers’ house,” cried the General as he jumped onto the running board of the fire engine.
The little engine fairly flew over the melting snow and it nearly fell over as it skidded dangerously around a piece of paving brick which lay in its path. Presently the fire department arrived at the Lovers’ bungalow, where they found clouds of smoke pouring out of the cracks around the back door and kitchen windows.
As Mr. and Mrs. Lover had locked up and gone with the Doctor to visit a sick mouse near by, it was found necessary to break in the back door, and soon a stream of water was thrown into the smoky kitchen.
[‡Illustration: Fire!]
The Chinaman was ironing one of the General’s shirts when he heard the news of the fire, and in the excitement he ran over to the Lovers’ house, carrying the hot iron he had been using at the time.
The excited Dunce climbed up onto the roof, and if it hadn’t been for Gogo he would have chopped a hole through the roof.
“What you-all goin’ to do with dat ax?” asked the little colored lad as he watched the Dunce hurry up the ladder.
“Gonna chop a hole in the roof,” answered the Dunce. “You’ve always got to do that; they always chop a hole in the roof when there’s a fire.”
“But there is no fire in the roof,” cried Gogo. “It’s down in the kitchen.”
“Makes no difference,” said the Dunce; “you always have to chop a hole in the roof.” And if Gogo hadn’t grabbed the ax from the Dunce’s hand the foolish fellow would have done a lot of damage with it.
Almost a teacupful of water was thrown into the tiny kitchen and it did more damage than the fire, for really all that burned was a bean, which Mrs. Lover had put on the stove to cook, and which had boiled dry.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
THE DUNCE TAKES A TUMBLE
“CRICKETY!” exclaimed the Dunce as he dropped into a chair before the Teenie Weenie fireplace. “Since the Scotchman left it’s as dull around here as a lady’s pocket knife,” and the little fellow blinked mournfully into the fire.
[‡Illustration: Lady sews]
“What’s wrong, Dunce?” asked the Lady of Fashion, looking up from her sewing.
“Ah, I want to take a walk or somethin’ and everybody is busy or somethin’.”
“Why don’t you get Gogo to go along? He always likes to take a walk,” smiled the little lady.
“Ah, he an’ the Cowboy an’ the Turk are buildin’ a fly trap over at the tool house. The Sailor and the Indian are helpin’ the Cook get a spoiled potato out of the cellar. Paddy Pinn, the Doctor, the General and the Old Soldier are havin’ a meetin’ at the hospital and the Clown and the Poet are out in the back yard talkin’ nonsense with a sparrow,” growled the Dunce.
“I’d love to take a walk today, but I promised to mend this dress for Mrs. Lover and it has to be finished by four o’clock, as she and Mr. Lover and the Twins are invited over to the squirrel’s house for dinner. Why don’t you go over to the laundry and try Chuck and Zip? Maybe one of them would like to take a walk.”
“Chink!” shouted the Dunce, “I never thought about the Chinaman and Zip,” and jumping up he hurried over to the old tea pot, where he found Zip toasting his shins before the fire.
The Chinaman had just gone over to the hospital to deliver some shirts to the Doctor, but Zip was ready for a walk, and in a few minutes he slipped on his sweater and the two Teenie Weenies set off together.
There was one place the Teenie Weenies loved to visit best of all and that was any big house where big people lived, for there were always so many big and wonderful things to see.
The two little fellows made their way straight to the nearest big house, and crawling under the door they began to investigate the place.
“Let’s crawl up on that,” said the Dunce, pointing to a shelf high above their heads, “and maybe we can find somethin’ good to eat.”
After a hard climb the two Teenie Weenies landed on the shelf, but they found nothing but glass fruit jars, which towered above their heads.
“S-S-S-Say, Zip!” said the Dunce as he nodded his head in the direction of one of the jars, “that jar hasn’t got any top on it and there are pickled peaches in it. I’ve just been thinkin’ that we could get up on the shelf above and you could hold a string while I slid down into the jar and got some of the fruit.”
[‡Illustration: Slide down the string]
After a long hunt the two Teenie Weenies found a piece of string, and climbing up to the shelf the Dunce started to slide down into the jar. He got nearly half way down when the string snapped and the little chap dropped with a loud splash into the juice.
Poor Zip was scared half out of his wits and ran off for help as fast as his legs would carry him. He found three of the Teenie Weenies in the tool house, and grabbing up a piece of rope they followed the little fellow at top speed.
When they climbed up onto the shelf they all burst out with laughter, for the Dunce was a funny sight, standing on a pickled peach with the juice dripping off the end of his nose.
The Cowboy threw a rope to the Dunce and the rest of the Teenie Weenies soon pulled him to safety.
“S-S-S-Say,” gasped the Dunce, rubbing the juice out of his eyes, “don’t t-t-t-tell the General. He’d give me an awful scolding for getting into this mess.”
“Well, you know that it’s not right to go meddling into things,” said the Cowboy, “but if you promise not to try anything like this again, we’ll not tell on you.”
“I’ll promise,” answered the Dunce, “bu-bu-bu-but look at my clothes, they are spoiled.”
“Me fix that all right,” cried Zip. “Me take you to laundry and wash clothes for you.”
Taking a roundabout way so they would not be seen, the Dunce and Zip soon reached the laundry, where the Dunce stripped to the skin and crawled into the Chinaman’s bed, while Zip washed and dried the soiled clothes.
[‡Illustration: Peach jar]
“They still smell a little of the pickled peaches,” said the Dunce, as he put on his clothes.
“Your clothes not smell much like peach,” said Zip, sniffing at the Dunce. “Nobody notice him.”
As it was nearly supper time, the Dunce hurried over to the shoe house, and when he drew his chair up to the tiny dinner table the Lady of Fashion looked suspiciously at him.
“Something smells funny,” remarked the little lady.
“Smells sort of like pickled peaches,” chuckled the Cowboy, winking at the Turk.
The poor Dunce turned as red as a cranberry and he was most uncomfortable for a few minutes, but fortunately the talk turned to other matters and he felt very much relieved.
While he ate his supper the Dunce made up his mind that he would never enter another pickle jar and to his credit let it be said that he has strictly kept his word.
[‡Illustration: Dunce washing his clothes]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
THE CLOWN FALLS OFF A SPOOL AND KNOCKS DOWN A HOUSE
AFTER his experience in the pickle jar the Dunce made a resolution to try to be good whenever he went into a big house. But the busy little fellow couldn’t keep out of mischief, and it wasn’t long before he got into trouble again. He didn’t really mean to be naughty, for he was a most kind hearted little chap, but being so full of life and so curious he simply couldn’t be quiet.
He loved to look into everything he saw, and being a good climber he wanted to crawl over everything. The little people had been skating all morning and they had stopped at a house, on their way home, to warm themselves. The Dunce had gone prowling about the place and had found a child’s play room with many wonderful toys in it which he wished his friends to see.
“Jimminie Christmas!” he shouted, “there’s building blocks and dolls, chairs and tables and everything! Come on in!”
The Teenie Weenies followed the Dunce to a nursery where they found all sorts of pretty toys. The little folks enjoyed themselves for some time looking at the many playthings, but the thing they liked most was a beautiful arch or house made out of building blocks.
Of course, the Dunce had to climb to the very top of the house, where he sat shouting at the Teenie Weenies below.
[‡Illustration: Dunce falling down]
“Jinks!” he cried, “you get a dandy view up here; I can see way over to the other side of the room.”
“You’d better come down,” warned the Doctor. “The first thing you know you’ll fall off and break your foolish neck.”
At this moment the Clown, who had been balancing himself on a spool, suddenly slipped and went crashing into the house.
“Run for your lives!” screamed the Cook, as the house toppled forward. One of the small boys, who had started to climb up the house, clung screaming to the column and the Dunce gave a mighty leap off the top, while those who were on the floor ran with all their might.
The house came crashing down and it was the luckiest thing in the world that no one was badly hurt. Outside of being badly scared and pretty well shaken up the small boy and Dunce were none the worse for their fall.
“This is a fine pickle,” said the General. “Now we’ll have to get pulleys and ropes and build this house up again just as we found it.”
[‡Illustration: Boy with nail]
The Teenie Weenies hurried home for the necessary tools and it took fully four hours of hard work to build the house again just as they had found it. The little folks did the work so well that the child who had first built the house never suspected for a moment what had happened to it.
That night Rufus Rhyme wrote a verse about the Dunce’s fall. It was called “Humpty Dumpty Dunce,” and here it is just as the Poet set it down:
Twenty times a day or more, the Dunce goes tumbling on the floor, He must be made of iron and rocks to stand so many bumpy knocks.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
THE ARMY IS PUT TO ROUT
THE old derby hat which the Teenie Weenies used as a school house was also used as an armory. The second floor was given over to the army and here the little soldiers drilled every Wednesday night.
Their tiny guns and uniforms were kept in little cases which stood around the room. The uniforms were spotless and the tiny guns shone as bright as the new moon.
About four times a year the General ordered the army out for a practice march. “It toughens the men up and makes better soldiers out of them,” he said, and most of the little soldiers seemed to like the experience.
One morning a tiny paper was pasted on the bulletin board and this is what it said, just as it was written by the General:
SPECIAL NOTICE Thursday morning at eight o’clock every enrolled member of the army will meet at the armory for a practice march to the big woods and back. The General, Commander in chief of the Teenie Weenie army.
“Ah, crickety!” growled the Dunce, when he had read the notice. “It’s too cold to go marchin’ around in the snow.”
“It won’t hurt you any,” said Paddy Pinn, who was standing near. “It’s good for you—that’s what it is—it’s good for you.”
“It may be good for me all right,” answered the Dunce, “but it would be much better for me to be sittin’ in front of the fire in weather like this.”
On Thursday morning the little men gathered at the armory promptly at eight o’clock and when they had slipped into their uniforms the General stepped onto a little platform, at one side of the room, and made a speech.
“Men,” he began, “while we get a great deal of good drilling in the armory once a week, it is quite necessary for us to get out of doors occasionally. We need the long marches to keep the army in good shape, for we never know just when it may be necessary to tackle a hard task and it is very wise to be prepared.”
The soldiers formed in line in front of the school house and when the command was given the little army swung off, led by the General, who looked every inch a commander, sitting astride a big gray mouse.
As the little army trudged along through the snow they were suddenly thrown into a panic by the unexpected appearance of a huge rabbit, who popped into view over a snow bank directly in their path.
The appearance of the rabbit was so sudden the little army were frightened half out of their wits, and most of the soldiers turned and ran, in spite of the commands of the Old Soldier.
The mouse, on which the General rode, reared up on his hind feet, and the General was tumbled off into the snow.
“Well! Well! This is rather unusual!” cried the rabbit. “This is the first time I ever saw anybody run away from me; I’m usually the one that runs.”
The rabbits voice was so pleasant the Teenie Weenies felt quite sure he would not harm them and soon they were gathered all about the big fellow, feeling his soft fur and asking many questions.
“Great grief!” exploded the General, picking himself up and brushing the snow off his coat. “That’s a fine way to come bouncing onto an army. You came on us so quietly and suddenly you gave us a great start.”
“I have to go along quietly,” said the rabbit. “I have to sneak around, for there are so many hunters and dogs, who are always on the lookout for us poor rabbits. This spring I had thirty-three sons and daughters and now—now I am a widower with only seventeen children. Only last night I had to call in old Doc. Woodchuck to take some shot out of my oldest boy’s skin.”
“Ah, Mr. Rabbit,” cried the Poet, “your sad story has given me an idea for a verse. While you were talking to my friends here I have been scribbling and with your kind permission I’ll recite what I’ve written.”
“I would be delighted to hear it if it isn’t too long,” said the rabbit. “You see, I’ve got to always be on the jump; can’t stay very long in one place.”
[‡Illustration: Rabbit in the snow]
“This verse is very short,” said the Poet. “In fact, it is no longer than its name. It’s called ‘The Tale of a Rabbit.’”
“The rabbit’s life is full of strife, His days are short and few; For dodging shot becomes his lot From the cradle to the stew.”
“A very truthful and beautiful piece of poetry,” said the rabbit, brushing a tear from his furry cheek. “I hope you will excuse me now, for I must hurry home and call the roll and see whether any more of my children are missing.”
The Teenie Weenie soldiers watched the rabbit hop away and then they fell into line and continued their march to the big woods.
Paddy Pinn and the Cook had gone ahead of the army with food for the soldiers. They drove one of the army wagons, which was pulled by a team of mice, and when the hungry little soldiers arrived they found a thimble full of hot soup and other good things to eat.
After the men had rested for a time they set out on the trip home, where they arrived safely, a tired but happy and rosy, cheeked army.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
COUGHING SYRUP
“GENERAL,” said the Doctor, walking into the Teenie Weenie sitting room where the General sat before the fireplace, “I need some help.”
“What’s the trouble, Doc? Has the Dunce been getting into trouble again?”
[‡Illustration: A plate]
“No,” answered the Doctor, “that bump he got the other day when he tumbled off the block house ought to keep him steady for a while,” and the Doctor drew up a chair and sat down, while the General threw several matches onto the fire.
“What I wanted to tell you was this,” continued the Doctor. “Several of the children have a bad cough and—”
“I knew it, I knew it,” cried the Old Soldier. “I knew they’d get their feet wet. They were over in the garden yesterday, sliding on some ice in a saucer, and I told them that ice was dreadfully thin and it would break, and they’d slip in and get wet and catch their death of cold.”
“You’re right,” said the Doctor, “they got their feet wet, caught bad colds, and I haven’t a bit of cough syrup in the house.”
“I know where there’s some,” cried the Clown, who had been listening to the conversation. “The Dunce and I were looking for some pills to use as bowling balls, and we saw a big bottle of cough syrup on the bathroom window sill of that house next door.”
“We’ll go over and get some for you, Doc,” said the General. “It will do us good to have the exercise.”
Glad of an excuse to get out, the Teenie Weenies were soon on their way after the cough syrup.
The window sill on which the bottle of syrup stood was very high, but the Clown and the Cowboy soon climbed to the top. Lowering a piece of thread that two Teenie Weenies had carried between them for just such use, they soon pulled the rest of the little people up beside them.
[‡Illustration: Teenie Weenie and spoon]
“Now,” said the Turk, who had been examining the bottle of syrup, “four or five of you fellows get hold and tip the bottle, and I’ll hold the spoon somebody has thoughtfully left beside it, while you pour out a dose.”
“Goodness gracious,” cried the Lady of Fashion, “we don’t need a whole spoonful!”
“Well, it says on the bottle, one teaspoonful for children,”’ said the Turk.
“So it does, so it does,” cried the little lady, as she stood on her tip toes and carefully read the label on the bottle.
“You see I’m right, don’t you?” asked the Turk. “The Doctor told me to read carefully what it said on the bottle, and to bring about three doses. It says one teaspoonful is a dose for children, so we’ll take about three spoonfuls.”
[‡Illustration: Bottle]
“But that does seem an awful lot of medicine,” said the Lady of Fashion doubtfully.
“It makes no difference,” announced the Turk, “I’m going according to directions.”
The Teenie Weenies poured out three spoonfuls of the syrup, which filled half an English walnut shell.
“Mercy on us,” cried the Doctor, when he saw the Teenie Weenies carrying the heavy load of syrup up the walk to the shoe house, “you don’t bathe in cough syrup.”
“Well,” muttered the Turk, “I went according to directions.”
“The directions are all right for big children,” laughed the Doctor, “but ours are Teenie Weenie children.”
“Oh, my,” exclaimed the Turk. “I never thought of that!”
“Well we can put it away and keep it,” said the Doctor, “for it’s likely we’ll need it again before the winter is over.”
[‡Illustration: Teenie Weenies falling off can]
The Doctor took out enough of the syrup to give the children each several doses and the rest was put in the half of a large English walnut. It was then carried to the cellar, covered tightly and put away for future use.
Of course the Dunce had to get into trouble while the rest of the Teenie Weenies were getting the syrup.
He climbed to the top of a talcum powder box, which stood on the window sill, and when he tried to pull the Chinaman up the foolish fellow slipped and tumbled off. He nearly fell on top of Zip, but that little chap managed to get safely out of the way.
The Dunce was badly shaken up by the fall and he almost knocked out one of his teenie weenie teeth.
“That’s the last time I’ll ever try climbing onto a talcum powder box,” he said as he felt the tooth which had been bumped. “They’re so awful slippery.”
[‡Illustration: Two Teenie Weenies carrying water]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
THE CLOWN HAS A NARROW ESCAPE
“WELL, we’re goin’ to have a change in the weather,” announced Grandpa, as he peered out the tiny sitting room window at the sky.
“What makes you think so?” asked the Turk, who was playing checkers with the Cook.
“That toe of mine is hurting,” answered the old man, “and that’s a sure sign there’s going to be a change,” and with this prophecy Grandpa shuffled upstairs to bed.
Grandpa was quite right about the change in the weather, for it grew cold in the night, and the Lady of Fashion, who had to get up about midnight to give several of the children their cough syrup, noticed that the snow was falling.
In the morning the ground was covered with almost an inch of soft white snow and the little people shivered as they slipped on their tiny clothes.
After breakfast, several of the Teenie Weenies went out to play in the snow, but most of the little people were contented to sit before the warm fire.
“This snow storm reminds me of an experience of mine in forty-nine,” said Grandpa, who pulled his chair so near the fire he almost scorched his shins. “I was cuttin’ up an old ruler for fire wood one afternoon, when—”
“HELP! HELP!” screamed a voice from the outside.
“What’s that?” cried the General, jumping to his feet.
Suddenly the front door burst open, and a frightened Teenie Weenie boy sprang into the room.
“Quick—help,” panted the small boy. “The Clown has broken through the ice, and—and he—he can’t get out! Quick—help!”
“Land sakes,” cried the General, “where’s the Clown!”
“He’s over in the chicken yard, in a pan of wa-water,” gasped the small boy.
With all speed the Teenie Weenies made their way to the chicken yard. As they hurried up to the pan they could hear the Clown faintly crying for help. The Turk and the Cook boosted the Sailor up to the top of the pan, where he caught on, and pulled himself over the edge. The poor Clown’s head was only just out of the water, and he was holding fast to the edge of the ice.
“Throw me a board or a match, or something strong,” shouted the Sailor to the others, waiting below. At once the little people began to dig about in the snow for the desired board.
“Oh dear,” cried the Dunce, “if we only had a straw! I’ve always heard that a drowning man catches at a straw!”
“Here,” shouted the Old Soldier. “Here’s a burnt match, but it’s frozen to the ground!”
The Turk grabbed the match and with a mighty heave he pulled it free and threw it up to the waiting Sailor. The Sailor carefully pushed the match out across the hole, and with its help he soon pulled the half frozen Clown from the water.
[‡Illustration: Frozen bowl]
The poor fellow was carried quickly to the shoe house, where he was given a hot bath, wrapped up in a warm comforter and set before the fireplace. The Cook made cocoa for the Clown and brought it to him steaming hot.
“J-J-J-Jimminie f-f-f-fishhooks,” stuttered the Dunce, as he watched the Clown sip the delicious cocoa, “I-I-I-I wish I’d have fallen into the pan so I could get some of that good cocoa.”
“You don’t need to fall into a pan to get some,” laughed the kind hearted little Cook, “I’ll bring you some,” and in a few seconds he handed the Dunce a steaming cup.
“Crickety, but this is good,” cried the Dunce, as he sat down beside the Clown. “J-J-J-Jimminie, I’m glad you fell into that pan.”
“So am I,” answered the Clown, as he drained his cup.
“Now I want you to tell me how this happened,” said the General when the Clown had finished his cocoa.
“Why, a couple of us were skating,” said the Clown, “and all at once the ice cracked, and—and I fell in!”
“Now then, I don’t want to hear of any more skating in pans,” said the General, shaking his finger at the open-mouthed Teenie Weenies, standing about.
“Yes, sir,” several meekly answered.
“That is,” continued the General, “unless they are shallow pie pans, out of which you could wade. Remember!”
“We will,” promised the little people.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
A SQUIRREL TO THE RESCUE
THE weather continued cold for several days and the Teenie Weenies enjoyed almost a solid week of skating. An old dripping pan, which stood under a water spout at the corner of a big house near by, made a wonderful place to try out their tiny skates.
The ice was fully an inch thick, and as it was frozen solid it made a safe place to skate. The little people had a fine time on the smooth ice, but at the end of the week a thaw set in and they were forced to walk for their exercise.
“I’d advise you people to all go out and take a long walk, for I’m going to have a dandy dinner and I want you to have good appetites so you’ll enjoy it,” said the Cook Sunday morning as he stood tying on his apron in the Teenie Weenie dining room door.
“Wh-Wh-Wh-What are you going to-to-to have for dinner?” asked the Dunce. “A baked prune?”
“Well, here’s the menu,” grinned the Cook. “Potato soup, planked minnow, mashed peas and grape salad. For dessert we’ll have a date stuffed with chopped nuts and whipped cream.”
“Oh, good, good!” shouted the Dunce, catching the Lady of Fashion around the waist and dancing about the room.
In a few minutes the Teenie Weenies bundled themselves into their warm muffs, sweaters and mittens and started out on a long walk.
“Let’s go down and see if the creek is frozen over,” said the General. “I haven’t been down that way for a long time, and it will make a nice walk for us.”
There was quite a lot of snow on the ground, but as it was rather solid the little people were able to walk on it without much trouble, and in a short time they stood on the bank of the creek. For some time the Teenie Weenies stood watching the huge cakes of ice as they floated down the stream. In order to get a better view, the Lady of Fashion and the Doctor stepped out on a piece of ice which had not been broken away from the bank, and, to the horror of the little people, the piece of ice on which they stood snapped off and floated out into the surging stream.
It was impossible to swim among the sharp cakes of ice, as a Teenie Weenie would have been ground to pieces, for some of the cakes of ice were as big as soda crackers.
“Oh, jimminie crickets!” cried the frightened Dunce. “The Lady of Fashion and the Doctor will be drowned and then they won’t get any of that go-go-good dinner the Cook is getting ready for us,” and the poor Dunce burst into tears.
[‡Illustration: Frozen stream]
“Hold on a minute, Doc!” shouted a voice, and to the astonishment of the frightened Teenie Weenies a squirrel ran up a bush which hung over the stream. Hanging by his front feet, the squirrel swung his body down over the stream so that his bushy tail was only an inch or two from the water, and as the Lady of Fashion and the Doctor floated by he yelled to the Doctor to catch on.
Catching the Lady of Fashion about the waist, the Doctor grabbed the tail and the squirrel quickly pulled the two Teenie Weenies up to the bush, down which they safely crawled to the bank.
The Teenie Weenies were not the only ones who enjoyed a good dinner that day, for the little people presented the squirrel and his wife with four hickory nuts, five English walnuts, and a half dozen almonds for his bravery in rescuing the Lady of Fashion and the Doctor.
[‡Illustration: Walnuts]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[‡Illustration: Hat house]
A CHRISTMAS PRESENT
ON CHRISTMAS morning the Dunce was first to jump out of bed. While he was getting into his teenie weenie clothes he happened to glance out of the tiny window.
“G-G-G-G-Great c-c-c-cat f-f-f-fish!” he yelled, and his eyes nearly popped out of his head, for on the walk before the school house stood a huge box.
“Get up, J-J-Jerry,” cried the Dunce, pulling the bed clothes from the sleeping Clown. “There’s a C-C-C-Christmas p-p-p-present out in the front yard and it’s as big as, as, as a—jimminie—it’s as big as everything,” and the Dunce dashed out of the house at top speed.
All the little folks had been awakened by the noisy Dunce and in a few minutes they came pouring out of the shoe house like a stream of water.
“It’s got a stamp on it and everything,” shouted the excited Dunce, who had crawled up onto the box. “It’s addressed to us too. The mail man must have left it. Hooray!” and the Dunce danced in such a comical way that all the little folks nearly burst from laughing.
Some kind person had sent the little people a pound box of candy and they were too excited to eat their breakfast, so the General told them they could open the box at once.
It took a great deal of labor for the little folks to cut away the paper and remove the box cover.
“Oh WHILLIKER!” howled the Dunce when the cover had been removed, “it’s full of chocolates and bon bons, and great cats’ eyes, there’s a stick of peppermint candy.”
“I don’t know where in the world we’re going to store all this candy,” said the General. “There’s enough to last us a year.”
“You can store it in my bed room,” cried the Dunce, “only leave just enough room for me to sleep in!”
“You mean, leave enough room so you can eat yourself to death,” laughed the Cowboy.
“We can put a little of it in the cellar,” said the Cook. “Maybe two or three pieces.”
“There’s room for four or five pieces in the tool house,” suggested the Old Soldier, “and I think we can put the rest in the upper floor of the school house.”
It was decided to store as much as possible in the school house and the little men began carrying the candy in as fast as they could.
“We can’t put any more in here,” shouted the Old Soldier, who came running out of the school house after several pieces had been stored away. “We’ve stored eight chocolates and a stick of peppermint upstairs and the beams have begun to bend. The floor will come tumbling down if we put another piece up there.”
Other places had to be found to store the candy and when the last piece had been put away there wasn’t a bit of vacant space left anywhere in the little houses under the rose bush.
“Great grief!” exclaimed the General, when the last piece had been tucked away, “we’ll have enough candy to last us the rest of our natural lives.”
“Don’t you worry about that, General,” cried the Dunce. “I can eat a whole chocolate myself.”
After the Teenie Weenies had eaten their Christmas dinner, a whole chocolate was placed on the table and every one of the little people was allowed to eat all the candy he wanted.
The Dunce ate himself sick, but the next morning he was ready for more and the General made up his mind that the candy would not last as long as he first thought it would.
Several of the candies were stuffed with nuts and these the Teenie Weenies gave to their friend the squirrel, but most of it they kept for themselves and several pieces are still stored, this very minute, in the little houses under the rose bush.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
MOTHER BUNCH DRINKS A TOAST
“WELL my toe is on the rampage again,” announced Grandpa, several evenings after the rescue of the Doctor and the Lady of Fashion. “Whenever that old toe gets to hurtin’, just look out for a change in the weather. It’ll be mighty cold tomorrow or I’m no weather prophet.”
“I hope it gets cold enough to freeze the ice again. That’s what I do,” cried Paddy Pinn, who was fond of skating, and had some new racing skates that he was anxious to try.
“I remember once in forty-nine,” said Grandpa, “when the ice was frozen about six inches deep. I had to—” But he got no further with his story, for the Teenie Weenies started upstairs to bed and the old gentleman soon followed their example.
The next morning the weather was very cold and the Teenie Weenies were quite happy to stay indoors where it was warm and comfortable.
The Chinaman was braver than the rest, for that little chap wrapped himself up good and warm and set out to visit a mouse that lived near the rosebush.
“Hey, there, you Chinaman!” shouted a voice, as the little fellow hurried past a chicken yard.
The Chinaman glanced up at a huge chicken head that smiled down at him through the slats on the fence, and taking off his hat he made a very polite bow.
“Glood mornings,” said the little chap. “It muchee clold mornings.”
“Cold!” exclaimed the old hen, “I should say it was! I feel just like a feathered icicle and I wish I had a pair of nice warm felt boots for my feet—they’re as cold as a doorknob.”
“Allee same me muchee sorry and me will give you me muffler,” said the little fellow, unwinding the tiny scarf from about his neck.
“I’m much obliged, I’m much obliged, but, whistling gizzard, that little muffler of yours wouldn’t keep my little toe nail warm,” laughed the old hen. “However, there is something you can do for me which would help me a great deal.”
“Allee same you tell me and me be muchee glad to help,” cried the Chinaman.
“Well,” said Mother Bunch, for that was the old hen’s name, “I’m as dry as a Saratoga chip. I haven’t had a drink for three days. There’s a pan of water in my coop, but it’s froze. I beg your pardon, I mean frozen. I’ve pecked at the ice with my bill until it’s as sore as an ingrowing pin feather and I haven’t made a dent in it.”
“Allee same me tell Gleneral and he come up klick and chop hole in ice,” shouted the Chinaman.
“That’s the idea! That’s the idea!” exclaimed the old hen. “You see the folks who feed me just throw the corn into the pen and they never look at the pan of water and of course they never suspect that it’s frozen. If you’ll tell the General to come over and cut a hole so I can get a drink you will be doing an old lady a great favor.”
“Me tell’m klick,” cried the Chinaman, and off he ran for the shoe house as fast as he could.
The Chinaman told his story to the General and a few minutes later a number of the little people were on their way to Mrs. Bunch’s coop. The old hen saw the little people coming and she was so excited she sat down and laid an egg right before the Teenie Weenies.
In just a few minutes the little folks set about cutting a hole in the ice, and it was quite a hard task, for the water was frozen to the depth of one Teenie Weenie foot.
“Well, here’s to your health,” said Mother Bunch when the little men had chopped a hole through the ice, and dipping her big yellow beak into the cold water she filled her bill and raising her head she let it trickle down her throat.
The pan which held the old hen’s water had a long handle and the Dunce thought it great fun to crawl up on the handle and slide down to the edge of the pan. He did this several times with great success, but finally failed to catch the edge of the pan and he slid off onto the ice, and dropped kersplash into the cold water.
He was dragged out by the Turk and was sent home in disgrace, to the great amusement of the old hen.
Mrs. Bunch presented the egg she laid to the Teenie Weenies for their kindness, and the little people went home, happy to have such a friendly neighbor.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
● Transcriber’s Notes: ○ Missing or obscured punctuation was corrected. ○ Unbalanced quotation marks were left as the author intended. ○ Typographical errors were silently corrected. ○ Spelling and hyphenation were made consistent when a predominant form was found in this book; otherwise it was not changed. ○ Illustrations marked with ‡ were created by the transcriber. ○ Text in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_).
End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Adventures of the Teenie Weenies, by  William Donahey

= = = PG71213 = = =
ADVENTURES OF THE RUNAWAY ROCKING CHAIR
_Happy Home Series_
ADVENTURES OF THE RUNAWAY ROCKING CHAIR
BY
HOWARD R. GARIS
_Author of "Adventures of the Galloping Gas Stove," "Adventures of the Traveling Table," "Adventures of the Sliding Foot Stool," "Adventures of the Sailing Sofa," "Uncle Wiggily Stories," Etc._
ILLUSTRATED BY LANG CAMPBELL
GROSSET & DUNLAP PUBLISHERS NEW YORK
HAPPY HOME SERIES
BY HOWARD R. GARIS
Adventures of the Galloping Gas Stove Adventures of the Runaway Rocking Chair Adventures of the Traveling Table Adventures of the Sliding Foot Stool Adventures of the Sailing Sofa
GROSSET & DUNLAP
Publishers New York
Copyright, 1926, by GROSSET & DUNLAP
_Adventures of the Runaway Rocking Chair_
Made in the United States of America
WHAT THERE IS IN THIS BOOK
You will find ADVENTURE ONE--GRANDMA BAKES A CAKE All printed out on ... PAGE 5
Then comes the next ADVENTURE TWO--RACKY RUNS AWAY So chase him to ... PAGE 25
After that, if all goes well, there is ADVENTURE THREE--EXCITEMENT IN THE HOUSE To find it skip to ... PAGE 39
Now you are to read ADVENTURE FOUR--SLIDING DOWN HILL Which starts on ... PAGE 55
If you liked that, there is another, ADVENTURE FIVE--THE SINGING GIRL Whose songs are told about on ... PAGE 71
Perhaps you may care to read ADVENTURE SIX--UP IN THE ATTIC So climb over to ... PAGE 84
And, when you come down, you will find ADVENTURE SEVEN--THE SNOW STORM Which blows you to ... PAGE 96
Finishing that, waiting for you is ADVENTURE EIGHT--A LITTLE OLD WOMAN Tramping through the snow to ... PAGE 113
And now, Oh joy! comes ADVENTURE NINE--SANTA CLAUS Who surprises you on ... PAGE 131
Then everything comes to a happy end in ADVENTURE TEN--THE RATTLE-BANG To find out what that is turn to ... PAGE 143
ADVENTURES OF THE RUNAWAY ROCKING CHAIR
ADVENTURE I
GRANDMA BAKES A CAKE
"Come, children, it is time to go to school!"
Grandma Harden waddled out on the front porch of the Happy Home where Nat and Weezie were playing with Rodney and Addie, the boy and girl from next door.  Nat, whose real name was Nathaniel, and Weezie, whose real name was Louisa, called their house "Happy Home," because they had so much fun and so many jolly adventures in it.
Thump, who was Rodney's dog, was sitting on the bottom step of the porch, waiting for some one to throw a stone, so that he might run after it to bring it back.
But Rodney and Nat were too busy, talking about going fishing, to think of throwing stones for Thump.  And Weezie and Addie were trying a new dress on Addie's doll, so, of course, they couldn't play with a dog.
Thump wagged his tail and whined softly.  That was his way of saying:
"Oh, please, somebody, throw a stone!  Let me show you how fast I can run after it!"
But Grandma waddled farther out on the porch--she just had to waddle like a duck because she was so jolly and fat--and Grandma said again:
"Come, my dears, it's time to go to school!"
"Oh, I wish there wasn't any school!" exclaimed Nat.
"So do I!" echoed his chum.  "Then we could go fishing now, instead of waiting until after school!"
"You'll have a lot more fun fishing, if you go to school first," said Grandma.  "Then you won't be worrying over the lessons you missed."
"I wouldn't worry over any lessons!" boasted Rodney.
"Nor I," said Nat.  "School's no fun!  But I guess we'll have to go."
"Yes," sighed his chum, and slowly they got to their feet.  Thump took this as a sign they were going to throw stones for him, or, at least, play in some way, so he leaped joyfully about and barked.
But a moment later Thump's happy bark stopped, his wagging tail drooped between his legs and he looked sad as Rodney cried:
"Go home, Thump!  Go back home!"
"Poor dog!" murmured Grandma Harden.  Thump looked up on hearing a friendly voice, and wagged his tail again.  "He would so love to come with you!" said the dear, old lady.
"I'd like to have him," admitted Rodney, "but if I let Mm come part way it's harder to make him go home."
"The other day he walked right into school after us!" said Addie with a laugh.  "And the teacher made Rod come out with Thump."
"Oh, say!" eagerly exclaimed Nat, "let's take him along now, and if he comes in school I'll ask teacher if I can't help you lead him out, and we could be a long while at it and not go back, maybe until school was almost out!  Hey!  How about that?"
"Nothing at all about that!" laughed Grandma, until her body was shaking like a big bowl of jelly--Oh, Grandma Harden was very fat--there was no getting away from that!  "Don't try any such tricks!" she went on, playfully shaking her fingers at the boys.  "It wouldn't be right to use a dog like that!"
"No, I guess it wouldn't," agreed Rodney.  "Go on home, Thump," he said, more softly.  "We'll play with you this afternoon."
"We'll take you fishing with us," added Nat.  "We'll have to do all our fishing pretty soon, now," he added as he and his chum walked toward the front gate, while Thump, still sadly drooping his tail, slunk off through the grass to his kennel next door.
"Why shall we have to do all our fishing soon?" asked Rod.
"Because it will soon be winter," explained Nat.  "The water with the fish in will freeze."
"It's nice and warm to-day," said Weezie, who walked on ahead, with her playmate, Addie.  The girls were rather more afraid, than were the boys, of being late for school.
"Yes, it's warm to-day," admitted Nat, "but there was a frost last night, I heard Daddy say, and to-night may be colder and freeze water."
"Then it will soon be Christmas!" exclaimed Weezie joyfully.
"Ho!  We haven't even had Thanksgiving yet!" objected her brother.
"Well, Thanksgiving is this month and Christmas is next month," said Weezie, "so there!"
"Yes, I guess we'll soon have winter, anyhow," admitted Rod.  "Well, anyhow, we'll go fishing this afternoon."
"And take Thump" went on Nat.  He liked the dog almost as much as did his chum who owned the animal.
Fat Grandma on the porch waved her hand to the children as they looked back before turning the corner of the street.
"I'll have a surprise for you when you come home from school," she said.
"A surprise?" questioned Weezie.
"Yes, something you like!"
"I wish my Grandma would make a surprise," sighed Addie.
The fat, jolly old lady on the porch heard this and said:
"You may have some of this surprise, Addie--you and Rodney.  Come over with Nat and Weezie after school!"
"Oh, we will!  Thank you!" exclaimed Weezie.
"Isn't that wonderful!" murmured Addie, clasping Weezie's arm.  "What do you suppose the surprise will be?"
"It will be a cake!" stated Weezie, calmly.
"Oh, if you _know_, then it isn't a _surprise_," said Rodney.
"Well, we know it will be a cake, for Grandma always bakes a cake on Monday when Lizzie has to do the washing," explained Weezie.  "So that's why we know it's going to be a cake."
"But we don't know what kind," added Nat, "and that's where the surprise comes in.  We never know whether it will be a chocolate cake, or a cocoanut cake or an orange short-cake or what kind of a cake it will be."
"Any kind of a cake is good," declared Rodney, "but I like chocolate best."
"So do I," agreed Nat.  "Anyhow, when we come home from school we'll know what kind it is."
"I'll save my piece to take with us when we go fishing," said Rodney. "We'll play we're explorers in the woods, Nat, and that all we have to eat is cake!"
"That'll be fun!" agreed his chum.
"Maybe Grandma will give you boys two pieces of cake," suggested Weezie, as the children hurried on along the street, for they could hear the ringing of the school bell.  "You could eat one piece right away and save the other to take fishing with you."
"That would be the best ever!" cried Rodney.
Having seen the children start for school, Grandma Harden waddled back into the house.
"Helen," she called to the mother of Nat and Weezie, "I'm going into the kitchen and bake a cake, as long as Lizzie is down in the laundry."
"All right, Mother!" answered Mrs. Marden.  She called the jolly, fat old lady "Mother," though, really, she was only a mother-in-law. However, that made no difference.  "But don't tire yourself out, Mother," she warned.
"I'll take Racky into the kitchen with me," said old Mrs. Marden. "I'll sit on that, and mend some stockings while I'm waiting for the cake to bake.  I like to watch my cakes so they won't burn."
Now, lest you wonder who Racky was, that fat, Grandma Marden was going to sit on in the kitchen, while she made a cake, I shall tell you.  It was an old rocking chair!  And it was a very strange, peculiar old rocking chair, as you shall, very soon, find out for yourself.
Humming a little tune, Grandma Marden carried her favorite, old rocking chair to the kitchen.  She had owned this chair for many years, since the time she kept house for herself, before she went to live with her son and his family.
The chair was painted brown, and it had a deep, thick, soft cushion on the seat and another cushion on the back.  Some buttons on the back cushion made it look like a face.
"Now I'll just mix up--let me see--I guess I'll make a chocolate cake this time," murmured the old lady, "I'll just mix it up and pop it into the oven.  Then, while it's baking, I'll sit and rock and mend stockings."
She set the chair in a corner, near the door leading down the cellar steps into the laundry, where Lizzie, the maid, was splashing about in the water with the Monday batch of clothes.
Into a brown bowl Grandma Marden put sugar, flour, milk, baking powder and whatever else goes into a cake.  She stirred the batter up until it was frothy and foamy, and then she poured it into shallow tins which she set into the oven of the new gas stove.
"Now I'll get the basket of stockings and rock while the cake is baking," said the fat old lady.  "I'm not going to have my cake burned on the edges.  If there's one thing worse than another, it's a burned cake, I think!"
The old brown rocker, which Grandma had named "Racky," creaked and groaned as the fat lady sat down in it with her basket of mending.
"Dear me!" murmured Mrs. Harden with a sighing sort of laugh, "you are getting old like myself, Racky!  You won't last much longer!"
"I won't if you sit down on me as hard as that every time!" said Racky.
Now don't be surprised.  The rocking chair did not speak out loud, though, when it was needful, it could talk.  But this time the chair was speaking to itself.
"No, indeed, I won't last much longer if you drop into me that way!" whispered the chair.  "You're getting fatter than ever, old lady!"
This was true enough, but Grandma Marden didn't mind that.  She would have been surprised, though, to hear the chair speak, for she did not know her old rocker had anything wonderful, or magical, about it, as, indeed, it had.
To and fro rocked Grandma, humming a little song to herself as she plied her needle in and out, mending holes that Nat and Weezie had worn in their stockings.  Many holes there were, for the children ran about like little wild Indians as soon as they came from school.
Every now and then Grandma would get up out of the rocker and look in the oven of the gas stove, to make sure the cake was not burning. And each time she sat down again, the chair creaked and groaned and squeaked, and seemed to shake as if it would fall apart.
"I say there!  Easy, Grandma!" exclaimed the chair as the fat old lady sat down particularly hard after about her third look in the oven.  "Be a bit careful, if you please!  You'll break one of my legs, or a rocker, if you sit down so heavily!  Then I'll be put away up in the attic with the other old furniture, and that will be the end of me!  Don't sit on me so hard!"
But Grandma only laughed as she heard the chair creaking and groaning in its joints, and she said, again:
"You're getting old like myself, Racky!"
Back and forth she rocked, and then she laughed and exclaimed:
"Well, I declare!  You're a regular traveler, Racky!  Here you are away over by the sink, though when I first sat in you it was near the cellar door.  You're a regular traveler!"
And so the rocking chair was.  I dare say you have heard of traveling rockers.  If you sit in them on one side of the room, and sway to and fro, in a little while you will find yourself on the other side of the room.
Racky, the rocker, was this kind of a chair, though he had never given it much thought.  But now, all of a sudden, a daring plan came into his mind.  For, in a way, Racky could think, and act and talk.
Grandma picked up the traveling rocker and set it down again near the cellar door.  She swung herself backward and forward, finishing the song she was humming, and also mending the last stocking.
Then she wanted to get up, but she had leaned so far back in the chair that she had to try twice before she could rise.  And, after the first falling back, the rocker creaked and strained so under her weight that the old lady exclaimed:
"Oh, are you going to break a leg?"
"I certainly hope not!" thought Racky, though, for a moment, he feared something like this had happened.  But it was only his old joints creaking.
"Well, you seem to be all right," went on Grandma as, finally, sue managed to get up.  "We are growing old together, Racky--you and I--growing old together!  But you may last a few more years."
"I won't if you keep on sitting down on me as hard as you did just then!" said the chair to himself.  "You have no idea how you hurt me! One leg is splintered, I'm sure!"
Grandma Harden took off her glasses and tucked them down in a snug place between the seat and back cushions of the chair.  She did not have to wear her spectacles to see to take the layers of cake from the oven, for they were now baked.  Only when she sewed, mended or read stories to the children did Grandma need her glasses.  So now she left them in the old, traveling rocking chair.
Setting the hot cakes on the table, the old lady went to the front hall to ask her daughter-in-law where the chocolate was kept.
And while Grandma was out of the kitchen, Racky decided on something very bold and strange.
The door leading down into the laundry was open.  Out of the kitchen window Racky could look and see Lizzie in the yard hanging out the clothes.  And there was no sign of a blackbird coming along to nip at her nose.
So it happened that Racky was alone in the kitchen, and Gassy, the stove, was alone down in the laundry.
As I have told you, in another of these "Happy Home" books, entitled "The Adventures of the Galloping Gas Stove," Gassy had gone through some wonderful experiences.  Having heard, somehow, that a new stove was to be put into the kitchen, in his place, Gassy decided to run away!  And, what is more, he did, and with him ran Thump, the dog, who had been scolded because he came into the kitchen with muddy paws!  As if that mattered!
Gassy and Thump had many strange adventures together before they came home with Rodney, Addie, Nat and Weezie, who had gone to search for the runaways.  They all came home on the back of an elephant, as you may read in the book about Gassy's adventures.
Mr. Zink, the plumber, brought a new stove for the Harden kitchen, but as Gassy still was useful, he was put down in the laundry, where he made the best of it with the wringer and the tubs for company.
And now something else was going to happen.  Racky, who was still creaking from Grandma's weight, softly called down the cellar stairs:
"Gassy, are you there?  Hello, Gassy!"
"Where else would I be?" asked the stove.  "I can't get away since the gas pipes hold me fast.  What did you want, Racky?"
"I wanted to ask how you ran away that time," went on Racky.
The rocking chair could still see Lizzie out in the garden hanging up the clothes, and Grandma was still talking to Mrs. Marden about the chocolate, which seemed to have been mislaid.
"Oh, you want to know how I ran away; is that it?" asked the stove in the laundry.
"Yes.  How did you do it?"
"Why, having four legs, I just galloped away like a horse," was the answer.  "That's all there was to it.  I galloped away.  But why do you ask, Racky?"
"Because," replied the chair in a hoarse and creaking whisper, "because that's what I'm going to do!"
"What!" cried Gassy.  "You are going to run away?"
"I have fully made up my mind to run away!" declared the rocker.
"What for?" asked the stove.  "What in the world for?  Don't you like it in this jolly house?"
"I like it well enough," went on the chair, "but--"
And just then there was a sound in the hall as if Grandma was coming back to mix the chocolate to put on the cake.
"Wait a minute--I'll tell you later!" whispered Racky.
ADVENTURE II
RACKY RUNS AWAY
While Gassy, the old stove down in the laundry, was waiting for Racky to give his reasons for wanting to run away, the rocker was listening up in the kitchen.  The noise he had heard when he was in the middle of his story, he thought was made by Grandma coming back.
But it must have been a false alarm, for the old lady was still out in the hall, talking to the mother of Nat and Weezie.  She had found out that the chocolate was on a shelf in the pantry, instead of being in the white, kitchen cabinet, where it was usually kept.  But now Grandma was talking to Mrs. Trent, the mother of Rodney and Addie. Mrs. Trent had run over to bring a letter which the postman, by mistake, had left at her house instead of at the Harden home.  And, so, knowing that Grandma would not come back to the kitchen for a few moments yet, Racky went on:
"I'm going to run away, Gassy, so I won't be broken to pieces!"
"Broken to pieces!  What do you mean?" asked the gas stove.
"Well, it's like this," explained Backy as he rocked to and fro on the kitchen linoleum.  "Old Grandma is getting fatter and heavier day by day.  Every time she sits down in me I'm afraid she'll go through the seat, or at least crack one of my legs."
"That's a terrible thing to have happen!" spoke Gassy.  "That's one reason why they got a new stove in my place and put me down in the laundry--because I had a broken leg."
"I can't stand it to think of such a thing!" cried Backy.  "So before the old lady gets any heavier, I've decided to do just what you did--run away.  But I don't know anything about how it is done. Please tell me!"
"Why, you just watch your chance, as I did, and, when no one is around to stop you, trot off," advised the gas stove.  "You aren't like I was--fastened to the wall by gas pipes.  It ought to be easy for you to run away.  You can move about; can't you?"
"Oh, yes," answered the rocker.  "Only a little while ago I moved half way across the kitchen.  Grandma said I was quite a traveler!"
"Then what more do you want?" asked the stove.  "Watch your chance and start out.  I wish you joy and luck!  You'll have many adventures!"
"Do you think so?" asked the chair eagerly.
"I am sure of it," replied the laundry stove.  "And when you come back, tell me all about what happened."
"I am not coming back!" declared the rocker.  "I have been sat on long enough!  I am never coming back!"
"That's what I said when I galloped away," sighed the old stove. "But, after all, I was glad to come back.  Perhaps you will be the same."
"No!  Never!" said the brown rocker proudly.  "When I run away, I go for good!"
"Well, watch your chance," went on the stove, "and when no one is looking, slip out the back door and run away.  Or, since you have rockers on your legs, I suppose you will have to rock away."
"Yes," agreed the chair, "I am a traveling rocker and I am going off to have adventures."
He looked out in the yard.  Lizzie, the maid, was no longer there hanging out the clothes.  Racky could hear her moving about down in the laundry.
At the same time, the chair could hear Grandma talking in the front hall to Mrs. Trent.  The mother of Nat and Weezie had also come down stairs to get the letter which her neighbor brought over.
"I believe I'll never get a better chance than this!" suddenly thought Racky.  "There is no one in the kitchen to stop me, and I can rock right out the back door, across the yard, now that Lizzie isn't there, and through the hole in the fence.  Then I'll start traveling over the vacant lots to have adventures.  I'm going now!"
Racky wished he might call good-bye to Gassy down in the laundry, but, with Lizzie now there, this was out of the question.  The stove and chair did not want to let the people of the house know that they could talk among themselves.
So Racky could only softly whisper:
"Good-bye, Gassy!  I'm going to run away!  I'll never see you again, nor hear your voice, for I am never coming back!  I am not going to stay here to be sat on by a fat old lady whose weight makes me creak and groan.  I am going off by myself to have jolly adventures and lots of fun.  Good-bye, Gassy!"
The stove could not hear this whisper, and so did not answer.  But over his head Gassy could hear Racky rocking away on the kitchen linoleum.
"I believe that rocker is really getting ready to run away!" thought Gassy as he watched Lizzie wring more clothes out of the blue water so she could hang them in the yard.  "I hope he doesn't get caught," mused the gas stove.
And run away was just what the chair intended to do.  He had chosen a good time, too, with Grandma out in the hall and Lizzie down in the laundry.  The back kitchen door was open, because the room was so hot from the cake-baking.  Grandma had opened the door herself.
"Here's where I go!" whispered Racky, and he began to rock very hard, for it was by swaying to and fro that he traveled along sideways, as well as ahead.
Over the kitchen floor he rocked his way, and the cushions were so well tied in the chair that they did not fall out.  And Grandma's glasses were tucked down so deeply among the cushions that they did not bounce out.
Racky reached the door, rocked out on the small, back porch and hesitated a moment at the top step.
"Well, I've got to get down them some way," he said to himself.  "I may tumble and break a leg, but I'll have all four legs broken, and my rockers, too, if I stay here to be sat on by fat Grandma.  She is jolly enough, and means well, but she is too heavy for me!"
So, all of a sudden, giving himself another swaying rock, Racky went sliding down the back steps, making quite a noise.
"There he goes!" whispered the gas stove down in the cellar.  "Racky is going adventuring!  I wish him luck!"
Lizzie, wringing out the clothes, also heard the sliding, thumping, bumping noise up at the back door.
"Is that you, Baker!" called the maid, "We want one loaf of bread to-day!"
But there was no answer.
"It wasn't the baker," said Lizzie as she went on wringing out the clothes from the blue water.  "I guess it was the children.  But no--it couldn't have been them, either," she said, musingly, "they are at school.  It must have been that dog Thump.  Yes, that's who it was--that dog Thump."
But it wasn't Thump, as we know.  It was Racky the rocker, running away.
And, having safely reached the ground at the foot of the kitchen steps, without breaking any of its legs, the chair began to sway to and fro so as to travel across the yard, toward the back fence, where there was a large hole.
Rodney and Nat had made this hole by taking off some of the boards. The boys found it quicker to get into the back lots through the hole in the fence than by going around the corner of the street.
"And I'm glad they left the boards off," said Racky.  "I can get out that way.  Once in the open lots, I'll go so fast they shall never catch me to bring me back.
"I hope no one in the houses next door, on either side, sees me," thought Racky.  "If they do, they may call to Grandma and she will come out and bring me in."
But the only person who saw Racky in the yard was Dabby, the cook in the Trent house, next door, where Rodney and Addie lived.  And Dabby caught a glimpse of the rocker between the sheets on the line.  She knew the old chair belonged to Grandma Harden.
"I guess they've been cleaning the chair cushions with gasoline," thought Dabby, "and they put them out in the yard to air."
Dabby only had a fleeting glimpse of the rocking chair between the flapping clothes.  If she had thought it was running away of course she would have given an alarm, and perhaps have hurried out to stop it.  But she did not give it much thought because, a moment later, the telephone bell rang, and Dabby hastened out of the kitchen to answer it.
So it happened that no one really saw the rocking chair get through the hole in the fence, which trick Racky did a few minutes later.  It was hard work for the chair to escape from the yard.  If it had been a kitchen chair, with legs that had no curved rockers fast to them, it would have been easier.
"But one can never succeed unless he tries," said Racky to himself. "And I am going to try very hard!"
So he rocked and swayed to and fro, straining at his legs and reaching out with his arms--oh, yes! the rocking chair had arms, of course--and at last he was through the hole in the fence.
"I am free at last!  Free!" exclaimed Racky in his own kind of a voice--a sort of squeak, peculiar to some rocking chairs.  "I am free!  No more shall I be sat on by fat, old ladies, though I really love Grandma Marden.  But I cannot stand it to be cracked apart and then stuck up in the attic with the junk.  I am running away at last!"
The chair was now in the open lots back of the two houses in which the four children lived.  All about were dried weeds growing, for summer had passed, it was now late fall, and, as Weezie had said, it would soon be Christmas, or at least Thanksgiving, and we all know Christmas comes after the turkey holiday.
"How wonderful it is to be free--to do as one pleases!" cried Racky, with a happy little laugh.  "I wonder what adventure I shall have first?"
As he rocked along, something rattled beneath his seat cushion.
"Ha!" cried the chair in surprise, stopping short, "is one of my legs coming loose?"
He felt about with his arms and was glad to find that all four legs were still firmly in place, as were the two rockers.  Then Racky felt beneath the cushion and found Grandma's glasses.
"She left them with me when she went to ask about the chocolate," murmured Racky.  "Well, I can't take them back, for if I did I might not get another chance to run away.  I don't want to leave them here in the lots, either, for it will snow, soon, and they will be covered up.  I guess I shall have to take Grandma's glasses with me!"
Starting to rock again, Racky moved on and on over the lots, through patch after patch of dried weeds which tickled his legs and made him laugh in glee.  For he was very happy because he was running away.
"Ho, for the jolly adventures!" sang Racky to himself.
All of a sudden, from a patch of weeds at his right arm, there came a strange sound.  The weeds shivered and shook, though there was no wind to cause them to do this.
"Something is coming!" whispered Racky to himself, stopping short. "I wonder if it is Grandma chasing after me, to make me go back, or if it is an adventure I am about to have?  I wonder?"
The noise grew louder and the weeds shook harder.
ADVENTURE III
EXCITEMENT IN THE HOUSE
Racky stood still in the middle of the lot, his four legs held stiffly under him and his arms rigid at his sides.
What was going to happen?
Suddenly, out of the tangle of frost-killed weeds rushed--Thump, the shaggy dog belonging to Rodney Trent--belonging, also, to his sister Addie; and to Nat and Weezie next door.  The dog belonged to all four children, equally, though, in the beginning, Mr. Trent had bought the puppy for Rodney.
"Oh, it's you; is it, Thump?" asked Racky in a low voice, for the chair, the stove and the dog could talk to, and understand, each other.
"Yes, it is I," barked Thump, who, at times, was very careful about grammar, for once he had been to school, as I have told you.  "But what in the world are you doing out here, Racky?" asked the dog.
Racky looked carefully around, before answering, to make sure neither Grandma nor Lizzie was coming after him.  Then, rocking a bit closer to Thump, who stood in the patch of weeds, with his head thrust out, the chair whispered:
"I am running away!"
"Running away!" barked Thump.
"Yes!  I can't stand Grandma's treatment any longer."
"Did she scratch you, or stick pins in you, or pull your tail?" whined Thump.  "No, she couldn't pull your tail," he made haste to add, "for you haven't any.  But what did she do to you to make you want to run away?"
"She sits on me too hard!" answered the chair.  "Poor Grandma--it isn't all her fault," added Racky with a sigh, "it's just because she is getting too heavy and fat!  It's too bad, for otherwise, she is such a jolly old lady.  And I'm sorry about her glasses, too!  But I am going to run away!  I have already started."
"So I see," barked the dog, coming out of the weeds and walking around the chair.  "You are on your way.  But what do you mean about Grandma's glasses?"
"She left them in between my cushions," answered the chair.  "I didn't dare go back with them, and I don't want to leave them in the lot for it may snow.  Will you take them back to her?"
Thump thought this over for a moment.  He was very fond of Grandma Harden, for she had given him many a juicy bone.  He would have been glad to do her the favor of returning her glasses, but, all of a sudden, Thump stiffened his tail and barked:
"No!  I am going to run away myself!"
"You are?" cried Racky.  "When, where and with whom?"
"I am going to run away now--with you!" barked the dog.
"Oh, good!" exclaimed the rocking chair.  "I thought I would have to go alone, by myself.  It will be much more jolly to have company.  We can have many adventures, and talk about them.  First," he went on with a little laugh, "when I heard that noise, and saw the weeds moving, I thought an adventure was coming out.  But it was only you, Thump."
"Yes, I have been roaming around in these weeds looking for a bone I buried last week," said Thump.  "But I can't seem to remember where I hid it.  Yes, I guess I'll run away myself!  Rod wouldn't let me come with him this morning.  I'll show him I don't have to stay home unless I want to!  I'm going to run away!"
"You know all about it; don't you?" asked the chair, who felt a bit envious of the dog.  "You have run away before."
"Oh, yes," answered Thump, as though running away was an old story with him.  "I went off with Gassy when he ran away.  We had good times together!"
"And now you're coming with me!" murmured the rocking chair.  "How fine that will be!  What jolly adventures we shall have!"  And he laughed until he nearly tumbled over backward.
"Come on then," barked Thump.  "We had better get as far off as we can before they start to chase us, as they may.  Did anyone see you come away?"
"No," answered Racky.  "Grandma was out in the hall, and Lizzie went into the laundry from the yard, just as I slid out the back door.  No one saw me leave."
"Good!" barked Thump.  "It will be all the mysteriouser."
"What's mysteriouser?" asked Racky.
"It means strange," explained Thump, who was a bit proud that he had once been in school, though he didn't stay long.
"Then why don't you say strange?" asked Racky.
"Because mysteriouser is a much more stylisher word," answered the dog.  "But let's start running away some more.  It's a good thing none of them saw you leave!"
"Yes, indeed!" agreed Racky, and he began to sway again, following Thump across the lots, for the dog, having no rockers on his legs, could go a bit faster than the chair.
But if no one saw Racky leave the house, his absence was soon found out, or discovered, as Thump might have said.  For Grandma came back in from the hall to mix the chocolate to put on the cake, and when she did not see the rocking chair where she had left it, with her basket of mended stockings on the floor beside it, the old lady cried out:
"Why, my goodness!"
"Is the cake burned?" asked Nat's mother, who was on her way back up stairs.
"No, the cake isn't burned," answered Grandma.  "I took it out of the oven before I went to ask you where the chocolate was.  But my rocking chair is gone!"
"Your what?" asked Mother Harden.
"Racky--my traveling rocker," went on Grandma.  "I brought it out to the kitchen to sit in, while I darned the stockings and watched to see that the cake didn't burn, but now it is gone!"
"Oh, is that all?" laughed her daughter-in-law.  "I thought something had happened."  And there really had, as was soon found out.  "I suppose," went on Nat's mother, "that Lizzie thought you were through with your rocker and has carried it into the living room, where you nearly always sit in it.  Lizzie must have taken it."
"What did I take?" asked Lizzie, coming up, just then, from the laundry, in time to hear this last talk.  "What did I take, Mrs. Marden?"
"Grandma's rocker," was the answer.
"I had it here in the kitchen, to sit in while I watched the cake baking, and mended the children's stockings," added the dear, fat, old lady.  "Did you carry it out, Lizzie!"
"Why, no ma'am, Mrs. Marden, I didn't touch your chair," was the quick answer.  "I've been down in the laundry, almost all the time, excepting when I was in the yard hanging out the clothes.  I didn't even know you had brought your chair to the kitchen."
"It's very queer," said Grandma, looking about.  "And my glasses are gone, too!" she added, as she put her hands to the top of her head where, sometimes, she pushed back her "other eyes," as Weezie used to call them.
"Where did you leave your glasses'?" asked Mother Marden.
"In the cushions of the chair.  I slipped them off to go ask you about the chocolate.  And now the chair is gone and my glasses are with it.  Dear me!  It is very strange!"
"Why, nothing could have happened," declared the mother of Nat and Weezie.  "If Lizzie didn't take the chair, some one else did."
"I didn't, and I don't believe you did," said Grandma, looking at her daughter-in-law.  "And Racky certainly couldn't have rocked off by himself, I'm sure!"
"What about the gas stove?" asked Lizzie quietly.
"Eh?" exclaimed old Mrs. Marden.
"I say what about the gas stove?" repeated Lizzie.
"Whatever does the girl mean?" asked Grandma in surprise.
"It was before you came to live with us," went on the maid.  "Mr. Marden ordered a new gas stove.  Mr. Zink, the plumber, loosened the pipes on the old stove.  And when he went away to get the new one, the old stove ran away, all by itself, it really did!"
"Oh, what utter nonsense!  A fairy story!" laughed Grandma.  "I suppose a junk man came and carried off the old gas stove, and the children pretended that it had gone off by itself to have adventures; wasn't that it, Helen?" she asked the mother of Weezie.
"Well," was the slow answer, "the gas stove certainly disappeared. The children declared they found it in the woods, several miles from here.  But their father insisted the junk man must have taken it away by mistake, and that it fell out of his wagon in the woods."
"No, it didn't!" declared Lizzie, firmly but with the respect due to her mistress.  "That gas stove ran away by itself.  And it came home on the back of an elephant, with Thump and the children; didn't it?" she asked.  "You can't deny that, Mrs. Marden.  The stove came back on an elephant!"
"Did it, really!" asked Grandma.  "I have heard the children talk about such a happening, but I supposed they were making it up."
"Well," said Mother Marden, as if she did not like to admit it but was obliged to, "the old gas stove certainly came home on an elephant's back."
"But how in the world--?" began Grandma.
"It was a trained elephant, that had escaped from the circus," said the children's mother.  "And it picked up our boy and girl, and Rodney and Addie, as well as Thump the dog and the gas stove."
"Really!" exclaimed Grandma.  "That is quite strange, of course, but it's very natural.  I can understand how that happened.  But this is something different.  My glasses have vanished, and my rocking chair has gone away, but I'm sure it didn't run off by itself."
"Yes it did!" declared Lizzie, but in a low voice, so neither of the ladies would hear her.  "That rocker ran off by itself, you'll find! Something happened to hurt its feelings, just as happened to the old gas stove.  This is a very queer house," she went on, shaking her head as she went down into the laundry again.  "A very queer house! Strange things happen here!  I wouldn't be surprised to see the piano go flying out of the window some day, or the old couch walk off the front porch!  No, indeed!"
But Grandma was sure Lizzie had carried the rocker out of the kitchen, and had forgotten about it, or else that Mother Marden had done so.
"But I tell you I wasn't in the kitchen this morning until just now, Mother!" said young Mrs. Marden.  "You must have taken the chair and carried it out yourself!"
"No!" said the old lady.  "But we'll look around and find it!"
However this was more easily said than done, and, though soon an excited search was being made, the old rocker could not be found.  It was neither down cellar, up stairs nor in the attic.
"Dear me!  What could have become of it, and my glasses?" exclaimed Grandma.
"It walked away, I tell you!" insisted Lizzie.
"Nonsense!" cried Grandma, and the children's mother said the same.
"There must have been some one in the house," went on the old lady. "Perhaps a tramp came in and carried the rocker away."
Just then there was a noise on the rear porch, and Lizzie cried:
"Maybe that's a tramp now!"
But when, still more excited, the three of them hurried to the back door, they only saw Nat and Weezie coming home from school for their noon lunch.
"Where's the surprise, Grandma?" asked the little girl.
"Is it a chocolate cake?" shouted Nat.  Then, all at once, the children knew that something very strange had happened.  They could tell this by the looks on the faces of their mother, their grandma and Lizzie.
"Nat, run down to the corner, and bring back Policeman Paddock!" said Grandma, suddenly.
"A policeman--what for?" gasped Weezie.
"A tramp has taken my rocking chair and my glasses!" said Grandma, sternly.  "I want the policeman to chase after him and get them back! Hurry, or it may be too late!"
But before Nat could hasten down to the corner, up the front steps came big Policeman Paddock himself, swinging his club.
"There's something the matter in the lot back of your house, Mrs. Marden," said the officer to the children's mother.  "There's a great commotion in the weeds, and I hear a dog barking!  Don't be frightened but I'll just go through your kitchen and over your back fence and see what it's all about!"
The policeman started to run through the house, while Weezie and Nat looked at each other with wonder in their eyes.
ADVENTURE IV
SLIDING DOWN HILL
Not for long, though, did Nat and Weezie stand there.  It was all so exciting--so thrilling!  The idea of having a policeman come in your house, to rush out toward the back lots where something was happening!  Nat and Weezie had never known anything like this.
"Come on!" called the little boy to his sister.  "Let's go see what it is!"
"Do you think it will hurt us?" asked Weezie, holding back a little.
"No!" answered her brother.  "Anyhow, isn't Policeman Paddock here with his club?  And Mother and Grandma have gone out to see about it!"
This gave Weezie courage, so she followed the officer out into the yard, close after Nat.  The children saw the policeman crawling through the hole in the back fence--the same hole through which Racky the rocker had gone but a little while before.  Only they did not know this.
"What's the matter, Nat?" asked Rodney, looking over the side fence.
"Is somebody going to be arrested?" asked Addie.
She and her brother had come home from school to eat their lunch, just as had Nat and Weezie.  They had heard the loud talk in the house next door, and had seen the blue-coated officer run out of the back door with his swinging club.
"Is somebody going to be arrested!" Addie again inquired.
"Oh, I don't guess so," answered Weezie.  "Anyhow, it's only a tramp."
"A tramp came in while we were at school," explained Nat, "and took Grandma's rocking chair and her glasses.  She sent me after a policeman, but he came in, anyhow, before I could run after him!"
"He said the tramp was in the lots back of our house," added Weezie, "and I guess he's going to arrest him."
"No, he didn't say there was a _tramp_ there," corrected Nat, "but he said there was a lot of scrabbling around in the tall weeds, and he heard a dog bark."
"Maybe it's Thump," suggested Rodney as he and his sister jumped down off the boxes upon which they had climbed, to look over the side fence, and ran toward the back.  Their fence also had a hole in it through which they could crawl to the vacant lots.
"Yes, it is Thump!" went on Rodney as the children hurried to the clump of tall, dried weeds, around which now stood the policeman and the mother and grandmother of Nat and Weezie.  "It is Thump!  There he comes!"
And, surely enough, out of the weeds ran the dog, barking and wagging his tail.  He seemed much excited over something.
"Is the tramp there?" called Nat.
"Did you arrest him!" Rodney wanted to know.
"Are Grandma's chair and glasses there?" was the question Weezie asked, while Addie called to Thump:
"Be still!  Stop barking!"
"No, children," said Mother Harden, "there isn't any tramp here, nor anything else.  And the rocking chair isn't here--how could it be?"
"It could be if it ran away like our gas stove did," said Nat.
"Ha!  Ha!" laughed Policeman Paddock.  "Who ever heard of a gas stove running away?"
"Ours did," said Weezie, but the policeman did not hear her, or, if he did, he paid no attention, for he was playing with Thump, letting the dog catch hold of the leather thong on the club.
"I guess it was a false alarm," went on the officer as he started back toward the fence.  "I was walking along," he explained, "and I looked through, between the houses, and saw something moving in the tall weeds.  Then I heard a dog barking and I thought something had happened.  But it hadn't."
"Yes, something happened," said Grandma Harden.  "A tramp got in our house, while I was baking a cake, and stole my rocking chair and my glasses!"
"Stole a rocking chair!" cried the officer.  "That's a queer thing for a tramp to take!  And glasses, too--that's stranger still!"
"My glasses were in the chair cushions," explained Grandma.  "And what I am going to do without them I don't know!  I can't see to read, sew or bake.  You'll have to finish chocolate-frosting that cake, Helen," she told Nat's mother.
"Yes, I'll do that," young Mrs. Harden promised.  "But it is very strange about that chair.  We were just sending for you, Mr. Paddock, to ask if you had seen any tramps about, when you came running in."
"No, I haven't seen any tramps," said the policeman, "but I'll be on the lookout for any of the ragged chaps who have your chair and glasses," he told Grandma.  "I'll be watching for them!"
"I hope you catch them," exclaimed the old Mrs. Marden.
By this time the two ladies, and the policeman, had made their way back through the hole in the Marden fence, the officer to go out on the streets, up and down which he marched all day, keeping order. And Mrs. Marden wanted to get the children's lunch.
As for the two boys and the two girls, they lingered about the clump of weeds, near which Thump also stood, his head cocked on one side and his ears held up.
Oh, Thump could tell a strange story had he wished!
"I wonder what Thump saw here that made him bark so hard?" asked Nat.
"Maybe a strange cat," answered Rod.  "Or maybe a big rat."
"Oh--a rat!  I'm going in!" cried Weezie, making a dash for the fence.
"So am I!" echoed Addie, so the two boys were left there with Thump.
"Ho!  Ho!" laughed Nat.  "Rats won't hurt you!"
"Not with Thump around," declared Rod.  "Look!" he called to his chum, "see how the weeds are all trampled down, as if there had been a fight here."
"Maybe Thump was fighting another dog," suggested Nat.
"Maybe," agreed Rod.  "And look at these two funny marks in the soft ground, as if somebody had dragged a sled along."
"Nobody would drag a sled now," objected Nat.  "There's no snow on the ground, but maybe it will snow soon, for it's getting colder."
"Those are funny marks," went on Rod.  "I wonder what made them?"
But Nat could not tell, though, soon after that, he remembered and then something very strange happened.
Thump sniffed about in the weeds, he sniffed at the queer marks in the soft ground.  Then the boys' mothers called them to lunch.
"I could tell what those marks are if I wanted to," laughed Thump to himself as he followed his little master into the yard.  For the dog could understand boy and girl talk, though he could not speak that language.  Thump talked by barks, whines and by wags of his tail.
True it was that Thump could have told about the queer marks had he wished, for they were made by the runaway rocking chair.  After Racky had told the dog he was going away, and after Thump said he, too, would go, all of a sudden Thump remembered something, and turned back.
"I can't go with you, Racky," barked the dog, as the old, brown chair started to sway away.
"Why not?" asked Racky.  "I thought you said Rodney didn't treat you kindly--that he wouldn't let you come with him to-day--and that you would be glad to run away again, as you did with my friend the gas stove."
"Yes, I said that," softly barked Thump, "but I just happened to remember that Rod and Nat are going fishing to-morrow, or maybe this afternoon, and they are going to take me with them.  I love to go fishing with the boys, so I guess I won't run away this time."
"All right," spoke the rocking chair, "then I'll have to run away alone.  But don't tell anybody which way I went, Thump."
"No, I won't tell," promised the dog and then, all of a sudden, he grew much excited and whispered: "Quick, Racky, rock away as fast as you can!  I see a policeman passing along the street between my house and your house.  Maybe he is coming after you!  Rock away!  I'll chase my tail here in the weeds and bark loud, and the policeman will look at me and he won't see you.  That will give you a chance to rock away and hide!  Quick!  Go on!"
[Illustration: "QUICK, RACKY, ROCK AWAY AS FAST AS YOU CAN!"]
"Thanks!  I will!" said the chair.  So away he rocked through the stiff weeds and bushes, off toward the forest and the lake.
Now Policeman Paddock, though he had been seen by Thump passing along the street, had no notion of coming after the rocking chair.  He did not even know Racky was running away.  But Thump thought he did, and the dog began making a great fuss so the officer would look at him and not try to stop Racky.
And, surely enough, hearing the noise in the weeds, Policeman Paddock came rushing in, as I have told you, but all he saw was a dog.  By this time Racky had rocked far enough away to be out of sight.
"I'm glad they didn't catch me!" murmured the chair to himself as he traveled on over the vacant lots.  "If it hadn't been for Thump, though, my adventures would be at an end before they had fairly begun.
"But now I am off to see the world!  No more fat old ladies, however nice they are, can sit on me, making me creak and groan.  I am going to do as I please!"
So, holding his arms stiffly against his sides, and settling his cushions down in his seat and against his back, away rocked Racky. It was getting colder, though the sun was shining brightly, and at first the chair, who had lived, all his life, in a warm house, felt a bit chilly.
"But if I rock faster, perhaps I will get warm," he told himself, so he swayed to and fro as hard as he could.  And the more he rocked the farther on he traveled, for that is the way of some rocking chairs. Soon he felt a warm glow all through his legs and arms.
"Yes, I ought to begin my adventures very soon," thought Racky as he rocked over the fields toward the woods.  "I wonder what will be the first one?"
And, almost before he knew it, an adventure happened to him.
He was swaying along, not thinking of any danger when, all of a sudden, he found himself on top of a rather steep little hill, which led down to the edge of a wide brook.  The hill was covered with grass, which was now dried because Jack Frost had touched it with his cold fingers; and this grass was slippery.
All at once, Racky rocked himself up to the top of this hill, and, before he could stop himself, he began sliding swiftly down.  Faster and faster his smooth, polished rockers slipped along the crisp grass as a boy coasts down a snow-covered hill on his sled.  Faster and faster slid Racky.
"Oh, I wonder what will happen to me?" thought the chair.  "This is certainly an adventure.  But it will not be a very jolly one if I splash into that brook at the foot of the hill!  Oh, dear!  I can't stop myself!"
And straight on toward the brook slid Racky!
ADVENTURE V
THE SINGING GIRL
Amid a clearing in the forest, and not far from the edge of the brook, stood a little cottage where lived the Singing Girl.  She was the daughter of a wood-chopper who, every morning, tramped off through the lanes of tall trees to cut fire-sticks which he sold in the town.  The Singing Girl, as she was called, remained at home in the cottage, after her father had gone to cut wood.  She washed the dishes, she swept the floors and she dusted the furniture until her father came home at night, when she would have his supper ready.
As she worked about the cottage, the Girl sang--jolly little songs she would sing, about anything and everything, for she was very happy, though she and her father were poor.
"La, la, la!" the Girl would sing.  "Tra, la, la!"  Just simple little things like that.
"My Singing Girl is happy!" the wood-chopper would say as he tramped off in the forest.
Now it was toward this cottage of the Singing Girl that Racky, the runaway rocker, was sliding as he coasted down the grassy hill, at the foot of which was the wood-chopper's home.
Faster and faster down the slope glided the rocking chair.  He could see the water of the brook sparkling in the sun.
"What shall I do?  How can I stop myself from sliding into the brook and drowning?" thought the chair.  He did not dream that, being made of wood, he would float like a cork, and not sink.  "I didn't know adventures were like this--so dangerous!" murmured Racky, shivering, for the warm glow had left him.  "I wonder what Gassy would do if he were here?"
But the stove was not there to ask, so Racky just had to keep on sliding.  He was close to the brook now.  Another second or two and he would splash in.  But just then the Singing Girl ran out of the cottage humming:
"La!  La!  La, la, la!"
She had finished washing the dishes, and was bringing out the drying-towels to hang on a bush in the sun when, looking up the hill, she saw the rocking chair coming down.
"Oh, isn't that wonderful!" laughed the Singing Girl.  "A chair sliding down hill!  I never saw such a thing before.  Never!  Never! Never!  Turoo!  Turoo!  Turoo!" she sang merrily.
"It would be much better if you would stop your singing, sweet as it sounds, and save me from going into the brook," thought Racky, though, of course, he said nothing that the Girl could understand. "Save me!  Save me!" begged the chair, in his own, queer talk.  "I ran away to have adventures, but I don't want to be drowned!  Save me!"
And then, just as if the Singing Girl had heard, and understood, she ran out until she stood in front of the sliding rocker.  With a quick motion, like a cowboy with a lasso, the Girl flung her drying-towel around the top of the chair's back, and there she held him firmly.
"Whoa there, you funny sliding-down-hill rocker!" laughed the Singing Girl.  "Whoa there, my pony chair!  I caught you just in time!"
And, surely enough, that is just what she had done.  For, in another second or two, Racky would have been in the brook, so slippery was the grassy hill and so shiny were his rockers.
"Now then," said the Singing Girl, looking up the slope, "are there any more pieces of furniture coming down?  If there are I'll be ready for them."
"No, I am the only one,"  said Racky.  "I ran away all by myself because I got sat on so hard.  Thump, the dog, started to run away with me, but he turned back to go fishing with the boys.  Maybe he'll come along later.  But there is no more furniture!"
Of course the Singing Girl could not understand what Racky said.  To her it sounded only like squeaks, creaks and snaps, such as you may often hear in a chair when you sit on it.  That is the time when chairs, couches, tables, stools and other things speak to you; only it isn't everyone who knows what they say.
But the Singing Girl, after standing and looking up the hill a little while longer, could see no more furniture coming down, so she took the lasso-towel off the back of Racky and, humming another jolly little song, she carried the chair into the cottage.
"I could rock myself in there alone if she would let me," said the chair.  "I don't need to be carried.  But go ahead, if you like."
Racky had made up his mind to stay in the cottage over night.  His slide down the grassy hill, and his narrow escape from splashing into the brook, had made the runaway rocker a bit nervous.
"I'll stay here to-night," he said to himself, "and in the morning, as soon as I get a chance to slip away, I'll travel on."
But of course the Singing Girl knew nothing of this.
"Well, you are a nice, old-fashioned rocker!" she said as she looked at the chair and hummed a little tune.  "We have no rocker in our cottage, and when Father comes home from chopping wood he will be glad to sit himself down and rest on your cushions.  They look very soft!"
With that the Girl seated herself in the old, brown rocker and began swaying to and fro, singing: "La!  La!  La!"
"Dear me!  I hope she doesn't break Grandma's glasses!" thought Racky, for he could feel the spectacles in between his seat and back cushions.  "The old lady sat on me hard, it is true, but I wouldn't like her glasses to be smashed!"
Racky wished he could speak the talk of real people, that he might call out a warning to the Singing Girl, but he could not say a word. However he creaked and squeaked and rattled as best he could, hoping, in that way, to make her more careful.
But she only laughed as she rocked to and fro, saying:
"My, but you are an old chair!  You must have come out of Noah's Ark, by the way you creak!  And you are a traveling chair, too!" went on the Singing Girl, for she noticed that, as she rocked, the chair was sliding over toward the side of the cottage.
"Indeed I am a traveling chair!" said Racky, who could understand what the Singing Girl was saying, even though he could not talk to her himself.  "I am quite a traveler!  Not that I have gone as far as Gassy, my friend, the stove, in the laundry, for I have only just started.  I am a runaway, traveling rocker!  Just wait!  In the morning you will not find me here, for I am going to travel on again."
To do that, Racky had made up his mind.  He was going to rock away in the night, as soon as he knew the Singing Girl and her father were asleep.
"Well, I must not stay here all day rocking!" cried the Singing Girl with a laugh.  "I have my work to do!  But you are such a nice, easy, old rocker I love to sit in you!"
Up she jumped, but when she looked at the soft cushions she sat down on them again with a little bounce.
"Easy!  Easy!" cried Racky.  "You'll break Grandma's glasses!"
However, the spectacles were deep between the cushions, which were quite thick, and so the glasses came to no harm.
Moving the rocker away from the middle of the cottage floor, the Singing Girl began to sweep and dust, just as Racky had often seen Lizzie doing her work back in the Happy Home he had left.
All day long the Singing Girl worked about the cottage, and Racky stayed just where she put him.  For he did not want to let her know that he could travel by himself whenever he wished.
"But to-night, after dark, I'll slip away," said Racky to himself.
Toward evening the father of the Singing Girl came home from the forest where he had chopped wood all day.
"Look, Daddy!  See what came to me while you were away!" cried the Singing Girl, as she put the supper on the table.  She pointed to the rocker in a corner.
"Where did you get that?" asked the wood-chopper.
"It came sliding down the grassy hill!"
"Sliding down the grassy hill?  What do you mean, Singing Girl?  How could a chair slide down hill?" and the wood-chopper laughed.
"It did look very strange!" said the Singing Girl.  "I was standing in the door, going out to hang up my dish-towel, when I saw the chair coming down.  It almost slid into the brook, but I lassoed it."
"And very glad I am that you did!" thought Racky, who was listening.
"Clever one!" laughed the wood-chopper as he kissed the Singing Girl. "I think I know how the chair came to be sliding down."
"How was it, Daddy?"
"A load of moving was going along the road at the top of the hill. This rocking chair fell off and came sliding down.  After a while, when the moving men miss the chair, they will come back for it."
"Oh, dear!  That will be too bad!" sighed the Singing Girl.  "But of course I will give the chair to whoever comes for it.  Only I would like to keep it, for it is so soft to sit in.  And it creaks in the funniest way.  And, there is something else, Daddy!" she said with shining eyes.
"What is it, Singing Girl?" he asked, as he began to eat his supper.
"It is a traveling rocker," she answered as she laughed like the brook tinkling over the stones outside the cottage.  "It moves along over the floor when I rock in it."
"Be careful that it doesn't travel away before those who lost it from the moving wagon can come after it," said the wood-chopper.
"Oh, never fear!  The rocker will stay here until some one comes for it," answered the Singing Girl.
"We shall see about that," whispered Racky to himself.
That night the cottage was very still and quiet.  The wood-chopper and the Singing Girl were asleep.  They left the front door open a little way so the black cat, who lived in the cottage, could go out and come in.
"Now is my chance!" whispered Racky, as he looked out the partly-open door and saw the moon shining on the trees.  "I'll travel on!"
ADVENTURE VI
UP IN THE ATTIC
During the luncheon hour, while Nat and Weezie were home from school, little was talked of but the strange disappearance of the old rocker, with Grandma's glasses in the cushions.
"I can't understand it at all," murmured the puzzled old lady who could hardly see the food on her plate.  "Such things as rockers being taken away by tramps never happened in my house!"
"This is a different house, Grandma," said Nat, "and more different things happen here than happen in any other house around--all the boys say so.  Look how our gas stove ran away!"
"Oh, don't talk to me about such nonsense!" laughed Grandma.  "You must have dreamed that about the stove!"
But Nat and Weezie were sure they had not dreamed it.
"And I believe your rocker ran away just the same," said Weezie.
But the dear old lady shook her white head and murmured:
"A tramp slipped in and took my chair and glasses.  However, the police officer will catch him and bring back Racky, cushions, glasses and all.  And I'll be so glad to get them, for I'm half blind as it is!"
When the children hurried back to school, Rodney and Addie skipping along with Nat and Weezie, they talked of what had happened.
"Wouldn't it be great if we could catch that tramp and get your Grandma's chair and glasses?" asked Rod, as he and Nat neared the schoolhouse.
"It wasn't a tramp, I tell you!" insisted Nat.  "I know that chair ran away just as the stove did."
"Then why can't we chase after it and get it back, the same as we did when Thump ran away, and we found him and the gas stove together?" asked Rodney.
"Maybe we could," agreed Nat.
"Oh, let's do it to-morrow, instead of going fishing!" went on the other boy.  "Will you?"
"I guess so--maybe," agreed Nat.  "To-morrow or next day.  We haven't any more school this week, on account of some of the classes having examinations.  So we could go hunting for the chair or go fishing, whichever we liked."
"We can do both!" cried Rod, quickly.  "We'll go fishing and take Thump with us, and he can help us find the lost rocker!"
"And if we get Grandma's glasses, maybe she'll give us each five cents," exclaimed Nat.
"Hurray!  That would be great!" cried Rod, and just then the last bell rang, so the children had to hurry into school.
That afternoon Nat spoke to his mother about going fishing next day.
"I'm afraid it will be too cold," objected Mrs. Marden.  "We shall have winter almost before we know it."
"That's why Rod and I want to go fishing--before it is too late," explained Nat.  "Soon the pond and brook will be frozen over, and then we can't catch anything.  May we go?"
"Oh, yes, I guess so," promised Mrs. Marden.  "And I hope you catch the big rocker!"
"What?" cried Nat in surprise, looking at his mother.
"Oh, I mean I hope you catch the big fish," she said, laughing a little.  Truth to tell, she was thinking very much about the disappearance of the rocker and grandma's glasses, though she did not really believe the chair had traveled off by itself.
"We'll have lots of fun!" exclaimed Nat and he ran to tell his chum that he could go fishing.  Rod was also permitted to go, and the two boys made great plans for next day.
"Are you going to take Thump?" asked Weezie of her brother after supper that evening.
"Oh, yes, sure!  Thump's going fishing with us!"
"Then couldn't you take Addie and me?" begged Weezie.  "We get tired playing with dolls.  We don't have to fish--we could just watch you and Rod."
"Yes, I guess you can go," promised Nat.
But the next day it rained.  It rained all night.  And it rained the next day, too.  Big, pelting drops came down, and when the children looked out of the windows, they knew there would be no fishing for them until it cleared.  Two whole days of rain, and when there was no school, either!  It was quite sad.
"Oh, dear!" sighed Nat when he saw the second day of rain.
"What can we do?" asked his sister.
"Why don't you play up in the attic?" inquired Grandma.  "That's what I used to do when I was a girl, and it rained on a holiday."
"Oh, yes!  Let's do that!" exclaimed Weezie with shining eyes.
"If we could have Rod and Addie over, it would be more fun!" said Nat.
A little later, the four children were up in the big attic of the Happy Home.  On the roof the pelting of the rain drops sounded more loudly, but Nat and the others did not mind that, for they were snug and dry, and in the attic were many things with which to play.
"There's an old rocker in the corner," said Rodney, pointing to a dust-covered one.  "Is it the one named Racky, that your Grandma uses?  Maybe she doesn't know it's up here."
"No, that's another chair.  It has been here since before Grandma came to live with us," explained Nat.  "But I'll pull it out and we can play it's a steamboat and take turns having rides.  I'll be a steamboat engineer!"
"And I'll be the captain," offered Rod.
"What can we be?" inquired Addie.
"We'll be the passengers," suggested Weezie.  "It's lots of fun to play steamboat with the old chair."
The two boys pulled it out, across the attic, and, as they did so, Nat pointed to two long, straight marks the rockers had made in the dust on the floor.
"Look!" he whispered.
"Well, what about it?" asked Rodney.
"Do you mean the rocker tracks look like twin snake marks?" inquired Weezie.  "They do; don't they?"
"No, I didn't mean that," went on Nat, who had a queer look on his face as he stared at the dusty trail.  "But don't you remember--the clump of weeds where Thump was barking yesterday?  In the soft ground, near the weeds, were tracks just like these we made now, when we pulled the rocking chair across the floor."
"Well, what about that?" asked Rodney again.
"Why, don't you see!" went on Nat in a low voice, just a little bit excited, "these are the same marks.  There must have been a rocker pulled along near the weeds."
"But it wasn't this rocker," objected Weezie.
"No, it was Grandma's rocker, I think!" went on Nat.  "I wondered, when I saw them, what had made those marks near the weeds.  Now I know!  It was Grandma's rocker."
"But who would pull her rocker off across the back lots like that?" Addie asked.
Nat looked carefully around the attic before answering.  And, when he did, it was in a whisper.  He said:
"Nobody pulled Grandma's rocker along!  It went there by itself, the same as our stove did!  The rocker ran away, and we can tell where it went by following the tracks it left.  We can get back Grandma's rocker and glasses.  Come on!"  His voice was eager and his eyes were shining bright.
"We can't go out in the rain," objected Weezie.
"It's stopped raining now," said Rod, looking out of the attic window.
And so it had.  The early winter storm was over.  But the sky was still cloudy.
"Maybe it will snow!" exclaimed Addie.
"That'll be fun!" came from Weezie.  "I don't mind being out in the snow, but I don't like to get wet in the rain."
"Then let's go out and see if we can find that runaway rocker!" proposed Nat.  "Mother won't mind.  She wants it to be found, and so does Grandma.  She needs her glasses very much."
"All right--we'll go!" decided Rod.
"We'll have lots of fun," added his sister.  "And maybe some adventures like we did when we went after the gas stove.  Oh, I'm so glad it stopped raining!"
The children hurried down out of the attic.  They intended to tell Grandma, or Mother Marden, about what they had seen--the two marks in the dusty floor--marks that showed where a rocker had been dragged across--marks like those in the soft ground near the weed-clump.  And Nat and Weezie intended to tell their mother that they were going out to find Racky and the lost glasses.
But when the children came down from the attic, neither their mother nor grandmother was to be seen.  The ladies had gone next door to talk to Mrs. Trent, the mother of Addie and Rodney.
"Oh, well," said Nat, after Lizzie had told him where his mother was, "she won't mind if we go out.  Come on!"
"Where are you going?" inquired the maid.  "You must dress warmly, for it will be cold after the rain.  Where are you going?"
"Oh--just out--to play," answered Nat.  He did not want to say they were going to search for Racky, but that is just what the children intended to do.
"We'll find Grandma's glasses!" declared Nat as he led the others through the kitchen into the back yard, where they could go through the hole in the fence.
ADVENTURE VII
THE SNOW STORM
Now we shall see what happened to Racky when he slipped out of the cottage of the Singing Girl into the moonlit forest.
"I hope I don't make a noise and awaken the wood-chopper," thought the rocking chair as he softly swayed to and fro across the floor. "He would chase after me and bring me back if he thought I was going away.  He thinks I dropped off a load of moving and slid down hill. But I didn't at all!  I ran away!  I know what I did."
The wood-chopper slept soundly after his day's work in the forest, and the Singing Girl did not open her eyes, as Racky softly slipped through the door.
"Now I am out again--free--ready for more adventures," laughed the chair to himself.  "But I am not going to fall into you!" he said to the brook which was murmuring along beneath the trees.
"You may splash into me and swim, if you like," whispered the running brook.  "But my waters are very chilling now, and you might catch cold."
"Thank you, then I will stay on dry land," said the rocking chair. "I am a traveler, but not a sailor.  Though back in Happy Home, where I came from, is an old sofa who says he is some day going to sail away to sea."
"Is he?" asked the brook.  "Well, that's wonderful!  You know I, myself, run down to the great, salty sea."
"Oh, do you?" inquired the rocker.  "I shall tell the sailing sofa about you when I go back.  But no!  I am never going back to be sat on by fat old Grandma!" creaked the rocker.
"Is your friend, the sofa, a sailor?" went on the brook.
"Well, he has never yet been to sea," Racky replied, "but he is always talking of going sailing, so I suppose he may, some day."
"Tell him I shall be glad to meet him," went on the brook.  "And, if he likes, he may start his voyaging on my waters."
"I'll tell him, if ever I go back to Happy Home," promised the rocker, "but I think that will never be."
This talk was in whispers, for Racky did not want to awaken the Singing Girl nor the wood-chopper.  Then, bidding the brook good-bye, the chair rocked on and on, traveling through the forest, which was now white and gleaming under the silvery moon.
All of a sudden, as Racky was swaying to and fro, his arms held stiffly to his sides, he heard a voice calling:
"Who?  Who?  Who?"
"Oh, dear!  That is some one after me!" thought the rocker.  "Maybe it is Grandma, or one of the children, or the policeman whom Thump saw coming.  Or perhaps it is Thump himself!  I hope it is!" Then Racky called: "Hello!  Hello!  Who are you?"
Down through the trees came the call again:
"Who?  Who?  Who?"
"What do you mean?" asked Racky.  "Why do you ask who I am, when you will not tell me who are you?  Who are you?"
"I am the owl bird," was the answer.  "I was not asking who you were. I was just giving my night call of 'Whoo!  Whoo!  Whoo!'  That was to let my little owls in the nest know I am coming to them, soon, with something to eat.  Whoo!  Whoo!  Whoo!"
And away flew the owl bird on his big wings, while Racky, glad to know he was not being chased by a policeman, traveled on.  All through the night the chair rocked away, getting farther and farther from the Happy Home.
At first it was bright moonlight in the woods, and, though it was cold, Racky rather liked it.  But soon the moon hid behind the clouds.  Then it began to rain and grew very dark.
"If this is an adventure, I do not like it at all!" sighed the runaway rocker.  "I am going to get all wet and my legs and arms and joints will creak and squeak worse than ever.  I wish I could find a house in which to stay."
Almost without knowing it, the chair was speaking aloud in his own language and, as he finished, he heard a voice say:
"Why don't you come in here?"
"In where?" asked Racky, for all he could see through the trees was a big blob of darkness, and the voice seemed to come from this.
"Come into this snug, dry cave," was the answer.  "Then you will be out of the rain."
"Whose cave is it?" asked Racky, remembering to have heard Gassy tell of caves, or caverns, that the stove had seen in the sides of hills when he galloped away that time.
"It is the cave of all the Woodland Folk," was the answer.  "Any one, who has no other home, is welcome to live in this cave as long as he likes."
"Well, I am traveling around, looking for adventures," said Racky. "I had a home, but I left it, so I shall be glad to come in out of the rain and stay all night.  But who are you, if I may ask?"
"You may ask and I shall tell you," was the polite answer.  "I am a wild pig and after my supper of acorns, last night, I crept into this cave to sleep.  Come in, you are welcome!"
So Racky entered the dark cave in the side of the hill, beneath the trees from which dripped the cold rain drops.  At first the chair could see nothing, but, after a while, he noticed a little glow, like a faint fire, in one corner of the cave.  And, by the glow of this pale fire, the chair could see the wild pig curled up on a bed of dried leaves.
"That fire looks like the one which burns in Gassy, when Lizzie is doing the washing," said Racky, while he gave his cushions a shake to get the rain out of them.  As he did so, something fell to the floor of the cave with a tinkle.
"What's that?" asked the wild pig, jumping around.
"Grandma's glasses, I guess," said the chair.  "I hope they aren't broken.  They were in my cushions when I ran away and I had no means of sending them back."
"No, they aren't broken," said the wild pig, who could see quite well in the dim cave.  "Here they are," and he picked them up and gave them back to Racky, who tucked them in between the cushions again.
"Thanks," creaked the chair.  "But is some one going to cook a meal, that I see a fire glowing?"
"No, that is fox-fire--it has no heat," explained the wild pig.
"Fox-fire?" cried Racky, wonderingly.  "Are there foxes in here, and will they nibble my legs?  Though my legs are only wood, I should not like to have them scratched or nibbled."
"Have no fear!" laughed the wild pig.  "It is only called fox-fire because, in the olden days, foxes were supposed to see their way about in the forest by its light.  It comes from old, punky, rotten wood and it only glows as pale and gently as you see it now.  There is no danger.  The fox-fire comes from an old rotten stump that has been in this cave longer than I can remember.  But, even if a real fox came in this cave, out of the storm, he would do you no harm.  We are all friends here.  Now I am going to sleep again."
"And I will sleep, too," said Racky, who was glad to be in the cave out of the rain, which was now pattering down harder than ever.  And so, in the soft glow of the fox-fire, Racky went to sleep.
It was still raining when he awakened in the morning, and a little daylight streamed into the cave.  Before the gleam of the gray dawn the pale fox-fire seemed to fade away.
"But it will glow again when night comes," said the wild pig.  Then, waddling over to the rocker, the pig asked: "Have you a garden rake about you?"
"A garden rake?" exclaimed Racky.  "Why, no!  I don't carry rakes! But why do you want one?"
"To scratch my back," grunted the pig.  "You know we porkers always like to have our backs scratched, and I thought, if you had a rake, you could do it for me.  But never mind--it doesn't matter."
"Oh, but it does!" exclaimed Racky.  "I should like to do you a favor since you were so kind as to invite me into this cave out of the rain.  And I believe I know how I can scratch your back."
"How can you?" asked the wild pig.
"With the sharp ends of my rockers," answered the chair.  "Oh, do not be afraid," he went on with a laugh.  "They are not sharp enough to cut you.  But if you will lie down behind me, with your back toward the ends of my rockers, I will sway to and fro.  The rocker ends will move up and down and scratch your back nicely."
"Oh, joy!" grunted the pig.  "I do so need a back-scratch!"
Out he stretched behind the chair, close to the rocker ends.  To and fro swayed Racky, and "scritchy-scratchy" went the somewhat sharp ends on the pig's back.
"Uff!  Uff!" grunted the wild porker.  "That feels fine!  It gives me an appetite!  Now I will go out and get a breakfast of acorns!"
"What, in all this rain?" exclaimed Racky.
"Oh, I don't mind the rain!" grunted the pig, and out he waddled.
Racky thought he was going to be lonesome in the cave, after the wild pig had left, but as the rain kept up, and it grew lighter in the dim cavern, the chair saw a small, gray animal come scampering in.  It seemed to be in trouble.
"Oh, I can't do it!  I can't do it!" chattered the small, gray chap.
"What can't you do?" asked Racky, who saw, now, that the animal was a squirrel.
"I can't crack this hard nut!" was the answer.  "I've tried and I've tried, but the nut is too hard for me to crack or gnaw!  You see I am only a this-year's squirrel," went on the bushy fellow.  "When I grow older, I will know more about cracking nuts.  But now I am so hungry, and I can't get at the meat in this one!  Oh, dear!"
"I'll crack the nut for you," said Racky.
"What!  You, a rocking chair, will crack a nut!  How?" chattered the squirrel.
"Put the nut down on the floor of the cave," said the chair.  "I will rock over it and crack the shell for you.  It will be easy for me, as I am strong."
The squirrel placed the nut down on a low, flat rock.  Racky swayed to and fro, traveling closer and closer, until one of the rockers was right over the shell.  Then, suddenly:
"Crunch!  Crack!"
"There you are--the nut is broken open!" cried Racky, and surely enough, it was.
"Oh, thank you!" chattered the gray squirrel as he began nibbling the sweet meat and casting aside the bits of broken shell.
Racky cracked several more nuts for the little chap, who then scampered out of the cave.  The rocker was wishing the rain would stop, so he could travel on, when a white animal, larger than the squirrel, came hopping in, carrying in her paws a tiny, furry creature.
"Hush now!  Go to sleep.  Rock-a-bye-baby!" crooned the mother rabbit, for that is what this new animal was.  "Go to sleep, my dear!"
"I don't want to go to sleep!  I'm not sleepy!" whined the baby rabbit.  "I'm going to stay awake for ever!"
"Oh, what is mother going to do with you?" sighed the grown-up rabbit.  "Please go to sleep!"
"No!  No!" whined the baby rabbit.
Racky felt sorry for the mother bunny, who looked so tired out and bedraggled from the rain.
"If you will put your little baby girl rabbit up on my soft cushions I will rock her to sleep," kindly offered the chair.
"Oh, that is so good of you," said the mother rabbit.
"But I'm not going to sleep!" whined the cross, peevish little bunny.
"We'll see about that, my dear," murmured the old, brown chair, who more than once, when they were small, had rocked Nat and Weezie to sleep in their mother's arms.
The mother bunny put the little rabbit up on the chair's soft cushions.  They were snug and warm, The teeny, weeny bunny cuddled down as if in a little nest.
"But I'm not going to sleep!" she said.
Slowly, to and fro, Racky commenced to sway.  To and fro he rocked, gently, gently, gently.  The mother bunny crooned a little song.
"I'm not--going--not going to--I'm not going--to--to--I'm not--------going," murmured the baby bunny.
And then, all of a sudden, she fell asleep in the rocker.
"I'm so glad," sighed the tired mother bunny.  Then she, too, cuddled up on Racky's cushions and went to sleep.
It was noon when the little bunny child awakened, no longer cross or tired after her slumber.
"The rain has stopped," said Mrs. Rabbit.  "Come, Hopper, we shall go out and get a bit of cabbage to nibble."  And away they scampered, after thanking Racky.
"Well, if the rain is over," murmured the chair, which he could see was the case, by looking out of the cave, "if the rain is over, I must travel on and find more adventures.  I haven't had half enough!"
Away rocked Racky, away from the cave, off through the forest.  The rain had stopped, but it was getting colder.  All of a sudden it began to snow!  The air was filled with white, swirling flakes.
"Oh!" cried the runaway rocker, "I don't like this!  The rain was bad, but the snow is worse!  What shall I do!  I must find shelter!" And off through the snow-storm rocked the chair as fast as it could go.
"What will happen next?" thought Racky.
ADVENTURE VIII
A LITTLE OLD WOMAN
Racky, the runaway rocker, swayed out of the cave where he had scratched the back of the wild pig, where he had cracked the nut for the squirrel and where he had rocked the baby rabbit to sleep.  It was just about the same time that Nat and the other children started to search for the missing chair.
"What shall we do with Racky if we find him?" asked Weezie of her brother, as the four slipped through the hole in the fence and ran across the lots.
"Well bring him back to Grandma, of course," answered Nat.
"Do you think her glasses will be in the chair cushions?" asked Addie.
"I hope so," was Nat's answer.  "For without her glasses Grandma can't read us any stories.  Yes, I think the glasses will be in the cushions when we find the chair," he decided.
"Oh, but don't you remember?" suddenly called Weezie, as the children hurried toward the clump of weeds where they had seen the strange marks.
"Don't we remember what?" asked Nat.
"About the runaway gas stove," went on Weezie.  "That had a lot of good things to eat in the warming oven when it ran away.  But when we found it in the woods, and the elephant brought it home on his back, there wasn't a single thing left--_not a single thing_!"
"Oh, well, that was different," said Nat.  "Hungry people must have eaten what was in the gas stove--that was all right!"
"You can't eat glasses!" said Rodney.
"That's true!" agreed his chum.  "Nobody will take Grandma's glasses out of the chair cushions.  You'll see--we'll find them!"
"I hope we do," murmured Addie, for she and her brother loved the dear old lady, who lived next door to them, almost as much as did Nat and Weezie.
Skipping along over the vacant lots, still damp and spongy from the rain, which had only just stopped, the children soon reached the big clump of weeds where Nat had noticed the two marks of the chair's rockers in the soft earth.  The marks were just like those made when the old chair in the attic was dragged through the dust.
"Maybe the marks will all be washed away by the rain," suggested Rodney.
"They were deep in the ground," answered Nat, "and I guess we'll see part of 'em."  And so it turned out.  On the edge of the patch of weeds, and straggling through them, so that some of the stalks were bent down and broken, were the tracks made when Racky ran away from Thump.  Though the rain had washed away some of the chair's trail, still it was plain enough for the children to see.
"Come on!" cried Nat, joyfully excited.  "The chair was here all right!  Now all we'll have to do will be to follow these marks and we'll find Racky.  Come on!"
He led the way, followed by the others who were quite as happily excited as he was.  It would be wonderful to find the runaway rocker and Grandma's glasses, the children thought.
"How far do you think we'll have to go!" asked Weezie, when they had followed the chair's trail quite a distance over the lot.
"Oh, not very far, I guess," answered her brother.  "Why, don't you want to come?"
"Yes, of course I want to come," replied Weezie.  "But I don't want to go too far from home."
"I don't, either," said Addie.  "And it looks like it was going to rain some more."  She glanced up at the clouds.
"I guess it will snow," declared her brother.  "It's getting colder."
"If it snows, it will be lots of fun, and we can find Racky easier," stated Nat.
"How?" asked Rodney.
"Why, the tracks will be plainer in the snow," said Nat.  "And we can slide down hill, too, after we find the chair and take Grandma's glasses back to her.  Let's run!  I can see where the chair has been along here," and he pointed to the marks in the soft ground--marks that looked as if a two-wheeled cart had been hauled along there. They were the tracks of Racky's rockers, plain enough.
Forward ran the children, laughing and shouting until, all of a sudden, Addie exclaimed:
"Hark!  Some one is calling us!"
They stopped to listen.  They heard a noise behind them.  Then Rodney began to laugh.
"That's our dog Thump," he said.  "We forgot to take him with us, and he's following after."
"Good!  Let him come!" decided Nat.  "He can smell along the track, where it only shows faint, and help us find Racky."
"Come on, Thump!  Help us find Racky!" and Rod pointed to the marks on the ground.
Thump knew what this meant, of course.  He could tell that the rocking chair had come this way, and now Thump knew the children were seeking Racky.  What should Thump do?
"I can lead those children on the wrong trail, away from where Racky went, and tease them off into the deep woods, where they can never find that chair," thought Thump to himself.  "I can do that, or I can lead them straight to where Racky is hiding.  He cannot be far off, for he is a slow rocker."
Then Thump thought again:
"If I lead the children to Racky, he will never forgive me, for he does not want to be found and brought back to Happy Home.  But winter is coming on, there will be snow and ice, soon.  Racky may catch cold in his legs.  I think it will be best if the children find him and bring him home.  After all, he may thank me for it.  Perhaps Grandma Marden will not sit on him so hard after he comes back.  Yes, I'll lead the children to Racky!"
Having thus made up his mind to do something that, perhaps, the chair might not like, at first, Thump just went ahead and did it.  He sniffed at the tracks and started off on a run, barking loudly.
"Come on!" shouted Rodney, who knew, by these signs, that his dog was "on the trail," as it is called.  "Thump will lead us just where the chair went!  Now we'll find it!"
"And Grandma's glasses, too, I hope!" murmured Weezie, as she and Addie followed the two boys.
Thump ran quite fast, and so did Nat and Rod.  The girls tried to keep up with their brothers, but it was hard work.  Once Addie fell down, and bruised her knees, but she got up again, without crying, and hurried on.  And once Weezie's dress caught on a bramble bush and was torn.  But Rodney happened to have a safety pin in his pocket, so the dress was mended, after a fashion, and the chase kept up.
The children, led by the dog, reached the top of the hill, down which Racky had coasted.  Here the trail was so faint that the children could not see it on the grass.  But with Thump along, to sniff at the track left by the chair, they were able to follow.
Down the hill, and up to the cottage of the Singing Girl, Thump led the way.  The dog was barking loudly and the Singing Girl opened the door.
"Oh, hello, Children and Dog!" she greeted them, pausing in her song. "What do you want?"
"We are after a runaway rocking chair," answered Nat.
"Have you seen it?" asked Rodney, politely taking off his cap, which Nat did, also, a moment later.
"Oh, yes," replied the Singing Girl.  "Yesterday I found a brown rocking chair outside our door.  It came sliding down the hill, and I lassoed it with a towel and took it inside."
"Is it there now?" asked Weezie eagerly, "and has it cushions on with Grandma's glasses in?"
"The chair had cushions," answered the Singing Girl, "but it is gone, now.  Some one came in the night and took it."
"No," said Nat, slowly shaking his head, "no one took the chair away. It ran off by itself, just as it did from our house."
"Why, I never heard of such a thing!" exclaimed the Singing Girl, with a laugh.  "A runaway rocking chair!  Truly, though, I saw it come sliding down hill, but I thought it had fallen off some moving wagon!"
"No, it ran away from us and it ran away from you," explained Nat. "Well, we are on Racky's trail, anyhow.  He has been here and gone away.  Come on!" he cried.
"Go ahead, Thump!" ordered his master, and the dog, who had been impatiently leaping around, for he knew the chair was no longer in the cottage, started off through the woods.
"I hope you find Racky!" the Singing Girl called to the children, as they ran along after Thump.  Then she went back in the cottage, humming a little tune.
On and on through the woods Thump led Nat and the others on the trail of Racky.  Well it was that the children had the dog along for, without him, they never would have been able to follow Racky's winding trail.
But Thump led them to the cave in the side of the hill, where the chair had slept the second night.  There were the marks of his rockers going in, and the marks of his rockers coming out.
"Racky isn't in there," reported Nat and Rod, who ventured into the dim cavern, which Weezie and Addie would not do.
The wild pig, whose back had been so kindly scratched by the chair, the squirrel for whom Racky had cracked a nut, and the mother rabbit whose little bunny had been rocked to sleep, were no longer in the cave, so they could not tell the children where Racky had gone.
"But Thump will find him!" declared Rodney.  "Go on!" he called to his pet, and the dog, looking back to see that the children were following, led the way deeper into the forest.
And then, all of a sudden, it began to snow.  The storm swooped down over the children, just as it had done over Racky, who was swaying his way along, hardly knowing where he was going or what to do.
But while Racky did not like the swirling, white flakes, the children did, laughing and shouting in glee as they felt the melting, white crystals cool their warm, red cheeks.
"Hurray!  Hurray!  Hurray!" they shouted.  "It's snowing!  It's snowing!  Soon it will be Thanksgiving and Christmas!  Santa Claus will come with his sleigh and reindeer when it snows!  Hurray! Hurray!  Hurray!"
But as the snow came down thicker and faster, the children could not see which way to go.  They were in the middle of the woods.  Even Thump did not know what to do, for now he could no longer sniff at the track, or trail, made by the runaway rocker.  The snow had quite covered it.
"I thought it would be easier in the snow, but it's harder," said Nat.
"What are we going to do?" asked his sister.  "I like the snow, but I don't want to be lost in the storm."
"I guess we'd better go home," murmured Addie.
"Yes," agreed Weezie.  "Do you know which way home is?" she inquired of her brother.
"Well, not exactly," Nat replied.  "But I guess Rod knows."
"No, I don't, either," confessed Rodney.  "But I'm sure Thump does! Hi, Thump!" he called to his pet.  "Take us home!"
But, instead of barking, and rushing off through the storm as he should have done, Thump drooped his tail between his legs and whimpered, cuddling close to Rodney's legs.
"Oh, he's afraid of something!" whispered Addie.  "Thump doesn't know how to lead us home.  He's lost, too, and he's afraid of something!"
Truly, the dog did act strange, and as if a little fearful of what was going to happen.  The wind was howling and moaning through the bare branches of the trees.  The snow flakes were swirling down thicker than ever.  All about the children was a pale, frosty mist through which they could see nothing.
Suddenly Weezie whispered:
"I hear some one coming!"
They all listened.  Above the noise of the storm they could hear the breaking and snapping of twigs and branches on the ground, as heavy feet trod on them.
"Maybe it's the circus elephant coming for us," said Addie in a low voice.
"Elephants don't come out in winter," declared Nat.  "It's too cold for them."
"Oh, look!" cried Weezie.  "See there!"
She pointed off among the trees and there, walking through the storm, toward the children, was a little old woman, wrapped in a big fur coat.  She tramped over the snow and over the underbrush like a man.
"Come with me!" cried the old woman, waving her hands toward the children.  "Come with me and bring your dog!"
[Illustration: "COME WITH ME!" CRIED THE OLD WOMAN.]
And, hardly knowing why they did so, the children followed the strange woman through the storm, with Thump whining and keeping close to Rodney and Nat.
ADVENTURE IX
SANTA CLAUS
For Racky, caught out in the snow storm, just as the children had been, did not know what to do.  The cold, white flakes swirled around his legs, and fell on his stiff, wooden arms, chilling him all the way into his glue, by which he was held together.
"If the snow gets into my cracks, it will melt, and be just like rain," thought Racky as he swayed along.  "Then I shall fall apart! Or I shall get the rheumatism, and creak worse, than when fat Grandma sits on me!  Oh, dear!  I almost wish I had not run away!"
He found that he could travel faster though, with the snow on the ground.  For he would rock a little way, then suddenly stop, and he would slide ahead ten feet or more, just as children do on a slippery place.
"Well, there is something good in the snow, anyhow," said the chair to himself.  "I can go very fast on it."
But it was getting colder, and the flakes were now so thick that Racky could hardly see more than a little distance in front of him. Once, after a slide, he bumped into an evergreen tree, whose thick branches were white with the crystal flakes.
"Whoa there!" exclaimed the tree.  "Where are you going, chair?"
"Oh, excuse me!" murmured Racky.  "I am so sorry!  I didn't mean to bump into you.  But I am running away, and the snow blinded me!"
"That is quite all right," sighed the evergreen tree, kindly.  "I have often thought, myself, that I would like to run away.  But I am rooted fast in the ground and must stay here forever.  Tell me, is it nice to run away?"
"It was at first," answered Racky, "but I am not so sure about it, now.  I have had some wonderful adventures, and I may have more.  But just now the snow is sifting down my back and I fear--a-ker-choo!" he suddenly sneezed.  "I fear I am catching a--ker-snitzio--I beg your pardon--I fear I am catching cold!"
"I am quite certain of it," said the tree.  "But if you want shelter from the storm, rock yourself in beneath my thick branches."
"Thank you, I will," said Racky, noticing that the low-hanging boughs of the evergreen tree made a sort of tent.
Even during the short time the chair had been standing still, talking to the tree, the snow had drifted over his rockers, so that now, when he wanted to move again he found it not easy.  But he swayed to and fro, and, at last, managed to get in beneath the thick, green branches.
It was warmer there, almost as warm and sheltered as it had been in the cave, and Racky was thinking he could stay there until the storm was over, when, all of a sudden, he sneezed again:
"Ker-choo!  Ker-foo!  Ker-snitzio!"
"Oh, that isn't so good!" sighed the tree.  "You have sneezed three times at once."
"What is that a sign of?" asked Racky.
"I should say it was a sign that you now have a cold, and ought to be in a snug, warm place, near a blazing, hot fire," answered the tree. "I fear it is a bit breezy out here, even under my thick, green branches."
This was quite true, and then, as Racky stood there, shivering in spite of the warm cushions, all at once a shower of snow fell on him.
"Oh!" cried the chair.
"It's too bad, but it can't be helped," said the evergreen.  "You see my branches are covered with snow, and when the wind blows it shakes the snow off so that it falls on you.  I am very sorry!"
"I am catching more--a-ker-choo--more cold!" sneezed the chair.  "Is there no place, Tree, where I could be warm and sheltered?  Is there no place where I can go in, to be away from the storm?  After it is over I shall keep on adventuring."
The evergreen thought for a moment and then, as the wind again shook its branches, sifting more snow down on poor Racky, the tree said:
"Just beyond this patch of woods, where I am rooted, is a little house."
"Oh, a little house!" murmured Racky.  "That sounds comforting!  And is there a fire in the little house?"
"There must be," answered the evergreen, "a warm, blazing fire.  For a little old woman lives in the house and, each day, she comes here to the forest to gather up sticks for her fire.  So it must be warm there."
"I wish I could go in the little house," sighed Racky.
"Why don't you?" asked the tree.  "I am glad to have you here, under me, but I cannot help sifting snow on you when the wind blows.  And it is too breezy for one who is catching cold.  The little old woman is kind.  I am sure she will let you come in her house."
"Then I am going there, thank you," said Racky, who was now shivering so that he almost shook Grandma's glasses out from between the cushions.  "How can I find the little house?" he asked.
"Bock yourself straight through the woods until you come to a big rock," answered the tree.  "Around the corner of that rock stands the house of the little old woman."
And so, with many thanks to the kind evergreen, Racky swayed out from beneath the sheltering branches into the storm again.  The wind was blowing harder now, and the snow was swirling down more thickly.  It was all the chair could do to slide along.  But he held his wooden arms stiffly to his sides, and swayed forward until he came within sight of the big rock, and then he noticed the little house.
Just as Racky looked, he saw the little old woman, in the big fur coat, leading four children and a dog into her cottage.  At the sight of them, the chair shrunk back behind the shelter of the great rock.
"The tree said nothing about children and a dog," murmured the chair. "I wonder if this is the right house?  I couldn't see those boys and girls very well, nor the dog, either.  But if they are going to live in the cottage, there may be no room for me."
Then the runaway rocker thought of something else.
"I wonder if they could be the children from the Happy Home where I used to live?" mused Racky.  "I wonder if they could be Nat and Weezie, with Rodney and Addie?  And perhaps that dog was Thump. But--no--they would not be so far from home in the storm.  They must be some other children.  I will wait a bit, and then I will knock on the door.  The little old woman may be kind enough to take me in."
But, though Racky was not certain of it, those children were the very ones he had mentioned--Nat and his sister, Rodney and Addie, and Thump the dog.  The little old woman had seen them in the storm-swept woods.
"What are you doing out in the snow?" she had asked them.
"We are trying to find our runaway rocking chair, with Grandma's glasses in," answered Nat.  He and the other children were no longer frightened, nor worried about being lost in the storm, once they had seen, through the mist of swirling flakes, the kind face of the little old woman.
"A runaway rocking chair!" she laughed.  "I never heard of such a thing, though I know about lost glasses, for I often lose my own. But come to my house out of the storm!"
She led the way, and soon the children were snug and warm in the cottage.  Racky had seen them go in, but, as I have told you, he was not certain that they were the same children whom he knew.  So he stood there in the storm, not knowing what to do.
It did not take the little old woman long to draw chairs up to the bright, blazing fire on the hearth, so the children could sit in them and get warm.  Thump, the dog, curled up in a round ball on the hearth, as near the blaze as he dared to go without burning his tail.
"Now, would you like something to eat?" asked the little old woman.
"Oh--would we?" murmured the boys, while the girls bashfully whispered:
"Oh, yes, very much indeed!"
"Then here you are!" cried the little old woman, and she set on the table a plate of molasses cookies and a pitcher of milk, with four glasses.  Thump looked up from his place on the hearth, hungrily sniffing.
"You shall have your share, too," said the little old lady.  "I have a juicy bone in my cupboard for you!"
Soon Thump was gnawing the bone, and the children were eating cookies and drinking milk.  The little old lady sat in a deep, easy chair near the blazing fire and said:
"Now tell me more about yourselves, my dears; and this strange story about the runaway rocker.  Also, tell me where you live, and I will try to think of a way to send you home, though I cannot take you myself.  Tell me all about it."
But before any of them could answer, Weezie, with a queer little, catching sound in her breath, pointed to a window and exclaimed:
"Look!  There's Santa Claus!"
And through the glass, a white frame of snow around his face, the other children could see an old man, with apple-red cheeks and long, white whiskers, peering in at them.
"Oh, it is Santa Claus!" murmured Addie, and she dropped a piece of cookie into her glass of milk with a little ploppy splash!
ADVENTURE X
THE RATTLE-BANG
"Come out here a minute, Mrs. Chimney!" called the red-cheeked, old man as he tapped on the snow-covered window.  "Come out here, and see what this is, Mrs. Chimney!"
"If that is Santa Claus, why doesn't he come in?" asked Weezie.
"Maybe he's afraid of us," suggested Addie.  "Santa Claus doesn't like children to see him."
"Oh, no, it isn't that!" laughed the little old woman.
"And why does he call you Mrs. Chimney?" asked Rodney.
"Maybe he said he wanted to get down the chimney," suggested Nat. "That's what Santa Claus always wants to do; though it isn't Christmas yet, nor even Thanksgiving.  But he said _something_ about a chimney."
And the white-whiskered man tapped on the snow-covered pane again, and called:
"Come out, Mrs. Chimney!  Come out!"
"He calls me Mrs. Chimney, just for fun, because he once mended my chimney when the wind blew off some bricks," explained the little old woman.  "But Chimney isn't really my name."
"Is Santa Claus _his_ name?" asked Weezie, who was now not quite so sure of her first guess, since she could neither see any reindeer nor any pack on the old man's back.
"No, he isn't Santa Claus, though he looks like the kind old Saint, my dears," said Mrs. Chimney, as she had been called.  "But I must go out and see what he wants."
She opened the door of her cottage.  The red-cheeked, old man left the window and stood on the front steps, as the children could see when the door was open.  They could also see something else.  They held their breaths in wonderment.
"Oh, see!" murmured Weezie, pointing a trembling finger.
But before the others could gasp out their surprises, the old man exclaimed:
"Look, Mrs. Chimney, coming through the storm I saw this old rocking chair sliding along.  It slid right up to your door and seemed about to knock.  Perhaps it wants to come in out of the snow.  I thought I'd better tell you.  The chair rocked itself down the hill, from around the edge of the big rock."
"You mean the wind blew it," said Chimney with a smile.  "A chair can't rock itself down hill."
"Oh, yes it can!  This chair can!" cried Nat.  "This is our chair, Racky, that ran away.  That's the chair we have been looking for!" He was all excited, and so were the other children.
"Yes, that's Racky!" echoed Weezie.
The children crowded to the open door, through which the late afternoon wind blew little flakes of snow.
"It's your Grandmother's rocking chair!" added Rod.  "Sure it is!"
"And here are her glasses!" cried Addie, slipping her hand in between the cushions, and taking out the spectacles.
"Well, I do declare!" cried Mrs. Chimney, looking wonderingly at the boys and girls.  Thump shuffled out on the steps and barked a welcome to his old friend Racky, saying:
"I am sorry you can't run away any more.  I led the children on your trail.  I hope you will forgive me."
"It's all right," said Racky.  "I'll forgive you.  I'm glad they have found me.  Or, rather, I am glad I came where the children were.  I couldn't stand it to be out in the storm any longer.  I was catching cold, and getting a pain in my legs and back.  It wasn't your fault, Thump.  I saw the children come in here, though, at first, I didn't believe they were the ones I knew.  And I wasn't sure it was you, Thump.  But I am tired of running away and having adventures.  I have had enough.  I am ready to go back to Happy Home!"
"I'm glad," barked the dog.  "We'll all go together."
Of course this talk between Thump and Racky was not heard by the children, nor by Mrs. Chimney nor by Santa Claus, as the boys and girls still called the old man.
"This chair must have fallen off a moving wagon in the storm, and the wind blew it along, so you thought it was rocking itself," said Mrs. Chimney, making the same mistake as had the Singing Girl.
"I saw that chair, ma'am, as plainly as I see you, shuffle along until it got to your door," declared Santa Claus.  "It was going to knock with its rockers or arms, I verily believe, so you would take it in."
"Nonsense!" laughed Mrs. Chimney.
"Oh, but it's true!" exclaimed Nat.  "The chair ran away."
"Just like our gas stove," added Weezie.
"Well, have it as you like," said Mrs. Chimney with a laughing look at Santa Claus.  "But I am sure of one thing, and that is you children ran away, or walked away, from home, and your folks will be worried."
"Yes, they may be," admitted Rodney.
"We'd like to go home, though it's lovely here," said Addie, politely.
"And I can take you home, if you don't mind riding in a rattle-bang," said the old man who looked like Santa Claus, though he really wasn't.
"What's a rattle-bang?" Nat wanted to know.
"It's an old rattling, banging trap of a wagon, hauled by an old, bony horse, that I drive around collecting rags in," explained Santa Claus, which, though they knew he wasn't, the children always, afterward, called him.  "I'm a sort of a junker," he went on, "and my wagon is a rattle-bang.  But my horse is strong, if he is bony, and my wagon has a cover on, to keep out the snow.  So, if you would like to ride with me, I'll take you home."
"Do you know where we live?" asked Rodney.
"Oh, yes," was the answer.  "I have often passed your houses, and seen you children playing in the street.  I can take you home.  It isn't far from here.  Just down the lane and across the fields."
"I'll drive my wagon around," promised the red-cheeked man.  "It will be here in a minute!"
Off he shuffled, through the snow, and soon the children heard a rattling, banging sound as the bony horse drew the junk wagon up to the door of Mrs. Chimney's cottage.  First, into the wagon was lifted Racky, for he would have found it hard, stiff and cold as he was, to climb up by himself.  Then in leaped Thump, cuddling down on the chair's warm seat cushion.  Then in climbed the children.
"Gid-dap!" cried Santa Claus to his bony horse and away he started through the storm.
"Come and see me again, sometime, my dears!" invited Mrs. Chimney.
"We will!" promised Nat, Rodney, Weezie and Addie.  "We will!"
And so, riding in the rattle-bang, through the storm, they reached their homes just about supper time.  Mr. and Mrs. Marden and Mr. and Mrs. Trent were then getting worried about the children, and were thinking of having Policeman Paddock go in search of them.
"But here they are, safe and sound!" cried Santa Claus, as he stopped his bony horse and rattle-bang wagon.
"Where in the world have you been?" asked Mrs. Marden.
"We went after Racky, the runaway rocker, and we found him!" cried Nat in a jolly voice.
"And we found Grandma's glasses, too!" added Weezie, holding up the spectacles.
"Well, I declare!" exclaimed the fat old lady.  "They are my glasses! But you never can make me believe that Racky ran away by himself!  A tramp took him, and left him in the field where you found him; that's how it happened!  I know!"
"But, Grandma," said Weezie as Rod and Addie, with their dog Thump, hurried over to their own house, "we found Racky at Mrs. Chimney's cottage!"
"And he was just about to knock on the door, so she would take him in out of the storm," said Santa Claus.
"Stuff and nonsense!  Stuff and nonsense!" laughed Grandma.  "But I am delighted to have back my old rocker and my glasses," and, sitting very gently down in the chair, so that it creaked hardly at all, the old lady swayed to and fro, and, putting on her glasses, began to read the paper.
The snow rattled on the windows.
"Well, I'm glad you children are safe home out of the storm," said their father as he thanked Santa Claus for bringing them back.
And that night, when all was still and quiet in Happy Home, the chair called down the stairs to Gassy in the laundry:
"I had some wonderful adventures.  I'll tell you about them sometime."
"Yes, do," invited the gas stove.  "But not now.  I am going to sleep."
"So am I," murmured Racky.
And so, for a time, the strange happenings in Happy Home came to an end, but not for very long.  Because, shortly after that, as you may read in the next book of this series, there were other queer events. I shall tell you about them in a new story, to be called: "Adventures of the Traveling Table," and I hope you will like it.
The next day Grandma rocked to and fro in her chair, and polished her glasses, ready to bake another cake.
"They tell me you ran away," she said to Racky, just as if he could understand, which he could, though the old lady didn't know it. "They tell me you ran away!  Nonsense!  A tramp took you!"
But we know better than that; don't we?
THE END

= = = PG36582 = = =
ADVICE TO SUNDAY SCHOOL CHILDREN
Produced by Larry B. Harrison, Archives and Special Collections, University Libraries, Ball State University and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
[Illustration]
ADVICE TO _Sunday School_ CHILDREN.
PUBLISHED BY THE _NEW-YORK_ Religious Tract Society, And sold at their Depository, No. 142 Broadway.
D. Fanshaw, Print. 1 Murray-St.
SERIES II.      NO. XV.
ADVICE TO SUNDAY SCHOOL CHILDREN
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[Illustration]
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Published by the New-York Religious Tract Society, and for sale at their Depository, (Wilder and Campbell's Book-store,) 142 Broadway, and by the principal Booksellers in the United States.
D. Fanshaw, Printer, No. 1 Murray-street
[Illustration]
ADVICE TO SUNDAY SCHOOL CHILDREN.
MY DEAR CHILDREN;
When our blessed Saviour was upon earth, little children were brought to him, and he kindly took them in his arms, laid his hands upon them, and blessed them. You have read this pleasing account in the New Testament, and you have been taught that this kind Saviour came down from heaven, and was called Jesus, because he should save his people from their sins; you have learned that God Almighty will punish all wicked people after death, by sending them into a dreadful place. Now, consider, children, that you are all sinners, and though you are young, be sure, that unless you repent, and put your trust in Jesus Christ, God will cast you off for ever, and then you must be miserable. But Jesus Christ loves little children who come to him; he was nailed to the cross, and died to save them; and he will bless them, while they live; and when they die, he will take their souls up to heaven to himself, where they will be happy with the blessed angels for ever. Now, if you love him, my dear children, you will try and do what he says, and that is what we mean by your duty. Out of love, therefore, to you, we give you this little book, which sets before you some of the good instructions which are so kindly given you by your friends in the Sunday School: you must take care to keep in mind these things, if you would behave like children who love their Saviour, and hope to go to heaven. Read, therefore, this affectionate admonition, consider it well, and pray to God for grace, that you may profit by it.
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1. _Be early and constant in your attendance at School._ Many naughty children come perhaps on one Sunday, and then are absent for two or three following ones; this shows that they have no desire to learn; if they loved our Saviour, they would not do so. Let not trifles keep you away; do not mind a little cold or a little rain, but hasten to school, and if you are there before your teachers, they will be pleased with you, and welcome you with a smile; they will also be encouraged to take pains with such good children, and you will go on regularly, and will not forget your former lessons, and be obliged to learn them over again, as foolish and idle children must often do. Such early attendance will prevent your class being thrown into confusion; and your teachers will be delighted to find that you are always ready for them as soon as they are ready for you.
2. _Be very attentive to instruction._ If instead of minding what is said to you, you gaze about the school, and look at the other children, you will still remain ignorant. When your teachers are explaining what you have been reading, listen, and try to understand them. When you are learning your lesson, keep your eyes fixed upon your book, and take as much pains as you can, that you may repeat it quite perfectly.
3. _Be silent in your Class._ Do not whisper and talk with those who sit next you; you have much to learn, and little time for the purpose; make it not less by your own carelessness.
4. _Be thankful to your Teachers._ They seek your welfare; you hear them pray for you, and they often do so when you are not with them. Their hearts' desire and prayer to God for you, is, that you may be saved; they would bring you to Jesus Christ, that you may be delivered from the wrath of God and endless misery, through his precious blood shed for you; that you may be saved from your sins, by repentance and faith in him; that you may be taught to pray to God through him; and that, by his grace, you may learn and obey his holy commandments, forsake all sin, do his will all the days of your life, and when you die, may inherit the kingdom of heaven. Whenever, therefore, they admonish, take heed to their words, fix your eyes upon them, and your thoughts on what they say; it is for your good that they take pains with you; they are seeking your salvation, and your endless happiness. How unkind will it be if you do not love them! How insensible must you be, if you do not profit by their instruction! How dreadful will your case be, if, in the day of judgment, they should be obliged to bear witness against you, that they taught you, and laboured to bring you to salvation, but you would not! On the contrary, how joyful will it be for both, if you are placed together at the right hand of our blessed Saviour, and hear him say, "Come, ye blessed children of my Father, receive the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world."
5. _Honour and obey your parents._ Remember, this is God's commandment. Consider this when you repeat the fifth commandment; grieve them not by impertinence and obstinacy; dare not to answer them with passion or disrespect; never speak evil of them, nor let others do so in your hearing; be always gentle, humble, and dutiful, in your manner; never frown, or be perverse, or idle, when they require you to work, but show that you are willing and industrious; be a comfort to them, attend on them in sickness, read your books to them, and tell them what your teachers say to you; and strive, as much as in you lies, to be the staff of their old age, like good Joseph in the Scripture. So God and they will bless you; and you will be like our blessed Saviour, who was subject to his parents in his childhood, and cared and provided for his aged mother even while he hung upon the cross.
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6. _Love your Brothers and Sisters._ Be kind in your behaviour to each other, and show your love by actions as well as words. Do all in your power to make them happy; let brothers especially behave with gentleness to their sisters; they are by nature more weak and defenceless, and therefore brothers should treat them with peculiar tenderness. If your brothers or sisters displease you, do not speak angrily to them, but be patient, and forgive them, as you hope our blessed Saviour will forgive you. If they rail at you, rail not again; but pray for them; let them see that you love them still, and they will be ashamed of themselves, or, even if they are not, our Saviour will be pleased with you; for when he was reviled, he reviled not again. It is a sad thing when brothers and sisters quarrel, and dreadful when they strike each other; but a good and pleasant thing when brethren dwell together in unity and love.
"Birds in their little nests agree, "And 'tis a shameful sight, "When children of one family "Fall out, and chide, and fight."
7. _Reverence the Lord's day._ It is appointed for the worship of God; and all its hours should be employed in his service. On this holy day you must give up your amusements, and have as little as possible to do with worldly things; on this day you are taught to read the word of God, and you go with your school-fellows to worship him in his house; there you are to join with the congregation in prayer and praise, and to hear the minister of God preach the gospel, which is to make men wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. Let your behaviour be very serious when you are thus engaged; listen to every word which the minister speaks; he is the messenger of God Almighty, and speaks as if Christ Jesus besought you, by him, to be reconciled to God. Pray to God that his word may prove a blessing to you, and try to understand all you hear; good children will not only endeavour to recollect the text and part of the sermon, but will also repeat them to their parents and teachers. Those who are idle, careless, or sleepy, in the house of God, act as if there was no fear of God before their eyes.
8. _Read daily in the Bible._ It is the word of God himself; it points out the way of salvation by our Saviour Jesus Christ; if you love him, you will delight in reading about him in the Bible. God's word is given for a light unto your feet, and a lamp unto your path: you know the use of a lamp in a dark night; such is the Bible, a light to guide us in this dark world. Ignorance and wickedness are the darkness of the world: Jesus is the light, and the Bible is to instruct you in the knowledge and love of him. Obey its commands, avoid what it forbids, follow its directions; and when you read it, pray to God to give you understanding, and a heart to receive its truths, that by his grace and blessing you may profit by them.
9. _Pray to God constantly._ What a mercy it is that--
"God will lend a gracious ear, "To what a child can say!"
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God is your heavenly Father, who loves you; and though you cannot see him, he can both see and hear you; and he _will_ hear you at all times. Confess all your sins to him, and think upon the love of our blessed Saviour, who died for your sins, and pray to God to prosper you, for his name sake. My dear children, he is very merciful; and if you are sorry for your sins, and afraid you shall be cast into the wicked place for them, you must tell him your fears, and he will be gracious to you, and teach you so to believe on our Lord Jesus Christ, that your sins will certainly be all forgiven; and then, oh, how must you love him! When you are tempted to be naughty, and disobedient, or ill-tempered, or idle, pray to him to give you a new heart and a right spirit; and do not give over praying for it till you find a better mind in yourselves; for he will give you the Holy Spirit, if you ask for it. Praise him also for all his mercies to you, especially for raising up such good friends to teach you the way of salvation.
10. _Take a cheerful part in the praises of God._ You learn hymns, in order to sing those praises. What beautiful hymns they are! I hope you will not merely please yourselves with the tunes, but study the meaning of the words, that your hearts may make melody to the Lord. How sweetly Moses, and the children of Israel, sang upon the banks of the Red Sea, when God had delivered them from the wicked Egyptians! Exodus, xv. How sweetly David sang to his harp and other instruments of music, as you read in the Book of Psalms! Our blessed Saviour sang a hymn with his disciples before he suffered; Matt. xxvi. 30. and Paul and Silas sang the praises of God when they were in prison, at dark midnight, and their feet were made fast in the stocks. Acts, xvi. 25. Oh, may you, dear children, sing his praises in the same blessed spirit, and it will be as sweet incense before his throne.
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11. _Abhor Swearing._ What! a Sunday School child swear! Awful thought! And yet there are some who do! Such wicked children are taking the broad road which leads to hell. And what will be _your_ feelings, if _you_ are cast into that dreadful place, after all the pains which have been taken to lead you to heaven! Your case will be far more dreadful than that of others, who are left to perish in ignorance and sin. Never take the sacred name of God in vain! Never use it but with fear and reverence, and when it is necessary to use it. When careless children call upon the name of God in their common conversation, as many do, exclaiming, Oh, Lord! Oh, God! Lord, have mercy! and the like, it proves that they are very wicked, or at least very thoughtless. Reverence his name, and tremble at the thought of mentioning it lightly.
12. _Avoid bad company._ Remember the Bible says, "A companion of fools shall be destroyed." "Therefore, come out from among them, and be separate, and I will be a father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty." Shun all places of public amusement, particularly taverns and play-houses. Many people call them harmless, and their diversions innocent; but do not believe them; all sorts of wickedness and folly are practised there--gluttony, drunkenness, indecency, swearing, and sins of almost every kind; if you go to them, you will soon become as bad as the rest of those who frequent them; do not mind the scorn of those who may despise you, because you will not run to the same excess of riot as they. If they are your relations, or your acquaintance, endeavour to persuade them to go to the house of God on the Lord's day, and on every other day to keep out of the path of temptation. If they will not be persuaded to do so, at least go not with them into any sinful course. They may endeavour to persuade you, but withstand their entreaties; call to mind the words of Solomon, "My son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou not!" They may entice, but they cannot compel you; and as evil communications corrupt good manners, so, if you join their company, you will be in danger of following these wicked examples. If, my dear children, you hope to meet our Saviour at the last, and to spend eternity in heaven with holy angels, and the spirits of just men made perfect, how can you bear to be in company with those wicked people upon earth, who are, every day, making themselves more fit for the company of the devil and his angels in the outer darkness, "where there shall be weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth?"
And now I commend you unto God, and to the word of his grace, which is able to give you an inheritance among them that are sanctified. We love you, we care for you, we pray for you! Oh, may God turn your hearts by the Holy Spirit to himself, that you may be his dear children; and may he bless this little book to you, and give you grace to read, to mark, to understand, and to practise its directions; may you walk in the path of duty while you live on earth, and at last join the assembly of his people before his throne in heaven, share in their happiness, and unite in their praises, to all eternity.
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CHILDREN'S BOOKS
PUBLISHED BY THE NEW-YORK Religious Tract Society.
2d SERIES.
1. Address to a Child. 2. Goodness of Providence. 3. The Vine. 4. The Orphan. 5. Elizabeth Loveless. 6. Little Susan and her Lamb. 7. Wonderful cure of Naaman. 8. Happy Cottager. 9. Mary Jones. 10. Ann Walsh, the Irish Girl. 11. Sally of the Sunday-School. 12. Destructive consequences of Vice, Dissipation, &c. 13. Mischief its own Punishment. 14. Louisa and the Little Birds. 15. Advice to Sunday S. Children. 16. Bread the Staff of Life. 17. Affectionate Daughter. 18. Happy Negro. 19. S. Butler, & Passionate Boy.
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Transcriber's Note
* Punctuation errors have been corrected.
End of Project Gutenberg's Advice to Sunday School Children, by Anonymous

= = = PG18732 = = =
AESOP'S FABLES
Produced by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, Karina Aleksandrova and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
ÆSOP'S FABLES
A NEW REVISED VERSION
FROM ORIGINAL SOURCES
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WITH UPWARDS OF 200 ILLUSTRATIONS
BY HARRISON WEIR,[A] JOHN TENNIEL, ERNEST GRISET AND OTHERS
NEW YORK FRANK F. LOVELL & COMPANY 142 AND 144 WORTH STREET
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COPYRIGHT, 1884, BY R. WORTHINGTON.
[Transcriber's note A: Original had "WIER".]
LIFE OF ÆSOP.
The Life and History of Æsop is involved, like that of Homer, the most famous of Greek poets, in much obscurity. Sardis, the capital of Lydia; Samos, a Greek island; Mesembria, an ancient colony in Thrace; and Cotiæum, the chief city of a province of Phrygia, contend for the distinction of being the birthplace of Æsop. Although the honor thus claimed cannot be definitely assigned to any one of these places, yet there are a few incidents now generally accepted by scholars as established facts, relating to the birth, life, and death of Æsop. He is, by an almost universal consent, allowed to have been born about the year 620 B.C., and to have been by birth a slave. He was owned by two masters in succession, both inhabitants of Samos, Xanthus and Jadmon, the latter of whom gave him his liberty as a reward for his learning and wit. One of the privileges of a freedman in the ancient republics of Greece was the permission to take an active interest in public affairs; and Æsop, like the philosophers Phædo, Menippus, and Epictetus, in later times, raised himself from the indignity of a servile condition to a position of high renown. In his desire alike to instruct and to be instructed, he travelled through many countries, and among others came to Sardis, the capital of the famous king of Lydia, the great patron in that day, of learning and of learned men. He met at the court of Crœsus with Solon, Thales, and other sages, and is related so to have pleased his royal master, by the part he took in the conversations held with these philosophers, that he applied to him an expression which has since passed into a proverb, "������ � ����"--"The Phrygian has spoken better than all."
On the invitation of Crœsus he fixed his residence at Sardis, and was employed by that monarch in various difficult and delicate affairs of state. In his discharge of these commissions he visited the different petty republics of Greece. At one time he is found in Corinth, and at another in Athens, endeavoring, by the narration of some of his wise fables, to reconcile the inhabitants of those cities to the administration of their respective rulers, Pariander and Pisistratus. One of these ambassadorial missions, undertaken at the command of Crœsus, was the occasion of his death. Having been sent to Delphi with a large sum of gold for distribution among the citizens, he was so provoked at their covetousness that he refused to divide the money, and sent it back to his master. The Delphians, enraged at this treatment, accused him of impiety, and, in spite of his sacred character as ambassador, executed him as a public criminal. This cruel death of Æsop was not unavenged. The citizens of Delphi were visited with a series of calamities, until they made a public reparation of their crime; and "The blood of Æsop" became a well-known adage, bearing witness to the truth that deeds of wrong would not pass unpunished. Neither did the great fabulist lack posthumous honors; for a statue was erected to his memory at Athens, the work of Lysippus, one of the most famous of Greek sculptors. Phædrus thus immortalizes the event:--
These few facts are all that can be relied on with any degree of certainty, in reference to the birth, life, and death of Æsop. They were first brought to light, after a patient search and diligent perusal of ancient authors, by a Frenchman, M. Claude Gaspard Bachet de Mezeriac, who declined the honor of being tutor to Louis XIII. of France, from his desire to devote himself exclusively to literature. He published his life of Æsop, Anno Domini 1632. The later investigations of a host of English and German scholars have added very little to the facts given by M. Mezeriac. The substantial truth of his statements has been confirmed by later criticism and inquiry.
It remains to state, that prior to this publication of M. Mezeriac, the life of Æsop was from the pen of Maximus Planudes, a monk of Constantinople, who was sent on an embassy to Venice by the Byzantine Emperor Andronicus the elder, and who wrote in the early part of the fourteenth century. His life was prefixed to all the early editions of these fables, and was republished as late as 1727 by Archdeacon Croxall as the introduction to his edition of Æsop. This life by Planudes contains, however, so small an amount of truth, and is so full of absurd pictures of the grotesque deformity of Æsop, of wondrous apocryphal stories, of lying legends, and gross anachronisms, that it is now universally condemned as false, puerile, and unauthentic. It is given up in the present day, by general consent, as unworthy of the slightest credit.
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ÆSOP'S FABLES.
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The Wolf Turned Shepherd.
A wolf, finding that the sheep were so afraid of him that he could not get near them, disguised himself in the dress of a shepherd, and thus attired approached the flock. As he came near, he found the shepherd fast asleep. As the sheep did not run away, he resolved to imitate the voice of the shepherd. In trying to do so, he only howled, and awoke the shepherd. As he could not run away, he was soon killed.
Those who attempt to act in disguise are apt to overdo it.
The Stag at the Pool.
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A stag saw his shadow reflected in the water, and greatly admired the size of his horns, but felt angry with himself for having such weak feet. While he was thus contemplating himself, a Lion appeared at the pool. The Stag betook himself to flight, and kept himself with ease at a safe distance from the Lion, until he entered a wood and became entangled with his horns. The Lion quickly came up with him and caught him. When too late he thus reproached himself: "Woe is me! How have I deceived myself! These feet which would have saved me I despised, and I gloried in these antlers which have proved my destruction."
What is most truly valuable is often underrated.
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The Fox and the Mask.
A fox entered the house of an actor, and, rummaging through all his properties, came upon a Mask, an admirable imitation of a human head. He placed his paws on it, and said: "What a beautiful head! yet it is of no value, as it entirely wants brains."
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A fair face is of little use without sense.
The Bear and the Fox.
A bear boasted very much of his philanthropy, saying "that of all animals he was the most tender in his regard for man, for he had such respect for him, that he would not even touch his dead body." A Fox hearing these words said with a smile to the Bear: "Oh, that you would eat the dead and not the living!"
We should not wait till a person is dead, to give him our respect.
The Wolf and the Lamb.
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A Wolf, meeting with a Lamb astray from the fold, resolved not to lay violent hands on him, but to find some plea, which should justify to the Lamb himself his right to eat him. He then addressed him: "Sirrah, last year you grossly insulted me." "Indeed," bleated the Lamb in a mournful tone of voice, "I was not then born." Then said the Wolf: "You feed in my pasture." "No, good sir," replied the Lamb, "I have not yet tasted grass." Again said the Wolf: "You drink of my well." "No," exclaimed the Lamb, "I never yet drank water, for as yet my mother's milk is both food and drink to me." On which the Wolf seized him, and ate him up, saying: "Well! I won't remain supperless, even though you refute every one of my imputations."
The tyrant will always find a pretext for his tyranny, and it is useless for the innocent to try by reasoning to get justice, when the oppressor intends to be unjust.
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The One-Eyed Doe.
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A Doe, blind of an eye, was accustomed to graze as near to the edge of the sea as she possibly could, to secure greater safety. She turned her eye towards the land, that she might perceive the approach of a hunter or hound, and her injured eye towards the sea, from which she entertained no anticipation of danger. Some boatmen, sailing by, saw her, and, taking a successful aim, mortally wounded her. Said she: "O wretched creature that I am! to take such precaution against the land, and, after all, to find this seashore, to which I had come for safety, so much more perilous."
Danger sometimes comes from a source that is least suspected.
The Dog, Cock and Fox.
A Dog and a Cock, traveling together, took shelter at night in a thick wood. The Cock perched himself on a high branch, while the Dog found a bed at the foot of the tree. When morning dawned, the Cock, as usual, crowed very loudly. A Fox, hearing the sound, and wishing to make a breakfast on him, came and stood under the branches, saying how earnestly he desired to make the acquaintance of the owner of so sweet a voice.
"If you will admit me," said he, "I should very much like to spend the day with you."
The Cock said: "Sir, do me the favor to go round and wake up my porter, that he may open the door, and let you in." On the Fox approaching the tree, the Dog sprang out and caught him and quickly tore him in pieces.
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Those who try to entrap others are often caught by their own schemes.
The Mouse, the Frog, and the Hawk.
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A Mouse, by an unlucky chance, formed an intimate acquaintance with a Frog. The Frog one day, intent on mischief, bound the foot of the Mouse tightly to his own. Thus joined together, the Frog led his friend toward the pool in which he lived, until he reached the very brink, when suddenly jumping in, he dragged the Mouse in with him. The Frog enjoyed the water amazingly, and swam croaking about as if he had done a meritorious action. The unhappy Mouse was soon suffocated with the water, and his dead body floated about on the surface, tied to the foot of the Frog. A Hawk observed it, and, pouncing upon it, carried it up aloft. The Frog, being still fastened to the leg of the Mouse, was also carried off a prisoner, and was eaten by the Hawk.
Harm hatch, harm catch.
The Dog and the Oyster.
A Dog, used to eating eggs, saw an Oyster, and opening his mouth to its widest extent, swallowed it down with the utmost relish, supposing it to be an egg. Soon afterwards suffering great pain in his stomach, he said: "I deserve all this torment, for my folly in thinking that everything round must be an egg."
Who acts in haste repents at leisure.
The Wolf and the Shepherds.
A Wolf passing by, saw some shepherds in a hut eating for their dinner a haunch of mutton. Approaching them, he said: "What a clamor you would raise, if I were to do as you are doing!"
Men are too apt to condemn in others the very things they practice themselves.
The Hares and the Frogs.
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The Hares, oppressed with a sense of their own exceeding timidity, and weary of the perpetual alarm to which they were exposed, with one accord determined to put an end to themselves and their troubles, by jumping from a lofty precipice into a deep lake below. As they scampered off in a very numerous body to carry out their resolve, the Frogs lying on the banks of the lake heard the noise of their feet, and rushed helter-skelter to the deep water for safety. On seeing the rapid disappearance of the Frogs, one of the Hares cried out to his companions: "Stay, my friends, do not do as you intended; for you now see that other creatures who yet live are more timorous than ourselves."
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We are encouraged by seeing others that are worse off than ourselves.
The Lion and the Boar.
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On a summer day, when the great heat induced a general thirst, a Lion and a Boar came at the same moment to a small well to drink. They fiercely disputed which of them should drink first, and were soon engaged in the agonies of a mortal combat. On their stopping on a sudden to take breath for the fiercer renewal of the strife, they saw some Vultures waiting in the distance to feast on the one which should fall first. They at once made up their quarrel, saying: "It is better for us to make friends, than to become the food of Crows or Vultures, as will certainly happen if we are disabled."
Those who strive are often watched by others who will take advantage of their defeat to benefit themselves.
The Mischievous Dog.
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A Dog used to run up quietly to the heels of those he met, and to bite them without notice. His master sometimes suspended a bell about his neck, that he might give notice of his presence wherever he went, and sometimes he fastened a chain about his neck, to which was attached a heavy clog, so that he could not be so quick at biting people's heels.
The Dog grew proud of his bell and clog, and went with them all over the market-place. An old hound said to him: "Why do you make such an exhibition of yourself? That bell and clog that you carry are not, believe me, orders of merit, but, on the contrary, marks of disgrace, a public notice to all men to avoid you as an ill-mannered dog."
Those who achieve notoriety often mistake it for fame.
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The Quack Frog.
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A Frog once made proclamation to all the beasts that he was a learned physician, and able to heal all diseases. A Fox asked him: "How can you pretend to prescribe for others, and you are unable to heal your own lame gait and wrinkled skin?"
Those who pretend that they can mend others should first mend themselves, and then they will be more readily believed.
The Ass, the Fox, and the Lion.
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The Ass and the Fox, having entered into a partnership together, went out into the forest to hunt. They had not proceeded far, when they met a Lion. The Fox approached the Lion and promised to contrive for him the capture of the Ass, if he would pledge his word that his own life should be spared. On his assuring him that he would not injure him, the Fox led the Ass to a deep pit, and contrived that he should fall into it. The Lion, seeing that the Ass was secured, immediately clutched the Fox, and then attacked the Ass at his leisure.
Traitors must expect treachery.
The Wolf and the Sheep.
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A Wolf, being sick and maimed, called to a Sheep, who was passing, and asked him to fetch some water from the stream. "For," he said, "if you will bring me drink, I will find means to provide myself with meat." "Yes," said the Sheep, "if I should bring you the draught, you would doubtless make me provide the meat also."
Hypocritical speeches are easily seen through.
The Cock and the Jewel.
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A Cock, scratching for food for himself and his hens, found a precious stone; on which he said: "If thy owner had found thee, and not I, he would have taken thee up, and have set thee in thy first estate; but I have found thee for no purpose. I would rather have one barleycorn than all the jewels in the world."
The Two Pots.
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A river carried down in its stream two Pots, one made of earthenware, and the other of brass. As they floated along on the surface of the stream, the Earthen Pot said to the Brass Pot: "Pray keep at a distance, and do not come near me, for if you touch me ever so slightly, I shall be broken in pieces; and besides, I by no means wish to come near you."
Equals make the best friends.
The Gnat and the Lion.
A Gnat came and said to a Lion: "I do not the least fear you, nor are you stronger than I am. For in what does your strength consist? You can scratch with your claws, and bite with your teeth--so can a woman in her quarrels. I repeat that I am altogether more powerful than you; and if you doubt it, let us fight and see who will conquer." The Gnat, having sounded his horn, fastened itself upon the Lion, and stung him on the nostrils. The Lion, trying to crush him, tore himself with his claws, until he punished himself severely. The Gnat thus prevailed over the Lion, and buzzing about in a song of triumph, flew away. But shortly afterwards he became entangled in the meshes of a cobweb, and was eaten by a spider. He greatly lamented his fate, saying: "Woe is me, that I, who can wage war successfully with the hugest beasts, should perish myself from this spider."
The Widow and her Little Maidens.
A widow woman, fond of cleaning, had two little maidens to wait on her. She was in the habit of waking them early in the morning, at cockcrow. The maidens, being aggrieved by such excessive labor, resolved to kill the cock who roused their mistress so early. When they had done this, they found that they had only prepared for themselves greater troubles, for their mistress, no longer hearing the cock, was unable to tell the time, and so, woke them up to their work in the middle of the night.
Unlawful acts to escape trials only increase our troubles.
The Fox and the Lion.
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A Fox who had never yet seen a Lion, when he fell in with him by a certain chance for the first time in the forest, was so frightened that he was near dying with fear. On his meeting with him for the second time, he was still much alarmed, but not to the same extent as at first. On seeing him the third time, he so increased in boldness that he went up to him, and commenced a familiar conversation with him.
Acquaintance softens prejudices.
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The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse.
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A Country Mouse invited a Town Mouse, an intimate friend, to pay him a visit, and partake of his country fare. As they were on the bare plough-lands, eating their wheat-stalks and roots pulled up from the hedge-row, the Town Mouse said to his friend: "You live here the life of the ants, while in my house is the horn of plenty. I am surrounded with every luxury, and if you will come with me, as I much wish you would, you shall have an ample share of my dainties." The Country Mouse was easily persuaded, and returned to town with his friend. On his arrival, the Town Mouse placed before him bread, barley, beans, dried figs, honey, raisins, and, last of all, brought a dainty piece of cheese from a basket. The Country Mouse, being much delighted at the sight of such good cheer, expressed his satisfaction in warm terms, and lamented his own hard fate. Just as they were beginning to eat, some one opened the door, and they both ran off squeaking, as fast as they could, to a hole so narrow that two could only find room in it by squeezing. They had scarcely again begun their repast when some one else entered to take something out of a cupboard, on which the two Mice, more frightened than before, ran away and hid themselves. At last the Country Mouse, almost famished, thus addressed his friend: "Although you have prepared for me so dainty a feast, I must leave you to enjoy it by yourself. It is surrounded by too many dangers to please me."
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Better a little in safety, than an abundance surrounded by danger.
The Monkey and the Dolphin.
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A Sailor, bound on a long voyage, took with him a Monkey to amuse him while on shipboard. As he sailed off the coast of Greece, a violent tempest arose, in which the ship was wrecked, and he, his Monkey and all the crew were obliged to swim for their lives. A Dolphin saw the Monkey contending with the waves, and supposing him to be a man (whom he is always said to befriend), came and placed himself under him, to convey him on his back in safety to the shore. When the Dolphin arrived with his burden in sight of land not far from Athens, he demanded of the Monkey if he were an Athenian, who answered that he was, and that he was descended from one of the noblest families in that city.
The Dolphin then inquired if he knew the Piræus (the famous harbor of Athens). The Monkey, supposing that a man was meant, and being obliged to support his previous lie, answered that he knew him very well, and that he was an intimate friend, who would, no doubt, be very glad to see him. The Dolphin, indignant at these falsehoods, dipped the Monkey under the water, and drowned him.
He who once begins to tell falsehoods is obliged to tell others to make them appear true, and, sooner or later, they will get him into trouble.
The Game-cocks and the Partridge.
A Man had two Game-cocks in his poultry yard. One day, by chance, he fell in with a tame Partridge for sale. He purchased it, and brought it home that it might be reared with his Game-cocks. On its being put into the poultry-yard, they struck at it, and followed it about, so that the Partridge was grievously troubled in mind, and supposed that he was thus badly treated because he was a stranger. Not long afterwards he saw the Cocks fighting together, and not separating before one had well beaten the other. He then said to himself: "I shall no longer distress myself at being struck at by these Game-cocks, when I see that they cannot even refrain from quarreling with each other."
Strangers should avoid those who quarrel among themselves.
The Boy and the Nettle.
A Boy was stung by a Nettle. He ran home and told his mother, saying: "Although it pains me so much, I did but touch it ever so gently." "That was just it," said his mother, "which caused it to sting you. The next time you touch a Nettle, grasp it boldly, and it will be soft as silk to your hand, and not in the least hurt you."
Whatever you do, do with all your might.
The Trumpeter taken Prisoner.
[Illustration]
A Trumpeter, bravely leading on the soldiers, was captured by the enemy. He cried out to his captors: "Pray spare me, and do not take my life without cause or without injury. I have not slain a single man of your troop. I have no arms, and carry nothing but this one brass trumpet." "That is the very reason for which you should be put to death," they said, "for while you do not fight yourself, your loud trumpet stirs up all the other soldiers to battle."
He who incites strife is as guilty as they who strive.
The Fatal Marriage.
The Lion, touched with gratitude by the noble procedure of a Mouse, and resolving not to be outdone in generosity by any wild beast whatsoever, desired his little deliverer to name his own terms, for that he might depend upon his complying with any proposal he should make. The Mouse, fired with ambition at this gracious offer, did not so much consider what was proper for him to ask, as what was in the powers of his prince to grant; and so demanded his princely daughter, the young lioness, in marriage. The Lion consented; but, when he would have given the royal virgin into his possession, she, like a giddy thing as she was, not minding how she walked, by chance set her paw upon her spouse, who was coming to meet her, and crushed him to pieces.
Beware of unequal matches. Alliances prompted by ambition often prove fatal.
The Ass and the Charger.
[Illustration]
An Ass congratulated a Horse on being so ungrudgingly and carefully provided for, while he himself had scarcely enough to eat, nor even that without hard work. But when war broke out, the heavy armed soldier mounted the Horse, and rushed into the very midst of the enemy, and the Horse, being wounded, fell dead on the battle-field. Then the Ass, seeing all these things, changed his mind, and commiserated the Horse, saying: "How much more fortunate am I than a charger. I can remain at home in safety while he is exposed to all the perils of war."
Be not hasty to envy the condition of others.
The Vain Jackdaw.
[Illustration]
Jupiter determined, it is said, to create a sovereign over the birds, and made proclamation that, on a certain day, they should all present themselves before him, when he would himself choose the most beautiful among them to be king. The Jackdaw, knowing his own ugliness, searched through the woods and fields, and collected the feathers which had fallen from the wings of his companions, and stuck them in all parts of his body. When the appointed day arrived, and the birds had assembled before Jupiter, the Jackdaw also made his appearance in his many-feathered finery. On Jupiter proposing to make him king, on account of the beauty of his plumage, the birds indignantly protested, and each plucking from him his own feathers, the Jackdaw was again nothing but a Jackdaw.
Hope not to succeed in borrowed plumes.
The Milkmaid and her Pot of Milk.
[Illustration]
A Maid was carrying her pail of milk to the farm-house, when she fell a-musing. "The money for which this milk will be sold will buy at least three hundred eggs. The eggs, allowing for all mishaps, will produce two hundred and fifty chickens. The chickens will become ready for market when poultry will fetch the highest price; so that by the end of the year I shall have money enough to buy a new gown. In this dress I will go to the Christmas junketings, when all the young fellows will propose to me, but I will toss my head, and refuse them every one." At this moment she tossed her head in unison with her thoughts, when down fell the Milk-pot to the ground, and broke into a hundred pieces, and all her fine schemes perished in a moment.
Count not your chickens before they are hatched.
[Illustration]
The Playful Ass.
An Ass climbed up to the roof of a building, and, frisking about there, broke in the tiling. The owner went up after him, and quickly drove him down, beating him severely with a thick wooden cudgel. The Ass said: "Why, I saw the Monkey do this very thing yesterday, and you all laughed heartily, as if it afforded you very great amusement."
Those who do not know their right place must be taught it.
The Man and the Satyr.
[Illustration]
A Man and a Satyr once formed a bond of alliance. One very cold wintry day, as they talked together, the Man put his fingers to his mouth and blew on them. On the Satyr inquiring the reason, he told him that he did it to warm his hands. Later on in the day they sat down to eat, the food prepared being quite scalding. The Man raised one of his dishes towards his mouth and blew in it. On the Satyr again inquiring the reason, he said that he did it to cool the meat. "I can no longer consider you as a friend," said the Satyr; "a fellow who with the same breath blows hot and cold I could never trust."
A man who talks for both sides is not to be trusted by either.
The Oak and the Reeds.
[Illustration]
A very large Oak was uprooted by the wind, and thrown across a stream. It fell among some Reeds, which it thus addressed: "I wonder how you, who are so light and weak, are not entirely crushed by these strong winds." They replied:
"You fight and contend with the wind, and consequently you are destroyed; while we, on the contrary, bend before the least breath of air, and therefore remain unbroken."
Stoop to conquer.
The Huntsman and the Fisherman.
A Huntsman, returning with his dogs from the field, fell in by chance with a Fisherman, bringing home a basket laden with fish. The Huntsman wished to have the fish, and their owner experienced an equal longing for the contents of the game-bag. They quickly agreed to exchange the produce of their day's sport. Each was so well pleased with his bargain, that they made for some time the same exchange day after day. A neighbor said to them: "If you go on in this way, you will soon destroy, by frequent use, the pleasure of your exchange, and each will again wish to retain the fruits of his own sport."
Pleasures are heightened by abstinence.
The Mother and the Wolf.
[Illustration]
A famished Wolf was prowling about in the morning in search of food. As he passed the door of a cottage built in the forest, he heard a mother say to her child: "Be quiet, or I will throw you out of the window, and the Wolf shall eat you." The Wolf sat all day waiting at the door. In the evening he heard the same woman fondling her child, and saying: "He is quiet now, and if the Wolf should come, we will kill him." The Wolf, hearing these words, went home, gaping with cold and hunger.
Be not in haste to believe what is said in anger or thoughtlessness.
[Illustration]
The Shepherd[B] and the Wolf.
A Shepherd once found a young Wolf, and brought it up, and after a while taught it to steal lambs from the neighboring flocks. The Wolf, having shown himself an apt pupil, said to the Shepherd: "Since you have taught me to steal, you must keep a sharp look-out, or you will lose some of your own flock."
The vices we teach may be practiced against us.
[Transcriber's note B: Original had "Sheperd".]
The Dove and the Crow.
[Illustration]
A Dove shut up in a cage was boasting of the large number of the young ones which she had hatched. A Crow, hearing her, said: "My good friend, cease from this unreasonable boasting. The larger the number of your family, the greater your cause of sorrow, in seeing them shut up in this prison-house."
To enjoy our blessings we must have freedom.
The Old Man and the Three Young Men.
[Illustration]
As an old man was planting a tree, three young men came along and began to make sport of him, saying: "It shows your foolishness to be planting a tree at your age. The tree cannot bear fruit for many years, while you must very soon die. What is the use of your wasting your time in providing pleasure for others to share long after you are dead?" The old man stopped in his labor and replied: "Others before me provided for my happiness, and it is my duty to provide for those who shall come after me. As for life, who is sure of it for a day? You may all die before me." The old man's words came true; one of the young men went on a voyage at sea and was drowned, another went to war and was shot, and the third fell from a tree and broke his neck.
We should not think wholly of ourselves, and we should remember that life is uncertain.
The Lion and the Fox.
[Illustration]
A Fox entered into partnership with a Lion, on the pretense of becoming his servant. Each undertook his proper duty in accordance with his own nature and powers. The Fox discovered and pointed out the prey, the Lion sprang on it and seized it. The Fox soon became jealous of the Lion carrying off the Lion's share, and said that he would no longer find out the prey, but would capture it on his own account. The next day he attempted to snatch a lamb from the fold, but fell himself a prey to the huntsman and his hounds.
Keep to your place, if you would succeed.
The Horse and the Stag.
[Illustration]
The Horse had the plain entirely to himself. A Stag intruded into his domain and shared his pasture. The Horse, desiring to revenge himself on the stranger, requested a man, if he were willing, to help him in punishing the Stag. The man replied, that if the Horse would receive a bit in his mouth, and agree to carry him, he would contrive very effectual weapons against the Stag. The Horse consented, and allowed the man to mount him. From that hour he found that, instead of obtaining revenge on the Stag, he had enslaved himself to the service of man.
He who seeks to injure others often injures only himself.
The Lion and the Dolphin.
A Lion, roaming by the sea-shore, saw a Dolphin lift up its head out of the waves, and asked him to contract an alliance with him; saying that of all the animals, they ought to be the best friends, since the one was the king of beasts on the earth, and the other was the sovereign ruler of all the inhabitants of the ocean. The Dolphin gladly consented to this request. Not long afterwards the Lion had a combat with a wild bull, and called on the Dolphin to help him. The Dolphin, though quite willing to give him assistance, was unable to do so, as he could not by any means reach the land. The Lion abused him as a traitor. The Dolphin replied: "Nay, my friend, blame not me, but Nature, which, while giving me the sovereignty of the sea, has quite denied me the power of living upon the land."
Let every one stick to his own element.
The Mice in Council.
[Illustration]
The Mice summoned a council to decide how they might best devise means for obtaining notice of the approach of their great enemy the Cat. Among the many plans devised, the one that found most favor was the proposal to tie a bell to the neck of the Cat, that the Mice, being warned by the sound of the tinkling, might run away and hide themselves in their holes at his approach. But when the Mice further debated who among them should thus "bell the Cat," there was no one found to do it.
Let those who propose be willing to perform.
The Camel and the Arab.
[Illustration]
An Arab Camel-driver having completed the lading of his Camel, asked him which he would like best, to go up hill or down hill. The poor beast replied, not without a touch of reason: "Why do you ask me? Is it that the level way through the desert is closed?"
The Fighting Cocks and the Eagle.
[Illustration]
Two Game Cocks were fiercely fighting for the mastery of the farm-yard. One at last put the other to flight. The vanquished Cock skulked away and hid himself in a quiet corner. The conqueror, flying up to a high wall, flapped his wings and crowed exultingly with all his might. An Eagle sailing through the air pounced upon him, and carried him off in his talons. The vanquished Cock immediately came out of his corner, and ruled henceforth with undisputed mastery.
Pride goes before destruction.
The Boys and the Frogs.
Some boys, playing near a pond, saw a number of Frogs in the water, and began to pelt them with stones. They killed several of them, when one of the Frogs, lifting his head out of the water, cried out: "Pray stop, my boys; what is sport to you is death to us."
What we do in sport often makes great trouble for others.
The Crab and its Mother.
A Crab said to her son: "Why do you walk so one-sided, my child? It is far more becoming to go straight forward." The young Crab replied: "Quite true, dear mother; and if you will show me the straight way, I will promise to walk in it." The mother tried in vain, and submitted without remonstrance to the reproof of her child.
Example is more powerful than precept.
The Wolf and the Shepherd.
[Illustration]
A Wolf followed a flock of sheep for a long time, and did not attempt to injure one of them. The Shepherd at first stood on his guard against him, as against an enemy, and kept a strict watch over his movements. But when the Wolf, day after day, kept in the company of the sheep, and did not make the slightest effort to seize them, the Shepherd began to look upon him as a guardian of his flock rather than as a plotter of evil against it; and when occasion called him one day into the city, he left the sheep entirely in his charge. The Wolf, now that he had the opportunity, fell upon the sheep, and destroyed the greater part of the flock. The Shepherd, on his return, finding his flock destroyed, exclaimed: "I have been rightly served; why did I trust my sheep to a Wolf?"
[Illustration]
An evil mind will show in evil action, sooner or later.
The Man and the Lion.
A Man and a Lion traveled together through the forest. They soon began to boast of their respective superiority to each other in strength and prowess. As they were disputing, they passed a statue, carved in stone, which represented "A Lion strangled by a Man." The traveler pointed to it and said: "See there! How strong we are, and how we prevail over even the king of beasts." The Lion replied: "This statue was made by one of you men. If we Lions knew how to erect statues, you would see the man placed under the paw of the Lion."
One story is good till another is told.
The Ox and the Frog.
[Illustration]
An Ox, drinking at a pool, trod on a brood of young frogs, and crushed one of them to death. The mother, coming up and missing one of her sons, inquired of his brothers what had become of him. "He is dead, dear mother; for just now a very huge beast with four great feet came to the pool, and crushed him to death with his cloven heel." The Frog, puffing herself out, inquired, "If the beast was as big as that in size." "Cease, mother, to puff yourself out," said her son, "and do not be angry; for you would, I assure you, sooner burst than successfully imitate the hugeness of that monster."
Impossible things we cannot hope to attain, and it is of no use to try.
The Birds, the Beasts, and the Bat.
The Birds waged war with the Beasts, and each party were by turns the conquerors. A Bat, fearing the uncertain issues of the fight, always betook himself to that side which was the strongest. When peace was proclaimed, his deceitful conduct was apparent to both the combatants; he was driven forth from the light of day, and henceforth concealed himself in dark hiding-places, flying always alone and at night.
Those who practice deceit must expect to be shunned.
The Charcoal-Burner and the Fuller.
A Charcoal-burner carried on his trade in his own house. One day he met a friend, a Fuller, and entreated him to come and live with him, saying that they should be far better neighbors, and that their housekeeping expenses would be lessened. The Fuller replied: "The arrangement is impossible as far as I am concerned, for whatever I should whiten, you would immediately blacken again with your charcoal."
Like will draw like.
The Bull and the Goat.
[Illustration]
A Bull, escaping from a Lion, entered a cave, which some shepherds had lately occupied. A He-goat was left in it, who sharply attacked him with his horns. The Bull quietly addressed him--"Butt away as much as you will. I have no fear of you, but of the Lion. Let that monster once go, and I will soon let you know what is the respective strength of a Goat and a Bull."
It shows an evil disposition to take advantage of a friend in distress.
The Lion and the Mouse.
[Illustration]
A Lion was awakened from sleep by a Mouse running over his face. Rising up in anger, he caught him and was about to kill him, when the Mouse piteously entreated, saying: "If you would only spare my life, I would be sure to repay your kindness." The Lion laughed and let him go. It happened shortly after this that the Lion was caught by some hunters, who bound him by strong ropes to the ground. The Mouse, recognizing his roar, came up and gnawed the rope with his teeth, and, setting him free, exclaimed: "You ridiculed the idea of my ever being able to help you, not expecting to receive from me any repayment of your favor; but now you know that it is possible for even a Mouse to confer benefits on a Lion."
No one is too weak to do good.
The Horse and the Ass.
A Horse, proud of his fine trappings, met an Ass on the highway. The Ass being heavily laden moved slowly out of the way. "Hardly," said the Horse, "can I resist kicking you with my heels." The Ass held his peace, and made only a silent appeal to the justice of the gods. Not long afterward, the Horse, having become broken-winded, was sent by his owner to the farm. The Ass, seeing him drawing a dung-cart, thus derided him. "Where, O boaster, are now all thy gay trappings, thou who art thyself reduced to the condition you so lately treated with contempt?"
The Old Hound.
[Illustration]
A Hound, who in the days of his youth and strength had never yielded to any beast of the forest, encountered in his old age a boar in the chase. He seized him boldly by the ear, but could not retain his hold because of the decay of his teeth, so that the boar escaped. His master, quickly coming up, was very much disappointed, and fiercely abused the dog. The Hound looked up and said: "It was not my fault, master; my spirit was as good as ever, but I could not help mine infirmities. I rather deserve to be praised for what I have been, than to be blamed for what I am."
No one should be blamed for his infirmities.
The Crow and the Pitcher.
[Illustration]
A Crow, perishing with thirst, saw a pitcher, and, hoping to find water, flew to it with great delight. When he reached it, he discovered to his grief that it contained so little water that he could not possibly get at it. He tried everything he could think of to reach the water, but all his efforts were in vain. At last he collected as many stones as he could carry, and dropped them one by one with his beak into the pitcher, until he brought the water within his reach, and thus saved his life.
Necessity is the mother of invention.
The Ass Eating Thistles.
An Ass was loaded with good provisions of several sorts, which, in time of harvest, he was carrying into the field for his master and the reapers to dine upon. By the way he met with a fine large Thistle, and, being very hungry, began to mumble it; and while he was doing so he entered into this reflection: "How many greedy epicures would think themselves happy, amidst such a variety of delicate viands as I now carry! But to me this bitter, prickly Thistle is more savory and relishing than the most exquisite and sumptuous banquet. Let others choose what they may for food, but give me, above everything, a fine juicy thistle like this and I will be content."
Every one to his taste: one man's meat is another man's poison, and one man's poison is another man's meat; what is rejected by one person may be valued very highly by another.
The Wolf and the Lion.
[Illustration]
A Wolf, having stolen a lamb from a fold, was carrying him off to his lair. A Lion met him in the path, and, seizing the lamb, took it from him. The Wolf, standing at a safe distance, exclaimed: "You have unrighteously taken from me that which was mine." The Lion jeeringly replied: "It was righteously yours, eh? Was it the gift of a friend, or did you get it by purchase? If you did not get it in one way or the other, how then did you come by it?"
One thief is no better than another.
The King's Son and the Painted Lion.
[Illustration]
A King who had one only son, fond of martial exercises, had a dream in which he was warned that his son would be killed by a lion. Afraid lest the dream should prove true, he built for his son a pleasant palace, and adorned its walls for his amusement with all kinds of animals of the size of life, among which was the picture of a lion. When the young Prince saw this, his grief at being thus confined burst out afresh, and standing near the lion, he thus spoke: "O you most detestable of animals! through a lying dream of my father's, which he saw in his sleep, I am shut up on your account in this palace as if I had been a girl. What shall I now do to you?" With these words he stretched out his hands toward a thorn-tree, meaning to cut a stick from its branches that he might beat the lion, when one of its sharp prickles pierced his finger, and caused great pain and inflammation, so that the young Prince fell down in a fainting fit. A violent fever suddenly set in, from which he died not many days after.
We had better bear our troubles bravely than try to escape them.
The Trees and the Axe.
[Illustration]
A Man came into a forest, and made a petition to the Trees to provide him a handle for his axe. The Trees consented to his request, and gave him a young ash-tree. No sooner had the man fitted from it a new handle to his axe, than he began to use it, and quickly felled with his strokes the noblest giants of the forest. An old oak, lamenting when too late the destruction of his companions, said to a neighboring cedar: "The first step has lost us all. If we had not given up the rights of the ash, we might yet have retained our own privileges and have stood for ages."
In yielding the rights of others, we may endanger our own.
The Seaside Travelers.
Some travelers, journeying along the sea-shore, climbed to the summit of a tall cliff, and from thence looking over the sea, saw in the distance what they thought was a large ship, and waited in the hope of seeing it enter the harbor. But as the object on which they looked was driven by the wind nearer to the shore, they found that it could at the most be a small boat, and not a ship. When, however, it reached the beach, they discovered that it was only a large fagot of sticks, and one of them said to his companions: "We have waited for no purpose, for after all there is nothing to see but a fagot."
Our mere anticipations of life outrun its realities.
The Sea-gull and the Kite.
[Illustration]
A Sea-gull, who was more at home swimming on the sea than walking on the land, was in the habit of catching live fish for its food. One day, having bolted down too large a fish, it burst its deep gullet-bag, and lay down on the shore to die. A Kite, seeing him, and thinking him a land bird like itself, exclaimed: "You richly deserve your fate; for a bird of the air has no business to seek its food from the sea."
Every man should be content to mind his own business.
The Monkey and the Camel.
[Illustration]
The beasts of the forest gave a splendid entertainment, at which the Monkey stood up and danced. Having vastly delighted the assembly, he sat down amidst universal applause. The Camel, envious of the praises bestowed on the Monkey, and desirous to divert to himself the favor of the guests, proposed to stand up in his turn, and dance for their amusement. He moved about in so very ridiculous a manner, that the Beasts, in a fit of indignation, set upon him with clubs, and drove him out of the assembly.
It is absurd to ape our betters.
The Rat and the Elephant.
[Illustration]
A Rat, traveling on the highway, met a huge elephant, bearing his royal master and his suite, and also his favorite cat and dog, and parrot and monkey. The great beast and his attendants were followed by an admiring crowd, taking up all of the road. "What fools you are," said the Rat to the people, "to make such a hubbub over an elephant. Is it his great bulk that you so much admire? It can only frighten little boys and girls, and I can do that as well. I am a beast; as well as he, and have as many legs and ears and eyes. He has no right to take up all the highway, which belongs as much to me as to him." At this moment, the cat spied the rat, and, jumping to the ground, soon convinced him that he was not an elephant.
Because we are like the great in one respect we must not think we are like them in all.
The Fisherman Piping.
[Illustration]
A Fisherman skilled in music took his flute and his nets to the sea-shore. Standing on a projecting rock he played several tunes, in the hope that the fish, attracted by his melody, would of their own accord dance into his net, which he had placed below. At last, having long waited in vain, he laid aside his flute, and casting his net into the sea, made an excellent haul.
The Wolf and the House-dog.
[Illustration]
A Wolf, meeting with a big, well-fed Mastiff, having a wooden collar about his neck, inquired of him who it was that fed him so well, and yet compelled him to drag that heavy log about wherever he went. "The master," he replied. Then, said the Wolf: "May no friend of mine ever be in such a plight; for the weight of this chain is enough to spoil the appetite."
Nothing can compensate us for the loss of our liberty.
The Eagle and the Kite.
[Illustration]
An Eagle, overwhelmed with sorrow, sat upon the branches of a tree, in company with a Kite. "Why," said the Kite, "do I see you with such a rueful look?" "I seek," she replied, "for a mate suitable for me, and am not able to find one." "Take me," returned the Kite; "I am much stronger than you are." "Why, are you able to secure the means of living by your plunder?" "Well, I have often caught and carried away an ostrich in my talons." The Eagle, persuaded by these words, accepted him as her mate. Shortly after the nuptials, the Eagle said: "Fly off, and bring me back the ostrich you promised me." The Kite, soaring aloft into the air, brought back the shabbiest possible mouse. "Is this," said the Eagle, "the faithful fulfillment of your promise to me?" The Kite replied: "That I might attain to your royal hand, there is nothing that I would not have promised, however much I knew that I must fail in the performance."
Promises of a suitor must be taken with caution.
The Dogs and the Hides.
[Illustration]
Some Dogs, famished with hunger, saw some cow-hides steeping in a river. Not being able to reach them, they agreed to drink up the river; but it fell out that they burst themselves with drinking long before they reached the hides.
Attempt not impossibilities.
The Fisherman and the Little Fish
[Illustration]
A Fisherman who lived on the produce of his nets, one day caught a single small fish as the result of his day's labor. The fish, panting convulsively, thus entreated for his life: "O Sir, what good can I be to you, and how little am I worth! I am not yet come to my full size. Pray spare my life, and put me back into the sea. I shall soon become a large fish, fit for the tables of the rich; and then you can catch me again, and make a handsome profit of me." The fisherman replied: "I should be a very simple fellow, if I were to forego my certain gain for an uncertain profit."
[Illustration]
The Ass and his Purchaser.
A man wished to purchase an Ass, and agreed with its owner that he should try him before he bought him. He took the Ass home, and put him in the straw-yard with his other Asses, upon which he left all the others, and joined himself at once to the most idle and the greatest eater of them all. The man put a halter on him, and led him back to his owner, saying: "I do not need a trial; I know that he will be just such another as the one whom he chose for his companion."
A man is known by the company he keeps.
The Shepherd and the Sheep.
A Shepherd, driving his Sheep to a wood, saw an oak of unusual size, full of acorns, and, spreading his cloak under the branches, he climbed up into the tree, and shook down the acorns. The sheep, eating the acorns, frayed and tore the cloak. The Shepherd coming down, and seeing what was done, said: "O you most ungrateful creatures! you provide wool to make garments for all other men, but you destroy the clothes of him who feeds you."
The basest ingratitude is that which injures those who serve us.
The Fox and the Crow.
[Illustration]
A Crow, having stolen a bit of flesh, perched in a tree, and held it in her beak. A Fox, seeing her, longed to possess himself of the flesh, and by a wily stratagem succeeded. "How handsome is the Crow," he exclaimed, "in the beauty of her shape and in the fairness of her complexion! Oh, if her voice were only equal to her beauty, she would deservedly be considered the Queen of Birds!" This he said deceitfully, having greater admiration for the meat than for the crow. But the Crow, all her vanity aroused by the cunning flattery, and anxious to refute the reflection cast upon her voice, set up a loud caw, and dropped the flesh. The Fox quickly picked it up, and thus addressed the Crow: "My good Crow, your voice is right enough, but your wit is wanting."
He who listens to flattery is not wise, for it has no good purpose.
The Swallow and the Crow.
The Swallow and the Crow had a contention about their plumage. The Crow put an end to the dispute by saying: "Your feathers are all very well in the spring, but mine protect me against the winter."
Fine weather friends are not worth much.
The Hen and the Golden Eggs.
[Illustration]
A Cottager and his wife had a Hen, which laid every day a golden egg. They supposed that it must contain a great lump of gold in its inside, and killed it in order that they might get it, when, to their surprise, they found that the Hen differed in no respect from their other hens. The foolish pair, thus hoping to become rich all at once, deprived themselves of the gain of which they were day by day assured.
[Illustration]
The Old Man and Death.
An old man was employed in cutting wood in the forest, and, in carrying the fagots into the city for sale. One day, being very wearied with his long journey, he sat down by the wayside, and, throwing down his load, besought "Death" to come. "Death" immediately appeared, in answer to his summons, and asked for what reason he had called him. The old man replied: "That, lifting up the load, you may place it again upon my shoulders."
We do not always like to be taken at our word.
The Fox and the Leopard.
[Illustration]
The Fox and the Leopard disputed which was the more beautiful of the two. The Leopard exhibited one by one the various spots which decorated his skin. The Fox, interrupting him, said: "And how much more beautiful than you am I, who am decorated, not in body, but in mind."
People are not to be judged by their coats.
The Mountain in Labor.
A Mountain was once greatly agitated. Loud groans and noises were heard; and crowds of people came from all parts to see what was the matter. While they were assembled in anxious expectation of some terrible calamity, out came a Mouse.
Don't make much ado about nothing.
The Bear and the Two Travelers.
[Illustration]
Two men were traveling together, when a bear suddenly met them on their path. One of them climbed up quickly into a tree, and concealed himself in the branches. The other, seeing that he must be attacked, fell flat on the ground, and when the Bear came up and felt him with his snout, and smelt him all over, he held his breath, and feigned the appearance of death as much as he could. The Bear soon left him, for it is said he will not touch a dead body. When he was quite gone, the other traveler descended from the tree, and, accosting his friend, jocularly inquired "what it was the Bear had whispered in his ear?" His friend replied: "He gave me this advice: Never travel with a friend who deserts you at the approach of danger."
Misfortune tests the sincerity of friends.
The Sick Kite.
A Kite, sick unto death, said to his mother: "O Mother! do not mourn, but at once invoke the gods that my life may be prolonged." She replied: "Alas! my son, which of the gods do you think will pity you? Is there one whom you have not outraged by filching from their very altars a part of the sacrifice which had been offered up to them?"
We must make friends in prosperity, if we would have their help in adversity.
The Wolf and the Crane.
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A Wolf, having a bone stuck in his throat, hired a Crane, for a large sum, to put her head into his throat and draw out the bone. When the Crane had extracted the bone, and demanded the promised payment, the Wolf, grinning and grinding his teeth, exclaimed: "Why, you have surely already a sufficient recompense, in having been permitted to draw out your head in safety from the mouth and jaws of a Wolf."
In serving the wicked, expect no reward, and be thankful if you escape injury for your pains.
The Cat and the Cock.
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A Cat caught a Cock, and took counsel with himself how he might find a reasonable excuse for eating him. He accused him as being a nuisance to men, by crowing in the night time, and not permitting them to sleep. The Cock defended himself by saying that he did this for the benefit of men, that they might rise betimes, for their labors. The Cat replied: "Although you abound in specious apologies, I shall not remain supperless;" and he made a meal of him.
It does no good to deny those who make false accusations knowingly.
The Wolf and the Horse.
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A Wolf coming out of a field of oats met with a Horse, and thus addressed him: "I would advise you to go into that field. It is full of capital oats, which I have left untouched for you, as you are a friend the very sound of whose teeth it will be a pleasure to me to hear." The Horse replied: "If oats had been the food for wolves, you would never have indulged your ears at the cost of your belly."
Men of evil reputation, when they perform a good deed, fail to get credit for it.
The Two Soldiers and the Robber.
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Two Soldiers, traveling together, were set upon by a Robber. The one fled away; the other stood his ground, and defended himself with his stout right hand. The Robber being slain, the timid companion runs up and draws his sword, and then, throwing back his traveling cloak, says: "I'll at him, and I'll take care he shall learn whom he has attacked." On this, he who had fought with the Robber made answer: "I only wish that you had helped me just now, even if it had been only with those words, for I should have been the more encouraged, believing them to be true; but now put up your sword in its sheath and hold your equally useless tongue, till you can deceive others who do not know you. I, indeed, who have experienced with what speed you ran away, know right well that no dependence can be placed on your valor."
When a coward is once found out, his pretensions of valor are useless.
The Monkey and the Cat.
A Monkey and a Cat lived in the same family, and it was hard to tell which was the greatest thief. One day, as they were roaming about together, they spied some chestnuts roasting in the ashes. "Come," said the cunning Monkey, "we shall not go without our dinner to-day. Your claws are better than mine for the purpose; you pull them out of the hot ashes and you shall have half." Pussy pulled them out one by one, burning her claws very much in doing so. When she had stolen them all, she found that the Monkey had eaten every one.
A thief cannot be trusted, even by another thief.
The Two Frogs.
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Two frogs dwelt in the same pool. The pool being dried up under the summer's heat, they left it and set out together for another home. As they went along they chanced to pass a deep well, amply supplied with water, on seeing which, one of the Frogs said to the other: "Let us descend and make our abode in this well." The other replied with greater caution: "But suppose the water should fail us, how can we get out again from so great a depth?"
Do nothing without a regard to the consequences.
The Vine and the Goat.
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A Vine was luxuriant in the time of vintage with leaves and grapes. A Goat, passing by, nibbled its young tendrils and its leaves. The Vine said: "Why do you thus injure me and crop my leaves? Is there no young grass left? But I shall not have to wait long for my just revenge; for if you now crop my leaves, and cut me down to my root, I shall provide the wine to pour over you when you are led as a victim to the sacrifice."
Retribution is certain.
The Mouse and the Boasting Rat.
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A Mouse lived in a granary which became, after a while, the frequent resort of a Cat. The Mouse was in great fear and did not know what to do. In her strait, she bethought herself of a Rat who lived not far away, and who had said in her hearing a hundred times that he was not afraid of any cat living. She resolved to visit the bold Rat and ask him to drive the Cat away. She found the Rat in his hole and relating her story, besought his help. "Pooh!" said the Rat, "You should be bold as I am; go straight about your affairs, and do not mind the Cat. I will soon follow you, and drive him away." He thought, now, he must do something to make good his boast. So he collected all the Rats in the neighborhood, resolved to frighten the Cat by numbers. But when they all came to the granary, they found that the Cat had already caught the foolish Mouse, and a single growl from him sent them all scampering to their holes.
Do not rely upon a boaster.
The Dogs and the Fox.
Some Dogs, finding the skin of a lion, began to tear it in pieces with their teeth. A Fox, seeing them, said: "If this lion were alive, you would soon find out that his claws were stronger than your teeth."
It is easy to kick a man that is down.
The Thief and the House-Dog.
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A Thief came in the night to break into a house. He brought with him several slices of meat, that he might pacify the House-dog, so that he should not alarm his master by barking. As the Thief threw him the pieces of meat, the Dog said: "If you think to stop my mouth, to relax my vigilance, or even to gain my regard by these gifts, you will be greatly mistaken. This sudden kindness at your hands will only make me more watchful, lest under these unexpected favors to myself you have some private ends to accomplish for your own benefit, and for my master's injury. Besides, this is not the time that I am usually fed, which makes me all the more suspicions of your intentions."
He who offers bribes needs watching, for his intentions are not honest.
The Sick Stag.
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A sick Stag lay down in a quiet corner of his pasture-ground. His companions came in great numbers to inquire after his health, and each one helped himself to a share of the food which had been placed for his use; so that he died, not from his sickness, but from the failure of the means of living.
Evil companions bring more hurt than profit.
The Fowler and the Ringdove.
A Fowler took his gun, and went into the woods a shooting. He spied a Ringdove among the branches of an oak, and intended to kill it. He clapped the piece to his shoulder, and took his aim accordingly. But, just as he was going to pull the trigger, an adder, which he had trod upon under the grass, stung him so painfully in the leg that he was forced to quit his design, and threw his gun down in a passion. The poison immediately infected his blood, and his whole body began to mortify; which, when he perceived, he could not help owning it to be just. "Fate," said he, "has brought destruction upon me while I was contriving the death of another."
Men often fall into the trap which they prepare for others.
The Kid and the Wolf.
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A Kid, returning without protection from the pasture, was pursued by a Wolf. He turned round, and said to the Wolf: "I know, friend Wolf, that I must be your prey; but before I die, I would ask of you one favor, that you will play me a tune, to which I may dance." The Wolf complied, and while he was piping, and the Kid was dancing, the hounds, hearing the sound, came up and gave chase to the Wolf. The Wolf, turning to the Kid, said: "It is just what I deserve; for I, who am only a butcher, should not have turned piper to please you."
Every one should keep his own colors.
The Blind Man and the Whelp.
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A Blind Man was accustomed to distinguish different animals by touching them with his hands. The whelp of a Wolf was brought him, with a request that he would feel it, and say what it was. He felt it, and being in doubt, said: "I do not quite know whether it is the cub of a Fox, or the whelp of a Wolf; but this I know full well, that it would not be safe to admit him to the sheepfold."
Evil tendencies are shown early in life.
The Geese and the Cranes.
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The Geese and the Cranes fed in the same meadow. A bird-catcher came to ensnare them in his nets. The Cranes, being light of wing, fled away at his approach; while the Geese, being slower of flight and heavier in their bodies, were captured.
Those who are caught are not always the most guilty.
The North Wind and the Sun.
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The North Wind and the Sun disputed which was the more powerful, and agreed that he should be declared the victor who could first strip a wayfaring man of his clothes. The North Wind first tried his power, and blew with all his might; but the keener became his blasts, the closer the Traveler wrapped his cloak around him, till at last, resigning all hope of victory, he called upon the Sun to see what he could do. The Sun suddenly shone out with all his warmth. The Traveler no sooner felt his genial rays than he took off one garment after another, and at last, fairly overcome with heat, undressed, and bathed in a stream that lay in his path.
Persuasion is better than Force.
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The Laborer and the Snake.
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A Snake, having made his hole close to the porch of a cottage, inflicted a severe bite on the Cottager's infant son, of which he died, to the great grief of his parents. The father resolved to kill the Snake, and the next day, on its coming out of its hole for food, took up his axe; but, making too much haste to hit him as he wriggled away, missed his head, and cut off only the end of his tail. After some time, the Cottager, afraid lest the Snake should bite him also, endeavored to make peace, and placed some bread and salt in his hole. The Snake said: "There can henceforth be no peace between us; for whenever I see you I shall remember the loss of my tail, and whenever you see me you will be thinking of the death of your son."
It is hard to forget injuries in the presence of him who caused the injury.
The Bull and the Calf.
A Bull was striving with all his might to squeeze himself through a narrow passage which led to his stall. A young Calf came up and offered to go before and show him the way by which he could manage to pass. "Save yourself the trouble," said the Bull; "I knew that way long before you were born."
Do not presume to teach your elders.
The Goat and the Ass.
A Man once kept a Goat and an Ass. The Goat, envying the Ass on account of his greater abundance of food, said: "How shamefully you are treated; at one time grinding in the mill, and at another carrying heavy burdens;" and he further advised him that he should pretend to be epileptic, and fall into a deep ditch and so obtain rest. The Ass gave credence to his words, and, falling into a ditch, was very much bruised. His master, sending for a leech, asked his advice. He bade him pour upon the wounds the blood of a Goat. They at once killed the Goat, and so healed the Ass.
In injuring others we are apt to receive a greater injury.
The Boasting Traveler.
A Man who had traveled in foreign lands boasted very much, on returning to his own country, of the many wonderful and heroic things he had done in the different places he had visited. Among other things, he said that when he was at Rhodes he had leaped to such a distance that no man of his day could leap anywhere near him--and as to that there were in Rhodes many persons who saw him do it, and whom he could call as witnesses. One of the bystanders, interrupting him, said: "Now, my good man, if this be all true, there is no need of witnesses. Suppose this to be Rhodes and now for your leap."
Cure a boaster by putting his words to the test.
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The Ass, the Cock, and the Lion.
An Ass and a Cock were together, when a Lion, desperate from hunger, approached. He was about to spring upon the Ass, when the Cock (to the sound of whose voice the Lion, it is said, has a singular aversion) crowed loudly, and the Lion fled away. The Ass, observing his trepidation at the mere crowing of a cock, summoned courage to attack him, and galloped after him for that purpose. He had run no long distance when the Lion, turning about, seized him and tore him to pieces.
False confidence often leads into danger.
The Stag and the Fawn.
A Stag, grown old and mischievous, was, according to custom, stamping with his foot, making offers with his head, and bellowing so terribly that the whole herd quaked for fear of him; when one of the little Fawns, coming up, addressed him thus: "Pray, what is the reason that you, who are so formidable at all other times, if you do but hear the cry of the hounds, are ready to fly out of your skin for fear?" "What you observe is true," replied the Stag, "though I know not how to account for it. I am indeed vigorous and able, and often resolve that nothing shall ever dismay my courage; but, alas! I no sooner hear the voice of a hound but my spirits fail me, and I cannot help making off as fast as my legs can carry me."
The greatest braggarts are the greatest cowards.
The Partridge and the Fowler.
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A Fowler caught a Partridge, and was about to kill him. The Partridge earnestly besought him to spare his life, saying: "Pray, master, permit me to live, and I will entice many Partridges to you in recompense for your mercy to me." The Fowler replied: "I shall now with the less scruple take your life, because you are willing to save it at the cost of betraying your friends and relations;" and without more ado he twisted his neck and put him in his bag with his other game.
Those who would sacrifice their friends to save themselves from harm are not entitled to mercy.
The Farmer and the Stork.
A Farmer placed his nets on his newly sown plough lands, and caught a quantity of Cranes, which came to pick up his seed. With them he trapped a Stork also. The Stork, having his leg fractured by the net, earnestly besought the Farmer to spare his life. "Pray, save me, Master," he said, "and let me go free this once. My broken limb should excite your pity. Besides, I am no Crane, I am a Stork, a bird of excellent character; and see how I love and slave for my father and mother. Look too at my feathers, they are not the least like to those of a Crane." The Farmer laughed aloud, and said: "It may be all as you say; I only know this, I have taken you with these robbers, the Cranes, and you must die in their company."
Birds of a feather flock together.
The Ass and his Driver.
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An Ass, being driven along the high road, suddenly started off, and bolted to the brink of a deep precipice. When he was in the act of throwing himself over, his owner, seizing him by the tail, endeavored to pull him back. The Ass persisting in his effort, the man let him go, and said: "Conquer; but conquer to your cost."
The perverse generally come to harm.
The Hare and the Hound
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A Hound having started a Hare from his form, after a long run, gave up the chase. A Goat-herd, seeing him stop, mocked him, saying: "The little one is the best runner of the two." The hound replied; "You do not see the difference between us; I was only running for a dinner, but he for his life."
Incentive spurs effort.
The Kites and the Swans.
The Kites of old time had, equally with the Swans, the privilege of song. But having heard the neigh of the horse, they were so enchanted with the sound, that they tried to imitate it; and, in trying to neigh, they forgot how to sing.
The desire for imaginary benefits often involves the loss of present blessings.
The Dog in the Manger.
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A Dog lay in a manger, and by his growling and snapping prevented the oxen from eating the hay which had been placed for them. "What a selfish Dog!" said one of them to his companions; "he cannot eat the hay himself, and yet refuses to allow those to eat who can."
We should not deprive others of blessings because we cannot enjoy them ourselves.
The Crow and the Serpent.
A Crow, in great want of food, saw a Serpent asleep in a sunny nook, and flying down, greedily seized him. The Serpent, turning about, bit the Crow with a mortal wound. The Crow in the agony of death exclaimed: "O unhappy me! who have found in that which I deemed a most happy windfall the source of my certain destruction."
What seem to be blessings are not always so.
The Cat and the Fox.
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As the Cat and the Fox were talking politics together, Reynard said: "Let things turn out ever so bad, he did not care, for he had a thousand tricks for them yet, before they should hurt him." "But pray," says he, "Mrs. Puss, suppose there should be an invasion, what course do you design to take?" "Nay," says the Cat, "I have but one shift for it, and if that won't do, I am undone." "I am sorry for you," replies Reynard, "with all my heart, and would gladly help you, but indeed, neighbor, as times go, it is not good to trust; we must even be every one for himself, as the saying is." These words were scarcely out of his mouth, when they were alarmed with a pack of hounds, that came upon them in full cry. The Cat, by the help of her single shift, ran up a tree, and sat securely among the top branches; from whence she beheld Reynard, who had not been able to get out of sight, overtaken with his thousand tricks, and torn in as many pieces by the dogs which had surrounded him.
A little common sense is often of more value than much cunning.
The Eagle and the Arrow.
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An Eagle sat on a lofty rock, watching the movements of a Hare, whom he sought to make his prey. An archer, who saw him from a place of concealment, took an accurate aim, and wounded him mortally. The Eagle gave one look at the arrow that had entered his heart, and saw in that single glance that its feathers had been furnished by himself. "It is a double grief to me," he exclaimed, "that I should perish by an arrow feathered from my own wings."
The misfortunes arising from a man's own misconduct are the hardest to bear.
The Dog Invited to Supper.
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A Gentleman, having prepared a great feast, invited a Friend to supper; and the Gentleman's Dog, meeting the Friend's Dog, "Come," said he, "my good fellow, and sup with us to-night." The Dog was delighted with the invitation, and as he stood by and saw the preparations for the feast, said to himself: "Capital fare indeed! this is, in truth, good luck. I shall revel in dainties, and I will take good care to lay in an ample stock to-night, for I may have nothing to eat to-morrow." As he said this to himself, he wagged his tail, and gave a sly look at his friend who had incited him. But his tail wagging to and fro caught the cook's eye, who, seeing a stranger, straightway seized him by the legs, and threw him out the window to the street below. When he reached the ground, he set off yelping down the street; upon which the neighbors' dogs ran up to him and asked him how he liked his supper. "In faith," said he, with a sorry smile, "I hardly know, for we drank so deeply, that I can't even tell you which way I got out."
Those who enter by the back stairs must not complain if they are thrown out by the window.
The Frogs Asking for a King.
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The Frogs, grieved at having no established Ruler, sent ambassadors to Jupiter entreating for a King. He, perceiving their simplicity, cast down a huge log into the lake. The Frogs, terrified at the splash occasioned by its fall, hid themselves in the depth of the pool. But no sooner did they see that the huge log continued motionless, than they swam again to the top of the water, dismissed their fears, and came so to despise it as to climb up, and to squat upon it. After some time they began to think themselves ill-treated in the appointment of so inert a Ruler, and sent a second deputation to Jupiter to pray that he would set over them another sovereign. He then gave them an Eel to govern them. When the Frogs discovered his easy good-nature, they yet a third time sent to Jupiter to beg that he would once more choose for them another King. Jupiter, displeased at their complaints, sent a Heron, who preyed upon the Frogs day by day, till there were none left to complain.
When you seek to change your condition, be sure that you can better it.
The Prophet.
A Wizard, sitting in the market-place, told the fortunes of the passers-by. A person ran up in great haste, and announced to him that the doors of his house had been broken open, and that all his goods were being stolen. He sighed heavily, and hastened away as fast as he could run. A neighbor saw him running, and said: "Oh! you follow those? you say you can foretell the fortunes of others; how is it you did not foresee your own?"
The Dog and his Master's Dinner.
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A Dog had been taught to take his master's dinner to him every day. As he smelled the good things in the basket, he was sorely tempted to taste them, but he resisted the temptation and continued day after day to carry the basket faithfully. One day all the dogs in the neighborhood followed him with longing eyes and greedy jaws, and tried to steal the dinner from the basket. At first the faithful dog tried to run away from them, but they pressed him so close that at last he stopped to argue with them. This was what the thieves desired, and they soon ridiculed him to that extent that he said: "Very well, I will divide with you," and he seized the best piece of chicken in the basket, and left the rest for the others to enjoy.
He who stops to parley with temptation, will be very likely to yield.
The Buffoon and the Countryman.
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A rich nobleman once opened the theater to the public without charge, and gave notice that he would handsomely reward any one who would produce a new amusement. A Buffoon, well known for his jokes, said that he had a kind of entertainment that had never been produced in a theater. This report, being spread about, created a great stir in the place, and the theater was crowded to see the new entertainment. The Buffoon appeared, and imitated the squeaking of a little pig so admirably with his voice, that the audience declared that he had a porker under his cloak, and demanded that it should be shaken out. When that was done, and yet nothing was found, they cheered the actor, with the loudest applause. A countryman in the crowd proclaimed that he would do the same thing on the next day. On the morrow a still larger crowd assembled in the theater. Both of the performers appeared on the stage. The Buffoon grunted and squeaked, and obtained, as on the preceding day, the applause and cheers of the spectators. Next the Countryman commenced, and pretending that he concealed a little pig beneath his clothes (which in truth he did), contrived to lay hold of and to pull his ear, when he began to squeak. The crowd, however, cried out that the Buffoon had given a far more exact imitation. On this the Rustic produced the pig, and showed them the greatness of their mistake.
Critics are not always to be depended upon.
The Boar and the Ass.
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A little scoundrel of an Ass, happening to meet with a Boar, had a mind to be arch upon him, and so, says he: "Your humble servant." The Boar, somewhat nettled at his familiarity, bristled up to him, and told him he was surprised to hear him utter so impudent an untruth, and was just going to show his resentment by giving him a rip in the flank; but wisely stifling his passion, he contented himself with saying: "Go, you sorry beast! I do not care to foul my tusks with the blood of so base a creature."
Dignity cannot afford to quarrel with its inferiors.
The Fox and the Goat.
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A Fox, having fallen into a well, could find no means of escape. A Goat, overcome with thirst, came to the well, and, seeing the Fox, inquired if the water was good. The Fox, concealing his sad plight under a merry guise, indulged in lavish praise of the water, saying it was beyond measure excellent, and encouraged him to descend. The Goat, mindful only of his thirst, thoughtlessly jumped down, when, just as he quenched his thirst, the Fox informed him of the difficulty they were both in, and suggested a scheme for their common escape. "If," said he, "you will place your fore-feet upon the wall, and bend your head, I will run up your back and escape, and will help you out." On the Goat readily assenting to this proposal, the Fox leaped upon his back, and steadying himself with the goat's horns reached in safety the mouth of the well, and immediately made off as fast as he could. The Goat upbraided him with the breach of his bargain, when he turned round and cried out: "You foolish fellow! If you had as many brains in your head as you have hairs in your beard, you would never have gone down before you had inspected the way up, nor have exposed yourself to dangers from which you had determined upon no means of escape."
Look before you leap.
The Oxen and the Butchers.
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The Oxen, once on a time, sought to destroy the Butchers, who practiced a trade destructive to their race. They assembled on a certain day to carry out their purpose, and sharpened their horns for the contest. One of them, an exceedingly old one (for many a field had he ploughed), thus spoke: "These Butchers, it is true, slaughter us, but they do so with skillful hands, and with no unnecessary pain. If we get rid of them, we shall fall into the hands of unskillful operators, and thus suffer a double death; for you may be assured that, though all the Butchers should perish, yet will men never want beef."
Do not be in a hurry to change one evil for another.
The Horse and his Rider.
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A Horse-soldier took great pains with his charger. As long as the war lasted, he looked upon him as his fellow-helper in all emergencies, and fed him carefully with hay and corn. When the war was over, he only allowed him chaff to eat, and made him carry heavy loads of wood, and subjected him to much slavish drudgery and ill-treatment. War, however, being again proclaimed, the Soldier put on his charger its military trappings, and mounted, being clad in his heavy coat of mail. The Horse fell down straightway under the weight, no longer equal to the burden, and said to his master: "You must now e'en go to the war on foot, for you have transformed me from a Horse into an Ass."
He who slights his friends when they are not needed must not expect them to serve him when he needs them.
The Dog and the Hare.
A Hound, having started a Hare on the hill-side, pursued her for some distance, at one time biting her with his teeth as if he would take her life, and at another time fawning upon her, as if in play with another dog. The Hare said to him: "I wish you would act sincerely by me, and show yourself in your true colors. If you are a friend, why do you bite me so hard? If an enemy, why do you fawn on me?"
They are no friends whom you know not whether to trust or to distrust.
The Fawn and his Mother.
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A young Fawn once said to his mother: "You are larger than a dog, and swifter, and more used to running; why, then, O Mother! are you always in such a terrible fright of the hounds?" She smiled, and said: "I know full well, my son, that all you say is true. I have the advantages you mention, but yet when I hear the bark of a single dog I feel ready to faint."
No arguments will give courage to the coward.
The Lark and her Young Ones.
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A Lark had made her nest in the young green wheat. The brood had almost grown, when the owner of the field, overlooking his crop, said: "I must send to all my neighbors to help me with my harvest." One of the young Larks heard him, and asked his mother to what place they should move for safety. "There is no occasion to move yet, my son," she replied. The owner of the field came a few days later, and said: "I will come myself to-morrow, and will get in the harvest." Then the Lark said to her brood: "It is time now to be off--he no longer trusts to his friends, but will reap the field himself."
Self-help is the best help.
The Bowman and the Lion.
[Illustration]
A very skillful Bowman went to the mountains in search of game. All the beasts of the forest fled at his approach. The Lion alone challenged him to combat. The Bowman immediately let fly an arrow; and said to the Lion: "I send thee my messenger, that from him thou mayest learn what I myself shall be when I assail thee." The Lion, thus wounded, rushed, away in great fear, and on a Fox exhorting him to be of good courage, and not to run away at the first attack, he replied: "You counsel me in vain, for if he sends so fearful a messenger, how shall I abide the attack of the man himself?"
A man who can strike from a distance is no pleasant neighbor.
The Boy and the Filberts.
A Boy put his hand into a pitcher full of filberts. He grasped as many as he could possibly hold, but when he endeavored to pull out his hand, he was prevented from doing so by the neck of the pitcher, which was much smaller than his closed hand. Unwilling to lose his filberts, and yet unable to withdraw his hand, he burst into tears, and bitterly lamented his disappointment. A bystander said to him: "Be satisfied with half the quantity, and you will readily draw out your hand."
Do not attempt too much at once.
The Woman and her Hen.
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A Woman possessed a Hen that gave her an egg every day. She often thought with herself how she might obtain two eggs daily instead of one, and at last, to gain her purpose, determined to give the Hen a double allowance of barley. From that day the Hen became fat and sleek, and never once laid another egg.
Covetousness overreacheth itself.
The Lamb and the Wolf.
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A Wolf pursued a Lamb, which fled for refuge to a certain temple. The Wolf called out to him and said: "The priest will slay you in sacrifice, if he should catch you;" on which the Lamb replied: "It would be better for me to be sacrificed in the temple, than to be eaten by you."
It is safer to be among friends than enemies.
The Bear and the Gardener.
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A Gardener, who lived alone, became discontented, and set out, one day, to seek a friend who would be a suitable companion. He had not gone far when he met a Bear, whom he invited to come and live with him. The Bear was a very silly one, who was also discontented with living alone, so he went home with the Gardener very willingly. The Gardener provided all the food, and the only service he required of the Bear was to keep the flies off his face while he slept in the shade. One day, a fly insisted upon lighting on the Gardener's face, although he was brushed off again and again. The silly Bear finally became so enraged that he threw a heavy stone upon it. He killed the fly, but, alas! he also killed his friend.
Better have no friend at all than a foolish one.
The Heifer and the Ox.
A Heifer saw an Ox hard at work harnessed to a plough, and tormented him with reflections on his unhappy fate in being compelled to labor. Shortly afterward, at the harvest home, the owner released the Ox from his yoke, but bound the Heifer with cords, and led her away to the altar to be slain in honor of the festival. The Ox saw what was being done, and said to the Heifer: "For this you were allowed to live in idleness, because you were presently to be sacrificed."
The lives of the idle can best be spared.
The Eagle and the Fox.
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An Eagle and a Fox formed an intimate friendship, and decided to live near each other. The Eagle built her nest in a tall tree, while the Fox crept into the underwood and there produced her young. Not long after, when the Fox was ranging for food, the Eagle, being in want of provision for her young ones, swooped down and seized upon one of the little cubs, and feasted herself and brood. The Fox on her return, discovering what had happened, was less grieved for the death of her young than for her inability to avenge them. A just retribution, however, quickly fell upon the Eagle. While hovering near an altar, on which some villagers were sacrificing a goat, she suddenly seized a piece of flesh, and carried with it to her nest a burning cinder. A strong breeze soon fanned the spark into a flame, and the eaglets, as yet unfledged and helpless, were roasted in their nest and dropped down dead at the bottom of the tree. The Fox gobbled them up in the sight of the Eagle.
The tyrant is never safe from those whom he oppresses.
The Hawk and the Nightingale.
A Nightingale, sitting aloft upon an oak, was seen by a Hawk, who made a swoop down, and seized him. The Nightingale earnestly besought the Hawk to let him go, saying that he was not big enough to satisfy the hunger of a Hawk, who ought to pursue the larger birds. The Hawk said: "I should indeed have lost my senses if I should let go food ready to my hand, for the sake of pursuing birds which are not yet even within sight."
A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.
The Hen and the Swallow.
A Hen finding the eggs of a viper, and carefully keeping them warm, nourished them into life. A Swallow observing what she had done, said: "You silly creature! Why have you hatched these vipers, which, when they shall have grown, will surely inflict injury on all of us, beginning with yourself?"
If we nourish evil, it will sooner or later turn upon us.
The Herdsman and the Lost Bull.
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A Herdsman, tending kine in a forest, lost a Bull-calf from the fold. After a long and fruitless search, he made a vow that, if he could only discover the thief who had stolen the Calf he would offer a lamb in sacrifice to the Guardian Deities of the forest. Not long afterwards, as he ascended a small hillock, he saw at its foot a Lion feeding on the Calf. Terrified at the sight, he lifted his eyes and his hands to heaven, and said: "Just now I vowed to offer a lamb to the Guardian Deities of the forest if I could only find out who had robbed me; but now that I have discovered the thief, I would willingly add a full-grown Bull to the Calf I have lost, and give them both to the guardians of the forest, if I may only secure my own escape from this terrible Lion in safety."
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That which we are anxious to find, we are sometimes even more anxious to escape from, when we have succeeded in finding it.
The Shepherd's Boy and Wolf.
A Shepherd-boy, who watched a flock of sheep near a village, brought out the villagers three or four times by crying out, "Wolf! Wolf!" and when his neighbors came to help him, laughed at them for their pains. The Wolf, however, did truly come at last. The Shepherd-boy, now really alarmed, shouted in an agony of terror: "Pray, do come and help me; the Wolf is killing the sheep;" but no one paid any heed to his cries.
There is no believing a liar, even when he speaks the truth.
The Hawk, the Kite, and the Pigeons.
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The Pigeons, terrified by the appearance of a Kite, called upon the Hawk to defend them. He at once consented. When they had admitted him into the cote, they found that he made more havoc and slew a larger number of them in a single day, than the Kite could possibly pounce upon in a whole year.
Avoid a remedy that is worse than the disease.
The Farmer and the Cranes.
Some Cranes made their feeding grounds on some plough-lands newly sown with wheat. For a long time the Farmer, brandishing an empty sling, chased them away by the terror he inspired; but when the birds found that the sling was only swung in the air, they ceased to take any notice of it, and would not move. The farmer, on seeing this, charged his sling with stones, and killed a great number. They at once forsook his plough-lands, and cried to each other: "It is time for us to be off, for this man is no longer content to scare us, but begins to show us in earnest what he can do."
If words suffice not, blows must follow.
The Cat and the Mice.
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A certain house was overrun with Mice. A Cat, discovering this, made her way into it, and began to catch and eat them one by one. The Mice, being continually devoured, kept themselves close in their holes. The Cat, no longer able to get at them, perceived that she must tempt them forth by some device. For this purpose she jumped upon a peg, and, suspending herself from it, pretended to be dead. When the Mice came near she pounced among them and killed a great number. Pleased with the success of the trick, she tried another. She whitened herself with flour, and lay still on the heap of bags, as though she was one of them. The young Mice crept dangerously near her, but an old one peeping stealthily out said: "Ah, my good madam, though you should turn into a real flour-bag, I will not come too near you."
Avoid even appearances of danger.
The Father and his Sons.
A Father had a family of sons who were perpetually quarreling among themselves. When he failed to heal their disputes by his exhortations, he one day told them to bring him a bundle of sticks. When they had done so, he placed the bundle into the hands of each of them in succession, and ordered them to break it in pieces. They each tried with all their strength, and were not able to do it. He next unclosed the faggot, and took the sticks, separately, one by one, and again put them into their hands, on which they broke them easily. He then addressed them in these words: "My sons, if you are of one mind, and unite to assist each other, you will be as this faggot, uninjured by all attempts of your enemies; but if you are divided among yourselves, you will be broken as easily as these sticks."
Disunited families are easily injured by others.
The Owl and the Grasshopper.
An Owl who was sitting in a hollow tree, dozing away a summer's afternoon, was very much disturbed by a rogue of a Grasshopper singing in the grass beneath. So far from keeping quiet, or moving away at the request of the Owl, the Grasshopper sang all the more, and called her an old blinker, that only came out at night when all honest people had gone to bed. The Owl waited in silence for a time, and then artfully addressed the Grasshopper as follows: "Well, my dear, if one cannot be allowed to sleep, it is something to be kept awake by such a pleasant voice. And now I think of it, I have a bottle of delicious nectar. If you will come up, you shall have a drop." The silly Grasshopper, came hopping up to the Owl, who at once caught and killed him, and finished her nap in comfort.
Flattery is not a proof of admiration.
The Fox and the Grapes.
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A famished Fox saw some clusters of ripe black grapes hanging from a trellised vine. She resorted to all her tricks to get at them, but wearied herself in vain, for she could not reach them. At last she turned away, beguiling herself of her disappointment, and saying: "The Grapes are sour, and not ripe as I thought."
Revile not things beyond your reach.
The Ass carrying the Image.
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An Ass once carried through the streets of the city a famous wooden Image, to be placed in one of its temples. The crowd as he passed along made lowly prostration before the Image. The Ass, thinking that they bowed their heads in token of respect for him, bristled up with pride and gave himself airs, and refused to move another step. The driver, seeing him thus stop, laid his whip lustily about his shoulders and said: "O you perverse dull-head! it is not yet come to this, that men pay worship to an Ass."
They are not wise who take to themselves the credit due to others.
The Ass and the Lap-Dog.
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A man had an Ass and a Maltese Lap-dog, a very great beauty. The Ass was left in a stable, and had plenty of oats and hay to eat, just as any other Ass would. The Lap-dog was a great favorite with his master, and he frisked and jumped about him in a manner pleasant to see. The Ass had much work to do, in grinding the corn-mill, and in carrying wood from the forest or burdens from the farm. He often lamented his own hard fate, and contrasted it with the luxury and idleness of the Lap-dog, till at last one day he broke his halter, and galloped into his master's house, kicking up his heels without measure, and frisking and fawning as well as he could. He next tried to jump about his master as he had seen the Lap-dog do, but he broke the table and smashed all the dishes upon it to atoms. He then attempted to lick his master, and jumped upon his back. The servants hearing the strange hubbub, and perceiving the danger of their master, quickly relieved him, and drove out the Ass to his stable, with kicks, and clubs, and cuffs. The Ass, beaten nearly to death, thus lamented: "I have brought it all on myself! Why could I not have been contented to labor with my companions, and not try to live by idleness?"
The Tortoise and the Eagle.
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A Tortoise, lazily basking in the sun, complained to the sea-birds of her hard fate, that no one would teach her to fly. An Eagle, hovering near, heard her lamentation, and demanded what reward she would give him, if he would take her aloft, and float her in the air. "I will give you," she said, "all the riches of the Red Sea." "I will teach you to fly then," said the Eagle; and taking her up in his talons, he carried her almost to the clouds,--when suddenly letting her go, she fell on a lofty mountain, and dashed her shell to pieces. The Tortoise exclaimed in the moment of death: "I have deserved my present fate; for what had I to do with wings and clouds, who can with difficulty move about on the earth?"
If men had all they wished, they would be often ruined.
The Porcupine and the Snakes.
A Porcupine, wanting to shelter himself, desired a nest of Snakes to give him admittance into their cave. They were prevailed upon, and let him in accordingly; but were so annoyed with his sharp prickly quills that they soon repented of their easy compliance, and entreated the Porcupine to withdraw, and leave them their hole to themselves. "No," says he, "let them quit the place that don't like it; for my part, I am well enough satisfied as I am."
Hospitality is a virtue, but should be wisely exercised; we may by thoughtlessness entertain foes instead of friends.
The Fox who had Lost his Tail.
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A Fox, caught in a trap, escaped with the loss of his "brush." Henceforth, feeling his life a burden from the shame and ridicule to which he was exposed, he schemed to bring all the other Foxes into a like condition with himself. He publicly advised them to cut off their tails, saying "that they would not only look much better without them, but that they would get rid of the weight of the brush." One of them said: "If you had not yourself lost your tail, my friend, you would not thus counsel us."
Advice prompted by selfishness should not be heeded.
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The Old Lion.
A Lion, worn out with years, lay on the ground at the point of death. A Boar rushed upon him, and avenged with a stroke of his tusks a long remembered injury. Shortly afterwards the Bull with his horns gored him as if he were an enemy. When the Ass saw that the huge beast could be assailed with impunity, he let drive at his forehead with his heels.
The Ass and the Wolf.
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An Ass, feeding in a meadow, saw a Wolf approaching to seize him, and immediately pretended to be lame. The Wolf, coming up, inquired the cause of his lameness. The Ass said that he had a thorn in his foot, and requested the Wolf to pull it out. The Wolf consenting, the Ass with his heels kicked his teeth into his mouth, and galloped away. The Wolf said: "I am rightly served, for why did I attempt the art of healing, when my father only taught me the trade of a butcher?"
Every one to his trade.
The Horse and the Groom.
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A Groom used to spend whole days in currycombing and rubbing down his Horse, but at the same time stole his oats, and sold them for his own profit. "Alas!" said the Horse, "if you really wish me to be in good condition, you should groom me less, and feed me more."
If you wish to do a service, do it right.
The Ass and his Shadow.
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A traveler hired an Ass to convey him to a distant place. The day being intensely hot, and the sun shining in its strength, the traveler stopped to rest, and sought shelter from the heat under the Shadow of the Ass. As this afforded only protection for one, and as the traveler and the owner of the Ass both claimed it, a violent dispute arose between them as to which of them had the right to it. The owner maintained that he had let the Ass only, and not his Shadow. The traveler asserted that he had, with the hire of the Ass, hired his Shadow also. The quarrel proceeded from words to blows, and while the men fought the Ass galloped off.
In quarreling about the shadow we often lose the substance.
The Horse and the Loaded Ass.
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An idle Horse, and an Ass laboring under a heavy burden, were traveling the road together. The Ass, ready to faint under his heavy load, entreated the Horse to assist him, and lighten his burden, by taking some of it upon his back. The Horse was ill-natured and refused to do it; upon which the poor Ass tumbled down in the midst of the highway, and expired. The countryman then took the whole burden, and laid it upon the Horse, together with the skin of the dead Ass.
Laziness often prepares a burden for its own back.
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The Mules and the Robbers.
Two Mules laden with packs were trudging along. One carried panniers filled with money, the other sacks of grain. The Mule carrying the treasure walked with head erect, and tossed up and down the bells fastened to his neck. His companion followed with quiet and easy step. All on a sudden Robbers rushed from their hiding-places upon them, and in the scuffle with their owners wounded the Mule carrying the treasure, which they greedily seized upon, while they took no notice of the grain. The Mule which had been wounded bewailed his misfortunes. The other replied: "I am glad that I was thought so little of, for I have lost nothing, nor am I hurt with any wound."
The conspicuous run the greatest risk.
The Lion and the Three Bulls.
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Three Bulls for a long time pastured together. A Lion lay in ambush in the hope of making them his prey, but was afraid to attack them whilst they kept together. Having at last by guileful speeches succeeded in separating them, he attacked them without fear, as they fed alone, and feasted on them one by one at his own leisure.
In union is strength.
The Dog and the Shadow.
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A Dog, crossing a bridge over a stream with a piece of flesh in his mouth, saw his own shadow in the water, and took it for another Dog, with a piece of meat double his own in size. He therefore let go his own, and fiercely attacked the other Dog, to get his larger piece from him. He thus lost both--that which he grasped at in the water, because it was a shadow and his own, because the stream swept it away.
It is not wise to be too greedy.
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The Ants and the Grasshopper.
The Ants were employing a fine winter's day in drying grain collected in the summer time. A Grasshopper, perishing with famine, passed by and earnestly begged for a little food. The Ants inquired of him: "Why did you not treasure up food during the summer?" He replied: "I had not leisure; I passed the days in singing." They then said: "If you were foolish enough to sing all the summer, you must dance supperless to bed in the winter."
Idleness brings want.
The Thirsty Pigeon.
A Pigeon, oppressed by excessive thirst, saw a goblet of water painted on a sign-board. Not supposing it to be only a picture, she flew toward it with a loud whirr, and unwittingly dashed against the sign-board and jarred herself terribly. Having broken her wings by the blow, she fell to the ground, and was caught by one of the bystanders.
Zeal should not outrun discretion.
The Flies and the Honey.
A Jar of Honey having been upset in a housekeeper's room, a number of flies were attracted by its sweetness, and placing their feet in it, ate it greedily. Their feet, however, became so smeared with the honey that they could not use their wings, nor release themselves, and were suffocated. Just as they were expiring, they exclaimed, "O foolish creatures that we are! For the sake of a little pleasure we have destroyed ourselves."
The Great and the Little Fishes.
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A Fisherman was drawing up a net which he had cast into the sea, full of all sorts of fish. The Little Fish escaped through the meshes of the net, and got back into the deep, but the Great Fish were all caught and hauled into the ship.
Our insignificance is often the cause of our safety.
The Wolves and the Sheep.
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"Why should there always be this implacable warfare between us?" said the Wolves to the Sheep. "Those evil-disposed Dogs have much to answer for. They always bark whenever we approach you, and attack us before we have done any harm. If you would only dismiss them from your heels, there might soon be treaties of peace between us." The sheep, poor silly creatures! were easily beguiled, and dismissed the Dogs. The Wolves destroyed the unguarded flock at their pleasure.
Change not friends for foes.
The Fox and the Stork.
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The Fox invited the Stork to dinner, and provided nothing but a soup, in a wide, shallow dish. This he could lap up with ease; but the Stork, who could but just dip in the point of his bill, was not a bit better. A few days after, he returned the compliment, and invited the Fox; but suffered nothing to be brought to the table but some minced meat in a glass jar, the neck of which was so deep and so narrow, that, though the Stork with his long bill could eat very well, all that the Fox could do was to lick the brims. Reynard was heartily vexed, but owned that he had been used as he deserved.
Those who practice cunning must expect to suffer by it.
The Bat and the Weasels.
A Bat, falling upon the ground, was caught by a Weasel, of whom he earnestly besought his life. The Weasel refused, saying that he was by nature the enemy of all birds. The Bat assured him that he was not a bird, but a mouse, and thus saved his life. Shortly afterward the Bat again fell on the ground, and was caught by another Weasel, whom he likewise entreated not to eat him. The Weasel said that he had a special hostility to mice. The Bat assured him that he was not a mouse, but a bat; and thus a second time escaped.
The Hare and the Tortoise.
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A Hare one day ridiculed the short feet and slow pace of the Tortoise. The latter, laughing, said: "Though you be swift as the wind, I will beat you in a race." The Hare, deeming her assertion to be simply impossible, assented to the proposal; and they agreed that the Fox should choose the course, and fix the goal. On the day appointed for the race they started together. The Tortoise never for a moment stopped, but went on with a slow but steady pace straight to the end of the course. The Hare, trusting to his native swiftness, cared little about the race, and lying down by the wayside, fell fast asleep. At last waking up, and moving as fast as he could, he saw the Tortoise had reached the goal, and was comfortably dozing after her fatigue.
Perseverance is surer than swiftness.
Jupiter and the Monkey.
Jupiter issued a proclamation to all the beasts of the forest, and promised a royal reward to the one whose offspring should be deemed the handsomest. The Monkey came with the rest, and presented, with all a mother's tenderness, a flat-nosed, hairless, ill-featured young Monkey as a candidate for the promised reward. A general laugh saluted her on the presentation of her son. She resolutely said: "I know not whether Jupiter will allot the prize to my son; but this I do know, that he is the dearest, handsomest, and most beautiful of all who are here."
A mother's love blinds her to many imperfections.
The Lion in Love.
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A Lion demanded the daughter of a woodcutter in marriage. The Father, unwilling to grant and yet afraid to refuse his request, hit upon this expedient. He expressed his willingness to accept him as the suitor of his daughter on one condition; that he should allow him to extract his teeth, and cut off his claws. The Lion cheerfully assented to the proposal: when, however, he next repeated his request, the woodman set upon him with his club.
The Miser.
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A Miser had a lump of gold which he buried in the ground, coming to look at the spot every day. One day he found that it was stolen, and he began to tear his hair and loudly lament. A neighbor, seeing him, said: "Pray do not grieve so; bury a stone in the hole, and fancy it is the gold. It will serve you just as well, for when the gold was there you made no use of it."
The Wolf and the Goat.
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A Wolf saw a Goat feeding at the summit of a steep precipice, where he had not a chance of reaching her. He called to her, and earnestly besought her to come lower down, lest she should by some mishap get a fall; and he added that the meadows lay where he was standing, and that the herbage was most tender. She replied: "No, my friend, it is not of me you are thinking, but of yourself."
Invitations prompted by selfishness are not to be accepted.
The Bald Knight.
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A Bald Knight, who wore a wig, went out to hunt. A sudden puff of wind blew off his hat and wig, at which a loud laugh rang forth from his companions. He joined in the joke by saying: "What marvel that hairs which are not mine should fly from me, when my own have forsaken even the man with whom they were born."
Those who cannot take care of their own, should not be entrusted with the care of another's property.
The Fox and the Wood-Cutter.
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A Fox, running before the hounds, came across a Wood-cutter felling an oak, and besought him to show him a safe hiding-place. The Wood-cutter advised him to take shelter in his own hut. The Fox crept in, and hid himself in a corner. The Huntsman came up, with his hounds, in a few minutes, and inquired of the Wood-cutter if he had seen the Fox. He declared that he had not seen him, and yet pointed, all the time he was speaking, to the hut where the Fox lay hid. The Huntsman took no notice of the signs, but, believing his word, hastened forward in the chase. As soon as they were well away, the Fox departed without taking any notice of the Wood-cutter; whereon he called to him, and reproached him, saying: "You ungrateful fellow, you owe your life to me, and yet you leave me without a word of thanks." The Fox replied: "Indeed, I should have thanked you most fervently, if your deeds had been as good as your words."
The Kid and the Wolf.
A Kid, mounted on a high rock, bestowed all manner of abuse upon a Wolf on the ground below. The Wolf, looking up, replied: "Do not think, vain creature, that you annoy me. I regard this ill language as coming not from you, but from the place on which you stand."
The Lion, the Bear, and the Fox.
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A Lion and a Bear seized upon a kid at the same moment, and fought fiercely for its possession. When they had fearfully lacerated each other, and were faint from the long combat, they lay down exhausted with fatigue. A Fox who had gone round them at a distance several times, saw them both stretched on the ground, and the Kid lying untouched in the middle, ran in between them, and seizing the Kid, scampered off as fast as he could. The Lion and the Bear saw him, but not being able to get up, said: "Woe betide us, that we should have fought and belabored ourselves only to serve the turn of a Fox!"
It sometimes happens that one man has all the toil, and another all the profit.
The Stag in the Ox-Stall.
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A Stag, hardly pressed by the hounds, and blind through fear to the danger he was running into, took shelter in a farm-yard, and hid himself in a shed among the oxen. An Ox gave him this kindly warning: "O unhappy creature! why should you thus, of your own accord, incur destruction, and trust yourself in the house of your enemy?" The Stag replied: "Do you only suffer me, friend, to stay where I am, and I will undertake to find some favorable opportunity of effecting my escape." At the approach of the evening the herdsman came to feed his cattle, but did not see the Stag. The Stag, congratulating himself on his safety, began to express his sincere thanks to the Oxen who had kindly afforded him help in the hour of need. One of them again answered him: "We indeed wish you well, but the danger is not over. There is one other yet to pass through the shed, who has as it were a hundred eyes, and, until he has come and gone, your life is still in peril." At that moment the master himself entered, and having had to complain that his oxen had not been properly fed, he went up to their racks, and cried out: "Why is there such a scarcity of fodder? There is not half enough straw for them to lie on. Those lazy fellows have not even swept the cobwebs away." While he thus examined everything, he spied the antlers of the Stag peeping out of the straw. Summoning his laborers, he ordered that the Stag should be killed.
What is safety for one is not always safety for another.
The Eagle and the Jackdaw.
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An Eagle, flying down from his eyrie on a lofty rock, seized upon a lamb, and carried him aloft in his talons. A Jackdaw who witnessed the capture of the lamb, was stirred with envy, and determined to emulate the strength and flight of the Eagle. He flew round with a great whirr of his wings, and settled upon a large sheep, with the intention of carrying it off, but his claws becoming entangled in its fleece, he was unable to release himself, although he fluttered with his feathers as much as he could. The shepherd, seeing what had happened, ran up and caught him. He at once clipped his wings, and, taking him home at night, gave him to his children.
We should not permit our ambition to lead us beyond the limits of our power.
The Three Tradesmen.
A great city was besieged, and its inhabitants were called together to consider the best means of protecting it from the enemy. A Bricklayer present earnestly recommended bricks, as affording the best materials for an effectual resistance. A Carpenter, with equal energy, proposed timber, as providing a preferable method of defense. Upon which a Currier stood up, and said: "Sirs, I differ from you altogether; there is no material for resistance equal to a covering of hides; and nothing so good as leather."
Every man for his trade.
The Dancing Monkeys.
A Prince had some Monkeys trained to dance. Being naturally great mimics of men's actions, they showed themselves most apt pupils; and when arrayed in their rich clothes and masks, they danced as well as any of the courtiers. The spectacle was often repeated with great applause, till on one occasion a courtier, bent on mischief, took from his pocket a handful of nuts, and threw them upon the stage. The Monkeys, at the sight of the nuts, forgot their dancing, and became (as indeed they were) Monkeys instead of actors, and pulling off their masks and tearing their robes, they fought with one another for the nuts. The dancing spectacle thus came to an end, amidst the laughter and ridicule of the audience.
They who assume a character will betray themselves by their actions.
The Ass and the Grasshopper.
An Ass, having heard some Grasshoppers chirping, was highly enchanted; and desiring to possess the same charms of melody, demanded what sort of food they lived on, to give them such beautiful voices. They replied: "The dew." The Ass resolved that he would live only upon dew, and in a short time died of hunger.
Where one may live, another may starve.
The Ass in the Lion's Skin.
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An Ass, having put on the Lion's skin, roamed about in the forest, and amused himself by frightening all the foolish animals he met with in his wanderings. At last, meeting a Fox, he tried to frighten him also, but the Fox no sooner heard the sound of his voice, than he exclaimed: "I might possibly have been frightened myself, if I had not heard your bray."
No disguise will hide one's true character.
The Boy Bathing.
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A Boy bathing in a river was in danger of being drowned. He called out to a traveler passing by for help. The traveler, instead of holding out a helping hand, stood up unconcernedly, and scolded the boy for his imprudence. "Oh, sir!" cried the youth, "pray help me now, and scold me afterwards."
Counsel, without help, is useless.
The Cock and the Fox.
The Fox, passing early one summer's morning near a farm-yard, was caught in a springe, which the farmer had planted there for that end. The Cock, at a distance, saw what happened, and, hardly yet daring to trust himself too near so dangerous a foe, approached him cautiously, and peeped at him. Reynard addressed himself to him, with all the designing artifice imaginable. "Dear cousin," says he, "you see what an unfortunate accident has befallen me here, and all upon your account: for, as I was creeping through yonder hedge, in my way homeward, I heard you crow, and was resolved to ask you how you did before I went any farther; but I met with this disaster; and therefore now I must ask you for a knife to cut this string; or, at least, to conceal my misfortune till I have gnawed it asunder." The Cock, seeing how the case stood, made no reply, but posted away as fast as he could, and told the farmer, who came and killed the Fox.
To aid the vicious is to become a partner in their guilt.
The Viper and the File.
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A Viper, entering the workshop of a smith, sought from the tools the means of satisfying his hunger. He more particularly addressed himself to a File, and asked of him the favor of a meal. The File replied: "You must indeed be a simple-minded fellow if you expect to get anything from me, who am accustomed to take from every one, and never to give anything in return."
The covetous are poor givers.
The Oxen and the Axle-Trees.
A heavy wagon was being dragged along a country lane by a team of oxen. The axle-trees groaned and creaked terribly, when the oxen, turning round, thus addressed the wheels: "Hallo there! why do you make so much noise? We bear all the labor, and we, not you, ought to cry out."
Those who suffer most cry out the least.
The Bear and the Bee-Hives.
A Bear that had found his way into a garden where Bees were kept began to turn over the hives and devour the honey. The Bees settled in swarms about his head, and stung his eyes and nose so much, that, maddened with pain, he tore the skin from his head with his own claws.
The Thrush and the Swallow.
A young Thrush, who lived in an orchard once became acquainted with a Swallow. A friendship sprang up between them; and the Swallow, after skimming the orchard and the neighboring meadow, would every now and then come and visit the Thrush. The Thrush, hopping from branch to branch, would welcome him with his most cheerful note. "O mother!" said he to his parent one day, "never had creature such a friend as I have in this same Swallow."--"Nor ever any mother," replied the parent-bird, "such a silly son as I have in this same Thrush. Long before the approach of winter, your friend will have left you; and while you sit shivering on a leafless bough he will be sporting under sunny skies hundreds of miles away."
The Sensible Ass.
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An Old Fellow, in time of war, was allowing his Ass to feed in a green meadow, when he was alarmed by a sudden advance of the enemy. He tried every means in his power to urge the Ass to fly, but in vain. "The enemy are upon us!" said he. "And what will the enemy do?" asked the Ass. "Will they put two pairs of panniers on my back, instead of one?"--"No," answered the Man; "there is no fear of that."--"Why, then," replied the Ass, "I'll not stir an inch. I am born to be a slave; and my greatest enemy is he who gives me most to carry."
The Lion and the Ass.
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A Lion and an Ass made an agreement to go out hunting together. By-and-by they came to a cave, where wild goats abode. The Lion took up his station at the mouth of the cave, and the Ass, going within, kicked and brayed, and made a mighty fuss to frighten them out. When the Lion had caught them, the Ass came out and asked him if he had not made a noble fight. "Yes, indeed," said the Lion; "and I assure you, you would have frightened me too, if I had not known you to be an Ass."
The Fox and the Ape.
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Upon the decease of the Lion, the beasts of the forest assembled to choose another king. The Ape played so many grimaces, gambols, and antic tricks, that he was elected by a large majority; and the crown was placed upon his head. The Fox, envious of this distinction, seeing, soon after, a trap baited with a piece of meat, approached the new king, and said with mock humility: "May it please your majesty, I have found on your domain a treasure, to which, if you will deign to accompany me, I will conduct you." The Ape thereupon set off with the Fox, and, on arriving at the spot, laid his paw upon the meat. Snap! went the trap, and caught him by the fingers. Mad with the shame and the pain, he reproached the Fox for a false thief and a traitor. Reynard laughed heartily, and said, with a sneer: "You a king, and not understand a trap!"
The Lion and the Wolf.
A Wolf, roaming by the mountain's side, saw his own shadow, as the sun was setting, become greatly extended and magnified, and he said to himself: "Why should I, being of such an immense size, and extending nearly an acre in length, be afraid of the Lion? Ought I not to be acknowledged as King of all the collected beasts?" While he was indulging in these proud thoughts, a Lion fell upon him, and killed him. He exclaimed with a too-late repentance, "Wretched me! this over-estimation of myself is the cause of my destruction."
It is not wise, to hold too exalted an opinion of one's self.
The Miller, his Son and their Ass.
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A miller and his Son were driving their Ass to a fair. On the way, they met a troop of girls. "Look there!" cried one of them, "did you ever see such fools, to be trudging along on foot when they might be riding?" The old Man, hearing this, quietly bade his Son get on the Ass, and walked along merrily by his side.
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Presently they came to a group of old men in earnest debate. "There!" said one of them, "it proves what I was saying. What respect is shown to old age in these days? Do you see that idle young rogue riding, while his old father has to walk?--Get down, you scapegrace! and let the old Man rest his weary limbs." Upon this the Father made his Son dismount, and got up himself. In this manner they had not proceeded far when they met a company of women and children. "Why, you lazy old fellow!" cried several tongues at once, "how can you ride upon the beast, while that poor little lad there can hardly keep pace by the side of you." The good-natured Miller immediately took up his Son behind him. They had now almost reached the town. "Pray, honest friend," said a townsman, "is that Ass your own?" "Yes," says the old Man. "Oh! One would not have thought so by the way you load him. Why, you two fellows are better able to carry the poor beast than he you!" "Anything to please you," said the old Man. So, alighting with his Son, they tied the Ass's legs together, and by the help of a pole endeavored to carry him on their shoulders over a bridge. The people ran out in crowds to laugh at the sight; till the Ass, not liking the noise nor his situation, kicked asunder the cords and, tumbling off the pole, fell into the river. Upon this the old Man made the best of his way home with his Son--convinced that, by endeavoring to please every-body, he had succeeded in pleasing nobody, and lost his Ass into the bargain.
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The Travelers and the Plane-Tree.
Two Travelers, worn out by the heat of the summer's sun, laid themselves down at noon under the wide-spreading branches of a Plane-tree. As they rested under its shade, one of the Travelers said to the other: "What a singularly useless tree is the Plane. It bears no fruit, and is not of the least service to man." The Plane-tree interrupting him said: "You ungrateful fellows! Do you, while receiving benefits from me, and resting under my shade, dare to describe me as useless, and unprofitable?"
Some men despise their best blessings because they come without cost.
The Tortoise and the Two Ducks.
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A Tortoise, becoming tired of her humble home, resolved to visit foreign lands, but she did not know which way to go. She repaired to two Ducks to show her the road, and they told her that the best way to travel was through the air. On her imploring their help, they made her grasp a stick with her mouth, and so they bore her aloft. As they flew along, the gaping people beneath shouted at sight of the spectacle. The vain Tortoise mistook their shouts for applause. "I am surely a queen," said she. But, alas! as she opened her mouth to speak she lost her hold of the stick, and, falling to the ground, was dashed to pieces.
Those who are not able to roam should stay at home.
The Countryman and the Snake.
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A Villager found a Snake under a hedge, almost dead with cold. He could not help having a compassion for the poor creature, so he brought it home, and laid it upon the hearth near the fire; but it had not lain there long, before (being revived with the heat) it began to erect itself, and fly at his wife and children. The Countryman, hearing an outcry, and perceiving what the matter was, caught up a mattock, and soon dispatched him, upbraiding him at the same time in these words: "Is this, vile wretch, the reward you make to him that saved your life?"
Kindness to the ungrateful and the vicious is thrown away.
The Madman who Sold Wisdom.
A Madman once set himself up in the market place, and with loud cries announced that he would sell Wisdom. The people at once crowded about him, and some gave him gold for his wares, but they each got only a blow on the ear and a bunch of thread, and were well laughed at by their companions. One of them, however, took it more seriously than the others, and asked a wise sage what it meant. "It means," said the sage, "that if one would not be hurt by a Madman, he must put a bunch of thread over his ears." So the Madman was really selling Wisdom.
The Leopard and the Fox.
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A Leopard, being no longer able, by reason of old age, to pursue his prey, feigned illness, and gave out that he would confer great favors upon any animal that would cure him. A cunning Fox heard of the proclamation, and lost no time in visiting the Leopard, first making himself look as much like a physician as he could. On seeing him, the Leopard declared that such a distinguished looking animal could not fail to cure him. This so flattered the Fox that he came near, and at once fell a victim to his vanity, being unable to flee because of the disguise, which fettered his limbs.
Flattery is a dangerous weapon in the hands of an enemy.
The Hare afraid of his Ears.
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The Lion, being badly hurt by the horns of a goat, swore in a great rage that every animal with horns should be banished from his kingdom. A silly Hare, seeing the shadow of his ears, was in great fear lest they should be taken for horns, and scampered away.
The Peacock and the Crane.
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A Peacock, spreading its gorgeous tail, mocked a Crane that passed by, ridiculing the ashen hue of its plumage, and saying: "I am robed like a king, in gold and purple, and all the colors of the rainbow; while you have not a bit of color on your wings." "True," replied the Crane, "but I soar to the heights of heaven, and lift up my voice to the stars, while you walk below, like a cock, among the birds of the dunghill."
Fine feathers don't make fine birds.
The Mouse and the Weasel.
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A little starveling Mouse had made his way with some difficulty into a basket of corn, where, finding the entertainment so good, he stuffed and crammed himself to such an extent, that when he would have got out again he found the hole was too small to allow his puffed-up body to pass. As he sat at the hole groaning over his fate, a Weasel, who was brought to the spot by his cries, thus addressed him: "Stop there, my friend, and fast till you are thin; for you will never come out till you reduce yourself to the same condition as when you entered."
The Fox and the Tiger.
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A skillful archer, coming into the woods, directed his arrows so successfully that he slew many wild beasts, and pursued several others. This put the whole savage kind into a fearful consternation, and made them fly to the most retired thickets for refuge. At last, the Tiger resumed courage, and, bidding them not be afraid, said that he alone would engage the enemy; telling them they might depend upon his valor and strength to revenge their wrongs. In the midst of these threats, while he was lashing himself with his tail, and tearing up the ground for anger, an arrow pierced his ribs, and hung by its barbed point in his side. He set up an hideous and loud roar, occasioned by the anguish which he felt, and endeavored to draw out the painful dart with his teeth; when the Fox, approaching him, inquired with an air of surprise who it was that could have strength and courage enough to wound so mighty and valorous a beast! "Ah!" says the Tiger, "I was mistaken in my reckoning: it was that invincible man yonder."
There is always some vulnerable point in the strongest armor.
The Fox and the Turkeys.
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A Fox spied some turkeys roosting in a tree. He managed to attract their attention and then ran about the tree, pretended to climb, walked on his hind legs, and did all sorts of tricks. Filled with fear, the Turkeys watched every one of his movements until they became dizzy, and, one by one, fell from their safe perch.
By too much attention to danger, we may fall victims to it.
The Eagle, the Cat, and the Wild Sow.
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An Eagle had made her nest at the top of a lofty oak. A Cat, having found a convenient hole, lived with her kittens in the middle of the trunk; and a Wild Sow with her young had taken shelter in a hollow at its foot. The Cat resolved to destroy by her arts this chance-made colony. She climbed to the nest of the Eagle, and said: "Destruction is preparing for you, and for me too. The Wild Sow, whom you may see daily digging up the earth, wishes to uproot the oak, that she may, on its fall, seize our families as food." Then she crept down to the cave of the Sow and said: "Your children are in great danger; for as soon as you shall go out with your litter to find food, the Eagle is prepared to pounce upon one of your little pigs." When night came, she went forth with silent foot and obtained food for herself and her kittens; but, feigning to be afraid, she kept a look-out all through the day. Meanwhile, the Eagle, full of fear of the Sow, sat still on the branches, and the Sow, terrified by the Eagle, did not dare to go out from her cave; and thus they each, with their families, perished from hunger.
Those who stir up enmities are not to be trusted.
The Peacock and the Magpie.
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The Birds once met together to choose a king; and, among others, the Peacock was a candidate. Spreading his showy tail, and stalking up and down with affected grandeur, he caught the eyes of the silly multitude by his brilliant appearance, and was elected with acclamation. The Magpie then stepped forth into the midst of the assembly, and thus addressed the new king: "May it please your majesty, elect to permit a humble admirer to propose a question. As our king, we put our lives and fortunes in your hands. If, therefore, the Eagle, the Vulture, and the Kite, should make a descent upon us, what means would you take for our defense?" This pithy question opened the eyes of the Birds to the weakness of their choice and they canceled the election.
The Two Goats.
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Two Goats started at the same moment, from opposite ends, to cross a rude bridge that was only wide enough for one to cross at a time. Meeting at the middle of the bridge, neither would give way to the other. They locked horns and fought for the right of way, until they both fell into the torrent below and were drowned.
The Dove and the Ant.
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An Ant went to the bank of a river to quench its thirst, and, being carried away by the rush of the stream, was on the point of being drowned. A Dove, sitting on a tree overhanging the water, plucked a leaf, and let it fall into the stream close to her. The Ant, climbing on to it, floated in safety to the bank. Shortly afterwards a bird catcher came close and stood under the tree, and laid his lime-twigs for the Dove, which sat in the branches. The Ant, perceiving his design, stung him in the foot. He suddenly threw down the twigs, and thereupon made the Dove take wing.
The grateful heart will always find opportunities to show its gratitude.
The Eagle and the Beetle.
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The Eagle and the Beetle were at enmity together, and they destroyed one another's nests. The Eagle gave the first provocation in seizing upon and in eating the young ones of the Beetle. The Beetle got by stealth at the Eagle's eggs, and rolled them out of the nest, and followed the Eagle even into the presence of Jupiter. On the Eagle making his complaint, Jupiter ordered him to make his nest in his lap; and while Jupiter had the eggs in his lap, the Beetle came flying about him, and Jupiter, rising up unawares to drive him away from his head, threw down the eggs, and broke them.
The weak often revenge themselves on those who use them ill, even though they be the more powerful.
The Mule.
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A Mule, frolicsome from want of work and from overmuch corn, galloped about in a very extravagant manner, and said to himself: "My father surely was a high-mettled racer, and I am his own child in speed and spirit." On the next day, being driven a long journey, and feeling very weary, he exclaimed in a disconsolate tone: "I must have made a mistake; my father, after all, could have been only an ass."
The Cat, the Weasel and the Rabbit.
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While a Rabbit was absent from his hole one day, a Weasel took possession of it. On the Rabbit's return, seeing the Weasel's nose sticking out, he said: "You must leave this hole immediately. There is only room for one, and it has always belonged to me and my fathers before me." "The more reason that you should give it up now," said the Weasel, "and leave its possession to me." As they could not settle the dispute, they agreed to leave the question of ownership to a wise old Cat, to whom they went without more ado. "I am deaf," said the Cat. "Put your noses close to my ears." No sooner had they done so, than she clapped a paw upon each of them, and killed them both.
The strong are apt to settle all questions by the rule of might.
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The Rat and the Frog.
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A Rat in an evil day made acquaintance with a Frog, and they set off on their travels together. The Frog, on pretense of great affection, and of keeping his companion out of harm's way, tied the Rat's foot to his own hind-leg, and thus they proceeded for some distance by land. Presently they came to some water, and the Frog, bidding the Rat have good courage, began to swim across. They had scarcely, however, arrived midway, when the Frog took a sudden plunge to the bottom, dragging the unfortunate Rat after him. But the struggling and floundering of the Rat made so great a commotion in the water that it attracted the attention of a Kite, who, pouncing down and bearing off the Rat, carried away the Frog at the same time in his train.
Inconsiderate and ill-matched alliances generally end in ruin; and the man who compasses the destruction of his neighbor, is often caught in his own snare.
The Widow and the Sheep.
There was a certain Widow who had an only Sheep, and, wishing to make the most of his wool, she sheared him so closely that she cut his skin as well as his fleece. The Sheep, smarting under this treatment, cried out: "Why do you torture me thus? What will my blood add to the weight of the wool? If you want my flesh, Dame, send for the Butcher, who will put me out of my misery at once; but if you want my fleece, send for the Shearer, who will clip my wool without drawing my blood."
Economy may be carried too far.
The Man Bitten by a Dog.
A Man who had been bitten by a Dog was going about asking who could cure him. One that met him said: "Sir, if you would be cured, take a bit of bread and dip it in the blood of the wound, and give it to the dog that bit you." The Man smiled, and said: "If I were to follow your advice, I should be bitten by all the dogs in the city."
He who proclaims himself ready to buy up his enemies will never want a supply of them.
The Horse and the Wolf.
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A Wolf saw a Horse grazing in a field. Putting on a grave air, he approached him and said: "Sir, you must be very ill; I have some skill as a physician, and if you will tell me where your ailment is, I shall be glad to be of service." Said the horse: "If you will examine my foot, you will find what ails me." But as the wily Wolf approached him, with a kick he sent him flying into the air.
The Goatherd and the Goats.
It was a stormy day, and the snow was falling fast, when a Goatherd drove his Goats, all white with snow, into a desert cave for shelter. There he found that a herd of Wild Goats, more numerous and larger than his own, had already taken possession. So, thinking to secure them all, he left his own Goats to take care of themselves, and threw the branches which he had brought for them to the Wild Goats to browse on. But when the weather cleared up, he found his own Goats had perished from hunger, while the Wild Goats were off and away to the hills and woods. So the Goatherd returned a laughing-stock to his neighbors, having failed to gain the Wild Goats, and having lost his own.
They who neglect their old friends for the sake of new ones, are rightly served if they lose both.
The Goose with the Golden Eggs.
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A certain man had the good fortune to possess a Goose that laid him a Golden Egg every day. But dissatisfied with so slow an income, and thinking to seize the whole treasure at once, he killed the Goose, and cutting her open, found her--just what any other goose would be!
Much wants more, and loses all.
The Old Woman and the Wine-Jar.
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An Old Woman found an empty jar which had lately been full of prime old wine, and which still retained the fragrant smell of its former contents. She greedily placed it several times to her nose, and drawing it backwards and forwards, said: "O most delicious! How nice must the Wine itself have been when it leaves behind in the very vessel which contained it so sweet a perfume!"
The memory of a good deed lives.
The Ass Carrying Salt.
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A certain Huckster who kept an Ass, hearing that Salt was to be had cheap at the sea-side, drove down his Ass thither to buy some. Having loaded the beast as much as he could bear, he was driving him home, when, as they were passing a slippery ledge of rock, the Ass fell into the stream below, and the Salt being melted, the Ass was relieved of his burden, and having gained the bank with ease, pursued his journey onward, light in body and in spirit. The Huckster soon afterwards set off for the sea-shore for some more Salt, and loaded the Ass, if possible, yet more heavily than before. On their return, as they crossed the stream into which he had formerly fallen, the Ass fell down on purpose, and by the dissolving of the Salt, was again released from his load. The Master, provoked at the loss, and thinking how he might cure him of this trick, on his next journey to the coast freighted the beast with a load of sponges. When they arrived at the same stream as before, the Ass was at his old tricks again, and rolled himself into the water; but he found to his cost, as he proceeded homewards, that instead of lightening his burden, he had more than doubled its weight.
The same measures will not suit all circumstances.
The Gnat and the Bull.
A Gnat that had been buzzing about the head of a Bull, at length settling himself down upon his horn, begged his pardon for incommoding him; "but if," says he, "my weight at all inconveniences you, pray say so, and I will be off in a moment." "Oh, never trouble your head about that," says the Bull, "for 'tis all one to me whether you go or stay; and, to say the truth, I did not know you were there."
The smaller the Mind the greater the Conceit.
The Lion and the Gnat.
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As a Gnat was buzzing around a Lion, the Lion said to him: "How dare you approach so near? Be off, or I will kill you with the least stroke of my paw." The Gnat, knowing the advantage of his small size, and his alertness, immediately challenged the boaster to combat, and alighting first upon his nose and then upon his tail, made the Lion so furious that he injured himself grievously with his paws. As the Gnat flew away he boasted of his own prowess in thus defeating the King of Beasts without the slightest injury to himself. But, in his carelessness, he flew directly into a spider's web, and the spider instantly seized and killed him.
The Lion, the Ass and the Fox Hunting.
The Lion, the Ass and the Fox formed a party to go out hunting. They took a large booty, and when the sport was ended, bethought themselves of having a hearty meal. The Lion bade the Ass allot the spoil. So, dividing it into three equal parts, the Ass begged his friends to make their choice; at which the Lion, in great indignation, fell upon the Ass and tore him to pieces. He then bade the Fox make a division; who, gathering the whole into one great heap, reserved but the smallest mite for himself. "Ah! friend," says the Lion, "who taught you to make so equitable a division?" "I wanted no other lesson," replied the Fox, "than the Ass's fate."
Better be wise by the misfortunes of others than by your own.
The Dog Whose Ears were Cropped.
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A Dog complained of the cruelty of her master in cutting off her ears, and was so ashamed of her appearance that she resolved to stay in her kennel with her family. A friendly hunting dog said to her: "If you had been peaceful, and not always fighting, you would have saved your ears and your good looks. If you will fight, it is a kindness to crop your ears, that they may not give your enemy the advantage."
The Wind and the Sun.
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A dispute once arose between the Wind and the Sun, which was the stronger of the two, and they agreed to settle the point upon this issue--that whichever of the two soonest made a traveler take off his cloak, should be accounted the more powerful. The Wind began, and blew with all his might and main a blast, cold and fierce as a Thracian storm; but the stronger he blew, the closer the traveler wrapped his cloak around him, and the tighter he grasped it with his hands. Then broke out the Sun. With his welcome beams he dispersed the vapor and the cold; the traveler felt the genial warmth, and as the Sun shone brighter and brighter, he sat down, quite overcome with the heat, and taking off his cloak, cast it on the ground.
Thus the Sun was declared the conqueror; and it has ever been deemed that persuasion is better than force; and that the sunshine of a kind and gentle manner will sooner lay open a poor man's heart than all the threatenings and force of blustering authority.
The Wild Boar and the Fox.
A Wild Boar was whetting his tusks against a tree, when a Fox coming by, asked why he did so; "for," said he, "I see no reason for it; there is neither hunter nor hound in sight, nor any other danger that I can see, at hand." "True," replied the Boar; "but when that danger does arise, I shall have something else to do than to sharpen my weapons."
It is too late to whet the sword when the trumpet sounds to draw it.
The Hunter and the Wolf.
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A greedy Hunter one day shot a fine Deer, and ere he could dress it, a pretty Fawn came that way, and an arrow brought it to the ground. A Boar now chanced to be passing, and the Hunter wounded it so that it lay upon the ground as if dead. Not satisfied with this game, he must needs pursue a Partridge that came fluttering near, and while he was doing so the wounded Boar regained enough strength to spring upon him and kill him. A Wolf came that way, and seeing the four dead bodies, said: "Here is food for a month; but I will save the best, and be content to-day with the bow-string." But when he seized the string it loosened the fixed arrow, which shot him through the heart.
The greedy man and the miser cannot enjoy their gains.
The Astronomer.
An Astronomer used to walk out every night to gaze upon the stars. It happened one night that, with his whole thoughts rapt up in the skies, he fell into a well. One who heard his cries ran up to him, and said: "While you are trying to pry into the mysteries of heaven, you overlook the common objects under your feet."
We should never look so high as to miss seeing the things that are around us.
The Bulls and the Frogs.
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Two Bulls lived in the same herd, and each aspiring to be the leader and master, they finally engaged in a fierce battle. An old Frog, who sat on the bank of a stream near by, began to groan and to quake with fear. A thoughtless young Frog said to the old one: "Why need you be afraid? What is it to you that the Bulls fight for supremacy?" "Do you not see," said the old Frog, "that one must defeat the other, and that the defeated Bull, being driven from the field, will be forced to stay in the marshes, and will thus trample us to death?"
The poor and weak are often made to suffer for the follies of the great.
The Thief and His Mother.
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A Schoolboy stole a horn-book from one of his schoolfellows, and brought it home to his mother. Instead of chastising him, she rather encouraged him in the deed. In course of time the boy, now grown into a man, began to steal things of greater value, until, at last, being caught in the very act, he was brought to the Judge and sentenced to be hung. As he was being led to the scaffold, the mother bowed herself to the ground with grief. A neighbor seeing her thus, said to her: "It is too late for you to moan and sob now. If you had been as much grieved when he committed his first theft, you would have corrected him in time, and thus have saved yourself this sorrowful day."
Nip evil in the bud.
The Man and His Two Wives.
In days when a man was allowed more wives than one, a middle-aged bachelor, who could be called neither young nor old, and whose hair was only just beginning to turn gray, must needs fall in love with two women at once, and marry them both. The one was young and blooming, and wished her husband to appear as youthful as herself; the other was somewhat more advanced in age, and was as anxious that her husband should appear a suitable match for her. So, while the young one seized every opportunity of pulling out the good man's gray hairs, the old one was as industrious in plucking out every black hair she could find, till he found that, between the one and the other, he had not a hair left.
He that submits his principles to the influence and caprices of opposite parties will end in having no principles at all.
The Heifer, the Goat, the Sheep and the Lion.
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A Heifer, a Goat, a Sheep, and a Lion formed a partnership, and agreed to divide their earnings. The Goat having snared a stag, they sent for the Lion to divide it for them. The Lion said: "I will make four parts--the first shall be mine as judge; the second, because I am strongest; the third, because I am bravest; and the fourth--I will kill any one who dares touch it."
He who will steal a part will steal the whole.
The Camel and the Travelers.
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Two Travelers on a desert saw a Camel in the distance, and were greatly frightened at his huge appearance, thinking it to be some huge monster. While they hid behind some low shrubs, the animal came nearer, and they discovered that it was only a harmless Camel which had excited their fears.
Distance exaggerates dangers.
The Swan and the Goose.
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A certain rich man bought in the market a Goose and a Swan. He fed the one for his table, and kept the other for the sake of its song. When the time came for killing the Goose, the cook went to take him at night, when it was dark, and he was not able to distinguish one bird from the other, and he caught the Swan instead of the Goose. The Swan, threatened with death, burst forth into song, and thus made himself known by his voice, and preserved his life by his melody.
Sweet words may deliver us from peril, when harsh words would fail.
The Dolphins and the Sprat.
The Dolphins and the Whales were at war with one another, and the Sprat stepped in and endeavored to separate them. But one of the Dolphins cried out: "We would rather perish in the contest, than be reconciled by you."
The Shepherd and the Sea.
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A Shepherd moved down his flock to feed near the shore, and beholding the Sea lying in a smooth calm, he was seized with a strong desire to sail over it. So he sold all his sheep and bought a cargo of Dates, and loaded a vessel, and set sail. He had not gone far when a storm arose; his ship was wrecked, and his Dates and everything lost, and he himself with difficulty escaped to land. Not long after, when the Sea was again calm, and one of his friends came up to him and was admiring its repose, he said: "Have a care, my good fellow, of that smooth surface, it is only looking out for your Dates."
The Bees, the Drones, and the Wasp.
Some Bees had built their comb in the hollow trunk of an oak. The Drones asserted that it was their doing, and belonged to them. The cause was brought into court before Judge Wasp. Knowing something of the parties, he thus addressed them: "The plaintiffs and defendants are so much alike in shape and color as to render the ownership a doubtful matter. Let each party take a hive to itself, and build up a new comb, that from the shape of the cells and the taste of the honey, the lawful proprietors of the property in dispute may appear." The Bees readily assented to the Wasp's plan. The Drones declined it. Whereupon the Wasp gave judgment: "It is clear now who made the comb, and who cannot make it; the Court adjudges the honey to the Bees."
Professions are best tested by deeds.
The Wolf, the Goat and the Kid.
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As an old Goat was going forth to pasture, she carefully latched her door, and bid her kid not to open it to any one who could not give this pass-word: "Beware of the Wolf and all his race." A Wolf happened to be passing, and overheard what the old Goat said. When she was gone, he went to the door, and, knocking, said: "Beware of the Wolf and all his race." But the Kid, peeping through a crack, said: "Show me a white paw and I will open the door." As the Wolf could not do this, he had to depart, no better than he came.
Two sureties are better than one.
The Fox and the Hedgehog.
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A Fox, while crossing over a river, was driven by the stream into a narrow gorge, and lay there for a long time unable to get out, covered with myriads of horse-flies that had fastened themselves upon him. A Hedgehog, who was wandering in that direction, saw him, and taking compassion on him, asked him if he should drive away the flies that were so tormenting him. But the Fox begged him to do nothing of the sort. "Why not?" asked the Hedgehog. "Because," replied the Fox, "these flies that are upon me now are already full, and draw but little blood, but should you remove them, a swarm of fresh and hungry ones will come, who will not leave a drop of blood in my body."
When we throw off rulers or dependents, who have already made the most of us, we do but, for the most part, lay ourselves open to others, who will make us bleed yet more freely.
The Brazier and His Dog.
A Brazier had a little Dog, which was a great favorite with his master, and his constant companion. While he hammered away at his metals the Dog slept; but when, on the other hand, he went to dinner, and began to eat, the Dog woke up, and wagged his tail, as if he would ask for a share of his meal. His master one day, pretending to be angry, and shaking his stick at him, said: "You wretched little sluggard! what shall I do to you? While I am hammering on the anvil, you sleep on the mat, and when I begin to eat after my toil, you wake up and wag your tail for food. Do you not know that labor is the source of every blessing, and that none but those who work are entitled to eat?"
The Wild Ass and the Lion.
A Wild Ass and a Lion entered into an alliance that they might capture the beasts of the forest with the greater ease. The Lion agreed to assist the Wild Ass with strength, while the Wild Ass gave the Lion the benefit of his greater speed. When they had taken as many beasts as their necessities required, the Lion undertook to distribute the prey, and for this purpose divided it into three shares. "I will take the first share," he said, "because I am king; and the second share, as a partner with you in the chase; and the third share (believe me) will be a source of great evil to you, unless you willingly resign it to me, and set off as fast as you can."
Might makes right.
The Father and His Two Daughters.
A man had two daughters, the one married to a gardener, and the other to a tile-maker. After a time he went to the daughter who had married the gardener, and inquired how she was, and how all things went with her. She said: "All things are prospering with me, and I have only one wish, that there may be a heavy fall of rain, in order that the plants may be well watered." Not long after he went to the daughter who had married the tile-maker, and likewise inquired of her how she fared; she replied: "I want for nothing, and have only one wish, that the dry weather may continue, and the sun shine hot and bright, so that the bricks might be dried." He said to her: "If your sister wishes for rain, and you for dry weather, with which of the two am I to join my wishes?"
The Fir Tree and the Bramble.
A Fir Tree said boastingly to the Bramble: "You are useful for nothing at all, while I am everywhere used for roofs and houses." The Bramble made answer: "You poor creature, if you would only call to mind the axes and saws which are about to hew you down, you would have reason to wish that you had grown up a Bramble, not a Fir Tree."
Better poverty without care, than riches with.
The Fox and the Monkey.
A Monkey once danced in an assembly of the Beasts, and so pleased them all by his performance that they elected him their king. A Fox envying him the honor, discovered a piece of meat lying in a trap, and leading the Monkey to the place where it was, said "that she had found a store, but had not used it, but had kept it for him as treasure trove of his kingdom, and counseled him to lay hold of it." The Monkey approached carelessly, and was caught in the trap; and on his accusing the Fox of purposely leading him into the snare, she replied: "O Monkey, and are you, with such a mind as yours, going to be king over the Beasts?"
The Farmer and His Sons.
A Farmer being on the point of death, wished to insure from his sons the same attention to his farm as he had himself given it. He called them to his bedside, and said: "My sons, there is a great treasure hid in one of my vineyards." The sons, after his death, took their spades and mattocks, and carefully dug over every portion of their land. They found no treasure, but the vines repaid their labor by an extraordinary and superabundant crop.
The Cat and the Birds.
A Cat, hearing that the Birds in a certain aviary were ailing, dressed himself up as a physician, and, taking with him his cane and the instruments becoming his profession, went to the aviary, knocked at the door, and inquired of the inmates how they all did, saying that if they were ill, he would be happy to prescribe for them and cure them. They replied: "We are all very well, and shall continue so, if you will only be good enough to go away, and leave us as we are."
The Stag, the Wolf and the Sheep.
A Stag asked a Sheep to lend him a measure of wheat, and said that the Wolf would be his surety. The Sheep, fearing some fraud was intended, excused herself, saying: "The Wolf is accustomed to seize what he wants, and to run off, and you, too, can quickly out-strip me in your rapid flight. How then shall I be able to find you when the day of payment comes?"
Two blacks do not make one white.
The Raven and the Swan.
A Raven saw a Swan, and desired to secure for himself a like beauty of plumage. Supposing that his splendid white color arose from his washing in the water in which he swam, the Raven left the altars in the neighborhood of which he picked up his living, and took up his abode in the lakes and pools. But cleansing his feathers as often as he would, he could not change their color, while through want of food he perished.
Change of habit cannot alter nature.
The Lioness.
A controversy prevailed among the beasts of the field, as to which of the animals deserved the most credit for producing the greatest number of whelps at a birth. They rushed clamorously into the presence of the Lioness, and demanded of her the settlement of the dispute. "And you," they said, "how many sons have you at a birth?" The Lioness laughed at them, and said: "Why! I have only one; but that one is altogether a thorough-bred Lion."
The value is in the worth, not in the number.
End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Aesop's Fables, by Aesop

= = = PG11339 = = =
AESOP'S FABLES
Produced by Suzanne Shell, Greg Chapman and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.
ÆSOP'S FABLES
A NEW TRANSLATION
BY V. S. VERNON JONES
WITH AN INTRODUCTION
BY G. K. CHESTERTON
AND ILLUSTRATIONS
BY ARTHUR RACKHAM
1912 EDITION
INTRODUCTION
_Æsop embodies an epigram not uncommon in human history; his fame is all the more deserved because he never deserved it. The firm foundations of common sense, the shrewd shots at uncommon sense, that characterise all the Fables, belong not him but to humanity. In the earliest human history whatever is authentic is universal: and whatever is universal is anonymous. In such cases there is always some central man who had first the trouble of collecting them, and afterwards the fame of creating them. He had the fame; and, on the whole, he earned the fame. There must have been something great and human, something of the human future and the human past, in such a man: even if he only used it to rob the past or deceive the future. The story of Arthur may have been really connected with the most fighting Christianity of falling Rome or with the most heathen traditions hidden in the hills of Wales. But the word "Mappe" or "Malory" will always mean King Arthur; even though we find older and better origins than the Mabinogian; or write later and worse versions than the "Idylls of the King." The nursery fairy tales may have come out of Asia with the Indo-European race, now fortunately extinct; they may have been invented by some fine French lady or gentleman like Perrault: they may possibly even be what they profess to be. But we shall always call the best selection of such tales "Grimm's Tales": simply because it is the best collection.
The historical Æsop, in so far as he was historical, would seem to have been a Phrygian slave, or at least one not to be specially and symbolically adorned with the Phrygian cap of liberty. He lived, if he did live, about the sixth century before Christ, in the time of that Croesus whose story we love and suspect like everything else in Herodotus. There are also stories of deformity of feature and a ready ribaldry of tongue: stories which (as the celebrated Cardinal said) explain, though they do not excuse, his having been hurled over a high precipice at Delphi. It is for those who read the Fables to judge whether he was really thrown over the cliff for being ugly and offensive, or rather for being highly moral and correct. But there is no kind of doubt that the general legend of him may justly rank him with a race too easily forgotten in our modern comparisons: the race of the great philosophic slaves. Æsop may have been a fiction like Uncle Remus: he was also, like Uncle Remus, a fact. It is a fact that slaves in the old world could be worshipped like Æsop, or loved like Uncle Remus. It is odd to note that both the great slaves told their best stories about beasts and birds.
But whatever be fairly due to Æsop, the human tradition called Fables is not due to him. This had gone on long before any sarcastic freedman from Phrygia had or had not been flung off a precipice; this has remained long after. It is to our advantage, indeed, to realise the distinction; because it makes Æsop more obviously effective than any other fabulist. Grimm's Tales, glorious as they are, were collected by two German students. And if we find it hard to be certain of a German student, at least we know more about him than We know about a Phrygian slave. The truth is, of course, that Æsop's Fables are not Æsop's fables, any more than Grimm's Fairy Tales were ever Grimm's fairy tales. But the fable and the fairy tale are things utterly distinct. There are many elements of difference; but the plainest is plain enough. There can be no good fable with human beings in it. There can be no good fairy tale without them.
Æsop, or Babrius (or whatever his name was), understood that, for a fable, all the persons must be impersonal. They must be like abstractions in algebra, or like pieces in chess. The lion must always be stronger than the wolf, just as four is always double of two. The fox in a fable must move crooked, as the knight in chess must move crooked. The sheep in a fable must march on, as the pawn in chess must march on. The fable must not allow for the crooked captures of the pawn; it must not allow for what Balzac called "the revolt of a sheep" The fairy tale, on the other hand, absolutely revolves on the pivot of human personality. If no hero were there to fight the dragons, we should not even know that they were dragons. If no adventurer were cast on the undiscovered island--it would remain undiscovered. If the miller's third son does not find the enchanted garden where the seven princesses stand white and frozen--why, then, they will remain white and frozen and enchanted. If there is no personal prince to find the Sleeping Beauty she will simply sleep. Fables repose upon quite the opposite idea; that everything is itself, and will in any case speak for itself. The wolf will be always wolfish; the fox will be always foxy. Something of the same sort may have been meant by the animal worship, in which Egyptian and Indian and many other great peoples have combined. Men do not, I think, love beetles or cats or crocodiles with a wholly personal love; they salute them as expressions of that abstract and anonymous energy in nature which to any one is awful, and to an atheist must be frightful. So in all the fables that are or are not Æsop's all the animal forces drive like inanimate forces, like great rivers or growing trees. It is the limit and the loss of all such things that they cannot be anything but themselves: it is their tragedy that they could not lose their souls.
This is the immortal justification of the Fable: that we could not teach the plainest truths so simply without turning men into chessmen. We cannot talk of such simple things without using animals that do not talk at all. Suppose, for a moment, that you turn the wolf into a wolfish baron, or the fox into a foxy diplomatist. You will at once remember that even barons are human, you will be unable to forget that even diplomatists are men. You will always be looking for that accidental good-humour that should go with the brutality of any brutal man; for that allowance for all delicate things, including virtue, that should exist in any good diplomatist. Once put a thing on two legs instead of four and pluck it of feathers and you cannot help asking for a human being, either heroic, as in the fairy tales, or un-heroic, as in the modern novels.
But by using animals in this austere and arbitrary style as they are used on the shields of heraldry or the hieroglyphics of the ancients, men have really succeeded in handing down those tremendous truths that are called truisms. If the chivalric lion be red and rampant, it is rigidly red and rampant; if the sacred ibis stands anywhere on one leg, it stands on one leg for ever. In this language, like a large animal alphabet, are written some of the first philosophic certainties of men. As the child learns A for Ass or B for Bull or C for Cow, so man has learnt here to connect the simpler and stronger creatures with the simpler and stronger truths. That a flowing stream cannot befoul its own fountain, and that any one who says it does is a tyrant and a liar; that a mouse is too weak to fight a lion, but too strong for the cords that can hold a lion; that a fox who gets most out of a flat dish may easily get least out of a deep dish; that the crow whom the gods forbid to sing, the gods nevertheless provide with cheese; that when the goat insults from a mountain-top it is not the goat that insults, but the mountain: all these are deep truths deeply graven on the rocks wherever men have passed. It matters nothing how old they are, or how new; they are the alphabet of humanity, which like so many forms of primitive picture-writing employs any living symbol in preference to man. These ancient and universal tales are all of animals; as the latest discoveries in the oldest pre-historic caverns are all of animals. Man, in his simpler states, always felt that he himself was something too mysterious to be drawn. But the legend he carved under these cruder symbols was everywhere the same; and whether fables began with Æsop or began with Adam, whether they were German and mediæval as Reynard the Fox, or as French and Renaissance as La Fontaine, the upshot is everywhere essentially the same: that superiority is always insolent, because it is always accidental; that pride goes before a fall; and that there is such a thing as being too clever by half. You will not find any other legend but this written upon the rocks by any hand of man. There is every type and time of fable: but there is only one moral to the fable; because there is only one moral to everything_.
G. K. CHESTERTON
CONTENTS
THE FOX AND THE GRAPES
THE GOOSE THAT LAID THE GOLDEN EGGS
THE CAT AND THE MICE
THE MISCHIEVOUS DOG
THE CHARCOAL-BURNER AND THE FULLER
THE MICE IN COUNCIL
THE BAT AND THE WEASELS
THE DOG AND THE SOW
THE FOX AND THE CROW
THE HORSE AND THE GROOM
THE WOLF AND THE LAMB
THE PEACOCK AND THE CRANE
THE CAT AND THE BIRDS
THE SPENDTHRIFT AND THE SWALLOW
THE OLD WOMAN AND THE DOCTOR
THE MOON AND HER MOTHER
MERCURY AND THE WOODMAN
THE ASS, THE FOX, AND THE LION
THE LION AND THE MOUSE
THE CROW AND THE PITCHER
THE BOYS AND THE FROGS
THE NORTH WIND AND THE SUN
THE MISTRESS AND HER SERVANTS
THE GOODS AND THE ILLS
THE HARES AND THE FROGS
THE FOX AND THE STORK
THE WOLF IN SHEEP'S CLOTHING
THE STAG IN THE OX-STALL
THE MILKMAID AND HER PAIL
THE DOLPHINS, THE WHALES, AND THE SPRAT
THE FOX AND THE MONKEY
THE ASS AND THE LAP-DOG
THE FIR-TREE AND THE BRAMBLE
THE FROGS' COMPLAINT AGAINST THE SUN
THE DOG, THE COCK, AND THE FOX
THE GNAT AND THE BULL
THE BEAR AND THE TRAVELLERS
THE SLAVE AND THE LION
THE FLEA AND THE MAN
THE BEE AND JUPITER
THE OAK AND THE REEDS
THE BLIND MAN AND THE CUB
THE BOY AND THE SNAILS
THE APES AND THE TWO TRAVELLERS
THE ASS AND HIS BURDENS
THE SHEPHERD'S BOY AND THE WOLF
THE FOX AND THE GOAT
THE FISHERMAN AND THE SPRAT
THE BOASTING TRAVELLER
THE CRAB AND HIS MOTHER
THE ASS AND HIS SHADOW
THE FARMER AND HIS SONS
THE DOG AND THE COOK
THE MONKEY AS KING
THE THIEVES AND THE COCK
THE FARMER AND FORTUNE
JUPITER AND THE MONKEY
FATHER AND SONS
THE LAMP
THE OWL AND THE BIRDS
THE ASS IN THE LION'S SKIN
THE SHE-GOATS AND THEIR BEARDS
THE OLD LION
THE BOY BATHING
THE QUACK FROG
THE SWOLLEN FOX
THE MOUSE, THE FROG, AND THE HAWK
THE BOY AND THE NETTLES
THE PEASANT AND THE APPLE-TREE
THE JACKDAW AND THE PIGEONS
JUPITER AND THE TORTOISE
THE DOG IN THE MANGER
THE TWO BAGS
THE OXEN AND THE AXLETREES
THE BOY AND THE FILBERTS
THE FROGS ASKING FOR A KING
THE OLIVE-TREE AND THE FIG-TREE
THE LION AND THE BOAR
THE WALNUT-TREE
THE MAN AND THE LION
THE TORTOISE AND THE EAGLE
THE KID ON THE HOUSETOP
THE FOX WITHOUT A TAIL
THE VAIN JACKDAW
THE TRAVELLER AND HIS DOG
THE SHIPWRECKED MAN AND THE SEA
THE WILD BOAR AND THE FOX
MERCURY AND THE SCULPTOR
THE FAWN AND HIS MOTHER
THE FOX AND THE LION
THE EAGLE AND HIS CAPTOR
THE BLACKSMITH AND HIS DOG
THE STAG AT THE POOL
THE DOG AND THE SHADOW
MERCURY AND THE TRADESMEN
THE MICE AND THE WEASELS
THE PEACOCK AND JUNO
THE BEAR AND THE FOX
THE ASS AND THE OLD PEASANT
THE OX AND THE FROG
THE MAN AND THE IMAGE
HERCULES AND THE WAGGONER
THE POMEGRANATE, THE APPLE-TREE, AND THE BRAMBLE
THE LION, THE BEAR, AND THE FOX
THE BLACKAMOOR
THE TWO SOLDIERS AND THE ROBBER
THE LION AND THE WILD ASS
THE MAN AND THE SATYR
THE IMAGE-SELLER
THE EAGLE AND THE ARROW
THE RICH MAN AND THE TANNER
THE WOLF, THE MOTHER, AND HER CHILD
THE OLD WOMAN AND THE WINE-JAR
THE LIONESS AND THE VIXEN
THE VIPER AND THE FILE
THE CAT AND THE COCK
THE HARE AND THE TORTOISE
THE SOLDIER AND HIS HORSE
THE OXEN AND THE BUTCHERS
THE WOLF AND THE LION
THE SHEEP, THE WOLF, AND THE STAG
THE LION AND THE THREE BULLS
THE HORSE AND HIS RIDER
THE GOAT AND THE VINE
THE TWO POTS
THE OLD HOUND
THE CLOWN AND THE COUNTRYMAN
THE LARK AND THE FARMER
THE LION AND THE ASS
THE PROPHET
THE HOUND AND THE HARE
THE LION, THE MOUSE, AND THE FOX
THE TRUMPETER TAKEN PRISONER
THE WOLF AND THE CRANE
THE EAGLE, THE CAT, AND THE WILD SOW
THE WOLF AND THE SHEEP
THE TUNNY-FISH AND THE DOLPHIN
THE THREE TRADESMEN
THE MOUSE AND THE BULL
THE HARE AND THE HOUND
THE TOWN MOUSE AND THE COUNTRY MOUSE
THE LION AND THE BULL
THE WOLF, THE FOX, AND THE APE
THE EAGLE AND THE COCKS
THE ESCAPED JACKDAW
THE FARMER AND THE FOX
VENUS AND THE CAT
THE CROW AND THE SWAN
THE STAG WITH ONE EYE
THE FLY AND THE DRAUGHT-MULE
THE COCK AND THE JEWEL
THE WOLF AND THE SHEPHERD
THE FARMER AND THE STORK
THE CHARGER AND THE MILLER
THE GRASSHOPPER AND THE OWL
THE GRASSHOPPER AND THE ANTS
THE FARMER AND THE VIPER
THE TWO FROGS
THE COBBLER TURNED DOCTOR
THE ASS, THE COCK, AND THE LION
THE BELLY AND THE MEMBERS
THE BALD MAN AND THE FLY
THE ASS AND THE WOLF
THE MONKEY AND THE CAMEL
THE SICK MAN AND THE DOCTOR
THE TRAVELLERS AND THE PLANE-TREE
THE FLEA AND THE OX
THE BIRDS, THE BEASTS, AND THE BAT
THE MAN AND HIS TWO SWEETHEARTS
THE EAGLE, THE JACKDAW, AND THE SHEPHERD
THE WOLF AND THE BOY
THE MILLER, HIS SON, AND THEIR ASS
THE STAG AND THE VINE
THE LAMB CHASED BY A WOLF
THE ARCHER AND THE LION
THE WOLF AND THE GOAT
THE SICK STAG
THE ASS AND THE MULE
BROTHER AND SISTER
THE HEIFER AND THE OX
THE KINGDOM OF THE LION
THE ASS AND HIS DRIVER
THE LION AND THE HARE
THE WOLVES AND THE DOGS
THE BULL AND THE CALF
THE TREES AND THE AXE
THE ASTRONOMER
THE LABOURER AND THE SNAKE
THE CAGE-BIRD AND THE BAT
THE ASS AND HIS PURCHASER
THE KID AND THE WOLF
THE DEBTOR AND HIS SOW
THE BALD HUNTSMAN
THE HERDSMAN AND THE LOST BULL
THE MULE
THE HOUND AND THE FOX
THE FATHER AND HIS DAUGHTERS
THE THIEF AND THE INNKEEPER
THE PACK-ASS AND THE WILD ASS
THE ASS AND HIS MASTERS
THE PACK-ASS, THE WILD ASS, AND THE LION
THE ANT
THE FROGS AND THE WELL
THE CRAB AND THE FOX
THE FOX AND THE GRASSHOPPER
THE FARMER, HIS BOY, AND THE ROOKS
THE ASS AND THE DOG
THE ASS CARRYING THE IMAGE
THE ATHENIAN AND THE THEBAN
THE GOATHERD AND THE GOAT
THE SHEEP AND THE DOG
THE SHEPHERD AND THE WOLF
THE LION, JUPITER, AND THE ELEPHANT
THE PIG AND THE SHEEP
THE GARDENER AND HIS DOG
THE RIVERS AND THE SEA
THE LION IN LOVE
THE BEE-KEEPER
THE WOLF AND THE HORSE
THE BAT, THE BRAMBLE, AND THE SEAGULL
THE DOG AND THE WOLF
THE WASP AND THE SNAKE
THE EAGLE AND THE BEETLE
THE FOWLER AND THE LARK
THE FISHERMAN PIPING
THE WEASEL AND THE MAN
THE PLOUGHMAN, THE ASS, AND THE OX
DEMADES AND HIS FABLE
THE MONKEY AND THE DOLPHIN
THE CROW AND THE SNAKE
THE DOGS AND THE FOX
THE NIGHTINGALE AND THE HAWK
THE ROSE AND THE AMARANTH
THE MAN, THE HORSE, THE OX, AND THE DOG
THE WOLVES, THE SHEEP, AND THE RAM
THE SWAN
THE SNAKE AND JUPITER
THE WOLF AND HIS SHADOW
THE PLOUGHMAN AND THE WOLF
MERCURY AND THE MAN BITTEN BY AN ANT
THE WILY LION
THE PARROT AND THE CAT
THE STAG AND THE LION
THE IMPOSTOR
THE DOGS AND THE HIDES
THE LION, THE FOX, AND THE ASS
THE FOWLER, THE PARTRIDGE, AND THE COCK
THE GNAT AND THE LION
THE FARMER AND HIS DOGS
THE EAGLE AND THE FOX
THE BUTCHER AND HIS CUSTOMERS
HERCULES AND MINERVA
THE FOX WHO SERVED A LION
THE QUACK DOCTOR
THE LION, THE WOLF, AND THE FOX
HERCULES AND PLUTUS
THE FOX AND THE LEOPARD
THE FOX AND THE HEDGEHOG
THE CROW AND THE RAVEN
THE WITCH
THE OLD MAN AND DEATH
THE MISER
THE FOXES AND THE RIVER
THE HORSE AND THE STAG
THE FOX AND THE BRAMBLE
THE FOX AND THE SNAKE
THE LION, THE FOX, AND THE STAG
THE MAN WHO LOST HIS SPADE
THE PARTRIDGE AND THE FOWLER
THE RUNAWAY SLAVE
THE HUNTER AND THE WOODMAN
THE SERPENT AND THE EAGLE
THE ROGUE AND THE ORACLE
THE HORSE AND THE ASS
THE DOG CHASING A WOLF
GRIEF AND HIS DUE
THE HAWK, THE KITE, AND THE PIGEONS
THE WOMAN AND THE FARMER
PROMETHEUS AND THE MAKING OF MAN
THE SWALLOW AND THE CROW
THE HUNTER AND THE HORSEMAN
THE GOATHERD AND THE WILD GOATS
THE NIGHTINGALE AND THE SWALLOW
THE TRAVELLER AND FORTUNE
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
=IN COLOUR=
THE HARE AND THE TORTOISE
THE MOON AND HER MOTHER
THE FIR-TREE AND THE BRAMBLE
THE CRAB AND HIS MOTHER
THE QUACK FROG
THE SHIPWRECKED MAN AND THE SEA
THE BLACKAMOOR
THE TWO POTS
VENUS AND THE CAT
THE TRAVELLERS AND THE PLANE-TREE
THE TREES AND THE AXE
THE LION, JUPITER, AND THE ELEPHANT
THE GNAT AND THE LION
=IN BLACK AND WHITE=
THE FOX AND THE GRAPES
THE FOX AND THE CROW
THE CAT AND THE BIRDS
THE CROW AND THE PITCHER
THE NORTH WIND AND THE SUN
THE FOX AND THE STORK
THE GNAT AND THE BULL
THE FLEA AND THE MAN
THE OAK AND THE REEDS
THE THIEVES AND THE COCK
THE OWL AND THE BIRDS
THE ASS IN THE LION'S SKIN
THE BOY BATHING
THE DOG IN THE MANGER
THE FROGS ASKING FOR A KING
KING LOG
THE FOX WITHOUT A TAIL
THE FOX AND THE LION
THE DOG AND THE SHADOW
THE BEAR AND THE FOX
THE OX AND THE FROG
THE MAN AND THE SATYR
THE OLD WOMAN AND THE WINE-JAR
THE CAT AND THE COCK
THE SHEEP, THE WOLF, AND THE STAG
THE GOAT AND THE VINE
THE HOUND AND THE HARE
THE WOLF AND THE CRANE
THE TOWN MOUSE AND THE COUNTRY MOUSE
THE WOLF, THE FOX, AND THE APE
THE COCK AND THE JEWEL
THE GRASSHOPPER AND THE ANTS
THE BALD MAN AND THE FLY
THE MONKEY AND THE CAMEL
THE MILLER, HIS SON, AND THEIR ASS
THE WOLF AND THE GOAT
THE KINGDOM OF THE LION
THE KID AND THE WOLF
THE MULE
THE FROGS AND THE WELL
THE GOATHERD AND THE GOAT
THE WOLF AND THE HORSE
THE FISHERMAN PIPING
THE MONKEY AND THE DOLPHIN
THE WOLF AND HIS SHADOW
THE LION, THE FOX, AND THE ASS
THE GNAT AND THE LION
THE FOX AND THE LEOPARD
THE MISER
THE HUNTER AND THE WOODMAN
THE HORSE AND THE ASS
ÆSOP'S FABLES
THE FOX AND THE GRAPES
A hungry Fox saw some fine bunches of Grapes hanging from a vine that was trained along a high trellis, and did his best to reach them by jumping as high as he could into the air. But it was all in vain, for they were just out of reach: so he gave up trying, and walked away with an air of dignity and unconcern, remarking, "I thought those Grapes were ripe, but I see now they are quite sour."
THE GOOSE THAT LAID THE GOLDEN EGGS
A Man and his Wife had the good fortune to possess a Goose which laid a Golden Egg every day. Lucky though they were, they soon began to think they were not getting rich fast enough, and, imagining the bird must be made of gold inside, they decided to kill it in order to secure the whole store of precious metal at once. But when they cut it open they found it was just like any other goose. Thus, they neither got rich all at once, as they had hoped, nor enjoyed any longer the daily addition to their wealth.
Much wants more and loses all.
THE CAT AND THE MICE
There was once a house that was overrun with Mice. A Cat heard of this, and said to herself, "That's the place for me," and off she went and took up her quarters in the house, and caught the Mice one by one and ate them. At last the Mice could stand it no longer, and they determined to take to their holes and stay there. "That's awkward," said the Cat to herself: "the only thing to do is to coax them out by a trick." So she considered a while, and then climbed up the wall and let herself hang down by her hind legs from a peg, and pretended to be dead. By and by a Mouse peeped out and saw the Cat hanging there. "Aha!" it cried, "you're very clever, madam, no doubt: but you may turn yourself into a bag of meal hanging there, if you like, yet you won't catch us coming anywhere near you."
If you are wise you won't be deceived by the innocent airs of those whom you have once found to be dangerous.
THE MISCHIEVOUS DOG
There was once a Dog who used to snap at people and bite them without any provocation, and who was a great nuisance to every one who came to his master's house. So his master fastened a bell round his neck to warn people of his presence. The Dog was very proud of the bell, and strutted about tinkling it with immense satisfaction. But an old dog came up to him and said, "The fewer airs you give yourself the better, my friend. You don't think, do you, that your bell was given you as a reward of merit? On the contrary, it is a badge of disgrace."
Notoriety is often mistaken for fame.
THE CHARCOAL-BURNER AND THE FULLER
There was once a Charcoal-burner who lived and worked by himself. A Fuller, however, happened to come and settle in the same neighbourhood; and the Charcoal-burner, having made his acquaintance and finding he was an agreeable sort of fellow, asked him if he would come and share his house: "We shall get to know one another better that way," he said, "and, beside, our household expenses will be diminished." The Fuller thanked him, but replied, "I couldn't think of it, sir: why, everything I take such pains to whiten would be blackened in no time by your charcoal."
THE MICE IN COUNCIL
Once upon a time all the Mice met together in Council, and discussed the best means of securing themselves against the attacks of the cat. After several suggestions had been debated, a Mouse of some standing and experience got up and said, "I think I have hit upon a plan which will ensure our safety in the future, provided you approve and carry it out. It is that we should fasten a bell round the neck of our enemy the cat, which will by its tinkling warn us of her approach." This proposal was warmly applauded, and it had been already decided to adopt it, when an old Mouse got upon his feet and said, "I agree with you all that the plan before us is an admirable one: but may I ask who is going to bell the cat?"
THE BAT AND THE WEASELS
A Bat fell to the ground and was caught by a Weasel, and was just going to be killed and eaten when it begged to be let go. The Weasel said he couldn't do that because he was an enemy of all birds on principle. "Oh, but," said the Bat, "I'm not a bird at all: I'm a mouse." "So you are," said the Weasel, "now I come to look at you"; and he let it go. Some time after this the Bat was caught in just the same way by another Weasel, and, as before, begged for its life. "No," said the Weasel, "I never let a mouse go by any chance." "But I'm not a mouse," said the Bat; "I'm a bird." "Why, so you are," said the Weasel; and he too let the Bat go.
Look and see which way the wind blows before you commit yourself.
THE DOG AND THE SOW
A Dog and a Sow were arguing and each claimed that its own young ones were finer than those of any other animal. "Well," said the Sow at last, "mine can see, at any rate, when they come into the world: but yours are born blind."
THE FOX AND THE CROW
A Crow was sitting on a branch of a tree with a piece of cheese in her beak when a Fox observed her and set his wits to work to discover some way of getting the cheese. Coming and standing under the tree he looked up and said, "What a noble bird I see above me! Her beauty is without equal, the hue of her plumage exquisite. If only her voice is as sweet as her looks are fair, she ought without doubt to be Queen of the Birds." The Crow was hugely flattered by this, and just to show the Fox that she could sing she gave a loud caw. Down came the cheese, of course, and the Fox, snatching it up, said, "You have a voice, madam, I see: what you want is wits."
THE HORSE AND THE GROOM
There was once a Groom who used to spend long hours clipping and combing the Horse of which he had charge, but who daily stole a portion of his allowance of oats, and sold it for his own profit. The Horse gradually got into worse and worse condition, and at last cried to the Groom, "If you really want me to look sleek and well, you must comb me less and feed me more."
THE WOLF AND THE LAMB
A Wolf came upon a Lamb straying from the flock, and felt some compunction about taking the life of so helpless a creature without some plausible excuse; so he cast about for a grievance and said at last, "Last year, sirrah, you grossly insulted me." "That is impossible, sir," bleated the Lamb, "for I wasn't born then." "Well," retorted the Wolf, "you feed in my pastures." "That cannot be," replied the Lamb, "for I have never yet tasted grass." "You drink from my spring, then," continued the Wolf. "Indeed, sir," said the poor Lamb, "I have never yet drunk anything but my mother's milk." "Well, anyhow," said the Wolf, "I'm not going without my dinner": and he sprang upon the Lamb and devoured it without more ado.
THE PEACOCK AND THE CRANE
A Peacock taunted a Crane with the dullness of her plumage. "Look at my brilliant colours," said she, "and see how much finer they are than your poor feathers." "I am not denying," replied the Crane, "that yours are far gayer than mine; but when it comes to flying I can soar into the clouds, whereas you are confined to the earth like any dunghill cock."
THE CAT AND THE BIRDS
A Cat heard that the Birds in an aviary were ailing. So he got himself up as a doctor, and, taking with him a set of the instruments proper to his profession, presented himself at the door, and inquired after the health of the Birds. "We shall do very well," they replied, without letting him in, "when we've seen the last of you."
A villain may disguise himself, but he will not deceive the wise.
THE SPENDTHRIFT AND THE SWALLOW
A Spendthrift, who had wasted his fortune, and had nothing left but the clothes in which he stood, saw a Swallow one fine day in early spring. Thinking that summer had come, and that he could now do without his coat, he went and sold it for what it would fetch. A change, however, took place in the weather, and there came a sharp frost which killed the unfortunate Swallow. When the Spendthrift saw its dead body he cried, "Miserable bird! Thanks to you I am perishing of cold myself."
One swallow does not make summer.
THE OLD WOMAN AND THE DOCTOR
An Old Woman became almost totally blind from a disease of the eyes, and, after consulting a Doctor, made an agreement with him in the presence of witnesses that she should pay him a high fee if he cured her, while if he failed he was to receive nothing. The Doctor accordingly prescribed a course of treatment, and every time he paid her a visit he took away with him some article out of the house, until at last, when he visited her for the last time, and the cure was complete, there was nothing left. When the Old Woman saw that the house was empty she refused to pay him his fee; and, after repeated refusals on her part, he sued her before the magistrates for payment of her debt. On being brought into court she was ready with her defence. "The claimant," said she, "has stated the facts about our agreement correctly. I undertook to pay him a fee if he cured me, and he, on his part, promised to charge nothing if he failed. Now, he says I am cured; but I say that I am blinder than ever, and I can prove what I say. When my eyes were bad I could at any rate see well enough to be aware that my house contained a certain amount of furniture and other things; but now, when according to him I am cured, I am entirely unable to see anything there at all."
THE MOON AND HER MOTHER
The Moon once begged her Mother to make her a gown. "How can I?" replied she; "there's no fitting your figure. At one time you're a New Moon, and at another you're a Full Moon; and between whiles you're neither one nor the other."
MERCURY AND THE WOODMAN
A Woodman was felling a tree on the bank of a river, when his axe, glancing off the trunk, flew out of his hands and fell into the water. As he stood by the water's edge lamenting his loss, Mercury appeared and asked him the reason for his grief; and on learning what had happened, out of pity for his distress he dived into the river and, bringing up a golden axe, asked him if that was the one he had lost. The Woodman replied that it was not, and Mercury then dived a second time, and, bringing up a silver axe, asked if that was his. "No, that is not mine either," said the Woodman. Once more Mercury dived into the river, and brought up the missing axe. The Woodman was overjoyed at recovering his property, and thanked his benefactor warmly; and the latter was so pleased with his honesty that he made him a present of the other two axes. When the Woodman told the story to his companions, one of these was filled with envy of his good fortune and determined to try his luck for himself. So he went and began to fell a tree at the edge of the river, and presently contrived to let his axe drop into the water. Mercury appeared as before, and, on learning that his axe had fallen in, he dived and brought up a golden axe, as he had done on the previous occasion. Without waiting to be asked whether it was his or not the fellow cried, "That's mine, that's mine," and stretched out his hand eagerly for the prize: but Mercury was so disgusted at his dishonesty that he not only declined to give him the golden axe, but also refused to recover for him the one he had let fall into the stream.
Honesty is the best policy.
THE ASS, THE FOX, AND THE LION
An Ass and a Fox went into partnership and sallied out to forage for food together. They hadn't gone far before they saw a Lion coming their way, at which they were both dreadfully frightened. But the Fox thought he saw a way of saving his own skin, and went boldly up to the Lion and whispered in his ear, "I'll manage that you shall get hold of the Ass without the trouble of stalking him, if you'll promise to let me go free." The Lion agreed to this, and the Fox then rejoined his companion and contrived before long to lead him by a hidden pit, which some hunter had dug as a trap for wild animals, and into which he fell. When the Lion saw that the Ass was safely caught and couldn't get away, it was to the Fox that he first turned his attention, and he soon finished him off, and then at his leisure proceeded to feast upon the Ass.
Betray a friend, and you'll often find you have ruined yourself.
THE LION AND THE MOUSE
A Lion asleep in his lair was waked up by a Mouse running over his face. Losing his temper he seized it with his paw and was about to kill it. The Mouse, terrified, piteously entreated him to spare its life. "Please let me go," it cried, "and one day I will repay you for your kindness." The idea of so insignificant a creature ever being able to do anything for him amused the Lion so much that he laughed aloud, and good-humouredly let it go. But the Mouse's chance came, after all. One day the Lion got entangled in a net which had been spread for game by some hunters, and the Mouse heard and recognised his roars of anger and ran to the spot. Without more ado it set to work to gnaw the ropes with its teeth, and succeeded before long in setting the Lion free. "There!" said the Mouse, "you laughed at me when I promised I would repay you: but now you see, even a Mouse can help a Lion."
THE CROW AND THE PITCHER
A thirsty Crow found a Pitcher with some water in it, but so little was there that, try as she might, she could not reach it with her beak, and it seemed as though she would die of thirst within sight of the remedy. At last she hit upon a clever plan. She began dropping pebbles into the Pitcher, and with each pebble the water rose a little higher until at last it reached the brim, and the knowing bird was enabled to quench her thirst.
Necessity is the mother of invention.
THE BOYS AND THE FROGS
Some mischievous Boys were playing on the edge of a pond, and, catching sight of some Frogs swimming about in the shallow water, they began to amuse themselves by pelting them with stones, and they killed several of them. At last one of the Frogs put his head out of the water and said, "Oh, stop! stop! I beg of you: what is sport to you is death to us."
THE NORTH WIND AND THE SUN
A dispute arose between the North Wind and the Sun, each claiming that he was stronger than the other. At last they agreed to try their powers upon a traveller, to see which could soonest strip him of his cloak. The North Wind had the first try; and, gathering up all his force for the attack, he came whirling furiously down upon the man, and caught up his cloak as though he would wrest it from him by one single effort: but the harder he blew, the more closely the man wrapped it round himself. Then came the turn of the Sun. At first he beamed gently upon the traveller, who soon unclasped his cloak and walked on with it hanging loosely about his shoulders: then he shone forth in his full strength, and the man, before he had gone many steps, was glad to throw his cloak right off and complete his journey more lightly clad.
Persuasion is better than force
THE MISTRESS AND HER SERVANTS
A Widow, thrifty and industrious, had two servants, whom she kept pretty hard at work. They were not allowed to lie long abed in the mornings, but the old lady had them up and doing as soon as the cock crew. They disliked intensely having to get up at such an hour, especially in winter-time: and they thought that if it were not for the cock waking up their Mistress so horribly early, they could sleep longer. So they caught it and wrung its neck. But they weren't prepared for the consequences. For what happened was that their Mistress, not hearing the cock crow as usual, waked them up earlier than ever, and set them to work in the middle of the night.
THE GOODS AND THE ILLS
There was a time in the youth of the world when Goods and Ills entered equally into the concerns of men, so that the Goods did not prevail to make them altogether blessed, nor the Ills to make them wholly miserable. But owing to the foolishness of mankind the Ills multiplied greatly in number and increased in strength, until it seemed as though they would deprive the Goods of all share in human affairs, and banish them from the earth. The latter, therefore, betook themselves to heaven and complained to Jupiter of the treatment they had received, at the same time praying him to grant them protection from the Ills, and to advise them concerning the manner of their intercourse with men. Jupiter granted their request for protection, and decreed that for the future they should not go among men openly in a body, and so be liable to attack from the hostile Ills, but singly and unobserved, and at infrequent and unexpected intervals. Hence it is that the earth is full of Ills, for they come and go as they please and are never far away; while Goods, alas! come one by one only, and have to travel all the way from heaven, so that they are very seldom seen.
THE HARES AND THE FROGS
The Hares once gathered together and lamented the unhappiness of their lot, exposed as they were to dangers on all sides and lacking the strength and the courage to hold their own. Men, dogs, birds and beasts of prey were all their enemies, and killed and devoured them daily: and sooner than endure such persecution any longer, they one and all determined to end their miserable lives. Thus resolved and desperate, they rushed in a body towards a neighbouring pool, intending to drown themselves. On the bank were sitting a number of Frogs, who, when they heard the noise of the Hares as they ran, with one accord leaped into the water and hid themselves in the depths. Then one of the older Hares who was wiser than the rest cried out to his companions, "Stop, my friends, take heart; don't let us destroy ourselves after all: see, here are creatures who are afraid of us, and who must, therefore, be still more timid than ourselves."
THE FOX AND THE STORK
A Fox invited a Stork to dinner, at which the only fare provided was a large flat dish of soup. The Fox lapped it up with great relish, but the Stork with her long bill tried in vain to partake of the savoury broth. Her evident distress caused the sly Fox much amusement. But not long after the Stork invited him in turn, and set before him a pitcher with a long and narrow neck, into which she could get her bill with ease. Thus, while she enjoyed her dinner, the Fox sat by hungry and helpless, for it was impossible for him to reach the tempting contents of the vessel.
THE WOLF IN SHEEP'S CLOTHING
A Wolf resolved to disguise himself in order that he might prey upon a flock of sheep without fear of detection. So he clothed himself in a sheepskin, and slipped among the sheep when they were out at pasture. He completely deceived the shepherd, and when the flock was penned for the night he was shut in with the rest. But that very night as it happened, the shepherd, requiring a supply of mutton for the table, laid hands on the Wolf in mistake for a Sheep, and killed him with his knife on the spot.
THE STAG IN THE OX-STALL
A Stag, chased from his lair by the hounds, took refuge in a farmyard, and, entering a stable where a number of oxen were stalled, thrust himself under a pile of hay in a vacant stall, where he lay concealed, all but the tips of his horns. Presently one of the Oxen said to him, "What has induced you to come in here? Aren't you aware of the risk you are running of being captured by the herdsmen?" To which he replied, "Pray let me stay for the present. When night comes I shall easily escape under cover of the dark." In the course of the afternoon more than one of the farm-hands came in, to attend to the wants of the cattle, but not one of them noticed the presence of the Stag, who accordingly began to congratulate himself on his escape and to express his gratitude to the Oxen. "We wish you well," said the one who had spoken before, "but you are not out of danger yet. If the master comes, you will certainly be found out, for nothing ever escapes his keen eyes." Presently, sure enough, in he came, and made a great to-do about the way the Oxen were kept. "The beasts are starving," he cried; "here, give them more hay, and put plenty of litter under them." As he spoke, he seized an armful himself from the pile where the Stag lay concealed, and at once detected him. Calling his men, he had him seized at once and killed for the table.
THE MILKMAID AND HER PAIL
A farmer's daughter had been out to milk the cows, and was returning to the dairy carrying her pail of milk upon her head. As she walked along, she fell a-musing after this fashion: "The milk in this pail will provide me with cream, which I will make into butter and take to market to sell. With the money I will buy a number of eggs, and these, when hatched, will produce chickens, and by and by I shall have quite a large poultry-yard. Then I shall sell some of my fowls, and with the money which they will bring in I will buy myself a new gown, which I shall wear when I go to the fair; and all the young fellows will admire it, and come and make love to me, but I shall toss my head and have nothing to say to them." Forgetting all about the pail, and suiting the action to the word, she tossed her head. Down went the pail, all the milk was spilled, and all her fine castles in the air vanished in a moment!
Do not count your chickens before they are hatched.
THE DOLPHINS, THE WHALES, AND THE SPRAT
The Dolphins quarrelled with the Whales, and before very long they began fighting with one another. The battle was very fierce, and had lasted some time without any sign of coming to an end, when a Sprat thought that perhaps he could stop it; so he stepped in and tried to persuade them to give up fighting and make friends. But one of the Dolphins said to him contemptuously, "We would rather go on fighting till we're all killed than be reconciled by a Sprat like you!"
THE FOX AND THE MONKEY
A Fox and a Monkey were on the road together, and fell into a dispute as to which of the two was the better born. They kept it up for some time, till they came to a place where the road passed through a cemetery full of monuments, when the Monkey stopped and looked about him and gave a great sigh. "Why do you sigh?" said the Fox. The Monkey pointed to the tombs and replied, "All the monuments that you see here were put up in honour of my forefathers, who in their day were eminent men." The Fox was speechless for a moment, but quickly recovering he said, "Oh! don't stop at any lie, sir; you're quite safe: I'm sure none of your ancestors will rise up and expose you."
Boasters brag most when they cannot be detected.
THE ASS AND THE LAP-DOG
There was once a man who had an Ass and a Lap-dog. The Ass was housed in the stable with plenty of oats and hay to eat and was as well off as an ass could be. The little Dog was made a great pet of by his master, who fondled him and often let him lie in his lap; and if he went out to dinner, he would bring back a tit-bit or two to give him when he ran to meet him on his return. The Ass had, it is true, a good deal of work to do, carting or grinding the corn, or carrying the burdens of the farm: and ere long he became very jealous, contrasting his own life of labour with the ease and idleness of the Lap-dog. At last one day he broke his halter, and frisking into the house just as his master sat down to dinner, he pranced and capered about, mimicking the frolics of the little favourite, upsetting the table and smashing the crockery with his clumsy efforts. Not content with that, he even tried to jump on his master's lap, as he had so often seen the dog allowed to do. At that the servants, seeing the danger their master was in, belaboured the silly Ass with sticks and cudgels, and drove him back to his stable half dead with his beating. "Alas!" he cried, "all this I have brought on myself. Why could I not be satisfied with my natural and honourable position, without wishing to imitate the ridiculous antics of that useless little Lap-dog?"
THE FIR-TREE AND THE BRAMBLE
A Fir-tree was boasting to a Bramble, and said, somewhat contemptuously, "You poor creature, you are of no use whatever. Now, look at me: I am useful for all sorts of things, particularly when men build houses; they can't do without me then." But the Bramble replied, "Ah, that's all very well: but you wait till they come with axes and saws to cut you down, and then you'll wish you were a Bramble and not a Fir."
Better poverty without a care than wealth with its many obligations.
THE FROGS' COMPLAINT AGAINST THE SUN
Once upon a time the Sun was about to take to himself a wife. The Frogs in terror all raised their voices to the skies, and Jupiter, disturbed by the noise, asked them what they were croaking about. They replied, "The Sun is bad enough even while he is single, drying up our marshes with his heat as he does. But what will become of us if he marries and begets other Suns?"
THE DOG, THE COCK, AND THE FOX
A Dog and a Cock became great friends, and agreed to travel together. At nightfall the Cock flew up into the branches of a tree to roost, while the Dog curled himself up inside the trunk, which was hollow. At break of day the Cock woke up and crew, as usual. A Fox heard, and, wishing to make a breakfast of him, came and stood under the tree and begged him to come down. "I should so like," said he, "to make the acquaintance of one who has such a beautiful voice." The Cock replied, "Would you just wake my porter who sleeps at the foot of the tree? He'll open the door and let you in." The Fox accordingly rapped on the trunk, when out rushed the Dog and tore him in pieces.
THE GNAT AND THE BULL
A Gnat alighted on one of the horns of a Bull, and remained sitting there for a considerable time. When it had rested sufficiently and was about to fly away, it said to the Bull, "Do you mind if I go now?" The Bull merely raised his eyes and remarked, without interest, "It's all one to me; I didn't notice when you came, and I shan't know when you go away."
We may often be of more consequence in our own eyes than in the eyes of our neighbours.
THE BEAR AND THE TRAVELLERS
Two Travellers were on the road together, when a Bear suddenly appeared on the scene. Before he observed them, one made for a tree at the side of the road, and climbed up into the branches and hid there. The other was not so nimble as his companion; and, as he could not escape, he threw himself on the ground and pretended to be dead. The Bear came up and sniffed all round him, but he kept perfectly still and held his breath: for they say that a bear will not touch a dead body. The Bear took him for a corpse, and went away. When the coast was clear, the Traveller in the tree came down, and asked the other what it was the Bear had whispered to him when he put his mouth to his ear. The other replied, "He told me never again to travel with a friend who deserts you at the first sign of danger."
Misfortune tests the sincerity of friendship.
THE SLAVE AND THE LION
A Slave ran away from his master, by whom he had been most cruelly treated, and, in order to avoid capture, betook himself into the desert. As he wandered about in search of food and shelter, he came to a cave, which he entered and found to be unoccupied. Really, however, it was a Lion's den, and almost immediately, to the horror of the wretched fugitive, the Lion himself appeared. The man gave himself up for lost: but, to his utter astonishment, the Lion, instead of springing upon him and devouring him, came and fawned upon him, at the same time whining and lifting up his paw. Observing it to be much swollen and inflamed, he examined it and found a large thorn embedded in the ball of the foot. He accordingly removed it and dressed the wound as well as he could: and in course of time it healed up completely. The Lion's gratitude was unbounded; he looked upon the man as his friend, and they shared the cave for some time together. A day came, however, when the Slave began to long for the society of his fellow-men, and he bade farewell to the Lion and returned to the town. Here he was presently recognised and carried off in chains to his former master, who resolved to make an example of him, and ordered that he should be thrown to the beasts at the next public spectacle in the theatre. On the fatal day the beasts were loosed into the arena, and among the rest a Lion of huge bulk and ferocious aspect; and then the wretched Slave was cast in among them. What was the amazement of the spectators, when the Lion after one glance bounded up to him and lay down at his feet with every expression of affection and delight! It was his old friend of the cave! The audience clamoured that the Slave's life should be spared: and the governor of the town, marvelling at such gratitude and fidelity in a beast, decreed that both should receive their liberty.
THE FLEA AND THE MAN
A Flea bit a Man, and bit him again, and again, till he could stand it no longer, but made a thorough search for it, and at last succeeded in catching it. Holding it between his finger and thumb, he said--or rather shouted, so angry was he--"Who are you, pray, you wretched little creature, that you make so free with my person?" The Flea, terrified, whimpered in a weak little voice, "Oh, sir! pray let me go; don't kill me! I am such a little thing that I can't do you much harm." But the Man laughed and said, "I am going to kill you now, at once: whatever is bad has got to be destroyed, no matter how slight the harm it does."
Do not waste your pity on a scamp.
THE BEE AND JUPITER
A Queen Bee from Hymettus flew up to Olympus with some fresh honey from the hive as a present to Jupiter, who was so pleased with the gift that he promised to give her anything she liked to ask for. She said she would be very grateful if he would give stings to the bees, to kill people who robbed them of their honey. Jupiter was greatly displeased with this request, for he loved mankind: but he had given his word, so he said that stings they should have. The stings he gave them, however, were of such a kind that whenever a bee stings a man the sting is left in the wound and the bee dies.
Evil wishes, like fowls, come home to roost.
THE OAK AND THE REEDS
An Oak that grew on the bank of a river was uprooted by a severe gale of wind, and thrown across the stream. It fell among some Reeds growing by the water, and said to them, "How is it that you, who are so frail and slender, have managed to weather the storm, whereas I, with all my strength, have been torn up by the roots and hurled into the river?" "You were stubborn," came the reply, "and fought against the storm, which proved stronger than you: but we bow and yield to every breeze, and thus the gale passed harmlessly over our heads."
THE BLIND MAN AND THE CUB
There was once a Blind Man who had so fine a sense of touch that, when any animal was put into his hands, he could tell what it was merely by the feel of it. One day the Cub of a Wolf was put into his hands, and he was asked what it was. He felt it for some time, and then said, "Indeed, I am not sure whether it is a Wolf's Cub or a Fox's: but this I know--it would never do to trust it in a sheepfold."
Evil tendencies are early shown.
THE BOY AND THE SNAILS
A Farmer's Boy went looking for Snails, and, when he had picked up both his hands full, he set about making a fire at which to roast them; for he meant to eat them. When it got well alight and the Snails began to feel the heat, they gradually withdrew more and more into their shells with the hissing noise they always make when they do so. When the Boy heard it, he said, "You abandoned creatures, how can you find heart to whistle when your houses are burning?"
THE APES AND THE TWO TRAVELLERS
Two men were travelling together, one of whom never spoke the truth, whereas the other never told a lie: and they came in the course of their travels to the land of Apes. The King of the Apes, hearing of their arrival, ordered them to be brought before him; and by way of impressing them with his magnificence, he received them sitting on a throne, while the Apes, his subjects, were ranged in long rows on either side of him. When the Travellers came into his presence he asked them what they thought of him as a King. The lying Traveller said, "Sire, every one must see that you are a most noble and mighty monarch." "And what do you think of my subjects?" continued the King. "They," said the Traveller, "are in every way worthy of their royal master." The Ape was so delighted with his answer that he gave him a very handsome present. The other Traveller thought that if his companion was rewarded so splendidly for telling a lie, he himself would certainly receive a still greater reward for telling the truth; so, when the Ape turned to him and said, "And what, sir, is your opinion?" he replied, "I think you are a very fine Ape, and all your subjects are fine Apes too." The King of the Apes was so enraged at his reply that he ordered him to be taken away and clawed to death.
THE ASS AND HIS BURDENS
A Pedlar who owned an Ass one day bought a quantity of salt, and loaded up his beast with as much as he could bear. On the way home the Ass stumbled as he was crossing a stream and fell into the water. The salt got thoroughly wetted and much of it melted and drained away, so that, when he got on his legs again, the Ass found his load had become much less heavy. His master, however, drove him back to town and bought more salt, which he added to what remained in the panniers, and started out again. No sooner had they reached a stream than the Ass lay down in it, and rose, as before, with a much lighter load. But his master detected the trick, and turning back once more, bought a large number of sponges, and piled them on the back of the Ass. When they came to the stream the Ass again lay down: but this time, as the sponges soaked up large quantities of water, he found, when he got up on his legs, that he had a bigger burden to carry than ever.
You may play a good card once too often.
THE SHEPHERD'S BOY AND THE WOLF
A Shepherd's Boy was tending his flock near a village, and thought it would be great fun to hoax the villagers by pretending that a Wolf was attacking the sheep: so he shouted out, "Wolf! wolf!" and when the people came running up he laughed at them for their pains. He did this more than once, and every time the villagers found they had been hoaxed, for there was no Wolf at all. At last a Wolf really did come, and the Boy cried, "Wolf! wolf!" as loud as he could: but the people were so used to hearing him call that they took no notice of his cries for help. And so the Wolf had it all his own way, and killed off sheep after sheep at his leisure.
You cannot believe a liar even when he tells the truth.
THE FOX AND THE GOAT
A Fox fell into a well and was unable to get out again. By and by a thirsty Goat came by, and seeing the Fox in the well asked him if the water was good. "Good?" said the Fox, "it's the best water I ever tasted in all my life. Come down and try it yourself." The Goat thought of nothing but the prospect of quenching his thirst, and jumped in at once. When he had had enough to drink, he looked about, like the Fox, for some way of getting out, but could find none. Presently the Fox said, "I have an idea. You stand on your hind legs, and plant your forelegs firmly against the side of the well, and then I'll climb on to your back, and, from there, by stepping on your horns, I can get out. And when I'm out, I'll help you out too." The Goat did as he was requested, and the Fox climbed on to his back and so out of the well; and then he coolly walked away. The Goat called loudly after him and reminded him of his promise to help him out: but the Fox merely turned and said, "If you had as much sense in your head as you have hair in your beard you wouldn't have got into the well without making certain that you could get out again."
Look before your leap.
THE FISHERMAN AND THE SPRAT
A Fisherman cast his net into the sea, and when he drew it up again it contained nothing but a single Sprat that begged to be put back into the water. "I'm only a little fish now," it said, "but I shall grow big one day, and then if you come and catch me again I shall be of some use to you." But the Fisherman replied, "Oh, no, I shall keep you now I've got you: if I put you back, should I ever see you again? Not likely!"
THE BOASTING TRAVELLER
A Man once went abroad on his travels, and when he came home he had wonderful tales to tell of the things he had done in foreign countries. Among other things, he said he had taken part in a jumping-match at Rhodes, and had done a wonderful jump which no one could beat. "Just go to Rhodes and ask them," he said; "every one will tell you it's true." But one of those who were listening said, "If you can jump as well as all that, we needn't go to Rhodes to prove it. Let's just imagine this is Rhodes for a minute: and now--jump!"
Deeds, not words.
THE CRAB AND HIS MOTHER
An Old Crab said to her son, "Why do you walk sideways like that, my son? You ought to walk straight." The Young Crab replied, "Show me how, dear mother, and I'll follow your example." The Old Crab tried, but tried in vain, and then saw how foolish she had been to find fault with her child.
Example is better than precept.
THE ASS AND HIS SHADOW
A certain man hired an Ass for a journey in summertime, and started out with the owner following behind to drive the beast. By and by, in the heat of the day, they stopped to rest, and the traveller wanted to lie down in the Ass's Shadow; but the owner, who himself wished to be out of the sun, wouldn't let him do that; for he said he had hired the Ass only, and not his Shadow: the other maintained that his bargain secured him complete control of the Ass for the time being. From words they came to blows; and while they were belabouring each other the Ass took to his heels and was soon out of sight.
THE FARMER AND HIS SONS
A Farmer, being at death's door, and desiring to impart to his Sons a secret of much moment, called them round him and said, "My sons, I am shortly about to die; I would have you know, therefore, that in my vineyard there lies a hidden treasure. Dig, and you will find it." As soon as their father was dead, the Sons took spade and fork and turned up the soil of the vineyard over and over again, in their search for the treasure which they supposed to lie buried there. They found none, however: but the vines, after so thorough a digging, produced a crop such as had never before been seen.
THE DOG AND THE COOK
A rich man once invited a number of his friends and acquaintances to a banquet. His dog thought it would be a good opportunity to invite another Dog, a friend of his; so he went to him and said, "My master is giving a feast: there'll be a fine spread, so come and dine with me to-night." The Dog thus invited came, and when he saw the preparations being made in the kitchen he said to himself, "My word, I'm in luck: I'll take care to eat enough to-night to last me two or three days." At the same time he wagged his tail briskly, by way of showing his friend how delighted he was to have been asked. But just then the Cook caught sight of him, and, in his annoyance at seeing a strange Dog in the kitchen, caught him up by the hind legs and threw him out of the window. He had a nasty fall, and limped away as quickly as he could, howling dismally. Presently some other dogs met him, and said, "Well, what sort of a dinner did you get?" To which he replied, "I had a splendid time: the wine was so good, and I drank so much of it, that I really don't remember how I got out of the house!"
Be shy of favours bestowed at the expense of others.
THE MONKEY AS KING
At a gathering of all the animals the Monkey danced and delighted them so much that they made him their King. The Fox, however, was very much disgusted at the promotion of the Monkey: so having one day found a trap with a piece of meat in it, he took the Monkey there and said to him, "Here is a dainty morsel I have found, sire; I did not take it myself, because I thought it ought to be reserved for you, our King. Will you be pleased to accept it?" The Monkey made at once for the meat and got caught in the trap. Then he bitterly reproached the Fox for leading him into danger; but the Fox only laughed and said, "O Monkey, you call yourself King of the Beasts and haven't more sense than to be taken in like that!"
THE THIEVES AND THE COCK
Some Thieves broke into a house, and found nothing worth taking except a Cock, which they seized and carried off with them. When they were preparing their supper, one of them caught up the Cock, and was about to wring his neck, when he cried out for mercy and said, "Pray do not kill me: you will find me a most useful bird, for I rouse honest men to their work in the morning by my crowing." But the Thief replied with some heat, "Yes, I know you do, making it still harder for us to get a livelihood. Into the pot you go!"
THE FARMER AND FORTUNE
A Farmer was ploughing one day on his farm when he turned up a pot of golden coins with his plough. He was overjoyed at his discovery, and from that time forth made an offering daily at the shrine of the Goddess of the Earth. Fortune was displeased at this, and came to him and said, "My man, why do you give Earth the credit for the gift which I bestowed upon you? You never thought of thanking me for your good luck; but should you be unlucky enough to lose what you have gained I know very well that I, Fortune, should then come in for all the blame."
Show gratitude where gratitude is due.
JUPITER AND THE MONKEY
Jupiter issued a proclamation to all the beasts, and offered a prize to the one who, in his judgment, produced the most beautiful offspring. Among the rest came the Monkey, carrying a baby monkey in her arms, a hairless, flat-nosed little fright. When they saw it, the gods all burst into peal on peal of laughter; but the Monkey hugged her little one to her, and said, "Jupiter may give the prize to whomsoever he likes: but I shall always think my baby the most beautiful of them all."
FATHER AND SONS
A certain man had several Sons who were always quarrelling with one another, and, try as he might, he could not get them to live together in harmony. So he determined to convince them of their folly by the following means. Bidding them fetch a bundle of sticks, he invited each in turn to break it across his knee. All tried and all failed: and then he undid the bundle, and handed them the sticks one by one, when they had no difficulty at all in breaking them. "There, my boys," said he, "united you will be more than a match for your enemies: but if you quarrel and separate, your weakness will put you at the mercy of those who attack you."
Union is strength.
THE LAMP
A Lamp, well filled with oil, burned with a clear and steady light, and began to swell with pride and boast that it shone more brightly than the sun himself. Just then a puff of wind came and blew it out. Some one struck a match and lit it again, and said, "You just keep alight, and never mind the sun. Why, even the stars never need to be relit as you had to be just now."
THE OWL AND THE BIRDS
The Owl is a very wise bird; and once, long ago, when the first oak sprouted in the forest, she called all the other Birds together and said to them, "You see this tiny tree? If you take my advice, you will destroy it now when it is small: for when it grows big, the mistletoe will appear upon it, from which birdlime will be prepared for your destruction." Again, when the first flax was sown, she said to them, "Go and eat up that seed, for it is the seed of the flax, out of which men will one day make nets to catch you." Once more, when she saw the first archer, she warned the Birds that he was their deadly enemy, who would wing his arrows with their own feathers and shoot them. But they took no notice of what she said: in fact, they thought she was rather mad, and laughed at her. When, however, everything turned out as she had foretold, they changed their minds and conceived a great respect for her wisdom. Hence, whenever she appears, the Birds attend upon her in the hope of hearing something that may be for their good. She, however, gives them advice no longer, but sits moping and pondering on the folly of her kind.
THE ASS IN THE LION'S SKIN
An Ass found a Lion's Skin, and dressed himself up in it. Then he went about frightening every one he met, for they all took him to be a lion, men and beasts alike, and took to their heels when they saw him coming. Elated by the success of his trick, he loudly brayed in triumph. The Fox heard him, and recognised him at once for the Ass he was, and said to him, "Oho, my friend, it's you, is it? I, too, should have been afraid if I hadn't heard your voice."
THE SHE-GOATS AND THEIR BEARDS
Jupiter granted beards to the She-Goats at their own request, much to the disgust of the he-Goats, who considered this to be an unwarrantable invasion of their rights and dignities. So they sent a deputation to him to protest against his action. He, however, advised them not to raise any objections. "What's in a tuft of hair?" said he. "Let them have it if they want it. They can never be a match for you in strength."
THE OLD LION
A Lion, enfeebled by age and no longer able to procure food for himself by force, determined to do so by cunning. Betaking himself to a cave, he lay down inside and feigned to be sick: and whenever any of the other animals entered to inquire after his health, he sprang upon them and devoured them. Many lost their lives in this way, till one day a Fox called at the cave, and, having a suspicion of the truth, addressed the Lion from outside instead of going in, and asked him how he did. He replied that he was in a very bad way: "But," said he, "why do you stand outside? Pray come in." "I should have done so," answered the Fox, "if I hadn't noticed that all the footprints point towards the cave and none the other way."
THE BOY BATHING
A Boy was bathing in a river and got out of his depth, and was in great danger of being drowned. A man who was passing along a road heard his cries for help, and went to the riverside and began to scold him for being so careless as to get into deep water, but made no attempt to help him. "Oh, sir," cried the Boy, "please help me first and scold me afterwards."
Give assistance, not advice, in a crisis.
THE QUACK FROG
Once upon a time a Frog came forth from his home in the marshes and proclaimed to all the world that he was a learned physician, skilled in drugs and able to cure all diseases. Among the crowd was a Fox, who called out, "You a doctor! Why, how can you set up to heal others when you cannot even cure your own lame legs and blotched and wrinkled skin?"
Physician, heal thyself.
THE SWOLLEN FOX
A hungry Fox found in a hollow tree a quantity of bread and meat, which some shepherds had placed there against their return. Delighted with his find he slipped in through the narrow aperture and greedily devoured it all. But when he tried to get out again he found himself so swollen after his big meal that he could not squeeze through the hole, and fell to whining and groaning over his misfortune. Another Fox, happening to pass that way, came and asked him what the matter was; and, on learning the state of the case, said, "Well, my friend, I see nothing for it but for you to stay where you are till you shrink to your former size; you'll get out then easily enough."
THE MOUSE, THE FROG, AND THE HAWK
A Mouse and a Frog struck up a friendship; they were not well mated, for the Mouse lived entirely on land, while the Frog was equally at home on land or in the water. In order that they might never be separated, the Frog tied himself and the Mouse together by the leg with a piece of thread. As long as they kept on dry land all went fairly well; but, coming to the edge of a pool, the Frog jumped in, taking the Mouse with him, and began swimming about and croaking with pleasure. The unhappy Mouse, however, was soon drowned, and floated about on the surface in the wake of the Frog. There he was spied by a Hawk, who pounced down on him and seized him in his talons. The Frog was unable to loose the knot which bound him to the Mouse, and thus was carried off along with him and eaten by the Hawk.
THE BOY AND THE NETTLES
A Boy was gathering berries from a hedge when his hand was stung by a Nettle. Smarting with the pain, he ran to tell his mother, and said to her between his sobs, "I only touched it ever so lightly, mother." "That's just why you got stung, my son," she said; "if you had grasped it firmly, it wouldn't have hurt you in the least."
THE PEASANT AND THE APPLE-TREE
A Peasant had an Apple-tree growing in his garden, which bore no fruit, but merely served to provide a shelter from the heat for the sparrows and grasshoppers which sat and chirped in its branches. Disappointed at its barrenness he determined to cut it down, and went and fetched his axe for the purpose. But when the sparrows and the grasshoppers saw what he was about to do, they begged him to spare it, and said to him, "If you destroy the tree we shall have to seek shelter elsewhere, and you will no longer have our merry chirping to enliven your work in the garden." He, however, refused to listen to them, and set to work with a will to cut through the trunk. A few strokes showed that it was hollow inside and contained a swarm of bees and a large store of honey. Delighted with his find he threw down his axe, saying, "The old tree is worth keeping after all."
Utility is most men's test of worth.
THE JACKDAW AND THE PIGEONS
A Jackdaw, watching some Pigeons in a farmyard, was filled with envy when he saw how well they were fed, and determined to disguise himself as one of them, in order to secure a share of the good things they enjoyed. So he painted himself white from head to foot and joined the flock; and, so long as he was silent, they never suspected that he was not a pigeon like themselves. But one day he was unwise enough to start chattering, when they at once saw through his disguise and pecked him so unmercifully that he was glad to escape and join his own kind again. But the other jackdaws did not recognise him in his white dress, and would not let him feed with them, but drove him away: and so he became a homeless wanderer for his pains.
JUPITER AND THE TORTOISE
Jupiter was about to marry a wife, and determined to celebrate the event by inviting all the animals to a banquet. They all came except the Tortoise, who did not put in an appearance, much to Jupiter's surprise. So when he next saw the Tortoise he asked him why he had not been at the banquet. "I don't care for going out," said the Tortoise; "there's no place like home." Jupiter was so much annoyed by this reply that he decreed that from that time forth the Tortoise should carry his house upon his back, and never be able to get away from home even if he wished to.
THE DOG IN THE MANGER
A Dog was lying in a Manger on the hay which had been put there for the cattle, and when they came and tried to eat, he growled and snapped at them and wouldn't let them get at their food. "What a selfish beast," said one of them to his companions; "he can't eat himself and yet he won't let those eat who can."
THE TWO BAGS
Every man carries Two Bags about with him, one in front and one behind, and both are packed full of faults. The Bag in front contains his neighbours' faults, the one behind his own. Hence it is that men do not see their own faults, but never fail to see those of others.
THE OXEN AND THE AXLETREES
A pair of Oxen were drawing a heavily loaded waggon along the highway, and, as they tugged and strained at the yoke, the Axletrees creaked and groaned terribly. This was too much for the Oxen, who turned round indignantly and said, "Hullo, you there! Why do you make such a noise when we do all the work?"
They complain most who suffer least.
THE BOY AND THE FILBERTS
A Boy put his hand into a jar of Filberts, and grasped as many as his fist could possibly hold. But when he tried to pull it out again, he found he couldn't do so, for the neck of the jar was too small to allow of the passage of so large a handful. Unwilling to lose his nuts but unable to withdraw his hand, he burst into tears. A bystander, who saw where the trouble lay, said to him, "Come, my boy, don't be so greedy: be content with half the amount, and you'll be able to get your hand out without difficulty."
Do not attempt too much at once.
THE FROGS ASKING FOR A KING
Time was when the Frogs were discontented because they had no one to rule over them: so they sent a deputation to Jupiter to ask him to give them a King. Jupiter, despising the folly of their request, cast a log into the pool where they lived, and said that that should be their King. The Frogs were terrified at first by the splash, and scuttled away into the deepest parts of the pool; but by and by, when they saw that the log remained motionless, one by one they ventured to the surface again, and before long, growing bolder, they began to feel such contempt for it that they even took to sitting upon it. Thinking that a King of that sort was an insult to their dignity, they sent to Jupiter a second time, and begged him to take away the sluggish King he had given them, and to give them another and a better one. Jupiter, annoyed at being pestered in this way, sent a Stork to rule over them, who no sooner arrived among them than he began to catch and eat the Frogs as fast as he could.
THE OLIVE-TREE AND THE FIG-TREE
An Olive-tree taunted a Fig-tree with the loss of her leaves at a certain season of the year. "You," she said, "lose your leaves every autumn, and are bare till the spring: whereas I, as you see, remain green and flourishing all the year round." Soon afterwards there came a heavy fall of snow, which settled on the leaves of the Olive so that she bent and broke under the weight; but the flakes fell harmlessly through the bare branches of the Fig, which survived to bear many another crop.
THE LION AND THE BOAR
One hot and thirsty day in the height of summer a Lion and a Boar came down to a little spring at the same moment to drink. In a trice they were quarrelling as to who should drink first. The quarrel soon became a fight and they attacked one another with the utmost fury. Presently, stopping for a moment to take breath, they saw some vultures seated on a rock above evidently waiting for one of them to be killed, when they would fly down and feed upon the carcase. The sight sobered them at once, and they made up their quarrel, saying, "We had much better be friends than fight and be eaten by vultures."
THE WALNUT-TREE
A Walnut-tree, which grew by the roadside, bore every year a plentiful crop of nuts. Every one who passed by pelted its branches with sticks and stones, in order to bring down the fruit, and the tree suffered severely. "It is hard," it cried, "that the very persons who enjoy my fruit should thus reward me with insults and blows."
THE MAN AND THE LION
A Man and a Lion were companions on a journey, and in the course of conversation they began to boast about their prowess, and each claimed to be superior to the other in strength and courage. They were still arguing with some heat when they came to a cross-road where there was a statue of a Man strangling a Lion. "There!" said the Man triumphantly, "look at that! Doesn't that prove to you that we are stronger than you?" "Not so fast, my friend," said the Lion: "that is only your view of the case. If we Lions could make statues, you may be sure that in most of them you would see the Man underneath."
There are two sides to every question.
THE TORTOISE AND THE EAGLE
A Tortoise, discontented with his lowly life, and envious of the birds he saw disporting themselves in the air, begged an Eagle to teach him to fly. The Eagle protested that it was idle for him to try, as nature had not provided him with wings; but the Tortoise pressed him with entreaties and promises of treasure, insisting that it could only be a question of learning the craft of the air. So at length the Eagle consented to do the best he could for him, and picked him up in his talons. Soaring with him to a great height in the sky he then let him go, and the wretched Tortoise fell headlong and was dashed to pieces on a rock.
THE KID ON THE HOUSETOP
A Kid climbed up on to the roof of an outhouse, attracted by the grass and other things that grew in the thatch; and as he stood there browsing away, he caught sight of a Wolf passing below, and jeered at him because he couldn't reach him. The Wolf only looked up and said, "I hear you, my young friend; but it is not you who mock me, but the roof on which you are standing."
THE FOX WITHOUT A TAIL
A fox once fell into a trap, and after a struggle managed to get free, but with the loss of his brush. He was then so much ashamed of his appearance that he thought life was not worth living unless he could persuade the other Foxes to part with their tails also, and thus divert attention from his own loss. So he called a meeting of all the Foxes, and advised them to cut off their tails: "They're ugly things anyhow," he said, "and besides they're heavy, and it's tiresome to be always carrying them about with you." But one of the other Foxes said, "My friend, if you hadn't lost your own tail, you wouldn't be so keen on getting us to cut off ours."
THE VAIN JACKDAW
Jupiter announced that he intended to appoint a king over the birds, and named a day on which they were to appear before his throne, when he would select the most beautiful of them all to be their ruler. Wishing to look their best on the occasion they repaired to the banks of a stream, where they busied themselves in washing and preening their feathers. The Jackdaw was there along with the rest, and realised that, with his ugly plumage, he would have no chance of being chosen as he was: so he waited till they were all gone, and then picked up the most gaudy of the feathers they had dropped, and fastened them about his own body, with the result that he looked gayer than any of them. When the appointed day came, the birds assembled before Jupiter's throne; and, after passing them in review, he was about to make the Jackdaw king, when all the rest set upon the king-elect, stripped him of his borrowed plumes, and exposed him for the Jackdaw that he was.
THE TRAVELLER AND HIS DOG
A Traveller was about to start on a journey, and said to his Dog, who was stretching himself by the door, "Come, what are you yawning for? Hurry up and get ready: I mean you to go with me." But the Dog merely wagged his tail and said quietly, "I'm ready, master: it's you I'm waiting for."
THE SHIPWRECKED MAN AND THE SEA
A Shipwrecked Man cast up on the beach fell asleep after his struggle with the waves. When he woke up, he bitterly reproached the Sea for its treachery in enticing men with its smooth and smiling surface, and then, when they were well embarked, turning in fury upon them and sending both ship and sailors to destruction. The Sea arose in the form of a woman, and replied, "Lay not the blame on me, O sailor, but on the Winds. By nature I am as calm and safe as the land itself: but the Winds fall upon me with their gusts and gales, and lash me into a fury that is not natural to me."
THE WILD BOAR AND THE FOX
A Wild Boar was engaged in whetting his tusks upon the trunk of a tree in the forest when a Fox came by and, seeing what he was at, said to him, "Why are you doing that, pray? The huntsmen are not out to-day, and there are no other dangers at hand that I can see." "True, my friend," replied the Boar, "but the instant my life is in danger I shall need to use my tusks. There'll be no time to sharpen them then."
MERCURY AND THE SCULPTOR
Mercury was very anxious to know in what estimation he was held by mankind; so he disguised himself as a man and walked into a Sculptor's studio, where there were a number of statues finished and ready for sale. Seeing a statue of Jupiter among the rest, he inquired the price of it. "A crown," said the Sculptor. "Is that all?" said he, laughing; "and" (pointing to one of Juno) "how much is that one?" "That," was the reply, "is half a crown." "And how much might you be wanting for that one over there, now?" he continued, pointing to a statue of himself. "That one?" said the Sculptor; "Oh, I'll throw him in for nothing if you'll buy the other two."
THE FAWN AND HIS MOTHER
A Hind said to her Fawn, who was now well grown and strong, "My son, Nature has given you a powerful body and a stout pair of horns, and I can't think why you are such a coward as to run away from the hounds." Just then they both heard the sound of a pack in full cry, but at a considerable distance. "You stay where you are," said the Hind; "never mind me": and with that she ran off as fast as her legs could carry her.
THE FOX AND THE LION
A Fox who had never seen a Lion one day met one, and was so terrified at the sight of him that he was ready to die with fear. After a time he met him again, and was still rather frightened, but not nearly so much as he had been when he met him first. But when he saw him for the third time he was so far from being afraid that he went up to him and began to talk to him as if he had known him all his life.
THE EAGLE AND HIS CAPTOR
A Man once caught an Eagle, and after clipping his wings turned him loose among the fowls in his hen-house, where he moped in a corner, looking very dejected and forlorn. After a while his Captor was glad enough to sell him to a neighbour, who took him home and let his wings grow again. As soon as he had recovered the use of them, the Eagle flew out and caught a hare, which he brought home and presented to his benefactor. A fox observed this, and said to the Eagle, "Don't waste your gifts on him! Go and give them to the man who first caught you; make _him_ your friend, and then perhaps he won't catch you and clip your wings a second time."
THE BLACKSMITH AND HIS DOG
A Blacksmith had a little Dog, which used to sleep when his master was at work, but was very wide awake indeed when it was time for meals. One day his master pretended to be disgusted at this, and when he had thrown him a bone as usual, he said, "What on earth is the good of a lazy cur like you? When I am hammering away at my anvil, you just curl up and go to sleep: but no sooner do I stop for a mouthful of food than you wake up and wag your tail to be fed."
Those who will not work deserve to starve.
THE STAG AT THE POOL
A thirsty Stag went down to a pool to drink. As he bent over the surface he saw his own reflection in the water, and was struck with admiration for his fine spreading antlers, but at the same time he felt nothing but disgust for the weakness and slenderness of his legs. While he stood there looking at himself, he was seen and attacked by a Lion; but in the chase which ensued, he soon drew away from his pursuer, and kept his lead as long as the ground over which he ran was open and free of trees. But coming presently to a wood, he was caught by his antlers in the branches, and fell a victim to the teeth and claws of his enemy. "Woe is me!" he cried with his last breath; "I despised my legs, which might have saved my life: but I gloried in my horns, and they have proved my ruin."
What is worth most is often valued least.
THE DOG AND THE SHADOW
A Dog was crossing a plank bridge over a stream with a piece of meat in his mouth, when he happened to see his own reflection in the water. He thought it was another dog with a piece of meat twice as big; so he let go his own, and flew at the other dog to get the larger piece. But, of course, all that happened was that he got neither; for one was only a shadow, and the other was carried away by the current.
MERCURY AND THE TRADESMEN
When Jupiter was creating man, he told Mercury to make an infusion of lies, and to add a little of it to the other ingredients which went to the making of the Tradesmen. Mercury did so, and introduced an equal amount into each in turn--the tallow-chandler, and the greengrocer, and the haberdasher, and all, till he came to the horse-dealer, who was last on the list, when, finding that he had a quantity of the infusion still left, he put it all into him. This is why all Tradesmen lie more or less, but they none of them lie like a horse-dealer.
THE MICE AND THE WEASELS
There was war between the Mice and the Weasels, in which the Mice always got the worst of it, numbers of them being killed and eaten by the Weasels. So they called a council of war, in which an old Mouse got up and said, "It's no wonder we are always beaten, for we have no generals to plan our battles and direct our movements in the field." Acting on his advice, they chose the biggest Mice to be their leaders, and these, in order to be distinguished from the rank and file, provided themselves with helmets bearing large plumes of straw. They then led out the Mice to battle, confident of victory: but they were defeated as usual, and were soon scampering as fast as they could to their holes. All made their way to safety without difficulty except the leaders, who were so hampered by the badges of their rank that they could not get into their holes, and fell easy victims to their pursuers.
Greatness carries its own penalties.
THE PEACOCK AND JUNO
The Peacock was greatly discontented because he had not a beautiful voice like the nightingale, and he went and complained to Juno about it. "The nightingale's song," said he, "is the envy of all the birds; but whenever I utter a sound I become a laughing-stock." The goddess tried to console him by saying, "You have not, it is true, the power of song, but then you far excel all the rest in beauty: your neck flashes like the emerald and your splendid tail is a marvel of gorgeous colour." But the Peacock was not appeased. "What is the use," said he, "of being beautiful, with a voice like mine?" Then Juno replied, with a shade of sternness in her tones, "Fate has allotted to all their destined gifts: to yourself beauty, to the eagle strength, to the nightingale song, and so on to all the rest in their degree; but you alone are dissatisfied with your portion. Make, then, no more complaints. For, if your present wish were granted, you would quickly find cause for fresh discontent."
THE BEAR AND THE FOX
A Bear was once bragging about his generous feelings, and saying how refined he was compared with other animals. (There is, in fact, a tradition that a Bear will never touch a dead body.) A Fox, who heard him talking in this strain, smiled and said, "My friend, when you are hungry, I only wish you _would_ confine your attention to the dead and leave the living alone."
A hypocrite deceives no one but himself.
THE ASS AND THE OLD PEASANT
An old Peasant was sitting in a meadow watching his Ass, which was grazing close by, when all of a sudden he caught sight of armed men stealthily approaching. He jumped up in a moment, and begged the Ass to fly with him as fast as he could, "Or else," said he, "we shall both be captured by the enemy." But the Ass just looked round lazily and said, "And if so, do you think they'll make me carry heavier loads than I have to now?" "No," said his master. "Oh, well, then," said the Ass, "I don't mind if they do take me, for I shan't be any worse off."
THE OX AND THE FROG
Two little Frogs were playing about at the edge of a pool when an Ox came down to the water to drink, and by accident trod on one of them and crushed the life out of him. When the old Frog missed him, she asked his brother where he was. "He is dead, mother," said the little Frog; "an enormous big creature with four legs came to our pool this morning and trampled him down in the mud." "Enormous, was he? Was he as big as this?" said the Frog, puffing herself out to look as big as possible. "Oh! yes, _much_ bigger," was the answer. The Frog puffed herself out still more. "Was he as big as this?" said she. "Oh! yes, yes, mother, _MUCH_ bigger," said the little Frog. And yet again she puffed and puffed herself out till she was almost as round as a ball. "As big as...?" she began--but then she burst.
THE MAN AND THE IMAGE
A poor Man had a wooden Image of a god, to which he used to pray daily for riches. He did this for a long time, but remained as poor as ever, till one day he caught up the Image in disgust and hurled it with all his strength against the wall. The force of the blow split open the head and a quantity of gold coins fell out upon the floor. The Man gathered them up greedily, and said, "O you old fraud, you! When I honoured you, you did me no good whatever: but no sooner do I treat you to insults and violence than you make a rich man of me!"
HERCULES AND THE WAGGONER
A Waggoner was driving his team along a muddy lane with a full load behind them, when the wheels of his waggon sank so deep in the mire that no efforts of his horses could move them. As he stood there, looking helplessly on, and calling loudly at intervals upon Hercules for assistance, the god himself appeared, and said to him, "Put your shoulder to the wheel, man, and goad on your horses, and then you may call on Hercules to assist you. If you won't lift a finger to help yourself, you can't expect Hercules or any one else to come to your aid."
Heaven helps those who help themselves.
THE POMEGRANATE, THE APPLE-TREE, AND THE BRAMBLE
A Pomegranate and an Apple-tree were disputing about the quality of their fruits, and each claimed that its own was the better of the two. High words passed between them, and a violent quarrel was imminent, when a Bramble impudently poked its head out of a neighbouring hedge and said, "There, that's enough, my friends; don't let us quarrel."
THE LION, THE BEAR, AND THE FOX
A Lion and a Bear were fighting for possession of a kid, which they had both seized at the same moment. The battle was long and fierce, and at length both of them were exhausted, and lay upon the ground severely wounded and gasping for breath. A Fox had all the time been prowling round and watching the fight: and when he saw the combatants lying there too weak to move, he slipped in and seized the kid, and ran off with it. They looked on helplessly, and one said to the other, "Here we've been mauling each other all this while, and no one the better for it except the Fox!"
THE BLACKAMOOR
A Man once bought an Ethiopian slave, who had a black skin like all Ethiopians; but his new master thought his colour was due to his late owner's having neglected him, and that all he wanted was a good scrubbing. So he set to work with plenty of soap and hot water, and rubbed away at him with a will, but all to no purpose: his skin remained as black as ever, while the poor wretch all but died from the cold he caught.
THE TWO SOLDIERS AND THE ROBBER
Two Soldiers travelling together were set upon by a Robber. One of them ran away, but the other stood his ground, and laid about him so lustily with his sword that the Robber was fain to fly and leave him in peace. When the coast was clear the timid one ran back, and, flourishing his weapon, cried in a threatening voice, "Where is he? Let me get at him, and I'll soon let him know whom he's got to deal with." But the other replied, "You are a little late, my friend: I only wish you had backed me up just now, even if you had done no more than speak, for I should have been encouraged, believing your words to be true. As it is, calm yourself, and put up your sword: there is no further use for it. You may delude others into thinking you're as brave as a lion: but I know that, at the first sign of danger, you run away like a hare."
THE LION AND THE WILD ASS
A Lion and a Wild Ass went out hunting together: the latter was to run down the prey by his superior speed, and the former would then come up and despatch it. They met with great success; and when it came to sharing the spoil the Lion divided it all into three equal portions. "I will take the first," said he, "because I am King of the beasts; I will also take the second, because, as your partner, I am entitled to half of what remains; and as for the third--well, unless you give it up to me and take yourself off pretty quick, the third, believe me, will make you feel very sorry for yourself!"
Might makes right.
THE MAN AND THE SATYR
A Man and a Satyr became friends, and determined to live together. All went well for a while, until one day in winter-time the Satyr saw the Man blowing on his hands. "Why do you do that?" he asked. "To warm my hands," said the Man. That same day, when they sat down to supper together, they each had a steaming hot bowl of porridge, and the Man raised his bowl to his mouth and blew on it. "Why do you do that?" asked the Satyr. "To cool my porridge," said the Man. The Satyr got up from the table. "Good-bye," said he, "I'm going: I can't be friends with a man who blows hot and cold with the same breath."
THE IMAGE-SELLER
A certain man made a wooden Image of Mercury, and exposed it for sale in the market. As no one offered to buy it, however, he thought he would try to attract a purchaser by proclaiming the virtues of the Image. So he cried up and down the market, "A god for sale! a god for sale! One who'll bring you luck and keep you lucky!" Presently one of the bystanders stopped him and said, "If your god is all you make him out to be, how is it you don't keep him and make the most of him yourself?" "I'll tell you why," replied he; "he brings gain, it is true, but he takes his time about it; whereas I want money at once."
THE EAGLE AND THE ARROW
An Eagle sat perched on a lofty rock, keeping a sharp look-out for prey. A huntsman, concealed in a cleft of the mountain and on the watch for game, spied him there and shot an Arrow at him. The shaft struck him full in the breast and pierced him through and through. As he lay in the agonies of death, he turned his eyes upon the Arrow. "Ah! cruel fate!" he cried, "that I should perish thus: but oh! fate more cruel still, that the Arrow which kills me should be winged with an Eagle's feathers!"
THE RICH MAN AND THE TANNER
A Rich Man took up his residence next door to a Tanner, and found the smell of the tan-yard so extremely unpleasant that he told him he must go. The Tanner delayed his departure, and the Rich Man had to speak to him several times about it; and every time the Tanner said he was making arrangements to move very shortly. This went on for some time, till at last the Rich Man got so used to the smell that he ceased to mind it, and troubled the Tanner with his objections no more.
THE WOLF, THE MOTHER, AND HER CHILD
A hungry Wolf was prowling about in search of food. By and by, attracted by the cries of a Child, he came to a cottage. As he crouched beneath the window, he heard the Mother say to the Child, "Stop crying, do! or I'll throw you to the Wolf." Thinking she really meant what she said, he waited there a long time in the expectation of satisfying his hunger. In the evening he heard the Mother fondling her Child and saying, "If the naughty Wolf comes, he shan't get my little one: Daddy will kill him." The Wolf got up in much disgust and walked away: "As for the people in that house," said he to himself, "you can't believe a word they say."
THE OLD WOMAN AND THE WINE-JAR
An old Woman picked up an empty Wine-jar which had once contained a rare and costly wine, and which still retained some traces of its exquisite bouquet. She raised it to her nose and sniffed at it again and again. "Ah," she cried, "how delicious must have been the liquid which has left behind so ravishing a smell."
THE LIONESS AND THE VIXEN
A Lioness and a Vixen were talking together about their young, as mothers will, and saying how healthy and well-grown they were, and what beautiful coats they had, and how they were the image of their parents. "My litter of cubs is a joy to see," said the Fox; and then she added, rather maliciously, "But I notice you never have more than one." "No," said the Lioness grimly, "but that one's a lion."
Quality, not quantity.
THE VIPER AND THE FILE
A Viper entered a carpenter's shop, and went from one to another of the tools, begging for something to eat. Among the rest, he addressed himself to the File, and asked for the favour of a meal. The File replied in a tone of pitying contempt, "What a simpleton you must be if you imagine you will get anything from me, who invariably take from every one and never give anything in return."
The covetous are poor givers.
THE CAT AND THE COCK
A Cat pounced on a Cock, and cast about for some good excuse for making a meal off him, for Cats don't as a rule eat Cocks, and she knew she ought not to. At last she said, "You make a great nuisance of yourself at night by crowing and keeping people awake: so I am going to make an end of you." But the Cock defended himself by saying that he crowed in order that men might wake up and set about the day's work in good time, and that they really couldn't very well do without him. "That may be," said the Cat, "but whether they can or not, I'm not going without my dinner"; and she killed and ate him.
The want of a good excuse never kept a villain from crime.
THE HARE AND THE TORTOISE
A Hare was one day making fun of a Tortoise for being so slow upon his feet. "Wait a bit," said the Tortoise; "I'll run a race with you, and I'll wager that I win." "Oh, well," replied the Hare, who was much amused at the idea, "let's try and see"; and it was soon agreed that the fox should set a course for them, and be the judge. When the time came both started off together, but the Hare was soon so far ahead that he thought he might as well have a rest: so down he lay and fell fast asleep. Meanwhile the Tortoise kept plodding on, and in time reached the goal. At last the Hare woke up with a start, and dashed on at his fastest, but only to find that the Tortoise had already won the race.
Slow and steady wins the race.
THE SOLDIER AND HIS HORSE
A Soldier gave his Horse a plentiful supply of oats in time of war, and tended him with the utmost care, for he wished him to be strong to endure the hardships of the field, and swift to bear his master, when need arose, out of the reach of danger. But when the war was over he employed him on all sorts of drudgery, bestowing but little attention upon him, and giving him, moreover, nothing but chaff to eat. The time came when war broke out again, and the Soldier saddled and bridled his Horse, and, having put on his heavy coat of mail, mounted him to ride off and take the field. But the poor half-starved beast sank down under his weight, and said to his rider, "You will have to go into battle on foot this time. Thanks to hard work and bad food, you have turned me from a Horse into an ass; and you cannot in a moment turn me back again into a Horse."
THE OXEN AND THE BUTCHERS
Once upon a time the Oxen determined to be revenged upon the Butchers for the havoc they wrought in their ranks, and plotted to put them to death on a given day. They were all gathered together discussing how best to carry out the plan, and the more violent of them were engaged in sharpening their horns for the fray, when an old Ox got up upon his feet and said, "My brothers, you have good reason, I know, to hate these Butchers, but, at any rate, they understand their trade and do what they have to do without causing unnecessary pain. But if we kill them, others, who have no experience, will be set to slaughter us, and will by their bungling inflict great sufferings upon us. For you may be sure that, even though all the Butchers perish, mankind will never go without their beef."
THE WOLF AND THE LION
A wolf stole a lamb from the flock, and was carrying it off to devour it at his leisure when he met a Lion, who took his prey away from him and walked off with it. He dared not resist, but when the Lion had gone some distance he said, "It is most unjust of you to take what's mine away from me like that." The Lion laughed and called out in reply, "It was justly yours, no doubt! The gift of a friend, perhaps, eh?"
THE SHEEP, THE WOLF, AND THE STAG
A Stag once asked a Sheep to lend him a measure of wheat, saying that his friend the Wolf would be his surety. The Sheep, however, was afraid that they meant to cheat her; so she excused herself, saying, "The Wolf is in the habit of seizing what he wants and running off with it without paying, and you, too, can run much faster than I. So how shall I be able to come up with either of you when the debt falls due?"
Two blacks do not make a white.
THE LION AND THE THREE BULLS
Three Bulls were grazing in a meadow, and were watched by a Lion, who longed to capture and devour them, but who felt that he was no match for the three so long as they kept together. So he began by false whispers and malicious hints to foment jealousies and distrust among them. This stratagem succeeded so well that ere long the Bulls grew cold and unfriendly, and finally avoided each other and fed each one by himself apart. No sooner did the Lion see this than he fell upon them one by one and killed them in turn.
The quarrels of friends are the opportunities of foes.
THE HORSE AND HIS RIDER
A Young Man, who fancied himself something of a horseman, mounted a Horse which had not been properly broken in, and was exceedingly difficult to control. No sooner did the Horse feel his weight in the saddle than he bolted, and nothing would stop him. A friend of the Rider's met him in the road in his headlong career, and called out, "Where are you off to in such a hurry?" To which he, pointing to the Horse, replied, "I've no idea: ask him."
THE GOAT AND THE VINE
A Goat was straying in a vineyard, and began to browse on the tender shoots of a Vine which bore several fine bunches of grapes. "What have I done to you," said the Vine, "that you should harm me thus? Isn't there grass enough for you to feed on? All the same, even if you eat up every leaf I have, and leave me quite bare, I shall produce wine enough to pour over you when you are led to the altar to be sacrificed."
THE TWO POTS
Two Pots, one of earthenware and the other of brass, were carried away down a river in flood. The Brazen Pot urged his companion to keep close by his side, and he would protect him. The other thanked him, but begged him not to come near him on any account: "For that," he said, "is just what I am most afraid of. One touch from you and I should be broken in pieces."
Equals make the best friends.
THE OLD HOUND
A Hound who had served his master well for years, and had run down many a quarry in his time, began to lose his strength and speed owing to age. One day, when out hunting, his master started a powerful wild boar and set the Hound at him. The latter seized the beast by the ear, but his teeth were gone and he could not retain his hold; so the boar escaped. His master began to scold him severely, but the Hound interrupted him with these words: "My will is as strong as ever, master, but my body is old and feeble. You ought to honour me for what I have been instead of abusing me for what I am."
THE CLOWN AND THE COUNTRYMAN
A Nobleman announced his intention of giving a public entertainment in the theatre, and offered splendid prizes to all who had any novelty to exhibit at the performance. The announcement attracted a crowd of conjurers, jugglers, and acrobats, and among the rest a Clown, very popular with the crowd, who let it be known that he was going to give an entirely new turn. When the day of the performance came, the theatre was filled from top to bottom some time before the entertainment began. Several performers exhibited their tricks, and then the popular favourite came on empty-handed and alone. At once there was a hush of expectation: and he, letting his head fall upon his breast, imitated the squeak of a pig to such perfection that the audience insisted on his producing the animal, which, they said, he must have somewhere concealed about his person. He, however, convinced them that there was no pig there, and then the applause was deafening. Among the spectators was a Countryman, who disparaged the Clown's performance and announced that he would give a much superior exhibition of the same trick on the following day. Again the theatre was filled to overflowing, and again the Clown gave his imitation amidst the cheers of the crowd. The Countryman, meanwhile, before going on the stage, had secreted a young porker under his smock; and when the spectators derisively bade him do better if he could, he gave it a pinch in the ear and made it squeal loudly. But they all with one voice shouted out that the Clown's imitation was much more true to life. Thereupon he produced the pig from under his smock and said sarcastically, "There, that shows what sort of judges you are!"
THE LARK AND THE FARMER
A Lark nested in a field of corn, and was rearing her brood under cover of the ripening grain. One day, before the young were fully fledged, the Farmer came to look at the crop, and, finding it yellowing fast, he said, "I must send round word to my neighbours to come and help me reap this field." One of the young Larks overheard him, and was very much frightened, and asked her mother whether they hadn't better move house at once. "There's no hurry," replied she; "a man who looks to his friends for help will take his time about a thing." In a few days the Farmer came by again, and saw that the grain was overripe and falling out of the ears upon the ground. "I must put it off no longer," he said; "This very day I'll hire the men and set them to work at once." The Lark heard him and said to her young, "Come, my children, we must be off: he talks no more of his friends now, but is going to take things in hand himself."
Self-help is the best help.
THE LION AND THE ASS
A Lion and an Ass set up as partners and went a-hunting together. In course of time they came to a cave in which there were a number of wild goats. The Lion took up his stand at the mouth of the cave, and waited for them to come out; while the Ass went inside and brayed for all he was worth in order to frighten them out into the open. The Lion struck them down one by one as they appeared; and when the cave was empty the Ass came out and said, "Well, I scared them pretty well, didn't I?" "I should think you did," said the Lion: "why, if I hadn't known you were an Ass, I should have turned and run myself."
THE PROPHET
A Prophet sat in the market-place and told the fortunes of all who cared to engage his services. Suddenly there came running up one who told him that his house had been broken into by thieves, and that they had made off with everything they could lay hands on. He was up in a moment, and rushed off, tearing his hair and calling down curses on the miscreants. The bystanders were much amused, and one of them said, "Our friend professes to know what is going to happen to others, but it seems he's not clever enough to perceive what's in store for himself."
THE HOUND AND THE HARE
A young Hound started a Hare, and, when he caught her up, would at one moment snap at her with his teeth as though he were about to kill her, while at another he would let go his hold and frisk about her, as if he were playing with another dog. At last the Hare said, "I wish you would show yourself in your true colours! If you are my friend, why do you bite me? If you are my enemy, why do you play with me?"
He is no friend who plays double.
THE LION, THE MOUSE, AND THE FOX
A Lion was lying asleep at the mouth of his den when a Mouse ran over his back and tickled him so that he woke up with a start and began looking about everywhere to see what it was that had disturbed him. A Fox, who was looking on, thought he would have a joke at the expense of the Lion; so he said, "Well, this is the first time I've seen a Lion afraid of a Mouse." "Afraid of a Mouse?" said the Lion testily: "not I! It's his bad manners I can't stand."
THE TRUMPETER TAKEN PRISONER
A Trumpeter marched into battle in the van of the army and put courage into his comrades by his warlike tunes. Being captured by the enemy, he begged for his life, and said, "Do not put me to death; I have killed no one: indeed, I have no weapons, but carry with me only my trumpet here." But his captors replied, "That is only the more reason why we should take your life; for, though you do not fight yourself, you stir up others to do so."
THE WOLF AND THE CRANE
A Wolf once got a bone stuck in his throat. So he went to a Crane and begged her to put her long bill down his throat and pull it out. "I'll make it worth your while," he added. The Crane did as she was asked, and got the bone out quite easily. The Wolf thanked her warmly, and was just turning away, when she cried, "What about that fee of mine?" "Well, what about it?" snapped the Wolf, baring his teeth as he spoke; "you can go about boasting that you once put your head into a Wolf's mouth and didn't get it bitten off. What more do you want?"
THE EAGLE, THE CAT, AND THE WILD SOW
An Eagle built her nest at the top of a high tree; a Cat with her family occupied a hollow in the trunk half-way down; and a Wild Sow and her young took up their quarters at the foot. They might have got on very well as neighbours had it not been for the evil cunning of the Cat. Climbing up to the Eagle's nest she said to the Eagle, "You and I are in the greatest possible danger. That dreadful creature, the Sow, who is always to be seen grubbing away at the foot of the tree, means to uproot it, that she may devour your family and mine at her ease." Having thus driven the Eagle almost out of her senses with terror, the Cat climbed down the tree, and said to the Sow, "I must warn you against that dreadful bird, the Eagle. She is only waiting her chance to fly down and carry off one of your little pigs when you take them out, to feed her brood with." She succeeded in frightening the Sow as much as the Eagle. Then she returned to her hole in the trunk, from which, feigning to be afraid, she never came forth by day. Only by night did she creep out unseen to procure food for her kittens. The Eagle, meanwhile was afraid to stir from her nest, and the Sow dared not leave her home among the roots: so that in time both they and their families perished of hunger, and their dead bodies supplied the Cat with ample food for her growing family.
THE WOLF AND THE SHEEP
A Wolf was worried and badly bitten by dogs, and lay a long time for dead. By and by he began to revive, and, feeling very hungry, called out to a passing Sheep and said, "Would you kindly bring me some water from the stream close by? I can manage about meat, if only I could get something to drink." But this Sheep was no fool. "I can quite understand", said he, "that if I brought you the water, you would have no difficulty about the meat. Good-morning."
THE TUNNY-FISH AND THE DOLPHIN
A Tunny-fish was chased by a Dolphin and splashed through the water at a great rate, but the Dolphin gradually gained upon him, and was just about to seize him when the force of his flight carried the Tunny on to a sandbank. In the heat of the chase the Dolphin followed him, and there they both lay out of the water, gasping for dear life. When the Tunny saw that his enemy was doomed like himself, he said, "I don't mind having to die now: for I see that he who is the cause of my death is about to share the same fate."
THE THREE TRADESMEN
The citizens of a certain city were debating about the best material to use in the fortifications which were about to be erected for the greater security of the town. A Carpenter got up and advised the use of wood, which he said was readily procurable and easily worked. A Stone-mason objected to wood on the ground that it was so inflammable, and recommended stones instead. Then a Tanner got on his legs and said, "In my opinion there's nothing like leather."
Every man for himself.
THE MOUSE AND THE BULL
A Bull gave chase to a Mouse which had bitten him in the nose: but the Mouse was too quick for him and slipped into a hole in a wall. The Bull charged furiously into the wall again and again until he was tired out, and sank down on the ground exhausted with his efforts. When all was quiet, the Mouse darted out and bit him again. Beside himself with rage he started to his feet, but by that time the Mouse was back in his hole again, and he could do nothing but bellow and fume in helpless anger. Presently he heard a shrill little voice say from inside the wall, "You big fellows don't always have it your own way, you see: sometimes we little ones come off best."
The battle is not always to the strong.
THE HARE AND THE HOUND
A Hound started a Hare from her form, and pursued her for some distance; but as she gradually gained upon him, he gave up the chase. A rustic who had seen the race met the Hound as he was returning, and taunted him with his defeat. "The little one was too much for you," said he. "Ah, well," said the Hound, "don't forget it's one thing to be running for your dinner, but quite another to be running for your life."
THE TOWN MOUSE AND THE COUNTRY MOUSE
A Town Mouse and a Country Mouse were acquaintances, and the Country Mouse one day invited his friend to come and see him at his home in the fields. The Town Mouse came, and they sat down to a dinner of barleycorns and roots, the latter of which had a distinctly earthy flavour. The fare was not much to the taste of the guest, and presently he broke out with "My poor dear friend, you live here no better than the ants. Now, you should just see how I fare! My larder is a regular horn of plenty. You must come and stay with me, and I promise you you shall live on the fat of the land." So when he returned to town he took the Country Mouse with him, and showed him into a larder containing flour and oatmeal and figs and honey and dates. The Country Mouse had never seen anything like it, and sat down to enjoy the luxuries his friend provided: but before they had well begun, the door of the larder opened and some one came in. The two Mice scampered off and hid themselves in a narrow and exceedingly uncomfortable hole. Presently, when all was quiet, they ventured out again; but some one else came in, and off they scuttled again. This was too much for the visitor. "Good-bye," said he, "I'm off. You live in the lap of luxury, I can see, but you are surrounded by dangers; whereas at home I can enjoy my simple dinner of roots and corn in peace."
THE LION AND THE BULL
A Lion saw a fine fat Bull pasturing among a herd of cattle and cast about for some means of getting him into his clutches; so he sent him word that he was sacrificing a sheep, and asked if he would do him the honour of dining with him. The Bull accepted the invitation, but, on arriving at the Lion's den, he saw a great array of saucepans and spits, but no sign of a sheep; so he turned on his heel and walked quietly away. The Lion called after him in an injured tone to ask the reason, and the Bull turned round and said, "I have reason enough. When I saw all your preparations it struck me at once that the victim was to be a Bull and not a sheep."
The net is spread in vain in sight of the bird.
THE WOLF, THE FOX, AND THE APE
A Wolf charged a Fox with theft, which he denied, and the case was brought before an Ape to be tried. When he had heard the evidence on both sides, the Ape gave judgment as follows: "I do not think," he said, "that you, O Wolf, ever lost what you claim; but all the same I believe that you, Fox, are guilty of the theft, in spite of all your denials."
The dishonest get no credit, even if they act honestly.
THE EAGLE AND THE COCKS
There were two Cocks in the same farmyard, and they fought to decide who should be master. When the fight was over, the beaten one went and hid himself in a dark corner; while the victor flew up on to the roof of the stables and crowed lustily. But an Eagle espied him from high up in the sky, and swooped down and carried him off. Forthwith the other Cock came out of his corner and ruled the roost without a rival.
Pride comes before a fall.
THE ESCAPED JACKDAW
A Man caught a Jackdaw and tied a piece of string to one of its legs, and then gave it to his children for a pet. But the Jackdaw didn't at all like having to live with people; so, after a while, when he seemed to have become fairly tame and they didn't watch him so closely, he slipped away and flew back to his old haunts. Unfortunately, the string was still on his leg, and before long it got entangled in the branches of a tree and the Jackdaw couldn't get free, try as he would. He saw it was all up with him, and cried in despair, "Alas, in gaining my freedom I have lost my life."
THE FARMER AND THE FOX
A Farmer was greatly annoyed by a Fox, which came prowling about his yard at night and carried off his fowls. So he set a trap for him and caught him; and in order to be revenged upon him, he tied a bunch of tow to his tail and set fire to it and let him go. As ill-luck would have it, however, the Fox made straight for the fields where the corn was standing ripe and ready for cutting. It quickly caught fire and was all burnt up, and the Farmer lost all his harvest.
Revenge is a two-edged sword.
VENUS AND THE CAT
A Cat fell in love with a handsome young man, and begged the goddess Venus to change her into a woman. Venus was very gracious about it, and changed her at once into a beautiful maiden, whom the young man fell in love with at first sight and shortly afterwards married. One day Venus thought she would like to see whether the Cat had changed her habits as well as her form; so she let a mouse run loose in the room where they were. Forgetting everything, the young woman had no sooner seen the mouse than up she jumped and was after it like a shot: at which the goddess was so disgusted that she changed her back again into a Cat.
THE CROW AND THE SWAN
A Crow was filled with envy on seeing the beautiful white plumage of a Swan, and thought it was due to the water in which the Swan constantly bathed and swam. So he left the neighbourhood of the altars, where he got his living by picking up bits of the meat offered in sacrifice, and went and lived among the pools and streams. But though he bathed and washed his feathers many times a day, he didn't make them any whiter, and at last died of hunger into the bargain.
You may change your habits, but not your nature.
THE STAG WITH ONE EYE
A Stag, blind of one eye, was grazing close to the sea-shore and kept his sound eye turned towards the land, so as to be able to perceive the approach of the hounds, while the blind eye he turned towards the sea, never suspecting that any danger would threaten him from that quarter. As it fell out, however, some sailors, coasting along the shore, spied him and shot an arrow at him, by which he was mortally wounded. As he lay dying, he said to himself, "Wretch that I am! I bethought me of the dangers of the land, whence none assailed me: but I feared no peril from the sea, yet thence has come my ruin."
Misfortune often assails us from an unexpected quarter.
THE FLY AND THE DRAUGHT-MULE
A Fly sat on one of the shafts of a cart and said to the Mule who was pulling it, "How slow you are! Do mend your pace, or I shall have to use my sting as a goad." The Mule was not in the least disturbed. "Behind me, in the cart," said he, "sits my master. He holds the reins, and flicks me with his whip, and him I obey, but I don't want any of your impertinence. _I_ know when I may dawdle and when I may not."
THE COCK AND THE JEWEL
A Cock, scratching the ground for something to eat, turned up a Jewel that had by chance been dropped there. "Ho!" said he, "a fine thing you are, no doubt, and, had your owner found you, great would his joy have been. But for me! give me a single grain of corn before all the jewels in the world."
THE WOLF AND THE SHEPHERD
A Wolf hung about near a flock of sheep for a long time, but made no attempt to molest them. The Shepherd at first kept a sharp eye on him, for he naturally thought he meant mischief: but as time went by and the Wolf showed no inclination to meddle with the flock, he began to look upon him more as a protector than as an enemy: and when one day some errand took him to the city, he felt no uneasiness at leaving the Wolf with the sheep. But as soon as his back was turned the Wolf attacked them and killed the greater number. When the Shepherd returned and saw the havoc he had wrought, he cried, "It serves me right for trusting my flock to a Wolf."
THE FARMER AND THE STORK
A Farmer set some traps in a field which he had lately sown with corn, in order to catch the cranes which came to pick up the seed. When he returned to look at his traps he found several cranes caught, and among them a Stork, which begged to be let go, and said, "You ought not to kill me: I am not a crane, but a Stork, as you can easily see by my feathers, and I am the most honest and harmless of birds." But the Farmer replied, "It's nothing to me what you are: I find you among these cranes, who ruin my crops, and, like them, you shall suffer."
If you choose bad companions no one will believe that you are anything but bad yourself.
THE CHARGER AND THE MILLER
A Horse, who had been used to carry his rider into battle, felt himself growing old and chose to work in a mill instead. He now no longer found himself stepping out proudly to the beating of the drums, but was compelled to slave away all day grinding the corn. Bewailing his hard lot, he said one day to the Miller, "Ah me! I was once a splendid war-horse, gaily caparisoned, and attended by a groom whose sole duty was to see to my wants. How different is my present condition! I wish I had never given up the battlefield for the mill." The Miller replied with asperity, "It's no use your regretting the past. Fortune has many ups and downs: you must just take them as they come."
THE GRASSHOPPER AND THE OWL
An Owl, who lived in a hollow tree, was in the habit of feeding by night and sleeping by day; but her slumbers were greatly disturbed by the chirping of a Grasshopper, who had taken up his abode in the branches. She begged him repeatedly to have some consideration for her comfort, but the Grasshopper, if anything, only chirped the louder. At last the Owl could stand it no longer, but determined to rid herself of the pest by means of a trick. Addressing herself to the Grasshopper, she said in her pleasantest manner, "As I cannot sleep for your song, which, believe me, is as sweet as the notes of Apollo's lyre, I have a mind to taste some nectar, which Minerva gave me the other day. Won't you come in and join me?" The Grasshopper was flattered by the praise of his song, and his mouth, too, watered at the mention of the delicious drink, so he said he would be delighted. No sooner had he got inside the hollow where the Owl was sitting than she pounced upon him and ate him up.
THE GRASSHOPPER AND THE ANTS
One fine day in winter some Ants were busy drying their store of corn, which had got rather damp during a long spell of rain. Presently up came a Grasshopper and begged them to spare her a few grains, "For," she said, "I'm simply starving." The Ants stopped work for a moment, though this was against their principles. "May we ask," said they, "what you were doing with yourself all last summer? Why didn't you collect a store of food for the winter?" "The fact is," replied the Grasshopper, "I was so busy singing that I hadn't the time." "If you spent the summer singing," replied the Ants, "you can't do better than spend the winter dancing." And they chuckled and went on with their work.
THE FARMER AND THE VIPER
One winter a Farmer found a Viper frozen and numb with cold, and out of pity picked it up and placed it in his bosom. The Viper was no sooner revived by the warmth than it turned upon its benefactor and inflicted a fatal bite upon him; and as the poor man lay dying, he cried, "I have only got what I deserved, for taking compassion on so villainous a creature."
Kindness is thrown away upon the evil.
THE TWO FROGS
Two Frogs were neighbours. One lived in a marsh, where there was plenty of water, which frogs love: the other in a lane some distance away, where all the water to be had was that which lay in the ruts after rain. The Marsh Frog warned his friend and pressed him to come and live with him in the marsh, for he would find his quarters there far more comfortable and--what was still more important--more safe. But the other refused, saying that he could not bring himself to move from a place to which he had become accustomed. A few days afterwards a heavy waggon came down the lane, and he was crushed to death under the wheels.
THE COBBLER TURNED DOCTOR
A very unskilful Cobbler, finding himself unable to make a living at his trade, gave up mending boots and took to doctoring instead. He gave out that he had the secret of a universal antidote against all poisons, and acquired no small reputation, thanks to his talent for puffing himself. One day, however, he fell very ill; and the King of the country bethought him that he would test the value of his remedy. Calling, therefore, for a cup, he poured out a dose of the antidote, and, under pretence of mixing poison with it, added a little water, and commanded him to drink it. Terrified by the fear of being poisoned, the Cobbler confessed that he knew nothing about medicine, and that his antidote was worthless. Then the King summoned his subjects and addressed them as follows: "What folly could be greater than yours? Here is this Cobbler to whom no one will send his boots to be mended, and yet you have not hesitated to entrust him with your lives!"
THE ASS, THE COCK, AND THE LION
An Ass and a Cock were in a cattle-pen together. Presently a Lion, who had been starving for days, came along and was just about to fall upon the Ass and make a meal of him when the Cock, rising to his full height and flapping his wings vigorously, uttered a tremendous crow. Now, if there is one thing that frightens a Lion, it is the crowing of a Cock: and this one had no sooner heard the noise than he fled. The Ass was mightily elated at this, and thought that, if the Lion couldn't face a Cock, he would be still less likely to stand up to an Ass: so he ran out and pursued him. But when the two had got well out of sight and hearing of the Cock, the Lion suddenly turned upon the Ass and ate him up.
False confidence often leads to disaster.
THE BELLY AND THE MEMBERS
The Members of the Body once rebelled against the Belly. "You," they said to the Belly, "live in luxury and sloth, and never do a stroke of work; while we not only have to do all the hard work there is to be done, but are actually your slaves and have to minister to all your wants. Now, we will do so no longer, and you can shift for yourself for the future." They were as good as their word, and left the Belly to starve. The result was just what might have been expected: the whole Body soon began to fail, and the Members and all shared in the general collapse. And then they saw too late how foolish they had been.
THE BALD MAN AND THE FLY
A Fly settled on the head of a Bald Man and bit him. In his eagerness to kill it, he hit himself a smart slap. But the Fly escaped, and said to him in derision, "You tried to kill me for just one little bite; what will you do to yourself now, for the heavy smack you have just given yourself?" "Oh, for that blow I bear no grudge," he replied, "for I never intended myself any harm; but as for you, you contemptible insect, who live by sucking human blood, I'd have borne a good deal more than that for the satisfaction of dashing the life out of you!"
THE ASS AND THE WOLF
An Ass was feeding in a meadow, and, catching sight of his enemy the Wolf in the distance, pretended to be very lame and hobbled painfully along. When the Wolf came up, he asked the Ass how he came to be so lame, and the Ass replied that in going through a hedge he had trodden on a thorn, and he begged the Wolf to pull it out with his teeth, "In case," he said, "when you eat me, it should stick in your throat and hurt you very much." The Wolf said he would, and told the Ass to lift up his foot, and gave his whole mind to getting out the thorn. But the Ass suddenly let out with his heels and fetched the Wolf a fearful kick in the mouth, breaking his teeth; and then he galloped off at full speed. As soon as he could speak the Wolf growled to himself, "It serves me right: my father taught me to kill, and I ought to have stuck to that trade instead of attempting to cure."
THE MONKEY AND THE CAMEL
At a gathering of all the beasts the Monkey gave an exhibition of dancing and entertained the company vastly. There was great applause at the finish, which excited the envy of the Camel and made him desire to win the favour of the assembly by the same means. So he got up from his place and began dancing, but he cut such a ridiculous figure as he plunged about, and made such a grotesque exhibition of his ungainly person, that the beasts all fell upon him with ridicule and drove him away.
THE SICK MAN AND THE DOCTOR
A Sick Man received a visit from his Doctor, who asked him how he was. "Fairly well, Doctor," said he, "but I find I sweat a great deal." "Ah," said the Doctor, "that's a good sign." On his next visit he asked the same question, and his patient replied, "I'm much as usual, but I've taken to having shivering fits, which leave me cold all over." "Ah," said the Doctor, "that's a good sign too." When he came the third time and inquired as before about his patient's health, the Sick Man said that he felt very feverish. "A very good sign," said the Doctor; "you are doing very nicely indeed." Afterwards a friend came to see the invalid, and on asking him how he did, received this reply: "My dear friend, I'm dying of good signs."
THE TRAVELLERS AND THE PLANE-TREE
Two Travellers were walking along a bare and dusty road in the heat of a summer's day. Coming presently to a Plane-tree, they joyfully turned aside to shelter from the burning rays of the sun in the deep shade of its spreading branches. As they rested, looking up into the tree, one of them remarked to his companion, "What a useless tree the Plane is! It bears no fruit and is of no service to man at all." The Plane-tree interrupted him with indignation. "You ungrateful creature!" it cried: "you come and take shelter under me from the scorching sun, and then, in the very act of enjoying the cool shade of my foliage, you abuse me and call me good for nothing!"
Many a service is met with ingratitude.
THE FLEA AND THE OX
A Flea once said to an Ox, "How comes it that a big strong fellow like you is content to serve mankind, and do all their hard work for them, while I, who am no bigger than you see, live on their bodies and drink my fill of their blood, and never do a stroke for it all?" To which the Ox replied, "Men are very kind to me, and so I am grateful to them: they feed and house me well, and every now and then they show their fondness for me by patting me on the head and neck." "They'd pat me, too," said the Flea, "if I let them: but I take good care they don't, or there would be nothing left of me."
THE BIRDS, THE BEASTS, AND THE BAT
The Birds were at war with the Beasts, and many battles were fought with varying success on either side. The Bat did not throw in his lot definitely with either party, but when things went well for the Birds he was found fighting in their ranks; when, on the other hand, the Beasts got the upper hand, he was to be found among the Beasts. No one paid any attention to him while the war lasted: but when it was over, and peace was restored, neither the Birds nor the Beasts would have anything to do with so double-faced a traitor, and so he remains to this day a solitary outcast from both.
THE MAN AND HIS TWO SWEETHEARTS
A Man of middle age, whose hair was turning grey, had two Sweethearts, an old woman and a young one. The elder of the two didn't like having a lover who looked so much younger than herself; so, whenever he came to see her, she used to pull the dark hairs out of his head to make him look old. The younger, on the other hand, didn't like him to look so much older than herself, and took every opportunity of pulling out the grey hairs, to make him look young. Between them, they left not a hair in his head, and he became perfectly bald.
THE EAGLE, THE JACKDAW, AND THE SHEPHERD
One day a Jackdaw saw an Eagle swoop down on a lamb and carry it off in its talons. "My word," said the Jackdaw, "I'll do that myself." So it flew high up into the air, and then came shooting down with a great whirring of wings on to the back of a big ram. It had no sooner alighted than its claws got caught fast in the wool, and nothing it could do was of any use: there it stuck, flapping away, and only making things worse instead of better. By and by up came the Shepherd. "Oho," he said, "so that's what you'd be doing, is it?" And he took the Jackdaw, and clipped its wings and carried it home to his children. It looked so odd that they didn't know what to make of it. "What sort of bird is it, father?" they asked. "It's a Jackdaw," he replied, "and nothing but a Jackdaw: but it wants to be taken for an Eagle."
If you attempt what is beyond your power, your trouble will be wasted and you court not only misfortune but ridicule.
THE WOLF AND THE BOY
A Wolf, who had just enjoyed a good meal and was in a playful mood, caught sight of a Boy lying flat upon the ground, and, realising that he was trying to hide, and that it was fear of himself that made him do this, he went up to him and said, "Aha, I've found you, you see; but if you can say three things to me, the truth of which cannot be disputed, I will spare your life." The Boy plucked up courage and thought for a moment, and then he said, "First, it is a pity you saw me; secondly, I was a fool to let myself be seen; and thirdly, we all hate wolves because they are always making unprovoked attacks upon our flocks." The Wolf replied, "Well, what you say is true enough from your point of view; so you may go."
THE MILLER, HIS SON, AND THEIR ASS
A Miller, accompanied by his young Son, was driving his Ass to market in hopes of finding a purchaser for him. On the road they met a troop of girls, laughing and talking, who exclaimed, "Did you ever see such a pair of fools? To be trudging along the dusty road when they might be riding!" The Miller thought there was sense in what they said; so he made his Son mount the Ass, and himself walked at the side. Presently they met some of his old cronies, who greeted them and said, "You'll spoil that Son of yours, letting him ride while you toil along on foot! Make him walk, young lazybones! It'll do him all the good in the world." The Miller followed their advice, and took his Son's place on the back of the Ass while the boy trudged along behind. They had not gone far when they overtook a party of women and children, and the Miller heard them say, "What a selfish old man! He himself rides in comfort, but lets his poor little boy follow as best he can on his own legs!" So he made his Son get up behind him. Further along the road they met some travellers, who asked the Miller whether the Ass he was riding was his own property, or a beast hired for the occasion. He replied that it was his own, and that he was taking it to market to sell. "Good heavens!" said they, "with a load like that the poor beast will be so exhausted by the time he gets there that no one will look at him. Why, you'd do better to carry him!" "Anything to please you," said the old man, "we can but try." So they got off, tied the Ass's legs together with a rope and slung him on a pole, and at last reached the town, carrying him between them. This was so absurd a sight that the people ran out in crowds to laugh at it, and chaffed the Father and Son unmercifully, some even calling them lunatics. They had then got to a bridge over the river, where the Ass, frightened by the noise and his unusual situation, kicked and struggled till he broke the ropes that bound him, and fell into the water and was drowned. Whereupon the unfortunate Miller, vexed and ashamed, made the best of his way home again, convinced that in trying to please all he had pleased none, and had lost his Ass into the bargain.
THE STAG AND THE VINE
A Stag, pursued by the huntsmen, concealed himself under cover of a thick Vine. They lost track of him and passed by his hiding-place without being aware that he was anywhere near. Supposing all danger to be over, he presently began to browse on the leaves of the Vine. The movement drew the attention of the returning huntsmen, and one of them, supposing some animal to be hidden there, shot an arrow at a venture into the foliage. The unlucky Stag was pierced to the heart, and, as he expired, he said, "I deserve my fate for my treachery in feeding upon the leaves of my protector."
Ingratitude sometimes brings its own punishment.
THE LAMB CHASED BY A WOLF
A Wolf was chasing a Lamb, which took refuge in a temple. The Wolf urged it to come out of the precincts, and said, "If you don't, the priest is sure to catch you and offer you up in sacrifice on the altar." To which the Lamb replied, "Thanks, I think I'll stay where I am: I'd rather be sacrificed any day than be eaten up by a Wolf."
THE ARCHER AND THE LION
An Archer went up into the hills to get some sport with his bow, and all the animals fled at the sight of him with the exception of the Lion, who stayed behind and challenged him to fight. But he shot an arrow at the Lion and hit him, and said, "There, you see what my messenger can do: just you wait a moment and I'll tackle you myself." The Lion, however, when he felt the sting of the arrow, ran away as fast as his legs could carry him. A fox, who had seen it all happen, said to the Lion, "Come, don't be a coward: why don't you stay and show fight?" But the Lion replied, "You won't get me to stay, not you: why, when he sends a messenger like that before him, he must himself be a terrible fellow to deal with."
Give a wide berth to those who can do damage at a distance.
THE WOLF AND THE GOAT
A Wolf caught sight of a Goat browsing above him on the scanty herbage that grew on the top of a steep rock; and being unable to get at her, tried to induce her to come lower down. "You are risking your life up there, madam, indeed you are," he called out: "pray take my advice and come down here, where you will find plenty of better food." The Goat turned a knowing eye upon him. "It's little you care whether I get good grass or bad," said she: "what you want is to eat me."
THE SICK STAG
A Stag fell sick and lay in a clearing in the forest, too weak to move from the spot. When the news of his illness spread, a number of the other beasts came to inquire after his health, and they one and all nibbled a little of the grass that grew round the invalid till at last there was not a blade within his reach. In a few days he began to mend, but was still too feeble to get up and go in search of fodder; and thus he perished miserably of hunger owing to the thoughtlessness of his friends.
THE ASS AND THE MULE
A certain man who had an Ass and a Mule loaded them both up one day and set out upon a journey. So long as the road was fairly level, the Ass got on very well: but by and by they came to a place among the hills where the road was very rough and steep, and the Ass was at his last gasp. So he begged the Mule to relieve him of a part of his load: but the Mule refused. At last, from sheer weariness, the Ass stumbled and fell down a steep place and was killed. The driver was in despair, but he did the best he could: he added the Ass's load to the Mule's, and he also flayed the Ass and put his skin on the top of the double load. The Mule could only just manage the extra weight, and, as he staggered painfully along, he said to himself, "I have only got what I deserved: if I had been willing to help the Ass at first, I should not now be carrying his load and his skin into the bargain."
BROTHER AND SISTER
A certain man had two children, a boy and a girl: and the boy was as good-looking as the girl was plain. One day, as they were playing together in their mother's chamber, they chanced upon a mirror and saw their own features for the first time. The boy saw what a handsome fellow he was, and began to boast to his Sister about his good looks: she, on her part, was ready to cry with vexation when she was aware of her plainness, and took his remarks as an insult to herself. Running to her father, she told him of her Brother's conceit, and accused him of meddling with his mother's things. He laughed and kissed them both, and said, "My children, learn from now onwards to make a good use of the glass. You, my boy, strive to be as good as it shows you to be handsome; and you, my girl, resolve to make up for the plainness of your features by the sweetness of your disposition."
THE HEIFER AND THE OX
A Heifer went up to an Ox, who was straining hard at the plough, and sympathised with him in a rather patronising sort of way on the necessity of his having to work so hard. Not long afterwards there was a festival in the village and every one kept holiday: but, whereas the Ox was turned loose into the pasture, the Heifer was seized and led off to sacrifice. "Ah," said the Ox, with a grim smile, "I see now why you were allowed to have such an idle time: it was because you were always intended for the altar."
THE KINGDOM OF THE LION
When the Lion reigned over the beasts of the earth he was never cruel or tyrannical, but as gentle and just as a King ought to be. During his reign he called a general assembly of the beasts, and drew up a code of laws under which all were to live in perfect equality and harmony: the wolf and the lamb, the tiger and the stag, the leopard and the kid, the dog and the hare, all should dwell side by side in unbroken peace and friendship. The hare said, "Oh! how I have longed for this day when the weak take their place without fear by the side of the strong!"
THE ASS AND HIS DRIVER
An Ass was being driven down a mountain road, and after jogging along for a while sensibly enough he suddenly quitted the track and rushed to the edge of a precipice. He was just about to leap over the edge when his Driver caught hold of his tail and did his best to pull him back: but pull as he might he couldn't get the Ass to budge from the brink. At last he gave up, crying, "All right, then, get to the bottom your own way; but it's the way to sudden death, as you'll find out quick enough."
THE LION AND THE HARE
A Lion found a Hare sleeping in her form, and was just going to devour her when he caught sight of a passing stag. Dropping the Hare, he at once made for the bigger game; but finding, after a long chase, that he could not overtake the stag, he abandoned the attempt and came back for the Hare. When he reached the spot, however, he found she was nowhere to be seen, and he had to go without his dinner. "It serves me right," he said; "I should have been content with what I had got, instead of hankering after a better prize."
THE WOLVES AND THE DOGS
Once upon a time the Wolves said to the Dogs, "Why should we continue to be enemies any longer? You are very like us in most ways: the main difference between us is one of training only. We live a life of freedom; but you are enslaved to mankind, who beat you, and put heavy collars round your necks, and compel you to keep watch over their flocks and herds for them, and, to crown all, they give you nothing but bones to eat. Don't put up with it any longer, but hand over the flocks to us, and we will all live on the fat of the land and feast together." The Dogs allowed themselves to be persuaded by these words, and accompanied the Wolves into their den. But no sooner were they well inside than the Wolves set upon them and tore them to pieces.
Traitors richly deserve their fate.
THE BULL AND THE CALF
A full-grown Bull was struggling to force his huge bulk through the narrow entrance to a cow-house where his stall was, when a young Calf came up and said to him, "If you'll step aside a moment, I'll show you the way to get through." The Bull turned upon him an amused look. "I knew that way," said he, "before you were born."
THE TREES AND THE AXE
A Woodman went into the forest and begged of the Trees the favour of a handle for his Axe. The principal Trees at once agreed to so modest a request, and unhesitatingly gave him a young ash sapling, out of which he fashioned the handle he desired. No sooner had he done so than he set to work to fell the noblest Trees in the wood. When they saw the use to which he was putting their gift, they cried, "Alas! alas! We are undone, but we are ourselves to blame. The little we gave has cost us all: had we not sacrificed the rights of the ash, we might ourselves have stood for ages."
THE ASTRONOMER
There was once an Astronomer whose habit it was to go out at night and observe the stars. One night, as he was walking about outside the town gates, gazing up absorbed into the sky and not looking where he was going, he fell into a dry well. As he lay there groaning, some one passing by heard him, and, coming to the edge of the well, looked down and, on learning what had happened, said, "If you really mean to say that you were looking so hard at the sky that you didn't even see where your feet were carrying you along the ground, it appears to me that you deserve all you've got."
THE LABOURER AND THE SNAKE
A Labourer's little son was bitten by a Snake and died of the wound. The father was beside himself with grief, and in his anger against the Snake he caught up an axe and went and stood close to the Snake's hole, and watched for a chance of killing it. Presently the Snake came out, and the man aimed a blow at it, but only succeeded in cutting off the tip of its tail before it wriggled in again. He then tried to get it to come out a second time, pretending that he wished to make up the quarrel. But the Snake said, "I can never be your friend because of my lost tail, nor you mine because of your lost child."
Injuries are never forgotten in the presence of those who caused them.
THE CAGE-BIRD AND THE BAT
A Singing-bird was confined in a cage which hung outside a window, and had a way of singing at night when all other birds were asleep. One night a Bat came and clung to the bars of the cage, and asked the Bird why she was silent by day and sang only at night. "I have a very good reason for doing so," said the Bird: "it was once when I was singing in the daytime that a fowler was attracted by my voice, and set his nets for me and caught me. Since then I have never sung except by night." But the Bat replied, "It is no use your doing that now when you are a prisoner: if only you had done so before you were caught, you might still have been free."
Precautions are useless after the event.
THE ASS AND HIS PURCHASER
A Man who wanted to buy an Ass went to market, and, coming across a likely-looking beast, arranged with the owner that he should be allowed to take him home on trial to see what he was like. When he reached home, he put him into his stable along with the other asses. The newcomer took a look round, and immediately went and chose a place next to the laziest and greediest beast in the stable. When the master saw this he put a halter on him at once, and led him off and handed him over to his owner again. The latter was a good deal surprised to see him back so soon, and said, "Why, do you mean to say you have tested him already?" "I don't want to put him through any more tests," replied the other: "I could see what sort of beast he is from the companion he chose for himself."
A man is known by the company he keeps.
THE KID AND THE WOLF
A Kid strayed from the flock and was chased by a Wolf. When he saw he must be caught he turned round and said to the Wolf, "I know, sir, that I can't escape being eaten by you: and so, as my life is bound to be short, I pray you let it be as merry as may be. Will you not play me a tune to dance to before I die?" The Wolf saw no objection to having some music before his dinner: so he took out his pipe and began to play, while the Kid danced before him. Before many minutes were passed the gods who guarded the flock heard the sound and came up to see what was going on. They no sooner clapped eyes on the Wolf than they gave chase and drove him away. As he ran off, he turned and said to the Kid, "It's what I thoroughly deserve: my trade is the butcher's, and I had no business to turn piper to please you."
THE DEBTOR AND HIS SOW
A Man of Athens fell into debt and was pressed for the money by his creditor; but he had no means of paying at the time, so he begged for delay. But the creditor refused and said he must pay at once. Then the Debtor fetched a Sow--the only one he had--and took her to market to offer her for sale. It happened that his creditor was there too. Presently a buyer came along and asked if the Sow produced good litters. "Yes," said the Debtor, "very fine ones; and the remarkable thing is that she produces females at the Mysteries and males at the Panathenea." (Festivals these were: and the Athenians always sacrifice a sow at one, and a boar at the other; while at the Dionysia they sacrifice a kid.) At that the creditor, who was standing by, put in, "Don't be surprised, sir; why, still better, at the Dionysia this Sow has kids!"
THE BALD HUNTSMAN
A Man who had lost all his hair took to wearing a wig, and one day he went out hunting. It was blowing rather hard at the time, and he hadn't gone far before a gust of wind caught his hat and carried it off, and his wig too, much to the amusement of the hunt. But he quite entered into the joke, and said, "Ah, well! the hair that wig is made of didn't stick to the head on which it grew; so it's no wonder it won't stick to mine."
THE HERDSMAN AND THE LOST BULL
A Herdsman was tending his cattle when he missed a young Bull, one of the finest of the herd. He went at once to look for him, but, meeting with no success in his search, he made a vow that, if he should discover the thief, he would sacrifice a calf to Jupiter. Continuing his search, he entered a thicket, where he presently espied a lion devouring the lost Bull. Terrified with fear, he raised his hands to heaven and cried, "Great Jupiter, I vowed I would sacrifice a calf to thee if I should discover the thief: but now a full-grown Bull I promise thee if only I myself escape unhurt from his clutches."
THE MULE
One morning a Mule, who had too much to eat and too little to do, began to think himself a very fine fellow indeed, and frisked about saying, "My father was undoubtedly a high-spirited horse and I take after him entirely." But very soon afterwards he was put into the harness and compelled to go a very long way with a heavy load behind him. At the end of the day, exhausted by his unusual exertions, he said dejectedly to himself, "I must have been mistaken about my father; he can only have been an ass after all."
THE HOUND AND THE FOX
A Hound, roaming in the forest, spied a lion, and being well used to lesser game, gave chase, thinking he would make a fine quarry. Presently the lion perceived that he was being pursued; so, stopping short, he rounded on his pursuer and gave a loud roar. The Hound immediately turned tail and fled. A Fox, seeing him running away, jeered at him and said, "Ho! ho! There goes the coward who chased a lion and ran away the moment he roared!"
THE FATHER AND HIS DAUGHTERS
A Man had two Daughters, one of whom he gave in marriage to a gardener, and the other to a potter. After a time he thought he would go and see how they were getting on; and first he went to the gardener's wife. He asked her how she was, and how things were going with herself and her husband. She replied that on the whole they were doing very well: "But," she continued, "I do wish we could have some good heavy rain: the garden wants it badly." Then he went on to the potter's wife and made the same inquiries of her. She replied that she and her husband had nothing to complain of: "But," she went on, "I do wish we could have some nice dry weather, to dry the pottery." Her Father looked at her with a humorous expression on his face. "You want dry weather," he said, "and your sister wants rain. I was going to ask in my prayers that your wishes should be granted; but now it strikes me I had better not refer to the subject."
THE THIEF AND THE INNKEEPER
A Thief hired a room at an inn, and stayed there some days on the look-out for something to steal. No opportunity, however, presented itself, till one day, when there was a festival to be celebrated, the Innkeeper appeared in a fine new coat and sat down before the door of the inn for an airing. The Thief no sooner set eyes upon the coat than he longed to get possession of it. There was no business doing, so he went and took a seat by the side of the Innkeeper, and began talking to him. They conversed together for some time, and then the Thief suddenly yawned and howled like a wolf. The Innkeeper asked him in some concern what ailed him. The Thief replied, "I will tell you about myself, sir, but first I must beg you to take charge of my clothes for me, for I intend to leave them with you. Why I have these fits of yawning I cannot tell: maybe they are sent as a punishment for my misdeeds; but, whatever the reason, the facts are that when I have yawned three times I become a ravening wolf and fly at men's throats." As he finished speaking he yawned a second time and howled again as before. The Innkeeper, believing every word he said, and terrified at the prospect of being confronted with a wolf, got up hastily and started to run indoors; but the Thief caught him by the coat and tried to stop him, crying, "Stay, sir, stay, and take charge of my clothes, or else I shall never see them again." As he spoke he opened his mouth and began to yawn for the third time. The Innkeeper, mad with the fear of being eaten by a wolf, slipped out of his coat, which remained in the other's hands, and bolted into the inn and locked the door behind him; and the Thief then quietly stole off with his spoil.
THE PACK-ASS AND THE WILD ASS
A Wild Ass, who was wandering idly about, one day came upon a Pack-Ass lying at full length in a sunny spot and thoroughly enjoying himself. Going up to him, he said, "What a lucky beast you are! Your sleek coat shows how well you live: how I envy you!" Not long after the Wild Ass saw his acquaintance again, but this time he was carrying a heavy load, and his driver was following behind and beating him with a thick stick. "Ah, my friend," said the Wild Ass, "I don't envy you any more: for I see you pay dear for your comforts."
Advantages that are dearly bought are doubtful blessings.
THE ASS AND HIS MASTERS
A Gardener had an Ass which had a very hard time of it, what with scanty food, heavy loads, and constant beating. The Ass therefore begged Jupiter to take him away from the Gardener and hand him over to another master. So Jupiter sent Mercury to the Gardener to bid him sell the Ass to a Potter, which he did. But the Ass was as discontented as ever, for he had to work harder than before: so he begged Jupiter for relief a second time, and Jupiter very obligingly arranged that he should be sold to a Tanner. But when the Ass saw what his new master's trade was, he cried in despair, "Why wasn't I content to serve either of my former masters, hard as I had to work and badly as I was treated? for they would have buried me decently, but now I shall come in the end to the tanning-vat."
Servants don't know a good master till they have served a worse.
THE PACK-ASS, THE WILD ASS, AND THE LION
A Wild Ass saw a Pack-Ass jogging along under a heavy load, and taunted him with the condition of slavery in which he lived, in these words: "What a vile lot is yours compared with mine! I am free as the air, and never do a stroke of work; and, as for fodder, I have only to go to the hills and there I find far more than enough for my needs. But you! you depend on your master for food, and he makes you carry heavy loads every day and beats you unmercifully." At that moment a Lion appeared on the scene, and made no attempt to molest the Pack-Ass owing to the presence of the driver; but he fell upon the Wild Ass, who had no one to protect him, and without more ado made a meal of him.
It is no use being your own master unless you can stand up for yourself.
THE ANT
Ants were once men and made their living by tilling the soil. But, not content with the results of their own work, they were always casting longing eyes upon the crops and fruits of their neighbours, which they stole, whenever they got the chance, and added to their own store. At last their covetousness made Jupiter so angry that he changed them into Ants. But, though their forms were changed, their nature remained the same: and so, to this day, they go about among the cornfields and gather the fruits of others' labour, and store them up for their own use.
You may punish a thief, but his bent remains.
THE FROGS AND THE WELL
Two Frogs lived together in a marsh. But one hot summer the marsh dried up, and they left it to look for another place to live in: for frogs like damp places if they can get them. By and by they came to a deep well, and one of them looked down into it, and said to the other, "This looks a nice cool place: let us jump in and settle here." But the other, who had a wiser head on his shoulders, replied, "Not so fast, my friend: supposing this well dried up like the marsh, how should we get out again?"
Think twice before you act.
THE CRAB AND THE FOX
A Crab once left the sea-shore and went and settled in a meadow some way inland, which looked very nice and green and seemed likely to be a good place to feed in. But a hungry Fox came along and spied the Crab and caught him. Just as he was going to be eaten up, the Crab said, "This is just what I deserve; for I had no business to leave my natural home by the sea and settle here as though I belonged to the land."
Be content with your lot.
THE FOX AND THE GRASSHOPPER
A Grasshopper sat chirping in the branches of a tree. A Fox heard her, and, thinking what a dainty morsel she would make, he tried to get her down by a trick. Standing below in full view of her, he praised her song in the most flattering terms, and begged her to descend, saying he would like to make the acquaintance of the owner of so beautiful a voice. But she was not to be taken in, and replied, "You are very much mistaken, my dear sir, if you imagine I am going to come down: I keep well out of the way of you and your kind ever since the day when I saw numbers of grasshoppers' wings strewn about the entrance to a fox's earth."
THE FARMER, HIS BOY, AND THE ROOKS
A Farmer had just sown a field of wheat, and was keeping a careful watch over it, for numbers of Rooks and starlings kept continually settling on it and eating up the grain. Along with him went his Boy, carrying a sling: and whenever the Farmer asked for the sling the starlings understood what he said and warned the Rooks and they were off in a moment. So the Farmer hit on a trick. "My lad," said he, "we must get the better of these birds somehow. After this, when I want the sling, I won't say 'sling,' but just 'humph!' and you must then hand me the sling quickly." Presently back came the whole flock. "Humph!" said the Farmer; but the starlings took no notice, and he had time to sling several stones among them, hitting one on the head, another in the legs, and another in the wing, before they got out of range. As they made all haste away they met some cranes, who asked them what the matter was. "Matter?" said one of the Rooks; "it's those rascals, men, that are the matter. Don't you go near them. They have a way of saying one thing and meaning another which has just been the death of several of our poor friends."
THE ASS AND THE DOG
An Ass and a Dog were on their travels together, and, as they went along, they found a sealed packet lying on the ground. The Ass picked it up, broke the seal, and found it contained some writing, which he proceeded to read out aloud to the Dog. As he read on it turned out to be all about grass and barley and hay--in short, all the kinds of fodder that Asses are fond of. The Dog was a good deal bored with listening to all this, till at last his impatience got the better of him, and he cried, "Just skip a few pages, friend, and see if there isn't something about meat and bones." The Ass glanced all through the packet, but found nothing of the sort, and said so. Then the Dog said in disgust, "Oh, throw it away, do: what's the good of a thing like that?"
THE ASS CARRYING THE IMAGE
A certain man put an Image on the back of his Ass to take it to one of the temples of the town. As they went along the road all the people they met uncovered and bowed their heads out of reverence for the Image; but the Ass thought they were doing it out of respect for himself, and began to give himself airs accordingly. At last he became so conceited that he imagined he could do as he liked, and, by way of protest against the load he was carrying, he came to a full stop and flatly declined to proceed any further. His driver, finding him so obstinate, hit him hard and long with his stick, saying the while, "Oh, you dunder-headed idiot, do you suppose it's come to this, that men pay worship to an Ass?"
Rude shocks await those who take to themselves the credit that is due to others.
THE ATHENIAN AND THE THEBAN
An Athenian and a Theban were on the road together, and passed the time in conversation, as is the way of travellers. After discussing a variety of subjects they began to talk about heroes, a topic that tends to be more fertile than edifying. Each of them was lavish in his praises of the heroes of his own city, until eventually the Theban asserted that Hercules was the greatest hero who had ever lived on earth, and now occupied a foremost place among the gods; while the Athenian insisted that Theseus was far superior, for his fortune had been in every way supremely blessed, whereas Hercules had at one time been forced to act as a servant. And he gained his point, for he was a very glib fellow, like all Athenians; so that the Theban, who was no match for him in talking, cried at last in some disgust, "All right, have your way; I only hope that, when our heroes are angry with us, Athens may suffer from the anger of Hercules, and Thebes only from that of Theseus."
THE GOATHERD AND THE GOAT
A Goatherd was one day gathering his flock to return to the fold, when one of his goats strayed and refused to join the rest. He tried for a long time to get her to return by calling and whistling to her, but the Goat took no notice of him at all; so at last he threw a stone at her and broke one of her horns. In dismay, he begged her not to tell his master: but she replied, "You silly fellow, my horn would cry aloud even if I held my tongue."
It's no use trying to hide what can't be hidden.
THE SHEEP AND THE DOG
Once upon a time the Sheep complained to the shepherd about the difference in his treatment of themselves and his Dog. "Your conduct," said they, "is very strange and, we think, very unfair. We provide you with wool and lambs and milk and you give us nothing but grass, and even that we have to find for ourselves: but you get nothing at all from the Dog, and yet you feed him with tit-bits from your own table." Their remarks were overheard by the Dog, who spoke up at once and said, "Yes, and quite right, too: where would you be if it wasn't for me? Thieves would steal you! Wolves would eat you! Indeed, if I didn't keep constant watch over you, you would be too terrified even to graze!" The Sheep were obliged to acknowledge that he spoke the truth, and never again made a grievance of the regard in which he was held by his master.
THE SHEPHERD AND THE WOLF
A Shepherd found a Wolf's Cub straying in the pastures, and took him home and reared him along with his dogs. When the Cub grew to his full size, if ever a wolf stole a sheep from the flock, he used to join the dogs in hunting him down. It sometimes happened that the dogs failed to come up with the thief, and, abandoning the pursuit, returned home. The Wolf would on such occasions continue the chase by himself, and when he overtook the culprit, would stop and share the feast with him, and then return to the Shepherd. But if some time passed without a sheep being carried off by the wolves, he would steal one himself and share his plunder with the dogs. The Shepherd's suspicions were aroused, and one day he caught him in the act; and, fastening a rope round his neck, hung him on the nearest tree.
What's bred in the bone is sure to come out in the flesh.
THE LION, JUPITER, AND THE ELEPHANT
The Lion, for all his size and strength, and his sharp teeth and claws, is a coward in one thing: he can't bear the sound of a cock crowing, and runs away whenever he hears it. He complained bitterly to Jupiter for making him like that; but Jupiter said it wasn't his fault: he had done the best he could for him, and, considering this was his only failing, he ought to be well content. The Lion, however, wouldn't be comforted, and was so ashamed of his timidity that he wished he might die. In this state of mind, he met the Elephant and had a talk with him. He noticed that the great beast cocked up his ears all the time, as if he were listening for something, and he asked him why he did so. Just then a gnat came humming by, and the Elephant said, "Do you see that wretched little buzzing insect? I'm terribly afraid of its getting into my ear: if it once gets in, I'm dead and done for." The Lion's spirits rose at once when he heard this: "For," he said to himself, "if the Elephant, huge as he is, is afraid of a gnat, I needn't be so much ashamed of being afraid of a cock, who is ten thousand times bigger than a gnat."
THE PIG AND THE SHEEP
A Pig found his way into a meadow where a flock of Sheep were grazing. The shepherd caught him, and was proceeding to carry him off to the butcher's when he set up a loud squealing and struggled to get free. The Sheep rebuked him for making such a to-do, and said to him, "The shepherd catches us regularly and drags us off just like that, and we don't make any fuss." "No, I dare say not," replied the Pig, "but my case and yours are altogether different: he only wants you for wool, but he wants me for bacon."
THE GARDENER AND HIS DOG
A Gardner's Dog fell into a deep well, from which his master used to draw water for the plants in his garden with a rope and a bucket. Failing to get the Dog out by means of these, the Gardener went down into the well himself in order to fetch him up. But the Dog thought he had come to make sure of drowning him; so he bit his master as soon as he came within reach, and hurt him a good deal, with the result that he left the Dog to his fate and climbed out of the well, remarking, "It serves me quite right for trying to save so determined a suicide."
THE RIVERS AND THE SEA
Once upon a time all the Rivers combined to protest against the action of the Sea in making their waters salt. "When we come to you," said they to the Sea, "we are sweet and drinkable: but when once we have mingled with you, our waters become as briny and unpalatable as your own." The Sea replied shortly, "Keep away from me and you'll remain sweet."
THE LION IN LOVE
A Lion fell deeply in love with the daughter of a cottager and wanted to marry her; but her father was unwilling to give her to so fearsome a husband, and yet didn't want to offend the Lion; so he hit upon the following expedient. He went to the Lion and said, "I think you will make a very good husband for my daughter: but I cannot consent to your union unless you let me draw your teeth and pare your nails, for my daughter is terribly afraid of them." The Lion was so much in love that he readily agreed that this should be done. When once, however, he was thus disarmed, the Cottager was afraid of him no longer, but drove him away with his club.
THE BEE-KEEPER
A Thief found his way into an apiary when the Bee-keeper was away, and stole all the honey. When the Keeper returned and found the hives empty, he was very much upset and stood staring at them for some time. Before long the bees came back from gathering honey, and, finding their hives overturned and the Keeper standing by, they made for him with their stings. At this he fell into a passion and cried, "You ungrateful scoundrels, you let the thief who stole my honey get off scot-free, and then you go and sting me who have always taken such care of you!"
When you hit back make sure you have got the right man.
THE WOLF AND THE HORSE
A Wolf on his rambles came to a field of oats, but, not being able to eat them, he was passing on his way when a Horse came along. "Look," said the Wolf, "here's a fine field of oats. For your sake I have left it untouched, and I shall greatly enjoy the sound of your teeth munching the ripe grain." But the Horse replied, "If wolves could eat oats, my fine friend, you would hardly have indulged your ears at the cost of your belly."
There is no virtue in giving to others what is useless to oneself.
THE BAT, THE BRAMBLE, AND THE SEAGULL
A Bat, a Bramble, and a Seagull went into partnership and determined to go on a trading voyage together. The Bat borrowed a sum of money for his venture; the Bramble laid in a stock of clothes of various kinds; and the Seagull took a quantity of lead: and so they set out. By and by a great storm came on, and their boat with all the cargo went to the bottom, but the three travellers managed to reach land. Ever since then the Seagull flies to and fro over the sea, and every now and then dives below the surface, looking for the lead he's lost; while the Bat is so afraid of meeting his creditors that he hides away by day and only comes out at night to feed; and the Bramble catches hold of the clothes of every one who passes by, hoping some day to recognise and recover the lost garments.
All men are more concerned to recover what they lose than to acquire what they lack.
THE DOG AND THE WOLF
A Dog was lying in the sun before a farmyard gate when a Wolf pounced upon him and was just going to eat him up; but he begged for his life and said, "You see how thin I am and what a wretched meal I should make you now: but if you will only wait a few days my master is going to give a feast. All the rich scraps and pickings will fall to me and I shall get nice and fat: then will be the time for you to eat me." The Wolf thought this was a very good plan and went away. Some time afterwards he came to the farmyard again, and found the Dog lying out of reach on the stable roof. "Come down," he called, "and be eaten: you remember our agreement?" But the Dog said coolly, "My friend, if ever you catch me lying down by the gate there again, don't you wait for any feast."
Once bitten, twice shy.
THE WASP AND THE SNAKE
A Wasp settled on the head of a Snake, and not only stung him several times, but clung obstinately to the head of his victim. Maddened with pain the Snake tried every means he could think of to get rid of the creature, but without success. At last he became desperate, and crying, "Kill you I will, even at the cost of my own life," he laid his head with the Wasp on it under the wheel of a passing waggon, and they both perished together.
THE EAGLE AND THE BEETLE
An Eagle was chasing a hare, which was running for dear life and was at her wits' end to know where to turn for help. Presently she espied a Beetle, and begged it to aid her. So when the Eagle came up the Beetle warned her not to touch the hare, which was under its protection. But the Eagle never noticed the Beetle because it was so small, seized the hare and ate her up. The Beetle never forgot this, and used to keep an eye on the Eagle's nest, and whenever the Eagle laid an egg it climbed up and rolled it out of the nest and broke it. At last the Eagle got so worried over the loss of her eggs that she went up to Jupiter, who is the special protector of Eagles, and begged him to give her a safe place to nest in: so he let her lay her eggs in his lap. But the Beetle noticed this and made a ball of dirt the size of an Eagle's egg, and flew up and deposited it in Jupiter's lap. When Jupiter saw the dirt, he stood up to shake it out of his robe, and, forgetting about the eggs, he shook them out too, and they were broken just as before. Ever since then, they say, Eagles never lay their eggs at the season when Beetles are about.
The weak will sometimes find ways to avenge an insult, even upon the strong.
THE FOWLER AND THE LARK
A Fowler was setting his nets for little birds when a Lark came up to him and asked him what he was doing. "I am engaged in founding a city," said he, and with that he withdrew to a short distance and concealed himself. The Lark examined the nets with great curiosity, and presently, catching sight of the bait, hopped on to them in order to secure it, and became entangled in the meshes. The Fowler then ran up quickly and captured her. "What a fool I was!" said she: "but at any rate, if that's the kind of city you are founding, it'll be a long time before you find fools enough to fill it."
THE FISHERMAN PIPING
A Fisherman who could play the flute went down one day to the sea-shore with his nets and his flute; and, taking his stand on a projecting rock, began to play a tune, thinking that the music would bring the fish jumping out of the sea. He went on playing for some time, but not a fish appeared: so at last he threw down his flute and cast his net into the sea, and made a great haul of fish. When they were landed and he saw them leaping about on the shore, he cried, "You rascals! you wouldn't dance when I piped: but now I've stopped, you can do nothing else!"
THE WEASEL AND THE MAN
A Man once caught a Weasel, which was always sneaking about the house, and was just going to drown it in a tub of water, when it begged hard for its life, and said to him, "Surely you haven't the heart to put me to death? Think how useful I have been in clearing your house of the mice and lizards which used to infest it, and show your gratitude by sparing my life." "You have not been altogether useless, I grant you," said the Man: "but who killed the fowls? Who stole the meat? No, no! You do much more harm than good, and die you shall."
THE PLOUGHMAN, THE ASS, AND THE OX
A Ploughman yoked his Ox and his Ass together, and set to work to plough his field. It was a poor makeshift of a team, but it was the best he could do, as he had but a single Ox. At the end of the day, when the beasts were loosed from the yoke, the Ass said to the Ox, "Well, we've had a hard day: which of us is to carry the master home?" The Ox looked surprised at the question. "Why," said he, "you, to be sure, as usual."
DEMADES AND HIS FABLE
Demades the orator was once speaking in the Assembly at Athens; but the people were very inattentive to what he was saying, so he stopped and said, "Gentlemen, I should like to tell you one of Æsop's fables." This made every one listen intently. Then Demades began: "Demeter, a Swallow, and an Eel were once travelling together, and came to a river without a bridge: the Swallow flew over it, and the Eel swam across"; and then he stopped. "What happened to Demeter?" cried several people in the audience. "Demeter," he replied, "is very angry with you for listening to fables when you ought to be minding public business."
THE MONKEY AND THE DOLPHIN
When people go on a voyage they often take with them lap-dogs or monkeys as pets to wile away the time. Thus it fell out that a man returning to Athens from the East had a pet Monkey on board with him. As they neared the coast of Attica a great storm burst upon them, and the ship capsized. All on board were thrown into the water, and tried to save themselves by swimming, the Monkey among the rest. A Dolphin saw him, and, supposing him to be a man, took him on his back and began swimming towards the shore. When they got near the Piræus, which is the port of Athens, the Dolphin asked the Monkey if he was an Athenian. The Monkey replied that he was, and added that he came of a very distinguished family. "Then, of course, you know the Piræus," continued the Dolphin. The Monkey thought he was referring to some high official or other, and replied, "Oh, yes, he's a very old friend of mine." At that, detecting his hypocrisy, the Dolphin was so disgusted that he dived below the surface, and the unfortunate Monkey was quickly drowned.
THE CROW AND THE SNAKE
A hungry Crow spied a Snake lying asleep in a sunny spot, and, picking it up in his claws, he was carrying it off to a place where he could make a meal of it without being disturbed, when the Snake reared its head and bit him. It was a poisonous Snake, and the bite was fatal, and the dying Crow said, "What a cruel fate is mine! I thought I had made a lucky find, and it has cost me my life!"
THE DOGS AND THE FOX
Some Dogs once found a lion's skin, and were worrying it with their teeth. Just then a Fox came by, and said, "You think yourselves very brave, no doubt; but if that were a live lion you'd find his claws a good deal sharper than your teeth."
THE NIGHTINGALE AND THE HAWK
A Nightingale was sitting on a bough of an oak and singing, as her custom was. A hungry Hawk presently spied her, and darting to the spot seized her in his talons. He was just about to tear her in pieces when she begged him to spare her life: "I'm not big enough," she pleaded, "to make you a good meal: you ought to seek your prey among the bigger birds." The Hawk eyed her with some contempt. "You must think me very simple," said he, "if you suppose I am going to give up a certain prize on the chance of a better of which I see at present no signs."
THE ROSE AND THE AMARANTH
A Rose and an Amaranth blossomed side by side in a garden, and the Amaranth said to her neighbour, "How I envy you your beauty and your sweet scent! No wonder you are such a universal favourite." But the Rose replied with a shade of sadness in her voice, "Ah, my dear friend, I bloom but for a time: my petals soon wither and fall, and then I die. But your flowers never fade, even if they are cut; for they are everlasting."
THE MAN, THE HORSE, THE OX, AND THE DOG
One winter's day, during a severe storm, a Horse, an Ox, and a Dog came and begged for shelter in the house of a Man. He readily admitted them, and, as they were cold and wet, he lit a fire for their comfort: and he put oats before the Horse, and hay before the Ox, while he fed the Dog with the remains of his own dinner. When the storm abated, and they were about to depart, they determined to show their gratitude in the following way. They divided the life of Man among them, and each endowed one part of it with the qualities which were peculiarly his own. The Horse took youth, and hence young men are high-mettled and impatient of restraint; the Ox took middle age, and accordingly men in middle life are steady and hard-working; while the Dog took old age, which is the reason why old men are so often peevish and ill-tempered, and, like dogs, attached chiefly to those who look to their comfort, while they are disposed to snap at those who are unfamiliar or distasteful to them.
THE WOLVES, THE SHEEP, AND THE RAM
The Wolves sent a deputation to the Sheep with proposals for a lasting peace between them, on condition of their giving up the sheep-dogs to instant death. The foolish Sheep agreed to the terms; but an old Ram, whose years had brought him wisdom, interfered and said, "How can we expect to live at peace with you? Why, even with the dogs at hand to protect us, we are never secure from your murderous attacks!"
THE SWAN
The Swan is said to sing but once in its life--when it knows that it is about to die. A certain man, who had heard of the song of the Swan, one day saw one of these birds for sale in the market, and bought it and took it home with him. A few days later he had some friends to dinner, and produced the Swan, and bade it sing for their entertainment: but the Swan remained silent. In course of time, when it was growing old, it became aware of its approaching end and broke into a sweet, sad song. When its owner heard it, he said angrily, "If the creature only sings when it is about to die, what a fool I was that day I wanted to hear its song! I ought to have wrung its neck instead of merely inviting it to sing."
THE SNAKE AND JUPITER
A Snake suffered a good deal from being constantly trodden upon by man and beast, owing partly to the length of his body and partly to his being unable to raise himself above the surface of the ground: so he went and complained to Jupiter about the risks to which he was exposed. But Jupiter had little sympathy for him. "I dare say," said he, "that if you had bitten the first that trod on you, the others would have taken more trouble to look where they put their feet."
THE WOLF AND HIS SHADOW
A Wolf, who was roaming about on the plain when the sun was getting low in the sky, was much impressed by the size of his shadow, and said to himself, "I had no idea I was so big. Fancy my being afraid of a lion! Why, I, not he, ought to be King of the beasts"; and, heedless of danger, he strutted about as if there could be no doubt at all about it. Just then a lion sprang upon him and began to devour him. "Alas," he cried, "had I not lost sight of the facts, I shouldn't have been ruined by my fancies."
THE PLOUGHMAN AND THE WOLF
A Ploughman loosed his oxen from the plough, and led them away to the water to drink. While he was absent a half-starved Wolf appeared on the scene, and went up to the plough and began chewing the leather straps attached to the yoke. As he gnawed away desperately in the hope of satisfying his craving for food, he somehow got entangled in the harness, and, taking fright, struggled to get free, tugging at the traces as if he would drag the plough along with him. Just then the Ploughman came back, and seeing what was happening, he cried, "Ah, you old rascal, I wish you would give up thieving for good and take to honest work instead."
MERCURY AND THE MAN BITTEN BY AN ANT
A Man once saw a ship go down with all its crew, and commented severely on the injustice of the gods. "They care nothing for a man's character," said he, "but let the good and the bad go to their deaths together." There was an ant-heap close by where he was standing, and, just as he spoke, he was bitten in the foot by an Ant. Turning in a temper to the ant-heap he stamped upon it and crushed hundreds of unoffending ants. Suddenly Mercury appeared, and belaboured him with his staff, saying as he did so, "You villain, where's your nice sense of justice now?"
THE WILY LION
A Lion watched a fat Bull feeding in a meadow, and his mouth watered when he thought of the royal feast he would make, but he did not dare to attack him, for he was afraid of his sharp horns. Hunger, however, presently compelled him to do something: and as the use of force did not promise success, he determined to resort to artifice. Going up to the Bull in friendly fashion, he said to him, "I cannot help saying how much I admire your magnificent figure. What a fine head! What powerful shoulders and thighs! But, my dear friend, what in the world makes you wear those ugly horns? You must find them as awkward as they are unsightly. Believe me, you would do much better without them." The Bull was foolish enough to be persuaded by this flattery to have his horns cut off; and, having now lost his only means of defence, fell an easy prey to the Lion.
THE PARROT AND THE CAT
A Man once bought a Parrot and gave it the run of his house. It revelled in its liberty, and presently flew up on to the mantelpiece and screamed away to its heart's content. The noise disturbed the Cat, who was asleep on the hearthrug. Looking up at the intruder, she said, "Who may you be, and where have you come from?" The Parrot replied, "Your master has just bought me and brought me home with him." "You impudent bird," said the Cat, "how dare you, a newcomer, make a noise like that? Why, I was born here, and have lived here all my life, and yet, if I venture to mew, they throw things at me and chase me all over the place." "Look here, mistress," said the Parrot, "you just hold your tongue. My voice they delight in; but yours--yours is a perfect nuisance."
THE STAG AND THE LION
A Stag was chased by the hounds, and took refuge in a cave, where he hoped to be safe from his pursuers. Unfortunately the cave contained a Lion, to whom he fell an easy prey. "Unhappy that I am," he cried, "I am saved from the power of the dogs only to fall into the clutches of a Lion."
Out of the frying-pan into the fire.
THE IMPOSTOR
A certain man fell ill, and, being in a very bad way, he made a vow that he would sacrifice a hundred oxen to the gods if they would grant him a return to health. Wishing to see how he would keep his vow, they caused him to recover in a short time. Now, he hadn't an ox in the world, so he made a hundred little oxen out of tallow and offered them up on an altar, at the same time saying, "Ye gods, I call you to witness that I have discharged my vow." The gods determined to be even with him, so they sent him a dream, in which he was bidden to go to the sea-shore and fetch a hundred crowns which he was to find there. Hastening in great excitement to the shore, he fell in with a band of robbers, who seized him and carried him off to sell as a slave: and when they sold him a hundred crowns was the sum he fetched.
Do not promise more than you can perform.
THE DOGS AND THE HIDES
Once upon a time a number of Dogs, who were famished with hunger, saw some Hides steeping in a river, but couldn't get at them because the water was too deep. So they put their heads together, and decided to drink away at the river till it was shallow enough for them to reach the Hides. But long before that happened they burst themselves with drinking.
THE LION, THE FOX, AND THE ASS
A Lion, a Fox, and an Ass went out hunting together. They had soon taken a large booty, which the Lion requested the Ass to divide between them. The Ass divided it all into three equal parts, and modestly begged the others to take their choice; at which the Lion, bursting with fury, sprang upon the Ass and tore him to pieces. Then, glaring at the Fox, he bade him make a fresh division. The Fox gathered almost the whole in one great heap for the Lion's share, leaving only the smallest possible morsel for himself. "My dear friend," said the Lion, "how did you get the knack of it so well?" The Fox replied, "Me? Oh, I took a lesson from the Ass."
Happy is he who learns from the misfortunes of others.
THE FOWLER, THE PARTRIDGE, AND THE COCK
One day, as a Fowler was sitting down to a scanty supper of herbs and bread, a friend dropped in unexpectedly. The larder was empty; so he went out and caught a tame Partridge, which he kept as a decoy, and was about to wring her neck when she cried, "Surely you won't kill me? Why, what will you do without me next time you go fowling? How will you get the birds to come to your nets?" He let her go at this, and went to his hen-house, where he had a plump young Cock. When the Cock saw what he was after, he too pleaded for his life, and said, "If you kill me, how will you know the time of night? and who will wake you up in the morning when it is time to get to work?" The Fowler, however, replied, "You are useful for telling the time, I know; but, for all that, I can't send my friend supperless to bed." And therewith he caught him and wrung his neck.
THE GNAT AND THE LION
A Gnat once went up to a Lion and said, "I am not in the least afraid of you: I don't even allow that you are a match for me in strength. What does your strength amount to after all? That you can scratch with your claws and bite with your teeth--just like a woman in a temper--and nothing more. But I'm stronger than you: if you don't believe it, let us fight and see." So saying, the Gnat sounded his horn, and darted in and bit the Lion on the nose. When the Lion felt the sting, in his haste to crush him he scratched his nose badly, and made it bleed, but failed altogether to hurt the Gnat, which buzzed off in triumph, elated by its victory. Presently, however, it got entangled in a spider's web, and was caught and eaten by the spider, thus falling a prey to an insignificant insect after having triumphed over the King of the Beasts.
THE FARMER AND HIS DOGS
A Farmer was snowed up in his farmstead by a severe storm, and was unable to go out and procure provisions for himself and his family. So he first killed his sheep and used them for food; then, as the storm still continued, he killed his goats; and, last of all, as the weather showed no signs of improving, he was compelled to kill his oxen and eat them. When his Dogs saw the various animals being killed and eaten in turn, they said to one another, "We had better get out of this or we shall be the next to go!"
THE EAGLE AND THE FOX
An Eagle and a Fox became great friends and determined to live near one another: they thought that the more they saw of each other the better friends they would be. So the Eagle built a nest at the top of a high tree, while the Fox settled in a thicket at the foot of it and produced a litter of cubs. One day the Fox went out foraging for food, and the Eagle, who also wanted food for her young, flew down into the thicket, caught up the Fox's cubs, and carried them up into the tree for a meal for herself and her family. When the Fox came back, and found out what had happened, she was not so much sorry for the loss of her cubs as furious because she couldn't get at the Eagle and pay her out for her treachery. So she sat down not far off and cursed her. But it wasn't long before she had her revenge. Some villagers happened to be sacrificing a goat on a neighbouring altar, and the Eagle flew down and carried off a piece of burning flesh to her nest. There was a strong wind blowing, and the nest caught fire, with the result that her fledglings fell half-roasted to the ground. Then the Fox ran to the spot and devoured them in full sight of the Eagle.
False faith may escape human punishment, but cannot escape the divine.
THE BUTCHER AND HIS CUSTOMERS
Two Men were buying meat at a Butcher's stall in the market-place, and, while the Butcher's back was turned for a moment, one of them snatched up a joint and hastily thrust it under the other's cloak, where it could not be seen. When the Butcher turned round, he missed the meat at once, and charged them with having stolen it: but the one who had taken it said he hadn't got it, and the one who had got it said he hadn't taken it. The Butcher felt sure they were deceiving him, but he only said, "You may cheat me with your lying, but you can't cheat the gods, and they won't let you off so lightly."
Prevarication often amounts to perjury.
HERCULES AND MINERVA
Hercules was once travelling along a narrow road when he saw lying on the ground in front of him what appeared to be an apple, and as he passed he stamped upon it with his heel. To his astonishment, instead of being crushed it doubled in size; and, on his attacking it again and smiting it with his club, it swelled up to an enormous size and blocked up the whole road. Upon this he dropped his club, and stood looking at it in amazement. Just then Minerva appeared, and said to him, "Leave it alone, my friend; that which you see before you is the apple of discord: if you do not meddle with it, it remains small as it was at first, but if you resort to violence it swells into the thing you see."
THE FOX WHO SERVED A LION
A Lion had a Fox to attend on him, and whenever they went hunting the Fox found the prey and the Lion fell upon it and killed it, and then they divided it between them in certain proportions. But the Lion always got a very large share, and the Fox a very small one, which didn't please the latter at all; so he determined to set up on his own account. He began by trying to steal a lamb from a flock of sheep: but the shepherd saw him and set his dogs on him. The hunter was now the hunted, and was very soon caught and despatched by the dogs.
Better servitude with safety than freedom with danger.
THE QUACK DOCTOR
A certain man fell sick and took to his bed. He consulted a number of doctors from time to time, and they all, with one exception, told him that his life was in no immediate danger, but that his illness would probably last a considerable time. The one who took a different view of his case, who was also the last to be consulted, bade him prepare for the worst: "You have not twenty-four hours to live," said he, "and I fear I can do nothing." As it turned out, however, he was quite wrong; for at the end of a few days the sick man quitted his bed and took a walk abroad, looking, it is true, as pale as a ghost. In the course of his walk he met the Doctor who had prophesied his death. "Dear me," said the latter, "how do you do? You are fresh from the other world, no doubt. Pray, how are our departed friends getting on there?" "Most comfortably," replied the other, "for they have drunk the water of oblivion, and have forgotten all the troubles of life. By the way, just before I left, the authorities were making arrangements to prosecute all the doctors, because they won't let sick men die in the course of nature, but use their arts to keep them alive. They were going to charge you along with the rest, till I assured them that you were no doctor, but a mere impostor."
THE LION, THE WOLF, AND THE FOX
A Lion, infirm with age, lay sick in his den, and all the beasts of the forest came to inquire after his health with the exception of the Fox. The Wolf thought this was a good opportunity for paying off old scores against the Fox, so he called the attention of the Lion to his absence, and said, "You see, sire, that we have all come to see how you are except the Fox, who hasn't come near you, and doesn't care whether you are well or ill." Just then the Fox came in and heard the last words of the Wolf. The Lion roared at him in deep displeasure, but he begged to be allowed to explain his absence, and said, "Not one of them cares for you so much as I, sire, for all the time I have been going round to the doctors and trying to find a cure for your illness." "And may I ask if you have found one?" said the Lion. "I have, sire," said the Fox, "and it is this: you must flay a Wolf and wrap yourself in his skin while it is still warm." The Lion accordingly turned to the Wolf and struck him dead with one blow of his paw, in order to try the Fox's prescription; but the Fox laughed and said to himself, "That's what comes of stirring up ill-will."
HERCULES AND PLUTUS
When Hercules was received among the gods and was entertained at a banquet by Jupiter, he responded courteously to the greetings of all with the exception of Plutus, the god of wealth. When Plutus approached him, he cast his eyes upon the ground, and turned away and pretended not to see him. Jupiter was surprised at this conduct on his part, and asked why, after having been so cordial with all the other gods, he had behaved like that to Plutus. "Sire," said Hercules, "I do not like Plutus, and I will tell you why. When we were on earth together I always noticed that he was to be found in the company of scoundrels."
THE FOX AND THE LEOPARD
A Fox and a Leopard were disputing about their looks, and each claimed to be the more handsome of the two. The Leopard said, "Look at my smart coat; you have nothing to match that." But the Fox replied, "Your coat may be smart, but my wits are smarter still."
THE FOX AND THE HEDGEHOG
A Fox, in swimming across a rapid river, was swept away by the current and carried a long way downstream in spite of his struggles, until at last, bruised and exhausted, he managed to scramble on to dry ground from a backwater. As he lay there unable to move, a swarm of horseflies settled on him and sucked his blood undisturbed, for he was too weak even to shake them off. A Hedgehog saw him, and asked if he should brush away the flies that were tormenting him; but the Fox replied, "Oh, please, no, not on any account, for these flies have sucked their fill and are taking very little from me now; but, if you drive them off, another swarm of hungry ones will come and suck all the blood I have left, and leave me without a drop in my veins."
THE CROW AND THE RAVEN
A Crow became very jealous of a Raven, because the latter was regarded by men as a bird of omen which foretold the future, and was accordingly held in great respect by them. She was very anxious to get the same sort of reputation herself; and, one day, seeing some travellers approaching, she flew on to a branch of a tree at the roadside and cawed as loud as she could. The travellers were in some dismay at the sound, for they feared it might be a bad omen; till one of them, spying the Crow, said to his companions, "It's all right, my friends, we can go on without fear, for it's only a crow and that means nothing."
Those who pretend to be something they are not only make themselves ridiculous.
THE WITCH
A Witch professed to be able to avert the anger of the gods by means of charms, of which she alone possessed the secret; and she drove a brisk trade, and made a fat livelihood out of it. But certain persons accused her of black magic and carried her before the judges, and demanded that she should be put to death for dealings with the Devil. She was found guilty and condemned to death: and one of the judges said to her as she was leaving the dock, "You say you can avert the anger of the gods. How comes it, then, that you have failed to disarm the enmity of men?"
THE OLD MAN AND DEATH
An Old Man cut himself a bundle of faggots in a wood and started to carry them home. He had a long way to go, and was tired out before he had got much more than half-way. Casting his burden on the ground, he called upon Death to come and release him from his life of toil. The words were scarcely out of his mouth when, much to his dismay, Death stood before him and professed his readiness to serve him. He was almost frightened out of his wits, but he had enough presence of mind to stammer out, "Good sir, if you'd be so kind, pray help me up with my burden again."
THE MISER
A Miser sold everything he had, and melted down his hoard of gold into a single lump, which he buried secretly in a field. Every day he went to look at it, and would sometimes spend long hours gloating over his treasure. One of his men noticed his frequent visits to the spot, and one day watched him and discovered his secret. Waiting his opportunity, he went one night and dug up the gold and stole it. Next day the Miser visited the place as usual, and, finding his treasure gone, fell to tearing his hair and groaning over his loss. In this condition he was seen by one of his neighbours, who asked him what his trouble was. The Miser told him of his misfortune; but the other replied, "Don't take it so much to heart, my friend; put a brick into the hole, and take a look at it every day: you won't be any worse off than before, for even when you had your gold it was of no earthly use to you."
THE FOXES AND THE RIVER
A number of Foxes assembled on the bank of a river and wanted to drink; but the current was so strong and the water looked so deep and dangerous that they didn't dare to do so, but stood near the edge encouraging one another not to be afraid. At last one of them, to shame the rest, and show how brave he was, said, "I am not a bit frightened! See, I'll step right into the water!" He had no sooner done so than the current swept him off his feet. When the others saw him being carried down-stream they cried, "Don't go and leave us! Come back and show us where we too can drink with safety." But he replied, "I'm afraid I can't yet: I want to go to the seaside, and this current will take me there nicely. When I come back I'll show you with pleasure."
THE HORSE AND THE STAG
There was once a Horse who used to graze in a meadow which he had all to himself. But one day a Stag came into the meadow, and said he had as good a right to feed there as the Horse, and moreover chose all the best places for himself. The Horse, wishing to be revenged upon his unwelcome visitor, went to a man and asked if he would help him to turn out the Stag. "Yes," said the man, "I will by all means; but I can only do so if you let me put a bridle in your mouth and mount on your back." The Horse agreed to this, and the two together very soon turned the Stag out of the pasture: but when that was done, the Horse found to his dismay that in the man he had got a master for good.
THE FOX AND THE BRAMBLE
In making his way through a hedge a Fox missed his footing and caught at a Bramble to save himself from falling. Naturally, he got badly scratched, and in disgust he cried to the Bramble, "It was your help I wanted, and see how you have treated me! I'd sooner have fallen outright." The Bramble, interrupting him, replied, "You must have lost your wits, my friend, to catch at me, who am myself always catching at others."
THE FOX AND THE SNAKE
A Snake, in crossing a river, was carried away by the current, but managed to wriggle on to a bundle of thorns which was floating by, and was thus carried at a great rate down-stream. A Fox caught sight of it from the bank as it went whirling along, and called out, "Gad! the passenger fits the ship!"
THE LION, THE FOX, AND THE STAG
A Lion lay sick in his den, unable to provide himself with food. So he said to his friend the Fox, who came to ask how he did, "My good friend, I wish you would go to yonder wood and beguile the big Stag, who lives there, to come to my den: I have a fancy to make my dinner off a stag's heart and brains." The Fox went to the wood and found the Stag and said to him, "My dear sir, you're in luck. You know the Lion, our King: well, he's at the point of death, and has appointed you his successor to rule over the beasts. I hope you won't forget that I was the first to bring you the good news. And now I must be going back to him; and, if you take my advice, you'll come too and be with him at the last." The Stag was highly flattered, and followed the Fox to the Lion's den, suspecting nothing. No sooner had he got inside than the Lion sprang upon him, but he misjudged his spring, and the Stag got away with only his ears torn, and returned as fast as he could to the shelter of the wood. The Fox was much mortified, and the Lion, too, was dreadfully disappointed, for he was getting very hungry in spite of his illness. So he begged the Fox to have another try at coaxing the Stag to his den. "It'll be almost impossible this time," said the Fox, "but I'll try"; and off he went to the wood a second time, and found the Stag resting and trying to recover from his fright. As soon as he saw the Fox he cried, "You scoundrel, what do you mean by trying to lure me to my death like that? Take yourself off, or I'll do you to death with my horns." But the Fox was entirely shameless. "What a coward you were," said he; "surely you didn't think the Lion meant any harm? Why, he was only going to whisper some royal secrets into your ear when you went off like a scared rabbit. You have rather disgusted him, and I'm not sure he won't make the wolf King instead, unless you come back at once and show you've got some spirit. I promise you he won't hurt you, and I will be your faithful servant." The Stag was foolish enough to be persuaded to return, and this time the Lion made no mistake, but overpowered him, and feasted right royally upon his carcase. The Fox, meanwhile, watched his chance and, when the Lion wasn't looking, filched away the brains to reward him for his trouble. Presently the Lion began searching for them, of course without success: and the Fox, who was watching him, said, "I don't think it's much use your looking for the brains: a creature who twice walked into a Lion's den can't have got any."
THE MAN WHO LOST HIS SPADE
A Man was engaged in digging over his vineyard, and one day on coming to work he missed his Spade. Thinking it may have been stolen by one of his labourers, he questioned them closely, but they one and all denied any knowledge of it. He was not convinced by their denials, and insisted that they should all go to the town and take oath in a temple that they were not guilty of the theft. This was because he had no great opinion of the simple country deities, but thought that the thief would not pass undetected by the shrewder gods of the town. When they got inside the gates the first thing they heard was the town crier proclaiming a reward for information about a thief who had stolen something from the city temple. "Well," said the Man to himself, "it strikes me I had better go back home again. If these town gods can't detect the thieves who steal from their own temples, it's scarcely likely they can tell me who stole my Spade."
THE PARTRIDGE AND THE FOWLER
A Fowler caught a Partridge in his nets, and was just about to wring its neck when it made a piteous appeal to him to spare its life and said, "Do not kill me, but let me live and I will repay you for your kindness by decoying other partridges into your nets." "No," said the Fowler, "I will not spare you. I was going to kill you anyhow, and after that treacherous speech you thoroughly deserve your fate."
THE RUNAWAY SLAVE
A Slave, being discontented with his lot, ran away from his master. He was soon missed by the latter, who lost no time in mounting his horse and setting out in pursuit of the fugitive. He presently came up with him, and the Slave, in the hope of avoiding capture, slipped into a treadmill and hid himself there. "Aha," said his master, "that's the very place for you, my man!"
THE HUNTER AND THE WOODMAN
A Hunter was searching in the forest for the tracks of a lion, and, catching sight presently of a Woodman engaged in felling a tree, he went up to him and asked him if he had noticed a lion's footprints anywhere about, or if he knew where his den was. The Woodman answered, "If you will come with me, I will show you the lion himself." The Hunter turned pale with fear, and his teeth chattered as he replied, "Oh, I'm not looking for the lion, thanks, but only for his tracks."
THE SERPENT AND THE EAGLE
An Eagle swooped down upon a Serpent and seized it in his talons with the intention of carrying it off and devouring it. But the Serpent was too quick for him and had its coils round him in a moment; and then there ensued a life-and-death struggle between the two. A countryman, who was a witness of the encounter, came to the assistance of the Eagle, and succeeded in freeing him from the Serpent and enabling him to escape. In revenge the Serpent spat some of his poison into the man's drinking-horn. Heated with his exertions, the man was about to slake his thirst with a draught from the horn, when the Eagle knocked it out of his hand, and spilled its contents upon the ground.
One good turn deserves another.
THE ROGUE AND THE ORACLE
A Rogue laid a wager that he would prove the Oracle at Delphi to be untrustworthy by procuring from it a false reply to an inquiry by himself. So he went to the temple on the appointed day with a small bird in his hand, which he concealed under the folds of his cloak, and asked whether what he held in his hand were alive or dead. If the Oracle said "dead," he meant to produce the bird alive: if the reply was "alive," he intended to wring its neck and show it to be dead. But the Oracle was one too many for him, for the answer he got was this: "Stranger, whether the thing that you hold in your hand be alive or dead is a matter that depends entirely on your own will."
THE HORSE AND THE ASS
A Horse, proud of his fine harness, met an Ass on the high-road. As the Ass with his heavy burden moved slowly out of the way to let him pass, the Horse cried out impatiently that he could hardly resist kicking him to make him move faster. The Ass held his peace, but did not forget the other's insolence. Not long afterwards the Horse became broken-winded, and was sold by his owner to a farmer. One day, as he was drawing a dung-cart, he met the Ass again, who in turn derided him and said, "Aha! you never thought to come to this, did you, you who were so proud! Where are all your gay trappings now?"
THE DOG CHASING A WOLF
A Dog was chasing a Wolf, and as he ran he thought what a fine fellow he was, and what strong legs he had, and how quickly they covered the ground. "Now, there's this Wolf," he said to himself, "what a poor creature he is: he's no match for me, and he knows it and so he runs away." But the Wolf looked round just then and said, "Don't you imagine I'm running away from you, my friend: it's your master I'm afraid of."
GRIEF AND HIS DUE
When Jupiter was assigning the various gods their privileges, it so happened that Grief was not present with the rest: but when all had received their share, he too entered and claimed his due. Jupiter was at a loss to know what to do, for there was nothing left for him. However, at last he decided that to him should belong the tears that are shed for the dead. Thus it is the same with Grief as it is with the other gods. The more devoutly men render to him his due, the more lavish is he of that which he has to bestow. It is not well, therefore, to mourn long for the departed; else Grief, whose sole pleasure is in such mourning, will be quick to send fresh cause for tears.
THE HAWK, THE KITE, AND THE PIGEONS
The Pigeons in a certain dovecote were persecuted by a Kite, who every now and then swooped down and carried off one of their number. So they invited a Hawk into the dovecote to defend them against their enemy. But they soon repented of their folly: for the Hawk killed more of them in a day than the Kite had done in a year.
THE WOMAN AND THE FARMER
A Woman, who had lately lost her husband, used to go every day to his grave and lament her loss. A Farmer, who was engaged in ploughing not far from the spot, set eyes upon the Woman and desired to have her for his wife: so he left his plough and came and sat by her side, and began to shed tears himself. She asked him why he wept; and he replied, "I have lately lost my wife, who was very dear to me, and tears ease my grief." "And I," said she, "have lost my husband." And so for a while they mourned in silence. Then he said, "Since you and I are in like case, shall we not do well to marry and live together? I shall take the place of your dead husband, and you, that of my dead wife." The Woman consented to the plan, which indeed seemed reasonable enough: and they dried their tears. Meanwhile, a thief had come and stolen the oxen which the Farmer had left with his plough. On discovering the theft, he beat his breast and loudly bewailed his loss. When the Woman heard his cries, she came and said, "Why, are you weeping still?" To which he replied, "Yes, and I mean it this time."
PROMETHEUS AND THE MAKING OF MAN
At the bidding of Jupiter, Prometheus set about the creation of Man and the other animals. Jupiter, seeing that Mankind, the only rational creatures, were far outnumbered by the irrational beasts, bade him redress the balance by turning some of the latter into men. Prometheus did as he was bidden, and this is the reason why some people have the forms of men but the souls of beasts.
THE SWALLOW AND THE CROW
A Swallow was once boasting to a Crow about her birth. "I was once a princess," said she, "the daughter of a King of Athens, but my husband used me cruelly, and cut out my tongue for a slight fault. Then, to protect me from further injury, I was turned by Juno into a bird." "You chatter quite enough as it is," said the Crow. "What you would have been like if you hadn't lost your tongue, I can't think."
THE HUNTER AND THE HORSEMAN
A Hunter went out after game, and succeeded in catching a hare, which he was carrying home with him when he met a man on horseback, who said to him, "You have had some sport I see, sir," and offered to buy it. The Hunter readily agreed; but the Horseman had no sooner got the hare in his hands than he set spurs to his horse and went off at full gallop. The Hunter ran after him for some little distance; but it soon dawned upon him that he had been tricked, and he gave up trying to overtake the Horseman, and, to save his face, called after him as loud as he could, "All right, sir, all right, take your hare: it was meant all along as a present."
THE GOATHERD AND THE WILD GOATS
A Goatherd was tending his goats out at pasture when he saw a number of Wild Goats approach and mingle with his flock. At the end of the day he drove them home and put them all into the pen together. Next day the weather was so bad that he could not take them out as usual: so he kept them at home in the pen, and fed them there. He only gave his own goats enough food to keep them from starving, but he gave the Wild Goats as much as they could eat and more; for he was very anxious for them to stay, and he thought that if he fed them well they wouldn't want to leave him. When the weather improved, he took them all out to pasture again; but no sooner had they got near the hills than the Wild Goats broke away from the flock and scampered off. The Goatherd was very much disgusted at this, and roundly abused them for their ingratitude. "Rascals!" he cried, "to run away like that after the way I've treated you!" Hearing this, one of them turned round and said, "Oh, yes, you treated us all right--too well, in fact; it was just that that put us on our guard. If you treat newcomers like ourselves so much better than your own flock, it's more than likely that, if another lot of strange goats joined yours, _we_ should then be neglected in favour of the last comers."
THE NIGHTINGALE AND THE SWALLOW
A Swallow, conversing with a Nightingale, advised her to quit the leafy coverts where she made her home, and to come and live with men, like herself, and nest under the shelter of their roofs. But the Nightingale replied, "Time was when I too, like yourself, lived among men: but the memory of the cruel wrongs I then suffered makes them hateful to me, and never again will I approach their dwellings."
The scene of past sufferings revives painful memories.
THE TRAVELLER AND FORTUNE
A Traveller, exhausted with fatigue after a long journey, sank down at the very brink of a deep well and presently fell asleep. He was within an ace of falling in, when Dame Fortune appeared to him and touched him on the shoulder, cautioning him to move further away. "Wake up, good sir, I pray you," she said; "had you fallen into the well, the blame would have been thrown not on your own folly but on me, Fortune."
ILLUSTRATIONS
[Illustration: THE HARE AND THE TORTOISE]
[Illustration: THE MOON AND HER MOTHER]
[Illustration: THE FIR-TREE AND THE BRAMBLE]
[Illustration: THE CRAB AND HIS MOTHER]
[Illustration: THE QUACK FROG]
[Illustration: THE SHIPWRECKED MAN AND THE SEA]
[Illustration: THE BLACKAMOOR]
[Illustration: THE TWO POTS]
[Illustration: VENUS AND THE CAT]
[Illustration: THE TRAVELLERS AND THE PLANE-TREE]
[Illustration: THE TREES AND THE AXE]
[Illustration: THE LION, JUPITER, AND THE ELEPHANT]
[Illustration: THE GNAT AND THE LION]
End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Aesop's Fables, by Aesop

= = = PG21189 = = =
AESOP, IN RHYME: OLD FRIENDS IN A NEW DRESS
Produced by David Edwards, Jacqueline Jeremy and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The University of Florida, The Internet Archive/Children's Library)
[Illustration]
[Illustration: Æsop in Rhyme]
ÆSOP,
IN RHYME;
OR,
OLD FRIENDS IN A NEW DRESS.
[Illustration]
BY MARMADUKE PARK.
*       *       *       *       *
PHILADELPHIA: C. G. HENDERSON, & CO., N. W. CORNER ARCH AND FIFTH STREETS. 1852.
*       *       *       *       *
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1852,
BY C. G. HENDERSON & CO.,
in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States, in and for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
*       *       *       *       *
[Illustration]
THE DOG AND THE WOLF.
A wolf there was, whose scanty fare Had made his person lean and spare; A dog there was, so amply fed, His sides were plump and sleek; 'tis said The wolf once met this prosp'rous cur, And thus began: "Your servant, sir; I'm pleased to see you look so well, Though how it is I cannot tell; I have not broke my fast to-day; Nor have I, I'm concern'd to say, One bone in store or expectation, And that I call a great vexation."
"Indeed it is," the dog replied: "I know no ill so great beside; But if you do not like to be So poorly fed, come live with me." "Agreed," rejoined the wolf, "I'll go: But pray, what work am I to do?" "Oh, guard the house, and do not fail To bark at thieves, and wag your tail."
So off they jogg'd, and soon arrived At where the friendly mastiff lived. "Well," said the wolf, "I can't deny You have a better house than I." "Not so," the other then replied, "If you with me will hence abide." "Oh," said the wolf, "how kind you are! But what d'ye call _that_, hanging there? Is it an iron chain, or what?" "Friend," said the dog, "I quite forgot To mention that; sometimes, you see, They hook that little chain to _me_; But it is only meant to keep Us dogs from walking in our sleep, And should you wear it, you would find, It's nothing that you need to mind."
"I'll take your word," the wolf replied. "It's truth by me shall ne'er be tried; I'll have my liberty again, And you your collar and your chain."
MORAL.
Our neighbors sometimes seem to be A vast deal better off than we; Yet seldom 'tis they really are, Since _they_ have troubles too to bear, Which, if the truth were really known, Are quite as grievous as our own.
[Illustration]
THE HERDSMAN.
A herdsman, who lived at a time and a place Which, should you not know, is but little disgrace, Discover'd one morning, on counting his stock, That a sheep had been stolen that night from the flock.
"Oh, I wish I had caught ye, _whoever ye be_ I'd have soon let you know, I'd have soon let ye see, What he had to expect," said the herdsman, "I trow; But I've thought of a scheme that will trouble you now."
So what did he do, sir, but put up a board, Describing the thief, and proposed a reward Of a lamb, to the man who would give information Concerning the thief, and his true designation.
The project succeeded; for soon there applied A certain near neighbor, with others beside. "But tell me the thief," said the herdsman, "at least;" "Come hither," said they, "and we'll show you the beast!"
"The _beast_!" said the rustic, who thought he should die on The spot, when he found that the thief was a lion! "Ill luck to my hurry, what now shall I do? I promised a lamb to detect you 'tis true; But now I'd consent _all_ my substance to pay, If I could but with safety get out of your way."
MORAL.
Silly people ask things that would ruin, if sent; They demand them in haste, and at leisure repent.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE BOYS AND THE FROGS.
Some boys, beside a pond or lake, Were playing once at _duck and drake?_ When, doubtless to their heart's content, Volleys of stones were quickly sent.
But there were some (there will be such) Who did not seem amused so much; These were the frogs, to whom the game, In point of sport was not the same.
For scarce a stone arrived, 'tis said, But gave some frog a broken head; And scores in less than half an hour, Perished beneath the dreadful shower.
At last, said one, "You silly folks, I say, Do fling your stones another way; Though _sport_ to _you_, to throw them thus, Remember, pray, 'tis _death_ to us!"
MORAL.
From hence this moral may be learn'd: Let play _be play_ to _all concern'd_.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE COCK AND THE JEWEL.
A cock there was: a sage was he (If Esop we may trust,) Who wish'd to make a meal, you see, As other sages must.
With this intent, as heretofore, When on the hunt for grain; Our hero scratch'd the litter o'er With all his might and main.
But scarce a minute had he scratch'd, When, to his great surprise, A gem, with golden chain attach'd, He saw with both his eyes.
"Alack!" quoth he, "what have we here? A diamond, I protest! Which lords and ladies buy so dear, And hold in such request.
"But one good barley-corn to me Has more intrinsic worth Than all the pearls now in the sea, Or gold now in the earth."
MORAL.
The moral here, in Esop's mind, Was this, there's not a doubt: Things have _most_ value, which we find We _cannot_ do without.
[Illustration]
THE MAN AND THE LION.
A man and a lion once had a dispute, Which was reckon'd the greatest, the man or the brute; The lion discoursed on his side at some length, And greatly enlarged on his courage and strength.
The man, one would think, had enough to reply On _his_ side the question, which none could deny; But like many others who make a pretence, He talk'd perfect nonsense, and thought it good sense.
"So," says he, "don't be prating,--look yonder, I pray, At that sculpture of marble, now what will you say? The lion is vanquished; but as for the man He is striding upon him; deny it who can."
"But pray," said the lion, "who sculptured that stone?" "One of _us_," said the man, "I must candidly own." "But when _we_ are sculptors," the other replied, "You will then on the man see the _lion_ astride."
MORAL.
The man might have added, if he had been wise, "But a beast _cannot_ sculpture a stone, _if he tries_." _That_ sufficiently shows where the difference lies.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE FOX AND THE CRANE.
"I certainly think," said a fox to a crane, "That face, ma'am of yours is remarkably plain; That beak that you wear is so frightful a feature, It makes you appear a most singular creature." The crane, much offended at what she had heard, March'd off at full speed, without saying a word: "Oh dear!" said the fox, "Mrs. Crane, I protest You misunderstand me, 'twas only a jest." "Come, don't be affronted--stay with me and dine; You know very well 'tis this temper of mine To say such odd things to my intimate friends; But you know that poor Reynard no mischief intends." So the crane thought it best not to break with him quite, But to view his remarks in a good-natured light. So she put on as pleasant a face as she could When he ask'd her to dine, and replied that she would. But alas! she perceived that his jokes were not over, When Reynard removed from the victuals its cover 'Twas neither game, butcher's meat, chicken, not fish; But plain gravy-soup, in a broad shallow dish. Now this the fox lapp'd with his tongue very quick, While the crane could scarce dip in the point of her beak; "You make a poor dinner," said he to his guest; "Oh, dear! by no means," said the bird, "I protest." But the crane ask'd the fox on a subsequent day, When nothing, it seems, for their dinner had they But some minced meat served up in a narrow-neck'd jar; Too long, and narrow, for Reynard by far. "You make a poor dinner, I fear," said the bird; "Why, I think," said the fox, "'twould be very absurd To deny what you say, yet I cannot complain, But confess, though a fox, that I'm matched by a crane."
MORAL.
Cunning folks who play tricks which good manners condemn, Often find their own tricks play'd again upon them.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE TRAVELLER AND THE SATYR.
A luckless wight, in winter slow, Travelling once a forest through Cold and hungry, tired and wet, Began in words like these to fret: "Oh, what a sharp inclement day! And what a dismal, dreary way! No friendly cot, no cheering fields, No food this howling forest yields; I've nought in store or expectation! There's nought before me but starvation."
"Not quite so bad," a voice replied; Quickly the traveller turned aside, And saw the satyr of the wood, Who close beside his dwelling stood. "Here is my cave hard by," said he, "Walk in, you're welcome, pray be free."
The traveller did not hesitate, Hoping for something good to eat, But follow'd to his heart's content, Blowing his finger as he went.
"Pray," said the satyr, "may I know For what you blow your fingers so?"
"What! need you," said the man, "be told?-- To _warm_ my fingers, 'numb'd with cold."
"Indeed!" was all his host replied, Intent some pottage to provide, Which heated well, with spice infused, Was to his shivering guest produced:
So hot it was, as Esop sung, It made our traveller scald his tongue; And wishing not again to do it, Our hero could not wait, but blew it.
"What?" said his host, in accent rough, "Is not your pottage hot enough?" "Yes," said the man, "full well I know it, 'Tis far too hot, that's why I blow it." "You artful villain! do you so?" His host replied, with angry brow; "My cave shall not a moment hold A man that blows both hot and cold! By none but rogues can that be done, You double-dealing wretch, begone!"
MORAL.
The traveller scarce deserved such wrath, For warming fingers--cooling broth. No statutes old or new forbid it, Although with the same mouth he did it: Yet this beware of old and young, What Esop meant--a _double tongue_; Which flatters now with civil clack, And slanders soon behind one's back.
[Illustration]
THE TRAVELLERS AND THE PURSE.
Two friends once were walking in sociable chat, When a purse one espied on the ground; "Oh, see!" said he, (thank my fortune for that,) "What a large sum of money I've found!"
"Nay, do not say _I_" said his friend, "for you know 'Tis but friendship to share it with me;" "I share it with you," said the other. "How so? He who _found_ it the owner should be."
"Be it so," said his friend, "but what sound do I hear? 'Stop thief!' one is calling to you; He comes with a constable close in the rear!" Said the other, "Oh, what shall we do?"
"Nay, do not say _we_," said his friend, "for you know You claimed the sole right to the prize! And since all the _money_ was taken by you, With you the _dishonesty_ lies."
MORAL.
When people are selfish, dishonest, and mean, Their nature, in dealing, will quickly be seen.
[Illustration]
THE MOUTH AND THE LIMBS.
In days of yore, they say, 'twas then When all things spoke their mind; The arms and legs of certain men, To treason felt inclined.
These arms and legs together met, As snugly as they could, With knees and elbows, hands and feet, In discontented mood.
Said they, "'Tis neither right nor fair, Nor is there any need, To labor with such toil and care, The greedy mouth to feed."
"This we're resolved no more to do, Though we so long have done it;" "Ah!" said the knees and elbows too, "And we are bent upon it."
"I," said the tongue, "may surely speak, Since I his inmate am; And for his vices while you seek, His virtues I'll proclaim.
"You say the mouth embezzles all, The fruit of your exertion; But I on this assembly call To prove the base assertion.
"The food which you with labor gain, He too with labor chews; Nor does he long the food retain, But gives it for your use.
"But he his office has resign'd To whom you may prefer; He begs you therefore now to find Some other treasurer."
"Well, be it so," they all replied; "His wish shall be obeyed; We think the hands may now be tried As treasurers in his stead."
The hands with joy to this agreed, And all to them was paid; But they the treasure kept indeed, And no disbursements made.
Once more the clam'rous members met, A lean and hungry throng; When all allowed, from head to feet, That what they'd done was wrong.
To take his office once again, The mouth they all implored; Who soon accepted it, and then Health was again restored.
MORAL.
This tale for state affairs is meant, Which we need not discuss; At present we will be content, To find a moral thus:
The mouth has claims of large amount, From arms, legs, feet, and hands; But let them not, on that account, Pay _more_ than it demands.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE HARE AND THE TORTOISE.
Said a hare to a tortoise, "Good sir, what a while You have been only crossing the way; Why I really believe that to go half a mile, You must travel two nights and a day."
"I am very contented," the creature replied, "Though I walk but a tortoise's pace, But if you think proper the point to decide, We will run half a mile in a race."
"Very good," said the hare; said the tortoise, "Proceed, And the fox shall decide who has won," Then the hare started off with incredible speed; But the tortoise walk'd leisurely on.
"Come tortoise, friend tortoise, walk on," said the hare, "Well, I shall stay here for my dinner; Why, 'twill take you a month, at that rate, to get there, Then how can you hope to be winner?"
But the tortoise could hear not a word that she said For he was far distant behind; So the hare felt secured while at leisure she fed, And took a sound nap when she dined.
So at last this slow walker came up with the hare, And there fast asleep did he spy her; And he cunningly crept with such caution and care, That she woke not, although he pass'd by her.
"Well now," thought the hare, when she open'd her eyes, "For the race,--and I soon shall have done it;" But who can describe her chagrin and surprise, When she found that the _tortoise_ had won it!
MORAL.
Thus plain plodding people, we often shall find, Will leave hasty confident people behind.
[Illustration]
THE MILKMAID.
A milkmaid, who poized a full pail on her head, Thus mused on her prospects in life, it is said: "Let's see--I should think that this milk will procure One hundred good eggs, or fourscore to be sure.
"Well then--stop a bit,--it must not be forgotten, Some of these may be broken, and some may be rotten; But if twenty for accidents should be detach'd, It will leave me just sixty sound eggs to hatch'd.
"Well, sixty sound eggs--no; sound chickens, I mean; Of these some may die--we'll suppose seventeen-- Seventeen!--not so many--say ten at the most, Which will leave fifty chickens to boil or to roast.
"But then there's their barley; how much will they need? Why they take but one grain at a time when they feed, So that's a mere trifle; now then let us see, At a fair market price, how much money there'll be?
"Six shillings a pair--five--four--three-and-six, To prevent all mistakes, that low price I will fix; Now what will that make? fifty chickens, I said, Fifty times three-and-sixpence--_I'll ask brother Ned_.
"Oh! but stop--three-and-sixpence a _pair_ I must sell 'em; Well, a pair is a couple--now then let us tell 'em; A couple in fifty will go--(my poor brain!) Why just a score times, and five pair will remain.
"Twenty-five pair of fowls--now how shameful it is, That I can't reckon up as much money as this! Well, there's no use in trying; so let's give a guess; I will say twenty pounds, and _it can't be no less_.
"Twenty pounds, I am certain, will buy me a cow, Thirty geese, and two turkeys--eight pigs and a sow; Now if these turn out well, at the end of the year, I shall fill both my pockets with guineas 'tis clear.
"Then I'll bid that old tumble-down hovel good-bye; My mother she'll scold, and my sisters they'll cry: But I won't care a crow's egg for all they can say; I sha'n't go to stop with such beggars as they!"
But forgetting her burden, when this she had said, The maid superciliously toss'd up her head When alas! for her prospects--the milk pail descended! And so all her schemes for the future were ended.
MORAL.
This moral, I think, may be safely attach'd: Reckon not on your chickens before they are hatch'd.
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[Illustration]
THE LARK AND HER YOUNG ONES.
A lark who had her nest conceal'd, Says Esop, in a barley field; Began, as harvest time drew near, The reaping of the corn to fear; Afraid they would her nest descry, Before her tender brood could fly. She charged them therefore every day, Before for food she flew away, To watch the farmer in her stead, And listen well to all he said.
It chanced one day, she scarce was gone, Ere the farmer came and his son. The farmer well his field survey'd, And sundry observations made; At last, "I'll tell you what," said he, "This corn is fit to cut, I see; But we our neighbor's help must borrow, So tell them we begin to-morrow."
Just after this the lark returned, When from her brood this news she learned. "Ah! dearest mother," then, said they, "Pray, let us all begone to-day."
"My dears," said she, "you need not fret, I shall not be uneasy yet; For if he waits for neighbor's aid, The business long will be delay'd."
At dawn she left her nest once more, And charged her young ones as before.
At five the farmer came again, And waited for his friends in vain, "Well," said the man, "I fancy, son, These _friends_ we can't depend upon; To-morrow early, mind you go, And let our own _relations_ know."
Again the lark approach'd her nest, When round her all her young ones press'd, And told their mother, word for word, The fresh intelligence they heard.
"Ah, children, be at ease," said she "We're safe another day, I see; For these _relations_, you will find, Just like his _friends_, will stay behind."
At dawn again the lark withdrew, And did again her charge renew.
Once more the farmer early came, And found the case was just the same. The day advanced, the sun was high; But not a single help drew nigh. Then said the farmer, "Hark ye, son-- I see this job will not be done, While thus we wait for friends and neighbors; So you and I'll commence our labors: To-morrow early, we'll begin _Ourselves_, and get our harvest in."
"Now," said the lark, when this she heard, "Our movement must not be deferr'd; For if the farmer and his son Themselves begin, 'twill soon be done."
The morrow proved the lark was right; For all was cut and housed by night.
MORAL.
Hence, while we wait for other's aid, Our business needs must be delay'd; Which might be done with half the labor 'Twould take to go and call a neighbor.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE PHILOSOPHER AND THE ACORN.
A philosopher, proud of his wit and his reason, Sat him under an oak in a hot summer season. On the oak grew an acorn or two, it is said: On the ground grew a pumpkin as big as his head.
Thought the sage, "What's the reason this oak is so strong A few acorns to bear that are scarce an inch long; While this poor feeble plant has a weight to sustain, Which had much better hang on the tree, it is plain?"
But just at the time the philosopher spoke An acorn dropp'd down on his head from the oak; Then, said he, who just now thought _his_ plan was so clever, "I am glad that _this_ was not a pumpkin, however."
MORAL.
The sage would no doubt have looked grievously dull, Had a pumpkin descended with force on his scull. Of his folly then let us in future beware, And believe that _such_ matters _are best as they are_: Leave the manners and customs of oak trees alone, Of acorns, and pumpkins--and look to our own.
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THE WOLF AND THE CRANE.
A wolf, once forgetting the size of his swallow, Tried to pass a large marrow-bone through it. "Oh dear," said the beast, thinking death was to follow, "How careless and stupid to do it!"
His mouth was propp'd open by means of the bone, And his breathing was greatly impeded, But a crane coming up, he contrived to make known What kind of assistance he needed.
"How d'ye do?" said the bird; said the beast, "Very ill, For a bone has gone down the wrong way; But if you can extract it by means of your bill, The service I'll amply repay."
Thought the crane, "I'm no surgeon: yet all must agree, That my bill will make excellent _forceps_; And as for the money, I do not now see Why I need refuse taking his worship's."
Said the bird, "It's agreed;" said his patient, "Proceed, And take the bone hence, I beseech;" Which, after awhile, and with infinite toil, The crane at last managed to reach.
"Thank my stars!" said the beast, from his terrors released, "Thank you _too_, sir," said he to the bird; "Alas!" said the crane, "is this all I'm to gain, I was waiting the promised reward."
Said the wolf, "You forget, I've contracted no debt, Since the service was _rendered by me_; Your head I releas'd from the jaws of a beast, And now you're demanding a fee!"
MORAL.
Give your help to a wolf, should he beg for your aid, But you must not expect when you've done to be paid.
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[Illustration]
THE DOG AND THE SHADOW.
A dog growing thinner, for want of a dinner, Once purloined him a joint from a tray, "How happy I am, with this shoulder of lamb," Thought the cur as he trotted away.
But the way that he took, lay just over a brook, Which he found it was needful to cross; So without more ado, he plunged in to go through, Not dreaming of danger or loss.
But what should appear, in this rivulet clear, As he thought upon coolest reflection, But a cur like himself, who with ill-gotten pelf, Had run off in that very direction.
Thought the dog, _a propos_! but that instant let go (As he snatched at this same water-spaniel) The piece he possess'd:--so with hunger distress'd He slowly walk'd home to his kennel.
MORAL.
Hence, when we are needy, don't let us be greedy, (Excuse me this line of digression,) Lest in snatching at all, like the dog, we let fall The good that we have in possession.
[Illustration]
THE TRAVELLERS AND THE BEAR.
Two trav'llers one morning set out from their home, It might be from Sparta, from Athens, or Rome; It matters not which, but agreed, it is said, Should danger arise, to lend each other aid.
But scarce was this done, when forth rushing amain, Sprung a bear from a wood tow'rds these travellers twain; Then one of our heroes, with courage immense, Climb'd into a tree, and there found his defence.
The other fell flat to the earth with dread, When the bear came and smelt him, and thought he was dead; So not liking the carcase, away trotted he, When straight our brave hero descended the tree.
Then, said he, "I can't think what the bear could propose, When so close to your ear, he presented his nose." "Why this," said the other, "he told me to do, To beware for the future of cowards like you."
MORAL.
Those people who run from their friends in distress, Will be left when _themselves_ are in trouble, I guess.
[Illustration]
THE FROGS AND THE BULL.
A Bull once treading near a bog, Displaced the entrails of a frog, Who near his foot did trust them; In fact, so great was the contusion, And made of his inwards such confusion, No art could re-adjust them.
It chanced that some who saw his fate, Did to a friend the deed relate, With croakings, groans, and hisses; "The beast," said they, "in size excell'd All other beasts," their neighbors swell'd, And ask'd, "as large as this is!"
"Oh, larger far than that," said they, "Do not attempt it, madam, pray;" But still the frog distended, And said, "I'll burst, but I'll exceed," She tried, and burst herself indeed! And so the matter ended.
MORAL.
Should you with pride inflate and swell, As did the frog: then who can tell! Your sides may crack, as has been shown, And we with laughing crack our own.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE COUNCIL OF MICE.
Some mice who saw fit, once a quarter to meet, To arrange the concerns of their city; Thought it needful to choose, as is common with us, First a chairman, and then a committee.
When the chairman was seated, the object he stated For which at that meeting they sat: Which was, it should seem, the concerting a scheme To defeat the designs of the cat.
Dr. Nibblecheese rose, and said, "I would propose, To this cat we fasten a bell; He who likes what I've said, now will hold up his head; He who does not, may hold up his tail."
So out of respect, they their noses erect, Except one who the order reversed; _Ayes_, all then but one, but yet nought could be done, Until he had his reasons rehearsed.
"I shall not," said this mouse, "waste the time of the house, In long arguments; since, as I view it, The scheme would succeed without doubt, if indeed We could find any mouse who would _do it_."
"Hear! hear!" was the cry, and "no bells we will try, Unless you will fasten them on;" So quite broken-hearted the members departed, For the bill was rejected _nem. con._
MORAL.
Then be not too hasty in giving advice, Lest your schemes should remind of the council of mice; You had better delay your opinion a year, Than put forth a ridiculous one, it is clear.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE WOLF AND THE LAMB.
A wolf and lamb once chanced to meet, Beside a stream, whose waters sweet Brought various kinds of beasts together, When dry and sultry was the weather; Now though the wolf came there to _drink_, Of _eating_, he began to think, As soon as near the lamb he came, And straight resolved to kill the same; Yet thought it better to begin, With threat'ning words and angry mien.
"And so," said he, to him below, "How dare you stir the water so? Making the cool refreshing flood, As brown as beer, and thick as mud."
"Sir," said the lamb, "that cannot be, The water flows _from you to me_; So, 'tis impossible, I think, That what I do can spoil your drink."
"I say it does, you saucy puss: How dare you contradict me thus; But more than this, you idle clack, You rail'd at me behind my back Two years ago, I have been told;" "How so? I'm not a twelvemonth old," The lamb replied; "So I suspect Your honor is not quite correct."
"If not, your mother it must be, And that comes all the same to me," Rejoined the wolf--who waited not But kill'd and ate him on the spot.
MORAL.
Some, like the wolf, adopt the plan, To make a quarrel _if they can_; But none with you can hold dispute, If you're _determined_ to be mute; For sure this proverb must be true, That ev'ry _quarrel_ must have _two_.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE BEASTS IN PARTNERSHIP.
This _firm_ once existed, I'd have you to know, Messrs. Lion, Wolf, Tiger, Fox, Leopard, and Co.; These in business were join'd, and of course 'twas implied, They their stocks should unite, and the profits divide.
Now the fable relates, it so happened one day, That their efforts combined, made a bullock their prey: But agreed that the Lion should make the division, And patiently waited the monarch's decision.
"My friends," said the Lion, "I've parted, you see, The whole into six, which is right, you'll agree; One part I may claim, as my share in the trade." "Oh, take it and welcome," they all of them said.
"I claim too the second; since no one denies 'Twas my courage and conduct that gained you the prize: And for the third; that you know is a fine To the Lord of the manor, and therefore is mine."
"Hey day!" said the fox; "Stop a bit," said the lion, "I have not quite done," said he, fixing his eye on The other three parts; "you are fully aware, That, as _tribute_, one other part comes to my share.
"And I think 'twould be prudent, the next to put by Somewhere safe in _my_ den for a future supply, And the other, you know, will but barely suffice, To pay those expenses which always arise."
"If this be the case," said the fox, "I discern That the business to _us_ is a losing concern; If so to withdraw, I should think would be best;" "Oh, yes! let us break up the firm," said the rest;
And so:--for you may not have heard of it yet,-- It was quickly dissolved, though not in _the gazette_.
MORAL.
Some folks in their dealings, like him in the fable, Will take others' shares, if they think they are able; But let them not wonder who act in this way, If they find none will join them in business or play.
[Illustration]
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THE LION AND THE MOUSE.
A lion, with the heat oppress'd, One day composed himself to rest; But whilst he dozed, as he intended, A mouse his royal back ascended; Nor thought of harm as Esop tells, Mistaking him for something else, And travelled over him, and round him, And might have left him as he found him, Had he not, tremble when you hear, Tried to explore the monarch's ear! Who straightway woke with wrath immense, And shook his head to cast him thence. "You rascal, what are you about," Said he, when he had turned him out. "I'll teach you soon," the lion said, "To make a mouse-hole in my head!" So saying, he prepared his foot, To crush the trembling tiny brute; But he, the mouse, with tearful eye, Implored the lion's clemency, Who thought it best at least to give His little pris'ner a reprieve. 'Twas nearly twelve months after this, The lion chanced his way to miss; When pressing forward: heedless yet, He got entangled in a net. With dreadful rage he stamp'd and tore, And straight commenced a lordly roar; When the poor mouse who heard the noise, Attended, for she knew his voice. Then what the lion's utmost strength Could not effect, she did at length: With patient labor she applied Her teeth, the net-work to divide; And so at last forth issued he, A _lion_, by a mouse set free.
MORAL.
Few are so small or weak, I guess, But may assist us in distress; Nor shall we ever, if we're wise, The meanest, or the least, despise.
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THE JEALOUS ASS.
"There lived," says friend Esop, "some ages ago, An ass who had feelings acute, you must know; This ass to be jealous, felt strongly inclined, And for reasons which follow, felt hurt in his mind."
It seems that his master, as I understand, Had a favorite dog which he fed from his hand. Nay, the dog was permitted to jump on his knee: An honor that vex'd our poor donkey to see.
"Now," thought he, "what's the reason, I cannot see any, That I have no favors, while he has so many? If all this is got by just wagging his tail, Why _I_ have got one, which I'll wag without fail."
So the donkey resolved to try what he could do And, determined unusual attentions to show, When his master was dining, came into the room. "Good sir!" said his friends, "why your donkey is come!"
"Indeed!" said their host, great astonishment showing, When he saw the ass come, while his tail was a-going; But who can describe his dismay or fear, When the donkey rear'd up, and bray'd loud in his ear!
"You rascal get down,--John, Edward, or Dick! Where are you? make haste, and come here with a stick." The man roared--the guests laugh'd--the dog bark'd--the bell rung: Coals, poker, and tongs, at the donkey were flung,
Till the blows and the kicks, with combined demonstration, Convinced him that this was a bad speculation; So, mortified deeply, his footsteps retrod he, Hurt much in his mind, but still more in his body.
MORAL.
So some silly children, as stupid as may be, Will cry for indulgences fit for a baby. Had they enter'd the room while the donkey withdrew, They'd have seen their own folly and punishment too: Let them think of this fable, and what came to pass; Nor forget, he who play'd this fine game was _an ass_.
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THE TOWN AND COUNTRY MICE.
A plain, but honest, country mouse, Residing in a miller's house; Once, on a time, invited down An old acquaintance of the town: And soon he brought his dainties out; The best he had there's not a doubt. A dish of oatmeal and green peas, With half a candle, and some cheese; Some beans, and if I'm not mistaken, A charming piece of Yorkshire bacon. And then to show he was expert In such affairs, a fine dessert Was next produced, all which he press'd, With rustic freedom, on his guest.
But he, the city epicure, This homely fare could not endure Indeed he scarcely broke his fast By what he took, but said, at last, "Old crony, now, I'll tell you what: I don't admire this lonely spot; This dreadful, dismal, dirty hole, Seems more adapted for a mole Than 'tis for you; Oh! could you see _My_ residence, how charm'd you'd be. Instead of bringing up your brood In wind, and wet, and solitude, Come bring them all at once to town, We'll make a courtier of a clown. I think that, for your children's sake, 'Tis proper my advice to take." "Well," said his host, "I can but try, And so poor quiet hole good bye!"
Then off they jogg'd for many a mile, Talking of splendid things the while; At last, in town, they all arrived-- Found where the city mouse had lived-- Entered at midnight through a crack, And rested from their tedious track.
"Now," said the city mouse, "I'll show What kind of fare I've brought you to:" On which he led the rustic mice Into a larder, snug and nice, Where ev'ry thing a mouse could relish, Did ev'ry shelf and nook embellish.
"Now is not this to be preferr'd To your green peas?" "Upon my word, It is," the country mouse replied, "All this must needs the point decide."
Scarce had they spoke these words, when, lo! A tribe of servants hasten'd through, And also two gigantic cats, Who spied our country mouse and brats. Then, by a timely exit, she Just saved herself and family.
"Oh, ask me not," said she in haste, "Your tempting dainties more to taste; I much prefer my homely peas, To splendid dangers such as these."
MORAL.
Then let not those begin to grumble, Whose lot is safe, though poor and humble; Nor envy him who better fares, But for each good, has twenty cares.
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THE FOX AND THE CROW.
Crows feed upon worms: yet an author affirms Cheshire cheese they will get if they're able; "For," said he, "I well know, one unprincipled crow Once purloined a large piece from my table."
Then away darted she, to the shade of a tree, To deposit the booty within her; But it never occurr'd to the mind of the bird, That a _fox_ was to have it for dinner.
"How many a slip, 'twixt the cup and the lip!" (Excuse me, I pray, the digression,) Said a fox to himself, "I can share in the pelf, If I act with my usual discretion."
So said he, "Is it you? pray, ma'am, how do you do, I have long wish'd to pay you a visit; For a twelvemonth has pass'd, since I heard of you last Which is not very neighborly, is it?
"But, dear madam," said he, "you are dining, I see; On that subject I'd ask your advice; Pray, ma'am, now can you tell, where provisions they sell, That are not an extravagant price?
"Bread and meat are so dear, and have been for a year, That poor people can scarcely endure it, And then _cheese is so high_, that such beggars as I, _Till it falls_, cannot hope to procure it."
But the ill-behaved bird did not utter a word, Still intent on retaining her plunder; Thought the fox, "It should seem, this is not a good scheme, What else can I think of, I wonder?"
So said Reynard once more, "I ne'er knew it before, But your feathers are whiter than snow is!" But thought he, when he'd said it, "she'll ne'er give it credit, For what bird is so black as a crow is." "But I'm told that your voice is a horrible noise, Which they say of all sounds is the oddest; But then this is absurd, for it never is heard, Since you are so excessively modest."
If _that's_ all thought the crow, "I will soon let you know That all doubt on that score may be ended;" Then most laughingly piped, the poor silly biped, When quickly her dinner descended!
MORAL.
If this _biped_ had not been so vain and conceited, She would not by the fox quite so soon have been cheated; But perhaps the term _biped_ to some may be new: 'Tis a two-legged creature--perchance it is _you_.
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THE LION AND THE ECHO.
A lion, bravest of the wood, Whose title undisputed stood, As o'er the wide domains he prowl'd, And in pursuit of booty growl'd, An Echo from a distant cave Regrowl'd, articulately grave: His majesty, surprised, began To think at first it was a man; But on reflection sage, he found It was too like a lion's sound. "Whose voice is that which growls at mine?" His highness ask'd. Says Echo, "Mine!" "Thine!" says the Lion: "Who art thou?" Echo as stern cried, "Who art thou?" "Know I'm a lion, hear and tremble!" Replied the king. Cried Echo, "Tremble!" "Come forth," says Lion; "show thyself." Laconic Echo answered, "Elf." "Elf, durst thou call me, vile pretender?" Echo as loud replies, "Pretender!" At this, as jealous of his reign, He growl'd in rage; she growl'd again. Incensed the more, he chafed and foam'd, And round the spacious forest roam'd To find the rival of his throne, Who durst with him dispute the crown.
A fox, who listen'd all the while, Address'd the monarch with a smile: "My liege, most humbly I make bold, Though truth may not be always told, That this same phantom which you hear, That so alarms your royal ear, Is not a rival of your throne: The voice and fears are all your own." Imaginary terrors scare A timorous soul with real fear; Nay, even the wise and brave are cow'd By apprehensions from the crowd: A frog a lion may disharm, And yet how causeless the alarm!
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THE PAPER KITE.
Once on a time, a paper kite Was mounted to a wondrous height; Where, giddy with its elevation, It thus express'd self-admiration: "See how yon crowds of gazing people Admire my flight above the steeple; How would they wonder, if they knew All that a kite, like me, could do? Were I but free, I'd take a flight, And pierce the clouds beyond their sight. But, ah! like a poor prisoner bound, My string confines me near the ground. I'd brave the eagle's towering wing, Might I but fly without a string." It tugg'd and pull'd, while thus it spoke, To break the string--at last it broke! Deprived at once of all its stay, In vain it tried to soar away: Unable its own weight to bear, It flutter'd downward through the air; Unable its own course to guide, The winds soon plunged it in the tide. Oh! foolish kite, thou hadst no wing, How could'st thou fly without a string? My heart replied, "Oh, Lord, I see How much the kite resembles me! Forgetful that by thee I stand, Impatient of thy ruling hand; How oft I've wish'd to break the lines Thy wisdom for my lot assigns! How oft indulged a vain desire For something more or something higher! And but for grace and love divine, A fall thus dreadful had been mine."
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THE RATS AND THE CHEESE.
If bees a government maintain, Why may not rats of stronger brain And greater power, as well bethought By Machiavelian axioms taught? And so they are, for thus of late It happened in the rats' free state. Their prince (his subjects more to please) Had got a mighty Cheshire cheese, In which his ministers of state Might live in plenty and grow great. A powerful party straight combined, And their united forces join'd, To bring their measures into play, For none so loyal were as they; And none such patriots, to support As well the country as the court. No sooner were those Dons admitted But (all those wondrous virtues quitted) They all the speediest means devise To raise themselves and families. Another party well observing These pamper'd were, while they were starving, Their ministry brought in disgrace, Expelled them and supplied their place; These on just principles were known The true supporters of the throne, And for the subjects liberty They'd (marry would they) freely die; But being well fix'd in their station, Regardless of their prince and nation, Just like the others, all their skill Was how they might their paunches fill. On this a rat, not quite so blind In state intrigues as human kind, But of more honor, thus replied: "Confound ye all on either side; All your contentions are but these, Whose arts shall best secure the cheese."
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AURELIA AND THE SPIDER.
The muslin torn, from tears of grief In vain Aurelia sought relief; In sighs and plaints she pass'd the day; The tatter'd frock neglected lay: While busied at the weaving trade, A spider heard the sighing maid And kindly stopping in a trice, Thus offer'd (gratis) her advice: "Turn, little girl! behold in me A stimulus to industry Compare your woes, my dear, with mine, Then tell me who should most repine: This morning, ere you left your room, The chambermaid's remorseless broom In one sad moment that destroy'd, To build which thousands were employ'd! The shock was great; but as my life I saved in the relentless strife, I knew lamenting was in vain, So patient went to work again. By constant work, a day or more, My little mansion did restore: And if each tear which you have shed Had been a needle-full of thread, If every sigh of sad despair Had been a stitch of proper care, Closed would have been the luckless rent, Nor thus the day have been misspent."
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THE REDBREAST AND THE SPARROW.
Perch'd on a tree, hard by a rural cot, A redbreast singing cheer'd the humble spot; A sparrow on the thatch in critic spleen Thus took occasion to reprove the strain: "Dost thou," cried he, "thou dull dejected thing, Presume to emulate the birds of spring? Can thy weak warbling dare approach the thrush Or blackbird's accents in the hawthorn bush? Or with the lark dost thou poor mimic, vie, Or nightingale's unequal'd melody? These other birds possessing twice thy fire Have been content in silence to admire." "With candor judge," the minstrel bird replied, "Nor deem my efforts arrogance or pride; Think not ambition makes me act this part, I only sing because I love the art: I envy not, indeed, but much revere Those birds whose fame the test of skill will bear; I feel no hope arising to surpass, Nor with their charming songs my own to class; Far other aims incite my humble strain. Then surely I your pardon may obtain, While I attempt the rural vale to move By imitating of the lays I love."
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THE POET AND THE COBWEBS.
A bard, whose pen had brought him more Of fame than of the precious ore, In Grub Street garret oft reposed With eyes contemplative half-closed. Cobwebs around in antique glory, Chief of his household inventory, Suggested to his roving brains Amazing multitude of scenes.
"This batch," said he, "of murder-spinners Who toil their brains out for their dinners, Though base, too long unsung has lain By kindred brethren of Duck Lane, Unknowing that its little plan Holds all the cyclopedia of man.
"This one, whose radiant thread Is every where from centre spread, Like orbs in planetary skies, Enclosed with rounds of various size, This curious frame I aptly call A cobweb mathematical.
"In secret holes, that dirty line, Where never sun presumes to shine, With straws, and filth, and time beset, Where all is fish that comes to net, That musty film, the Muse supposes Figures the web of Virtuosos.
"You, where the gaudy insect sings, Are cobwebs of the court of kings, Where gilded threads conceal the gin. And broider'd knaves are caught therein.
"That holly, fix'd 'mid mildew'd panes, Of cheerless Christmas the remains (I only dream and sing its cheer, My Muse keeps Lent throughout the year) That holly, labor'd o'er and o'er, Is cobwebs of the lawyer's lore, Where frisky flies, on gambols borne, Find out the snare, when lost, undone.
"These dangling webs, with dirt and age, Display their tatter'd equipage, So like the antiquarian crew, That those in every thread I view.
"Here death disseminated lies, In shrunk anatomies of flies; And amputated limbs declare What vermin lie in ambush there: A baited lure with drugg'd perdition, A cobweb, not misnamed physician.
"Those plaited webs, long pendent there, Of sable bards a subtle snare, Of all-collective disposition, Which holds like gout of inquisition, May well denominated be, The trap-webs of divinity."
But whilst our bard described the scene, A bee stole through a broken pane; Fraught with the sweets of every flower, In taking his adventurous tour, Is there entrapp'd. Exert thy sting, Bold bee, and liberate thy wing! The poet kindly dropp'd his pen, And freed the captive from its den; Then musing o'er his empty table, Forgot the moral of his fable.
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THE EPICURE AND THE PHYSICIAN.
Two hundred years ago, or more, An heir possess'd a miser's store; Rejoiced to find his father dead, Till then on thrifty viands fed; Unnumber'd dishes crown'd his board, With each unwholesome trifle stored. He ate--and long'd to eat again, But sigh'd for appetite in vain: His food, though dress'd a thousand ways, Had lost its late accustom'd praise; He relish'd nothing--sickly grew-- Yet long'd to taste of something new. It chanced in this disastrous case, One morn betimes he join'd the chase: Swift o'er the plain the hunters fly, Each echoing out a joyous cry; A forest next before them lay; He, left behind, mistook his way, And long alone bewildered rode, He found a peasant's poor abode; But fasting kept, from six to four, Felt hunger, long unfelt before; The friendly swain this want supplied, And Joan some eggs and bacon fried. Not dainty now, the squire in haste Fell to, and praised their savory taste; Nay, said his meal had such a _gout_ He ne'er in tarts and olios knew. Rejoiced to think he'd found a dish, That crown'd his long unanswer'd wish, With gold his thankful host he paid, Who guides him back from whence he stray'd; But ere they part, so well he dined, His rustic host the squire enjoin'd To send him home next day a stock Of those same eggs and charming hock. He hoped this dish of savory meat Would prove that still 'twas bliss to eat; But, ah! he found, like all the rest, These eggs were tasteless things at best; The bacon not a dog would touch, So rank--he never tasted such! He sent express to fetch the clown, And thus address'd him with a frown: "These eggs, this bacon, that you sent, For Christian food were never meant; As soon I'll think the moon's a cheese, As those you dress'd the same with these. Little I thought"--"Sir," says the peasant, "I'm glad your worship is so pleasant: You joke, I'm sure: for I can swear, The same the fowls that laid them are! And know as well that all the bacon From one the self-same flitch was taken: The air, indeed, about our green Is known to make the stomach keen." "Is that the case?" the squire replied; "That air shall be directly tried." He gave command--a house he hired, And down he goes with hope inspired, And takes his cooks--a favorite train; But still they ply their art in vain. Perhaps 'twas riding did the feat: He rides,--but still he cannot eat. At last a friend, to physic bred, Perceived his case, and thus he said: "Be ruled by me, you soon shall eat, With hearty gust, the plainest meat; A pint of milk each rising morn, Procure from cow of sable horn; Shake in three drops of morning dew From twig of ever-verdant yew; It must by your own hand be done, Your face turn'd westward from the sun. With this, ere half an hour is past, Well crumb'd with biscuit, break your fast; Which done, from food (or all is vain) For twice three hours and one abstain-- Then dine on one substantial dish, If plainly dress'd, of flesh or fish." Grave look'd the doctor as he spake-- The squire concludes th' advice to take, And, cheated into temperance, found The bliss his former luxury drown'd.
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THE FROGS DESIRING A KING.
Athens in freedom flourish'd long, 'Till licence seized the giddy throng. Just laws grown weary to obey, They sunk to tyranny a prey. Pisistratus, though mild he sway'd, Their turbulence had not allay'd. Whilst they were cursing in despair, The yoke they had not learn'd to bear, Esop, their danger to describe, Rehears'd this fable to the tribe:
"Some frogs, like you, of freedom tired, From Jupiter a king desir'd: One that should execute the law, And keep the dissolute in awe. Jove laugh'd, and threw them down a log, That thundering fell and shook the bog. Amongst the reeds the tremblers fled: Till one more bold advanc'd his head, And saw the monarch of the flood Lying half smothered in the mud. He calls the croaking race around: "A wooden king!" the banks resound. Fear once remov'd they swim about him, And gibe and jeer and mock and flout him; And messengers to Jove depute, Effectively to grant their suit. A hungry stork he sent them then, Who soon had swallow'd half the fen. Their woes scarce daring to reveal, To Mercury by night they steal, And beg him to entreat of Jove The direful tyrant to remove. 'No,' says the God, 'they chose their lot, And must abide what they have got:' So you, my friends, had best go home In peace, lest something worse should come."
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THE HARE AND THE BRAMBLE.
A hare, closely pursued, thought it prudent and meet To a bramble for refuge awhile to retreat; He enter'd the covert, but entering, found That briers and thorns did on all sides abound; And that, though he was safe, yet he never could stir, But his sides they would wound, or would tear off his fur: He shrugg'd up his shoulders, but would not complain: "To repine at small evils," quoth puss, "is in vain: That no bliss can be perfect, I very well knew-- But from the same source good and evil doth flow-- And full sorely my skin though these briers may rend, Yet they keep off the dogs, and my life will defend: For the sake of the good, then, let evil be borne-- For each sweet has its bitter, each bramble its thorn."
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THE HORSE AND THE STAG.
Within a certain pasture, There lived some creatures wild. The sky was blue, the grass was green, The air was very mild.
Now though this field was large and fine, They could not live in love: But for the grass in one large spot A horse and stag once strove.
The stag was strongest in the strife, And so the battle won; And from the field the horse was sent And with chagrin was stung.
So to the man the horse applied, For help, the stag to beat, And so effectual was his help, The stag had to retreat.
But when to go away he tried, The man held to him fast: "Now that you are of use," he cried, "You'll serve me to the last."
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THE CAT AND THE OLD MOUSE.
The mice o'errun a certain house-- In every spot was found a mouse. So for a cat the mistress went, And to the kitchen puss was sent.
With diligence were many caught, And eaten up. The mice were taught That they some cunning must devise To keep the prey from pussy's eyes.
So on a certain shelf so high, To reach which puss in vain might try, There all the mice together got, And they resolved to leave it not.
So pussy found that to eat them, She must resort to stratagem. And holding fast by means of pegs, She hung suspended by the legs.
And downward she then hung her head, And looked as though she were quite dead-- And thus she sought to cheat the mice, And from their dwellings them entice.
A cunning mouse, well "up to trap," On pussy her two eyes did clap. "Aha!" she cried, "puss are you there? Within your reach, I would not dare-- Not e'en though it were proved by law, That your whole skin were stuffed with straw."
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THE FOX AND THE VIZOR MASK.
A fox while walking out one day, Into a toy shop chanced to stray; Among the toys that stood arrayed, A vizor mask was there displayed, With rosy cheeks, complexion fair, And ruby lips and auburn hair, And eyes of blue, and Grecian nose; And many beauties to disclose, It seemed made. The fox, with sighs, Gazed on. "Ah, ah!" he cries, "Look at this head it naught contains, It has rare beauty, but no brains."
MORAL.
The accomplished beau, in air and mien how blest. His hat well fashioned, and his hair well dress'd-- But still undress'd within: to give him brains Exceeds his hatter's or his barber's pains.
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THE GOOSE THAT LAID GOLDEN EGGS.
A man once had a goose I'm told, Which had laid each day an egg of gold. Now if this treasure were well spent, It might make any one content. But no! this man desired more; And though of eggs he had rich store; He thought one day the goose he'd kill, And then at once his pockets fill. So chasing goosey round and round, She soon was caught and firmly bound He opened her from neck to tail And then his folly did bewail. For not a single egg was there, And thus he lost this treasure rare.
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THE FOX AND THE GRAPES.
A fox once took it in his pate, To go beyond a garden gate, To see if there grew on the trees, Some food his hunger to appease. So in he went and there he spied Some grapes. To reach them hard he tried. Now they were large and luscious too, Quite purple, and beautiful to view. So up he jumps with many a bound, Until exhausted to the ground, He falls. The grapes hang o'er his head, In clusters large, "Well! well!" he said, "You are but green, and hard as stone, And all my time away is thrown. I'll leave you to your solitude, You are not fit to make me food."
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THE MOUSE AND THE WEASEL.
A very thin and hungry mouse, Into a granary stole, Where stood a basket full of grain, In which was a small hole.
After much squeezing he got in, And there he ate his fill; But when he tried to issue out, The hole seemed smaller still.
A weasel who stood looking on, Cried out in sneering tone, "You can't come out, my little dear, Until you've smaller grown.
"You were half-starved when you crept in, And now you are quite stout; So cease to eat until you can, As you got in, get out."
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THE MISER AND HIS TREASURE.
In a retired spot, A miser had got A very large treasure in store. And it was his delight, Each morn and each night, To count it and add to it more.
He had made the hole deep, And he thought none would peep, To find out his secret retreat. But a servant so sly, His master did spy, And thought that his cunning he'd beat.
So one dark winter night, He took out his light, And to the field hastened away; And he laughed in his sleeve, To think how 'twould grieve His master to miss it next day.
And indeed the distress Of his lord you may guess, For words can't describe it, I'm sure. He tore out his hair, Clasp'd his hands in despair And cried he was ruined and poor.
A man passing by, His grief chanced to spy; And told him, "'tis useless to mourn. You can look at the hole, To solace your soul, Although all the money is gone."
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THE JACKDAW AND THE PEACOCKS.
Thus Esop has the folly shown, To build on merits not your own.
A jackdaw, empty, pert and vain, Who held his equals in disdain, One day some beauteous feathers found, Left by a peacock on the ground. When in the gaudy plumage dress'd, The shallow thing his fortune bless'd; With stately gesture strode along, And boldly join'd the peacock throng; Who, his impertinence to pay, First stripp'd him, and then chas'd away. The crest-fall'n coxcomb homeward sneaks, And his forsaken comrades seeks; Where'er he comes, with scorn they leave him, And not a jackdaw will receive him. Says one he had disdain'd, at last, "Such as thou art, thou mightst have pass'd, And hadst not now been cast behind, The scorn and scandal of thy kind."
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THE SPARROW AND THE HARE.
Who dares another's ills deride, Had best against his own provide. An eagle pouncing on a hare, With piercing cries puss rends the air; When a pert sparrow from a tree, Insulted thus her misery: "Ho, ho! poor puss, thy boasted speed Has failed thee, then, in time of need!" Scarce had she spoke, when, like an arrow, A vulture darted on the sparrow. Ere the poor hare resign'd her breath, "This sight," she cried, "consoles in death --That thou, who hast my woes derided, My last of miseries hast divided!"
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THE ASS AND THE LION.
Vain boasters credit may surprise, Till known; who knows them will despise.
A lion once a hunting took An ass, and hid him in a nook. To drive the forest made him bray, That he might seize the passing prey. Long-ears set up such horrid cries, That every creature trembling flies; The lion, practised in his trade, Had soon abundant carnage made; Satiate with spoil, the ass he calls, And bid him cease his hideous brawls. The king he found with slaughter weary, Surrounded by his noble quarry, And, puffed with self-importance, said: "Sir, to some purpose I have bray'd!" "No ass more famously could do," The lion says, "but thee I knew, Or I might have been frightened too."
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THE STAG AND THE FOUNTAIN.
That good from bad men rarely know, This apologue may serve to show:
A stag upon a fountain's side, Beheld his branching horns with pride; While of his spindle-shanks asham'd, Their disproportioned form he blam'd. Sudden he hears the hunter's cries, And to the forest nimbly flies. The woods receive their well-known guest. His tangled horns, his feet arrest; The hounds approach, and seize their prey; Who, dying, thus was heard to say: "Wretch that I am! too late I learn, How little we the truth discern! What would have saved me, I despis'd, And what has been my ruin, priz'd!"
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THE EAGLE, THE CAT, AND THE SOW.
Her nest on high an eagle made Lower a cat her kittens laid; And at the bottom of the tree A sow dispos'd her progeny. Vile puss to gain her wicked ends, Much love for both of them pretends. First to the eagle's aerie mounts, And thus to her false alarms recounts: "Madam, in truth our dangerous state, 'Tis with reluctance I relate; But things are really gone so far, Conceal them I no longer dare. Night after night the treacherous sow Our tree has undermined below; Ere long it cannot choose but fall, And then she hopes to eat us all." Successful when she saw her lies, Down to the bristly sow she hies; "My worthy neighbor!" crying out, "I pray you, mind what you're about, For to a certainty I know, The eagle waits but till you go, (The thing with great concern I say,) To make your little ones her prey." Suspicious dread when thus inspir'd, Puss to her hole all day retir'd; Stealing at night on silent paw, To stuff her own and kittens' maw. To stir nor sow nor eagle dare. What more? fell hunger ends their care; And long the mischief-making beast With her base brood on carrion feast.
Learn hence, ye simples, ere too late, What ills the double-tongued create.
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THE EAGLE, THE RAVEN AND THE TORTOISE.
Who in their foe united find Force, art, and a remorseless mind, Whate'er their strength and prowess be, To perish stand in jeopardy.
An eagle once a tortoise held, Safe in his horny house concealed, Which he in vain essayed to break With all the fury of his beak. As with his prey he wing'd the air, A wily raven ventur'd near: "Your prize is excellent," says she, "And if you'll give a share to me, I know, for all his iron hide, How we the dainty may divide." The bargain made, "On yonder wall, Down," says the raven, "let him fall." He listen'd to the hoary sinner; And they on turtle made their dinner.
Thus fraud and force their purpose gain, And nature fortifies in vain.
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THE FLY AND THE HORSE.
A fly upon a coach-box seated, With arrogance the horses rated. "Advance!" cries out the paltry thing, "Unless you mean to feel my sting." "Not thee we heed," a horse replied, "But him whose skilful hand can guide The rein and whip. We better know Than thee when we should stop or go."
Thus men without or sense or weight, Think themselves born to rule the state.
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ESOP AT PLAY.
When an Athenian Esop saw, Playing with school-boys once at taw, The man with laughter shook his sides; Esop the laughter thus derides: "Of this slack bow before you laid, The meaning, sprightly sir," he said, "Explain!" (A crowd had gather'd round.) Surpris'd, the man no answer found: He puzzled long, but all his wit Could on no explanation hit. The laugh on Esop's side; says he, "Why you this bow unbended see, It is because it needs must break, If always bent; so we must take Due relaxation, that the mind Its vigor may when wanted find."
He who in harmless sport employs A vacant hour, is not unwise.
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THE OLD PILOT AND THE SAILORS.
To one complaining of his fate, Esop this fable did relate.
A ship by raging tempests toss'd, The seamen, giving all for lost, 'Twas who should weep and pray the most. Grown calm at once the sky and sea, They shout in joyful extacy. The pilot, from experience wise, The giddy crew did thus advise: "Nor much rejoice, nor over grieve, But decently what comes receive; Since good and ill succeed so near, Meet ill with hope and good with fear."
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THE CRAB AND HER DAUGHTER.
Not what they hear, but what they see, Will children and domestics be.
A crab one day her daughter chid; "You never do as you are bid, Have I not told you o'er and o'er, That awkward gait to use no more? Learn, ninny, once for all to know, Folks forward and not backward go." "Mamma," says Miss, "how strange you talk! Have I not learn'd from you to walk? Were I to move the other way, How could I follow you I pray?"
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THE SUN AND THE WIND.
Phebus and Boreas from on high Upon the road a traveller spy, Wearing a cloak for fear of rain. Says Boreas, "his precaution's vain 'Gainst me, I'll show you for a joke How soon I'll make him quit his cloak." "Come on," says Phebus, "let us see Who best succeeds, or you or me." The wind to blow so fierce began, He almost had upset his man; But still his cloak, for all his roar, Was wrapp'd more closely than before. When Boreas what he could had done, "Now for my trial," says the Sun, And with his beams so warm'd the air, The man his mantle could not bear, But open'd first, then threw aside.
Learn hence, unbending sons of pride Persuasive manners will prevail, When menaces and bluster fail.
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THE TWO POTS.
Forc'd on a stream to make their way, To pot of brass says pot of clay: "Since brass is stout and clay is frail, Pray let us at a distance sail. Not your intention that I fear Sir Brass," adds humble Earthenware, "While the winds leave you to yourself; But woe betide my ribs of delf, If it should dash our sides together; For mine would be the damage, whether Their force should you or I impel; To pray proceed, and fare you well."
Learn hence, ye folks of low estate, To keep due distance from the great.
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HERCULES AND THE CARTER.
His cart bemired, a carter pray'd To Hercules to come and aid. "Up!" says the God, "thou lazy dog. And lift the axle from the bog; Think'st thou Gods nothing have to do But listen to such knaves as you?"
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THE ANT AND THE GRASSHOPPER.
From a wise emmet, well sustain'd On what her industry had gain'd, A grasshopper some aid desir'd. "What was his trade?" the ant inquir'd. "I've none," the grasshopper replied; "I range the country far and wide, Singing all day from door to door, And have no time to form a store." Shutting her granaries, says the ant, "No wonder, friend, you are in want; He who all summer sings, may chance In winter to be forc'd to dance."
To spend his time in idle song, The thoughtless grasshopper was wrong; And not to give a small supply, The emmet mean and niggardly.
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THE CROW AND THE PITCHER.
Patience and ingenuity The want of natural means supply.
A thirsty crow some water found, But in a vessel so profound, That with her neck at utmost stretch, A single drop she could not reach. Then stones she in the pitcher places, Which to the top the water raises; And by this innocent device Her thirst at leisure satisfies.
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THE ANGLER AND THE LITTLE FISH.
An angler a small salmon caught, Who with much earnestness besought That he would let her go: says she, "What can you do with such as me! Next year when grown a little bigger, I in your bag might make a figure." The prudent man replied, "No, no; Into my pouch, though small, you go. A bird in hand is better far, Than two that in the bushes are."
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THE FROG AND THE FOX.
Let us our own defects amend, Ere to guide others we pretend.
A sallow, wrinkl'd, spotted frog, To turn physician left the bog. "He every malady could cure," He said, "that animals endure." "First on yourself your science show," Says Reynard: "that the world may know Your skill and knowledge, pray begin Of those foul spots to clear your skin: For while you look so sick and pale, To vend your drugs you'll ne'er prevail."
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THE APE AND HER YOUNG ONES.
An ape had cubs; one much she lov'd, The other small affection prov'd. Alarm'd, she hears the hunter's cries; And catching up her darling flies: Through fear she stumbled o'er some stones And broke the little favorite's bones; The other to her back who clung Uninjured went with her along.
Mothers, beware! the fondl'd child By too much tenderness is spoil'd; While those who hardships have endur'd, To suffer life are best inur'd.
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THE FIR TREE AND THE THORN.
The lowly and contented state Is farthest from the wounds of fate.
A fir tree upon a humble thorn From his high top look'd down with scorn. "For loftiest fanes we grow," she said, "Of us the tallest masts are made, While thou, poor bramble, canst produce Nothing of ornament or use." "Great tree," the modest thorn replied, "When the sharp axe shall pierce your side, In vain you then may wish to be Unsought-for, and unknown like me."
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THE ASS IN THE LION'S SKIN.
Fools may on other fools impose; The sage their real value knows.
An ass once found a lion's skin, And rolling up himself therein, From every fold that he came nigh, Made flocks, and herds, and shepherds fly. Ranging the country round, at last He meets his master where he pass'd, Who long-ears instantly descries Through his magnificent disguise: Laying his cudgel on his side, "Get home, thou stupid fool," he cried: "With others for a lion pass; I know thee for an arrant ass."
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THE DOG IN THE MANGER.
A mastiff in a stable lay, Couch'd on a manger full of hay. When any thing drew near to eat, He quickly forced it to retreat. An ox then cried, "detested creature, How vile is thy malignant nature, Which will not others let enjoy That which thou never canst employ!"
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THE STAG AND THE VINE.
A stag pursued with horn and hound In a thick vineyard shelter found. Soon as he thought the danger past, He on the vine began to feast. The huntsman hears the rustling noise, And through half-eaten leaves descries His branching horns, the pack recalls, And merited the creature falls To his ingratitude a prey.
Those their protectors who betray, Unpitying, all the world will see Consign'd to death and infamy.
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THE MISCHIEVOUS DOG.
Titles and ribands, bought with shame, Folly and vice but more proclaim. A man who own'd a vicious dog, Upon his collar fix'd a log, Which the vain cur supposed to be A note of worth and dignity. A mastiff saw his foolish pride; "Puppy," indignantly he cried, "That thing is put about your neck Your mischievous designs to check; And to who see you to declare, Of what a currish race you are."
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THE SICK MAN AND THE PHYSICIAN.
Woe to the land where those who guide, To please the people's foolish pride, Persuade them there is nought to dread, When ruin threatens o'er their head.
A patient, ask'd to tell his pains, Of thirst and shivering cold complains. "'Tis very good," the doctor said; "He has but to remain in bed, And take the med'cines I shall send, The thing will soon be at an end." When next the question was repeated, The man complain'd he much was heated; "This," cried the leech, "is better still!" And thus to each increasing ill, "That it was going well," he cried, Till the poor martyr sunk and died.
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THE FARMER AND HIS SONS.
Work, work, my boys, with hand and mind! Your labors you will fruitful find.
A husbandman, about to die, Call'd on his children to come nigh: "I leave," he says, "a small estate, But wherewithal to make it great: For know, a treasure it contains, If you to search will take the pains." He died. The sons dug all the ground, And there no hidden treasure found; But so productive was the soil, The crop by far o'erpaid the toil. Says one, when they the corn had sold, "This treasure 'twas our sire foretold!"
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THE SWALLOW AND THE BIRDS.
Those who of guides stand most in need, Are least inclin'd advice to heed.
A travell'd swallow, learn'd and wise, To all his feather'd neighbors cries: "See you yon laborers there below; What is it, think ye, that they sow? 'Tis hemp, my friends; of which are made The nets that for us all are laid; The moment yonder men are gone, Then pick the seeds up one by one." The gay inhabitants of air For his precaution little care. The seedling sprung; again the swallow Urges his good advice to follow; Again his counsel they deride. The plants full grown, and cut, and dried, Beaten and spun, the nets were made, And the unwary birds betray'd, Regretting, in their hapless fate, Their incredulity too late.
Learn hence the danger to foresee, Nor wait for their maturity.
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THE BOASTING TRAVELLER.
A fellow who abroad had been, Told marvels he had done and seen: "When resident at Rhodes," he said, "A leap of twenty yards he made Over a barrier ten feet high; A dozen witnesses were by." "Come on," says one, at the same table, "Yon ditch and fence to o'erleap you're able. They're not, by much, so high or wide; Here let the experiment be tried. Suppose yourself at Rhodes, and we Your faithful witnesses will be." The man replied, "that he to-day Was not quite well," and stole away.
Who boast of what they cannot do Both knavery and folly show.
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THE OLD WOMAN AND HER MAIDS.
Better known evils to endure, Than seek by wrong a doubtful cure.
A thrifty dame her maids awoke At the first crowing of the cock. They of such early rising tir'd, To kill the harmless cock conspir'd. The dame, to hear him crow in wait, Next morning lay in bed till eight. But when she knew the trick they had play'd, She caused a larum to be made, And rung it daily in their ears Two hours before the dawn appears.
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INDUSTRY AND SLOTH.
Insidious sloth her object gains, If but a hearing she obtains.
A youth ask'd why so long in bed? "I listen to a cause," he said; "As soon as I unclose my eyes. First industry excites to rise." "Up, up," she says, "to meet the sun, Your task of yesterday's undone!" "Lie still," cries sloth, "it is not warm, An hour's more sleep can do no harm; You will have time your work to do, And leisure for amusement too."
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THE SHEPHERD TURNED MERCHANT.
Fair weather sailors, keep at home, For be assur'd the storm will come.
A shepherd of an inland breed Brought to the coast his flocks to feed; The beauty of a summer sea, A merchant tempted him to be. He sold his sheep, and with the sale Purchas'd of dates an ample bale. He sail'd; a furious tempest rose; Into the sea his dates he throws; And swimming from the bark to land, Arrives half dead upon the strand. To one, soon afterwards who stood Pleas'd with the calmness of the flood, "Aye, aye," the simple shepherd said "With dates again it would be fed."
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THE SPENDTHRIFT AND THE SWALLOW.
A fool who all had thrown away, When wandering pennyless one day, Perceived a swallow. "Ho," says he, "Summer is come at last I see!" And to a Jew his mantle sold. Next day it was severely cold: Starv'd as he walk'd, the bird he found Frozen to death upon the ground. "Ah! what a fool was I," he cried, "When on one swallow I relied!"
Those who too readily believe, For their credulity may grieve.
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THE EAGLE AND THE CROW.
The wise well know their force to weigh, Nor what they cannot do, essay.
A carrion crow an eagle saw Seize on a lamb with beak and claw. Conceiving he could better do, He pounces on a well fed ewe; But he and not the sheep was caught; For when to fly with it he sought, His feet entangled in the wool, The shepherd seiz'd the helpless fool.
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THE WOLF AND THE SHEPHERD'S BOY.
In wantonness a shepherd's boy Alarm'd the neighbor's with his cry; "The wolf! the wolf!" And when they came, Of their lost labor made his game. At last the wolf when there indeed, His real cries they did not heed; He and his flock a prey were made, And for his lies he dearly paid.
Those who are known to have deceiv'd, When they speak truth, are not believ'd.
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THE FOX WITHOUT A TAIL.
Fashions and modes we often see, Made to conceal deformity: Those to whom nature has been kind, Should leave such fopperies behind.
A fox who in a trap was taken, Resign'd his brush to save his bacon. Ashamed that all the world should know His cunning had been cheated so, To an assembly of the nation He made the following oration: "I oft have thought the tails we wear A troublesome appendage are; Where's their utility, I pray? They serve but to obstruct our way. Nor ornamental do I find, To drag this ponderous length behind. For my part, without more debate, I move our tails we amputate." "Please, sir, to show yourself behind," (Says one to smoke the jest inclin'd, And who discovered what it was) "We there perhaps shall see the cause, Ere we your prudent counsel take, Why you this curious motion make?" His bare posteriors when they found, Loud laughter shook the benches round; Nor could the fox without a tail To introduce the mode prevail.
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THE MEN AND THE OYSTER.
Any partition better make, Than _all_ the hungry law should take.
By the sea side two travellers found A fine large oyster on the ground; His claim each obstinately lays: "I saw it first," one eager says; "I pick'd it up," the other cries; "Mine"--"Mine is certainly the prize." They talk'd as usual, loud and long; And more they reason'd, more were wrong; Till they a neighboring lawyer see Passing, and mutually agree To take him for their referee. With legal dignity of face, He heard them both relate the case; "Your claims are good," then gravely said, "And a brave lawsuit would have made Which to prefer I cannot tell, So each of you must take a shell; And, as the oyster is but one, That I myself will swallow down; To stink it otherwise had lain, And all your cash been spent in vain; You're cheaply off; go home content; And faith the fish was excellent."
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THE SHEPHERD AND HIS DOG.
A dog his master so deceiv'd, He was the best of curs believ'd. The flock was trusted to his care, Whene'er the shepherd was not there. And in the house, a favored guest, He always fed upon the best. The treacherous guard his charge betray'd And on the sheep in secret prey'd. The master, when the crime was prov'd, With double indignation mov'd, About his neck the halter tied Himself: the dog for mercy cried; "You let the wolf escape," he said, "Who much more slaughter oft has made." "Wretch!" says the man, "the wolf declares Hostility, and boldly dares; He has no confidence abused: But, coward, thou my trust hast used: Against myself! and on this tree Without delay shalt hanged be."
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THE COUNTRYMAN AND THE JUSTICE.
The law still lends the readiest aid, When well her ministers are paid.
A countryman, by power oppress'd, Seeking to have his wrongs redress'd, Oft to the justice went in vain; Admittance he could ne'er obtain, But still was bid again to come; "Unwell"--"engag'd"--or "not home!" The wily rustic took a kid One day, and in a basket hid; And when he to the house drew near, Began to pinch him by the ear, So that the porter, from the hall, Might hear the little fatling squall; The man his master's mind who knew, Open'd the door and let him through. The shepherd, laughing as he pass'd, Says to his kid, "Thy cries at last An audience for my wrongs obtain; Thy flesh, perhaps, redress will gain."
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THE COCK AND THE FOX.
The world applauds the lucky hit, When it beholds the biter bit.
A treach'rous fox invited down A cock, who on a tree had flown. "Do you not know, my friend," says he, "Bird, beast, fish, reptile, man agree, To live henceforth in amity? Come down and celebrate the day." "Troth," quoth the cock, "you truly say; For hounds I see come o'er the dell, With open mouths, the news to tell." "Adieu," says Ren. "'Tis best to go; Those dogs the treaty may not know."
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THE BLIND MAN AND THE LAME.
Who kind assistance give and take, Life's arduous journey best will make.
Two men, one blind, the other lame, To pass a ford together came. The stream was rapid, and the way Obliquely thwart the current lay; To his companion says the blind, "Yon winding road I ne'er shall find." "Nor my poor limbs," the lame replied, "The current's rapid force abide." "Come," says the blind, "my loins are strong, I'll bear you on my back along, While you to guide me give the word;" And thus they safely cross'd the ford.
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THE MAN AND THE SERPENT.
There's in the world a cursed race, Of nature so perverse and base, If from the gallows you should save, A dangerous enemy you have.
A countryman a serpent found, Stiffen'd with frost upon the ground, And took her home; but when the fire Began new vigor to inspire, Swelling her neck with angry eyes, She fills the cot with hissing cries. The rustic then his axe did take, "Is this then the return you make? Is this your gratitude?" he said, And knock'd the reptile on the head.
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THE TWO STREAMS.
Those who display much dash and din, Have seldom any thing within.
A weary traveller, one day, Cross'd o'er a river in his way; Alarm'd to see the foaming tide Dashing o'er rocks from side to side, Nevertheless, his course to keep, He ventur'd in with trembling step; And found the water neither deep, Nor footing bad; and got well o'er. When he had travell'd some leagues more, He to another river came, That smoothly flowed, a silent stream: This he thought easily to pass; But ere he in the middle was, He plunged into a gulf profound, And for his feet no bottom found; But, forced to swim with all his might, Got to the shore in piteous plight.
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THE SOT AND HIS WIFE.
Inveterate sin is seldom cur'd.
A wife had long a sot endur'd, Who all his time in taverns spent, While his affairs in ruin went. Once as insensible he lay, She dress'd him in a corpse's array, And with the undertaker's aid, Into a burying vault convey'd. The fumes dispersed, the man awakes; All for reality he takes. When by the glimmering of a lamp He saw his mansion drear and damp, Reflecting how his life had pass'd, A forced repentance came at last. The wife, with suited voice and dress, Presented an infernal mess: "Good Trap, pray take away your meat; I have no appetite to eat," He cried, "but faith I'm devilish dry: Can't you a bowl of wine supply?" The woman, seeing all was vain, Restor'd him to his casks again: Consol'd with certainty, that he Ere long a real corpse must be.
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THE FARMER AND HIS QUARRELSOME SONS.
Three sons an honest farmer had; And it so happen'd, ne'er a lad Could with the other two agree; All quarrelling perpetually. Their time in idle contest spent, Garden and farm to ruin went; And the good farmer and his wife Led but a miserable life. One day as this unhappy sire Sat musing by his evening fire, He saw some twigs in bundles stand, Tied for the basket-maker's hand. Taking up one: "My boys," says he, "Which is the strongest, let me see; He who this bundle breaks in twain, The preference, and this prize shall gain," (Showing a pair of Sunday shoes.) The rivals every effort use In vain. Their utmost force when tried, The father took the twigs untied, And giving to them one by one, The work immediately was done. "Yon twigs," he says, "that broken lie, This useful lesson may supply: That those in amity who live, And succor to each other give, Double their forces to resist Oppression, and their work assist."
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THE FIG TREE AND THE FLOWERING SHRUB.
Flowers which many leaves display, In fruitless beauty fade away.
Cries one of these, with saucy sneer, To a plain fig-tree growing near, "How comes it, honest friend, that thou Dost in the spring no blossoms show?" Says he, "I keep them out of view, For fear I should resemble you, And in the autumn nought produce Of permanence and solid use."
Who soon and much essay to shine, May dread a premature decline.
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THE FARMER AND THE LANDLORD.
A farmer of an honest fame, One morning to his landlord came: "Alas, my lord," he weeping said, "Gored by my bull, your ox is dead. What must be done?" "The case is plain," Replies the lord; "the creature slain, The owner of the bull must pay; Let it be done without delay." "Heav'n give your worship long to live! I hope you will a good one give, For mine was good!" "How! your's, my friend? Let me your story comprehend: Your bull, you say, my ox has gored?" "Forgive me the mistake, my lord, In my confusion I have made; Mine was the ox that must be paid; But 'tis all one--what's just for me The same must for your worship be: I'll tell the steward what you say." "Not yet--we'll think of it to-day. Further inquiry must be had; Perhaps your fences were but bad; Perhaps--but come again to-morrow." The honest laborer saw with sorrow, That justice wears a different face, When for themselves men put the case.
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THE SCHOOL-BOY AND THE MONITOR.
At play on Thames's verdant side A school boy fell into the tide, Where providentially there stood A willow, bending o'er the flood. Buoy'd on its branch, he floating lay, The monitor pass'd by that way. The lad entreats his life to save: The Don replies with aspect grave, "Sirrah, what business had you there? How vain is all our watchful care! You never heed a word we say; Your disobedience you shall pay!" "First," says the boy, "pray stretch your hand: I'll hear you when I come to land."
This is for those, with vain parade Who give advice, instead of aid.
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THE MILLER AND HIS ASS.
A rustic bringing to the fair An ass, that he might show him there, Sleek and well looking let him trot; He followed with his son on foot. The first they met upon the road, At our pedestrians laugh'd loud, "Look at those two legged asses," cried, "Who trudge on foot when they might ride!" The father with the hint complies: Makes the boy mount. Now other cries Assail their ears; by graybeards blam'd; "Sirrah, you ought to be asham'd To ride and let your father walk!" Again he listened to their talk. The sire got up, the youth got down; When passing through a country town, At every door the mothers said, "A murrain light on thy old head! Hast thou no bowels for thy kind? At least take up the lad behind." This done they next were thus address'd: "Two lubbers on a little beast? They fitter are to carry him!" Complying with this senseless whim, Upon a pole his feet in air, The ass they on their shoulders bear. Now laughing shouts spread far and wide. The ass's ligatures untied, "Proceed, my son," then said the man: "To please the world, do all we can, Since 'tis impossible, you see, To please ourselves content we'll be."
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THE DREAMER AND HIS SON.
Mortals bring down upon their head The very miseries most they dread.
The only son of a rich knight In hunting daily took delight. The father living in alarm, Lest he should come to any harm, Dream'd that he saw him on the ground, Rent with the lion's fatal wound. The youth, allow'd to hunt no more, Impatiently confinement bore. Remarking, one unlucky day, In the fine chamber where he lay, A lion painted on the wall, "Thou art," he cried, "the cause of all." With idle rage the wall he struck, And in his hand an iron stuck, Which piercing bones and sinews through, Fester'd and then a gangrene grew. And thus the father's ill-tim'd care Deprived him of his son and heir.
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THE OLD MAN AND DEATH.
Though life be welcome to the wise, Death cannot take him by surprise; Aware that every day and hour He holds but at the tyrant's power, That beauty, talents, worth, are vain. A moment's respite to obtain. Nothing more known, and yet how rare It is with courage to prepare For this inevitable day! All hope a little more delay.
One who had suffer'd many a year, And to a century drew near, At last complain'd, that unawares Death came, unsettled his affairs: "My will is not completely made; A little time," he trembling said, "A little longer let me live; Some warning 'tis but fair to give! My grandson is expected home; At least pray, let the doctor come." "Poor helpless driveller!" Death replied, "Ten years ago thou should'st have died! Thy friends, thy foes, thyself outliv'd: Almost an age thou hast surviv'd: Some who their day had scarce begun. Others beneath their noon-tide sun-- Time's deepest lines engrave thy brow, And dost thou hesitate to go? Idiot, what warning would'st thou have? One foot already in the grave: Sight, hearing, feeling, day by day, Sunk gradual in a long decay. I blame myself for my neglect; Thou'st not a moment to expect!"
When failing nature warns, the sage Sees death a refuge from old age; And rising from life's lengthened feast, Willing retires, a sated guest.
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THE PAINTER.
When candid critics deign to blame Their index points the road to fame, But when dull fools your works admire, Throw them at once into the fire.
In Rome there dwelt, in days of yore, A painter deep in graphic lore. His touch was firm, his outline true, And every rule full well he knew. A Mars he painted, meant to show How far his learned skill could go. The work complete, he call'd a friend, On whose good taste he could depend. The friend was honest, spoke his thought, And fairly pointed out the fault, "That overwork'd in every part, It show'd too much laborious art." The painter argued for his rules, And cited maxims from the schools; Still the judicious critic held The labor should be more conceal'd. While they disputed on his stricture, A coxcomb came to see the picture: Entering, he cries, "Good heavens, how fine! The piece, I swear, is quite divine! The sword, the knot, the belt, the leather, The steel, the gold, the silk, the feather, Are perfect nature, all together!" The painter, reddening with despite, Whispers, "My friend, by Jove, you're right. 'Tis not enough our art to know, Till less of it we learn to show; My picture must be done again I see, to please discerning men."
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THE COBBLER AND THE NABOB.
A cobbler, who had fix'd his stall Against a nabob's palace wall, Work'd merrily as others play, And sung and whistled all the day. A prey to many an anxious care, Less merry was the lord, by far; And often in the night he thought It hard, sleep was not to be bought: And if tow'rds morn he got a doze, The cobbler troubled his repose. One day he bid the man attend-- And, "Well," says he, "my honest friend, How is it that so well you thrive? You seem the happiest man alive. Pray, what may be the profit clear, That you can earn within the year?" "What in a twelvemonth I can earn, My lord, was never my concern; 'Tis quite enough," the cobbler said, "If I can gain my daily bread." "Take then this note"--'twas twenty pound; "But sing not with so shrill a sound, Good man," the generous nabob cries, "When early to your work you rise; For then I want to close my eyes." Delighted to his stall he went: But now he first felt discontent; All day he neither work'd nor ate, For thinking of his happy fate. At night, when he retir'd to bed, He plac'd the note beneath his head. But could not sleep a single wink, What he should do with it, to think; And every little noise he heard, That folks were come to rob him, fear'd. Living in constant dread to all, Who did but look towards his stall, So lean and sallow he was grown, The man was hardly to be known. At last he begg'd the lord to see: "Take back your present, sir," said he, "Riches, I find, are not for me. To-morrow I my song renew; Not less my gratitude to you: And care henceforward I will take, My chaunts your slumber do not break."
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THE HORSE AND HIS RIDER.
A man a palfrey long possess'd, A quiet, serviceable beast; Spavin'd, indeed, and somewhat blind, But still his way he well could find; And if he stumbled now and then, Was soon upon his feet again. In short, for many a year, the pack Had borne him safely on his back. Till riding out one fatal day, He overheard some coxcombs say, "For such a man, 'tis quite a shame, To mount a horse old, blind, and lame." "Aye," replied one, "I know a steed Would nobly carry him indeed; Young, vigorous, beautiful, and sound; His like is nowhere to be found." In evil hour an ear he lent, To view this boasted courser went: Unwary on his back he got, And tried to put him on a trot; He rear'd and plung'd, and leap'd about, Till from his seat he shook him out, Then kicking, pitch'd him o'er his head, And laid him on the pavement dead. The vicious creature left at large, On all his fury would discharge; This from behind his heels surprise, Trod under foot, that sprawling lies: Another, who would seize the reins, Is bit and mangled for his pains. But want of nourishment and rest Will tame at last the fiercest beast; And rage itself suspends its course, Exhausted by its proper force. Light'ning no more his eyes inspire, No more his nostrils snorted fire; At bay he stood, fatigu'd and lank, With flagging ears, and beating flank. An active jockey, stout and able, Contracts to bring him to the stable; Soothes, and his neck begins to pat, And the corn rattles in his hat; By hunger drawn, repell'd by fear, The courser neighs, retires, comes near; Lur'd with the smell, begins to eat. The jockey vaulted in the seat: With vigorous hand the bridle plied, And stuck the rowels in his side. Some bounds and curvets still he made, But soon submissively obey'd. The horseman who such skill had shown, Resolv'd to keep him for his own: Aware that constant work alone Can keep this wicked spirit down He night and day is on his back, To lead him to some new attack, No road is safe, nor far nor near, This highwayman is every where.
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THE GOOD MINISTER.
An honest minister disgrac'd, (Such are not easily replac'd,) Found the sweet leisure in his fields, To virtuous minds retirement yields. The king, who had his foes believ'd, The loss of him ere long perceiv'd. To bring him back again intent, To his retreat alone he went: "My friend, you must return with me," He said, "your value now I see." "Forgive me," the Recluse replied; "Here I determine to abide. By sad experience well I know, Were I to court again to go, And all my best endeavors do, To serve my country, sir, and you, Art and intrigue so much prevail, Again I certainly should fail; Against your will and approbation, And the good wishes of the nation, You'd find yourself compell'd to yield, And I once more must quit the field."
The honest man, who will not bend To circumstance, or condescend To pay his court to knave or fool, Will never long a nation rule.
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THE SWAN AND THE COOK.
A man once had a swan and goose Among his birds and beasts. The one was destined for a pet, The other for a feast. Sometimes you saw them sailing Gracefully on the current, side by side, Sometimes they played a game of tag, Or plunged into the tide. One day the master ordered The cook to kill the goose, And roast it for his dinner; It was fat and fit for use. But the cook had taken a drop too much, And it had gone to his head; So when he went out for the goose He took the swan instead. He seized the swan fast by the throat, And would have kill'd it soon: But the bird saw he was to die, And he his throat did tune, And warbled out his farewell lay. The cook straight dropped his knife In great surprise, "what! what!" cried he, "Shall I take the life Of a musical bird like this? No, no! it must not be. So to the garden he shall go back And ne'er be kill'd by me."
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THE LYNX AND THE MOLE.
A lynx once met by chance a mole, Just emerging from his hole. The lynx with penetrating eye The beauties of the place did spy, And asked the mole to take a share In the fine prospect, rich and rare. "I've seldom found so good a place. From this small hill you see a space Extended far beneath your view, I like it much; pray do not you? See now the sun begins to rise, And with crimson tints the skies. It spreads all round its genial heat, And nature now enjoys a treat." "Well, well!" the mole aloud did cry "You may see this and more, but I Can only now before me see, A very heavy mist." "Truly, Now," said the lynx, "I clearly see The difference 'twixt you and me. My eyes see with perception bright While your's are always dark as night. Go to your hold beneath the ground, While I will range the forest round."
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THE OLD CAT AND THE YOUNG MOUSE.
A young mouse of little experience, Thought to soften an old cat, And besought her clemency, By asking for his life at her expense. Said he, "A mouse, or e'en a rat, Is not a great charge on the house; And I shall not starve out the host. Besides I seldom quit my post, And when I do a grain of corn Has served me since I first was born. Now I am thin, pray let me be, I'll serve your children yet, you'll see." Thus to the cat spoke the poor mouse. The other answered, "You mistake, When unto me this tone you take; You might as well talk to the deaf, As to so old a cat as I, And through your tricks I spy, Die! you can go and chatter to the fates, My children will be fed on better cates."
MORAL.
Youth is sanguine, and hopes for all: Old age is pitiless; so says our moral.
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THE TWO FRIENDS.
Two real friends lived in Monomotapa, All that belonged to one was for the other, And each was unto each a brother. The people of that country, thus, Make better friends than among us. One night when fast asleep, They each were sound reposing, The eldest darted from his couch, And stopped the other's dozing. He runs to see his friend, Awakes the slaves, and in the end, Even his friend is quite alarmed, And goes to seek the other, With sword and purse. "My brother, What can the matter be? Here I am armed, you see, Ready with sword to fight for you, And here is money ready too, If you have lost in play. You're even welcome to my handsome slave, With jet black hair, and eyes so grave." "No!" said the other, "I need naught, But ere I slept to-night, I thought, Being in a trance, that you were sad, And as the thought nigh drove me mad, I hurried to your tent, And found you sleeping quite content."
MORAL.
Which of the two best loved the other? Here is a thing to ponder on. A true friend is a precious thing, And all to aid you he will bring, But with excess of love the other In dreams was thinking of his brother.
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THE SICK STAG.
In a land where stags are many, One fell sick, and not any Of all his friends, delayed to come, To offer aid and consolation, In his sorrowful situation. Said he, "My friends, pray let me die In the right way, nor shed such tears." Not at all, the consolers, With many a tear, and many a sigh, Had come resolved by him to lie; And when they left they helped themselves Upon his lands, the greedy elves! And drank from out his brook, And every one of them such suppers took, That when the stag revived, He found his meals reduced; So that while his friends had thrived, He had to fast or die of hunger.
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THE FOREST AND THE WOODMAN.
A woodman had broken or misplaced The wooden handle of his axe, This loss could not be well replaced. So master woodman humbly prayed From all the trees a single branch, And promised to go elsewhere when he made Again his livelihood, And he would touch nor oak nor pine. The trees which were all very good Furnished for him new arms, And soon commenced all their alarms, And their regret. The axe was mended. And his repentance all was ended. The miserable wretch but used it, E'en as he had before abused it, By felling down the forest trees, Which groaned in spirit, and which died, By arms they had themselves supplied.
MORAL.
This is the way the world goes on, We use our benefits against our benefactors: I am tired of speaking thereupon, Till we obtain our wants, we are good actors.
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THE ELEPHANT AND THE MONKEY OF JUPITER.
Formerly the elephant and the rhinoceros Disputing on the light of empire Resolved to end the combat thus-- By fighting to their heart's desire. The day was fixed, when it was heard, That the monkey of Sire Jupiter Had been seen in the air, Poised on a cloud like any bird. The elephant was quite convinced That to arrange the new election, An interest the god evinced, And felt for him a great affection, He went to see the monkey's highness, Expecting him to speak about the fight, But not a word said monkey. At this sight, The elephant perceived that he must speak himself, And so began: "Sire Jupiter," said he, "Between rhinoceros and me will see A royal combat of legation; A tournament for all the nation. I suppose you have already heard This news!" Said monkey, "Not a word." The elephant ashamed, and quite surprised, Looked on the monkey with astonished eyes. Said monkey, "In celestial place, A fly or leopard are of equal race." "Was it not then because of us," Said elephant, "that you descended?" "Nay," said the monkey, quite offended. "I left the heavens to share a grain of corn Among some ants, nor knew that you were born. We have the care of mortal things; But all are equals in our eyes, And at your talk I feel surprise."
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THE WOODCUTTER AND DEATH.
A woodman was toiling, all covered with dust, But reach home with his faggot ere night he must, Panting and weary he walks quite slow, How to get home he does not know. At last quite exhausted with toil and trouble, With the weight of the burden and his years, bent double. He puts down his faggot, and thinks of his pains, What is his work, and what are his gains, How since he came into this weary world, By the wheels of blind fortune around he's been twirled. Was he not poor, a wood cutter, at best, Oft without bread, always without rest. He thinks of his wife, his children, his taxes, At last quite warm with the subject he waxes. He calls on death; who comes without delay, The woodman, in terror, knows not what to say. Death asks what to do the man wishes he should. "Oh, help me," he said, "with this faggot of wood. My poor bones ache, and my limbs they crack. So help me to put it upon my back."
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THE RAT AND THE OYSTER.
A rat who lived in the field, A rat of little wit, Once grew tired of his father's house, And quietly left it. He left the field, the grain and wheat, Set out to travel, left his hole, And just as soon as he was out, "How large and spacious on the whole Is this great country spread about. Here are the Apeninnes, and there Caucasus." The smallest mole hill is a mountain. At the end of some days our traveller arrives At a certain canton where every oyster thrives, And our famed traveller turned very pale, Thinking he saw great vessels setting sail "Mercy," said he, "My father was a dunce, He did not dare to travel even once, While I have seen already, The maritime empire, And travelled to my heart's desire." From a certain learn'd man, The rat had heard of such things, And thinks he has seen all he can. Among the many oysters closed, There was one open, which reposed, Mouth gaping, in the sun, The learned, travelled man, The rat, approached, thinking to make An excellent repast, and began to take A bite at the fine oyster, plump and fat, Whereupon closing on our rat, The oyster caught him tight And held him with all its might.
MORAL.
This fable goes to show, That those mistake, Who think that all they know: When knowing nothing of the world, Their giddy brain is quickly whirled. And hence this moral let us make, That he is caught, who thinks to take.
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THE PHYSICIANS.
Dr. So-much-the-worse went out to see A patient sick as one could be. His brother So-much-the-better, Having received an urgent letter, Came also the sick man to visit. So-much-the-worse declared he'd die, So-much-the-better asked him why. And while their plans they thus discourse, The sick man died, _so much the worse_! So-much-the-better now declared, That if the sick man had not despaired, He would have lived. So-much-the-worse Said, "I was right, agree with me, Our patient's dead, as you can see."
MORAL.
There's wisdom in the saying, by my troth, Too many cooks will spoil the broth.
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THE MOUNTAIN IN LABOR.
A mountain thought to be in labor, Made such a horrid noise, That round it each stranger came and neighbor, Thinking the end of all this noise would be A city, quite as large as three. Having drawn all the province round, The mountain from a little mound, Let out a mouse.
MORAL.
When I think upon this fable, Of which the narration is false, And the sense true; It puts me much in mind Of authors not a few, Who boast that they are able To write on any subject as they please, And after all--do nothing.
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THE CAT METAMORPHOSED INTO A WOMAN.
A man was passionately fond of his cat, He thought she was pretty, and sleek, and all that; And she purred in the softest tone, He wished to make her his own. This man by prayers, by tears, By sorcery and charms, Changed pussy to a woman fair, And took her in his arms. But in the wainscot soon a rat Made itself manifest, And very soon the pussy cat, Could still no longer rest. Her foolish husband who believed That nothing had of cat remained, And as his wife had her received-- Was, now, I warrant, somewhat pained. Next time the vermin came, Pussy was surer of her game-- For having changed her face, The mice not frightened, Did not change their pace-- And the astonished spouse Was very glad-- To change her back-- And was no more cat-mad.
MORAL.
What in the bone is born, Will in the flesh remain, Both night and morn, And ne'er come out again.
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THE FROG AND THE RAT.
He who another thinks to injure, May in the end destroy himself.
A rat who fed exceeding well, Was by a frog invited out to dine; "The voyage," said froggy, "will be quickly made, If you will tie your foot to mine." Frog vaunted the delight of bathing, Praised the varieties they'd met upon the way, And when the rat consented to be tied, Attempted to bear him away. The rat half drowned resisted all he could. The frog, imaged the dinner he would make; Suddenly, flying from a neighboring wood, A hawk appeared, and quickly did he take Both of the combatants up in his bill, Before they e'en had time to make their will; And quite delighted did the greedy sinner Make off of fish and flesh a hearty dinner. For in the hawk's dominions, fast days Are never kept. Now if the frog had acted as he ought, And had not tried to dine off the poor rat, They would not both have perished, To make fat, A pampered hawk; And master rat, Had he not been so curious about Aquatic government, Had from the scrape got safely out.
MORAL.
A scheme or a conspiracy, Be it all plotted well As safe, 'twould seem as it could be, And sure of all success, May, none the less, Entirely fail, And grand conspirators, And all bewail, The day that set them scheming.
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THE LION AND THE FLY.
A lion by a gad-fly worried, Half maddened by his sting, Exclaimed, "Be off, vile fly-- Mean, pitiful, base thing!" After the fly had ended his repast, Fully exhausted feels the beast at last, And roared so that he shook the earth, While the victorious fly Met in the spider's web his destiny.
MORAL.
Two morals draw I from this tale: First, We should fear the smallest enemy; And second, We may escape great perils, And from a trifling cause may die.
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THE TWO MULES.
Two mules went travelling on their way, One with a sack of corn; The other with gold and bells so gay, Most gaily tripped along. Proud of so rich a load, He kept the bells a ringing-- And was so proud, had he known how He would have commenced singing. Soon some robbers rude appeared, Who stopped this mule upon his road, And very soon they had him cleared Of all his weight of precious gold. Falling beneath their blows, "I die," The expiring trotter cried, "Had you been," said the other, "Low as I, you would not thus have died."
Be moderate when you are high, Nor glory o'er the passers by.
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JUPITER AND THE FARMER.
Jupiter had a farm to let, Mercury advertised it, and people came, Made offers, listened, all the same, Made some objection. One declared the land Was rough and dry, And full of sand. One had this reason, one had that, Until at last a man appeared, Who said he'd try to farm it, agreed that He might have any weather that he chose.
Behold! as soon as he but yawns, it blows Or rains, or is quite clear. His neighbors, even the most near, Are not affected by these changes. In usual route, their weather ranges; They have good crops, But he had none. At last when tired, he began Complaining unto Jupiter. The next year the same thing, Changes of weather he can bring-- And the neighbors no more Than the Americans, Are troubled by the farming Of his lands. At last tired out, with all his strife in vain, He yields his power to the God of rain; Acknowledging, that all along The god did right, And he did wrong.
MORAL.
Let us conclude that Providence For man ordains much better than we can.
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THE COCK, THE CAT, AND THE LITTLE MOUSE.
A young mouse, who had nothing seen, Was nearly caught; You shall hear how He told his mother the adventure-- He said, "Pray, listen, now: I started out to frolic at a venture, When two fine animals appeared Before my eyes, And filled me with surprise. One was soft, benign, and sweet, The other, turbulent, and full of inquietude, Had a loud voice, piercing and rude, And on his head a piece of flesh. A sort of arm raised him up in the air, As though to fly out of a mesh-- His tail was spread out like a fan." Now it was a cock of which our little mouse, Made to his mother this fine picture, Describing him like an enthusiast. "He beat," said he, "his flanks, With his two arms, Making such a noise and such a din, That, frightened half to death, I hurried in. Although I pique myself upon my courage And heartily I cursed him in my heart, For but for him, I'd taken part, In conversation with the gentle creature, Who my advances would encourage. She is velvety, like us, with a long tail, A modest look, and sparkling eyes, And is much like a rat. She spies The objects round her. I turned pale On hearing the other creature's din, Or else I should have asked her in." "My child," said the mother, "this last was a cat, An enemy of every mouse and rat. The other a cock, whom do not fear, Perhaps we may dine on him here."
Take care, whatever they may seem, Of judging people by their mien.
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THE MONKEY.
The animals, on the death of the lion, During his life, prince of the country, Resolved to elect a king to try on The regal crown, and chose a monkey. Because after the animals had all Tried on the regal crown, or let it fall, Because their heads were all too big, Or too small, too horned, or too thick, The monkey slipped through it; And with it cut up many a trick, Which they all thought refined, And chose him with one mind. Only the fox regretted the election, And swore to reign in his defection. He came and made his compliment; "Sire," said he, "I know a treasure meant For your high majesty. I will show The spot where it lies hid." The monkey went at Reynard's bid-- And was caught in a trap. The fox exclaimed, "How do you think to govern us, When, after all, with all your fuss, You cannot well, do what you may, Keep e'en yourself out of harm's way." The animals agreed, That royal power suits very few indeed.
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THE HORSE AND THE ASS.
An ass accompanied by a horse uncourteous, Who only had his harness on his back; And the poor jackass staggered 'Neath the load of vegetable and a pack; He begged the horse to help him, If he could-- But not a single bit, The other would. "I ask," said the poor beast, "A little pity-- Help me at least, To reach the city." The horse refused, And got his due, For the ass died. The farmer's man Stripped off the skin of honest Ben, And made the horse, whom they espied, Drag on the skin and the cart beside.
MORAL.
'Tis wise to lend our aid To others in distress, We often thus are made The means of happiness. The churlish, unkind man His neighbor's death may cause, And have to help his family, Through taxes and the laws.
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THE ASTROLOGER WHO FELL INTO A WELL.
An astrologer, of high ambition, While star-gazing fell down Into a well. "Sage gentleman," Remarked the people of the town, "How did you think to read the stars, old man, When you cannot preserve your own position." This adventure in itself, without going further, Might serve as a lesson, to most of mankind, For of us mortals, a certain part inclines, To the belief, that, with the help of mind, The book of Destiny may easily be read, But this book, by Homer and his disciples sung, What is it called but _Chance_, by ancients, And by us Christians named Providence instead. Now in Chance there can no science be, Or why should it be called by them _Chance_-- And things uncertain, who knows in advance? If all depends upon the fixed decree, Of Him who does all things, and nothing does unwisely. How should we read his will, And know that which from us he would conceal? Wherefore watch the stars so nicely, To know how to avoid inevitable woe; Or how, in future times, our fate will go; To make us, in the midst of pleasure, sad, Or with predicted evil, drive us mad, Convert all blessings into curses dire? Is this the knowledge to which we aspire, Is it an error or a crime thus to believe That future destiny can thus be known? In place of star-gazing above our head, Let us confide ourselves to the Great One. The firmament exists, the stars go on their way, And the sun shines upon us every day; And every day, the day is lost in night, Without our knowing aught else from the sight. That the seasons come, the crops are ripe, And in what wood we should look out for snipe, And some few other things, but for the change Of day to night, by which the world doth range, It has not aught to do with Destiny. Quacks, and ye compilers of horoscopes, Quit all the courts of princes in Europe, And take with you all mischief makers
You deserve belief no more than they do.
MORAL.
This astrologer in the well, Resembles all of his false art, Who while they are in danger, dream That in the stars, they read the happiest theme.
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THE ANIMALS SICK WITH THE PLAGUE.
A scourge which spread terror, Invented by heaven to punish earth-- The plague (if to name it be no error) Was making every animal To curse his birth. In one day it might have enriched Acheron, And upon beasts made busy war. Amongst them all there was not one, But, sick and ailing, was complaining sore; All did not die, but each was ill-- Not one strove now to eat his fill, No meat excited them to taste, Nor did the wolves again lay waste, The innocent prey. Even the doves fled from each other, And cooed no more the live-long day. The lion held war counsel--"My brother," Said he, addressing each in turn, "I think that heaven hath allowed This punishment on us to fall For the sins we have disavowed. Now I for one will confess all, And let him who is most to blame, Be slaughtered in the others' name. Perhaps he may obtain a common cure, For history tells us that in like cases, The guilty die in others' places; Let us not then be false to Nature, Let us confess our faults--in fine I will the first acknowledge mine; And I avow, that oft I keep A serious tax on harmless sheep. What had they done, In naught offended-- Yet I their quiet lives have ended. Sometimes, with sorrow be it heard, I e'en have eaten the shepherd, And I acknowledge all-- And I will die like a quiet bird-- If my death keep you from your fall. It must be hoped now in all justice, That he who is most guilty perish." "Sire," said the fox, "you are too good a king To die for any trivial thing; Your simples are too nice. Eat sheep, and why not? Is it a sin? is it a vice? No, sire, you did them honor; And as for shepherds, I desire, That over us their false empire Should cease, and we have all we want Of sheep and fleece." So said the fox, flatterers applaud, The tiger, bear, and other powers they laud, Even for their most violent offence. All quarrelsome people, Down to the mastiffs, Were little saints. But when the donkey's turn came on, They heard him with many ifs. He said, "I now remember That by a monk's garden passing, (It was late in December, And my strength soon faints,) I ate a leaf of some dry plant, And e'en now I with terror pant." They seized upon him and devoured, And said he was the cause Of heaven's anger being lowered.
With interested judges, _right_ Is always on the side of _might_.
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THE CANDLE.
It was in the home of the Olympian gods, That bees first lodged, 'tis said, On Mount Hymettus; and thitherwards Came zephyrs with light tread. When from the hives, the honey, Had all been taken out, As there remained naught but wax, Some candles were, for money, Carefully made and sold in packs. One of these candles on a certain day Seeing that clay by fire was turned to brick, Thought he could harden his body the same; And getting near the fire to try the trick, This new Empedocles to flame condemned Soon found of his philosophy the end.
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THE HOG, THE GOAT, AND THE SHEEP.
A goat, a sheep, and a fat hog, On the same cart were bound for the fair. They lay as quietly as any log, But were not seeking their amusement there. They were to be sold, so says the story. The carter, who his business knows, Don't take them into town to see the _shows_. Dame porker was inclined to squeal, As though the butcher's knife she 'gan to feel. Her grunts, and squeals, and cries Were loud enough to deafen one, The other animals more wise, And better tempered, with surprise Exclaimed, "have done!" The carter to the porker turned, "Where have you manners learned, Why stun us all? Do you not see That you're the noisiest of the three? That sheep says not a word, Nor can the young goat's voice be heard." "But," said the hog, "they both are fools. If like me they knew their fate, They'd halloo out at greater rate, The goat will only lose her milk, The sheep his wool, but here, poor me, I'm to be eaten, and know my destiny." The porker was quite right, But hallooing with all her might, Was all too late, And could not alter her sad fate.
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THE DELICATE HERON.
By the bank of a river, A heron walked out, And in it were sporting, Pike, mackerel and trout.
Now these fish with great ease, Our bird might have caught, But I'll wait till I'm hungry The silly bird thought.
At last came his appetite, "Now I'll eat," the bird cries, And some tench from the bottom, Just then he saw rise.
"But these are not good enough At this time of day," And he waited for better Till all swam away.
At eve almost starved When all other means fail, He was right glad to sup On a poor little snail.
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THE BLACKAMOOR AND HER MISTRESS.
A foolish young lady, Took one of her maids, Who chanced to be black As the ace of spades, And said she'd have her washed white, By the other maids; She was put in a tub, And with water and towels Her skin they did rub, Through a long summer day till the night; But the more they did rub her, The blacker she got; And while they did scrub her, She mourned her hard lot. So the maids threw away All their labor and care, And the mistress gave up Her fine scheme in despair.
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THE BEAR AND THE GARDENER.
A bear and gardener, Who mutually tired Of solitary life, And were inspired, With a warm friendship for each other, Promised to be to one another, Excellent friends, and so they were. As for the death of the poor man I'll tell you how it happened, If I can. The bear watching the gardener in his sleep-- Beholding on his head a fly, And thinking it bad company, Took up a stone and dropped it down, Upon the fly 'tis true, But broke the gardener's crown.
MORAL.
To make our fortunes or to mend, A most malignant enemy Is better than a foolish friend.
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THE VULTURES AND THE PIGEONS.
The wing'd inhabitants of air Waged on a time a direful war. Not those, in budding groves who sing, To usher in the amorous spring; Nor those, with Venus' car who fly Through the light clouds and yielding sky But the rapacious vulture brood, With crooked beak that thirsts for blood, And iron fangs. Their war, 'tis said, For a dog's carrion corse was made. Shrill shrieks resound from shore to shore; The earth beneath is sanguin'd o'er; Versed in the science to destroy, Address and valor they employ. 'Twould take a hundred tongues to tell, The heroes from the air who fell. The dovecote race, a gentle nation, Made offers of their mediation. Prudent ambassadors are sent; The vultures with the terms content, Agree their guarantee to take, And armistice and treaty make. This kind desire to interfere, Cost the poor peace-makers full dear. To rapine bred, the ruthless crew, Nor gratitude nor faith who knew, On the defenceless pigeons fall, And shortly had devoured them all.
MORAL.
When tyrants from their quarrels cease, Some weaker neighbor pays their peace. His safety in their warfare lies; Their feuds, not he should compromise. When Joseph, Frederick, and Kate, Tired of unprofitable hate, Their animosities would heel, They swallowed Poland at a meal.
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THE BEAR AND THE BEES.
A bear once rambled from his home, Chanced through a garden trim to roam, Where, 'neath the shelter of the trees, The farmer had his hives of bees. Bruin loved honey. "Now," said he, "I'll rob your store-house, Master Bee. You'll buz, and hum about my ears, But noise a brave bear never fears." So saying, bear o'erturns a hive, And straight the air is all alive, With angry enemies, who sting As well as buz; and make bear sing, A lively tune of growls and roars, And cover him with smarting sores.
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MAJA'S ALPHABET.
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[Illustration]
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= = = PG21384 = = =
AFAR IN THE FOREST
Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England
Afar in the Forest, by W.H.G. Kingston.
________________________________________________________________________
This is not a long book, but is very much in the Kingston style, that is, the style he employs when writing about land-based adventures, as opposed to sea-based ones.
It is quite difficult to follow who is who in this story, and why they are doing what they do. I suggest that you use a pen and paper to jot down people's names as and when they make their appearance.
But there are some surprises regarding who is related to whom, a device which Kingston uses quite often.
________________________________________________________________________
AFAR IN THE FOREST, BY W.H.G. KINGSTON.
CHAPTER ONE.
OUR HABITATION IN THE FOREST--MY SHARE OF THE SPOILS OF THE DAY'S CHASE--UNCLE MARK COMMENCES HIS NARRATIVE--WHY MY UNCLES DECIDED TO EMIGRATE--LANDING IN SAFETY, THEY START UP COUNTRY--THEIR MEETING WITH SIMON YEARSLEY, AN OLD SETTLER--THE SETTLEMENT IS FOUND IN RUINS--LILY AND I RESCUED--UNCLE MARK PROMISES TO RESUME HIS NARRATIVE ON THE FIRST OPPORTUNITY--MY LOVE OF NATURAL HISTORY--UNCLE MARK CONTINUES HIS NARRATIVE--YEARSLEY GOES IN PURSUIT OF THE INDIANS--THE BURIAL OF LILY'S MOTHER--THE RETURN TO THE WAGGON--THEY REACH THE NEAREST SETTLEMENT-- ALARM OF THE SETTLERS UPON HEARING OF THE OUTRAGE COMMITTED BY THE INDIANS--UNCLE STEPHEN'S MARRIAGE--CONCLUSION OF UNCLE MARK'S NARRATIVE--LILY AND I GO BERRYING--WE ARE ATTACKED BY A WOLF--KEPENAU SAVES OUR LIVES--HIS PRESENT OF VENISON TO AUNT HANNAH--KEPENAU'S BELIEF IN THE GOODNESS OF THE GREAT SPIRIT--THE INDIAN'S ADVICE.
"Is Lily not Uncle Stephen's daughter, then?"  I asked.
The question was put to my uncle, Mark Tregellis, whom I found seated in front of our hut as I returned one evening from a hunting excursion--it having been my duty that day to go out in search of game for our larder. Uncle Mark had just come in from his day's work, which had been that of felling the tall trees surrounding our habitation.  He and I together had cleared an acre and a half since we came to our new location.
It was a wild region in which we had fixed ourselves.  Dark forests were on every side of us.  To the north and the east was the great chain of lakes which extend a third of the way across North America.  Numberless mountain-ranges rose in the distance, with intervening heights,--some rugged and precipitous, others clothed to their summits with vegetation. Numerous rivers and streams ran through the country; one of which, on whose banks we purposed building our future abode, passed close to our hut.  Besides the features I have described, there were waterfalls and rapids, deep valleys and narrow gorges penetrating amid the hills; while to the south-west could be seen, from the higher ground near us, the wide prairie, extending away far beyond human ken.  Wild indeed it was, for not a single habitation of white men was to be found to the westward; and on the other side, beyond the newly-formed settlement in which Uncle Stephen resided, but few cottages or huts of the hardy pioneers of civilisation,--and these scattered only here and there,-- existed for a hundred miles or more.
Uncle Mark, having lighted the fire and put the pot on to boil, had thrown himself down on the ground in front of the hut, with his back to the wall, and was busy contemplating the dark pines which towered up before him, and calculating how long it would take, with his sharp axe, to fell them.
I had brought home a haunch of venison as my share of the spoils of the chase (in which I had joined Uncle Stephen); and it was in consequence of a remark made by him while we were out hunting, that I had somewhat eagerly asked at Uncle Mark the question with which this story opens.
"No; Lily is not Stephen's daughter,--nor even related to him," he answered.  "But we will cut some steaks off that haunch and broil them; and while we are discussing our supper, I will tell you all about the matter."
The slices of venison, and flour-cakes baked on the fire, were soon ready; and seated at the door of our hut, with a fire burning before us to keep off the mosquitoes, we commenced our repast, when I reminded my uncle of his promise.
"It is a good many years ago, but even now it is painful to think of those days," he began.  "We came from Cornwall, in the `old country,' where your Uncle Stephen, your mother, and I were born.  She had married your father, Michael Penrose, however, and had emigrated to America, when we were mere boys; and we were just out of our apprenticeship (Stephen as a blacksmith and I as a carpenter) when we received a letter from your father and mother inviting us to join them in America, and setting forth the advantages to be obtained in the new country.  We were not long in making up our minds to accept the invitation; and in the spring of the next year we crossed the sea, with well nigh three hundred other emigrants,--some going out to relatives and friends, others bent on seeking their fortunes, trusting alone to their own strong arms and determined will for success.
"We found, on landing, that we had a journey of some hundred miles before us; part of which could be performed in boats up the rivers, but the greater portion was along `corduroy' roads, through dark forests, and over mountains and plains.  Our brother-in-law, a bold, determined person, had turned backwoodsman, and, uniting himself with a party of hardy fellows of similar tastes, had pushed on in advance of the old settlers, far to the westward, in spite of the difficulties of obtaining stores and provisions, and the dangers they knew they must encounter from hostile Indians whose territories they were invading.  We did not, however, think much of these things, and liked the idea of being ahead, as it seemed to us, of others.  The forest was before us.  We were to win our way through it, and establish a home for ourselves and our families.
"We had been travelling on for a couple of weeks or so, following the directions your father had given us in order to find his new location, but greatly in doubt as to whether we were going right, when we were fortunate enough to fall in with a settler who knew him, and who was returning with a waggon and team.  He readily undertook to be our guide, glad to have our assistance in making way through the forest.  We provided ourselves with crowbars to lift the waggon out of the ruts and holes and up the steep ascents; for we had left the `corduroy' roads-- or, indeed, any road at all--far behind.  Our new acquaintance seemed to be somewhat out of spirits about the prospects of the new settlement; but, notwithstanding, he had determined to chance it with the rest.  The Indians, he said, had lately been troublesome, and some of them who had been found prowling about, evidently bent on mischief, had been shot. `We have won the ground, and we must keep it against all odds,' he observed.
"Everything in the country was then new to us.  I remember feeling almost awe-struck with the stillness which reigned in the forest.  Not a leaf or bough was in motion; nor was a sound heard, except when now and then our ears caught the soughing of the wind among the lofty heads of the pine-trees, the tapping of the woodpeckers on the decaying trunks, or the whistling cry of the little chitmonk as it ran from bough to bough.
"I had expected to meet with bears, wolves, raccoons, lynxes, and other animals, and was surprised at encountering so few living creatures. `They are here, notwithstanding,' observed our friend; `you will get your eyes sharpened to find them in time.  In the course of a year or two you _may_ become expert backwoodsmen.  You can't expect to drop into the life all at once.'  By attending to the advice our friend gave us, and keeping our senses wide awake, we gained some knowledge even during that journey.
"We were now approaching the settlement--Weatherford, it was called.  It was a long way to the eastward of where we are now, with numerous towns and villages in the neighbourhood.  The waggon had gained the last height, from the top of which, our guide told us, we should be able to catch sight of the settlement.  We had been working away with our crowbars, helping on the wheels,--our friend being ahead of the team,-- and had just reached level ground, when we heard him utter a cry of dismay.  Rushing forward, we found him pointing, with distended eyes, into the plain beyond us, from which could be seen, near the bank of a river, thick volumes of smoke ascending, while bright names kept flickering up from below.
"`The settlement has been surprised by Indians!' he exclaimed, as soon as he could find words to speak.  `I know the bloodthirsty nature of the savages.  They don't do things by halves, or allow a single human being to escape, if they can help it.  Lads, you will stick by me; though we can do nothing, I fear, but be revenged on the Redskins.  I left my wife and children down there, and I know that I shall never see them alive again.'
"He spoke quite calmly, like a man who had made up his mind for the worst.
"`We cannot leave the waggon here, or the Indians will see it,--if they have not done so already,--and know that we are following them.  We will take it down to yonder hollow, and leave it and the oxen.  There is pasture enough for them, and they will not stray far.  Then we will follow up the Indians' trail; and maybe some of their braves won't get back to boast of their victory, if you will only do as I tell you.'
"Of course, we at once agreed to accompany Simon Yearsley--such was our friend's name--and follow his directions.  Quickly turning the waggon round, we got it down to the spot he had indicated, where the oxen were unyoked, and left to crop the grass by the side of a stream flowing from the hill above.  Then taking our rifles, with a supply of ammunition, and some food in our wallets, we again set off, Yearsley leading the way.
"We next descended the hill, concealing ourselves as much as possible among the rocks and shrubs until we gained the plain.  Although Simon moved at a rapid rate, there was nothing frantic in his gestures.  He had made up his mind, should he find his loved ones destroyed, to follow the murderers with deadly vengeance, utterly regardless of the consequences to himself.  As none of the intervening country had been cleared except a straight road through the forest, where the trees had been felled, and the stumps grubbed up here and there to allow of a waggon passing between the remainder, we were able to conceal ourselves until we got close to the settlement.
"We now saw that, though the greater number were in flames, two or three huts on one side remained uninjured.  Still, not a sound reached us,-- neither the cries of the inhabitants nor the shouts of the savages. Nothing was heard save the sharp crackling of the flames.
"`The Indians have retreated, and the settlers are following.  We shall be in time to join them!' exclaimed Yearsley, dashing forward.  `But we must first search for any who have survived.'  His previous calmness disappeared as he spoke, and he rushed, through the burning huts, towards one of the buildings.
"Stephen and I were about to follow, when we heard a cry proceeding from one of the huts at hand, which, though the doorway was charred and the burning embers lay around it, had as yet escaped destruction.  Hurrying in, I stumbled over the corpse of a man.  His rifle lay on the ground, while his hand grasped an axe, the blade covered with gore.  I gazed on his face, and recognised, after a moment's scrutiny, my own brother-in-law.  He had fallen while defending his hearth and home. Close to him lay a young boy, who, I guessed, was his eldest child, shot through the head.
"My poor sister! where could she be?
"Again a cry reached my ear.  It came from an inner room.  It was Martha, your mother, who had uttered the cry.  She was stretched on the ground, holding you in her arms.  Her neck was fearfully wounded, her life-blood ebbing fast away.
"I endeavoured to stanch it, telling her meanwhile who I was.
"`Stephen and I have come at your invitation,' I said.
"`Heaven, rather, has sent you, to protect my Roger,' she faintly gasped out, trying to put you in my arms.  `His father and brother are dead; I saw them fall.  Hearing voices which I knew to be those of white men, I cried out, that they might come and protect him.  Mark!  I am dying. You will ever be a father to him?'
"The blood continued to flow; and soon she breathed her last, her head resting on my arm.  Your dress and little hands were stained with her blood; but you were too young to understand clearly what had happened, although, as I took you up to carry you from the hut, you cried out lustily to be taken back to your poor mother.
"Thinking it possible that the Indians might return, I hurried out to look for Stephen, so that we might make our escape.  I was resolved at all costs to save your life.  I tried to comfort you, at the same time, by telling you that I was your uncle, and that your mother had wished me to take care of you.
"Going on a little way, I found another hut, the door of which was open, and smoke coming out of it.  The savages had thrown in their firebrands as they quitted the village, and the front part was already on fire.
"While I was shouting for Stephen he rushed out of the hut, with a blanket rolled up in his arms, the end thrown over his own head.
"`I have saved this child, and thank Heaven you are here to take her!' he exclaimed, unfolding the blanket, and putting a little girl into my arms.  `I must try and preserve the mother;' and again throwing the blanket over his head, he dashed in through the flames.
"In another minute he reappeared, struggling along under the heavy burden of a grown-up person wrapped in the blanket.  As he reached me he sank down, overcome by the smoke, and I noticed that his clothes and hair were singed.
"On opening the blanket I saw a young woman, her dress partly burned. She too was wounded.  The fresh air somewhat revived her; and on opening her eyes and seeing the little girl, she stretched out her arms for her. `Lilias! my little Lily! she's saved,' she whispered, as she pressed her lips to the child's brow.  `May Heaven reward you!'
"It was the final effort of exhausted nature, and in a few minutes she breathed her last.
"The flames, meantime, had gained the mastery over the building, and we saw that it was impossible to save it.
"But it's time to turn in, Roger," said Uncle Mark.  "I'll tell you more about the matter to-morrow."
As Uncle Mark always meant what he said, I knew that there would be no use in trying to get him to go on then, eager as I was to hear more of what had, as may be supposed, so deeply interested me.  I accordingly turned into my bunk, and was soon asleep.
I dreamed of shrieking Indians and burning villages; and more than once I started up and listened to the strange unearthly sounds which came from the depths of the forest.
These noises, I may here say, were caused by the wolves; for the savage brutes occasionally came near the settlement, attracted by the sheep and cattle which the inhabitants had brought with them.  A bright look-out being kept, however, it was seldom that any of our stock was carried off.  Bears also occasionally came into the neighbourhood; and we had already shot two, whose skins supplied us with winter coats.  Our intention was to kill as many more as we could meet with, that their skins might serve us for other purposes--especially as coverlets for our beds.  And, besides, their flesh was always a welcome addition to our larder.
Next morning we went about our usual work.  My uncle with his bright axe commenced felling the trees round our hut--working away from sunrise to sunset, with only an hour's intermission for dinner.  I aided him, as far as my strength would allow, for a certain number of hours daily. But my uncle encouraged me to follow the bent of my inclination, which was to get away and observe the habits of the creatures dwelling in the surrounding forest.
I had been a naturalist from my earliest days.  The study had been my poor father's hobby--so my uncle told me--and I inherited his love for it.  It had, moreover, been developed and encouraged by a visit we had received, some few years back, from a scientific gentleman, who had come over to America to make himself acquainted with the feathered tribes, the quadrupeds, and the reptiles of the New World.
It had been my delight to accompany this gentleman on his excursions while he was with us; and I prized a couple of books he had left with me more than I should have done a lump of gold of the same weight.  From him I learned to preserve and stuff the skins of the birds and animals I killed; a knowledge which I turned to profitable account, by my uncle's advice--as they were sent, when opportunity occurred, to the Eastern States, where they found a ready market.
"It pays very well in its way, Roger," observed Uncle Mark; "but work is better.  If you can combine the two, I have no objection; but you are now too old to play, and, for your own sake, you should do your best to gain your own living.  While you were young, I was ready to work for you; and so I should be now, if you could not work for yourself.  I want you, however, to understand that it is far nobler for a man to labour for his daily bread, than to allow others to labour for him."
I fully agreed with Uncle Mark.  Indeed, my ambition had long been to support myself.  I had an idea, nevertheless, that the skins I preserved brought more immediate profit than did the result of his labours with the axe.  But, everything considered, we got on very well together; for I was grateful to him for the affection and care he had bestowed on me during my childhood.
I was hard at work that day preparing a number of birds I had shot in the morning; and when dinnertime came, Uncle Mark, telling me to continue my task, said he would get our meal ready.  Having quickly prepared it, he brought out the platters, and set himself down near me. I washed my hands, and speedily despatched my dinner; after which I returned to my work.
"Will you go on with the account you were giving me last night?"  I said, observing that he did not seem inclined to move.  "You have more than half an hour to rest, and I will then come and help you."
"Where was I?  Oh!  I remember," said my uncle.  "In the middle of the burning settlement, with you and Lily in my arms.
"We were wondering what had become of Yearsley, when we caught sight of him rushing out from amid the burning huts.
"`They are all killed!--all, all, all!' he shrieked out.  `Follow me, lads;' and he pointed with a significant gesture in the direction he supposed the Indians had taken.
"`But these children, Mr Yearsley!  You would not have us desert them! And my brother is too much injured, I fear, to accompany you,' I observed.
"He looked at the children for a moment.
"`You are right,' he answered.  `Stay by them; or rather, make your way back eastward with them.  Ignorant as you are of the habits of the savages, you could aid me but little.  If I do not return, the waggon and its contents, with the team, will be yours.'
"Before I had time to reply, or to ask him the name of the poor young woman who lay dead at my feet, he had dashed across the stream, and soon disappeared amid the forest beyond.  He had doubtless discovered the trail of the Indians, or of the band of settlers who had gone in pursuit of them; although we at that time were quite unable to perceive what was visible to his more practised eye.
"I told Stephen how I had discovered our sister's house; so we agreed to return to it, and to carry there the body of the poor young woman, that we might bury it with those of our own family.  The hut was one of the very few which had escaped the flames, and we found some spades and a pickaxe within.  Not knowing how soon we might be interrupted, we at once set to work and dug two graves under a maple-tree at the further end of the garden.  One was large enough to hold our brother-in-law and sister, and their boy; and in the other we placed the poor young lady-- for a lady she appeared to be, judging from her dress, her ear-rings and brooch, and a ring which she wore on her finger.  These trinkets we removed, in order to preserve them for her little daughter; as also a miniature which hung round her neck,--that of a handsome young man, who was doubtless her husband.  Stephen told me that the cottage from which he had rescued her, as far as he had time to take notice, seemed to be neatly and tastefully furnished.
"We concluded that her husband, if he had not been killed when the village was surprised, had followed the savages along with the rest; and he would be able on his return to identify his child, while we should know him by his portrait.
"Before beginning our sad occupation, we had got some water and washed the stains from your hands and clothes, and left you in a room playing with little Lily; and on our return we gave you both some food which we found in the house.  By this time, too, you seemed perfectly at home with us.
"At first we thought of remaining in the house until Mr Yearsley and the settlers whom we supposed had gone in pursuit of the savages should return; but Stephen suggested that this might be dangerous, as we should not know what was happening outside.  The Indians might come back and surprise us, when we should to a certainty share the fate which had befallen so many others.  We agreed, therefore, that our safest course would be to make our way back to the waggon, where we had abundance of provisions, and where we could find shelter for the children who had been committed to us, we felt sure, by Providence.
"They were now our chief care.  While I took charge of them, Stephen hurriedly examined the other huts which had escaped destruction; crying out in case any one should be concealed, in order to let them know that we were ready to help them.  No answer came, however, and we were soon convinced that every person in the settlement, with the exception of those who had gone in pursuit of the savages, had been slaughtered.
"As soon as we were satisfied as to this, we began our retreat, hoping to get back to the waggon before nightfall.  Our intention was to wait there for Mr Yearsley, as we felt sure that, after he had punished the Indians, he would come and look for us where he had left the waggon.
"The sun was setting as we reached the top of the ridge; but we were too far off to distinguish any one moving in the settlement, although we made out the smouldering fire, from which thin wreaths of smoke alone ascended in the calm evening air.  On reaching the waggon, we found the cattle grazing quietly beside it.  Having removed some packages, among which was one of new blankets, we made up beds for the two children; and after giving them some supper, we placed them, sleeping, side by side.
"We agreed that one of us should watch while the other slept.  We also resolved that, in the event of our being attacked by Indians, we should show them fight; for we had a good store of ammunition, and knew well how to handle our weapons.  Although we hoped they would not come, yet we knew that they might possibly fall upon our trail and discover our whereabouts.  Indeed, had we not thought it our duty to wait for Mr Yearsley, we should have harnessed the cattle, and endeavoured to make our way down the mountain in the dark.
"After we had put you and Lily to bed, and had refreshed ourselves with some supper, I climbed again to the top of the ridge; but I could see no object moving in the plain, nor could I hear the slightest sound to indicate the approach of any one.  I therefore returned.
"While Stephen lay down under the waggon, I kept watch, walking up and down with my rifle ready in my hand, and resting occasionally by leaning against the wheel of the waggon.  After I had watched thus for about four hours, I called Stephen, who took my place.
"I was again on foot by daybreak, and once more climbed to the top of the ridge to look out.  But I had the same report as before to give. The fire had burned itself out, and I could see no one moving.  We waited all that day--and might have waited for several more, until our cattle had eaten up the herbage--without being discovered; but Mr Yearsley did not appear, nor could we see any signs of the other settlers.
"We did our best to amuse you and Lily.  You asked frequently after your poor mother; and it went to my heart to tell you that you would never see her again.
"Stephen proposed that we should the next morning set out on our journey eastward; but as I thought it possible that Mr Yearsley would by that time have got back to the settlement, I undertook to go and search for him--or to try and find any of the other people, and learn what had become of him.  Stephen agreed to this; undertaking to look after the children and guard the waggon during my absence.
"At daybreak I set out, keeping myself concealed, as much as possible, behind bushes and trunks of trees, until I got back to the scene of the catastrophe.  I listened; but all was still as death.  Excepting the two or three huts around my brother-in-law's abode, the whole ground where the settlement had stood presented only black heaps of ashes, surrounded by palings and trunks of trees charred by the flames.  I could see no one moving across the river, either; and the dreadful idea seized me that the settlers who had gone in pursuit of the foe had been cut off, and that Mr Yearsley had in all likelihood shared the same fate.  Had it not been for Stephen and the children, I would have watched all day, in the hope of our friend's return; but I had promised not to be longer than I could help.
"I again visited my poor brother-in-law's hut, and packed up such clothes as I saw belonging to you.  I also brought away a few other articles, to remind us of your mother; for I thought it probable that the settlement would be revisited by the savages, who would take good care to finish the work they had begun.  I then set off on my return to the waggon, looking back every now and then, lest I might be followed by any of the foe.
"On reaching the waggon, Stephen agreed with me that we might safely wait till the next morning.  We did so; and poor Yearsley not then appearing, we proceeded with the waggon along the road we had taken in coming, until we reached Watfield, a large settlement which had then been established for three or four years.
"The account we gave of what had happened caused the inhabitants considerable anxiety and alarm.  The men at once flew to arms; stockades were put up; and sentries were posted at all points, to watch for the possible approach of the Indians.
"Stephen and I having now no wish to go further east, we determined to remain where we were.  As for the waggon and team, though we had no written document to show that Yearsley had given them to us, our statement was believed; and it was agreed that we should be allowed to keep them,--especially as we consented to give them up should the original owner return.  But nothing was ever heard of him, or of the other settlers who had gone in pursuit of the retreating foe; and it was generally believed that the whole had been surrounded and murdered by the savages.
"As we could not spare time to look after the children, one of us agreed to marry.  Stephen therefore fixed upon your Aunt Hannah, who was, he had discovered, likely to prove a good housewife, and was kind-hearted and gentle-mannered.  A true mother, too, she has ever proved to our Lily."
Uncle Mark only spoke the truth when he praised Aunt Hannah; for she had been like an affectionate mother to me, as well as to Lily, and much I owed her for the care she had bestowed upon me.
I need not describe my own early days; indeed, several years passed without the occurrence of any incidents which would be especially interesting to others.  Gradually the border-village grew into a town, although even then the country continued in almost its original wild state within a mile or two of us.  Both Lily and I got a fair amount of schooling; and in the holidays I was able to indulge my taste, by rambling into the forest and increasing my knowledge of the habits of its denizens.  Occasionally I got leave for Lily to accompany me, although Aunt Hannah did not much approve of her going so far from home.
One day I had persuaded our aunt to let her accompany me--Lily herself was always ready to go--for the sake of collecting some baskets of berries.  "I promise to come back with as many as I can carry, to fill your jam-pots," said I.  There were whortleberries, and thimble-berries, blue-berries, raspberries, and strawberries, and many others which, I reminded her, were now in season.  "If we do not get them now, the time will pass.  Lily's fingers, too, will pick them quicker than mine, so that we shall get double as many as I should get by myself," I observed.
My arguments prevailed, and Lily and I set out, happy as the red-birds we saw flying in and out among the trees around us.
We had nearly filled our baskets, and I was on my knees picking some strawberries which grew on the bank of a small stream running through an open part of the forest, when Lily, who was at a little distance from me, shrieked out.  I was about to spring to my feet and hurry to her assistance--supposing that she had been frightened by some animal--when what was my horror to see, close to me, a huge wolf, with open jaws, ready to seize me!  My stick, the only weapon I carried, lay just within my reach; so I put out my hand and instinctively grasped it, determined to fight for my own life and Lily's too--knowing how, if the wolf killed me, it would next attack her.
As I moved the creature snarled, but did not advance any nearer.  So, grasping the stick, I sprang to my feet and swung the weapon round with all my might, despair giving energy to my muscles.  The savage creature retreated a few paces, astonished at the unexpected blow, snarling, and eyeing me, as if about to make another attack.
Again Lily shrieked.
"Run, run!"  I cried; "I will tackle the wolf."
But she did not move; indeed, she saw that the creature was more likely to come off victor than I was.
I stood ready to receive the animal, doubtful whether I ought to make the attack; Lily, in the meantime, continuing to cry aloud for help. The wolf at length seemed to get tired of waiting for his expected prey, and giving a fierce howl, he was on the point of springing at me, when a bullet fired by an unseen hand laid him dead at my feet.
Lily sprang towards me, exclaiming, "You are safe! you are safe, Roger!" and then burst into tears.  She scarcely seemed to consider how I had been saved.  All she saw was the dead wolf, and that I was unhurt.
On looking round, I observed an Indian advancing towards us from among the trees.
"That must be the man who killed the wolf," I exclaimed.  "We must thank him, Lily."
Lily had ever a great dread of Indians.  "We must run! we must run, Roger!" she cried.  "He may kill us as easily as he did the wolf, or carry us away prisoners."
"We cannot escape him, Lily; and I do not think he will hurt us," I answered in an encouraging tone.  "I will go forward and thank him for saving my life.  It will not do to show any fear; and if he is disposed to be friendly, he would think it ungrateful if we were to run off without thanking him."
I took Lily's hand as I spoke, and led her towards the Indian.  He was dressed in skins, with an axe hanging from his belt, and had long black hair streaming over his shoulders,--unlike most of the Indians I had seen, who wear it tied up and ornamented with feathers.  A small silver medal hung from his neck, and I guessed from this that he was a friend to the white men, and had received it as a token for some service he had rendered them.
He made a friendly sign as he saw us approach, and put out his hand.
"We come to thank you for killing the wolf that was about to spring upon me," I said in English, for though I knew a few words of the Indian tongue, I could not at that time speak it sufficiently well to express what I wished to say.
"Kepenau is glad to have done you a service," he answered in English. "I heard the young maiden cry out, and guessed that she would not do so without cause, so I hurried on to help you.  But why are you so far from home?  It is dangerous for unarmed people to wander in this forest."
"We came out to gather berries, and were about to return," said Lily. "You will not detain us?"
"Not if you wish to go," answered the Indian.
"But come with me, and you shall return with something of more value than these berries."
I felt sure that the Indian would not injure us, so Lily and I followed him, hand in hand.
He moved through the forest faster than we could, and presently stopped near some rocks, amid which lay the body of a deer with huge antlers. Placing himself across the carcass of the animal, he exclaimed with a look of exultation, "See!  I have overcome the king of these forests. Once, thousands of these animals wandered here, but since the white man has come they have all disappeared; and now that I have slain him, we must go likewise, and seek for fresh hunting-grounds.  Still, Kepenau bears the Whiteskins no malice.  He was ever their friend, and intends to remain so.  You must take some of the meat and present it to your friends."
Saying this, he commenced skinning the deer, in which operation I assisted him.  He then cut off several slices, which he wrapped up in some large leaves and placed in my basket.
"Take the venison to your mother, and say that Kepenau sends it," he observed.
"He has no mother," said Lily.
"Is he not your brother?" asked the Indian.
"No!" said Lily.  "His mother was killed by the Redskins long, long ago."
Lily at that time did not know that her own mother had been murdered when mine was.
"You do not bear the red men any malice on that account, I trust?" said Kepenau, turning to me.
"The Great Spirit tells us to forgive our enemies; and there are good and bad Indians."
"You are a good Indian, I am sure," said Lily, looking up at him with more confidence in her manner than she had before shown.
"I wish to become so," he said, smiling.  "I have learned to love the Great Spirit, and wish to obey him.  But it is time for you to return home.  Wait until I have secured the flesh of the deer, and then I will accompany you."
Kepenau quickly cut up the animal, and fastened the more valuable portion's to the bough of a tree--out of the reach of the wolves--by means of some lithe creepers which grew at hand; then loading himself with as much of the venison as he could conveniently carry, he said, "We will move on."
Having accompanied us to the edge of the forest, he bade us farewell. "Should there be more wolves in the forest, they will not follow you further than this," he said; "but if they do, remember that it will be better to sacrifice some of the venison, than to allow them to overtake you.  Throw them a small bit at a time; and as in all likelihood they will stop to quarrel over it, you will thus have time to escape."
I remembered the Indian's advice, although we did not need to practise it on this occasion.
We reached home before dark, and greatly surprised Aunt Hannah with the present of venison.  She had, she told us, been very anxious at our prolonged absence.
CHAPTER TWO.
We had only lately, as I have already said, arrived at our new location. My uncles had been imbued with the restless spirit of backwoodsmen, and Aunt Hannah was ready to do whatever Uncle Stephen wished.  So, having grown weary of the life at Watfield, where we had at first been located, they had resolved, along with several other inhabitants of that place, to push westward; and after making their way through forests, rivers, and swamps, and over hills and plains, had formed the new settlement where Uncle Stephen now was, and which they had named Greenford.
To the hut where Uncle Mark and I lived no name had been given; but he expressed his belief that it would one day become the centre of a great city.  "Before that day arrives, however, you and I, Roger, will have moved far away westward," he observed.
I used to exercise diligence while I was at work, in order that I might have more time to attend to the study of natural history.  My great delight was to get away into the forest and observe the habits of its various inhabitants.  Often would I sit on the root of an old tree watching the playful squirrels at their gambols.  When I spied a hole in which I knew that a family were likely to have taken up their abode, I would hide myself; and before long I was generally rewarded by seeing a "papa" squirrel poking out his nose.  Soon he would give an inaudible sniff, sniff, sniff, then out would come his head, and he would look round to ascertain whether danger was near.  Presently I would catch sight of his thick furry body and lovely brush, the tail curling over his head.  Then another nose would appear, and large shining eyes; and out another would pop; followed in rapid succession by the whole family. Then, how delightful it was to watch them frolicking about, darting round the trunks, sending the bark rattling down as they chased each other; whisking their tails; darting along the boughs, and bounding fearlessly from branch to branch.  One, reaching the end of a bough, would spread out its arms and tail, exhibiting the white fur beneath, and fly down to a lower branch, or to the earth below, followed by its companions; then away they would go along the logs or swinging vines, and up another trunk, quick as lightning.  Sometimes I would catch them at their supper, nibbling away at the nuts which they had plucked, or had dug out of the ground with their sharp little paws.
A flying squirrel is indeed a beautiful creature.  Its colour is a most delicate grey; the fur thick and short, and as soft as velvet; the eyes large and full.  The membrane by which it is enabled to take its flights is of a soft texture, and white, like the fur of the chinchilla.  The tail greatly resembles an elegantly-formed broad feather.
One day, as I was wandering along the banks of a stream, for the purpose of observing the habits of a family of beavers that had lately made their abode there, I caught sight of a number of squirrels.  They were evidently about some important operation, since they were moving steadily along the branches, and refraining from their usual frisking and playing.  Having concealed myself from their view, in order that they might not be disturbed by my presence, I noticed that they went on until they reached the branch of a tree overhanging the stream, at the extreme end of which one, who appeared to be their leader, took post, looking eagerly up the current.  In a short time a small log floated near, with a tendency to move over to the opposite side.  As it came beneath the leader of the party he dropped down upon it, at the same time uttering a sharp cry.  Quick as lightning some others followed his example; and by holding on to the lower twigs they arrested its progress until the whole party were seated on board, when the log was allowed to float, as they sagaciously knew it would, towards the opposite bank.  It seemed to me as if some of them were steering it with their tails; but of that I am not positive.  In a short time, after floating some way down the stream it was guided to the shore; when one after the other leaped off, and quickly running along the boughs of the trees, gained a point exactly opposite to that from which they had started; after which they went away into the forest,--bent, I doubted not, on some predatory expedition.  They would soon make their presence known, when they reached the pumpkin-grounds or maize-fields of the settlers.
I was not always alone in my rambles through the forest.  Lily would have been only too happy to accompany me, but Aunt Hannah judged it prudent to keep her at home; and, indeed, she had plenty of occupation there.  My chief companion, therefore, was one of Uncle Stephen's labourers--an Irishman, Mike Laffan by name.
Although Mike had no great knowledge of natural history, he was as fond of searching for animals as I was, and consequently was always ready to accompany me when he had the chance.  He was an honest fellow; a thorough Patlander in look, manners, language, and ideas.  When he could, he used to press Tom Quambo, an old free negro, into the service; and Quambo enjoyed the fun as much as Mike did.  Each possessed a dog, of which they were very proud, ugly as the animals were to look at.
"Den, you see, massa, if Yelp not 'ansome, he know eberyting," Quambo used to remark.  "He braver dan painter [meaning the puma], and run like greased lightning."
It was difficult to say whether Yelp or Mike's dog was the ugliest; but both masters were equally proud of their canine friends.
I too had a dog, which, if not a beauty, was certainly handsomer than either of his two acquaintances.  He was clever enough in his way, but more useful in watching the hut than in hunting; indeed, when I went out by myself for the purpose of observing the habits of the denizens of the forest, I never took him, knowing that he would only interfere with their sports.
On one occasion I had been over to see my Uncle Stephen, and as I was returning home Mike Laffan met me.
"Would you loike to be afther looking for a 'coon to-night, Masther Roger?" he asked.  "Quambo says he can come; and Yelp and Snap are moighty ager for the sport."
I at once agreed to meet my two friends, accompanied by my dog Pop.
Accordingly, at the time appointed, the day's work being over, Mike and Quambo made their appearance at the hut; while running at their heels were their two dogs, who were soon warmly greeted by Pop.
Setting out, we took our way along the banks of the river, near which we fully expected to fall in with several raccoons.  We had our guns, and were provided with torches and the means of lighting them.  We had not gone far before we heard voices, and soon we were joined by three lads from the settlement, who had got notice of the expedition.  As they had brought their dogs, we had a full pack of mongrels of high and low degree, but united by one feeling,--that of deadly enmity to raccoons.
On we went, while the dogs, who had just then scented one of their foes, yelled in chorus.  Over huge logs and rotten trunks, through the brush and dead trees and briars, we went at full speed; and sometimes wading across bogs, sometimes climbing up banks, and occasionally tumbling over on our noses, we continued to make our way at the heels of the dogs, until old Quambo, waving his torch above his head, and suddenly stopping short, shouted out, "De 'coon's treed!"
He had made a mistake, however, for the dogs bayed loudly and continued their course.
"Dat a mighty old 'coon," cried Quambo.  "He know what he about."
The raccoon, if it had got up the tree, had come down again, and was still ahead.  Some of the party were almost in despair; but I knew the habits of the creature too well not to feel sure that we should get it at last, so I encouraged my friends, while we dashed on as before.
Yelp and Snap, having kept well ahead of the other dogs, were now heard baying under a big tree, and no doubt remained that the raccoon had taken refuge amid its branches.  Our difficulty was to get it down.  As the others hesitated to encounter the fierce little animal amid the boughs, Mike, for the honour of "Old Ireland," offered to make his way up.  Without more ado, then, he got on Quambo's shoulders, sprang to a branch within his reach, and was soon lost to sight among the foliage.
"I see him!" he shouted at last; and bits of bark, leaves, and rotten twigs came rattling down, while the loud whacks of his stick reached our ears.  Presently there was a "flop;" the raccoon had been compelled to evacuate its stronghold.  The dogs once more gave chase; and I, torch in hand, followed them.  In less than a minute I came up with the dogs, and found the creature at bay, its eyes flashing fire, while it bravely faced the pack, which, with gnashing growls and savage yells, were about to dash upon it, though each seemed unwilling to receive the first bite from its sharp teeth.  But, hearing the voices of their masters, they gained courage, and in another instant had the poor animal struggling vainly in their midst; while our blows came rattling down, to finish its sufferings, and prevent them tearing its skin to pieces.
Such was one of several raccoon-hunts in which I took part.
The raccoon is about the size of a spaniel, and its colour is a blackish grey.  Its tail is short and bushy, and is marked with five or six blackish rings on a grey ground.  When the animal walks slowly, or sits, it plants the soles of its feet upon the ground; but when in a hurry it runs along on the tips of its toes.  It hunts for its prey chiefly at night, when it devours any small animals it can catch.  It has no objection, however, to a vegetable diet; and, indeed, its teeth show that it is capable of feeding on both descriptions of food.
I once caught a young raccoon, which soon became domesticated--being quite as tame as a dog.  It possessed, however, a habit of which I could not cure it; that of seizing any fowls it set eyes on, and biting off their heads.  It having treated two or three of Aunt Hannah's in this way, I was compelled to carry it into the forest and set it at liberty. It enjoyed its freedom but a short time, however, as it was soon afterwards hunted and killed by some of our boys.
Having got so far from home, our party were not inclined to return without something in addition to the unfortunate animal we had slaughtered.  Mike, too, announced to us that he had seen a brown bear at a spot a little further on; so it was at once agreed that we should "knock up the quarters of Mr Bruin."
It was necessary to proceed with caution; for though the "musquaw" or brown bear will seldom attack a human being unless first assaulted, our friend, if unceremoniously disturbed at night, would probably not be in a good-humour.  Our three well-trained dogs kept at our heels, but the other curs went yelping away through the forest; nor could their masters' voices succeed in calling them back.  We feared, therefore, that they would rouse up the bear, and thus give it time to escape before we could reach its dwelling.
"Faix, though, I am not sure that the noise outside won't make the old gentleman keep quiet in his den," observed Mike.  "He will be after saying to his wife, `Sure, what would be the use, Molly, of turning out to go hunting thim noisy spalpeens of dogs?  I'll sit snug and quiet till they come to the door; and thin, sure, it will be toime enough to axe thim what they want.'"
Mike's notion encouraged us to go on; and at length Pop, Snap, and Yelp gave signs of uneasiness, and showed a decided inclination to rush forward.
"Let dem go!" exclaimed Quambo.
"Off with you!" we cried at once; and the dogs darted on, barking furiously, until they stopped before the decayed trunk of a huge tree, round which several smaller trees, once saplings, had grown up--a well-selected natural fortification.  As the light of our torches fell on it, we fully expected to see Mr Bruin stalk forth and inquire what we wanted.
Quambo proposed that we should light a fire in the neighbourhood, so that, did our enemy appear, we might be better able to attack him and defend ourselves.  We followed the black's advice; but still nothing appeared.  The dogs, however, showed they were convinced that some animal or other was concealed within the trunk.
At last, growing impatient, we approached and thrust our long sticks into the hollow, feeling about in every direction.
"I am sure that mine has struck something soft!"  I exclaimed; and scarcely had I uttered the words when a low growl reached our ears.  A dark body next appeared for an instant among the stems of the trees surrounding the hollow trunk, and then out rushed a bear through an opening which we had not perceived.
The dogs gave chase, and so did we.  Bruin had but a short start; and although he must have been well acquainted with the locality, we, scorning all impediments, soon overtook him--the dogs having already commenced biting at his hind feet.  This was too much for his equanimity, so, suddenly turning round, he struck two or three of them with his fore paws, sending them sprawling to a distance.  As he did so the glare of our torches dazzled his eyes, and so perplexed him that he seemed not to know what to do.  Of one thing only he must have been convinced,--that he was in for a fight; and, brave bear as he was, he sat up on his hind legs and prepared to receive us.
Mike fired, but only wounded him in the shoulder.  This stirred up Bruin's anger to a pitch of fury, and, with a growl like thunder, he dashed forward at his opponent.  Mike, however, nimbly skipped on one side, and the bear's eye fell on Quambo, who had lifted his rifle to fire.  But scarcely had he pulled the trigger when the bear was upon him, and both rolled over together.
For an instant I thought that the black was killed, but his voice shouting to us to drag off the bear reassured me; and Mike's hunting-knife quickly finished the animal, which was struggling in the agonies of death.  Happily, his teeth had only torn Quambo's jacket; and on our dragging away the dead body the black sprang to his feet.
"Berry good sport," he observed, shaking himself.  "I'se wonder wedder Mrs Bear not remain behind! and piccaninny bears too, perhaps!  We look as we go by.  Howeber, we now make ready dis gen'leman to carry home." He and Mike then fastened the bear's feet together, and hung the animal to a long pole, which they cut from a sapling growing near.  Then having placed it on their shoulders, with short pieces at right angles at either end to prevent it slipping, they announced that they were ready to set off; so, while they led the way with our prize, we commenced our homeward journey.
Whether Mrs Bruin had occupied part of the trunk, we could not positively ascertain.  Quambo expressed his belief that she had been there, but had taken the opportunity, while we went in chase of her spouse, to make her escape with her offspring.  We possibly might have found her; but, with her young to defend, she would have proved a dangerous foe, and, as our torches were almost burnt out, we should have had to encounter her in the dark.  We therefore considered it prudent to proceed on our way.
I remained at the hut while the rest of the party went back to the settlement.  Aunt Hannah was well pleased to obtain so valuable a prize; and she sent us, some weeks afterwards, a smoked bear's ham as our share of the spoil.
I can give but a very brief account of the adventures of those days; indeed, sometimes weeks went by during which I was hard at work without intermission, either assisting Uncle Mark, or joining in one or other of the "bees" got up for various purposes--when we went to help others, as our neighbours, when required, came to help us.
Sometimes we joined what was called a "logging bee," which I may explain thus:--When a new hut was to be erected, we and others united to drag the logs out of the forest, and to hew them into proper lengths to form the walls of the hut.  These are placed, not upright, but horizontally, one above another.  The length of the outside walls is first determined; whereupon the lowest log is let a little way into the earth, and a groove is cut on the upper side with a deep notch at each end.  The next log is placed on the top of it, each end being so cut as to dovetail into the others at right angles; thus one log is placed upon another until the destined height of the wall is reached.  Doors and windows are afterwards sawed out; and the rafters are fixed on in the usual fashion. The roof is formed of rough slabs of wood called shingles; the interstices being filled up with clay.  A big iron stove, the flues running from one end to the other, keeps the hut thoroughly warm in winter; while the thickness of the walls causes it to be cool in summer.
Many of the settlers had large houses of this description; but stores, and buildings where warmth was not of so much consequence, had their walls merely of planks nailed on to the framework.  Uncle Stephen's house was built of logs raised on a platform above the ground, with steps leading to it, and a broad verandah in front.  It contained a sitting-room, several bedrooms, and a kitchen; the verandah being painted a bright green, with stripes of pink, while the window-frames and doors were yellow.  I used to think it a beautiful mansion, but perhaps that was on account of those who lived within.  The abode of Lily was of necessity, to my mind, charming.
The autumn of that year was now approaching its close.  There is in North America, at that period of the year, what is called the "Indian summer."  The air is balmy, but fresh, and mere existence to those in health is delightful; a light gauze-like mist pervades the atmosphere, preventing the rays of the sun, beaming forth from an unclouded sky, from proving over-oppressive.  Already the forest has assumed its particoloured tints.  The maple has put on a dress of every hue,--of yellow, red, pink, and green.  The leaves of the beeches become of a golden tinge, and those of the oak appear as if turned into bronze, while numerous creepers present the richest reds.
We settlers, however, had but little time in which to admire the beauties of Nature, for we knew that every day was rapidly bringing us to the period when all agricultural labour must cease, and the ground would be covered with a sheet of snow.  Not that we were then doomed to idleness, however, for we had abundance of out-of-door work during the winter, in felling trees; and, as soon as the snow had hardened, dragging them over it,--either to form huge heaps, where they could be burned, or to be placed in the spots where they were required for putting up buildings or fences.
Uncle Stephen having engaged some new hands,--who, being fresh from the "old country," were unwilling, as they were unfit, to go further into the forest,--allowed Mike and Quambo to come to us.  We therefore put up a room for them next to our own, and which could be heated in winter by the same stove.  We were thus able to get on much more rapidly with our task of clearing the ground.  Mike, indeed, was a great acquisition to our party; for, besides singing a good Irish song, he had learned to play the fiddle,--and, of course, he had brought his "Cremona," of which he was justly proud, along with him.  He beguiled the long winter evenings with many a merry tune, and not unfrequently set old Quambo dancing.  Sometimes we would look in; and we found it great fun to see Quambo, in the confined space of the cabin, coming the "double shuffle"--bounding up and down, and whirling round and round, snapping his fingers and stamping his feet, until the perspiration streamed down his sooty cheeks.  Mike would continue bobbing his head, meanwhile, and applauding with voice and gesture, though keeping his countenance, and looking as grave as a judge while listening to the counsel for a prisoner.
We had now made an opening which enabled us to see the river from our hut; and Mike declared that we were getting quite civilised, and were beginning to look like being in the midst of a great city, barring the houses, and streets, and people.
"Sure, they'll be afther coming one of these days," he added.
"When that happens, it will be time for us to think of moving further westward," observed Uncle Mark.
A violent storm, which sent the boughs and leaves flying about our heads, brought the "Indian summer" to a conclusion, and the frost set in soon afterwards.
One evening, after the day's work was over, and supper had been finished, we were sitting in our hut employed in various occupations before turning in for the night, when a low howl reached our ears.
"What is that?"  I exclaimed.
Before Uncle Mark could make answer, the howl was answered by another; and presently, others joining in, the whole forest reverberated with a melancholy and spirit-depressing chorus.
"Wolves!" said Uncle Mark.  "The frost has driven them from the high ground, and they are contemplating a raid on our porkers and cattle.  We must send them to the right-about, or they will become audacious."
Calling to Mike and Quambo, we put on our coats and sallied forth, armed with guns and sticks.  The moon was shining brightly, so we required no torches.  We made our way over the fallen trunks and rough rocks which formed the bank of the river, but after a while the howls appeared to come from a still greater distance than before.
Uncle Mark now called a halt.  "The brutes hear us, and are retreating," he said.  "Keep silence for a few minutes, and maybe we shall catch sight of them."
Under his directions I seated myself on the trunk of a tree, while he and the two men stayed near.  Presently I caught sight of a pair of glaring eyeballs, and soon another wolf came into view.
"Get your rifles ready," whispered Uncle Mark.  "You, Roger, shoot the one to the left.  I will aim at the next.  Mike and Quambo, you take two others.  Unless they run off, we may give a good account of the whole pack."
As he finished speaking I fired, followed by Uncle Mark and the other men; and, as the result, four wolves rolled over dead.  The rest of them, however, disappointed us by turning tail and scampering off to a safe distance, from whence only their howls reached us.  Uncle Mark, however, did not consider it prudent to follow them.  Indeed, had they heard us approaching they would probably have retreated out of shot; for wolves, though they will follow a fugitive, like other savage animals, will generally try to escape when pursued.  So, having secured the skins of those we had killed, although they were of no great value, we returned homewards.
After this we had alternately rain and frost, with a few fine days, till the snow came down, and the winter commenced in earnest.  But we were all pretty well inured to it.  Indeed, except when the wind blew, we were in the habit of hewing in the forest with our coats off; and even then we often found it hot work.
Mike came back one day from the settlement--where he had been sent for a few stores and powder and shot--with the information that a party of lumberers had commenced operations some miles up a river which ran into the great lake, and that the "boss" had sent a ganger to hire hands, more of whom were wanted.
"A few dollars of ready cash would be very acceptable," observed Uncle Mark.  "What say you, Roger?  We'll start away, and spend a month or so with them.  We can take Mike with us, while Quambo will look after the hut, the cattle, and pigs."
I was ready, of course; and so, as my uncle was a man of action, he determined to set off the next morning.  We were all good skaters; and although, during the first part of our journey, we should be unable to make use of our skates, we settled to carry them with us.
At daybreak, then, we were up, and having taken breakfast, were ready to start,--our provisions consisting of flour-cakes and cold pork, with a pot and pannikins.  Mike also carried his fiddle hung around his neck.
"It will help to amuse the gossoons--and maybe put a few dollars in my pocket," he remarked with a wink.  "Bedad!  I'll keep their feet going, when the work is over for the day, and they are afther sharpening their axes."
We had but one gun with us, which Mike carried, as we wished to travel with as little encumbrance as possible.
But just as we were starting off, Uncle Mark recollected that he had forgotten to write to Uncle Stephen upon a matter of importance.
"You, Roger, and Mike, can go on ahead," he said, "while I finish my letter, which I will leave with Quambo to be forwarded; and I will soon overtake you."
As there was now light enough for us to see our way through the forest, we commenced our tramp.  There was no risk of our taking the wrong road, seeing there was but one--along the course of the stream, which ran into the larger river; and it was now frozen in such a manner as to afford us a good highway.  Mike was always amusing, and I was glad of his company; besides which, as we had had a good start of my uncle, I was in hopes that we might have time to get a shot at something.
We had accomplished three or four miles, and I had begun to wonder why Uncle Mark had not overtaken us, as he was a quick walker, and intended to carry only his axe, and a small skin bag over his shoulder containing some necessaries.  We were looking about us, in the hope of catching sight of a raccoon or opossum, or some larger game, when a howl, such as had aroused us one night a short time before, sounded through the forest.
"Sure, that comes from a pack of wolves," observed Mike.  "But no!  I belave one of the brutes is capable of making that noise.  We have heard the echoes among the trees.  I hope that there are not many of them, as they might take it into their heads to attack us, and that would not be pleasant."
We went on, however, troubling ourselves very little about the wolf, for I felt sure that there was only one, or a couple at the most.  The stream, as we proceeded, became wider, running round the foot of some hills, with larches scattered on either side, their boughs bent down by the snow which had frozen hard on them.  The sky had become cloudy by this time, too, and there was every appearance of a fresh fall.
"Surely Uncle Mark will be up with us soon, Mike!"  I observed.
But scarcely had I spoken when I heard my uncle shouting to us.  He was in the middle of the frozen stream, and was hurrying towards us, axe in hand.  He had good reason to keep it there, for just then we saw a huge wolf rush out from behind a clump of trees close at hand.  He stopped to receive his assailant, which, probably well nigh famished, seemed bent on his destruction.
Mike, without saying a word, had unslung the gun and dropped on his knee, for there was not a moment to be lost.  In another instant the fierce wolf would have sprung at my uncle's throat, and might have taken his life; or, at all events, have severely injured him, and that before we could get near enough to render him any assistance.  It all depended on Mike's steady aim, therefore; and although I was a good shot, still I was thankful that he had the gun.
He fired; and the brute, the moment that it was making its spring, fell over, snarling and hissing, with its shoulder broken.  A blow on the head from my uncle's axe finished its existence.
"You have rendered me good service, Laffan," said my uncle, when we got up to him.  "Had you not taken steady aim, that brute's fangs would have been at my throat in another moment."
"Faix, thin, Mr Mark, it is only what I would have wished to be done," answered Mike.  "And if you ever catch sight of a bear about to give me a hug, or such a brute as this at my heels,"--and he gave the dead wolf a kick--"you will be afther shooting him, sure enough!"
"Well, Mike, we shall then be quits.  In the meantime I am your debtor," answered my uncle, laughing.  Notwithstanding the danger he had been in, he was quite unmoved.  His cheek had not lost its ruddy glow, nor did a limb tremble.
We quickly skinned the wolf, and hung the hide up to the branch of a tree a little way from the bank, where it would be concealed from any passers-by.  We did not wish to encumber ourselves with it in the meantime, and we hoped to find it on our return.  We were not likely to forget the spot, any more than those boys in the "old country" would do, who, as I have heard, are taken to certain landmarks and whipped, in order that they may afterwards bear them duly in mind.
We were thankful that the wolf which had attacked my uncle was alone, as it would have been unpleasant to find ourselves followed by a howling pack; and we now regretted that we had not all of us brought our guns.
Trudging on some miles further, we came upon a part of the river which had not been frozen over until after the snow fell.  Here, the ice being clear, we put on our skates, and glided merrily along towards the spot where we understood the lumberers were at work.
CHAPTER THREE.
The snow had for some time been falling lightly, but the wind which had arisen blew it off the ice, and thus it did not impede our progress; but that same wind, which was now by a turn of the river brought directly ahead of us, soon increased in strength, and drove the particles of snow, sharp as needles, into our faces.  Indeed, the cold every instant became more intense, while the snow fell more thickly.
"Faix, and it's moighty loike a shower of penknives, mixed with needles and pins!" cried Mike.  "It's a hard matther to keep the eyes open. What will we be afther doing, Mr Mark, if it gets worse?"
"We'll go on till it does get worse," said Uncle Mark.  "It would not do to turn back now."
Mike said no more, but, bending down his head, worked away manfully with might and main.
I did my best to keep up, but I may say that seldom have I endured such suffering.  At last I felt that I could stand it no longer; so I proposed to my uncle that we should make for the shore, and there build a hut, light a fire, and wait till the storm was over.
He was, however, bent upon going on.  "We should be half-frozen before we could get up a wigwam," he answered.
Just then I heard a voice hailing us in gruff tones, and I guessed it was that of an Indian; but we had no reason to dread the Indians of these parts.  As we looked about to see from whence it proceeded, I caught sight of the tops of two or three wigwams just peeping out from a cedar-bush at a little distance from the shore.
"Friends, come here!" exclaimed some one, and we observed an Indian making towards us; whereupon we turned round and skated up to him.
"Ah, friends!  I know you," he said.  "You cannot face the storm, which will soon blow stronger still.  Come to my wigwam, where you shall have shelter till it has passed by."
As he spoke I recognised my old friend Kepenau, whom I had not seen since we had come to our present location.  I had so grown, too, that he did not at first recognise me.
Having taken off our skates, we followed him to his camp, where he introduced us to several other Indians and their squaws, among whom were a number of children of all ages.
The thick cedar-bushes sheltered the spot completely from the wind, and the fire which burned in the centre afforded us a welcome warmth; for, in spite of the exercise we had gone through, our blood was chilled by the piercing snowstorm.  The Indians were dressed partly in skins, and partly in garments made of blankets, received from the white men; most of the squaws wore a large blanket over their heads, forming a cloak in which they were shrouded.  The wigwams were constructed of long thin poles, fastened at the top, and spread out in a conical form, the whole being covered thickly with slabs of birch-bark.
Our red-skinned hosts put us at once at our ease; and I asked Kepenau how he came to be in that part of the country.
"The white men compelled us to move westward," he answered.  "They have planted on our lands, and shot the game on which we subsisted; and though I should have been content to remain among them and adopt their customs, yet my people wished to live as our fathers have lived; and I would not desert them.  My desire is to instruct them in the truths I have myself learned; and it is only by dwelling with them, and showing them that I love them, that I can hope to do that."
We had much interesting conversation with Kepenau, and I was surprised at the amount of information on religious subjects which he possessed; indeed.  I confess that he put us all to shame.
Uncle Mark looked grave, and sighed.  "I used once to read my Bible, and listen gladly to God's Word read and preached, when I lived with my good father and mother in the `old country,' though I have sadly neglected it since I came out here," he said; "but I will do so no longer.  You have reminded me of my duty, friend Kepenau."
"What you say makes me glad.  Keep to your resolve, for you cannot do God's will without reading his Word, to know what that will is," remarked Kepenau.
Our host gave up one of the wigwams for our special use, in the centre of which a fire burned, prevented from spreading by a circle of stones. The ground around the sides was covered with thick rushes which served as our beds, and we lay with our feet towards the fire.  Severe as was the cold outside, and thin as appeared the walls, the heat from the fire kept us thoroughly warm; and I never slept more soundly in my life, for, although our hosts were Redskins, we felt as secure as in our own hut. Notwithstanding that the storm raged without, the wigwams were so well protected by the cedar-bushes that the fierce wind failed to reach us.
In the morning, when we came out of our wigwam we found that the squaws had prepared breakfast; which consisted of dried venison, cakes made from Indian corn, and fish which had been caught before the frost set in, and had remained hard-frozen ever since.
"You can now continue your journey, for the storm has ceased; and may the Great Spirit protect you!" observed Kepenau, looking up at the sky, across which the clouds were now scarcely moving.
Uncle Mark inquired why he did not bring his camp nearer the settlement.
"I will tell you," answered Kepenau.  "Though I have been ever friendly with the white men, and value the advantages to be obtained from them, there is one thing for which I fear them,--their accursed `fire water.' Already it has slain thousands of my people, or reduced them to a state lower than the brutes which perish; and I know not whether my young men would resist the temptation were it placed in their way."
"But all the white men do not sell the `fire water' of which you speak," observed Uncle Mark.  "I have none in my hut."
"But while one among you possesses the poison, and is ready to barter it with my people, the harm may be done," answered Kepenau.  "Until I am sure that none of the `fire water' exists in your settlement, I will not allow my people to come near it."
"I am afraid, then, that you will fail to civilise them, as you desire," observed Uncle Mark.
"Do you call it civilising them, to teach them the vices of the white men?" exclaimed the Indian in a tone of scorn.  "If so, then I would rather that they remained savages, as you call them, than obtain knowledge at such a price."
"I believe that you are right," answered Uncle Mark, as we bade our host and his family good-bye; "and I have learned more than one lesson from you."
Kepenau accompanied us to the bank of the river; where we put on our skates, and continued our course without interruption till we caught sight of several thin wreaths of smoke above the tops of the trees.
"Sure, that smoke must come from the lumberers' fires," observed Mike.
"Such is probably the case; but it is just possible that it may proceed from a camp of Indians, who might not be so friendly as those we left this morning," said my uncle.
Still we were not to be stopped, and on we skated.  Even should we meet enemies, we had not much cause to fear them, unless they possessed firearms.  On we went, I say, gliding along at the rate of ten or twelve miles an hour; and as I had never before had an opportunity of performing so great a distance, I enjoyed it amazingly.
As we advanced we caught sight of numerous logs of timber hauled out into the middle of the stream.  Shortly afterwards the sound of voices reached our ears, and we saw a number of men scattered about--some engaged, with gleaming axes, in felling trees; others with horses dragging the trunks, placed on sleighs, over the hard snow on to the ice.  They were there arranged alongside each other, and bound together so as to form numerous small rafts.  Here they would remain until the giving way of the frost; when, on the disappearance of the ice, they would be floated down towards the mouth of the river and towed across the lake to the various saw-mills on its banks.
We were glad to be welcomed by the "boss;" who at once engaged Uncle Mark and Mike to hew, while I was to undertake the less onerous task of driving a team.
The shores of the river had been already pretty well cleared of large timber, so that I had to bring the trunks from some distance.
Uncle Mark and Laffan soon showed that they were well practised axemen.
Our companions were to spend some months engaged in the occupation I have described; till the return of spring, in fact, when, the rafts being put together, they would descend the river till rapids or cataracts were reached.  The rafts would then be separated, and each log of timber, or two or three together at most, would be allowed to make their way as they best could down the fall, till they reached calm water at the foot of it; when they would be again put together, and navigated by the raftsmen guiding them with long poles.  In some places, where rough rocks exist in the rapids by which the timber might be injured, slides had been formed.  These slides are channels, or rather canals, as they are open at the top; and are constructed of thick boards--just as much water being allowed to rush down them as will drive on the logs. Some of these slides are two hundred feet long; others reach even to the length of seven hundred feet.  The timbers are placed on cribs,--which are frames to fit the slides,--then, with a couple of men on them to guide their course, when they get through they shoot away at a furious rate down the inclined plane, and without the slightest risk of injury.
When evening approached we all assembled in a huge shanty, which had been built under the shelter of the thick bush.  Round it were arranged rows of bunks, with the cooking-stove in the centre, which was kept burning at all hours, and served thoroughly to warm our abode.  On each side of the stove were tables, with benches round them.  Here we took our meals; which, although sufficient, were not too delicate,--salt pork being the chief dish.  Rough as were the men, too, they were tolerably well-behaved; but quarrels occasionally took place, as might have been expected among such a motley crowd.
On the first evening of our arrival Mike's fiddle attracted universal attention, and he was, of course, asked to play a tune.
"Why thin, sure, I will play one with all the pleasure in life," he answered.  "And, sure, some of you gintlemen will be afther loiking to take a dance;" and without more ado he seated himself on the top of a bench at the further end of the shanty, and began to scrape away with might and main, nodding his head and kicking his heels to keep time. The effect was electrical.  The tables were quickly removed to the sides of the shanty; and every man, from the "boss" downwards, began shuffling away, circling round his neighbour, leaping from the ground, and shrieking at the top of his voice.
When Mike's fiddle was not going, our lumbering companions were wont to spin long yarns, as we sat at the supper-table.  Several of them had worked up the northern rivers of Canada, where the winter lasts much longer than it does in the district I am describing; and among these was a fine old French Canadian, Jacques Michaud by name, who had come south with a party, tempted by the prospect of obtaining a pocketful of dollars.  He stood six feet two inches in his stockings; and his strength was in proportion to his size.  At the same time, he was one of the most good-natured and kind-hearted men I ever met.
Among our party were several rough characters; and it happened that one evening two of them fell out.  They were about to draw their knives, when Jacques seized each of them in his vice-like grasp, and, holding them at arm's-length, gradually lifted them off the ground.  There he kept them; mildly expostulating,--now smiling at one, and now at the other,--till they had consented to settle their dispute amicably; he then set them on their legs again, and made them shake hands.
This man took a great fancy to Mike.  "Ah, I do wish all your countrymen were like you," he observed, smiling benignantly on him; "but they are generally very different, especially when they get the grog on board: then they often lose their lives,--and all their own fault, too.
"I had come down the Ottawa with several rafts, some two hundred miles or more.  My own raft was manned by Canadians,--steady boys, who stuck to our laws, whatever they do to those of other people, and kept sober till they brought their raft safe into dock.  Another raft was manned chiefly by Irishmen,--who, although I warned them, would indulge in strong drink.  We were nearing the Chaudiere Falls, and I had brought my raft safe to shore, where it was taken to pieces, so that the logs might be sent down the slide.  I had gone on to a point where I could watch this being done, when I heard loud cries; and on looking up the river I saw that part of another raft, with four men on it, had got adrift, and, to my horror, was hurrying towards the most dangerous part of the rapids.  I saw at once that in a few moments it must be dashed to pieces, and, as I thought, the fate of the four unfortunates on it was surely sealed.
"On it hurried, whirling round and round amid the foaming waters.  The next instant dashing against the rocks, it separated into as many fragments as there were timbers, each of which was whirled down towards the falls.  Three of the poor wretches soon disappeared among the tossing waves; but the fourth clung to the end of a piece of timber with the grasp of despair--to that end which reached nearly to the edge of the cataract.  A fearful position!  Still, the Irishman held on.  I was almost sure that the next moment would be his last; but just then the current turned the log, so that the opposite end pointed to the fall. On it went, with even greater rapidity than at first; then balancing for an instant on the brink, the end to which he held was lifted up high in the air, and he was sent from it as from a catapult, far out into the calm water below the caldron!  I never expected again to see him, but he rose uninjured to the surface; and being a good swimmer, struck out boldly till he was picked up by one of several canoes which put off instantly to his assistance.  Tim Nolan, I have a notion, was the first man who ever came over those terrific falls and lived; and I would not advise any of you young fellows to try the experiment, for, in my opinion, he is the last who will ever do so and escape destruction."
Such was one of the many anecdotes I heard from the lips of old Jacques and our other associates.
I was not sorry when, after some weeks, Uncle Mark told me that he had made up his mind to return home.  Mike had agreed to finish a job which would occupy him a day or so longer; but as Uncle Mark was anxious to be off, it was settled that he and I should start together, leaving the rifle with Mike, as he would have to come on alone.  We believed that no animals were likely at that season to attack two people; besides, Uncle Mark had purchased a pair of pistols from Jacques Michaud, which he considered would be sufficient for our defence.  Accordingly, pocketing our dollars and slinging our wolf-skin knapsacks over our backs, we put on our skates and commenced our journey.
We got on famously, for the air was calm, although the cold was intense. We found our friend Kepenau, too, encamped where we had left him; and stopping for a short time, we took our mid-day meal with him.  As we had made such good progress during the morning, we hoped to reach the hut before midnight, for the moon was up, and we could not miss our way. Uncle Mark was in good spirits, well satisfied with the result of our expedition, and we laughed and chatted as we glided over the smooth ice.
"We must not forget our wolf-skin," I observed.  "We shall get up to the spot before daylight is over, and I would rather carry it on my back than leave it behind."
"I shall not let you do that," answered my uncle.  "It will weigh less on my shoulders than on yours."
We were approaching a part of the river where, the ice having formed before the snow fell, we should be compelled to take off our skates and travel on foot.  I had just remarked that I supposed the wolves had gone off to some other district, where game was more abundant than with us, when a howl reached our ears, coming down the stream, from the very direction in which we were going.  Another and another followed. Presently we heard the full chorus of a whole pack, and soon we caught sight of numerous dark spots on the white snow in the distance.
Uncle Mark watched them for an instant or two.  "We must beat a retreat, Roger, or the brutes will be upon us.  We cannot hope to fight our way through them.  Off we go!" and turning round, we skated away for dear life in the direction from whence we had come.
We hoped soon to distance the savage creatures; in which case, losing sight and scent of us, they might turn off into the forest and leave the road clear.  As we went on, however, we heard their cries becoming more and more distinct; and casting a glance over our shoulders, we saw, to our horror, that they had already gained considerably on us; for with their light bodies they ran very quickly over the hard-frozen snow.
Forward we dashed, faster than I had ever skated before; but nearer and nearer grew those terrible sounds.  When once, however, the wolves reached the smooth ice, they were no longer able to run so fast as before; still, they gradually gained on us, and we felt sure that ere long they must be at our heels, as they were not now likely to give up the chase.
"Never give up while life remains!  Keep on, keep on, Roger!" cried Uncle Mark.  "My pistols will do for two of their leaders; our sticks must knock over some of the others; and we must hope that the rest of the pack will stop to devour their carcasses."
It might have been a quarter of an hour after this, although the time appeared longer, when, looking round, I saw a dozen wolves at least within twenty yards of us.
"We must try a dodge I have heard of," said Uncle Mark.  "When they get near us we must wheel rapidly round, and as they cannot turn on the ice so fast as we can, we shall gain on them."
We waited until the wolves were almost up to us, then we followed the proposed plan.  The brutes, after rushing on a short distance, tried to turn also.  In doing so, those behind tumbled over their leaders, and we skated on as before.  We did this several times, until the cunning wolves, perceiving our object, instead of turning kept straight forward. Uncle Mark now drew one of his pistols, and as he skated round shot the leading wolf.  It rolled over dead.  The next he treated in the same manner.  We then brought our sticks down on the heads of several others.
As we had expected, their followers instantly began tearing away at the dead bodies, and this enabled us to get some distance ahead of them.  I was in hopes that they would be content with this feast, and allow us to proceed unmolested; but before long our ears were again saluted with their abominable howls, and we saw the survivors of the pack coming along in full chase.
As we skated on Uncle Mark deliberately reloaded his pistols, observing, "We shall have to play the same game over again, and I hope we shall play it as well."
The wolves, however, seemed resolved not to let us escape.  They nearly overtook us; and though we turned, skating away now to the right and now to the left bank of the river, they declined imitating our example.
"Our best chance is to keep straight on," said Uncle Mark.  "Don't give in, whatever you do.  Our legs are as strong as theirs, and they will begin to get tired at last."
I was not so sure of that till, looking back for a moment, I saw that the pack was drawn out into a long line, showing that some, at all events--probably the younger animals--were losing wind.  If, however, only one brute had succeeded in catching hold of our legs, it would have been all up with us.
Fearfully depressing indeed were their howls; as they sounded close behind us, they almost took the life out of me.  Two of the largest of the brutes were not five yards from us, and I was already beginning to feel as if their sharp fangs were fixed in the calves of my legs, when I saw several figures in the distance, and faint shouts were borne on the breeze towards us.
"Courage, Roger! courage!" cried Uncle Mark.  "Put forth all your strength, and we shall be saved.  Those are friends."
As we moved on we perceived Kepenau and a number of Indians rushing towards us, flourishing sticks, and shouting at the top of their voices. Kepenau himself, and three others, were armed with rifles.
"Turn on one side," he shouted, "and let us aim at the wolves."
We followed his advice; when four rifle-shots sent over as many of the howling brutes.  The rest, frightened by the shouts of the Indians as much probably as by the death of their companions, turned off on one side, and allowed us to escape.  Instead, however, of going back, they continued their course down the river.  Probably they had been bound in that direction when they first winded us.
We were saved; but so overcome were we by our long-continued violent exertions, that, had not our Indian friends caught us in their arms, we should have sunk exhausted on the ice.  Taking off our skates, they supported us between their arms to their camp.  Here, seated on mats, with our feet before the fire, we were kindly tended by the squaws, who rubbed our ankles and legs, and bathed our feet in water.  Some warm broth--we did not examine too minutely the ingredients--quickly restored us; and we were able to give an account of our adventure.
It was now too late to think of continuing our journey that night, so the Indians pressed us to remain with them till the next morning; promising to ascertain the direction taken by the pack of wolves, so that we might not run the risk of again falling in with the hungry brutes.
Kepenau would not allow us to use our own provisions,--observing that we might want them the next day,--and he insisted on supplying us with everything needful.
We slept soundly, but when I tried to get up next morning I felt little able to continue the journey.  I did not so much feel the effects of the exercise as of the anxiety I had so long endured.  Even Uncle Mark was very stiff, and seemed inclined to enjoy a longer rest.
The Indians told us that during the night the wolves had come back; probably to devour the carcasses of their slain companions.  It was thought probable that they had returned up the river.  One of the men went out to ascertain this, and on coming back told us that the first surmise was correct--that the pack had indeed gone up the river, but that it had afterwards gone down again, as was evident from the bloody marks left by their feet.
Suddenly my uncle exclaimed: "By-the-by, Mike will be on his way home some time to-day; and if so, it is more than possible that he may fall in with the wolves!  Though he has a gun, it will go hard with him should they follow his trail."
My uncle accordingly expressed his fears to Kepenau.
"Then we must set out to meet your white friend," said the Indian; "for should he be coming over the ice to-day, the wolves are certain to espy him."
Mike had told me that he would visit our Indian friends on the way, and spend the night with them, should he start too late to perform the whole distance in one day.  The recollection of this increased my apprehension for his safety.
Kepenau said that he and four of the best-armed of his people would set out early in the afternoon to look for our friend.  Of course, we insisted on accompanying them; and being pretty well rested, we started at the hour proposed.  We put on our skates, but the Indians kept pace with us by running.
We went on and on, but no sign could we see of Mike.  It was already getting dusk when Kepenau stopped and examined the ice.
"A man has passed this way," he said, "and has turned off to the right."
Telling one of his people to follow up the trail, he proceeded onwards, narrowly scrutinising the ice.
"It is as I thought," he observed; "he was coming along on foot when he saw a pack of wolves following him, and instead of continuing on the ice he made his way for the shore, to try and reach a tree into which he could climb--the wisest thing he could do."
Having made this remark, he led the way in the direction the other Indian had taken.  He soon overtook him; but as darkness was increasing we had to proceed slowly, so as not to lose the trail, which I was utterly unable to perceive.  The banks here were of a low, marshy nature, so that there were few trees about up which the fugitive could have escaped.  I did not confidently expect to meet Mike on this occasion, for he, I thought, would have come along on his skates, whereas this person, the Indian said, was on foot.
We had not gone far when Kepenau stopped.  "That is the howl of wolves," he observed; "but it is accompanied by a curious sound, and they are not howling in their usual fashion."
Advancing further, I could clearly distinguish the howling of the wolves, accompanied by another sound.
"Why, as I am alive, those are the tones of Mike Laffan's fiddle!" exclaimed Uncle Mark.  "He is safe, at all events--that is one comfort; but it is a curious place to be playing in."
Kepenau now told us that the path we were following would lead us to the ruins of an old fort, erected by the early French settlers, and that he had little doubt our friend had found his way to it for refuge from the wolves; but they had followed him, and were certainly not far off.
We hurried on, and as the sounds of the fiddle became more distinct, the full moon rose from behind a dark mass which proved to be a ruined wall of the building; and immediately afterwards, directly in front of us, we discovered Mike Laffan seated on one of the time-worn and rickety beams which had once formed part of the fort.  There he was, bow in hand, fiddling with might and main; while below him were a whole pack of wolves, their mouths open, singing an inharmonious chorus to his music. So entranced were they, that the brutes actually did not discover us; nor, so far as we could see, were they making any attempt to reach Mike.
At a sign from Kepenau we stopped; but Mike, though he had perceived us, went on fiddling.  Presently he changed the tune to one of extraordinary rapidity: this evidently astonished his vulpine audience, which began to leap about.  Suddenly he exclaimed, "Now! shout, friends, shout! and we shall put the spalpeens of wolves to flight."  As we raised our voices he made his instrument produce the most fearful shrieks and cries, while he uttered at the same time a true Irish howl.
Mike's plan had the desired effect.  The wolves, bewildered by the strange sounds, were seized with terror, and off they scampered like a pack of curs, howling and biting at each other as they rushed along towards the forest, in which they soon disappeared.
Mike on this jumped down from his perch, laughing heartily, and thanked us all for having come to his assistance.  Of course, our opportune appearance had very much astonished him; but we soon explained matters, and expressed our hope that he was none the worse for his adventure.
"Sorra a bit," he answered, "except that I am mighty cowld, sitting up there among the snow for so long; but I'll soon be afther warming my limbs."
Saying this he set off with us, and at a rapid rate we retraced our steps to the Indian camp.  We were all glad enough to turn in; and next morning our friends, after examining the country around, assured us that the wolves were not likely to follow our footsteps.
My uncle had taken a great liking to Kepenau, and invited him to come and pitch his camp near us; promising to supply him with powder and shot, and also to assist him in trading with the white men so that no risk might be run of whisky being given in exchange for game and furs. Kepenau said he would think about the matter.
One of the young squaws who happened to be present was his daughter.  On hearing of the invitation, she begged her father to accept it.  She was far superior to the other Indian women in appearance; and although not so old as Lily, she was taller than any of them.  Her complexion was of the lightest olive, through which rich colour could be seen on her cheeks.  She was, indeed, fairer than many Europeans.  Her figure was extremely graceful, too.  I did not, however, observe this when I first saw her, for she was then dressed in her thick blanket robe.  Her name was Ashatea, or "White Poplar;" a very suitable name, as I thought.  She had seen Lily, I found, two or three times, before they had moved westward; and she longed, she told me, to meet her again, and begged that I would tell Lily so when I returned home.  It was this that made her so anxious that her father and his tribe should come and camp near us.
Before we started, Kepenau had almost promised to come, though he would not bind himself to do so.  "Circumstances might change," he observed. "He was well located where his camp was pitched, and it was trying work to change quarters at that season of the year."
Ashatea accompanied us, with her people, down to the ice.  "Do not forget," she said, "my message to your sister Lily."
"You may trust me," I answered, making her a bow--for I felt that she was a lady, although an Indian squaw; then off we set, hoping this time to reach home before nightfall.  Having completely recovered from our fatigue, we got on famously.  Mike did not forget to secure the wolf-skin; and just as the sun sank behind the trees, we were saluted by the sharp, joyous barking of Snap, Yelp, and Pop, and by the gruffer tones of Quambo, who rushed out of the hut to welcome us home.
We had plenty of work to do after we returned home, but I managed to make a run over to the settlement to pay a visit to my uncle and aunt and Lily.  I did not fail to give her Ashatea's message; and she was much pleased to hear of her.
"I do hope they will come into our neighbourhood; I should be so glad to see her again," said Lily.  "Ashatea promised to take me out in her canoe; for, you know, she is as expert as any of the men in paddling one.  She wished to show me how the Indians catch fish.  And then she said that when the rice was ripe we should go to the rice-lake to collect it.  I hope that Aunt Hannah won't object.  It would be very interesting; and there could be no possible danger, as all the Indians in this part of the country are friendly.  But, to tell you the truth, Roger, I am quite jealous of you, as you are now able to go out into the forest by yourself, and meet with all sorts of adventures; whilst I, alas! am compelled to stay at home, with no other amusement than occasionally a `sewing' or an `apple bee.'"
I, of course, sympathised with Lily, and said that I wished Aunt Hannah would let her come out with me, and that I should take very great care of her.
"I am afraid that she thinks we are now too old to run about together as we used to do, when you were a boy and I was a girl," she answered.
"I wish, then, that we were young again!"  I exclaimed; "although I should not then be able to take as much care of you as I can now.  I would sooner die, Lily, than allow any harm to happen to you."
"That I am sure you would, Roger," she said; "and I should not be afraid to trust myself with you anywhere."
We were not very old even then, I should remark: but I was feeling myself a man, and was ready to do all sorts of manly things.
"By-the-by," observed Lily, "we have become intimate with a family among the settlers who arrived last fall,--Mr and Mrs Claxton, and Dora their daughter, a very nice girl of my age, and a great friend of mine. Dora has a brother called Reuben, and I think you will like him. Although he is younger than you are, he seems to be a fine fellow, and has your taste for natural history and sporting."
"I shall be very glad to meet with him; but I have not time to look him up now, as I must get back to the hut.  But you may tell him about me; and say that, if he will come over, I shall be happy to take him out into the forest, where we can have a hunt together."
Although I had said that I must go immediately, I lingered for some time with Lily, for I never was in a hurry to leave her.  It was consequently quite dark before I got half-way to the hut; still, I knew the path-- indeed, there was only one.  The snow, however, thickly covered the ground, and I had to guide myself by feeling the scores on the trunks of the trees.  Had every tree been thus marked, there would have been no great difficulty; but, of course, they were scored only at intervals, and sometimes I was uncertain whether I had not somehow got out of the direct line.  I knew that, did I once go wrong, it would be a hard matter, if not impossible, to find my way back again.  There might be wolves prowling about, too; or I might by chance find myself in the grasp of a hungry bear, bent on a visit to the hog-pens in the settlement.  Intending to return early, I had left without my gun--an act of folly I resolved not to repeat.  Should I lose myself, I should have no means of making a signal, and I might very possibly be frozen to death before the morning.
I had gone some distance without finding a score, and I began to fear that I really had lost myself; but it would not do to stand still, so I walked on; and greatly to my relief, as I touched tree after tree, I at length felt a scored one, and knew that I was in the right direction. Presently a light appeared ahead.  I ran towards it, shouting at the top of my voice.  A welcome halloo came from Mike, who was standing, with a pine torch in his hand, at the door of the hut.
Two days after this, a tall lad, of fair complexion, made his appearance at the hut, gun in hand, and introduced himself as Reuben Claxton. "Miss Lily, who is a great friend of my sister Dora, told me that you would be glad to see me; and so I have come, and I should much like to have a hunt with you in the forest," he said abruptly.
It was his way, I found.  He always went directly to the point, whether in talking or in doing anything: and I liked him the better for that.
Uncle Mark invited him to stay with us.
"I said that I would if you asked me, so they will not be expecting me at home again," he answered.
In ten minutes we were on as friendly terms as if we had known each other all our lives.  Next day we started with our guns, accompanied by Mike and Quambo, and our three dogs.  The sky was bright, the air calm, and, except for the snow and the leafless trees, we might have supposed ourselves to have been in the middle of summer.
We had not gone far when we caught sight of an animal making its way along the trunk of a fallen tree.  I soon recognised it to be a marten, and was just going to fire, when I perceived another creature coming out of a hole hard by.  The former animal was evidently bent on attacking the latter.  The marten immediately stopped, and carefully eyed the hermit, the character of which I could not at first make out on account of the distance it was from us.  Quambo would probably have known, but he and Mike were some way behind us.  Of the marten I had no doubt; I recognised it by its agile and graceful movements, by its length, which was about a foot and a half, with a bushy tail somewhat under a foot long, and by its dark tawny coat and white throat, its pointed muzzle, and bright and lively eyes.  We stopped to watch what would take place, keeping back the dogs, which were about to rush forward and seize the animals.
The marten soon made up its mind to assault its opponent, which, instead of retreating into its hole, came boldly forward and ascended the fallen trunk.  I at once saw that it was an "urson," or porcupine; although my companion supposed it to be another animal, as he could not see the long quills with which the English porcupine is armed.  This creature was fully two feet long.  Its back was covered with thick hair of a dusky brown colour; its head was short, and its nose blunt; it had small round ears, very powerful teeth, short limbs, and feet armed with strong crooked claws.  These particulars I was afterwards able to exhibit to him.
The porcupine stood eyeing its opponent for nearly a minute; then the marten began the attack by showing its teeth, erecting its hairs, and springing forward with graceful bounds.  At the same time the porcupine, erecting an armour of quills, which had till then been concealed under its thick hair, appeared all at once to become twice its former size. The marten had too much impetus to stop its attempt to seize the porcupine by the snout; but the latter, suddenly whisking round, dealt the marten a tremendous blow with its tail, filling its body with short darts, and sending it off the trunk sprawling among the snow.
The marten was now animated by rage as well as by the desire to capture its foe.  It again sprang up, ran along the boughs of the fallen tree, and advanced once more towards the porcupine; but its courage and agility did not avail it.  Another blow from that formidable tail cast it once more into the snow; while the porcupine looked down with contempt on its defeated antagonist.  Reuben, taking good aim with his rifle, put the marten out of misery; while I killed the victorious porcupine.  The dogs then rushed forward; but Snap, the most eager, had reason to repent his eagerness, as before we could keep him off the animal he had received several sharp quills in his jaws.  These we immediately extracted, but he never again attempted to seize either a living or a dead porcupine.
We killed another marten and some squirrels, and were returning home just at sundown, when we met Uncle Mark, who had followed our trail--no difficult thing to do over the snow, even for a white man.  He had just before caught sight of an opossum, which had escaped him.  It had evidently paid a visit to our poultry-yard a short time previously, and having succeeded in carrying off one of the inhabitants, was making its way with its prey to its mate or hungry family when Uncle Mark overtook it.  He had knocked it over with his stick, and supposed it dying or dead, as it lay with open mouth, extended tongue, and dim eyes.  At that moment he had caught sight of a marten or some other animal moving through the forest.  The creature thereupon proved that it was only "'possuming;" for the instant his eye was withdrawn it sprang up, and set off at a rate which showed that its powers of locomotion, at least, had not been impaired by the blows it had received.
He was telling us this, when the dogs began to yelp, and presently right ahead of us appeared a creature of the size of a large cat.
"Dere a 'possum," exclaimed Quambo; and we hurried after it with the dogs.
"Master 'Possum" was not going to be caught so easily, however.  In an instant it was up a tree, and lost to sight amid the branches, while the dogs yelped around it.
"The creature is lost," cried Reuben.
"No fear ob dat," answered Quambo.  "We soon find him out."
Then he and Mike, with the rest of us, began to collect all the decayed branches to be found above the snow.  We soon bad enough wood for a fire; when Quambo striking a light, it quickly blazed up, and the flames exhibited the opossum making its way along one of the branches.  The dogs leaped about, and yelped loudly.  Quambo had thrown himself on the ground to watch the animal's proceedings; for the moment we had attempted to take aim, it had nimbly sprung round to the dark side, apparently watching us as eagerly as we were watching it.  Mike on this hurried off to a little distance and lifted his rifle.  He fired, and down came the opossum.
The dogs seized it, and in a few moments life was extinct.  There was no shamming now, though the Irishman gave it another blow, after we had taken off the dogs, just to make sure.  He having slung it over his back, we put out the fire to prevent the risk of igniting the trees, and proceeded homewards well content with our evening's sport.
It was the last idle day we had for some time, for we had an abundance of work to get through before the return of spring, which was now rapidly approaching.  It was the least pleasant time of the year, too; for we had thaws of two or three days at a time, during which the hardened snow was turned into slush.  Then frost would come on again, and hold the timber with such a grasp that we could not move it.  We occupied the time in putting up sheds, and in such other work as could be done before the ground was clear.  No one, however, complained; for we knew that the snow would soon disappear, that the leaves would again come forth, and that the rivers would be open, when we should be able to move about much more rapidly in our canoes than we had done over the frozen ground.
CHAPTER FOUR.
The summer had now come.  The trees were all decked with their rich and varied foliage; the notes of the feathered inhabitants were heard in the forest; and numerous animals which had either gone south during the winter, or had concealed themselves in sheltered places, were moving about.  There had been too much ploughing and sowing to allow of my indulging in my favourite pursuits.  All I could do was to run over and pay my uncle and aunt a visit; but it may be that Lily was the chief attraction.
I found her friend Dora with her one day.  She was certainly a very nice girl, although not equal to Lily by a long way, in my opinion.  They inquired whether we had seen anything of Kepenau and his daughter Ashatea.
"They have not yet appeared," I answered; "nor have we received any tidings of them."
"Dora wants to make the acquaintance of a real Indian girl, fit to be a heroine," said Lily, laughing.  "She has hitherto only seen the wretched squaws who appear in the Eastern States.  She can scarcely believe that Ashatea is the interesting creature I describe her."
I said that I would try to communicate with Kepenau, if I could learn his whereabouts from any passing Indians.
"Oh do!" said Lily; "and let him understand how glad we shall be to see him and his daughter again."
While we were talking Reuben came in, and offered to accompany me back to the hut.  He, like me, had been very busy all the spring.  He certainly did not look well suited for hard labour; but his face was more bronzed than heretofore, and he seemed perfectly well.  Wishing the girls good-bye, we shouldered our guns, and commenced the walk to the hut.  There was no risk of losing our way at this time, for the days were long, and there was a bright moon that evening.
Uncle Mark welcomed Reuben, whom he liked for his straightforward character and honesty.
"I am glad you have got such a companion as that young fellow," he said to me.  "When two harum-scarum fellows associate, they are sure to get into trouble; but you two will help each other out of difficulties, should you unexpectedly fall into them."
Mike amused us that evening with a tune on his fiddle; and Quambo diverted us still more by a dance he performed to the music, which made Reuben, who was not addicted to laughing, almost split his sides.
We agreed to have a long ramble into the forest next day, my uncle giving me leave of absence.  He could not spare Mike, but he allowed Quambo to accompany us.
"We can cook our dinner without him," I said; "though, to be sure, we cannot expect to dress it as well as he would."
"Ah!  Massa Mark, poor black fellow do one t'ing well; you do ebery t'ing well," observed Quambo, with a grimace, by which he intended to show that he was paying a deserved compliment.
We carried our guns, with provisions in our knapsacks to last us for a day, although we expected to kill more game than we should want.  As we wished to make a long excursion, we started at daybreak; that is to say, Reuben, Quambo, and I, with the dogs.  Reuben had a great desire to see a beaver settlement which I had once visited when we first came into that part of the country; and I thought that I could find my way to it. Quambo amused us, as we walked along, with all sorts of tales about beavers, raccoons, opossums, bears, and other animals, with the habits of which he was well acquainted.
The beaver is a good-sized animal, being two and a half feet long exclusive of the tail, which is one foot more.  It is of a deep chestnut colour; the hair very fine, smooth, and glossy.  The Indians use its incisor teeth, which are very large and hard, to cut the bone or horn with which they tip their spears.  It is a rodent, or gnawing animal. It has a broad, horizontal, flattened tail, nearly of an oval form, which is covered with scales.  The hind feet are webbed, and, with the aid of the tail, which acts as a rudder, enable it to swim through the water with ease and rapidity.  Except in one respect, I do not know that it can be considered a sagacious animal; but it is a marvellous engineer, its faculties being employed in building houses, and in forming dams for the protection of its village.
One of its chief characteristics is the power it possesses of producing a substance termed "castor,"--which is contained in two bags, each about the size of a hen's egg.  This castor is peculiarly attractive to beavers.  They scent it at a distance, and invariably make their way towards it.  No sooner does the beaver discover the delicious odour than he sits upright, sniffs about in every direction, and squeals with excitement until he can get up to it.  The trapper, knowing this, always carries a supply of castor, or bark-stone; and when he reaches a stream or any other water near which he believes beavers may be found, he sets his trap, about six inches under the water.  He then chews the end of a twig, dips it in the castor, and sticks it in with the scented end uppermost, just a little above the water.  The nearest beaver, on discovering the scent, hurries up to the spot; and, if a young animal, is nearly certain to be caught by the trap.  The older beavers are more knowing and cautious, and frequently bite off the end of the twig without entangling themselves.
Another curious circumstance connected with this "castoreum" is, that as soon as one beaver has deposited any of it on the ground, the beavers from another lodge go to the spot, and after covering it with earth and leaves, deposit their own "castoreum" on it.  When they have gone away, others in turn perform the same operation; and thus the process goes on till a heap four or five feet in height has been raised.  No one has as yet been able to ascertain the object of this proceeding.  It gives the trapper, however, the means of catching the poor creatures--means which they would undoubtedly withhold, if they had the power.  Like human beings, they are sufferers from their own acts.
The teeth of the beavers are sharp and powerful, and their jaws possess an extraordinary amount of strength.  This enables them to bite through wood, tear the bark from trees, and chew vegetable substances of all sorts.  During summer they regale themselves on fruits and plants of various descriptions; but their winter stock of food consists of the bark of the birch, plane, and other trees--and even of the young wood itself, which they steep in water before devouring it.
Their favourite resort is a stream or a pool near trees.  Here they will assemble to the number of some hundreds, living in communities, and working together.  They select, when they can, a stream with a current, because it affords them the means of conveying wood and other materials for their habitations.  They choose such parts as will afford them depth of water sufficient to resist the frost in winter, and prevent it freezing to the bottom.  When, however, they find that there is not depth enough for this purpose, they build a dam across the stream, at a convenient distance below their habitations.  If the current is gentle, the dam is made perfectly straight; but if rapid, it is constructed with a considerable curve, the convex side being towards the upper part of the stream.  The materials employed are drift wood, green willows, birch, and poplar; these are placed horizontally, and kept down by mud and stones.  So strong do these dams become, that they are capable of resisting a considerable force both of water and ice; for generally the wood, taking root, shoots upwards, and forms ultimately a thick hedge. In some cases even trees sprout up, in the branches of which the birds form their nests.
Beavers build their houses of the same materials as their dams, and of various sizes, according to the number of the inmates.  These, however, do not often exceed four or eight old ones, and from six to fourteen young ones.  The houses are of a circular form, elevated some feet above the surface of the water; but the entrance is always low down beneath it.  They are more rudely constructed than the dams, too.  The wood is laid nearly horizontally, and crosswise; the branches, which project inwards, they cut off with their teeth.  First there is a layer of wood, and then one of mud and stones; and so they work on till a sufficient height is gained, when the roof, of rough branches, is placed on the top, and plastered down with mud and stones.
Such was the interesting account which Quambo gave us as we walked along.
No event worthy of description occurred during our walk, though it took us some hours to reach the spot for which I was directing our course.
I was not disappointed.  As we approached it cautiously, we caught sight of several beavers running about on the banks of the stream, some nibbling away at the trunks of saplings and small trees which they were engaged in felling.  Had we fired, we might have killed two or three; but the rest would have disappeared, and we should then have lost the opportunity of observing them.  We therefore crept on, concealing ourselves among the thick underwood.
At length I was afraid, should we get closer, that we might make some noise and alarm the animals.  I therefore made a sign to my companions to stop; and looking down, we could discern one of the dams I have spoken of carried across the stream from one side to the other, and apparently not quite finished.  Though several beavers were running about it, they were not at work; indeed, all their operations are carried on during darkness.  Nature, of course, has given them the instinct to work at this time, which saves them the destruction that would otherwise probably overtake them, both from men and beasts.
After watching them for some time, I wished to retire and let them amuse themselves undisturbed; but Quambo took it into his head to give a loud shout, when in an instant the startled creatures scampered off, and dived under the water.  Our chance of seeing more of them was gone; they were evidently on the watch for us, for now and then I saw a snout popping up above the surface, to ascertain if we had taken our departure.
We made our way along the banks of the stream for some distance, till we saw before us a broad expanse of water; and we discovered that it was a shallow lake or pond, bordered by reeds, and with numerous dead trees rising up out of the water near its shores.  It struck me that this lake had been produced by the beaver-dams; and on our proceeding downwards towards what appeared to be its outlet, we found what had the appearance of being a long bank, of a convex form, stretched directly across the stream.  This, on further examination, I had no doubt was the work of beavers.  Alders and willows, and other water-loving trees of considerable size, were growing out of it; and digging down to a slight depth, we found that it consisted of lengths of the trunks of young trees, now rapidly decaying and turning into a vegetable mould, thus affording nourishment to all sorts of plants.
Above the surface of the lake were numerous beaver-houses, and after we had concealed ourselves for some time we caught sight of the inhabitants coming forth and swimming about; while one or two knowing old fellows climbed to the roof of their houses, to keep a look-out, as we supposed, and give notice of approaching danger.  We might have shot several, but without the dogs we should not have been able to recover them.  Indeed, their skins would have been of much less value than those caught in traps.  After watching them for some time, then, we agreed that we ought to be on our homeward way, or we should certainly be benighted.  Though we had found the path easily enough in daylight, it would be a hard matter to do so in the dark.
"I should very much like to turn trapper," said Reuben to me as we walked along.  "I once heard a good deal about the lives the trappers lead, from a fine old man who stopped at our house one night, on his way to dispose of his packs of skins at one of the fur-traders' posts."
"I suspect that it must be a very hard life, and you would soon get tired of it, Reuben," I answered.
"As to that, I fancy that when I got accustomed to the hardships I should like it more and more; but I would be a trapper on my own hook-- have my own animals and traps, hunt where I chose, and sell my peltries to whom I pleased.  Our old friend had a horse and two mules.  He rode the horse, and the mules served to carry his packs.  He had six traps, which he carried in a leathern bag called his trap-sack.  I was particularly struck by his appearance as he rode up to our cottage.  His costume was a hunting-shirt of dressed buckskin, ornamented with long fringes; pantaloons of the same material, decorated with porcupine-quills hanging down the outside of the leg.  He wore moccasins on his feet, and a flexible felt hat upon his head.  Under his right arm, and suspended from his left shoulder, hung his powder-horn and bullet-pouch, in which he carried balls, flint, and steel His long knife, in a sheath of buffalo, hung from a belt round his waist--made fast to it by a steel chain.  Also, he carried a tomahawk; and slung over his shoulder was his long heavy rifle; while from his neck hung his pipe-holder, garnished with beads and porcupine-quills.
"He had come many hundreds of miles from the west, having trapped as far off as the Rocky Mountains, and had met with all sorts of adventures among the Indians, from whom he had often narrowly escaped with his life.  He said that he would take me with him, as he much wanted a companion, and would answer for my life with his own; though I should run no more risk than he did, if I only followed his directions.  But my father would not hear of it, and was quite angry with the old man for putting the idea into my head; so, of course, I had to give it up.
"`Well, Reuben, my boy,' he said as he rode away, `should your father change his mind, and you hold fast to yours, when I come back I will take you with me.'
"But he never has come back since."
I laughed at Reuben's notion; for, knowing him as I did, I saw that he was utterly unfit for the sort of life he proposed to lead, and would be heartily sick of it before long.  He had a fertile imagination, and had pictured a trapper's life as something very delightful, although I was sure he would in reality hate it.  And I believe that is the case with many other boys,--especially with those who take it into their head to go to sea, and who have never been on board a ship, and know nothing whatever of sea-life.
We had now performed the greater part of our journey home, and had reached the bank of the larger river, where it extended into lake-like dimensions, narrowing again shortly to its former width.  Here several rocks were seen rising out of it--the waters rushing between them with great force, and forming a cataract, down which I should have thought it impossible for the strongest boat to make its way without being dashed to pieces.
At this point we sat down on the bank to rest and take some refreshment, when Quambo pulled out his pipe.
"You no smoke, young gen'lemen; but ole neegur, he fond of baccy, and you no object," said Quambo.
Quambo was always a pattern of politeness.  We begged him to smoke as much as he liked, although we had not taken to it ourselves.
When Quambo was enjoying his pipe, he was never in a hurry to move, so we sat on longer than we should otherwise have done.  I considered, at length, that it was time to move; when, looking up the stream, across the broad expanse I have mentioned, I caught sight of a light canoe skimming rapidly over the surface.  It was approaching us; so, prompted by curiosity, we agreed to wait its arrival at the shore--for it did not occur to us it could possibly descend the rapids.  It kept, however, in the middle of the current, and before we had got far from where we had been sitting I saw that it was about to make its way amid the tumbling waters.
"These people must be strangers, and cannot be aware of the danger they are running," I observed.  "Their canoe will be destroyed, and we must do our best to save them."
We accordingly hurried back.  As the canoe approached, I saw that there were four people in her: one in the stern, and two in the bows paddling; the other, who appeared to be a female, sitting near the after end, was also dexterously using a paddle, now on one side and now on the other. On looking again, I felt nearly sure that the Indian in the stern was our friend Kepenau, and that the female was his daughter Ashatea.
I shouted, but it was too late to warn him to turn back; indeed, from the calm way in which he sat, I was convinced that he well knew where he was going: and almost before I had time to think much about the danger my friends were running, they had passed it, and their canoe was floating in the calm water at the foot of the rapids.
My shout attracted the notice of Kepenau, who at once recognised me, and steered his canoe for the bank.  He and Ashatea stepped on shore, and seemed much pleased at seeing me.  I introduced Reuben, who made as polite a bow to the Indian girl as he would have done to a princess. She put out her hand, and in her broken language inquired if he had a sister.  On his replying that such was the case, Ashatea expressed a hope that she would become a friend to her, as Lily was.
Kepenau told me that they were on their way to visit our settlement, according to his promise.  "I thought it wisest," he said "to keep my people at a distance, so we have fixed our camp on the banks of a stream some miles to the westward; and as the rivers are now open, we can easily hold communication with you.  At the same time, as there are several intervening rapids and waterfalls, the white men are not likely to find their way often to us, or to bring the `fire water' which I so much dread."
On hearing that we were on our way home, he offered to accompany us; observing that Ashatea could steer the canoe as well as he could, and though the distance by the river was greater, she would not be long after us.  "There are no more rapids or waterfalls to be passed, so that the remainder of the voyage can be performed without danger," he observed.
Reuben, on hearing this, asked leave to take his place, saying that he should much like the trip by the river.
"But you cannot use a paddle," said Kepenau.
"Not very well," answered Reuben.
"Then don't make the attempt, or you may upset the canoe, or lose your paddle.  If you go, you must sit perfectly quiet," said Kepenau.
Reuben promised to obey orders.  Ashatea smiled, and appeared to be highly amused at the idea of having a white man as her passenger.
As we had no time to lose, Ashatea resumed her seat in the stern of the canoe.
"Now, take care," she said, laughing, as she saw Reuben about to step in, "else you will tumble over on the other side, or make a hole in the canoe and go through it."
Reuben looked somewhat alarmed, and in his eagerness was very nearly doing both the things against which he was being warned.  Kepenau, however taking his arm, helped him in.
"Now, don't move till you reach the end of your voyage," said the Indian.  "Perhaps we shall be there to help you out."
Ashatea gave a flourish with her paddle as a farewell signal, and striking the water, away the canoe shot down the stream.  We meanwhile took the path homewards, and as we were anxious to arrive before the canoe we hurried forward.
Kepenau told me that his daughter had so much wished to see Lily,--or my sister, as he called her,--that he had consented to bring her, and to leave her for two or three days, if my friends would allow it.
I said that I was sure they would.
He desired, he told me, to make some trade arrangements for disposing of the peltries which he and his people obtained; his object, at the same time, being to keep them away from the white men, for fear of the "fire water."  This subject was continually on his mind.  He had seen it prove the destruction of so many of his countrymen, that he dreaded its introduction among his own tribe, who had hitherto been kept free from it.  However, as my uncles and Mr Claxton were men who never touched liquor, he was not afraid of dealing with them.
I remarked, as we walked along, that his eyes were constantly turning in every direction,--now on the ground, now on the trees and hushes on either side,--as if he was on the look-out for game, or fancied that an enemy was lurking near.  I at last inquired why he did this.
"It is the habit of my people," he answered.  "We never can tell whether our foes may be before us or tracking our footsteps.  I noticed that some one besides you and your young friend and the black has passed this way lately.  He wore moccasins, and may therefore be a red man and an enemy; but I have just discovered that he is one of your people, and has a load on his shoulders.  Observe that soft ground; his feet sank deeper into it than would have been the case had he been unencumbered.  He is either an old man, or overcome with fatigue.  He cannot be very far before us, and is going in the direction of your hut."  Kepenau pointed as he spoke to some mossy ground, where I could just distinguish a faint outline of the footsteps of a man; but I should have been unable to read anything beyond that fact from the marks left behind.
Quambo, who saw them, thought that they might have been, after all, only the footsteps of Uncle Mark or Mike, who might have come out thus far in search of game; but Kepenau laughed when this was said.
"No, no," he answered; "these are moccasins.  You will see that I am right."
We hurried on, for the sun was getting low, and already the gloom had settled down in the recesses of the forest.
As we emerged into more open ground near the banks of the river, the rays of the sun glancing along it sparkled on the flakes of foam, as the stream hurried rippling along the banks.  Nearing the hut, we caught sight of three figures standing in front of it.
"I told you so," observed Kepenau.  "Yonder is the man whose trail I discovered.  A trapper, who has come east with his peltries.  He is an old man, too, as I thought, and carried a heavy load."
Before even our friends saw us, the canoe shot into view down the stream; and after helping Ashatea and Reuben to land--or rather the latter, for the Indian girl sprang lightly on shore without assistance-- we proceeded to the hut.
Uncle Mark advanced to meet us.  "All friends are welcome," he said, taking Kepenau's hand, and then greeting the young girl in his kind, friendly way.  "You will, however, have to submit to pretty close stowage, if, as I hope you intend to do, you will remain the night with us."
"We can quickly put up sufficient shelter for this time of the year for ourselves, so that we need not crowd you, my friend," answered the Indian.  "And our aged brother there, I doubt not, is as well accustomed to the open air as we are."
"Many days and nights have passed since I slept under a roof," observed the old hunter, who, hearing himself mentioned, now came forward.  "We have met before, brother," he added, looking at the Indian; "ay, and fought and hunted together!  Don't you recollect me?"
"Ay, that I do.  You saved my life when the Apaches were about to take my scalp, and enabled me to reach my horse and escape," answered Kepenau.
"Ah!  I have a faint recollection of that; but I remember more clearly how, when I was hunted by a party of Araphoes, you and your people came sweeping down to my assistance, and put them to flight," replied the old trapper.
"I recollect the event," observed Kepenau; "but I have long since buried the war-hatchet, and now strive to live at peace with my neighbours, if they will let me."
While the Indian and the old trapper had been speaking, I had been looking at the latter.  I had no doubt, from the description Reuben had given of the visitor to his father's house, that this was the same person; and I was therefore not surprised to see him and Reuben shaking hands as old acquaintances.
Quambo, knowing that food would be required for our guests, lost no time, with the assistance of Mike, in lighting a fire, and immediately set about cooking whatever his larder supplied.  Though we had killed but little game on our excursion, Uncle Mark and Mike had been more fortunate during our absence, and there was no lack of food.
In the meantime Kepenau had called up his people from the canoe, and they set to work to collect materials for two small wigwams, which, though they were more rudely constructed than usual, served the purpose intended.  One was for the accommodation of Ashatea, and the other for the chief--his men contenting themselves with a rough lean-to.
The whole party joined us in the hut at supper, which, thanks to the diligence of Mike and Quambo, was quickly prepared.  The old trapper had many anecdotes to tell, and many a wild adventure to recount, which, I saw, was greatly interesting to Reuben.  Ashatea spoke but little, though I could see, by her quick glance, that she understood much, if not all, that was said.
At night the chief and his daughter retired to their wigwams, while the old trapper accepted a shakedown in the corner of our hut.  He smiled when Uncle Mark offered him a bed.  "For many a long year I have not slept in one," he answered; "and I possibly may never again put my head on a pillow softer than my saddle or a pack of skins."
Without taking off his clothes, and merely unbuckling his belt, he lay down, and was soon fast asleep.  Reuben and I, after a few minutes' talk, did the same.  Before I closed my eyes, however, I saw that Uncle Mark was sitting at the table, resting his head upon his hands, apparently lost in thought.
At break of day the next morning our Indian friends were on foot, and we turned out to receive them.  As our hut was close, we had our breakfast spread on a grassy spot beneath the trees, where we could enjoy fresh air, which was certainly more suited to their taste.
Ashatea looked handsomer than ever.  She was eager to set out to see Lily.  Reuben offered to accompany her, and show the way: at which Kepenau laughed, observing that an Indian never required a guide through his own country; but, for all that, he should be happy to have the white stranger's society.
Kepenau had brought several packages of skins, which it was his object to dispose of.
"My friend," said the old trapper, touching him on the shoulder, "let me sell them for you.  I know how the white men will treat you if they think that they are yours: they will offer a third of the value, and then insist on your taking articles you do not require."
"I wish to open a fair trade with the white men," answered Kepenau.  "I will let them understand that I have more skins to bring."
"The greater reason they will have for putting a small value on them," observed the old trapper.
"I would advise you to accept Samson Micklan's offer," said Uncle Mark, turning to the Indian.
Kepenau considered the matter for some time.  "I will do as you advise," he said at length.  "I know that I can trust you.  When you have fixed a price, I will not consent to sell under it.  I intend, nevertheless, to go to the settlement."
The old trapper, whose name I now for the first time heard, appeared to be in no hurry to continue his journey.  When at length he declared that he was ready to start, Reuben offered to carry his pack.
Old Samson smiled.  "It may make your young shoulders ache more than you suppose," he observed.
"Let me try," answered Reuben; and I helped him to place it on his shoulders.  In doing so I was able to judge of its weight.
"If my uncle can spare me, I will assist you," I said; "for I doubt very much whether you will be able to carry it all the way."
Reuben, however, had made up his mind to fulfil his promise.  I saw a twinkle in the old man's eyes when he trudged off trying to look as if he did not feel the weight.  My uncle told me I might go too, so we set off.  Kepenau and Samson led the way, talking together.  Reuben, as I expected, dropped alongside Ashatea; and I followed.  The other Indians brought up the rear, carrying Kepenau's packs.
Before long, I saw that Reuben was walking with difficulty, and putting his hands behind his back to try and lift the pack off his shoulders.  I ranged up to him.
"You had better let me carry that a little way for you," I said.  "Or suppose we sling it on our sticks! we shall then get along more easily, and neither of us will feel the weight too much."
Still Reuben declared that he could carry it.
Ashatea looked at him, evidently understanding the matter as well as I did.  "You better let your friend do as he says," she observed.
At length Reuben, who was getting very hot, and had stumbled more than once, said, "Well, I do think it will be the best way.  I am much obliged to you, Roger."
We soon had the pack slung to the sticks, and poor Reuben stepped along much more easily than before.
We soon reached Uncle Stephen's house, when the old trapper turned round to Reuben.  "You are a brave lad," he said; "I like your pluck.  In a few years, when you get more muscle in your limbs, you will laugh at a pack twice the weight of that."
Lily was delighted to see Ashatea, and we left them together while we went on to Mr Claxton's, where old Samson intended to stay.  He had arranged with Kepenau to sell his peltries, and the next day they were all disposed of at a price which greatly astonished and delighted our Indian friend.  He made an arrangement with Uncle Stephen to sell all the produce of the chase which he might bring, and to purchase for him such articles as he required.
Reuben brought his sister Dora over to see Ashatea, and the three girls seemed very happy together.  The Indian girl was as eager to learn English as Lily and Dora were to instruct her; and she got on rapidly.
Old Samson had suffered more from his long tramp on foot than he was at first willing to confess, and a fit of illness was the consequence.  He was well cared for, however, by the Claxtons, who treated him as kindly as if he had been a relation.  He was grateful in his way; but it struck me that there was something hard and unsympathising in his character. He spoke of his fights with the Indians, of the scalps he had taken, of his hairbreadth escapes; but he never uttered a word which showed that he had any religious feeling.  Indeed, he seemed to me to be as much of a heathen as the Indians among whom he had lived so long.  It appeared strange to me that an old man should be so hardened.  I was not aware, at the time, that when people once begin to give up trusting God they go further and further from him; and thus, of course, as they advance in years they think less and less of their souls, and, in fact, become more dead with regard to all spiritual matters.
I had been accustomed to see Uncle Stephen read the Bible to his family, and offer up prayers morning and night; while he never did any work, except such as necessity demanded, on the Sabbath.  Uncle Mark had been less exact in these respects, although even he was accustomed to read the Bible on the Sabbath, and to refrain from work; and occasionally we went over to Uncle Stephen's on that day and joined his family at worship.  Most of the people of the settlement, however, paid but little attention to the day, though they ceased from all rough work, and made a sort of holiday of it.  There was no church or chapel of any description in the neighbourhood, and few paid any attention to what are called religious duties.
The day after I went to stay with Uncle Stephen, some little time before sunset I saw a horseman approaching the house from the eastward.  He was a middle-aged man, dressed in a suit of dark grey, with his legs encased in strong leather gaiters, and a broad-brimmed hat on his head; a pair of huge saddle-bags, too, were thrown across the hardy-looking mustang he bestrode.  He had neither gun over his shoulder nor sword by his side; but he carried a thick staff of considerable length in his hand.
"Canst tell me, young friend, if yonder house is the abode of Stephen Tregellis?" he asked as I advanced towards him.
"Yes, sir.  He is my uncle," I answered, offering to hold his nag's head while he dismounted.
He threw himself from the saddle with the activity of a young man.
"I hope, then, that I shall not intrude, for I have come far, and should like to spend a few days with one who, if I am not wrongly informed, will receive me as a brother Christian," he said.
"Uncle Stephen will be glad to see you, sir," I answered, feeling sure that I was only saying what was the case.
"Well, then, young man, go in and tell him that Martin Godfrey has come to claim his hospitality."
As my uncle had just reached home, I hurried in and gave him the message.  He immediately came out and welcomed the stranger, with whom he had a short conversation, which I did not hear, as I was holding the pony at a little distance.  I only caught the words, uttered by my uncle, "We will make ready a small upper room, and to that you shall be welcome as long as you remain in these parts."
He then told me to take the mustang round to the stable, to rub him down, and feed him well, and to bring the minister's saddle-bags into the house.  When I returned, after having obeyed these orders, I found the stranger seated at table--on which Aunt Hannah and Lily had spread supper--talking cheerfully; and from what he said I gathered that he had visited a number of outlying settlements, accompanied by several young ministers, one of whom he had left at each.
"I had no one to bring on here, and was unwilling to leave you without the `bread of life,' so I was fain to come on myself," he observed.
I wondered what he could mean.  Aunt Hannah explained, after he and Uncle Mark had gone out, that he was one of those energetic Gospellers who had done so much for the back settlements of America; that he was an overseer among them--his duty being to move from place to place to form new congregations where none existed, and to strengthen and encourage the older ones.
He had much conversation with Kepenau and Ashatea, with whom he could converse in their own language.  They were evidently deeply interested in what he said, and I saw him frequently produce his Bible and refer to it to strengthen what he was saying.  Kepenau had, as I have already said, some knowledge of Christianity, and he and his daughter very gladly received the instruction which the missionary afforded them.
Uncle Stephen went out and succeeded in bringing in three or four of our neighbours, among whom were Mr Claxton and Reuben, and we had a regular service in the cottage,--the first of the sort I can recollect.  The Bible was read, prayers were offered up, and the missionary gave an address; after which some of Wesley's hymns were sung by Lily and Dora-- Ashatea occasionally joining in, with a very sweet voice, although she had never heard them before.
Mr Claxton afterwards begged the missionary to come and visit old Samson.  He gladly complied; but I heard him next day tell Uncle Stephen that he feared no impression had been made on the old trapper's heart. "Still, I do not despair," he added.  "It may be as hard as iron, or stone; but iron can be melted by the fire, and stone worn away by the constant dripping of water.  One thing I know,--that nothing is too difficult for God to accomplish; though we, his instruments, are obliged to confess our own weakness."
I must not, however, dwell further on the various events which took place at this time.
Martin Godfrey spent some days with Uncle Stephen, preaching every evening in the open air, and three times on the Sabbath; and he promised the people, if they would put up a chapel, that he would ere long find a minister for them.  Having distributed some Bibles and other books contained in his saddle-bags, he at length mounted his mustang and went his way.
I remember Uncle Stephen asking him if he was not afraid of travelling without firearms.
"I trust to One well able to protect me," he answered, smiling. "Whenever I have to employ the arm of flesh, I find my trusty stick sufficient to defend myself against hostile Indians or savage beasts;" and as he whisked it round his head with a rapidity which dazzled the eyes, I could easily understand how it would prove a formidable weapon against either bears or wolves--a tap of it on their skulls being sufficient to stun them; while it seemed to me that he might be able to ward off either the arrows or the tomahawks of hostile Indians.
Kepenau and Ashatea returned to their settlement; and the old trapper, who had now recovered, began to make preparations for his departure.  He had again invited Reuben to join him, but Mr Claxton, very wisely, would not hear of his son going away with the old man.
"It is more than likely we shall never see him again," he observed. "Whatever his fate may be, you would probably share it; either to be killed by Indians, or starved, or drowned, or frozen to death, or torn to pieces by bears or wolves."
Reuben was inclined to complain.  "Father thinks I cannot take care of myself," he said to me.  "As old Samson has spent so many years out trapping by himself, why should not I have as good a chance of escaping from danger?"
"There is an old saying, `That the water-pot which goes often to the well, gets broken at last,'" I observed.  "Such may be the case with regard to old Samson; and you know nothing of the country, or of the cunning of the Redskins, and would be very sure to lose your life if he lost his."
The old man, who had set his heart on obtaining a companion of some sort, succeeded in persuading a half-breed to accompany him.  This was a man named Sandy McColl, whose father was a Scotchman and his mother an Indian, and who had long been accustomed to the wild life of the prairies.  He had come to the settlement intending to remain, and had built a hut and begun to cultivate a garden, with the intention, as was supposed, of taking unto himself a wife; but the damsel on whom he had set his affections had refused him.  Sandy after this became very downcast; he neglected his garden, and spent most of his time wandering about gun in hand, shooting any game he could come across.  He had few associates, and was of a morose disposition.  People, indeed, whispered that he had been guilty of some crime or other, and was forced to leave the part of the country where he had before resided.  Uncle Stephen, who occasionally exchanged a few words with him, did not believe that this was the case, and declared that Sandy, in spite of his taciturnity and love of solitude, was an honest fellow.  Be that as it may, Samson was satisfied with him, and the two agreed to start together.
Soon after the old man's arrival, he had asked Reuben and me to make a journey to the place where he had left his other packs of skins hidden away; and he described the spot so exactly, that we believed we should have no difficulty in finding it.  My uncle said I might go with Mike Laffan.  Reuben, too, got leave from his father; and Sandy volunteered to accompany us.  Without him we should, I believe, have lost our way, for he knew the country much better than we did.
We had to proceed cautiously during the latter part of the journey for fear of Indians, as we were far in advance of the territory claimed by the white men.  But I do not give an account of the expedition, because, in reality, we met with no adventure worthy of notice.  Thanks to Sandy, we discovered the packs, and succeeded in bringing them back safe to their owner; for which Samson was very grateful, and rewarded us handsomely.  With the proceeds he purchased two mustangs, six beaver-traps, a supply of powder and shot, and other articles.  Sandy had the means of obtaining another mustang, and such supplies as he required.
After this old Samson quickly recovered.  As soon as he was well enough he and Sandy mounted their ponies, reserving a third animal to carry their goods; and having bidden us all good-bye, they set off into the wilderness--going to the westward, intending to push forward to the spurs of the Rocky Mountains, where, they said, game in abundance was to be found.  Reuben, who was really a very good fellow, soon got reconciled to remaining at home and attending to his duty.
Kepenau had made me promise to come and visit him, and had agreed to send one of his people with a canoe to take me to his lodges; and at last the Indian arrived at our hut.
Kepenau, he said, had sent but a small canoe, as we might thus more easily make our way up the stream, and pass the several portages we should have to go over.
I knew that Reuben would take delight in the excursion, so I hurried to the settlement to see if he could come.  His father was very willing to give him leave, as it might turn his thoughts from the wilder and more dangerous adventures on which he was set.  He had, some time before this, obtained a birch-bark canoe, which Kepenau, and sometimes Ashatea, had taught him how to use; and as he was constantly practising, he was by this time well able to employ his paddle.  We obtained leave to take Mike Laffan with us, too; and thus, with the Indian, we made a party of four in the two canoes.
We carried our guns and axes and the usual woodmen's knives, a pot and pan for cooking our meals, some tin cups, and a few small bales of cloths and coloured calicoes with which to pay the Indians for any peltries they might have to sell--for our expedition was on business as well as pleasure.  We enjoyed the thoughts of it all the more on that account.  We expected also to get some hunting, and to come back with a supply of dried venison, as well as some skins.
The Indian told us that his name was Kakaik, or the "Small Hawk;" he let us understand that he was a great hunter, but as he could speak no English, and as we understood but a few words of his language, we could not carry on much conversation with him.  However, we managed to understand each other very well by means of signs.
The first part of the voyage was along the main river, with which we were well acquainted.  We afterwards struck off up one of its tributaries, which varied greatly in width; sometimes it expanded into a lake-like form, and at other parts it contracted into narrow dimensions, where the current ran with great force, and we had hard work to stem it.
At length we reached a waterfall of nearly thirty feet in height, where the river rushed over the rocks and fell down perpendicularly in masses of foam.  Kakaik made signs to us that we must land and carry our canoes for some distance through the wood.  This is what is called making a "portage."  Accordingly we unloaded them, and piled up our goods at the foot of the fall.  We then lifted the canoes out of the water; Kakaik taking one bottom upwards on his shoulders and walking off with it. Mike imitated his example, as one man could get between the trees better than two, and the canoes were so light that they could be carried with ease.  Reuben, shouldering a portion of the goods, followed the Indian; and I, with another bale on my shoulders and the paddles and gun under my arm, kept close after Mike--leaving the remainder of the things for a second trip.
The ground was rough in the extreme, and it was some way up a steep bank among rocks.  My fear was lest Mike should knock the canoe against the branches of the overhanging trees and make a hole in her bottom, so I sang out to him to be cautious.
"Faix!  Masther Roger, it's that same I intind to be," he answered.  "I have no fancy to walk all the way back again, or forward either, if this is the sort of ground we should have to pass over."
We had to traverse a quarter of a mile or more till we saw the stream ahead of us, running placid as before.  Kakaik, going down into the water, placed his canoe gently on the surface, and then helped to take Mike's off his shoulders.  The goods we had brought were next placed in them, and the Indian sat down on the bank to watch them while we went back for the remainder.
"Suppose some hostile Indians or prowling bear should have paid a visit to the landing-place, and carried off our property," said Reuben.
"We will hope for the best," I answered, laughing; "but I will take my gun, in case of accidents."
CHAPTER FIVE.
AN INTRUDER--WE ARRIVE AT KEPENAU'S CAMP--ASHATEA INQUIRES KINDLY AFTER LILY AND DORA--DEER-HUNTING--THE STRANGE INDIANS--KEPENAU'S PRECAUTIONS--MIKE AMUSES THE CAMP WITH HIS FIDDLE--OUR FAREWELL-- KAKAIK'S ADVICE WITH REGARD TO RAPID-SHOOTING--THE TREACHEROUS INDIAN ON SHORE--MIKE AND I PADDLE DESPERATELY--THE CANOE IS UPSET--CARRIED DOWN THE STREAM--A NATURAL PLACE OF CONCEALMENT IN A HOLLOW TRUNK--MY TERROR ON PERCEIVING THE INDIANS--FORCED BY HUNGER TO LEAVE MY CONCEALMENT, I AM TAKEN PRISONER BY FOUR INDIANS.
On arriving at the foot of the falls we found our goods safe; but just as we were about to shoulder them we heard a rustling among the bushes. Advancing cautiously towards the spot, not knowing what might be there, I caught sight of a dark hairy form.  It was a brown bear, which in another minute would in all likelihood have been examining our property with no delicate fingers.  I hesitated to fire, for I was sure that I should be unable to hit any vital part; and as even a brown bear, if wounded, will turn furiously on his pursuers, before I could have reloaded the beast might have been upon me.  In another instant Bruin had plunged in among the thick underwood, and was concealed from view; but I heard him making his way rapidly from us, doubtless considering that discretion was the better part of valour.
Having taken up our goods, and looked carefully round to see that nothing was left behind, we set off towards the canoes.  Kakaik by this time had them both secured alongside the bank, so that we quickly reloaded them and recommenced our voyage up the stream.
I asked Mike to sing one of his Irish songs: this he was never loath to do, and he soon made the banks echo with his melody.  As soon as he had ceased, the Indian took up the strain with one of his native songs.  It was melancholy in the extreme, and contrasted greatly with Mike's joyous notes.
"Faix! if it's tears he wants to draw from our eyes, I can bate him there," observed Mike, when Kakaik had ceased; and he began one of those sad ditties descriptive of the death of some Irish heroine.  Though the Indian could not understand the meaning, he appeared to be much affected, and it was some time before he began another song.  From the few words we could make out, we supposed him to be recounting the misfortunes of his people, and their departure from the hunting-grounds of their fathers.
Mike had brought his fiddle, but of course he could not play it while paddling.
"When we get to Kepenau's, I'll show the people what I can do, and set them all jigging away, and laughing till they split their sides," he observed.
The scenery amid which we passed was wild in the extreme.  Not a sign of a human being, or a habitation of any sort, was visible.  Sometimes dark rocks rose up in precipitous cliffs on both sides of us, and at other times the trees of the forest overhung the water.  We had several portages to make, as it was easier to carry the canoes over the land than to drag them up the rapids, but Kakaik signified that on our return we might shoot them without danger.
At last, in the far-off distance, we caught sight of a wreath of smoke ascending from near the bank, and from the gestures of the Indian we understood that we were now approaching Kepenau's camp.  In a short time shouts were heard, and we saw several wigwams erected on the greensward in a recess of the forest, surrounded by trees which sheltered them completely from the wind.
A canoe immediately put off and came paddling out towards us; then turned round and accompanied us back to the bank, on which Kepenau, with Ashatea and other members of his family, stood ready to receive us.  As we shook hands he told us how glad he was to see us; and Ashatea had many questions to ask about Lily and Dora.
"I have been longing to come and visit them again," she said.  "Now that the rice is ripe, I want to take them down to the lake where it grows, that we may gather our canoe full."
Kepenau said that his people would be very glad to receive the goods we had brought, and would be ready to purchase them with their beaver-skins and other peltries, of which they had a considerable store.
When we talked about hunting, he assured us that we need have no fear of obtaining plenty of sport, as, with our rifles, we should be certain to kill the game much more easily than his people could do with their bows and arrows.  A hunting-party was accordingly arranged for the next day, on the shores of a lake some miles off.  He had already transported a couple of canoes to it, so that, should any of the deer take to the water, we might be able to pursue them.  Ashatea was much inclined to come with us, but her father told her that she would be acting more like an English girl if she would stay at home and attend to household affairs.
We started the next morning with Kepenau, Kakaik, and several other Indians, who carried long spears as well as bows and arrows.  We were also accompanied by a pack of dogs, well-trained by the Indians for chasing the deer, though they were noisy, ill-looking curs.
We commenced our hunt at some distance from the shores of the lake, but for an hour or more we saw no signs of deer, and Reuben and I began to fancy that we should have to return home without venison.
We had separated from Kepenau, but now we heard his voice, and immediately afterwards the dogs gave tongue.  We were looking about to ascertain in what direction to bend our steps, when a fine deer started out from among the trees on our right into the open glade.  My gun being ready, I fired, and felt sure that I had wounded the deer; but the animal still continued its course.  The next instant the dogs appeared from the same direction, in hot chase after the deer.
We followed, joined by Kepenau and the other men.  Marks of blood on the grass showed us that the deer had been wounded.  Still, it might run, should the dogs not overtake it, for several miles, and might escape us after all.  It was too valuable a prize to be lost, so we continued the pursuit.
The country now became much more open, and we saw that the deer had made its way across the plain.  On the further side there were some lofty pines, towards which the animal appeared to have directed its course.
We had been running on for several minutes, when, before I could distinguish anything, the exclamations of the Indians showed me that the deer was in sight; and presently I saw it standing at bay under the trees, with the dogs yelping round it and preventing it from proceeding further.
When I got within gun-shot, I stopped for a moment to reload my rifle; and crying out to my friends not to get in the way, I again fired, and the noble beast rolled over.  Kakaik then dashed forward with his hunting-knife, and quickly put an end to the creature's sufferings, while the rest beat off the dogs.
The deer was soon cut up, and each man loading himself with as much as he could carry, the venison was conveyed to the spot selected for an encampment; where two of them remained to take care of it while we went in search of more game.
We had been for some time beating about, when once more we heard the dogs giving tongue; and after making our way through the forest, and reaching the borders of an open glade, we caught sight of a herd of eight or ten deer scampering along at full speed, with the pack of dogs at their heels.  We all of us fired, but although two or three shots took effect none of the deer stopped.  We saw them directing their course towards the lake; but they ran faster than we did, and did not allow us an opportunity of firing.  We managed, however, to keep them in view, and saw that they did not turn either to the right hand or to the left, so that we felt sure of overtaking them when they reached the shore of the lake.
Kakaik, who was on my left hand, made signs to me to accompany him towards the spot where we had left one of the canoes.  I also understood him to signify that the dogs would prevent the deer from turning back. On reaching the canoe he lifted me into it, and stepping after me, seized a paddle, and with a few strokes sent it skimming out into the lake.  Rounding a point, we soon caught sight of the deer, which stood on the shore with the dogs barking behind them.  The shouts of some of the people who now came up increased the terror of the poor animals. First one plunged into the water, then another, and another; till the whole herd, with the exception of two which had fallen, were striking out in different directions, making for the opposite bank.
Kakaik pointed out one fine deer, and paddled towards it.  I might have shot the animal, but my Indian companion made signs to me to use a spear which lay at the bottom of the canoe; so, standing up, I grasped the weapon with both my hands, and drove it with all my force into the creature's skull.  In an instant its head went down, and its feet rising, it lay dead on the surface.  Kakaik handed me a rope to cast round its antlers, and we forthwith towed it in triumph to the shore. This done, we made chase after a second deer, which was swimming across the lake towards a spot some little way off.  Greatly to my satisfaction, I succeeded in striking this animal as I had done the first.
In the meantime the other canoe was paddling away in chase of two more deer, which had made towards the further end of the lake.
While we were occupied as I have described, I saw a third canoe, paddled by two strangers, darting out from behind a point in pursuit of another deer.  Whether the people were friends or foes, I could not tell; but as soon as Kakaik saw them he declared that they were the latter, and that we must be prepared for an attack should they have many companions in the neighbourhood.
"Then let us at once tow our deer up the lake towards the camp, where we can obtain assistance," I said.
I now observed that those who had been unable to embark in the canoe were making their way in that direction.  They had probably caught sight of the strange Indians.  My fear was that Kepenau and Reuben might be attacked on their return.  I made signs to my companion that we would land the deer and then go to the assistance of our friends.  As Reuben and I had our rifles, and the strange Indians were probably without firearms, we might easily keep them in check or put them to flight; or should they venture to attack us, we might sink their canoes, even if we did not kill them with our rifle-bullets, before they got up to us.
As we reached the shore at the end of the lake, we found Mike and several of the Indians standing ready to receive us.
Mike was fall of fight.  "Arrah! be aisy, Masther Roger," he said. "Sure, if the inimy come, I will sind them to the right-about wid me firelock, and they'll not be afther taking our venison from us in a hurry."
He and the Indians taking charge of the deer, which they immediately set about cutting up, Kakaik and I paddled off again down the lake to the assistance of our friends.  The strange Indians had succeeded in capturing one of the deer; but as we considered that it was their lawful prize, although we had driven it into the water, we did not interfere with them.
Seeing another deer still swimming, though at considerable distance, I fired at it, for the purpose of showing the strange Indians, in case they should not have heard our other shots, that we had firearms, and thus probably prevent them attacking us.  Whether or not my shot had taken effect I could not tell, as the deer continued to swim on towards the bank.
We now directed our course for our friends, who had killed the two deer of which they had gone in chase.  I told them of the strangers we had seen; and Kakaik, in his own language, gave a long account to Kepenau of the matter.
"We will let them alone, if they do not molest us," answered Kepenau, after expressing his approval of my conduct.
Having secured the bodies of the two deer to ropes,--Kepenau and Reuben towing one, and Kakaik and I the other,--we began to paddle back towards the end of the lake from which we had come.
As we passed the part of the shore near which I had shot the last deer, we observed several Indians, who had seized the animal as it landed, and were now employed in cutting it up.  They had evidently only one canoe with them, and were therefore afraid of coming off to attack us, whatever may have been their disposition.  We might, therefore, consider ourselves masters of the seas.
Kepenau was well pleased with the success of our expedition, and having made up his mind to live at peace with his neighbours, he was very glad to avoid a collision with the strangers, even though we might come off victorious.  "We must, however, be on the watch for them as we return homewards," he observed.  "They may possibly greatly outnumber our party; and though our firearms will keep them in check, they may try to overcome us by stratagem."
The deer we had first killed were soon cut up, and all the best parts made ready for transportation to the camp.  Those we had now towed on shore were treated in the same manner; and each man being loaded with as much as he could possibly carry, we set off for the camp.  Here we found a blazing fire ready for cooking the venison, of which our friends ate an enormous quantity--with the exception of Kepenau, who was as moderate as we were.
Knowing that we had foes in the neighbourhood sentinels were posted, two of whom kept watch all the night round the camp; but the strangers, seeing us prepared, did not make their appearance, and on the following morning we started, an hour before dawn, on our return.  Kepenau kept in the rear, turning round very frequently to ascertain if we were followed.  He also gave his people directions to keep a look-out on either hand.  Once he caught sight of a warrior's plume in the distance, but although his eyes were of the sharpest he could not discover whether his foe approached nearer.  Before evening we arrived safely at his lodges; the ample supply of food we brought affording great satisfaction.  The chief, however, did not fail to send out scouts to bring word whether the enemy had ventured into the neighbourhood.  As no traces of them could be seen, Kepenau came to the conclusion that the strangers had gone off again to the westward, content with the game they had obtained.  Still, he thought it prudent, in case of treachery, to keep on the watch; and day and night two or three of the party were constantly scouring the country round, in search of tracks made by strange Indians.
The time had now arrived for us to return.  Mike had made himself a universal favourite; the Indians, notwithstanding their general gravity, delighting in the merry tunes he played on his fiddle.  He frequently set them jigging; and Reuben and I showed them how white people danced-- though neither of us had any exact notions on the subject.  Ashatea sometimes joined us, and moved about very gracefully, performing figures of her own invention, which I have since discovered greatly resemble those of the minuet of Europe.
She often told me how much she longed to go back and stay with Lily. Native of the wilds as she was, she had gained a taste for civilised life, she told Reuben and me.  We assured her that Lily and Dora would be delighted to see her, and that, if her father would allow her to accompany us, we should be glad to take her at once.  This, however, Kepenau refused.  He did not tell us why; only saying that he could not let her go unless he went with her, and for the present he must not leave his people, who had to hunt and fish, so as to lay in a store of provisions for the winter.
I should have said that at the back of the lodges were several pieces of cleared ground, on which Indian corn was growing and potatoes had been planted.  This showed that Kepenau and his people were in advance of the hunting Indians, who trust only to the chase for subsistence, and are thereby frequently reduced to a state of starvation.
All the inhabitants of the camp turned out to wish us farewell, and offered up prayers for our safety as we stepped into our canoes.  Kakaik and Reuben led the way in one canoe, and Mike and I followed in the other, flourishing our paddles over our heads as a farewell salute.  We plied them diligently, and, gliding rapidly down the stream, were soon lost to sight.  Having the current with us, we expected to reach home before nightfall, should no accident happen.
"I'm afther hoping that none of those Indians we saw the other day are lurking about, or maybe they will take a fancy to our packs of dried venison and skins, and stop us," observed Mike.
"What put that idea into your head?"  I asked.
"Sure, because they are cunning spalpeens; and as they know the way we must take, they are likely enough to be on the watch for us," he replied.
"We must be on the watch for them, then," I answered, laughing.  "If any of them appear, and look as if they intended to interfere with us, we shall have to show them the muzzles of our rifles; although, as I never have shot a man, I trust that I shall not be obliged to do so."
We paddled on for some time after this, and now and then we caught up Reuben's canoe and had a talk with him.  I told him what Mike had said.
"Oh!  I don't think there is much chance of that," he answered, lightly. "A few rifle-bullets will soon drive the fellows into the woods, if they show their noses."
We were now entering a part of the stream which ran between broken cliffs; on one side rocks rose almost perpendicularly from the water, their summits shaped like the parapets of ruined castles, while on the other the trees came down to the river's brink.  Kakaik reminded us that we were approaching a series of rapids; and he explained by signs that he would lead the way, and advised Mike and me to keep exactly in his course.  He and Reuben paddled on, therefore, while we followed at a little distance.  We saw them descend one of the first rapids. Immediately below this, in a turn of the river, was another, the fall in which being probably about four or five feet, was not sufficient to endanger the safety of the canoes if carefully handled.
We were approaching the highest of the rapids, which, as I have said, the other canoe had just descended, when we saw an Indian dart out from behind the trunk of a tree growing close to the water, and point his arrow at the first canoe, aiming at Reuben.  The arrow flew from the bow, but whether my friend was hit or not I could not say, as the canoe, darting down the rapid, was lost to sight.
We were too near the rapid to paddle back, for in turning round we should have run the risk of upsetting the canoe, when it would have been carried down sideways, and probably dashed to pieces.  Our only safe course, therefore, was to dash forward; and we hoped to pass the Indian before he could perceive us, or have time to fix another arrow in his bow.  Had we been in still water I might have lifted my rifle and shot the Indian, but I dared not leave my paddle for a moment.  Down the rapid we dashed, then, paddling with might and main to turn the canoe so as to be ready for the next descent.  The Indian had disappeared, but we heard his voice, calling, as we supposed, to his companions,--and directly afterwards we caught sight of him running along the bank among the trees; but he could not have seen us.
A short way below this was another and still more dangerous rapid. Kakaik signified that he had often shot it, but he at the same time advised that we should land and make a portage.  To do this was now, however, out of the question, as we should be seized by the Indians on shore did we land on the side on which they were; the only practicable one along which we could make our way.
"Paddle, Mike! paddle!"  I said in a low voice, fearing that I might be heard should I shout.  "Our only chance is to dash down the rapid.  We cannot stop to look out for rocks ahead, and must run all risks."
Mike saw this as well as I did.  "Sure, it's the only thing to be done, any way.  May all the saints in the calendar help us!" he exclaimed.
I don't think, however, that Mike had much faith in the saints, although he uttered the expression.
We dashed on, the water hissing and bubbling and foaming round us, and had almost reached the bottom, when I felt the bow of the canoe strike something.  The next instant I found myself struggling in the seething waters, and instinctively striking out for dear life.  Looking down the stream, I caught a glance of the canoe being rapidly hurried downwards, with Mike clinging to it.  The next moment, he and the canoe had disappeared.
I had been carried down some distance, when, on more perfectly recovering my senses, I discovered that I was happily near the side opposite to that on which I had seen the Indians.  I scrambled up on the bank, therefore, hoping to find some place of concealment before they could discover me.  I had not gone far, however, before I recollected that my footprints would certainly betray me.  I therefore retraced my steps and threw myself backwards into the water; and as I looked up towards the bank, I clearly perceived the marks I had left.
The river in this place was narrow, but though the current ran strong it was smooth, and I felt sure that I could swim across it and hide myself among some thick bushes which I saw growing over the water.  It was my only hope of saving myself, and I determined to run the risk; but no time was to be lost, as the Indians might look up the stream and discover me.  I struck out boldly, and found that I could stem the current, though it certainly required all the strength I possessed.  I looked down the stream every now and then, to ascertain whether the Indians were returning, which I thought they might do when they saw only one person clinging to the canoe; otherwise I kept my eye as steadily as I could on the bushes for which I was making.  Of course, I might have crossed the stream much more easily by allowing myself to be carried down with the current, but then I should have landed much below the place where I hoped to find concealment.  I could distinguish for some time, even amid the roar of the waters, the voices of the Indians as they shouted to each other; but they gradually became fainter and fainter, and this gave me encouragement, as it informed me that they were getting further off.
Even then I thought of poor Mike.  What might be his fate, should he be captured by the Indians?  His fiddle, and probably everything else in the canoe, would be lost, and he would have no means of softening their savage hearts.  With his fiddle in his hand, I felt that he might succeed in saving his life.  It may seem strange that such thoughts entered my mind at that time; but the truth is, I was less anxious about myself than I was about him.
I had got more than half-way across when I began to find my strength failing me.  It seemed that I should never reach the shore; still, I struck out, straining every nerve.  I was afraid at length that I should be obliged to allow myself to be carried down by the current, and be glad to cling to the first rock or bough I could reach.  My eyes were growing dim, and I could scarcely see the bushes on which they had so long been fixed.  Still I struggled on, determined if possible to succeed.  Suddenly I felt myself caught by an eddy, and the next instant I was carried close under the bank.  I was about to grasp one of the branches, when I recollected that the sharp eyes of the Indians would discover where my hand had crushed the leaves, so I resisted the temptation, turning myself on my back for a minute to rest; then I dived down, and came up again in the very middle of the bush.
I now without fear drew myself out of the water, and climbing up, discovered a thick trunk hollowed out by age, the larger portion of which had been broken off either by a storm or lightning, the boughs having sprung out of the remainder--forming, indeed, a natural pollard. No concealment could have been more perfect; for even an Indian's eye would fail to penetrate through the bark.  By slipping down I was concealed on all sides, while at the same time a slit in the trunk afforded me a "look-out" through the boughs in the direction of the river.  Here, therefore, I considered that I was safe for the present. The difficulty would be to get away; although I might remain concealed as long as I should desire, hunger would at length compel me to leave my hiding-place in search of food.  I remained crouched down, listening anxiously for any sounds which might indicate the whereabouts of the Indians.  Mike, I felt sure, had he escaped drowning, would be captured by them; but I had hopes that Reuben and his companion, by being so much ahead, might escape altogether.
The ground was excessively rough; numerous high rocky ridges, and intervening spaces filled by trees and dense underwood, abounded.
The fact that the Indians had been so long shouting to each other convinced me that they had not up to that time captured the first canoe. As I heard no one approaching, I should not have been afraid of leaving my hiding-place; but then I knew that my footsteps would betray me.
I must have remained an hour or more, when I heard voices in the distance.  The sounds came nearer, and I knew that the Indians were returning.  I scarcely dared to draw breath.  They passed close to the tree in which I lay concealed; but I did not venture to look out, lest they should discover me.  I was sure as they went along that they were trying to discover my trail.  I knew, too, by the voices, that there was only a small party.  What had become of the rest?
I calculated, by the direction their voices came from, that they were making their way up the stream.  Some distance off, the low cliffs between which the river forced its way were surmounted by trees, which formed a natural bridge.  I knew, therefore, that should they wish to get to the opposite side they might easily pass over.
Nearly another anxious hour went by, when I again heard their voices coming across the stream; and looking through the slit, I saw three painted savages standing together in the shallow water, narrowly examining the bank on both sides.  Presently one of them stopped and pointed at the marks which my feet had made as I sprang up the bank.  I saw them standing consulting eagerly together, but whether their sagacity would enable them to decide if I had gone forward across the country, or leaped back into the water, I could not tell.  I anxiously watched, in order to ascertain to what decision they had come.  At length one of them climbed up the bank and looked about; then the others followed, and walked for some distance, closely scrutinising the ground. At first I hoped that they were at fault.  I had noticed that the bank was composed, a little way on, of hard stones, which could scarcely, I thought, receive any impression from my feet.
They went on for some distance; and then I saw from their gestures that they were fairly puzzled.  At length they came back to the bank, and gazed down at the rapidly-flowing stream.  They were evidently of opinion that I could not have swam across it.  Greatly to my relief, I saw them continuing their course down the river, examining the bank as they went along, under the belief that I must have landed again further down, or else have been swept away by the current.  This greatly relieved my mind.  I sincerely hoped that they would give me up as lost, and abandon the idea that they should have the pleasure of exhibiting me to their squaws, and torturing me.
On and on they went, until they disappeared among the trees which grew on the bank.  Whether or not they would again cross the stream I could not tell, or if indeed they had the means of doing so.  They had come from the right bank, so I concluded that they must know of some way or other to get back to it.  Still, I was anxious to be certain that they had done this before I left my shelter.  I had made up my mind to swim back, and to descend the stream on the left bank, following it down till I reached home.  There were by this time ripe fruits of all sorts to be found, I knew, so that I had no fear of starving.
I sat crouched dowd, feeling very much as I suppose a hare does, listening for the hunters--eager to be off, yet not daring to leave her cover.  Hour after hour passed by, but I could hear no sounds except the notes of the birds in the trees, the woodpeckers searching for insects in the bark, and the cries of the squirrels as they skipped from branch to branch.  I really wished that one of them would poke his nose into my nest, that I might have the chance of capturing him, for I was getting very hungry, and would have eaten him raw without compunction; but none came within my grasp.
At last I could bear it no longer.  Food I must have, or strength sufficient would not be left me to swim across the river.  I fully believed that the Indians had gone to a distance, and that I might therefore make the attempt without being seen by them.  However, I did not intend to swim directly across, as I had done before, but to allow myself to float down with the stream, paddling easily till I could gain the opposite bank.  I should thus be assisted rather than impeded by the current.
I nerved myself up for the enterprise.  I believed that it would be more easy to make my way out of the hole through the branches on the land-side, and then, going round them, take to the water where there was no back eddy.  I had observed, a little lower down, that the current set directly across to the opposite bank, and it was this which had caused me so much trouble to reach the spot where I now was.
Popping up my head, I was about to climb out of the hole, when what was my horror to see four Indians sitting silently smoking their pipes, directly in front of me!  To escape was impossible, for I knew that they had perceived me by the loud grunts they uttered, and by one of them immediately springing to his feet and rushing forward towards the tree.
Endeavouring to conceal my fears, I leaped down and advanced towards them, putting out my hand.  Instead of taking it, the man who was advancing grasped me by the shoulder; while the others burst into a loud guttural laugh, as much as to say, "You thought yourself very clever, young master, but we have outwitted you."
How they came to know that I was in the tree, I could not divine; perhaps they only suspected that I was in the neighbourhood, from not finding my dead body lower down, and had taken their seats on that spot by chance.
One of the men now addressed me, but I could not understand a word he said.  I answered him, however, in English, interspersed with such Indian expressions as I could recollect.  He on this rose to his feet, patted me on the shoulder, and pointed to the tree; intimating, as I fancied, that I had been very clever to conceal myself as I had done, but that he and his companions were cleverer still to discover me.
As I was famishing, for my anxiety had not taken away my appetite, I thought it as well to let them understand that I wanted something to eat.  Espying some berries growing on bushes near at hand, I pointed to them; and the man who held me letting me go, I sprang forward and ravenously devoured a number.  They quenched my thirst, though they did not much tend to appease my hunger.  One of the Indians, suspecting that this was the case, produced some dried buffalo meat from his pouch, and offered it to me.
I thanked him by signs, and showed how I appreciated his gift by immediately eating it up.  He and his companions, on observing how hungry I was, again laughed.  One of them now pointed to the sun, which was getting low, and made me understand that I must accompany them.  As I knew that I had no chance of escaping, I nodded,--as much as to say that I was ready to go if they wished it,--and tried to look as cheerful as possible.
Their leader, the man who had first spoken to me, pointed to the west and stalked off; and two of the others seizing me by the arms, one on each side, we followed him.
CHAPTER SIX.
My captors led me along at a rapid rate over the rough ground; nimbly climbing the rocks, and dragging me after them without much consideration as to whether I was hurt or not.  Of course, I had made up my mind to attempt escaping on the first opportunity.  Perhaps they suspected this, for they took good care not to afford me the chance.
On we went due west, as I knew by the position of the sun, scorning all impediments--up hills and across valleys, through streams and marshes. They were, I knew, in an enemy's country, and were in a hurry to get out of it.  Their leader did not fail to keep a look-out on every side-- sometimes hurrying on ahead to the top of a rock, from whence he could take a glance over the country around to ascertain whether any one was moving; still they did not appear to be very anxious, and they must have been aware of the exact spot in which Kepenau and his tribe were encamped, while they knew that they were not likely to encounter other foes.
We must have traversed a good many miles before the sun set; and a thick grove now appearing ahead, with a stream running by its side, they hurried towards it.  Having entered the grove, they immediately began stripping off the bark from some of the older trees, and collecting firewood.  With the bark they formed a lean-to; and igniting the wood, they soon had a fire blazing.
While the daylight lasted they allowed me to search for berries; one of the party helping me, but keeping a constant watch on my movements.  The rest, in the meantime, toasted on sticks some dried buffalo meat, a small portion of which they gave to me.  Having satisfied my hunger, and feeling very tired, I lay down before the fire, glad of the warmth; for my clothes, though partly dry, were still damp, and I every now and then gave a shiver, which made me fear that I was going to be seized with illness.
From the way in which my captors had hitherto behaved towards me I hoped that I should not be ill-treated, and believing that I should some day or other make my escape, I determined not to be unhappy.  I was soon, therefore, fast asleep.  Just before I closed my eyes I saw the Indians sitting round the fire smoking their pipes, and eagerly discussing some subject or other--probably, what they should do with me--but, in spite of my precarious position, I never slept so soundly in my life as I did for some hours.  When I at length awoke, I saw that a few embers alone of the fire remained.  One of the Indians was walking up and down, acting as sentry; while the others lay, with their feet towards the fire, wrapped in their buffalo robes.  I was nearly certain that they were the same men who had discovered my footprints, and they probably had then left their robes concealed somewhere while they searched for me in the river, and had afterwards resumed them.
How I wished that that sentinel would sit down and go to sleep!  If he should do so, I had determined to get up and run away.  They would be unable to follow my tracks in the dark, so that I should have a long start of them; and I thought that I might possibly reach the river before they could overtake me, and either swim down it, or get floated down on a log of timber or a raft of rushes.
I had still my axe in my belt, which the Indians had not taken from me, as also my hunting-knife.  I was nearly throwing away the first when crossing the river, but, feeling its value, I resolved to keep it as long as I could, and was very glad I had done so.  Once the thought came into my mind that, should the sentry at last go to sleep, I might kill all the Indians with my axe before they could awake.  I remembered a story I had heard of a white woman who had been made prisoner thus killing all her captors while sleeping, and ultimately escaping; but I put the idea from me as a temptation of Satan, and felt more happy when I had done so.  They had unjustly made me captive, it is true, but they were only following the instincts of their savage nature; and it would be a dreadful thing to think of afterwards, should I deprive them of life.
As the sentry kept his post, and presently brought some more wood, which he threw on the embers, I felt sure that he was not likely to neglect his duty; therefore, closing my eyes, I again went off to sleep.  When I next awoke the Indians were yawning and stretching themselves.  One got up, and then another, and I saw that day had broken.
I sprang to my feet, and the idea came into my head to pretend that I was not aware I was their captive; so, putting out my hand, I signified that I would wish them a good morning and take my way homewards.  They shook their heads--laughing, however, as if they thought the idea a good joke; and two of them walking on either side of me, we set off in the same order as before.
We travelled on all day, till, leaving the hilly country and crossing several streams, we saw the wide prairie stretching out before us, beyond some thick clumps of trees.  Towards one of these clumps the Indians advanced, when I heard the neigh of a horse.  In a few minutes we saw a couple of Indians, who had charge of several steeds tethered among the trees.  A few words were exchanged between my captors and them, after which they immediately set to work to build a lean-to and light a fire.  From this I knew that they were going to pass the night in the wood.  Again the hope rose in my breast that I might have a chance of escaping, but I tried to put on as unconcerned an air as possible.
The Indians we had found in the wood exhibited the carcass of a deer, which they had, I supposed, killed during the day.  This was quickly cut up in large pieces, and placed before, the fire to roast.
"I only hope, my friends, that you will gorge yourselves till you are unable to move," I thought.  "Then, if I can but get on the back of one of those horses, I will gallop off to the hills, and not let you see my face again if I can help it."
I was not sorry, however, to eat some of the venison which the Indians gave me; and then I lay down and pretended to go to sleep.  They sat up feeding for some time after this; then, greatly to my disappointment, one got on his feet and began to walk backwards and forwards, while the rest stretched themselves on the ground, as they had done the night before.  I watched and watched, and at last believing that they were too cunning to allow me to escape, I closed my eyes and went to sleep.  I awoke twice, and on each occasion observed that one of them was on the watch.
When daylight appeared they all rose, and after shaking themselves, the horses were caught and they got on horseback; their leader making a sign to me to mount one of the spare animals, of which there were several. This done, we immediately set off at full gallop across the plain, taking a south-westerly direction.  We stopped twice during the day, to allow our animals to crop the grass; while we took some food, a stream near at hand supplying us with water.
Towards evening I espied several wigwams partly concealed by the wood before us.  On approaching nearer, I saw that they were very different from those to which I had been accustomed further east, where the Indian dwellings are constructed of birch-bark.  These were, however, much larger; the framework, consisting of long poles tied together at the top in a conical shape, was covered with the tanned skins of buffalo and deer, and was ornamented with figures of animals and men,--apparently hunting scenes.
There were five or six of these wigwams pitched close together.  Several women were moving about, or sitting on the ground.  In front of one stood a tall man wrapped in a buffalo robe, with a spear in his hand, whom I at once guessed to be the chief.  He contemplated us, as we drew near, without moving, or seeming in any way interested.  This manner was, I suspected, put on to show his own importance, when he discovered that a white person was among our party.  Getting still nearer, another Indian, who had been, I concluded, sleeping, and just awakened by the tramp of our horses, crawled out of the tent to have a look at us.  It was a perfect scene of Indian domestic life.  Near the chief, his wife sat on the ground playing with her child, a fat little urchin; a second woman was busy chopping wood; a third was coming in, axe in hand, with a huge bundle of sticks on her back, and a child clinging round her neck while a dog was too busy gnawing a bone to turn round and bark at us.
On drawing near, our leader got off his horse, and ordered us also to dismount.  We then approached the chief, to whom he described, as I concluded, the mode in which I had been taken prisoner.  The clever way in which I had hidden myself, and the efforts I had made to escape, elicited no small amount of admiration from the chief.  I could, of course, only guess at what he said, but I caught a word here and there; and he looked down on me and smiled with such benignity as his stern features were capable of assuming.  At all events, I thought that these people, whatever they might do, would not torture me or put me to death.
My captors having unsaddled their horses, turned them adrift to pick up food on the surrounding prairie, where the grass grew with unusual luxuriance.  The men then went to their lodges, leaving me with the chief.  He seemed to have taken a fancy to me from the first, and now invited me into his lodge, where his wife brought me a mess of broth, which, hungry as I was, I found very palatable.
The floor of the greater part of the lodge was covered with buffalo-skins, and a sort of divan, composed of stuffed cushions, was arranged round the walls; while in the centre burned a large fire, from which ascended volumes of smoke through the aperture at the top, though no small quantity pervaded the wigwam.  Though disagreeable, it had the effect of driving away mosquitoes and other flying things.
I had not expected to be so well treated; still, I could not tell how long the chief might remain in his present good-humour.
The chief's name was, I found, Aguskogaut.  The tribe into whose hands I had fallen were Sioux, who live entirely on the prairies, and subsist by hunting the buffalo.  They had come further east than they generally venture, in order that their warriors might make predatory excursions against the more pacific and civilised Indians living near the white men.  They seemed to have no fear of being attacked by the latter, as, being well supplied with horses, they could beat a rapid retreat to the westward; and I discovered that they had scouts out in all directions to give notice of the approach of a foe.
Not knowing how long I might be kept a prisoner, I set to work at once to try and learn the language of my captors.  The women, especially, were very ready to teach me; and my willingness to learn gaining me their friendship, they supplied me plentifully with food.  I was puzzled, however, to know on what account they had carried me off, as I certainly could in no way benefit them.  I concluded that one object might be to hold me as a hostage, in case any of their party should be taken prisoners.
The chief took me out riding with him, in search of deer or other game. He was armed with his bow and a long spear; and knowing that a bow would be of little use in my hands, he gave me a spear, with which to defend myself or attack any animals we might come across.  He kept a sharp look-out on me, however, in case I might try to escape; but I well knew that, under present circumstances, it would be useless to make the attempt.
We were successful the first day in running down a young deer, with which we returned to the camp.  As we approached, what was my surprise to hear the sound of a fiddle!  Surely those tones could be produced by no one but Mike Laffan!  Could he have escaped?  There, sure enough, as we rode up to the lodges, was Mike himself, standing in the midst of a group of Indians; while he was fiddling away with might and main, they were dancing to the best of their ability, and keeping very good time too.
On seeing me he shouted out, "Good luck to ye, Masther Roger!  Sure my heart was nigh breaking, when I thought ye had been drownded or shot to death by these rid gintlemen; but it would not do to show me grafe, lest it would make them think manely of me, so thinks I to meself, I'll fiddle away as long as me elbow can move."
All the time he was speaking, he continued to play as furiously as at first; most of those surrounding him jumping and whirling round and round, or keeping time with their hands.  The Indians, we knew, must have been aware that we were friends, and therefore it would be of no use to pretend that we were strangers to each other.
Mike was at length obliged to stop playing; upon which the chief ordered that he should be brought before him, and inquired how he had been captured.  What account those who had taken him gave, I could not make out; but Mike told me how, after the canoe had been upset, he had floated some way down the stream clinging tightly to it.  Most of the articles were soon thrown out.  The guns, of course, had at once gone to the bottom, but the bales floated down.  At last he saw his beloved fiddle washed out.
"Faix! it would have broken me heart to lose it," he observed; "so I made a grab and caught it and the bow, and held them tight, although the wetting, to be sure, was doing them no good.  Down I went, fasther and fasther.  I could hear the roar of the lower cataract.  Thinks I to meself, If I go over that I shall be done for, and just then I found the canoe carried by the current towards the shore.  I struck out with me feet to help it; and glad I was when, as I let them dhrop, I felt them touch the ground.  I sprang up the bank, but, to me sorrow, the canoe floated off, and it was more than I could do to get a hold of it again. I climbed to the top of a cliff, hoping to catch sight of you, or of Reuben and the Indian; but no one could I see.  And grieving from the bottom of me heart at the thought that you were lost, I scrambled down again, and made me way through the wood, guided by the sound of the waterfall.
"I went on and on till I had passed it, looking out for our friends; but not a glimpse of them could I see.  At last, as I was getting pretty tired, I thought to meself that I would climb up into a tree to get some rest, and hide away in case the inimy should be looking for me. Scarcely had I stowed meself away among the branches when I heard voices.  I dared not look out, but I guessed they were those of the Indians, who had by some means or other missed me tracks, and having gone down the bank before me, were now returning.  They passed by without seeing me, which shows that they are not always so sharp-sighted as is supposed.  I stayed up in the tree all night; but next morning, being very hungry, I came down to make me breakfast off the berries I had seen growing about.  There was no lack of them, and I was lucky enough to knock down two young squirrels with a stick I had picked up.
"I was not happy in me mind all the time at going away without looking for you, so, thinks I to myself, I'll try and find him.  I started up the stream again to the place where the canoe was upset.  Not a trace of you could I discover; so with a sad heart I began to make me way back again.  It struck me that, somehow or other, I must have wandered away from the river; and after trudging along all day I could nowhere find it.  I felt still more unhappy than I had done before, and so, thinking to solace myself, I sat down on a rock, and putting me fiddle to me chin, began playing away.  I tried one tune and then another, and a mighty dale of good it seemed to do me.  I was playing the `Groves of Blarney,' when half a dozen rid-skinned savages jumped out of the bushes and looked me full in the face.
"`Whoo!' says I.  `Whaugh!' says they, in chorus.  `Whoo!' says I again. On which they came nearer, flourishing their ugly-looking scalping-knives.
"`Is that what you're going to be afther?' said I, feeling uncomfortable on the top of me head.  `Keep off, me beauties, till I give you another tune.'  And putting up me fiddle to me chin--for I had let it drop, and small blame to me!--I began scraping away as if I would be afther shaking me arm off.
"`Whaugh!' says they again, beginning to skip and leap about.
"On this I played faster and faster; and the faster I played, the higher they bounded.  `It's all right,' thinks I to meself; `they will not be doing me any harm if I can keep them at that game.'  So I thought I had best give them a tune with me voice into the bargain; and I sang, and scraped, and shook me head, till they all burst out into fits of laughter.
"On this I got up and made them a low bow; though I clapped my hat on again pretty quick, in case of accidents.  And says I--`If you will all sit down, and behave yourselves like dacent men, I'll tell you a tale which will astonish you.'
"Whether or not they understood me, I could not for the life of me tell; but, sure enough, down they all squatted.  And I began to recount to them how Daniel O'Rourke one night, returning from waking Widow Casey at Ballybotherem, and having taken a drop more than usual of the `crayther,' saw the fairies come dancing round him; and I went on to describe what Daniel said, and what the fairies did.  `And now,' says I, `just sit quiet where you are till I come back and finish me story.' And on this, giving another whoop, and a hop, skip, and a jump, I was making me way back to the river, when up sprang the Ridskins and came bounding afther me.  `Sure, thin,' says I, stopping short, and beginning to scrape away as before on me fiddle, `you don't understand me.'  And, by me faith, indade they did not; for without more ado they got round me, and suspecting that I had been bamboozling them, began to prick me with their spears behind, as a gentle hint that I was to march forward.
"Seeing that there was no use trying to make me escape--for, of course, six men can run faster than one--I took their hints, which were not to be mistaken, and stepped out in the direction they pointed, now and then playing a tune to keep up me spirits and put them in good-humour.
"The long and the short of it is, that they made me prisoner, and brought me along with them; until we found some horses, on which-- stopping a night or two on the way--we galloped along till we reached this place.
"And here I am, Masther Roger! well pleased to find that you're alive, and to bear you company."
And so Mike concluded his story.
The Indians allowed Mike and me to talk together without interfering with us.  I told him that I would try to escape as soon as I could.
"Sure, and that is what I'll be afther," he answered.  "But it's more easily said than done, I am afraid.  However, where there is a will there is a way; and cunning as the Ridskins think themselves, maybe we'll be even with them."
While we were talking we had observed some commotion among the inhabitants of the lodges; and presently we caught sight of a band of horsemen scouring across the prairie towards us, and flourishing their spears as they came along.  At first I thought they might be enemies; but as no preparations were made for the defence of the camp, I knew that they must be friends.  In a few minutes they galloped up; and the leading warriors, decked in war-paint and feathers, dismounted, each of them carrying one or more scalps hanging to the end of his spear.  Our chief, Aguskogaut, who had put on his finest robes, advanced to meet them while they stepped forward; and their leader began a long harangue, which sounded very fine, although I could not make out what it was all about.
Mike and I stood on one side, thinking it as well to keep out of the way.  The new-comers, however, after a time began to point towards where we were standing; and I guessed they were talking about us, and inquiring how we happened to be there.
Aguskogaut then, as we supposed, gave them an account of what had occurred; to which (as I judged from their gestures) they replied, that we ought to have been killed, and our scalps taken to adorn their lodges.  On this Aguskogaut--who was, happily, our friend--made another speech; and lifting up his hand to heaven, appeared to be invoking the Great Spirit, and letting his countrymen understand that we were under his protection, and that no harm must happen to us.  So successful was his eloquence, that the warriors appeared to be satisfied.  At all events, we were allowed to move about within sight of the camp, no one molesting us.
The next day there was a great feast in honour of the victory which had been gained.
Mike and I were generally kept apart; but we occasionally found opportunities for meeting, when we did not fail to discuss plans for escaping.  We were, however, too narrowly watched to allow at present of any of them being feasible: wherever we went, an Indian, apparently appointed for the purpose, had his eye on us.  Had we managed to mount any of the horses tethered near the lodges or feeding around, we should have been immediately tracked and followed.  Still, it kept up our spirits to talk of what we would do.  We were not otherwise ill-treated, and were amply supplied with dried buffalo meat.  Sometimes the hunters brought in a deer or a bear; but as there was always on such occasions a grand feast, the fresh meat did not last long.
At last, one morning the Indians turned out at daybreak, and immediately began taking down the tents and packing up their goods.  The coverings for the tents were divided and done up in bales, and then secured to the backs of horses.  The poor women were loaded with as much as they could carry, in addition to the younger children.  The chief's squaws were allowed to mount; but their animals were also loaded like the rest of the horses.  The men carried only their arms, and spare buffalo robes strapped on to their saddles.  Mike and I were compelled to assist in doing up the bales, the squaws showing us how to perform the operation; sometimes scolding us, at other times laughing at what they considered our clumsiness.
When all was done, we were left standing; so we concluded that it was the intention of the Indians to compel us to march on foot.
"Begorrah," exclaimed Mike, "I don't like this fun at all, at all!  See, there are two mustangs without anything on their backs!  Small blame to us if we just get astride them."  And suiting the action to the word, he leaped on to one of the ponies, while I mounted the other.  Whether they belonged to any of the Indians, we could not tell, but there were several spare animals besides.
Urging on our steeds, we joined the throng of warriors, who were already forming at a little distance from our late camp.  The chief laughed when he saw us, and exchanged remarks with some of his companions.  We concluded that these were in our favour, for we were allowed to retain our steeds.
The signal was now given to advance, and the tribe moved forward in a south-westerly direction.  Though we were glad to be on horseback, yet our spirits sank when we found that we were getting further and further from home, and saw our chances of escape diminishing.
"No matter," cried Mike; "the longer we stay with these Indians, the more we shall know of their ways, and be the better able to desave them. We must appear to be perfectly continted and happy, and try to spake their language--though it gives me a pain in me jaws whenever I utter one of their long words."
"You are right, Mike; I will try to practise your philosophy," I answered.
We marched on all day, stopping only for a short time to take our scanty meals.  We could proceed but slowly, on account of the women and loaded animals; but the warriors scoured over the plain on both sides of our line of march, either looking out for an enemy or in search of game. Mike and I, however, were kept with the main body.  At night we encamped either near a wood or by the side of a stream, where there were always trees to afford us fuel for our fires.  Thus we went on for several days.
The Indians were, we guessed, making for a region frequented by buffalo, which had not this year come so far east as usual.  At last we reached the spot at which they considered it desirable to remain; there being a full stream from which water could be obtained, and plenty of wood to afford fuel for our fires.  In every other direction, as far as we could see, the country was nearly level, with little or no timber of any size growing on it.  The women immediately set about their usual avocations. But as our meals were very scanty, it was evident that there was a scarcity of meat in the camp.
Early next morning a band of twenty men mounted their best horses to set out, as we concluded, in search of buffalo.  Without asking leave, Mike and I got on our steeds and joined them.  They did not object to this; probably supposing that we should not attempt to make our escape so far from home.  We each of us obtained a bow and a quiver full of arrows, besides a long spear.  None of the tribe possessed firearms.
We rode on for some distance, the main body keeping together, while scouts were sent forward to look out for buffalo.  At last we reached a broad stream, and were proceeding along the bank, when my companions became greatly interested; and looking out to the left, I saw the whole plain covered with a dense mass of dark objects, which I at once guessed to be buffalo.  It was evident that they were making for the river.  The Indians, urging on their horses, dashed forward to try to intercept the herd before they could cross it.  It seemed to me, however, that we should be too late to do that.
I could see the scouts galloping along the flank of the herd nearest us, trying to find an opening among them into which they might penetrate; while every now and then they let fly one of their arrows into the neck of an animal.  As to turning the herd, or preventing it from crossing the stream, they might as well have attempted to stop the falls of Niagara in their downward course.  With a tramp which shook the earth, and terrific bellowings sounding far across the plain, onward rushed the seemingly maddened creatures, tossing their heads, throwing high their tails, and turning up the earth in their course.
The river was reached before we could get up to them; and their leaders plunging in, they began to swim across, the animals in the rear driving those in front into the water.  The former would have treated the latter in the same way had they reached the edge of a precipice, when all would have gone over together.  As it was, they proved themselves good swimmers, quickly gaining the opposite bank, and rushing forward as at first.
Before we got within shot of them, the greater number had crossed; but the hunters, urging on their well-trained steeds, rode boldly up, shooting their arrows within a few feet of the creatures.  Three or four only fell; others seemed to take no notice of their wounds; and several, springing out of the herd, with heads lowered to the ground, plunged forward furiously at their assailants.  The nimble horses wheeled as they approached, and escaped the attack made on them; their riders never failing to discharge one or two arrows in return at the infuriated buffalo.  Had we possessed firearms, many more would have been killed.
The Indians had no intention of giving up the pursuit.  Where the herd had crossed the river, the water was too deep to allow us to wade over. At a signal from their leader, however, the hunters turned their horses, and galloped back in the direction from whence we had come; soon we reached a ford, where we all crossed, though the water almost covered the backs of our short-legged ponies.  The herd could still be seen in the far distance, so we immediately galloped on to overtake it.
Though called buffalo, the animal I am speaking of is really the bison. It has a protuberant hunch on its shoulders, and the body is covered, especially towards the head, by long, fine, woolly hair, which makes the animal appear much more bulky than it really is.  That over the head, neck, and fore part of the body is long and shaggy, and forms a beard beneath the lower jaw, descending to the knees in a tuft; while on the top it rises in a dense mass nearly to the tops of the horns, and is strongly curled and matted on the front.  The tail is short, and has a tuft at the end--the general colour of the hair being a uniform dun. The legs are especially slender, and appear to be out of all proportion to the body; indeed, it seems wonderful that they are able to bear it, and that the animals can at the same time exhibit the activity they seemed possessed of.
In summer the buffalo finds an abundance of food by cropping the sweet grass which springs up after the fires so frequent in one part or other of the prairies.  In winter, in the northern regions, it would starve, were it not possessed of a blunt nose, covered by tough skin, with which it manages to dig into the snow and shovel it away, so as to get at the herbage below.  In winter, too, the hair grows to a much greater length than in summer, when the hinder part is covered only by a very short fine hair, smooth as velvet.  Many thousands of these magnificent animals congregate in herds, which roam from north to south over the western prairies.  At a certain time of the year the bulls fight desperately with each other, on which occasions their roaring is truly terrific.
The hunters select, when they can, female buffalo, as their flesh is far superior in quality and tenderness to that of the males.  The females are, however, far more active than the males, and can run three times as fast, so that swift horses are required to keep up with them.  The Indians complain of the destruction of the buffalo--forgetting that their own folly in killing the females is one of the chief causes of the diminution of their numbers.
Huge and unwieldy as is the buffalo, it dashes over the ground at a surprising rate, bounding with large and clumsy-looking strides across the roughest country, plunging down the broken sides of ravines, and trying the mettle of horses and the courage of riders in pursuit of it.
To the Indians of the prairies the buffalo is of the greatest possible value, for they depend on these animals for their food, tents, clothing, and numerous other articles.  They dress the skins with the hair on, and these serve as cloaks or coverings at night.  The horns are converted into powder-flasks; the hides, when tanned, serve to cover their tents; and the wool makes a coarse cloth.  When the flesh is eaten fresh, it is considered superior in tenderness and flavour to that of the domestic ox; the hump especially being celebrated for its delicacy.  It is also cut into strips and dried in the sun; or it is pounded up with the fat and converted into pemmican.  The hides are used also for leggings, saddles, or, when cut into strips, form halters.  With the sinews, strings are made for their bows.  From the bones they manufacture a variety of tools--of the smaller ones making needles, and using the finer sinews as threads.  From the ribs, strengthened by some of the stronger sinews, are manufactured the bows which they use so dexterously.  The bladder of the animal is used as a bottle; and often, when the Indian is crossing the prairie where no water is to be found, he is saved from perishing of thirst by killing a buffalo and extracting the water which is found in its inside.
To resume: In spite of the rate at which the buffalo were going, we soon overtook them on our swift mustangs; and now began the most exciting part of our day's sport.  The leading portion of the herd kept close together; but in the rear the animals were separated--some lagging behind, others scattering on either side.  The Indians, with their bows drawn or their spears couched in their hands, dashed in among them, shooting right and left, or plunging their weapons into the shoulders of the brutes--so dexterously aiming the blows, that many of their victims fell pierced to the heart.
Mike and I, though good horsemen, were but little accustomed to the Indian weapons; and although we did our best, many of the buffalo at which we rode either escaped being wounded, or galloped off with our arrows sticking in their bodies.  We each of us, however, managed to kill an animal, and were galloping on, closely following one of the principal hunters, when a huge bull, after which the Indian was riding, turned suddenly round, and with its head to the ground rushed madly at him.  His horse for a moment stood stock-still, watching the buffalo, while the Indian shot his arrow.  It struck the animal on the neck, but failed to kill it.  I expected that the next moment I should see both horse and rider rolling on the ground; but the well-trained steed sprang nimbly on one side, and the now infuriated buffalo dashed towards Mike and me.  I shot my last arrow, but it glanced off the skull of the creature, which now came towards me, looking the picture of savageness.
I endeavoured to make my steed spring on one side, but barely in time to escape the tremendous battering-ram--for to nothing else can I liken the buffalo's head.  The creature went rushing on till it was met by two Indians, one of whom shot his arrow, while the other struck his spear so exactly in the buffalo's breast that the huge creature immediately fell over dead.
Such was the beginning of our day's hunt.  I was completely carried away by the excitement of the chase, and was as eager to kill buffalo as any Indian amongst them.  As I had exhausted all my arrows, I had now only my spear to trust to.  Had I been dependent on my own skill, I should have been quickly overthrown, and probably gored to death; but my well-trained mustang knew far more about the matter than I did, so I let him get out of the way of any of the animals which attacked me as he thought best.
I had singled out a young bull which turned off from the herd, and I followed it up, expecting to be able to get ahead of it, so that I might point my spear full at its breast in the way I had seen several of the Indians do, knowing that my mustang would spring on one side should it be necessary.  Suddenly the bull stopped; then turning round and seeing me before it, came rushing towards me.  I endeavoured to run my spear into its breast, and then make my steed spring out of the way.  I thrust my spear with all my force; but before I could let go my grasp it was whisked out of my hand, after which my horse sprang clear of the animal with a bound which very nearly threw me from the saddle, and had galloped some distance away before I could stop it.
What a glorious opportunity this would be for escaping!  I thought to myself.  Had Mike been near me, I should have proposed doing so.  I was looking round, to try and ascertain where he was, when down came my steed--having stepped into the hole of a prairie dog, numbers of which honeycombed the ground around--and I was thrown right over his head.  As I lay half-stunned, I saw to my horror the whole herd of buffalo tearing along towards me, ploughing up the turf with their hoofs, and bellowing loudly.  I fully expected to be trampled to death before many minutes had passed, or to be tossed high in the air over their shaggy backs.  My horse, looking up, saw his danger, and seemed to understand the state of affairs as well as I did.  He made desperate struggles to rise; and I endeavoured to get on my feet and seize the reins, hoping to mount before the herd was upon me.  I might thus gallop off, and keep ahead of them till I could find an opportunity of turning on one side.
I rose, but fell again before I could reach the reins which hung over my steed's neck.  Already I could almost see the eyes of the infuriated beasts; but I was not going to give up my life if I could help it.  I therefore made another desperate effort, and reaching the rein, patted the animal's nose, turning his eyes away from the approaching foe; then in an instant--I scarcely know how I did it--I was on his back.
I was fully aware that the same accident which had brought me to the ground might again occur; but of that I must run the risk.  Before, however, my horse could spring forward, the herd was close upon us. Digging my heels into his flanks, I urged him on, shrieking at the top of my voice.  The sound of the tramping hoofs behind him, the bellowing of the bulls, and the expectation every instant of being probed by their horns, made him strain every muscle to keep ahead of them.  His speed was far greater than theirs, and he soon distanced them; but still, the danger of again falling was imminent, for as we flew along I could see in every direction the burrows of those abominable little prairie dogs, though the inhabitants had taken good care to ensconce themselves far down out of the way of the hoofs of the buffalo.  Looking over my shoulder, I saw that by turning to the right I might soon get clear of the herd, which did not extend far on that side.  I accordingly pulled the right rein, so as to ride almost across the course the herd was taking; and observed, as I did so, a number of the Indians galloping along by the side of the buffalo, and shooting their arrows.
I was congratulating myself on the prospect of escaping, when down came my steed once more; and as I was as unprepared for the accident as before, I was thrown over his head, and more severely injured than at first.  Still, though partly stunned, I could see what was taking place. I fancied that I was, at all events, sufficiently to the right of the herd to escape being trampled to death, when just then a huge bull, who must have had his eye upon me, wheeled from his companions, and, putting his head to the ground, made, as I thought, towards me.  To escape by mounting my horse was now out of the question, for I had been thrown too far to seize the reins, and the poor animal still lay struggling to get his feet out of the hole.  Any other than a prairie horse would have broken his legs, or sprained himself irretrievably.  Just when I expected to be trampled to death or gored by the bull's horns, I saw that the savage creature was making towards my horse instead of me; but as it reached the mustang, the latter drew his feet out of the hole, and throwing up his heels at the bull's nose, scampered off, followed by his enemy, while the rest of the herd swept by like a torrent, not ten yards from where I lay.  Some stragglers, however, caught sight of me; and another big bull was rushing on to give me a taste of his horns and hoofs, when a loud "Whallop-ahoo-aboo!  Erin go bragh!" sounded in my ears.
"Don't be afraid, Masther Roger, me darlint!" shouted Mike, for it was he who had uttered the cry; and dashing forward with spear in rest, he struck the bull behind the shoulder with such force that his weapon must have pierced the animal's heart.  It swerved on one side, thereby enabling Mike to avoid trampling on me, and the next moment fell over perfectly dead.
A number of Indians passing at the moment, applauded Mike's achievement. I managed at the same time to get on my feet, and pointed to my horse.
"Ay, to be sure; I'll be afther him," cried Mike, "as soon as I can git me shtick out of this baste's carcass."
He tugged and tugged till he liberated his spear, then galloped off in the direction my horse had taken, leaving me by the dead bull.
I had no longer any fear of being knocked over by the buffalo, as all, except a few laggards, had passed by, and were further away to the left. I could just see Mike attacking with his spear the animal which had pursued my horse; but a faintness again came over me, and I was obliged to sit down on the ground.  I had no fear of being deserted, as I was sure that the Indians would come to look after the animals they had killed; and in a few minutes Mike returned, leading my horse, who appeared none the worse for his falls or his encounter with the buffalo.
We had by this time reached a part of the country where woods and hills could be seen rising here and there above the plain.  The rearmost of the buffalo had become separated, and many of the Indians, having exhausted their arrows, were now attacking them with their spears; two hunters generally singling out one animal, and riding alongside it till they had wounded it to death.  As far as I could see, on either side, the country exhibited an animated scene,--the buffalo scampering along in every direction, with Indians riding after them, their robes wildly flying in the air, while they flourished their spears above their heads. On the ground over which we had come could be distinguished numerous dark spots,--the bodies of the buffalo we had slain.  Indeed, our comparatively small party had, I afterwards found, killed upwards of two hundred animals; which will give some idea of the numbers annually slaughtered by the Indians.
At length they gave over the chase, and commenced the operation of skinning their victims, leaving most of the carcasses a prey to the wolves.  The tongues and humps, however, were generally secured, as well as the flesh of the cows, which is, as I have said, far superior in tenderness to that of the bulls.
The horses loaded with skins and meat, we returned at night to the camp; and as our captors had now an abundance of provisions, they were in an unusually good-humour.
"Sure, thin, but this wouldn't be a bad opportunity for us to git away from these rid gintlemen," observed Mike, as we watched them feasting on the produce of the day's hunt--stuffing such huge quantities of flesh into their insides, that it seemed impossible, were they long to continue the operation, that they would be able to move.
CHAPTER SEVEN.
MIKE'S PRECAUTION--WE AGAIN GO BUFFALO-HUNTING--THE PRAIRIE ON FIRE--A RIDE FOR LIFE--OUR ESCAPE FROM THE FIRE AND THE INDIANS--HOBBLING HORSES--THE FIRE IS STOPPED BY THE RIVER--A BRIEF SLEEP--OUR FISHING TACKLE--MIKE CATCHES A CAT-FISH--OUR LEAN-TO--MIKE LOSES HIS BOOK--THE VISIT OF BRUIN--A HEARTY MEAL--DEATH OF MIKE'S HORSE--I AM TAKEN SICK-- MIKE'S CAREFUL WATCH--MY HORSE IS DROWNED--OUR VISIT TO THE RICE-LAKE-- WE FIND LILY AND DORA THERE, WITH ASHATEA, IN A CANOE, GATHERING RICE-- LILY'S ACCOUNT OF MANILICK, THE YOUNG CHIEF, ASHATEA'S LOVER--KEPENAU'S ADDRESS--AGAIN TAKEN ILL--HOW I RECOVER.
Mike and I were on the watch for an opportunity of mounting our horses and galloping off unperceived by the Indians; but, though they feasted for several successive days, that opportunity never came. Unfortunately, so far as our enterprise was concerned, they had no whisky in the camp, and were therefore able to watch our movements.
In a few days the hunters again set out, to obtain a further supply of buffalo robes; not that these were required for their own use, but they intended to exchange them with the traders for whisky and other articles--especially firearms and ammunition.  The chief and two or three of the leading men had already procured weapons, although as yet they were by no means expert in their use.
"They'll soon give us a chance, if they get howld of the whisky," observed Mike; "so we must have patience till that happy time comes."
As we had proved ourselves such expert hunters on the previous occasion, the Indians decided to take us with them, and allowed us to select two capital horses, as also some tough spears and a supply of arrows.  We likewise stowed away, at Mike's suggestion, as much dried buffalo meat as our pouches would hold.  "There is no harm in having it," he observed; "and it may just come in convanient if we get the chance of giving our rid-skinned frinds the slip."
I was glad to find that the Indians were directing their course to the north-west of the camp, towards a plain on which, the scouts had brought word, buffalo had been seen feeding the previous evening, and it was supposed that they were not yet likely to have got far off.  When we reached the ground, however, it was found that they had gone away further to the northward, so chase was immediately made after them.  The herd must have gone on at a somewhat rapid rate, for we forded several streams, and entered on a part of the prairie across which, after riding a few miles, we could see nothing but the waving grass on every side.
The chief had of late been friendly, and kept Mike and me near him.  He was evidently pleased with the good-humour we exhibited, and probably thought that we were contented with our lot.
At last we came in sight of the rear-guard of the herd, when the Indians at once gave chase.
We had been riding on for some time, the buffalo evidently moving at a greater speed than they do under ordinary circumstances, when the chief, who was on the right of the party, stopped, and looking round him, shouted to those who were within hearing.  I could not understand what he said, and asked Mike if he could.
"Sure, it's something not altogether plisant," he answered.  "Look there, Masther Roger.  What does that mane?"
He pointed, as he spoke, to a long line of what looked like grey mist, forming wreaths, and rising above the horizon to the westward.
I saw several of the Indians standing up in their stirrups and gazing in the same direction.  They knew perfectly well what it was, but they were trying to ascertain a point of vital importance to us all.  The prairie was on fire!  Of that there was no doubt; but, in order to give themselves the best chance of saving their lives, it was necessary to settle, before galloping forward, what course to take.
While the Indians were discussing this point, Mike, who had been looking about him, exclaimed to me,--"There is one way we want to go, and that is to the north-east.  Never mind if we do get singed a little, for sure, as we came along, I remember that we passed several swamps.  If we can get into one of them we shall be safe, as the fire won't be afther crossing the wather."
"But the Indians will probably take the same direction," I observed.
"Sure, if they intinded doing that same, they would have been off at once," he answered.  "They have some raison for what they think of doing, and we have another for what we will do; so come along, Masther Roger.  There's only one thing I mourn for, and that is me fiddle; but no matther; maybe I will be afther getting that another time. Whallop-ahoo-aboo!  Erin go bragh!"  Then digging his heels into his horse's flanks, he set off in the direction he proposed; and I, seeing that the Indians were too much occupied to notice us, galloped after him.
As I turned my head I saw them scampering along towards the north-west. The fire having approached with far greater rapidity than I could have supposed possible, I began to fear that they were right and we were wrong, when I saw the flames catching the dry grass and flaring up furiously, with dense masses of black smoke above them, and already scarcely a mile behind us; indeed, they looked very much nearer.  Onward came the conflagration, faster than any horse could gallop.  Happily we had the start of it, but we must, we knew, keep our steeds at the utmost stretch of their powers to maintain a safe distance.
As our course diverged more and more from that of the Indians, they soon discovered our object, and shouted to us to accompany them.
"Bawl away, me boys!" answered Mike.  "It is not convanient just now to attind to you."
When our intention became clearly evident, the chief despatched two of his people in pursuit of us; but we kept well ahead of our pursuers, and they, fearing that the fire would overtake them, turned and took the same direction as the main body.  Soon after this we lost sight of our late companions.
"I would be well contint never to set eyes on you again, me jewels," said Mike, shaking his spear as a sign of farewell.
Although my companion kept up his spirits, I could not avoid fearing that, after all, the fire would overtake us.  Happily our horses were fleet and in good wind, as we had not exhausted them during the early part of the day; and all we could do at present was to gallop on.  The wind, of which there had hitherto been very little, now got up, and blew almost in our faces, driving the fire in the direction the Indians had taken, and at the same time keeping it back from that in which we were going.  Still on came the fire, the whole country in our rear apparently one mass of flame.  Even now, did we stop, we should be overtaken. Happily for us, there were no buffalo in the direction from which the fire was coming, or we should have run the danger of being overwhelmed by them.  Smaller animals, however, came rushing by us or close at our heels, but too much frightened even to notice us; and we were in too great a hurry to interfere with them.
I am almost afraid to say how many miles we covered in a couple of hours, but certainly not till that time had elapsed did we get to a safe distance from the fire; and even then, on looking back, we could see it raging along the whole verge of the horizon to the westward and southward.  It was clear to me that Mike was mistaken about the swamps, and had not the wind, providentially for us, changed, we should probably have fallen victims.
We now slackened our speed a little, hoping to meet with some broad river which might prove a barrier to the flames, should another change of wind drive them towards us, as there was nothing, so far as we could see, to stop the fire from quickly overtaking us.  Our horses, too, were already suffering from want of water, and so were we.  We therefore eagerly looked out for a pool or stream at which we might slake our thirst.  At length, greatly to our joy, as evening was approaching, we caught sight in the far distance of a silvery line of water glittering in the rays of the western sun.  It was a river running from the north-west to the south-east, and as we approached we saw that it was of considerable width.  Should it not prove fordable, we resolved to swim across.
With infinite satisfaction we reached the bank of the river, and descending quickly, allowed our horses to drink; while, stooping down by their sides, we lapped up the water eagerly with our hands.  It seemed as if we could never drink enough.  When we had somewhat slaked our thirst, we looked about for a place at which to cross.  From the appearance of the current a little lower down, we hoped that we should there find the river fordable; we accordingly agreed to lead our horses to it.
On climbing up the bank we observed that the fire was still raging in the direction from whence we had come; and it was evidently very much nearer.  We had wished to allow our animals to rest and recover their strength before attempting to cross; but on again looking back we saw that there was no time to be lost.  We accordingly at once mounted, and urged our steeds into the water, keeping their heads up the stream.
As we advanced it grew deeper and deeper, and we expected every moment to have our horses taken off their legs; still it would not do to turn back.  Our greatest chance of safety lay in pushing forward.  The cool water restored strength to our beasts, and, sagaciously leaning over against the current, they soon got across the deep part.  We had now no further difficulty, and in a few minutes landed safely on the opposite side.  Fortunately there was plenty of fresh herbage, and we allowed the animals to crop it, while we sat down and discussed some of the pemmican with which, by Mike's forethought, we had provided ourselves.  Without it we should have starved; for we could find nothing eatable anywhere around.  As night was approaching, and our horses were too much knocked up to go further, we resolved to remain on the bank of the river till the morning.  We accordingly hobbled the animals, and then looked about for some place which might afford us shelter.
Our search was rewarded by the discovery of a hollow made by the stream in the bank during the spring floods.  Here we hoped that we might rest secure from danger.  Indians were not likely to be passing at that time of the evening, and no wolves would find their way, we believed, into our cave.  Our horses were, of course, more exposed to risk than ourselves; but we were obliged to let them take their chance, for unless they were allowed to feed during the night they would be unable to carry us the next day.
After leaving our horses to pick up their supper, we were about to return to our cave, when, on looking to the eastward, we observed that the fire was making most rapid progress in our direction.  We felt thankful indeed that we were on the right side of the river.
On came the conflagration, the heat sensibly increasing every minute, while dark wreaths of smoke filled the air, below which the burning grass and shrubs hissed and crackled.  The darkness of night added to the fearful character of the scene.  As far as the eye could reach there appeared a long unbroken line of fire: now, as it caught some thick bush or clump of trees, forked flames rose high in the air; in other places it came along maintaining the same height, but ever advancing, till it reached the bank of the river, when every shrub and tree was enveloped in a sheet of fire; and notwithstanding the width of the river, we expected every instant to see some of the sparks carried across, and the whole country on our side given over to destruction.  We might save our own lives, but our horses would inevitably be lost.
We sat anxiously watching the conflagration as it raged along the entire bank: now the sparks, wafted by the wind, flew high into the air; now burning branches fell hissing into the water.
"It's all very fine," observed Mike, after watching it for some time; "but I would rather be afther going quietly to slape."
I felt quite as tired as did Mike, but I sat up till my eyes began to close and my head to droop, and I could not for the life of me tell what I was looking at.  I had just sense enough left to lie down alongside Mike, when I was almost directly asleep.  I do not think I ever slept more soundly in my life than I did on that occasion.  So thoroughly wearied out was I, that I forgot all about the fire raging within a few hundred yards of us; or prowling wolves, or Indians, or rattlesnakes, which might have made their holes in the bank.
When I awoke I found Mike sitting up, dawn having just broken.  The fire had burned itself out, a few burning embers alone appearing on the opposite side, with here and there a blackened stem of some tree which had resisted the flames.  One side of the river presented a scene of utter desolation, while the other was still green, and glittering with the dew of early morn.
We knelt down and returned thanks to God for our preservation, and offered up a petition that he would still take care of us.  We then ate a little more pemmican, and took a draught of water from the river; though, to do so, we had to drive back the burned twigs and black scum which came floating down the stream.  We then caught our horses, which, in consequence of being hobbled, had not strayed far; and after leading them down to drink we mounted and rode on to the north-east.  Reaching some elevated ground whence we could obtain an extensive view, we looked round to ascertain if any Indians were in sight.  Not a human being could we discover; and we therefore, with increased hopes that we might escape, continued our journey.
I asked Mike how many days he thought it would take us to reach home, that I might see if his computation agreed with mine.  I calculated, recollecting the distance we had come with our captors, that it would occupy us a week at least, or perhaps ten days.  He was of the same opinion.
"But will our pemmican last us as long?"  I asked.
"Sure, that depinds upon how much we take of it each day," he answered. "The berries are now ripe, and by good luck I have found a couple of fish-hooks in me pocket.  Maybe, also, I can manage to manufacture some traps in which to catch birds or small animals; and though we have no arrows, if we are hard pressed we may make some; and we have got our spears.  If we could only meet with a young bear, we should have flesh enough to last us for many a day.  Sure, we'll not be fearing harm till it comes upon us."
I agreed with Mike that we were not so badly off after all, and we rode forward in good spirits.  There was still, of course, the danger of being overtaken by the Indians; but on that score Mike thought that we need not trouble ourselves.  They would probably suppose that we had been destroyed by the fire; or they themselves might have met with the fate from which we had so narrowly escaped.
The sun shone brightly from the unclouded sky; the atmosphere was clear, and we could see objects at a great distance.  We looked out, as we rode along, for any of the natives who might be passing either on the war-path or engaged in hunting, as we resolved to endeavour to avoid them rather than risk an encounter.  They might prove to be friends; but if enemies, we knew that we should have a poor chance of coming off victorious.  Whenever the country was open, we galloped across it as fast as we could venture to push our horses without over-fatiguing them; but when we came to woody districts we kept as much as possible under shelter of the trees, so as to avoid being seen.  We did not forget that, should enemies cross our trail, they would probably follow us.  We therefore very frequently looked about us, to ascertain if we were pursued.  We agreed that, in that case, we would run for it, trusting to the mettle of our horses for escape.
It may seem strange, but I enjoyed the excitement, and should not have been alarmed had we caught sight of a dozen Redskins, provided they were on foot, and we had a fair start.  Mike did not quite enter into my feelings, however.
"Sure it would be betther, Masther Roger, if we could get along asily, and just stop and enjoy our dinner and supper without the feeling that at any moment our scalps might be taken off our heads," he observed.
"We have kept them on through much greater dangers than we are now likely to meet with," I answered; "and while we have fleet horses under us, we may laugh at the Indians.  They won't know that we are without firearms, and they are terribly afraid of bullets."
For all this, I should have been glad had we possessed a good rifle and a brace of pistols apiece.  Though our spears might serve us in a close encounter with a bear, or even with wolves, we were but ill able to protect ourselves against the arrows of a party of Redskins.
Whenever we reached a height we surveyed the country both before and behind us, to make sure, in the first place, that no Indians were following; and, in the second, that none were encamped ahead, or, as I have before said, moving about.  During the day we met with several small streams at which we could water our horses and slake our own thirst; and the first night we encamped under shelter of a wood, where there was plenty of grass for our steeds.  We contented ourselves with forming a lean-to, but did not light a fire lest it should betray our whereabouts.  Having eaten a little more pemmican, we formed our beds of spruce-fir tops, and lay down to rest.
"Do you slape as sound as you like, Masther Roger; I'll jist keep one eye open, in case any unwelcome visitor should take the throuble to poke his nose into our palace," observed Mike.  "When you think you have had rest enough, you can jist wake up and let me take a snooze till morning."
I thanked my honest friend for his kind intentions, and in less than half a minute my eyes were closely shut.  When I awoke it was already dawn, but Mike, instead of keeping watch, was as sound asleep as I had been.
"Hallo, Mike!"  I exclaimed; "I thought that you intended to rest with one eye open all night."
"Sure, Masther Roger, haven't I done so, barring the last few minutes," he answered.  "I did my best, thinking that every moment you would be getting up; and small blame to me if at last I dramed that you did get up, and told me that you would take a turn at watching."
"Never mind, since no harm has happened," I said.  "Now let us mount our horses and ride forward till we can get some cold water for breakfast."
Our animals, who now knew us, came at our call; and throwing ourselves on their backs, we galloped forward as we had done the day before.  Not a human being did we meet with during the whole day, and in the evening we encamped by the side of a broad stream overshadowed by trees.  From the appearance of several deep holes close under the bank, we hoped that fish might be found in them.  As soon, therefore, as we had secured our horses, we set to work to manufacture lines for the two hooks which Mike had found in his pocket.
Some people might have been puzzled how to get the lines, but we were not to be defeated in our object.  We procured them by cutting off a small portion of the two hobbles, which consisted of long strips of deer-hide, and plucking some hairs out of our horses' tails.  The deer-hide we cut into thinner strips, which served for the upper part of the lines, while the lower were formed of the hair platted together.  We thus in a short time had two good lines, to which we carefully secured the hooks.  Having caught some grasshoppers, we determined to try them for bait; while our spears served us for fishing-rods.  Hunger made us keen sportsmen, and never had I felt so anxious for success.
My line had not been long in the water when I felt a bite.  I almost trembled with eagerness as I gave a gentle jerk, sufficient to hook the unwary fish.  It tugged pretty hard, and I was sure that I had it fast; but still I was afraid that it might break my line.  Carefully I drew it along till I got it sufficiently near the surface to ascertain its size. To my satisfaction, I saw that it was not more than two or three pounds' weight.  After playing it for some time I drew it towards the bank, when Mike, who had hitherto not got a bite, left his rod and rushed into the water to secure our prize, exclaiming--
"Faix, thin, we'll have this darlint for our supper to-night; and, bedad! there is another at my line.  Hurrah! good luck to us!"
Throwing the fish to me, which proved to be a gold-eye, he sprang off, just in time to catch his rod, the end of which was nearly off the bank.
"Och, murther," he cried out, "but it's a big one!" and he rushed along the shore, jumping over all impediments; shrieking out in his eagerness in a manner which would have made a sedate Indian fancy that he had gone out of his mind.
I could not help laughing as I watched him.
"Come along, Masther Roger, and lend me a hand, or the baste will be afther getting away."
Securing our first prize, I followed Mike as he rushed along down the bank, afraid of breaking his line, which was by this time stretched to the utmost.  Now he gently pulled it in, now he allowed it to go off again, as he felt the strain increase.  By thus dexterously managing the fish for some minutes, he at length brought it close to the shore, and I caught sight of an ugly-looking dark monster.
"Sure, it's a cat-fish, and mighty good ateing too, though it's no beauty," exclaimed Mike.  "Get howld of him, Masther Roger; get howld of him, or he will be off."
Following Mike's example, I dashed into the water and grasped the huge creature, although, covered as it was with slime, it was no easy matter to do so.  Giving it a sudden jerk, I threw it on shore, rushing after it to prevent its floundering back again into its native element.  It proved to be a prize worth having, being at least seven or eight pounds in weight.  It was a wonder how, with such slight tackle, Mike had contrived to hold it.
We agreed that, as we had now an ample supply of fish for one day at least, we would not run the risk of losing our hooks; and accordingly, carrying our two prizes, we made our way back to the part of the bank we had selected for our camp.  It was under a widespreading tree, which extended over the water, and would materially serve to hide a fire, which we agreed to light on a piece of flat ground, almost level with the water.  We soon collected a sufficient supply of sticks, and had our fire blazing and our fish cooking.  The cat-fish, in spite of its ugly name and uglier looks, proved excellent, though somewhat rich--tasting very like an eel.
Having eaten a hearty meal, and cooked the remainder of our fish for the next day, we put out our fire, and then arranged our dwelling for the night.  It consisted simply of branches stuck in the ground, and extending about six feet from the trunk of the tree.  We closed the entrance, so that no wolves or bears could pay us a visit without some warning; and kept our spears by our sides, to poke at their noses should they make their appearance.
The night passed quietly away, and the next morning at daylight, having caught our horses, we swam them across the stream.  The sun soon dried our clothes, and as we had no fear of starving for that day, we rode merrily onward.
Next day we were as successful in fishing at a stream we reached a short time before sundown; but we were not so prudent, for after each of us had caught a couple of fish we continued our sport, when Mike's hook was carried off.  He looked as if he was going to burst into tears, while he surveyed the end of his line with an utterly comical expression of countenance.
"No, bedad! it's not there," he exclaimed; "the baste of a fish has got it--ill luck to him!  But we shall have the consolation of ateing his brothers; and maybe some day we will come back and hook him."
We had now but one hook left, and this it was necessary to secure with the greatest care.  What a value we set upon that little crooked bit of steel!  Our lives might depend on it, for though Mike had set several traps of various descriptions, no animals would consent to be caught by them.
Two days more we travelled on, catching sight of what we believed to be Indian encampments in the distance, but, according to our resolution, carefully avoiding them.  Our fish had come to an end, our last handful of pemmican was exhausted, and for a whole day we had no food except a few berries.  Towards evening we reached a wood.  As there was a stream not far from it, while Mike was engaged in forming our camp I endeavoured to hook a fish.
My efforts were vain; for some time none would bite.  At last I felt a tug, and I was sure that I had hooked a fish.  Eagerly I drew it towards the bank.  It seemed to come willingly enough at first, but there was another tug, and my line almost flew out of the water.  I cast a blank look at the end.  The hook was gone!
Feeling very disconsolate, I returned to the camp.  Mike endeavoured to comfort me for our loss, but he could not supply us with food.  We therefore lay down to rest, keeping our spears as usual by our sides, and Mike offering to watch while I slept.
Whether or not he had done so I could not tell, but suddenly I was awakened by feeling the branches at my side roughly shaken; and looking up, what was my dismay to see, by the moonlight streaming through the wood, a big brown bear poking his nose through the bushes, and not live feet from us!  Giving Mike a nudge with my elbow, I grasped my spear, and rising on my knee, without a moment's consideration as to what might be the result, I thrust the spear with all my might into the bear's chest.  With a fierce growl and open jaws it rushed at me,--as it did so, driving the spear still further into its body; whilst I, expecting the movement, sprang to the inner end of our arbour.
Mike in a moment was on his knees,--he had not time to rise to his feet,--and seizing his weapon, drove it into the bear's neck.  Still the creature, though thus desperately wounded, broke through the branches we had put up; but the thick leaves prevented it from seeing us as clearly as it would otherwise have done.  The life-blood was flowing from its wounds.  Mike managed, as I had done, to get out of Bruin's way; and before the creature could turn to pursue either of us, over it fell, on the very ground on which we had been sleeping.  It struggled for a few seconds, gnashing its teeth, and I had to retreat through the branches to avoid it.  Mike, who had managed to escape at the other end, now joined me, and getting hold of the handle of his spear, endeavoured to pull it out of the bear's body.  After a few tugs he succeeded in regaining possession of his weapon; and the first thing he did with it was to plunge it again into the animal's breast.
"I did it just to make sure," he remarked.  "These bastes have as many lives as a cat; and maybe he would have come to again, and taken to ateing us instead of our ateing him, as I hope we will be afther doing before long."
Whether or not the last thrust was necessary I do not know, but the bear ceased struggling; and Mike, springing on the body, exclaimed--
"He's dead enough now, anyhow!  And we'll take the liberty of cutting him up, and getting our teeth into his flesh; for, sure, he has spoilt our rest for the night."
The centre of the hut was by this time a pool of blood; we therefore dragged out the bear, and while Mike began scientifically to flay the carcass, I collected sticks for a fire.  We soon had a good one blazing up, and some of the slices of the bear toasting before it.  We were too hungry to wait until the morning.
"Sure, the bear was sent to us to be aten," observed Mike; "and suppose we get nothing else till we reach home, it will serve to keep us alive till then."
Having satisfied the cravings of hunger, we cooked some more slices of the best portions of the meat, to serve for our breakfast before starting; and the remainder we cut into thin strips to smoke over the fire, and afterwards to dry in the sun.  As both we and our steeds were tired, we agreed not to start till a later hour than usual.  There was a risk in remaining, but still it was better to run it, rather than knock up our horses or ourselves.
Mike faithfully kept watch, and the sun was already high in the sky when I awoke.  We hung up the strips of bear's flesh, to give them a drying before we packed them to carry with us.  We also did up a portion of the fresh meat, which would, we calculated, last us for some time.  Then, having taken a late breakfast, we mounted our horses and continued our journey.
It would take too much time, were I to describe the events of the next few days.  After continuing on for the time we supposed it would occupy us in reaching home, we were still unable to recognise any of the features of the country.  Mike, however, remarked that as forests and hills and rivers were all much alike, it was no wonder that we could not make out where we were.  I proposed directing our course eastward, as we should thus certainly come to some of the settlements.  Mike thought that we had not got sufficiently far to the north, and advised that we should continue on in that direction.  I gave in to him.
Our horses had hitherto held out well, but suddenly Mike's began to stagger, and, almost before he could throw himself from its back, down the poor animal fell.  What had been the cause of the horse's death we had not knowledge sufficient to ascertain; only one thing was certain,-- that it was dead, and that we must take it by turns to ride, and thus get on at a much slower pace.  There was no use stopping to mourn our loss, so, having taken off the saddle and bridle, we did them up in a package, and placed them on the back of my steed.  We did this lest the dead horse should be recognised as having belonged to the Indians, and some of their friends might discover it and pursue us.
We had, shortly afterwards, a river to cross.  True, we might have made a raft, but as we were both good swimmers we determined to trust to our own arms and legs for getting to the other side.  After some persuasion we induced the horse to go in; and then, Mike taking the rein, we each of us put a hand on the saddle and swam over, I on one side and Mike on the other.  Though swept down for some distance, we got safe on shore at last, but we had to trudge on in our wet clothes.  Not only were we wet, but so was our imperfectly dried meat; the consequence was, that when we came to cook it in the evening it was scarcely eatable.  Our clothes, too, were damp when we lay down at night.
I awoke shivering the next morning, though the fire was still blazing near me; and when I tried to get up I was unable to stand.  Mike was in a state of great distress.  The remainder of our provisions had become worse; but even had the food been of the most delicate description, I could not have touched it.
Mike, faithful fellow that he was, immediately set to work to build a hut, so that I might be sheltered from the heat of the sun as well as from the wind.  As soon as it was completed he carried me into it, and closing the entrance, said he would set out in search of food.  In a short time he returned with some delicious strawberries, which greatly refreshed me.
For several days he tended me with the greatest care, and was fortunate in trapping several young birds, which, though not very fat, served to restore my strength.  I asked him how he had managed to eat the dried bear's meat, being very sure that he had not touched any of the birds he had caught.
"Bedad, Masther Roger, it's not the mate at all I've been ateing," he answered.  "I found no lack of big fellows with four legs hopping about in the marsh down there, and, for want of better food, I took the liberty of cooking them.  They are not so bad, afther all; only the idea of the thing was not plisant at first."
Mike had been living on frogs, I found out, during all my illness; and as for a whole day he was unable to catch any birds, I begged that he would let me taste the frogs.  I confess that I had no reason to complain of the food, for he gave me the hinder legs alone, which I should have supposed to have been those of small birds, had he not told me what they were.
I was at last strong enough to move about, and I proposed that we should at once continue our journey.  Mike agreed, therefore, that we should start the next morning.
When daylight arrived, he left the hut to look for the horse while I prepared breakfast.  He was a long time absent, and I began to grow anxious, wondering what could have become of him.  I waited and waited till I could bear the suspense no longer, so, going to a height at a little distance from the wood in which we had formed our encampment, I gazed around on every side.  Should any accident have befallen him, how fearful would be my fate!  I was also deeply grieved at the thought of losing him; but I confess that selfish feelings for the time predominated.  There was a river, I should have said, in the distance, and on looking in that direction I at length saw a figure moving towards me.  It might be Mike, or it might be an Indian, and perhaps an enemy. Still, I did not think of concealing myself.
Great was my joy when, as the person drew nearer, I recognised Mike.  I rushed down to meet him; but I saw that there was something wrong, by the expression of his countenance.
"What is the matter, Mike?"  I asked.  "I was terribly afraid that you were lost."
"Sure, a great deal is the matther," he answered.  "That baste of a horse has been afther drowning himself; and you will have to walk the rest of the journey on foot, except when I carry you on me shoulders-- and that I will do, as long as I have the strength, with the greatest pleasure in the world."
I assured Mike that I was so glad to see him, that I cared little in comparison for the loss of the horse, for I felt perfectly able to walk any distance.
"Well, that is one comfort; and seeing that we have nothing to carry except our spears, which will help us along, matthers might have been worse," he answered.
Both of us were determined to make the best of what had happened; so, having eaten our breakfast, and packed up the remainder of our provisions, we recommenced our march forward.  Mike insisted on our encamping early in the day, so that he might search for food; and before dark he had procured a supply of the same description as that on which we had been living for several days.
The next morning we went on as before, and I felt my strength considerably restored.  Soon after noon, having reached the summit of a height, we saw before us a wide river, connected with a series of small lakes, their borders apparently deeply fringed with tall grass.  This, Mike said, he believed must be rice, and it would afford us a change of diet if we could procure some; we accordingly made our way down towards the nearest.  We thought, also, that we might catch some unwary ducks, if they were not accustomed to the sight of human beings.
On getting close to the borders, we fancied we heard some sounds from a brood of ducklings.  We therefore crept cautiously along the shore, when, to our infinite satisfaction, we caught sight of a couple of ducks, and not one, but two broods.  We had got almost near enough to catch hold of the hindermost, when the cries of the mother-ducks warned their young ones to make the best of their way from us.  Eager to seize our prey, we dashed into the water after them; when, to escape us, they endeavoured to make their way through the high grass.
We had each of us caught a couple, when what was our astonishment, on pressing aside the grass, to see directly before us a canoe with three girls in it!  Two of them were busily employed in beating out the rice into their canoe, while the one who sat in the bow, on hearing the noise we made, turned her head with an inquiring but somewhat alarmed glance towards us.  Yes!  I could not be mistaken; it was Lily!  Just before her sat Dora, while Ashatea occupied the stern.
"Lily, Lily!"  I exclaimed.  "Don't you know me?"
"Yes, yes!  I do.  O Dora, Dora! there is Roger and Mike Laffan.  They were not drowned, or killed by the Indians!  I always said so," she cried.
In a moment their paddles were out, and, guided by Ashatea, they were making their way towards us.
"Come into the canoe!" they exclaimed in chorus.  "There is room for you; and we will take you to our friends.  They will be so glad to know that you are alive, though you both look sadly tired and thin."
"No wonder, Misthress Lily," observed Mike; and he gave an account of my illness.
They were all eager to hear how we had escaped; and as the canoe skimmed lightly over the smooth surface of the lake, urged by their paddles, I told them all that had happened to us, from the time we left the camp of our Indian friends.  I then asked if Reuben and his companion had ever been heard of.
"Yes; it was they who told us that you had either been drowned or made prisoners by the Indians," said Lily.  "They escaped by running through the rapids at a place where no canoe had ever before ventured.  And Reuben has undertaken to come up here and escort us back to the settlement.  We have been paying our long-promised visit to Ashatea; and I can assure you she received us in the most hospitable manner.  You will like to see the beautiful dome-shaped wigwam her people built for us, with a divan all round, and the floor covered thickly with matting. We felt quite like Indian princesses, when she escorted us into it.  It is divided by a curtain into two portions.  The inner serves as our bedroom, and the outer as our drawing-room.  As there is space for a fireplace in the centre, we agreed that we should not object to spend the winter in it; while at the present season it is delightfully cool and pleasant."
"Ah, but it is not equal to one of your comfortable houses," observed Ashatea, who understood all that Lily said, and had, I found, improved greatly in her knowledge of English, having spent a considerable time at the settlement with Lily and Dora.
We had some distance to go, I found, before we could reach the spot where Kepenau and his people were now encamped.  The chief had, Lily told me, spent several months there; and had, besides, made a tour with our missionary friend, Martin Godfrey, for the purpose of being instructed in gospel truth, which he was most anxious to impart to his countrymen.  The chief had, some time before, learned to read, and had devoted all his attention to the study of the Scriptures, so that he was well able to carry the gospel to others.
My uncles and aunt had been greatly grieved at my supposed loss, and it had made them less contented with the settlement than they had before been; Uncle Mark especially missed the assistance of Mike, though honest Quambo had done his best to supply his place.
Various schemes were afloat for occupying fresh territory, far to the westward.  Some speculators had visited our settlement, and my uncles had listened to their descriptions of the advantages to be gained with far more interest than they might otherwise have done.
"I had hoped that we should remain where we are," said Lily.  "I am attached to the place, and should be content to spend the remainder of my days here."
"You have not got over many of them as yet, Lily," I said, looking up in her face.
"They may be many, in comparison with those which are to come," she answered gravely, and I thought mournfully.
"I hope to see you grow into a dear old woman, like Aunt Hannah.  I like to think of the future, and I want my future to be happy.  However, it will be a long, long time before you grow old, Lily."
"I already feel old," she said; "or I did, at least, when they told me that you were lost, Roger, though I did not believe it; but perhaps I shall now feel young again.  I have been very sorry, too, about poor Ashatea," she continued in a whisper; "she has her troubles, though she does not show what she feels by her countenance as much as we white people do.  A young Indian, who is said to be superior to most of his people, has long wished to marry her; but as she is a Christian and he is still a heathen, though I believe she likes him very much, neither she nor her father will consent.  This has produced a feud between them; and the conduct of Manilick--for that is his name, which, I believe, means a `pine-tree'--has caused them a great deal of anxiety.  Kepenau fears that Manilick will try to carry off his daughter by force, and he is therefore obliged to keep scouts constantly watching the movements of the young chief.  Indeed, when you appeared through the rice grass I fancied that you were Manilick, and that you might have come to carry us all off together; not that I believe he would venture to injure any white people, since he professes to be our friend."
I was much interested in what Lily told me, for I fancied that Reuben had lost his heart to the Indian girl.  Still, superior as she was in many respects to those of her race, she would scarcely have made a fitting wife for a well-educated young man; though the rough traders and hunters of the Far West frequently marry Indian wives, who make them as happy as they wish to be, but are seldom able to bring up their children properly, the chief objection to such alliances.
While Lily was talking to me, Mike was recounting to Dora and Ashatea, in his rich Irish brogue, our various adventures with the Indians.  Thus the time was passed while the girls paddled across the lake and up the river till we reached Kepenau's lodges.
As we neared the shore, we observed a large concourse of people assembled near the wigwams.  Many by their costume appeared to be strangers, while others were Kepenau's own people.  I saw that Ashatea was regarding them with great interest.  In front, on a rock, sat Kepenau; and I judged by his attitude and the tone of his voice that he was addressing them on a matter of importance, while they listened with rapt attention.  His right hand pointed to the sky, while his left was directed towards the earth; and by the words which reached me I knew that he was preaching the gospel--setting before the people the way of eternal life.
We all stopped at some distance to listen, and so intent were he and his auditors that none perceived us.  Ashatea, who stood next to Lily, was regarding the scene with even greater interest than we were.  I saw her eye directed towards a young Indian, who by the ornaments on his dress I guessed was a chief.  I pointed him out to Lily.
"Yes," she said, "that is Manilick.  I am very glad to see him here, as I hope he is receiving the truths which Kepenau is endeavouring to impart."
Ashatea was, I had no doubt, hoping the same.
Kepenau had nearly brought his address to a conclusion when we arrived. Now, rising from his seat, he took Manilick's hand, and spoke to him affectionately, as it seemed to me.  The young chief hung down his head, and answered only in monosyllables.
Kepenau, after speaking in the same way to others, offered up a prayer, in which several of his own people joined.  Not till then did he discover us.  With a look of surprise he at once advanced to greet Mike and me, his countenance as well as his words exhibiting his satisfaction.  He afterwards turned again to the young chief, and addressed him.  He had, until now, I found, suspected that Manilick had instigated the attack on us, if he had not taken part in it, and he wished openly to exonerate him.  Kepenau questioned me as to the dress and appearance of the Indians who had made us prisoners.  From my description he was satisfied that they were really Sioux, and that Manilick had nothing to do with them.
We were anxious to return as soon as possible to the settlement, to relieve the minds of our relatives but that evening, in consequence of the fatigue and hardships I had endured, I was again taken ill.  Kepenau had a wigwam carefully built for me, in which Lily and Dora assisted Mike in watching over me.  Good food, however, was all I needed; and as our Indian friends had abundance of fish and game, I was soon well again.
Just as I had recovered, we one evening saw a large canoe approaching the camp.  Who should step out of it but Uncle Mark, accompanied by Reuben, Quambo, and several men!  They had brought a quantity of goods to supply their Indian friends.
As may be supposed, Uncle Mark was delighted to find that I was alive; and Quambo, in the exuberance of his joy, embraced Mike.
"But where de fiddle?" he exclaimed, after their salutations had ceased. "Just play one tune.  It do my heart good, and we set all de camp jigging."
"Och, botheration! but the Ridskins have got it--bad luck to the spalpeens! and sorra a one of thim can play a tune, or I would not mind it so much," answered Mike.
"But you must try to get him back," observed Quambo; "if dey not play on him, dey not want him."
"I'm mighty afraid it's burned, though," said Mike, with a sorrowful countenance.
When Uncle Mark heard of Mike's loss, he told Kepenau and Manilick.  The latter had that day paid a visit to the chief.  They were both of opinion that should the fiddle be in existence, it might, by proper diplomatic proceedings, be recovered; and, greatly to Mike's joy, Manilick undertook to ascertain what had become of it, and, if possible, to restore it to its owner.
CHAPTER EIGHT.
The canoe in which Uncle Mark had come up had been built by some Indians on the lake, who intended to dispose of it to the fur-traders; but, in consequence of some dispute, they had refused to let them have it, and had thereafter sold it to my uncles at a reduced price.
It was of far superior construction to those we had hitherto seen used, though of the same materials.
Formed of large sheets of birch-bark, kept in shape by delicate ribs of lance-wood or willow, it was nearly forty feet in length, and sharp at both ends; and the seams where the bark was sewn together were covered by a thick resinous gum, which became hard in the water.  Like the small canoes, it required careful handling; for, having no keel, it was easily turned over.  It was impelled by six or eight paddles,--three or four on one side, and the same number on the other; one man steering with a paddle, as well as paddling.
Uncle Mark had come down one river, then across the lake, and up another river, instead of the shorter route along the course of several narrower streams with rapids, which necessitated the same number of portages.  By this means he was able to bring a cargo of cottons, cutlery, and other heavy articles.  He purposed returning by the same route, though it might have been possible to carry the canoe across the portages, as the bales of peltries occupied less space than the cargo he had brought. There was sufficient room, too, for the four additional people the canoe had now to carry.
The day before we were to start, Ashatea appeared to be very unhappy. It was, I concluded, at the thought of parting from Lily; but Lily afterwards told me that it was more on account of Manilick, who still refused to embrace Christianity.
"We must pray for him," said Lily.  "Kepenau has taken every opportunity of speaking to him, and putting the truth plainly before him; but though he would very gladly make Ashatea his wife, he still remains firm in his heathen belief."
We could no longer delay our return home, as the autumn was advancing, and before long we might expect storms and frosts, which would make our proposed voyage in the canoe both trying and dangerous.
The whole tribe came down to the bank of the river at early dawn to see us off, as Uncle Mark wished to cross the lake before sunset.  We should have to encamp for the night, and continue our voyage up the river next morning.
We made good progress down the stream, having the current with us, and entered the lake just as the sun rose above what appeared like a sea horizon, though we knew that the shore was not far off on the opposite side.  The calm lake shone like a burnished mirror.  The shore we were leaving was tinted with various colours, the higher ground here crowned by groups of spruce-firs, and in other places rocky and barren, but still picturesque in the extreme.
I took a paddle and sat by Lily.  Reuben and Mike also made themselves of use; while Uncle Mark sat with Dora at the bottom of the canoe.  It was the first voyage I had ever taken on the lake, and Lily and I agreed that it would be very pleasant to have a canoe or small vessel of our own, and to cruise round the shores, exploring every inlet and creek.
As the sun rose the heat became intense; not a breath of air stirred the surface of the lake, and Lily, who had taken off her hat, was very glad to put it on again.  After paddling for some distance we landed to breakfast, or rather to dine; for we did not intend to stop again till we went on shore to encamp for the night.
Wild rocks fringed the shore, and we had to exercise great caution in approaching it, for the slightest touch would have knocked a hole in the bow of our canoe, and we should very soon have had the water rushing in. We had, therefore, to look out for some opening into which we could slowly paddle till we found a landing-place.  After making two or three ineffectual attempts, we succeeded in finding a bank with an almost perpendicular side, on to which we could at once step from the canoe.
Immediately after landing, all hands set to work to collect wood for a fire.  An abundance lay on the ground, driven there by the wind.  Lily and Dora undertook to cook the breakfast, the materials for which consisted of eggs, fish, maize cakes, and dandelion coffee--the roots having been prepared by Aunt Hannah.  We soon had a fire blazing up, when, as Uncle Mark declared, Lily and Dora performed their duties in a most efficient manner.
Just as we had finished, one of the men, who were seated at some little distance from us, started up, exclaiming, "Take care! take care! there are rattlesnakes near us."
Scarcely had he spoken when I saw one of the venomous creatures, the sound of whose tail the man had heard, rearing its head not five feet off from Lily.  In another moment it might spring on her.  Fortunately a long thin stick lay close to me, which I seized, and with all my might struck the snake a blow on the head which brought it to the ground, while I cried out to Lily to run to a distance.  Almost in an instant the snake recovered itself, and sounding its rattle as it moved forward, made an attempt to spring at me.  Again I struck it; and Mike coming to my assistance, it was quickly despatched.
Where one rattlesnake is found, there are generally many more.  Scarcely two minutes had passed ere another made its appearance, crawling out of a hole under a tree.  While Mike and Reuben went to attack it, Uncle Mark advised that we should all get on board without delay.  Our breakfast and cooking things were quickly packed up; and the second rattlesnake being destroyed, Mike and Reuben followed us into the canoe. Scarcely had we shoved off when three or four more rattlesnakes were seen, and we felt thankful that none of us had been bitten by them.  We had literally encamped in the midst of a colony of the venomous reptiles.
We had to exercise the same caution in going out of the harbour as on entering it; after which we continued our course to the eastward at a moderate distance from the shore.
"The day was, Masther Roger, when you and I would have been very happy to have fallen in with as many of those same snakes as we could have caught," observed Mike to me.  "They're mighty good ateing, barring the head and tail.  At laste, the Ridskins hold to that notion."
I was, I confess, very thankful that we had not been compelled to eat the creatures; though I did not know what hunger might have induced me to do.
As we paddled on, Uncle Mark asked Lily and Dora to sing.  They were not girls to offer excuses, and declare that they were out of voice.
"What shall it be?" said Lily.
"Anything you like," replied Dora; and immediately they commenced a melody which, although I had heard it before, sounded very sweet on the calm water.
Reuben and I joined in chorus; and the men, as well they might, applauded heartily.  Then one of them commenced a canoe-song, in which they all joined.  As soon as they ceased, Lily and Dora gave us a third; and so we went on, singing and paddling over the calm water.
"Och! but it's a sad pity that them Ridskins have got me beautiful fiddle!" exclaimed Mike.  "Would I not have been giving you all a tune! Sure, if I do not recover it I will be breaking me heart intirely."
He said this in so melancholy and yet comical a tone, that Reuben and I burst out laughing.  We reminded him that our Indian friend had promised to try and recover his beloved instrument, and by degrees he regained his spirits.
The weather continued fine, and the water smooth as before.  As I gazed over the vast expanse spread out on our left, I could scarcely fancy myself navigating an inland lake, small though it was compared to many in that region.  I thought, too, of how it would appear should a storm arise, and the now tranquil surface be turned into foaming billows by the furious wind.  Our canoe, with sides not much thicker than a few sheets of brown paper, would have been a frail bark for navigating the lake under such circumstances.
Evening was approaching, and though we had paddled on all day we could not as yet see the mouth of the river, near which we intended to camp. We redoubled our efforts, therefore, to gain it during daylight.
The sun had almost reached the watery horizon to the west, when we espied a clump of tall trees which marked the spot towards which we were directing our course.  Having rounded a point, we ran into a bay with a grass-covered shore; and here we were able to land without difficulty.
We unloaded the canoe, and carried our packages up to a grassy spot underneath the trees.  The men immediately set to work to collect bark with which to form a wigwam for Lily and Dora; we contenting ourselves with a lean-to, which would afford us protection from the night wind. The usual fire was lighted, and as we were all very hungry, no time was lost in cooking supper.  As soon as it was over Lily and Dora retired to their abode, as they had been up and ready to start some time before dawn.
We sat round the fire spinning yarns, as the sailors say, and singing songs.  We were speaking of the necessity of trying to get some more fresh fish, as our stock was nearly exhausted, and Mike had told the party how successful we had been till our hooks were bitten off.
"But there is a place not far from here where we can catch fish without hooks," was the answer.
"Sure, and I should like to see it!" exclaimed Mike.  "But how is it to be done?"
"Why, with nets, to be sure," said the canoeman.  "And if you like to come with me, I will show you how I do it."
Mike at once agreed to the proposal.
Hearing that some nets which would suit the purpose had been left _en cache_ with other articles close at hand, Reuben and I and another man agreed to accompany them.
Jacques Lerocque, Mike's friend, was an amusing fellow, and fond of practical joking.  It struck me at the time that he was up to some trick; but he put on so grave a face, and spoke so earnestly, that my suspicions were banished.
On reaching the cache, which was close to the camp, I found that the nets were something in the form of hand-nets, only larger.  We were also provided with a lantern containing a thick tallow candle.
"You see how to use these nets!" said Jacques.  "We put them into the water, and then hold the candle at the further end.  When the fish see the light, they swim towards it and are caught."
The plan seemed very feasible, and Mike declared that he thought it was a mighty convenient way of obtaining a supper.
We were to fish in twos; one man to hold the net, and the other the light.  Reuben agreed to accompany Mike, and I was to take the other man; while Jacques said he would superintend operations, promising us an abundance of sport if we would follow his directions.
Going on for half a mile over hard ground, we reached a marsh which was connected with the lake.
"It is very full of fish, which come in to feed on the insects clinging to the reeds," observed Jacques, "But you must not mind wetting your feet."
However, having so recently recovered from a severe illness, I thought it wiser, when it came to the point, not to do this; so Jacques took my intended companion with him.
"Here, Master Reuben, you take one bit of candle and I the other," said Jacques, cutting the piece in the lantern in two.
Reuben and Mike at once plunged into the marsh, and made their way through the rushes.  I heard their voices, although from where I stood I could not see them.  Presently Mike exclaimed--
"Here comes a big one!  Howld the light furder back, Masther Reuben, and, bedad, we'll have him.  Sure, though, he's gone off; come a little furder.  There he is now; this time he'll be afther getting caught, sure enough."
Then the sound of splashing and the crackling of the reeds reached my ears, when presently Mike cried out,--"Och! murther, but what are these bastes about?  They'll be biting off our noses, and bunging up our eyes! But we must have the fish, though.  Och! murther, murther!"
Reuben's voice joined in chorus, though with varied exclamations.
I ran to a point near the spot which my friends had reached, and there I saw Mike bending down, holding the net in one hand, while he endeavoured to beat off with his hat a swarm of mosquitoes which were buzzing thickly round him.  Reuben stood near holding out the candle, and a second net in his other hand, which prevented him from defending his face from the venomous bites of his persevering assailants.  Still, though his countenance exhibited the sufferings he was enduring, he manfully kept his post.
Just then the most fearful shrieks and cries rent the air, sounding like the war-whoop of a band of savage Indians.
"Och, but the Ridskins are upon us!" cried out Mike.  "We must run for it, Masther Reuben dear.  Niver mind the nets, or the fish, or the mosquito bastes.  It's too much for any mortal man to stand, with the savages into the bargain.  Come along as fast as your legs can carry you; but we will find Masther Roger first.  We must not lave him behind to be scalped; and as to Jacques and Tom Hodges, if they have not taken care of themselves, it's more than we can do for them."
Mike was rapidly uttering these expressions while, floundering along, he made his way up to where I was standing.  Whether or not Reuben was aware of the true state of the case I could not tell, but he was certainly following much more leisurely than might have been expected. I had that moment caught sight of the grinning countenances of Jacques and Tom over the rushes, and guessed that the former was playing off one of his tricks.
When Mike saw me, he exclaimed, "Run, Masther Roger, run! sure, don't you hear the shrieks of the Indians?  They will have the scalps off our heads, if we don't show them our heels, before many minutes are over."
I burst out laughing, and pointed to our two companions, who, however, at that moment bobbed down and hid themselves among the rushes.
Mike now began to suspect that a trick had been played him; but nothing ever made him angry, so, laughing as I was doing, he exclaimed--
"Come out of that, ye spalpeens!  It will be many a day before you get me to go fishing with you again."
Jacques, having had his joke, recovered the nets, and being well experienced in the style of sport, in a short time caught half a dozen fine fish, with which we returned to the camp.  I was glad to roll myself up in my blanket, and go to sleep under the shelter of our lean-to; but the rest of the party sat up cooking and eating one of our prizes.
I was awoke before long by the sound of loud growlings, which made Uncle Mark and several of the party start to their feet, with guns ready to receive the bear from whom they expected an attack.  Recollecting Jacques' propensity to practical joking, I lay quiet; and I heard my uncle come back soon afterwards, growling almost as much as the supposed bear, and observing that the brute had got off, though it must have been close to the camp.  I said nothing, though I suspected who had performed the part of the bear.  The next morning I looked about, but could discover no traces of such an animal.  Jacques, if he had represented it, kept his own counsel; and after we had started I heard him complaining that his night's rest should have been so disagreeably disturbed.
Lily and Dora had been awakened, but they, trusting to the vigilance of their protectors, had wisely gone to sleep again, being very sure that, did any savage animal approach the camp, we should soon give a good account of it.
We had a long paddle up the river, and had again to encamp, but no event worthy of mention occurred; and the next day, late in the evening, we reached the settlement.  Lily and Dora and Reuben went to their respective homes; and after we had paid a visit to Uncle Stephen and Aunt Hannah, to convince them that we were still alive notwithstanding our perilous adventures, we returned to the hut, where we were welcomed by our three canine friends, which had been left to guard it under charge of one of Uncle Stephen's men.
The autumn soon passed by, and once more the winter was upon us.  We had plenty of work in felling trees, and either burning them or dragging them over the snow to places where we intended to cut them up. Occasionally we paid a visit to the settlement; indeed, I was always glad of an excuse for passing a few hours with Lily when I could spare the time.  I looked in, also, on my friends the Claxtons.  Both they and my uncles, as Lily had told me, were, I observed, becoming more and more discontented with the settlement, as were likewise a number of other people, and the attractions of the new regions of the far west were the constant subject of conversation.  We at the hut troubled ourselves much less about such matters than did our friends.  We had plenty of hard work, and were pretty well tired when the day's labours were over.  Mike declared that the only drawback to his happiness was the loss of his fiddle, which he never expected to see again.
"Dat am de cause ob my grief," observed Quambo, putting his hand to his heart.  "If you did get it, would not we hab a dance!  We would kick up de heels all night long, to make up for lost time."
It was some days after this that we one evening saw an Indian coming through the opening which had now been made down to the river, walking on snow-shoes, and with a package of some size on his back.
"Here comes Kakaik!  I wonder what him bring!" exclaimed Quambo, running forward to meet our visitor.
Kakaik having made signs that he had got something valuable, Mike advanced with open mouth and outstretched hands.  An idea had occurred to him.
"What is it, me friend?" he asked eagerly.
The Indian began a long speech.
"Och, man alive! just tell us what it's all about," cried Mike, who could no longer restrain his curiosity.
By this time Uncle Mark had come out of the hut.  The Indian, however, would go on with his address, of which we did not understand a word. Mike kept all the time pointing to the package, and entreating him to undo it.
At length the Indian stopped and commenced untying the thongs which secured the mysterious parcel, and exposed to the delighted eyes of Mike--his fiddle and bow.
"Sure, I thought so!" exclaimed the Irishman, eagerly grasping his treasure.  "Erin go bragh!--long life to yese, me jewil!" and clapping the instrument to his chin, he made an attempt to play on it; but it required, as may be supposed, no small amount of tuning.  Mike at once set to work, however, turning the keys and drawing the bow over the strings, all the time uttering expressions of gratitude to the Indian, and to all concerned in the recovery of the fiddle.  The moment he had tuned it to his satisfaction, he began playing one of the merriest of jigs, in unison with his own joyous spirits.
Quambo on hearing the sounds started up, snapping his fingers, kicking up his legs, and whirling round and round in time to the tune.  The Indian, grave as was his exterior, forthwith joined him, out-vying him in his leaps, and adding the wildest shrieks and shouts.  I could not long resist their example, and in a few minutes even Uncle Mark was dancing away as vigorously as any of us; Mike all the time kicking his heels, and bobbing his head with a rapidity which seemed to threaten the dislocation of his neck.  It was the wildest scene imaginable, and any one observing us would have supposed that we had all gone mad.
At last we had to stop from sheer want of breath, and on entering the hut Kakaik informed us that it was through the exertions of Manilick that the fiddle had been recovered.  He had paid half-a-dozen yards of cotton, the same number of strings of beads, a looking-glass, and a frying-pan, for the treasure.  It had been regarded with reverential awe by the possessors.  He sent it, however, as a gift to the rightful owner, and declined to receive anything in return.
"Faix, thin, I will be grateful to him till the end of me days," answered Mike; "and I hope that you will receive, for your throuble in coming, Masther Kakaik, my 'baccy-box, and half-a-dozen red cotton handkerchiefs for your wife and childer, all of them bran-new, except one which I wore as a night-cap when I last had a cowld, and another which has been in use for a matther of a week or so."
Kakaik accepted the proffered gifts with due gratitude, and further informed us that the Indians from whom Mike and I escaped had succeeded in regaining their encampment, though the fire had been close to their heels; and until Manilick's ambassador visited them they had supposed that we were destroyed.  By the manner in which we had got away from them, we were very much raised in their opinion; though they threatened, should they ever catch hold of us, to have our scalps off our heads.
"Much obliged to the gintlemen," remarked Mike; "but we will not let them do that same if we can help it, and we'll show them that the Palefaces have as much brains in their skulls as the Ridskins, cunning as they think themselves."
Kakaik consented to stop with us for the night, and we had several more tunes from Mike's fiddle, and another dance, almost as boisterous as the first.  Kakaik, after remaining a day with us, took his departure, loaded with as many articles as he could well carry; some forced on him by Mike and Quambo, others being given by my uncle and myself as presents to our friends.  I should have said that Kakaik also told us that Manilick was frequently at Kepenau's camp, and appeared to be favourably received by Ashatea.
Mike's fiddle was a constant source of amusement to us during the remainder of the winter.
Spring returned, whereupon Kepenau paid us another visit.  He said that he and his people had determined to move further westward, into an unoccupied territory, and he feared that some time would pass before he could again see our faces, but that he hoped occasionally to come with the peltries he and his people might obtain.
I accompanied him to the settlement.  Lily was much grieved to find that she and Ashatea were not likely to meet again for a long time.
"I thought that she would have become like one of us," she said, "and live in a comfortable house, and adopt our habits."
"A flower of the forest cannot bloom on the mountain top; nor can one born in the wilderness live happily in a city," answered Kepenau. "Though she may not adopt the habits of the Palefaces, she loves them, and the true faith they have taught her, and will ever pray to the same God they worship to protect them from danger."
Reuben scarcely attempted to conceal his disappointment, and even offered to accompany Kepenau back to his lodges; but the chief shook his head.
"If it is not well for my daughter to dwell among your people, still worse would it be for you to live with us, natives of the land," he answered.  "Stay with your parents, and support and protect them, and you will be blessed, and made far happier than were you to follow the desires of your heart."
After spending some days with us, Kepenau took his departure.
We were, as usual, very busy getting in the crops on our newly cleared ground, and carrying on other agricultural pursuits.  The summer was intensely hot,--far hotter than I ever recollected it.  The crops had come up early, but the locusts appeared and destroyed every growing thing which had risen above the surface.  This greatly disappointed those who had looked forward to an early harvest.
About this time a stranger arrived at the settlement.  He quickly made himself known as Mr Simon Sparks; and said, moreover, that he was the chief land agent of a new territory far to the west, which wonderfully surpassed our settlement in richness of soil, and fertility, and abundance of game.  His accounts were eagerly listened to, and my uncles were completely carried away, as were a large portion of the community. Still, some of the older people were of the opinion that well should be let alone; and that if we took as much pains in cultivating the ground as we should have to do were we to make a long journey, we should prove, notwithstanding the difficulties which might beset us, as successful in the end.
Mr Sparks, however, was not a man to be defeated in his object; he continued arguing the point till he had won over a good many adherents. Still, he had not gained a sufficient number to suit his purpose.
"Well, friends," he said, mounting his horse one evening, as a large number of the inhabitants were assembled in the chief open place in the village, which was designated the Square, "do I look like a man who would mislead you, or fail to carry out my promises?  I have slain many a bear, hunted the buffalo across the prairies, and, single-handed, fought and defeated scores of Redskins.  With such fellows as you at my back, even if ten thousand were to attempt to stop us we would force our way onward, and send them to the right-about.  What are you afraid of? If rivers are to be crossed, we can form rafts and swim our cattle over. There is grass on the plains, and game in the forests to supply all our wants; and a glorious country at the end of the journey, where happy homes can be established, and wealth obtained for ourselves and our children.  I ask you again--Do you take me for a man who would bamboozle you; or do I look like one who will prove true as steel, and fulfil all his engagements, as an honest man should do?  Those who believe that I speak the truth, hold up their hands; and those who don't, keep them down, and we part friends notwithstanding."
Few of us could help confessing that, as Mr Simon Sparks, with his tall sinewy figure, firm-set lips, and keen eyes, sat there on his strongly-built mustang, his rifle held across his saddle, he did look like a man very capable of doing what he said he had done, and what he said he would do.  Nearly all hands were raised up.
"Thank you, friends," he said; "I will stay another day with you, and we will talk the matter over again.  If a fair number are determined to move, we will go together; if not, I shall soon find others who know their interests better than you seem to do."
Saying this, he dismounted, and went to spend the evening with Mr Claxton, who was one of his chief adherents.
I returned home to report to Uncle Mark what Mr Sparks had said; but he was doubtful about moving till he had secured a purchaser for the land we had cleared with so much labour.
We were about to turn in for the night, when Quambo, who had been to look after the cattle and pigs, reported that he observed a peculiar glare through the opening towards the west, though no camp-fire was likely to be burning in that direction.  We all hurried out to look at what the black had described, and saw the brilliancy of the glare rapidly increasing.
"It is such a fire as it will take many bucketfuls of water to put out!" exclaimed Uncle Mark.  "As I live, boys, the forest is in flames!  And they are likely to extend pretty rapidly, too, with the wood dry as it now is."
"What had we better do?"  I asked.
"Collect our cattle, pigs, and poultry, take our guns and ammunition, and a supply of food, and get out of the wood as fast as possible," he answered, quite calmly.  "In a few minutes, if I mistake not, we shall have the forest blazing away all round us; and nothing that I know of can save the hut from destruction.  It will be fortunate if the village itself escapes, for the forest comes close up to it on two sides; and there will be no time to clear away the trees, and put an open belt between the houses and the fire."
Influenced by Uncle Mark's spirit, we immediately set to work to drive in the cattle, set the pigs free, and collect the poultry.  We loaded the waggon with as many articles as it could carry; and harnessing the oxen, commenced our retreat.
We were not a moment too soon, for already the forest to the westward was in a blaze, extending from the river far away to the north.  A narrow belt of trees alone remained between us and the conflagration, the dense smoke, curling in thick wreaths, being sent by the wind towards us, and making respiration difficult.  While Uncle Mark took charge of the waggon, the rest of us drove on the other animals, directing our course to the settlement by the only open road.  We knew, indeed, that in a short time we might have the fire on both sides of us.
The flames rose up high above the tops of the trees in the rear.  The crackling of the burning branches, and the loud reports as the thick trunks were split in two by the heat, sounded alarmingly near--the whole landscape before us being lighted up by the glare shed from the burning forest.  We might, we believed, escape with our lives, were we to leave the waggon and the cattle, but that was very far from Uncle Mark's thoughts.  By voice and whip we urged on the oxen, and shouting, shrieking, and using our thick sticks, we endeavoured to drive forward our refractory charges.
The inhabitants of the village must have seen the conflagration long before this, and would, we hoped, be preparing for their escape.
I remembered the fire on the prairie.  Then only the grass was burning, but now we should soon have the tall trees in flames on both sides of us.  In a few minutes the flaming masses might be tumbling down on our heads, and overwhelming us.  The thought of this prevented us from relaxing our efforts.  We ran here and there flourishing our sticks, shouting and bawling till we were hoarse; still, we kept ahead of the fire, although it was advancing rapidly in our track.  The hut, outbuildings, and enclosures must already, we knew, be reduced to a mass of cinders; but there was no use thinking about that.  We should be fortunate, did we preserve the more valuable part of our property.
At length the road became wider, and we got among clearings, which would somewhat stop the progress of the flames, did they not impede them altogether.  We dared not halt, however, but pushed on, directing our course to the south side of the village, where the country was completely open, and no trees left standing.  The river, too, ran in that direction, and some flat marshes on the banks would afford security to all fugitives.
I was thinking all the time of Lily, and my uncle and aunt; and had not my duty compelled me to remain with the cattle, I would certainly have hurried on to warn them, in case they should not have discovered their danger.  However, I felt sure that Uncle Mark would not have forgotten them, and that he was satisfied they would take the necessary steps to escape.  Uncle Stephen had also a waggon in which to convey his household goods out of the way of danger.
As we got near the village, we were satisfied that the inhabitants were aroused; for already several waggons were moving forward in the direction we were going, while we heard the shouts of the men driving others in the rear.  Fortunate, indeed, were those who had waggons, as the rest of the people would have to carry on their shoulders everything they wished to save.
The wind, which had increased, hurried forward the fire with terrific rapidity, and drove the smoke in dense masses round us, so that, bright as were the flames, we could often see but a short distance ahead.  The shouts and cries of the terrified settlers increased in loudness.  All hope that the village would be preserved must by this time have been abandoned.  The fire was coming up from the west and north-west, leaping at a bound, as it seemed, over the clearings; the burning branches, driven by the wind, quickly igniting all combustible matters amid which they fell.
We at last reached the ground I have spoken of; but not without the loss of some of our hogs, which had got away from us, in spite of our efforts to drive them forward.  Having early taken the alarm, we were the first to arrive, but others from the village quickly followed; when we immediately set to work to cut down every bush and blade of grass which might catch fire.
In a short time I heard Uncle Stephen's voice, and thankful indeed was I to see Lily and Aunt Hannah safe.  They had found time to load their waggon with the most valuable part of their property and a store of provisions.  The Claxtons directly afterwards arrived, and reported that there were still several persons remaining in the village, who believed that the conflagration would not reach it, and that they would be perfectly safe.  We were, however, too busily engaged in clearing the ground to think of anything else.
It was fortunate that these precautions had been taken.  In a short time, as we looked towards the village, we saw the flames rising up in all directions.  The fire came working its way along; in some places in thin lines, in others like a wave rolling over the sandy beach, and consuming everything in its course.
Before the night was half over a semicircle of flame was blazing up round the spot we occupied; the river, which was here very broad, preventing the progress of the fire in that direction.  Still, a burning brand, driven across a narrow part by the wind, might set some dry grass or bushes on fire; and it was impossible to say how far it might then extend.  Frequently the stifling smoke almost prevented our breathing, and we had to throw ourselves on the ground to escape it.
All night long did the fire rage round us.  The heat was intense, and the smoke and fine black dust blown over us was most oppressive. Happily, we had water near to quench our thirst, blackened though it was with ashes; and we had reason to be thankful that we had reached a place of safety--the only one near the settlement where we could have escaped destruction.
The women and children were placed in the waggons, where they endeavoured to obtain some rest.  The ground was too wet for the men to lie down; and we therefore either leaned against the wheels of the waggons or walked about.  Indeed, we had ample occupation in beating out the fire, which ran along the most dry portions of the ground we occupied, wherever there was herbage of any description.
Morning came: but the fire raged on; and there was but little chance of our being able to move for some days to come.  We had, however, no lack of meat; for, besides the pigs and poultry, several deer and numerous small animals rushed for safety towards our camp--only to meet the fate they were attempting to avoid.  Two or three bears, also endeavouring to escape from the flames, were shot.  No wolves or foxes came near us: they had probably, exercising their cunning, made their escape from the burning forest against the wind.
Daylight showed us such a scene of desolation as I hope never again to look on.  Not a vestige of the village remained; while blackened trunks--some with a few of their stouter limbs still branching from them, others reduced to mere black poles, and many burned down to stumps--appeared in every direction.  The crops had disappeared; and not even a fence was standing.
Thus the settlers, with sorrowful countenances, beheld the labour of years destroyed.
CHAPTER NINE.
THE SETTLERS DETERMINE TO ACCEPT MR. SPARKS' OFFERS--LILY'S SORROW AT LEAVING THE OLD SETTLEMENT--MODE OF ADVANCE--SABBATH OBSERVANCE ON THE MARCH--WE ARE LEFT BEHIND, IN CONSEQUENCE OF OUR WAGGON BREAKING DOWN-- OUR GREAT WANT OF WATER--A DANGEROUS DESCENT--THE HORRID SPECTACLE OF THE WOLVES--OUR OXEN FLAGGING, I PROCEED FORWARD ALONE IN THE DIRECTION OF A FIRE IN THE DISTANCE--MY JOY UPON DISCOVERING OUR FRIENDS--REUBEN OFFERS TO ACCOMPANY ME BACK--WE GET LOST--FAITHFUL MIKE FINDS US-- STRANGE HORSEMEN--MIKE, REUBEN, AND I TAKEN PRISONERS BY THE SIOUX.
The fire gave more support to the schemes of Mr Sparks than did all his arguments and glowing descriptions.  Mr Claxton, my uncles, and most of the settlers who possessed the means of transport, resolved to accept his offers, and at once prepared for the journey.  Those who had no waggons made up their minds to remain where they were, and to cultivate the ground, which the ashes would render more fertile than before.  The grass, after the first rain, would spring up and afford a rich pasture for their cattle; and the charred trunks would enable them to rebuild their log-huts and put up fences.  I had reason afterwards to believe that they chose the wisest course; though at the time I was well pleased at the thought of the long journey we were to take, and the adventures we might expect to meet with.
I was surprised to find that Lily did not enter into my feelings.  "I would far rather have stayed where we were," she said.  "The trees would soon have become green again, and we could have cultivated the ground as before, and the river and hills would have remained the same; though, as Uncle Stephen and aunt, and you, Roger, wish it, I am ready to go."
My uncles had saved a bag of dollars, and the Claxtons and others were provided with cash.  Therefore, as soon as the country was sufficiently cool to enable the waggons to move, two were sent off to the eastward to bring back such stores as were required; while the main body began to move southward, along the bank of the river, to a spot where we intended to cross.
Our course for some distance was to be to the southward; after which we were to turn to the south-west till we reached the prairie.  I cannot describe each day's journey.  In front marched a body of a dozen men, with their axes, to clear the road.  The waggons, drawn by long teams of oxen, followed; and the loose cattle, driven by the younger men and boys, brought up the rear.
While no fears existed of an attack from the Indians, the axemen generally marched a day in advance of us, to cut a road through the woods.  Another party, acting as hunters, ranged on one side or the other of the line of march in search of deer, bears, or any other animals, and birds; and they contrived, when possible, to reach the camping-ground an hour or two before the waggons, so that they might get the fires lighted, and have the game they had killed cooking on the spits, in readiness for the women and children.  Reuben and I undertook to hunt, since we were as good shots as any of the emigrants.  We always went together, and seldom failed to bring in game of some sort.
As evening approached we made our way towards the spot fixed on for the encampment.  Before nightfall the main body usually arrived, and the waggons were arranged in a circle, so as to form a sort of fortification in case of attack from the Indians: though we had no great reason to apprehend such an event at that period of our journey.  No time was lost in commencing supper; and as soon as it was over the women and children went to rest inside the waggons, while the men not on guard lay down either under them or in the neighbourhood of the fires.  A spot was always chosen--either by the side of a stream or near some pool--where the cattle could find water and good grass.  They were then turned out to graze, under charge of a few armed men.  Of course, we all kept our rifles by our sides, so that we might be ready to defend ourselves at a moment's notice.
We met with very few Indians, and those we fell in with seemed disposed to be friendly.  They saw that we were merely passing through their hunting-grounds, and had apparently no objection to our killing the comparatively small amount of game we met with.  Had we shown any intention of settling, the case might have been different.
We thus pushed on for many days together, halting only on the Sabbath, to obtain the rest which both we and our cattle required.  This was a day we all enjoyed.  One of the elders conducted a service, and the wilderness we were traversing resounded for the time with praise and prayer.
Thus we travelled on day after day; but we made but slow progress through the densely-wooded country, having sometimes to cut our way amid the trees, though we were generally able to find a passage without felling them.  Occasionally, however, we were compelled to do even that, and to drag the huge trunks out of the road, before the waggons could proceed.  We had also frequently to cross rivers.  When no ford could be found, we built large rafts, on which the waggons were ferried over, while the oxen gained the opposite bank by swimming.  They were accustomed to the undertaking; and, strange as it may seem, we never lost any by this means.
At length we gained an open but more desert region.  The ground was stony and uneven, and we had rocky hills to ascend and dark gorges to pass through.  Water was scarce, and we had often to carry sufficient to supply our wants for a couple of days; while our cattle suffered greatly from thirst.  We could no longer hunt in small parties, for fear of encountering hostile Indians; but we were able to kill game without going to any great distance from the camp, as we found several species of deer inhabiting those wilds.
My uncle's waggon was one day bringing up the rear of the train; and our water being nearly exhausted, we were pushing forward as fast as the oxen could move, in the hope of reaching a stream before dark, when one of the wheels came off, and the waggon, in falling over, suffered considerable damage.  Under other circumstances, the train would have stopped till our waggon was put to rights; but as most of the oxen were suffering from thirst, and many of the party had no water remaining, it was important for them to push forward without delay.  We were therefore compelled to remain by ourselves; but no Indians had as yet been seen in this part of the country, and we hoped that we should escape without being attacked.
My uncles were not men to be frightened by difficulties.  They and Mike, with Quambo and I, immediately set to work to do what was necessary.  We unloaded the waggon, and commenced repairing the damage it had received. This, however, took us some time, and it was quite dark before we got the wheel on again and the waggon reloaded.  Having been more provident than the rest of the party, we were able to wet our beasts' muzzles, and still have sufficient water to last ourselves for a few hours.
As we wished to overtake our companions as soon as possible, we immediately pushed forward, and soon got into a somewhat more level country than we had lately been passing through; but the ground was very hard, and in the darkness we could not perceive the tracks made by those in advance.  Had an Indian guide been with us, he would undoubtedly have discovered them; but we had to trust to our own sagacity, and we had not gone far when we found that we had got out of the right road.  We did our utmost to regain it, but in vain.  Still, believing that we were going in the proper direction, we proceeded onwards.  The stars came out brightly from the sky, and we shaped our course as directly as we could by them.
While Uncle Stephen drove, Uncle Mark and I, with Mike and Quambo, marched on either side, our faithful dogs following at our heels.  We kept a look-out in every direction, lest we should chance to be observed by a band of Indians, who, seeing a small party, might pounce down upon us; still, we were all accustomed to look on the bright side of things, and though we were aware of the possible danger, we were not unnecessarily alarmed.  Our chief anxiety arose from a fear of not finding water for our thirsty beasts.  They might hold out during the cool hours of night; but should they not be supplied with the necessary fluid, they must in a short time succumb, and dreadful indeed would be the consequences to ourselves.
When I occasionally went up to the waggon, I found Aunt Hannah and Lily awake.  They kept up their spirits very well, and naturally inquired whether we had as yet discovered the track of those who had gone before.
"Not yet," I answered in as cheerful a voice as I could command; "but we soon shall, I dare say; and, at all events, we are going in the right direction.  The stars are shining brightly, and by them Uncle Stephen can guide the waggon as well as if we had the train of our friends in view.  But we shall soon be up with them, I hope, and find them all comfortably encamped."
"I trust that we may," said Aunt Hannah, "if not, we shall find water, I suppose, in a few hours, and we shall certainly overtake them to-morrow."
This showed what was passing in her mind.  She had begun to suspect-- what really was the case--that we had widely deviated from our course. One thing was very certain,--that it would be destruction to stop; so, although our oxen were beginning to show signs of fatigue, and we felt our own legs aching, we continued to move forward.
At length, about a couple of hours before dawn, we arrived at the edge of a ravine, the sides of which, though not precipitous, appeared to be _very_ steep, and down which it would have been madness to attempt taking the waggon in the dark.  We must either stop, or try to find a passage across to the north or south.  We had observed that the valleys already passed by us were shallower to the southward; we therefore turned our waggon in that direction, hoping shortly to discover a practicable path, though we suspected that it would lead us even further from the track of our friends.
We went on and on, fancying that we could discern the bottom of the valley more clearly than at first, and hoping soon to discover a sufficiently gentle slope which we might be able to descend.  But we were deceived, and though Uncle Mark and I made our way down in several places, we saw that the waggon would certainly be upset should we attempt to get it down.  We were almost in despair of success, for the ravine appeared to run on to the southward with equally rugged sides as at first.  The panting oxen, too, could scarcely drag on the waggon, and we began to fear that they would fall unless water should be found.  We urged them on, however, for stopping to rest would not avail them, and might prove our destruction.
Morning at length broke, when we saw a hill before us which seemed to be the termination of the ravine; and as the light increased, to our joy we caught sight of a silvery line of water making its way along the course of the valley.  Our eagerness to reach the bottom was now greater than ever; and we could with difficulty restrain the oxen from rushing down the bank.  We had to keep at their heads, indeed, to prevent them attempting so mad a performance.
On we went, till we saw before us what we had so long been looking for,--a gentle slope which it would be easy to descend, while on the opposite side the ground was equally favourable for again ascending to the same elevation as before.  Putting the drag on the wheel, we commenced the undertaking; and though I more than once feared that the waggon would be upset, we reached the bottom in safety.  Then, immediately unyoking the tired oxen, we hurried to the fountain-head to obtain water, while they rushed to a pool close below it, where they could more easily drink.  Near at hand was an abundance of fresh grass, with which they quickly recruited their strength.
Aunt Hannah and Lily offered to watch while we lay down and took the sleep we so much required.
"I will keep a look-out all round, and if I see any suspicious Indians approaching I'll scream loud enough to wake you all," said Lily, half in joke, as if she were not at all anxious on the subject.
"One thing is very certain,--if they do come, we cannot run away from them," observed Uncle Mark.  "We must hope that they will prove friendly, for if not we shall have to beat them or be cut to pieces. However, we will trust to your watchfulness, and pick up a little strength to continue our journey."
We accordingly lay down under the waggon, and in less than a minute were fast asleep.
We rested till about ten o'clock, when Aunt Hannah, as Uncle Stephen had desired, awoke us.  Not a human being had approached the valley, though she said that she had seen some creatures moving along on the top of the heights; but what they were she could not make out, though they did not look, she thought, like deer.
Having taken a hurried meal, we again yoked the oxen; and going behind with crowbars to assist, we commenced the ascent of the hill.  It was harder work than we expected, but, by making a zigzag course, in about half an hour we got to the top.  Looking ahead, the country appeared to be pretty level, with rocky hills rising out of it in various directions, but we expected to have no difficulty in making our onward way.  We had filled all our skin-bottles with water, and even should we meet with no more till the following day the cattle would not materially suffer.
My uncles were of opinion that we had crossed near the source of the stream at which the rest of the party must have stopped, and that by verging to the right we should fall upon their tracks, although we did not expect to meet with them till the close of the day, owing to the direction we were taking.  They might possibly have sent back to help us; but as they had not many men to spare, it was more likely that they would push forward, expecting us ultimately to overtake them.  We kept a look-out for water as we went along, that we might allow our animals to drink, and thus be able to continue our journey the next day although none should be found at the camping-ground.  Still, though we went on and on, no signs could we discover of our friends.  Already the sun was sinking towards the west.
I had gone on ahead, and made my way up a hill over which we should have to pass, that I might obtain before sunset a wide view around, when I saw some way before me a number of creatures moving about.  They seemed to be very busy, but what they were doing I could not make out.  Some objects lay near them on the ground.  I hastened on, and when I got nearer I perceived that the objects were broken pieces of waggons,-- several wheels, and portions of the woodwork,--while the animals, I had no doubt, were wolves, from the horrid sounds which reached me; a mixture of snarling, yelping, barking, and growling, for I cannot otherwise describe the noise made by the creatures.
Not wishing to approach closer by myself, I returned to tell my uncles what I had seen.  Uncle Mark and Quambo accompanied me back, and as we got nearer the wolves looked up and snarled at us, and continued their occupation; but what was our horror, on advancing a little further, to discover that they were feeding on the dead bodies of a number of persons stretched on the ground!  A dreadful fear seized us.  Could they be those of our late companions?  I shuddered, and burst into tears.
Yes! there could be no doubt about it, I thought.  There lay those we had lately parted from in health and strength, cruelly murdered, and now the prey of the savage wolves.  Our friends the Claxtons!--Dora! honest Reuben! and their parents!
Then the fearful thought that such might ere long be our fate came over me.
"Can none have escaped?"  I exclaimed.
Uncle Mark advanced a few paces nearer the wolves, with his gun, ready to fire should they attack him.  He was looking at a man whom the wolves had not yet torn to pieces.  Apparently he was only just dead, and had probably defended himself to the last, keeping his assailants at bay.
"That man did not belong to our party," I heard Uncle Mark cry out. "These people must have formed part of another emigrant-train."
Quambo and I ran up to him.  We then shouted together, and some of the wolves nearest to us, startled by our approach, left their prey, when we were convinced, by the dresses of the corpses, that Uncle Mark's surmise was correct.  This discovery somewhat relieved our minds.  Our friends might have escaped; but at the same time it was too evident that hostile Indians were scouring that part of the country, and that we ourselves might ere long be attacked, and share the fate of the unhappy persons we saw before us.
We now slowly retreated, shouting as we did so to keep the wolves at bay, and turning every few paces to face them; for had they seen us fly, they might have been induced to follow.  They were now, however, happily for us, too much engaged in their dreadful feast to take further notice of us.
Having told Uncle Stephen what we had seen, we turned the heads of the oxen away from the spot, directing our course to the right, where the ground appeared to be more even than any we had yet gone over.  We agreed not to let Aunt Hannah and Lily know of the dreadful scene we had witnessed; but it was important to get as far as possible from the spot, and we determined, if the oxen could drag the waggon, to continue on all night.
"Do you think it likely that the wolves, when they have finished their horrible feast, will track us out?"  I said to Uncle Mark.
"I hope not," he answered.  "Were they starving, they might do so; but only the younger animals, which would have been prevented by their elders from joining in the feast, may possibly follow us.  If they do, we can keep them at a distance, for they are more easily frightened than the older brutes."
The stars, as on the previous night, were very bright, and we were able, by them, to keep a direct course.  Our chief desire now was to rejoin our friends, and next to that to find water.  We, of course, as we moved along, kept a strict watch, as before; but the scene I had witnessed made me feel much more anxious than usual, and every moment I expected to see a band of Indians start up from behind the rocks which here and there rose above the plain, or to hear a flight of arrows whistling through the air past our ears--perhaps to feel one sticking in my body.
Uncle Stephen had advised Aunt Hannah and Lily to lie down in a space left vacant for them in the middle of the waggon, where they would be protected by the luggage piled up on both sides.
We had now gone on many hours without water, and our cattle began to show signs of being very thirsty.  All we could do was to wet their muzzles with a little of the water we had brought with us; but our lives might depend upon our pushing on.
As we generally marched apart--two of us on either side of the waggon-- we had no opportunities for conversation, and were left, consequently, to our own melancholy thoughts.  Had I been by myself, or with male companions only, I should not have cared so much; but my mind was troubled by the idea of what might be dear Lily's fate, and that of Aunt Hannah, should we be attacked, or should our cattle break down and we be unable to proceed.
The oxen went slower and slower, notwithstanding every effort of Uncle Stephen to make them move at their usual pace.  At last they came to a stand-still.  Mike and Quambo, who at the time were ahead, endeavoured in vain to induce them to move on.  Uncle Mark and I ran forward to assist them.  As I was about to do so I caught sight of a ruddy spot in the distance, away somewhat to the left.  That must be a fire, I thought, and I pointed it out to Uncle Mark.
"It may be the camp-fire of our friends," he observed; "but we must not be too sure, for it may be that of a band of Indians."
He asked Uncle Stephen what he thought.
"The Indians generally take care to have their fires in places where they cannot be seen from a distance, so that is much more likely to be what you at first supposed," he answered.  "At all events, we will try and find out."
"If the oxen cannot be got to move, I will go on and ascertain," I said. "I can direct my course by the fire, and will approach cautiously. Should I discover that Indians are encamped there, I will hurry back and let you know.  We must then try and make our way in some other direction."
"I am afraid, Roger, that in such a case our hope of escape will be very small," said my uncle in a grave tone.  "Unless we can find water in some hollow in which it will be possible to conceal ourselves, at the return of day, the Indians are sure to see us.  Should they cross our track, they are equally certain to come upon us before long.  We must, however, hope for the best.  Go forward as you propose, and may Heaven protect you, my boy."
Without stopping to bid Lily and my aunt good-bye I hurried on, keeping my gaze on the fire, which, growing brighter as I advanced, enabled me without difficulty to direct my course for it.  The ground was tolerably even, but sloped slightly downwards in the direction I was taking.  The fire, indeed, when I first saw it, appeared to be in a hollow, or at all events at a lower elevation than that where we were standing.  I looked back once or twice, and quickly lost sight of the waggon.  So far I was satisfied that, should the people who had made the fire be Indians, they would not discover the waggon until daylight, by which time I hoped we should be able to conceal ourselves among the hills in the neighbourhood.
I hurried on as fast as I could venture to move, ignorant of what was before me.  It would be useless, I knew, to attempt concealing my trail, but as I did not intend to go nearer the camp-fire than was necessary to make out who were there, I hoped some time would elapse after I had retreated before the Indians could discover that any one had been near them.  Now and then, when crossing a hill, I lost sight of the fire, and had to direct my course by the stars overhead.  Again I saw it before me, blazing brightly.  I hoped that Uncle Stephen was right in his conjectures.  The fire, however, was further off than I had supposed, and the greater part of an hour was consumed before I got close enough to see the figures moving about it.
I now crept on as noiselessly as I could, for I knew that the least sound would be conveyed to the quick ears of the Redskins.  Fortunately there were a number of bushes in the neighbourhood, behind which I could conceal myself.
As I was going on I heard voices, and stopped breathlessly to listen. They did not sound like those of Indians, and presently I saw a couple of figures pass in front of the fire.  I almost shouted for joy as I distinguished by their outlines against the bright blaze that their dress was that of white men.  I felt sure that the people I saw before me were our friends; still, caution was necessary, for it was possible that they were prisoners of the Indians, saved from the caravan lately destroyed, only to meet with a more cruel death by torture.  There might be a large party of Indians encamped.
Presently two other fires came into view, which had been hitherto concealed by the thick bushes surrounding the hollow in which the camp was formed.  I crept on and on, crouching down like a panther about to spring on its prey.  The voices became more and more distinct, and at last I found myself on the top of the bank, with only a few bushes intervening between me and those encamped below.
On pushing aside the branches my eyes were greeted by the pleasant sight of waggons, cattle, and a number of people; some cooking before the fires, others preparing their resting-places for the night.  Not far off, at the lower part of the hollow, for it could scarcely be called a valley, was a pool reflecting the stars overhead.
Feeling sure that I saw my friends before me, I now rushed down the slope towards them.  The first person I met was Reuben Claxton.
"Why, Roger! where have you come from?" he exclaimed.  "We were very anxious about you, and my father had determined, should you not appear soon, to return with a party to your relief."
I quickly told him what had occurred, several others gathering round to hear my account.  They were greatly alarmed at the description I gave of the remains of the emigrant-train we had discovered.  I pointed out that their own camp was formed with less care than usual; of which fact they were convinced, but excused themselves on the plea that they had arrived very tired just at dark, having had a rough country to traverse, and that their cattle had suffered from want of water since the last place they had stopped at.  The way I had approached showed them how easily they might have been surprised by a party of hostile Indians.
I told them that I must be off again at once, as I was anxious to get back to our waggon, in order that we might join them without delay. Reuben offered to accompany me, and I was very glad to have him.  We therefore set off immediately.
It was necessary to be careful, however, to keep a direct course; and this could only be done by watching a star which I had marked, overhanging the spot where I had left the waggon.  By any deviation to the right hand or to the left we might easily pass it.
Reuben told me that many of the emigrants had become very anxious, and the account I had brought would make them still more so.  Could they venture back alone, he thought they would be willing to return to the settlement.
"For my own part, I like the wild sort of life we are leading; but I should be happier if I knew that Lily and my aunt were in safety, whereas they are exposed to as much danger as we are," I observed.
More than once I thought that we had gone wrong, as it was impossible to distinguish objects clearly in the gloom of night.  I fancied that we must have performed the distance; still I could nowhere see the waggon. The dreadful thought occurred to me that some prowling Indians might have pounced upon it, and carried it off.
"I hope not," said Reuben, when I told him my fears.  "We may not have gone far enough yet; or we are perhaps too much on one side or the other."
We went on a little further, trying to pierce the gloom.  Then we stopped to listen, but could hear no sounds.
"We must have gone wrong," I said; "for I am certain that we should otherwise have got up to the waggon by this time."
Still Reuben thought that I might be mistaken.
"Let us shout, and perhaps they will hear us;" and before I could stop him, he cried out at the top of his voice--"Hallo!  Mr Tregellis, whereabouts are you?"
Thinking it too probable that Indians were not far off, I dreaded lest the shout might be heard by them, and I advised Reuben not to cry out again.
I was still fearing that we had missed the waggon, when a voice reached our ears.  It was that of Mike.
"Is that you, Masther Roger?  If you are yourself, come on here; but if not, I'll throuble you to stop where you are, or I'll be afther shooting you through the head."
"All right, Mike!"  I exclaimed, as we made our way in the direction from whence the voice came.
He had grown anxious at my long delay, and had got leave from my uncles to try and find out what had become of me.
We soon got back to the waggon; and by giving the patient oxen the remainder of our water, they having in the meantime cropped some grass, we were able to move forward.  The road, in the dark, was difficult; but we managed to reach the camp without any accident, and were heartily welcomed by our friends.
Those who wished to return had, we found, summoned a meeting, and it was settled that the matter should be decided by the majority of votes.  My uncles turned the scale in favour of going on.  They pointed out that it would be as dangerous to retreat as to advance.
Mr Sparks urged that it would be madness to give up the enterprise. Water, he assured us, would be found at the end of every day's march, or even oftener; and though Indians might be met, with our rifles we could without difficulty keep them at bay, as none of them were likely to possess firearms--their only weapons being bows and arrows and spears. His remarks prevailed; and it was agreed that after a day's rest, which the cattle greatly required, we should recommence our march.
Once more we were making our toilsome way across the desert.  For two days we had moved on without interruption, keeping scouts out as usual on either side to give notice should any Indians approach.  Reuben and I, and other young men, performed that necessary duty for several hours each day.
Early in the morning of the second day we caught sight in the distance of a couple of horsemen with long spears in their hands.  They galloped towards us, apparently to ascertain who we were; then, wheeling round, they quickly disappeared, and though we were on the watch we saw no more of them.  When we halted at noon, we of course reported the circumstance.  As it showed that Redskins were in the neighbourhood, several more men were told off to act as scouts, with orders to retreat towards the train the moment they might see any Indians, whether few or many.
Reuben, Mike, and I were advancing as I have described, somewhat ahead of the train, when towards evening we entered a valley, the hills sloping away on either side of it.  At the further end we expected to find a stream, at the side of which we could encamp.  I was leading, Mike was next to me, and Reuben was nearest the train.  The ground I was traversing was somewhat rough, and I was leaping from one rock to another, when I fell and sprained my ankle.  Just as I got up--being then on higher ground than my companions, and having a more extensive view--I saw a large band of horsemen approaching at full gallop.  I knew at once that they were Redskins.
"Indians!  Indians!"  I shrieked out to Mike.  "Tell Reuben to run and let our friends know that the enemy are upon us."
Mike shouted at the top of his voice, as I had desired him.  I saw Reuben set off, and Mike following him.  Presently Mike stopped and looked back to see what had become of me.  I endeavoured to run, but found it impossible to move.  Before I had made a second step, I sank to the ground.
"Sure, you are not coming, Masther Roger," cried Mike, on seeing me fall.
The pain I endured prevented me speaking.
Mike rushed back towards me, crying out all the time, "Come along! come along!"  But move I could not.
He was still at some distance from me, when, looking round, I saw that the Indians were rapidly approaching.  I made signs to him to save himself, but he either did not, or would not, understand them.
"Go back! go back!"  I at length cried out.
"Arrah! and sure, not till I've got you on me back," he answered, still making his way towards me.
I felt very certain that, with me to carry, he could not possibly reach the train before the Indians would be up with us, and he could scarcely have failed to know this.
"Cling to me back, Masther Roger, and I'll show the Ridskins how a bog-trotter can get over the ground;" and stooping down, he seized my arms and threw me on his back.  "Now, here we go!" he cried out, and began leaping over the ground with as much agility as if he had had no burden to carry.
But his efforts, as I feared they would be, were in vain.  A wild whoop sounded in my ears, and looking back I saw upwards of a dozen Indians in their war-paint--their feather-plumes and cloaks flying in the air, as they galloped forward on their mustangs over the rocky ground, sending the stones and dust flying away from their heels.  I expected every instant to feel one of those ugly-looking spears plunged into my back. One of the painted warriors was just about to finish my career, when I heard a loud voice shouting in an authoritative tone; and instead of transfixing me, he let the point of his spear fall, then, seizing me by the collar, dragged me up on his steed, and laid me across his saddle in front of him.  Another treated Mike in the same manner, in spite of his struggles to free himself.  I made no resistance, knowing it was useless to do so.
The two Indians who had captured us wheeled their horses round and galloped away, and we met crowds of other warriors galloping at full speed in the track of the first.  I got one glance round, which enabled me to see that the enemy were close up to the waggons, while the puffs of smoke and the report of rifles showed that my friends were determined to defend themselves.  Several of the Indian saddles were emptied in a minute, but still a whole host of the savages appeared charging down on the train.  Whether or not Reuben had succeeded in getting under shelter of the waggons, I could not tell.  I saw no more, for my captor galloped off with me round the hill, and they were concealed from view, though I could still hear the sound of the shots and the shrieks and shouts of the combatants.  I had no hope of escaping with life, and believed that I was reserved to suffer the fearful tortures to which the Redskins so frequently subject their prisoners.
After going some distance the Indian stopped, and lifting me up from the painful position in which I lay, placed me behind him; fastening me by a leather strap round his body, and so securing my arms that I could not move.  He had previously deprived me of my rifle, which I had hitherto held firmly in my grasp, hoping against hope that I might have an opportunity of using it.  I saw Mike not far off, he having been treated much in the same manner, though not without the assistance of another Indian, who had accompanied the one on whose horse he was placed.
Having secured us, the Indians again galloped forward.  After going some distance, I saw that we were approaching a more wooded region than the one we had left, with a stream or river running through it; and I thought that I could distinguish cliffs, below which the river, in part of its course, made its way.
I could manage to turn my head, and as I did so I fancied that I discerned another horseman coming up behind us, with a prisoner, whom I naturally feared was Reuben.  Further off were numerous Indians, but whether they formed the whole of the body which had attacked the train or not I could not make out.  If they were, I had great hopes that the Redskins had been defeated, although they would probably wreak their vengeance on us, their unfortunate captives.  Still, in either case I felt sure that we should be put to death--though I rejoiced in the belief that Lily and my other relatives and friends had escaped; for as none of the Indians I had seen had firearms, I had good reason for hoping that our party had gained the victory.  Should Mr Sparks prove equal to his professions, by leading them well and taking the necessary precautions against surprise, they might still fight their way through the hostile territory.
My mind being relieved of anxiety about my friends, I was able to think more about myself and Reuben and Mike.  Had we any chance of escaping? I was determined, at all events, to make the attempt; and I was very sure that they would do likewise.  I resolved, could I get near enough to Mike, to tell him of my intention, and to advise him to keep up his spirits; and before long I had an opportunity.
"Bedad! it's what I have been afther thinking about," he answered. "I'll let young Reuben know me thoughts, too.  We've outwitted the Ridskins once before, and, sure, we'll thry to play them another trick."
He spoke in a tone of voice which showed that no coward fears had overcome him.
We galloped on until we reached the wood, where our captors dismounted, aided by the third Indian I have mentioned.  I had scarcely thought about my foot during my ride, but when I was cast loose and attempted to move by myself, I found that I could not stand, and presently sank to the ground.  Mike, on finding himself at liberty, hurried to my assistance, and, taking off my shoe, examined my ankle.
"It's a bad sprain," he observed; "but maybe these rid gintlemen will just let me get some cowld wather.  I'll bathe it and bind it up, and in the course of a few days, or in less time than that, it will be all to rights again."
I could only smile, not believing that I should be allowed many days to get well.
He then carried me under the shade of a tree, against the trunk of which I reclined.  The pain rapidly went off, and I was better able to consider our position, and the possibility of escape.
CHAPTER TEN.
The Indians, instead of binding Mike, as I expected they would do, allowed him to come and sit by me under the tree; narrowly watching him, however, though they did not interfere with us.
"Faix, thin, Masther Roger, I don't think these Ridskin gintlemen can be intending to do us much harm, or they would not be afther letting us sit so quietly by ourselves," he observed.
"I am not so confident of that, Mike," I answered.  "We must wait till the rest come up, to judge how they will treat us; at all events, I would advise you, when you get the chance, to mount one of their best horses and gallop off.  I am afraid that I shall be unable to make the attempt, or I would try it."
"Why, thin, Masther Roger, would you be afther belaving that I would go and desart you?  Even if they were to bring me a horse, and tell me to mount and be off, it would break me heart intirely to think that I had left you to their tinder mercies.  Whativer they do to you, they may do to me; and I'll stop and share iverything with you."
"I deeply feel your generosity, Mike," I said; "but you might have saved yourself and got back to the waggons, had you not attempted to carry me off, and I therefore wish you to try and escape if you have the opportunity."
Mike laughed and shook his head; and when I still urged him to escape if he could, he put on that look of stolidity which an Irishman so well knows how to assume, and refused to reply to any of my remarks.
While we had been talking, the Indian I had seen following us approached, having slowly walked his horse, which had apparently been lamed.  I now caught sight of the person behind him, and with much concern recognised my friend Reuben.  One of our captors assisted him to dismount; and Reuben, with his hands bound, was dragged forward to a short distance from us, where he was compelled to sit down on the ground, the Indians intimating by signs that he must not move.  He looked very melancholy, evidently imagining that he was soon to be put to death.  I tried to cheer him up by telling him that we had not been ill-treated.
"That may be," he answered; "but I know their treacherous nature. Depend upon it, when they all eat together, and talk over the number of their warriors who have been slain, they will wreak their vengeance upon us.  Are you prepared to die, Roger?  We must make up our minds for that, and we may consider ourselves fortunate if we are not scalped and flayed first.  I have often read, with very little concern, of the dreadful tortures the Redskins inflict on their prisoners, little dreaming that I should ever have to suffer the same."
"It is not wise to anticipate evil," I said.  "Let us hope for the best; and perhaps means may be offered us, that we do not now think of, to make our escape."
"I don't see where they can come from," he replied.  "These fellows keep too sharp a look-out on us to give us a chance.  Look there! here come the whole tribe of savages, and they will soon settle our fate."
He pointed as he spoke to a large number of horsemen galloping across the country from different directions, towards us.  They halted outside the wood, and several of them appeared to be wounded; but they did not allow themselves to exhibit any sign of suffering.  Having taken the saddles and bridles from their horses, the greater number led them down towards the water to drink; while six, who, from their more ornamental dresses, appeared to be chiefs, advanced towards us.  Their principal man, or head chief, spoke to us; but as we could not understand what he said, we knew that it would be useless to reply.  He then pointed to Mike and me, and addressed a few words to his companions.  They nodded, and we were led to separate trees, to which we were bound, with our hands secured behind us in a very unpleasant fashion.
Matters now began to look more serious than at first.  Darkness was coming on, and our captors lighted a large fire near to the spot where we were bound, and those among them who acted the part of cooks began dressing the evening meal.  They then sat down to discuss it--an operation which was soon concluded.  We in the meantime were left bound to the trees, watching what was going on.  After supper, a similar fire having been lighted near where we were bound, the principal Indians took their seats round it and began to smoke their long pipes, while, as I suspected, they deliberated on our fate.  They were some little distance off, but the flames from the fire cast a red glow on their figures, and enabled me to observe the expression of the countenances of those turned towards me, from which, with painful anxiety, I endeavoured to learn how they were disposed towards us.  Though I could hear their voices, I could not understand a word that was said.
After talking for some time, one of them, whose back, however, was towards me, got up and addressed his companions.  He spoke at some length, and I would have given much to know what he was saying.  His spear he held with one hand; with the other he pointed, now to the sky, now to some unseen distant object, now he waved it in the air.  The other Indians gazed up at his countenance, as if greatly moved by his address; but whether he was pleading for us or advocating our death, I could by no means discover.  In vain I listened to catch any words I might understand.
At last he brought his address to a conclusion, and sat down; when another slowly rose and commenced a harangue which was equally unintelligible to me.  Still, I felt very sure that the discussion was one on which our lives depended; and, judging from the countenances of the Indians, I was nearly certain that they intended to kill us.
The next speaker was even more long-winded than the first.  I thought that he would never bring his address to a conclusion.
A fourth man got up.  His face was also turned away from me.  His action was more vehement than that of his predecessors, and the tones of his voice afforded me but very little hope of mercy from his hands.
While he was speaking, another Indian, whom I had not hitherto seen, stalked into the circle, and regarding the speaker with a fixed and, as I thought, somewhat contemptuous look, sat himself down among the others.  His appearance evidently created a considerable amount of astonishment, little as the natives are accustomed to show their feelings.  So soon as the last had ceased speaking, he rose and addressed the assembly.  As he did so, it struck me that he bore a strong resemblance to Manilick, though he was much more gaudily dressed than I had ever seen that young chief.
All eyes were turned towards him as he spoke, and scarcely had he commenced when I heard a voice whisper in my ear, "Trust to me!"  At the same moment I felt that the thongs which bound me were being cut, and the next instant I was at liberty; but, recollecting my sprained ankle, I feared that it would not avail me.  To my surprise, however, when I tried to move I found that I could do so without much pain.
I slipped round the tree, when I felt my hand grasped by that of my deliverer, who, discovering that I could move but slowly, stooped down and lifted me on his back.  The darkness prevented me from seeing who he was, but I felt convinced, from his dress and the tone of his voice, that he was a white man.  He moved along cautiously under the trees towards the bank of the river.
"Can you swim?" he asked in a low voice, "Yes--like a fish," I answered.
"Then we will take to the river at once.  There are horses waiting on the opposite side, lower down.  We can float with the current till we reach them," he continued.
We were not more than three or four minutes in reaching the bank, and we at once glided in so as to create no splash.
"Strike out towards the middle of the river," he whispered; "but do so as gently as possible."
I followed his directions, and found that I could swim without any pain to my ankle.
"Now throw yourself on your back, and we will float down with the current," he said.
We could all this time hear the voice of the Indian addressing the assembly of warriors.  So intent were they in listening to what he was saying, that they had evidently not discovered my escape.
"Can nothing be done to save my companions?"  I asked, thinking of the dreadful fate which might await Reuben and Mike.
"Others will look after them," he answered.  "Don't speak, lest the water should convey your voice to the shore."
After we had gone some distance he told me to turn round again and swim, so that we might make more progress.
"Now make for the shore," he said.
In a short time we gained a spot where the trees grew close down to the bank.  Climbing up there, he led me through the wood.  On the further side I found a man holding three horses.
"Glad to get you out of the clutches of the Indians, my son Reuben," he said.
"I am not Reuben," I answered; "but I heartily wish that he had escaped. I am Roger Penrose."
"Why, Sandy McColl, I told you to try and set Reuben at liberty; though I am glad to see you, Roger," said the speaker, whom I now recognised as the old trapper, Samson Micklan.
"I should have been discovered if I had attempted to reach the two others, for they were much nearer the fire; and, in truth, I could not distinguish one from the other," said Sandy.
"Well, we must see what can be done to rescue Reuben and the Irishman," said old Samson.  "Our friend Manilick promised to plead for you and Mike, and, should he fail, to come and let me know; and he will, I trust, exert his influence in favour of Reuben, when he finds that you have got off.  At all events, the Indians will not put their prisoners to death till they get back to their lodges, and we must try and set them at liberty before then.  Though they have vowed to have my hair, I fear them not, for I have outwitted them a hundred times--and intend to outwit them as many more, if I have the chance.  But we must not delay here, for when they find that you have got away they will suspect that you took to the river, and will scour the banks in search of you."
Anxious as I was to save my friends, I had no wish again to fall into the hands of the Indians, I therefore very readily mounted one of the horses.
"If you, Samson, will go on to the cave with this young man, I will return and try to help the others," said Sandy.  "Maybe, while the Indians are looking for me, they may leave them unguarded, and I may have a chance of carrying out my object."
"That's what we'll do, then," answered old Samson.  "I needn't tell you to be cautious, because I know that you will be so."
As he spoke, Samson threw himself on one of the horses, and took the rein of the third.  "We shall better deceive the Redskins if we take this one with us," he observed.  "They may possibly discover that it has no rider; but it will puzzle them, at all events, if they come upon our trail, and they will be less likely to suspect that you are watching them."
"Don't fear for me," answered Sandy.  "I'll keep my wits about me; and if the other two can make good use of their legs, we will overtake you before long, should I manage to set them free.  If I am caught, why, I shall only suffer the fate I have often thought would be my lot."
Saying this, Sandy again plunged into the wood out of which we had come; while Samson and I galloped away across the country.  It was too dark to discern objects at any distance, but my companion seemed to be thoroughly acquainted with the ground.  At last I saw before me a hill, rising out of the plain.  As I got nearer, I observed that the sides and summit in many places were covered with trees; in others, it was barren and rocky.  We directed our course towards a gap in the hillside, up which we wound our way.
"Can you walk?" asked old Samson.
"I will try," I answered, imitating his example and dismounting--when I soon found that I could get on better than I should have supposed possible.
He led two of the horses, while I followed with the third; but, passing amid the trees, the animals had to lower their heads to enable them to creep under the boughs.
On getting out of the wood, I found that we were proceeding up a steep zigzag path, along which two people could not make their way abreast. At last we reached a narrow terrace, with a few trees growing on it.  We made our way between them till Samson entered a cavern, the mouth of which would admit only a horse, or, at the utmost, a couple of persons at a time.  I followed; and having gone through this narrow archway, Samson told me to stop.  He then, using his flint and steel, lighted a torch, and by the flame I discovered that we were in a large vaulted chamber.  On one side there were some rude stalls, and litter for horses; on the other, a couple of rough bunks, and a table and some stools, showed that it was used as a human habitation.
"This is my home and fortress," said Samson.  "I come to it occasionally when tired of hunting; and I always keep here a store of provisions.  At the further end is a spring of water, so that I might hold it for any length of time against a host of foes.  I have never as yet been attacked, for the Indians know that they could not attempt to drive me out with impunity, and think it wiser to leave me and my companion unmolested."
I asked him how he came to know that we had been captured by the Indians.
"Because I witnessed with my own eyes what happened," he answered.  "I was on the hillside overlooking the train, but had no time to warn you of the approach of the enemy, nor could I at first help you; but I saw you three carried off, and then made my way here to get the assistance of Sandy, who had remained at home, as well as the three horses."
I asked him if he thought that our friends had escaped.
"I know that the Indians were beaten off," he answered; "but whether any of the emigrants were killed or wounded, I cannot say.  They continued their course, and must have encamped shortly afterwards by the side of the river.  They will there have formed a strong camp, which the Indians will not venture to attack.  Their road will lead them not far from this, when you can rejoin them, and I will pay them a visit."
"But I could not show my face among them without Reuben and Mike.  I should feel as if I had deserted my friends, without attempting to rescue them," I said.
"A very right spirit, my lad," answered old Samson; "but you could have done nothing, and would only have lost your life if you had made the attempt.  Sandy has a long head on his shoulders, and a brave heart; and if any man can circumvent the Redskins, he can.  He has a good drop of their blood in his veins, with the brains of a white man, and knows all their ways."
These assurances somewhat relieved my mind.  The exertions I had made, however, had brought on the pain in my foot; and after having eaten some food which Samson gave me, I was thankful, by his advice, to lie down in Sandy's bunk.  I slept, but not soundly, for I fancied that I heard the voices of the Indians consulting as to our fate; and then, in my dreams, I saw them approaching with their scalping-knives to take the hair off my head.  Such being the character of my dreams, I was glad to awake and find myself in comparative safety.
Old Samson was listening at the entrance of the cave.  He had, I found, the means of barricading it with stout timbers, so that no foes could force their way in without paying dearly for the attempt.  I rose from the bunk, intending to join him, but he told me to lie quiet.  I obeyed, and was soon asleep; and when I again awoke daylight was streaming through the entrance.  I looked round, but Samson was not to be seen.
On attempting to get up, I found that my ankle was much swollen, and that I could not walk.  With a groan I sank back again on the bunk, and waited anxiously for Samson, wondering what had become of him.  The horses were still there, munching their fodder, so he was not likely to have gone far.  At last I saw him at the entrance.
"Well, lad, you may get up now, and have some breakfast," he said.
I told him that I could not walk, as I was suffering severely from my ankle.
"That's a bad job," he observed; "I intended to have moved away from this.  There are more Redskins in the neighbourhood than I like, as no game can be got while they are here."
I asked if Sandy had appeared, and brought any tidings of Reuben and Mike.
"No," he answered; "for the reason I have given, they could not make their way across the country in daylight.  But that is no reason why Sandy should not have succeeded.  He may have set them at liberty, and concealed them and himself in some other place.  There are several caves like this in different directions, which seem to be made by nature as refuges from the Indians.  The only difficulty is to get to them without being tracked, as it is always a hard job to escape the keen eyes of the Redskins, although the horsemen of the plains are not so clever in tracking a foe as those who go on the war-path on foot.  That makes me hope that we shall hear of our friends, though it may be some time hence."
These remarks of old Samson again somewhat relieved my mind.  I then asked him when he thought that the emigrant-train would pass by; and whether he could manage to let me join it on horseback, for I thought that I could ride although I could not walk.
"I much doubt whether it will pass this way at all," he answered.  "It will either turn back, or, if the leader is a man of judgment, he will conduct it by a different route, further to the south.  Your uncles, Mr Claxton, and their companions are brave men, but they will not wish to encounter the savage hordes who have assembled to stop their progress on the road they intended taking."
I was very glad to hear this opinion from one who was so well able to judge rightly, and I felt more reconciled than I otherwise should have been at remaining inactive; for, as to moving, unless I was placed on horseback, I knew that was impossible.  As far as I could tell, it might be many days before I could recover, as a sprain, I was aware, is frequently as difficult to cure as a broken bone; still, I did not like to keep old Samson in the cave, should he wish to go out for the purpose of ascertaining what had become of Sandy.  I told him that I should not be at all afraid of staying by myself, if he could manage to close the entrance behind him.
"I have no desire to show myself on the plain, or I should have a dozen Redskins galloping after me; and though I should not fear to meet twice as many, provided I could take shelter behind some big trees, I would rather not meet them where I should be exposed to their arrows," he answered.  "We must make up our minds to be prisoners for some days to come; and keep a constant watch, too, lest they should get upon our trail, and find their way up here."
"But how can you manage to keep watch alone?  You will require some sleep," I observed.
"Two or three hours are quite sufficient for me; and they are not likely to attack us for the first hour or two before and after midnight," he answered.  "If they come at all during the night, it will be soon after dark, or just before dawn.  I know their ways, and have thus been frequently enabled to get some necessary rest, even when I knew that they were on my trail."
"But you would surely be better for more than two or three hours of sleep; and if you will drag my bunk to the door, I will keep watch while you rest."
To this he would not agree.  "You require all the sleep that you can get," he said.  "No enemy, either, is able to break in on us unawares. I have made arrangements in case of an attack, as you would have seen, had you examined the entrance.  There is a thick door which can be slid across it; and in the door several loopholes, so that Sandy and I could hold it against any number of Indians who might manage to make their way up the hill."
From what old Samson had said, I fully expected that the cave would be attacked; for I did not suppose that the Indians, scouring the country, would fail to observe our tracks.
The entrance was always kept closed, and we should have been in darkness had it not been for a rude lamp, fed by bear or deer fat, which stood on the table.  The old hunter and his companion had stored up a large supply of dried grass for the horses, so that it was not necessary to turn them out to feed.  He allowed me to sleep as much as I could, and when I was awake he generally seemed disposed to enter into conversation.  He told me many of his adventures and escapes from Indians, and appeared to like to have me talk to him, and to hear all about my uncles, Aunt Hannah, and Lily.
One day I began repeating to him the history Uncle Mark had given me of his and Uncle Stephen's arrival in America.  As I went on, I saw that he was listening with more and more interest; and when I described how, on reaching the village where my parents had lived, they found it burnt to the ground, and discovered Lily and me, and our murdered mothers, he exclaimed--
"Did your uncles learn the name of the little girl's mother?"
"No," I answered; "she died before she had time to utter it, and could only commit her infant to their charge."
"Strange!" exclaimed the old man.  "I had a daughter, my only child, living in that village; and she, with her husband and babe, were, I had every reason to suppose, slaughtered by the savages who attacked the place.  Yet it is possible that their infant may be the very one your uncles saved; but, alas!  I can never be sure of that."
"But I think that you may have very satisfactory proofs whether or not Lily is your daughter's child," I answered, "for Aunt Hannah has carefully preserved her clothing, and some ornaments which her mother wore, and which you may be able to recognise."
"That I certainly should," said old Samson, "for I had but a few days before parted from my daughter to proceed eastward.  On hearing of the massacre, I returned; but finding the whole village a mass of blackened ashes, and being unable to gain any tidings of the beings I loved best on earth, I had no doubt left on my mind that they had all perished. Having thus no one to care for, I took to the life I have since led-- which I had before only occasionally followed, after the death of my wife and the marriage of my daughter, for the sake of the sport it afforded me."
From this time forward old Samson constantly spoke about Lily; and, persuaded by his own hopes that she was his grand-daughter, he seemed to be fully convinced that such was the case.  His anxiety to see her, and to examine the clothes and ornaments which Aunt Hannah had preserved, increased every day; but how were we to find Lily and Aunt Hannah?  Had our friends turned back; or had they pushed forward, fighting their way successfully towards the fertile region to which they were bound? Neither he nor I could bring ourselves to contemplate what might otherwise have happened--had they been overwhelmed by the hordes of savages, and met the fearful fate which had overtaken the smaller band whose remains we had discovered?
The old trapper went out every day to ascertain if the Indians had moved away from the plain below us--should he find the country open, he intended, he said, to go in search of Sandy, and those he might have rescued--but he as often returned with the information that the Indians still occupied the country.  I, of course, greatly hampered him, for he would not leave me in the cavern for long together.  Had he been by himself, he could easily have started at night and made his escape.
Gradually my ankle regained strength, and Samson now made me get up and walk about to try it.  Unwilling longer to detain him, I at last declared that it was quite well, making light of the pain I still felt when I walked, and begged to accompany him the next time he went out. He consented.  "But you must not go without a weapon; and you can use it well, I know," he observed, as he drew a rifle from under his bunk.  He produced also a powder-horn, which I slung over my shoulder, and a bag of bullets.  The great drawback to our place of concealment was, that although well hidden from the sight of those in the plain, we had to go some distance before we could obtain a view of the surrounding country.
Leaving the horses in the stable, and the entrance open, we set out. Then going some distance down the hill, we made our way through the thick wood which covered its sides, and were just emerging into the open space, when, through the bushes, I caught sight of several horsemen galloping across the country.  I made a sign to my companion to keep concealed, and crept forward on my hands and knees.  As I looked out, I discovered the object of the Indians.  A solitary waggon had just come into view, and they were about to attack it.
I drew cautiously back, for though the Indian warriors were probably intent on the business in hand, their keen eyes might have detected me. I asked Samson if we could assist the unfortunate people in the waggon.
"I fear not," he answered.  "We might kill a few of the Redskins; but unless the travellers possess a number of rifles, and make a bold stand, we cannot help them.  We will, however, be ready to take a part if we have opportunity."
As the horsemen approached, three rifles alone opened fire upon them from behind the waggon.  One of their number fell, but several dashed forward; while others, circling round, prepared to attack the devoted emigrants from the opposite side.  The affair, which was a short one, was dreadful to witness.  We should, I saw well enough, lose our lives did we show ourselves.  Indeed, before we could have got up to the waggon, all its defenders were killed by the savages surrounding it; and we knew too well that those inside must, according to their cruel custom, have been put to death, whether women or children.  The Indians of the plains have no compassion either for age or sex.  The dreadful thought occurred to me that those we had seen slaughtered might be our own friends.  It was evident, however, from his calmness, that the idea of such a thing had not crossed old Samson's mind.
After plundering the waggon of everything they considered of value, the savages set it on fire.  While it was burning, and they were still gathered round it, a dreadful explosion took place, scattering destruction among them.  Panic-stricken, and not knowing what might next happen, the survivors mounted their horses and galloped off.  A keg of powder, which they must have overlooked, had probably exploded.
"They deserve their punishment," said the old man, "and they will not come back again in a hurry; so we may now descend into the plain, and see if we can learn who the unfortunate people were."
This was what I was wishing to do.  We accordingly left the wood and made our way down the hill, towards the remains of the waggon.  We had not got far, however, when we caught sight of three horsemen galloping across the plain towards us.  My companion scrutinised them narrowly.
"If they are friends, they have reason for their hurry; and if enemies, the sooner we get under cover the better," he observed.  "We must not now attempt to reach the waggon.  Ah!  I understand all about it.  See! out there come a dozen or more horsemen.  They must be Indians in pursuit of the first--who, if I mistake not, are our friends.  Come on, Roger! they will reach the hill as soon as we do."
As he said this we retreated to the foot of the hill, and began to climb it as rapidly as we could.
"But, if these are our friends, will they find their way to the cave?" I asked.
"Yes, yes!  Sandy knows it as well as I do," he answered, without stopping.
We were just approaching the entrance of the cave, when the war-whoops of the Indians, and their loud cries, as they shouted to each other, reached our ears.
"They are making their way up the hill," said Samson.  "Get inside, lad, and prepare to close the entrance when I tell you."
The loud rustling sound of persons making their way through the brushwood was heard, and presently Sandy, accompanied by Reuben and Mike, sprang out from among the trees, and rushed towards the mouth of the cavern.
"No time to be lost," sang out Sandy.  "The Redskins are at our heels!"
In a moment they were all three within the cave.  Old Samson was still outside, and I saw him lift his rifle and fire.  At the same moment two arrows flew past his head--one sticking in the woodwork, the other entering the cavern--and just then I caught sight of the fierce countenances of half-a-dozen red warriors who were making their way between the trees.  Their leader, springing forward tomahawk in hand, nearly reached Samson; when, with the agility of a far younger man, he sprang through the opening, and I immediately closed the door--the sharp blade of the weapon burying itself deep in the wood.
"Now, we'll give it them!" exclaimed Samson, as he and Sandy opened three of the concealed loopholes, through which we thrust the barrels of our rifles and fired on our assailants.  Their leader fell dead, shot through the heart by Samson.  Two others were severely wounded, but numbers were following them, and rushing forward with their hatchets, dealt desperate blows on the door.
"You may cut away pretty hard, my laddies, before you break that in," observed Sandy, as he reloaded his rifle.  Samson and I were doing the same, and again we fired; but most of the Indians, knowing the time we should take to do that, sprang aside, and only one of them was hit.
"You will find two more rifles in yonder chest," said Samson to Reuben and Mike.  "Quick! load them, and we'll astonish the Redskins."
While he was speaking, the blows on the door were redoubled, and in spite of its strength it appeared every instant as if it would give way. Samson was, in the meantime, ramming down his charge, and again his rifle sent forth its deadly contents.  Instead of firing together, we now followed each other, allowing a few seconds to elapse between each shot, thus making our assailants afraid of approaching the door.  We guessed that they were collected on either side, where our rifles could not reach them.
"Won't you come and be American with us?" she asked kindly.
The boy drew back a moment while his blue eyes searched her face for whatever hidden cruelty might lurk beneath its seeming sweetness. Then he smiled--a timid, but trusting smile--and rising, took her extended hand.
But Billy Hastings called jeeringly: "He's a sneak! He's just doing it to pretend!"
"He knows I'd drag him if he didn't come!" exclaimed another.
"Coward! _Coward!_" yelled Luke. "You're afraid to refuse!"
And then, all suddenly, something in the German lad flamed up. He snatched his hand from Louise's. He stood to his full height with blazing eyes, and cried:
"It's a lie!"
The sound of the school-bell broke the startled quiet which followed the alien's spirited revolt.
"_Please_," pleaded Louise, "don't mind them! You've time yet to come under the flag."
But Rudolph stood indignant, immovable.
"Get to your lines, children," and the principal's call-bell was heard tapping above on the porch.
A group of boys came suddenly together into a tight bunch.
"We'll fix him after school," Louise heard them threaten. And she knew that Rudolph heard it, too--knew by the sudden whiteness which swept over his face.
The next minute the boys and girls were drawn up in parallel lines ready to march into the schoolhouse. Louise was at the end of her line and Rudolph Kreisler was the last on the boys' row. They were opposite each other.
"Eyes front--march!" came the command, and the lines moved forward with one impulse.
"Eyes front!" But to save her life Louise could not help stealing a sidelong glance at Rudolph.
To her horror she saw the little alien slip quietly behind a rose-bush and drop out of sight into the bricked-up area which furnished window-space for the basement.
With a flash Louise remembered that those windows communicated directly with the engine-room, and that the engine-room was directly under the third grade.
"Pay attention, Louise," came from the porch, and Louise's startled, dark eyes were turned to the front again.
When the children were seated in their room it developed that Miss Barclay had been temporarily called away, and that a scared-looking girl from the teacher training-class was in charge of the third grade.
The new teacher did not miss Rudolph, but the children did, and there was smothered excitement in consequence.
Louise, who had not breathed a word of what she knew, sat grasping her desk with both hands. Rudolph Kreisler had refused to come under the flag! Of course they had taunted him, but the stark fact remained that he _had_ refused. And then no human being had ever seen inside those bulging pockets. Rudolph Kreisler, bulging pockets and all, was in the engine-room, right under their feet!
And then a new fear suddenly laid its grip upon her heart. Suppose that German boy should do something to the flag! She tried to shift her position so that she could see out of the window, but found it impossible.
"Oh-o-o, teacher!" Louise jumped at the sound of excitement in the voice from behind her, but quieted somewhat when she realized that it was Tinsie Willis who spoke. "Louise has left her hat on the front lawn!"
"Louise, go and get your hat," said the substitute, looking all about the room to see which one of the many little girls might be the one reported.
Louise rose from her seat with fear and trembling and left the room.
But the first glimpse of the out-of-doors dispelled her great new fear--her flag was still there!
The stately lawn looked vast and awe-inspiring now that one had to face its darkly waving greens all alone, but Duty called. She had left her hat by the flagpole, and she now went timidly up to get it. She mounted the green knoll. She looked up.
To play fair--to play fair! And yet, one must be loyal. One couldn't let German spies go around with their pockets--Rudolph Kreisler was in the engine-room right now!
Louise's grandfather and his father's father had died for their country--would they know, 'way up yonder in heaven, if she of their own blood were to turn coward at the test?
It was too poignant a risk. Louise took hep young life in her hands. Down the green knoll and around the rose-bush, and she dropped into the brick area right by the window which opened from the engine-room. It was raised.
The little girl peeped in, with her heart swelling till she thought she would smother. There was black dust on the floor and black soot on the walls. And there in the centre rose the huge black demon engine. But no crouching enemy was to be seen anywhere--he was hiding, of course!
She slipped through the window, past the great silent engine, and came face to face with Rudolph Kreisler.
The die was cast now.
"Tell me," demanded Louise, choking with excitement and fear, "are you a--a _German spy_?"
"No," said the astonished boy, "_no_!"
"Well, what _are_ you, then?" There was no backing down now; she was going to have it out with him.
"I wanted to be--American," he said, his lips threatening to quiver. "I--I thought I was." And he looked away.
One must know the truth when one's country was at stake. Louise drew a quick breath.
"Well, what are you doing with your pockets full of bombs, then?" she forced herself to bring out.
The little boy turned toward her again, and began slowly to draw out the contents of those suspicious pockets. A mitt, a top, two balls, a kite-string, a chicken-foot, a gopher, nails of various lengths, some tobacco tags, and a grimy stick of candy were laid one by one on the janitor's tool-bench, and the German spy stood with his pockets turned wrong side out.
But one must have the _whole_ truth.
"What are you doing with balls and mitts when you sit on the steps all the time?" the little girl demanded, but with decidedly less asperity this time.
"I thought maybe they'd--let me play, sometime." Something rolled down his cheek and splashed on the front of his jacket.
"_Won't_ they let you play?" choked Louise, blinking hard to clear her suddenly clouded vision.
The boy shook his head.
"Well, why doesn't your mamma come and scold the teacher about it?" she demanded in indignant sympathy.
"I haven't any mamma."
"Oh-o-o! Well, you have a papa, haven't you? Why doesn't _he_ do something?"
"Father says those who are born here don't know how awful it is to have to choose----" then he stopped.
"Doesn't your father hate Germany?" the little girl asked.
"Why, no," said the boy.
"Does he love America?"
"Yes," said the boy.
"Well! Well!" exclaimed the little girl. Then--"Do you know, Rudolph, I'm sorry for your papa!"
But Rudolph did not answer this time. He merely turned aside till his face was hidden.
Suddenly a remembered something gripped Louise.
"Rudolph," she said, "if you _are_ American, why did you refuse to come under the flag?"
"I--I was going to--but they called me a 'coward,' and said I was afraid to refuse," he answered huskily.
Louise found herself batting very heavy lashes again.
"I am so glad I came to you," she said, "because I never would have known that you are not a German spy if you hadn't told me!"
"Lou-i-i-se!"
The two started at the call--it was in Tinsie Willis's high-pitched voice. Evidently she had been sent to find the truant.
"Sh-h-h!" exclaimed Louise to Rudolph. "They are after me for staying out so long. I must go."
"Those steps yonder lead to the front hall," said the boy. "Go up that way."
"But you must come, too!" Louise exclaimed.
"I can't," replied the miserable child. "The boys are fixing to fight me. When school is over I'll slip out and go home."
"But why wait? Why don't you go now?" asked the little girl, a strange uneasiness coming over her.
"The police will get me if I go out on the street during school hours," answered he.
"Lou-i-i-se!"
"I'm going," whispered Louise to Rudolph, "but _don't_ let the boys catch you! Miss Barclay has gone--and--and--_don't_ let them catch you, Rudolph!"
The next moment she glided up the dark stairway and came out into the big hall.
Jimmie Fisher was emerging from the third-grade cloaking-room with his hat and books.
"Father's leaving for France with a hospital unit," he explained hurriedly, "and mother sent for me to tell him good-by." Then he darted away.
Miss Barclay gone! And Jimmie gone! Had God himself deserted the third grade?
*       *       *       *       *
When Louise crept back into the schoolroom--ahead of Tinsie Willis, who was still searching for her--she found things very troublous indeed. The children were naughty and restless, and the substitute was--a substitute! The whole class had been told to stay in, and Louise was promptly included in the sentence as soon as her tardy little face appeared in the doorway.
But she did not cry or fling herself about, for she knew she had remained out of the room overtime. Of course it had been for a high purpose, but that she could not explain, so she merely assented courteously and slipped into her seat. Her grandfather and his father's father had laid down their lives for the right--if she did not succeed in living through that dreadful half-hour of punishment, she would be but another of her race to die for a high cause.
Matters grew worse, and now the wind and the sky took a hand. The great trees outside began to battle fiercely together, and the sky frowned, darker and darker.
Suddenly Louise--looking out of the window--saw Perkins, the janitor, hauling down the flag! Was the Houston Street School surrendering to the Germans?
For one unworthy moment Louise suspected Rudolph Kreisler again. But she instantly afterward reminded herself that he had told her with his own lips he wished to be American.
Then the heavens opened and the floods came. It was a terrible, terrible afternoon, but children and substitute managed somehow to live through it, and after so long a time the gong sounded for the dismissal of school.
The children of the other grades marched out. Tramp--tramp--it sounded terribly like a host in retreat!
Then quiet!--with the third-graders sitting silent in their seats, trying to calculate how many thousand years it would take for that long clock-hand to move half-way round the dial again.
Louise began wondering at just what point Rudolph Kreisler would steal out of his hiding and break for home. The rain had stopped, and she hoped and believed that the little German would make good his escape before the third grade had finished serving sentence.
Suddenly Luke, raising his hand, asked of the substitute:
"May I speak to Billy Hastings on business?"
The substitute was writing something and assented without looking up. Louise could not help hearing the hoarsely whispered "business."
"Connie Tipton," said Luke to Billy, "says that that German spy has been hiding in the basement but has slipped up-stairs--" The hoarse whisper dropped lower at this point and Louise could not catch the words which followed. She guessed darkly, however, and clung to her desk tighter and tighter.
At that fateful moment the substitute looked up and said:
"Children, the others have all gone, and it looks like rain again, so I am going to dismiss you. File out quietly--I don't wish to have to call you back."
She did not rise from her seat to marshal them out, taking care that the last one of them was out of sight of the schoolhouse before he slackened his pace. She merely dropped her eyes to her writing again and left them practically to their own devices.
The boys marched through the cloaking-room first, and they were ominously quiet about it.
Then the little girls rose and filed out. Louise led the girls' line, but though she followed swiftly in the wake of the boys, they had disappeared off the face of the earth when she reached the cloaking-room door which opened into the hall.
They had slipped off to hunt for Rudolph Kreisler, and Louise knew it. She hoped that Rudolph had left the building, but she was not sure.
Something must be done--but _what_?
Just then she caught from above the sound of tiptoeing and whispering.
It was dishonorable to "tattle," but it wasn't dishonorable to fly after a set of lawless boys and keep them from abusing an innocent would-be American. Louise deserted the head of her line and darted up the long stairs.
It was like a frightful nightmare--the stealthy, breathless chase which followed. She could not stop the boys in their mad search, could not command their attention a moment to explain. In and out they darted--fourth-grade, fifth-grade, sixth-grade, seventh! Every crack and cranny, every cloaking-room and teacher's desk was made to prove its innocence of sheltering the fugitive spy. The scampering boys were just finishing their search of the seventh grade when Louise found herself at the foot of the garret steps.
She stopped and surveyed their boxed-up secretiveness. What if Rudolph had gone up there?
From the sounds of disappointment now issuing from the seventh grade she knew that the last schoolroom to be searched had not yielded up the quarry. Yes, Rudolph must be in the garret, and of course the boys would pursue him there!
Then a sudden idea came to her. If she could but reach Rudolph first she might help him to climb out of the garret window.
Up the dark steps she flew, but, alas! there were flying feet to follow! The others had seen, and were coming after.
They caught up with her before she reached the top, and she and they burst into the long garret room together.
It was big with mystery--that long garret place--and weirdly frightening with its half-lights and whole shadows. For one moment the children stood at pause before its awesome silence.
No German spy was in sight.
Then the boys began searching hurriedly, and after a quick glance about the open and lighter space before them, went pushing their quest farther and farther into the distant dark of the wings and gables.
Louise stood where they had left her, with the feeling that _the end of all things_ was at hand, and that there was no use to struggle further. Presently her mist-dimmed eyes were attracted to a pile of something over at a small window near where she stood. The janitor had thrown their beautiful flag across an old couch without taking the trouble to roll it properly.
The indignant little girl started toward the couch to straighten out and roll the flag when her ear caught a sound which caused her to pause a moment in dim speculation. There was a step below, a firm, a familiar step--but no, she must be mistaken!
She slipped over to the couch, but the next moment drew back and clapped her hand over her mouth to repress a startled scream. A little yellow-haired boy lay asleep upon the couch, with the big flag nearly covering him!
Louise leaned over him. Two shining drops still lay on his cheek. He had sobbed himself to sleep--he was such a _little_ boy!
[Illustration: "You can't touch Rudolph!" she tried. "He's under the flag!"]
A drift of damp air floated in from the window, and the sleeper shivered and moved as if to cuddle further under his shelter. Louise very gently drew the bunting folds closer about his neck. Somehow she _knew_ that this was not desecration.
That steady step from below again and--nearer!
But just at that moment the boys came noisily back from the distant wings and gables.
"Hello, Louise! What are you doing there?" Luke Musgrove called.
Louise started up. She was between them and the sleeping boy, but she could not screen him from their astonished eyes.
"Gee, but there he is!" exclaimed Billy. "Let's----"
But the spirit of a long line of just and fair Americans was facing them. Louise Carey was descended from ancestors who had bought freedom and fair play with their blood, so in that hour--when she faced the unthinking lawless--there was a something in her eyes which brought them to a stand before her.
"You can't touch Rudolph!" she cried. "He's under the flag!"
A quiet fell upon them. They looked first at the sacred, sheltering flag of their country, and then at each other. And while they yet paused in awe there came to them the sound of a steady, familiar step on the garret stair. The next moment the door opened and there entered Miss Barclay--the teacher who, by her wisdom and her justice, could always command to stillness the tempests of their childish hearts.
AMERICA FIRST
Little Riego Yañez was a native of Mexico--of that unhappy part of Mexico which is constantly plundered by revolutionary bands who spend their time in fighting, and who win their supplies by robbing the more stable people of the republic.
Riego's father, Antonio Yañez, had suffered many times at the hands of the revolutionists. He was a saddler by trade, and also a small farmer, so the products of his industry were just what the warring bandits needed. But the warring bandits did not pay for what they needed. They merely took, and rode away!
So Antonio decided on a desperate step--he would emigrate to America.
But Riego's mother objected to removing to America. Mexico was rife with hatred and distrust of the "gringos," and many and dark were the stories told of the country north of the Great North River. Besides, Riego's elder brother, Pascual, an unruly lad of fifteen, was very bitterly opposed to the change.
So it was at length decided that Antonio should dare alone the dangers and hardships of America. If all was as the revolutionists said, he could escape back to Chihuahua. If, by happy chance, he should prosper in the new country, he would send for wife and children.
A year passed. The father's letters--few and short, for he had had little schooling--were chiefly concerned with begging them to come and see for themselves.
Then, one never-to-be-forgotten day, the mother and children packed into a hired wagon the tragic little which the bandits had left them, and set their faces toward the Rio Grande. They, too, were bound for that distrusted country which lay north of the northern edge of their world. The mother and the two girls were hopeful, but Pascual was silent and Riego afraid.
Not till the night came down did they reach the dark river which was to flow forever between the old life and the new. To little ten-year-old Riego this all-pervading darkness meant "America," for to his drowsy brain and anxious heart the black clouds above and the darkly rolling waters below seemed to typify the spirit of the land into which he was crossing.
Another moment, however, and he had given up the struggle to think it all out and fallen asleep with his head on his mother's lap.
The next morning Riego waked up in a better land.
He sat up on his cot and blinked his black eyes and stared about him at the cosey little room. A flood of light poured in at the one tiny window--Then the sun _did_ shine in this land of the gringos!
This was very interesting. Riego hurried into his clothes and started out to see America.
His route of exploration led through a cheery kitchen, where he found his two sisters busy cooking breakfast, and smiling and chatting at their work. But Riego had no time to stop and question, for the green things in the little garden beyond were beckoning to him.
In another minute he was out among them. It was very green--this "America"--very green and very sunny, with rows upon rows of the most wonderful vegetables running out to meet the morning sun!
Soon Riego glimpsed his father and mother beyond a dividing fence at the side, and he ran at once to his father's arms. After the first long embrace Riego drew back, the better to see the father who had dared America alone for his children's sake.
Why--his brow was smoother than Riego remembered!--his eyes clearer!--Did one grow younger, happier, in America?
And now Riego's mother was calling his attention to the snow-white chickens which fluttered about them. There was a cow, too, Riego learned--a cow and a pony and pigs and pigeons--and _all theirs_!
Riego shouted for joy. But the next moment the joy died upon his lips, and he asked:
"The revolutionists, father? How long will they let us have these?"
"Riego," said his father, "there are no revolutionists in America. Here, if a man works, he receives a just reward, and he is allowed to keep in peace what he earns. Our only danger is from across the border."
Then Riego's mother told him that his father had a fine saddle-shop which the Americans never raided.
It was all very, very wonderful!--A man was paid well for working, and could keep in peace what he earned!--Was this what was meant by "_America_"?
Riego's father's saddle-shop was the front room of their little dwelling, and opened immediately upon a small street in the Mexican quarter of the village. It was a very interesting place, indeed, for the wide door and the hospitable bench just inside invited in many an entertaining visitor, besides the men who came to buy saddles or to have their harness repaired.
One of these visitors, Alonzo Lorente, was particularly interesting to Riego and his brother, though their father always became moodily quiet when the man came. Lorente was a big, dashing fellow, full of strange oaths and of dark insinuations. And somehow, whenever he entered, the air of the shop became electric with an indefinable excitement.
It did not take Riego long to see that, at such times, his father managed to keep him and Pascual so busy that they missed most of their hero's inspiriting talk. Riego was particularly unfortunate in this respect. He spent little of his time in the shop where his father and Pascual plied the saddler's trade, for it was his duty to help in the market-garden.
This deprivation of Lorente's society, however, had its compensations. It was Riego's especial work to peddle their vegetables at the khaki tents of the gringo soldiers a few miles away, and this was very entertaining and exciting in itself, for the soldiers were jolly and kind and said nice things to one.
And then, one rainy Saturday afternoon, when the peddling was all done, Riego sat in his father's shop and listened to Alonzo Lorente. And Alonzo Lorente startled him awake with the news that all was not well with the land of America. He spoke darkly of "gringos" and of "vengeance."
Pascual, Riego noticed, crept closer and closer to the big man, till his fingers forgot the leather they should have been stretching.
It was then that the unexpected happened. The father, usually so quiet and so busy, suddenly rose from his work-bench and came forward.
"Lorente," he said, and Pascual and Riego started at the iron in his tone, "Lorente, it is not the busy men who have quarrel with America. It is those who have time to do--much talking!"
There was a pause and dead silence, and then Lorente the magnificent turned on his heel with a growl and left the shop.
Then Antonio returned to his work-bench, with Riego following, but Pascual stole to the door and gazed at the receding Lorente till his father called him sharply to his duties.
One day the father did not open his shop at all. It was closed in honor of the great American festival, Riego heard him explain grimly to a follower of Lorente, who questioned. And Riego heard the follower of Lorente laugh scornfully as he strode away.
There being no work that day, Pascual and Riego set out together to explore the yet farther reaches of America.
But they had not gone far past the square where loomed the several American stores when they sighted a crowd in a grove of big trees, and heard voices shouting and hands clapping as if in great joy. A number of gringo soldiers were roving about. Two were coming leisurely toward them across the green.
Riego wanted to press forward to see and hear, but his brother jerked him by the sleeve, exclaiming:
"It is the Americans' great feast-day, the Fourth of July. Come away!"
"But father says _we_ are Americans now. Why can't we go and hear what they are saying?" Riego's voice had risen in his eagerness.
The approaching soldiers stopped and looked at him, and Riego's heart stopped, too.
But the taller of the soldiers saluted him in fine fashion, and addressed to him words of courteous welcome:
"Don Pedro de Alvarado-Rain-in-the-Face-Sitting-Bull, for such as thou art is the picnic! Welcome to our city!"
Riego understood the gesture of invitation. He thanked the courtly soldier, and walked proudly forward, followed by his brother.
It was a gay scene, but quiet now, for someone was speaking. The starry banner of America fluttered everywhere, and smiling, white-faced señoritas and brown-clad soldiers were gathered here and there in listening groups. Under a tree, near the platform, sat musicians with shining silver horns and a big drum. A number of children were seated on the grass in front of the stand. Among them, Riego noticed, were many dark faces like his own.
Suddenly Riego's courage gave way and he started to retreat. But a sweet-faced señora took him by the hand and led him and Pascual to a place where they could see everything, whispering as they went:
"It is our day of freedom."
At first the boy was dazed by the strangeness of the scene, and his interest shifted. But the sound of a sweet, ringing voice soon compelled his attention and he turned quickly toward the platform.
Riego caught his breath. Who was it? _What_ was it that was speaking to him?
In the centre of the platform stood a clear-eyed, white-faced goddess, with the flag of the new country draped around her slender form, and the sunlight of this day of freedom beating down upon her shining head. She was speaking, but in the difficult new tongue.
Riego could not take his eyes away, but he reached out his hand quickly to touch Pascual.
The sweet-faced señora leaned over him.
"America," she whispered in explanation.
_America!_ Beautiful America! Riego crept forward, unconscious now of the crowd around. Oh, to _understand_ America!
Then a strange thing happened. The beautiful goddess suddenly ceased speaking, and her face became clouded with thought. Her eyes were focussed on the eager boy who had crept forward and was standing spellbound before her--the most conspicuous of the group of dark-faced, bewildered children.
Riego did not know that everybody in that audience had suddenly leaned forward in dead silence.
After one tense moment the Beautiful One advanced to the edge of the platform and descended the steps till she stood almost among them.
And now this strange, new, better country was speaking to Riego _in his own tongue_!
"You didn't _understand_ me, did you?" she asked in Spanish.
"Not _then_, my lady!--but _now_!" It was Riego who answered her, but the other dark faces were alight like his own now. The crowd was leaning forward again.
"Ah, that is all the trouble!" said the Beautiful One. "Our new people simply do not understand America! Do you wish me to tell you the story in Spanish?"
There were many who answered this time.
Then she told them in their own tongue of the great struggle for a new freedom and a new peace which had been waged upon this soil over a hundred years before. And the breathless children heard how this new ideal of freedom had passed all bounds of the country in which it was born, and thrilled all lands. They heard how the noble La Fayette of France, Steuben of Prussia, and Kosciuszko of Poland each had offered his all that America might be forever a refuge for the oppressed. They learned how the German De Kalb had laid down his life at Camden for the new faith, and how Count Pulaski had poured out the last drop of his Polish blood to make the world's great dream of freedom "come true."
Then the Beautiful One told the children how, throughout the more than one hundred years since the fight was won, the footsore and oppressed of many lands have found in America work and a just reward for working, the freedom to do anything which does not harm another, and the great gift of peace!
"And now," exclaimed the speaker, "which of you will promise with me to be loyal to America? Stand up!"
And they stood up--the dark children, the white-faced señoritas, the gringo soldiers, and all!--and repeated after the Beautiful One:
"I pledge allegiance to my flag and to the republic for which it stands, One nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."
When Riego turned from the inspiring scene it was to see his brother Pascual walking away, and in close conversation with Alonzo Lorente.
*       *       *       *       *
The days passed, but Riego still treasured in his heart his first vision of America. He knew now that the Beautiful One was only a charming señorita and daughter of the big captain who commanded at the American camp. But he liked to think of her as "America"--the beneficent goddess who had smoothed the furrows from his father's brow and crowned his faithful labors with reward.
And then, one momentous day, the Beautiful One stood in the shop-door, asking in Spanish if she might be allowed to enter. She was all in white this time--snow-white. To Riego's fond imagination she was still a shining goddess.
Riego's father welcomed the señorita and dusted the bench that she might sit and rest, for Riego had told him of the great American festival, and Antonio had learned much besides.
The señorita had come to speak to the father about his sons--and her smiling glance included both the sullen Pascual and Riego, who stood worshipfully by.
It seemed that the señorita--Miss Flora Arden was her name--was to teach a class of "newly made Americans," and again her glance included the boys. She wanted to teach them to speak the English language and to help them to a better understanding of America. The señorita believed that most of the trouble which the newly made Americans encountered was due to the fact that they did not know how to find and use the good gifts which their new country had to offer. And she was certain that most of the trouble they _gave_ was because they brought old prejudices with them, and so did not open their hearts to America.
Riego understood the spirit of her proposal better than he did the words of her correct Spanish. His father listened throughout with thoughtful, grave attention.
There were no charges to be made for this teaching? Then what was the señorita to gain for so much effort?
"I?" said the señorita--she was standing now, ready to depart--"I gain a better country! My father is a soldier and serves his country by helping to keep the peace along this troubled border. If I had been a son I might have done as much. But I am only a daughter, Antonio! And yet"--and she put her arm over Riego's shoulders as she spoke--"if I help to make loyal even _one_ of America's adopted sons, am not I, too, serving my country?"
The father's rare smile assented to her offer, even before his lips made the promise.
Riego followed the Beautiful One to the door.
Outside, Alonzo Lorente slouched against a lamp-post. The señorita looked into Lorente's face and recoiled slightly. Riego saw the recoil, and an unnamed fear suddenly laid its hand upon his heart.
*       *       *       *       *
Pascual and Riego went to Miss Arden's class--Pascual sullen and uninterested, Riego breathlessly eager. But they had not attended many times--indeed, had just begun to glimpse something of the bigness and goodness of their new country--when the stroke fell that was to change their little world. The good father dropped at his work-bench, speechless and bewildered. The American doctor said he would be able to work again, but that his mind would never be quite the same.
Their wise father thus reduced to childishness, and their mother ignorant of the new conditions and the new tongue, the boys were left to plan for themselves.
Pascual left Miss Arden's class. He explained that he would now have to take charge of his father's shop; but he found time to make many trips across the dark Rio Grande and to talk much with Lorente, who now resumed his old practice of dropping in at the shop to chat. His younger brother, however, continued under the señorita's instruction.
Riego learned at Miss Arden's class that "freedom" gives one the right to do as he wishes only in so far as he does not wish to interfere with the rights of another.
"There is no 'freedom' except in loyal obedience to law," she told him one day. "America is a 'free' country because--though here are gathered people from all lands--they join together in making laws which are kind and impartial to all, and they stand together in support of the laws they make."
"But, señorita, Alonzo Lorente says--" began the boy, and stopped short.
"What does Alonzo Lorente say?" the señorita asked quickly.
"I--I promised not to tell," stammered the child.
There was the blue truth of heaven in the señorita's eyes as she looked into his own, and answered: "Riego, it is more than dishonest in Lorente to accept the blessings which America affords him and not be true to her. It is worse than traitorous in him to help spoil the peace of the country which is his refuge from oppression. If Alonzo Lorente likes the old way better than the new, he should go back to the old country. If he honestly wishes to change what he finds here, and thinks he can better things, he has one man's just share in deciding, for he is a naturalized citizen and can vote on any question. But Alonzo Lorente _should speak out openly or else keep silent_!"
Before Riego left that afternoon Miss Arden had him repeat with her:
"I pledge allegiance to my flag and to the republic for which it stands, One nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."
But little Riego did not dream in how short a time would his loyalty to his new country be tested. One afternoon--his father was still lying unconscious--Riego was tending the shop alone, for Pascual had crossed the Rio Grande in the early morning and had not yet returned.
It was a dull, dull afternoon, for no patrons came, and the visitors merely glanced in and passed on. It was hot and still, so the sleepy Riego decided to rest. He found a cool spot behind a pile of boxes, and lay down and closed his eyes.
*       *       *       *       *
When Riego opened his eyes again it was with a start. There were voices--smothered voices--some men were in the shop! Riego lay still and listened.
"We will attack the gringo camp to-night--just before dawn," a smothered voice was saying. "Alva has three hundred men and more. They can easily surprise and destroy these eighty Americans, and so can seize their horses and ammunition."
"But the patrol?" It was Pascual's voice that whispered the question. Riego's heart turned sick. He recognized the voice of Lorente in the terrifying reply:
"Pacheco and a picked few will knife the patrol at the ford, then Alva's men will cross, and approach the camp up the ravine."
"To-morrow morning?" Pascual's voice asked.
"Yes, just before dawn."
There were approaching steps on the street.
A customer entered. Riego heard Lorente departing--heard the customer inquire the price of a saddle, and go out.
It must be done _now_--now while Pascual was alone, and he could speak to him! The next moment Riego stood before his brother.
"I heard you!" he cried. "Pascual, they _must not_!"
But Pascual laid a fierce hand upon his breast and pinned him to the wall.
It was a terrible scene--that which followed--terrible in the tense quiet of its enactment--terrible in its outcome!
With Riego pinned against the wall where he needs must listen, Pascual poured forth such a torrent of abuse, of falsehood, against the "gringos" that at length the old hate blood leapt in the younger boy's veins and went beating through his brain.
The gringos were their enemies--_enemies_! The men who were coming down upon them with the dawn were of their own blood, of their native country! What if the invaders _were_ "revolutionists"? Were they not _Mexican_? Talk of "loyalty"--one must be loyal to _one's own_!
When Pascual loosed his grip upon the slight form it was after he had stirred to the very dregs all that was passionate, all that was ignorant and prejudiced and violent, in the boy's nature.
That afternoon Riego did not report at Miss Arden's class, but long after class hour he was obliged to pass her house on the mission to deliver a mended harness to a farmer living near the American camp.
Miss Arden and her mother, Riego knew, were the only members of the big captain's family. They lived in a large house in the woods, half-way between the town and the camp. He knew also that the big captain stayed in camp.
As Riego emerged from the long stretch of lonely woods which separated Miss Arden's house from the town, and as he faced the other long stretch of woods which lay between him and the camp, the boy was struck by the isolation of the señorita's home.
He reflected, however, that Alva's men were to attack the gringo soldiers by way of the ford, and that the ford lay to the right yonder, far out of connection with the captain's house. He was glad--glad that Alva's men would not come that way!
Suddenly he spied the señorita herself. She was standing on the steps of her father's home. Riego's heart bounded within him at sight of her. He pulled down his hat and hoped to pass unrecognized, but the sweet, familiar voice called:
"Riego!"
He did not answer.
Then she ran down the steps to him, and put her gentle hands upon him, turning him to her against his will.
"What is the matter, Riego?" she asked.
No answer.
"You didn't come to class this afternoon."
No answer.
"I'm sorry," she said, after a moment of silence in which she looked searchingly into his face, "because we had an interesting lesson to-day. It was all about what one ought to do in case one should be forced to _choose between_ the old land and the new."
The boy gave a swift, upward glance at her, then dropped his eyes to the ground again. Miss Arden continued, and her voice was very serious now:
"And we decided, Riego, that one ought to think out carefully which country was really the better, and be true to that, because there is a higher duty than that to party or country, and that is--to the principles of justice and freedom."
Riego's head sank lower. The Beautiful One took one of his brown hands into her own.
"And we said"--was she looking into the dark heart of him?--"that whichever way one chose, one should choose _openly_. Now this little brown hand could never----"
But the little brown hand was snatched away, and with a great sob the child fled into the woods.
When at last that night Riego did fall asleep he dreamed that his beautiful America came to him with her white arms held out in appeal, and that he slipped a dagger out of his bosom and stabbed her to the heart.
He started, awake, and sat up. It was black dark.
_Had Alva struck already? Or was there yet time?_
Ten feet away was Pascual's cot--he must not wake Pascual! As still as death he slipped out of his bed, pulled on his overalls that he had hung near, and crept out into the moonless night.
Riego could not think--it was all so desperate! He could only respond to the heart that was in him, and creep forward through the dark. But his feet knew the road that he took, though his brain was reeling. He was going straight to the one who had wakened the new loyalty in him--his beautiful America!
"I pledge allegiance to my flag and to the republic for which it stands," went surging through him as he struggled on.
Riego was not grandly heroic; he was only a frightened little boy, but determined now to do his loyal best for the country that had sheltered him from oppression. And so, though the treacherous sands might seek to drag him down, though the dark chaparral yonder might hide--any fearsome thing!--Riego went forward.
And now the house of the big captain loomed black before him. Riego stole up the front steps. He knew behind which of the long, closed windows the señorita slept, and he approached and tapped fearfully upon it.
It was a frightened voice that called: "Who is _that_?"
Riego was not conscious how he answered, but he knew that a wave of relief flowed over him when the blind of the long window opened and he was drawn into the dark room by a pair of familiar hands.
The blind was closed after him and a light was struck.
The señorita's eyes were disclosed big and startled; her face was as white as the long robe she wore.
"What _is_ it, Riego?" she gasped.
"They are coming!" he whispered.
"Who?" she exclaimed, catching him by the shoulders, "_Who?_"
"Alva," the boy answered, "and three hundred with him. They are going to surprise--our soldiers--and kill them while they sleep!"
The señorita sprang to the telephone. She pulled down the lever many, many times, then she staggered back against the wall.
"They have cut the wires!" she cried. "Riego, you and I must take the warning!"
"To the camp?" the boy cried in dismay.
"Yes, there's no one within a mile of here that could take it but us!"
"But the Mexicans have spies over there," the boy moaned. "They will find us in the dark with their knives!"
She had flung on a long cloak, and was hurriedly fastening her shoes.
"Then you stay here and I'll go," she said.
"_You?_" cried the startled child--then--"It is dark out there, my lady; I'll go with you."
They extinguished the light and stole out together to the stable, but the horses were gone!
Desperate now, they started out afoot.
The treacherous sand again and the black dark! But they crept along together. Then suddenly the boy's courage gave way and he clung to the cloaked figure, sobbing:
"Señorita! Señorita! I am _afraid_!"
The señorita was trembling, too, and her voice broke as she whispered:
"You and I don't make very good heroes, do we?"
They had come to a standstill and were clinging together in the dark. Suddenly there was a sound of something approaching---the velvet tread of an unshod pony in the sand!
The rider passed.
When they breathed again the señorita took him strongly by the shoulders.
"Riego," she whispered--and there was no break in her voice now--"we must separate. One of us must go straight to the ford and warn the patrol, the other to camp."
"But it is near the ford that Pacheco is hiding," the boy replied.
"I'll go to the ford," she said simply.
"No, my lady, _I_ go--you take the news to camp." And before she could detain him the boy turned at a sharp angle and plunged into the deeper blackness of the chaparral.
*       *       *       *       *
A long nightmare intervened between their parting and the time when the half-dead boy clung to the saddle of the patrol and whispered to him:
"Keep to the open, señor; there are men with knives in the chaparral! Help is coming!"
Then, somehow, everything was blotted out for Riego.
When consciousness came again to the boy, the cool air of the dawn was choked with dust clouds till he could not see ten feet before him and his ears were nearly bursting with the thunder-beat of frantic hoofs. Dim horses were rearing and plunging against the reddening dawn. There were shouts and cries and firing! Firing!
Who was losing? Who was _winning_?
Dear God, Alva's men were sweeping back across the Rio Grande!
One little frightened boy had saved the day for the country that had given him refuge from oppression.
But what was that? A call for help? _Whose voice was that?_
Riego plunged into the thick of the dust cloud toward the cry, and dropped by Pascual's side. How could he have known that his brother would ride that night with the invaders!
But Pascual was striving to speak. Riego leaned over him and caught the whisper:
"Lorente shot me down to get my horse and escape!"
And now the gringos were circling round the wounded one--they would beat out his brains with their guns! But--but--why, they were lifting him up, and _tenderly_! The Americans were lifting up his wounded brother!
*       *       *       *       *
Many and bewildering were the things which happened to Riego in the next few hours. First, he and the all-but-dead Pascual were carried by the soldiers to the American camp. Then his brother was taken away from him and borne into a closed tent.
The soldiers gathered around Riego and patted him on the shoulder. They gave him many things--things to eat and coins and pocket-knives and tobacco-tags, all the while challenging him to smile--he whose captured brother was yonder!
Later the big captain sent for him and took him by the hand.
"Riego Yañez," he said, "I am proud to shake hands with an American hero!"
At length a tall soldier came to Riego and led him to the closed tent. But the tall soldier did not enter; he merely pushed the boy inside the tent and dropped the khaki flap.
Riego blinked his eyes. Somebody was lying stretched out on a cot, and somebody was fanning him--the Beautiful One and his brother! Riego crept toward her suddenly outstretched hands.
Then he leaned over Pascual. But Pascual's eyes were closed and on his face was a yellow pallor.
"The surgeon has taken out the ball," whispered the Beautiful One. "He will live, with good nursing, and I am on the job." She paused a moment, then asked, as she looked into his face with concern: "Aren't you happy, you tragic little soldier? Why don't you smile at the good news?"
"How--" began the child--and a strange, sick feeling swept over him--"how long before he will be well enough to be stood against a wall--and----"
"Why, you poor child!"--and the big tears sprang to the señorita's eyes--"your brother will not be stood against a wall and shot for treason--never--_never_! And he's not going to be shut up in prison, either!"
[Illustration: "Riego Yañez," he said. "I am proud to shake hands with an American hero!"]
"But why, señorita? Why? The big captain knows that he was with Alva's men."
"He is young--just a boy," and the señorita laid a tender hand upon the head of the wounded lad. "He is the son of good parents and brother to---- Oh, you tragic little soldier, can't you guess who it is has saved your brother?"
"_You_, señorita?"
"_Yourself_, Riego. Because you have been heroically loyal they are to give your brother another chance. We Americans, Riego"--and her white hand closed upon his own to include him with her--"we Americans are going to nurse Pascual back to a better life and teach him how to be free!"
The sick lad stirred on his cot.
When the Beautiful One leaned over him in quick solicitude, he smiled.
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= = = PG22352 = = =
AMERICAN BOY'S LIFE OF THEODORE ROOSEVELT
Produced by David Edwards, Graeme Mackreth and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from scans of public domain material produced by Microsoft for their Live Search Books site.)
[Illustration: American Boy's Life of Theodore Roosevelt
STRATEMEYER]
[Handwritten inscription: To Elmer, A Merry Christmas from Papa & Mamma. 1904]
AMERICAN BOYS' LIFE
OF
THEODORE ROOSEVELT
EDWARD STRATEMEYER'S BOOKS
Old Glory Series
_Six Volumes. Cloth. Illustrated. Price per volume $1.25._
UNDER DEWEY AT MANILA. A YOUNG VOLUNTEER IN CUBA. FIGHTING IN CUBAN WATERS. UNDER OTIS IN THE PHILIPPINES. THE CAMPAIGN OF THE JUNGLE. UNDER MacARTHUR IN LUZON.
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_Ten Volumes. Cloth. Illustrated. Price per volume $1.00._
THE LAST CRUISE OF THE SPITFIRE. REUBEN STONE'S DISCOVERY. TRUE TO HIMSELF. RICHARD DARE'S VENTURE. OLIVER BRIGHT'S SEARCH. TO ALASKA FOR GOLD. THE YOUNG AUCTIONEER. BOUND TO BE AN ELECTRICIAN. SHORTHAND TOM, THE REPORTER. FIGHTING FOR HIS OWN.
War and Adventure Stories
_Cloth. Illustrated. Price per volume $1.25._
ON TO PEKIN. BETWEEN BOER AND BRITON.
American Boys' Biographical Series
_Cloth. Illustrated. Price per volume $1.25._
AMERICAN BOYS' LIFE OF WILLIAM McKINLEY. AMERICAN BOYS' LIFE OF THEODORE ROOSEVELT.
Colonial Series
_Cloth. Illustrated. Price per volume $1.25._
WITH WASHINGTON IN THE WEST. MARCHING ON NIAGARA. AT THE FALL OF MONTREAL. ON THE TRAIL OF PONTIAC.
Pan-American Series
_Cloth. Illustrated. Price per volume $1.25._
LOST ON THE ORINOCO. THE YOUNG VOLCANO EXPLORERS. YOUNG EXPLORERS OF THE ISTHMUS. YOUNG EXPLORERS OF THE AMAZON.
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_Cloth. Illustrated. Price per volume $1.00, net._ TWO YOUNG LUMBERMEN.
JOE, THE SURVEYOR. _Price, $1.00_. LARRY, THE WANDERER. _Price, $1.00_.
[Illustration: COLONEL ROOSEVELT AT SAN JUAN HILL]
AMERICAN BOYS' LIFE
OF
THEODORE ROOSEVELT
BY
EDWARD STRATEMEYER
AUTHOR OF "AMERICAN BOYS' LIFE OF WILLIAM McKINLEY," "WITH WASHINGTON IN THE WEST," "OLD GLORY SERIES," "PAN-AMERICAN SERIES," "SHIP AND SHORE SERIES," ETC.
_ILLUSTRATED FROM PHOTOGRAPHS AND WITH FRONTISPIECE BY CHARLES COPELAND_
[Illustration]
BOSTON LEE AND SHEPARD 1904
PUBLISHED, AUGUST, 1904.
_Copyright, 1904, by Lee And Shepard._
_All Rights Reserved._
AMERICAN BOYS' LIFE OF THEODORE ROOSEVELT.
Norwood Press J.S. Cushing & Co.--Berwick & Smith Co. Norwood, Mass., U.S.A.
PREFACE
The life of Theodore Roosevelt is one well worth studying by any American boy who wishes to make something of himself and mount high on the ladder of success.
The twenty-sixth President of our country is a fine type of the true American of to-day, full of vim and vigor, quick to comprehend, and equally quick to act, not afraid to defend his opinions against all comers when satisfied that he is in the right, independent, and yet not lacking in fine social qualities, physically and morally courageous, and with a faith in himself and his God that is bound to make for good so long as he clings to it.
Theodore Roosevelt comes from countless generations of fighting stock, both in this country and abroad. And yet as a youth the future hero of San Juan Hill was a delicate lad, and many fears were entertained that he might not live to manhood. But life in the open air, with judicious athletic exercise, accomplished wonders, and he became strong and hardy to an astonishing degree.
The boyhood days of the future President were spent in New York City and at the family's country home, Oyster Bay, Long Island. From there he went to Harvard College, from which he graduated with high honors. Still somewhat delicate in health, he travelled in Europe, studied for a short time at Dresden, and took to climbing the Alps and other noted mountains.
His mind had gravitated toward literature, and he was writing a naval history of the War of 1812 when something prompted him to take up politics, and almost before he knew it he was elected a New York State assemblyman. He served in this capacity for three terms, and many are the stories told of how he fought against corruption first, last, and all the time.
The death of his first wife and of his beloved mother were at this time a great blow to him, and leaving his one little daughter with relatives, he struck out for the great West, where, in the Bad Lands, so called, he located as ranchman and hunter, filling in his spare hours by studying and by writing on various outdoor subjects, works which have become decidedly popular, and which show well his gifts as an author and as an observer of nature.
While still in great part a successful ranchman, he ran for mayor of New York and was defeated. He now devoted himself with increased energy to his literary labors until, soon after, he was appointed by President Harrison a member of the Civil Service Commission. He served on this commission with marked ability for six years, when he resigned to become police commissioner of New York City.
Theodore Roosevelt's work as a police commissioner will not be readily forgotten. The whole tone of the service was at once raised, and for the first time in many years the metropolis had "dry" Sundays, when every saloon in the city was tightly closed. This strict compliance with the law made him some enemies, but to these he paid no heed, for he was doing only his duty.
When William McKinley was nominated for the Presidency the first time, Theodore Roosevelt was one of his most enthusiastic supporters. Upon the election of McKinley, John D. Long was appointed Secretary of the Navy and Theodore Roosevelt became the First Assistant Secretary. Ever since writing his naval history the newly appointed assistant had made a close study of naval matters, and now he applied himself with vigor to the duties of his office; and it was primarily through his efforts that when the war with Spain came, our war-ships and our coast defences were in much better condition than they had been at any time previous in our history.
With the outbreak of the war, Theodore Roosevelt resigned. "My duty here is done," he said. "My place is in the field." And without loss of time he and his intimate friend, Dr. Leonard Wood, began the organization of that body of troops which was officially designated as the First United States Volunteer Cavalry, but which speedily became known everywhere as the Rough Riders,--a body as unique as the world has ever seen, being made up of men from all over the Union, but principally from four Territories, and including hunters, cowboys, soldiers of fortune, foot-ball and base-ball champions, college graduates, ex-policemen, with American, Irish, Dutch, German, Mexican, and Indian blood in their veins,--truly a remarkable collection, but every man and officer strong and hardy, full of courage, a good horseman, and a fine shot.
From the very start, the Rough Riders were anxious to get into the fight, and the opportunity was not long in coming. From Florida the command was transported to Daiquiri, on the southern coast of Cuba, and then began the advance upon the city of Santiago, which brought on the engagement at La Guasima, followed by the thrilling battle of San Juan Hill, in which the Rough Riders distinguished themselves in a manner that will never be forgotten. In the very thickest of this fight was Colonel Roosevelt, urging his men forward to victory, regardless of the shot and shell falling upon all sides. A hero truly, and such heroes are not forgotten.
Upon the close of the war Theodore Roosevelt thought to retire to private life, but this was not to be. Arriving at New York, he was hailed with delight by thousands, and at the next election was made governor of the Empire State. As governor he made friends in both of the leading political parties by his straightforwardness and his sterling honesty. Men might differ with him politically, but they could never accuse him of doing that which he himself did not firmly believe was right.
His term as governor had not yet expired when President McKinley was nominated for a second term. Again the people at large clamored for Roosevelt, and against his earnest protestations he was forced to accept the nomination for the Vice-Presidency. He was elected, and at the proper time took his seat as presiding officer of the Senate.
It was at this time a blow fell upon our nation from which we have scarcely yet recovered. President McKinley was struck down by the cowardly hand of an assassin. The Vice-President was at this time off on one of his favorite outings, but with all possible speed he came back and was sworn in as President. It was a great responsibility, and many feared that great changes in our government might result. But the fears proved groundless. Young as he was,--and he is the youngest of all of our Presidents,--he took upon himself the duty of carrying out the intentions of his predecessor, and proving to the world once again that, even though a President die, "the government at Washington still lives."
There is another side to the character of our President which must not be overlooked. He is of strong religious convictions and a member of the Dutch Reformed Church. It is seldom that he is given to preaching, but when he does his words have a sincerity that proves much for the foundation of his character. He stands for what is honest and upright in political and private life, and although, being but human, he may make mistakes, he remains a Chief Magistrate well deserving the highest honors our nation can bestow.
EDWARD STRATEMEYER. MAY 2, 1904.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I PAGE Birthplace and Ancestry of Theodore Roosevelt--His Father's Philanthropy--City and Country Home--Days at School--Religious Training.                                                              1
CHAPTER II
Nicknamed Teddy--Goes to Harvard College--Member of Many Clubs--Death of Mr. Roosevelt--Anecdotes of College Life              11
CHAPTER III
Marries Miss Alice Lee--Travels in Europe--Bold Mountain Climbing--Elected to the Assembly--Personal Encounter with the Enemy                                                             20
CHAPTER IV
Theodore Roosevelt and Governor Cleveland--Good Work as an Assemblyman--Some Measures pushed through--Birth of Alice Roosevelt--Death of Mr. Roosevelt's Mother                            30
CHAPTER V
Theodore Roosevelt as a Ranchman and Hunter in the Bad Lands--Bringing down his First Buffalo--Rattlesnakes and a Wild Goose                                                      39
CHAPTER VI
Grouse and Other Small Game--The Scotchman and the Skunk--Caught in a Hailstorm on the Prairie--Bringing down Black-tail Deer          49
CHAPTER VII
Runs for Mayor of New York City--Marriage to Edith Kermit Carew--Hunting in the Bighorn Mountains--A Wild Chase after Three Elk                                                             63
CHAPTER VIII
Bringing down a Grizzly Bear--Back to New York--Appointed a Civil Service Commissioner--The Work of the Commission              74
CHAPTER IX
A Trip to the Shoshone Mountains--Caught in a Driving Snowstorm--Back to Work--Resignation as Civil Service Commissioner                                                          85
CHAPTER X
Appointed Police Commissioner of New York City--Corruptness of the Department--Strenuous Endeavors to make Matters Better--A "Dry" Sunday--Enforcing the Tenement House Law and Other Measures     94
CHAPTER XI
Appointed First Assistant Secretary of the Navy--The Condition of Affairs in Cuba--Preparing for War--Theodore Roosevelt's Resolve                                                              104
CHAPTER XII
Destruction of the _Maine_--Dewey's Victory--Theodore Roosevelt becomes a Soldier--Organizing the Rough Riders--Various Men in the Command                                   112
CHAPTER XIII
In Camp at Tampa--To Port Tampa in Coal Cars--Theodore Roosevelt's Quick Move to obtain a Transport--The Wait in the Harbor--Off for Cuba at Last                                     122
CHAPTER XIV
Life on the Transport--The Landing at Daiquiri--The March to Siboney--The Trail through the Jungle--The Skirmish at La Guasima    132
CHAPTER XV
Along the Jungle Trail--Fording the River--Opening of the Battle of San Juan Hill--Bravery of the Rough Riders--Personal Experiences of Theodore Roosevelt during the Battle                  142
CHAPTER XVI
Results of the Fight--Life in the Trenches--The Spanish Fleet in Santiago Harbor--Another Great Naval Victory--The Rough Riders and the Spanish Guerillas                                     154
CHAPTER XVII
Devotion of the Rough Riders to Theodore Roosevelt--His Kindness to his Men--Last of the Fighting--The Truce and Treaty of Peace                                                      163
CHAPTER XVIII
Last Days in Cuba--The Departure for Home--Arrival at Montauk--Caring for the Sick and Wounded--Presentation to Theodore Roosevelt by his Men--Mustering out of the Rough Riders                                                               171
CHAPTER XIX
Nominated for Governor of New York--A Rough Rider Way of Campaigning--Elected Governor--Important Work at Albany--The Homestead at Oyster Bay--Chopping down a Tree for Exercise           183
CHAPTER XX
Great Reception to Admiral Dewey--Governor Roosevelt's Increased Popularity--Last Annual Message as Governor--Visit to Chicago--Remarkable Speech on the Strenuous Life                  193
CHAPTER XXI
The Convention at Philadelphia--Theodore Roosevelt seconds the Nomination of William McKinley--Becomes Candidate for the Vice-Presidency--Remarkable Tours through Many States                203
CHAPTER XXII
Elected Vice-President of the United States--Presides over the Senate--Tax upon Theodore Roosevelt's Strength--Starts on Another Grand Hunting Tour                                        214
CHAPTER XXIII
The Roosevelt Family in the Adirondacks--The Pan-American Exposition at Buffalo--Shooting of President McKinley--The Vice-President's Visit--Death of the President                       223
CHAPTER XXIV
Theodore Roosevelt's Tramp up Mount Marcy--A Message of Importance--Wild Midnight Ride through the Mountains--On the Special Trains from North Creek to Buffalo                       233
CHAPTER XXV
Takes the Oath as President--The New Chief Magistrate at the Funeral of President McKinley--At the White House--How the First Real Working Day was Spent                                 241
CHAPTER XXVI
Continuing the Work begun by President McKinley--The Panama Canal Agitation--Visit of Prince Henry of Prussia--The President at the Charleston Exposition                               251
CHAPTER XXVII
Destruction at St. Pierre--American Aid--The Great Coal Strike--President Roosevelt ends the Difficulty--Tour through New England--The Trolley Accident in the Berkshires--A Providential Escape from Death                                                    260
CHAPTER XXVIII
New Offices at the White House--Sends a Wireless Message to King Edward of England--End of the Trouble in Venezuela--The Canadian Boundary Dispute--Beginning of a Trip to the West--In Yellowstone Park                                                                 269
CHAPTER XXIX
Dedication of the Fair Buildings at St. Louis--Continuation of the Trip to San Francisco--Up in the Far Northwest--Back in Washington--The Post-office Scandals--The New Republic of Panama--A Canal at Last--Proclamation regarding the War between Japan and Russia--Opening of the Great Fair                  277
CHAPTER XXX
Personal Characteristics of Theodore Roosevelt--The President's Family--Life at the White House--Our Country and its Future                                                       289
APPENDIX
A.  Brief Extracts from Famous Addresses delivered by Theodore Roosevelt                                                297
B.  List of Theodore Roosevelt's Writings                            300
ILLUSTRATIONS
COLONEL ROOSEVELT AT SAN JUAN HILL   _Frontispiece_
FACING PAGE
THEODORE ROOSEVELT'S BIRTHPLACE                                         2
HOUSE IN WHICH THEODORE ROOSEVELT ROOMED WHILE AT HARVARD              14
THEODORE ROOSEVELT AT GRADUATION, 1880                                 20
MISS ALICE LEE ROOSEVELT                                               36
EDITH KERMIT ROOSEVELT                                                 66
THEODORE ROOSEVELT AS A ROUGH RIDER                                   118
COLONEL ROOSEVELT AT MONTAUK POINT                                    176
THE ROOSEVELT HOMESTEAD AT OYSTER BAY                                 192
THEODORE ROOSEVELT                                                    202
PRESIDENT MCKINLEY AND VICE-PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT                       216
PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT AT HIS DESK                                       252
THE WHITE HOUSE, SHOWING NEW OFFICES                                  270
PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT AND CABINET, 1903                                 276
PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT AND HIS FAMILY                                    292
AMERICAN BOYS' LIFE OF THEODORE ROOSEVELT
CHAPTER I
"Our country calls not for the life of ease, but for the life of strenuous endeavor. The twentieth century looms before us big with the fate of many nations. If we stand idly by, if we seek merely swollen, slothful ease and ignoble peace, if we shrink from the hard contests where men must win at hazard of their lives and at the risk of all they hold dear, then the bolder and stronger peoples will pass us by and will win for themselves the domination of the world. Let us therefore boldly face the life of strife, resolute to do our duty well and manfully; resolute to uphold righteousness by deed and by word; resolute to be both honest and brave, to serve high ideals, yet to use practical methods. Above all, let us not shrink from strife, moral or physical, within or without the nation, provided that we are certain that the strife is justified; for it is only through strife, through hard and dangerous endeavor, that we shall ultimately win the goal of true national greatness."
These words, taken from President Roosevelt's remarkable speech on "The Strenuous Life," show well the character of the man, his lofty ideals, his sterling courage, his absolute honesty, and unwavering patriotism. He is a typical American in the best sense of the word, and his life is worthy of careful study. From it American boys of to-day, and in generations to come, may gain lessons that will do them much good.
Theodore Roosevelt, the twenty-sixth President of our country, was born in New York City, October 27, 1858. The place of his birth was the old family mansion at 28 East Twentieth Street, in a neighborhood which, at that time, was the abode of wealth and culture. The building is one of a row, of a type to be seen in hundreds of other places, of brick and stone, four stories and a basement high, the upper floor being an attic. A heavy railing runs from in front of the basement up the broad front steps to the doorway. Inside, the rooms are large and comfortably arranged, and there was, in those days, quite a nice garden in the rear.
[Illustration: THEODORE ROOSEVELT'S BIRTHPLACE. 28 E. 20TH STREET, NEW YORK CITY.]
It can truthfully be said that Theodore Roosevelt comes from a race of soldiers and statesmen, and that Dutch, Scotch, French, and Irish blood flows in his veins. This being so, it is no wonder that, when the Spanish-American War broke out, he closed his desk as Assistant Secretary of the Navy, saying, "My duty here is done; my place is in the field," and went forth to win glory on the battle-field of San Juan Hill.
Five generations of Roosevelts lived in or near New York previous to the birth of Theodore Roosevelt, the father of the President, in 1831. Nearly all were well-to-do, and many served the city and the state as aldermen and members of the legislature. During the Revolution they followed under Washington's banner, and their purses were wide open to further the cause of independence.
Theodore Roosevelt the elder was a merchant and banker; a man broad in his views and filled with the spirit of genuine philanthropy. He founded one of the hospitals of the city and was at one time chairman of the State Board of Charities. A story is told of him which is probably true. One day Charles Loring Brace came to him for financial assistance in establishing homes for the little waifs of the city.
"I will see what I can do," said Mr. Roosevelt. "But you know that just at present I am busy with other charitable works."
"I know that," said Mr. Brace. "But what I ask for is very much needed. The waifs and poor, homeless newsboys have no shelter."
The next day, when returning from the establishment in which he was a partner, Mr. Roosevelt came upon a newsboy sitting on a doorstep, crying bitterly.
"What is the matter, my little man?" he asked.
"I lost me money; it dropped down into de sewer hole!" sobbed the ragged urchin. "Every cent of it is gone."
Mr. Roosevelt questioned the lad and found out that the boy had no home and that his only relative was a longshoreman who was hardly ever sober. He gave the lad some money to replace the amount lost, and the next day sent word to Mr. Brace that he would do all he possibly could toward establishing the waifs' shelters that were so much needed. The Newsboys' Lodging House of New York City is one of the results of Mr. Roosevelt's practical charities. He also did much to give criminals a helping hand when they came from prison, stating that that was the one time in their lives when they most needed help, for fear they might slip back into their previous bad habits.
In 1853 Theodore Roosevelt the elder married Miss Martha Bullock, of Roswell, Cobb County, Georgia. Miss Bullock was the daughter of Major James S. Bullock and a direct descendant of Archibald Bullock, the first governor of Georgia. It will thus be seen that the future President had both Northern and Southern blood in his make-up, and it may be added here that during the terrible Civil War his relatives were to be found both in the Union and the Confederate ranks. Mrs. Roosevelt was a strong Southern sympathizer, and when a certain gathering, during the Civil War, was in progress at the Roosevelt city home, she insisted upon displaying a Confederate flag at one of the windows.
"I am afraid it will make trouble," said Mr. Roosevelt; and he was right. Soon a mob began to gather in the street, clamoring that the flag be taken down.
"I shall not take it down," said Mrs. Roosevelt, bravely. "The room is mine, and the flag is mine. I love it, and nobody shall touch it. Explain to the crowd that I am a Southern woman and that I love my country."
There being no help for it, Mr. Roosevelt went to the front door and explained matters as best he could. A few in the crowd grumbled, but when Mrs. Roosevelt came to the window and looked down on the gathering, one after another the men went away, and she and her flag remained unmolested.
Theodore Roosevelt, the future President, was one of a family of four. He had a brother Elliott and two sisters. His brother was several years younger than himself, but much more robust, and would probably have lived many years and have distinguished himself, had he not met death in a railroad accident while still a young man.
In the years when Theodore Roosevelt was a boy, New York City was not what it is to-day. The neighborhood in which he lived was, as I have already mentioned, a fashionable one, and the same may be said of many other spots near to Union Square, where tall business blocks were yet unknown. The boys and girls loved to play in the little park and on the avenue, and here it was that the rather delicate schoolboy grew to know Edith Carew, who lived in Fourteenth Street and who was his school companion. Little did they dream in those days, as they played together, that one day he would be President and she his loving wife, the mistress of the White House.
Mr. Roosevelt was a firm believer in public institutions, and he did not hesitate to send his children to the public schools, especially his boys, that they might come in direct personal contact with the great outside world. So to a near-by institution of learning Theodore and Elliott trudged day after day, with their school-books under their arms, just as thousands of other schoolboys are doing to-day. But in those days there were few experiments being tried in the schools, and manual training and the like were unknown. The boys were well grounded in reading, writing, and arithmetic, as well as spelling, history, and geography, and there was great excitement when a "spelling-bee" was in progress, to see who could spell the rest of the class or the gathering down.
It is said upon good authority that Theodore Roosevelt was a model scholar from the start. He loved to read Cooper's "Leatherstocking Tales," and works of travel, and preferred books above anything else. But when he found that constant studying was ruining his constitution, he determined to build himself up physically as well as mentally.
In the summer time the family often went to the old Roosevelt "out of town" mansion on Long Island. This was called "Tranquillity," a fine large place near Oyster Bay, set in a grove of beautiful trees. The journey to "Tranquillity" was in those days a tedious one, but the Roosevelt children did not mind it, and once at the old place they were certain of a good time so long as their vacation lasted. Here it was that Theodore Roosevelt learned to ride on horseback and how to handle a gun. And here, too, the boys would go boating, fishing, and bathing, to their hearts' content.
Mr. Theodore Roosevelt the elder was a member of the Dutch Reformed Church, and the religious teaching of his children was not neglected. At an early age the future President became a member of that denomination and has remained a member ever since. The church was on the East Side, and had high-backed pews, and here were delivered sermons that were as long as they were full of strength and wisdom. That these sermons had their full effect upon the future President is shown by his addresses delivered before the Young Men's Christian Association of New York City and a church community of the West, years later. In addressing the Young Men's Christian Association Mr. Roosevelt, who was then governor of the State, said:--
"The vice of envy is not only dangerous, but also a mean vice, for it is always a confession of inferiority. It may provoke conduct which will be fruitful of wrong to others; and it must cause misery to the man who feels it. It will not be any the less fruitful of wrong and misery if, as is often the case with evil motives, it adopts some high-sounding alias. The truth is, gentlemen, that each one of us has in him certain passions and instincts which, if they gain the upper hand in his soul, would mean that the wild beast had come uppermost in him. Envy, malice, and hatred are such passions, and they are just as bad if directed against a class or group of men as if directed against an individual."
Golden words, well worth remembering. A person who believes in them with all his heart cannot go far wrong in his actions, no matter what his station in life.
CHAPTER II
The instincts of the hunter must have been born in Theodore Roosevelt. His first gun was given to him when he was ten years of age, and for the time being his books and his studies were forgotten, and he devoted his whole time and attention to shooting at a target set up in the garden of the country home and in going out with the older folks after such small game as were to be found in that vicinity.
The horses on the place were his pets, and he knew the peculiarities of each as well as did the man who cared for them. Riding and driving came to him as naturally as breathing, and the fact that a steed was mettlesome did not daunt him.
"My father often drove four-in-hand," he has said. "I liked very much to go with him, and I liked to drive, too."
Theodore Roosevelt's schoolboy days were not far out of the ordinary. He studied hard, and if he failed in a lesson he did his best to make it up the next time. It is well said that there is no royal road to learning, and even a future President must study just as hard as his classmates if he wants to keep up with them. Sometimes he was absent from school on account of sickness, and then it was a sharp struggle to keep from dropping behind.
"In those days nobody expected Teddy Roosevelt to amount to a great deal," some one has said. "He was thin, pale, and delicate, and suffered with his eyes. But he pulled through, and when he took to athletics, it was wonderful how he got stronger."
By his intimate companions, and indeed by nearly everybody who knew him, he was called Teddy, and this nickname clung to him when he went forth into the great world to become a governor and a president. How the nickname came first into use is not known.
Since those schoolboy days Mr. Roosevelt has been asked this question:--
"What did you expect to be, or dream of being, when you were a boy?"
"I do not recollect that I dreamed at all or planned at all," was the answer. "I simply obeyed the injunction, 'Whatever thy hand findeth to do, do that with all thy might,' and so I took up what came along as it came."
In 1876, while the great Centennial Exhibition was being held at Philadelphia in commemoration of one hundred years of national liberty, Theodore Roosevelt took up his residence at Cambridge, Massachusetts, and became a student at Harvard College. During the previous year his health had been poor indeed, but now he had taken hold of himself in earnest.
"I determined to be strong and well, and did everything to make myself so," he has said. "By the time I entered Harvard I was able to take part in whatever sports I liked."
As perhaps some of my readers know, Harvard College (now termed a University) is the oldest and largest institution of learning in the United States. It was founded in 1636, and among its graduates numbered John Quincy Adams, sixth President of our country. The college proper is located in Cambridge, but some of the attached schools are in Boston.
Theodore Roosevelt was rich enough to have lived in elegant style while at Harvard, but he preferred unostentatious quarters, and took two rooms in the home of Benj. H. Richardson, at what was then No. 16 and is now No. 88 Winthrop Street. The residence is a neat and comfortable one, standing on the southwest corner of Winthrop and Holyoke streets.
The young student had two rooms on the second floor,--one of good size, used for a study, and a small bedroom. In the whole four years he was at the college he occupied these rooms, and he spent a great deal of time in fixing them up to suit his own peculiar taste. On the walls were all sorts of pictures and photographs, along with foils and boxing-gloves, and the horns of wild animals. On a shelf rested some birds which he had himself stuffed, and books were everywhere.
[Illustration: HOUSE IN WHICH THEODORE ROOSEVELT ROOMED WHILE AT HARVARD.]
"It was a regular den, and typical of Roosevelt to the last degree," a student of those times has said. "He had his gun there and his fishing rod, and often spoke of using them. He was noted for trying to get at the bottom of things, and I remember him well on one occasion when I found him with a stuffed bird in one hand and a natural history in the other, trying to decide if the description in the volume covered the specimen before him." When Roosevelt graduated from college, he was one of a very few that took honors, and the subject of his essay was natural history. How his love of natural history continued will be shown later when we see him as a ranchman and hunter of the West.
Theodore Roosevelt had decided to make the most of himself, and while at Harvard scarcely a moment was wasted. If he was not studying, he was in the gymnasium or on the field, doing what he could to make himself strong. He was a firm believer in the saying that a sound body makes a sound mind, and he speedily became a good boxer, wrestler, jumper, and runner. He wrestled a great deal, and of this sport says:--
"I enjoyed it immensely and never injured myself. I think I was a good deal of a wrestler, and though I never won a championship, yet more than once I won my trial heats and got into the final rounds."
At running he was equally good. "I remember once we had a stiff run out into the country," said a fellow-student. "Roosevelt was behind at the start, but when all of the others got played out he forged ahead, and in the end he beat us by several minutes. But he never bragged about it. You see, it wasn't his style."
With all his other sports, and his studying, the young collegian did not give up his love for driving. He had a good horse and a fancy cart,--one of the elevated sort with large wheels,--and in this turnout he was seen many a day, driving wherever it pleased him to go. Sometimes he would get on the road with other students, and then there was bound to be more or less racing.
With a strong love for natural history it was not surprising that he joined the Natural History Club of the college, and of this he was one of the most active members. He also joined the Athletic Association, of which he was a steward, and the Art Club, the Rifle Corps, the O.K. Society, and the Finance Club. In his senior year he became a member of the Porcellian Club, the Hasty Pudding, and the Alpha Delta Phi Club, and also one of the editors of a college paper called the _Advocate_. On Sundays he taught a class of boys, first in a mission school, and then in a Congregational Sunday school. It was a life full of planning, full of study, and full of work, and it suited Theodore Roosevelt to the last degree.
As he grew older his love of natural history was supplemented by a love for the history of nations, and particularly by a love of the history of his own country. The war of 1812 interested him intensely, and before he graduated he laid plans for writing a history of this war, which should go into all the details of the memorable naval conflicts.
It was while in his third year at Harvard that Theodore Roosevelt suffered the first heavy affliction of his life. On February 9, 1878, his father died. It was a cruel blow to the family, and one from which the faithful wife scarcely recovered. The son at Harvard felt his loss greatly, and it was some time before he felt able to resume his studies. The elder Roosevelt's work as a philanthropist was well known, and many gathered at his bier to do him honor, while the public journals were filled with eulogies of the man. The poor mourned bitterly that he was gone, and even the newsboys were filled with regret over his taking away. In speaking of his parent, President Roosevelt once said: "I can remember seeing him going down Broadway, staid and respectable business man that he was, with a poor sick kitten in his coat pocket, which he had picked up in the street." Such a man could not but have a heart overflowing with goodness.
While at college Theodore Roosevelt often showed that self-reliance for which he has since become famous. To every study that he took up he applied himself closely, and if he was not at the head of the class, he was by no means near the foot. When he was sure of a thing, no amount of argument could convince him that he was wrong, and he did not hesitate at times to enter into a discussion even with some of the professors over him.
Although a close student, and also a good all-round athlete, Theodore Roosevelt did not forget his social opportunities. Boston was but a short distance from his rooms in Cambridge, and thither he often went to visit the people he had met or to whom he had letters of introduction. He was always welcome, for his manner was a winning one, and he usually had something to tell that was of interest--something of what he had seen or done, of the next foot-ball or base-ball game, of the coming boat races, of his driving or exploring, or of how he had added a new stuffed bird to his collection, or a new lizard, and of how a far-away friend had sent him a big turtle as a souvenir of an ocean trip in the South Seas. There is a story that this big turtle got loose one night and alarmed the entire household by crawling through the hallway, looking for a pond or mud-hole in which to wallow. At first the turtle was mistaken for a burglar, but he soon revealed himself by his angry snapping, and it was hard work making him a prisoner once more.
CHAPTER III
It was a proud and happy day for Theodore Roosevelt when, in the summer of 1880, he was graduated from Harvard. He took scholarly as well as social honors, and came forth a Phi Beta Kappa man. His fellow-students wished him well, and his family greeted him most affectionately.
Yet with it all there was just a bit of melancholy in this breaking away from a place that had been as a second home to him for four long years. The students were scattering to the four points of the compass, and he might never see some of them again. But others were there whom he was to meet later, and who were destined to march under him up the bullet-swept slopes of San Juan in far-away Cuba. But at that time there was no thought of war and carnage, only good-fellowship, with addresses and orations, music, flying flags, and huge bonfires and fireworks at night. Happy college days were they, never to be forgotten.
[Illustration: THEODORE ROOSEVELT AT GRADUATION, 1880.]
While a student at Harvard, Theodore Roosevelt had become intimately acquainted with Miss Alice Lee, of Boston, a beautiful girl who was a member of an aristocratic family of that city. The young college student was a frequent visitor at the home of the Lees, and on September 23, 1880, the two were married.
It had been decided that Theodore Roosevelt should travel in Europe after graduating. His father had left the family well provided for, so there was no rush to get into something whereby a living might be earned. Yet Theodore Roosevelt had long since determined not to be an idler. He would travel and improve his mind, and then settle down to that for which he seemed best fitted.
To Europe then he went, accompanied by his bride, to study a little and to visit the art galleries and museums, the palaces of kings and queens, and the many great cities of that continent. He travelled through Italy, Switzerland, Germany, France, and the British Isles, taking note of everything he saw and comparing it with what he had seen in his own country. When in lower Europe, the spirit of adventure seized him, and he climbed those lofty mountains of the Alps, the Jungfrau and the Matterhorn, and for those deeds of daring was made a member of the Alpine Club of London. It may be mentioned here that climbing the mountains mentioned is a very difficult feat, and that more than one traveller has lost his life in such attempts. The peaks are covered with snow and ice; the path from one cliff to the next is narrow and uncertain, and a fall into some dark and fearful hollow usually means death. But the danger only urged Theodore Roosevelt on, and added zest to the undertaking.
He was intensely interested in all he saw, both in Europe proper and in the British Isles, but wrote that he was glad to get back home again, among his own people. To him there was no country like America, the land of _Golden Opportunity_, as one of our most noted writers has called it. In Europe there was more or less a lack of personal liberty; here a man could try to make what he pleased of himself, be it cobbler or President.
The young college graduate had an uncle in New York, named Robert B. Roosevelt, who was a well-known lawyer. On his return to this country Theodore Roosevelt entered his uncle's office, and likewise took up the study of law at Columbia University, attending the lectures given by Professor Dwight. Here again his search after what he termed "bottom facts" came to light, and he is well remembered as a member of the law class because of the way he frequently asked questions and called for explanations--accepting nothing as a fact until it was perfectly clear in his own mind. The interruptions did not always suit the professor or the other students, yet they were often the means of clearing up a point that was hazy to many others who had not the courage to thrust forth their inquiries as did Theodore Roosevelt.
"He wants to know it all," said one student, in disgust.
"Well, never mind; I wish I knew it all," answered another. "I guess he knows what he is doing." And in this he was right; Theodore Roosevelt knew exactly what he was trying to accomplish.
The young man was now twenty-three years of age, broad-shouldered, and in much better health than ever before. He had not abandoned his athletic training, and would often run out to the old home at Oyster Bay for a tramp into the woods or on a hunting tour.
While still studying law, Theodore Roosevelt entered politics by taking an active part in a Republican primary. He lived in the twenty-third assembly district of the state. The district included a great number of rich and influential citizens, and on that account was called the "Diamond Back District."
"Let us put up young Roosevelt for Assembly," said one of the politicians. "He's a clever fellow."
"That may be," said another. "But I don't know that we can manage him. He seems a fellow who wants his own way."
"Yes, he'll want his own way, but I reckon that way will be the right way," put in a third speaker.
No sooner had Theodore Roosevelt's name been mentioned as a possible candidate than there was a storm of opposition from some politicians who had in the past ruled the district with a rod of iron. It was a Republican district, so that the contest for the place was entirely in the primary.
"If he is nominated and elected, our power will be gone," they told themselves; and set to work without delay to throw the nomination into the hands of somebody else.
Theodore Roosevelt suspected what was going on, but he said nothing to those who opposed him. With his friends he was very frank, and told them that if he was nominated he would do his best to win the election and serve them honestly in the legislature.
His open-heartedness won him many friends, and when the primary was held, those who had opposed him were chagrined to see him win the nomination with votes to spare. Some at once predicted that he would not be elected.
"Those who opposed him at the primary will not vote for him," they said. "They would rather help the Democrats."
But this prediction proved false. At the election Theodore Roosevelt was elected with a good majority. It was his first battle in the political arena and if he felt proud over it, who can blame him?
The State Capitol of New York is, as my young readers must know, at Albany, on the Upper Hudson, and hither the young assemblyman journeyed. The assemblymen poured in from all over the state, and were made up of all sorts and conditions of men, including bankers, farmers, merchants, contractors, liquor dealers, and even prize-fighters. Many of these men were thoroughly honest, but there were others who were there for gain only, and who cared little for the passing of just laws.
The party to which Theodore Roosevelt belonged was in the minority, so that the young assemblyman found he would have to struggle hard if he expected to be heard at all. But the thoughts of such a struggle only put him on his mettle, and he plunged in with a vigor that astonished his opponents and caused great delight to his friends.
"He is fearless," said one who had voted for him. "He will make things warm for those who don't want to act on the square." And he certainly did make it warm, until a certain class grew to fear and hate him to such a degree that they plotted to do him bodily harm.
"He has got to learn that he must mind his own business," was the way one of these corruptionists reasoned.
"But what can we do?" asked another. "He's as sharp on the floor of the Assembly as a steel trap."
"We'll get Stubby to brush up against him," said a third.
Stubby was a bar-room loafer who had been at one time something of a pugilist. He was a thoroughly unprincipled fellow, and it was known that he would do almost anything for money.
"Sure, I'll fix him," said Stubby. "You just leave him to me and see how I polish him off."
The corruptionists and their tool met at the Delavan House, an old-fashioned hotel at which politicians in and around the capital were wont to congregate, and waited for the young assemblyman. Roosevelt was not long in putting in an appearance and was soon in deep discussion with some friends.
"Watch him, Stubby," said one of the young assemblyman's enemies. "Don't let him get away from you to-night."
"I have me eye on him," answered Stubby.
Roosevelt was on the way to the buffet of the hotel when the crowd, with Stubby in front, pushed against him rudely. The young assemblyman stepped back and viewed those before him fearlessly.
"Say, what do yer mean, running into me that way?" demanded Stubby, insolently.
As he spoke he aimed a savage blow at Theodore Roosevelt. But the young assemblyman had not forgotten how to box, and he dodged with an agility that was astonishing.
"This fellow needs to be taught a lesson," Theodore Roosevelt told himself, and then and there he proceeded to administer the lesson in a manner that Stubby never forgot. He went down flat on his back, and when he got up, he went down again, with a bleeding nose and one eye all but closed. Seeing this, several leaped in to his assistance, but it was an ill-fated move, for Roosevelt turned on them also, and down they went, too; and then the encounter came to an end, with Theodore Roosevelt the victor.
"And that wasn't the end of it," said one, who witnessed the affair. "After it was over young Roosevelt was as smiling as ever. He walked straight over to some of his enemies who had been watching the mix-up from a distance and told them very plainly that he knew how the attack had originated, and he was much obliged to them, for he hadn't enjoyed himself so much for a year. Phew! but weren't those fellows mad! And wasn't Stubby mad when he learned that they had set him against one of the best boxers Harvard ever turned out? But after that you can make sure they treated Roosevelt with respect and gave him a wide berth."
CHAPTER IV
The career of an assemblyman is not generally an interesting one, but Mr. Roosevelt managed to extract not a little pleasure and also some profit from it. The experience was just what he needed to fit himself for the larger positions he was, later on, to occupy.
One happening is of peculiar interest to note. While Theodore Roosevelt was a member of the Assembly, Grover Cleveland became governor of the state. Mr. Cleveland was a Democrat, while Mr. Roosevelt was a Republican, yet the two future Presidents of the United States became warm friends,--a friendship that has endured to the present day.
It is said that the friendship started in rather a peculiar manner. There was at the time a measure before the Assembly to reduce the fare of the elevated roads in New York City from ten cents to five cents. After a great deal of talking, the bill passed the Assembly and then the Senate, and went to the governor for his signature. Much to the surprise of the general public Governor Cleveland vetoed the bill, stating that when the capitalists had built the elevated roads they had understood that the fare was to be ten cents, and that it was not right to deprive them of their profits. At once those who wanted the measure to become a law decided to pass it over the governor's head. When this attempt was made, Theodore Roosevelt got up boldly and said he could not again vote for the bill--that he was satisfied that Governor Cleveland's view of the matter was correct.
"These people would not have put their money in the elevated railroads had they not been assured that the fare was to be ten cents," said he. "We are under obligation to them, and we must keep our promises." And so the bill fell through. It was not in itself right that the fare should be ten cents, and it has long since been reduced to five cents, but it shows that Theodore Roosevelt was bound to do what was right and just, according to the dictates of his own conscience, and this won for him many friends, even among those who had opposed him politically.
In a work of this kind, intended mainly for the use of young people, it is not necessary to do more than glance at the work which Theodore Roosevelt accomplished while a member of the New York Assembly.
He made a close study of the various political offices of New York County and discovered that many office-holders were drawing large sums of money in the shape of fees for which they were doing hardly any work. This he considered unfair, and by dint of hard labor helped to pass a law placing such offices on the salary list, making a saving to the county of probably half a million dollars a year.
One of the best things done by Theodore Roosevelt at that time was the support given by him to a civil service law for the state. Up to that time office-holding was largely in the hands of the party which happened to be in power.
"This is all wrong," said the young assemblyman. "A clerk or anybody else doing his duty faithfully should not be thrown out as soon as there is a political change." The new law was passed, and this was the beginning of what is commonly called the merit system, whereby a large number of those who work for the state are judged solely by their capabilities and not by their political beliefs. This system has since been extended to other states and also to office-holding under the national government.
Another important measure pushed through the Assembly by Theodore Roosevelt was what was known as the Edson Charter for New York City, giving to the mayor certain rights which in the past had rested in the board of aldermen. This measure was defeated during Roosevelt's second term of office, but in 1884 he pressed it with such force that it overcame all opposition and became a law. Many have considered this victory his very best work.
By those who knew him at this time he is described as having almost a boyish figure, frank face, clear, penetrating eyes, and a smile of good-natured friendship and dry humor. When he talked it was with an earnestness that could not be mistaken. By those who were especially bitter against him he was sometimes called a dude and a silk stocking, but to these insinuations he paid no attention, and after the encounter at the Delavan House his opponents were decidedly more careful as to how they addressed him.
"Take him all the way through he was generally even tempered," one has said who met him at that time. "But occasionally there was a flash from his eye that made his opponent draw back in quick order. He would stand a good deal, but there were some things he wouldn't take, and they knew it. One thing is certain, after he was in the Assembly for a few months everybody knew perfectly that to come to him with any bill that was the least bit shady was a waste of time and effort. Roosevelt wouldn't stand for it a minute."
In those days Theodore Roosevelt did not give up his habits of athletic exercise, and nearly every day he could be seen taking long walks in the country around Albany. In the meantime his "Naval War of 1812" was well under way, but he could spare only a few hours occasionally to complete his manuscript.
His married life had thus far been a happy one, and its joy was greatly increased by the birth of his daughter Alice. As will be seen later, Mr. Roosevelt is what is called a family man, and he took great comfort in this new addition to his little household. But his happiness was short-lived, for in 1884, when the daughter was but a baby, the beloved wife died, and the little one had to be given over to the care of the grandparents in Boston. Not many months later Mr. Roosevelt's mother died also, heaping additional sorrow upon his head.
With the conclusion of his third term in the Assembly Theodore Roosevelt's work as a member of that body came to an end. If he had made some enemies, he had made more friends, and he was known as an ardent supporter of reform in all branches of politics. In recognition of his ability he was chosen as a delegate-at-large to the Republican convention brought together to nominate a candidate to succeed President Arthur.
At that time James G. Blaine from Maine had served many years in the United States Senate, and it was thought that he would surely be both nominated and elected. But many were opposed to Blaine, thinking he would not support such reform measures as they wished to see advanced, and among this number was Theodore Roosevelt.
"We must nominate Mr. Edmunds," said the young delegate-at-large, and did his best for the gentleman in question.
"It cannot be done," said another delegate.
The convention met at Exposition Hall in Chicago, and Mr. Roosevelt was placed on the Committee on Resolutions. It was a stormy convention, and ballot after ballot had to be taken before a nomination could be secured. Blaine led from the start, with Senator Edmunds a fairly close second.
"If Blaine is nominated, he will be defeated," said more than one.
At last came the deciding vote, and James G. Blaine was put up at the head of the ticket, with John A. Logan for Vice-President.
At once Blaine clubs were organized all over the country, and the Republican party did all in its power to elect its candidate. He was called the Plumed Knight, and many political clubs wore plumes in his honor when on parade. In the meantime the Democrats had nominated Grover Cleveland.
The fight was exceedingly bitter up to the very evening of election day. When the votes were counted, it was found that Blaine had been defeated by a large majority, and that Grover Cleveland, Roosevelt's old friend, had won the highest gift in the hands of the nation.
His work at the convention in Chicago was Theodore Roosevelt's first entrance into national affairs, and his speeches on that occasion will not be readily forgotten. It was here that he came into contact with William McKinley, with whom, sixteen years later, he was to run on the same ticket. The records of that convention show that on one occasion McKinley spoke directly after Roosevelt. Thus were these two drawn together at that early day without knowing or dreaming that one was to succeed the other to the Presidency.
But though Theodore Roosevelt was disappointed over the nomination made at Chicago, he did not desert his party. Instead he did all he could to lead them to victory, until the death of his mother caused him to withdraw temporarily from public affairs.
[Illustration: Signature: Alice Lee Roosevelt]
CHAPTER V
Theodore Roosevelt had now published his "Naval History of the War of 1812," and it had created a decidedly favorable opinion among those critics who were best able to judge of the production. It is an authoritative work, and is to-day in the library of nearly every American war-ship afloat, as well as in numerous government libraries in this country, as at Washington, West Point, and Annapolis, and also in leading libraries of England.
Being out of politics the young author thought of taking up his pen once more. But he was restless by nature, and the loss of his wife and his mother still weighed heavily upon him. So he took himself to the West, to where the Little Missouri River flows in winding form through what are called the Bad Lands of North Dakota.
Here, on the edge of the cattle country, Theodore Roosevelt had become possessed of two ranches, one called the Elkhorn and the other Chimney Butte. Both were located by the river, which during the dry season was hardly of any depth at all, but which during the heavy rains, or during the spring freshets, became a roaring torrent.
At one of these ranches Theodore Roosevelt settled down for the time being, to rough it in hunting and raising cattle. When the weather would not permit of his going abroad, or when the mood of the author seized him, he wrote. As a result of these experiences he has given us a delightful work called "The Hunting Trips of a Ranchman," first published in 1885, giving his adventures among the cattle and while on the hunt, sometimes alone and sometimes in company with the rude but honest cow punchers and plainsmen who surrounded him.
Mr. Roosevelt has described the ranch at which he lived for the greater part of his time as a long, low, story-high house of hewn logs, clean and neat, and with many rooms. It faced the river, and in front was a long, low veranda, where one might idle on a clear, warm day to his heart's content. Inside, the main room contained a shelf full of the owner's favorite outdoor books and the walls half-a-dozen pet pictures. Rifles and shot-guns stood handy in corners, and on pegs and deer horns hung overcoats of wolf or coon skin and gloves of otter or beaver.
That Theodore Roosevelt was a close observer of all that occurred around him is proved by his writings. With great minuteness he has described his life at the ranch home and while in the saddle, both in winter and summer, telling of his experiences while rounding up cattle and while bringing down waterfowl and larger game of various kinds. He likewise describes the trained hunters he has met at different seasons of the year, and tells of what they have done or were trying to do.
At this time his favorite horse was a steed called Manitou. But when on a round-up of cattle, many ponies were taken along, so that a fresh mount could be had at any time. It was a breezy, free life, and to it our President undoubtedly owes the rugged constitution that he possesses to-day.
His observations led him to make many investigations concerning the smaller wild animals near his ranches and the larger beasts to be found farther off. The tales which were told to him by other ranchmen and hunters he always took "with a grain of salt," and he soon reached the conclusion that many of the so-styled mighty hunters were only such in name, and had brought down quantities of game only in years gone by when such game was plentiful and could be laid low without much trouble. Once when a man told him he had brought down a certain beast at four hundred yards, Roosevelt measured the distance and found it to be less than half that.
"You couldn't fool him on much," said one of the persons who met him about that time. "He would take precious little for granted. He wanted to know the how of everything, and he wasn't satisfied until he did know."
Regarding his own powers as a hunter at that time, Mr. Roosevelt is very modest. He says his eyesight was rather poor, and his hand not over steady, so that "drawing a bead" on anything was not easy. Yet he went into the sport with much enthusiasm, and if at times he came back at nightfall empty-handed, he did not complain, and he was almost certain to have something interesting to tell of what he had seen.
Theodore Roosevelt had been in this territory before, although not to remain any great length of time. Once he had come out to hunt buffalo, no easy thing to do, since this game was growing scarcer every day. He had a guide named Ferris, who was not particularly struck with the appearance of the pale young man, plainly dressed, whom he met at the railroad station.
"I sized him up as not being able to endure a long trip after a buffalo," said the guide, in speaking afterward of the meeting. "He was well mounted, but he looked as if he might play out before the sun went down."
But in this the guide was mistaken. Roosevelt proved that he could ride as well as anybody. The first night out found the hunters about thirty miles from any settlement. They went into camp on the open prairie, tethering their horses with ropes fastened to their saddles, which they used as pillows.
All went well for an hour or two, when the improvised pillow was jerked from beneath Theodore Roosevelt's head, and he heard his horse bounding away in the distance.
"Wolves!" cried the guide. "They have frightened our horses!"
So it proved; and the hunters lost no time in reaching for their firearms. But the wolves kept their distance, and soon Theodore Roosevelt was running after the horses, which, after a good deal of trouble, he secured and brought back. After that the guide no longer looked on him as a "tenderfoot."
"A tenderfoot," said he, "would have been scared to death. But Teddy Roosevelt was as cool as a cucumber through it all--as if the happening wasn't in the least out of the ordinary."
For several days the hunters remained on the prairie looking for buffalo, but without success. They were on the point of turning back when the guide noticed that the horses were growing uneasy.
"Some big game at hand," he announced. "Come on to yonder washout and see if I am not right."
With great caution the hunters advanced to the washout the guide had mentioned. Dismounting, they crept forward in the shelter of the brushwood, and there, true enough, resting at his ease was a great buffalo bull.
"Hit him where the patch of red shows on his side," whispered the guide, and Roosevelt nodded to show that he understood. With care and coolness he took aim and fired, and the buffalo bull leaped up and staggered forward with the blood streaming from his mouth and nose.
"Shall I give him another?" was the question asked, but before it could be answered the buffalo bull gave a plunge and fell dead.
Rattlesnakes are rather unpleasant reptiles to deal with, and Theodore Roosevelt has shown his bravery by the way in which he speaks of them in his accounts of outdoor life. He says to a man wearing alligator boots there is little danger, for the fang of the reptile cannot go through the leather, and the snake rarely strikes as high as one's knee. But he had at least one experience with a rattlesnake not readily forgotten.
He was out on a hunt for antelope. The sage-brush in which he was concealing himself was so low that he had to crawl along flat on his breast, pushing himself forward with hands and feet as best he could.
He was almost on the antelope when he heard a warning whirr close at his side, and glancing hastily in that direction, saw the reptile but a few feet away, coiled up and ready to attack.
It was a thrilling and critical moment, and had the young hunter leaped up he might have been dangerously if not fatally struck. But by instinct he backed away silently and moved off in another direction through the brush. The rattlesnake did not follow, although it kept its piercing eyes on the hunter as long as possible. After the antelope stalk was over, Roosevelt came back to the spot, made a careful search, and, watching his chance, fired on the rattlesnake, killing it instantly.
In those days Theodore Roosevelt met Colonel William Cody, commonly known as "Buffalo Bill," and many other celebrated characters of the West. He never grew tired of listening to the stories these old trappers, hunters, scouts, and plainsmen had to tell, and some of these stories he afterward put into print, and they have made excellent reading.
During many of his hunting expeditions at that time Theodore Roosevelt was accompanied by his foreman, a good shot and all-round ranchman named Merrifield. Merrifield had been in the West but five years, but the life fitted him exactly, and in him Roosevelt the ranchman and hunter found a companion exactly to his liking, fearless and self-reliant to the last degree.
As perhaps most of my young readers know, wild geese are generally brought down with a shot-gun, but in the Bad Lands it was not unusual to bring them down with a rifle, provided the hunter was quick and accurate enough in his aim. One morning, just before dawn, Theodore Roosevelt was riding along the edge of a creek when he heard a cackling that he knew must come from some geese, and he determined if possible to lay one low.
It was easy work to dismount and crawl to the edge of the creek. But a fog lay over the water, and he could see the geese but indistinctly. Leaving the creek bank, he ran silently to where the watercourse made a turn and then crawled forward in the brush. Soon the fog lifted once more, and he saw the geese resting on the water close to the bend. He fired quickly and brought down the largest of the flock, while the others lost no time in disappearing. It was a good fat goose and made excellent eating.
CHAPTER VI
It cannot be said that Theodore Roosevelt's venture as a ranchman was a very successful one, and it is doubtful if he expected to make much money out of it. He lost nothing in a financial way, and there is no doubt but that the experience was of great benefit to him. In this semi-wilderness he met all sorts and conditions of men, and grew to know them thoroughly. In the past his dealings had been almost entirely with people of large cities and towns, and with men of learning and large business affairs; here he fell in with the wildest kind of cowboys and frontiersmen. Some he soon found were not fit to be associated with, but the majority proved as honest and hard-working fellows as could be met with anywhere. Many of these loved the young "boss" from the start, and when, years later, the war with Spain broke out, and there was a call to arms, not a few of them insisted upon joining the Rough Riders just to be near Theodore Roosevelt once more.
Around the ranches owned by Theodore Roosevelt there were more or less grouse of the sharp-tailed variety. As this sort of game made excellent eating, ranchmen and regular hunters did not hesitate to bring them down at every opportunity.
One afternoon Theodore Roosevelt left his ranch to visit the shack of one of his herders, about thirty-five miles down the river. It was a cold, clear day, and he was finely mounted on a well-trained pony. He writes that he was after grouse, hoping to get quite a number of them.
He had trusted to reach the shack long before sundown, but the way was bad, over bottoms covered with thin ice and snow, and soon darkness came on, leaving him practically lost in the cottonwoods that lined the watercourse.
What to do the young ranchman did not know, and it is safe to say that he wished himself heartily out of the difficulty. It was so dark he could not see three yards ahead of him, and it was only by the merest accident that he struck the shack at last, and then he found it empty, for the herder had gone off elsewhere on business.
So far Roosevelt had seen no game, so he was without food, and what made matters worse, the larder of the shack proved to be empty. All he had with him was a little package of tea.
It was a dismal outlook truly, and especially on such a cold night. But firewood was at hand, and after turning his pony loose to shift for itself, the future President of our country started up housekeeping for himself by lighting a fire, bringing in some water from under the ice of the river, and brewing himself a good, strong cup of tea! It was not a very nourishing meal, but it was all he had, and soon after that he went to sleep, trusting for better luck in the morning.
He was up almost before daybreak, and my young readers can rest assured that by that time his appetite was decidedly keen. Listening intently, he could hear the grouse drumming in the woods close by.
"I must have some of them, and that directly," he told himself, and rifle in hand lost no time in making his way to the woods. By keeping out of sight behind the brushwood he managed to get quite close to the game, and so brought down one after another until he had five. Such success was a great satisfaction to him, and returning to the shack he fixed himself a breakfast of broiled sharptails, to which he did full justice.
It was not all play at the ranches, and sometimes Theodore Roosevelt went out with his men to round up the cattle and help "cut out" what was his own. This was hard work, for frequently the cattle did not want to be separated from the beasts belonging to another ranchman. More than once an angry cow or a bull would charge, and then there would be a lively scramble on pony-back or on foot to get out of the way. Sometimes, too, the cattle would wander off and get lost, and then a long and hard hunt would be necessary in order to find them again.
But there was fun as well as hard work, and Mr. Roosevelt has told one story about a skunk that is sure to be remembered. He says that skunks were very numerous, and that they were more feared than larger animals by the cowboys because the bite was sure to bring on hydrophobia.
One night a number of the cowboys and Mr. Roosevelt were sleeping in a hut. A skunk came along, and after a time worked its way into the hut. It got among the pots and pans and made a noise which quickly awoke a Scotchman named Sandy.
Thinking something was wrong, Sandy struck a light, and seeing the eyes of the skunk, fired. But his aim was bad, and the animal fled.
"What were you firing at?" asked half a dozen of the other cowboys.
The Scotchman explained, and, satisfied that it had been a skunk, the others told him he had better leave the animal alone or there would be trouble.
Nobody thought the skunk would come back, but it did, and again Sandy heard it among the pots and pans. This was too much for his Scotch blood, and taking aim once more, he fired and gave the skunk a mortal wound. At once the hut was filled with a powerful odor that made all the inmates rush for the open air.
"Now see what you have done!" cried several, indignantly.
"Hoot mon!" answered the Scotchman, holding his nose tightly, "A didna ken 'twould cause sec' a tragedee!"
And after that we may be sure that Sandy let skunks severely alone.
Hunting in the summer time, or when the weather was but moderately cold, was well enough, but hunting in the dead of winter was quite a different thing. Then the thermometer would frequently drop to thirty and forty degrees below zero, and there would be a cutting "norther" fit to freeze the very marrow in one's bones. Seldom was there much snow, but when it came, it caused a veritable blizzard, during which neither man nor beast felt like stirring out.
It was during such weather that Theodore Roosevelt once had the tip of his nose and one cheek frozen--something that caused him not a little pain and trouble for a long time afterward.
It was in those dreary days that the logs were piled high in the broad fireplace of the ranch home, and Theodore Roosevelt spent his days in reading and studying, in writing letters to his friends and relatives, and in penning some of the hunting sketches that have won him literary fame.
One day, early in the winter, Theodore Roosevelt and his foreman went out to see if they could not bring in two white-tail deer which had been seen in the vicinity of the ranch the day before. One of the deer, a large buck, had been shot in the ankle by the foreman, so the beginning of the trail was easy to follow. The buck and his mate had gone into a thicket, and it was likely that there the pair had spent the night.
"We'll have our own trouble finding the tracks again," said the foreman. And so it proved; for during the night some cattle and other animals had passed in and out of the thicket, which covered a large extent of territory.
At last the hunters hit upon the right trail, and the foreman went ahead, leaving Roosevelt to keep somewhat toward the outside of the cover. Both were wide-awake and on the alert, and presently the foreman announced that he had found the spot where the wounded buck had passed the night.
"He is not very far from here," said the foreman, and hardly had he said this than Theodore Roosevelt heard a cracking of fallen twigs and a breaking of the brush and lower limbs of the trees as the buck rushed through the thicket. He ran with all speed in the direction and took station behind a large tree.
Only a few seconds passed, and then the buck showed his head and antlers among the brushwood. He was gazing ahead anxiously, no doubt trying to decide if it would be safe to leap into the open and run up the trail. Then he turned his gaze directly toward where Theodore Roosevelt was crouching, rifle in hand.
Another instant and it would have been too late. But just as the buck's head was turned and he sniffed the air suspiciously, the young ranchman pulled the trigger.
"He turned his head sharply toward me as I raised the rifle," says Mr. Roosevelt, in writing of this adventure, "and the bullet went fairly into his throat, just under the jaw, breaking his neck, and bringing him down in his tracks with hardly a kick."
The buck proved to be an extra fine one, and the two hunters lost no time in dressing the game and taking it to the ranch. Not wishing to go back for their horses, the two dragged the game over the snow, each taking hold of an antler for that purpose. It was intensely cold, so that each of the hunters had to drag first with one hand and then with the other for fear of having his fingers frozen.
This was one of the times when the young ranchman and hunter was successful in his quest. But Mr. Roosevelt has not hesitated to tell of the many times he has gone out on the hunt only to return empty-handed and glad enough to get back to a warm shelter and where he was sure of a good meal.
"Ranching and hunting was no bed of roses," some one who knew him at that time has said. "Many a time he came back utterly fagged out and not a thing to show for his labor. But he never complained, and on the contrary could generally tell a pretty good story about something he had seen or had taken note of. In the summer he would examine the nests of birds and waterfowl with great care, and I have seen him with a horned frog before him, studying every point of the creature."
Once while on the prairie the young ranchman was caught in a heavy hailstorm. He was out with a number of others, when, with scarcely any warning, the sky began to grow dark, and the wind came up in fitful gusts.
"We must get out of this, and quick too," said a companion. And all pushed onward as fast as they could. But soon the heavy fall of hail overtook them, and they were glad enough to seek even the slight shelter of a deep washout, where men and horses huddled close together for protection. The hailstones came down as large as marbles, causing the horses to jump around in a fashion that was particularly dangerous to themselves and to their owners. The time was August, yet the air grew very cold, and when the storm was over, some cattle were found completely benumbed. A few had been killed, and there had likewise been great slaughter among a flock of lambs that had been driven into the Bad Lands the year previous.
Mr. Roosevelt tells us that the greatest number of black-tailed deer he ever killed in one day was three. He is a true sportsman in this respect and does not kill for the mere sake of killing. Those who go out just to slaughter all they possibly can are not sportsmen, but butchers. To be sure, a hunter may have to play the butcher at times, when the meat is needed, but not otherwise.
On the occasion when the three black-tails were laid low the young ranchman and his foreman started on the hunt very early in the morning, when the bright moon was still in the sky. It was late in November and stinging cold, so they allowed their horses to take their own pace, which was far from slow.
The course of the hunters was up the bed of a dry creek, along which they passed the still sleeping cattle and also a drove of ponies. Then they reached a spot where they left their own steeds, and, rifles in hand, hurried silently toward a great plateau which lay some distance before them. Signs of deer could be seen on every hand, and both were certain that the day's outing would prove a grand success.
Theodore Roosevelt had separated from his companion when of a sudden he caught sight of a beautiful doe. It was a fair shot, and dropping on one knee he took aim and fired. But to his intense chagrin the doe bounded off and disappeared in the brushwood.
"Hit anything?" sang out the foreman.
"I am afraid not," was the answer.
"Never mind; better luck next time." And then both sank down behind a rock where they could get a good view of a hollow ahead of them.
They had been behind the rock but a short time when they heard a cracking of twigs, and a fine black-tail buck came cautiously into view. Both fired, and the buck rolled over, never to rise again. Then another deer came into view and both fired again, but the game was not struck and lost no time in disappearing.
"Never mind; one isn't so bad," said Theodore Roosevelt, and his companion agreed with him.
The hunters now decided to go forward into the hollow and look for the doe Theodore Roosevelt had missed. This was done, and soon the foreman pointed to some drops and splashes of blood.
"Must have hit her, after all," said the foreman. "We can take our time about following her up. We'll be sure to get her sooner or later."
But locating the wounded doe proved not so easy, after all. The trail was followed for some time, but was lost on the hard ground higher up; and at last the two hunters agreed to look for new game. They had lunch, and then started out nearly as fresh as before when suddenly the foreman called out:--
"There's your game all right!"
He pointed to a clump of bushes, and running forward, both saw the doe stretched out, stiff and cold. She had been mortally wounded, after all, much to both hunters' gratification.
So far the hunting had been on foot, but now the hunters took again to their steeds. Mr. Roosevelt says he was wishing for just one more shot, to see if he could not do better than before, when his wish was gratified. Just ahead a yearling black-tail buck leaped into view and cantered away. After the buck went both hunters, but Theodore Roosevelt was in the lead, and this time determined to make no miss or poor shot. He waited until the buck turned its side to him, then fired with especial care. The game staggered on, then fell. The bullet had gone clean through its body, and in a few seconds it breathed its last.
CHAPTER VII
Although Theodore Roosevelt was devoting himself to ranching, hunting, and literary work in North Dakota he had by no means given up his residence in New York or at Oyster Bay. More than this, he still continued his connection with the Republican party in spite of the set-back at the last National Convention.
In 1886, while Grover Cleveland was still President of the United States, there was an exceedingly sharp and bitter fight in New York City over the office of mayor. There was great discontent both in the Republican and the Democratic party, and nobody could tell what was going to happen on election day.
"Let us put up Teddy Roosevelt," said some of the Republicans, and shortly after this Theodore Roosevelt was nominated for mayor of New York. His regular opponent was Abram Hewitt, while the Independents put up Henry George, the "single tax" man, well known as the author of a book entitled "Progress and Poverty."
From the very start the campaign was an exceedingly hot one, and there was a good deal of parading and speech-making. Many clubs were organized in behalf of Theodore Roosevelt, and clubs were likewise formed to support the other candidates. The supporters of Henry George came from both regular parties, so political matters became very much mixed up.
"There is no show for Roosevelt unless George withdraws," said more than one old politician.
"And George won't withdraw," added others. And so it proved. Henry George was exceptionally strong with the poorer classes, and on election day he polled over 68,000 votes; 90,552 votes were cast for Hewitt, while Roosevelt received 60,435 votes.
It was certainly a disheartening defeat, and many a man would have retired from the political field, never to show himself again. But Theodore Roosevelt was made of sterner stuff. He held his ground and went his way as before, resolved to do his duty as it should present itself.
It was about this time that his intimacy with Miss Edith Kermit Carew was renewed. It will be remembered that she had been his playmate during his earlier days around Union Square. In the years that had followed she had been graduated from a young ladies' seminary and had travelled abroad, visiting London, Paris, and other large cities. Now she was home again, and on December 2, 1886, she became Mr. Roosevelt's wife.
Mr. Roosevelt's second marriage has been a very happy one. Mrs. Roosevelt is a loving wife and a gracious mistress of the White House. Five children have come to bless their union, of which more will be said later. Mrs. Roosevelt at once took Mr. Roosevelt's daughter Alice to her heart, and from that time to this the two have been as mother and daughter.
Theodore Roosevelt had already produced his "Naval War of 1812" and his "Hunting Trips of a Ranchman," both spoken of in previous pages. A short while after he was married the second time he brought out a "Life of Thomas Benton," and a year later a "Life of Gouverneur Morris." In addition to this he wrote a number of articles for the magazines, and also some short stories for young folks. All were well received and added not a little to his literary reputation.
But the desire to be out in the open, to roam the prairie and to hunt, was in his veins, and again and again he visited his ranches in the Bad Lands, and took hunting trips in other directions. Sometimes he cared little or nothing for the game brought down, and at others he went on the hunt with great deliberation, for "something worth while," as he expressed it.
How careful he could be on the latter occasions is shown by his printed views on hunting, in which he discusses the best rifles, shot-guns, and pistols to use, the best knives to carry, how to dress with comfort, and how to follow up game, on horseback and on foot, in the open and when in the woods or in the short brush. He has also told us much about the habits of the beasts and birds that he has hunted, showing that he followed the sport intelligently and not in the haphazard fashion of many who go out merely to get a big bagful of game.
[Illustration: Edith Kermit Roosevelt]
Hunting was not all fun in those days. We have already related how Theodore Roosevelt was caught in a heavy hailstorm. At another time he and his companions were caught in a three-days' rain-storm, during which the wind blew a hurricane. They were miles away from the ranch home, and it was utterly impossible to move in any direction.
"Reckon we are booked to stay here," said one of the cowboys, a fellow from the South. "It's a right smart storm, and it's going to stay by us." And stay by them it did, until the party were almost out of provisions. They got what shelter they could in something of a hollow overhung with trees and brush, but this was not very satisfactory, and all were soaked to the skin, and the blankets in which they rolled themselves at night were both wet and muddy.
"Teddy Roosevelt didn't like that wetting, and I know it," one of the cowboys has said since. "But he didn't grumble near as much as some of the others. We had to take our medicine, and he took his like a man."
There were no elk in the immediate vicinity of Theodore Roosevelt's ranches, nor were there many bears or buffaloes. But all of these animals were to be met with further westward, and the young ranchman had been after them during a previous year's hunting while on a trip to Montana and Wyoming.
At that time the destination of the party was the Bighorn Mountains, which were reached only after a painful and disheartening journey over a very uncertain Indian trail, during which one of the ponies fell into a washout and broke his neck, and a mule stuck fast in a mud-hole and was extricated only after hours of hard work.
"It was on the second day of our journey into the mountains that I got my first sight of elk," says Mr. Roosevelt. The party was on the trail leading into a broad valley, moving slowly and cautiously along through a patch of pine trees. When the bottom of the valley was gained, Mr. Roosevelt saw a herd of cow elk at a great distance, and soon after took a shot at one, but failed to reach his mark.
"I'm going after that herd," he said. And as soon as the party had pitched camp, he sallied forth in one direction, while his foreman, Merrifield, took another.
As Theodore Roosevelt had supposed, the elk had gone off in a bunch, and for some distance it was easy to follow them. But further on the herd had spread out, and he had to follow with more care, for fear of getting on the wrong trail, for elk tracks ran in all directions over the mountains. These tracks are there to-day, but the elk and the bears are fast disappearing, for ruthless hunters have done their best to exterminate the game.
After passing along for several miles, Theodore Roosevelt felt he must be drawing close to the herd. Just then his rifle happened to tap on the trunk of a tree, and instantly he heard the elk moving away in new alarm. His hunting blood was now aroused, and he rushed forward with all speed, but as silently as possible. By taking a short cut, the young ranchman managed to come up beside the running elk. They were less than twenty yards away, and had it not been for the many trees which were on every side, he would have had an excellent shot at them. As it was he brought low a fine, full-grown cow elk, and hit a bull calf in the hind leg. Later on he took up the trail of the calf and finished that also.
Of this herd the foreman also brought down two, so that for the time being the hunters had all the meat they needed. But Theodore Roosevelt was anxious to obtain some elk horns as trophies of the chase, and day after day a watch was kept for bull elk, as the hunters moved the camp from one place to another.
At last the long-looked-for opportunity arrived. Three big bulls were seen, and Roosevelt and his man went after them with all possible speed. They were on foot, and the trail led them over some soft ground, and then through a big patch of burnt timber. Here running was by no means easy, and more than once both hunters pitched headlong into the dirt and soot, until they were covered from head to foot. But Theodore Roosevelt was bound to get the elk, and kept on until the sweat was pouring down his face and neck. Shot after shot was fired, and all three of the animals were wounded, but still they kept on bounding away.
"One is down!" shouted Roosevelt at last. And the news proved true; the smallest of the bulls had rocked unsteadily for a few seconds and gone to earth. Then on and on after the remaining game sped the hunters, panting and sweating as before.
"The sweat streamed down in my eyes and made furrows in the sooty mud that covered my face, from having fallen full length down on the burnt earth," writes the dauntless hunter, in relating this story. "I sobbed for breath as I toiled at a shambling trot after them, as nearly done out as could well be."
But he did not give up; and now the elk took a turn and went downhill, with Theodore Roosevelt pitching after them, ready to drop from exhaustion, but full of that grit to win out which has since won the admiration of all who know the man. The second bull fell; and now but one remained, and this dashed into a thicket. On its heels went the daring hunter, running the chance of having the elk turn on him as soon as cornered, in which case, had Roosevelt's rifle been empty, the struggle for life on both sides would have been a fierce one.
In the midst of the thicket the hunter had to pause, for the elk was now out of sight, and there was no telling what new course had been taken by the game. At a distance he saw a yellow body under the evergreen trees, and, taking hasty aim, fired. When he came up, he was somewhat dismayed to learn that he had not brought down the elk, but a black-tail deer instead. In the meantime, the elk got away, and it proved impossible to pick up the trail again.
There is a valuable lesson to be learned from this hunting trip, and one that all young readers should take to heart. It shows what sticking at a thing can accomplish. Mr. Roosevelt had determined to get at least a portion of that game, no matter what the labor and hardship involved. Many a hunter would have given up in disgust or despair after the first few shots were fired and it looked as if the elk were out of range and intended to keep out. But this determined young man did not give up thus easily. Hard as was that run up hill and down, and regardless of the tumbles taken, and that he was so tired he could scarcely stand, he kept on until two elk were brought down, and it was firmly settled that the third could not be captured.
The way to accomplish anything in this life is to _stick at it_. Theodore Roosevelt understood this truth even when he went to college, for in the Harvard journal of which he was an editor he wrote, speaking of foot-ball practice, "What is most necessary is that every man should realize the necessity of faithful and honest work, _every afternoon_." He put "every afternoon" in italics himself, and he meant that every foot-ball player who hoped to win in the inter-collegiate foot-ball games should _stick at it_ until he had made himself as perfect a player as possible. A victory worth gaining is worth working for, and usually the hardest-earned victories are the sweetest.
CHAPTER VIII
It was while in the Bighorn Mountains that Theodore Roosevelt got his first shot at a bear. He had been wanting such a chance for a good many years, but up to that date the bears had kept well out of his sight.
In his writings he has said much about bears, both common and grizzly, and told of their habits, and how they have been tracked down and shot at various times of the year. He holds to the opinion that the average bear would rather run away than fight, yet he tells the story of how one bear faced the hunter who had shot him, and gave the man one blow with his powerful paw that proved fatal.
One day his companion of the hunt came riding in with the carcass of a black bear killed in a network of hollows and ravines some miles from their present camp.
"The hollows are full of bear tracks," said Merrifield. "I am sure, if we go up there, we'll get one or more black bears and perhaps a grizzly."
"Then let us go by all means," responded Theodore Roosevelt. And no time was lost in moving to the new locality.
The hunters had been out nearly all of the next day, when, on returning through the forest toward nightfall, Roosevelt came across the footmarks of a large bear. He tried to follow them, but night closed in on him, and he had to return to camp. That very night the bear came around the camp, looking for something to eat.
"Let us try to bring him down," cried Roosevelt, seizing his rifle, while his companion did the same. But outside it was pitch dark.
"Do you see him?" questioned Merrifield.
"No."
"Neither do I."
"Listen."
Both listened, and at a distance heard the bear lumbering off slowly through the woods. They went forward a short distance, then came to a halt.
"We'll have to give it up for the present," said Theodore Roosevelt. "But I am going to have him, sooner or later, if the thing is possible."
Early the next morning both of the hunters sallied forth and discovered that the bear had been at the carcasses of some game left in the forest. The tracks were fresh.
"He has been here, no doubt of it," said Merrifield. "Shall we wait for him to come again?"
"We might as well," was the answer. "He'll get hungry again, sooner or later."
So the pair sat down to watch. But the bear was shy, and kept his distance. Then it grew dark once more, so that but little could be seen under the trees.
"He knows enough to keep away," said Roosevelt's companion.
"Hark!" was the reply and both strained their ears. There was a faint crackling of twigs, and they felt certain it was the bear. But it was too dark to see anything; so both shouldered their rifles and walked back to camp.
Here was another illustration of Theodore Roosevelt's method of sticking at a thing. Two days had been spent in trying to get that bear, and yet he did not give up. On the following morning he sallied forth once more, as full of hope as before.
The bear had been at the carcass again, and the trail was now one to be followed with ease.
"I'm going to hunt him down to his lair," said Theodore Roosevelt, and stalked off with his companion beside him. Soon they were again deep in the woods, walking perhaps where the foot of white man had never before trod. Fallen trees were everywhere, and over these they often had to climb.
"Getting closer," whispered Roosevelt's companion, and pointed to some fresh claw scratches on the bark of fallen trees.
They now moved forward as silently as Indians, sure that the bear could not be far off. Suddenly Merrifield dropped on his knee as if to take aim. Roosevelt sprang to the front, with rifle raised. The bear was there, standing upright, only a few paces away. Without hesitation Theodore Roosevelt fired. His aim was true, and the great beast fell with a bullet straight between the eyes. The leaden messenger had entered his brain, and he died with scarcely a struggle.
"The whole thing was over in twenty seconds from the time I caught sight of the game," writes Mr. Roosevelt, in his book "Hunting Trips on the Prairies" (Part II of "Hunting Trips of a Ranchman"). "Indeed it was over so quickly that the grizzly did not have time to show fight at all or come a step toward me. It was the first I had ever seen, and I felt not a little proud as I stood over the great brindled bulk which lay stretched out at length in the cool shade of the evergreens. He was a monstrous fellow, much larger than any I have seen since, whether alive or brought in dead by hunters. As near as we could estimate he must have weighed about twelve hundred pounds."
There is a bear story for you, boys. And the best of it is, it is every word true. In later years Theodore Roosevelt brought down many more grizzlies, but I doubt if he was as proud of them as he was of that first capture.
While Theodore Roosevelt was spending a large part of his time in hunting and in literary work, and in studying political economy, Grover Cleveland's first term as President came to an end, and Benjamin Harrison was inaugurated to fill the office of Chief Magistrate.
At that time the question of Civil Service was again being agitated. Theodore Roosevelt was a warm advocate of the merit system, and knowing this, President Harrison appointed him, in 1889, a Civil Service Commissioner, and this office he held for six years, until his resignation in 1895. When Benjamin Harrison's term of office was up, and Grover Cleveland was reëlected to the Presidency, it was thought that Roosevelt would have to go, but his friend, the newly elected President, wished him to remain as a commissioner, and he did so for two years longer, thus serving both under a Republican and a Democratic administration.
To some of my young readers the term Civil Service, as applied here, may be a bit perplexing. For the benefit of such let me state that civil service here applies to the thousands of persons who work for the government, such as post-office clerks, letter carriers, clerks in the various departments at Washington, like the Treasury, the Congressional Library, the Government Printing Office, the War Department, and the hundred and one other branches in which Uncle Sam needs assistance.
For seventy or eighty years these various positions had been under what is commonly called the "spoils system." "To the victor belong the spoils," had been the old motto, which generally meant that the party happening to be in power could do as it pleased about dealing out employment to those under it. A worker might have been ever so faithful in the discharge of his duties, but if the administration was changed, he ran the risk of losing his position without any notice.
Statesmen of both great political parties had long seen the injustice of the spoils system, but few cared to take the matter up for fear of offending their political friends. But as matters grew worse, those who were honest said they would stand such a system no longer, and they began to advocate the merit plan, whereby each worker for our government should stand on his merit, so that he could not be removed from his position without just cause. This merit system is in operation to-day and is a most excellent thing, only becoming dangerous when extended too far.
There were two other commissioners besides Mr. Roosevelt on the Commission, but all worked together in harmony, although in many moves taken Mr. Roosevelt was the leader. About this work he has written a notable essay called "Six Years of Civil Service Reform," in which he reviews much of the work done. In this essay, among many other things, he says:--
"No republic can permanently endure when its politics are corrupt and base; and the spoils system,--the application in political life of the degrading doctrine that to the victor belong the spoils,--produces corruption and degradation. The man who is in politics for the offices might just as well be in politics for the money he can get for his vote, so far as the general good is concerned." Certainly wise words and well worth remembering.
The work of the Commission was by no means easy, and the members were often accused of doing some things merely to benefit their own particular party or friends. Politicians of the old sort, who wanted everything they could lay hands on, fought civil service bitterly, and even those who might have been expected to help often held back, fearing they would lose their own popularity. Yet on the other hand, some members of Congress upheld the Commission nobly, and when President Garfield was assassinated by a half-crazy office-seeker many more came forward and clamored to put public offices on the merit system by all means.
Part of the work of the Commission was to prosecute the head of any bureau or department where an employee had been discharged or had suffered without just cause. Such cases came up in large numbers and were prosecuted with all the vigor of which the Commission were capable.
"We were not always successful in these trials," says Mr. Roosevelt. "But we won out in the majority of cases, and we gave the wrong-doing such a wide publicity that those who were guilty hesitated to repeat their actions." And he goes on to add that during his term of service not over one per cent. of those who worked for Uncle Sam were dismissed purely for political reasons. This was certainly an excellent record, and our government will do well to maintain such a high standard in the future.
To give a further idea of the work required in the way of examinations for positions under our government, let me state that during the year from July 1, 1890, to July 1, 1891, 5251 applicants were examined for the departments service, 1579 for the customs service, 8538 for the postal service, 3706 for the railway mail service, making a total of nearly 20,000, of which about 13,000 passed and the balance failed. Since our war with Spain, the work of the government has been vastly increased, and the places to be filled every year run up into figures that are startling.
One of the best and wisest acts of the Commission was to place the colored employees of the government on an equal footing with the white employees. In the past the colored employees had occupied their places merely through the whim or goodwill of those over them. Now this was changed, and any colored man who could pass the examination, and who was willing to attend strictly to his labor, was as safe in his situation as anybody.
CHAPTER IX
Notwithstanding the great amount of labor involved as a Civil Service Commissioner, Theodore Roosevelt did not forego the pleasures of the hunt, and in 1891 he made an extended trip to the Shoshone Mountains in Wyoming, going after elk and such other game as might present itself.
On this trip he was accompanied by his ranch partner, a skilled shot named Ferguson, and two old hunters named Woody and Hofer. There was also in the party a young fellow who looked after the pack-horses, fourteen in number.
The start was made on a beautiful day in September, and the party journeyed along at a gait that pleased them, bringing down everything that came to hand and which could be used as meat. Two tents were carried, one for sheltering their packs at night and the other for sleeping purposes.
In his book called "The Wilderness Hunter," Mr. Roosevelt has given many of the details of this grand hunt, which he says was one of the most exciting as well as most pleasurable undertaken. With an interest that cannot be mistaken, and which betrays the true sportsman at every turn, he gives minute descriptions of how the tents were erected, how everything in camp was put in its proper place, and how on wet days they would huddle around the camp-fire in the middle of the larger tent to keep warm and dry. He also tells how the packs on the horses were adjusted, and adds that the hunter who cannot take care of his outfit while on the hunt, or who must have all his game stalked for him, is a hunter in name only;--which is literally true, as every genuine sportsman knows.
The young Civil Service Commissioner went out garbed in a fitting hunting costume, consisting of a buckskin shirt, with stout leggings, and moccasins, or, when occasion required, alligator-leather boots. Heavy overcoats were also carried and plenty of blankets, and for extra cold nights Theodore Roosevelt had a fur sleeping-bag, in which, no doubt, he slept "as snug as a bug in a rug."
The horses of a pack-train in the wild West are not always thoroughly broken, and although the majority rarely do anything worse than lag behind or stray away, yet occasionally one or another will indulge in antics far from desired. This was true on the present occasion, when at different times the pack-beasts went on a "shindy" that upset all calculations and scattered packs far and wide, causing a general alarm and hard work on the part of all hands to restore quietness and order.
For two days the hunters pushed on into the mountains with but little signs of game. Then a rain-storm set in which made the outlook a dismal one.
"Going to have a big storm," said one of the old hunters.
"Never mind, we'll have to take it as it comes," was Mr. Roosevelt's philosophical answer. "We can't expect good weather every day."
It was almost noon of that day when all heard the call of a bull elk, echoing over the hills. The sound came from no great distance, and in the face of the rain, Theodore Roosevelt and the hunter named Woody set off on foot after the beast, who was still calling as loudly as ever.
It was not long before the hunters could hear the bull plainly, as he pawed the earth, a challenge to another bull who was answering him from a great distance.
"We are gettin' closer to him," said Woody. "Got to go slow now, or he'll take alarm and be off like a flash."
The timber was rather thin, and the ground was covered with moss and fallen leaves, and over this the pair glided as silently as shadows, until Woody declared that the bull was not over a hundred yards away.
"And he's in a tearing rage, on account of that other bull," he added. "Got to plug him fair and square or there will be trouble."
Without replying to this, Theodore Roosevelt took the lead, keeping eyes and ears wide open for anything that might come to hand. Then through the trees he caught sight of the stately horns of the elk, as he stood with head thrown back, repeating his call in trumpet-like tones.
As the hunters came closer, the elk faced around and caught sight of his human enemies. Up went his antlers once more, as if to defy them.
"He's coming!" shouted Woody. And scarcely had he spoken when Theodore Roosevelt took aim and fired at the animal. There was a snort and a gasp, and the elk turned to run away. Then Roosevelt fired a second shot, and over went the monarch of the forest in his death agony. It was a fine bit of game to bring down, the antlers having twelve prongs. The head was cut off and taken back to camp, along with a small part of the best of the meat.
After that the forward march was resumed in the face of a sweeping rain that wet everybody to the skin. On they went until, just as the rain ceased, they reached a bold plateau, overlooking what is called Two-Ocean Pass, a wild and wonderful freak of nature, surrounded by lofty mountains and watered by streams and brooks flowing in several directions. Far up the mountains could be seen the snow-drifts, while lower down were the heavy forests and underbrush, the haunts of the game they were seeking.
In this Wonderland Theodore Roosevelt hunted to his heart's content for many days--bringing down several more elk and also a fair variety of smaller game. It was now growing colder, and knowing that the winter season was close at hand, the hunters decided to strike camp and return homeward.
The movement was made none too soon. The snow was already filling the air, and one morning, on coming from his tent, Theodore Roosevelt found the ground covered to a depth of a foot and a half. To add to his discomfort the pony he was riding began to buck that day and managed to dislocate his rider's thumb. But Theodore Roosevelt stuck to him and showed him who was master; and after that matters went better. The snow continued to come down, and before the end of the journey was reached, at Great Geyser Basin, the hunters almost perished from the cold.
Such pictures as the above give us some idea of the varied life that Theodore Roosevelt has led. Even at this early age--he was but thirty-three years old--he had been a college student, a traveller, an author, an assemblyman, a ranchman and hunter, and a Civil Service Commissioner. He had travelled the length and breadth of Europe and through a large section of our own country. He had visited the palaces of kings and the shacks of the humble cowboys of the far West, he had met men in high places and in low, and had seen them at their best and at their worst. Surely if "experience is the school wherein man learns wisdom," then the future President had ample means of growing wise, and his works prove that those means were not neglected.
As already mentioned, when Grover Cleveland became President a second time, he requested Theodore Roosevelt to retain his place on the Civil Service Commission. This was a practical illustration of the workings of the merit system, and it made for Mr. Cleveland many friends among his former political enemies. By this movement the workings of the Commission were greatly strengthened, so that by the time Theodore Roosevelt resigned, on May 5, 1895, the Commission had added twenty thousand places filled by government employees to those coming under the merit system. This number was larger than any placed under the system before that time, and the record has scarcely been equalled since.
"He was a fighter for the system, day and night," says one who knew him at that time. "He was enthusiastic to the last degree, and had all sorts of statistics at his fingers' ends. If anybody in the government employ was doing wrong, he was willing to pitch into that person regardless of consequences. Some few politicians thought he was a crank on the subject, but the results speak for themselves. Some politicians, who wanted the old spoils system retained, were often after him like a swarm of angry hornets, but he never got out of their way, and when they tried to sting, he slapped them in a way that soon made them leave him alone. And more than that, he was very clever in the way that he presented his case to those representatives and senators who understood the real value of Civil Service reform. He made them appreciate what he and his fellow-commissioners were trying to do, and when the Commission was attacked in Congress it always had, as a consequence, a support that could not be easily overthrown."
When Theodore Roosevelt resigned, President Cleveland wrote as follows to him:--
"You are certainly to be congratulated upon the extent and permanency of civil service reform methods which you have so substantially aided in bringing about. The struggle for its firm establishment and recognition is past. Its faithful application and reasonable expansion remain, subjects of deep interest to all who really desire the best attainable public service." It was high praise for the retiring commissioner, and it was well deserved.
CHAPTER X
During the time that Theodore Roosevelt was a Civil Service Commissioner there were several important political changes made in New York City.
In the past there had been a great deal of what is familiarly called "machine politics," and matters had been going from bad to worse. But now there was an upward turn by the election of William S. Strong to the office of mayor. Mr. Strong was a man of high character, and was elected by a vote that combined the best elements of all the political parties.
It was at a time when New York City was in urgent need of reform. Those in power were doing but little to stop the corruption that was stalking abroad upon every hand. Bribes were given and taken in nearly all departments, clerks were being paid large salaries for doing practically nothing, and contracts were put out, not to those who could do the best work, but to those who would pay the political tricksters the most money for them.
The record of the police department was perhaps the blackest of the lot. It was to this department that the citizens looked for protection from crime, yet it was known that many in the department winked at all sorts of vice, providing they were properly paid for so doing. Saloons and worse resorts were kept open in defiance of the law, and wickedness flaunted itself in the face of the public in a manner that was truly shocking. Occasionally a private citizen would try to do something to mend matters, but his complaint was generally "pigeon-holed," and that would be the end of the matter. The rottenness, as it was well called, extended from the highest places in the department to the lowest, so that it was said not even a policeman could secure his appointment without paying several hundred dollars for it, and this he was, of course, expected to get back by blackmailing those who lived or did business on his beat. And get it back the policeman would, even if he had to make an Italian fruit dealer pay him a dollar a month for having a stand on the sidewalk, where the walk was supposed to be free from obstruction.
When William Strong came into office, the first thing he did was to cast his eyes about him for reliable men who might aid him in purifying the city. He already knew of Theodore Roosevelt's work as an assemblyman and a Civil Service Commissioner.
"Mr. Roosevelt is just the man to take the office of Police Commissioner and put the department on an honorable basis," said the newly elected mayor, and he lost no time in tendering the office to Mr. Roosevelt. The tender was accepted, and Theodore Roosevelt was sworn into his new position on May 24, 1895.
The appointment of Mr. Roosevelt to the office of Police Commissioner was a great shock to nearly the entire police department. He was known for his sterling honesty, and it was felt that he would not condone crime in any shape or form.
"There will be a grand shaking up," said more than one. "Just you wait till he gets to the bottom of things. He'll turn the light on in a way that will make more than one officer tremble in his boots."
On the Board with Mr. Roosevelt were Andrew D. Parker, Avery D. Andrews, and Frederick D. Grant, the latter the son of former President Grant. Theodore Roosevelt was chosen president, and the Board lost no time in getting to work.
"The new Board found the department in a demoralized condition," says Mr. Roosevelt, in his report on the matter. "A recent grand jury had investigated the records of many officers, and many indictments had been found; 268 vacancies existed in the department, and 26 officers, including one inspector and five captains, were under suspension on account of indictment for crime." This was truly a sad state of affairs, and a horrible example to the other large cities of our Union.
The Commissioners went to work with a will, and Theodore Roosevelt was the leading spirit in every move made. Every branch of the police department was given an overhauling, and those who would not do their duty were promptly dismissed, while minor offences were met with heavy fines. By an act of the legislature the force of men was increased to eight hundred, to keep pace with the growth of the metropolis. The men who were particularly faithful in the discharge of their duties were rewarded by honorable mention, engrossed certificates, medals of honor, and by promotions. More than this, they were given to understand that if they did their duty faithfully they need not fear trouble from those over them, no matter what changes were made. No officer was allowed to accept blackmail money from those lower in the service; and above all, no politics were to interfere with the fair and square running of the whole department.
It was a gigantic task, and it cannot be said that it was totally successful, for the opposition in some quarters was strong. More than once Mr. Roosevelt was threatened with violence, but, as when an assemblyman, he paid but scant attention to these mutterings.
His habits of personally investigating matters still clung to him, and it is well remembered how he went around at odd hours of the day and night, and on Sundays, seeing if the policemen were really doing their duty. There had been a boast that all policemen were at their posts at night. Mr. Roosevelt went out once and found just two out of an even dozen where they should be. Then began that "shaking up" that has resulted in better police service in New York to this day.
The effect of the new vigor in the police department was felt in many other ways. There was a tenement-house law regarding buildings which were unfit for human habitations. New York City was crowded with such buildings, but nobody had ordered them torn down, because either nobody wanted to bother, or the owners paid blackmail money to keep them standing for the rent they could get out of them.
"Those tenements must come down," said Theodore Roosevelt.
"If you order them down, the owners will fight you to the bitter end," said another officer of the department.
"I don't care if they do. The houses are a menace to life and health. They are filthy, and if a fire ever started in them, some would prove regular traps. They have got to go." And shortly after that about a hundred were seized, and the most destroyed.
The enforcement of the Sunday liquor law was another thing that occasioned great surprise during Mr. Roosevelt's term as Police Commissioner. In the past, saloons had been almost as wide open on Sundays as on week days. On account of the cosmopolitan character of the population it was thought that to close up the saloons on Sundays would be impossible. But the police force was given strict orders, and on one Sunday in June, 1895, New York City had the first "dry" Sunday that it could remember in many years.
This "dry" Sunday provoked a new storm of opposition, especially from many of foreign birth, who were used to getting liquor as easily on that day as on any other. More threats were made against the vigorous commissioner, and on two occasions dynamite bombs were placed in his desk, evidently with the hope that they would explode and blow him to pieces. But the bombs were found in time, and no damage was done, and Theodore Roosevelt paid scant attention to them.
After that he was attacked in a new way. Some of the politicians laid traps for him whereby they hoped to bring discredit to his management of the department. The fight grew very hot and very bitter, and he was accused of doing many things, "just for the looks of them," rather than to benefit the public at large. But he kept on his way, and at last the opposition were silenced to such an extent that they merely growled behind his back.
For many years a large number of shiftless and often lawless men, and women too, were attracted to the metropolis because of the "Tramps' Lodging Houses" located there. These resorts were continually filled by vagrants who would not work and who were a constant menace to society at large.
"We must get rid of those lodging houses," said Mr. Roosevelt. "They simply breed crime. No respectable man or woman, no matter how poor, will enter them."
"But we'll have to have some sort of shelter for the poor people," said others.
"To be sure--for those who are deserving. The others should be driven off and discouraged," answered Mr. Roosevelt. And one by one the tramps' lodging places were abolished. In their place the Board of Charities opened a Municipal Lodging House, where those who were deserving were received, were made to bathe, and given proper shelter and nourishment.
A story is told that, during the excitement attending the closing of saloons on Sunday, a friend came to Mr. Roosevelt and told about hearing some saloon-keepers plotting to harm him.
"What can they do?" demanded the Police Commissioner.
"I am afraid they can do a good deal," was the answer. "Each of those men has a barkeeper who has been in jail for various crimes. They may attack you some dark night and kill you."
"Perhaps I won't give them the chance," answered the man who had been on many a dangerous hunt in the wild West. "If they can shoot, so can I."
"But they may sneak up behind you and knock you out," insisted the visitor.
"Well, if they do that, I shall have died doing my duty," was the calm answer made by the future hero of the Rough Riders.
CHAPTER XI
While Theodore Roosevelt was serving as Police Commissioner of the city of New York, William McKinley ran for the Presidency of the United States the first time and was elected.
The young commissioner was a firm upholder of McKinley, for he did not believe in "free silver" as it was called, but in "sound money," which meant that in the future, as in the past, all national indebtedness should be made payable in gold, instead of in gold and silver, as many desired.
As soon as the new President was inaugurated, March 4, 1897, he appointed Hon. John D. Long to be Secretary of the Navy. Mr. Long knew Theodore Roosevelt well, and also knew of the "History of the Naval War of 1812," which the energetic author and commissioner had written.
"He is just the man we need here," said Mr. Long to President McKinley. "He has made a study of the navy, and he is not afraid of work," and without further delay Theodore Roosevelt was asked to resign his position in the metropolis and come to Washington, where he was duly installed as First Assistant Secretary of the Navy.
In his new position, certainly a high one for such a young man to occupy, Mr. Roosevelt had much to do. As first assistant, nearly the whole responsibility of the real workings of the department fell upon his shoulders. He took up these responsibilities manfully, and how well he succeeded in the work, history has abundantly proved.
"It was Roosevelt's work that made Dewey's victory at Manila possible," one who knew of the inner workings of the department has said, and another has said that the victory off Santiago Bay was also due in part to Roosevelt's watchfulness over the ships that took part in that conflict.
At Washington the Assistant Secretary found an era of extravagance equal to that which he had discovered in New York. The Navy Department was paying dearly for almost everything it bought, and many laborers and others were drawing high wages for doing little or no work. Against this Theodore Roosevelt set his face uncompromisingly, so that inside of a year the actual saving to our government was twenty-five per cent. When it is remembered that the Navy Department spends each year millions of dollars, something of what such a saving means can be realized.
For many years our country had been at peace with the whole world, but now a war cloud showed itself on the horizon, scarcely visible at first, but gradually growing larger and larger. Those at Washington watched it with great anxiety, wondering if it would burst, and what would be the result.
Cuba had been fighting for liberty for years. It was under Spanish rule, and the people were frightfully oppressed. To Spain they paid vast sums of money and got but little in return. Money that should have gone into improvements--that should have supplied good roads and schools--went into the pockets of the royalty of Spain. When a Cuban tried to remonstrate, he could scarcely get a hearing, and this state of affairs went from bad to worse until, in sheer desperation, the Cubans declared war on the mother-country, just as in 1776 our own nation threw off the yoke of England.
As my young readers know, Cuba lies only a short distance from the southeast coast of Florida. Being so close, it was but natural that our people should take an interest in the struggle at hand. Everybody sympathized with the Cubans, and some made offers of assistance. Then, when many Cubans were on the verge of starvation, we voted to send them relief in the way of something to eat.
The action of the United States was viewed with suspicion by Spain. The people of that country were certain we wanted to help Cuba only in order to "gobble her up afterward," as the saying went. Such was not our intention at all, and total Cuban liberty to-day testifies to that fact.
Not knowing how far matters might go, President McKinley and his advisers deemed it wise to prepare for the worst. This meant to put the army and navy on the best possible footing in the least possible time.
It was felt that should war come, it would be fought largely on the sea, and nobody realized this more than did Theodore Roosevelt. He was active day and night in the pursuit of his duty, seeing to it that this ship or that was properly manned, and this fortification and that put in proper order to resist attack. Our ships were in all parts of the world, on the Atlantic and the Pacific, in the far north and the far south, in European waters and Hong Kong Harbor. Each had to be supplied with coal and ammunition and with provisions. Those that were "out of commission," that is, laid up, generally for repairs, were put into commission with all speed. A thousand contracts had to be inspected, judged, and passed upon. Outwardly the Navy Department at Washington was moving along as peacefully as ever, internally it was more active than it had been at any time since the great Civil War.
"War may come at any moment," said Mr. Roosevelt to his friends. "And if it does come, there is nothing like being prepared for it."
About one thing Theodore Roosevelt was very particular. In the past, gun practice on board of our war-ships had been largely a matter of simply going through the motions of handling the guns.
"This will not do," said the Assistant Secretary. "Our gunners will never make good marksmen in that way. They must practise with powder and ball, shot and shell." And after that they did. Such practice cost a round sum of money, and the department was criticised for its wastefulness in this direction; but the worth of it was afterward proven when Commodore Dewey sank the Spanish ships in Manila Bay, and the Atlantic Squadron likewise destroyed the enemy's ships that were trying to escape from Santiago Harbor.
In those days at Washington, Theodore Roosevelt made a warm, personal friend of Dr. Leonard Wood. Dr. Wood was an army surgeon, who had seen considerable active service while under General Miles in the campaigns against the Apache Indians. Mr. Roosevelt has himself told how he and Dr. Wood would often, after office hours, take long walks out of the city, or play foot-ball, or go snow-skating when the weather permitted, and during such pastimes their conversation was invariably about the situation in Cuba, and what each intended to do should war break out.
"If war actually comes, I intend, by hook or by crook, to get out into the field," said Dr. Wood.
"I shall go with you," answered Theodore Roosevelt. "No more office work for me if there is any fighting to be done."
In the meantime, as already mentioned, matters in Cuba were rapidly approaching a crisis. Spain could not send a large enough army to the island to conquer the people while they were at liberty to roam through the jungles and mountains, and so began to drive men, women, and children into various cities or camps, where they were kept, under penalty of death if they tried to escape. Thus large numbers were torn from their homes, and sent miles and miles away, with no money, and nothing with which to support themselves. Food became scarce and high in price, and many grown folks and children were literally starved to death.
To help these starving people the Congress of our country voted to expend fifty thousand dollars from the national treasury. This excited Spain more than ever, and we were accused of trying to prolong the rebellion. But the deed was done, and many would have had us go farther, and recognize Cuba as a free and independent nation. This desire was overruled on the ground that our government could not with propriety endanger the peace of the world by taking so serious a step at that time. But the strength of popular sympathy with an oppressed people was shown by the fact that many Americans at grave personal risk went to Cuba, and joined the army in one capacity or another, fighting as bravely as if for their own individual rights.
CHAPTER XII
DESTRUCTION OF THE _MAINE_--DEWEY'S VICTORY--THEODORE ROOSEVELT BECOMES A SOLDIER--ORGANIZING THE ROUGH RIDERS--VARIOUS MEN IN THE COMMAND
"The _Maine_ has been blown up!"
Such was the awful news which startled this whole nation in the middle of February, 1898, and which caused the question of war with Spain to crystallize without further deliberation.
The _Maine_ was a battleship of large size, that had been sent down to the harbor of Havana, Cuba, on nothing more than a friendly visit. The explosion that destroyed this noble vessel occurred about ten o'clock at night, and was heard for miles around. Soon after the explosion, the war-ship began to sink, and over two hundred and fifty sailors and officers lost their lives.
The entire nation was now aroused, and many wanted to go to war with Spain immediately. But the Spaniards professed to be ignorant of the cause of the explosion, and said it must have come from the _inside_ of the ship and not the _outside_. Without delay a Board of Inquiry was established, and it was settled that the explosion had come from the outside, probably from a mine set by the Spaniards in Havana Harbor.
"This means war, and nothing but war," said even the wisest of our statesmen. And so it proved. Without hesitation the whole nation sprang forward to uphold the administration, and in a few days Congress passed an appropriation of fifty millions of dollars "for national defence." It may be added that this appropriation was passed unanimously, regardless of party politics and regardless of the differences which, in the past, had existed between the North and the South.
We have already learned what had been done to prepare the navy for the conflicts to follow. Now there was even more work on hand, to get the army into shape for service in Cuba and on other foreign soil.
The regular army at that time consisted of about twenty-five thousand men, scattered all over the United States,--on the frontier, at the Indian reservations, and along the sea-coasts. Many of these troops were hurried to camps in the southeast portion of our country, leaving but small garrisons in the far West.
It was realized by President McKinley that our regular army could not cope with the troubles at hand, and soon came a call for one hundred and twenty-five thousand volunteers. These volunteers were to come from the various States and Territories, each furnishing its proportion of soldiers according to its population. These soldiers were quickly collected and marched to the various state camps, there to be sworn into the service of the United States.
The "war fever" was everywhere, and many private parties began to raise companies, while all sorts of independent commands, Grand Army, Confederate Veterans, Italian-American Guards, German Singing Societies, Colored Guards, and the like, offered their assistance. Even the colleges caught the fever, and men went forth from Yale, Harvard, Princeton, and other institutions of learning to battle for Uncle Sam.
The first blow struck at Spain was a most effective one. Commodore, afterwards Admiral, Dewey was at Hong Kong when the trouble began, and he was directed by the War Department to hunt for a Spanish fleet somewhere among the Philippine Islands and engage it. On Sunday, May 1, came the news that the gallant commodore had reached Manila Bay, fought the Spanish fleet and sunk every hostile ship, and come out of the battle with all of his own ships safe and not a single man killed!
"Hurrah! that shows what our navy can do!" cried many citizens. And they were justly proud. In the past, foreign nations had looked with something akin to scorn on our vessels and the way they were manned. Now such criticism was silenced; and this result was, in a certain measure, due to the work of Theodore Roosevelt, while First Assistant Secretary to Secretary Long.
But Theodore Roosevelt was no longer in the department. He resigned and closed his desk, saying, "My duty here is done; my place is in the field." With such an active nature, it was impossible for him to remain a private citizen while stern war was a reality.
In his own excellent work, "The Rough Riders," and in his sworn testimony before the Commission of Investigation of the Spanish War, Mr. Roosevelt has given us graphic pictures of how the First United States Volunteer Cavalry, commonly called the Rough Riders, happened to be organized, and what it tried to do and did, and this testimony is supplemented by many who know the facts, and who took part in the battles which made the organization famous throughout the length and breadth of our land.
At first Theodore Roosevelt thought to attach himself to the militia of New York, but found every place taken.
"Let us try one of my Massachusetts regiments," said Dr. Wood. And this was also done, with a like result.
"We could fill every place, did we want five times as many men," said one colonel. "Everybody seems crazy to go." This shows how truly patriotic our nation can become when the occasion arises for going to the front.
While Theodore Roosevelt and his intimate friend were wondering what to do next, Congress authorized the raising of three cavalry regiments, to be composed of the daring riflemen and riders of New Mexico, Oklahoma, Arizona, and Indian Territory.
"There, that will just suit me," said Theodore Roosevelt. "I know many of those men, and I know we can raise a regiment in no time."
And without delay he sought out Secretary of War Alger and told him of his hopes.
"I am perfectly willing to give you command of one of those regiments," said the war secretary. "I know you are something of a rough rider yourself, and a good marksman to boot."
This was certainly flattering, but Theodore Roosevelt's head was not turned by the offer.
"I don't think I am quite ready to take command," said he. "I know that I can learn, and that quickly, but it will be precious time wasted."
"Well, what do you wish, Mr. Roosevelt?" asked the Secretary of War, curiously.
"What I should like best of all is for Dr. Wood to become colonel of the regiment, and for myself to become lieutenant-colonel."
"Very well; I will consult President McKinley on the subject," said the secretary. The request was granted, and in a few days more Colonel Wood and Lieutenant-Colonel Roosevelt sallied forth to organize the Rough Riders, and fit them for service in Cuba.
Leaving his family, which now consisted of his wife and six children, the lieutenant-colonel made his way to San Antonio, Texas, where the regiment was to gather. Previous to going he spent a full week in Washington, seeing to it that arrangements were completed for supplying the command with uniforms, carbines, saddles, and other articles which were needed. This was in itself quite a task, for all of the departments at the Capitol were more than busy, and it took a great amount of "hustling" to get what one wanted.
As soon as it was known that Theodore Roosevelt was going to help organize the Rough Riders, offers from everywhere began to pour in upon him. Not alone did the men of the plains and ranch who knew him want to go, but likewise his old college chums at Harvard. These men, of wealth and good families, were willing to serve in any capacity, if only they could be mustered in. There were crack base-ball and foot-ball players, yachtsmen, all-round athletes and men of fortune, all mixed in with hunters, cowboys, men who had served as sheriffs in the far West, where fighting was an everyday occurrence, some policemen who had served under Roosevelt when he was a Police Commissioner in New York, and even some Indians. Nearly every nationality was represented when it came to blood, and the men ran from the best educated to the most ignorant.
[Illustration: Theodore Roosevelt as a Rough Rider (_Photograph by Pach Bros., N.Y._)]
But there were three tests which every man, private or officer, had to pass. He had to be in perfect health, he had to know how to ride, and he had to know how to shoot. To these conditions were afterward added two more: each man had to learn his duty as quickly as he could and had to learn to obey his superiors.
In such a collection of soldiers it was but natural that the real leaders soon asserted themselves. Several of the captains had served in the United States army before; two were former famous western sheriffs; and all were full of that pluck and energy which is bound to command success.
In this regiment were some men who had hunted with Theodore Roosevelt on more than one occasion. They knew him well and loved him, and did their best to serve him. To them he was really their commander, although they officially recognized Colonel Wood. They were preëminently "Roosevelt's Rough Riders," and the great majority of the people of our nation call them such to this day.
The majority of the command were rather young in years, although a few were of middle age. But all were tough and hardy, either from athletic training or from years spent in the open air of the great West. Some of them could ride almost any kind of a horse, and "bronco busting," that is, breaking in a wild steed, was common sport among them. Some had spent nearly their entire lives in the saddle, and some could exhibit remarkable skill with their firearms while riding at full speed.
When the men began to come into San Antonio, they found but little in the way of accommodations. But soon tents and blankets were procured. It is said that good shoes were scarce, but some of the soldiers did not mind going without them. The regiment was supplied with good rifles, but the cartridges were not made of smokeless powder, which was a bad thing, for smoke sometimes enables an enemy to locate the shooter, when, if smokeless powder were used, nothing could be seen. Each man had also a six shooter, and was to have had a machete, but the long knives did not come.
"On to Cuba!" was the cry. And it was taken up every day. The Rough Riders were eager for the fray. Alas! little did many of them realize that, once in the "bloody isle," they would never see their native land again.
CHAPTER XIII
That the path of the soldier is not always one full of glory can easily be proven by what happened to the Rough Riders when, late in May, they were ordered to Tampa, Florida, where a part of the army was gathering in readiness to be transported to Cuba.
"We were just wild to go," says one of the number, in speaking of that time. "We were tired of staying at San Antonio and drilling day in and day out, rain or shine. I guess everybody felt like hurrahing when we piled on to the cars.
"Colonel Roosevelt--he was only Lieutenant-Colonel then--had six troops under him, and he did all he could to make the boys comfortable. But the cars were crowded, and travelling was so slow it took us four days to reach Tampa. Then when we got there, we found everything in confusion. The railroad yard was chock-a-block with freight and passenger cars, and nobody was there to tell us where to go or where to find provisions.
"The boys were hungry and tired out, for sleeping on the railroad had been almost out of the question. There wasn't a sign of rations in sight, and it looked as if we would have to stay hungry. But Teddy Roosevelt just put his hand into his own pocket and bought us about all we wanted. Then he scurried around and found out where we were to go, and in another twenty-four hours we were settled in camp." Even in camp the Rough Riders had to put up with continued discomfort. The weather was warm, flies and mosquitoes were numerous, and the drinking water was not of the best. The rations were plain, but the Rough Riders did not mind this, for many of them had often fared worse on the plains.
Although it was now a regular military camp that the Rough Riders were in, it was rather difficult to control some of the men, especially those who had been used to an unusually rough life. But they were held in check as much as possible by their commanders, and on Sunday all attended a church service held by Chaplain Brown, who spoke to them in a manner that soon claimed their attention.
After but a few days spent in the camp at Tampa, within walking distance of many of the fashionable hotels, the command was ordered to Port Tampa, there to board a transport to sail for some destination not revealed. But the soldiers knew they were going to Cuba, to fight the Spaniards and to aid in freeing Cuba, and again there was a loud hurrahing.
But immediately on top of this came one of the hardest blows the Rough Riders had to endure, and one which some of them will probably never forget.
As already stated, volunteers from all over our nation were anxious to get into the fight, and it was no easy matter for the authorities at Washington to decide who should go and who should be left behind.
"Only eight troops of seventy men each of the Rough Riders will embark on the transport," was the order sent to Colonel Wood. More than this, it was ordered that the command should be on board of the transport by the following morning, otherwise it could not go.
"Four troops to be left behind!" exclaimed Theodore Roosevelt.
"Too bad," returned Colonel Wood. "Every man expects to go, and wants to go."
It was a hard task to tell some of the men that they could not go. Mr. Roosevelt tells us that many of them actually cried at the news. They were willing to go under any conditions. They did not want any pay, they did not want any pensions if they were disabled, and some, who had money, even offered to pay their way, just for the privilege of fighting for Uncle Sam. After such an exhibition, let nobody dare to say that true patriotism is dying out in this country.
But orders were orders, and as quickly as possible those to go were selected. Then the command marched to the railroad tracks to await the cars. None came, and they were given orders to march to another track. This they also did; but still no train appeared.
"We'll be left, that is certain," said Colonel Wood, anxiously.
"It certainly looks like it, unless we march the boys down to the port."
"Here comes a train!" was the cry.
It was a train, but only of empty coal cars. It was about to pass by when the Rough Riders halted it.
"What's the matter with riding down to the port in the coal cars?" was the question asked by several.
"Good enough!" came the answer. "Into the cars, boys, and don't waste time!" And into the dirty coal cars they piled, and persuaded the engineer of the train to take them down to Port Tampa as quickly as he could.
If there had been bustle and confusion up at Tampa, it was far worse at the port. Everybody was in a hurry, and ten thousand soldiers stood around, not knowing what to do with their baggage, and not knowing which of the many transports to board.
At last the Rough Riders were told to go aboard the _Yucatan_, and started to do so.
"The _Yucatan_?" exclaimed a member of another command. "That is our transport."
"No, she has been allotted to us," put in an officer belonging to still another command.
"How many men will she hold?" questioned a captain of the Rough Riders.
"About a thousand."
"Then she can't take the three commands."
Theodore Roosevelt overheard this talk, and at once made up his mind that it would be a question of what command got aboard of the transport first. Without the loss of a moment he ran back to where his men were in waiting.
"Double-quick to the dock!" was his order. And forming quickly, the troops made their way to the wharf with all possible speed. In the meantime, Colonel Wood had gone out to the transport in a steam-launch and gotten the vessel to come up to the wharf. On board went the Rough Riders pell-mell, and not a minute too soon.
"This is our boat!" cried an officer, as he came up with his command a minute later.
"Sorry for you, sir, but it is our boat," was Colonel Wood's firm answer.
Then the third command loomed up, and a three-handed dispute arose. But the Rough Riders remained aboard of the transport, taking four companies of another command in with them.
I have told of the particulars of this affair to show my young readers what was needed at this time, and how well Theodore Roosevelt performed his duties. He had been a soldier and officer only a few weeks, yet he realized that army life on paper and army life in reality were two different things. He felt that an officer must do much besides leading his men in the field: that he must look after them constantly, see that their health was provided for, see that they got their rations, see that transportation was ready when needed, and even see to it that some were kept away from the temptations of drink, and that they did not quarrel among themselves.
When going on board of the transport, the Rough Riders were supplied with twelve days' rations each. The most of the food was good, but the canned beef was very bad, just as it was found to be very bad in many other quarters, and it made a great number sick. Added to this, somebody had forgotten to issue salt to the soldiers; so much had to be eaten without this very necessary seasoning.
"But we took matters good-naturedly," said one of the number, in speaking of the trip that followed. "Many of the boys were out for a lark, and when they growled, they did it good-naturedly. We had all sorts of men, and all sorts of nicknames. An Irishman was called Solomon Levi, and a nice young Jew Old Pork Chop. One fellow who was particularly slow was called Speedy William, and another who always spoke in a quick, jerky voice answered to the hail of 'Slow-up Peter.' One cowboy who was as rough as anybody in the command was christened The Parson, and a fine, high-toned, well-educated college boy had to answer to the name of Jimmy the Tramp. Some of the boys could sing, and they organized the Rough Rider Quartette; and others could play, and they gave us music on the mouth harmonicas and other instruments they had managed to smuggle along."
The War Department had expected to send the troops to Cuba without delay, but now came in a report that some Spanish war-ships were hovering around, ready to sink the transports as soon as they should show themselves, and for five days the vessels remained in Port Tampa Harbor, until it was ascertained that the report was untrue.
Those five days were important to Theodore Roosevelt and to the men under him. Every day the young officer spent a certain portion of his time in studying military tactics and in drilling his soldiers. Much had still to be learned, and the officers had their school of instructions as well as did those under them.
The weather was broiling hot, and some were already suffering from fever or its symptoms. Fortunately bathing was good, and many went in once or twice a day. Bathing in the ocean was great sport to some of the plainsmen who had never seen anything larger than a river or creek, and they frolicked around like children, and got up races, with prizes for the best swimmers.
At last came the orders for the transports to set sail for Cuba. They numbered thirty-two in all, including a schooner which was towed along filled with drinking water, for water must be had, and that was the only place where it could be stowed. To protect the transports from a possible attack by the enemy, they were accompanied by five war-ships at first, and later on by fourteen. All told, there were on the transports eight hundred officers and sixteen thousand enlisted men. Of the commands, the most were from the regular army, the volunteers numbering but three--the Rough Riders, the Seventy-first New York Infantry, and the Second Massachusetts Infantry.
CHAPTER XIV
While the army was preparing to invade Cuba, matters so far as they concerned the navy had been moving along rapidly. Commodore Dewey had sunk the Spanish fleet in Manila Bay; Havana and the adjacent coasts were being blockaded, so no ships could pass in or out without running the risk of capture; and a large fleet of war-ships under Admiral Cervera, of the enemy's navy, had been "bottled up" in Santiago Harbor.
It had been decided that the United States troops should be landed on the southeast coast of Cuba, not far from the entrance to Santiago Bay, and from that point should make an advance on Santiago, which is the second city of importance in the island.
Day after day the flotilla of transports kept on its way, spread out in a broad column during the time it was light, and coming in close together during the night. The war-ships hovered near, and at night swept the ocean with their powerful search-lights, rendering a surprise by the enemy impossible.
The trip to the southeast coast of Cuba lasted seven days. It was very hot, even for this time of the year, and those who could, slept on deck during the voyage. There was but little to do, and when not drilling, the men took it easy in the shade,--sleeping, chatting, or playing games. Sometimes they would talk of the future and wonder how much of real fighting lay before them.
"We didn't know even then where we were going," said one, in speaking of the trip. "I don't believe Wood or Roosevelt knew either. First we thought it might be Havana, then we imagined it might be Porto Rico, but when we turned southward and ran around the eastern end of the island, we all knew we were bound for Santiago."
As the transports swept up toward the mouth of Santiago Bay, they came within sight of the American war-ships that were keeping Admiral Cervera's fleet "bottled up" in the harbor. A shout of recognition went up, and one of the bands struck up a patriotic air that was truly inspiring.
The landing of the Rough Riders and many other commands was made at Daiquiri, a small settlement on the coast east of Santiago Harbor. The _Yucatan_ got closer to the shore than most of the other transports, and the men lost no time in disembarking, taking with them two Colt's automatic guns and a dynamite gun of which they had become possessed. As there had not been transports enough, only the officers' horses had been brought along. These were thrown into the water and made to swim ashore. Theodore Roosevelt had two horses, but one was drowned.
It was important that the landing should be guarded, and the war-ships sent in some shot and shell to dislodge any Spaniards who might be in the vicinity. But none showed themselves, and soon nearly all of the soldiers were ashore, either at Daiquiri or at a landing a short distance farther westward. No enemy was in sight, and the only persons who appeared were some Cubans, soldiers and civilians, who wanted but one thing, food.
The Rough Riders had been put into a brigade commanded by General S.B.M. Young. There were two of these brigades, and it is worth noting that they formed a division under the command of Major-General Joseph Wheeler, who had in years gone by fought so gallantly on the side of the Confederacy. Now, as brave as of old, he was fighting for Old Glory, the one banner of the North and the South alike.
As the Rough Riders landed, they were marched up the beach, and here they went into temporary camp,--an easy matter, since each soldier carried his outfit with him, or, at least, as much as he could get of what belonged to him. Theodore Roosevelt had his weapons and ammunition, a mackintosh and a toothbrush, certainly much less than he had carried even when roughing it in the Bad Lands of the West.
As soon as the larger portion of the army was landed, General Lawton--he who was afterward to give his life for his flag in the Philippines--threw out a strong detachment on the Santiago road to the westward, and also detachments on the roads to the north and east.
"On to Santiago!" was the cry. And many were for pushing forward without delay. But the transports had still to unload their baggage, and word did not reach the Rough Riders to move on until the afternoon of the day after landing.
It was a rocky, uneven country, with much brushwood and jungles of trees and vines. It had rained, but now the sun came out fiercely, and the Rough Riders (riders in name only, for only the officers were on horseback) suffered greatly through being clad in winter uniform.
"It was a tough and tiresome march," said one who was there. "The air just quivered with heat, and many of the boys felt like throwing half of their clothing away. Whenever we reached a drinking place, the crowd would swarm around for water like a lot of bees.
"General Lawton had his outposts pretty well advanced. Our commander, old General Wheeler, was just as anxious to make a showing, and he ordered General Young to push on with the Rough Riders and some other troops. So away we went, with Colonel Wood at our head, and Lieutenant-Colonel Roosevelt in command of one squadron and Major Brodie in command of the other. In some spots the road was frightful, full of mud-holes, with big land crabs crawling around in all directions, and with the trailing vines full of poisonous spiders. We didn't know but that the woods might be full of Spaniards, and we were on the alert to give the Dons as good as they sent, should they show themselves."
By nightfall the Rough Riders reached the little village of Siboney without having met the enemy. Here they went into camp in the midst of a heavy thunder-storm in which every soldier and officer was drenched to the skin. Fires could scarcely be lighted, and it was not until the storm had partly cleared away that the cooks could prepare anything to eat. Surely being a soldier was not all glory after all.
It had been learned that a portion of the Spanish army was less than four miles away, and General Young was ordered by General Wheeler to move forward at daybreak and engage the enemy. Colonel Wood received orders to move the Rough Riders by a trail over a hill, beyond which the country sloped toward the bay and the city of Santiago.
The first encounter with the enemy occurred at a place called La Guasima (or Las Guasimas), so called on account of trees of that name growing in the vicinity. Here the Spaniards had rifle-pits and mounds of earth to shelter them and had likewise the sugar-house of a plantation. They had been watching for the coming of the _Americanos_ eagerly, and were determined to give our soldiers a lesson not to be forgotten. They knew that our army had not been in active warfare for years, and felt certain that they would soon be able to make the "paper" soldiers retreat.
The Rough Riders found the way led up a steep hill, and the pace was so fast that before the firing line was reached some men fell out from exhaustion. Theodore Roosevelt was at the head of the first squadron and did his best to urge those under him forward. There was an advance guard, led by some men under Sergeant Hamilton Fish, and Captain Capron's troop, and soon a crash of firearms notified all that a fight was on.
Orders were at once issued to fill the magazines of the guns, and this was done. Then, while some troops moved to the left of the trail, Lieutenant-Colonel Roosevelt was ordered to take three troops to the right. Here the jungle was heavy, and no sooner had the Rough Riders advanced than the Spaniards opened fire upon them. In speaking of the opening of this fight, Mr. Roosevelt himself writes:--
"The effect of the smokeless powder (used by the enemy) was remarkable. The air seemed full of the rustling sound of the Mauser bullets, for the Spaniards knew the trails by which we were advancing, and opened heavily on our position. But they themselves were entirely invisible. The jungle covered everything, and not the faintest trace of smoke was to be seen in any direction, to indicate from whence the bullets came."
It was certainly a trying time--to stand up and be shot at without being able to return the compliment. Roosevelt and all the other leaders knew that this would not do, and at a great risk they continued to advance, until some Spaniards were at last discovered across a valley to the right of where the troops under Lieutenant-Colonel Roosevelt were located.
"There they are!" was the cry. "Forward and at 'em, boys! Down with the Dons!" Without delay some sharpshooters fired on the Spaniards, and then the regular troops opened up, and at last the Spaniards ran from cover.
Bullets were now flying in all directions, and both sides were making their shots tell. The Americans had but scant protection, and it was not long before a number of them fell. Some bullets came close to Theodore Roosevelt, and one hit a palm tree near where he was standing, filling his left eye and ear with the dust and splinters. Had that Mauser bullet come a few inches closer, the man who was destined to become the future President of our country might have been killed on the spot.
In the midst of the skirmish--for the conflict proved to be nothing more--there was a report that Colonel Wood was dead, and Theodore Roosevelt took it upon himself to restore the fighting line of Rough Riders to order. But happily the report proved false; and a little while after this the skirmish came to an end, and both Spaniards and Americans betook themselves to positions of greater safety. In this skirmish, brief as it was, the Rough Riders lost eight men killed and nearly forty wounded.
CHAPTER XV
Taken as a whole, the skirmish at La Guasima was quite an important one, for it showed the Spaniards that our soldiers were bound to advance upon Santiago, be the cost what it might.
More than this, it showed that Theodore Roosevelt was brave under fire. During the skirmish he paid but scant attention to his own personal safety. He went wherever he thought he was needed, and the fact that Mauser bullets were flying about in all directions did not daunt him.
"He was about as cool a man as I ever saw in a fight," said one old soldier. "He did all he could to encourage the men, and had a kind word for every man he ran across who was wounded. Once, in the thickest of the brush, he grabbed up a gun and began to shoot with us, and I reckon he fired as straight as anybody there, for he had had lots of practice while hunting."
The Spaniards had been driven from their pits and from the sugar-house of the plantation, and now took good care to keep out of sight. Picket-guards were thrown out by the officers of the army, and those who had been in the fight took a much-needed rest, and looked after the dead and wounded. There was certainly a touching scene at the temporary hospital, where one soldier started to sing "My Country, 'tis of Thee," and many others joined in. On the following morning the dead were buried, the men gathering around the one common grave to sing "Rock of Ages" in a manner that brought tears to the eyes of many.
From La Guasima the Rough Riders moved to the bank of a small stream in the neighborhood. Part of the army was ahead of them and the rest behind, and for several days nothing unusual occurred. But during that time General Young caught the fever, whereupon Colonel Wood had to take charge of the brigade, and Lieutenant-Colonel Roosevelt took command of the Rough Riders.
It was now the end of June, and the weather was anything but agreeable. When the rain did not come down in torrents, the sun shone with a glare and a heat that was terrific. As said before, the uniforms of the Rough Riders were heavy, and much clothing had to be cast aside as unfit for use. To add to the discomfort, rations that were promised failed to appear, so that a good square meal was almost unknown.
"This will not do; the men must have enough to eat, even if I have to buy it for them," said Acting Colonel Roosevelt, and made two trips down to the seacoast in search of beans, tomatoes, and other things to eat. Here he was informed that he could only buy stuff meant for the officers.
"All right; I'll buy the things for the officers," he answered, and purchased as much as they would allow. When he got back, he turned the food over to the officers, but saw to it that they gave their men a fair share.
"It was a kindness none of his men ever forgot," said a soldier who was there. "It wasn't any of his business to buy the grub,--the commissary department had to supply it free,--but he knew we might starve while the department was getting itself straightened out and ready to do the right thing. Before he went on a hunt for food, all we had was salt pork, hardtack, and coffee, and some of the stuff wasn't fit to put in your mouth." And this testimony was the testimony of scores of others.
The Spaniards were strongly intrenched upon the outskirts of Santiago, and as it was a rough, hilly country, with many shallow streams and much jungle, it was hard for the American army to advance. It was General Shafter's idea to form a grand semicircle around Santiago, starting from El Caney on the north, and running in an irregular line to Aguadores on the south. Throughout this territory the Spaniards had done everything possible to hinder the advance of our troops. Barbed wire was strung in many directions, and often the brushwood would conceal dangerous pitfalls, so that any advance had to be made with great caution.
The attack upon the Spanish lines began on July 1, and the fighting took place in several quarters at once, but was unusually heavy at El Caney and at San Juan Hill. At El Caney the heroic General Lawton was in command, and fought as gallantly as he afterward did in the Philippines. Some of the charges were terrific, and will ever be remembered by those who participated in them.
The Rough Riders struck camp and moved along the trail on the last day of June. It was as hot as ever, with no sign of rain. The trail was filled with troops and provision wagons, and the progress, consequently, was slow.
"Let us get into the fight!" was the cry heard on every side. "Don't keep us waiting any longer."
"Keep cool," said one of the officers. "You'll get all the fighting you want soon." And so it proved.
At a little after eight o'clock in the evening the Rough Riders found themselves on El Poso Hill, and here the whole brigade to which they were attached went into camp.
"It wasn't much of a camp," said one who was there. "We just threw out a strong picket-guard and went to sleep on our arms, and glad of it, after that day in the broiling sun. We had had to ford some pretty muddy streams, and all of us were water and mud up to our knees. But everybody was as enthusiastic to fight as ever."
At sunrise the battle opened at El Caney, and the Rough Riders could hear the booming of cannon. At once all was activity, and the men prepared to move ahead at a moment's notice.
Acting Colonel Roosevelt was with Colonel Wood at the time, and both were listening to the roar of the artillery.
"I wish we could move--" began Colonel Wood, when, of a sudden, both he and Theodore Roosevelt heard a strange humming sound in the air. Then came the explosion of a shrapnel shell over their heads, and both leaped to their feet.
"This is getting warm!" cried Theodore Roosevelt, and ran toward his horse, when boom! came another explosion, and one of the bullets fell upon his wrist, making, as he himself says, "a bump about as big as a hickory nut." This same shell, he adds, wounded four of the men under him and two or three regulars, one of whom lost his leg. Certainly another providential escape on the part of the future President.
Without loss of time Theodore Roosevelt ordered his troops into the underbrush, and here, for the time being, they were safe. On account of the smokeless powder they used, the Spanish batteries could not be precisely located, so our own artillery were at a slight disadvantage.
But now the blood of the Americans was fully aroused, and soon came an order for a general advance,--something that was hailed with wild delight by the Rough Riders.
"Hurrah, now we'll show 'em what the Yankees can do!" was the cry. "Down with the Dons! Three cheers for Uncle Sam!"
The Rough Riders had to ford the river, and while they were doing this, a balloon that had been used for observations came down in that vicinity and attracted the attention of the Spanish sharpshooters. The firing was now heavy on all sides, and many a gallant soldier went down to rise no more.
Then came another wait of an hour, during which the Rough Riders rested in a hollow leading up from the river. Again there was grumbling. With so much fighting on all sides, why could they not advance?
"We'll get our turn," said Theodore Roosevelt. And soon after a staff officer dashed up with orders to move forward and support the cavalry of the regular army on the hills in front.
"Now to the front!" was the cry. "Down with the Dons!" And away went troop after troop on the double-quick, with Acting Colonel Roosevelt leading them. Shot and shell were hurling themselves through the air in all directions, and on all sides could be heard the shrieks and groans of the dead and the dying. It was a time long to be remembered. Men went down in all directions, and with them not a few officers. It was so hot that Roosevelt's orderly was prostrated from the heat and afterward died. Roosevelt summoned another Rough Rider, and had just finished giving the man some orders when the soldier pitched forward upon his commander, killed by a bullet through the throat.
As the troops advanced, Theodore Roosevelt urged his men forward and told them to do their best, to which they responded with a cheer. He was on horseback at the time, and soon came across a man lying in the shade, probably overcome by the heat. He started to speak to the Rough Rider when a bullet hit the fellow and killed him on the spot.
"I suppose that bullet was meant for me," says Mr. Roosevelt, in writing of this incident. "I, who was on horseback in the open, was unhurt, and the man lying flat on the ground in the cover beside me was killed."
The fight had now centred around the possession of San Juan Hill, upon which was located a Spanish blockhouse. The bullets were flying as thickly as ever, when Roosevelt was ordered to advance in support of another regiment. As the Rough Riders reached the spot where the other regiment was, they found the men lying down awaiting orders.
"I am ordered to support your regiment," said Theodore Roosevelt to the first captain he met.
"We are awaiting orders to advance," answered the captain of the regulars.
"In my opinion we cannot take these hills by firing at them," returned the commander of the Rough Riders. "We must rush them."
"My orders are to keep my men where they are."
"Where is your Colonel?"
"I don't know."
"Well, if he isn't here, then I am the ranking officer, and I give the order to charge," came quickly and positively from Theodore Roosevelt.
"Well, sir,--I--I have orders from our Colonel--" began the captain of the regulars.
"If you won't charge, let my men pass through, sir," cut in the Acting Colonel of the Rough Riders, and he ordered his men to move to the front. This was too much for the regulars, and up they sprang with shouts and yells, and Rough Riders and regulars went up San Juan Hill together. Roosevelt was on horseback as before, but at a barbed-wire fence he leaped to the ground, swung his hat in the air, and joined his men on foot.
The fight was now at its fiercest, and men were being mowed down in all directions. But the fever of battle was in the veins of all the American soldiers, and nothing could stop them. Up the hill they went, loading and firing at random, and making as many shots as possible tell. The Spaniards were in retreat, and soon Old Glory was planted in several places. Some of the leading officers had been shot, and Theodore Roosevelt found himself at one time in command of five regiments, and doing his best to keep them in military order. Strange as it may seem, with bullets flying all around him, he remained unharmed, saving for some slight scratches which, he tells us, "were of no consequence."
With the top of the hill gained, the American soldiers could get a distant glimpse of Santiago, several miles away, and some wanted to move still farther forward. But the Spaniards had strong intrenchments to fall back upon, and it was deemed best to "let well enough alone." Accordingly the American line was made as strong as possible, and by nightfall the battle was at an end, and the Rough Riders were told to hold the hill and intrench, and they did so. In the blockhouse they found some food belonging to some Spanish officers, and upon this they feasted after their well-earned victory.
CHAPTER XVI
The fight had been a hard and heavy one. The Rough Riders had gone into the engagement just 490 strong, and of that number 89 were killed or wounded. The total loss to the Americans was 1071 killed and wounded. The loss to the Spanish was also heavy, but the exact figures will probably never be known.
Utterly tired out with their marching and fighting, the Rough Riders intrenched as best they could, cared for their wounded and dead, and then dropped down to get a well-earned rest. The night was misty and cold, and many who had been bathed in perspiration suffered accordingly. Theodore Roosevelt had a blanket taken from the Spanish, and in this he rolled himself, and slept with others of his command.
At three o'clock in the morning came an unexpected alarm. The Spanish skirmishers were out in force, trying to drive the Americans back. But there was no heavy attack, and presently all became as quiet as before.
"They'll not give up yet," said one of the officers of the Rough Riders. "They mean to retake this hill if they can."
Just at daybreak the Spaniards opened the attack on San Juan Hill once more. Theodore Roosevelt was resting under a little tree when a shrapnel shell burst close by, killing or wounding five men of the command. He at once ordered the eight troops under him to a safer position, where the Spanish battery and the sharpshooters could not locate them so readily.
If the fight had been hard, guarding the trenches was almost equally so. The sun beat down fiercely, and the newly turned up earth made many of the Rough Riders sick. Added to this, provisions were, as usual, slow in arriving. Those in the trenches were kept there six hours, and then relieved by the others who were farther to the rear.
"Running from the cover of brush to the trenches was no easy matter," says one Rough Rider who was there. "We had dug the trenches in a hurry, and had no passages from the rear leading to them. All we could do was to wait for a signal, and then rush, and when we did that, the Spaniards would open a hot fire and keep it up for perhaps fifteen minutes. The sun was enough to turn a man's brain, and more than one poor fellow caught a fever there that proved fatal to him."
Through the entire day the firing continued, but no advances were made upon either side. The Americans were waiting for reinforcements, and the Spaniards were doing likewise. On our side a dynamite gun and two Colt's guns were used, but with little success. But the Gatling guns proved very effective, and caused a great loss to the enemy.
The city of Santiago lies on the northeast coast of a large bay of the same name. This bay is shaped somewhat like a bottle, with a long neck joining it to the Caribbean Sea.
In the harbor, at the time of the battles just described, the Spaniards had a fleet of war-ships under the command of Admiral Cervera, an old and able naval commander. In the fleet were four large cruisers and two torpedo-boats. Three of the cruisers were of seven thousand tons burden each, and all could make from eighteen to nineteen knots an hour. Each carried a crew of about five hundred men, and all were well supplied with guns and ammunition.
To keep this fleet "bottled up," our own navy had a fleet of its own just outside of the harbor, where it had been stationed ever since Admiral Cervera had been discovered within. The American fleet consisted of the cruiser _Brooklyn_, which was Commodore Schley's flag-ship, the battleships _Texas_, _Iowa_, _Indiana_, and _Oregon_ (the latter having sailed all the way from the Pacific coast around Cape Horn to get into the fight), and the converted yachts _Gloucester_ and _Vixen_. There were also close at hand, but not near enough to get into the fight, the cruiser _New York_, Admiral Sampson's flag-ship, and several other vessels of lesser importance.
For a long time it had been thought that Cervera would try to escape from the harbor, in which he could not be reached because of the strong forts that protected the entrance. To bottle him up more effectively, the Americans tried to block up the harbor entrance by sinking an old iron steamboat, the _Merrimac_, in the channel. This heroic work was undertaken by Lieutenant Hobson with a crew of seven daring men, but the plan failed, for the _Merrimac_, instead of sinking where intended, swung to one side of the main channel.
When it was reported to him that the Americans had taken the heights of El Caney and San Juan and were strongly intrenched in their positions, Admiral Cervera concluded that Santiago Bay might soon become too hot to hold him. The capture of the city would be followed by the taking of the forts at the harbor entrance, and then there would be nothing left for him to do but to surrender.
San Juan and El Caney had been taken on Friday, and all day Saturday occurred the shooting at long range, as already described. In the meantime the war-ships outside of the harbor kept up a close watch on the harbor entrance, lying well out during the day, but coming in closer at night, and using their powerful search-lights from sundown to sunrise.
Sunday dawned bright and clear, and for the time being all was quiet both ashore and afloat. In the trenches the Rough Riders and other soldiers were still on guard, doing what they could for their wounded, and trying to get the rations which were still delayed.
Presently, those on board of the American fleet noticed a thick cloud of smoke hanging over the harbor, coming from the funnels of the Spanish war-ships. Then one of the enemy's vessels showed itself, quickly followed by the others, and all turned westward, to escape up the coast.
"The enemy is escaping!" was the signal hoisted. And then one cannon after another boomed out, giving the signal to all our ships in that vicinity. The booming of the cannon was heard away eastward at Siboney, whither Admiral Sampson had gone with his ship to confer with General Shafter, and without delay the _New York_ raced madly back to get into the fight that followed.
"Remember the _Maine!_" was the cry. "Down with the Spanish ships! Give 'em what Dewey did!" And this cry, "Give 'em what Dewey did!" was heard on every hand.
The first vessel to go down was a torpedo-boat, sunk by the _Gloucester_, and this was quickly followed by the sinking of the second torpedo-boat. In the meantime the larger vessels were pouring in their rain of steel upon the Spanish cruisers with deadly effect, knocking great holes into the ships and killing scores of those on board.
The Spanish cruiser _Teresa_ was the first to succumb to the heavy attack, and soon she turned in to shore to save her crew from drowning. Then the _Oquendo_ caught fire in several places, and burning fiercely from stem to stern, she, too, turned in.
But two ships were now left to Admiral Cervera, the _Vizcaya_ and the _Colon_, and each had suffered much. Both were doing their best to get out of reach of our guns and the marvellous accuracy of our gunners.
"Don't let 'em get away!" was the cry. "Give 'em what Dewey did!" Forward went the war-ships of Uncle Sam, the powerful _Oregon_ leading, with the _Brooklyn_ and _Texas_ not far behind. The rain of steel continued, and at last, burning like her sister ships, the _Vizcaya_ turned shoreward, and many of her crew leaped overboard to save their lives.
Only the _Colon_ now remained. She was still in fair condition, and it was the Spaniards' ardent hope to save at least one ship from the dire calamity that had overtaken them. But this was not to be, and after a run of a few miles, during which the _Oregon_ and _Brooklyn_ continued to pound her with shot and shell, the Spanish flag was lowered, and the _Colon_ also ran ashore.
It was assuredly a mighty victory, a fitting mate to the great victory won by Admiral Dewey, and when the news reached our country there was such a Fourth of July celebration everywhere as will never be forgotten. Twice had our navy met the ships of Spain, and each time we had sunk every vessel without losing any of our own. More than this, while the Spaniards had lost many men through shot and fire and drowning, our total loss was but one man killed and a handful wounded.
The loss of her second fleet was a bitter blow to Spain, and many predicted that the war would not continue much longer, and this prediction proved correct.
During the rush made by the Rough Riders and our other soldiers, they had gone right through several bodies of Spanish guerillas who were secreted in the trees of the jungle. These guerillas, really lawless fellows belonging to no particular command, could not get back into Santiago because of the strong American guard at the intrenchments, and consequently they contented themselves with remaining out of sight and peppering our soldiers whenever the opportunity offered.
"This will not do," said Theodore Roosevelt. "They are shooting down our men without giving them a chance to fire back. We'll have to get after them." And without delay he sent out a detachment of the best Rough Rider shots to be found. These sharpshooters searched the jungle back of the intrenchments thoroughly, and as a result killed eleven of the guerillas and wounded many more. After that the guerillas kept their distance, satisfied that the Yankees could beat them at their own game.
CHAPTER XVII
With the defeat of Admiral Cervera's fleet, a flag of truce was sent into Santiago by the commander of our army, demanding the surrender of the city. While these negotiations were pending, all fighting came to an end, and the Rough Riders had but little to do outside of making themselves comfortable and caring for the many who were getting sick because of the lack of shelter and proper food. Food was now coming in more rapidly, and soon all were supplied with tents and blankets. During this time Theodore Roosevelt's personal baggage appeared, and he celebrated the arrival by treating himself to a shave and a change of linen, something impossible to do since the fighting had begun.
In his own writings, Mr. Roosevelt has spoken at great length of the devotion which all of the Rough Riders displayed toward him. They were anxious to wait on him at all hours of the day and night. Some would pitch his tent, others would clean his weapons, and still others would go hunting and bring in such game as the vicinity afforded. When ordered to do anything, there was rarely a grumble. Those in the hospital bore their sufferings with remarkable fortitude.
In return for this, Theodore Roosevelt did all he could to make life less hard for those under him. The game that was brought to him he sent to the hospital, that the wounded might have proper nourishment; and he either went himself or sent somebody to the seacoast, to purchase food which the commissary department possessed, but which, through lack of organization, it was slow in distributing. When no shelter was to be had, he slept on the ground with his men, and when they had to work on the trenches at night, he was up and around superintending the labor.
"He was one of us, and he let us know it," was said by one of the Rough Riders. "He ate the same food we did, and he was mighty good to the sick and the wounded. He paid for lots of things out of his own pocket, and I don't believe he has ever asked Uncle Sam to pay him back."
There was no telling how soon the truce would come to an end and fighting would begin again, and night after night the Rough Riders were kept on guard. There was a standing order that each fourth man should keep awake while the others slept, and no matter how dark or rainy the night, Theodore Roosevelt tramped around from one trench to another, seeing to it that this order was obeyed. He also visited the intrenchments of other commands, to compare them and make certain that the grade of service was equally high among the Rough Riders. This shows distinctly that he was a natural-born military commander.
The truce lasted a week, and while all operations were supposed to have come to an end, both the Americans and the Spaniards spent the time in strengthening their positions. At one time the Americans constructed a fairly good defence, in which they placed two Gatling guns and two automatic Colt guns, and this was named Fort Roosevelt, in honor of the Rough Rider commander.
On the tenth of July the fighting began once more, and again the batteries on both sides sent shot and shell into the camps of the enemy. It was largely fighting at long range, and the only Rough Riders who took part were those who manned the Colt's guns, and a small body of sharpshooters stationed in a trench well to the front.
On the next day the Rough Riders were ordered northward, to guard the road running from Santiago to El Caney. Here some fighting was in progress, and the troopers expected to get into battle once more. But the skirmish came to an end before they arrived, very much to their disappointment.
Hardly had the Rough Riders settled in their new position than a storm came up which proved to be the heaviest yet experienced during the campaign. While Theodore Roosevelt was sleeping in his tent, the shelter was blown down and away, and all of his personal effects were scattered in the mud and wet. As best he could, he donned his clothing, saw to it that his men were safe, and then betook himself to a kitchen tent, where he finished the sleep of that night on a rude table recently taken from an abandoned Spanish home in that vicinity.
"On that night it rained cats and dogs and hammer-handles," said one of the soldiers afterward. "It was inky dark--darker than I have ever known it to be anywhere on the plains. The water made a muddy pond of the whole camp, and the trenches were half filled in no time. Everything was blown helter-skelter by the furious wind, and some of our outfits we never recovered. In the midst of the confusion some fellows reported that the Spaniards were trying to break through our lines, but the report was false,--the outsiders were starving Cubans who had come in looking for shelter and something to eat. We gave them what we could--which was precious little, for we had next to nothing ourselves--and then got them to help us get things together again. One of the Cubans was an old man, who could speak a little English. He said he had lost two daughters and three grandchildren by starvation since the war between Spain and Cuba had started. He himself was little more than a skeleton."
That Theodore Roosevelt was warmhearted enough to look out for other soldiers besides those of his own command is proven by what took place on the day following the big storm. Next to the Rough Riders were located a regiment of Illinois Volunteers. Because of the muddy roads and swollen streams, they could get no rations, and scant as were their own supplies, Colonel Roosevelt had the Rough Riders furnish them with beans, coffee, and a few cases of hardtack, for which they were extremely grateful. Later in the day the commander of the Rough Riders also got to them part of a mule train of provisions.
The American position had been greatly strengthened, and many additional troops were now at the front. It was felt that an advance upon Santiago would surely result in victory, although the losses might be large. But the Spaniards were no longer in a position to continue the struggle, and on July 17 the city formally surrendered. The surrendered territory covered many miles, and the Spanish soldiers to lay down their arms numbered upward of twenty thousand.
There was great cheering in the American trenches when the glad news was brought in, and soon Old Glory was planted on every height, while the trumpets sounded out triumphantly. Possession of Santiago was immediate, and in a few hours the Stars and Stripes floated from the flagstaff of the civil government buildings. Our gallant army had won on the land just as our gallant navy had won on the sea. The war had been, for us, one of triumph from start to finish.
In foreign countries the news was received with an astonishment that can scarcely be described. After Dewey's wonderful victory in Manila Bay, many naval experts said that such a fight could not be duplicated, yet it was duplicated two months later off Santiago Bay in a manner that left no doubt of American supremacy on the sea. Then when it came to fighting on land, our army was designated as "paper" soldiers, that is, soldiers on paper or in name only, and it was said that their guns would be found of little use against the Mausers of Spain. But this was likewise false; and to-day the army and navy of the United States are respected everywhere. And more than this, foreign powers have come to our country for many of their war-ships, asking us to build and equip them, and also asking us to make cannon and rifles for them.
While the war was on in Cuba, a part of the United States army under General Miles was sent to Porto Rico, another island belonging to Spain. Here the inhabitants hailed the Americans with delight, and the resistance by the Spanish soldiers was only half-hearted.
With the downfall of the navy and Santiago, Spain knew not what to do next, and gladly received the terms of peace offered by President McKinley and his advisers. The terms were accepted on August 9, and thus the short but sharp war came to a termination. By the treaty of peace Cuba was given her liberty, and Porto Rico and the Philippines passed into the possession of the United States.
CHAPTER XVIII
Four days after the surrender of Santiago the Rough Riders found themselves in the hills four or five miles back from the intrenchments they had occupied during the last fight. Other commands were scattered in various directions, for to let them go into the wretched city would have been out of the question. Santiago was dirty in the extreme; the fever was there, and hundreds were on the verge of starvation.
It was a trying time for everybody, and equally so for Theodore Roosevelt, who did all in his power, as before, to make his men comfortable. When it did not rain, the sun came out fiercely, causing a rapid evaporation that was thoroughly exhausting to the soldiers. The locality was not a healthy one, and soon scores of Rough Riders and others were down with malaria or fever. Doctors and surgeons were scarce, and hospital accommodations were scanty, and again and again did Colonel Roosevelt send down on his own account to the seacoast and to Santiago for food and medicines of which his command were in dire need. He was now colonel of the Rough Riders in reality, his promotion having been granted to him just one week after the heroic charge up San Juan Hill. His old colonel, Wood, was installed at Santiago as military governor. This, for the time being, left Colonel Roosevelt in command of the cavalry brigade, no small honor to one who had been, but a few months before, a stranger to military duties.
During this time in camp, Theodore Roosevelt visited Santiago and the forts at the entrance to the harbor, and with the pen of a skilled author he has, in one of his books, given us vivid pictures of the sights to be seen there at that time--the crooked streets with their queer shops, the wretched inhabitants, the grim and frowning forts, all hemmed in by the towering mountains and the sea. He likewise tells of his trips to the mountains, and how his companions were usually exhausted by the climbing done. For one who in his youth had been so delicate, he stood the exposure remarkably well, for which he was thankful.
For some time the authorities at Washington did not know what to do with the troops in Cuba. It was suggested that they move up to higher ground, or to another neighborhood. But General Shafter knew, and so did all of the officers under him, that to keep the army in the island would only mean more sickness and death.
"I will go to the general with a protest," said Colonel Roosevelt. And he did so. Meanwhile the other head officers drew up a letter of protest, and this was signed by all, including the commander of the Rough Riders. In his own letter Roosevelt protested against the treatment of his men in the matter of rations, clothing, and hospital accommodations, and in the other letter, called by the officers a Round Robin, there was a protest about remaining in Cuba longer, with the fever getting worse every day. These letters were made public through the press of the United States, with the result that the troops were ordered home without further delay.
The Rough Riders left Cuba on August 7, just six weeks and a half after landing. The time spent in the island had been short, but to many it seemed an age. None were sorry to depart, although sad to think that some of the sick had to be left behind.
The transport used this time was the _Miami_, and Mr. Roosevelt tells us that, taken as a whole, the accommodations were better than they had been on the _Yucatan_. But on the trip much trouble was had with some of the stokers and engineers, who insisted upon drinking some liquor smuggled aboard.
"I will not permit this," said Colonel Roosevelt. And he read the disorderly ones a strong lecture and made them give up their liquor. After that, as there was much grumbling, he set a guard; and that was the end of that trouble.
The destination of the transport was Montauk, on the extreme eastern shore of Long Island. The trip took nine days,--rather a dreary time to those anxious to see their native land once more. When an anchorage was gained, a gunboat came out to the transport with the welcome news that Spain had agreed to our terms.
The sick had still to be cared for; yet, taken as a whole, the month spent at the camp at Montauk was pleasant enough. Here Colonel Roosevelt met that part of the regiment that had been left behind in Florida, and all the stories of the fights had to be told over and over again.
"It was good to meet the rest of the regiment," says Mr. Roosevelt, in his book. "They all felt dreadfully at not having been in Cuba. Of course those who stayed had done their duty precisely as did those who went." Which was true; yet, as he adds, those who had been left behind could not be comforted.
Colonel Roosevelt was still in charge of the brigade while at Montauk, and much of his time was taken up in getting out necessary reports, and seeing to it that the entire camp was kept in first-class sanitary condition.
"And he was up to the mark," said one of those who were there. "He didn't allow the least bit of dirt, and everything had to be as shipshape as if we were at West Point. And it was a good thing, too, for it kept the sickness from spreading."
The sea-breeze is strong at Montauk, and this soon began to tell upon all who were sick, putting in them new life and vigor. Here every possible attention was given to those who were down, so that ere long many were up again and as well as ever.
When he had a little time to himself, Theodore Roosevelt would gather a few friends around him, and either go to the beach to bathe or go off on a long horseback ride. War was to him a thing of the past, and he was once more willing to become a private citizen as of old.
In those days the camp at Montauk was constantly crowded with visitors from New York City and elsewhere, who poured in upon every train. All of the soldiers who had been to Cuba were hailed as heroes, and had to tell their stories many times.
"Every soldier had a crowd following him," said one private. "The visitors wanted to know how we had fought, how we had been treated by the government, how things looked in Cuba, and a hundred and one other things. Most of the visitors, especially the ladies, wanted our autographs, and I had to write mine as many as forty times a day. I remember one of the men, a cowboy from Oklahoma, couldn't write, and he got so upset over this that every time somebody asked him for his autograph he would run away, saying he had forgotten to do something that he had been ordered to do. When I and some chums went down to New York to look around, all the folks stared at us, and many insisted on shaking hands and treating."
[Illustration: COLONEL ROOSEVELT AT MONTAUK POINT. (_Photograph by Pach Bros., New York._)]
The uniforms the Rough Riders had worn in Cuba were in rags, and many had boarded the transport barefooted. The rags were saved as trophies of the occasion, and many are still in existence.
At Camp Wykoff, as the place was called, there was a large hospital for the sick, and to this many came to do what they could for the sufferers, who were now given every possible attention. Among the visitors was Miss Helen Gould, who had used her ample means for the benefit of the sick all through the war, and who now continued to play the good Samaritan. President McKinley and many of his cabinet likewise visited the camp, and saw to it that everything in the hospital and out of it was as it should be. The sick were presented with the best of fruits and other things, and many ladies assisted the nurses by reading to the patients and by writing letters for them.
Now that they had nothing to do in the shape of fighting, many of the Rough Riders were anxious to get back to the wild West. Life in an ordinary camp did not suit them, and at every available opportunity they indulged in "horse play," working off many practical jokes upon each other.
One day a report went the rounds that a member of another cavalry organization could not master a certain horse that had been assigned to him. The report was true, for the horse was what is called by ranchmen a "bad bucker."
"I think Sergeant Darnell can master him," said Colonel Roosevelt.
He referred to one of the best "bronco busters" among the Rough Riders, a man who had never yet allowed a steed to get the best of him.
"All right, let Darnell try him," said others. And a test was arranged for the day following.
At that time Secretary of War Alger was in camp, and a great crowd of visitors, military men and others, gathered before Colonel Roosevelt's quarters to watch the contest. At the proper time the vicious horse was brought forth, and watching his chance, Sergeant Darnell leaped upon his back. Then came such a bucking, leaping, and prancing as many had never witnessed before.
"He'll be killed!" cried many of the ladies. "The horse will have him under in another moment." But such fears were groundless. Darnell knew exactly what he was doing, and in the end the fiery steed had to give in, completely conquered.
On the last Sunday in camp, Chaplain Brown delivered an impressive sermon, to which all listened with grave attention. After he had finished, Theodore Roosevelt spoke to the men in a feeling way.
"I told them how proud I was of them," he says. "But warned them not to think that they could go back and rest on their laurels, bidding them remember that though for ten days or so the world would be willing to treat them as heroes, yet after that time they would find they would have to get down to hard work just like anybody else, unless they were willing to be regarded as worthless do-nothings." This was the best possible advice, and it is believed that many of the soldiers profited by it.
Before the men were mustered out, they treated their beloved commander to a genuine surprise. They had had a fine bronze of a "Bronco Buster" made, and this was presented to Colonel Roosevelt on behalf of the whole regiment. It touched him deeply, and to-day this bronze is one of his most highly prized gifts.
At last came news that the Rough Riders would be mustered out of the United States service the next day. That evening a great celebration took place, in which all of the men joined, each according to his own notion of what a celebration should be. Large bonfires were lit, and here some delivered speeches, the soldiers from the colleges sang, those with Indian blood in them gave a characteristic dance, and cowboys and ranchmen did "double-shuffles" and "cut up" as suited them.
On the morning of September 15, four months after the Rough Riders had been organized, the colors were lowered in camp, the men were mustered out, and officers and privates shook hands and said good-by.
"It was the greatest sight I ever saw," says one of the number. "Not until that moment came did we realize what it meant to part with those who had fought with us in battle and suffered the hardships of life in the trenches. Strange friendships had been formed, some between those who were very rich and very poor, and others between those who were well educated and very ignorant. One man who was studying for a professional life had as his particular chum a rough cowboy who had never spent six months over his books. But the two had stood by each other and suffered, and I really believe they were willing to lay down their lives for each other.
"Many of the men could hardly bear to part with Colonel Roosevelt. He had stuck by them through thick and thin, and they worshipped him. Some shook hands half a dozen times, and some hardly dared to speak for fear of breaking down. I never expect to see the match of that scene again."
CHAPTER XIX
The war with Spain was at an end, and Uncle Sam had now to turn his attention to the Philippines, where for many months to come military disturbances of a more or less serious nature were to take place.
Theodore Roosevelt might have remained in the army, and had he done so there is no doubt but that he would have swiftly risen to a rank of importance.
But the people of the State of New York willed otherwise.
"He is a great military man," they said. "But he was likewise a fine Police Commissioner and a Civil Service Commissioner, fighting continually for what was right and good. Let us make him our next governor."
The convention that nominated Theodore Roosevelt for the highest office in the Empire State met at Saratoga, September 27, 1898, just twelve days after the Rough Riders were mustered out. At that time Frank S. Black was governor of the state, having been elected two years before by a large majority. The governor had many friends, and they said he deserved another term.
"Roosevelt is not a citizen of this state," said they. "He gave up his residence here when he went to Washington to become Assistant Secretary of the Navy."
"We don't want him anyway," said other politicians, who had not forgotten how the Rough Rider had acted when in the Assembly. "If he gets into office, it will be impossible to manage him." And they worked night and day to defeat the hero of San Juan Hill.
On the day of the convention, the hall where it was held was jammed with people. The people were also crowded in the street outside, and on every hand were seen Rough Rider badges.
"It was a Roosevelt crowd from top to bottom," says one who was there. "You heard his name everywhere--in the hotels, on the streets, no matter where you went. Every once in a while somebody would shout, 'Three cheers for Teddy!' and the cheers would be given with a will."
As soon as the convention had settled down to business, Governor Black was put up for nomination, and then the Hon. Chauncey M. Depew presented the name of Theodore Roosevelt. He spoke of what had been done in Cuba, and added:--
"The Rough Riders endured no hardships nor dangers which were not shared by their Colonel. He helped them dig their ditches; he stood beside them in the deadly dampness of the trenches. No floored tent for him if his comrades must sleep on the ground and under the sky. In that world-famed charge of the Rough Riders up the hill of San Juan, their Colonel was a hundred feet in advance."
There was a prolonged cheering when Theodore Roosevelt's name was mentioned, and hundreds waved their handkerchiefs and flags. Other speeches followed, and at last came the voting. Out of the total number cast Theodore Roosevelt received seven hundred and fifty-three and Governor Black two hundred and eighteen.
"I move we make the nomination of Theodore Roosevelt unanimous!" cried Judge Cady, who had previously presented the name of Governor Black. And amid continued cheering this was done.
Theodore Roosevelt had been nominated on the regular Republican ticket. In opposition, the Democrats nominated Augustus Van Wyck, also well known, and likewise of as old Dutch stock as Roosevelt himself.
The campaign was a decidedly strenuous one. The Democrats made every effort to win, while on the other hand the Republicans who had wanted Governor Black for another term did not give to Mr. Roosevelt the support promised when his nomination had been made unanimous.
"We shall be defeated," said more than one friend to Roosevelt. "It seems a shame, but we cannot arouse the party as it should be aroused."
"I will see what I can do myself," answered the former leader of the Rough Riders. And he arranged to make a complete tour of the State, taking in almost every city and town of importance. When some of the old campaign managers heard of this, they came to Roosevelt in great alarm.
"You mustn't do it," they said. "It will ruin you."
"I will risk it," was the answer of the candidate. And forthwith he started on his tour, taking a handful of his Rough Rider friends with him.
It was a brilliant stroke on the part of Theodore Roosevelt, and it told tremendously in his favor. Wherever he went, the people turned out in large crowds to see him and to listen to what he or his Rough Rider companions had to say. Citizens by the hundred came up to shake him by the hand and wish him success. Parades were organized to do him honor, and at night there would be brilliant illuminations and fireworks.
"We have aroused the party," said he, when the tour was at an end. And so it proved. Although Van Wyck was popular, Theodore Roosevelt was elected to the high office of governor by seventeen thousand plurality.
It was certainly a high position for such a young man to occupy. He was barely forty years of age, yet as governor of New York he ruled twice as many people as did George Washington when first President of the United States.
He entered on his new duties with as much zeal as he had displayed when organizing the Rough Riders, and in a few weeks had the reins of government well in hand. It is said that while he was governor he was never surprised by those who opposed him. When they wanted facts and figures he was able to produce them, and he never supported or vetoed a measure unless he was morally certain he was on the right side. He was open-faced to the last degree, and what he said he meant.
During his term of office many measures of importance were considered, but in a work of this kind it is not necessary to go into details. For several important offices he nominated men of his own selection, despite the protests of some older politicians, and these selections proved first-class.
During his term as governor, Mr. Roosevelt did a great work for many poor people in New York City, who worked in what are called "sweat shops,"--small, close quarters, not fit for working purposes, in which men, women, and children make clothing and other articles. He enforced what was known as the Factory Law, and the owners of the "sweat-shops" had to seek larger and more sanitary quarters for their employees. He also took a strong hand in reforming the administration of the canals, which had been one-sided and unfair.
But perhaps his greatest work was in behalf of a measure meant to make the great corporations of New York State pay their fair share of the general taxes. In the past these corporations had had great rights conferred upon them, and they had paid little or nothing in return.
"This is unjust," said Governor Roosevelt. "They should pay their taxes just as the poorest citizen is compelled to pay his tax."
When the corporations heard this, many of the men in control were furious, and they threatened the governor in all sorts of ways. They would defeat him if he ever again came up for election, and defeat him so badly that he would never again be heard of.
"Do as you please, gentlemen," said the governor. "I am here to do my duty, and I intend to do it." And he called an extra session of the legislature for that purpose. It is said that much money was used by some corporations to defeat Governor Roosevelt's will, but in the end a modified form of the bill was passed. Since that time other bills along similar lines have become laws; so that the great corporations have to pay millions of dollars which in the past they had escaped paying. Such measures are of immense benefit to the ordinary citizen, and for his share in this work Theodore Roosevelt deserves great credit.
It was while governor of New York that Mr. Roosevelt gave to the public his book entitled "The Rough Riders." It contains a history of that organization from his personal point of view, and makes the most fascinating kind of reading from beginning to end. It was well received, and added not a little to the laurels of the writer as an author.
Although much of his time was spent at Albany as Executive, Theodore Roosevelt had not given up the old homestead at Oyster Bay on Long Island, and thither he went for rest and recreation, taking his entire family, which, as has been said, consisted of his wife and six children, with him.
The old Roosevelt homestead is on a hill about three miles distant from the village. The road to the house winds upward through a wilderness of trees and brushwood. At the top of the hill, where the house stands, is a cleared space, free to the strong breezes of Long Island Sound. It is on the north shore, about twenty-five miles from City Hall, New York.
The house is a large, three-story affair, with crossed gables, and a large semicircular veranda at one end. Inside there is a wide hall, and all the rooms are of good size, with broad windows and inviting open fireplaces. One room is fitted up as Mr. Roosevelt's "den," with many bookcases filled with books, and with rare prints of Washington, Lincoln, and other celebrities on the walls, and with not a few trophies of the hunt added. In this room Mr. Roosevelt has done much of his work as an author.
It is said that Abraham Lincoln not only chopped wood for a living, but that he rather enjoyed the outdoor exercise. Be that as it may, it remains a fact that Mr. Roosevelt frequently goes forth into the woods on his estate to fell a tree, or split one up, just for the exercise thus afforded. This he did while he was governor of New York, and once astonished some newspaper men who had come to see him on business by the dexterity with which he cut a large tree trunk in two. He even invited his visitors to "take a hack at it" themselves, but they respectfully declined.
He still kept up his athletic exercise, and one of his favorite amusements was to go on long horseback rides, either alone, or with some relative or friend. At other times he would go deep into the woods with his young sons, showing them how to bring down the nuts from the trees, or how to use their guns on any small game that chanced to show itself. His family life was then, as it has always been, a happy one; but of this let us speak later.
[Illustration: THE ROOSEVELT HOMESTEAD AT OYSTER BAY.
(_Photograph by Pach Bros., N.Y._)]
CHAPTER XX
Although the war with Spain was over, the people of the United States had not forgotten the wonderful work accomplished by Admiral Dewey and his men at Manila, and when the dauntless naval fighter returned to this country, people everywhere arose to do him honor.
"He well deserves it," said Governor Roosevelt. And he appointed September 29 and 30, 1899, as public holidays, to be observed throughout the entire State as days of general thanksgiving. These days were commonly called "Dewey Days."
The reception to the Admiral and to the other naval heroes was to take place in New York and vicinity, and for many days the citizens were busy decorating their homes and places of business with flags and bunting and pictures, and immense signs of "Welcome," some in letters several feet long. At the junction of Broadway, Fifth Avenue, and Twenty-Third Street, an immense triumphal arch was erected, and reviewing stands stretched along the line of parade for many miles.
On the day before the grand reception, Governor Roosevelt, with some members of his staff, called upon Admiral Dewey on board of the _Olympia_, and offered the State's greeting. A pleasant time was had by all, and the governor assured the sea hero that the people of New York and vicinity were more than anxious to do him honor.
It had been arranged that a naval parade should be held on the first day of the reception, and a land parade on the day following. The course of the naval parade was up the Hudson River past Grant's Tomb, and the grand procession on the water included the _Olympia_, the Admiral's flag-ship, and the _New York_, _Indiana_, _Massachusetts_, _Texas_, _Brooklyn_, and a large number of other war-ships of lesser importance, besides an immense number of private steam-yachts and other craft.
The day dawned clear and bright, and the banks of the Hudson were lined from end to end with people. When the procession of war-ships swept up the stream, loud was the applause, while flags waved everywhere, and whistles blew constantly. When passing Grant's Tomb every war-ship fired a salute, and the mass of sound echoing across the water was positively deafening.
As the _Olympia_ swept up the river, fired her salute, and then came to anchor a short distance below the last resting-place of General Grant, Admiral Dewey stood on the bridge of his flag-ship, a small, trim figure, with a smile and a wave of the hand for everybody. The surging people could see him but indistinctly, yet there was much hand clapping, and throats grew sore with cheering.
But there was another figure in that naval parade, the person of one also dear to the hearts of the people. It was the figure of Theodore Roosevelt, dressed, not as a Rough Rider, but as a civilian, standing at the rail of a steamer used by the New York State officials. When the people saw and recognized that figure, the cheering was as wild as ever.
"It is Roosevelt!" ran from mouth to mouth. "The hero of San Juan Hill!"
"Hurrah for the Rough Riders and their gallant leader!" came from others. And the cheering was renewed.
In the evening there was a grand display of fireworks and illuminated floats. The immense span of the Brooklyn Bridge was a mass of lights, and contained the words "Welcome, Dewey" in lettering which covered several hundred feet. All of the war-ships had their search-lights in operation, and it can truthfully be said that for once the metropolis was as light as day.
But all of this was as nothing compared with the land parade which followed. Never before had the streets of New York been so jammed with people. At many points it was impossible to move, yet the crowds were good-natured and patriotic to the core. The parade started at Grant's Tomb and ended at Washington Square, and was between five and six hours in passing. Admiral Dewey rode in a carriage with Mayor Van Wyck, and received another ovation. At the Triumphal Arch the Admiral reviewed the parade, and here he was accorded additional honors.
In this parade Governor Roosevelt rode on horseback, in civilian dress. As he came down the street, the immense crowds recognized him from afar, and the hand clapping and cheering was tremendous, and lasted long after he was out of sight.
"It's our own Teddy Roosevelt!" cried the more enthusiastic.
"Hurrah for the governor! Hurrah for the colonel of the Rough Riders!"
"Hurrah for the coming President!" said another. And he spoke better than he knew.
This demonstration came straight from the people's heart, and it could not help but affect Theodore Roosevelt. Sitting astride of his dark-colored horse like a veteran, he bowed right and left. Next to Dewey, he was easily the greatest figure in the parade.
On January 3, 1900, Governor Roosevelt sent his last annual message to the State legislature. It was an able document, and as it was now recognized everywhere that he was a truly national figure, it was given careful attention. It treated of the corruption in canal management, of the franchise tax, of taxation in general, and a large portion was devoted to the trusts. At that time the trusts were receiving great attention everywhere, and it was felt that what the governor had to say about them, that they were largely over-capitalized, that they misrepresented the condition of their affairs, that they promoted unfair competition, and that they wielded increased power over the wage-earner, was strictly true.
In Chicago there is a wealthy organization known as the Hamilton Club, and the members were very anxious to have Governor Roosevelt as their guest on Appomattox Day, April 10, 1899. A delegation went to New York to invite the governor, and he accepted the invitation with pleasure.
"The middle West is very dear to me," said he. "It will be a pleasure to meet my many friends there."
Of course he was expected to speak, and said the subject of his address would be "The Strenuous Life,"--certainly a subject close to his own heart, considering the life he himself had led.
When Mr. Roosevelt reached the metropolis of the Great Lakes, he found a large crowd waiting at the railroad station to receive him. The reception committee was on hand, with the necessary coaches, and people were crowded everywhere, anxious to catch a sight of the man who had made himself famous by the advance up San Juan Hill.
But for the moment Governor Roosevelt did not see the reception committee, nor did he see the great mass of people. In a far corner of the platform he caught sight of six men, dressed in the faded and tattered uniform of the Rough Riders. They were not men of wealth or position, but they were men of his old command, and he had not forgotten them.
"Glad to see you, boys, glad to see you!" he shouted, as he elbowed his way toward them. "Come up here and shake hands."
"Glad to see you, Colonel," was the ready answer, and the faces of the men broke into broad smiles. They shook hands readily, and willingly answered all of the questions the governor put to them. He asked how each of them was doing, calling them by their names, and concluded by requesting them to come up to the Auditorium later, "for an all-round chat."
"It was a great meeting," said one who was there. "Before the train came in, those old Rough Riders were nervous and showed it. They knew that Roosevelt had become a great man, and they were just a little afraid he would pass them by. When the meeting was over, they went off as happy as a lot of children, and one of them said, 'Say, fellows, Teddy's just all right yet, ain't he?' And another answered: 'Told you he would be. He's a white man through and through, none whiter anywhere.'"
The banquet was held in the Auditorium Theatre building, and was said to be the largest ever given in Chicago. Many distinguished guests were present, both from the North and the South, and the place was a mass of flowers and brilliantly illuminated, while a fine orchestra discoursed music during the meal. When Theodore Roosevelt arose to speak, there was cheering that lasted fully a quarter of an hour.
The speech made upon this occasion is one not likely to be forgotten. Previous to that time the word "strenuous" had been heard but seldom, but ever since it has stood for something definite, and is much in use. In part Mr. Roosevelt spoke as follows:--
"I wish to preach, not the doctrine of ignoble ease, but the doctrine of the strenuous life; the life of toil and effort; of labor and strife; to preach that highest form of success which comes, not to the man who desires mere easy peace, but to the man who does not shirk from danger, from hardship, or from bitter toil, and who out of these wins the splendid ultimate triumph."
Another paragraph is equally interesting and elevating:--
"We do not admire the man of timid peace. We admire the man who embodies victorious effort; the man who never wrongs his neighbor, who is prompt to help a friend; but who has those virile qualities necessary to win in the stern strife of actual life. It is hard to fail; but it is worse never to have tried to succeed."
And to this he adds:--
"As it is with the individual so it is with the nation. It is a base untruth to say that happy is the nation that has no history. Thrice happy is the nation that has a glorious history. Far better is it to dare mighty things to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat."[1]
[Footnote 1: For other extracts from this speech, see Appendix A, p. 297.]
[Illustration: Theodore Roosevelt]
CHAPTER XXI
THE CONVENTION AT PHILADELPHIA--THEODORE ROOSEVELT SECONDS THE NOMINATION OF PRESIDENT MCKINLEY--BECOMES CANDIDATE FOR THE VICE-PRESIDENCY--REMARKABLE TOURS THROUGH MANY STATES
As the time came on to nominate parties for the office of President and Vice-President of the United States, in 1900, there was considerable speculation in the Republican party regarding who should be chosen for the second name on the ticket.
It was felt by everybody that President McKinley had honestly earned a second term, not alone by his management of the war with Spain, but also because of his stand touching the rebellion in the Philippines, and on other matters of equal importance.
About the Vice-Presidency the political managers were not so sure, and they mentioned several names. But in the hearts of the people there was but one name, and that was Theodore Roosevelt.
"We must have him," was heard upon every side. "He will be just the right man in the right place. He will give to the office an importance never before attached to it, and an importance which it deserves."
Personally, Governor Roosevelt did not wish this added honor. As the Executive of the greatest State in our Union, he had started great reforms, and he wanted to finish them.
"My work is here," he said to many. "Let me do what I have been called to do, and then I will again be at the service of the whole nation once more."
The National Republican Convention met in Philadelphia, June 19, in Exposition Hall, beautifully decorated with flags and banners. Senator Mark Hanna, President McKinley's warmest personal friend, was chairman, and the delegates, numbering over seven hundred, came, as usual at such conventions, from every State in the Union. Governor Roosevelt himself was a delegate, and sat near the middle aisle, five or six seats from the front. He was recognized by everybody, and it is safe to say that he was the most conspicuous figure at the convention.
Up to the last minute many of the political leaders were, in a measure, afraid of Theodore Roosevelt. They understood his immense popularity, and were afraid that the convention might be "stampeded" in his favor.
"If they once start to yell for Roosevelt, it will be good-by to everybody else," said one old politician. "They are just crazy after the leader of the Rough Riders."
But this man did not understand the stern moral honesty of the man under consideration. Roosevelt believed in upholding William McKinley, and had said so, and it was no more possible for him to seek the Presidential nomination by an underhanded trick than it was for President McKinley to do an equally base thing when he was asked to allow his name to be mentioned at the time he had pledged himself to support John Sherman.[2] Both men were of equal loyalty, and the word of each was as good as his bond.
[Footnote 2: See "American Boys' Life of William McKinley," p. 191.]
It was Senator Foraker who put up President McKinley for nomination, and the vigorous cheering at that time will never be forgotten. Fifteen thousand throats yelled themselves hoarse, and then broke into the ringing words and music of "The Union Forever!" in a manner that made the very convention hall tremble. Then came cries for Roosevelt, "For our own Teddy of the Rough Riders!" and, written speech in hand, he arose amid that vast multitude to second the candidacy of William McKinley. Not once did he look at the paper he held in his hand, but with a force that could not be misunderstood he addressed the assemblage.
"I rise to second the nomination of William McKinley, because with him as a leader this people has trod the path of national greatness and prosperity with the strides of a giant," said he, "and because under him we can and will succeed in the election. Exactly as in the past we have remedied the evils which we undertook to remedy, so now when we say that a wrong shall be righted, it most assuredly will be righted.
"We stand on the threshold of a new century, a century big with the fate of the great nations of the earth. It rests with us to decide now whether in the opening years of that century we shall march forward to fresh triumphs, or whether at the outset we shall deliberately cripple ourselves for the contest."
His speech was the signal for another burst of applause, and when finally Theodore Roosevelt was named as the candidate for Vice-President, the crowd yelled until it could yell no longer, while many sang "Yankee Doodle" and other more or less patriotic airs, keeping time with canes and flag-sticks. When the vote was cast, only one delegate failed to vote for Theodore Roosevelt, and that was Theodore Roosevelt himself.
The platform of the party was largely a repetition of the platform of four years before. Again the cry was for "sound money," and for the continuance of President McKinley's policy in the Philippines.
The campaign which followed was truly a strenuous one--to use a favorite word of the candidate. President McKinley decided not to make many speeches, and thus the hard work previous to election day fell upon Theodore Roosevelt.
He did not shirk the task. As with everything he undertook, he entered into the campaign with vigor, resolved to deserve success even if he did not win it.
"I will do my best in the interests of our party, and for the benefit of the people at large," said Theodore Roosevelt. "No man can do more than that."
In the few short months between the time when he was nominated and when the election was held, Governor Roosevelt travelled over 20,000 miles by rail, visiting nearly 600 towns, and addressing, on a rough estimate, fully 3,000,000 of people! In that time he delivered 673 speeches, some of them half an hour and some an hour in length.
In his thousands of miles of travel the candidate for the Vice-Presidency visited many States, particularly those lying between New York and Colorado. At nearly every town he was greeted by an immense crowd, all anxious to do the leader of the Rough Riders honor. In the large cities great banquets were held, and he was shown much respect and consideration. In many places those who had fought under him came to see and listen to him, and these meetings were of especial pleasure. Often he would see an old Rough Rider hanging back in the crowd, and would call him to the front or do his best to reach the ex-soldier and shake him by the hand.
One occurrence is worthy of special mention. The Democratic party had nominated William Jennings Bryan as their candidate for President. There was a great labor picnic and demonstration at Chicago, and both Governor Roosevelt and Mr. Bryan were invited to speak.
"You had better not accept, governor," said some friends to Theodore Roosevelt. "There may be trouble."
"I am not afraid," answered the former leader of the Rough Riders.
"But Mr. Bryan and yourself are to be there at practically the same time."
"That does not matter," said the governor. And he went to Chicago on September 3, to attend the Labor Day celebrations. The picnic was held at Electric Park, and in the presence of fifteen thousand people Governor Roosevelt and Mr. Bryan "buried the hatchet" for the time being, and spoke to those surrounding them on the dignity of labor and the duties of the laboring man to better himself and his social conditions. In that motley collection of people there were frequent cries of "Hurrah for Teddy!" and "What's the matter with Bryan? He's all right!" but there was no disturbance, and each speaker was listened to with respectful attention from start to finish. It was without a doubt a meeting to show true American liberty and free speech at its best.
But all of the stops on his tours were not so pleasant to Governor Roosevelt. In every community there are those who are low-bred and bound to make an exhibition of their baseness. At Waverly, New York, a stone was flung at him through the car window, breaking the glass but missing the candidate for whom it was intended. At once there was excitement.
"Are you hurt, Governor?" was the question asked.
"No," returned Theodore Roosevelt. And then he added, with a faint smile, "It's only a bouquet, but I wish, after this, they wouldn't make them quite so hard."
There was also a demonstration against the candidate at Haverstraw, New York, which threatened for a while to break up an intended meeting. But the worst rowdyism was encountered at Victor, a small town in Colorado, near the well-known mining centre of Cripple Creek. Victor was full of miners who wanted not "sound money," but "free silver," for free silver, so styled, meant a great booming of silver mining.
"We don't want him here," said these miners. "We have heard enough about him and his gold standard. He had better keep away, or he'll regret it."
When Theodore Roosevelt was told he might have trouble in the mining camps, he merely shrugged his shoulders.
"I know these men," he said. "The most of them are as honest and respectable as the citizens of New York. I am not afraid of the vicious element. The better class are bound to see fair play."
The governor spoke at a place called Armory Hall, and the auditorium was packed. He had just begun his speech when there was a wild yelling and cat-calling, all calculated to drown him out. He waited for a minute, and then, as the noise subsided, tried to go on once more, when a voice cried out:--
"What about rotten beef?" referring to the beef furnished during the Santiago campaign, which had, of course, come through a Republican Commissary Department.
"I ate that beef," answered the governor, quickly. And then he added to the fellow who had thus questioned him: "You will never get near enough to be hit with a bullet, or within five miles of it." At this many burst into applause, and the man, who was a coward at heart, sneaked from the hall in a hurry. He was no soldier and had never suffered the hardships of any campaign, and many hooted him as he deserved.
But the trouble was not yet over. Theodore Roosevelt finished his address, and then started to leave the hall in company with a number of his friends. On the way to the train a crowd of rowdies followed the candidate's party, and threw all sorts of things at them. One man made a personal attack on the governor and hit him on the chest with a stick. He tried to leap away, but was knocked down by a personal friend of Theodore Roosevelt.
"Down with the gold bugs!" was the cry, and the violence of the mob increased. The friends of Governor Roosevelt rallied to his support, and blows were given and taken freely. But with it all the candidate reached his train in safety, and in a few minutes more had left the town far behind. He was not much disturbed, and the very next day went on with his speech-making as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened. The better classes of citizens of Victor were much disturbed over the happening, and they sent many regrets to Governor Roosevelt, assuring him that such a demonstration would never again be permitted to occur.
CHAPTER XXII
But the campaign, sharp and bitter as it had been, was not yet at an end. In New York City there followed a "Sound Money Parade," which was perhaps the largest of its kind ever witnessed in the United States. It was composed of all sorts and conditions of men, from bankers and brokers of Wall Street to the humble factory and mill hands from up the river and beyond. The parade took several hours to pass, and was witnessed by crowds almost as great as had witnessed the Dewey demonstration.
In New York City, as the time drew closer for the election, there was every intimation that the contest would be an unusually "hot" one, and that there would be much bribery and corruption. It was said by some that police methods were very lax at that time, and that the saloons, which ought to be closed on election day, would be almost if not quite wide open.
[Illustration: _Photograph by Pach Bros., N.Y._
PRESIDENT MCKINLEY AND VICE-PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT.]
"We must have an honest election," said Governor Roosevelt. And without loss of time he sent letters to Mayor Van Wyck, and to the sheriff and the district attorney of the county of New York, calling their attention to the facts in the case, and telling them that he would hold them strictly responsible if they did not do their full duty. As a consequence the election was far more orderly than it might otherwise have been in the metropolitan district.
The results of the long contest were speedily known. McKinley and Roosevelt had been elected by a large plurality, and both they and their numerous friends and supporters were correspondingly happy. Great parades were had in their honor, and it was predicted, and rightly, that the prosperity which our country had enjoyed for several years in the past would continue for many years to come.
During those days the United States had but one outside difficulty, which was in China. There a certain set of people called the Boxers arose in rebellion and threatened the lives of all foreigners, including American citizens. An International Army was organized, including American, English, French, German, Japanese, and other troops, and a quick attack was made upon Tien-Tsin and Pekin, and the suffering foreigners in China were rescued. In this campaign the American soldiers did their full share of the work and added fresh laurels to the name of Old Glory.
The tax upon the strength of the newly elected Vice-President had been very great, and he was glad to surrender the duties of governor into the hands of his successor. But as Vice-President, Theodore Roosevelt became the presiding officer of the United States Senate, a position of equal if not greater importance.
As President of the Senate it is said that Mr. Roosevelt was kind yet firm, and ever on the alert to see that affairs ran smoothly. He occupied the position only for one short winter session, and during that time nothing came under discussion that was of prime importance, although my young readers must remember that all the work accomplished in our Senate is of more or less magnitude.
"He was very earnest in his work," says one who was in the Senate at that time. "As was his usual habit, he took little for granted, but usually started to investigate for himself. He knew the rules thoroughly, and rarely made an error."
For a long time the newly elected Vice-President had been wanting to get back to his favorite recreation, hunting. Despite the excitement of political life, he could not overcome his fondness for his rifle and the wilderness. He felt that an outing would do his system much good, and accordingly arranged for a five weeks' hunting trip in northwestern Colorado.
In this trip, which he has himself described in one of his admirable hunting papers, he had with him two companions, Dr. Gerald Webb of Colorado Springs, and Mr. Philip K. Stewart, an old friend who in former years had been captain of the Yale base-ball team.
The party went as far as the railroad would carry them, and then started for a settlement called Meeker, forty miles distant. The weather was extremely cold, with the thermometer from ten to twenty degrees below zero, but the journey to Meeker was made in safety, and here the hunters met their guide, a well-known hunter of that region named Goff, and started with him for his ranch, several miles away.
Theodore Roosevelt would have liked to bring down a bear on this trip, but the grizzlies were all in winter quarters and sleeping soundly, so the hunt was confined to bob-cats and cougars. The hunting began early, for on the way to the ranch the hounds treed a bob-cat, commonly known as a lynx, which was secured without much trouble, and a second bob-cat was secured the next day.
The territory surrounding Goff's ranch, called the Keystone, was an ideal one for hunting, with clumps of cottonwoods and pines scattered here and there, and numerous cliffs and ravines, the hiding-places of game unnumbered. The ranch home stood at the foot of several well-wooded hills, a long, low, one-story affair, built of rough logs, but clean and comfortable within.
The two days' ride in the nipping air had been a severe test of endurance, and all were glad, when the ranch was reached, to "thaw out" before the roaring fire, and sit down to the hot and hearty meal that had been prepared in anticipation of their coming.
The hunters had some excellent hounds, trained especially for bob-cats and cougars, animals that were never allowed to go after small game under any circumstances. Theodore Roosevelt was much taken with them from the start, and soon got to know each by name.
"In cougar hunting the success of the hunter depends absolutely upon his hounds," says Mr. Roosevelt. And he described each hound with great minuteness, showing that he allowed little to escape his trained eye while on this tour.
On the day after the arrival at the ranch the party went out for its first cougar, which, as my young readers perhaps know, is an animal inhabiting certain wild parts of our West and Southwest. The beast grows to a size of from six to nine feet in length, and weighs several hundred pounds. It is variously known as a puma and panther, the latter name sometimes being changed to "painter." When attacked, it is ofttimes exceedingly savage, and on certain occasions has been known to kill a man.
In Colorado the cougar is hunted almost exclusively with the aid of hounds, and this was the method adopted on the present occasion. With the pen of a true sportsman, Mr. Roosevelt tells us how the hounds were held back until a cougar trail less than thirty-six hours old was struck. Then off went the pack along the cliffs and ravines, with the hunters following on horseback. The trail led up the mountain side and then across the valley opposite, and soon the hounds were out of sight. Leading their steeds, the hunters went down the valley and followed the dogs, to find they had separated among the bare spots beyond. But soon came a welcome sound.
"The cougar's treed," announced the guide. And so it proved. But when the hunters came closer, the cougar, an old female, leaped from the tree, outdistanced the dogs, and leaped into another tree. Then, as the party again came up, the beast took another leap and started to run once more. But now the hounds were too quick, and in a trice they had the cougar surrounded. Slipping in, Theodore Roosevelt ended the struggles of the wild beast by a knife-thrust behind the shoulder.
The next day there was another hunt, and this had rather a tinge of sadness to it. The dogs tracked a mother cougar, who occupied her den with her three kittens. The hounds rushed into the hole, barking furiously, and presently one came out with a dead kitten in his mouth.
"I had supposed a cougar would defend her young to the last," says Mr. Roosevelt, "but such was not the case in this instance. For some minutes she kept the dogs at bay, but gradually gave ground, leaving her three kittens." The dogs killed the kittens without loss of time, and then followed the cougar as she fled from the other end of her hole. But the hounds were too quick for her, and soon had her on the ground. Theodore Roosevelt rushed up, knife in one hand and rifle in the other. With the firearm he struck the beast in the jaws, and then ended the struggle by a knife-thrust straight into the heart.
To many this may seem a cruel sport, and in a certain sense it assuredly is; but my young readers must remember that cougars and other wild beasts are a menace to civilization in the far West, and they have been shot down and killed at every available opportunity. More than this, as I have already mentioned, Theodore Roosevelt is more than a mere hunter delighting in bloodshed. He is a naturalist, and examines with care everything brought down and reports upon it, so that his hunting trips have added not a little to up-to-date natural history. The skulls of the various animals killed on this trip were forwarded to the Biological Survey, Department of Agriculture, Washington, and in return Mr. Roosevelt received a letter, part of which stated:--
"Your series of skulls from Colorado is incomparably the largest, most complete, and most valuable series ever brought together from any single locality, and will be of inestimable value in determining the amount of individual variation."
CHAPTER XXIII
THE ROOSEVELT FAMILY IN THE ADIRONDACKS--THE PAN-AMERICAN EXPOSITION AT BUFFALO--SHOOTING OF PRESIDENT MCKINLEY--THE VICE-PRESIDENT'S VISIT--DEATH OF THE PRESIDENT
Theodore Roosevelt's companions of the hunt remained with him for fourteen days, after which they departed, leaving him with Goff, the ranchman and hunter already mentioned.
When the pair were alone, they visited Juniper Mountain, said to be a great ground for cougars and bob-cats, and there hunted with great success. All together the trip of five weeks' hunting netted fourteen cougars, the largest of which was eight feet in length and weighed 227 pounds. Mr. Roosevelt also brought down five bob-cats, showing that he was just as skilful with his rifle as ever.
The hero of San Juan Hill fairly loved the outdoor exercise of the hunt, and spent three weeks in keen enjoyment after his companions had departed. During this time it snowed heavily, so that the hunters were often compelled to remain indoors. As luck would have it there were other ranches in that vicinity, with owners that were hospitable, so that they did not have to go into camp, as would otherwise have been the case.
On the last day of the hunt, Theodore Roosevelt was able to bring down the largest cougar yet encountered. The hounds were on the trail of one beast when they came across that of another and took it up with but little warning.
"We're going to get a big one now," said Goff. "Just you wait and see."
"Well, if we do, it will be a good ending to my outing," responded Theodore Roosevelt.
The cougar was at last located by the hounds in a large pinyon on the side of a hill. It had run a long distance and was evidently out of breath, but as the hunters drew closer, it leaped to the ground and trotted away through the snow. Away went the hounds on the new trail of the beast.
"He's game, and he'll get away if he can," said the guide.
At the top of another hill the cougar halted and one of the hounds leaped in, and was immediately sent sprawling by a savage blow of the wild animal's paw. Then on went the cougar as before, the hounds barking wildly as they went in pursuit.
When Theodore Roosevelt came up once more, the cougar was in another pinyon tree, with the hounds in a semicircle on the ground below.
"Now I think I've got him," whispered Theodore Roosevelt to his companion, and advanced on foot, with great cautiousness. At first he could see nothing, but at last made out the back and tail of the great beast, as it lay crouched among the branches. With great care he took aim and fired, and the cougar fell to the ground, shot through the back.
At once the hounds rushed in and seized the game. But the cougar was not yet dead, and snapping and snarling the beast slipped over the ground and down a hillside, with the dogs all around it. Theodore Roosevelt came up behind, working his way through the brush with all speed. Then, watching his chance, he jumped in, hunting-knife in hand, and despatched the game.
"A good haul," cried Goff. And later on he and his men came to the conclusion that it was the same cougar that had carried off a cow and a steer and killed a work horse belonging to one of the ranches near by.
The five weeks spent in the far West strengthened Theodore Roosevelt a great deal, and it was with renewed energy that he took up his duties as Vice-President of our nation.
In the meantime, however, matters were not going on so well at home. Among the children two had been very sick, and in the summer it was suggested that some pure mountain air would do them a great deal of good.
"Very well, we'll go to the mountains," said Mr. Roosevelt, and looked around to learn what place would be best to choose.
Among the Adirondack Mountains of New York State there is a reservation of ninety-six thousand acres leased by what is called the Adirondack Club, a wealthy organization of people who have numerous summer cottages built within the preserve.
Among the members was a Mr. McNaughten, an old friend of the Roosevelt family, and he suggested that they occupy his cottage until the close of the season. This invitation was accepted, and the whole Roosevelt family moved up to the spot, which was located at the foot of Mount Marcy, the largest of the mountains in that vicinity. Here Mr. Roosevelt spent much time in hunting and fishing, and also in writing. The family were not forgotten, and he frequently went out with the whole party, rowing and exploring. Sometimes they took baskets of lunch with them and had regular picnics in the woods, something the Roosevelt children enjoyed very much.
In the meantime the Pan-American Exposition at Buffalo, New York, had been opened, and day after day it was thronged with visitors. Vice-President Roosevelt had assisted at the opening, and he was one of many who hoped the Exposition would be a great success.
At the Exposition our government had a large exhibit, and it was thought highly proper that President McKinley should visit the ground in his official capacity and deliver an address. Preparations were accordingly made, and the address was delivered on September 5 to a most enthusiastic throng.[3]
[Footnote 3: For this speech in full, and for what happened after it was delivered, see "American Boys' Life of McKinley."]
On the following day the President was driven to the Temple of Music, on the Exposition grounds, there to hold a public reception. The crowds were as great as ever, but perfectly orderly, and filed in at one side of the building and out at the other, each person in turn being permitted to grasp the Chief Magistrate's hand.
For a while all went well, and nobody noticed anything unusual about a somewhat weak-faced individual who joined the crowd, and who had one hand covered with a handkerchief. As this rascal came up to shake hands, he raised the hand with the handkerchief and, using a concealed pistol, fired two shots at President McKinley.
For an instant everybody was dazed. Then followed a commotion, and while some went to the wounded Executive's assistance, others leaped upon the dastardly assassin and made him a prisoner.
There was an excellent hospital upon the Exposition grounds, and to this President McKinley was carried. Here it was found that both bullets had entered his body, one having struck the breastbone and the other having entered the abdomen. The physicians present did all they possibly could for him, and then he was removed to the residence of Mr. Millburn, the President of the Exposition.
In the meantime, all unconscious of the awful happening that was to have such an influence upon his future, Mr. Roosevelt had been enjoying himself with his family, and helping to take care of the children that were not yet totally recovered from their illness. All seemed to be progressing finely, and he had gone off on a little tour to Vermont, to visit some points of interest and deliver a few addresses.
He was at Isle La Motte, not far from Burlington, when the news reached him that President McKinley had been shot. He had just finished an address, and for the moment he could not believe the sad news.
"Shot!" he said. "How dreadful!" And could scarcely say another word. He asked for the latest bulletin, and, forgetful of all else, took the first train he could get to Buffalo, and then hastened to the side of his Chief.
It was truly a sad meeting. For many years these two men had known each other, and they were warm friends. Their methods were somewhat different, but each stood for what was just and right and true, and each was ready to give his country his best service, no matter what the cost.
It was a sad time for the whole nation, and men and women watched the bulletins eagerly, hoping and praying that President McKinley might recover. Every hour there was some slight change, and people would talk it over in a whisper.
In a few days there were hopeful signs, and the physicians, deceived by them, said they thought the President would recover. This was glad news to Theodore Roosevelt. Yet he lingered on, fearful to go away, lest the news should prove untrue and he should be needed. But then there was a still brighter turn, and he thought of his own family, and of the fact that one of his children was again ill.
"I will return to my family," said he to two of his closest friends. "But if I am needed here, let me know at once." And his friends promised to keep him informed. Two days later he was back among the Adirondacks, in the bosom of his family.
The prayers of a whole nation were in vain. William McKinley's mission on earth was finished, and one week after he was shot he breathed his last. His wife came to bid him farewell, and so did his other relatives, and his friend of many years, Mark Hanna, and the members of his Cabinet.
"It is God's way," murmured the dying Executive. "His will be done, not ours." Then like a child going to sleep, he relapsed into unconsciousness, from which he did not recover. He died September 14, 1901, at a little after two o'clock in the morning.
It was the last of a truly great life. Illustrious men may come and go, but William McKinley will be remembered so long as our nation endures. As a soldier and a statesman he gave his best talents to better the conditions of his fellow-creatures, and to place the United States where we justly belong, among the truly great nations of the world.
CHAPTER XXIV
With a somewhat lighter heart, Theodore Roosevelt returned to the Adirondacks and joined his family on Wednesday, three days previous to President McKinley's death. The last report he had received from Buffalo was the most encouraging of any, and he now felt almost certain that the President would survive the outrageous attack that had been made upon his person.
"He will get well," said several who lived close by. "You need not worry about his condition any longer."
On the following day it was planned to go up to Colton Lake, five miles from where the family was stopping. Some friends went along, and in the party were Mrs. Roosevelt and several of the children. Two guides accompanied them, and it was decided to spend the night at a camp on the lake, returning home the following day.
The next morning it rained, but in spite of this drawback Theodore Roosevelt, leaving the ladies and children to return to the cottage, started to climb Mount Marcy. Such an undertaking was exactly to his liking, and he went up the rough and uneven trail with the vigor of a trained woodsman, the guide leading the way and the other gentlemen of the party following.
At last, high up on the side of Mount Marcy, the party reached a small body of water known as Tear of the Clouds, and here they rested for lunch.
"You are certainly a great walker, Mr. Roosevelt," remarked one of the gentlemen during the progress of the lunch.
"Oh, I have to be," answered Theodore Roosevelt, jokingly. "A Vice-President needs exercise to keep him alive. You see, when he is in the Senate, all of his work is done sitting down."
The words had scarcely been uttered when one of the party pointed to a man climbing up the mountain side toward them. The newcomer held some yellow telegram-slips in his hand, and Theodore Roosevelt quickly arose to receive them.
He had soon mastered the contents of the messages. President McKinley was much worse; it was likely that he would not live. For fully a minute Mr. Roosevelt did not speak. He realized the great responsibility which rested upon his shoulders. Then, in a voice filled with emotion, he read the messages aloud.
"Gentlemen," he continued, "I must return to the club-house at once." And without waiting, he turned and started down the mountain side along the trail by which he had come.
It was a long, hard walk, but it is doubtful if Theodore Roosevelt took note of it. A thousand thoughts must have flashed through his mind. If William McKinley should indeed breathe his last, the nation would look to him as their Chief Magistrate. He could not make himself believe that his President was to die.
It was not long before Theodore Roosevelt reached the club-house at the lake. He asked for further news, but none was forthcoming.
"We will send to the lower club-house at once," said his friends. "You had better take a short rest, in case you have a sudden call to make the trip to Buffalo."
A misty rain was falling, and the atmosphere of the mountains was raw and penetrating. Messengers were quickly despatched to the lower club-house, and by eleven o'clock that evening news came back that left no doubt of the true condition of affairs. President McKinley was sinking rapidly, and his death was now only a question of a few hours.
"I must go, and at once," said Theodore Roosevelt. And soon a light wagon drove up to the club-house, and he leaped in. There was a short good-by to his family and his friends, the whip cracked, and the drive of thirty-five miles to the nearest railroad station was begun.
It was a never-to-be-forgotten journey. For ten miles or more the road was fearfully rough and ran around the edges of overhanging cliffs, where a false turn might mean death. Then at times the road went down into deep hollows and over rocky hills. All was pitch black, save for the tiny yellow light hanging over the dashboard of the turnout. Crouched on the seat, Mr. Roosevelt urged the driver to go on, and go on they did, making better time during that rain and darkness than had before been made in broad daylight.
At last a place called Hunter's was reached, and Theodore Roosevelt alighted.
"What news have you for me?" he asked of a waiting messenger, and the latest message was handed to him. There was no new hope,--President McKinley was sinking faster than ever. New horses were obtained, and the second part of the journey, from Hunter's to Aiden Lair, was begun.
And during that wild, swift ride of nine miles, when it seemed to Theodore Roosevelt as if he were racing against death, the angel of Life Everlasting claimed William McKinley, and the man crouched in the wagon, wet from the rain, hurrying to reach him, became the next President of the United States.
It was a little after three in the morning when Aiden Lair was reached. The sufferer at Buffalo had breathed his last, but Theodore Roosevelt did not know it, and he still hoped for the best. More fresh horses, and now the last sixteen miles of the rough journey were made on a buckboard. In spots the road was worse than it had previously been, and the driver was tempted to go slow.
"Go on!" cried Mr. Roosevelt, and held his watch in hand. "Go on!" And the driver obeyed, the buckboard dancing up and down over the rocks and swinging dangerously from side to side around the curves of ravines. But Theodore Roosevelt's mind was not on the road nor on the peril of that ride, but in that room in Buffalo where the great tragedy had just seen its completion.
At last, a little after five in the morning, the turnout came in sight of the railroad station at North Creek. A special train was in waiting for him. He gazed anxiously at the little knot of people assembled. Their very faces told him the sorrowful truth. President McKinley was dead.
With bowed head he entered a private car of the special train, and without delay the train started on its journey southward for Albany. No time was lost on this portion of the trip, and at seven o'clock Theodore Roosevelt reached the city in which but a short time before he had presided as Governor of the State.
At Albany he was met by Secretary of State Hay, who informed him officially that President McKinley was no more. He likewise informed the Vice-President that, considering the excitement, it might be best that Mr. Roosevelt be sworn in as President without delay.
Another special train was in waiting at Albany, and this was rushed westward with all possible speed, arriving in Buffalo at half-past one in the afternoon. In order to avoid the tremendous crowd at the Union railroad station, Mr. Roosevelt alighted at the Terrace station. Here he was met by several friends with a carriage and also a detachment of the Fourth Signal Corps and a squad of mounted police.
Without loss of time Theodore Roosevelt was driven to the Millburn house. Here he found a great many friends and relatives of the dead President assembled. All were too shocked over what had occurred to say much, and shook the hand of the coming President in silence.
Thousands of eyes were upon Theodore Roosevelt, but he noticed them not. Entering the Millburn house, he thought only of the one who had surrendered his life while doing his duty, and of that kind and patient woman now left to fight the battles of this world alone. He offered what consolation he could to Mrs. McKinley, heard the little that had not yet been told of that final struggle to fight off death, and then took his departure, to assume the high office thus suddenly and unexpectedly thrust upon him.
CHAPTER XXV
TAKES THE OATH AS PRESIDENT--THE NEW CHIEF MAGISTRATE AT THE FUNERAL OF PRESIDENT MCKINLEY--AT THE WHITE HOUSE--HOW THE FIRST REAL WORKING DAY WAS SPENT
The new President took the oath of office at the residence of Mr. Ansley Wilcox in Buffalo. It is a fine, substantial mansion and has ever since been of historic interest to sight-seers.
When he arrived at the Wilcox home, he found a number of members of the McKinley Cabinet awaiting him, as well as Judge John R. Hazel, of the United States District Court, who administered the oath; and ten or a dozen others.
The scene was truly an affecting one. Secretary Root could scarcely control himself, for, twenty years before, he had been at a similar scene, when Vice-President Arthur became Chief Magistrate, after the assassination of President Garfield. In a voice filled with emotion he requested Vice-President Roosevelt, on behalf of the Cabinet as a whole, to take the prescribed oath.
It is recorded by an eye-witness that Theodore Roosevelt was pale, and that his eyes were dim with tears, as he stepped forward to do as bidden. His hand was uplifted, and then in a solemn voice the judge began the oath:--
"I do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will, to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States."
The words were repeated in a low but distinct voice by Theodore Roosevelt, and a moment of utter silence followed.
"Mr. President, please attach your signature," went on the judge. And in a firm hand the new Chief Executive wrote "Theodore Roosevelt" at the bottom of the all-important document which made him the President of our beloved country.
Standing in that room, the President felt the great responsibility which now rested on his shoulders, and turning to those before him, he spoke as follows:--
"In this hour of deep and terrible bereavement, I wish to state that it shall be my aim to continue absolutely unbroken the policy of President McKinley for the peace and prosperity and honor of our country."
These were no mere words, as his actions immediately afterward prove. On reaching Washington he assembled the Cabinet at the home of Commander Cowles, his brother-in-law, and there spoke to them somewhat in this strain:--
"I wish to make it clear to you, gentlemen, that what I said at Buffalo I meant. I want each of you to remain as a member of my Cabinet. I need your advice and counsel. I tender you the office in the same manner that I would tender it if I were entering upon the discharge of my duties as the result of an election by the people." Having thus declared himself, the newly made President asked each member personally to stay with him. It was a sincere request, and the Cabinet members all agreed to remain by Mr. Roosevelt and aid him exactly as they had been aiding Mr. McKinley. Thus was it shown to the world at large, and especially to the anarchists, of which the assassin of McKinley had been one, that though the President might be slain, the government still lived.
The entire country was prostrate over the sudden death of President McKinley, and one of the first acts of Theodore Roosevelt, after assuming the responsibilities of his office, was to issue the following proclamation:--
"A terrible bereavement has befallen our people. The President of the United States has been struck down; a crime committed not only against the Chief Magistrate, but against every law-abiding and liberty-loving citizen.
"President McKinley crowned a life of largest love for his fellow-men, of most earnest endeavor for their welfare, by a death of Christian fortitude; and both the way in which he lived his life and the way in which, in the supreme hour of trial, he met his death, will remain forever a precious heritage of our people.
"It is meet that we, as a nation, express our abiding love and reverence for his life, our deep sorrow for his untimely death.
"Now, therefore, I, Theodore Roosevelt, President of the United States, do appoint Thursday next, September 19, the day in which the body of the dead President will be laid in its last earthly resting-place, a day of mourning and prayer throughout the United States.
"I earnestly recommend all the people to assemble on that day in their respective places of divine worship, there to bow down in submission to the will of Almighty God, and to pay out of full hearts their homage of love and reverence to the great and good President whose death has smitten the nation with bitter grief."
The funeral of President McKinley was a most imposing one. The body was at first laid in state in the City Hall at Buffalo, where President Roosevelt and fully a hundred and fifty thousand men, women, and children went to view the remains. From Buffalo the remains were taken by special funeral train to Washington, and there placed in the Rotunda of the Capitol. Here the crowd was equally great, and here the services were attended by representatives from almost every civilized nation on the globe. Outside a marine band was stationed, playing the dead President's favorite hymns, "Lead, Kindly Light" and "Nearer, my God, to Thee," and in the singing of these thousands of mourners joined, while the tears of sorrow streamed down their faces.
From Washington the body of the martyred President was taken to Canton, Ohio, where had been his private home. Here his friends and neighbors assembled to do him final honor, and great arches of green branches and flowers were erected, under which the funeral cortege passed. As the body was placed in the receiving vault, business throughout the entire United States was suspended. In spirit, eighty millions of people were surrounding the mortal clay left by the passing of a soul to the place whence it had come. It was truly a funeral of which the greatest of kings might well be proud.
The taking-off of President McKinley undoubtedly had a great effect upon President Roosevelt. During the Presidential campaign the Vice-Presidential nominee had made many speeches in behalf of his fellow candidate, showing the high personal character of McKinley, and what might be expected from the man in case he was elected once more to the office of Chief Magistrate. More than this, when Assistant Secretary of the Navy, Mr. Roosevelt had done his best to carry out the plans formulated by the President. The two were close friends, and in the one brief session of the Senate when he was Vice-President, Mr. Roosevelt gave to President McKinley many evidences of his high regard.
On returning to Washington, President Roosevelt did not at once take up his residence at the White House, preferring that the place should be left to Mrs. McKinley until she had sufficiently recovered from her terrible shock to arrange for the removal of the family's personal effects.
As it may interest some of my young readers to know how President Roosevelt's first day as an active President was spent, I append the following, taken down at the time by a reporter for a press association:--
"Reached the White House from Canton, on September 20, 1901, at 9.40 A.M. Went at once to the private office formerly occupied by President McKinley, and, as speedily as possible, settled down for the business of the day.
"Met Secretary Long of the navy in the cabinet room and held a discussion concerning naval matters; received Colonel Sanger to talk over some army appointments; signed appointments of General J. M. Bell and others; met Senators Cullom and Proctor.
"At 11 A.M. called for the first time formal meeting of the Cabinet and transacted business of that body until 12.30 P.M.
"Received his old friend, General Wood, and held conference with him and with Secretary Root in regard to Cuban election laws.
"President Roosevelt left the White House at 1.20 P.M. to take lunch with Secretary Hay at the latter's residence. He was alone, disregarding the services of a body-guard.
"Returned to the White House at 3.30 P.M. and transacted business with some officials and received a few personal friends.
"Engaged with Secretary Cortelyou from 4 P.M. to 6.30 P.M. in the transaction of public business, disposal of mail, etc.
"Left the White House unattended at 6.30 P.M. and walked through the semi-dark streets of Washington to 1733 N Street, N.W., the residence of his brother-in-law, Commander Cowles. Dined in private with the family.
"Late in the evening received a few close friends. Retired at 11 P.M."
It will be observed that special mention is made of the fact that President Roosevelt travelled around alone. Immediately after the terrible tragedy at Buffalo many citizens were of the opinion that the Chief Magistrate of our nation ought to be strongly protected, for fear of further violence, but to this Theodore Roosevelt would not listen.
"I am not afraid," he said calmly. "We are living in a peaceful country, and the great mass of our people are orderly, law-abiding citizens. I can trust them, and take care of myself." And to this he held, despite the protestations of his closest friends. Of course he is scarcely ever without some guard or secret service detective close at hand, but no outward display of such protection is permitted. And let it be added to the credit of our people that, though a few cranks and crazy persons have caused him a little annoyance, he has never, up to the present time, been molested in any way.
CHAPTER XXVI
President Roosevelt had said he would continue the policy inaugurated by President McKinley, and one of the important steps in this direction was to appoint many to office who had been expecting appointment at the hands of the martyred President. This gained him many friends, and soon some who had kept themselves at a distance flocked around, to aid him in every possible manner.
Late in September the last of the McKinley effects were taken from the White House, and some days later the newly made President moved in, with his family, who had come down from the Adirondacks some time previous. In Washington the family were joined by Mr. Roosevelt's two brothers-in-law, Commander Wm. Sheffield Cowles and Mr. Douglas Robinson, and their wives, and the relatives remained together for some days.
It was at first feared by some politicians that President Roosevelt would be what is termed a "sectional President,"--that is, that he would favor one section of our country to the exclusion of the others, but he soon proved that he was altogether too noble for such baseness.
"I am going to be President of the whole United States," he said. "I don't care for sections or sectional lines. I was born in the North, but my mother was from the South, and I have spent much of my time in the West, so I think I can fairly represent the whole country."
President Roosevelt sympathized deeply with the condition of the negroes in the South, and for the purpose of learning the true state of affairs sent for Mr. Booker T. Washington, one of the foremost colored men of this country and founder of the Tuskegee Industrial School for Colored People. They had a long conference at the White House, which Mr. Washington enjoyed very much. For this action many criticised the President severely, but to this he paid no attention, satisfied that he had done his duty as his conscience dictated.
[Illustration: PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT AT HIS DESK.]
President Roosevelt's first message to Congress was awaited with considerable interest. It was remembered that he was the youngest Executive our White House had ever known, and many were curious to know what he would say and what he proposed to do.
The Fifty-seventh Congress of the United States assembled at Washington, December 2, 1901, and on the day following, President Roosevelt's first annual message was read in both Senate and House of Representatives.
It proved to be a surprisingly long and strong state paper, and by many was considered one of the best messages sent to Congress in many years. It touched upon general conditions in our country, spoke for improvements in the army and the navy, called for closer attention to civil service reform, for a correction of the faults in the post-office system, and for a clean administration in the Philippines, Hawaii, and Porto Rico. It spoke of several great needs of the government, and added that the Gold Standard Act had been found timely and judicious.
"President Roosevelt is all right," was the general comment, after the message had been printed in the various papers of our country. "He is looking ahead, and he knows exactly what this country wants and needs. We are prosperous now, and if we want to continue so, we must keep our hands on the plough, and not look backward."
The first break in the old Cabinet occurred on December 17, when Postmaster General Charles E. Smith resigned. His place was immediately filled by the appointment of Henry C. Payne, of Wisconsin. Soon after this Secretary Gage of the Treasury resigned, and his place was filled by former governor Leslie M. Shaw, of Iowa.
For a long time there had been before the American people various suggestions to build a canal across Central America, to join the Atlantic and the Pacific oceans, so that the ships wanting to go from one body of water to the other would not have to take the long and expensive trip around Cape Horn.
In years gone by the French had also contemplated such a canal, and had even gone to work at the Isthmus of Panama, making an elaborate survey and doing not a little digging. But the work was beyond them, and the French Canal Company soon ran out of funds and went into the hands of a receiver.
"We ought to take hold and dig a canal," was heard on all sides in the United States. But where to dig the canal was a question. Some said the Isthmus of Panama was the best place, while others preferred a route through Nicaragua. The discussion waxed very warm, and at last a Commission was appointed to go over both routes and find out which would be the more satisfactory from every point of view.
The Commission was not very long in reaching a decision. The Panama Canal Company was willing to sell out all its interest in the work already done for forty millions of dollars, and it was recommended that the United States accept this offer. President Roosevelt received the report, and lost no time in submitting it to Congress.
At the beginning of the new year, 1902, there was a grand ball at the White House, attended by a large gathering of people, including many of the foreign representatives accredited to Washington. The occasion was the introduction into society of Miss Alice Roosevelt, and the affair was a most pleasing one from beginning to end.
One of the President's sons, Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., had been sent to a boarding school at Groton, Massachusetts. Early in February he was taken down with a cold that developed into pneumonia. It looked as if the youth might die, and both Mrs. Roosevelt and the President lost no time in leaving Washington and going to his bedside. The sympathy of the whole country was with the anxious parents, and when it was announced that the crisis had been passed in safety there was much relief in all quarters.
Before this illness occurred there came to the Roosevelts an invitation which pleased them, and especially Miss Alice, not a little. The German Emperor William was having a yacht built in this country, at Shooter's Island. He sent his brother, Prince Henry of Prussia, over to attend the launching, and requested Miss Roosevelt to christen the yacht, which was to be called the _Meteor_.
The arrival of Prince Henry was made a gala day by many who wished to see the friendship between the United States and Germany more firmly cemented than ever, and the royal visitor was treated with every consideration wherever he went. From New York he journeyed to Washington, where he dined with the President. He returned to New York with President Roosevelt and with Miss Roosevelt, and on February 25 the launching occurred, in the presence of thousands of people and a great many craft of all sorts. Miss Roosevelt performed the christening in appropriate style, and this was followed by music from a band and the blowing of hundreds of steam whistles. After these ceremonies were over, there followed an elaborate dinner given by the mayor of New York, and then the Prince started on a tour of the country lasting two weeks. His visit made a good impression wherever he went, and he was universally put down as a right good fellow.
It was about this time that President Roosevelt showed he was not to be led altogether by what his party did. So far he had not vetoed any measures sent to him for his signature. Now, however, a bill came to him touching the desertion of a sailor in the navy. Congress was willing to strike the black record of the sailor from the books, but President Roosevelt would not have it.
"The sailor did wrong," he said. "He knew what he was doing, too. The record against him must stand." And he vetoed the bill. On the other hand he was prompt to recognize real worth in those who had served the government, and when over two hundred private pension bills came before him for his approval, he signed them without a murmur.
The people of Charleston, South Carolina, had been arranging for a long time to hold an exposition which should set forth the real advance and worth of the leading southern industries. This exposition was now open to the public, and President Roosevelt and his wife were invited to attend the exhibit. With so much southern blood in his veins, the President could not think of refusing, and he and Mrs. Roosevelt visited the exposition early in April.
It was a gala day at Charleston, and the President and Mrs. Roosevelt were received with every honor due their rank, and with great personal consideration. Governor McSweeney of the state was assisted by Governor Aycock, of North Carolina, in receiving President Roosevelt.
A stirring patriotic speech was made by the President during his visit, and a feature of the trip was the presentation of a sword to Major Micah Jenkins of the Rough Riders. A great number of President Roosevelt's former troopers were present, and all were glad, as of old, to crowd around and take him by the hand.
CHAPTER XXVII
During the summer of 1902 two matters of great importance occurred in which the whole people of our nation were deeply interested.
Early in May occurred tremendous volcanic eruptions on the islands of Martinique and St. Vincent. At the former island, Mont Pelee threw such a rain of fire upon the town of St. Pierre that the entire place, with about thirty thousand people, was wiped out of existence in a minute. At other points the eruptions were not so bad, yet hundreds lost their lives, and all of the islands of the Lesser Antilles were thrown into a state bordering upon panic.
It was felt that something must be done, and at once, for the sufferers, and a large fund for relief was gathered, of which the Americans contributed their full share. The volcanic disturbances continued for some time, and as it was thought they might also cover certain portions of Central America, nothing was done further concerning a canal to unite the two oceans.
The other event of importance was the strike of thousands upon thousands of coal-miners, working in Pennsylvania and other states. The miners did not think they were being treated rightly and went out in a body, and for many weeks not a pound of coal of any kind was mined. This produced a double hardship, for people could get no coal either for the fall or winter, and the miners were, in some cases, reduced almost to the verge of starvation. Neither the workmen nor the operators of the mines would give in, and soon there was more or less violence, and some soldiers had to be called out in an effort to preserve order.
As matters went from bad to worse, and it looked as if the entire eastern section of our country would have to go without coal for the winter, there were loud demands that the government take hold of the difficulty and settle the matter, if not in one way, then in another.
At last, early in October, the whole country was aroused, for it was felt that with no coal a winter of untold suffering stared the people in the face. President Roosevelt held a conference at Washington with the mine operators and the representatives of the miners.
"We must get together, gentlemen," said he. "The country cannot do without coal, and you must supply it to us." And he laid down the law in a manner not to be misunderstood.
Another conference followed, and then a third, and at last the coal operators asked the President to appoint a Commission to decide upon the points in dispute. To this the representative of the mine workers agreed, and as a result a Commission was appointed by President Roosevelt, which was to settle all points in dispute, and by its decision each side was to abide. In the meantime, while the Commission was at work, the mine workers were to resume their labors. The mines were thereupon once more put in operation, after a strike lasting over five months. This is the greatest coal strike known in American history, and it is not likely that the people at large will ever again permit themselves to suffer for the want of coal as they did during that fall and the winter which followed.
Early in June occurred the centennial celebration of the founding of the United States Military Academy at West Point. The occasion was made one of great interest, and among the many distinguished visitors were President Roosevelt and General Miles, head of our army at that time. The President reviewed the cadets and made a speech to them, complimenting them on their truly excellent showing as soldiers.
Although very busy with matters of state, President Roosevelt received an urgent call to deliver a Fourth of July oration at Pittsburg. He consented, and spoke to a vast assemblage on the rights and duties of American citizens.
To remain in Washington during the hot summer months was out of the question with President Roosevelt and his family, and early in the season he removed to Oyster Bay, there to enjoy himself as best he might during the short time allowed him for recreation.
That the business of the administration might not be too seriously interrupted, he hired a few rooms over a bank building in the village of Oyster Bay, and these were fitted up for himself and his several secretaries and assistants. To the bank building he rode or drove every day, spending an hour or more over the routine work required. By this means undesirable visitors were kept away from his private residence, and he was permitted to enjoy himself as he pleased in company with his family.
While Mr. Roosevelt was summering at Oyster Bay, it was arranged that he should make a short tour through New England, to last from August 22 to September 3. The trip covered every New England State, and was one of great pleasure to the President until the last day. Everywhere he went he was greeted by enthusiastic crowds, and, of course, had to make one of his characteristic speeches, accompanied by a great deal of hand-shaking.
On the last day of the trip he was at Dalton, Massachusetts, the home of Governor Crane. It had been planned to drive from Dalton to Lenox, a beautiful spot, adjoining Laurel Lake, where are located the summer homes of many American millionnaires.
The trip was begun without a thought of what was to follow. In the party, besides President Roosevelt, were Governor Crane, Secretary Cortelyou (afterward made a member of the Cabinet), United States Secret Service officer William Craig, and the driver of the carriage. It may be mentioned here that William Craig was detailed as a special guard for the President, and had been with him since the tour was begun.
There are a number of trolley lines in this section of Massachusetts, all centring in Pittsfield. As the mass of the people were very anxious to see President Roosevelt, the trolleys going to the points where he would pass were crowded, and the cars were run with more than usual speed.
As the carriage containing the President and his companions attempted to cross the trolley tracks a car came bounding along at a rapid rate of speed. There seemed to be no time in which to stop the car, and in an instant the long and heavy affair crashed into the carriage with all force, hurling the occupants to the street in all directions. The Secret Service officer, William Craig, was instantly killed, and the driver of the carriage was seriously hurt.
There was immediate and great excitement, and for the time being it was feared that President Roosevelt had been seriously injured. He had been struck a sharp blow on the leg, and had fallen on his face, cutting it not a little. The shock was a severe one, but in a little while he was himself once more, although his face was much swollen. Later still a small abscess formed on the injured limb, but this was skilfully treated by his physician, and soon disappeared. The others in the carriage escaped with but a few bruises and a general shaking-up.
The result of this accident, small as it was to the President personally, showed well how firmly he was seated in the affection of his fellow-citizens. From all over the country, as well as from his friends in foreign climes, telegrams of congratulation came pouring in. Everybody was glad that he had escaped, and everybody wished to show how he felt over the affair.
"President Roosevelt was much affected by the messages received," said one who was in a position to know. "It showed him that his friends were in every walk of life, from the highest to the lowest. Had he met death, as did the Secret Service officer detailed to guard over him, the shock to the people, coming so soon after the assassination of President McKinley, would have been tremendous."
The President had already been persuaded to consent to a short trip to the South, from September 5 to 10, and then a trip to the West, lasting until September 19, or longer. The trips came to an end on September 23, in Indiana, because of the abscess on the lower limb already mentioned, yet on November 19 he was given a grand reception by the people of Memphis, Tennessee, who flocked around him and were glad to see him as well as ever.
"We are so glad you escaped from that trolley accident!" was heard a hundred times.
"We can't afford to lose you, Mr. President," said others. "Really good men are too scarce." And then a cheer would go up for "The hero of San Juan Hill!"
His speeches on these trips were largely about the trusts and monopolies that are trying to control various industries of our country. It is an intricate subject, yet it can be said that Mr. Roosevelt understands it as well as any one, and is laboring hard to do what is right and best, both for the consumer and the capitalist.
Congress had, some time before, voted a large sum for the extension and improvement of the White House, and while Mr. Roosevelt and his family were at Oyster Bay these improvements were begun. They continued during the fall, and the President made his temporary home at a private residence in the capital city. Here it was he was treated for his wounded limb, and here he ended the coal strike, as already chronicled.
CHAPTER XXVIII
The end of the year found President Roosevelt in the best of health, despite the accident some weeks previous. The improvements at the White House were now complete, and the family of the Chief Magistrate took possession. A separate set of offices for the President and his Cabinet had been built at the western end of the executive mansion, and the rooms formerly used for this purpose were turned into living apartments. The changes made have been approved by many who have seen them, and they have wondered why the alterations were not made a long time ago.
On December 1, Congress assembled for a new session, and on the day following the President's message was read. It was a masterly state paper, dealing with the trust question, our relations with the new government of Cuba (for the island was now free, just as we had meant it to be when the war with Spain started), the creation of a new department of Commerce and Labor, needs of the army and navy, and the all-important matter of how the Philippines should be governed. It may be added here that not long after this a Department of Commerce and Labor was created by Congress, and Mr. George B. Cortelyou, the secretary to the President, became its first official head. When Mr. Cortelyou left his post as secretary, Mr. William Loeb, Jr., who had been the President's private secretary for some time, became the regular first secretary to the Chief Magistrate, a place he occupies to-day.
Just about this time there was considerable trouble in Indianola, Mississippi. A colored young lady had been appointed postmistress, and the people in that vicinity refused to recognize her. The Post-Office Department did what it could in the matter, and then referred the case to the President.
[Illustration: THE WHITE HOUSE, SHOWING NEW OFFICES.]
"As she has been regularly appointed, the people will have to accept her," said Mr. Roosevelt. And when there was more trouble, he sent forward an order that the post-office be shut up entirely. This was done, and for a long time the people of that vicinity had to get their mail elsewhere, a great inconvenience to them.
On January 1, 1903, the new cable to the Hawaiian Islands was completed, and President Roosevelt received a message from Governor Dole, and sent a reply to the same. About two weeks later the President sent a wireless, or rather cableless, message to King Edward of England. This helped to mark the beginning of a new era in message-sending which may cause great changes in the transmission of messages in the future.
For some time past there had been a small-sized war going on in Venezuela, South America, between that nation on one hand and England, Germany, and Italy on the other. This war had caused much disturbance to American trade. Pressure was brought to bear upon the several nations through President Roosevelt, and at last it was agreed to leave matters to be settled by arbitration at The Hague. The agreements to this end were signed at Washington, much to the President's satisfaction. All trouble then ceased, and American commerce was resumed as before.
For many years there had been a dispute between the United States and Canada, regarding a certain boundary line. This country claimed a long strip of territory next to the sea, near the seaports of Dyea and Skagway, and Canada claimed that this strip, about thirty miles in width, belonged to her domain.
There had been endless disputes about the claim, and considerable local trouble, especially during the rush to the Klondike after gold.
Many Americans contended that we had absolute right to the territory, and when arbitration was spoken of, said we had nothing to arbitrate. This was, in the main, President Roosevelt's view of the matter, yet, as things grew more disturbed, he realized, as a good business man, that something must be done. We did not wish to fight Canada and England for the strip of land, and neither did they wish to fight, so at last a Board of Arbitration was agreed upon, and the claims of both parties were carefully investigated. In the end nearly every point claimed by the United States was granted to us. It was a great satisfaction to have this long-standing dispute settled; and how much better it was to do it by arbitration than by going to war.
The regular session of Congress came to an end on March 4, 1903, but President Roosevelt had already called an extra session, to consider a bill for reciprocity in our dealing with the new government of Cuba and to ratify a treaty with Colombia concerning the Panama Canal.
There was a great deal of debating at this session of Congress. The bill concerning Cuba caused but little trouble, but many wanted the canal placed in Nicaragua instead of Panama, and did not wish to pay the forty millions of dollars asked for the work already accomplished by the old French Canal Company. But in the end the bill passed the United States Senate by a vote of seventy-three to five, with the proviso that should we fail to make a satisfactory arrangement about the Panama Canal, then the government should build the canal through Nicaragua. President Roosevelt was enthusiastic over a canal at the isthmus, and lost no time in arranging to push the work further.
The people of the far West were very anxious to meet the chief ruler of our nation, and early in the year it was arranged that President Roosevelt should leave Washington on April 1 for a tour to last until June. In that time he was to visit more than twenty States, and make over one hundred stops. The people in the West awaited his coming with much pleasure.
The President was justly entitled to this outing, for the nation was now at peace with the entire world, and never had business been so prosperous. More than this, our affairs with other nations had been so handled that throughout the entire civilized world no ruler was more popular than was Theodore Roosevelt. In England he was spoken of with the highest praise, and the regards of the Germans had already been shown in the visit of Prince Henry to this country. He was known to be vigorous to the last degree, but it was likewise realized that he was thoroughly honest and straight-forward.
The first stop of the President in his trip West was made at Chicago, where during the day he laid the corner-stone of the new law building of the University of Chicago, which university conferred upon him the degree of LL.D. (Doctor of Laws). In the evening he addressed an unusually large crowd at the Auditorium building, speaking upon the Monroe Doctrine.
From Chicago the President journeyed to Milwaukee, and then to St. Paul and Minneapolis. At the first-named city he made a forceful address on the trusts, giving his hearers a clear idea of how the great corporations of to-day were brought into existence, and what may be done to control them, and in the last-named city he spoke on the ever-important question of tariff.
It was an eventful week, and when Sunday came the Chief Magistrate was glad enough to take a day of rest at Sioux Falls, South Dakota. From there he journeyed to Gardiner, Montana, one of the entrances to that greatest of all American wonderlands, Yellowstone Park.
It was understood that President Roosevelt wished to visit the Park without a great following of the general public, and this wish was carried out to the letter. Mr. Roosevelt had with him the well-known naturalist, Mr. John Burroughs, and for about two weeks he enjoyed himself to his heart's content, visiting many of the spots of interest and taking it easy whenever he felt so disposed. It was not a hunting trip, although big game is plentiful enough in the Park. It was just getting "near to nature's heart," and Mr. Roosevelt afterward declared it to be one of the best outings he had ever experienced.
[Illustration:
CORTELYOU. PAYNE. MOODY. HAY. ROOSEVELT. HITCHCOCK. ROOT. SHAW. WILSON. KNOX.
PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT AND CABINET, 1903.]
CHAPTER XXIX
After the refreshing tour of Yellowstone Park, President Roosevelt journeyed across Nebraska to Omaha, then across Iowa to Keokuk, and from the latter city to St. Louis.
As before, he delivered a number of addresses, and wherever he spoke great crowds came to see and to hear him. In these crowds were people of all political tendencies, but it made no difference if they were Republicans, Democrats, or Populists, all were equally glad to greet the President of the United States and the hero of San Juan Hill.
On this trip he frequently met some of the Rough Riders, and they invariably did all in their power to make him feel at home. On the other hand he showed that he had not forgotten them.
"By George, I am glad to see you!" he would exclaim, catching an old comrade by the hand. And his tone of voice would show that he meant just what he said.
For a long time the people of St. Louis had been preparing for a grand fair, to be known as the Louisiana Purchase Exposition, to commemorate the purchasing from France of all that vast territory of the United States which lies between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains and the Gulf of Mexico and British America. The purchase was made in 1803 for fifteen millions of dollars, and it was hoped to hold the exposition on the one hundredth anniversary, in 1903, but matters were delayed, and so the fair was postponed until 1904.
The dedication of the fair buildings at the Exposition Grounds was held on April 30, 1903, and was made a gala occasion by those interested. President Roosevelt was invited to speak, and also Ex-President Cleveland, and both made addresses of remarkable interest. Following the dedication exercises a grand banquet was given at which the scene of good-fellowship was one not readily forgotten. The President wished the exposition well, and promised to do all in his power to make it a success.
Although the President had already travelled many miles, the greater part of his western trip still lay before him.
From St. Louis he went to Kansas City and to Topeka, where the citizens were as anxious to meet him as anywhere. He stopped at Sharon Springs over Sunday, and then went to Denver, and to various towns in Colorado and in New Mexico. While in New Mexico he became interested in the systems of irrigation there, and told the people what they might do if their systems of watering the ground were increased.
Having passed through the Grand Cañon, the second week in May found him in southern California. He visited Los Angeles, reviewing the annual floral parade, and many other points, and at Claremont addressed a great gathering of school children in a beautiful park filled with shrubs and flowers. The children were decidedly enthusiastic over the meeting, and when Mr. Roosevelt went away, some pelted him with flowers, which bombardment he took in good part.
President Roosevelt's visit to Leland Stanford Jr. University in California came next, and here the students cheered him with vigor. He visited many of the more important buildings, and was entertained by members of the faculty.
His face was now set toward the Golden Gate, and San Francisco was all alive to give him an ovation. It was his first official visit to the Pacific coast, and all whom he met vied with each other to do him honor, while they listened with great attention to what he had to say.
Three days were spent in San Francisco and vicinity, and three days more in a tour of the Yosemite Valley. President Roosevelt was particularly anxious to see some of the big trees of the State, and was driven to several that are well known.
The steps of the Chief Magistrate were now turned northward, to Oregon, and a week was spent at Portland, and in the towns and cities of the Puget Sound territory, and beyond. Here he saw much that was new and novel in the lumber trade and in the salmon industry, and was received with a warmth that could not be mistaken.
"He is a President for the whole country, no mistake about that," said more than one.
"He makes you feel he is your friend the minute you lay eyes on him," would put in another. To many in this far corner of our country, this visit of the President will ever remain as a pleasant memory. They could never hope to get to Washington, more than three thousand miles away, and to have him come out to see them was worth remembering.
The journey eastward was made through Montana to Salt Lake City and then to Cheyenne, where additional addresses were delivered. From the latter point a fast train bore him homeward, and by the next Sunday he was back in the White House once more, as fresh and hearty as ever, and well prepared to undertake whatever important work might come to hand.
And work was there in plenty. Among the first things taken up by the President was a scandal in the Post-Office Department. Without loss of time President Roosevelt ordered Postmaster General Payne to make a thorough investigation, with the result that many contracts which were harmful to our post-office system were annulled, and some wrong-doers were brought to justice.
Toward the end of July there was considerable disturbance in the Government Printing Office at Washington because a certain assistant foreman, who had been discharged, was reinstated. All of the bookbinders were on the point of striking because they did not want the man returned, as he did not belong to their union. But President Roosevelt was firm in the matter; and in the end the man went back, and there was no strike. This affair caused an almost endless discussion in labor circles, some claiming that the union should have been upheld, while others thought differently.
During the summer, as was his usual habit, President Roosevelt, with his family, spent part of his time at his country home at Oyster Bay. This time the visit to the old homestead was of unusual interest, for, on August 17, the North Atlantic Fleet of the navy visited that vicinity, for review and inspection by the President.
It was a gala occasion, and the fleet presented a handsome appearance as it filed past and thundered out a Presidential salute. Many distinguished guests were present, and all without exception spoke of the steady improvement in our navy as a whole. President Roosevelt was equally enthusiastic, and well he might be, for he had used every means in his power to make our navy all it should be.
Late in September President Roosevelt returned to Washington, and on October 15 delivered the principal address at the unveiling of a statue of that grand military hero, General Sherman. Here once more he was listened to with tremendous interest, delivering a speech that was patriotic to the core and full of inspiration.
For some time past matters in Colombia had been in a very mixed-up condition. The United States were willing to take hold of the Panama Canal, as already mentioned, but although a treaty had been made to that effect, the Colombian government would not ratify the agreement.
On November 3, the trouble in Colombia reached its culminating point. On that day the State of Panama declared itself free and independent. The people of that State wanted the canal built by the United States, and were very angry when the rest of the Colombian States would not agree to the treaty which had been made.
At once there were strong rumors of war, and a few slight attacks were really made. The United States forbade the transportation of soldiers on the Panama railroad, and a few days later recognized Panama as an independent republic. The new republic was likewise recognized by France, and, later still, by England. On November 9, Panama appointed a commission to negotiate a canal treaty with our country, and this treaty was signed and sealed at Washington by Secretary of State Hay, acting for the United States, and M. Bunau-Varilla, acting for Panama.
The President's next message to Congress went at great length into the question of the Panama Canal, and in defence of the recognition of the new republic. It also told of what the new Department of Commerce and Labor had accomplished, especially the branch devoted to corporations.
[Illustration: PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT SPEAKING AT THE UNVEILING OF THE STATUE OF GENERAL SHERMAN.
(_Photograph by Clinedinst, Washington, D.C._)]
"We need not be over-sensitive about the welfare of corporations which shrink from the light," wrote Mr. Roosevelt. And in this statement every one who had the best interests of our nation at heart agreed. To accomplish great works great corporations are often necessary, but they must conduct business in such a fashion that they are not ashamed to show their methods to the public at large.
At the opening of the year 1904 there were strong rumors of a war between Japan and Russia, over the occupation of Korea, and this war started early in February by a battle on the sea, wherein the Russian fleet lost several war-ships. This contest was followed by others of more or less importance, and it looked as if, sooner or later, other nations might become involved in the struggle.
"We must keep our hands off," said President Roosevelt, and at once issued a proclamation, calling on all good citizens to remain strictly neutral, and warning those who might take part that they could hope for no aid from the United States should they get into trouble personally or have any property confiscated. This proclamation was followed by some excellent work of our State Department, whereby it was agreed among the leading nations that the zone of fighting should be a limited one,--that is, that neither Japan nor Russia should be allowed to carry it beyond a certain defined territory.
For many weeks Congress had debated the Panama Canal treaty and the action of President Roosevelt regarding the new republic of Panama. On February 23, 1904, a vote was taken in the Senate, and the Panama Canal treaty was ratified in all particulars. Without delay some United States troops were despatched to Panama, to guard the strip of land ten miles wide through which the canal is to run, and preparations were made to push the work on the waterway without further delay.
On Saturday, April 30, the great World's Fair at St. Louis was formally opened to the public. It had cost over fifty millions of dollars and was designed to eclipse any fair held in the past. The opening was attended by two hundred thousand visitors, all of whom were more than pleased with everything to be seen.
It had been arranged that President Roosevelt should formally open the Exposition by means of telegraphic communications from the White House to the fair grounds. A key of ivory and gold was used for the purpose, and as soon as it was touched a salute of twenty-one guns roared forth in the Exposition's honor. Around the President were assembled the members of his Cabinet and representatives of many foreign nations. Before touching the key which was to set the machinery of the wonderful fair in motion, President Roosevelt spoke as follows:--
"I have received from the Exposition grounds the statement that the management of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition awaits the pressing of the button which is to transmit the electric energy which is to unfurl the flag and start the machinery of the Exposition.
"I wish now to greet all present, and especially the representatives of the foreign nations here represented, in the name of the American people, and to thank these representatives for the parts their several countries have taken in being represented in this centennial anniversary of the greatest step in the movement which transformed the American Republic from a small confederacy of States lying along the Atlantic seaboard into a continental nation.
"This Exposition is one primarily intended to show the progress in the industry, the science, and the art, not only of the American nation, but of all other nations, in the great and wonderful century which has just closed. Every department of human activity will be represented there, and perhaps I may be allowed, as honorary president of the athletic association which, under European management, started to revive the memory of the Olympic games, to say that I am glad that, in addition to paying proper heed to the progress of industry, of science, of art, we have also paid proper heed to the development of the athletic pastimes which are useful in themselves as showing that it is wise for nations to be able to relax.
"I greet you all. I appreciate your having come here on this occasion, and in the presence of you, representing the American government and the governments of the foreign nations, I here open the Louisiana Exposition."
CHAPTER XXX
PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THEODORE ROOSEVELT--THE PRESIDENT'S FAMILY--LIFE AT THE WHITE HOUSE--OUR COUNTRY AND ITS FUTURE
In reading over the foregoing pages the question may occur to some of my young readers, How is it possible for President Roosevelt to accomplish so much and still have time in which to occasionally enjoy himself by travelling or by going on a hunting tour?
The answer is a very simple one. Mr. Roosevelt works systematically, as do all who want their labor to amount to something. Years ago, when he was physically weak, he determined to make himself strong. He persisted in vigorous exercise, especially in the open air, and in the end attained a bodily health which any ordinary man may well envy.
The President does each day's work as it comes before him. He does not borrow trouble or cross a bridge before he comes to it. Whatever there is to do he does to the very best of his ability, and he allows future complications to take care of themselves. If a mistake is made, he does not worry continually over it, but keeps it in mind, so that a like mistake shall not occur again. When once his hand is on the plough, he does not believe in turning back. He has unlimited faith in the future of our glorious country, and a like faith in the honor and courage of his fellow-citizens.
Any man to be an intelligent worker cannot be dissipated, and the President is a good illustration of this. He has a good appetite, but eats moderately, and does not depend upon stimulants or tobacco to "brace him up" when the work is extra heavy. He goes out nearly every day for a walk, a ride on horseback, or a drive with some members of his family, and as a result of this, when night comes, sleeps soundly and arises the next morning as bright and fresh as ever.
This is the first time that a President with a large family has occupied the White House. Other Presidents have had a few children, but Mr. Roosevelt took possession with six, a hearty, romping crowd, the younger members of which thought it great fun to explore the executive mansion when first they moved in. The President loves his children dearly, and is not above "playing bear" with the little ones when time permits and they want some fun.
Of Mrs. Roosevelt it can truthfully be said that she makes a splendid "first lady in the land." She takes a great interest in all social functions, and an equal interest in what is best for her boys and girls and their friends. She is very charitable, and each year contributes liberally to hundreds of bazaars and fairs held throughout our country.
The oldest child of the President is Miss Alice Lee Roosevelt, named after her mother, the first wife of the Chief Magistrate. Although but a step-daughter to the present Mrs. Roosevelt, the two are as intimate and loving as if of the same flesh and blood. Miss Roosevelt has already made her debut in Washington society, and assisted at several gatherings at the White House.
All of the other children were born after Mr. Roosevelt's second marriage. His oldest son is Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., commonly called by his chums, Teddy, Jr. He is a lad of sixteen, bright and clever, and has been attending a college preparatory school at Groton, Massachusetts, as already mentioned. He loves outdoor games, and is said to possess many tastes in common with his father.
The other members of the family are, Kermit, fourteen, Ethel Carew, twelve, Archibald Bullock, nine, and a lively little boy named Quentin, who is six.
Some time ago a distinguished member of the English Educational Commission visited this country and made an inspection of our school system. When asked what had impressed him most deeply, he answered:--
"The children of the President of the United States sitting side by side with the children of your workingmen in the public schools."
This simple little speech speaks volumes for the good, hard common sense of our President. He believes thoroughly in our public institutions, and knows the real value of sending out his boys to fight their own battles in the world at large. He does not believe in pampering children, but in making them self-reliant. All love to go out with him, and when at Oyster Bay he frequently takes the boys and their cousins for a day's tramp through the woods or along the beach, or else for a good hard row on the bay. The President prefers rowing to sailing, and frequently rows for several miles at a stretch. His enjoyment of bathing is as great as ever, and his boys love to go into the water with him.
Christmas time at the White House is just as full of joy there as it is anywhere. The younger children hang up their stockings, and scream with delight over every new toy received. For some days previous to Christmas one of the rooms is turned into a storeroom, and to this only Mrs. Roosevelt and one of the maids hold the key. Presents come in from everywhere, including many for the President, for his friends far and near insist upon remembering him. These presents are arranged on a large oval table near one of the broad windows, and on Christmas morning the distribution begins.
The President, in his trips to the woods, has seen the great harm done by cutting down promising evergreens, so he does not believe very much in having a Christmas tree. But a year ago a great surprise awaited him.
"I'm going to fix up a tree," said little Archie, and managed to smuggle a small evergreen into the house and place it in a large closet that was not being used. Here he and his younger brother Quentin worked for several days in arranging the tree just to suit them. On Christmas morning, after the presents were given out, both asked their father to come to where the closet was located.
"What is up now?" asked Mr. Roosevelt, curiously.
"Come and see!" they shouted. And he went, followed by all the others of the family. Then the closet door was thrown open, and there stood the tree, blazing with lights. It was certainly a great surprise, and Mr. Roosevelt enjoyed it as much as anybody.
The children of Washington, and especially those whose fathers occupy public positions, always look forward with anticipations of great pleasure to the children's parties given by Mrs. Roosevelt, and these parties are of equal interest to those living at the mansion.
[Illustration: PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT AND HIS FAMILY.
(_Photograph by Pach Bros., N.Y._)]
Such a party was given during the last holidays, and was attended by several hundred children, all of whom, of course, came arrayed in their best. They were received by Mrs. Roosevelt, who had a hand-shake and a kind word for each, and then some of the Cabinet ladies, who were assisting, gave to each visitor a button, set in ribbon and tinsel and inscribed "Merry Christmas and Happy New Year."
The big main dining-room of the White House had been prepared for the occasion. There was a Christmas tree at one side of the room, and the table was filled with fruit, cake, and candy. The President came in and helped to pass the ice-cream and cake, and Theodore, Jr. and some of the others passed the candy and other good things.
After this the visitors were asked to go to the East Room and dance. The Marine Band furnished the music, and while the children were dancing, the President came in to look at them. The entertainment lasted until the end of the afternoon, and when the visitors departed, President Roosevelt was at the door to shake hands and bid them good-by.
And here let us bid good-by ourselves, wishing Theodore Roosevelt and his family well. What the future holds in store for our President no man can tell. That he richly deserves the honors that have come to him, is beyond question. He has done his best to place and keep our United States in the front rank of the nations of the world. Under him, as under President McKinley, progress has been remarkably rapid. In the uttermost parts of the world our Flag is respected as it was never respected before. Perhaps some few mistakes have been made, but on the whole our advancement has been justified, and is eminently satisfactory. The future is large with possibilities, and it remains for the generation I am addressing to rise up and embrace those opportunities and make the most of them.
APPENDIX A
BRIEF EXTRACTS FROM FAMOUS ADDRESSES DELIVERED BY THEODORE ROOSEVELT
"If we are to be a really great people, we must strive in good faith to play a great part in the world. We cannot avoid meeting great issues. All that we can determine for ourselves is whether we shall meet them well or ill."
"All honor must be paid to the architects of our material prosperity; to the captains of industry who have built our factories and our railroads; to the strong men who toil for wealth with brain or hand; for great is the debt of the nation to these and their kind. But our debt is still greater to the men whose highest type is to be found in a statesman like Lincoln, a soldier like Grant."
"A man's first duty is to his own home, but he is not thereby excused from doing his duty to the state; for if he fails in this second duty it is under the penalty of ceasing to be a freeman."
--_Extracts from "The Strenuous Life."_
"Is America a weakling to shrink from the work that must be done by the world's powers? No! The young giant of the West stands on a continent and clasps the crest of an ocean in either hand. Our nation, glorious in youth and strength, looks into the future with eager and fearless eyes, and rejoices, as a strong man to run the race."
--_Extract from Speech seconding the Nomination of William McKinley for President._
"Poverty is a bitter thing, but it is not as bitter as the existence of restless vacuity and physical, moral, and intellectual flabbiness to which those doom themselves who elect to spend all their years in that vainest of all vain pursuits, the pursuit of mere pleasure."
"Our interests are at bottom common; in the long run we go up or go down together."
"The first essential of civilization is law. Anarchy is simply the hand-maiden and forerunner of tyranny and despotism. Law and order, enforced by justice and by strength, lie at the foundation of civilization."
--_Extracts from a Speech delivered at Minneapolis, Minnesota, September 2, 1901._
"We hold work, not as a curse, but as a blessing, and we regard the idler with scornful pity."
"Each man must choose, so far as the conditions allow him, the path to which he is bidden by his own peculiar powers and inclinations. But if he is a man, he must in some way or shape do a man's work."
"It is not given to us all to succeed, but it is given to us all to strive manfully to deserve success."
"We cannot retain the full measure of our self-respect if we do not retain pride in our citizenship."
--_Extracts from an Address on "Manhood and Statehood."_
"The true welfare of the nation is indissolubly bound up in the welfare of the farmer and wage-worker; of the man who tills the soil, and of the mechanic, the handicraftsman, and the laborer. The poorest motto upon which an American can act is the motto of 'some men down,' and the safest to follow is that of 'all men up.'"
--_Extract from Speech delivered at the Dedication of the Pan-American Fair Buildings._
"The men we need are the men of strong, earnest, solid character--the men who possess the homely virtues, and who to these virtues add rugged courage, rugged honesty, and high resolve."
--_Extract from Speech delivered upon the Life of General Grant._
APPENDIX B
LIST OF THEODORE ROOSEVELT'S WRITINGS
Books:
The Naval War of 1812, 2 volumes. (1882.) The Winning of the West, 6 volumes. (1889-1896.) Hunting Trips of a Ranchman. (1885.) Hunting Trips on the Prairie. (Companion volume to that above. 1885.) The Wilderness Hunter. (1893.) Hunting the Grisly. (Companion volume to that above. 1893.) The Rough Riders. (1899.) Life of Oliver Cromwell. (1900.) The Strenuous Life--Essays and Addresses. (1900.) American Ideals. (1897.) Administration--Civil Service. (1898.) Life of Thomas Hart Benton. (1887.) New York. (Historic Towns Series. 1891.) Life of Gouverneur Morris. (1888.) Ranch Life and the Hunting Trail. (1888.) Essays on Practical Politics. (1888.)
Written by Theodore Roosevelt and Henry Cabot Lodge:
Hero Tales from American History. (1895.)
Written by Theodore Roosevelt and G.B. Grinnell:
Trail and Camp Fire. (1896.) Hunting in Many Lands. (1896.)
Principal Magazine Articles:
Admiral Dewey. (McClure's Magazine.) Military Preparedness and Unpreparedness. (Century Magazine.) Mad Anthony Wayne's Victory. (Harper's Magazine.) St. Clair's Defeat. (Harper's Magazine.) Fights between Iron Clads. (Century Magazine.) Need of a New Navy. (Review of Reviews.)
APPENDIX C
CHRONOLOGY OF THE LIFE OF THEODORE ROOSEVELT FROM 1858 TO 1904
1858.  October 27. Theodore Roosevelt born in New York City, son of Theodore Roosevelt and Martha (Bullock) Roosevelt.
1864.  Sent to public school, and also received some private instruction; spent summers at Oyster Bay, New York.
1873.  Became a member of the Dutch Reformed Church; has been a member ever since.
1876.  September. Entered Harvard College. Member of numerous clubs and societies.
1878.  February 9. Death of Theodore Roosevelt, Sr.
1880.  June. Graduated from Harvard College; a Phi Beta Kappa man. September 23. Married Miss Alice Lee, of Boston, Massachusetts. Travelled extensively in Europe; climbed the Alps; made a member of the Alpine Club of London.
1881.  Elected a member of the New York Assembly, and served for three terms in succession.
1884.  Birth of daughter, Alice Lee Roosevelt. Death of Mrs. Alice (Lee) Roosevelt, Mr. Roosevelt's first wife. Death of Mrs. Martha (Bullock) Roosevelt, Mr. Roosevelt's mother. Made Delegate-at-large to the Republican National Convention that nominated James G. Blaine for President.
1885.  Became a ranchman and hunter.
1886.  Ran for office of mayor of New York City, and was defeated by Abram Hewitt. Spent additional time in hunting. December 2. Married Edith Kermit Carew, of New York City.
1888.  Birth of son, Theodore Roosevelt, Jr. September. Grand hunt in the Selkirk Mountains.
1889.  May. Appointed by President Harrison a member of the Civil Service Commission; served for six years, four under President Harrison and two under President Cleveland.
1890.  Birth of son, Kermit Roosevelt.
1891.  September. Grand hunt at Two-Ocean Pass, Wyoming.
1892.  Birth of daughter, Ethel Carew Roosevelt.
1895.  May 24. Appointed Police Commissioner of New York City by Mayor William Strong. Served until April, 1897. Birth of son, Archibald Bullock Roosevelt.
1897.  April. Made First Assistant Secretary of the Navy, under Secretary Long and President McKinley. Birth of son, Quentin Roosevelt.
1898.  April 25. Congress declared war with Spain. Roosevelt resigned his position in the Navy Department. May. Helped to organize the Rough Riders, and was appointed Lieutenant-Colonel, May 6. May 29. The Rough Riders left San Antonio, Texas, for Tampa, Florida. June 2. In camp at Tampa. June 7. Move by coal cars to Port Tampa; four companies left behind; board transport _Yucatan_. June 13. Start for Cuba, without horses. June 22. Landing of the Rough Riders at Daiquiri. June 23. March to Siboney. June 24. Advance to La Guasima (Las Guasimas). First fight with the Spanish troops. July 1. Battles of San Juan and El Caney. Roosevelt leads the Rough Riders up San Juan Hill. July 2. Fighting in the trenches by the Rough Riders, Roosevelt in command. July 3. Sinking of the Spanish fleet off Santiago Bay. July 8. Roosevelt made Colonel of the Rough Riders. August 7. Departure of the Rough Riders from Cuba. August 9. Spain accepts terms of peace offered by the United States. August 16. Arrival of the Rough Riders at Montauk, Long Island. September 15. Mustering out of the Rough Riders. September 27. Nominated by the Republican party for governor of New York. October. Grand campaigning tour through the Empire State. November. Elected governor of New York by seventeen thousand plurality.
1899.  January 1. Assumed office as governor of New York. April 10. Delivered famous address on "The Strenuous Life," at Chicago. September 29 and 30. Governor appointed these days as holidays in honor of a reception to Admiral Dewey; grand water and land processions.
1900.  June 19. Republican Convention met at Philadelphia; Roosevelt seconded the nomination of McKinley for President (second term), and was nominated for the Vice-Presidency. July, August, and September. Governor Roosevelt travelled 20,000 miles, delivering 673 political speeches at nearly 600 cities and towns. November 6. McKinley and Roosevelt carried 28 states, Democratic opponents carried 17 states; Republican electoral votes, 292, Democratic and scattering combined, 155. December. Presided over one short session of the United States Senate.
1901.  January 11. Started on a five weeks' hunting tour in Northwest Colorado; bringing down many cougars. April. Attended the dedication of the Pan-American Exposition buildings at Buffalo, New York, and delivered an address. September 6. Received word, while at Isle la Motte, Vermont, that President McKinley had been shot; hurried at once to Buffalo; assured that the President would recover, joined his family in the Adirondacks. September 14. Death of President McKinley. Roosevelt returned to Buffalo; took the oath of office as President of the United States at the house of Ansley Wilcox; retained the McKinley Cabinet. September 15 to 19. Funeral of President McKinley, at Buffalo, Washington, and Canton, Ohio. President Roosevelt attended. September 20. First regular working day of President Roosevelt at the White House. December 3. First annual message delivered to Congress. December 4. Senate received Hay-Pauncefote canal treaty from the President. December 17. First break in the McKinley Cabinet. Postmaster General Smith resigned; was succeeded by H.C. Payne.
1902.  January 3. Grand ball at the White House, Miss Alice Roosevelt formally presented to Washington society. January 6. Secretary Gage of the Treasury resigned; was succeeded by Ex-Governor Leslie M. Shaw, of Iowa. January 20. The President transmitted to Congress report of Canal Commission, recommending buying of rights for $40,000,000. February 10. Serious sickness of Theodore Roosevelt, Jr. President in attendance at Groton, Massachusetts, several days. February 24. Reception to Prince Henry of Prussia. February 25. Launching of German Emperor's yacht, which was christened by Miss Alice Roosevelt. March 7. President signed a bill creating a permanent pension bureau. May 12. Beginning of the great coal strike; largest in the history of the United States. May 21. President unveiled a monument at Arlington Cemetery, erected in memory of those who fell in the Spanish-American War. June 9. President reviewed West Point cadets at the centennial celebration of that institution. July 4. Addressed a great gathering at Pittsburg. July 5. Removed his business offices to Oyster Bay for the summer. August 11. Retirement of Justice Gray of the Supreme Court; the President named Oliver Wendell Holmes as his successor. August 22. The President began a twelve days' tour of New England. September 3. Narrow escape from death near Pittsfield, Massachusetts. Trolley car ran down carriage, killing Secret Service attendant. September 6 and 7. President visited Chattanooga, Tennessee, and delivered addresses. October 3. President called conference at Washington concerning coal strike. October 21. As a result of several meetings between the President, the mine operators, and the mine workers the miners resumed work, and a commission was appointed by the President to adjust matters in dispute. November 19. Grand reception to the President at Memphis, Tennessee. December 2. President's message to Congress was read by both branches.
1903.  January 15. President signed the free coal bill passed by Congress. January 21. President signed the bill for the reorganization of the military system. March 5. Special session of Congress called by the President to consider Cuban reciprocity bill and Panama Canal treaty with Colombia. March 12. President appointed a Commission to report on organization, needs, and conditions of government work. March 18. President received report of Coal Commission. April 2. President received degree of LL.D. from the University of Chicago. Beginning of long trip to the west. April 4. President addressed Minnesota legislature at St. Paul. April 30. President delivered address at dedication of buildings of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition, at St. Louis. June 6. President ordered an investigation into the Post-office Department scandals. July 4. First message around the world, via new Pacific cable, received by President at Oyster Bay. July 23. The President refused to consider charges made by a bookbinders' union against a workman in the Government Printing Office, thereby declaring for an "open" shop. August 17. Grand naval review by the President, on Long Island Sound, near Oyster Bay. September 17. President delivered an address at the dedication of a monument to New Jersey soldiers, on the battle-field of Antietam. October 15. President delivered an address at unveiling of statue to General Sherman, at Washington. October 20. President called extra session of Congress to consider a commercial treaty with Cuba. November 3. Panama proclaimed independent of Colombia. November 6. The United States government formally recognized the independence of the state of Panama. November 10. Opening of extra session of Congress called by President to consider commercial treaty with Cuba. November 18. A new canal treaty was formally signed at Washington by Secretary Hay, of the United States, and M. Bunau-Varilla, acting for Panama. December 2. The canal treaty was ratified at Panama. December 7. The President sent regular message to Congress especially defending the administration policy regarding Panama and the canal.
1904.  January 4. The President sent a special message to Congress regarding the recognition of the new republic of Panama. This was followed for weeks by debates, for and against the action of the administration. February. War broke out between Japan and Russia; the President issued a proclamation declaring the neutrality of the United States. February 22. The President and family assisted at a Washington's Birthday tree-planting at the White House grounds. February 23. The United States ratified all the provisions of the Panama Canal treaty; preparations were made, under the directions of the President, to begin work without delay. April 30. President, at Washington, delivered address and pressed telegraphic key opening World's Fair at St. Louis.
American Boys' Life Of William McKinley
By EDWARD STRATEMEYER. 300 pages. Illustrated by A.B. Shute, and from photographs $1.25
[Illustration]
Here is told the whole story of McKinley's boyhood days, his life at school and at college, his work as a school teacher, his glorious career in the army, his struggles to obtain a footing as a lawyer, his efforts as a Congressman, and lastly his prosperous career as our President. There are many side lights on the work at the White House during the war with Spain, and in China, all told in a style particularly adapted to boys and young men. The book is full of interesting anecdotes, all taken from life, showing fully the sincere, honest, painstaking efforts of a life cut all too short. The volume will prove an inspiration to all boys and young men, and should be in every one's library.
_For sale by all booksellers, or sent postpaid, on receipt of price, by the publishers._
LEE AND SHEPARD BOSTON
THE FAMOUS "OLD GLORY SERIES"
By EDWARD STRATEMEYER
_Author of "The Bound to Succeed Series," "The Ship and Shore Series," "Colonial Series," "Pan-American Series," etc._
Six volumes. Cloth. Illustrated. Price per volume $1.25
[Illustration]
UNDER DEWEY AT MANILA Or The War Fortunes of a Castaway
A YOUNG VOLUNTEER IN CUBA Or Fighting for the Single Star
FIGHTING IN CUBAN WATERS Or Under Schley on the Brooklyn
UNDER OTIS IN THE PHILIPPINES Or A Young Officer in the Tropics
THE CAMPAIGN OF THE JUNGLE Or Under Lawton through Luzon
UNDER MACARTHUR IN LUZON Or Last Battles in the Philippines
"A boy once addicted to Stratemeyer stays by him."--_The Living Church._
"The boys' delight--the 'Old Glory Series.'"--_The Christian Advocate, New York._
"Stratemeyer's style suits the boys."--JOHN TERHUNE, _Supt. of Public Instruction, Bergen Co., New Jersey._
"Mr. Stratemeyer is in a class by himself when it comes to writing about American heroes, their brilliant doings on land and sea."--_Times, Boston._
"Mr. Stratemeyer has written a series of books which, while historically correct and embodying the most important features of the Spanish-American War and the rebellion of the Filipinos, are sufficiently interwoven with fiction to render them most entertaining to young readers."--_The Call, San Francisco._
_For sale by all booksellers, or sent, postpaid, on receipt of price by_ LEE AND SHEPARD, Publishers, BOSTON
THE COLONIAL SERIES
By EDWARD STRATEMEYER
_Author of "Pan-American Series," "Old Glory Series," "Great American Industries Series," "American Boys' Biographical Series," etc._
Four volumes. Cloth. Illustrated by A.B. Shute. Price per volume, $1.25
[Illustration]
WITH WASHINGTON IN THE WEST Or A Soldier Boy's Battles in the Wilderness
MARCHING ON NIAGARA Or The Soldier Boys of the Old Frontier
AT THE FALL OF MONTREAL Or A Soldier Boy's Final Victory
ON THE TRAIL OF PONTIAC Or The Pioneer Boys of the Ohio
"Mr. Stratemeyer has put his best work into the 'Colonial Series.'"--_Christian Register, Boston._
"A series that doesn't fall so very far short of being history itself."--_Boston Courier._
"The tales of war are incidental to the dramatic adventures of two boys, so well told that the historical facts are all the better remembered."--_Boston Globe._
"Edward Stratemeyer has in many volumes shown himself master of the art of producing historic studies in the pleasing story form."--_Minneapolis Journal._
"The author, Edward Stratemeyer, has used his usual care in matters of historical detail and accuracy, and gives a splendid picture of the times in general."--_Milwaukee Sentinel._
"Told by one who knows how to write so as to interest boys, while still having a care as to accuracy."--_Commercial Advertiser, New York._
_For sale by all booksellers, or sent, postpaid, on receipt of price by_ LEE AND SHEPARD, Publishers BOSTON
TWO GOOD WAR STORIES
By EDWARD STRATEMEYER
_ON TO PEKIN, Or Old Glory in China_
Cloth. 330 pages. Illustrated by A. Burnham Shute. $1.25
[Illustration]
The hero, Gilbert Pennington, has become a lieutenant in the regular army, and goes from the Philippines with the Ninth Regiment to take part in the rescue of the beleaguered British Embassy at Pekin by the international forces. Mr. Stratemeyer has risen to the occasion by giving, in addition to one of his very best stories, a store of information concerning China and the Chinese, conveyed in a natural and entertaining manner.
Mr. Stratemeyer gives his youthful readers plenty of adventures, but there is little that might not easily happen. His books are eminently "safe" ones, and their patriotic spirit will be considered admirable.--_Home Journal, Boston._
_BETWEEN BOER AND BRITON Or Two Boys' Adventures in South Africa_
Illustrated by A. Burnham Shute 354 pages Price $1.25
Relates the experiences of two boys, cousins to each other, one American and the other English, whose fathers are engaged in the Transvaal, one in farming and the other in mining operations. While the two boys are off on a hunting trip after big game, the war between the Boers and Britons suddenly breaks out, and the boys find themselves placed between hostile armies, where their thrilling experiences are brought out in Mr. Stratemeyer's best style.
Exhibits the same qualities which have given popularity to his former writings.--_The Times, Pittsburg, Pa._
A stirring story of the South African war.--_The Journal, Indianapolis, Ind._
The kind of story to please boys and give them a fair idea of a great historical event.--_St. Louis Post-Despatch._
GREAT AMERICAN INDUSTRIES SERIES
By EDWARD STRATEMEYER
VOLUME ONE
_TWO YOUNG LUMBERMEN Or From Maine to Oregon for Fortune_
320 pages. Cloth. Illustrated. Price $1.00 net
[Illustration]
A splendid new story, undoubtedly the best Mr. Stratemeyer has yet penned. It covers the whole of the great lumber industry of our country, the scene shifting from Maine to Michigan and the Great Lakes, and then to the Columbia and the Great Northwest. The heroes are two sturdy youths who have been brought up among the lumbermen of their native State, and who strike out in an honest endeavor to better their condition. As mill hands, fellers, log drivers, and general camp workers they have a variety of adventures, absorbing in the extreme. An ideal volume for the library of every wide-awake American who wishes to know what our great lumber industry is to-day.
Boys are acquiring the Stratemeyer habit.--_Post, Chicago._
Mr. Stratemeyer's books are not only entertaining but instructive.--_Daily Press, Portland, Me._
He knows how to attract and hold boy readers.--_Evening Standard, New Bedford, Mass._
The demands of boy readers are peculiar, and the author who can satisfy them, not once or twice, but uniformly, must possess rare ability in an extremely difficult field. Such an author is Edward Stratemeyer.--_Sunday News, Newark, N.J._
PAN-AMERICAN SERIES
By EDWARD STRATEMEYER
VOLUME ONE
_LOST ON THE ORINOCO Or American Boys in Venezuela_
12mo. Cloth. Illustrated. Price $1.25
This volume tells of five American youths, who, with their tutor, sail from New York to La Guayra, touching at Curaçao on the way. They visit Caracas, the capital, Macuto, the fashionable seaside resort, go westward to the Gulf of Maracaibo and lake of the same name, and at last find themselves in the region of the mighty Orinoco, and of course they have some exciting experiences, one of which gives name to the book. Just the book boys and young men should read, in view of the general interest in matters Pan-American.
Its pictures of South American life and scenery are novel and instructive.--_The Literary World, Boston._
The scenes described are of the sort to charm the hearts of adventurous boys.--_The Outlook, N.Y._
VOLUME TWO
_THE YOUNG VOLCANO EXPLORERS Or American Boys in the West Indies_
12mo. Cloth. Illustrated. Price $1.25
This is a complete tale in itself, but has the same characters which have appeared so successfully in "Lost on the Orinoco." The boys, with their tutor, sail from Venezuela to the West Indies, stopping at Jamaica, Cuba, Hayti, and Porto Rico. They have numerous adventures on the way, and then set out for St. Pierre, Martinique, where they encounter the effects of the eruption of Mt. Pelee, and two of the boys are left on a raft to shift for themselves. Life in the West Indies is well portrayed, and the tale will appeal to many an older person as well as to the boys.

= = = PG4357 = = =
AMERICAN FAIRY TALES
American Fairy Tales
by L. Frank Baum
Author of FATHER GOOSE; HIS BOOK, THE WONDERFUL WIZARD OF OZ, ETC.
Contents
THE BOX OF ROBBERS
No one intended to leave Martha alone that afternoon, but it happened that everyone was called away, for one reason or another. Mrs. McFarland was attending the weekly card party held by the Women’s Anti-Gambling League. Sister Nell’s young man had called quite unexpectedly to take her for a long drive. Papa was at the office, as usual. It was Mary Ann’s day out. As for Emeline, she certainly should have stayed in the house and looked after the little girl; but Emeline had a restless nature.
“Would you mind, miss, if I just crossed the alley to speak a word to Mrs. Carleton’s girl?” she asked Martha.
“’Course not,” replied the child. “You’d better lock the back door, though, and take the key, for I shall be upstairs.”
“Oh, I’ll do that, of course, miss,” said the delighted maid, and ran away to spend the afternoon with her friend, leaving Martha quite alone in the big house, and locked in, into the bargain.
The little girl read a few pages in her new book, sewed a few stitches in her embroidery and started to “play visiting” with her four favorite dolls. Then she remembered that in the attic was a doll’s playhouse that hadn’t been used for months, so she decided she would dust it and put it in order.
Filled with this idea, the girl climbed the winding stairs to the big room under the roof. It was well lighted by three dormer windows and was warm and pleasant. Around the walls were rows of boxes and trunks, piles of old carpeting, pieces of damaged furniture, bundles of discarded clothing and other odds and ends of more or less value. Every well-regulated house has an attic of this sort, so I need not describe it.
The doll’s house had been moved, but after a search Martha found it away over in a corner near the big chimney.
She drew it out and noticed that behind it was a black wooden chest which Uncle Walter had sent over from Italy years and years ago—before Martha was born, in fact. Mamma had told her about it one day; how there was no key to it, because Uncle Walter wished it to remain unopened until he returned home; and how this wandering uncle, who was a mighty hunter, had gone into Africa to hunt elephants and had never been heard from afterwards.
The little girl looked at the chest curiously, now that it had by accident attracted her attention.
It was quite big—bigger even than mamma’s traveling trunk—and was studded all over with tarnished brassheaded nails. It was heavy, too, for when Martha tried to lift one end of it she found she could not stir it a bit. But there was a place in the side of the cover for a key. She stooped to examine the lock, and saw that it would take a rather big key to open it.
Then, as you may suspect, the little girl longed to open Uncle Walter’s big box and see what was in it. For we are all curious, and little girls are just as curious as the rest of us.
“I don’t b’lieve Uncle Walter’ll ever come back,” she thought. “Papa said once that some elephant must have killed him. If I only had a key—” She stopped and clapped her little hands together gayly as she remembered a big basket of keys on the shelf in the linen closet. They were of all sorts and sizes; perhaps one of them would unlock the mysterious chest!
She flew down the stairs, found the basket and returned with it to the attic. Then she sat down before the brass-studded box and began trying one key after another in the curious old lock. Some were too large, but most were too small. One would go into the lock but would not turn; another stuck so fast that she feared for a time that she would never get it out again. But at last, when the basket was almost empty, an oddly-shaped, ancient brass key slipped easily into the lock. With a cry of joy Martha turned the key with both hands; then she heard a sharp “click,” and the next moment the heavy lid flew up of its own accord!
The little girl leaned over the edge of the chest an instant, and the sight that met her eyes caused her to start back in amazement.
Slowly and carefully a man unpacked himself from the chest, stepped out upon the floor, stretched his limbs and then took off his hat and bowed politely to the astonished child.
He was tall and thin and his face seemed badly tanned or sunburnt.
Then another man emerged from the chest, yawning and rubbing his eyes like a sleepy schoolboy. He was of middle size and his skin seemed as badly tanned as that of the first.
While Martha stared open-mouthed at the remarkable sight a third man crawled from the chest. He had the same complexion as his fellows, but was short and fat.
All three were dressed in a curious manner. They wore short jackets of red velvet braided with gold, and knee breeches of sky-blue satin with silver buttons. Over their stockings were laced wide ribbons of red and yellow and blue, while their hats had broad brims with high, peaked crowns, from which fluttered yards of bright-colored ribbons.
They had big gold rings in their ears and rows of knives and pistols in their belts. Their eyes were black and glittering and they wore long, fierce mustaches, curling at the ends like a pig’s tail.
“My! but you were heavy,” exclaimed the fat one, when he had pulled down his velvet jacket and brushed the dust from his sky-blue breeches. “And you squeezed me all out of shape.”
“It was unavoidable, Luigi,” responded the thin man, lightly; “the lid of the chest pressed me down upon you. Yet I tender you my regrets.”
“As for me,” said the middle-sized man, carelessly rolling a cigarette and lighting it, “you must acknowledge I have been your nearest friend for years; so do not be disagreeable.”
“You mustn’t smoke in the attic,” said Martha, recovering herself at sight of the cigarette. “You might set the house on fire.”
The middle-sized man, who had not noticed her before, at this speech turned to the girl and bowed.
“Since a lady requests it,” said he, “I shall abandon my cigarette,” and he threw it on the floor and extinguished it with his foot.
“Who are you?” asked Martha, who until now had been too astonished to be frightened.
“Permit us to introduce ourselves,” said the thin man, flourishing his hat gracefully. “This is Lugui,” the fat man nodded; “and this is Beni,” the middle-sized man bowed; “and I am Victor. We are three bandits—Italian bandits.”
“Bandits!” cried Martha, with a look of horror.
“Exactly. Perhaps in all the world there are not three other bandits so terrible and fierce as ourselves,” said Victor, proudly.
“’Tis so,” said the fat man, nodding gravely.
“But it’s wicked!” exclaimed Martha.
“Yes, indeed,” replied Victor. “We are extremely and tremendously wicked. Perhaps in all the world you could not find three men more wicked than those who now stand before you.”
“’Tis so,” said the fat man, approvingly.
“But you shouldn’t be so wicked,” said the girl; “it’s—it’s—naughty!”
Victor cast down his eyes and blushed.
“Naughty!” gasped Beni, with a horrified look.
“’Tis a hard word,” said Luigi, sadly, and buried his face in his hands.
“I little thought,” murmured Victor, in a voice broken by emotion, “ever to be so reviled—and by a lady! Yet, perhaps you spoke thoughtlessly. You must consider, miss, that our wickedness has an excuse. For how are we to be bandits, let me ask, unless we are wicked?”
Martha was puzzled and shook her head, thoughtfully. Then she remembered something.
“You can’t remain bandits any longer,” said she, “because you are now in America.”
“America!” cried the three, together.
“Certainly. You are on Prairie avenue, in Chicago. Uncle Walter sent you here from Italy in this chest.”
The bandits seemed greatly bewildered by this announcement. Lugui sat down on an old chair with a broken rocker and wiped his forehead with a yellow silk handkerchief. Beni and Victor fell back upon the chest and looked at her with pale faces and staring eyes.
When he had somewhat recovered himself Victor spoke.
“Your Uncle Walter has greatly wronged us,” he said, reproachfully. “He has taken us from our beloved Italy, where bandits are highly respected, and brought us to a strange country where we shall not know whom to rob or how much to ask for a ransom.”
“’Tis so!” said the fat man, slapping his leg sharply.
“And we had won such fine reputations in Italy!” said Beni, regretfully.
“Perhaps Uncle Walter wanted to reform you,” suggested Martha.
“Are there, then, no bandits in Chicago?” asked Victor.
“Well,” replied the girl, blushing in her turn, “we do not call them bandits.”
“Then what shall we do for a living?” inquired Beni, despairingly.
“A great deal can be done in a big American city,” said the child. “My father is a lawyer” (the bandits shuddered), “and my mother’s cousin is a police inspector.”
“Ah,” said Victor, “that is a good employment. The police need to be inspected, especially in Italy.”
“Everywhere!” added Beni.
“Then you could do other things,” continued Martha, encouragingly. “You could be motor men on trolley cars, or clerks in a department store. Some people even become aldermen to earn a living.”
The bandits shook their heads sadly.
“We are not fitted for such work,” said Victor. “Our business is to rob.”
Martha tried to think.
“It is rather hard to get positions in the gas office,” she said, “but you might become politicians.”
“No!” cried Beni, with sudden fierceness; “we must not abandon our high calling. Bandits we have always been, and bandits we must remain!”
“’Tis so!” agreed the fat man.
“Even in Chicago there must be people to rob,” remarked Victor, with cheerfulness.
Martha was distressed.
“I think they have all been robbed,” she objected.
“Then we can rob the robbers, for we have experience and talent beyond the ordinary,” said Beni.
“Oh, dear; oh, dear!” moaned the girl; “why did Uncle Walter ever send you here in this chest?”
The bandits became interested.
“That is what we should like to know,” declared Victor, eagerly.
“But no one will ever know, for Uncle Walter was lost while hunting elephants in Africa,” she continued, with conviction.
“Then we must accept our fate and rob to the best of our ability,” said Victor. “So long as we are faithful to our beloved profession we need not be ashamed.”
“’Tis so!” cried the fat man.
“Brothers! we will begin now. Let us rob the house we are in.”
“Good!” shouted the others and sprang to their feet.
Beni turned threateningly upon the child.
“Remain here!” he commanded. “If you stir one step your blood will be on your own head!” Then he added, in a gentler voice: “Don’t be afraid; that’s the way all bandits talk to their captives. But of course we wouldn’t hurt a young lady under any circumstances.”
“Of course not,” said Victor.
The fat man drew a big knife from his belt and flourished it about his head.
“S’blood!” he ejaculated, fiercely.
“S’bananas!” cried Beni, in a terrible voice.
“Confusion to our foes!” hissed Victor.
And then the three bent themselves nearly double and crept stealthily down the stairway with cocked pistols in their hands and glittering knives between their teeth, leaving Martha trembling with fear and too horrified to even cry for help.
How long she remained alone in the attic she never knew, but finally she heard the catlike tread of the returning bandits and saw them coming up the stairs in single file.
All bore heavy loads of plunder in their arms, and Lugui was balancing a mince pie on the top of a pile of her mother’s best evening dresses. Victor came next with an armful of bric-a-brac, a brass candelabra and the parlor clock. Beni had the family Bible, the basket of silverware from the sideboard, a copper kettle and papa’s fur overcoat.
“Oh, joy!” said Victor, putting down his load; “it is pleasant to rob once more.”
“Oh, ecstacy!” said Beni; but he let the kettle drop on his toe and immediately began dancing around in anguish, while he muttered queer words in the Italian language.
“We have much wealth,” continued Victor, holding the mince pie while Lugui added his spoils to the heap; “and all from one house! This America must be a rich place.”
With a dagger he then cut himself a piece of the pie and handed the remainder to his comrades. Whereupon all three sat upon the floor and consumed the pie while Martha looked on sadly.
“We should have a cave,” remarked Beni; “for we must store our plunder in a safe place. Can you tell us of a secret cave?” he asked Martha.
“There’s a Mammoth cave,” she answered, “but it’s in Kentucky. You would be obliged to ride on the cars a long time to get there.”
The three bandits looked thoughtful and munched their pie silently, but the next moment they were startled by the ringing of the electric doorbell, which was heard plainly even in the remote attic.
“What’s that?” demanded Victor, in a hoarse voice, as the three scrambled to their feet with drawn daggers.
Martha ran to the window and saw it was only the postman, who had dropped a letter in the box and gone away again. But the incident gave her an idea of how to get rid of her troublesome bandits, so she began wringing her hands as if in great distress and cried out:
“It’s the police!”
The robbers looked at one another with genuine alarm, and Lugui asked, tremblingly:
“Are there many of them?”
“A hundred and twelve!” exclaimed Martha, after pretending to count them.
“Then we are lost!” declared Beni; “for we could never fight so many and live.”
“Are they armed?” inquired Victor, who was shivering as if cold.
“Oh, yes,” said she. “They have guns and swords and pistols and axes and—and—”
“And what?” demanded Lugui.
“And cannons!”
The three wicked ones groaned aloud and Beni said, in a hollow voice:
“I hope they will kill us quickly and not put us to the torture. I have been told these Americans are painted Indians, who are bloodthirsty and terrible.”
“’Tis so!” gasped the fat man, with a shudder.
Suddenly Martha turned from the window.
“You are my friends, are you not?” she asked.
“We are devoted!” answered Victor.
“We adore you!” cried Beni.
“We would die for you!” added Lugui, thinking he was about to die anyway.
“Then I will save you,” said the girl.
“How?” asked the three, with one voice.
“Get back into the chest,” she said. “I will then close the lid, so they will be unable to find you.”
They looked around the room in a dazed and irresolute way, but she exclaimed:
“You must be quick! They will soon be here to arrest you.”
Then Lugui sprang into the chest and lay flat upon the bottom. Beni tumbled in next and packed himself in the back side. Victor followed after pausing to kiss her hand to the girl in a graceful manner.
Then Martha ran up to press down the lid, but could not make it catch.
“You must squeeze down,” she said to them.
Lugui groaned.
“I am doing my best, miss,” said Victor, who was nearest the top; “but although we fitted in very nicely before, the chest now seems rather small for us.”
“’Tis so!” came the muffled voice of the fat man from the bottom.
“I know what takes up the room,” said Beni.
“What?” inquired Victor, anxiously.
“The pie,” returned Beni.
“’Tis so!” came from the bottom, in faint accents.
Then Martha sat upon the lid and pressed it down with all her weight. To her great delight the lock caught, and, springing down, she exerted all her strength and turned the key.
This story should teach us not to interfere in matters that do not concern us. For had Martha refrained from opening Uncle Walter’s mysterious chest she would not have been obliged to carry downstairs all the plunder the robbers had brought into the attic.
THE GLASS DOG
An accomplished wizard once lived on the top floor of a tenement house and passed his time in thoughtful study and studious thought. What he didn’t know about wizardry was hardly worth knowing, for he possessed all the books and recipes of all the wizards who had lived before him; and, moreover, he had invented several wizardments himself.
This admirable person would have been completely happy but for the numerous interruptions to his studies caused by folk who came to consult him about their troubles (in which he was not interested), and by the loud knocks of the iceman, the milkman, the baker’s boy, the laundryman and the peanut woman. He never dealt with any of these people; but they rapped at his door every day to see him about this or that or to try to sell him their wares. Just when he was most deeply interested in his books or engaged in watching the bubbling of a cauldron there would come a knock at his door. And after sending the intruder away he always found he had lost his train of thought or ruined his compound.
At length these interruptions aroused his anger, and he decided he must have a dog to keep people away from his door. He didn’t know where to find a dog, but in the next room lived a poor glass-blower with whom he had a slight acquaintance; so he went into the man’s apartment and asked:
“Where can I find a dog?”
“What sort of a dog?” inquired the glass-blower.
“A good dog. One that will bark at people and drive them away. One that will be no trouble to keep and won’t expect to be fed. One that has no fleas and is neat in his habits. One that will obey me when I speak to him. In short, a good dog,” said the wizard.
“Such a dog is hard to find,” returned the glass-blower, who was busy making a blue glass flower pot with a pink glass rosebush in it, having green glass leaves and yellow glass roses.
The wizard watched him thoughtfully.
“Why cannot you blow me a dog out of glass?” he asked, presently.
“I can,” declared the glass-blower; “but it would not bark at people, you know.”
“Oh, I’ll fix that easily enough,” replied the other. “If I could not make a glass dog bark I would be a mighty poor wizard.”
“Very well; if you can use a glass dog I’ll be pleased to blow one for you. Only, you must pay for my work.”
“Certainly,” agreed the wizard. “But I have none of that horrid stuff you call money. You must take some of my wares in exchange.”
The glass-blower considered the matter for a moment.
“Could you give me something to cure my rheumatism?” he asked.
“Oh, yes; easily.”
“Then it’s a bargain. I’ll start the dog at once. What color of glass shall I use?”
“Pink is a pretty color,” said the wizard, “and it’s unusual for a dog, isn’t it?”
“Very,” answered the glass-blower; “but it shall be pink.”
So the wizard went back to his studies and the glass-blower began to make the dog.
Next morning he entered the wizard’s room with the glass dog under his arm and set it carefully upon the table. It was a beautiful pink in color, with a fine coat of spun glass, and about its neck was twisted a blue glass ribbon. Its eyes were specks of black glass and sparkled intelligently, as do many of the glass eyes worn by men.
The wizard expressed himself pleased with the glass-blower’s skill and at once handed him a small vial.
“This will cure your rheumatism,” he said.
“But the vial is empty!” protested the glass-blower.
“Oh, no; there is one drop of liquid in it,” was the wizard’s reply.
“Will one drop cure my rheumatism?” inquired the glass-blower, in wonder.
“Most certainly. That is a marvelous remedy. The one drop contained in the vial will cure instantly any kind of disease ever known to humanity. Therefore it is especially good for rheumatism. But guard it well, for it is the only drop of its kind in the world, and I’ve forgotten the recipe.”
“Thank you,” said the glass-blower, and went back to his room.
Then the wizard cast a wizzy spell and mumbled several very learned words in the wizardese language over the glass dog. Whereupon the little animal first wagged its tail from side to side, then winked his left eye knowingly, and at last began barking in a most frightful manner—that is, when you stop to consider the noise came from a pink glass dog. There is something almost astonishing in the magic arts of wizards; unless, of course, you know how to do the things yourself, when you are not expected to be surprised at them.
The wizard was as delighted as a school teacher at the success of his spell, although he was not astonished. Immediately he placed the dog outside his door, where it would bark at anyone who dared knock and so disturb the studies of its master.
The glass-blower, on returning to his room, decided not to use the one drop of wizard cure-all just then.
“My rheumatism is better to-day,” he reflected, “and I will be wise to save the medicine for a time when I am very ill, when it will be of more service to me.”
So he placed the vial in his cupboard and went to work blowing more roses out of glass. Presently he happened to think the medicine might not keep, so he started to ask the wizard about it. But when he reached the door the glass dog barked so fiercely that he dared not knock, and returned in great haste to his own room. Indeed, the poor man was quite upset at so unfriendly a reception from the dog he had himself so carefully and skillfully made.
The next morning, as he read his newspaper, he noticed an article stating that the beautiful Miss Mydas, the richest young lady in town, was very ill, and the doctors had given up hope of her recovery.
The glass-blower, although miserably poor, hard-working and homely of feature, was a man of ideas. He suddenly recollected his precious medicine, and determined to use it to better advantage than relieving his own ills. He dressed himself in his best clothes, brushed his hair and combed his whiskers, washed his hands and tied his necktie, blackened his shoes and sponged his vest, and then put the vial of magic cure-all in his pocket. Next he locked his door, went downstairs and walked through the streets to the grand mansion where the wealthy Miss Mydas resided.
The butler opened the door and said:
“No soap, no chromos, no vegetables, no hair oil, no books, no baking powder. My young lady is dying and we’re well supplied for the funeral.”
The glass-blower was grieved at being taken for a peddler.
“My friend,” he began, proudly; but the butler interrupted him, saying:
“No tombstones, either; there’s a family graveyard and the monument’s built.”
“The graveyard won’t be needed if you will permit me to speak,” said the glass-blower.
“No doctors, sir; they’ve given up my young lady, and she’s given up the doctors,” continued the butler, calmly.
“I’m no doctor,” returned the glass-blower.
“Nor are the others. But what is your errand?”
“I called to cure your young lady by means of a magical compound.”
“Step in, please, and take a seat in the hall. I’ll speak to the housekeeper,” said the butler, more politely.
So he spoke to the housekeeper and the housekeeper mentioned the matter to the steward and the steward consulted the chef and the chef kissed the lady’s maid and sent her to see the stranger. Thus are the very wealthy hedged around with ceremony, even when dying.
When the lady’s maid heard from the glass-blower that he had a medicine which would cure her mistress, she said:
“I’m glad you came.”
“But,” said he, “if I restore your mistress to health she must marry me.”
“I’ll make inquiries and see if she’s willing,” answered the maid, and went at once to consult Miss Mydas.
The young lady did not hesitate an instant.
“I’d marry any old thing rather than die!” she cried. “Bring him here at once!”
So the glass-blower came, poured the magic drop into a little water, gave it to the patient, and the next minute Miss Mydas was as well as she had ever been in her life.
“Dear me!” she exclaimed; “I’ve an engagement at the Fritters’ reception to-night. Bring my pearl-colored silk, Marie, and I will begin my toilet at once. And don’t forget to cancel the order for the funeral flowers and your mourning gown.”
“But, Miss Mydas,” remonstrated the glass-blower, who stood by, “you promised to marry me if I cured you.”
“I know,” said the young lady, “but we must have time to make proper announcement in the society papers and have the wedding cards engraved. Call to-morrow and we’ll talk it over.”
The glass-blower had not impressed her favorably as a husband, and she was glad to find an excuse for getting rid of him for a time. And she did not want to miss the Fritters’ reception.
Yet the man went home filled with joy; for he thought his stratagem had succeeded and he was about to marry a rich wife who would keep him in luxury forever afterward.
The first thing he did on reaching his room was to smash his glass-blowing tools and throw them out of the window.
He then sat down to figure out ways of spending his wife’s money.
The following day he called upon Miss Mydas, who was reading a novel and eating chocolate creams as happily as if she had never been ill in her life.
“Where did you get the magic compound that cured me?” she asked.
“From a learned wizard,” said he; and then, thinking it would interest her, he told how he had made the glass dog for the wizard, and how it barked and kept everybody from bothering him.
“How delightful!” she said. “I’ve always wanted a glass dog that could bark.”
“But there is only one in the world,” he answered, “and it belongs to the wizard.”
“You must buy it for me,” said the lady.
“The wizard cares nothing for money,” replied the glass-blower.
“Then you must steal it for me,” she retorted. “I can never live happily another day unless I have a glass dog that can bark.”
The glass-blower was much distressed at this, but said he would see what he could do. For a man should always try to please his wife, and Miss Mydas has promised to marry him within a week.
On his way home he purchased a heavy sack, and when he passed the wizard’s door and the pink glass dog ran out to bark at him he threw the sack over the dog, tied the opening with a piece of twine, and carried him away to his own room.
The next day he sent the sack by a messenger boy to Miss Mydas, with his compliments, and later in the afternoon he called upon her in person, feeling quite sure he would be received with gratitude for stealing the dog she so greatly desired.
But when he came to the door and the butler opened it, what was his amazement to see the glass dog rush out and begin barking at him furiously.
“Call off your dog,” he shouted, in terror.
“I can’t, sir,” answered the butler. “My young lady has ordered the glass dog to bark whenever you call here. You’d better look out, sir,” he added, “for if it bites you, you may have glassophobia!”
This so frightened the poor glass-blower that he went away hurriedly. But he stopped at a drug store and put his last dime in the telephone box so he could talk to Miss Mydas without being bitten by the dog.
“Give me Pelf 6742!” he called.
“Hello! What is it?” said a voice.
“I want to speak with Miss Mydas,” said the glass-blower.
Presently a sweet voice said: “This is Miss Mydas. What is it?”
“Why have you treated me so cruelly and set the glass dog on me?” asked the poor fellow.
“Well, to tell the truth,” said the lady, “I don’t like your looks. Your cheeks are pale and baggy, your hair is coarse and long, your eyes are small and red, your hands are big and rough, and you are bow-legged.”
“But I can’t help my looks!” pleaded the glass-blower; “and you really promised to marry me.”
“If you were better looking I’d keep my promise,” she returned. “But under the circumstances you are no fit mate for me, and unless you keep away from my mansion I shall set my glass dog on you!” Then she dropped the ’phone and would have nothing more to say.
The miserable glass-blower went home with a heart bursting with disappointment and began tying a rope to the bedpost by which to hang himself.
Some one knocked at the door, and, upon opening it, he saw the wizard.
“I’ve lost my dog,” he announced.
“Have you, indeed?” replied the glass-blower tying a knot in the rope.
“Yes; some one has stolen him.”
“That’s too bad,” declared the glass-blower, indifferently.
“You must make me another,” said the wizard.
“But I cannot; I’ve thrown away my tools.”
“Then what shall I do?” asked the wizard.
“I do not know, unless you offer a reward for the dog.”
“But I have no money,” said the wizard.
“Offer some of your compounds, then,” suggested the glass-blower, who was making a noose in the rope for his head to go through.
“The only thing I can spare,” replied the wizard, thoughtfully, “is a Beauty Powder.”
“What!” cried the glass-blower, throwing down the rope, “have you really such a thing?”
“Yes, indeed. Whoever takes the powder will become the most beautiful person in the world.”
“If you will offer that as a reward,” said the glass-blower, eagerly, “I’ll try to find the dog for you, for above everything else I long to be beautiful.”
“But I warn you the beauty will only be skin deep,” said the wizard.
“That’s all right,” replied the happy glass-blower; “when I lose my skin I shan’t care to remain beautiful.”
“Then tell me where to find my dog and you shall have the powder,” promised the wizard.
So the glass-blower went out and pretended to search, and by-and-by he returned and said:
“I’ve discovered the dog. You will find him in the mansion of Miss Mydas.”
The wizard went at once to see if this were true, and, sure enough, the glass dog ran out and began barking at him. Then the wizard spread out his hands and chanted a magic spell which sent the dog fast asleep, when he picked him up and carried him to his own room on the top floor of the tenement house.
Afterward he carried the Beauty Powder to the glass-blower as a reward, and the fellow immediately swallowed it and became the most beautiful man in the world.
The next time he called upon Miss Mydas there was no dog to bark at him, and when the young lady saw him she fell in love with his beauty at once.
“If only you were a count or a prince,” she sighed, “I’d willingly marry you.”
“But I am a prince,” he answered; “the Prince of Dogblowers.”
“Ah!” said she; “then if you are willing to accept an allowance of four dollars a week I’ll order the wedding cards engraved.”
The man hesitated, but when he thought of the rope hanging from his bedpost he consented to the terms.
So they were married, and the bride was very jealous of her husband’s beauty and led him a dog’s life. So he managed to get into debt and made her miserable in turn.
As for the glass dog, the wizard set him barking again by means of his wizardness and put him outside his door. I suppose he is there yet, and am rather sorry, for I should like to consult the wizard about the moral to this story.
THE QUEEN OF QUOK
A king once died, as kings are apt to do, being as liable to shortness of breath as other mortals.
It was high time this king abandoned his earth life, for he had lived in a sadly extravagant manner, and his subjects could spare him without the slightest inconvenience.
His father had left him a full treasury, both money and jewels being in abundance. But the foolish king just deceased had squandered every penny in riotous living. He had then taxed his subjects until most of them became paupers, and this money vanished in more riotous living. Next he sold all the grand old furniture in the palace; all the silver and gold plate and bric-a-brac; all the rich carpets and furnishings and even his own kingly wardrobe, reserving only a soiled and moth-eaten ermine robe to fold over his threadbare raiment. And he spent the money in further riotous living.
Don’t ask me to explain what riotous living is. I only know, from hearsay, that it is an excellent way to get rid of money. And so this spendthrift king found it.
He now picked all the magnificent jewels from this kingly crown and from the round ball on the top of his scepter, and sold them and spent the money. Riotous living, of course. But at last he was at the end of his resources. He couldn’t sell the crown itself, because no one but the king had the right to wear it. Neither could he sell the royal palace, because only the king had the right to live there.
So, finally, he found himself reduced to a bare palace, containing only a big mahogany bedstead that he slept in, a small stool on which he sat to pull off his shoes and the moth-eaten ermine robe.
In this straight he was reduced to the necessity of borrowing an occasional dime from his chief counselor, with which to buy a ham sandwich. And the chief counselor hadn’t many dimes. One who counseled his king so foolishly was likely to ruin his own prospects as well.
So the king, having nothing more to live for, died suddenly and left a ten-year-old son to inherit the dismantled kingdom, the moth-eaten robe and the jewel-stripped crown.
No one envied the child, who had scarcely been thought of until he became king himself. Then he was recognized as a personage of some importance, and the politicians and hangers-on, headed by the chief counselor of the kingdom, held a meeting to determine what could be done for him.
These folk had helped the old king to live riotously while his money lasted, and now they were poor and too proud to work. So they tried to think of a plan that would bring more money into the little king’s treasury, where it would be handy for them to help themselves.
After the meeting was over the chief counselor came to the young king, who was playing peg-top in the courtyard, and said:
“Your majesty, we have thought of a way to restore your kingdom to its former power and magnificence.”
“All right,” replied his majesty, carelessly. “How will you do it?”
“By marrying you to a lady of great wealth,” replied the counselor.
“Marrying me!” cried the king. “Why, I am only ten years old!”
“I know; it is to be regretted. But your majesty will grow older, and the affairs of the kingdom demand that you marry a wife.”
“Can’t I marry a mother, instead?” asked the poor little king, who had lost his mother when a baby.
“Certainly not,” declared the counselor. “To marry a mother would be illegal; to marry a wife is right and proper.”
“Can’t you marry her yourself?” inquired his majesty, aiming his peg-top at the chief counselor’s toe, and laughing to see how he jumped to escape it.
“Let me explain,” said the other. “You haven’t a penny in the world, but you have a kingdom. There are many rich women who would be glad to give their wealth in exchange for a queen’s coronet—even if the king is but a child. So we have decided to advertise that the one who bids the highest shall become the queen of Quok.”
“If I must marry at all,” said the king, after a moment’s thought, “I prefer to marry Nyana, the armorer’s daughter.”
“She is too poor,” replied the counselor.
“Her teeth are pearls, her eyes are amethysts, and her hair is gold,” declared the little king.
“True, your majesty. But consider that your wife’s wealth must be used. How would Nyana look after you have pulled her teeth of pearls, plucked out her amethyst eyes and shaved her golden head?”
The boy shuddered.
“Have your own way,” he said, despairingly. “Only let the lady be as dainty as possible and a good playfellow.”
“We shall do our best,” returned the chief counselor, and went away to advertise throughout the neighboring kingdoms for a wife for the boy king of Quok.
There were so many applicants for the privilege of marrying the little king that it was decided to put him up at auction, in order that the largest possible sum of money should be brought into the kingdom. So, on the day appointed, the ladies gathered at the palace from all the surrounding kingdoms—from Bilkon, Mulgravia, Junkum and even as far away as the republic of Macvelt.
The chief counselor came to the palace early in the morning and had the king’s face washed and his hair combed; and then he padded the inside of the crown with old newspapers to make it small enough to fit his majesty’s head. It was a sorry looking crown, having many big and little holes in it where the jewels had once been; and it had been neglected and knocked around until it was quite battered and tarnished. Yet, as the counselor said, it was the king’s crown, and it was quite proper he should wear it on the solemn occasion of his auction.
Like all boys, be they kings or paupers, his majesty had torn and soiled his one suit of clothes, so that they were hardly presentable; and there was no money to buy new ones. Therefore the counselor wound the old ermine robe around the king and sat him upon the stool in the middle of the otherwise empty audience chamber.
And around him stood all the courtiers and politicians and hangers-on of the kingdom, consisting of such people as were too proud or lazy to work for a living. There was a great number of them, you may be sure, and they made an imposing appearance.
Then the doors of the audience chamber were thrown open, and the wealthy ladies who aspired to being queen of Quok came trooping in. The king looked them over with much anxiety, and decided they were each and all old enough to be his grandmother, and ugly enough to scare away the crows from the royal cornfields. After which he lost interest in them.
But the rich ladies never looked at the poor little king squatting upon his stool. They gathered at once about the chief counselor, who acted as auctioneer.
“How much am I offered for the coronet of the queen of Quok?” asked the counselor, in a loud voice.
“Where is the coronet?” inquired a fussy old lady who had just buried her ninth husband and was worth several millions.
“There isn’t any coronet at present,” explained the chief counselor, “but whoever bids highest will have the right to wear one, and she can then buy it.”
“Oh,” said the fussy old lady, “I see.” Then she added: “I’ll bid fourteen dollars.”
“Fourteen thousand dollars!” cried a sour-looking woman who was thin and tall and had wrinkles all over her skin—“like a frosted apple,” the king thought.
The bidding now became fast and furious, and the poverty-stricken courtiers brightened up as the sum began to mount into the millions.
“He’ll bring us a very pretty fortune, after all,” whispered one to his comrade, “and then we shall have the pleasure of helping him spend it.”
The king began to be anxious. All the women who looked at all kind-hearted or pleasant had stopped bidding for lack of money, and the slender old dame with the wrinkles seemed determined to get the coronet at any price, and with it the boy husband. This ancient creature finally became so excited that her wig got crosswise of her head and her false teeth kept slipping out, which horrified the little king greatly; but she would not give up.
At last the chief counselor ended the auction by crying out:
“Sold to Mary Ann Brodjinsky de la Porkus for three million, nine hundred thousand, six hundred and twenty-four dollars and sixteen cents!” And the sour-looking old woman paid the money in cash and on the spot, which proves this is a fairy story.
The king was so disturbed at the thought that he must marry this hideous creature that he began to wail and weep; whereupon the woman boxed his ears soundly. But the counselor reproved her for punishing her future husband in public, saying:
“You are not married yet. Wait until to-morrow, after the wedding takes place. Then you can abuse him as much as you wish. But at present we prefer to have people think this is a love match.”
The poor king slept but little that night, so filled was he with terror of his future wife. Nor could he get the idea out of his head that he preferred to marry the armorer’s daughter, who was about his own age. He tossed and tumbled around upon his hard bed until the moonlight came in at the window and lay like a great white sheet upon the bare floor. Finally, in turning over for the hundredth time, his hand struck against a secret spring in the headboard of the big mahogany bedstead, and at once, with a sharp click, a panel flew open.
The noise caused the king to look up, and, seeing the open panel, he stood upon tiptoe, and, reaching within, drew out a folded paper. It had several leaves fastened together like a book, and upon the first page was written:
“When the king is in trouble This leaf he must double And set it on fire To obtain his desire.”
This was not very good poetry, but when the king had spelled it out in the moonlight he was filled with joy.
“There’s no doubt about my being in trouble,” he exclaimed; “so I’ll burn it at once, and see what happens.”
He tore off the leaf and put the rest of the book in its secret hiding place. Then, folding the paper double, he placed it on the top of his stool, lighted a match and set fire to it.
It made a horrid smudge for so small a paper, and the king sat on the edge of the bed and watched it eagerly.
When the smoke cleared away he was surprised to see, sitting upon the stool, a round little man, who, with folded arms and crossed legs, sat calmly facing the king and smoking a black briarwood pipe.
“Well, here I am,” said he.
“So I see,” replied the little king. “But how did you get here?”
“Didn’t you burn the paper?” demanded the round man, by way of answer.
“Yes, I did,” acknowledged the king.
“Then you are in trouble, and I’ve come to help you out of it. I’m the Slave of the Royal Bedstead.”
“Oh!” said the king. “I didn’t know there was one.”
“Neither did your father, or he would not have been so foolish as to sell everything he had for money. By the way, it’s lucky for you he did not sell this bedstead. Now, then, what do you want?”
“I’m not sure what I want,” replied the king; “but I know what I don’t want, and that is the old woman who is going to marry me.”
“That’s easy enough,” said the Slave of the Royal Bedstead. “All you need do is to return her the money she paid the chief counselor and declare the match off. Don’t be afraid. You are the king, and your word is law.”
“To be sure,” said the majesty. “But I am in great need of money. How am I going to live if the chief counselor returns to Mary Ann Brodjinski her millions?”
“Phoo! that’s easy enough,” again answered the man, and, putting his hand in his pocket, he drew out and tossed to the king an old-fashioned leather purse. “Keep that with you,” said he, “and you will always be rich, for you can take out of the purse as many twenty-five-cent silver pieces as you wish, one at a time. No matter how often you take one out, another will instantly appear in its place within the purse.”
“Thank you,” said the king, gratefully. “You have rendered me a rare favor; for now I shall have money for all my needs and will not be obliged to marry anyone. Thank you a thousand times!”
“Don’t mention it,” answered the other, puffing his pipe slowly and watching the smoke curl into the moonlight. “Such things are easy to me. Is that all you want?”
“All I can think of just now,” returned the king.
“Then, please close that secret panel in the bedstead,” said the man; “the other leaves of the book may be of use to you some time.”
The boy stood upon the bed as before and, reaching up, closed the opening so that no one else could discover it. Then he turned to face his visitor, but the Slave of the Royal Bedstead had disappeared.
“I expected that,” said his majesty; “yet I am sorry he did not wait to say good-by.”
With a lightened heart and a sense of great relief the boy king placed the leathern purse underneath his pillow, and climbing into bed again slept soundly until morning.
When the sun rose his majesty rose also, refreshed and comforted, and the first thing he did was to send for the chief counselor.
That mighty personage arrived looking glum and unhappy, but the boy was too full of his own good fortune to notice it. Said he:
“I have decided not to marry anyone, for I have just come into a fortune of my own. Therefore I command you return to that old woman the money she has paid you for the right to wear the coronet of the queen of Quok. And make public declaration that the wedding will not take place.”
Hearing this the counselor began to tremble, for he saw the young king had decided to reign in earnest; and he looked so guilty that his majesty inquired:
“Well! what is the matter now?”
“Sire,” replied the wretch, in a shaking voice, “I cannot return the woman her money, for I have lost it!”
“Lost it!” cried the king, in mingled astonishment and anger.
“Even so, your majesty. On my way home from the auction last night I stopped at the drug store to get some potash lozenges for my throat, which was dry and hoarse with so much loud talking; and your majesty will admit it was through my efforts the woman was induced to pay so great a price. Well, going into the drug store I carelessly left the package of money lying on the seat of my carriage, and when I came out again it was gone. Nor was the thief anywhere to be seen.”
“Did you call the police?” asked the king.
“Yes, I called; but they were all on the next block, and although they have promised to search for the robber I have little hope they will ever find him.”
The king sighed.
“What shall we do now?” he asked.
“I fear you must marry Mary Ann Brodjinski,” answered the chief counselor; “unless, indeed, you order the executioner to cut her head off.”
“That would be wrong,” declared the king. “The woman must not be harmed. And it is just that we return her money, for I will not marry her under any circumstances.”
“Is that private fortune you mentioned large enough to repay her?” asked the counselor.
“Why, yes,” said the king, thoughtfully, “but it will take some time to do it, and that shall be your task. Call the woman here.”
The counselor went in search of Mary Ann, who, when she heard she was not to become a queen, but would receive her money back, flew into a violent passion and boxed the chief counselor’s ears so viciously that they stung for nearly an hour. But she followed him into the king’s audience chamber, where she demanded her money in a loud voice, claiming as well the interest due upon it over night.
“The counselor has lost your money,” said the boy king, “but he shall pay you every penny out of my own private purse. I fear, however, you will be obliged to take it in small change.”
“That will not matter,” she said, scowling upon the counselor as if she longed to reach his ears again; “I don’t care how small the change is so long as I get every penny that belongs to me, and the interest. Where is it?”
“Here,” answered the king, handing the counselor the leathern purse. “It is all in silver quarters, and they must be taken from the purse one at a time; but there will be plenty to pay your demands, and to spare.”
So, there being no chairs, the counselor sat down upon the floor in one corner and began counting out silver twenty-five-cent pieces from the purse, one by one. And the old woman sat upon the floor opposite him and took each piece of money from his hand.
It was a large sum: three million, nine hundred thousand, six hundred and twenty-four dollars and sixteen cents. And it takes four times as many twenty-five-cent pieces as it would dollars to make up the amount.
The king left them sitting there and went to school, and often thereafter he came to the counselor and interrupted him long enough to get from the purse what money he needed to reign in a proper and dignified manner. This somewhat delayed the counting, but as it was a long job, anyway, that did not matter much.
The king grew to manhood and married the pretty daughter of the armorer, and they now have two lovely children of their own. Once in awhile they go into the big audience chamber of the palace and let the little ones watch the aged, hoary-headed counselor count out silver twenty-five-cent pieces to a withered old woman, who watched his every movement to see that he does not cheat her.
It is a big sum, three million, nine hundred thousand, six hundred and twenty-four dollars and sixteen cents in twenty-five-cent pieces.
But this is how the counselor was punished for being so careless with the woman’s money. And this is how Mary Ann Brodjinski de la Porkus was also punished for wishing to marry a ten-year-old king in order that she might wear the coronet of the queen of Quok.
THE GIRL WHO OWNED A BEAR
Mamma had gone down-town to shop. She had asked Nora to look after Jane Gladys, and Nora promised she would. But it was her afternoon for polishing the silver, so she stayed in the pantry and left Jane Gladys to amuse herself alone in the big sitting-room upstairs.
The little girl did not mind being alone, for she was working on her first piece of embroidery—a sofa pillow for papa’s birthday present. So she crept into the big bay window and curled herself up on the broad sill while she bent her brown head over her work.
Soon the door opened and closed again, quietly. Jane Gladys thought it was Nora, so she didn’t look up until she had taken a couple more stitches on a forget-me-not. Then she raised her eyes and was astonished to find a strange man in the middle of the room, who regarded her earnestly.
He was short and fat, and seemed to be breathing heavily from his climb up the stairs. He held a work silk hat in one hand and underneath his other elbow was tucked a good-sized book. He was dressed in a black suit that looked old and rather shabby, and his head was bald upon the top.
“Excuse me,” he said, while the child gazed at him in solemn surprise. “Are you Jane Gladys Brown?”
“Yes, sir,” she answered.
“Very good; very good, indeed!” he remarked, with a queer sort of smile. “I’ve had quite a hunt to find you, but I’ve succeeded at last.”
“How did you get in?” inquired Jane Gladys, with a growing distrust of her visitor.
“That is a secret,” he said, mysteriously.
This was enough to put the girl on her guard. She looked at the man and the man looked at her, and both looks were grave and somewhat anxious.
“What do you want?” she asked, straightening herself up with a dignified air.
“Ah!—now we are coming to business,” said the man, briskly. “I’m going to be quite frank with you. To begin with, your father has abused me in a most ungentlemanly manner.”
Jane Gladys got off the window sill and pointed her small finger at the door.
“Leave this room ‘meejitly!” she cried, her voice trembling with indignation. “My papa is the best man in the world. He never ’bused anybody!”
“Allow me to explain, please,” said the visitor, without paying any attention to her request to go away. “Your father may be very kind to you, for you are his little girl, you know. But when he’s down-town in his office he’s inclined to be rather severe, especially on book agents. Now, I called on him the other day and asked him to buy the ‘Complete Works of Peter Smith,’ and what do you suppose he did?”
She said nothing.
“Why,” continued the man, with growing excitement, “he ordered me from his office, and had me put out of the building by the janitor! What do you think of such treatment as that from the ‘best papa in the world,’ eh?”
“I think he was quite right,” said Jane Gladys.
“Oh, you do? Well,” said the man, “I resolved to be revenged for the insult. So, as your father is big and strong and a dangerous man, I have decided to be revenged upon his little girl.”
Jane Gladys shivered.
“What are you going to do?” she asked.
“I’m going to present you with this book,” he answered, taking it from under his arm. Then he sat down on the edge of a chair, placed his hat on the rug and drew a fountain pen from his vest pocket.
“I’ll write your name in it,” said he. “How do you spell Gladys?”
“G-l-a-d-y-s,” she replied.
“Thank you. Now this,” he continued, rising and handing her the book with a bow, “is my revenge for your father’s treatment of me. Perhaps he’ll be sorry he didn’t buy the ‘Complete Works of Peter Smith.’ Good-by, my dear.”
He walked to the door, gave her another bow, and left the room, and Jane Gladys could see that he was laughing to himself as if very much amused.
When the door had closed behind the queer little man the child sat down in the window again and glanced at the book. It had a red and yellow cover and the word “Thingamajigs” was across the front in big letters.
Then she opened it, curiously, and saw her name written in black letters upon the first white leaf.
“He was a funny little man,” she said to herself, thoughtfully.
She turned the next leaf, and saw a big picture of a clown, dressed in green and red and yellow, and having a very white face with three-cornered spots of red on each cheek and over the eyes. While she looked at this the book trembled in her hands, the leaf crackled and creaked and suddenly the clown jumped out of it and stood upon the floor beside her, becoming instantly as big as any ordinary clown.
After stretching his arms and legs and yawning in a rather impolite manner, he gave a silly chuckle and said:
“This is better! You don’t know how cramped one gets, standing so long upon a page of flat paper.”
Perhaps you can imagine how startled Jane Gladys was, and how she stared at the clown who had just leaped out of the book.
“You didn’t expect anything of this sort, did you?” he asked, leering at her in clown fashion. Then he turned around to take a look at the room and Jane Gladys laughed in spite of her astonishment.
“What amuses you?” demanded the clown.
“Why, the back of you is all white!” cried the girl. “You’re only a clown in front of you.”
“Quite likely,” he returned, in an annoyed tone. “The artist made a front view of me. He wasn’t expected to make the back of me, for that was against the page of the book.”
“But it makes you look so funny!” said Jane Gladys, laughing until her eyes were moist with tears.
The clown looked sulky and sat down upon a chair so she couldn’t see his back.
“I’m not the only thing in the book,” he remarked, crossly.
This reminded her to turn another page, and she had scarcely noted that it contained the picture of a monkey when the animal sprang from the book with a great crumpling of paper and landed upon the window seat beside her.
“He-he-he-he-he!” chattered the creature, springing to the girl’s shoulder and then to the center table. “This is great fun! Now I can be a real monkey instead of a picture of one.”
“Real monkeys can’t talk,” said Jane Gladys, reprovingly.
“How do you know? Have you ever been one yourself?” inquired the animal; and then he laughed loudly, and the clown laughed, too, as if he enjoyed the remark.
The girl was quite bewildered by this time. She thoughtlessly turned another leaf, and before she had time to look twice a gray donkey leaped from the book and stumbled from the window seat to the floor with a great clatter.
“You’re clumsy enough, I’m sure!” said the child, indignantly, for the beast had nearly upset her.
“Clumsy! And why not?” demanded the donkey, with angry voice. “If the fool artist had drawn you out of perspective, as he did me, I guess you’d be clumsy yourself.”
“What’s wrong with you?” asked Jane Gladys.
“My front and rear legs on the left side are nearly six inches too short, that’s what’s the matter! If that artist didn’t know how to draw properly why did he try to make a donkey at all?”
“I don’t know,” replied the child, seeing an answer was expected.
“I can hardly stand up,” grumbled the donkey; “and the least little thing will topple me over.”
“Don’t mind that,” said the monkey, making a spring at the chandelier and swinging from it by his tail until Jane Gladys feared he would knock all the globes off; “the same artist has made my ears as big as that clown’s and everyone knows a monkey hasn’t any ears to speak of—much less to draw.”
“He should be prosecuted,” remarked the clown, gloomily. “I haven’t any back.”
Jane Gladys looked from one to the other with a puzzled expression upon her sweet face, and turned another page of the book.
Swift as a flash there sprang over her shoulder a tawney, spotted leopard, which landed upon the back of a big leather armchair and turned upon the others with a fierce movement.
The monkey climbed to the top of the chandelier and chattered with fright. The donkey tried to run and straightway tipped over on his left side. The clown grew paler than ever, but he sat still in his chair and gave a low whistle of surprise.
The leopard crouched upon the back of the chair, lashed his tail from side to side and glared at all of them, by turns, including Jane Gladys.
“Which of us are you going to attack first?” asked the donkey, trying hard to get upon his feet again.
“I can’t attack any of you,” snarled the leopard. “The artist made my mouth shut, so I haven’t any teeth; and he forgot to make my claws. But I’m a frightful looking creature, nevertheless; am I not?”
“Oh, yes;” said the clown, indifferently. “I suppose you’re frightful looking enough. But if you have no teeth nor claws we don’t mind your looks at all.”
This so annoyed the leopard that he growled horribly, and the monkey laughed at him.
Just then the book slipped from the girl’s lap, and as she made a movement to catch it one of the pages near the back opened wide. She caught a glimpse of a fierce grizzly bear looking at her from the page, and quickly threw the book from her. It fell with a crash in the middle of the room, but beside it stood the great grizzly, who had wrenched himself from the page before the book closed.
“Now,” cried the leopard from his perch, “you’d better look out for yourselves! You can’t laugh at him as you did at me. The bear has both claws and teeth.”
“Indeed I have,” said the bear, in a low, deep, growling voice. “And I know how to use them, too. If you read in that book you’ll find I’m described as a horrible, cruel and remorseless grizzly, whose only business in life is to eat up little girls—shoes, dresses, ribbons and all! And then, the author says, I smack my lips and glory in my wickedness.”
“That’s awful!” said the donkey, sitting upon his haunches and shaking his head sadly. “What do you suppose possessed the author to make you so hungry for girls? Do you eat animals, also?”
“The author does not mention my eating anything but little girls,” replied the bear.
“Very good,” remarked the clown, drawing a long breath of relief. “you may begin eating Jane Gladys as soon as you wish. She laughed because I had no back.”
“And she laughed because my legs are out of perspective,” brayed the donkey.
“But you also deserve to be eaten,” screamed the leopard from the back of the leather chair; “for you laughed and poked fun at me because I had no claws nor teeth! Don’t you suppose Mr. Grizzly, you could manage to eat a clown, a donkey and a monkey after you finish the girl?”
“Perhaps so, and a leopard into the bargain,” growled the bear. “It will depend on how hungry I am. But I must begin on the little girl first, because the author says I prefer girls to anything.”
Jane Gladys was much frightened on hearing this conversation, and she began to realize what the man meant when he said he gave her the book to be revenged. Surely papa would be sorry he hadn’t bought the “Complete Works of Peter Smith” when he came home and found his little girl eaten up by a grizzly bear—shoes, dress, ribbons and all!
The bear stood up and balanced himself on his rear legs.
“This is the way I look in the book,” he said. “Now watch me eat the little girl.”
He advanced slowly toward Jane Gladys, and the monkey, the leopard, the donkey and the clown all stood around in a circle and watched the bear with much interest.
But before the grizzly reached her the child had a sudden thought, and cried out:
“Stop! You mustn’t eat me. It would be wrong.”
“Why?” asked the bear, in surprise.
“Because I own you. You’re my private property,” she answered.
“I don’t see how you make that out,” said the bear, in a disappointed tone.
“Why, the book was given to me; my name’s on the front leaf. And you belong, by rights, in the book. So you mustn’t dare to eat your owner!”
The Grizzly hesitated.
“Can any of you read?” he asked.
“I can,” said the clown.
“Then see if she speaks the truth. Is her name really in the book?”
The clown picked it up and looked at the name.
“It is,” said he. “‘Jane Gladys Brown;’ and written quite plainly in big letters.”
The bear sighed.
“Then, of course, I can’t eat her,” he decided. “That author is as disappointing as most authors are.”
“But he’s not as bad as the artist,” exclaimed the donkey, who was still trying to stand up straight.
“The fault lies with yourselves,” said Jane Gladys, severely. “Why didn’t you stay in the book, where you were put?”
The animals looked at each other in a foolish way, and the clown blushed under his white paint.
“Really—” began the bear, and then he stopped short.
The door bell rang loudly.
“It’s mamma!” cried Jane Gladys, springing to her feet. “She’s come home at last. Now, you stupid creatures—”
But she was interrupted by them all making a rush for the book. There was a swish and a whirr and a rustling of leaves, and an instant later the book lay upon the floor looking just like any other book, while Jane Gladys’ strange companions had all disappeared.
This story should teach us to think quickly and clearly upon all occasions; for had Jane Gladys not remembered that she owned the bear he probably would have eaten her before the bell rang.
THE ENCHANTED TYPES
One time a knook became tired of his beautiful life and longed for something new to do. The knooks have more wonderful powers than any other immortal folk—except, perhaps, the fairies and ryls. So one would suppose that a knook who might gain anything he desired by a simple wish could not be otherwise than happy and contented. But such was not the case with Popopo, the knook we are speaking of. He had lived thousands of years, and had enjoyed all the wonders he could think of. Yet life had become as tedious to him now as it might be to one who was unable to gratify a single wish.
Finally, by chance, Popopo thought of the earth people who dwell in cities, and so he resolved to visit them and see how they lived. This would surely be fine amusement, and serve to pass away many wearisome hours.
Therefore one morning, after a breakfast so dainty that you could scarcely imagine it, Popopo set out for the earth and at once was in the midst of a big city.
His own dwelling was so quiet and peaceful that the roaring noise of the town startled him. His nerves were so shocked that before he had looked around three minutes he decided to give up the adventure, and instantly returned home.
This satisfied for a time his desire to visit the earth cities, but soon the monotony of his existence again made him restless and gave him another thought. At night the people slept and the cities would be quiet. He would visit them at night.
So at the proper time Popopo transported himself in a jiffy to a great city, where he began wandering about the streets. Everyone was in bed. No wagons rattled along the pavements; no throngs of busy men shouted and halloaed. Even the policemen slumbered slyly and there happened to be no prowling thieves abroad.
His nerves being soothed by the stillness, Popopo began to enjoy himself. He entered many of the houses and examined their rooms with much curiosity. Locks and bolts made no difference to a knook, and he saw as well in darkness as in daylight.
After a time he strolled into the business portion of the city. Stores are unknown among the immortals, who have no need of money or of barter and exchange; so Popopo was greatly interested by the novel sight of so many collections of goods and merchandise.
During his wanderings he entered a millinery shop, and was surprised to see within a large glass case a great number of women’s hats, each bearing in one position or another a stuffed bird. Indeed, some of the most elaborate hats had two or three birds upon them.
Now knooks are the especial guardians of birds, and love them dearly. To see so many of his little friends shut up in a glass case annoyed and grieved Popopo, who had no idea they had purposely been placed upon the hats by the milliner. So he slid back one of the doors of the case, gave the little chirruping whistle of the knooks that all birds know well, and called:
“Come, friends; the door is open—fly out!”
Popopo did not know the birds were stuffed; but, stuffed or not, every bird is bound to obey a knook’s whistle and a knook’s call. So they left the hats, flew out of the case and began fluttering about the room.
“Poor dears!” said the kind-hearted knook, “you long to be in the fields and forests again.”
Then he opened the outer door for them and cried: “Off with you! Fly away, my beauties, and be happy again.”
The astonished birds at once obeyed, and when they had soared away into the night air the knook closed the door and continued his wandering through the streets.
By dawn he saw many interesting sights, but day broke before he had finished the city, and he resolved to come the next evening a few hours earlier.
As soon as it was dark the following day he came again to the city and on passing the millinery shop noticed a light within. Entering he found two women, one of whom leaned her head upon the table and sobbed bitterly, while the other strove to comfort her.
Of course Popopo was invisible to mortal eyes, so he stood by and listened to their conversation.
“Cheer up, sister,” said one. “Even though your pretty birds have all been stolen the hats themselves remain.”
“Alas!” cried the other, who was the milliner, “no one will buy my hats partly trimmed, for the fashion is to wear birds upon them. And if I cannot sell my goods I shall be utterly ruined.”
Then she renewed her sobbing and the knook stole away, feeling a little ashamed to realized that in his love for the birds he had unconsciously wronged one of the earth people and made her unhappy.
This thought brought him back to the millinery shop later in the night, when the two women had gone home. He wanted, in some way, to replace the birds upon the hats, that the poor woman might be happy again. So he searched until he came upon a nearby cellar full of little gray mice, who lived quite undisturbed and gained a livelihood by gnawing through the walls into neighboring houses and stealing food from the pantries.
“Here are just the creatures,” thought Popopo, “to place upon the woman’s hats. Their fur is almost as soft as the plumage of the birds, and it strikes me the mice are remarkably pretty and graceful animals. Moreover, they now pass their lives in stealing, and were they obliged to remain always upon women’s hats their morals would be much improved.”
So he exercised a charm that drew all the mice from the cellar and placed them upon the hats in the glass case, where they occupied the places the birds had vacated and looked very becoming—at least, in the eyes of the unworldly knook. To prevent their running about and leaving the hats Popopo rendered them motionless, and then he was so pleased with his work that he decided to remain in the shop and witness the delight of the milliner when she saw how daintily her hats were now trimmed.
She came in the early morning, accompanied by her sister, and her face wore a sad and resigned expression. After sweeping and dusting the shop and drawing the blinds she opened the glass case and took out a hat.
But when she saw a tiny gray mouse nestling among the ribbons and laces she gave a loud shriek, and, dropping the hat, sprang with one bound to the top of the table. The sister, knowing the shriek to be one of fear, leaped upon a chair and exclaimed:
“What is it? Oh! what is it?”
“A mouse!” gasped the milliner, trembling with terror.
Popopo, seeing this commotion, now realized that mice are especially disagreeable to human beings, and that he had made a grave mistake in placing them upon the hats; so he gave a low whistle of command that was heard only by the mice.
Instantly they all jumped from the hats, dashed out the open door of the glass case and scampered away to their cellar. But this action so frightened the milliner and her sister that after giving several loud screams they fell upon their backs on the floor and fainted away.
Popopo was a kind-hearted knook, but on witnessing all this misery, caused by his own ignorance of the ways of humans, he straightway wished himself at home, and so left the poor women to recover as best they could.
Yet he could not escape a sad feeling of responsibility, and after thinking upon the matter he decided that since he had caused the milliner’s unhappiness by freeing the birds, he could set the matter right by restoring them to the glass case. He loved the birds, and disliked to condemn them to slavery again; but that seemed the only way to end the trouble.
So he set off to find the birds. They had flown a long distance, but it was nothing to Popopo to reach them in a second, and he discovered them sitting upon the branches of a big chestnut tree and singing gayly.
When they saw the knook the birds cried:
“Thank you, Popopo. Thank you for setting us free.”
“Do not thank me,” returned the knook, “for I have come to send you back to the millinery shop.”
“Why?” demanded a blue jay, angrily, while the others stopped their songs.
“Because I find the woman considers you her property, and your loss has caused her much unhappiness,” answered Popopo.
“But remember how unhappy we were in her glass case,” said a robin redbreast, gravely. “And as for being her property, you are a knook, and the natural guardian of all birds; so you know that Nature created us free. To be sure, wicked men shot and stuffed us, and sold us to the milliner; but the idea of our being her property is nonsense!”
Popopo was puzzled.
“If I leave you free,” he said, “wicked men will shoot you again, and you will be no better off than before.”
“Pooh!” exclaimed the blue jay, “we cannot be shot now, for we are stuffed. Indeed, two men fired several shots at us this morning, but the bullets only ruffled our feathers and buried themselves in our stuffing. We do not fear men now.”
“Listen!” said Popopo, sternly, for he felt the birds were getting the best of the argument; “the poor milliner’s business will be ruined if I do not return you to her shop. It seems you are necessary to trim the hats properly. It is the fashion for women to wear birds upon their headgear. So the poor milliner’s wares, although beautified by lace and ribbons, are worthless unless you are perched upon them.”
“Fashions,” said a black bird, solemnly, “are made by men. What law is there, among birds or knooks, that requires us to be the slaves of fashion?”
“What have we to do with fashions, anyway?” screamed a linnet. “If it were the fashion to wear knooks perched upon women’s hats would you be contented to stay there? Answer me, Popopo!”
But Popopo was in despair. He could not wrong the birds by sending them back to the milliner, nor did he wish the milliner to suffer by their loss. So he went home to think what could be done.
After much meditation he decided to consult the king of the knooks, and going at once to his majesty he told him the whole story.
The king frowned.
“This should teach you the folly of interfering with earth people,” he said. “But since you have caused all this trouble, it is your duty to remedy it. Our birds cannot be enslaved, that is certain; therefore you must have the fashions changed, so it will no longer be stylish for women to wear birds upon their hats.”
“How shall I do that?” asked Popopo.
“Easily enough. Fashions often change among the earth people, who tire quickly of any one thing. When they read in their newspapers and magazines that the style is so-and-so, they never question the matter, but at once obey the mandate of fashion. So you must visit the newspapers and magazines and enchant the types.”
“Enchant the types!” echoed Popopo, in wonder.
“Just so. Make them read that it is no longer the fashion to wear birds upon hats. That will afford relief to your poor milliner and at the same time set free thousands of our darling birds who have been so cruelly used.”
Popopo thanked the wise king and followed his advice.
The office of every newspaper and magazine in the city was visited by the knook, and then he went to other cities, until there was not a publication in the land that had not a “new fashion note” in its pages. Sometimes Popopo enchanted the types, so that whoever read the print would see only what the knook wished them to. Sometimes he called upon the busy editors and befuddled their brains until they wrote exactly what he wanted them to. Mortals seldom know how greatly they are influenced by fairies, knooks and ryls, who often put thoughts into their heads that only the wise little immortals could have conceived.
The following morning when the poor milliner looked over her newspaper she was overjoyed to read that “no woman could now wear a bird upon her hat and be in style, for the newest fashion required only ribbons and laces.”
Popopo after this found much enjoyment in visiting every millinery shop he could find and giving new life to the stuffed birds which were carelessly tossed aside as useless. And they flew to the fields and forests with songs of thanks to the good knook who had rescued them.
Sometimes a hunter fires his gun at a bird and then wonders why he did not hit it. But, having read this story, you will understand that the bird must have been a stuffed one from some millinery shop, which cannot, of course, be killed by a gun.
THE LAUGHING HIPPOPOTAMUS
On one of the upper branches of the Congo river lived an ancient and aristocratic family of hippopotamuses, which boasted a pedigree dating back beyond the days of Noah—beyond the existence of mankind—far into the dim ages when the world was new.
They had always lived upon the banks of this same river, so that every curve and sweep of its waters, every pit and shallow of its bed, every rock and stump and wallow upon its bank was as familiar to them as their own mothers. And they are living there yet, I suppose.
Not long ago the queen of this tribe of hippopotamuses had a child which she named Keo, because it was so fat and round. Still, that you may not be misled, I will say that in the hippopotamus language “Keo,” properly translated, means “fat and lazy” instead of fat and round. However, no one called the queen’s attention to this error, because her tusks were monstrous long and sharp, and she thought Keo the sweetest baby in the world.
He was, indeed, all right for a hippopotamus. He rolled and played in the soft mud of the river bank, and waddled inland to nibble the leaves of the wild cabbage that grew there, and was happy and contented from morning till night. And he was the jolliest hippopotamus that ancient family had ever known. His little red eyes were forever twinkling with fun, and he laughed his merry laugh on all occasions, whether there was anything to laugh at or not.
Therefore the black people who dwelt in that region called him “Ippi”—the jolly one, although they dared not come anigh him on account of his fierce mother, and his equally fierce uncles and aunts and cousins, who lived in a vast colony upon the river bank.
And while these black people, who lived in little villages scattered among the trees, dared not openly attack the royal family of hippopotamuses, they were amazingly fond of eating hippopotamus meat whenever they could get it. This was no secret to the hippopotamuses. And, again, when the blacks managed to catch these animals alive, they had a trick of riding them through the jungles as if they were horses, thus reducing them to a condition of slavery.
Therefore, having these things in mind, whenever the tribe of hippopotamuses smelled the oily odor of black people they were accustomed to charge upon them furiously, and if by chance they overtook one of the enemy they would rip him with their sharp tusks or stamp him into the earth with their huge feet.
It was continual warfare between the hippopotamuses and the black people.
Gouie lived in one of the little villages of the blacks. He was the son of the chief’s brother and grandson of the village sorcerer, the latter being an aged man known as the “the boneless wonder,” because he could twist himself into as many coils as a serpent and had no bones to hinder his bending his flesh into any position. This made him walk in a wabbly fashion, but the black people had great respect for him.
Gouie’s hut was made of branches of trees stuck together with mud, and his clothing consisted of a grass mat tied around his middle. But his relationship to the chief and the sorcerer gave him a certain dignity, and he was much addicted to solitary thought. Perhaps it was natural that these thoughts frequently turned upon his enemies, the hippopotamuses, and that he should consider many ways of capturing them.
Finally he completed his plans, and set about digging a great pit in the ground, midway between two sharp curves of the river. When the pit was finished he covered it over with small branches of trees, and strewed earth upon them, smoothing the surface so artfully that no one would suspect there was a big hole underneath. Then Gouie laughed softly to himself and went home to supper.
That evening the queen said to Keo, who was growing to be a fine child for his age:
“I wish you’d run across the bend and ask your Uncle Nikki to come here. I have found a strange plant, and want him to tell me if it is good to eat.”
The jolly one laughed heartily as he started upon his errand, for he felt as important as a boy does when he is sent for the first time to the corner grocery to buy a yeast cake.
“Guk-uk-uk-uk! guk-uk-uk-uk!” was the way he laughed; and if you think a hippopotamus does not laugh this way you have but to listen to one and you will find I am right.
He crawled out of the mud where he was wallowing and tramped away through the bushes, and the last his mother heard as she lay half in and half out of the water was his musical “guk-uk-uk-uk!” dying away in the distance.
Keo was in such a happy mood that he scarcely noticed where he stepped, so he was much surprised when, in the middle of a laugh, the ground gave way beneath him, and he fell to the bottom of Gouie’s deep pit. He was not badly hurt, but had bumped his nose severely as he went down; so he stopped laughing and began to think how he should get out again. Then he found the walls were higher than his head, and that he was a prisoner.
So he laughed a little at his own misfortune, and the laughter soothed him to sleep, so that he snored all through the night until daylight came.
When Gouie peered over the edge of the pit next morning he exclaimed:
“Why, ’tis Ippi—the Jolly One!”
Keo recognized the scent of a black man and tried to raise his head high enough to bite him. Seeing which Gouie spoke in the hippopotamus language, which he had learned from his grandfather, the sorcerer.
“Have peace, little one; you are my captive.”
“Yes; I will have a piece of your leg, if I can reach it,” retorted Keo; and then he laughed at his own joke: “Guk-uk-uk-uk!”
But Gouie, being a thoughtful black man, went away without further talk, and did not return until the following morning. When he again leaned over the pit Keo was so weak from hunger that he could hardly laugh at all.
“Do you give up?” asked Gouie, “or do you still wish to fight?”
“What will happen if I give up?” inquired Keo.
The black man scratched his woolly head in perplexity.
“It is hard to say, Ippi. You are too young to work, and if I kill you for food I shall lose your tusks, which are not yet grown. Why, O Jolly One, did you fall into my hole? I wanted to catch your mother or one of your uncles.”
“Guk-uk-uk-uk!” laughed Keo. “You must let me go, after all, black man; for I am of no use to you!”
“That I will not do,” declared Gouie; “unless,” he added, as an afterthought, “you will make a bargain with me.”
“Let me hear about the bargain, black one, for I am hungry,” said Keo.
“I will let your go if you swear by the tusks of your grandfather that you will return to me in a year and a day and become my prisoner again.”
The youthful hippopotamus paused to think, for he knew it was a solemn thing to swear by the tusks of his grandfather; but he was exceedingly hungry, and a year and a day seemed a long time off; so he said, with another careless laugh:
“Very well; if you will now let me go I swear by the tusks of my grandfather to return to you in a year and a day and become your prisoner.”
Gouie was much pleased, for he knew that in a year and a day Keo would be almost full grown. So he began digging away one end of the pit and filling it up with the earth until he had made an incline which would allow the hippopotamus to climb out.
Keo was so pleased when he found himself upon the surface of the earth again that he indulged in a merry fit of laughter, after which he said:
“Good-by, Gouie; in a year and a day you will see me again.”
Then he waddled away toward the river to see his mother and get his breakfast, and Gouie returned to his village.
During the months that followed, as the black man lay in his hut or hunted in the forest, he heard at times the faraway “Guk-uk-uk-uk!” of the laughing hippopotamus. But he only smiled to himself and thought: “A year and a day will soon pass away!”
Now when Keo returned to his mother safe and well every member of his tribe was filled with joy, for the Jolly One was a general favorite. But when he told them that in a year and a day he must again become the slave of the black man, they began to wail and weep, and so many were their tears that the river rose several inches.
Of course Keo only laughed at their sorrow; but a great meeting of the tribe was called and the matter discussed seriously.
“Having sworn by the tusks of his grandfather,” said Uncle Nikki, “he must keep his promise. But it is our duty to try in some way to rescue him from death or a life of slavery.”
To this all agreed, but no one could think of any method of saving Keo from his fate. So months passed away, during which all the royal hippopotamuses were sad and gloomy except the Jolly One himself.
Finally but a week of freedom remained to Keo, and his mother, the queen, became so nervous and worried that another meeting of the tribe was called. By this time the laughing hippopotamus had grown to enormous size, and measured nearly fifteen feet long and six feet high, while his sharp tusks were whiter and harder than those of an elephant.
“Unless something is done to save my child,” said the mother, “I shall die of grief.”
Then some of her relations began to make foolish suggestions; but presently Uncle Nep, a wise and very big hippopotamus, said:
“We must go to Glinkomok and implore his aid.”
Then all were silent, for it was a bold thing to face the mighty Glinkomok. But the mother’s love was equal to any heroism.
“I will myself go to him, if Uncle Nep will accompany me,” she said, quickly.
Uncle Nep thoughtfully patted the soft mud with his fore foot and wagged his short tail leisurely from side to side.
“We have always been obedient to Glinkomok, and shown him great respect,” said he. “Therefore I fear no danger in facing him. I will go with you.”
All the others snorted approval, being very glad they were not called upon to go themselves.
So the queen and Uncle Nep, with Keo swimming between them, set out upon their journey. They swam up the river all that day and all the next, until they came at sundown to a high, rocky wall, beneath which was the cave where the mighty Glinkomok dwelt.
This fearful creature was part beast, part man, part fowl and part fish. It had lived since the world began. Through years of wisdom it had become part sorcerer, part wizard, part magician and part fairy. Mankind knew it not, but the ancient beasts knew and feared it.
The three hippopotamuses paused before the cave, with their front feet upon the bank and their bodies in the water, and called in chorus a greeting to Glinkomok. Instantly thereafter the mouth of the cave darkened and the creature glided silently toward them.
The hippopotamuses were afraid to look upon it, and bowed their heads between their legs.
“We come, O Glinkomok, to implore your mercy and friendly assistance!” began Uncle Nep; and then he told the story of Keo’s capture, and how he had promised to return to the black man.
“He must keep his promise,” said the creature, in a voice that sounded like a sigh.
The mother hippopotamus groaned aloud.
“But I will prepare him to overcome the black man, and to regain his liberty,” continued Glinkomok.
Keo laughed.
“Lift your right paw,” commanded Glinkomok. Keo obeyed, and the creature touched it with its long, hairy tongue. Then it held four skinny hands over Keo’s bowed head and mumbled some words in a language unknown to man or beast or fowl or fish. After this it spoke again in hippopotamese:
“Your skin has now become so tough that no man can hurt you. Your strength is greater than that of ten elephants. Your foot is so swift that you can distance the wind. Your wit is sharper than the bulthorn. Let the man fear, but drive fear from your own breast forever; for of all your race you are the mightiest!”
Then the terrible Glinkomok leaned over, and Keo felt its fiery breath scorch him as it whispered some further instructions in his ear. The next moment it glided back into its cave, followed by the loud thanks of the three hippopotamuses, who slid into the water and immediately began their journey home.
The mother’s heart was full of joy; Uncle Nep shivered once or twice as he remembered a glimpse he had caught of Glinkomok; but Keo was as jolly as possible, and, not content to swim with his dignified elders, he dived under their bodies, raced all around them and laughed merrily every inch of the way home.
Then all the tribe held high jinks and praised the mighty Glinkomok for befriending their queen’s son. And when the day came for the Jolly One to give himself up to the black man they all kissed him good-by without a single fear for his safety.
Keo went away in good spirits, and they could hear his laughing “guk-uk-uk-uk!” long after he was lost in sight in the jungle.
Gouie had counted the days and knew when to expect Keo; but he was astonished at the monstrous size to which his captive had grown, and congratulated himself on the wise bargain he had made. And Keo was so fat that Gouie determined to eat him—that is, all of him he possibly could, and the remainder of the carcass he would trade off to his fellow villagers.
So he took a knife and tried to stick it into the hippopotamus, but the skin was so tough the knife was blunted against it. Then he tried other means; but Keo remained unhurt.
And now indeed the Jolly One laughed his most gleeful laugh, till all the forest echoed the “guk-uk-uk-uk-uk!” And Gouie decided not to kill him, since that was impossible, but to use him for a beast of burden. He mounted upon Keo’s back and commanded him to march. So Keo trotted briskly through the village, his little eyes twinkling with merriment.
The other blacks were delighted with Gouie’s captive, and begged permission to ride upon the Jolly One’s back. So Gouie bargained with them for bracelets and shell necklaces and little gold ornaments, until he had acquired quite a heap of trinkets. Then a dozen black men climbed upon Keo’s back to enjoy a ride, and the one nearest his nose cried out:
“Run, Mud-dog—run!”
And Keo ran. Swift as the wind he strode, away from the village, through the forest and straight up the river bank. The black men howled with fear; the Jolly One roared with laughter; and on, on, on they rushed!
Then before them, on the opposite side of the river, appeared the black mouth of Glinkomok’s cave. Keo dashed into the water, dived to the bottom and left the black people struggling to swim out. But Glinkomok had heard the laughter of Keo and knew what to do. When the Jolly One rose to the surface and blew the water from his throat there was no black man to be seen.
Keo returned alone to the village, and Gouie asked, with surprise:
“Where are my brothers:”
“I do not know,” answered Keo. “I took them far away, and they remained where I left them.”
Gouie would have asked more questions then, but another crowd of black men impatiently waited to ride on the back of the laughing hippopotamus. So they paid the price and climbed to their seats, after which the foremost said:
“Run, mud-wallower—run!”
And Keo ran as before and carried them to the mouth of Glinkomok’s cave, and returned alone.
But now Gouie became anxious to know the fate of his fellows, for he was the only black man left in his village. So he mounted the hippopotamus and cried:
“Run, river-hog—run!”
Keo laughed his jolly “guk-uk-uk-uk!” and ran with the speed of the wind. But this time he made straight for the river bank where his own tribe lived, and when he reached it he waded into the river, dived to the bottom and left Gouie floating in the middle of the stream.
The black man began swimming toward the right bank, but there he saw Uncle Nep and half the royal tribe waiting to stamp him into the soft mud. So he turned toward the left bank, and there stood the queen mother and Uncle Nikki, red-eyed and angry, waiting to tear him with their tusks.
Then Gouie uttered loud screams of terror, and, spying the Jolly One, who swam near him, he cried:
“Save me, Keo! Save me, and I will release you from slavery!”
“That is not enough,” laughed Keo.
“I will serve you all my life!” screamed Gouie; “I will do everything you bid me!”
“Will you return to me in a year and a day and become my captive, if I allow you to escape?” asked Keo.
“I will! I will! I will!” cried Gouie.
“Swear it by the bones of your grandfather!” commanded Keo, remembering that black men have no tusks to swear by.
And Gouie swore it by the bones of his grandfather.
Then Keo swam to the black one, who clambered upon his back again. In this fashion they came to the bank, where Keo told his mother and all the tribe of the bargain he had made with Gouie, who was to return in a year and a day and become his slave.
Therefore the black man was permitted to depart in peace, and once more the Jolly One lived with his own people and was happy.
When a year and a day had passed Keo began watching for the return of Gouie; but he did not come, then or ever afterwards.
For the black man had made a bundle of his bracelets and shell necklaces and little gold ornaments and had traveled many miles into another country, where the ancient and royal tribe of hippopotamuses was unknown. And he set up for a great chief, because of his riches, and people bowed down before him.
By day he was proud and swaggering. But at night he tumbled and tossed upon his bed and could not sleep. His conscience troubled him.
For he had sworn by the bones of his grandfather; and his grandfather had no bones.
THE MAGIC BON BONS
There lived in Boston a wise and ancient chemist by the name of Dr. Daws, who dabbled somewhat in magic. There also lived in Boston a young lady by the name of Claribel Sudds, who was possessed of much money, little wit and an intense desire to go upon the stage.
So Claribel went to Dr. Daws and said:
“I can neither sing nor dance; I cannot recite verse nor play upon the piano; I am no acrobat nor leaper nor high kicker; yet I wish to go upon the stage. What shall I do?”
“Are you willing to pay for such accomplishments?” asked the wise chemist.
“Certainly,” answered Claribel, jingling her purse.
“Then come to me to-morrow at two o’clock,” said he.
All that night he practiced what is known as chemical sorcery; so that when Claribel Sudds came next day at two o’clock he showed her a small box filled with compounds that closely resembled French bonbons.
“This is a progressive age,” said the old man, “and I flatter myself your Uncle Daws keeps right along with the procession. Now, one of your old-fashioned sorcerers would have made you some nasty, bitter pills to swallow; but I have consulted your taste and convenience. Here are some magic bonbons. If you eat this one with the lavender color you can dance thereafter as lightly and gracefully as if you had been trained a lifetime. After you consume the pink confection you will sing like a nightingale. Eating the white one will enable you to become the finest elocutionist in the land. The chocolate piece will charm you into playing the piano better than Rubenstein, while after eating the lemon-yellow bonbon you can easily kick six feet above your head.”
“How delightful!” exclaimed Claribel, who was truly enraptured. “You are certainly a most clever sorcerer as well as a considerate compounder,” and she held out her hand for the box.
“Ahem!” said the wise one; “a check, please.”
“Oh, yes; to be sure! How stupid of me to forget it,” she returned.
He considerately retained the box in his own hand while she signed a check for a large amount of money, after which he allowed her to hold the box herself.
“Are you sure you have made them strong enough?” she inquired, anxiously; “it usually takes a great deal to affect me.”
“My only fear,” replied Dr. Daws, “is that I have made them too strong. For this is the first time I have ever been called upon to prepare these wonderful confections.”
“Don’t worry,” said Claribel; “the stronger they act the better I shall act myself.”
She went away, after saying this, but stopping in at a dry goods store to shop, she forgot the precious box in her new interest and left it lying on the ribbon counter.
Then little Bessie Bostwick came to the counter to buy a hair ribbon and laid her parcels beside the box. When she went away she gathered up the box with her other bundles and trotted off home with it.
Bessie never knew, until after she had hung her coat in the hall closet and counted up her parcels, that she had one too many. Then she opened it and exclaimed:
“Why, it’s a box of candy! Someone must have mislaid it. But it is too small a matter to worry about; there are only a few pieces.” So she dumped the contents of the box into a bonbon dish that stood upon the hall table and picking out the chocolate piece—she was fond of chocolates—ate it daintily while she examined her purchases.
These were not many, for Bessie was only twelve years old and was not yet trusted by her parents to expend much money at the stores. But while she tried on the hair ribbon she suddenly felt a great desire to play upon the piano, and the desire at last became so overpowering that she went into the parlor and opened the instrument.
The little girl had, with infinite pains, contrived to learn two “pieces” which she usually executed with a jerky movement of her right hand and a left hand that forgot to keep up and so made dreadful discords. But under the influence of the chocolate bonbon she sat down and ran her fingers lightly over the keys producing such exquisite harmony that she was filled with amazement at her own performance.
That was the prelude, however. The next moment she dashed into Beethoven’s seventh sonata and played it magnificently.
Her mother, hearing the unusual burst of melody, came downstairs to see what musical guest had arrived; but when she discovered it was her own little daughter who was playing so divinely she had an attack of palpitation of the heart (to which she was subject) and sat down upon a sofa until it should pass away.
Meanwhile Bessie played one piece after another with untiring energy. She loved music, and now found that all she need do was to sit at the piano and listen and watch her hands twinkle over the keyboard.
Twilight deepened in the room and Bessie’s father came home and hung up his hat and overcoat and placed his umbrella in the rack. Then he peeped into the parlor to see who was playing.
“Great Caesar!” he exclaimed. But the mother came to him softly with her finger on her lips and whispered: “Don’t interrupt her, John. Our child seems to be in a trance. Did you ever hear such superb music?”
“Why, she’s an infant prodigy!” gasped the astounded father. “Beats Blind Tom all hollow! It’s—it’s wonderful!”
As they stood listening the senator arrived, having been invited to dine with them that evening. And before he had taken off his coat the Yale professor—a man of deep learning and scholarly attainments—joined the party.
Bessie played on; and the four elders stood in a huddled but silent and amazed group, listening to the music and waiting for the sound of the dinner gong.
Mr. Bostwick, who was hungry, picked up the bonbon dish that lay on the table beside him and ate the pink confection. The professor was watching him, so Mr. Bostwick courteously held the dish toward him. The professor ate the lemon-yellow piece and the senator reached out his hand and took the lavender piece. He did not eat it, however, for, chancing to remember that it might spoil his dinner, he put it in his vest pocket. Mrs. Bostwick, still intently listening to her precocious daughter, without thinking what she did, took the remaining piece, which was the white one, and slowly devoured it.
The dish was now empty, and Claribel Sudds’ precious bonbons had passed from her possession forever!
Suddenly Mr. Bostwick, who was a big man, began to sing in a shrill, tremolo soprano voice. It was not the same song Bessie was playing, and the discord was shocking that the professor smiled, the senator put his hands to his ears and Mrs. Bostwick cried in a horrified voice:
“William!”
Her husband continued to sing as if endeavoring to emulate the famous Christine Nillson, and paid no attention whatever to his wife or his guests.
Fortunately the dinner gong now sounded, and Mrs. Bostwick dragged Bessie from the piano and ushered her guests into the dining-room. Mr. Bostwick followed, singing “The Last Rose of Summer” as if it had been an encore demanded by a thousand delighted hearers.
The poor woman was in despair at witnessing her husband’s undignified actions and wondered what she might do to control him. The professor seemed more grave than usual; the senator’s face wore an offended expression, and Bessie kept moving her fingers as if she still wanted to play the piano.
Mrs. Bostwick managed to get them all seated, although her husband had broken into another aria; and then the maid brought in the soup.
When she carried a plate to the professor, he cried, in an excited voice:
“Hold it higher! Higher—I say!” And springing up he gave it a sudden kick that sent it nearly to the ceiling, from whence the dish descended to scatter soup over Bessie and the maid and to smash in pieces upon the crown of the professor’s bald head.
At this atrocious act the senator rose from his seat with an exclamation of horror and glanced at his hostess.
For some time Mrs. Bostwick had been staring straight ahead, with a dazed expression; but now, catching the senator’s eye, she bowed gracefully and began reciting “The Charge of the Light Brigade” in forceful tones.
The senator shuddered. Such disgraceful rioting he had never seen nor heard before in a decent private family. He felt that his reputation was at stake, and, being the only sane person, apparently, in the room, there was no one to whom he might appeal.
The maid had run away to cry hysterically in the kitchen; Mr. Bostwick was singing “O Promise Me;” the professor was trying to kick the globes off the chandelier; Mrs. Bostwick had switched her recitation to “The Boy Stood on the Burning Deck,” and Bessie had stolen into the parlor and was pounding out the overture from the “Flying Dutchman.”
The senator was not at all sure he would not go crazy himself, presently; so he slipped away from the turmoil, and, catching up his had and coat in the hall, hurried from the house.
That night he sat up late writing a political speech he was to deliver the next afternoon at Faneuil hall, but his experiences at the Bostwicks’ had so unnerved him that he could scarcely collect his thoughts, and often he would pause and shake his head pityingly as he remembered the strange things he had seen in that usually respectable home.
The next day he met Mr. Bostwick in the street, but passed him by with a stony glare of oblivion. He felt he really could not afford to know this gentleman in the future. Mr. Bostwick was naturally indignant at the direct snub; yet in his mind lingered a faint memory of some quite unusual occurrences at his dinner party the evening before, and he hardly knew whether he dared resent the senator’s treatment or not.
The political meeting was the feature of the day, for the senator’s eloquence was well known in Boston. So the big hall was crowded with people, and in one of the front rows sat the Bostwick family, with the learned Yale professor beside them. They all looked tired and pale, as if they had passed a rather dissipated evening, and the senator was rendered so nervous by seeing them that he refused to look in their direction a second time.
While the mayor was introducing him the great man sat fidgeting in his chair; and, happening to put his thumb and finger into his vest pocket, he found the lavender-colored bonbon he had placed there the evening before.
“This may clear my throat,” thought the senator, and slipped the bonbon into his mouth.
A few minutes afterwards he arose before the vast audience, which greeted him with enthusiastic plaudits.
“My friends,” began the senator, in a grave voice, “this is a most impressive and important occasion.”
Then he paused, balanced himself upon his left foot, and kicked his right leg into the air in the way favored by ballet-dancers!
There was a hum of amazement and horror from the spectators, but the senator appeared not to notice it. He whirled around upon the tips of his toes, kicked right and left in a graceful manner, and startled a bald-headed man in the front row by casting a languishing glance in his direction.
Suddenly Claribel Sudds, who happened to be present, uttered a scream and sprang to her feet. Pointing an accusing finger at the dancing senator, she cried in a loud voice:
“That’s the man who stole my bonbons! Seize him! Arrest him! Don’t let him escape!”
But the ushers rushed her out of the hall, thinking she had gone suddenly insane; and the senator’s friends seized him firmly and carried him out the stage entrance to the street, where they put him into an open carriage and instructed the driver to take him home.
The effect of the magic bonbon was still powerful enough to control the poor senator, who stood upon the rear seat of the carriage and danced energetically all the way home, to the delight of the crowd of small boys who followed the carriage and the grief of the sober-minded citizens, who shook their heads sadly and whispered that “another good man had gone wrong.”
It took the senator several months to recover from the shame and humiliation of this escapade; and, curiously enough, he never had the slightest idea what had induced him to act in so extraordinary a manner. Perhaps it was fortunate the last bonbon had now been eaten, for they might easily have caused considerably more trouble than they did.
Of course Claribel went again to the wise chemist and signed a check for another box of magic bonbons; but she must have taken better care of these, for she is now a famous vaudeville actress.
This story should teach us the folly of condemning others for actions that we do not understand, for we never know what may happen to ourselves. It may also serve as a hint to be careful about leaving parcels in public places, and, incidentally, to let other people’s packages severely alone.
THE CAPTURE OF FATHER TIME
Jim was the son of a cowboy, and lived on the broad plains of Arizona. His father had trained him to lasso a bronco or a young bull with perfect accuracy, and had Jim possessed the strength to back up his skill he would have been as good a cowboy as any in all Arizona.
When he was twelve years old he made his first visit to the east, where Uncle Charles, his father’s brother, lived. Of course Jim took his lasso with him, for he was proud of his skill in casting it, and wanted to show his cousins what a cowboy could do.
At first the city boys and girls were much interested in watching Jim lasso posts and fence pickets, but they soon tired of it, and even Jim decided it was not the right sort of sport for cities.
But one day the butcher asked Jim to ride one of his horses into the country, to a pasture that had been engaged, and Jim eagerly consented. He had been longing for a horseback ride, and to make it seem like old times he took his lasso with him.
He rode through the streets demurely enough, but on reaching the open country roads his spirits broke forth into wild jubilation, and, urging the butcher’s horse to full gallop, he dashed away in true cowboy fashion.
Then he wanted still more liberty, and letting down the bars that led into a big field he began riding over the meadow and throwing his lasso at imaginary cattle, while he yelled and whooped to his heart’s content.
Suddenly, on making a long cast with his lasso, the loop caught upon something and rested about three feet from the ground, while the rope drew taut and nearly pulled Jim from his horse.
This was unexpected. More than that, it was wonderful; for the field seemed bare of even a stump. Jim’s eyes grew big with amazement, but he knew he had caught something when a voice cried out:
“Here, let go! Let go, I say! Can’t you see what you’ve done?”
No, Jim couldn’t see, nor did he intend to let go until he found out what was holding the loop of the lasso. So he resorted to an old trick his father had taught him and, putting the butcher’s horse to a run, began riding in a circle around the spot where his lasso had caught.
As he thus drew nearer and nearer his quarry he saw the rope coil up, yet it looked to be coiling over nothing but air. One end of the lasso was made fast to a ring in the saddle, and when the rope was almost wound up and the horse began to pull away and snort with fear, Jim dismounted. Holding the reins of the bridle in one hand, he followed the rope, and an instant later saw an old man caught fast in the coils of the lasso.
His head was bald and uncovered, but long white whiskers grew down to his waist. About his body was thrown a loose robe of fine white linen. In one hand he bore a great scythe, and beneath the other arm he carried an hourglass.
While Jim gazed wonderingly upon him, this venerable old man spoke in an angry voice:
“Now, then—get that rope off as fast as you can! You’ve brought everything on earth to a standstill by your foolishness! Well—what are you staring at? Don’t you know who I am?”
“No,” said Jim, stupidly.
“Well, I’m Time—Father Time! Now, make haste and set me free—if you want the world to run properly.”
“How did I happen to catch you?” asked Jim, without making a move to release his captive.
“I don’t know. I’ve never been caught before,” growled Father Time. “But I suppose it was because you were foolishly throwing your lasso at nothing.”
“I didn’t see you,” said Jim.
“Of course you didn’t. I’m invisible to the eyes of human beings unless they get within three feet of me, and I take care to keep more than that distance away from them. That’s why I was crossing this field, where I supposed no one would be. And I should have been perfectly safe had it not been for your beastly lasso. Now, then,” he added, crossly, “are you going to get that rope off?”
“Why should I?” asked Jim.
“Because everything in the world stopped moving the moment you caught me. I don’t suppose you want to make an end of all business and pleasure, and war and love, and misery and ambition and everything else, do you? Not a watch has ticked since you tied me up here like a mummy!”
Jim laughed. It really was funny to see the old man wound round and round with coils of rope from his knees up to his chin.
“It’ll do you good to rest,” said the boy. “From all I’ve heard you lead a rather busy life.”
“Indeed I do,” replied Father Time, with a sigh. “I’m due in Kamchatka this very minute. And to think one small boy is upsetting all my regular habits!”
“Too bad!” said Jim, with a grin. “But since the world has stopped anyhow, it won’t matter if it takes a little longer recess. As soon as I let you go Time will fly again. Where are your wings?”
“I haven’t any,” answered the old man. “That is a story cooked up by some one who never saw me. As a matter of fact, I move rather slowly.”
“I see, you take your time,” remarked the boy. “What do you use that scythe for?”
“To mow down the people,” said the ancient one. “Every time I swing my scythe some one dies.”
“Then I ought to win a life-saving medal by keeping you tied up,” said Jim. “Some folks will live this much longer.”
“But they won’t know it,” said Father Time, with a sad smile; “so it will do them no good. You may as well untie me at once.”
“No,” said Jim, with a determined air. “I may never capture you again; so I’ll hold you for awhile and see how the world wags without you.”
Then he swung the old man, bound as he was, upon the back of the butcher’s horse, and, getting into the saddle himself, started back toward town, one hand holding his prisoner and the other guiding the reins.
When he reached the road his eye fell on a strange tableau. A horse and buggy stood in the middle of the road, the horse in the act of trotting, with his head held high and two legs in the air, but perfectly motionless. In the buggy a man and a woman were seated; but had they been turned into stone they could not have been more still and stiff.
“There’s no Time for them!” sighed the old man. “Won’t you let me go now?”
“Not yet,” replied the boy.
He rode on until he reached the city, where all the people stood in exactly the same positions they were in when Jim lassoed Father Time. Stopping in front of a big dry goods store, the boy hitched his horse and went in. The clerks were measuring out goods and showing patterns to the rows of customers in front of them, but everyone seemed suddenly to have become a statue.
There was something very unpleasant in this scene, and a cold shiver began to run up and down Jim’s back; so he hurried out again.
On the edge of the sidewalk sat a poor, crippled beggar, holding out his hat, and beside him stood a prosperous-looking gentleman who was about to drop a penny into the beggar’s hat. Jim knew this gentleman to be very rich but rather stingy, so he ventured to run his hand into the man’s pocket and take out his purse, in which was a $20 gold piece. This glittering coin he put in the gentleman’s fingers instead of the penny and then restored the purse to the rich man’s pocket.
“That donation will surprise him when he comes to life,” thought the boy.
He mounted the horse again and rode up the street. As he passed the shop of his friend, the butcher, he noticed several pieces of meat hanging outside.
“I’m afraid that meat’ll spoil,” he remarked.
“It takes Time to spoil meat,” answered the old man.
This struck Jim as being queer, but true.
“It seems Time meddles with everything,” said he.
“Yes; you’ve made a prisoner of the most important personage in the world,” groaned the old man; “and you haven’t enough sense to let him go again.”
Jim did not reply, and soon they came to his uncle’s house, where he again dismounted. The street was filled with teams and people, but all were motionless. His two little cousins were just coming out the gate on their way to school, with their books and slates underneath their arms; so Jim had to jump over the fence to avoid knocking them down.
In the front room sat his aunt, reading her Bible. She was just turning a page when Time stopped. In the dining-room was his uncle, finishing his luncheon. His mouth was open and his fork poised just before it, while his eyes were fixed upon the newspaper folded beside him. Jim helped himself to his uncle’s pie, and while he ate it he walked out to his prisoner.
“There’s one thing I don’t understand,” said he.
“What’s that?” asked Father Time.
“Why is it that I’m able to move around while everyone else is—is—froze up?”
“That is because I’m your prisoner,” answered the other. “You can do anything you wish with Time now. But unless you are careful you’ll do something you will be sorry for.”
Jim threw the crust of his pie at a bird that was suspended in the air, where it had been flying when Time stopped.
“Anyway,” he laughed, “I’m living longer than anyone else. No one will ever be able to catch up with me again.”
“Each life has its allotted span,” said the old man. “When you have lived your proper time my scythe will mow you down.”
“I forgot your scythe,” said Jim, thoughtfully.
Then a spirit of mischief came into the boy’s head, for he happened to think that the present opportunity to have fun would never occur again. He tied Father Time to his uncle’s hitching post, that he might not escape, and then crossed the road to the corner grocery.
The grocer had scolded Jim that very morning for stepping into a basket of turnips by accident. So the boy went to the back end of the grocery and turned on the faucet of the molasses barrel.
“That’ll make a nice mess when Time starts the molasses running all over the floor,” said Jim, with a laugh.
A little further down the street was a barber shop, and sitting in the barber’s chair Jim saw the man that all the boys declared was the “meanest man in town.” He certainly did not like the boys and the boys knew it. The barber was in the act of shampooing this person when Time was captured. Jim ran to the drug store, and, getting a bottle of mucilage, he returned and poured it over the ruffled hair of the unpopular citizen.
“That’ll probably surprise him when he wakes up,” thought Jim.
Near by was the schoolhouse. Jim entered it and found that only a few of the pupils were assembled. But the teacher sat at his desk, stern and frowning as usual.
Taking a piece of chalk, Jim marked upon the blackboard in big letters the following words:
“Every scholar is requested to yell the minute he enters the room. He will also please throw his books at the teacher’s head. Signed, Prof. Sharpe.”
“That ought to raise a nice rumpus,” murmured the mischiefmaker, as he walked away.
On the corner stood Policeman Mulligan, talking with old Miss Scrapple, the worst gossip in town, who always delighted in saying something disagreeable about her neighbors. Jim thought this opportunity was too good to lose. So he took off the policeman’s cap and brass-buttoned coat and put them on Miss Scrapple, while the lady’s feathered and ribboned hat he placed jauntily upon the policeman’s head.
The effect was so comical that the boy laughed aloud, and as a good many people were standing near the corner Jim decided that Miss Scrapple and Officer Mulligan would create a sensation when Time started upon his travels.
Then the young cowboy remembered his prisoner, and, walking back to the hitching post, he came within three feet of it and saw Father Time still standing patiently within the toils of the lasso. He looked angry and annoyed, however, and growled out:
“Well, when do you intend to release me?”
“I’ve been thinking about that ugly scythe of yours,” said Jim.
“What about it?” asked Father Time.
“Perhaps if I let you go you’ll swing it at me the first thing, to be revenged,” replied the boy.
Father Time gave him a severe look, but said:
“I’ve known boys for thousands of years, and of course I know they’re mischievous and reckless. But I like boys, because they grow up to be men and people my world. Now, if a man had caught me by accident, as you did, I could have scared him into letting me go instantly; but boys are harder to scare. I don’t know as I blame you. I was a boy myself, long ago, when the world was new. But surely you’ve had enough fun with me by this time, and now I hope you’ll show the respect that is due to old age. Let me go, and in return I will promise to forget all about my capture. The incident won’t do much harm, anyway, for no one will ever know that Time has halted the last three hours or so.”
“All right,” said Jim, cheerfully, “since you’ve promised not to mow me down, I’ll let you go.” But he had a notion some people in the town would suspect Time had stopped when they returned to life.
He carefully unwound the rope from the old man, who, when he was free, at once shouldered his scythe, rearranged his white robe and nodded farewell.
The next moment he had disappeared, and with a rustle and rumble and roar of activity the world came to life again and jogged along as it always had before.
Jim wound up his lasso, mounted the butcher’s horse and rode slowly down the street.
Loud screams came from the corner, where a great crowd of people quickly assembled. From his seat on the horse Jim saw Miss Scrapple, attired in the policeman’s uniform, angrily shaking her fists in Mulligan’s face, while the officer was furiously stamping upon the lady’s hat, which he had torn from his own head amidst the jeers of the crowd.
As he rode past the schoolhouse he heard a tremendous chorus of yells, and knew Prof. Sharpe was having a hard time to quell the riot caused by the sign on the blackboard.
Through the window of the barber shop he saw the “mean man” frantically belaboring the barber with a hair brush, while his hair stood up stiff as bayonets in all directions. And the grocer ran out of his door and yelled “Fire!” while his shoes left a track of molasses wherever he stepped.
Jim’s heart was filled with joy. He was fairly reveling in the excitement he had caused when some one caught his leg and pulled him from the horse.
“What’re ye doin’ hear, ye rascal?” cried the butcher, angrily; “didn’t ye promise to put that beast inter Plympton’s pasture? An’ now I find ye ridin’ the poor nag around like a gentleman o’ leisure!”
“That’s a fact,” said Jim, with surprise; “I clean forgot about the horse!”
This story should teach us the supreme importance of Time and the folly of trying to stop it. For should you succeed, as Jim did, in bringing Time to a standstill, the world would soon become a dreary place and life decidedly unpleasant.
THE WONDERFUL PUMP
Not many years ago there lived on a stony, barren New England farm a man and his wife. They were sober, honest people, working hard from early morning until dark to enable them to secure a scanty living from their poor land.
Their house, a small, one-storied building, stood upon the side of a steep hill, and the stones lay so thickly about it that scarce anything green could grow from the ground. At the foot of the hill, a quarter of a mile from the house by the winding path, was a small brook, and the woman was obliged to go there for water and to carry it up the hill to the house. This was a tedious task, and with the other hard work that fell to her share had made her gaunt and bent and lean.
Yet she never complained, but meekly and faithfully performed her duties, doing the housework, carrying the water and helping her husband hoe the scanty crop that grew upon the best part of their land.
One day, as she walked down the path to the brook, her big shoes scattering the pebbles right and left, she noticed a large beetle lying upon its back and struggling hard with its little legs to turn over, that its feet might again touch the ground. But this it could not accomplish; so the woman, who had a kind heart, reached down and gently turned the beetle with her finger. At once it scampered from the path and she went on to the brook.
The next day, as she came for water, she was surprised to see the beetle again lying upon its back and struggling helplessly to turn. Once more the woman stopped and set him upon his feet; and then, as she stooped over the tiny creature, she heard a small voice say:
“Oh, thank you! Thank you so much for saving me!”
Half frightened at hearing a beetle speak in her own language, the woman started back and exclaimed:
“La sakes! Surely you can’t talk like humans!” Then, recovering from her alarm, she again bent over the beetle, who answered her:
“Why shouldn’t I talk, if I have anything to say?
“’Cause you’re a bug,” replied the woman.
“That is true; and you saved my life—saved me from my enemies, the sparrows. And this is the second time you have come to my assistance, so I owe you a debt of gratitude. Bugs value their lives as much as human beings, and I am a more important creature than you, in your ignorance, may suppose. But, tell me, why do you come each day to the brook?”
“For water,” she answered, staring stupidly down at the talking beetle.
“Isn’t it hard work?” the creature inquired.
“Yes; but there’s no water on the hill,” said she.
“Then dig a well and put a pump in it,” replied the beetle.
She shook her head.
“My man tried it once; but there was no water,” she said, sadly.
“Try it again,” commanded the beetle; “and in return for your kindness to me I will make this promise: if you do not get water from the well you will get that which is more precious to you. I must go now. Do not forget. Dig a well.”
And then, without pausing to say good-by, it ran swiftly away and was lost among the stones.
The woman returned to the house much perplexed by what the beetle had said, and when her husband came in from his work she told him the whole story.
The poor man thought deeply for a time, and then declared:
“Wife, there may be truth in what the bug told you. There must be magic in the world yet, if a beetle can speak; and if there is such a thing as magic we may get water from the well. The pump I bought to use in the well which proved to be dry is now lying in the barn, and the only expense in following the talking bug’s advice will be the labor of digging the hole. Labor I am used to; so I will dig the well.”
Next day he set about it, and dug so far down in the ground that he could hardly reach the top to climb out again; but not a drop of water was found.
“Perhaps you did not dig deep enough,” his wife said, when he told her of his failure.
So the following day he made a long ladder, which he put into the hole; and then he dug, and dug, and dug, until the top of the ladder barely reached the top of the hole. But still there was no water.
When the woman next went to the brook with her pail she saw the beetle sitting upon a stone beside her path. So she stopped and said:
“My husband has dug the well; but there is no water.”
“Did he put the pump in the well?” asked the beetle.
“No,” she answered.
“Then do as I commanded; put in the pump, and if you do not get water I promise you something still more precious.”
Saying which, the beetle swiftly slid from the stone and disappeared. The woman went back to the house and told her husband what the bug had said.
“Well,” replied the simple fellow, “there can be no harm in trying.”
So he got the pump from the barn and placed it in the well, and then he took hold of the handle and began to pump, while his wife stood by to watch what would happen.
No water came, but after a few moments a gold piece dropped from the spout of the pump, and then another, and another, until several handfuls of gold lay in a little heap upon the ground.
The man stopped pumping then and ran to help his wife gather the gold pieces into her apron; but their hands trembled so greatly through excitement and joy that they could scarcely pick up the sparkling coins.
At last she gathered them close to her bosom and together they ran to the house, where they emptied the precious gold upon the table and counted the pieces.
All were stamped with the design of the United States mint and were worth five dollars each. Some were worn and somewhat discolored from use, while others seemed bright and new, as if they had not been much handled. When the value of the pieces was added together they were found to be worth three hundred dollars.
Suddenly the woman spoke.
“Husband, the beetle said truly when he declared we should get something more precious than water from the well. But run at once and take away the handle from the pump, lest anyone should pass this way and discover our secret.”
So the man ran to the pump and removed the handle, which he carried to the house and hid underneath the bed.
They hardly slept a wink that night, lying awake to think of their good fortune and what they should do with their store of yellow gold. In all their former lives they had never possessed more than a few dollars at a time, and now the cracked teapot was nearly full of gold coins.
The following day was Sunday, and they arose early and ran to see if their treasure was safe. There it lay, heaped snugly within the teapot, and they were so willing to feast their eyes upon it that it was long before the man could leave it to build the fire or the woman to cook the breakfast.
While they ate their simple meal the woman said:
“We will go to church to-day and return thanks for the riches that have come to us so suddenly. And I will give the pastor one of the gold pieces.”
“It is well enough to go to church,” replied her husband, “and also to return thanks. But in the night I decided how we will spend all our money; so there will be none left for the pastor.”
“We can pump more,” said the woman.
“Perhaps; and perhaps not,” he answered, cautiously. “What we have we can depend upon, but whether or not there be more in the well I cannot say.”
“Then go and find out,” she returned, “for I am anxious to give something to the pastor, who is a poor man and deserving.”
So the man got the pump handle from beneath the bed, and, going to the pump, fitted it in place. Then he set a large wooden bucket under the spout and began to pump. To their joy the gold pieces soon began flowing into the pail, and, seeing it about to run over the brim, the woman brought another pail. But now the stream suddenly stopped, and the man said, cheerfully:
“That is enough for to-day, good wife! We have added greatly to our treasure, and the parson shall have his gold piece. Indeed, I think I shall also put a coin into the contribution box.”
Then, because the teapot would hold no more gold, the farmer emptied the pail into the wood-box, covering the money with dried leaves and twigs, that no one might suspect what lay underneath.
Afterward they dressed themselves in their best clothing and started for the church, each taking a bright gold piece from the teapot as a gift to the pastor.
Over the hill and down into the valley beyond they walked, feeling so gay and light-hearted that they did not mind the distance at all. At last they came to the little country church and entered just as the services began.
Being proud of their wealth and of the gifts they had brought for the pastor, they could scarcely wait for the moment when the deacon passed the contribution box. But at last the time came, and the farmer held his hand high over the box and dropped the gold piece so that all the congregation could see what he had given. The woman did likewise, feeling important and happy at being able to give the good parson so much.
The parson, watching from the pulpit, saw the gold drop into the box, and could hardly believe that his eyes did not deceive him. However, when the box was laid upon his desk there were the two gold pieces, and he was so surprised that he nearly forgot his sermon.
When the people were leaving the church at the close of the services the good man stopped the farmer and his wife and asked:
“Where did you get so much gold?”
The woman gladly told him how she had rescued the beetle, and how, in return, they had been rewarded with the wonderful pump. The pastor listened to it all gravely, and when the story was finished he said:
“According to tradition strange things happened in this world ages ago, and now I find that strange things may also happen to-day. For by your tale you have found a beetle that can speak and also has power to bestow upon you great wealth.” Then he looked carefully at the gold pieces and continued: “Either this money is fairy gold or it is genuine metal, stamped at the mint of the United States government. If it is fairy gold it will disappear within 24 hours, and will therefore do no one any good. If it is real money, then your beetle must have robbed some one of the gold and placed it in your well. For all money belongs to some one, and if you have not earned it honestly, but have come by it in the mysterious way you mention, it was surely taken from the persons who owned it, without their consent. Where else could real money come from?”
The farmer and his wife were confused by this statement and looked guiltily at each other, for they were honest people and wished to wrong no one.
“Then you think the beetle stole the money?” asked the woman.
“By his magic powers he probably took it from its rightful owners. Even bugs which can speak have no consciences and cannot tell the difference between right and wrong. With a desire to reward you for your kindness the beetle took from its lawful possessors the money you pumped from the well.”
“Perhaps it really is fairy gold,” suggested the man. “If so, we must go to the town and spend the money before it disappears.”
“That would be wrong,” answered the pastor; “for then the merchants would have neither money nor goods. To give them fairy gold would be to rob them.”
“What, then, shall we do?” asked the poor woman, wringing her hands with grief and disappointment.
“Go home and wait until to-morrow. If the gold is then in your possession it is real money and not fairy gold. But if it is real money you must try to restore it to its rightful owners. Take, also, these pieces which you have given me, for I cannot accept gold that is not honestly come by.”
Sadly the poor people returned to their home, being greatly disturbed by what they had heard. Another sleepless night was passed, and on Monday morning they arose at daylight and ran to see if the gold was still visible.
“It is real money, after all!” cried the man; “for not a single piece has disappeared.”
When the woman went to the brook that day she looked for the beetle, and, sure enough, there he sat upon the flat stone.
“Are you happy now?” asked the beetle, as the woman paused before him.
“We are very unhappy,” she answered; “for, although you have given us much gold, our good parson says it surely belongs to some one else, and was stolen by you to reward us.”
“Your parson may be a good man,” returned the beetle, with some indignation, “but he certainly is not overwise. Nevertheless, if you do not want the gold I can take it from you as easily as I gave it.”
“But we do want it!” cried the woman, fearfully. “That is,” she added, “if it is honestly come by.”
“It is not stolen,” replied the beetle, sulkily, “and now belongs to no one but yourselves. When you saved my life I thought how I might reward you; and, knowing you to be poor, I decided gold would make you happier than anything else.
“You must know,” he continued, “that although I appear so small and insignificant, I am really king of all the insects, and my people obey my slightest wish. Living, as they do, close to the ground, the insects often come across gold and other pieces of money which have been lost by men and have fallen into cracks or crevasses or become covered with earth or hidden by grass or weeds. Whenever my people find money in this way they report the fact to me; but I have always let it lie, because it could be of no possible use to an insect.
“However, when I decided to give you gold I knew just where to obtain it without robbing any of your fellow creatures. Thousands of insects were at once sent by me in every direction to bring the pieces of lost gold to this hill. It cost my people several days of hard labor, as you may suppose; but by the time your husband had finished the well the gold began to arrive from all parts of the country, and during the night my subjects dumped it all into the well. So you may use it with a clear conscience, knowing that you wrong no one.”
This explanation delighted the woman, and when she returned to the house and reported to her husband what the beetle had said he also was overjoyed.
So they at once took a number of the gold pieces and went to the town to purchase provisions and clothing and many things of which they had long stood in need; but so proud were they of their newly acquired wealth that they took no pains to conceal it. They wanted everyone to know they had money, and so it was no wonder that when some of the wicked men in the village saw the gold they longed to possess it themselves.
“If they spend this money so freely,” whispered one to another, “there must be a great store of gold at their home.”
“That is true,” was the answer. “Let us hasten there before they return and ransack the house.”
So they left the village and hurried away to the farm on the hill, where they broke down the door and turned everything topsy turvy until they had discovered the gold in the wood-box and the teapot. It did not take them long to make this into bundles, which they slung upon their backs and carried off, and it was probably because they were in a great hurry that they did not stop to put the house in order again.
Presently the good woman and her husband came up the hill from the village with their arms full of bundles and followed by a crowd of small boys who had been hired to help carry the purchases. Then followed others, youngsters and country louts, attracted by the wealth and prodigality of the pair, who, from simple curiosity, trailed along behind like the tail of a comet and helped swell the concourse into a triumphal procession. Last of all came Guggins, the shopkeeper, carrying with much tenderness a new silk dress which was to be paid for when they reached the house, all the money they had taken to the village having been lavishly expended.
The farmer, who had formerly been a modest man, was now so swelled with pride that he tipped the rim of his hat over his left ear and smoked a big cigar that was fast making him ill. His wife strutted along beside him like a peacock, enjoying to the full the homage and respect her wealth had won from those who formerly deigned not to notice her, and glancing from time to time at the admiring procession in the rear.
But, alas for their new-born pride! when they reached the farmhouse they found the door broken in, the furniture strewn in all directions and their treasure stolen to the very last gold piece.
The crowd grinned and made slighting remarks of a personal nature, and Guggins, the shopkeeper, demanded in a loud voice the money for the silk dress he had brought.
Then the woman whispered to her husband to run and pump some more gold while she kept the crowd quiet, and he obeyed quickly. But after a few moments he returned with a white face to tell her the pump was dry, and not a gold piece could now be coaxed from the spout.
The procession marched back to the village laughing and jeering at the farmer and his wife, who had pretended to be so rich; and some of the boys were naughty enough to throw stones at the house from the top of the hill. Mr. Guggins carried away his dress after severely scolding the woman for deceiving him, and when the couple at last found themselves alone their pride had turned to humiliation and their joy to bitter grief.
Just before sundown the woman dried her eyes and, having resumed her ordinary attire, went to the brook for water. When she came to the flat stone she saw the King Beetle sitting upon it.
“The well is dry!” she cried out, angrily.
“Yes,” answered the beetle, calmly, “you have pumped from it all the gold my people could find.”
“But we are now ruined,” said the woman, sitting down in the path beginning to weep; “for robbers have stolen from us every penny we possessed.”
“I’m sorry,” returned the beetle; “but it is your own fault. Had you not made so great a show of your wealth no one would have suspected you possessed a treasure, or thought to rob you. As it is, you have merely lost the gold which others have lost before you. It will probably be lost many times more before the world comes to an end.”
“But what are we to do now?” she asked.
“What did you do before I gave you the money?”
“We worked from morning ’til night,” said she.
“Then work still remains for you,” remarked the beetle, composedly; “no one will ever try to rob you of that, you may be sure!” And he slid from the stone and disappeared for the last time.
This story should teach us to accept good fortune with humble hearts and to use it with moderation. For, had the farmer and his wife resisted the temptation to display their wealth ostentatiously, they might have retained it to this very day.
THE DUMMY THAT LIVED
In all Fairyland there is no more mischievous a person than Tanko-Mankie the Yellow Ryl. He flew through the city one afternoon—quite invisible to mortal eyes, but seeing everything himself—and noticed a figure of a wax lady standing behind the big plate glass window of Mr. Floman’s department store.
The wax lady was beautifully dressed, and extended in her stiff left hand was a card bearing the words:
“RARE BARGIN! This Stylish Costume (Imported from Paris) Former Price, $20, REDUCED TO ONLY $19.98.”
This impressive announcement had drawn before the window a crowd of women shoppers, who stood looking at the wax lady with critical eyes.
Tanko-Mankie laughed to himself the low, gurgling little laugh that always means mischief. Then he flew close to the wax figure and breathed twice upon its forehead.
From that instant the dummy began to live, but so dazed and astonished was she at the unexpected sensation that she continued to stand stupidly staring at the women outside and holding out the placard as before.
The ryl laughed again and flew away. Anyone but Tanko-Mankie would have remained to help the wax lady out of the troubles that were sure to overtake her; but this naughty elf thought it rare fun to turn the inexperienced lady loose in a cold and heartless world and leave her to shift for herself.
Fortunately it was almost six o’clock when the dummy first realized that she was alive, and before she had collected her new thoughts and decided what to do a man came around and drew down all the window shades, shutting off the view from the curious shoppers.
Then the clerks and cashiers and floorwalkers and cash girls went home and the store was closed for the night, although the sweepers and scrubbers remained to clean the floors for the following day.
The window inhabited by the wax lady was boxed in, like a little room, one small door being left at the side for the window-trimmer to creep in and out of. So the scrubbers never noticed that the dummy, when left to herself, dropped the placard to the floor and sat down upon a pile of silks to wonder who she was, where she was, and how she happened to be alive.
For you must consider, dear reader, that in spite of her size and her rich costume, in spite of her pink cheeks and fluffy yellow hair, this lady was very young—no older, in reality, than a baby born but half an hour. All she knew of the world was contained in the glimpse she had secured of the busy street facing her window; all she knew of people lay in the actions of the group of women which had stood before her on the other side of the window pane and criticised the fit of her dress or remarked upon its stylish appearance.
So she had little enough to think about, and her thoughts moved somewhat slowly; yet one thing she really decided upon, and that was not to remain in the window and be insolently stared at by a lot of women who were not nearly so handsome or well dressed as herself.
By the time she reached this important conclusion, it was after midnight; but dim lights were burning in the big, deserted store, so she crept through the door of her window and walked down the long aisles, pausing now and then to look with much curiosity at the wealth of finery confronting her on every side.
When she came to the glass cases filled with trimmed hats she remembered having seen upon the heads of the women in the street similar creations. So she selected one that suited her fancy and placed it carefully upon her yellow locks. I won’t attempt to explain what instinct it was that made her glance into a near-by mirror to see if the hat was straight, but this she certainly did. It didn’t correspond with her dress very well, but the poor thing was too young to have much taste in matching colors.
When she reached the glove counter she remembered that gloves were also worn by the women she had seen. She took a pair from the case and tried to fit them upon her stiff, wax-coated fingers; but the gloves were too small and ripped in the seams. Then she tried another pair, and several others, as well; but hours passed before she finally succeeded in getting her hands covered with a pair of pea-green kids.
Next she selected a parasol from a large and varied assortment in the rear of the store. Not that she had any idea what it was used for; but other ladies carried such things, so she also would have one.
When she again examined herself critically in the mirror she decided her outfit was now complete, and to her inexperienced eyes there was no perceptible difference between her and the women who had stood outside the window. Whereupon she tried to leave the store, but found every door fast locked.
The wax lady was in no hurry. She inherited patience from her previous existence. Just to be alive and to wear beautiful clothes was sufficient enjoyment for her at present. So she sat down upon a stool and waited quietly until daylight.
When the janitor unlocked the door in the morning the wax lady swept past him and walked with stiff but stately strides down the street. The poor fellow was so completely whuckered at seeing the well-known wax lady leave her window and march away from the store that he fell over in a heap and only saved himself from fainting by striking his funny bone against the doorstep. When he recovered his wits she had turned the corner and disappeared.
The wax lady’s immature mind had reasoned that, since she had come to life, her evident duty was to mix with the world and do whatever other folks did. She could not realize how different she was from people of flesh and blood; nor did she know she was the first dummy that had ever lived, or that she owed her unique experience to Tanko-Mankie’s love of mischief. So ignorance gave her a confidence in herself that she was not justly entitled to.
It was yet early in the day, and the few people she met were hurrying along the streets. Many of them turned into restaurants and eating houses, and following their example the wax lady also entered one and sat upon a stool before a lunch counter.
“Coffee ’n’ rolls!” said a shop girl on the next stool.
“Coffee ’n’ rolls!” repeated the dummy, and soon the waiter placed them before her. Of course she had no appetite, as her constitution, being mostly wood, did not require food; but she watched the shop girl, and saw her put the coffee to her mouth and drink it. Therefore the wax lady did the same, and the next instant was surprised to feel the hot liquid trickling out between her wooden ribs. The coffee also blistered her wax lips, and so disagreeable was the experience that she arose and left the restaurant, paying no attention to the demands of the waiter for “20 cents, mum.” Not that she intended to defraud him, but the poor creature had no idea what he meant by “20 cents, mum.”
As she came out she met the window trimmer at Floman’s store. The man was rather near-sighted, but seeing something familiar in the lady’s features he politely raised his hat. The wax lady also raised her hat, thinking it the proper thing to do, and the man hurried away with a horrified face.
Then a woman touched her arm and said:
“Beg pardon, ma’am; but there’s a price-mark hanging on your dress behind.”
“Yes, I know,” replied the wax lady, stiffly; “it was originally $20, but it’s been reduced to $19.98.”
The woman looked surprised at such indifference and walked on. Some carriages were standing at the edge of the sidewalk, and seeing the dummy hesitate a driver approached her and touched his cap.
“Cab, ma’am?” he asked.
“No,” said she, misunderstanding him; “I’m wax.”
“Oh!” he exclaimed, and looked after her wonderingly.
“Here’s yer mornin’ paper!” yelled a newsboy.
“Mine, did you say?” she asked.
“Sure! Chronicle, ’Quirer, R’public ’n’ ’Spatch! Wot’ll ye ’ave?”
“What are they for?” inquired the wax lady, simply.
“W’y, ter read, o’ course. All the news, you know.”
She shook her head and glanced at a paper.
“It looks all speckled and mixed up,” she said. “I’m afraid I can’t read.”
“Ever ben to school?” asked the boy, becoming interested.
“No; what’s school?” she inquired.
The boy gave her an indignant look.
“Say!” he cried, “ye’r just a dummy, that’s wot ye are!” and ran away to seek a more promising customer.
“I wonder that he means,” thought the poor lady. “Am I really different in some way from all the others? I look like them, certainly; and I try to act like them; yet that boy called me a dummy and seemed to think I acted queerly.”
This idea worried her a little, but she walked on to the corner, where she noticed a street car stop to let some people on. The wax lady, still determined to do as others did, also boarded the car and sat down quietly in a corner.
After riding a few blocks the conductor approached her and said:
“Fare, please!”
“What’s that?” she inquired, innocently.
“Your fare!” said the man, impatiently.
She stared at him stupidly, trying to think what he meant.
“Come, come!” growled the conductor, “either pay up or get off!”
Still she did not understand, and he grabbed her rudely by the arm and lifted her to her feet. But when his hand came in contact with the hard wood of which her arm was made the fellow was filled with surprise. He stooped down and peered into her face, and, seeing it was wax instead of flesh, he gave a yell of fear and jumped from the car, running as if he had seen a ghost.
At this the other passengers also yelled and sprang from the car, fearing a collision; and the motorman, knowing something was wrong, followed suit. The wax lady, seeing the others run, jumped from the car last of all, and stepped in front of another car coming at full speed from the opposite direction.
She heard cries of fear and of warning on all sides, but before she understood her danger she was knocked down and dragged for half a block.
When the car was brought to a stop a policeman reached down and pulled her from under the wheels. Her dress was badly torn and soiled. Her left ear was entirely gone, and the left side of her head was caved in; but she quickly scrambled to her feet and asked for her hat. This a gentleman had already picked up, and when the policeman handed it to her and noticed the great hole in her head and the hollow place it disclosed, the poor fellow trembled so frightfully that his knees actually knocked together.
“Why—why, ma’am, you’re killed!” he gasped.
“What does it mean to be killed?” asked the wax lady.
The policeman shuddered and wiped the perspiration from his forehead.
“You’re it!” he answered, with a groan.
The crowd that had collected were looking upon the lady wonderingly, and a middle-aged gentleman now exclaimed:
“Why, she’s wax!”
“Wax!” echoed the policeman.
“Certainly. She’s one of those dummies they put in the windows,” declared the middle-aged man.
The people who had collected shouted: “You’re right!” “That’s what she is!” “She’s a dummy!”
“Are you?” inquired the policeman, sternly.
The wax lady did not reply. She began to fear she was getting into trouble, and the staring crowd seemed to embarrass her.
Suddenly a bootblack attempted to solve the problem by saying: “You guys is all wrong! Can a dummy talk? Can a dummy walk? Can a dummy live?”
“Hush!” murmured the policeman. “Look here!” and he pointed to the hole in the lady’s head. The newsboy looked, turned pale and whistled to keep himself from shivering.
A second policeman now arrived, and after a brief conference it was decided to take the strange creature to headquarters. So they called a hurry-up wagon, and the damaged wax lady was helped inside and driven to the police station. There the policeman locked her in a cell and hastened to tell Inspector Mugg their wonderful story.
Inspector Mugg had just eaten a poor breakfast, and was not in a pleasant mood; so he roared and stormed at the unlucky policemen, saying they were themselves dummies to bring such a fairy tale to a man of sense. He also hinted that they had been guilty of intemperance.
The policemen tried to explain, but Inspector Mugg would not listen; and while they were still disputing in rushed Mr. Floman, the owner of the department store.
“I want a dozen detectives, at once, inspector!” he cried.
“What for?” demanded Mugg.
“One of the wax ladies has escaped from my store and eloped with a $19.98 costume, a $4.23 hat, a $2.19 parasol and a 76-cent pair of gloves, and I want her arrested!”
While he paused for breath the inspector glared at him in amazement.
“Is everybody going crazy at the same time?” he inquired, sarcastically. “How could a wax dummy run away?”
“I don’t know; but she did. When my janitor opened the door this morning he saw her run out.”
“Why didn’t he stop her?” asked Mugg.
“He was too frightened. But she’s stolen my property, your honor, and I want her arrested!” declared the storekeeper.
The inspector thought for a moment.
“You wouldn’t be able to prosecute her,” he said, “for there’s no law against dummies stealing.”
Mr. Floman sighed bitterly.
“Am I to lose that $19.98 costume and the $4.25 hat and—”
“By no means,” interrupted Inspector Mugg. “The police of this city are ever prompt to act in defense of our worthy citizens. We have already arrested the wax lady, and she is locked up in cell No. 16. You may go there and recover your property, if you wish, but before you prosecute her for stealing you’d better hunt up a law that applies to dummies.”
“All I want,” said Mr. Floman, “is that $19.98 costume and—”
“Come along!” interrupted the policeman. “I’ll take you to the cell.”
But when they entered No. 16 they found only a lifeless dummy lying prone upon the floor. Its wax was cracked and blistered, its head was badly damaged, and the bargain costume was dusty, soiled and much bedraggled. For the mischief-loving Tanko-Mankie had flown by and breathed once more upon the poor wax lady, and in that instant her brief life ended.
“It’s just as I thought,” said Inspector Mugg, leaning back in his chair contentedly. “I knew all the time the thing was a fake. It seems sometimes as though the whole world would go crazy if there wasn’t some level-headed man around to bring ’em to their senses. Dummies are wood an’ wax, an’ that’s all there is of ’em.”
“That may be the rule,” whispered the policeman to himself, “but this one were a dummy as lived!”
THE KING OF THE POLAR BEARS
The King of the Polar Bears lived among the icebergs in the far north country. He was old and monstrous big; he was wise and friendly to all who knew him. His body was thickly covered with long, white hair that glistened like silver under the rays of the midnight sun. His claws were strong and sharp, that he might walk safely over the smooth ice or grasp and tear the fishes and seals upon which he fed.
The seals were afraid when he drew near, and tried to avoid him; but the gulls, both white and gray, loved him because he left the remnants of his feasts for them to devour.
Often his subjects, the polar bears, came to him for advice when ill or in trouble; but they wisely kept away from his hunting grounds, lest they might interfere with his sport and arouse his anger.
The wolves, who sometimes came as far north as the icebergs, whispered among themselves that the King of the Polar Bears was either a magician or under the protection of a powerful fairy. For no earthly thing seemed able to harm him; he never failed to secure plenty of food, and he grew bigger and stronger day by day and year by year.
Yet the time came when this monarch of the north met man, and his wisdom failed him.
He came out of his cave among the icebergs one day and saw a boat moving through the strip of water which had been uncovered by the shifting of the summer ice. In the boat were men.
The great bear had never seen such creatures before, and therefore advanced toward the boat, sniffing the strange scent with aroused curiosity and wondering whether he might take them for friends or foes, food or carrion.
When the king came near the water’s edge a man stood up in the boat and with a queer instrument made a loud “bang!” The polar bear felt a shock; his brain became numb; his thoughts deserted him; his great limbs shook and gave way beneath him and his body fell heavily upon the hard ice.
That was all he remembered for a time.
When he awoke he was smarting with pain on every inch of his huge bulk, for the men had cut away his hide with its glorious white hair and carried it with them to a distant ship.
Above him circled thousands of his friends the gulls, wondering if their benefactor were really dead and it was proper to eat him. But when they saw him raise his head and groan and tremble they knew he still lived, and one of them said to his comrades:
“The wolves were right. The king is a great magician, for even men cannot kill him. But he suffers for lack of covering. Let us repay his kindness to us by each giving him as many feathers as we can spare.”
This idea pleased the gulls. One after another they plucked with their beaks the softest feathers from under their wings, and, flying down, dropped then gently upon the body of the King of the Polar Bears.
Then they called to him in a chorus:
“Courage, friend! Our feathers are as soft and beautiful as your own shaggy hair. They will guard you from the cold winds and warm you while you sleep. Have courage, then, and live!”
And the King of the Polar Bears had courage to bear his pain and lived and was strong again.
The feathers grew as they had grown upon the bodies of the birds and covered him as his own hair had done. Mostly they were pure white in color, but some from the gray gulls gave his majesty a slight mottled appearance.
The rest of that summer and all through the six months of night the king left his icy cavern only to fish or catch seals for food. He felt no shame at his feathery covering, but it was still strange to him, and he avoided meeting any of his brother bears.
During this period of retirement he thought much of the men who had harmed him, and remembered the way they had made the great “bang!” And he decided it was best to keep away from such fierce creatures. Thus he added to his store of wisdom.
When the moon fell away from the sky and the sun came to make the icebergs glitter with the gorgeous tintings of the rainbow, two of the polar bears arrived at the king’s cavern to ask his advice about the hunting season. But when they saw his great body covered with feathers instead of hair they began to laugh, and one said:
“Our mighty king has become a bird! Who ever before heard of a feathered polar bear?”
Then the king gave way to wrath. He advanced upon them with deep growls and stately tread and with one blow of his monstrous paw stretched the mocker lifeless at his feet.
The other ran away to his fellows and carried the news of the king’s strange appearance. The result was a meeting of all the polar bears upon a broad field of ice, where they talked gravely of the remarkable change that had come upon their monarch.
“He is, in reality, no longer a bear,” said one; “nor can he justly be called a bird. But he is half bird and half bear, and so unfitted to remain our king.”
“Then who shall take his place?” asked another.
“He who can fight the bird-bear and overcome him,” answered an aged member of the group. “Only the strongest is fit to rule our race.”
There was silence for a time, but at length a great bear moved to the front and said:
“I will fight him; I—Woof—the strongest of our race! And I will be King of the Polar Bears.”
The others nodded assent, and dispatched a messenger to the king to say he must fight the great Woof and master him or resign his sovereignty.
“For a bear with feathers,” added the messenger, “is no bear at all, and the king we obey must resemble the rest of us.”
“I wear feathers because it pleases me,” growled the king. “Am I not a great magician? But I will fight, nevertheless, and if Woof masters me he shall be king in my stead.”
Then he visited his friends, the gulls, who were even then feasting upon the dead bear, and told them of the coming battle.
“I shall conquer,” he said, proudly. “Yet my people are in the right, for only a hairy one like themselves can hope to command their obedience.”
The queen gull said:
“I met an eagle yesterday, which had made its escape from a big city of men. And the eagle told me he had seen a monstrous polar bear skin thrown over the back of a carriage that rolled along the street. That skin must have been yours, oh king, and if you wish I will sent an hundred of my gulls to the city to bring it back to you.”
“Let them go!” said the king, gruffly. And the hundred gulls were soon flying rapidly southward.
For three days they flew straight as an arrow, until they came to scattered houses, to villages, and to cities. Then their search began.
The gulls were brave, and cunning, and wise. Upon the fourth day they reached the great metropolis, and hovered over the streets until a carriage rolled along with a great white bear robe thrown over the back seat. Then the birds swooped down—the whole hundred of them—and seizing the skin in their beaks flew quickly away.
They were late. The king’s great battle was upon the seventh day, and they must fly swiftly to reach the Polar regions by that time.
Meanwhile the bird-bear was preparing for his fight. He sharpened his claws in the small crevasses of the ice. He caught a seal and tested his big yellow teeth by crunching its bones between them. And the queen gull set her band to pluming the king bear’s feathers until they lay smoothly upon his body.
But every day they cast anxious glances into the southern sky, watching for the hundred gulls to bring back the king’s own skin.
The seventh day came, and all the Polar bears in that region gathered around the king’s cavern. Among them was Woof, strong and confident of his success.
“The bird-bear’s feathers will fly fast enough when I get my claws upon him!” he boasted; and the others laughed and encouraged him.
The king was disappointed at not having recovered his skin, but he resolved to fight bravely without it. He advanced from the opening of his cavern with a proud and kingly bearing, and when he faced his enemy he gave so terrible a growl that Woof’s heart stopped beating for a moment, and he began to realize that a fight with the wise and mighty king of his race was no laughing matter.
After exchanging one or two heavy blows with his foe Woof’s courage returned, and he determined to dishearten his adversary by bluster.
“Come nearer, bird-bear!” he cried. “Come nearer, that I may pluck your plumage!”
The defiance filled the king with rage. He ruffled his feathers as a bird does, till he appeared to be twice his actual size, and then he strode forward and struck Woof so powerful a blow that his skull crackled like an egg-shell and he fell prone upon the ground.
While the assembled bears stood looking with fear and wonder at their fallen champion the sky became darkened.
An hundred gulls flew down from above and dripped upon the king’s body a skin covered with pure white hair that glittered in the sun like silver.
And behold! the bears saw before them the well-known form of their wise and respected master, and with one accord they bowed their shaggy heads in homage to the mighty King of the Polar Bears.
This story teaches us that true dignity and courage depend not upon outward appearance, but come rather from within; also that brag and bluster are poor weapons to carry into battle.
THE MANDARIN AND THE BUTTERFLY
A mandarin once lived in Kiang-ho who was so exceedingly cross and disagreeable that everyone hated him. He snarled and stormed at every person he met and was never known to laugh or be merry under any circumstances. Especially he hated boys and girls; for the boys jeered at him, which aroused his wrath, and the girls made fun of him, which hurt his pride.
When he had become so unpopular that no one would speak to him, the emperor heard about it and commanded him to emigrate to America. This suited the mandarin very well; but before he left China he stole the Great Book of Magic that belonged to the wise magician Haot-sai. Then, gathering up his little store of money, he took ship for America.
He settled in a city of the middle west and of course started a laundry, since that seems to be the natural vocation of every Chinaman, be he coolie or mandarin.
He made no acquaintances with the other Chinamen of the town, who, when they met him and saw the red button in his hat, knew him for a real mandarin and bowed low before him. He put up a red and white sign and people brought their laundry to him and got paper checks, with Chinese characters upon them, in exchange, this being the only sort of character the mandarin had left.
One day as the ugly one was ironing in his shop in the basement of 263 1/2 Main street, he looked up and saw a crowd of childish faces pressed against the window. Most Chinamen make friends with children; this one hated them and tried to drive them away. But as soon as he returned to his work they were back at the window again, mischievously smiling down upon him.
The naughty mandarin uttered horrid words in the Manchu language and made fierce gestures; but this did no good at all. The children stayed as long as they pleased, and they came again the very next day as soon as school was over, and likewise the next day, and the next. For they saw their presence at the window bothered the Chinaman and were delighted accordingly.
The following day being Sunday the children did not appear, but as the mandarin, being a heathen, worked in his little shop a big butterfly flew in at the open door and fluttered about the room.
The mandarin closed the door and chased the butterfly until he caught it, when he pinned it against the wall by sticking two pins through its beautiful wings. This did not hurt the butterfly, there being no feeling in its wings; but it made him a safe prisoner.
This butterfly was of large size and its wings were exquisitely marked by gorgeous colors laid out in regular designs like the stained glass windows of a cathedral.
The mandarin now opened his wooden chest and drew forth the Great Book of Magic he had stolen from Haot-sai. Turning the pages slowly he came to a passage describing “How to understand the language of butterflies.” This he read carefully and then mixed a magic formula in a tin cup and drank it down with a wry face. Immediately thereafter he spoke to the butterfly in its own language, saying:
“Why did you enter this room?”
“I smelled bees-wax,” answered the butterfly; “therefore I thought I might find honey here.”
“But you are my prisoner,” said the mandarin. “If I please I can kill you, or leave you on the wall to starve to death.”
“I expect that,” replied the butterfly, with a sigh. “But my race is shortlived, anyway; it doesn’t matter whether death comes sooner or later.”
“Yet you like to live, do you not?” asked the mandarin.
“Yet; life is pleasant and the world is beautiful. I do not seek death.”
“Then,” said the mandarin, “I will give you life—a long and pleasant life—if you will promise to obey me for a time and carry out my instructions.”
“How can a butterfly serve a man?” asked the creature, in surprise.
“Usually they cannot,” was the reply. “But I have a book of magic which teaches me strange things. Do you promise?”
“Oh, yes; I promise,” answered the butterfly; “for even as your slave I will get some enjoyment out of life, while should you kill me—that is the end of everything!”
“Truly,” said the mandarin, “butterflies have no souls, and therefore cannot live again.”
“But I have enjoyed three lives already,” returned the butterfly, with some pride. “I have been a caterpillar and a chrysalis before I became a butterfly. You were never anything but a Chinaman, although I admit your life is longer than mine.”
“I will extend your life for many days, if you will obey me,” declared the Chinaman. “I can easily do so by means of my magic.”
“Of course I will obey you,” said the butterfly, carelessly.
“Then, listen! You know children, do you not?—boys and girls?”
“Yes, I know them. They chase me, and try to catch me, as you have done,” replied the butterfly.
“And they mock me, and jeer at me through the window,” continued the mandarin, bitterly. “Therefore, they are your enemies and mine! But with your aid and the help of the magic book we shall have a fine revenge for their insults.”
“I don’t care much for revenge,” said the butterfly. “They are but children, and ’tis natural they should wish to catch such a beautiful creature as I am.”
“Nevertheless, I care! and you must obey me,” retorted the mandarin, harshly. “I, at least, will have my revenge.”
Then he stuck a drop of molasses upon the wall beside the butterfly’s head and said:
“Eat that, while I read my book and prepare my magic formula.”
So the butterfly feasted upon the molasses and the mandarin studied his book, after which he began to mix a magic compound in the tin cup.
When the mixture was ready he released the butterfly from the wall and said to it:
“I command you to dip your two front feet into this magic compound and then fly away until you meet a child. Fly close, whether it be a boy or a girl, and touch the child upon its forehead with your feet. Whosoever is thus touched, the book declares, will at once become a pig, and will remain such forever after. Then return to me and dip your legs afresh in the contents of this cup. So shall all my enemies, the children, become miserable swine, while no one will think of accusing me of the sorcery.”
“Very well; since such is your command, I obey,” said the butterfly. Then it dipped its front legs, which were the shortest of the six, into the contents of the tin cup, and flew out of the door and away over the houses to the edge of the town. There it alighted in a flower garden and soon forgot all about its mission to turn children into swine.
In going from flower to flower it soon brushed the magic compound from its legs, so that when the sun began to set and the butterfly finally remembered its master, the mandarin, it could not have injured a child had it tried.
But it did not intend to try.
“That horrid old Chinaman,” it thought, “hates children and wishes to destroy them. But I rather like children myself and shall not harm them. Of course I must return to my master, for he is a magician, and would seek me out and kill me; but I can deceive him about this matter easily enough.”
When the butterfly flew in at the door of the mandarin’s laundry he asked, eagerly:
“Well, did you meet a child?”
“I did,” replied the butterfly, calmly. “It was a pretty, golden-haired girl—but now ’tis a grunting pig!”
“Good! Good! Good!” cried the mandarin, dancing joyfully about the room. “You shall have molasses for your supper, and to-morrow you must change two children into pigs.”
The butterfly did not reply, but ate the molasses in silence. Having no soul it had no conscience, and having no conscience it was able to lie to the mandarin with great readiness and a certain amount of enjoyment.
Next morning, by the mandarin’s command, the butterfly dipped its legs in the mixture and flew away in search of children.
When it came to the edge of the town it noticed a pig in a sty, and alighting upon the rail of the sty it looked down at the creature and thought.
“If I could change a child into a pig by touching it with the magic compound, what could I change a pig into, I wonder?”
Being curious to determine this fine point in sorcery the butterfly fluttered down and touched its front feet to the pig’s nose. Instantly the animal disappeared, and in its place was a shock-headed, dirty looking boy, which sprang from the sty and ran down the road uttering load whoops.
“That’s funny,” said the butterfly to itself. “The mandarin would be very angry with me if he knew of this, for I have liberated one more of the creatures that bother him.”
It fluttered along after the boy, who had paused to throw stones at a cat. But pussy escaped by running up a tree, where thick branches protected her from the stones. Then the boy discovered a newly-planted garden, and trampled upon the beds until the seeds were scattered far and wide, and the garden was ruined. Next he caught up a switch and struck with it a young calf that stood quietly grazing in a field. The poor creature ran away with piteous bleats, and the boy laughed and followed after it, striking the frightened animal again and again.
“Really,” thought the butterfly, “I do not wonder the mandarin hates children, if they are all so cruel and wicked as this one.”
The calf having escaped him the boy came back to the road, where he met two little girls on their way to school. One of them had a red apple in her hand, and the boy snatched it away and began eating it. The little girl commenced to cry, but her companion, more brave and sturdy, cried out:
“You ought to be ashamed of yourself, you nasty boy!”
At this the boy reached out and slapped her pretty face, whereupon she also began to sob.
Although possessed of neither soul nor conscience, the butterfly had a very tender heart, and now decided it could endure this boy no longer.
“If I permitted him to exist,” it reflected, “I should never forgive myself, for the monster would do nothing but evil from morning ’til night.”
So it flew directly into his face and touched his forehead with its sticky front feet.
The next instant the boy had disappeared, but a grunting pig ran swiftly up the road in the direction of its sty.
The butterfly gave a sigh of relief.
“This time I have indeed used the mandarin’s magic upon a child,” it whispered, as it floated lazily upon the light breeze; “but since the child was originally a pig I do not think I have any cause to reproach myself. The little girls were sweet and gentle, and I would not injure them to save my life, but were all boys like this transformed pig, I should not hesitate to carry out the mandarin’s orders.”
Then it flew into a rose bush, where it remained comfortably until evening. At sundown it returned to its master.
“Have you changed two of them into pigs?” he asked, at once.
“I have,” replied the butterfly. “One was a pretty, black-eyed baby, and the other a freckle-faced, red-haired, barefooted newboy.”
“Good! Good! Good!” screamed the mandarin, in an ecstasy of delight. “Those are the ones who torment me the most! Change every newboy you meet into a pig!”
“Very well,” answered the butterfly, quietly, and ate its supper of molasses.
Several days were passed by the butterfly in the same manner. It fluttered aimlessly about the flower gardens while the sun shone, and returned at night to the mandarin with false tales of turning children into swine. Sometimes it would be one child which was transformed, sometimes two, and occasionally three; but the mandarin always greeted the butterfly’s report with intense delight and gave him molasses for supper.
One evening, however, the butterfly thought it might be well to vary the report, so that the mandarin might not grow suspicious; and when its master asked what child had been had been changed into a pig that day the lying creature answered:
“It was a Chinese boy, and when I touched him he became a black pig.”
This angered the mandarin, who was in an especially cross mood. He spitefully snapped the butterfly with his finger, and nearly broke its beautiful wing; for he forgot that Chinese boys had once mocked him and only remembered his hatred for American boys.
The butterfly became very indignant at this abuse from the mandarin. It refused to eat its molasses and sulked all the evening, for it had grown to hate the mandarin almost as much as the mandarin hated children.
When morning came it was still trembling with indignation; but the mandarin cried out:
“Make haste, miserable slave; for to-day you must change four children into pigs, to make up for yesterday.”
The butterfly did not reply. His little black eyes were sparkling wickedly, and no sooner had he dipped his feet into the magic compound than he flew full in the mandarin’s face, and touched him upon his ugly, flat forehead.
Soon after a gentleman came into the room for his laundry. The mandarin was not there, but running around the place was a repulsive, scrawny pig, which squealed most miserably.
The butterfly flew away to a brook and washed from its feet all traces of the magic compound. When night came it slept in a rose bush.

= = = PG45279 = = =
AMERICAN INDIAN FAIRY TALES
Produced by David Widger from page images generously provided by the Internet Archive
AMERICAN INDIAN FAIRY TALES
By W.T. Larned
Illustrated by John Rae
1921
P. F. Volland Company
Twenty-ninth Edition
With one exception, all the tales in this book are adapted from the legends collected by Henry R. Schoolcraft, ethnologist and government agent for the Lake Superior country, and published in 1839 with the title, "Algic Researches."
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Iagoo, the Story-Teller
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HERE never was anyone so wise and knowing as old Iagoo. There never was an Indian who saw and heard so much. He knew the secrets of the woods and fields, and understood the language of birds and beasts. All his life long he had lived out of doors, wandering far in the forest where the wild deer hide, or skimming the waters of the lake in his birch-bark canoe.
Besides the things he had learned for himself, Iagoo knew much more. He knew the fairy tales and the wonder stories told him by his grandfather, who had heard them from his grandfather, and so on, away back to the time when the world was young and strange, and there was magic in almost everything.
Iagoo was a great favorite with the children. No one knew better where to find the beautiful, colored shells which he strung into necklaces for the little girls. No one could teach them so well just where to look for the grasses which their nimble fingers wove into baskets. For the boys he made bows and arrows--bows from the ash-tree, that would bend far back without breaking, and arrows, strong and straight, from the sturdy oak.
But most of all, Iagoo won the children's hearts with his stories. Where did the robin get his red breast? How did fire find its way into the wood, so that an Indian can get it out again by rubbing two sticks together? Why was Coyote, the prairie wolf, so much cleverer than the other animals; and why was he always looking behind him when he ran? It was old Iagoo who could tell you where and why.
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Now, winter was the time for story-telling. When the snow lay deep on the ground, the North. Wind came howling from his home in the Land of Ice, and the cold moon shone from the frosty sky, it was then that the Indians gathered in the wigwam. It was then that Iagoo sat by the fire of blazing logs, and the little boys and girls gathered around him.
"Whoo, whoo!" wailed the North Wind. The sparks leapt up, and Iagoo laid another log on the fire. "Whoo, whoo!" What a mischievous old fellow was this North Wind! One could almost see him--his flowing hair all hung with icicles. If the wigwam were not so strong he would blow it down, and if the fire were not so bright he would put it out. But the wigwam was made on purpose, for just such a time as this; and the forest nearby had logs to last forever. So the North Wind could only gnash his teeth, and say, "Whoo, whoo!"
One little girl, more timid than the rest, would draw nearer and put her hand on the old man's arm. "O, Iagoo," she said, "Just listen! Do you think he can hurt us?"
"Have no fear," answered Iagoo. "The North Wind can do no harm to anyone who is brave and cheerful. He blusters, and makes a lot of noise; but at heart he is really a big coward, and the fire will soon frighten him away. Suppose I tell you a story about it."
And the story Iagoo told we shall now tell to you, the story of how Shin-ge-bis fooled the North Wind.
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Shin-ge-bis fools the North Wind
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ONG, long ago, in the time when only a few people lived upon the earth, there dwelt in the North a tribe of fishermen. Now, the best fish were to be found in the summer season, far up in the frozen places where no one could live in the winter at all. For the King of this Land of Ice was a fierce old man called Ka-bib-on-okka by the Indians--meaning in our language, the North Wind.
Though the Land of Ice stretched across the top of the world for thousands and thousands of miles, Ka-bib-on-okka was not satisfied. If he could have had his way there would have been no grass or green trees anywhere; all the world would have been white from one year's end to another, all the rivers frozen tight, and all the country covered with snow and ice. .
Luckily there was a limit to his power. Strong and fierce as he was, he was no match at all for Sha-won-dasee, the South Wind, whose home was in the pleasant land of the sun-flower. Where Sha-won-dasee dwelt it was always summer. When he breathed upon the land, violets appeared in the woods, the wild rose bloomed on the yellow prairie, and the cooing dove called musically to his mate. It was he who caused the melons to grow, and the purple grapes; it was he whose warm breath ripened the corn in the fields, clothed the forests in green, and made the earth all glad and beautiful. Then, as the summer days grew shorter in the North, Sha-won-dasee would climb to the top of a hill, fill his great pipe, and sit there--dreaming and smoking. Hour after hour he
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sat and smoked; and the smoke, rising in the form of a vapor, filled the air with a soft haze until the hills and lakes seemed like the hills and lakes of dreamland. Not a breath of wind, not a cloud in the sky; a great peace and stillness over all. Nowhere else in the world was there anything so wonderful. It was Indian Summer.
Now it was that the fishermen who set their nets in the North worked hard and fast, knowing the time was at hand when the South Wind would fall asleep, and fierce old Ka-bib-on-okka would swoop down upon them and drive them away. Sure enough! One morning a thin film of ice covered the water where they set their nets; a heavy frost sparkled in the sun on the bark roof of their huts.
That was sufficient warning. The ice grew thicker, the snow fell in big, feathery flakes. Coyote, the prairie wolf, trotted by in his shaggy white winter coat. Already they could hear a muttering and a moaning in the distance.
"Ka-bib-on-okka is coming!" cried the fishermen. "Ka-bib-on-okka will soon be here. It is time for us to go."
But Shin-ge-bis, the diver, only laughed.
Shin-ge-bis was always laughing. He laughed when he caught a big fish, and he laughed when he caught none at all. Nothing could dampen his spirits.
"The fishing is still good," he said to his comrades. "I can cut a hole in the ice, and fish with a line instead of a net. What do _I_ care for old Ka-bib-on-okka?"
They looked at him with amazement. It was true that Shin-ge-bis had certain magic powers, and could change himself into a duck. They had seen him do it; and that is why he came to be called the "diver." But how would this enable him to brave the anger of the terrible North Wind?
"You had better come with us," they said. "Ka-bib-onokka is much stronger than you. The biggest trees of the forest bend before his wrath. The swiftest river that runs
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freezes at his touch. Unless you can turn yourself into a bear, or a fish, you will have no chance at all."
But Shin-ge-bis only laughed the louder.
"My fur coat lent me by Brother Beaver and my mittens borrowed from Cousin Muskrat will protect me in the daytime," he said, "and inside my wigwam is a pile of big logs. Let Ka-bib-on-okka come in by my fire if he dares."
So the fishermen took their leave rather sadly; for the laughing Shin-ge-bis was a favorite with them, and, the truth is, they never expected to see him again.
When they were gone, Shin-ge-bis set about his work in his own way. First of all he made sure that he had plenty of dry bark and twigs and pine-needles, to make the fire blaze up when he returned to his wigwam in the evening. The snow by this time was pretty deep, but it froze so hard on top that the sun did not melt it, and he could walk on the surface without sinking in at all. As for fish, he well knew how to catch them through the holes he made in the ice; and at night he would go tramping home, trailing a long string of them behind him, and singing a song he had made up himself:
"Ka-bib-on-okka, ancient man,
Come and scare me if you can.
Big and blustery though you be,
You are mortal just like me!"
It was thus that Ka-bib-on-okka found him, plodding along late one afternoon across the snow.
"Whoo, whoo!" cried the North Wind. "What impudent, two-legged creature is this who dares to linger here long after the wild goose and the heron have winged their way to the south? We shall see who is master in the Land of Ice. This very night I will force my way into his wigwam, put his fire out, and scatter the-ashes all around. Whoo, whoo!"
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Night came; Shin-ge-bis sat in his wigwam by the blazing fire. And such a fire! Each backlog was so big it would last for a moon. That was the way the Indians, who had no clocks or watches, counted time; instead of weeks or months, they would say "a moon"--the length of time from one new moon to another.
Shin-ge-bis had been cooking a fish, a fine, fresh fish caught that very day. Broiled over the coals, it was a tender and savory dish; and Shin-ge-bis smacked his lips, and rubbed his hands with pleasure. He had tramped many miles that day; so it was a pleasant thing to sit there by the roaring fire and toast his shins. How foolish, he thought, his comrades had been to leave a place where fish was so plentiful, so early in the winter.
"They think that Ka-bib-on-okka is a kind of magician," he was saying to himself, "and that no one can resist him. It's my own opinion that he's a man, just like myself. It's true that I can't stand the cold as he does; but then, neither can he stand the heat as I do."
This thought amused him so that he began to laugh and sing:
"Ka-bib-on-okka, frosty man,
Try to freeze me if you can.
Though you blow until you tire,
I am safe beside my fire!"
He was in such a high good humor that he scarcely noticed a sudden uproar that began without. The snow came thick and fast; as it fell it was caught up again like so much powder and blown against the wigwam, where it lay in huge drifts. But instead of making it colder inside, it was really like a thick blanket that kept the air out.
Ka-bib-on-okka soon discovered his mistake, and it made him furious. Down the smoke-vent he shouted; and his voice
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was so wild and terrible that it might have frightened an ordinary man. But Shin-ge-bis only laughed. It was so quiet in that great, silent country that he rather enjoyed a little noise.
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"Ho, ho!" he shouted back. "How are you, Ka-bib-onokka? If you are not careful you will burst your cheeks."
Then the wigwam shook with the force of the blast, and the curtain of buffalo hide that formed the doorway flapped and rattled, and rattled and flapped.
"Come on in, Ka-bib-on-okka!" called Shin-ge-bis merrily. "Come on in and warm yourself. It must be bitter cold outside."
At these jeering words, Ka-bib-on-okka hurled himself against the curtain, breaking one of the buckskin thongs; and made his way inside. Oh, what an icy breath!--so icy that it filled the hot wigwam like a fog.
Shin-ge-bis pretended not to notice. Still singing, he rose to his feet, and threw on another log. It was a fat log of pine, and it burned so hard and gave out so much heat that he had to sit a little distance away. From the corner of his eye he watched Ka-bib-on-okka; and what he saw made him laugh again. The perspiration was pouring from his forehead; the snow and icicles in his flowing hair quickly disappeared. Just as a snowman made by children melts in the warm sun of March, so the fierce old North Wind began to thaw! There could be no doubt of it; Ka-bib-on-okka, the terrible, was melting! His nose and ears became smaller, his body began to shrink. If he remained where he was much longer, the King of the Land of Ice would be nothing better than a puddle.
"Come on up to the fire," said Shin-ge-bis cruelly. "You must be chilled to the bone. Come up closer, and warm your hands and feet."
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But the North Wind had fled, even faster than he came, through the doorway.
Once outside, the cold air revived him, and all his anger returned. As he had not been able to freeze Shin-ge-bis, he spent his rage on everything in his path. Under his tread the snow took on a crust; the brittle branches of the trees snapped as he blew and snorted; the prowling fox hurried to his hole; and the wandering coyote sought the first shelter at hand.
Once more he made his way to the wigwam of Shin-ge-bis, and shouted down the flue. "Come out," he called. "Come out, if you dare, and wrestle with me here in the snow. We'll soon see who's master then!"
Shin-ge-bis thought it over. "The fire must have weakened him," he said to himself. "And my own body is warm. I believe I can overpower him. Then he will not annoy me any more, and I can stay here as long as I please."
Out of the wigwam he rushed, and Ka-bib-on-okka came to meet him. Then a great struggle took place. Over and over on the hard snow they rolled, locked in one another's arms.
All night long they wrestled; and the foxes crept out of their holes, sitting at a safe distance in a circle, watching the wrestlers. The effort he put forth kept the blood warm in the body of Shin-ge-bis. He could feel the North Wind growing weaker and weaker; his icy breath was no longer a blast, but only a feeble sigh.
At last, as the sun rose in the east, the wrestlers stood apart, panting. Ka-bib-on-okka was conquered. With a despairing wail, he turned and sped away. Far, far to the North he sped, even to the land of the White Rabbit; and as he went, the laughter of Shin-ge-bis rang out and followed him. Cheerfulness and courage can overcome even the North Wind.
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The Little Boy and Girl in the Clouds
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AGOO, the Story-Teller, was seated one evening in his favorite corner, gazing into the embers of the log fire like one in a dream.
At such a time the children knew better than to interrupt him by asking questions or teasing him for a story. They knew that Iagoo was turning over in his mind the strange things he had heard and the wonderful things he had seen; that the burning logs and red coals took on curious shapes and made odd pictures that only he could understand, and that if they did not disturb him he would presently begin to speak.
On this particular evening, however, though they waited patiently and talked to one another only in low whispers, Iagoo kept on sitting there as if he were made of stone. They began to fear that he had forgotten them, and that bed-time would come without a story. So at last little Morning Glory, who was always asking questions, thought of one she had never asked before.
"Iagoo!" she said; and then she stopped, fearing to offend him.
At the sound of her voice the old man roused himself, as if his mind had been away on a long journey into the past.
"What is it, Morning Glory?"
"Iagoo--can you tell me---were the mountains always here?"
The old man looked at her gravely. No matter how hard the question was, or how unexpected, Iagoo was always glad to answer. He never said: "I'm too busy, don't bother me," or, "Wait till some other time." So when Morning Glory
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asked him this very peculiar question, he nodded his wise old head, saying:
"Do you know, I've often asked myself that very thing: Were the mountains always here?"
He paused, and looked once more into the fire, as if the answer was to be found there if he only looked long enough. At last he spoke again:
"Yes, I think it must be true that the mountains were always here--the mountains and the hills. They were made when the world was made--a long, long time ago; and the story of how the world was made you have heard before. But there is one high hill that was not always here--a hill that grew like magic, all of a sudden. Did I ever tell you the story of the Big Rock--how it rose and rose, and carried the little boy and girl up among the clouds?"
"No, no!" shouted the children in a chorus. "You never told us that one. Tell it to us now."
And this is the story of the magical Big Rock, as old Iagoo heard it from his grandfather, who heard it from his great-grandfather, who was almost old enough to have been there himself when it all happened:
In the days when all animals and men lived on friendly terms, when Coyote, the prairie wolf, was not a bad sort of fellow when you came to know him, and even the Mountain Lion would growl pleasantly and pass you the time of day--there lived in a beautiful valley a little boy and girl.
[Illustration: 0023]
This valley was a lovely place to live in; never was such a playground anywhere on earth. It was like a great green carpet stretching for miles and miles, and when the wind blew upon the long grass it was like looking at the waves of the sea. Flowers of all colors bloomed in the beautiful valley, berries grew thick on the bushes, and birds filled the summer air with their songs.
Best of all, there was nothing whatever to fear. The
Never was such a play-ground anywhere.
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children could wander at will--watching the gay butterflies, making friends with the squirrels and rabbits, or following the flight of the bee to some tree where his honey is stored.
As for the wild animals, it was all very different from what it is to-day, when they keep the poor things in cages, or coop them up in a little patch of ground behind a high fence. In the beautiful valley the animals ran free and happily, as they were meant to do. The Bear was a big, lazy, good-natured fellow, who lived on berries and wild honey in the summer, and in winter crept into his cavern in the rocks and slept there till the spring. The deer were not only gentle, but tame as sheep, and often came to crop the tender grass that grew where the two children were accustomed to play.
They loved all the animals, and the animals loved them; but perhaps their special favorites were Jack Rabbit and Antelope. Jack Rabbit had long legs, and long ears--almost as long as a mule's, and no animal of his size could jump so high. But of course he could not jump as high as Antelope--the name of a beautiful little deer, with short horns and slender legs, who could run like the wind.
Another thing that made the happy valley such a pleasant place to live in was the river that flowed through it. All the animals came from miles around to drink from its clear, cool waters, and to bathe in it on a hot summer day. One shallow pool seemed made especially for the little boy and girl. Their friend, the Beaver, with his flat tail like an oar and his feet webbed like a duck's, had taught them how to swim almost as soon as they had learned to walk; and to splash around in the pool on a warm afternoon was among their greatest pleasures.
One day in mid-summer the water was so pleasant that they remained in the pool much longer than usual, so that when at last they came out they were quite tired. And as they were
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a little chilled besides, they looked around for a good place where they could get dry and warm.
"Let's climb up on that big, flat rock, with the moss on it," said the little boy. "We've never done it before. It would be lots of fun."
So he clambered up the side of the rock, which was only a few feet high, and drew his sister up after him. Then they lay down to rest, and pretty soon, without intending it at all, they were fast asleep.
Nobody knows how it happened that exactly at this time the rock began to rise and grow. But it did happen, because there it is today, high and bare and steep, higher than the other hills in the valley. As the children slept, it rose and rose, inch by inch, foot by foot; by the next day it was taller than the tallest trees.
Meanwhile their father and mother were searching for them everywhere, but all in vain; nor was any trace of them to be found. No one had seen them climb up on the rock, and everyone concerned was too much excited to notice what had really happened to it. The parents wandered far and wide saying: "Antelope, have you seen our little boy and girl? Jack Rabbit, you must have seen our little boy and girl." But none of the animals had seen them.
At last they met Coyote, the cleverest of them all, trotting along the valley with his nose in the air; so they put the same question to him.
"No," said Coyote. "I have not seen them for a long time. But my nose was given me to smell with, and my brains were given me to think with. So who can tell but that I may help you?"
He trotted by their side, along the banks of the river, and pretty soon they came to the pool where the children had been in swimming. Coyote sniffed and sniffed. He ran around and around, with his nose to the ground; then he ran right up to
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the rock, put his forepaws up as high as he could reach, and sniffed again.
"H-m-m!" he grunted. "I cannot fly like the Eagle, and I cannot swim like the Beaver. But neither am I stupid like the Bear, nor ignorant like the Jack Rabbit. My nose has never deceived me yet; your little boy and girl must be up there on that rock."
"But how could they get there?" asked the astonished parents. For the rock was now so high that the top was lost to sight in the clouds.
"That is not the question," said Coyote severely, unwilling to admit there was anything he did not know. "That is not the question at all. Anybody could ask that. The only question worth asking is: How are we to get them down again?"
So they called all the animals together, to talk it over and see what could be done. Then the Bear said: "If I could only put my arms around the rock I could climb it. But it is much too big for that." And the Fox said: "If it were only a deep hole, instead of a high hill, I would be able to help you." And the Beaver said: "If it were just a place out in the water I could swim to, I'd show you very quickly."
But as this kind of talk did not take them very far, they decided to try what jumping would do. There seemed to be no other way; and as each one was anxious to do his part, the smallest one was permitted to make the first attempt. So the Mouse made a funny little hop, about as high as your hand. The Squirrel went a little higher. Jack Rabbit made the highest jump of his life, and almost broke his back, to no purpose. Antelope gave a great bound in the air, but managed to light on his feet again without doing himself any harm. Finally, the Mountain Lion went a long way off, to get a good start, ran toward the rock with great leaps, sprang straight up--and
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fell and rolled over on his back. He had made a higher jump than any of them; but it was not nearly high enough.
No one knew what to do next. It seemed as if the little boy and girl must be left sleeping on forever, up among the clouds. Suddenly they heard a tiny voice saying:
"Perhaps if you let _me_ try, I might _climb_ up the rock." They all looked around in surprise, wondering who it was that spoke; and at first they could see nobody, and thought that Coyote must be playing a trick on them. But Coyote was as much surprised as anyone.
"Wait a minute. I'm coming as fast as I can," said the tiny voice again. Then a Measuring Worm crawled out of the grass--a funny little worm that made its way along by hunching up its back and drawing itself ahead an inch at a time.
"Ho, ho!" said the Mountain Lion, from deep down in his throat. He always spoke that way when his dignity was offended. "Ho, ho! Did you ever hear of such impudence? If I, a lion, have failed, how can a miserable little crawling worm like you hope to succeed; just tell me that!"
"It's downright silly," said Jack Rabbit. "That's what it is. I never heard of such conceit."
However, after much talk, they agreed at last that it could do no harm to let him try. So the Measuring Worm made his way slowly to the rock, and began to climb. In a few minutes he was higher than Jack Rabbit had jumped. Soon he was farther up than the lion had been able to leap: before long he had climbed out of sight.
It took the Measuring Worm a whole month, climbing day and night, to reach the top of the magic rock. When he got there he awakened the little boy and girl, who were much surprised to see where they were, and guided them safely down along a path no one else knew anything about. Thus, by patience and perseverance, the weak little creature was able to
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do something that the Bear, for all his size, and the Lion, for all his strength, could never have done at all. That was a long time ago; today there are no more lions or bears in the valley, and no one ever thinks of them. But everybody thinks of the Measuring Worm, because the Big Rock is still there, and the Indians have named it after him. Tu-tok-a-nu-la, they call it, a big name indeed for a little fellow, yet by no means too big when you come to think of the big, brave thing he did.
[Illustration: 0028]
[Illustration: 0029]
The Child of the Evening Star
[Illustration: 9029]
NCE upon a time, on the shores of the great lake, Gitchee Gumee, there lived a hunter who had ten beautiful young daughters. Their hair was dark and glossy as the wings of the blackbird, and when they walked or ran it was with the grace and freedom of the deer in the forest.
Thus it was that many suitors came to court them--brave and handsome young men, straight as arrows, fleet of foot, who could travel from sun to sun without fatigue. They were sons of the prairie, wonderful horsemen who would ride at breakneck speed without saddle or stirrup. They could catch a wild horse with a noose, tame him in a magical way by breathing into his nostrils, then mount him and gallop off as if he always had been ridden. There were those also who came from afar in canoes, across the waters of the Great Lake, canoes which shot swiftly along, urged by the strong, silent sweep of the paddle.
All of them brought presents with which they hoped to gain the father's favor. Feathers from the wings of the eagle who soars high up near the sun; furs of fox and beaver and the thick, curly hair of the bison; beads of many colors, and wampum, the shells which the Indians used for money; the quills of the porcupine and the claws of the grizzly bear; deerskin dressed to such a softness that it crumpled up in the hands--these and many other things they brought.
One by one, the daughters were wooed and married, until nine of them had chosen husbands. One by one, other tents were reared, so that instead of the single family lodge on the shores of the lake there were tents enough to form a little village. For the country was a rich one, and there was game and fish enough for all.
There remained the youngest daughter, Oweenee--the fairest of them all. Gentle as she was beautiful, none was so kind of heart. Unlike her proud and talkative elder sisters, Oweenee was shy and modest, and spoke but little. She loved to wander alone in the woods, with no company but the birds and squirrels and her own thoughts. What these thoughts were we can only guess; from her dreamy eyes and sweet expression, one could but suppose that nothing selfish or mean or hateful ever came into her mind. Yet Oweenee, modest though she was, had a spirit of her own. More than one suitor had found this out. More than one conceited young man, confident that he could win her, went away crestfallen when Oweenee began to laugh at him.
[Illustration: 0031]
The truth is, Oweenee seemed hard to please. Suitor after suitor came--handsome, tall young men, the handsomest and the bravest in all the country round. Yet this fawn-eyed maiden would have none of them. One was too tall, another too short; one too thin, another too fat. At least, that was the excuse she gave for sending them away. Her proud sisters had little patience with her. It seemed to be questioning their own taste; for Oweenee, had she said the word, might have gained a husband more attractive than any of theirs. Yet no one was good enough. They could not understand her; so they ended by despising her as a silly and unreasonable girl.
Her father, too, who loved her dearly and wished her to be happy, was much puzzled. "Tell me, my daughter," he said to her one day, "Is it your wish never to marry? The handsomest young men in the land have sought you in marriage, and you have sent them all away--often with a poor excuse. Why is it?"
Oweenee looked at him with her large, dark eyes.
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"Father," she said at last. "It is not that I am wilful. But it seems somehow as if I had the power to look into the hearts of men. It is the heart of a man, and not his face, that really matters; and I have not yet found one youth who in this sense is really beautiful."
Soon after, a strange thing happened. There came into the little village an Indian named Osseo, many years older than Oweenee. He was poor and ugly, too. Yet Oweenee married him.
How the tongues of her nine proud sisters did wag! Had the spoiled little thing lost her mind? they asked. Oh, well! They always knew she would come to a bad end; but it was pretty hard on the family.
Of course they could not know what Oweenee had seen at once--that Osseo had a generous nature and a heart of gold; that beneath his outward ugliness was the beauty of a noble mind, and the fire and passion of a poet. That is why Oweenee loved him; knowing, too, that he needed her care, she loved him all the more.
Now, though Oweenee did not suspect it, Osseo was really a beautiful youth on whom an evil spell had been cast. He was in truth the son of the King of the Evening Star--that Evening Star which shines so gloriously in the western sky, just above the rim of the earth, as the sun is setting. Often on a clear evening it hung suspended in the purple twilight like some glittering jewel. So close it seemed, and so friendly, that the little children would reach out their hands, thinking that they might grasp it ere it was swallowed by the night, and keep it always for their own. But the older ones would say: "Surely it must be a bead on the garments of the Great Spirit as he walks in the evening through the garden of the heavens."
Little did they know that the poor, despised Osseo had really descended from that star. And when he, too, stretched
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out his arms toward it, and murmured words they could not understand, they all made sport of him.
There came a time when a great feast was prepared in a neighboring village, and all of Oweenee's kinsfolk were invited to attend. They set out on foot--the nine proud sisters, with their husbands, walking ahead, much pleased with themselves and their finery, and all chattering like magpies. But Oweenee walked behind in silence, and with her walked Osseo.
The sun had set; in the purple twilight, over the edge of the earth, sparkled the Evening Star. Osseo, pausing, stretched out his hands toward it, as if imploring pity; but when the others saw him in this attitude they all made merry, laughing and joking and making unkind remarks.
"Instead of looking up in the sky," said one of the sisters, "he had better be looking on the ground. Else he may stumble and break his neck." Then calling back to him, she cried: "Look out! Here's a big log. Do you think you can manage to climb over it?"
Osseo made no answer; but when he came to the log he paused again. It was the trunk of a huge oak-tree blown down by the wind. There it had lain for years, just as it fell; and the leaves of many summers lay thick upon it. There was one thing, though, the sisters had not noticed.. The tree-trunk was not a solid one, but hollow, and so big around that a man could walk inside it from one end to the other without stooping.
But Osseo did not pause because he was unable to climb over it. There was something mysterious and magical in the appearance of the great hollow trunk; and he gazed at it a long time, as if he had seen it in a dream, and had been looking for it ever since.
"What is it, Osseo?" asked Oweenee, touching him on the arm. "Do you see something that I cannot see?"
But Osseo only gave a shout that echoed through the
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forest, and leaped inside the log. Then as Oweenee, a little alarmed, stood there waiting, the figure of a man came out from the other end. Could this be Osseo? Yes, it was he--but how transformed! No longer bent and ugly, no longer weak and ailing; but a beautiful youth---vigorous and straight and tall. His enchantment was at an end.
But the evil spell had not been wholly lifted, after all. As Osseo approached he saw that a great change was taking place in his loved one. Her glossy black hair was turning white, deep wrinkles lined her face; she walked with a feeble step, leaning on a staff. Though he had regained his youth and beauty, she in turn had suddenly grown old.
"O, my dearest one!" he cried. "The Evening Star has mocked me in letting this misfortune come upon you. Better far had I remained as I was; gladly would I have borne the insults and laughter of your people rather than you should be made to suffer."
"As long as you love me," answered Oweenee, "I am perfectly content. If I had the choice to make, and only one of us could be young and fair, it is you that I would wish to be beautiful."
Then he took her in his arms and caressed her, vowing that he loved her more than ever for her goodness of heart; and together they walked hand in hand, as lovers do.
When the proud sisters saw what had happened they could scarcely believe their eyes. They looked enviously at Osseo, who was now far handsomer than any one of their husbands, and much their superior in every other way. In his eyes was the wonderful light of the Evening Star, and when he spoke all men turned to listen and admire him. But the hard-hearted sisters had no pity for Oweenee. Indeed, it rather pleased them to see that she could no longer dim their beauty, and to realize that people would no longer be singing her praises in their jealous ears.
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The feast was spread, and all made merry but Osseo. He sat like one in a dream, neither eating nor drinking. From time to time he would press Oweenee's hand, and speak a word of comfort in her ear. But for the most part he sat there, gazing through the door of the tent at the star-besprinkled sky.
Soon a silence fell on all the company. From out of the night, from the dark, mysterious forest, came the sound of music--a low, sweet music that was like, yet unlike, the song sung by the thrush in summer twilight. It was magical music such as none had ever heard, coming, as it seemed, from a great distance, and rising and falling on the quiet summer evening. All those at the feast wondered as they listened. And well they might! For what to them was only music, was to Osseo a voice that he understood, a voice from the sky itself, the voice of the Evening Star. These were the words that he heard:
"Suffer no more, my son; for the evil spell is broken, and hereafter no magician shall work you harm. Suffer no more; for the time has come when you shall leave the earth and dwell here with me in the heavens. Before you is a dish on which my light has fallen, blessing it and giving it a magic virtue. Eat of this dish, Osseo, and all will be well."
So Osseo tasted the food before him, and behold! The tent began to tremble, and rose slowly into the air; up, up above the tree-tops--up, up toward the stars. As it rose, the things within it were wondrously changed. The kettles of clay became bowls of silver, the wooden dishes were scarlet shells, while the bark of the roof and the poles supporting it were transformed into some glittering substance that sparkled in the rays of the stars. Higher and higher it rose. Then the nine proud sisters and their husbands were all changed into birds. The men became robins, thrushes and woodpeckers. The sisters were changed into various birds with bright plumage;
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the four who had chattered most, whose tongues were always wagging, now appeared in the feathers of the magpie and bluejay.
Osseo sat gazing at Oweenee. Would she, too, change into a bird, and be lost to him? The very thought of it made him bow his head with grief; then, as he looked at her once more, he saw her beauty suddenly restored, while the color of her garments was the color only to be found where the dyes of the rainbow are made.
Again the tent swayed and trembled as the currents of the air bore it higher and higher, into and above the clouds; up, up, up--till at last it settled gently on the land of the Evening Star.
Osseo and Oweenee caught all the birds, and put them in a great silver cage, where they seemed quite content in each other's company. Scarcely was this done when Osseo's father, the King of the Evening Star, came to greet them. He was attired in a flowing robe, spun from star-dust, and his long white hair hung like a cloud upon his shoulders.
"Welcome," he said, "my dear children. Welcome to the kingdom in the sky that has always awaited you. The trials you have passed through have been bitter; but you have borne them bravely, and now you will be rewarded for all your courage and devotion. Here you will live happily; yet of one thing you must beware."
He pointed to a little star in the distance--a little, winking star, hidden from time to time by a cloud of vapor.
"On that star," he continued, "lives a magician named Wabeno. He has the power to dart his rays, like so many arrows, at those he wishes to injure. He has always been my enemy; it was he who changed Osseo into an old man and cast him down upon the earth. Have a care that his light does not fall upon you. Luckily, his power for evil has been greatly weakened; for the friendly clouds have come to my assistance,
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and form a screen of vapor through which his arrows cannot penetrate."
The happy pair fell upon their knees, and kissed his hands in gratitude.
"But these birds," said Osseo, rising and pointing to the cage. "Is this also the work of Wabeno, the magician?"
"No," answered the King of the Evening Star. "It was my own power, the power of love, that caused your tent to rise and bear you hither. It was likewise by my power that the envious sisters and their husbands were transformed into birds. Because they hated you and mocked you, and were cruel and scornful to the weak and the old, I have done this thing. It is not so great a punishment as they deserve. Here in the silver cage they will be happy enough, proud of their handsome plumage, strutting and twittering to their hearts' content. Hang the cage there, at the doorway of my dwelling. They shall be well cared for."
Thus it was that Osseo and Oweenee came to live in the kingdom of the Evening Star; and, as the years passed by, the little winking star where Wabeno, the magician, lived grew pale and paler and dim and dimmer, till it quite lost its power to harm. Meanwhile a little son had come to make their happiness more perfect, a charming boy with the dark, dreamy eyes of his mother and the strength and courage of Osseo.
It was a wonderful place for a little boy to live in--close to the stars and the moon, with the sky so near that it seemed a kind of curtain for his bed, and all the glory of the heavens spread out before him. But sometimes he was lonely, and wondered what the Earth was like--the Earth his father and mother had come from. He could see it far, far below-- so far that it looked no bigger than an orange; and sometimes he would stretch out his hands toward it, just as the little children on earth stretch out their hands for the moon.
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His father had made him a bow, with little arrows, and this was a great delight to him. But still he was lonely, and wondered what the little boys and girls on earth were doing, and whether they would be nice to play with. The Earth must be a pretty place, he thought, with so many people living on it. His mother had told him strange stories of that far-away land, with its lovely lakes and rivers, its great, green forests where the deer and the squirrel lived, and the yellow, rolling prairies swarming with buffalo.
These birds, too, in the great silver cage had come from the Earth, he was told; and there were thousands and thousands just like them, as well as others even more beautiful that he had never seen at all. Swans with long, curved necks, that floated gracefully on the waters; whip-poor-wills that called at night from the woods; the robin redbreast, the dove and the swallow. What wonderful birds they must be!
Sometimes he would sit near the cage, trying to understand the language of the feathered creatures inside. One day a strange idea came into his head. He would open the door of the cage and let them out. Then they would fly back to Earth, and perhaps they would take him with them. When his father and mother missed him they would be sure to follow him to the Earth, and then--
He could not quite see just how it would all end. But he found himself quite close to the cage, and the first thing he knew he had opened the door and let out all the birds. Round and round they flew; and now he was half sorry, and a little afraid as well. If the birds flew back to Earth, and left him there, what would his grandfather say?
"Come back, come back!" he called.
But the birds only flew around him in circles, and paid no attention to him. At any moment they might be winging their way to the Earth.
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"Come back, I tell you!" he cried, stamping his foot and waving his little bow. "Come back, I say, or I'll shoot you."
Then, as they would not obey him, he fitted an arrow to his bow and let it fly. So well did he aim that the arrow sped through the plumage of a bird, and the feathers fell all around. The bird itself, a little stunned but not much hurt, fell down; and a tiny trickle of blood stained the ground where it lay. But it was no longer a bird, with an arrow in its wing; instead, there stood in its place a beautiful young woman.
Now, no one who lives in the stars is ever permitted to shed blood, whether it be of man, beast or bird. So when the few drops fell upon the Evening Star, everything was changed. The boy suddenly found himself sinking slowly downward, held up by invisible hands, yet ever sinking closer and closer to the Earth. Soon he could see its green hills and the swans floating on the water, till at last he rested on a grassy island in a great lake. Lying there, and looking up at the sky, he could see the tent descending, too. Down it softly drifted, till it in turn sank upon the island; and in it were his father and mother, Osseo and Oweenee--returned to earth, to live once more among men and women and teach them how to live. For they had learned many things in their life upon the Evening Star; and the children of Earth would be better for the knowledge.
As they stood there, hand in hand, all the enchanted birds came fluttering after, falling and fluttering through the air. Then as each one touched the Earth, it was no longer a bird they saw, but a human being. A human being, yet not quite as before; for now they were only dwarfs, Little People, or Pygmies; Puk-Wudjies, as the Indians called them. Happy Little People they became, seen only by a few. Fishermen, they say, would sometimes get a glimpse of them--dancing in the light of the Evening Star, of a summer night, on the sandy, level beach of the Great Lake.
[Illustration: 0040]
The Boy who Snared the Sun
[Illustration: 9040]
DEEP, crusted snow covered the earth, and sparkled in the light of a wintry moon. The wind had died away; it was very cold and still. Not a sound came from the forest; the only noise that broke the perfect quiet of the night was the cracking of the ice on the Big-sea-water, Gitche Gumee, which was now frozen solid.
But inside old Iagoo's teepee it was warm and cheerful. The teepee, as the Indians call a tent, was covered with the thick, tough skin of the buffalo; the winter coat of Muk-wa, the bear, had now become a pleasant soft rug for Iagoo's two young visitors, Morning Glory and her little brother, Eagle Feather. Squatting at their ease on the warm fur, they waited for the old man to speak.
Suddenly a white-footed mouse crept from his nest in a corner, and, advancing close to the children, sat up on his hind-legs, like a dog that begs for a biscuit. Eagle Feather raised his hand in a threatening way, but Morning Glory caught him by the arm.
"No, no!" she said. "You must not harm him. See how friendly he is, and not a bit afraid. There is game enough in the forest for a brave boy's bow and arrow. Why should he spend his strength on a weak little mouse?"
Eagle Feather, pleased with anything that seemed like praise of his strength, let his hand fall.
"Your words are true words, Morning Glory," he answered. "Against Ahmeek, the beaver, or Wau-be-se, the wild swan, it is better that I should measure my hunter's skill."
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At this, Iagoo, turning around, broke his long silence. "There was a time," he said, mysteriously, "when a thousand boys such as Eagle Feather would have been no match at all for that mouse as he used to be."
"When was that?" asked Eagle Feather, looking uneasily at his sister.
"In the days of the great Dormouse," answered Iagoo. "In the days, long ago, when there were many more animals than men on the earth, and the biggest of all the beasts was the Dormouse. Then something strange happened--something that never happened before or since. Shall I tell you about it?"
"O, please do!" begged Morning Glory.
"The story I am going to tell you," began Iagoo, "is not so much a story about the Dormouse as it is a story about a little boy and his sister. Yet had it not been for the Dormouse, I would not be here to tell about it, and you would not be here to listen.
"To begin with, you must understand that the world in those days was a different sort of place from what it is now.
O yes, a different sort of place. People did not eat the flesh of animals. They lived on berries, and roots, and wild vegetables. The Great Spirit, who made all things on land, and in the sky and water, had not yet given men Mon-da-min, the Indian corn. There was no fire to give them heat, or to cook with. In all the world there was just one small fire, watched by two old witches who let nobody come near it; and until Coyote, the prairie wolf, came along and stole some of this fire, the food that people could manage to get was eaten raw, the way it grew."
"They must have been pretty hungry," said Morning Glory..
"O, yes, they were hungry," agreed Iagoo. "But that was not all. There were so many animals, and so few men,
[Illustration: 0000]
that the animals ruled the earth in their own way. The biggest of them all was Bosh-kwa-dosh, the Mastodon. He was higher than the highest trees, and he had an enormous appetite. But he did not stay long on earth, or there would not have been food enough even for the other animals."
[Illustration: 0043]
"I thought you said the Dormouse was the biggest," interrupted Eagle Feather.
Iagoo looked at him severely.
"At the time I speak of," he continued, "Bosh-kwa-dosh, the Mastodon, had just gone away. He had not gone a bit too soon, either; for, by this time, the only people left on the whole earth were a young girl and her little brother."
"Like Eagle Feather and me?" asked Morning Glory. "The girl was much like you," said Iagoo, patiently. "But the boy was a dwarf, who never grew to be more than three feet high. Being so much stronger and larger than her brother, she gathered all the food for both, and cared for him in every way. Sometimes she would take him along with her, when she went to look for berries and roots. 'He's such a very little boy,' she said to herself, 'that if I leave him all alone, some big bird may swoop down, and carry him off to its nest.'
"She did not know what a strange boy he was, and how much mischief he could do when he set his mind upon it. One day she said to him: 'Look, little brother! I have made you a bow and some arrows. It is time you learned to take care of yourself; so when I am gone, practice shooting, for this is a thing you must know how to do.'
"Winter was coming, and to keep himself from freezing the boy had nothing better than a light garment woven by his sister from the wild grasses. How could he get a warm coat? As he asked himself that question, a flock of snow birds flew down, near by, and began pecking at the fallen logs, to get the worms. 'Ha!' said he. 'Their feathers
[Illustration: 0000]
would make me a fine coat.' Bending his bow, he let an arrow fly; but he had not yet learned how to shoot straight. It went wide of the mark. He shot a second, and a third; then the birds took fright, and flew away.
"Each day he tried again--shooting at a tree when there was nothing better to aim at. At last he killed a snow bird, then another and another. When he had shot ten birds, he had enough. 'See, sister,' he said, 'I shall not freeze. Now you can make me a coat from the skins of these little birds.'
"So his sister sewed the skins together, and made him the coat, the first warm winter coat he had ever had. It was fine to look at, and the feathers kept out the cold. Eh-yah! he was proud of it! With his bow and arrows, he strutted up and down, like a little turkey cock. 'Is it true?' he asked, 'that you and I are the only persons living on earth? Perhaps if I look around, I may find someone else. It will do no harm to try.'
"His sister feared he would come to some harm; but he had made up his mind to see the world for himself, and off he went. But his legs were short, he was not used to walking far, and he soon grew tired. When he came to a bare place, on the edge of a hill, where the sun had melted the snow, he lay down, and was soon fast asleep.
"As he slept, the sun played him a trick. It was a mild winter's day. The bird skins of which the coat was made were still fresh and tender, and under the full glare of the sun they began to shrivel and shrink. 'Eh-yah! What's wrong?' he muttered in his sleep, feeling the coat become tighter and tighter. Then he woke, stretched out his arms, and saw what had happened.
"The sun was nearly sinking now. The boy stood up and faced it, and shook his small fist. 'See what you have done!' he cried, with a stamp of his foot. 'You have spoiled my new birdskin coat. Never mind! You think yourself
[Illustration: 0000]
beyond my reach, up there; but I'll be revenged on you. Just wait and see!'"
"But how could he reach the sun?" asked Morning Glory, her eyes growing rounder and rounder.
"That is what his sister asked, when he told her about it," said Iagoo. "And what do you think he did? First, he did nothing at all but stretch himself out on the ground, where he lay for ten days without eating or moving. Then he turned over on the other side, and lay there for ten days more. At last he rose to his feet. 'I have made up my mind,' he said. 'Sister, I have a plan to catch the sun in a noose. Find me some kind of a cord from which I can make a snare.' "She got some tough grass, and twisted it into a rope. 'That will not do,' he said. 'You must find something stronger.' He no longer talked like a little boy, but like one who was to be obeyed. Then his sister thought of her hair. She cut enough from her head to make a cord, and when she had plaited it he was much pleased, and said it would do. He took it from her, and drew it between his lips, and as he did this it turned into a kind of metal, and grew much stronger and longer, till he had so much that he wound it around his body.
"In the middle of the night he made his way to the hill, and there he fixed a noose at the place where the sun would rise. He had to wait a long time in the cold and darkness. But at last a faint light came into the sky. As the sun rose it was caught fast in the noose, and there it stayed."
Iagoo stopped talking, and sat looking into the fire. One might have supposed that when he did this he saw pictures in the flames, and in the red coals, and that these pictures helped him to tell the story. But Morning Glory was impatient to hear the rest.
"Iagoo," she said, timidly, at last. "Did you forget about the Dormouse?"
[Illustration: 0000]
"Eh-yah! the Dormouse! No. I have not forgotten," answered the old man, rousing himself. "When the sun did not rise as usual, the animals could not tell what had happened. Ad-ji-dau-mo, the squirrel, chattered and scolded from the branch of a pine tree. Kah-gah-gee, the raven, flapped his wings, and croaked more hoarsely than ever, to tell the others that the end of the world had come. Only Muk-wa, the bear, did not mind. He had crept into his cave for the winter, and the darker it was the better he liked it.
"Wa-bun, the East Wind, was the one who brought the news. He had drawn from his quiver the silver arrows with which he chased the darkness from the valleys. But the sun had not risen to help him, and the arrows fell harmless to the earth. 'Wake, wake!' he wailed. 'Someone has caught the sun in a snare. Which of all the animals will dare to cut the cord?'
"But even Coyote, the prairie wolf, who was the wisest of them all, could think of no way to free the sun. So great was the heat thrown out by its rays that he could not come within an arrow's flight of where it was caught fast in the magical noose of hair.
"'Leave it to me!' screamed Ken-eu, the war-eagle, from his nest on the cliff. 'It is I alone who soar to the sky, and look the sun in the face, without winking. Leave it to me!'
"Down he darted through the darkness, and up he flew again, with his eagle feathers singed. Then they woke the Dormouse. They had a hard time doing it, because when he once went to sleep he stayed asleep for six months, and it was almost impossible to arouse him. Coyote crept close to his ear, and howled with all his might. It would have split the eardrum of almost any other animal. But Kug-e-been-gwa-kwa, the Dormouse, only groaned and turned over on the other
[Illustration: 0000]
side, and Coyote had a narrow escape from being mashed flat, like a corn-cake.
"'There is only one thing that will wake him,' said Coyote, getting up and shaking himself. 'I will run to the mountain cave of An-ne-mee-kee, the Thunder. His voice is even more terrible than mine.' So off he went at a gallop.
"Soon they could hear An-ne-mee-kee coming. Boom, boom! When he shouted in the ear of the Dormouse, the biggest beast on earth rose slowly to his feet. In the darkness he looked bigger than ever, almost as big as a mountain. An-ne-mee-kee, the Thunder, shouted once more, to make sure that the Dormouse was really wide awake, and would not go to sleep again.
"'Now,' said Coyote to the Dormouse, 'it is you that will have to free the sun. If he burned one of us, there would be little left but bones. But you are so big that if part of you is burned away there will still be enough. Then, in that case you would not have to eat so much, or work so hard to get it.'
"The Dormouse was a stupid animal, and Coyote's talk seemed true talk. Besides, as he was the biggest animal, he was expected to do the biggest things. So he made his way to the hill, where the little boy had snared the sun, and began to nibble at the noose. As he nibbled away, his back got hotter and hotter. Soon it began to burn, till all the upper part of him burned away, and became great heaps of ashes. At last, when he had cut through the cord with his teeth, and set the sun free, all that was left of him was an animal no larger than an ordinary mouse. What he became then, so he is today. Still, he is big enough for a mouse; and perhaps that is what Coyote really meant. Coyote, the prairie wolf, is a cunning beast, up to many tricks, and it is not always easy to tell exactly what he means."
[Illustration: 0047]
[Illustration: 0048]
How the Summer Came
[Illustration: 9048]
ORNING Glory was tired of the winter, and longed for the spring to come. Sometimes it seemed as if Ka-bib-on-okka, the fierce old North Wind, would never go back to his home in the Land of Ice. With his cold breath he had frozen tight and hard the Big-Sea-Water,Gitche Gumee, and covered it deep with snow, till you could not tell the Great Lake from the land.
Except for the beautiful green pines, all the world was white--a dazzling, silent world in which there was no musical murmur of waters and no song of birds.
"Will O-pee-chee, the robin, never come again?" sighed Morning Glory. "Suppose there was no summer anywhere, and no Sha-won-dasee, the South Wind, to bring the violet and the dove. O, Iagoo, would it not be dreadful?"
"Be patient, Morning Glory," answered the old man. "Soon you will hear Wa-wa, the wild goose, flying high up, on his way to the North. I have lived many moons. Sometimes he seems long in coming, but he always comes. When you hear him call, then O-pee-chee, the robin, will not be far behind."
"I'll try to be patient" said Morning Glory. "But Ka-bib-on-okka, the North wnd, is so strong and fierce. I can't help wondering whether there ever was a time when his power was so great that he made his home here always. It makes me shiver to think of it!"
Iagoo rose from his place by the fire, and drew to one side the curtain of buffalo-hide that screened the doorway. He pointed to the sky--clear, and sparkling with stars.
[Illustration: 0000]
"Look!" he said. "There, in the North. See that little cluster of stars. Do you know the name we give it?"
"I know," said Eagle Feather. "It is O-jeeg An-nung--the Fisher stars. If you look right, you can see how they make the body of the Fisher. He is stretched out flat, with an arrow through his tail. See, sister!"
"The Fisher," repeated Morning Glory. "You mean the furry little animal, something like a fox? Is Marten another name for it?"
"That's it," said Eagle Feather.
"Yes, I see," nodded Morning Glory. "But why is the Fisher spread out flat that way, in the sky, with an arrow sticking through his tail?"
"I don't know just exactly why," admitted Eagle Feather. "I suppose some hunter was chasing him. Perhaps Iagoo can tell us."
Iagoo closed the curtain, and went back to the fire.
"You thought there might have been a time when there was no summer on the earth," he said to Morning Glory. "And you were right. Until O-jeeg, the Fisher, found a way to bring the summer down from the sky, the earth was everywhere covered with snow, and it was always cold. If O-jeeg had not been willing to give his life, so that all the rest of us could be warm, Ka-bib-on-okka, the North Wind, would have ruled the world, as he now rules the Land of Ice."
Then Morning Glory and Eagle Feather sat down on the soft rug that was once the winter coat of Muk-wa, the bear, and Iagoo told them the story of How the Summer Came:
In the wild forest that borders the Great Lake there once lived a mighty hunter named O-jeeg. No one knew the woods so well as he; where others would be lost without a trail to guide them, he found his way easily and quickly, by day or night, through the trackless tangle of trees and underbrush. Where the red deer fled, he followed; the bear could not escape
[Illustration: 0000]
his swift pursuit. He had the cunning of the fox, the endurance of the wolf, the speed of the wild turkey when it runs at the scent of danger.
When O-jeeg shot an arrow, it always hit the mark. When he set out on a journey, no storm or snow could turn him back. He did everything he said he would do, and did it well.
Thus it was that some men came to believe that O-jeeg was a Manito--the Indian name for one who has magic powers. This much was certain: whenever O-jeeg wished to do so, he could change himself into the little animal known as the Fisher, or Marten.
[Illustration: 0051]
Perhaps that is why he was on such friendly terms with some of the animals, who were always willing to help him when he called upon them. Among these were the otter, the beaver, the lynx, the badger and the wolverine. There came a time, as we shall see, when he needed their services badly, and they were not slow in coming to his assistance.
O-jeeg had a wife whom he dearly loved, and a son, of thirteen years, who promised to be as great a hunter as his father. Already he had shown great skill with the bow and arrow; if some accident should prevent O-jeeg from supplying the family with the game upon which they lived, his son felt sure that he himself could shoot as many squirrels and turkeys as they needed to keep them from starving. With O-jeeg to bring them venison, bear's meat and wild turkey, they had thus far plenty to eat. Had it not been for the cold, the boy would have been happy enough. They had warm clothing, made from deerskin and furs; to keep their fire burning, they had all the wood in the forest. Yet, in spite of this, the cold was a great trial; for it was always winter, and the deep snow never melted.
Some wise old men had somewhere heard that the sky was not only the roof of our own world, but also was the floor of a beautiful world beyond; a land where birds with bright feathers
[Illustration: 0000]
sang sweetly through a pleasant, warm season called Summer. It was a pretty story that people wished to believe; and likely enough they said, when you came to think that the sun was so far away from the earth, and so close to the sky itself.
The boy used to dream about it, and wonder what could be done. His father could do anything; some men said he was a Manito. Perhaps he could find some way to bring Summer to the earth. That would be the greatest thing of all.
Sometimes it was so cold that when the boy went into the woods his fingers would be frost-bitten. Then he could not fit the notch of his arrow to the bowstring, and was obliged to go back home without any game whatever. One day he had wandered far in the forest, and was returning emptyhanded, when he saw a red squirrel seated on his hind-legs on the stump of a tree. The squirrel was gnawing a pine cone, and did not try to run away when the young hunter came near. Then the little animal spoke:
"My grandson," said he, "there is something I wish to tell you that you will be pleased to hear. Put away your arrows, and do not try to shoot me, and I shall give you some good advice."
The boy was surprised; but he unstrung his bow, and put the arrow in his quiver.
"Now," said the squirrel, "listen carefully to what I have to say. The earth is always covered with snow, and the frost bites your fingers, and makes you unhappy. I dislike the cold as much as you do. To tell the truth, there is little enough for me to eat in these woods, with the ground frozen hard all the time. You can see how thin I am, for there is not much to eat in a pine cone. If someone could manage to bring the Summer down from the sky, it would be a great blessing." "Is it really true, then," asked the boy, "that up beyond the sky is a pleasant warm land, where Winter only stays for a few moons?"
[Illustration: 0000]
"Yes, it is true," said the squirrel. "We animals have known it for a long time. Ken-eu, the war-eagle, who soars near the sun, once saw a small crack in the sky. The crack was made by Way-wass-i-mo, the Lightning, in a great storm that covered all the earth with water. Ken-eu, the war-eagle, felt the warm air leaking through; but the people who live up above mended the crack the very next moment, and the sky has never leaked again."
"Then our wise old men were right," said the boy. "O-jeeg, my father, can do most anything he has a mind to. Do you suppose if he tried hard enough, he could get through the sky, and bring the Summer down to us?"
"Of course!" exclaimed the squirrel. "That is why I spoke to you about it. Your father is a Manito. If you beg him hard enough, and tell him how unhappy you are, he is sure to make the attempt. When you go back, show him your frostbitten fingers. Tell him how you tramp all day through the snow, and how difficult it is to make your way home. Tell him that some day you may be frozen stiff, and never get back at all. Then he will do as you ask, because he loves you very much."
The boy thanked the squirrel, and promised to follow this advice. From that day he gave his father no peace. At last O-jeeg said to him:
"My son, what you ask me to do is a dangerous thing, and I do not know what may come of it. But my power as a Manito was given me for a good purpose, and I can put it to no better use than to try to bring the Summer down from the sky, and make the world a more pleasant place to live in." Then he prepared a feast to which he invited his friends, the otter, the beaver, the lynx, the badger, and the wolverine; and they all put their heads together, to decide what was best to be done. The lynx was the first to speak. He had travelled far on his long legs, and had been to many strange places.
[Illustration: 0000]
Besides, if you had good strong eyes, and you looked at the sky, on a clear night when there was no moon, you could see a little group of stars which the wise old men said was exactly like a lynx. It gave him a certain importance, especially in matters of this kind; so when he began to speak, the others listened with great respect.
"There is a high mountain," said he, "that none of you has ever seen. No one ever saw the top, because it is always hidden by the clouds; but I am told it is the highest mountain in the world, and almost touches the sky."
The otter began to laugh. He is the only animal that can do this; sometimes he laughs for no particular reason, unless it is that he thinks himself more clever than the other animals, and likes to "show off."
"What are you laughing at?" asked the lynx.
"Oh, nothing," answered the otter. "I was just laughing." "It will get you into trouble some day," said the lynx. "Just because you never heard of this mountain, you think it is not there."
"Do you know how to get to it?" asked O-jeeg. "If we could climb to the top, we might find a way to break through the sky. It seems a good plan."
"That is what I was thinking," said the lynx. "It is true I don't know just where it is. But a moon's journey from here, there lives a Manito who has the shape of a giant. _He_ knows, and he could tell us."
So O-jeeg bade good-bye to his wife and his little son, and the next day the lynx began the long journey, with O-jeeg and the others following close behind. It was just as the lynx had said. When they had travelled, day and night, for a moon, they came to a lodge, as the white men call an Indian's tent; and there was the Manito standing in the doorway. He was a queer-looking man, such as they had never seen before, with an enormous head
[Illustration: 0000]
and three eyes, one eye being set in his forehead above the other two.
He invited them into the lodge, and set some meat before them; but he had such an odd look, and his movements were so awkward, that the otter could not help laughing. At this, the eye in the Manito's forehead grew red, like a live coal, and he made a leap at the otter, who barely managed to slip through the doorway, out into the bitter cold and darkness of the night, without having tasted a morsel of supper.
When the otter had gone, the Manito seemed satisfied, and told them they could spend the night in his lodge. They did so; and O-jeeg, who stayed awake while his friends slept, noticed that only two of the Manito's eyes were closed, while the one in his forehead remained wide open.
In the morning the Manito told O-jeeg to travel straight toward the North Star, and that in twenty suns--the Indian name for days--they would reach the mountain. "As you are a Manito yourself," he said, "you may be able to climb to the top, and to take your friends with you. But I cannot promise that you will be able to get down again."
"If it is close enough to the sky," answered O-jeeg, "that is all I ask."
Once more they set out. On their way they met the otter, who laughed again when he saw them; but this time he laughed because he was glad to find them, and glad to get some meat that O-jeeg had saved from the Manito's supper.
In twenty days they came to the foot of the mountain. Then up and up they climbed, till they passed quite through the clouds; up once more, till at last they stopped, all out of breath, and sat down to rest on the highest peak in the world. To their great delight, the sky seemed so close that they could almost touch it.
O-jeeg and his comrades filled their pipes. But before smoking, they called out to the Great Spirit, asking for success
[Illustration: 0000]
in their attempt. In Indian fashion they pointed to the earth, to the sky overhead, and to the four winds.
"Now," said O-jeeg, when they had finished smoking, "which of you can jump the highest?"
The otter grinned.
"Jump, then!" commanded O-jeeg.
The otter jumped, and, sure enough, his head hit the sky. But the sky was the harder of the two, and back he fell When he struck the ground, he began to slide down the mountain; soon he was out of sight, and they saw him no more.
"Ugh!" grunted the lynx. "He is laughing on the other side of his mouth."
It was the beaver's turn. He, too, hit the sky, but fell down in a heap. The badger and the lynx had no better luck, and their heads ached for a long time afterward.
"It all depends on you," said O-jeeg to the wolverine. "You are the strongest of them all. Ready, now--jump!" The wolverine jumped, and fell, but came down on his feet, sound and whole.
"Good!" cried O-jeeg. "Try again!"
This time the wolverine made a dent in the sky.
"It's cracking!" exclaimed O-jeeg. "Now, once more!" For the third time the wolverine jumped. Through the sky he went, passing out of sight, and O-jeeg quickly followed him.
Looking around them, they beheld a beautiful land.
O-jeeg, who had spent his life among the snows, stood like a man who dreams, wondering if it could be true. He had left behind him a bare world, white with winter, whose waters were always frozen, a world without song or color. He had now come into a country that was a great green plain, with flowers of many hues; where birds of bright plumage sang amid the leafy branches of trees hung with golden fruit. Streams wandered through the meadows, and flowed into
[Illustration: 0000]
lovely lakes. The air was mild, and filled with the perfume from a million blossoms. It was Summer.
Along the banks of a lake were the lodges in which lived the people of the sky, who could be seen some distance away. The lodges were empty, but before them were hung cages in which there were many beautiful birds. Already the warm air of Summer had begun to rush through the hole made by the wolverine, and O-jeeg now made haste to open the cages, so that the birds could follow.
The sky-dwellers saw what was happening, and raised a great shout. But Spring, Summer and Autumn had already escaped through the opening into the world below, and many of the birds as well.
The wolverine, too, had managed to reach the hole, and descend to the earth, before the sky-dwellers could catch him. But O-jeeg was not so fortunate. There were still some birds remaining that he knew his son would like to see, so he went on opening the cages. By this time the sky dwellers had closed the hole, and O-jeeg was too late.
As the sky-dwellers pursued him, he changed himself into the Fisher, and ran along the plain, toward the North, at the top of his speed. In the form of the Fisher he could run faster. Also, when he took this shape, no arrow could injure him unless it hit a spot near the tip of his tail.
But the sky-dwellers ran even faster, and the Fisher climbed a tall tree. They were good marksmen, and they shot a great many arrows, until at last one of these chanced to hit the fatal spot. Then the Fisher knew that his time had come.
Now he saw that some of his enemies were marked with the totems, or family arms, of his own tribe. "My Cousins!" he called to them. "I beg of you that you go away, and leave me here alone."
The sky-dwellers granted his request. When they had gone, the Fisher came down from the tree, and wandered
[Illustration: 0000]
around for a time, seeking some opening in the plain through which he might return to the earth. But there was no opening; so at last, feeling weak and faint, he stretched himself flat on the floor of the sky, through which the stars may be seen from the world below.
"I have kept my promise," he said with a sigh of content. "My son will now enjoy the summer, and so will all the people who dwell on the earth. Through the ages to come I shall be set as a sign in the heavens, and my name will be spoken with praise. I am satisfied."
So it came about that the Fisher remained in the sky, where you can see him plainly for yourself, on a clear night, with the arrow through his tail. The Indians call them the Fisher Stars--O-jeeg An-nung; but to white men are they known as the constellation of the Plough.
[Illustration: 0058]
[Illustration: 0059]
Grasshopper
[Illustration: 9059]
HERE was once a merry young Indian who could jump so high, and who played so many pranks, that he came to be known as Grasshopper. He was a tall, handsome fellow, always up to mischief of one kind or another; and though his tricks were sometimes amusing, he carried them much too far, and so in time he came to grief.
Grasshopper owned all the things that an Indian likes most to have. In his lodge were all sorts of pipes and weapons, ermine and other choice furs, deer-skin shirts wrought with porcupine quills, many pairs of beaded moccasins, and more wampum belts than one person could have honestly come by.
The truth is, Grasshopper did not get these things by his skill and courage as a hunter. He got them by shaking pieces of colored bone and wood in a wooden bowl, then throwing them on the ground. That is to say, Grasshopper was a gambler, and such a lucky gambler that he easily won from others, with his game of Bowl and Counters, the things that they had obtained by risking their lives in the hunt.
If people put up with his ways, and even laughed at some of his mad pranks, it was because he could dance so well. Never had there been such a dancer. Was there a wedding to be celebrated, or some feast following a successful hunt--then who but Grasshopper could so well supply the entertainment?
He could dance with a step so light that it seemed to leave no mark upon the earth. He could dance as the Indian dances when he goes to war, or as when he holds a festival in honor of the corn. But the dance in which he excelled was a furious, dizzy dance, with leaps and bounds, that fairly turned the heads of the beholders.
[Illustration: 0000]
It was then that Grasshopper became a kind of human whirlwind. As he spun round and round, his revolving body drew up the dry leaves and the dust, till the dancer all but faded from view, and you saw instead what looked like a whirling cloud.
Once, when the great Manito, named Man-a-bo-zho, took a wife and came to live with the tribe, that he might teach them best how to live, Grasshopper danced at the wedding. The Beggar's Dance, he called it, and such a dance! On the shores of the Big-Sea-Water, Gitche Gumee, are heaps of sand rising into little hills known as dunes. Had you asked Iagoo, he would have told you that these dunes were the work of Grasshopper, who whirled the sands together, and piled them into hills, as he spun madly around in his dance at Man-a-bo-zho's wedding.
[Illustration: 0061]
But though Grasshopper came to the wedding, and danced this crazy Beggar's Dance, it seems probable that he did it more to please himself, and to show his skill, than to honor the great Man-a-bo-zho. Grasshopper really had no respect for anybody. When Iagoo's grandfather was in the middle of some interesting story, and had come to the most exciting part, Grasshopper likely as not would yawn and stretch himself, and say in a loud whisper that he had heard it all before.
So, too, with Man-a-bo-zho. This great Manito, who was the son of the West-Wind, Mud-je-kee-wis, had magic powers which he used for the good of the tribe. It was he who fasted and prayed, that his people might be given food other than the wild things of the woods; and whose prayer was answered with the gift of the Indian corn. Then when Kah-gah-gee, King of ravens, flew down with his band of black thieves, to tear up the seed in the ground, it was Man-a-bo-zho who snared him, and tied him fast to the ridge-pole of his lodge, to croak out a warning to the others.
But Man-a-bo-zho's goodness and wisdom had little effect
[Illustration: 0000]
on Grasshopper. "Pooh!" he would say. "Why should an Indian bother his head with planting corn, when he can draw his bow and kill a good fat deer?" Then he shook his wolfskin pouch, and rattled the pieces of bone and wood. "As long as I have these," he said to himself, "I need nothing more. After all, it is everybody else that works for the man who knows how to use his head."
He walked through the village, very proud and straight, with his fan of turkey-feathers, a swan's plume fastened in his long, black hair, and the tails of foxes trailing from his heels. In his white deer-skin shirt, edged with ermine, his leggings and moccasins ornamented with beads and porcupine quills, he cut a fine figure. There was to be a dance that night, and Grasshopper, who was a great dandy and a favorite with all the young girls and women, had decked himself out for the occasion. He had painted his face with streaks of blue and vermilion; his blue-black hair, parted in the middle, and glistening with oil, hung to his shoulders in braids plaited with sweet grass. The warriors might call him Shau-go-daya, a coward, and make jokes at his expense, but he did not care. Could he not beat them all when it came to playing ball or quoits, and were not the maidens all in love with his good looks?
Meanwhile, Grasshopper wished to pass the time in some pleasant way. Glancing through the door of a lodge, he saw a group of young men seated on the ground, listening to one of old Iagoo's stories.
"Ha!" he cried. "Have you nothing better to do? Here's a game worth playing."
He drew from his pouch the thirteen pieces of bone and wood, and juggled them from one hand to the other. But no one paid any attention to him. After all, Grasshopper had "more brains in his heels than in his head." For once he had been too cunning; fearing his skill, no one could be found who would play with him.
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"Pooh!" muttered Grasshopper, as he turned away. "I see how it is. The pious Man-a-bo-zho has been preaching to them again. This village is getting to be pretty tiresome to live in. It's about time for me to strike out, and find a place where the young men don't sit around and talk to the squaws,"
He walked along, bent on mischief. Even the dance was forgotten; he wondered what he could do to amuse himself. As he came to the outskirts of the village, he passed the lodge of Man-a-bo-zho. "I would like to play him some trick," he said, under his breath, "so he will remember me when I am gone." But he was well aware that Man-a-bo-zho was much more powerful than himself; so he hesitated, not knowing exactly what do to.
At last he walked softly to the doorway, and listened, but could hear no sound of voices. "Good!" he said with a grin. "Perhaps nobody is at home." With that, he spun around the outside of the lodge, on one leg, raising a great cloud of dust. No one came out; but on the ridge-pole of the lodge, the captive Kah-gah-gee, King of ravens, flapped his big black wings, and screamed with a hoarse, rasping cry.
"Fool!" cried Grasshopper. "Noisy fool!"
With a bound; he leapt clear over the lodge, and then back again; at which the raven screamed more harshly than ever. But within the lodge all was silent.
Grasshopper grew bolder. Going to the doorway again, he rattled the flap of buffalo hide. Nobody answered; so, cautiously drawing the curtain to one side, he ventured to peer in. Then he chuckled softly. The lodge was empty.
"This is my chance!" he exclaimed. "Man-a-bo-zho is away, and so is his foolish wife. I'll just pay my respects before they come back, and then I'll be off for good."
Saying this, he went in, and began to turn everything upside down. He threw all the bowls and kettles in a corner,
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filled the drinking gourds with ashes from the fire, flung the rich furs and embroidered garments this way and that, and strewed the floor with wampum belts and arrows. When he finished, one might have thought a crazy man had been there. No woman in the village was more neat and orderly than the wife of Man-a-bo-zho, and Grasshopper knew this would vex her more than anything else he could do.
"Now for Man-a-bo-zho," he grinned as he left the lodge, well pleased with the mischief he had wrought.
"Caw, caw!" screamed the King of ravens.
"Kaw!" answered Grasshopper, mocking him. "A pretty sort of pet you are. Does Man-a-bo-zho keep you sitting there because you are so handsome? Or is it your beautiful voice."
With that, he made a leap to the ridge-pole, seized the raven by the neck, and whirled it round and round till it was quite limp and lifeless. Then he left it hanging there, as an insult to Man-a-bo-zho.
He was now in high good humor, and went his way through the forest, whistling and singing, and turning hand-springs to amuse the squirrels. There was a high rock, overlooking the lake, from the top of which one could view the country for miles and miles. Grasshopper climbed it. He could see the village plainly, so he thought he would wait there till Man-a-bo-zho came home. That would be part of the joke.
As he sat there, many birds darted around him, flying close over his head. Man-a-bo-zho called these fowls of the air his chickens, and he had put them under his protection. But Grasshopper had grown reckless. Along came a flock of mountain chickens, and he strung his bow, and shot them as they flew, for no better reason than because they were Man-a-bo-zho's, and not because he needed them for food. Bird after bird fell, pierced by his arrows; when they had fallen, he would throw their bodies down the cliff, upon the beach below.
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At last Kay-oshk, the sea-gull, spied him at this cruel sport, and gave the alarm. "Grasshopper is killing us," he called. "Fly, brothers! Fly away, and tell our protector that Grasshopper is slaying us with his arrows."
When Man-a-bo-zho heard the news, his eyes flashed fire, and he spoke in a voice of thunder:
"Grasshopper must die for this! He cannot escape me. Though he fly to the ends of the earth, I shall follow, and visit my vengeance upon him."
On his feet he bound his magic moccasins with which, at each stride, he could step a full mile. On his hands he drew his magic mittens with which, at one blow, he could shatter the hardest rock. Then he started in pursuit.
Grasshopper had heard the warning call of the sea-gull, and knew it was time to be off. He, too, could run. So fleet of foot was he that he could shoot an arrow ahead of him, and reach the spot where it fell before it dropped to earth. Also, he had the power to change himself into other shapes, and it was almost impossible to kill him. If, for example, he entered the body of a beaver, and the beaver was slain, no sooner had its flesh grown cold than the _Fee-bi_, or spirit, of Grasshopper would leave the dead body, and Grasshopper would become a man again, ready for some new adventure.
But at first he trusted to his legs and to his cunning. On rushed Man-a-bo-zho, breathing vengeance; swiftly, like a moving shadow, fled Grasshopper. Through the forest and across the hills he fled, faster than the hare. His pursuer was hot on the trail. Once he came upon the forest bed where the grass was still warm and bent; but the Grasshopper, who had rested there, was far away. Once Man-a-bo-zho, high on a mountain, spied him in the meadow below. Grasshopper had shown himself on purpose, and mocked the great Manito, and defied him. The truth is, Grasshopper was just a bit conceited.
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At last he grew tired of running. Not that his legs ached him or his feet were sore. But this kind of life was not much to his liking, and he kept his eye open for something new. Pretty soon he came to a stream where the water was backed up by some kind of a dam, so that it flooded the banks. Grasshopper had run about a thousand miles that day--counting all the turns and twists. He was hot and dusty, and the pond, with its water-lilies and rushes, looked cool and refreshing. From far, far away came a faint sound; it was the voice of Man-a-bo-zho, shouting his war-cry.
"Tiresome fellow!" said Grasshopper. "I could almost wish I were a beaver, and lived down there at the bottom of the pond, where no one would disturb me."
Then up popped the head of a beaver, who looked at him suspiciously.
"Don't be alarmed. I left my bow and arrows over there in the grass," explained Grasshopper. "Besides, I was just thinking I would like to be a beaver myself. What do you say to that?"
"I shall have to consult Ahmeek, our chief," answered the friendly animal.
Down he dived to the bottom, and pretty soon Ahmeek's head appeared above the water, followed by the heads of twenty others.
"Let me be one of you," said Grasshopper. "You have a pleasant home down there in the clear, cool water, and I am tired of the life I lead."
Ahmeek was pleased that such a strong, handsome young Indian should wish to join their company.
"But I can help you," he answered, "only after you have plunged into the pond. Do you think you can change yourself into one of us?"
"That is easy," said Grasshopper.
He waded into the water up to his waist; and behold! he
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had a broad flat tail. Deeper and deeper he went; as the water closed above his head he became a beaver, with glossy, black fur, and feet webbed like a duck's. Down he sank with the others to the bottom, which was covered with heaps of logs and branches.
"That," explained Ahmeek, "is the food we have stored for the winter. We eat the bark, and you will soon be as fat as any of us."
"But I want to be even fatter," said Grasshopper. "Flatter and ten times as big."
"As you please," agreed Ahmeek. "We can help to make you just as big as you wish."
They reached the lodge where the beavers lived, and entered the doorway, leading into a number of large rooms. Grasshopper selected the largest one for himself.
"Now," he said, "bring me all the food I can eat, and when I am big enough I will be your chief."
The beavers were willing. They set to work getting quantities of the juiciest bark for Grasshopper, who was delighted with this lazy life, and did little more than eat or sleep. Bigger and bigger he grew, till at last he was ten times the size of Ahmeek, and could barely manage to move around in his lodge. He was perfectly happy.
But one day the beaver who kept watch up above, among the rushes of the pond, came swimming to the lodge in a state of great excitement.
"The hunters are after us," he panted. "It is indeed Man-a-bo-zho himself, with his hunters. They are breaking down our dam!"
Even as he spoke, the water in the pond sank lower and lower; the next moment came the tramping of feet, as the hunters leapt upon the roof of the lodge, trying to break it open.
All the beavers but Grasshopper scampered out of the lodge, and escaped into the stream, where they hid themselves
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in some deep pools, or swam far down with the current. Grasshopper did his best to follow them, but could not. The doorway was too small for his big, fat body; when he attempted to go through it, he found himself stuck fast.
Then the roof gave way, and the head of an Indian appeared.
"_Ty-au!_" he called. "_Tut-ty-au!_ See what's here! This must be Me-shau-mik, the King of the beavers." Man-a-bo-zho came, and gave one look.
"It's Grasshopper!" he cried. "I can see through his tricks. It's Grasshopper in the skin of a beaver."
Then they fell upon him with their clubs; and eight tall Indians, having swung his limp carcass upon poles, carried it off in triumph through the woods.
But his _Fee-bi_, or spirit, was still in the body of the beaver, and struggled to escape. The Indians bore him to their lodges and prepared to make a feast. Then, when the squaws were ready to skin him, his flesh was quite cold, and the spirit of Grasshopper left the beaver's body, and glided swiftly away. As the shadowy shape fled across the prairie, into the forest, the watchful Man-a-bo-zho saw it take the human form of Grasshopper, and he started in pursuit.
Grasshopper's life among the beavers had made him lazier than ever, and as he ran he looked around for some easier way than running. Soon he came upon a herd of elk, a species of deer with large, spreading horns. The elk were feeding contentedly, and looked sleek and fat.
"They lead a free and happy life," said Grasshopper as he watched them. "Why fatigue myself with running? I'll change myself into an elk, and join their band."
Horns sprouted from his head; in a few minutes the transformation was complete. Still he was not satisfied.
"I am hardly big enough," he said to the leader. "My feet are much too small, and my horns should be twice the
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size of yours. Is there nothing I can do to make them grow?" "Yes," answered the leader of the elks. "But you do it at your own risk."
He took Grasshopper into the woods, and showed him a bright red berry that hung in clusters on some small, low bushes.
"Eat these," he said, "and nothing else, and your horns and feet will soon be much bigger than ours. However, it would be wise if you did not eat too many of them."
The berries were delicious. Grasshopper felt that he could not get enough, and he ate them greedily whenever he could find them. Before long his feet had grown so large and heavy he could hardly keep up with the herd, while his horns had such a huge spread that he sometimes found them rather in his way.
One cold day the herd went into the woods for shelter; pretty soon some of the elks who had lingered behind came rushing by with snorts of-alarm. Hunters were pursuing them.
"Run!" called out the leader to Grasshopper. "Follow us out on the prairie, where the Indians cannot catch us." Grasshopper tried to follow them; but his big feet weighted him down, and he ran slowly. Then, as he plunged madly through a thicket, his spreading horns were entangled in some low branches that held him fast. Already several arrows had whizzed by him; another pierced his heart, and he sank to the ground.
Along came the hunters, with a whoop. "Ty-au!" they exclaimed when they saw the enormous elk. "It is he who made the large tracks on the prairie. Ty-au!"
As they were skinning him, Man-a-bo-zho joined the party; and at that moment the _Fee-bi_, or spirit, of Grasshopper escaped through the mouth of the dead elk, and passed swiftly to the open plains, like a puff of white smoke driven before the wind. Then, as Man-a-bo-zho watched it melt away, he
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saw once more the mortal shape of Grasshopper; and once more he followed after, breathing vengeance.
As Grasshopper ran on, a new thought came into his head. Above him in the clear blue sky the birds wheeled and soared. "There is the place for me," he said, "far up in the sky. Let me have wings, and I can laugh at Man-a-bo-zho."
Ahead of him was a lake; approaching it, he saw a flock of wild geese known as brant, feeding among the rushes. "Ha," said Grasshopper, admiring them as they sailed smoothly here and there. "They will soon be winging their way to the North. I would like to fly in their company."
He spoke to them, calling them Pish-ne-kuh, his brothers, and they consented to receive him as one of the flock. So he floated on his back till feathers sprouted on him, and he became a brant, with a broad black beak, and a tail that would guide him through the air as a rudder steers a ship.
Greedy as ever, he fed long after the others had had enough, so that he soon grew into the biggest brant ever seen. His beak looked like the paddles of a canoe; when he spread his wings they were as large as two large _au-puk-wa_, or mats. The wild geese gazed at him in astonishment. "You must fly in the lead," they said.
"No," answered Grasshopper. "I would rather fly behind." "As you please," they told him. "But you will have to be careful. By all means keep your head and neck straight out before you, and do not look down as you fly, or you may meet with an accident."
It was a beautiful sight to see them flap their wings, stretch their long necks, and rise with a "whir" from the lake, mounting the wind, and rushing on before it. They flew with a breeze from the south, faster and faster, till their speed was like the flight of an arrow.
One day, passing over a village, they could hear the people shouting. The Indians were amazed at the size of the big
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brant, flying in the rear of the flock; yelling as loud as they could yell, their cries made Grasshopper curious. One voice especially seemed familiar to him, and he could not resist the temptation to draw in his neck and stretch it down toward the earth. As he did so, the strong wind caught his tail, and turned him over and over. In vain he tried to recover his balance; the wind whirled him round and round, as it whirls a leaf. The earth came nearer, the shouts of the Indians grew louder in his ears; at last he fell with a thud, and lay lifeless.
It was a fine feast of wild goose that had dropped so suddenly from the skies. The hungry Indians pounced upon him, and began to pluck his feathers. This was the very village where Grasshopper had once lived; little had he dreamed that he would ever return to supply it with such a dinner, a dinner at which he himself was to be the best dish.
But again his _Fee-bi_, or spirit, went forth, and fled in the form of Grasshopper; again Man-a-bo-zho, shouting his warcry, followed after.
Grasshopper had now come to the desert places, where there were few trees, and no signs of animal life. Man-abo-zho was gaining on him; he must play some new trick. Coming at last to a tall pine-tree growing in the rock, he climbed it, pulled off all the green needles, and scattered them about, leaving the branches quite bare. Then he took to his heels again. When Man-a-bo-zho came, the pine spoke to him, saying:
"See what Grasshopper has done. Without my foliage I am sure to die. Great Manito, I pray you give me back my green dress."
Man-a-bo-zho, who loves and protects all trees, had pity on the pine. He collected the scattered needles, and restored them to the branches. Then he hastened on with such speed that he overtook Grasshopper, and put his hand out to clutch him. But Grasshopper stepped quickly aside, and spun
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round and round on one leg in his whirlwind dance, till the air all about was filled with leaves and sand. In the midst of this whirlwind he sprang into a hollow tree, and changed himself into a snake. Then he crept out through the roots, and not a moment too soon; for Man-a-bo-zho smote the tree with one of his magic mittens, and crumbled it to powder.
Grasshopper changed himself back into his human form, and ran for dear life. The only thing left for him to do was to hide. But where? In his headlong flight he had come again to the shores of the Great Lake; and he saw rising before him the high cliff of the Picture Rocks. If he could but manage to reach these rocks, the Manito of the Mountain, who lived in one of the gloomy caverns, might let him in. Sure enough! As he reached the cliff, calling out for help, the Manito opened the door, and told him to enter.
Hardly had the big door closed with a bang, than along came Man-a-bo-zho. With his mitten he gave a tap on the rock that made the splinters fly.
"Open!" he cried, in a terrible voice.,
But the Manito was brave and hospitable.
"I have sheltered you," he said to Grasshopper, "and I would rather die myself than give you up."
Man-a-bo-zho waited, but no answer came.
"As you will," he said at last. "If the door is not opened to me by night, I shall call upon the Thunder and the Lightning to do my bidding."
The hours passed; darkness fell. Then from a black cloud that had gathered over the Great Lake, Way-wass-i-mo, the red-eyed Lightning, shot his bolts of fire. Crash--boom--crash! An-ne-mee-kee, the Thunder, shouted hoarsely from the heavens. A wild wind arose; the trees of the forest swayed and groaned, and the foxes hid in their holes.
Way-wass-i-mo, the Lightning, leapt from the black cloud, and darted at the cliff. The rock trembled; the door was
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shivered, and fell apart. Out from his gloomy cavern came the Manito of the Mountain, asking Man-a-bo-zho for mercy. It was granted, and the Manito fled to the hills.
Grasshopper then appeared; the next moment he was buried under a mass of rock shaken loose by An-ne-mee-kee, the Thunder. This time he had been killed in his human form, he could play his mad pranks no more.
But Man-a-bo-zho, the merciful, remembered that Grasshopper was not wholly bad.
"Your _Fee-bi_" he said, "must no longer remain upon the earth in any form whatever. As a man you lived an idle, foolish life, and you are no longer wanted here. Instead, I shall permit you to inhabit the skies."
Saying this, he took the ghost of Grasshopper, and clothed it with the shape of the war-eagle, bidding him to be chief of all the fowls. .
But Grasshopper, the mischievous, is not forgotten by the people. In the late winter days, snow fine as powder fills the air like a vapor. It keeps the hunter from his traps, the fisherman from his hole in the ice. Suddenly a puff of wind seizes this light, powdery snow, blows it round and round, and sets it whirling along; and when this happens, the Indians laugh and say:
"Look! There goes Grasshopper. See how well he dances."
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[Illustration: 0074]
Mish-o-sha, the Magician
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N the heart of the great green forest once lived a hunter whose lodge was many miles distant from the wigwams of his tribe. His wife had long since died, and he dwelt there all alone with his two young sons, who grew up as best they could without a mother's care.
When the father was away on a hunting trip, the boys had no companions but the birds and beasts of the forest, and with some of the smaller animals they became fast friends. Ad-ji-dau-mo, the squirrel, scampering from tree to tree, would let his nut-shells fall plump on the roof of the lodge. That was his way of knocking at the door, coming to pay a morning call. He was a great talker, without much to say--as is often so with those whose voices are seldom still. But he was bright and merry, chattering away cheerfully about nothing in particular; and it made no difference whether you listened to him or not.
Wa-bo-se, the little white hare, was another friend. One winter's day, when forest food was scarce, O-ne-o-ta, the lynx, was just about to pounce upon him, when the boys' father let fly an arrow--and O-ne-o-ta was no longer interested in little white hares.
Wa-bo-se was grateful for this, and sometimes in his shy way he tried to show it.
The father and the boys lived mostly on big game, like bear and venison. This meat would be cut in strips, and cured; sometimes it had to last them many a long day, when game was scarce, or the woods so dry for want of rain that the twigs would snap under the hunters feet, and warn the animals
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he was coming. So the boys were used to being left alone for weeks at a time, when their father was absent.
Then came a season of famine. No berries grew on the bushes, grass withered on the stalk, few acorns hung on the oaks. Some of the brooks went dry. Thus it happened that the hunter had gone far in search of game.
Many months passed. When Seegwun, the elder boy, saw that but little meat remained, he said to his younger brother Ioscoda:
"Let us take what meat is left, and strike out through the forest, toward the North. I remember our father saying that many moons distant lies a great lake called Gitche Gumee, whose waters are alive with fish."
"But can we find our way?" asked Ioscoda, doubtfully. "Never fear!" called out a voice from overhead.
It was Ad-ji-dau-mo, the squirrel, frisky as ever, though a little lean for lack of nuts.
"I'll go along with you," he continued, "and so will Wa-bo-se, the white hare. He can hop ahead and find the trail, and I can jump from tree to tree, and keep a look-out. Between us, we are bound to go right."
It proved to be a good idea, and Wa-bo-se took the lead. Where the trail was overgrown with grass, he would nose his way along the ground, without once going wrong; where the track was plain, he would run ahead, then stop and sit up on his haunches, to wait for the boys, his long ears pricked up and moving, to detect the slightest danger.
But nothing happened to alarm them. The lynx, the wildcat and the wolf had all fled before the famine, and the silent forest was empty of savage beasts. On and on they went, till it seemed as if the woods would never end. Then, one day, Ad-ji-dau-mo climbed a tall pine, from whose topmost bough he could see far over the forest. The sun was shining bright; as he cocked his eye and looked toward the north,
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something that seemed to meet the sky sparkled like silver. It was Gitche Gumee, the Great Lake.
They had reached a place where nuts were plentiful, and many green things grew that would fatten the white hare. So Wa-bo-se and the squirrel bade good-bye to the boys, who could now make their way with ease. Soon they came to the edge of the woods. They heard a piping cry. It was Twee-tweesh-ke-way, the plover, flying along the beach; in another moment the great glittering waters lay before them.
Seegwun with his sharp hunting knife cut a limb from an ash-tree, and made a bow; from an oak bough he whittled some arrows, which he tipped with flint. He found feathers fallen from a gull's wing for the shaft; a strip cut from his deer-skin shirt supplied the bow-string. Then giving the bow and arrow to Ioscoda, to practice with, he gathered some seed pods from the wild rose, to stay their hunger.
An arrow, badly aimed by his brother, fell into the lake, and Seegwun waded in, to recover it. He had walked into the water till it reached his waist, and put out his hand to grasp the arrow, when suddenly, as if by magic, a canoe came skimming along like a bird. In the canoe was an ugly old man, who reached out, seized the astonished boy, and pulled him on board.
"If I must go with you, take my brother, too!" begged Seegwun. "If he is left here, all alone, he will starve."
But Mish-o-sha, the Magician, only laughed. Then striking the side of the canoe with his hand, and uttering the magic words, _Chemaun Poll_, it shot across the lake like a thing alive, so that the beach was quickly lost to sight. Soon it came to rest on a sandy shore, and Mish-o-sha, leaping out, beckoned him to follow.
They had landed on an island. Before them, in a grove of cedars, were two wigwams, or lodges; from the smaller one two lovely young girls came out, and stood looking at them.
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To Seegwun, who had never before seen a girl, these maidens looked like spirits from the skies. He gazed at them in wonder, half expecting they would vanish. For their part they looked at him without smiling; in their dark eyes were only sympathy and sadness.
"My daughters!" said the old man to Seegwun, with a chuckle that displayed his long, yellow teeth. Then turning to the girls:
"Are you not glad to see me safely back?" he asked,"and are you not pleased with my handsome young friend here?" They bent their heads politely, but said nothing.
"It's a long time since you were favored with such a visitor," he went on, in a loud whisper to the elder girl. "He would make you a fine husband."
The maiden murmured something under her breath, and Mish-o-sha gave her a wicked look.
"We shall see, we shall see!" he muttered to himself, laughing like a magpie, and rubbing his long, bony hands together.
Seegwun, much troubled in mind, and hardly knowing what to make of it all, resolved to keep his eyes open. Luckily Mish-o-sha was sometimes careless. He walked on ahead, and entered his lodge, leaving the others together; whereupon the elder girl, approaching Seegwun, spoke to him quickly: "We are not his daughters," she said. "He brought us here as he brought you. He hates the human race. Every moon he seizes a young man, and pretends he has borne him here as a husband for me. But soon he takes him off in his canoe, and the young man never comes back. We feel sure Mish-o-sha has made away with them all."
"What must I do?" asked Seegwun. "I care less for myself than for my little brother. He was left behind on a wild beach, and may die of hunger."
"Ah!" said the maiden. "You are really good and unselfish;
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so, no matter what comes of it, we must aid you. Koko-ko-ho, the great owl, keeps watch all night on the bare limb of that big cedar. Wait till Mish-o-sha falls asleep, then wrap yourself from head to foot in his blanket, and steal softly to the door of our lodge. Whisper my name,Nin-i-mo-sha, and I shall come out and tell you what to do."
"Nin-i-mo-sha," murmured the youth. "What a beautiful name!" Then, before he could thank her, the girls were gone.
Mish-o-sha now appeared, and made a sign to Seegwun to join him. The old man seemed to be in a good humor, and passed the time telling stories; but Seegwun was not deceived by this pretense of friendship. When the Magician was sound asleep, he rose, wrapped Mish-o-sha's blanket around him, and walked carefully to the door of the little lodge.
"Nin-i-mo-sha!" he whispered, and his heart beat fast; for Nin-i-mo-sha in the Indian tongue is "My Sweetheart." "Seegwun!" she answered; and his name, meaning "Spring," came like music from her lips.
She drew aside the curtain, and came out.
"Here," she said, "is food that will last your brother for several days. Get into Mish-o-sha's canoe, pronounce the magic charm, and it will take you where you wish. You can be back before daybreak."
"But the owl?" asked Seegwun. "Will he not cry out?" "Walk with a stoop, the way Mish-o-sha walks," she explained. "Ko-ko-ko-ho, when he sees you, will cry 'Hoot, hoot!' You must answer, 'Hoot, hoot, whoo! Mish-o-sha.' Then he will let you pass."
Seegwun did as he was told, and was soon skimming across the lake. Having landed on the beach, he began to bark like a squirrel; and at this friendly signal his brother ran up and flung his arms around him. Seegwun made a shelter for the boy, and told him he would come again. Then he returned in the canoe, and was soon fast asleep in the Magician's lodge.
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Mish-o-sha, who trusted in his owl, suspected nothing. How should he know what lovers can do when they put their heads together?
"You have slept well, my son," said he. "And now we have a pleasant journey before us. We are going to an island where thousands of gulls lay their eggs in the sand, and we shall get all we can carry away."
Remembering what Nin-i-mo-sha had said, Seegwun shivered. But she kissed her hand, and waved him a good-bye; and this put heart in him.
As the canoe sped away, he made sure that his hunting knife slipped easily in its sheath, and he did not take his eyes off Mish-o-sha for a moment.
When they reached the island the gulls rose in great numbers, and flew screaming above their heads.
"You gather the eggs," said the Magician, "while I keep watch in the canoe."
Seegwun hastened ashore, glad to quit the old man's company. Then the Magician cried out to the gulls:
"Ho, my feathered friends! Here is the human offering I promised you when you agreed to call me master. Fly down, my pretty ones! Fly down, and devour him!"
Striking the side of his canoe, he abandoned the youth to the mercy of the birds.
With harsh cries, the gulls swept down on Seegwun. Never had he heard such a clamor. Ten thousand wings beat the air, and stirred it like a storm. Whirling and darting they came upon him in a cloud. But Seegwun did not flinch. Shouting the _Saw-saw-quan_, or war-cry, he seized the first bird that attacked him. Then grasping it by the neck, he held it high above his head in his left hand, and with his right hand drew his knife, which glittered in the sun.
"Hold!" he cried. "Hold, you poor fools! Beware the vengeance of the Great Spirit."
[Illustration: 0000]
The gulls paused in their attack, but still circled around him, with sharp beaks extended.
"Hear me, O Gulls!" he continued. "The Great Spirit gave you life that you might serve mankind. Slay me, and you slay one made to rule over all the beasts and birds. I tell you, beware!"
"But Mish-o-sha is all powerful." screamed the gulls. "He has bidden us destroy you."
"Mish-o-sha is no Manito," answered Seegwun. "He is only a wicked magician who would use you for his own evil ends. Bear me on your wings back to his island; for it is he who must be destroyed."
Then the gulls, persuaded that Mish-o-sha had tricked them, drew close together, that the youth might lie upon their backs. Rising on the wind, they carried him across the waters, setting him down gently by the lodge before the Magician had arrived there.
Nin-i-ino-sha rejoiced when she saw it was really Seegwun. "I was not mistaken in you," she told him. "It is plain that the Great Spirit protects you. But Mish-o-sha will try again, so be on your guard."
The Magician now arrived in his magic canoe. When he saw Seegwun he tried to smile pleasantly. But having had little practice in thinking kind thoughts, he only grinned like a gargoyle, which, excepting perhaps the hyena, has the most painful possible smile. >
"Good, my son!" he managed to say. "You must not misunderstand me. I did it to test your courage; and now Nin-i-mo-sha is sure to love you. Ah, my children, you will make a happy pair!"
Nin-i-mo-sha turned away to hide her disgust, but Seegwun pretended to believe the malicious old man was in earnest.
"However," continued the Magician, "I owe you something for having seemed to play you such a trick. I see you wear
[Illustration: 0000]
no ornaments. Come with me, then, to the Island of Glittering Shells, and soon you will be attired as becomes a handsome warrior."
The island where they landed was indeed a wonderful place, covered with colored shells that gleamed in the sun like jewels.
"Look!" said Mish-o-sha, as they walked along the beach. "Out there a little way. See it shining on the bottom." Seegwun waded in. When the water reached his thighs, the Magician made a leap for the canoe, and shoved it far out into the lake.
"Come, King of Fishes!" he called. "You have always served me well. Here is your reward."
Then, striking his canoe, he quickly disappeared. Immediately an enormous fish, with jaws wide open, rose to the surface a few feet away. But Seegwun only smiled, saying as he drew his long blade:
"Know, Monster, that I am Seegwun--named after him whose breath warms the ice-bound waters and clothes the hills with green. The cowardly Mish-o-sha, fearing the anger of the Great Spirit, seeks to make you do what he dares not do himself. Spill but one drop of my blood, and it will dye the waters of the lake, in which all your tribe will miserably perish.' "Mish-o-sha has deceived me," said the King of Fishes. "He promised me a tender maiden, and has brought instead a youth with the eyes of a warrior. How shall I aid you, my Master?"
"Wretch!" exclaimed Seegwun. "Rejoice that he did not keep his frightful promise. You deserve to die at my hands, but I give you a chance to repent. Take me on your back to the island of Mish-o-sha, and I will spare your life."
The King of Fishes hastened to take Seegwun astride his broad back, and swam so swiftly that he reached the island soon after Mish-o-sha. The Magician was explaining to Nini-mo-sha how the youth had fallen from the canoe into the
[Illustration: 0000]
jaws of a big fish, when along came Seegwun himself, strolling up from the Lake as if he had returned from an everyday excursion. Even so, Mish-o-sha still sought to excuse himself.
"My daughter," said he. "I was only trying to find out how much you cared for him."
But all the while he was saying to himself that the next time he would not fail. And the next time was the very next day.
"My owl is growing old, and cannot live much longer," he explained. "I should like to catch a young eagle, and tame him. Will you help me?"
Seegwun consented, and went with him in the magic canoe to a rocky point of land reaching out into the lake. There, in the fork of a tall pine, was an eagle's nest, in which were some young eagles, who could not yet fly.
"Quick!" said Mish-o-sha. "Climb the tree before the old birds return."
[Illustration: 0083]
Seegwun had almost reached the nest when the Magician spoke to the pine, commanding it to grow taller. At once it began to rise, until it was so high, and swayed so in the wind, that he felt it would take all his courage to get down again. At the same time the Magician uttered a peculiar cry, at which the father and mother eagles came swooping from the clouds to protect their young.
"Ho, ho!" laughed Mish-o-sha. "This time I have made no mistake. Either you will fall and break your neck, or the eagles will scratch your eyes out."
Striking his canoe, he vanished in the mist.
The eagles now circled around Seegwun, who, resting on a branch, thus addressed them:
"My brothers, behold the eagle's feather in my hair! It proves my admiration for your bravery and skill. Yet in me you see your master; for I am a man, and you are only birds. Obey me, then, and bear me to Mish-o-sha's island."
[Illustration: 0000]
This praise pleased the eagles, who respected the youth's cool courage. Mounting on the back of the enormous male bird, Seegwun was borne through the air, and set down safely on the enchanted island.
Mish-o-sha now saw that neither bird nor beast would harm this handsome youth, who seemed to be protected by some powerful Manito. It must be done some other way.
"One more test," he said to Seegwun, "and then you may take Nin-i-mo-sha for your wife. But first you must prove your skill as a hunter. Come!"
They made a lodge in the forest; and Mish-o-sha, by his magic, caused a snow-storm, with a stinging gale from the north, like a flight of icy arrows. Seegwun, that night, before going to sleep, had hung his moccasins and leggings by the fire to dry; and Mish-o-sha, rising first, at daybreak, took one of each and threw them into the flames. Then he rubbed his hands, and laughed like a prairie wolf.
"What is it?" asked Seegwun, sitting up.
"Alas, my son!" said Mish-o-sha. "I was just too late. This is the season of the moon when fire attracts all things. It has drawn to it one of your moccasins and leggings, and destroyed them. Yeo, yeo! I should have warned you."
Seegwun held his tongue, though the thing was plain enough. Mish-o-sha meant that he should freeze to death. But Seegwun, praying silently to his Manito for aid, took from the fireplace a charred stick with which he blackened one leg and foot, murmuring at the same time a charm. Then putting on his remaining moccasin and legging, he was ready tor the hunt.
Their way led through snow and ice, into thickets of thorn, and over bogs half-frozen, where Seegwun sank to the knees. But his prayer had been heard; the charm worked, and the youth walked on, dry shod. With his first arrow he slew a bear.
[Illustration: 0000]
"Now," he said, looking the Magician full in the eye. "I see you are suffering from the cold. Let us go back to your island."
At Seegwun's bold look, Mish-o-sha bent his head, and mumbled some foolish answer. At last he had met his match; and he knew it.
"Take up the bear on your shoulders!" commanded Seegwun.
Again the Magician obeyed. For the first time they returned together to the island, where the two young girls looked on in amazement to see the proud Mish-o-sha staggering under the weight of the bear, grunting with helpless rage.
"His power is broken," agreed Nin-i-mo-sha, when Seegwun had told her all. "But we shall never sleep in safety until we are really rid of him. What is best to do?"
They put their heads together; and when they had talked it over, Nin-i-mo-sha laughed merrily.
"He deserves a greater punishment," she said. "The world will not be safe as long as he has life. Yet what we plan to do will revenge us, without shedding a single drop of blood." The next day Seegwun said to the Magician:
"It is time that we rescued my brother, whom we left all alone on the beach. Come with me."
Mish-o-sha made a wry face, but prepared to go. Landing on the beach, they soon spied the boy, who joyfully clambered into the canoe. Then Seegwun said to the old man:
"Those red willows over on the bank would make good smoking mixture. Could you manage to climb up there and cut me some?"
"To be sure, my son, to be sure," answered Mish-o-sha, walking rapidly toward the willows. "I am not so weak and good-for-nothing as you seem to think."
Seegwun struck the canoe with his hand, pronouncing the magic words, _Chemaun Poll_; and away it went with the two
[Illustration: 0000]
brothers aboard, leaving the Magician high and dry, and gnashing his yellow teeth.
The girls ran to meet them at the shore, Nin-i-mo-sha rejoicing that the old man had been left behind, while her sister could think of nothing but the attractive boy who looked so much like his big brother.
"But Mish-o-sha can call the canoe back to him," said Nin-i-mo-sha, "until a way is found to break the charm. Some one must keep watch, with his hand upon it."
Ioscoda begged permission to do his part; so they left him, with night coming on, sitting on the sand and holding fast to the canoe.
It was a tiresome task for a little boy already weary with long waiting. To amuse himself he began to count the stars. First he counted those in the Big Dipper and the Little Dipper, then the ones that look like a high-back chair, and the three big bright ones in the belt of Orion the Hunter. He did not know them by these names, which were given them long afterward; but he recognized the cluster called O-jeeg An-nung, the Fisher, who brought Summer from the sky because his boy was cold.
Ioscoda also was cold, sitting there in the wet sand. But Indian boys do not complain. Yet seeing the Fisher stars, he thought of his own dear father, and wondered where he might be. Had Ioscoda been a white boy, instead of a red, we think the sand he sat on might have been a little wetter for his tears. As it was, he found himself looking at the sky through a kind of fog. What was it? He rubbed his eyes, lost his count, and began all over again.
The worst of it was that Indians could reckon only with their fingers--unless you include their toes; and Ioscoda's toes were tucked away snugly in his moccasins, quite out of sight and question. How many fingers had he counted--and how--many--stars--?
[Illustration: 0000]
The fog, or whatever it was, filled his eyes. Lap, lap! went the little waves, rocking the canoe like a cradle. Soo, soo! sighed the wind in the cedars. All else earthly nodded and was still; even the stars blinked and winked, as if weary of watching the world.
And Ioscoda slept.
Whoo, whoo! The cry of Ko-ko-ko-ho, the owl, shrilled evilly on the ears. It was only for a moment. The shadows lifted, a squirrel barked. Wa-bun, the East Wind, rising above the rim of the waters, let loose his silver arrows. It was day.
Ioscoda sat up, only half aroused, and looked out over the lake. Was he still on the wild beach, waiting for his brother? Then he remembered, and gave a guilty start. The canoe was gone!
Gone, but come again! There it appeared, gliding straight toward him; and in it sat Mish-o-sha.
"Good-morning, child!" called the Magician, as the canoe grated on the sand. "Are you not glad to see your grandfather again?"
Ioscoda clenched his small fists. He was very brave, and he was angry.
"You are _not_ my grandfather," he said, "and I am _not_ glad to see you again."
"_Esa, esa!_ (Shame, shame!)" chuckled the old man. "But Seegwun will be glad to see me, and so will my dear daughters. I hope they have not been worried about me."
He was much pleased with his cleverness in outwitting them all, and was now as impudent as before. But Seegwun bided his time. He thought of another plan.
"Grandfather," said he, "it seems that we must continue to live here together. Let us therefore lay in a supply of meat for the winter. Come with me to the mainland. I am sure you must be a mighty hunter."
[Illustration: 0000]
Mish-o-sha's vanity was his weakest point.
"_Eh, yah!_" he answered, boastfully. "I can run all day with a dead deer on my back. I have done it."
"Good!" said Seegwun. "The wind is going north again, and we shall need all our strength on the march."
Now Seegwun had somehow learned the Magician's dearest secret, which was this: Mish-o-sha's left leg and foot were the only parts of his body that could be harmed. No arrow could pierce his heart; a war-club brought down upon his head would be shivered into splinters. As well strike him with a straw. But his left leg and foot. Ah! It was not for rheumatism that his legging was so well laced. And _why_ did he always sit down with his left foot tucked up under him? Ha! Why, indeed? Seegwun had found the answer.
They made a rude lodge in the forest, just as they had done before. And again it came bitter cold; only this time it was Seegwun that brought the storm. He could not help laughing. There was the blazing fire, and there on the couch was Mish-o-sha, sound asleep.
Seegwun softly rose, took both the Magician's moccasins and leggings, and threw them into the flames.
"Get up, grandfather," he called. "It's the season when fire attracts all things, and I fear you have lost something you may need."
When Mish-o-sha saw what had happened he looked so frightened that Seegwun was almost sorry for him. But remembering Nin-i-mo-sha and his little brother, he could think of no other way. "We must be going," he said.
They set out through the snow. My, how cold it was! Mish-o-sha began to run, thinking this would help; while Seegwun followed, fearing that if he led, the Magician might send an arrow through his back. After running for an hour, the Magician was quite out of breath, and his legs and feet were growing numb and stiff.
[Illustration: 0000]
They had come to the edge of the forest, and reached the shore of the lake. Here Mish-o-sha stopped. When he tried to take another step, he could not lift his feet. How heavy they had grown! He tried again; but something strange had happened. His toes sank into the sand, and took the form of roots. The feathers in his hair, and then the hair itself, changed gradually into leaves. His outstretched arms were branches, swaying in the wind; bark appeared on his body.
Seegwun looked and wondered. That which had been Mish-o-sha was no longer a man, but a tree, a sycamore hung with button-balls, leaning crookedly toward the lake.
At last the wicked old Magician had met his master. No more would his evil spell be cast on the young and innocent Seegwun lingered a moment, to make sure that Mish-o-sha would not come to life. Then he took his way across the water, where the others, anxiously awaiting him, were told the good news.
"Mish-o-sha is no more," said Seegwun. "He can never harm us again. Let us leave this place where we have suffered so much, and make our home on the mainland."
So together they went forth, his sweetheart, her sister, and the boy, with Seegwun showing the way. The trail he took led them again to the great forest, and once more to the lodge from which he had set out. And there they lived happily for the rest of their days.
[Illustration: 0090]
The Fairy Bride
[Illustration: 9090]
NCE there was a lovely young girl named Neen-i-zu, the only daughter of an Indian chief, who lived on the shore of Lake Superior; Neen-i-zu, in the Indian language, means "My Dear Life." It was plain that her parents loved her tenderly, and did everything in their power to make her happy and to shield her from any possible harm.
There was but one thing that made them uneasy. Neen-i-zu was a favorite with the other young girls of the village, and joined them in their play. But she liked best of all to walk by herself in the forest, or to follow some dim trail that led to the heart of the little hills. Sometimes she would be absent for many hours; and when she returned, her eyes had the look of one who has dwelt in secret places, and seen things strange and mysterious. Nowadays, some persons would have called Neen-i-zu "romantic." Others, who can never see a thing that is not just beneath their noses, would have laughed a little, in a superior sort of way, and said she was a "dreamer." What was it that Neen-i-zu saw and heard, during these lonely walks in the secret places of the hills? Was it perhaps the fairies? She did not say. But her mother, who wished her to be more like other girls, and who would have liked to see her marry and settle down, was much disturbed in mind.
The mischievous little fairies known as Puk-Wudjies were believed to inhabit the sand dunes where Neen-i-zu so often went to walk. These were the sand-hills made by Grasshopper, when he danced so madly at Man-a-bo-zho's wedding,
[Illustration: 0000]
whirling the sand into great drifts and mounds that may be seen to this very day. The Puk-Wudjies loved these hills, which were seldom visited by the Indians. It was just the place for leap-frog and all-hands-'round; in the twilight of summer days they were said to gather here in little bands, playing all manner of pranks. Then, as night came, they would make haste to hide themselves in a grove of pine-trees known as the _Manito Wac_, or the Wood of the Spirits.
No one had ever come close to them; but fishermen, paddling their canoes on the lake, had caught glimpses of them from afar, and had heard the tiny voices of these merry little men, as they laughed and called to one another. When the fishermen tried to follow, the Puk-Wudjies would vanish in the woods; but their foot-prints, no larger than a child's, could be seen on the damp sand of a little lake in the hills.
If anything more were needed to convince those doubters who did not believe in fairies, the proof was quickly supplied by fishermen and hunters who were victims of their tricks. The Puk-Wudjies never really harmed anyone, but they were up to many kinds of mischief. Sometimes a hunter, picking up his cap in the morning, would find the feathers plucked out; sometimes a fisherman, missing his paddle, would discover it at last in a tree. When such things happened it was perfectly plain that Puk-Wudjies had been up to their pranks, and few persons were still stupid enough to believe it could be anything else.
Neen-i-zu had her own ideas concerning these little men; for she, like Morning Glory, had often listened to the tales that old Iagoo told. One of these stories was the story of a Happy Land, a far-off place where it was always Summer; where no one wept or suffered sorrow.
It was for this land that she sighed. It filled her thoughts by day, when she sought the secret places of the hills, and sat in some lonely spot, listening to the mysterious voices that whispered in the breeze. Where was this Happy Land--this place without pain or care?
Tired out at night, she would sink into her bed. Then from their hiding places would come stealing the small messengers of Weenz, the Spirit of Sleep. These kindly gnomes--too small for the human eye to see--crept quickly up the face of the weary Neen-i-zu and tapped gently on her forehead with their tiny war-clubs, called _pub-ga-mau-guns_. Taptap--tap!--till her eyelids closed, and she sought the Happy Land in that other pleasant land of dreams.
[Illustration: 0093]
She, too, had seen the foot-prints of the Puk-Wudjies on the sandy beach of the little lake, and had heard their merry laughter ring out in the grove of pines. Was it their only dwelling place, she asked herself, or were they not messengers from the Happy Land, sent to show the way to that mortal who believed in it, and longed to enter.
Neen-i-zu came to think that this must be really so. Oftener than ever, she made her way to the meadow bordering on the Spirit Wood, and sat there gazing into the grove. Perhaps the Puk-Wudjies would understand, and tell the fairies whom they served. Then some day a fairy would appear at the edge of the pines, and beckon her to come. That would surely happen, she thought, if she wished it long enough, and could give her wishes wings. So, sitting there, she composed the words of a song, and set it to the music the pines make when the south wind stirs their branches. Then she sang:
Spirit of the laughing leaves,
Fairy of the forest pine,
Listen to the maid who grieves           For that happy land of thine.
From your haunt in summer glade      Hasten to your mournful maid.
Was it only her fancy, that she seemed to hear the closing
[Illustration: 0000]
words of her song echoed from the deep woods where the merry little men had vanished? Or was it the Puk-Wudjies mocking her?
She had lingered later than usual; it was time to go. The new moon swung low in the western sky, with its points turned upwards to the heavens. An Indian would say he could hang his powder horn upon it, and that it meant dry weather, when the leaves crackled under the hunter's feet, and the animals fled before him, so that he was unable to come near-enough to shoot. And Neen-i-zu was glad of this. In the Happy Land, she declared no one would suffer, and no life would be taken.
Yet it was a hunter that her mother wished her to marry, a man who spent his whole life in slaying the red deer of the forest; who thought and talked of almost nothing else.
This came into her mind as she rose from her seat in the meadow, and cast a farewell glance at the pines. The rays of the crescent moon touched them with a faint light; and again her fancy came into play. What was it that seemed to move along the edge of the mysterious woods? Something with the dim likeness of a youth--taller than the Puk-Wudjies--who glided rather than walked, and whose garments of light green stood out against the darker green of the pines. Neeni-zu looked again; but the moon hid behind the hills. All was black to the eye; to the ear came no sound but the creepy cry of the whip-poor-will. She hastened home.
That night she heard from her mother's lips what she had long expected and feared. "Neen-i-zu," said her mother. "I named you 'My dear Life,' and you are as dear as life to me. That is why I wish you to be safe and happy. That is why I wish you to marry a good man who will take the best care of you now, and will protect and comfort you when I am gone. You know the man I mean."
"Yes, mother," answered Neen-i-zu. "I know him well
[Illustration: 0000]
enough--as well as ever I want to know him. He hunts the deer, he kills the deer, he skins the deer. That is all he does, that is all he thinks, that is all he talks about. It is perhaps well that someone should do this, lest we starve for want of meat. Yet there are many other things in the world, and this hunter of yours is content if he does but kill."
"Poor child!" said her mother. "You are too young to know what is best for you."
"I am old enough, mother dear," answered Neen-i-zu, "to know what my heart tells me. Besides, this hunter you would have me marry is as tall as a young oak, while I am not much taller than one of the Puk-Wudjies. When I stand up very straight, my head comes little higher than his waist. A pretty pair we would make!"
What she said was quite true. Neen-i-zu had never grown to be much larger than a child. She had a graceful, slender body, little hands and feet, eyes black as midnight, and a mouth like a meadow flower. One who saw her for the first time, passing upon the hills, her slight figure sketched against the sky, might have thought that she herself was a fairy.
For all her gentle, quiet ways, and her love of lonely places, Neen-i-zu was often merry. But now she seldom laughed; her step was slow; and she walked with her eyes fixed upon the ground. "When she is married," thought her mother, "she will have other things to occupy her mind, and she will no longer go dreaming among the hills."
But the hills were her one great joy--the hills, and the flowery meadows where the lark swayed to and fro, bidding her be of good cheer, as he perched on a mullein stalk. Every afternoon she sat, singing her little song. Soon she would sing no more. The setting sun would gild the pine grove, the whip-poor-will would complain to the stars; but the picture would be incomplete; there would be no Neen-i-zu. For the wedding day was named; she must be the hunter's wife.
[Illustration: 0000]
On this day set for her marriage to the man she so disliked, Neen-i-zu put on the garments of a bride. Never had she looked so lovely. Blood-red blossoms flamed in her jet-black hair; in her hand she held a bunch of meadow flowers mingled with the tassels of the pine.
Thus arrayed, she set out for a farewell visit to the grove. It was a thing they could not well deny her; but as she went her way, and the hills hid her from sight, the wedding guests looked uneasily at one another. It was something they could not explain. At that moment a cloud blew up from nowhere, across the sun; where light had been there was now a shadow. Was it a sign? They glanced sidelong at the hunter, but the bridegroom was sharpening his sheath knife on a stone. Sunshine or shadow, his thoughts were following the deer.
Time passed; but Neen-i-zu did not return. Then so late was the hour, that the wedding guests wondered and bestirred themselves. What could be keeping her so long? At last they searched the hills; she was not there. They tracked her to the meadow, where the prints of her little moccasins led on and on--into the grove itself; then the tracks disappeared. Neen-i-zu had vanished.
They never saw her more. The next day a hunter brought them strange news. He had climbed a hill, on his way home by a short cut, and had paused there a moment to look around. Just then his dog ran up to him, whining, with its tail between its legs. It was a brave dog, he said, that would not run from a bear, but this one acted as if he had seen something that was not mortal.
Then the hunter heard a voice, singing. Soon the singing stopped, and he made out--far off--the figure of Neen-i-zu, walking straight toward the grove, with her arms held out before her. He called to her, but she did not hear, and drew nearer and nearer to the Spirit wood.
[Illustration: 0000]
"She walked like one who dreams," said the hunter, "and when she had almost reached the woods, a young man, slender as a reed, came out to meet her. He was not one of our tribe. No, no! I have never seen his like. He was dressed in the leaves of the forest, and green plumes nodded on his head. He took her by the hand. They entered the Sacred Grove. There is no doubt that he was a fairy--the fairy Evergreen. There is nothing more; I have finished."
So Neen-i-zu became a bride, after all.
[Illustration: 0097]
[Illustration: 0102]
[Illustration: 0103]
[Illustration: 0104]
End of Project Gutenberg's American Indian Fairy Tales, by Anonymous

= = = PG59968 = = =
AMERICAN INDIAN LIFE
Produced by Turgut Dincer, Robert Tonsing, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
AMERICAN INDIAN LIFE
BY SEVERAL OF ITS STUDENTS
EDITED BY ELSIE CLEWS PARSONS ILLUSTRATED BY C. GRANT LA FARGE
[Illustration]
NEW YORK      B. W. HUEBSCH, INC.      MCMXXII
COPYRIGHT, 1922, BY B. W. HUEBSCH, INC. PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFACE                                                              1
PLAINS TRIBES:
TRIBES OF THE MIDDLE WEST:
THUNDER-CLOUD, A WINNEBAGO SHAMAN, RELATES AND PRAYS                75 _By Paul Radin, Late of the Department of Anthropology, University of California_
EASTERN TRIBES:
HANGING-FLOWER, THE IROQUOIS                                        99 _By Alexander A. Goldenweiser, Lecturer in Anthropology, New School of Social Research_
TRIBES OF THE SOUTH-WEST:
MEXICAN TRIBES:
HOW HOLON CHAN BECAME THE TRUE MAN OF HIS PEOPLE                   251 _By Sylvanus G. Morley, Associate, Carnegie Institution of Washington_
THE TOLTEC ARCHITECT OF CHICHEN ITZA                               265 _By Alfred M. Tozzer, Professor of Anthropology, Harvard University, and Curator Middle American Archaeology, Peabody Museum_
PACIFIC COAST TRIBES:
ALL IS TROUBLE ALONG THE KLAMATH                                   289 _By T. T. Waterman, Ethnologist, Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation_
NORTHERN ATHABASCAN TRIBES:
CRIES-FOR-SALMON, A TEN’A WOMAN                                    337 _By T. B. Reed and Elsie Clews Parsons. Mr. Reed is an Alaskan (Ten’a) student in Hampton Institute_
ESKIMO:
Preface
“She always says she will come, and sometimes she comes and sometimes she doesn’t come. I was so surprised when I first came out here to find that Indians were like that,” the wife of the Presbyterian Missionary in an Indian town in New Mexico was speaking, as you readily infer, on her servant question.
“Where did you get your impressions of Indians before you came here?”
“From Fenimore Cooper. I used to take his books out, one right after the other from the library at New Canaan, Connecticut, where I grew up.”
At that time, during the youth of this New Englander past middle age, few anthropological monographs on Indian tribes had been written, but it is doubtful if such publications are to be found in New England village libraries even to-day, and it is more than doubtful that if they were in the libraries anybody would read them; anthropologists themselves have been known not to read them. Between these forbidding monographs and the legends of Fenimore Cooper, what is there then to read for a girl who is going to spend her life among Indians or, in fact, for anyone who just wants to know more about Indians?
From these considerations, among others, this book was conceived. The idea of writing about the life of the Indian for the General Reader is not novel, to be sure, to anthropologists. Appearances to the contrary, anthropologists have no wish to keep their science or any part of it esoteric. They are too well aware, for one thing, that facilities for the pursuit of anthropology are dependent more or less on popular interest, and that only too often tribal cultures have disappeared in America as elsewhere before people became interested enough in them to learn about them.
Nevertheless, the cost of becoming popular may appear excessive—not only to the student who begrudges the time and energy that must be drawn from scientific work, but to the scientist who is asked to popularize his study in terms repugnant to his sense of truth or propriety. Hitherto, American publishers appear to have proposed only to bring Fenimore Cooper up to date, merely to add to the over-abundant lore of the white man about the Indian.
In this book the white man’s traditions about Indians have been disregarded. That the writers have not read other traditions from their own culture into the culture they are describing is less certain. Try as we may, and it must be confessed that many of us do not try very hard, few, if any of us, succeed, in describing another culture, of ridding ourselves of our own cultural bias or habits of mind. Much of our anthropological work, to quote from a letter from Spinden, “is not so much definitive science as it is a cultural trait of ourselves.”
For one thing we fail to see the foreign culture as a whole, noting only the aspects which happen to interest us. Commonly, the interesting aspects are those which differ markedly from our own culture or those in which we see relations to the other foreign cultures we have studied. Hence our classified data give the impression that the native life is one unbroken round, let us say, of curing or weather-control ceremonials, of prophylaxis against bad luck, of hunting, or of war. The commonplaces of behavior are overlooked, the amount of “common sense” is underrated, and the proportion of knowledge to credulity is greatly underestimated. In other words the impression we give of the daily life of the people may be quite misleading, somewhat as if we described our own society in terms of Christmas and the Fourth of July, of beliefs about the new moon or ground hogs in February, of city streets in blizzards and after, of strikes and battleships. Unfortunately, the necessarily impressionistic character of the following tales, together with their brevity, renders them, too, subject to the foregoing criticism. Of this, Dr. Kroeber in the Introduction will have more to say, as well as of his impression of how far we have succeeded in presenting the psychological aspects of Indian culture.
The problems presented by the culture, problems of historical reconstruction, Dr. Kroeber will also refer to, but discussion of the problems, of such subjects as culture areas, as the current phrase goes, as diffusion and acculturation, will not be presented in this book—it is a book of pictures. But if the reader wants to learn of how the problems are being followed up, he is directed to the bibliographical notes in the appendix. If the pictures remain pictures for him, well and good; if they lead him to the problems, good and better. Anthropology is short on students.
E. C. P.
Introduction
The old ethnology, like every science in its beginnings, was speculative. The new ethnology is inductive. Fifty or sixty years ago the attempt was first made to read the riddle of human origins and substantiate the answer by facts. One student after another—Spencer, Tylor, Morgan, and others—thought out a formula that seemed a reasonable explanation of how some activity of human civilization—institutional, religious, or inventive—began, developed, and reached its present condition; and then ransacked the accounts of travelers, missionaries, and residents among primitive tribes for each bit of evidence favorable to his theory. Thus the origin of marriage was plausibly traced back to the matriarchate and ultimate promiscuity, of society to totemic clans, of the historic religions to a belief in souls and ghosts, of pottery to clay-lined basketry. Twenty-five years ago this theory fabrication was in full swing; and in many non-scientific quarters it still enjoys vogue and prestige.
It is plain that the method of these evolutionary explanations was deductive. One started with an intuition, a rationalization, a guess, then looked for corroborative facts. Inevitably, all contrary facts tended to be ignored or explained away. What was more, the evidence being adduced solely with reference to whether it fitted or failed to fit into the theory under examination, it was torn from its natural relations of time, space, and association. This was very much as if a selection of statements, made by an individual on a given topic, were strung together, without reference to the circumstances under which he uttered them and without the qualifications which he attached. By the use of this method of ignoring _context_, a pretty good case might be made out to show that the Kaiser was really a pacificist republican at heart, Huxley a devout if not quite regular Christian, and Anthony Comstock a tolerant personality. Roosevelt could be portrayed as either a daring radical or as a hide-bound reactionary. Just such contrary interpretations did emerge in the older ethnology. Totems, for instance, were held by one “authority” to have had their origin in magical rites concerned with food supply, by another in a sort of nicknames, by a third in a primitive, mystic adumbration of the concept of society itself.
Gradually it began to be recognized by students that this method might be necessary in the law-courts, where each party advowedly contends for his own interests, but that in science it led to exciting wrangling rather more than to progress toward impartial truth. And so a new ethnology modestly grew up which held for its motto: “All possible facts first, then such inferences as are warranted.” “All facts” means not only all items but also these items in their _natural_ order: the sequence in which they occur, their geographical relation, the degree to which they are associated.
The anthropologist no longer compares marriage customs from all over the world as they come to hand. He realizes that marriage is likely to be a different rite as it is practiced respectively among peoples, with and without civil government, or among nations that have come under the influence of a world religion or remain in a status of tribal ceremony. The whole culture of the group must be more or less known before the history and meaning of an institution can become intelligible. Detached from its culture mass, a custom reveals as little of its functioning as an organ dissected out of the living body.
Equally important for the interpretation of ethnic facts, are their geographical associations, their distribution. Is a custom or invention peculiar to one people or is it shared by many distinct peoples occupying a continuous area? Such a question may seem trivial. But the answer usually bears heavy significance. A unique institution, or one found in various spots but in disconnected ones, is, other things equal, either of recent and independent origin in each locality, or it is a lingering survival of a custom that was once wide-spread. In short, it represents the beginning or end of a process of development.
On the other hand, where we find an art or institution possessed in common by dozens or hundreds of tribes situated without any gaps between them on the map, it would be far-fetched to assume that each of them independently evolved this identical phenomenon. Why presuppose a hundred parallel causes, each operating quite separately, when one will suffice, in view of the fact that human beings imitate each other’s manners and borrow knowledge. We know that Christianity, gun-powder, the printing press, were originated but once. Even with history wiped out, we could infer as much, from their universality among the nations of Europe.
Now this is just the situation as regards primitive peoples. Their history _has_ been wiped out—it was never preserved by themselves or their neighbors. But knowledge of the geographical occurrence of a custom or invention, usually affords rather reliable insight into its history, sometimes into its origin. When the available information shows that Indian corn was grown by all the tribes from Chile and Brazil to Arizona and Quebec, it is evident that the history of native American agriculture is as much of a unit, essentially, as the history of Christianity or of fire-arms. It is a story of _invention_ only at its outset, of _diffusion_ and amplification through its greater length. When pottery is further discovered to possess almost exactly the same aboriginal distribution as maize, it becomes likely that this art, too, was devised but once; and likely, further, that it was invented at about the same time as maize culture and diffused with it.
By evidence such as this, reënforced by the insight gained from the stratification of prehistoric objects preserved in caves and in the ground, native, American history is being reconstructed for some thousands of years past. The outline of this history runs about as follows.
Eight, ten, or twelve thousand years ago, contemporary with the last phase of the Old Stone Age of Europe or the opening there of the New Stone Age, man, for the first time, entered the New World. He came from Asia across Behring Strait, a narrow gap with an island stepping-stone in the middle, and probably frozen over solidly in midwinter. In race he was Mongoloid—not Chinese, Japanese, or Mongol proper, but _proto-Mongoloid_; a straight-haired type, medium in complexion, jaw protrusion, nose-breadth, and inclining probably to round-headedness; an early type, in short, from which the Chinese, the Malay, and the Indian grew out, like so many limbs from a tree. This proto-Mongoloid stock must have been well established in Asia long before. This is morally certain from the fact that the proto-Negroids and proto-Caucasians were living at least ten to fifteen thousand years earlier, as attested by their discovered fossils, Grimaldi man and Cro-Magnon man.
Well, somewhere about 8000 B. C., then, bands of proto-Mongolians began to filter in through the easy, northwest gate of America. Others pushed them behind; before them, to the south, the country was ever more pleasantly tempting, and life easier. They multiplied, streamed down the Pacific coast, wandered across to the Atlantic, entered the tropics in fertile Mexico, defiled through Panama, and slowly overran South America. Separate groups of entrants into Alaska may have brought distinct languages with them; or, if they all came with one mother-tongue, their migrations to diverse environments and long, long separations provided ample opportunity for differentiation into dialects, languages, and families. The history of speech in the Old World covered by records, is but little more than three thousand years old, just a third of the ten thousand years with which we are dealing in America. Multiply by three the difference between twentieth-century English and ancient Sanskrit or one of its modern representatives such as Bengali, and there is just about the degree of speech distinctness that exists between the American language families, such as Siouan and Algonkin, Aztec and Maya.
So with the racial type. Fundamentally, one physical type stretches from Cape Horn to Alaska. Superficially, it is intricately variegated—here with round heads, there with long—with short faces or hooked noses or tall statures or wavy hair, in this or that group of tribes. In fact, it might seem that during ten thousand years the variety of climates and habitats might have succeeded in moulding the Indian into racial types of even greater distinctness than we encounter; until we remember that he found the two continents empty, and was never subjected to mixtures with white or black or dwarf races, to mixtures such as were experienced by many of the peoples of the eastern hemisphere.
What the first immigrants brought with them in culture was rudimentary. They kept dogs, but no other domesticated animal. They were not yet agricultural, and subsisted on what they wrested from nature. They knew something of weaving baskets and mats; clothed and housed themselves; probably had harpoons and possibly bows; made fire with the drill; cut with flint knives; and believed in magic, spirits, and the perpetuity of the soul.
In and about southern Mexico they prospered the fastest, became most numerous, acquired some leisure, began to organize themselves socially, and developed cults of increasing elaborateness. They “invented” maize-agriculture and pottery; architecture in stone; irrigation; cloth weaving and cotton growing; the smelting and casting of copper, silver, and gold; a priesthood, calendar system, picture-writing, pantheon of gods, and sacrifices; and accustomed themselves to town life.
Gradually these amplifications of culture spread: slowly to the north, more rapidly and completely to the south, into the similar environment of Colombia and Peru. Not all of the civilization devised in Yucatan and Guatemala, was carried into South America. Writing and time reckoning, for instance, never squeezed through the Isthmus, and the Incas got along with traditions and records of strings. On the other hand the South Americans, also growing populous and wealthy, added some culture elements of their own—bronze alloying, the hammock, the Pan’s pipe, the balance scale, the surgical art of trephining the skull, the idea of a vast, compactly organized empire.
In Peru then, and in Mexico, two nearly parallel centers of civilization grew up during thousands of years; sprung from the same foundation, differentiated in their superstructures, that of Mexico evidently the earlier, and, at the time of discovery, slightly more advanced. The Peruvian civilization, if we include with it those of western Colombia and Bolivia, rayed itself out through the whole southern continent, becoming feebler and more abbreviated with increasing distance from its focus.
The South Mexican center similarly diffused its light through most of the northern continent. First its influences traveled to northern Mexico and the Southwest of the United States—Arizona and New Mexico, the seat of the Cliff-dwellers. There they took new root and then spread northward and eastward—altered, diluted, with much omitted. We may compare Mexico to a manufacturing district, where capital, inventiveness, resources and industry, flourish in mutual alliance; the Southwest to one of its outlets, a sort of distributing point or jobbing center, which imports, both for its own consumption and for re-export; the articles of trade in this case being elements of civilization—inventions, knowledge, arts.
Throughout, it was a flow of things of the mind, not a drift of the bodies of men; of culture, not of populations. And the radiation was ever northward, counter to the drift of the migrations which had begun thousands of years before, and which, in part, seem to have continued to crowd southward even during the period of northward spread of civilization. It was much as in Europe fifteen hundred years ago, when Goth and Vandal and Frank and Lombard pounded their way southward into the Roman empire, but the civilization of Rome—writing, learning, money, metallurgy, architecture, Christianity, laws—streamed ever against the human pressure, until the farthest barbarians of the North Sea had become, in some measure, humanized.
Thus the Southwest learned from Mexico to build in stone, to grow and weave cotton, to irrigate, to obey priests, and in some rude measure to organize the year into a calendar. None of these culture elements traveled farther. But the maize-beans-squash agriculture, pottery making, the organization of cult societies, the division of the community into clans, reckoning descent from one parent only, some tendency toward town life and the confederation of towns, all of which the Southwest had also acquired from Mexico, it passed on to its neighbors, notably to those of the Gulf States between Louisiana and Georgia. Here, these institutions were once more worked over and, in the main, reduced, and then some of them passed on northward, first to the Mound-builders of the Ohio valley, and then to the Iroquois of New York. From the Iroquois, in turn, some of their Algonkian neighbors and foes were just beginning to be ready to learn certain betterments, when the white man came and swept their cultures into memory.
We have thus, a series of culture centers—Mexico, Southwest, Southeast, Iroquois, Atlantic Algonkins—of descending order of advancement, and subsequent to one another in time. They constitute a ladder of culture development, and, although undated, represent a real sequence of history.
One area was but haltingly and sparsely infiltrated from the Southwest: the North Pacific Coast, centering in British Colombia. In this mild and rich environment a native culture grew up that, in the main, went its own way. It did not attain to the heights of Mexico, scarcely even equaled the Southwest. Pottery and agriculture failed to reach it. But out of its own resources, it developed, independently, a number of the arts and institutions which the remainder of North America drew from Mexico: clan organization and cult societies, for instance, the beginnings of a calendar and cloth weaving. And it added features, all its own: plank houses, totem poles, a remarkable style of decorative art, a society based on wealth. Here then we have a minor, but mainly independent culture center of the greatest interest.
In a still smaller way, and without as great a freedom from southern influences, the tribes of the treeless Plains, in the heart of the continent, developed a little civilization of their own. This was founded on what they had originally got from the Southwest and Southeast, was remodeled on the basis of an almost exclusive dependence on the buffalo, and underwent a brief and stirring efflorescence from the seventeenth to the nineteenth century, after the Plains tribes had got horses from the Spaniards. Here, then, grew up customs and appliances like the tepee, the travois, the camp circle, warfare as a game with “coups” as counters.
Similarly in the far north, along the shores of the Arctic, where the Eskimo spread themselves. Here, almost nothing penetrated from Mexico, but stern necessity forced a special inventiveness on the mechanical side and the way was near for the entrance of influences from Asia, some few of which may have diffused beyond the Eskimo to the North Pacific Coast tribes.
Such, then, are the outlines of the history of the native, American race and civilization. It is a long and complexly rich story, only partly unraveled. Those who wish it in greater fullness will find it in Wissler’s _The American Indian_. Only enough has been sketched here to show that modern anthropology is an inductive science with a minimum of speculation; that it aims at truly historical reconstructions and is beginning to achieve them; and that it lies in the nature of its tasks to distinguish and analyze the several native culture areas or local types of Indians before proceeding to conclusions based on combinations.
Therefore it is, that many small items of ethnic knowledge acquire considerable importance. From the average man’s point of view, it is of little moment that the Zuñi farm and the Yurok and Nootka do not, or that the former refuse to marry their dead wives’ sisters and the latter insist on it. At best, such bits of facts have for the layman only the interest of idle curiosities, of antiquarian fragments. To the specialist, however, they become dependable means to a useful end, much as intimate knowledge of the position of arteries and nerves serves the surgeon.
But, just as the exact understanding of anatomy which modern medicine enjoys, bulks to infinitely more than any one anatomist could ever have discovered, so with ethnology. No one mind could ever observe or assemble and digest all the cultural facts that are needed. Many workers are busy, have been systematically busy for two or three generations. Though they may, now and then, enliven their toil by a scientific quarrel over this or that set of facts or interpretation, they are inherently coöperating, laboring cumulatively at a great joint enterprise. Sometimes, they divide their interests topically: one specializes on social customs, another on material arts, a third along lines of religion. But, in the main, the cultural context is so important that it has been found most productive for each investigator to try to learn everything possible about all the phases of culture of a single tribe, or, at most, of two or three tribes.
To do this, he “goes into the field.” That is, he takes up his residence, for a continuous period or repeatedly for several years, among a tribe, on its reservation or habitat. He enters into as close relations as possible with its most intelligent or authoritative members. He acquires all he can of their language, reduces it to writing, perhaps compiles texts, a dictionary or grammar. Day after day he records notes from visual observation or the memory of the best informants available on the industries, beliefs, government, family life, ceremonies, wars, and daily occupations of his chosen people. And with all this, there flow in his personal experiences and reactions. The final outcome is a monograph—a bulky, detailed, often tedious, but fundamental volume, issued by the government or a scientific institution.
It is from intensive studies such as these, that the stories which form the present volume have sprung as a by-product. Have sprung as a sort of volunteer crop, it might be said, under the stimulus of the editorial suggestion of Dr. Parsons. The monographs have a way of sticking pretty closely to the objective facts recorded. The mental workings of the people whose customs are described, are subjective, and therefore much more charily put into print. The result is that every American anthropologist with field experience, holds in his memory many interpretations, many convictions as to how his Indians feel, why they act as they do in a given situation, what goes on inside of them. This psychology of the Indian is often expressed by the frontiersman, the missionary and trader, by the man of the city, even. But it has been very little formulated by the very men who know most, who have each given a large block of their lives to acquiring intensive and exact information about the Indian and his culture.
There is, thus, something new, something of the nature of an original contribution, in each of these stories; and they are reliable. To many of us, the writing of our tale has been a surprise and of value to ourselves. We had not realized how little we knew of the workings of the Indian mind on some sides, how much on others.
The fictional form of presentation devised by the editor has definite merit. It allows a freedom in depicting or suggesting the thoughts and feelings of the Indian, such as is impossible in a formal, scientific report. In fact, it incites to active psychological treatment, else the tale would lag. At the same time the customs depicted are never invented. Each author has adhered strictly to the social facts as he knew them. He has merely selected those that seemed most characteristic, and woven them into a plot around an imaginary Indian hero or heroine. The method is that of the historical novel, with emphasis on the history rather than the romance.
There is but one important precedent for this undertaking,[1] and that single-handed instead of collective, and therefore depictive of one people only, the Keresan Pueblos. This is _The Delight Makers_ of Bandelier, archæologist, archivist, historian, and ethnologist of a generation ago; and this _novel_ still renders a more comprehensive and coherent view of native Pueblo life than any scientific volume on the Southwest.
The present book, then, is a picture of native American life, in much the sense that a series of biographies of one statesman, poet, or common citizen from each country of Europe would yield a cross-sectional aspect of the civilization of that continent. France and Russia, Serbia and Denmark, would each be represented with its national peculiarities; and yet the blended effect would be that of a super-national culture. So with our Indians. It is through the medium of the intensive and special coloring of each tribal civilization, that the common elements of Indian culture are brought out most truthfully, even though somewhat indirectly.
There are only a few points at which the composite photograph, produced by these twenty-seven stories, should be used with caution, and these disproportions or deficiencies are unavoidable at present. The first of them is religion. The book is likely to make the impression that some sixty per cent, of Indian life must have been concerned with religion. This imbalance is due to the fact that religion has become the best known aspect of Indian life. Ritual and ceremony follow exact forms which the native is able to relate with accuracy from memory, long after the practices have become defunct. Moreover, once his confidence is gained, he often delights in occupying his mind with the matters of belief and rite that put an emotional stamp on his youth. Social usages are much more plastic, more profoundly modified to suit each exigency as it arises, and therefore more difficult to learn and portray. The mechanical and industrial arts have a way of leaving but pallid recollections, once they have been abandoned for the white man’s manufactures; and to get them recreated before one’s eyes is usually very time-consuming. Thus, through a tacit coordination of Indians and ethnologists to exploit the vein of most vivid productivity, religion has become obtruded; and some excess must be discounted. Yet the over-proportion is perhaps all for the best. For the Indian is, all in all, far more religious than we, and the popular idea errs on the side of ignoring this factor. The stories are substantially truthful in their effect, in that the average Indian did spend infinitely more time on affairs of religion than of war, for instance.
On the side of economics and government, the book is underdone. It is so, because ethnological knowledge on these topics is insufficient. It is difficult to say why. Possibly ethnologists have not become sufficiently interested or trained. But economic and political institutions are unquestionably difficult to learn about. They are the first to crumble on contact with Anglo-Saxon or Spanish civilization. So they lack the definiteness of ceremonialism, and their reconstruction from native memories is a bafflingly intricate task.
As regards daily life, personal relations, and the ambitions and ideals of the individual born into aboriginal society, in other words the social psychology of the Indian, we have done much better. In fact, collectively we have brought out much that is not to be found anywhere in the scientific monographs, much even that we had not realized could be formulated. This element seems to me to contain the greatest value of the book, and to be one that should be of permanent utility to historians and anthropologists, as well as to the public which is fortunately free from professional trammels. The exhibit of the workings of the Indian mind which these tales yield in the aggregate, impresses me as marked by a rather surprising degree of insight and careful accuracy.
Only at one point have we broken down completely: that of humor. One might conclude from this volume that humor was a factor absent from Indian life. Nothing would be more erroneous. Our testimony would be unanimous on this score. And yet we have been unable to introduce the element. The failure is inevitable. Humor is elusive because its understanding presupposes a feeling for the exact psychic situation of the individual involved, and this in turn implies thorough familiarity with the finest nuances of his cultural setting. We could have introduced Indian jokes, practical ones and witty ones, but they would have emerged deadly flat, and their laughs would have sounded made to order. An Indian himself, or shall we say, a contemporary of the ancients, may let his fancy play, and carry over to us something of his reaction: witness Aristophanes, Plautus, Horace. But the reconstructor, if he is wise, leaves the task unattempted. That prince of historical novelists, Walter Scott, for the most part collapses sadly when he tries to inject into his romances of the Middle Ages, the humor that marks his modern novels of Scotland; and so far as he salvages anything, it is by substituting the humor of his own day for the actual mediæval one. _Hypatia_ is a superb picture of the break-down of Roman civilization; but how silly and boring are its humorous passages! A greater artist, in _Thaïs_, and another in _Salammbô_, have wisely evaded attempting the impossible, and, at most, touched the bounds of irony. Where the masters have succumbed or refrained, it is well that we scientists, novices in the domain of fiction, should hold off; though we all recognize both the existence and the importance of humor in Indian life. This element, then, the reader must accept our bare word for—or supply from his own discrimination and intuition.
A. L. KROEBER
AMERICAN INDIAN LIFE
Takes-the-pipe, a Crow Warrior
I
Horses neighing, women scurrying to cover, the report of guns, his mother, Pretty-weasel, gashing her legs for mourning,—that was Takes-the-pipe’s earliest memory. Later he learned that his own father, a famous warrior of the Whistling-water clan, had fallen in the fight and that his “father,” Deaf-bull, was really a paternal uncle who had married the widow. No real father could have been kinder than Deaf-bull. If anything, he seemed to prefer his brother’s son to his own children, always petting him and favoring him with the choicest morsels.
When Pretty-weasel needed help in dressing a hide or pitching a tent, her sisters and cousins of the Sore-lip clan came as visitors, often bringing moccasins and gewgaws for their little clansman, Takes-the-pipe. One of the sisters stood out more clearly than the rest, a lusty wench who would pull Deaf-bull by the ear and pour water on his face when he took an afternoon nap. He in turn would throw her on the ground and tickle her till she bawled for mercy. Another salient figure was the grandmother, old Muskrat, who used to croon the boy to sleep with a lullaby: “The dog has eaten, he is smoking. Haha, huhu! Haha, huhu!” Whenever she came to the refrain she raised a wrinkled, mutilated hand, and snapped what remained of her fingers in the child’s face.
The people were always traveling back and forth in those days. Now Takes-the-pipe was throwing stones into the Little Bighorn, then with other boys he was chasing moths in the Wolf Mountains. When he caught one he rubbed it against his breast, for they said that was the way to become a swift runner. One fall, the Mountain Crow traveled to the mouth of the Yellowstone to visit their kin of the River band. All winter was spent there. It was fun coasting down-hill on a buffalo-rib toboggan and spinning tops on the smooth ice. Each boy tried to upset his neighbor’s with his own, and when he succeeded he would cry, “I have knocked you out!” Takes-the-pipe was a good player, but once he came home inconsolable because his fine new top was stolen, and another time a bigger lad had cheated, “knocking him out” with a stone deftly substituted for the wooden toy. His mother comforted him saying, “That boy is crazy! His father is of the Bad-honors clan, that’s why he acts that way!”
Takes-the-pipe was still a little fellow when Deaf-bull made him a bow and arrows, and taught him to shoot. Now he ran about, letting fly his darts against birds and rabbits. There was ample chance to gain skill in archery. The boys would tie together a bundle of grass and set it on a knoll, then all shot at this target, and the winner took all his competitors’ arrows. Whenever Takes-the-pipe brought home a sheaf of darts, his father would encourage him, saying, “You’ll be like Sharp-horn, who always brings down his buffalo with the first shot.” And when his son had killed his first cottontail, Deaf-bull proudly called Sliding-beaver, a renowned Whistling-water, feasted him royally and had him walk through camp, leading Takes-the-pipe mounted on his horse and proclaiming his success in a laudatory chant.
One spring there was great excitement. The supply of meat was exhausted, yet the buffalo remained out of sight. Scouts were sent to scour the country in search of game, but in vain. At last Sharp-horn offered to lure the buffalo by magic. At the foot of a cliff he had the men build a corral. He summoned Deaf-bull to be his assistant. “Bring me an old unbroken buffalo chip,” he said. Takes-the-pipe found one, and together he and his father brought it to the shaman. “Someone is trying to starve us; my medicine is stronger than his; we will eat,” said Sharp-horn. He smoothed the earth in his lodge and marked buffalo tracks all over. He put the chip on one of the tracks and on the chip a rock shaped like a buffalo’s head, which he wore as a neck ornament. This rock he smeared with grease. “The buffalo are coming, bid the men drive them here,” he said.
Deaf-bull went out and issued the orders received from Sharp-horn. On the heights above the corral, old men, women and children strung out in two diverging lines for the distance of a mile or two. The young men rode far out till they sighted the herd, got behind it and chased the game between the two lines nearer and nearer to the declivity. They drove them down into the corral. Some were killed in leaping, others stunned so they could be easily dispatched. That was a great day for Takes-the-pipe. He rode double with his father, and Deaf-bull was a person of consequence. Had he not assisted Sharp-horn? Then, too, he was a member of the Big Dog Society, and the Big Dogs were the police for that season with power to whip every man, woman or child who dared disobey Sharp-horn’s orders.
After the hunt, the meat-racks sagged with the weight of the buffalo ribs, and the people made up for past want by gorging themselves with fat and tongues. One evening the Big Dogs held a feast and dance, the next evening the Fox society, then the Lumpwoods, and so on. There were promiscuous gatherings, too, where the valiant warriors rose to tell the assembled multitude about their exploits, while the old men exhorted the callow youths to emulate the example of their fathers and the camp reëchoed the ancient warriors’ songs:—
Sky and earth are everlasting, Men must die. Old age is a thing of evil, Charge and die!
On one of these occasions Takes-the-pipe was proudly listening to Deaf-bull’s record. He would have been a chief, had he ever wrested a gun from an enemy in a hand-to-hand encounter; in every other essential he more than passed muster. Three times he had crawled into a Piegan camp and stolen horses picketed to their owners’ tents; six times he had “counted coup” on enemies, touching them with his lance or bare hand; twice he had carried the pipe and returned with blackened face as leader of a victorious expedition.
While Takes-the-pipe was listening spellbound to his father’s narrative, he felt a sudden pinch. He turned round to smite his tormentor only to face Cherry-necklace, a boy somewhat older than himself. He was Sliding-beaver’s son and that put a different complexion on the matter, for Sliding-beaver, like Deaf-bull, was a Whistling-water, so their sons might take what liberties they chose with each other and enjoy complete immunity. At present, however, Cherry-necklace had more important business than playing a trick on Takes-the-pipe. “Magpie,” he whispered, “they are playing magpie.” Off both boys dashed to a creek nearby, where some twenty lads were already assembled round a big fire. They smeared their faces with charcoal till one could hardly recognize his neighbor. “Now, we’ll be magpies,” they said, “Takes-the-pipe is a swift runner, he shall lead.” They scampered back to camp. The women, seeing them approach in their disguise, snatched their meat from the racks to hide it inside their tents. But Takes-the-pipe had already fixed his eye on some prime ribs, pounced upon them and carried off his prize, followed by the other boys, each vanishing with what booty he could safely capture.
It was a great gathering about the fireplace by the stream. One of the lads strutted up and down as a crier and announced, “Takes-the-pipe has stolen the best piece!” Then he and a few others who had won like delicacies were granted their choice of the spoils, whereupon all feasted. When they had done eating, the oldest boy declared, “We’ll remain seated here. If anyone gets up, we’ll rub our hands with this grease and smear it over his body.” So they sat still for a long time. At last Cherry-necklace forgot about the warning and got up. In an instant they were upon him like a pack of wolves. Here was a fine chance for Takes-the-pipe to get even for that pinch; he daubed Cherry-necklace’s face all over with the fat. Others followed suit and soon his body glistened with grease. He leaped into the creek to wash it off, but the water glided off the fat.
II
The people were moving along the Bighorn, with the long lodge poles dragging along the ground. Some dozen girls with toy tents were transporting them in imitation of their mothers. Takes-the-pipe was riding with the Hammers, a boys’ club patterned on the men’s societies. The members treated dogs or deer as enemies and practised counting coup on them. Takes-the-pipe as one of the daredevils carried one of the emblems of the organization, a long stick with a wooden hammer-head pivoted some two feet from its top. Suddenly an idea struck him. “Hammers,” he cried, “let us offer a seat on our horses to the girls we like!” No sooner said than done. He himself had had his eye on Otter for some time, and presently the two were riding double.
In the evening when the women of the camp pitched their lodges, the Hammer boys’ sweethearts set up theirs a little way off. They played at married life. Takes-the-pipe sneaked into his mother’s lodge, purloined some meat, brought it near Otter’s tent, and bade her fetch the food, which she then cooked for him. Other boys and girls did likewise. Thus they played every day while on the march. Once Takes-the-pipe killed a young wolf and brought a lock of its hair to the young folks’ camp. He pretended that it was an enemy’s scalp and set it on a pole and all the girls had to dance the scalp dance around it. There followed a recital of deeds; the boys who had struck wolves were allowed to claim coups against the Dakota, and those who had touched deer might boast of having stolen picketed horses.
It was a gay journey. But one evening when Takes-the-pipe had bragged of his mock exploits, Cherry-necklace suddenly appeared on the scene and taunted him before all his playmates, “You think you are a man, because you are as tall as Deaf-bull,” he cried, “you are nothing but a child fit to play with little girls. Have you ever been on the war-path? _I_ went with Long-horse and struck a Piegan.” Takes-the-pipe hung his head. It was only too true. Cherry-necklace was not so much older, yet he had already distinguished himself and might recite his coup in any public assembly. Takes-the-pipe had no answer for he knew nothing to fling back in his “joking-relative’s” teeth, but he resolved forthwith to join a war party at the earliest opportunity.
Not long after this Shinbone let it be known that he was setting out on a horse-raid against the Dakota. Now Takes-the-pipe had his chance. Well provided with moccasins by his clanswomen, he joined a dozen young men starting afoot on the perilous adventure,—perilous because, though Shinbone was a brave man, this was his first attempt at leading a party and it remained to be seen whether “his medicine was good.” They walked for four days. As Takes-the-pipe was the youngest of the company, he had to fetch water and firewood, and one morning when he slept too late they poured water all over him.
Warily the party advanced. On the fourth evening Shinbone ordered them to halt on a little knoll. “Yonder are the Dakota lodges,” he said, “early to-morrow morning we will go there.” He took his sacred bundle, unwrapping a weasel skin stuffed with deer hair, and pointed it toward the camp. “The Dakota are tired,” he said, “they will sleep late.” Before dawn he roused the party. He appointed two young men as scouts. They came back. “Well,” he asked, “how is it?”
“Where you pointed, there are the Dakota lodges,” they replied.
“It is well,” he said. He chose four others to drive all the loose horses out of the camp. They left. They had not gone far when they were overtaken by Takes-the-pipe. “What are you doing? Go back. He did not send _you_.”
“I am going to the camp to cut a horse or strike a coup.”
“You are crazy! We are older than you and are still without honors. We are here to steal horses, not to score deeds. The one who is carrying our pipe is a new leader, he may not be very powerful and you will spoil his luck. Go back!”
But though they threatened to beat him, Takes-the-pipe would not return and so all five approached the camp. There were the lodges ranged in a circle. The inmates seemed plunged in sleep. Near the edge a herd of horses were peacefully grazing. The scouts quietly stole up to them and began to drive them off toward the rest of their party. In the meantime Takes-the-pipe was getting his bearings in the strange encampment. He cast about for a picketed horse, but there was none to be seen. Then of a sudden, chance favored him. Out of a little tent on the outskirts of the circle a wizened old man came hobbling on a staff. Takes-the-pipe stole up behind him and dealt him a stunning blow. “Hēha!” he cried, counting coup on the prostrate foe. Then he dashed towards his friends, who had watched him from a little distance. As yet there was no alarm, but no time was to be lost. They mounted and drove the horses before them. When they reached Shinbone, the rest of the party got on horseback. “Now we will run!” said the captain.
They had come and gone to the Dakota afoot and slowly enough; now they were mounted, and traveled at top speed, for they knew that before long the enemy would be in their wake. They rode on and on till they got to the brink of a rapid stream. Here, some of their stolen horses turned back, but the greatest number they saved, driving them through the ice-cold water, where they themselves felt as though they must die from the cold. They traveled that day and all through the night without stopping to eat. On the following morning they reached the Crow camp, sore and worn out, but with sixty head of horses. By rights they all belonged to Shinbone, but after the fashion of a good leader, he was generous to his followers and let them have nearly half of the herd. Takes-the-pipe won three horses.
His parents rejoiced when they heard of his coup and his booty. His mother and her sisters at once prepared a magnificent feast, to which all the Sore-lip women contributed. On such occasions it behooved a young man to give lavish entertainment to his father’s kin, so that he might live to be an old man. So Deaf-bull invited all the eminent Whistling-water men, and Takes-the-pipe selected Sliding-beaver from among them, presenting him with a fine bay horse. Then Sliding-beaver trudged through camp, leading Takes-the-pipe’s horse and singing the young man’s praises.
III
He was rolling a hoop and another youth was hurling a dart at it when Shinbone clutched him by the arm. “Come, I’ll make a man of you. You shall take the place of your elder brother.” Takes-the-pipe knew what he meant: a cousin of his belonging to the Fox society had fallen in a skirmish with the Dakota, and his fellow-members had been casting about for a clubbable kinsman.
Now a new sort of life began for Takes-the-pipe. He no longer roamed about aimlessly or consorted with random companions. His fellow-members were now his constant associates. Spare time was whiled away in the lodges of eminent Foxes, beating the drum and singing the songs of the organization. Now and then the younger members took jaunts to the hills with their sweethearts. Again there was a philandering when the Foxes and their girls went berrying or up to the mountains to drag lodge poles to camp. Often enough a wealthy member had a herald invite all the Foxes to his lodges, where they were feasted, and held a dance. There, too, valiant men rose to expatiate on their prowess. The Foxes had done well that year. Shinbone had struck the first coup of the season, thus making his club take precedence of the rival Lumpwood society. By the rules of the game the Lumpwoods had lost the right to sing their own songs, and when they danced they were obliged to borrow those of the Big Dogs, exposing themselves to the mockery of the Foxes. That year Takes-the-pipe joined a number of war parties and succeeded in capturing an enemy’s gun. Now he, too, would rise and tell about his martial experiences.
The following spring there were great doings. The Foxes were electing new officers in place of the last year’s standard-bearers. Three or four of the elders had had a council and now they came to the club lodge where all the members were gathered. Two of the emblems of the society were straight staffs, two were hooked and wrapped with otter-skin. Each was pointed at the bottom, for in sight of the enemy the bearer was obliged to plant it into the earth, and stand his ground regardless of danger or death, without budging an inch unless a companion plucked out the fatal lance. That was why the officers were called “men doomed to die.” If they escaped unscathed by the end of the year, they retired with all the honors of distinguished service; if they died in battle, they were solemnly mourned by their fellow-members and other tribesmen; but if they failed in duty, they became the pariahs of the camp.
There were not many young men eager to undertake so arduous an office. The electors were passing round the circle, offering a pipe to likely candidates, for to smoke it meant acceptance. Some of the faint-hearted ones crouched behind others to escape notice and even some, who were forward enough on other occasions, shrank back. First the elders went to the tried warriors. No trouble was expected with Shinbone, and as a matter of fact he readily consented. Next they came to Lone-pine, Sliding-beaver’s eldest son. He, too, smoked without sign of reluctance. But now the electors were beginning to cast about among the younger fellow-members, for they were coming towards Cherry-necklace. Cherry-necklace was no coward; he had shown his mettle in more than one encounter. Yet he was very fond of having a good time. Would he willingly accept appointment? No, he was squirming uneasily and refused the pipe. Rather, he would have refused it, but Lone-pine, his brother, seized him by the bang of his hair and forcibly made his lips touch the pipestem. Thus Cherry-necklace too was “doomed to die.” And now the elders passed round once more in search of the last officer. Takes-the-pipe’s heart began to beat. What if they asked him? It would be an honor for one so young, but did he wish to die? They were coming straight toward him. He seemed to hear the old song:
Sky and earth are everlasting, Men must die.
Yes, if he died, what mattered it? He would yield without coaxing and shame Cherry-necklace. He eagerly clutched the pipe and became one of the bearers of a hooked-staff.
While the Foxes were holding their annual election, the Lumpwoods were going through a like procedure. A day or two later, a defiant call was heard from their lodge. They were ready for the annual indulgence in licensed wife-stealing. Only the Foxes and the Lumpwoods took part in this pastime, the other societies being mere spectators. If a Fox had ever had for his sweetheart a Lumpwood’s wife, he was now privileged to kidnap her from her rightful husband, who would only make himself a laughing-stock if he interposed objections, let alone violence. Takes-the-pipe remembered that Otter was now married to a Lumpwood named Drags-the-wolf, so he went to the lodge and called her. Drags-the-wolf was game. He had the reputation of being very fond of his pretty, young wife, but he knew the proper way for a Crow to act. Instead of restraining her, he himself said, “He is calling you. Go!” Takes-the-pipe brought her to his parents’ lodge. His mother and sisters gave her a beautiful elk-tooth dress and other Sore-lip women from all over the camp brought her moccasins and beaded pouches. Then the Foxes selected from their number an old man who had once rescued a wounded tribesman from certain death by dashing into the thick of the fray, and carrying him off on his horse. This man, for none other might venture, rode double with the kidnapped bride, all the other Foxes parading jubilantly behind and twitting their rivals with the capture of so handsome a Lumpwood woman.
IV
Shinbone had come home from a war party with blackened face and taken the rank of chief. No wonder, the people were saying. Had not the Thunder-bird adopted him when as a young man he prayed and thirsted for a revelation? Men must undergo suffering if they wanted supernatural blessing so that they could become great men among their people. Of all the Crow chiefs, only Drags-the-wolf had been in luck: him the Moon visited as he was peacefully slumbering in his tent and granted him invulnerability and coups. The other distinguished warriors had had to mortify their flesh in order to gain favor.
That spring the herald proclaimed that Red-eye was going to hold a Sun Dance. He had lost a brother and was hungering for revenge. What surer way to attain it than to fast and dance before the sacred doll till it became alive and showed him a scalped Dakota in earnest of victory and vengeance? But Red-eye’s announcement was a signal for all the ambitious youths to plan for a public mortification of their flesh at the same time in the hope of winning supernatural favor. So, while the pledger of the ceremony was dancing up and down with his gaze riveted on the holy image in the rear of the lodge, a dozen young men were undergoing torture for their own ends. Some were dragging through camp two buffalo skulls fastened to a stick thrust through holes cut in their backs. Others—and Takes-the-pipe among them—decided to swing from the lodge poles. So he begged Sharp-horn to pierce the flesh above his breasts, run skewers through the openings, and tie the rods to ropes hung from a pole. Thus attached he ran back and forth till he had torn out the skewers. Yet when he had fallen to the ground faint and bloodstained no vision came for all his pains.
He wanted to become a chief like Shinbone, so he went on a mountain peak to fast. Without clothes save his gee-string and a buffalo robe, he slept there overnight. He awoke early, the sun had just risen. He took a piece of wood and put on it his left forefinger. “Sun,” he cried, “I am miserable. I am giving you this. Make me a chief!” With a huge knife he hacked off the first joint. The blood began to flow. He lost consciousness. When he came to, it was evening. His finger ached. He tried to sleep, but the pain and cold kept him awake. Of a sudden he heard a man clearing his throat and a horse’s neighing came closer and closer. A voice behind him said, “The one whom you wanted to come has arrived.” He turned about. He saw a man on a bay horse; his face was painted red and he wore a shirt with many discs cut out from its body, yet hanging from it as though by a thread. From the back of his head rose a chicken-hawk feather. The rider said, “You are miserable. I have been looking for you for a long time but could never quite reach you. I will adopt you as my child. Look! I am going to run.” He began to gallop; the dust flew to the sky. Then the trees and shrubs all about turned into Piegans began shooting at the horseman. Arrows came whizzing by him and bullets flew round him and the enemies were yelling after him, but he wheeled round unscathed. With his spear he knocked down one warrior and counted coup on him. He rode up to Takes-the-pipe: “Though you fight all the people of the world, dress as I do and you need have no fear of death before you are a chief. That man I struck is a Piegan; you have seen his country, go there, I give him to you. As I am, so shall you be; arrows will not hurt you, bullets you can laugh at. You shall be like a rock. But one thing you must not do: never eat of any animal’s kidneys.”
When Takes-the-pipe got back to his people, he was very glad. Two things remained to be done before he might call himself chief: one was to lead a victorious war party, the other to cut a picketed horse. His vision enabled him forthwith to play a captain’s part. He shot a chicken-hawk and took one of its feathers to be worn at the back of his head on his expeditions. He prepared a shirt like the one he had seen and a spear that resembled exactly that borne by his patron. Then he gathered his war party. His sisters and other Sore-lip women made moccasins galore for him. He set out in the dead of night. For several days they traveled north and west. On the Missouri they ran into a few Piegans in a hunting-lodge. They killed them all and took their scalps. Thus they could return with blackened faces. One of the enemies had a thumbless hand, so the year was known ever after as “the winter when they killed the thumbless man.”
V
He had been wounded in the knee. He could not understand it. He had been promised that his body would be like stone. He had worn his feather at the back of his head, as in every fight since the time of his vision, yet his kneecap had been shattered in a skirmish with the Dakota. And it was an ugly injury. Red-eye had salved it with bear root, but the cure-all had failed. Bullsnake, foremost of doctors, blessed by the buffalo, had waded into the river to wash his knee, but all in vain; he remained crippled. Then he knew that he had unwittingly broken his guardian spirit’s rule; there had been a feast before the fatal battle and then he must have eaten of the forbidden food.
Soon there came surety. In a dream appeared the man on the bay horse and said: “I told you not to eat kidney, you have eaten it. You shall never be chief.” Takes-the-pipe had now struck many coups and captured guns and carried the captain’s pipe. His record surpassed that of any man of his age, but he lacked the honor of cutting a picketed horse. How could he ever gain it now? Horse-raiders started on foot, and he could only painfully limp across the camp.
Young women, drawn by his fame, often visited him in his tent, but their attentions soon palled on him. His mother tried to console him. “Of all the young men you are the best-off; you have struck more coups than the rest and own plenty of horses; the young women are crazy about you. You ought to be the happiest man in camp.” But he would watch the bustle of preparations for new raids that he could not join; he would ride about of an evening and chance upon the foot-soldiers setting out from their trysting-place, and would look after them, wistful and envious and sick at heart.
Sharp-horn, the aged sage, advised him to go for another vision; possibly the guardian spirit would relent. So Takes-the-pipe started out on horseback and rode far away towards the mountain where he had prayed before. At the foot he hobbled his horse and painfully climbed to the summit. He lay down, with outstretched arms, facing the sky. “Father,” he wailed, “I am miserable, take pity on me.” He lay there during the night but at the first glimmer of dawn there was still no message from the mysterious powers. All day he stayed about the jagged bowlders without drink or a morsel to eat.
Long after nightfall a muffled tread became audible and as it came closer it was the tramp of a buffalo. Then a bull was standing over him, scenting his breath and caressing his naked breast with shaggy fur. At last he spoke in Crow. “I will adopt you my son. I have seen you suffering from afar. What other Indians have prayed for shall be yours. Look at the inside of my mouth.” He looked and there was not a tooth to be seen. “So long as you have teeth, my son, you shall not die. You shall marry a fine, chaste, young woman and beget children and see your grandchildren about you. When you die you shall be so old that your skin will crack as you move from one corner of the lodge to another.”
But Takes-the-pipe shook his head and said, “Father, it is not because I crave old age that I am thirsting; I want to be a chief like Shinbone.”
“My son, what you ask is difficult. As I hurried to you from my home, I overtook another person traveling towards you; perhaps you will still be able to get what you desire.” Takes-the-pipe sat up to ask further counsel, but the bull was gone and nothing but a bleached buffalo skull was gaping at him in the gloaming.
All next day he fasted and prayed on his peak, addressing now the Sun, then the Thunder, then again the Morningstar. His throat was parched when he lay down at dark in his old resting place. He did not know how, but of a sudden the darkness was lifted and the hilltop shone with a gentle radiance. An old woman was standing at his feet, resting on a digging-stick; she wore a splendid robe with horsetracks marked on it in porcupine-quill embroidery. “My child,” she said, “you have not called me, nevertheless I am here. I heard your groans and started towards you but another person passed me on the road. I am the Moon. When children fall sick, doctor them with this root; their parents will give you horses. I will make you the wealthiest of all the Crows.”
But Takes-the-pipe shook his head and answered, “Grandmother, I am not suffering to gain wealth, I want to become a chief like Shinbone.”
“My dear child, you are asking for something great. As I came hither, I saw another person starting to come here. Perhaps he has more power than I, and can grant your wish.” He was eager to ask her more, but her form faded into nothing and only the sheen of the waning crescent remained visible.
Another day he fasted and drank no water. He was now very weak, so that he dragged himself about with the aid of a cane. Was there no power to help him in his distress? Night came as he lay wailing and peering into the darkness, when a handsome young man stood before him. “I was sleeping far away, you have roused me with your lamentations,” he said. “I have come to help you. You shall be my son. Do you recognize me? I am the Tobacco your old people plant every year. So long as they harvest me, the Crow shall be a great tribe. They have forgotten the way to prepare the seed, their crops will be poor. I will show you how to mix it before planting. Then you will make your tribe great and teach others and receive all sorts of property in payment.”
And Takes-the-pipe answered; “Father, I am not suffering in order to plant tobacco and gain property, I want to be a chief like Shinbone.”
Then the man replied, “My son, everything else in the universe is easy for me, only what you ask for is hard. That one who used to be your father is very strong. ‘Don’t eat kidney,’ he said. You have eaten it. I cannot make you chief. Listen, my son. All things in the world go by fours. Three of us have come to help you. We have been powerless. A fourth one is coming, perhaps he can do it.”
The next day Takes-the-pipe could hardly crawl on all fours. His head swam. He seized his knife and chopped off another finger joint on his left hand. Then holding aloft the bleeding stump he cried, “Fathers, I am giving you this. Make me a chief!”
Suddenly a huge figure came panting toward him, shaking a rattle and singing a song. “I am the last,” said a big bear; “though I am heavy and slow, I have arrived.”
Takes-the-pipe called out to him joyfully, “Father, I knew you were coming. Cure my knee so that I can go out to cut a picketed horse and become a chief.”
“My son, the one who used to be your father is very strong. He does not want you to be a chief. Well, I too am strong. If you are a man, I can help you. If you are faint-hearted, I am powerless.”
“Father,” said Takes-the-pipe, “make me great; make me greater than other men, and if I die what matters it?”
“My son, there are many chiefs in camp; of _your_ kind there shall be but one. Tell me, have you ever seen the whole world?” Without waiting for an answer, the bear lifted him up. Mountains and streams and prairies and camps came into his vision. The berries were ripe and the Crow camp loomed in sight and the Tobacco society were harvesting the precious seed. Far away were hostile lodges. Then the leaves were turning yellow and the enemy were setting out to raid Crow horses. One Crow all alone was riding towards them. “My son, do you see that horseman with trailing sashes? They were trying to hold him back, he has broken loose. He could not be a chief; he wants to die. He is a Crazy Dog. He speaks ‘backward’; he cares little for the rules of the camp. Where there is danger, he is the foremost. Dress like him, act like him, and you shall be great. The people will speak of you so long as there are Crows living on this earth. This I will give you if your heart is strong.”
“Thanks, father, thanks! What you have shown me is great; I will do it. I wanted to live and be a chief. It cannot be. There is no way for me to live; I shall die as a Crazy Dog.”
Then the bear vanished.
VI
The people were gathered near the mouth of the Bighorn. There was merriment in camp after a successful hunt. Suddenly was heard the beating of a drum and the chanting of a strange song. All ran out of their lodges to see what was going on. Who is that man on the richly fitted-out horse? He approaches the center of the circle, shaking a rattle. Two sashes of deerskin, slipped over his head, descend to the ground. Sliding-beaver is leading the horse, halting from time to time, and beating a drum. At the fourth stop he cried aloud: “Young women, if you would be this man’s sweethearts, you must hasten, he is about to die!” Then he beat his drum and addressed the rider: “Remain on horseback, do not dance!”
Forthwith Takes-the-pipe dismounted and danced in position. Then because he did the opposite of what he was told everyone knew him for a Crazy Dog pledged to court death. Straightway Pretty-weasel began to lament: “I begged him not to do it; he has done it!” But the other women cheered lustily, and Sliding-beaver sang his praises aloud as he slowly led him outside of the camp circle.
Then for a while he appeared every evening, dancing and shaking his rattle. He would ride through camp like a madman. When a few were gathered eating some meat, he would walk his horse into their very midst as if to run over them. Then they would cry out, “Trample on us.” And the Crazy Dog would turn aside and let them eat in peace. At night the best-looking young women paid him visits; even married women went there and their husbands did not mind it. Sometimes two or three would come of a single night. Famous Whistling-waters came to tell him what a great thing he was doing. All the eminent warriors in camp, Drags-the-wolf, Red-eye, and Shinbone, were looking on him with envy.
The cherries had ripened and one day a woman offered him some. He said, “When I decided to do this, the grass was sprouting. I did not expect to live so long, yet to-day I am eating cherries. Well, I will see whether I can achieve what I wish.” When they went hunting the next time, he got some buffalo blood and mixed it with badger blood and water. In the mixture he saw his image with blood streaming down his face. “Yes,” he cried, “I have seen it. What I am longing for is coming true!”
The leaves were turning yellow when a tribesman caught sight of some Dakota raiders. The young men drove them off and the enemy took refuge in the dry bed of a stream. There, the Crow warriors were going to attack them. They were getting ready when Pretty-weasel rushed into their midst, crying, “Bind my son! Don’t let him go!” They looked for him. He was not to be found. All alone he was dashing toward the enemy. They galloped after him. He was close to the coulée, shaking his rattle and singing his song:—
Sky and earth are everlasting, Men must die. Old age is a thing of evil, Charge and die!
He rode straight up to the enemies’ hiding-place. At the edge he dismounted. Several Dakotas were peeping out. “There is no way for me to live,” he cried, “I must die!” He shot one foe and struck him with his rattle. Then another Dakota shot him in the left temple, and Takes-the-pipe fell dead.
The Crow warriors caught up, and killed every man in the raiding party. Pretty-weasel reached the spot and wiped the blood from her son’s forehead. The men put him on a horse and brought him to camp. Wailing, they went home. There the Sore-lip women clipped their hair and gashed their legs. The Whistling-water men rode up and down singing the praises of the dead Crazy Dog. His fellow-Foxes propped up the corpse against a backrest, knelt before it and wailed. Their officers ran arrows through their flesh and jabbed their foreheads till the blood flowed in streams. Then they set up a scaffold on four posts, wrapped the body in a robe, and placed it on top. Beside the stage they planted a pole. From it was hung his drum, and his sashes swept down as streamers blowing in the wind. His rattle they put into his hand. Then the camp moved.
ROBERT H. LOWIE
A Crow Woman’s Tale
“A story, grandmother, a story!”
“What, in the daytime, outdoors? And in the summer too? Don’t you know that we tell tales only of a winter night?”
“Oh, grandmother, those old rules are gone. Do tell us a story to keep us awake on this hot day.”
“Well, what shall it be? Shall I tell you how Old-woman’s grandchild conquered the monsters that haunted the earth?”
“No, you’ve told us that one many times. Tell us a new one.”
“Well, you shall hear one you have never heard before; a new story and yet a true one.”
*       *       *       *       *
There was a young Crow maiden named Beaver-woman who was as good-looking as any girl the Crows had ever known. She was neither too tall nor too short, her waist was slim, and her nose was as straight as a nose can be. She made the finest moccasins in all the tribe and knew how to embroider them with the prettiest quill designs. Throughout the camp there was no one for whom she did not have a kind word. The young men respected her for they knew she would not romp with them as some girls did, and those older ones who had been on the war-path were eager to take her to wife. Yet though one suitor after another came to offer horses to her father, the beautiful girl refused them all. At length her parents grew impatient and scolded her. “What are you waiting for? Your brothers have need of horses. Do you expect Morningstar to come down from the sky and woo you?”
Then for the first time she spoke of her hopes. “One day when the grass was sprouting, I went to the creek to fetch some water. There my eldest brother’s comrade, the one they call White-dog, spoke to me and courted me, then left with a war party. I have seen him in my dreams, returning with booty. He is bringing home horses; he will offer you more than all the other suitors together who have tried to buy me.”
Then one of her brothers laughed in derision, and another good-naturedly, and still others kept their peace, while her mother mumbled, “Some dreams have come true and some only mock one. I liked the looks of the horses you refused.”
But a few days later, when the cherries were ripe, White-dog came back with his party, driving eighty head of horses stolen from the Sioux. Many he allotted to his followers and many he gave away to his father’s clansmen; but of the remainder he offered the twenty finest to Beaver-woman’s parents. Then she was happy and said, “My dream has come true.” Her parents, too, were very glad, and she went to live in her husband’s lodge.
White-dog had an older wife named Turtle, whom he had inherited from a brother killed in battle. Turtle did not like the newcomer, but White-dog would not allow her to abuse Beaver-woman. He was very proud of his young and beautiful wife. When the people moved camp, it was Beaver-woman who bore his buffalo-hide shield; and when he came back from the enemy with spoils, she was the one to dance with his bow or spear while Turtle and other women looked on with envy. There was one thing he prized even higher than her good looks, and that was her virtue. Other men were having all sorts of trouble with their wives, but he was sure of his. When he heard of a married woman eloping with her lover, he would say proudly, “My wife will soon be the only one who shall dare chop down the tree for the Sun Dance lodge”; for only a wife who had never erred was allowed to take part in this sacred rite.
All went well until one spring soon after Beaver-woman had borne her first child. You young men have your dancing-clubs to-day, some of you are Hot Dancers and others belong to the Big-Ear-Holes. That’s the way we Crows used to have it in the old days, only we had _real_ societies, the Foxes and the Lumpwoods. They didn’t just dance and feast; they tried to be brave in war and each society sought to outdo the other. But they fought in another way, too. Sometimes it happened that a Lumpwood or a Fox had once had a mistress who afterwards married into the other society. Then for a few days in the early spring he was allowed to kidnap her. No matter how badly he felt about it, her husband durst not protect her, it would have been a terrible disgrace. He must never take her back so long as he lived, or the whole camp would jeer at him for the rest of his days. Often a man might feel like fighting, but he would control himself and say, “She is nothing to me, take her.” Then the people would praise him, saying, “That one has a strong heart.”
Well, one day in the spring, a hooting was heard in camp. The Lumpwoods, headed by Red-eye, were ready to steal the Foxes’ wives, and the Foxes had answered the call of challenge. White-dog was not greatly interested in these doings. He was lounging in his lodge, talking to his younger brother, Little-owl, while Beaver-woman was crooning a song over her baby. Of a sudden the tramping of feet was heard, the door flap was rudely lifted, and Red-eye’s head was thrust through the opening. Beaver-woman faced him calmly. “What’s the matter?” she asked.
He answered with a song:
“My sweetheart is the one I love, I am taking her away.”
“Go away, you’re crazy,” she said, “I have never been your sweetheart!”
“What, don’t you remember what happened at the spring?”
“Yes, you were going to hug me and I drenched you with water. Go away to your real sweetheart.”
But now Red-eye had entered the lodge with two of his companions and was about to lay hands on her. Then she knew that it was no jest, that he was falsely claiming her as a one-time mistress and she screamed aloud at her husband.
“He is lying, you know he is lying! Help me!” All this time White-dog was sitting in the rear of the lodge, stiff and silent. He knew the charge against his wife was false, and hatred filled him against her wanton accuser. He also knew that unless he fought for her now she was lost forever. But it was not a man’s part to show resentment at such times. Just because no one in camp would believe in Red-eye’s tale, he, White-dog, would be all the greater for having shown a strong heart. So with stern face he turned to his wife and said, “They are calling you, go.” But as they seized her, up sprang Little-owl, White-dog’s younger brother, a gentle young man who loved Beaver-woman and had always shown respect for her instead of teasing her as most brothers-in-law do with their brothers’ wives. He picked up a large butchering knife from the ground and rushed at Red-eye crying, “You lie, you lie!” But now White-dog, too, leaped up and with his greater strength pinioned his brother’s arms behind his back. He wanted no scuffle when his wife was being kidnapped; it would have been a disgrace. Thus Red-eye dragged Beaver-woman away without interference.
The Lumpwoods had a grand feast and a dress parade on horseback, and Beaver-woman had to ride double with the greatest warrior in the society. They had dressed her up in the finest elk-tooth dress and everyone admired her good looks, but she was sad and could not hold back her tears. All the Foxes stood round about to see the spectacle, and among them was White-dog, looking on as if nothing had happened. For he wanted to show what a strong heart he had.
When the celebration was over, Beaver-woman had to live as the wife of Red-eye, whom she hated. One night she stole to White-dog’s lodge and begged him to take her back. But White-dog got angry and bade her depart. “Do you believe he was ever my lover?” she asked.
He answered, “I do not believe it, but he has made the charge and seized you. Go back. I do not want people to sing songs in mockery of me.” And when she lingered he thrust her out and struck her a blow,—he who had never beaten her before. Then she mournfully retraced her steps towards her new home. But before she had gotten very far she felt a light tap on her shoulder. She turned about and faced not White-dog but his younger brother.
“The people here are bad,” said Little-owl, “come, let us two flee. By the mouth of the Yellowstone there are Crows too, and down the Missouri are the villages of the Corn-eaters. I have relatives among both; let us go and live with them.” So in the same night they packed some dried meat and other necessaries and they started northward down the Yellowstone without being detected in camp.
But on the second day’s journey they were espied by a group of scouting Cheyenne. Little-owl fought bravely but was killed and scalped. Beaver-woman with her baby became a captive of the hostile tribe, and the leader of the party took her as his wife, when they got back to the Cheyenne camp. Her new husband was a great warrior and treated her kindly, but he was an elderly man and she could not love him as she had loved White-dog. She grieved, too, for gentle Little-owl who had died for love of her, and she longed to go back to her own people.
About a year later another Crow woman was brought to camp as a captive. That was a joyful day for Beaver-woman. Now she learned all the news about her own people. She heard that Red-eye was dead, killed by lightning, and all the Crows said it was because he had abducted an innocent woman. White-dog had not married again; he had even sent away Turtle, his elder wife. He was more famous as a brave than ever, for he had struck several enemies and stolen two picketed horses from the Sioux. The people talked about his recklessness and thought he would surely become a chief.
When Beaver-woman heard about her people, she was filled with a great longing to go back to them. “We are not far from our own people,” she said, “let us run back there together. My husband is setting out against the Sioux; then we can escape.” So they made their get-away and arrived in safety among their own tribe. Beaver-woman went straight to her first husband’s lodge. She found him alone, smoothing an arrow-shaft. “They told me that other man was killed by lightning; I have come back,” she said. But he hardly looked up.
“A man does not take back a kidnapped wife,” he said, “go away.” Then she saw that she had come in vain and, weeping, she went to her parents’ home.
White-dog had always had a strong heart. But now the people were saying that he was positively foolhardy. When enemies were entrenched, he was the first to lead the attack; when a hostile camp was to be entered, he was the first to volunteer; he was always planning a raid against the Cheyenne or Sioux. But one time a Crow party returned wailing: White-dog had fallen in a reckless charge and they were bearing his corpse for burial among his people. His kinsfolk and the Foxes and all the tribe mourned his death, and the women in his family gashed themselves with knives to show their grief. But none grieved more, or inflicted more cruel wounds upon herself than Beaver-woman, and for a whole year she wore ragged clothes, and let her hair hang down disheveled. Then, because she was still good-looking, men came once more to woo her, and at length, because her brothers urged her, she married an oldish man and bore him children. And her children, as they grew up, married and had children too. But all her life she could not forget those early days when White-dog came and took her as his wife.
*       *       *       *       *
The old woman paused.
“Thanks, grandmother, yours is a good story and a new one, too. What times! Aren’t we happy now to live in peace, without being disturbed by Sioux or Cheyenne and without the women being kidnapped by a society of our own?”
The old woman straightened up and looked at the youth with a disdainful glance. “You boys who go to school don’t understand anything. The longer you stay there, the less sense you have. I once hoped to cut down the sacred tree in the Sun Dance! I bore White-dog’s shield when the camp moved! I danced, holding his spear, with Turtle and all the other women looking on in envy! Little-owl died for love of me! White-dog threw away his life because he could not take me back!”
ROBERT H. LOWIE
A Trial of Shamans
Big-dog was troubled; he knew he should not sleep that night. White-hip, blind old White-hip, had passed him with a taunt. He did not mind the old fellow’s gibes, yet....
*       *       *       *       *
It all happened long ago. White-hip was stretched out in his lodge one night when a young kinsman named Shows-his-horse burst in upon him.
“They say you are a great medicine man, take pity on me, I am in distress.”
“Well, what ails you?”
“As I approached my tent this evening, a man came out, wrapped in his robe. He has stolen my wife; I want revenge.”
Then White-hip said, “You are my younger brother; I will help you. Who is it that has stolen your wife?”
Shows-his-horse replied, “It was Big-dog.”
Then White-hip shrank back and asked, “Are you sure it was Big-dog? The night is dark, you may have made a mistake.”
But the young man answered, “It was still light when I saw him,—a short, stocky man with the wolf-tails at his heels plainly visible dragging along the ground.”
White-hip said, “My younger brother, it is wrong for a man to mind the loss of a woman. If your joking-relatives should hear of this, they will sing songs in mockery of you. This is dangerous business. The Thunder himself has adopted Big-dog as his child.”
Then Shows-his-horse flared up. “They told me you were a great medicine man, that is why I came to you in my grief. I see you are afraid; your medicine is worthless.”
Then for a long time White-hip spoke not a word. At length he said, “It will be very difficult, but my medicine is strong. Though the Thunder himself be his father, I will lay him low.”
*       *       *       *       *
It happened that a few days later Big-dog set out on a war party against the Sioux. Then White-hip prayed to the sacred stone that was his medicine. And Big-dog’s war party was met by a superior force of Sioux that killed one of his followers and scattered the rest. There was grief in the Crow camp and the people were wondering about Big-dog’s first failure. But Shows-his-horse brought his three best horses as a gift to White-hip, and slowly the news leaked out that a trial of strength was on between the two great shamans of the tribe.
Soon after this event White-hip, too, wanted to go on the war-path, and the men who had been thwarted by Big-dog’s failure were eager to join him. But the very night they set out, Big-dog prayed to the Thunder: “I do not want you to afflict my people; only he that leads them shall meet with disaster.” And it rained and stormed in the war party’s path, and a tree, felled by lightening, grazed the captain’s shoulder. Then the braves were alarmed and insisted on turning back.
Thus, when either of the shamans had set out against the enemy, the other was sure to thwart him, till neither ventured on a war party, and the whole camp were wondering who should conquer in the end. At last Big-dog could contain himself no longer. Once more he addressed the Thunder: “These scars are from the flesh I cut as an offering to you, these finger-joints were chopped to make you a present. You made me your child. That one is mocking me and you. He thinks his is the greater medicine; smite him with blindness.”
And before the cherries had ripened, White-hip had lost his sight. Then Big-dog triumphed and the Crows all said that he was the greatest shaman they had ever had and that his medicine was the most powerful of all; and White-hip was deserted by all but his next of kin, and became so poor that for a while a rope served him for a belt.
But the blind man still had faith in his medicine and one day he thus invoked it: “His father has made me blind and miserable. I do not care if you can make _him_ miserable too. He has three sons. Kill them all and make him live till his skin cracks from old age and force him to beg his food from strangers.”
Then on the next war party Big-dog’s eldest son was slain by the Blackfoot; and people began to say that perhaps White-hip had not been conquered for good. And a year later his second eldest son died from sickness. Then the Crows all said it must be White-hip’s work. And before the leaves had turned yellow, the shaman’s last son was drowned in the Yellowstone. Then some said that, for all that, Big-dog had won, for he himself was well, while his enemy was blind. But others thought that White-hip, despite his blindness, had shown himself superior.
And as years passed, Big-dog grew infirm. He outlived his nearest kin and those more remote till no clansfolk remained. He would wander about from lodge to lodge, feasting on what strangers offered him in sheer compassion. He would hear mothers whispering to their children, “Big-dog was a great medicine man once and the whole tribe stood in awe of him, but White-hip had the greater medicine and laid him low.”
And just now White-hip had passed him with a taunt. He did not mind the blind fellow’s mockery, but one thought troubled and racked him and would not let him sleep at night: “Whose medicine was really the greater? Who had won?”
ROBERT H. LOWIE
Smoking-star, a Blackfoot Shaman
It was one evening in summer, the time of the long day, when the twilight is equally long, that I sat before the tepee fire of my host, Smoking-star. According to his own belief, he had seen the snows of nine times around his hands, or ninety years, as we count it. He was regarded as by far the oldest living Blackfoot, but his eye was bright and his memory good. That evening as we smoked in silence, I mused on the cross-section of man’s history this venerable life would reveal, if it could be read. I told him how I felt, and my pleasure if he would tell his story for me. He sat long and silently, as is the way of his people; then rose, and with great dignity, left the tepee. Presently he returned and when seated, said, “The Smoking-star, Mars, is high. He shines approvingly. I have long lived by his power. I believe He will not be offended if I tell you the story of my life.”
So runs the tale of old Smoking-star as near as my memory can follow:
*       *       *       *       *
My father’s name was Old-beaver, chief of the Small-robe band, to which band I still belong. My mother came from the Fat-roasting band, she was the younger wife of my father, her older sister being the first, or head-wife. A child always calls each of his father’s women _mother_ and also all the women married to father’s and mother’s brothers; just why this is we do not know, but it is our way. My father was very kind to me, but my older mother was cross.
I suppose I was born in a small tepee set up outside, for such is the custom. Also I suppose that for a time my mother laid aside all ornaments and affected carelessness of person. If anyone should gaze at her, she would say, “Don’t. My child will look like you; you are ugly, etc.” She was attended by women only, for men should not approach the birthplace. Even my father was not permitted to enter and it was many days before he saw me. In due time, I suppose, I was strapped to a cradle board. Later, a name was conferred upon me by my father, he being a chief. Unless a man is great, he does not name his child, but calls some man possessing these qualifications. Having once captured two guns from the Cree, my father told the story of that deed, or coup, and named me Two-guns. It is the belief that the qualities of the namer and the name itself pass to the child; hence great importance is given to the name and the conferring of it is a solemn occasion. The black-robe (priest) tells me it is much the same with your people.
Also, I suppose that when I got my first tooth, my grandmothers reminded my parents that it was time to do something. So a feast was made, presents given, and prayers offered. This was, no doubt, repeated when I took my first step and when I learned to speak. But I do remember having my ears pierced. That is the first memory of childhood. I can still see a terrible looking old grandmother standing up before me, holding up a bone awl. I was never so frightened in my life. You have seen how it is done at the sun dance, where some old woman cries out, “I quilled a robe, all with these hands. So I have the power to do this.” Just like a warrior recounting a coup.
My real mother never reproved me, but when I began to run about, my older mother did not like to have me meddling with her things. Often she would make threats to me in a kind of song, as—“There is a coyote outside. Come coyote, and eat up this naughty baby.” Again, “Come old Crooked-back woman; bring your meat pounder; smash this baby’s head.” The woman referred to was a crazy cripple who terrorized the children because some of them teased her. I was very much afraid, so that usually all my older mother need say was, “Sh-h-h!” and mumble something about the coyote or the woman. I have noticed that among your people, parents strike their children. That is not our way. If they will not listen to advice, an uncle may be called upon to exercise discipline and if necessary he will punish, but whipping is the way of the police societies. Once I saw the police whip a chief because he broke the rules of the buffalo hunt.
Soon I began to play with the older boys; in winter we spun tops on the ice and in the snow, coasted the hills on toboggans made of buffalo ribs, or just stood up on a dry skin, holding up the end. In summer there were all kinds of games: racing, follow-the-leader, arrow games, the wheel game, etc. I had a hobby-horse, made of a bent stick, with a saddle and bridle, upon which I played running buffalo and going to war. I even learned to play tricks upon old people. Sometimes we would be playing where old women came to gather firewood and when one of them had a great heap of wood on her pack line, she would squat with her back against the wood, the lines in her hands, and call for us to help raise the load; occasionally, we would assist until she reached her feet and then, with a quick push, send her sprawling with the wood on top. Then we would run away to escape a beating. Again, as water was carried in pails made of buffalo paunch, some boys would ambush the path and shoot an arrow into the pail, letting out the water. But usually we let older people alone, for, if caught, we were severely handled.
When about six years old one of my grandfathers made me a bow; he prayed for me and said if I killed anything I should bring in the scalp to prove it. He told me the story of Scar-face and the dangerous birds. Some time after this I killed a bird, my first, and my father made a feast, calling in many great men, who smoked many pipes, told of great deeds and predicted that I would be a great warrior. The skin of the bird was put into my grandfather’s war bundle.
When we traveled my mother carried me on her saddle or put me on a travois, hitched to a dog or some trusty old mare. But when I was old enough to ride alone, my father went on the war-path to the Assiniboin country and brought back six horses; one pony he gave to me. Before I learned to ride it well, it was stolen by the Cree. At the same time my older mother was killed and scalped while out picking berries. All this made a deep impression upon me and I resolved to prepare for the war-path and to take vengeance on the Cree, particularly for the loss of my pony. In the meantime my father gave me another pony.
One morning when I was about eleven years old, I was terribly frightened to find a man from a police society standing at the door, shouting for me to come out at once. It was cold and stormy, but he ordered me to the water for a plunge and when I stood on the bank whimpering, he threw me headlong into the icy current. The older boys were splashing about gaily, but it was hard for me. When I crept back to the tepee, shivering, my old grandmother began to sing a derisive song about a would-be warrior who turned to an old woman. After that I went daily to the bath and soon became hard and strong.
The next summer our people were camped on Milk River where buffalo were plenty. The berries were just turning. One day while herding the horses I fell to eating berries and that night became ill. The next day I was very sick and a doctor was sent for. Old One-ear came, a man all of us feared, sat by my bed, beat upon a drum, sang in a loud voice, then turned down the robes that covered me, held a tube of bone against my breast and sucked violently. Then he arose and spat out a grasshopper. Everyone said that I would soon be well, and I was. But while I was too weak to go out, my grandfather came in and told me tales of the war-path and occasionally of the Lost Children, the Woman-who-went-to-the-sky, Morningstar, Scar-face, Blood-clot, and other tales. I came to take a deep interest in these tales and to think more and more of going to war. When I could go out, my people were holding the sun dance and one evening I heard my father reciting his coups, putting on the fire a stick for each. At last when there was a great blaze from so much wood, the people all shouted. It was a proud moment for me and from then on I began to train for the war-path.
Before cold weather our people separated, as was their custom, and our band, with the Fat-roasters and the Many-medicines, made winter camp on the Two Medicine River. It was a cold winter, but buffalo were plenty and we did not mind. In the spring my father led a war party against the Crow. I knew nothing of it until they had gone, but even had I known, he would not have taken me. I felt very sad and spent most of the time sitting on a hill, meditating. One day, on coming to camp I heard the women and even old men wailing. I saw my mother before our door hacking her bare leg with her butchering knife. Then I knew what had happened. The camp crier began to shout out that a runner had come in from a distant camp to say that Old-beaver and all his party had been killed by the Crows. When I met my old grandmother, with blood streaming down her bare arms, the sight sickened me and I fled to the hilltop and meditated further. As I thought of how coup had been counted on my father, my anger grew and I vowed to take a Crow scalp at the first opportunity.
Our camp mourned long after this. It was also necessary to select a new chief. One Good-runner was well thought of and was our choice, but an evil-minded fellow named Crow-eye sought the place. Finding that he was in disfavor, Crow-eye secretly loaded a gun, entered the tepee of Good-runner and shot him down. Crow-eye’s relatives put him on a horse and sent him away for a few days, while they made presents to the relatives of Good-runner. Well, in the end Crow-eye became chief, but it was a sorry time for us all.
As was the custom, my mother went to live with her people, or the Fat-roasting band. My mother’s brother now took an interest in me. He gave me a gun. Guns were scarce in those days. My grandfather remembered when the first gun came to us and said that his father knew when the first horse came. I now spent much of my time with my uncle, though I still looked upon the Small-robes band as my band. He helped me to buy a place in the Pigeon Society and every spring and summer I danced with them and sometimes helped guard the camp at night when the great camp circle was formed.
It was during the summer following my father’s death that I was taken on my first buffalo hunt. Sometimes boys were severely whipped by the police if found joining in running buffalo before they were old enough. But now my uncle took me with him. As guns were scarce, we kept them for war, and killed buffalo with arrows. When we rode at the herd, I took after a young cow. She was very fleet, but at last I drew alongside and sent an arrow into her. When she fell I stood by in awe. My relations praised me and my mother tanned the skin to make a robe for me. I was now a hunter and always joined in the killing unchallenged.
That autumn my mother ceased to mourn and married a man in the Lone-eaters band. After this I saw little of her, for they camped apart and I stayed with my uncle, but danced with my father’s band, the Small-robes. About this time my uncle explained to me the ways of women and the duties of a man, so I began to look forward to having a woman of my own. I began to practice on the flageolet and to seek meetings with the girls of the camp on the path to the water hole; but I knew that though I had become a hunter, I had yet to go to war and to become a man. The opportunity soon came, for I was now about fourteen years old.
One day my uncle said, “Now it is time for you to go to war. When the moon is full, I shall lead a party to the Crow country. You can be the water boy.” You know how it was with us, a boy might be taken to war to do errands. This is how he got his experience.
My uncle had a war bundle, or medicine, in which were a collar of coyote skin, a bird to tie in his hair, some tobacco, a pipe, paints, a whistle and a rattle. Every night we gathered in his tepee to sing the songs of his bundle and to work out the plan for our raid. At last, we were off, eight of us. Though still a boy, I was permitted to take my gun, my bow, and a knife. As we were leaving the tepee my old grandmother asked me not to go; she took my hand and began to wail, but I pulled away. At the edge of the camp stood my uncle’s father-in-law. He pled for all to return. Said he, “I have many horses, more than you can get from the Crow. Take what you want and stay at home. I am old and have not long to be with you.” But we marched by in silence.
Pranks are usually played upon a boy on his first war excursion. The first night one of the warriors said, “Take this pail and run down that path for water, it is far.” I set out briskly only to step into a a deep pool of ill-smelling mud. About this I was teased, and all manner of jokes were made. Of course, the warriors knew the pool was there. They joked about my new paint, my new way of deceiving an enemy, my new perfume (love medicine), and so on. Finally one man in a very solemn manner conferred a new name upon me—Stinking-legs. From that time on, all of them called me by that name.
But by the next night we were in the open country and there was little hilarity. My uncle opened his bundle and performed the ritual for it, all of us singing in a low subdued tone. After this we traveled mostly by night and slept by day, though the warriors took turns scouting. On the fourth day, a scout reported the enemy.
“Now,” said my uncle, “it is time to sing the ‘tapping-the-stick.’” So we all sat in a circle and my uncle began singing very softly, keeping time by tapping lightly on the stock of his gun with the end of his pipe-stick. He sang about a love affair and at the end named the woman. So it went around the circle. The last man, next to me, sang, and then named a young girl I was very fond of. Instinctively, I grasped my knife, but then, Oh shame! I was not yet a warrior, for here no one must resent. So I desisted, but I lay awake the rest of the day struggling with my anger. This was all very foolish, for the man was only teasing me; yet few men would venture to jest in such songs.
That night we stole out and found the Crow camp unguarded. So we took all the loose horses grazing outside and made off with them. Not even a dog barked. When at a safe distance my uncle told us to follow a warrior named Running-crane, that he and one man were going back to get scalps to pay for my father’s death, that they would join us at the rendezvous later. My uncle was accompanied by the man who sang about my girl. On the third day my uncle overtook us, but he was alone. What became of his companion he knew not; he was never seen after they separated to steal into the Crow camp. That was what came of jesting with medicine songs. All holy things must be respected. But my uncle had brought a scalp, a shield, and a gun. So we were happy.
When we got home there was feasting and scalp dancing for all. Finally, my old grandmother drew me out into full view, harangued the crowd upon my greatness as a warrior and said, “Now you must have been given a new name. What is it?” I hung my head for shame, “Oh!” she said, “my grandson is modest.”
Then my uncle came forward and told the story of the mud hole and called me, “Stinking-legs.” Then merriment broke loose and for a long time I was teased about it.
Two of the captured horses were allotted to me: one I gave to my grandfather. Not long after my uncle told me it was time to seek power. This meant that I must fast and sacrifice, seeking a vision. So I took my other Crow horse to old Medicine-bear, a shaman, offered him a pipe, and made my request. My instruction took many weeks. I was introduced to the sweat house and other ceremonies, learned how to make the pipe offering, to cry for power, and so forth. At last all was ready and old Medicine-bear left me alone on a high hill to fast, dance, and pray. Each evening and morning he came and, standing afar off, exhorted me to greater efforts. By the third day I was too exhausted to stand. That night I lay on my back looking up at the sky. Then I saw the Smoking-star.[2] And as I gazed it came nearer and nearer. Then I heard a voice, “My son, why do you cry here?” Then I saw a fine warrior sitting on the ground before me, smoking my pipe. At last he said, “I will give you power. You are to take my name. You must never change it. Always pray to me and I will help you.”
The next morning when old Medicine-bear came and stood afar off I said, “Something has been given me.” Then he prayed and took me home. In due time he heard my story, composed a song for me, gave me a small medicine bundle and announced my new name. I was now a man of power. Many young men offered to go to war with me, so I soon began to lead out parties. Many _coups_ I counted as the years passed, but all came by the power of the Smoking-star. Only once did this power seem to fail me on the war-path. I was alone and surrounded by the Cree. At last I called upon the Sun, offering to give him my little finger. Then I overcame my enemies. So at the next sun dance I chopped off this finger (the left) and offered it to the sun to fulfil my vow. But this belongs to the second period in my life, of which I shall speak later.
Shortly after I saw the Smoking-star, I took a woman. My uncle and my grandparents had often hinted of marriage. I was particularly fond of a girl in the Small-robe band, but could not court her openly because that was my band by right of my father, though I lived with the band of my mother, the Fat-roasters. It is not good for a man to marry in his own band where most of his relatives live, but he can freely marry a woman of his mother’s band, if not too closely related to her. I could have joined my mother’s band, as my uncle urged, and then married the girl, but that seemed to me like evading my duty to uphold the honor of my father and to take revenge for his untimely death. People would talk about it. So I courted a girl in my mother’s band. As she was not closely related to me, there was no hindrance. Our courtship was secret, as is often the custom; when I led out my first war party she slyly passed me a pair of moccasins. I think no one knew of our attachment. You see my mother’s people all looked upon me as one of their band, though they should not have done so, and so looked elsewhere for my future woman. Long afterward I learned that they had picked a woman for me from the Blood band, the widow of a young warrior, a good woman some ten years older than I, but it turned out otherwise.
The girl I courted was named Elk-woman. She and I were nearing twenty and it was time for her to marry, past time in fact. So her relatives arranged to give her to a man of the They-don’t-laugh-band. The relatives of both parties had feasted and talked over the affair and were about ready to exchange the first presents, when Elk-woman’s relatives first suggested the marriage to her. She asked for time to think it over. That evening when I met her as usual in a secret place, she told me the story and cried. Such a marriage was repugnant to her. I knew the man and had already come to dislike him. So that night we ran away. I took my horse, gun, and bow. We rode double. We went far up into the foothills of the mountains and made a secret camp.
Some two weeks later my uncle trailed us and we had a talk. He said I had done a very foolish thing; that all of my woman’s relatives were angry and that the prospective husband vowed vengeance. However, as he had himself made the man a present of a horse and smoked a pipe with him, his anger was waning. He thought that since I had always adhered to my father’s band I should go there to live. Anyway my father’s people would then protect me. In due time presents could be made to my parents-in-law. You see when a man takes a woman, he is required to give many presents to her parents; this is called paying for her. So, I had stolen my woman because nothing had been paid. This would always stand against me in the minds of the people.
The next day we went back to my father’s band. A poor old woman, an aunt of my father, one of my grandmothers, as we say, took us in as we had no tepee. No one seemed to take notice of us. When I hunted I took some of the meat and left it by the door of my father-in-law, as was the custom. Finally, my uncle’s relatives got together and collected six horses, a few robes, a warrior’s suit, and a great lot of dried meat. In solemn procession they paraded over to the camp of my parents-in-law. Then followed a feast and a reconciliation.
Not long after this I happened to meet my mother-in-law in a path. No one must see the face of his mother-in-law; if he does he must make her a present to cover her shame. This accident cost me my gun. It was a grievous loss as we were still poor. My woman had not so much as a travois-dog to bring wood.
At this point the narrator paused and began to fill his pipe. Presently he said, “The Smoking-star is still overhead. We have reached the fork of the first trail; the boy becomes a hunter, goes to war, has a vision, he joins the Pigeons, then marries and takes his place among the men of his band. So far he travels but one trail. Thenceforth it is different with us, some become warriors, some medicine men, some are chiefs. It is well that we rest here a little while, before I go on.”
When the pipe was burned out the story began thus:—
Some time before I was married I bought into the Mosquito society when they sold out to the Pigeons. It was this way with us: There were nine societies for men, of different rank as follows; Mosquitoes, Braves, All-brave-dogs, Front-tails, Raven-bearers, Dogs, Kit-foxes, Catchers, and Bulls. Lower than all was a boy’s society, the Pigeons. To enter these societies you first bought into the Pigeons; that is, you gave presents to an older member who in return transferred his membership to you. Every four years each of the nine men’s societies sold to the next lower; so one might finally, if he lived to be an old man, become a member of the Bulls. These societies were spoken of as the All-comrades. Each had its own songs, dances, regalia, and ritual. When the whole tribe came together for the summer hunt and the sun dance, these societies were called upon to guard and police the camp. Their parades and dances through the camp were very impressive. As all the members of a society were near the same age, these organizations are often called age-societies by the white people.
In time I passed through all of the societies and became a Bull. When in the Raven-bearers we gave a dance at a trading post where Fort Benton now stands and two strange white men watched us. One of them drew a picture of us and afterwards the older man asked questions of me through an interpreter and wrote something in a book. I heard that he came from across the great water as did the first white people, but I never saw him again.[3]
When with my comrades in the Bulls we sold out to the Catchers, I became one of the old men to sit in council and advise the people. There are two leaders for each society. I was never a leader, because the leaders of one always sold to the leaders of the lower, and it so happened during my life that the same two men lived to reach the Bulls. So there was no chance for anyone else to lead. But we are now far ahead of my story, I must begin with my life as one of the young married men.
After I came back with my woman to live in my band, old Medicine-bear often sat in our tepee. (My woman soon tanned skins from my hunting and made a large fine tepee of our own.) He wished me to become a shaman like himself. You see I had experienced a real vision, few men who fasted received such power as came to me. I had the power to become a shaman, but I held to my vow to be a warrior. I was poor. So I led war parties against the Cree, Assiniboin, Snake, and Crow. Many horses and guns I took. Coups I counted and took three scalps from the Crow. But I meditated often upon the powers in the air, water, and earth. They are the great mysteries. Everything is done by them. About this time two things happened to me that turned my thoughts from war.
Our chief led a party against the Cree and invited me to go. The chief was jealous of me. As I told you, he was a bad man, but I could not refuse. Medicine-bear, the shaman, went with us to give us power. When we reached the Cree country I was ordered out as a scout. It was dark. As I went along I saw a tepee all by itself. I went up to it quietly and looked in. There was no one in the tepee except a man, his wife, and a little child. The little child could just walk and was amusing itself by dipping soup from the kettle with a small horn spoon. The man and his wife were busy talking and paid no attention to the child. Now the child looked up and saw me peeping through the hole, toddled over to the kettle, dipped up some soup in the spoon and held it to my lips. I drank and the child returned to the kettle for more. In this way the child fed me for many minutes. Then I went away. As I went along to my own party, I thought to myself, “I do not like to do this, but I must tell my party about this tepee. When they know of it, they will come and kill these people. This little child fed me even when I was spying upon them, and I do not like to have it killed. Well, perhaps I can save the child; but then it would be too bad for it to lose its parents. No, I do not see how I can save them, yet I cannot bear to have them killed.” I sat down and thought it over. After a while, I went back to the tepee, went in, and sat down. While my host was preparing the pipe, the child began to feed me again with the spoon. After we had smoked, I talked to the man in the sign-language, told him all about it, how I had come as a scout to spy upon them, how I was about to bring up my war party, but that they had been saved by the little child. Then I directed the man to go at once, leaving everything behind him in the tepee.
The man was very thankful and offered to give me a medicine bundle and a suit of clothes; but I refused, because I knew that my party would suspect me. Then the man suggested that he might place the bundle near the door, behind the bedding, so that when the war party came up and dashed upon the tepee, I would be the first to capture the bundle. (All the important property of the tepee is always kept at the back, opposite the door, and, when a war party rushes in, the swiftest runs to this place.)
Then I reported to my chief, telling him that I had discovered a camp of the enemy but that I had not been up to it or seen anyone. He started out at once, all of us following. When we had surrounded the tepee, we gave a whoop and rushed upon it. I kept behind and while the others were busy counting coup upon the things in the back of the tepee, I seized the bundle by the door. The chief was angry, but said nothing. When we were again in camp old Medicine-bear began to unwrap his war medicine pipe to make a thank offering for our success. Then the chief faced me and denounced me as a traitor, accused me of warning the enemy and secreting the medicine bundle. My anger rose, I drew my knife, but at that moment old Medicine-bear sprang between us, holding the holy pipe in both hands. This is the custom, no one can fight over a holy pipe. The shaman made us each take the pipe and vow to put away our anger and hold our silence. So it was.
Never have I forgotten that little child. Some great power was guarding it. Its medicine was strong. Many times have I prayed to that power and sometimes it helped me, but I do not yet know what power it is. Yet somehow I took little interest in war, the child’s medicine did that to me.
The next year I felt sad and gloomy. So I decided to go to war anyway. I led out a party of my own against the Crow. The fourth night I went out to scout. It was cloudy and rather dark. As I was stealing along a marshy place, a star rose out of the earth and stood before me. It was the Smoking-star. Something in me said, “Follow.” Then the star led off slowly; gradually it took me to the back trail and then swiftly faded away, as it moved toward my woman’s tepee at home. I sat down and prayed. In my mind the Smoking-star was telling me to go back.
When dawn came I returned to my party. I told my story. All agreed that we should go home for the signs were against us. When I got into our camp I saw many people standing about my woman’s tepee and heard a doctor’s drum. My son, my first born, was very ill. Three doctors had been called, one after the other. I gave them all my horses. As is their way, when they feared the sick one would die, they departed. At last, I went out to the top of a hill to cry to the Smoking-star. Surely, I thought, he would help me, but clouds overcast the sky and there was no answer to my appeal. That morning the boy died.
In the afternoon the body was wrapped in a robe and placed in a tree near our camp. As he died in the tepee, we could not use it again so we placed it at the foot of the tree. I cropped my hair and mourned many days. Now I was poor. All my horses went to the doctors. My woman’s tepee was gone and once again we lived with our poor old grandmother in her little ragged tepee; but in a few days my woman’s relatives gave her another tepee and after a time we again accumulated horses.
About this time Medicine-bear became a beaver bundle owner. My misfortunes turned my mind more and more to the mysteries of the powers around us and I began to learn the songs and the teachings of the beaver men. The ritual for the beaver bundle is long and difficult. There are more than three hundred songs to be learned before one can lead the ceremony of the beaver. In the bundle are the skins of beavers, otters, and many kinds of birds and water animals. With each of these there are songs, for each brought some power to the man who first saw it in a vision. My people did not plant corn, as did the Mud-houses (Mandan and Hidatsa), but the beaver men planted tobacco. At the planting and the gathering of the tobacco, the beaver bundle is opened and the ritual sung. The garden and the plants are sacred, for tobacco must be offered to all the powers of the earth, and of the water. A beaver man must keep count of the days, the moons, and the winters. For this he keeps a set of sticks like those sometimes found in a beaver’s house. At all times he must be ready to tell the moon and the day; he must say when it is time to go on the spring hunt, to hold the sun dance, etc. Then he must watch the sun, moon, stars, winds, and clouds so that he may know what the weather will be. If he is holy and good, he will have visions and dreams of power and so become a shaman.
So after my son died I often sat with the beaver men. In time I learned many of the beaver songs and became chief assistant to Medicine-bear in the ceremonies. When I was an old man, Medicine-bear died; it was the year before I sold out of the Bull society (the year we saw the first steamboat). Then I became the leading beaver man, as I am still.
When I first began to study the beaver medicine, I spent hours on the hilltops and near the waters, meditating and watching the birds, animals, and the heavens. Yet such solemn thoughts did not occupy all my time as a young married man.
There was much sport in the winter camps. Many men played the wheel and arrow game and again the hand game. These were the favorite gambling games. The first was for two players, but the latter permitted team playing. Some men gambled away all their belongings and even their women. I never went so far. Once I remember two young men played the wheel game until one lost all his possessions except his moccasins and his breechcloth, finally losing these, to the great merriment of the whole camp.
My band had a great reputation for jokes. In this I was a leader. Once in the spring we fooled a man named Bow-string. This man had a favorite race horse which he guarded very carefully, picketing him outside his tepee. One day I dressed myself to look like a Crow, and while Bow-string was inside playing the hand game, untied his horse and led him off up the hills across the creek. Then a confederate gave the alarm. All ran out to see a Crow going off with the horse in broad day. Of course, everyone knew the trick, but Bow-string. Care had been taken to send all the other horses of the camp out to pasture with a herder. So Bow-string took a gun and set out with a pursuing party, afoot. Everybody in camp appeared to be greatly frightened, women screamed, and all the dogs began to bark. As the supposed Crow, I sprang upon the horse, waved a defiance and dashed over the hill.
Once out of sight I rode quickly around the hills and got back to camp after the pursuers had passed over the ridge. After a fruitless search for the trail, the party came back, Bow-string looking very sad. But there stood his horse tied as before! Then there was great uproar and jesting.
A favorite trick of mine was often played upon visiting strangers, especially upon dignified old men. I would invite the guest to my tepee to feast with a few of my friends. Then I would pretend to quarrel with my woman and we would fall to fighting. The others would try to separate us and so all begin to struggle, taking care to fall upon and thoroughly muss up the puzzled visitor.
Our people were fond of liquor, which could be had when we went to the trading posts in summer. At such times there was much fighting. We all wanted liquor because we believed that some mysterious power could be had in that way. Some men had visions while drunk, that made them shamans or doctors according to the powers that were given them. Sometimes I drank liquor too. Once when my woman was drunk also, we quarreled and I threatened to tomahawk her smallest child, but she snatched a burning stick from the fire and thrust the glowing end against my neck; you see the scar. After that I did not drink much. I was glad when the Great Father stopped the trading of liquor, it did us much harm.
Once a year in summer all the bands of our tribe camped together. A great circle of tepees was formed and the societies had charge of the camp. At this time the sun dance was held. It was very sacred and lasted many days. No man was wise enough to know how all parts of it were conducted, so many medicine men were needed for the different rituals. Some men would vow to torture themselves at this time. I once gave a finger to the sun, but that is not the real sacrifice. Those who made the vow have holes cut in the skin of their breasts and shoulders, through which sticks are thrust and cords attached. The ends of these cords are fastened to the center pole in the sun dance lodge, where these devotees dance and cry for power until they tear themselves free or fall in a swoon: I never made this sacrifice. I was afraid, for it is very holy. Yet many times have I given bits of my skin to Natos (the sun) as the scars upon my body show. These were not given in the sun dance, but when I was fasting alone in the hills.
A good and virtuous woman may often save the lives of her relatives by making a vow to take the tongues at the sun dance. My woman did this in the year known as “Gambler-died-winter” (about 1845, according to most tribal counts). Her brother was about to die. So she went outside, looked up at the sun, and said, “I will take the tongue at the sun dance.” Her brother got well. If she had not been a pure and good woman, he would have died. In due time old Medicine-bear, the beaver bundle man, was given a horse and called in to prepare her for the ordeal. During the spring a hundred buffalo tongues were sliced and dried. Only true women are permitted to slice them. If a woman cuts her finger or cuts a hole in her slice, she is turned out because she has not been true to her husband. At the proper time in the sun dance, as the sun is setting, the women who have vowed to take the tongues go forward and in turn, take up a piece of tongue and holding it up to the sun, declare their purity. It is the duty of any man, who knows the claim to be false to come forward with a challenge. My woman was not challenged. Everyone knew her to be pure and good.
Once she was the holy woman to give the sun dance. It was in the deep snow winter (about 1851) that she became ill. Many people were starving, for the buffalo had drifted far before the snowstorms. Then my woman addressed the sun, saying that she would give the sun dance, next year. Soon the people found buffalo and she got well.
A woman cannot give the sun dance alone, her man must also be good and brave. Both must fast four days and sit in the holy tepee. The holy natoas bundle must be opened and the woman wear its sacred headdress, with the prairie turnip and carry the digging-stick used by the Woman-who-married-a-star. That winter we were camped on the Missouri. The following summer we went to Yellow River to give the sun dance.
Now, it is our way, that the woman who vows to give the sun dance must buy a natoas bundle. The power and right to the ritual thus come to her. For this, many horses, robes, and dried meat must be given. When we came to bring our bundle all the people of our band and our relatives in other bands were called upon to help us by gifts. After the sun dance we kept the natoas bundle in our tepee and cared for it as the ritual required. My woman was now a medicine woman. She did not sell her bundle. In the Blood-fought-among-themselves winter she died (about 1858). I put the bundle in her robe, set up her tepee on a high hill and left her there. That is our custom.
She was a good and true woman. After that I went to live with my son, as you now see. I never took another woman because the Smoking-star appeared to me in a dream and forbade it.
In the course of time everyone came to look upon me as a shaman. No one will now walk before me as I sit in a tepee. In my presence all are dignified and orderly and avoid frivolous talk. Four times in my life the Smoking-Star has stood before me. All visions are sacred, as are some dreams, but when a vision appears the fourth time, it is very holy. Even a shaman may not speak of it freely. Many times have I gone to lonely places and cried out to the powers of the air, the earth, and the waters to help me understand their ways. Sometimes they have answered me, but all the truly great mysteries are beyond understanding.
In the year of the Camp-at-bad-waters-winter the Bull society sold out as I have said. That was the end of that society; there were but three of us left when we sold to the Catchers and those to whom we sold soon died. The ways of the white man were coming among us and many things were passing away. I was now an old man, fit only for sitting in council. I could no longer run buffalo, no longer go to war. So we have come to the last fork in the trail. I have smoked many pipes. I have sat in many councils, I have made many speeches to restrain our young men from rash and unjust actions. We are near the end. The Smoking-star will soon pass down in the west. Soon it will lead me to the sand hills where my spirit will wander about among the ghosts of buffalo, horses, and men. Your way is not our way, but you have loved us. Perhaps your spirit also may return to wander with us among the sand hills of our fathers. I pray that it may be so. Now, it is finished.
*       *       *       *       *
Thoughtfully I left that fireside to find my blankets. As I passed out through the night, I saw the “Smoking-star” sinking in the west. It shone to me with a new light. The next winter my old friend passed into the beyond. His body was laid on a tree scaffold near the favorite haunts of his band on Two Medicine River.
CLARK WISSLER
Little-wolf Joins the Medicine Lodge
I
IN THE LODGE OF THE MASTER
Matcikineu, Terrible-eagle, sat dozing in the dusk in his round, rush-mat wigwam. The fire smouldered, but random drafts, slipping in through the swinging mat that covered the door, encouraged little dancing flames to spring up, and these illumined the far interior of the lodge, so that it was possible to observe its furnishings down to the mustiest cranny.
Around the inner circumference of the wigwam, ran a broad rustic bench, supported by forked sticks and thickly strewn balsam boughs on which lay bearskin robes. The inner wall of the home was hung with woven reed mats, bearing designs in color, of angular figures and conventional floral motifs. Over Terrible-eagle’s head, on smoke encrusted poles, swung several mat-covered, oval bundles, festooned with age-blackened gourd rattles, war clubs, and utensils and weapons of unusual portent. These were his sacred war and hunting bundles, packets of charms whose use and accompanying formulæ he had obtained personally from the Gods, while fasting, or purchased at a great price from others more fortunate than he. For Terrible-eagle was a renowned war leader, a hunter, and the greatest of all Mätc Mitäwûk, Masters of the Grand Medicine Society, a secret fraternal and medical organization, to which, in one form or another, nearly every Indian of influence in all the Great Lakes and Central Western region belonged.
The door covering was quietly thrust aside and Anäm, a wolf-like dog, trotted in to curl up by the fire, while after him, first dropping a load of faggots from her shoulders, stumbled Wábano-mitämu, Dawn-woman, wife of Terrible-eagle, who crouched down grumbling to enter the lodge, and turned on her time-gnarled knees to drag the kindlings in after her.
Roused by the noise, Terrible-eagle stretched and yawned, then reached over his head and took down a calabash-shell rattle, which he began to shake gently, while Dawn-woman shoved aside the birch-bark boxes that cluttered the floor, stirred up the fire in the round, shallow pit where it was glowing, and set among the hot embers a large, round, deep, pointed-bottomed kettle of brown earthenware, the base of which she screwed into the ashes by a quick, circular twist of the rim. Into this kettle she poured some water from a birch-bark pail; and, when it began to simmer, added a quantity of wild rice, smoked meat, and dried berries, which she stirred with an elaborate wooden-spoon paddle.
The random swish of Terrible-eagle’s rattle now began to articulate itself in the form of a tune, the motif of which might have been borrowed from the night babblings and murmurings of a woodland brook. It rose like the prattle of water racing down stony riffles; it fell to the purring monotone of a little fall burbling into a deep pool.
Then, suddenly, Terrible-eagle raised his voice in song—a song without meaning to the uninitiated—yet a song potent with the powers of Manitous, and ancient as the pine forests.
“Ni mánituk, häwatûkuk, kê’nêäminûm.”
“You, my gods, I am singing to you!”
“Look you, old fellow,” cried Dawn-woman, squatting beside her cooking, “why do you sing that sacred song? There is no need to rehearse the chants of the Manitous when ice binds the rivers, and snow blankets the land! When new life dawns with the grass blades in the spring, then we will need to refresh our memories; not now, while the gods sleep like bears.”
“Silence, old partner! You do not know everything! Even now there comes one seeking the knowledge of the path our brethren and fellows have trod before us. Listen!”
The lodge was hushed with the heavy silence of the Wisconsin forest in midwinter. Then came the crunch and squeak of approaching snowshoes slipping over the crusted drifts.
“N’hau, Dawn-woman! Prepare the guest place, spread robes behind the fire, dish out a bowl of soup! Some one of our people desires to enter!”
The noise ceased before the doorway, and Terrible-eagle, now hunched before the fire, paused before dropping a hot coal on the tobacco in his red stone pipe, to bid the guest to enter. “Yoh!” came the hearty response, and a tall, dark warrior, bareheaded save for a fillet of otter fur around his brows, ducked under the doorway and silently passed round the fire, on the left, to the guest place, where he seated himself, cross-legged, on a pile of robes. He was clad in a plain shirt of blue-dyed deerskin, deeply fringed on the seams, in flapping, leather leggings, high soft-soled moccasins, and a leather apron handsomely embroidered with colored porcupine quills wrought in delicate, flowered figures. He bore no weapon, and on his swarthy cheeks two round spots of red paint were seen in the firelight.
After the newcomer had eaten a bowl of steaming stew with the aid of a huge, wooden ladle, he lay back among the robes, puffing comfortably on a long-stemmed pipe with bowl of red stone, filled and lighted for him by the old man. As the cheerful odor of tobacco and kinnikinick permeated the lodge, the stranger began to speak. He informed the old people that his name was Muhwäsê, Little-wolf, of the Wave clan of the Menomini, that he had come all the way from Mätc Suamäko, the Great Sand Bar village on the Green Bay of Lake Michigan; that the young men had opened their war bundles, and danced preparatory to going to war against the Sauk, but that the Sauk had heard the news and fled southward. He ended with all the gossip and tittle-tattle of his band.
It was not until Dawn-woman slept, and the stars were visible in the winter sky through the smoke hole of the lodge, that Little-wolf went out abruptly, and returned bearing a huge bundle which he dumped on the floor at the feet of Terrible-eagle, and silently took his place on the lounge once more.
With trembling hands the old man undid the leathern thongs and unwrapped the bearskin with which the bundle was enclosed, and spread before him an array of articles that brought an avaricious sparkle to his red-rimmed eyes.
“Nimá, nékan! Well done, my colleague!” he exclaimed. “These are valuable gifts, and in the proper number. Four hatchets, four spears, and four knives of the sacred yellow rock (native copper), four belts of white wampum, and four garments of tanned deerskin, embroidered with quillwork, with much tobacco. Surely this gift has a meaning?”
“Grandfather! You to whom nothing is hard,” replied the visitor. “It is true that I am nobody. I am poor—the enemy scarcely know my name. Yet I am desirous of eating the food of the Medicine Lodge, as all the brethren have done who have passed this way before me!”
“N’hau, my grandson! I shall call together the three other Pushwäwûk, or masters, for their consent. What you have asked for, may seem as nothing to you—yet it is Life. These songs may appear to partake of the ways of children—yet they are powerful. I understand you well; you desire to imitate the ways of our own ancient Grand Master, Mä’näbus, who was slain and brought to life that we might gain life unending! Good! You have done well. In the morning I shall send invitation-sticks and tobacco to summon the leaders here, that your instruction may begin at once!”
II
THE INSTRUCTION
It was an hour after sunset. In the rear of the lodge sat Terrible-eagle and three other old men, with Little-wolf at their left. Before them lay the pile of valuable gifts, and, on the white-tanned skin of an unborn fawn, stood the sacred towaka or deep drum, hollowed by infinite labor from a short section of a basswood log, holding two fingers’ depth of water to make its voice resonant, and covered with a dampened membrane of tanned, buck hide. Across its head was balanced a crooked drumstick, its striking end carved to represent a loon’s beak. Before the drum, was placed a wooden bowl in the shape of a minature, log canoe heaped with tobacco, and four gourd rattles with wooden handles which shone from age and usage. A youth tended the fire and kept the air redolent with incense of burning sweet grass and cedar. Dawn-woman and Anäm, the dog, guarded the door.
Extending his hands over the sacred articles before them, Terrible-eagle began a prayer of invocation, calling on the mythical hero and founder of the Medicine Lodge, Mä’näbus, on the Great Spirit, the Sun, and the Thunder-birds; on the good-god Powers or Manitous of air and earth, and also upon the Evil Powers who dwell in and under the earth and water and hidden in the dismal places of the world, to appear in spirit and accept the tobacco offered them and to dedicate the fees presented to the instructors.
When the prayer was ended, all those gathered in the wigwam ejaculated “Hau,” and three of the elders smoked and listened while Terrible-eagle began the instruction by relating the history of the origin of the Medicine Lodge. Taking the drumstick in his hand, Terrible-eagle gave four distinct strokes on the drum, and recited in a rhythmic and solemn tone, hushing his voice to a whisper when it became necessary to mention a great Power by name.
He told how Mätc Häwätûk, the Great Spirit, sat alone in the heavenly void above the ever extending sea, and willed that an island (the world) should appear there; how he further willed that there should spring up upon this island, an old woman who was known as “Our Grandmother, The Earth.” He recited how the Earth Grandmother conceived, supernaturally, and gave birth to a daughter. How the Four winds, desiring to be born as men, entered the daughter’s body and lay as twins in her womb, and how, when the hour of their birth came, so great was their power, they burst their mother, making women forever after liable to death in travail.
“Then,” related Terrible-eagle, “our Earth Grandmother gathered up the shattered pieces of her daughter, and placed them under an inverted, wooden bowl, and prayed, and on the fourth day, through the pity of the Great Spirit, the fragments were changed into a little rabbit, who was named Mätc Wábus, or the Great Hare, since corrupted into ‘Mä’näbus,’ who was to prepare the world for human habitation.
“The rabbit grew, in human form, to man’s estate, when he was given, as a companion and younger brother, a little wolf, but the Powers Below, being jealous, slew the wolf brother. Then, Mä’näbus in his wrath attacked the Powers below, and, as he was the child of the Great Spirit, they could not resist him. In fear the Evil Powers restored his younger brother to life, but, since he had been dead four days, the flesh dropped from his bones and he stank, and Mä’näbus, in sorrow, refused to receive him, and sent him to rule the dead in the After World, at the end of the Milky Way in the Western Heavens. Hence, human beings may not come back to life on the fourth day.
“At their wits’ end to appease Mä’näbus, the Evil Ones called on the Powers Above who are of good portent. They erected a Medicine Lodge on the high hilltops, oblong, rectangular, facing east and west. The Power of the Winds roofed it with blue sky and white clouds. The pole framework was bound with living, hissing serpents instead of basswood strings, the food for feasting was seasoned with a pinch of the blue sky itself. Then the Powers entered. The gods of Evil took the north side where darkness and cold abide; the Good Powers Above sat on the south. Then they all stripped off the animal natures with which they were disguised, and hung them on the wall of the Lodge, and all appeared in their true forms, as aged persons.
“In council, guided by the admonitions of the Great Spirit, they decided to give to Mä’näbus the ritual of the Lodge, with its secret—long life and immortality for mankind—as a bribe to cease his molestation. But Mä’näbus refused to receive their message, until Otter volunteered to fetch him. Then Mä’näbus came, and was duly instructed and raised, by being slain and brought to life again, thus showing the great potency of the Powers who owned the Lodge.
“This very ceremony, just as it was given Mä’näbus, and later transferred to us, his uncles and aunts, with its rites, formulas, and medicines, is the same,” concluded Terrible-eagle, “as we perform to-day, as all the brethren and fellows have done who have passed this way before us, since the Menomini came out of the ground, in the past.” As he ended the old man struck the drum four times, crying, “My colleagues, my colleagues, my colleagues, my colleagues!”
When Terrible-eagle had concluded his part, there was a recess for refreshment and relaxation, which lasted until each had smoked, then another old pushwäo or master took up the work. He it was who related to the candidate the identity of the Powers Above and Below who had given the Medicine Lodge to mankind, through Mä’näbus. There were, he said, four groups of Evil Powers, who sat on the north side of the Lodge. First were the Otter, Mink, Marten, and Weasel; second the Bear, Panther, Wolf, and Horned Owl; third the Banded Rattlesnake, the little Prairie Rattlesnake, the Pine Snake, and the Hog-nosed Snake. The fourth group was composed of lesser birds and beasts. The Upper World which had not offended Mä’näbus, was not so well represented, and was composed of various predatory birds, such as the Red-shouldered Hawk and the Sparrow-hawks. These sat on the south side, and, in ancient days, human Lodge members had been seated according to the nature of their medicine bags.
The skins of any of these animals might be used as containers or sacks for the secret nostrums of the craft, but the Dog and Fox, which were formerly associated with the Wolf, had, by their cunning and their custom of eating filth and carrion, become too closely associated with witchcraft, and were now tabu.
The old master then told the candidates that each of these animals had donated some special power to aid mankind. Thus the Weasel gave cunning and ferocity in war and the chase, the Snapping-turtle, probably one of the vague fourth group of Evil Powers, had given his heart, which beats long after it is torn from his bosom, to grant long life. Each animal had four songs sung in his honor during the session of the Lodge, said the elder, and the third instructor would teach these to the candidate.
The old master informed his pupil that in his opinion the Medicine Lodge and its rites were found far to the east, in the country by the Great Sea Where the Dawn Rises, for he had once met a party of warriors, from the far off Nottoway or Iroquois, who spoke of a society and its ritual, given them by the animals, which had for its object long life and immortality for men.
Dawn-woman now fetched steaming rice and fat venison, marrow-bones and dried berries, and the little party feasted. The hour was very late, yet none thought of sleep. After the feast, the third elder did his part.
He selected a calabash rattle, and, sometimes rattling, sometimes drumming an accompaniment, taught the songs of the Lodge to Little-wolf. There were songs of opening and songs of closing, as well as the animal songs, each repeated four times, the sacred number, and each in groups of four. Each was made obscure and unintelligible to eavesdroppers by the addition of nonsense syllables. Some, indeed, were so ancient, and so clouded by vocables, that nothing but their general meaning was remembered even by the brethren. These passed for songs in a secret, magic language. Some chants were in other languages, particularly Ojibway, and all ended with the mystic phrase “we-ho-ho-ho-ho,” which meant “so mote it be.” The songs had titles, but these names too, were magic, and often gave no inkling of the meaning or wording of the song, and most of them avoided naming the animals or gods to which they referred, except by circumlocution, or by merely mentioning some prominent characteristic or attribute of the creature.
There were songs for the “shooting of the medicine”—an act which was so secret and mysterious that the candidate was as yet kept in the dark as to its meaning—and others for dancing, for thanksgiving and for dedication.
When the third elder had ended his synopsis of the songs, which the candidate had later to purchase and learn at leisure, the fourth and last past master took him in hand. His part, he said, was short, yet important. He showed the candidate certain articles which would be ceremonially given to the candidate at the proper time and place. Among these articles was the tanned skin of an otter, the nostrils of which were stuffed with tufts of red-dyed hawk-down, the under surfaces of the four feet and tail being adorned with fringed rectangles of blue-dyed doe leather, embroidered with conventional flower designs in colored porcupine hair and quills. This was to be the medicine bag of the new member. Through an opening, a slit in the chest of the otter, one could thrust a hand, and find in the little pouch made by the skin of the left forefoot of the animal, a small sea shell, called the konäpämîk, or medicine arrow, by which the essence of all the sacred objects contained in the bag was ceremonially “shot” or transferred to the bodies of the Lodge brethren during the performance of the ritual.
Three other medicines the otter-skin contained. There were sacred, blue face-paint, the color of the sky; a mysterious brown powder holding a seed, wrapped in a packet with a fresh water clamshell; and another mixture of pounded roots called “Reviver,” or Apisétchikun.
The clamshell was a sacred, ancient cup, in which the accompanying powder and seed were placed with a little water, and given to all candidates to drink. The mystic seed was supposed to be the badge of the Medicine Lodge, and was to remain in the candidate’s breast, forever, even until he had followed the Pathway of the Dead along the Milky Way. The “Reviver” was a powerful drug for use at all times when life ebbed low, through sickness or magic.
“These then,” said the last instructor, “are the ways and sacred things of Mä’näbus, given us Indians to have and use, as long as the world shall stand!”
So saying, he in turn retired, and the party rolled in their blankets to sleep before the sun could look in through the smoke hole of the wigwam.
III
THE INITIATION
It was the season when buds burst, and the young owls, hatched while the snow was yet on the ground, were already taking their prey. The discordant croaking of the frogs came as a roar from the marshlands. The arbutus was blooming.
Perched on the top of a warm, sunny knoll, was an oblong, dome-roofed structure of poles, covered with bark and rush mats. It was oriented east and west, and its length, a full hundred feet, contrasted oddly with its breadth of twenty.
It was the evening of the fourth day of the Mitäwiwin, or Medicine ceremony. The preceding three days and nights had been spent by the four masters, led by Terrible-eagle, in preparing Little-wolf within a room, formed by curtaining off one end of the lodge proper; in giving him his ceremonial sweat bath of purification; and in hanging the initiation fees, four sets of valuable goods—clothing, robes, weapons, copper utensils—on the ridgepole at the eastern end of the lodge; and in dedicating them.
As the sun set, the four old men and the candidate entered the lodge, followed by the men and women of the tribe who were already members of the society. Going in at the eastern door, the procession filed along the north side, and passing once regularly around, the people seated themselves on the right of the door, with the candidate on the west side of them, next to Terrible-eagle.
The night having largely passed in quiescence and instruction, towards dawn an officer of the lodge approached Little-wolf, and stood before him, facing the east. Thrusting his hand into his medicine bag he drew forth his sacred clamshell cup and the powder containing the seed, which he compounded into a drink, while he sang a song called “What Otter Keeps.”
“I am preparing the thing that was hung [the little seed], And that which was hung shall fall!”
When he had finished, and Little-wolf had swallowed the draft, this officer retired, and another came forward and took his place, singing. As he ended, he stooped over, coughed and retched violently until he cast forth a sea shell, which he held in the palm of his hand, and, chanting, displayed to the east, west, south, and north, after which he caused Little-wolf to swallow it, that it might remain in his body forever: the symbol of immortality, and the badge of a lodge member. When this had been accomplished the assistant gave place to a third, who sang his four songs and painted the candidate’s face with the sacred, blue paint. Then a fourth and last assistant came before the candidate and the masters, bearing an otter-skin, medicine bag, which he laid at Little-wolf’s feet, while he sang four songs concerning Otter, the most famous of which was entitled Yom Mitäwakeu, or “This Medicine Land,” but which held no reference to otters whatever!
Now the old men conducted the candidate, four times regularly around the lodge, while they related to him somewhat of the story of the ancient Master Mä’näbus, whom he now represented. On the last circuit Terrible-eagle led him to a seat near the western end of the lodge, and there placed him, facing the east; remaining with the candidate standing behind, and holding his shoulders.
The men and women seated around the walls of the lodge sat tense. The silence was unbroken save for woodland sounds, for the great, dramatic moment had arrived.
The four assistant masters, who had just performed before Little-wolf, now assembled in the east, facing him, and the first, taking his medicine bag in his two hands, and holding it breast high before his body, sang, to the rapid beat of the drum, a song entitled “Shooting the New Member.” At its end he gave the usual sacred cry “oh we ho ho ho ho!” blew on the head of the otter-skin, and rushed forward as though to attack the candidate.
In front of the neophyte impersonator of the ancient hero the attacker paused, and jerked the head of his otter upward, crying savagely, “Ya ha ha ha ha!” The magical essence of the bag supposedly striking the candidate, he staggered slightly, but was steadied by a companion, only to meet the feigned attacks of the second and third assistants, at each of which he reeled once more. But the charge of the fourth fellow was so violent that the candidate fell flat on the ground. Stooping, the last man laid the medicine bag across the back of the apparently unconscious brother, to be his, thereafter. At a sign from Terrible-eagle, the four assistants approached the prostrate candidate, and raising him to his feet, shoo__ him gently to remove their shots and restore him to life.
And now all was rejoicing. Steaming earthen kettles were carried in, filled with delicious stews and soups of bear and turtle flesh, partridges, and young ducks. Laughing, jesting, and good-natured banter filled the lodge until the last wooden bowl was scraped clean, when the utensils and scraps were carried out, and the drummer struck up a lively dancing tune. After the men and women had had each four sets of songs, a general dance took place, wherein the members circled the lodge, the new brother among them, shooting each other promiscuously with jollity, vying with each other to rise and point their bags or fall prone on the earth. All the time a loud and lively chant was sung:
I “I pass through them! I pass through them! I pass through even the chief!” II “Ye Gods take part, invisible though ye be beneath us!”
When all was over, and Keso, the Sun, was almost noon high, the four assistants took down the invitation fees from the ridgepole, and distributed them to the four old Masters and the others who had taken prominent part in the ceremonial, and all the Indians filed out of the western door, singing:
“You, my brethren, I pass my hand over you. I thank you.”
*       *       *       *       *
Muhwäsê, Little-wolf, watched the last of his companions strike their camps; saw the coverings stripped from the lodge structure, saw the last party vanish in the brush.
He was a Mitäo! A member of a great fraternal organization, who might travel westward to the foothills of the Rockies, north to the Barren Lands, south to the countries of the Iowa and Oto, east to the land of the Iroquois, and find brethren who had traveled the same road, or at least one fundamentally similar. He had shown his fortitude and fidelity, those two great, cardinal virtues of the Medicine Lodge, and he had come through the sacred mysteries alive and in possession of the secret rites that had been handed down since the days when the Menomini first came out of the ground.
ALANSON SKINNER
Thunder-cloud, a Winnebago Shaman, Relates and Prays
I came from above and I am holy. This is my second life on earth. Long ago I lived on earth, long ago when this earth was full of wars. I used to be a warrior then and I was a brave man.
Long ago in battle I was killed. As I went along I thought I had stumbled and fallen on the ground. Then I got up again and went on my way. To my home I went. When I got home my wife and my children were there, but they would not look at me, they would not notice me. So I spoke to my wife, but she did not show in any way that she was aware of my presence. She did not show any signs that she was aware of anyone speaking to her. There I stood. I could not converse with them and they never looked at me. “What can be the matter?” I thought. At last it occurred to me that I was probably dead, so I immediately started out for the battlefield and there, surely enough, I saw my body lying. Then, for the first time, I knew that I was dead.
After that I tried for a long time to return to my original home; for four years I tried, but I failed, so I stayed on earth.
At one time I was a fish and I lived with them. Their life is much more wretched than ours, for they are often in lack of food. Yet they are happy beings for they have dances very often.
At another time I lived as a little bird. Now that is a wonderful existence when the weather is good, but when it is cold, life is a hardship. Often birds are in lack of food and suffer from cold. It was my custom to go to the camp of certain people who lived near and to stay there in the daytime. These people were hunting at the time and from their meat-racks I used to steal a little food.
A little boy was staying with them and we were always terribly afraid of him, for he had an object that was fear-inspiring. With this he would shoot and make so great a noise that we would fly away. At night we used to go home, to a hollow tree. Whenever I got there first, the others, coming after me in great numbers, would almost squeeze me to death and yet, on those occasions when I waited till all the others had entered, I almost froze to death.
On another occasion I became a buffalo and lived as a buffalo lives. Lack of food and cold weather did not bother us much, but we had to be on the alert all the time against hunters.
Then from that place I went home, to my spirit-home up above, the place I had originally come from. Now in the sky, up above, there is a doctors’ home; that is the place I have come from.
After a while I wanted to leave my home and go to the earth again. The person in charge of that home is my grandfather. He at first objected to my going, but I asked him again and again. The fourth time I asked him, he consented. He said to me: “Well, grandson, if you really wish to go to the earth, you may go. Before you go, you had better fast, for if any of the spirits have compassion upon you, then you will be able to live in peace on earth.”
I fasted for four years, and the spirits above, even as far as the fourth heaven, all approved of my going. They blessed me. Ten days I fasted and after that I fasted twenty days; and again I fasted thirty days. All the spirits blessed me, even those under the earth.
Then when I was ready to go to the earth, all the spirits gathered around me and they had a council. In the center of the world, there, they had a council. There they were to advise me. All the spirits were present. They told me that I would not fail in anything I attempted. There they tested my powers. The first thing they did was to place a spirit grizzly bear at the end of the dancing lodge. This bear, it was said, could not be hurt in any manner.
The lodge was full of spirits. Then they started to sing the songs that I was to use when on earth. After that, I walked around the fireplace, and taking a live coal, I held it in the palm of my hand and danced around the fireplace again. Then I shouted “wahi!” and struck the hand containing the live coal with the other hand. The bear, the invulnerable bear, shot forward and fell to the ground, flat on his stomach. A black substance oozed from his mouth.
Then the spirits said to me, “You have killed him. Powerful as he was, you have killed him. Clearly never will anything evil succeed in crossing your path.” That I would fail in nothing they told me. Then they took the one that I had killed and taking a red knife they cut him into pieces and piled him in the center of the lodge. There they covered him with a dark covering and said. “Now! Again you must try your strength.” So I asked for the objects that I was to use on earth, a flute and a gourd. Those were the objects that I used.
Then I made myself holy. Those that had blessed me were present. Then I walked around the one who had been cut into pieces and I breathed upon him. Then for the second time I walked around the object and I breathed upon him, and the rest within the lodge, breathed with me. Four times I breathed upon him, and then he arose and walked away, a human being.
“Hoho, it is good,” they said, “he has restored him to life. Surely, most surely, he is holy.” Thus they spoke to me. “Well, grandson, you will ever be thus. Whatever exists you will be able to destroy and then to restore to life again. Most surely have you been blessed.” Thus they spoke to me.
Then they placed a black stone in the doctors’ lodge above, there where I was blessed and again they put me to a test of strength. Four times I breathed upon that stone and finally I made a hole right through the stone by the force of my breathing. So now, whoever has a pain, if he permits me to blow upon him, then I can blow his pain away for him. It makes no difference what kind of pain it is, for my breath has been made holy. They, the spirits, made my breath holy and strong.
Then the spirits presiding over the earth and those living under the earth, they also gave me a trial. A rotten log was placed before me. I breathed upon it, I spat water upon it, and the log rose up, a living man. He walked away. This power of spitting upon people, of squirting water upon people, I received from an eel; from an eel that was the chief of all the eels, an eel that lives in the center of the ocean, in the very deepest part of the ocean. He is perfectly white. He it is, who blessed me. Therefore it is that I can use water and that the water I possess is inexhaustible. This is what he told me.
Then I came to the people of the earth. Before I came, they all had a council meeting about me. When I came, I entered a lodge and there I was born again. I thought that I had entered a lodge, but it was really my mother’s womb that I had entered. Not even then, at my birth, did I lose consciousness. As I grew up I fasted again, and then again all those who had blessed me before sent their blessings to me once more. It is for that reason that I am the dictator over all these spirits. Whatever I say will be so.
Now the tobacco you offered me is really not for myself, but for the spirits, because I have really been sent here by the spirits to get tobacco for them. Here, there is a sick person and you have offered me tobacco. That is what I am on earth for: to accept this offering. I tell you that this patient will live.
You will live, patient, so help yourself as much as you can and make yourself strong. Now as I offer tobacco to the spirits, you must listen, and if you feel that I am telling the truth, then you will gain strength thereby.
Here is tobacco for you, O Fire! I offer tobacco to you. You promised me that if I offered tobacco to you, you would grant me my request. That you promised, if I placed tobacco upon your head. Did you not say that to me after I had fasted for four days and you had blessed me? Now here there comes a plea from a human being, from one who wishes to live. Here, the tobacco is yours and I ask that within four days, he be restored to his usual health. I ask that he regain his former health and be even as the rest of us. I offer tobacco to you, grandfather. Here it is.
May you, O Buffalo, also add your strength, add your power. Six days I fasted and then you sent your spirit upon me. I entered your lodge, your lodge that is in the center of this earth. You Buffalo, you who are pure white in color, you blessed me. So likewise did the buffaloes with the four different colors. Those blessings that you bestowed upon me, those I now want. The gift of being able to breathe upon man, you gave me. You told me I would not fail. Now that is what I desire. Therefore it is that I ask that you add your strength as you promised, for they, the people, have given me plenty of tobacco.
Now you, O Grizzly Bear, here is tobacco. At a place called Pointed-hill there is a spirit in charge of a dancing lodge. Now all those in that lodge blessed me and said that I would be able to kill anything that confronted me; that I would also be able to restore to life whatever I wished. Here I have opportunity of giving life to a man. I want him to live. They have given me tobacco. Here it is. When I was a ghost you took me to your home, and after I had fasted for ten days you blessed me. Those things with which you blessed me, those are the things that I now want. The people are offering you tobacco, grandfathers,—here it is.
Now you, chief eel in the center of the ocean, you too blessed me after I had fasted for eight days. With your power of breath did you bless me, with your inexhaustible wealth of water. You gave me the gift of using it whenever I treated a patient. That is what you told me. All the water in the ocean you told me I could use. You blessed me with all the objects that exist in the ocean. Now here is a man desiring life, and I too wish him to live. It is for that reason that I speak to you in this way. As I now squirt water upon him, may it be as though it were your power. O grandfather, I offer you tobacco. Here it is. Here is tobacco for you.
Now you who are above, Turtle, you who are in charge of a doctors’ lodge, you blessed me after I had fasted seven days and you carried me, in spirit, to your home. There in your home I found all the birds who have sharp claws and you all blessed me and you told me that however bad the pain was, you would be able to extract it. Therefore it was that you named me the extractor of pain. Now here comes a man with an intense pain inside of him. I am the one to remove it for him, for I am the one you blessed and whom you taught that in nothing would he fail. I am going to heal this man. Here is the tobacco.
You of the snake home, you the perfectly white one, Rattlesnake! Did you not bless me after I had fasted for four days? You said that on an occasion like this, you would help me. You blessed me with your rattles that I was to use as gourds. You blessed me and told me that I would accomplish all that I attempted, by the use of the rattle. I offer you tobacco therefore, that I may make this sick person live when I shake my gourd. That life would be opened before him, that is what you told me, grandfather.
Ho, you Night Spirits! You too blessed me after I had fasted nine days. You took me to your village, situated in the east. There you told me that your plants were sacred and you blessed me with them. Now that is what I want. You made my flute sacred. That I am speaking the truth, you well know. Now to me the people have come bringing a sick person, for whom they desire life. I too want him to live. That is why I am speaking to you. You promised always to accept my tobacco and here it is, grandfathers.
Ho, here is tobacco for you, Disease-giver! After I had fasted for two days, you caused me to know that you were the one that bestowed diseases, that if I desired to heal one who is sick, that it would not be difficult. To you, therefore, Disease-giver, I offer tobacco. I offer you tobacco that this person, who is sick, may become well again. That is what you promised me in your blessing.
Ho, you Thunder-birds! I offer you tobacco. When you blessed me, you said you would help me if I needed you. Now here I have someone who desires life. I, too, want him to live, and that is why I remind you of your promise. I ask your help, grandfather, as you promised it to me. Here is the tobacco.
Ho, I offer you tobacco, Sun. Here it is. You blessed me after I had fasted for five days and you said that you would come to my relief whenever I had a difficult object to accomplish. Now here is a man who desires life. He comes with offerings of tobacco to you. Since you have blessed me, the people have brought their offerings of tobacco to me.
Ho, grandmother, Moon! You too blessed me, Moon. You said that you would also add your power. Here is a man who desires life and I call on you to add your power, as you promised me, so that he may live. Grandmother, here is tobacco.
Ho, grandmother, Earth! To you I also offer tobacco. You blessed me and promised always to help me. You promised that I could use all the herbs belonging to you, all the best ones, and that then I would not fail in that which I attempted. Now that is what I ask on this occasion, and that you keep the promise you made to me and help me. I ask you to do for this sick man what these people are asking me to do for him. Make my medicine powerful, grandmother.
Ho, you the chief of all the spirits! You too have blessed me and you too said that you would help me. Therefore I offer you tobacco so that this person may live. If his spirit is about to wander, I ask that you keep away from him, that you do not seize him. This is what I ask of you and why I offer you tobacco.
Ho-o-o, to all of you spirits I offer tobacco, to all of you who have blessed me.
PAUL RADIN
How Meskwaki Children Should Be Brought Up
Harry Lincoln, of the Meskwaki, has dictated the following free rendition of a Meskwaki text written out in the current syllabary.
When a boy becomes old enough to be intelligent, his parents begin to teach him how to take care of himself and act righteously. They usually tell him not to do a good many things. Children are taught not to be naughty. They are told that if they are naughty, people will have nothing to do with them. They are told that if they are naughty, people will talk about them. And children are told not to steal anything from their neighbors. Moreover, children are taught not to talk to people. If they see any one going by their place, they should hold their tongues, nor should they laugh.
And they also tell children not to visit other people too often. “Every time they see you going anywhere they would say that you are looking for something good to eat, if you go visiting too often,” is what children are told. So children do not often visit too much.
They likewise tell children not to gamble. They tell them that they might be lucky and win, but that it would not benefit them. And they tell them that it is just as bad to lose. They caution them in this way: “If you win, people will see your winnings and will try to get you to gamble. And if you do, you will surely lose all that you have won. And yet it is not right to be over-quiet. If you are quiet and well off, that is not quite right either. If you have a lot of horses, people will be jealous of you. Some one might want some of your property, and you would not give it to him. That is how it will be.
“The best way is to be kindly to every one, to speak kind words, to treat your friends nicely, to keep your heart clean, and not to talk meanly. If you do this, you will have a number of friends. And when you are a young boy, do not fight with other boys. If any one speaks badly to you, do not answer him. Let it go. This is one of the best things you can do. And if you see some one doing something, you must hold your peace; do not be the one to start the news. Do not tell what you saw him or her do. If you spread the report they will hate you. They will become your enemies.”
And there is another thing which boys are told. Boys are told not to tattle to any one. They are told not to be too intimate with girls. It is not a right thing for a boy to do. They are warned: “If you do that, people will be jealous of you.”
And there is another thing they are warned. “When there are many people, when something is going on, don’t go over there, and try to show off. That will not benefit you. You may go to the crowd and see what is going on, but behave yourself. And if any one asks you a question, you are to tell the person that you know nothing about it. That is the best way to keep out of trouble.”
And there is another thing which young men are told, which is: “If some one asks you to do a favor, you must always do it for him. Some time in the near future they will come around again and ask another favor of you. If you refuse, you straightway will begin to have trouble. But you should always do a favor for any one, so as to please them.”
And another thing, young men are told, not to fear ashes: “By fasting and painting your face with ashes, you may get a blessing from the Manitou. If you do the right thing, you will surely be blessed. If you are afraid, the Manitou will know it. People claim that fasting and blackening one’s face with ashes is one of the best things that they can do. In the early days it was said that if one fasted long to obtain a blessing from the Manitou, he often went on the war-path successfully; or he killed people by fasting so long. Such was the blessing the person obtained. And you can go and kill game easily. You may become a leader in anything. If there is a war you may become a leader. And you will always bring your men back safe and sound. They will not be killed by the enemy. You will surely be blessed by the Manitou if you take an interest in fasting, and are not afraid of doing so. After you have fasted long enough, if you desire anything, you will obtain it. So fasting is the right thing to do. And if you do this, you must get up early—before our grandfather, the Sun, rises. If anything happens to people where you are, after a few years, nothing will happen to you: you will not be destroyed. This is the only way you can live again. All the people will be benefited by you. This is the best life there is.” And this is why children are taught to fast.
Boys are told that if they see an animal they must not destroy it. For if they destroy animals, they themselves will not live very long. Boys are also taught to be good hunters.
Boys are taught nearly everything so that they can get along nicely with their wives after they are married. They are told that if they are hustlers many girls will wish to marry them.
Of course this is after they have grown to be young men. Up to that time they are merely made to fast. And by fasting, is how they reach old age. Also children are made to fast when any one dies. And they also tell children not to make a noise when some one dies; and not to play where the body is. And they tell boys not to refuse if they are asked to do something. “If you do what people who have lost their relatives ask you, they will be well satisfied with you. And some day you will exchange positions. If you ask them a favor at that time, they will willingly do it,” is what boys are told.
And this is what boys are told when they are growing up: “If you are asked to be a ceremonial attendant at clan festivals, you must do it. By doing them the favor of waiting on them, you will benefit your own life. And any time you are asked to do anything you must always do it, so as to please the people.”
And after they grow up, they are told not to bother too much with girls, especially if they have sisters of their own. They are told, “Sometime you may be desired as a son-in-law. But if you bother with many girls, while going with one, they will think you are a nobody.” And they tell boys not to be intimate with girls unless they plan to marry them. They are told, “You must not say anything evil to women: if you do, you will be talking evilly to your own sisters.
“And if you are going with a girl, if you are engaged to her, you must marry her, and treat her rightly. You must go home with her and stay with your father-in-law and your mother-in-law. You must treat them as nicely as you can. And you should hunt for your mother-in-law and your father-in-law. If you treat your wife meanly, every one will talk about you. And that will make it bad for you. At all gatherings people will talk about you, saying how badly you treat your wife. The people will say many things about you, though you may not know it. They will say you are jealous. And in that way people will always refuse you favors. You will be treating your wife badly, if you pay no attention to the old people.
“You must obey your parents. It is the right thing to obey one’s parents. And boys who do not obey their parents are the worst boys to-day.
“If you know any one has something of his own, you must not ask him for it, nor must you steal it. It is not right to steal. If you steal or ask for the thing you want, all the people will be afraid of you. You are nothing but a beggar. Every one will say that to you. They will call you a beggar.”
Now when boys are beginning to be grown up, they are told: “You must not turn against your friends; you must be kind-hearted. And you must not bother with any woman or girl who is married to another man. You should not try to ‘cut him out.’ It is dangerous to do that.” This is one of the most important things they try to get boys to understand. By doing what is forbidden they might get into trouble; and they might end their lives. Many boys end their lives before they are middle-aged by not listening to their parents.
And girls are taught a little differently from boys. Of course they tell girls, in the beginning, the same thing, that is, how to take care of themselves. They teach girls that if they obey the rules they will have an easier life as they grow older. After they are old enough they teach them how to do things. And they also make them fast. They are asked to fast so that adversity shall not strike them when they grow up. They make girls fast for four days. They make them fast all winter, especially when they are beginning to be young ladies. The reason why they make them fast is that they are supposed to dream of something that will take them through their life. That is why they do not take regular meals like others, to prepare for a long life.
And they teach them to do something for themselves, especially when they grow up. They teach them work, suitable for women. They teach them to learn to make mattings and how to make sacks. They also teach them how to make moccasins and beadwork. Girls are told that they can get along nicely if they learn these things before they are married. They are told, “You will be benefited by doing this for your husband. Your relatives will be benefited by you.”
And girls are told: “If you are a moral girl, your father-in-law and mother-in-law will treat you as nicely as they can. And they will love you. If you are quiet and well-behaved, you will be much better off than those girls who do not mind. Men do not care for girls who do not mind and who are immoral. If you do not mind and are immoral, no man will have you for his wife.” That is why girls are taught to be good.
After they learn to make things, they are taught to cook meals. Girls are told that by doing so, they are leading themselves the right way. “By so doing you are leading yourself an easy way. Sometime you may grow up and make your own home.” That is why girls are told to be willing workers.
And girls are told not to go off and live with other people. Of course people would like a girl to live with them a few days. But a few days later they might turn her out, especially if she were lazy. People do not wish to support a lazy person. This is why girls are taught to cook.
And after they are married, girls are especially told not to say anything about other persons, and not to feel unfriendly towards them. And they are told not to have any quarrels with other people, for that is not a right thing to do. They are told to be kind towards the people and not to have quarrels with any one. “This is the best way, to be friendly with every one. By so doing, the people will feel kindly towards you. They will always say a good word for you. People do not think anything of a mean person. If you are mean, some day some one will turn against you. Some persons are dangerous. They have secret ways to kill people.” This is why girls are told not to be mean, or say mean things to other persons. And some girls hate their parents for telling them this. But it is a rule that children should be taught. The reason parents tell girls this, is because they love them so well. They are teaching them so they can attain an old age. Girls who were not taught, do anything they please. They do not care what they do. They spoil themselves.
Girls are supposed to be taught till they are married. After a girl is married, she has full control of herself, and may do whatever she thinks best. But it is best to follow the rules forever, to be kind to one’s husband and the people. It is pretty hard to lead a righteous life.
When girls begin to have children they are told to be kind to their children and love them, and not to do anything bad to them. And they are taught that if they live quietly to an old age, they themselves will be the only relations they have.
And before children are well grown, they dare not go any place by themselves. Of course boys are different: they can go any place they please. And girls dare not do so, unless they have a good reason for it. They are taught to always be at home and do the work. They are told: “If you grow to be a young lady, if you walk around and do not do any work, people will not think anything of you. They will always talk about you. They will say that all you are good for, is to walk from place to place. They will say you are looking for a place to get your meals. They will say that you are looking for a place where you can get the finest food. They will say many things about you. They will even say that you are worse than a man. Every time you are on the road they will say, ‘There goes a woman who goes about looking for good meals for herself.’” That is the reason why they desire a girl to be able to do things so that she can support herself after she is grown. That is why they tell girls to obey their parents. Their parents have had good experience and know what they are talking about.
And when girls arrive at puberty, they are told not to marry a divorced man. They are told to marry a young man. In the early days, people used to say to each other when girls married divorced men: “It is not natural for a girl to marry a divorced man, nor for a young man to marry a divorced woman.” They told girls that if they married young men, that they would be benefited by getting horses, and so on. And a girl is told to look around and get the right kind of a boy. In the early days, they liked boys who killed game, trapped, sold furs, and so got money; but nowadays they tell girls to look around for boys that have horses, homes, everything they want. They say, “That’s the right kind of a young man to marry—one that can support you.”
Girls are also told: “When you are staying with your father-in-law and with your mother-in-law, you are supposed to help them in their work. When your mother-in-law begins doing anything, you must ask her if you may do it.” A girl is taught this so that she can get along nicely after she is married. Girls are told: “If you don’t do these things, people will talk about you, and say how lazy you are. And people will not like you.” This is the reason why a girl is taught all manner of work.
And all girls are taught the same things. And in this way, they lead themselves the right way.
TRUMAN MICHELSON
In Montagnais Country
On the shores of a great lake were clustered the buildings of the old Hudson’s Bay Company’s Post, where the People of the Interior came every spring with their cargoes of pelts to trade for the articles which the white man made for them. Through the long, cold winters, the factor and his crew passed the time as comfortably as they could, with little to break the monotony of the days, while powerful blasts of cold, often bringing several feet of drifted snow in their wake, beat upon the buildings. In the summer, however, the time went quickly. From the vast, forested hills northward came the returning bands of trappers, bringing the results of their winter’s hunt. From the regions nearer, the People of the Lake, by shorter stages, came in, too, with their peltry. So, with the two bands of nomads camped along the beach and on the grassy terrace between the lake and the forest of the upland, the scene was enlivened each spring by the presence of several hundred hunters, with their families, gaudily dressed and garrulous.
By day, in the heat of the sun, which makes these northern places blossom in acres of green and showy flowers, the newcomers wandered from tent to tent, exchanging gossip, talking, singing, gaming and planning for the coming of winter; and all the time gradually enlarging the store of their annual necessities by an irregular trade with the factor behind his long counter in the Post shop. By night among the tents, grouped in twos and threes, the twinkling lights illuminated scenes of quiet domestic life, where some were asleep on piles of tent litter and furs, while others were engaged in plying the busy needle or in the low conversation which made the early evenings such pleasant times for visiting between those who had not seen each other for many months.
The People of the Interior always came to the Post two or three weeks later than those whose hunting grounds were around the lake. Some of the families from the interior came six hundred miles, driving dogs which dragged their laden sleds, the canoes forming part of the loads, until, coming south to where the snow was giving way to the advance of the spring, they left the sleds and loaded the canoes, finishing their journey by drifting in them with the swollen current down to the great lake. The trading completed, the People of the Interior returned as they had come, by canoe and sled, leaving the Post two or three weeks sooner than the People of the Lake. This had been the procedure for innumerable generations.
The People of the Lake never envied their friends from the interior. Their nearness to the Post they considered a great advantage. They could even make a short journey to the Post in midwinter to enjoy the festivities of Christmas with the factor and his employees, while their friends in the interior were perhaps freezing or starving if the game had failed them.
The People of the Lake had begun to feel themselves wiser and more important than their simple forest neighbors. Often one of them would come back from the metropolis with new and smart-cut clothes, plenty of gin, and some household finery with which to decorate the shelves and tables of the board houses which they had erected on the lake shore, but above all, with glowing accounts of the great and busy city where everything could be had that a Montagnais might covet in his most prodigal dreams. To the People of the Interior, these tales sounded marvelous, yet, much as they loved to hear them told, there was a lingering suspicion in their minds that all was not as fine and grand as it was painted, judging by the strong breath, the fagged condition and the depleted pocket-books of those who had experienced these transitory contacts with the outside world.
A product of the conditions which made the People of the Lake so satisfied with themselves was young Antoine, a stalwart youth, whose knowledge of French and the astute principles of business in general, made him invaluable to the independent fur traders who regularly came to the lake to drive bargains with the returning hunters. Antoine’s clothes showed his advance in the social scale. Peg-top trousers, narrow-waisted jacket, suède-topped, patent leather shoes, blue celluloid collar, ready-made cravat, and a green woolen golf cap marked him at once as a denizen of the back streets of Montreal as much as his brown skin, oblique eyes, and sleek hair proclaimed his origin from the People of the North. In broken French, even in broken English, Antoine could swear in competition with the French-Canadian employees of the honorable Hudson’s Bay Company’s Post, and those of Revillon Brothers of Montreal who sought to compete with the great company. Antoine had actually cultivated an urbane swagger, he consumed innumerable packages of paper cigarettes and perfumed his system attentively with draughts of gin and brandy. At times, even, Antoine forgot that he was a Montagnais. It was only when reminded by his own people that it was unbecoming for him to prey upon them to the advantage of the traders, that his vanity was lowered to a point which made him agreeable to the other young men. To the girls he was more attractive, and among the People of the Lake there were few girls he had not sampled. At times his vain heart yearned to extend his conquests to the simple maids who came patiently with their parents on the toilsome journey from the hills and forests of the north.
The head man of the People of the Interior, old Shekapeo, whose name meant “Going Backwards,” was a stern and practical hunter whose annual catch could generally be depended upon to contain the finest and rarest furs. While he was alive to the defects of character which made Antoine in figure and reputation so conspicuous about the Post, he often wondered if a matrimonial attachment between Antoine and his daughter would not be of considerable advantage. With his own opportunities of production and Antoine’s far-reaching business experience and associations, he had more than once pictured the advantage, while puffing his pipe before the fire. And yet he could not make up his mind to discourage the growing intimacy between his daughter and a young man of his own band, whom he had always admired for his quiet energy and productive trapping. The girl herself, if left to her own judgment, would have had little to say. Born by the side of a remote lake on a beautiful still morning, when the heat of noontime was lifting a mirage to the north across the glassy waters, her mother had called her Ilitwashteu, Mirage, from the first phenomenon seen after the birth of her child. Mirage, like her father, felt the contrast between Good-ground and Antoine. But the mystery of Antoine was making him an object of growing interest in her mind. She had dared to raise her eyes from her moccasins and look directly at him once, when he had come to the tent to talk with her father on business. Then, when her father’s back was turned, Antoine spoke to her, but she did not go so far as to answer him.
It was winter. Shekapeo had returned to his hunting grounds in the region of the Lake of Steep Shores. Near him, this year, was camped the family of young Good-ground who was at this season trapping in that section of his hereditary hunting grounds for marten. The territories of the two families adjoined each other, though for several years each had been operating on the more distant tracts, with the idea of allowing the intervening zone to become replenished with the fur-bearing animals. Old Shekapeo and young Good-ground knew perfectly well where their respective bounds lay. During the winter they occasionally visited one another and sometimes planned to exchange privileges in each other’s grounds. When, for instance, one year bear had been abundant in Shekapeo’s district, owing to a forest fire in the month of flowers which had left in its wake an exceptional abundance of berries, the same winter on young Good-ground’s territory, caribou had wandered in unusual numbers. Then they had allowed each other to cross the landmarks. Good-ground took toll on many of Shekapeo’s bears, and Shekapeo took what he needed of Good-ground’s caribou.
It happened late in the winter in the month of great cold that several members of Good-ground’s family were taken sick with coughs and aching limbs. Sickness added to Good-ground’s duties, and often he was prevented from following his line of traps properly, by the necessity of remaining at camp himself. One trip when he started to visit his ten traps, which were strung at a distance of about two miles apart along the banks of the River of Poplars, he found himself at the ninth trap by the end of the second day. So bad had been the conditions of travel, and his own feelings so oppressed, that, late this afternoon, he made himself a little fire where he had scraped away the snow with one of his snowshoes, and boiled himself a pot of tea. Near the fire lay his good dogs Ntohum and Kawabshet, “My Hunter” and “Whitey,” names descended through many generations of canines. They were worn out and tired, from pulling the toboggan through the soft, deep snowdrifts. The nine traps had yielded a few furs, yet most of them were empty. The promise of bad weather added to the trouble. To the northeast a heavy bank of lead-colored sky appeared above the pointed tops of the vast spruce forest. Fitful blasts of wind came occasionally from the same quarter, growing more frequent during the afternoon and causing Good-ground many times to turn his head about and look behind, then urge the dogs with a few sharp words to greater exertions.
Now, smoking his pipe of stone, which several times he refilled with dry tobacco obtained from the Post so far away, his eyes rested first upon his fagged dogs, then upon the slowly spreading pall of gray, northward above the hills. The question of the tenth trap was resting heavily upon Good-ground’s mind. Might there be anything held fast in its iron jaws, or would the machine be empty before his disheartened gaze, should he gather his forces together and press on against the rising wind for another three hours? The price to pay in risk to himself and his animals for whatever might be caught there, would be, indeed, the highest. With depleted provisions through another afternoon of struggle against the blizzard which was surely coming, a question arose in his experienced mind as to the actual possibility of its accomplishment. Should he turn about now and go down with the wind to the little shelter camp where he could spend the night, back on Round Lake, he would then be within a short day’s voyage of his home camp. There his sick family, brothers, sisters and mother, were comfortably and snugly housed in their warm tent, roofed tightly with birch-bark and lined with caribou skins, making it warm as the inside of his fur-lined mitten. But what if trap number ten should contain an animal, perhaps a sable or even a black fox, whose pelt would bring the profit he so badly needed?
Having filled his pipe several times, and cleaned it with the blade of bone which he carried tied to his tobacco bag, it seemed as if Good-ground could not decide. Finally, with a motion of determination, he plunged his hand into the bag, which contained the carcass of a hare reserved for his supper. With a few cuts of his knife he got out the shoulder blade of the animal, and he removed the clinging flesh by tearing it off with his teeth till the bone was clean and brown; then upon the end of a split stick he held the hare’s shoulder bone before the heat of his fire, and raised his voice in a low melody which came from between slightly opened lips. “Ka na ka na aa ka na he.” While he sang, the bone, affected by the heat, grew black toward the center; finally a segment with a little crack split from the center and ran toward the edge, breaking through the bone and causing it to burn away on one of its outer sides. The divination was complete. The spirit of the hare had told him that his voyage would be unsuccessful.
Now, with a few deft and decided motions, Good-ground cleaned out his pipe, replaced several articles which he had removed from his bag, adjusted his snowshoes by kicking his feet into the stiffened loops, and squared about toward the south, pulling the sled around on its runners till it, too, pointed backwards along the trail over which he had, thirty minutes ago, tramped down the snow to make a path for his dogs. The animals needed no human urging to tighten their traces and drag the sled forward in a trail, which even now was being blown over with drifting snow coming slant-wise through the forest on a furious wind. Kiwedin, the north wind, was now going to rule the world of the people of the north. Whatever thought Good-ground had a while ago as to what the tenth trap might have yielded him had he gone to it, faded from his mind with the satisfaction that he was obeying his dream animal, and that probably he would reach his home camp in time to escape the suffering which he knew he would have met had he gone on to learn what trap number ten contained. His forebodings were not without ground. It was with difficulty that he reached his little camp station that night, helped along by the wind at his back. His out-trail was now completely covered, but it had been possible for him to run ahead of his dogs and break the snow for them with his snowshoes. That night at his station he tried again his “mutnshawan” and the bone broke in the same way as before. This time the crack in the surface of the shoulder blade zig-zagged off in the direction of the home camp, a sure indication that this was to be the direction of travel next day.
By the time the late northern dawn had lighted up the trail sufficiently for him to follow it, Good-ground had fed his dogs and himself on the remaining carcasses of the few beasts that he had taken, in coming up to his line of traps. By dark, forcing his way through growing drifts with the wind still at his back, he silently wound into the cleared space, near the center of which stood the three bark tents with their wisps of smoke driven horizontally from the poles, that for almost nine months of the year he called home. Several little fox-bred mongrel dogs limped out on the beaten footpaths from one of the tents, and with wheezy coughs announced the return of the son and brother to the females within the enclosure. They were building up the fire and preparing a stew of hare and smoked caribou meat. Good-ground lifted the skin hanging before the door, bent under its low arch, and stepped toward the fire, laying his game bag on the boughs near the knees of his oldest sister. The glances at his face and his return glance showed that all was well, they felt, while all were still alive. And smiles lighted their faces as the girl brought the contents of one of the packs from the sled and opened it before their eyes, though it contained only medium pelts and carcasses only large enough to go into the stew-pot for to-morrow’s dinner.
The blizzard raged, the weak and sick ones got worse before they got better, and several weeks passed before Good-ground could muster the strength, and afford the time to harness his dogs again and move along the trap line. Smoked caribou flakes, hare carcasses, and a small portion of flour had carried them through the short period of famine.
Finally with the return of good weather and the subsidence of the wind, Good-ground was able to make his round of traps, baiting and resetting those which had been torn down by the force of the wind, the snow and the beating branches of the undergrowth. Arriving at the location of trap number ten, he scraped away the snow to find there the chewed and devoured remains of a splendid black fox! The loss, Good-ground realized as he stood there regarding the remaining patch of silky ink-black fur no larger than the span of his hands, would amount to $2500 at least. Had he visited trap number ten that terrible day, weeks ago, he might have secured the pelt.
On his return home Good-ground was to have another surprise. He found his neighbor old Shekapeo visiting his family, having ventured a day’s struggle through the soft and deep snowdrifts, from a sympathetic desire to see whether all had gone well with the family whose lives depended upon the support of one young man.
Shekapeo heard the story of Good-ground’s lost prize with impassive expression. But on his way home the next day, tramping ahead of his dogs he had time to think over the bad luck attaching to Good-ground. Shekapeo’s thoughts then turned to the coming trading season at the Post, and in particular to the financial ascendancy of Antoine.
During that spring season at the Post, among the tales which circulated was that about Good-ground and trap number ten. The story of the adventure did not turn out to his credit, especially after Antoine took occasion to say to Shekapeo, in the presence of the family, including Mirage, that Good-ground was a fool to have turned back at a time when a catch worth several thousand dollars was waiting his enterprise.
To account for Good-ground’s lack of success, Antoine even remarked that Good-ground’s dream spirit would not have lied to him that day when he turned back, unless he had been a liar himself.
With the advent of the moon when the birds begin to fly, which the white people at the Post called August, the People of the Interior having finished their trading, repaired their canoes, and satisfied their craving for society, bade adieu to their friends of the lake and started on their return to the northern wilderness. In the coming voyage of ascent, Good-ground’s three canoe loads of provisions and supplies, in large part advanced to him in credit by the factor, which were to last him through the winter on his hunting grounds, would have to be carried over thirty-two portages. If the weather continued good he expected to make the return trip in forty days. The largest lake that he had to cross would be nine miles wide, but if the wind blew hard he would have to make double that distance by working around the shore line. His load consisted of about two thousand pounds in all, fifteen bags of flour, two hundred pounds of pork, ten of tobacco, one hundred of flour, one hundred of grease, twenty-five of tea, forty of salt, twenty boxes of baking powder, twenty-five bars of soap, two boxes of candles, twelve boxes of shells, four boxes of rifle cartridges, three hundred traps, from beaver size down, and ten bear traps,—all this in three canoes. With the help of mother, sisters, and younger brothers, these canoes had to be paddled in smooth water, while on the portages and in water that was too shallow for paddling, they had to be relayed in loads on the back.
Finally, their toilsome journey ended, Good-ground and the others reached their distant hunt-grounds and reopened their home camps, where, all summer during their absence, the porcupines and other rodents had made havoc among the greasy furnishings; where even an occasional passing bear had left his marks. More than once the caribou and moose had poked their noses well within the clearing and among the deserted tents, as though they knew that the men, who in the winter time were so eager for their lives, were now far away killing fish to live on, and eating the white men’s food put up in tin cans.
So another winter was passed by the People of the Interior, busy in killing the wild animals of the forest and busy, too, in reviving the spirits of the slain animals, as they believed, by constant resource to drumming, singing, praying, and other shamanistic performances.
This winter at the Post, for Antoine, at least, was also a season of great activity. Antoine’s astute employer, an independent French trader, had conceived a scheme to secure the trade of the People of the Interior when they should come out from the forests in the spring. The scheme was nothing less than to have a score of cases of the strongest fire water sent to the lake, at great expense, hidden from the eyes of the revenue officers en route. The whole was to cost about all that the independent French company could afford to put into the venture, and incidentally, as his employer finally made clear to him, to absorb the whole of Antoine’s available estate in the shape of over a thousand dollars ready cash. Antoine and his employer gloated together over the scoop that would be made when the People of the Interior were told that the old company factor had died and the Post was closed, and learned that the new company had gone to the trouble of providing for them their beloved liquor so that there should be at least something for which to trade their furs. It was planned that Antoine should ascend the river Where-Moose-Abound, down which the People of the Interior generally came, a several days’ journey, and there intercept them and put through the hoax.
With considerable care, seven sturdy canoe men were engaged, with Antoine as their foreman, to transfer the disguised cases from the lake to a convenient point up the river where the People of the Interior, with their precious cargoes of fur, would be sure to pass by in their descent. On the great day, the flotilla with its spirituous cargo made an early morning start. The men, with occasional levies upon the contents of their load to refresh themselves, finally reached the destined point and unloaded the boxes, setting up their camp to wait for the arrival of the descending hunters. Antoine’s expectations ran high. He pictured to himself the consternation with which the People of the Interior would receive the surprising news that he had to impart, and then the eagerness with which they would fall upon his stores of liquor. With their potations well begun, he expected that they would not stop until they had traded the best of their peltries for the last flask of his fire water. His visions were hourly more stimulated by draughts upon his stock.
That evening, when the voyagers had settled down about their leaping fire, nothing would have aroused the suspicion of the observer as to what was about to take place. The seven canoe men, who were from among the People of the Lake, had decided upon an action which, to their minds, seemed advantageous to themselves, as well as in accordance with the excise laws of the Dominion, but which was prompted above all by fidelity to their friends among the People of the Interior. These men of the People of the Lake had known from former years’ experience what it would mean for their friends of the forest to be turned back to their distant hunting grounds with nothing but the remains of a drunken orgy to meet their requirements for the coming winter. Therefore had they decided, with great moral satisfaction, in the interests of self, of government, and of mankind exactly what their correct course should be.
Before the evening had worn away, Antoine felt himself enjoying the best of spirits. He did not notice, when one of the men asked him to pass the matches, that two of the others behind him were fumbling among some tangled thongs and ropes. He did not notice, until too late, a quick movement by which he was thrown on his back and quickly bound hand and foot, his hands behind his back. Attempts to reach his sheath-knife, frantic yells, squirmings, and attempts to bite the binding thongs were lost in a roar of laughter which greeted him when he was tumbled to one side of the camp like a strangled bear, to curse in French, and threaten them with every dreadful thing that the northern Indian has learned to fear. They only laughed at him as his store clothes became grimy and his urbane veneer disappeared. They laughed all the more, these merry Men of the Lake, when the boxes had been broken open with their keen axes and the corks pulled from a score of flat bottles, whose limpid contents disappeared down their throats between gurgles of liquid and gurgles of laughter and jokes.
Now for two days this merry camp of Bacchus made the forests echo with songs and cries, some from the throats of the Men of the Lake, growing louder each hour, others growing feebler each hour from the throat of Antoine. Had the People of the Interior been within hearing distance, they might have thought that a band of marauding enemies had engaged one another in warfare on their peaceful river. And no doubt they would have gone into concealment until some of their scouts could have learned the cause of it. But it so happened that they were delayed many miles up the river at one of the portages; several invalids had required attention. When all were able to resume their journey they descended by easy stages to favor the condition of their patients.
It was not until the second day after the demolition of the boxes and their contents in Antoine’s bivouac, that the flotilla carrying the People of the Interior swung around a point of the river, and came down upon the camp, where by this time all the merrymakers were strewn about in a profound sleep. Cautiously and reverently stepping ashore, the foremost men in the canoes of the People of the Interior believed that they had come upon a camp of the dead, although, as they afterward remarked, the odor pervading the air was not exactly of a funereal taint. It took but a few moments for them to connect the circumstances. It took but a few more for them to connect with a dozen of the flat bottles whose contents had either been reserved for this special occasion by the thoughtful Men of the Lake, or had been overlooked in the surge of feeling which had followed their first attack upon the load. It now became the turn of the People of the Interior to show solicitude for those men of the People of the Lake, who had so sacrificed their loyalty to their employer for the sake of their kinsmen. Even Antoine was stripped of his thongs and stood upon his feet. But two days of fasting and exposure in the damp moss in his wet store clothes, with nothing to eat or drink, had about exhausted his constitution. His companions were the first to resuscitate, and it was from their lips that the story of the event was learned by the bewildered People of the Interior.
A day or so later, refreshed with sleep, fresh fish, and cold water, the whole company pushed off from the shore. The People of the Interior continued their journey to the Post, but among some of them a change had taken place which was to affect in particular the relationship of two individuals. These two were Good-ground and Mirage.
FRANK G. SPECK
Hanging-flower, the Iroquois
I
She was born in a bark house. Her mother, Rising-sun, was surprised as she looked at the little face, for she felt that once before, long ago, she had seen that face, and presently the assurance came to her that the child was the image of her great-grandmother, Rising-sun’s mother’s mother, whom she had often seen when she herself was a little girl. Hanging-flower had been a great medicine woman in her day, and the fame of her art had spread far and wide; on one occasion, it was claimed, she had even cured a woman of insanity. Rising-sun could not hesitate long: she wished to name the baby Hanging-flower.
Soon after this, when Rising-sun had regained her health and vigor, she called on Clear-as-a-brook, the Keeper of names of the Bear clan, to which Rising-sun belonged. From her the mother learned that Hanging-flower, a remote relative of Rising-sun, of whom she remembered having heard, had recently died and that her name had been “put away in a box.” The mother knew now that nothing stood in the way of the realization of her desire: Hanging-flower was to be the name of her little girl.
When the fall came, Rising-sun began to get ready for the great Green Corn Festival, and on the second day of the festivities she carried little Hanging-flower to the Long House where her name was ceremonially bestowed upon her, in the presence of all the people.
II
The first summers of Hanging-flower’s life passed uneventfully. Rising-sun was a kind mother; for hours she talked to little Hanging-flower in soft, soothing tones, and at night she sang her to sleep with her doleful, monotonous lullabies. When harvesting time came and Rising-sun was busy in the cornfields with the other women, Hanging-flower was wrapped and tied securely to her carrying-board, which was then hung on a branch of an elm tree; there, gently swayed by the wind, Hanging-flower slept, while her mother was hard at work.
III
The summers passed, and Hanging-flower was a baby no longer. Her mother taught her the art of cooking; she also began to help when the corn was pounded in large, wooden mortars. Soon she learned how to embroider. And as her fingers grew nimble and her eyes fond of the colored beads and wampum shells, she began to feel that the world of buds and flowers and leaves was her own, hers and her mother’s and of the other women;—the men knew nothing of such things.
Once, when Rising-sun’s brother was staying for a visit, Hanging-flower overtook him at work on a small False Face; for a long time she watched him unobserved, and when he was gone, she practiced carving on bits of wood and bark until she felt that she was as good at it as any man. But of this she never spoke nor did she show her work to any one, as she had been taught that carving was not woman’s work.
IV
The summers passed and Hanging-flower became a maiden. Her eyes were large, black and deep, and her hair which she wore in two large braids, fell heavily from her shoulders. As she passed along the road, some boys looked intently at her while others turned their eyes away and hurried their steps. But, one and all, she passed them by. Hanging-flower had become a great dancer, and many a flattering comment was heard among the older men and women as they watched her dance with the others at the Strawberry and Raspberry Festivals.
V
At the next berrying season Hanging-flower joined a group of young men and girls and together they went off to the woods. Old Ringing-voice, the great story-teller, was with them.
Every night, when the day’s work was done and the boys and girls returned to camp with their baskets heaped full of red, juicy berries, they would all sit around the fire, while Quick-of-hand and She-works-in-the-house, who were reputed for their skill in cooking, prepared a delicious soup of corn meal, after which, berries in great quantities were eaten. Then Ringing-voice would light his pipe and leaning his back against a tree stump, the legs drawn up so that the knees almost touched his chin, he would begin to talk, in slow and measured phrases. It is here that Hanging-flower first learned of the language of the animals and of the great warrior who had been so kind to the beasts and birds of the woods and the fields, and who was brought to life by their efforts after he had succumbed to the arrows of the Sioux. She learned of the great medicine, ga’-nṑ-da, which the animals made of parts of their own bodies and gave to the warrior to be used as a cure for all sickness. She was thrilled as she listened to the story of Pale-face, the pure youth, who started out alone and, wandering through the woods, met the pygmies and learned from them the Pygmy or Dark Dance, which, her mother had told her, she would herself one day perform. And for many evenings in succession, the boys and girls were spellbound as Ringing-voice recounted the great story of the foundation of the League, of Deganawīda and Hayenhwáhtha, the great chiefs, who organized the League and prescribed the Law and established the Great Peace.
One night, as they were sitting around the fire, and Ringing-voice was absorbed in his tale, Hanging-flower suddenly became aware that some one was looking at her. She turned her head and saw Straight-as-an-arrow, the tall, slim youth, who was staring at her with large wondering eyes. She looked away, and not once during the long evening did she turn her head again.
Evening after evening, while listening to the stories, Hanging-flower felt his gaze fixed upon her. She never turned, she was afraid even to move, but she knew that his eyes were fixed upon her.
One night, when the moon was not shining and all was quiet in the camp, he came upon her like the wind. Seized with terror, Hanging-flower wanted to scream. Her lips parted, but no sound came; her heart was beating fast and she lay there in the wet grass, hot and trembling.
When next spring came a baby was born to Hanging-flower. It made no sound when it came, for it was dead. On the evening of that day, two forms, wrapped in blankets, slipped out of the bark house; one was carrying a small bundle in her arms. Quietly as shadows they glided along the road, until they reached the cemetery of the Bear clan. And there the two women buried the little, nameless thing that had come unasked for and unwelcome. No one had seen them, no one knew; and after a while, Hanging-flower herself forgot what had happened.
VI
Some time later Rising-sun paid a visit to her sister’s village. It so happened that the Bean Feast was being held at that time. Rising-sun went to the Long House with her sister and her people. There she saw Fleet-of-foot, the great runner, and so charmed was she with his form, graceful as that of a deer, that she could not take her eyes off him. After the feast, Rising-sun spoke to Fleet-of-foot’s mother. She asked Corn-planter to visit her at the home village.
VII
In a little while, Corn-planter came to visit Rising-sun. With her hostess she went to the fields where the corn was ripe and the women were busy harvesting it. She saw the long rows of bent backs, and the green and yellow cobs which would show for an instant over the left shoulders of the women, presently to disappear into the large baskets on their backs.
“That young girl in the third row,” exclaimed Corn-planter, “seems to do work for two. Look how her hands fly through the corn!”
“It is Hanging-flower,” answered Rising-sun, “my daughter. And a good wife she would make for Fleet-of-foot, the runner.”
“Let her cook a basket of corn bread,” said Corn-planter, “Fleet-of-foot will be ready.”
VIII
That night Rising-sun told Hanging-flower that the time had come for her to be married, and that Fleet-of-foot, the great runner, was ready to accept her basket of corn bread. Saying not a word, Hanging-flower got busy with the corn meal and before morning the basket of bread was ready. Hanging-flower started on her way early, and by noon she had reached Corn-planter’s village. The boys were running races when she arrived. With wide open eyes she stood, as Fleet-of-foot rushed by her, as if carried by the wind. Hanging-flower shut her eyes ... and it seemed to her that she heard the rustling of the pines; she felt herself lying in the wet grass, hot and trembling; and through the mist she saw two shapes wrapped in blankets, bending over a nameless thing which they buried in the ground....
When the races were over Hanging-flower saw Fleet-of-foot resting on a stump of wood in front of his mother’s house. Then she stepped forward and placed the basket of corn bread before him on the ground. Fleet-of-foot rose and said nothing. He only looked at Hanging-flower with a sharp, piercing look and, taking the basket, entered the house. In a while Corn-planter appeared in the doorway. She invited Hanging-flower to step inside, and Hanging-flower had her meal with Corn-planter and her people. The sun was still high when she started on her way back and before nightfall she reached her village.
When Hanging-flower fell asleep that night she saw some deer running among the trees. One of the deer was larger and fleeter than the others. Hanging-flower was trying to catch it. Again and again she felt herself flying through the air, in pursuit, but just as she was about to seize it, it eluded her.
In the morning of the following day Fleet-of-foot arrived before the house where Hanging-flower lived with her people. As she saw him enter, she rose to her feet. In his hand he held a necklace of blue and white wampum beads. Presently he took them in both hands and placed them about her neck. Then Hanging-flower knew that she had a husband.
The Long House in which Hanging-flower had lived with her mother and several other families had been crowded for some time, and Fleet-of-foot decided that they had to start a new home for themselves. Many men and women, most of them relatives of Hanging-flower, helped the young couple to build a small bark house, and before many moons had passed the house was ready and Hanging-flower and Fleet-of-foot began to live there.
As the summers passed, other couples came to live in the house, and extensions were built to it, to accommodate the ever-growing numbers. This continued for some time, until the house became a Long House, like the others.
IX
When the next berrying season came, a son was born to Hanging-flower; and having consulted Spring-blossoms, her mother’s mother, Hanging-flower gave him the name Glad-tidings. As Hanging-flower was lying on her bed and her blood was hot in her, she heard the sound of rattles outside and she saw her brother take his turtle rattle and join the False Faces, who were passing through the village. Hanging-flower knew that Glad-tidings was one day to become a chief, and that night she carved a little False Face and hid it in her bag, for she had heard the rattles and she knew that some day her son was to be a leader of the False Faces. Hanging-flower was very beautiful, as she lay there on her bed. Her large black eyes were even larger and deeper than usual; she had looked into the future.
X
Many summers passed and Glad-tidings had become a strong and handsome youth. He was very young, but the older men thought him wise and cool-headed. The women were wild over him, but he had no eyes for them. He would rather sit with the older men, always inquiring about ancient things and eager to learn the laws and traditions of his people.
One day, while Hanging-flower was pounding corn back of her house, a piercing sound was heard on the road, gwā-á! gwā-á! gwā-á! Hanging-flower shuddered, for she knew that a chief was dead. Soon the news came that Power-of-thunder, her brother, had been killed by a stray arrow during an encounter with the Sioux.
Spring-blossoms and Rising-sun were dead and Hanging-flower was the matron of her family now. When she heard the mournful news, she began to think of Glad-tidings. He was young, but wise and strong, and there was no other man in the family who might be made chief in his stead.
In a few days a Council of the family was called by Hanging-flower. There were some men at the Council, but mostly women, and although some other Bear people were there, most of those present belonged to Hanging-flower’s family. When they were all assembled, Hanging-flower began to speak and as she spoke, all were silent. She spoke of Glad-tidings’ youth, but recalled the many indications of wisdom and character which he had given, and before closing, she nominated her son to be chief in place of Power-of-thunder, her brother.
For many days after this, Hanging-flower was busy calling on the other chiefs of her tribe. First she called on those who belonged to the brother clans and then on those who were of the cousin clans, and when her nominee was ratified by all these chiefs, she brought his name before the Great Council of the chiefs of the League, who also approved of her choice.
And so it came that before the corn was gathered in that fall, Glad-tidings was made chief in place of his mother’s brother.
XI
Some summers passed and strange rumors began to reach Hanging-flower. First came Full-moon, and in many words told the mother that Glad-tidings was suspected of having made a dishonorable agreement with the Sioux. He had promised, she averred, to exercise his influence with the warriors of his people so that they would not attack the Sioux while the latter were fighting the Algonquin. Then Crossing-of-the-roads came, Fleet-of-foot’s brother, and he spoke in grave tones about the dishonor that Glad-tidings’ act had brought upon his people. Day after day, men and women came and spoke earnestly and vehemently to Hanging-flower, and the tenor of the news they brought was always the same.
XII
Hanging-flower was pale and haggard now, and from day to day she was losing weight. But one day she felt that she was mother no longer, but the matron of her family. She called on Glad-tidings, the chief, and standing before him, admonished him in ceremonial terms to desist from his shameful ways, which were bringing dishonor upon his people. But should he persist, such were her parting words, she would call on him again, and then once more, accompanied by the Chief Warrior, and then she would depose him and he would be chief no longer.
The days passed and the rumors persisted. Hanging-flower called on Glad-tidings for the second time; and when she had spoken, he said nothing. In a little while, she called on him for the third time, accompanied by the Chief Warrior. As both of them stood facing Glad-tidings, the Chief Warrior said: “I will now admonish you for the last time, and if you continue to resist acceding to and obeying our request, then your duties as chief of our family and clan will cease, and I shall take the deer’s horns from off your head, and with a broad strong-edged ax I shall cut the tree down.” Having spoken thus, the Chief Warrior “took the deer’s horns off Glad-tidings’ head,” and handed them to Hanging-flower, for from now on Glad-tidings was chief no longer.
Hanging-flower then went to the Council house and informed the other chiefs, in person, that Glad-tidings had been deposed. As she spoke, her heart broke, for she knew that “the coals had gone out on the fire” of her family, and the chieftainship was lost.
A few days after this, Full-moon called on Hanging-flower and informed her in many words that Feathered-arrow, Full-moon’s son, was to be chief in Glad-tidings’ place and that the chiefs of the League had transferred the chieftainship to her family.
In the evening of that day Hanging-flower, wrapped in a blanket, went outside of the village. For a long time she stood there, on the hill above the cornfields. Her thoughts turned to the past and for a long time she was lost in memories.... But of the future she did not care to think.
ALEXANDER A. GOLDENWEISER
The Thunder Power of Rumbling-wings
The strange events of which I write, took place in the summer of 1840, when I, then a man in the full vigor of my early forties, chanced to be in charge of a museum expedition sent to explore an ancient Lenape burial site situated on a hilltop in the northwestern part of the State of New Jersey.
On the tenth day of June we encountered an unusually deep grave of circular form, some six feet in diameter, in which, at a distance from the surface of perhaps seven feet, we encountered a number of slabs of stone piled up in the form of a cairn.
Removing these with care, we found beneath them a skeleton, which, when carefully uncovered and brushed off, proved to be of a full-grown man, lying on his right side, with his knees drawn up at right angles to his body and his hands near his face. Beside his crumbling breastbone lay a tiny mask of stone, bearing two little perforations which showed the wear of a suspending cord, and near it a knife blade of purple argillite and a small pipe of baked clay, bearing a very neat pattern, drawn into its surface with a sharp point while the material was still soft. At each side of the skull were the chalky remains of some shell beads, rather larger and coarser than wampum, but similar in form; while near the feet a little pile of neatly-made flint arrow points told of the one-time presence of a sheaf or quiver of arrows.
What archæologist has not sat upon the brink of a newly uncovered, ancient grave and wished that the fleshless jaws before him could speak and tell their story? Or wished that he himself could be transported backward in time for a brief space to learn something of the life of a bygone day? So I sat and so I wished; and then we photographed our find as it lay, and removed the specimens for safe keeping.
As the hour was late, we did not touch the bones, however, intending to remove them upon the morrow, and so we left them for the night, still surrounded by some of the stone slabs.
After dark I bethought myself that I had forgotten to bring in my notebook, and recalled that I had left it on the pile of dirt beside the grave, and so, guiding my steps by the flickering flashes of lightning from an approaching thunder-shower, I made my way thither. I remember that I had found the book and had just turned back toward the camp, holding out my hand to feel the first splashes of rain, when a blinding flash and a violent concussion sent me reeling, reeling, down,—into darkness....
When I came to myself I could see nothing, but I knew it was raining steadily; I could hear the drops patter on the leaves; I could feel them on my body.
On my body? I must be naked! I felt my chest, it was bare and wet, my arms likewise. What had become of my clothes? I felt at my waist; it was belted, and in front hung something like a little apron, wet and slimy. My legs? I felt, and found them encased in long stockings of some sort, reaching nearly to the hips, and I could feel that some sort of supporters ran from them to the belt. My feet seemed covered with the same soft stockings which, like the apron, felt wet and slimy to the touch.
As I bent over to feel of my feet, something brushed against my cheek, something hard and cold, yet light and almost clinging. I put up my hand and felt; it seemed to be a string or rather loop of little beads.
Then I followed up with my fingers and found that the loop, with a number of other loops were, somehow or other, firmly attached to my ear in several different places from the lobe upward. I felt around and discovered there were so many of them that the top of the ear was bent over by their weight, and the lobe was somewhat stretched. I felt of each separate loop; each was firmly attached; and the other ear was in similar shape. I shook my head and could feel the swinging weight of them.
Puzzled, I started to run my fingers through my hair—a favorite habit of mine, and found that I had none! That is none to speak of—it was very short indeed, almost as if shaven, except for a bristly crest like a mule’s mane, which ran from front to back over the top of my head, and ended in a little pigtail or queue in the back.
Something moving against my breast as I moved, I felt it and found a little hard, cold, oval object slung from a string about my neck; near it on another string hung a wet and slimy bag, and what felt like a small knife in a sheath.
I was puzzled indeed—I could not make out what had happened to me. As I sat thinking, I must have dropped off into a doze in spite of the rain, for when I opened my eyes again it was daylight.
I looked about me; it was still raining and a brisk wind stirred the tree tops; but I seemed to be in a strange, wild country for, although to my left I could look off over a valley, my eye met no houses, roads, or clearings, just a waste of tossing tree tops, in fact no sign of man except a distant blur of smoke, rising apparently from among the trees. I looked behind me; there stood a great tree, its wood showing white, its bark practically stripped off, while broken branches littered the ground. It had been struck by lightning.
I looked at my hands; they were lean, and tawny in color instead of fat and freckled as I knew them; I looked at my legs; they were encased in soiled and worn buckskin leggings; upon my feet were moccasins puckered to a single seam down the front, near which were traces of colored patterns now nearly worn away—and still I did not understand.
I pulled the queue around and looked at it; the hair was black and neatly braided, whereas my own, in those days, was red; I pulled around the beads attached to my ears; they were white and apparently made of shell, but were too close to my eyes to see plainly.
Then I investigated the things hung about my neck, and noted, with a start, that the oval, hard object was the little stone mask we had found in the grave. I pulled the knife from its sheath; it was of stone—argillite—not purple from age, but black, fresh-looking, sharp. And when I looked in the bag, I found what I had come to expect, the little, decorated pipe of clay, and with it some damp, shriveled leaves which must have been some sort of tobacco.
I could not avoid the conclusion; I was somehow transported back into prehistoric times, and had assumed the body and belongings of the Indian whose skeleton we had unearthed.
If this were true, I must have some weapons, I thought, and soon I found them—a five-foot, straight bow, lying beneath the broken branches that had fallen from the lightning-blasted tree, and a buckskin quiver. I pulled out the arrows; their points were of flint. I noticed that the sinew filaments that fastened them to the shafts were loosening from the dampness, and I found myself instinctively twirling each one between my fingers until the sinew was tight again. The carcass of a deer lay also among the fallen branches, evidently a victim of the bow.
I noticed that I was feeling hungry so I slung my quiver, picked up my bow, and then, after a moment’s hesitation, shouldered the deer and started down the hill toward the smoke.
After a while I found a trail leading in the right direction; this I followed until I reached the brink of a bluff from which I could plainly see the roofs of a number of bark houses above which rose the naked limbs of dead trees, making a strong contrast to the living, green forest all about them.
As I looked, I heard voices of people ascending the hill. I slipped into the bushes with my burden, out of sight but where I could peer out. The voices belonged to a number of men, apparently setting forth upon the hunt, armed with bows like mine. I noticed most of them wore leggings and moccasins of more or less the same shape as my own; that their hair with a few exceptions was cut like mine, and that they wore in their ears either strings of beads like mine, or tufts of downy feathers. And I noticed with surprise that I could understand, perfectly, their language.
From all this I judged that they must belong to the same tribe as myself and that it must be safe to proceed, so, after they had passed, I stepped from my hiding-place and went on down the hill and into the village.
The first thing to strike my eye was a big, rectangular, barn-like wigwam which stood near the middle of a large open square or plaza, the roof made of sheets of bark held in place with poles, and pinned at the ridge with two smoke holes. The sides were of logs; the door, which occupied the middle of the end facing me, was closed with some sort of curtain.
About the plaza stood fifteen or twenty smaller houses of similar form, but from a half to a quarter the size; these had but one smoke hole in the roof; and the sides, like the roofs, were of bark.
Some of these roofs were extended forward to form a sort of porch in front of the wigwam; in other cases a separate little shed stood in front, provided with a bark roof of its own, but open on all sides. From these sheds and porches rose a haze of blue smoke wafting a savory smell.
Beside me, at the edge of the plaza, stood one of the dead trees, the bark of which had been girdled round; and I could see blackened stumps where others had stood; while many such dead trees rose stark and naked from the garden patches about the village. I found out later that, in clearing land for village or garden, the custom was to chop the bark around the trees so that they died, to let them stand until thoroughly dry, then to fell them with the aid of fire and, splitting them up with wedges, use them for wood as needed.
Seeing some women standing beneath a shed from which came a hollow, thumping sound I made my way thither. Suddenly one of the group darted out from under the shed and came running toward me with a glad cry. “Oh Flying-wolf! So you have come back safe to me after all!” she exclaimed, grasping me affectionately by the arm and leading me toward one of the wigwams. “So the Mengwe did not get you after all! I am so happy!”
Thinking that this must be the wife of the man whose body I had taken, and that I must say something, I remarked, “Yes, I have really come.”
“Ah!” she said with concern, looking up into my face, “how hungry you must be! I cooked your favorite stew against your return last night, but you did not appear, and the boy and I never touched it; I can warm it for you in just a little while. Hang the deer on the tree in the old place and go to your bed and rest until I have it ready; you must be tired. Or wait,” she added, “I will spread a fresh mat I finished yesterday.”
She passed into the wigwam and I followed, to find myself in a dwelling, the most noticeable feature of which was a pair of wide platforms or benches, one along the wall on each side, raised some two or three feet above the floor and covered with mats. Back of these benches or bunks, the wall was lined with colored mats; and the space beneath them was filled with assorted bags, baskets and bundles, while from the roof hung other bags and bundles, and a string or two of corn, the ears braided together by the husk. Behind the poles supporting the roof, was thrust a half-finished bow; near it hung a bundle of sprouts intended, probably, for arrows.
The woman spread a fresh mat on one of the platforms. “Lie here,” she said, “I will build the fire inside here instead of out in the shed; our house feels damp after the rain.”
I watched her as she went out, and saw her taking down some large object from a shelf in the shed, and by the time I had stretched myself on the mat she returned with a large, egg-shaped, earthen pot, and set its pointed end between three stones placed for the purpose in the fireplace in the center of the wigwam, and began to stir the ashes with a long stick. Finally she uncovered some live coals, left from the night before, and gathering them in a heap with her stick, she placed some fibrous stuff, which looked like shredded cedar bark, upon them and began to blow into it. Soon she had a lively blaze, which she fed with small sticks until it was well started.
Pulling the fire about the base of the pot, she soon had it bubbling, and, before long, set before me a wooden bowl of steaming, savory stew of meat, corn and beans. Beside the first bowl she placed another, containing flat dumplings, which proved to be made of crushed, hulled corn flavored with berries, rather heavy but delicious.
On the edge of the stew bowl hung a short, wide, wooden spoon. As I ate, she sat on the edge of the bench just opposite me and chatted happily of this and that, rarely pausing for an answer—for which I was thankful.
Between mouthfuls, I looked her over. She was a comely young woman of twenty-five or thirty, ever showing her even, white teeth in a smile, her kindly face as yet but little weather-beaten. Her black hair was neatly parted in the middle and brought back and fastened at the nape of her neck with a sort of long, cylindrical knot which was wrapped in beads; several short loops of beads hung from the rims of her ears where there were evidently, as in my own case, a number of small perforations, while each lobe showed a hole perhaps a quarter of an inch in diameter. About her neck were many strings of beads of different sorts; some looked to be of dried berries or seeds; others of bone, while some were certainly of shell, and one string looked like copper.
The upper part of her plump body was naked but for these beads; from her waist hung a skirt of buckskin reaching below the knees, neatly fringed and bearing a wide, embroidered border with an intricate design in colors; it was evidently a flat, robe-like piece wrapped about her waist, belted taut, and the top edge folded down over the belt. Her legs were covered by leggings, her little feet in moccasins, both leggings and moccasins being of deerskin and embroidered with what I afterwards found to be dyed deer hair and porcupine quills. Both wrists were wound with strings of beads.
As I ate, she talked on: “Your mother was over yesterday from the Pulling-corn village. She says she is making you a fine robe of four soft, dressed deerskins, and is decorating the back with a large picture of your Guardian Spirit, the mask being done in the little shells she bought from those southern tribesmen who came up the river in that big canoe—you remember. She gave them in exchange her whole stock of healing herbs, and had to work like a beaver to dig another lot of the little roots before winter set in.
“She says she is going to sew each little shell on separately—you know each has a little hole rubbed into it—so that even if one breaks loose the others will not come off. Talking of trading, when are you going to get me that pair of Cherokee shell ear-pins you promised me? That old Shawnee woman in Possum-ground village has some and there is not another pair in Lenape land. See, I have stretched the holes in my ears on purpose for them.
“And speaking of making things, when are you going to finish that big, wooden bowl for me? You brought the maple burl home long ago, yet you only have it partly burned out, and there it lies beneath the sleeping birch, and right by it is a whole basket full of little slabs and pieces of sandstone for grinding it smooth.
“I know you have no flint scrapers, but don’t you remember you buried a lot of half-finished arrow points and little blocks of flint to keep them fresh, just outside one corner of the shed? They ought to be moist enough to work easily and you could make all the scrapers you want in a little while.
“The reason I need it now is because our son took the big old feast bowl out to play canoe with, the other day when I was not looking. It was all right until three or four other little boys tried to stand in it, too, all at the same time, then it split and is ruined. It made me feel sad because that was the bowl that grandfather made for mother when she and father built their first wigwam. I shall have to borrow another bowl for to-night.”
During all this I had said as little as possible, for I did not want to show my ignorance of all these things. I could not bear to spoil her happiness and let her discover that I was not really her husband. Now, however, I ventured to inquire, “What is going to happen to-night?”
“I forgot to tell you,” she replied, “last night when you were away, our war chief came to see you with a number of the elders from here, and other villages. They are going to get up a big war party to punish the Mengwe who, you know, are getting too bold. You remember how one of their scalping parties killed my poor brother last year when they caught him alone out hunting; and how they killed your friend Breaker but a few moons ago. Last night when you did not come home I feared they had got you.
“The war chief says you know more about those trails to the north than any other Lenape—that is of our Unami tribe—and they want you to lead the party. Everybody said they had full confidence in your judgment and your bravery.
“I hate to have you go because it is so dangerous, and our son and I need our hunter yet a while, yet,” she smiled sadly, “I am proud of my warrior too; the tribe needs you, and the ghost of my poor brother cries for vengeance.
“I told them to come again to-night and so they will be here I suppose. They spoke of bringing our tribal head chief, too. I was looking for women to help me cook for them, among that party pounding corn in that arbor, when you came into the village.”
As she finished, I realized that the crisis had come; I could keep my secret no longer. I had not enough knowledge of tribal affairs to talk with the delegation, let alone lead a war party. I must tell her the truth, or at least that part of it I felt she could understand.
So I said to her. “Listen, my mate. You have been so glad to see me come home that I have hated to spoil your joy. But something happened to me last night—I know not what—and when I awoke this morning I found I had forgotten everything I ever knew. I did not even recognize my own clothing and body; I did not know myself to be Flying-wolf until you named me. I found my way to this village by accident, and know you to be my wife only by your actions; and at this minute I do not remember your name. Of our life I remember only the language; as for leading a war party, making a wooden bowl, or even hunting meat for you, all are equally impossible. I could no more do these things than a blind puppy, not because I do not want to do them, but because I have forgotten how.”
She slid off the bench and coming straight across the wigwam grasped me by the shoulders with her two hands and looked full into my eyes. “Is this true, Flying-wolf?” she asked.
“Yes,” I choked.
She stepped to the door and looked out for a while in silence; when she turned to me again her cheeks were wet. “Perhaps,” she said, “if you should see your son whom you always loved so, your memory would come back.”
She went out. Shortly she returned with a bright-looking little lad about eight years old, his long, black hair hanging loose, his lithe body naked except for a little string about his neck where hung some little bones which my experienced eye recognized as those of a turtle.
“Father,” he cried, “why did you send mother after me? I was having such a good time down at the creek with the boys—we were playing Thunder-Beings hunting for horned water-serpents.”
I laid my hand on his head and said, “All right, son, then run right back there and play.” I met his mother’s questioning eyes, and shook my head.
After sitting in a miserable silence a while, she asked: “Where did you awake this morning?”
“On that hill over yonder,” I replied, pointing, “under a tree. I would know the place again because the wood of that tree shows naked and white, half the bark has been torn off by lightning. It must have been struck lately because the broken limbs lying about it are still green.”
“Now I know what the matter is,” she cried, springing to her feet. “You have been struck by one of the Thunder’s arrows. And I know who can help you.” She darted out.
She returned with a fine-looking elderly man whose long, iron-gray hair hung loose upon his shoulders, except for one little braid at the back, to which were tied several fine, large, eagle feathers, white with black tips. From the outer corner of each eye a blue line, apparently tattooed, ran zigzag down across his cheeks to his chin; on his naked breast was tattooed a rude but striking figure of a bird with wings spread, surrounded by many other zigzag lines. Here hung suspended from a string that passed around his neck, a tiny model of a war club, its ball-like head painted red.
“This is Rumbling-wings,” said my wife. “If any one can help you, he can.” And so I told him my story as I had told it to her.
He pondered for a while, then turned to my wife. “Run down to the spring, Whispering-leaves,” he said, “and get us some fresh water.” When she had disappeared with the bark bucket, he said, “I think I understand what the matter is. Flying-wolf, whose body you occupy, must have been killed or stunned by the Thunder arrow, and your spirit, which must have been floating near, took possession of his body. Where you come from I know not, but you must have been thinking of us and our time, when your spirit was driven from its body by another Thunder arrow. Whispering-leaves must not know this—that her real husband may be dead.
“What can you do? You can either make up your mind to live out your life among us and learn to be what she expects of her husband, or you can go to that same hilltop with me some day, and I will call back the Thunders to set you free again. Then maybe, if your own body has not been destroyed, you may return to it, and, perhaps, Flying-wolf’s spirit, if it has not already gone to the Land of Ghosts, will come back to this body. It is all a chance. To-night when the elders and chiefs come, lie in your bed here as if sick in body and say nothing; I will explain to them. As to what you want to do, think about it as long as you wish and when you decide, let me know. In the meantime learn all you can and take care of your mate and the boy.”
Just then Whispering-leaves (I was glad to learn her name!) came in with the water, and the old man dipped a gourdful for me, then drank himself. “Thanks, daughter,” he said to her, “your husband has been struck by lightning and his memory is very sick. Be good to him, and little by little it will come back. But do not expect too much of him at first. If you run short of food let my wife know. And you, Flying-wolf,” said he, “whenever you want to learn something come to my house. I am alone every night.” He went out.
I looked at Whispering-leaves and she at me; hope shone in her face, she smiled. The more I looked at her, the better I liked her.
The first night I visited Rumbling-wings, his wife, after spreading a mat for me, withdrew, murmuring something about visiting a neighbor for the evening. I had learned by this time the Lenape amenities, and so I did not start boldly off with my questions, but chatted quietly of this and that for a while, finally winding up with, “Why did my wife go to you when she heard I had been struck by a Thunder arrow? Why do you think you can call the Thunders to set my spirit free?”
“You are asking a hard question, my friend,” said Rumbling-wings after a moment’s cogitation, “and one which a Lenape does not like to discuss with another. But I realize that you have been cut off from the years of early training that most of our boys go through, and the only way I can make you understand is to tell you outright, and I feel that my Guardian Spirit will forgive me.
“In the first place, you know what the Thunder-Beings are—powerful spirits, helpers of the Great Spirit—in form at the same time man-like and bird-like. They bring the rain to water our crops and refresh the earth. You have often heard the rumbling of their wings in the storm, and have seen their arrows of flame shoot toward the earth as they hunt the great horned serpents and other man-destroying monsters which form their daily food. And it was one of those very arrows which, as you know, started you in life as a Lenape.
“Well, I suppose I must tell you, one of these Thunder-Beings is my Guardian Spirit and that is why people say that I am in league with the Thunder, and have Thunder power, and why they call on me in cases like yours.
“The Thunders must have picked me out for their favor even before I was born, as you will realize when you hear how I come by my name of Rumbling-wings.
“It appears that my mother confided to her brother, my uncle, that she was expecting me, and according to our custom she asked him to take particular notice of any dream he might have, in hopes of finding out the child’s name. Not long after, he was overtaken at night, far from his village; it was black and stormy and he took refuge beneath an overhanging rock. He found a spot fairly dry, but rough and uncomfortable, and he fell into a troubled sleep. Sometime in the night he was awakened by something, he knew not what, and found himself sitting up, listening. He heard a distant rumbling of thunder among the mountains which seemed at last to take the form of words: ‘Rumbling-wings is coming, Rumbling-wings is coming.’ ... All this he told my mother, and I was born shortly after.
“When the time came for our great autumn ceremony in the Big House—that large wigwam in the square you passed, coming here to-night, is one of them—my uncle took me in his arms and, standing before the centre post with its great, carved face of ‘Mising’ looking down upon me, he announced to the people that my name was Rumbling-wings. Even as he spoke there was a crash of thunder, late as it was in the moon-of-falling-leaves, and a wind sighed through the trees about the Big House, and they heard drops of rain patter upon the bark roof or fall hissing through the smoke holes into the two great fires below.
“Perhaps Whispering-leaves has told you how our people believe that after the birth of a child, its navel string has much to do with its disposition; so, if a girl, they take that string and bury it under the house or in the garden to make her fond of home duties; or, if a boy, they hide it out in the woods so he will like the hunt. Well, my father, so he told me, took mine to the wood, and hid it in a hollow tree. He had hardly done this when a thunder-shower came up and drove him to shelter; coming back on his way home he found the tree, where he had hidden my navel string, burning. It had been struck by a Thunder arrow.
“As a boy I knew nothing of the Thunder power except that when the great, black clouds fringed with yellow, began to pile up in the west, and others, young and old, looked upon them with dread, I alone of the village felt no fear. In fact I used to go out naked into every storm; the crash of thunder was as music to me, the bright flashes were beautiful, the pelting rain refreshed me. And, in truth, I do this yet, always stretching out my arms to my Guardian to thank him for having helped me thus far along the trail.
“But I did not know who my Guardian Spirit actually was until I had seen some twelve or fourteen snows. About this time my parents began to act strangely and to speak crossly to me. I did not understand why I deserved such a change in their feelings, and many a time I felt alone in the world. They even gave me the poorest part of the meat they had to eat, and scraps and leavings of corn bread, and stew that had begun to smell sour.
“One morning I was awakened before dawn by some one punching me in the ribs with a stick—well I remember how it hurt—and I heard my father say, ‘We must drive this wretched boy away from here, I can not stand him any longer. Get up from there, dog-like!’ and he punched me again. My mother who had always until lately taken my part in any dispute, took no notice, but bent over the fireplace, and soon a little fire began to flicker and finally filled our wigwam with light. She went to the water jar just inside the door, and I saw her dip into it our oldest, blackest, greasiest gourd cup. Then she turned to me and her face, usually so kind, seemed hard as flint. ‘Drink, boy,’ she ordered, handing me that cup, and I wonderingly obeyed.
“Then my father spoke, handing me a burnt and shriveled shred of meat no larger than his little finger—a piece full of dirt and grit where it had fallen to the floor. ‘Eat this, miserable brat,’ he cried, ‘and get away out of my sight.’
“A sudden anger overcame me and I flung the morsel full in his face and darted for the door. ‘Wait,’ I heard him say, ‘aren’t you going to blacken your face? And besides I was going to tell you the rest of it, that you must not come back until you bring with you something great, but you started out too quick!’ Did I see a fleeting smile on his stern face? Surely his eyes were twinkling!
“Then it dawned upon me what the matter was; I was expected to fast for power, and all this seeming abuse was nothing but a sham to make Those-above-us take pity on me as an outcast, suffering child, and grant me a vision from which I would gain a Guardian Spirit that would be my protector through life. Often had I heard older boys speaking of such things, but I had never realized that I, Rumbling-wings, was expected to go through the ordeal.
“Then said my father, ‘It seems to me I have heard that some boys who were driven away from home, had to go up on Wolf mountain to the east end where there is a little cave that was nice to lie in while they prayed, because they could look out over the tops of the trees to the river and the hills beyond. Besides,’ he added, ‘I expect to go hunting up that way early to-morrow morning and I shall look into that cave to see if any one is hidden away there.’
“Then indeed I understood, and so under his direction, with my mother looking on, I rubbed my face with charcoal and, throwing about my shoulders the oldest and raggedest robe I could find—the one the dog had been using for a bed beneath the sleeping bench—I set out.
“All day I lay hungry in that little cave while mosquitoes and deer-flies from the woods, and fleas from the dog’s robe bit me unmercifully. Yet I looked out over the valley as calmly as I could, praying to Those-above-us to take pity on me; yet nothing happened, except that when the day was nearly spent, a cloud came up behind me over Wolf mountain and overspread the sky, then went away grumbling without letting fall a drop of rain. That night, still hungry, I slept a troubled sleep and next morning, before sun up, in came my father with a little scrap of meat and a small gourd of water. As I drew out the cob stopper and drank, he asked me, ‘Have you found anything yet?’ When I replied ‘No,’ he took the bottle and departed.
“The same things happened on the two following days, and I got weaker and weaker from hunger, yet saw nothing but the black cloud every afternoon.
“But on the afternoon of the fourth day when the cloud came again it brought rain, and heavy thunder, and this, strange as it may seem, lulled me to sleep. And in my sleep I dreamed that I stood naked and alone on the bare sand hills by the Great-water-where-daylight-appears, with nothing but a wooden war club, with its round head painted red, in my hand. And as I stood arrows came flying through the air from every direction and whispering past my head, struck quivering into the ground about me. But not one touched me, and my heart was unafraid.
“At this point I was awakened by an unusually loud crash of thunder and I opened my eyes to see the shower moving off across the valley, carrying with it a bow of beautiful colors and followed by the rays of a lowering sun.
“Somehow I felt satisfied then that I should go home; it was useless to linger longer in the cave. And so I started, staggering from weakness among the wet bushes on the mountain side.
“Weak as I was I nearly lost my footing, crossing the swollen creek, but at last I reached our village. The people looked curiously at me as I entered and made my way toward our wigwam.
“My father was sitting in front, scraping the charcoal from the inside of a wooden bowl he had been burning out; some one called to him, or perhaps he heard my step, and he looked up.
“‘Have you brought it with you, son?’ he asked. On my reply that I had a dream he seemed very well satisfied and called to my mother who was looking out of our door. ‘Wife, sweep and fix a place for our son to sit—he is bringing it with him!’ Mother bustled about then and swept, and smiling, spread a fresh mat for me; I was surprised at her air of deference. Down I sat, and after the sun had gone beneath the edge of the world, she brought me a great bowl of stew, steaming and delicious, and a new, clean gourd of fresh water.
“That evening they really treated me as a guest. Father even filled a pipe for me, and then, when my mother’s deep breathing from her place on the sleeping bench told us that she slumbered, he asked me outright, ‘What animal spirit or other Manitou has offered himself to be your helper?’ ‘I do not know,’ I answered, and then I told him my dream, fearing in my heart that he would think it meant nothing.
“‘Son’, he said when I had finished, ‘you have done better than I dared to hope, you have indeed gained a powerful friend among Those-above-us, no less a personage than one of the Thunders!’ And when I asked him how he knew, he replied, ‘The wooden war club with a round head painted red is the emblem of the Thunder-Beings, and represents the fearful blows they strike. The fact that, while you held this club in your hand, the arrows did not wound you, means that your Guardian Spirit, the Thunder, will protect you. Don’t you understand?’
“All that night in my dreams I was struggling and fighting, with whom I know not, but through it all I heard myself singing,
In my trouble In my trouble I call upon my Helper And his answer Out of a dark sky It comes rumbling, It comes rumbling!
“And this ever since has been my war song, and the song I sing at our great autumn ceremony in the Big House, where all who have been so blessed sing of their visions.”...
“So that,” I said, as Rumbling-wings finished, “is why you wear that little, red, war club hanging about your neck! Now tell me why I carry a little stone face in the same way. I have tried to take it off several times, but Whispering-leaves will not let me.”
“That,” replied the old man, “represents Misinghalikun, the living Mask-Being, and a powerful Manitou he is, for the Great Spirit has given him control of all the wild animals of the forest. He is the Guardian Spirit of Flying-wolf, whose body you occupy, but I cannot tell you the story of his vision. No one could tell you that story but Flying-wolf himself. And where is he? You occupy his body, but I doubt if Misinghalikun will help you as he did him. I believe Flying-wolf won his great fame as a hunter through the power of this Guardian Spirit, and without that, you may have a hard time to live up to his reputation.” And, I must say, so I found it.
Another evening I asked Rumbling-wings if his Guardian Spirit ever helped him in later years.
“Many times, and I will tell you some instances. When I had seen about twenty snows, I went with some of our kinsfolk to visit the Minsi, our allies living above us on Lenape River and in the mountains to the north and east of us here. You may have heard that, although their language is quite a little different from our Unami tongue, they too call themselves Lenape and their customs are almost the same as ours. From there we went with some of these people eastward across the mountains to see the Great River of the Mahicans of which we had often heard. Arriving at the river, we wished to cross to visit a Mahican village just opposite, but, although we made a signal smoke, no one dared put out from the village with a canoe to get us because there was a high north wind and the wide river was very rough. So I burned tobacco and prayed to my helper, the Thunder, and soon thunder-clouds arose in the west, and a west wind sprung up which killed the north wind and left the river smooth; and then the Mahican canoes came for us. We spent many pleasant days in their village, feasting and dancing, and visiting from one wigwam to another. Their language is very much like the Minsi, and enough like ours so that we could understand almost everything.
“Another time a war party of us Lenape set forth against the Susquehannocks, a tribe like the Mengwe. They lived on Muddy River in a big village circled about with a great stockade of sharpened logs, twice as high as a man, set on end almost touching one another. Time and time again we attacked them, but could not break through this stockade, nor could we pile fire against it to destroy it, so well did their bowmen defend it.
“At last we withdrew a little way to counsel and our war chiefs said to me, ‘We must depend on you, Rumbling-wings, to help us overthrow this people who have harassed us so long. Call on your Guardian Spirit; help us to take this village!’
“And so, as there were no thunder-clouds in sight, I drew from my medicine bag a few scales of the Great Horned Serpent and laid them on a rock beside a little creek. You know how the Thunders hate these great snakes, and always begin to gather, the instant one of them shows any part of himself above the water. Well even these scales seem to attract them; I always use these scales to call the Thunders when I need them.
“Immediately the sky began to darken in the west—so I built a little fire, threw an offering of tobacco upon it, and prayed to my Guardian.
“Blacker and blacker grew the sky, nearly as dark as night. We could hardly see the yellow scud flying overhead beneath the mass of cloud. The air near the earth seemed hot, choking. All at once a few great drops of rain splattered down, and then we heard the roar of a mighty rain approaching across the forest. Soon it was pouring down about us like a water-fall.
“How long this downpour lasted I know not, but it stopped as suddenly as it began, and a few large hailstones fell, so large that we could hear them rattle on the bark roofs of the village. Then came a deeper roar out of the southwest, louder and louder, nearer and nearer. Suddenly a great thing rushed past us in a cloud of flying leaves and broken branches, and struck the village with a crash, full in the middle, and in a moment was gone. As it passed on we saw it; it looked like a great, twisting strand of long hair hanging from the clouds and dragging along the earth, sweeping before it the trees and the wigwams.
“The instant it passed, we saw that the log stockade was down and most of the houses of the village, but just then came another blinding flood of rain which held us back, and when we finally reached our goal we found a number of the Susquehannocks lying dead amid the ruins of their houses; and of those who were left alive and able to run, all were in flight somewhere in that rain-swept forest.
“As to the wounded, we dispatched those too badly hurt to take with us, and seized the rest as captives, and then, with all the weapons, pipes, beautiful clothing and ornaments we could carry, we made our way homeward. Thus the Thunder, my Guardian Spirit, helped me, and helped me to raise my name to what it is to-day.
“What finally became of the captives, do you ask? A few we killed by torture, in revenge for what their people had done to us; some died; some we let go free after a year or two; others finally intermarried with our people and cast their lot with us. You know Traveling-everywhere’s wife? She was one of those captives, given as a servant to his parents. She was but a young girl, and Traveling-everywhere, himself but little older, took pleasure in teaching her to speak our Lenape language. They got to liking each other so well that they finally built a wigwam of their own. Now you could hardly tell her from one of us.”
I found it much easier to assimilate these beliefs and stories than to learn the every-day, practical side of Lenape life, at which I proved a tragic failure. Although I studied the methods of experienced hunters I never could master the knack of effective shooting with the bow and arrow. And I tried my best. Seldom could I bring down a deer. The neighbors grew tired of providing meat for me and my family.
Whispering-leaves did her part to perfection; everything she made or produced was of the very best, which made me feel my shortcomings all the more. And she would not let me touch the garden—the only thing I knew anything about. “Garden work is not manly,” she would say. “I will not endure hearing the neighbors talk about my mate doing woman’s work. How would you feel if you saw me going out of the village with a long bow on my shoulder? Or burning out a log for a canoe? Would you not feel shame to see your mate do an unwomanly thing? In our life, the man and woman must do each his or her part and neither is harder than the other. Surely to hunt all day and every day, good weather and bad, is fully as hard as wielding the hoe! How would you like to hear the neighbors say, ‘Whispering-leaves ought to give Flying-wolf the skirt, and she put on his long leggings and breechclout?’”
I was even a failure at finishing her wooden bowl, although I had watched a number of men making such things and thought I had learned their method. I heaped hot coals on that maple burl, blew them until they burned deep, and scraped out the charcoal with shells and bits of flint again and again, until I thought I had it hollowed deep enough. Then I ground it patiently with bits of gritty sandstone. When I had finished, I thought I had accomplished a very good piece of work for a beginner. But Whispering-leaves, although she smiled and said sweet words when I laid it finished before her, and pretended to think it perfect, tucked it away after a few days, and when we had visitors and a big bowl was needed, she borrowed another bowl from the neighbors.
What hurt me worst was seeing her treasured finery disappear bit by bit, doubtless traded for meat and for skins to make our moccasins and every-day garments. First it was the seed beads, then those of bone, then one string of shell beads after another until only the copper beads were left. Finally they too were missing when I came home one night. One day I had occasion to search beneath the sleeping benches for something and had to pull out the square basket in which she kept her treasures, her prettiest embroidered, festival attire. The basket felt so light that I looked into it—and found it empty.
Often the boy came in crying and said that his little companions would not let him play with them because, they said, his father was “no good.”
And one night Rumbling-wings told me that he had seen the spirit of Flying-wolf in a dream the night before, and that he said he was living in a strange land and wanted to come back to his home.
But the crisis came when I returned one night, tired out from my fifteenth successive fruitless day’s hunting, and found my Whispering-leaves crying bitterly. Although I begged her to tell me what the trouble was she refused, but at last she broke down. “My dear mate,” she sobbed, “there is nothing to eat in this house, and there is no hope for anything, unless I sell that robe your mother made for you. All my pretty things are gone long ago, and all yours except that.”
I caught her to me and held her tight in my arms for a moment, then dashed out into the night straight to Rumbling-wings’ wigwam. “I am ready,” I said....
When I came to myself I was lying beneath the lightning-riven tree.
It did not take me long to find my place again in the modern world; but always to this day, when the clouds pile up and the thunder begins to mutter in the west, I think sadly of my lost Whispering-leaves and of my friend Rumbling-wings and his Thunder power.
M. R. HARRINGTON
Tokulki of Tulsa
Tokulki was born in the Muskogee town of Tulsa, in the central part of what is now Alabama. Like all other Indian babies of that region he first saw the light in a brush shelter some distance back from his mother’s home; for were he to be born in the latter it was thought misfortune might fall upon all its occupants. His name belonged to the Wind clan of Tulsa, and means two persons running. When the first bearer of the name was born, his father was absent on a war expedition during which he frightened two of his enemies who were on scout duty, so thoroughly that they ran off in haste, leaving their weapons in his hands. It was in commemoration of this event that the new-born babe received his name.
Tokulki’s mother was waited upon during her period of seclusion by her own mother and another old woman of the clan, reputed most skillful in midwifery. Although it was late in the autumn this old woman took the infant immediately to the bank of the river and plunged him into it, after which he was strapped securely into a cradle, made of canes, by means of bark cords about the shoulders and thighs. Here Tokulki spent the next few months of his life, sometimes carried on his mother’s back, sometimes propped up against the wall of the house while his mother was engaged in her household duties. But whenever he was so placed, the cradle was allowed to rest upon a panther skin, for his father and his uncles had all been famous warriors and it was expected that he would follow in their footsteps. Therefore he must have that about him which would communicate a warlike essence and make him fierce and bold.
Tokulki passed through the period when his principal experience of life was that there was something in it that gave him food and warmth, which was “mother,” and when there was something light in which dark objects moved, or something dark in which light objects moved. There was one particular light object that he gazed upon continually, and which resolved itself into the house door, and another, red and hot, which he saw when he awoke at night and which resolved itself into the house fire.
The home into which he gradually came to consciousness was the winter house of his family. The framework was of hickory poles, set in a circle of perhaps twenty-five feet in diameter, with their slender ends gathered together at the top and supported by a central element of four wooden columns. Interwoven with this were thin, flexible pieces of wood plastered thickly with mud mixed with dry grass, and the whole covered inside and out with mats. The floor was excavated a couple of feet below the general level of the ground, and a shallow trench dug about it a little farther back, so that water would be carried off without entering. The doorway which had so early attracted Tokulki’s attention was to the east where the first rays of the sun could steal into it, but it was seldom that it found any one but very young babies to awaken, for the duties of the day were assumed early and ended soon, except in times of merry-making or the great ceremonials. There was no vent for the escape of smoke which sometimes accumulated to an extent which would render the inside unendurable to a white man; but this was partly provided against by the judicious selection of wood,—old sticks of oak and hickory which would fall apart with little smoke, and leave a glowing bed of coals to radiate heat during much of the night. Around the walls of the house was a continuous seat made of matting, raised a foot and a half to two feet from the floor and covered with bearskins upon which most of the household slept.
The household consisted of Tokulki’s father and mother, a brother and sister, his mother’s mother, a married sister of his mother, her husband and two children, a younger brother of his mother, and an old man of the Wind clan, not closely connected with the family but making this his temporary home. More important in Tokulki’s life than most of these, was an old man, living a short distance away, but a frequent visitor in the cabin, a man whom we should call “maternal uncle” in English; yet he was “uncle” not only to Tokulki and Tokulki’s brother and sister and the children of his mother’s sister, but to a large number of other boys and girls—boys and girls whom we should not consider related in the least. Tokulki, however, as he grew older, learned to call them “elder brothers,” “younger brothers,” and “sisters,” and he learned that most of these were called “Wind people,” like himself, but that some were called “Skunk people,” and some “Fish people.”
While still on his mother’s back, Tokulki was taken down to the river every morning, and his mother dashed water over him and over herself even when the weather was bitterly cold. One of his earliest memories was of this cold douche after his warm night’s rest. All of the inhabitants of the village except a few of the sick and decrepit, took this morning bath, the men and boys plunging in, the women and children contenting themselves in cold weather with a little splashing.
And it was the “uncle” of each band who saw to it that none evaded this regulation. He was always present, encouraging the smaller boys, scolding the timorous, and sometimes correcting the unruly by means of a stout stick. As he did so he poured good advice into their ears, and Tokulki soon learned that his “uncle” was the man to whom he must appeal in time of trouble, whose approbation he must win, and whose displeasure he must be careful to shun. Often, on winter evenings the uncle would gather his “nephews” and “nieces” together and instruct them, and he would tell them in particular of the deeds of their ancestors, sometimes assisting his memory by means of little strings of beads, or by referring to notches cut in sticks.
But when the old people were talking with one another, Tokulki’s mother would by no means allow him to go near them, and sometimes, when his curiosity had gotten the better of him, she would box his ears soundly. In after life Tokulki learned that this was not because such behavior was considered disrespectful of the old people or annoying to them, but because old people have uncanny powers and may bewitch a child who hangs about them too closely. There was not much temptation to do this except in winter, for during the rest of the year the elders would be working or talking apart by themselves, or the old men would be in the square.
This “square” loomed larger in Tokulki’s life the older he grew. It was only a short distance from his home. He was not allowed to play there, but he could walk all around the edge, marked by a ridge of earth which had been piled up by successive scrapings of its surface in preparation for the ceremonials. Near its western end were four long, narrow buildings plastered with mud and outlining a hollow square with entrances at the corners. They were open in front, and each was divided into three equal sections by transverse walls, which did not, however, reach to the roof. The middle section of the western cabin was slightly different, in that the back part was separated by another wall parallel to the walls of the building, and, closely shut up in the room thus formed, Tokulki knew that the ceremonial pots, rattles, drums, the dried medicines, and all of the most sacred possessions of the tribes were kept. In front the town chief or miko and his principal councilors had their seats. On the northwestern edge of the grounds loomed the tshokofa, the indoors council house, constructed precisely like a winter house except that it was very much larger. To the eastward extended a wide, open space kept bare of grass by intermittent hoeing and the pressure of many feet. In the middle of it rose a ball post, and at the farther corners stood two shorter posts where captives taken in war were burned. Almost every morning Tokulki could watch the leading men of his town assemble in this square, and between the buildings catch glimpses of the medicine-bearers carrying asi (an infusion of ilex vomitoria) in conch shells to regale the councilors. All that they had in their stomachs they forthwith ejected, that they and their minds might both be clear for the matters about to be discussed.
Frequently Tokulki accompanied his mother when she went in quest of firewood, or he would sit on the edge of the garden patch while his mother, his grandmother, and the other women of the household were at work, and sometimes he was given the temporarily congenial task of driving off crows. This garden was planted principally with pumpkins and beans, but most of the corn was in the great town garden farther off from the village, and thither all of the people marched in the spring, headed by their miko, with hoes made of hickory limbs over their shoulders, to prepare the ground for planting. Each household had its own patch separated from the rest by a narrow strip of grass, but the work was in common: first so-and-so’s strip, next some-one-else’s until all was completed. After that it was largely the duty of the women and children to keep weeds down and drive away birds, and there were little watch-houses on the edges of the fields for the accommodation of the guardians. The days when all worked were as much holidays as days of labor. The participants began early but worked only until shortly after noon. Then they partook of their principal meal in common, and after that there was usually a ball game followed by a dance around a big fire in the square, the light of which was reinforced by cane torches.
The ball game was usually played about a single post, though not the one in the square-ground, and it was indulged in by both men and women, who played against each other, the women throwing the ball with their hands, the men with their ball sticks. Single tallies were made by striking the pole above a certain mark, but five points were counted if the carved bird which surmounted it was touched. Sometimes, however, the men played their own game, a game similar to lacrosse except that two small ball sticks took the place of the one large one. Each side strove to bring the ball home to its own goal, marked by two straight poles set up a couple of feet apart, and twenty points constituted a game, ten sticks being stuck into the ground by the scorer of each side and then drawn out again. In dividing up, the Wind, Bear, Bird, Beaver, and some other clans, called collectively “Whites,” played against the Raccoon, Fox, Potato, Alligator, Deer, and certain others who were known as “People-of-a-different-speech.” But these games were only practice games, or make believe games. The regular games were always between certain towns, and they were very serious matters conducted with the deliberation and ritualism of a war expedition. Each game was preceded by careful negotiations: the players fasted and were scratched with gar teeth, they enlisted the aid of the supernatural by employing a medicine man, they marched to the appointed place as if to meet an enemy, wagered quantities of property on the result, and conducted it so energetically that serious injuries were sometimes inflicted.
In winter Tokulki’s mother and the other women busied themselves making baskets and mats, twisting bison hair into garters for the leggings, and weaving cloaks—worn only by women—out of the inner bark of the mulberry. In the summer they made pottery and dressed skins, and the preparation of food kept them busy, of course, at all seasons. They must prepare their own flour by pounding the corn in a wooden mortar, at which they sometimes worked two and two. Sometimes they would relax their labors long enough to play a sort of dice game in which sections of cane took the place of our bits of bone. The men spent most of their winters seemingly to less advantage, much of it in smoking and recounting to one another tales of their hunting or war excursions, humorous sketches frequently revolving about the Rabbit, and sometimes myths of a more serious and sacred character. However, they devoted many hours in the aggregate to the repair of their hunting and fishing outfits, and to the manufacture of axes, arrow points, and other articles of utility, material for which had been laid aside during the preceding fall.
When Tokulki was able to run about freely by himself, his uncle made him a blowgun out of a long, hollow cane which he provided also with cane arrows with their butt ends wrapped in thistledown. He sent him out to try his skill upon the birds and smaller game animals, and more than once Tokulki came home proudly with birds, squirrels, and even an occasional rabbit. A little later they made him a bow and arrows, with which he attacked rabbits, and wild turkeys, and upon one happy occasion, he succeeded in creeping near enough to a young deer to dispatch it. He came home in triumph to his mother, telling her where the animal was to be found, and listened to the praises of his entire household, particularly those of his uncle, with flushing cheeks.
Upon this Tokulki’s father and uncle began to instruct him in the arts of woodcraft. They took the head of a deer and placed splints inside of it so as to restore it as nearly as might be to its original shape, and showed him how to use it in stalking the living animal. They taught him how to make traps for the smaller animals, and where game was to be found. They also taught him that a piece of flesh must be cut out of every deer that was killed, and thrown away so that the deer might not be offended and leave the country. They taught him that he must not cast bones of game animals far off, when they fed them to their dogs, lest the animals afterward become shy. He was told that a sprig of old man’s tobacco must be put under every fire made by the hunting party so that malevolent spirits would not follow them. Still later he was to learn about certain medicines and formulæ to insure success in the chase.
As soon as spring came, hunting of a somewhat desultory character began, but the families did not move far from town until after the annual ceremonies were over and the corn had been harvested, unless driven to it by famine, or drawn to certain points on the rivers by runs of fish. During this time Tokulki accompanied a hunting party to the bear preserve, a section of forest not far from Tulsa where bears were numerous and which was the common property of all the citizens. When the party approached a tree in which a bear had been located, Tokulki stood at one side to watch the method of procedure. He saw that one man climbed into a tree not far from that containing the animal they sought, and was given blazing slivers of pitch pine which he threw successively into the tree den. When its occupant was driven out, he was quickly dispatched by the hunters disposed below. The meat was distributed throughout the town for immediate consumption, but the fat was tried out and poured into bags made of whole deerskins which were then packed away for the winter season. Meanwhile, the women were hunting through the forests for roots, particularly groundnuts and the roots of a smilax which they called kunti. They also collected the seeds of a pond lily; a little later a profusion of berries enables them to vary their diet.
In April the miko called his leading men together and shortly afterwards was held the first ceremony of the season accompanied by fasting and the drinking of the red willow and button-snake root. At the time of the corresponding full moons in May and June, similar ceremonies took place, but these were merely in preparation for the great Fast (poskita), the culmination of the Southeastern religious season. And so it was that about the middle of July a messenger appeared at Tokulki’s home, and delivered to the house chief a little bundle of sticks tied with deer sinew. Before handing it over, he drew one stick from the bundle and threw it away. Every morning thereafter the house chief did the same until but one stick remained and on that day the ceremony began. Similar bundles were carried to every household of Tulsa Indians far or near, all of whom synchronized their movements in such a way as to converge on the square-ground at the time appointed. Failure to come in then was both impiety and treason, and it was severely punished by the warrior class known as tastanagalgi, who would handle the absentee severely, and destroy or confiscate his property.
The poskita was the type of all the ceremonials of the tribes of the Southeast. The active participants were those men who had been on war expeditions and had received new names in consequence, names usually ending hadjo, fiksiko, imala, tastanagi, or yahola, and containing often the names of the clan animals, the towns of the Creek confederacy, or even foreign tribes. Generally speaking, the miko and the members of his clan sat in the west cabin, the “second men,” or henehalgi, who were devoted to peace, in the south cabin, the higher classes of warriors on the north, and the common warriors on the east. Each cabin or “bed” contained from two to four “honored men,” retired warriors who constituted the inner council in charge of the ceremony. This poskita was distinctly a peace ceremony when old enmities were forgotten, all but the most heinous crimes pardoned, and new resolutions made for the ensuing year.
At least one day was devoted to feasting, but after that a rigid fast was observed by all the active participants. Then those who had performed brave actions received new names and new war honors, while novitiates were shut up in the tshokofa and a strict fast was imposed upon them preparatory to their admission into the class of warriors and induction into adult life. During this ceremony, too, all of the fires, which were supposed to have become corrupt from contamination with worldly things during the year, were extinguished, and a new fire was lighted by the “Medicine Maker,” the high priest of the town, in the most impressive manner by means of the common fire drill. This new fire was first used to replace the fires in the square-ground and the tshokofa, and afterwards it was taken to one side of the square where the women stood ready to receive it and carry it to their several homes. The rituals extended over eight days, and on the last, just at sunset, the men marched in single file to the river, led by one of the Fish clan bearing a feather wand, and all plunged into its waters. They returned in the same order, the miko made a short farewell address, and the ceremony was over.
From this time until the harvest had been gathered in, Tokulki’s people, and most of the others, did not stray far from town. In October was a sacred ceremony called the “Polecat dance,” and afterward the people began to scatter rapidly for their fall hunting. Some proceeded to their camps overland, the women serving as beasts of burden; but the greater number, including Tokulki’s family, had their hunting lodges near the rivers and reached them by means of canoes made of single trees, fire-felled and fire-excavated. Some parties went as many as seventy-five or a hundred miles from home, especially when they desired to hunt the woodland bison. This season was devoted especially to the preparation of quantities of dried venison against the coming of winter.
When game was plentiful, a series of merry-makings were indulged in. This usually began with the presentation of a ball, made of buckskin, to one of the men by his sister-in-law, who at the same time intimated that she desired venison, bear meat, or occasionally squirrels. Upon receiving this challenge, the man communicated the intelligence to all of the other men in camp and they set out on a grand deer, bear, or squirrel hunt as the case might be. Meantime the women busied themselves pounding corn, or perhaps kunti roots, into flour and preparing various sorts of dishes. When the men returned they also took the meat in hand and a great feast followed, with a ball game of the single pole type, and a dance to close the day. They would light a great fire and two men would station themselves near it, one with a drum made by stretching a deerskin over an earthen pot or cypress knee, the other with a gourd rattle, while the dancers went around the fire, usually sinistrally, in single file or two-and-two, under the charge of one or two leaders. The dances were usually named after animals, real or imaginary, and the steps and other motions were supposed to be in imitation of them. The men did most of the singing.
After a few days there would be another presentation of a ball and the same feasting, ball playing, and dancing would follow, and this was frequently kept up until the weather was very cold.
Sometimes sickness came upon a member of Tokulki’s camp, and then Tokulki’s mother’s younger brother, who was doctor of the band, and at the same time Medicine Maker of the town, would be called in. Before prescribing, such a doctor often consulted the kila, or “knower,” who seems to have combined the functions of prophet and diagnostician, but Tokulki’s uncle never did this because he united the two functions in himself. Having determined the nature of the disease, he would go in quest of various herbs, or sometimes send members of the household after them. These he put into a great pot, poured water over them, and placed the pot over the fire. After the contents were sufficiently heated, he gave it potency by breathing into it through a hollow cane, while repeating a magical formula. This was done four times, the doctor meantime facing east. Sometimes, however, he prescribed sweat bathing in a lodge made of blankets thrown over poles, and containing heated rocks on which water was poured, and sometimes he declared the trouble was caused by witchcraft which he proceeded to cure by sucking the witching object out of the affected part by means of a bison horn.
If, in spite of all his efforts, death supervened, all of the people in that house and in the neighboring settlements began shouting and making loud noises so that the soul of the deceased would not stay about the dwelling but start upon its journey to the country of spirits. They removed the body to the house in town, wrapped in dressed deerskins and, after wailing over it, buried it in an oblong trench about four feet deep, excavated beneath the floor, lined with cypress bark, and covered with sticks upon which a thick layer of mud was plastered. The face of the deceased was painted red, he was seated facing the east, his most important implements, such as his bow and arrows, his war club, his paints, his pipe and tobacco pouch, were buried with him, and for four days the women of his family bewailed his death with loud howlings. The faces of all the mourners were painted black. The hair of a widow was unbound for four years, she discarded all ornaments, and was compelled to absent herself from all merry-makings. At the fourth poskita she was formally released by her husband’s sister and either provided with a new husband from the same clan,—or clan connection,—or set free to marry whomever she chose. For a widower the period of mourning was only four months.
The medical practices of his uncle possessed a fascination for Tokulki who was present whenever he was tolerated. He had seen similar performances in the square-ground at the time of the annual ceremonies, and his mind, which had a mystical bent, eagerly fed upon them.
At intervals during all this time Tokulki had seen bands of warriors, including sometimes his father and uncles, march out against their enemies, and in particular there was an enemy to the westward, not large in numbers but led by a chief of rare size, strength, and sagacity, whose activities were constantly more threatening, and who was aided and abetted by a much more numerous people beyond him called Long Hairs. At last, raids from this quarter became so numerous and so many injuries were suffered that a great council was held in Tulsa and it was determined to draw their settlements closer together and erect a strong stockade about them. Tokulki, although still too young for the heavier work, was called upon to render such assistance as he could in the completion of the structure. While the older men marked out the course of the wall and planted in the ground good-sized tree trunks a few feet apart, Tokulki and the other young men brought together numbers of long, flexible branches or young trees which they wove from one post to another, covering the whole with a plastering of mud. About a hundred feet apart little watchtowers were raised above the top of the wall, projecting forward slightly in order to defend the intervening spaces against attempts of an enemy to scale or burn them. On the river side there was but one row of palisades, but elsewhere it was doubled. Toward the river, too, was the only opening, made by allowing the walls slightly to overlap. To approach this an enemy must creep along a narrow path between wall and water, exposed to certain death should he be discovered.
About two years after this fort was completed, Tokulki went upon his first war expedition. The “uncle” of his group was to be one of the party, and took this occasion to initiate his nephew into the cardinal tribal institution, man-killing, the one great avenue for the attainment of personal glory and social standing. The leader of the party was to be none other than the tastanagi lako, the head warrior of the town, and therefore when he sent out to drum up volunteers there was a great outpouring of the ambitious youth of the nation. For four days they remained shut up in the tshokofa, fasting, taking war medicine, dancing, and singing war songs to lash themselves up to the proper degree of martial fury. Each was provided with a war club, a bow, and a quiver of arrows, a shield of cane or bison-hide, and a sack containing fire sticks, paints, and a slender ration of parched corn meal. The ceremonies completed, they set out quietly in single file very early in the morning. With them they carried a sacred box made of splints which was usually borne on the back of the chief’s assistant, and at every camp was placed upon a log, or hung upon a tree or post. Among other things it contained some of the painted bones of an enormous panther which the ancestors of this people had slain on their way from the far western country, and a part of one of the horns of an aquatic horned serpent. On occasion it was believed that this box gave forth oracular utterances, informing the party in what direction to proceed, or warning them of an attack.
On this occasion the spirit guardian appears to have been favorable, for they surprised four outlying camps of their enemies, took a dozen scalps, and carried off fifteen women and children as captives besides two grown men whom they subjected to the death penalty by fire. During this action Tokulki had the good fortune to save the life of the war chief’s servant by engaging an enemy, about to strike him from behind. Therefore, after the triumphant return, he received the much coveted feather headdress, his first war name, and a seat in the eastern cabin of the square.
He had stepped upon the first rung of the social ladder and could attend all but the most secret and important meetings to decide the actions of the nation. It was not long before he received another name and left the cabin of the tasikaias for that of the imalas at the east end of the north cabin. Later deeds entitled him to the rank of tastanagi, the highest war grade, but being by birth a member of the white Wind clan he was assigned instead to a seat of honor in the peace cabin on the other side.
In spite of his prowess, however, Tokulki took less pleasure in warfare than most of his companions. He had, as we have noted, a mystical type of mind. The great ceremonies had a powerful influence over him, and the practices of his uncle, the Medicine Maker, proved a constant fascination. Blessed with a retentive memory, he rapidly picked up a fund of tribal lore which presently attracted the attention of the old men,—the custodians of the sacred legends and the keepers of the rituals. They talked earnestly about him with the Medicine Maker, as of one to whom his people might look for spiritual leadership in future days, and at his uncle’s suggestion he and three other of the most promising youths of the Wind connection agreed to undertake the young men’s poskita, “the first degree in medicine” if we may so term it.
Calling these youths into his house the Medicine Maker talked to them earnestly and then made an appointment to meet them at a remote spot in the forest, on the bank of a small stream away from the frequented trails. At the time and place agreed upon, he presented himself before them and directed them to make a sweat lodge by the bank of the rivulet. Then he began his instructions, going over as much of his more elementary knowledge as he thought they could grasp at one time, and, when he returned to his house, telling them to memorize all he had said carefully, until the fourth day, after when he would visit them once more. He repeated his visits and instructions at similar intervals for the better part of a month when he was satisfied with their progress and told them to go back to their homes. “Now,” he said, “you understand how to heal wounds made by arrows and are entitled to wear buzzard feathers in your hair.”
This degree was taken by Tokulki shortly after his first war expedition, but for some time other events interposed to prevent the continuation of his initiation. In the first place his family had decided that it was time for him to take a wife and assume a position in the tribe as the responsible head of a household of his own. He fell in with this arrangement as part of the natural order of things, and consequently his mother, accompanied by two or three of her clanswomen, visited the “uncle” of the Raccoon clan to which the chosen girl belonged. The recipient of the visit was not unaware of the offer about to be made and had called to his house some of the other leading men of his clan, the mother of the girl, and, as a matter of courtesy, her father. A few days thereafter the Raccoon people returned the visit and formally announced that the suit was accepted. The wedding might have been consummated then and there, by conducting the groom to his betrothed’s house and holding a feast and dance, but Tokulki and his parents were ambitious to have him reach a high position in the tribe as soon as possible, and accordingly they delayed the ceremony until he could erect a house, garner a crop of corn, and lay by a supply of venison.
Word was sent to all of the male members of the Wind clan residing in that town to go into the forest and bring together a supply of poles, bark, bark rope, and other articles sufficient for the proposed house. The planting season was beginning, and when the town field was laid out, an extra plot was sowed for the new household. When this was ready to harvest, a corncrib raised on posts was put up near the site of the projected dwelling, and filled from Tokulki’s new plot. The harvest being over, and the days cool enough for comfortable work out-of-doors, the men of the Wind clan came together again and appointed a day upon which the new house was to be raised. This work was carried out much like an old New England husking bee. It was placed under the direction of the one considered most skilled in such matters who assigned the various processes to all the rest. They worked with such a good will that it was practically complete by the middle of the afternoon. Afterward a common meal was served followed by a game of ball and the usual dance after dark. Sofkee, prepared like our “hulled corn,” stood ready in pots at the service of any of those present.
A little later Tokulki went hunting and brought back dried venison to add to his winter’s stores. It was only then that he and his bride were brought to their new home, where a final feast was partaken of by all together, speeches exchanged by the leading men of the Wind and Raccoon clans, and the new couple left in possession.
During this period Tokulki was too busily occupied to think of his earlier ambitions, but after his first child was born and the routine of his new life had become well established, they began to recur to him. He communicated his thoughts to the three young men with whom he had been associated before, and he found that they too were prepared to continue in their course. They approached the Medicine Maker again, and again submitted to the fasts, the sweat baths, and the repeated instructions, more rigorous now than before. This time they learned among other things the treatment proper for snake bite, and how, as they believed, to detect objects clearly on the darkest nights.
Tokulki was still unsatisfied. Every fresh revelation awakened new ambitions. His companions, however, were content with what they had acquired and with the prestige they had attained, and were wearied with the long and exhausting fasts. Therefore when Tokulki presented himself as a candidate for the third degree he went entirely alone. In fact, so rigorous was the ordeal to which he was at this time subjected, that he debated within himself whether he should not stop there. As it was, he had penetrated farther into the mysteries than all except ten or a dozen men in the fifty allied Muskogee towns.
He allowed two years to slip away before making up his mind to undertake the fourth and crowning ordeal. Finally, however, he set himself to the task, and he came triumphantly through, though the periods of fasting were doubled, and the memorizing more severe than any which he had before experienced. He returned to his house a mere shadow of a man, with hollow cheeks, sunken eyes, and almost fleshless bones, but with a position and influence in the Nation shared by none except the Medicine Makers of a few of the leading towns.
With the Medicine Maker of Tulsa, his instructor and uncle, Tokulki now came to be on the most friendly terms. It was natural that a man of such advanced mentality as Tokulki and such steadfastness of purpose should excite interest in his superior. It became evident that when the Medicine Maker died or gave up his spiritual headship his position would fall to Tokulki. Many were the talks which the two men had together, talks in which the older man unfolded whatever knowledge his long life of physical activity and spiritual contemplation had given him. Some was not new to Tokulki, some had been suggested to him by the other learned men, but much was novel and strange.
The world envisaged by the Tulsa sage was about like this: The middle earth which mankind knows, is flat and square and lies afloat upon “the wide white waters.” There is a world above it and a world below it, and these are inhabited by beings like ourselves. Below are those left behind when the races now on earth found their way to its surface; above, those who had lived on earth but, having undergone the experience called death, had traveled westward, crossed a narrow point in the ocean stream, upon a foot log, and either remained with the malevolent spirits in that quarter or ascended to the fortunate region directly overhead, presided over by Hisakita-imisi, “the breath holder.” The white streak in the sky which we call “the milky way” was said to be the very road which they traversed. Unavenged souls of those who had been killed in wars, however, were unwilling to begin their journey until scalps from the offending tribe were brought in, and meanwhile they remained about the eaves of the houses, moaning. Some said that bad spirits were reincarnated into beasts, but about this men differed. However, they were agreed that human beings might acquire such malevolent power as to become witches and assume the forms of animals while still living on earth. Their evil dispositions were attributed to lizards who had taken up their abode inside of the witch, but might be expelled by the proper medical rites.
The stars were thought to be attached to the under surface of the solid vault above, along which the sun and moon traveled each day. An eclipse of the sun was usually attributed to a great toad who might be frightened off by hostile demonstrations on the part of human beings. To an eclipse of the moon people paid little attention. The moon was inhabited by a man and a dog. The rainbow was a big, celestial snake which had power over rain.
The world and all that it contained were the products of mind and bore everywhere the marks of mind. Matter was not something which had given birth to mind, but something which had formerly been mind, something from which mind had withdrawn, was quiescent, and out of which it might again be roused. This mind was visibly manifested in the so-called “living things,” as plants, and, still more, animals. Nevertheless, latent within inorganic substance no less than in plants and animals, was mind in its highest form, i. e., human mind. This might come to the surface at any time but it did so particularly to the fasting warrior, the “knower,” and the doctor. Indeed, the importance of these two last lay in their ability to penetrate to the human life within the mineral, plant, and animal life of nature, and bring back from that experience knowledge of value in ordering the lives of their fellow beings. Not that mind was attributed to one individuality, but that it was recognized as everywhere of the same nature.
Its manifestations were not in all cases equally powerful. Its manifestation in the panther, bear, and bison was more powerful than its manifestation in the raccoon, the rabbit, and the squirrel. Some “inorganic” powers,—as, for instance, the wind, the rivers, and the sea,—were, however, even more powerful. Peculiarly powerful were the thunder and the lightning, which were produced by two sets of animals. The dangerous kind, the kind that “struck,” was made by huge birds from whose eyes flashed fire, and this they flashed down at the other fire-producing creatures, enormous, horned serpents, who in turn shot the blue, harmless lightning upward. Bones of these earth serpents were sometimes found after a rainstorm. Besides there were long serpents who lived in the waters and who, rearing their huge lengths straight upward at intervals, would allow themselves to fall over with a gigantic splash. There were the sharp-breasted snakes, suggested to native imagination by the tracks of lightning, snakes supposed to run straight along the surface of the ground, cutting through roots and bushes as they went. There were bodiless snakes which rose whirling into the air on still mornings. There were creatures like bison which went by fours, each resting for a minute in the tracks of its predecessor. There were very little people who sometimes deprived travelers of their senses, and very big people who ate them.
Besides the embodied power in nature there was power not altogether differentiated from it, which was unembodied, or indistinctly conceived as embodied. This power could be invoked by the use of charms and the repetition of certain formulæ. “By a word” wonderful things could be accomplished; “by a word” the entire world could be compressed into such a small space that the medicine man who was master of the word could encircle it in four steps. It was power of this kind which was imparted to medicines, yet the source of this power was after all the anthropomorphic powers, which, at the very beginning of things, declared what the diseases were to be and also appointed the remedies to be employed in curing them. But when the doctor had prepared these remedies and placed them in a pot in front of him, they were not efficacious until he had repeated the prescribed formulæ, or prayers, four times, while breathing into the medicine through a hollow cane. In this way the spirit that made the medicine powerful passed into it through the breath of life in the doctor.
From this conception it came about that the supreme being of the Creeks, a kind of sky god, was known as Hisakita-imisi, “the breath holder.” While he did not necessarily interfere actively in the relations between the lesser powers and mankind, his primacy was recognized, and they were spoken of as his servants; he was their miko.
What took place for the individual in time of sickness happened for the entire tribe annually at the time of the poskita. It had been given to men by Hisakita-imisi for their health and for the annual renewal of the life of the tribe, as well as the individual lives of those composing it. The square-ground fire was but a detached fragment of the sun, the sky fire, and both of these meant life, for both were necessary to the lives of men. The renewal of the fire was the renewal of life, an act by means of which, the connection between human lives and the life of the universe was restored, and the corruption, which had accumulated about the fire obtained the previous year, gotten rid of. Similarly the participants were cleansed internally by means of the poskita medicines, one of which was to make good the defects of the system and heal its diseases, the other to insure the enjoyment of positive benefits. Hence it was that a little of each was carried home by every household and hung up by the door, some of it being used occasionally in medicines until the next annual ceremony.
As to the origin of things, the Muskogee had obscure traditions. They believed that the solid land had come from the expansion of a bit of earth brought from the edges of the world or from the bottom of the ocean. They also told of a flood, but their story of human origins did not concern any tribes except their own and a few believed to be related closely to theirs. They thought that after their ascent from the world beneath at the point in the far west called “the navel of the world,” they had traveled toward the southeast for a long time, led by their Medicine Maker, who, in turn, was guided by a staff, stuck upright in the ground every night and found inclining in the direction to be taken every morning. In the meantime, four “light beings” from the corners of the world had brought the knowledge of the poskita to them and had lighted their first poskita fire. During this period, ties of friendship sprang up between the several Muskogee tribes, and some that were not Muskogee. Two of the leading tribes, the Kasihta and Coweta, formed an agreement by which they were to play ball with each other at intervals, but were never to fight and as other towns or tribes became allied with these, they also became allied in the ball games until there came to be two classes of towns with about twenty-five on a side. Those headed by Kasihta were dedicated to peace and those headed by Coweta to war....
One day—it was toward the end of summer—Tokulki and the Medicine Maker strayed some distance eastward of the town and sat down upon the side of a hill, where the older man reviewed the more important particulars of his teaching more impressively than ever before. After a time he paused, and then he said: “I have told you all that I know; this is what the Medicine Maker who was before me, and all of the knowers and the doctors have told me. It must be so. I believe it. Yet perhaps it is not all the truth. I think we are not to understand some of the things that they tell just as they sound; they have another meaning. Sometimes we can see what this other meaning is; sometimes we can not. Perhaps, too, like the poskita fire, it has become fouled by much contact with common things, by much repeating. Perhaps Hisakita-imisi did not tell our grandfathers all that he had in mind to tell. But much of it is good, and it is for the good of our people. So use what seems to you good! And the rest you need not use. And if Hisakita-imisi seems to tell you something that is better, if you think it is better for your people, use it! It is what he must have intended from the beginning. I tell you this because I feel that your times will not be like my times. The plant dies. In the spring the plant comes up again. It is the same plant, and yet it is not the same plant. It is like, but it is unlike.
“Have you not heard of the people who come across the wide, white water in canoes with wings? Even now I hear that a great number of them are marching through our country and that they are coming in this direction. Maybe the old things are to pass away.” He stopped, and just then out of the east came a low noise, a noise strange to that country until then, but one which a white man of the time would have recognized as the discharge of a harquebus. It was a harquebus in the army of De Soto.
JOHN R. SWANTON
Slender-maiden of the Apache
Slender-maiden was to have her dance in twelve days. The acorns were now ripening along Ash Creek; the stags, their horns fully grown, were taking on fat; thunder-showers were now falling, and the year was at its best. During the preceding spring, Slender-maiden’s mother had noted her daughter’s approach to womanhood. The winter before, Slender-maiden’s father had gone to the mountains beyond Black River and hunted for half a month. The best of the deerskins had been carefully tanned and put away. On Cibicu Creek, a day to the west, lived a man noted for the fine buckskin suits he could make. Slender-maiden’s father took four of these dressed deerskins and two of his best horses to this skilled man. The horses were given him for his work on the skins. Slender-maiden’s father was told to come for the garments about the time corn showed its tassels.
Slender-maiden’s mother and Slender-maiden herself were Wormwood clan. Many women of this clan lived in the neighborhood and they gladly agreed to help gather food for the feast. Slender-maiden’s father was of the Adobe clan. His brothers promised to join him before the dance, in a hunt which should provide venison for the feast. There was, fortunately, a large number of horses belonging to the family with which those who sang the songs and directed the ceremony might be paid.
Slender-maiden’s father rode up the creek to the marsh where he cut a supply of reeds. Of these he made tubes, which he filled with tobacco and tied at right angles, making crosses. These were sent by Slender-maiden’s cousin, a young man but recently with a beard to pluck, to the medicine man living on Eastfork who knew the songs of Naiyenezgani, used for the dance of adolescent girls. When the young man arrived at the home of the singer he placed the cross on his toe. As the old man reached for the token he asked the young man from whence he came.
“I am Wormwood clan and I come from the valley of dancehouse. Slender-maiden’s father, my uncle, asks that on the twelfth day you sing for his daughter under the cotton-woods on Ash Creek. He sends you this deerskin, these beads of turquoise, of jet, of white stone, and of red coral. Besides he gives you a horse, and a saddle from Old Mexico.”
“Sit, my grandchild,” said the singer to the young man. The old man then filled his pipe and passed his buckskin bag of tobacco to the young man. “Call my brothers,” he said to his wife before they began smoking. When they had gathered and the pipes were burning, the singer told the young man’s errand and that their aid was required in the ceremony. Food was now brought and the young man was served.
A similar invitation was sent to a medicine man on Turkey Creek who knew the dance of the Gans.
A few days later the women of Slender-maiden’s clan and those living in her camp loaded their burros and horses with the food for the feast and the necessary utensils. The sun was well up when they were ready to start, and by sundown the party camped when they reached a stream where oaks grew in profusion, about two-thirds of the way to Ash Creek. By noon the next day, camp was made under the cotton-woods in the valley of the creek.
The day before the dance was to be held a sweat lodge was built near the stream. In this dome-shaped lodge, parties of six and eight men went repeatedly for baths. The songs of Naiyenezgani were sung and the men were purified by the steam and heat. At midday, food was served to all those who had gathered in the vicinity.
Just before the sun rose the next morning, four blankets were spread, one above the other, and a cane, bent at the top, was stood up just east of this bed. Near the cane was placed a basket of shelled corn.
The singer from Eastfork with his chorus of young men formed a line just back of the western end of the bed. Slender-maiden now appeared and took her place in front of the singers, facing the rising sun. As the songs were sung in proper order Slender-maiden danced, swaying her body from side to side. When the proper song was reached, she knelt and moved from side to side on alternate knees with her face always toward the rising sun. Soon she lay prone on the bed and was molded to a form of beauty by her matronly attendant. Finally she was prayed for by all the assembled spectators who passed in line behind her and put pollen on the crown of her head. When the sun was about half-way to the middle of the sky she ran the appointed race and the morning ceremony was completed.
Every one was soon served with meat and soup.
That evening at about sunset a man without clothes, except a breechcloth, his body painted white with black stripes, appeared at the dance-ground and by signs inquired if a dance were in progress. On being told that was the case he ran away to a secluded spot. Soon peculiar noises were heard and the sound of rattles. Four men came in single file followed by a painted clown. The four wore moccasins and kilts below the waist but were painted black above with symbolic designs in white. Their faces were covered and on the tops of their heads were fan-shaped forms of wood covered with painted designs. After making a circuit of the dance-ground, these masked men danced for some time and then withdrew.
After nightfall a great fire was kindled and the masked men returned. Slender-maiden, bearing her cane, danced near the fire. With her were other maidens who occasionally invited young men to dance with them. While the masked men were dancing, the singer from Turkey Creek led the songs of the Gans, immortals who join with men in the celebration of attaining adolescence. The time of the songs was marked by the singers beating on a stretched skin.
When the earth was made, When the sky was made, Where the head of the black earth lies, Where the head of the black sky lies, Where the heads of them meet, Black Thunder, Black Gan, facing each other with life stepped out. Black Gan with his dance spoke four times.
About midnight the singer from Eastfork and his assistants took their places within a house consisting of four poles only. A fire was kindled here, back of which, facing the east, stood Slender-maiden accompanied by a girl of her own age, and two youths. At intervals until dawn the songs of Naiyenezgani were sung while the young people danced.
Estsunnadlehe From her house of white cloud Living white shell, her chief, It echoes with me. Estsunnadlehe Long and fortunate life, her chief, It echoes with me.
After breakfast more songs were sung and then the masked men appeared and assisted, first in painting Slender-maiden with white earth and later in marking with symbols the cheeks and hands of all the spectators. The ceremony was now complete and the assembly soon dispersed, some people to the gathering of acorns and some to their camps in order to tend their crops.
Among those who had been at the ceremony at Ash Creek was a young man named Red-boy. His home was on San Pedro Creek, one hundred miles south and west, not far from the country of the Pima. He had come to visit relatives in the White Mountain country for his mother was of the Adobe clan and her brothers and sisters were living on the White River.
Red-boy was much interested in Slender-maiden and resolved to seek her for a wife. His request was listened to, and his presents of horses were accepted. Slender-maiden herself was pleased, for the stranger was tall, and generous with his presents to her. The couple soon moved to a camp on Black River, where Slender-maiden was left behind while her husband joined a small party which was going to Mexico on a raid. Ten days later the party returned without loss and with a large number of horses. Red-boy had taken ten which he gave Slender-maiden’s parents.
The next spring Red-boy and Slender-maiden went to the village on San Pedro and planted the land that had belonged to Red-boy’s mother. Here they lived for five years, raising good crops and having plenty of deer from the surrounding mountains.
One day in August Slender-maiden and her sister-in-law were making baskets under the cotton-woods by the creek. Slender-maiden’s five-year old daughter was sleeping under a willow nearer the stream where the breeze was cooler. Suddenly a roar was heard and a wall of water, mud, and torn-up trees rushed out of the canyon. The women jumped up, but before they could reach the sleeping child the water had rolled over in a brown flood. The women themselves were able to escape by climbing into the cotton-woods.
Saddened by this loss and disconcerted by the washing over of the farm by the waters of a thunder-shower, Slender-maiden and her husband moved to the White Mountain country and settled on Cedar Creek near her people. Here they lived for ten years. There were now five children, the youngest of which was a girl.
One day a messenger came from White River asking that Slender-maiden’s husband come to treat a sick man. Red-boy knew the songs and ritual of a healing ceremony. He went with his wife, and camped by the man who had been suddenly taken ill. He was burning with fever and covered with an eruption. The songs were of no avail for before dawn the man was dead. The body was almost immediately placed in a cleft of the rocks in a nearby canyon and covered with sticks and stones.
That afternoon Slender-maiden and her husband moved down White River and a few days later to Black River in which she and her husband bathed. That night her head ached and she begged her husband to leave, lest he too contract the disease. When twelve days later the fever left her, she saw her husband sitting by, tired and worn with watching over her.
“Why did you not leave me?” she asked.
“Because I have loved you for many years,” he replied.
In a few days he too was ill and then Slender-maiden, still weak, watched him until he was taken to the canyon for burial. When the plague had passed, Slender-maiden’s children and near relatives were all dead except the youngest girl who had been left with an aunt on Cedar Creek.
Slender-maiden cut her hair, of course, and wore only a skirt and a poncho of cloth. Even when the year was up she did not allow her hair to grow. Her husband’s clansmen, noting her disinclination to marry again, respected her wishes and did not assign her a husband. She continued the cultivation of her small farm and the care of her daughter.
The requests of her adolescence ceremony for long life were answered. So old is she that she must walk with a cane. Her hair is white, not with the symbolic white earth but with age. Her daughter, in middle age, unmarried, highly respected, but much sought for herself and her considerable herds, attends to her physical needs. For the remainder, Slender-maiden lives with her memories of a happy youth.
P. E. GODDARD
When John the Jeweler was Sick[4]
_Told at St. Michaels, Arizona, by one of the Franciscan Fathers_
You may remember having met here a Navaho friend of ours, one of the silver-smiths, whom we familiarly called “John the Jeweler.” Early this year he went over to the Kohonino Cañon and stayed there four days. The day after leaving the Cañon he was taken with ague, and every day for twenty days he had a chill followed by fever and delirium. The strangeness of the disease had an extraordinarily depressing effect on him and during these twenty days he was in a state of utter collapse.
John the Jeweler is a medicine man, a minor priest, of considerable repute, and numbers of his friends came to see him, but none of them knew anything about his disease. The priests and the patient were inclined to attribute it to “a bad smell emanating from the Kohonino,” but as there was also a band of wandering Paiutes there during the time of the patient’s visit, they were not sure but that the bad smell may have originated with the Paiutes.
It was concluded in this emergency to call in the best mediciners of the region. The first to officiate was Ojkai yośna. His rites and song-prayers were directed to the Yè who dwells at the mouth of the pit through which all people came up to this world, and through which the spirits of the dead return to the lower world.
This pit is in the summit of that mountain in the north called Tjoliĭ. Between the patient and the mouth of the pit the priest made a fire with certain woods, and beside this fire he sang prayers to the Yè who sits on “this side” the mouth of the pit. He beseeched the Yè not to call the patient to descend the ladder leading to the regions of the dead. He rubbed the ashes and pulverized charcoal of his medicine-fire all over the body of the patient, first having rubbed him with a mixture obtained by melting the fat of the bison, mountain sheep, elk and deer, with a small portion of the fat of the domestic sheep. This grease was to make stick to the skin the charcoal and ashes of the medicine-fire. After the anointment the songs were sung again beside the patient.
The rites of Ojkai yośna lasted two days and nights and his fee was one horse, say fifty dollars.
The next shaman was Kuma byge. In the sick man’s hut, a little hollow mound of clay was made, and within the hollow three stones were set; on these were laid splinters of piñon and cedar which were set afire. When they had burned to embers, the shaman shook his rattle and sang to the Yès of his father. He then laid upon the embers five herbs. The patient was laid naked upon the sand, close to the fireplace, and a blanket was spread over the fireplace, and the patient thus inhaled the fumes of the herbs, while the shaman sat alongside, shaking his rattle and continuing his song.
The treatment was performed at sunrise and sunset, and should last four days, with songs, dances and other ceremonies at night. But in this instance, at the close of the second day, an embarrassing circumstance occurred: the patient’s wife’s menstrual flow began. This at once put a stop to all further treatment. Kuma byge’s fee was one horse, say fifty dollars.
After the wife got well, Etsĭdi bĭkĭs was summoned. To the leader of the four winds sang the shaman, the white wind of the East, the blue wind of the South, the yellow wind of the West, and the black wind of the North. Before the people emerged from the lower world the winds were taken up the pit at Tjoliĭ by the “Leader” and their directions assigned them. He caused them to blow upon the muddy surface of the earth while this upper surface was yet new and damp, until the world became dry enough for habitation. The winds expelled the evil influence of the bad Yès, and the new world became beautiful. So it was to this Leader that Etsĭdi bĭkĭs sang, asking him to bring the winds together, and expel the evil influence that threatened the patient.
The ceremonies lasted four days and nights and consisted of song-prayers, exhibiting fetiches, shaking the rattle, blowing the whistle, and swinging the tsin boosni (which is like swinging the Thunder prayer stick of the Hopi). The fee of Etsĭdi bĭkĭs was a large horse, say sixty dollars.
The next shaman was called Hostin bĭkân. He administered herb roots, both raw and in infusions. The raw root of the Jamestown weed was given the patient at sunrise, noon and sunset. Each dose was something less than half an ounce of the recently dry root. This was chewed and swallowed. Closely following each of these doses, he was given a piece of the stalk of the Golden Alexander, about six inches long and as thick as the thumb. This he chewed, swallowing the saliva, but not the fiber. Between the songs, during the day and night, infusions were given the patient to drink, in quantities never to exceed half a pint at once. There were separate infusions of herbs known as: aze klohĭ, laughing medicine, aze bĭni, bad or dreaded talk medicine, thajuhuĭtso, great chief of water medicines, that is of medicinal herbs growing in marshes, all, I surmise, species of nightshade. Hostin bĭkân’s ceremonies lasted a day and a night. His fee was a horse, say fifty dollars.
The last and most potent of the shamans was Kuma. He is chief of the clan to which the patient belongs. He lives about thirty miles southwest from our Cañon.
Kuma’s prayers were directed to Hosdjoqun (the Killer) and Hos-(dje) Yelti (the Talker), guardian deities of Tjoliĭ. But all these prayers were more immediately addressed to the Yès who dwell in the Half-white-house, asking their mediation, that the “Killer” might withhold his hand, that the “Talker” might withhold the word of death. I presume you know that there is a mythic region in the north. It extends from nadir to zenith and has no horizon. It is a land of vertical strata of various colors, each stratum reaching from The Below to The Above. At each stratification is the house of a Yè, half in one stratum, half in the next.[5]
A sweat house is decorated on the outside with a rainbow in colored sands; a singing-house is built for the occasion; sand pictures (altars) are made on the floor of the singing-house; and there are dances of the masked participants.
Kuma’s ceremonies lasted five days and nights. Every morning at sunrise, the patient was placed in the sweat house for about twenty minutes, say ten minutes in each. Nothing of special significance was done during the day, but from sunset to dawn the maskers danced before the singing-house, while within the singing-house, the priests sang their prayers, made their sand pictures, and placed the proper fetiches before and upon them. For a fee, Kuma received a fine horse and colt, worth one hundred dollars.
Aside from all these fees, sheep were killed to provide mutton, and other provisions were purchased to feed the shamans and their assistants, the dancers, and the numerous spectators who flock around when any of these religious ceremonies are in progress. In these expenses the patient was assisted by all his relatives.
In these ceremonies, three weeks went by, with every day an ague. At the end of that time, the patient said that he was “looking down the descending ladder.”
His friends then cinched him upon a saddle, and brought him here, muffled in a blanket, just like a bag of bones. We had him dumped in the wool room. This was four days ago. We had no calomel, so we gave him a generous dose of blue mass, about thirty grains. On the following morning we administered a liberal draught of castor oil, and then we gave him about thirty grains of quinine, in four doses, daily. Two days ago his ague left him. This morning he and his friends left for home. Just as he was leaving, John the Jeweler told me he was feeling so well, he thought that by to-morrow night he could resume the performance of his marital duties.
A. M. STEPHEN
Waiyautitsa of Zuñi, New Mexico
“Isn’t it hard to believe that life should be so intricate and complex among those meek, adobe houses on that low hill?”
We were on the last mile or so of the forty-mile drive through the red sandstone above and below, and the green cedar and spruce and sagebrush from Gallup to Zuñi; behind us to the southeast was the great mesa to which three centuries ago the people had escaped for a while from Spanish arrogance, the mesa where one day we were to seek for the shrines of the War Leaders and the Song Youth and the Earth Woman as we ostensibly hunted rabbits; and before us, barely in sight, so quietly does an Indian pueblo fit into the landscape, were the rectangular blocks of the many-storied Zuñi houses whose flat roofs make broken lines, mesa-like, against the sky. At the highest point, a three-storied house, the town crier was probably at that very moment calling out to the townspeople the orders of the governor and council for the following day; but we were still too far away to hear, quiet as was the air, and our unarrested eyes turned westward to the flaming spectacle of a sunset the like of which is not to be seen outside the sweeping valley plain of Zuñi.
Now and again, as you walk between those “meek, adobe houses,” dodging a snouting pig, or assuming indifference to the dogs that dash out from every corner to snarl or yelp; now and again as you see the villagers going about their daily affairs, men driving in from the fields, or taking the horses in or out of the corrals, women fetching water from the well or bound on a visit to a neighbor, little boys chasing one another and babies playing about in the dirt, now and again that first impression of material simplicity returns and with it the feeling that the round of life must be simple, too. But the feeling never lasts long, never holds its own with the crowding impressions of ceremonial rain dance or pilgrimage or domiciliary visitation, of baffling sacerdotal organization and still more baffling sacerdotal feuds, of elaborate pantheon, of innumerable myths and tales, of associations in story or cult with every hill and rock and spring, of kinship ramifications and matrimonial histories, of irksome relationships with Mexicans and “Americans,” and of village gossip which is made up so comprehensively of the secular and the sacred as to pass far beyond the range of even a New England church social.
It is not surprising that accounts of Zuñi are often bewildering. In our own complex culture biography may be a clarifying form of description. Might it not avail at Zuñi? I venture this biography of Waiyautitsa.[6]
Waiyautitsa is a girl’s name; sex generally appears in Zuñi personal names. Sex appears somewhat in speech too. Waiyautitsa in learning to talk will make use of expressions, particularly exclamations, peculiar to women. In a recent list of the first words used by a Zuñi child, a boy, there was noted a comparatively large number of kinship terms in his vocabulary. The kinship terms of little Waiyautitsa would be somewhat different from a boy’s. He calls a younger sister ikina; a younger brother, suwe; she calls either hani, meaning merely the younger. And, as the Zuñi system of kinship terms is what is called classificatory, cousins having the same terms as brother and sister, Waiyautitsa has even fewer words than her brother to express cousinship.
When Waiyautitsa is three or four years old she may be recognized as a girl not merely from her speech, but from her dress, from her cotton slip; at this age little boys wear trousers. But not for another three or four years, perhaps longer, will Waiyautitsa wear over her cotton slip the characteristic Pueblo woman’s dress,—the black blanket dress fastened on the left shoulder and under the right arm and hence called in Zuñi, watone, meaning “across,” the broad belt woven of white, green and red cotton, the store-bought kerchief or square of silk (pitone) which, fastened in front, hangs across shoulders and back, and the small foot, thick leg moccasins which cover ankle and calf in an envelope of fold upon fold of buckskin. Before Waiyautitsa is eight or even six she may, however, when she goes out, cover her head and body with a black blanket or with the gay colored “shawl” similarly worn. And I have seen very little girls indeed wearing moccasins or the footless black stockings Zuñi women also wear, or “dressing up” in a pitone, that purely ornamental article of dress without which no Zuñi woman would venture outdoors. Without her pitone she would feel naked, she says, and any man would be at liberty to speak disrespectfully to her. When Waiyautitsa is about five, her hair, before this worn, like the boys, in a short cut, is let grow into a little tail on the nape of her neck. In course of time her pigtail will be turned up and tied with a “hair belt” of white, green and red cloth. From ear to ear her front hair will be banged to the end of her nose, the bang drawn sidewise above the forehead except at such times in ceremonials when it is let fall forward to conceal the upper part of the face.
This hair arrangement serves in ceremonials as a kind of mask, as you may see in the frontispiece picture of the headdress worn in the Thlahawe, a woman’s corn dance. A mask proper, that quasi fetich which has so important a place in Pueblo ceremonialism, Waiyautitsa will in all probability never wear. Unlike her brother, Waiyautitsa will not be initiated in childhood into the Kachina society, and consequently she will not join one of the six sacred clubhouses or estufas which supply personators for the Kachinas or masked dancers. Not that female personages do not figure in these ceremonials, but as was the rule on the Elizabethan stage, women are impersonated by men.
To this exclusion of girls from the Kachina society and from participating in the masked dances there are a few exceptions. To-day three women belong to the Kachina society. They were taken into it not in childhood, but in later life and, it is said, for one of the same reasons women as well as men are taken into the other societies of Zuñi. Cured by ceremonial whipping of the bad effects of nightmare or of some other ailment, they were “given” to the estufa credited through one of its members with the cure. Of the three women members only one is said to dance, and she is accounted mannish, katsotse, girl-man, a tomboy.
Waiyautitsa will likely not be initiated into the kotikyane, but she is quite likely to be initiated into another society,—into the Great-fire-brand or Little fire-brand, or Bedbug or Ant or Wood society, into any one of the thirteen Zuñi societies except three, the bow priesthood or society of warriors, of warriors who have taken a scalp, or the Hunter society or the Cactus society, a society that cures arrow or gun-shot wounds. As women do not hunt or go to war, from membership in these groups they are excluded or, better say, precluded. As we shall see later, affiliation by sex is, in ceremonial affairs, along the lines of customary occupation.
If Waiyautitsa falls sick and is cured by a medicine man of the medicine order of a society she must be “given” either to the family of the medicine man or to his society. Initiated she may not be, however, for a long time afterwards, perhaps for years. Initiations take place in the winter when school is in session, the school either of the Indian Bureau or of the Dutch Reformed Church, and for that reason, it is said, initiations may be postponed until past school age. Despite the schools, I may say, I have met but two Zuñi women who speak English with any fluency. One woman is a member of the Snake-medicine society, into which she was initiated after convalescence from measles, a decimating disease at Zuñi, to be accounted for only through witchcraft. The other woman was accounted the solitary convert of the Dutch Reformed Church Mission in Zuñi until six or seven years ago she joined the Wood society because as a child she had been cured by them of smallpox.
After initiation, the women, like the men of a society, offer prayer sticks each moon, observing continence for four days thereafter, and they join in the four-day retreat in the ceremonial house of the society preliminary to an initiation. Unlike the men, however, the women do not spend the entire night, only the evening, in the society house, and, while there, they are listeners rather than narrators of the inexhaustible folk tales that are wont to be told at society gatherings. Men are the custodians of the lore, secular as well as esoteric, of the tribe, just as men and not women are the musicians. The men are devoted singers, singing as they dance or singing as a choir for dancers, and singing as they go to or from work in the fields, or as they drive their horses to water in the river or to the corrals on the edges of the town. Even grinding songs are sung on ceremonial occasions by men.
In the public appearances of the society, the women members figure but little. Societies supply choirs and drummers and ceremonial road openers or leaders to the masked dancers and, during the great koko awia (Kachina coming) or shalako ceremonial, to various groups of sacred personages. I have seen several dances in Zuñi and one celebration of koko awia, and I have seen but one woman officiate in public. As a daughter of the house which was entertaining the koyemshi or sacred clowns she was in attendance upon that group in the koko awia or Advent, so to speak, of 1915.
If Waiyautitsa belongs to a society, she will offer or plant the befeathered prayer sticks, which are so conspicuous a feature of Pueblo religion, but, being a woman, Waiyautitsa will not cut or dress the sticks. She will only grind the pigments and, perhaps, paint the sticks. Nor as a woman would she offer the sticks on certain other ceremonial occasions when the men offer them. Once a year, however, at the winter solstice ceremonial on which so much of Zuñi ritualism pivots, Waiyautitsa will be expected, even in infancy, to plant, planting for the “old ones,” i. e., the ancestors and for the Moon, but not, like the men, for the Sun or, unless a member of the Kachina society, for the ancestral beings, the Kachina.
At the conclusion of the winter solstice ceremonial, when certain sacred figures called kwelele go from house to house, the women carry embers around the walls of the house and throw them out on the kwelele. It is the rite of shuwaha, cleansing, exorcism. There are a number of other little rites peculiar to the women in Zuñi ceremonialism. Through them, and through a number of rites they share with the men, through provisions for supplying food in the estufa to the sacred personators or for entertaining them at home or making them presents, women have an integral part in Zuñi ceremonialism. In what we may call the ceremonial management, however, they appear to have little or no part.
Even when women are initiated into the Kachina society, or are associated with the ashiwanni or rain priests, their functions seem to be primarily of an economic or housekeeping order. The women members of the rain priesthoods have to offer food every day to the fetiches of these sacerdotal groups—to stones carved and uncarved, and to cotton-wrapped lengths of cane filled with “the seeds the people live by.” For the seed fetiches to be in any way disturbed in the houses to which they are attached, involves great danger to the people, and on a woman in the house, the woman member of the priesthood, falls the responsibility of guardianship or shelter. But even these positions of trust are no longer held by women—there are only six women ashiwanni among the fifteen priesthoods. The woman’s position among the paramount priesthood, the rain priesthood of the North, has been vacant now for many years—no suitable woman being willing, they say, to run the risks or be under the tabus of office. Aside from this position of woman ashiwanni, women count for little or nothing in the theocracy of Zuñi. They were and are associated with the men priests to do the work pertinent to women. In the case of the Zuñi pantheon or its masked impersonations, the association is needed to satisfy or carry out, so to speak, Zuñi standards or concepts of conjugality. The couple rather than the individual is the Zuñi unit. Sometimes, in ceremony or in myth, the couple may consist of two males.
There is one masked couple I have noted in particular at Zuñi, the atoshle. Two or three times during the winter our little Waiyautitsa, together with other girls and very little boys, may expect to be frightened by the atoshle, the disciplinary masks who serve as bugaboos to children as well as a kind of sergeant-at-arms, the male atoshle at least, for adults. If the children meet the old man and his old woman in the street, they run away helter-skelter. If the dreadful couple visits a child indoors, sent for perhaps by a parent, the child is indeed badly frightened. I suppose that Waiyautitsa is six or seven years old when one day, as an incident of some dance, the atoshle “come out” and come to her house. The old woman atoshle carries a deep basket on her back in which to carry off naughty children and in her hand a crook to catch them by the ankle. With the crook she pulls Waiyautitsa over to the grinding stones in the corner of the room, telling her that now she is getting old enough to help her mother about the house, to look after the baby and, before so very long, to grind. She must mind her mother and be a good girl. I once saw a little girl so terrified by such admonition that she began to whimper, hiding her head in her mother’s lap until the atoshle was sprinkled with the sacred meal and left the house to perform elsewhere his role of parent’s assistant.
Whether from fear, from supernatural fear or fear of being talked about as any Zuñi woman who rests or idles is talked about, or whether from example, more from the latter no doubt than from the former, Waiyautitsa is certainly a “good girl,” a gentle little creature, and very docile. Sometimes she plays lively games with her “sisters” next door like the game of bear at the spring. A spiral is traced on the ground and at the center is placed a bowl of water to represent a spring. The girls follow the spiral to get water for their little turkeys which, they sing, are dying of thirst. Then the “bear” rushes out from the spring and gives chase. But for the most part the little girls play quietly at house. In this way and in imitating at home her industrious mother or aunt, or her even more industrious grandmother or great-aunt, Waiyautitsa learns to do all the household tasks of women. She learns to grind the corn on the stone metate—that back-hardening labor of the Pueblo woman—and to prepare and cook the meal in a number of ways in an outside oven or on the American stove or on the flat slab on which hewe or wafer bread is spread. For the ever cheery family meal she sets out the coffee-pot, the hewe or tortilla, and the bowls of chile and of mutton stew on the earthen floor she is forever sweeping up with her little homemade brush or with an American broom. (A Zuñi house is kept very clean and amazingly neat and orderly.)
And Waiyautitsa becomes very thrifty—not only naturally but supernaturally. She will not sell corn out of the house without keeping back a few grains in order that the corn may return—in Zuñi thought the whole follows a part. And she will keep a lump of salt in the corn storeroom and another in the bread bowl—when salt is dug out, the hole soon refills, and this virtue of replacing itself the salt is expected to impart to the corn. There are other respects, too, in which Waiyautitsa will learn how to facilitate the economy. She will sprinkle the melon seeds for planting, with sweetened water—melons should be sweet. Seed wheat she will sprinkle with a white clay to make the crop white, and with a plant called k’owa so that wheat dough will pull well. Seed corn will be sprinkled with water that the crop may be well rained on.
From some kinswoman who is a specially good potter, Waiyautitsa may have learned to coil and paint and fire the bowls as well as the cook pots and water jars the household needs. She fetches in wood from the woodpile and now and again she may be seen chopping the pine or cedar logs the men of the household have brought in on donkey or in wagon. She fetches water from one of the modern wells of the town, carrying it in a jar on her head and walking in the slow and springless gait always characteristic of Pueblo women. Perhaps that gait, so ponderous and so different from the gait of the men, is the result of incessant industry, a kind of unconscious self-protective device against “speeding up.”
Waiyautitsa will learn to work outdoors as well as in. She will help her mother in keeping one of the small vegetable gardens near the town—the men cultivate the outlying fields of corn and wheat (and the men and boys herd the sheep which make the Zuñi prosperous), and Waiyautitsa will help her household thresh their wheat crop, in the morning preparing dinner for the workers, for relatives from other households as well as from her own, in the afternoon joining the threshers as the men drive horses or mules around the circular threshing floor and the women and girls pitchfork the wheat and brush away the chaff and winnow the grain in baskets. Waiyautitsa will also learn to make adobe blocks and to plaster with her bare hand or with a rabbit-skin glove the adobe walls of her mother’s house, inside and out. Pueblo men are the carpenters of a house, but the women are always the plasterers, and Waiyautitsa will have to be a very old woman indeed to think she is too old to plaster. On my last visit to Zuñi I saw a woman seventy, or not much under, spending part of an afternoon on her knees plastering the chinks of a door newly cut between two rooms.
The house she plasters belongs, or will in time belong, to Waiyautitsa. Zuñi women own their houses and their gardens or, perhaps it is better to say, gardens and houses belong to the family through the women. At marriage a girl does not leave home; her husband joins her household. He stays in it, too—only as long as he is welcome. If he is lazy, if he fails to bring in wood, if he fails to contribute the produce of his fields, or if some one else for some other reason is preferred, his wife expects him to leave her household. He does not wait to be told twice. “The Zuñi separate whenever they quarrel or get tired of each other,” a critical Acoma moralist once said to me. The monogamy of Zuñi is, to be sure, rather brittle. In separation the children stay with the mother.
Children belong to their mother’s clan. They have affiliations, however, as we shall see, with the clan of their father. If the mother of Waiyautitsa is a Badger, let us say, and her father a Turkey, Waiyautitsa will be a Badger and “the child of the Turkey.” She can not marry a Turkey clansman nor, of course, a Badger. Did she show any partiality for a clansman, an almost incredible thing, she would be told she was just like a dog or a burro.
These exogamous restrictions aside, and the like restrictions that may arise in special ways between the household of Waiyautitsa and other households, Waiyautitsa would be given freedom of choice in marrying. Even if her household did not like her man, and her parents had told her not “to talk to” him, Zuñi for courting, she and he could go to live with some kinswoman. No one, related or unrelated, would refuse to take them in. Nobody may be turned from the door. Nor would a girl whose child was the offspring of a chance encounter be turned out by her people or slighted. The illegitimate child is not discriminated against at Zuñi.
Casual relationships occur at Zuñi, but they are not commercialized, there is no prostitution. Nor is there any lifelong celibacy. As for courtship, very little of it can there be—at least before intimacy either in the more transient or more permanent forms of mating,—the separation outside of the household of boys and girls of various ages is so thorough. “But what if a little girl wanted to play with boys?” I once asked. “They would laugh at her and say she was too crazy about boys.” “Crazy” at Zuñi, as quite generally among Indians, means passionate. (Girls at Zuñi are warned away from ceremonial trespass by the threat of becoming “crazy.”)
The young men and girls do, to be sure, have non-ceremonial dances together, and in preparing for them there are opportunities for personal acquaintance. I saw one of these dances not long ago. It was a Comanche dance. There were a choir of about a dozen youths including the drummer, four girl dancers heavily be-ringed and be-necklaced, the pattern of whose dance, two by two or in line, was very regular, and a youth who executed in front of them or around them an animated and very beautiful pas seul. After dancing outside in the plaza, they all went into the “saint’s house” to dance for her “because they like her”—a survival no doubt of the custom of dancing in the Catholic church observed by the Indians in Mexico and not long since quite generally in New Mexico.
But it is on the twilight trip to the well, the conventional Zuñi hour of courtship, that Waiyautitsa will be approached by suitors. Muffled in his black blanket the youth may step out from the corner where he has been lurking and put his hand on the girl’s arm. If she will have none of him, she may avert her head and hasten on to overtake the woman in front, but if she fancies the fellow, she will pause, if but for a moment or two, to talk. It is a brief encounter and, with somebody in front and perhaps another girl coming up behind, it is far from private; still after Waiyautitsa has had a few such meetings, “two or four,” she is likely to invite the young man to join her household. At first, for a few days, he will stay in the common room, in the room where all sleep (sleeping and dressing, let me say, with the utmost modesty), he will stay only at night, leaving before dawn, “staying still” his shyness is called. Then he will begin to eat his meals with the household. There is, you see, no wedding ceremonial and a man slips as easily as he can into the life of his wife’s household.
Waiyautitsa will pay a formal visit on her bridegroom’s people, taking his mother a basket of corn meal. To Waiyautitsa herself her young man will have given a present of cloth for a dress, or a buckskin for the moccasins he will make for her. Hides are a product of the chase, of cattle raising (cowhide is used to sole moccasins), or of trade, men’s occupations, and so moccasins of both women and men are made by men. Women make their own dresses, although, formerly, before weaving went out of fashion at Zuñi, it is likely that men were the weavers, just as they are to-day among the Hopi from whom the men of Zuñi get cloth for their ceremonial kilts and blankets, and for the dresses of the women. Even to-day at Zuñi men may make up their own garments from store-bought goods and it is not unusual to see a man sitting to a sewing machine.
A man may use cloth or thread for other than economic reasons. In case a girl jilts him he will catch her out some night and take a bit from her belt to fasten to a tree on a windy mesa top. As the wind wears away the thread, the woman will sicken and perhaps in two or three years die. A woman who is deserted may take soil from the man’s footprints and put it where she sleeps. At night he will think of her and come back—“even if the other woman is better looking.” Apprehensive of desertion a woman may put a lock of hair from the man in her house wall or, the better to attach him to her, she may wear it over her heart. Women and men alike may buy love charms from the ne’wekwe, a curing society, potent in magic, black or white. There is a song, too, which men and women may sing “in their heart” to charm the opposite sex. And there is a song which a girl may sing to the corn as she rubs the yellow meal on her face before going out. “Help me,” is the substance of it, “I am going to the plaza. Make me look pretty.” Rarely do our girls pray, I suppose, when they powder their noses.
Courtship past for the time being, courtship by magic or otherwise, Waiyautitsa is now, let us say, an expectant mother. Her household duties continue to be about the same, but certain precautions, if she inclines to be very circumspect, she does take. She will not test the heat of her oven by sprinkling it in the usual way with bran, for if she does, her child, she has heard, may be born with a skin eruption. Nor will she look at a corpse or help dress a dead animal lest her child be born dead or disfigured. She has heard that, even as a little girl if she ate the whitish leaf of the corn husk, her child would be an albino. If her husband eats this during the pregnancy, the result would be the same. On her husband fall a number of other pregnancy tabus, perhaps as many as fall on her, if not more. If he hunts and maims an animal, the child will be similarly maimed—deformed or perhaps blind. If he joins in a masked dance, the child may have some mask-suggested misshape or some eruption like the paint on the mask. If he sings a great deal, the child will be a cry-baby. The habit of thinking in terms of sympathetic magic or of reasoning by analogy which is even more conspicuous at Zuñi than, let us say, at New York, is particularly evident in pregnancy or birth practises or tabus.
Perhaps Waiyautitsa has wished to determine the sex of the child. In that case she may have made a pilgrimage with a rain priest to Corn Mesa to plant a prayer stick which has to be cut and painted in one way for a boy, in another way for a girl. (Throughout the Southwest blue or turquoise is associated with maleness, and yellow with femaleness.) Wanting a girl—and girls are wanted in Zuñi quite as much as boys, if not more—Waiyautitsa need not make the trip to the mesa, instead her husband may bring her to wear in her belt scrapings from a stone in a phallic shrine near the mesa. When labor sets in and the pains are slight, indicating, women think, a girl, Waiyautitsa may be told by her mother, “Don’t sleep, or you will have a boy.” A nap during labor effects a change of sex. When the child is about to be born, Waiyautitsa is careful, too, if she wants a girl, to see that the custom of sending the men out of the house at this time is strictly observed.
After the birth, Waiyautitsa will lie in for several days, four, eight, ten or twelve, according to the custom of her family. Whatever the custom, if she does not observe it, she runs the risk of “drying up” and dying. She lies on a bed of sand heated by hot stones, and upon her abdomen is placed a hot stone. Thus is she “cooked,” people say, and creatures whose mothers are not thus treated are called uncooked, raw—they are the animals, the gods, Whites. To be “cooked” seems to be tantamount in Zuñi to being human.
It is the duty of Waiyautitsa’s mother-in-law, the child’s paternal grandmother, to look after mother and child during the confinement, and at its close to carry the child outdoors at dawn and present him or her to the Sun. Had Waiyautitsa lost children, she might have invited a propitious friend, some woman who had had many children and lost none, to attend the birth and be the first to pick up the child and blow into his mouth. In these circumstances the woman’s husband would become the initiator of the child, if a boy, when the child was to be taken into the Kachina society. Generally the child’s father chooses some man from the house of his own kuku or paternal aunt to be the initiator or godfather, so to speak, of the child. Ceremonial rites usually fall to the paternal relatives.
But the infant will receive attentions of a ritual or magical nature, likewise from his mother and her household. He is placed on a cradle board in which, near the position of his heart, a bit of turquoise is inlaid to preclude the cradle bringing any harm to its tenant. Left alone, a baby runs great risk—some family ghost may come and hold him, causing him to die within four days. And so a quasi-fetichistic ear of corn, a double ear thought of as mother and child, is left alongside the baby as a protector. That the baby may teethe promptly, his gums may be rubbed by one who has been bitten by a snake—“snakes want to bite.” To make the child’s hair grow long and thick, his grandfather or uncle may puff the smoke of native tobacco on his head. That the child may not be afraid in the dark, water-soaked embers are rubbed over his heart the first time he is taken out at night—judging from what I have seen of Zuñi children and adults a quite ineffectual method. That the child may keep well and walk early, hairs from a deer are burned, and the child held over the smoke—deer are never sick, and rapid is their gait. Their hearing, too, is acute, so discharge from a deer’s ear will be put into the baby’s ear. That the child may talk well and with tongues, the tongue of a snared mocking bird may be cut out and held to the baby to lick. The bird will then be released in order that, as it regains its tongue and “talks,” the child will talk. A youth who speaks in addition to his native tongue Keresan, English and Spanish, has been pointed out to me as one who had licked mocking bird tongue.
Waiyautitsa will give birth to three or four children, probably not more, and then, as she approaches middle age, we may suppose that she falls sick, and after being doctored unsuccessfully first by her old father who happens to be a well known medicine man of the Great Fire-brand society, and then by a medicine man from the ne’wekwe society whose practice is just the opposite, Waiyautitsa dies. Within a few hours elderly kinswomen of her father’s will come in and wash her hair and body, and at dawn sprinkle her face, first with water and then with meal. The deceased will be well dressed, and in a blanket donated by her father’s people she will be carried to the cemetery lying in front of the old church, a ruin from the days of the Catholic establishment in Zuñi. There to the north of the central wooden cross, i. e., on the north side of the cemetery, Waiyautitsa will be buried. Women are buried on the north side and men on the south.
Waiyautitsa will be carried out and buried by her father and other men in the household. No women will go to the burial, nor will the widower. The widower, as soon as the corpse is taken outdoors, will be fetched by his women relatives to live at their house. There they straightway wash his hair—a performance inseparable in Zuñi, as at other pueblos, from every time of crisis or ceremony. The hair of all the other members of Waiyautitsa’s household will be washed at the end of four days by women relatives of her father. During this time, since the spirit of Waiyautitsa is thought to linger about the home, the house door will be left open for her at night. The bowl used in washing her hair, and the implements used in digging her grave will also be left outdoors. Her smaller and peculiarly personal possessions have been buried with her, and bulky things like bedding have been burned or taken to a special place down the river to be buried. The river flows to the lake sixty miles or so west of Zuñi, where Waiyautitsa’s spirit is also supposed to take its journey. There under the lake it abides, except when with other spirits it returns in the clouds to pour down upon Zuñi fields the beneficent rain. People will say to a child, when they see a heavy cloud, “There goes your grandmother”; or they will quite seriously say to one another, “Our grandfathers are coming.”
Waiyautitsa’s children may go on living at home with their grandmother, Waiyautitsa’s mother, or it may be that one of them is adopted by a maternal aunt or great-aunt or cousin. Zuñi children, cherished possessions as they are, are always being adopted—even in the lifetime of their mother. Adopted, a child—or an adult—will fit thoroughly into the ways of his adoptive household. It is the household as well as the clan which differentiates the Zuñi family group from our individualistic type of family. The household changes quite readily, but, whatever its composition, it is an exceedingly integrated and responsible group.
However the children are distributed, it will be the older woman or women in the household who will control them. This household system is one that gives position and considerable authority to the elder women—until the women are too old, people say, to be of any use. (In spite of this irony, I have heard of but one old woman who was neglected by her household.) An older woman who is the female head of the household is greatly respected by her daughters and sons-in-law and grandchildren, as well as by the sons or brothers who continually visit the household and often, as temporary celibates, return to live in it.
The older woman is highly esteemed, but she is by no means the head of the household—unless she is widowed. Wherever the household contributes to the ceremonial public life, her husband is paramount. In the non-ceremonial, economic life, too, he has equal, if not greater, authority. And in the general economy he more or less expects his wife to serve him and wait on him. This conjugal subordination is not apparent to any extent among the younger people; the younger husband and wife are too much drawn into the corporate household life. But as time passes and they in turn become the heads of the household, the man appears to be more given to staying at home, and more and more he takes control.
From this brief survey of the life of a woman at Zuñi, in so far as it can be distinguished from the general life, we get the impression that the differentiation of the sexes follows lines of least resistance which start from a fairly fundamental division of labor. From being hunters and trappers men become herders of the domestic animals, drivers or riders. Trade journeys and trips for wood or for the collecting of other natural resources are associated with men, and work on the things acquired is men’s work—men, for example, are wood cutters, and bead makers, whether the objects are for secular or sacerdotal use. Analogously all work upon skins or feathers is work for men whether it leads to the manufacture of clothing or to communication with the supernaturals. Again, as farmers, men are associated with that system of supernatural instrumentalism for fertility and weather control which constitutes in large part Zuñi religion. In other words, the bulk of the ceremonial life, a system for the most part of rain rituals, is in the hands of the men. So is government. The secular officers are merely representatives of the priests. Zuñi government is a theocracy in which women have little part. The house and housekeeping are associated with women. Clay is the flesh of a female supernatural, and clay processes, brickmaking or laying or plastering, and pottery making are women’s work. There are indications in sacerdotal circles that painting is, or was thought of as, a feminine activity. Corn, like clay, is the flesh of female supernaturals, and the corn is associated with women. Even men corn growers are in duty bound to bring their product to their wife or mother. Women or women impersonations figure in corn rituals. It is tempting to speculate that formerly, centuries since, women themselves were the corn growers. To-day, at any rate, the preparation of corn, as of other food, is women’s work. Wherever food and its distribution figure in ceremonials, and there is a constant offering of food to the supernaturals, women figure. Fetiches are attached to houses and in so far as providing for these fetiches is household work, it is women’s work and leads to the holding of sacerdotal office by women. The household rather than ties of blood is the basis of family life. The children of the household are more closely attached to the women than to the men. One expression of this attachment is seen in reckoning clan membership through the mother.
Household work at Zuñi as elsewhere is continuous. The women are always on the move. The work of the men, on the other hand, is intermittent. Hunting, herding and farming are more or less seasonal activities and are more or less readily fitted into ceremonial pursuits, or rather, in their less urgent periods, take on ceremonial aspects. In the ceremonial life the arts find expression, and the men and not the women are, by and large, the artists of the tribe.
Attached to the ceremonial life are the games of chance and the races that are played or run at certain seasons. Here again the intermittent habit of work of the men, together with their comparative mobility, qualifies them as gamesters and runners to the exclusion more or less of the women. Formerly, to be sure, the women played a pole and hoop game, and, given ceremonial exigency as among the Hopi, the women no doubt would run races.
Household work is confining. Hunting, herding, trading lead to a comparatively mobile habit, a habit of mind or spirit which in the Southwest, at least, is adapted to ceremonial pursuit; for Pueblo Indian ceremonialism thrives on foreign accretions, whether of myth or song or dance or design of mask or costume, or, within certain limits of assimilation, of psychological patterns of purpose or gratification.
To the point of view that the differentiation of the sexes at Zuñi proceeds on the whole from the division of labor, the native custom of allowing a boy or man to become, as far as ways of living go, a girl or woman, gives color. Towards adolescence, and sometimes in later life, it is permissible for a boy culturally to change sex. He puts on women’s dress, speaks like a woman, and behaves like a woman. This alteration is due to the fact that one takes readily to women’s work, one prefers it to men’s work. Of one or another of the three men-women now at Zuñi or of the men-women in other pueblos I have always been told that the person in question made the change because he wanted to work like a woman or because his household was short of women and needed a woman worker.
And yet among the Hopi, where the economy is practically identical with the Zuñi, there are no men-women; in this tribe the institution, it is said, was never established. This, like other customs, is not merely a matter of economic adjustment; economic or psychologic propriety or consistency or predisposition may count, but of great importance also are the survival of traits from an earlier culture, and the acquiring of traits from the culture of neighboring peoples. Were we to understand the interplay of all these factors in the life, shall we say, of Waiyautitsa, we might be a long way towards understanding the principles of society, even other than that of Zuñi.
ELSIE CLEWS PARSONS
Zuñi Pictures
If there was any one thing in the wide world I wanted to do more than another, it was to visit the New Mexican pueblo where my friend Tenatsali[7] spent so many years of his strange career. He had discovered it and made it his own and before his death he turned over to me his title to its romance and mystery. This was all he possessed in it, for even the stone house he built with money earned by literary work had dropped from his lavish hands. It happened one winter while crossing the continent I heard there was to be a dance at the pueblo. The news decided me. I stopped off on the railroad, hired a team from the sheriff and had him drive me down to the town. It was winter; snow covered the heights and we were both chilled through when we reached Tenatsali’s big stone house, then a trading store. The farmer-agent, a jovial man, who had been the trader in Tenatsali’s day, lived in the other end of the building. He welcomed me as an old friend and told me stories of Tenatsali until late into the night, as we sat before his fire.
It was in his house Tenatsali had remained concealed in the long interval from the time he rode out so debonairly on the war-path to take a scalp, and the arrival of a scalp from Washington. He was obliged to perform a scalp-taking feat before he could be admitted to membership among the Priests of the Bow. As he would not secure a scalp in the orthodox way, he had to get one as best he could. It was a very old scalp, one from the National Museum collected by Lewis H. Morgan many years before.
I slept soundly after the long ride, but, rising betimes, sought a guide that I might go to the village, which is like an ant hill, across the little river, and then climb to the summit of that mesa to the East which overlooks the great valley. The two possible interpreters, youths who had been reared by the trader, were both sequestered in the village as they were to take part in the dance. And so it was decided I could do no better than engage a schoolboy who, while he spoke little or no English, could at least show me the trail up the mesa. In spite of the snow the boy was barefoot, and his single garment was scanty protection from the cold. We crossed the wide stretch of plain, rounded the mesa and took the steep trail on the farther side. It was half obliterated by the snowdrifts, but the boy ran lightly ahead, up and up, stretching me a hand at the steep places until we reached the broad, table top. There in an open shrine stood the image of the war god, Ahaiyuta, his plumes bedraggled and blown about by the wind. We passed the ruins covered with spiny cactus and I waited while the boy, nimble as a goat, descended the trail beside the pinnacled rock to visit the old images of the war gods ranged in a row in their immemorial cave. There too he saw, I suppose, the painted jars that held the old masks of Sayatasha. When he came back we visited the other war-god shrine and descended the mesa to return across the plain to the store, tired and hungry after our seven-miles’ round.
Here we found people from far and near who had come to see the dance. There was Jesus, the Mexican, and French Dan, Falstaffian and dissolute. There was the Missionary whom later I was to know better and the Field Matron, a wraith of a woman who went silently among the Indians and gave them some drug she had discovered through an advertisement in the “boiler plate” of her home paper. There were the Indians who fraternize with the whites, like the Albino and the old Mormon, or to give him his full name, Ten Cent Mormon, because he had been baptized by the Mormons in the early days and received ten cents to bind the bargain.
The conversation at the dinner table where we had a hearty, steaming meal was all about the dance, and even the sheriff was moved to express himself. It was the first time this particular dance had been performed for years. The Arrow-Swallowing society had given public exhibitions, but on this occasion there was to be tree-swallowing as well. It was plain enough that the agent and the sheriff really believed that the Indians had supernatural powers.
The agent accompanied me to the village that afternoon and guided me to a place in the large, central court where I could see the dance to advantage. A red blanket was spread for us to sit upon, and we took our places with the expectant crowd. Every living soul in the pueblo, dressed in their best and gayest clothes, lined the roofs of the terraced houses.
Few plays are staged more effectively than these performances. The adobe walls of the houses furnish a perfect background. The court seems entirely inclosed and the processions of dancers enter and return by passageways set at right angles on either side. In the centre of the plaza was a long, white, wooden box painted in colors with cloud-terrace and rain symbols which the musicians used as a resonator for their notched-stick rattles. While we talked, the agent pointed out familiar faces like Niña, the pretty granddaughter of old Nayuchi the war chief, and Lusalu, the fat governor. The small children played on the edges of the crowd and mud-bedaubed clowns lolled around the painted box. Two old men dressed in gala attire, with white smocks and gay bandas and sashes, took up the notched instruments and began scraping them in a rhythmic motion with plectra made of sheep bone. There are few more mysterious and disturbing sounds than this same scraping. The time is perfect, the rhythm inexorable. Something was about to happen.
Two long processions advanced slowly into the plaza. In single file, keeping perfect time, their turtle-shell, leg rattles in absolute unison, dressed all alike in kilts and armlets, with faces and bodies painted white, the dancers approached each other from opposite sides, and wonderful to behold, each dancer with head thrown back supported a tall spruce tree erect in his mouth. Below were the bodies of the white-painted figures, robust and vigorous, and above a moving forest. The processions continued to advance, and curved round the plaza until they displayed their entire length, halted with a loud fanfare of gourd rattles,—and then became still and silent. There were women among them—and one wearing a white, cylinder-shaped mask. Some children, neophytes, followed, and on one side a tiny boy with a miniature spruce brought up the rear. The dancers rested, withdrew the trees from their mouths and held them, butts upward with the top boughs resting on the ground. Then it was that the full significance of the performance was revealed. The butts, rudely chopped to a tapering point eight or more inches in length, had been entirely swallowed.
Again the strident notes of the rattles sounded. The dancers took up their trees, elevated and adjusted them in their mouths and danced as before. There was the same volume of coördinated sounds, of gourd rattles, of resonant shells and the swish, swish of the garments. Again the white mask danced on.... It grew dark and I left the plaza, in a daze. What did it all mean—the painted box, the swallowed trees, the white mask?
STEWART CULIN
Havasupai Days
I
Lanso is a hedonist of seven. Day dawns late down in Cataract Canyon, but even spring nights in Arizona are chill, and one’s own soft-woven bedding, cedar-bark mat and rabbit-skin blanket, suffuse a warmth one would not willingly forego. But,—“Lanso,” whispers grandfather Sinyella, “up and run toward the daylight. Run, that you grow straight and lusty. And heed me; take your torch and touch it to your elbows and your wrists that you may never be rheumatic as I, your relative. Oh yes, and as you turn back, fling the torch behind you, turn once again and snatch it up, that your memory may be strong too, that you may remember quickly a forgotten deer charm when you go to hunt.”
Lanso leaves his creekside home, worms his way among the slender cotton-woods, and emerging on the race course, drops into a dogged trot through the deep sand. The race course—but that is a place for a mad, scrambling dash; perched with brothers, and sisters too, on the bare back of father’s horse. What need to run afoot: foot races come at dance time, and that will have to wait until the harvest is in. Dance time—Lanso hums the songs. “Yes, I know them all; next time I, too, will dance....”
It is lighter when Lanso turns back: all the Havasupai are astir. Acrid smoke begins to drift over the willow thickets; ethereal strata that rest in the still air against the towering rock walls; walls that stretch to the winter home high on the plateau above. There in the clearing is his home; the willow-thatched dome for rainy days, the branch-covered, dirt-roofed, box-like shade for refuge from the midday sun, and Hat’s sand-drifted hut merging in the swell of the creek bank.
Lanso scents breakfast in the bubbling clay pot, the inexhaustible pot that stands day-long with open-mouthed hospitality extended to all comers. But even a cold-whetted appetite will not tempt him to a sidelong foray on the mess; no, there was bravery needed for the sharp reproach and unbearable ridicule meted out to unmannerly pilferers. Better to wait until Round-one, Hat’s wife, should call the family, Lanso, her nephew, not last among them, to the stew of ground corn and big-horn meat, little loaves of corn meal tied in the husks and baked in the embers, sweet mescal juice, and salt from the cave far down the canyon. Then he would creep up to the elders grouped on the ground around the pots and baskets, and from the side of Fox, his favorite uncle, beg for tasty bits fished out with sharpened twigs, and to take his turn at the brimming, horn ladles.
“Now,” said old Sinyella, “the brush is burned and our fields are cleared: to-day we will plant.” So, off the whole family trooped; men and children on horses, the women, their babies strapped to the cradle board in their arms, trudging along beside them. Lanso, clutching hard at his grandfather’s back, rocked to the easy canter of their horse. Here was business afoot he understood: next to the victims that fell before his arrows—very small creatures, indeed—this would be his chief contribution to the family larder. Yesterday he had watched them playing shinney, gambling for the future crops, and he had guessed they would begin to-day.
Down through the broad fields they rode, noting here the dam that spread a somewhat broken wing to scoop the creek to the level of the fields, there an irrigation ditch that needed mending, until they reached the family fields. These were Sinyella’s and had been Sinyella’s father’s and grandfather’s, and one day would go to Lanso.
Turning out the horses to graze at the foot of the rocky slope, they climbed to the storage houses set high above the reach of devastating floods, plastered like swallows’ nests in a crevice at the base of the cliff. The seed corn secured, Sinyella knelt in the field and scratched a hole with his pointed digging-stick. Then he prayed, “Grow good, corn; when your stalk grows, grow tall; grow like the ancient corn up there,” and dropping some kernels in the hole, he chewed another and blew it toward the “corn,” two white rocks high on the canyon wall. Then two short steps forward and he knelt to dig again. Lanso watched, and then followed; first a few kernels, a deft sweep to fill the hole, and then the next hill. Row after row they planted together under the white morning sun that rose to flood the canyon with its light and heat....
Back in the deep shade of the huge cotton-wood he saw his grandfather playing with his little brother—a toddling fellow not yet worthy of a name. Now he was searching for his mislaid arrows for he heard a twittering from a nearby bush. “Yes,” Sinyella teased the baby, “that bird is calling to you, ‘You are not a boy; you have no arrow to kill me; you are a girl.’” Grandfather knew everything: he made fine bows and arrows, and he told long stories in the winter evenings. “Next winter,” Lanso thought, “I will track rabbits in the snow when it lies in the cedar glades where our other home is; now I must hunt down here....”
The bushes spawned boys, Lanso among them. There were birds to be shot, dogs to be worried, deadfalls to be looked to, horses to be watered, sprawled over, and raced. They all ran down the canyon to Coyote’s, where there was that curious Navaho visitor to watch. Mornings are short when there are cliffs to scale, tanning to watch, flat cactus to roll for arrow-marks, food to beg from some friend—and relatives lived everywhere; Wooden-leg to listen to as he told of his trip to the Walapai people to fetch a bride, mock ambushes in the willows, and the creek, with its cooling embrace as it closes overhead....
II
Panamida drove his horses down the creek bank in a cloud of dust. Standing belly deep, they sluiced the cool water through their outstretched throats. Panamida let it swirl around his dangling ankles; here was relief from the afternoon heat. Bending low he could look up-stream beneath the vaulting willows where the women were filling their water-baskets. “Fox,” one called to him. “Fox,” indeed! Who was this who did not know that they had begun to call him Panamida since his marriage. Couldn’t she see that these three were Left-hand’s horses: Left-hand, to whom he had given a big blanket, a black Hopi shirt, and much dried meat, all for Gathawinga when he had first gone to live at her father’s and work for him. “When I have a son, I will build my own house on my family fields; Sinyella will give me a place,” he thought. He knew he was to have a son: only yesterday Hat’s girl had made a string-figure that resembled a boy.
Shrill laughter came from the dance-ground beyond the screening thicket: the women were playing hiding games and tossing dice over there. He laughed abruptly; Swollen-wrist’s voice came bellowing the song,
“My tally sticks; I want them to come back; I am nearly dead.”
“That fellow never does win the stakes,” thought Panamida. “Well, those women should cook now for the dance to-night: later I will join them for the racing.”
Panamida turned the horses out and sauntered down the creek side to Two-wives’ sweat lodge, where a dozen breechclouted men were lounging about in the sand. One could usually find them here, gossiping through the midday heat. While they waited a turn to enter, old Corn-thief droned recollections of his youth: “... We found a flock of mountain sheep, with several rams among them. I shot a very big one, the others all ran off. The wounded ram jumped down the cliff, and ran along a very narrow ledge. I and Hat’s father slid down from rock to rock, and followed him along that ledge until he stopped abruptly at its end. Suddenly he turned and dashed back at us, his head held down sideways. I flattened myself against the wall, Hat’s father beside me; there was hardly room. The ram struck Hat’s father, throwing him off the ledge: it is very high there. The ram stood quite still; those above me shot at him; when he was hit, he too tumbled headlong. Next day we tramped down the trail and found the body in the canyon. We carried it away, and dug a hole to bury it; we didn’t have time to burn it....” Panamida tried to recall Hat’s father’s name: no one said it now that he was dead.
Some one carried freshly heated stones into the little dome-shaped lodge. Panamida followed the next three to enter; there should be four at each of their four “sweats.” He crouched down close to them on the carpet of leaves. It was blinding dark inside the tightly blanketed lodge. It was hot; whatever he touched burned. Sweat began to pour into his eyes and down his back. His hair felt dry and burning at the roots; each breath was a gulp of liquid fire that seared his nostril-edges and his throat. It was intensely still. Suddenly his neighbor commenced a song; he joined; that was better. Now there was a sharp hiss as the leader threw a handful of water on the rocks: he gasped, the steam was choking and the heat suddenly unbearable. He bowed his head close to the ground between his feet to suck in the cooler air there; then he raised himself slowly. Sweat still streamed from him; every muscle was relaxed; every ache was gone; he felt pure and renewed. Struggling out beneath the door flap, he stood up in the sunlight, poised on the creek bank, and plunged into the stream. He gasped; his breath was sharply driven out; but his skin tingled, his muscles quivered, he felt exhilarated.
Many races had been run when Panamida reached the dance-ground. He would not ride, though he had sung over his colt to make him fleet. Fragment-of-rock, his youngest brother, should ride, and he would bet. He would be chief when his father died: he must be dignified now. He sat beside Gathawinga and her mother, She-chews-men, who were weaving baskets. “The Navaho have come,” he whispered to Gathawinga, “I have given one a basket of shelled corn for his big blanket for you: I have his horse too, for two big buckskins and a little corn.” He went toward the visitors: “Well, you have only one knot in your string now; to-night we dance. Ten sleeps ago when you went to tell your chief to share our harvest bounty there were eleven. It is nearly sundown; the dance-boss has spread the meat and bread on a bed of willow leaves; guests must eat everything.”
He drew back with his relatives that the Navaho and Hopi might eat first. Though they had not brought their women, these strangers could be trusted here, especially the Hopi, who lived so well and knew all manner of strange things, yet it was laughable to see them trotting by afoot when a man should ride.
But the enemy, those Yavapai; Panamida knew them too. He recalled the previous autumn when the owls were warning, “Some one comes from the south: hoo hu.” And they had come climbing down into the canyon in the early dawn. He recalled the alarm; the women and children scrambling up to hide on the cliffs; the day-long pursuit up the canyon, the skirmish, and the enemy fleeing again. Then the Yavapai, tiring, had taken refuge on a little hill. “Good,” Chief Manakadja had said. “We are hungry now: some of you ride back and fetch us food.” After they had eaten they felt braver. Two took thick buckskins, which they hung from their bows before them. Panamida, crouching with arrow set, had followed in this shelter with the others. Boldly they marched up the hill, Yavapai arrows raining harmlessly on the flapping skins. Suddenly the carriers dipped their shields and the hidden archers let fly. They had nearly reached the summit, when Wasakwivama, who held a skin, was hit. “My arm is getting weak; I can’t hold it up much longer; we had better go back.” A second time they tried: the Yavapai arrows were exhausted, they were rolling rocks. Panamida chuckled at the recollection of his foolhardy spring, the sudden jerk that sent an unwary enemy sprawling down the slope to be pounced on and dispatched. Well, another feat like that and they might call him a chief even before his father died. The Yavapai had fled in the night, but they would return. “Yes,” he ruefully reflected, “they like to come; they always kill so many....”
Moonlight spread across the clearing as they danced: the eastern cliffs stood sharply black against the sky. The song ended, and the group around the pole melted away. Sinyella rose in his place among the watching families. “My own land, hear me. Let all of us remain alive always. I want to live well always. Ground, hear me.” He prayed to the rocks, the ground, the creek: he told the young men to work hard, to dance well, not to be quarrelsome, as chiefs always spoke in the lull between the dances. Paiya, the best singer, again took up his place, facing the pole; Panamida, with the drum, stepped beside him; quickly others formed the circle with them. Shoulder to shoulder they stood; fingers intertwined. Paiya began to sing to the drum beats:
“A fresh wind in that country, Girls dance circling.”
He had dreamed that he had gone to that far land where he had seen them dancing. The others caught up the refrain: they stood singing for some minutes. Then when they sang in unison Paiya signaled and all began circling to the left with a short, sidewise shuffling step. Slowly the circle swung, fifty men in their gala dress, girls with their jingling ornaments; over and over they sang the song, to bring it to an end when the leader reached his starting point. They stood hardly a minute: none dropped out. “Nidjanwi,” several prompted; so Paiya began the favorite:
“Nidjanwi, I do it; I am the man who names himself; Maidens stand alongside.”
Soon all were chanting, and the circle moved again. Excitement was high; the old people called out encouraging compliments; girls shouldered their way beside partners of their choice; reluctant Navaho were laughingly forced into the throng. Panamida felt some one pushing against his thigh; there was little Lanso, his older brother’s boy: “Yes, come in,” as he made space. Another song, and they stopped to rest. Navaho paid a trifle to their partners for release. Now a grotesque figure dashed from the obscurity of the night; white mask, cross-barred body, yucca leaf switches in hand, he sprang about, whipping the laggards to the dance; adults were laughing, children scampering in fright, dogs barking. The dance commenced again. Panamida was hoarse, it was far from dawn, and this was only the first of three nights’ dance.
III
Sinyella is half a skeptic. He sat back in the lodge and watched Sack, the medicine man, in the firelight beside his sister’s sick grandson. Let the other relatives shout to make the shaman strong: he would wait, if the boy died, he would kill the incompetent. The shaman knelt over the boy, swaying as he sang, his head to one side, his left knuckles clenched over his closed eyes, his clashing rattle in the other hand. Once he stopped rigid with open mouth, so that his familiar spirit might leave his chest to search for sickening ghosts outside the house. Then he rose and went out into the dark. Sinyella heard his spirit halloing and whistling as it returned to him out there. The shaman reëntered and resumed his singing. He put his lips to the boy’s forehead that the spirit might go in search of the sickness. He sucked the spirit back with a gulp, spat into his palm, and triumphantly exhibited its contents, some little white thread-like worms. “That was hard for me, but I have taken out all the sickness; there is no more there now.” Well, the boy’s father would give Sack a big blanket, but Sinyella decided that he, at any rate, would wait.
Musing as he waded through the crusted snow to his own lodge set snugly in the cedar thickets, he thought: Sack is young, he may not be much good, perhaps his spirit is weak. But I don’t know much about these things: there’s that star up there, Pagioga, the man-snatcher, and sometimes there are ghosts. I pray too: “Sun, my relative,” I say, “do something for me. You make me work so I can do anything: make good things for us: keep me always as I am now.” ... Of late his ears had been frequently ringing; ghosts were whispering to him. Suddenly he shouted, “Huuuu; no, though you talk that way, I am not going to die.”
It was well that they had collected a good store of pine nuts and wild seeds in the autumn after they left the canyon; the snow was thigh deep this winter. It was bitter cold; men and birds would freeze; the firewood on the ground was covered. But deep snow soon exhausted hunted deer and antelope, and there would be no lack of drinking water here on the plateau. The laden trees brought back to him that long past day when his father found the Navaho woman lost in the snow and took her to wife. He remembered other Navaho; those he had fought, those whose horses he had carried off, those who had despoiled him on a trading trip to the Hopi. There had been many a trip eastward to the Hopi villages, where the Navaho, quondam enemies, came to trade too. Presents exchanged, friendships renewed in night-long talks, buckskins and horn ladles traded for blankets, he would turn his packed horses back for the fortnight’s journey across the arid wastes toward his canyon home. There he would wait the coming of the Walapai, his blood brothers, from the west. Or, if they did not come, he would carry the Hopi woven stuffs to trade in their country. Once he had even penetrated beyond their range to the Mohave in the low land of the Colorado River, where, astounded at his effrontery, they had permitted him to stay and peaceably trade.
In all countries they knew him well: that was why people called him chief. He made himself a chief. True, his grandfather had been chief, like his fathers before him. But his own father was never chief; no one would call him that; he was a good-for-nothing. Now when I die, he thought, my two oldest sons will share it, as they will my fields. I have taught them both to talk like chiefs.
As, stooping, he lifted the door flap of his dome-shaped house he sensed to the full the flood of warmth and light. This was his own, these his people, and it was always good to be at home. The group reclining about the central fire broke off their cheerful chatter to greet him: back under the dark eaves he could hear the children, nominally asleep, giggling over some fine mischief. “The Walapai have come to ask our young men to join them next spring in a raid on the Paiute across the Grand Canyon; Panamida wants to go,” they told him.
“Panamida will fight them soon enough, let him but stay at home.”
“Panamida, younger brother, some nice Walapai girl will say to you, ‘Here’s a roasted lizard,’” said Grediva, mocking the gruff Walapai speech, amid the laughter of her relatives at the thought of eating lizard.
Sinyella smiled drowsily at the firelit faces: yes, all his own people. At his side he heard Lanso, “Grandfather, tell us just one story. Don’t refuse this time; the snakes will not bother now, it is winter.” Sinyella sat back where the children were listening, lying in the darkness. “Wolf and Coyote lived far to the west close to the ocean. Wolf said to Coyote, ‘This country holds no game, no deer, no antelope. All we eat is rats; that’s all we kill; that’s the only meat we have. I think I want you to go right down in the water, way down to the bottom of the ocean.’ Many elk lived under the water. Coyote tried: he went close to the water and put his head down, but he felt afraid. ‘I’m afraid to go down: I want you to go.’ Wolf said, ‘All right, I will go down and hunt. I will hunt a big elk and drive it right out. I will come out again after four sleeps.’”...
LESLIE SPIER
Earth-tongue, a Mohave
Earth-tongue’s earliest recollection was of the dim, cool house, where he picked bits of charcoal out of the soft sand and crumbled it against his hand. Once a cricket appeared on the wattled wall, suddenly went back in when he thrust at it, and only a stream of dry soil sifted forth. And then there was the terrifying time when voices burst loudly into his sleep, people crowded in but stood helplessly awkward, while his father’s brother shot insults of stolid hate into the ceaseless flood of his wife’s vituperation. As the woman turned to beat a girl lurking in the corner and the man interposed and flung her off, Earth-tongue burst into bawling and clung to his mother. He saw the angry woman stamp on pot after pot, tear open her coils of shredded bark and strew them into the fire, and then, suddenly silent, load her belongings into a carrying-frame and stagger out. The frame caught in the door: as she tore it through, the contents crashed, and a laugh rose in the house; but Earth-tongue sobbed long.
He was larger when he paddled with other children at the edge of the slough; but still very small as he first remembered himself seeing the great, stretching river that drew by with mysterious, swirling noises in its red eddies. He and his little brother were put into a huge pot which his father and another man pushed before them across stream: their hair as it coiled high on their heads was just visible over the edge as they swam. And then followed an interminable trudge somewhere through the dust, relieved only by rides on his father’s back, and on his grandmother.
He was older when he shot his first bow; when at dusk he caught a woodpecker in its hole and would not let go though it hacked desperately at his clasped hands, until a half-grown cousin took it from him to imprison under a turned jar for the night. His father wove a cage the next day, and the captive was installed, but remained wild, and one morning was dead. And then came the time when the boys of Mesquite-water challenged those of his settlement on a hot, summer day after the inundation had half dried, and they slung lumps of mud at each other from the ends of long willow poles.
There were other events that must have fallen soon after this period, but which he did not remember: when he rolled his hair into long, slim cylinders, began to measure how nearly it reached his hip, and made his first advances to girls.
Even before this he had dreamed of Mastamho, gigantic on the peak Avikwa’me in the great, dark, round house full of peoples; of the two Ravens singing of dust whirls and war and of the far away clumps of cane waiting to be cut into flutes; and of the river, drawn from its source to wash away the ashes and bones of Matavilya where the pinnacles stand in the gorge at House-post-water. He knew later that he had dreamed these things as a little boy, even while he was still in his mother; he did not yet think about them, except when the old man his grandfather, and his father and uncles, sang of them.
One day a runner came up the valley and shouted pantingly that strangers had appeared from the east at dawn and killed a woman and two children at Sand-back, besides wounding a man and his younger brother. The men leaped for their weapons; the women called in their children, loaded themselves with property, and soon began to track northward in a straggling, excited stream. Earth-tongue pulled down his bow and raked among the roof thatch for such arrows as he could assemble. Then he joined his kinsmen and male neighbors who stood in a group in front of one of the shades, exclaiming and pointing at a smoke that rose down the valley. Bundles of crude, blunt arrows projected behind their hips, shoved under cord belts; and many had clubs dangling from their wrists. Earth-tongue did not own a club: he had never seen battle; and he hung about the outside of the cluster of seasoned men.
Soon, refugees from the nearer settlements began to arrive; and then a body of fighting men from up the valley, bedaubed for war. Earth-tongue’s kinsmen merged with them; and as they proceeded south, growing in numbers, they met ever more women and children, and finally those from the point of attack, until, not far away in the cotton-woods, they came upon the men of Sand-back. The enemy were Halchidhoma from far down-stream, they were now informed, not Walapai as at first conjectured. They had avoided the river, traversing the desert to hide in the Walapai mountains and descend at night upon the nearer tip of the Mohave land. They had long since gone off—sixty they were said to number, as they were seen to file over the rocks far above the stream at Pinnacles. They had looted and burnt only the group of houses at Sand-back, killed the woman, and lightly wounded with an arrow one of the men who fought back from a distance: the other reported casualties turned up safe. But the enemy had carried off the woman’s head, and would dance about its skin. Earth-tongue gazed at the collapsed houses, their charred posts smoking on the mass of sand; and that night he watched the beheaded woman’s cremation. There was much talk of retaliation, but an immediate attack would have found the Halchidhoma prepared or perhaps removed.
So some months elapsed without a move being made; and meanwhile Earth-tongue became married. In the turmoil of the Halchidhoma invasion, as party after party trooped by, he had been attracted by the sight of a girl, barely but definitely passed out of childhood, and only a little younger than himself, who halted, leaning under her laden carrying-frame, behind her mother, as their group paused for an excited colloquy. He saw that the girl noted his eyes on her and glanced away, and he knew, from the people she was with, that her name was Kata. Not long after, he began to find errands or companions that took him to her settlement. Soon a mutual familiarity of each other’s presence was established, the purport of which was manifest even though direct speech between the two young people was infrequent and brief. Both were shy; until one afternoon a blind old man, the girl’s father’s uncle, who knew of Earth-tongue’s repeated presence from the references of the family, addressed him and her directly. “Why do you not marry?” he said. “Persons do not live long. Soon you will be old like myself, unable to please yourselves. It is good that you sleep and play together. You, young man, should stay here the night.” Neither Earth-tongue nor the girl answered. But he remained through the evening meal and after; and when the house was dark, went silently to where she lay. The next day, he stayed on; the day after, returned briefly to his home; and from then on, spent increasing time at his new abode, where, without a word having been spoken, he slipped into a more and more recognized status. He did not work, unless special occasion called, such as assisting with a seine-net; and Kata only occasionally helped her relatives farm. Instead, they spent much time together, lolling under the shade, toying or teasing each other, or listening to their elders. Sometimes he sang softly as he lay by her, or she bent over him searching his head or untangling his clustered locks, or tried to draw the occasional hairs from his face with her teeth; and ever she laughed more freely. So the days followed one another.
When at last the Mohave were ready, it was announced that they would once for all destroy the Halchidhoma. The entire nation was to move and appropriate the enemy land. Soon they started, most of the men in advance, weaponed and unburdened save for gourds of maize meal at their hips; water they did not have to carry since they followed the river. Behind tramped the women, children, and old men, under loads. Foods, blankets of bark and rabbit fur, fish nets, metates, household property, and the most necessary pottery vessels were taken. The remainder of their belongings and stored provisions were buried or hidden away: every house in the valley stood empty.
For five days they walked. Then the men suddenly surrounded a group of settlements. These were the houses of the Kohuana, a far down-stream tribe, wasted by wars with their neighbors, until the pressed remnant had sought refuge half a day’s journey above the Halchidhoma to whom they were united, less by positive friendship than by common foes and parallel fortunes. For the Halchidhoma, too, remembered having once lived populously among the welter of tribes in the broad bottom lands below the mouth of the Gila. With the Kohuana the Mohave had no direct quarrel; and though they arrived armed and overpowering, they proclaimed themselves kinsmen, and announced that they had come as guests. By night the Kohuana houses overflowed with the mob of Mohave families. Kohuana messengers were dispatched to summon the Halchidhoma to battle at White-spread-rock-place, if they were not afraid. Such challenge the outnumbered people could not find it in their manhood to evade. So the next day saw them in line at the appointed field, barely a hundred strong, against perhaps four hundred that the Mohave mustered after setting a guard over their families.
Earth-tongue went into battle with much inward excitement, but little fear, and listened obediently to the admonitions of his seasoned kinsmen. Even before arrows could reach, the shooting began. Before long, arrows flew feebly by, and then it became necessary to twist sharply sidewise to avoid them. At this distance the two lines shot at each other, taunting and leaping, while, in the rear, half-grown boys and a few old men helped to gather up and replenish bundles of arrows. What the Halchidhoma lacked in frequency of shots, they partly made up in greater openness of target; and before long, struck men began to withdraw temporarily on each side. The Mohave could have made short work by charging in a body with their clubs; but they had asked for an open stand-up fight, and besides found pleasure in the game, which fell increasingly to their advantage. For hours they sweated in the sun, gradually and irregularly forcing the Halchidhoma line back, and shouting whenever one of the foe was carried off.
At last the leaders called that it was time to cease, and defied the foe to resume in the same spot on the fourth day. Then they trooped victoriously home, without a fatality, though a few, weakened from bleeding or with parts of shafts broken off in them, were carried on the backs of companions. Earth-tongue had been struck twice. One arrow had grazed the skin of his flank when he became over-confident and failed to bend his body with sudden enough vigor. Then, one of three shafts that came toward him almost at once had imbedded itself a finger-joint’s depth in the front of his thigh, and hung there until he hastily plucked it out. Neither wound bled profusely, especially after a bit of charcoal was reached him to rub in for stanching; and he returned stiff, tired, and proud. The Halchidhoma losses were severer. None of them appeared to have fallen dead on the field; but at least half had been struck, and a number so vitally or often that they would die.
For four days the Mohave treated their wounds, talked of the next battle, and ate their hosts’ provisions. Then they set out. But the Halchidhoma had sent their families down-stream and taken up a new stand farther back. Here they joined once more, and the fight went on as before but with ever more preponderance to the Mohave, until these, wearied by the noon sun, contemptuously drew off to the river to drink. The Halchidhoma seized the occasion to run to their children and women, set these across the river, and strike east over the desert. When the victors reappeared, the fugitives were far. The Mohave thereupon decided to occupy their fields and houses until the dispossessed might come to drive them out; which the latter, by this time safely received among the Maricopa far across the desert on the Gila, had no intention of doing. However, the Mohave lived nearly a year in the land of the Halchidhoma, adjusting themselves as they could; and returned only as the next flood and planting time approached, taking the Kohuana along to settle among themselves, where these enforced visitors remained for some years.
Before the stay in the Halchidhoma country was over, Earth-tongue and Kata had drifted apart. The derangement of accustomed residence, enforced with others, Earth-tongue’s pride as an incipient warrior, the fact that no child was born, all contributed to separate them increasingly. Each formed new interests while vaguely jealous of the other’s; and in the end Earth-tongue brought not Kata but another girl to his parents’ house.
Soon after his first child was born,—a daughter, called Owich like the sisters of himself, his father, and his father’s father,—Earth-tongue grew restless for adventure, and, the time being one of peace, joined himself to those that would travel. Ten or twenty in number, they would go out: too few to excite apprehension of treacherous intent, too many to be made away with safely. Each carried maize, water, his weapons, and whatever he might wish to trade. On shorter journeys they prided themselves on being able to travel at a trot four days without food, and with only such drink as the desert might afford, chewing perhaps a bit of willow as a relief for the dryness of their mouths. But these hardships they underwent mostly in emulation, or toward the last of a return with Mohave land before them. Again and again Earth-tongue went down the river, through Yuma, Kamia, Halyikwamai, and Cocopa settlements, to the flat shores of the salt sea; east into the Walapai mountains and down into the chasm of the Havasupai, where he saw strange-speaking and strangely dressed Hopi and Navaho, heard of their stone towns, and brought home their belts and, once, a blanket of white cotton.
To the northwest he visited the Chemehuevi and other Paiutes about their scattered springs, and ate their foods of seeds and wild fruits, some familiar, some strange; and mescal and sometimes deer. Theirs was a strange language too, but he had heard a little from the few Chemehuevi who lived at the northern extreme of Mohave valley and beyond it on Cotton-wood island; and many of his companions could speak more. They went from Paiute band to band, to where the river no longer flows from the north but from the east, beyond the Muddy, and found each group like the last in customs, but of new foods. They listened to the stories of the Paiute, who dreamed of the mountain Nüvant as the Mohave do of Avikwa’me, and to whom they sang their songs, which the Paiute wished to hear.
To the west were many tribes, all different tongued, but mostly easy to understand a little when one knew Chemehuevi. There were the Vanyume on their river that dried into nothing and left them always half-starved; the Hanyuvecha in the range of great pines beyond; northward, about Three-Mountains, the Kuvahye, adjoined by other mountaineers, little tribes, unwarlike, friendly to the visitors, some of whom they hailed as old friends. They offered no smoke, but gave tobacco crushed in a mortar with shells; which Earth-tongue and his companions ate in courtesy, and were nearly all made to sweat and vomit violently thereby. From a crest near here they looked over a vast plain beyond, in which shimmered what one of his companions said were large lakes. He had been there and seen the people, who lived in long houses of rushes,—a hundred fires in line within one house,—and ate rush roots, and slept on rushes, and at night worms came up and troubled the sleepers. And in the tumbled range on which they stood, but beyond them, were the Like-Mohave, a very little like them in speech, but naked, unkempt, and poor. Them Earth-tongue saw, but not in their own houses.
And going out again, he traversed the land of the tribes to the southwest, unfriendly, half-sullen, and dangerous to small parties. The Hakwicha dug wells and ate mesquite; beyond them were people in the mountains, about hot springs, who sang to turtle shells instead of gourds; and still farther, stretching down to the ocean that one could see from their peaks, lived the Foreign-Kamia, speaking almost like the real Kamia, but knowing nothing of farmed foods, eating rattle-snakes, and a hostile lot to venture among. They had some grudges to pay off to the Mohave for plundered settlements, but were not a people to travel far from their homes even for revenge.
The Yavapai, too, Earth-tongue came to know, though theirs was not an attractive country to visit. They dreamed and sang like the Mohave, but of other animals; and some of their stories were the same. Their neighbors and friends were the Roaming-Yavapai, a small-statured, sharp-eyed people, wearing their hair flowing, fierce lance fighters, taciturn, violent, untrustworthy; but inclined favorably to the Mohave in spite of the utter unintelligibility of their speech because they knew them through the Yavapai as traditionally hostile, like themselves, against the Maricopa and that people of innumerable houses, the Pima. These last Earth-tongue never came to know save on the field of battle.
One early summer, as the river was flooding, its rise suddenly stopped. The inundation being wont to grow in interrupted stages the people waited quietly for its resumption. But the water fell back and back. Then some began to declare that it might not rise again, and advised planting at once before the moist ground should dry: but others pointed out that high water was yet due, and had often come late, and that present planting in that case would cause the seed to wash out and be lost. So nearly all waited with concern and much discussing; until finally the river was wholly back within its banks and dropping decisively. Then they knew that nothing more was to be hoped for that season, and men and women hastened to save what they might of the crop. But many of the fields had remained untouched by water, and most of the others were already half dry. In some, the maize and beans never sprouted; in some they came up indeed, but soon wilted; and though the women carried water in jars, only small patches could be effectively served in this hand fashion.
Soon, every one knew that famine impended, and that so few houses would grow even enough harvest for another seeding, that the year after would also be hard to survive. They gathered every wisp of wild seed plants in the uncultivated bottoms; but these wild seeds, too, had come up thin, and the crop of mesquite pods was pitiful. The women labored faithfully, and the children watched over the scattered maize; yet though the grain ripened, the scattered stalks were too few to keep any house through the winter. Some families did not pick even an ear. A moon after harvest time, the crop was consumed; by winter, the last of the other stores. The men fished daily, but the sloughs and ponds had never filled and were soon seined out, and the river’s yield was uncertain and far insufficient. Every one was gaunt; the children lay listlessly about; sickness grew.
Earth-tongue’s wife, and his older brother’s, had planted with his mother in his father’s ancestral field, which lay low and was long-proved rich. So they fared better than many. Nevertheless, before spring the emaciated bodies of two children and an old woman had been burnt and Earth-tongue had three times sung himself hoarse as they lay dying.
The young men went out with their bows, and now and then returned with a bird or gopher or badger, but oftener empty-handed. People who had new belongings went to the Walapai to trade for mescal and deer meat. Whole families trudged to visit the Chemehuevi, until they brought back word that these hosts too were eaten out. At last not a day passed without columns of smoke from pyres visible somewhere in the valley. It was a terrible year and long remembered before the end of another summer brought partial abatement.
So numerous had been the deaths from bowel flux and cough, that shaman after shaman fell a victim to the anger of the kin of those he had attempted to save. Yellow-thigh, a powerful man and not very old, had lost two patients during the famine, and three more at intervals since. Mutterings were frequent; but no one had found opportunity, or dared, to work vengeance on him. One morning, Earth-tongue and a friend, sauntering up valley on some errand, turned to a house before which Yellow-thigh lay, for those there were kinsmen of his. No men were about; and as the two visitors stood in the door, his friend on sudden impulse whispered to Earth-tongue, “Let us kill him.” So they sat down for a little and passed the news of the day, then arose, Earth-tongue reaching for his bow and four cross-pointed arrows, with the remark that they were going to shoot doves. The shaman grunted assent and the pair passed out.
For a time they traversed the brush, planning the deed. At the mesa edge they broke two stones to sharp edges, and then returned. Yellow-thigh lay under the shade-roof with closed eyes, breathing regularly. The friend went by him to look into the house, and finding it empty, nodded. Earth-tongue, who had approached, bent suddenly down and struck with all his might at the sleeper’s head. The shaman pushed himself to a sitting position as the blood began to pour from the mangled side of his face. The friend started back, then plunged forward to finish the man, and swung; but his excited arm brought the weapon down only on the victim’s knee. Then he staggered off, scarcely able in fright and emotion to drag his own legs. Earth-tongue, seeing the shaman still sitting, strode forward again and with both hands drove the point of the stone through the top of his skull. Two women who had been going through each other’s hair in the shadow of the brush fence outside, half turned at the noise and shrieked, while Earth-tongue dashed after his companion, seized his hand, and dragged him forward. They ran through the willows and at last lay down to pant in hiding; and here, after they had quieted, Earth-tongue laughed at his friend’s faltering stroke and steps. Then they went on, still keeping to cover, until around the second bend they swam the river.
On the other side, old men were gaming with poles and hoop, and others watched. The two sat down and looked on. Three times, four times, until it was early afternoon, the players bet and threw their poles and one or the other finally took up the stakes. Then Earth-tongue said, “I have killed a shaman, the large man at Sloping-gravel.”
“Yes, kill him,” answered one of the old men, thinking he was boasting of an empty intent; and a spectator added, “Indeed, it would be well. Too many persons are dying.”
“I have killed him,” Earth-tongue said again, and they began to believe him. So they went to the houses. Soon word came that the shaman was dead; and then his kinsmen arrived, angry and threatening, and accusations flew back and forth, while Earth-tongue stood unmoved and silent but wary. The kinsmen finally challenged to a stick fight the next day, and withdrew to burn the dead man.
The people of the settlement commended Earth-tongue and promised to engage for him; and in the morning they and all his kin and the kin of those whom the shaman had brought to their death, gathered in the center of a large playing field. Each man carried a willow as thick as his forearm and reaching to his neck; and in his left hand, a shorter parrying stick. The challengers appeared, somewhat fewer in number and with tear-marked faces, but enraging their opponents by crying the names of their dead parents and grandparents. Then the two bodies, spreading into irregular lines, rushed at each other. Each man swung at an antagonist’s head, now with his staff held in one hand, now in both. Blows beat down on heads through the guard, rained on shoulders, bruised knuckles, and the willows clashed amid the shouts. Now and then a staff broke and a contestant ran back to seize a new one. The fighters sweated, panted, rubbed blood out of their eyes and staggered forward and back as the lines swayed in the clamor. Once or twice a maddened fighter, running in under his opponent’s strokes, seized his hair to belabor him with his parry-club; whereupon shouts of “Bad, bad! no! no! release!” arose and a multitude of rescuers’ blows drove him back. The shaman’s side were getting the worst of it, but rallied again and again without being driven wholly to their end of the field. Strokes became fewer and feebler. Weary arms could no longer rise. Fighter after fighter leaned on his stick, or sat on the ground in the rear. Each side taunted the other to come on again; and at last they drew apart, every man panting, bruised, and weary, but satisfied at the damage he had inflicted. No heads had been broken and no one died, though some were sick for a few days from maggots that had bred in the scalp under their clotted hair; and then talk died down and the enmity gradually subsided. Earth-tongue won the praise of all the Mohave who were not directly involved.
Once, runners came from the Yuma to invite to an attack on the Cocopa at the mouth of the river. A hundred and twenty Mohave went down. The kohota or play-chief of the northern Mohave asked for captives, although he already had several; and Earth-tongue was one of the men whom he requested to carry food and water for the prisoner’s return journey, and to guard against their escape.
The Yuma contingent was even larger than the Mohave one; and the attack was made at daybreak. It was not much of a fight. The first house entered gave the alarm and the settlement scattered amid yells. Only two Cocopa were killed by the Yuma and two young women, sisters, called Night-hawk, captured by the Mohave. The latter stayed with the Yuma four days to watch the scalp dance; but no one of them having touched the corpses, they were not in need of purification, and returned home.
The whole tribe came out to escort them to the kohota’s house. There the captives were made to sit down, while the kohota stood up and sang Pleiades. Then men and women, facing each other, danced. When the sun was at its height, they stopped, ate what the kohota’s women brought out, then lay in the shade or gambled. In the afternoon the kohota called out a Chutaha singer. Soon the sounding jar began to boom, the people left off their play, and danced: three rows of young men with feathers tied in their hair, one row of old men, and two women standing separate. Then at last, as the sun was coming low, the chief came with rattles in his hand and at the end of a song shouted: “Let him sing who wishes to! Let any woman sing! I appoint no one!” Women grasped the rattles and carried them, one to a Tumanpa singer, others to those who knew Vinimulya and Vinimulya-hapacha; and one was brought to Earth-tongue to sing Raven. Soon all four of the dance series were in progress at different places, while those women who liked Nyohaiva, having persuaded an old man to sing that, began to revolve about him standing shoulder to shoulder. As fast as one song ended, the singers took up another, for the sun had nearly set, and the sweating women clamored for more, while the crowd of people stood about.
With darkness they stopped to bathe and eat and rest, then danced again, singing as before and new kinds too, while off on the side, by the light of a fire, groups of men played hiding game to the Tudhulva songs through the night. In the morning the kohota had the assemblage bathe, fed them once more, and sent them home to return two days later.
This time they danced again all evening, all afternoon, and all night. As the sun rose, the kohota, still singing, took the two captives one by each hand, and walked toward the river. Behind him came the Tumanpa and Vinimulya singers, each with his crowd, and then the mass of people in procession. The kohota, still holding the two girls, ran over the bank, and every one followed. This made Mohaves of the captives, and people were no longer afraid of them. The kohota led them back to his house, where they were to live, and said, “Perhaps these girls will marry and bear children, who, belonging to both tribes, will make peace when they grow up, and there will be no more war.” So it came in part. After two years, one of the sisters married, and soon had a child. The other continued without husband. In time, formal peace was made between the Yuma and Cocopa; whereupon the kohota announced, “Since the tribes are friends now, let us not keep Night-hawk longer.” So a party led her to the Yuma, where her kinsmen met and escorted her home. Her sister remained with her Mohave husband.
Earth-tongue was beginning to grow old. His oldest son and one daughter both had children, and his hair showed first streaks of gray. He thought more of his youth, and commenced to remember what he had dreamed then. He knew he had seen Matavilya sick and gradually dying and burned, and his ashes washed away by the river that Mastamho made to flow out of the ground. He remembered too Mastamho’s house on Avikwa’me, with the multitudes inside it in rows like little children, and Mastamho instructing them; and how he repeated after him, correctly, until Mastamho said to him, “That is right! You know it! You have it! I gave it to you!” Then he had dreamed how Sky-rattle-snake was at last inveigled from his house far in the south ocean, and his head cut off on Avikwa’me. Earth-tongue saw his joints and blood and sweat and juices turn into eggs. From these eggs hatched Rattlesnake, Spider, Scorpion, and Yellow-ant, who went off to Three-Mountains and remote places, deep in the earth or high in the sky, and from there built four roads to all tribes. When they wish a man for a friend, they bite him and take his shadow home with them. “But another road leads from their house to my heart,” Earth-tongue would say, “and I know what they do. And I intercept the shadow before Rattlesnake has led it wholly to Three-Mountains, and sing it back; I break the roads of spittle that Spider has begun to wind four times around the man’s heart; and so he lives again.”
Then Earth-tongue commenced to be sent for when people were bitten—first his relatives, then others. He would stand up at once and sing to bring a cooling wind; and, reaching the sick person, sing over him from the north, west, south, and east, but not a fifth time, lest he die. Then, sending every one away but a wife or mother, and forbidding all drink, he would sit by the patient all night, singing his four songs from time to time. In the morning the sick person used to get up well.
Fighting interrupted these pursuits. It was a summons again from the Yuma, this time against the Maricopa; and two hundred of the Mohave responded. The seventh night they were on Maricopa soil and met eighty Yuma by appointment; and in the morning advanced to attack. But the Maricopa had got wind of their presence, and when the fight opened were reënforced by a vast number of the Pima. The Mohave and Yuma exhorted one another, and though man after man fell, gave ground slowly, fighting back outnumbered.
At last the enemy ran all in a body against them. Part of the Mohave broke before the shock and fled to the north, ultimately escaping. But sixty of them formed with the Yuma on a little knoll near the Gila, where they stood in a dense mass. As the Pima and Maricopa dashed against them, they dragged man after man struggling into their midst, where he was dispatched with fierce club blows on his head or thrusts into his face. Twice, Earth-tongue leaped out to grasp an opponent and fling him over his back, thus protecting his own skull, while his companions beat the struggling foe to death. The fighting grew wilder. The Pima no longer drew back to shoot but swirled incessantly around and into the dwindling cluster at bay. At last the shouts ceased; the dust began to settle; and all but two of the Yuma, and every man of the sixty Mohave, lay with crushed head or mangled body on foreign earth.
A. L. KROEBER
The Chief Singer of the Tepecano
There was unusual activity around the house of Don Pancho, a little thatch-roof hut of oval shape, possibly fifteen feet by eight. Two large posts supported a framework of poles on which was laid a gabled thatching of grass. Only toward the center of the house could one stand upright, and a strong push would have sent tumbling outside, the stones heaped in a wall without the use of mortar or mud, which filled the space between the eaves and the bare ground.
The unwonted stir in the house of Don Pancho did not betoken any epoch-making occurrence even in the uneventful history of the little village of Azqueltán which sheltered the remnants of the Tepecano tribe. It was merely that Don Pancho was awaiting the birth of his child. And so the women of the immediate neighborhood gathered inside the hut while the men conversed in low tones without. Francisco alone passed freely in and out. At last, after a longer pause within, he slipped quietly out of the door.
“Gracias a Dios! It is a son,” he said quietly and produced from somewhere a bottle of sotol[8] bought on his last journey to the nearest “civilized” village against this very event. The men crowded around him and drank heartily to the health of the newcomer. With true politeness they congratulated the father and then slipped away into the darkness toward their own little hovels. Only the squalling of the infant broke upon the stillness of the mountain air.
Again an air of unusual activity pervaded the village. Word had come that the cura from the neighboring town would arrive that day to say mass. The church and the adjoining curato had been opened and aired, the dirt swept from the floor and the dust from the crude figures of the crucifixion. For the little church was the pride of Azqueltán. A generation ago it had been built of adobe brick and stone quarried by civilized artisans, and its white front faced the torrid rays of the sun as valiantly as it did the sulphurous flames of hell. The little courtyard, too, shone with a freshly-swept air, not a blade of grass nor a speck of green marring its smooth surface.
At last sharp eyes detected a cavalcade slowly descending the tortuous path. Hastily Francisco climbed the shaking ladder to the roof of the church and seized the clapper. Well did he realize the importance of his office as mayor-domo of the church! And never while _he_ lived would the Sr. Cura arrive without proper greeting! One of the several bells was still uncracked, and to it Francisco devoted particular attention. The bells held a place hardly second to the church itself in Don Pancho’s affections, for had they not been imported at enormous expense from that far away capital, the City of Mexico? A final clang and Francisco hastened down the quaking ladder to be the first to kneel before the jocund padre and kiss his hand. Roused by the pealing of the bells the inhabitants of the little valley began to wander in. Reverently they entered the church, kneeling on the brick floor, the men and women on opposite sides, while mass was said.
The service finished, the Aguilars, Francisco and Julia, his wife, stood up, bearing the child. Beside them stood Juan Márquez and his wife, as godfather and godmother. A few drops of water resented, a few ritual words, and Mother Church had gathered another soul to her bosom. José María was the name the cura entered in his record.
But had these intervening weeks been entirely uneventful in the life of little José or Pepe, as he was familiarly called? By no means! Francisco was too conscientious a man to take any chances with his son’s welfare. For centuries before the padres had told them of God and Christ, the forefathers had worshiped Father Sun, Mother Moon and Elder Brother Morning Star. In fact it was quite obvious that God _was_ the Sun, the Virgin María the Moon and Jesus the Morning Star. For did not the beautiful picture of the Virgin of Guadalupe hanging in the church show her standing on the moon? The two religions could not be antagonistic, but merely supplementary, thought Francisco, as far as he thought on the subject at all. Nevertheless, there was no use arguing with the cura about it, for he would not understand. And so, immediately after the birth of little Pepe, Francisco made four prayer sticks with little squares of colored yarn attached, and went and deposited them at secret altars on the hills to east, north, west and south, breathing a prayer at each place for the health and fortune of his child.
Little José grew up to boyhood, his status in the world a rather anomalous one—a little lower than the half-blood Mexican peon on the rolling country to the south, a little above the pagan Huichol in the mountains, yet despised by both. Yet that worried him little. For was he not surrounded by loving parents and friends and a not ungenerous nature? To north and south stretched the canyon or barranca of the Bolaños, a great rent in the earth’s crust, carved out through countless ages by the little silvery rivulet hiding in its bottom. Hardly more than a brook in the dry season, it swelled to an impassable, turbulent torrent during the rains. On either side rose the steep sides of the barranca, those to the east leading to the rolling, flat country populated by the “neighbors,” the Mexicans, while to the west the mountains rose higher and higher to form the great Sierra Madre range in which lived the pagan Huichol and Cora Indians. Occasionally small groups of Huichol passed by or through the village on their way to or from their mountain homes, and José peeked at them from behind the shelter of his mother’s skirts, and wondered at their strange dress with many little woven bags around the waist, their queer hats, their bows and arrows.
“When I was your age,” said old Nestor, his grandfather, “we all dressed as they do now. Then our wives wove us blankets and we made clothes of deer hide. But Ave María! Now we must dress in white cotton blouses and trousers and look like Mexicans!”
José never tired of hearing Nestor tell of the glories of the days gone by, when the Tepecanos were a powerful people and held a great stretch of territory. But wars and pestilence had done their worst and the tribe had gradually withdrawn to the great barranca where José was born. And even there the Mexicans were gradually encroaching. Some married into the tribe, while the more unscrupulous boldly appropriated the ancestral lands and recorded the first titles.
José’s earliest impressions, of course, were those of home, to him a wonderful place, and his parents most remarkable people, omniscient beyond a doubt! Surely there was nothing in the world they did not know or could not do! His mother in particular was the busiest person. As the first rays of the sun dimmed the morning star, she arose and put wood on the fire which had been smoldering all night under the pot of beans and under the comal or griddle, and by the time the rest of the family were well awake the little, round, flat tortillas were toasting. These little toasted cakes of thin, unleavened corn dough were the staple food, not only of the Tepecano, but of millions of Mexicans of the peon class. Torn in half and used as a scoop to carry a mess of brown beans and chili sauce to the mouth—ah! Who could ask for anything more savory? Surely not little José. But what a drudgery it meant to his mother! Not that she considered it drudgery—she knew of nothing else, and it was the lot of every woman.
And so Señora Aguilar bent all day—or most of it—over the stone metate grinding the softened, boiled corn into dough. The corn itself, the typical Indian corn with yellow ears, black ears, red ears and ears of all these colors, lay husked in a corner of the house. Every day a few ears would be taken, shelled and put to simmer in a pot with a pinch of lime to soften it. Then it had to be ground on the metate with a stone grinder, patted into shape and toasted on the griddle. At almost any hour of the day could be heard in the hut the sound of the muller grating against the metate, or the sharp “pat, pat” on the cake. When night came at last, a mass of dough was always ready to be prepared for breakfast.
So José watched his busy mother and wondered why she took no time to play with him. Several times a day she took the great water jar on her shoulder and walked slowly with him down the long, winding trail to the little brook which supplied the household—yes, several households—with water. Occasionally, too, they bathed in the clear waters—in the summer. But even then the water was cool and soap expensive, so baths were infrequent. And then the water was full of wonderful animals known as chanes. No one could see them, of course, except in rainy weather, when they appeared as great arcs or bows in the sky, striped with colors, head in one spring and tail in another, as they visited. But ordinarily they were invisible, though their forms were well known. They had the bodies of serpents with horns like cattle. They were to be treated reverently, as they had the power of sickening all who disregarded them.
“Never drink directly from the spring, Pepe,” his mother warned him, “or the chan will enter and sting you. Dash the water into your mouth as your father does.”
Although corn cakes and beans supplied the major part of their dietary, there were other foods, in season and on a smaller scale, other crops, tobacco, chili-peppers and squash. Squashes did not keep like corn or beans, unless they were cut into long strips and dried. More often the squashes were eaten fresh, at harvest time. A hole was dug in the ground and lined with stones and in this a fire was lighted until the stones were hot. Then the fire was removed and replaced with squashes, and the whole covered and allowed to remain all night. In the morning the squashes were perfectly baked and delicious. But the best part of the squash was the seeds which were toasted, cracked open and the kernels eaten. These were indeed excellent! Occasionally the juicy centre of a large cactus was cooked in the same way.
But with the advent of spring, that was the joyous time! It was the coming of the rains after the long dry season. The spring rains are the most vital factor in the life and economy of the natives of northern Mexico, and on them all interests settle. Then the parched land springs into verdure and the streams burst forth anew. Then the nopal, the “prickly pear” cactus, puts forth new green leaves which can be cleaned of their spines and boiled to an edible tenderness, and the blue and purple tunas appear on their leaves. Then the mesquite and vamuchile trees prepare to produce their fruit. But best of all, it is the time of the pitahaya, that luscious fruit of the organ cactus.
“The pitahayas are ripe! The pitahayas are ripe!” shouted and sang José with the other children, while their elders prepared to desert their villages and repair to the heights where the cacti grew most abundantly, there to gorge themselves until the season passed. All year long the great reed poles leaned against the thatched roofs of the houses, awaiting the joyous spring when they would be used to pick the pitahayas from their high branches.
Seldom it was that little Pepe tasted flesh of any kind. To be sure they kept a few chickens, but the Aguilars were too poor to eat many of them; they were sold to the itinerant trader to take to the larger civilized towns. Too, the dried corn which the chickens ate meant just that much less for the family. Nevertheless José knew and relished the taste of chicken and eggs. A few goats, sheep, pigs and turkeys were kept in the neighborhood, and occasionally the word was passed around that one was to be killed. The wealthier families purchased a few pounds, cut it into strips and hung it up to dry. For a few days, meat was added to the dietary of the Aguilar family. A very few cattle and horses were kept by the very opulent, but these were seldom killed. They represented rather the wealth of the owner and were sold to Mexican ranchmen. But when for one reason or another—generally by accident—one was killed, the word was noised abroad for many miles and, like buzzards, the population gathered to purchase or beg the meat.
“Ah, but it was different in the old days!” exclaimed old Nestor. “Then the country was full of game. Ave María! So many deer! And rabbits and raccoons, ducks and pigeons! But now the Gods are angry at us because we have neglected them and will send us no more deer.”
“Is it really the Gods who send the deer, little grandfather?” asked José.
“Surely,” replied the old man. “Are they not the pets of our Elder Brother, the Morning Star? When one wishes to hunt deer he must first fast seven days and then go to one of the sacred altars with a prayer stick and beads for payment and recite the old prayer begging Elder Brother to lend him some of his deer. Then he will be sure to shoot them. But he must not eat any of the first deer he kills, but must give it to the other people, and he must be sure to make candles of the fat and burn them. Of course we always used bow and arrows to shoot them, as they would be offended and leave the country if they were killed by other means.”
“How interesting!” murmured little Pepe. “And do the Gods keep other animals too, little grandfather?”
“Por Dios, no! The deer are their only pets. But the scorpions are the cattle of the Devil and one must also say a prayer and make a jícara[9] full of pinole[10] with beads in order to drive them away from one’s home. And then there are the great serpents which live in the mountains. One must also recite a prayer to get one of them.”
“Ave María!” ejaculated José. “Did you eat snakes too?”
“Only small ones,” laughed Nestor, “and iguanas. The large serpents we kept in the houses as protectors. They were brought home and instructed to hold any one who came to the house to rob, and to give the alarm by striking the ground with their tails. But they had to be fed bread every Thursday.” Here old Nestor smiled. “At least that’s what my grandfather told _me_. I never saw them myself!”
It was many years before little José journeyed from home. There he played with the stones and the household objects, his dog and cat and his pet quail, learning the manifold secrets of the world about him. There were other boys nearby with whom he played; they had their bows and arrows—weapons discarded by their elders long ago—and their toys and dear possessions like boys the world over. There were few household objects for them to break in play, only a few pots and gourds, and, like all Indians, the Tepecanos seldom or never punished their children, preferring that they should grow up loving and with their spirits unbroken. An occasional trip to the nearest Mexican village to purchase cloth or sugar, or to the house of a relation a few miles away was the extent of José’s travels. For sweets he had the honey which might be taken from the hollow logs raised on forked posts outside of the house.
Gradually José learned to help his parents and, by the time he was fourteen, he was able to do most of the tasks expected of young men. He accompanied his father Francisco on trips to the hills in search of natural products. The leaves of the agave were one of the most sought-after materials. These they carried home, stripped off the soft green exterior and put the strong interior fibers to dry. This was called ixti, and from it all kinds of cord and rope were made. Many hours José sat, twisting the wheel with which his father made rope. At other times he helped to make adobe bricks, mixing the mud to a proper consistency, pressing it into moulds and leaving it in the sun to dry. His father likewise taught him to weave strong sacks of ixti cord on a simple loom.
Some of his spare time, too, he devoted to that eternal Mexican pastime of hunting buried treasure. Of course he never found any, but the joy of the search was in itself and had he not heard countless tales of fabulous wealth found in caves where it had been hidden during a revolution? One could never tell!
By this time José was old enough to wear the typical costume of the men of the tribe. For a few years he had run naked, but not for long, and during the greater part of his boyhood had worn clothes of a nondescript character. But about the time of puberty, his mother made him a suit of white cotton cloth consisting of blouse and trousers. These were so much more comfortable than the tight trousers affected by the civilized Mexicans. Nevertheless, the laws of the nearby towns prohibited any one’s appearing in the streets in the flowing calzones, so in each Indian village was at least one pair of pantalones which were borrowed whenever any one wished to visit town. The trousers were upheld by a girdle of faja or wool, woven by his mother on a narrow loom with geometric designs in black and white. A little bag, woven of the same material, known as a costal, accompanied him wherever he went, for in this he carried all his little personal possessions and necessities, such as matches, tobacco and, at times, lunch, as well as the dozens of little knick-knacks dear to the heart of the boy. In the same way his forefathers carried their sticks to make fire, and his grandfathers their flint and steel. But in these enlightened days sulphur or wax matches were within the reach of even impecunious Mexican Indians, and José very early learned to smoke cigarettes made of locally grown tobacco rolled in corn husks. As likely as not he carried the “makin’s” on the broad brim of his sombrero, an immense peaked hat of the braided leaf of the agave. Sandals of rawhide completed his costume. The hat was extremely heavy, but it was the custom, so José wore it with pride. But his greatest pride was his machete, that great steel knife carried by every man, which served every imaginable purpose. No boy was ever half so proud of his first watch as was little José of his first machete.
José helped his father in the labor of the field. In the winter they made a clearing by cutting and burning down the trees and brush. This was not a great task, for the rocky and infertile hillsides produced few trees or bushes and the cacti and grass were easily destroyed. Then, after the first heavy rain of the summer, they went to their field, carrying the seed corn, beads and a jícara full of water in which corn meal had been mixed. They had already undergone a fast of five days and an ablutionary bath. It was indeed a very sacred and solemn occasion, for the success of the yield, if not the entire harvest, depended upon them. For was not Corn the daughter of Father Sun? So they reverently placed the beads in the center and four corners of the field, and sprinkled the pinole water to the cardinal points of the compass while Francisco, reverently facing the east, recited the ancient prayer, promising Father Sun that they would guard well his daughter and cherish her. Then they made little holes in the ground with sticks, dropped in the kernels and covered them over. But little attention was required until harvest time. Then the corn was gathered with great joy, but the twin stalks, the corn plants with forked stem and two ears known as the milpa cuata, were left standing until the end. Then father and son solemnly walked around the field as many times as there were stalks within it, and recited another prayer, begging permission of Father Sun to carry home his daughter and promising again to guard her well. These stalks, with the ears attached, were then gathered in a sheaf and fastened to the ridgepole of the house, or to a tree. And that evening Nestor told again the old story of how Father Sun sent his daughter Corn to earth to be of service to man and how she was wronged by her husband, Toloache,[11] who used her bounty to support his mistresses, Crow and Badger, so that at last she returned to her father.
“Therefore it is,” said old Nestor, “that we must pray hard for only a little corn in place of the plenty which would have been ours. But Toloache was punished by being fastened head downwards to the rock and being required to grant us whatever we may ask of him.”
At this story José smiled for he was of the sophisticated younger generation, and he looked upon it as a pretty fable, but old Nestor evidently believed it implicitly.
Practically all the efforts of the people were individual or family affairs. It was only on religious or ceremonial occasions that any communal interests were attempted. But one day at the height of the dry season his father said to José:
“Pepecito, to-morrow we are all going to fish in the river and you are old enough to go along.”
The following day found them trudging toward the little river, their costales filled with gordas—tortillas made thicker than usual so that they retained their softness during the day. As they neared the river they were joined by other parties bound in the same direction. All paths led to a deep hole in the river above a series of rapids where, it was suspected, the fish had all congregated. Here all hands set to work making a tapexte, a weir or mesh of reeds laid together closely in a plane and tied with cord. One of the long edges was weighted with stones so that it sank to the bottom, and thus the entire mat could be dragged up or down the stream, carrying the fish with it. An entire day was consumed in making the tapexte and at nightfall all returned to their homes, worn out with exertion. The next day—ah! That was a wonderful day! Sounds of shouting and splashing filled the air. Dark skins glistened and sparkled in the sun as the fishermen plunged into the deep holes and endeavored to seize in little hand-nets the fish which had been cornered by the great tapexte. And that night fish boiled merrily in the pots of many happy households.
José was of good physical type, of medium height and slim build. His hands and feet were small and well shaped, his features large but not coarse. His eye was dark and sparkling, his hair thick, straight, long and very black, his mustache, beard and body hair sparse. His forefathers used to pluck out their beards, considering that it made them look like the animal world, but he, like the younger generation, cut and shaved his as fashion dictated. His color was a dark brown. He was active, keen and bright when necessary, but inclined to slothfulness. After all, why _should_ he do to-day anything he could put off till to-morrow? An unpleasant task, if procrastinated, might settle itself; if a pleasant prospect, why not prolong the enjoyable anticipation? When life contains so little variety, why do everything to-day and have nothing to do to-morrow?
José liked to smoke, of course, but any luxury was too expensive for him to overdo it. And naturally he drank whenever he could get the various distillates of agave which sold in the neighboring villages as mescal, tequila and sotol. He drank to excess, for strong liquor gave him a surcease from monotony—it made him a different person in a different environment and he was glad to seek the change. Of course drunken brawls were frequent and machete wounds occasional, but they were forgiven shortly afterwards and forgotten.
Like all of his people, José was naturally cheerful and from a certain point of view, honest. He would probably have considered it highly commendable to steal anything from a Mexican or a Gringo stranger if he could escape undetected, but he couldn’t steal from friends. He was given to boasting—when the boast could not be checked up. Always cheerful, singing and happy, few things worried him. Although very emotional, like all Indians he considered it weak to betray emotion before others. His one outstanding quality was his politeness, and this was of the heart, not a mere outward display; he was always ready to be of assistance to the helpless, sympathetic to the unfortunate. He could hardly be called literate though he could, after intense and laborious cerebration, manage to spell out a message or write a note. What with this illiteracy, his tendency to procrastination, ignorance of all trades and indisposition to continued labor, he would have been a miserable failure in an industrial civilization, although in his native environment he was a valuable member of society.
One year during the dry season, after the harvest of corn was in, José accompanied several other young men of the tribe to a nearby mining town where labor was in demand, and here he experienced his first contact with “high” civilization. Here with pick and shovel he could earn half a peso a day—twenty-five cents. Even at that rate José could save enough to return to the little village in comparative affluence after a few months, for money of any kind was seldom seen there, practically all business being done by barter and one was indeed deeply in debt who owed his neighbor a peso! José’s native boss was easy-going and the men were not overworked, but the American foreman was a puzzle to José. Always on the go, he never sat down to rest. And such queer Spanish as he spoke—principally profanity! Then there were such wonderful and incomprehensible machines, there, which did the work of many men, run by steam and electricity: telephones, telegraphs, automobiles and countless other appliances.
But the most joyous days of José’s youth were those of the fiestas. Then the natives for miles around, both Indians and “neighbors,” gathered in the little pueblo. Ave Marìa! What an assemblage! All the pretty girls with their best petticoats of bright red flannel, their rebozos[12] covering their sleek, black hair, their bright black eyes sparkling with excitement and their white teeth shining. All the men with their white trousers and blouses freshly washed, their hats freshened up and their machetes polished. All roads led to the little village, most coming on foot, the more opulent on donkeys, mules or horses, for none owned wagons, nor could any wagon traverse the rocky trails. Open hospitality reigned everywhere. Relations who had not seen each other for months, compadres by the scores, old friends, new acquaintances, fell on each other’s necks and slapped each other on the back while the bottle of fiery sotol or tequila circulated freely.
Frequently the fiesta began with some communal work on the church, for the church was the center of all activity. Possibly a wall had to be erected and each one helped as he or she was able, the boys and women carrying single small stones, the men carrying frames on which many large stones were piled. An hour or so of combined labor and the wall was built. In the afternoon, sports were the order of the day. Of these the most popular was that of colando al toro, in which the wealthy young men endeavored, each on his pet horse, to ride past a bull, seize him by the tail and overthrow him. How José longed to be able to own a horse and gain the plaudits of the girls by his prowess!
“I might even,” thought he, “go to the great City of Mexico and learn to be a famous torero and be the idol of the entire Republic.”
At night there were cuetes exploded in honor of the day, which delighted José hugely, and dances to the music of the violin. All day and much of the night the celebration kept up. Little booths and tables were erected wherever vendors sold dainties, and the air was filled with the cries of the merchants.
“Sweet oranges! Four for a half-real!”[13]
“Melon seeds! Perfectly toasted!”
“Peanuts! Peanuts!”
“Sugar cane! The very sweetest!”
“Candies! Who wants them?”
Lucky was the boy who had a real to spend at the fiesta, for a goodly portion of anything would be sold at the standard price of a centavo.
Meanwhile, over in one corner, the men gathered around a Mexican from a nearby town who was running a gambling game with the cards, while his partner dispensed bottles of the agave brandy. Soon the inevitable vicious altercation would arise. To be sure it was limited to a violent flood of profanity and only reputation and dignity were injured, but the women shrank away while drunken cries filled the air. A few cool heads interfered before any irreparable damage was done, but it was not always thus, as a rude cross or two in the neighborhood of the pueblo, marking a place where a soul had come to a violent end, mutely attest.
It was the Christmas season that was particularly celebrated at Azqueltán, for then the old pageant of “Los Pastores” was performed. For weeks before, the performers, all prominent men of the village, were engaged in making their costumes of long, white dresses and their staffs decorated with colored tinsel and tissue paper. The words and music had been handed down from the days of the first Spanish missionaries, and depicted the adventures of a group of shepherds journeying to the nativity. José’s father, Francisco, played the part of the hermit with a crude mask of wood and an immense rosary of wooden beads. It was José’s ambition to take the part of Satan, who attempted to prevent the pilgrimage.
“José,” said Francisco one day, “it is high time you were married. You are eighteen now and most of the boys of your age are married already. I cannot afford to support you any longer and you must set up for yourself. I’ve been hearing a great deal about your affairs with several girls—yes, and with some of our married women too! And it will have to cease.”
Here Don Pancho chuckled to himself, for he had a great deal of pride in his handsome son and enjoyed the gossip of his amours. José had learned to be a fair performer on the fiddle and the guitar, and would sit by night with a few other free lances of his own age under the eaves of some straw hut watching the stars come out in the beautiful crisp, evening air and singing melancholy love songs. Most of the girls succumbed to his advances at once, but there was one who rejected them with affected scorn and she, of course, was the one he most desired. Consequently he began to hedge at his father’s suggestion.
“But, little father,” said he, “I don’t want to get married yet,—possibly I never will!”
“What nonsense!” exploded Francisco. “It’s all right for Gringos to be bachelors; they can hire women to do their work; they can eat in tiendas. But you! Who’ll make your tortillas? Who’ll make your clothes? Don’t be a fool!”
José knew it was up to him to get a wife, but he wished a little more time to press his suit with Josefa, the much-to-be-desired daughter of Cándido Gonzales. “Give me another month, little father,” he asked, and Francisco agreed.
So José sought out his grandfather, old Nestor. Bashfully he hesitated and “stalled” until at last the sly old man suspected the truth.
“Come, come!” he ejaculated. “Speak out! What is it, a girl?” José presented his case. The old man swelled up with pride.
“Ah! Of a truth you have come to the right man! You knew your old grandfather was the one to aid you! There is now only one other man in the tribe who knows how to gain the love of a girl! A week from to-night at midnight will be the time. We must both fast for five days before, in order to appease the Gods and María Santísima. Get me a piece of the girl’s clothing and I’ll find the other things.”
José didn’t relish the idea of a fast, for he was of the younger generation and took little stock in the superstitions, as he considered them, of the elders. Nevertheless he was now in trouble and, with the natural faith of the helpless man, willing to try anything. So he endured the fast without a whimper and surreptitiously visited the girl’s house while she was fetching water from the spring and stole a small article of clothing.
When at last the night came, the old man was in a queer mood of neurotic enthusiasm and excitement, combined with sober dignity in contemplation of his important office.
“Have you the clothing?” he asked eagerly. José handed it to him.
“And now a piece of your own clothing!” A short search brought to light a discarded bit which would serve the purpose.
Carefully the old man made a doll of the clothes of each, one to represent the boy, the other the girl. Then he produced flowers of five narcotic plants which he had spent the day in seeking—güizache, palo mulato, garambullo, rosa maría and toloache—and with these he decorated the boy doll. When the stars indicated the hour of midnight, a candle was lighted and the figures were placed in a large bowl of water, floating. José watched with bated breath. Not that he put much faith in the outcome, but the spell of the magic, the stillness of the night and the temper of the old man, who by this time had practically reached a state of self-hypnosis, had a profound effect. Reverently, and in a low, tense voice the old man recited the ancient prayer begging of the Intoxicated Woman and the Flower Man, that the desired one should be brought to her lover. After this he produced his musical bow and, placing a bowl upside down on the ground, held the bow on it with his foot. Striking the string with two small sticks so that it gave a sonorous twang, he began to sing the old song appropriate for the occasion. Five times he sang it, and then jumped up and walked around the bowl with the floating figures, five times. The charm was then complete. Eagerly he looked into the bowl and found that the two figures had floated together. With a delighted air he turned to José, restraining his high-pitched emotion.
“It is well,” he said simply. “The Gods and María Santísima have answered your prayer.” José felt relieved, for, although at heart he doubted the efficacy of the charm, the old man’s emotion had a considerable effect upon him. So it was with greater self-confidence that in the morning he renewed both his meals and his assaults on the heart of the delectable Josefa, until he felt that he might confidently put the matter to the test.
“Father,” said he the following day, “will you speak to Cándido Gonzales about Josefa for me?” His father chuckled.
“So that’s the way the wind blows! I guess we can settle the matter. It would be silly of Don Cándido to refuse such a promising son-in-law!”
There were many things to be arranged and the matter of the marriage of one’s children was too important an affair to be lightly settled, so old Francisco and Cándido had many long conferences. They debated the matter from every possible point of view and then all over again from the beginning. But even matters of greater pith and moment must eventually be squeezed dry, and at last the time arrived when neither the fertile Don Pancho nor the equally fertile Don Cándido could conceive of another topic of discussion, so they considered the matter formally arranged. The young people would await the next visit of the cura and then be married.
But right there old Nestor interposed a furious objection. Here he was, the Cantador Mayor, the Chief Singer or high priest of the old religion, the keeper of the old customs, doing his best to preserve the tribe from dissolution and destruction because of the anger of the old Gods. The young generation were deserting the Gods and the practices of their forefathers. They no longer attended the old ceremonies, prayed and sacrificed to the Gods, fasted or made prayer sticks. Even the old language had nearly perished and the Gods were so angry that they were permitting the tribe to grow smaller and smaller, yearly. It was only the fervor of a few devoted conservatives like himself which still induced the Gods to send their rains in the spring. And would he allow his only grandson to be married without the practice of the old rites? Por Dios, no! And besides, he was one of the very few men who still remembered the old prayer and it was the custom to pay a peso per night to the one who recited the prayer. He had not the slightest objection to Pepe’s being married by the cura—the more Gods the better—but he insisted on his privileges and the observance of the old customs.
So, to please the old man and to keep peace, it was agreed to follow the old customs, and the next Wednesday night the three men, Nestor, Francisco and José, journeyed to the girl’s house. Along the narrow, steep and rocky trail they stumbled, finally arriving at the house where they were cordially admitted by old Cándido. Seating themselves by the door, Nestor immediately launched into the prayer which was a long one and recited with great gravity. He spoke in beautiful allegory of the creation of the girl in the heavens, and of her long wanderings before her birth. At last the long prayer came to an end and the party trooped home again.
For five nights on successive Wednesdays and Saturdays, this was repeated and on the last night Cándido, who had been ably coached by Nestor, arose at the end of the old man’s speech and spoke in reply, gravely, the traditional response which had served Tepecano brides and grooms for centuries. He admitted that his daughter was lazy and worthless, but appreciated the honor of having her hand asked, and closed with an appeal to the Gods for forgiveness from sins and for health. Then he brought out a white cloth and on it were piled all the girl’s possessions and her wedding gifts. Then all four, the bride and groom and their fathers, seized each a corner, raised the cloth, and the ceremony was complete. José remained with his wife’s people for several months while he built himself a new house and put his household in order before taking his bride to her new home. When the good cura came to say mass the next time, the couple appeared before him and were united according to the rites of Holy Church.
One day a melancholy figure appeared before the little hut of Nestor and the old man hobbled out to greet his visitor.
“Enter, enter, little grandson!” he greeted. “Why so sad? What has happened?”
“It is my wife, little grandfather,” replied José. “She is quite ill. We have done everything we can for her. All the neighbors have come, and each one has brought her some delicacy and forced her to eat it, but to no avail. Can you not help her?”
The old man puffed up with a mixture of self-conceit, anger and contempt.
“Ah, what could you expect from these old women? They expect to cure sickness by foods and drugs when it is necessary to appease or overcome something! Verily you have come to the right man! Let us see what we can do.” He disappeared within his house, made a judicious selection of objects, put them within his sack, and over the trail they went toward the house.
Sure enough, there lay poor Josefa on a mat on the floor of the house. The civilized physician would have diagnosed her malady as malaria and suggested doses of quinine and crude oil—the latter to be administered to the mosquitoes in the pools of stagnant water. A few sympathetic neighbors were gathered around, begging her to try one or another of the dainties they had so carefully prepared.
“Truly, I have done my best, grandfather,” lamented José. “I have sucked at the seat of pain as you have told me, but extracted nothing, and I have blown tobacco smoke on her and prayed, but without avail.”
“Yes, my son, but one must have practice in such matters and the confidence of the Gods. Possibly it is the work of one of your enemies. It is well that you called me, for none else in the tribe has my power and influence.”
Sending the neighbors home, he questioned José with regard to his sins of omission and commission, trying to determine the cause of his wife’s infirmity. Had he or she any enemies who might wish to send sickness upon them? José knew of none, except possibly one of her other old suitors. Had he been careful to placate the chanes when he built his new home? José was compelled to admit that he had ignored this matter entirely.
“Ah, my son!” lamented the old man, “you young people laugh at us; you think we are silly, and yet when your own obstinacy leads you into trouble you come to us for aid! Well, that is ever the way of youth. Now let’s see what we can do.”
He laid Josefa on her back, standing at her feet. Lighting a cigarette made of corn husk and tobacco he assumed a serious attitude which rapidly became almost hypnotic. Taking long draughts of smoke, he faced the four cardinal points in turn, blowing a puff of smoke in each direction, and then in a low tense voice recited a prayer, begging that the illness might pass from her and she be restored to health. Then he blew five puffs of smoke on her hands, feet and forehead and, falling on his knees, began to stroke her body rapidly from the extremities to the seat of pain, at which place he then began to suck vigorously. Finally arising, he spat into his hand a mouthful of blood. His state of tense emotion rapidly disappeared as he said gravely:
“This is a serious matter, Pepito. It is not the chan; if it were, I should have sucked out only spittle. The blood proves it to be witchcraft!
“It is a matter of the greatest delicacy,” continued Nestor, “and you are lucky to have one so powerful as I at your service. Even for me it will require a whole week of fasting and praying to diagnose the matter correctly. And even for my favorite grandson I couldn’t afford to do it for less than the standard price of five pesos!”
After a half-hour’s argument the matter was amicably arranged and for a week the old man bathed, fasted and prayed, and by the end of that time had worked himself into an exalted state which combined with the weakness induced by the fast, made him see visions. On the evening of the seventh day he again appeared before the young man, the gravity of the business evidently weighing upon him very heavily.
“I have seen it all,” he said simply. “It was a young man. I couldn’t see him plainly enough to recognize him. But he made a figure from a piece of her clothing and stuck a pin into it while another old man prayed that she might sicken and die!”
A wave of hatred passed over José and he cursed the culprit violently. There was no longer the slightest doubt in his mind that old Nestor spoke with authority. He had heard all these old tales about ways of harming an enemy by magical means, but he had never really put any faith in them. And now he was the victim! He ran over in his mind the names of those who might be suspected. There was Pablo Hernandez with whom he had had an argument at the last fiesta, and Pedro Martinez who claimed he had cheated him over a sale of corn last month. Ah, but wait. There was Margarito de la Rosa who had been his pet rival for the hand of Josefa. The more he thought of it, the more certain he was that it must have been he. All right! He would fix him!
Nestor set about his cure with gravity and self-possession, knowing like any doctor that the best half of any cure lay in the confidence of the patient. First he produced his bundle of arrows made of a straight shaft of wood with a large feather from an eagle or a red-tailed hawk, hanging from the blunt end. These were the arrows that attacked evil and sickness. Three of these he stuck in the ground at the patient’s head and a fourth at her feet. Then he performed a number of motions with the arrows, which involved changing their positions, pointing them to the four cardinal points and waving them above the patient’s head to purify her. Finally he fell on his knees and once again began to suck at the sorest spot in her body. After several attempts on various parts he finally arose with great emotion, his face a livid red from the intensity of his efforts, spat into his hand and showed José—a pin! The latter gasped with astonishment.
Now without doubt the old man had concealed the pin in his mouth before beginning to suck, nevertheless he had worked himself into such an intense emotional state that the fraud was probably quite unconscious. As for José—had he not seen with his own eyes? The very pin which had been stuck into the figure representing his wife had been removed from her body! So that was the game, was it? Very well, it was a game more than one could play at. From that time on he nursed his revenge.
After he had brooded over his wrongs for a long time he again consulted Nestor and told him of his suspicions. The old man nodded gravely.
“Most probably it was he,” he assented. “Now that I think of it, the person I saw in the vision was much like him. Of course! I see him very plainly now. And the old man who helped him was that shameless old Heleno Montez who thinks he has more power than I. I’m certain of that. Very well, we’ll show them!” And so the two conspirators secretly planned the untimely demise of Margarito and Heleno.
Thus it happened that a few days later they met late one night in a secluded spot on the outskirts of the village.
“There are several methods of bewitching,” began Nestor, after crossing himself. “You might as well learn them. One way is to make a figure of cotton and bury it in the cemetery, light a candle and place it at the head of a grave at midnight on Monday, after having fasted all day. Repeat this for five successive Mondays and on the last day get a black stone from the river and hit the earth above the figure five times. Then run home before the candle goes out. The corpse will cause your enemy to sicken and die within five months. But one must fast for the entire twenty-nine days.”
José shuddered and looked furtively around into the darkness with the fear of one who dreads ghosts. Neither the method nor the long fast appealed to him. But Nestor, with the air of a devotee, warmed up to his subject.
“But a better way is to make a figure of cotton with hands and feet, head and mouth, wrap it up with the shroud of a dead man and then pierce the head and the heart with five thorns. Pretty soon the victim will fall sick of the stomach and his heart will rot and—may God have mercy on his soul!” Nestor chuckled. “A very pretty way it is, too! That was probably the method they tried on Josefa. Lucky you had me to counteract it!”
Again José’s anger rose at the thought of the villainy and he hardened his heart against the malefactors.
“Another good way,” continued Nestor, “is to make a clay figure and bury it in an ant hill at high noon. You must fast a day and say the creed seven times while counting your rosary and light a candle. And when the candle goes out, the ants will come up and in five days the enemy will die of boils and hives and fever!”
“That’s a terrible death, little grandfather,” said José. “We can’t do anything like that!”
“Well, there’s still another way, the best of all. Few men know this, but I will tell you the secret.” His voice sank to a whisper.
“First you must get a bone from the right hand of a dead man. Take this and hide it in the thatch of the roof of your enemy’s house when no one is looking. Then in the night he will see a black phantom and the following night a terrifying vision lamenting behind the house. Unless he finds and removes the charm, he will continue being terrified until at last all the people of that house will die from fear of horrible nightmares of poisonous animals—rattle-snakes, centipedes, tarantulas, lizards, spiders and scorpions!”
But José had heard enough, and was on his way home as if all these noxious creatures were after him. Others might dabble in witchcraft if they pleased, but it was not for him! His difference with Margarito he would settle with fist or machete!
This experience brought José more closely into contact with old Nestor. Besides he was getting on toward middle life and beginning to recover from the agnosticism of youth and to take an interest in the old religion and customs of the forefathers. These, he was well aware, were kept alive by a few devoted old conservatives like Nestor who believed that it was only their fidelity which kept the tribe from complete annihilation by the Gods, angry because of the neglect of the younger people. The younger people regarded the conservatives as harmless old fools and their religious practices as amusing superstitions. In this they were encouraged by the padre who was anxious to see all the old beliefs rooted out. Nevertheless he knew enough of human nature to realize that little could be accomplished by coercion and force, and enough of church history to remember that the Church had always found it better to reinterpret the old pagan beliefs and incorporate them into the faith rather than to battle against them. Consequently the conservative group considered themselves perfectly good Catholics and saw no antagonism between the new and the old religions. Nestor found José in a receptive mood when he approached him on the topic.
“José,” said he, “it has always been a matter of great regret to me that my only grandson has not been one of the few who have kept faith with the ancient Gods of the pueblo. But that is the nature of youth. I too, up to your age, took little part in the ceremonies, although at that time all of the elder generation were loyal. But now you have arrived at the age of discretion; your advice is sought and your example has considerable influence. I know you no longer laugh at our beliefs; you have frequently questioned me about them. But you have never affiliated yourself with us. Delay no longer, dear little grandson. Father Sun is stretching out his hand toward you to gather you unto him. This is the fifth of January. To-night we celebrate the feast of the Pinole. Come and join us!”
There was an air of ecstasy about the old man and of hysterical emotion, due, as José realized, to the long fast in preparation for the feast, as well as to the narcotic peyote. José saw that a refusal would anger the old man and, besides, he felt a curiosity as well as a real religious interest in the proceedings.
“I will go,” he said shortly.
As the sun sank behind the western mountains José and Nestor followed the winding trail toward the place where the ceremony was to be held. Just at dusk they arrived at the patio situated on the top of a small hill. Of course in his boyhood days José had frequently visited the patios where the ceremonies of the conservatives for untold generations had been held. He knew their general form well—a flat circular ground with a place for a fire in the center, a ring of stones which served as seats for the communicants, a circular path without this for the dancers, and a rude altar built of stones to the east. But now everything assumed a new significance.
On arriving, Nestor and José gravely made the requisite five ceremonial circuits of the ground, after which they bowed before the altar, while old Nestor recited a prayer in a low voice. José knew enough of the old Tepecano language to get the sense of the prayer which begged permission of the Gods to prepare and decorate their temple. After this, they set to work and cleared the ground of all growth until it presented an even surface, swept it smooth and started a fire in the center.
Nestor then busied himself at the altar for a long time, and José observed that he had opened his box and taken out many objects of ceremonial importance which he placed in their proper positions on the altar. For a long time he busied himself there, carefully unwrapping every object and giving great care to its placing. José, sweeping the court and nursing the fire, watched him out of the corner of his eye. At last the old man turned and called to him.
“Joselito,” said the old man, surveying his work with the pride of a good craftsman, “it is well that you should understand the meaning of all our religious objects. Doubtless you have heard malicious gossip and lies concerning them from the unbelievers of the village. They have told you that we worship idols here, and are in league with the Devil in opposition to our Holy Catholic Faith. Lies! All lies! We worship God here just as we do in the church with songs and prayers. Our dear cura is the leader of that branch of the church, and I of this. He needs his chalices and his sacraments just as I need the ceremonial objects you see here. Just as the blessed images in the church protect the town from evil, so do these bring us health, relief from sickness, and rain for our crops. Look here! This white cloth is the tapexte—it represents the heavens filled with great white rain clouds. These little square objects of colored yarn on a frame, you know well. They are chimales, shields, and represent the face of God, the Sun. Consequently they shield us from every influence and we even fear to make them until after the rainy season for fear they might keep away the rains! These arrows you know too. They are our active defense from sickness and evil and are hung with the feathers of the royal eagle and the red-tailed hawk.”
“Why only those?” interrupted José.
“Because they are the most powerful, swift and strong; therefore the arrow will fly fast, hard and straight. It is with these arrows that people are cleansed from sickness and evil. Then these sticks with tufts of cotton wound on them are bastoncitos. The cotton, of course, represents the great rain clouds, and these also serve to cleanse and purify and to bring the rains for the crops. All of these things you have seen and know fairly well. But these little objects of great importance you probably do not know.”
Nestor pointed to the front of the altar where lay six or eight jícaras. Some of these were decorated with designs made of small glass beads of different colors set in beeswax on the outer and inner surfaces, but all of them contained various small objects resting on beds of cotton. Many of them were natural stones of strange and unusual shapes and colors, others were little bone carvings and similar objects made by the ancient populations of this region, and occasionally found by the present people. A few others were, although neither of the observers realized it, manufactured objects from other lands.
“These,” said old Nestor solemnly, “are the cidukam which are sometimes called our ‘idols.’ Of course they are not. But they are very powerful and rare and are carefully guarded. One finds them here and there, where they are left by the Gods that those with faith and observation may find them. They protect him from evil and sickness and bring to him health, wealth and happiness. I, as Chief Singer, have the largest number of most powerful ones which protect not only me, but the entire pueblo. And yet they care so little for it that the people laugh at my valuables and refuse to attend our ceremonies. But let them beware! The Gods will not bear with this neglect forever! Already things are not as they were in my youth. Then the rains were longer and heavier, the corn grew more bountifully and the deer were more plentiful. While I last, I will keep the faith, but who will follow me? Not one of the younger generation knows the prayers, the songs or the details of the ceremonies! Well, at any rate, I shall have done my best to save them from the consequences of their neglect.”
“Here,” he exclaimed, pointing to a spherical object resting on a bed of cotton in a beautifully decorated jícara, “here is the most powerful object in the collection. There is not another one in the tribe—yes, there cannot be another like this in the whole world.”
He raised the globe reverently and lovingly from its bed. Now an American schoolboy would have recognized it as a large glass marble with the white corkscrew veins in the center. But to Nestor and José it was a wonderful object, and they feasted their eyes on the beautiful and regular shape and color.
“This is surely the spirit of the rain,” said the old man softly. “See! It is transparent like the water and in the centre the whirling rain descends. Ah! If that should be lost or taken from the country, the rain would surely follow it and we would all die of drought and starvation!” He put it back into its place reverently.
“Here is a representation of the moon, white and round; this one is evidently the spirit of the deer. See how closely it resembles one with its horns! Here is doubtless an ear of corn, and this one here is certainly intended for a chimal. And these—but here come more people!”
Into the light of the fire brightly blazing in the center of the patio came three elderly men. José knew them well, of course, as prominent in the conservative party. They walked five times around the circle and stopped before the altar and breathed their prayers before stepping out to greet the two. From this time on, the communicants arrived slowly, until by eight o’clock about a dozen had congregated, almost entirely elderly men. A few women also had come, but these made a fire for themselves outside the circle and took no part in the ritual.
Presently Nestor brought out a bow of the type used by the hunters of old, and tightened the string until it gave forth a resonant twang when plucked. Then, scooping out a hole in the ground in front of his seat, he inverted a gourd bowl over this and held the bow, string uppermost, on the bowl with his foot so that it served as a resonance chamber. Two small sticks were selected and the ceremony was about to begin. First, however, he called José to him and formally recited to him another of the old speeches, handed down by tradition through centuries, delivering to him the care of the fire for the night. Then he seated himself on his central seat, and on either side sat another old man. In each hand they held one of the ceremonial arrows which they had taken from the altar. These were waved slowly, and pointed in turn to east, north, west and south while the old man recited the traditional prayer opening the fiesta. This done, he settled himself on his seat and, taking the two sticks in his hand, struck the bow with a sonorous twang. Then he began to sing in a low voice to the accompaniment of the monotonous twang of the bow. José followed the example of the other men by getting up and dancing around the circle with a solemn, slow tripping step, stopping to face outwards for a moment at each of the cardinal points, and particularly to the altar at the east.
And so the long night passed. Around Polaris swung the bright stars, shining as they can only in the crisp air of high altitudes. All night long with but brief intermissions the old man sang. Only four songs there were in all, but these were very long and full of monotonous repetition. They told of the origin of the Gods and of the world, and of the coming of the rain to refresh the world with its life-giving water. José tended the fire conscientiously and danced with the other men for at least a portion of every song.
At last above the rim of the eastern hills appeared the glowing Morning Star like a heavenly torch, and all greeted it reverently. Soon the great sun himself began to spread the light and warmth of his glow abroad, and finally showed his face radiant above the eastern hills. Seldom had he seemed more majestic to José and seldom had his warmth been more welcome, after the chilliness of the night.
About this time Nestor finished his last song to the Sun and the ceremony was almost over. Once again the other two old men took their places beside him on the stone seats and once again were the arrows pointed to the cardinal points while the Chief Singer recited the prayer to close the ceremony. Then, one by one, all the men approached the altar where they were given little tamales[14] to eat, while Nestor purified them of all sickness and evil by waving over them an arrow, the feather of which had been dipped in peyote water. A few drops of the water were placed in the hand of each, and then water in which corn meal had been mixed was sprinkled over every one present, over the altar and the seats. The sacred objects on the altar were collected and replaced in their box, all the attendants, led by Nestor, made their five ceremonial circuits of the patio and the ceremony was completed. José went home and slept the rest of the day.
Although José still affected to ridicule the beliefs and practices of the conservatives, yet the ceremony he had witnessed had really quite an effect upon him. And he began to show a live concern for the old religion, studying it almost as would a scientific investigator. Many were the conferences and long talks that he and Nestor held together, the old man an intensely enthusiastic informant, the young man an interested listener and keen inquisitor. Of course, like all the Tepecanos, he already understood the basis of the old religion, how the trinity of Father Sun, Mother Moon and Elder Brother Morning Star watched over and protected their people; how Father Sun had sent his daughter, the Corn, into the world that they might have sustenance, and how the Gods sent the welcome and necessary rains in the spring and summer, that the corn might flourish, requiring only that the people worship them with song and dance, with arrows and chimales. But all of the minor esoteric details opened a new field of interest to him. He learned the many set prayers which were enjoined for various occasions, the ritual songs sung at the four principal ceremonies, that of the Rain in April, the Ripe-corn in September, the Corn-meal in January and the Twin-corn in March. He heard of the tabus of fasting and continence enjoined upon the Chief Singer and, above all, of the influence and power of the magic peyote which played such a large part in all observances. He learned to make the various kinds of arrows and chimales and to know their special powers. He learned the locations of the altars, and particularly the four principal ones to the cardinal points, in each of which was a habitant spirit, and how to each pertained a special color—green to the east, gray to the north, black to the west and white to the south. He came to realize that the religion was practically based on the securing of rain, for which the Gods were petitioned with prayer and song, and placated by sacrifices and fasting, for rain was the one essential to human life.
José became particularly interested in the little cactus root known as peyote, that dried, shriveled-up little thing which produced such a wonderful effect when eaten. Such a feeling of ecstasy and exhilaration, of joy and insensibility to fatigue, did they produce that they were certainly powerful instruments of the Gods, if not near gods themselves.
“It is a kind of corn,” volunteered Nestor of the peyote, “just as the deer are corn.” By that he meant that it was a food sent by the Gods, for he knew well that it was the root of a cactus growing in a country far to the east.
“When I was young,” he continued, “we journeyed far to the east to gather the peyote root just as the Huicholes do to-day. But now that I am old and there is no one to take my place, I must buy it from them.”
Then and there José swore that he would accompany the next Huichol party to the eastern country in search of the strange plant, for he was still young enough to feel youth’s passion for visiting strange lands. He had frequently seen parties of peyote-seekers passing through the village and had struck up an acquaintance with some of them, envying them their gaudy costumes and long trip. Now he would go with them and himself bring back the peyote!
“May the Gods be with you, Joselito!” fervently prayed old Nestor. “Would that I were young enough to accompany you! But I shall fast and pray for you. When you return with the peyote you will have fulfilled one of the requirements for the office of Chief Singer, and I will go to my forefathers in peace, knowing that you will take my place. It is now October and some of the Huichol men will be about starting out. You have frequently heard me mention my old friend Benito Torres who left Azqueltán as a youth to live with the Huicholes, and who has risen to be one of the most respected men of the tribe. Go to him and he will befriend you. Go with God!”
It was a bright, warm day in October when José set out for the Huichol country. Josefa had filled his sack with gordas and his bule[15] with water. Tobacco, matches, his machete and blanket were the rest of his equipment. He waved farewell to his wife and started up the hills to the west. Higher and higher he climbed, now scrambling up a slope of rock talus, now following a trickling stream up a ravine, now skirting a fertile hill with the hay still slightly greenish from the recent rains. The little river in the bottom of the great barranca grew smaller and smaller, until at last it was lost to sight entirely, behind the hills of the upper edge. The heat grew perceptibly less as he climbed and the pine trees appeared singly and then in groups. The first night he spent by the side of a blazing pine fire on the edge of the mountain forests, while he listened to the howl of the wolves or the snarl of a jaguar or mountain lion.
Early in the morning he was off again, still going westward through the pine groves until at last he began to see the fields and houses of the Huichol. The houses were much like those of his tribe except that none was of adobe. They were also arranged in villages, but in every village was one larger house which served as the temple, in place of the open-air altars to which he was accustomed. The people looked very much the same, but their dress was different. They wore scarfs, belts and little pouches woven in designs of bright colors, wide hats with feathers, and their legs were bare to the knees. They looked askance at the traveler in the conventional cotton trousers of the Mexican peon. One or two accosted him in the Huichol language. It was a queer tongue to him, with many sounds he had never heard before and was confident no civilized man could ever reproduce. He replied in Spanish, but was not understood until one of the middle-aged men who had worked in the nearby mining town, and there acquired a small Spanish vocabulary, happened along. From him José learned that Benito Torres lived on a little ranch a few miles beyond the village. Arriving there about sunset he kicked aside the snarling dogs which, as everywhere in Mexico, prowled about the house, and called aloud. A middle-aged man came out of the house.
“Cafhövan, armano!” Jose greeted him. The man, after a moment of silent surprise, smiled and countered:
“Cafhövan api! It is a long time since I have heard that greeting in Tepecano,” he continued in Spanish, “and the language has about failed me. Enter! Enter! Here is your home! Julia! Bring food and drink for my brother Waköri!” Waköri is the name given the Tepecanos by the Huicholes.
“I am called José Aguilar,” said the traveler, “the son of Francisco and grandson of Nestor.”
“Ah, yes! Francisco and I were boys together, and many pranks we played on Nestor. He himself was a young man then. How long ago that was! But when I was younger than you, I saw the way things were going. The Mexicans were encroaching on our lands, the cura came and built the church and we were made to give up our communal land and each man take a piece for himself. As if the Gods ever intended their land to be owned like a machete or a hat! As well divide up the air and the water in the river and make the new-born babe pay to breathe and drink! Ave Maria! And then they began to bring in strong drinks; they wanted us to put our legs in those long trousers you wear now, to give up our old language and speak Spanish and to foreswear the old religion. I saw the way it was going and said, ‘Not for me! Not for Benito Torres!’ And I took my blanket as you have done and came up here with the Huicholes where I have spent a long, happy life following the mandates of the Gods. You are wise to have done likewise. I welcome you!” And he threw his arms around the younger man in a welcoming embrace.
José was pleased and yet troubled.
“Yes, little uncle,” he replied at last, “it is quite true. There is little of the old left now in Azqueltán. Only old Nestor and a few of the other old men keep to the old faith. But I am of the new order. These are the clothes I have always worn; Spanish is my language, Catholicism my religion. I cannot change to the old order any more than you to the new. And yet the new is inevitable; I see it even here.”
Benito nodded a sad acquiescence. “Yes, it is a losing fight. Even here the old is passing. I have not postponed it for these people, but only for myself by coming here. In a century or so there will be no Huicholes, no Tepecanos, no Coras, only Mexican peones of Indian blood. But why then have you come here?”
José explained his mission, at which the sad face lighted up again.
“It is well,” he said. “I too went with parties several times after I first came here. But it is a task for young men. You know it involves harsh restrictions of fasting and great endurance?” José insisted he was prepared for them.
“Very well, then. In a very few days a party begins the preliminary fast. I will speak to their leader and you shall join them.”
And so it happened that through the good offices of Benito, José was accepted among the peyoteros and prepared to take his part in the work. He adopted the dress and paraphernalia of the party, taking bow and arrows and several small tobacco gourds. The evening before the departure he bathed and prayed, as he might not bathe again until the return from the long journey. There were nine other men in the party, including a leader who was the only one allowed to make fire while on the long trip. Several burrows were taken along, to carry tortillas on the journey and bring back the peyote on the return. Nevertheless they were expected to fast much of the time, and several men of the party ate little but peyote during the entire forty-three days they were away on the journey.
Bidding an affectionate good-by to their wives and families, the little party started out. Instead of passing by Azqueltán, they struck eastward down the slopes of the wooded mountains and out onto the rolling plateau, dry, hot and sandy. Day followed day in monotonous repetition, night followed night. Generally in single file they walked, dirty and hungry, but with their minds fixed on the goal before them—the attainment of the little cacti which would protect their villages and bring them rain. Across the well known trail they went, camping each night in a certain place, so that the faithful watchers at home knew each night exactly where they were. This trail had been followed for centuries and went along the most inaccessible route, away from roads and villages, so that the pilgrims were seen by very few of the Mexicans of even the more inhabited parts of the country they traversed.
But at one spot when the journey was about half ended, not far from the great City of Zacatecas, they came to a road which could not be avoided. It was made up of short logs of wood laid parallel, and on these were fastened long, snaky iron rails. José, though more civilized than the others, had never seen anything of the kind before, but one of the other men who had made the journey before, explained by signs that an immense monster, dragging behind him houses full of people, ran at tremendous speed along the road, as a horse drew a cart along a dirt road. From the description José recognized it as a railroad, as he had heard about railroads when an open-eyed boy, from an itinerant peddler.
Eastward, ever eastward they pressed, until two full weeks had passed, when the leader of the party informed them that their destination was but five days’ journey away and that from that time all restrictions must be rigidly observed. They were to walk in single file continuously, and eat nothing but peyote for the rest of the journey. In a few days José began to see the first little peyote plants, but the leader affected not to notice them, although as the party pressed on the plants grew more abundant. At length, on the nineteenth day, when they had covered about three hundred miles, the leader called a halt. Trembling with emotion, superinduced by hunger and fatigue, he cried:
“There is the peyote, appearing as a deer!”
At that, all drew their arrows and shot at a peyote plant, taking care not to hit it. Then from the loads on the burrows various ceremonial objects were produced—arrows, chimales, bastones and other objects not used by the Tepecanos—which were deposited as sacrifices to the Gods and to the peyote. For the next three days all collected the little cactus roots until the burros were loaded down and the men wore strings around their necks. On the fifth day after arrival they started their long journey homeward.
By this time the supply of tortillas had become entirely exhausted and José, in particular, being more accustomed to regularity of food, and less accustomed to the diet of peyote, suffered greatly. The others appeared not to be greatly affected, for they consumed many peyote roots and walked with the sprightly, springy step that certain kinds of intoxication produce, though their thin limbs and drawn faces betrayed the strain upon them. Now and again inhabitants of the country gave them food, but these were rare occasions and for the greater part they covered the first fourteen days of the return trip in a daze, sustained only by the stimulus of peyote and their nerve.
But at last the fourteen days were over and they approached the spot where, the leader informed them, a party from the village would meet them, five days’ journey from home, with loads of tortillas. And so indeed it happened! How good the corn cakes, bone dry after five days in the scorching sun! With renewed strength they continued their way to the edge of their pine forests, where they hunted deer for several days to obtain the meat demanded for the return feast.
A few days later, a body of thin and famished men, their figures only just beginning to recover from the privations of the long journey, but their heads high with elation and consciousness of probity and of duty well performed, their burros laden with sacks of peyote and deer meat and their necks bedecked with strings of peyote, marched down the street of the principal village. The tabu upon washing would not be removed until the great feast, and they presented a bedraggled and filthy appearance, yet they were heroes to the stay-at-homes in the village as they entered the temple and deposited their cherished strings of roots. Then they again began to hunt deer in order to have plenty for the great Peyote Fiesta in January.
But José was anxious to get home. He felt that he had done his share and should be excused from the month or more delay in preparation for the fiesta in which he had but little interest. Benito took his part also and urged that he be allowed to depart. Many of the shamans took exception, fearing that such a rupture of all the regulations of peyote-gathering might anger the Gods and work harm. But finally Benito’s argument that harm, if any, would fall upon the culprit and his people in Azqueltán and not on the Huicholes, carried the day, and José was wished god-speed, loaded with gordas made by Benito’s wife, Julia, and sent on his way.
How beautiful the great barranca seemed as he first emerged from the edge of the pine forests and saw the gaping chasm below! What joy to make out the little cluster of adobe and thatch shacks with the little white church in the center! As he neared his house, his loving wife ran out and embraced him. How good it was to be home again, and how much better were her tortillas than those of any of the Huichol women!
But only a few minutes did he tarry at home in spite of his long absence, for Josefa said at once: “Old Nestor is sick unto death and has been asking for you hourly. He has kept track of the time you have been away, and says you should be home about this time and that he will not go until he sees you again.”
Hastily José ran along the winding trail which led to the house of the old man, and as he neared it he heard the doleful wail of an old shaman singing one of his curing songs. On his blanket on the floor lay the old man, surrounded by his ceremonial arrows and other sacred paraphernalia. As José entered, he smiled and motioned to the shaman to stop singing.
“It is useless,” he said simply. “I know my time has come. Sooner or later it comes to all of us. But I knew you were coming to-day, my boy. I dreamt it last night, and I would not go until I saw you. I see you have brought the peyote for me. Well, it will never benefit me. Stay! Give me a drink of it now. It will make my head clearer. But the rest of it you must keep for yourself. You are the only one of the tribe who has fulfilled the requirement for Chief Singer by going to the peyote country. And besides, you know all the songs and prayers and all the intricate details of our ceremonies. And I will leave you all my cherished valuables, my arrows, my chimales and my cidukam. They will help you in every need, and while you cherish them the Gods will allow no harm to befall the pueblo. Francisco! Baldomero! Must he not be Chief Singer after me?”
“It is true,” spoke Francisco. “José, my son, you are young in years, but old in experience and knowledge. Will you not do as grandfather wishes?”
Reluctantly José agreed.
A few days later a straggling procession wound its way to the little cemetery behind the church while strong hands bore a plain black box containing the body of old Nestor. The burial customs of old had been entirely forgotten, and even if they had not, Francisco would have taken no chances with fate by having the old man buried outside of consecrated ground. But nevertheless José managed to slip a few of the old man’s most cherished sacred things into the box with him. Later José went to the principal altars in the hills to deposit other things, besides journeying to the seat of the cura to pay to have masses said for the rest of his soul.
For a year or so José fulfilled his office as Chief Singer dutifully, but then the restrictions and fasts began to pall upon him, and he shirked the duties and finally abandoned them altogether. Some of the conservatives remonstrated with him, but he replied that he could not see but that they had just as much rain and corn, without performing the ceremonies, and no more sickness and famine than when the ceremonies were performed, in which he was certainly borne out by the facts. And not long afterwards, when a “Gringo” scientist came to the village to study the language and customs, he was glad to sell all of Nestor’s sacrosanct valuables at a high price and call it a good riddance.
J. ALDEN MASON
The Understudy of Tezcatlipoca
This story[16] is a mirage of thin words and bodiless phrases. It paints on a film of mist things that are long ago and far away, and lifts up a pale reflection of cities and grandeurs lying below the horizon of our times, never to be resurrected in fact. It presents in a vaguely understandable fashion, strange beliefs and philosophies that a wonderful society of human beings created out of their common thought and supposed necessities.
Have you ever tried really to understand the Past, not so much the material Past of quaint costumes and accoutrements, as the immaterial Past of ideals, ambitions, and enthusiasms? Have you ever wilfully imprisoned your present spiritual being in the emotional matrix of an age that is dead? In the hall where the glum old faces of your ancestors stare out from dull frames upon your unimagined new life, have you ever paused to gaze back into those dim presentments, and to think how impossible to-day would be the quest of the Pilgrims, or of the Crusaders? And when, not so long ago, a Gothic fantasy in gently treated stone crumbled before the war-saddened eyes of the world, did this fearful thought impress itself upon you: No man in all Christendom can ever re-carve those shattered prophets or re-groin those airy arches in the dread sincerity of the first builders?
Now, it is not the stone that changes, nor the chisel, nor the loves and hates of individual men and women: it is the over-soul of society that passes. For, out of our herded life of tribe or nation, comes an over-soul that directs our hands and implants in our minds the seeds of duty, the impulses of sincerity, and the recognition of all the needs which we think are absolute, but which, in a larger view, are merely relative. The cloud forms of communal emotion that constitute these over-souls, flame and fade like the western sky and never twice assume the same shapes and colors.
In Mexico, before the steel-clad soldiers of Cortes landed at Vera Cruz, there was a civilization that ran back into a twilight of the gods. Centuries of accumulating art and ceremony had enriched the first crude thoughts of savages coming out of desert camps to abide in houses of mud and stone, amid maize stalks and squash vines. Cities and indeed, empires, had risen, flourished and fallen. There had come into being those slaves to the ideal of ritual whom we call priests, and those slaves to the ideal of political grandeur whom we call kings. And back of all these were gods to whom sacrifices were duly given for benefits received. And the people, commanded by their over-soul, raised gleaming temples on stately pyramids for their gods, and built palaces with bright gardens for their priest and kings. And, moreover, they gave honors and rewards for success in trade and war and they set the marks of class upon certain men and their children. This is a story of their sincerity....
That wise old man, bent from much climbing of temple stairs, but with the steady, believing gaze which comes from watching the stars, foretold the distant event with deceptive clarity. He was reader of the fates and keeper of the calendar in Quauhnahuac, and after grave study of his painted books he resolved the tangled interests of greater and lesser gods in the new-born child. So he said to the father and the friends who crowded round: “Let him be called Macuilquaultli, Five-eagle, after the day on which he was born, and let him be well taught in all that a chief should know. He shall acquire grace, skill, and a knowledge of all arts, for he shall come to rule in a high place. Thus it is written: he shall govern the City.”
The father of Five-eagle was a Captain among the armed men of Quauhnahuac, a bearer of standards, and a councilor in matters of state. He proudly bore the insignia of high success in war against the strange-tongued people of Tolucca. Yet, Quauhnahuac was not a city of warriors. The populous capital of the Tlahuica (as you may know from that Cuernavaca of sunlight and indolence which survives) lay deep below the mist houses of Ajusco, in a valley where waters dance and flowers flame. To be sure this people had come out from the Seven Caves with the Azteca and other tribes, but they had passed down from the cold highlands and had prospered under the benign protection of Xochivuetzalli, goddess of flowers, and patroness of all the arts that give beauty to the world and take vigor from it.
Five-eagle, at the age of eight, left the shaded portico of his father’s courtyard, where the fountain bubbled in a gleaming pool and where imprisoned birds sang, to study and sleep in one of the Great Houses with other youths. He was a slender boy with a pleasing and thoughtful face. Under the instruction of the old warriors he acquired only a careless skill in the hurling of lances, and took little pride when he won his set in the battering contests with wooden swords and shields of cane. Rather he preferred to beat out the thundering war songs of his people on the two-lipped drums. In this he became proficient beyond all others, and in his hands the rubber-tipped drumsticks set up wild, nerve-racking rhythms that soon had young men and old whirling in a mad dance and chanting a song of the old nomadic days. Or, hidden among the trees he would play lonesome melodies on flutes of clay.
He knew the narrow hunting trails that led across the hills to the haunts of deer and wild turkey. He knew the great lava flow that stretched, in twisted and forbidding ridges, along the sides of the high mountain which separated Quauhnahuac from the Valley of the Five Lakes. He had climbed the pinnacles of black desolation on this lava desert and descended into its caverns of whirring bats.
Often in the shade of a market shrine Five-eagle would encounter the aged priest of the calendar who had laid the gorgeous prophecy upon him. This wise old man knew there was no end of knowledge, for he squatted with his books unfolded on the ground before him, and diligently made other books. But always he laid aside his brushes and his sheets of lime-sized paper when the youth drew near. First he would explain what calculation was being written down, and then expanding to the breadth of his subject, he would tell his young disciple how time ran in wheels of days and years and ages, and how the cycles of the Morning Star fell now for good and now for evil fortune, and how the gods ruled the hours in turn. He taught the boy to calculate in high numbers, to make hieroglyphs and read history, and to draw with a sure skill the faces and distinguishing marks of all the gods.
And sometimes, at the dead of night, he took the youth with him to the top of the high pyramid and before the very door of the temple itself. Below them lay the sleeping city amid soft rustlings of the wind and sweet smells of hidden flowers. The ravines were in deep shadow except where a thread of water gleamed faintly. The palm-thatched huts of the common people were huddled in the folds of the valley, with here and there a chieftain’s house built round a little court. The barracks and public buildings were placed on the four sides of larger squares, and in the dark of night their plaster walls showed ghostly white. In the market places still glowed the coals of dying fires, about which were massed the muffled figures of men who had brought their packs to market from afar. It was a solemn hour when mysteries crowd in upon the soul, and a still more solemn station. With heads together, speaking now and then in hushed and reverential voices, they studied the multitudinous stars as these swung grandly around the pole in a march of majesty across the eternal depths of heaven. And they kept their vigil until the great white Star of Morning hung like a splendid jewel above the calm snows of Ixtaccihuatl, the White Woman. Then the blue of the East turned to pearl and rose; new smoke streamed upwards through roofs of heavy thatch; the city stirred and the markets filled with sellers and buyers; the yellow Sun had given another day.
Once Five-eagle and the old priests journeyed together to the ruined site of Xochicalco, where one fair temple was still used in religious services. But the walls of a hundred more lay in shapeless heaps of fallen stone. In front and on either side, the terraced hill dropped off to great depths, but behind it rose another hill to a commanding height with a stronghold on its crest. The priest related fragments of history of this all-but-forgotten capital, shards of myths with names of kings and empty dates to signify resounding triumphs. Then he spoke sadly: “The glories of the great pass like the smoke of Popocatepetl, leaving the skies serene.”
“But Tenochtitlan,” broke in the youth, “tell me about that famous city, for surely you have been there and seen its wonders. Once from the top of Ajusco I looked down, far down, across the lava, and I saw the five lakes like five mists in the valley, and there was Tenochtitlan shining like a jewel. And I saw the roads that lead out from the land like a spider’s web.”
“Tenochtitlan: yes, I have seen it, and its gardens and temples are rich and beautiful. Its priests and warrior chiefs have much jade and green feathers of the quetzal. Yet Tenochtitlan is youngest of all the cities of Anahuac. Many ages older are Chaleo, Colhuacan, Atzcapotzalco,—and Tezcoco, too, where ruled the loved singer. They say that Tenochtitlan was nought but a rock amid the reeds of the great lake when the Azteca came in bondage and distress. But these sought favor of Tacuba to fish and build floating gardens. Then came Acamapichtli and his sons, so that the fishermen went forth to fight, and their god Huitzilopochtli gave them victory. And now the ancient cities have fallen, save only Tezcoco, in all the valley. Those Azteca of Tenochtitlan go now to Colima and Tuxpan for tribute and captives, and even past Cholula to the lands of the Zapoteca. Their traders first go forth with shining goods to spy out the way; then their warriors fall like the lightning flash. Only the wild Tarasca have turned them back, and those of Tlaxcala, fighting behind stone walls.”
So the priest of the calendar told the long history of Mexico, and he described the great feasts that fell, one each twenty days, till the year was done. He discussed the signs and powers of the various gods who thirsted for the blood of human sacrifices and hungered for hearts that were freely given.
“But they say,” said Five-eagle, “that in ancient times we gave only flowers to our Xochiquetzalli. Now we must offer children to her or she will be displeased.”
“They,” replied the priest softly, “are the most precious flowers! And to her who gives should be returned gifts as precious. Yet, I think pride of place enters sometimes into sacrifices, and that there is human boasting where the altars are piled too high. If only the Cause of All, to whom even the gods are quarreling children, would speak the last truth, so that man might understand! But if Tlaloc calls for a sprinkling of blood before he will give us showers of rain, then it is indeed just that he should have his blood. Without rain the world would die. Yet Huitzilopochtli, under whose standard fight those of Tenochtitlan, is a god of war alone. He can promise only plunder. He is a little god suddenly grown to commanding stature, so that all the cities pay tribute to his children. But Tezcatlipoca is the great one of all the land; he is the Magician to whom nothing is hidden—may he remember us only in gentle mood!”
There stands to this day in Cuernavaca a graven bowlder bearing a shield, a sheaf of arrows and a record in hieroglyphs of the fatal hour when the painted warriors of Tenochtitlan swept down upon Quauhnahuac. Then the City of Flowers withered before a rain of flint and a wind of flame. And among the men and women carried away as slaves or more honorable sacrifice was Five-eagle. This young man had disclosed, in the stress of that sudden attack, the qualities of true leadership. Out of the confusion he had emerged at the head of his people, leading them vainly against the foe. Yet he was captured at last and taken to Tenochtitlan without degradation, wearing still his ear-plugs of jade, sandals, and the embroidered mantle of his rank.
And then the prophecy of his birth was justified. For, because of his beauty, his daring and his arts of music and song, Five-eagle was raised to wealth, honor and the power of kings. He was made that other Tezcatlipoca to live among men and enjoy life and be granted every wish while the year turned slowly round to the feast of Toxcatl. His laughter meant good fortune to all the land, and his momentary sorrow spelled calamity. But at the end, replete with every honor, accomplished in every grace, surfeited with every joy, he must go freely under the black knife of glass. And the offer of his youth must be made so that the youth of Tezcatlipoca should be eternal, so that his powers should not wither with the creeping infirmities of time, so that his mysteries should still give forth life and happiness to the sad tribes of men.
What wonderful beings are the gods that men have imagined out of hopes and fears in the twilight of faith! They are creatures of beauty and terror, shaped from stars and storm winds and green waters and from the subtle and powerful beasts. Or they rise still higher to the very form and mind of their creator, man. They loom forever majestic, immortalized by the sincerities of human sacrifice, by prayers and incense and devoted lives, by ceremony and all its pictured train of magnificence and centered power, by temples and songs and statues that artists, in the grip of common thought, yield up and create. They are the over-souls of nations made visible from afar. But to their makers they are the blinding light of a great presence.
And what more gallant god ever bestrode the heavens than Tezcatlipoca of the Mexicans? He was a Lord of Magic, inscrutable, pitiless, magnificent. He combined the wisdom of white hair and wrinkled cheeks with the reckless joy of never-passing youth. He was swift and cunning and unconquerable, making and breaking fates, snaring his brother gods in wizard traps. He was not alone the Smoking Mirror in which the world lay reflected, he was the Sun that looked down into the hearts of men, he was the prowling Jaguar, he was the night wind stealing across land and sea. Yet in his proper guise he was Youth with all its wiles and enchantments: Youth that was graceful, debonair, beguiling as music, subtle as the perfume of flowers,—but cruel, swift and terrible as the lightning bolt.
The greatest feast of the Mexican year was the feast of Toxcatl, made in honor of Tezcatlipoca. It fell in the springtime when thirsty fields called for rain. Scarcely had one young warrior, chosen from the clean-limbed and accomplished prisoners of a sacred war, been sacrificed on the last day of his fictitious glory than another stepped into the empty rôle. And, as had been said, it was the fate of Five-eagle, after his arrival at the Aztecan capital, to be chosen as a fit candidate for this dramatic death. With a true knowledge of the symbolism and significance of the ceremony in the emotional fabric that then was Mexico, he assumed the part proudly, and made ready his mind to play out the drama to the end, with minute regard for all the details and effects.
A retinue of pages, the sons of chiefs and great merchants of Tenochtitlan, accompanied him in his daily wanderings about the city. These were six in number. They were dressed in fine liveries and it was their duty to see that their master, whom they addressed as Tezcatlipoca, did not fall into sad thoughts. A sacred college of girls embroidered new garments for Five-eagle and each day braided fresh garlands of fragrant blossoms to hang about his neck. Later, from this house of virgins, it was fated that four maidens should be chosen to act as his brides, during the last month of his earthly life, the month of Toxcatl, crowded with gayeties and tears.
So Five-eagle, as the Youth of Toxcatl, walked through the public squares of Tenochtitlan and over the many bridges that spanned its canals, and on the great wall that held back the storm winds of the lake. Clothed in the bright habiliments of divinity, with a laughing retinue, he played upon his flutes and chanted songs and danced. And no one in all the city remembered to have seen an understudy of the great God of Magic in other years so skilled in all the graces or so well taught to tread the brief stage of vanity and pride. Five-eagle, a captive from the enslaved city of Quauhnahuac, where Xochiquetzalli had been worshiped in happier times, ruled great and small in Tenochtitlan.
He chanted many songs that the people loved, but none that was so great a favorite as a splendid lament of fallen soldiers, a requiem of the young men who died in the sacred service of arms. All Mexico knew this song composed by a famous ruler of the Toltec cities whose name was a smile and a benediction after the passing of many years.
Words like the saddest, drooping flowers I seek I, the Singer, weaving my tears in song, For Youths, alas!—broken as spears are broken! And the women weep in darkened corners But the men lift up their heads in pride.
A valiant song it was, full of high courage and the will that conquers death. Upon such songs as this, planted deep in human hearts, rest the brave deeds of nations.
So Five-eagle passed through Tenochtitlan with his pages by his side, in the white mantle of Tezcatlipoca, with a garland of fragrant blossoms about his neck. His chanted verses charmed the market and the court to silence and tears, but when the song was done there was sudden laughter, and he was pelted with flowers by a gay throng. And he was invited to enter the houses and to eat of the choicest fruits, and to rest under canopies of those rare trees with crowns of cardinal, that now we call poinsettia.
Among the girls who did service in the temple of Tezcatlipoca, according to the law of consecration that none might escape, there was one who had come to look upon Five-eagle as more than a man, perhaps,—but less than a god. Once, as she had thrown across his shoulder a wreath of her own weaving, he had looked at her with unclouded eyes and a faint, steady smile. And she had turned away, thrilled and chilled with awakened interest in life and sudden visions of death. In the days that followed she wove other wreaths and awaited his coming at a certain place. And though she greeted the Youth of Toxcatl with a smile, she turned away in tears.
A kindly priest saw and understood. He knew that women were used to weep and moan for all the fine burst of glory that death might bring to the stilled flesh. Women, in the thoughts of Aztecan poets and philosophers, were flowers blooming near the ground. They were crushed beneath the feet of Huitzilopochtli leading his men to war. They could not be trusted for supreme sacrifices, and must be caught by surprise and trapped in the midst of revelry.
By the water gate against Tlaltelolco, when night was falling and mists were stretching filmy hands across the lake, the priest spoke to the girl of Tenochtitlan, “My child, are you envious of the gift that must be given cheerfully to a god who knows all thoughts? Do you dare love the consecrated sacrifice of Toxcatl?”
“Then why do those of the upper skies put seeds of love in our hearts to grow and bloom when it is spring?”
“That sometimes we may climb, my child, to heights where only the mind rules. The Youth of Toxcatl is a captive of Quauhnahuac. He fought bravely; he will die bravely that the city and all Mexico may prosper. Should he falter, he will live as a vile slave unworthy of a bright death; he will live as a vile slave condemned to life—beneath the whip. Daughters of Tenochtitlan may not mate with slaves.”
She stood rigidly by the wall as the priest spoke, a mutinous and tragic figure, with yellow flowers in her hair. On the towers of the water gate the torches were being lighted so that belated fishing boats might find their way into the city. The stars were beginning to twinkle faintly.
“But twenty days remain for that gallant boy,” said the priest softly, “for to-morrow is the feast of Huey Tozoztli, the great Humility, and then begins the month of Toxcatl, of such gladness and sorrow. Twenty days mean much when there is new love to be gathered and enjoyed. There are four who shall be his brides, impersonating in name and dress those four gracious beings of the ninth heaven to whom the love of Tezcatlicopa is given. If you might be the first of these, would your mind be content and filled with happy thoughts? Would you teach your will to strengthen his and not let your soft tears plunge him in worse than death, you to despair and the land to disaster?”
A new light shone in the eyes of the girl. “See how I shall laugh to the last,” she said, “and be happy in the noon of love and in him who is noble.” So among the gifts that came vicariously to Five-eagle, as the impersonator of Tezcatlipoca, there was a humble gift of love for him alone. But this is a tale of the stupendous lights and shadows that pass, not of those little ones of love and hate, forever found in human hearts.
When the sun rose after the feast of Huey Tozoztli, Five-eagle was installed in a royal house with many rooms and a wide court. Then the dancing that began with the sun ended with the paling stars. They dressed the hair of Five-eagle as if he were a leader in the army and they put new jewels upon him. When he went out into the streets of the city, the people knelt as he passed and bowed their heads and prayed. But in the temple many things were prepared behind the veil.
On the tenth day before the feasts of Toxcatl a priest in the common livery of the God of Magic stepped out into the marketplace and, while the multitude of buyers and sellers stood in silent awe, he played a summons on his clay flute. The shrill notes were directed first to the east and then to the north and west and south, so that the universe might be aware. When the signal notes had died away, every one bent forward and, having taken a bit of earth upon a finger tip placed it in the mouth as a sign of humility and abnegation. Then they wept strongly and threw themselves upon the ground, invoking the darkness of nights, the invisible winds, and other unknowable manifestations through which the great god spoke, imploring that men upon the earth be not forgotten, nor overwhelmed with labors, nor left in misery and despair. And because the God of Magic could look into secret deeds and thoughts, the thieves and murderers and those whose deeds had been secret and sinful were struck with great fear and sadness, and their faces altered with fright so that men knew their guilt. With tears they pleaded for clemency to an intangible, invisible presence, while incense carried their prayers upward. And the strong men of war bowed themselves in great agonies and begged for strength against all enemies, that they might return from their forays with many captives. So the shrill notes of the flute opened the floodgates of fear throughout the great city and there were tremblings and tears. In the still air, threads of smoke rose upward; now they were white from fragrant copal, now black from evil-smelling rubber.
On the fifth day before the feast of Toxcatl, the high priest of Mexico that in those days was Tizoc, locked himself in an inner room of his palace while his courtiers bowed low and acknowledged Five-eagle as lord. A day of submission was granted to each quarter of the city, and with pomp and pageants the temporary powers of an empire were conferred upon the impersonator of Tezcatlipoca. And the grandeurs crowded into these days kept sorrow from the eyes of a love which could see too clearly.
Before dawn of the last day, the priests went into the temple and removed the old garments from the stone image of Tezcatlicopa and refurbished it with new clothes, and adorned it, moreover, with feather ornaments and bangles and spread over it a bright canopy. Then they drew back the curtains of the temple so that the world might see the hard and splendid image. As this was done, a high priest came out with flowers in his hand, and played again a summons addressed to the east and the north and the west and the south.
When the multitude had gathered in the principal court of the city, before the temple enclosure with its serpent walls, a procession formed behind Five-eagle and the stone image of the god and two priests who carried ladles of incense. Five-eagle was seated on a gorgeous litter carried high on the shoulders of men. Behind him rode the high priests of the cults of magic with their bodies painted black and their hair tied at the nape with white ribbons. Then a throng of youths and maidens, comprising those specially dedicated to a year’s service in the temple of Tezcatlipoca, rushed forth with a rope of surprising whiteness in their hands, encircling with it the line of gorgeous litters. This rope was made up of threaded popcorn and was symbolical, so they say, of the thirstiness of the fields. The boys were dressed in mantles of open network, and the girls in new smocks with gay embroideries at neck and hem, but all of them wore necklaces of popcorn and turbans as well. Then the priests, leaning forward, took long strings of the white corn to wrap around their heads and to loop over the sides of the litters. Then the procession moved slowly forward over a road of green leaves strewn with flowers. On the ground, too, were strewn needle-like tips of the maguey with which many penitents perforated tongue and ears till they were bathed in blood that glistened horribly in the sunlight. And there were others in the long procession who lashed themselves with knotted cords. But such are the ways of frenzy whenever the souls of men are stirred in common.
It would prove over-tiresome should all the happenings of the marvelous day be related in full detail. There was a solemn sitting in state on the summit of the pyramid of Tezcatlipoca and before the door of the temple, where stood likewise the grim idol of stone, while complicated dances were being enacted in the court below. And Five-eagle, with a precise and certain artistry, wasted no moments of the triumph forecast at his birth and compromised in no feature his dignities and obligations.
The water pageant came at the end of the long, brilliant day when the sun was dropping towards the mountain crests. There was a long line of the largest canoes, laden with flowers and colored streamers and surmounted with awnings and sunshades. In the first of these Five-eagle sat erect on a royal seat with his brides beside him. The waters of the lake were calm, with pale reflections of gossamer clouds, and the boats struck a wide wake that found the distant reeds and willows.
Still there was laughter and gayety, but that one who in fantasy was a goddess of mountain crests had floating mists in her eyes while her lips formed a tremulous smile. On her black hair rested softly the hand of a lover, mortal at heart, but divine in a subtle play of mind over substance.
“O little Lady of the House of Mists, see how your white fogs cling to Ajusco, dropping dew on the cosmos flowers that Xochiquetzalli loves.”
“They are mists of a joyful sorrow, my Lord, they are mists of sorrow that obscure the world to-day that it may be fairer to-morrow.”
“Then tell me that no shadows shall lie across your heart to-morrow when the fishing boats enter the canal at sunset. Tell me there shall be no shadows but only content in what has been, O my precious Lady of Mists.”
“Youth of Toxcatl, there shall be no weeping.”
At a rocky point called Tlapitzahuayan the procession of canoes came to land. Here the courtiers and the four brides of the Youth of Toxcatl took merry leave of him, and he set out with his six boys for Tlacuchcalco, a nearby ancient temple, neglected and unused except on this one occasion of the year. A winding trail led to a rocky field of cactus and acacia to a temple mound overrun with desert growths. A broken stair climbed upward to a crumbling sacrificial chamber whose doorway was nearly closed by yellow orchids and thorny vines. Behind this humble screen, the thirsty knife of the great Magician awaited its draft of blood. The boys of the retinue followed in the footsteps of Five-eagle, and from the shore rang out a last sally of uplifting laughter.
At the foot of the temple stairs they took from his shoulders the white mantle of the god who must be kept youthful at the cost of youth, and they unwrapped from his waist the gayly brocaded breechcloth, and they took from his feet the sandals, and from his ears the disks of apple-green jade, the last symbols of his year of earthly power. Only around his neck remained the necklace of flutes. He was a naked mortal, come, in the last humility of all men, to make the sincere gift of his life itself to a jealous and implacable god. With a gallant smile Five-eagle dismissed his pages and mounted the broken stairs; pausing on each step to break a flute between his two hands. Only a moment later and a human body, naked, horribly gaping at the breast, came crashing down the temple stairs, staining the brambles and the stones with blood.
*       *       *       *       *
We can know the Past only as a masquerade of the Present. We can imagine only those smells and colors which have come into our nostrils and have passed before our eyes. To-day there are no gods, you say, and it is true that terrible Siva and the sweet face of Christ fade back into the haze that covers unbelief.
Yet, to-day, how many a young Icarus plunges gladly to his death from dizzy heights. Does Necessity make us invade the airy kingdom of the birds or the green depths of the sea? Or are we driven to these conquests by the lusts and sincerities of a new commanding over-soul, built out of song and fellowship and ordered lives of work and play? For the harnessed Powers enslave their busy masters, and the new-found gods of Speed and Thrill count victims as freely offered as that Youth of Toxcatl, who bravely climbed to the bloody altar of his sacrifice in Tenochtitlan that is no more. The soul of the Machine comes forth to rule the prostrate nations that another age may see a strange mirage thrown upward on the pale mists of romance.
HERBERT SPINDEN
How Holon Chan Became The True Man of His People
A youth of seventeen sat on the summit of the loftiest pyramid in the city, and gazed moodily out over the surrounding temples and palaces, and the thatched huts of the more lowly folk beyond, to the grasslands, which swept as far as the eye could reach in every direction.
He was naked save only for a sash-like cotton breechclout, so arranged that one end fell between his legs in front, the other in the same position behind, the ends being elaborately broidered with green feathers. A pendant of beautifully carved jade hung about his neck. Ear-plugs of the same material and sandals of deer hide with feather tassels completed his costume. In height he was under five feet and a half, slender, supple, small as to hands and feet, and a pleasing, warm golden brown in color. His eyes were black and narrow and in their placement somewhat slanting. His nose was aquiline and long, and merged into his flattened forehead in one straight line. During his babyhood his head had been bound between two boards to secure this very effect, an effect of beauty and distinction among his people. His hair was black, glossy and long. It was braided and then wrapped around his head except for a small queue which hung behind.
The time was the month of August 531 A. D.; the place, Tikal, the greatest metropolis of the Old Maya Empire; and the youth himself, no less a person than the ruler-to-be of the splendid city stretching at his feet, as well as of many smaller dependencies beyond the waste of grassy savannas which bounded his vision.
His discontent was of long standing and arose from a condition which he could not alter. His father, Ahmeket Chan, the preceding “True Man” of Tikal, had died two years before, leaving this boy, Holon Chan, as his sole surviving child and heir. The government of the state during the period of his minority had been carried on under the regency of his paternal uncle, Ahcuitok Chan, High Priest of Itzamna, aided by the powerful priesthood of this god, head of the Maya Pantheon; but now the people were clamoring for the investiture of Holon Chan in the supreme office, so that certain of the highest ceremonies, which only the True Man might perform, could be celebrated once again, and indeed Ahcuitok Chan was only awaiting the conclusion of the current five-year period to invest his nephew as True Man of Tikal. Itzamna, Lord of Heaven, had indicated through the mouthpiece of his priests that this event should be solemnized on the closing day of this period, and preparations for it had now been going forward for some time.
Now the boy had little heart for his coming dignity. His had always been a roving nature; he was a child of the open air, a lover of the forest fastnesses and solitudes, better suited to the humble lot of wood gatherer or corn planter than to that of ruler of a people.
The great discoveries of the preceding century, of large and wonderfully fertile lands far to the north of his own domains, had fired his imagination, and he burned to lead his people to this new land of promise, where the gods were said always to smile, and the cornfields to yield bountifully. Nor had these hopes always been without foundation. Once he had an older brother, named Chac Chan, who was to have succeeded their father as True Man, but while on a communal deer hunt, this brother had been bitten by a poisonous serpent, the deadly wolpuch, from whose bitter sting none ever recovered, and had died, leaving Holon Chan next in line of succession. And now the time was come when the exacting demands of his position, the elaborate ritual, which would fill his every hour, and the cares of the council chamber, would deprive him of every vestige of personal liberty.
The Maya people at this time, in Maya reckoning the close of Katin 18, were at once at the zenith of their power, and at the threshold of their decline. For generations now, the heavily forested lands which originally had surrounded their cities, towns and villages, had been gradually transformed under their primitive methods of cultivation into grassy savannas. This method of cultivation consisted in felling patches of the forests at the end of the rainy season in January or February, in burning the dried trees and bushes at the end of the dry season in March or April, and in planting after the first rains in May. The following year a new patch of forest was sought and the process repeated, nor was the first patch planted again for several years until a new growth of bush had come up, since experience showed that the use of the same cornfield two successive years would yield only a half crop the second year. This method of cultivation however, had two serious defects: not only was the greater part of the land thus always held idle, but also there eventually came a time when woody growth no longer came back to replace the original forests. Instead only perennial grasses would grow, and gradually the whole countryside was transformed into savannas. These savannas the Maya could not cultivate since they had no means of turning the sod, and they were thus obliged to go ever farther and farther from their homes in order to find suitable land for planting their corn. But the limit to which even this expedient was practicable had been reached at last. The cornfields now lay two, and even three days’ journey from the cities, and people were beginning to lose faith in deities who permitted living conditions to remain so intolerable, and who either could not, or would not make possible the cultivation of the savannas.
Holon Chan was not the only one whose eyes turned ever more anxiously toward the north, to Yucatan, where life was said to be so easy, and Yum Kax, Lord of the Harvests, always so propitious; and many a humble corn planter had stolen away with his family through the great northern forests to this new land, in spite of the stringent laws against such a procedure. Both priesthood and nobility were strongly opposed to this disintegrating movement, and oracle as well as law was being invoked to prevent the abandonment of the country. But, despite threats of divine wrath and the swifter punishment of men, for the death penalty had been exacted more than once for this very offense, a steady stream of people was pouring out of the Old Empire region, northward into Yucatan; it was whispered for example, that the priests of Itzamna at the Holy City of Palenque could scarcely muster enough temple servants to till the fields of the god himself. This news could not be repeated openly, but more and more people were coming to believe that the old land was accursed and that the only salvation of their race lay in a general exodus to the north. Indeed every one saw that if some way was not speedily found to cultivate the grasslands, the people would be starved into moving elsewhere.
Meanwhile the priests were holding forth every inducement for greater piety and religious zeal. It was said that the people were lax in their offerings, and the gods were offended. The sacrifices must be redoubled. And latterly, with the approaching accession of Holon Chan as True Man, the auguries and oracles had foretold that this event would usher in a new era of abundance and prosperity, the like of which had never been before. The boy, the priests widely circulated, was born on a lucky day, of which Yum Kax, Lord of the Harvests, was the patron, and the death of his older brother, far from being a calamity, had been a direct intervention of the gods in order that the chosen of Yum Kax should sit in the council chamber and rule over them. Thus was the Lord of the Harvests to be appeased, and thus would prosperity return once more to the people. High hopes therefore were entertained for his rule, and while in other happier days, Holon Chan might possibly have been permitted to renounce in favor of his uncle, the times were too troublous, and the future too uncertain thus deliberately to offend the Harvest God.
Of all these things the boy had been thinking as he sat on the temple summit, watching the shadows lengthen over the glistening white walls of the city. Finally with a sigh he jumped to his feet. The sun was setting behind the distant savannas, a great, glowing, red disk, as Holon Chan turned to enter the sanctuary of Itzamna to sacrifice to the god. A single aged white-robed priest squatted in the outer corridor guarding the sanctuary, but since the boy always had the right of entry because of his rank, the old man scarcely looked up from his meditations as Holon Chan drew aside the elaborately embroidered cotton curtain and passed within.
The sanctuary was dark save only for such fitful light as came from a brazier of burning incense and two small windows not more than eight inches square, one at either end of the long narrow room. As the curtain fell behind him, the boy stooped to a shallow platter by the door, selected from it a small, round ball of incense, the gum of the copal tree, painted a brilliant peacock blue for ceremonial use, and advanced to the brazier. In the half light, a wooden image some eight feet high could be distinguished standing on a stone platform against the back wall. It was in the form of an old man, with prominent Roman nose, toothless lower jaw, and piercing green eyes, made of two discs of highly polished jade which caught and shot back the flickering light. The head was surmounted by an elaborate headdress carved in the likeness of the Plumed Serpent, and the whole figure was brilliantly painted in red, blue, yellow, green, white and black. A necklace, breast-pendant, ear-plugs, anklets and wristlets of heavy, rich jade completed the costume of the image. Holon Chan placed his offerings on the brazier and prostrated himself before the image. However disinclined he might be to follow the path Itzamna had chosen for him by removing his older brother from the line of succession, it never entered the boy’s head to evade the responsibility thus thrust upon him. He came of an old and distinguished family which had ruled the state of Tikal for more than four centuries. From that distant ancestor of his, who had first led the people to their present home, down to his father, all had been brave men used to facing crises and shouldering responsibility, and this latest son of the Chan race had no other thought than to do likewise in the present emergency. And so he prayed long and earnestly for wisdom to meet the many problems of the future, and above all for some means of alleviating the terrible agricultural problems which were threatening the very existence of his people.
The prayer over, Holon Chan left the sanctuary and, nodding to its aged guardian in the outer corridor, he prepared to descend the pyramid. The swift twilight of the tropics had already dissolved into night. Above, the stars blazed forth in the cloudless sky; below, the darkness was picked out here and there with little glowing points of red, the cooking fires of his people, who were busily preparing for the great ceremony of his investiture, now but three days distant.
Carefully picking his way down the steep stairway, Holon Chan crossed the broad, paved plaza at its base, and ascending a low terrace, entered a long building of cut stone, which had been the home of his family for generations. It was a single story in height, more than two hundred feet long and three ranges of rooms in depth. These all had the typical Maya arched ceiling, were narrow and long, and lighted only by the exterior doorways and small, square windows about six feet above the floor. The largest room in the palace, a chamber sixty feet long, ten feet wide, and eighteen feet high, was entered directly through the central doorway. At one end was a raised stone platform with a wooden seat. This was without a back and the arms were carved to represent jaguar heads. Above there was a canopy of green featherwork. This was the council chamber of the state.
Through this chamber Holon Chan passed to the living quarters at the rear, and, clapping his hands, he summoned a slave to serve the evening meal to him as he sat cross-legged on the floor. Presently the slave returned bearing dishes of tortillas and black beans, a bush fowl, and a bowl containing an aromatic drink made of cacao. Holon Chan inquired for his uncle, and he was told that he was at the monastery of Itzamna. After eating, and rinsing out his mouth with water, a not-to-be-forgotten custom of gentlefolk, Holon Chan withdrew to his own room, and lying down on a bench covered with soft skins soon fell asleep.
Early the following morning, Holon Chan arose, and after a bath in a wooden tub, hollowed from a mahogany log, he dressed, but partook of no food, since custom decreed that he must fast throughout the period of his investiture. Thus he waited for his uncle to fetch him to the assembled priesthood of Itzamna. This first day of the induction ceremonies was to be given over exclusively to mental tests, quizzings by his uncle and the other priests of Itzamna, in the monastery of the god just behind his temple. It was proper for Holon Chan to appear before the priests without any emblem of rank, and presently when his uncle came to lead him thither, he was dressed as any other boy of his age, a simple breechclout encircling his loins, and leather sandals on his feet.
Of the many subjects Holon Chan was questioned about during that long day, we may only touch upon a few. First his uncle asked him to recite the complete ritual of the New Year’s feast, one of the most important ceremonies of the Maya year. Other old wiseheads questioned him as to the stars, when would the next eclipses of the sun and moon take place, when would Venus next appear as evening star? Clean sheets of fiber paper were set before him, pigments and brushes were brought in, and he was told to write the current date, giving the phases of the moon therefor, and the presiding deity. All these tests he went through creditably, and the old men nodded approval. Next a fowl was brought and the boy was told to kill it and read the omens from its entrails. Again he acquitted himself with credit, and the old priests were satisfied with his knowledge of this important part of the Maya ritual.
In conclusion his uncle again took the lead, and put searching questions to him as to the condition of the people—how many heads of families were there in the tribe, and how many man-loads of corn were required to support the average family for a year? With which cities he should strive to ally himself, and which to avoid? How migration to Yucatan could best be discouraged? When the boy replied it could neither be discouraged nor prevented unless the Harvest Lord permitted corn to be grown on the savannas, a few of the older men shook their heads, but the great majority of the priests signified their approval of this sage answer. After these tests he was led from the monastery back to the palace, and later his uncle informed him that the priests had adjudged him to be worthy and well qualified to be made the True Man of the state.
The second day was even more strenuous than the first. The day was devoted to numerous rites of purification, in which by sweatings and blood-lettings he was supposed to be purged of all sin and wickedness, and thus fitted for the high office he was about to assume.
Following this the priests led him to the Temple of Purification. Here, in an inner chamber, he removed his clothes and crawled, naked, into a low stone closet. A bowl of water stood at the back of this low cell, and presently the priests passed in through the small doorway five or six large, rounded, heated stones wrapped in leaves. The doorway was now closed by a slab of stone, and Holon Chan dropped these heated bowlders, one at a time, into the bowl of water. Each succeeding bowlder raised the temperature of the water, and soon clouds of vapor filled the cell. From time to time more hot stones were passed in and the boy thus kept the water boiling. Beads of sweat broke out over his body; he almost suffocated, but still he served the steaming bowl with heated stones, and still the temperature rose. Every pore streamed and he gasped for breath. When it seemed as though he could stand it no longer, the slab was suddenly removed, the vapor rushed out and he was left panting and faint from the heat and his hunger, and the first step toward ceremonial purification was over.
Next they gave him a violent emetic, which left him completely prostrated from weakness. With the characteristic stoicism of his race, however, he uttered no complaint, but presently gained sufficient strength to pass on to the next trial, a cruel and painful letting of blood. His uncle bade him put out his tongue and through the end of it, he thrust a sharp stone awl. Waiting priests caught the blood on little balls of cotton and these were borne off to the sanctuary of Itzamna as an earnest of his faith and purification. At sunset a small fiber cord with thorns caught in it every few inches was passed through the still open wound, cruelly lacerating the flesh, and fresh blood drawn to offer to the god in renewed proof of his constancy of purpose. That night Holon Chan was so exhausted that he slept without stirring, until awakened before dawn to prepare himself for the long day of meditation and prayer in the sanctuary of Itzamna which preceded the actual investiture at sunset.
Preparations for this ceremony had been going forward now for a long time. It has been told how Itzamna had indicated that the investiture of the new True Man must coincide with the unveiling of the great stone shaft which had been erected to commemorate the end of the current five-year period of the Maya Chronological Era. As much as a year before, this shaft had been quarried, transported to the Great Plaza of Tikal, set up there and a high fence of thatch built around it to conceal it from the people until the moment of its unveiling.
Ahcuitok Chan in consultation with the most learned astrologer priests of the state had carefully calculated what would be the nearest solar and lunar eclipses to the day of dedication (then still nearly a year ahead). Other astronomical phenomena important during the current five-year period, had been compiled, together with a record of the principal events of the period. These matters had been written down in the Maya hieroglyphic writing, on pieces of fiber paper coated with a sizing of fine white lime, which served as working drawings for the artisans who were to carve the shaft; and finally the likeness of Holon Chan himself, gorgeously appareled as he would be at the ceremony of investiture, had been laboriously carved on the front. This monument, which was to mark the ending of the current five-year period, 9.18.0.0.0. 11 Ahau 18 Mac of the Maya Era, was at last ready, and would be unveiled at the proper moment, namely the instant of sunset on the closing day of the period. This had to be so, since to the Maya, time was conceived and measured in terms of elapsed units (like our own astronomical time), and not until the final day of the period came to its end, that is at sunset on the last day, could the monument commemorating that period be formally dedicated thereto.
But now all was in readiness for the great festival, upon which, as has been noted, so many and such high hopes had been builded. For the past several days, people had been pouring into Tikal. From the farthest outlying villages men, women and children were moving toward the religious and governmental center of the state. The surrounding savannas were filled with temporary shelters of thatch, and booths had sprung up everywhere for the barter of tortillas, beans, squash, sapotes, cacao, bush meats, gourds, pottery, mats, featherwork, hides, cotton stuffs, and even beads and pendants of jade, the most highly prized of all materials by the Maya.
The Great Plaza of Tikal had been filling with people since midnight, eager to catch the first glimpse of their future ruler as he was being conducted at daybreak to the sanctuary of Itzamna for prayer and meditation. His learning tried and tested by the wise men of the state on the first day; his body purged of sin and wickedness by rites of purification, and his fortitude and earnestness of purpose established by his giving of blood to Itzamna on the second day, there remained only that he should cleanse his soul of any lurking grossness, by prayer and meditation, and he would then be ready for the most solemn moment of his life, his formal consecration as the True Man of his people.
After rising, Holon Chan bathed, and donned again the simple girdle worn by common folk, in token that he had not yet received the supreme rank, and passed into the council chamber. Here all the great dignitaries of the state, the high priests of the different Maya deities, the chieftains of the dependent towns and villages, the collectors of taxes, deputies, and other officials had assembled in gala costume—magnificent cloaks of featherwork, gorgeous panaches of plumes, mantles of deer hide, heavy necklaces, pendants, ear-plugs, wristlets and anklets of jade—each in his bravest display. Naked male slaves stood about the council chamber with lighted torches of fat pine in their hands, for the hour of dawn had not yet come, and these cast a fitful light over the company. Outside on the terrace, in front of the palace, the musicians were assembled with long, wooden drums, rattles and flageolets.
High on the topmost point of the roof of the sanctuary of Itzamna stood a priest scanning the eastern horizon for the first sign of the orb of day. As dawn approached, the multitude stirred faintly and with common consent all eyes turned to the portals of the palace. Slaves with short staves were seen to open a passage through the crowd and stand on either side to keep the way cleared. Suddenly a piercing cry falls from above. “Lo, the Lord of Day cometh.” The musicians strike up, and move in ordered rank down the terrace stairway and across the plaza. First come temple boys with brooms, sweeping the way, followed by others swinging braziers of incense from which clouds of heavy, black, aromatic smoke wreath upward. Next appear the temple chanters clad in white, singing an ode of welcome to the Lord of Day; next, a troop of the palace guard in quilted cotton armor, armed with stone-pointed javelins and shields of skin. Following these are the lords of the dependent towns and villages, and the higher civil officers of the state; these last, with their gorgeous cloaks of featherwork, furnishing the brightest spot of color in the procession. Next are the lower orders of the priesthood of Itzamna, a long file of white-robed figures moving slowly forward.
Now Ahcuitok Chan leaves the palace surrounded by the higher priestly dignitaries. He is magnificently dressed, a cloak of rich featherwork hanging from his shoulders and falling over the jaguar skin draped around his body. His jade necklace is a work of art, beautifully carved human heads hanging in front and back, and over each shoulder. Delicate, tendril-like feathers of the quetzal, the royal emblem, hang from a brilliantly painted wooden helmet carved to represent a serpent head, the patronymic of his family, Chan. Indeed he wears all the insignia of the True Man save only the Double-headed Ceremonial Bar which ancient practice decrees may only be borne by the True Man himself. Follows last the simply clad boy of seventeen in whose honor all have assembled.
The procession moves slowly across the plaza and ascends the steep stairway to the sanctuary of Itzamna above. The musicians, sweepers, incensers and chanters take positions on either side of the temple doorway on the summit of the pyramid, now bathed in the first rays of the rising sun. The soldiers form a double cordon on each side of the stairway from bottom to top, between which the rest of the procession passes, dividing at the top and arranging itself on either side of the doorway. Even Ahcuitok waits at the entrance for his nephew, and when the boy has at last reached the summit, he takes his hand and leads him within, followed only by the highest officers and priests.
The crowd now dispersed since nothing visible to the eye of the common folk would be going forward until the close of the afternoon, although within the sanctuary itself the ceremony would be continued all day. When the higher officers of the state had all assembled in the outer corridor of the temple, Ahcuitok Chan, still leading his nephew by the hand, approached the curtain guarding the sanctuary, and drew it aside, at the same time motioning the boy to enter. After Holon Chan had passed within, Ahcuitok Chan let the curtain fall behind him and seated himself on his haunches outside the doorway, all the others arranging themselves about the chamber in the same position.
Now followed a long and wearisome vigil both for those without the curtain and for the hungry tired boy within. Etiquette proscribed conversation lest it should interrupt the devotions of the suppliant in the sanctuary, and time hung heavy, as the hours dragged by.
All day long Holon Chan prayed to his father Itzamna in the semi-obscurity of the holy place, leaving his orisons only long enough to replenish the brazier with little balls of incense or quench his thirst from a bowl of water by the door. He had now fasted so long that he was light-headed, and it seemed to him that at times the wooden image of the god smiled down upon him, even answered his prayers for guidance and gave him counsel; at least so he told his uncle when the latter came to fetch him for the investiture an hour before sunset. But this one was a wise old man, well acquainted with the frailty of the flesh and the hallucinations born of an empty stomach, and he only nodded wisely, and did not press for further particulars.
In the outer corridor all was astir for the final act of the great drama. As Holon Chan stepped out of the sanctuary all prostrated themselves in obeisance. A priest now stepped forward, and painted his legs, arms and torso with a bright red pigment, encircling his eyes with a heavy band of the same color, and adding a large red daub to each cheek. His plain breechclout was now removed, and a heavily embroidered one wound around his loins instead. Next anklets and wristlets of jade were fastened around his ankles and wrists, and a heavy collar of the same material hung about his neck. This was richly embellished with four large medallions of jade, one in front, one behind, and one over each shoulder, beautifully carved to represent the human face; a fringe of smaller jade heads hung from the collar. Square jade ear-plugs were fitted into the lobes of his ears, and a jade ring slipped on his finger. These were, in truth, the state jewels; precious material gathered by succeeding generations of True Men to adorn their own persons.
A magnificent jaguar skin, tawny orange-red dappled with rosettes of black, was hung from his shoulders, the long tail dragging on the ground. Finally the serpent crown was placed upon his head. This was an ornate affair of cedar carved to represent the head of a snake with widely distended mouth. It was painted a brilliant green, the mouth being red; the eyes were formed by two pieces of highly polished, jet-black obsidian, the teeth being inset pieces of white shell. From the head of the snake rose a shower of quetzal plumes, the tail feathers of an hundred of these rare tropical birds, obtained with infinite hardships from the cold mountain ranges far to the South. These delicate tendrils of plumage floated down behind the boy, and as the evening breeze caught them, swirled around him, enveloping his body in a mist of translucent green.
The hour of sunset was at last drawing near. The priest on the roof of the temple above shouted down a warning that the Lord of the Day was nearing the horizon. The Great Plaza and its surrounding terraces had, in the meantime, filled with people; every pyramid-stairway and summit thronged with spectators. A body of priests had taken positions by the thatched fence around the monument, ready to fell it at the instant of sunset. All the officers of state and the priests, including Ahcuitok Chan, indeed all save only Holon Chan himself passed out of the temple, and arranged themselves on either side of the doorway. Before Ahcuitok Chan, stood two priests supporting a brilliantly painted wooden staff; one end carved to represent the Sun God, the other end, the Rain God, the whole shaft being hung with green feathers. This was the Double-headed Ceremonial Bar, the emblem of supreme authority of the state, only to be carried by the True Man. Throughout his regency even Ahcuitok Chan had never used this insignia of the highest office.
The sun was now all but touching the horizon; the watcher above uttered a piercing cry, and the multitude below stiffened to attention. Sixty silent seconds passed and then the watching priest chanted: “Lo, the Lord of Day passeth.” Suddenly from the temple doorway into the full radiance of the setting sun, now gilding the brilliant company gathered on the pyramid’s summit, stepped the new ruler, resplendent in the flashing green of jade against his crimson body, his cloak of glossy jaguar skin gleaming in the sun, his form swathed in a shimmering mist of green, the swirling tendrils of quetzal hanging from his headdress.
A mighty roar of acclaim loosed itself from the spectators below. The drums on the summit pealed a roll of welcome. At the same instant the fence of thatch around the monument was beaten to the ground; the sun, striking at last fair upon its front, made glow every detail of carving. From the True Man above, to his exact counterpart sculptured on the front of the newly unveiled monument below, every eye turned and turned again. The mighty cheer continued. The chosen of Itzamna and Yum Kax, he who would bring back fertility to their sterile fields, was at last proclaimed ruler. Ahcuitok Chan took the Ceremonial Bar from the waiting priests and, advancing to his nephew, placed it horizontally in his outstretched arms: “Hail, Ah Holon Chan, son of Ahmeket Chan! I invest thee with the rank of True Man of Tikal, and may the Great Itzamna grant thee long life, and to thy people prosperity everlasting!”
Ah Holon Chan, no longer a boy, and now entitled to a man’s designation (the male prefix Ah) advanced to the edge of the pyramid and, raising the Ceremonial Bar, signaled for silence. A profound hush fell upon the multitude.
“Oh People of my blood, my single purpose, my single thought from this moment henceforth till the Father of Heaven, Great Itzamna, calls me hence, shall be your welfare. May the Lord of Life guide me through the perils which beset our race, and endow me with wisdom to rule you justly and well, and above all to find that way which once again will bring prosperity and abundance to our failing fields. Oh People of my blood, accept this my solemn vow of consecration to your service.”
The sun had set, a rosy afterglow enveloped the boy in a haze of mysterious light. It seemed, to the breathless thousands in the plaza below, as though the Lord of Life were actually infusing the new ruler with that wisdom for which he had so earnestly prayed. Profound silence reigned. Swiftly the twilight fell. A few stars began to twinkle through the sky. At last in the gathering gloom the boy was seen to turn and pass within the temple. And then the multitude began to melt away until the court was empty....
SYLVANUS G. MORLEY
The Toltec Architect of Chichen Itza
The battle is over, the once glorious Chichen Itza has fallen and all because of the love of a woman. Hunac-eel, the king of Mayapan, the conqueror, is being borne into the ruined city. There are no shouts of welcome, no crowds gathered on the tops of such buildings as have escaped destruction. Many of the former citizens have been killed, others are held prisoners, later to be enslaved, and still others have fled far to the southwards to find a resting place in Peten Itza.
Chac-xib-chac, the king of Chichen Itza, had fallen on the field of battle, fighting for his bride. She was also of noble lineage and it was she whom Hunac-eel had dared to desire, although she was the bride of his friend and ally in the famous League of Mayapan which now was to be disrupted after an existence of two hundred years.
The wedding of Chac-xib-chac and Tibil had been marked by the pomp and luxury customary in royal marriages of the Mayas. There had been games and dancing, feasting and song. The kings of Mayapan, Uxmal, Izamal and the other kingdoms of Yucatan, had been present. Chichen was in gala dress. The festivities were at their height when, without warning, Hunac-eel and his followers from Mayapan rushed up the broad but steep stairway of the royal residence and burst into the very chamber of Chac-xib-chac and his bride. His retainers, worn out by too much feasting, had made but a feeble resistance. Hunac-eel fled with the reluctant bride to his home at Mayapan.
There followed a long and devastating war. Chac-xib-chac had been able to induce all the surrounding kingdoms except that of the Xius to join his forces. The Xius alone remained neutral. Hunac-eel, on seeing the hosts against him, had called to his aid a body of Mexican warriors who happened to be in Tabasco. The war raged for many years. Izamal was conquered, and one after another of the famous cities fell into the power of Hunac-eel and his foreign allies. Finally he attacked Chichen itself, killed Chac-xib-chac, and, aided by the novel machines of war of the Mexicans, sacked the city.
And now, the conqueror was making his triumphal entry. His son, also the son of Tibil, accompanied him, a youth just arriving at manhood. There was also in the train of Hunac-eel a young Mexican named Pantemitl. Pantemitl had been trained as a warrior, but his activities had taken a more peaceful turn. He had had a minor part in the erection of the great Temple of the Sun, at Teotihuacan in his homeland. Hunac-eel had recognized the young man’s abilities as an artist and architect; he was just such a man as Hunac-eel needed in order to carry out his plan of building a greater and more glorious Chichen.
Hunac-eel soon returned to Mayapan, leaving behind him Taxcal, his son, and installing a Governor to rule the city.
Taxcal and Pantemitl, the young architect, soon became the greatest of friends. Pantemitl was engaged in building a wonderful temple, erected on a high pyramid, with stairways on the four sides. He had brought with him the ideas of his country which were new to Yucatan. He had carvings of the feathered serpent made for the entrance to the temple and for one of the great stone stairways. The people of Chichen marveled at the art of the foreign country which was blossoming in their city.
Among the inhabitants, of whom many were serving as slaves to the usurpers, was a worker in jade. The beauty of his carvings had brought him renown. His craftsmanship was unequalled in all the country. It was he who was called upon to furnish all the head and breast ornaments and beads, for the regalia of those who impersonated the gods of the Mayas in the festivals which came every twenty days. With his daughter the old jade worker lived in a thatched hut on the outskirts of the city. The girl was beautiful. Her frame was small, and she had bright brown eyes with features sharp and finely chiselled. There was a subtle refinement about her which is common even to-day to all Maya women, especially when they are young. Nicte, the Flower, was a dutiful daughter and when she was not grinding maize she liked to spend her time sharpening the stone tools, and collecting the reeds needed by her father in his jade work. Like the other women, she took little part in the great religious spectacles performed so frequently in the temples. And now more than ever her father kept her at home, for he feared lest by chance she be selected as an offering to the new gods, introduced by the Toltecs who had come to the city in the armies of Hunac-eel. However her beauty attracted the attention of Pantemitl when he came to visit her father, who was making the jade and obsidian eyes for the many figures of the feathered serpent set up by the young artist.
Pantemitl was about to complete a wonderful Ball Court at Chichen, for the game of tlachtli which formed a part of the religious life of the Mexicans. The people of Chichen looked with favor at the introduction of this game into their city, as they were fond of spectacles. The court consisted of two massive and parallel walls of masonry. Near the top and at the center of each wall there projected a stone ring which was carved with the feathered serpent design. But the court itself was a very small part of the whole undertaking. There were two beautiful temples at either end, and the most wonderful of all buildings on the top and at the end of one of the walls. The outside was decorated with friezes of tigers alternating with shields. The portico of the building was borne by two serpent columns with a stone altar between, consisting of fifteen carved and painted human figures, supporting in their upturned hands a flat stone as a table. The stone jambs of the doorway were carved with warriors and the carved wooden lintel had the Sun God upon it. Inside the temple itself Pantemitl painted the scenes of the battles of Hunac-eel and his enemies. He introduced into this fresco also many scenes of domestic life; he had even dared to paint in women and the very house of Nicte. This was sacrilegious according to the ideas of Taxcal who believed that women should not be represented in a temple of the gods, as they had no part to play in the religion of his fathers.
Now Taxcal, too, had seen Nicte and had begun to covet her. His friendship for Pantemitl had given place to rivalry and bitter enmity. The quarrel had reached the ears of the Governor of Chichen who was forced to take cognizance of it as it was interfering with the completion of the architectural work. The Governor’s position was difficult. He feared the wrath of the king and yet he hesitated to take the side of Taxcal as the people had made Pantemitl, the Toltec, a hero on account of the part he was playing in rebuilding their city. Besides, the Governor had learned that Hunac-eel was being surrounded in his city by the Cocomes, descendants of the Itzas themselves. As these people were conquering everything before them, perhaps Hunac-eel was no longer to be feared.
The decision of the Governor was to let the gods solve the outcome of the quarrel. He ordered the two rivals to play the first game of tlachtli in the inauguration of the new court. The gods of the Ball Court would determine the victory; their solution would be a just one. It was decided, therefore, that the winner of the game could claim the jade worker’s daughter as his prize. The other should be given to the gods, his heart cut out and offered to their images. This practice, so common in Mexico, was comparatively unknown in Yucatan. Here was a chance, thought the Governor, of providing a worthy sacrifice to the new gods.
Each youth eagerly accepted the wager of gaming for their gods and Nicte. As for Nicte, she was virtually a slave, her choice in the matter played no part. And yet she was inclined strongly toward the prince, a man of her own race, as against Pantemitl, the foreigner.
The day dawned for the inauguration of the Ball Court. News had gone out of the unusual circumstances connected with the first game. People were coming from all the surrounding towns, even from Itzamal, many leagues distant. The usual stakes were mantles, gold, and jade ornaments, but sometimes men played themselves into slavery. To-day the loser is to give his very life. The crowd line the top of the massive walls, the Governor and his suite sit in the portico of the Temple of the Tigers, other dignitaries fill the two small temples at either end. Sacrifices are made to the gods of the Ball Court in these three temples. There are songs and dances in the court itself, by gayly dressed youths. Priests in the superb regalia of their offices are entering the enclosure in solemn procession. Prayers are offered and the ball is thrown about the court four times in the direction of the four points of the compass.
The two young men, each with five friends as fellow players, enter the court. A hush falls on the multitude, followed by a murmur of admiration when they see the stalwart youths, their bodies glistening with paint, and their breechclouts covered with gold and jade ornaments. Pantemitl is the favorite in the betting, as he it is who has caused Chichen to rise again as a city second to none in the whole peninsula. Taxcal and his players have the rubber ball, bouncing it steadily down the court towards the ring of their adversaries.
The ball hovers a moment at the hole but falls back again. It lands squarely on the hip of Pantemitl, who leaps high into the air to receive it. He and his fellow players have had long practice with the game in Mexico and this fact now begins to show itself. Pantemitl bounces the ball to a companion, and from one to the other it quickly passes until he finally receives it again, directly in front of the ring of his opponents. With great dexterity he throws it squarely through the hole and the game is ended.
According to the rules, the mantles of the spectators belonged to the victor but on this occasion none rushed from the court. All were preoccupied with the tragic ending of the game. For Taxcal had fallen exhausted at the feet of Pantemitl who raised him and carried him to the Tiger Temple. Here the Governor received them. Taxcal’s father was no longer to be feared, as word had come that he had been driven out of his city by the Cocomes. By sacrificing the son of Hunac-eel the Governor realizes that he will curry favor with the new conquerors of Mayapan.
The Governor decides, therefore, to have the sacrifice at once. Priests are dispatched to prepare for the ceremony in the portico of the famous Pyramid Temple, hardly a stone’s throw from the Ball Court. The sacrificial stone is ready to receive its offering, and Taxcal is a youth without a blemish, as demanded by the gods. Resistless, he allows himself to be arrayed in the magnificent robes of sacrifice. He is regaled with incense from vases of burning copal, and is almost buried in flowers. Pages follow him in the procession of priests as they wind their way up the hundred steps of the pyramid. According to Mexican custom, believed to be the impersonation of a god, he is treated with all possible honor and respect.
At the top of the staircase, relinquishing his flowers and his mantles, he is received by six priests with locks matted with the blood of previous victims, their ears hanging in long strips where they have been cut as acts of penance. Led to the sacrificial stone, he is thrown on his back upon it. Five priests hold his arms and legs while the sixth, clad in a scarlet mantle, dexterously opens his breast with the famous sacrificial knife, its wooden handle carved with the intertwined bodies of two serpents. Inserting his hand into the wound, he tears out the palpitating heart. Holding it first toward the setting sun, he casts it at the feet of the image of the god to whom the temple is dedicated.
When Pantemitl next made his way to the jade maker’s hut he heard from a distance singing and wailing, and was surprised to see crowds of people gathered. Presently he learned with horror that his beloved Nicte had offered herself for sacrifice. She had announced that she too would die, a sacrifice to the gods, in the sacred well of the Itzas.
Priests were already preparing the ceremonies. The sixty days of fasting had begun. Gifts and incense were brought and Nicte, lying on her couch, was being dressed in white robes and garlanded with flowers. In despair and contrition, Pantemitl spent the time in his Tiger Temple, painting over the door of the frescoed chamber the scene of the sacrifice of his rival. In the chamber behind the temple he carved scenes of warriors and civilians paying homage to the God of the Feathered Serpent. These he hoped would find favor with the gods and free him from his unhappy feelings.
The Cenote of Sacrifice, a huge natural well, was situated only a short distance from the temple which had been the scene of the death of Taxcal. Into the cenote the most precious possessions of the people were thrown as offerings to the gods. Virgins were considered especially welcome to the gods and the dark waters, three score feet from the surface, held many victims.
At the break of the sixtieth day, the procession starts from the house of the jade cutter. Numberless bowls of copal incense, incrusted with amulets, are burned, carved wooden staffs, with heads made of stone mosaics or covered with gold masks, are being carried by the priests, all to be thrown into the dark waters. The maiden herself is dressed in finely woven textiles, heavily ornamented with golden bells and jade beads. She wears on her breast a gold plaque on which the sacrifice of her lover is depicted. Nicte is to die for the love of Taxcal, but to all the others it is an act of supreme devotion to the gods.
The procession winds its way to the Great Pyramid and from there a broad avenue, lined with images, leads to the Cenote of Sacrifice. As the band of worshipers are encircling the holy well, the priests with the maiden take their places in the small temple directly at the brink. More incense is burned and the precious offerings are thrown into the water, with prayers and songs in praise of the gods of the cenote. In the silence which follows, the main actors reach the roof of the temple whence, in a few moments, the maiden is cast into the depths beneath. As the ripples widen out to the edges of the great pool, prayers are chanted supplicating the gods to receive graciously the offering....
Worn out with work and with sorrow, Pantemitl could stand the strain no longer, and he sickened and died. Just before his death he completed a small replica of the Pyramid Temple planned to receive the ashes of the poor queen, the mother of Taxcal, Tibil, who had requested that she be buried in the city of her fathers.
The death of Pantemitl cast the city into mourning. His great achievements had made of him a hero. His masterpiece, the Pyramid Tomb, was completed, and the people demanded that this beautiful temple with its crypt be made the tomb of its architect. Offerings from all covered the pyre on which his body was burned. His last wish was that the ashes of Taxcal should be mingled with his.... The final rite is about to begin. A beautiful alabaster jar, one of the most precious possessions of the city, a gift from a visiting monarch from a distant country, is carried in the procession of priests to the top of the Pyramid Tomb. It holds the ashes of Pantemitl and of Taxcal. Reverently the vase, surrounded by offerings of jade, is lowered from the floor of the temple through the stone-lined shaft until it rests in the natural chamber below the mound.
ALFRED M. TOZZER
Wixi of the Shellmound People
ON THE BEACH
“Here’s another! Here’s another! Here’s another!”
It is the excited voice of a naked, gesticulating youngster, little more than three years old, who is pointing to a tiny hole in the smooth surface of the tide beach at his feet.
“Yes, yes, child, I am coming,” is the reply, in soft, affectionate tones, by a woman a few steps away.
“But I am hungry, I am hungry,” comes the insistent, half-petulant voice.
“Well, you can’t have any clams now, you know. Mark the one you have and run along to find some more. Soon we shall go home.”
At this the child stoops unsteadily and with a rough, pointed splinter of bone draws a circle around the hole, then patters away along the wet beach.
Presently his mother comes forward, with a rough basket in one hand and a short, stout, pointed stick in the other. She is barefooted and bareheaded. Her only garment is a sort of skirt made of loose bark strands, reaching from the waist to the knees. Her heavy, glistening, black hair is fastened in two locks hanging down in front, partially covering her breasts. Her complexion, a shade darker than that of the child, is the color of a smoked, reddish brick or of a certain shade of Oriental bronze. Scarcely more than twenty years old, she has a fine, comely figure.
Having reached the spot indicated by the child, the young woman sets the basket down. Then, grasping the stick with both hands, she drives it into the firm beach mud and with a single, deft, prying motion brings to the surface a good-sized clam. She picks it up, throws it into the partly filled basket, and proceeds a few steps to where the child is calling her anew.
Similar scenes are being enacted on every hand. Women and children, numbering close to one hundred in all, are scattered along the beach for nearly half a mile; a hundred yards or so beyond there is another, somewhat smaller group. In both groups the women and older children are busy with the digging-stick, while the younger children run about over the beach locating the clams. Presently there is a curious splash near the edge of the receding waters. The splash is repeated once or twice and with it a chorus of voices rings out.
“Wixi! Wixi!” (Stingaree! Stingaree!)
A dozen or so half-grown children come running from different directions, all shouting vehemently, “He’s mine! He’s mine! I saw him first! I saw him first!”
There is nothing actually to be seen, except perhaps a small area immediately off shore where the water is unusually muddy. Into the water the children rush, keeping clear of the roiled spot, and when ranged partly around it on the sea side, they begin to poke into it with their sticks. Very soon there is another violent splash and a large, monstrous looking creature is seen to lift itself almost bodily out of the shallow water.
“Wixi! Wixi! We’ve got you!” shouts the chorus. “We’ve got you!”
The steadily receding water soon reveals the cause of the excitement—an extra large eagle ray, a kind of flat-fish, in outline something like an immense butterfly, plus a long whip-like tail, near the root of which appears a sharply-pronged, bony excrescence which can inflict a severe wound. Wixi is an ugly fellow, and as he lies there in two or three inches of water, flopping spasmodically, lashing his tail viciously from side to side, the children plant their sticks firmly in the ground, making a sort of fence around him, while they stand back out of reach. But, the moment the monster subsides, all pound and punch with their sticks, screaming and carrying on like a pack of fighting dogs. Finally, the oldest of the children, a girl of ten or eleven, manages to insert her digging-stick in the creature’s eye. A few violent lashings, and the ray lies still.
The girl remains leaning on the stick, holding the great fish firmly transfixed. The other children fall over each other in a scramble to get near it. All seek to pierce the dead body with their sticks and to pull it away. But their implements are too weak and dull. Some grasp with their fingers at the slimy thing, but to no avail. The girl stands unmoved.
In their rage some of the children suddenly turn upon her. In an effort to defend herself, she lets go her stick, and at the same moment the big ray is pulled away, but not by any of the original claimants. During the tumult a boy of thirteen or fourteen had approached unnoticed from the larger group of clam gatherers, and had wound the tail of the ray two or three times around his hand. Now when the girl’s hold on the stick is released, he jerks the ray away and starts to run as fast as his legs can carry him toward his own people, the body of the big fish dragging behind him over the slippery mud.
There is a tremendous uproar. Some of the children attempt to follow, but they are soon outdistanced. The girl who killed the ray, finally realizing what has happened, bursts out: “You took my wixi! You took my wixi! You—wixi! You—!” Her voice chokes with sobs. But her epithet is taken up by a chorus of voices in both groups of clam diggers, those of Kawina and those of Akalan: “You wixi! You wixi!”
But the boy pays no heed. When he reaches the shore proper, he winds the ray’s tail a few more times around his hand, swings the immense body over his shoulders, and disappears among the marsh weeds in the direction of his home.
Wixi! Wixi! Thus the boy is nicknamed for life.
AT BREAKFAST
It is still early morning on San Francisco Bay. The tide is going out, and the sun, just topping the eastern hills, is reflected in the placid waters as in a great oval mirror. On the horizon beyond the expanse of the waters of the bay, the sunlight glitters on the snowy summit of Mt. Hamilton; to the left, looms the hazy outline of Mt. Diablo; and to the right, glorious in the clear sunlight, stands green-clad Mt. Tamalpais, guarding the entrance to the broad channel heading north into San Pablo Bay. The surface of the channel is slightly choppy, because here passes out to sea the collected volume of the great rivers that drain the interior mountains and valleys. The shore of the bay is low and marshy, lying in sweeping curves. Along these curves faint blue smokes rise at intervals against the shadowy background of the hills. These smokes mark settlements, of which there are along the entire bay shore about two hundred, strung like pearls on a necklace.
In one of the curving arms of the bay, smoke ascends from a grayish spot in the marshland, some three hundred yards back of the shore line. It is the village of Kawina. Four miles farther east, directly on the water front, lies the village of Akalan. Beyond that the shore line turns, and other settlements hug the shore at every point where a fresh water streamlet empties into the bay.
The clam diggers are straggling along the beach toward home. A number of young men from Akalan have gone to the head of the cove a few rods away. They are engaged in dragging a dozen or more curiously shaped bundles of dried tule-rushes down the muddy slope to the tide channel, which drains the extensive marshes ranging along the entire east base of the potrero. When the clam gatherers left home the channel was dry, but the tide already is fast returning and the breakfast bringers have to be assisted across.
It is a lively, not to say noisy, occasion. The older children glide down the slippery mud into the water, and flounder across amidst laughter and shouting. Only the women with their baskets, and the smaller children cross by ferry; for these tule bundles are boats or, rather, floats. Some of them carry only from four to six persons, others as many as fifteen. The ferrying proceeds rather slowly, to the lively chatter of the women. The children have run on ahead, up the grassy incline to the village.
The grass suddenly ceases at the foot of a blackish eminence on which the village stands. The eminence is about twenty feet high and of an irregular contour, the slope in places being gradual, in others steep, while the top is roughly flattened. On approaching nearer, the whole mound-like structure appears to be composed of the shells of clams, mussels, and oysters. There is an occasional brightly colored abalone shell. Here and there are scattered pairs of deer antlers, and the wing bones of ducks, geese, and other birds with feathers still attached. Crushed or broken bones of various animals lie everywhere. And there are fish bones. Flies are swarming about; the odor is far from enticing. Closer inspection would reveal the presence of ashes and charcoal, as well as a goodly number of bowlders and pebbles of crackly surface. The impression is that of a huge ash pile or refuse heap. And yet on top of it all stands the village!
The village is an irregularly grouped cluster of about thirty hive-shaped huts, with openings facing either south or east. The huts themselves are constructed on a framework of slender poles set in circles from twelve to sixteen feet in diameter, the top ends being bent together and intertwined some eight or nine feet above the ground. Over this is placed a layer of twigs and grass, and this again is covered with earth and sod. Only the top is left open for the exit of smoke. This morning, however, the fires are out in front of the doors, each family having its own.
A number of fair-sized bowlders form a ring around the edge of the dying embers. Ranged about each of these circles, within reaching distance, are seated the members of the family. Even the older men, who do not condescend often to eat with the women and children, are present. They are mostly grizzled, ill-kempt, sluggish looking fellows, who have barely had time to rub the sleep out of their eyes. Through the rainy winter months they have been comparatively inactive, the women have been doing the work; but now it is April and the warmth of spring is bringing them out of their hibernation. Soon they will be off for the entire summer, and fall to leading an active life among the hills where food is not so easily obtained as it is on the bay shore, though it can be had in greater variety if all hands, including the men, make the effort.
The clams brought in from the beach are being distributed, and the older folk place them, just as they are, on the hot rocks around the fire. The smaller children watch intently and yet uneasily, having repeatedly been scolded for poking their fingers against the sizzling shellfish lying nearest on the rocks. Suddenly some of the clams open up, ready to eat. They have been cooked in the most admirable fashion in their own juice. In the group around the fire, next to one of the rear huts, are seated a very old man, a middle-aged woman, two children, and a half-grown boy. It is the boy Wixi, who has just proposed to his mother to boil some of the fish.
“Boiled fish! Boiled fish! Who ever heard of boiled fish?” blurts out the old man in a cracked voice. He is blind, or nearly so, judging from his dull, deeply sunken eyes. His hair, as well as his straggly beard, is white, and his face and neck are seamed and wrinkly, suggestive of tanned alligator skin. His body is thin and frail, his hands shaking.
“Well, fish _could_ be boiled,” Wixi retorts. “You boil acorn meal and you boil buckeye meal and you boil lots of things. Why couldn’t you boil fish?”
“Why couldn’t you boil fish? Why couldn’t you boil fish?” the old man screams, his whole frame trembling. “You couldn’t boil fish because—because nobody ever did such a thing! Chakalli didn’t tell us to boil fish.”
This sort of dispute has been an almost daily occurrence for many moons, since the time of the boy’s initiation ceremony, when he began to assume the responsibilities of manhood. His father, as Wixi would say, is away. A shaman, he had failed to cure the poisoned wound of a certain chief, and he had been quietly waylaid on the trail. Since then, his family had had to suffer partial disgrace.
That was some years ago, and the boy, thrown thus early upon his own resources, had learned through stress of circumstances to practice a number of new devices. He discovered that by suspending a grass mat in a vertical position by means of an upright stick to serve as a support, he was able alone to sail his tule float speedily before the wind. Other young men would have copied his device, only they had elders in direct authority and were prevented. But Wixi, being already something of an outcast in the village, was suffered to do much as he pleased, his feeble old grandfather being in no position to check him.
On this occasion, Wixi, instead of arguing with the old man, dips his hands quickly into a basket standing in a slight hollow, well away from the fire, and brings out four or five small rocks dripping with water. He throws them to one side, and by means of a couple of sticks, pulls several rocks out of the fire and drops them, one by one, into the basket, half full of water. There is a momentary splutter and rise of steam, and then the water in the basket begins to boil. Wixi places several chunks of the stingaree in the boiling water, and in a short time is eating boiled fish.
DRAKE PASSES
The fires have flashed more than once from mountain to mountain and have been answered not only by Akalan, but by every one of the two hundred settlements on the bay shore. The principal event, one for which no predetermined signal existed, was the passage along the California coast of the _Golden Hind_, early in the summer of 1579. The great captain, Sir Francis Drake, did not see the Golden Gate because of the heavy fog, but the watchers on Mt. Tamalpais saw his ship and did their duty as best they knew. Before evening of that day, every dweller on the bay shore (those on the coast could see for themselves) understood that Wasaka, the Eagle who brought the original fire to the Mutsun people while they yet lived in the far North, had passed by.
Three or four weeks later, when the vessel returned from the North, and was drawn ashore for repairs within the shelter of Point Reyes, the signals were revised as a result of messages brought to Tamalpais by runners from the Tamalaños, otherwise known as the “peaked-house” people, who lived directly at Drake’s landing place. This time the Mutsunes were informed that it was not Wasaka, but the great Chakalli himself. Chakalli, the “Man Above,” or the “Great One Above,” was much in their thoughts, but to have him visit was an event foreboding ill. Nearly every one wished to flee from his presence. As it turned out, the visitor conducted himself peaceably and in due course went away, leaving few of the Mutsunes any the wiser.
Drake’s Bay, as it happened, lay in the country of the Miwok people, who spoke a different tongue from the Mutsunes and who, besides, were ordinarily jealous of their territorial rights. But a few of the Mutsunes had gone around by sea, Wixi among them. Wixi was the only one from Akalan who had gone, and the adventure proved a turning point in his life. He came back somewhat of a hero, at least in the eyes of those of his own age, the older men holding aloof. Wixi had learned many wonderful things during his few days’ sojourn with the bearded white men, among them that other people used sails to drive their boats. If any doubted the story that he told, he had but to exhibit the proofs: a small mirror, a couple of strings of colored glass beads, a square of red cloth, and, above all, a truly marvelous thing, a knife of metal. These things were given Wixi by the great captain himself, in the general exchange of presents that followed one of the Indian dancing ceremonies that we read of in Drake’s own log book.
IN THE COUNCIL LODGE
In early manhood Wixi had become fairly conscious of his own strength and skill, as well as of his power to direct and improve the life of his people. He had decided, however, to wait his time. The old men would slowly give way or would “disappear.” Why quarrel? Besides, it was not his nature to hurry. His patience was shown in still another way, namely, by the fact that he was not yet married. According to custom his parents should have chosen and purchased a wife for him; but, having no parents, or at least only a mother who accepted his assistance and submitted to his authority, the matter was left largely to himself. He had indeed performed the acts that entitled him to a wife. That is, he had carried presents of food, and skins for clothing to the door of the girl he had chosen, and she had silently accepted them. Still he did not bring her home, because she was not acceptable in his own village, because she belonged to the neighboring village of Kawina. She was none other than the girl to whom he owed his name, the girl from whom he had wrested the stingaree.
Now the people of Kawina were not friends of the people of Akalan. Nevertheless, Wixi had met Mahúdah again and again, both on the beach and in the hill country, and, somehow, they had settled their quarrel and were friends.
Wixi had waited and yet, contrary to his expectations, the sentiment of his village people continued to harden against him. True, more and more power and authority fell to him, but the stern opposition of the old men was doing its work. Admired though he was by the younger generation, none dared to stand by him openly. He was constantly meeting the old men in council and they listened respectfully enough to his words, but stood solidly against him whenever he suggested departure from the ways of old.
*       *       *       *       *
One night in the council lodge at Akalan, the small blaze in the centre reveals Wixi and about a dozen of the old men looking unusually stern and solemn. The pipe is passing around the circle and the War Chief—the youngest man present, barring Wixi—is stating the purpose of the meeting.
“For many winters,” he is saying, his eyes averted to the roof, “for many winters we have all been troubled about the future of our tribe. We have not known what to do. The white man has come to the land. We thought first he was Wasaka, and later that he was Chakalli. But he is instead a powerful enemy. He has done us no harm. That is good. He is killing our enemies, the Longhairs beyond the Mutsun waters to the South. That is good, too. He has taken away some of our neighbors, the Miwok. And that also is good. But some day, when the clouds float high in the sky, he will discover the way into the Mutsun waters and then why should he not kill and enslave us also?”
There is a nodding of grave heads all around and some exchange of furtive glances, in part directed toward Wixi, who is seated alone opposite the main group of elders.
“In these circumstances,” the speaker continues, this time looking sharply in the direction of a very old man central in the group, “in these circumstances some of us have thought it well to have Kakari, our Peace Chief, tell us the ancient story of our people, so that together we may judge from past experience what is best for the future.”
Every one present, including Wixi, nods his head, and the word is taken up slowly and deliberately by the feeble old man, Kakari, the Peace Chief.
“The story of the Mutsunes,” the old man begins, “is long. It would take many nights to tell it all. I shall tell only two or three things that happened and which will show us what the ‘Great Ones Above’ expect us to do.”
“Yes, yes, what they expect us to do,” echo the hearers.
“Long ago,” the old man continues, “when the Mutsun people first came to this water, they were poor. They came on foot from the far North. They had no boats and they had no bow and arrow. Wasaka had brought them fire and they had the digging-stick. That was all. Our people first went to live at Old-Old Akalan. At that time the place was not an island, it was a part of our own long Mutsun hill that shelters us here on the west. And while they lived there Chakalli came. He came from the ‘Great Ones Above’ and he brought with him the boat and the bow and arrow and the pipe and many other things. These he gave to the Mutsunes and he showed them also how they were to be used. But later, Coyote came along and told them how to make different ones and to use them differently. That made Chakalli angry and he struck at Old-Old Akalan with his digging-stick, the lightning, and, missing the village, knocked a big piece out of the hill beside it. This shook the ground and when the piece, struck off the hill, fell into the Mutsun water, over where it runs out to the big sea, the Mutsun water came up high and ran through the hole made in our hill, and Old-Old Akalan became an island. The piece knocked out of the hill also became an island, Mutsun Island, where our young men rest and wait for the tide when they go out to the big sea after abalones. Then Chakalli went away, but he did not go back to the ‘Great Ones Above,’ for every now and then the earth shakes and we know that somebody else has disobeyed instructions.”
Here old Kakari paused. It was becoming plain to Wixi why the meeting had been called. But there was more for him to hear.
“After Chakalli went away,” went on Kakari, “the Mutsun people had to move. The beach around the small island was not large enough to give them the clams they needed. Moreover, the driftwood for the fire would not lodge near the village as before. It all went through the new channel made by Chakalli, and across to where now live our neighbors the Earth People at Kawina. Some of it came up here. Therefore the Peace Chief of that day—Walen was his name—advised the people to move across to Kawina, but he himself remained with the ‘Old People’ at Old-Old Akalan (i. e., he died), and with him were left all the things that Chakalli had brought. To-morrow we shall sail over to Old-Old Akalan to see them.
“The Mutsunes had made other boats, as well as bows, arrows, and everything, all copied after those brought by Chakalli. And they had no difficulty in sailing across the water to Kawina.
“All went well for a long time at Kawina. Then trouble came once more. Coyote had brought a basket from the North, which he gave to the young women of the Miwok people over across the water at Tamalpais. He told them to boil food in it. They did so and liked it. Later on, the Miwok people told some of the young men from Kawina, who were over there looking for wood for new bows. Chakalli must have heard about it all, for he struck the earth a fierce blow over near where the bearded men came with the great white-winged ship. Chakalli’s blow made a long, deep rent in the earth, and the big sea came in and filled it. You can see it there to-day. At that time the water also came up, and drowned many of the Mutsun people at Kawina, although they lived on a high mound they had made, like the one we now live on. Only the top of the mound was left above the water.
“Soon after that the Mutsun people left Kawina, or Old Akalan, as they called the place. Many of them went east and south, making new homes all around the Mutsun water. Our people alone came over here, where they have been ever since. Those are the stories of Old-Old Akalan and of Old Akalan.”
Old Kakari’s strength is being spent, and he leans back against the wall. But presently he goes on: “After we came over here, all went well again for a long time. Every one did as he was told by the elders, and Chakalli was pleased. One day the earth shook again and the water went away from around Kawina or Old Akalan. Our people thought it was Chakalli making ready for their going back to live once more near the ‘Old People.’ But before they could move over, Coyote came down from the North with some of the Earth People, who settled at Kawina. Coyote brought with him also the cooking basket and the fishing net.”
At this point the anger and resentment of the listeners are expressed by low growls and explosive breaths through set teeth. Wixi alone, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees and his chin resting in his hands, remains silent.
Old Kakari makes a last effort: “The Earth People, the Poma, belong in the North. They do not belong here. Some of them speak our tongue, but they are not our people. At first we made war upon them, but Coyote was too clever for Chakalli. Yet though we are now at peace, we never marry their women, nor they ours. We are neighbors, not friends. To-morrow we shall go to see the proof of what I have told you. Katka (Be full of crickets).” And with this formula of conclusion the Peace Chief ceased.
After a few moments of silence he leaned once more back against the wall as if in deep sleep. No one spoke, but, one after another, the listeners arose and left the council house. Outside, the night was black and no sound was to be heard except the sigh of the breezes over the marsh grass.
PROOF
At daybreak a large tule float stands out from the high, pointed cliff forming the southern extremity of Potrero San Pablo, and heads straight for Brooks Island. In a moment the swiftly paddled float is gone from sight. It carries all the men who were in the council lodge except one. Wixi is not there. The float left Akalan while the night was yet black, and the paddlers were obliged to feel their way along the shore as far as the pointed cliff, and to wait there until the island became faintly visible. Fortunately, this happened before they themselves could be observed from the home village, for their mission to Old-Old Akalan is secret.
The skiff slips behind a large outlying rock and the next moment grates on a low, narrow, curving sand bar connecting the rock with the island proper. As the men step ashore, they see emerging out of the dim north a small float bearing one paddler. The solitary boatman lands on the opposite side of the sand bar, a few yards nearer to the island. It is Wixi. He draws his float across the ridge to the south slope of the bar, to lie with the other float. It is a precaution, lest sharp eyes at Akalan or Kawina discover that visitors are on the island.
With the War Chief in the lead, the men proceed a few rods to the northwest corner of the island, which slopes conveniently to the beach. Bearing onward to the north shore, they walk eastward across a noticeable rise of ground toward a number of buckeye trees. Tall grasses and weeds cover the place. It is the mound left by the people of Old-Old Akalan. Here rest the bones of the oldest ancestors of the Mutsunes.
Having passed over the summit, the War Chief sights a line in the direction of the two oldest buckeye trees, and stations Wixi on the line. The older men he directs to sit down. He himself walks briskly to the nearest of the two trees, and returns again with steady, measured steps straight toward Wixi. As he walks, he counts the steps on his fingers. At a point half-way down the east slope of the mound, he suddenly comes to a halt and with a significant nod of his head motions every one toward him. From one of the men he takes a digging-stick, draws a rough circle around his standing place and says, “This is the place. Dig!”
The men drop to their knees, partly to keep hidden in the tall grasses, and none dares to stand up again for it is now almost sunrise. Some take to loosening up the earth with digging-sticks, and others scoop up the loosened portions with large abalone shells. In this way they make a hole several feet in diameter. Presently, at a depth of about two feet, they uncover the bones of a full-grown person with arms and legs doubled up tightly against the body. All exclaim under their breath. From the presence, next the skeleton, of a mortar and pestle, as well as certain bone awls and needles, the old men know that these are the remains of a woman. The spirit of the implements which the woman used in daily life, had gone, they would say, with the spirit of the departed to her new dwelling place in the far West.
Deeper down, perhaps five or six feet, the workers come to another skeleton. On the breast of the body, they uncover a large, beautifully shaped obsidian blade. Close to the shoulder are found a number of arrow points, just as they were left when the wooden shafts decayed away. Near one hand lie, side by side, two highly polished, steatite tobacco pipes. On either side of the skull is a disk-shaped ear pendant of iridescent abalone shell, and all about the neck and shoulders are many beads of clamshell. The workers are agreed that these are the remains of a great man and the War Chief emphatically declares them to be those of the ancient Peace Chief Walen, himself. All the old men demur to this, however, contending that Walen, according to the traditions, was buried, not in the black refuse material left by the inhabitants of Old-Old Akalan, but lower down in virgin soil.
All through the day the digging continues, and skeleton after skeleton is taken up—men, women, and children. Each was originally buried beneath the floor of the hut in which he or she died, and in the course of time, as shells and ashes accumulated above their bones, a new hut was built, again to be destroyed with the succeeding death.
As the men dig deeper and deeper, the paraphernalia of the dead become fewer and fewer, and even where anything at all is present, the object is crude and unfinished. There are no more pipes, no beautiful obsidian blades, and no fine, ivory-like awls or needles. What can it mean? Did the ancestors of early days not possess these things? Some such thoughts are surely passing through the mind of some of the workers, certainly of the War Chief, for he suddenly declares his belief that they are not digging in the right place. But the old men only smile and work on.
At last, shortly before dark, there are signs of bottom to the mound material. Real earth is beginning to appear, and before long human bones are turned up. Very soon the complete skeleton is laid bare. No implements have been found, but every one’s attention is centred on a bright red spot near the extended right hand of the skeleton. It is a quantity of paint powder, such as has been noticed to accompany several of the men skeletons. The War Chief, now visibly excited, grasps a sharp-edged abalone shell and eagerly cuts into the red substance. The next moment the shell drops from his hand. He, with the rest, is staring blankly at seven large, beautifully clear quartz crystals—the whole of Walen’s treasure!...
It is morning. The remains of the dead have been replaced and all obvious traces of disturbance removed. Let the “Old People” of Old-Old Akalan rest until the sea removes them! Wixi has labored hard and is weary in body, but in spirit he is a new man. Has he not had proof from the graves? Knows he not for a certainty that the life of the Mutsunes has not stood still in the past, and is he not determined that it shall unfold and develop in the future?...
The old men are sleeping after their arduous work, continued far into the night. Wixi alone has watched restlessly for the dawn, and when the cliff across the Mutsun channel is distinctly visible, he puts off with his featherweight skiff. He is scudding along with swift, sure strokes and is already near enough to the opposite shore to see a woman waving to him from the top of the bluff. It is Mahúdah, who has watched for his return since the evening before. The sun’s first rays are just beginning to play around her as she stands there on high, and Wixi is raising his paddle in the air to wave recognition. At that moment Mahúdah utters a loud, piercing scream and turns to run from the edge of the precipice. Portions of rock and earth fall to the beach, and a rising cloud of dust obscures the figure of the fleeing woman. A moment later Wixi is raised on the crest of a tremendous wave, which carries him with the speed of a swooping eagle directly against the face of the cliff.
The old men of Akalan, awakened by the first tremors of the earth, witness the whole scene. Most of them simply shake their heads. But the War Chief, affecting solemnity, announces: “Chakalli has struck! The old order remains.”
N. C. NELSON
All Is Trouble Along the Klamath
A YUROK IDYLL
(Mrs. Oregon Jim, from the house Erkigér-i or “Hair-ties” in the town of Pékwan, speaking): You want to know why old Louisa and I never notice each other? Well, I’ll tell you why. I wouldn’t speak to that old woman to save her life. There is a quarrel between her and me, and between her people and my people.
The thing started, so far as I know, with the bastard son of a woman from that big old house in Wáhsek that stands crossways—the one they call Wáhsek-héthlqau. They call it that, of course, because it is _behind_ the others. It kind of sets back from the river. This woman lived with several different men; first with a young fellow from the house next door, and then, when she left _him_, with a strolling fellow from Smith River. When she left him for a Húpa, they all began to call her _kímolin_, “dirty.” Not one of these men had paid a cent for her, although she came of good people. She lived around in different places. Two of her children died, but a third one grew up at the Presbyterian Mission.
He had even less sense than the Presbyterians have. He came down to Kepél one time, when the people there were making the Fish Dam. It was the last day of the work on the dam. The dam was being finished, that day. That’s the time nobody can get mad. Nobody can take offense at anything. This boy heard people calling each other bad names. They were having a dance. The time of that dance is different from all other times. People say the worst things! It sounds funny to hear the people say, for example, to old Kímorets, “Well, old One-Eye! you are the best dancer.” They think of the worst things to say! A fellow even said to Mrs. Poker Bob, “How is your grandmother?”; when Mrs. Poker Bob’s grandmother was already dead. It makes your blood run cold to hear such things, even though you know it’s in fun.
This young fellow I am telling you about, whom they called Fred Williams, and whose Indian name was Sär, came down from the Mission school to see the Fish-Dam Dance at Kepél. He was dressed up. He went around showing off. He wore a straw hat with a ribbon around it. He stood around watching the dance. Between the songs, he heard what people were saying to each other. He heard them saying all sorts of improper things. He thought that was smart talk. He thought he would try it when he got a chance. The next day, he went down by the river and saw Tuley-Creek Jim getting ready his nets. “Get your other hand cut off,” he said. “Then you can fish with your feet!” Two or three people who were standing by, heard him. Tuley-Creek Jim is pretty mean. They call him “Coyote.” He looked funny. He stood there. He didn’t know what to say.
Young Andrew, who was there, whose mother was from the house called “Down-river House” in Qóvtep, was afraid for his life. He was just pushing off his boat. He let go of the rope. The boat drifted off. He was afraid to pull it back. He went up to the house. “Something happened,” he told the people there. “I wish I was somewhere else. There is going to be trouble along this Klamath River.”
The talk soon went around that Coyote-Jim was claiming some money. It was told us that he was going to make the boy’s mother’s father pay fifteen dollars. “That’s my price,” he said. “I won’t do anything to the boy, for he isn’t worth it. Nobody paid for his mother. Also, I won’t charge him much. But his mother’s people are well-to-do, and they will have to pay this amount that I name. Otherwise, I will be mad.” As a matter of fact, he was afraid to do anything, for he, himself, was afraid of the soldiers at Húpa. He just made big talk. Besides, what he wanted was a headband ornamented with whole woodpecker heads, that the boy’s grandfather owned. He thought he could make the old man give it up, on account of what his grandson had said.
The boy went around, hollering to everybody. “I don’t have to pay,” he said. “I heard everybody saying things like that! How did I know that they only did it during that one day? Besides, look at me! Look at my shirt. Look at my pants.” He showed them his straw hat. “Look at my hat! I am just like a white man. I can say anything I please. I don’t have to care what I say.”
Every day somebody came along the river, telling us the news. There was a big quarrel going on. I was camped at that time, with my daughter, above Metá, picking acorns. All the acorns were bad that year—little, and twisted, and wormy. Even the worms were little and kind of shriveled that year. That place above Metá was the only place where the acorns were good. Lots of people were camped there. Some paid for gathering acorns there. My aunt had married into a house at Metá, the house they call Wóogi, “In-the-middle-House,” so I didn’t have to pay anything. People used to come up from the river to where we acorn pickers were camped, to talk about the news. They told us the boy’s mother’s people were trying to make some people at Smith River pay. “He’s the son of one of their men,” the old grandfather said. “They’ve got to pay for the words he spoke. I don’t have to pay.” The thing dragged on. Three weeks later they told us the old man wouldn’t pay yet.
Somebody died at the old man’s house that fall. The people were getting ready to have a funeral. The graveyard for that house called Héthlqau, in Wáhsek, is just outside the house door. They went into that kämethl, in that corpse-place, what you whites call a cemetery. They dug a hole and had it ready. They were singing “crying-songs” in that house where the person had died.
Tuley-Creek Jim’s brother-in-law was traveling down the river in a canoe. When he got to Wáhsek he heard “crying-songs.” “Somebody has died up there,” they told him. “We better stop! No use trying to go by. We better go ashore till the burial is over.” Tuley-Creek Jim’s brother-in-law did not want to stop. “They owe some money to my wife’s brother,” he said. “One of their people said something to Jim. They don’t pay up. Why should I go ashore?” So they all paddled down to the landing place. They started to go past, going down river. A young fellow at the landing place grabbed their canoe. “You got to land here,” he said. “My aunt’s people are having a funeral. It ain’t right for anybody to go by in a canoe.” The people in the canoe began to get mad. They pushed on the bottom with their paddles. The canoe swung around. Coyote-Jim’s brother-in-law stood up. He was pretty mad. They had got his shirt wet. He waved his paddle around. He hollered. He got excited.
One of the men on the bank was Billy Brooks, from the mouth of the river. “Hey! You fellow-living-with-a-woman-you-haven’t-paid-for!” he said to Billy Brooks, “make these fellows let go of my canoe.”
Billy was surprised. He hadn’t been holding the canoe. And anyway, he did not expect to be addressed that way. “Läs-son” is what he had heard addressed to him. That means “half-married, or improperly married, to a woman in the house by the trail.” Brooks had had no money to pay for a wife, so he went to live with his woman instead of taking her home to him. That is what we call being half-married. Everybody called Billy that way, behind his back. “Half-married-into-the-house-by-the-trail” was his name.
When Billy got over being surprised at this form of address, he got mad. He pointed at the fellow in the canoe. He swore the worst way a person can swear. What he said was awful. He pointed at him. He was mad clear through. He didn’t care what he said. “Your deceased relatives,” is what he said to Coyote-Jim’s brother-in-law, in the canoe. He said it right out loud. He pointed at the canoe. That’s the time he said “Your deceased relatives.” “All your deceased relatives,” he said to those in the canoe.
Coyote-Jim’s brother-in-law sat down in the canoe. Nobody tried to stop the canoe after that. The canoe went down river. Billy Brooks went up to the house. He waited. After a while the people there buried that person who was dead, and the funeral was over. “I’ve got to pay money,” Billy Brooks said to them then. “I got mad and swore something terrible at Coyote-Jim’s brother-in-law. That was on account of you people. If you had paid what you owed to Coyote-Jim, Coyote-Jim’s brother-in-law wouldn’t have gone past your house while you were crying, and you wouldn’t have held his canoe, and he wouldn’t have addressed me as he did, and I wouldn’t have said what I did. Moreover, Wóhkel Dave was in the canoe, and when I said that which I said, it applied to him, too. I feel terrible mean about what I said. I’ve got to have trouble with both those men. There were others in the canoe, too, but they are poor people, and don’t amount to anything. But Dave is a rich man. Now all this trouble is on your account, and you’ve got to pay me two dollars and a half.”
The old man at Wáhsek was in trouble. “First my mouse says to Coyote-Jim what should not in any case have been said,” the old man complained. (We call illegitimate children “mice,” because they eat, and stay around, and nobody has paid for them.) “Now on account of what my mouse said, all this other trouble has happened.”
Everybody was talking about the quarrel now. That is the time they left off talking about the old man’s troubles, and began talking about what Billy Brooks said to the Coyote’s brother-in-law in the canoe, and to Wóhkel Dave. It finally came out that the fellow who was steering the canoe, and who called Billy Brooks “Läs-son,” was out of the quarrel. His deceased relatives had been referred to, but, on the other hand, his father had only paid twenty-five dollars for his mother, so nobody cared much about him. He talked around but nobody paid any attention, so he decided that he had better keep still about it, and maybe people would forget that he had been insulted.
Wóhkel Dave, however, was a man of importance. His people were married into all the best houses up and down the river. Everybody was wondering what he and Brooks would do. Billy Brooks was kind of a mean man himself. He had a bad reputation. One time he even made a white man pay up for something he did. The white man took a woman from Brooks’ people to live with him. Brooks looked him up, and made him pay for her. Everybody was afraid of Brooks. Some people said, “Brooks won’t pay. He’s too mean. He’s not afraid. He’d rather fight it out.” Other people said, “That’s all right, as far as ordinary people are concerned. Wóhkel Dave, though, is not ordinary. His father paid a big price for his mother. She had one of the most stylish weddings along the river. Dave won’t let anybody get the best of him.” People used to argue that way. Some said one thing, and some said another. They used to almost quarrel about it.
Suddenly news came down the river that Billy Brooks was going to pay up for what he said. Some one came along and told us that Billy was going to pay. “He offered twenty-five dollars,” this fellow said. The next day we heard that Dave wouldn’t take it. He wanted forty dollars. They argued back and forth. It was February before they got it settled. Billy had to pay twenty dollars in money, a shot-gun made out of an army musket, bored out, and a string of shell money, not a very good one. The shells were pretty small, but the string was long—reaching from the chest bone to the end of the fingers.
The next thing that happened is what involved me and old Louisa. It came about because Billy didn’t have twenty dollars in cash. He had to get hold of the twenty dollars. About that time, certain Indians stole some horses. They were not people from our tribe. They were Chilula from Bald Hills, or people from over in that direction somewhere. Those people were awful poor. They couldn’t pay for a woman. They couldn’t pay for anything. They had to marry each other. In the springtime they got pretty wild. They were likely to do things. This time they took some horses from a white man. This white man complained to the agent at Húpa. So some soldiers from Húpa went out to chase these Indians. Billy Brooks was a great hunter. He has been all over everywhere, hunting and trapping. The soldiers needed a guide. They offered Billy twenty-five dollars to serve as a “scout” for the Government, to chase these Indians. So Billy, because he had to have twenty dollars, went as a scout, that time.
The soldiers went to Redwood Creek. Billy Brooks went along. There was a sergeant and six men, they say. Two of the men went to that Indian town six miles above the mouth of Redwood Creek, the name of which is Otlép. That town belongs to the Chilula. These two soldiers went there, looking for the men who stole the horses. There was trouble after a while at that place. The soldiers got into a quarrel with the Indians.
The trouble was about a woman. One of the soldiers wanted her, but the woman would not go with him. She did not feel like it. I don’t know exactly what happened, but the soldier insisted, and the woman insisted, and finally her relatives told the soldier that if the woman didn’t want to, she didn’t have to. There was a fight that time. There was a tussel about the soldier’s revolver. Somebody got hit over the head with it. The front sight was sharp. That soldier had filed down the sight on his revolver, to make it fine. That sight dug into a man’s face, and cut it open, from his jaw bone up to his eye.
There was big trouble there that time, they say. Everybody got to hollering. That woman had a bad temper. She hit a soldier with a rock. She broke his head open. The man whose face was cut open went for his gun. He couldn’t see very well. He didn’t get the percussion cap on properly. He tried to shoot the soldier, but the gun wouldn’t go off. The cap had dropped off the nipple. The soldier saw the Indian aiming the gun at him, so he fired at the Indian. There was blood in the soldier’s eyes, for the woman had cut his head open with a rock. So he missed the Indian who was aiming at him, but he hit old Louisa’s nephew, Jim Williams. The bullet went through his thigh. Two years passed before Jim Williams could walk straight after that.
Now that is the trouble between old Louisa and me. Her nephew was hurt, and she blames Billy Brooks, because Billy Brooks was with the soldiers, helping them, the time this happened. Billy would never “pay up” for this. One time it was reported that he was going to pay, but he never did.
Now Billy is a relative of mine by marriage. His sister married my father’s brother’s oldest boy. That old woman, whose nephew was shot, doesn’t like me, because I am a relative of Billy who guided the soldiers.
One time she played me a dirty trick. My nephew was fishing with a gill-net on the river here. The game warden made a complaint and had him arrested, for he had one end of his net fast to the bank. That old woman, that old Louisa, went to Eureka and told the judge there, that one end of the net was fast to the bank. They say she got money for doing that. Somebody said she got two dollars a day. My nephew was put in jail for sixty days. I am not saying anything to that old woman, but I am keeping a watch on her. If anybody talks to her, then I have nothing to do with them.
One time a white man from down below came along this river, asking about baskets. He wanted to know the name of everything. He was kind of crazy, that fellow. They used to call him “Häpó’o,” or “Basket-designs.” He was always asking, “What does that mean?” or “What is the name of that?” He wanted to know all about baskets. He talked to old Louisa for a day and a half about her baskets. Then he came through the fence to my house. I wouldn’t say a word to him, and he went away. My friends won’t talk to Louisa, or her friends. It will be that way forever.
It all goes back to that boy Sär. If he had not talked about Tuley-Creek Jim having only one hand, Jim’s brother-in-law would not have paddled past a house where there was a person lying dead, and his canoe would not have been seized, and there would have been no quarrel about the canoe, and Billy Brooks would not have sworn at anybody, so he would not have had to pay money, and he would not have hired out as a scout to the Government, and the fellow in Redwood Creek would not have been shot, and old Louisa would not have testified about my nephew. To make people pay is all right. That is what always happens when there is a quarrel. But to put my nephew in jail is not right.
I’ll never speak to that old lady again, and neither will any of my people.
T. T. WATERMAN
Sayach’apis, a Nootka Trader
Tom is a blind old man, whose staff may be heard any day stumping or splashing along the village street of his tribal reservation, or up or down the hillside that slopes to the smoke-drying huts massed by the Somass river. He is an honored member of the Ts’isha’ath, a Nootka tribe that is now permanently located a few miles up from the head of Alberni Canal, the deepest inlet on the west coast of Vancouver Island. The Ts’isha’ath fishes and harpoons along the river, the length of the “Canal,” and down among the hundreds of islands that dot Barkley Sound, the first of the large bays north of Cape Beale that are carved out on the stormy coast line of the island.
Tom’s early life was passed at the now abandoned village of Hikwis, whose row of houses looked out upon the main water of the Sound, but for decades he has led an uneventful existence in his river reservation and its vicinity, old summer fishing grounds that were conquered in the first instance by his people from an alien tribe. Within convenient reach are the slowly booming white men’s towns of Alberni and Port Alberni, where one may lay in a supply of biscuits and oranges for a tribal feast, or make periodic complaint to the Indian Agent. Tom is now old and poverty-stricken, but the memory of his former wealth is with his people. The many feasts he has given and the many ceremonial dances and displays he has had performed have all had their desired effect—they have shed luster on his sons and daughters and grandchildren, they have “put his family high” among the Ts’isha’ath tribe, and they have even carried his name to other, distant Nootka tribes, and to tribes on the east coast of the island that are of alien speech. Nowadays he spends much of his time by the fireside, tapping his staff in accompaniment to old ritual tunes that he is never tired of humming.
Tom’s present name is Sayach’apis, Stands-up-high-over-all. It is an old man’s name of eight generations’ standing, that hails from the Hisawist’ath, a now extinct Nootka tribe with which Tom is connected through his father’s mother’s mother, who was herself a Hisawist’ath on her mother’s side. The tribe is extinct, but its personal names, like its songs and legends and distinctive ritualistic ceremonies, linger on among the neighboring tribes through the fine spun network of inheritance. The name “Stands-up-high-over-all,” like practically all Nootka, and indeed all West Coast names, has its legendary background, its own historical warrant. The first Nootka chief to bear the name, obtained it in a dream. He was undergoing ritualistic training in the woods in the pursuit of “power” for the attainment of wealth, and had not slept for a long time. At last he fell into a heavy slumber, and this is what he dreamed: The Sky Chief appeared to him and said, “Why are you sleeping, Stands-up-high-over-all? You are not really desirous of getting wealthy, are you? I was about to make you wealthy and to give you the name Stands-up-high-over-all.” The ironical touch is a characteristic nuance in these origin legends. And so the name, a supernatural gift, was handed down the generations, now by direct male inheritance, now as a dower to a son-in-law, resident at some village remote from its place of origin. This is the normal manner, actually or in theory, of the transmission of all privileges, and though the owner of a privilege may be a villager a hundred miles or more distant from its historical or legendary home, he has not completely established his right to its use unless he has shown himself, directly or by reference to a speaker acquainted with tribal lore, possessed of the origin legend, the local provenance, and the genealogical tree or “historical” nexus that binds him to the individual, that is believed to have been the first to enjoy the privilege.
Tom did not always have the name of Sayach’apis, nor need he keep it to the end of his days. He assumed it over thirty years ago on the occasion of his great potlatch, a puberty feast in honor of his now deceased oldest daughter. At that time he had the young man’s name of Nawe’ik, now borne by his oldest son, Douglas. It is a name belonging to the Nash’as’ath sept or tribal subdivision of the Ts’isha’ath, and was first dreamt by Tom’s maternal grandfather. It is thus a name of comparatively recent origin, nor does it possess that aura of noble association that attaches to Tom’s present name. Its exact meaning is unknown, but it is said to have been a command—“Come here!”—of a spirit whale, dreamt of by its first possessor. Tom assumed it at a potlatch he gave to his own tribe when he was not yet married. It was just about the time that the discovery of placer gold in the Frazer river was bringing a considerable influx of whites to British Columbia.
Before this, Tom was known as Kunnuh, a Nitinat young man’s name, “Wake up!”, which is again based on the dream of a spirit whale. The Nitinat Indians are a group of Nootka tribes that occupy the southwest coast of the island, and Tom’s claim to the name and to other Nitinat privileges comes to him through his paternal grandfather, himself a Nitinat Indian. The name originated with his grandfather’s father’s father’s father, who received it in a dream as he was training for “power” in whaling. It was assumed by Tom when he was about ten years of age, at a naming feast given the Ts’isha’ath Indians by his Nitinat grandfather. It displaced the boy’s name Ha’wihlkumuktli, “Having-chiefs-behind,” this time of true Ts’isha’ath origin and descending to Tom through his paternal grandmother’s father’s father, who again received the name in a dream from a spirit whale. This ancestor was having much success in whaling and, becoming exceedingly wealthy, was “leaving other chiefs behind him.” Tom was given the name at an ordinary feast by his paternal grandfather.
The earliest name that Tom remembers having is Tl’i’nitsawa, “Getting-whale-skin.” When the great chief Hohenikwop had his whale booty towed to shore, the little boys used to come to the beach for slices of whale skin, so he made up the name of “Getting-whale-skin” for his son. The right to use it was inherited by his oldest son, but was also passed on to the chief’s younger sister, who brought it as a dowry to the father of Tom’s paternal grandfather. Tom himself received the name on the occasion of a mourning potlatch given by his paternal grandfather in honor of his son, Tom’s father, who had died not long before. Before this, Tom had a child’s nickname, in other words, a name bestowed not out of the inherited stock of names claimed by his parents, but created on the spot for any chance reason whatever. Such nicknames have no ceremonial value, are not privileges, and are therefore not handed down as an inheritance or transferred as a dowry. Tom has forgotten what his nickname was.
At the very outset, in the mere consideration of what Tom has called himself at various times, we are introduced to the two great social forces that give atmosphere to Nootka life. The first of these is privilege, the right to something of value, practical or ceremonial. Such a privilege is called “topati” by the Indians, and one cannot penetrate very far into their life or beliefs without stumbling upon one topati after another. The second is the network of descent and kinship relation that determines the status of the North West Coast Indian, not merely as a tribesman once for all, but in reference to his claim to share in any activity of moment. The threads of the genealogical past are wound tightly about the North West Coastman; he is himself a traditional composite of social features that belong to diverse localities, and involve him in diverse kinship relations.
As far back, then, as he can remember, Tom has been steeped in an atmosphere of privilege, of rank, of conflicting claims to this or that coveted right. As far back as he can remember, he has heard remarks like this: “Old man Tootooch has no right to have such and such a particular Thunder-bird dance performed at his potlatches. His claim to it is not clear. In my grandfather’s days men were killed for less than that, and the head chief of the Ahous’ath tribe, who has the primary claim to the dance, would have called him sharply to order.” But he has also heard Tootooch vigorously support his claim with arguments, genealogical and other, that no one quite knows the right or wrong of. And as far back as he can remember, Tom has been accustomed to think of himself not merely as a Ts’isha’ath, though he is primarily that by residence and immediate descent, but as a participant in the traditions, in the social atmosphere, of several other Nootka tribes. He has always known where to look for his remoter kinsmen, dwelling in villages that are dotted here and there on a long coast line.
The first few years of Tom’s life were spent in a “cradle” of basketry, in which he was tightly swathed by sundry wrappings and braids of the soft, beaten inner bark of the cedar. Even now he has a vague recollection of looking out over the sea from the erect vantage of a cradling basket, looped behind his mother’s shoulders. He also thinks he remembers crying bitterly one time when left all by himself in the basket, stood up on end against the butt of a willow tree, while his mother and four or five other women had strayed off to dig for edible clover roots with their hard, pointed digging-sticks.
During the cradling period, Tom was having his head, or rather his forehead, gradually flattened by means of cedar-bark pads, and the upper and lower parts of his legs were bandaged so as to allow the calves to bulge. The Indians believe that they do not like big foreheads and slim legs, nor do they approve of wide eyebrows, which are narrowed, if necessary, by plucking out some of the hairs. Later on in life Tom was less particular about his natural appearance, having been well “fixed” by his mother in infancy. Like the other men of his tribe, he has never bothered to pluck out the scanty growth of hair on his face. Some of the Indians of Tom’s acquaintance have tattooed themselves, generally on the breast, with designs referring to their hunting experiences, or to crest privileges—a quarter-moon or a sea lion or a pair of Thunder-birds,—but Tom has never bothered to do this. Aside from the head-flattening of infancy, Tom has never had any portion of his body mutilated, unless the perforation of his ears and the septum of his nose, for the attachment of ear and nose pendants of the bright rainbow-like abalone, strung by sinew threads, be considered a mutilation. These pendants, which he and other Indians have long discarded, were worn purely for ornament; they had no importance as ceremonial insignia.
In spite of the fact that neither razor nor tweezers have ever smoothed out the hairy surface of his face, Tom has not altogether neglected the care of his body. To prevent chapping, he has often rubbed himself with tallow and red paint, and in his younger days he was in the habit of keeping himself in good condition by a cold plunge, at daybreak, in river or sea. The vigorous rubbing down with hemlock branches which followed, until the skin all tingled red, helped to give tone to his body. He could not afford to miss the plunge and rub-down for more than two or three days at a time, if only because to have done so would have brought upon him the contempt and derision of his comrades. No aspiring young hunter of the seal and the sea lion could allow himself to be called a woman. In the course of his long life Tom has painted his face in a great variety of ways, whether for festive occasions, or in the private quest of supernatural power in some secluded spot in the woods. Some of these face paints—and there are hundreds of them in use among the Nootka—are geometrical patterns, others are emblematic of supernatural beings and animals. Many of them, like the songs and dances with which they are associated, are looked upon as valuable privileges.
It is long since Tom has worn or seen worn native costume—what little there was of it—but he distinctly remembers the blankets and cedar-bark garments that his people wore when he was a boy and, indeed, well on into his days of manhood. The heavy rains of the Coast, and the constant necessity of splashing in and out of the canoes along the beach, made tight-fitting garments and cumbrous foot- and leg-wear undesirable. The Nootka Indians wore no clinging shirts or leggings or moccasins. They are a barefoot and a bare-legged people. Those of the men who could afford more than a breechclout wore a blanket robe loosely thrown about the body, either a hide—of bear or the far more valuable sea otter—or a woven blanket, whether of the inner bark strands of the “yellow cedar” or the long, fleecy hair of the native dogs. The women wore cedar-bark “petticoats,” which are nothing but loosely fitting girdles, fringed with long tassels of cedar bark. In rainy weather, they also wore woven hats of cedar-bark strands or split root fibers, round topped and cone-like. When the weather was thick and heavy with rain—and this happens often enough in the winter—both men and women wore raincapes of cedar-bark or rush matting. The children ran about completely naked.
The food that Tom was accustomed to in his early days did not differ materially from his present fare. It was then, and is now, chiefly fish—boiled, steam-baked, spit-roasted, or smoked. In all his early haunts, in the houses and along the beach, everywhere he was immersed in grateful, fishy odors. From the earliest time that he can remember anything at all, he has been daily confronted by some aspect of the life of a fishing people, whether it be the catching of salmon trout by the boys with their two-barbed fish spears; or the spearing or trolling or netting of salmon by the older men; or the getting in the sea of herrings with herring rakes, of halibut with the peculiar, gracefully bent halibut hooks that every Indian even now has kicking around in his box of odds and ends, of cod with twirling decoys and spears that have two prongs of unequal length—“older” and “younger”; or the hanging up of salmon in rows to dry in the smoke houses, so that this all-important fish may still contribute his share of the food supply, long after the last salmon of the late fall has ceased to run; or the splitting up of the salmon by the women as a first preliminary to cooking; or any one of the hundreds of other scenes that make of a fisher folk a fish-handling and a fish-eating people.
Second in importance to fish are the various varieties of edible shellfish and other soft bodied inhabitants of the sea—mussels and clams and sea urchins, sea cucumbers, and octopuses. The flesh of the octopus or “devil-fish,” though not an important article of food, was considered quite a dainty, and feasts were often given in which it figured as a special feature, like crab apples or like the apples or oranges of present-day feasts. Far more important than these mushy foods, though probably subsidiary, on the whole, to salmon and other fish, was the flesh of sea mammals—the humpbacked whale, the California whale, the sea otter, the sea lion, and, most important of all, the hair seal.
Tom has harpooned his fill of seals in the course of his life and, like most other Nootka men of the last generation, has done a considerable amount of commercial sealing for white firms in Behring Sea. He has caught a few sea otters, which are now all but extinct, but no sea lions or whales, though he claims to have the hereditary privilege to hunt these animals, and to possess the indispensable magical knowledge without which their quest is believed by the Nootka to be doomed to failure.
Boiled whale and seal meat were highly prized and there was no more joyous event to break the monotony of tribal life than the towing to shore of a harpooned whale, or the drifting to shore of a whale carcass. In either case the flensing knives were quickly got ready, the carcass cut up, and feasts held in the village. Tom remembers how excitedly—he was then but a boy of ten or so—he once reported the appearance of a drifting whale carcass a quarter-mile from shore, how the whole village rushed into its canoes, and how they laboriously floated it on to the sandy beach, with their stout lanyards of cedar rope wound with nettle-fiber. The whale was cut up carefully, under the direction of a “measurer” into its traditionally determined portions, which were then distributed, according to hereditary right, to those entitled to receive them. Tom himself got the meat about the navel as a reward for his find. There was an unusual amount of whale oil tried out that time, and the fires at the feasts leaped higher than ever as the oil was thrown upon them, lighting up in lurid flashes the house posts carved into the likenesses of legendary ancestors.
Tom ate very little meat of land animals in his early days. Indeed, like most of the Coast people, he had a prejudice against deer meat and it was not until, as a middle-aged man, he had come into contact with some of the deer-hunting tribes of the interior of the island, that he learned to prize it, though even to this day venison has not for him the toothsome appeal of a chunk of whale meat. Fish and meat were the staples, yet not the only foods. The women dug up a variety of edible roots such as clover and fern root, which made a welcome change, while blackberries, salmon berries, soapberries, and other varieties, frequently dried and pressed for winter consumption, added a sweetening to the somewhat monotonous fare. One relish Tom has never learned to enjoy—salt. All the older Nootka Indians detest salt in their food.
As Tom grew up, he became initiated into the chief handicrafts of his tribe. He got to be rather skillful at working in wood, both the soft red cedar and the hard yew and spiræa, familiarizing himself with the various wood-working processes—felling trees with wedges and stone hammers, splitting out planks, smoothing with adzes, drilling, handling the curved knife, steaming, and bending by the “kerfing” or notching process. Even in his youngest years, iron-bladed and iron-pointed tools had almost completely replaced the aboriginal implements of stone and shell, but the forms themselves, of the manufactured objects, underwent little or no modification down to the present day. In the course of his long life Tom has made hundreds of wooden articles of use—boxes with telescoping lids, paddles, bailers, fish clubbers, adze handles, ladles, bows, arrow shafts, fire drills, latrines, root diggers, fish spears, and shafts for sealing and whaling harpoons. He has also assisted in making dugout canoes, and has often prepared and put in position the heavy posts and beams of the large quadrangular houses that were still being built in his youth. On the other hand, Tom has never developed much aptitude in the artistic decoration of objects. Such things as paintings on house boards and paddles, or realistic carvings in masks, rattles, ornamental fish clubbers and house posts, are rather beyond his power and have had to be made for him, when required, by others more clever than himself. The one thing that Tom grew to be most proficient in was the preparation of house planks of desired lengths and widths. When he was a young man, he would travel about in canoes from village to village with the stock of planks he had on hand, and trade them for blankets, strings of dentalium shells, dried fish, whale oil, and other exchangeable commodities. It was through trading, rather than through personal success in fishing or hunting, that Tom amassed in time a considerable share of wealth, and it was through his wealth and the opportunity it gave him to make lavish distributions at potlatches or feasts, rather than through nobility of blood, that he came to occupy his present honorable position among his tribesmen.
While Tom and the other men, when they were not busy “potlatching” or visiting some relative, or taking a run down to Victoria, were engaged in fishing and sea mammal hunting and wood-working, the women prepared the food, dug for edible roots, gathered clams, and spent what time they could spare from these and similar tasks in the weaving and plaiting of blankets, matting, and baskets. What receptacles were not of wood were of basketry, while mats of various sorts did duty for tables, hangings, and carpeting. The materials of these baskets and mats, the omnipresent cedar bark and the rush, frayed easily, so that the women were kept constantly busy replenishing the household stock. Even now one can hardly enter a Nootka house without seeing one or more of the women twilling mats and baskets with strips of softened cedar bark or twining the cedar-bark strands into cordage and bags, or threading a rush mat with the long needles of polished spiræa. In the old days, there was always in the house a great clatter of breaking up the raw, yellow cedar bark with the corrugated bark beaters of bone of whale, and of loosening up the hard strips of red cedar bark into fibrous masses with the half-moon shredders. The women could work up the bark into almost any degree of fineness; indeed, the cedar-bark “wool” that was used to pad the cradles is almost as soft and fluffy in feel as down or cotton batting. When Tom was a boy, the women made only plain, unornamented baskets, whether twined or twilled, and ornamented the mats with sober, but effective lines of alder-dyed red and mud-dyed black. Since then, however, they have taken to making also trinket baskets and plaques of the peculiar wrapped weave, beautifully ornamented with realistic and geometrical designs in the black and white weft of grass. This art came to Tom’s people from the Nitinats or Southern Nootka, who in turn owe it to the Makah of Cape Flattery. Trade with the whites is the chief incentive in the making of these finer specimens of basketry.
Nowadays the Nootka live in small frame houses, a family, in our narrower sense of the word, to a house. It was not so when Tom was young. The village of Hikwis, in which he was raised, consisted of a row of long plank houses, each constructed on a heavy quadrangular frame of posts, which were the trimmed trunks of cedars, and of crossbeams of circular section resting on the posts. The roofing and walls were of cedar planks, running lengthwise of the house. The floor was the bare earth, stamped smooth, and a slightly raised platform ran along the rear and the long sides of the house. On the inner floor one or more fires were built, the smoke escaping through openings in the roof, provided by merely shoving a roofing plank or two to a side. Tom early learned not to stand erect in the house any more than he could help. The smoke circulating in the upper reaches of the house, particularly in rainy weather when the smoke-hole rafters were closed, was trying to the eyes, and people found it convenient to sit or crouch on the floor as much as possible. Some of the houses, like the one in which Tom was brought up, had paintings or carvings referring to the crests or legendary escutcheons of the chief of the tribe, tribal subdivision, or house group. In Tom’s house the main escutcheons were two Thunder-birds, face to face, painted on the outside of the wall planks; a series of round holes cut in the roof, and one in front that served as a door, all representing moons; and paintings of wolves on the boards that ran below the platforms. The chief of the house group, together with his immediate family, occupied the rear of the house; other families of lesser rank, kin to the chief by junior lines of descent, occupied various positions along the sides. Slaves were also housed in the long communal dwelling. They were not, like the middle class, undistinguished relations of the chief’s families, but strangers, captured in war or bartered off like any chattels. The mat beds of the individual families were made on the platforms and were screened off from one another as required.
In such a house Tom early learned his exact relationship to all his kinsmen. He soon learned also the degree of his relationship to the neighboring house groups. He applied the terms “brother” and “sister” not only to his immediate brothers and sisters but to his cousins, near and remote, of the same generation. He distinguished, among all these remoter brothers and sisters, “older” and “younger,” not according to their actual ages in relation to his own, but according to whether they belonged to lines of descent that were senior or junior to his own. Primogeniture, he gradually learned, both of self and progenitor, meant superiority in rank and privilege. Hence the terms “older” and “younger,” almost from the beginning, took on a powerful secondary tinge of “superior” and “inferior.” The absurdity of calling some little girl cousin, perhaps ten years his junior, his “older sister” was for him immensely less evident because of his ever present consciousness of her higher rank. As Tom grew older, he became cognizant of an astonishing number of uncles and aunts, grandfathers and grandmothers, of endless brothers-in-law—far and near. He was very much at home in the world. Wherever he turned, he could say, “Younger brother, come here!” or “Grandfather, let me have this.” The personal names of most of his acquaintances were hardly more than tags for calling out at a distance, or at ceremonial gatherings.
Along with his feeling of personal relationship to individuals there grew up in Tom a consciousness of the existence of tribal subdivisions in the village. The Ts’isha’ath tribe, with which he was identified by residence, kinship, and upbringing, proved really to be a cluster of various smaller tribal units, of which the Ts’isha’ath, that gave their name to the whole, were the leading group. The other subdivisions were originally independent tribes that had lost their isolated distinctness through conquest, weakening in numbers, or friendly removal and union. Each of the tribal subdivisions or “septs” had its own stock of legends, its distinctive privileges, its own houses in the village, its old village sites and distinctive fishing and hunting waters that were still remembered in detail by its members. While the septs now lived together as a single tribe, the basis of the sept division was really a traditional local one. The sept grouping was perhaps most markedly brought to light at ceremonial gatherings. Tom learned in time that of all the honored seats recognized at a feast, a certain number of contiguous seats in the rear of the house belonged to representatives of the Ts’isha’ath sept, a certain number of others at the right corner in the rear to those of another sept, and so on. Thus, the proper ranking of the septs was ever kept before the eye by the definite assignment of seats of higher and lower rank.
But it must not be supposed that Tom’s childhood and youth were spent entirely in work and in the acquirement of social and ceremonial knowledge. On the contrary, what interested him at least as much as sociology was play. He spun his tops—rather clumsy looking, two-pegged tops they were—threw his gaming spears in the spear and grass game and in the hoop-rolling game, hit feathered billets with a flat bat, threw beaver teeth dice (though this was chiefly a woman’s game), and, when he grew older, took part in the favorite game of “lehal,” the almost universal Western American guessing game, played with two or four gambling bones to the accompaniment of stirring songs. More properly belonging to the domain of sport was the somewhat dangerous game of canoe-upsetting, in which the contestants upset their canoes and quickly righted them at a hand-clap signal. This was an especially favored game of Tom’s. All through his life, up to the time that he lost his sight, he was as instinctively familiar with the run of water, the dip and lurch of a canoe, and the turn of a paddle, as with the movements of walking on the land. Indeed, for days on end, at certain seasons, his life flowed on insistently to the very rhythm of rising and falling wave.
In at least one class of activities and beliefs Tom constantly received definite instruction from his father and maternal uncle. This was the world of unseen things, the mysterious domain of magic, of supernaturally compelling act and of preventive tabu. There were hundreds of things he must be careful to do or to avoid if he would have success in hunting and fishing, if he would be certain that unseen but ever present powers favor him in his pursuits or, at the least, desist from visiting harm upon him. He must be particularly careful not to anger the supernatural powers, among whom are to be counted the fish and mammals of the sea, by contamination with unclean things—and most obnoxious of all unclean things is the presence or influence of a menstruating or pregnant woman. For instance, a sealer or hunter of sea lions must not drag his canoe down to the water’s edge, but have it carried over, as otherwise it might run over offal or some spot through which a menstruating woman had passed, and thus carry with it a scent that would frighten away the game. And one must be careful about his speech when hunting on the sea. A curious example of this is the fiction by which fur seal hunting is spoken of as gathering driftwood, the fur seal himself being referred to as “the one that sits yonder under a tree.” It would not do to let him know too precisely what is going on while he is being hunted! The various tabus that Tom has learnt and practised in the course of his life are almost without number, and his practical success and longevity he ascribes in no small measure to his religious observance of them all.
The tabus are largely preventive measures. But Tom learned that there are more positive ways of working one’s will in the world of magic. One of these is the use of certain amulets on the person, hidden in the house or woods, or in connection with hunting and fishing implements. As a general good-luck amulet, Tom was fond of wearing in his hat the spine of the “rat-fish.” When his father was about to die, he called Tom to him and whispered in his ear an important secret. This was that the chief life-guarding amulet of the family had been a fire drill that was secreted at the bottom of an old box filled with all sorts of odds and ends. Its efficacy depended largely on the fact that hardly anybody knew of it. In general, secrecy helps tremendously in the power of all magic objects and formulæ. An Indian likes to withhold as much as possible, even from his nearest kin, until economic urgency or the approach of death compels him to transmit the magical knowledge to some one that is near and dear to him. Some of his most powerful amulets Tom would secrete in the canoe or hide under the cherry bark wrappings around the hafts of his hunting spears. These amulets were of all sorts, but chiefly fragments of supernatural animals—blind snakes, crabs, spiders, or the like—obtained in the woods.
Some men are fortunate in getting power for hunting, fishing, wealth, love, doctoring, witchcraft, or whatever it may be, from supernatural beings or visitations. Amulets are often obtained in connection with these experiences, which regularly take place in mysterious or out-of-the-way places—the open sea, a remote island, the summit of a mountain, the heart of the woods,—and of all mysteries, it is the mystery of the dark woods that most fascinates and inspires with dread the coast villager, so much at home on the sandy beach and on open sea spaces. The supernatural givers of power are a variegated and grotesque lot—mysterious hands pointing up out of the earth; the scaly, knife-tongued, lightning serpent; fairy-like beings; treacherous tree nymphs; hobgoblins; ogres; and strange hybrid animals that seem to have stepped out of nightmares. All these denizens of the supernatural world have power to bestow that may not with impunity be refused. This power, once obtained, must be carefully husbanded by the observance of requisite tabus.
Tom has not had as many supernatural experiences as some men, but he has nevertheless been favored by two or three striking visitations. A gnome-like being of the beneficent, wealth-giving class known as Chimimis, once appeared to him as he was sitting out at dusk in company with two other men. Though these companions had their eyes directed at the Chimimis, they could not perceive him. Tom alone, speechless with astonishment, saw him place two spears on the roof of the house, walk off to the neighboring house, and disappear, so it seemed, in a log. When Tom came to himself, he scraped off those parts of the spear shafts that the hand of the Chimimis had gripped. He preserved the scrapings as an amulet and, in time, became one of the wealthiest men of his tribe.
At another time Tom obtained power from a supernatural being known as “Full-eyed,” a diminutive, brownie-like creature. He was lying very ill in the house, gazing steadfastly at the fire, when the popping up of a little cinder caused him to raise his eyes. He saw what seemed to be a child circling the fire in a counter-clockwise direction, which is the exact opposite of the Nootka direction in dancing. He knew immediately that it was Full-eyed. The brownie carried a small storage basket on his breast, and picked up from the floor anything he could lay his hands on. Though Tom had been unable to sit up straight, this supernatural experience infused him with such sudden strength that he was now easily able to sit up. He believed also that, from this time on, wealth rolled into his house more rapidly than ever. The third of Tom’s supernatural experiences was less striking than the other two, but apparently equally potent in its practical results. Tom was reclining on the sleeping platform of the house, in the dead of winter, when he observed a strange thing in one of the storage baskets on the box that marked the head of his bed. He noticed that a big black bumblebee gave birth to an infant bee. This seemed remarkable and evidently significant in view of the fact that the young bees ordinarily come into being in the summer, only. Because Tom was sole witness to so strange an occurrence, he was more than ever favored in the accumulation of wealth.
Such extraordinary occurrences as these are clearly in the nature of accidents; they cannot be relied upon for the necessary aid in the successful prosecution of life’s work. The standard, and on the whole, the most useful means of securing this necessary aid is by the performance of secret rituals. Nothing came to one who did not undergo considerable hardship in training. This Tom learned early in life. If he wished to be a successful fisherman, or a hunter of sea mammals, or a land hunter, he had to retire at certain seasons to secret places in the woods, known only to the respective families that frequented them. Here, for days on end, he would bathe, rub himself down with hemlock branches until the skin tingled with pain, pray to the Sky Chief for long life and success, and, most important of all, carry out secret, magical performances based on the principle of imitation. If he wished to obtain power in sealing, he would build effigies of twigs representing the seal, the harpooning outfit, and the hunting canoe. The aspirants for success would dramatize the future hunt in its magical setting. He himself performed imitative actions and offered continuous prayers for success. These periods of preparation tested physical endurance to the utmost; fasting, continuous wakefulness, sexual continence, and the observance of all sorts of tabus formed part of the training. There was little that one could not learn to do, if only he were hardy enough to undergo the necessary magical preparation. Such young men as were fired with extraordinary ambitions, say unusual success in whaling or the acquirement of potent shamanistic power, would train the will and chasten the cries of the flesh for incredibly long periods, their spiritual eye fixed singly on the austerities of magical procedure.
Tom never devoted himself to unusual rigors in the acquirement of magical power. He contented himself with the normal routine enjoined upon those planning to seal, to spear salmon, to troll, to catch halibut with hooks, to spear cod with the aid of decoys, to accumulate wealth, to prepare for ritualistic performances, and to obtain enough shamanistic power to withstand the attempts of evil-minded people to bewitch him. He never ventured upon the more difficult and exhausting procedures required to make a successful whaler or hunter of sea lions. Of the more unusual types of secret ritual, Tom attempted but one. When past middle age, he was fired with the ambition to learn how to interpret the speech of ravens. The ravens are believed to be the supernatural messengers of the wolves, the most austere and eerie of all beings, in the belief of the Nootka. Could Tom have learned to unravel the mysteries concealed in the croakings of these supernatural birds, there is little doubt that he would have been able to advance in ritual power far beyond his fellow tribesmen. Unfortunately he found the quest of this difficult knowledge too exhausting, too baffling. Tom acknowledges his failure with a sigh.
The secret rituals could only be performed at auspicious periods, when the moon was waxing and when the days were becoming progressively long. It was for this reason that Tom was always very careful to keep track of the passage of time, of the recurrence of the moons. If some neighbor, less wise and observant, committed the error of taking one moon for another and of performing magical rituals out of season, Tom would say nothing. He would smile and keep counsel with himself, knowing well that his neighbor’s efforts when the hunting season came around, were doomed to failure. While Tom was one of those that never went out of his way to bewitch his neighbors or to spoil their luck, he was naturally not altogether displeased when they put themselves at a disadvantage. It was none of his business to correct them, to strengthen the hands of possible rivals.
Medicine men gained their power in a manner perfectly analogous to all other quests for magical assistance. The difference was simply that they sought aid of such beings as were known to grant power to cure diseases and to counteract witchcraft. The material guardians and amulets obtained by medicine men, generally certain birds and rarer fish, were locked away in their breasts. When required for the detection of sickness, for the cure of the diseased, or for the overcoming of an evil opponent, they could be called upon to fly invisibly to the desired goal and to return at will. Tom himself obtained a modicum of power from the mallard ducks, but not enough to warrant his considering himself a regular practitioner. He had, also, a certain inherited, shamanistic power, or rather privilege, that came to him from a Nitinat ancestor. This is why at public shamanistic performances which form part of the Ts’ayek cult, Tom’s oldest son has the right to initiate shamanistic novices at a certain point in the ceremonial procedure, though he himself is not a practising medicine man.
Many Nootka are accused of gaining power to bewitch their enemies or rivals, whether by the handling of their food, nail parings, and body effluvia, or by the pronouncing of direful spells in connection with the name and effigy of the hated person. Tom never indulged in such mean spirited pursuits, but he is very sure that many of his acquaintances have done so. It is the constant fear of witchcraft that even to this day causes the Indians to keep many dogs around the house, and to lock their doors securely at night. The barking of the dogs is useful in calling attention to malevolent “pains” or minute disease objects that wander about, particularly at night, while the locking of doors is essential in denying these objects an entrance.
The great supernatural beings of Nootka belief, such as the Sky Chief, the Thunder-bird, and the Wolves, loomed very large in Tom’s life, whether in prayer or in ritual. Certain Nootka are more deeply religious than others. They are more fervent in their prayers and they work themselves up to a greater ecstasy in the performance of rituals that are sacred to divine powers. In contrast to men of this type, Tom has always been rather sober, not a skeptic by any means, but not an emotional enthusiast. His knowledge of religious ceremonials is vast, but the spirit that animates this knowledge is rather one of order, of legal particularity, not of spiritual ecstasy. The practical economical world, the pursuit of gain, has always been more congenial to Tom’s temperament. This does not mean that Tom is a rationalist in matters relating to the unseen world. Only the educated or half-educated half-breeds are rationalists, and more than one of them has angered Tom by his ill-advised attempts to disturb him with skeptical arguments. However, there has been no change in Tom. He knows, as firmly as he knows his own name, that when the rumble of thunder is heard from the mountain, it is because the Thunder-bird is leaving his house on the peak, flapping his wings heavily, as he makes off for the sea to prey upon the whales. He knows also that when those that are not blind like himself tell him that there has been a flash of lightning, it is because the Thunder-bird has dropped the belt wound about his middle. This belt is the lightning serpent, zig-zagging down to the earth or coiling in a flash around a cedar tree.
Aside from the elementary problem of making his living, a Nootka’s main concern is to earn the esteem of his fellow tribesmen by a lavish display of wealth. It is not enough for him to accumulate it and to live in private ease. He must, from time to time, invite the other families of his tribe, and the neighboring tribes, to public ceremonies known as potlatches, in which one or more of the important privileges to which he is entitled are shown and glorified by the distribution of property to the guests. The exhibiting of privileges may take several forms. The most important of them refer to ancestral crests, which may be shown in a dramatic performance, as a picture on a board, or latterly, on canvas, or symbolized in a dance. Ceremonial games are another frequent type of exhibitions of privileges at certain potlatches. Nearly all privileges have their proper songs, which are themselves jealously guarded privileges, and which are sung on these occasions.
There are two considerations that make the public performance of the more important privileges a matter of the greatest moment. In the first place, a man must clearly indicate his right to its performance by recounting the origin myth that it dramatizes, and by tracing his personal connection with the originator of the privilege. In the second place, he must be careful to distribute at least as much property as has already been distributed in his family, in connection with the public presentation of the privilege. If it is at all possible, he will try to exceed the record, so as to add to the public prestige not only of himself and his immediate family, but of the privilege itself. Should he fail in either of these essential respects, he is shamed. Hence, an important potlatch is not to be lightly undertaken. It requires much careful thought and preparation, and it necessitates the gathering of enough wealth to pay for all the services rendered by singers and other assistants, to present substantial gifts to the guests, and to feed the crowd of men, women and children that are present at the ceremony.
A potlatch is not often given as a mere display of wealth. Nearly always it is combined with some definite social or religious function, such as the giving of a name, the coming to marriageable age of a daughter, marriage, a mourning ceremony, the Wolf ritual, or a doctoring ceremony. Potlatching in its fundamental sense, in other words the giving away of property to the guests, is an essential of practically all ceremonies, big or little, religious or profane. Every potlatch involves at least three parties, the giver, the guest or guests, and the person in whose honor the potlatch is given. The last of these is generally some young member of the family whose prestige is thus furthered early in life, but it may be a stranger who has done the giver a service. There are different kinds of gifts. Certain of them are ceremonial grants to which the highest in rank of the tribe are entitled, but which they are expected to return with one hundred per cent interest at a subsequent potlatch. Another class of gifts, which feature the most important and picturesque part of the potlatch, is made to the highest in rank among the guests. There is no rigid rule as to the return of these gifts, but in practice they are nearly always liquidated at a return potlatch, with gifts of an equal, and in many cases greater, value. Finally, towards the end of the potlatch, there is a general distribution of smaller amounts to the crowd. Less careful account is taken of the return of such gifts than of the first two types. In part, the giving of a potlatch amounts to an investment of value, though it is doubtful whether, among the Nootka, the greater part of the expenditure incurred at a potlatch ever returned to its owner.
A potlatch serves not only a definite social and economic purpose for its giver, but affords, as well, an opportunity for minor distributions of property, such as public payments for services, on the part of other individuals present. Indeed any announcements of importance, such as the handing over of a privilege or a change in name, would be most appropriately made at a potlatch. The assembled tribesmen and guests were, to all intents and purposes, witnesses to such announcements.
Tom began to give potlatches on his own account when still quite a young man. The first one of any importance that he was responsible for, was a potlatch in honor of his niece’s husband. This was a man of low birth, whom Tom had vowed to have nothing to do with. When his niece, however, gave birth to a child, Tom relented and, in order to wash away the stain on his family’s honor, he called together thirty of his relatives, and distributed four guns and a blanket to each. He also sang two of his privileged songs, which he then and there transferred to the child as its due privilege. This potlatch not only marked a reconcilement with his low-born nephew, but gave the little youngster a fair start in life in the race for status. The next of Tom’s potlatches was a Wolf ritual, in which he himself performed two of the ceremonial dances, those of the Thunder-bird and the Wolf circling about on all fours.
Some time after this, Tom resolved to marry a Ts’isha’ath girl named Witsah. In spite of the fact that she was a member of his own tribe, Tom wooed the girl not as a Ts’isha’ath, but as a member of a Nitinat tribe, among whom he had kinsmen on his father’s side. As his own father was dead, he had ten of his Nitinat uncles woo the girl on his behalf. The wooing is always an important part of the marriage preliminaries, and consists chiefly in the placing of objects, symbolizing one or more of the privileges of the suitor, outside the house of the girl’s family. The suitor himself is not present. Sometimes the objects are refused, when the suit may be continued until an acceptance is gained, though this does not necessarily follow. The suitor privileges deposited by Tom’s representatives consisted of ten fires and a carving, representing the lightning serpent. These were accepted and returned to Tom’s uncle as an indication of willingness on the part of the bride’s parents to proceed with the marriage ceremony. Not long after the return of the privileges, the marriage ceremony was celebrated among the Ts’isha’ath people. The money distributed at that time by Tom and his Nitinat relatives constituted a bridal purchase, but when Tom’s first child was born, the property then distributed was returned to Tom and the Nitinats with interest.
The greater part of the marriage ceremony consists of the performance of ceremonial games, each of which is accompanied by special songs, and followed by distributions of property. These games symbolize the difficulty of obtaining the hand of the bride, referring as they do to legendary tests that suitors were compelled to undergo in the past, before they could be admitted by the bride’s father. One of the tests, for instance, might be the lifting of an especially heavy stone, or standing for some time without flinching between two fires. According to legendary theory such tests should be endured by the bridegroom himself, but in actual ceremonial practice any one of the bridegroom’s party may be the winner in the contest, and receive the prize from the bride’s father or whoever of her people is the proud possessor of that particular marriage-game privilege.
Some time after his marriage Tom gave two potlatches in a single month. The first of these was a puberty potlatch in behalf of a younger sister of his. The second was a birth feast or, as the Nootka term it a “navel feast” for his first child, a boy. About a year later Tom invited the Ucluelet people, one of the Nootka tribes, to a feast at which many dance privileges were performed and much property distributed. By this time Tom was getting to be pretty well known among the tribes of the west coast of Vancouver Island, for his rapidly growing wealth and for his potlatches. It was, therefore, no surprise to him, though it proved very gratifying, to have the chief of the Ahousat, one of the most powerful of the northern Nootka tribes, especially invite him to a potlatch at which he was given four of the chief’s ceremonial songs. In return, Tom gave a potlatch to the Ahousat and the Comox, a tribe of alien speech from the east coast of the Island. He distributed four hundred blankets to the former, three hundred to the latter.
A year or two after this potlatch, occurred the decisive event in Tom’s social career. This was the birth of his first daughter. The most magnificent Nootka potlatches are generally given in connection with a daughter’s puberty ceremony. Ever since his marriage, Tom had been hoping to be able, in the fullness of time, to make a record in potlatching among his people, and to show his most valued privileges at the puberty potlatch of a daughter. Now that he was actually blessed by the arrival of a little girl, Tom’s plans took immediate shape. He set about the accumulation of property with more zest than ever, driving many a sharp bargain with the Indians and whites, and he revolved frequently in his mind what tribes he was to invite, and what dramatic displays, dances and songs he was to use at the great ceremony. His first concern was to build a large house of native construction that the guests were to enter when invited to the Ts’isha’ath people. Appropriate timbers for posts and beams are not easy to find, especially since the white man’s sawmill has made its appearance in the country. Hence, Tom was indefatigable in making inquiries of various persons and keeping his eye out for sufficiently large and conveniently located cedars. As he found such trees, he had them felled, hauled up to the Ts’isha’ath village along the Somass river, and put in place as opportunity presented itself. The actual construction of the house was thus spread over a period of some ten or fifteen years.
At one time an unfortunate casualty occurred. One of the heavy crossbeams fell to the ground, fortunately without injuring any one, but the event was considered an ill omen. Nevertheless, Tom did the best he could to ward off the evil influence by having a dance performed in honor of the spirit of the beam. Special songs that he possessed for this purpose were sung at the time.
Tom hoped that he could have the house completed before his daughter arrived at maturity. He was doomed to disappointment. His house still lacked one of the crossbeams and all the lighter wood-work, when his wife announced to him one morning that their daughter had come of age, was menstruating, in other words, for the first time. There was nothing for it but to have the puberty ceremony performed at once, reserving the main puberty potlatch for a few months later. Tom painted his face red and invited the neighboring Hopach’as’ath tribe to the puberty ceremony, the “torches standing on the ground,” as it is termed.
This ceremony marks the beginning of the period of seclusion of the girl. She is painted and ornamented for the occasion, generally with legendary insignia belonging to the family, is made to stand in front of two long boards painted with representations of Thunder-birds and whales, and has water thrown four times at her feet. Four or ten poles, the so-called “torches,” are lighted and later distributed with gifts to those entitled to receive them. Songs of various types are sung, particularly satirical songs twitting the opposite sex. Ceremonial games, some of them anticipating later marriage games, are also performed and prizes are distributed. After a general distribution of goods, the guests depart, leaving the girl to fast for four days and to enter upon a secluded period of various tabus behind the painted boards in the rear of the house.
After the puberty ceremony, Tom proceeded to Victoria to lay in his store of supplies for the impending potlatch. He bought an enormous number of boxes of biscuits, and to this day nothing pleases him more than to tell of how he compelled the white merchant to give him a special rate on the unusual order. As soon as the provisions were safely deposited at his village, Tom invited twelve tribes to his potlatch. To the nearer tribes he sent messengers; the more remote tribes of the east coast he invited in person. When the appointed day arrived, the Ts’isha’ath found that they had on their hands by far the largest number of guests that had ever visited the tribe at a single time. It was the proudest moment of Tom’s life. Everything went well. There was enough food for all, the distributions of property were generous, and all the privileges were interestingly presented. There were a considerable number of these privileges performed, one or two of them being fairly elaborate dramatic representations that were new even to the most northern Nootka tribes, great potlatchers though they are. Tom’s hereditary claim to the performances, the dances and the songs, was carefully explained by the ceremonial speaker. The ancestral legends were in every case recounted at length. Tom’s title to the special crests of the whale and the Thunder-bird was duly set forth. The explanation of the carved house posts took the speaker back to the creation of the first Ts’isha’ath man from the thigh of a woman. Due account, as usual in these origin legends, was taken of the flood. The potlatch securely established Tom’s position among the Indians of the Island. To this day it is often referred to by the Ts’isha’ath and their neighbors. Tom’s family was “put high” as never before. More than once, Tom’s grandson has found himself, when visiting comparative strangers, say among the East Coast tribes, received with open arms and honored with gifts of great value, all on the strength of his grandfather’s potlatch.
Tom’s potlatching career did not end here. Some time later he invited the Kyuquot, a Nootka tribe adjoining the Kwakiutl. At this potlatch he gave a dramatic representation of a number of privileges, including two Thunder-birds, a spouting whale, the supernatural quartz-beings known as He’na, and a supernatural bird known as Mihtach, a sort of mallard duck that haunts the top of the mountain called “Two-bladders-on-its-summit.” The Heshkwiat tribe of Nootka was the next to be invited to a potlatch. A year or two after this, the second greatest ceremonial event in Tom’s career took place, in the form of his second Wolf ritual or Tlokwana. The ritual was given for the special benefit of his oldest son Douglas and his newly married wife. These were the chief initiates in the ritual. Curiously enough, Tom’s little grandson, as yet unborn, was also initiated. This is an extreme instance of the tendency of the Nootka Indians to heap honors upon their offspring at the earliest possible opportunity.
The Wolf ritual is the most awesome, the most fascinating and fear-inspiring ceremony that the Nootka possess. Whatever religious exaltation or frenzy they are capable of, finds expression in this elaborate ritual. The performance, which generally lasts eight days, preferably in the winter, is dominated throughout by the spirit of the wolves who are believed to be hovering near at the outskirts of the village. The more important parts of the ceremonial are open to only such members of the tribe as have been initiated. Many tabus must be observed by those participating, and an attitude of high-minded seriousness must be maintained throughout. In the old days, frivolity during the more strictly religious parts of the ritual, aside of course from the ceremonial buffoonery, was very severely punished by the marshaling attendants. Spearing to death on the spot was the penalty for infraction of the most sacred tabus.
The ritual begins with the songs and other ceremonial activities of an ordinary potlatch. Rumors are set going of the appearance of wolves in the neighborhood of the village. These rumors, accentuated by tales of narrow escapes and bloody casualties, act powerfully upon the imagination of the children, who are soon reduced to a state of panic. All of a sudden the lights are extinguished, and the four “wolves” break through the side of the house. In the confusion that ensues they make off with the youngsters that are to be initiated. From this moment, begins the ritual proper. A certain number of the tribe have the hereditary privilege to “play wolf,” that is, to act as wolves during certain parts of the ritual beyond the confines of the village, to make off with the novices, and keep these as supposed prisoners in the woods. For a number of days, there are supposed to be unsuccessful attempts to take back the captured novices, but the wolves remain obdurate until certain songs are sung, when the novices are brought out in view of the people and the series of attacks finally succeeds in routing the wolves. The novices are supposed to be frenzied by the spirits of various supernatural beings that possess them. They must be brought back by force. Those privileged to do so lasso them, and, to the accompaniment of sacred songs, the struggling novices are conducted to the potlatch house, whistling furiously all the while. The hubbub of mingled whistling, drumming and simultaneous singing of many distinct ritual songs, continues for the greater part of the night. The din is indescribable. During the following day is performed the most sacred episode in the ritual. The whistling spirits that possess the novices must be exorcised by means of sacred dances and songs. A purification ceremony of bathing in the river or sea follows. The remainder of the ritual consists of the performance of a number of special dances, each of which is appropriate to the particular supernatural being that is supposed to have possessed one of the initiates. There are many of these dances, varying greatly in their prestige as privileges, and in their character of religious frenzy. Probably the most austere of the dances is that of the supernatural wolf, who crawls about in reckless pursuit of destruction and has to be restrained with great difficulty by a number of attendants. Other dances represent various types of woodsy creatures or ogres. Many of them are pantomimic representations of animals, while human activities of various kinds are represented in still others.
With this Wolf ritual Tom’s ceremonial activities gradually lessened. He continued to take an active interest in whatever potlatches were given by his family, and he often helped with his advice and active coöperation in the singing of songs and the delivering of ceremonial addresses, particularly of the formal speeches of thanks. Now that he had done his share in establishing the glory of his family, Tom sat back and allowed his eldest son to take the initiative, at least in theory, in all ceremonies affecting their standing in the tribe.
It is long since Tom has been able to do useful work. He is entirely dependent on his oldest son’s family, with whom he lives, but they do not feel his presence to be a burden. For one thing, he is uniformly good-natured, very talkative about his own past and in judging his neighbors, and always ready to help with his advice in matters of importance, whether it be the preparations for a potlatch or some contested sealing claim. But back of the garrulous, shabby Tom of the present, looms up the Tom of the great potlatches of former days. It is to this Tom that his children and grandchildren almost entirely owe the high standing that they maintain among their people.
When Tom dies he will be put in a coffin and buried in the ground. This was not the old Nootka custom. The more important families had caves in which their deceased members were put away; others were laid in burial boxes or rush mats which were then put up in trees back of the village. Near the place of the burial there would be put up a grave post, constructed of roof rafters of the house, on which would be painted one of the crests of the deceased.
Though the old burial customs are no longer followed, some of the beliefs and practices attending death have not yet died out. Thus, the immediate personal effects of the deceased, as well as considerable additional property, are always destroyed. In the old days the whole house might be burned down, and tales are told of how the mourning survivors would move off to another spot to build them a new house. In all likelihood there will be performed immediately after Tom’s death a ceremony intended to comfort the family of the deceased and to induce Tom’s spirit to leave the house and its vicinity. Tom’s soul will have left his body in the shape of a tiny shadow-like double of himself, through the crown of his head, to assume eventually the form of a full-fledged ghost. It is safe to assume that the tabu of the dead person’s name will be carefully observed. Not only will Tom’s name not be mentioned by his tribesmen for a stated period, but all words that involve the main element of his name will be carefully avoided. This element denotes the idea of “distant.” People will have to get along as best they can without it, whether by beating about the bush, by stretching the meaning of some other element so as to enable it to take its place, or, if need be, by borrowing the corresponding element, provided it be of different sound, from some other dialect. Wailing sounds will be heard in the village for some time after Tom’s death, and it is very likely that at a mourning potlatch a number of privileges belonging to the family, say four songs, will be thrown away. Such privileges are tabued during the mourning period. At the end of the mourning period, which may be anything from a year to ten, another potlatch is given by one of the family and the tabus are lifted. When that time arrives Tom’s name will have passed into native history. The name Sayach’apis, “Stands-up-high-over-all,” will then be freely referred to with pride or with envy.
EDWARD SAPIR
Windigo, a Chipewyan Story
I
Behind the Hudson’s Bay Company’s post at Fort Hearne, they were wrestling for wives. Forgotten were the words of Catholic priests on the sanctity of marriage, forgotten the precepts of Episcopal missionaries. In the twinkling of an eye those high-flown, newfangled notions had been swept aside by the deep rooted usage of ancient days. The Indians had been peaceably playing at “Button, button, who has the button?” with half the spectators staking shirts and blankets on the issue of the game. The real fun started when drunken Ramsay MacCrae reeled into the crowd and hugged Blanche Lecouvreur. Her husband sent him staggering to the ground, but the toper rose and, thrusting his fingers into Lecouvreur’s face, challenged him to an old-time combat for his spouse.
There was no more guessing game after that, there was genuine sport. Ramsay was laid low, but he had set the example and another young swashbuckler fell foul of Casimir; and so it went on. There was nothing riotous about the affair, it was as nicely regulated as a prize fight. There was never more than one contest at a time for no one would miss part of the spectacle by engaging in a side show of his own. The wrestlers pulled each other about by the hair and ears, after the approved Athabaskan fashion before attempting other holds. What amusement when Angus had thrown the gauntlet to little Gordon and was on the point of carrying off buxom Peggy by default! But there was still more laughter when the crafty wag of the camp, supposed to be cowering in a hiding-place, popped out of his tent, his skull cropped, ears and body glistening with grease, and, seizing his handicapped adversary by his long locks, dragged him to the ground. Cries of encouragement and admiration filled the air. One wagered his gun on a friend’s victory, another staked his net or tent. The women fought for, looked on stolidly while the battle was waging, but when Ramsay had fallen, Blanche heaved a sigh of relief, and Peggy could not suppress a sneer at her would-be captor. Others were hauled away whimpering, but with Marie every one knew that she was wailing only to satisfy the proprieties, for she was well rid of her brute of a husband who had nearly beaten her to death after his last journey.
But the climax came when big Douglas thrust his paw in Pierre Villeneuve’s face. To be sure, Louise was as comely as any young matron in or near the settlement, yet until now the bullies had refrained from challenging her husband. Every one respected her for her virtue and her kindness; and every one, too, was fond of Pierre. He was such a harmless, easy-going, good-natured chap, so handy with packstrap and toboggan, a prime companion after a two days’ trip without food, keeping up his blithe old ditty about “_ma belle patrie_” or warbling some native melody, when every one else was ready to sink down from exhaustion. But what was all that to crazy Douglas when he was in drink and lusting for a woman? He had the advantage of four inches in height, and of at least two stone in weight,—good enough reason for trying for a prize. Still, Pierre was no mean antagonist with his sinewy, agile frame and his widely famed strength of grip. Nor was it long before Douglas discovered that he had caught a tartar. Twice he was on the point of scoring, only to have Pierre wriggle unhurt from his grasp. At last a cry of anguish from Louise as the inevitable was about to happen. Douglas had lifted her husband and was about to hurl him to the ground. But then things happened quickly, no one knew how, and Douglas lay stretched out on the ground panting. He limped off with a sprained ankle, amidst the mocking and jubilations of Pierre’s friends, while even his backers had sportsmanship enough to congratulate the conqueror.
Then through the laughing, shouting, gesticulating crowd a Titanic figure elbowed his way. In the midst of the din and excitement the strange half-breed’s approach had passed unnoticed. He had arrived only yesterday, with a letter of credit from the Company of Gentlemen and Adventurers’ Trading into Hudson’s Bay. His name was George MacDonald; beyond that nothing was known about him. What a frame was his! Beside it, huge Douglas looked puny. Pierre seemed a mere babe. MacDonald was not a man of many words. He strode towards Louise, lightly touched her arm and said, “I want you.” She shrank back shrieking, and Pierre rushed at the giant in a blind fury, only to be firmly grasped and gently deposited on the ground. Once more he leaped at his conqueror but was caught in a vise-like grip and laid low again, raging and impotent. In his madness he unsheathed his knife, but now Casimir and Gordon pinioned his arms and the crowd shouted, “Peace, peace! The stranger has won fairly!”
MacDonald stood there calm and supercilious. “I have won,” he said to Louise, “come.” Without looking back he walked towards his tent, and the woman followed sobbing. That was the last wrestling bout that day.
II
MacDonald stayed at Fort Hearne and built himself a cabin at the other end of the post. He went off for a few days and returned with a retinue of Slaveys. Then he began trading against the Company itself. He had a way of dealing with the Indians that no other man had. He paid less, rather than more, for their furs, and disdained to coddle them with gifts and favors. Yet, when the peltry hunters caught a silver fox or some other valuable fur, the prize went to the gruff giant’s shack rather than to the Company’s warehouse. There was no competing with him. One factor was sent to relieve another, but without avail. At last the Commissioner himself braved the journey to the Fort, bought out MacDonald, and set him up as head of the post.
Now, things began to hum at Fort Hearne. Never had such a factor been seen as MacDonald. He spoke Dogrib and Chipewyan and Cree and French as well as his father’s Orkney Island brogue: there was no hunter for hundreds of miles with whom he could not converse in his own tongue. He was on his feet from morning until night and kept every one else on the go. As a freetrader he had beaten the Company at its own game. With the Company’s prestige behind him he allowed no freetrader to raise his head. By fair means none could compete, and who dared try force or trickery against MacDonald? In the long winter evenings, when boresome hours of sloth were whiled away with story telling, strange tales began to circulate about the big factor. Since little or nothing was known of his early life, imagination ran riot. Angus knew that the factor could transform himself into a wolf, and hunt deer thus disguised. Casimir pictured him in his youth, pulling cargo-laden scows, single-handed, that were wont to be towed by a half-dozen strapping Indians. Jean had it from an aunt that MacDonald had once swum a river in pursuit of a bear, had stabbed it with a knife and carried the carcass twenty miles to camp. Some said he was bulletproof, and others with a tincture of Christian lore spoke of his pact with the devil. He grew into the central figure of a new mythology.
The hero himself moved across his stage with the saturnine grandeur of a Norse god. He never boasted, never faltered, never failed. He ran unscathed through rapids never attempted since two parties of canoemen had been capsized and drowned. He walked toward the cocked gun of a drink-crazed competitor, and calmly knocked it out of his hand. MacDonald did not know what it was to be afraid.
Between the trader and Pierre a curious relationship developed. The factor of course used men as pawns, and knew a good lieutenant when he saw one. But for Pierre he showed more consideration than was due to even the best of assistants. Perhaps it was because Louise prompted kindness to her former husband; perhaps there was some spontaneous sentimentalism for a man he had wronged. However that might be, Pierre became a sort of attendant-in-ordinary on MacDonald, his companion on trips of inspection and the rarer jaunts of pleasure.
For Pierre, his sullen, imperious master became the one and only subject of interest. He studied his habits and gestures and speech. He had set out eager to detect weakness, but his prying skepticism had changed to grudging admiration, and later to despondent amazement. He had begun by hating his wife’s abductor, and he came to hate with an ever intenser hatred the man who was without peer. It was not merely the giant’s strength or dauntless courage, it was the way he had with men. How he ordered about Casimir or Angus or Ramsay! A word was enough to quell rebellion. Again and again, in the beginning, Pierre had resolved to bid him defiance, yet when the moment came his resolution had failed. Yes, people liked Pierre and after a fashion they respected him, but that was a different thing. It was not in him to issue commands to others. If he ever mustered courage to do so, they would think he was putting on airs and laugh in his face, so that he would slink off in shame and humiliation. Why were men born so different? Why was he not born superior to the rest, like MacDonald? Why born at all only to be lorded over by another? Thus he brooded and brooded for hours at night, losing all hope and joy in life.
Then one day, unexpectedly, his despair was lifted. He had been on a fruitless hunting trip with the factor, and the two were approaching the post at the close of a rainy day. They were walking through a dense wood. Both were drenched to the skin, and Pierre was nearly exhausted. Suddenly, odd fancies crossed his mind. Weird tales of childhood, retold round many a winter camp fire, surged in memory and would not down. At dark, the forest was peopled with mysterious beings. The Windigo were about then—cadaverous shapes with glaring eyes, and feeders on human flesh. They lurked in the shadows of trees, and rose upon wayfarers from the depths of the swamps. What chance of escape when they had once sighted a victim? Rattling their skeletons, they flitted after him faster than a hawk can fly, tore him apart like a rabbit or swallowed him whole. The very wood Pierre was now traversing had been once entered by a trapper who was never seen again. Pierre began to feel oppressed by a sense of uncanniness. He peered cautiously into the gathering darkness, then glanced eagerly behind him. He was glad MacDonald was near. The great man could protect him if any one could. Pierre felt reassured, yet it was best to take no chances, so he hurried on.
Of a sudden there was a snapping of boughs, and he heard his name called as if in mockery as a long form swished through the wood, and a grim face was gaping at him not ten feet away. He turned in horror and fled towards MacDonald, crying, “Windigo! Windigo!” as he pointed at a spot ahead. But MacDonald did not smite the ogre with one of his huge fists, or seek to grapple with it as he was said to have once wrestled with a bear. His face turned an ashen hue, his mighty body was quivering like an aspen. That was the half-breed of it. Then with a bound he ran through the wood as fast as his legs would carry him, down to the river bank and along the rocky water front, till at length he caught sight of the big warehouse. There he paused panting, with the cold perspiration on his forehead. Pierre had followed as swiftly as he could, and at last overtook his master. Both were trembling from head to foot and MacDonald kept muttering, “Windigo! Windigo!” Thus they walked toward the Fort. And Pierre felt happier than he had ever been since that wrestling bout when he had lost Louise: for all his way, MacDonald was afraid of the Windigo!
III
Casimir was dangerously ill. His appetite was gone and his limbs seemed paralyzed. There came rumors that a famous Cree doctor was visiting the Chipewyan of a nearby settlement, and Pierre was dispatched to lure him to Fort Hearne with promise of fabulous fees. The Cree consented. He was a garrulous old man and on their joint trip Pierre tried to sound him about his powers, but on that subject he was mum. “You will see,” he answered, and Pierre was obliged to wait.
When they arrived at the Fort, the medicine man erected a little booth and had himself thrust in, with his hands and feet firmly tied. He sang his incantations and the lodge began to shake. It seemed filled with strange beings, for unearthly sounds were heard, followed by a death-like silence. Opening the lodge they saw the conjuror unbound, and as if awakening from a trance. He proclaimed that the spirits had visited him and declared that Casimir would recover. Next, the patient himself was stretched out in the booth and the doctor entered it, stripped stark naked. He knelt and sang and blew at Casimir’s heart, sucked at his breasts, and talked as if with his guardian spirits. Then he swallowed a stick three feet long, and retched it up again, announcing that all was well. In sooth, Casimir was carried from the tent clamoring for food, and in a week he was able to walk about. Then his kin showered gifts on the great magician, and all the other Indians sought to curry favor with him by every manner of attention.
Pierre was less ostentatious than others in his entertainment of the old sage, but sometimes when the rest were fast asleep he would steal to the conjuror’s tent with liquor and tobacco, to ply him with questions about the magic art. And after a while his host’s reticence waned. He even confessed to having bewitched a rival by drawing his image on the ground with an arrow pointed at his heart. Yet when Pierre hinted that he, too, had a strong enemy on whom he would fain cast a spell, the old fox hedged and said that sorcery was a dangerous business. Some men had power of their own, and could hurl the evil charm back with redoubled force against the sorcerer. Besides, he himself was old and wanted to live his few years in peace.
When Pierre found it hopeless to make the Cree bewitch his master, he changed his tactics. What was the truth about the Windigo? He had heard his mother tell about them, but did they really exist? That proved a less delicate subject for the medicine man. He himself had never seen a Windigo, but he knew all about them from another conjuror. Yes, the Windigo were dangerous spirits and fearfully strong. How strong? Surely no stronger than the factor? Why, they would rend him asunder like a dry twig. They swooped down upon men to tear out their vitals, and played ball with their skulls. There was a way to gain their favor, but it was very hard. If one fasted for three or four days in a wood they haunted, and freely offered them of one’s flesh, they were pleased and might adopt him as their child. True, they were likely to swallow the sufferer whole, but when they spewed him out he was like one of themselves ever after, fierce and cannibalistic. The other Indians had better keep a wide berth of such as these, or placate them by gifts lest they break loose and destroy every one in sight. And now Pierre himself recalled a gaunt man who had terrorized the camp of his childhood, and whose bare glance had thrown timid folk into convulsions.
Pierre slipped home and sat musing for a long time. Should he tempt the spirits of the woods? Would they answer his prayer? What if they ate him before he could make his offering? Yet, why should he live? He had lost Louise; and her captor was master of Fort Hearne. Life mattered not, unless the Windigo chose to bless him.
The next day he entered the wood he had traversed with MacDonald that memorable evening. He ate not a morsel of food all day, and continued his fast next day, praying to the Windigo. At last he mustered up courage, gashed his chest with a big knife, and offered his body to the spirits. Then he fell down in a dead swoon. When he woke up, there was joy in his heart for all his pain. A Windigo had really come and blessed him! It had seized him as a boy seizes a moth, but when it saw the blood streaming from his breast it took pity on him, swallowed and disgorged him. Next spring he was to wreak vengeance as a Windigo. He must merely bide his time.
As he walked homeward, he exulted in his new powers. Why not try them for a joke? He, too, would show people his strength now. The first man he encountered he would terrify into fits. Yonder was Angus, mending a net in front of his tent. He would do as well as the next. Pierre quickly stepped up to him, and assuming a ferocious grimace, he cried, “I am Windigo! I have come to eat you!”
But Angus burst into a guffaw, “You a Windigo! You, who never hurt a fly! You are crazy. You’ve been drinking. Go home and sleep it off!” Pierre slunk home like a whipped cur, and threw himself on his bed crestfallen and humiliated. The Windigo had blessed him, yet he could not be Windigo. It was not in him. Even the Windigo could help only men like MacDonald. Thus he lay in impotent grief till exhaustion brought sleep. Then the Windigo loomed in sight and whispered, “In the spring, fool! I said, in the spring!”
IV
Spring came, and word reached Fort Hearne that the factor was to meet a fleet of scows at Fort Batise. That was a post he had never visited, so he summoned Pierre to make ready for the trip as his guide. They laid in an ample stock of provisions, for it was a long journey and there might be a protracted wait for the boats at their destination: Hudson’s Bay Company transports do not run on schedule time. One fine morning the two men set out in a canoe, struggling up-stream against the powerful current. Now and then they landed to shoot some partridges, and one day MacDonald killed a moose. Otherwise there was little to relieve the monotony of the journey. From morning till night, not a soul crossed their path. With MacDonald lapsing into his wonted silence, hours would pass without a sound but the splashing of the paddles and the quaint, plaintive notes of Pierre’s Red River melodies. Once in a while an abandoned site, with tent poles standing, suggested former human occupation. Every night the two men camped near the water edge, played a game or two of cribbage, and then stretched out to rest till four or five o’clock the next morning. And in the night Pierre would hear strange sounds, and as they grew nearer they turned into words: “In the spring! In the spring!”
When they reached Fort Batise, the post was all but deserted. The Company’s trader had gone on a hunting trip and the dozen Indians in his charge were scattered though the woods. A single half-witted breed was holding down the Fort, and pointed out the uninhabited island, already known to Pierre, where the scows from time immemorial had been unloading the cargoes destined for Northern posts. The factor and Pierre paddled across and threw their bedding into a long, tumble-down shack reserved for the Company’s servants. It was still somewhat too early for retiring, so MacDonald suggested a walk, and they set out for a stroll through the dense wood.
Pierre had been unusually silent that evening, as though by contagion with the factor’s taciturnity. Now, of a sudden, his tongue was loosened. Did MacDonald know why the post had never been transferred to the island for all its fine landing place? The Indians would not live there, they never came there alone, for the spot was haunted, they said. It was called Simon’s island. There was a long story about it, a foolish tale, but one the Indians told about their camp fires as though it were true. Of course Simon had really lived; Pierre remembered him well from the days of his boyhood—a ne’er-do-well, not a bad sort, but one always in bad luck. First, none of the girls would have him, then he got married and his wife died in childbirth. He would get a job towing a boat, stumble over a windfall on his first trip, and break his leg. It was always that way with poor Simon. When he gave up tracking, he became a pelt hunter. For years he roamed over the country and eked out a miserable livelihood. At last he had a stroke of luck and caught a silver fox. Now he thought he should live in plenty. But while on his way to the nearest trader’s, he fell in with another trapper. They slept side by side, and in the morning the stranger and the silver fox were both gone. High and low, Simon looked for them, but in vain. Then he turned crazy in his grief and became a Windigo. Whomever he chanced upon, men or women, he killed and ate. The Indians made up parties to hunt him like a wild beast. He laughed at them; he was Windigo. They could never catch him. Then some time after, those who had hunted him were found murdered in their tents, and people ceased pursuing him. Now they tried to buy him off. As soon as he had been sighted near a camp, heaps of meat were piled up outside the settlement, and the handsomest clothing was laid beside the food. Then he would leave the camp alone—till some fine day the fancy seized him once more, and he stole into a camp to gratify his craving. That was long ago, and Simon had died on this very island, where he lay buried. Yet the natives believed that his ghost still walked as a Windigo from time to time, though the Company said it was all nonsense and put up its shack there, in defiance of Indian tales. Of course the Company knew best.
MacDonald had been listening with growing attention, and throughout the tale Pierre’s gaze had been riveted on his features. Had not a faint tremor passed down his spine when he first heard the word “Windigo”? Had he not caught his breath when he learned of the ghost’s reported wanderings? And why this sudden turning on his heels at the close of the story? Pierre was whistling a tune on the return walk, and the factor roared at him to keep still. He was plainly nervous; the tale had done its work.
Arrived at the cabin, MacDonald picked up his bedding and muttered, “Perhaps we had better go across to the post, we won’t be able to sleep here for mosquitoes.” He did not expect Pierre to have faith in his pretext; neither did he expect to be openly flouted by his meek companion. But Pierre, looking him up and down, asked drily, “Afraid of Simon’s ghost?” “Afraid of nothing!” thundered MacDonald, hurling his blankets on the floor and glowering at his mate. He began to pace the room with giant strides. There was no doubt of it, he was troubled. He would not play cribbage. He was too tired, he said. MacDonald, who had never been tired before! So, soon both men sprawled out on the floor covered with their four-point blankets. But neither fell asleep.
After a while MacDonald rose softly, and tiptoed toward the door. Perhaps he could make his way to the bank unnoticed, and put the river between Simon’s ghost and himself. But Pierre was wide awake and staring at him in the gloaming of a Northern night. “I was just stretching a bit,” the big man offered in explanation, and Pierre did not even deign to tell him he lied. He sat up against the door now, and was eyeing the factor steadily, scornfully. The big man was nonplussed. What was Pierre’s game? How could he be so calm in a haunted spot? A mad hatred against him suddenly rose in MacDonald’s breast. He would brain this puny dolt with a blow of his fist, and say he had been drowned in the rapids. Then he would escape to the post and no soul would know of his weakness. Still Pierre sat looking at him with his gun across his knees. MacDonald cared little for the gun. There was at least a chance for him to take Pierre by surprise, and wrest the weapon from his grasp, and when had MacDonald been afraid to take chances? But there was something in Pierre’s gaze that cowed and subdued him. So he merely sat up facing Pierre and the door, with neither uttering a word.
As the minutes passed, strange noises became audible. The floor was creaking and the door began to rattle, and over on the other bank the dogs were barking as dogs never barked before. There was a something—was it a bat?—that kept flitting against the roof, and on the door came an unaccountable rhythmic tapping. The factor fidgeted and peered in this direction and that, while Pierre sat now six feet away, immobile and pitiless. Then there was a different sound. A slow, heavy tread was coming up from the water edge. It was approaching the shack from the rear, passed round and got to the door. MacDonald sprang to his feet, but the steps went on, and he sank on the floor relieved though faint. But what was that? The steps were coming closer again: the wanderer was circling the shack a second time. Yet it seemed he had no intention of coming in, for, without halting at the door, the mysterious being started on its third round. But if it cared not to enter, neither was its purpose to leave the inmates in peace, for a fourth circuit began.
Now Pierre burst forth: “It is Simon! He is walking round four times, then he will stop and pay you a visit.” MacDonald leaped up—a beast at bay, afraid to stay, afraid to go out now, straining to hear the weird footfalls first passing away then returning, ever more and more distinct. And now there was a dead halt at the door. Would it fly open and usher in the hideous shape of Simon’s ghost? The door remained closed. But now Pierre rose with a grim laugh, dropping his gun. He walked toward his master and thrust his thumb at his face. “Simon has come to see us wrestle. I will wrestle you for Louise. Simon has made me Windigo. I will throw you and kill you and eat you, and he wants to look on.” Fearlessly and madly he sprang at the giant’s throat. The factor had not watched him, he had not heard his speech, he was still looking and looking at the door. Where now were those puissant arms that had held Pierre like an infant at Fort Hearne? Limp and powerless, they were hanging from a twitching heap that fell resistless at the first impact. Pierre beat him and kicked him and choked him. Without knife or gun, with his bare hands he murdered the great factor. And then—he was Windigo!
He rose jubilant. The Windigo had spoken truly: his enemy lay conquered. What next? Return to the post and tell of his deed? Would they believe him? They would say he was drunk or crazed, _he_ who could not kill a fly. They would say some enemy of MacDonald’s, a party of freetraders perchance, had shot him from ambush. And _he_ would be once more good, meek Pierre Villeneuve. It had all been in vain. To kill MacDonald was nothing, nothing even to regain Louise. He wanted to be master like the dead giant, and that he could never be.
He staggered to the door and flung it open. What was that? A pallid face recoiling in terror, a horror-stricken cry of “Windigo!” and a man fleeing to the river and paddling across. He had forgotten the breed he had bribed, on plea of a practical joke, to cross from the post and prowl round the shack. The man had peeped in and seen everything. Now Pierre was saved, now he had won. His witness would spread the news and warn the people against the new Windigo. Pierre was greater now than MacDonald had ever been. His fame would travel from Hudson’s Bay to the Rocky Mountains and from the Red River to Fort Macpherson. How they would pamper him—Crees and half-breeds, Chipewyans and Slaveys—as he roamed over their country that now was his. He would steal their furs and eat their game and kidnap their wives, snapping his fingers in their faces. He was master now, for now he was Windigo.
ROBERT H. LOWIE
Cries-for-salmon, a Ten’a Woman
You ask me to tell you the story of somebody’s life at Anvik, my home in Alaska. I will tell the story of the woman who gave me the moccasins I showed you—there is more to tell about a girl than a boy. But I shall have to tell about a boy, too, for you can’t tell about the girls without telling about the boys.
When Cries-for-salmon was to be born, they called in Havetse-kĕdtsa, Their-little-grandmother, an old woman of experience, to help. For three days after the birth Their-little-grandmother stayed by the side of the bed of skins, nor might the mother leave her bed without the permission of Their-little-grandmother. I don’t know much about these days because boys and men do not stay in the house at this time; they go to the kadjim (the men’s house). All I know is that the after-birth is wrapped in a cloth, and placed in the fork of a tree—the after-birth is a part of the body and you would not want to destroy it, just as when you cut yourself, you wipe off the blood with shavings and place the shavings in the fork of a tree. Even what is left of an old garment you would not destroy, you would not throw it into the fire as the white people do, but put it into a bag which in course of time you will place in a spruce tree. Whatever is put away in the woods is thought of as being still a part of the village, so that when a ceremonial circuit has to be made of the village, a half mile or so of woods is covered so that these things in the trees may be included.
The baby’s cord is tied around the wrist or the neck of the baby with sinew, and left on for two or three years. An ax head is placed on the body of a boy baby for a certain number of days—I don’t know how many, nor what they put on top of a girl. Should a white person come into the house at this time, the object is removed. If the child dies under three or four years of age the object, the ax or other thing, is put with the corpse. I don’t know why, and when I have asked the old men they would answer, “Who of us knows?” as they often answer when they _do_ know but have not enough confidence in you to tell. Besides, young fellows are not expected to ask questions; you must learn by overhearing, and coming that way to understand.
For twenty days after Cries-for-salmon was born, her father had to stay at home, indoors, “under his smoke hole,” as people used to say when they lived in igloos or underground houses. Nowadays, all or almost all live in frame houses. During these twenty days a man is not to touch any object made by white people, more particularly things of steel or iron, knife or ax or ice pick. Copper, got in trade from the coast, which has been melted down and hand beaten, a man may use; and he would eat out of dishes of wood or bone. Work tools of any kind he would not handle, unless in a household emergency he had to go to the forest for wood or game, when he would first go to the dyiin, the shaman, to get a song to sing in the circumstances. For this song, as for other songs, the shaman would be paid loftak—skins, meat, or oil.
Even if a man goes out during the twenty days, he should be careful not to pass over the water of a stream or lake—it would be othlang, and the fish would cause a skin eruption in the child. Our skin is usually very smooth and clear, and whenever any one has an eruption or rash we know it is from othlang.
Had Cries-for-salmon been born in the spring, then the following fall her father would not go eeling—that too would be othlang and it would cause a dearth of eels. Nor would a man go eeling for a year after a death in his family. If you knew how much we depended on eels for food, you would understand why we have to be so careful. The first sign of the eel coming is the finding of an eel in the stomach of a lush, the fish which is our main food in winter. Some one may find an eel in a lush, miles away from the village, and then at once he sends word, and the men go out to the places on the river where the channel is narrow and there are good feeding grounds for the eel. Here they come so thick that they cause the water to rise, and you have but to throw them out on the bank with a stick. As people eel together in this way, every one would know if a man went eeling after a death or birth in his family.
As with work after a birth in his family, so with amusements—a man should not take part. He should sit quiet, with his head down, for at this time he is supposed to be in connection with his spirits. His spirits are not any stronger than the strongest songs he has, and at this time a man must be watchful lest his songs lose their virtue or power, or lest from violations of the rules the baby die.
When Cries-for-salmon was restless as a little child, and cried, no doubt her mother called out to her, “Lia! the Evil One! Keep quiet!” to scare her. (To abuse any one, people will say, Li dená! Blood of the Evil One.) And when Cries-for-salmon was able to walk, she was watched all the time by her father or mother, for she had to be taught from the very beginning not to step on anything pertaining to the welfare of the family that might be lying on the floor. Should a stick be lying there, for example, that was being worked for an arrow or fish trap, the little girl would have to walk around it, not over it. The spirit of the boy is stronger than the spirit of the girl, so a boy may step where he pleases.
And the girl, as she grows a little older, has to be taught to be extremely careful about whatever she finds on the floor, of bits of food, of bone or feather or hair or skin. It is a rule that all such waste bits be put separately into baskets by the women, and carried to the haunts, in forest or on river, of the creatures to which the bits belonged. Cries-for-salmon would go along with her mother to see how she dumped into the river from her canoe the feathers of duck or goose or swan, that they might change back into birds such as they had come from—as the feathers drifted down the current, although invisible to her, Cries-for-salmon was told, they became birds again to return to feed in their old haunts of mud and goose grass. Similarly she saw her mother empty out fish bones to become fish, and she saw her take to the forest the bones of game animals. Were such bones left on the floor and stepped on, it would be othlang.
Sometimes, as men sit on the floor with their heels drawn back to the buttocks, or as they sit cross-legged, left leg over right, with a bowl of food propped on their legs, a bone may snap out on the floor instead of back from their fingers into the bowl. It is a spirit of the family, a hungry spirit, who is after the food. The spirit of the food goes to feed the family spirit, and although the particle is picked up and taken to the forest, it has lost its power, it will not become animal again.
When we men kill willow or ruffed grouse (ptarmigan), we take out some of the tail feathers and throw them on the ground, giving them back to the forest to become birds again. I remember that the first time I shot a grouse I took out some feathers above the tail. The fellow with me laughed. “That is not right,” said he. “It is the tail feathers you must take.” In selling grouse to the Mission, people will first skin them, just as they will first pluck the geese or ducks they sell, and remove the entrails. Similarly, they skin and clean the rabbits they sell. (Before a ceremonial the men engage in a rabbit drive. They pick out an island or a point of land, and spread out, each man in sight of another. Each yells and beats on the trees to scare out the rabbits, and then they form the arc of a circle and close down to the water. They keep the rabbits for the feast, but a few they may sell.) Bear meat and lynx meat they would not sell at all to white people.
We do not eat rabbit meat in summer and no doubt Cries-for-salmon was told, as are other children, that it was wormy. She was told, too, never to eat in the dark, lest she swallow the eye of the Evil One, which in going back to the Evil One, would choke her. Nor in eating meat should she cut off a piece in her teeth. In pouring out tea or liquids, Cries-for-salmon was taught to be very careful to pour only to well below the brim, almost an inch below, not to risk spilling. If the cup ran over it would be othlang to the person served—he would fail to run down his game, to catch fish, or to do well in leadership—and to overcome the othlang he would have to go to the shaman for a song.
In all these particulars a girl has to learn how to behave, how to carry herself. A young man is rated by his ability in making snowshoes and in running down game, fox, deer and, before the portaging of the whites drove them out, caribou. A girl is rated by her ability in handicrafts and in providing food, but she is also esteemed for her household behavior. If she is gifted with strength, with virtue, as she grows old she is likely to have given into her keeping an old wooden bowl which has been passed down from generation to generation of women, within the same rank, to be used in ceremonies to honor hunters of distinction. Moreover, the presents of a careful woman are welcome. People hate to see a young man as he grows up wear things made by any or everybody. Were he to wear mittens or boots or parki (shirt) made by a careless woman, his own ability might be reduced and his spirits weakened.
Cries-for-salmon was taught, like other little girls and boys, never to sing or whistle when eating, and never to imitate at any time in the winter the birds of summer—that would prolong the winter, perhaps making it run into two winters (a frequent expression of the narrator meaning that the already short summer is further shortened), and so causing famine. Nor was Cries-for-salmon ever to make snowballs or snow images. There is but one time a snow man may be made—when people want a freezing spell in the spring. Travelers are afraid of being caught away from home by the spring floods. One early spring I remember that there were many traders at Anvik when it turned warm. The men had to get home to make their fish camps and set their fish nets. Some of them had a portage of twenty miles to make through tundra and woods. The soft snow in the woods and the slush would tire out their dogs. So they went to the shaman and got permission to make a snow man to face the north, and draw from it the cold winds. As image maker they chose an unmarried man who had been born in a month of changing weather.
Snow fights the children may not play, but they play at war in another way. Almost anything will start a sham fight. Perhaps a child will call the family of another child dirty or say, “My father has more skins than yours.” Then they gather fireweed, strip the stalks and use them for spears and darts. These weapons take the skin off your forehead, but the more you bleed the better you like it, and you never cry, no matter how hard hit. Two or three boys will pretend to be killed, the girls will set up a wail, they have a big feast, and they make friends again.
The boys play, too, at duck-hunting and deer-stalking. They will make a duck of grass and fasten it to a long, slender stick. Then they put it into a muddy place and throw short wooden spears at it. The game should be played only in the spring, for if it is played later it will cause famine. It is a very exciting game, and often, out of season, we boys would carry cans of water into the woods to make a duck pond out of sight of the old people.
To play deer-stalking, boys take a bunch of grass and make it into the figure of a deer. For the belly they insert strips of salmon. They set the figure up on sticks and then go off into a cover of stumps and grass. One boy says to the other, “I see a deer.” “Where?” “Over there.” They creep up on it. They shoot, and the boy who sends his arrow nearest to the heart is deemed the killer. They skin the deer, talking all the while—“How fat it is, how limber.”—“It was hard to get.” They take out the dried fish, the killer cuts it up and, as would an adult, he sees to it that the food is divided up among the hunters. When a man returns from a long and successful hunt he goes to the kadjim, while his wife prepares the food and invites all the people to come and partake of it. She goes from house to house, saying, “Come and drink tea and eat meat.” (By “meat” she would always mean bear meat, as that being the most powerful meat, is called just meat. Other flesh she would call deer meat, porcupine meat, etc.) Similarly when a woman gets a full trap of fish all the people are invited to eat.
Little girls and boys together play at fishing and housekeeping. The boys will gather willows and make them into a great bundle, a foot and a half thick and fifteen feet long. They choose a shallow place in the river where there are little fish, and they lay the willow trap in an oval. After the catch the girls take the fish to cook, and boys and girls pair off together to make fish camps like their elders. Once when I was about ten, I paired off with Cries-for-salmon. She got roots to sew into a basket, and grasses to make a doll. She sang to the doll and pretended to nurse it. I went into the woods and gathered bark and wood. I shot a squirrel and a little bird with my bow and arrows, and Cries-for-Salmon skinned the squirrel and picked the bird and cooked. We even made a kadjim to have a feast in. In winter, we children built snow houses and snared rabbits and stole pieces of dried meat or salmon from home. It is not stealing unless we are caught. But our games in winter were cut down.
I wish I could tell you about the time when the children, girls and boys, are turned over to the shaman, that they may belong to the village, to be a part of the village. I know there is a ceremony at that time, but I don’t know much about it. At that time I was at the Mission house. The children are little—about four or five years old. Henceforward, should anything happen to the family, the village would look after the child, and the village is responsible for the child’s learning as much as possible about village custom. The old men talk to the boys, and the old women to the girls. They tell them old stories to teach them what they may not have learned at home. Of course there are other stories that people tell; but these are never told except at night in the kadjim and in the early part of the winter before it is time to prepare for the big ceremonies, to make the masks and rehearse the songs. Many of these stories are about the bird nobody will ever kill, Raven, who can change himself into anything and who made the Yukon river by drawing a furrow with his feet, and the hills and mountains, by carrying earth. And many stories are about the beginnings of a town, of how it was started by a couple who survived a massacre and of what happened up to the present day.... It is improper to tell a story when nobody is listening, so every other sentence or two somebody must say “hen, hen” to show that there is a listener.
There is a ceremony for getting a name, too, which I know little about. Persons may be named according to what they do or according to their character. One girl I know is called Swollen-face; another, Pointing-at (she had a mean habit of pointing her finger [index finger of left hand] at people in scorn); another, Does-not-like-any-one (i. e. men; she would refuse suitors); another, One-the-Evil-One-does-not-like. This last girl got her name because she was never sick or subject to epidemics; she had good eyes; she was big at heart; she was a successful basket maker and net maker and rabbit snarer; she had a cheerful face and looked helpful, just the opposite of the kind of woman who hurts people by looking at them in scorn, and of whom people are afraid. I know a man called He-creeps-towards because his gait is stealthy, as if he were stalking something. Because of the way the name is given, and because it has so much meaning the name is little used. You go around it. A man will call out “Look here!” and his child will recognize his father’s voice and know it is he who is being called. When the Mission children call a village child by his name, it makes him very angry.
We go on now to when Cries-for-salmon is a big girl. When she first menstruated, she was placed in the corner of her father’s house to be out of sight of young men, and to stay so for a year, as we count by moons. The space assigned to Cries-for-salmon was just long enough to lie down in. In this corner Cries-for-salmon had to keep all the things she used, more particularly her own cup and bucket of water. When no one was about, she went to fill the bucket, but, as with her other things, she had to be scrupulous about not leaving the bucket where young men could by any chance come in contact with it. Girls are supposed not to go outdoors at all; but if a girl has to go, she must walk with head bent so that if she passed by a young man her eyes would not get a direct line on his eyes, or his eyes on hers. That would be othlang. The man would lose his hunting and fishing powers and what I may call his community power. (For example, he would not know how to speak in meeting, where there are rules for speaking in order to cut out loose talkers.) Once I went to Cries-for-salmon’s house while she was in the corner. We do not knock on the door like white people, and I would have gone in, making the customary quavering sound of hihihihihihi and saying something perhaps about the weather, expecting to be told to sit down and to be served with food—a guest is never allowed to leave without food—but Cries-for-salmon’s father saw me approaching and met me at the door, saying, “Let us go to the kadjim.” I knew what that meant; he had a daughter in the corner; he was protecting me.
In the corner, a girl wears continually a beaded forehead band to which bear claws are attached. Her behavior during this time determines whether or not she is to be a worthy woman for life, and how skilled she will be in the domestic arts. For at this time she makes everything she is going to use after she marries—what I have heard the students here (at Hampton Institute) call a hope chest. She learns to sew, to make beadwork and porcupine-quill work, to make baskets, and fish nets. The first few months she is not allowed to cook, but towards the close of the period the cooking, the bulk of the housework, indeed, is put upon her. And it is then that suitors take notice of her work and accomplishments. They notice whether the seams of the boots and mittens she has made look strong and durable; whether her bead embroidery is fine, whether she is industrious and competent, how she carries herself. A man knows how important to his welfare the character of his wife is. A man has to run his chase, but, after he marries, that is all; his wife does all the hard work. She gets wood and water, she snares grouse and rabbits, she sets fish traps, and she prepares all the clothing and all the food, not only for the family but for the ceremonies at which the man is called upon to contribute.
But there is more to tell about the girl in her first stage, as well as about the feeling about women until they have a change of life, until they are old. If a girl goes into the corner in the summer, when we are all at the fish camp, her family, in returning to winter quarters, will probably have to cross the river or go along it. This happened, I recall, in the case of Cries-for-salmon. Her father had to go to the shaman. He went to Salmon-clubber, who lived with his two wives and several families who had followed him because of his services, to settle down twenty miles or so away from Anvik. Cries-for-salmon’s father gave Salmon-clubber what he asked for—several bundles of fish, some seal oil, and a deerskin. And then Salmon-clubber went into a trance and, as the feeling he had in it was good, he gave permission to the family to move. Cries-for-salmon had to stay in the bow of the canoe, crouched down that her head might not be above the gunwale, and her face had to be covered over. Had she not observed these rules, it is likely that some time later a rash would have come out on her face.
Salmon-clubber would have had to withhold permission had any men been out hunting ducks or geese, as they do hunt after the fishing season closes. The birds and animals are sensitive, as you would say, to girls “in the corner.” To have animals respect them, men must respect their songs. After I returned home in 1917, I went on a bird hunt—this was in the spring. I got only one goose and one crane, and the other five men got much less, too, than usual. On our return one of the old men said to me, “My son, are you thoroughly familiar with all our rules? I have been talking with the shaman and he has seen you bathing where the girls bathe. There are three girls in their first stage.” “How did you know?” “We have ways of knowing.” And he used one of the phrases the old men use which we do not understand. The old men talk to us, only on the outside of things. They tell us enough for us to understand if we think as they think. He went on, “It was because of that, you got so little on your hunt, and the snow fell and heavy northwest winds blew.... We could put you aside; but we think too much of you; and I speak to you as a friend.” Had I been stubborn or not seen through what he meant at this time or another, I would have become known for it from one village to the other, and it would be hard for me to get a wife.
This old man knew, of course, that boys of the Mission were apt to be careless of the old rules. He may have seen the boys, for example, go into the basement of the girls’ dormitory, a violation of a strict rule, for, until a woman is old, she is, as we say, in an unfavorable state, and she should never be above the head of a man. In the spring, families move out to the fishing grounds where they open the season by making canoes or boats they will use. In cutting the wood they use a whipsaw. Now it is a rule that if a man and a woman are sawing together the man must always stand at the higher end of the saw, the woman below. Similarly, in putting away the fish in the cache, the post-built storeroom, the man must do the overhead work; a woman would never work on a rack above a man. In the kadjim, women sit on the floor, and men overhead on the benches which they also use to sleep on. Not only the Mission house, but other houses built on the American two-storied plan are making it difficult to follow this rule of overhead.[17]
Again, while a woman is still young she should not be present at a birth. Nor may she eat a certain species of duck or their eggs, and “meat” i. e. bear, she may not eat.[18]
During the menstrual periods, for about a week, were a young man to come into the house or a man to stay home, it would cause the woman pain at childbirth, so at these times a woman’s husband leaves their bed and goes to stay in the kadjim, sleeping there with the boys and young men. A boy leaves his mother, to live at the kadjim as soon as he has courage enough, perhaps at fourteen or fifteen. If plucky, he may go earlier; but if a weakling, he may not go until he is eighteen.
During her periods, a girl or woman will protect men against herself if she can. For example, if a boy starts to wrestle with a girl—to fuss her, as you say, only it is not done your way, a boy wrestles and throws a girl down, and tumbles about, it is much gayer and more lively—the girl, if she is in her period, will claw his face to make him leave her alone. The old people see him scratched up and they know why, and they laugh at him.... Once when Cries-for-salmon’s mother was in the kadjim at a ceremonial, she was called upon to dance on the skin she was giving to the shaman for a deceased relative. We saw her hesitate. “Go ahead. What’s the matter with you?” some one said. She was in her period. “That’s all right,” they said to her. “Stand on one corner of the skin. We’ll fix it up.” She took her place with Cries-for-salmon next to her, and they went through their own dance, their eyes on the ground, and making the motions with their arms that belonged to the dance.... In this way, you see, Cries-for-salmon learned the dance that belonged to her mother.
Like all dancers, the girl and her mother faced the doors of the kadjim—there are two doors, the outer of bearskin, meaning strength, the inner, about four feet away, of wolferene, meaning speed and skill. The space of about four feet, between the doors, allows for the first door to close on the person entering on all fours, and shut out Li, the Evil One, before the second door is opened. When masks are set out under their covers they, too, face the doors. The smoke hole of the kadjim has a cover of bear gut. Below it, in the center of the floor, is the fire. The kadjim is always warm. After the fire flares up, it is killed with split logs.
There is a ceremonial in the kadjim for a girl after she comes out from the corner. I know that she wears a new parki given to her by her parents or by her suitor; but I have never seen the ceremonial and I can’t tell about it.
As I said before, a girl may have a suitor while she is in the corner or before—that is a young man, who has noticed her and knows he wants her, has set to work for her family. He cuts wood for them and fetches water and gives them the bulk of his game. If he does enough to create an interest in him on the part of the old people, they will accept him. The girl herself has no say. Even if she likes him, if the old man does not like him, thinking he has not done enough, the young man can not get the girl. On the other hand, the girl may not like the young man whom the old man likes. As soon as she came out of the corner Cries-for-salmon was married to a man her father liked because he had done so much. This man, Thleg’athts’ox, Fish-skin-hat, after giving loftak, had also to get the consent of the shaman, or perhaps it was the chief of the village. Cries-for-salmon did not like Fish-skin-hat; and yet although his father is a miser, Fish-skin-hat himself is a good man of ability and power—songs had been bought for him and his name was one no ordinary fellow would have. (For such a name a man must have powers and must live up to them.)
Cries-for-salmon’s parents knew that since Cries-for-salmon would be a woman of ability, a good snarer and fisher, a woman who would be highly esteemed for the amount of fish she could cut up in a day, and for the skill and rapidity of her sewing, she should get a husband equally competent, one who would run his chase well, who would save his furs and trade. The old people knew, too, that unless Cries-for-salmon got a good husband, it would be a slave’s life for her. She would have to work for her husband’s relatives as well as for him. For the first two or three years, a girl will live on with her man in her parents’ home; but then he builds his own house and takes her to this house. It may be near her parents’ house, but it belongs to her husband. She will leave it, if she quarrels with him, and is scolded or beaten up by him, and she will return to her parents’ house, or to her grandmother’s or nearest relative’s, to stay there until he comes for her.
Fish-skin-hat belonged to Anvik, but Cries-for-salmon had seen little of him before he began to come in at night to visit her. Older boys and girls do not go about together in the day time; you never see them paddling together in a canoe. A girl would not speak to you on the road. If she wants to talk, it must be in the dark or under the cover of a roof—under cover because, as people say, “There is some one watching you.”
After the ice breaks up and people live in tents, when a man wants to take a girl, he will slip in at night under the tent wall to the side where he knows she sleeps, and he will slip out again when the birds begin to make noise. People of position see to it that nobody visits their daughter this way, except the man she is to live with openly after a while, i. e. marry. Parents would say to a girl, “You watch yourself.” If the wrong young man came in, the girl would know because he would not make the signs agreed upon, holding her perhaps in a certain way, and parents would expect the girl to cry out and wake up the family. But—some people are careless, and there are young men who do browse about. Sometimes the family will so embarrass the young man that he has to marry the girl; they will say that the girl has conceived by him—“from him she has man inside.” A man who persisted in not marrying in these circumstances, would be shunned by the other girls.
At the ceremonies, young men see the girls in a formal way. The chief will appoint a girl to be a man’s partner, sohaldid. When I returned home in 1917, the chief appointed three girls to be my partners, and two of the three girls, Cries-for-salmon and one other, accepted. During the intervals of the ceremonial, your partner invites you to her house, and sets out, for you to eat and drink, tea and whatever the season has produced, bear, caribou, etc. What you can not eat you are expected to carry away, and you judge the girl according to the generosity of her service. Always there is great lavishness in setting out food. At bear feasts, for example, the woman serving would set out ten times more than I could eat. (Never forgetting at the conclusion to give me a bowl of water to wash with and a cloth, that I might not take out carelessly any waste particle.) The dance leaders call out for the presents. When you give them, you go through a short dance. Once when it was my turn, two women, thinking I did not know the dance, got up, without being asked, and danced in my place. One woman was gifted with bear songs, the other, with hunting songs. I had given some tea in bulk. A cupful was given to every one present except to me, the giver, and then of what was left over they gave first to the shaman, and then to the elders and so down. On another occasion I received a skein of twine, an ax, a saw, a steel trap, two large white fish, and some ice cream of seal oil, berries, boneless fish and snow. Somebody made a joke. “We have given him things as if he were married. He ought to go and take some of these old women around here who are looking for old men.” I did not like the ice cream, so I gave it to Cries-for-salmon who saw to it, as a partner is always supposed to do, that my presents were taken out and put away. Women give feasts to men, where the women dance and give out presents, inviting the men between dances to eat. The day following, the men give the feast to the women, seeing to it likewise that the women get all they can eat. I may say here that it is the interest a man expresses in the feasts, in the ceremonials, that helps to make him a chief. Who helps most at these times and at other times (whenever one man can help another, help is expected of him) qualifies as a chief.
The sohaldid or partner relationship lasts. Whenever you return to the village where your partner lives, she will provide for you. Married women as well as unmarried are assigned as partners, and this sometimes makes trouble with the husband. But I remember one case where all the trouble was made by the missionary. Two men had each the other’s wife as partner, and after a while they agreed each to take his partner as his wife, that is they exchanged wives. Five years later the missionary heard about it and, although by that time one of the women was dead, he decided to make the other woman go back to her first husband.
With the marshal and me he went at night to Myuli’s house. They knocked. “Who’s that?” called Myuli.... “Why don’t you come in the light as we do when we want to speak to any one?”... The woman went to the door. A woman always goes to the door, as the newcomer might be an enemy, and she goes to protect her husband. The missionary wanted the marshal to arrest Myuli on the spot. “Do you think I am a white man to run away?” asked Myuli.... Myuli got sixty days, the other man thirty days, and the woman six months. “I can’t see through this,” Myuli said to me, “the other man was satisfied, I was satisfied, and she was satisfied, and now they come and break up things for us.”... Myuli sent in food to her after he got out, and after she got out they lived together again.
At the ceremonies the old men saw that I was well provided for, and because I had been away four years I was given a seat with the chief men of the village; and people tried to attach me to Anvik in other ways. Women are the berry gatherers, and so women would ask me to come and eat berries at their houses. At other times men would invite me. Once one of the chiefs met me as he came in from a hunt. He invited me to his house to eat. Instead of saying, however, “Do you want to come now?” or “Let’s go,” he said, “Wait a while.” From that I understood that he did not want me to follow him directly to the house because he had a daughter in the corner, and I knew too that he wanted me to become a suitor. He was afraid if I went along with him I might ask a question about her in the open sky—that would be othlang.
More than once an old man would say to me, “We want to see you settled down with a good-hearted girl who will take good care of you and keep to the customs. We don’t want to see you with a Mission girl. They don’t amount to much, they have lost their pride.” (You see the Mission girls don’t have to make their clothing or look ahead. Because of famines we always look ahead. People become greatly alarmed when they are down to a few skins, etc.; they are prudent, they watch themselves—except in ceremonies when they give away everything.)
And the old man might go on to say, “A man is no more than his wife. You must use your head enough to get a village girl. If you will go with the right kind of a girl here, we won’t say anything. We don’t care if you slip in at night and slip out again.” Some one else then might laugh out and make a joke. “If you went in you might upset a bowl and have to get out!” Being a Mission boy they thought I might be awkward.
People do not want young men to marry out of their village, and so, just as soon as a boy kills his first game, as soon as he can run his chase down and trap—perhaps he is only sixteen or so—they want him to take a girl. Nor do people welcome foreign suitors. They suspect them. A man never gives up connections with his own people—at ceremonies, for example, men who have wandered off may return home, and then they sit in the old place with their own people, even if the wife’s people are there too. Outsiders are invited to ceremonies. Two messengers are sent out to carry the invitation to other villages. From the masks the messengers wear, people know whether the performance is to be a mask ceremonial, a spirit ceremonial, or an ordinary “feast.” In the old days of raids of one village upon another, when all but the chiefs and the girls were killed, a foreigner might betray his wife’s people to his own people, telling them of weakness from an epidemic or from lack of warriors for various reasons, or telling about an abundance of stored food. And so even now people are suspicious of foreigners. If you do not marry within your village, they joke about you—they joke so much that it makes it disagreeable.
When I had volunteered to go into the American army, people said to me, “If you died among us, we would see to it that you were sent off right; but if you die on a battlefield you might be blown to pieces; men would track over you.”
“I am not afraid,” I answered.
“You are not afraid; but we want to look out for you.... Give a minx skin to the shaman; he thinks highly of you, he would not expect much to safeguard you.” Three men and two women came to me to urge this. Finally the shaman himself came. He said, “I will not ask you to pay anything. Let me but tattoo on your back the image of cross-guns.”
“No,” I said, “it would not do when I came to be examined by the white army doctor.”
“I will give you a skin-tight shirt with the cross-guns on it. You can take off the shirt before the examination.”
“No, in the army you may wear only what the government gives you to wear.”
“Well,” ended the shaman, “we will perform secretly to protect you.” The idea about the cross-guns was that as a spirit will not go against a spirit of its own kind, with the image on my back other guns and bullets would not attack me.
Again last year when I had the influenza here, and they wired home about it, my friend Cries-for-salmon gave fifteen dollars in gold to the shaman to have him visit me through his fox, the one who carries his messages. Weasels and wolferenes, wolferenes are the most powerful of all, may be messengers for the shamans, but the commonest messenger is the fox. The fox is swift and sly.
A boy should marry among his own people, but it is not customary for him to marry near kin, a first cousin. To have relations with a sister is othlang. Of such a boy, people would say, “There are so many girls, yet he did not have the courage to go with them, he went with his sister.” If he did go with his sister, he would be thinking at the same time of another girl. And for this reason, a sister, realizing she was a substitute, would feel outraged. A really weak-minded boy would even go with his mother. It is possible, for it is all in the dark, and no one speaks; merely some one will come, some one will go.
Cries-for-salmon has a brother who is dead or, as we say, “has gone.” In telling of his death you will hear about the death rites and the way the people mourn. I will tell you, too, of a woman relative of Cries-for-salmon, who died.
But first I would tell you of another relative of Cries-for-salmon who has been such an invalid since the birth of her first child that she can not sit up, and who will never have another child. She had been a woman who menstruated with the waning moon—the character of such women, it is thought, is poor. So, as women do, she went to the shaman to have him regulate her periods to fall with the growing moon—the best hearted, best natured women menstruate at that time. Again there was a time when this woman was much frightened because the menstrual flow did not stop. This time she asked an old woman shaman—sick women are apt to go to women shamans and to the wives or widows of shamans, and sick men, to men shamans—if she should consult a white doctor. “Yes,” said the old woman, “we don’t know what is going to happen nowadays.” Since the whites have come people have lost self-confidence. Formerly they were far more certain that the cause of sickness, of an epidemic, let us say, was not keeping the rules.
Well, when Cries-for-salmon’s relative was sick after her first child was born, she went again to the man shaman. On this occasion the shaman expressed a desire for her, but she refused. Ordinarily women will not refuse the shaman. Nor would their husbands expect them to. The old women tell you never to go against the will of the shaman. “That is one of the things you will have to watch,” an old woman once said to me. Nevertheless Cries-for-salmon’s relative refused, and she has been sick ever since, and ever since the other women have sneered at her.
Her husband, too, has been down and out. They were poor to start with, he lived in one of the few underground houses left at Anvik, and now he has only three poor dogs, bale-back dogs we call them, nor can he borrow a dog team. Not long since, he was charged with stealing green fish (fish fresh from the trap) from another man’s cache. “Why did you steal?” the old men asked him. “Don’t you know if you are hungry we will feed you?” And so they would. Food would be given to any one who was hungry, although sometimes in return he might be asked to help at the fish traps or in making snowshoes. With us it is only when a man is put into a mean position, when he has lost pride in himself, that he will steal. In this case, the man denied the theft, so the old men kept at him. “Why do you deny?” they asked. “We know what you have done. Don’t you know that there is somebody watching you?” You see, since it is customary for the young men to be most of the time in the kadjim, except when they are away hunting or in other settlements—on their return they go directly to the kadjim to tell the news and to give the jokes they have heard about the persons they know—the old men know pretty well what the young men are about, where they are. Besides there is the shaman. A man believes that the shaman knows what he is doing all the time. It is just because of this knowledge that the shaman is head of the village.
It is not only for cures, and to buy songs for hunting and trapping, that people go to the shaman: the shaman has to blow upon the masks which we put on to represent other beings (when we put them on we are not ourselves), and the shaman has to give power to the dancers by blowing on them at the ceremonies or, as we say, the annual performances, of which each has its own name. Until the shaman blows on it, a spirit mask is just like any other mask. Besides downy feathers, from the leg and breast of duck and goose, are fastened to a spirit mask and from the forehead there is the quill of a goose feather with a downy tuft tied to the tip. The masks of the fun makers are not blown on. The fun makers come out at intervals to give the dancers time to rest. The fun makers are usually young men, but sometimes a witty old man will act. I remember one old man—he was a shaman—and one of his jokes. He acted like a woman and he said, “Half of me belongs up river and half down river. How are you going to ‘fuss’ me?”
Men may wear female masks. There are certain parts women may not take, so men act for them. But there are female masks that women wear. Women never wear male masks. Women sing in the kadjim, too, to big drums, four feet in diameter, made of a sea animal’s stomach on a spruce frame—five drums that can be heard a mile or more away. There may be as many as a hundred and fifty persons singing at one time in the kadjim. But in the powerful dances—the hagerdelthlel—ordinary women do not sing, only the wives of chiefs and shamans.
After a mask is made, it belongs in the kadjim for a year, and some man will appropriate it to wear for the year—or longer if he likes, and if he performs well what the mask represents. The shaman does not make the masks—he is too busy. He is charged with the welfare of the whole village, and he may be called upon in any emergency—at an eclipse, for example. Once long ago, it is said, there was a great famine, the winter ran into two winters, and Moon said to the shaman, “Whenever I go out of the sky, the people may not look, they should go inside and cover the smoke hole until I have performed my duty.” Since then, at an eclipse, the shaman will send out fast runners to cry out, “Moon has gone under the sky! Stay indoors!” The shaman himself will go on top of the kadjim and chant and go through the motions the moon taught. When the moon reappears, the shaman will reënter the kadjim where every one has been sitting silent,—if a dance had been on at the time, it had stopped. The following morning all form a long line, the shaman in the lead. They encircle the village, forming an arc starting from the river and ending at the river, and, as I said before, taking in a half mile of woods above the village and half a mile below. They drum and sing and go through certain motions, each having a bundle of fish on his back.
There are many other times, too, when the shaman takes charge or tells people what to do. I remember a great to-do over a frog that appeared in a house in the middle of the floor. The house had been built in the fall, after the ground was frozen, and one warm day in the dead of winter the frog thawed out of its hole and came out on the floor. This was an othlang, and it had to be righted at once. The shaman had to be paid to find out about it. Such an incident would never be forgotten.
Muskrats come out from their holes in the bank of pond or lake, when the ice breaks loose in the spring. If a muskrat came out before, say in February or March, this, too, would be othlang and would have to be righted.
Sometimes a whale will stray up the Yukon River, and when this happens, unless the whale is killed, there will be a great famine. Once, a whale went up river as far as Tenana, about nine hundred miles. There was great alarm, and one of the shamans, a shaman of medium powers (there are shamans of high, medium, and low powers; nowadays, however, there are no very great shamans who, as in the ancient days, can do everything; nowadays some shamans do one kind of thing, others, other things), this Tenana shaman went out single-handed and speared the stray whale. It was forty to fifty degrees below zero, he was nude from the waist up, and from the great exposure and the great strain, within a few days he died. The people were so grateful to the shaman for saving the village that they made a carving in split spruce of the shaman spearing the spouting whale, to place near his grave-box.
When the caribou and deer began to decrease at Anvik, the people became greatly alarmed, they were afraid it was because of something they had done, and they consulted the shaman. When he came out of his trance, he told them to paint seven deer on the board over the ridge pole of the grave-building of a certain shaman who had been a great hunter of caribou. Each deer was to represent a year’s kill. Once, long ago, to preclude othlang, the shaman ordered a man to be thrown off the side of a certain mountain.
At every death the shaman has to give the death stroke, that is, when it is time to send the spirit of the deceased away—on the fourth day for an ordinary person, some days later for a person of distinction—the shaman has to strike the corpse on the chest. He sends him on his journey under the river to the village of the spirits—kethagyiye—a way where there are, at intervals, pillars of fire at which the dead may warm himself, and may cook. At the time of giving the death stroke, the shaman also drives away all the evil spirits that are around the village.
I mentioned a cousin of Cries-for-salmon who died in childbirth. Her child was born alive, but as it was a girl and as the family were ordinary people—the deceased woman was a sister of the invalid woman I told about—the baby was put in the grave-box of the mother, in her bosom. Strong families with many songs, with spirit powers and hunting powers, might save babies in these circumstances, particularly a boy baby; some woman in the family would adopt him. But the girl baby of an ordinary family would certainly not be let live. I remember the case of a girl baby the Mission people wanted to save. They took her, and she had the best of care from them, but in four months she died.
Should a child die while it is still creeping, it is wrapped in something the animals will not devour, like bark, and placed in the woods under a spruce sapling. As long as the tree lives, the spirit of the child lives, too, under its protection. The spirit dies with the tree.... I may say here that in getting wood or bush from the forest we do not take all there is in any place. We depend on the wood and bark. If we destroyed it, we would become vagabonds.
The death of Cries-for-salmon’s brother was by drowning. He had been drinking with the white trader, they were out in a boat together, the boat upset, and the Indian was drowned. When Cries-for-salmon’s mother heard the news, she rushed out of the house, wailing with heart-rending cries, pulling her hair, and stripping herself to her waist. “My son, why have you left me?” she cried, looking to the North where the dead live. We could hear her cries a mile away, and we knew from her wailing songs the family of the deceased. Distinguished families have their own songs, and they make a greater outcry at death. Cries-for-salmon’s mother is a woman with power. She has many strong songs. Her father had been a great hunter, with wolferene and bear songs. She is always consulted in the village, she knows her power, and there is no one to check her or to talk about her. So she stripped to the breeches—an ordinary woman would be afraid to strip lest people would talk—and she threw herself into the ice-cold water. She wanted to go on with her son, he was the only son left her. But they pulled her out. And they pulled out her husband who had also thrown himself in.
After two or three hours, they found the body and took it home, transporting it in the oldest or most worn-out canoe at hand. As the spirit of the drowned man was supposed to be still in the water, nobody was allowed to go into the water. It would cause othlang. People were told not to use that channel for a year, and women were not to set out their fish nets in a place where there was a good place for pickerel. The evil spirit of the place might pull them overboard. I recall another place in the river where there are sand bluffs where, unless people pay homage, they do not feel safe.
As usual, the mourners made new garments, new mittens, new moccasins, and a new cap for the dead man. The second night they danced and sang old songs, and the third night they danced to new songs. Cries-for-salmon’s brother was a good bear hunter, so they danced bear dances which showed how a bear behaves and which would promote the increase of bears. Had he been a good seal hunter or hunter of other animals, similarly they would have danced seal dances or other animal dances. Besides, had he died during a good game year, they might have carved the game animal on his grave-box. I recall a hunter with a good heart, who died in a good deer year, having a string of deer carved on his grave-box—to continue the abundance of the deer.
During the mourning time of work, of dancing and feasting, the corpse is placed so that the dead man can see what is going on and absorb it all. He is in a sitting position or, even if he is laid out, as happens nowadays, the body is propped up. The dead man has to report in the village of the dead how his favorite food was placed near him and how he was honored, up to the last. On the sixth day, after waiting for relatives from another village to arrive, after the death stroke,—in this case the white man was not allowed in to pray, for everything was done in the old way,—the dead man was put in the grave-box in a sitting position, his eyes open, frozen open, and his hands placed in a position to show his interest. He is thought to return to his grave-box from time to time, more particularly in summer, and he wants to see what is going on. For this reason, too, the sinew corded grave-box is set on a hillside overlooking the river, the face of the corpse turned towards the river, that the dead may see who are passing and what is going on in the village; likewise that the dead may be near his food supply, i. e. the fish in the river. In the late autumn, after the leaves have fallen, the older women take bits of their most valued food, salmon and, since the coming of the whites, biscuit, to place by the side of the grave-box for the dead to eat, and to bless the givers. At the same time the men, if not the old women, will put the grave place (tudatonte, where the body lies stiff, as we say) in order, removing vegetation and restoring implements to their place. Thus engaged, every one will be continually breathing out to the North. Towards spring these attentions to the dead are repeated, on a smaller scale.
At death, food is put near the head of the corpse in the grave-box and, in the case of Cries-for-salmon’s brother, the bows and arrows of the deceased were tied to a cross piece supported by upright sticks by the grave-box; but, as he was not a shaman or chief, no roof was built over the grave-box nor was the box ornamented. The dead man’s things were given away to relatives; his rifle in particular was given to a member of the family distinguished for his ability and for his songs. After the distribution was complete, they set fire to the man’s house, to drive away the evil spirit.
Cries-for-salmon’s brother, like most men to-day in Anvik, had only one wife—formerly a man might have as many wives as he could support, generally he had two wives, sometimes three. And she had not yet reached middle age, the time when women tattoo lines on their chin—they tattoo according to the songs they have or their husband has, a shaman’s wife will have more lines than a chief’s wife—nevertheless, she decided not to marry again and she bobbed her hair. In this way she showed, even to men from other villages who did not know about her, that she grieved and that she was unwilling to associate with one without her husband’s power. She wanted to prolong his powers, and to keep the atmosphere she was left in by him, from going over to another man. Having his atmosphere and songs, she was strong and she felt spurred to care for herself, to accomplish almost anything.
Sometimes a dying person will send for one to whom he wishes to pass on his powers. Then the dying one looks to the North, breathes on the other and spits on him (spittle is a part of you). Once, Cries-for-salmon said to me, “I think a great deal of you. I would do almost anything for you, and I would like to give you some of my power, but if I did, I would die within the year. I must live for my children—providing the Good One sees fit for me to live.” Cries-for-salmon spoke this way to me because a while before she had said something to me which I did not understand, and it hurt her. An old man present said, “You can’t expect much of him” (as a Mission boy). So Cries-for-salmon said to me, “With all the white man’s knowledge, you have no intelligence whatsoever. Had I completed my duties to my children, I could tell you more.”
Many widows do not bob their hair, but even so, unless a woman were of no account, she would not remarry within the year, she would wait two or three years. A woman is esteemed not only for waiting, she is valued according to the way she cared for her husband before he died, when he was helpless. A man’s feelings are badly hurt if he is neglected in these circumstances.
If a man and his wife died at the same time, let us say, from eating poisonous berries, “devil berries” people call them, the two would be buried in the same grave-box. I had to move such a box once—the Mission wanted to make some use of the place. A string of beads fell out, not the kind we use to-day, these were very old, I think, got from Siberia in trade. They asked me for the beads in the village, but I kept them—until they disappeared. The people wanted them very much.
The deceased is referred to as “the one who has gone from us.” The term for dead is used only of animals. Once I referred to some one as dead. They said, “What! He is not a dog. You are referring to a human being.” Nor is the name of the dead ever mentioned; but people think of them, and whenever they think of them they turn to the North and breathe out. (A prolonged, gentle expiration, as Reed showed me.) So on return from a hunt, passing the cemetery, a man will take a berry, eat half, and throw half in the direction of the cemetery, to some chief dying in a good season, and then look to the North and breathe out.
I recall a visit up river I paid to Shagrūk where lives my mother’s sister. “My grandmother,” I said to her. “Whose blood is this addressing me?” she asked. When she knew me, she began to wail, looking to the North—she was recalling my mother: “My sister, my sister, and here is my blood come again to me!” People think that if ever they said anything disrespectful about the dead, they would be laughing, as we say, at their own corpse. (In thinking of the dead, people appreciate the experience awaiting them.)
About Christmas time there are ceremonials for the dead for three or four days. Persons who have lost their relatives in the past year are called upon by the shaman to contribute the bulk of the feast. “Who will contribute so many bundles of salmon?” asks the shaman, “so many sacks of seal oil, so many sealskins or caribou skins, so many cords of sinew (for sewing), the œsophagus of a white whale (used in trimming)?” People eat to their heart’s content. Sometimes they eat for the dead, sometimes they set aside the food—the best that can be got from the woods and waters. The missionaries are told that these are merely social feasts. Not that many of the old ceremonies have not indeed been cut out at Anvik. If a ceremonial can not be performed fully, in the proper way, people do not want it performed at all. Yet it is much against the wish of the people to go without their ceremonials. The “feasts,” as I have often told the missionary, are the only amusements of the people, and they would like to keep on with them just as they do at the conservative village of Shagrūk.
T. B. REED AND ELSIE CLEWS PARSONS
An Eskimo Winter
The skin boat, propelled by the oars of the women, approached the shores. On the bundles of caribou skins which were piled up in the stern, steering cautiously through the floes of drift ice that dotted the surface of the sea, sat Pakkak, the boat-owner. The boat was heavily laden and a strong tide was running so that the women had to exert themselves, two on each oar, to make headway. Pakkak’s son accompanied the boat in his kayak. He had been out seal hunting in order to keep the traveling party supplied with provisions. The seals lay on the narrow deck of his boat which zig-zagged swiftly through the water, propelled by the strokes of the single paddle which he held in the middle, and which struck the water, now at the right and now at the left.
The young man was the first to reach the shore. He brought his boat sideways close to the beach and climbed out of the small central hatch in which he had been sitting. He took off his harpoon and lance, his bird spear and float from under the holding thongs. Then he unlashed the seals, and hauled them ashore. After everything had been taken off, he lifted the light boat out of the water, turned it over, put his head into the opening and carried it up the shore.
Meanwhile, the whole party in the large boat had reached the land. It was nearly high water. The travelers jumped ashore. The children and old people scrambled out of the boat, and the tent covers, poles and household goods were taken ashore. The caribou skins, which were the spoils of the summer’s hunt inland, were deposited on a dry spot. While the women climbed the barren hills to gather brush for building a fire, the men hauled up the boat, and put up the tent. The framework was quickly set up, the skin cover was thrown over it, and the lower part of the skin was ballasted with stones. When the women came back, the shrubs were put down in the rear of the tent. They were covered with heavy caribou skins, and thus the bed of the family was prepared. The seals were put down at the right and left of the doorway, inside.
After a short time, the boats of Pakkak’s brothers came in. They had started together in the morning, but had made unequal progress through the lanes of water that opened between the shifting ice floes. After unloading the boats, the brothers also put up their tents.
Some of the women had piled up the fuel nearby. Pakkak fanned into flames the smoldering slow match which he was carrying along. As soon as he had obtained fire, the shrubs were lighted. Meanwhile, the hunter had opened one of the seals and removed the skin with the attached blubber. He cut off pieces of the blubber and threw them into the flames. The rectangular kettle, hollowed out of a block of soft soapstone, was filled with water and placed over the fire. The seal meat was put into it, and soon the water began to boil. When the meat was done, the men and women had finished their work, and Pakkak stood next to the kettle and shouted, “Boiled meat, boiled meat!”
The men sat down in a circle near the fire. The women formed another circle. Pakkak took one piece of the meat out of the kettle, and handed it to one of the men; he gave another piece to one of the women. The first person bit into the meat and cut off a mouthful close to his lips. Then he passed the meat to his neighbor, who in the same way cut off a mouthful and passed the meat on. Thus, the whole company was provided for.
The travelers were tired from their exertions, and retired to their beds in the rear of the tent where the whole family lay down, their heads toward the door. They covered themselves with the large blanket of caribou skins which extended over the whole width of the bed from one side of the tent to the other.
Pakkak and his brothers, and Usuk, the half-witted old bachelor who lived with them, were the first to arrive at the place of the winter village, but within a few days other families came, who had been hunting in various districts. Men and women would sit together until late at night, telling of their summer experiences and of their success in hunting. Pakkak and his brothers had been hunting on the shores of the inland lake to which they used to resort, where they had fallen in with large herds of caribou. Some of the men drove the animals into the water, while others pursued them in their frail boats. The animals were easily overtaken and killed with the lance.
Pakkak was the oldest one of five brothers who were all skillful hunters, and provided well for their families. They were renowned for their daring and enterprise. Therefore, their friendship was valued and their enmity feared. Pakkak was held in particular awe, for he was not only strong in body and skilled in the use of the knife, lance and bow, but he was endowed with supernatural powers. As a child he had sat on the knees of the old medicine man, Shark, who had been known to visit the moon and the great deity that controls the supply of sea animals. Through contact with him, the supernatural power had passed into Pakkak’s body, and now his services were needed whenever sickness and famine visited the village. Thus it happened, that Pakkak and his brothers were both sought as protectors and shunned as possessed of unusual power.
Pakkak did not misuse his power, but one of his brothers, Ikeraping, was rash in anger and overbearing in manner, and he was feared and hated. If it had not been for the combined strength of the brothers, the people of the winter village would have agreed to do away with Ikeraping in order to rid themselves of his aggressions.
Among the later arrivals was No-tongue, whose party had been unsuccessful in the summer hunt. He had hunted in the narrow valleys between the ice covered highlands, and by mischance he had come at a time when the caribou had left for another feeding ground. He had only a few skins for his whole family, hardly sufficient to provide himself, his old mother Petrel, his wife, Attina, and his children, with the necessary winter clothing. However, he was not greatly perturbed. He relied upon good luck and the help of his friends who might be expected to assist him, in case they should have skins to spare.
Gradually, one party after another arrived, and on the island which a short time ago had been solitary and quiet, little groups of huts sprang up and there was great activity. The women were busy with their household duties, getting fuel and mending clothes, while the men went out hunting in their kayaks and brought home game for their evening meal. The skins of the seals were scraped by the women, and stretched on the ground to be dried and later on worked into tent covers.
The wind had shifted seaward, and the floating ice had been driven away from the shore. It was getting cold, and the ponds began to be covered with a thin sheet of ice. Before the sea began to freeze over, it was necessary to bring the dogs back from the islands on which they had been placed over summer, and where they lived on what they could find on the beach or what they could hunt on the hills. Only a few of them had been taken along on the summer hunt, and with them were brought back a few litters of pups that were carefully nursed by the women.
When the new ice began to form on the sea, the hunters could not go out any more in their boats, because the sharp edges of the ice would have cut the skin covers. For a few days, all were confined to the land. The hunters brought in ptarmigans and hares, but everybody looked anxiously forward to the time when the ice would be strong enough for the hunters to go out. A few days without new supplies are likely to empty the larder all too quickly. Besides, it was getting cold, and work on winter clothing could not be started until the sea was covered with ice. The Sea-Goddess would take bitter revenge if such a sin were committed.
This year the weather was favorable, and the anxious days between summer and winter were not needlessly prolonged. After three cold days, the men could go out on the sea ice and wait at the edge of the open water for the seals to come up to breathe. Since the wind had brought back the drifting ice, the stretch of open water was not very wide, and the seals came near enough to be harpooned without difficulty, and to be drawn up to the ice. It was even possible to venture out in the open water in the kayak, for the ice was not forming very rapidly. Thus an ample supply of meat was obtained.
Meanwhile, the women were busy scraping and cleaning the caribou skins, and making the winter clothing for the family—the warm shirts and drawers of young caribou skins, and the heavy jackets and trousers of heavy skins; the stockings of light skins of young caribou, and the boots made from the skin of caribou legs, with soles of ground sealskins. Poor No-tongue had just enough for his family, and a few skins to spare. Unfortunately the catch of the whole community had been rather light, notwithstanding Pakkak’s good luck.
From now on, the men went out regularly every morning and came back in the evening, generally with an ample catch. One day they had gone out again and were scattered along the edge of the ice, watching for seals. During the day the sky clouded up, and a strong, seaward wind began to blow. It increased in strength, and an ominous cracking of the ice gave warning of danger. Hurriedly the men loaded their sledges, and sped landward. Under their feet the ice began to crack and to yield to the pressure of the wind, but they succeeded in reaching land before the floe gave way and drifted out to sea.
Only No-tongue’s sledge was missing. He had been hunting on a projecting point of ice, and before he was even aware of his danger, the whole point had broken off and was rapidly drifting out to sea. There was nothing for him to do but yield to his fate, and see whether the gale would exhaust itself soon, and whether by chance the floe that carried him might be blown back to land. Fortunately he had just killed a seal. He flensed it and made a little shelter of the fresh hide. His lance had to serve as a tent pole. He protected his tent cover against the wind by piling snow all over it. He made a receptacle for the blubber out of a piece of skin, and thus improvised a little lamp. Fortunately, too, he carried his fire drill and a little of the moss which is used for wicks; so that he was able to start a little fire in his shelter. The gale was still blowing, and the angry waves threatened to break up the floe on which he was drifting. When day dawned the land was far away. Soon, however, the wind subsided, and a swift tide carried the ice floe back, nearer and nearer the land.
It had grown very cold. An icy slush was forming on the surface of the sea and the waves were rapidly calming down. The breaking up of the floe which seemed imminent through the night was no longer to be feared and immediate danger of drowning had passed. Still it was doubtful how the drift would end. With the changing tide, the current changed again, and the floe drifted away from the shore. The play of tides continued for days. Now the shore seemed near, so that the hopes of No-tongue were raised to a high pitch, and now the shore receded. In these days of anxiety No-tongue never lost courage, but, mocking his own misfortune, he composed this song:
Aya, I am joyful; this is good! Aya, there is nothing but ice around me, that is good! Aya, I am joyful; this is good! My country is nothing but slush, that is good! Aya, I am joyful; this is good! Aya, when indeed, will this end? this is good! I am tired of watching and waking, this is good!
His endurance and patience were finally rewarded. After a week of privations, he reached the shore not very far from the winter village. A few days of hard travel over the ice covered sea, and rocky hills brought him home to his family and friends. They had almost given him up for lost.
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As it grew colder the light tent no longer offered adequate protection. The women sewed a new cover of sealskins and gathered loads of brush. They placed them on the outside of the summer tent, and spread the new covers over the whole structure. The door flap was also transformed into a solid wall, and only a low opening was left, through which the people had to pass, stooping down low. This darkened the inside of the tent, which before had been fairly light because the front part of the tent cover was made of the transparent inner membrane of sealskin. Therefore the lamps were put into place. The long, rectangular entrance of the tent with its roof-shaped cover still served for keeping provisions, but just in front of the beds, the soapstone lamps—long crescent-shaped vessels—were placed. The wife of the tent owner took her seat on the bed in front of the lamp, where she sat in kneeling position letting her body rest between her heels. The lamp was filled with blubber that had been chewed to release the oil, and the straight front edge of the lamp was provided with a wick of moss which, when carefully treated with the bone pointer, gave an even, yellow flame that lighted and heated the hut pleasantly.
Soon the snow began to fall, and the autumnal gales packed it solid in every hollow in the ground, and piled it up against the sides of the huts. The heather-like shrubs were deeply buried under the snow, and all domestic work had to be done inside. The soapstone cooking vessels were placed over the lamps, and all the meals were prepared in the house. The entrance to the hut was protected against the cold by a low passage, built of snow. As it grew colder, the snow accumulated, and most of the people exchanged their tents for snow houses. The men cut out of an even snow bank blocks about thirty inches by eighteen inches high, and six inches wide. These they placed on edge, in the form of a circle. At one point, the upper edge of the row was cut down to the ground, and then sliced down to the right, so that it slanted up gradually. At the place where it had been cut down, a new block of snow was put on, leaning against the end of the first row and slightly inclined inward. One man was cutting the snow blocks outside, while his helper was placing the blocks from the inside,—each block being inclined slightly more inward so that a spiral wall was gradually formed. Finally the key block was inserted, and the builder cut a little door through which he came out. In the rear half of the circular room, a platform was built for the bed which was elevated a couple of feet above the ground, and at the same level, at the right and left of the entrance, a bank was erected. The bed platform was covered with shrubs and skins. The tent cover was used to line the inside of the snow house, being held to the wall by means of pegs and ropes, thus protecting the snow against the heat of the living room. The lamps were put in place on each side of the front of the bed platform, and the pots were hung over them. In front, just above the door, a window was cut which was covered with a translucent sheet, made of seal intestines sewed together, and a series of low vaulted structures was erected in front of the door, forming a passageway which protected the inside against the wind.
When everything was done the family moved into the snow house. Two families occupied one house and each housewife had her seat in front of her lamp. The stores of meat were placed on the platforms at the right and left. Now the regular winter life began. It was bitter cold. The dogs huddled together in the entrance passages of the snow houses.
Early in the morning, the men went out to the sledges. The shoeing of the runners, which were made of split and polished bone of whale, was covered with a thin sheet of ice. The hunter took some water in his mouth, and allowed it to run slowly over the shoeing. Then he polished it with his mittened hand. After the icing had been made smooth, he turned the sledge right side up. The harpoon was lashed on, the knife was suspended from the antlers that form the back of the sledge, which are used in steering it through rough ice. The hunters then put the dogs in harness. The light team started down to the beach. During the continued cold weather, the rise and fall of the high tides was forming a broken mass of heavy ice on the beach which, as the winter progressed, was constantly increasing in thickness. A beaten path led down through the broken masses to smooth floe. The sledge sped down, and the hunters went off to the sealing ground. At first the unwilling dogs had to be coaxed to go forward, and even spurred on by cries and by the use of the short handled whip, which the driver handled with skill and accuracy, calling upon the lazy dogs, and hitting them at the same time with the points of the whip. Gradually, the dogs warmed up, and ran along swiftly over the smooth floe. When they reached a part of the ice that was broken up by gales, and in which the uplifted floes were frozen together, the driver had to lift his sledge over the sharp edges and broken masses, and progress was slow and difficult.
Finally the hunting ground was reached. The dogs took the scent of the breathing hole of a seal, and they rushed forward with such speed that the driver could hardly restrain them. At some distance from the hole he succeeded in stopping his team. He tied the dogs to a hummock so that they should not run away and then he inspected the seal hole to see whether it was still being visited by the seal. It was completely covered by snow, and discernible only to the experienced eye. He piled up a few blocks of snow on which he sat down. He laid his harpoon down cautiously, and waited. For hours he remained seated there, waiting for the snorting of the seal. The slightest noise would frighten away the wary animal, and, notwithstanding the intense cold, the hunter could not stir. At last he heard the seal. Cautiously he lifted his harpoon, and sent it down vertically into the snow. It hit the seal which tried in vain to escape. The hunter broke the snow covering of the hole, and hauled the animal upon the ice where, with a swift blow on the head, he killed it. Before he loaded it on his sledge he cut it open, and took out the liver which served him as lunch.
Meanwhile the short day had come to an end! The dogs were harnessed to the sledge, and the hunters returned home. When they arrived, they unloaded the sledge, unharnessed the dogs, and took off the heavy outer clothing. The hunter patted his coat carefully to remove the ice formed by the freezing of his breath. Then he put his coat in the storeroom and entered the house. As soon as he came in he took off his sealskin slippers, bird-skin slippers and stockings, which protected his feet against the cold, and his wife placed them on the rack over the lamp to dry. Then she looked them over and mended them carefully so that they should be ready on the following day.
When all the hunters had come back, those who had brought home no game flocked to the house of one of the successful hunters, who butchered his seal and gave to each man a share to eat in the house, or to take home to his family. They talked over the events of the day until late at night.
*       *       *       *       *
This life had been going on quietly for all, without exciting events, when No-tongue’s youngest child became ill. The boy refused food and drink, and household remedies did not avail. In her anxiety for the life of her darling, Attina appealed to Pakkak and asked him to find out what ailed the child, and if possible to cure him. Pakkak went to No-tongue’s hut. As soon as he came in, the lamps were lowered. He sat down on the bed facing the rear wall of the hut and began his incantation. His body shook violently when he called his protecting spirits to help him. He uttered unintelligible sounds and cries.
Finally his incantation stopped. He addressed himself to Attina and said, “Have you sinned? Have you eaten forbidden food? Have you done forbidden work? What tabus have you transgressed?” She had asked herself what she might have done to bring about her child’s sickness, and she remembered that she had scraped the frost from the window of her house, and that she had eaten seal meat and caribou meat on the same day.
She replied, at once, “I confess! I have scraped frost from the window of my house. I have eaten caribou meat and seal meat on the same day. I have sinned.”
Pakkak replied, “It is well, my daughter that you have confessed. Now the evil consequences of your sins are forgiven. The black halo that I saw surrounding your body, and that has affected your child, has disappeared and the boy will soon recover.”
The lamps were lighted again. The confession of Attina’s transgressions had appeased the supernatural powers and therefore the parents hoped for the recovery of their son.
For a while the little boy seemed to improve, but suddenly he suffered a severe relapse, and before the help of Pakkak could be summoned, he died. At once No-tongue prepared to bury the boy. He stuffed his own nostrils with caribou hair to prevent contamination by the exhalation from the corpse. The limbs were tied up with thongs and No-tongue carried his dead child out of the hut and up the hills. There he cut the thongs, and thus released the soul of the child. No-tongue covered the body with a vault of stones, being careful that no stone should weigh on it. He deposited the child’s toys and returned home. For three days the whole family stayed in the house. No-tongue did not go out a-hunting. Attina did not clean her lamps. She did not move the caribou skin of the bed. She did not mend any clothing. To transgress these rules would have resulted in new misfortunes.
After four days all the members of the family threw away their clothing which had been contaminated by the breath of the dead child, and it was only with the greatest difficulty that they secured enough skins from their neighbors to make a new set for the whole family. Through the charity of friends they were finally provided for.
The death of the child, and the cares of the family weighed heavily on the mind of Petrel, No-tongue’s mother. He himself was light-hearted and consoled himself with the thought that they might have other children in the future; but she was an old woman, and felt that she could not carry the burden of her years much longer. She loved her son and her grandchildren, and the thought haunted her mind that she might die in the hut, and that they might be compelled to throw away another set of winter clothing and be exposed to the hardships of the winter without adequate protection. If only she could die away from home, and thus spare her dear ones the consequences of another sickness and death. The thought preyed on her mind and finally she resolved to end her own life.
The long Arctic night had set in, and only at noon came the sun near enough to the horizon to spread the faint light of dawn over the ice and mountains. One night when it was bitterly cold and the snow was drifting, lashed by a strong wind, old Petrel left the house and walked across the ice to a small island. There in a nook of barren rocks she piled up a wall of stones, and sat down behind it, in order to allow herself to freeze to death. Her thoughts dwelled with her children, and she was satisfied that she was not going to die of sickness in her bed, for then her future life would have been one of agony and torture in the lower world where there is only want and famine, where cold and struggle prevail all the year round. By choosing her own death she looked forward to a happy life in the upper world. There she was going to play ball, and her friends would see her joyful motions in the rays of the Aurora Borealis. She would enjoy comfort and plenty and the cares of this world, as well as the tortures of the lower world would be spared her. Her limbs became numb with the cold and she went to sleep, her mind filled with pleasant visions.
During the night Attina roused herself to trim her lamp. She chanced to look about, and noticed that Petrel was not there. She called her husband who at once guessed what had happened. He gave the alarm and soon all the sledges were out. No tracks were to be seen in the drifting snow, and the whole party scattered in different directions to search for the old woman. To right and left along the coast, north and south they went on their sledges. Usuk, the bachelor, who did menial work for Pakkak, had joined the party. He, the despised and ridiculed one, found the old woman in time to save her from death. Notwithstanding her resistance, he carried her to his sledge, and hurried home. She was taken into the house, covered with a warm blanket and scolded for the unnecessary worry that she had given to her family and to her neighbors. She was ill-satisfied with her rescue, but submitted to the friendly influence of her light-hearted son.
It seemed that with this event the ill luck of No-tongue had spent itself, and the rest of the winter passed quietly. The weather was propitious and no long continued gales kept the hunters at home. The snow was hard and crisp so that the hunting ground could be reached without difficulty. Early in February, the first rays of the sun struck the high mountains and although the cold was still intense, the daylight made hunting and work easier.
Now and then visitors came in from distant villages to see their relatives. Everybody flocked to the hut where they were visiting, to hear the news. There was much to tell about success in hunting, about marriage and birth, sickness and death. For months, the village had been cut off from all intercourse with the outside world, because the strong currents that washed the foot of the promontories prevented the formation of ice, and only after the cold had continued long enough, was the sea covered by a continuous floe, which allowed the villagers to travel unhampered from place to place.
One day a number of travelers were discovered, whose sledge, dogs and gait did not seem familiar. The news spread rapidly through the village and the women and children assembled on a point of vantage, straining their eyes in an attempt to discover who the visitors were. Soon, Pakkak recognized an old friend who lived many days’ journey away, and whom he had not seen for many years. He shouted, “There is Eiderduck.” When the women knew that the visitors were friends of Pakkak, they burst forth in song and laughter. They waved their arms and jumped about. The frightened children hid, crying, behind their mothers. Most of the men went down to the ground ice to meet the strangers, and to help them to unload their sledges. Pakkak led Eiderduck and his companions to a snow house, and treated them hospitably with frozen seal meat.
While they were eating, the people crowded into the house. They sat on the bed platform, and squatted on the floor until there was no more room. Those who could not get into the house crouched in the entrance to get a glimpse of the visitors, and to hear what they had to say. All the older people had some friends in the villages through which the travelers had passed, and therefore their reports were listened to with keenest interest, interest which communicated itself to the younger generation, who thus learned about the family relationships and the history of all the people who lived many miles up and down the coast line.
One of the saddest stories that Eiderduck had to tell was that of some people who had been caribou hunting in the fjord Muddy-Water. In the fall, when they were preparing to move camp, the frost set in very suddenly, covering the sea with ice. Heavy snows fell in calm weather. The sledges and the dogs sank deeply into the soft snow so that the people were practically unable to move. Soon they were starving. Many died. In one house lived an old woman with her three sons and a daughter. Her oldest son, Powlak, decided to go to the neighboring village to seek aid of the people. He left his only surviving dog with his mother, that she might use it for food after he was gone. Then he started on his dangerous tramp through the soft snow.
A short time after Powlak had left, his mother missed the dog. She went in search of it, and found that its footprints led to one of the neighboring huts and did not come out again. For some time no sound had been heard in that hut. She thought that the people were dead and she had avoided going in. Now, however, when she needed the dog, she overcame her fear. She called in through the entrance and found that the people were alive, although hardly able to stir. She asked, “Is my dog here?” The house owner denied that it was there, saying that she had not seen it. The old woman, however, searched, and finally when she lifted the heather on the bed she found its skinned body. She became very angry and took the meat. The people were so weak and famished that they could not resist. She took the dog home and she and her children lived on it. Her neighbors soon died of exhaustion. The pangs of hunger had so hardened Powlak’s mother, at other times a kind-hearted woman, that she only thought of her own salvation, and felt no pity for the sufferings of others.
When Powlak reached the neighboring village, he found that the people had caught two whales in the fall of the preceding year. He told them that the people in Muddy-Water were starving,—that a few had tried to reach other places, but that they must have perished in the attempt, since nothing had been heard from them. Powlak’s friends were very kind to him. They gave him food to eat and for a few days they did not let him return to his starving mother. They said to him, “Stay here. Why do you want to perish? Your mother, your brothers and your sister are certainly dead by this time.” Powlak, however, said, “I am sure they are alive.” When he insisted on returning as soon as he had recuperated, his friends gave him an old dog and a whale-bone toboggan which they loaded with whale meat, skin and blubber. He started on his way back.
When he reached his home after untold difficulties, he went to the window of his mother’s hut and asked, standing outside, “Are you all dead?” His mother replied, “There is life in us yet.” Then he went in, gave them the whale meat and whale skin, and learned of what had happened during his absence. The food which he had obtained gave him the strength to go out, and he had the good fortune to find a seal hole and as the season progressed, conditions became better and he was able to supply his family with food and clothing. A great number of the villagers, however, had starved to death....
It was late in the night when the crowd began to dwindle leaving Eiderduck and the other visitors to sleep.
*       *       *       *       *
As the season progressed and the sun rose, the seals whelped. The skin of the young seal is white and wooly and highly prized for warm clothing. Therefore, the whole village set out to hunt for them. The dogs take the scent of the seal hole, and the poor pup is dragged out with a hook and the hunter kills it by stepping on it.
One day when Pakkak was out hunting young seals, he found himself suddenly confronted by a great polar bear, which was also out in pursuit of seals. He always made it a point to raise good hunting dogs, and the large wolf-like gray creatures were eager to attack the bear which tried to escape. Pakkak never hesitated when there was a chance to get a bear. He cut the traces of two of his strongest dogs, which ran in pursuit. When the bear saw that the dogs were about to overtake him, it climbed an iceberg and took its position on a narrow ledge where its back was protected by the sheer ice wall. It sat up on its haunches. The dogs scrambled up the slippery ice, and when Pakkak saw that they held the bear at bay, he cut the traces of the others, jumped off the sledge, and approached lance in hand. His knife was hanging in its scabbard at his side.
The bear defended itself with its paws and teeth, and already one of the dogs lay bleeding on the ice. The bear, however, could not move on account of the swift attacks of the dogs. Pakkak approached fearlessly. With a swift throw he tried to pierce the bear’s heart His position was dangerous. The bear held the ledge, and by a single movement of its forelegs might throw the hunter down the steep side of the iceberg. With a swing of its powerful forelegs, it broke the lance. If Pakkak had not jumped back, he might have been caught in the embrace of the bear. There was nothing to do now, but attack the bear with the long hunting knife. He approached again, and watched until the bear, turning to the worrying dogs, exposed its side. Then with a powerful stroke, Pakkak stabbed it in the side. However, he was not quick enough, and, with its claws, the bear tore a deep gash in his shoulder. Then it rolled over, and fell down to the ice floe.
Without paying any attention to his wound, Pakkak skinned the bear and butchered it and rolled it on the sledge. He spliced the traces of the dogs and turned back home where his success was greeted with joy.
Then Pakkak tied the bladder and gall of the bear, together with his drill, to the tip of his spear which he put upright in the ground in front of his house. By this rite, the bear’s soul which remains for three days with the body, must be appeased.
The people asked Pakkak about his wound and his battle with the bear. He scoffed at the danger in which he had been pretending that to kill a fierce bear was to him no more of a task than to harpoon a harmless seal. His wife tended his wound, which was so deep that it took weeks to heal.
*       *       *       *       *
One day, No-tongue had been out sealing with Pakkak’s brother, Ikeraping. As luck would have it he was very successful, while Ikeraping, the strong and skillful hunter, had not killed a single seal. This annoyed Ikeraping, who was ashamed to go home without game. Therefore, he demanded of No-tongue that he should give up his seals to him. No-tongue refused, but Ikeraping became so furious and aggressive that No-tongue, who was by nature timid, gave way and let him have what he wanted. The injustice, however, rankled in No-tongue’s mind. It was not the first time that Ikeraping had lorded it over No-tongue, and No-tongue was afraid that sometime, in a quarrel with Ikeraping, he might be killed. No-tongue talked the matter over with the other people, but they were all too much afraid of Ikeraping and Pakkak and their brothers, to venture to do away with the aggressive Ikeraping.
Now No-tongue was prompted to leave the village in which he had spent many years. For a long time he had been talking of the distant home from which he had come with his mother, when he was a very young man. At that time he wanted to see the world, and he had drifted from village to village along the whole coast line until finally he had settled down with his wife. The memory of his old home had never left him, and he longed to go back and see his relatives and the scenes of his childhood. The quarrel with Ikeraping strengthened his decision to leave this year, despite the ties which held him to the village where his children were born and were growing up.
Although the feeding of many dogs was a burden, on account of the large amount of meat they demanded, No-tongue had strengthened his dog team by raising a number of pups. He had now an excellent team of ten dogs. His sledge was in good repair. And so, before the melting of the snow made traveling difficult, No-tongue was determined to depart. His wife would accompany him into the distant country which, to her, was a foreign land. It would take several years to accomplish the journey.
The departure of No-tongue was the beginning of the breaking up of the winter village. The families were already planning for the summer hunt. Soon, the brooks would be running. The walrus would come near the shore. Whales would come blowing in the open water. Salmon would ascend the rivers. Young geese would be plentiful, and the caribou would come back. The time of happiness was approaching of which No-tongue once sang:
Ayaya, beautiful is the great world when summer is coming at last! Ayaya, beautiful is the great world when the caribou begin to come! Ayaya, when the little brooks roar in our country. Ayaya, I feel sorry for the gulls, for they cannot speak, Ayaya, I feel sorry for the ravens, for they cannot speak. Ayaya, if I cannot catch birds I quickly get plenty of fish. Ayaya!
FRANZ BOAS
[Illustration: DISTRIBUTION OF NORTH AMERICAN TRIBES
NAMES OF TRIBES DESCRIBED IN THIS BOOK ARE PRINTED IN RED INK]
APPENDIX
NOTES ON THE VARIOUS TRIBES[19]
Crow
The Crow Indians number about 1750. They now occupy a reservation in southeastern Montana between Billings, Montana and Sheridan, Wyoming. This is near the center of their historic habitat, for their two main bands, the River Crow and Mountain Crow, roamed respectively from the Yellowstone-Missouri confluence southwards, and from east-central Montana southward into Wyoming.
In point of language, the Crow belong to the Siouan family, forming together with the Hidatsa of North Dakota a distinct subdivision. There is no doubt that some centuries ago they must have formed one tribe with the Hidatsa, since the languages are very closely related. In culture many differences have developed between the two tribes; e. g., the Hidatsa were always semi-sedentary tillers of corn as well as hunters in historic times, while the Crow remained pure nomads before white influence. On the other hand, some important traits persisted in both groups after their separation. The principal enemies of the Crow were the Dakota; to a somewhat lesser extent the Blackfoot and Cheyenne.
The most important publications on the Crow are:
CURTIS, EDWARD S. The North American Indian, vol. IV, New York, 1909.
LOWIE, ROBERT H. Social Life of the Crow Indians (_Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History_, vol. IX, part 2.). New York, 1912.
Societies of the Crow, Hidatsa and Mandan Indians (_ibid._, XI, part 3.). New York, 1913.
The Sun Dance of the Crow Indians (_ibid._, XVI, part 1.). New York, 1915.
Notes on the Social Organization and Customs of the Mandan, Hidatsa and Crow Indians (_ibid._, XXI, part 1.). New York, 1917.
Myths and Traditions of the Crow Indians (_ibid._, XXV, part 1.). New York, 1918.
The Tobacco Society of the Crow Indians (_ibid._, XXI, part 2.). New York, 1919.
Blackfoot
At the time of discovery, these Indians resided east of the Rocky Mountains in what is now Montana, and Alberta, Canada, and were grouped into three tribes: Blackfoot, Blood, and Piegan. The Piegan were the largest and dominant tribe, but all were in the habit of speaking of themselves as Blackfoot. How this name originated is not known, though there is a story that it was given them by other Indians because their moccasins were always stained with the black loam of the rich prairies of Alberta.
Closely affiliated with the Blackfoot were the Sarsi, a small Athabascan-speaking tribe, and the Prairie Gros Ventre, closely related to the Arapaho. Thus the Blackfoot group—confederacy of early writers—was composed of at least five distinct tribal units. Their nearest cultural contemporaries are the Plains-Cree, Assiniboin, Crow, and Shoshoni.
The Blackfoot speak a language belonging to the great Algonkian family of eastern North America. The presumption is, therefore, that they migrated from the woodlands of the east to the western plains, but this was very long ago.
The surviving remnants of the tribe now number less than 5,000, fully half of whom live in the State of Montana, and less than half of these are of pure descent.
For further information on the Blackfoot and other Plains tribes, the reader is referred to:
North American Indians of the Plains (Handbook series, No. 1 American Museum of Natural History, 1912), by Clark Wissler, and the following monographs by Dr. Wissler, published in the _Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History_:
Mythology of the Blackfoot Indians. vol. II, part 1.
The Material Culture of the Blackfoot Indians. vol. V, part 1.
The Social Life and Ceremonial Bundles of the Blackfoot Indians. vol. VII.
Societies and Dance Associations of the Blackfoot Indians. vol. XI, part 4.
Sun Dance of the Blackfoot Indians. vol. XVI, part 3.
Some Protective Designs of the Dakota. vol. I, part 2.
Societies and Ceremonial Associations in the Oglala Division of the Teton-Dakota. vol. XI, part 1.
Riding Gear of the North American Indians. vol. XVII, part 1.
Costumes of the Plains Indians. vol. XVII, part 2.
Structural Basis to the Decoration of Costumes among the Plains Indians. vol. XVII, part 3.
Decorative Art of the Sioux Indians (Bulletin, American Museum, vol. XVIII, part 3.).
Menomini
The Menomini are a small tribe (1745 in number) of the Algonkian stock, who formerly lived on the west shore of Green Bay, Wisconsin, and who now dwell on their reservation, about forty miles inland from their former headquarters, on the upper waters of the Wolf River, one of their old hunting grounds.
In culture the Menomini belong to the Central Algonkian group of Woodland Indians, and have long been closely associated with the Siouan Winnebago and the Algonkian Sauk, Fox, Potawatomi, and Ojibwa.
Dr. Skinner’s publications on the Menomini are as follows:
In the _Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History_, vol. XIII which is composed of:
Social Life and Ceremonial Bundles of the Menomini Indians.
Societies and Ceremonies of the Menomini.
Folk Lore and Mythology of the Menomini Indians,[20] and in _Indian Notes and Monographs_, Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation:
Medicine Ceremony of the Menomini Indians, vol. IV, 1920.
Material Culture of the Menomini Indians, (unnumbered), 1921.
Winnebago
The Winnebago number to-day about 3000 people of whom 1100 to 1500 live in Nebraska directly north of the Omaha reservation, and the rest in Wisconsin, mainly in Jackson county but scattered all over the region directly to the north, east and west of that county, also. When first discovered, toward the middle of the seventeenth century, they occupied the region between Green Bay and the Wisconsin River to the west, and their villages extended to the southern portions of Lake Winnebago to the south. Toward the end of the seventeenth century and beginning of the eighteenth century, we find them as far west as the Mississippi and as far south as Madison, Beloit, and even northern Illinois. While, unquestionably, they had been in part forced into this region by the warlike activities of the Fox Indians, there seems sufficient evidence to show that they had always roamed over the greater part of this country.
After their discovery by the French, much of their time was spent in fighting with the Foxes by whom they seem generally to have been defeated. They were, from the beginning, exceedingly faithful to the French. To what degree they were influenced by the French missionaries and traders, it is difficult to say, but in all probability this influence was greater than has generally been supposed. After the cession of the old Northwest to the United States, they remained rather quiet but were definitely implicated in the Black Hawk War.
About the middle of the nineteenth century, they were forcibly transferred to Nebraska but many of them made their way back to Wisconsin, and these, together with scattered Winnebago, who had managed to escape the enforced transference to Nebraska, form the majority of those now living in Wisconsin. Since their partial removal to Nebraska, a number of minor differences in dialect and customs have developed between the two divisions. The division in Wisconsin is undoubtedly the more conservative.
The immediate neighbors of the Winnebago were the Menomini to the north, and the Fox to the south; with these tribes they were always in intimate contact. With the Menomini they seem always to have been on peaceful terms, but with the Fox they were frequently at war. They seem to have known the Potawatomi quite well, and the Ojibwa fairly well. The eastern Dakota they also knew to a certain extent. In the main, however, they knew their Algonkian neighbors (Menomini, Fox, Potawatomi) best and they were profoundly influenced by these tribes in their material culture. The mythology and certain religious notions of their Central Algonkian neighbors they also adopted, but these seem to have been kept apart and distinct from their old Winnebago mythology and religion. In their social organization, they were totally uninfluenced and, on the contrary, influenced their neighbors profoundly.
They present the interesting spectacle of a people entirely surrounded by alien tribes, absolutely cut off from all communication with groups speaking related languages and having similar civilizations, who nevertheless have preserved many archaic Siouan cultural traits. What they have, however, they have in part completely assimilated, in part kept distinct.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
RADIN, PAUL. The Ritual and Significance of the Winnebago Medicine Dance. (_Journal of American Folklore_, vol. XIV, pp. 149-208. 1911.)
Winnebago Tales. (_Journal of American Folklore_, vol. XXII, pp. 288-313, 1909.)
Social organization of the Winnebago Indians. In Geological Survey of Canada. (Museum Bulletin, 10. Anthrop. ser. 5. 1915.)
The Peyote Cult of the Winnebago. (_Journal of Religious Psychology_, vol. VII [1914], pp. 1-22.)
Autobiography of a Winnebago Indian. (University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology, XVI [1920], No. 7.)
The Winnebago Indians. (Report of Bureau of American Ethnology.) (In press.)
Meskwaki
The Meskwaki Indians at present live in the vicinity of Tama, Iowa, and are 350 in round numbers. Officially, all are listed as full-bloods, but the fact is that there is a good deal of old white (French and English) mixture—practically none within the last sixty years. And many have Sauk, Potawatomi, and Winnebago blood. On the rolls the Meskwaki are carried as Sauk and Fox of the Mississippi; but this is due to the fact that the Federal government long ago legally consolidated the two tribes, though they are, even to-day, distinct in language, ethnology, and mythology. Fox is but one of the many synonyms for the Meskwaki Indians.
Their native name, me sgw A ki A ki, in the current syllabary, means “Red-Earths.”
The Meskwaki linguistically are closely related to the Sauk and Kickapoo, more remotely to Shawnee, and to the Penobscot, Malecite, etc., of Maine and adjacent parts of Canada. They are also comparatively close to the Cree and Menomini. Culturally the Sauk, Fox, and Kickapoo are very near each other, and show woodland traits predominantly, with touches of those of the plains. They are also close to the adjacent Siouan tribes. The physical type of the Meskwaki has not been worked out; from Michelson’s unpublished data it would appear that beside a mesocephalic tribe, a brachycephalic one also occurs. This last is probably due to intermarriage with Winnebagos. Moderate occipital deformation occurs owing to the use of hard cradle boards; and so the problem is not simple, for moderate deformation is not always easy to detect.
A practically complete bibliography on the Meskwaki is given by Michelson, _Journal of the Washington Academy of Sciences_, vol. IX, pp. 485, 593-596. Since that time (1919) but little has appeared. A number of volumes on the Meskwaki by Michelson will eventually be published by the Bureau of American Ethnology.[21] The most important publications on the Meskwaki are:
MAJOR MARSTON. Letter to the Rev. Jediah Morse, 1820.
FORSYTH, THOMAS. Account of the Manners and Customs of the Sauk and Fox Nations of Indians’ Traditions, 1827. (This, and the preceding are readily accessible in E. Blair’s Indian Tribes of the Upper Mississippi and Great Lakes Region, vol. II, pp. 137-245).
JONES, WILLIAM. Fox Texts, 1907.
The Algonkin Manitou (_Journal of American Folklore_, vol. XVIII, pp. 183-190 [1905]).
Mortuary observances and the adoption rites of the Algonquin Foxes of Iowa (Congrès International des Americanists, XVI: 263-277 [1907]).
Algonquian (Fox) (revised by Truman Michelson: Handbook of American Indian Languages, Bulletin 40, of the Bureau of American Ethnology part 1; pp. 735-873 [1911]).
MICHELSON, TRUMAN. Preliminary report on the linguistic classification of Alqonquian Tribes (28th Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, pp. 221-290b [1912]).
Montagnais
The Indians of the Algonkian linguistic stock known in literature as the Montagnais, inhabit the vast region north of the St. Lawrence river from the coast of Labrador on the Atlantic, westward through to the St. Maurice river near Quebec, and northward to the height of land dividing the Arctic watershed from that of the St. Lawrence. They number not far from 3,000 souls widely scattered in small bands comprising certain dialectic and ethnical groupings. Within certain limits they are nomadic, subsisting entirely by hunting and fishing, never warlike except in their resistance to the Iroquois, docile and orderly. They were visited early in the 17th century by Jesuit missionaries who have left us the only specific literature dealing with their mode of life. Their culture is characterized by extreme simplicity, almost barren in its social, political and ceremonial aspects though rich in the field of activity concerned with hunting, fishing and traveling. Roughly speaking, the Montagnais group lends itself to a threefold division, the ethnological and dialectic peculiarities following somewhat the same limits: those of the coast, the typical so-called Montagnais; those of the interior of the northwestern part of the Labrador peninsula, and those of the northeastern interior. The latter have come to be known as the eastern Naskapi. The whole group is closely related to the Cree of Hudson’s Bay, outside of which area its next closest affinities lie with the Wabanaki group of the region south of the St. Lawrence, from New Hampshire to Newfoundland.
Iroquois
The Iroquois Confederacy consisted of five, later six, tribes, speaking the Iroquois language. In addition to these tribes there were others belonging to the same linguistic stock, such as the Hurons, the Cherokee, and others. The Confederacy or League of the Iroquois was formed towards the end of the sixteenth century and embraced, at that time, the following tribes: Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga and Seneca. In the beginning of the eighteenth century they were joined by the Tuscarora.
The original area occupied by these tribes embraced the following district: nearly the entire valley of the St. Lawrence, the basins of Lake Ontario and Lake Erie, the southeast shores of Lake Huron and Georgian Bay, all of the present New York State except the lower Hudson valley, all of central Pennsylvania, and the shores of Chesapeake Bay in Maryland, as far as Choptank and Patuxent Rivers.
According to some computations, the number of Iroquois villages about 1657 was about twenty-four; towards 1750 their number may have grown to about fifty. Towards the end of the seventeenth century, the total number of confederated Iroquois may have reached 16,000, which is also the approximate number of the present Iroquois, including numerous mixed breeds, who occupy a number of reservations in northwest New York and southeastern Canada.
The tribes of the League are usually classed in the so-called Woodlands culture area. They have, however, developed a civilization which is greatly specialized when compared with other tribes of that area, especially in social and political organization. The Iroquois exerted a powerful influence on some of their neighbors, notably on some of the eastern Algonkian tribes, whose socio-political organization bears unmistakable traces of Iroquois influence. The Iroquois of the League greatly developed a consciousness of what to-day might be designated as a historic mission. Their leaders believed that the Great Peace, for which the League stood, was fated to spread over all of the Indian tribes. In their attempts to induce other tribes to accept the principles of the League, they carried on an almost unceasing warfare against such tribes as the Neutrals, the Algonkians and the Sioux, and their combined forces proved irresistible to their less efficiently organized neighbors. Ultimately, they were checked in the south by their own relatives, the Cherokee.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
HALE, HORATIO. The Iroquois Book of Rites.
MORGAN, LEWIS H. The League of the Iroquois (The 1904, one volume edition.)
PARKER, A. C. The Iroquois Uses of Maize and Other Food Plants.
Handsome Lake Doctrine.
The Constitution of the Iroquois League.
HEWITT, J. N. B. Orenda and a Definition of Religion. (_American Anthropologist_, vol. IV, 1902.).
Iroquoian Cosmology (21st Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology.).
Seneca Fiction, Legends and Myths (32nd Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology.).
GOLDENWEISER, ALEXANDER A. Summary Reports on Iroquoian Work (Geological Survey, Ottawa, Canada, 1912-13, 1913-14.).
Lenape or Delaware Indians
The Lenape or Delaware Indians were once a numerous people forming a confederacy of three closely related tribes: the Unami or Delawares proper, the Unalachtigo or Unalatko, and the Minsi or Muncey, first encountered by the whites in what is now New Jersey, Delaware, eastern Pennsylvania, and southeastern New York, but at last accounts reduced to some 1900 persons, scattered about in Oklahoma and in the Province of Ontario, Canada, with a few in Wisconsin and Kansas.
Algonkian in language, their culture was typical of the northern half of the Eastern Woodland area, being most nearly related, as might be expected, to that of the Nanticoke and other Algonkian tribes adjoining them to the south, and that of the Mohican of the Hudson valley and of the Long Island tribes; and resembling in many general features the cultures of the New England tribes, of the Central Algonkian peoples, and of the Shawnee. The culture of the Lenape, that of the Minsi, in particular, also shows some special resemblances in addition to the general ones common to the whole Eastern Woodland, to that of the Iroquois tribes, although the latter speak dialects of an entirely different language.
Among the works dealing wholly or mainly with Lenape ethnology are the following:
BRINTON, DANIEL G. The Lenape and their Legends, Philadelphia, 1885.
HARRINGTON, M. R. Some Customs of the Delaware Indians. (_Museum Journal of the Museum of the University of Pennsylvania_, vol. I. No. 3.).
Religion and Ceremonies of the Lenape (in press).
Political and Social Organization of the Lenape (in Ms.).
Material Culture of the Lenape (in Ms.).
Lenape Folklore (in Ms.).
HECKEWELDER, JOHN. An Account of the History, Manners and Customs of the Indian Nations who once inhabited Pennsylvania and the neighboring States. (Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, vol. I, Philadelphia, 1819.).
LOSKIEL, GEORGE HENRY. History of the Mission of the United Brethren among the Indians in North America, London, 1794.
SKINNER, ALANSON. The Indians of Greater New York, Cedar Rapids, 1915.
The Lenape Indians of Staten Island. (_Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History_, vol. III, New York, 1909.).
The Indians of Manhattan Island and vicinity. (Guide leaflet No. 41, American Museum of Natural History.)
ZEISBERGER, DAVID. David Zeisberger’s History of the Northern American Indians. Edited by Archer Butler Hulbert and William Nathaniel Schwarze. (_Ohio Archaeological and Historical Quarterly_, vol. XIX, Nos. 1 and 2, Columbus, 1910.)
Creeks
The Creek confederacy was based upon a number of tribes speaking the Muskogee language, usually called Creek, but many other tribes were taken into the organization in course of time, most of them speaking related tongues but a few of entirely distinct stocks. From estimates made by early writers it would seem as though the Creek population had increased from about 7000 in 1700 to 20,000 at the time of the removal (1832). This shrunk again after that date so that the Indian Office report of 1919 gives 11,952 “Creeks by blood,” to which must be added 2141 “Seminole by blood,” 585 “Florida Seminole,” and 192 Alabama in Texas. The Seminole and Alabama formerly belonged to the Confederacy. Probably this includes a great many individuals with very little Indian blood, because the Census of 1910 returned only about 9000 all told.
When first known to Europeans the tribes of this connection occupied the eastern two-thirds of Alabama and all of what is now Georgia, except the northernmost and easternmost parts. Some of the Indians, then found upon the Georgia coast, seem afterward to have moved into the hinterland to unite with the confederate body.
The confederacy was gradually extending itself by taking in smaller peoples driven from their own country or suffering from more powerful neighbors, among them the Yuchi and a part of the Shawnee. Even the Chickasaw, though sometimes at war with them, had a sort of semi-official membership and it is probable that more of the tribes east and south would have been gathered into the league had it not been for the coming of the whites. They were, however, equalled and probably excelled in numbers by the Cherokee on their northeastern border, and the Choctaw to the southwest, with both of which tribes they waged bitter wars as well as with the Apalachee and Timucua southeast of them. These differences were, however, aggravated considerably by the rival Spanish, English, and French colonists. It should be understood that the Creek Confederacy was a growing American national organism, comparable to the Iroquois Confederacy, the states of Central America and Mexico and some of those of the Old World.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
ADAIR, JAMES. History of the North American Indians.
BARTRAM, WILLIAM. Travels. (His paper in vol. III, American Ethnological Society. Trans.)
BOSSU, M. Nouveaux Voyages, etc., (Alabama Indians.), 1768.
GATSCHET. A Migration Legend of the Creek Indians, (vol. I in Brinton’s Library of Aboriginal Literature; vol. II in Trans. Academy of Science of St. Louis.).
HAWKINS, BENJAMIN. A Sketch of the Creek Country, (Georgia Historical Society Collections, vol. III, 1848.).
SWAN. Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes, vol. V.
SWANTON, JOHN R. Early History of the Creek Indians and Their Neighbors. (Bureau American Ethnology [in press]).
Apache
The various Apache tribes of Arizona number about 5000. They are about equally divided between the two adjoining reservations, San Carlos and White Mountain. Their habitat was the upper drainage systems of the Salt and Gila Rivers. Culturally, they are related to the Pima and the Yuman-speaking Yavapai and Walapai to the west. They are related also linguistically, and in pre-Spanish times culturally, to the Navaho who live north of them. In a general way they participate in the social and religious life characteristic of the whole Southwestern area.
BOURKE, JOHN G. The Medicine Men of the Apache (9th Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology.)
GODDARD, P. E. In the _Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History_, vol. XXIV:
Myths and Tales from the San Carlos Apache, part 1.
Myths and Tales from the White Mountain Apache. part 2.
Navaho
The Navaho are an Athabascan tribe of nomadic or semi-nomadic habit occupying a reservation in northeast Arizona, northwest New Mexico and southeast Utah. In 1906 they were roughly estimated at 28,500. Sheep raising and weaving are their main industries. In many ways their ceremonial life appears like that of their neighbors, the Pueblo Indians, but the relationship of the two peoples in ceremonialism, as in other respects, has not been studied.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
MATTHEWS, WASHINGTON. Navaho Legends (Memoirs American Folklore Society, V. 1897. [See bibliography]).
The Night Chant, a Navaho Ceremony. (Memoirs American Museum of Natural History, VI, 1902.)
FRANCISCAN FATHERS, THE. An Ethnologic Dictionary of the Navaho Language. 1910.
GODDARD, P. E. Indians of the Southwest. (Handbook Series, No. 2. American Museum of Natural History, 1921.)
Zuñi Indians
Zuñi is one of the towns of the Pueblo or Town Indians of the southwest. It is situated about the middle of New Mexico, near the Arizona border. The population of Zuñi and its outlying settlements is estimated at about 1600.
The Pueblo Indians live in about thirty towns in New Mexico and Arizona, and number about 10,000. They are usually classified according to language into four or five stocks, the Hopi of Arizona, the Ashiwi or people of Zuñi, the Keres of Acoma and Laguna to the west and, to the east, of five towns on the Rio Grande, and, also in the east, the Tanoans including the Tewa and the people of Jemez.
When the Spanish conquistadores came up from Mexico into this country, they found the people distributed more or less as they are to-day, although since that time many old sites have been deserted and new sites built upon. With increasing protection for life and property, there has been a tendency to move down from the mesa tops to the better watered and more fertile valleys.
At the arrival of the Spaniards, and no doubt long before, the people were not only builders, but skillful potters and farmers, practising alike dry farming and irrigation. From their economy and complex ceremonial life, they may be considered the northernmost fringe of the maize culture area of Middle and South America, that great reach which included the Inca Kingdom of Peru and the Mayas and Aztecs of Mexico.
Wheat, peach trees and watermelons were brought to the Pueblo Indians by the Spaniards, as well as sheep, cattle, horses and donkeys. And the Spaniards established Franciscan missions and a secular governorship, thereby affecting religion and form of government, to what extent is still an open question. Less obscure, but no less interesting is the effect that modern industry is having upon the culture; as might be expected, American trade has been disintegrating, but entirely destructive it has not been, as yet.
The ceremonial Mr. Culin describes, belongs either to the Thlewekwe Society or to the Big Fire-brand Society. See “The Zuñi Indians,” pp. 483-8, 502-1. After the dance, the saplings with butts tapered and painted red are thrown down a rocky pitch in one of the buttes of the mesa to the north. Specimens may be seen in the American Museum of Natural History and in the Museum of the University of California.
That the skull acquired by Mr. Cushing was of questionable authenticity is a fact at present known at Zuñi; for it is said there that it was because of this Tenatsali came to his premature death.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
CULIN, STEWART. American Indian Games. (24th [1906] Annual Report of Bureau of American Ethnology.)
CUSHING, F. H. Zuñi Fetiches. (2nd [1880-1] Annual Report of Bureau of American Ethnology.)
My Adventures in Zuñi. (_The Century Magazine_, N. S. III, 1882.)
Outlines of Zuñi Creation Myths. (13th [1891-2] Annual Report of Bureau of American Ethnology.)
Zuñi Folk Tales. New York & London, 1901.
Zuñi Breadstuffs. (Republished in _Indian Notes and Monographs_, vol. VIII. Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation, 1920.)
FEWKES, J. W. (For Hopi monographs see his Biography and Bibliography.)
Notes on Ceremonialism at Laguna. (_Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History_, vol. XIX, part 4. 1920.
_American Anthropologist_, vols. XVIII, XIX, XX, XXI, XXII, XXIII.
_Journal American Folklore_, vol. XXIX No. 113; vol. XXXI, No. 120; vol. XXXIII, No. 127.
_Man_, vol. XVI, No. 11; vol. XVII, No. 12; vol. XIX, No. 3; No. 11; vol. XXI, No. 7.)
STEPHEN, A. M. (For articles on Hopi ceremonials see _American Anthropologist_, vol. V; _Journal American Folklore_, vols. V. VI.)
STEVENSON, M. C. The Zuñi Indians (23rd [1901-2] Annual Report of Bureau of American Ethnology.)
The Sia. (11th [1889-90] Annual Report of Bureau of American Ethnology.)
VOTH, H. R. (Several valuable monographs on Hopi ceremonials in the Anthropological Series of the Field Museum.)
Havasupai
The Havasupai are a small Yuman-speaking tribe whose permanent village is in Cataract Canyon, a southern tributary of the Grand Canyon of Colorado, in northern Arizona. Their hunting territory is that portion of the Arizona Plateau seen by tourists to the Grand Canyon. The tribe numbers 177 (214 in 1881) and is therefore dependent on friendly relations with the neighboring Walapai, who share their tongue, to the west, and the Navaho and pueblo-dwelling Hopi to the east. Their enemies were the Yavapai and Apache south of their range and the Paiute, north across the Grand Canyon. Of the little that has been written about these people, the following are dependable:
COUES, ELLIOT. On the Trail of a Spanish Pioneer. The Diary and Itinerary of Francisco Garcés. (A curious record by their discoverer, written in 1776), vol. II, pp. 335-347, 403-409. New York, Francis P. Harper, 1900.
CUSHING, F. H. The Nation of the Willows. (A vivid account of the country and the first description of its people.) _Atlantic Monthly_, vol. I, Sept., Oct., 1882, pp. 362-374, 541-559.
SHUFELDT, R. W. Some Observations on the Havesu-pai Indians. (Proceedings, U. S. National Museum, Washington, D. C., 1891, vol. XIV, pp. 387, et seq.)
(A full account of tribal customs is to be published by the same author in the _Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History_.)
Mohave
The Mohave are of Yuman stock. They have lived for more than three centuries in the bottomlands of the Colorado river where the present states of California, Nevada, and Arizona adjoin. Down-stream to the mouth of the Colorado were half a dozen kindred but often hostile tribes, of whom the Yuma proper are the best known survivors. The mountains to the east, in Arizona, were held by still other Yuman groups—Yavapai, Walapai, Havasupai—of rather different habits from the river tribes. To the north and east, the deserts of Nevada and California were occupied by sparse groups of Shoshonean lineage.
The Mohave may have numbered 3000 in aboriginal times. In 1910 the government counted 1058. Part of these had been transferred to a reservation down-stream at Parker.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
BOLTON, H. E. Spanish Exploration in the Southwest. (pp. 268-280 contain a translation of Zárate-Salmerón’s Relacion or account of Oñate’s expedition of 1604-05.) New York, 1916.
COUES, ELLIOT. On the Trail of a Spanish Pioneer. The Diary and Itinerary of Francisco Garcés, 1775-1776. New York, 1900.
WHIPPLE, A. W., EWBANK, T., and TURNER, W. W. Report of Explorations for a Railway Route near to the 35th Parallel of North Latitude from the Missouri River to the Pacific Ocean. part 1, Itinerary; part 3. Report upon the Indian Tribes. Washington, 1855.
STRATTON, R. B. The Captivity of the Oatman Girls. New York, 1857.
BOURKE, J. G. Notes on the Cosmogony and Theogony of the Mojave Indians. (_Journal of American Folklore_, vol. II, pp. 169-189, 1889.)
CURTIS, E. S. The North American Indian, vol. II.
Yuman Tribes of the Lower Colorado. (University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology. vol. XVI, pp. 475-485, 1920.)
Chapters L and LI, “The Mohave,” of “The Indians of California,” (in press as Bulletin of the Bureau of American Ethnology, Washington, D. C.).
Tepecanos
The Tepecanos were formerly a tribe of some importance, occupying considerable territory on the southern slopes of the Sierra Madre range in Western Mexico. Here they were found by the early Spanish conquerors who refer to them as Chichimec tribes. Their subsequent history is yet to be culled from prosy Mexican records. They probably fought valiantly against the white invaders but were defeated. As the country became settled and European blood introduced, the conservative members of the tribe continually retreated, until to-day they occupy but one village, Azqueltán, in the northern part of the state of Jalisco, and a few square miles of surrounding territory. Their numbers are reduced to a few hundred and many of these are mixed-bloods.
Physically the Tepecanos are closely akin to the other native tribes of western Mexico. The same may be said as regards their language, though in this respect the differences are greater. The Tepecano language is very closely related to the Tepehuane, Papago and Pima of northwestern Mexico and Arizona and more distantly related to Huichol, Cora, Aztec and Ute.
Little of a connected nature has been written on the Tepecano. The following list includes practically all the extant literature:
LUMHOLTZ, CARL. Unknown Mexico, vol. II, p. 123, New York, 1902.
Physiological and Medical Observations. (Bulletin 34, Bureau of American Ethnology, Washington, 1908.)
LEÓN, NICOLÁS. Familias Lingüísticas de México, Mexico, 1902.
THOMAS, CYRUS, and SWANTON, JOHN R. Indian Languages of Mexico and Central America. (Bulletin 44, Bureau of American Ethnology, Washington, 1911.)
MASON, J. ALDEN. The Tepehuan Indians of Azqueltán. (Proceedings 18th International Congress of Americanists, London, 1912.)
The Fiesta of the Pinole at Azqueltán. (_The Museum Journal_, III, University Museum, Philadelphia, 1912.)
Tepecano Prayers. (_International Journal of American Linguistics_, vol. I, II, 1918.)
Folk Tales of the Tepecanos. (_Journal of American Folklore_, vol. XXVII, 1914.)
Aztecs
For general account and bibliography see Spinden, H. J. Ancient civilizations of Mexico and Central America. (American Museum of Natural History, Handbook series. No. 3. 1917.)
Mayas
I
The picture of life in the Old Maya Empire of Central America during the sixth century after Christ is reconstructed almost entirely from the archæological evidence. Unlike many of the indigenous cultures of our own country which have survived with all their wealth of legend, myth, rite and ceremonial, down to the present day, the Old Maya Empire had vanished centuries before the Discovery of America. The episode in the life of a boy who might have lived in those colorful times must necessarily be based upon what we may glean from the monuments, temples and palaces of the period, helped out here and there by some few ethnological facts about the New Maya Empire gathered a millenium later.
The term “True Man,” _halach vinic_, was that given by the Maya only to their highest chiefs, their hereditary rulers, who would seem to have lived in a state not unlike feudalism, even discounting the indubitable feudalistic bias with which all the early Spanish chroniclers wrote. The rulers together with the priesthood would appear to have been nearly, if not quite absolute; succession to the supreme office passed by hereditary descent, though probably individual unfitness therefor could and did modify the operation of strict primogeniture; finally a system of vassalage, of lesser chieftains dependent upon an overlord, certainly obtained. Indeed, such are the extent and magnificence of the architectural and monumental remains of the Maya civilization that in order to have achieved them, it is necessary to postulate a highly centralized form of government, administered by a small, powerful caste.
II
Chichen Itza has had a long and varied history. Founded by the Mayas about 500 A. D. in their northern migrations from their original homes in Honduras and Guatemala, abandoned for four hundred years and settled again about the year 1000, Chichen was now to have two hundred years of growth and prosperity. Many of the older buildings still standing, date from this period. The famous League of Mayapan, Uxmal, and Chichen Itza, was a working alliance which resulted in all the cities of Yucatan making great strides forward in many of the arts. Several of the more famous structures at Chichen were erected in this epoch. Our story begins with the disruption of this League, when Mayapan brought in Mexican forces to prey upon the other cities of the peninsula. Peace gave way to many years of civil strife. The final destruction of Mayapan, about the middle of the fifteenth century, marked the end of the Maya civilization. The Spaniards found only the lingering remnants of the former splendor.
None of the ruined cities of Yucatan is more wonderful than Chichen Itza, stately and grand even now when many of its temples have fallen into decay, and others are buried in the depths of the forest. The sharp outlines of the Great Pyramid still rise above the level line of the trees of the jungle. The fine proportions of the pyramid, and the temple still standing on its top, mark it as perhaps the most complete and perfect building still extant in the whole Maya area. The substantial walls of the Ball Court remain as solid as when they were built. One of the stone rings still projects from the wall, a witness to the love of sport of the ancient people. The beautiful Temple of the Tigers, standing on the end of one of the walls, has been a prey to the devastating forces of man, of beast, and of nature. Vines and the roots of trees have gained a foothold on the roof, and many of the carved stones have fallen. Iguanas run in all directions when the chance visitor approaches. The frescoes of the inner chamber are but blurred remains of a former art.
And the Cenote of Sacrifice, that famous well, so vividly described by the early Christian priests, is now but a deserted shrine. Trailing vines, ferns, and palms almost cover the precipitous sides. The dark green waters are almost concealed by the slime of decaying vegetation. But the sight of the silent, sinister pool, surrounded by the unbroken forest, makes it easy, even now, to picture the scenes of sacrifice which it has witnessed.
The country is still peopled by the Mayas but their greatness is a thing of the past. The present-day native may well pause to wonder what the ruined buildings of his country were really for. He knows only what his white masters have told him. “They are the temples of your ancestors who have had a past unequaled in the early history of the New World, a past stretching back almost to the beginning of the Christian Era.” He only shakes his head and murmurs in his adopted language, “_Quien sabe_.”
The Maya civilization formerly embraced the whole peninsula of Yucatan, Chiapas and Tabasco, states of Mexico, the greater part of Guatemala, British Honduras, northern Honduras, and northern Salvador. This country is still occupied in general with peoples speaking various dialects of the Maya language.
The Mayas, both linguistically and culturally, are distinct from the Zapotecs in Oaxaca and the Nahua-Aztec peoples of Central Mexico. There is little doubt, however, that all the cultures of Mexico and Central America go back to a common origin. The Maya civilization is older than that of the Toltecs in Mexico which, in turn, preceded that of the Aztecs. The Toltec culture greatly influenced the late Maya of northern Yucatan about 1200 A. D.
MAYA CHRONOLOGY (CHICHEN ITZA)
?-200 A. D.    Period of migrations. 200-600        Chichen Itza founded. 520        Chichen Itza abandoned. 640-960        Itzas at Chakanputun. 700-960        Chichen rebuilt. League of Mayapan. 960-1200       Old Empire. Great cities of Guatemala and Honduras flourished. 1200-1442       Toltec influence, especially at Chichen Itza. 1442            Fall of Mayapan and end of Maya civilization.
The historical accounts upon which parts of our story are based are:
MOLINA, J. Historia del discubrimiento y conquista de Yucatan, 1896, pp. 47-51
HERRERA, Historia General, 1601-1605.
PRESCOTT, Chapter III, after Herrera, Torquemada, etc.
LANDA (156), Brasseur de Bourbourg ed. 1864, pp. 344-346.
Relacion de Valladolid (1579) in Col. de Doc. Ineditos, 1898-1900, vol. XIII, p. 25
Other historical and general references are:
_History_:
COGOLLUDO, D. L. Historia de Yucatan, 1688.
VILLAGUTIERRE, J. Historia de la conquista de la Provincia del Itza, 1701.
MEANS, P. A. A history of the Spanish conquest of Yucatan and of the Itzas, in _Papers of the Peabody Museum_, vol. VII, 1917.
_Chronology_:
MORLEY, S. G. The correlation of Maya and Christian chronology. (_American Journal of Archaeology_, 2nd series, vol. XIV, pp. 193-204.)
The historical value of the Books of Chilam Balam (_American Journal of Archaeology_, 2nd series, vol. XV, pp. 195-214.)
_Ruins_:
STEPHENS, J. L. Incidents of travel in Yucatan, 1843.
Incidents of travel in Central America, Chiapas, and Yucatan, 1841.
MAUDSLAY, A. P. Biologia Centrali-Americana Archaeology, 1889-1902.
JOYCE, T. A. Mexican Archaeology. 1914.
SPINDEN, H. J. A study of Maya art. (Memoirs of the Peabody Museum, vol. VI, 1913.)
GORDON, G. B., THOMPSON, E. H., and TOZZER, A. M. in Memoirs of the Peabody Museum.
_Hieroglyphic writing_:
BOWDITCH, C. P. The numeration, calendar systems and astronomical knowledge of the Mayas, 1910.
MORLEY, S. G. An introduction to the study of the Maya hieroglyphs, (Bulletin 57, Bureau of American Ethnology, 1915.)
The inscriptions at Copan, (Carnegie Institution, 1920.)
_Present population_:
TOZZER, A. M. A comparative study of the Mayas and the Lacandones, 1907.
_Maya language_:
TOZZER, A. M. A Maya grammar with bibliography and appraisement of the works noted (_Papers of the Peabody Museum_, vol. IX, 1921.)
_Relation with surrounding cultures_:
SPINDEN, H. J. Ancient civilizations of Mexico and Central America. (Handbook Series, No. 3, American Museum of Natural History, 1917.)
The origin and distribution of agriculture in America. (Proceedings of the 19th International Congress of Americanists, New York, 1917.)
TOZZER, A. M. The domain of the Aztecs, (Holmes Anniversary Volume, 1916.)
The Shellmound People
Up in the tree where the Measuring Worm was, some Katydids were sitting on a branch and singing shrilly: "Did you ever? Did you ever? Ever? Ever? Ever? Did you ever?" And this shows how much excited they were, for they usually sang only at night.
Then the mower came sweeping down the field, drawn by the Blind Horse and the Dappled Gray, and guided by the farmer himself. The dust rose in clouds as they passed, the Grasshoppers gave mighty springs which took them out of the way, and all the singing and shrilling stopped until the mower had passed. The nodding grasses swayed and fell as the sharp knives slid over the ground. "We are going to be hay," they said, "and live in the big barn."
"Now we shall grow some more tender green blades," said the grass roots.
"Fine weather for haying," snorted the Dappled Gray. "We'll cut all the grass in this field before noon."
"Good feeling ground to walk on," said the Blind Horse, tossing his head until the harness jingled.
Then the Horses and the farmer and the mower passed far away, and the meadow people came together again.
"Well," said the Tree Frog. "That's over for a while."
The Ants and the Grasshoppers came back to their old places. "We did just the right thing," they cried joyfully. "We got out of the way."
The Measuring Worm and the Katydids came down from their tree as the Milkweed Butterfly fluttered past. "The men left the grass standing around the Meadow Mouse's nest," said the Milkweed Butterfly, "and the Cows up by the barn are telling how glad they will be to have the hay when the cold weather comes."
"Grass must grow and hay be cut," said the wise old Tree Frog, "and when the time comes we always know what to do. Puk-rup! Puk-r-r-rup!"
"I think," said the fat old Cricket, as he crawled out of his hole, "that my lame leg is well enough to use. There is nothing like rest for a lame leg."
[Illustration]
The GRASSHOPPER and the MEASURING WORM RUN a RACE
A few days after the Measuring Worm came to the meadow he met the Grasshoppers. Everybody had heard of the Caterpillars' wish to be fashionable, and some of the young Grasshoppers, who did not know that it was all a joke, said they would like to teach the Measuring Worm a few things. So when they met him the young Grasshoppers began to make fun of him, and asked him what he did if he wanted to run, and whether he didn't wish his head grew on the middle of his back so that he could see better when walking.
The Measuring Worm was good-natured, and only said that he found his head useful where it was. Soon one fine-looking Grasshopper asked him to race. "That will show," said the Grasshopper, "which is the better traveller."
The Measuring Worm said: "Certainly, I will race with you to-morrow, and we will ask all our friends to look on." Then he began talking about something else. He was a wise young fellow, as well as a jolly one, and he knew the Grasshoppers felt sure that he would be beaten. "If I cannot win the race by swift running," thought he, "I must try to win it by good planning." So he got the Grasshoppers to go with him to a place where the sweet young grass grew, and they all fed together.
The Measuring Worm nibbled only a little here and there, but he talked a great deal about the sweetness of the grass, and how they would not get any more for a long time because the hot weather would spoil it. And the Grasshoppers said to each other: "He is right, and we must eat all we can while we have it." So they ate, and ate, and ate, and ate, until sunset, and in the morning they awakened and began eating again. When the time for the race came, they were all heavy and stupid from so much eating,--which was exactly what the Measuring Worm wanted.
The Tree Frog, the fat, old Cricket, and a Caterpillar were chosen to be the judges, and the race was to be a long one,--from the edge of the woods to the fence. When the meadow people were all gathered around to see the race, the Cricket gave a shrill chirp, which meant "Go!" and off they started. That is to say, the Measuring Worm started. The Grasshopper felt so sure he could beat that he wanted to give the Measuring Worm a little the start, because then, you see, he could say he had won without half trying.
The Measuring Worm started off at a good, steady rate, and when he had gone a few feet the Grasshopper gave a couple of great leaps, which landed him far ahead of the Worm. Then he stopped to nibble a blade of grass and visit with some Katydids who were looking on. By and by he took a few more leaps and passed the Measuring Worm again. This time he began to show off by jumping up straight into the air, and when he came down he would call out to those who stood near to see how strong he was and how easy it would be for him to win the race. And everybody said, "How strong he is, to be sure!" "What wonderful legs he has!" and "He could beat the Measuring Worm with his eyes shut!" which made the Grasshopper so exceedingly vain that he stopped more and more often to show his strength and daring.
That was the way it went, until they were only a short distance from the end of the race course. The Grasshopper was more and more pleased to think how easily he was winning, and stopped for a last time to nibble grass and make fun of the Worm. He gave a great leap into the air, and when he came down there was the Worm on the fence! All the meadow people croaked, and shrilled, and chirped to see the way in which the race ended, and the Grasshopper was very much vexed. "You shouldn't call him the winner," he said; "I can travel ten times as fast as he, if I try."
"Yes," answered the judges, "we all know that, yet the winning of the race is not decided by what you might do, but by what you did do." And the meadow people all cried: "Long live the Measuring Worm! Long live the Measuring Worm!"
[Illustration]
MR GREEN FROG AND HIS VISITORS
One day a young Frog who lived down by the river, came hopping up through the meadow. He was a fine-looking fellow, all brown and green, with a white vest, and he came to see the sights. The oldest Frog on the river bank had told him that he ought to travel and learn to know the world, so he had started at once.
Young Mr. Green Frog had very big eyes, and they stuck out from his head more than ever when he saw all the strange sights and heard all the strange sounds of the meadow. Yet he made one great mistake, just as bigger and better people sometimes do when they go on a journey; he didn't try to learn from the things he saw, but only to show off to the meadow people how much he already knew, and he boasted a great deal of the fine way in which he lived when at home.
Mr. Green Frog told those whom he met that the meadow was dreadfully dry, and that he really could not see how they lived there. He said they ought to see the lovely soft mud that there was in the marsh, and that there the people could sit all day with their feet in water in among the rushes where the sunshine never came. "And then," he said, "to eat grass as the Grasshoppers did! If they would go home with him, he would show them how to live."
The older Grasshoppers and Crickets and Locusts only looked at each other and opened their funny mouths in a smile, but the young ones thought Mr. Green Frog must be right, and they wanted to go back with him. The old Hoppers told them that they wouldn't like it down there, and that they would be sorry that they had gone; still the young ones teased and teased and teased and teased until everybody said: "Well, let them go, and then perhaps they will be contented when they return."
At last they all set off together,--Mr. Green Frog and the young meadow people. Mr. Green Frog took little jumps all the way and bragged and bragged. The Grasshoppers went in long leaps, the Crickets scampered most of the way, and the Locusts fluttered. It was a very gay little party, and they kept saying to each other, "What a fine time we shall have!"
When they got to the marsh, Mr. Green Frog went in first with a soft "plunk" in the mud. The rest all followed and tried to make believe that they liked it, but they didn't--they didn't at all. The Grasshoppers kept bumping against the tough, hard rushes when they jumped, and then that would tumble them over on their backs in the mud, and there they would lie, kicking their legs in the air, until some friendly Cricket pushed them over on their feet again. The Locusts couldn't fly at all there, and the Crickets got their shiny black coats all grimy and horrid.
They all got cold and wet and tired--yes, and hungry too, for there were no tender green things growing in among the rushes. Still they pretended to have a good time, even while they were thinking how they would like to be in their dear old home.
After the sun went down in the west it grew colder still, and all the Frogs in the marsh began to croak to the moon, croaking so loudly that the tired little travellers could not sleep at all. When the Frogs stopped croaking and went to sleep in the mud, one tired Cricket said: "If you like this, _stay_. I am going home as fast as my six little legs will carry me." And all the rest of the travellers said: "So am I," "So am I," "So am I."
Mr. Green Frog was sleeping soundly, and they crept away as quietly as they could out into the silvery moonlight and up the bank towards home. Such a tired little party as they were, and so hungry that they had to stop and eat every little while. The dew was on the grass and they could not get warm.
The sun was just rising behind the eastern forest when they got home. They did not want to tell about their trip at all, but just ate a lot of pepper-grass to make them warm, and then rolled themselves in between the woolly mullein leaves to rest all day long. And that was the last time any of them ever went away with a stranger.
[Illustration]
THE DIGNIFIED WALKING-STICKS.
Three Walking-Sticks from the forest had come to live in the big maple tree near the middle of the meadow. Nobody knew exactly why they had left the forest, where all their sisters and cousins and aunts lived. Perhaps they were not happy with their relatives. But then, if one is a Walking-Stick, you know, one does not care so very much about one's family.
These Walking-Sticks had grown up the best way they could, with no father or mother to care for them. They had never been taught to do anything useful, or to think much about other people. When they were hungry they ate some leaves, and never thought what they should eat the next time that they happened to be hungry. When they were tired they went to sleep, and when they had slept enough they awakened. They had nothing to do but to eat and sleep, and they did not often take the trouble to think. They felt that they were a little better than those meadow people who rushed and scrambled and worked from morning until night, and they showed very plainly how they felt. They said it was not genteel to hurry, no matter what happened.
One day the Tree Frog was under the tree when the large Brown Walking-Stick decided to lay some eggs. He saw her dropping them carelessly around on the ground, and asked, "Do you never fix a place for your eggs?"
"A place?" said the Brown Walking-Stick, waving her long and slender feelers to and fro. "A place? Oh, no! I think they will hatch where they are. It is too much trouble to find a place."
"Puk-r-r-rup!" said the Tree Frog. "Some mothers do not think it too much trouble to be careful where they lay eggs."
"That may be," said the Brown Walking-Stick, "but they do not belong to our family." She spoke as if those who did not belong to her family might be good but could never be genteel. She had once told her brother, the Five-Legged Walking-Stick, that she would not want to live if she could not be genteel. She thought the meadow people very common.
The Five-Legged Walking-Stick looked much like his sister. He had the same long, slender body, the same long feelers, and the same sort of long, slender legs. If you had passed them in a hay-field, you would surely have thought each a stem of hay, unless you happened to see them move. The other Walking-Stick, their friend, was younger and green. You would have thought her a blade of grass.
It is true that the brother had the same kind of legs as his sister, but he did not have the same number. When he was young and green he had six, then came a dreadful day when a hungry Nuthatch saw him, flew down, caught him, and carried him up a tree. He knew just what to expect, so when the Nuthatch set him down on the bark to look at him, he unhooked his feet from the bark and tumbled to the ground. The Nuthatch tried to catch him and broke off one of his legs, but she never found him again, although she looked and looked and looked and looked. That was because he crawled into a clump of ferns and kept very still.
His sister came and looked at him and said, "Now if you were only a Spider it would not be long before you would have six legs again."
Her brother waved first one feeler and then the other, and said: "Do you think I would be a Spider for the sake of growing legs? I would rather be a Walking-Stick without any legs than to be a Spider with a hundred." Of course, you know, Spiders never do have a hundred, and a Walking-Stick wouldn't be walking without any, but that was just his way of speaking, and it showed what kind of insect he was. His relatives all waved their feelers, one at a time, and said, "Ah, he has the true Walking-Stick spirit!" Then they paid no more attention to him, and after a while he and his sister and their green little friend left the forest for the meadow.
On the day when the grass was cut, they had sat quietly in their trees and looked genteel. Their feelers were held quite close together, and they did not move their feet at all, only swayed their bodies gracefully from side to side. Now they were on the ground, hunting through the flat piles of cut grass for some fresh and juicy bits to eat. The Tree Frog was also out, sitting in a cool, damp corner of the grass rows. The young Grasshoppers were kicking up their feet, the Ants were scrambling around as busy as ever, and life went on quite as though neither men nor Horses had ever entered the meadow.
"See!" cried a Spider who was busily looking after her web, "there comes a Horse drawing something, and the farmer sitting on it and driving."
When the Horse was well into the meadow, the farmer moved a bar, and the queer-looking machine began to kick the grass this way and that with its many stiff and shining legs. A frisky young Grasshopper kicked in the same way, and happened--just happened, of course--to knock over two of his friends. Then there was a great scrambling and the Crickets frolicked with them. The young Walking-Stick thought it looked like great fun and almost wished herself some other kind of insect, so that she could tumble around in the same way. She did not quite wish it, you understand, and would never have thought of it if she had turned brown.
"Ah," said the Five-Legged Walking-Stick, "what scrambling! How very common!"
"Yes, indeed!" said his sister. "Why can't they learn to move slowly and gracefully? Perhaps they can't help being fat, but they might at least act genteel."
"What is it to be genteel?" asked a Grasshopper suddenly. He had heard every word that the Walking-Stick said.
"Why," said the Five-Legged Walking-Stick, "it is just to be genteel. To act as you see us act, and to----"
Just here the hay-tedder passed over them, and every one of the Walking-Sticks was sent flying through the air and landed on his back. The Grasshoppers declare that the Walking-Sticks tumbled and kicked and flopped around in a dreadfully common way until they were right side up. "Why," said the Measuring Worm, "you act like anybody else when the hay-tedder comes along!"
The Walking-Sticks looked very uncomfortable, and the brother and sister could not think of anything to say. It was the young green one who spoke at last. "I think," said she, "that it is much easier to act genteel when one is right side up."
[Illustration]
THE DAY OF THE GREAT STORM
Everything in the meadow was dry and dusty. The leaves on the milkweeds were turning yellow with thirst, the field blossoms drooped their dainty heads in the sunshine, and the grass seemed to fairly rattle in the wind, it was so brown and dry.
All of the meadow people when they met each other would say, "Well, this _is_ hot," and the Garter Snake, who had lived there longer than anyone else, declared that it was the hottest and driest time that he had ever known. "Really," he said, "it is so hot that I cannot eat, and such a thing never happened before."
The Grasshoppers and Locusts were very happy, for such weather was exactly what they liked. They didn't see how people could complain of such delightful scorching days. But that, you know, is always the way, for everybody cannot be suited at once, and all kinds of weather are needed to make a good year.
The poor Tree Frog crawled into the coolest place he could find--hollow trees, shady nooks under the ferns, or even beneath the corner of a great stone. "Oh," said he, "I wish I were a Tadpole again, swimming in a shady pool. It is such a long, hot journey to the marsh that I cannot go. Last night I dreamed that I was a Tadpole, splashing in the water, and it was hard to awaken and find myself only an uncomfortable old Tree Frog."
Over his head the Katydids were singing, "Lovely weather! Lovely weather!" and the Tree Frog, who was a good-natured old fellow after all, winked his eye at them and said: "Sing away. This won't last always, and then it will be my turn to sing."
Sure enough, the very next day a tiny cloud drifted across the sky, and the Tree Frog, who always knew when the weather was about to change, began his rain-song. "Pukr-r-rup!" sang he, "Pukr-r-rup! It will rain! It will rain! R-r-r-rain!"
The little white cloud, grew bigger and blacker, and another came following after, then another, and another, and another, until the sky was quite covered with rushing black clouds. Then came a long, low rumble of thunder, and all the meadow people hurried to find shelter. The Moths and Butterflies hung on the under sides of great leaves. The Grasshoppers and their cousins crawled under burdock and mullein plants. The Ants scurried around to find their own homes. The Bees and Wasps, who had been gathering honey for their nests, flew swiftly back. Everyone was hurrying to be ready for the shower, and above all the rustle and stir could be heard the voice of the old Frog, "Pukr-r-rup! Pukr-r-rup! It will rain! It will rain! R-r-r-rain!"
The wind blew harder and harder, the branches swayed and tossed, the leaves danced, and some even blew off of their mother trees; the hundreds of little clinging creatures clung more and more tightly to the leaves that sheltered them, and then the rain came, and such a rain! Great drops hurrying down from the sky, crowding each other, beating down the grass, flooding the homes of the Ants and Digger Wasps until they were half choked with water, knocking over the Grasshoppers and tumbling them about like leaves. The lightning flashed, and the thunder pealed, and often a tree would crash down in the forest near by when the wind blew a great blast.
When everybody was wet, and little rivulets of water were trickling through the grass and running into great puddles in the hollows, the rain stopped, stopped suddenly. One by one the meadow people crawled or swam into sight.
The Digger Wasp was floating on a leaf in a big puddle. He was too tired and wet to fly, and the whirling of the leaf made him feel sick and dizzy, but he stood firmly on his tiny boat and tried to look as though he enjoyed it.
The Ants were rushing around to put their homes in shape, the Spiders were busily eating their old webs, which had been broken and torn in the storm, and some were already beginning new ones. A large family of Bees, whose tree-home had been blown down, passed over the meadow in search for a new dwelling, and everybody seemed busy and happy in the cool air that followed the storm.
The Snake went gliding through the wet grass, as hungry as ever, the Tree Frog was as happy as when he was a Tadpole, and only the Grasshoppers and their cousins, the Locusts and Katydids, were cross. "Such a horrid rain!" they grumbled, "it spoiled all our fun. And after such lovely hot weather too."
"Now don't be silly," said the Tree Frog, who could be really severe when he thought best, "the Bees and the Ants are not complaining, and they had a good deal harder time than you. Can't you make the best of anything? A nice, hungry, cross lot you would be if it didn't rain, because then you would have no good, juicy food. It's better for you in the end as it is, but even if it were not, you might make the best of it as I did of the hot weather. When you have lived as long as I have, you will know that neither Grasshoppers nor Tree Frogs can have their way all the time, but that it always comes out all right in the end without their fretting about it."
[Illustration]
THE STORY OF LILY PAD ISLAND
This is the story of a venturesome young Spider, who left his home in the meadow to seek his fortune in the great world.
He was a beautiful Spider, and belonged to one of the best families in the country around. He was a worker, too, for, as he had often said, there wasn't a lazy leg on his body, and he could spin the biggest, strongest, and shiniest web in the meadow. All the young people in the meadow liked him, and he was invited to every party, or dance, or picnic that they planned. If he had been content to stay at home, as his brothers and sisters were, he would in time have become as important and well known as the Tree Frog, or the fat, old Cricket, or even as the Garter Snake.
But that would not satisfy him at all, and one morning he said "Good-by" to all his friends and relatives, and set sail for unknown lands. He set sail, but not on water. He crawled up a tree, and out to the end of one of its branches. There he began spinning a long silken rope, and letting the wind blow it away from the tree. He held fast to one end, and when the wind was quite strong, he let go of the branch and sailed off through the air, carried by his rope balloon, and blown along by the wind.
The meadow people, on the ground below, watched him until he got so far away that he looked about as large as a Fly, and then he looked no bigger than an Ant, and then no bigger than a clover seed, and then no bigger than the tiniest egg that was ever laid, and then--well, then you could see nothing but sky, and the Spider was truly gone. The other young Spiders all wished that they had gone, and the old Spiders said, "They might much better stay at home, as their fathers and mothers had done." There was no use talking about it when they disagreed so, and very little more was said.
Meanwhile, the young traveller was having a very fine time. He was carried past trees and over fences, down toward the river. Under him were all the bright flowers of the meadow, and the bushes which used to tower above his head. After a while, he saw the rushes of the marsh below him, and wondered if the Frogs there would see him as he passed over them.
Next, he saw a beautiful, shining river, and in the quiet water by the shore were great white water-lilies growing, with their green leaves, or pads, floating beside them. "Ah," thought he, "I shall pass over the river, and land on the farther side," and he began to think of eating his rope balloon, so that he might sink slowly to the ground, when--the wind suddenly stopped blowing, and he began falling slowly down, down, down, down.
How he longed for a branch to cling to! How he shivered at the thought of plunging into the cold water! How he wished that he had always stayed at home! How he thought of all the naughty things that he had ever done, and was sorry that he had done them! But it was of no use, for still he went down, down, down. He gave up all hope and tried to be brave, and at that very minute he felt himself alight on a great green lily-pad.
This was indeed an adventure, and he was very joyful for a little while. But he got hungry, and there was no food near. He walked all over the leaf, Lily-Pad Island he named it, and ran around its edges as many as forty times. It was just a flat, green island, and at one side was a perfect white lily, which had grown, so pure and beautiful, out of the darkness and slime of the river bottom. The lily was so near that he jumped over to it. There he nestled in its sweet, yellow centre, and went to sleep.
When he fell asleep it was late in the afternoon, and, as the sun sank lower and lower in the west, the lily began to close her petals and get ready for the night. She was just drawing under the water when the Spider awakened. It was dark and close, and he felt himself shut in and going down. He scrambled and pushed, and got out just in time to give a great leap and alight on Lily Pad-Island once more. And then he was in a sad plight. He was hungry and cold, and night was coming on, and, what was worst of all, in his great struggle to free himself from the lily he had pulled off two of his legs, so he had only six left.
He never liked to think of that night afterward, it was so dreadful. In the morning he saw a leaf come floating down the stream; he watched it; it touched Lily-Pad Island for just an instant and he jumped on. He did not know where it would take him, but anything was better than staying where he was and starving. It might float to the shore, or against one of the rushes that grew in the shallower parts of the river. If it did that, he would jump off and run up to the top and set sail again, but the island, where he had been, was too low to give him a start.
He went straight down-stream for a while, then the leaf drifted into a little eddy, and whirled around and around, until the Spider was almost too dizzy to stand on it. After that, it floated slowly, very slowly, toward the shore, and at last came the joyful minute when the Spider could jump to some of the plants that grew in the shallow water, and, by making rope bridges from one to another, get on solid ground.
After a few days' rest he started back to the meadow, asking his way of every insect that he met. When he got home they did not know him, he was so changed, but thought him only a tramp Spider, and not one of their own people. His mother was the first one to find out who he was, and when her friends said, "Just what I expected! He might have known better," she hushed them, and answered: "The poor child has had a hard time, and I won't scold him for going. He has learned that home is the best place, and that home friends are the dearest. I shall keep him quiet while his new legs are growing, and then, I think, he will spin his webs near the old place."
And so he did, and is now one of the steadiest of all the meadow people. When anybody asks him his age, he refuses to tell, "For," he says, "most of me is middle-aged, but these two new legs of mine are still very young."
[Illustration]
THE GRASSHOPPER WHO WOULDN'T BE SCARED.
There were more Ants in the meadow than there were of any other kind of insects. In their family there were not only Ants, but great-aunts, cousins, nephews, and nieces, until it made one sleepy to think how many relatives each Ant had. Yet they were small people and never noisy, so perhaps the Grasshoppers seemed to be the largest family there.
There were many different families of Grasshoppers, but they were all related. Some had short horns, or feelers, and red legs; and some had long horns. Some lived in the lower part of the meadow where it was damp, and some in the upper part. The Katydids, who really belong to this family, you know, stayed in trees and did not often sing in the daytime. Then there were the great Road Grasshoppers who lived only in places where the ground was bare and dusty, and whom you could hardly see unless they were flying. When they lay in the dust their wide wings were hidden and they showed only that part of their bodies which was dust-color. Let the farmer drive along, however, and they rose into the air with a gentle, whirring sound and fluttered to a safe place. Then one could see them plainly, for their large under wings were black with yellow edges.
Perhaps those Grasshoppers who were best known in the meadow were the Clouded Grasshoppers, large dirty-brown ones with dark spots, who seemed to be everywhere during the autumn. The fathers and brothers in this family always crackled their wings loudly when they flew anywhere, so one could never forget that they were around.
It was queer that they were always spoken of as Grasshoppers. Their great-great-great-grandparents were called Locusts, and that was the family name, but the Cicadas liked that name and wanted it for themselves, and made such a fuss about it that people began to call them Seventeen-Year-Locusts; and then because they had to call the real Locusts something else, they called them Grasshoppers. The Grasshoppers didn't mind this. They were jolly and noisy, and as they grew older were sometimes very pompous. And you know what it is to be pompous.
When the farmer was drawing the last loads of hay to his barn and putting them away in the great mows there, three young Clouded Grasshopper brothers were frolicking near the wagon. They had tried to see who could run the fastest, crackle the loudest, spring the highest, flutter the farthest, and eat the most. There seemed to be nothing more to do. They couldn't eat another mouthful, the other fellows wouldn't play with them, they wouldn't play with their sisters, and they were not having any fun at all.
They were sitting on a hay-cock, watching the wagon as it came nearer and nearer. The farmer was on top and one of his men was walking beside it. Whenever they came to a hay-cock the farmer would stop the Horses, the man would run a long-handled, shining pitch-fork into the hay on the ground and throw it up to the farmer. Then it would be trampled down on to the load, the farmer's wife would rake up the scattering hay which was left on the ground, and that would be thrown up also.
The biggest Clouded Grasshopper said to his brothers, "You dare not sit still while they put this hay on the load!"
The smallest Clouded Grasshopper said, "I do too!"
The second brother said, "Huh! Guess I dare do anything you do!" He said it in a rather mean way, and that may have been because he had eaten too much. Overeating will make any insect cross.
Now every one of them was afraid, but each waited for the others to back out. While they were waiting, the wagon stopped beside them, the shining fork was run into the hay, and they were shaken and stood on their heads and lifted through the air on to the wagon. There they found themselves all tangled up with hay in the middle of the load. It was dark and they could hardly breathe. There were a few stems of nettles in the hay, and they had to crawl away from them. It was no fun at all, and they didn't talk very much.
When the wagon reached the barn, they were pitched into the mow with the hay, and then they hopped and fluttered around until they were on the floor over the Horses' stalls. They sat together on the floor and wondered how they could ever get back to the meadow. Because they had come in the middle of the load, they did not know the way.
"Oh!" said they. "Who are those four-legged people over there?"
"Kittens!" sang a Swallow over their heads. "Oh, tittle-ittle-ittle-ee!"
The Clouded Grasshoppers had never seen Kittens. It is true that the old Cat often went hunting in the meadow, but that was at night, when Grasshoppers were asleep.
"Meouw!" said the Yellow Kitten. "Look at those queer little brown people on the floor. Let's each catch one."
So the Kittens began crawling slowly over the floor, keeping their bodies and tails low, and taking very short steps. Not one of them took his eyes off the Clouded Grasshopper whom he meant to catch. Sometimes they stopped and crouched and watched, then they went on, nearer, nearer, nearer, still, while the Clouded Grasshoppers were more and more scared and wished they had never left the meadow where they had been so safe and happy.
At last the Kittens jumped, coming down with their sharp little claws just where the Clouded Grasshoppers--had been. The Clouded Grasshoppers had jumped too, but they could not stay long in the air, and when they came down the Kittens jumped again. So it went until the poor Clouded Grasshoppers were very, very tired and could not jump half so far as they had done at first. Sometimes the Kittens even tried to catch them while they were fluttering, and each time they came a little nearer than before. They were so tired that they never thought of leaping up on the wall of the barn where the Kittens couldn't reach them.
At last the smallest Clouded Grasshopper called to his brothers, "Let us chase the Kittens."
The brothers answered, "They're too big."
The smallest Clouded Grasshopper, who had always been the brightest one in the family, called back, "We may scare them if they are big."
Then all the Clouded Grasshoppers leaped toward the Kittens and crackled their wings and looked very, very fierce. And the Kittens ran away as fast as they could. They were in such a hurry to get away that the Yellow Kitten tumbled over the White Kitten and they rolled on the floor in a furry little heap. The Clouded Grasshoppers leaped again, and the Kittens scrambled away to their nest in the hay, and stood against the wall and raised their backs and their pointed little tails, and opened their pink mouths and spat at them, and said, "Ha-ah-h-h!"
"There!" said the smallest Clouded Grasshopper to them, "we won't do anything to you this time, because you are young and don't know very much, but don't you ever bother one of us again. We might have hopped right on to you, and then what could you have done to help yourselves?"
The Clouded Grasshoppers started off to find their way back to the meadow, and the frightened Kittens looked at each other and whispered: "Just supposing they had hopped on to us! What _could_ we have done!"
[Illustration]
THE EARTHWORM HALF-BROTHERS
Early one wet morning, a long Earthworm came out of his burrow. He did not really leave it, but he dragged most of his body out, and let just the tip-end of it stay in the earth. Not having any eyes, he could not see the heavy, gray clouds that filled the sky, nor the milkweed stalks, so heavy with rain-drops that they drooped their pink heads. He could not see these things, but he could feel the soft, damp grass, and the cool, clear air, and as for seeing, why, Earthworms never do have eyes, and never think of wanting them, any more than you would want six legs, or feelers on your head.
This Earthworm had been out of his burrow only a little while, when there was a flutter and a rush, and Something flew down from the sky and bit his poor body in two. Oh, how it hurt! Both halves of him wriggled and twisted with pain, and there is no telling what might have become of them if another and bigger Something had not come rushing down to drive the first Something away. So there the poor Earthworm lay, in two aching, wriggling pieces, and although it had been easy enough to bite him in two, nothing in the world could ever bite him into one.
After a while the aching stopped, and he had time to think. It was very hard to decide what he ought to do. You can see just how puzzling it must have been, for, if you should suddenly find yourself two people instead of one, you would not know which one was which. At this very minute, who should come along but the Cicada, and one of the Earthworm pieces asked his advice. The Cicada thought that he was the very person to advise in such a case, because he had had such a puzzling time himself. So he said in a very knowing way: "Pooh! That is a simple matter. I thought I was two Cicadas once, but I wasn't. The thinking, moving part is the real one, whatever happens, so that part of the Worm which thinks and moves is the real Worm."
"I am the thinking part," cried each of the pieces.
The Cicada rubbed his head with his front legs, he was so surprised.
"And I am the moving part," cried each of the pieces, giving a little wriggle to prove it.
"Well, well, well, well!" exclaimed the Cicada, "I believe I don't know how to settle this. I will call the Garter Snake," and he flew off to get him.
A very queer couple they made, the Garter Snake and the Cicada, as they came hurrying back from the Snake's home. The Garter Snake was quite excited. "Such a thing has not happened in our meadow for a long time," he said, "and it is a good thing there is somebody here to explain it to you, or you would be dreadfully frightened. My family is related to the Worms, and I know. Both of you pieces are Worms now. The bitten ends will soon be well, and you can keep house side by side, if you don't want to live together."
"Well," said the Earthworms, "if we are no longer the same Worm, but two Worms, are we related to each other? Are we brothers, or what?"
"Why," answered the Garter Snake, with a funny little smile, "I think you might call yourselves half-brothers." And to this day they are known as "the Earthworm half-brothers." They are very fond of each other and are always seen together.
A jolly young Grasshopper, who is a great eater and thinks rather too much about food, said he wouldn't mind being bitten into two Grasshoppers, if it would give him two stomachs and let him eat twice as much.
The Cicada told the Garter Snake this one day, and the Garter Snake said: "Tell him not to try it. The Earthworms are the only meadow people who can live after being bitten in two that way. The rest of us have to be one, or nothing. And as for having two stomachs, he is just as well off with one, for if he had two, he would get twice as hungry."
[Illustration]
A GOSSIPING FLY
Of all the people who lived and worked in the meadow by the river, there was not one who gave so much thought to other people's business as a certain Blue-bottle Fly. Why this should be so, nobody could say; perhaps it was because he had nothing to do but eat and sleep, for that is often the way with those who do little work.
Truly his cares were light. To be sure, he ate much, but then, with nearly sixty teeth for nibbling and a wonderful long tongue for sucking, he could eat a great deal in a very short time. And as for sleeping--well, sleeping was as easy for him as for anyone else.
However it was, he saw nearly everything that happened, and thought it over in his queer little three-cornered head until he was sure that he ought to go to talk about it with somebody else. It was no wonder that he saw so much, for he had a great bunch of eyes on each side of his head, and three bright, shining ones on the very top of it. That let him see almost everything at once, and beside this his neck was so exceedingly slender that he could turn his head very far around.
This particular Fly, like all other Flies, was very fond of the sunshine and kept closely at home in dark or wet weather. He had no house, but stayed in a certain elder bush on cloudy days and called that his home. He had spent all of one stormy day there, hanging on the under side of a leaf, with nothing to do but think. Of course, his head was down and his feet were up, but Blue-bottle Flies think in that position as well as in any other, and the two sticky pads on each side of his six feet held him there very comfortably.
He thought so much that day, that when the next morning dawned sunshiny and clear, he had any number of things to tell people, and he started out at once.
First he went to the Tree Frog. "What do you suppose," said he, "that the Garter Snake is saying about you? It is very absurd, yet I feel that you ought to know. He says that your tongue is fastened at the wrong end, and that the tip of it points down your throat. Of course, I knew it couldn't be true, still I thought I would tell you what he said, and then you could see him and put a stop to it."
For an answer to this the Tree Frog ran out his tongue, and, sure enough, it was fastened at the front end. "The Snake is quite right," he said pleasantly, "and my tongue suits me perfectly. It is just what I need for the kind of food I eat, and the best of all is that it never makes mischief between friends."
After that, the Fly could say nothing more there, so he flew away in his noisiest manner to find the Grasshopper who lost the race. "It was a shame," said the Fly to him, "that the judges did not give the race to you. The idea of that little green Measuring Worm coming in here, almost a stranger, and making so much trouble! I would have him driven out of the meadow, if I were you."
"Oh, that is all right," answered the Grasshopper, who was really a good fellow at heart; "I was very foolish about that race for a time, but the Measuring Worm and I are firm friends now. Are we not?" And he turned to a leaf just back of him, and there, peeping around the edge, was the Measuring Worm himself.
The Blue-bottle Fly left in a hurry, for where people were so good-natured he could do nothing at all. He went this time to the Crickets, whom he found all together by the fat, old Cricket's hole.
"I came," he said, "to find out if it were true, as the meadow people say, that you were all dreadfully frightened when the Cow came?"
The Crickets answered never a word, but they looked at each other and began asking him questions.
"Is it true," said one, "that you do nothing but eat and sleep?"
"Is it true," said another, "that your eyes are used most of the time for seeing other people's faults?"
"And is it true," said another, "that with all the fuss you make, you do little but mischief?"
The Blue-bottle Fly answered nothing, but started at once for his home in the elder bush, and they say that his three-cornered head was filled with very different thoughts from any that had been there before.
[Illustration]
THE FROG-HOPPERS GO OUT INTO THE WORLD.
Along the upper edge of the meadow and in the corners of the rail fence there grew golden-rod. During the spring and early summer you could hardly tell that it was there, unless you walked close to it and saw the slender and graceful stalks pushing upward through the tall grass and pointing in many different ways with their dainty leaves. The Horses and Cows knew it, and although they might eat all around it they never pulled at it with their lips or ate it. In the autumn, each stalk was crowned with sprays of tiny bright yellow blossoms, which nodded in the wind and scattered their golden pollen all around. Then it sometimes happened that people who were driving past would stop, climb over the fence, and pluck some of it to carry away. Even then there was so much left that one could hardly miss the stalks that were gone.
It may have been because the golden-rod was such a safe home that most of the Frog-Hoppers laid their eggs there. Some laid eggs in other plants and bushes, but most of them chose the golden-rod. After they had laid their eggs they wandered around on the grass, the bushes, and the few trees which grew in the meadow, hopping from one place to another and eating a little here and a little there.
Nobody knows why they should have been called Frog-Hoppers, unless it was because when you look them in the face they seem a very little like tiny Frogs. To be sure, they have six legs, and teeth on the front pair, as no real Frog ever thought of having. Perhaps it was only a nickname because their own name was so long and hard to speak.
The golden-rod was beginning to show small yellow-green buds on the tips of its stalks, and the little Frog-Hoppers were now old enough to talk and wonder about the great world. On one stalk four Frog-Hopper brothers and sisters lived close together. That was much pleasanter than having to grow up all alone, as most young Frog-Hoppers do, never seeing their fathers and mothers or knowing whether they ever would.
These four little Frog-Hoppers did not know how lucky they were, and that, you know, happens very often when people have not seen others lonely or unhappy. They supposed that every Frog-Hopper family had two brothers and two sisters living together on a golden-rod stalk. They fed on the juice or sap of the golden-rod, pumping it out of the stalk with their stout little beaks and eating or drinking it. After they had eaten it, they made white foam out of it, and this foam was all around them on the stalk. Any one passing by could tell at once by the foam just where the Frog-Hoppers lived.
One morning the oldest Frog-Hopper brother thought that the sap pumped very hard. It may be that it did pump hard, and it may be that he was tired or lazy. Anyway, he began to grumble and find fault. "This is the worst stalk of golden-rod I ever saw in my life," he said. "It doesn't pay to try to pump any more sap, and I just won't try, so there!"
He was quite right in saying that it was the worst stalk he had ever seen, because he had never seen any other, but he was much mistaken in saying that it didn't pay to pump sap, and as for saying that "it didn't pay, so there!" we all know that when insects begin to talk in that way the best thing to do is to leave them quite alone until they are better-natured.
The other Frog-Hopper children couldn't leave him alone, because they hadn't changed their skins for the last time. They had to stay in their foam until that was done. After the big brother spoke in this way, they all began to wonder if the sap didn't pump hard. Before long the big sister wiggled impatiently and said, "My beak is dreadfully tired."
Then they all stopped eating and began to talk. They called their home stuffy, and said there wasn't room to turn around in it without hitting the foam. They didn't say why they should mind hitting the foam. It was soft and clean, and always opened up a way when they pushed against it.
"I tell you what!" said the big brother, "after I've changed my skin once more and gone out into the great world, you won't catch me hanging around this old golden-rod."
"Nor me!" "Nor me!" "Nor me!" said the other young Frog-Hoppers.
"I wonder what the world is like," said the little sister. "Is it just bigger foam and bigger golden-rod and more Frog-Hoppers?"
"Huh!" exclaimed her big brother. "What lots you know! If I didn't know any more than that about it, I'd keep still and not tell anybody." That made her feel badly, and she didn't speak again for a long time.
Then the little brother spoke. "I didn't know you had ever been out into the world," he said.
"No," said the big brother, "I suppose you didn't. There are lots of things you don't know." That made him feel badly, and he went off into the farthest corner of the foam and stuck his head in between a golden-rod leaf and the stalk. You see the big brother was very cross. Indeed, he was exceedingly cross.
For a long time nobody spoke, and then the big sister said, "I wish you would tell us what the world is like."
The big brother knew no more about the world than the other children, but after he had been cross and put on airs he didn't like to tell the truth. He might have known that he would be found out, yet he held up his head and answered: "I don't suppose that I can tell you so that you will understand, because you have never seen it. There are lots of things there--whole lots of them--and it is very big. Some of the things are like golden-rod and some of them are not. Some of them are not even like foam. And there are a great many people there. They all have six legs, but they are not so clever as we are. We shall have to tell them things."
This was very interesting and made the little sister forget to pout and the little brother come out of his foam-corner. He even looked as though he might ask a few questions, so the big brother added, "Now don't talk to me, for I must think about something."
It was not long after this that the young Frog-Hoppers changed their skins for the last time. The outside part of the foam hardened and made a little roof over them while they did this. Then they were ready to go out into the meadow. The big brother felt rather uncomfortable, and it was not his new skin which made him so. It was remembering what he had said about the world outside.
When they had left their foam and their golden-rod, they had much to see and ask about. Every little while one of the smaller Frog-Hoppers would exclaim, "Why, you never told us about this!" or, "Why didn't you tell us about that?"
Then the big brother would answer: "Yes, I did. That is one of the things which I said were not like either golden-rod or foam."
For a while they met only Crickets, Ants, Grasshoppers, and other six-legged people, and although they looked at each other they did not have much to say. At last they hopped near to the Tree Frog, who was sitting by the mossy trunk of a beech tree and looked so much like the bark that they did not notice him at first. The big brother was very near the Tree Frog's head.
"Oh, see!" cried the others. "There is somebody with only four legs, and he doesn't look as though he ever had any more. Why, Brother, what does this mean? You said everybody had six."
At this moment the Tree Frog opened his eyes a little and his mouth a great deal, and shot out his quick tongue. When he shut his mouth again, the big brother of the Frog-Hoppers was nowhere to be seen. They never had a chance to ask him that question again. If they had but known it, the Tree Frog at that minute had ten legs, for six and four are ten. But then, they couldn't know it, for six were on the inside.
[Illustration]
THE MOSQUITO TRIES TO TEACH HIS NEIGHBORS
In this meadow, as in every other meadow since the world began, there were some people who were always tired of the way things were, and thought that, if the world were only different, they would be perfectly happy. One of these discontented ones was a certain Mosquito, a fellow with a whining voice and disagreeable manners. He had very little patience with people who were not like him, and thought that the world would be a much pleasanter place if all the insects had been made Mosquitoes.
"What is the use of Spiders, and Dragon-flies, and Beetles, and Butterflies?" he would say, fretfully; "a Mosquito is worth more than any of them."
You can just see how unreasonable he was. Of course, Mosquitoes and Flies do help keep the air pure and sweet, but that is no reason why they should set themselves up above the other insects. Do not the Bees carry pollen from one flower to another, and so help the plants raise their Seed Babies? And who would not miss the bright, happy Butterflies, with their work of making the world beautiful?
But this Mosquito never thought of those things, and he said to himself: "Well, if they cannot all be Mosquitoes, they can at least try to live like them, and I think I will call them together and talk it over." So he sent word all around, and his friends and neighbors gathered to hear what he had to say.
"In the first place," he remarked, "it is unfortunate that you are not Mosquitoes, but, since you are not, one must make the best of it. There are some things, however, which you might learn from us fortunate creatures who are. For instance, notice the excellent habit of the Mosquitoes in the matter of laying eggs. Three or four hundred of the eggs are fastened together and left floating on a pond in such a way that, when the babies break their shells, they go head first into the water. Then they----"
"Do you think I would do that if I could?" interrupted a motherly old Grasshopper. "Fix it so my children would drown the minute they came out of the egg? No, indeed!" and she hurried angrily away, followed by several other loving mothers.
"But they don't drown," exclaimed the Mosquito, in surprise.
"They don't if they're Mosquitoes," replied the Ant, "but I am thankful to say my children are land babies and not water babies."
"Well, I won't say anything more about that, but I must speak of your voices, which are certainly too heavy and loud to be pleasant. I should think you might speak and sing more softly, even if you have no pockets under your wings like mine. I flutter my wings, and the air strikes these pockets and makes my sweet voice."
"Humph!" exclaimed a Bee, "it is a very poor place for pockets, and a very poor use to make of them. Every Bee knows that pockets are handiest on the hind legs, and should be used for carrying pollen to the babies at home."
"My pocket is behind," said a Spider, "and my web silk is kept there. I couldn't live without a pocket."
Some of the meadow people were getting angry, so the Garter Snake, who would always rather laugh than quarrel, glided forward and said: "My friends and neighbors; our speaker here has been so kind as to tell us how the Mosquitoes do a great many things, and to try to teach us their way. It seems to me that we might repay some of his kindness by showing him our ways, and seeing that he learns by practice. I would ask the Spiders to take him with them and show him how to spin a web. Then the Bees could teach him how to build comb, and the Tree Frog how to croak, and the Earthworms how to burrow, and the Caterpillars how to spin a cocoon. Each of us will do something for him. Perhaps the Measuring Worm will teach him to walk as the Worms of his family do. I understand he does that very well." Here everybody laughed, remembering the joke played on the Caterpillars, and the Snake stopped speaking.
The Mosquito did not dare refuse to be taught, and so he was taken from one place to another, and told exactly how to do everything that he could not possibly do, until he felt so very meek and humble that he was willing the meadow people should be busy and happy in their own way.
[Illustration]
THE FROG WHO THOUGHT HERSELF SICK
By the edge of the marsh lived a young Frog, who thought a great deal about herself and much less about other people. Not that it was wrong to think so much of herself, but it certainly was unfortunate that she should have so little time left in which to think of others and of the beautiful world.
Early in the morning this Frog would awaken and lean far over the edge of a pool to see how she looked after her night's rest. Then she would give a spring, and come down with a splash in the cool water for her morning bath. For a while she would swim as fast as her dainty webbed feet would push her, then she would rest, sitting in the soft mud with just her head above the water.
When her bath was taken, she had her breakfast, and that was the way in which she began her day. She did nothing but bathe and eat and rest, from sunrise to sunset. She had a fine, strong body, and had never an ache or a pain, but one day she got to thinking, "What if sometime I should be sick?" And then, because she thought about nothing but her own self, she was soon saying, "I am afraid I shall be sick." In a little while longer it was, "I certainly am sick."
She crawled under a big toadstool, and sat there looking very glum indeed, until a Cicada came along. She told the Cicada how sick she felt, and he told his cousins, the Locusts, and they told their cousins, the Grasshoppers, and they told their cousins, the Katydids, and then everybody told somebody else, and started for the toadstool where the young Frog sat. The more she had thought of it, the worse she felt, until, by the time the meadow people came crowding around, she was feeling very sick indeed.
"Where do you feel badly?" they cried, and, "How long have you been sick?" and one Cricket stared with big eyes, and said, "How dr-r-readfully she looks!" The young Frog felt weaker and weaker, and answered in a faint little voice that she had felt perfectly well until after breakfast, but that now she was quite sure her skin was getting dry, and "Oh dear!" and "Oh dear!"
Now everybody knows that Frogs breathe through their skins as well as through their noses, and for a Frog's skin to get dry is very serious, for then he cannot breathe through it; so, as soon as she said that, everybody was frightened and wanted to do something for her at once. Some of the timid ones began to weep, and the others bustled around, getting in each other's way and all trying to do something different. One wanted to wrap her in mullein leaves, another wanted her to nibble a bit of the peppermint which grew near, a third thought she should be kept moving, and that was the way it went.
Just when everybody was at his wits' end, the old Tree Frog came along. "Pukr-r-rup! What is the matter with you?" he said.
"Oh!" gasped the young Frog, weakly, "I am sure my skin is getting dry, and I feel as though I had something in my head."
"Umph!" grunted the Tree Frog to himself, "I guess there isn't enough in her head to ever make her sick; and, as for her skin, it isn't dry yet, and nobody knows that it ever will be."
But as he was a wise old fellow and had learned much about life, he knew he must not say such things aloud. What he did say was, "I heard there was to be a great race in the pool this morning."
The young Frog lifted her head quite quickly, saying: "You did? Who are the racers?"
"Why, all the young Frogs who live around here. It is too bad that you cannot go."
"I don't believe it would hurt me any," she said.
"You might take cold," the Tree Frog said; "besides, the exercise would tire you."
"Oh, but I am feeling much better," the young Frog said, "and I am certain it will do me good."
"You ought not to go," insisted all the older meadow people. "You really ought not."
"I don't care," she answered, "I am going anyway, and I am just as well as anybody."
And she did go, and it did seem that she was as strong as ever. The people all wondered at it, but the Tree Frog winked his eyes at them and said, "I knew that it would cure her." And then he, and the Garter Snake, and the fat, old Cricket laughed together, and all the younger meadow people wondered at what they were laughing.
[Illustration]
THE KATYDIDS' QUARREL
The warm summer days were past, and the Katydids came again to the meadow. Everybody was glad to see them, and the Grasshoppers, who are cousins of the Katydids, gave a party in their honor.
Such a time as the meadow people had getting ready for that party! They did not have to change their dresses, but they scraped and cleaned themselves, and all the young Grasshoppers went off by the woods to practise jumping and get their knees well limbered, because there might be games and dancing at the party, and then how dreadful it would be if any young Grasshopper should find that two or three of his legs wouldn't bend easily!
The Grasshoppers did not know at just what time they ought to have the party. Some of the meadow people whom they wanted to invite were used to sleeping all day, and some were used to sleeping all night, so it really was hard to find an hour at which all would be wide-awake and ready for fun. At last the Tree Frog said: "Pukr-r-rup! Pukr-r-rup! Have it at sunset!" And at sunset it was.
Everyone came on time, and they hopped and chattered and danced and ate a party supper of tender green leaves. Some of the little Grasshoppers grew sleepy and crawled among the plantains for a nap. Just then a big Katydid said he would sing a song--which was a very kind thing for him to do, because he really did it to make the others happy, and not to show what a fine musician he was. All the guests said, "How charming!" or, "We should be delighted!" and he seated himself on a low swinging branch. You know Katydids sing with the covers of their wings, and so when he alighted on the branch he smoothed down his pale green suit and rubbed his wing-cases a little to make sure that they were in tune. Then he began loud and clear, "Katy did! Katy did!! Katy did!!!"
Of course he didn't mean any real Katy, but was just singing his song. However, there was another Katydid there who had a habit of contradicting, and he had eaten too much supper, and that made him feel crosser than ever; so when the singer said "Katy did!" this cross fellow jumped up and said, "Katy didn't! Katy didn't!! Katy didn't!!!" and they kept at it, one saying that she did and the other that she didn't, until everybody was ashamed and uncomfortable, and some of the little Grasshoppers awakened and wanted to know what was the matter.
Both of the singers got more and more vexed until at last neither one knew just what he was saying--and that, you know, is what almost always happens when people grow angry. They just kept saying something as loud and fast as possible and thought all the while that they were very bright--which was all they knew about it.
Suddenly somebody noticed that the one who began to say "Katy did!" was screaming "Katy didn't!" and the one who had said "Katy didn't!" was roaring "Katy did!" Then they all laughed, and the two on the branch looked at each other in a very shamefaced way.
The Tree Frog always knew the right thing to do, and he said "Pukr-r-rup!" so loudly that all stopped talking at once. When they were quiet he said: "We will now listen to a duet, 'Katy,' by the two singers who are up the tree. All please join in the chorus." So it was begun again, and both the leaders were good-natured, and all the Katydids below joined in with "did or didn't, did or didn't, did or didn't." And that was the end of the quarrel.
[Illustration]
THE LAST PARTY OF THE SEASON
Summer had been a joyful time in the meadow. It had been a busy time, too, and from morning till night the chirping and humming of the happy people there had mingled with the rustle of the leaves, and the soft "swish, swish," of the tall grass, as the wind passed over it.
True, there had been a few quarrels, and some unpleasant things to remember, but these little people were wise enough to throw away all the sad memories and keep only the glad ones. And now the summer was over. The leaves of the forest trees were turning from green to scarlet, orange, and brown. The beech and hickory nuts were only waiting for a friendly frost to open their outer shells, and loosen their stems, so that they could fall to the earth.
The wind was cold now, and the meadow people knew that the time had come to get ready for winter. One chilly Caterpillar said to another, "Boo-oo! How cold it is! I must find a place for my cocoon. Suppose we sleep side by side this winter, swinging on the same bush?"
And his friend replied: "We must hurry then, or we shall be too old and stiff to spin good ones."
The Garter Snake felt sleepy all the time, and declared that in a few days he would doze off until spring.
The Tree Frog had chosen his winter home already, and the Bees were making the most of their time in visiting the last fall flowers, and gathering every bit of honey they could find for their cold-weather stock.
The last eggs had been laid, and the food had been placed beside many of them for the babies that would hatch out in the spring. Nothing was left but to say "Good-by," and fall asleep. So a message was sent around the meadow for all to come to a farewell party under the elm tree.
Everybody came, and all who could sing did so, and the Crickets and Mosquitoes made music for the rest to dance by.
The Tree Frog led off with a black and yellow Spider, the Garter Snake followed with a Potato Bug, and all the other crawling people joined in the dance on the grass, while over their heads the Butterflies and other light-winged ones fluttered to and fro with airy grace.
The Snail and the fat, old Cricket had meant to look on, and really did so, for a time, from a warm corner by the tree, but the Cricket couldn't stand it to not join in the fun. First, his eyes gleamed, his feelers waved, and his feet kept time to the music, and, when a frisky young Ant beckoned to him, he gave a great leap and danced with the rest, balancing, jumping, and circling around in a most surprising way.
When it grew dark, the Fireflies' lights shone like tiny stars, and the dancing went on until all were tired and ready to sing together the last song of the summer, for on the morrow they would go to rest. And this was their song:
The autumn leaves lying So thick on the ground, The summer Birds flying The meadow around, Say, "Good-by."
The Seed Babies dropping Down out of our sight, The Dragon-flies stopping A moment in flight, Say, "Good-by."
The red Squirrels bearing Their nuts to the tree, The wild Rabbits caring For babies so wee, Say, "Good-by."
The sunbeams now showing Are hazy and pale, The warm breezes blowing Have changed to a gale, So, "Good-by."
The season for working Is passing away. Both playing and shirking Are ended to day, So, "Good-by."
The Garter Snake creeping So softly to rest, The fuzzy Worms sleeping Within their warm nest, Say, "Good-by."
The Honey Bees crawling Around the full comb, The tiny Ants calling Each one to the home, Say, "Good-by."
We've ended our singing, Our dancing, and play, And Nature's voice ringing Now tells us to say Our "Good-by."
THE END.
"_Many a mother and teacher will accord a vote of thanks to the author._"
[Illustration]
Among the Meadow People.
STORIES OF FIELD LIFE, WRITTEN FOR THE LITTLE ONES. By CLARA D. PIERSON.
Illustrated by F. C. GORDON. New Edition, 12mo, 194 pages, cloth, gilt top, $1.25
"One of the daintiest and in many ways most attractive of the many books of nature study which the past year has brought forth."--_Boston Advertiser._
"They are like Mrs. Gatty's well-known 'Parables from Nature,' written in the best of English, as fascinating as fairy tales, and yet 'really true,' a quality which we all know appeals to the childish mind."--_N. Y. Evangelist._
"We have seen nothing better for its purpose, and hope many a teacher of kindergartens and many a mother may avail herself of the privilege of using these little tales."--_N. Y. Christian Advocate._
"It will be a great advance in the work of education in the school and the home when such books are more generally utilized."--_Zion's Herald._
"These charming stories of field life will delight many a child of kindergarten age; and it is safe to say that older brothers and sisters will also want to claim a share in them."--_Christian Register._
Among the Forest People
By CLARA D. PIERSON
Illustrated by F. C. GORDON 12mo, 220 pages, cloth, gilt top $1.25
"A thoroughly charming book for the little people, which grown folks can read, also, with many a satisfied chuckle at its slily insinuated 'morals,' and inimitable mingling of human sentiments and affairs in the wild life of 'the Forest People.' The illustrations have really artistic value; thoroughly well done, with a pleasing combination of the conventional in form and light and shade, they are also clever and accurate in drawing."--_Living Church._
"A most charming series of stories for children--yes, and for children of all ages, both young and old--is given us in the volume before us. No one can read these realistic conversations of the little creatures of the wood without being most tenderly drawn toward them, and each story teaches many entertaining facts regarding the lives and habits of these little people. Mothers and teachers must welcome this book most cordially. One cannot speak too strongly in praise of it."--_Boston Transcript._
"I declare I really feel tempted to adopt or borrow a nice little girl of six or seven, just for the pleasure of reading this perfect book to her while she snuggles down in my lap."--KATE SANBORN.
"The telling is conceived with decided originality."--_Outlook._
"There has not been such a book for many a year, and it makes the old folks long to be young again."--_N. Y. Observer._
"Is an utterly delightful book for the little folk."--_Interior._
Among the Farmyard People
By CLARA D. PIERSON
Illustrated by F. C. GORDON 12mo, 256 pages, cloth, gilt top, $1.25
"The very pretty stories of animal life, 'Among the Forest People,' and 'Among the Meadow People,' are continued in Clara D. Pierson's 'Among the Farmyard People.' To those who know the earlier volumes, this needs no introduction or praise. To those who may still have that pleasure in store, we can commend heartily these tenderly realistic conversations, which show a sympathetic knowledge at once of animals and of children, who will be amused and taught and edified by these dainty little tales that never obtrude the always healthy moral of this genuine Child's Book of Nature."--_Churchman._
"They will be found valuable for use by mothers and kindergarten teachers. The beautiful illustrations furnished by F. C. Gordon are distinctively instructive. Altogether the book is one of the most desirable works that can be found to train the child's imagination, affection, and powers of observation."--_Boston Beacon._
"We heartily recommend the book for its thoroughly healthy tone, far better adapted to a sweet and simple childhood than much of the rather stimulating juvenile literature of the day."--_N. Y. Commercial Advertiser._
"A helpful book for young readers, teaching first lessons in natural history, and inculcating principles of love for animals."--_Philadelphia Evening Telegram._
"A charming and pretty book for young children. It will help them to observe, and it will also help them to think. Nearly every story ends with something unsaid, which the nursery people are to think out for themselves."--_Church Standard._
Among the Pond People
By CLARA D. PIERSON
With 12 full-page illustrations by F. C. GORDON 12mo, 222 pages, cloth, gilt top $1.25
This last book of Mrs. Pierson's has all the charm of the earlier volumes. The adventures of Mother Eel, the Playful Muskrat, the Snappy Snapping Turtle, and the other Pond People, will be eagerly followed by children, whether they are naturalists or ordinary readers. The fact that one does not continually feel that she is writing for the purpose of instructing the young, gives Mrs. Pierson her hold on so many boys and girls. The books teach a great many lessons, but one does not feel that the author is lying in wait to enlighten the unwary youngster.
"In it, as in the old Greek comedies, the frogs have a voice and speak their little orations and crack their jokes and play their pranks. The 'science' is elementary but the entertainment genuine, and the little people to whom it is read will ever cherish a kindly interest in the denizens of the ponds and their floral homes and environments."--_Interior._
"One lays down the book with quickened sympathy for everything that crawls and creeps and swims."--_Critic._
"The Pond People are quite as real and as fascinating as were the Meadow People and the Barnyard People of previous books. They are genuine stories, full of a humor that will appeal to boys and girls, yet cleverly conveying information about the frogs, turtles, minnows, etc., and often suggesting a moral in a delicate manner which no child could resent."--_Congregationalist._
"In its way the work is very daintily done."--_Churchman._
Sent by mail, post-paid, on receipt of price
E. P. DUTTON & CO., Publishers 31 West 23d Street        New York

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AMONG THE NIGHT PEOPLE
Produced by Heather Clark and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
[Illustration: _Frontispiece_   COLLIE CHASED HIM AWAY   _Page 138_]
AMONG THE NIGHT PEOPLE
BY CLARA DILLINGHAM PIERSON Author of "Among the Meadow People," "Pond People," etc.
Illustrated by F. C. GORDON
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NEW YORK E. P. DUTTON AND COMPANY 31 WEST TWENTY-THIRD STREET
COPYRIGHT, 1902 by E. P. DUTTON & CO.
The Knickerbocker Press, New York
TO
RACHEL W. PIERSON
THIS BOOK IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED
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CONTENTS
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ILLUSTRATIONS
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MY DEAR LITTLE FRIENDS:--You can never guess how much I have enjoyed writing these stories of the night-time, and I must tell you how I first came to think of doing so. I once knew a girl--and she was not a very little girl, either,--who was afraid of the dark. And I have known three boys who were as brave as could be by daylight, but who would not run on an errand alone after the lamps were lighted. They never seemed to think what a beautiful, restful, growing time the night is for plants and animals, and even for themselves. I thought that if they knew more of what happens between sunset and sunrise they would love the night as well as I.
It may be that you will never see Bats flying freely, or find the Owls flapping silently among the trees without touching even a twig. Perhaps while these things are happening you must be snugly tucked in bed. But that is no reason why you should not be told what they do while you are dreaming. Before this, you know, I have told you more of what is done by daylight in meadow, forest, farmyard, and pond. It would be a very queer world if we could not know about things without seeing them for ourselves, and you may like to think, when you are going to sleep, that hundreds and thousands of tiny out-of-door people are turning, and stretching, and going to find their food. In the morning, when you are dressing in your sunshiny rooms, they are cuddling down for a good day's rest.
I think I ought to tell you that I have not been alone when writing these stories. I have often been in the meadow and the forest at night, and have seen and heard many interesting things, but my good Cat, Silvertip, has known far more than I of the night-doings of the out-of-door people. He has been beside me at my desk, and although at times he has shut his eyes and taken Cat-naps while I wrote, there have been many other times when he has taken the pen right out of my hand. He has even tried running the typewriter with his dainty white paws, and he has gone over every story I have written. I do not say that he has written any himself, but you can see that he has been very careful what I wrote, and I have learned a great deal from him that I never knew before. He is a very good and clever Cat, and if you like these stories I am sure it must be partly because he had a paw in the writing of them.
Your friend, CLARA D. PIERSON.
STANTON, MICHIGAN, April 15th, 1901.
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THE BLACK SPANISH CHICKENS
When the Speckled Hen wanted to sit there was no use in trying to talk her out of the idea, for she was a very set Hen. So, after the farmer's wife had worked and worked, and barred her out of first one nesting-place and then another, she gave up to the Speckled Hen and fixed her a fine nest and put thirteen eggs into it. They were Black Spanish eggs, but the Speckled Hen did not know that. The Hens that had laid them could not bear to sit, so, unless some other Hen did the work which they left undone, there would have been no Black Spanish Chickens. This is always their way, and people have grown used to it. Now nobody thinks of asking a Black Spanish Hen to sit, although it does not seem right that a Hen should be unwilling to bring up chickens. Supposing nobody had been willing to bring her up?
Still, the Black Spanish Hens talk very reasonably about it. "We will lay plenty of eggs," they say, "but some of the common Hens must hatch them." They do their share of the farmyard work, only they insist on choosing what that share shall be.
When the Speckled Hen came off the nest with eleven Black Chickens (two of the eggs did not hatch), she was not altogether happy. "I wanted them to be speckled," said she, "and not one of the whole brood is." That was why she grew so restless and discontented in her coop, although it was roomy and clean and she had plenty given her to eat and drink. She was quite happy only when they were safely under her wings at night. And such a time as they always had getting settled!
When the sunbeams came more and more slantingly through the trees, the Chickens felt less and less like running around. Their tiny legs were tired and they liked to cuddle down on the grass in the shadow of the coop. Then the Speckled Hen often clucked to them to come in and rest, but they liked it better in the open air. The Speckled Hen would also have liked to be out of the coop, yet the farmer kept her in. He knew what was best for Hens with little Chickens, and also what was best for the tender young lettuce and radishes in his garden.
When the sun was nearly down, the Speckled Hen clucked her come-to-bed cluck, which was quite different from her food cluck or her Hawk cluck, and the little Black Chickens ran between the bars and crawled under her feathers. Then the Speckled Hen began to look fatter and fatter and fatter for each Chicken who nestled beneath her. Sometimes one little fellow would scramble up on to her back and stand there, while she turned her head from side to side, looking at him with first one and then the other of her round yellow eyes, and scolding him all the time. It never did any good to scold, but she said she had to do something, and with ten other children under her wings it would never do for her to stand up and tumble him off.
All the time that they were getting settled for the night the Chickens were talking in sleepy little cheeps, and now and then one of them would poke his head out between the feathers and tell the Speckled Hen that somebody was pushing him. Then she would be more puzzled than ever and cluck louder still. Sometimes, too, the Chickens would run out for another mouthful of cornmeal mush or a few more drops of water. There was one little fellow who always wanted something to drink just when he should have been going to sleep. The Speckled Hen used to say that it took longer for a mouthful of water to run down his throat than it would for her to drink the whole panful. Of course it did take quite a while, because he couldn't hurry it by swallowing. He had to drink, as all birds do, by filling his beak with water and then holding it up until the last drop had trickled down into his stomach.
When the whole eleven were at last safely tucked away for the night, the Speckled Hen was tired but happy. "They are good children," she often said to herself, "if they are Black Spanish. They might be just as mischievous if they were speckled; still, I do wish that those stylish-looking, white-eared Black Spanish Hens would raise their own broods. I don't like to be hatch-mother to other Hens' chickens." Then she would slide her eyelids over her eyes, and doze off, and dream that they were all speckled like herself.
There came a day when the coop was raised and they were free to go where they chose. There was a fence around the vegetable garden now and netting around the flower-beds, but there were other lovely places for scratching up food, for nipping off tender young green things, for picking up the fine gravel which every Chicken needs, and for wallowing in the dust. Then the Black Spanish Chickens became acquainted with the other fowls whom they had never met before. They were rather afraid of the Shanghai Cock because he had such a gruff way of speaking, and they liked the Dorkings, yet the ones they watched and admired and talked most about were the Black Spanish Cock and Hen. There were many fowls on the farm who did not have family names, and the Speckled Hen was one of these. They had been there longer than the rest and did not really like having new people come to live in the poultry-yard. It was trying, too, when the older Hens had to hatch the eggs laid by the newcomers.
[Illustration: THEY WERE FREE TO GO WHERE THEY CHOSE.      _Page 6_]
It is said that this was what made the Speckled Hen leave the eleven little Black Spanish Chickens after she had been out of the coop for a while. They had been very mischievous and disobedient one day, and she walked off and left them to care for themselves while she started to raise a family of her own in a stolen nest under the straw-stack.
When night came, eleven little Black Spanish Chickens did not know what to do. They went to look for their old coop, but that had been given to another Hen and her family. They walked around looking very small and lonely, and wished they had minded the Speckled Hen and made her love them more. At last they found an old potato-crate which reminded them of a coop and so seemed rather homelike. It stood, top down, upon the ground and they were too big to crawl through its barred sides, so they did the best they could and huddled together on top of it. If there had not been a stone-heap near, they could not have done that, for their wing-feathers were not yet large enough to help them flutter. The bravest Chicken went first, picking his way from stone to stone until he reached the highest one, balancing himself awhile on that, stretching his neck toward the potato-crate, looking at it as though he were about to jump, and then seeming to change his mind and decide not do so after all.
The Chickens on the ground said he was afraid, and he said he wasn't any more afraid than they were. Then, after a while, he did jump, a queer, floppy, squawky kind of jump, but it landed him where he wanted to be. After that it was his turn to laugh at the others while they stood teetering uncertainly on the top stone. They were very lonely without the Speckled Hen, and each Chicken wanted to be in the middle of the group so that he could have others to keep him warm on all sides.
Somebody laughed at the most mischievous Chicken and told him he could stand on the potato-crate's back without being scolded, and he pouted his bill and said: "Much fun that would be! All I cared about standing on the Speckled Hen's back was to make her scold." It is very shocking that he should say such things, but he did say exactly that.
They slept safely that night, and only awakened when the Cocks crowed a little while after midnight. After that they slept until sunrise, and when the Shanghais and Dorkings came down from the apple-tree where they had been roosting, the Black Spanish Chickens stirred and cheeped, and looked at their feathers to see how much they had grown during the night. Then they pushed and squabbled for their breakfast.
Every night they came back to sleep on the potato-crate. At last they were able to spring up into their places without standing on the stone-pile, and that was a great day. They talked about it long after they should have been asleep, and were still chattering when the Shanghai Cock spoke: "If you Black Spanish Chickens don't keep still and let us sleep," said he, "some Owl or Weasel will come for you, and I shall be glad to have him!"
That scared the Chickens and they were very quiet. It made the Black Spanish Hen uneasy though, and she whispered to the Black Spanish Cock and wouldn't let him sleep until he had promised to fight anybody who might try to carry one of the Chickens away from the potato-crate.
The next night first one Chicken and then another kept tumbling off the potato-crate. They lost their patience and said such things as these to each other:
"You pushed me! You know you did!"
"Well, he pushed me!"
"Didn't either!"
"Did too!"
"Well, I couldn't help it if I did!"
The Shanghai Cock became exceedingly cross because they made so much noise, and even the Black Spanish Cock lost his patience. "You may be my children," said he, "but you do not take your manners from me. Is there no other place on this farm where you can sleep excepting that old crate?"
"We want to sleep here," answered the Chicken on the ground. "There is plenty of room if those fellows wouldn't push." Then he flew up and clung and pushed until some other Chicken tumbled off.
"Well!" said the Black Spanish Cock. And he would have said much more if the Black Spanish Hen had not fluttered down from the apple-tree to see what was the matter. When he saw the expression of her eyes he decided to go back to his perch.
"There is not room for you all," said the Black Spanish Hen. "One must sleep somewhere else."
"There _is_ room," said the Chickens, contradicting her. "We have always roosted on here."
"There is _not_ room," said the Black Spanish Hen once more. "How do your feathers grow?"
"Finely," said they.
"And your feet?"
"They are getting very big," was the answer.
"Do you think the Speckled Hen could cover you all with her wings if she were to try it now?"
The Chickens looked at each other and laughed. They thought it would take three Speckled Hens to cover them.
"But she used to," said the Black Spanish Hen. She did not say anything more. She just looked at the potato-crate and at them and at the potato-crate again. Then she walked off.
After a while one of the Chickens said: "I guess perhaps there isn't room for us all there."
The mischievous one said: "If you little Chickens want to roost there you may. I am too large for that sort of thing." Then he walked up the slanting board to the apple-tree branch and perched there beside the young Shanghais. You should have seen how beautifully he did it. His toes hooked themselves around the branch as though he had always perched there, and he tucked his head under his wing with quite an air. Before long his brothers and sisters came also, and heard him saying to one of his new neighbors, "Oh, yes, I much prefer apple-trees, but when I was a Chicken I used to sleep on a potato-crate."
"Just listen to him!" whispered the Black Spanish Cock. "And he hasn't a tail-feather worth mentioning!"
"Never mind," answered the Black Spanish Hen. "Let them play that they are grown up if they want to. They will be soon enough." She sighed as she put her head under her wing and settled down for the night. It made her feel old to see her children roosting in a tree.
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[Illustration]
THE WIGGLERS BECOME MOSQUITOES
It was a bright moonlight night when the oldest Wigglers in the rain-barrel made up their mind to leave the water. They had always been restless and discontented children, but it was not altogether their fault. How could one expect any insect with such a name to float quietly? When the Mosquito Mothers laid their long and slender eggs in the rain-barrel, they had fastened them together in boat-shaped masses, and there they had floated until the Wigglers were strong enough to break through the lower ends of the eggs into the water. It had been only a few days before they were ready to do this.
Then there had been a few more days and nights when the tiny Wigglers hung head downward in the water, and all one could see by looking across the barrel was the tips of their breathing tubes. Sometimes, if they were frightened, a young Wiggler would forget and get head uppermost for a minute, but he was always ashamed to have this happen, and made all sorts of excuses for himself when it did. Well-bred little Wigglers tried to always have their heads down, and Mosquitoes who stopped to visit with them and give good advice told them such things as these: "The Wiggler who keeps his head up may never have wings," and, "Up with your tails and down with your eyes, if you would be mannerly, healthy, and wise."
When they were very young they kept their heads way down and breathed through a tube that ran out near the tail-end of their bodies. This tube had a cluster of tiny wing-like things on the very tip, which kept it floating on the top of the water. They had no work to do, so they just ate food which they found in the water, and wiggled, and played tag, and whenever they were at all frightened they dived to the bottom and stayed there until they were out of breath. That was never very long.
There were many things to frighten them. Sometimes a stray Horse stopped by the barrel to drink, sometimes a Robin perched on the edge for a few mouthfuls of water, and once in a while a Dragon-Fly came over to visit from the neighboring pond. It was not always the biggest visitor who scared them the worst. The Horses tried not to touch the Wigglers, while a Robin was only too glad if he happened to get one into his bill with the water. The Dragon-Flies were the worst, for they were the hungriest, and they were so much smaller that sometimes the Wigglers didn't see them coming. Sometimes, too, when they thought that a Dragon-Fly was going the other way, some of them stayed near the top of the water, only to find when it was too late that a Dragon-Fly can go backward or sidewise without turning around.
When they were a few days old the Wigglers began to change their skins. This they did by wiggling out of their old ones and wearing the new ones which had been growing underneath. This made them feel exceedingly important, and some of them became disgracefully vain. One Wiggler would not dive until he was sure a certain Robin had seen his new suit. It was because of that vanity he never lived to be a Mosquito.
After they had changed their skins a few times, they had two breathing-tubes apiece instead of one, and these two grew out near their heads. And their heads were much larger. At the tail-end of his body each Wiggler now had two leaf-like things with which he swam through the water. Because they used different breathing-tubes, those Wigglers who had moulted or cast their skins several times now floated in the water with their heads just below the surface and their tails down. When a Wiggler is old enough for this, he is called a Pupa, or half-grown one.
There are often young Mosquito children of all ages in the same barrel--eggs, Wigglers, and Pupæ all together. There is plenty of room and plenty of food, but because they have no work to do there is much time for quarrelling and talking about each other.
This year the Oldest Brother had put on so many airs that nobody liked it at all, and several of the Wigglers had been heard to say that they couldn't bear the sight of him. He had such a way of saying, "When I was a young Wiggler and had to keep my head down," or repeating, "Up with your tails and down with your eyes, if you would be mannerly, healthy, and wise." One little Wiggler crossed his feelers at him, and they say that it is just as bad to do that as to make faces. Besides, it is so much easier--if you have the feelers to cross.
Now the Oldest Brother and those of his brothers and sisters who had hatched from the same egg-mass were talking of leaving the rain-barrel forever. It was a bright moonlight night and they longed to get their wings uncovered and dried, for then they would be full-grown Mosquitoes, resting most of the day and having glorious times at night.
The Oldest Brother was jerking himself through the water as fast as he could, giving his jointed body sudden bends, first this way and then that, and when he met anyone nearly his own age he said, "Come with me and cast your skin. It is a fine evening for moulting."
Sometimes they answered, "All right," and jerked or wiggled or swam along with him, and sometimes a Pupa would answer, "I'm afraid I'm not old enough to slip out of my skin easily."
Then the Oldest Brother would reply, "Don't stop for that. You'll be older by the time we begin." That was true, of course, and all members of Mosquito families grow old very fast. So it happened that when the moon peeped over the farmhouse, showing her bright face between the two chimneys, twenty-three Pupæ were floating close to each other and making ready to change their skins for the last time.
It was very exciting. All the young Wigglers hung around to see what was going on, and pushed each other aside to get the best places. The Oldest Brother was much afraid that somebody else would begin to moult before he was ready, and all the brothers were telling their sisters to be careful to split their skins in the right place down the back, and the sisters were telling them that they knew just as much about moulting as their brothers did. Every little while the Oldest Brother would say, "Now wait! Don't one of you fellows split his old skin until I say so."
Then two or three of his brothers would become impatient, because their outer skins were growing tighter every minute, and would say, "Why not?" and would grumble because they had to wait. The truth was that the Oldest Brother could not get his skin to crack, although he jerked and wiggled and took very deep breaths. And he didn't want any one else to get ahead of him. At last it did begin to open, and he had just told the others to commence moulting, when a Mosquito Mother stopped to lay a few eggs in the barrel.
"Dear me!" said she. "You are not going to moult to-night, are you?"
"Yes, we are," answered the Oldest Brother, giving a wiggle that split his skin a little farther. "We'll be biting people before morning."
"You?" said the Mosquito Mother, with a queer little smile. "I wouldn't count on doing that. But you young people may get into trouble if you moult now, for it looks like rain."
She waved her feelers upward as she spoke, and they noticed that heavy black clouds were piling up in the sky. Even as they looked the moon was hidden and the wind began to stir the branches of the trees. "It will rain," she said, "and then the water will run off the roof into this barrel, and if you have just moulted and cannot fly, you will be drowned."
"Pooh!" answered the Oldest Brother. "Guess we can take care of ourselves. I'm not afraid of a little water." Then he tried to crawl out of his old skin.
The Mosquito Mother stayed until she had laid all the eggs she wanted to, and then flew away. Not one of the Pupæ had been willing to listen to her, although some of the sisters might have done so if their brothers had not made fun of them.
At last, twenty-three soft and tired young Mosquitoes stood on their cast-off pupa-skins, waiting for their wings to harden. It is never easy work to crawl out of one's skin, and the last moulting is the hardest of all. It was then, when they could do nothing but wait, that these young Mosquitoes began to feel afraid. The night was now dark and windy, and sometimes a sudden gust blew their floating pupa skins toward one side of the barrel. They had to cling tightly to them, for they suddenly remembered that if they fell into the water they might drown. The oldest one found himself wishing to be a Wiggler again. "Wigglers are never drowned," thought he.
"Who are you going to bite first?" asked one of his brothers.
He answered very crossly: "I don't know and I don't care. I'm not hungry. Can't you think of anything but eating?"
"Why, what else is there to think about?" cried all the floating Mosquitoes.
"Well, there is flying," said he.
"Humph! I don't see what use flying would be except to carry us to our food," said one Mosquito Sister. She afterward found out that it was good for other reasons.
After that they didn't try to talk with their Oldest Brother. They talked with each other and tried their legs, and wished it were light enough for them to see their wings. Mosquitoes have such interesting wings, you know, thin and gauzy, and with delicate fringes around the edges and along the line of each vein. The sisters, too, were proud of the pockets under their wings, and were in a hurry to have their wings harden, so that they could flutter them and hear the beautiful singing sound made by the air striking these pockets. They knew that their brothers could never sing, and they were glad to think that they were ahead of them for once. It was not really their fault that they felt so, for the brothers had often put on airs and laughed at them.
Then came a wonderful flash of lightning and a long roll of thunder, and the trees tossed their beautiful branches to and fro, while big rain-drops pattered down on to the roof overhead and spattered and bounded and rolled toward the edge under which the rain-barrel stood.
"Fly!" cried the Oldest Brother, raising his wings as well as he could.
"We can't. Where to?" cried the rest.
"Fly any way, anywhere!" screamed the Oldest Brother, and in some wonderful way the whole twenty-three managed to flutter and crawl and sprawl up the side of the building, where the rain-drops fell past but did not touch them. There they found older Mosquitoes waiting for the shower to stop. Even the Oldest Brother was so scared that he shook, and when he saw that same Mosquito Mother who had told him to put off changing his skin, he got behind two other young Mosquitoes and kept very still. Perhaps she saw him, for it was lighter then than it had been. She did not seem to see him, but he heard her talking to her friends. "I told him," she said, "that he might better put off moulting, but he answered that he could take care of himself, and that he would be out biting people before morning."
"Did he say that?" cried the other old Mosquitoes.
"He did," she replied.
Then they all laughed and laughed and laughed again, and the young Mosquito found out why. It was because Mosquito brothers have to eat honey, and only the sisters may bite people and suck their blood. He had thought so often how he would sing around somebody until he found the nicest, juiciest spot, and then settle lightly down and bite and suck until his slender little body was fat and round and red with its stomachful of blood. And that could never be! He could never sing, and he would have to sit around with his stomach full of honey and see his eleven sisters gorged with blood and hear them singing sweetly as they flew. If Mosquito Fathers had ever come to the barrel he might have found this out, but they never did. He sneaked off by himself until he met an early bird and then--well, you know birds must eat something, and the Mosquito was right there. Of course, after that, his brothers and sisters had a chance to do as they wanted to, and the eleven sisters bit thirteen people the very next night and had the loveliest kind of Mosquito time.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE NAUGHTY RACCOON CHILDREN
There was hardly a night of his life when the Little Brother of the Raccoon family was not reproved by his mother for teasing. Mrs. Raccoon said she didn't know what she had done to deserve such a child. When she spoke like this to her neighbors they sighed and said, "It must be trying, but he may outgrow it."
The Oldest Wolverene, though, told the Skunk that his cousin, Mrs. Raccoon's husband, had been just as bad as that when he was young. "I do not want you to say that I said so," he whispered, "because he might hear of it and be angry, but it is true." The Oldest Wolverene didn't say whether Mr. Raccoon outgrew this bad habit, yet it would seem that his wife had never noticed it.
You must not think that Mr. Raccoon was dead. Oh, no, indeed! Every night he was prowling through the forest on tiptoe looking for food. But Mrs. Raccoon was a very devoted mother and gave so much time and attention to her children that she was not good company for her husband. He did not care much for home life, and the children annoyed him exceedingly, so he went away and found a hole in another tree which he fitted up for himself. There he slept through the day and until the setting of the sun told him that it was time for his breakfast. Raccoons like company, and he often had friends in to sleep with him. Sometimes these friends were Raccoons like himself with wives and children, and then they would talk about their families and tell how they thought their wives were spoiling the children.
The four little Raccoons, who lived with their mother in the dead branch of the big oak-tree, had been born in April, when the forest was sweet with the scent of wild violets and every one was happy. Beautiful pink and white trilliums raised their three-cornered flowers above their threefold leaves and nodded with every passing breeze. Yellow adder's-tongue was there, with cranesbill geraniums, squirrel-corn, and spring beauties, besides hepaticas and windflowers and the dainty bishop's-cap. The young Raccoons did not see these things, for their eyes would not work well by daylight, and when, after dark, their mother let them put their heads out of the hole and look around, they were too far from the ground to see the flowers sleeping in the dusk below. They could only sniff, sniff, sniff with their sharp little turned-up noses, and wonder what flowers look like, any way.
When their mother was with them for a time, and that was while they were drinking the warm milk that she always carried for them, she told them stories of the flowers and trees. She had begun by telling them animal stories, but she found that it made them cowardly. "Just supposing," one young Raccoon had said, "a great big, dreadful Snail should come up this tree and eat us all!"
The mother told them that Snails were small and slow and weak, and never climbed trees or ate people, but it did no good, and her children were always afraid of Snails until they had seen one for themselves. After that she told them stories of the flowers, and when they asked if the flowers would ever come to see them, she said, "No, indeed! You will never see them until you can climb down the tree and walk among them, for they grow with their feet in the ground and never go anywhere." There were many stories which they wanted over and over again, but the one they liked best of all was that about the wicked, wicked Poison Ivy and the gentle Spotted Touch-me-not who grew near him and undid all the trouble that the Ivy made.
When the night came for the young Raccoons to climb down from their tree and learn to hunt, all the early spring blossoms were gone, and only the ripening seed-vessels showed where nodding flowers had been. You would have expected the Raccoon children to be disappointed, yet there were so many other things to see and learn about that it was not until three nights later that they thought much of the flowers. They might not have done so then if Little Sister had not lost her hold upon the oak-tree bark and fallen with her forepaws on a scarlet jack-in-the-pulpit berry.
They had to learn to climb quickly and strongly up all sorts of trees. Perhaps Mrs. Raccoon had chosen an oak for her nest because that was rough and easily climbed. There were many good places for Raccoons to grip with their twenty strong claws apiece. After they had learned oaks they took maples, ironwoods, and beeches--each a harder lesson than the one before.
"When you climb a tree," said their mother, "always look over the trunk and the largest branches for hiding-places, whether you want to use one then or not."
"Why?" asked three of the four children. Big Brother, who was rather vain, was looking at the five beautiful black rings and the beautiful black tip of his wonderful bushy tail. Between the black rings were whitish ones, and he thought such things much more interesting than holes in trees.
"Because," said the Mother Raccoon, "you may be far from home some night and want a safe place to sleep in all day. Or if a man and his Dogs are chasing you, you must climb into the first hiding-place you can. We Raccoons are too fat and slow to run away from them, and the rings on our tails and the black patches on our broad faces might show from the ground. If the hole is a small one, make it cover your head and your tail anyway, and as much of your brown body fur as you can."
Mother Raccoon looked sternly at Big Brother because he had not been listening, and he gave a slight jump and asked, "W-what did you say?"
"What did I say?" she replied. "You should have paid better attention."
"Yes 'm," said Big Brother, who was now very meek.
"I shall not repeat it," said his mother, "but I will tell you not to grow vain of your fur. It is very handsome, and so is that of your sisters and your brother. So is mine, and so was your father's the last time I saw him. Yet nearly all the trouble that Raccoons have is on account of their fur. Never try to show it off."
The time came for the young Raccoons to stop drinking milk from their mother's body, and when they tried to do so she only walked away from them.
"I cannot work so hard to care for you," said she. "I am so tired and thin, now, that my skin is loose, and you must find your own food. You are getting forty fine teeth apiece, and I never saw a better lot of claws on any Raccoon family, if I do say it."
They used to go hunting together, for it is the custom for Raccoons to go in parties of from five to eight, hunt all night, and then hide somewhere until the next night. They did not always come home at sunrise, and it made a pleasant change to sleep in different trees. One day they all cuddled down in the hollow of an old maple, just below where the branches come out. Mother Raccoon had climbed the tree first and was curled away in the very bottom of the hole. The four children were not tired and hadn't wanted to go to bed at all. Little Sister had made a dreadful face when her mother called her up the tree, and if it had not already been growing light, Mrs. Raccoon would probably have seen it and punished her.
Big Sister curled down beside her mother and Little Sister was rather above them and beside mischievous Little Brother. Last of all came Big Brother, who had stopped to scratch his ear with his hind foot. He was very proud of his little round ears, and often scratched them in this way to make sure that the fur lay straight on them. He was so slow in reaching the hole that before he got into it a Robin had begun his morning song of "Cheerily, cheerily, cheerup!" and a Chipmunk perched on a stump to make his morning toilet.
He got all settled, and Little Brother was half asleep beside him, when he remembered his tail and sat up to have one more look at it. Little Brother growled sleepily and told him to "let his old tail alone and come to bed, as long as they couldn't hunt any more." But Big Brother thought he saw a sand-burr on his tail, and wanted to pull it out before it hurt the fur. Then he began to look at the bare, tough pads on his feet, and to notice how finely he could spread his toes. Those of his front feet he could spread especially wide. He balanced himself on the edge of the hole and held them spread out before him. It was still dark enough for him to see well. "Come here, Little Brother," he cried. "Wake up, and see how big my feet are getting."
Mother Raccoon growled at them to be good children and go to sleep, but her voice sounded dreamy and far away because she had to talk through part of her own fur and most of her daughters'.
Little Brother lost his patience, unrolled himself with a spring, jumped to the opening, and knocked his brother down. It was dreadful. Of course Big Brother was not much hurt, for he was very fat and his fur was both long and thick, but he turned over and over on his way to the ground before he alighted on his feet. He turned so fast and Little Brother's eyes hurt him so that it looked as though Big Brother had about three heads, three tails, and twelve feet. He called out as he fell, and that awakened the sisters, who began to cry, and Mother Raccoon, who was so scared that she began to scold.
[Illustration: KNOCKED HIS BROTHER DOWN.                  _Page 40_]
Such a time! Mother Raccoon found out what had happened, and then she said to Little Brother, "Did you mean to push him down?"
"No, ma'am," answered Little Brother, hanging his head. "Anyhow I didn't mean to after I saw him going. Perhaps I did mean to before that." You see he was a truthful Raccoon even when he was most naughty, and there is always hope for a Raccoon who will tell the truth, no matter how hard it is to do so.
Big Brother climbed slowly up the trunk of the oak-tree, while more and more of the daytime people came to look at him. He could not see well now, and so was very awkward. When he reached the hole he was hot and cross, and complained to his mother. "Make him quit teasing me," he said, pointing one forepaw at Little Brother.
"I will," answered Mother Raccoon; "but you were just as much to blame as he, for if you had cuddled down quietly when I told you to, you would have been dreaming long ago. Now you must sleep where I was, at the lower end of the hole. Little Brother must go next, and I do not want to hear one word from either of you. Sisters next, and I will sleep by the opening. You children must remember that it is no time for talking to each other, or looking at claws, or getting sand-burrs out of your tails after you have been sent to bed. Go to sleep, and don't awaken until the sun has gone down and you are ready to be my good little Raccoons again."
Her children were asleep long before she was, and she talked softly to herself after they were dreaming. "They do not mean to be naughty," she said. "Yet it makes my fur stand on end to think what might have happened.... I ought not to have curled up for the day until they had done so.... Mothers should always be at the top of the heap." Then she fixed herself for a long, restful day's sleep.
[Illustration]
THE TIMID LITTLE GROUND HOG
It was not often that the little Ground Hogs were left alone in the daytime. Before they were born their mother had been heard to say that she had her opinion of any Ground Hog who would be seen out after sunrise. Mr. Ground Hog felt in the same way, and said if he ever got to running around by daylight, like some of his relatives, people might call him a Woodchuck. He thought that any one who ate twigs, beets, turnips, young tree-bark, and other green things from sunset to sunrise ought to be able to get along until the next sunset without a lunch. He said that any Ground Hog who wanted more was a Pig.
After the baby Ground Hogs were born, matters were different. They could not go out at night to feed for themselves, and their stomachs were so tiny and held so little at a time that they had to be filled very often. Mr. Ground Hog was never at home now, and the care all fell upon his hard-working wife.
"You know, my dear," he had said, "that I should only be in the way if I were to stay at home, for I am not clever and patient with children as you are. No, I think I will go away and see to some matters which I have rather neglected of late. When the children are grown up and you have more time to give me, I will come back to you."
Then Mr. Ground Hog trotted away to join a party of his friends who had just told their wives something of the same sort, and they all went together to the farmer's turnip patch and had a delightful time until morning. Mrs. Ground Hog looked after him as he trotted away and wished that she could go too. He looked so handsome with the moonlight shining down on his long, thick, reddish fur, and showing the black streak on his back where the fur was tipped with gray. He was fat and shaky, with a baggy skin, and when he stopped to sit up on his haunches and wave his paws at her and comb his face-fur, she thought him just as handsome as he had been in the early spring when they first met. That had been in a parsnip patch where there was good feeding until the farmer found that the Ground Hogs were there, and dug the rest of his vegetables and stored them in his cellar. Such midnight meals as they had eaten there together! Mrs. Ground Hog said she never saw a parsnip afterward without thinking of their courtship.
She had been as handsome as he, and there were many other Ground Hogs who admired her. But now she was thin and did not have many chances to comb her fur with her fore paws. She could not go with him to the turnip patch because she did not wish to go so far from her babies. Thinking of that reminded her to go into her sidehill burrow and see what they were doing. Then she lay down and let them draw the warm milk from her body. While they were feeding she felt of them, and thought how fast they were growing. It would be only a short time before they could trot around the fields by themselves and whistle shrilly as they dodged down into their own burrows. "Ah!" said she, "this is better than turnip patches or even parsnips."
When they had finished, their mother left them and went out to feed. She had always been a hearty eater, but now she had to eat enough more to make the milk for her babies. She often thought that if Ground Hog babies could eat anything else their father might have learned to help feed them. She thought of this especially when she saw the Great Horned Owl carrying food home to his son and daughter. "It is what comes of being four-legged," said she, "and I wouldn't be an Owl for anything, so I won't grumble." After this she was more cheerful.
When she left the burrow she always said: "I am going out to feed, and I shall not be gone very long. Don't be afraid, for you have a good burrow, and it is nice and dark outside."
The children would cry: "And you will surely come home before sunrise?"
"Surely," she always answered as she trotted away. Then the children would rest happily in their burrow-nest.
But now Mrs. Ground Hog was hungry, and it was broad daylight. She knew that it was because her children grew bigger every day and had to have more and more milk. This meant that she must eat more, or else when they wanted milk there would not be enough ready. She knew that she must begin to feed by day as well as by night, and she was glad that she could see fairly well if the sun were not shining into her eyes.
"Children," said she to them, just as they finished their morning lunch, "I am very hungry and I am going out to feed. You will be quite safe here and I want you to be good while I am gone."
The young Ground Hogs began to cry and clutch at her fur with their weak little paws. "Oh, don't go," they said. "Please don't go. We don't want to stay alone in the daytime. We're afraid."
"I must," said she, "or I shall have no milk for you. And then, you wouldn't have me lie here all day too hungry to sleep, would you?"
"N-no," said they; "but you'll come back soon, won't you?"
"Yes," said she, and she shook off their clinging paws and poked back the daughter who caught on again, and trotted away as fast as she could. It was the first time that she had been out by daylight, and everything looked queer. The colors looked too bright, and there seemed to be more noise than usual, and she met several people whom she had never seen before. She stopped for a minute to look at an Ovenbird's nest. The mother-bird was inside, sitting there very still and brave, although she was much frightened.
"Good-morning," said Mrs. Ground Hog. "I was just admiring your nest. I have never seen it by daylight."
"Good-morning," answered the Ovenbird. "I'm glad you fancy my nest, but I hope you don't like to eat meat."
"Meat?" answered Mrs. Ground Hog. "I never touch it." And she smiled and showed all her teeth.
"Oh," exclaimed the Ovenbird, "I see you don't, for you have gnawing-teeth, rather like those of the Rabbits." Then she hopped out of the nest and let Mrs. Ground Hog peep in to see how the inside was finished and also to see the four speckled eggs which lay there.
"It is a lovely nest," said Mrs. Ground Hog, "and those eggs are beauties. But I promised the children that I would hurry. Good-by." She trotted happily away, while Mrs. Ovenbird settled herself upon her eggs again and thought what a pleasant call she had had and what an excellent and intelligent person Mrs. Ground Hog was!
All this time the children at home were talking together about themselves and what their mother had told them. Once there was a long pause which lasted until the brother said: "I'm not afraid, are you?"
"Of course not," said they.
"Because there isn't anything to be afraid of," said he.
"Not anything," said they.
"And I wouldn't be afraid anyway," said he.
"Neither would we," answered the sisters.
There was another long pause.
"She said we'd be just as safe as if it were dark," said the big sister.
"Of course," said the brother.
"And she said she'd come back as soon as she could," said the second sister.
"I wish she'd come now," said the smallest sister.
There was another long pause.
"You don't suppose anybody would come here just to scare us, do you?" asked the second sister.
"See here," said the brother, "I wish you'd quit saying things to make a fellow afraid."
"You don't mean that you are frightened!" exclaimed the three sisters together. And the smallest one added: "Why, you are, too! I can feel you tremble."
"Well, I don't care," said the brother. "I'm not afraid of people, anyhow. If it were only dark I wouldn't mind."
"Oh, are you afraid of the daylight too?" cried each of the sisters. "So am I!" Then they all trembled together.
"I tell you what let's do," said the smallest sister. "Let's all stop looking toward the light end of the burrow, and cuddle up together and cover our eyes and make believe it's night." They did this and felt better. They even played that they heard the few noises of the night-time. A Crow cawed outside, and the brother said, "Did you hear that Owl? That was the Great Horned Owl, the one who had to hatch the eggs, you know."
When another Crow cawed, the smallest sister said, "Was that his cousin, the Screech Owl?"
"Yes," answered the big sister. "He is the one who used to bring things for the Great Horned Owl to eat."
So they amused themselves and each other, and really got along very well except when, once in a while, they opened their eyes a little crack to see if it were not getting really dark. Then they had to begin all over again. At last their mother came, and what a comfort it was! How glad she was to be back, and how much she had to tell them! All about the Ovenbird's nest and the four eggs in it, and how the Ovenbirds spent their nights in sleeping and their days in work and play.
"I wonder if the little Ovenbirds will be scared when they have to stay alone in the daytime?" said the smallest sister.
"They would be more scared if they had to stay alone at night," said their mother.
"At night!" exclaimed all the young Ground Hogs. "Why, it is dark then!"
"They might be afraid of the darkness," said their mother. Then the children laughed and thought she was making fun of them. They drank some milk and went to sleep like good little Ground Hogs, but even after he was half asleep the big brother laughed out loud at the thought of the Ovenbird babies being scared at night. He could understand any one's being afraid of daylight, but darkness----!
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE YOUNG RACCOONS GO TO A PARTY
It was not very many nights after Big Brother had tumbled from the maple-tree, when he and the other children were invited to a Raccoon party down by the pond. The water was low, and in the small pools by the shore there were many fresh-water clams and small fishes, such as Raccoons like best of all. A family of six young Raccoons who lived very near the pond had found them just before sunrise, when they had to climb off to bed. They knew there was much more food there than they could eat alone, so their mother had let them invite their four friends who lived in the hollow of the oak-tree. The party was to begin the next evening at moonrise, and the four children who lived in the oak-tree got their invitation just as they were going to sleep for the day. They were very much excited over it, for they had never been to a party.
"I wish we could go now," said Big Brother.
"Yes, lots of fun it would be now!" answered Little Brother. "The sun is almost up, and there are no clouds in the sky. We couldn't see a thing unless we shaded our eyes with our fore paws, and if we had to use our fore paws in that way we couldn't eat."
"You do eat at parties, don't you?" asked Little Sister, who had not quite understood what was said.
"Of course," shouted her brothers. "That is what parties are for."
"I thought maybe you talked some," said Big Sister.
"I suppose you do have to, some," said Big Brother, "but I know you eat. I've heard people tell about parties lots of times, and they always began by telling what they ate. That's what makes it a party."
"Oh, I wish it were night and time to go," sighed Little Brother.
"I don't," said Little Sister. "I wouldn't have any fun if I were to go now. I'd rather wait until my stomach is empty."
"There!" said their mother. "You children have talked long enough. Now curl down and go to sleep. The birds are already singing their morning songs, and the Owls and Bats were dreaming long ago. It will make night-time come much sooner if you do not stay awake."
"We're not a bit sleepy," cried all the young Raccoons together.
"That makes no difference at all," said their mother, and she spoke quite sternly. "Cuddle down for the day now, cover your eyes, and stop talking. I do not say you must sleep, but you must stop talking."
They knew that when she spoke in that way and said "must," there was nothing to do but to mind. So they cuddled down, and every one of them was asleep before you could drop an acorn. Mother Raccoon had known it would be so.
When they awakened, early the next night, each young Raccoon had to make himself look as neat as possible. There were long fur to be combed, faces and paws to be washed, and twenty-three burrs to be taken out of Little Brother's tail. He began to take them out himself, but his mother found that whenever he got one loose he stuck it onto one of the other children, so she scolded him and made him sit on a branch by himself while she worked at the burrs. Sometimes she couldn't help pulling the fur, and then he tried to wriggle away.
"You've got enough out," he cried. "Let the rest go."
"You should have thought sooner how it would hurt," she said. "You have been told again and again to keep away from the burrs, and you are just as careless as you were the first night you left the tree." Then she took out another burr and dropped it to the ground.
"Ouch!" said he. "Let me go!"
"Not until I am done," she answered. "No child of mine shall ever go to a party looking as you do."
After that Little Brother tried to hold still, and he had time to think how glad he was that he hadn't stuck any more burrs on the other children. If he had gotten more onto them, he would have had to wait while they were pulled off again, and then they might have been late for the party. If he had been very good, he would have been glad they didn't have to be hurt as he was. But he was not very good, and he never thought of that.
When he was ready at last, Mother Raccoon made her four children sit in a row while she talked to them. "Remember to walk on your toes," said she, "although you may stand flat-footed if you wish. Don't act greedy if you can help it. Go into the water as much as you choose, but don't try to dive, even if they dare you to. Raccoons can never learn to dive, no matter how well they swim. And be sure to wash your food before you eat it."
All the young Raccoons said "Yes'm," and thought they would remember every word. The first moonbeam shone on the top of the oak-tree, and Mrs. Raccoon said: "Now you may go. Be good children and remember what I told you. Don't stay too long. Start home when you see the first light in the east."
"Yes'm," said the young Raccoons, as they walked off very properly toward the pond. After they were well away from the oak-tree, they heard their mother calling to them: "Remember to walk on your toes!"
Raccoons cannot go very fast, and the moon was shining brightly when they reached the pond and met their six friends. Such frolics as they had in the shallow water, swimming, twisting, turning, scooping up food with their busy fore paws, going up and down the beach, and rolling on the sand! They never once remembered what their mother had told them, and they acted exactly as they had been in the habit of doing every day. Big Brother looked admiringly at his own tail every chance he got, although he had been told particularly not to act as if he thought himself fine-looking. Little Brother rolled into a lot of sand-burrs and got his fur so matted that he looked worse than ever. Big Sister snatched food from other Raccoons, and not one of them remembered about walking on tiptoe. Little Sister ate half the time without washing her food. Of course that didn't matter when the food was taken from the pond, but when they found some on the beach and ate it without washing--that was dreadful. No Raccoon who is anybody at all will do that.
The mother of the family of six looked on from a tree near by. The children did not know that she was there. "What manners!" said she. "I shall never have them invited here again." Just then she saw one of her own sons eat without washing his food, and she groaned out loud. "My children are forgetting too," she said. "I have told him hundreds of times that if he did that way every day he would do so at a party, but he has always said he would remember."
The mother of the four young Raccoons was out hunting and found herself near the pond. "How noisy those children are!" she said to herself. "Night people should be quiet." She tiptoed along to a pile of rocks and peeped between them to see what was going on. She saw her children's footprints on the sand. "Aha!" said she. "So they did walk flat-footed after all."
She heard somebody scrambling down a tree near by. "Good-evening," said a pleasant Raccoon voice near her. It was the mother of the six. "Are you watching the children's party?" asked the newcomer. "I hope you did not notice how badly my son is behaving. I have tried to teach my children good manners, but they will be careless when I am not looking, and then, of course, they forget in company."
That made the mother of the four feel more comfortable. "I know just how that is," said she. "Mine mean to be good, but they are so careless. It is very discouraging."
The two mothers talked for a long time in whispers and then each went to her hole.
When the four young Raccoons came home, it was beginning to grow light, and they kept close together because they were somewhat afraid. Their mother was waiting to see them settled for the day. She asked if they had a good time, and said she was glad they got home promptly. They had been afraid she would ask if they had washed their food and walked on their toes. She even seemed not to notice Little Brother's matted coat.
When they awakened the next night, the mother hurried them off with her to the same pond where they had been to the party. "I am going to visit with the mother of your friends," said she, "and you may play around and amuse yourselves."
The young Raccoons had another fine time, although Little Brother found it very uncomfortable to wear so many burrs. They played tag in the trees, and ate, and swam, and lay on the beach. While they were lying there, the four from the oak-tree noticed that their mother was walking flat-footed. There was bright moonlight and anybody might see her. They felt dreadfully about it. Then they saw her begin to eat food which she had not washed. They were so ashamed that they didn't want to look their friends in the eye. They didn't know that their friends were feeling in the same way because they had seen their mother doing ill-mannered things.
After they reached home, Big Brother said, very timidly, to his mother: "Did you know you ate some food without washing it?"
"Oh, yes," she answered; "it is such a bother to dip it all in water."
"And you walked flat-footed," said Little Brother.
"Well, why shouldn't I, if I want to?" said she.
The children began to cry: "P-people will think you don't know any b-better," said they. "We were d-dreadfully ashamed."
"Oh!" said their mother. "Oh! Oh! So you think that my manners are not so good as yours! Is that it?"
The young Raccoons looked at each other in a very uncomfortable way. "We suppose we don't always do things right ourselves," they answered, "but you are grown up."
"Yes," replied their mother. "And you will be."
For a long time nobody spoke, and Little Sister sobbed out loud. Then Mrs. Raccoon spoke more gently: "The sun is rising," said she. "We will go to sleep now, and when we awaken to-morrow night we will try to have better manners, so that we need not be ashamed of each other at parties or at home."
Long after the rest were dreaming, Big Sister nudged Big Brother and awakened him. "I understand it now," she said. "She did it on purpose."
"Who did what?" asked he.
"Why, our mother. She was rude on purpose to let us see how it looked."
Big Brother thought for a minute. "Of course," said he. "Of course she did! Well she won't ever have to do it again for me."
"Nor for me," said Big Sister. Then they went to sleep.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE SKUNKS AND THE OVEN-BIRD'S NEST
The Skunks did not go into society at all. They were very unpopular, and so many people feared or disliked them that nobody would invite them to a party. Indeed, if they had been invited to a party and had gone, the other guests would have left at once. The small people of the forest feared them because they were meat-eaters, and the larger ones disliked them because of their disagreeable habits. The Skunks were handsome and quiet, but they were quick-tempered, and as soon as one of them became angry he threw a horrible smelling liquid on the people who displeased him. It was not only horrible smelling, but it made those who had to smell it steadily quite sick, and would, indeed, have killed them if they had not kept in the fresh air. If a drop of this liquid got on to a person, even his wife and children had to keep away from him for a long time.
And the Skunks were so unreasonable. They would not stop to see what was the real trouble, but if anybody ran into them by mistake in the darkness, they would just as likely as not throw the liquid at once. Among themselves they seemed to be quite happy. There were from six to ten children born at a time in each family. These children lived in the burrow with their father and mother until the next spring, sleeping steadily through the coldest weather of winter, and only awakening when it was warm enough for them to enjoy life. When spring came, the children found themselves grown-up and went off to live their own lives in new holes, while their mothers took care of the six or seven or eight or nine or ten new babies.
There was one very interesting Skunk family in the forest, with the father, mother, and eight children living in one hole. No two of them were marked in exactly the same way, although all were stoutly built, had small heads, little round ears, and beautiful long tails covered with soft, drooping hair. Their fur was rather long and handsome and they were dark brown or black nearly all over. Most of them had a streak of white on the forehead, a spot of it on the neck, some on the tail, and a couple of stripes of it on their backs. One could see them quite easily by starlight on account of the white fur.
The Skunks were really very proud of their white stripes and spots. "It is not so much having the white fur," Mrs. Skunk had been heard to say, "as it is having it where all can see it. Most animals wear the dark fur on their backs and the light on their bellies, and that is to make them safer from enemies. But we dare to wear ours in plain sight. _We_ are never afraid."
And what she said was true, although it hardly seemed modest for her to talk about it in that way. It would have been more polite to let other people tell how brave her family were. Perhaps, however, if somebody else had been telling it, he would have said that part of their courage was rudeness.
Father Skunk always talked to his children as his father had talked to him, and probably as his grandfather had also talked when he was raising a family. "Never turn out of your way for anybody," said he. "Let the other fellow step aside. Remember that, no matter whom you meet and no matter how large the other people may be. If they see you, they will get out of your path, and if they can't it is not your fault. Don't speak to them and don't hurry. Always take your time."
Father Skunk was slow and stately. It was a sight worth seeing when he started off for a night's ramble, walking with a slow and measured gait and carrying his fine tail high over his back. He always went by himself. "One is company, two is a crowd," he would say as he walked away. When they were old enough, the young Skunks began to walk off alone as soon as it was dark. Mother Skunk also went alone, and perhaps she had the best time of all, for it was a great rest not to have eight babies tumbling over her back and getting under her feet and hanging on to her with their thirty-two paws, and sometimes even scratching her with their one hundred and sixty claws. They still slept through the days in the old hole, so they were together much of the time, but they did not hunt in parties, as Raccoons and Weasels do.
[Illustration: HE STARTED OFF FOR A NIGHT'S RAMBLE.       _Page 72_]
One of the brothers had no white whatever on his tail, so they called him the Black-tailed Skunk. He had heard in some way that there was an Ovenbird's nest on the ground by the fern bank, and he made up his mind to find it the very next night and eat the eggs which were inside.
Another brother was called the Spotted Skunk, because the spot on his neck was so large. He had found the Ovenbird's nest himself, while on his way home in the early morning. He would have liked to rob it then, but he had eaten so much that night that he thought it better to wait.
So it happened that when the family awakened the next night two of the children had important plans of their own. Neither of them would have told for anything, but they couldn't quite keep from hinting about it as they made themselves ready to go out.
"Aha!" said the Black-tailed Skunk. "I know something you don't know."
"Oh, tell us!" cried four or five of the other children, while the Spotted Skunk twisted his head and said, "You don't either!"
"I do too!" replied the Black-tailed Skunk.
"Children! Children!" exclaimed Mrs. Skunk, while their father said that he couldn't see where his children got their quarrelsome disposition, for none of his people had ever contradicted or disputed. His wife told him that she really thought them very good, and that she was sure they behaved much better than most Skunks of their age. Then their father walked off in his most stately manner, putting his feet down almost flat, and carrying his tail a little higher than usual.
"I do know something that you don't," repeated the Black-tailed Skunk, "and it's something nice, too."
"Aw!" said the Spotted Skunk. "I don't believe it, and I don't care anyhow."
"I know you don't know, and I know you'd want to know if you knew what I know," said the Black-tailed Skunk, who was now getting so excited that he could hardly talk straight.
"Children!" exclaimed their mother. "Not another word about that. I do wish you would wake up good-natured."
"He started it," said the Spotted Skunk, "and we're not quarrelling anyhow. But I guess he'd give a good deal to know where I'm going."
"Children!" repeated their mother. "Go at once. I will not have you talking in this way before your brothers and sisters. Do not stop to talk, but go!"
So the two brothers started out for the night and each thought he would go a roundabout way to fool the other. The Black-tailed Skunk went to the right, and the Spotted Skunk went to the left, but each of them, you know, really started to rob the Ovenbird's nest. It was a very dark night. Even the stars were all hidden behind thick clouds, and one could hardly see one's forepaws while walking. But, of course, the night-prowlers of the forest are used to this, and four-footed people are not so likely to stumble and fall as two-footed ones. Besides, young Skunks have to remember where logs and stumps of trees are, just as other people have to remember their lessons.
So it happened that, while Mrs. Ovenbird was sleeping happily with her four eggs safe and warm under her breast, two people were coming from different ways to rob her. Such a snug nest as it was! She had chosen a tiny hollow in the fern bank and had cunningly woven dry grasses and leaves into a ball-shaped nest, which fitted neatly into the hollow and had a doorway on one side.
The Black-tailed Skunk sneaked up to the nest from one side. The Spotted Skunk sneaked up from the other side. Once the Black-tailed Skunk thought he heard some other creature moving toward him. At the same minute the Spotted Skunk thought he heard somebody, so he stopped to listen. Neither heard anything. Mrs. Ovenbird was sure that she heard a leaf rustle outside, and it made her anxious until she remembered that a dead twig might have dropped from the beech-tree overhead and hit the dry leaves below.
Slowly the two brothers crept toward the nest and each other. They moved very quietly, because each wanted to catch the mother-bird if he could. Close to the nest hollow they crouched and sprang with jaws open and sharp teeth ready to bite. There was a sudden crashing of leaves and ferns. The two brothers had sprung squarely at each other, each was bitten, growled, and ran away. And how they did run! It is not often, you know, that Skunks go faster than a walk, but when they are really scared they move very, very swiftly.
Mrs. Ovenbird felt her nest roof crush down upon her for a minute as two people rolled and growled outside. Then she heard them running away in different directions and knew that she was safe, for a time at least. In the morning she repaired her nest and told her bird friends about it. They advised her to take her children away as soon as possible after they were hatched. "If the Skunks have found your nest," they said, "you may have another call from them."
When the Black-tailed Skunk came stealing home in the first faint light just before sunrise, he found the Spotted Skunk telling the rest of the family how some horrible great fierce beast had pounced upon him in the darkness and bitten him on the shoulder. "It was so dark," said he, "that I couldn't see him at all, but I am sure it must have been a Bear."
They turned to tell the Black-tailed Skunk about his brother's misfortune, and saw that he limped badly. "Did the Bear catch you, too?" they cried.
"Yes," answered he. "It must have been a Bear. It was so big and strong and fierce. But I bit him, too. I wouldn't have run away from him, only he was so much bigger than I."
"That was just the way with me," said the Spotted Skunk. "I wouldn't have run if he hadn't been so big."
"You should have thrown liquid on him," said their father. "Then he would have been the one to run."
The brothers hung their heads. "We never thought," they cried. "We think it must have been because we were so surprised and didn't see him coming."
"Well," said their father sternly, "I suppose one must be patient with children, but such unskunklike behavior makes me very much ashamed of you both." Then the two bitten brothers went to bed in disgrace, although their mother was sorry for them and loved them, as mothers will do, even when their children are naughty or cowardly.
One night, some time later, these two brothers happened to meet down by the fern bank. It was bright moonlight and they stopped to visit, for both were feeling very good-natured. The Black-tailed Skunk said: "Come with me and I'll show you where there is an Ovenbird's nest."
"All right," answered the Spotted Skunk, "and then I'll show you one."
"I've just been waiting for a bright night," said the Black-tailed Skunk, "because I came here once in the dark and had bad luck."
"It was near here," said the Spotted Skunk, "that I was bitten by the Bear."
They stopped beside a tiny hollow. "There is the nest," said the Black-tailed Skunk, pointing with one of his long forefeet.
"Why, that is the one I meant," exclaimed the Spotted Skunk.
"I found it first," said the Black-tailed Skunk, "and I'd have eaten the eggs before if that Bear hadn't bitten me."
Just at that minute the two Skunks had a new idea. "We do believe," cried they, "that we bit each other!"
"We certainly did," said the Spotted Skunk.
"But we'll never tell," said the Black-tailed Skunk.
"Now," they added together, "let's eat everything."
But they didn't. In fact, they didn't eat anything, for the eggs were hatched, and the young birds had left the nest only the day before.
[Illustration]
THE LAZY CUT-WORMS
Now that spring had come and all the green things were growing, the Cut-Worms crawled out of their winter sleeping-places in the ground, and began to eat the tenderest and best things that they could find. They felt rested and hungry after their quiet winter, for they had slept without awakening ever since the first really cold days of fall.
There were many different kinds of Cut-Worms, brothers and sisters, cousins and second cousins, so, of course, they did not all look alike. They had hatched the summer before from eggs laid by the Owlet Moths, their mothers, and had spent the time from then until cold weather in eating and sleeping and eating some more. Of course they grew a great deal, but then, you know, one can grow without taking time especially for it. It is well that this is so. If people had to say, "I can do nothing else now. I must sit down and grow awhile," there would not be so many large people in the world as there are. They would become so interested in doing other things that they would not take the time to grow as they should.
Now the Cut-Worms were fine and fat and just as heedless as Cut-Worms have been since the world began. They had never seen their parents, and had hatched without any one to look after them. They did not look like their parents, for they were only worms as yet, but they had the same habit of sleeping all day and going out at night, and never thought of eating breakfast until the sun had gone down. They were quite popular in underground society, and were much liked by the Earthworms and May Beetle larvæ, who enjoyed hearing stories of what the Cut-Worms saw above ground. The May Beetle larvæ did not go out at all, because they were too young, and the Earthworms never knew what was going on outside unless somebody told them. They often put their heads up into the air, but they had no eyes and could not see for themselves.
The Cut-Worms were bold, saucy, selfish, and wasteful. They were not good children, although when they tried they could be very entertaining, and one always hoped that they would improve before they became Moths. Sometimes they even told the Earthworms and May Beetle larvæ stories that were not so, and that shows what sort of children they were. It was dreadful to tell such things to people who could never find out the difference. One Spotted Cut-Worm heard a couple of Earthworms talking about Ground Moles, and told them that Ground Moles were large birds with four wings apiece and legs like a Caterpillar's. They did not take pains to be entertaining because they wanted to make the underground people happy, but because they enjoyed hearing them say: "What bright fellows those Cut-Worms are! Really exceedingly clever!" And doing it for that reason took all the goodness out of it.
One bright moonlight night the Cut-Worms awakened and crawled out on top of the ground to feed. They lived in the farmer's vegetable garden, so there were many things to choose from: young beets just showing their red-veined leaves above their shining red stems; turnips; clean-looking onions holding their slender leaves very stiff and straight; radishes with just a bit of their rosy roots peeping out of the earth; and crisp, pale green lettuce, crinkled and shaking in every passing breeze. It was a lovely growing time, and all the vegetables were making the most of the fine nights, for, you know, that is the time when everything grows best. Sunshiny days are the best for coloring leaves and blossoms, but the time for sinking roots deeper and sending shoots higher and unfolding new leaves is at night in the beautiful stillness.
Some Cut-Worms chose beets and some chose radishes. Two or three liked lettuce best, and a couple crawled off to nibble at the sweet peas which the farmer's wife had planted. They never ate all of a plant. Ah, no! And that was one way in which they were wasteful. They nibbled through the stalk where it came out of the ground, and then the plant tumbled down and withered, while the Cut-Worm went on to treat another in the same way.
"Well!" exclaimed one Spotted Cut-Worm, as he crawled out from his hole. "I must have overslept! Guess I stayed up too late this morning."
"You'd better look out," said one of his friends, "or the Ground Mole will get you. He likes to find nice fat little Cut-Worms who sleep too late in the evening."
"Needn't tell me," answered the Spotted Cut-Worm. "It's the early Mole that catches the Cut-Worm. I don't know when I have overslept myself so. Have you fellows been up ever since sunset?"
"Yes," they answered; and one saucy fellow added: "I got up too early. I awakened and felt hungry, and thought I'd just come out for a lunch. I supposed the birds had finished their supper, but the first thing I saw was a Robin out hunting. She was not more than the length of a bean-pole from me, and when I saw her cock her head on one side and look toward me, I was sure she saw me. But she didn't, after all. Lucky for me that I am green and came up beside the lettuce. I kept still and she took me for a leaf."
"St!" said somebody else. "There comes the Ground Mole." They all kept still while the Mole scampered to and fro on the dewy grass near them, going faster than one would think he could with such very, very short legs. His pink digging hands flashed in the moonlight, and his pink snout showed also, but the dark, soft fur of the rest of his body could hardly be seen against the brown earth of the garden. It may have been because he was not hungry, or it may have been because his fur covered over his eyes so, but he went back to his underground run-way without having caught a single Cut-Worm.
Then the Cut-Worms felt very much set up. They crawled toward the hole into his run-way and made faces at it, as though he were standing in the doorway. They called mean things after him and pretended to say them very loudly, yet really spoke quite softly.
Then they began to boast that they were not afraid of anybody, and while they were boasting they ate and ate and ate and ate. Here and there the young plants drooped and fell over, and as soon as one did that, the Cut-Worm who had eaten on it crawled off to another.
"Guess the farmer will know that we've been here," said they. "We don't care. He doesn't need all these vegetables. What if he did plant them? Let him plant some more if he wants to. What business has he to have so many, anyhow, if he won't share with other people?" You would have thought, to hear them, that they were exceedingly kind to leave any vegetables for the farmer.
In among the sweet peas were many little tufts of purslane, and purslane is very good to eat, as anybody knows who has tried it. But do you think the Cut-Worms ate that? Not a bit of it. "We can have purslane any day," they said, "and now we will eat sweet peas."
One little fellow added: "You won't catch me eating purslane. It's a weed." Now, Cut-Worms do eat weeds, but they always seem to like best those things which have been carefully planted and tended. If the purslane had been set in straight rows, and the sweet peas had just come up of themselves everywhere, it is quite likely that this young Cut-Worm would have said: "You won't catch me eating sweet peas. They are weeds."
As the moon rose higher and higher in the sky, the Cut-Worms boasted more and more. They said there were no Robins clever enough to find them, and that the Ground Mole dared not touch them when they were together, and that it was only when he found one alone underground that he was brave enough to do so. They talked very loudly now and bragged dreadfully, until they noticed that the moon was setting and a faint yellow light showed over the tree-tops in the east.
"Time to go to bed for the day," called the Spotted Cut-Worm. "Where are you going to crawl in?" They had no regular homes, you know, but crawled into the earth wherever they wanted to and slept until the next night.
"Here are some fine holes already made," said a Green Cut-Worm, "and big enough for a Garter Snake. They are smooth and deep, and a lot of us can cuddle down into each. I'm going into one of them."
"Who made those holes?" asked the Spotted Cut-Worm; "and why are they here?"
"Oh, who cares who made them?" answered the Green Cut-Worm. "Guess they're ours if we want to use them."
"Perhaps the farmer made them," said the Spotted Cut-Worm, "and if he did I don't want to go into them."
"Oh, who's afraid of him?" cried the other Cut-Worms. "Come along!"
"No," answered the Spotted Cut-Worm. "I won't. I don't want to and I won't do it. The hole I make to sleep in will not be so large, nor will it have such smooth sides, but I'll know all about it and feel safe. Good-morning." Then he crawled into the earth and went to sleep. The others went into the smooth, deep holes made by the farmer with his hoe handle.
The next night there was only one Cut-Worm in the garden, and that was the Spotted Cut-Worm. Nobody has ever seen the lazy ones who chose to use the smooth, deep holes which were ready made. The Spotted Cut-Worm lived quite alone until he was full-grown, then he made a little oval room for himself in the ground and slept in it while he changed into a Black Owlet Moth.
After that he flew away to find a wife and live among her people. It is said that whenever he saw a Cut-Worm working at night, he would flutter down beside him and whisper,--"The Cut-Worm who is too lazy to bore his own sleeping-place will never live to become an Owlet Moth."
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE NIGHT MOTH'S PARTY
From the time when she was a tiny golden-green Caterpillar, Miss Polyphemus had wanted to go into society. She began life on a maple leaf with a few brothers and sisters, who hatched at the same time from a cluster of flattened eggs which their mother had laid there ten days before. The first thing she remembered was the light and color and sound when she broke the shell open that May morning. The first thing she did was to eat the shell out of which she had just crawled. Then she got acquainted with her brothers and sisters, many of whom had also eaten their egg-shells, although two had begun at once on maple leaves. It was well that she took time for this now, for the family were soon scattered and several of her sisters she never saw again.
She found it a very lovely world to live in. There was so much to eat. Yes, and there were so many kinds of leaves that she liked,--oak, hickory, apple, maple, elm, and several others. Sometimes she wished that she had three mouths instead of one. In those days she had few visitors. It is true that other Caterpillars happened along once in a while, but they were almost as hungry as she, and they couldn't speak without stopping eating. They could, of course, if they talked with their mouths full, but she had too good manners for that, and, besides, she said that if she did, she couldn't enjoy her food so much.
You must not think that it was wrong in her to care so much about eating. She was only doing what is expected of a Polyphemus Caterpillar, and you would have to do the same if you were a Polyphemus Caterpillar. When she was ten days old she had to weigh ten times as much as she did the morning that she was hatched. When she was twenty days old she had to weigh sixty times as much; when she was a month old she had to weigh six hundred and twenty times as much; and when she was fifty days old she had to weigh four thousand times as much as she did at hatching. Every bit of this flesh was made of the food she ate. That is why eating was so important, you know, and if she had chosen to eat the wrong kind of leaves just because they tasted good, she would never have become such a fine great Caterpillar as she did. She might better not eat anything than to eat the wrong sort, and she knew it.
Still, she often wished that she had more time for visiting, and thought that she would be very gay next year, when she got her wings. "I'll make up for it then," she said to herself, "when my growing is done and I have time for play." Then she ate some more good, plain food, for she knew that there would be no happy Moth-times for Caterpillars who did not eat as they should.
She had five vacations of about a day each when she ate nothing at all. These were the times when she changed her skin, crawling out of the tight old one and appearing as fresh and clean as possible in the new one which was ready underneath. After her last change she was ready to plan her cocoon, and she was a most beautiful Caterpillar. She was about as long as a small cherry leaf, and as plump as a Caterpillar can be. She was light green, with seven slanting yellow lines on each side of her body, and a purplish-brown V-shaped mark on the back part of each side. There were many little orange-colored bunches on her body, which showed beautiful gleaming lights when she moved. Growing out of these bunches were tiny tufts of bristles.
She had three pairs of real legs and several pairs of make-believe ones. Her real legs were on the front part of her body and were slender. These she expected to keep always. The make-believe ones were called pro-legs. They grew farther back and were fat, awkward, jointless things which she would not need after her cocoon was spun. But for them, she would have had to drag the back part of her body around like a Snake. With them, the back part of her body could walk as well as the front, although not quite so fast. She always took a few steps with her real legs and then waited for her pro-legs to catch up.
As the weather grew colder the Polyphemus Caterpillar hunted around on the ground for a good place for her cocoon. She found an excellent twig lying among the dead leaves, and decided to fasten to that. Then began her hardest work, spinning a fluffy mass of gray-white silk which clung to the twig and to one of the dry leaves and was almost exactly the color of the leaf. Other Caterpillars came along and stopped to visit, for they did not have to eat at cocoon-spinning time.
"Better fasten your cocoon to a tree," said a pale bluish-green Promethea Caterpillar. "Put it inside a curled leaf, like mine, and wind silk around the stem to strengthen it. Then you can swing every time the wind blows, and the silk will keep the leaf from wearing out."
"But I don't want to swing," answered the Polyphemus Caterpillar. "I'd rather lie still and think about things."
"Fasten to the twig of a tree," advised a pale green Cecropia Caterpillar with red, yellow, and blue bunches. "Then the wind just moves you a little. Fasten it to a twig and taper it off nicely at each end, and then----"
"Yes," said the Polyphemus Caterpillar, "and then the Blue-Jays and Chickadees will poke wheat or corn or beechnuts into the upper end of it. I don't care to turn my sleeping room into a corn-crib."
Just here some other Polyphemus Caterpillars came along and agreed with their relative. "Go ahead with your tree homes," said they. "We know what we want, and we'll see next summer who knew best."
The Polyphemus cocoons were spun on the ground where the dead leaves had blown in between some stones, and no wandering Cows or Sheep would be likely to step on them. First a mass of coarse silk which it took half a day to make, then an inside coating of a kind of varnish, then as much silk as a Caterpillar could spin in four or five days, next another inside varnishing, and the cocoons were done. As the Polyphemus Caterpillars snuggled down for the long winter's sleep, each said to himself something like this: "Those poor Caterpillars in the trees! How cold they will be! I hope they may come out all right in the spring, but I doubt it very much."
And when the Cecropia and Promethea Caterpillars dozed off for the winter, they said: "What a pity that those Polyphemus Caterpillars would lie around on the ground. Well, we advised them what to do, so it isn't our fault."
They all had a lovely winter, and swung or swayed or lay still, just as they had chosen to do. Early in the spring, the farmer's wife and little girl came out to find wild flowers, and scraped the leaves away from among the stones. Out rolled the cocoon that the first Polyphemus Caterpillar had spun and the farmer's wife picked it up and carried it off. She might have found more cocoons if the little girl had not called her away.
This was how it happened that one May morning a little girl stood by the sitting-room window in the white farmhouse and watched Miss Polyphemus crawl slowly out of her cocoon. A few days before a sour, milky-looking stuff had begun to trickle into the lower end of the cocoon, softening the hard varnish and the soft silken threads until a tiny doorway was opened. Now all was ready and Miss Polyphemus pushed out. She was very wet and weak and forlorn. "Oh," said she to herself, "it is more fun to be a new Caterpillar than it is to be a new Moth. I've only six legs left, and it will be very hard worrying along on these. I shall have to give up walking."
It was discouraging. You can see how it would be. She had been used to having so many legs, and had looked forward all the summer before to the time when she should float lightly through the air and sip honey from flowers. She had dreamed of it all winter. And now here she was--wet and weak, with only six legs left, and four very small and crumpled wings. Her body was so big and fat that she could not hold it up from the window-sill. She wanted to cry--it was all so sad and disappointing. She would have done so, had she not remembered how very unbecoming it is to cry. When she remembered that, she decided to take a nap instead, and that was a most sensible thing to do, for crying always makes matters worse, while sleeping makes them better.
When she awakened she felt much stronger and more cheerful. She was drier and her body felt lighter. This was because the fluids from it were being pumped into her wings. That was making them grow, and the beautiful colors began to show more brightly on them. "I wonder," she said to herself, "if Moths always feel so badly when they first come out?"
If she had but known it, there were at that very time hundreds of Moths as helpless as she, clinging to branches, leaves, and stones all through the forest. There were many Polyphemus Moths just out, for in their family it is the custom for all to leave their cocoons at just about such a time in the morning. Perhaps she would have felt more patient if she had known this, for it does seem to make hard times easier to bear when one knows that everybody else has hard times also. Of course other people always are having trouble, but she was young and really believed for a time that she was the only uncomfortable Moth in the world.
All day long her wings were stretching and growing smooth. When it grew dark she was nearly ready to fly. Then the farmer's wife lifted her gently by the wings and put her on the inside of the wire window-screen. When the lights in the house were all put out, the moonbeams shone in on Miss Polyphemus and showed her beautiful sand-colored body and wings with the dark border on the front pair and the lighter border on the back pair.
On the back ones were dark eye-spots with clear places in the middle, through which one could see quite clearly.
"I would like to fly," sighed Miss Polyphemus, "and I believe I could if it were not for this horrid screen." She did not know that the farmer's wife had put her there to keep her safe from night birds until she was quite strong.
The wind blew in, sweet with the scent of wild cherry and shad-tree blossoms, and poor Miss Polyphemus looked over toward the forest where she had lived when she was a Caterpillar, and wished herself safely there. "Much good it does me to have wings when I cannot use them," said she. "I want something to eat. There is no honey to be sucked out of wire netting. I wish I were a happy Caterpillar again, eating leaves on the trees." She was not the first Moth who has wished herself a Caterpillar, but she soon changed her mind.
There fluttered toward her another Polyphemus Moth, a handsome fellow, marked exactly as she was, only with darker coloring. His body was more slender, and his feelers were very beautiful and feathery. She was fat and had slender feelers.
"Ah!" said he. "I thought I should find you soon."
"Indeed?" she replied. "I wonder what made you think that?"
"My feelers, of course," said he. "They always tell me where to find my friends. You know how that is yourself."
"I?" said she, as she changed her position a little. "I am just from my cocoon. This was my coming-out day."
"And so you have not met any one yet?" he asked. "Ah, this is a strange world--a very strange world. I would advise you to be very careful with whom you make friends. There are so many bad Moths, you know."
"Good-evening," said a third voice near them, and another Polyphemus Moth with feathery feelers alighted on the screen. He smiled sweetly at Miss Polyphemus and scowled fiercely at the other Moth. It would have ended in a quarrel right then and there, if a fourth Moth had not come at that minute. One after another came, until there were nine handsome fellows on the outside and Miss Polyphemus on the inside of the screen trying to entertain them all and keep them from quarrelling. It made her very proud to think so many were at her coming-out party. Still, she would have enjoyed it better, she thought, if some whom she had known as Caterpillars could be there to see how much attention she was having paid to her. There was one Caterpillar whom she had never liked. She only wished that she could see her now.
Still, society tires one very much, and it was hard to keep her guests from quarrelling. When she got to talking with one about maple-trees, another was sure to come up and say that he had always preferred beech when he was a Caterpillar. And the two outside would glare at each other while she hastily thought of something else to say.
At last those outside got to fighting. There was only one, the handsomest of all, who said he thought too much of his feelers to fight anybody. "Supposing I should fight and break them off," said he. "I couldn't smell a thing for the rest of my life." He was very sensible, and really the eight other fellows were fighting on account of Miss Polyphemus, for whenever they thought she liked one best they began to bump up against him.
[Illustration: THEY LIVED IN THE FOREST AFTER THAT.      _Page 109_]
Toward morning the farmer's wife awakened and looked at Miss Polyphemus. When she saw that she was strong enough to fly, she opened the screen and let her go. By that time three of those with feathery feelers were dead, three were broken-winged and clinging helplessly to the screen, and two were so busy fighting that they didn't see Miss Polyphemus go. The handsome great fellow who did not believe in fighting went with her, and they lived in the forest after that. But she never cared for society again.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE LONELY OLD BACHELOR MUSKRAT
Beyond the forest and beside the river lay the marsh where the Muskrats lived. This was the same marsh to which the young Frog had taken some of the meadow people's children when they were tired of staying at home and wanted to travel. When they went with him, you remember, they were gay and happy, the sun was shining, and the way did not seem long. When they came back they were cold and wet and tired, and thought it very far indeed. One could never get them to say much about it.
Some people like what others do not, and one's opinion of a marsh must always depend on whether he is a Grasshopper or a Frog. But whether people cared to live there or not, the marsh had always been a pleasant place to see. In the spring the tall tamaracks along the edge put on their new dresses of soft, needle-shaped green leaves, the marsh-marigolds held their bright faces up to the sun, and hundreds of happy little people darted in and out of the tussocks of coarse grass. There was a warm, wet, earthy smell in the air, and near the pussy-willows there was also a faint bitterness.
Then the Marsh Hens made their nests, and the Sand-pipers ran mincingly along by the quiet pools.
In summer time the beautiful moccasin flowers grew in family groups, and over in the higher, dryer part were masses of white boneset, tall spikes of creamy foxglove, and slender, purple vervain. In the fall the cat-tails stood stiffly among their yellow leaves, and the Red-winged Blackbirds and the Bobolinks perched upon them to plan their journey to the south.
Even when the birds were gone and the cat-tails were ragged and worn--even then, the marsh was an interesting place. Soft snow clung to the brown seed clusters of boneset and filled the open silvery-gray pods of the milkweed. In among the brown tussocks of grass ran the dainty footprints of Mice and Minks, and here and there rose the cone-shaped winter homes of the Muskrats.
The Muskrats were the largest people there, and lived in the finest homes. It is true that if a Mink and a Muskrat fought, the Mink was likely to get the better of the Muskrat, but people never spoke of this, although everybody knew that it was so. The Muskrats were too proud to do so, the Minks were too wise to, and the smaller people who lived near did not want to offend the Muskrats by mentioning it. It is said that an impudent young Mouse did say something about it once when the Muskrats could overhear him and that not one of them ever spoke to him again. The next time he said "Good-evening" to a Muskrat, the Muskrat just looked at him as though he didn't see him or as though he had been a stick or a stone or something else uneatable and uninteresting.
The Muskrats were very popular, for they were kind neighbors and never stole their food from others. That was why nobody was jealous of them, although they were so fat and happy. Their children usually turned out very well, even if they were not at all strictly brought up. You know when a father and mother have to feed and care for fifteen or so children each summer, there is not much time for teaching them to say "please" and "thank you" and "pardon me." Sometimes these young Muskrats did snatch and quarrel, as on that night when fifteen of them went to visit their old home and all wanted to go in first. You may recall how, on that dreadful night, their father had to spank them with his scaly tail and their mother sent them to bed. They always remembered it, and you may be very sure their parents did. It makes parents feel dreadfully when their children quarrel, and it is very wearing to have to spank fifteen at once, particularly when one has to use his tail with which to do it.
There was one old Bachelor Muskrat who had always lived for himself, and had his own way more than was good for him. If he had married, it would not have been so, and he would have grown used to giving up to somebody else. He was a fine-looking fellow with soft, short, reddish-brown fur, which shaded almost to black on his back, and to a light gray underneath. There were very few hairs on his long, flat, scaly tail, and most of these were in two fringes, one down the middle of the upper side, and the other down the middle of the lower side. His tiny ears hardly showed above the fur on his head, and he was so fat that he really seemed to have no neck at all. To look at his feet you would hardly think he could swim, for the webs between his toes were very, very small and his feet were not large.
He was like all other Muskrats in using a great deal of perfume, and it was not a pleasant kind, being so strong and musky. He thought it quite right, and it was better so, for he couldn't help wearing it, and you can just imagine how distressing it would be to see a Muskrat going around with his nose turned up and all the time finding fault with his own perfume.
Nobody could remember the time when there had been no Muskrats in the marsh. The Ground Hog who lived near the edge of the forest said that his grandfather had often spoken of seeing them at play in the moonlight; and there was an old Rattlesnake who had been married several times and wore fourteen joints in his rattle, who said that he remembered seeing Muskrats there before he cast his first skin. And it was not strange that, after their people had lived there so long, the Muskrats should be fond of the marsh.
One day in midsummer the farmer and his men came to the marsh with spades and grub-hoes and measuring lines. All of them had on high rubber boots, and they tramped around and measured and talked, and rooted up a few huckleberry bushes, and drove a good many stakes into the soft and spongy ground. Then the dinner-bell at the farmhouse rang and, they went away. It was a dull, cloudy day and a few of the Muskrats were out. If it had been sunshiny they would have stayed in their burrows. They paddled over to where the stakes were, and smelled of them and gnawed at them, and wondered why the men had put them there.
"I know," said one young Muskrat, who had married and set up a home of his own that spring. "I know why they put these stakes in."
"Oh, do listen!" cried the young Muskrat's wife. "He knows and will tell us all about it."
"Nobody ever told me this," said the young husband. "I thought it out myself. The Ground Hog once said that they put small pieces of potato into the ground to grow into whole big ones, and they have done the same sort of thing here. You see, the farmer wanted a fence, and so he stuck down these stakes, and before winter he will have a fence well grown."
"Humph!" said the Bachelor Muskrat. It seemed as though he had meant to say more, but the young wife looked at him with such a frown on her furry forehead that he shut his mouth as tightly as he could (he never could quite close it) and said nothing else.
"Do you mean to tell me," said one who had just sent five children out of her burrow to make room for another lot of babies, "that they will grow a fence here where it is so wet? Fences grow on high land."
"That is what I said," answered the young husband, slapping his tail on the water to make himself seem more important.
"Well," said the anxious mother, "if they go to growing fences and such things around here I shall move. Every one of my children will want to play around it, and as like as not will eat its roots and get sick."
Then the men came back and all the Muskrats ran toward their burrows, dived into the water to reach the doors of them, and then crawled up the long hallways that they had dug out of the bank until they got to the large rooms where they spent most of their days and kept their babies.
That night the young husband was the first Muskrat to come out, and he went at once to the line of stakes. He had been lying awake and thinking while his wife was asleep, and he was afraid he had talked too much. He found that the stakes had not grown any, and that the men had begun to dig a deep ditch beside them. He was afraid that his neighbors would point their paws at him and ask how the fence was growing, and he was not brave enough to meet them and say that he had been mistaken. He went down the river bank and fed alone all night, while his wife and neighbors were grubbing and splashing around in the marsh or swimming in the river near their homes. The young Muskrats were rolling and tumbling in the moonlight and looking like furry brown balls. After it began to grow light, he sneaked back to his burrow.
Every day the men came in their high rubber boots to work, and every day there were more ditches and the marsh was drier. By the time that the flowers had all ripened their seeds and the forest trees were bare, the marsh was changed to dry ground, and the Muskrats could find no water there to splash in. One night, and it was a very, very dark one, they came together to talk about winter.
"It is time to begin our cold-weather houses," said one old Muskrat, "I have never started so soon, but we are to have an early winter."
"Yes, and a long one, too," added his wife, who said that Mr. Muskrat never told things quite strongly enough.
"It will be cold," said another Muskrat, "and we shall need to build thick walls."
"Why?" asked a little Muskrat.
"Sh!" said his mother.
"The question is," said the old Muskrat who had first spoken, "where we shall build."
"Why?" asked the little Muskrat, pulling at his mother's tail.
"Sh-h!" said his mother.
"There is no water here except in the ditches," said the oldest Muskrat, "and of course we would not build beside them."
"Why not?" asked the little Muskrat. And this time he actually poked his mother in the side.
"Sh-h-h!" said she. "How many times must I speak to you? Don't you know that young Muskrats should be seen and not heard?"
"But I can't be seen," he whimpered. "It is so dark that I can't be seen, and you've just got to hear me."
Of course, after he had spoken in that way to his mother and interrupted all the others by his naughtiness, he had to be punished, so his mother sent him to bed. That is very hard for young Muskrats, for the night, you know, is the time when they have the most fun.
The older ones talked and talked about what they should do. They knew, as they always do know, just what sort of winter they were to have, and that they must begin to build at once. Some years they had waited until a whole month later, but that was because they expected a late and mild winter. At last the oldest Muskrat decided for them. "We will move to-morrow night," said he. "We will go to the swamp on the other side of the forest and build our winter homes there."
All the Muskrats felt sad about going, and for a minute it was so still that you might almost have heard a milkweed seed break loose from the pod and float away. Then a gruff voice broke the silence. "I will not go," it said. "I was born here and I will live here. I never have left this marsh and I never will leave it."
They could not see who was speaking, but they knew it was the Bachelor. The oldest Muskrat said afterward that he was so surprised you could have knocked him over with a blade of grass. Of course, you couldn't have done it, because he was so fat and heavy, but that is what he said, and it shows just how he felt.
The other Muskrats talked and talked and talked with him, but it made no difference. His brothers told him it was perfectly absurd for him to stay, that people would think it queer, and that he ought to go with the rest of his relatives. Yet it made no difference. "You should stay," he would reply. "Our family have always lived here."
When the Muskrat mothers told him how lonely he would be, and how he would miss seeing the dear little ones frolic in the moonlight, he blinked and said: "Well, I shall just have to stand it." Then he sighed, and they went away saying to each other what a tender heart he had and what a pity it was that he had never married. One of them spoke as though he had been in love with her some years before, but the others had known nothing about it.
The Muskrat fathers told him that he would have no one to help him if a Mink should pick a quarrel with him. "I can take care of myself then," said he, and showed his strong gnawing teeth in a very fierce way.
It was only when the dainty young Muskrat daughters talked to him that he began to wonder if he really ought to stay. He lay awake most of one day thinking about it and remembering the sad look in their little eyes when they said that they should miss him. He was so disturbed that he ate only three small roots during the next night. The poor old Bachelor had a hard time then, but he was so used to having his own way and doing what he had started to do, and not giving up to anybody, that he stayed after all.
The others went away and he began to build his winter house beside the biggest ditch. He placed it among some bushes, so that if the water in the ditch should ever overflow they would help hold his house in place. He built it with his mouth, bringing great mouthfuls of grass roots and rushes and dropping them on the middle of the heap. Sometimes they stayed there and sometimes they rolled down. If they rolled down he never brought them back, for he knew that they would be useful where they were. When it was done, the house was shaped like a pine cone with the stem end down, for after he had made it as high as a tall milkweed he finished off the long slope up which he had been running and made it look like the other sides.
After that he began to burrow up into it from below. The right way to do, he knew, was to have his doorway under water and dive down to it. Other winters he had done this and had given the water a loud slap with his tail as he dived. Now there was not enough water to dive into, and when he tried slapping on it his tail went through to the ditch bottom and got muddy. He had to fix the doorway as best he could, and then he ate out enough of the inside of his house to make a good room and poked a small hole through the roof to let in fresh air.
[Illustration: THE MARSH SEEMED SO EMPTY AND LONELY.     _Page 127_]
After the house was done, he slept there during the days and prowled around outside at night. He slept there, but ate none of the roots of which it was made until the water in the ditch was frozen hard. He knew that there would be a long, long time when he could not dig fresh roots and must live on those.
At night the marsh seemed so empty and lonely that he hardly knew what to do. He didn't enjoy his meals, and often complained to the Mice that the roots did not taste so good to him as those they used to have when he was young. He tried eating other things and found them no better. When there was bright moonlight, he sat upon the highest tussock he could find and thought about his grandfathers and grandmothers. "If they had not eaten their houses," he once said to a Mouse, "this marsh would be full of them."
"No it wouldn't," answered the Mouse, who didn't really mean to contradict him, but thought him much mistaken. "If the houses hadn't been eaten, they would have been blown down by the wind and beaten down by rains and washed away by floods. It is better so. Who wants things to stay the way they are forever and ever? I'd rather see the trees drop their leaves once in a while and grow new ones than to wear the same old ones after they are ragged and faded."
The Bachelor Muskrat didn't like this very well, but he couldn't forget it. When he awakened in the daytime he would think about it and at night he thought more. He was really very forlorn, and because he had nobody else to think about he thought too much of himself and began to believe that he was lame and sick. When he sat on a tussock and remembered all the houses which his grandparents had built and eaten, he became very sad and sighed until his fat sides shook. He wished that he could sleep through the winter like the Ground Hog, or through part of it like the Skunk, but just as sure as night came his eyes popped open and there he was--awake.
When spring came he thought of his friends who had gone to the swamp and he knew that last year's children were marrying and digging burrows of their own. The poor old Bachelor wanted to go to them, yet he was so used to doing what he had said he would, and disliked so much to let anybody know that he was mistaken, that he chose to stay where he was, without water enough for diving and with hardly enough for swimming. How it would have ended nobody knows, had the farmer not come to plough up the old drained marsh for planting celery.
Then the Bachelor went. He reached his new home in the early morning, and the mothers let their children stay up until it was quite light so that he might see them plainly. "Isn't it pleasant here?" they cried. "Don't you like it better than the old place?"
"Oh, it does very well," he answered, "but you must remember that I only moved because I had to."
"Oh, yes, we understand that," said one of the mothers, "but we hope you will really like it here."
Afterward her husband said to her, "Don't you know he was glad to come? What's the use of being so polite?"
"Poor old fellow," she answered. "He is so queer because he lives alone, and I'm sorry for him. Just see him eat."
And truly it was worth while to watch him, for the roots tasted sweet to him, and, although he had not meant to be, he was very happy--far happier than if he had had his own way.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE GREEDY RED FOX
The Red Fox had been well brought up. His mother was a most cautious person and devoted to her children. When he did things which were wrong, he could never excuse himself by saying that he did not know better. Of course it is possible that he was like his father in being so reckless, yet none of his two brothers and three sisters were like him. They did not remember their father. In fact, they had never seen him, and their mother seldom spoke of him.
His mother had taken all the care of her six children, even pulling fur from her own belly to make a soft nest covering for them when they were first born. They were such helpless babies. Their eyes and ears were closed for some time, and all they could do was to tumble each other around and drink the warm milk that their mother had for them.
They had three burrows to live in, all of them in an open field between the forest and the farmhouse. Sometimes they lived in the first, sometimes in the second, and sometimes in the third. One night when their mother went out to hunt, she smelled along the ground near the burrow and then came back. "There has been a man near here," she said, "and I shall take you away."
That excited the little Foxes very much, and each wanted to be the first to go, but she hushed them up, and said that if they talked so loudly as that some man might catch them before they moved, and then--. She said nothing more, yet they knew from the way she moved her tail that it would be dreadful to have a man catch them.
While she was carrying them to another burrow one at a time, those who were left behind talked about men. "I wish I knew why men are so dreadful," said the first. "It must be because they have very big mouths and sharp teeth."
"I wonder what color their fur is," said another.
Now these young Foxes had seen nobody but their mother. If she had not told them that different animals wore different colored furs, they would have thought that everybody looked just like her, with long reddish-yellow fur and that on the hinder part of the back quite grizzled; throat, belly, and the tip of the tail white, and the outside of the ears black. They were very sure, however, that no other animal had such a wonderful tail as she, with each of its long, reddish hairs tipped with black and the beautiful brush of pure white at the end. In fact, she had told them so.
The next time their mother came back, the four children who were still there cried out, "Please tell us, what color is a man's fur?"
She was a sensible and prudent Fox, and knew it was much more important to keep her children from being caught than it was to answer all their questions at once. Besides, she already had one child in her mouth when they finished their question, and she would not put him down for the sake of talking. And that also was right, you know, for one can talk at any time, but the time to do work is just when it needs to be done.
After they were snugly settled in the other burrow, she lay down to feed them, and while they were drinking their milk she told them about men. "Men," she said, "are the most dreadful animals there are. Other animals will not trouble you unless they are hungry, but a man will chase you even when his stomach is full. They have four legs, of course,--all animals have,--but they use only two to walk upon. Their front legs they use for carrying things. We carry with our mouths, yet the only thing I ever saw a man have in his mouth was a short brown stick that was afire at one end. I thought it very silly, for he couldn't help breathing some of the smoke, and he let the stick burn up and then threw the fire away. However, men are exceedingly silly animals."
One of the little Red Foxes stopped drinking long enough to say, "You didn't tell us what color their fur is."
"The only fur they have," said Mother Fox, "is on their heads. They usually have fur on the top and back parts of their heads, and some of them have a little on the lower part of their faces. They may have black, red, brown, gray, or white fur. It is never spotted."
The children would have liked to ask more questions, but Mother Fox had eaten nothing since the night before, and was in a hurry to begin her hunt.
One could never tell all that happened to the little Red Foxes. They moved from burrow to burrow many times; they learned to eat meat which their mother brought them instead of drinking milk from her body, they frolicked together near the doorway of their home, and while they did this their mother watched from the edge of the forest, ready to warn them if she saw men or dogs coming.
She had chosen to dig her burrows in the middle of a field, because then there was no chance for men or Dogs to sneak up to them unseen, as there would have been in the forest, yet she feared that her children would be playing so hard that they might forget to watch. They slept most of the day, and at night they were always awake. When they were old enough, they began to hunt for themselves. Mother Fox gave them a great deal of good advice and then paid no more attention to them. After that, she took her naps on a sunny hillside, lying in a beautiful soft reddish-yellow bunch, with her bushy tail curled around to keep her feet warm and shade her eyes from the light.
The six brothers and sisters seldom saw each other after this. Foxes succeed better in life if they live alone, and of course they wanted to succeed. The eldest brother was the reckless one. His mother had done her best by him, and still he was reckless. He knew by heart all the rules that she had taught him, but he did not keep them. These were the rules:
"Always run on hard, dry things when you can. Soft, wet places take more scent from your feet, and Dogs can follow your trail better on them.
"Never go into any place unless you are sure you can get out.
"Keep your tail dry. A Fox with a wet tail cannot run well.
"If Dogs are chasing you, jump on to a rail fence and run along the top of it or walk in a brook.
"Always be willing to work for your food. That which you find all ready and waiting for you may be the bait of a trap.
"Always walk when you are hunting. The Fox who trots will pass by that which he should find."
For a while he said them over to himself every night when he started out. Then he began to skip a night once in a while. Next he got to saying them only when he had been frightened the day before. After that he stopped saying them altogether. "I am a full-grown Fox now," he said to himself, "and such things are only good for children. I guess I know how to take care of myself."
He often went toward the farmhouse to hunt, sometimes for grapes, sometimes for vegetables, and sometimes for heartier food. Collie had chased him away, but Collie was growing old and fat and had to hang his tongue out when he ran, so the Red Fox thought it only fun. He trotted along in the moonlight, his light, slender body seeming to almost float over the ground, and his beautiful tail held straight out behind. His short, slender legs were strong and did not tire easily, and as long as he could keep his tall dry he outran Collie easily. Sometimes he would get far ahead and sit down to wait for him. Then he would call out saucy things to the panting Dog, and only start on when Collie's nose had almost touched him.
"Fine evening!" he once said. "Hope your nose works better than your legs do."
That was a mean thing to say, you know, but Collie always keeps his temper and only answered, "It's sweating finely, thank you." He answered that way because it is the sweat on a Dog's nose which makes it possible for him to smell and follow scents which dry-nosed people do not even know about.
Then the Fox gave a long, light leap, and was off again, and Collie had to lie down to breathe. "I think," said he, "that I can tend Sheep better than I can chase Foxes--and it is a good deal easier." Still, Collie didn't like to be beaten and he lay awake the rest of the night thinking how he would enjoy catching that Fox. Every little while he heard the Red Fox barking off in the fields, and it made him twitch his tail with impatience.
Now the Red Fox was walking carefully toward the farmhouse and planning to catch a Turkey. He had watched the flocks of Turkeys all afternoon from his sleeping-place on the hillside. Every time he opened his eyes between naps he had looked at them as they walked to and fro in the fields, talking to each other in their gentle, complaining voices and moving their heads back and forth at every step. If his stomach had not been so full he would have tried to catch one then. He made up his mind to try it that night, and decided that he would rather have the plump, light-colored one than any of her darker sisters. He did not even think of catching the old Gobbler, for he was so big and strong and fierce-looking. He had just begun to walk with the Turkey mothers and children. During the summer they had had nothing to do with each other.
When the Red Fox reached the farmyard, he found them roosting on the low branches of an apple-tree. A long board had been placed against it to let the Chickens walk up. Now the Chickens were in the Hen-house, but the board was still there. The Red Fox looked all around. It was a starlight night. The farmhouse was dark and quiet. Collie was nowhere to be seen. Once he heard a Horse stamp in his sleep. Then all was still again.
The Red Fox walked softly up the slanting board. The Gobbler stirred. The Red Fox stopped with one foot in the air. When he thought him fast asleep he went on. The Gobbler stirred again and so did the others. The Red Fox sprang for the plump, light-colored one. She jumped also, and with the others flew far up to the top of the barn. The Red Fox ran down the board with five buff tail-feathers in his mouth. He was much out of patience with himself. "If I hadn't stopped to pick for her," he said, "I could have caught one of the others easily enough."
He sneaked around in the shadows to see if the noise made by the turkeys had awakened the farmer or Collie. The farmhouse was still and dark. Collie was not at home. "I will look at the Hen-house," said the Red Fox.
He walked slowly and carefully to the Hen-house. The big door was closed and bolted. He walked all around and into the poultry yard. There was a small opening through which the fowls could pass in and out. The Red Fox managed to crawl though, but it was not easy. It squeezed his body and crushed his fur. He had to push very hard with his hind feet to get through at all. When he was inside it took him some time to get his breath. "That's the tightest place I ever was in," said he softly, "but I always could crawl through a very small hole."
He found the fowls all roosting too high for him. Perhaps if the Hen-house had been larger, he might have leaped and caught one, but there was not room for one of his finest springs. He went to the nests and found many eggs there. These he broke and ate. They ran down in yellow streams from the corners of his mouth and made his long fur very sticky. You can just imagine how hard it would be to eat raw eggs from the shell with only your paws in which to hold them.
One egg was light and slippery. He bit hard to break that one, and when it broke it was hollow. Not a drop of anything to eat in it, and then it cut his lip a little, too, so that he could not eat more without its hurting. He jumped and said something when he was cut. The Shanghai Cock, who was awakened by the noise, said that he exclaimed, "Brambles and traps!" but it may not have been anything so bad as that. We will hope it was not.
The Shanghai Cock awakened all the other fowls. "Don't fly off your perch!" he cried. "Stay where you are! _Stay where where you are!_ STAY WHERE YOU ARE!" The other Cocks kept saying "Eru-u-u-u," as they do when Hawks are near. The Hens squawked and squawked and squawked, until they were out of breath. When they got their breath they squawked some more.
The Red Fox knew that it was time for him to go. The farmer would be sure to hear the noise. He put his head out of the hole through which he had come in, and he pushed as hard as he could with his hind feet and scrambled with his fore feet. His fur was crushed worse than ever, and he was squeezed so tightly that he could hardly breathe. You see it had been all he could do to get in through the hole, and now he had nine eggs in his stomach (excepting what had run down at the corners of his mouth), and he was too large to pass through.
The fowls saw what was the matter, and wanted to laugh. They thought it very funny, and yet the sooner he could get away the better they would like it. The Red Fox had his head outside and saw a light flash in the farmer's room. Then he heard doors open, and the farmer came toward the Hen-house with a lantern in his hand. Collie came trotting around the corner of the house. The Red Fox made one last desperate struggle and then lay still.
When the farmer picked him up and tied a rope around his neck, he had to pull him backward into the Hen-house to do it. The Red Fox was very quiet and gentle, as people of his family always are when caught. Collie pranced around on two legs and barked as loudly as he could. The fowls blinked their round yellow eyes in the lantern light, and the farmer's man ran out for an empty Chicken-coop into which to put the Red Fox. Collie was usually quite polite, but he had not forgotten how rude the Red Fox had been to him, and it was a fine chance to get even.
"Good evening!" he barked. "Oh, good evening! I'm glad you came. Don't think you must be going. Excuse me, but your mouth worked better than your legs, didn't it?"
The Red Fox shut his eyes and pretended not to hear. The dirt from the floor of the Hen-house had stuck to his egg-covered fur, and he looked very badly. They put him in a Chicken-coop with a board floor, so that he couldn't burrow out, and he curled down in a little heap and hid his face with his tail. Collie hung around for a while and then went off to sleep. After he was gone, the Red Fox cleaned his fur. "I got caught this time," he said, "but it won't happen again. Now I must watch for a chance to get away. It will surely come."
It did come. But that is another story.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE UNFORTUNATE FIREFLIES
Several very large families of Fireflies lived in the marsh and were much admired by their friends who were awake at night. Once in a while some young Firefly who happened to awaken during the day would go out and hover over the heads of the daylight people. He never had any attention paid to him then, however, for during the day he seemed like a very commonplace little beetle and nobody even cared to look at him a second time. The only remarkable thing about him was the soft light that shone from his body, and that could only be seen at night.
The older Fireflies told the younger ones that they should get all the sleep they could during the daytime if they were to flutter and frisk all night. Most of them did this, but two young Fireflies, who cared more about seeing the world than they did about minding their elders, used to run away while the rest were dreaming. Each thought herself very important, and was sure that if the others missed her they wouldn't sleep a wink all day.
One night they planned to go by daylight to the farthest corner of the marsh. They had heard a couple of young Muskrats talking about it, and thought it might be different from anything they had seen. They went to bed when the rest did and pretended to fall asleep. When she was sure that the older Fireflies were dreaming, one of them reached over with her right hind leg and touched the other just below the edge of her left wing-cover. "Are you ready?" she whispered.
"Yes," answered the friend, who happened to be the smaller of the two.
"Come on, then," said the larger one, picking her way along on her six tiptoes. It was already growing light, and they could see where they stepped, but, you know, it is hard to walk over rough places on two tiptoes, so you can imagine what it must be on six. There are some pleasant things about having many legs. There are also some hard things. It is a great responsibility.
When well away from their sleeping relatives, they lifted their wing-covers, spread their wings, and flew to the farthest corner of the marsh. They were not afraid of being punished if caught, for they were orphans and had nobody to bring them up. They were afraid that if the other Fireflies awakened they would be called "silly" or "foolish young bugs." They thought that they were old enough to take care of themselves, and did not want advice.
"Oh, wouldn't they make a fuss if they knew!" exclaimed the Larger Firefly.
"They think we need to be told every single thing," said the Smaller Firefly.
"Guess we're old enough now to go off by ourselves," said the Larger Firefly.
"I guess so," answered the Smaller Firefly. "I'm not afraid if it is light, and I can see pretty near as well as I can at night."
Just then a Flycatcher darted toward them and they had to hide. He had come so near that they could look down his throat as he flew along with his beak open. The Fireflies were so scared that their feelers shook.
"I wish that bird would mind his own business," grumbled the Larger Firefly.
"That's just what he was doing," said a voice beside them, as a Garter Snake drew himself through the grass. Then their feelers shook again, for they knew that snakes do not breakfast on grass and berries.
"Did you ever see such luck?" said the Smaller Firefly. "If it isn't birds it is snakes."
"Perfectly dreadful!" answered the other. "I never knew the marsh to be so full of horrid people. Besides, my eyes are bothering me and I can't see plainly."
"So are mine," said the Smaller Firefly. "Are you going to tell the other Fireflies all about things to-night?"
"I don't know that I will," said the Larger Firefly. "I'll make them ask me first."
Then they reached the farther corner of the marsh and crawled around to see what they could find. Their eyes bothered them so that they could not see unless they were close to things, so it was useless to fly. They peeped into the cool dark corners under the skunk cabbage leaves, and lay down to rest on a bed of soft moss. A few stalks of last year's teazles stood, stiff and brown, in the corner of the fence. The Smaller Firefly alighted on one and let go in such a hurry that she fell to the ground. "Ouch!" she cried. "It has sharp hooks all over it."
While they were lying on the moss and resting, they noticed a queer plant growing near. It had a flower of green and dark red which was unlike any other blossom they had ever seen. The leaves were even queerer. Each was stiff and hollow and grew right out of the ground instead of coming from a stalk.
"I'm going to crawl into one of them," said the Larger Firefly. "There is something sweet inside. I believe it will be lots better than the skunk cabbage." She balanced herself on the top of a fresh green leaf.
"I'm going into this one," said the other Firefly, as she alighted on the edge of a brown-tipped leaf. "It looks nice and dark inside. We must tell about this at the party to-night, even if they don't ask us."
Then they repeated together the little verse that some of the pond people use when they want to start together:
"Tussock, mud, water, and log, Muskrat, Snake, Turtle, and Frog, Here we go into the bog!"
When they said "bog" each dropped quickly into her own leaf.
For a minute nobody made a sound. Then there was a queer sputtering, choking voice in the fresh green leaf and exactly the same in the brown-tipped one. After that a weak little voice in the green leaf said, "Abuschougerh! I fell into water."
Another weak voice from the brown-tipped one replied, "Gtschagust! So did I."
On the inside of each leaf were many stiff hairs, all pointing downward. When the Fireflies dropped in, they had brushed easily past these hairs and thought it rather pleasant. Now that they were sputtering and choking inside, and wanted to get out, these same hairs stuck into their eyes and pushed against their legs and made them exceedingly uncomfortable. The water, too, had stood for some time in the leaves and did not smell good.
Perhaps it would be just as well not to tell all the things which those two Fireflies said, for they were tired and out of patience. After a while they gave up trying to get out until they should be rested. It was after sunset when they tried the last time, and the light that shone from their bellies brightened the little green rooms where they were. They rested and went at it carefully, instead of in the angry, jerky way which they had tried before. Slowly, one foot at a time, they managed to climb out of the doorway at the top. As they came out, they heard the squeaky voice of a young Mouse say, "Oh, where did those bright things come from?"
They also heard his mother answer, "Those are only a couple of foolish Fireflies who have been in the leaves of the pitcher-plant all day."
After they had eaten something they flew toward home. They knew that it would be late for the party, and they expected to surprise and delight everybody when they reached there. On the way they spoke of this. "I'm dreadfully tired," said one, "but I suppose we shall have to dance in the air with the rest or they will make a fuss."
"Yes," said the other. "It spoils everything if we are not there. And we'll have to tell where we've been and what we've done and whom we have seen, when we would rather go to sleep and make up what we lost during the daytime."
[Illustration: TWINKLING WITH HUNDREDS OF TINY LIGHTS.   _Page 157_]
As they came near the middle of the marsh they were surprised to see the mild summer air twinkling with hundreds of tiny lights as their friends and relatives flew to and fro in the dusk. "Well," said the Larger Firefly, "I think they might have waited for us."
"Humph!" said the Smaller Firefly. "If they can't be more polite than that, I won't play."
"After we've had such a dreadfully hard time, too," said the Larger Firefly. "Got most eaten by a Flycatcher and scared by a Garter Snake and shut up all day in the pitcher-plant. I won't move a wing to help on their old party."
So two very tired and cross young Fireflies sat on a last year's cat-tail and sulked. People didn't notice them because they were sitting and their bright bellies didn't show. After a long time an elderly Firefly came to rest on the cat-tail and found them. "Good evening," said he. "Have you danced until you are tired?"
They looked at each other, but before either could speak one of their young friends alighted beside them and said the same thing. Then the Smaller Firefly answered. "We have been away," said she, "and we are not dancing to-night."
"Going away, did you say?" asked the elderly Firefly, who was rather deaf. "I hope you will have a delightful time." Then he bowed and flew off.
"Don't stay long," added their young friend. "We shall be so lonely without you."
After he also was gone, the two runaways looked into each other's eyes. "We were not even missed!" they cried. "We had a bad time and nobody makes any fuss. They were dancing without us." Poor little Fireflies!
They were much wiser after that, for they had learned that two young Fireflies were not so wonderfully important after all. And that if they chose to do things which it was never meant young Fireflies should do, they would be likely to have a very disagreeable time, but that other Fireflies would go on eating and dancing and living their own lives. To be happy, they must keep the Firefly laws.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE KITTENS COME TO THE FOREST
One day the three big Kittens who lived with their mother in the farmer's barn had a dreadful quarrel. If their mother had been with them, she would probably have cuffed each with her fore paw and scolded them soundly. She was not with them because she had four little new Kittens lying beside her in the hay-loft over the stalls.
You would think that the older Kittens must have been very proud of their baby brothers and sisters, yet they were not. They might have done kind little things for their mother, but they didn't. They just hunted food for themselves and never took a mouthful of it to her. And this does not prove that they were bad Kittens. It just shows that they were young and thoughtless.
The Brown Kitten, the one whose fur was black and yellow mixed so finely as to look brown, had climbed the barn stairs to see them. When he reached their corner he sat down and growled at them. His mother said nothing at first, but when he went so far as to switch his tail in a threatening way, she left her new babies and sprang at him and told him not to show his whiskers upstairs again until he could behave properly.
His sisters, the Yellow Kitten and the White Kitten, stayed downstairs. They didn't dislike babies so much as their brother. They just didn't care anything about them. Cats never care much about Kittens, you know, unless they are their own, and big brothers always say that they can't bear them.
Now these three older Kittens were perfectly able to care for themselves. It was a long time since their mother stopped feeding them, and they were already excellent hunters. They had practised crouching, crawling, and springing before they left the hay-loft. Sometimes they hunted wisps of hay that moved when the wind blew in through the open door. Sometimes they pounced on each other, and sometimes they hunted the Grasshoppers who got brought in with the hay. It was when they were doing this once that they were so badly scared, but that is a story which has already been told.
There was no reason why they should feel neglected or worry about getting enough to eat. If one of them had poor luck in hunting, all he had to do was to hang around the barn when the Cows were brought up, and go into the house with the man when he carried the great pails full of foamy milk. Then if the Kittens acted hungry, mewed very loudly, and rubbed up lovingly against the farmer's wife they were sure to get a good, dishful of warm milk.
You can see how unreasonable they were. They had plenty to eat, and their mother loved them just as much as ever, but they felt hurt and sulked around in corners, and answered each other quite rudely, and would not run after a string which the farmer's little girl dangled before them. They were not cross all the time, because they had been up the whole night and had to sleep. They stopped being cross when they fell asleep and began again as soon as they awakened. The Hens who were feeding around became so used to it that as soon as they saw a Kitten twist and squirm, and act like awakening, they put their heads down and ran away as fast as they could.
They did not even keep themselves clean. Oh, they licked themselves over two or three times during the day, but not thoroughly. The Yellow Kitten did not once try to catch her tail and scrub it, and actually wore an unwashed tail all day. It didn't show very plainly because it was yellow, but that made it no cleaner. The White Kitten went around with her fore paws looking really disgraceful. The Brown Kitten scrubbed his ears in a sort of half-hearted way, and paid no attention to the place under his chin. When he did his ears, he gave his paw one lick and his ear one rub, and repeated this only six times. Everybody knows that a truly tidy Cat wets his paw with two licks, cleans his ear with two rubs, and does this over and over from twenty to forty times before he begins on the other ear.
Toward night they quarrelled over a dishful of milk which the farmer's wife gave them. There was plenty of room for them all to put their heads into the dish at once and lap until each had his share. If it had not been for their whiskers, there would have been no trouble. These hit, and each told the others to step back and wait. Nobody did, and there was such a fuss that the farmer's wife took the dish away and none of them had any more. They began to blame each other and talk so loudly that the man drove them all away as fast as they could scamper.
Now that they were separated, each began to grow more and more discontented. The Brown Kitten had crawled under the carriage house, and as soon as it was really dark he stole off to the forest.
"My mother has more Kittens," he said, "and my sisters get my whiskers all out of shape, and I'll go away and never come back. I won't say good-by to them either. I guess they'll feel badly then and wish they'd been nicer to me! If they ever find me and want me to come back, I won't go. Not if they beg and beg! I'll just turn my tail toward them and walk away."
The Brown Kitten knew that Cats sometimes went to live in the woods and got along very well. He was not acquainted with one who had done this; his mother had told him and his sisters stories of Cats who chose to live so. She said that was one thing which showed how much more clever they were than Dogs. Dogs, you know, cannot live happily away from men, although there may be the best of hunting around them.
"I will find a good hollow tree," said he, "for my home, and I will sleep there all day and hunt at night. I will eat so much that I shall grow large and strong. Then, when I go out to hunt, the forest people will say, 'Sh! Here comes the Brown Cat.'"
As he thought this he was running softly along the country road toward the forest. Once in a while he stopped to listen, and stood with his head raised and turned and one fore foot in the air. He kept his ears pointed forward all the time so as to hear better.
When he passed the marsh he saw the Fireflies dancing in the air. Sometimes they flew so low that a Kitten might catch them. He thought he would try, so he crawled through the fence and toward the place where they were dancing. He passed two tired ones sitting on a leaf and never saw them. That was because their wings covered their sides so well that no light shone past, and their bright bellies were close to the leaf. He had almost reached the dancers when he found his paws getting wet and muddy. That made him turn back at once, for mud was something he couldn't stand. "I wish I had something to eat," he said, as he took a bite of catnip. "This is very good for a relish, but not for a whole meal."
He trotted on toward the forest, thinking about milk and Fireflies and several other things, when he was stopped by some great winged person flying down toward him and then sweeping upward and alighting on a branch. The Brown Kitten drew back stiffly and said, "Ha-a-ah!"
"Who? Who? To who?" asked the person on the branch.
The Brown Kitten answered, "It is I." But the question came again: "Who? Who? To who?"
That made the Brown Kitten remember that, since his voice was not known in the forest, nobody could tell anything by his answer. This time he replied: "I am the Brown Kitten, if you please, and I have come to live in the forest."
"Who? Who? To who?" was the next question, and the Brown Kitten thought he was asked to whose home he was going.
"I am not going to anybody," he said. "I just wanted to come, and left my old home suddenly. I shall live alone and have a good time. I didn't even tell my mother."
"Who? Who? To who?" said the Great Horned Owl, for it was he.
"My m-mother," said the Brown Kitten, and then he ran away as fast as he could. He had seen the Owl more clearly as he spoke, and the Owl's face reminded him a little of his mother and made him want to see her. He ran so fast that he almost bumped into the Skunk, who was taking a dignified stroll through the forest and sniffing at nearly everything he saw. It was very lucky, you know, that he did not quite run into the Skunk, for Skunks do not like to be run into, and, if he had done so, other people would soon have been sniffing at him.
The Brown Kitten thought that the Skunk might be related to him. They were about the same size, and the Brown Kitten had been told that his relatives were not only different colors, but different shapes. His mother had told of seeing some Manx Kittens who had no tails at all, and he thought that the Skunk's elegant long-haired one needn't prevent his being a Cat.
"Good evening," said the Brown Kitten. "Would you mind telling me if you are a Cat."
"Cat? No!" growled the Skunk. "They sometimes call me a Wood-Kitty, but they have no right to. I am a Skunk, _Skunk_, SKUNK, and I am related to the Weasles. Step out of my path."
A family of young Raccoons in a tree called down teasingly to him to come up, but after he had started they told him to go down, and then laughed at him because he had to go tail first. He did not know that forest climbers turn the toes of their hind feet backward and scamper down head first. Still, it would have made no difference if he had known, for his toes wouldn't turn.
He found something to eat now and then, and he looked for a hollow tree. He found only one, and that was a Bee tree, so he couldn't use it. All around him the most beautiful mushrooms were pushing up from the ground. White, yellow, orange, red, and brown they were, and looked so plump and fair that he wanted to bite them. He knew, however, that some of them were very poisonous, so he didn't even lick them with his eager, rough little pink tongue. He was just losing his Kitten teeth, and his new Cat teeth were growing, and they made him want to bite almost everything he saw. One kind of mushroom, which he thought the prettiest of all, grew only on the trunks of fallen beech trees. It was white, and had a great many little branches, all very close together.
Most of the plants which he saw were sound asleep. Every plant has to sleep, you know, and most of them take a long nap at night. Some of them, like the water-lilies, also sleep on cloudy days. He was very fond of the clovers, but they had their leaflets folded tight, and only the mushrooms, the evening primroses, and a few others were wide awake. Everybody whom he met was a stranger, and he began to feel very lonely. Cats do not usually mind being alone. Indeed, they rather like it; still, you can see how hard it would be for a Kitten who had always been loved and cared for to find himself alone in a dark forest, where great birds ask the same questions over and over, and other people make fun of him. You wouldn't like it yourself, if you were a Kitten.
At last, when he was prowling along an old forest road and hoping to meet a tender young Wood-Mouse, he saw a couple of light-colored animals ahead of him. They looked to him very much like Kittens, but he remembered how the Skunk had snubbed him when taken for a Cat, and he kept still. He ran to overtake them and see more clearly, and just as he reached them they all came to a turn in the road.
Before he could speak or they could notice that he was there, the wind roared through the branches above, and just ahead two terrible great eyes glared at them out of an old log. They all stopped with their back-fur bristling and their tails arched stiffly. Not a sound did one of them make. They lifted first one foot and then another and backed slowly and silently away. When they had gone far enough, they turned quickly and ran down the old road as fast as their twelve feet could carry them. They never stopped until they were in the road for home and could look back in the starlight and be sure that nobody was following them. Then they stared at each other--the Yellow Kitten, the White Kitten, and the Brown Kitten.
"Did you run away to live in the forest?" asked the sisters.
"Did you?" asked the Brown Kitten.
"You'll never tell?" said they.
"Never!" said he.
"Well then, we did run away, and met each other just before you came. We meant to live in the forest."
"So did I," said he. "And I couldn't find any hollow tree."
"Did you meet that dreadful bird?" said they,--"the one who never hears your answers and keeps asking you over and over?"
"Yes," said he. "Don't you ever tell!"
"Ha-ha!" screamed a laughing little Screech-Owl, who had seen what had happened in the old forest road and flapped along noiselessly behind them.
"Three big Kittens afraid of fox-fire! O-ho! O-ho!"
Now all of them had heard about fox-fire and knew it was the light which shines from some kinds of rotten wood in the dark, but they held up their heads and answered, "We're not afraid of fox-fire."
"Ha-ha!" screamed the Screech-Owl again. "Thought you saw big eyes glaring at you. Only fox-fire. Dare you to come back if you are not afraid."
"We don't want to go back," answered the Brown Kitten. "We haven't time."
"Ha-ha!" screamed the Screech-Owl. "Haven't time! Where are you going?"
"Going home, of course," answered the Brown Kitten. And then he whispered to his sisters, "Let's!"
"All right," said they, and they raced down the road as fast as they could go. To this day their mother does not know that they ever ran away from home.
But it was only fox-fire.
[Illustration]
THE INQUISITIVE WEASELS
The Weasels were very unpopular with most of the forest people, the pond and meadow people did not like them, and those who lived in the farmyard couldn't bear them. Something went wrong there every time that a Weasel came to call. Once, you know, the Dorking Hen was so frightened that she broke her wonderful shiny egg, and there were other times when even worse things had happened. Usually there was a Chicken or two missing after the Weasel had gone.
The Weasels were very fond of their own family, however, and would tell their best secrets to each other. That meant almost as much with them as to share food, for they were very inquisitive and always wanted to know all about everything. They minded their own business, but they minded everybody's else as well. If you told a thing to one Weasel you might be sure that before the night was over every Weasel in the neighborhood would know all about it. They told other people, too, when they had a chance. They were dreadful gossips. If they saw a person do something the least unusual, they thought about it and talked about it and wondered what it meant, and decided that it meant something very remarkable and became very much excited. At such times, they made many excuses to go calling, and always managed to tell about what they had seen, what they had heard, and what they were perfectly certain it meant.
They went everywhere, and could go quietly and without being noticed. They were small people, about as long as Rats, but much more slender, and with such short legs that their bodies seemed to almost lie on the ground. All their fur was brown, except that on their bellies and the inside of their legs, which was pure white. Sometimes the fur on their feet matched their backs and sometimes it matched their bellies. That was as might happen. You can easily see how they could steal along over the brown earth or the dead leaves and grass without showing plainly. In winter they turned white, and then they did not show on the snow. The very tip of their short tails stayed a pale brown, but it was so tiny as hardly to be noticed. Any Hawk in the air, who saw just that bit of brown on the snow beneath him, would be likely to think it a leaf or a piece of bark and pay no more attention to it.
The Weasel mothers were very careful of their children and very brave. It made no difference how great the danger might be, they would stay by their babies and fight for them. And such workers as they were! It made no difference to them whether it was day or night, they would burrow or hunt just the same. When they were tired they slept, and when they awakened they began at once to do something.
[Illustration: IN WINTER THEY TURNED WHITE.              _Page 178_]
Several families lived in the high bank by the edge of the forest, just where the ground slopes down to the marsh. They had lived there year after year, and had kept on adding to their burrows. There was only one doorway to each burrow and that was usually hidden by some leaves or a stone. They were hardly as large as Chipmunk's holes and easily hidden. "It is a good thing to have a fine, large home," said the Weasels, "but we build for comfort, not for show."
All the Weasel burrows began alike, with a straight, narrow hall. Then more halls branched off from this, and every little way there would be a room in which to turn around or rest. In some of these they stored food; in others they had nothing but bones and things which were left from their meals. Each burrow had one fine, large room, bigger than an Ovenbird's nest, with a soft bed of leaves and fur. Some of the rooms were so near the top of the ground that a Weasel could dig his way up in a few minutes if he needed another door. They were the loveliest sort of places for playing hide-and-seek, and that is a favorite Weasel game, only every Weasel wants to seek instead of hiding. There was never a bit of loose earth around these homes, and that is the one secret which Weasels will not tell out of the family--they never tell what they do with the earth they dig out. It just disappears.
Weasels like to hunt in parties. They say there is no fun in doing anything unless you have somebody with whom to talk it over. One night four of them went out together as soon as it was dark. They were young fellows and had planned to go to the farmer's Hen-house for the first time. They started to go there, but of course they wanted to see everything by the way. They would run straight ahead for a little while, then turn off to one side, as Ants do, poking into a Chipmunk's hole or climbing a tree to find a bird's nest, eating whatever food they found, and talking softly about everything.
"It is disgraceful the way that Chipmunk keeps house," said one of them, as he came back from going through a burrow under a tree. "Half-eaten food dropped right on the floor of the burrow in the most careless way. It was only a nut. If it had been anything I cared for, I would have eaten it myself."
Then they gossiped about Chipmunks, and said that, although they always looked trim and neat, there was no telling what sort of housekeepers they were; and that it really seemed as though they would do better to stay at home more and run about the forest less. The Chipmunk heard all this from the tree where he had hidden himself, and would have liked to speak right out and tell them what he thought of callers who entered one's home without knocking and sneaked around to see how things were kept. He knew better than to do so, however. He knew that when four hungry Weasels were out hunting their supper, it was an excellent time to keep still. He was right. And there are many times when it is better for angry people to keep still, even if they are not afraid of being eaten.
After they had gone he came down. "It was lucky for me," he said, "that I awakened hungry and ate a lunch. If I hadn't been awake to run away there's no telling where I would be now. There are some things worse than having people think you a poor housekeeper."
Just as the Chipmunk was finishing his lunch, one of the Weasels whispered to the others to stop. "There is somebody coming," said he. "Let's wait and see what he is doing."
It was the Black-tailed Skunk, who came along slowly, sniffing here and there, and once in a while stopping to eat a few mouthfuls.
"Doesn't it seem to you that he acts very queerly?" said one of the Weasels to the rest.
"Very," replied another. "And he doesn't look quite as usual. I don't know that I ever saw him carry his tail in just that way."
"I'd like to know where he is going," said another. "I guess he doesn't think anybody will see him."
"Let's follow him," said the fourth Weasel, who had not spoken before.
While he was near them they hid behind a hemlock log out of which many tiny hemlocks were growing. Once in a while they peeped between the soft fringy leaves of these to see what he was doing. They were much excited. "He is putting his nose down to the ground," one would say. "It must be that he has found something."
Then another would poke his little head up through the hemlocks and look at the Skunk. "He couldn't have found anything after all," he would say. "I can't hear him eating."
"It is very strange," the rest would murmur.
Now it just happened that the Black-tailed Skunk had scented the Weasels and knew that they were near. He had also heard the rustling behind the hemlock log. He knew what gossips Weasels are, and he guessed that they were watching him, so he decided to give them something to think about. He knew that they would often fight people larger than themselves, but he was not afraid of anybody. He did not care to fight them either, for if he got near enough to really enjoy it they would be likely to bite him badly, and when a Weasel has set his teeth into anybody it is not easy to make him let go. "I rather think," said he to himself, "that there will be four very tired young Weasels sleeping in their burrows to-morrow."
"He's walking away," whispered one of the Weasels. "Where do you suppose he is going?"
"We'll have to find out," said the others, as they crept quietly out of their hiding-places.
The Skunk went exactly where he wanted to. Whenever he found food he ate it. The Weasels who followed after found nothing left for them. They became very hungry, but if one of them began to think of going off for a lunch, the Skunk was certain to do something queer. Sometimes he would lie down and laugh. Then the Weasels would peep at him from a hiding-place and whisper together.
"What do you suppose makes him laugh?" they would ask. "It must be that he is thinking of something wonderful which he is going to do. We must not lose sight of him."
Once he met the Spotted Skunk, his brother, and they whispered together for a few minutes. Then the Spotted Skunk laughed, and as he passed on, the Black-tailed Skunk called back to him: "Be sure not to tell any one. I do not want it known what I am doing."
Then the four young Weasels nudged each other and said, "There! We knew it all the time!"
After that, nobody spoke about being hungry. All they cared for was the following of the Black-tailed Skunk. Once, when they were in the marsh, they were so afraid of being seen that they slipped into the ditch and swam for a way. They were good swimmers and didn't much mind, but it just shows how they followed the Skunk. Once he led them over to the farm and they remembered their plan of going to the Hen-house. They were very, very hungry, and each looked at the others to see what they thought about letting the Skunk go and stopping for a hearty supper. Still, nobody spoke of doing so. One Weasel whispered: "Now we shall surely see what he is about. He ought to know that he cannot do wrong or mischievous things without being found out. And since we discover it ourselves, we shall certainly feel free to speak of it."
Collie, the watch-dog, was sleeping lightly, and came rushing around the corner of the house to see what strangers were there, but when he saw who they were, he dropped his tail and walked away. He was old enough to know many things, and he knew too much to fight either a Skunk or a Weasel. Every one lets Skunks alone, and it is well to let Weasels alone also, for although they are so small they bite badly.
Now the Black-tailed Skunk turned to the forest and walked toward his hole. The Screech-Owl passed them flying homeward, and several times Bats darted over their heads. When they went by the Bats' cave they could tell by the sound that ten or twelve were inside hanging themselves up for the day. A dim light showed in the eastern sky, and the day birds were stirring and beginning to preen their feathers.
"What do you think it means?" whispered the Weasels. "He seems to be going home. Do you suppose he has changed his mind?"
When he reached his hole the Black-tailed Skunk stopped and looked around. The Weasels hid themselves under some fallen leaves. "I bid you good-morning," said the Skunk, looking toward the place where they were. "I hope you are not _too_ tired. This walk has been very easy for me, but I fear it was rather long for Weasels. Besides, I have found plenty to eat and have chosen smooth paths for myself. Good-morning! I have enjoyed your company!"
When even the tip of his tail was hidden in the hole, the Weasels crawled from under the leaves and looked at each other.
"We believe he knew all the time that we were following him," they said. "He acted queerly just to fool us. The wretch!"
Yet after all, you see, he had done only what he did every night, and it was because they were watching and talking about him that they thought him going on some strange errand.
[Illustration]
THE THRIFTY DEER MOUSE
When the days grew short and chilly, and bleak winds blew out of the great blue-gray cloud banks in the west, many of the forest people went to sleep for the winter. And not only they, but over in the meadow the Tree Frog and the Garter Snake had already crawled out of sight and were dreaming sweetly. The song birds had long before this started south, and the banks of the pond and its bottom of comfortable soft mud held many sleepers. Under the water the Frogs had snuggled down in groups out of sight. Some of the Turtles were there also, and some were in the bank.
The Ground Hogs had grown stupid and dozy before the last leaves fluttered to the ground, and had been the first of the fur-bearers to go to bed for the winter. There were so many interesting things to see and do in the late fall days that they tried exceedingly hard to keep awake.
A Weasel was telling a Ground Hog something one day--and it was a very interesting piece of gossip, only it was rather unkind, and so might better not be told here--when he saw the Ground Hog winking very slow and sleepy winks and letting his head droop lower and lower. Once he asked him if he understood. The Ground Hog jumped and opened his eyes very wide indeed, and said: "Oh, yes, yes! Perfectly! Oh-ah-ah-ah-ah-ah." His yawn didn't look so big as it sounds, because his mouth was so small.
He tried to act politely interested, but just as the Weasel reached the most exciting part of his story, the Ground Hog rolled over sound asleep. The next day he said "good-by" to his friends, wished them a happy winter, and said he might see some of them before spring, as he should come out once to make the weather. "I only hope I shall awaken in time," he said, "but I am fat enough to sleep until the violets are up."
He had to be fat, you know, to last him through the cold weather without eating. He was so stout that he could hardly waddle, his big, loose-skinned body dragged when he walked, and was even shakier than ever. He really couldn't hurry by jumping and he was so short of breath that he could barely whistle when he went into his hole.
The Raccoons went after the Ground Hog and the Skunks were later still. They never slept so very long, and said they didn't really need to at all, and wouldn't except that they had nothing to do and it made housekeeping easier. It saved so much not to have to go out to their meals in the coldest weather.
When the large people were safely out of the way, the smaller ones had their best times. The Muskrats were awake, but they had their big houses to eat and were not likely to trouble Mice and Squirrels. There was not much to fear except Owls and Weasels. The Ground Hogs had once tried to get the Great Horned Owl to go south when the Cranes did, and he had laughed in their faces. "To-whoo!" said he. "Not I! I'm not afraid of cold weather. You don't know how warm feathers are. I never wear anything else. Furs are all right, but they are not feathers."
He and his relatives sat all day in their holes, and seldom flew out except at night. Sometimes, when the day was not too bright, they made short trips out for luncheon. It was very unfortunate for any Mouse to be near at those times.
Now the snow had fallen and the beautiful still cold days had come. The Weasels' fur had changed from brown to white, as it does in cold countries in winter. The Chipmunks had taken their last scamper until early spring, and were living, each alone, in their comfortable burrows. They were most independent and thrifty. No one ever heard of a Chipmunk lacking food unless some robber had carried off his nuts and corn. The Mice think that it must be very dull for a Chipmunk to stay by himself all winter, since he does not sleep steadily. The Chipmunks do not find it so. One of them said: "Dull? I never find it dull. When I am awake, I eat or clean my fur or think. If I had any one staying with me he might rouse me when I want to sleep, or pick the nut that I want for myself, or talk when I am thinking. No, thank you, I will go calling when I want company."
[Illustration: THE MICE MAKE WINTER THEIR PLAYTIME.      _Page 195_]
The Mice make winter their playtime. Then the last summer's babies are all grown up and able to look out for themselves, and the fathers and mother's have a chance to rest. The Meadow Mice come together in big parties and build groups of snug winter homes under the snow of the meadow, with many tiny covered walks leading from one to another. Their food is all around them--grass roots and brown seeds--and there is so much of it that they never quarrel to see who shall have this root and who shall have that. They sleep during the daytime and awaken to eat and visit and have a good time at night.
Sometimes they are awakened in the daytime, as they were when the Grouse broke through the snow near them. That was an accident, and the Grouse felt very sorry about it. They had snuggled down in a cozy family party near by, and were just starting out for a stroll one morning when the eldest son stumbled and fell and crushed through the snow into the little settlement of Meadow Mice.
The young Grouse was much ashamed of his awkwardness. "I am so sorry," he said. "I'm not used to my snow-shoes yet. This is the first winter I have worn them."
"That is all right," said the Oldest Mouse politely. "It must be hard to manage them at first. We hope you will have better luck after this." Then they bowed to each other and the Grouse walked off to join his brothers and sisters, lifting his feet with their newly grown feather snow-shoes very high at every step. The Meadow Mice went to work to make their homes neat again, yet they never looked really right until that snow had melted and more had fallen. One might think that the Meadow Mice and the Grouse would care less for each other after that, but it was not so. It never is so if people who make trouble are quick to say that they are sorry, and those who were hurt will keep patient and forgiving.
It was only the night after this happened that one of the Deer Mice had a great fright. His home was in a Bee tree in the forest. The Bees and he had always been the best of friends, and now that they were keeping close to their honeycomb all winter, the Deer Mouse had taken a small room in the same tree. It helped to keep him warm when he slept close to the Bees, for there was always some heat coming from their bodies. Once in a while, too, he took a nibble of honey, and they did not mind.
The Deer Mouse did not keep much of his own winter food where he lived. He had a few beechnuts near by, and when the weather was very stormy indeed he ate some of these. There was room for many more in the storeroom (another hole in the Bee tree), but he liked to keep food in many places. "It is wiser," said he. "Supposing I had them all here and this tree should be blown down, and it should fall in such a way that I couldn't reach the hole. What would I do then?"
He was talking to a Rabbit when he said this. The Rabbit never stored up food himself, yet he sometimes told other people how he thought it should be done. He was sure it would be better to have all the nuts in one place as the Chipmunks did. And now that the Deer Mouse had given his reasons, he was just as sure as ever. "The Bee tree is not very likely to blow down in that way," said he. "There is not much danger."
"Not much, but some," answered the Deer Mouse. "Hollow trees fall more quickly than solid ones. You may store your food where you please and I'll take care of mine."
The Deer Mouse spoke very decidedly, although he was perfectly polite. His beautiful brown eyes looked squarely at the Rabbit, and you could tell by the position of his slender long tail that he was much in earnest. The Rabbit went home.
The Deer Mouse put away hundreds and hundreds of beechnuts. These he took carefully out of their shells and laid in nicely lined holes in tree-trunks. He used leaves for lining these places. Besides keeping food in the trees, he hid little piles of nuts under stones and logs, and tucked seeds into chinks of fences or tiny pockets in the ground. He had worked in the wheatfield after the grain was cut, picking up and carrying away the stray kernels which had fallen from the sheaves. He never counted the places where food was stored, but he was happy in thinking about them. When he lay down to sleep in the morning he always knew where the next night's meals were coming from. There was not a thriftier, happier person in the forest. He was gentle, good-natured, and exceedingly businesslike. He was also very handsome, with large ears and white belly and feet.
The night after his cousins, the Meadow Mice, had been so frightened by the Grouse, this Deer Mouse started out for a good time. He called on the Meadow Mice, ate a chestnut which he dug up in the edge of the forest, scampered up a fence-post and tasted of his hidden wheat to be sure that it was keeping well, and then went to the tree where most of his beechnuts were stored. He was not quite certain that he wanted to eat one, but he wished to be sure that they were all right before he went on. He had been invited to a party by some other Deer Mice, and so, you see, it wouldn't do for him to spoil his appetite. They would be sure to have refreshments at the party.
"I suppose they are all right," said he, as he started to run up the tree; "still it is just as well to be sure."
"My whiskers!" he exclaimed, when he reached the hole. "If that isn't just like a Red Squirrel!"
The opening into the tree had been barely large enough for him to squeeze through, and now he could pass in without crushing his fur. Around the edge of it were many marks of sharp teeth. Somebody had wanted to get in and had not found the doorway large enough. The Deer Mouse went inside and sat on his beechnuts. Then he thought and thought and thought. He knew very well that it was a Red Squirrel, for the Red Squirrels are not so thrifty as most of the nut-eaters. They make a great fuss about gathering food in the fall, and frisk and chatter and scold if anybody else comes where they are busy. For all that, the Chipmunks and the Deer Mice work much harder than they. It is not always the person who makes the greatest fuss, you know, who does the most.
A Red Squirrel is usually out of food long before spring comes, and after that he takes whatever he can lay his paws on. Sometimes the Chipmunks tell them that they should be ashamed of themselves and work harder. Then the Red Squirrels sigh and answer, "Oh, that is all very well for you to say, still you must remember that we have not such cheek pouches as you."
The Deer Mouse thought of these things. "Cheek pouches!" cried he. "I have no cheek pouches, but I lay up my own food. It is only an excuse when they say that. I don't think much of people who make excuses."
He passed through the doorway several times to see just how big it was. He found it was not yet large enough for a Red Squirrel. Then he scampered over the snow to a friend's home. "I'm not going to the party," said he. "I have some work to do."
"Work?" said the friend. "Work? In winter?" But before he had finished speaking his caller had gone.
All night long the Deer Mouse carried beechnuts from the old hiding-place to a new one. He wore quite a path in the snow between one tree and the other. His feet were tiny, but there were four of them, and his long tail dragged after him. It was not far that he had to go. The new place was one which he had looked at before. It was in a maple tree, and had a long and very narrow opening leading to the storeroom. It was having to go so far into the tree that had kept the Deer Mouse from using it before. Now he liked it all the better for having this.
"If that Red Squirrel ever gnaws his way in here," he said, "he won't have any teeth left for eating."
When the sun rose, the Deer Mouse went to sleep in the maple tree. The Red Squirrel came and gnawed at the opening into his old storeroom. If he had gnawed all day he would surely have gotten in. As it was, he had to spend much time hunting for food. He found some frozen apples still hanging in the orchard, and bit away at them until he reached the seeds inside. He found one large acorn, but it was old and tasted musty. He also squabbled with another Red Squirrel and chased him nearly to the farmyard. Then Collie heard them and chased him most of the way back.
When night came and he ran off to sleep in his hollow tree, he had made the hole almost, but not quite, large enough. He could smell the beechnuts inside, and it made him hungry to think how good they would taste. "I will get up early to-morrow morning and come here," he said. "I can gnaw my way in before breakfast, and then!"
He went off in fine leaps to his home and was soon sound asleep. In summer he often frolicked around half of the night, but now it was cold, and when the sun went down he liked to get home quickly and wrap up warmly in his tail. The Red Squirrel was hardly out of sight when the Deer Mouse came along his path in the snow and up to his old storeroom. His dainty white feet shook a little as he climbed, and he hardly dared look in for fear of finding the hole empty. You can guess how happy he was to find everything safe.
All night long he worked, and when morning came it was a very tired little Deer Mouse who carried his last beechnut over the trodden path to its safe new resting place. He was tired but he was happy.
There was just one other thing that he wanted to do. He wanted to see that Red Squirrel when he found the beechnuts gone. He waited near by for him to come. It was a beautiful, still winter morning when the hoar-frost clung to all the branches, and the shadows which fell upon the snow looked fairly blue, it was so cold. The Deer Mouse crouched down upon his dainty feet to keep them warm, and wrapped his tail carefully around to help.
Along came the Red Squirrel, dashing finely and not noticing the Deer Mouse at all. A few leaps brought him to the tree, a quick run took him to the hole, and then he began to gnaw. The Deer Mouse was growing sleepy and decided not to wait longer. He ran along near the Red Squirrel. "Oh, good-morning!" said he. "Beautiful day! I see you are getting that hole ready to use. Hope you will like it. I liked it very well for a while, but I began to fear it wasn't safe."
"Wh-what do you mean?" asked the Red Squirrel sternly. He had seen the Deer Mouse's eyes twinkle and he was afraid of a joke.
"Oh," answered the Deer Mouse with a careless whisk of his tail, "I had some beechnuts there until I moved them."
"You had!" exclaimed the Red Squirrel. He did not gnaw any after that. He suddenly became very friendly. "You couldn't tell me where to find food, I suppose," said he. "I'd eat almost anything."
The Deer Mouse thought for a minute. "I believe," said he, "that you will find plenty in the farmer's barn, but you must look out for the Dog."
"Thank you," said the Red Squirrel. "I will go."
"There!" said the Deer Mouse after he had whisked out of sight. "He has gone to steal from the farmer. Still, men have so very much that they ought to share with Squirrels."
And that, you know, is true.
[Illustration]
THE HUMMING-BIRD AND THE HAWK-MOTH
The Hawk-Moths are acquainted with nearly everybody and are great society people. They are invited to companies given by the daylight set, and also to parties given at night by those who sleep during the day. This is not because the Hawk-Moths are always awake. Oh dear, no! There is nobody in pond, forest, meadow, marsh, or even in houses, who can be well and strong and happy without plenty of sleep.
The Hawk-Moths were awake more or less during the day, but it was not until the sun was low in the western sky that they were busiest. When every tree had a shadow two or three times as long as the tree itself, then one heard the whir-r-r of wings and the Hawk-Moths darted past. They staid up long after the daylight people went to bed. The Catbird, who sang from the tip of the topmost maple tree branch long after most of his bird friends were asleep, said that when he tucked his head under his wing the Hawk-Moths were still flying. In that way, of course, they became acquainted with the people of the night-time.
There was one fine large Hawk-Moth who used to be a Tomato Worm when he was young, although he really fed as much upon potato vines as upon tomato plants. He was handsome from the tip of his long, slender sucking-tongue to the tip of his trim, gray body. His wings were pointed and light gray in color, with four blackish lines across the hind ones. His body was also gray, and over it and his wings were many dainty markings of black or very dark gray. On the back part of it he had ten square yellow spots edged with black. There were also twenty tiny white spots there, but he did not care so much for them. He always felt badly to think that his yellow spots showed so little. That couldn't be helped, of course, and he should have been thankful to have them at all.
Another thing which troubled him was the fact that he couldn't see his own yellow spots. He would have given a great deal to do so. He could see the yellow spots of other Hawk-Moths who had been Tomato Worms when he was, but that was not like seeing his own. He had tried and tried, and it always ended in the same way--his eyes were tired and his back ached. His body was so much stouter and stiffer than that of his butterfly cousins that he could not bend it easily.
When he got to thinking about his yellow spots he often flew away to the farmer's potato-fields, where the young Tomato Worms were feeding. He would fly around them and cry out: "Look at my yellow spots. Are they not fine?" Then he would dart away to the vegetable-garden and balance himself in the air over the tomato plants. The humming of his wings would make the Tomato Worms there look up, and he would say: "If you are good little Worms and eat a great deal, you may some day become fine Moths like me and have ten yellow spots apiece."
Sometimes he even went down to the corner where the farmer had tobacco plants growing, and showed his yellow spots to the Tomato Worms there. He never went anywhere else, for these worms do not care for other things to eat. Everywhere that he went the Tomato Worms exclaimed: "Oh! Oh! What beautiful yellow spots! What wonderful yellow spots!" When he flew away they would not eat for a while, but rested on their fat pro-legs, raised the front part of their bodies in the air, folded their six little real legs under their chins, and thought and thought and thought. They always sat in that position when they were thinking, and they had a great many cousins who did the same thing. It was a habit which ran in the family.
When other people saw them sitting in this way, with their real legs crossed under their chins, they always cried: "Look at the Sphinxes!" although not one of them knew what a Sphinx really was. And that was just one of their habits. This was why the Hawk-Moths were sometimes called Sphinx-Moths.
It was not kind in the Hawk-Moth to come and make the Tomato Worms discontented. If he had stayed away, they would have thought it the loveliest thing in the world to be fat green Tomato Worms with two sorts of legs and each with a horn standing up on the hind end of his body. That is not the usual place for horns, still it does very well, and these horns are worn only for looks. They are never used for poking or stinging.
Before the Hawk-Moth came to visit them, the Tomato Worms had thought it would be quiet, and restful, and pleasant to lie all winter in their shining brown pupa-cases in the ground, waiting for the spring to finish turning them into Moths. Now they were so impatient to get their yellow spots that they could hardly bear the idea of waiting. They did not even care about the long, slender tongue-case which every Tomato-Worm has on his pupa-case, and which looks like a handle to it.
One day the Tomato Worms told the Ruby-throated Humming-Bird about all this. The Humming-Bird was a very sensible fellow, and would no doubt have been a hard-working husband and father if his wife had not been so independent. He had been a most devoted lover, and helped build a charming nest of fern-wool and plant-down, and cover it with beautiful gray-green lichens. When done it was about as large as half of a hen's egg, and a morning-glory blossom would have more than covered it. The lichens were just the color of the branch on which it rested, and one could hardly see where it was. That is the nicest thing to be said about a nest. If a bird ever asks you what you think of his nest, and you wish to say something particularly agreeable, you must stare at the tree and ask: "Where is it?" Then, when he has shown it to you, you may speak of the soft lining, or the fine weaving, or the stout way in which it is fastened to the branches.
After this nest was finished and the two tiny white eggs laid in it, Mrs. Humming-Bird cared for nothing else. She would not go honey-hunting with her husband, or play in the air with him as she used to do. He tried to coax her by darting down toward her as she sat covering her eggs, and by squeaking the sweetest things he could think of into her ear, but she acted as though she cared more for the eggs than for him, and did not even squeak sweet things back. So, of course, he went away, and let her hatch and bring up her children as she chose. It was certainly her fault that he left her. She might not have been able to leave the eggs, but she could have squeaked.
Now that the Ruby-throated Humming-Bird had no home cares, he made many calls on his friends. They were very short calls, for he would seldom sit down, yet he heard and told much news while he balanced himself in the air with his tiny feet curled up and his wings moving so fast that one could not see them.
When the Tomato Worms told him how they felt about the Hawk-Moth's yellow spots, he became very indignant. "Those poor young worms!" he said to himself. "It is a shame, and something must be done about it."
The more he thought, the angrier he became, and his feathers fairly stood on end. He hardly knew what he was doing, and ran his long, slender bill into the same flowers several times, although he had taken all the honey from them at first.
That night, when the sun had set and the silvery moon was peeping above a violet-colored cloud in the eastern sky, the Ruby-throated Humming-Bird sat on the tip of a spruce-tree branch and waited for the Hawk-Moth.
"I hope nobody else will hear me talking," said he. "It would sound so silly if I were overheard." He sat very still, his tiny feet clutching the branch tightly. It was late twilight now and really time that he should go to sleep, but he had decided that if he could possibly keep awake he would teach the Hawk-Moth a lesson.
"I wish he would hurry," said he. "I can hardly keep my eyes open." He did not yawn because he had not the right kind of mouth for it. You know a yawn ought to be nearly round. His beak would have made one a great, great many times higher than it was wide, and that would have been exceedingly unbecoming to him.
Yellow evening primroses grew near the spruce-tree, and the tall stalks were opening their flowers for the night. Above the seed-pods and below the buds on each stalk two, three, or four blossoms were slowly unfolding. The Ruby-throated Humming-Bird did not often stay up long enough to see this, and he watched the four smooth yellow petals of one untwist themselves until they were free to spring wide open. He had watched five blossoms when he heard the Hawk-Moth coming. Then he darted toward the primroses and balanced himself daintily before one while he sucked honey from it.
Whir-r-r-r! The Hawk-Moth was there. "Good evening," said he. "Rather late for you, isn't it?"
"It is a little," answered the Humming-Bird. "Growing a bit chilly, too, isn't it? I should think you'd be cold without feathers. Mine are such a comfort. Feel as good as they look, and that is saying a great deal."
The Hawk-Moth balanced himself before another primrose and seemed to care more about sucking honey up his long tongue-tube than he did about talking.
[Illustration: THE HUMMING-BIRD AND THE HAWK-MOTH.       _Page 218_]
"I think it is a great thing to have a touch of bright color, too," said the Humming-Bird. "The beautiful red spot on my throat looks particularly warm and becoming when the weather is cool. You ought to have something of the sort."
"I have yellow spots--ten of them," answered the Hawk-Moth sulkily.
"You have?" exclaimed the Humming-Bird in the most surprised way. "Oh yes! I think I do remember something about them. It is a pity they don't show more. Mrs. Humming-Bird never wears bright colors. She says it would not do. People would see her on her nest if she did. Excepting the red spot, she is dressed like me--white breast, green back and head, and black wings and tail. Green is another good color. You should wear some green."
The Hawk-Moth murmured that he didn't see any particular use in wearing green.
"Oh," said the Humming-Bird, "it is just the thing to wear--neat, never looks dusty" (here the Hawk-Moth drew back, for his own wings, you know, were almost dust color), "and matches the leaves perfectly."
The Hawk-Moth said something about having to go and thinking that the primrose honey was not so good as usual.
"I thought it excellent," said the Humming-Bird. "Perhaps you do not get it so easily as I. Ah yes, you use a tongue-tube. What different ways different people do have. Now I like honey, but I could not live many days on that alone. What I care most for is the tiny insects that I find eating it. And you cannot eat meat. What a pity! I must say that you seem to make the best of it, though, and do fairly well. Oh, must you go? Well, good night."
The Hawk-Moth flew away feeling very much disgusted. He had always thought himself the most beautiful person in the neighborhood. He rather thought so still. Yet it troubled him to know that others did not think so, and he began to remember how many times he had heard people admire the Ruby-throated Humming-Bird. He never liked him after that. But neither did he brag.
The young Tomato Worms soon forgot what the Hawk-Moth had said to them, and became happy and contented once more. The Ruby-throated Humming-Bird never cared to talk about it, yet he was once heard to say that he would rather offend the Hawk-Moth and even make him a little unhappy than to have him bothering the poor little Tomato Worms all the time.
[Illustration]
End of Project Gutenberg's Among the Night People, by Clara Dillingham Pierson

= = = PG35002 = = =
AMONG THE POND PEOPLE
Produced by Heather Clark and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
[Illustration: _Frontispiece_       "BADDY-BADDY!"       _Page 142_]
AMONG THE POND PEOPLE
BY CLARA DILLINGHAM PIERSON Author of "Among the Meadow People," "Forest People," etc.
Illustrated by F. C. GORDON
NEW YORK E. P. DUTTON AND COMPANY 31 WEST TWENTY-THIRD STREET
COPYRIGHT, 1901 BY E. P. DUTTON & CO.
The Knickerbocker Press, New York
TO
JOHN W. S. PIERSON
THIS BOOK IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED
Dear Little Friends:--When the ten Polliwogs came to spend a day with me, some two years ago, I promised to tell you stories of how they and their neighbors live in the pond. I wanted to tell the stories at once, but this is a busy world and story-telling is only play, so there were many things to be done before I could sit down to my desk and hold my pen while the stories slid out of it onto paper. I wonder where all my ten Polliwogs are now!
One cannot come to know pond people quite so well as those who live in the forest or in the meadow, yet down in the shining water they live and build their homes and learn much that they need to know. And wherever people are living, and working, and playing, there are stories to be found. The pond people cannot be well or happy long away from the water, and you can only come to know them by watching the ponds and brooks. If you do that and are very quiet, the Minnows will swim to where you are, the Mud Turtles will waddle out on the logs in the sunshine, and you may even see a Crayfish walking backward along the sand.
But if you should see a very large, black bug with fore legs which open and shut like jack-knives--then keep away from him, for that is Belostoma. Some time you may see him under the electric lights in the city, for he likes to sprawl around there, and you can look at him on land, but let him alone.
Remember that the Dragon-Flies and many of their friends who seem to do nothing but play in the sunshine, have lived long in the dusky pond, and that this life in the air comes only after a long time of getting ready. Remember that if you pick up a Turtle or catch Minnows in a net, you must not leave the Turtle on his back or keep any water-breathing people, like the Minnows, in the air. Watch them for a little while and then let them go free.
And then remember, be sure to remember, this: that you are not to get acquainted with the pond people by tumbling into the water or by going into it with your shoes and stockings on. If you do that, your mothers will say, "We wish that Mrs. Pierson had never written about the pond people." And if they should say that, just think how I would feel!
Your friend, CLARA DILLINGHAM PIERSON.
STANTON, MICHIGAN, December 22, 1900
CONTENTS
ILLUSTRATIONS
THE BIGGEST FROG AWAKENS
The Biggest Frog stretched the four toes of his right forefoot. Then he stretched the four toes of his left forefoot. Next he stretched the five toes of his right hindfoot. And last of all he stretched the four toes of his left hindfoot. Then he stretched all seventeen toes at once. He should have had eighteen toes to stretch, like his friends and neighbors, but something had happened to the eighteenth one a great many years before. None of the pond people knew what had happened to it, but _something_ had, and when the Tadpoles teased him to tell them what, he only stared at them with his great eyes and said, "My children, that story is too sad to tell."
After the Biggest Frog had stretched all his toes, he stretched his legs and twitched his lips. He poked his head out of the mud a very, very little way, and saw a Minnow swimming past. "Good day!" said he. "Is it time to get up?"
"Time!" exclaimed the Minnow, looking at him with her mouth open. "I should say it was. Why, the watercress is growing!"
Now every one who lives in a pond knows that when the watercress begins to grow, it is time for all the winter sleepers to awaken. The Biggest Frog crawled out of the mud and poked this way and that all around the spot where he had spent the cold weather. "Wake up!" he said. "Wake up! Wake up!" The water grew dark and cloudy because he kicked up so much mud, but when it began to clear again he saw the heads of his friends peeping up everywhere out of that part of the pond bottom. Seven of them had huddled close to him all winter. "Come out!" he cried. "The spring is here, and it is no time for Frogs to be asleep."
"Asleep! No indeed!" exclaimed his sister, an elderly and hard-working Frog, as she swam to the shore and crawled out on it. She ate every bit of food that she found on the way, for neither she nor any of the others had taken a mouthful since the fall before.
The younger Frogs followed through the warmer shallow water until they were partly out of it. There is always a Biggest Frog in every pond. All the young Frogs thought how fine it would be to become the Biggest Frog of even a very small puddle, for then they could tell the others what to do. Now they looked at their leader and each said to himself, "Perhaps some day I shall begin the concert."
The Biggest Frog found a comfortable place and sat down. He toed in with his eight front toes, as well-bred frogs do, and all his friends toed in with their eight front toes. He toed out with his nine back toes, and all his friends toed out with their ten back toes. One young Yellow Brown Frog said, "How I wish I did not have that bothersome fifth toe on my left hindfoot! It is so in the way! Besides, there is such a style about having one's hind feet different." He spoke just loud enough for the Biggest Frog to hear. Any one would know from this remark that he was young and foolish, for when people are wise they know that the most beautiful feet and ears and bodies are just the way that they were first made to be.
Now the Biggest Frog swallowed a great deal of air, filled the sacs on each side of his neck with it, opened his big mouth, and sang croakily, "Frogs! Frogs! Frogs! Frogs! Frogs! Frogs! Frogs! Frogs!" And all the others sang, "Frogs! Frogs! Frogs!" as long as he. The Gulls heard it, and the Muskrats heard it, and all were happy because spring had come.
A beautiful young Green Brown Frog, who had never felt grown-up until now, tried to sing with the others, but she had not a strong voice, and was glad enough to stop and visit with the Biggest Frog's Sister. "Don't you wish we could sing as loudly as they can?" said she.
"No," answered the Biggest Frog's Sister. "I would rather sit on the bank and think about my spring work. Work first, you know, and pleasure afterward!"
"Oh!" said the Green Brown Frog. "Then you don't want to sing until your work is done?"
"You may be very sure I don't want to sing then," answered the older Frog. "I am too tired. Besides, after the eggs are laid, there is no reason for wanting to sing."
"Why not?" asked the Green Brown Frog. "I don't see what difference that makes."
"That," said the older Frog wisely, "is because you are young and have never laid eggs. The great time for singing is before the eggs are laid. There is some singing afterward, but that is only because people expect it of us, and not because we have the same wish to sing." After she had said all this, which was a great deal for a Frog to say at once, she shut her big mouth and slid her eyelids over her eyes.
There was another question which the Green Brown Frog wanted very much to ask, but she had good manners and knew that it was impolite to speak to any Frog whose eyes were not open. So she closed her own eyes and tried to think what the answer would be. When she opened them again, the Biggest Frog's Sister had hopped away, and in her place sat the Yellow Brown Frog, the same handsome young fellow who had found one of his toes in the way. It quite startled her to find him sitting so close to her and she couldn't think of anything to say, so she just looked at him with her great beautiful eyes and toed in a little more with her front feet. That made him look at them and see how pretty they were, although of course this was not the reason why she had moved them.
The Yellow Brown Frog hopped a little nearer and sang as loudly as he could, "Frogs! Frogs! Frogs! Frogs! Frogs! Frogs! Frogs! Frogs!" Then she knew that he was singing just for her, and she was exceedingly happy. She swallowed air very fast because she seemed to be out of breath from thinking what she should answer. She had wanted to ask the Biggest Frog's Sister what she should say if any one sang to her alone. She knew that if she wanted to get away from him, all she had to do was to give a great jump and splash into the water. She didn't want to go away, yet she made believe that she did, for she hopped a little farther from him.
He knew she was only pretending, though, for she hadn't hopped more than the length of a grass-blade. So he followed her and kept on singing. Because she knew that she must say something, she just opened her mouth and sang the first words that she could think of; and what she sang was, "Eggs! Eggs! Eggs! Eggs! Eggs! Eggs! Eggs! Eggs!" As it happened, this was exactly what she should have sung, so he knew that she liked him. They stayed together for a long, long time, and he sang a great deal and very loudly, and she sang a little and very softly.
After a while she remembered that she was now a fully grown Frog and had spring work to do, and she said to him, "I really must lay some eggs. I am going into the water."
"Then I will go too," said he. And they gave two great leaps and came down with two great splashes.
[Illustration: "THEN I WILL GO TOO," SAID HE.              _Page 9_]
The Green Brown Frog laid eggs for four days, and the Yellow Brown Frog stayed with her all that time and took care of the eggs after she had laid them. They were covered with a sort of green jelly which made them stick to each other as they floated in little heaps on the water. The Frogs thought that a good thing, for then, when the Tadpoles hatched, each would have playmates near.
One day, after the eggs were all laid and were growing finely (for Frogs' eggs grow until the Tadpoles are ready to eat their way out), the Green Brown Frog sat alone on the bank of the pond and the Biggest Frog's Sister came to her. She had a queer smile around the corners of her mouth. Frogs have excellent mouths for smiling, but it takes a very broad smile to go way across, so when they smile a little it is only at the corners. "How are your eggs growing?" she asked.
"Oh," answered the Green Brown Frog sadly, "I can't tell which ones they are."
"That's just like a young Frog," said the Biggest Frog's Sister. "Is there any reason why you should know which ones they are? It isn't as though you were a bird and had to keep them warm, or as though you were a Mink and had to feed your children. The sun will hatch them and they will feed themselves all they need."
"I think," said the Green Brown Frog, "that my eggs were a little better than the rest."
"Yes," croaked the Biggest Frog's Sister, "every Frog thinks that."
"And I wanted to have my own Tadpoles to look after," sighed the Green Brown Frog.
"Why?" asked the Biggest Frog's Sister. "Can't you take any comfort with a Tadpole unless you laid the egg from which he was hatched? I never know one of my own eggs a day after it is laid. There are such a lot floating around that they are sure to get mixed. But I just make the best of it."
"How?" asked the Green Brown Frog, looking a little more cheerful.
"Oh, I swim around and look at all the eggs, and whenever I see any Tadpoles moving in them I think, 'Those may be mine!' As they are hatched I help any one who needs it. Poor sort of Frog it would be who couldn't like other people's Tadpoles!"
"I believe I'll do that way," said the Green Brown Frog. "And then," she added, "what a comfort it will be if any of them are cross or rude, to think, 'I'm glad I don't know that they are mine.'"
"Yes," said the Biggest Frog's Sister. "I often tell my brother that I pity people who have to bring up their own children. It is much pleasanter to let them grow up as they do and then adopt the best ones. Do you know, I have almost decided that you are my daughter? My brother said this morning that he thought you looked like me."
THE DANCE OF THE SAND-HILL CRANES
One fine day in spring, a great flock of Sand-hill Cranes came from the south. They were flying high and quietly because the weather was bright. If it had been stormy, or if they had been flying by night, as they usually did, they would have stayed nearer the ground, and their leader would have trumpeted loudly to let his followers know which way he was going. They would also have trumpeted, but more softly, to tell him that they were coming after.
They were a fine company to look upon, orderly, strong, and dignified. Their long necks were stretched out straight ahead, their long legs straight behind, and they beat the air with slow, regular strokes of the strong wings. As they came near the pond, they flew lower and lower, until all swept down to the earth and alighted, tall and stately, by the edge of the water.
They had eaten nothing for several days, and were soon hunting for food, some on land, and some in the water, for they had stopped to feed and rest. Those who hunted in the water, did so very quietly. A Crane would stand on one leg, with his head against his breast, so quietly that one might think him asleep: but as soon as anything eatable came near, he would bend his body, stretch out his neck, open his long, slender bill, and swallow it at one gulp. Then he would seem to fall asleep again.
While most of the Cranes were still feeding, some of them were stalking through the woods and looking this way and that, flying up to stand on a tree, and then flying down to stand on the ground. They were those who thought of staying there for the summer.
When the flock arose to fly on again, eight Cranes stayed behind. They watched their friends fly away, and stood on the ground with their necks and bills uplifted and mouths open, while they trumpeted or called out, "Good-bye! Stop for us in the fall!" The flying Cranes trumpeted back, "We will! Don't forget us!"
That night they slept near together, as they had done when with the large flock, and one Crane kept awake to watch for danger while the others tucked their heads under their wings. They were fine looking, even when they slept, and some people never look well unless they are awake. They were brownish-gray, with no bright markings at all, and their long legs gave them a very genteel look. The tops of their heads were covered with warty red skin, from which grew short black feathers that looked more like hairs.
One morning, when the Cranes awakened, a fine young fellow began to strut up and down before the rest, bowing low, and leaping high into the air, and every now and then whooping as loudly as he could. The Gulls, who had spent the winter by the pond, screamed to each other, "The Crane dance has begun!" Even the Frogs, who are afraid of Cranes, crept quietly near to look on.
It was not long before another young Crane began to skip and hop and circle around, drooping his wings and whooping as he went. Every Crane danced, brothers, and sisters, and all, and as they did so, they looked lovingly at each other, and admired the fine steps and enjoyed the whooping. This went on until they were so tired they could hardly stand, and had to stop to eat and rest.
When they were eating, the young fellow who had begun the dance, stalked up to the sister of one of his friends, as she stood in the edge of the pond, gracefully balanced on one leg. She did not turn her head towards him, although, having such a long and slender neck, she could have done so with very little trouble. She stood with her head on her breast and looked at the water. After a while, he trumpeted softly, as though he were just trying his voice. Then she gave a pretty little start, and said, "Oh, are you here? How you did frighten me!"
"I am sorry," he said. "I did not want to frighten you." And he looked at her admiringly.
"It was just for a minute," she answered. "Of course I am not frightened now that I know who it is."
Then they stood and fished for a long time without saying anything. When she flew away, she said, "That is a very pleasant fishing-place." He stood on the other leg for a while, and thought how sweet her voice sounded as she said it. Then he thought that, if she liked the place so well, she might come there again the next day. He wondered why he could not come too, although everybody knows that a Crane catches more if he fishes alone.
The next morning, when the Cranes danced, he bowed to her oftener than to any of the rest, and he thought she noticed it. They danced until they were almost too tired to move, and indeed he had to rest for a while before he went to feed. As she stalked off toward the pond, she passed him, and she said over her shoulder, "I should think you would be hungry. I am almost starved." After she had gone, he wondered why she had said that. If he had been an older Crane, and understood the ways of the world a little better, he would have known that she meant, "Aren't you coming to that fishing-place? I am going now." Still, although he was such a young Crane and had never danced until this year, he began to think that she liked him and enjoyed having him near. So he flew off to the fishing-place where he had seen her the day before, and he stalked along to where she was, and stood close to her while she fished. Once, when he caught something and swallowed it at one gulp, she looked admiringly at him and said, "What fine, big mouthfuls you can take!"
[Illustration: "WHAT FINE, BIG MOUTHFULS YOU CAN TAKE!"   _Page 19_]
That pleased him, of course, because Cranes think that big mouthfuls are the best kind, so he tipped his head to one side, and watched his neck as the mouthful slid down to his stomach. He could see it from the outside, a big bunch slowly moving downward. He often did this while he was eating. He thought it very interesting. He pitied short-necked people. Then he said, "Pooh! I can take bigger mouthfuls than that. You ought to see what big mouthfuls I can take."
She changed, and stood on her other leg. "I saw you dancing this morning," she said. Now it was not at all queer that she should have seen him dancing, for all the eight Cranes had danced together, but he thought it very wonderful.
"Did you notice to whom I bowed?" he asked. He was so excited that his knees shook, and he had to stand on both legs at once to keep from falling. When a Crane is as much excited as that, it is pretty serious.
"To my sister?" she asked carelessly, as she drew one of her long tail-feathers through her beak.
"No," said he. "I bowed to her sister." He thought that was a very clever thing to say. But she suddenly raised her head, and said, "There! I have forgotten something," and flew off, as she had done the day before. He wondered what it was. Long afterward he asked her what she had forgotten and she said she couldn't remember--that she never could remember what she had forgotten.
It made him feel very badly to have her leave him so. He wanted a chance to tell her something, yet, whenever he tried to, it seemed to stick in his bill. He began to fear that she didn't like him; and the next time the Cranes danced he didn't bow to her so much, but he strutted and leaped and whooped even more. And she strutted and leaped and whooped almost as loudly as he. When they were all tired out and had stopped dancing, she said to him, "I am so tired! Let us go off into the woods and rest."
You may be very sure he was glad to go, and as he stalked off with her, he led the way to a charming nesting-place. He didn't know just how to tell what he wanted to, but he had seen another Crane bowing to her, and was afraid she might marry him if he was not quick. Now he pointed with one wing to this nesting-place, and said, "How would you like to build a nest there?"
She looked where he had pointed, "I?" she said. "Why, it is a lovely place, but I could never have a nest alone."
"Let me help you," he said. "I want to marry and have a home."
"Why," said she, as she preened her feathers, "that is a very good plan. When did you think of it?"
So they were married, and Mrs. Sand-Hill Crane often told her friends afterward that Mr. Crane was so much in love with her that she just _had_ to marry him. They were very, very happy, and after a while--but that is another story.
THE YOUNG MINNOW WHO WOULD NOT EAT WHEN HE SHOULD
"When I grow up," said one young Minnow, "I am going to be a Bullhead, and scare all the little fishes."
"I'm not," said his sister. "I'm going to be a Sucker, and lie around in the mud."
"Lazy! Lazy!" cried the other young Minnows, wiggling their front fins at her.
"What is the matter?" asked a Father Minnow, swimming in among them with a few graceful sweeps of his tail, and stopping himself by spreading his front fins. He had the beautiful scarlet coloring on the under part of his body which Father Minnows wear in the summer-time. That is, most of them do, but some wear purple. "What is the matter?" he asked again, balancing himself with his top fin and his two hind ones.
Then all the little Minnows spoke at once. "He says that when he grows up he is going to be a Bullhead, and frighten all the small fishes; and she says that she is going to be a Sucker, and lie around in the mud; and we say that Suckers are lazy, and they _are_ lazy, aren't they?"
"I am surprised at you," began the Father Minnow severely, "to think that you should talk such nonsense. You ought to know----"
But just then a Mother Minnow swam up to him. "The Snapping Turtle is looking for you," she said. Father Minnow hurried away and she turned to the little ones. "I heard what you were saying," she remarked, with a twinkle in her flat, round eyes. "Which of you is going to be a Wild Duck? Won't somebody be a Frog?" She had had more experience in bringing up children than Father Minnow, and she didn't scold so much. She did make fun of them though, sometimes; and you can do almost anything with a young Minnow if you love him a great deal and make fun of him a little.
"Why-ee!" said the young Minnows. "We wouldn't think of being Wild Ducks, and we couldn't be Frogs, you know. Frogs have legs--four of them. A fish couldn't be a Frog if he wanted to!"
"No," said Mother Minnow. "A fish cannot be anything but a fish, and a Minnow cannot be anything but a Minnow. So if you will try to be just as good Minnows as you can, we will let the little Bullheads and Suckers do their own growing up."
She looked at them all again with her flat, round eyes, which saw so much and were always open, because there was nothing to make them shut. She saw one tiny fellow hiding behind his brother. "Have you torn your fin again?" she asked.
"Yes'm, just a little," said he. "A boy caught me when he was in wading, and I tore it when I flopped away from him."
"Dreadful!" said she. "How you do look! If you are so careless, you will soon not have a whole fin to your back--or your front either. Children, you must remember to swim away from boys. When the Cows wade in to drink, you may stay among them, if you wish. They are friendly. We pond people are afraid of boys, although some of them are said not to be dangerous."
"Pooh!" said one young Minnow. "All the pond people are not so afraid! The Bloodsuckers say they like them."
The Mother Minnow looked very severe when he said this, but she only replied, "Very well. When you are a Bloodsucker you may stay near boys. As long as you are a Minnow, you must stay away."
"Now," she added, "swim along, the whole school of you! I am tired and want a nap in the pondweed." So they all swam away, and she wriggled her silvery brown body into the soft green weeds and had a good sleep. She was careful to hide herself, for there were some people in the pond whom she did not want to have find her; and, being a fish, she could not hear very distinctly if they came near. Of course her eyes were open even when she was asleep, because she had no eyelids, but they were not working although they were open. That is an uncomfortable thing about being a fish--one cannot hear much. One cannot taste much either, or feel much, yet when one has always been a fish and is used to it, it is not so hard.
She slept a long time, and then the whole school of young Minnows came to look for her. "We are afraid," they cried. "We feel so very queerly. We don't know how we feel, either, and that is the worst part of it. It might be in our stomachs, or it might be in our fins, and perhaps there is something wrong with our gill-covers. Wake up and tell us what is the matter."
The Mother Minnow awakened and she felt queerly too, but, being older, she knew what was the matter. "That," she said, "is the storm feeling."
"But," said the young Minnows, "there isn't any storm."
"No," she answered wisely. "Not now."
"And there hasn't been any," they said.
"No," she answered again. "The storm you feel is the storm that is going to be."
"And shall we always feel it so?" they asked.
"Always before a storm," she said.
"Why?" asked the young Minnows.
"Because," said she. "There is no answer to that question, but just 'because.' When the storm comes you cannot smell your food and find it, so you must eat all you can before then. Eat _everything_ you can find and be quick." As she spoke she took a great mouthful of pondweed and swallowed it.
All but one of the young Minnows swam quickly away to do as she had told them to. This young Minnow wanted to know just how and why and all about it, so he stayed to ask questions. You know there are some questions which fishes cannot answer, and some which Oxen cannot answer, and some which nobody can answer; and when the Mother Minnow told the young Minnows what she did, she had nothing more to tell. But there are some young Minnows who never will be satisfied, and who tease, and tease, and tease, and tease.
"Hurry along and eat all you can," said the Mother Minnow to him again.
"I want to know," said he, opening his mouth very wide indeed and breathing in a great deal of water as he spoke, "I want to know where I feel queerly."
"I can't tell," said the Mother Minnow, between mouthfuls. "No fish can tell."
"Well, what makes me feel queerly there?"
"The storm," said she.
"How does it make me feel queerly?"
"I don't know," said the Mother Minnow.
"Who does know?" asked the young Minnow.
"Nobody," said she, swallowing some more pondweed of one kind and then beginning on another. "Do eat something or you will be very hungry by and by."
"Well, why does a storm make me feel so?" asked he.
"Because!" said she. She said it very firmly and she was quite right in saying it then, for there was a cause, yet she could not tell what it was. There are only about seven times in one's life when it is right to answer in this way, and what the other six are you must decide for yourself.
Just then there was a peal of thunder which even a Minnow could hear, and the wind blew until the slender forest trees bent far over. The rain came down in great drops which pattered on the water of the pond and started tiny circles around each drop, every circle spreading wider and wider until it touched other circles and broke. Down in the darkened water the fishes lay together on the bottom, and wondered how long it would last, and hoped it would not be a great, great while before they could smell their food again.
One little fellow was more impatient than the others. "Didn't you eat enough to last you?" they said.
"I didn't eat anything," he answered.
"Not anything!" they exclaimed. "Why not?"
"Because!" said he. And that was not right, for he did know the reason. His mother looked at him, and he looked at her, and she had a twinkle in her round, flat eyes. "Poor child!" she thought. "He must be hungry." But she said nothing.
THE STICKLEBACK FATHER
Nobody can truthfully say that the Sticklebacks are not good fathers. There are no other fish fathers who work so hard for their children as the Sticklebacks do. As to the Stickleback Mothers--well, that is different.
This particular Stickleback Father had lived, ever since he had left the nest, with a little company of his friends in a quiet place near the edge of the pond. Sometimes, when they tired of staying quietly at home, they had made short journeys up a brook that emptied into the pond. It was a brook that flowed gently over an even bed, else they would never have gone there, for Sticklebacks like quiet waters. When they swam in this little stream, they met the Brook Trout, who were much larger than they, and who were the most important people there.
Now this Stickleback was a year old and knew much more than he did the summer before. When the alder tassels and pussy willows hung over the edge of the pond in the spring-time, he began to think seriously of life. He was no longer really young, and the days were past in which he was contented to just swim and eat and sleep. It was time he should build a home and raise a family if he wanted to ever be a grandfather. He had a few relatives who were great-grandfathers, and one who was a great-great-grandfather. That does not often happen, because to be a Stickleback Great-great-grandfather, one must be four years old, and few Sticklebacks live to that age.
As he began to think about these things, he left the company of his friends and went to live by himself. He chose a place near the edge of the pond to be his home; and he brushed the pond-bottom there with his tail until he had swept away all the loose sticks and broken shells. He told some Pond Snails, who were there, that they must move away because he wanted the place. At first they didn't want to go, but when they saw how fierce he looked, they thought about it again and decided that perhaps there were other places which would suit them quite as well--indeed, they might find one that they liked even better. Besides, as one of them said to his brother, they had to remember that in ponds it is always right for the weak people to give up to the strong people.
"It will take us quite a while to move," they said to him, "for you know we cannot hurry, but we will begin at once."
All the rest of that day each Snail was lengthening and shortening his one foot, which was his only way of walking. You can see how slow that must be, for a Snail cannot lift his foot from one place and put it down in another, or he would have nothing to stand on while he was lifting it. This was a very hard day for them, yet they were cheerful and made the best of it.
"Well," said one, as he stopped to rest his foot, "I'm glad we don't have to build a home when we do find the right place. How I pity people who have to do that!"
"Yes," said his brother. "There are not many so sure of their homes as we. And what people want of so much room, I can't understand! A Muskrat told me he wanted room to turn around in his house. I don't see what use there is in turning round, do you?"
"No," answered the other Snail, beginning to walk again. "It is just one of his silly ideas. My shell is big enough to let me draw in my whole body, and that is house room enough for any person!"
The Stickleback had not meant to look fierce at the Pond Snails. He had done so because he couldn't help it. All his fins were bristling with sharp points of bone, and he had extra bone-points sticking out of his back, besides wearing a great many of his flat bones on the outside. All his family had these extra bones, and that was why they were called Sticklebacks. They were a brave family and not afraid of many things, although they were so small. There came a time when the Stickleback Father wanted to look fierce, but that was later. Now he went to work to build his nest.
First he made a little hollow in the pond-bottom, and lined it with watergrass and tiny pieces of roots. Next, he made the side-walls of the same things, and last of all, the roof. When it was done, he swam carefully into it and looked around. Under and beside and over him were soft grasses and roots. At each end was an open doorway. "It is a good nest," he said, "a very good nest for my first one. Now I must ask some of my friends to lay eggs in it for me."
Before doing this, he went to look at the homes built by his neighbors. After he left the company in the quiet pool, many others did the same, until the only Sticklebacks left there were the dull-colored ones, the egg-layers. The nest-builders had been dull-colored, too, but in the spring-time there came beautiful red and blue markings on their bodies, until now they were very handsome fellows. It is sad to tell, still it is true, that they also became very cross at this time. Perhaps it was the work and worry of nest-building that made them so, yet, whatever it was, every bright-colored Stickleback wanted to fight every other bright-colored Stickleback. That was how it happened that, when this one went to look at the nest of an old friend, with whom he had played ever since he was hatched, this same friend called out, "Don't you come near my nest!"
The visiting Stickleback replied, "I shall if I want to!" Then they swam at each other and flopped and splashed and pushed and jabbed until both were very tired and sore, and each was glad to stay by his own home. This was the time when they wanted to look fierce.
[Illustration: THEN THEY SWAM AT EACH OTHER.              _Page 39_]
Soon the dull-colored Sticklebacks came swimming past, waving their tails gracefully, and talking to each other. Now this fine fellow, who had sent the Snails away and built his nest, who had fought his old friend and come home again, swam up to a dull-colored Stickleback, and said, "Won't you lay a few eggs in my nest? I'm sure you will find it comfortable."
She answered, "Why, yes! I wouldn't mind laying a few there." And she tried to look as though she had not expected the invitation. While she was carefully laying the eggs in the nest, he stood ready to fight anybody who disturbed her. She came out after a while and swam away. Before she went, she said, "Aren't you ashamed to fight so? We dull-colored ones never fight." She held her fins very stiff as she spoke, because she thought it her duty to scold him. The dull-colored Sticklebacks often did this. They thought that they were a little better than the others; so they swam around together and talked about things, and sometimes forgot how hard it was to be the nest-builder and stay at home and work. Then they called upon the bright-colored Sticklebacks, for they really liked them very much, and told them what they should do. That was why this one said, "We dull-colored ones never fight."
"Have you ever been red and blue?" asked the nest-builder.
"N--no," said she. "But I don't see what difference that makes."
"Well, it does make a difference," said he. "When a fellow is red and blue, he can't help fighting. I'll be as good-natured as any of you after I stop being red and blue."
Of course she could not say anything more after that, so she swam off to her sisters. The bright-colored Stickleback looked at the eggs she had laid. They were sticky, like the eggs of all fishes, so that they stuck to the bottom of the nest. He covered them carefully, and after that he was really a Stickleback Father. It is true that he did not have any Stickleback children to swim around him and open their dear little mouths at him, but he knew that the eggs would hatch soon, and that after he had built a nest and covered the eggs in it, the tiny Sticklebacks were beginning to grow.
However, he wanted more eggs in his nest, so he watched for another dull-colored Stickleback and called her in to help him. He did this until he had almost an hundred eggs there, and all this time he had fought every bright-colored Stickleback who came near him. He became very tired indeed; but he had to fight, you know, because he was red and blue. And he had covered all the eggs and guarded them, else they would never have hatched.
The dull-colored Sticklebacks were also tired. They had been swimming from nest to nest, laying a few eggs in each. Now they went off together to a quiet pool and ate everything they could find to eat, and visited with each other, and said it was a shame that the bright-colored Sticklebacks had fought so, and told how they thought little Sticklebacks should be brought up.
And now the red and blue markings on the Stickleback Father grew paler and paler, until he did not have to fight at all, and could call upon his friends and see how their children were hatching. One fine day, his first child broke the shell, and then another and another, until he had an hundred beautiful Stickleback babies to feed. He worked hard for them, and some nights, when he could stop and rest, his fins ached as though they would drop off. But they never did.
As the Stickleback children grew stronger, they swam off to take care of themselves, and he had less to do. When the last had gone, he left the old nest and went to the pool where the dull-colored Sticklebacks were. They told him he was not looking well, and that he hadn't managed the children right, and that they thought he tried to do too much.
He was too tired to talk about it, so he just said, "Perhaps," and began to eat something. Yet, down in his fatherly heart he knew it was worth doing. He knew, too, that when spring should come once more, he would become red and blue again, and build another nest, and fight and work and love as he had done before. "There is nothing in the world better than working for one's own little Sticklebacks," said he.
THE CARELESS CADDIS WORM
When the Caddis Fly felt like laying eggs, she crawled down the stalk of one of the pond plants and laid them there. She covered them with something sticky, so that they were sure to stay where she put them. "There!" she said, as she crawled up to the air again. "My work is done." Soon after this, she lay down for a long, long rest. What with flying, and visiting, and laying eggs, she had become very tired; and it was not strange, for she had not eaten a mouthful since she got her wings.
This had puzzled the Dragon-Flies very much. They could not understand it, because they were always eating. They would have liked to ask her about it, but they went to sleep for the night soon after she got up, and whenever she saw them coming she flew away. "I do not seem to feel hungry," said she, "so why should I eat? Besides," she added, "I couldn't eat if I wanted to, my mouth is so small and weak. I ate a great deal while I was growing--quite enough to last me--and it saves time not to bother with hunting food now."
When her eggs hatched, the larvæ were slender, soft, six-footed babies called Caddis Worms. They were white, and they showed as plainly in the water as a pond-lily does on the top of it. It is not safe to be white if one is to live in the water; certainly not unless one can swim fast and turn quickly. And there is a reason for this, as any one of the pond people will tell you. Even the fishes wear all their white on the under side of their bodies, so that if they swim near the top of the water, a hungry Fish Hawk is not so likely to see them and pounce down on them.
The Caddis Worms soon found that white was not a good color to wear, and they talked of it among themselves. They were very bright larvæ. One day the biggest one was standing on a stem of pickerel-weed, when his sister came toward him. She did not come very fast, because she was neither swimming nor walking, but biting herself along. All the Caddis Worms did this at times, for their legs were weak. She reached as far forward as she could, and fastened her strong jaws in the weed, then she gave a jerk and pulled her body ahead. "It is a very good way to travel," said she, "and such a saving of one's legs." Now she was in so great a hurry that sometimes when she pulled herself ahead, she turned a half-somersault and came down on her back.
"What is the matter?" called the Biggest Caddis Worm. "Don't hurry so. There is lots of time." That was just him, for he was lazy. Everybody said so.
"I must hurry," said she, and she breathed very fast with the white breathing hairs that grew on both sides of her body. She picked herself up from her last somersault and stood beside her brother, near enough to speak quite softly. "I have been getting away from Belostoma," she said, "and I was dreadfully afraid he would catch me."
"Well, you're all right now, aren't you?" asked her brother. And that was also like him. As long as he could have enough to eat and was comfortable, he did not want to think about anything unpleasant.
"No, I'm not," she answered, "and I won't be so long as any hungry fish or water-bug can see me so plainly. I'm tired of being white."
"You are not so white as you were," said her brother. "None of us children are. Our heads and the front part of our bodies are turning brown and getting harder." That was true, and he was particularly hard-headed.
"Yes, but what about the rest of us?" said she, and surely there was some excuse for her if she was impatient. "If Belostoma can see part of me and chase that, he will find the rest of me rather near by."
"Keep quiet then, and see if you don't get hard and brown all over," said he.
"I never shall," said she. "I went to the Clams and asked them if I would, and they said 'No.' I'm going to build a house to cover the back part of my body, and you'd better do the same thing."
The Biggest Caddis Worm looked very much surprised. "Whatever made you think of that?" said he.
"I suppose because there wasn't anything else to think of," said she. "One has to think of something."
"I don't," said he.
She started away to where her other brothers and sisters were. "Where are you going?" cried he.
"Going to build my house," answered she. "You'd better come too."
"Not now," said he. "I am waiting to get the rest of my breakfast. I'll come by and by."
The Biggest Caddis Worm stood on the pickerel-weed and ate his breakfast. Then he stood there a while longer. "I do not think it is well to work right after eating," he said. Below him in the water, his brothers and sisters were busily gathering tiny sticks, stones, and bits of broken shell, with which to make their houses. Each Caddis Worm found his own, and fastened them together with a sort of silk which he pulled out of his body. They had nobody to show them how, so each planned to suit himself, and no two were exactly alike.
"I'm going to make my house big enough so I can pull in my head and legs when I want to," said one.
"So am I," cried all the other Caddis Worms.
After a while, somebody said, "I'm going to have an open door at the back of my house." Then each of his busy brothers and sisters cried, "So am I."
When the tiny houses were done, each Caddis Worm crawled inside of his own, and lay with head and legs outside the front door. The white part of their bodies did not show at all, and, if they wanted to do so, they could pull their heads in. Even Belostoma, the Giant Water-Bug, might have passed close to them then and not seen them at all.
"Let's hook ourselves in!" cried one Caddis Worm, and all the others answered, "Let's."
So each hooked himself in with the two stout hooks which grew at the end of his body, and there they were as snug and comfortable as Clams. About this time the Big Brother came slowly along the stem of pickerel-weed. "What," said he, "you haven't got your houses done already?"
"Yes," answered the rest joyfully. "See us pull in our heads." And they all pulled in their heads and poked them out again. He was the only white-bodied person in sight.
"I must have a home," said he. "I wish one of you Worms would give me yours. You could make yourself another, you know. There is lots more stuff."
"Make it yourself," they replied. "Help yourself to stuff."
"But I don't know how," he said, "and you do."
"Whose fault is that?" asked his sister. Then she was afraid that he might think her cross, and she added quickly, "We'll tell you how, if you'll begin."
The Biggest Caddis Worm got together some tiny sticks and stones and pieces of broken shell, but it wasn't very much fun working alone. Then they told him what to do, and how to fasten them to each other with silk. "Be sure you tie them strongly," they said.
"Oh, that's strong enough," he answered. "It'll do, anyhow. If it comes to pieces I can fix it." His brothers and sisters thought he should make it stouter, yet they said nothing more, for he would not have liked it if they had; and they had already said so once. When he crawled into his house and hooked himself in, there was not a Caddis Worm in sight, and they were very proud to think how they had planned and built their houses. They did not know that Caddis Worms had always done so, and they thought themselves the first to ever think of such a thing.
The Biggest Caddis Worm's house was not well fastened together, and every day he said, "I really must fix it to-morrow." But when to-morrow came, it always proved to be to-day, and, besides, he usually found something more interesting to be done. It took him a great deal of time to change his skin, and that could not be easily put off. He grew so fast that he was likely to awaken almost any morning and find his head poking through the top of his skin, and, lazy as he was, he would not have the pond people see him around with a crack in the skin of his head, right where it showed. So when this happened, he always pulled his body through the crack, and threw the old skin away. There was sure to be a whole new one underneath, you know.
When they had changed their skin many times, the Caddis Worms became more quiet and thoughtful. At last the sister who had first planned to build houses, fastened hers to a stone, and spun gratings across both its front and its back doors. "I am going to sleep," she said, "to grow my feelers and get ready to fly and breathe air. I don't want anybody to awaken me. All I want to do is to sleep and grow and breathe. The water will come in through the gratings, so I shall be all right. I couldn't sleep in a house where there was not plenty of fresh water to breathe." Then she cuddled down and dozed off, and when her brothers and sisters spoke of her, they called her "the Caddis Nymph."
They did not speak of her many times, however, for they soon fastened their houses to something solid, and spun gratings in their doorways and went to sleep.
One day a Water-Adder came around where all the Caddis houses were. "Um-hum," said he to himself. "There used to be a nice lot of Caddis Worms around here, and now I haven't seen one in ever so long. I suppose they are hidden away somewhere asleep. Well, I must go away from here and find my dinner. I am nearly starved. The front half of my stomach hasn't a thing in it." He whisked his tail and went away, but that whisk hit a tiny house of sticks, stones, and bits of broken shell, and a fat sleeping Caddis Nymph rolled out. It was the Biggest Brother.
Soon Belostoma, the Giant Water-Bug, came that way. "What is this?" he exclaimed, as he saw the sleeping Caddis Nymph. "Somebody built a poor house to sleep in. You need to be cared for, young Caddis." He picked up the sleeping Caddis Nymph in his stout forelegs and swam off. Nobody knows just what happened after that.
When the other Caddis Nymphs awakened, they bit through their gratings and had a good visit before they crawled out of the pond into their new home, the air. "Has anybody seen my biggest brother?" asked one Nymph of another, but everybody answered, "No."
Each looked all around with his two far-apart eyes, and then they decided that he must have awakened first and left the water before them. But you know that he could not have done so, because he could never be a Caddis Fly unless he finished the Nymph-sleep in his house, and he did not do that. He had stopped being a Caddis Worm when he turned into a Caddis Nymph. Nobody will ever know just what did become of him unless Belostoma tells--and Belostoma is not likely to tell.
THE TADPOLE WHO WANTED TO BE GROWN-UP
It was a bright, warm April day when the First Tadpole of the season ate his way out of the jelly-covered egg in which he had come to life. He was a very tiny, dark brown fellow. It would be hard to tell just what he did look like, for there is nothing in the world that one Tadpole looks like unless it is another Tadpole. He had a very small head with a busy little mouth opening on the front side of it: just above each end of this mouth was a shining black eye, and on the lower side of his head was a very wiggly tail. Somewhere between his head and the tip of this were his small stomach and places for legs, but one could not see all that in looking at him. It seemed as if what was not head was tail, and what was not tail was head.
When the First Tadpole found himself free in the water, he swam along by the great green floating jelly-mass of Frogs' eggs, and pressed his face up close to first one egg and then another. He saw other Tadpoles almost as large as he, and they were wriggling inside their egg homes. He couldn't talk to them through the jelly-mass--he could only look at them, and they looked greenish because he saw them through green jelly. They were really dark brown, like him. He wanted them to come out to play with him and he tried to show them that it was more interesting where he was, so he opened and shut his hard little jaws very fast and took big Tadpole-mouthfuls of green jelly.
Perhaps it was seeing this, and perhaps it was because the warm sunshine made them restless--but for some reason the shut-in Tadpoles nibbled busily at the egg-covering and before long were in the water with their brother. They all looked alike, and nobody except that one particular Tadpole knew who had been the first to hatch. He never forgot it, and indeed why should he? If one has ever been the First Tadpole, he is quite sure to remember the loneliness of it all his life.
Soon they dropped to the bottom of the pond and met their neighbors. They were such little fellows that nobody paid much attention to them. The older pond people often seemed to forget that the Tadpoles heard what they said, and cared too. The Minnows swam in and out among them, and hit them with their fins, and slapped them with their tails, and called them "little-big-mouths," and the Tadpoles couldn't hit back because they were so little. The Minnows didn't hurt the Tadpoles, but they made fun of them, and even the smallest Minnow would swim away if a Tadpole tried to play with him.
Then the Eels talked among themselves about them. "I shall be glad," said one old Father Eel, "when these youngsters hide their breathing-gills and go to the top of the water."
"So shall I," exclaimed a Mother Eel. "They keep their tails wiggling so that it hurts my eyes to look at them. Why can't they lie still and be good?"
Now the Tadpoles looked at each other with their shining black eyes. "What are our breathing-gills?" they asked. "They must be these little things on the sides of our heads."
"They are!" cried the First Tadpole. "The Biggest Frog said so. But I don't see where we can hide them, because they won't come off. And how could we ever breathe water without them?"
"Hear the children talk," exclaimed the Green Brown Frog, who had come down to look the Tadpoles over and decide which were hers. "Why, you won't always want to breathe water. Before long you will have to breathe air by swallowing it, and then you cannot stay long under water. I must go now. I am quite out of breath. Good-bye!"
Then the Tadpoles looked again at each other. "She didn't tell us what to do with our breathing-gills," they said. One of the Tadpoles who had hatched last, swam up to the First Tadpole. "Your breathing-gills are not so large as mine," she said.
"They surely are!" he exclaimed, for he felt very big indeed, having been the first to hatch.
"Oh, but they are not!" cried all his friends. "They don't stick out as they used to." And that was true, for his breathing-gills were sinking into his head, and they found that this was happening to all the older Tadpoles.
[Illustration: THE BIGGEST FROG TOLD THEM STORIES.        _Page 63_]
The next day they began going to the top to breathe air, the oldest ones first, and so on until they were all there. They thought it much pleasanter than the bottom of the pond, but it was not so safe. There were more dangers to be watched for here, and some of the careless young Tadpoles never lived to be Frogs. It is sad, yet it is always so.
Sometimes the Frogs came to see them, and once--once, after the Tadpoles had gotten their hindlegs, the Biggest Frog sat in the marsh near by and told them stories of his Tadpolehood. He said that he was always a very good little Tadpole, and always did as the Frogs told him to do; and that he was such a promising little fellow that every Mother Frog in the pond was sure that he had been hatched from one of her eggs.
"And were you?" asked one Tadpole, who never listened carefully, and so was always asking stupid questions.
The Biggest Frog looked at him very sternly. "No," said he, "I was not. Each wanted me as her son, but I never knew to which I belonged. I never knew! Still," he added, "it does not so much matter who a Frog's mother is, if the Frog is truly great." Then he filled the sacs on each side of his neck with air, and croaked loudly. His sister afterward told the Tadpoles that he was thinking of one of the forest people, the Ground Hog, who was very proud because he could remember his grandfather.
The Green Brown Frog came often to look at them and see how they were growing. She was very fond of the First Tadpole. "Why, you have your forelegs!" she exclaimed one morning. "How you do grow!"
"What will I have next?" he asked, "more legs or another tail?"
The Green Brown Frog smiled the whole length of her mouth, and that was a very broad smile indeed. "Look at me," she said. "What change must come next to make you look like a Frog?"
"You haven't any tail," he said slowly. "Is that all the difference between us Tadpoles and Frogs?"
"That is all the difference now," she answered, "but it will take a long, long time for your tail to disappear. It will happen with that quite as it did with your breathing-gills. You will grow bigger and bigger and bigger, and it will grow smaller and smaller and smaller, until some day you will find yourself a Frog." She shut her mouth to get her breath, because, you know, Frogs can only breathe a little through their skins, and then only when they are wet. Most of their air they take in through their noses and swallow with their mouths closed. That is why they cannot make long speeches. When their mouths are open they cannot swallow air.
After a while she spoke again. "It takes as many years to make a newly hatched Tadpole into a fully grown Frog," she said, "as there are toes on one of your hindfeet."
The First Tadpole did not know what a year was, but he felt sure from the way in which she spoke that it was a long, long time, and he was in a hurry to grow up. "I want to be a Frog sooner!" he said, crossly. "It isn't any fun at all being a Tadpole." The Green Brown Frog swam away, he was becoming so disagreeable.
The First Tadpole became crosser and crosser, and was very unreasonable. He did not think of the pleasant things which happened every day, but only of the trying ones. He did not know that Frogs often wished themselves Tadpoles again, and he sulked around in the pondweed all day. Every time he looked at one of his hindfeet it reminded him of what the Green Brown Frog had said, and he even grew out of patience with his tail--the same strong wiggly little tail of which he had been so proud.
"Horrid old thing!" he said, giving it a jerk. "Won't I be glad to get rid of you?" Then he thought of something--foolish, vain little First Tadpole that he was. He thought and he thought and he thought and he thought, and when his playmates swam around him he wouldn't chase them, and when they asked him what was the matter, he just answered, "Oh nothing!" as carelessly as could be.
The truth was that he wanted to be a Frog right away, and he thought he knew how he could be. He didn't want to tell the other Tadpoles because he didn't want any one else to become a Frog as soon as he. After a while he swam off to see the Snapping Turtle. He was very much afraid of the Snapping Turtle, and yet he thought him the best one to see just now. "I came to see if you would snap off my tail," said he.
"Your what?" said the Snapping Turtle, in his most surprised way.
"My tail," answered the First Tadpole, who had never had a tail snapped off, and thought it could be easily done. "I want to be a Frog to-day and not wait."
"Certainly," said the Snapping Turtle. "With pleasure! No trouble at all! Anything else I can do for you?"
"No, thank you," said the First Tadpole, "only you won't snap off too much, will you?"
"Not a bit," answered the Snapping Turtle, with a queer look in his eyes. "And if any of your friends are in a hurry to grow up, I shall be glad to help them." Then he swam toward the First Tadpole and did as he had been asked to do.
The next morning all the other Tadpoles crowded around to look at the First Tadpole. "Why-ee!" they cried. "Where is your tail?"
"I don't know," he answered, "but I think the Snapping Turtle could tell you."
"What is this?" asked the Green Brown Frog, swimming up to them. "Did the Snapping Turtle try to catch you? You poor little fellow! How did it happen?" She was very fond of the First Tadpole, and had about decided that he must be one of her sons.
"Well," he said slowly, for he didn't want the other Tadpoles to do the same thing, "I met him last evening and he--"
"Snapped at you!" exclaimed the Green Brown Frog. "It is lucky for you that he doesn't believe in eating hearty suppers, that is all I have to say! But you are a very foolish Tadpole not to keep out of his way, as you have always been told you must."
Then the First Tadpole lost his temper. "I'm not foolish, and I'm not a Tadpole," he said. "I asked him to snap it off, and now I am a Frog!"
"Oho!" said the voice of the Yellow Brown Frog behind him. "You are a Frog, are you? Let's hear you croak then. Come out on the bank and have a hopping match with me."
"I--I don't croak yet," stammered the First Tadpole, "a--and I don't care to hop."
"You are just a tailless Tadpole," said the Yellow Brown Frog sternly. "Don't any more of you youngsters try such a plan, or some of you will be Tadpole-less tails and a good many of you won't be anything."
The old Snapping Turtle waited all morning for some more Tadpoles who wanted to be made into Frogs, but none came. The Biggest Frog croaked hoarsely when he heard of it. "Tails! Tails! Tails! Tails! Tails! Tails! Tails! Tails!" said he. "That youngster will never be a strong Frog. Tadpoles must be Tadpoles, tails and all, for a long time, if they hope to ever be really fine Frogs like me." And that is so, as any Frog will tell you.
The Green Brown Frog sighed as she crawled out on the bank. "What a silly Tadpole," she said; "I'm glad he isn't my child!"
THE RUNAWAY WATER SPIDERS
When the little Water Spiders first opened their eyes, and this was as soon as they were hatched, they found themselves in a cosy home of one room which their mother had built under the water. This room had no window and only one door. There was no floor at all. When Father Stickleback had asked Mrs. Spider why she did not make a floor, she had looked at him in great surprise and said, "Why, if I had built one, I should have no place to go in and out." She really thought him quite stupid not to think of that. It often happens, you know, that really clever people think each other stupid, just because they live in different ways. Afterward, Mrs. Water Spider saw Father Stickleback's nest, and understood why he asked that question.
When her home was done, it was half as large as a big acorn and a charming place for Water Spider babies. The side walls and the rounding ceiling were all of the finest Spider silk, and the bottom was just one round doorway. The house was built under the water and fastened down by tiny ropes of Spider silk which were tied to the stems of pond plants. Mrs. Water Spider looked at it with a happy smile. "Next I must fill it with air," said she, "and then it will be ready. I am out of breath now."
She crept up the stem of the nearest plant and sat in the air for a few minutes, eating her lunch and resting. Next she walked down the stem until just the end of her body was in the air. She stood so, with her head down, then gave a little jerk and dove to her home. As she jerked, she crossed her hindlegs and caught a small bubble of air between them and her body. When she reached her home, she went quickly in the open doorway and let go of her bubble. It did not fall downward to the floor, as bubbles do in most houses, and there were two reasons for this. In the first place, there was no floor. In the second place, air always falls upward in the water. This fell up until it reached the rounded ceiling and had to stop. Just as it fell, a drop of water went out through the open doorway. The home had been full of water, you know, but now that Mrs. Spider had begun to bring in air something had to be moved to make a place for it.
She brought down thirteen more bubbles of air and then the house was filled with it. On the lower side of the open doorway there was water and on the upper side was air, and each stayed where it should. When Mrs. Spider came into her house, she always had some air caught in the hairs which covered her body, even when she did not bring a bubble of it in her hindlegs. She had to have plenty of it in her home to keep her from drowning, for she could not breathe water like a fish. "Side doors may be all right for Sticklebacks," said she, "for they do not need air, but I must have bottom doors, and I will have them too!"
After she had laid her eggs, she had some days in which to rest and visit with the Water-Boatmen who lived near. They were great friends. Belostoma used to ask the Water-Boatmen, who were his cousins, why they were so neighborly with the Water Spiders. "I don't like to see you so much with eight-legged people," he said. "They are not our kind." Belostoma was very proud of his family.
"We know that they have rather too many legs to look well," said Mrs. Water-Boatman, "but they are pleasant, and we are interested in the same things. You know we both carry air about with us in the water, and so few of our neighbors seem to care anything for it." She was a sensible little person and knew that people who are really fond of their friends do not care how many legs they have. She carried her air under her wings, but there were other Water-Boatmen, near relatives, who spread theirs over their whole bodies, and looked very silvery and beautiful when they were under water.
One day, when Mrs. Water Spider was sitting on a lily-pad and talking with her friends, a Water-Boatman rose quickly from the bottom of the pond. As soon as he got right side up (and that means as soon as he got to floating on his back), he said to her, "I heard queer sounds in your house; I was feeding near there, and the noise startled me so that I let go of the stone I was holding to, and came up. I think your eggs must be hatching."
[Illustration: AS SOON AS HE GOT TO FLOATING ON HIS BACK. _Page 76_]
"Really?" exclaimed Mrs. Water Spider. "I shall be so glad! A house always seems lonely to me without children." She dove to her house, and found some very fine Water Spider babies there. You may be sure she did not have much time for visiting after that. She had to hunt food and carry it down to her children, and when they were restless and impatient she stayed with them and told them stories of the great world.
Sometimes they teased to go out with her, but this she never allowed. "Wait until you are older," she would say. "It will not be so very long before you can go safely." The children thought it had been a long, long time already, and one of them made a face when his mother said this. She did not see him, and it was well for him that she did not. He should have been very much ashamed of himself for doing it.
The next time Mrs. Water Spider went for food, one of the children said, "I tell you what let's do! Let's all go down to the doorway and peek out." They looked at each other and wondered if they dared. That was something their mother had forbidden them to do. There was no window to look through and they wanted very much to see the world. At last the little fellow who had made a face said, "I'm going to, anyway." After that, his brothers and sisters went, too. And this shows how, if good little Spiders listen to naughty little Spiders, they become naughty little Spiders themselves.
All the children ran down and peeked around the edge of the door, but they couldn't see much besides water, and they had seen that before. They were sadly disappointed. Somebody said, "I'm going to put two of my legs out!" Somebody else said, "I'll put four out!" A big brother said, "I'm going to put six out!" And then another brother said "I'll put eight out! Dare you to!"
You know what naughty little Spiders would be likely to do then. Well, they did it. And, as it happened, they had just pulled their last legs through the open doorway when a Stickleback Father came along. "Aren't you rather young to be out of the nest?" said he, in his most pleasant voice.
Poor little Water Spiders! They didn't know he was one of their mother's friends, and he seemed so big to them, and the bones on his cheeks made him look so queer, and the stickles on his back were so sharp, that every one of them was afraid and let go of the wall of the house--and then!
Every one of them rose quickly to the top, into the light and the open air. They crawled upon a lily-pad and clung there, frightened, and feeling weak in all their knees. The Dragon Flies flew over them, the Wild Ducks swam past them, and on a log not far away they saw a long row of Mud Turtles sunning themselves. Why nothing dreadful happened, one cannot tell. Perhaps it was bad enough as it was, for they were so scared that they could only huddle close together and cry, "We want our mother."
Here Mrs. Water Spider found them. She came home with something for dinner, and saw her house empty. Of course she knew where to look, for, as she said, "If they stepped outside the door, they would be quite sure to tumble up into the air." She took them home, one at a time, and how she ever did it nobody knows.
When they were all safely there and had eaten the food that was waiting for them, Mrs. Spider, who had not scolded them at all, said, "Look me straight in the eye, every one of you! Will you promise never to run away again?"
Instead of saying at once, "Yes, mother," as they should have done, one of them answered, "Why, we didn't run away. We were just peeking around the edge of the doorway, and we got too far out, and somebody came along and scared us so that we let go, and then we couldn't help falling up into the air."
"Oh, no," said their mother, "you couldn't help it then, of course. But who told you that you might peep out of the door?"
The little Water Spiders hung their heads and looked very much ashamed. Their mother went on, "You needn't say that you were not to blame. You were to blame, and you began to run away as soon as you took the first step toward the door, only you didn't know that you were going so far. Tell me," she said, "whether you would ever have gone to the top of the water if you had not taken that first step?"
The little Water Spiders were more ashamed than ever, but they had to look her in the eye and promise to be good.
It is very certain that not one of those children even peeped around the edge of the doorway from that day until their mother told them that they might go into the world and build houses for themselves. "Remember just one thing," she said, as they started away. "Always take your food home to eat." And they always did, for no Water Spider who has been well brought up will ever eat away from his own home.
THE SLOW LITTLE MUD TURTLE
When the twenty little Mud Turtles broke their egg-shells one hot summer day, and poked their way up through the warm sand in which they had been buried, they looked almost as much alike as so many raindrops. The Mother Turtle who was sunning herself on the bank near by, said to her friends, "Why! There are my children! Did you ever see a finer family? I believe I will go over and speak to them."
Most of the young Mud Turtles crawled quickly out of the sand and broken shells, and began drying themselves in the sunshine. One slow little fellow stopped to look at the broken shells, stubbed one of his front toes on a large piece and then sat down until it should stop aching. "Wait for me!" he called out to his brothers and sisters. "I'm coming in a minute."
The other little Turtles waited, but when his toe was comfortable again and he started toward them, he met a very interesting Snail and talked a while with him. "Come on," said the Biggest Little Turtle. "Don't let's wait any longer. He can catch up."
So they sprawled along until they came to a place where they could sit in a row on an old log, and they climbed onto it and sat just close enough together and not at all too close. Then the Slow Little Turtle came hurrying over the sand with a rather cross look in his eyes and putting his feet down a little harder than he needed to--quite as though he were out of patience about something. "Why didn't you Turtles wait for me?" he grumbled. "I was coming right along."
[Illustration: "GOOD MORNING," SAID SHE. "I BELIEVE YOU ARE MY CHILDREN?"                      _Page 85_]
Just then the Mother Turtle came up. "Good morning," said she. "I believe you are my children?"
The little Mud Turtles looked at each other and didn't say a word. This was not because they were rude or bashful, but because they did not know what to say. And that, you know, was quite right, for unless one has something worth saying, it is far better to say nothing at all.
She drew a long Mud Turtle breath and answered her own question. "Yes," she said, "you certainly are, for I saw you scrambling out of the sand a little while ago, and you came from the very place where I laid my eggs and covered them during the first really warm nights this year. I was telling your father only yesterday that it was about time for you to hatch. The sun has been so hot lately that I was sure you would do well."
The Mother Turtle stretched her head this way and that until there was hardly a wrinkle left in her neck-skin, she was so eager to see them all. "Why are you not up here with your brothers and sisters?" she asked suddenly of the Slow Little Turtle, who was trying to make a place for himself on the log.
"They didn't wait for me," he said. "I was coming right along but they wouldn't wait. I think they are just as mea----"
The Mother Turtle raised one of her forefeet until all five of its toes with their strong claws were pointing at him. She also raised her head as far as her upper shell would let her. "So you _are_ the one," she said. "I thought you were when I heard you trying to make the others wait. It is too bad."
She looked so stern that the Slow Little Turtle didn't dare finish what he had begun to say, yet down in his little Turtle heart he thought, "Now they are going to catch it!" He was sure his mother was going to scold the other Turtle children for leaving him. He wanted to see what they would do, so he looked out of his right eye at the ten brothers and sisters on that side, and out of his left eye at the nine brothers and sisters on that side. He could do this very easily, because his eyes were not on the front of his head like those of some people, but one on each side.
"I have raised families of young Turtles every year," said the Mother Turtle. "The first year I had only a few children, the next year I had more, and so it has gone--every year a few more children than the year before--until now I never know quite how many I do have. But there is always one Slow Little Turtle who lags behind and wants the others to wait for him. That makes him miss his share of good things, and then he is quite certain to be cross and think it is somebody else's fault."
The Slow Little Turtle felt the ten brothers and sisters on his right side looking at him out of their left eyes, and the nine brothers and sisters on his left side looking at him out of their right eyes. He drew in his head and his tail and his legs, until all they could see was his rounded upper shell, his shell side-walls, and the yellow edge of his flat lower shell. He would have liked to draw them in too, but of course he couldn't do that.
"I did hope," said the Mother Turtle, "that I might have one family without such a child in it. I cannot help loving even a slow child who is cross, if he is hatched from one of my eggs, yet it makes me sad--very, very sad."
"Try to get over this," she said to the Slow Little Turtle, "before it is too late. And you," she added, turning to his brothers and sisters, "must be patient with him. We shall not have him with us long."
"What do you mean?" asked the Slow Little Turtle, peeping out from between his shells. "I'm not going away."
"You do not want to," said his mother, "but you will not be with us long unless you learn to keep up with the rest. Something always happens to pond people who are too slow. I cannot tell you what it will be, yet it is sure to be _something_. I remember so well my first slow child--and how he--" She began to cry, and since she could not easily get her forefeet to her eyes, she sprawled to the pond and swam off with only her head and a little of her upper shell showing above the water.
The Slow Little Turtle was really frightened by what his mother had said, and for a few days he tried to keep up with the others. Nothing happened to him, and so he grew careless and made people wait for him just because he was not quite ready to go with them, or because he wanted to do this or look at that or talk to some other person. He was a very trying little Turtle, yet his mother loved him and did not like it when the rest called him a Land Tortoise. It is all right, you know, to be a Land Tortoise when your father and mother are Land Tortoises, and these cousins of the Turtles look so much like them that some people cannot tell them apart. That is because they forget that the Tortoises live on land, have higher back shells, and move very, very slowly. Turtles live more in the water and can move quickly if they will. This is why other Turtles sometimes make fun of a slow brother by calling him a Land Tortoise.
One beautiful sunshiny afternoon, when most of the twenty little Turtles were sitting on a floating log by the edge of the pond, their mother was with some of her friends on another log near by. She looked often at her children, and thought how handsome their rounded-up back shells were in the sunshine with the little red and yellow markings showing on the black. She could see their strong little pointed tails too, and their webbed feet with a stout claw on each toe. She was so proud that she could not help talking about them. "Is there any sight more beautiful," she said, "than a row of good little Turtles?"
"Yes," said a fine old fellow who was floating near her, "a row of their mothers!" He was a Turtle whom she had never liked very well, but now she began to think that he was rather agreeable after all. She was just noticing how beautifully the skin wrinkled on his neck, when she heard a splash and saw two terrible great two-legged animals wading into the pond from the shore.
"Boys!" she cried, "Boys!" And she sprawled off the end of her log and slid into the water, all her friends following her. The Biggest Little Turtle saw these great animals coming toward him. He sprawled off the end of his log and slid into the water, and all his brothers and sisters followed him except the Slow Little Turtle. "Wait for me," he said. "I'm coming in just a----"
Then one of these great animals stooped over and picked him up, and held him bottom side uppermost and rapped on that side, which was flat; and on the other side, which was rounded; and stared at him with two great eyes. Next the other great animal took him and turned him over and rapped on his shells and stared at him. The poor Slow Little Turtle drew in his head and tail and legs and kept very, very still. He wished that he had side-pieces of shell all around now, instead of just one on each side between his legs. He was thinking over and over, "Something has happened! Something has happened!" And he knew that back in the pond his mother would be trying to find him and could not.
The boys carried him to the edge of the meadow and put him down on the grass. He lay perfectly still for a long, long time, and when he thought they had forgotten about him he tried to run away. Then they laughed and picked him up again, and one of them took something sharp and shiny and cut marks into his upper shell. This did not really give him pain, yet, as he said afterward, "It hurts almost as much to think you are going to be hurt, as it does to be hurt."
It was not until the sun went down that the boys let the Slow Little Turtle go. Then he was very, very tired, but he wanted so much to get back to his home in the pond that he started at once by moonlight. This was the first time he had ever seen the moon, for, except when they are laying eggs, Turtles usually sleep at night. He was not quite sure which way he should go, and if it had not been for the kindness of the Tree Frog he might never have seen his brothers and sisters again. You know the Tree Frog had been carried away when he was young, before he came to live with the meadow people, so he knew how to be sorry for the Slow Little Turtle.
The Tree Frog hopped along ahead to show the way, and the Turtle followed until they reached a place from which they could see the pond. "Good night!" said the Tree Frog. "You can find your way now."
"Good night!" said the Turtle. "I wish I might help you some time."
"Never mind me," said the Tree Frog. "Help somebody else and it will be all right." He hopped back toward his home, and for a long time afterward the Turtle heard his cheerful "Pukr-r-rup! Pukr-r-rup!" sounding over the dewy grass and through the still air. At the edge of the pond the Slow Little Turtle found his nineteen brothers and sisters sound asleep. "I'm here!" he cried joyfully, poking first one and then another of them with his head.
The Biggest Little Turtle moved without awakening. "I tell you I'm not hungry," he murmured. "I don't want to get up." And again he fell fast asleep.
So the Slow Little Turtle did not disturb him, but cuddled inside his two shells and went to sleep also. He was so tired that he did not awaken until the sun was high in the sky. When he did open his eyes, his relatives were sitting around looking at him, and he remembered all that had happened before he slept. "Does my shell look very bad?" he cried. "I wish I could see it. Oh, I am so glad to get back! I'll never be slow again, Never! Never!"
His mother came and leaned her shell lovingly against his. "If you will only learn to keep up with your brothers and sisters," she said "I shall not be sorry that the boys carried you off."
"You just wait and see," said the Slow Little Turtle. And he was as good as his word. After that he was always the first to slip from the log to the water if anything scared them; and when, one day, a strange Turtle from another pond came to visit, he said to the Turtles who had always lived there, "Why do you call that young fellow with the marked shell 'The Slow Little Turtle?' He is the quickest one in his family."
The pond people looked at each other and laughed. "That is queer!" they said. "After this we will call him 'The Quick Little Turtle.'"
This made him very happy, and when, once in a while, somebody forgot and by mistake called him "The Quick Slow Little Turtle," he said he rather liked it because it showed that a Turtle needn't keep his faults if he did have them.
THE DRAGON-FLY CHILDREN AND THE SNAPPING TURTLE
The Dragon-Flies have always lived near the pond. Not the same ones that are there now, of course, but the great-great-great-grandfathers of these. A person would think that, after a family had lived so long in a place, all the neighbors would be fond of them, yet it is not so. The Dragon-Flies may be very good people--and even the Snapping Turtle says that they are--still, they are so peculiar that many of their neighbors do not like them at all. Even when they are only larvæ, or babies, they are not good playmates, for they have such a bad habit of putting everything into their mouths. Indeed, the Stickleback Father once told the little Sticklebacks that they should not stir out of the nest, unless they would promise to keep away from the young Dragon-Flies.
The Stickleback Mothers said that it was all the fault of the Dragon-Fly Mothers. "What can you expect," exclaimed one of them, "when Dragon-Fly eggs are so carelessly laid? I saw a Dragon-Fly Mother laying some only yesterday, and how do you suppose she did it? Just flew around in the sunshine and visited with her friends, and once in a while flew low enough to touch the water and drop one in. It is disgraceful!"
The Minnow Mothers did not think it was so much in the way the eggs were laid, "although," said one, "I always lay mine close together, instead of scattering them over the whole pond." They thought the trouble came from bad bringing up or no bringing up at all. Each egg, you know, when it is laid, drops to the bottom of the pond, and the children are hatched and grow up there, and do not even see their fathers and mothers.
Now most of the larvæ were turning into Nymphs, which are half-grown Dragon Flies. They had been short and plump, and now they were longer and more slender, and there were little bunches on their shoulders where the wings were growing under their skin. They had outgrown their old skins a great many times, and had to wriggle out of them to be at all comfortable. When a Dragon-Fly child became too big for his skin, he hooked the two sharp claws of each of his six feet firmly into something, unfastened his skin down the back, and wriggled out, leaving it to roll around in the water until it became just part of the mud.
Like most growing children, the Dragon-Fly larvæ and Nymphs had to eat a great deal. Their stomachs were as long as their bodies, and they were never really happy unless their stomachs were full. They always ate plain food and plenty of it, and they never ate between meals. They had breakfast from the time they awakened in the morning until the sun was high in the sky, then they had dinner until the sun was low in the sky, and supper from that time until it grew dark and they went to sleep: but never a mouthful between meals, no matter how hungry they might be. They said this was their only rule about eating, and they _would_ keep it.
They were always slow children. You would think that, with six legs apiece and three joints in each leg, they might walk quite fast, yet they never did. When they had to, they hurried in another way by taking a long leap through the water. Of course they breathed water like their neighbors, the fishes and the Tadpoles. They did not breathe it into their mouths, or through gills, but took it in through some openings in the back part of their bodies. When they wanted to hurry, they breathed this water out so suddenly that it sent them quickly ahead.
The Snapping Turtle had called them "bothering bugs" one day when he was cross (and that was the day after he had been cross, and just before the day when he was going to be cross again), and they didn't like him and wanted to get even. They all put their queer little three-cornered heads together, and there was an ugly look in their great staring eyes.
"Horrid old thing!" said one larva. "I wish I could sting him."
"Well, you can't," said a Nymph, turning towards him so suddenly that he leaped. "You haven't any sting, and you never will have, so you just keep still." It was not at all nice in her to speak that way, but she was not well brought up, you know, and that, perhaps, is a reason why one should excuse her for talking so to her little brother. She was often impatient, and said she could never go anywhere without one of the larvæ tagging along.
"I tell you what let's do," said another Nymph. "Let's all go together to the shallow water where he suns himself, and let's all stand close to each other, and then, when he comes along, let's stick out our lips at him!"
"Both lips?" asked the larvæ.
"Well, our lower lips anyway," answered the Nymph. "Our upper lips are so small they don't matter."
"We'll do it," exclaimed all the Dragon-Fly children, and they started together to walk on the pond-bottom to the shallow water. They thought it would scare the Snapping Turtle dreadfully. They knew that whenever they stuck out their lower lips at the small fishes and bugs, they swam away as fast as they could. The Giant Water-Bug (Belostoma), was the only bug who was not afraid of them when they made faces. Indeed, the lower lip of a Dragon-Fly child might well frighten people, for it is fastened on a long, jointed, arm-like thing, and has pincers on it with which it catches and holds its food. Most of the time, the Dragon-Fly child keeps the joint bent, and so holds his lip up to his face like a mask. But sometimes he straightens the joint and holds his lip out before him, and then its pincers catch hold of things. He does this when he is hungry.
When they reached the shallow water, the Dragon-Fly children stood close together, with the larvæ in the middle and the Nymphs all around them. The Snapping Turtle was nowhere to be seen, so they had to wait. "Aren't you scared?" whispered one larva to another.
"Scared? Dah! Who's afraid," answered he.
"Oh, look!" cried a Nymph. "There go some grown-up Dragon-Flies over our heads. Just you wait until I change my skin once more, and then won't I have a good time! I'll dry my wings and then I'll----"
"Sh-h!" said one of the larvæ. "Here comes the Snapping Turtle."
Sure enough, there he came through the shallow water, his wet back-shell partly out of it and shining in the sunlight. He came straight toward the Dragon-Fly children, and they were glad to see that he did not look hungry. They thought he might be going to take a nap after his dinner. Then they all stood even closer together and stuck out their lower lips at him. They thought he might run away when they did this. They felt sure that he would at least be very badly frightened.
The Snapping Turtle did not seem to see them at all. It was queer. He just waddled on and on, coming straight toward them. "Ah-h-h!" said he. "How sleepy I do feel! I will lie down in the sunshine and rest." He took a few more steps, which brought his great body right over the crowd of Dragon-Fly children. "I think I will draw in my head," said he (the Dragon-Fly children looked at each other), "and my tail (here two of the youngest larvæ began to cry) and lie down." He began to draw in his legs very, very slowly, and just as his great hard lower shell touched the mud, the last larva crawled out under his tail. The Nymphs had already gotten away.
"Oh," said the Dragon-Fly children to each other, "Wasn't it awful!"
"Humph," said the Snapping Turtle, talking to himself--he had gotten into the way of doing that because he had so few friends--"How dreadfully they did scare me!" Then he laughed a grim Snapping Turtle laugh, and went to sleep.
THE SNAPPY SNAPPING TURTLE
There was but one Snapping Turtle in the pond, and he was the only person there who had ever been heard to wish for another. He had not always lived there, and could just remember leaving his brothers and sisters when he was young. "I was carried away from my people," he said, "and kept on land for a few days. Then I was brought here and have made it my home ever since."
One could tell by looking at him that he was related to the Mud Turtles. He had upper and lower shells like them, and could draw in his head and legs and tail when he wanted to. His shells were gray, quite the color of a clay-bank, and his head was larger than those of the Mud Turtles. His tail was long and scaly and pointed, and his forelegs were large and warty. There were fine, strong webs between his toes, as there were between the toes of his relatives, the Mud Turtles.
When he first came to live in the pond, people were sorry for him, and tried to make him feel at home. He had a chance to win many friends and have all his neighbors fond of him, but he was too snappy. When the water was just warm enough, and his stomach was full, and he had slept well the night before, and everything was exactly as he wished it to be,--ah, then he was a very agreeable Turtle, and was ready to talk in the most gracious way to his neighbors. That was all very well. Anybody can be good-natured when everything is exactly right and he can have his own way. But the really delightful people, you know, are the ones who are pleasant when things go wrong.
It was a Mud Turtle Father who first spoke to him. "I hope you'll like the pond," said he. "We think it very homelike and comfortable."
"Humph! Shallow little hole!" snapped the one who had just come. "I bump my head on the bottom every time I dive."
"That is too bad," exclaimed the Mud Turtle Father. "I hope you dive where there is a soft bottom."
"Sometimes I do and sometimes I don't," answered the Snapping Turtle. "I can't bother to swim down slowly and try it, and then go back to dive. When I want to dive, I _want_ to dive, and that's all there is to it."
"Yes," said the Mud Turtle Father. "I know how it is when one has the diving feeling. I hope your head will not trouble you much, and that you will soon be used to our waters." He spread his toes and swam strongly away, pushing against the water with his webbed feet.
"Humph!" said the Snapping Turtle to himself. "It is all very well to talk about getting used to these waters, but I never shall. I can hardly see now for the pain in the right side of my head, where I bumped it. Or was it the left side I hit? Queer I can't remember!" Then he swam to shallow water, and drew himself into his shell, and lay there and thought how badly he felt, and how horrid the pond was, and what poor company his neighbors were, and what a disagreeable world this is for Snapping Turtles.
The Mud Turtle Father went home and told his wife all about it. "What a disagreeable fellow!" she said. "But then, he is a bachelor, and bachelors are often queer."
"I never was," said her husband.
"Oh!" said she. And, being a wise wife, she did not say anything else. She knew, however, that Mr. Mud Turtle was a much more agreeable fellow since he had married and learned to think more of somebody else than of himself. It is the people who think too much of themselves you know, who are most unhappy in this world.
The Eels also tried to be friendly, and, when he dove to the bottom, called to him to stay and visit with them. "You must excuse us from making the first call," they said. "We go out so little in the daytime."
"Humph!" said the Snapping Turtle. "Do you good to get away from home more. No wonder your eyes are weak, when you lie around in the mud of the dark pond-bottom all day. Indeed, I'll not stay. You can come to see me like other people."
Then he swam away and told the Clams what he had said, and he acted quite proud of what was really dreadful rudeness. "It'll do them good to hear the truth," said he. "I always speak right out. They are as bad as the Water-Adder. They have no backbone."
The Clams listened politely and said nothing. They never did talk much. The Snapping Turtle was mistaken though, when he said that the Eels and the Water-Adder had no backbone. They really had much more than he, but they wore theirs inside, while his was spread out in the shape of a shell for everybody to see.
He did not even try to keep his temper. He became angry one day because Belostoma, the Giant Water-Bug, ate something which he wanted for himself. His eyes glared and his horny jaws snapped, and he waved his long, pointed, scaly tail in a way which was terrible to see. "You are a good-for-nothing bug," he said. "You do no work, and you eat more than any other person of your size here. Nobody likes you, and there isn't a little fish in the pond who would be seen with you if he could help it. They all hide if they see you coming. I'll be heartily glad when you get your wings and fly away. Don't let any of your friends lay their eggs in this pond. I've seen enough of your family."
Of course this made Belostoma feel very badly. He was not a popular bug, and it is possible that if he could have had his own way, he would have chosen to be a Crayfish or a Stickleback, rather than what he was. As for his not working--there was nothing for him to do, so how could he work? He had to eat, or he would not grow, and since the Snapping Turtle was a hearty eater himself, he should have had the sense to keep still about that. Belostoma told the Mud Turtles what the Snapping Turtle had said, and the Mud Turtle Father spoke of it to the Snapping Turtle.
By that time the Snapping Turtle was feeling better natured and was very gracious. "Belostoma shouldn't remember those things," said he, moving one warty foreleg. "When I am angry, I often say things that I do not mean; but then, I get right over it. I had almost forgotten my little talk with him. I don't see any reason for telling him I am sorry. He is very silly to think so much of it." He lifted his big head quite high, and acted as though it was really a noble thing to be ugly and then forget about it. He might just as sensibly ask people to admire him for not eating when his stomach was full, or for lying still when he was too tired to swim.
When the Mud Turtle Mother heard of this, she was quite out of patience. "All he cares for," said she, "is just Snapping Turtle, Snapping Turtle, Snapping Turtle. When he is good-natured, he thinks everybody else ought to be; and when he is bad-tempered he doesn't care how other people feel. He will never be any more agreeable until he does something kind for somebody, and I don't see any chance of that happening."
There came a day, though, when the pond people were glad that the Snapping Turtle lived there. Two boys were wading in the edge of the pond, splashing the water and scaring all the people who were near them. The Sticklebacks turned pale all over, as they do when they are badly frightened. The Yellow Brown Frog was so scared that he emptied out the water he had saved for wetting his skin in dry weather. He had a great pocket in his body filled with water, for if his skin should get dry he couldn't breathe through it, and unless he carried water with him he could not stay ashore at all.
The boys had even turned the Mud Turtle Father onto his back in the sunshine, where he lay, waving his feet in the air, but not strong enough to get right side up again. The Snapping Turtle was taking a nap in deep water, when the frightened fishes came swimming toward him as fast as their tails would take them. "What is the matter?" said he.
"Boys!" cried they. "Boys! The dreadful, splashing, Turtle-turning kind."
"Humph!" said the Snapping Turtle. "I'll have to see about that. How many are there?"
"Two!" cried the Sticklebacks and Minnows together.
"And there is only one of me," said the Snapping Turtle to himself. "I must have somebody to help me. Oh, Belostoma," he cried, as the Giant Water-Bug swam past. "Help me drive those boys away."
"With pleasure," said Belostoma, who liked nothing better than this kind of work. Off they started for the place where the boys were wading. The Snapping Turtle took long, strong strokes with his webbed feet, and Belostoma could not keep up with him. The Snapping Turtle saw this. "Jump onto my back," cried he. "You are a light fellow. Hang tight."
Belostoma jumped onto the Snapping Turtle's clay-colored shell, and when he found himself slipping off the back end of it, he stuck his claws into the Snapping Turtle's tail and held on in that way. He knew that he was not easily hurt, even if he did make a fuss when he bumped his head. As soon as they got near the boys, the Snapping Turtle spoke over his back-shell to Belostoma. "Slide off now," said he, "and drive away the smaller boy. Don't stop to talk with these Bloodsuckers."
So Belostoma slid off and swam toward the smaller boy, and he ran out his stout little sucking tube and stung him on the leg. Just then the Snapping Turtle brought his horny jaws together on one of the larger boy's feet. There was a great splashing and dashing as the boys ran to the shore, and three Bloodsuckers, who had fastened themselves to the boy's legs, did not have time to drop off, and were carried ashore and never seen again.
[Illustration: THERE WAS A GREAT SPLASHING AND DASHING.  _Page 117_]
"There!" said the Snapping Turtle. "That's done. I don't know what the pond people would do, if you and I were not here to look after them, Belostoma."
"I'm glad I happened along," said the Giant Water-Bug quietly, "but you will have to do it all after this. I'm about ready to leave the pond. I think I'll go to-morrow."
"Going to-morrow!" exclaimed the Snapping Turtle. "I'm sorry. Of course I know you can never come back, but send your friends here to lay their eggs. We mustn't be left without some of your family."
"Thank you," said Belostoma, and he did not show that he remembered some quite different things which the Snapping Turtle had said before, about his leaving the pond. And that showed that he was a very wise bug as well as a brave one.
"Humph!" said the Snapping Turtle. "There is the Mud Turtle Father on his back." And he ran to him and pushed him over onto his feet. "Oh, thank you," cried the Mud Turtle Mother. "I was not strong enough to do that."
"Always glad to help my neighbors," said the Snapping Turtle. "Pleasant day, isn't it? I must tell the fishes that the boys are gone. The poor little fellows were almost too scared to swim." And he went away with a really happy look on his face.
"There!" said the Mud Turtle Mother to her husband. "He has begun to help people, and now he likes them, and is contented, I always told you so!"
THE CLEVER WATER-ADDER
None of the pond people were alone more than the Water-Adders. The Snapping Turtle was left to himself a great deal until the day when he and Belostoma drove away the boys. After that his neighbors began to understand him better and he was less grumpy, so that those who wore shells were soon quite fond of him.
Belostoma did not have many friends among the smaller people, and only a few among the larger ones. They said that he was cruel, and that he had a bad habit of using his stout sucking tube to sting with. Still, Belostoma did not care; he said, "A Giant Water-Bug does not always live in the water. I shall have my wings soon, and leave the water and marry. After that, I shall fly away on my wedding trip. Mrs. Belostoma may go with me, if she feels like doing so after laying her eggs here. I shall go anyway. And I shall flutter and sprawl around the light, and sting people who bother me, and have a happy time." That was Belostoma's way. He _would_ sting people who bothered him, but then he always said that they need not have bothered him. And perhaps that was so.
With the Water-Adders it was different. They were good-natured enough, yet the Mud Turtles and Snapping Turtle were the only ones who ever called upon them and found them at home. The small people without shells were afraid of them, and the Clams and Pond Snails never called upon any one. The Minnows said they could not bear the looks of the Adders--they had such ugly mouths and such quick motions. The larger fishes kept away on account of their children, who were small and tender.
One might think that the Sand-Hill Cranes, the Fish Hawks, and the other shore families would have been good friends for them, but when they called, the Adders were always away. People said that the Adders were afraid of them.
The Yellow Brown Frog wished that the Adders could be scared, badly scared, some time: so scared that a chilly feeling would run down their backs from their heads clear to the tips of their tails. "I wish," said he, "that the chilly feeling would be big enough to go way through to their bellies. Their bellies are only the front side of their backs, anyway," he added, "because they are so thin." Of course this was a dreadful wish to make, but people said that one of the Adders had frightened the Yellow Brown Frog so that he never got over it, and this was the reason he felt so.
The Water-Adders were certainly the cleverest people in the pond, and there was one Mother Adder who was so very bright that they called her "the Clever Water-Adder." She could do almost anything, and she knew it. She talked about it, too, and that showed bad taste, and was one reason why she was not liked better. She could swim very fast, could creep, glide, catch hold of things with her tail, hang herself from the branch of a tree, lift her head far into the air, leap, dart, bound, and dive. All her family could do these things, but she could do them a little the best.
One day she was hanging over the pond in a very graceful position, with her tail twisted carelessly around a willow branch. The Snapping Turtle and a Mud Turtle Father were in the shallow water below her. Her slender forked tongue was darting in and out of her open mouth. She was using her tongue in this way most of the time. "It is useful in feeling of things," she said, "and then, I have always thought it quite becoming." She could see herself reflected in the still water below her, and she noticed how prettily the dark brown of her back shaded into the white of her belly. You see she was vain as well as clever.
The Snapping Turtle felt cross to-day, and had come to see if a talk with her would not make him feel better. The Mud Turtle was tired of having the children sprawl around him, and of Mrs. Mud Turtle telling about the trouble she had to get the right kind of food.
The Clever Water-Adder spoke first of the weather. "It must be dreadfully hot for the shore people," she said. "Think of their having to wear the same feathers all the year and fly around in the sunshine to find food for their children."
"Ah yes," said the Mud Turtle. "How they must wish for shells!"
"Humph!" said the Snapping Turtle. "What for? To fly with? Let them come in swimming with their children, if they are warm and tired."
The Water-Adder laughed in her snaky way, and showed her sharp teeth. "I have heard," she said, "that when the Wild Ducks bring their children here to swim, they do not always take so many home as they brought."
The Snapping Turtle became very much interested in his warty right foreleg, and did not seem to hear what she said. The Mud Turtle smiled. "I have heard," she went on, "that when young Ducks dive head first, they are quite sure to come up again, but that when they dive feet first, they never come up."
"What do you mean?" asked the Snapping Turtle, and he was snappy about it.
"Oh, nothing," replied the Water-Adder, swinging her head back and forth and looking at the scales on her body.
"I know what you mean," said the Snapping Turtle, "and you know what you mean, but I have to eat something, and if I am swimming under the water and a Duckling paddles along just above me and sticks his foot into my mouth, I am likely to swallow him before I think."
The Water-Adder saw that he was provoked by what she had said, so she talked about something else. "I think the Ducks spoil their children," said she. "They make such a fuss over them, and they are not nearly so bright as my children. Why, mine hatch as soon as the eggs are laid, and go hunting at once. They are no trouble at all."
"I never worry about mine," said the Mud Turtle, "although their mother thinks it is not safe for them all to sleep at once, as they do on a log in the sunshine."
"It isn't," said the Adder decidedly. "I never close my eyes. None of us Adders do. Nobody can ever say that we close our eyes to danger." They couldn't shut their eyes if they wanted to, because they had no eyelids, but she did not speak of that. "How stupid people are," she said.
"Most of them," remarked the Turtles.
"All of them," she said, "except us Adders and the Turtles. I even think that some of the Turtles are a little queer, don't you?"
"We have thought so," said the Mud Turtle.
"They certainly are," agreed the Snapping Turtle, who was beginning to feel much better natured.
"What did you say?" asked the Adder who, like all her family, was a little deaf.
"Ouch!" exclaimed the Snapping Turtle. "Ouch! Ouch!"
"What is the matter?" asked the Mud Turtle. Then he began to slap the water with his short, stout tail, and say "Ouch!"
Two naughty young Water-Boatmen had swum quietly up on their backs, and stung the Turtles on their tails. Then they swam away, pushing themselves quickly through the water with swift strokes of their hairy oar-legs.
"Ah-h-h!" exclaimed the Snapping Turtle, and he backed into the mud, knowing that fine, soft mud is the best thing in the world for stings.
"Ah-h-h!" exclaimed the Mud Turtle, "if I could only reach my tail with my head, or even with one of my hind feet!"
"Reach your tail with your head?" asked the Water-Adder in her sweetest voice. "Nothing is easier." And she wound herself around the willow branch in another graceful position, and took the tip of her tail daintily between her teeth.
"Humph!" said the Snapping Turtle, and he pulled his tail out of the mud and swam away.
"Ugh!" said the Mud Turtle, and he swam away with the Snapping Turtle.
"What a rude person she is!" they said. "Always trying to show how much more clever she is than other people. We would rather be stupid and polite."
After a while the Snapping Turtle said, "But then, you know, we are not stupid."
"Of course not," replied the Mud Turtle, "not even queer."
THE GOOD LITTLE CRANES WHO WERE BAD
When the Sand-Hill Cranes were married, they began to work for a home of their own. To be sure, they had chosen a place for it beforehand, yet there were other things to think about, and some of their friends told them it would be very foolish to build on the ground. "There are so many accidents to ground nests," these friends said. "There are Snakes, you know, and Rats, and a great many other people whom you would not want to have look in on your children. Besides, something might fall on it."
The young couple talked this all over and decided to build in a tree. "We are not afraid of Snakes and Rats," they said, "but we would fear something falling on the nest." They were talking to quite an old Crane when they said this.
"Do you mean to build in a tree?" said he. "My dear young friends, don't do that. Just think, a high wind might blow the nest down and spoil everything. Do whatever you wish, but don't build in a tree." Then he flew away.
"Dear me!" exclaimed young Mrs. Crane, "one tells me to do this and never to do that. Another tells me to do that and never to do this. I shall just please myself since I cannot please my friends."
"And which place do you choose?" asked her husband, who always liked whatever she did.
"I shall build on the ground," she said decidedly. "If the tree falls, it may hit the nest and it may not, but if we build in the tree and it falls, we are sure to hit the ground."
"How wise you are!" exclaimed her husband. "I believe people get in a way of building just so, and come to think that no other way can be right." Which shows that Mr. Sand-Hill Crane was also wise.
Both worked on the nest, bringing roots and dried grasses with which to build it up. Sometimes they went to dance with their friends, and when they did they bowed most of the time to each other. They did not really care very much about going, because they were so interested in the nest. This they had to build quite high from the ground, on account of their long legs. "If I were a Duck," said Mrs. Sand-Hill Crane, "it would do very well for me to sit on the nest, but with my legs? Never! I would as soon sit on two bare branches as to have them doubled under me." So she tried the nest until it was just as high as her legs were long.
When it was high enough, she laid in it two gray eggs with brown spots. After that she did no more dancing, but stood with a leg on either side of the nest, and her soft body just over the eggs to keep them warm. It was very tiresome work, and sometimes Mr. Crane covered the eggs while she went fishing. The Cranes are always very kind to their wives.
This, you know, was the first time that either had had a nest, and it was all new and wonderful to them. They thought that there never had been such a beautiful home. They often stood on the ground beside it, and poked it this way and that with their bills, and said to each other, "Just look at this fine root that I wove in," or, "Have you noticed how well that tuft of dried grass looks where I put it?" As it came near the time for their eggs to hatch, they could hardly bear to be away long enough to find food.
One day young Mr. Sand-Hill Crane came home much excited. "Our neighbors, the Cranes who live across the pond," said he, "had two children hatched this morning."
"Oh, how glad I am!" cried his wife. "How glad I am! Those eggs were laid just before ours, which must hatch very soon now."
"That is what I thought," said he. "I feel so sorry for them, though, for I saw their children, and they are dreadfully homely,--not at all like their parents, who are quite good-looking."
"I must see them myself," said his wife, "and if you will cover the eggs while I go for food, I will just peep in on them. I will hurry back." She flew steadily across the pond, which was not very wide, and asked to see the babies. She had never seen any Crane children, you know, since she herself was little. She thought them very ugly to look at, and wondered how their mother could seem bright and cheerful with two such disappointing children. She said all the polite things that she honestly could, then got something to eat, and flew home. "They are very, very homely," she said to her husband, "and I think it queer. All their older children are good-looking."
She had hardly said this when she heard a faint tapping sound in the nest. She looked, and there was the tip of a tiny beak showing through the shell of one egg. She stood on one side of the nest, watching, and her husband stood on the other while their oldest child slowly made his way out. They dared not help for fear of hurting him, and besides, all the other Cranes had told them that they must not.
"Oh, look!" cried the young mother. "What a dear little bill!"
"Ah!" said the young father. "Did you ever see such a neck?"
"Look at those legs," cried she. "What a beautiful child he is!"
"He looks just like you," said the father, "and I am glad of it."
"Ah, no," said she. "He is exactly like you." And she began to clear away the broken egg-shell.
Soon the other Crane baby poked her bill out, and again the young parents stood around and admired their child. They could not decide which was the handsomer, but they were sure that both were remarkable babies. They felt more sorry than ever for their neighbors across the pond, who had such homely children. They took turns in covering their own damp little Cranes, and were very, very happy.
Before this, it had been easy to get what food they wanted, for there had been two to work for two. Now there were two to work for four, and that made it much harder. There was no time for dancing, and both father and mother worked steadily, yet they were happier than ever, and neither would have gone back to the careless old days for all the food in the pond or all the dances on the beach.
The little Cranes grew finely. They changed their down for pin-feathers, and then these grew into fine brownish gray feathers, like those which their parents wore. They were good children, too, and very well brought up. They ate whatever food was given to them, and never found fault with it. When they left the nest for the first time, they fluttered and tumbled and had trouble in learning to walk. A Mud Turtle Father who was near, told them that this was because their legs were too long and too few.
"Well," said the brother, as he picked himself up and tried to stand on one leg while he drew the other foot out of the tangled grass, "they may be too long, but I'm sure there are enough of them. When I'm thinking about one, I never can tell what the other will do."
Still, it was not long before they could walk and wade and even fly. Then they met the other pond people, and learned to tell a Stickleback from a Minnow. They did not have many playmates. The saucy little Kingfishers sat on branches over their heads, the Wild Ducks waddled or swam under their very bills, the Fish Hawks floated in air above them, and the Gulls screamed hoarsely to them as they circled over the pond, yet none of them were long-legged and stately. The things that the other birds enjoyed most, they could not do, and sometimes they did not like it very well. One night they were talking about the Gulls, when they should have been asleep, and their father told them to tuck their heads right under their wings and not let him hear another word from them. They did tuck their heads under their wings, but they peeped out between the feathers, and when they were sure their father and mother were asleep, they walked softly away and planned to do something naughty.
"I'm tired of being good," said the brother. "The Gulls never are good. They scream, and snatch, and contradict, and have lots of fun. Let's be bad just for fun."
"All right," said his sister. "What shall we do?"
"That's the trouble," said he. "I can't think of anything naughty that I really care for."
Each stood on one leg and thought for a while. "We might run away," said she.
"Where would we go?" asked he.
"We might go to the meadow," said she. So they started off in the moonlight and went to the meadow, but all the people there were asleep, except the Tree Frog, and he scrambled out of the way as soon as he saw them coming, because he thought they might want a late supper.
"This isn't any fun!" said the brother. "Let's go to the forest."
They went to the forest, and saw the Bats flitting in and out among the trees, and the Bats flew close to the Cranes and scared them. The Great Horned Owl stood on a branch near them, and stared at them with his big round eyes, and said, "Who? Who? Waugh-ho-oo!" Then the brother and sister stood closer together and answered, "If you please, sir, we are the Crane children."
But the Great Horned Owl kept on staring at them and saying "Who? Who? Waugh-ho-oo!" until they were sure he was deaf, and answered louder and louder still.
The Screech Owls came also, and looked at them, and bent their bodies over as if they were laughing, and nodded their heads, and shook themselves. Then the Crane children were sure that they were being made fun of, so they stalked away very stiffly, and when they were out of sight of the Owls, they flew over toward the farmhouse. They were not having any fun at all yet, and they meant to keep on trying, for what was the good of being naughty if they didn't?
They passed Horses and Cows asleep in the fields, and saw the Brown Hog lying in the pen with a great many little Brown Pigs and one White Pig sleeping beside her. Nobody was awake except Collie, the Shepherd Dog, who was sitting in the farmyard with his nose in the air, barking at the moon.
"Go away!" he said to the Crane children, who were walking around the yard. "Go away! I must bark at the moon, and I don't want anybody around." They did not start quite soon enough to please him, so he dashed at them, and ran around them and barked at them, instead of at the moon, until they were glad enough to fly straight home to the place where their father and mother were sleeping with their heads under their wings.
"Are you going to tell them?" asked the brother.
"I don't know," answered the sister. When morning came, they looked tired, and their father and mother seemed so worried about them that they told the whole story.
"We didn't care so very much about what we did," they said, "but we thought it would be fun to be naughty."
The father and mother looked at each other in a very knowing way. "A great many people think that," said the mother gently. "They are mistaken after all. It is really more fun to be good."
"Well, I wish the Gulls wouldn't scream, 'Goody-goody' at us," said the brother.
"What difference does that make?" asked his father. "Why should a Crane care what a Gull says?"
"Why, I--I don't know," stammered the brother. "I guess it doesn't make any difference after all."
The next day when the Crane children were standing in the edge of the pond, a pair of young Gulls flew down near them and screamed out, "Goody-goody!"
Then the Crane brother and sister lifted their heads and necks and opened their long bills, and trumpeted back, "Baddy-baddy!"
"There!" they said to each other. "Now we are even."
THE OLDEST DRAGON-FLY NYMPH
When the Oldest Dragon-Fly Nymph felt that the wings under her skin were large enough, she said good-bye to her water friends, and crawled slowly up the stem of a tall cat-tail. All the other Dragon-Fly Nymphs crowded around her and wished that their wings were more nearly ready, and the larvæ talked about the time when they should become Nymphs. The Oldest Nymph, the one who was going away, told them that if they would be good little larvæ, and eat a great deal of plain food and take care not to break any of their legs, or to hurt either of their short, stiff little feelers, they would some day be fine great Nymphs like her. Then she crawled slowly up the cat-tail stem, and when she drew the tenth and last joint of her body out of the water, her friends turned to each other and said, "She is really gone." They felt so badly about it that they had to eat something at once to keep from crying.
The Oldest Nymph now stopped breathing water and began to breathe air. She waited to look at the pond before she went any farther. She had never seen it from above, and it looked very queer to her. It was beautiful and shining, and, because the sky above it was cloudless, the water was a most wonderful blue. There was no wind stirring, so there were no tiny waves to sparkle and send dancing bits of light here and there. It was one of the very hot and still summer days, which Dragon-Flies like best.
A sad look came into the Nymph's great eyes as she stood there. "The pond is beautiful," she said; "but when one looks at it from above, it does not seem at all homelike." She shook her three-cornered head sadly, and rubbed her eyes with her forelegs. She thought she should miss the happy times in the mud with the other children.
A Virgin Dragon-Fly lighted on the cat-tail next to hers. She knew it was a Virgin Dragon-Fly because he had black wings folded over his back, and there were shimmering green and blue lights all over his body and wings. He was very slender and smaller than she. "Good morning," said he. "Are you just up?"
"Yes," said she, looking bashfully down at her forefeet. She did not know how to behave in the air, it was so different from the water.
"Couldn't have a finer day," said he. "Very glad you've come. Excuse me. There is a friend to whom I must speak." Then he flew away with another Virgin Dragon-Fly.
"Hurry up and get your skin changed," said a voice above her, and there was a fine great fellow floating in the air over her head. "I'll tell you a secret when you do."
Dragon-Flies care a great deal for secrets, so she quickly hooked her twelve sharp claws into the cat-tail stem, and unfastened her old skin down the back, and wriggled and twisted and pulled until she had all her six legs and the upper part of her body out. This made her very tired and she had to rest for a while. The old skin would only open down for a little way by her shoulders, and it was hard to get out through such a small place. Next she folded her legs close to her body, and bent over backward, and swayed this way and that, until she had drawn her long, slender body from its outgrown covering.
[Illustration: SHE SWAYED THIS WAY AND THAT.             _Page 146_]
She crawled away from the empty skin and looked it over. It kept the shape of her body, but she was surprised to find how fast she was growing slender. Even then, and she had been out only a short time, she was much longer and thinner than she had been, and her old skin looked much too short for her. "How styles do change," she said. "I remember how proud I was of that skin when I first got it, and now I wouldn't be seen in it."
Her beautiful gauzy wings with their dark veinings, were drying and growing in the sunshine. She was weak now, and had them folded over her back like those of the Virgin Dragon-Fly, but, as soon as she felt rested and strong, she meant to spread them out flat.
The fine Big Dragon-Fly lighted beside her. "How are your wings?" said he.
"Almost dry," she answered joyfully, and she quivered them a little to show him how handsome they were.
"Well," said he. "I'll tell you the secret now, and of course you will never speak of it. I saw you talking with a Virgin Dragon-Fly. He may be all right, but he isn't really in our set, you know, and you'd better not have anything to do with him."
"Thank you," she said. "I won't." She thought it very kind in him to tell her.
He soon flew away, and, as she took her first flight into the air, a second Big Dragon-Fly overtook her. "I'll tell you a secret," said he, "if you will never tell."
"I won't," said she.
"I saw you talking to a Virgin Dragon-Fly a while ago. You may have noticed that he folded his wings over his back. The Big Dragon-Flies never do this, and you must never be seen with yours so."
"Thank you," she said. "I won't. But when they were drying I had to hold them in that way."
"Of course," said he. "We all do things then that we wouldn't afterward."
Before long she began egg-laying, flying low enough to touch her body to the water now and then and drop a single egg. This egg always sank at once to the bottom, and she took no more care of it.
A third Big Dragon-Fly came up to her. "I want to tell you something," he said. "Put your head close to mine."
She put her head close to his, and he whispered, "I saw you flying with my cousin a few minutes ago. I dislike to say it, but he is not a good friend for you. Whatever you do, don't go with him again. Go with me."
"Thank you," said she, yet she began to wonder what was the matter. She saw that just as soon as she visited with anybody, somebody else told her that she must not do so again. Down in the pond they had all been friends. She wondered if it could not be so in the air. She rubbed her head with her right foreleg, and frowned as much as she could. You know she couldn't frown very much, because her eyes were so large and close together that there was only a small frowning-place left.
She turned her head to see if any one else was coming to tell her a secret. Her neck was very, very slender and did not show much, because the back side of her head was hollow and fitted over her shoulders. No other Dragon-Fly was near. Instead, she saw a Swallow swooping down on her. She sprang lightly into the air and the Swallow chased her. When he had his beak open to catch her as he flew, she would go backward or sidewise without turning around. This happened many times, and it was well for her that it was so, for the Swallow was very hungry, and if he had caught her--well, she certainly would never have told any of the secrets she knew.
The Swallow quite lost his patience and flew away grumbling. "I won't waste any more time," he said, "on trying to catch somebody who can fly backward without turning around. Ridiculous way to fly!"
The Dragon-Fly thought it an exceedingly good way, however, and was even more proud of her wings than she had been. "Legs are all very well," she said to herself, "as far as they go, and one's feet would be of very little use without them; but I like wings better. Now that I think of it," she added, "I haven't walked a step since I began to fly. I understand better the old saying, 'Make your wings save your legs.' They certainly are very good things to stand on when one doesn't care to fly."
Night came, and she was glad to sleep on the under side of a broad leaf of pickerel-weed. She awakened feeling stupid and lazy. She could not think what was the matter, until she heard her friends talking about the weather. Then she knew that Dragon-Flies are certain to feel so on dark and wet days. "I don't see what difference that should make," she said. "I'm not afraid of rain. I've always been careless about getting my feet wet and it never hurt me any."
"Ugh!" said one of her friends. "You've never been wet in spots, or hit on one wing by a great rain-drop that has fallen clear down from a cloud. I had a rain-drop hit my second right knee once, and it has hurt me ever since. I have only five good knees left, and I have to be very careful about lighting on slippery leaves."
It was very dull. Nobody seemed to care about anybody or anything. The fine Big Dragon-Flies, who had been so polite to her the day before, hardly said "Good morning" to her now. When she asked them questions, they would say nothing but "Yes" or "No" or "I don't know," and one of them yawned in her face. "Oh dear!" she said. "How I wish myself back in the pond where the rain couldn't wet me. I'd like to see my old friends and some of the dear little larvæ. I wish more of the Nymphs would come up."
She looked all around for them, and as she did so she saw the shining back-shell of the Snapping Turtle, showing above the shallow water. "I believe I'll call on him," she said. "He may tell me something about my old friends, and anyway it will cheer me up." She lighted very carefully on the middle of his back-shell and found it very comfortable. "Good morning," said she. "Have you--"
"No," snapped he. "I haven't, and I don't mean to!"
"Dear me," said she. "That is too bad."
"I don't see why," said he. "Is there any particular reason why I should?"
"I thought you might have just happened to," said she, "and I should like to know how they are."
"What are you talking about?" snapped he.
"I was going to ask if you had seen the Dragon-Fly children lately," she said. And as she spoke she made sure that she could not slip. She felt perfectly safe where she was, because she knew that, no matter how cross he might be, he could not reach above the edges of his back-shell.
"Well, why didn't you say so in the first place," he snapped, "instead of sitting there and talking nonsense! They are all right. A lot of the Nymphs are going into the air to-day!" Now that he had said a few ugly things, he began to feel better natured. "You've changed a good deal since the last time I saw you."
"When was that?" asked she.
"It was one day when I came remarkably near sitting down on a lot of you Dragon-Fly children," he chuckled. "You were a homely young Nymph then, and you stuck out your lower lip at me."
"Oh!" said she. "Then you did see us?"
"Of course I did," answered he. "Haven't I eyes? I'd have sat down on you, too, if I hadn't wanted to see you scramble away. The larvæ always are full of mischief, but then they are young. You Nymphs were old enough to know better."
"I suppose we were," she said. "I didn't think you saw us. Why didn't you tell us?"
"Oh," said the Snapping Turtle, "I thought I'd have a secret. If I can't keep a secret for myself, I know that nobody can keep it for me. Secrets can swim faster than any fish in the pond if you once let them get away from you. I thought I'd better not tell. I might want to sit on you some other time, you know."
"You'll never have the chance," said she, with a twinkle in her big eyes. "It is my turn to sit on you." And after that they were very good friends--as long as she sat on the middle of his shell.
THE EELS' MOVING-NIGHT
The Eels were as different from the Clams as people well could be. It was not alone that they looked unlike, but that they had such different ways of enjoying life. The Clams were chubby people, each comfortably settled in his own shell, which he could open or shut as he chose. They never wanted to live anywhere else, or to get beyond the edges of their own pearl-lined shells.
The Eels were long, slender, and slippery people, looking even more like snakes than they did like fishes. They were always careful to tell new acquaintances, though, that they were not even related to the snakes. "To be sure," they would say, "we do not wear our fins like most fishes, but that is only a matter of taste after all. We should find them dreadfully in the way if we did." And that was just like the Eels--they were always so ready to explain everything to their friends.
They were great talkers. They would talk about themselves, and their friends, and the friends of their friends, and the pond, and the weather, and the state of the mud, and what everything was like yesterday, and what it would be likely to be like to-morrow, and did you really think so, and why? The Water-Adder used to say that they were the easiest people in the pond to visit with, for all one had to do was to keep still and look very much interested. Perhaps that may have been why the Clams and they were such good friends.
The Clams, you know, were a quiet family. Unless a Clam was very, very much excited, he never said more than "Yes," "No," or "Indeed?" They were excellent listeners and some of the most popular people in the pond. Those who were in trouble told the Clams, and they would say, "Indeed," or "Ah," in such a nice way that their visitor was sure to leave feeling better. Others who wanted advice would go to them, and talk over their plans and tell them what they wanted to do, and the Clams would say, "Yes," and then the visitors would go away quite decided, and say, "We really didn't know what to do until we spoke to the Clams about it, but they agree with us perfectly." The Clams were also excellent people to keep secrets, and as the Eels were forever telling secrets, that was all very well.
Mother Eel was fussy. She even said so herself. And if a thing bothered her, she would talk and talk and talk until even her own children were tired of hearing about it. Now she was worrying over the pond water.
"I do not think it nearly so clean as it was last year," she said, "and the mud is getting positively dirty. Our family are very particular about that, and I think we may have to move. I do dread the moving, though. It is so much work with a family the size of mine, and Mr. Eel is no help at all with the children."
She was talking with Mother Mud Turtle when she said this, and the little Eels were wriggling all around her as she spoke. Then they began teasing her to go, until she told them to swim away at once and play with the young Minnows. "I'm afraid I shall have to go," said she, "if only on account of the children. I want them to see something of the world. It is so dull in this pond. Were you ever out of it?" she asked, turning suddenly to Mrs. Mud Turtle.
"Oh, yes," answered she. "I go quite often, and one of my sons took a very long trip to the meadow. He went with some boys. It was most exciting."
[Illustration: SHE WAS TALKING WITH MOTHER MUD TURTLE.   _Page 160_]
"Is that the one with the--peculiar back-shell?" asked Mother Eel.
"Yes," replied Mother Mud Turtle sweetly. "He is very modest and does not care to talk about it much, but I am really quite pleased. Some people travel and show no sign of it afterward. One would never know that they had left home (Mother Eel wondered if she meant her), but with him it is different. He shows marks of having been in the great world outside."
Mother Eel wriggled a little uneasily. "I think I must tell you after all," she said. "I have really made up my mind to go. Mr. Eel thinks it foolish, and would rather stay here, but I am positive that we can find a better place, and we must consider the children. He thinks he cares as much for them as I do, yet he would be willing to have them stay here forever. He was hatched here, and thinks the pond perfect. We get to talking about it sometimes, and I say to him, 'Mr. Eel, where would those children be now if it were not for me?'"
"And what does he say then?" asked the Mud Turtle Mother.
"Nothing," answered Mother Eel, with a smart little wriggle. "There is nothing for him to say. Yes, we shall certainly move. I am only waiting for the right kind of night. It must not be too light, or the land people would see us; not too dark, or we could not see them. And then the grass must be dewy. It would never do for us to get dry, you know, or we should all be sick. But please don't speak of this, dear Mrs. Turtle. I would rather leave quietly when the time comes."
So the Mud Turtle Mother remembered that it was a secret, and told nobody except the Mud Turtle Father, and he did not speak of it to anybody but the Snapping Turtle.
"Did you say that it was a secret?" asked the Snapping Turtle.
"Yes," said the Mud Turtle Father, "It is a great secret."
"Humph!" said the Snapping Turtle. "Then why did you tell me?"
That same day when the Stickleback Father came to look for nineteen or twenty of his children who were missing, Mother Eel told him about her plans. "I thought you would be interested in hearing of it," she said, "but I shall not mention it to anybody else."
"You may be sure I shall not speak of it," said he. And probably he would not have told a person, if it had not been that he forgot and talked of it with the Snails. He also forgot to say that it was a secret, and so they spoke freely of it to the Crayfishes and the Caddis Worms.
The Caddis Worms were playing with the Tadpoles soon after this, and one of them whispered to a Tadpole right before the others, although he knew perfectly well that it was rude for him to do so. "Now, don't you ever tell," said he aloud.
"Uh-uh!" answered the Tadpole, and everybody knew that he meant "No," even if they hadn't seen him wave his hindlegs sidewise. Of course, not having the right kind of neck for it, he couldn't shake his head.
Then the other Tadpoles and Caddis Worms wanted to tell secrets, and they kept whispering to each other and saying out loud, "Now don't you _ever_ tell." When a Caddis Worm told a Tadpole anything, he said, "The Eels are going to move away." And when a Tadpole told a secret to a Caddis Worm, he just moved his lips and said, "Siss-el, siss-el, siss-el-siss. I'm only making believe, you know." But he was sure to add out loud, "Now don't you _tell_." And the Caddis Worm would answer, "Uh-uh!"
The Eel Mother also spoke to the Biggest Frog, asking him to watch the grass for her and tell her when it was dewy enough for moving. He was afraid he might forget it, and so told his sister and asked her to help him remember. And she was afraid that she might forget, so she spoke to her friend, the Green Brown Frog, about it. The Yellow Brown Frog afterward said that he heard it from her.
One night it was neither too dark nor too light, and the dew lay heavy on the grass. Then Mother Eel said to her children, "Now stop your wriggling and listen to me, every one of you! We shall move because the mud here is so dirty. You are going out into the great world, and I want you to remember everything you feel and see. You may never have another chance."
The little Eels were so excited that they couldn't keep still, and she had to wait for them to stop wriggling. When they were quiet, she went on. "All the Eels are going--your uncles and aunts and cousins--and you children must keep with the older ones. Be careful where you wriggle to, and don't get on anybody else's tail."
She led the way out of the water and wriggled gracefully up the bank, although it was quite steep at that place. "I came this way," she said, "because I felt more as though this was the way to come." She closed her mouth very firmly as she spoke. Mr. Eel had thought another way better. They had to pass through crowds of pond people to reach the shore, for everybody had kept awake and was watching. The older ones cried out, "Good-bye; we shall miss you," and waved their fins or their legs, or their tails, whichever seemed the handiest. The younger ones teased the little Eels and tried to hold them back, and told them they'd miss lots of fun, and that they guessed they'd wish themselves back in the pond again. When they got onto the shore, the Frogs and the Mud Turtles were there, and it was a long time before they could get started on their journey. One of the little Eels was missing, and his mother had to go back for him. She found that a mischievous young Stickleback had him by the tail.
When at last they were all together on the bank, the Eel Father said to his wife, "Are you sure that the Cranes and Fish Hawks don't know about our moving? Because if they did--"
"I know," she said. "It would be dreadful if they found out; and we have been so late in getting started. We shall have to stop at the very first water we find now, whether we like it or not." She lay still and thought. "I have a feeling," said she, "that we should go this way." So that way they went, dragging their yellow bellies over the ground as carefully as they could, their dark green backs with their long fringes of back fins hardly showing in the grass. It was a good thing that their skin was so fat and thick, for sometimes they had to cross rough places that scraped it dreadfully and even rumpled the tiny scales that were in it, while their long fringes of belly fins became worn and almost ragged. "If your scales were on the outside," said their father, "like those of other fishes, you wouldn't have many left."
Mother Eel was very tired and did not say much. Her friends began to fear that she was ill. At last she spoke, "I do not see," she said, "how people found out that we were to move."
"You didn't tell anybody?" said Mr. Eel.
"No indeed!" said she; and she really believed it. That was because she had talked so much that she couldn't remember what she did say. It is always so with those that talk too much.
THE CRAYFISH MOTHER
Three Stickleback Mothers and several Clams were visiting under the lily-pads in the early morning. Mother Eel was also there. "Yes," she said "I am glad to come back and be among my old friends, and the children are happier here. As I often tell Mr. Eel, there is no place like one's home. We had a hard journey, but I do not mind that. We are rested now, and travel does teach people so much. I should think you would get dreadfully tired of being in the water all the time. I want my children to see the world. Now they know grass, and trees, and air, and dry ground. There are not many children of their age who know more than they. We stayed in a brook the one day we were gone, so they have felt running water too. It was clean--I will say that for it--but it was no place for Eels, and so we came back."
There is no telling how long she would have kept on talking if she had not been called away. As soon as she left, the Sticklebacks began to talk about her.
"So she thinks we must be tired of staying in the water all the time," said one. "It doesn't tire me nearly so much as it would to go dragging myself over the country, wearing out my fins on the ground."
"Indeed?" said a Clam, to whom she turned as she spoke.
"Well, I'll tell you what I think," said another Stickleback Mother. "I think that if she didn't care so much for travel herself, she would not be dragging her family around to learn grass and trees. Some night they will be learning Owls or men, and that will be the end of them!"
"I do not believe in it at all," said the first speaker. "I certainly would not want my sons to learn these things, for they must grow up to be good nest-builders and baby-tenders. I have told their fathers particularly to bring them up to be careful housekeepers. With my daughters, it is different."
For a long time nobody spoke; then a Clam said, "What a difference there is in mothers!" It quite startled the Sticklebacks to hear a Clam say so much. It showed how interested he was, and well he might be. The Clam who brings up children has to do it alone, and be both father and mother to them, and of course that is hard work. It is hard, too, because when a little Clam is naughty, his parent can never say that he takes his naughtiness from any one else.
"And there is a difference in fathers too," exclaimed one fine-looking Stickleback Mother. "_I_ say that a father's place is by the nest, and that if he does his work there well, he will not have much time to want to travel, or to loaf around by the shore." The Clams looked at each other and said nothing. Some people thought that the Stickleback Mothers were lazy.
Just then a Crayfish Mother came swimming slowly along, stopping often to rest. Her legs were almost useless, there were so many little Crayfishes clinging to them.
"Now look at her," said one Stickleback. "Just look at her. She laid her eggs at the beginning of last winter and fastened them to her legs. Said she was so afraid something would happen if she left them, and that this was a custom in her family anyway. Now they have hatched, and her children hang on to her in the same way."
The Crayfish Mother stopped with a sigh. "Isn't it dreadfully warm?" said she.
"We haven't found it so," answered the Sticklebacks, while the Clams murmured "No."
"Let me take some of your children," said one Stickleback. "Perhaps carrying them has made you warm and tired."
The Crayfish stuck her tail-paddles into the mud, and spread her pinching-claws in front of her family. "Oh no, thank you," said she. "They won't be contented with any one but me."
"That must make it hard for you," said another Stickleback politely. She was thinking how quickly she would shake off the little Crayfishes if they were her children.
"It does," answered their mother. "It is hard, for I carried the eggs on my legs all through the cold weather and until it was very warm again; and now that they are hatched, the children hang on with their pinching-claws. Still, I can't bear to shake them off, poor little things!" She held up first one leg and then another to show off her dangling babies.
"I don't know what will happen to them when I cast my shell," said she. "I shall have to soon, for I can hardly breathe in it. My sister changed hers some time ago, and her new one is getting hard already."
"Oh, they'll be all right," said a Stickleback cheerfully. "Their fathers tell me that my children learn remarkably fast how to look out for themselves."
"But my children can't walk yet," said the Crayfish Mother, "and they don't know how to swim."
"What of that?" asked a Stickleback, who was beginning to lose her patience. "They can learn, can't they? They have eight legs apiece, haven't they, besides the ones that have pincers? Isn't that enough to begin on? And haven't they tail-paddles?"
"I suppose so," said their mother, with a sigh, "but they don't seem to want to go. I must put them to sleep now and try to get a little rest myself, for the sun is well up."
The next night she awakened and remembered what the Sticklebacks had said, so she thought she would try shaking her children off. "It is for your own good," she said, and she waved first one leg and then another. When she got four of her legs free, and stood on them to shake the other four, her children scrambled back to her and took hold again with their strong little pinching-claws. Then she gave it up. "You dear tiny things!" she said. "But I do wish you would walk instead of making me carry you."
"We don't want to!" they cried; "we don't know how."
"There, there!" said their mother. "No, to be sure you don't."
The next night, though, they had to let go, for their mother was casting her shell. When it was off she lay weak and helpless on the pond-bottom, and her children lay around her. They behaved very badly indeed. "Come here and let me catch hold of you," cried one. "I can't walk," said another, "because I don't know how."
Some of them were so cross that they just lay on their backs and kicked with all their eight feet, and screamed, "I _won't_ try!" It was dreadful!
The Crayfish Mother was too weak to move, and when the Wise Old Crayfish came along she spoke to him. "My children will not walk," said she, "even when I tell them to." He knew that it was because when she had told them to do things before, she had not made them mind.
"I will see what I can do," said he, "but you must not say a word." He walked backward to where they were, and kept his face turned toward their mother, which was polite of him. "Do you want the Eels to find you here?" he said, in his gruffest voice. "If you don't, you'd better run."
What a scrambling there was! In one way or another, every little Crayfish scampered away. Some went forward, some went sidewise, and some went backward. Some didn't keep step with themselves very well at first, but they soon found out how. Even the crossest ones, who were lying on their backs flopped over and were off.
The Wise Old Crayfish turned to their mother. "It is no trouble to teach ten-legged children to walk," said he, "if you go at it in the right way."
The little Crayfishes soon got together again, and while they were talking, one of their many aunts came along with all her children hanging to her legs. Then the little Crayfishes who had just learned to walk, pointed their pinching-claws at their cousins, and said, "Sh-h-h! 'Fore I'd let my mother carry me! Babies!"
TWO LITTLE CRAYFISHES QUARREL
The day after the Eels left, the pond people talked of nothing else. It was not that they were so much missed, for the Eels, you know, do not swim around in the daytime. They lie quietly in the mud and sleep or talk. It is only at night that they are really lively. Still, as the Mother Mud Turtle said, "They had known that they were there, and the mud seemed empty without them."
The larger people had been sorry to have them go, and some of them felt that without the Eels awake and stirring, the pond was hardly a safe place at night.
"I think it is a good deal safer," remarked a Minnow, who usually said what she thought. "I have always believed that the Eels knew what became of some of my brothers and sisters, although, of course, I do not know."
"Why didn't you ask them?" said a Stickleback.
"Why?" replied the Minnow. "If I had gone to the Eels and asked them that, my other brothers and sisters would soon be wondering what had become of me."
"I have heard some queer things about the Eels myself," said the Stickleback, "but I have never felt much afraid of them. I suppose I am braver because I wear so many of my bones on the outside."
Just then a Wise Old Crayfish came along walking sidewise. "What do you think about the Eels?" asked the Stickleback, turning suddenly to him.
The Crayfish stuck his tail into the mud. He often did this when he was surprised. It seemed to help him think. When he had thought for a while, he waved his big pinching-claws and said, "It would be better for me not to tell what I think. I used to live near them."
This showed that the Wise Old Crayfish had been well brought up, and knew he should not say unpleasant things about people if he could help it. When there was need of it, he could tell unpleasant truths, and indeed that very evening he did say what he thought of the Eels. That was when he was teaching some young Crayfishes, his pupils. Their mother had brought up a large family, and was not strong. She had just cast the shell which she had worn for a year, and now she was weak and helpless until the new one should harden on her. "It is such a bother," she said, "to keep changing one's shell in this way, but it is a comfort to think that the new one will last a year when I do get it."
While their mother was so weak, the Wise Old Crayfish amused the children, and taught them things which all Crayfishes should know. Every evening they gathered around him, some of them swimming to him, some walking forward, some sidewise, and some backward. It made no difference to them which way they came. They were restless pupils, and their teacher could not keep them from looking behind them. Each one had so many eyes that he could look at the teacher with a few, and at the other little Crayfishes with a few more, and still have a good many eyes left with which to watch the Tadpoles. These eyes were arranged in two big bunches, and, unless you looked very closely, you might think that they had only two eyes apiece. They had good ears, and there were also fine smelling-bristles growing from their heads. The Wise Old Crayfish sometimes said that each of his pupils should sit in a circle of six teachers, so that he might be taught on all sides at once.
"That is the way in which children should learn," he said, "all around at once. But I do the best I can, and I at least teach one side of each."
This evening the Wise Old Crayfish was very sleepy. There had been so much talking and excitement during the day that he had not slept so much as usual; and now, when he should have been wide awake, he felt exceedingly dull and stupid. When he tried to walk, his eight legs stumbled over each other, and the weak way in which he waved his pinching-claw legs showed how tired he was.
After he had told his pupils the best way to hold their food with their pinching-claws, and had explained to them how it was chewed by the teeth in their stomachs, one mischievous little fellow called out, "I want to know about the Eels. My mother would never let me go near them, and now they've moved away, and I won't ever see them, and I think it's just horrid."
"Eels, my children," said their teacher, "are long, slender, sharp-nosed, slippery people, with a fringe of fins along their backs, and another fringe along their bellies. They breathe through very small gill-openings in the backs of their heads. They have large mouths, and teeth in their mouths, and they are always sticking out their lower jaws."
"And how do--" began the Biggest Little Crayfish.
"Ask me that to-morrow," said their teacher, stretching his eight walking legs and his two pinching-claw legs and his tail paddles, "but remember this one thing:--if you ever see an Eel, _get out of his way_. Don't stop to look at him."
"We won't," said one little Crayfish, who thought it smart to be saucy. "We'll look to stop at him." All of which meant nothing at all and was only said to annoy his teacher.
They scrambled away over the pond-bottom, upsetting Snails, jiggling the young Clams, and racing with each other where the bottom was smooth. "Beat you running backward!" cried the Saucy Crayfish to the Biggest Little Crayfish, and they scampered along backward in the moonlit water. There was an old log on the bottom of the pond, and they sat on that to rest. The Biggest Little Crayfish had beaten. "I would like to see an Eel," said he.
"I'd like to see them running on the land," said the saucy one.
"Pooh!" said the biggest one. "That's all you know! They don't run on land."
"Well, I guess they do," replied the saucy one. "I know as much about it as you do!"
"Eels swim. They don't run," said the biggest one. "Guess I know!"
"Well, they don't swim in air," said the saucy one. "That's the stuff that lies on top of the water and the ground, and people can't swim in it. So there!"
"Well, I've seen the Wild Ducks swim in it! They swim with their legs in the water, and with their wings in the air," said the biggest one.
"I don't believe it," said the saucy one. "Anyhow, Eels run on land."
"Eels swim on land," said the biggest one.
"Eels run!"
"Eels swim!"
"Run!"
"Swim!"
Then the two little Crayfishes, who had been talking louder and louder and becoming more and more angry, glared at each other, and jerked their feelers, and waved their pinching-claws in a very, very ugly way.
[Illustration: MOTHER EEL OPENED HER BIG MOUTH.          _Page 186_]
They did not notice a great green and yellow person swimming gently toward them, and they did not know that the Eels had come back to live in the old pond again. Mother Eel opened her big mouth very wide. "On land," she said decidedly, as she swallowed the Biggest Little Crayfish, "Eels wriggle." Then she swallowed the Saucy Crayfish.
"There!" said she. "I've stopped that dreadful quarrel." And she looked around with a satisfied smile.
THE LUCKY MINK
During the warm weather, the Minks did not come often to the pond. Then they had to stay nearer home and care for their babies. In the winter, when food was not so plentiful and their youngest children were old enough to come with them, they visited there every day. It was not far from their home.
The Minks lived by a waterfall in the river, and had burrows in the banks, where the young Minks stayed until they were large enough to go out into the world. Then the fathers and mothers were very busy, for in each home there were four or five or six children, hungry and restless, and needing to be taught many things.
They were related to the Weasels who lived up by the farmyard, and had the same slender and elegant bodies and short legs as they. Like the Weasels, they sometimes climbed trees, but that was not often. They did most of their hunting in the river, swimming with their bodies almost all under water, and diving and turning and twisting gracefully and quickly. When they hunted on land, they could tell by smelling just which way to go for their food.
The Minks were a very dark brown, and scattered through their close, soft fur were long, shining hairs of an even darker shade, which made their coats very beautiful indeed. The fur was darker on their backs than on the under part of their bodies, and their tapering, bushy tails were almost black. Their under jaws were white, and they were very proud of them. Perhaps it was because they had so little white fur that they thought so much of it. You know that is often the way--we think most of those things which are scarce or hard to get.
There was one old Mink by the river who had a white tip on his tail, and that is something which many people have never seen. It is even more uncommon than for Minks to have white upper lips, and that happens only once in a great while. This Mink was a bachelor, and nobody knew why. Some people said it was because he was waiting to find a wife with a white tip on her tail, yet that could not have been, for he was too wise to wait for something which might never happen. However it was he lived alone, and fished and hunted just for himself. He could dive more quickly, stay under water longer, and hunt by scent better than any other Mink round there. His fur was sleeker and more shining than that of his friends, and it is no wonder that the sisters of his friends thought that he ought to marry.
When the Minks visited together, somebody was sure to speak of the Bachelor's luck. They said that, whatever he did, he was always lucky. "It is all because of a white tip on his tail," they said. "That makes him lucky."
The young Minks heard their fathers and mothers talking, and wished that they had been born with white tips on their tails so that they could be lucky too. Once the Bachelor heard them wishing this, and he smiled and showed his beautiful teeth, and told them that it was not the tip of his tail but his whole body that made him lucky. He did not smile _to_ show his teeth, because he was not at all vain. He just smiled _and_ showed his teeth.
[Illustration: USED TO FOLLOW HIM AROUND.                _Page 191_]
There was a family of young Minks who lived at the foot of the waterfall, where the water splashed and dashed in the way they liked best. There were four brothers and two sisters in this family, and the brothers were bigger than the sisters (as Mink Brothers always are), although they were all the same age. One was very much larger than any of the rest, and so they called him Big Brother. He thought there was never such a fine Mink as the Bachelor, and he used to follow him around, and look at the tip on his tail, and wish that he was lucky like him. He wished to be just like him in every way but one; he did not want to be a bachelor.
The other young Minks laughed at Big Brother, and asked him if he thought his tail would turn white if he followed the Bachelor long enough. Big Brother stood it very patiently for a while; then he snarled at them, and showed his teeth without smiling, and said he would fight anybody who spoke another word about it. Minks are very brave and very fierce, and never know when to stop if they have begun to fight; so, after that, nobody dared tease Big Brother by saying anything more about the Bachelor. Sometimes they did look at his tail and smile, but they never spoke, and he pretended not to know what they meant by it.
A few days after this, the Bachelor was caught in a trap--a common, clumsy, wooden trap, put together with nails and twine. It was not near the river, and none of his friends would have found him, if Big Brother had not happened along. He could hardly believe what he saw. Was it possible that a trap had dared to catch a Mink with a white-tipped tail? Then he heard the Bachelor groan, and he knew that it was so. He hurried up to where the trap was.
"Can't you get out?" said he.
"No," said the Bachelor. "I can't. The best way to get out is not to get in--and I've gotten in."
"Can't you do something with your lucky tail to make the trap open?" asked Big Brother.
"I could do something with my teeth," answered the Bachelor, "if they were only where the tip of my tail is. Why are Minks always walking into traps?" He was trying hard not to be cross, but his eyes showed how he felt, and that was very cross indeed.
Then Big Brother became much excited. "I have good teeth," said he, "Tell me what to do."
"If you will help me out," said the Bachelor, "I will give you my luck."
"And what shall I do with the tail I have?" asked the young Mink, who thought that the Bachelor was to give him his white-tipped tail.
"Never mind now," answered the Bachelor, and he told the young Mink just where to gnaw. For a long time there was no sound but that of the young Mink's teeth on the wood of the trap. The Bachelor was too brave to groan or make a fuss, when he knew there was anybody around to hear. Big Brother's mouth became very sore, and his stomach became very empty, but still he kept at work. He was afraid somebody would come for the trap and the Mink in it, before he finished.
"Now try it," said he, after he had gnawed for quite a while. The Bachelor backed out as far as he could, but his body stuck in the hole. "You are rumpling your beautiful fur," cried the young Mink.
"Never mind the fur," answered the Bachelor. "I can smooth that down afterward. You will have to gnaw a little on this side." And he raised one of his hind feet to show where he meant. It was a beautiful hindfoot, thickly padded, and with short partly webbed toes, and no hair at all growing between them. The claws were short, sharp, and curved.
Big Brother gnawed away. "Now try it," said he. The Bachelor backed carefully out through the opening and stood there, looking tired and hungry and very much rumpled.
"You are a fine young Mink," said he. "We will get something to eat, and then we will see about making you lucky."
They went to the river bank and had a good dinner. The Bachelor ate more than Big Brother, for his mouth was not sore. But Big Brother was very happy. He thought how handsome he would look with a white-tipped tail, and how, after he had that, he could surely marry whoever he wished. It was the custom among his people to want to marry the best looking and strongest. Indeed it is so among all the pond people, and that is one reason why they care so much about being good-looking. It is very hard for a young Mink to have the one he loves choose somebody else, just because the other fellow has the bushiest tail, or the longest fur, or the thickest pads on his feet.
"Now," said the Bachelor, "we will talk about luck. We will go to a place where nobody can hear what we say." They found such a place and lay down. The Bachelor rolled over three times and smoothed his fur; he was still so tired from being in the trap. Then he looked at the young Mink very sharply. "So you want my tail?" said he.
"You said you would give me your luck," answered Big Brother, "and everybody knows that your luck is in your tail."
The Bachelor smiled. "What will you do with the tail you have?" said he.
"I don't know," answered Big Brother.
"You wouldn't want to wear two?" asked the Bachelor.
"Oh, no," answered Big Brother. "How that would look!"
"Well, how will you put my tail in place of yours?" asked the Bachelor.
"I don't know," answered the young Mink, "but you are so wise that I thought you might know some way." He began to feel discouraged, and to think that the Bachelor's offer didn't mean very much after all.
"Don't you think?" said the Bachelor slowly, "don't you think that, if you could have my luck, you could get along pretty well with your own tail?"
"Why, yes," said the young Mink, who had begun to fear he was not going to get anything. "Yes, but how could that be?"
The Bachelor smiled again. "I always tell people," said he, "that my luck is not in my tail, and they never believe it. I will tell you the secret of my luck, and you can have luck like it, if you really care enough." He looked all around to make sure that nobody was near, and he listened very carefully with the two little round ears that were almost hidden in his head-fur. Then he whispered to Big Brother, "This is the secret: _always do everything a little better than anybody else can_."
"Is that all?" asked the young Mink.
"That is enough," answered the Bachelor. "Keep trying and trying and trying, until you can dive deeper, stay under water longer, run faster, and smell farther than other Minks. Then you will have good luck when theirs is poor. You will have plenty to eat when they are hungry. You can beat in every fight. You can have sleek, shining fur when theirs is dull. Luck is not a matter of white-tipped tails."
The more the young Mink thought about it, the happier he became. "I don't see that I am to have your luck after all," said he. "When I have learned to do everything in the very best way, it will be luck of my own."
"Of course," answered the Bachelor. "Then it is a kind of luck that cannot be lost. If I carried mine in the tip of my tail, somebody might bite it off and leave me unlucky."
Big Brother kept the secret, and worked until he had learned to be as lucky as the Bachelor. Then he married the person he wanted, and she was very, very handsome. It is said that one of their sons has a white-tipped tail, but that may not be so.
THE PLAYFUL MUSKRATS
One warm day in winter, when some of the pussy-willows made a mistake and began to grow because they thought spring had come, a party of Muskrats were visiting in the marsh beside the pond. All around them were their winter houses, built of mud and coarse grasses. These homes looked like heaps of dried rushes, unless one went close to them. If one did that, he could plainly see what they were; and if one happened to be a Muskrat, and could dive and go into them through their watery doorways, he would find under the queer roof of each, a warm, dry room in which to pass the cold days.
"Fine weather!" said every Muskrat to his neighbor. "Couldn't sleep all of such a day as this." They spoke in that way, you know, because they usually sleep in the daytime and are awake at night.
"We wish it would always be warm weather," said the young Muskrats. "What's the use of winter?"
"Hard to tell," answered one Muskrat, who had lived in the marsh longer than the rest. "Hard to tell: I know it always gives me a good appetite, though." Then all the Muskrats laughed. They were a jolly, good-natured company, and easy to get along with. The other pond people liked them much better than they did their neighbors, the Minks. The Wild Ducks who nested in the sedges, were quite willing that the young Muskrats should play with their children, and the Mud Hens were not afraid of them. Mud Hens cannot bear Minks. They say that when a Mud Chicken is missing from the nest, there is quite sure to be a Mink somewhere near with a full stomach and down around the corners of his mouth.
Perhaps if the Wild Ducks and the Mud Hens were raising their families in the winter time it might be different, for then the Muskrats get hungry enough to eat almost anything. In spring and summer, when they can find fresh grasses and young rushes, or a few parsnips, carrots, and turnips from the farmers' fields, other animals are quite safe. In the winter they live mostly on roots.
"Fine day!" screamed the Gulls, as they swept through the air. "Pity the Frogs don't come out to enjoy it!"
"Yes, great pity," chuckled the old Muskrat. "How glad you would be to see them!" He smiled all around his little mouth and showed his gnawing teeth. He knew that the Frogs were better off asleep in the mud at the bottom of the pond, than they would be sitting in the sunshine with a few hungry Gulls above them. The Turtles were sleeping all winter, too, in the banks of the pond. The Eels were lying at the bottom, stupid and drowsy, and somewhere the Water-Adders were hidden away, dreaming of spring. Of all the birds who lived by the water, only the Gulls were there, and they were not popular. It is true that they helped keep the pond sweet and clean, and picked up and carried away many things which made the shore untidy, still, they were rude, and talked too loudly, and wore their feathers in such a way that they looked like fine large birds, when really they were lean and skinny and small. The other pond people said that was just like them, always pretending to be more than they really were.
Fifteen young Muskrats, all brothers and sisters, and all born the summer before, started off to look at the old home where they were children together. That is to say, they were not all there at once, but there were five born early in the season; and when they were old enough to look out for themselves, five more came to live in the old nest; and when these were old enough to leave the nest, another five were born.
It doesn't mean so much to Muskrats to be brothers and sisters as it does to some people, still they remembered that they were related, and they played more with each other than with those young Muskrats who were only their cousins or friends. Their mother was very proud of them, and loved to watch them running around on their short legs, and to hear them slap their long, scaly tails on the water when they dove. They had short, downy fur, almost black on the back, soft gray underneath, and a reddish brown everywhere else. There was very little fur on their tails or on their feet, and those parts were black.
These fifteen children had been fairly well brought up, but you can see that their mother had many cares; so it is not strange if they sometimes behaved badly. In some other families, where there were only nine or ten babies all the season, they had been brought up more strictly. Like all young Muskrats, they were full of fun, and there were few pleasanter sights than to see them frolicking on a warm moonlight evening, when they looked like brown balls rolling and bounding around on the shore or plunging into the water. If they had all been exactly the same age, it would have been even pleasanter, for the oldest five would put on airs and call the others "the children"; and the next five would call the youngest five "babies"; although they were all well grown. There was no chance for the youngest five to call other Muskrats "babies," so when they were warm and well fed and good-natured they laughed and said, "Who cares?" When they were cold and hungry, they slapped their tails on the ground or on the water and said, "Don't you think you're smart!"
When they got to talking so and their mother heard it, she would say, "Now, children!" in such a way that they had to stop. Their father sometimes slapped them with his tail. Teasing is not so very bad, you know, although it is dreadfully silly, but when people begin by teasing they sometimes get to saying things in earnest--even really hateful, mean things. And that was what made the Muskrat father and mother stop it whenever they could.
Now the whole fifteen crowded around the old summer home, and some of them went in one way, and some of them went in another, for every Muskrat's summer house has several burrows leading to it. When they reached the old nest at the end, all of them tried to get in at once, and they pushed each other around with their broad little heads, scrambled and clutched and held on with their strong little feet. Five of them said, "It's our turn first. We're the oldest." And five more said, "Well, it's our turn next anyway, 'cause we're next oldest." The others said, "You might give up to us, because we're the youngest."
They pushed and scrambled some more, and one of the youngest children said to one of the oldest, "Well, I don't care. I'm just as big as you are" (which was so). And the older one answered back, "Well, you're not so good-looking" (which was also true).
Then part of the brothers and sisters took sides with one, and part took sides with the other. What had been a lovely frolic became an unpleasant, disgraceful quarrel, and they said such things as these:
"'Fore I'd make such a fuss!"
"Who's making any more fuss than you are, I'd like to know?"
"Oh, yes. You're big enough, but you're just as homely as you can be. So there!"
"Quit poking me!"
"You slapped your tail on my back!"
"I'm going to tell on you fellows!"
"I dare you to!"
"Won't you catch it though!"
And many more things which were even worse. Think of it. Fifteen young Muskrats who really loved each other, talking like that because they couldn't decide whether the oldest or the youngest or the half-way-between brothers and sisters should go first into the old nest. And it didn't matter a bit who was oldest or who was youngest, and it never would have happened had it not been for their dreadful habit of teasing.
Just as they had become very hot and angry, they heard their mother's voice say, "Now, children!" but they were too much excited to mind, and they did not stop until their father came and slapped them with his tail. Then they kept still and listened to their mother. She told them that they should leave the place at once, and not one of them should even set foot in the old nest. "Suppose somebody had gotten hurt," she said. This made the young Muskrats look very sober, for they knew that the Muskrat who is hurt in winter never gets well.
After she had let them think about this for a while, she said, "I shall punish you all for this." Then there was no quarrel among her children to see who should have the first turn--not at all.
One young Muskrat said, "Aren't you going to let us play any more?"
"Yes," said she. "I shall let you play all the rest of the day, but I shall choose the games. The oldest five will play 'Mud Turtles in winter,' the next five will play 'Frogs in winter,' and the youngest five will play 'Snakes in winter.' The way to play these games is to lie perfectly still in some dark place and not say a word."
The young Muskrats looked at each other sorrowfully. They thought it sounded very much the same as being sent to bed for being naughty. They did not dare say anything, for they knew that, although their mother was gentle, as Muskrats are most of the time, she could be very severe. So they went away quietly to play what she had told them they must. But it was not much fun to play those games when all the others were having a fine time in the sunshine.
There were nine of the young Muskrats who did not tease any after that. Even the other six were more careful.
End of Project Gutenberg's Among the Pond People, by Clara Dillingham Pierson

= = = PG34486 = = =
AMONG THE RED-SKINS; OR, OVER THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS
Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England
Among the Red-skins, by W.H.G. Kingston.
________________________________________________________________________
CHAPTER ONE.
MISSING.
AN UNEXPECTED RETURN--HUGH IS ABSENT--NO KNOWLEDGE OF HIS WHEREABOUTS-- UNCLE DONALD'S APPREHENSIONS--A HURRIED SUPPER, AND PREPARATIONS FOR A SEARCH.
"Hugh, my lad!  Hugh, run and tell Madge we have come back," cried Uncle Donald, as he and I entered the house on our return, one summer's evening, from a hunting excursion in search of deer or any other game we could come across, accompanied by three of our dogs, Whiskey, Pilot, and Muskymote.
As he spoke, he unstrapped from his shoulders a heavy load of caribou meat.  I, having a similar load, did the same--mine was lighter than his--and, Hugh not appearing, I went to the door and again called.  No answer came.
"Rose, my bonnie Rose!  Madge, I say!  Madge!  Where are you all?" shouted Uncle Donald, while he hung his rifle, with his powder-horn and shot-pouch, in their accustomed places on the wall.
On glancing round the room he seemed somewhat vexed to perceive that no preparations had been made for supper, which we expected to have found ready for us.  It was seldom, however, that he allowed himself to be put out.  I think I can see him now--his countenance, though weather-beaten and furrowed by age, wearing its usual placid and benignant expression; while his long silvery beard and the white locks which escaped from beneath his Highland bonnet gave him an especially venerable appearance. His dress was a plaid shooting-coat, and high leggings of well-tanned leather, ornamented with fringe after the fashion of the Indians. Upright as an arrow, with broad shoulders and wiry frame, he stood upwards of six feet in his mocassins, nor did he appear to have lost anything of the strength and energy of youth.
As no one appeared, I ran round to the back of the house, thinking that Rose and Madge, accompanied by Hugh, had gone to bring in the milk, which it was the duty of Sandy McTavish to draw from our cows, and that he, for some cause or other, being later than usual, they had been delayed.  I was not mistaken.  I presently met them, Madge carrying the pails, and Rose, a fair-haired, blue-eyed little maiden, tripping lightly beside her.  She certainly presented a great contrast in appearance to the gaunt, dark-skinned Indian woman, whose features, through sorrow and hardship, had become prematurely old.  I inquired for Hugh.
"Is he not with you?" asked Rose, in a tone of some little alarm.  "He went off two hours ago, saying that he should be sure to fall in with you, and would assist in bringing home the game you might have killed."
"Yes, Hugh would go.  What he will he do," said the Indian woman, in the peculiar way of speaking used by most of her people.
"He felt so much better in the afternoon that he was eager to go out and help you," said Rose.  "He thought that Uncle Donald would not be angry with him, though he had told him to remain at home."
We soon got back to the house.  When Uncle Donald heard where Hugh had gone, though he expressed no anger, he looked somewhat troubled.  He waited until Rose had gone out of the room, then he said to me--
"I noticed, about four miles from home, as we went out in the morning, the marks of a `grizzly,' which had been busy grubbing up a rotten log, but as his trail appeared to lead away up the mountains to the eastward I did not think it worth my while to chase him; and you having just before separated from me, I forgot to mention the fact when you came back.  But vexed would I be if Hugh should have fallen in with the brute.  He's too venturesome at times; and if he fired and only wounded it, I doubt it would be a bad job for him.  Don't you let Rose hear a word about the `grizzly,' Archie," he hastily added, as she re-entered the room.
Both Madge and Rose were, however, very anxious when they found that Hugh had not returned with us.  There was still an hour or so of daylight, and we did not therefore abandon the hope that he would return before dark.  Uncle Donald and I were both very hungry, for we had been in active exercise the whole of the day, and had eaten nothing.
Madge knowing this set about preparing supper with all haste.  She could not, however, help running to the door every now and then to ascertain if Hugh were coming.  At length Sandy McTavish came in.  He was something like Uncle Donald in figure, but though not so old, even more wiry and gaunt, looking as if he were made of bone and sinews covered with parchment.
He at once volunteered to set out and look for Hugh.
"Wait till we get our supper, and Archie and I will go too.  What's the use of man or boy with an empty stomach?" said Uncle Donald.
"'Deed an' that's true," observed Sandy, helping himself from the trencher which stood in the centre of the table.  "It's a peety young Red Squirrel isna' here; he would ha' been a grand help if Maister Hugh's missin'.  But I'm thinkin' he's no far off, sir.  He'll have shot some beast likely, and be trying to trail it hame; it wud be a shame to him to hae lost his way!  I canna believe that o' Maister Hugh."
Sandy said this while we were finishing our supper, when, taking down our rifles, with fresh ammunition, and bidding Rose and Madge "cheer up," we three set out in search of Hugh.
Fortunately the days were long, and we might still hope to discover his track before darkness closed upon the world.
CHAPTER TWO.
AN INDIAN RAID.
But where did the scene just described occur?  And who were the actors?
Take a map of the world, run your eye over the broad Atlantic, up the mighty St. Lawrence, across the great lakes of Canada, then along well-nigh a thousand miles of prairie, until the Rocky Mountains are reached, beyond which lies British Columbia, a region of lakes, rivers, and streams, of lofty, rugged, and precipitous heights, the further shores washed by the Pacific Ocean.
On the bank of one of the many affluents of its chief river--the Fraser--Uncle Donald had established a location, called Clearwater, far removed from the haunts of civilised man.  In front of the house flowed the ever-bright current (hence the name of the farm), on the opposite side of which rose rugged pine-crowned heights; to the left were others of similar altitude, a sparkling torrent running amid them into the main stream.  Directly behind, extending some way back, was a level prairie, interspersed with trees and bordered by a forest extending up the sides of the variously shaped hills; while eastward, when lighted by the rays of the declining sun, numberless snow-capped peaks, tinged with a roseate hue, could be seen in the far distance.  Horses and cattle fed on the rich grass of the well-watered meadows, and a few acres brought under cultivation produced wheat, Indian corn, barley, and oats sufficient for the wants of the establishment.
Such was the spot which Uncle Donald, who had won the friendship of the Sushwap tribe inhabiting the district, had some years ago fixed on as his abode.  He had formerly been an officer in the Hudson's Bay Company, but had, for some reason or other, left their service.  Loving the country in which he had spent the best years of his life, and where he had met with the most strange and romantic adventures, he had determined to make it his home.  He had not, however, lost all affection for the land of his birth, or for his relatives and friends, and two years before the time I speak of he had unexpectedly appeared at the Highland village from which, when a young man, more than a quarter of a century before, he had set out to seek his fortune.  Many of his relatives and the friends of his youth were dead, and he seemed, in consequence, to set greater value on those who remained, who gave him an affectionate reception.  Among them was my mother, his niece, who had been a little blooming girl when he went away, but was now a staid matron, with a large family.
My father, Mr Morton, was a minister, but having placed himself under the directions of a Missionary Society, he was now waiting in London until it was decided in what part of the world he should commence his labours among the heathen.  My two elder brothers were already out in the world--one as a surgeon, the other in business--and I had a fancy for going to sea.
"Let Archie come with me," said Uncle Donald.  "I will put him in the way of doing far better than he ever can knocking about on salt water; and as for adventures, he'll meet with ten times as many as he would if he becomes a sailor."  He used some other arguments, probably relating to my future advantage, which I did not hear.  They, at all events, decided my mother; and my father, hearing of the offer, without hesitation gave his consent to my going.  It was arranged, therefore, that I should accompany Uncle Donald back to his far-off home, of which he had left his faithful follower, Sandy McTavish, in charge during his absence.
"I want to have you with me for your own benefit, Archie; but there is another reason.  I have under my care a boy of about your own age, Hugh McLellan, the son of an old comrade, who died and left him to my charge, begging me to act the part of a father to him.  I have done so hitherto, and hope to do so as long as I live; you two must be friends.  Hugh is a fine, frank laddie, and you are sure to like one another.  As Sandy was not likely to prove a good tutor to him, I left him at Fort Edmonton when I came away, and we will call for him as we return."
I must pass over the parting with the dear ones at home, the voyage across the Atlantic, and the journey through the United States, which Uncle Donald took from its being in those days the quickest route to the part of the country for which we were bound.
After descending the Ohio, we ascended the Mississippi to its very source, several hundred miles, by steamboat; leaving which, we struck westward, passing the head waters of the Bed River of the north, on which Fort Garry, the principal post of the Hudson's Bay Company, is situated, but which Uncle Donald did not wish to visit.
We had purchased good saddle-horses and baggage animals to carry our goods, and had engaged two men--a French Canadian, Pierre Le Clerc, and an Irishman, Cornelius Crolly, or "Corney," as he was generally called. Both men were known to Uncle Donald, and were considered trustworthy fellows, who would stick by us at a pinch.  The route Uncle Donald proposed taking was looked upon as a dangerous one, but he was so well acquainted with all the Indian tribes of the north that he believed, even should we encounter a party of Blackfeet, they would not molest us.
We had been riding over the prairie for some hours, with here and there, widely scattered, farms seen in the distance, and were approaching the last frontier settlement, a village or hamlet on the very outskirts of civilisation, when we caught sight of a column of smoke ascending some way on directly ahead of us.
"Can it be the prairie on fire?"  I asked, with a feeling of alarm; for I had heard of the fearful way in which prairie fires sometimes extend for miles and miles, destroying everything in their course.
Uncle Donald stood up in his stirrups that he might obtain a better view before us.
"No; that's not the smoke of burning grass.  It looks more like that from a building, or may be from more than one.  I fear the village itself is on fire," he answered.
Scarcely had he spoken when several horsemen appeared galloping towards us, their countenances as they came near exhibiting the utmost terror. They were passing on, when Uncle Donald shouted out, "Hi! where are you going?  What has happened?"  On hearing the question, one of the men replied, "The Indians have surprised us.  They have killed most of our people, set fire to our houses, and carried off the women and children."
"And you running away without so much as trying to recover them?  Shame upon ye!" exclaimed Uncle Donald.  "Come on with me, and let's see what can be done!"
The men, however, who had scarcely pulled rein, were galloping forward. Uncle Donald shouted to them to come back, but, terror-stricken, they continued their course, perhaps mistaking his shouts for the cries of the Indians.
"We must try and save some of the poor creatures," said Uncle Donald, turning to our men.  "Come on, lads!  You are not afraid of a gang of howling red-skins!" and we rode on, making our baggage horses move much faster than they were wont to do under ordinary circumstances.
Before reaching the village we came to a clump of trees.  Here Uncle Donald, thinking it prudent not to expose his property to the greedy eyes of the Indians, should we overtake them, ordered Corney and Pierre to halt and remain concealed, while he and I rode forward.  By the time we had got up to the hamlet every farm and log-house was burning, and the greater part reduced to ashes.
No Indians were to be seen.  According to their custom, after they had performed their work they had retreated.
I will pass over the dreadful sights we witnessed.  Finding no one alive to whom we could render assistance, we pushed on, Uncle Donald being anxious to come up with the enemy before they had put their captives to death.  Though darkness was approaching, we still rode forward.
"It's likely they will move on all night, but, you see, they are loaded, and we can travel faster than they will.  They are sure to camp before morning, and then we'll get up with them," observed Uncle Donald.
"But what will become of our baggage?"  I asked.
"Oh, that will be safe enough.  Pierre and Corney will remain where we left them until we get back," he answered.
I was certain that Uncle Donald knew what he was about, or I should have been far from easy, I confess.
We went on and on, the Indians keeping ahead of us.  From this circumstance, Uncle Donald was of opinion that they had not taken many prisoners.  At length we came to a stream running northward, bordered by willows poplars, and other trees.  Instead of crossing directly in front of us, where it was somewhat deep, we kept up along its banks.  We had not got far when we saw the light of a fire, kindled, apparently, at the bottom of the hollow through which the stream passed.
"If I'm not far wrong, that fire is in the camp of their rear guard. Their main body cannot be far off," observed Uncle Donald.  "Dismount here, Archie, and you hold the horses behind these trees, while I walk boldly up to them.  They won't disturb themselves much for a single man."
I dismounted as he desired, and he proceeded toward the fire.  I felt very anxious, for I feared that the Blackfeet might fire and kill him without stopping to learn who he was.
CHAPTER THREE.
WITH THE RED-SKINS.
I waited with intense anxiety for Uncle Donald who appeared to have been a long time absent.  I dared not disobey his orders by moving from the spot, yet I felt eager to creep up and try and ascertain what had happened.  I thought that by seeming the horses to the trees, I might manage to get near the Indian camp without being perceived, but I overcame the temptation.  At length I heard footsteps approaching, when, greatly to my relief, I saw Uncle Donald coming towards me, carrying some object wrapped up in a buffalo-robe in his arms.
I will now mention what occurred to him.  He advanced, as he told me afterwards, without uttering a word, until he was close up to the fire round which the braves were collected, then seating himself opposite the chief, whom he recognised by his dress and ornaments, said, "I have come as a friend to visit my red brothers; they must listen to what I have to say."  The chief nodded and passed the pipe he was smoking round to him, to show that he was welcome as a friend.  Uncle Donald then told them that he was aware of their attack upon the village, which was not only unjustifiable, but very unwise, as they would be certain to bring down on their heads the vengeance of the "Long-knives"--so the Indians call the people of the United States.  That wide as was the country, the arm of the Long-knives could stretch over it; that they had fleet horses, and guns which could kill when their figures appeared no larger than musk rats; and he urged them, now that the harm was done, to avert the punishment which would overtake them by restoring the white people they had captured.
When he had finished, the chief rose and made a long speech, excusing himself and his tribe on the plea that the Long-knives had been the aggressors; that they had killed their people, driven them from their hunting-grounds, and destroyed the buffalo on which they lived.  No sooner did the chief begin to speak than Uncle Donald recognised him as a Sioux whose life he had saved some years before.  He therefore addressed him by his name of Ponoko, or the Red Deer, reminding him of the circumstance.  On this the chief, advancing, embraced him; and though unwilling to acknowledge that he had acted wrongly, he expressed his readiness to follow the advice of his white friend.  He confessed, however, that his hand had only one captive, a little girl, whom he was carrying off as a present to his wife, to replace a child she had lost. "She would be as a daughter to me; but if my white father desires it, I will forego the pleasure I expected, and give her up to him.  As for what the rest of my people may determine I cannot be answerable; but I fear that they will not give up their captives, should they have taken any alive," he added.
"It would have been a terrible thing to have left the little innocent to be brought up among the savages and taught all their heathen ways, though they, no doubt, would have made much of her, and treated her like a little queen," said Uncle Donald to me; "so I at once closed with the chief's offer.  Forthwith, a little girl, some five years of age, was brought out from a small hut built of boughs, close to where the party was sitting.  She appeared almost paralysed with terror; but when, looking up, she saw that Uncle Donald was a white man, and that he was gazing compassionately at her, clinging to his hand, she entreated him by her looks to save her from the savages.  She had been so overcome by the terrible scenes she had witnessed that she was unable to speak."
Uncle Donald, lifting her up in his arms, endeavoured to calm her fears, promising that he would take care of her until he had restored her to her friends.  He now expressed his intention of proceeding to the larger camp, but Ponoko urged him on no account to make the attempt, declaring that his life would not be safe, as several of their fiercest warriors were in command, who had vowed the destruction of all the Long-knives or others they should encounter.
"But the prisoners!  What will they do with them?" asked Uncle Donald. "Am I to allow them to perish without attempting their rescue?"
"My white father must be satisfied with what I've done for him.  I saw no other prisoners taken.  All the pale-faces in the villages were killed," answered Ponoko.  "For his own sake I cannot allow him to go forward; let him return to his own country, and he will there be safe. I know his wishes, and will, when the sun rises, go to my brother chiefs and tell them what my white father desires."
Ponoko spoke so earnestly that Uncle Donald, seeing that it would be useless to make the attempt, and fearing that even the little girl might be taken from him, judged that it would be wise to get out of the power of the savages; and carrying the child, who clung round his neck, he bade the other braves farewell, and commenced his return to where he had left me.  He had not got far when Ponoko overtook him, and again urged him to get to a distance as soon as possible.
"Even my own braves cannot be trusted," he said.  "I much fear that several who would not smoke the pipe may steal out from the camp, and try to kill my white father if he remains longer in the neighbourhood."
Brave as Uncle Donald was, he had me to look after as well as the little girl.  Parting with the chief, therefore, he hurried on, and told me instantly to mount.
I was very much astonished to see the little girl, but there was no time to ask questions; so putting spurs to our horses, we galloped back to where we had left our men and the baggage.
As both we and our horses required rest, we camped on the spot, Pierre and Corney being directed to keep a vigilant watch.
The little girl lay in Uncle Donald's arms, but she had not yet recovered sufficiently to tell us her name, and it was with difficulty that we could induce her to take any food.
Late in the day we met a party going out to attack the Indians; but, as Uncle Donald observed, "they might just as well have tried to catch the east wind.  We waited to see the result of the expedition.  They at length returned, not having come near the enemy.  The few men who had escaped the massacre were unable to give any information about the little girl or her friends, nor could we learn to whom she belonged. All we could ascertain from her was that her name was Rose, for her mind had sustained so fearful a shock that, even after several days had passed, she was unable to speak intelligibly.
"Her fate among the Indians would have been terrible, but it would be almost as bad were we to leave her among the rough characters hereabouts," observed Uncle Donald.  "As none of her friends can be found, I will be her guardian, and, if God spares my life, will bring her up as a Christian child."
It was many a long day, however, before Rose recovered her spirits.  Her mind, indeed, seemed to be a blank as to the past, and Uncle Donald, afraid of reviving the recollection of the fearful scenes she must have witnessed, forbore to say anything which might recall them.  However, by the time we reached Fort Edmonton, where Hugh McLellan had been left, she was able to prattle away right merrily.  The officers at the fort offered to take charge of her, but Uncle Donald would not consent to part with his little "Prairie Rose," as he called her; and after a short stay we set out again, with Hugh added to our party, across the Rocky Mountains, and at length arrived safely at Clearwater.
Corney and Pierre remained with us, and took the places of two other men who had left.
Hugh McLellan was a fine, bold little fellow, not quite two years my junior; and he and I--as Uncle Donald had hoped we should--soon became fast friends.
He had not much book learning, though he had been instructed in the rudiments of reading and writing by one of the clerks in the fort, but he rode fearlessly, and could manage many a horse which grown men would fear to mount.
"I want you, Archie, to help Hugh with his books," said Uncle Donald. "I believe, if you set wisely about it, that he will be ready to learn from you.  I would not like for him to grow up as ignorant as most of the people about us.  It is the knowledge we of the old country possess which gives us the influence over these untutored savages; without it we should be their inferiors."
I promised to do my best in fulfilling his wishes, though I took good care not to assert any superiority over my companion, who, indeed, though I was better acquainted with literature than he was, knew far more about the country than I did.
But there was another person in the household whose history is worthy of narration--the poor Indian woman--"Madge," as we called her for shortness, though her real name was Okenmadgelika.  She also owed her life to Uncle Donald.
Several years before this, she, with her two children, had accompanied her husband and some other men on an expedition to trap beavers, at the end of autumn, towards the head waters of the Columbia.  While she was seated in her hut late in the evening, one of the men staggered in desperately wounded, and had just time to tell her that her husband and the rest were murdered, when he fell dead at her feet.  She, instantly taking up her children--one a boy of six years of age, the other a little girl, an infant in arms--fled from the spot, with a horse and such articles as she could throw on its back, narrowly escaping from the savages searching for her.
She passed the winter with her two young ones, no human aid at hand.  On the return of spring she set off, intending to rejoin her husband's people far away to the westward.  After enduring incredible hardships, she had been compelled to kill her horse for food.  She had made good some days' journey, when, almost sinking from hunger, and fearing to see her children perish, she caught sight of her relentless foes, the Blackfeet.  In vain she endeavoured to conceal herself.  They saw her and were approaching, when, close to the spot where she was standing, a tall white man and several Indians suddenly emerged from behind some rocks.  The Blackfeet came on, fancying that against so few they could gain an easy victory; but the rifles of the white man and his party drove them back, and Uncle Donald--for he was the white man--conveyed the apparently dying woman and her little ones to his camp.
The house at Clearwater had not yet been built.  By being well cared for the Indian woman and her children recovered; but though the boy flourished, the little girl seemed like a withered flower, and never regained her strength.
Grateful for her preservation, the poor woman, when she found that Uncle Donald was about to settle at Clearwater, entreated that she might remain with her children and labour for him, and a faithful servant she had ever since proved.
Her little girl at length died.  She was for a time inconsolable, until the arrival of Rose, to whom she transferred all her maternal feelings, and who warmly returned her affection.
But her son, whose Indian name translated was Red Squirrel, by which appellation he was always known, had grown up into a fine lad, versed in all Indian ways, and possessing a considerable amount of knowledge gained from his white companions, without the vices of civilisation.  He was a great favourite with Uncle Donald, who placed much confidence in his intelligence, courage, and faithfulness.
Nearly two years had passed since Rose, Hugh, and I had been brought to Clearwater, and by this time we were all much attached to each other. We had also learned to love the place which had become our home; but we loved Uncle Donald far more.
CHAPTER FOUR.
THREE GRIZZLIES.
I must now continue my narrative from the evening Hugh was missing.
The moment we had finished our hurried meal we set out.  Sandy, in case we should be benighted, had procured a number of pine torches, which he strapped on his back; and Uncle Donald directed Corney and Pierre who came in as we were starting, to follow, keeping to the right by the side of the torrent, in case Hugh should have taken that direction.
Whiskey, Pilot, Muskymote followed closely at our heels--faithful animals, ready to drag our sleighs in winter, or, as now, to assist us in our search.  We walked on at a rapid rate, and were soon in a wild region of forests, rugged hills, and foaming streams.  As we went along we shouted out Hugh's name, and searched about for any signs of his having passed that way.  At length we discovered in some soft ground a foot-print, which there could be no doubt was his, the toe pointing in the direction we were going.
"Now we have found the laddie's trail we must take care not to lose it," observed Uncle Donald.  "It leads towards the very spot where I saw the grizzly this morning."
On and on we went.  Soon another foot-print, and then a mark on some fallen leaves, and here and there a twig bent or broken off, showed that we were on Hugh's trail.
But the sun had now sunk beneath the western range of mountains, and the gloom of evening coming on would prevent us from tracing our young companion much further.  Still, as we should have met him had he turned back, we followed the only track he was likely to have taken.
We were approaching the spot where Uncle Donald had seen the bear, near a clump of trees with a thick undergrowth, a rugged hill riding beyond. We were somewhat scattered, hunting about for any traces the waning light would enable us to discover.  I half feared that I should come upon his mangled remains, or some part of his dress which might show his fate.  I had my rifle, but was encumbered with no other weight, and in my eagerness, I ran on faster than my companions.  I was making my way among some fallen timber blown down by a storm, when suddenly I saw rise up, just before me, a huge form.  I stopped, having, fortunately, the presence of mind not to run away, for I at once recognised the animal as a huge grizzly, which had been engaged in tearing open a rotten trunk in search of insects.  I remembered that Uncle Donald had told me, should I ever find myself face to face with a grizzly, to throw up my arms and stand stock still.
The savage brute, desisting from its employment, came towards me, growling terribly, and displaying its huge teeth and enormous mouth.
I was afraid to shout, lest it might excite the animal's rage; but I acted as Uncle Donald had advised me.  As I lifted up my rifle and flourished it over my head, the creature stopped for a moment and got up on its hind legs.
Now or never was my time to fire, for I could not expect to have a better opportunity, and bringing my rifle, into which I had put a bullet, to my shoulder, I took a steady aim and pulled the trigger.  To my dismay, the cap snapped.  It had never before played me such a trick. Still the bear kept looking at me, apparently wondering what I was about.  Mastering all my nerve, and still keeping my eye fixed on the shaggy monster in front of me, I lowered my rifle, took out another cap, and placed it on the nipple.  I well knew that should I only wound the bear my fate would be sealed, for it would be upon me in an instant.  I felt doubly anxious to hill it, under the belief that it had destroyed my friend Hugh; but still it was sufficiently far off to make it possible for me to miss, should my nerves for a moment fail me.  As long as it remained motionless I was unwilling to fire, in the hope that before I did so Uncle Donald and Sandy might come to my assistance.
Having re-capped my rifle, I again lifted it to my shoulder.  At that moment Bruin, who had grown tired of watching me, went down on all fours.  The favourable opportunity was lost; for although I might still lodge a bullet in its head, I might not kill it at once, and I should probably be torn to pieces.  I stood steady as before, though sorely tempted to run.  Instead, however, of coming towards me, to my surprise, the bear returned to the log, and recommenced its occupation of scratching for insects.
Had it been broad daylight I might have had a fair chance of shooting it; but in the obscurity, as it scratched away among the fallen timber, from which several gnarled and twisted limbs projected upwards, I was uncertain as to the exact position of its head.  Under the circumstances, I considered that discretion was the better part of valour; and feeling sure that Uncle Donald and Sandy would soon come up and settle the bear more effectually than I should, I began slowly to retreat, hoping to get away unperceived.  I stepped back very cautiously, scarcely more than a foot at a time, then stopped.  As I did so I observed a movement a little distance off beyond the big bear, and presently, as I again retreated, two other bears came up, growling, to the big one, and, to my horror, all three moved towards me.
Though smaller than their mother, each bear was large enough to kill me with a pat of its paw; and should I even shoot her they would probably be upon me.  Again, however, they stopped, unwilling apparently to leave their dainty feast.
How earnestly I prayed for the arrival of Uncle Donald and Sandy!  I had time, too, to think of poor Hugh, and felt more convinced than ever that he had fallen a victim to the ferocious grizzlies.  I still dared not cry out, but seeing them again turn to the logs, I began, as before, to step back, hoping at length to get to such a distance that I might take to my heels without the risk of being pursued.  In doing as I proposed I very nearly tumbled over a log, but recovering myself, I got round it. When I stopped to see what the bears were about they were still feeding, having apparently forgotten me.  I accordingly turned round and ran as fast as I could venture to go among the trees and fallen trunks, till at length I made out the indistinct figures of Uncle Donald and Sandy, with the dogs, coming towards me.
"I have just seen three bears," I shouted.  "Come on quickly, and we may be in time to kill them!"
"It's a mercy they did not catch you, laddie," said Uncle Donald, when he got up to me.  "With the help of the dogs we'll try to kill them, however.  Can you find the spot where you saw them?"
"I have no doubt about that," I answered.
"Well, then, before we go further we'll just look to our rifles, and make sure that there's no chance of their missing fire."
Doing as he suggested, we moved on, he in the centre and somewhat in advance, Sandy and I on either side of him, the dogs following and waiting for the word of command to rush forward.
The bears did not discover us until we were within twenty yards of them, when Uncle Donald shouted to make them show themselves.
I fancied that directly afterwards I heard a cry, but it might only have been the echo of Uncle Donald's voice.  Presently a loud growl from the rotten log showed us that the bears were still there, and we soon saw all three sitting up and looking about them.
"Sandy, do you take the small bear on the right; I will aim at the big fellow, and leave the other to you, Archie; but do not fire until you are sure of your aim," said Uncle Donald.  "Now, are you ready?"
We all fired at the same moment.  Sandy's bear dropped immediately, but the big one, with a savage growl, sprang over the logs and came towards us, followed by the one at which I had fired.
Uncle Donald now ordered the dogs, which had been barking loudly, to advance to the fight; but before they reached the larger bear she fell over on her side, and giving some convulsive struggles, lay apparently dead.  The dogs, on this, attacked the other bear, which, made furious by its wound, was coming towards us, growling loudly.  On seeing the dogs, however, the brute stopped, and sat up on its hind legs, ready with its huge paws to defend itself from their attacks.  We all three, meantime, were rapidly reloading, and just as the bear had knocked over Whiskey and seized Muskymote in its paws, Uncle Donald and Sandy again fired and brought it to the ground, enabling Muskymote, sorely mauled, to escape from its deadly embrace.
I instinctively gave a shout, and was running on, when Uncle Donald stopped me.
"Stay!" he said; "those brutes play `possum' sometimes, and are not to be trusted.  If they are not shamming, they may suddenly revive and try to avenge themselves."
"We'll soon settle that," said Sandy, and quickly reloading, he fired his rifle into the head of the fallen bear.
"Have you killed them all?"  I heard a voice exclaim, which seemed to come from the branches of a tree some little distance off.
I recognised it as Hugh's.  "Hurrah!"  I shouted; "are you all right?"
"Yes, yes," answered Hugh, "only very hungry and stiff."
We quickly made our way to the tree, where I found Hugh safe and sound, and assisted him to descend.  He told us that he had fallen in with the bears on his way out, and had just time to escape from them by climbing up the tree, where they had kept him a prisoner all day.
"I am thankful to get ye back, Hugh.  You disobeyed orders, and have been punished pretty severely.  I hope it will be a lesson to you," was the only remark Uncle Donald made as he grasped Hugh's hand.  I judged, by the tone of his voice, that he was not inclined to be very angry.
Having flayed the bears by the light of Sandy's torches, we packed up as much of the meat as we could carry, and hung up the remainder with the skins, intending to send for it in the morning.  We then, having met the other two men, hastened homewards with Hugh; and I need not say how rejoiced Rose and Madge were to see him back safe.
CHAPTER FIVE.
AN EXPEDITION.
Summer was advancing, and we had for some time been expecting the return of Red Squirrel and Kondiarak, another Indian, who had been sent in the spring to Fort Edmonton with letters, and directions to bring any which might have come for us.  At length we became somewhat anxious at their non-appearance, fearing that some serious accident might have happened to them, or that they might have fallen into the hands of the savage Blackfeet, the chief predatory tribe in the country through which they had to pass.
Hugh and I were one evening returning from trapping beaver, several of which we carried on our backs.  Though the skins are the most valued, the meat of the animal serves as food.  We were skirting the edge of the prairie, when we caught sight of two figures descending the hills to the east by the pass which led from Clearwater towards the Rocky Mountains.
"They are Indians," cried Hugh, "What if they should be enemies?"
"It is more likely that they are friends," I answered.  "If they were enemies they would take care not to show themselves.  Let us go to meet them."
The two men made their way slowly down the mountains and had got almost up to us before we recognised Red Squirrel, and his companion Kondiarak ("the rat"), so travel-stained, wan, and haggard did they look.
They had lost their horses, they said, after our first greetings were over.  One had strayed, the other had been stolen by the Blackfeet, so that they had been compelled to perform the greater part of the journey on foot; and having exhausted their ammunition, they had been almost starved.  They had succeeded, however, in preserving the letters confided to them, and they had brought a packet, for Uncle Donald, from a white stranger at whose hut they had stopped on the way.
On seeing the beavers we carried they entreated that we would give them some meat without delay, saying that they had had no food for a couple of days.
Their countenances and the difficulty with which they dragged their feet along corroborated their assertions.  We, therefore, at once collecting some fuel, lighted a fire, and having skinned and opened one of the beavers, extended it, spread-eagle fashion, on some sticks to cook. They watched our proceedings with eager eyes; but before there was time to warm the animal through their hunger made them seize it, when tearing off the still uncooked flesh, they began to gobble it up with the greatest avidity.
I was afraid they would suffer from over eating, but nothing Hugh or I could say would induce them to stop until they had consumed the greater part of the beaver.  They would then, had we allowed them, have thrown themselves on the ground and gone to sleep; but anxious to know the contents of the packets they had brought, relieving them of their guns, we urged them to lean upon us, and come at once to the farm.  It was almost dark before we reached home.
Madge embraced her son affectionately, and almost, wept when she observed the melancholy condition to which he was reduced.  He would not, however, go to sleep, as she wanted him to do, until he had delivered the packets to Uncle Donald, who was still out about the farm.
He in the meantime squatted down near the fire, where he remained with true Indian patience till Uncle Donald came in, when, rising to his feet, he gave a brief account of his adventures, and produced the packets, carefully wrapped up in a piece of leather.
To those which came by way of Edmonton I need not further refer, as they were chiefly about business.  One, however, was of great interest; it was in answer to inquiries which Uncle Donald had instituted to discover any relatives or friends of little Rose.  To his secret satisfaction he was informed that none could be found, and that he need have no fear of being deprived of her.  As he read the last packet his countenance exhibited astonishment and much concern.
"This letter is from your mother, Archie," he said, at length, when he had twice read it through.  "Your father has brought her and the rest of the family to a mission station which has been established for the benefit of the Sercies, on the other side of the Rocky Mountains. Scarcely had they been settled for a few months, and your father had begun to win the confidence of the tribe among whom he had come to labour, than the small-pox broke out in their village, brought by the Blackfeet from the south; and their medicine-men, who had from the first regarded him with jealous eyes, persuaded the people that the scourge had been sent in consequence of their having given a friendly reception to the Christian missionary.  Some few, whose good will he had gained, warned him that his life was in danger, and urged him to make his escape from the district.  Though unwilling himself to leave his post, he had proposed sending your mother and the children away, when he was attacked by a severe illness.  She thus, even had she wished it, could not have left him, and they have remained on at the station, notwithstanding that she fears they may at any time be destroyed by the savages, while the medicine-men have been using all their arts to win over the few Indians who continue faithful.  These have promised to protect them to the best of their power, but how long they will be able to do so is doubtful. Their cattle and horses have been stolen, and they have for some time been short of provisions; thus, even should your father regain his health, they will be unable to travel.  He, like a true missionary of the Gospel, puts his confidence in God, and endeavours, your mother says, ever to wear a cheerful countenance.  She does not actually implore me to come to her assistance, for she knows the length and difficulties of the journey; and she expresses her thankfulness that you are safe on this side of the mountains, but I see clearly that she would be very grateful if I could pay her a visit; and I fear, indeed, unless help reaches your family, that the consequences may be serious.  I have, therefore, made up my mind to set off at once.  We may manage to get across the mountains before the winter sets in, though there is no time to be lost.  I will take Pierre and Corney, with Red Squirrel and a party of our own Indians, and leave Sandy, with Hugh and you, in charge of Clearwater."
"May I not go, also?"  I asked, in a tone of disappointment.  "Surely I may be able to help my father and mother, and Hugh would be very sorry to be left behind."
"It is but natural that you should wish to go; and Hugh, too, maybe of assistance, for I can always trust to your discretion and judgment should any difficulty occur," he observed.
"Then you will take us, won't you?" we both cried at once.
"Yes," he answered.  "I would not take one without the other, so Hugh may go if he wishes it."
"Thank you, thank you!"  I exclaimed, gratified at Uncle Donald's remark; "we will try to deserve your confidence.  What shall we do first?"
"We must have the canoes got ready, and lay in a stock of provisions so that we may not be delayed by having to hunt; indeed, except some big-horns, and perhaps a grizzly, we shall not find much game on the mountains," he remarked.
That evening all our plans were completed, and Sandy and the other men received their directions.  Saddle and pack horses were at once to be started off by a circuitous route, carrying only light loads however, and were to meet us at the head of the river navigation, however, while we were to go as far up the stream as we could in canoes, with as large a supply of provisions as they could convey.
The very next morning at daybreak while we were engaged in preparing the birch bark canoes by covering the seams with gum, and sewing on some fresh pieces of bark with wattap, which is formed of the flexible roots of the young spruce tree, an Indian was seen on the opposite side of the river making a signal to us that he desired to cross.  One of the canoes which was ready for launching was sent for him and brought him over.
"He had come," he said, "to bring us information that a large body of Blackfeet were on the war-path, having crossed the Rocky Mountains at one of the southern passes, and that having attacked the Sinapools, their old enemies on the Columbia, they were now bending their steps northward in search of plunder and scalps.  He came to tell his white friends to be prepared should they come so far north."
On hearing this I was afraid that Uncle Donald would give up the expedition and remain to defend Clearwater, but on cross-questioning the Indian, he came to the conclusion that the Blackfeet were not at all likely to come so far, and Sandy declared that if they did he would give a very good account of them.
Still, as it was possible that they might make their appearance, Uncle Donald considered that it was safer to take Rose with us notwithstanding the hardships to which she might be exposed.
"Then Madge will go too," exclaimed Rose; "poor Madge would be very unhappy at being left alone without me."
"Madge shall go with us," said Uncle Donald; and Rose, highly delighted, ran off to tell her to get ready.
The horses had been sent off at dawn, but we were not able to start until the following morning as it took us the whole day to prepare the packages of dried fish, pemmican, and smoked venison and pork, which were to serve us as provisions.
On a bright clear morning, just before the sun rose over the hills to the east, we pushed off from the bank in four canoes.  In each were five people, one to steer and the others to paddle.  Uncle Donald took Rose in his as a passenger.
Hugh and I went together with Red Squirrel to steer for us, and Corney and Pierre had each charge of another canoe.
I will describe our canoes, which were light, elegant, and wonderfully strong, considering the materials of which they were formed.  They were constructed of the bark of the white birch-tree.  This had been peeled from the tree in large sheets, which were bent over a slender frame of cedar ribs, confined by gunwales, and kept apart by thin bars of the same wood.  The ends were alike, forming wedge-like points, and turned over from the extremities towards the centre so as to look somewhat like the handle of a violin.  The sheets of bark were then fastened round the gunwales by wattap, and sewn together with the same materials at the joinings.  These were afterwards covered by a coat of pine pitch, called gum.  The seats for the paddlers were made by suspending a strip of board with cords from the gunwales in such a manner that they did not press against the sides of the canoe.  At the second cross-bar from the bow a hole was cut for a mast, so that a sail could be hoisted when the wind proved favourable.  Each canoe carried a quantity of spare bark, wattap, gum, a pan for heating the gum, and some smaller articles necessary for repairs.  The canoes were about eighteen feet long, yet so light that two men could carry one with ease a considerable distance when we had to make a "portage."  A "portage," I should say, is the term used when a canoe has to be carried over the land, in consequence of any obstruction in the river, such as rapids, falls, or shallows.
As soon as we were fairly off Pierre struck up a cheerful song, in which we, Corney, and the Indians joined, and lustily plying our paddles we urged our little fleet up the river.
CHAPTER SIX.
PADDLING UP STREAM.
For the first day we made good progress, stopping only a short time to land and cook our provisions.  We then paddled on until nearly dark, when we went on shore, unloaded our canoes, hauled them up, lighted a fire for cooking, and pitched a small tent for Rose, in front of which Madge, as she always afterwards did, took up her post to be ready to guard her in case of danger.
As soon as supper was over, two men were placed on watch, and the rest of the party lay down round the fire with our buffalo-robes spread on fresh spruce or pine boughs as beds.  Before dawn we were aroused by Uncle Donald.
The morning was calm, the stars were slightly paling, a cold yellow light began to show itself.  Above the river floated a light mist through which objects on the opposite bank were dimly seen, while on the land side a wall of forest rose up impenetrable to the eye.  From the dying embers of the camp fire a thin column of smoke rose high above the trees, while round it were the silent forms of the Indians, lying motionless at full length on their backs, enveloped in their blankets. To stretch my legs I walked a few paces from the camp, when I was startled by a sudden rush through the underbrush.  For a moment I thought of the Blackfeet, but the movement proved to be made by a minx or marten, which had been attracted to the spot by the remains of last night's meal.
On hearing Uncle Donald's voice the Indians started to their feet, and after a hurried breakfast, the canoes being launched and the baggage stowed on board, we proceeded on our voyage.  The mist by degrees cleared away, the sun mounting over the hills, lighted up the scenery, and our crews burst into one of the songs with which they were wont to beguile the time while plying their paddles.  Having stopped as before to dine we were paddling on, when we heard a low ceaseless roar coming down between the high banks.  In a short time we saw the waters rushing and foaming ahead of us, as they fell over a broad ledge of rocks.
"Can we get over there?" asked Hugh.
"No," I answered; "see, Uncle Donald is steering in for the shore."
We soon landed, the canoes were unloaded, and being hauled up the bank, each was placed on the shoulders of two men, who trotted off with them by a path parallel to the river; the rest loaded themselves with the bales.  Hugh and I imitated their example, Madge carried as heavy a package as any of the men, and Rose begged that she might take charge of a small bundle, with which she trotted merrily off, but did not refuse to let Madge have it before she had gone half-way.  After proceeding for nearly a mile among rocks and trees, the canoes were placed on the banks where the river flowed calmly by, and the men returned for the remainder of the baggage.  Three trips had to be made to convey the whole of the cargoes above the falls.  This is what is called "making a portage."
Re-embarking, on we went until nightfall.  During the next few days we had several such portages to make.  We were at times able to hoist our sails, but when the stream became more rapid and shallow, we took to poling, a less pleasant way of progressing, though under these circumstances the only one available.  Occasionally the river opened out, and we were able to resume our paddles.
We had just taken them in hand and were passing along the east bank when Hugh exclaimed, "I see some one moving on shore among the trees!  Yes, I thought so; he's an Indian," and he immediately added, "there are several more."
I shouted to Uncle Donald to tell him, and then turned to warn Pierre and Corney.
Scarcely had I spoken than well-nigh fifty savages appeared on the banks, and, yelling loudly, let fly a cloud of arrows towards us, while one of them shouted to us to come to shore.
"Very likely we'll be after doin' that, Mister Red-skins," cried Corney.
And we all, following Uncle Donald's example, turning the heads of our canoes, paddled towards the opposite bank.
We were safe for the present, and might, had we chosen, have picked off several of the savages with our rifles; Corney and Pierre had lifted theirs for the purpose, but Uncle Donald ordered them not to fire.
"Should we kill any of them we should only find it more difficult to make peace afterwards," he observed.
The river was here wide enough to enable us to keep beyond range of their arrows, and we continued our course paddling along close to the western bank.  After going a short distance we saw ahead of us a lake, which we should have to cross.  The Indians had disappeared, and I hoped we had seen the last of them, when Corney shouted out that he had caught sight of them running alone; the shore of the lake to double round it. Their object in so doing was evident, for on the opposite side of the upper river entered the lake, rounding a point by a narrow passage, and this point they hoped to gain before we could get through, so that they might stop our progress.
"Paddle, lads--paddle for your lives!" cried Uncle Donald.  "We must keep ahead of the red-skins if we wish to save our scalps."
We did paddle with might and main, making the calm water bubble round the bows of our canoes.
Looking to our right, we every now and then caught a glimpse of the Blackfeet, for such we knew they were by their dress.  They were bounding along in single file among the trees, led apparently by one of their most nimble warriors.  It seemed very doubtful whether we could pass the point before they could reach it.  We persevered, for otherwise we should be compelled either to turn back, or to run the risk of being attacked at one of the portages, or to land at the western side of the lake, and to throw up a fort in which we could defend ourselves should the Blackfeet make their way across the river.  It was not likely, however, that they would do this.  They had already ventured much farther to the north than it was their custom to make a raid; and should they be discovered, they would run the risk of being set upon by the Shoushwaps, the chief tribe inhabiting that part of the country, and their retreat cut off.  Still it was of the greatest importance to lose no time, and we redoubled our efforts to get by the point.  The Indians had a greater distance to go; but then they ran much faster than we could paddle our canoes.  As we neared the point, I kept looking to the right to see how far our enemies had got.  Again I caught a glimpse of their figures moving among the trees, but whether or not they were those of the leaders I could not distinguish.
Uncle Donald reached the point, and his canoe disappeared behind it. Hugh and I next came up, closely followed by the other two.  We could hear the savage shouts and cries of the red-skins; but there was now a good chance of getting beyond their reach.
"There goes the captain's canoe," I heard Corney sing out; "paddle, boys, paddle, and we'll give them the go-by!"
We had entered the upper branch of the river; the current ran smoothly. Still we were obliged to exert ourselves to force our canoes up against it.  Looking back for a moment over my shoulder, I could see the leading Indians as they reached the point we had just rounded.  Enraged at being too late to stop us, they expended another flight of arrows, several of which struck the water close to us, and two went through the after end of Pierre's canoe, but fortunately above water.
Though we had escaped for the present, they might continue along the eastern bank of the river, and meet us at the next portage we should have to make.  The day was wearing on, and ere long we should have to look out for a spot on which to camp, on the west bank, opposite to that where we had seen the Indians.
We had got four or five miles up the river when the roaring sound of rushing waters struck our ears, and we knew that we should have to make another portage.  The only practicable one was on the east bank, and as it would occupy us the greater part of an hour, we could scarcely hope to escape the Indians, even should they not already have arrived at the spot.  On the left rose a line of precipitous rocks, over which we should be unable to force our way.  At length we got up to the foot of the rapids.  Uncle Donald took a survey of them.  I observed on the west side a sheet of water flowing down smoother and freer from rocks than the rest.
"We must pole up the rapids, but it will need caution; follow me," said Uncle Donald.
We got out our long poles, and Uncle Donald leading the way, we commenced the ascent.
While resting on our paddles Corney and Pierre had overtaken us, and now followed astern of Uncle Donald, so that our canoe was the last.  We had got nearly half-way up, the navigation becoming more difficult as we proceeded.  The rocks extended farther and farther across the channel, the water leaping and hissing and foaming as it rushed by them.  One of our Indians sat in the bows with a rope ready to jump out on the rocks and tow the canoe should the current prove too strong for us.  Red Squirrel stood aft with pole in hand guiding the canoe, while Hugh and I worked our poles on either side.  Corney and Pierre were at some little distance before us, while Uncle Donald, having a stronger crew, got well ahead.
"We shall soon be through this, I hope," cried Hugh; "pretty tough work though."
As he spoke he thrust down his pole, which must have been jammed in a hole, and his weight being thrown upon it, before he could recover it broke, and over he went; I in my eagerness, leaning on one side, attempted to grasp at him, the consequence was that the canoe, swinging round, was driven by the current against the rock.  I heard a crash, the foaming water washed over us, and I found myself struggling in its midst.  My first impulse was to strike out, for I had been a swimmer from childhood.
Notwithstanding, I found myself carried down.  I looked out for Hugh, but the bubbling water blinded my eyes, and I could nowhere see him nor my Indian companions; still I instinctively struggled for life. Suddenly I found myself close to a rugged rock, whose sides afforded the means of holding on to it.  By a violent effort I drew myself out of the water and climbed to the top.  I looked round to see what had become of the rest of the crew; my eye first fell on the canoe, to which Hugh was clinging.  It was being whirled hurriedly down the rapids; and some distance from it, indeed, almost close to where I now was, I saw the head of an Indian.  His hands and feet were moving; but instead of trying to save himself by swimming towards the rock on which I was seated, he was evidently endeavouring to overtake the canoe.  I could nowhere see our other companion; he had, I feared, sunk, sucked under by the current.  A momentary glance showed me what I have described.
Directly I had recovered breath I shouted to Pierre and Corney, but the roar of the waters prevented them from hearing my voice; and they and their companions were so completely occupied in poling on their canoes that they did not observe what had occurred.  Again and again I shouted; then I turned round, anxiously looking to see how it fared with Hugh and the Indian.
The canoe had almost reached the foot of the rapids, but it went much faster than the Indian, who was still bravely following it.  He had caught hold of one of the paddles, which assisted to support him.  I was now sure that his object was to assist Hugh, for he might, as I have said, by swimming to the rock and clutching it, have secured his own life until he could be taken off by Corney or Pierre.  Hugh still held tight hold of the canoe, which, however, the moment it reached the foot of the rapids, began to drift over to the eastern shore.
Just then what was my dismay to see a number of red-skins rush out from the forest towards the bank.  They were those, I had no doubt, from whom we were endeavouring to escape.  They must have seen the canoe, and were rejoicing in the thoughts of the capture they were about to make. Hugh's youth would not save him from the cruel sufferings to which they were wont to put their prisoners, should they get hold of him, and that they would do this seemed too probable.  I almost wished, rather than he should have had to endure so cruel a fate, that he had sunk to the bottom.  Even now the Indian might come up with the canoe, but would it be possible for him to tow it to the west bank, or support Hugh while swimming in the same direction.  Though the rock was slippery I at length managed to stand up on it, and as I did so I gave as shrill a shout as I could utter.  One of the Indians in Corney's canoe glanced at me for a moment.  He at once saw what had happened, and I guessed from his gestures was telling Pierre as well as Corney of the accident.  In an instant the poles were thrown in, and the Indians seizing their paddles, the canoes, their heads turned round, were gliding like air bubbles down the torrent.
CHAPTER SEVEN.
A NARROW ESCAPE.
HUGH'S CANOE ARRESTED BY RED SQUIRREL JUST IN TIME--THE CANOE SAVED--ALL GOT UP THE RAPIDS AT LAST--CAMP AT THE TOP--THE BLACKFEET REACH THE CAMP TO FIND THE PARTY GONE--THE INDIANS PURSUE, AND UNCLE DONALD LIES BY FOR TWO DAYS ON AN ISLAND--END OF THE WATER PASSAGE--THE HORSES DO NOT APPEAR.
As Corney and Pierre approached I waved to them to go on, pointing to the canoe to which Hugh was clinging.  They saw the necessity of at once going to his rescue, and so left me on the rock, where I was perfectly safe for the present.  There was need, in truth, for them to make haste, for already Hugh was drifting within range of the Indians' arrows, and they might shoot him in revenge for the long run we had given them.
The overturned canoe seemed to be gliding more and more rapidly towards them, when I saw its progress arrested.
The brave Indian had seized it, and was attempting to tow it away from the spot where the savages were collected.  But all his efforts could scarcely do more than stop its way, and he apparently made but little progress towards the west shore.  Corney and Pierre were, however, quickly getting up to it.  I shouted with joy when I saw Hugh lifted into Corney's canoe, and the Indian with some assistance clambering into that of Pierre.  Not satisfied with this success they got hold of the canoe itself, determined to prevent it from falling into the hands of the enemy.  This done, they quickly paddled over to the west shore, where a level spot enabled them to land.  They had not forgotten me; and presently I saw Corney's canoe, with three people in her, poling up towards the rock on which I stood, while Pierre's was engaged in picking up such of the articles of baggage as had floated.  It was not without some difficulty that I got on board.  My first inquiry was to ascertain which of the Indians had assisted to save Hugh, and I was thankful to hear, as I had expected, that it was Bed Squirrel who had behaved so gallantly.
We then had to decide what to do--whether to continue our course upwards, to let Uncle Donald know what had happened, or to rejoin Pierre.  Though I had managed to cling on to the rock I found my strength so much exhausted that I could afford but little help in poling up the canoe.  While we were discussing the matter, what was my dismay to see an Indian on the top of the western cliff.
"Our enemies must have crossed, and we shall be attacked," I exclaimed.
"Sure no, it's one of Mr Donald's men who has been sent to see what has become of us," answered Corney.
Such I saw was the case.  We could not hear his voice, but getting closer to us he made signs which his own people understood, that he would go back to Uncle Donald and learn what we were to do.  In reply our two Indians pointed down to where Pierre's party were now on shore, letting him understand exactly what had happened.
He quickly disappeared, and we had to wait some time, hanging on to a rock by a rope, until he returned with two other men.  They then pointed up the stream as a sign to us that we were to proceed.  We accordingly did so, poling up as before.  By the time we got to the head of the rapids we saw that Pierre was coming after us, apparently towing the shattered canoe.
Above the rapids we discovered a small bay, towards which Uncle Donald's voice summoned us.  As we landed he grasped my hand, showing his joy at my escape.  It was some time before Pierre arrived.  Hugh came in his canoe, while the rest of the men had arrived over land with the luggage which had been saved, as also with our rifles, which, having been slung under the thwarts, had fortunately not slipped out.
We immediately began our preparations for camping, but had, besides doing what was usual, to collect materials for a stockade, which might enable us to resist a sudden onslaught of the Blackfeet should they cross the river.  One of the men was also placed on watch all the time to prevent surprise.
While most of the party were thus engaged, Red Squirrel and Jock, who were the best canoe builders, were employed in repairing the shattered canoe, and making some fresh paddles and poles; indeed there was so much work to be done, that none of us got more than a few hours' rest.  We had also to keep a vigilant watch, and two of the men were constantly scouting outside the camp, to guard in more effectually from being taken by surprise.
All was ready for a start some time before daylight, when Uncle Donald, awakening the sleepers, ordered every one to get on board as noiselessly as possible.  He, as usual, led the way, the other canoes following close astern.  The last man was told to make up the fire, which was left burning to deceive the enemy, who would suppose that we were still encamped.
We had got some distance, the wind being up stream, when just at dawn I fancied that I heard a faint though prolonged yell.  We stopped paddling for a moment, I asked Red Squirrel if he thought that the Blackfeet had got across to our camp.  He nodded, and uttered a low laugh, significant of his satisfaction that we had deceived them.  Daylight increasing, we put up our masts and hoisted the light cotton sails, which sent our canoes skimming over the water at a far greater speed than we had hitherto been able to move.
Another lake appeared before us.  By crossing it we should be far ahead of the Blackfeet.  We had brought some cooked provisions, so that we were able to breakfast in the canoes.  It was long past noon before, the river having again narrowed, we ventured on shore for a brief time only to dine.
The next portage we came to was on the east bank.  It was fortunately a short one, and Uncle Donald kept some of the men under arms, a portion only being engaged in carrying the canoes and their cargoes.  No Indians, however, appeared.
"I hope that we have given them the go-by," said Hugh, "and shall not again see their ugly faces."
"We must not be too certain; I'll ask Red Squirrel what he thinks," I replied.
"Never trust a Blackfoot," was the answer.  "They are as cunning as serpents, and, like serpents, they strike their enemies from among the grass."
We expected in the course of two or three days more to come to an end of the river navigation at a spot where Uncle Donald had directed that the horses should meet us.  We were not without fear, however, that some, if not the whole of the animals, might have been stolen by the Blackfeet should they by any means have discovered them.
Occasionally sailing, sometimes paddling and poling, and now and then towing the canoes along the banks, we continued our progress.  As we went along we kept a look-out for the Blackfeet, as it was more than possible that they might pursue us.  We accordingly, in preference to landing on either bank, selected an island in the centre of the stream for our camping-ground.
We had just drawn up the canoes among the bushes and formed our camp in an open spot near the middle of the island, when one of the men who was on the lookout brought word that he saw a large number of savages passing on the east bank.  We were, however, perfectly concealed from their keen eyes.  Watching them attentively, we guessed by their gestures that they were looking for us, and not seeing our canoes, fancied that we had passed on.  Night was now approaching.  We were afraid of lighting a fire, lest its glare might betray our position to our pursuers.  They would, however, on not discovering us, turn back, so that we should thus meet them, and Uncle Donald resolved, therefore, to remain where we were, until they had retreated to the southward.  Even should they discover us we might defend the island more easily than any other spot we could select.  We had plenty of provisions, so that we could remain there without inconvenience for several days, except that we should thus delay our passage over the mountains.  Hugh and I were, much to our satisfaction, appointed by Uncle Donald to keep watch, Hugh on one side of the island and I on the other, for fear lest, should the red-skins find out where we were, they might attempt, by swimming across, to take us by surprise.
None appeared, however, and two more days went by.  At last Uncle Donald began to hope that they, supposing we had taken another route, were on their way back.  We accordingly, seeing no one the next morning, embarked, and the river here expanding into a lake, we were able to paddle on without impediment across it, and a short distance up another stream, when we came to a fall of several feet, beyond which our canoes could not proceed.  This was the spot where we had expected to find the horses, but they had not arrived.  We were greatly disappointed, for, having been much longer than we had calculated on coming up, we naturally expected that they would have been ready for us.  Winter was rapidly approaching, and in the autumn before the streams are thoroughly frozen the dangers of crossing the mountains are greater than at any other period.
As the canoes could go no higher we took them up the stream and placed them "en cache," where there was little chance of their being discovered.  They were to remain there until the return of our men, who would accompany us to the foot of the mountains and go back again that autumn.
On not finding the horses Uncle Donald went to the highest hill in the neighbourhood, overlooking the country through which they had to pass, in the hopes of seeing them approach.  He came back saying that he could perceive no signs of them, and he ordered us forthwith to camp in such a position that we might defend ourselves against any sudden attack of hostile Indians.
CHAPTER EIGHT.
AMONG THE MOUNTAINS.
THE HORSE PARTY ARRIVES AT LAST, BUT WITH HALF THE HORSES STOLEN--THE START ACROSS THE MOUNTAINS--MORE BLACKFEET IN THE WAY OBLIGE THE PARTY TO TAKE A STRANGE PASS--IT BECOMES COLDER--SNOW COMES ON--A PACK OF WOLVES--SLEIGHS AND SNOW-SHOES--IN THE HEART OF THE "ROCKIES"--CORNEY HAS A NARROW ESCAPE AND A COLD BATH--SNOW IN THE CANOES--DIFFICULTIES OF THE WAY--THE PASS AT LAST--A FEARFUL AVALANCHE.
Several days passed by.  We were not molested by the Indians, but the horses did not arrive.  Uncle Donald never fretted or fumed, though it was enough to try his temper.  I asked him to allow me to set off with Corney and Pierre to ascertain if they had gone by mistake to any other place.  We were on the point of starting when we saw a party of horses and men approaching.  They proved to be those we were expecting, but there were only eight horses, less than half the number we had sent off. The men in charge had a sad account to give.  The rest had been stolen by Indians, and one of their party had been killed, while they had to make a long round to escape from the thieves, who would otherwise very likely have carried off the remainder.  The men also had brought a dozen dogs--our three especial favourites being among them--to be used in dragging our sleighs in case the horses should be unable to get through. We had carried the materials for forming sleighs with us in the canoes, while the harness had been transported thus far with the other packages by the horses.  The poor beasts, though very thin, were better than no horses at all.  There were a sufficient number to convey our stores and provisions, one for Uncle Donald, who carried Rose on his saddle, and two others for Hugh and me.  The rest of the party had to proceed on foot.  I offered mine to Madge, but she declared that she could walk better than I could.
We made a short day's journey, but the poor animals were so weak that we were compelled to camp again at a spot where there was plenty of grass. It was here absolutely necessary to remain three days to enable them to regain their strength.
While we were in camp Uncle Donald sent out Pierre and one of our Indians to try and ascertain if any of the Blackfeet were still hovering in the direction we proposed taking across the mountains.  We did not wait for the return of our scouts, but started at the time proposed, expecting to meet them on the road we should travel.
We were engaged in forming our camp, collecting wood for the fires, and putting up rough huts, or rather arbours of boughs, as a protection from the wind--which here coming off the snowy mountains was exceedingly cold at night--while the gloom of evening was coming on, when one of the men on watch shouted--
"The enemy! the enemy are upon us!"
While some of our people ran out intending to bring in the horses, the rest of us flew to our arms.
Uncle Donald, taking his rifle, at once went out in the direction in which the sentry declared he had seen the band of savages coming over the hill.
Our alarm was put an end to when, shortly afterwards, he came back accompanied by Pierre and his companion, who brought the unsatisfactory intelligence that a large body of Blackfeet were encamped near the pass by which we had intended to descend into the plains of the Saskatchewan.
Ever prompt in action, Uncle Donald decided at once to take a more northerly pass.
The country through which we were travelling was wild and rugged in the extreme; frequently we had to cross the same stream over and over again to find a practicable road.  Now we had to proceed along the bottom of a deep valley among lofty trees, then to climb up a steep height by a zigzag course, and once more to descend into another valley.  Heavily laden as were both horses and men, our progress was of necessity slow. Sometimes after travelling a whole day we found that we had not made good in a straight line more than eight or ten miles.
The weather hitherto had been remarkably fine, and Hugh and Rose and I agreed that we enjoyed our journey amazingly.  Our hunters went out every day after we had camped, and sometimes before we started in the morning, or while we were moving along, and never failed to bring in several deer, so that we were well supplied with food.  The cold at night was very considerable; but with good fires blazing, and wrapped up in buffalo-robes, we did not feel it; and when the sun shone brightly the air was so pure and fresh that we were scarcely aware how rapidly winter was approaching.
It should be understood that there are several passes through the lofty range it was our object to cross.  These passes had been formed by the mountains being rent asunder by some mighty convulsion of nature.  All of them are many miles in length, and in some places several in width; now the pass presents a narrow gorge, now expands into a wide valley. The highest point is called the watershed, where there is either a single small lake, or a succession of lakelets, from which the water flows either eastward through the Saskatchewan or Athabasca rivers, to find its way ultimately into the Arctic Ocean, or westward, by numberless tributaries, into the Fraser or Columbia rivers, which fall, after making numerous bends, into the Pacific.
We had voyaged in our canoes up one of the larger tributaries of the Fraser, and had now to follow to its source at the watershed one of the smaller streams which flowed, twisting and turning, through the dense forests and wild and rugged hills rising on every side.
The country had become more and more difficult as we advanced, and frequently we had to wind our way in single file round the mountains by a narrow path scarcely affording foothold to our horses.  Sometimes on one side, sometimes on the other were steep precipices, over which, by a false step, either we or our animals might be whirled into the roaring torrent below.  Now we had to force a road through the tangled forest to cut off an angle of the stream, and then to pass along narrow gorges, beetling cliffs frowning above our heads, and almost shutting out the light of day.
At length we camped on higher ground than any we had yet reached.  On one side was a forest, on the other a rapid stream came foaming by.  The sky was overcast, so that, expecting rain, we put up all the shelter we could command.
The hunters having brought in a good supply of meat, our people were in good spirits, and seemed to have forgotten the dangers we had gone through, while they did not trouble themselves by thinking of those we might have to encounter.  We had no longer hostile Indians to fear; but we still kept a watch at night in case a prowling grizzly or pack of hungry wolves might pay the camp a visit.  The wind blew cold; not a star was visible.  The light from our fire threw a lurid glare on the stems and boughs of the trees and the tops of the rugged rocks which rose beyond.
Having said good night to Rose, whom we saw stowed away in her snug little bower, Hugh and I lay down a short distance from the fire, sheltered by some of the packages piled up at our heads.  Uncle Donald was not far from us.  On the other side were Pierre and Corney and Red Squirrel, while Madge took her post, disdaining more shelter than the men, close to Rose's hut.  Two of the men kept awake, one watching the camp, the other the horses, and the rest lay in a row on the opposite side of the fire.
Such was the scene I looked on till, completely covering my head up in a buffalo-robe, I closed my eyes.  I was awakened by finding an unusual weight above me.  I threw my arms about, when down came a cold shower on my face and clearing my eyes I could just see the snow on every side, while my body was completely covered up.  I was perfectly warm, however, and felt no inclination to get out of my cosy bed to brush the snow away.  I drew my robe again over my head; being well assured that Uncle Donald would arouse us if there was any risk of our being completely covered up.  How much longer I had slept I could not tell, when I was once more awakened by a terrific howling, yelping, the barking of dogs, the trampling and snorting of horses, followed by the shouts and shrieks of our men.
I speedily drew myself out of my snowy burrow, and through the gloom I caught sight of our horses endeavouring to defend themselves by kicking out with their heels against a pack of wolves which had followed them up to the camp, and Uncle Donald with the men engaged, some with their rifles and others with sticks, in endeavouring to drive off the savage brutes, but they were afraid of firing, for fear of wounding the horses. I felt about for Hugh, who being covered up by the snow, had not been awakened by the din.
"What is happening?" he exclaimed, sitting up.  "Are the Indians upon us?"
"Only some hungry wolves, and we are all right," I said.
"Why, I fancy it has been snowing!" he exclaimed.
"I should think so," I answered.  "Come, jump up, we'll help put those brutes to flight."
When the wolves found themselves encountered by human beings, they quickly turned tail, but we had some difficulty in catching the frightened horses, and I was just in time to seize one which was on the point of dashing into Rose's hut.  As it was almost daylight, no one again turned in; the fires were made up, and we began cooking our morning meal.
The snow continued to fall so heavily, that Uncle Donald decided to remain where we were, or rather to form another camp more under shelter of the trees.  To proceed with the horses would have been almost impossible, and he therefore settled to send them back and to prepare the sleighs and snow-shoes for the rest of our journey.  A sleigh is simply a thin board, ten feet long and about a foot broad, turned up at one end.  The baggage is secured to it by leathern thongs.
To form a cariole, a cradle or framework like the body of a small carriage is fixed on a sleigh such as I have just described, and is covered with buffalo skin parchment, the inside being lined with a buffalo-robe.  When the traveller is seated in a cariole with outstretched legs, he is only separated from the snow by the thin plank which forms the floor.  The dogs which drag the sleighs are attached to them by leathern thongs and collars generally decorated with bead work and tassels, surmounted by arches, to which are suspended strings of small bells.  We had brought a supply of snow-shoes and moccasins for all the party.  The snow-shoe is an oval frame five or six feet in length, about one in width, the intermediate space being filled with network, except a hole in the centre for the heel of the wearer.  It is attached to the foot by leathern thongs.  All hands were busily engaged in putting the sleighs together, fitting the harness to the dogs, and arranging the cargoes.  The horses were sent back.  The canoe men had taken their departure, and our party now consisted of Uncle Donald, Rose, Hugh and I, Pierre, Corney, Madge, Red Squirrel, and four Indians.
We had to wait until the snow had somewhat hardened, and the stream up which we were to proceed had been frozen over.  Uncle Donald had made for Rose to sleep in a bag of buffalo-robes lined with softer furs, which kept her perfectly warm.  She was the only person who was to enjoy the privilege of a sleigh, drawn by Whiskey and Pilot, and guided by Uncle Donald.  The rest of us were to travel on snow-shoes, a mode of proceeding which, though fatiguing, kept us warm.
The last night of our stay in camp arrived.  We were to start, should the weather be propitious, the next morning.  Soon after we turned in for the night, before I had fallen asleep, I was greatly surprised to hear the sound of chopping in a wood at no great distance off.  I called to Hugh, he heard it also, as did Uncle Donald.
One after the other the men expressed their wonder at the sound. Corney, who was on guard, walked a few paces in the direction from whence it came, evidently thinking that something was wrong, but he soon returned, declaring that he could see no one.  Suddenly there came the crash of a falling tree.  After this mysterious occurrence, nothing could induce him to go up to the spot, though it could not have been more than two hundred yards off.  No one had been seen on the previous evening, and had Indians been there, they would have observed our fire, and would long ere this have gathered round it.
What Uncle Donald thought I could not tell, he certainly did not get up to try and solve the mystery, nor did any of the Indians.  Night passed away without disturbance, and the next morning, though Hugh, and Pierre, and I made a circuit of the camp, we could discover no footsteps to indicate that any one had been in the neighbourhood, nor signs of chopping, nor a fallen tree, so that the mystery remained unexplained.
Breakfast over, our four Indians were sent ahead to trample down the snow with their snow-shoes, the loaded sleighs following, driven by the other men and Madge, who was as good a driver as any of them, Uncle Donald in charge of Rose bringing up the rear with Hugh and me.  Such was to be our proceeding for many a day, until we were over the mountains.
We were now in the heart of the "Rockies."  The valley of the river we were following was about a mile wide, and on either side rose high rocky peaks, covered with perpetual snow, among which big-horns could be seen watching us, the intruders into their domains, and daring us, as it were, to scale the glaciers and meet them on their own ground.
We several times met with moose, one of which was shot nearly every day to supply our camp with meat.  We were anticipating getting through the pass without difficulty, when we found ourselves at the bottom of a fall a hundred feet in height, with thickly timbered hills on each side, which, rising abruptly from the water's edge, seemed to offer no footing even for a snow-shoe, much less a practicable trail for dog-sleighs.
Uncle Donald was not to be defeated, however, and at once ordered a regular track, graded round the face of the bluffs, to be formed.  By using snow-shoes as shovels, and poles and brush for bridges, we crossed the intervening gullies and reached the edge of the first fall.  Going on a mile further, we found the river confined between perpendicular walls of rock, up which there was no climbing.  We had to form another path, carrying it over ledges of rock, banks of ice and snow, making bridges from one huge boulder to another with the dark water boiling at our feet ready to engulf any one who might make a false step.
To our joy, the formidable obstacle being surmounted, the good ice was reached at last, when we pushed on, the dogs trotting gaily along, and we following behind.
But ere long another fall barred our progress.  Before attempting to surmount it, we halted for dinner.
As I was looking up I espied a big-horn, or mountain goat, and believing that we could get near enough to shoot it, Hugh and I set off with our guns.  The animal is about the size of a common sheep, with conical horns, nearly three feet long, and forming a complete circle, but so thick is the wool which covers its head and body that their full length is not seen.
"Sure, you'll not be gettin' up after that baste!"  I heard Corney say, he having followed us.
"We'll try," I answered, and began ascending the steep rocks.  The difficulties were greater than we expected, but still we did not like to be defeated.  We had been deceived by the clearness of the atmosphere, and after climbing up and up, the goat appeared as far off as ever. Presently he saw us, and off he bounded, springing along places where it would have been madness to follow.
"I tould ye so!" cried Corney from below, for he had still followed us. "Ye must git above one of those gentlemen if you want to shoot him.  Now dinner will be cooked, and we had better be after getting down to eat it."  We accordingly descended to where we had left our snow-shoes.
"Stop a moment!" cried Corney.  "Just let me get a drink of water, for I see a rill dripping over a rock there."
Corney accordingly made his way up to the perpendicular bank, but scarcely had he reached it, when, to our horror, there was a crash, and he suddenly disappeared, leaving, however, his long pole behind him.
I knew that the river was running like a mill sluice down below, so rushing forward I shoved the pole across the opening, and holding it in one hand, as I threw myself flat on the ice, I thrust down my arm.  To my relief, I felt Corney's head as he came to the surface, and seizing his hair, hauled away with might and main.  Hugh now assisted me, and we managed to drag up the Irishman from his fearfully perilous position. It required caution, however, to get him on the ice, as that at any moment might give way, and we should have to share the fate from which we were trying to rescue him.
"Arrah! the spalpeens! why don't they help us?" cried Corney.  "Shout, Mr Archie! shout, Mr Hugh!"
Our cries brought Pierre, who was nearest at hand, carrying a long rope and a pole.
By resting on the poles, and lowering the rope with a bowline knot at the end, we got it under his arms, and soon hauling him upon the ice, we hurried away from the dangerous spot.
He was none the worse for his dip, though it was no joke to be plunged head over ears in that icy cold water.  Several of the other men fell in at different times, for although it was freezing hard the rapidity of the current prevented the ice forming securely in many places.  We had occasionally, therefore, to leave the river and to make our way through the forest--no easy undertaking.  But we could get through any places, provided they were more than two feet wide.  When camping, we shovelled away the snow until we reached the moss on which we formed our beds; then we made our fire in the centre of the hole, and took our places round it.
When we went to sleep it was pretty deep, but in the morning, on getting up, I found that I could not see over the wall of snow.  By beating down the edges, however, we managed to climb out.
In spite of the depth of the snow, we travelled on, though as our snow-shoes sank in places nearly a foot deep, the fatigue was very great.  Rose laughed heartily as she saw us trudging on, and wanted Hugh to take her place in the sleigh and let her go on foot while he rested.
Again we came to a more mighty canyon than any we had yet encountered. This necessitated a detour, to avoid it, of about three miles overland.
A canyon, from the Spanish, is a deep gully or gorge, either with a river or stream flowing through the bottom or not, but the canyons in this part of the Rockies nearly always have a stream at the bottom.
We had again reached the river where it flowed on a more even course. It was entirely frozen over, but we were high above it, and the difficulty was to get down.
Pierre was the first to start.  Away went the dogs with the sleigh, Pierre hauling it back and trying to stop its way.  But all would not do, and presently he, dogs, and sleigh, went rolling over and over, until they plunged into the snow at the bottom, to a considerable depth.
"Och sure I'll be wiser," cried Corney; and he made fast a tail rope to a tree, thus enabling him to lower it gently for a short distance at a time.  In slipping it, however, from one tree to another, the sleigh gathered way, but scarcely had it got abreast of the dogs than it sheered off on one side of a small tree, the dogs rolling on the other. The tree--a mere sapling--bent, and the impetus carried the whole train nearly twenty feet out towards its end--the dogs hanging by their traces on one side, counterbalancing the sleigh on the other, where they swayed to and fro in the most ludicrous fashion, yelping, barking, and struggling to get free, and running a great risk of being hanged.
"Surely I'll be afther losin' me dogs, and the sleigh will be dashed to pieces!" cried Corney, wringing his hands in his despair.
Uncle Donald told us to take charge of Rose; then springing down the bank with the agility of a young man, axe in hand, with a few blows he cut the traces and set the poor dogs free, while the sleigh bounded down the hill into the snow at the bottom, where Pierre was trying to put his train to rights, the new arrival adding not a little to his difficulties.
Fearing that Rose might meet with a similar accident, Uncle Donald, taking her in his arms, carried her down, while Hugh and I managed the sleigh.  As soon as we were all to rights, we had the satisfaction of seeing before us a clear "glare" of ice.  The dogs, entering into our feelings, set off at a scamper to cross it.
In less than an hour we had got over a greater distance than we had the whole of the previous day.  We had now reached the entrance to the pass. On either side rose pyramidical peaks, covered with perpetual snow, three thousand feet above the valley.  Shortly afterwards we came to the foot of a magnificent glacier, which must have been scarcely less than a mile in length and several hundred feet in height.  As we had made a good day's journey, and evening was approaching, Uncle Donald was looking out for a place at which to camp.  We had just fixed on a spot on the bank of the river at the edge of a thick belt of trees, which here intervened between it and the cliffs, when a roar as of distant thunder reached our ears.
"Look out! look out!" cried the Indians in chorus, and they pointed upwards.
We did look, and there we saw the whole side of the mountain, as it seemed, in movement.  Huge rocks and vast masses of ice came rolling down towards the spot we were passing over, threatening to overwhelm us.
Down rushed the fearful avalanche.  One huge rock was so directing its course that our destruction seemed certain, when it crashed in among the trees, tearing several up by the roots, but meeting with one of a larger size, just before it readied us, it was turned aside, and forcing its way through the remainder, it plunged into the river, not many feet from where we stood.
As may be supposed, we did not camp at that spot, but, thankful for our preservation, pushed on to where, the valley slightly widening out, we ran less risk of being overwhelmed by an avalanche.
CHAPTER NINE.
LOST IN THE SNOW.
"The first part of our difficulties are approaching an end," said Uncle Donald the next morning, as we were starting.  "It is possible that we may reach the dividing ridge by nightfall."
The news caused every countenance to assume a cheerful expression.  We pushed on in high spirits.  The river, which had been growing less and less as we proceeded, at length became a small stream, fed by a fall down a steep slope, up which we had, as before, to make our way by a zigzag path.
On reaching the summit we found ourselves in an elevated valley, with mountain peaks on each side towering magnificently to the sky, the rays of the rising sun glancing on their snow-clad sides.
The surface of the lakes afforded a level and easy road.  Away went the dogs at a brisk trot, the men shouting with glee as they thought our difficulties were over.
Climbing up the banks of one lake, we crossed over the ground to another, and then went on again as before.  We quickly got over seven or eight miles, when we saw a stream, which, issuing from the eastern end of the last lake, ran down a gentle incline.  The bright rivulet was a feeder of one of the vast rivers which flow towards the Arctic Ocean.
A joyous shout was raised; we had crossed the dividing ridge, and the vast plain through which flow the Saskatchewan and Athabasca lay below us.  Several trees which grew by the lakelet were marked, to show the boundary of the North West Territory, into which we had now entered. Having quenched our thirst from the little stream, we again set out, the ground sloping perceptibly towards the east.
The rivulet widened as we advanced, and after we had gone a short way we found it completely frozen over.  The ice being of sufficient thickness to bear our weight, we at once descended on to it, and away we went at a greater speed than we had hitherto gone, every one being in the highest spirits.
We had now to make a long circuit through a dense forest, keeping away from the river, for fear of slipping down over the precipices which formed the side.
Hugh and I, while sitting on our snow-shoes, were gliding downwards, fancying that we should reach the bottom of a hill without difficulty, when presently I saw him, on coming to some object concealed by the snow, give an unintentional jump, and over he went, head first, clutching at the shrubs and trying to stop himself.  I was laughing at his mishap, when I felt myself jerked forwards, and then away I went in the same fashion.
After some tumbling and rolling, with arms and legs outstretched, we were both pitched into a deep snow reef at the foot of the hill.
One of the loaded sleighs, driven by Corney, before he had time to unharness the dogs, as he was about to do, broke away from him, and away it went, the poor dogs, terribly frightened, endeavouring to keep ahead of it, but it went faster than they could.  In vain Corney and Red Squirrel tried to stop it.  Had it kept clear of all impediments no great harm would have happened; but, unfortunately, it came in contact with a log, turning the poor dog who had the leader's place into a pancake, while the front part of the sleigh itself was shattered to fragments.  We hurried to the spot.  The poor dog lay dead, with its head and limbs fractured.
We were some time occupied in repairing the broken sledge and harness. Continuing our journey, the river level was at last reached, when, on looking up, we saw that we had stood on a projecting ledge of ice not more than two feet in thickness, which might have given way beneath our weight and carried us down to destruction.
Hitherto, when not travelling on the ice, we had to make our way over snow seldom less than two feet deep, but as we reached the base of the mountains it suddenly disappeared.  As far as we could see to the eastward, not a patch was visible.  Had it not been for the frozen rivers and the leafless trees, we might have fancied that summer was returning.  This phenomenon occurs along the whole base of the Rocky Mountains, where there is a belt of nearly twenty miles in width perfectly free from snow.
The ground being hard, we made good way over it, directing our course about south-east towards a stream running into the Saskatchewan.
The stream we were steering for was reached.  Travelling over the ice, we were soon again in a region where the snow lay thicker than ever, and it became very trying to our dogs.  Our special favourites, Whiskey, Pilot, and Muskymote, went on bravely, in spite of their hard labour by day and the intense cold to which they were exposed by night.  They, knowing fellows, whenever they stopped, carefully picked out the snow which, getting between their toes, would have cut them severely; but some of the younger ones, not understanding the necessity of so doing, allowed it to accumulate, and became lame.
The snow now lay two feet in thickness over the whole surface of the country, making it fearfully heavy work to get along.  We frequently had to go ahead to form a track; and even so soft was the snow, that the poor dogs would wallow through it up to their bodies, until they were well-nigh worn out with their incessant labour.
We, however, pushed on, for had we ventured to stop our whole party might have succumbed.  Our provisions were well-nigh exhausted, and neither buffalo, nor deer, nor smaller game appeared to enable us to replenish our stock of food.  Our object was to get on a stream with a southerly or south-easterly course, on which we could travel until we could strike a line across the country leading to the missionary station.
We made short journeys between sunrise and sunset.  At the end of each day our first task was to clear away the snow, so as to have a space for our camp fire and room for the party to stretch themselves round it. The most sheltered spot was selected for Rose's hut, which, when wood was wanting, was formed of buffalo-robes.  She seemed to enjoy the journey, and was as blooming and merry as ever.  The poor dogs were the greatest sufferers.  They had hard work and scanty food.  First one stretched out its legs and died, and then another did the same; and one morning, when we were starting, even Pilot could not be coaxed away from the camp fire.  No one had the heart to kill him, but stand on his legs he either could not or would not, so he was left to his fate in the faint hope that in an hour or so he might recover his strength and overtake us.
As we pushed forward, on one side rose the lofty peaks of the Rocky Mountains, and on the other stretched out a vast extent of comparatively level land, in some parts open prairie, in others dense forest.  The boughs of the trees were thickly laden with snow, the whole country, indeed, was wrapped in a white wintry mantle.  The scenery was dreary in the extreme.  Our spirits sank; it seemed that we should never come to an end of our long journey.
The sky, hitherto bright, became overcast with clouds about the time that we had got over about two-thirds of the day's journey.  Hugh and Red Squirrel and I were at some distance in the rear of the party, when snow began to fall and the wind to blow with unusual violence.  The snow came down so thickly that it seemed as if the contents of a huge feather-bed had suddenly been emptied upon us.  Thicker and thicker it fell; so great was the obscurity that we could scarcely see a yard ahead, while the tracks of our companions were almost instantly obliterated.
We shouted, expecting that they would reply, and that we should be guided by their voices, but no sound came in return.  We tried to run on, hoping to overtake them, when Hugh fell and broke one of his snow-shoes.  We, of course, stopped to help him up, and in so doing must have turned slightly about.  Red Squirrel, ever fertile in resources, set to work to mend the shoe.  This he did very rapidly; but even that short delay was serious.  As soon as Hugh was on his legs we again hurried on, supposing that we were following close behind the rest of the party.  We shouted and shouted, but still there was no reply.  I asked Red Squirrel if he thought we were going right.
He did not answer.
It is seldom that an Indian loses his way, but at length I began to fear that he was at fault.  He acknowledged, indeed, that he was so.  We unslung our guns, hoping that if we fired our friends would hear the report, and fire theirs in return, but neither Hugh's nor mine would go off.  We put on fresh caps, and both again snapped.  I felt in my pouch for my pricker, to try and clear out the nipple, but could not find it. I asked Hugh for his.
"I'm afraid that I dropped it yesterday evening in the camp, and I thought that I would look for it in the morning, but forgot to do so," he answered.
At last we gave up the attempt in despair.  More valuable time had thus been lost.  Red Squirrel urged us to go on, saying that he thought he could guide us by the wind.  On and on we went.  The snow fell as thickly as ever.  At last Hugh declared that he could go no further.  We were both suffering from fearful pains in our ankles--the _mal de raquette_, as the French Canadians call it, produced by the pressure of the snow-shoe straps.
I looked anxiously about, hoping to discover some trees or shrubs which might afford us shelter and enable us to light a fire, but a thick veil of falling snow shrouded us on every side.  I consulted Red Squirrel as to what we should do.  One thing was certain--that if we remained in the open, exposed to the biting blast, we should perish.  I feared that such would be our fate.  Poor Hugh gave way altogether, and, casting off the straps from his ankles, threw himself down on the snow, and begged us to leave him.
CHAPTER TEN.
SNOWED UP.
To leave Hugh was not to be thought of.
"Oh, say what we must do!"  I exclaimed, addressing Red Squirrel.
"Make haste," he answered, taking off his snow-shoes.
I took off mine also, and using them as spades, we energetically set to work to shovel up the snow until we had got down to the ground, building up a wall with what we had thrown out.  There was just sufficient space to hold three.  We then placed Red Squirrel's shoes on the top, for they were the longest, and Hugh's above them, while with mine we threw up more snow to form a roof.  As soon as we had got thus far, we lowered Hugh into our burrow, that he might be sheltered from the wind, placing the guns beside him.  We then continued throwing up the snow until we had completely surrounded the hole, leaving only a small aperture through which we could crawl in on hands and knees.  We next covered one of my snow-shoes with snow, patted it down until it was like a board, and this served as the door of our burrow.  We had just space sufficient to sit up, or lie down packed close together, for we knew that the smaller its size the warmer it would be, or, rather, the less should feel the cold.
The change from the outer biting air made us feel tolerably comfortable, and we had no great fear of being frozen to death.  Hugh, from not having exerted himself in building the hut, suffered more than Red Squirrel or I, and as soon as the door was closed I set to work to rub his hands and feet to restore circulation, for I was afraid that they might have been frost-bitten.
A very faint light at first came in through the snowy walls, but this lessened, until we could not see our hands held close to our faces.
Night we knew must have at length come on.  We were very hungry, but as we had not a particle of food, there was no use in complaining.
For a long time neither Hugh nor I could go to sleep.  At last Red Squirrel set us the example, and when, some time afterwards, I addressed Hugh, he did not answer, so that I knew he had forgotten his troubles, and I hoped that perfect rest would enable him to recover from the pain he had been suffering.  I at last also dropped off to sleep.
When I awoke the darkness was as complete as ever, though supposing it was still night, I once more went to sleep.  The next time I opened my eyes it was still dark as before.  I felt warmer than I had expected, but I was desperately hungry.  From this I fancied that another day must have begun.  In a short time my companions awoke.  Hugh said the pain in his instep had gone, but that he would give much for something to eat. Red Squirrel did not suffer as much as we did, for Indians are able to endure hunger and pain a much longer time than can white people.
"Surely it must be day," said Hugh.  "We ought to try and get out, and find our friends.  Rose and Uncle Donald will be dreadfully frightened at having lost us."
"I hope that no accident has happened to them," I could not help saying, for the recollection came upon me that they also had been exposed to the snow-storm; but then I reflected that they were a large party, and might have reached the shelter of a wood.  This was some consolation.
"Oh, how hungry I am!" cried Hugh.  "We must get out."
I took up my rifle and tried to open the door with the barrel, but, although I ran it up to the lock, on again withdrawing it I could not see daylight through the hole.
"I am afraid that the snow must be very thick," I said.  The dreadful idea now occurred to me that we were buried alive in a snow tomb.  Such had happened to other people, I knew, and it might be our fate, for if the snow once froze over us we might be unable to force our way out.  I asked Red Squirrel what he thought.
He answered with an ominous "Very bad!  Try," he added, and I found that he was groping about to find the door.  He did not speak, but I heard him scraping away with his hands, just as a terrier does at the entrance of a rabbit burrow, with a vehemence which showed how much he feared that we were completely buried.  I could feel the snow which he dug up coming down on my legs.
At last he asked for my gun.  He thrust it into the hole he had formed, but still no light streamed through it.  We must, however, by some means or other, force our way out or perish.
"We had better try to work upwards," I observed.  "The falling snow has surrounded the walls of our hut, and though we made the roof pretty thick, we are more likely to reach the open air through it than by working at the sides."
The Indian followed my suggestion.  Of course, we could all work together, but then we might have pulled a mass of snow down on our heads.  Our object was simply to make a hole through which we could look out and ascertain if it were daylight, and if so to try and find out whereabouts we were.  We might all the time be close to our party.  I earnestly hoped that we were, so that we might satisfy the cravings of hunger without delay.  The Indian tried to force off the snow-shoe which formed the door, but found that impossible.  He then worked away above it.  The snow he brought down considerably decreased the size of our hut.  Still he persevered in working away, until I thought that he would never get through the roof.  At last he asked me again to hand him up my gun, and having forced the barrel upwards, as he withdrew it we could feel the cold air coming down, while a gleam of daylight entered our burrow.  But it would still require much labour before we could enlarge the hole sufficiently to enable us to force our bodies through it.
At last, by dint of hard work, standing on the snow he had brought down, Red Squirrel got out his head.  The report he gave was unsatisfactory. Scarcely, however, listening to what he said, I jumped up and thrust out my head, eager to ascertain the state of affairs.  I could see nothing but a vast plain of snow on every side without a single object to direct our steps.  Snow was still falling and had already reached above the level of our hut.  We could not make our way over the vast plain without our snow-shoes, and it would take a considerable time before we could dig them out; and in the meantime we should be well-nigh frozen.
I drew in my head again, my face chilled by the cold air, and, sinking down to the bottom of the hut, consulted with Red Squirrel and Hugh as to what was to be done.  Hunger made us all anxious to go on; but then arose the question, In what direction should we go?  We might perish in the attempt to reach our friends.  We accordingly agreed to wait until the snow had ceased.
Red Squirrel had, in the meantime, stopped up the hole to prevent the cold from getting in.  Hunger and darkness soon caused us again to drop off to sleep, and thus we must have remained some hours.  When at length I awoke, I had neither the inclination nor power to move.
I called to Hugh.  He answered faintly.  I had, however, my senses sufficiently about me to be aware of our perilous position.  The acute sensation of hunger had gone off, and my only wish was to be left alone. I tried to rouse myself, and endeavour to get up, but sank again to the ground.  I then asked Red Squirrel to take a look out.  He at once rose and scrambled up to the hole.  It was some time before he could force off the snow.  He then told us that the snow had ceased, and that it was night, for he could see the stars shining overhead.
"We must wait until morning, then," I said, thankful that I should not have to move.
Once more we all dropped off into a state of stupor rather than sleep. I don't know how long we had thus remained, when I was aroused by a noise which came down the funnel.  It seemed as if some animal were scratching away at the entrance.  The idea seized me that it was a bear, and I thought how unable we were to defend ourselves.  I felt about for my gun, forgetting that it had refused to go off.  Just as I grasped it I remembered this, and desperately plunged my hand into my pouch, when at the bottom I discovered my pricker, which my numbed fingers had before failed to feel.  Clearing out the nipple as well as I could in the dark, I put on a fresh cap.  While doing so, I awoke my companions. Hugh answered faintly.  Red Squirrel immediately got up, and together we managed to crawl to the opening through which I thrust my rifle, ready to fire should the bear show himself.
The scratching continued more vehemently than before.  "He'll be upon us presently," I whispered to Red Squirrel, as a gleam of light came down through the aperture.  "Do you take the gun; I haven't strength enough to fire;" and I sank back quite exhausted.
CHAPTER ELEVEN.
RESCUED.
THE ANIMAL PROVES TO BE ONE OF THE DOGS--WHO GOES OFF FOR RESCUE--HELP COMES AT LAST--HOW THE DOG HAD FOUND THE PARTY--EFFECTS OF THE ADVENTURE--THE PARTY REACH THE BLOCK-HOUSE AT LAST, TO FIND ARCHIE'S FAMILY ALL SAFE AND WELCOME REST.
I fully expected the next moment to see the huge claws of a monstrous grizzly as he worked his way down to us, when, instead of a growl, I heard the whine and sharp bark of a dog.  It was the voice I felt sure, of our faithful Pilot, whom we had left at our last camp, as we supposed, on the point of death.  I called out his name, and he answered with a joyous bark.  Presently we saw him looking down upon us, when, satisfied that we were really there, he gave another bark, and then Red Squirrel, who had clambered up to the surface, told me that he was scampering away to the southward.  I tried to get out to watch him, but was utterly unable to accomplish the task, and Red Squirrel himself was too weak to help me.  I felt sure, however, that the dog had gone to summon our friends.  I tried to cheer up poor Hugh with the news.  He seemed scarcely able to understand what had occurred, and I became greatly alarmed at his condition.
We waited and waited; it seemed as if several hours had elapsed.  At last Red Squirrel, who had gone to the hole, exclaimed that he saw some dark objects moving over the snow.  They came nearer and nearer.  I cannot describe the joy I felt when I heard Uncle Donald's voice, and presently I saw Red Squirrel's legs disappear as he was drawn up through the hole.  Directly afterwards another person came slipping down.
"Arrah! we've found ye at last, sure!" exclaimed Corney, lifting me in his arms.
"Take up Hugh," I said, "he is in a worse state than I am."  He did as I requested, but he was down again in a minute, and carrying me up, wrapped me in buffalo-robes and placed me in one of the sleighs which Uncle Donald, who was engaged in feeding Hugh from a can of broth, had brought to convey us.  Some of the broth was immediately given to me.  I could have gobbled up the whole of it, for the moment I felt the fresh air the keenness of my appetite returned.
"I feared, my dear lads, that you were lost!" exclaimed Uncle Donald, as he ran backwards and forwards between Hugh and me, giving us each alternately a mouthful of the food.  "But through the mercy of Heaven, as I will tell you by-and-by, we were led to this spot, and now the sooner we get back to camp the better, for you require careful nursing, I suspect.  It is a wonder that you have escaped."
Red Squirrel came in for a portion of the broth, and, not suffering so much from hunger as we were, he was soon able, after he had swallowed the food, to move about and assist Corney in digging out our snow-shoes. As soon as they had been recovered, we set out for the camp, which we found under the shelter of a wood about two miles off.
How Pilot, who had been left, as we supposed, dying in the camp, had found us out, we were curious to know.  It appeared that one of the Indians had left, as he confessed, a load of pemmican behind.  This the dog must have scented out after we had gone, and having eaten it, had remained sheltered during the storm under the snow.  His provisions exhausted, he had set out to rejoin his companions, and on his way had providentially been led to the mouth of our burrow.  Finding that he could not get us out, he had gone on, and on coming up with the party, by his extraordinary behaviour attracted attention.  The moment he had had some buffalo meat, he rushed back towards where he had left us, and then pulled at Corney's and Uncle Donald's leggings, thus leading them to believe that he knew where we were to be found.
The cold was intense, but as it had hardened the snow, and the dogs had greatly recovered by having had plenty of buffalo meat to eat, we made rapid progress.  Hugh was placed in Rose's sleigh, and I had one to myself, with some of the cargo stowed at my back, for even after two day's rest we were unable to walk; Red Squirrel, however, was soon himself again, and was able to keep up with the rest of the men.
More than a week had passed, when, as evening was approaching, we caught sight of a flagstaff, above a block-house, and a circle of palisades rising out of the snow on the banks of a stream backed by a lofty range of mountains, spurs of the Rockies.
Though there were no trees in the immediate neighbourhood, a thick forest was seen on either side, extending backwards, and rising up the steep slopes.
It was the station to reach which we had travelled many hundred miles. Descending to the river, which was frozen over, we dashed across it, and were met on the other side by a party who issued from the stockade as we approached.  At first we could only make out a number of Indians, but presently a lady and five young people appeared among them.  To my joy, I recognised the lady as my mother, the others were my two sisters and three younger brothers, but they had all grown so much that I should not have known them; and certainly they did not know me, for they looked greatly surprised at the affectionate greeting my mother gave me.
"I am grateful, most grateful to you, Uncle Donald, for having come to our assistance," she said, as she kissed his weather-beaten cheek. "Your appearance will revive my poor husband, who is still suffering from sickness.  He has not got over the fearful scenes we witnessed, and is still anxious about our safety, as the savage Indians have vowed that they will return in the spring and put us and those of their tribe who have become Christians to death, should the pest again break out among them, and I much fear, in consequence of their careless and dirty habits, that it will do so."
"Cheer up, my good niece, we will now go into the house, and then arrange what is best to be done," answered Uncle Donald.
I, in the meantime, was receiving the embraces of my brothers and sisters, the latter of whom immediately rushed towards Rose, and conducted her to the house.  My brothers also gave a warm greeting to Hugh.  My poor father had risen to receive us.  He looked fearfully thin and careworn, though our arrival, it was evident, cheered him.  Very soon we were all assembled round a roaring fire in the sitting-room, thankful for our preservation from the clangers of our journey, and not a little pleased to be able to throw off our heavy clothing.  The Indians took good care of Madge, Corney, and Pierre, and the rest of the party, not neglecting the poor dogs, honest Pilot especially, when the service he had rendered us was told, coming in for a large share of their favour.
CHAPTER TWELVE.
ON THE ALERT.
My brothers and sisters, Hugh Rose, and I were very happy.
The former fancied that, now we had come, all their troubles would be over.  They had, however, passed a sad and anxious time; the missionary who had accompanied my father, with his wife and two children, had died, as had several of the Christian Indians, while some hundreds of the wild Indians had been swept off by the fearful pestilence.  The latter had gone away south during the winter, and it was supposed that they would not return till the spring.
Hugh and I occasionally went out with Uncle Donald, or Pierre and Corney, in search of buffalo or deer.  We were generally fortunate enough to kill either the one or the other.  Uncle Donald had lost no time in sending out trusty scouts to try and ascertain the whereabouts of the Blackfeet.
Red Squirrel, from being one of the most active and intelligent of our Indians, was thus constantly employed.  The duty was a hazardous one, for, as he well knew, should the enemy catch him, they would to a certainty take his scalp.
As neither buffalo nor deer had for several days appeared near the station, the hunters had to go a considerable distance in search of them.  As soon as an animal was killed one of the dog-sleighs was sent out to bring in the meat.
I have not described the station.  It was in some respects like a fort, being entirely surrounded by palisades, both that it might be defended from an hostile attack, and for the purpose of protecting the buildings in the interior from the cold winds in winter, and to prevent the snow from drifting round them.  There was a strong gate on one side which could be securely closed with bars, and a narrow platform with a parapet ran round the upper part of the palisades, from which its defenders could fire down on their assailants.  It was in this respect very different from the usual missionary stations, which are entirely without defence.  It had been built as a fort by the fur traders, and being in the neighbourhood of a savage and warlike tribe, it was considered prudent to repair it in the fashion I have described.  When existing as a fort, it had been more than once captured and plundered by the Indians, and on one occasion the whole of the defenders had been put to death.
I had one morning gone up to the platform to take a look out, when I espied far off to the southward a small herd of buffalo.  Our hunters had, on the previous evening, gone off to the eastward, and, unless they should find game near, were not likely to return for some days.  I hurried down to Uncle Donald to tell him what I had seen, and request permission to set off to try and kill a buffalo.
"I will go with you," he said; and Hugh begged that he might accompany us.  So we set off with our guns, hoping, that by keeping among the woods, we might get to leeward of the herd, and sufficiently near to shoot one or more beasts.
My brother Alec, who was nearly as old as Hugh, went also.  We hurried along on our snow-shoes, eager to get up to the herd before they should move off.  This they were not likely to do, as they had found a spot where the snow was less deep than in other places, and they had got down to the grass by pawing with their feet.
They did not perceive us, and the wind being north-east, we succeeded in getting round to the south of them.  We then crept carefully up, and Uncle Donald, firing, brought a fat cow to the ground.  Hugh and I aimed at another, which we badly wounded; but instead of running off with its head lowered, ploughing up the snow as a ship turns up the foaming water, it came charging towards us.
"Now, Alec, see what you can do!" exclaimed Hugh and I, as we rapidly re-loaded; "but run aside as soon as you have fired, or the brute may kill you."
I heard Alec's shot, when, looking up, to my dismay, I saw that he had missed.  The buffalo was within twenty paces of us.  Alec did his best to make off on one side, which, however, could not be done very rapidly with snow-shoes on.  In another instant the buffalo would have reached us, when a shot which came from behind a tree laid him low, and looking round, I saw an Indian, whom I directly recognised as Red Squirrel.  The rest of the herd being thus disturbed had made off.  Uncle Donald now came up and thanked Red Squirrel for his timely aid.  He reported that he was on his return to the fort with somewhat alarming intelligence. He had got up one night, he said, close to the Blackfeet lodges, where he observed the chiefs seated in council.  He caught the meaning of some of their speeches, from which he gathered that it was their intention, before long, to come north and avenge themselves on the white medicine man--so they called my father--for the pestilence which they asserted he had inflicted on them because they had refused to become his proselytes. Red Squirrel also stated that he had seen among them a white man, who had spoken, and tried to dissuade them from prosecuting their design. He was clothed, like them, in a dress of buffalo-robes, from which Red Squirrel argued that he had been some time among them.  They seemed, however, in no way inclined to listen to the advice of the white stranger, and expressed their intention of setting out as soon as their medicine man should pronounce the time to be propitious.
"We must return at once and put the station in a state of defence," said Uncle Donald, on hearing this.  "The savages may be upon us in the course of two or three days, and will give us but a short time to prepare for them.  It is unfortunate that the hunters are away, for we require their assistance; and should the Blackfeet fall in with them they will lose their scalps to a certainty."
"I would willingly go out and try and find them," I said.  "As no snow has fallen since they started, I can easily find their tracks."
"I would much rather send Red Squirrel or Corney; but I'll think about it as we go along," said Uncle Donald.
Pierre had gone with the hunters, so that only the Irishman and young Indian were available for the purpose.
We at once turned our faces homewards, going on as fast as we could move on our snow-shoes.  We thought it possible that we might find on our arrival that some of the hunters had returned, but none had made their appearance.  My father looked very anxious when he heard the information brought by Red Squirrel.
"We might repulse them should they attack the place, but if any are killed, what hope can I afterwards have of winning them over to the Gospel?" he said.  "I talk to them of peace, and urge them to enlist under the banner of the Prince of Peace, and yet they find me and my friends allied in arms against them."
"But if we don't defend ourselves, they will knock us on the head and carry off our scalps," answered Uncle Donald.  "I will do all I can to preserve peace, and induce them to go back without fighting, should I be able to hold any communication with them.  In the meantime, we must prepare to defend the fort.  Archie has volunteered to go out in search of the hunters, who must be forthwith called in, but without your permission I do not like to let him go."
"As it is in the path of duty, I will not forbid him," answered my father.
"If Archie goes, let me go too," cried Alec.  "I can run as fast as he does on snow-shoes."
After some demur, Alec got leave to accompany me, for Hugh, not being quite well, was unable to go.
We were in good spirits, pleased at the confidence placed in us, and only regretting that Hugh had not been able to come.  The trail of the hunters was perfectly clear, leading away to the south-east.  They had taken a couple of sleighs to bring in the meat, so that we had no difficulty in directing our course.
We had made good nearly ten miles, and had not met any buffalo tracks, which showed us that the hunters must still be some way ahead, when we heard a voice shouting to us, and, looking back, we saw an Indian running towards us over the snow.  As he was alone, we had no doubt that he was a friend, and as he came nearer we recognised Red Squirrel.
He could not, he said, allow us to go without him, and as soon as he had taken some food he had set off.  He had left Uncle Donald busily engaged, assisted by my father and the remaining men in the fort, in strengthening the palisades.  "If the Blackfeet come expecting to get in and plunder the fort, they will find themselves mistaken," he added.
We were very glad to have Red Squirrel with us; although, accustomed as we were to travel over the snow-covered plains, and having the mountains with whose forms we were well acquainted to the eastward, we had no fear about finding our way back, provided that the weather should remain clear.  There was, of course, the possibility of a snow-storm coming on, and then we might have been greatly puzzled.
Notwithstanding the fatigue Red Squirrel had gone through during the last few days, he was as active as ever, and kept us moving as fast as we could go.
Before sunset we came upon the tracks of buffalo, though the animals themselves were nowhere to be seen.
"We'll soon find them," observed the Indian; but though we went on some distance, neither buffalo nor hunters could we discover, and we were glad, just as night fell, to take shelter under the lee of a thick clump of poplars and spruce pine.  To cut sufficient wood for our fire and clear away the snow was the work of a few minutes, and, with our pot boiling, we were soon sitting round a cheerful blaze discussing our supper.  We continued sitting round the fire, wrapped in our buffalo-robes, with our feet close to the embers, every now and then throwing on a stick, while we talked and Red Squirrel smoked his pipe.
I proposed that two of us should lie down and go to sleep, while the third kept watch, when Red Squirrel, getting up, said he would take a look out.
Climbing up the bank, he went to the top of a knoll a short distance off.  We could see his figure against the sky.  In a short time he came back.
"See fire out there," he said, pointing to the southward.  "May be friends, may be enemies, may be Blackfeet.  If Blackfeet, sooner we get 'way better."
"But how are we to find out whether they are friends or foes?"  I asked.
"Red Squirrel go and see," he answered.  "You stay here;" and taking up his gun, he quickly disappeared in the darkness, leaving us seated at our camp fire.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN.
ATTACKED BY THE RED-SKINS.
We felt very uneasy at the strangely prolonged absence of Red Squirrel. He could have anticipated no danger, or he would have advised us what course to pursue should he not return.  At last, telling Alec to sit quiet, I got up, and made my way to the top of the knoll, whence I could see over the country to the southward, in the direction I supposed Red Squirrel had gone.  I looked and looked in vain through the gloom of night, though I could see in the far distance the light of the fire of which he had spoken.
Could he have been captured? if so, what should Alec and I do?  It would be impossible to rescue him--indeed, it was too probable that he had been immediately put to death by the Blackfeet, and that we might ourselves, should we remain in the neighbourhood, be killed.  I came therefore to the conclusion that we must continue our search for the hunters to the eastward, keeping at the same time a watchful eye in the direction in which we had seen the fire of our supposed enemies.  I say supposed enemies, because I still had a lingering hope that, after all, the fire might be at the hunters' camp.
Such were the thoughts which passed through my mind as I stood on the top of the knoll.  I had not been there many minutes before I recollected how clearly I had seen Red Squirrel in the same position against the sky.  Instead, therefore, of remaining upright, I stooped down until I reached a thick bush, behind which I crouched, as well able as before to see any objects moving in the plain below.  At last I thought that it was time to go back to Alec, and was on the point of descending the knoll, when I fancied that I saw some objects moving along the ground.
I remained stock still, scarcely daring to breathe, with my eyes fixed on the spot.  They were human beings--Indians I felt sure; if so, they would soon see our fire, and we should be discovered.
While there was time I hurried down the knoll and flew to Alec.  I made a sign to him to take up his rifle and buffalo-robe, with a few other articles, left on the ground, and led the way through the wood.  Here we might remain concealed until the savages had gone away, and then try to get back to the fort.  I had no great hopes of success, still, it was the only thing to be done.
We had reached the spot, and it was some way from the fire, but we were still able to see it by raising our heads over the bushes.
We had both knelt down behind the bush, with our rifles ready to raise to our shoulders at any minute.  Alec, only the moment before I returned, had thrown some wood on the fire, so that it was now blazing up brightly, and we could see all the objects round it.  Just then three figures appeared.  Two were Indians--there could be no doubt about it; but the other we could not make out clearly.  They advanced, looking eagerly around, but as they came more into the light, instead of savages, with scalping knives in hand ready to kill us, great was our joy to discover that one was Pierre, and the others Red Squirrel and Kondiarak.  They looked very much astonished at not seeing us.  We did not keep them long in suspense, and Pierre then told us that they had come on purpose to advise that we should at once return to the fort, without waiting for daylight.  They had been successful in hunting, having killed three buffalo cows, with the meat of which the sleighs were already packed, and as the track was formed, the dogs would find their way without the slightest difficulty.
We reached the fort without having seen the enemy, and, as may be supposed, were heartily welcomed.
Our arrival restored the spirits of my poor father and mother, who were very anxious, not so much for themselves as for my younger brothers and sisters.  They were prepared to die, if God so willed it, in the path of their duty.  My father was still very unwilling to resort to force, and proposed going out himself to meet the enemy to try and induce them to turn back.
Uncle Donald, however, told him that as he was the object of their vengeance they would, to a certainty, seize and torture him, and then probably come on and endeavour to destroy the fort.  Thus no object would have been gained, as we should do our utmost to defend ourselves, and his life would be uselessly sacrificed.
"But I should have done my duty in attempting to soften the hearts of the poor savages," answered my father, meekly.
"My good nephew, it's just this, I'm not going to let ye have your scalp taken off," said Uncle Donald, bluntly.  "I am commander here for the time being, and no man, not e'en yourself, shall leave the fort without my leave.  If the savages come they must take the consequences."
My father did not reply, but I am very sure that, had he been left to act by himself, he would have earned out his intentions, and would most probably have perished.  From Pierre's report we fully expected every minute to see the Blackfeet appear.  To each man under Uncle Donald's directions a post was assigned, which he was charged to defend with his life.  Orders were, however, given that no one was to fire until the word of command was received.
Hugh, Alec, and I were stationed together, and highly proud we were at the confidence placed in us, as the post we had to maintain was one of the most important.
The day wore on, but we were still unmolested, and at last darkness came down upon us.
The winter, it will be remembered, was not yet over.  To defend ourselves from the intense cold we all put on as many buffalo-robes and bear-skins as we could wear, and Hugh declared that we looked like a garrison of grizzlies.
It was cold enough during the day, but it was still colder at night; notwithstanding this, as Alec and I had had no sleep for many hours, we found it difficult to keep awake.  We, therefore, rolling ourselves up in our wraps, lay down, while Hugh stood ready to call us at a moment's notice.  There were, however, sentries enough to keep a look-out, and Uncle Donald continued going round and round the fort, seeing that they were watchful.
The dawn was approaching; it was the time the Red-skins often make their attacks, as they expect to find their enemies buried in sleep.
When morning at last came, and no enemy had appeared, we began to hope that no Blackfeet had as yet reached the neighbourhood.
Another day was drawing on.  Except a few men who remained on guard, the rest of the garrison lay down to sleep, that they might be more watchful the following night.
I spent a short time with my mother and sisters and Rose, and did my best to encourage them, but I could not help feeling that possibly it might be the last time we should be together on earth.  By Red Squirrel's report, the Blackfeet were very numerous, and they are noted for being the most savage and warlike of all the northern tribes.
The next night was almost a repetition of the former, except that Alec and I kept watch, while Hugh lay down to sleep.  Uncle Donald, as before, went his rounds, and there seemed but little risk of our being taken by surprise.  He had just left us, when Hugh, who had got up and was standing near me, whispered--
"I see something moving over the snow.  There! there are others.  Yes, they must be Indians."
"Wait until we are certain," I answered, in the same low voice; "and then, Alec, run round and tell Uncle Donald."
We were not left long in doubt before we all three were certain that the objects we saw were Indians, and that they were trying to keep themselves concealed.
Alec set off to find Uncle Donald.  He had not been gone many seconds, when fearful yells rent the air.  Before us up started hundreds of dark forms, and a shower of bullets and arrows came flying above our heads.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN.
AN OLD FRIEND.
THE BLACKFEET MEET A WARM RECEPTION--AND RETREAT--A WOUNDED INDIAN-- PROVES TO BE PONOKO, WHO TELLS OF A WHITE MAN IN THE INDIAN CAMP--A FRIENDLY CONFERENCE.
The moment the war-whoop of the Blackfeet had ceased Uncle Donald's voice was heard, ordering us to fire.
We obeyed with right good will, and must have greatly astonished the savages, who, not aware of the increased number of our garrison, had probably expected to gain quite an easy victory.  Many of them had muskets, but the larger number could only have been armed with bows and arrows.  After they had shot five or six showers of arrows and fired their guns--fortunately, without hitting any of us, though we could hear their missiles pinging against the thick palisades--they suddenly ceased, and began to retreat, when Uncle Donald shouted to them in their own language, inquiring why they had attacked people who had done them no harm, but were anxious to benefit them.
No reply came.  Our men uttered a shout of triumph.  Uncle Donald stopped them.
"The Blackfeet have retired, but I know their cunning ways, and I deem it more than likely that they will be down upon us again when they think to catch us off our guard or maybe they have devised some treacherous plot to entrap us."
We waited, but, as far as we could judge by the sounds which reached our ears, the savages had really retreated, and did not intend to attack us again that night.  That they would give up their object was not to be expected, and my father proposed, should we find they had gone to a distance, that, rather than cause more bloodshed, we should abandon the station and retreat to one of the company's forts to the northward, "We have sleighs sufficient to convey the women and children," he added; "and when the anger of the misguided people has subsided, I will return by myself, and endeavour to win them over by gentle means, for such only should be employed to spread the Gospel among the heathen."
"You are very right in that respect, but though we may get to some distance, when the Blackfeet find that we have gone, they will to a certainty follow on our trail and quickly overtake us," answered Uncle Donald.  "I cannot consent to such a plan; we must show them that we are able to defend ourselves, and let their blood be upon their own heads if they persist in attacking us.  We will, however, try how negotiation will succeed.  I used to be well-known among them, and I propose to-morrow, should they not again attack the fort, to go singly into their camp and invite them to smoke the calumet of peace.  Should I be detained, you must promise to hold out to the last, and not any account trust to what they may say.  We will, in the meantime, send a messenger to Rocky Mountain House, entreating for assistance.  I feel sure that the officer in charge will send as many men and horses as he can spare to enable you to escape, or defend the fort, if necessary."
My father and mother entreated Uncle Donald not thus to risk his life; but he was firm in his resolution.  My father then proposed going with him, but to this Uncle Donald would not consent.
A considerable portion of the night was consumed in these discussions. A vigilant watch was of course kept, but no one could be seen stirring outside the fort.  Having taken a brief nap, just before dawn I returned to my post on the ramparts.  As daylight increased I fancied that I saw the body of a man lying under a bush some distance from the fort.  Yes, I was certain of it.  I pointed him out to Hugh, and we both fancied that we saw an arm move.
"He is one of the savages who was shot in the attack last night, and, unperceived by his companions, he must have fallen where we see him," observed Hugh.
While we were speaking, some of the Indians we had brought with us--who, though faithful servants, were still heathens--caught sight of the body. Lowering themselves down without asking leave, they were rushing, with their scalping knives in their hands, towards the hapless being.
Uncle Donald at that instant coming up on the ramparts saw them, and guessed their object.  "Come back, you rascals!" he shouted.  "Whether that man be alive or dead, don't touch a hair of his head!"
As they did not stop he fired his rifle, the bullet passing just in front of the leading Indian, who now thought it time to come to a standstill.
"Archie and Hugh, you go and look after that poor fellow, and make our people bring him in," continued Uncle Donald.
We instantly obeyed, for although the height was considerable we could manage to drop to the bottom without injuring ourselves.  We then ran as fast as our legs could carry us to overtake our Indians.  Having delivered Uncle Donald's orders, we then hurried on to where the Indian lay.  At a glance I saw that he was desperately wounded from the blood which flowed from both his legs, while another shot had rendered his right arm powerless.  His eyes still wore a defiant expression, and he appeared to fancy that we were about to kill him.  By signs and such words of his language as we could speak, we endeavoured to make him understand that we had come to carry him into the fort to try and save his life.
As there was not a moment to be lost, we first bound up his wounds, and then ordering our people to assist us we lifted him from the ground and hurried towards the fort, meeting on our way Uncle Donald, who had the gate open to admit us.  Without stopping we carried the wounded man into the house, where my father, who had risen, was ready with bandages and salves to attend to him.  My mother, meantime, was preparing some strong broth, which our prisoner eagerly swallowed.  It had an almost instantaneous effect in reviving him.  Uncle Donald, who had in the meantime been going round the fort to ascertain if more wounded had been left in its neighbourhood, now entered the room, and as his eye fell on the countenance of our captive, he exclaimed, "Ponoko!  Do you remember your white friend?"
The Indian made a sign that he was the person supposed, though he was too weak to speak.
Uncle Donald then told him that although he had come as an enemy he should be well cared for.
In a short time the judicious treatment he was receiving enabled him to utter a few words.  He seemed grateful for the care taken of him, and his eyes brightened when my young sisters and Rose brought him the soup, which he received almost every hour.  He especially noticed Rose, and when Uncle Donald came to see him, inquired, in a tone of evident interest, who she was.
"You are right if you think you remember her, for she is the little girl you saved when your people attacked the village in the territory of the Long-knives some years ago," answered Uncle Donald.
"Will you now let me take her back?" asked Ponoko.
"Do you think it likely that I should consent?" said Uncle Donald.  "Her ways are not the ways of your people.  She would pine and die were she to be treated as your women are treated."
"But there is one who has long lived with us whose heart would be rejoiced to see her," said Ponoko.  "You may remember when I parted from you I promised to try and save the lives of any of our pale-faced prisoners.  I succeeded in saving that of one man just as he was about to be tortured and killed, but it was on condition that he would swear to remain with us, and never betray us to our enemies.  He was a great hunter, and brave as the bravest among us.  He also, we found, was not one of the Long-knives, but was a subject of the Queen of the Pale-faces.  He has kept his promise, though he might often have made his escape.  He had been many months with us, before I found how sorely his heart yearned to get away, and I would have set him free, but the other chiefs would not consent.  He looked upon me as his friend.  He told me that his child and all his household had died by the hands of our people, except his wife, who was away in one of the big cities in the east at the time we attacked the place.  I was thus led to tell him of the little girl I had saved and given over to you, and he has ever since been hoping that she might prove to be one of his children.  He has hoped and hoped until he has persuaded himself that such she is. Thus I know how it would rejoice his heart to see her."
"I have strong doubts about that," answered Uncle Donald.  "He would rejoice to see her, but not to have her among your people, from whom she differs so greatly.  The only way truly to benefit him would be to set him at liberty and allow him to return among the Pale-faces to whom he belongs."
"But how can that be while I am sick and a prisoner with you?" asked Ponoko.
"You'll recover, I hope, ere long, and as you have fulfilled your promise on one occasion, I feel confident that you will not disappoint us if we set you at liberty on your undertaking to restore this white stranger to his people."
"Ponoko always keeps his word," answered the Indian in a proud tone.
"But should the Blackfeet, in the meantime, attack us, we may be destroyed, and they may take you away with them," observed Uncle Donald.
"If my people come, you shall carry me out on a litter; I will tell them how well the Pale-faces have treated me, and will urge them, instead of fighting, to make a lasting peace with my white father and his friends," said Ponoko.
"I will trust you, my brother," said Uncle Donald, pressing Ponoko's hand.  "I pray that you may soon be restored to health, and that you will teach your people that it is to their true interests to be at peace with the white men, and to trade honestly with them."
CHAPTER FIFTEEN.
A HAPPY ENDING.
Day after day went by, and the Blackfeet did not appear.  Ponoko, never having indulged in the pernicious fire-water, was rapidly recovering under my father's judicious care and the attention he received from Rose and the rest of the family.  We had not yet told her of the possibility that her father had escaped and might be restored to her.  I suspect that she would not have understood us had we done so, for she looked upon Uncle Donald as her father, though she called him "Uncle" as Hugh and I did.  Indeed, all the events of her life which had occurred before the fearful night of the massacre appeared to have faded from her memory.
At length, as the Blackfeet had not shown themselves, we began to hope that they would allow us to remain at peace, and Uncle Donald already talked of returning home.  He proposed that my mother and father and the rest of the family should accompany him, but my father replied that nothing should induce him to quit his post, unless driven away by the savages, and that he would then retire, with his converts, to some spot among more friendly tribes further north.
Among others signs of returning spring was the appearance of a herd of buffalo passing in the far distance, and as our provisions were again running short, Uncle Donald was compelled to allow the hunters to set off for the purpose of killing some of the animals.  Hugh and I wanted to accompany them, but he would only allow Pierre, and Corney, and four of the most active red men to go on the expedition.
As soon as they set out, he sent off Red Squirrel to try and ascertain the whereabouts of the Blackfeet camp, with directions to come back should he discover that they were on the move.
We waited day after day for Red Squirrel's expected return, but he did not appear, and we began to have serious apprehensions that he had been captured.
The hunters, however, had come back with a good supply of buffalo meat, so that we should be well prepared in case we should be besieged.
At last, one evening as I was looking out towards the south, I saw several objects moving across the prairie.  At first I thought that they might be deer or wolves, or even smaller game.  One was leading considerably ahead of the rest.  They were coming towards the fort. Besides the first I counted six others.  I called the attention of my companion to them.
"They are men!" exclaimed Ponoko.  "Those six are of my tribe; they are in pursuit of the first!  He must run fast, or before he can reach the fort they will overtake him.  Already I see by his movements that he is fatigued."
I had little doubt but that the leader was Red Squirrel.  I asked Ponoko, whose keen eyes could distinguish his dress better than the rest of us could do.
"Yes, he is your young friend," he answered.  "See, see! he is increasing his speed, he may still escape, and my people will go back disappointed.  They will not dare to come within range of your rifles."
"Then we will go out and meet them!"  I exclaimed, hurrying down.  I told Uncle Donald what Ponoko had said.  Taking our rifles, and buckling on our snow-shoes, Hugh, Alec, Pierre, Corney, and I hurried out of the fort, and set off running faster, I think, than we had ever run before, to meet the hard-pressed fugitive.
Once more his pursuers were gaining on him; before long their scalping knives might be about his head.  He was the first to perceive us approaching, and it seemed to add fresh nerve to his legs.  Soon afterwards the Blackfeet caught sight of us.  The instant they did so they sprang forward, making a last desperate effort to overtake our friend; but perceiving that we had rifles ready, they well knew that, even should they succeed, we should make them pay dearly for the act.
Giving up the chase, therefore, they stopped, and turning round, ran off at a rate which soon placed them beyond our reach.
In a few moments Red Squirrel was up to us, but so hard-pressed had he been that he was unable to tell us what had happened.  We supported him, not without difficulty, to the fort, when his snow-shoes being taken off, had he not been resting in our arms, he would have sunk fainting to the ground.  We delivered him over to his mother, who chafed his limbs, and used every other means she could devise for restoring his strength. It was some time before he could speak.  He had ably fulfilled his mission, having watched the enemy's camp until the previous day, when finding that they were about to move northward, he had set off to bring us tidings of their approach.
He was, however, observed, and six of their fleetest runners had pursued him.  Hour after hour he had continued his flight, though he confessed that, had we not come to his assistance, he should, he believed, have fallen even in sight of the fort.
That night was an anxious one.  Frequent alarms were raised that the enemy were upon us.  At length the morning broke, and as the sun rose above the eastern prairie his beams fell on the plumed heads and trappings of several hundred warriors, who came on, confident in their numbers, and believing that our small garrison would easily become their prey.
They halted when considerably beyond range of our weapons, and having sung a war-song, gave utterance to one of those terrible whoops which are said to paralyse even horses and cattle.  Ponoko had in the meantime, dressed himself in the costume in which he had been discovered when lying wounded, and the gate being opened, he sallied forth with feeble steps, very different from his once elastic tread.  The gates of the fort were closed behind him, and he proceeded towards the warriors drawn up in battle array.  We watched him as he approached them.  At length he stopped and stretching out his arms, addressed his people.
The effect on his tribe of what he said was almost electrical.  They looked upon him as one restored from the dead, for they had long mourned him as lost.  We watched him until he was among them, when, after some time, he reappeared, leading by the hand a person who, though dressed in Indian costume, we saw was a white man.  Together they approached the fort, when the gate was opened to receive them.
The stranger gazed round with looks of astonishment, evidently endeavouring to find the words to express himself.  At last he said--
"I can scarcely believe my senses.  A few minutes ago I was a prisoner, and threatened by the Indians with a cruel death should they again be defeated."
"We are truly thankful that you have escaped," answered Uncle Donald, advancing and taking his hand.
"You owe your preservation to our friend Ponoko here."
"I am indeed grateful to him," said the stranger.  "He preserved my life when so many of my companions were massacred.  He has ever since continued my protector, but when it was supposed that he was killed, his people threatened to avenge his death by murdering me.  Grateful as I am to him and to you, I am restored to liberty a ruined and a childless man, while I know not what has become of my poor wife, who was providentially absent from the settlement at the time of the massacre, but will have supposed that I, as well as our little girl, shared the common fate," answered Mr Kennedy, for such he told us was his name.
"Should your child have escaped, do you believe you would recognise her?" asked Uncle Donald.
"Among a hundred!" answered the stranger.  "I should know her, however much grown, from her likeness to her mother."
As he spoke my sisters and Rose approached.  The stranger glanced at the group, then rushing forward, gazed earnestly into Rose's countenance.
"You would not deceive me!" he exclaimed.  "Say, how did this young girl come to be with you?  Rose, do you recollect me?  Speak, my child, are you not Rose Kennedy?"
"Kennedy!  Kennedy!" murmured Rose, looking greatly astonished and somewhat frightened.  "Kennedy!  Yes, that was my papa's name."
"You are my own child!" he exclaimed, kissing her brow and cheeks again and again while he held her in his arms.
The lookers-on were greatly moved.  It was some time, however, before Rose could fully comprehend that the stranger was her father, and that she belonged to him rather than to Uncle Donald.
Mr Kennedy now eagerly inquired whether we could give him any tidings of his wife.
"Extraordinary as it may seem, I think I am able to do so," said my father.  "On stopping at the Red River settlement on our way hither, I met a Mrs Kennedy, whose husband and child had, I heard, been murdered by the Indians."
I should like to prolong my history, but I must be brief.  Ponoko, after remaining a day or two with us, went among his tribe, and persuaded them that it would be to their advantage to live peaceably with their neighbours.  Not many years after they entered into a treaty with the Canadian Government, and the fearful state of warfare which for so long a period had existed in that fair northern region almost entirely ceased.
We were very, very sorry to lose Rose, but Mr Kennedy was, of course, most anxious to join his wife.  As soon as he could travel he set off for the Red River.  He promised to return and bring his wife and Rose with him, having accepted an invitation from Uncle Donald to settle at Clearwater.
In course of time, Hugh, Alec, and I established in its neighbourhood several fairly flourishing farms, of one of which Hugh, with Rose as its mistress, became the owner.  My father laboured for many years among the heathen, greatly aided by Ponoko.
The entire country, including the Rocky Mountains over which we passed, now forms part of the great Canadian dominion, and probably, before another generation has passed away, the whole region, from east to west, will be the home of happy and flourishing communities.
THE END.

= = = PG53695 = = =
AMONG THE RIVER PIRATES
Produced by Stephen Hutcheson, MFR and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
_A SKIPPY DARE MYSTERY STORY_
AMONG THE RIVER PIRATES
BY HUGH LLOYD _Author of_ The Hal Keen Mystery Stories
ILLUSTRATED BY SEYMOUR FOGEL
GROSSET & DUNLAP PUBLISHERS    NEW YORK
Copyright, 1934, by GROSSET & DUNLAP, Inc. _All Rights Reserved_ _Printed in the United States of America_
CONTENTS
AMONG THE RIVER PIRATES
CHAPTER I UPSTREAM
The shabby old motor boat moved slowly up the river towing an equally shabby old barge. Dilapidated and unpainted as the hull was, the engine was well muffled—suspiciously well muffled—and the disreputable looking craft moved through the water with all the noiseless dignity of a yacht.
A ferry-boat paused midway of the long tow rope and its commuters, crowded on the forward deck, watched this slow-moving procession with some show of annoyance. Not a few impatient remarks rose loud and clear above the hum of the restless crowd, directed at the head of a man seated in the stern of the boat, calmly puffing on a pipe. Aft on the barge, a young boy was wrestling heroically with the tiller, trying to keep the lumbering hulk head on.
Slowly they crawled upstream. On their left was the precipitous Jersey shore, and on their right the towering buildings of the great city. Over the water the late afternoon sun spread a warm, mellow glow and touched with gold the myriad windows of the clustering skyscrapers across the river.
The man knocked out his pipe with calm deliberation and turned his wide, gray eyes to the lofty Palisades, now bathed in a dazzling crimson. Then slowly his glance wandered back to where the shimmering light fell across the little shanty on the barge and picked out in hold relief the incongruously new and shining letters, _Minnie M. Baxter_.
A smile lighted up his lined, weary features, a smile of pride in ownership.
“She ain’t so bad fer the old battle-axe that she is, hey Skippy?” he called to the boy.
The boy’s tousled head appeared from around the battered cabin.
“I’ll say she ain’t, Pop,” he answered. “An’ she’s _ours_! Gee, I can’t believe my pop really an’ truly owns a _whole_ barge!”
The man laughed, then listened for a moment to a significant sound emanating from the muffled engine.
“That there front cylinder’s missin’ agin, Skippy,” he shouted. “Loop ’er in that there ring; the tide’s runnin’ out now so she’ll stand upstream. Set ’er even ’n’ come aboard here.”
The boy nodded obediently and with an end of rope fastened the old tiller to a rusty ring. Then, hurrying forward, he jumped into the water and grasping the taut tow line, pulled himself hand over hand and scrambled over the stern of the launch.
The father put out a large, work-worn hand and helped him in with a tenderness that was surprising in one so rough and uncouth looking.
“Gimme that there shirt and them shoes while I hang ’em near the engine,” he said, his voice soft with affection. “Ye’ll be gettin’ a bad throat agin.” He made no demand for the boy’s trousers, which were the only other article of apparel that the little fellow wore.
Having spread the clothing to dry and adjusted the rebellious motor, the man returned to the stern. He relighted his pipe and sat down with an arm about his son.
“I’ll steer her fer a while, Pop,” said Skippy.
For a few minutes there was silence.
“Yer glad we’re goin’ straight?” the man asked with a sudden move of his arm on the boy’s shoulder.
Skippy’s eyes widened and he looked up at his parent, hesitantly.
“I mean yer glad we’re goin’ straight—in a straight racket, I mean? Now there ain’t goin’ to be no more worry about coppers. I won’t care if they’re floatin’ all over the harbor an’ I won’t be worryin’ about no pinches. A man don’t ever think uv bein’ pinched when his racket’s on the up and up. An’ that’s me from now on. I said when I got three hunderd saved I’d buy a barge an’ not touch no more shady rackets. _An’ I have!_ Three hunderd—every penny we had in the world, sonny, I paid Josiah Flint fer the _Minnie M. Baxter_. She’s worth every dime uv it.”
Skippy nodded gravely.
“An’ll that help me t’ be honest when I grow up, too,” he asked eagerly, “an’ be like—like a gentleman even?”
“Sure, Skippy. Ain’t that just why I saves up an’ buys the _Minnie M. Baxter_? So’s yer kin grow up clean an’ honest like—that’s why I done Josiah Flint’s dirty work fer his dirty money! So’s I could save an’ buy this ol’ battle-axe an’ give yer a good an’ a clean start.”
“But we’re gonna carry garbage an’ ashes on her,” said Skippy. “That ain’t so clean exactly, is it, Pop?”
“Garbage an’ ashes’ll bring in clean money, Skippy—that’s what I’m talkin’ about—clean money. Since yer ma died I ain’t had many real honest like jobs. It’s been hard ter git ’em with yer needin’ me with yer so much counta yer bad throat. Anyways the money come easier an’ quicker on my jobs even if it was dirty an’ now I’m all through with gettin’ it shady like.”
“An’ my throat’s lots better’n it usta be, Pop,” said Skippy eagerly. “I ain’t had a bad one for three months’n over.”
“Sure, I know. Everthin’ll be jake now with us goin’ straight. Ol’ Flint, let him have his dirty money an’ his fine yacht. It’s a wonder he gets so generous an’ sells me such a good scow fer three hunderd smackers. Everybody says he’s such a money-pincher he’d even try makin’ money on a rusty nail.”
“A regular miser, huh, Pop?” said Skippy. “Maybe he felt sorry about you savin’ all that money so’s you could get a clean business. Did he say the _Minnie M. Baxter’s_ a good barge for haulin’ garbage an’ ashes?”
“Sure. He boosted her hisself when I tells him I wants a good scow. An’ he oughta know, him that owns more scows’n he can count.”
“Gee, three hunnerd dollars—real money,” mused the boy.
“Sure, but not for no scow like this one. Brand new ones cost four times that. Big Joe Tully paid Ol’ Flint five hunderd fer his an’ Joe cleaned up two thousand bucks on the first year. He tole me that fer a fact.”
“But ain’t Big Joe Tully doin’ sumpin’ for Mr. Flint now?” Skippy asked.
“Big Joe can’t keep away from dirty money,” replied the man. “He wants to get rich quick. Not me, though. I can keep away from Ol’ Flint from now on, an’ what’s more, _I will_!”
“Gee, I know you will, Pop,” said the boy, with shining eyes. “You’re not like—well, you’re different from old Mr. Flint an’ that Big Joe.”
The father ran his hand over his son’s tousled head and gripped a handful of the straight brown hair affectionately.
“That cabin ain’t goin’ ter make us no bad little shack, hey Skippy?” he said nodding toward the little square shelter aft.
“She’s swell inside—for a barge, I mean. Three bunks an’ a nice oil stove an’ a table an’ chairs. Gee, that’s a regular home, huh Pop? Even there’s a kerosene lamp.”
“Sure. Yer can read books an’ be nice and comfortable in there nights. That paint job,” he said, scrutinizing it thoughtfully; “I ain’t so fond uv that there red, rusty color. It’s kinda gloomy. Well, we can repaint her sometime when we’re makin’ money. Blamed if that launch across stream ain’t headin’ straight this way.”
“It’s the harbor inspectors, Pop. Whadja s’pose....”
“Well, I got my license all ready, if that’s what they’re after. Anyways, we ain’t got no stuff[1] aboard, so we should worry.”
Skippy wondered and shivered a little. His father’s services in the employ of the rich, unscrupulous Josiah Flint had brought a certain instinctive fear of all uniformed officials and the harbor inspectors were no exception. It was difficult for him to believe even now that these uniformed men meant no harm to his father.
Skippy had lived in the shadow of the law a little too long.
CHAPTER II CONDEMNED
Skippy watched as the green, shining launch swept alongside and stopped. He was instantly reassured, however, when its occupants smiled genially at him and then at his father.
“Well, if it ain’t Toby Dare himself,” said one of the men, heartily. “Buy her lately, Dare?”
“Jes’ yesterday, Inspector Jones,” said Skippy’s father, proudly. “An’ I ain’t a-goin’ ter put nothin’ on her but what I’ll be glad ter show ter anybody what asks.”
Inspector Jones’ bland face became serious.
“Big Joe Tully said the same thing when he bought his scow, Dare,” he said. “I wouldn’t make promises too soon.”
Toby Dare’s eyes turned fondly on his son.
“Big Joe Tully ain’t got no boy like my Skippy ter fetch up,” he said with firm resolve.
“Good for you, Dare,” the inspector smiled. “Skippy’s worth keeping out of trouble for. But see that you keep him in mind when you’re tempted. Most o’ you birds that start a new leaf stub your toes.”
“Not me,” said Toby vehemently. “I ain’t carin’ ter make no quick fortune. A couple grand a year’ll start Skippy an’ git him educated. That’s all I’m carin’ about, Inspector. _Me_, I don’t need nothin’.”
Inspector Jones beamed upon the smiling Skippy, then casually glanced toward the barge.
“_Minnie M. Baxter_, eh?” he mused.
“Yere,” said Toby exultantly. “That was my wife’s name when she was a girl. She died when Skippy was born. I thought mebbe the name’d bring me luck.”
The inspector nodded sympathetically.
“Got any contracts lined up?” he asked.
“Two,” said Toby proudly. “An’ it ain’t bad fer a start. I’m ter haul garbage an’ ashes from the island.”
“Good for you, Dare. Well, we’ll look her over and pass on her, then let you beat it.”
Toby Dare looked exultantly at his son as the trim green launch chugged off to circle the barge. It was a look of triumph and of high hopes for the future.
“All we need’s his O.K., Skippy,” he said in soft tones. “It’s somethin’ ter be able ter face guys like the inspector, specially when I been dodgin’ him so long.”
“Then he knows you usta——” Skippy’s tongue seemed not to be able to say the word.
“Sure,” said Toby, a little abashed. “There ain’t many reg’lars in this harbor that the inspector ain’t got spotted some time or other. But I should worry now.”
Skippy nodded happily and a silence ensued between them. They listened together and watched while the harbor launch paused midway of the _Minnie M. Baxter_ and Inspector Jones and his two subordinates held an inaudible conference. Then for a time they made soundings after which the inspector boarded the barge and spent another five minutes inspecting it fore and aft.
“There’s more ter this here inspectin’ business than what a guy thinks,” said Toby simply. “All I know uv boats is this here kicker. I never did more’n load an’ unload aboard Ol’ Flint’s scows.”
“The inspector’s gettin’ back in the launch,” said Skippy eagerly. “Now they’ll come back an’ say it’s all right an’ then we can go, huh?”
Toby Dare nodded and smilingly waited as the launch chugged back alongside of his kicker.
“What yer think uv my ol’ battle-axe, hey, Inspector?” he asked, chuckling.
“Battle-axe is a good word for her, Dare,” said the inspector solemnly. “Nothing describes her better.”
Toby Dare’s generous mouth seemed to tighten at the corners.
“What yer mean, Inspector?”
“How much did you pay for her?”
“Three hunderd—why?” Toby’s lips trembled a little and he searched the inspector’s face anxiously.
“Who’d you buy her from?” the inspector persisted.
“Ol’ Flint! Josiah Flint,” Toby answered suspiciously. “_Why?_”
“I thought it must be somebody like him. I hate to spring it on you, Dare, but you’ve paid three hundred dollars too much. She’s not worth a dime.”
Toby Dare cleared his throat and a strange look came into his kindly gray eyes.
“Inspector ——, yer mean this here barge ain’t....” he began.
“She’s not seaworthy,” the inspector interposed as kindly as he could. “It’s not safe to keep her afloat, Dare. Flint gypped you. You should have had somebody look her over before you bought her—somebody that knew an up-and-coming barge from driftwood. That’s all you got on your hands, I’m sorry to say—_driftwood_. Her keel’s as rotten as a keel can possibly be.”
Toby Dare’s tanned, weather-beaten face went suddenly white and he made a funny little clicking noise with his tongue.
“The keel,” he muttered hoarsely, “can’t I have ’er fixed, Inspector—_can’t I_?”
Inspector Jones shook his head.
“It’d take more money than what you paid for the old hulk, Dare; more money than you’ve got, I guess.”
“I ain’t got a cent, Inspector, that’s the truth,” Toby said, choking on his words. “Every cent I had I paid Ol’ Flint an’—an’....”
Inspector Jones leaned toward the miserable man.
“Don’t take on so, Dare. Maybe the thing’s not as hopeless as it seems. If Josiah Flint’s got a spark of human feeling he’ll make good. Perhaps he didn’t realize what shape the barge was in when he sold her. He owns so many....”
“That’s jest it, Inspector,” said Toby, clenching his calloused hands. “Ol’ Flint _ain’t_ got human feelin’. I worked fer him an’ I know. An’ fer a big ship-owner like him, he knows every craft he owns like a book. Now that I think uv it, I know he knew what he was sellin’ me! He knew I was dumb about them things an’ he took advantage uv it.” Dare looked down the harbor, glowing in the sunset, and his jaw was set determinedly. “He smiled, Ol’ Flint did, when I forked over my jack. He knew all the time!”
Skippy’s eyes were misty and he looked appealingly at Inspector Jones.
“Does that mean Pop can’t use the _Minnie M. Baxter_?” he faltered.
The inspector averted his face from the boy’s pleading eyes.
“If you think you can’t appeal to Flint personally, Dare,” said he, “sue him. A lawyer’ll make him kick in.”
“Not from Ol’ Flint,” said Toby Dare hoarsely and looking straight across the river. “He’s too rich ter be sued. But there’s one way uv fixin’ him—_one way_!”
Inspector Jones motioned his men to start their craft on its way.
“Cheer up,” he said, glancing quickly from father to son. “You’ll get a break yet. The safest way to get after Flint, Toby, is to sue him. You’d certainly not get anywhere with him the way you feel now. Meanwhile, the safest place for the scow is up at the Basin. She’s just not safe even to be towed around the harbor.”
Skippy watched the long line of foam that the launch left in its wake. For a long time his misty eyes were fastened on the glistening bubbles dancing atop the water until he could no longer stand his father’s silence.
“Pop, Pop,” he stammered, “can’t we go—go somewhere now?”
“Sure—sure,” said Toby brokenly. “We’re goin’ somewheres a’right. We’re goin’ ter the Basin where Jones told us to go with the _Minnie M. Baxter_.” He laughed sardonically. “We’re goin’ ter put the ol’ battle-axe in dry-dock _forever_!”
“What’s that mean, Pop?” Skippy asked pathetically. “It sounds like you mean something terrible will happen to the _Minnie M. Baxter_.”
“It _is_ terrible ter me—an’ ter you, Skippy boy,” mumbled Toby. “It means that the pore scow’s so rotten she ain’t fit fer nothin’ but ter be put high an’ dry in Brown’s Basin along with half a hunderd other rotten scows. It’s way in the inlet an’ folks live in them scows like I guess you an’ me’ll have ter till I kin think what next.”
“Then all those other barges like ours can never sail the harbor again, huh?” Skippy asked sadly. “They just sorta stay there till they rot an’ fall apart, is that it? Like as if they’re condemned.”
“That’s the word, Skippy,” said Toby Dare bitterly. “The _Minnie M. Baxter’s_ been condemned an’ you an’ me are condemned along with her.”
CHAPTER III THE BASIN
Brown’s Basin was off the beaten track, even nautically speaking. One could never have found it except by the merest chance, unless one were fortunate enough to have a companion who was familiar with it. The rivermen knew, perhaps knew too well, as did the police who preferred to get no closer to the colony than the shadowy inlet which sulks silently in the daylight hours and strangely springs to life under cover of the blackest nights.
The Basin, as it is more familiarly known, thrives under the protection of the lofty Palisades. In summer the foliage all but hides it from the shore, and in winter the grim, gray rocks give it ample security from the prying eyes of the world. And the Basin wishes that security, for the character of the residents is such that secrecy and isolation provide the means for their livelihood and their existence.
Perhaps half a hundred derelict barges dot the slimy mud banks of the Basin, some of them occupied and some not. But on the whole the combined population of this sordid looking place represents a fair number and on bright, sunlit mornings one can get an occasional glimpse from the steep river road of poorly clad children scrambling from one to the other of the closely packed barges, much the same as they would scramble across city streets.
Large planks connect the sprawling hulks in a sort of interminable chain and the denizens can traverse the entire settlement by this means. More often than not the family laundry waving in the damp river breeze on the forward deck must be dodged by this strolling citizenry, but they are quite used to all forms of adroit evasion, particularly where the law is concerned.
It was into this little lawless colony that the _Minnie M. Baxter_ was towed. Sunset had long since gone, leaving but a hint of vermilion colored sky at the horizon as the kicker chugged silently farther and farther into the muddy waters of the inlet. Skippy steered the motor-boat and Toby Dare struggled at the tiller of the barge while most of the colonists looked on indifferently. They sprawled about on the various decks, men, women and children.
Criticism, both friendly and otherwise, reached Toby Dare’s sensitive ears, but he paid little heed, using his own judgment as to a suitable spot in which to rest the ill-fated barge. It was a spot at the very edge of the Basin that he chose and so manifest was its isolation from the rest of the colony that but one inference could be drawn: Toby Dare did not intend his son or himself to be drawn into that maelstrom of dubious citizenry. His grief over the recent misfortune in no way blunted his keen senses and, as always, Skippy’s future welfare was uppermost in his mind.
“They’re people what ain’t partic’lar ’bout things, Sonny,” he explained while the _Minnie M. Baxter_ was settling in the mud. “They—well, they can’t help it, but they’re folks what ain’t carin’ whether their boys is fetched up right or not. They jest let their kids live day after day sorta an’ they don’t think uv next year. Me, I’m always a-thinkin’ ’bout you a year ahead—see? So it ain’t no use botherin’ with folks what thinks different.”
“I see, Pop,” said Skippy looking musingly into the rust-colored water. “You know all about ’em, huh?”
“More’n they know themselves, Sonny. Ain’t they slaves fer Ol’ Flint same as I was? Only I did more uv his high class dirty work. I overseed ’em load an’ unload the stuff fer Ol’ Flint an’ it paid enough ter keep my sonny in a shack ashore where he didn’t see his Pop helpin’ ter beat the law. Now when I thought I was through with that an’ ready ter give yer a clean, honest start—_where am I?_” He buried his face in his hands.
Skippy touched his father on the shoulder with a trembling hand.
“Aw, Pop—forget it, huh? I can help soon too, can’t I? When I get my workin’ papers I can. I’ll even go to night school an’ I’ll be honest an’ like a gentleman just the same as if the _Minnie M. Baxter_ wasn’t condemned an’ we could haul garbage an’ ashes an’ make plenty.” He was quite exhausted by this lengthy declaration but his eyes were full of shining hope.
Toby Dare raised his head.
“Yer a-meanin’ well, Sonny, but yer ain’t got no idea how hard it is ter do anythin’ without a little money. Besides, it sort uv taints a man’s own fam’ly even, when he’s worked fer Ol’ Flint. Decent, honest shipowners give a man the go-by when they find out yer been a Flint man. Yer blackballed, in other words, Sonny—see? Yer ain’t given no chance ter work at an honest job no matter how bad yer want to. An’ I can’t do nothin’ but river work an’ the like—I ain’t never done nothin’ else! The only thing fer a man like me ter do was ter try an’ go on his own hook like I meant ter do with the _Minnie M. Baxter_. Now I can’t do that unless—unless....” His large, yellow teeth seemed to close over the word hopefully.
“Unless what, Pop?” Skippy asked eagerly.
“Unless I kin make him give me back my money an’ I kin buy another _Minnie M. Baxter_.” He choked a little and shook his disheveled head. “But that’s too much ter hope fer, Skippy. Ol’ Flint’s never been known ter give anythin’ back—it’s me that oughta know that. I was a fool ter think he could be honest with me—_me_, a poor workman uv his. Why, Ol’ Flint’s bragged he’d skin anybody what was fool enough ter _be_ skinned.”
Skippy shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other.
“So then will you go to a lawyer like Inspector Jones told you? To please me, Pop, will you?”
“I’m a-goin’ nowheres but ter see Ol’ Flint,” answered Toby hoarsely. “That swell yacht uv his is anchored in the bay an’ he’s livin’ aboard it durin’ this hot spell so I know where ter find him after workin’ hours. He ain’t only ten years older ’n me an’ he’s in good condition an’ jest my size so....”
“Pop—Pop, you got fight on your mind an’ it’s just the way Inspector Jones warned you not to go to see Mr. Flint! Besides, it ain’t gonna be half bad here till we can think up sumpin’ else to do. Forget about Mr. Flint if you’re jus’ thinkin’ of him on accounta me. I’ll be all right——”
“I’ll forget anythin’ ’ceptin’ that Ol’ Flint’s cheated me with a grin on his slick face,” said Toby Dare with an ominous softness in his voice. “So I’m a-goin’ ter teach him a lesson, Skippy—I’m a-goin’ ter teach him that Toby Dare can’t be cheated outa everythin’ he’s hoped fer, fer years, without hittin’ back. Yessir, Ol’ Flint’s gotta learn what it means ter cheat me!”
“Pop—Pop! You ain’t goin’—honest?”
“I am. I’m a-goin’ sure as guns.”
“When—when you goin’, Pop?”
“_Tonight!_”
CHAPTER IV COMPROMISE
Skippy got the first meal aboard the _Minnie M. Baxter_. His heart and soul were certainly not in the task for he burned four of the flapjacks that he was cooking. The coffee had twice boiled over and the narrow little cabin was filled with a blue, acrid smoke and though the sight of his father’s lugubrious face, as he paced up and down outside the little windows, disturbed him, he was not particularly unhappy.
His mind, during the preparation of that meal, was not on his father’s misfortunes nor on the threatened and ominous visit to the Flint yacht that very evening. Instead he was visualizing what benefits were to be derived from residing in the Basin, chief among these being an uninterrupted summer season of fishing and swimming. That to the heart of a boy of his age compensated fully for the loss of the garbage and ashes contract, yes, even for the loss of the barge’s promise of a remunerative future.
It is not to be thought that Skippy did not deeply feel his father’s grief, for indeed he had brooded over it for hours. But after they had settled and arranged their few belongings in the meagerly furnished cabin of the barge, he had achieved that blessed miracle of youth and accepted the inevitable without a question. Life stretched out ahead of him as the inlet lay spread under this starlit night, broken now and then by a quiet ripple until it reached the river. What would happen beyond that point he knew he could find out when he came to it.
And so, more contented than his brooding and troubled parent, Skippy piled up the flapjacks until they resembled the leaning tower of Pisa, and he whistled to the accompaniment of the sputtering coffee pot. All the world seemed delightful and generous with these savory dishes ready to be eaten, and he asked himself if his father wasn’t making much of little. After all, they had the _Minnie M. Baxter_ for a home, didn’t they? And wasn’t living on a barge just the kind of life that he and his pals had often wished for when they had lain about their dusty dooryards on hot summer nights?
The boy ran to the door, his tanned face flushed and expectant. He would tell his father how much better he was going to feel out on the river all summer than back in dusty, hot Riverboro where he had spent all his life. He would fish and swim and take lots of deep, lung-developing breaths. He’d probably never have another bad throat....
He inhaled deeply on the strength of this thought and though his lungs filled with a queerly mixed odor of mud, decayed fish and salt, he noticed it not at all. Moreover, the inlet might have been a clear, wind-swept ocean waste, so far above the Basin had his imagination carried him.
A figure stirred in the shadows forward and then he heard the familiar tread of his father. Suddenly on the damp salt breeze they heard the distant sound of chimes and waited silently while the faint notes struck off the hour of ten.
“Pretty late to eat, huh Pop? Everythin’s ready, so you better come while it’s hot.”
“Yer know where them chimes come from?” Toby asked in a tone of voice that was strange to his son. “They come from River Heights on that swell Town Hall what Ol’ Flint give to the borough. Now I s’pose he’ll give the three hunderd dollars he cheated me outa, fer somethin’ else what’ll give him a big name, hey? That’s what some uv them scoundrels like Ol’ Flint do—give their dirty money ter things what’ll give ’em a fine big name. Well, he won’t git the chanct ter give my three hunderd—not while I live!”
Josiah Flint again! Skippy’s heart lost all its merry hopes in a fleeting second. He turned back into the cabin and his father followed him in gloomy silence. Mechanically, he carried the steaming plate from the oil stove to the rickety little oil-cloth covered table and without a word they pulled up their chairs and sat down.
“I never tole yer before,” said Toby after a few moments, “but if it wasn’t fer Ol’ Flint there wouldn’ never ’a’ been no squatter colony like this in Brown’s Basin. It’s him what’s made it, that’s what. They’re all blackballed men, Sonny; men what’s got in Ol’ Flint’s clutches an’ ain’t never got the chance nor the brains ter git out. Not like me that had a little more brains ter earn bigger money so’s I could save fer the _Minnie M. Baxter_. _Save!_” He brought his fist down upon the table with such force that a flapjack bounced from his plate to the floor. “Ha, ha—what for did I save, hey?”
He laughed so sardonically that Skippy hurried for the coffee to hide his concern.
“Aw, please don’t take on so, Pop!” His eyes were directed at Toby’s back. “Gee, that old miser, he ain’t worth you actin’ so queer an’ all. It ain’t so bad here. It’s a nice little house we got in this cabin; chairs an’ the stove an’ a table an’ our trunk.” His glance wandered to the tiny windows opened to the damp salt breeze. “Even I bet I could put up some cretonne stuff as good as a girl an’ then won’t this be one nice-lookin’ little place!”
Toby’s chair scraped over the rough, clean boards and he stood up, straight and powerful and ominous.
“Never mind the coffee now,” he said hoarsely. “We kin heat it up an’ drink it when we come back.” He laughed. “We’ll drink it as a toast ter Ol’ Flint’s health!”
Skippy put down the coffee pot and wiped his grimy hands on his khaki knickers. Then with a swift movement he shook back his straight, rebellious hair and glanced up at his father.
“You—you mean you want me with you, Pop?” he asked tremulously.
“_Jest_ what I mean, Skippy. I want yer along so’s I kin remember Ol’ Flint ain’t worth ... well, what I mean is, if I have yer to talk ter on the way I ain’t so like ter lose my head when I git there an’ talk ter him. If he gits sneerin’ at me like his habit is mostly, it’ll be good fer me ter know my Sonny’s right outside a-waitin’ in the kicker. Waitin’ fer his Pop, hey?”
“Sure, sure,” Skippy gulped. “Sure, I’ll go with you if it’s gonna make you feel that way, Pop. Gee, I’ll go anywheres with you if you only promise not to lose your head.”
“Jest the sight uv that man’ll make me lose my head, Skippy—I know it. But so long as yer make me promise—I won’t give him the worst uv it, if I kin help it.”
Skippy knew his father well enough to accept just that much and hope for the best. He went to the old battered trunk, took out a worn sweater and while still drawing it on followed Toby outside.
They descended the rope ladder in silence and got into the shabby boat. Toby turned over the motor and Skippy took his place at the bow to watch for drifting logs for the little kicker had not a light. Toby’s former nocturnal occupations had made it necessary for him to dispense with this appurtenance and now, as he explained to his inquiring son, it had become a habit to roam the river without illumination, knowing as he did every square foot of it. Besides, he had come to love the solitude of darkness.
Skippy looked all about him, not exactly at his ease. The inlet was black and at times the starlit sky seemed so far away as to be but a mirage. Perhaps there wasn’t a star in all the heavens, he would try to tell himself. All was black night and the muffled motor purred with a hushed monotony that affected him strangely. He fervently hoped that they would not be long in reaching the river where he could breathe without feeling that he was going to choke.
He knew he was afraid and he knew it really had nothing to do with the inlet or the black, silent night. It was a nameless dread that had seized him and, try as he would, he could not shake it off.
Instinctively, he felt that they shouldn’t go on to Josiah Flint’s yacht that night.
CHAPTER V THE APOLLYON
Skippy felt better when the boat nosed out into the river. He raised his worried face to the clear salt breeze and let it blow over his hot cheeks. Lights blinked here and there on the dark water and a tug chortled by noisily. Then on the far shore he saw a cable light, and a ship ran clear of it before she dropped her mooring anchor.
Toby said nothing but sat in a lugubrious silence as he steered the little craft downstream. Skippy stared hard at the spray foaming against the bow; his mind was not on drifting logs. He turned to his father, scanned his face anxiously, then peered downstream again.
“Is Mr. Flint’s yacht much further, Pop?” he asked after a few minutes.
“No, we oughta soon be on top uv her,” came the hoarse reply. “Yer can’t miss her—she’s got her name sprawled fore an’ aft in great big gold letters. It’s some fancy name called A—Apollyon. That’s it. Kindo highfalutin name, hey? Like all them there Flints.”
“How many Flints are there, Pop?”
“Jest two now, like me an’ you. Ol’ Flint an’ his son, Buck. His real name’s Harry. Anyway folks call him Buck. But he’s got it better’n you, Sonny. Much better. Besides he’s old enough ter take his father’s place in the dirty business, though I heerd not so long ago that Buck ain’t uv a mind with the old man an’ lets Marty Skinner help run the works. They say Buck’s terrible honest an’ all fer the law but Skinner’s nothin’ but a rat.”
“Well, maybe Buck’ll take over his father’s business some day and make it pay without havin’ smugglin’ an’ things like that, huh Pop?”
“Mebbe, but not if that crook Skinner keeps his ball in the game. Still, I heerd it said that Ol’ Flint’s business has always paid good enough without him doin’ dirty work fer easy money. But that’s what a miser he is—he’s gotta have a crooked side line so’s ter pile up his millions in a coupla years. He ain’t willin’ like the rest uv these shipowners ’round here ter wait an’ let a honest fortune pile up, say, in twenty years or so. He can’t be honest, Ol’ Flint can’t, not even with a poor man like me, an’ Skinner’s the same breed uv cats.”
They were approaching a wide bend in the river. Anchored launches and trim sailboats dotted the shadowy water like immaculate sentinels. Skippy’s restless eyes roved over the silent scene until he espied the graceful sweep of a yacht’s bow projecting out of the shadows into the line of its anchor light. Simultaneously he saw great gold letters spelling out the name _Apollyon_ and it occurred to him how modest and neat was the brass lettering of the _Minnie M. Baxter_ in contrast.
The white, dainty craft swayed ever so gently on the slight swell and Skippy was lost in envy. He bethought himself of the sprawling uncouth barge and for a moment wondered why things were like this; why a man of Josiah Flint’s sort could own this dainty, spotless yacht while his father who wanted so much to be honest had not even the worth of the hard-earned barge.
For the first time, he understood how bitter and revengeful his father must feel. He too felt bitter and revengeful as they got closer to the _Apollyon_. Something began to smolder in his boy’s heart; something wholly alien to his cheerful, wholesome nature. But he was aware of nothing of this, save that he felt like sneering aloud at this proud, complacent craft swaying before his eyes. In a wild fancy he imagined her to be mocking his father and himself for daring to hope that Josiah Flint would make restitution.
A dim light shone amidships and save for the anchor lights the rest of the yacht was in darkness. Skippy stared hard at her and suddenly saw something skimming away from her port side.
He leaned far over the prow of the little motor boat until he saw that the object was a kicker like their own with its engine muffled. In whispered words he drew Toby’s attention to it.
“Wonder where she’s been and where she’s goin’ to, huh Pop?” he queried.
“That ain’t none uv our business, Skippy,” his father answered staring up at the _Apollyon_. “Folks on the river don’t think uv them things this time uv night. They know a muffled engine’s one that ain’t carin’ ter be heard, same as I got one fer mine.”
“We could have ours taken off now, huh Pop? It ain’t any more use now, is it?”
“That all depends, Sonny. It all depends on Ol’ Flint,” Toby said softly. “Now here we are an’ the less said, the better.”
“Ahoy!” called a voice in deep, soft tones from above. “Who’s below?”
Father and son glanced up to see the head and shoulders of a burly man leaning over the glistening rail. Skippy saw Toby stiffen determinedly.
“Ol’ Flint aboard?” he asked.
“Yeah,” the man answered suppressing a yawn. “He’s in his cabin amidships. Lookin’ for him?”
“Yeah.”
“Move the kicker aft an’ come aboard. Old man was talkin’ with Mr. Skinner when I come on duty two hours ago. His light’s still on so he’s readin’ likely.”
The little boat moved aft with hardly a splash and the next moment Toby was scrambling up the ladder. Skippy listened intently as his father set foot on the _Apollyon’s_ deck.
“Want me to tell him he’s got a caller?” the man suddenly asked.
“Nope. Thanks jest the same,” Toby was saying. “I even got half an idee that mebbe he expects me.”
“Awright, buddy,” said the man heartily. “You’ll find him ’midships like I told you. There where the little light is.”
Skippy heard the soft tread of his father’s step along the deck. A door closed and after an interval of silence he looked up to see that the man was still there, bending over the rail and apparently staring at him.
“Your Dad, hey kid?” he asked, catching Skippy’s upturned eyes.
“My Pop,” Skippy corrected, chuckling. He liked the man’s hearty voice. “You work aboard this yacht, Mister?”
“Second mate, that’s what. Easy job summers when the old man’s busy. All we do is to sleep and keep the old girl ship-shape.”
“Old girl?”
“Yeah, this scow.”
“Some scow!” Skippy laughed. “She’s pretty swell, I’ll say. Not much trouble keepin’ _her_ ship-shape, huh?”
“Naw. There ain’t enough to keep us busy an’ it makes a swab lazy. Same’s me tonight. Here I am the only one on duty (there ain’t no need for more’n one, anchored here like we are) and things are so quiet what do I do but fall sound asleep! I’d sat me down and I hear the old man bawlin’ Mr. Skinner out fierce. Then I guess I was dozin’ a spell ’fore I heard the sound of a muffled motor aft. Dreamed it, I guess, and I dreamed I heard somebody comin’ out from the boss’s quarters ’midships. Anyways, I finally woke up and when I come to the rail I see you folks. Guess that’s what I was hearin’ in my dreams all the time, hey?”
“Maybe,” said Skippy. “Our motor’s muffled, I guess you noticed already, but you might ’a’ heard another kicker like ours too because one was aft when we came along.”
“Guess maybe that’s what it was then,” said the second mate pleasantly. “Just somebody bein’ a little cautious, like. Still I got to quit bein’ so lazy nights and do my duty by _Polly_ like the old man pays me for.”
“_Polly?_”
The second mate laughed softly and Skippy fancied that his mischievous wink penetrated the darkness.
“_Apollyon_—_Polly_ for short, kid! _Apollyon_ is too highfalutin for able seamen, hey?”
“That’s what I thought, Mister. I never heard it before. Gee whiz, what’s it mean anyway?”
The second mate paused a moment.
“From what I could make out from the Cap’n it was the name of a Greek story or somethin’. You know—one of them real old Greeks thousands of years back. And this _Apollyon_ was a evil spirit or somethin’ like that, and folks called ’im the Destroyer! Ain’t that a name for you?”
Skippy nodded and looked at the graceful ship with a new interest. Evil spirit? Destroyer? A queer name indeed for such a dainty craft. Why should Josiah Flint give that beautiful hull such an evil name? The sound of a dull thump interrupted his thoughts.
“I couldn’t work on a ship with a name like that,” he said to the second mate at length.
“Why?” the man laughed. “Superstitious?”
“I wouldn’t say that,” Skippy answered seriously. “At least I never thought I was sup-super-superstitious more’n most kids. But it don’t seem exactly fair callin’ a nice ship like that the destroyer or an evil spirit or whatever _Apollyon_ really means. Gee, I’ve heard my Pop say that a ship kinda gets lookin’ like its name an’ actin’ like its name after a while. That’s why he named the barge he bought from Mr. Flint after my mother; the _Minnie M. Baxter_ she’s called. He said she’d be the nicest barge on the river if she took after my mother. But so far it ain’t worked out,” he added wistfully.
“No?” the second mate inquired sympathetically.
Skippy summed up the whole story of his father’s misfortune in a few words. Particularly did he stress Toby’s grief over Josiah Flint’s wilful deception in the transaction.
“And so your Pop’s come to make the old man come across, hey? Well, I don’t blame him.” The man lowered his voice to a mere whisper. “I only hope he don’t get the boss in a nasty temper ’cause he’s not one to give in and he sounded like he was good and sore when he was bawlin’ out Mr. Skinner. Besides, he ain’t the one to admit he cheated your pop either. Still....”
A low moan startled them both and suddenly a door slammed, followed by the sound of someone running along the deck. Skippy stood straight up in the motor boat and listened intently.
He knew those footsteps and he knew what was in the mind that directed them with such force. His father never hurried, much less ran, unless he was terribly angered or pained or....
He dared not complete that thought, nor did he have need to, for his father’s drawn, white face was already looking down at him from above the rail and Skippy read there all that he needed to know.
Something terrible had happened.
CHAPTER VI A STRANGE STORY
The little motor boat had left the _Apollyon_ far behind, ignoring shouts from its deck to halt, before Skippy dared break the tense silence.
“Gee, Pop,” he stammered fearfully, “what happened between you and Mr. Flint anyway, huh? Because you didn’t even say goodnight to the mate an’ you got in the boat an’ told me so cranky an’ all to push off before I got a chance to say goodnight to him, either—gee whiz! I never seen you act so funny before in my life. What’s the matter, huh?”
Toby Dare groaned and buried his face between his hands. Then, for what seemed to Skippy an interminable time, he rocked to and fro and the groans that escaped him were distressing to the waiting boy.
Finally Skippy could stand it no longer.
“Pop, you gotta tell me what’s the matter! Gee, it’s somethin’ terrible the way....”
“Sonny,” Toby interposed brokenly, “git back ter the _Minnie M. Baxter_ jest as quick as yer kin! I got ter put as much water between me—me an’—an’ _him_ as it’s possible ter put.”
“Pop?”
“It’s like a dream, Sonny—a bad dream—a terrible dream. I can’t make head or tail uv it yet. I went ter his cabin ’midships like that mate told me....”
“Yes?” Skippy encouraged.
“I knocked on the door an’ I could uv sworn I heard a kinda grunt like Ol’ Flint does. He’s a man uv few words. Anyways, I goes in an’ there he’s sittin’ in a big chair with a funny grin on his face.”
“Grinnin’ at _you_, Pop?” Skippy asked clenching his straight white teeth.
“That’s what I thought an’ right away I got wild,” Toby answered running his hands nervously through his disheveled hair. “I forgot what I promised—I forgot everythin’ ’ceptin’ the way he’d cheated me an’ I got tellin’ him so but he didn’t say nothin’, but jest kep’ sittin’ there a-grinnin’ that funny way. Well, I knowed as how he always was a man uv few words but I thought he could stop grinnin’ an’ at least say _somethin’_. But he didn’ an’ that’s what made me see red—I thought he was a-makin’ fun uv me, sorta, an’——”
“You didn’t go for him?” Skippy interposed fearfully.
“Sonny, I jest sorta lost my head,” answered Toby brokenly. “I kin hardly remember what happened ’ceptin’ I realized all uv a sudden that I had my hands ’round his throat an’ I was chokin’ him.”
“And didn’t he make any noise or anythin’?” Skippy was horrified.
“That’s what made me let go. I got wise right then that somethin’ was funny ’cause he didn’t let a sound outa him all the time. His eyes seemed ter git funnier lookin’ though, but he kep’ on grinnin’ jest the same. Then I let go quick an’ _plop_—over he fell, head first he fell an’ that’s when I saw it——”
“_What?_”
“That he’d been shot in the back,” Toby whispered looking about uneasily.
“_Pop!_”
“Sure as guns, Skippy,” Toby moaned pitifully. “Then I knew he musta been dead all the time—even before I got in the room.”
Skippy too groaned.
“How—how could he sit up like that then, if he really was _dead_?” he asked with an audible gulp.
“That’s what I’ve been wonderin’ an’ all I kin think is that whoever did it, sat him up that way after it happened. I could see in his bedroom off uv the room he was sittin’ in an’ papers was lyin’ all ’round like as if there’d been a scrap.”
“With somebody else,” Skippy murmured as if to himself. Then, in a frightened whisper: “What then, Pop?”
“All I could do was stand there like a crazy man,” Toby groaned. “I don’t even remember how long I stood there. It’s all like part uv that nightmare so I can’t remember.”
“I know, Pop.” Skippy tried to sound comforting. “Who—what groaned that time? The second mate and me heard it plain’s anythin’.”
“Me. That was when I knew he was dead! It jest sorta come ter me full in the face an’ I was so full uv fright that I had ter let it out some way.”
Skippy turned around and for a few moments searched the face of his unhappy father.
“Pop—Pop,” he faltered, “just one thing I can’t understand—why—why didn’t you tell the second mate, an’ me, right then? Why—why didn’t you spurt it right out an’ not run away when you know you didn’t do it?”
“Who’d believe it?” Toby answered hopelessly. “There was the mark uv my fingers on his throat—_there they was_! I’d even have ter admit ter that mate that I was mad enough ter choke Ol’ Flint ter death—he could see my fingers there ter prove it, couldn’t he? Well, why wouldn’t he think I give him an automatic in the back afterwards, hey? Why wouldn’t he?”
“_But, Pop!_ If you only had said _sumpin_!”
“I wanted ter git away from that awful grinnin’ face. As far away as I c’d get. I—I couldn’t stay there ter tell nobody _nothin’_, Skippy. Besides, do I know I didn’t choke him ter—ter...” He sobbed a moment, then looked up. “Mebbe ’twasn’t the automatic what really got him, Skippy—mebbe ’twas _me_, hey?”
Skippy reached out and grasped Toby’s damp flannel shirt sleeve in agony.
“Pop, it wasn’t you—I know it—_I just feel it_!” he cried. “I can tell from all you told me about him grinnin’ like from the time you got inside the room.” He hesitated a moment, then: “You don’t remember him makin’ a sound at all?” he asked, anxiously peering into his father’s face.
“Not one sol’tary sound, Sonny—I didn’t hear a one!”
Skippy sighed and again took up the task of steering the little motor boat upstream. His tired young face, however, had taken on a new look of resolution.
“You’re tired, Pop, an’ I’m gonna take you back to the _Minnie M. Baxter_. Then I’m gonna turn this kicker straight back and head her downstream again an’ I’m goin’ aboard that _Apollyon_ an’ explain the whole thing. I’ll tell ’em everythin’ like you told me an’ I bet they’ll believe it all right ’cause they’ll see that my Pop couldn’t kill anybody.”
Toby said nothing but continued to rock back and forth with his head in his hands.
“Maybe—maybe you’re not so tired an’ you’d turn ’round with me an’ go back an’ tell ’em, huh Pop?” Skippy returned anxiously.
“Skippy,” Toby cried hoarsely, “jest now I wanta go back ter the _Minnie M. Baxter_ an’ think. Like a good boy don’t talk about it no more till we get there, hey?”
Skippy, bewildered, promised that he wouldn’t, and let the little kicker out to the best of her ability. From time to time he heard the miserable sighs of his father, and over and over again he told himself the story of Josiah Flint’s strange death just as Toby had told it. But with each recurring thought, a strange suspicion asserted itself and clamored so hard in the boy’s conscious mind that he was forced to recognize that it was a doubt, a small one, but nevertheless a doubt of his father’s story.
And by the time they were once more on board the _Minnie M. Baxter_, Skippy was fearful that possibly, after all, his father might be the actual murderer of Josiah Flint!
CHAPTER VII FOR SKIPPY
Skippy washed the dishes and cleaned up the cabin, then made some fresh coffee. He put the two cups on a little tin tray and carried it out on deck where his father sat disconsolately puffing a pipe.
“I made this good an’ careful, Pop,” he said, handing Toby a cup of the steaming beverage. “Maybe it’ll make you feel better, it’s so hot.”
Toby took the proffered cup and smiled wanly.
“Yer think your Pop’s a coward, takin’ on this way?” he asked anxiously.
Skippy flushed and, to cover his embarrassment, sat down on a stool a little distance away.
“Nah, I don’t think that, Pop,” he said at length. “I guess I know how kinda crazy an’ different you’d act after seem’ that. Gee, it musta been pretty awful to make you act so different.”
“I know how yer mean by different, Sonny, but I ain’t blamin’ yer. I know it must look funny, but it ain’t. Besides I ain’t a coward ’bout it. If I’d told the mate right on the spot, he’d had ter keep me till the police come. Then what would happened ter _you_? Even if I give myself up now they’ll hold me on charges an’ the law’s that slow, it’ll be months mebbe ’fore I kin clear myself.”
“But that’d be better’n lettin’ ’em think you was the one that killed Mr. Flint, wouldn’t it?”
“I thought mebbe we could run somewheres out west or the like, hey Skippy? Yer don’t know what the law is once yer git in its fist. If they can’t find nobody else they’ll pin it on me no matter what we say—I know it! So we might’s well take our duds an’ beat it now.”
“Pop, you’re not talkin’ like yourself. You got sorta crazy on accounta thinkin’ how all this’ll hurt me. Gee whiz, forget about me, because you can’t have the cops thinkin’ you did it, when you didn’t! Gee, I’ll get along somehow, honest I will, Pop. I’ll get along better to know you did what was right an’ told the truth. An’ even the law I bet can see when a man’s tellin’ the truth an’ they’ll let you out quick—so will you go for my sake, Pop?”
Toby brought a hairy fist down on his bony knees.
“It’s fer yer sake that I didn’t want ter go near ’em, Skippy,” he said vehemently. “But if yer promise yer Pop ter stay good an’ all till they let me out, I don’t care. Fer my sake I _wanta_ go!”
“Gee, Pop, I’m glad!”
Toby drank his coffee with a determined gulp, then got up and stalked into the cabin with the empty cup. When he came out, he held out his hands to Skippy.
“C’mon, then, Sonny,” he said gripping the boy by the shoulders, “we’ll be a-gittin’ back ter the _Apollyon_ ’fore too much water slips inter the bay, hey?”
“Just what I was thinkin’ of, Pop,” Skippy answered and averted his head so that his father should not see the tears swimming in his eyes. “And, Pop, you’re kinda calm now, ain’t you? Calm enough to remember better’n when we were comin’ down?”
Toby Dare nodded wearily.
“What yer wanta know, Skippy?”
“Just that you’re good an’ sure that you didn’t hear him make a noise from the time you first seen him till you ran outa the room?”
“Sure, I’m sure, Sonny. And like I told you, the grin was the same too.”
“Then he _was_ dead, Pop—dead all the time, an’ somebody with an automatic did it because the second mate said he dreamed he heard somebody runnin’ an’ then he heard a muffled kicker shoving off aft like I saw when we come along. Whoever had that automatic was in that kicker, Pop. I got a hunch about it.”
“I hope the coppers believe you, Sonny. But c’mon, we’ll take the chance. Anyways, I’ll tell what I know.”
They walked forward together and were just about to descend when they saw a long, dark painted launch shoot alongside of the _Minnie M. Baxter_. As Skippy and his father leaned over to get a better view they were blinded with the glaring rays of a searchlight.
“_Coppers, Pop!_” Skippy hissed. “It’s the coppers!”
[Illustration: “COPPERS, POP!” SKIPPY HISSED. “IT’S THE COPPERS!” _Frontispiece_]
Toby gripped his son’s trembling fingers in his own.
“Don’t move, Dare!” a deep voice commanded from the police launch.
“I’m not,” Toby answered hoarsely.
“We’ll be right up. Stay right where you are.”
“Pop an’ I were just comin’,” Skippy cried to them, “that is, we were just goin’ back to the yacht—the _A—Apollyon_ an’ tell them how it all really happened. Pop ran away on accounta me, but after we talked about it he decided to go back an’ tell.... Mr. Flint was dead before Pop got there—_he was; honest!_”
“Oh yeah?” laughed the first officer to reach the deck. “Now that’s interestin’. But I’d wait till the rest of the gang gets up, kid, because they all got ears too.”
Skippy watched them troop up until the last man set foot on the barge’s worn deck. Six men, he thought, with not a little fear. How weak would his father’s story seem to these frowning cops? Would they believe him as he had believed him?
His fingers were entwined in his father’s in a tight grip and yet he had the feeling that Toby was already snatched away from him. Now that the police confronted them he was terribly afraid and in that instant his hopes fled as quickly as the stars in the face of gathering storm clouds overhead.
Then Toby spoke in his hoarse, broken voice....
CHAPTER VIII ALONE
Skippy’s hopes were somewhat rekindled during Toby’s recital of his visit to the yacht. The story sounded so straightforward as he told it, that it did not seem possible that these representatives of the law could find a single flaw in it. And yet to his utter dismay they found more than a flaw in it; they found it sufficiently damning to threaten his unhappy father with certain conviction.
They had already seen Inspector Jones and had had his word for it that Toby Dare had threatened to “fix Josiah Flint,” and there was also the corroboration of the inspector’s men. There was also the strongly incriminating statement of the second mate of the _Apollyon_ and the charge that Toby refused to stop when called to from the yacht by Skinner.
“My Pop never carried a gun!” Skippy cried in protest. “You can’t say that he did!”
“There’s a robbery charge too,” said one of the officers sternly. “You went to Flint’s yacht because you were sore and Inspector Jones heard you crack that it would be bad for Flint if he didn’t kick in for the loss of the barge. It adds up swell for a jury.”
“Yeah,” said another, “and when Flint give you the razz like you’re trying to tell us, you burn up, shoot him, then you choke him and frisk him to get that three hundred with plenty interest back. Your fingerprints on his throat are the only fingerprints we found. What did you do with the gun—throw it in the river?”
Toby denied it all with a groan, and Skippy sidled up to his father and held on to his arm with a gesture of protection. The officers frowned for there is neither time nor place for sentiment in the progress of the law. They had come to arrest Toby Dare for the murder and robbery of Josiah Flint and all Skippy’s pleading would not thwart them.
The faint boom of thunder sounded as Toby was led into the police launch and a flash of lightning streaked the black sky just above the _Minnie M. Baxter_. But Skippy was indifferent to everything save the hopeless, staring look that his father gave him as their eyes met.
He fought back the tears bravely and smiled his bravest.
“Now, Pop, stop thinking about me again, huh!” he cried desperately. “Gee whiz, I’ll be swell—I promise I will so will you cheer up an’ everythin’, huh? Because you gotta prove you’re tellin’ the truth an’ never had a gun so how could you do what they say you did? So will you cheer up if I tell you I’ll be all right, no matter what?”
Toby Dare’s troubled face lighted with a smile.
“Skippy, boy,” he gulped, “I kin do anythin’ when I hear yer talk like that. Jest hearin’ yer say yer’ll be a good boy’s enough fer me.”
“All right, then, Pop,” Skippy said, forcing a laugh. “So we won’t even say so long ’cause they’ll let you come back in a day or so, I bet.”
“Sure,” Toby assured him. “They’re bound ter let me.”
And that was all, for the launch chugged off leaving Skippy strangely numb and bewildered. He watched the snakelike movements of the trim craft as she darted through the inlet but soon the darkness enfolded her from view. After a few moments they switched on their running lights but there was too much distance between them for the boy to see his father and so he turned his back to the inlet and slowly walked toward the little cabin.
Not a light had appeared the length or breadth of the whole barge colony since the police launch slipped up to the _Minnie M. Baxter_ yet Skippy knew that every man and woman in Brown’s Basin was awake and watching all that had transpired. His father had told him that these strange, lawless people had a surprising faculty for learning of the law’s arrival in the inlet. And hating the law as they did, they kept silently out of its sight, nor did they want to be drawn into it through another’s troubles.
Notwithstanding this knowledge, Skippy had the feeling that he had only to call out and ask for help for himself and his father, and his lawless neighbors would immediately respond. Yet that is just what Toby had warned him against. Moreover, his promise to avoid dubious company was not ten minutes old.
And so he resolved to bear his troubles manfully and alone, though never in his life had he so wanted the warmth and sympathy of human companionship. He was young enough to be afraid, yet old enough to feel ashamed of it. But the events of the day and his father’s unhappy plight finally proved too much for him and with trembling under lip he sought the shelter of the cabin.
A few minutes later a terrific storm broke over the river and swept through the Basin relentlessly. Rain lashed against the tiny windows of the cabin on the _Minnie M. Baxter_ and the wind moaned eerily in and out of the inlet.
Skippy buried his tousled head under a pillow in his bunk and tried to stifle the sobs that would not stop. His heart raced madly in his breast every time he thought of his father and his fears increased with every crash of thunder. Could it possibly be that his father wouldn’t come back?
He squirmed farther under the bedclothes. He would have shut out his thoughts if that had been possible. Presently he heard a muffled knocking at the cabin door.
CHAPTER IX A VISITOR
Skippy sat up instantly, threw off the bedclothes and slid to the floor. Then he hurried to the little table and lighted the lamp, meanwhile glancing toward the door uneasily. The knock sounded again; this time insistently.
He rushed to the door and swung it open. A man stood before him in the pelting rain, the tallest, broadest man he had ever seen in his life. He could not have been out of his twenties and had a large, rather amiable looking face; so large, indeed, that it made his blue eyes seem small and insignificant.
[Illustration: A MAN STOOD BEFORE HIM IN THE PELTING RAIN.]
As Skippy waited questioningly, he moved his ponderous neck above his upturned coat collar and smiled, a slow, secretive smile. Then he half turned and glanced quickly toward the inlet, before he spoke.
“Sure and be ye Toby’s kid?” he asked with a slight brogue. “Can I come in? And where’s Toby bein’ at this hour?” He walked into the cabin quickly.
The ghost of a smile flitted across Skippy’s tear-stained cheeks as he closed the door.
“Sure, sure, come in!” he said hospitably. “Pop ain’t here. He’s....”
“’Tis all right, so ’tis,” the stranger interposed pleasantly, and calmly divested himself of his wet clothing. “I got nothin’ but time. Your ould man told me I’d always be welcome in his diggins so here I be. ’Tis too bad ’bout this scow, though. I only got wise tonight that the inspectors told Toby the _Minnie M. Baxter_ was junk. Bad cess to ’em. So Flint gypped Toby on it, did he?”
“An’ how!” Skippy answered dismally. “Gee, gee....”
The man got up and waving his hands deprecatingly, made a quick movement toward one of the windows on the inlet side. He bent his huge frame in a stooping posture and after rubbing the steam from the diminutive pane, he peered out intently.
Suddenly he turned back and smiled his slow, secretive smile.
“I ain’t exactly aisy in me mind, kid,” he explained with a low chuckle. “I be keepin’ a weather eye on thim coppers. They’re curious like ’bout some stuff and I ain’t in the spirit to answer thim. They got me barge and that’s enough, so ’tis.”
“You ain’t Big Joe Tully?” Skippy asked.
“That be callin’ the turn, kid. S’pose your Pop give ye an earful ’bout me. Well, I started out shootin’ straight like he did, but whilst Flint’s got the monop’ly on shippin’ and the like on this river, a guy’s a million to one, so he is.”
“Mr. Flint won’t have it no more,” Skippy gulped. “I guess you ain’t heard....”
“_What?_” asked Big Joe Tully reaching in his pocket for a cigarette.
“He’s dead—he was killed tonight.” Tears rushed to Skippy’s eyes again. “An’ my Pop’s been sorta accused, Mr. Tully,” he added, and blurted out the whole story.
Tully was puffing energetically on his cigarette when Skippy finished.
“Now don’t ye be worryin’ kid,” he said sympathetically. “If that ol’ rat was dead when Toby got there they can’t do nothin’ to him. Toby’ll be home tomorrow, so he will, I bet.”
Skippy felt instantly cheered. He was beginning to feel glad of Big Joe’s comforting presence when he bethought himself of the man’s dubious activities on the river. Wasn’t it this man and his ilk that his father had warned him against? Men who weren’t honest? The boy sat down on his bunk to think it over.
To his surprise, Tully had got up and was putting on his coat and hat. Immediately, Skippy forgot that he was considering the moral aspect of an invitation to the man to stay; he forgot all his father’s warnings against association with the river gentry, and thought only of the void that Tully’s sudden departure would make in the long night.
“I thought you said you were gonna stay, Mr. Tully?” he said with evident disappointment. “Gee, now you ain’t, huh?”
“’Tis sorry I be, kid,” said Big Joe with a friendly wink. “I did think along thim lines when I come in, but since the coppers been nosin’ ’round here tonight, I’ll be mosyin’ along. They might come back and spot me here so I’d better be takin’ the air.”
“Did they catch you carryin’ _stuff_?” Skippy asked, interested. “Is that why?”
“Sure and they did that. Somewan tipped off the police—somewan what was jealous I wasn’t carryin’ _their_ stuff.” He laughed lightly. “The coppers hook ye either way, so they do. Look how quick they come after Toby and they knew he was on the up and up! So I says, does it pay?” Then, seeing the shadow on Skippy’s face, he added: “But sure you’ll be seein’ Toby back tomorrow, kid. They can’t be keepin’ him when he didn’t do it.”
“He didn’t do it, so they can’t!” Skippy echoed.
“’Tis a cinch, so ’tis,” said Big Joe Tully with an awkward attempt to sympathize. “Be hittin’ the hay now, kid, an’ ye’ll be seein’ Toby tomorrow or me name ain’t Joe Tully. Now I’ll be swingin’ into me kicker and chug her up the river till daylight. I’ll be layin’ low a while and some day I’ll be seein’ ye and Toby. Be watchin’ the old step. S’long.”
He went out like a breeze and Skippy soon heard the chug of his engine. Another craft muffled so that the ears of the law would not hear its approach! The boy made a mental grimace at the thought of all this muffled life on the river, Big Joe Tully included. His inherent love of clean living and honesty had come to the fore as his father had wanted it to. And honesty and clean living _did_ pay despite what Tully had said. Certainly it would pay his father tomorrow! He lay back on his bunk and closed his burning eyes.
Tomorrow was almost here ... almost....
CHAPTER X A SUGGESTION
Many tomorrows had come and gone before Skippy saw his father again and then it was under circumstances that the lonely boy had not contemplated. The shadow of prison walls already threatened Toby Dare for the rest of his natural life; conviction was certain.
Skippy returned to the _Minnie M. Baxter_ toward noon. It threatened to be a sultry day; the air was heavy and still, and a sickening blue haze hung over the inlet. Brown’s Basin, always more or less apathetic under the glare of noonday, was unusually silent and Skippy listened in vain for the cheering sound of a human voice.
He set about preparing lunch, but it was a half-hearted, pathetic attempt, for the Dare larder was getting dangerously bare. He had been living on an almost exclusive diet of pancakes for more than a week past and Nature was beginning to retaliate for Skippy was far from being a robust boy.
He pushed back his plate after a time, hurried out of the cabin and got into his motor boat. It was his only consolation during the interminable days and nights of his father’s continued absence and on this particular day his heart warmed toward it with a new, affectionate thought.
His fishing tackle was assembled at his feet and he set the nose of the little boat downstream as soon as he reached the river. Fog horns pierced the still, hazy air with their dismal warnings and the screams of steam winches and tooting whistles echoed and reechoed about the boy’s tousled head.
He watched the passing river traffic abstractedly, particularly the lumbering and heavily-laden barges moving along in the wake of chortling tugs. The sight of them always made him think of his father and of what might have been, and the more he saw of them the more did the feeling grow within him that it was a strange and unjust law that could take his father away from him. Moreover, he could not understand why a jury would not believe his father’s straightforward story, which proved so clearly to him that another hand had taken Josiah Flint’s life.
Hadn’t the police found that the rich man had been robbed of a considerable sum of money and hadn’t they admitted that it was neither on Toby’s person nor on the barge? Skippy remembered only too well the day when the police ransacked the _Minnie M. Baxter_ fore and aft for Josiah Flint’s money. But their search was futile, as he knew it would be, and although they now had ample proof that poverty threatened him, they still insisted that the stolen money had been hidden by his unhappy father.
But Skippy did not consider the testimony of Marty Skinner that he, on returning to his employer’s stateroom, saw Toby Dare with his arm out the porthole (from which a clever and venomous prosecuting attorney drew the inference for the jury that Toby was disposing of the pistol from which the fatal shot was fired). Skinner did not swear he saw any weapon, but his testimony, linked with the other evidence, made for a strong circumstantial case.
Skinner also testified that he had rushed to his employer’s side as Toby raced from the room; that upon discovering that Josiah Flint had been shot he chased after the squatter and shouted to him, as he made off in his kicker, to no avail. The second mate corroborated the testimony that Toby failed to heed the cries for him to halt.
While the pistol had not been found, Inspector Jones and his men testified that Toby had threatened to fix Josiah Flint because he felt he had been cheated of his life savings of $300 in buying a rotten barge from Flint. That, the prosecutor insisted to the jury, furnished the motive for the crime. Altogether he made a case which convinced the twelve men, but it did not convince Skippy for he could not be convinced that his father was guilty.
Skippy was deep in his bitter reflections and did not see the familiar launch of the harbor inspectors until it was almost upon him. Inspector Jones’ bright and smiling face came alongside of him with startling suddenness.
“Well, Skippy!” he said pleasantly. “How’s the boy?”
Skippy winced and a frown darkened his face. He could not forget that Inspector Jones’ testimony had helped to take his father from him.
“I feel sick on accounta my Pop, that’s what,” said he bitterly. “You helped make things worse for him too, Mr. Jones, on account of the things you told about what he said that day after you inspected the _Minnie M. Baxter_.”
Inspector Jones’ bland countenance looked immediately troubled.
“I told the truth, Skippy,” he said kindly. “I told only what your father had said and my men were there to prove it.”
“You needn’t have said that Pop said he was gonna _fix_ Mr. Flint ’cause you mighta known he really didn’t mean it. Pop was mad then, but he promised me before we left for the _Apollyon_ that night that he wouldn’t lose his head. Gee, he’s even sworn since he didn’t take Mr. Flint’s life an’ don’t you suppose I know when my Pop’s tellin’ the truth?”
“I guess so,” Inspector Jones answered with real feeling in his voice; “I guess you know your Pop better than anybody, Skippy. I’m sorry, the law required me to testify against him. But it was my duty—can’t you see?”
“Then you believe they’ll be keepin’ my Pop in jail when he’s innocent, too, huh?” Skippy asked excitedly.
“I’m rather inclined to believe that your father didn’t shoot Flint,” answered the inspector. “But I can’t do anything about it, Skippy, and I doubt if my testimony alone would convict him. It’s that District-Attorney and Marty Skinner that’s made it so tough for your father. You know Skinner swore he saw Toby at the porthole and the D. A. put it over to the jury that he was dropping the gun which did the job.”
“Yeah, but that diver didn’t find no gun,” Skippy replied, “an’ my Pop swore he wasn’t near no porthole an’ besides nobody tried findin’ out about that kicker that was around when we come up. I’ll betcha the feller what did the killin’ got away in it.”
“You’re right about not finding the gun, Skippy,” Inspector Jones nodded thoughtfully. “I’ll look into the kicker angle some more.”
“Say, thanks, Mr. Jones, me’n Pop we’d be so thankful, we would. Maybe if I went to see Mr. Skinner he’d help us ’cause I guess hard as he is he’ll see I don’t tell lies even to get my Pop free. Maybe I oughta go right away to see him, huh?”
Inspector Jones nodded thinking how futile the boy’s errand would be. But he had boys of his own and he did not want to jolt the lad out of his pleasant dream. So all he said was: “The sooner the better, because I hear he’s going on the _Apollyon_ for a week’s cruise. You know Buck Flint has gone to Europe and now Skinner, who was only Josiah Flint’s yes-man for years, is ruling the roost and living high on a millionaire’s yacht. Buck says he won’t ever board her so it’s pretty soft for Skinner. He’s got the boat anchored just outside in the bay, ready to nose her out to sea after nightfall. If you get right on down there, you’ll catch him aboard, sure.”
Skippy smiled his thanks and turned his little motor over. The inspector waved his hand.
“From the sound of that kicker,” he shouted, “I take it you’ve lost Toby’s muffler?”
“Sure,” Skippy answered laughing, “what do I need with a muffler, huh? ’Cepting it might be better for fishin’ with. But gee, I should worry about livin’ on fish if I can see Mr. Skinner, huh? Pop ought to be out by—by....”
“Tomorrow, eh?” Inspector Jones interposed turning his head aside and blowing his nose hard.
“Nope,” Skippy answered wistfully, “I won’t say tomorrow ’cause then—oh well, it’s too quick. But anyway, if I see Mr. Skinner it won’t be long after tomorrow, I bet.”
He had yet to learn from his bitter experience that tomorrow never comes.
CHAPTER XI ALL OF A KIND
Skippy’s little boat chugged out of the bay and around toward the Hook. It was late afternoon and the haze had deepened into an ominous sultriness. White caps danced atop the waves and off on the horizon black clouds and black sea met in dismal union. A flock of gulls swarmed about, flapping their huge wings between sky and sea with monotonous precision.
A miscellaneous collection of craft was anchored just outside the bay; sailboats, fishing smacks, dories and yachts of every size, and not the least of these was the shining hull of the lovely _Apollyon_. Skippy caught sight of her immediately and slowed his own little boat that he might have a better view of her in the light of day.
Her superstructure was painted a most delicate shade of green and Skippy understood then why he had imagined her to be of that ghostly whiteness below her anchor lights which shone like stars against that dark, memorable night. Too, the large gilt letters spelling out her queer name seemed not so ornate now as when he had first seen them.
His first reaction to the lovely yacht had been one of envy and admiration; it was so now and he tried hard not to think of the unhappy sequel that his first visit to the _Apollyon_ had brought. Yet somehow he could not shake off the fear-inspiring memory of what the name really meant and he wondered if anything but evil could tread those spotless decks.
He chuckled a little and turned his motor boat toward the yacht. There were signs of a near-departure aboard and he caught sight of the second mate resplendent in his spotless uniform and cap. Leaning over the forward rail, he recognized Skippy at once, and waved his hand.
“If it ain’t the kid!” he called cheerfully. “Young Dare, hey? Well, you’ve come a ways.”
“Sure,” Skippy smiled. “I come down to see Mr. Skinner. It’s awful particular what I gotta see him about.”
“You look’s if it might be a case of life or death at that,” the second mate mused.
“It is a case of life, Mister—my Pop’s whole life,” said Skippy anxiously. “That’s why I wanta see Mr. Skinner.”
The second mate was all contrition. “Kid, I clean forgot about your Pop, ’deed I did. C’mon aboard. Sure Mr. Skinner’ll be seein’ you. ’Course I ain’t promisin’ you’ll find him easy talkin’ to ’cause he ain’t. He’s right set in his notions ’bout you Basin and river folks; he thinks you’re all rascals.”
“But his boss, ol’ Flint——” Skippy began protesting.
“He knowed like you’n me and plenty others that the old boss was a tough egg—and between you’n me Skinner ain’t no angel hisself—but that don’t change his mind none.”
Skippy realized this full well a little later when Marty Skinner refused to hear him, ordered him off the boat, and shouted that his father was a rogue and so was he.
Skippy rushed blindly out of the cabin. The door slammed behind him, the same door that had slammed behind his father on that tragic night. He had accomplished just nothing at all in that cabin of past horrors, nothing except to hear from a gentleman’s lips what his kind really thought of river people.
And he, Skippy Dare, was one of the river people—himself, the son of a rogue!
CHAPTER XII DRIFTING
Skippy nosed the motor boat toward the Hook. He had no thought of anything save that he was angry and hurt and wanted to feel the fresh, salt breeze blow over his burning face. He felt that he must think over this new and humiliating status in which Marty Skinner had so cruelly placed him, and he wanted to think of it where no one could see the unhappiness that it caused him.
He hadn’t the heart to turn back toward the Basin and home. Home! He frowned at the word, for it seemed that the _Minnie M. Baxter_ and all that it represented could bring him nothing now but recurring thoughts of the hated Skinner. All that the man had said had left its mark on the sensitive boy’s mind and for the first time in his life he felt a bitter hatred toward a fellow being.
That Marty Skinner, old Josiah Flint’s right-hand man, should call his father a rogue, was hardly to be endured. But if it were so, he reasoned in a calmer moment, then all the more reason for the blame to fall on the dead Josiah. Hadn’t Old Flint himself been the worst rogue of all?
He was tempted to return and shout these thoughts so that all aboard the _Apollyon_ might hear. He wanted to tell them what Toby had said about Josiah Flint making the despised Brown’s Basin possible because of his selfish, unscrupulous dealings.
But, boy-like, Skippy’s anger was soon reduced to a smoldering memory and his father’s imminent incarceration was a thing that had to be faced. Just now he was forced to think of his own present situation, for a significant sputtering from the motor gave warning that he was about to have trouble.
He had not his father’s knack for adjusting the rebellious motor, and so he decided to turn the boat about and make for the quieter waters of the bay. But just then the motor stalled and despite his earnest efforts, it refused to respond.
Skippy looked about him anxiously and saw that he had already been carried an alarming distance. Dusk was rapidly settling, hastened by the deepening haze and in a few moments the tide and undertow had swept him out of sight of all the anchored craft clustered about the _Apollyon_.
He looked hopefully toward the Hook but saw that it was useless to try and reach it even with the one oar that the little boat had in reserve. The tide was against him.
After a quick glance about, he hunted around among some neglected tools lying at his feet and picked out the searchlight. But that, too, refused to respond; the battery was dead. Then he looked for some matches only to meet with disheartening disappointment.
He got to his knees after that and worked furiously at the cold motor, squinting at his hopeless task in the near-darkness. The boom of thunder could be heard from out at sea, and with the swiftly passing minutes the storm came nearer and nearer until it broke directly overhead.
Lightning flashed across the drifting boat and Skippy dodged under the bow. There was something terrifying about the elements when one was alone and drifting steadily toward the sea in an open boat.
After a momentary lull, he crept out, not a little ashamed of his cowardice. He looked about, trying hard not to look or feel panicky despite the fact that he could see nothing of the Hook or anything else. Darkness and high, shadowy waves upon which the little boat bobbed were all that met his frightened gaze. Then a damp, cold wind began to blow.
He crouched down in the bottom of the boat with a feeling of dull despair. Rain pattered into an old rusty bait can that lay at his feet and he edged his shivering body closer under the bow. Curiously enough, he was quite calm now and the thought that his situation was dangerous did not enter his mind.
Skippy-like, he was thinking only that he was terribly hungry and more than anything else he wanted to eat.
CHAPTER XIII LIGHTS
The thunder and lightning died away after a time but the rain continued. The constant boom of the sea gradually wore away some of Skippy’s calm and he raised his head from time to time to gaze apprehensively at the dark sea rising all about him in mountainous waves.
The sky seemed a black void and at times as the little boat tossed about in the waves, he had the breath-taking sensation that he had turned turtle. Once, he mused about what probability there was of his being carried clear across the sea to some European port. He had heard of men being able to live without food or water from ten to fourteen days. Well, he had his fishing outfit, he reasoned hopefully; he needn’t starve, but how to get water puzzled him.
After a few more minutes of tossing wildly about, he decided that the little boat could probably never stand an ocean voyage. With each succeeding wave it came perilously near to upsetting and he doubted that the craft could triumph over the angry sea much longer.
That contingency awoke a strong determination in him, for he got to his feet, reached for the oar and struggled valiantly to balance the boat against the oncoming foe. The rain soaked him through to the skin but he was not cold for he was kept in constant action trying to make one oar do the work of two.
He had lost all sense of time and direction; he thought only of keeping the boat balanced. That he could not keep it up very long did not occur to him, for he already felt the effects of the past week’s malnutrition and his long journey from the Basin had fatigued him.
After what seemed an interminable time he caught a glimpse of a light, a faint gleam, but nevertheless a light. He gasped with joy and looked hard into the darkness to get a definite idea of its location. In point of fact he looked so hard he all but swamped the boat.
Great beads of perspiration stood out on his forehead when he righted the boat, but he came up triumphant on the crest of a wave. The exertion was too much for him, however; he felt inexpressibly weak and tired. His muscles ached and a giddiness in his head made him feel as if he must lie down.
But there was the light just ahead and he bent his frail body in a supreme effort to reach it. He was cheered because it did not seem to move and he ventured to hope that it might be on the shore. The main thing—it was a light, and light might reasonably be expected to mean rescue by all the rules of the game.
Suddenly a great arc of faint yellow light swept from behind and circled his head. He had come to no decision about its origin before it came again, a little brighter than before. Then after some minutes had passed and it had grown still brighter, it occurred to him that it was from the lighthouse at the Hook and the great light had gradually penetrated the fast dissolving haze.
He took heart at this because he knew he could not be so very far away from land. But he knew it was futile to even hope to get back there in his boat. It might be ten miles and it might be twenty. The great light at the Hook boasted a range of thirty miles on a clear night, he had heard his father say.
The light that gave him real hope was the heartening glimmer just ahead. He knew that it was not just because he wished it so fervently, but he could plainly see that it became brighter as the boat advanced.
Then suddenly he heard the faint ringing of a bell, which echoed eerily on the shifting wind.
CHAPTER XIV THE BELL BUOY
He listened intently and thought that it came from the direction of the light. It rang again and again, each time a little louder. Suddenly, however, he was aware that the light seemed no longer stationary. He had the disheartening experience of realizing that his beacon of hope was a running light on a fishing smack. He felt like crying as he watched the shadowy hull gaining speed for he realized that she must have just started ahead, having waited for the wind to change.
Every wave carried her farther and farther away from the watching boy. If he had only got there just a little sooner, he thought dismally. But he had done the best he could. There was nothing left now but to sit and watch her swallowed up by the darkness and the mountainous seas and that had happened in a few minutes’ time.
He was glad he had not been foolish enough to hope that he could reach her and overtake her, only to be disappointed and use up what little strength he had left. That at least was some satisfaction and it helped him bear his desperate plight a little more patiently.
The constant booming of the sea had a queer effect on his sensitive ears. He imagined himself to be hearing all sorts of noises, particularly the ringing of the bell. At times he could have sworn he heard it right at hand and at other times it seemed but a mocking echo.
The air was quite clear now, though the rain continued, and Skippy saw to his dismay that the boat was getting a little too full of water for his safety. He put down the oar for a while and bailed her out with his rusty bait can.
The little boat tossed against each rising wave like a feather; but he worked feverishly and trusted to luck that it would not upset. Then after a few minutes he was startled by the sound of the bell ringing right over his head. Before he had time to look up he felt the boat bump hard against something.
He was on his feet in a second and saw to his great surprise that the boat was alongside of a bell buoy.
It has been truly said that time and tide wait for no man and certainly Skippy was aware of this instantly, for in the next second a giant wave had washed him out of reach of the buoy. This realization made him desperate and he got into action to get back to it, for he well knew now that to drift on through the night would mean certain death.
With a swift movement he pushed his wet hair back from his high forehead. Then he bent over, got the oar and grabbed a rope, holding it tightly in his hand. And for fully five minutes he battled and struggled against the undertow.
His eyes were wide and staring from the strain and little streams of water ran down either cheek. His clothes from head to foot were weighted against him with water but he never stopped until he had brought the boat back against the buoy and in a second he had thrown the painter around it and pulled it taut.
That done he sank down in the bottom of the boat, exhausted.
For some time his mind was an utter blank. He was too tired and weak to think or even to care. But the rain beating steadily down on his unprotected body soon chilled him back into action and he got up and exercised his arms and legs.
As the buoy swayed upon each succeeding swell, the bell tolled mournfully. Its eerie echoes were faint and quickly lost in the noise of the pounding sea, and Skippy decided that no mariner ten minutes’ sail from the bell was likely to look that way. Also, the quick wash of the sea prevented the bell from tolling its loudest and longest. Nothing but his own two hands could do that.
And so he did it.
For the next hour he bent his frail body over the swaying buoy and swung the cold, wet bell back and forth, back and forth. Peal after peal tolled forth dismally and though his eyes became blurred with weariness he knew that he had missed nothing, for nothing had passed for him to miss.
So it went on through the long, dark hours. He would take an interval of rest and then jump up to his vigil at the bell for fear he would fall asleep and miss some passing ship.
The night seemed interminable. Indeed, he began to believe that he had fallen asleep and that a day had passed and another night had come without his being aware of it, for never had he thought the dark hours were so long.
Morning came at last and with the first streak of light on the eastern horizon, hope came back anew. The rain gradually ceased and during Skippy’s intervals of rest he watched, with not a little awe, the wonder of dawn at sea. Little by little the night fled before the roseate morn and soon the entire sky was flooded with soft light. And as the sun crept up out of the sea he stretched himself across the wet seats and relaxed.
Two hours later, he woke with the sun shining full in his face. He sat up, startled, and realized that his head was aching and that he felt stiff and chilled. Moreover, he felt sick with despair to think that he had slept away the hours of daylight, hours when a ship might have passed near enough for him to signal.
He stood up and scanned the sunlit water in all directions but there was not a sign of a sail, not a sign of a ship. In the distance, a gull soared high above the water and after a moment another one seemed to leap out of space and join it.
The tide was going out and the whole surface of the blue-green water seemed to roll on toward the horizon in a series of undulating hills. A gentle murmur filled the warm, sunlit air and Skippy could not believe that the booming surf of the past night had been anything but a bad dream.
He rang the bell for a time but had to give it up because of a terrible giddiness in his head. And so for hours, he sat anxiously scanning the illimitable sea and sky, hoping, hoping, hoping....
Noon came and passed and the sun scorched him cruelly. The boat, too, had become a constant source of anxiety for she developed a leak and had to be continually bailed out, and he was thankful that he had not obeyed a former impulse and tried to row her east in the hope that he would strike the Hook.
Toward mid-afternoon he was conscious of pains in his chest, and his hunger and thirst were becoming unbearable, particularly the thirst, for the heat of the sun was intense. He wished fervently for the cooling rain of the night before.
Sunset came, however, and with it a soft, cool wind. Skippy welcomed it, but hated the gray light of approaching twilight that obliterated the deep blue clouds. It seemed to spell doom to him and he cried out in despair. If daylight had not brought rescue what hope was there left for another long night?
His hopes sprang up afresh, however, and he conceived the idea of tying to the bell a long length of rope which he found in the bottom of the boat. In this manner, he could ring it constantly just by pulling the rope which required little exertion on his part. By dusk he was feeling too sick to either stand or sit up.
He entered his second night at sea both hopeful and despairing. Every doleful clang from the bell brought him hope but in the following silence it would quickly vanish and he would sink in depths of despair. Then with his fast-ebbing strength he would pull hopefully at the rope again.
[Illustration: EVERY DOLEFUL CLANG FROM THE BELL BROUGHT SKIPPY HOPE.]
And so the bell tolled on through the long night hours.
CHAPTER XV RESCUED
A few hours before dawn a long, trim, high-powered motor boat cut through the placidly rolling waves. Its motor was so muffled that it emitted no more than a low droning sound and could be heard for only a short distance, despite the fact that it had been let out to full speed.
Besides the man at the wheel the boat carried six men, three standing fore and three aft. One of the men aft half lounged over the coaming and his broad shoulders and large, amiable face all but filled the stern of the boat. The spray constantly swept over his big, dangling hands and the salt moisture struck at his tanned cheeks but he seemed not to notice. His entire attention, like that of his comrades, was centered on the grayish black horizon; his eyes seemed to miss nothing, yet there was an abstracted look in them that the man at the wheel did not fail to notice.
“Whadja hear, Big Joe?” he asked quietly.
The big man nodded his head without moving his body.
“’Tis that buoy,” he said absently. “Sure and she’s goin’ a great rate for such a calm, me lad. Even in pretty bad storms I niver knowed Flint’s buoy to be ringin’ like that.”
“Flint’s?” queried another of the men, interested.
Big Joe Tully smiled reminiscently.
“And why not? ’Tis what most o’ Flint’s men called it. ’Tis a buoy at the intrance to Kennedy’s Channel and ’tis a bad spot, if iver there was wan. Ye niver know how the tide’s goin’ to act. ’Tis like a colleen what can’t make up her mind, and she’s not to be trusted, so nobody goes by that way. Besides, ’tis a long way round past the Hook. Anyways, the ould boss took advantage o’ that place and we used to meet some o’ his best customers there and unload the stuff to thim.”
“Not a bad idea takin’ us by there for an eyeful, hey, Tully?” suggested the man at the wheel. “Long’s you’ve decided on playin’ ball with us, since we squared that case ’gainst you, we might as well take your tips. Seems like a wise mug like ol’ Flint never made no mistakes. He got rich an’ the law never got him so if _he_ picked out a spot like this buoy, he must ’a’ known what he was doin’. Mebbe it’ll be a pretty good spot for our customers too?”
They all laughed at this, but Big Joe Tully merely smiled and glanced down at the compass.
“Sure and ould Flint made his mistakes and plenty,” he said in his soft, deep voice. “He made mistakes whin he didn’t watch out that the coppers didn’t take the scows o’ men what was workin’ for his racket. And he made a mistake whin he stuck Toby Dare with a piece o’ junk. I guess he thought he’d be puttin’ me on me uppers where I’d be goin’ back and beg him for work.”
“He got knocked off fust, didn’t he, Big Joe?” laughed the man at the wheel.
“That he did. ’Tis too bad he couldn’t ’a’ lived to see how quick I connected with you guys.”
“It’s too bad he couldn’ lived anyways,” said another of the men, “’cause that poor guy Dare wouldn’t be in the can then. Anyhow I don’t think he knocked him off. I think he’d liked to ’cause Flint give him a lousy break, but I believe what he said in court that some other guy beat him to it.”
“I know lots o’ guys what were layin’ for ould Flint,” said Big Joe. “Sure he’d been dead a dozen times if iverywan what had it in for him, did what they said they’d like to. That’s why they won’t be holdin’ poor Toby.”
“All the same, they _are_ holdin’ poor Toby,” said the man at the wheel. “He was sentenced late yesterday afternoon for twenty years to life an’ by this time he’s hittin’ the hay in the big house, that’s what.”
“And didn’t ye hear!” said another. “His kid, Skippy, ain’t been seen since he had a talk with Marty Skinner aboard the _Apollyon_. Poor kid, he went there to plead for his old man, the paper says, and that hardshell Skinner wouldn’t give him a break, I guess. The second mate told a reporter that the kid left the yacht in a rush, hopped in his kicker and beat it for the Hook. Guess he thought as long as he couldn’t do nothin’ for Toby, he’d get away somewhere and try an’ fergit. Well, that’s life.”
Big Joe Tully clenched his knotted, hairy fists.
“Sufferin’ swordfish!” he said. “Poor Toby! And that poor kid! ’Tis a howlin’ shame, so ’tis.”
“Know ’em?” asked the man at the wheel.
“I oughta—I worked ’longside o’ Toby doin’ Flint’s jobs night after night, so I did. A whiter guy than Toby niver lived. He ain’t old—thirty-four or so. Got married whin he was a kid and his wife died. He’s crazy ’bout that kid o’ his, Skippy. ’Tis what makes me feel bad.” Big Joe looked down at the compass once more. “North, northeast,” he said to the man at the wheel. “We oughta be at Flint’s buoy in twinty minutes. There’s the light from the Hook.”
They watched intently the great sweeping arc of light swinging over the smoothly rolling water. The motor boat plunged north, then northeast and in Big Joe Tully’s eyes was a thoughtful, puzzled expression, the closer they got to the buoy.
“D’ye say there ain’t somethin’ spooky ’bout the way that bell’s ringin’?” he asked his comrades. “Did ye iver hear a bell on a buoy ring like that without stoppin’? ’Tain’t natural, ’cause....”
Just then he caught a glimpse of the little kicker bobbing merrily alongside the buoy.
CHAPTER XVI RIVER PEOPLE
“An’ when I sees ye layin’ in the bottom o’ that kicker, I’d swore I was seein’ things so I would,” Big Joe Tully was saying. “Lucky I gets it in me noodle that somethin’s wrong the way that bell keeps ringin’.”
The shanty of the _Minnie M. Baxter_ was bright with the light of mid-morning. The floor had been scrubbed almost to whiteness, the table was laid with a soft Turkey red cloth and the lamp looked shiny and clean. Skippy’s feverish eyes took it all in before he turned on his pillow.
“I felt so sick, I didn’t exactly know it was you,” he said weakly. “I heard voices, but I couldn’t think what it was all about. All I’d thought all night was that I hadda keep on ringin’ the bell.”
“Sure, kid, and ye rang it!” said Big Joe with a light laugh.
“An’ you sure saved me,” Skippy smiled in return. “Gee, it was lucky you came that way, huh? Where’d you been?”
Big Joe lighted a cigarette and puffed on it before answering.
“Sure an’ just puttin’ the big eye on some new location for a new racket,” he said softly. “I got six men with me.”
“Is it—is it gonna be straight?” Skippy asked.
“Nah,” Big Joe laughed. “Who’ll be straight in the Basin and live like a human bein’? As ’tis, what they got? They’re all doin’ the higher-up’s dirty work; but _me_, I ain’t so foolish even if ould Flint tipped off the coppers and they grab me scow. I got a little money and I’ll work this new racket and make lots more. The doctor says ye’ve got a pretty weak lung so ye need a month in bed and the best o’ food. Well, sufferin’ swordfish, we’ll dig up the dough so’s ye’ll be fat an’ sassy ’fore Toby comes out.”
Skippy’s eyes lighted up.
“Gee, Mr. Tully, it must be costin’ an awful lotta money for a lawyer to appeal the case, huh?”
Big Joe waved a large hand deprecatingly.
“Forget it, Skippy. Ain’t I doin’ it for a good friend and ain’t I doin’ it so’s ye won’t see Toby in the can for twinty years or more? Don’t ye be worryin’ ’bout the dough, me lad. I made it with the scow easy. Now it’ll do you and Toby some good, so ’twill.”
“Gee whiz,” breathed the boy gratefully. “It’s too much for you to do for Pop and me ’cause we can’t pay it back—_never_!”
“That’s why ye gotta be forgettin’ it!” Tully protested. “I ain’t got nobody to spend it on, kid, so I might’s well spend it on you and Toby. I’d only leave it to ye in me will whin I died!” He laughed loudly. “Now’ll we be good friends, kid?”
Skippy had to fight back the tears before he smiled.
“Gee, _sure_! Gee, I like you an awful lot, Mis——”
“Cut out the _Mister_, kid! Big Joe’s me monicker, and nothin’ else. Now anythin’ more on that big mind o’ yourn?”
Skippy nodded hesitantly.
“Gee—gee whiz,” he stammered, “I just was thinkin’ wouldn’t it be nice if you had enough money so you didn’t have to go into any crooked rackets for a while, huh? Gee, I’d like to think you didn’t have to do it, honest I would, Big Joe! Maybe I’ll be able to go to work when I get strong and I’ll be able to help then, huh? Maybe we can live on clean, honest money like Pop wanted me to, huh? Besides, the money you’re helpin’ Pop and me with is kind of from when you were runnin’ your barge straight, isn’t it?”
Big Joe got up from his chair, went over to the table and ground out his cigarette stub in an ash tray. Then he came back and leaning over Skippy’s bunk, he rumpled the boy’s hair playfully.
“’Tis a funny lad ye be, Skippy. But I s’pose ye be gettin’ it from Toby. He was always agin doin’ Flint’s work. Said he wouldn’t ’a’ started it if he hadn’t been takin’ care o’ ye so much daytimes whin ye was sick with that throat business.”
“Pop was always honest inside, that shows it,” said Skippy proudly.
Big Joe smiled.
“Anyways ye’re right about me runnin’ me barge straight the first year,” he said vehemently. “I did.” Then: “So ye want me on the level? Well, we’ll be seein’ about that but we ain’t goin’ to starve I’ll be tellin’ ye, so I will.”
Skippy’s eyes were shining.
“You’ll get along if people can see you’re tryin’ to be honest, that’s what Pop said.”
“Sufferin’ swordfish, kid,” said Big Joe. “Be quittin’ thinkin’ ’bout anythin’ now ’ceptin’ gettin’ better. And no more talk about work when ye’re better. Sufferin’ swordfish, ye ain’t nothin’ but skin and bones, the doctor said! Ye’re as pale as a ghost, too. Eggs, milk and chicken soup is what ye need and what ye’ll be gettin’.”
“Who’ll fix ’em?” Skippy asked, chuckling weakly.
“Our nixt door neighbor on the _Dinky O. Cross_,” Big Joe said. “She’s a right nice woman, kid—Mrs. Duffy, and as soon as she sees us carryin’ ye in she said it milted her heart. So we put a plank across to her scow and she come in here and did ’bout iverythin’ ’fore the doctor come. I give her the dough for the things and she’s cookin’ thim now.”
“She’s a—she’s one of the river people, huh? Like _you_, Big Joe?” Skippy asked wondering.
“Like you and me, Skippy me boy,” answered Big Joe, nodding his head. “She’s one o’ our people, the kind what helps their own whin there’s trouble.”
Skippy shut his eyes to visualize the stern, cold visage of Marty Skinner. Hadn’t he talked of river people as if they were all of a kind? Hadn’t he said they were all crooks and criminals?
Big Joe had put him in that category of river people, he who had never disobeyed a law in his young life! He resented it and wanted to say so, but his better judgment prevailed against it and he decided to wait and see what kind of people these river people of Brown’s Basin really were. Certainly if they were all like Big Joe Tully, Skinner had much to learn.
It was the buxom Mrs. Duffy who decided it, some moments later. She came in like the fresh morning breeze from the inlet, clean-aproned and smiling, laden with soup and eggnog and a wealth of bright cretonne tucked under her generous arm.
“Cretonne curtains for thim little windows, bhoy,” she said breathlessly. “Mr. Tully give me the money for ’em an’ I made ’em up ’fore I come over. It’ll seem more like home to ye in Brown’s Basin whin ye see ’em from the outside. The inlet’s dismal enough, so ’tis, without starin’ at it through bare, dirty winders; ain’t I right, Mr. Tully?”
“Guess so,” Big Joe answered a little abashed. “Women folks know more about thim things, but even me, I be likin’ that bright stuff flutterin’ around a winder. Ye got the soup an’ everythin’?”
Mrs. Duffy’s smile was vast and it swept from Big Joe to the wan-looking Skippy.
“Ye’ll pick up, so ye will, or me and Mr. Tully’ll be to blame, Skippy,” she said heartily.
Skippy almost choked with gratitude. He tried to speak, but could only think that these were river people—his people! Big Joe, who was spending a lot of money so that his father might have another chance for freedom and who would spare no expense to nurse him back to health. And Mrs. Duffy, who was bringing cheer into the shanty of the _Minnie M. Baxter_ and who seemed to care so much that he get well!
_River people?_ Skinner didn’t know what he was talking about! He, Skippy Dare, was proud to be one of the river people.
CHAPTER XVII MUGS
Many delightful weeks Skippy spent after he was up and around. Day after day, he and Big Joe roamed the length and breadth of the river, and often they went down the bay and across to some unfrequented beach where they swam and fished to their hearts’ content.
Skippy soon showed the effects of his healthful life and Mrs. Duffy’s fine cooking. He was browned from head to foot and his flat chest had expanded two inches. And what was more, he had learned to triumph over tears.
That in itself was a great achievement, for he had great need to practice self-control during the fall and the winter following. The gods themselves seemed to have cast sorrowful glances over the _Minnie M. Baxter_ and Skippy’s mettle was tried to the breaking point sometimes, yet always he came up smiling. Very often it was a poignant smile, the kind that pierced Big Joe Tully’s almost invulnerable heart and set him to doing all sorts of extravagant things so that he might see the pain effaced from the boy’s face and hear him laugh happily.
That was why on the evening of Toby’s retrial, Big Joe left the shanty of the _Minnie M. Baxter_ in awkward haste. He had left Skippy smiling a smile so poignant that he could bear it no longer.
“Big Joe,” the boy said when they were dawdling over the most luxurious meal that Tully’s money could buy, “it was most like throwin’ money away, huh? They don’t wanta let Pop get out, I guess. They can’t find the man that really did it and they’ve gotta have somebody so I s’pose they think it might’s well be my Pop. Now he _will_ be in for life on account of the way they tripped him up in his answers. Gee, how could he remember word for word what he said at his first trial? People don’t remember word for word ’bout things like that. Poor Pop was so nervous I got chills down my back.”
“Don’t ye be gettin’ down, kid,” Tully protested; “’tis not sayin’ we’re licked till they turn down an appeal. We got some more dough.”
“So much money,” said Skippy with a note of wonder in his high-pitched voice. “Gee, Big Joe, you’ve spent so much on Pop an’ me already. Now you wanta spend the last you got! Gee whiz, I can’t let you—_I can’t_! Much as I wanta see Pop free. It ain’t fair lettin’ you spend all your hard-earned money....”
Tully had long since learned that he could not lie to Skippy.
“Sure an’ this last coin ain’t hard-earned, kid,” he said not a little abashed. “So ye see ’cause it ain’t, it might’s well be used for springin’ your old man.”
“All right, if you say it like that,” said Skippy with a slightly reproving smile. Suddenly he squared his shoulders; then: “Anyway, next to Pop, Big Joe, I like you best. Gee, ain’t you been just like Pop even! So I don’t care if that money’s not so straight, but d’ye think it’ll be lucky for Pop? Sometimes I wonder if crooked money ain’t hard luck in the end. Maybe when you’re broke you can start over clean?”
“We’ll see what the breaks’ll be bringin’ this winter, kid,” Big Joe had mumbled. “We’ll see, so we will.”
And it was Skippy’s answering smile that drove Big Joe off the barge for a few hours. When he returned late in the evening, he had a fluffy sort of bundle in his big arms and an expansive smile on his face.
“Three guesses what’s in me arms,” he said with a mischievous wink, standing half in and half out of the doorway.
“Is it dead or alive?” Skippy asked chuckling.
“’Tis the liveliest little guy ye ever see.” Big Joe stooped over and released the fluffy bundle from his arms and presently an Airedale pup put its four young and rather unsteady legs on the shanty floor.
Skippy laughed out loud. He twisted his hands together in a gesture of delight, then got to his knees and coaxed the puppy to him.
“It’s got brown eyes like a reg’lar angel,” he said.
“An’ brown legs like the divil,” Big Joe laughed; “the divil for runnin’ into mischief. The man what I bought him from said he was a son-of-a-sufferin’ swordfish for runnin’ an’ chewin’. But he’ll be gettin’ better as he gets older, so he will. Ain’t he got the cute little mug though, kid!”
Skippy looked up with shining eyes, then drew the puppy up to him.
“Big Joe, that’s his name—it’s a swell name for him! Mug—_Mugs_, huh? With that funny little face he couldn’t be called anything else.”
“Sure, sure, kid. Anythin’ ye say. Mugs it’ll be, so ’twill.” He coughed. “And will he be makin’ ye happy now, kid?”
“_Happy!_ Big Joe, Mugs’ll make me happy ’cause you bought him to make me laugh. Gee, gee....” Skippy swallowed his emotion. “What for do you do so much, Big Joe?” he asked naïvely. “Gee—_why_?”
“’Cause ye be such a nice kid, so ye be,” the man answered, rumpling Skippy’s straight hair. “Ye kind o’ get under a guy’s skin—ye do that. Ye seem to be needin’ somebody for to look after ye, so ye do, an’ with Toby not about it might’s well be me.” He laughed nervously. “Besides I ain’t got nobody else at all, at all, kid, an’ even a tough guy like me does be needin’ company, so he does.”
Skippy hugged the puppy gratefully and he was so overwhelmed by Tully’s generosity that he could not speak. Never, he thought, did a boy have a friend like Big Joe!
His cup of happiness would have been filled to the brim and his father been released that day. But here again, Big Joe, like an angel of mercy, was making a last supreme effort to bring his father back to him. It seemed impossible that such gigantic effort could fail to bring a joyous result and he told Tully so.
“An’ when Pop gets out,” he said in conclusion, “I bet he’ll never forget what you’ve done an’ all, Big Joe. Even now he don’t forget it. He said it’s so gloomy and strict in prison that he’s sad all the time, ’specially ’cause he was so used to roamin’ all over the river free. Gee, he said the feller what really killed Mr. Flint was a coward ’cause he must know how it’s keepin’ Pop an’ me away from each other an’ he said he could almost kill him for doin’ that alone.”
“There, now, the ould man’ll be gettin’ out!” said Tully vehemently. “My last grand’ll do it, I be tellin’ ye! See if it don’t! Now ye ain’t goin’ to start worryin’ all over ’bout Toby now, are ye? An’ me gettin’ ye Mugs so’s to make it aisier like for ye.”
Skippy looked at the puppy sliding over the floor on his gawky legs. He laughed.
“Mugs makes up for an awful lot, Big Joe, but nobody could make up for Pop,” he said wistfully. “I never told Pop, ’cause he’d think it sounded silly, but I love him. You know, like I guess girls feel only they show it an’ talk about it, but I don’t. I couldn’t. But I’m just tellin’ you like a secret—see? I get a funny pain in my heart when I’m not seein’ Pop an’ it gets awful bad when I think maybe he won’t ever get out of prison.” Then at the sight of Big Joe’s frowning countenance, he added: “But it’s like I said, Big Joe, I like you almost as much as Pop. An’ now you’ve bought me Mugs—gee, how much’d you pay for him, huh?”
“’Tis nothin’,” said Big Joe smiling softly; “a coupla bucks. ’Course, they cost a little more thin just muts, but the man at the dog place said thim Airedales be great for protectin’ kids so I think maybe he’d be good for ye nights when I might be out with the boys. He’ll be comp’ny anyways.”
A little later, when Big Joe was having a good-night smoke alone on the deck, he took out of his pocket a piece of paper, and in the light gleaming from the cabin windows he glanced at it curiously. It was a receipt for one Airedale puppy; price, one hundred and fifty dollars.
He smiled, shrugged his powerful shoulders and tearing the paper into bits let it drop in the inlet. Then he turned his trousers’ pockets outward and laughed ruefully.
“Broke,” he said half aloud. “Sure and ’tis aisy come, aisy go. And now for to be gettin’ some more dough. The kid’ll be needin’ it so——” He shrugged as if getting money was the least of his troubles.
CHAPTER XVIII BAD NEWS
Skippy had food and plenty of it during the next month. Big Joe saw to that though it kept him away from the barge many hours at night, hours when he lived in mortal fear that the boy would develop a “bad throat” and be seriously sick before he could get back.
Skippy’s “bad throat” had become a veritable bugaboo to Tully and though he had no definite idea of what it was, the fear of its recurrence stalked every hour that he spent away from the boy. And when he did return he would tiptoe into the silent shanty and up to the boy’s bunk, sighing with relief to find him sleeping quietly. Then, when he had made sure there was no sign of the pinched look and feverish cheek, he would climb into his own bunk with a light on his face that would have surprised his rough comrades.
Skippy saw this light on Tully’s face one early morning. He saw it from under half-opened lids and it made him glad until he noticed the quick look of concern that passed over the man’s tanned brow.
“What’s up, Big Joe?” he asked anxiously.
“So it’s awake ye be?” Big Joe returned nervously. “Well now I was just lookin’ and seem’ if ye was all right. Sure an’ the weather’s gittin’ cold and all and I got wonderin’ how the throat was. I bought a new stove what’ll give ye lots o’ heat—it’s comin’ in the mornin’.”
“Gee whiz!” Skippy said gratefully, then: “You sorta looked worried.”
Big Joe turned his back and started to undress.
“I’ve got to be tellin’ ye sometime, kid—I—listen....”
“You’ve heard about Pop, huh?” Skippy sat up.
“Yes—they....”
“They what?” said Skippy anxiously.
“They turned down the appeal. But don’t be takin’ on about it, Skippy. Sure an’ next year we’ll be diggin’ up new evidence. Now....”
“I ain’t gonna take on, Big Joe, honest I ain’t,” said Skippy bravely. “On accounta you I ain’t. You been so good—all the money you spent tryin’ to get Pop free. An’ now—well, maybe if I don’t hope about it sumpin’ll happen, sometime.”
“Sure now that’s bein’ a good kid, takin’ it so aisy like. We’ll be tryin’ agin like I said. Some time Marty Skinner’ll get over his crazy notion that iverybody in Brown’s Basin’s agin him and that Toby did the job. Sure he hates iverybody here so much I hear he’s got Buck Flint to agree to buy the whole inlet. And thin he’ll be drivin’ us squatters out, so he will.”
“But he can’t do that!” Skippy protested indignantly. “He can’t drive me outa the _Minnie M. Baxter_ ’cause it’s Pop’s home—gee, the only home we got. I gotta stay here till—well, when I leave it, I’ll know I ain’t got any hope that he’ll come back.”
“And don’t I be knowin’ how ye feel, kid? But if Skinner’s put it in Buck Flint’s head that the inlet’s a good buy and the deal goes through, he’ll be orderin’ us out and we’ll be likin’ it. Buck ain’t a bad egg, but Skinner’s runnin’ the works and what he says goes, so it does. Now if he tells us to beat it I’m wonderin’ who’ll be towin’ a barge out o’ this mud whin she’s settled. Why, it’d take a derrick, so it would, an’ even then it’d be a chance.”
Skippy was deeply affected by this news. He could not sleep because of it and long after Big Joe was snoring comfortably he rolled and tossed in his bunk. Then, after a time, he thought of what Tully had said about the barges being too deeply settled in the mud to get them out, and he was so curious about it that he got up to see for himself.
He bundled himself up and slipped out onto the deck in the cold, damp air of an early fall morning. It was not yet dawn but the deep black of night had gone and Brown’s Basin lay silent in a dark gray mist.
Skippy leaned far over aft where the _Minnie M. Baxter_ was settled deepest in the mud. Up forward, the slinking waters of the inlet gurgled plaintively against the keel at high tide. Big Joe was right, he decided with sinking heart; it would take a derrick and more to pull the barge out of her muddy berth.
As he started to step back he noticed a tarpaulin to his right which seemed to be covering some bulky objects. Something that Big Joe had brought aboard, he thought, and curiously he raised one end of it. One glimpse told him enough.
They were stolen ships’ supplies, things that his father had told him a river pirate could easily dispose of to some unscrupulous ship captain. Skippy knew instantly how they had come there and he turned on his heel and had started back for the shanty when a searchlight suddenly fell full upon him.
He crouched out of its glare and needed but to look hastily up the inlet to see that it was the police boat bearing down upon the _Minnie M. Baxter_.
CHAPTER XIX DANGER
Feverishly, Skippy set to work and pushed the stolen goods overboard piece by piece. Most of them floated but a moment, then sank out of sight, and the rest floated at a safe enough distance from the oncoming launch to escape the eyes of the police.
[Illustration: FEVERISHLY SKIPPY PUSHED THE STOLEN GOODS OVERBOARD.]
When the last piece had been disposed of he rushed to the shanty, awakened Big Joe and told him what he had done.
“’Tis a good boy ye be, Skippy,” he praised. “Sure th’ bulls give me a chase tonight so they did and I couldn’ unload the goods on me customer so I brought thim here till tomorrow night. Ye’re a broth of a lad to be droppin’ thim over, so ye be.”
“Sh!” said Skippy, frightened. “Ain’t that them boardin’ us now?” He got out of his clothes and back into his bunk.
They listened in silence while the soft tramp of feet came along the deck. Skippy had reason to remember another terrible occasion when the police boat had come to take his father. He had thought then that it was only for a day.
He had only Big Joe now, his only friend in a singularly callous world. Would the law take him too? He couldn’t bear it—he wouldn’t bear it! He would like and protect Big Joe even if he was a murderer, the police wouldn’t take the one thing he had left!
They knocked insistently and Big Joe padded to the door, barefooted and feigning complete surprise. He invited them in, hurried ponderously to the rickety table and lighted the lamp. Mugs growled ominously.
The officers told Tully that a certain warehouse had been broken into that night. The watchman who had surprised the intruder thought he had recognized Big Joe Tully.
“Tonight?” Skippy piped up from his bunk. “It ain’t so ’cause Big Joe’s been here takin’ care of me since noon. I got one of my bad throats again an’ he wouldn’t go out ’cause I was feelin’ so bad.”
Who of the river front police hadn’t heard of Skippy Dare’s bad throat? None that had patrolled the harbor during the past four months. Hadn’t it been because of his frail boy that Toby Dare had fought his prison sentence so hard? The papers had been full of it too.
“So the throat’s cutting up again, eh Skippy?” asked Inspector Jones. He was the same man who had taken Toby away from his son.
Skippy, always a bit wan looking when he lay in his bunk, looked more wan than ever then. His pallor was not simulated; it was terribly real, for he was not only frightened at the prospect of losing Big Joe; he was frightened because of the barefaced lie he had just told—the first in his life.
“I always gotta be careful of my throat, Mister,” he said to the officer when the worst of his emotion had passed. “’Specially when it gets cold. Sometimes I get fever right away an’ the doctor told Big Joe the last time that I gotta right away have attention.”
“Sure and the lad’s right,” Big Joe interposed with genuine feeling in his voice, “he’s got only me to be lookin’ after him now.”
“What you doing for a living, Big Joe?” asked the officer a little pointedly.
Big Joe stifled a yawn and sat down on a chair.
“Me?” he asked innocently. “Ye mean what’ll I do when the money I saved from me barge gives out, is it? With the way Flint blackballed me ’fore he died, I guess I’ll have to be workin’ out o’ the bay next summer, so I do.”
“Got enough for you and the kid till next summer?” the officer persisted.
“Sure and ’tis lucky I have, the way things be,” answered Big Joe.
The officer leveled his eyes at Tully.
“For the kid’s sake, watch your step, Big Joe,” he said with a warning note. “For the kid’s sake....”
Skippy couldn’t believe they had gone. It seemed too good to be true, and in order to reassure him, Big Joe put something around him and went out on deck to see that the launch had actually gone.
“Sure she’s aisy out to the river by this time,” he assured Skippy when he came back. He lighted a cigarette and sat down. “Now was that a close shave I’ll be askin’,” he exclaimed. “And I can be thankin’ ye for it, kid. I never expected thim to come stealin’ up on us here, no, I didn’t.”
“See it don’t pay, Big Joe!” Skippy said gently. He seemed spent with the great strain. “People know a big guy like you anywheres an’ besides like I say, it don’t pay anyhow. Gee, if you can’t get honest work ’cause Flint blackballed you then I gotta work myself. I can get a job as office boy in a warehouse. I bet I can!”
“Nix, kid, nix, ye ain’t well enough,” Big Joe protested hotly. “Besides I don’t niver take things from folks what are hard up, Skippy. I——”
“Lemme try it, Big Joe, huh? I’m better now’n I been in a long time, so lemme try it! I’m not kickin’ ’bout you. Gee, I can see how it is now. Even Pop once told me how hard it was for a blackballed man to get back along the river. You spent all your money on Pop an’ me an’ we hadda eat an’ live, so what was you gonna do! I shoulda known before that your money couldn’t last forever—gee! All you’ve done for me, Big Joe—lemme try!”
Tully was still protesting at daylight, but Skippy, having made up his mind, fell peacefully to sleep with the dog tucked snugly under his outstretched arm. Big Joe sat watching them until long after the sun came up.
“Sure and the kid lied for me,” he said as he climbed back into his bunk. “Sure and that nice kid lied for me—_me_!”
And as his large features settled in slumber, they looked strangely troubled.
CHAPTER XX A JOB
Skippy left the barge noiselessly that morning and did not return until six o’clock in the evening. Consequently, Big Joe spent a troubled day, waiting and hoping and fearing. When he saw the boy crossing the plank from the _Dinky O. Cross_, he hurried to the door.
“And where have ye been, Skippy?” he called anxiously. “Here and ye been havin’ me crazy wonderin’ if ye’d run away!”
Skippy laughed and greeted Mugs who seemed to be growing by the minute. Then he swung energetically into the shanty and sat down to a hot supper that Mrs. Duffy had faithfully sent over.
“Guess what, Big Joe?”
“Sure and ye’ll not be for quittin’ me ’cause o’ what happened last night?” Big Joe returned trying not to sound anxious.
“I should say not. Whad’ye think I am? I ain’t yeller, Big Joe. Besides I like you too much. What I wanta say is, I got a job.”
Tully frowned.
“It ain’t gonna be hard,” Skippy assured him. “I’m the new office boy at the Central Warehouse an’ I’ll get ten bucks a week. So now you needn’t be scareda cops.”
Tully smiled in spite of himself. “My now, ain’t that just fine. Ain’t that just fine, kid. But do ye be knowin’ who’s boss o’ the Central?”
“No. Who?”
“Marty Skinner, actin’ as Buck Flint’s agent, no less.”
“Well, he can see then that my Pop brought me up honest an’ hard workin’,” said Skippy after a moment’s surprise.
“Sure, to be sure and he can that, but shiverin’ swordfish, don’t ye be goin’ on expectin’ too much from him, kid. D’ye be thinkin’ he’s wise ye be on the payroll?”
“No.”
“Well, now, just ye be waitin’ till he is. Just ye be....”
Skippy did not have long to wait. He had completed his first week’s work in the Central Warehouse when one day he heard a hushed voice pass around the awesome news that “the boss” was coming.
Skinner recognized Skippy as soon as he stepped into the room. There were a few questions asked and Skippy trudged back to the _Minnie M. Baxter_ that night with a heavy heart.
Big Joe was all sympathy.
“And what was he sayin’ to ye, kid?”
“He wanted to know how I come to get a job there,” Skippy answered dolefully. “Wanted to know how I had nerve enough an’ said I was there as a spotter for my father’s gang probably. An’ before he finished he said it was lucky there hadn’t been a robbery there or he’d handed me right over to the police then an’ there. _Me_—me that ain’t done him a bitta harm an’ that wouldn’t! Gee, Big Joe, ain’t it enough that he helped put Pop where he is? Can’t he see how _I_ am?”
“None o’ ’em can see anythin’, kid,” Big Joe answered, bitterly. “That’s the trouble with me and Toby and every man in this Basin. Sure ’tis ’cause the likes o’ Skinner can’t see. They don’t even give us a chance, they don’t ’cause we’re river folks. They tell us so much that we’re crooked that we wind up that way whither we want to or not, so we do. They make us be crooked. And now they be startin’ in on you, kid. ’Tis a dirty shame, so ’tis.”
“I’ll get some other place,” Skippy was defiant. “They’re not gonna make me crooked when I don’t wanna be.”
“Skippy, kid,” thought Tully from the depths of his river front wisdom, “I ain’t so sure, I ain’t so sure.” But what he said was: “Sure and that they’ll not, Skippy me boy, that they’ll not.”
CHAPTER XXI WHAT NEXT?
Weary week after weary week passed for Skippy until the winter months had come and gone. March arrived, cold, blustery and disappointing, for he hadn’t yet been able to hold a job longer than it took his employers to find out just who their office boy was. And as gossip spreads quickly along the river front, the discouraged boy seldom drew more than a few days’ pay at a time.
He had learned upon being dismissed from his last job the reason why employers had no use for his services. He demanded to know.
“Is it ’cause my father’s in prison?” he asked wistfully. “’Cause if it is nobody is fair in the world. You’ve heard, I bet, that lots of innocent people are in jail so can’t you believe maybe my father could be one of them? And anyway, does that prove that I’m....”
The employer, thus confronted, protested.
“No,” he said in that self-righteous tone that was beginning to wear on Skippy’s nerves, “we think that you, yourself, mean to be honest but we know that you can’t hold out long against such home conditions as the Basin offers. A wage such as a boy like you with your limited education can earn isn’t enough to provide you with all you want. And sooner or later, your association with a person like Big Joe Tully will have its effect on you.”
“My Pop was gonna send me to school so’s I could get educated,” Skippy protested, “but anyway I’m honest an’ I’m gonna stay honest, no matter what you think. Besides, Big Joe’s tried to live straight all this winter for my sake, but are you an’ everybody else I’ve tried to work for tryin’ to help him? No, nobody won’t even give him a job so he can stay straight. An’ now you won’t let me stay ’cause I live with him, because you’re afraid....”
“My dear boy,” the employer interposed patronizingly, “can you blame us? Tully has served a jail sentence for robbing our warehouses. How can we be certain that he won’t do it again? Or that he won’t use your position of trust in our offices to learn more easily what goods we have in our warehouses that he can steal? What assurance can you give us that he don’t do that when he gets tired treading the straight and narrow path? None. Absolutely none! No, we warehouse owners have been too long aware that it is you thieving river people who are responsible for our tremendous losses every year. And so we maintain that, once a thief, always a thief!”
Skippy was wounded and bitter. His full, generous lips curled sardonically.
“Then it ain’t any use to try to make you understand,” he said bravely. “You warehouse people complain that we’re thieves an’ you make us thieves just like you’re tryin’ to make me one by keepin’ me outa jobs so’s I can’t make an honest livin’. An’ anyway, if the only way I could hold a job is to quit Big Joe then I won’t do it! I’d rather _be_ a thief, yes I would! He saved my life and he’s helped my Pop ... oh, what’s the use!”
He slammed the door behind him and rushed home to find Big Joe with his faithful, smiling face. Plank after plank he hurried over, connecting the barges, and at last he crossed the deck of the _Dinky O. Cross_, waved a greeting to the smiling Mrs. Duffy and whistled for Mugs when he reached the plank of the _Minnie M. Baxter_.
“And have ye lost the job, kid?” Big Joe asked when he entered the shanty.
“My last job, Big Joe,” the boy answered smiling ruefully. “You were right about ’em—there ain’t one that’ll gimme a chance. Even you who ain’t always been honest yourself did more than that! You let me try at least. They know more about you than I did—they know you served time.”
“Sure and that’s why they’re blackballin’ ye, is it? ’Cause ye’re stickin’ with me?” His bland face looked dark and ominous. Then as he glanced at the boy’s wistful countenance, his expression softened: “I’m tellin’ ye the truth, kid, whin I say that they railroaded me, so they did—I was startin’ in honest like you. Office boy. Thin one night the warehouse was robbed and next mornin’ they accused me o’ workin’ with the gang—tippin’ ’em off. ’Cause I’d been seen ’round with one o’ the guys what was caught. I got a year, I did, and didn’t have a chance. When I come out I was blackballed and Ol’ Flint took me under. Sufferin’ swordfish, sure and I’ve tried twice now to travel on the up and up. When I first got my barge and now. And ’tis no use, ’tis no use.”
“Seems that way,” Skippy murmured, disconsolate. “Now I ain’t gonna try. I’m gonna live an’ eat like other fellers my age. I wanta go to the movies an’ take things up to Pop when I go to see him. Gee, already he’s startin’ to write to me that the food’s bad up at the big house. So I gotta help him have a little sumpin’ to smile at if he’s gonna be there the rest of his life! An’ I gotta have money to go to see him—I gotta see him! If they won’t lemme earn it honest—_what else_? Like the man said, I don’t know enough to work anywheres else.”
“And ye’ll be wantin’ to quit me, kid? Ye’ll be wantin’ to go away and start over where they don’t know ’bout river people and all?” Big Joe’s anxiety was pathetic.
“I’m afraid of places too far away from the river,” Skippy admitted. “I guess I got the river in me like Pop, huh? I ain’t got nerve enough to break away. Besides I sorta promised Pop I’d stay by the _Minnie M. Baxter_. S’pose just by a lucky break the governor pardons Pop some day, huh? He’s paid good money for this barge an’ it’s the only home he’s got. Besides, I don’t wanta quit you, Big Joe—_I couldn’t_!”
And Skippy’s decision stood until Brown’s Basin was no more....
CHAPTER XXII BIG JOE’S IDEA
In May, Big Joe conceived a brilliant idea for making a living. He came into the shanty of the barge with it one balmy noon, for it was embodied in a large canvas bag which he carried in his big outstretched hand.
“Sure and now we be goin’ to eat, kid, and we be goin’ to live high, and ye be goin’ to do all the things ye’ want for Toby,” he said chuckling.
“Stealin’?” Skippy asked, looking worried and wan. “As hard up as we been, Big Joe, I can’t stand for sneakin’ down the river at night an’ climbin’ into warehouse windows. Gee, Pop’d feel fierce if we was caught an’ I was put in reform school or sumpin’ like that!”
“And d’ye be thinkin’ I ain’t carin’ no more for ye than seein’ ye grabbed for somethin’ like that, me boy? Kid, I been thinkin’ and thinkin’ o’ some way for us to be gettin’ by—some way that no copper could catch us up on. And if they iver should ’twon’t be you what’d be holdin’ the bag—’twill be me, ’cause I’m the one what’ll do the trick. Do you catch on?”
“What trick, Big Joe?”
“’Tis the stuff I got in this bag, kid,” answered Tully softly. “’Tis ground carbon and whin it’s poured in with oil it raises the divil with thim nice engines in rich guys’ boats up at the Riverview Yacht Club. From now on till the end o’ summer they’re takin’ trips—see? Well, sure and Big Joe’s got a good pal what looks out for the boats up there ... he’s told beforehand what rich guy’s goin’ out in his boat, he is ... my pal tells me and I go up there—see? Him and me edge aisy like towards the boat and whilst he’s lookin’ out the corners o’ his eye that no one’s comin’, Big Joe uncovers the crank case and ’fore ye could say _scat_, I’m pourin’ me little powder in the breather pipe and sure she’s mixin’ with the oil.”
“An’ what then?” Skippy asked, nervous, yet admiring Big Joe’s ingenious idea.
Big Joe winked, then laughed.
“Sure, I pour the right amount o’ this powder, kid,” he said, “thin I beats it off quick and watch the rich guy start, so I do. If ’tis possible, me pal finds out where the guy’s goin’ so’s I can beat it on ahead and circle his course so I come up on him by the time his ingine’s dead—see?”
“The powder mixes through the oil an’ up through the engine, huh?” Skippy asked fearfully. “Makes the engine go dead, huh?”
“Sure ’tis ground up like nobody’s business, kid,” Big Joe laughed. “An’ I make sure o’ puttin’ in enough so’s I’ll be knowin’ about where the ingine goes dead on thim. And thin I chug up to thim all innocent like and asks do they want help. _Do_ they? Sure they must be towed back so I says I don’t think I’m their man ’cause I’ll be losin’ business somewheres or other—see? And they’re so anxious they’ll be willin’ to pay me price, so they will. And I gotta be paid for the loss o’ me time!” He laughed heartily.
“I—I—gee, in a way that’s worse than pulling a warehouse, Big Joe? It ain’t so dangerous, but....”
“Kid, sure I thought ye’d be takin’ on, but I can tell ye it ain’t so bad at all, at all. I’ll be pickin’ out only thim what’s payin’ tin and twinty grand for their kickers! What’s the cost to thim what throws away hundreds o’ bucks at a time? And what’s fifty or seventy-five bucks for to be payin’ me for towin’ thim back? Sure ’tis a drop in the bucket, says I. They’ll niver be missin’ it, kid. And we gotta live, you and me, and Toby’s case’s gotta go before the governor some day and that takes money too.”
Skippy nodded and Big Joe noticed that the old pinched look had come back to his thin cheeks.
“Kid, ye can’t be goin’ on like this, you and me!” he pleaded. “Like I said ’tis only the big guys—guys what have the heavy sugar. We’ll be layin’ off the others and we’ll be workin’ the different clubs so nobody gets wise. Thim boat tenders’ll go along for a little o’ the split. So ye needn’t be worryin’ that we’re takin’ thim what can’t afford it! Besides they’re mostly rich warehouse guys that won’t give you and me the chance for honest work. Sure and now ye won’t be feelin’ so bad about takin’ it, will ye?”
That decided Skippy. Hunger and privation had dulled his conscience, embittered him against the warehouse owners and he was at last ready to strike back at his oppressors.
And strange to say, in contemplating the results of this stealthy enterprise, Skippy did not think of the food, nor the movies to which he could go. He was thinking instead that he would at last have the money to pay for his journey up to see his father. For a few golden moments the walls of the prison would fade away and Toby would imagine himself a free man. And all because of a breath of river air that his son would bring him in his smile.
And for that, Skippy was willing to forget that he hated dishonesty in any form.
CHAPTER XXIII ANOTHER JOB
It was early morning a few days later when Skippy and Tully set out on the first stage of their enterprise. The inlet was dark and shadowy, and the sweet soft breath of spring floated about their heads. In its wake, however, came the smell of mud and fish at low tide and the boy was glad to get out into the fresh salt air of the river.
“It’s the only thing that makes me hate the inlet,” he said to Big Joe as they turned up toward the yacht club. “I get feelin’ choked, sorta—you know, sumpin’ like I imagine people feel when they go to jail.”
“Now don’t ye be feelin’ spooky,” Tully admonished. “’Tain’t the spirit for a job like this. Sure, there’s somethin’ ’bout mentionin’ jail what gives me the creeps. So don’t be thinkin’ we’ll be gettin’ in any jams—’tis hard luck, so ’tis.”
“I’m sorry, Big Joe,” said Skippy contritely. “I—I didn’t say it for that, honest, because even Pop can tell you how the inlet always made me feel like that. I’m all right when I’m up on the barge; it’s only the inlet makes me feel that way. Just as soon as we strike the river I feel better.”
“That’s the talk, me boy. And I’m sorry for jumpin’ on ye so quick. I thought ye was nervous ’bout this job, so I did.”
“Aw, no,” Skippy protested, but his quivering lip belied his words.
Tully did not see it, however, for he was intent on approaching the yacht club unobtrusively.
“Now if this ain’t a good break,” he said enthusiastically. “There’s a party o’ three goin’ out on a two days’ fishing trip at Snug Island. She’s called the _Minnehaha_, me pal tells me, and she’s a baby. Twenty-six footer! Guy that owns her is Crosley.”
“Crosley Warehouse where I worked last?” Skippy asked anxiously.
“Sure, and now don’t that beat all! Little Old Lady Luck’s playin’ with us, kid! Sure ’tis a break to make him hand over his bucks or sink in Watson’s Channel!”
“You wouldn’t let ’em do that, Big Joe?” Skippy asked fearfully. “_You wouldn’t!_”
“Nah, Big Joe ain’t that hard hearted, much as I got it in for thim rich bugs. I’ll just be lettin’ thim think I’m doin’ thim a favor not lettin’ Watson’s Channel close ’em in, so I will.”
“Do you s’pose Mr. Crosley’ll get wise we’re doin’ it a-purpose?” Skippy was beginning to weaken already.
“And how’ll he be doin’ that, I’m askin’ ye? Me pal tipped me off they be due at dawn. We’ll be there and gone a half hour afore they show up. So don’t be startin’ worryin’, kid. Leave everythin’ to Big Joe, as if ye didn’t know nothin’ ’bout the business at all, at all. You don’t say nothin’. Be lookin’ dumb if anybody talks to ye.”
“I will,” said Skippy, half-whimsically, and half-frightened. “I’ll be _scared_ dumb so you needn’t worry that I’ll get nervous an’ give anythin’ away—gee whiz!”
Big Joe laughed, then he said, “Awright, kid, D’ye be knowin’ Skinner and Crosley be pals?”
“Gee!” said Skippy. “Now I know why I couldn’t get a job. Skinner put ’em all wise, huh? Gee!”
They were silent after that and chugged steadily toward the yacht club. A ferry-boat was crossing far up the river and her lights blinked out over the dark water like a hundred evil eyes. Hundreds of boats anchored near shore bobbed up and down on the tide like a ghostly river army, and from the shore more lights winked down on them knowingly as if they knew their secret.
They crept into the slip alongside the yacht club; Big Joe had shut off the motor. At a sign from him, Skippy dropped the anchor and without a word, he got out and crept across the float and onto the club grounds.
After the darkness hid him from view Skippy looked about, nervously. There was a little light gleaming from under the vast clubhouse porch and suddenly he saw Big Joe’s ponderous figure pass under it. Presently, he halted and held out his hand to a man approaching him from the other direction.
Skippy sighed with relief and relaxed. At least Big Joe had met his comrade without accident. Besides, no one seemed to be about. He heard not a sound except the river lapping restlessly around the piling under the slip and the swish of anchored craft as they swayed on the tide.
It seemed to him that Big Joe was staying an interminable time, but as an actual fact, it was just seven minutes before he saw the man’s bulky figure coming stealthily toward him.
Skippy weighed anchor without a sound and they pushed the kicker out of the slip with oars. A little distance below the club, Big Joe turned over his motor.
“Shiverin’ swordfish, kid,” he murmured with a chuckle, “all we do now is wait—wait so’s Crosley can get ’bout as far as Watson’s Channel. He’ll be gettin’ no further’n that—so he won’t.”
Skippy shivered a little and leaned over the coaming to watch for logs.
CHAPTER XXIV ANOTHER RESCUE
As the moments wore on, Skippy felt meaner than ever. He tried to force himself to accept Big Joe’s point of view, but it was difficult and more than once he wished he had not encouraged his good friend in this dubious enterprise.
They chugged into the bay and out of the awakening river traffic. Dawn had broken through and glimmerings of dancing light peeped over the horizon. An hour more and they would be in sight of Watson’s Channel.
“We’ll not be goin’ straight for the Channel, we’ll not,” called Big Joe as if anticipating Skippy’s fears. “We’ll be layin’ quite like below here a ways ’till the _Minnehaha_ gets in the Channel. ’Tis a funny name, hey kid?”
“Mm,” Skippy answered. “It’s a Indian name, Big Joe—I think it means sumpin’ like Laughing—Laughing sumpin’.”
Big Joe’s mirth knew no bounds.
“Sure and just about now _Minnie_ ain’t laughin’, she ain’t,” he said. “’Tis us.”
“Not me,” Skippy said gloomily. “I won’t laugh ... not till after.”
An hour later they were chugging noisily toward Watson’s Channel. The sun was glorious and the water glistened under its warm spring rays. Gulls frolicked about in the foaming spray and Skippy tried hard to believe there was nothing but peace in his busy mind.
After a time they heard a distant sound, faint at first but growing louder within a few minutes. Tully grinned at Skippy’s questioning face and nodded as the piercing note of a siren cut the silent sunlit air.
“Sure, and I wonder what that might be?” he said with mock-seriousness. “Sounds like distress I’d be sayin’, I would.”
“Stop kiddin’, Big Joe,” Skippy pleaded. “You mean you think it’s _them_?”
“Well now I wouldn’ be s’prised,” the big fellow answered. Then seriously, he said: “We’ll be gettin’ there, kid! Don’t be lookin’ as if they was drownin’ or somethin’. Sure they could keep afloat for hours so they could, and look at the tide besides.”
Skippy glanced at the quietly rolling swell and felt somewhat reassured. But the voice of the siren jarred him and he was glad to see that Big Joe looked serious and determined. He hadn’t liked that note of raillery in his friend’s voice.
But despite Skippy’s fears Tully answered the siren call with all the haste of a good Samaritan. One might have supposed that he gloried in the duties of heroic service. And when he reached the Channel and they sighted the distressed launch, he opened wide his throttle until the old hull shook to the vibrations of the engine.
Skippy clenched his slim, brown fingers and sat tense in his seat while a spray rained into the boat. Big Joe coughed significantly and drove his ramshackle craft straight for the disabled cruiser.
“Now ain’t she the sweet lookin’ baby,” he observed as if he had never seen the launch before.
Skippy said nothing but grimly watched the three men who awaited their coming. Crosley he recognized at once, but the man standing alongside of him was a stranger. The third occupant of the _Minnehaha_ was Marty Skinner. Skippy remembered him from his father’s trial and from the night Skinner had ordered him off the _Apollyon_ without a hearing.
“You see him?” he asked Big Joe between clenched teeth.
“’Tis all the better,” Big Joe seemed to say in his bland smile.
He brought the kicker up alongside the _Minnehaha_ and laid a life preserver over the coaming of his boat to prevent its scratching the gleaming hull of the launch. Skippy scrambled to the rescue and held the kicker as the ill-assorted pair rocked and rubbed in the heavy swell.
“Sure I don’t want to be scratchin’ her,” said Tully with a fine assumption of humble respect for the launch. “I was tellin’ the kid here, she’s some baby, hey? What’s bein’ the matter; power give out did she? ’Tis too bad, so ’tis.”
Skippy kept his eyes on space, but he had the feeling that Big Joe and he were being scrutinized with unfriendly stares.
Crosley sniffed the air contemptuously before he spoke.
“She’s pumping oil to beat the band,” he said. “We don’t seem to be getting any compression either. We can’t get a kick out of her. Been flopping around for an hour.”
“Sure maybe ye be needin’ new rings,” said Tully. “Guess ye been pushin’ her too hard, hey?”
He glanced into the cockpit and with a fine show of rueful astonishment, beheld the disastrous results of his own handiwork. She was indeed pumping oil. The engine head was covered with it, and it was streaming down the side over the carburetor. Three or four spark plugs had been taken out and lay on a locker in little puddles of oozy muck.
“If ’t was only one cylinder now, I’d be sayin’ ye had a busted ring, or even a cracked piston,” Tully said blandly. “But shiverin’ swordfish if it don’t look like the whole six o’ thim, don’t it? Ye can’t do nothin’ here. Looks like ye was racin’ her a lot.” His detestable device had worked so well that he seemed moved to offer gratuitous suggestions. “I knowed a guy was stuck on the bar over by Inland Beach and he kept racin’ his motor, and somehow—I dunno just how—she sucked in a lot o’ beach sand and it sanded down his cylinder wall good an’ plenty, so it did.”
Skinner’s lips were drawn in a thin line above his pointed chin.
“Does that mean we’ll have to be towed back, Crosley?” he asked his host petulantly.
“Afraid so, Marty,” answered Crosley. “I can’t imagine how a fine engine like mine could break down so soon.”
“Sure and if that ain’t just like some guys,” said Tully glibly. “They’re fine’s a fiddle one day and the next—they’re done for, ain’t it so?”
Crosley nodded indifferently.
“Could you tow us in?” he asked as if the question were distasteful. His aversion to the uncouth, but amiable river man was too obvious to escape Skippy’s sensitive eyes.
If Tully was aware of it too, he did not betray it. His face looked grave and thoughtful.
“Trouble is I’m due at the Hook,” he said hesitantly. “Have an all day’s job towin’ a barge. I’m late as ’tis. And if I ain’t there in twinty minutes I lose the job, so I do. ’Tis the first good payin’ job I’ve had in a long....”
Crosley waved his hand in entreaty.
“We’ll see that you’re paid for the loss of your day’s job, man. How much would you get for it, eh?”
Tully moved his large head and shrugged his powerful shoulders. “Seventy-five bucks is what they’re goin’ to pay me,” he said modestly.
Crosley gasped audibly.
“That’s a lot of money, but....”
“It’s a hold up!” snapped Skinner between his tightly drawn lips.
“Sure and it’s what they’re payin’ me, boss,” said Big Joe with a look of hurt pride. “I ain’t askin’ ye’ for a cent, I’m not considerin’ I may lose my customer for future jobs. ’Tis not only I’m losin’ that seventy-five bucks, ’tis....”
“All right,” Crosley sniffed angrily. “You’re taking advantage of us. I don’t believe you can earn seventy-five dollars for a day’s work. But you have us at a disadvantage—the Lord knows who else we could get to our rescue in this unfrequented channel.”
“So and that’s all the thanks I get,” said Tully. “Comin’ way out o’ me way....”
“All right,” Skinner interposed. “Give it to him, Crosley. I know who this fellow is. We’re at his mercy. But I’ll remember this, Tully—you’re occupying the mud banks at Brown’s Basin. You and this boy, Dare, may want some consideration when you people have to get out of the Basin. And I’ll remember who’s living on the _Minnie M. Baxter_!”
“You oughta!” Skippy shouted angrily, rising to his feet. “Your cheatin’ boss what’s dead put it there, that’s what, an’ my father’ll never see the sun on the river again on account of it too! So try an’ take it away.”
Skinner’s cold dignity seemed unruffled. He averted his gaze while Crosley counted out seventy-five dollars to Big Joe Tully. Skippy stood by, his heart full of hate, and at that moment he thought that he could cheerfully see the _Minnehaha_ sink to the bottom of the Channel while Skinner begged to be saved.
While leisurely chugging back toward the Basin that afternoon he and Tully talked it over seriously.
“Well, and we got seventy-five bucks aisy money out o’ the tightwads,” Tully chuckled in conclusion.
“Seventy-five bucks an’ the promise of trouble from Skinner, Big Joe,” Skippy reminded him with a note of apprehension in his voice.
Tully’s face darkened.
“I hate Skinner for sayin’ what he did, so I do,” he said ominously. “Sufferin’ swordfish if he do be makin’ ye scared and drivin’ ye outa the only home ye got—well, he better be lettin’ ye ’lone. _Me_, I don’t care much where I live, but _you_ ... I’ll be fixin’ him if he....”
“Don’t say it, Big Joe!” Skippy pleaded earnestly. “It scares me, ’cause that’s just what Pop said the night he went to see old Mr. Flint on the _Apollyon_! It’s sorta——”
“And ’tis all right, kid, so ’tis.” Tully smiled. “Now ye be forgettin’ it.”
Skippy tried to; certainly he had forgotten that he himself had wished Marty Skinner a like fate only that morning.
CHAPTER XXV DAVY JONES
Tully’s game worked successfully for the next few weeks, for he had distributed his activities among various club houses dotting the shore. It had become an enterprise apparently without threat of untoward incident—so much so that Skippy, with his uncanny knack of presaging ill, came to feel that they must not go on with the distasteful business.
He had hated the treachery of it from the very beginning, partly because of his innate honesty and also because in fairness to himself, he knew he had no real grudge against his rich fellow men. And in his vague, ignorant way Skippy knew that Skinner and Crosley represented something which hate could never successfully combat.
He felt it particularly one early morning when Tully, swaggering out of the shanty of the _Minnie M. Baxter_, rubbed his large hands in gleeful anticipation of the next victim.
“’Tis up to the Riverview Yacht Club we’ll be goin’ this mornin’, kid,” he said confidently. “We’ve worked aroun’ to it agin. Me pal, the boat tender what tipped me off on Crosley’s _Minnehaha_, ain’t there no more, but the new guy was aisy pickin’. He fell for a little split, without battin’ an eye, so he did, and sent word down last night that a little fishin’ party headed for Snug Island would push off at dawn.”
“Snug Island, huh?” Skippy asked fearfully. “That means Watson’s Channel for us again?”
“Sure,” laughed Tully, “’tis a spot I like. Nobody goes through Watson’s Channel ’cept they’re headed for Snug Island. And nobody goes to Snug Island fishin’ but a coupla rich guys what own the whole place. It’s aisy pickin’ so ’tis.”
“For you it’s easy, Big Joe,” said Skippy, “but not for me. Sometimes I think I never had anythin’ so hard to do in my life as just gettin’ up nerve to go on these trips. Gee, I ain’t never had the heart to tell Pop about them—I lied, an’ said we was makin’ a pretty good livin’ towin’ an’ fishin’.”
Big Joe roared with laughter.
“Sure and we’re towin’ and fishin’,” he said with a malicious wink. “Ye didn’t tell Toby no lie. We fish the money out o’ ’em and thin tow thim back—that’s no story.”
“I wish you wouldn’t laugh about it, Big Joe,” Skippy said with a frown. “It makes it seem as if it was a joke—as if you liked it almost.”
“And you’d be likin’ it too, kid, if ye wanted to get back at these rich guys much as I do. But I won’t be laughin’ about it no more, if it makes ye feel that way. Sufferin’ swordfish but ye don’t have to be actin’ like we’re goin’ to a funeral.”
“I feel funny about goin’ to the Riverview Yacht Club this morning. Big Joe, would you stay away from there if I asked you to?”
“Any mornin’ but this one, Skippy me boy,” said Tully with all his old affection. “I can’t be side-steppin’ it on account o’ this new boat tender. He’s expectin’ a little handout so I can’t be disappointin’ him. But I’ll tell ye what, kid, if it’s makin’ ye feel so awful bad I’ll chuck this game ’fore ye can say any more. I’ll be thinkin’ up somethin’ else. Anythin’ but seem’ ye’ feelin’ sad, kid.”
They got into the kicker and chugged out of the inlet once more. Skippy’s eyes glistened happily and he told himself that he could forget the ominous whisperings inside of him for just this once. Indeed, he could forget everything distasteful in the past few weeks now that Tully had promised to give up the hated business.
“We ain’t heard from Crosley or Skinner since that mornin’ we towed ’em back, huh Big Joe?” he asked irrelevantly. “I wonder if they found out what was really wrong with the engine?”
“We’d o’ heard ’bout it soon enough if they did, so we would,” said Tully thoughtfully. “Anyways, I heard that Crosley sold the _Minnehaha_ right that next day. He said he didn’t want no boat that almost put him down in Watson’s Channel. Ha, ha! Sure and I’m glad he did. He should be worryin’ with his money.”
Once more they pulled up beside the slip of the Riverview Yacht Club and once more Big Joe stole silently up the lawn in the gray morning shadows. Skippy waited patiently, albeit anxiously, and held the boat secure while his weary eyes blinked sleepily in the sultry air.
After a time, Big Joe came hurrying out of the shadows.
“Simple as sayin’ meow, kid,” he said exultantly. “The boat tender tells me this guy’s goin’ alone to Snug Island this mornin’. He couldn’t be rememberin’ the guy’s name what owns her, but he says the boat ain’t a week old. She’s a peach—a trim, twenty-six footer, kid! And of all names she’s got! Sufferin’ swordfish!”
“What?”
“The _Davy Jones_—so ’tis. Can ye be beatin’ that?”
“_Big Joe!_” Skippy said in a small, frightened voice. “That’s a name that scares me terrible.”
“_Ye’re crazy, kid, ye’re crazy!_ Sure and what’s in a name. Just ’cause Davy Jones happens to mean....”
“Just the same I’m scared terrible,” Skippy maintained stoutly. “An’ there’s lots in names whether you believe it or not. Now take the _Minnie M. Baxter_—nothin’ bad could come of her in the end, I bet, and if it did I bet it would be for the best, because it was my mother’s name. Even if there’s been trouble about the barge from the beginnin’ there’s good come on it too. When Pop was taken away, then you came to be good to me so that shows there’s somethin’ good about the barge, don’t it? But Davy Jones only means one thing, Big Joe, an’ you can say, what’s in a name!”
What, indeed!
CHAPTER XXVI THE ROCKS
It was a murky dawn and no sun followed in its wake. The air was heavy and oppressive, and low rumblings of thunder echoed in from sea. Skippy shook his head worriedly as they chugged out of sight of the bay to let the _Davy Jones_ pass by.
“I don’t feel right this morning, Big Joe,” the boy insisted. “Say what you like, but we shouldn’t wait—we oughta tail the _Davy Jones_, right away—_this minute_, before the storm comes on.”
“Now ye be worryin’ agin, hey?” Tully asked impatiently. “That storm’s out at sea and it won’t hit the Channel. Sure ’tis just a murky mornin’.”
“All right,” said Skippy, “but I know.”
Tully was beginning to be annoyed with Skippy’s gloomy predictions and he showed it. Yet somehow it gave him a little uneasiness and from time to time he glanced thoughtfully from the boy to the distant black horizon.
The storm clouds were coming nearer and thunder rolled ominously over their heads. Finally Tully turned over his motor and set her nose about. After she had warmed up, he opened wide the throttle and headed for the bay.
“I’ll be keepin’ her open and beat it for the Channel soon’s we get across,” he explained. “We’ll be gettin’ there sure ’fore the storm breaks bad.”
“I hope so,” said Skippy, “because it’s travelin’ in from sea, fast.”
“We’ll be goin’ round by The Rocks and save fifteen minutes or so,” Tully said hopefully searching the boy’s face. “’Tis high enough tide for to take a chance.”
The Rocks, that bane of all mariners who were unfamiliar with the lurking waters beyond the bay, could be safely passed in small boats at high tide. There were few, however, who took advantage of this concession of Nature to the small nautical man, nearly all mariners preferring the greater safety that was offered them by going the long way around Inland Beach.
A high wind was steadily rising as they chugged into the vicinity of The Rocks, and it prevented Skippy from hearing that call of distress for which he was so intently listening. Whether the wind was against them, he did not know, for the howling tempest and turbulent water drowned out all other sounds.
The storm broke after a few minutes and rain lashed at them from all sides. Tully said not a word, but stayed at his wheel silent and grave. And by his averted head, Skippy knew that he, too, was listening for that siren call from the _Davy Jones_.
Salt spray flung itself up over the bow and into Skippy’s face. He could have moved farther back to avoid it, but he seemed incapable of action then, and sat tense and white, listening, listening....
Tully did not miss it. The boy’s tragic expression so dismayed him that he felt for the first time in his life that he should have mended his ways while there was still time. All his sins seemed to have crowded into Skippy’s face to accuse him.
And still they heard no call of distress from the _Davy Jones_.
Tully, desperate, raced his engine until they whistled through the foaming spray. Then suddenly they felt the keel grind under them with such force that it took all their combined strength to steady the boat and keep her from turning over.
“What happened, do you s’pose?” Skippy asked with white face.
“Sufferin’ swordfish, kid!” Tully cried. “I think she’s stove in—The Rocks! _Look!_”
He pointed and Skippy looked, to see a jagged hole in the bottom of the kicker. Water came in through it rapidly and even as he stared at it, it trickled over his feet and up to his ankles.
CHAPTER XXVII SUSPENSE
“What’ll we do?” Skippy cried. “Gee, what’ll we do?”
“We’ll be swimmin’ for it, kid,” Big Joe answered, his face ashen and drawn. “Inland Beach’s nearest—we’ll be swimmin’ it in a half hour, takin’ it aisy like.”
“_Easy!_ In this water and wind?”
“Skippy, don’t be worryin’. Sure and I ain’t goin’ to see ye go down. I’ll be keepin’ ye up if it takes me life.”
Suddenly Skippy turned, pleading. Big Joe knew and his eyes dropped before the boy’s accusing gaze.
“And what can I be doin’ about the _Davy Jones_ now, kid!” he protested “I _got_ ye to be thinkin’ about now.... Sufferin’ swordfish!” He groaned.
“Then we gotta swim to Inland Beach as fast as we can, Big Joe,” Skippy said, master of himself once more. “We gotta get help right away for the _Davy Jones_!”
“Sure, sure,” the big fellow moaned, “anythin’, kid, only don’t be lookin’ at me so accusin’. Did I know it was goin’ to happen like this? Sufferin’ swordfish!”
“C’mon, Big Joe—_c’mon_!”
They had no sooner jumped clear of the boat than she sank out of sight. A terrific gale blew them along and Skippy kept close to Tully, buoyed up by the thought that he must keep going in order to get help for the _Davy Jones_.
And for once Tully was right in a prediction. It took them all of the half hour before they sighted the sandy wastes of Inland Beach.
The summer colonists sheltered from the storm in their inadequately built bungalows sighted the bobbing heads of the swimmers as they battled their way against the tide. Speedily the beach was covered with people and the life-guards, summarily dragged from their bunks in their beach shanty, jumped drowsy-eyed into the life-boat and went into action.
Ten minutes later, the two were rushed up to the guards’ shanty and hurriedly divested of their dripping garments.
“We gotta ...” Skippy began as soon as he had a chance to talk.
“We thought we heard a siren,” Big Joe interposed. “Sure, it sounded like distress—there ain’t a doubt.”
“We heard it plain!” Skippy exclaimed anxiously. “An’ it came from the Channel—didn’t it, Big Joe, huh?”
“Sure and he’s right. ’Tis about where I figgered she was comin’ from,” Tully added.
“An’ we better start right out again!” Skippy said eagerly. “With this high wind....”
“A guy hasn’t much chance in the Channel,” interposed one of the guards bluntly. “I can tell you that before we start. And if it wasn’t that you say you’re sure you heard it, we wouldn’t take a chance ourselves. Even a big tub like ours ain’t a match for the Channel in a storm and high wind.”
“But we’re sure we heard it! Ain’t we, Big Joe?”
“Sure we did that!” Tully said emphatically.
And so they started for the Channel.
The wind died down shortly after they had lost sight of Inland Beach. Presently the rain ceased and after a few moments’ struggle with storm clouds, the sun came smiling through.
Skippy smiled too, hopeful that it augured well for the object of their search. Tully relaxed and took a cigarette that one of the guards offered him. He talked little and kept his eyes ahead.
They reached the Channel in a half hour and for a full hour they searched it up and down. Skippy kept his eyes on the water; he dared not let the guards see the hopelessness written there should his glance chance to meet Tully’s.
“Sure we _couldn’t_ be dreamin’ we heard a siren, now could we?” Tully pleaded when the guards announced their intention of returning to the beach.
“You guys didn’t seem to be so sure you heard any at all when we first got you out of the water,” one of the men reminded them.
“Sure and we were kind o’ all in from the breaks we got,” Tully explained. His voice sounded hollow and weary.
“Well, we don’t hear no siren now,” said the other guard, “and we’ve been up and down the Channel. If there _was_ any guy in distress, maybe he’s been swept out to sea. And we can’t go hunting that far for you fellers. We’ll send out word to the coast guard anyway when we get back just to be on the safe side. They’ll find the tub if it’s still afloat.”
“An’ if there was any siren signaling distress when that high wind first come up,” said the first guard, “she’s most likely screeching now for to get into Davy Jones’ locker. Who knows?”
Skippy and Big Joe would have given their lives at that moment to know.
CHAPTER XXVIII THE DUFFYS
They borrowed a kicker from one of the summer colonists and set out for home just before noon. Skippy was too overwhelmed to speak until long after they left the beach and Tully sat tragic and silent at the wheel.
“We might’s well look agin,” he murmured brokenly, as he headed the boat toward the Channel. “Just so’s to be makin’ sure.”
“Might’s well,” Skippy echoed. Then: “Gee, do you think maybe he was blowin’ the siren?”
“That he must o’ done. He must o’ been blowin’ it like mad.”
They spent half the afternoon chugging up and down the Channel and passed several craft, government and otherwise, which had heard the warning that the Inland Beach guards had passed along. Finally they decided to return home and with bowed heads found their way out of the treacherous waters.
“Sure if the coast guards ain’t found him, we won’t—not if we be stayin’ there all night,” said Tully mournfully. “Kid, don’t ye be jumpin’ on me, now. If ye knew what I been through since ... since.... I been blowin’ a siren in distress five hun’erd times, so I have, and five hun’erd times, I been in that _Davy Jones_ callin’ me lungs out for help an’ no help come! I’ve sunk with her too—oh shiverin’ swordfish ... kid, I ain’t nothin’ but a plain....”
“Don’t say it, Big Joe,” said Skippy, moved to the depths of his soul with pity. “Gee, don’t I know! You wouldn’t have done it a-purpose.”
“No. ’Tis right ye be there.” Tully looked beaten.
They chugged on up the river and seemed to pass everyone they knew. Inspector Jones and his men bobbed by in the trim harbor launch waving a cheery greeting to Skippy and eyeing Tully with obvious suspicion.
Skippy was grateful for the silent inlet and the warm throaty bark that Mugs gave as he scrambled aboard the barge. He looked at the dog, winced a little at his faithful canine eyes and took him up in his arms. He couldn’t do to Mugs what they had done to that unknown man on the _Davy Jones_.
He sprawled in a rickety arm chair on deck while the sun sank slowly in the west. The whole horizon was a blaze of scarlet, then gold, then purple and at last it faded into leaden colored clouds. Big Joe was calling him in to supper.
Skippy looked down in the crook of his arm at the sleeping dog. Supper? He didn’t want any—he never wanted to eat while that man on the _Davy Jones_ lay in Watson’s Channel. He couldn’t do it to Mugs.
Tully got tired of waiting and came out on deck. After one glance at Skippy’s tragic face he got his hat, pulled it down over his head and left the barge while the boy watched him go with a constricted feeling in his throat. And though he wanted with all his heart to call Big Joe back, he knew that he could never again sit opposite him at the table with a dead man between them.
Dusk settled over the inlet and through the shadows came Mrs. Duffy. Her cheery smile was conspicuous by its absence just then and her cheeks looked tear-stained and haggard. Skippy forgot the dead man in the _Davy Jones_—he was all concern for this kindly neighbor who had helped nurse him back to health.
Hadn’t Skippy heard? Mrs. Duffy sobbed a little, then bravely smiled through her tears. She had to be strong and brave—other wives and mothers in the Basin were getting used to the experience of seeing their menfolk taken in by the long arm of the law. And now Mr. Duffy had been added to that number.
What had he done? No more than other river folk had done before him. But it was forbidden by the law and there you were. And the excuse that they had to live and eat carried no weight in the courts of the land. Neither did the courts care that a rich and unscrupulous Josiah Flint had lured these men into his vicious employ at starvation wages only to leave them unwanted and ostracized from honest employment upon his untimely death. And Mr. Josephus Duffy, obeying that primal law of the survival of the fittest, was to be jailed for five years because he stole when employment was denied him. Five years of punishment for bringing food home to his family!
Skippy’s young heart was bursting with sympathy. Wrapped up in his own and his father’s concerns he had been vaguely conscious of his neighbors, the Duffys of the _Dinky O. Cross_. Squatters like himself, he had been aware that they came and went, but that was all. Now they became suddenly real and vivid to him—the Duffys, father and mother, and their two children, minus the father now.
“And wouldn’t Skinner give him nothin’ at the Central havin’ two kids like you got?” he asked sympathetically.
“Skinner’d push men in prison before he’d help ’em get a decent job,” the good woman said with a jerk of her head. “He said he’s goin’ to clean all us scum out of this Basin—ain’t you heard?”
Yes, Skippy had heard only too well. He leaned over and timidly touched the woman’s work-worn hands, pledging his slim, manly self as an aid and comfort to herself and her two unfortunate children. In gratitude, she hugged the boy to her breast and hurried back to the _Dinky O. Cross_ to put her young ones to bed.
Skippy cherished that embrace; it was the only maternal affection he had ever known. His eyes shone into the darkness with the joy of it and he hugged Mugs still closer in his arms and spent some time in reflecting on why he was so happy when he was so sad.
Josiah Flint and Marty Skinner rose up before his eyes. He was beginning to realize what sorrow they had brought to the river people—_his people_! A fellow feels things like that when he’s going on thirteen.
Thirteen! Skippy looked up into the starlit sky and blinked. Mugs’ even breathing was like the whisper of the breeze blowing about his head. And he went to sleep planning how he could save the menfolk of the Basin from future prison life. He would see that the boys went to school as he himself had wanted to do so badly and he would see that they got decent, honest wages so that they could live as other people did in houses with pretty gardens....
Tully found him still asleep when he came back at midnight.
CHAPTER XXIX GOOD NEWS
“Skip—Skippy, kid!” Tully called, shaking the boy to arouse him.
Skippy sat up, startled. Mugs barked blatantly.
“What’s up, huh? You look as if something’d happened—what’s the matter?”
Tully motioned him into the shanty where he lighted the lamp and sat down.
“Can ye stand hearin’ somethin’ without faintin’?” he asked mirthlessly.
“I guess so,” the boy answered shaking his straight hair from off his forehead. “But I hope it ain’t anything worse!”
“Better and worse, sorta,” Big Joe laughed ruefully. “But first so’s to be aisin’ ye, kid—the _Davy Jones_ turned back, so she did, when she reached the bay this mornin’. From what the boat tender told me, sure must o’ put a little extra dose o’ the powder in the breather and she started kickin’ up a rumpus a little sooner than ordinary, she did. So the owner, bein’ a foxy guy, turned back when he heard that and saw the storm clouds comin’ in from over the sea.”
“So the _Davy Jones_ ain’t in her locker then, huh? Gee, am I glad!”
“Sure, and she got back to the club, and the owner had somebody come right away to be seein’ what was wrong.”
“Did they find out?”
“That they did, kid. He’s got the police on the case, and I think they’ll be workin’ on me. But they ain’t got no evidence so they ain’t, and besides, I took all me powder and threw it in the inlet tonight, so I did.”
Skippy sat down at the table, his head in his hands.
“Gee, I was afraid something awful would come of it.”
“Now don’t ye be worryin’ too soon, kid. They’ll have to be goin’ some to get me.... You can bet on that.”
“Gee, Big Joe, you don’t savvy. It’s the idea of gettin’ the coppers suspectin’ me and sayin’ they expected sumpin’ like that from Toby Dare’s kid. That’s what I couldn’t bear Pop to hear after he’s planned better things for me. Gee, I couldn’t stand it!” Then: “Who owns the _Davy Jones_, Big Joe, huh?” he demanded.
“Now that’s a funny thing,” Tully said. “The _Davy Jones_ is Crosley’s. He bought her a week ago after he sold the _Minnehaha_. I s’pose that’s why he played foxy whin the ingine wint wrong with the new one? If that big sap boat tender had only tole me who owned her I’d niver....”
“Gee whiz, Big Joe, now I can see why Pop said these crooked rackets don’t pay in the end. It’s account of that _if_. It’s always if this or that didn’t happen everythin’ would be all right. But it never is. Oh, gee, I’m not hoppin’ on you—maybe I’d been just like you if it wasn’t that I’m sick and disgusted with crooked rackets already. Maybe it’s because my mother came from a farm and so I’m not all river, huh? Anyway, I know I don’t want any more of this business. I’m gonna be straight I am. I learned a lesson today on that _Davy Jones_ business an’ I mean it.”
“Me, too!” said Big Joe with all his old time swagger. “I was tellin’ meself comin’ back here that if I think up an aisy racket where the coppers don’t get wise, I’ll be savin’ up a few grand an’ thin open up one o’ thim hot dog stands in the country. Sure and the river won’t see me at all, at all after that.”
Skippy laughed outright—for, boy that he was, he could see that Tully would be Tully as long as the river flowed down to the sea.
CHAPTER XXX BEASELL
Next day, life in the Basin flowed once more in familiar channels. Tully trod the decks watching for the unwelcome police and puffing furiously on his cigarettes. Skippy sprawled in the rickety easy chair, playing with the dog and calling out to Mrs. Duffy some words of cheer when the occasion required. And when sunset came and the law had not put in its appearance they had supper noisily together.
Tully stretched out in his bunk after the meal had been cleared away. He looked at peace with the world. Skippy, watching him out of the corner of his eye, wondered what new racket he was planning now. And he didn’t rest until he had asked the big fellow point blank.
“Me racket for a while, kid,” Tully said amiably, “is to be keepin’ ye from gettin’ gloomy and sad. Whin I’m sure that Crosley ain’t set the coppers on me trail thin I’ll be turnin’ around—see? Right now I’m stickin’ close to the _Minnie M. Baxter_, so I be.”
“And you could do worse, Big Joe, believe me. I’m gonna stick close too until I know what’s what. But we’ll talk about that then.”
An insistent knock sounded on the door. Tully blanched and looked about for some means of escape. But Skippy, braving himself to the task, swung open the door to get it over with.
A man stood outside, bowing graciously and smiling. He stepped inside at Skippy’s invitation.
“Beasell’s the name, boys,” he said. “Yuh heard how Marty Skinner’s runnin’ the works for Buck Flint?”
“Sure we been hearin’ it too much, I’ll be tellin’ ye,” Big Joe snapped as he came ponderously out of his bunk and stood on the floor.
“It’s all jake then, big boy, you an’ me won’t waste no time,” Beasell said unruffled.
“You’ve come to tell us....” Skippy began fearfully.
“Marty says all yuh squatters in this Basin’ll have tuh scram by sundown tomorrow, get me? He’s had all the rough stuff he’s goin’ for and that goes double for the warehouse guys. So it’s scram in twenty-four hours, see? If yuh can’t take these lousy scows out we’ll blow ’em up, get me? Just a nice little Fourth uh July party, see?” He chuckled as if at a great joke.
“You can’t blow up the _Minnie M. Baxter_!” Skippy cried. “Even a guy like Skinner can’t take her from me ’cause, ’cause....”
“Lissen, punk, and you too, big boy, it’s scram by sundown tomorrow,” Beasell snarled. “Yuh better get me. I ain’t kiddin’ believe yuh me!” He scowled as he left to spread the bad news to the _Dinky O. Cross_.
“Sufferin’ swordfish! Sure that Skinner’s a lousy rat,” Big Joe growled. “I should o’ been pastin’ that slimy Beasell but it wouldn’t done no good. He’s only carryin’ out orders.”
“Not only me’n you’s gotta go, Big Joe,” said Skippy plaintively, “but Mrs. Duffy an’ her kids an’ everybody here in the Basin. How’re they all gonna pack up an’ clear out by tomorrow night, huh? Gee, that ain’t fair. There ain’t one of us got a home to go to—gee whiz, these barges, why—they’re home!”
Tully’s face looked distorted as he walked to and fro across the shanty floor. Finally he turned.
“Sure Skinner don’t know what it means to be sendin’ that Beasell guy down here to be tellin’ us we must be out by tomorrow night, bad cess to him.”
“What d’ye mean, Big Joe?”
“Sure, folks here ain’t like other folks, like ye’ve noticed. They been free for years and they ain’t goin’ to be kicked out without doin’ some kickin’ first thimselves. Law? Sure, they don’t know what it’s all about so what do they care, I’ll be askin’ ye.”
Big Joe Tully had summed it all up in one sentence. They didn’t know about the law, so what did they care about it?
It wasn’t many hours before Skippy learned how little they did care.
CHAPTER XXXI MOONLIGHT
Skippy waited until Tully was fast asleep that night, then he crept stealthily out of the shanty with the dog skipping and sniffing at his heels. He was careful to close the door softly behind him; he wanted to be alone.
It was a different Skippy that trod those decks, a new and older Skippy, who looked about the lumbering old barge through his father’s eyes. It did not seem possible to him that Skinner could so ruthlessly order him away from the only home he had. Yet he realized that not many hours hence he would not even have _that_ home.
He went forward and, getting to his knees, leaned far over and stared down at the trickling waters of the muddy inlet lapping against the hull. The dog, thinking him to be playing, jumped about with a soft whine to draw his master’s attention.
Skippy tumbled him about for a while, then climbed down with him into the borrowed kicker that was anchored alongside the barge.
“We’re gonna take one last cruise out and back in the inlet again—see, Mugs? I’ve just gotta see how the _Minnie M. Baxter’s_ gonna look when I think of her afterwards. I don’t want to forget it’s where I lived with two of the best pals I’ll ever have, outside of Pop. Gee, Mugs, maybe it’s silly to feel so over a barge,” he confided to the attentive puppy, “but I gotta feel that it’s sumpin’ I must think a lot of. Every time I’ve visited Pop, he’s asked me how was the _Minnie M. Baxter_. Just like as if she was a human being, he asked about her! So I love her on accounta my Pop. He’s proud of her because she was so hard to get and because he decided to quit Ol’ Flint and be honest so’s I’d have a better chance.”
He started the kicker after this long confidence and steered it with one hand, putting his free arm about the dog. And as if cherishing the whispered confidences and affection, the animal cuddled close and remained perfectly still while the boat crept out to the mouth of the river.
As they turned back, a full moon broke through some dark clouds and shone brilliantly down upon the Basin. Skippy looked at the mellow, silver light gleaming over the grouped barges and he gazed in wonder at the fairyland that the moon made of the sordid colony. The dust at once became a shimmering film of silver and the washlines strung from shanty to forward deck contained fluttering bits of laundry that stirred flippantly in the soft night breeze.
Skippy’s heartstrings tightened at the sight of it—he loved it all. His honest nature cried out against the injustice of turning all these people out of their homes. For that is just what it amounted to—no more and no less. Skinner knew that there wasn’t a man in the Basin who could afford to have his barge lifted out of the mud. They would have to face it, he realized—they were people condemned!
He steered the boat farther on until he caught sight of the moonlight gleaming across his own shanty. Its shimmering rays picked out in bold relief the now dulled letters, _Minnie M. Baxter_, and he thought of a late afternoon when he and his father had looked on those same letters so new and shining, shining in the last brilliant rays of a dying sun.
He turned away from these reflections with heavy heart only to have his attention drawn to a boat, floating about the bow of the kicker. As he leaned forward to see it better, the dog growled ominously.
Skippy drew back instantly, gasping with horror. He sat stark still for a moment, as cold as ice and unable to take his eyes away from the battered face and body of a man he had seen in robust health but a few hours before.
That man was Beasell, Marty Skinner’s lieutenant, and he appeared lifeless.
CHAPTER XXXII THE LAST OF THE BASIN
Skippy was so frightened that he did nothing for a moment but sit and stare. Then suddenly he realized the terrible thing before his eyes, and he pulled the boat up alongside of the barge, trembling from head to foot.
The dog leaped out of his arms the moment he got on deck and refused to run with him to the shanty. But Skippy had neither the time nor the nerves to think of anything but the battered Beasell in the boat floating beside the barge.
He flung open the door of the shanty and rushed to Tully’s bunk. The big fellow jumped up startled, and sat motionless while Skippy whispered of his discovery.
“Won’t it go bad for everybody here?” he asked with agonized suspense. “Won’t it, Big Joe?”
“Sure ’twill be just too bad, so ’twill,” Tully said getting up and dressing. “Somewan did it what’s gone cuckoo for thinkin’ they’ll be turned out o’ their home tomorrow night. And crazy like, they beat up that Beasell thinkin’ they’d be gettin’ even with Marty Skinner—see? Sure I know me Brown’s Basin, kid.”
Skippy shivered with the horror of it. If Brown’s Basin was like that, he wouldn’t be sorry to leave it after all. Neither could he love people who used such ghastly means for their revenge against Skinner. He wanted to get away from it then, that minute.
“We gotta tell the police, Big Joe, huh?” he murmured.
Big Joe nodded as if he were dazed.
“Us river people ain’t goin’ to have no peace whilst Skinner’s alive, kid!” he said in hard, even tones. “Whoever slugged that Beasell guy—well, _me_, I’d be goin’ for Skinner, so I would. So he’s goin’ to take the _Minnie M. Baxter_ from ye, is he? Well, we’ll be seein’ about that.”
“Forget me for now, Big Joe. What worries me is, what’re we gonna do with Beasell? Maybe he’s dead.”
“Now ye be goin’ down and stay till I come, kid,” said the big fellow, drawing on his shoes.
Skippy started for the kicker. He went forward but that was as far as he got for he became suddenly aware of a low, ominous rumbling noise that seemed to come from shore and run through the barge colony. Before he had a chance to determine what it was he felt himself lifted off his feet bodily and like a feather he was thrown into the muddy waters of the Basin.
There was a terrific detonation throughout Brown’s Basin as Skippy came to the surface. Fire leaped from one barge to the other in the twinkling of an eye and the screams of men, women and children filled the turbid air.
Smoke poured skyward in great columns and in the light of the moon, Skippy saw the ponderous form of Big Joe Tully standing on the deck of the _Minnie M. Baxter_ shouting and waving his hands. Suddenly he leaped into the kicker and the boy called out but he seemed not to hear in the din about them.
At that moment, the _Minnie M. Baxter_ burst into flames. Big Joe Tully shouted deafeningly and Skippy, swimming hard to reach him, saw a strange, almost maniacal expression on his large face.
“’Tis Marty Skinner what’s done this!” he was shouting to no one in particular. “’Tis him what’s blowed this place up and took the kid away from me. ’Tis him! Skippy’s dead—I’m sure he’s dead! I can’t find him!” he was almost whimpering.
“I’m here!” Skippy called frantically. “Big Joe....”
But Tully was even then steering the kicker out of the inlet. He had the throttle wide open and Skippy had no more than a glimpse of the racing craft before she slipped beyond his sight.
Logs, huge chunks of driftwood and every known article of household furniture, both broken and whole, floated in Skippy’s path, blocking his progress. Suddenly he saw a little boat bearing down upon him, floating through the inlet unoccupied.
He reached out, grabbed the bow and climbed in, breathless and exhausted. Other kickers were shoving off filled with crying women and shouting men. Skippy looked about over the water, but saw nothing but a procession of slowly moving debris.
He turned over the motor and she responded with a fearful jerk. He was moving, in any event, moving away from the fearful heat that the burning barges threw out over the water. The moon’s shimmering light now looked sickly and pale in contrast to the fearful red glare that spread over the entire sky.
The screaming sirens of motor boats soon became part of the pandemonium and Skippy heard commanding shouts for the boats to clear out of the inlet immediately. In the wake of this he heard a heart-rending shriek from the midst of the barge inferno which made him feel sick and weak.
“Mrs. Duffy an’ her two kids ain’t nowheres,” a man’s voice shouted above the roar. “I’ll bet Skinner had that dynamite planted.” And as Skippy attempted to turn the kicker about he was peremptorily ordered from the approaching police launch to keep on his way out to the river.
He didn’t look back again. The _Minnie M. Baxter_ was a seething mass behind him—there was nothing left. Big Joe was nowhere about—Skippy suddenly remembered the big fellow’s shouts about Skinner. It gave him an idea and he nosed the boat down the river.
Out of this confusion of mind, he thought of the dog. He remembered then that he hadn’t seen the puppy since he had let him down on the deck after seeing the battered Beasell.
And what had become of him? Was he dead or alive? Skippy wiped a grimy hand across his forehead. He was utterly weary and exhausted by the ordeal. He could not think of an answer to anything. His world had toppled over since the discovery of Beasell and the explosion. And now Mugs was gone too—his skipping, faithful-eyed pal! Was there nothing left for him at all?
He put his hands over the wheel and gripped it bitterly, but soon he relaxed and with a soft sob he covered his face. And nobody knew but the river.
CHAPTER XXXIII SKIPPY’S WISDOM
Skippy got the most out of his commandeered kicker. He opened it wide and raced her down the river and the closer he got to the bay the more apprehensive did he feel about Big Joe’s flight. He tried not to attach any special significance to his good friend’s shouts, but he could not help remembering Tully’s earlier veiled threats about Skinner.
His fears grew as he chugged out into the bay and something urged him on still faster. Then he spied the glistening hull of the beautiful _Apollyon_, her anchor lights gleaming like stars against the night and a single light amidships.
Funny, the boy thought, how much it seemed like that night when he and his father had come for the showdown with the older Flint. Now there was to be no showdown, but he must warn Skinner against Big Joe’s sudden maniacal fury. Queer that he should go to such trouble for a man who had given them no quarter in anything. But he was not thinking of doing Skinner a good turn beyond that it might prevent Big Joe from killing the Flint agent and being sent to jail.
He approached the yacht with his old feeling of awe. The deck was almost dark as he scrambled aboard but up forward he saw the rotund form of the second mate asleep and snoring in a luxurious swing. The boy could not help remember a very solemn resolve that night long ago, when the mate had sworn to be more faithful to his duties during his night watches.
With silent tread, he hurried along the deck and stopped before the lighted cabin amidships. Once, twice, he knocked softly, and waited.
“Come in!” Marty Skinner’s cold voice commanded.
Skippy stepped in, his heart bounding. He was thinking of the last time he had been in this room and closed the door, determined he would not be driven out again until he had had his say.
“Well?” Skinner snapped but this time he did not order Skippy out.
“You seen Big Joe Tully?” Skippy asked bravely. “He been here yet?”
“What d’ye mean—yet? I have no business with Tully and I haven’t any with you that I know of.”
“You’re wrong both times Mister Skinner. ’Cause if you don’t listen to me Big Joe’ll be comin’ here an’ he’ll try gettin’ you an’ he’s so mad he’ll probably kill you.”
Skinner was all interest now. “He’s mad and he may kill me and you come to warn me. That’s funny.”
“No it ain’t funny. I wouldn’t care much what happened to you Mister Skinner you been so hard on me’n Pop an’ everybody, but I ain’t gonna see Big Joe get in a jam an’ maybe go to jail for life on accounta you. I’m tippin’ you off so’s Big Joe won’t have no chance gettin’ jammed. Maybe after that blowin’ up of the barges tonight, which they say you ordered done, an’ what happened to that guy Beasell I oughta let....”
“Blowing up barges? Beasell? What d’ye mean, boy? What happened?”
“Well, Beasell come an’ ordered us outa the Basin by sundown tomorrow, sayin’ it was your orders, an’ if we can’t get the barges out they’ll be blowed up. Some time after he left me’n Joe I go for a boat ride. When I come back I see Beasell in a boat all battered an’ lookin’ as if he’s dead. So I goes to call Joe an’ while he’s gettin’ his shoes on I comes out again an’ I just got near the rail when there’s an explosion an’ I’m tossed in the water. I swim till I find a boat an’ climb in. I see Big Joe on deck an’ he’s yellin’ that I’m lost an’ acts like he’s gonna get you when he jumps in his kicker an’ races off without hearin’ me. So I come right here to beat him to it an’ keep him outa trouble, see?”
Skinner did not seem interested in the explosion. While he appeared callous as to the suffering and death that came in its wake he wanted to know more about Beasell. “D’ye think he’s really dead?” he asked anxiously.
“Looked like that to me,” answered Skippy, “an’ if he wasn’t he probably was blowed apart or burnt up.” He wondered at the look of satisfaction that appeared on Skinner’s face. “But you better be beatin’ it Mister Skinner or Big Joe’ll be here an’ takin’ you apart if he don’t kill you.”
“Well, if Big Joe comes here looking for trouble he’ll get it—and plenty.” Skinner reached under his left arm and pulling out a pistol laid it on the table before him.
Skippy heard footsteps and turned as if to shout a warning.
“Quiet you!” Skinner ordered as he picked up the pistol and leveled it at the door. Skippy with visions of his beloved Big Joe shot dead in his tracks as he opened the door wished from the bottom of his heart that he had not tried to warn Skinner. All he had done was bait the trap for Big Joe.
He stood there, a bit to the side of the desk, his knees shaking and, while his brain was active, he was so terror stricken that he could not open his mouth to warn Big Joe of his impending fate. He closed his eyes and said a little prayer as he heard the door creak a bit on its hinges. Why hadn’t he left the door open when he came into Skinner’s cabin, why....
A few tense seconds that seemed as so many hours to Skippy and then he heard the voice of Inspector Jones: “Now that’s hardly the nice way to welcome a police officer, Mr. Skinner. I like your extended hand but not with a gun in it.”
Skippy looked up to see Inspector Jones advancing into the room and this time a policeman’s uniform was a most welcome sight to him. He breathed thanks that the visitor was not Big Joe.
“I’ll just tuck the hardware away, Inspector, and give you the hand.” Skinner smiled and did so. “I thought you were Big Joe Tully coming in to get me. The boy here warned me Joe was on the warpath so I was all set to welcome him and beat him to the draw.”
“So I could see,” the Inspector commented. “Heard about the burning of the barges in the Basin and what happened to poor Beasell?”
“This boy told me there was an explosion and that some one slugged Beasell. Tell me is he—is he—dead?” The question sounded to Skippy as if Skinner was hoping the answer would be yes.
Inspector Jones looked sharply at Skinner. “Yes. He is,” he answered simply and again looked up sharply as Skinner sighed as if in relief.
“Beasell was in my confidence. He knew my business and I trusted him,” Skinner spoke as if to himself.
“Sure, I know you did,” the Inspector agreed and there was that in his words which made Skippy feel as if there was something behind them.
“And how did you know that, may I ask, Inspector?” Skinner seemed a bit ill at ease.
“I talked to him before he died. We picked him up in a boat when we went to the fire. He had been badly beaten but before he died he regained consciousness. He talked plenty, too.”
“What did he say? Tell who beat him up?” Skinner was plainly anxious.
“No, strange to say he didn’t.”
“Well then...?”
“Just this.” Inspector Jones whipped out his gun. “Put ’em up Skinner and keep ’em up. I’m arresting you and I’m going to charge you with the murder of Josiah Flint.”
“Why—why—that’s—that’s ridiculous, Inspector. You can’t make a charge like that stand up on the ravings of a dying man.”
“I didn’t tell you that Beasell made any such charges. But I’m tellin’ you now that he made a dying statement that he was in the kicker off the yacht when Skippy and his father came along, that he had been there some time, and hearing you and Flint quarreling, he watched through the porthole, saw you two struggling after Flint charged you with cheating him—saw you shoot the old man in the back when you twisted him around as he tried to snatch the gun you drew in your anger. He also saw you sit old Flint up again, scatter papers all over the place and take what money there was in his desk. Beasell’s blackmailed you plenty since, threatening to turn you in.”
“But—but——”
“And that isn’t all,” the Inspector went on relentlessly. “Buck Flint has been giving you a free hand and staying away, but he’s had accountants working on your books and he’s got plenty of evidence as to how you’ve ben cheating him and how you cheated the old man.”
“No jury will ever convict me on evidence like that.” Skinner seemed to have regained his composure. “Beasell was only a cheap crook anyway and he’s dead, too. Stealing money isn’t murder.”
“Guess you’re right on those points,” the Inspector mused and Skinner started to lower his hands.
“Not so fast, not so fast there! Keep ’em up! There’s one bet you overlooked, Skinner, and I’m going to call it right now.” Still keeping Skinner covered the Inspector moved closer and pulled the gun out of the man’s shoulder holster. “I’ve got a hunch that our ballistic expert will find a groove in the barrel of your gun which will prove the bullet which killed old Flint was fired by you. The gun never was found, you remember, but the bullet with a peculiar mark was and it’s still right down at headquarters.”
Skinner slumped into a chair at that, but Skippy looked quickly from his dejected figure as he heard a familiar bark. He turned to the door and there in the arms of a policeman was his beloved Mugs.
“Mugs! Mugs!” he cried out overjoyed. And then, as if in afterthought, “See anythin’ of Big Joe, officer? Gee, if he’d only come along now, ’cause I know my Pop’s gonna be free soon, everythin’d be just grand. Gee, but I’m happy. I’m....”
He stopped suddenly frightened at something he saw in the policeman’s face. “What—what—what’s wrong? Tell me,” he demanded.
“I’m in a tough spot, kid, but I know you got plenty guts, so here goes point blank. Big Joe went back to your barge figgering you might have found your way back there. We see him and tell him you’re safe. Then he hears the dog barkin’, goes into the flames after him and saves him.” He paused, gulped, then went on: “He was burned bad, Big Joe was. Fulla smoke, too. Well, anyways ... he kicked off.”
There was a silence, which was finally broken by Skippy’s sobs. At a motion from Inspector Jones the policeman, who had brought Mugs and the sad news about Big Joe, handcuffed Skinner and took him out of the cabin, softly closing the door.
It was far in the night before Inspector Jones had Skippy sufficiently comforted so that the boy fell asleep. Then the Inspector bundled him up, carried him to the police launch and that night Skippy and Mugs slept at the Inspector’s home.
CHAPTER XXXIV THE GREAT ADVENTURE
Skippy had two things to show his delighted father when they met at the railroad station a few weeks later, by which time Skinner had confessed murdering Josiah Flint when mad with rage at having been caught stealing, and Skippy’s grief over Big Joe’s death had become less poignant. One was the gawky Mugs and the other a little satchel which he carried under his arm with the greatest care.
“What’s in there, Skippy son?” Toby asked after their outstretched arms had clung in an awkward embrace.
Skippy winked at his father mysteriously.
“I waited to tell you now, Pop—sort of as a surprise. It’s what Buck Flint calls redress money—money that Old Flint should have paid you and didn’t. And he says it’s for the price of the _Minnie M. Baxter_ too. Altogether he said he figured Old Flint owed you a thousand dollars with interest—see Pop?”
Toby was overwhelmed.
“What we a-goin’ ter do with it, son?” he wanted to know.
“Whatever you say, Pop. There’s enough to buy another _Minnie M. Baxter_ and more besides, huh? An’ there’s enough to buy a nice hot dog stand somewheres up in the mountains where the doctor said I wouldn’t have no more bad throats. So what do you say, Pop?”
“Mountains, Skippy boy,” said Toby with shining eyes. “We’ll call our stand the _Minnie Baxter_ jest the same, hey? ’Cause didn’t she sort uv bring us luck in the end, after all? How’d we got all this money if she hadn’t uv burned up and that helped ter show up Skinner and made Buck Flint feel sorry and that he ought ter make good. Yessir we’ll call her that.”
A train announcer sauntered out of the big iron gates and in his sonorous voice called out, “Mountain Express on Track Number Four ... Cold Glen ... Pine Ridge ... Baxter....”
“Did yer hear that, Skippy?” asked Toby excitedly. “There’s a place in them mountains what’s called _Baxter_! Seems like as if it was Fate or somethin’! S’pose we jest try her fer luck. What do you say?”
“I’m on, Pop,” Skippy cried joyfully. “Baxter for luck!”
And arm in arm, Skippy and Toby, with Mugs sniffing at their heels, darted through the big iron gates on their Great Adventure.
END
FOOTNOTES
[1]Stolen goods.
HAL KEEN MYSTERY STORIES By HUGH LLOYD
Boys! Meet Hal Keen, that lanky, nonchalant, red-headed youth whose guiding star is the star that points to adventure, excitement and mystery. Follow him in his hunts for clues and criminals. There are plenty of thrills and shivers in these stories to keep you on your toes.
THE SMUGGLER’S SECRET
Hal Keen sets out to get to the bottom of a mystery that threatens the safety of a whole community.
THE MYSTERIOUS ARAB
Mystery, excitement, murder in a scientist’s camp in the jungles of Africa, where hate, revenge, and suspicion lead to tragedy.
THE HERMIT OF GORDON’S CREEK
The disappearance of two airmail pilots leads to a mystery that centers about an abandoned mine and a strange old man.
KIDNAPPED IN THE JUNGLE
A hint of buried treasure in the ruins of an old French mission leads Hal deep into the Central American jungle.
THE COPPERHEAD TRAIL MYSTERY
Baffling and blood-curdling events center about the ranch where Hal Keen and his friends had gone in search of gold.
THE LONESOME SWAMP MYSTERY
The lonely and mysterious swamp gave up its secret only after a series of terrifying events taxed Hal’s courage and ability.
THE CLUE AT SKELETON ROCKS
In this new thriller Hal Keen finds mystery and adventure in and about a lonely lighthouse on Skeleton Rocks, off the Maine coast.
THE DOOM OF STARK HOUSE
Mystery and terror in an old house in the wilderness above Quebec where Hal Keen is the guest of a strange family.
THE JUDY BOLTON MYSTERY STORIES By MARGARET SUTTON
Here is a new series of mystery stories for girls by an author who knows the kind of stories every girl wants to read—mystery of the “shivery” sort, adventure that makes the nerves tingle, clever “detecting” and a new lovable heroine, Judy Bolton, whom all girls will take to their hearts at once.
THE VANISHING SHADOW
Judy’s safety is threatened by a gang of crooks who think she knows too much about their latest “deal.” She is constantly pursued by a mysterious shadow which vanishes before she can get a glimpse of its owner.
THE HAUNTED ATTIC
The Boltons move into a large rambling house reputed to be haunted. Even the brave Judy who has looked forward to “spooky” goings on is thoroughly frightened at the strange scrapings and rappings and the eery “crying ghost.”
THE INVISIBLE CHIMES
Through an automobile accident a strange girl is taken into the Bolton household—the whole family becomes attached to her and interested in her story. Judy tracks down many clues before she finally uncovers the real identity of “Honey.”
SEVEN STRANGE CLUES
Judy gets to the bottom of a mystery that centers around a prize poster contest and a fire in the school building—through seven baffling clues that hold the key to the answer.
THE NANCY DREW MYSTERY STORIES By CAROLYN KEENE
Illustrated. Every Volume Complete in Itself.
Here is a thrilling series of mystery stories for girls. Nancy Drew, ingenious, alert, is the daughter of a famous criminal lawyer and she herself is deeply interested in his mystery cases. Her interest involves her often in some very dangerous and exciting situations.
THE SECRET OF THE OLD CLOCK
Nancy, unaided, seeks to locate a missing will and finds herself in the midst of adventure.
THE HIDDEN STAIRCASE
Mysterious happenings in an old stone mansion lead to an investigation by Nancy.
THE BUNGALOW MYSTERY
Nancy has some perilous experiences around a deserted bungalow.
THE MYSTERY AT LILAC INN
Quick thinking and quick action were needed for Nancy to extricate herself from a dangerous situation.
THE SECRET AT SHADOW RANCH
On a vacation in Arizona Nancy uncovers an old mystery and solves it.
THE SECRET OF RED GATE FARM
Nancy exposes the doings of a secret society on an isolated farm.
THE CLUE IN THE DIARY
A fascinating and exciting story of a search for a clue to a surprising mystery.
NANCY’S MYSTERIOUS LETTER
Nancy receives a letter informing her that she is heir to a fortune. This story tells of her search for another Nancy Drew.
FLYING STORIES FOR BOYS IN THE AIR WITH ANDY LANE By EUSTACE L. ADAMS
Illustrated. Every Volume Complete in Itself.
Mr. Adams, the author of this flying series for boys is an experienced aviator and has had many thrilling adventures in the air—both as a member of the famous Lafayette Escadrille in the World War and in the United States Naval Aviation Service flying with the squadrons patrolling the Atlantic Coast. His stories reveal not only his ability to tell daring and exciting air episodes but also his first hand knowledge of modern aeroplanes and the marvelous technical improvements which have been made in the past few years. Andy Lane flies the latest and most highly developed machines in the field of aviation.
FIFTEEN DAYS IN THE AIR OVER THE POLAR ICE RACING ROUND THE WORLD THE RUNAWAY AIRSHIP PIRATES OF THE AIR ON THE WINGS OF FLAME THE MYSTERIOUS MONOPLANE THE FLYING WINDMILL THE PLANE WITHOUT A PILOT WINGS OF ADVENTURE ACROSS THE TOP OF THE WORLD PRISONERS OF THE CLOUDS
THE REX LEE FLYING STORIES By THOMSON BURTIS
Illustrated. Every Volume Complete in Itself.
The author of this series of exciting flying stories is an experienced aviator. He says, “During my five years in the army I performed nearly every sort of flying duty—instructor, test pilot, bombing, photographing pilot, etc., in every variety of ship, from tiny scout planes to the gigantic three-motored Italian Caproni.”
Not only has this author had many experiences as a flyer; a list of his activities while knocking around the country includes postal clerk, hobo, actor, writer, mutton chop salesman, preacher, roughneck in the oil fields, newspaper man, flyer, scenario writer in Hollywood and synthetic clown with the Sells Floto Circus. Having lived an active, daring life, and possessing a gift for good story telling, he is well qualified to write these adventures of a red-blooded dare-devil young American who became one of the country’s greatest flyers.
REX LEE; GYPSY FLYER REX LEE; ON THE BORDER PATROL REX LEE; RANGER OF THE SKY REX LEE; SKY TRAILER REX LEE; ACE OF THE AIR MAIL REX LEE; NIGHT FLYER REX LEE’S MYSTERIOUS FLIGHT REX LEE; ROUGH RIDER OF THE AIR REX LEE; AERIAL ACROBAT REX LEE; TRAILING AIR BANDITS REX LEE; FLYING DETECTIVE
THE HARDY BOYS SERIES By FRANKLIN W. DIXON
Illustrated. Every Volume Complete in Itself.
The Hardy Boys are sons of a celebrated American detective, and during vacations and their off time from school they help their father by hunting down clues themselves.
THE TOWER TREASURE—A dying criminal confessed that his loot had been secreted “in the tower.” It remained for the Hardy Boys to clear up the mystery.
THE HOUSE ON THE CLIFF—Mr. Hardy started to investigate—and disappeared! An odd tale, with plenty of excitement.
THE SECRET OF THE OLD MILL—Counterfeit money was in circulation, and the limit was reached when Mrs. Hardy took some from a stranger. A tale full of thrills.
THE MISSING CHUMS—Two of the Hardy Boys’ chums disappear and are almost rescued by their friends when all are captured. A thrilling story of adventure.
HUNTING FOR HIDDEN GOLD—In tracing some stolen gold the trail leads the boys to an abandoned mine, and there things start to happen.
THE SHORE ROAD MYSTERY—Automobiles were disappearing most mysteriously from the Shore Road. It remained for the Hardy Boys to solve the mystery.
THE SECRET OF THE CAVES—When the boys reached the caves they came unexpectedly upon a queer old hermit.
THE MYSTERY OF CABIN ISLAND—A story of queer adventures on a rockbound island.
THE GREAT AIRPORT MYSTERY—The Hardy Boys solve the mystery of the disappearance of some valuable mail.
WHAT HAPPENED AT MIDNIGHT—The boys follow a trail that ends in a strange and exciting situation.
WHILE THE CLOCK TICKED—The Hardy Boys aid in vindicating a man who has been wrongly accused of a crime.
FOOTPRINTS UNDER THE WINDOW—The Smuggling of Chinese into this country is the basis of this story in which the boys find thrills and excitement aplenty.
WESTERN STORIES FOR BOYS By JAMES CODY FERRIS
Each Volume Complete in Itself.
Thrilling tales of the great west, told primarily for boys but which will be read by all who love mystery, rapid action, and adventures in the great open spaces.
The Manly boys, Roy and Teddy, are the sons of an old ranchman, the owner of many thousands of heads of cattle. The lads know how to ride, how to shoot, and how to take care of themselves under any and all circumstances.
The cowboys of the X Bar X Ranch are real cowboys, on the job when required, but full of fun and daring—a bunch any reader will be delighted to know.
THE X BAR X BOYS ON THE RANCH THE X BAR X BOYS IN THUNDER CANYON THE X BAR X BOYS ON WHIRLPOOL RIVER THE X BAR X BOYS ON BIG BISON TRAIL THE X BAR X BOYS AT THE ROUND-UP THE X BAR X BOYS AT NUGGET CAMP THE X BAR X BOYS AT RUSTLER’S GAP THE X BAR X BOYS AT GRIZZLY PASS THE X BAR X BOYS LOST IN THE ROCKIES THE X BAR X BOYS RIDING FOR LIFE THE X BAR X BOYS IN SMOKY VALLEY
BOOKS BY LEO EDWARDS
Illustrated. Every Volume Complete in Itself.
Hundreds of thousands of boys have laughed until their sides ached over the weird and wonderful adventures of Jerry Todd, Poppy Ott, Trigger Berg and their friends. Mr. Edwards’ boy characters are all real. They do the things other boys like. Pirates! Mystery! Detectives! Adventure! Ghosts! Buried Treasure! Achievement! Stories of boys making things, doing things, going places—always on the jump and always having fun. His stories are for boys and girls of all ages.
THE JERRY TODD BOOKS
THE POPPY OTT BOOKS
THE TRIGGER BERG BOOKS
TRIGGER BERG AND THE TREASURE TREE TRIGGER BERG AND 700 MOUSETRAPS TRIGGER BERG AND THE SACRED PIG
THE TUFFY BEAN BOOKS
GARRY GRAYSON FOOTBALL STORIES By ELMER A. DAWSON
Illustrated. Each Volume Complete in Itself.
Garry Grayson is a football fan, first, last, and all the time. But more than that, he is a wideawake American boy with a “gang” of chums almost as wideawake as himself.
How Garry organized the first football eleven his grammar school had, how he later played on the High School team, and what he did on the Prep School gridiron and elsewhere, is told in a manner to please all readers and especially those interested in watching a rapid forward pass, a plucky tackle, or a hot run for a touchdown.
Good, clean football at its best—and in addition, rattling stories of mystery and schoolboy rivalries.
GARRY GRAYSON’S HILL STREET ELEVEN; or, The Football Boys of Lenox. GARRY GRAYSON AT LENOX HIGH; or, The Champions of the Football League. GARRY GRAYSON’S FOOTBALL RIVALS; or, The Secret of the Stolen Signals. GARRY GRAYSON SHOWING HIS SPEED; or, A Daring Run on the Gridiron. GARRY GRAYSON AT STANLEY PREP; or, The Football Rivals of Riverview. GARRY GRAYSON’S WINNING KICK; or, Battling for Honor. GARRY GRAYSON HITTING THE LINE; or, Stanley Prep on a New Gridiron. GARRY GRAYSON’S WINNING TOUCHDOWN; or, Putting Passmore Tech on the Map. GARRY GRAYSON’S DOUBLE SIGNALS; or, Vanquishing the Football Plotters. GARRY GRAYSON’S FORWARD PASS; or, Winning in the Final Quarter.
BOB CHASE BIG GAME SERIES By FRANK A. WARNER
In these thrilling stories of outdoor life the hero is a young lumberjack who is a crack rifle shot. While tracking game in the Maine woods he does some rich hunters a great service. They become interested in him and take him on various hunting expeditions in this country and abroad. Bob learns what it is to face not only wildcats, foxes and deer but also bull moose, Rocky Mountain grizzly bears and many other species of big game.
_A Skippy Dare Mystery Story_ AMONG THE RIVER PIRATES
_By_ HUGH LLOYD
Nearly all the boats and barges on the River that was “home” to Skippy belonged to old Flint. A grasping and merciless man, Flint also controlled the lives of most of the people who tried to earn their living on the River. For many years Skippy’s father had worked for him; loading and unloading illicit merchandise—aware that he was involved in crooked business but reaping little benefit beyond a meager living therefrom.
Honest, courageous young Skippy finally persuades his father to leave Flint’s employ—but it is impossible to escape the evil net in which they are caught. Before they succeed in getting away from the illicit river traffic, they become involved with the police—the boy’s father is accused of murder—Skippy is forced into a crooked game—and the Basin, where the condemned river barges provide homes for the river people is blown up. In one great blast men, women, children and all their worldly goods are destroyed in a sea of lapping flames.
In the end Skippy’s fearless honesty and loyalty bring happy freedom to himself and his best pal—his father.
Hal Keen Mystery Stories
_By_ HUGH LLOYD
Follow Hal Keen on his hunts for clues and criminals. There are plenty of thrills and shivers in these stories of adventure and mystery.
THE HERMIT OF GORDON’S CREEK
The disappearance of two airmail pilots leads to a mystery that centers about an abandoned mine.
KIDNAPPED IN THE JUNGLE
A hint of buried treasure leads Hal deep into the Central American jungle.
THE COPPERHEAD TRAIL MYSTERY
What was the meaning of the baffling and blood curdling events that centered about the ranch where Hal Keen had gone in search of gold?
THE SMUGGLERS’ SECRET
Hal Keen sets out to get to the bottom of a mystery that threatens the safety of a whole community.
THE MYSTERIOUS ARAB
Mystery, excitement, murder in a scientist’s camp in the jungles of Africa.
THE LONESOME SWAMP MYSTERY
The lonely and mysterious swamp gave up its secret only after a series of terrifying events.
THE CLUE AT SKELETON ROCKS
Hal Keen finds mystery and adventure in and about a lonely lighthouse off the Maine coast.
THE DOOM OF STARK HOUSE
A menacing cloud of mystery hangs over the isolated and snow bound Stark house.
THE LOST MINE OF THE AMAZON
Hal’s sympathy for an exiled white family leads him on to solve the tragic mystery that surrounds the lost mine.
_Skippy Dare_
courageous—honest—loyal
A young “detective” who keeps his head when trouble starts. And Skippy has a way of being in the thick of things
HIS ADVENTURES MAKE TENSE READING
He learns the trickery of crooked men on his father’s river barge; his experience stands him in good stead when he becomes an office boy in a detective agency—and he proves an invaluable aide to Conne, the great detective.... Fearless, fast thinking Skippy is a hero well worth knowing!
Skippy Dare Mystery Stories by HUGH LLOYD author of the “_Hal Keen Mystery Stories_”
AMONG THE RIVER PIRATES PRISONERS IN DEVIL’S BOG HELD FOR RANSOM
GROSSET & DUNLAP · _Publishers_ · New York
Transcriber’s Notes
--Copyright notice provided as in the original—this e-text is public domain in the country of publication.
--Silently corrected palpable typos; left non-standard spellings and dialect unchanged.
--Relocated the illustrations (printed on unnumbered pages) to the corresponding paragraph in the text.
--In the text versions, delimited italics text in _underscores_ (the HTML version reproduces the font form of the printed book.)
End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Among the River Pirates, by Hugh Lloyd

= = = PG11723 = = =
AMONG THE TREES AT ELMRIDGE
E-text prepared by Juliet Sutherland, Charlie Kirschner, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 11723-h.htm or 11723-h.zip: (http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/1/1/7/2/11723/11723-h/11723-h.htm) or (http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/1/1/7/2/11723/11723-h.zip)
AMONG THE TREES AT ELMRIDGE
BY
ELLA RODMAN CHURCH
1886
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
_A SPRING OPENING._
On that bright spring afternoon when three happy, interested children went off to the woods with their governess to take their first lesson in the study of wild flowers, they saw also some other things which made a fresh series of "Elmridge Talks," and these things were found among the trees of the roadside and forest.
"What makes it look so _yellow_ over there, Miss Harson?" asked Clara, who was peering curiously at a clump of trees that seemed to have been touched with gold or sunlight. "And just look over here," she continued, "at these pink ones!"
Malcolm shouted at the idea:
"Yellow and pink trees! That sounds like a Japanese fan. Where are they, I should like to know?"
"Here, you perverse boy!" said his governess as she laughingly turned him around. "Are you looking up into the sky for them? There is a clump of golden willows right before you, with some rosy maples on one side. What other colors can you call them?"
Malcolm had to confess that "yellow and pink trees" were not so wide of the mark, after all, and that they were very pretty. Little Edith was particularly delighted with them, and wanted to "pick the flowers" immediately.
"They are too high for that, dear," was the reply, "and these blossoms--for that is what they really are, although nothing more than fringes and catkins--are much prettier massed on the trees than they would be if gathered. The still-bare twigs and branches seem, as you see, to be draped with golden and rose-colored veils, but there will be no leaves until these queer flowers have dropped. If we look closely at the twigs and branches, we shall see that they are glossy and polished, as though they had been varnished and then brightened with color by the painter's brush. It is the flowing of the sap that does this. The swelling of the bark occasioned by the flow of sap gives the whole mass a livelier hue; hence the ashen green of the poplar, the golden green of the willow and the dark crimson of the peach tree, the wild rose and the red osier are perceptibly heightened by the first warm days of spring."
[Illustration: MALE CATKIN OF WILLOW.]
"Miss Harson," asked Clara, with a perplexed face, "what are catkins?"
"Here," said her governess, reaching from the top bar of the road-fence for the lowest branch of a willow tree; "examine this catkin for yourself, and I will tell you what my _Botany_ says of it: 'An ament, or catkin, is an assemblage of flowers composed of scales and stamens or pistils arranged along a common thread-like receptacle, as in the chestnut and willow. It is a kind of calyx, by some classed as a mode of inflorescence (or flowering), and each chaffy scale protects one or more of the stamens or pistils, the whole forming one aggregate flower. The ament is common to forest-trees, as the oak and chestnut, and is also found upon the willow and poplar.'"
"It's funny-looking," said Malcolm, when he had made himself thoroughly acquainted with the appearance of the catkin, "but it doesn't look much like a flower: it looks more like a pussy's tail."
"Yes, and that is the origin of its name. 'Catkin' is diminutive for 'cat;' so this collection of flowers is called 'catkin,' or 'little cat.'"
"I think I'll call them 'pussy-tails,'" said Edith.
"There is a great deal to be learned about trees," said Miss Harson, when all were comfortably seated in the pleasant schoolroom; "and, besides the natural history of their species, some old trees have wonderful stories connected with them, while many in tropical countries are so wonderful in themselves that they do not need stories to make them interesting. The common trees around us will be our subjects at first; for I suppose that you can scarcely tell a willow from a poplar, or a chestnut tree from either, can you?"
"I can tell a chestnut tree," said Malcolm, confidently.
"When it is not the season for nuts?" asked his governess, smiling.
There was not a very positive reply to this; and Miss Harson continued:
"I do not think that any of us know as much as we ought to know of the trees which we see every day, and of the uses to which many of them are put, to say nothing of many familiar trees that we read about, and even depend upon for some of the necessaries of life."
"Like the cocoanut tree," suggested Clara.
"That is not exactly necessary to our comfort, dear," was the reply, "for people can manage to live without cocoanuts, although in many forms they are very agreeable to the taste, and it is only the inhabitants of the countries where they grow who look upon these trees as necessaries; but we will take them up in their turn. And first let us find out what we can about the willow, because it is the first tree, with us, to become green in the spring, and, of that large class which is called _deciduous_, the last one to lose its leaves."
"And why are they called _deciduous?_" asked Malcolm.
"Because they shed their leaves every autumn and are furnished with a new set in the spring: 'deciduous' is Latin for 'falling off.' And this is the case with nearly all our native trees and plants. _Persistent_, or permanent, leaves remain on the stem and branches all through the changes of season, like the leaves of the pine and box, while _evergreens_ look fresh through the entire year and are generally cone-bearing and resinous trees. 'These change their leaves annually, but, the young leaves appearing before the old ones decay, the tree is always green.'"
"Miss Harson," said Clara, "when people talk about _weeping_ willows, what do they mean? Do the trees really cry? I sometimes read about 'em in stories, and I never knew what they did."
"They cry dreadfully," said Malcolm, "when it rains."
"But only as you do when you are out in it," replied his governess--"by having the water drip from your clothes.--No, Clara, the tree is called 'weeping' because it seems to 'assume the attitude of a person in tears, who bends over and appears to droop.' The sprays of this tree are particularly beautiful, and 'willowy' is often used for 'graceful,' as meaning the same thing. Its language is 'sorrow,' and it is often seen in burial-grounds and in mourning-pictures. 'We remember it in sacred history, associating it with the rivers of Babylon, and with the tears of the children of Israel, who sat down under the shade of this tree and hung their harps upon its branches. It is distinguished by the graceful beauty of its outlines, its light-green, delicate foliage, its sorrowing attitude and its flowing drapery.'"
"Were those weeping willows that we saw to-day?" asked Clara.
"No," replied her brother, quickly; "they just stuck up straight and didn't weep a bit."
"They are called _water_ willows," said Miss Harson, "because they are never found in dry places. They are more common than the weeping willow. The water willow has the same delicate foliage and the same habit, under an April sky, of gleaming with a drapery of golden verdure among the still-naked trees of the forest or orchard. 'When Spring has closed her delicate flowers,' says a bright writer, 'and the multitudes that crowd around the footsteps of May have yielded their places to the brighter host of June, the willow scatters the golden aments that adorned it, and appears in the deeper garniture of its own green foliage.' A group of these golden willows, seen in a rainstorm, will have so bright an appearance as to make it seem as if the sun were actually shining."
[Illustration: THE WHITE WILLOW (_Salix alba_).]
"I wish we had them all around here, then," said Edith; "I like to see the sun shining when it rains."
"But the sun is _not_ shining, dear," replied her governess: "it is only the reflection from the willows that makes it look so; and we can make just such sunshine ourselves when it rains, or when there is dullness of any sort, by being all the more cheerful and striving to make others happy. Who loves to be called 'Little Sunshine'?"
"I do," said the child, caressing the hand that had patted her rosy cheek.
"Let's all be golden willows," said Malcolm, in a comical way that made them laugh.
Miss Harson told him that he could not make a better attempt than to be one of those home-brighteners who bring the sunshine with them, but she added that such people are always considerate for others. Malcolm wondered a little if this meant that _he_ was not, but he soon forgot it in hearing the many things that were to be said of the willow.
"The family-name of this tree is _Salix_, from a word that means 'to spring,' because a willow-branch, if planted, will take root and grow so quickly that it seems almost like magic. 'And they shall _spring up_ as among the grass, as willows by the watercourses,' says the prophet Isaiah, speaking of the children of the people of God. The flowers of the willow are of two kinds--one bearing stamens, and the other pistils--and each grows upon a separate plant. When the ovary, at the base of the pistil, is ripe, it opens by two valves and lets out, as through a door, multitudes of small seeds covered with a fine down, like the seeds of the cotton-plant. This downy substance is greedily sought after by the birds as a lining for their nests, and they may be seen carrying it away in their bills. And in some parts of Germany people take the trouble to collect it and use it as a wadding to their winter dresses, and even manufacture it into a coarse kind of paper."
"What queer people!" exclaimed Clara. "And how funny they must look in their wadded dresses!"
"They are not graceful people," was the reply, "but they live in a cold climate and show their good sense by dressing as warmly as possible. It was quite a surprise, though, to me to find that the willow was of use in clothing people. The more we learn of the works of God, the better we shall understand that last verse of the first chapter of the Bible: 'And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good.' The bees, too, are attracted by the willow catkins, but they do not want the down. On mild days whole swarms of them may be seen reveling in the sweets of the fresh blossoms. 'Cold days will come long after the willow catkins appear, and the bees will find but few flowers venturesome enough to open their petals. They have, however, thoroughly enjoyed their feast, and the short season of plenty will often be the means of saving a hive from famine.'"
"Are willow baskets made of willow trees?" asked Malcolm.
"Yes," said Miss Harson. "Basket-making has been a great industry in England from the earliest times; the ancient Britons were particularly skillful in weaving the supple wands of the willow. They even made of these slender stems little boats called 'coracles,' in which they could paddle down the small rivers, and the boats could be carried on their shoulders when they were walking on dry land."
"Just like our Indians' birch-bark canoes," said Malcolm, who was reading about the North American Indians. "But isn't it strange, Miss Harson, that the Indians and the Britons didn't get drowned going out in such little light boats?"
"Their very lightness buoyed them up upon the waves," was the reply; "but it does seem wonderful that they could bear the weight of men. The willow, however, was also used by the Romans in making their battle-shields, and even for the manufacture of ropes as well as baskets. The rims of cart-wheels, too, used to be made of willow, as now they are hooped with iron; so, you see, it is a strong wood as well as a pliant one. The kind used for basket-making is the _Salix viminalis_, and the rods of this species are called 'osiers.' Let us see now what this English book says of the process of basket-making:
"'The quick and vigorous growth of the willow renders it easy to provide materials for this branch of industry. Osier-beds are planted in every suitable place, and here the willow-cutter comes as to an ample store. Autumn is the season for him to ply his trade, and he cuts the willow rods down and ties them in bundles. He then sets them up on end in standing water to the depth of a few inches. Here they remain during the winter, until the shoots, in the following spring, begin to sprout, when they are in a fit state to be peeled. A machine is used in some places to compress the greatest number of rods into a bundle.
[Illustration: THE POLLARD WILLOW IN WINTER.]
"'Aged or infirm people and women and children can earn money by peeling willows at so much per bundle. The operation is very simple, and so is the necessary apparatus. Sometimes a wooden bench with holes in it is used, the willow-twigs being drawn through the holes. Another way is to draw the rod through two pieces of iron joined together, and with one end thrust into the ground to make it stand upright. The willow-peeler sits down before his instrument and merely thrusts the rod between the two pieces of iron and draws it out again. This proceeding scrapes the bark off one end, and then he turns it and fits it in the other way; so that by a simple process the whole rod is peeled. When the rods are quite prepared, they are again tied up in bundles and sold to the basket-makers.'"
"But how do they make the baskets?" asked Clara and Edith. "That is the nicest part."
"There is little to tell about it, though," said their governess, "because it is such easy work that any one can learn to do it. You saw the Indian women making baskets when papa took us to Maine last summer, and you noticed how very quickly they did it, beginning with the flat bottom and working rapidly up. It is a favorite occupation for the blind, and one of the things which are taught them in asylums."
"I wonder," said Malcolm, "if there is anything else that can be done with the willow?"
"Oh yes," replied Miss Harson; "we have not yet come to the end of its resources. It makes the best quality of charcoal, and in many parts of England the tree is raised for this express purpose. 'The abode of the charcoal-burner,' says an English writer, 'may be known from a distance by the cloud of smoke that hovers over it, and that must make it rather unhealthy. It is sometimes a small dome-shaped hut made of green turf, and, except for the difference of the material, might remind us of the hut of the Esquimaux. Beside it stands a caravan like those which make their appearance at fairs, and that contains the family goods and chattels. A string of clothes hung out to dry, a water-tub and a rough, shaggy dog usually complete the picture.'"
"But how can people live in the hut," asked Malcolm, "if the charcoal is burned in it? Ugh! I should think they'd choke."
"They certainly would," said his governess; "for the charcoal-smoke is death when inhaled for any length of time. But the charcoal-burner knows this quite as well as does any one else, and he makes his fire outside of the house, puts a rude fence around it and lets it smoke away like a huge pipe. The hut is more or less enveloped in smoke, but this is not so bad as letting it rise from the inside would be. A great deal of willow charcoal is made in Germany and other parts of Europe."
"But, Miss Harson," said Clara, in a puzzled tone, "I don't see what they do with it all. It doesn't take much to clean people's teeth."
"No, dear," was the smiling reply, "and I am afraid that the people who make it are rather careless about their teeth.--You need not laugh, Malcolm, because it is 'just like a girl,' for it is quite as much like a boy not to know things which he has never been taught, and you must remember that you have two years the start of your sister in getting acquainted with the world. Perhaps you will kindly tell us of some of the uses to which charcoal is applied?"
"Well," said the young gentleman, after an awkward silence, "it takes lots of it to kindle fires."
"I do not think that Kitty ever uses it in the kitchen," said Miss Harson, "for she is supplied with kindling-wood for that purpose. You will have to think of something else."
But Malcolm could not think, and his governess finally told him that a great deal of charcoal is used for making gun-powder, and still more for fuel in France and the South of Europe, where a brass vessel supplies the place of a grate or stove. Quantities of it are consumed in steel-and iron-works, in preserving meat and other food, and in many similar ways. The children listened with great interest, and Malcolm felt sure that the next time he was asked about charcoal he would have a sensible answer.
"Our insect friends the aphides, or plant-lice, are very fond of the willow," continued Miss Harson, "and in hot, dry weather great masses of them gather on the leaves and drop a sugary juice, which the country-people call 'honey-dew,' and in some remote places, where knowledge is limited, it has been thought to come from the clouds. But we, who have learned something about these aphides[1], know that it comes from their little green bodies, and that the ants often carry the insects off to their nests, where they feed and 'tend them for the sake of this very juice. The aphis that infests the willow is the largest of the tribe, and the branches and stems of the tree are often blackened by the honey-dew that falls upon them."
[1] See _Flyers and Crawlers_, by the author. Presbyterian Board of Publication.
"Do willow trees grow everywhere?" asked Clara.
"They are certainly found in a great many different places," was the reply, "and even in the warmest countries. In one of the missionary settlements in Africa there is a solitary willow that has a story attached to it. It was the only tree in the settlement--think what a place that must have been!--except those the missionary had planted in his own garden, and it would never have existed but for the laziness of its owner. Nothing would have induced any of the natives to take the trouble to plant a tree, and therefore the willow had not been planted. But it happened, a long-time ago, that a native had fetched a log of wood from a distance, to make into a bowl when he should feel in the humor to do so. He threw the log into a pool of water, and soon forgot all about it. Weeks and months passed, and he never felt in the humor to work. But the log of wood set to work of its own accord. It had been cut from a willow, and it took root at the bottom of the pool and began to grow. In the end it became a handsome and flourishing tree."
This story was approved by the young audience, except that it was too short; but their governess laughingly said that, as there was nothing more to tell, it could not very well be any longer.
[Illustration: THE WEEPING WILLOW (_Salix Babylonica_).]
"The weeping willow," continued Miss Harson, "was first planted in England in not so lazy a way, but almost as accidentally. Many years ago a basket of figs was sent from Turkey to the poet Pope, and the basket was made of willow. Willows and their cousins the poplars are natives of the East; you remember that the one hundred and thirty-seventh psalm says of the captive Jews, 'By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion. We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof.' 'The poet valued highly the small slender twigs, as associated with so much that was interesting, and he untwisted the basket and planted one of the branches in the ground. It had some tiny buds upon it, and he hoped he might be able to rear it, as none of this species of willow was known in England. Happily, the willow is very quick to take root and grow. The little branch soon became a tree, and drooped gracefully over the river in the same manner that its race had done over the waters of Babylon. From that one branch all the weeping willows in England are descended.'"
"And then they were brought over here," said Malcolm. "But what odd leaves they have, Miss Harson!--so narrow and long. They don't look like the leaves of other trees."
"The leaf is somewhat like that of the olive, only that of the olive is broader. The willow is a native of Babylon, and the weeping willow is called _Salix Babylonica_. It was considered one of the handsomest trees of the East, and is particularly mentioned among those which God commanded the Israelites to select for branches to bear in their hands at the feast of tabernacles. Read the verse, Malcolm--the fortieth of the twenty-third chapter of Leviticus."
Malcolm read:
"'And ye shall take you on the first day the boughs of goodly trees, branches of palm trees, and the boughs of thick trees, and _willows of the brook;_ and ye shall rejoice before the Lord your God seven days.'"
[Illustration: LEAF OF WEEPING WILLOW.]
"A place called the 'brook of the willows,'" added his governess, "is mentioned in Isaiah xv. 7, and this brook, according to travelers in Palestine, flows into the south-eastern extremity of the Dead Sea. The willow has always been considered by the poets as an emblem of woe and desertion, and this idea probably came from the weeping of the captive Jews under the willows of Babylon. The branches of the _Salix Babylonica_ often droop so low as to touch the ground, and because of this sweeping habit, and of its association with watercourses in the Bible, it has been considered a very suitable tree to plant beside ponds and fountains in ornamental grounds, as well as in cemeteries as an emblem of mourning."
"How much there is to remember about the willow!" said Clara, thoughtfully. "I wonder if all the trees will be so interesting?"
"They are not all _Bible_ trees," replied Miss Harson. "But the wise king of Israel found them interesting, for he 'spake of trees, from the cedar tree that is in Lebanon even unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall.'"
CHAPTER II.
_THE MAPLES._
"The pink trees next, I suppose," said Malcolm, "since we have had the yellow ones?"
"_Real_ pink trees?" asked Edith, with very wide-open eyes.
"No, dear;" replied her governess; "there are no pink trees, except when they are covered with bloom like the peach trees. Malcolm only means the maples that we saw in blossom yesterday and thought of such a pretty color. There are many varieties of the maple, which is always a beautiful and useful tree, but the red, or scarlet, maple is the very queen of the family. It is not so large as are most of the others; but when a very young tree, its grace and beauty are noticeable among its companions. It is often found in low, moist places, but it thrives just as well in high, dry ground; and it is therefore a most convenient tree. Here is a very pretty description, Malcolm, in one of papa's large books, that you can read to us."
Malcolm read remarkably well for a boy of his age, and he always enjoyed being called upon in this way.
[Illustration: THE RED MAPLE.]
Miss Harson pointed to these lines:
"Coming forth in the spring, like morning in the east, arrayed in crimson and purple; bearing itself, not proudly but gracefully in modest green, among the more stately trees in summer; and ere it bids adieu to the season stepping forth in robes of gold, vermilion, crimson and variegated scarlet,--stands the queen of the American forest, the pride of all eyes and the delight of every picturesque observer of nature, the red maple."
"Why, I never saw such a tree as that!" exclaimed Clara, in great surprise.
"Yes, dear," replied her governess; "you have seen it, but you never thought of describing it to yourself in just this way. When you saw it yesterday, it was coming forth in the spring, like morning in the east, arrayed in crimson and purple,' but you just called it a pink tree. It is much nearer red, however, than it is pink."
"I've seen all the rest of the colors, too," said Malcolm, "when we went out after nuts."
"That is its autumn dress," said Miss Harson, "although a small tree is often seen with no color on it but brilliant red. But first we must see what it is like in spring and summer. It is also called the scarlet, the white, the soft and the swamp maple, and the flowers, as you see from this specimen, are in whorls, or pairs, of bright crimson, in crowded bunches on the purple branches. The leaves are in three or five lobes, with deep notches between, and some of them are very broad, while others are long and narrow. The trunk of the red maple is a clear ashy gray, often mottled with patches of white lichens; and when the tree is old, the bark cracks and can be peeled off in long, narrow strips."
"Is anything done with the bark?" asked Clara.
"Yes, it is used, with other substances, for dyeing, and also for making ink. The sap, too, can be boiled down to sugar, but it is not nearly so rich as that of the proper sugar-maple. The wood, which is very light-colored with a tinge of rose in it, is often made into common furniture, as it takes a fine polish and is easy to work with. It is used, too, for building-purposes. The early-summer foliage of the red maple is of a beautiful yellow green, and the young leaves are very delicate and airy-looking; but the graceful tree is in such a hurry to display her gay autumn colors that she will often put on a scarlet or crimson streamer in July or August. One brilliantly-colored branch will be seen on a green tree, or the leaves of an entire tree will turn red while all the other trees around it are clothed in summer greenness."
"Don't you remember, Miss Harson," said Edith, "the little tree that I thought was on fire and how frightened I was?"
"Yes, dear, I remember it very well--an innocent little red maple that _would_ put on its flame-colored dress when it should have been all in green, like its sisters; but it was too green at heart to be in a blaze. This tree is often used for fuel, but it has to be cut down and dried first. The reddening of the leaf generally begins at the veins and spreads out from them until the whole is tinted. Sometimes it appears in spots, almost like drops of blood, on the green surface; but, come as it will, it is always beautiful. It is said of the red maple that 'it stands among the occupants of the forest like Venus among the planets--the brightest in the midst of brightness and the most beautiful in a constellation of beauty,'"
"Is there such a thing as a silver tree?" asked Clara.
[Illustration: THE SILVER-LEAF MAPLE.]
"There is a tree called 'the silver maple,'" was the reply, "and there is also the silver poplar. The silver maple is considered the most graceful of the large and handsome maple family. I have not told you, I think, that the name of the family is _Acer_, which means 'sharp' or 'hard,' and it was supposed to have been given in old English times when the wood of the maple was used for javelins. The silver maple gets its name from the whitish under-surface of its leaves, and it is a favorite shade-tree; it has a slender trunk and long, drooping branches. The foliage is light and rather dull-looking, and it is not a very bright tree in autumn. The leaves are so deeply notched that they have a fringe-like appearance, and this, with its slender form and bending, swaying habit, gives it a very graceful look."
Little Edith wished to know "if the wood was like silver," and Malcolm asked her how she expected it to grow if it was.
But Miss Harson replied kindly,
"The silver, dear, is all in the leaves, and there is not much of it there. The wood is white and of little use, as it is soft and perishable; but the beauty of the finely-cut foliage, the contrast between the green of the upper surface of the leaves and the silver color of the lower, and the magnificent spread of the limbs of the white maple, recommend it as an ornamental tree; and this is the purpose for which it is intended. It is used very largely in the cities for shade and beauty. It is often called the 'river maple,' because it is so frequently seen on the banks of streams."
"And now," said Malcolm, "I hope there is ever so much about the maple-sugar tree. Can't we get some this spring, Miss Harson, before it's all gone?"
"We can certainly buy the sugar in town, Malcolm, if that is what you mean; but it does not grow on the trees in cakes, and we shall scarcely be able to tap the trunks and go through with the process of preparing the sap, even if it were not too late for that. We will do what we can, though, to become acquainted with the rock maple, that we may be able to recognize it when we see it. When young, it is a beautiful, neat and shapely tree with a rich, full leafy head of a great variety of forms. It is the largest and strongest of the maples, and gives the best shade. It can be distinguished from the other members of the family by its leaves, in which the notch between the lobes is round instead of being sharp, and also by their appearing at the same time with the blossoms, which are of a yellowish-green color. The green tint of the leaves is darker on some trees than it is on others, and in autumn they become, often before the first touch of the frost, of a splendid orange or gold, sometimes of a bright scarlet or crimson, color, each tree commonly retaining from year to year the same color or colors, and differing somewhat from every other. The most beautiful and valuable maple-wood is taken from this tree. It is known as 'curled maple' and 'bird's-eye maple,' and the common variety looks like satin-wood. In the curled maple the fibres are in waves instead of in straight lines, and the surface seems to change with alternate light and shade; in the bird's-eye, irregular snarls of fibres look like roundish projections rising from hollow places, each one resembling the eye of a bird. Buckets, tubs and many useful things are made of the straight variety, and for lasts it is considered better than any other kind of wood. The curled and the bird's-eye are largely used for furniture."
"But isn't it a shame," said Clara, "to spoil the maple-sugar by making the trees into chairs and things?"
"You would not think so," replied her governess, "if you needed the 'chairs and things' more than you need the sugar. But the supply of trees seems to be sufficient for both purposes."
"Does the sugar come right out of the tree when people tap on it with a hammer?" asked Edith, whose ideas of sugar-making were rather crude.
"You blessed baby!" cried Malcolm, with a shout of laughter. Let's take our hammers and go after some maple-sugar right away."
"No, Edie," said Miss Harson as she took her much-loved little pupil on her lap; "we'll stay at home and learn just how the sugar is made. To _tap_ a tree, dear, means to make cuts in the trunk for the sap to flow out, and in the sugar-maple this sap is more like water than sugar. From the middle of February to the second week in March, according to the warmth or the coldness of the locality, is the time for tapping the trees; and when the holes are bored, spouts of elder or sumac from which the pith has been taken are put into them at one end, while the other goes down to the bucket which receives the sap. 'Several holes are so bored that their spouts shall lead to the same bucket, and high enough to allow the bucket to hang two or three feet from the ground, to prevent leaves and dirt from being blown in.' The next thing is to boil the sap, and this is done in great iron kettles, over immense wood-fires, out there among the trees, with plenty of snow on the ground, and only two or three rude little cabins for the men and boys to sleep in. This is called 'the sugar-camp,' and the sap-season lasts five or six weeks."
"And why is it boiled?"
"Boiling drives the water off in vapor, and leaves the sugar behind in the pot."
"And do they stay in the woods there all the time?" asked Malcolm, with great interest. "What lots of fun they must have, with the big fires and the snow and as much maple-sugar as ever they want to eat! _I'd_ like to stay in a sugar-camp in the woods."
[Illustration: MAKING MAPLE SUGAR.]
"Perhaps not, after trying it and finding how much hard work there is in sugar-making," replied his governess. "'The kettles must be carefully watched and plenty of wood brought to keep them boiling, and during the process the sap, or syrup, is strained; lime or salaeratus is added, to neutralize the free acid; and the white of egg, isinglass or milk, to cause foreign substances to rise in a scum to the surface. When it has been sufficiently boiled, the syrup is poured into moulds or casks to harden.' The sugar with which the most pains have been taken is very light-colored, and I have seen it almost white."
"Have you ever been to a sugar-camp, Miss Harson?" asked Clara, who was wishing, like Malcolm, that she could go to one herself.
"Yes," said Miss Harson; "I did go once, in Vermont, when the family with whom I was staying took me to see the 'sugaring off.' This is putting it into the pans and buckets to harden after it has been sufficiently boiled and clarified; and we younger ones, by way of amusement, were allowed to make jack-wax."
"Oh!" exclaimed three voices at once; "what is that? Is it good to eat?"
"I thought it particularly good," was the reply, "and I am quite sure that you would agree with me. To make it, we poured a small quantity of hot syrup on the snow to cool; and when it was fit to eat, it was just like wax, instead of being hard like the cakes in moulds. It took only a few minutes, too, to make it, and it seemed a great deal nicer because we did it ourselves. I remember that it was the last of March and very cold, but there were big fires to get warmed at, and we had a delightful time."
"Were there any Indians there, Miss Harson?" asked little Edith, after being quiet for some time. Vermont was such a long way off on the map, besides being up almost at the top, that Indians and bears and all sorts of wild things seemed to have a right to live there.
"No," said her governess, smiling at the question; "I did not see one, even at the sugar-camp. Yet the Indians made maple-sugar long before we knew anything about it, and from them the white people learned how to do it."
"Well, that's the funniest thing!" exclaimed Malcolm. "I thought that Indians were always scalping people instead of making maple-sugar."
"They did a great many other things, though, besides fighting, and their life was spent so much out of doors that they studied the nature of every plant and living thing about them. The healing-properties of some of our most valuable herbs were first discovered by the Indians, and, as they never had any grocery-stores, the presence of trees that would supply them with sugar was a blessing not likely to be neglected. The devoted missionary John Brainerd first heard of this tree-sugar from them, and it is said that he used to preach to them when they were thus peacefully employed, and obtained a better hearing than at other times."
"Have we any maple-sugar trees?" asked Clara.
"No," replied Miss Harson; "there are none at Elmridge, and I have seen none anywhere near here. They seem to flourish best in the Northern and North-eastern States, while in Western Canada the tree is found in groves of from five to twenty acres. These are called 'sugar-bushes,' and few farmers in that part of America are without them. In England the maple trees are called 'sycamores,' and the sap is used as a sweet drink. I will read to you from a little English book called _Voices from the Woodlands_ a simple account of a country festival where maple sap was the choicest refreshment:
"'"Take care of that young tree," said Farmer Robinson to his laborer, who was diligently employed in clearing away a rambling company of brambles which had grown unmolested during the time of the last tenant; "the soil is good, and in a very few years we shall have pasturage for our bees, and plenty of maple-wine."
"'The farmer spoke true; before his young laborer had attained middle age the sapling had grown into a fine tree. Its branches spread wide and high, and bees came from all parts to gather their honey-harvests among the flowers; beneath its shade lambkins were wont in spring to sleep beside their dams; and when the time of shearing came, and the sheep were disburdened of their fleeces, you might see them hastening to the sycamore tree for shelter.
"'A kind of rustic festival was held about the same time in honor of the maple-wine. Hither came the farmer and his dame, with their children and young neighbors, each carrying bunches of flowers. Older people came in their holiday dresses, some with baskets containing cakes, others tea and sugar, with which the farmer and his wife had plentifully supplied them; and joyfully did they rest a while on the green sward while young men gathered sticks, and, a bright fire having been kindled, the kettle sent up its bubbling steam.
"'When this was ended, and few of the piled-up cakes remained--when, also, the young children had emptied their cans and rinsed them at the old stone trough into which rushed a full stream--tiny hands joyfully held up the small cans and bright eyes looked anxiously to the stem of the tall tree while the farmer warily cut an incision in the bark.
"'What joy when a sweet watery juice began to trickle! and the farmer filled one small cup, then another, till all were satisfied and a portion sent to the older people, who were contentedly looking on from the grassy slope where they had seated themselves. The farmer's wife knew naught concerning the process for obtaining sugar, or else she might have sweetened her children's puddings from the watery liquid yielded by the sycamore, or greater maple--an art well known to the aboriginal tribes of North America.'"
"Does that mean Indians, Miss Harson?" asked Malcolm, with a wry face at the long word.
"Yes," was the reply; "and I hope that you will feel properly grateful to these aborigines whenever you eat maple-sugar."
CHAPTER III.
_OLD ACQUAINTANCES: THE ELMS._
Miss Harson had admonished her little flock that they must use their own eyes and be able to tell her things instead of depending altogether on her to tell them; so now they were all peering curiously among the trees to see which were putting on their new spring suits. The yellow trees and the pink trees had been readily distinguished, but, although the others had not been idle, it was not so easy for little people to discern their leaf-buds.
Clara soon made a discovery, however, of what her governess had noticed for a day or two, and the wonder was found on their own home-elms, those stately trees which had shaded the house ever since it was built, and from which the place got its pretty name--Elmridge.
"Well, dear," said Miss Harson, coming to the upper window from which an eager head was thrust, "what is it that you wish me to see?"
"Those funny flowers on the bare elm trees," was the reply. "Look, Miss Harson! Didn't I see them first?"
"You have certainly spoken of them first, for neither Malcolm nor Edith has said anything about them. But they must both come up here now, where they can see them, and Malcolm and I can manage to reach some of the blossoms by getting out of the broad window on to the little balcony."
Up came the two children kangaroo-fashion in a series of jumps, and presently Miss Harson was holding a cluster of dark maroon-colored flowers in her hand.
"How queer and dark they make the trees look!" said Malcolm; "and they're so thick that they 'most cover up the branches. They're like fringe."
"A very good description," replied his governess. "And now I wish you all to examine the trees very thoroughly and tell me afterward what you have noticed about them; then we will go down to the schoolroom and see what the books will tell us in our talk about the American elm and its cousin of England."
The books had a great deal to tell about them, but Miss Harson preferred to hear the children first.
"What did my little Edith see when she looked out of the window?" she asked.
"Stems of trees," was the reply, "with flowers on 'em."
"A very good general idea," continued Miss Harson, "but perhaps Clara can tell us something more particular about the elms?"
"They are very tall," said Clara, hesitatingly, "and they make it nice and shady in summer; and some of the branches bend over in such a lovely way! Papa calls one of them 'the plume.'"
"And now Malcolm?"
"The trunk--or big 'stem,' as Edie would call it--is very thick, and the branches begin low down, near the ground."
"Some of them do," said his governess, "but many of the elms on your father's grounds are seventy feet high before the branches begin. Sometimes two or three trunks shoot up together and spread out at the top in light, feathery plumes like palm trees. The elm has a great variety of shapes; sometimes it is a parasol, when a number of branches rise together to a great height and spread out suddenly in the shape of an umbrella. This makes a very regular-looking and beautiful tree. For about three-quarters of the way up, the 'plume' of which Clara speaks has one straight trunk, which then bends over droopingly. Small twigs cluster around the trunk all the way from bottom to top and give the tree the appearance of having a vine twining about it. I think that the plume-shape is the prettiest and most odd-looking of all the elms. Another strange shape is the vase, which seems to rest on the roots that stand out above the ground. 'The straight trunk is the neck of the vase, and the middle consists of the lower part of the branches as they swell outward with a graceful curve, then gradually diverge until they bend over at their extremities and form the lip of the vase by a circle of terminal sprays.'"
"Have we any trees that look like vases, Miss Harson?" asked Clara.
"Yes," was the reply; "not far from Hemlock Lodge there is one which we will look at when the leaves are all out. But you must not expect to find a perfect vase-shape, for it is only an approach to it. The dome-shaped elm has a broad, round head, which is formed by the shooting forth of branches of nearly equal length from the same part of the trunk, which gradually spread outward with a graceful curve into the roof or dome that crowns the tree."
"I know something else about our elms," said Malcolm: "some of the roots are on top of the ground. Isn't that very queer, Miss Harson?"
[Illustration: WYCH-ELM LEAVES.]
"Not for old elm trees, as this is quite a habit with them. Indeed, in many ways, the elm is so entirely different from other trees that it can be recognized at a great distance. It is both graceful and majestic, and is the most drooping of the drooping trees, except the willow, which it greatly surpasses in grandeur and in the variety of its forms. The green leaves are broad, ovate, heart-shaped, from two to four or five inches long. You can see their exact shape in this illustration. Their summer tint is very bright and vivid, but it turns in autumn to a sober brown, sometimes touched with a bright golden yellow, And now," continued Miss Harson, "we will examine the flowers which we have here, and we see that each blossom is on a green, slender thread less than half an inch long, and that it consists of a brown cup parted into seven or eight divisions, rounded at the border and containing about eight brown stamens and a long compressed ovary surmounted by two short styles. This ripens into a flattened seed-vessel before the leaves are fully out, and the seeds, being small and chaffy, are wafted in all directions and carried to great distances by the wind."
"Where does slippery elm come from?" asked Clara.
"From another American species, dear, which is very much like the white elm that we have been considering. The slippery elm is a smaller tree, does not droop so much, and the trunk is smoother and darker. The leaves are thicker and very rough on the upper side. The inner bark contains a great deal of mucilage--that, I suppose, is the reason for its being called 'slippery'--and it has been extensively used as a medicine. The wood is very strong and preferred to that of the white elm for building-purposes, although the latter is considered the best native wood for hubs of wheels. There is a great elm tree on Boston Common which is over two hundred years old, and another in Cambridge called the 'Washington Elm,' because near it or beneath its shade General Washington is said to have first drawn his sword on taking command of the American army. In 1744 the celebrated George Whitefield preached beneath this tree."
"I'm glad we have elm trees here," said Malcolm, "though I s'pose nobody ever did anything in particular under ours."
"You mean," replied his governess, laughing, "that they are not _historical_ trees; but they are certainly very fine ones. There is another species of elm, the English, which is often seen in this country too. It is a very large and stately tree, but not so graceful as our own elm. It is distinguished from the American elm by its bark, which is darker and much more broken; by having one principal stem, which soars upward to a great height; and by its branches, which are thrown out more boldly and abruptly and at a larger angle. Its limbs stretch out horizontally or tend upward with an appearance of strength to the very extremity; in the American elm they are almost universally drooping at the end. Its leaves are closer, smaller, more numerous and of a darker color. In England this tree is a great favorite with those black and solemn birds the rooks. The poet Hood writes of it as
"'The tall, abounding elm that grows In hedgerows up and down, In field and forest, copse and park, And in the peopled town, With colonies of noisy rooks That nestle on its crown.'
"Some of these English elms are very ancient and of an immense size; one of them, known as the 'Chequer Elm,' measures thirty-one feet around the trunk, of which only the shell is left. It was planted seven hundred years ago. The Chipstead Elm is fifteen feet around; the Crawley Elm, thirty-five. A writer says, 'The ample branches of the Crawley Elm shelter Mayday gambols while troops of rustics celebrate the opening of green leaves and flowers. Yet not alone beneath its shade, but within the capacious hollow which time has wrought in the old tree, young children with their posies and weak and aged people find shelter during the rustic _fêtes_.'"
"Does that mean that people can sit inside the tree?" asked Clara. "I wish we had one to play house in where Hemlock Lodge is."
"That is one of the things, Clara," replied Miss Harson, "that people can have only in the place where they grow. In the South of England there is another great elm tree with a hollow trunk which has fitted into it a door fastened by a lock and key. A dozen people can be comfortably accommodated inside, and there is a story told of a woman and her infant who lived there for a time."
"What a funny house!" said Malcolm. "Just like a woodpecker's."
"Another great elm, near London, has a winding staircase cut within it, and a turret at the top where at least twenty persons can stand. One species of this tree, called the _wych-_, or _witch-_, elm, was believed by ignorant people to possess magical powers and to defend from the malice of witches the place on which it grew. Even now it is said that in remote parts of England the dairymaid flies to it as a resource on the days when she churns her butter. She gathers a twig from the tree and puts it into a little hole in the churn. If this practice were neglected, she confidently believes that she might go on churning all day without getting any butter."
"Isn't that silly?" exclaimed Clara.
"Very silly indeed," replied her governess; "but we must remember that the poor ignorant girl knows no better. The wood of the European elm is stronger than ours; it is hard and fine-grained, and brownish in color, and is much used in the building of ships, for hubs of wheels, axletrees and many other purposes. In France the leaves and shoots are used to feed cattle. In Russia the leaves of one variety are made into tea. The inner bark is in some places made into mats, and in Norway they kiln-dry it and grind it with corn as an ingredient in bread. So that the elm tree is almost as useful as it is beautiful."
[Illustration]
CHAPTER IV.
_MAJESTY AND STRENGTH: THE OAK_.
"Here," said Miss Harson, "is a small branch from an oak tree containing the young leaves and the catkins, which come out together; for the oak belongs, like the willow and the maple, to the division of _amentaceous_ plants."
"Oh dear!" sighed Clara at the hard name.
But Malcolm repeated:
"_Amentaceous_--_ament_. I know, Miss Harson: it's _catkins_"
"Yes, it means trees which produce their flowers in catkins, or looking as if strung on long drooping stems; and the oak is the monarch of this family, and in Great Britain of all the forest-trees. It is especially an English tree, although our woods contain several varieties. But they do not hold the pre-eminence in our forests that the oaks do in those of England. The oak ordinarily runs more to breadth than to height, and spreads itself out to a vast distance with an air of strength and grandeur. This is its striking character and what gives it its peculiar appearance. Oaks do not always go straight out, but crook and bend to right and left, upward and downward, abruptly or with a gentle sweep.
[Illustration: MALE CATKIN OF THE OAK.]
[Illustration: THE OAK]
"The white oak is the handsomest species, and takes its name from the very light color of the bark on the trunk, by which it is easily known. The leaves are long in proportion to the width and deeply divided into lobes, of which there are three or four on each side. There is a great variety in the shape of oak-leaves, those of our white oak being long and slender, while the red oak has very broad ones, and the foliage of the scarlet oak is almost skeleton-like. The chestnut oak has leaves almost exactly like those of the chestnut. The acorns of the different varieties, too, differ in size and shape.
[Illustration: WHITE-OAK LEAF.]
"There is so much to be said of the oak," continued Miss Harson, "it is such an ancient and venerable tree and has so many stories attached to it, that it is not easy to begin an account of it. The blossoms, perhaps, will be the best starting-point: and I should like to have you examine this branch and tell me if you see any difference in the blossoms."
"They are nearly all alike," said Malcolm, "but here at the ends of the twigs are one or two that look like buds."'
"That is just what I wanted you to notice," replied his governess, "for the flowers are of two kinds, one bearing the stamens, and the other the pistils. The flowers that bear the stamens grow on loose scaly catkins, as you may see in this branch. Those with the pistils are also in catkins, but very small, like a bud. The bud spreads into a little branchlet and bears the flowers at the tip. The calyx is not seen at first; it is a mere membrane covering the ovary. By degrees the ovary swells into the acorn and the membrane becomes part of the shell."
"I like acorns," said little Edith, "they're so nice to play with."
"But they're not nice to eat," said Clara.
[Illustration: SQUIRREL AND ACORN]
"Some animals think they are," continued Miss Harson. "If you should come here in October, you would find the squirrels feasting on them. In old times in England the oaks were valued highly on account of their acorns, and great herds of swine were driven into the forests to feed upon them. In the time of the Saxons a crop of acorns often formed a part of the dowry bestowed upon the Saxon queens, and the king himself would be glad to accept a gift or grant of acorns; and the failure of the crop would be considered as a kind of famine. In those days laws were made to protect the oaks from being felled or injured, and a man who cut down a tree under the shadow of which thirty hogs could stand was fined three pounds. The herds of swine were placed under the care of a swineherd, whose sole employment was to keep them together, and they formed a staple part of the riches of the country. But when the Norman kings began to rule, they brought with them a passionate love of hunting and took possession of the forests as preserves for their favorite sport. The herds of swine were forbidden to roam about as heretofore, and their owners were reduced to poverty in consequence."
"Wasn't that wicked, Miss Harson?" asked Malcolm.
"Yes; it was both unjust and cruel, and it was one of the great grievances of the nation. Even at this day the laws for the protection of game are one of the grounds of ill-feeling on the part of the poor toward the nobles. In Spain the acorns have the taste of nuts, and are sold in the markets as an article of food. They grow abundantly in the woods and forests. Once, in time of war, a foreign army subsisted almost entirely on them. Herds of swine range the forests in Spain and feed luxuriously upon acorns, and the salted meats of Malaga, that are famous for their delicate flavor, are thought to owe it to this cause. Some of our American Indians depend upon acorns and fish for their winter food; and when the acorns drop from the tree, they are buried in sand and soaked in water to draw out the bitter taste."
"I shouldn't like them," said Clara, with a wry face at the thought of such food.
"Well, dear," replied her governess, laughing, "as you are not an Indian, you will probably not be called upon to like them; but it would be better to eat acorns than to starve. You may have noticed the trunk and branches of the oak are often gnarled and knotted, and this helps to give the tree its appearance of great strength. It is just as strong as it looks, and for building-purposes it lasts longer than any other wood. Beams and rafters of oak are found in old English houses, showing among the brick-work, and many of these half-timbered houses, as they are called, were built hundreds of years ago.
"Bedsteads and other articles of furniture, too, were 'built' in those days, rather than made, for they were not expected to be moved about; and a heavy oak bedstead is still in existence which is said to have belonged to King Richard III. It is curiously carved, and the king rested upon it the night before the battle of Bosworth Field, where he was killed. Clumsy as the bedstead was, he took it about with him from place to place; but after the fatal battle it passed into the hands of various owners, and nothing remarkable was discovered about it until the king had been dead a hundred years. By that time the bedstead had come into the possession of a woman who found a fortune in it. One morning, says the story, as she was making the bed, she heard a chinking sound, and saw, to her great delight, a piece of money drop on the floor. Of course she at once set about examining the bedstead, and found that the lower part of it was hollow and contained a treasure. Three hundred pounds--a fortune in those days--was brought to light, having remained hidden all those years. As King Richard was not there to claim his gold, the woman quickly possessed herself of it. But, as it happened, she had better have remained in ignorance and poverty. As soon as the matter became known one of her servants robbed her of the gold, and even caused her death. Thus it was said in the neighborhood that 'King Richard's gold' did nobody any good."
The children were very much pleased with this story, and Malcolm said that he always liked to hear about people who found gold and things.
"I think that I do, myself," replied Miss Harson, "although, as in this poor woman's case and in many others, gold is not the best thing to find. It often brings with it so much sorrow and sin as to be a curse to its owner. The only safe treasure is that laid up in heaven, where 'neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal,'
"From the very earliest times the oak has been used for shipbuilding. The Saxons, we are told, kept a formidable fleet of vessels with curved bottoms and the prow and poop adorned with representations of the head and tail of some grotesque and fabulous creature. King Alfred had many vessels that carried sixty oars and were entirely of oak. A vessel supposed to be of his time has been discovered in the bed of a river in Kent, and after the lapse of so many centuries it is as sound as ever and as hard as iron."
"Do oak trees ever have apples on 'em?" asked Clara. "In a story that I read there was something about 'oak-apples.'"
[Illustration: THE OAK-GALL INSECT (_Cynips_).]
"They are not apples such as we eat, or fruit in any sense," said her governess. "They are the work of a species of fly called _Cynips_, which is very apt to attack the oak. 'The female insect is armed with a sharp weapon called an _ovipositor_, which she plunges into a leaf and makes a wound. Here she lays her eggs; and when she has done so, she flies away and we hear no more of her. But the wound she has made disturbs the circulation of the sap. It flows round and round the eggs as though it had met with some foreign body it would fain remove. Very soon the eggs are in the midst of a ball-like and fleshy chamber--the most suitable provision for them, and one which the parent-insect had provided by means of puncturing the leaf. As the eggs are hatched the grubs will find themselves safely housed and in the midst of an abundance of food.'"
[Illustration: OAK-APPLES.]
"Well," exclaimed Malcolm, in great disgust, "_apple_ is a queer name for a ball full of little flies!"
"It's a very pretty ball, though," said Miss Harson, "with a smooth skin and tinged with red or yellow, like a ripe apple. If it is cut open, a number of granules are seen, each containing a grub embedded in a fruit-like substance. The grub undergoes its transformation, and in due course emerges a perfect insect. These pretty pink-and-white apples used to be gathered by English boys on the twenty-ninth of May, which was called 'Oak-Apple Day.'"
"Did they eat 'em?" asked Edith.
"I do not see how they could, dear," was the reply; "they were probably gathered just to look at. Yet 'May-apples,' which grow, you will remember, on the wild azalea and the swamp honeysuckle, are often eaten, and they are formed in the same way; so we will not be too positive about the oak-apples."
"What are oak-_galls_, Miss Harson?" asked Malcolm. "Are they the same as oak-apples?"
"Not quite the same," was the reply, although both are produced by the same insect. This is what one of our English books says of them: 'When the acorn itself is wounded, it becomes a kind of monstrosity, and remains on the stalk like an irregularly-shaped ball. It is called a "nut-gall," and is found principally on a small oak, a native of the southern and central parts of Europe. All these oak-apples and nut-galls are of importance, but the latter more especially, and they form an important article of commerce. A substance called "gallic acid" resides in the oak; and when the puncture is made by the cynips, it flows in great abundance to the wound. Gallic acid is one of the ingredients used in dyeing stuffs and cloths, and therefore the supply yielded by the nut-gall is highly welcome. The nut-galls are carefully collected from the small oak on which they are found, the Pyreneean oak. It is easily known by the dense covering of down on the young leaves, that appear some weeks later than the leaves of the common oak. The galls are pounded and boiled, and into the infusion thus made the stuffs about to be dyed are dipped,'"
"I should think," said Clara, "that people would plant oak trees everywhere, when they are so useful. Is anything done with the bark?"
"Yes," said her governess; "the bark, which is very rough, is valuable for tanning leather and for medicine. The element which has the effect of turning raw hide or skin into leather is called _tannin_; it is also found in the bark of some other trees and in tropical plants."
"Didn't people use to worship oak trees," asked Malcolm--"people who lived ever so long ago?"
"You are thinking of the Druids, who lived in old times in Britain and Gaul," replied Miss Harson, "and whose strange heathen rites were practiced in oak-groves; and they really did consider the tree sacred. These Druids have left their traces in some parts of England and France in rows of huge stones set upright; and wherever an immense stone was found lying on two others, in the shape of a table, there had been a Druid altar, where the priest offered sacrifices, often of human beings. So horrible may be a so-called religion that men themselves devise, and that has not come from the true God.
[Illustration: DRUIDIC SACRIFICE.]
"It was an article in the Druids' creed, and one to which they strictly adhered, that no temple with a covered roof was to be built in honor of the gods. All the places appointed for public worship were in the open air, and generally on some eminence from which the moon and stars might be observed; for to the heavenly bodies much adoration was offered. But to afford shelter from wind or rain, and also to ensure privacy and shut out all external objects, the place fixed upon, either for teaching their disciples or for carrying out the rites of their idolatrous worship, was in the recess of some grove or wood. An oak-grove was supposed to be the favorite of the gods whom they ignorantly worshiped, and therefore the Druids declared the oak to be a sacred tree. The Druid priest always bound a wreath of oak-leaves on his forehead before he would perform any religious ceremony. One of these ceremonies was to go in search of the mistletoe, which sometimes grows on the oak and was considered as sacred as the tree itself, being much used in their worship. One priest would climb to the branch on which the misletoe was growing and cut it with a golden knife, while another priest stood below and held out his white robe to receive it.
"These sacred groves were all cut down by the Romans, who waged fierce war against the Druids, and nothing is left of them now but the circles of stones that formed their temples. At a place called Stonehenge, 'cromlechs,' or altar-tables, are still standing, and very ancient oaks stood in a circle round these stones for many centuries after the Druids were swept away."
"Miss Harson," said Clara when all had expressed their horror of the Druids and rejoiced that they _were_ swept away, "are there any oak trees in the Bible?"
"Look and see," was the reply; "and first you may find Genesis xxxv. 4."
Clara read:
"'And they gave unto Jacob all the strange gods which were in their hands, and all their earrings which were in their ears; and Jacob hid them under the _oak_ which was by Shechem.'"
"In the eighth verse of the same chapter," said Miss Harson, "we read that Rebekah's nurse was buried under an oak at Bethel. We are told in the book of Joshua[2] that 'Joshua took a great stone and set it up there under an _oak_, that was by the sanctuary of the Lord;' and in Judges[3], 'There came an angel of the Lord and sat under an _oak_ which was in Ophrah.'--Malcolm, you may read Second Samuel, eighteenth chapter, ninth verse."
[2] Josh. xxiv. 26.
[3] Judg. vi. II.
Malcolm read:
"'And Absalom met the servants of David. And Absalom rode upon a mule, and the mule went under the thick boughs of a great _oak_, and his head caught hold of the oak, and he was taken up between the heaven and the earth; and the mule that was under him went away.'"
"Poor Absalom!" said Edith, softly. "Wasn't that dreadful?"
"Yes, dear," replied her governess, "it _was_ dreadful; but it is still more dreadful that Absalom was such a wicked man. In Isaiah[4] we read of the oaks of Bashan, that, like the cedars of Lebanon, were 'high and lifted up,' and the oaks of Bashan are mentioned again in Zechariah[5]. Several varieties of the oak are found in Palestine.
[4] Isa. ii. 13.
[5] Zech. xi. 2.
[Illustration: ABRAHAM'S OAK, NEAR HEBRON.]
"In his _Ride Through Palestine_, Dr. Dulles tells of a great oak near Hebron known as 'Abraham's oak,' supposed to occupy the ground where the patriarch pitched his tent under the oaks of Mamre. It is an aged tree, and a grand one. Here is a picture of it, from the _Ride_[6]. The crests and sides of the hills beyond the Jordan are still clothed, as in ancient times, with magnificent oaks.
[6] See page 85
"We get a good idea of the strength and durability of this wood from the fact that there is an old wooden church near Ongar, in Essex, the nave of which is composed of half logs of oak roughly fastened by wooden pegs. The ancient fabric dates back to the time of King Edmund, who was slain by the robber Leolf in the year A.D. 946. The oaken church was hurriedly put together--according to report--in order to make a temporary receptacle for the body of the murdered prince on its way to burial. Be that as it may, it was afterward used as a parish church, and, though the oaken logs are corroded by the weather, they are still sound, and, having been beaten by the storms of a thousand winters, bid fair to defy those of a thousand more."
"I should think, then," said Malcolm, "that people would always build their houses with oak if it lasts so long."
"Yet they do not do this even in England," was the reply, "where the trees grow to such an immense size and the ancient buildings still in existence prove the great endurance of the oak. Now brick and stone and iron are used, which outlast any wood. And now," continued Miss Harson, "I am going to tell you something about a foreign species of this tree which I am sure will surprise you. It is found in the South of Europe and in Algeria, and is called the _cork oak_."
"'The _cork_ oak'!" exclaimed Clara, quite as much surprised as she was expected to be. "Do the corks that come in bottles grow on it?"
"Not just in that shape, dear, but they are made from its bark. The outside bark, or _epidermis_, consists of a thin, transparent, tissue-like substance, which covers not only the bark, but the whole of the tree, stem, leaves and branches, and beneath the epidermis is found a layer of cellular tissue, generally green. It covers the trunk and branches, fills up the spaces between the veins of the leaves and contains the sap, which flows in canals arranged for it in the most beautiful and wonderful manner. In one species of oak this layer--which is called the _suber_--assumes a peculiar character and is of remarkable thickness. When the tree is some five years old, its whole energy is directed toward the increase of the suber. A mass of cells is formed with great rapidity, and layer upon layer is added, until that part of the trunk grows so unwieldy that it would crack and split of its own accord. But such a thing is rarely allowed to happen: the suber is of too much value to man. After it is taken from the tree and has undergone due preparation, it appears in our shops and houses under the name of _cork_"
"I should like to see how they get it," said Malcolm.
"The trunk is regularly marked around in deep cuts, which begin close to the branches and go down almost to the roots. A ladder is used to mount to the upper part of the trunk, and the cuts, or incisions, are made with a long knife or with an axe. Then they strip off the sheets of cork between the circles. This operation is a very delicate one, and requires much care and skill lest the inner part should be injured. If the operation is carried out successfully, the cork-like substance will grow again and become as abundant as ever.
"The next thing to be done to the pieces of bark is partially to burn, or char, them, and also to make them quite flat, as they come from the trunk in a rounded shape. The burning makes the pores close up, so that the liquid in a vessel for which it is used as a stopper cannot come through; and this is done over a brisk fire, in what is called a _burning-yard_. Another process, called _rounding_, removes every trace of the fire, unless the cork has been too much burned, and then, having already been flattened by the pressure of heavy stones, it is ready for the cork-maker, who cuts the material first into strips and then into squares according to the size of corks wanted.
"Cork is very light and elastic, and can be used successfully in contrivances for the rescue of men from the perils of the deep. The cork jacket and the lifeboat have been the means of saving many lives, for cork will float on the surface of the water and bear up the person wearing the jacket and the shipwrecked people in the lifeboat. 'The shallowness of the boat and the bulk of cork within allow but little room for water; so that even when filled it is in no danger of overturning or sinking, like other crafts. Also, the lifeboat can move across the waves with perfect safety, and can make its way from one object to another in a broken sea as easily as an ordinary boat can pass from one ship to another.'"
The children declared that the cork-oak was the best tree of all, but they agreed with their governess that the entire oak family was made up of grand and useful trees.
"Our American oaks," said Miss Harson, "are very handsome in autumn because of their brilliant foliage; the _scarlet oak_, which turns to a deep crimson and keeps its leaves longer than any of the other forest trees, is the most showy of the species. But we have no cork oaks, and no oaks that we know to be a thousand years old. There was once a famous oak in this country, called the 'Charter Oak,' which fell to the ground in August, 1856, before any of us were born. I wonder if you would like to hear the story about it?"
This question was thought extremely funny by three such devourers of stories as the little Kyles, and they eagerly assured their governess that they would like it.
"If that is really the case," continued Miss Harson, smiling at the excited faces, "I must tell you the history of
"THE CHARTER OAK.
"This tree grew in Hartford, Connecticut, and it is said that before the English governor Wyllis went there to live his steward, whom he had sent on before to get a house ready for him, came near cutting down this very oak. He was clearing away the trees around it on the hillside when a party of Indians appeared and begged him to leave that particular tree, because, they said, 'it had been the guide of their ancestors for centuries.' So the oak was spared; even then it was old and hollow.
"King Charles II. granted the people of Connecticut a very liberal charter of rights, which was publicly read in the Assembly at Hartford and declared to belong for ever to them and their successors. A committee was appointed to take charge of it, under a solemn oath that they would preserve this palladium of the rights of the people.
"When James II., the tyrannical brother of Charles II., came to the throne, he changed the government of New England and ordered the people of Connecticut to give up their charter. This they refused to do; and when a third command from the king had been sent to them, they called a special meeting of the Assembly, under their own governor, Treat, and resolved to hold on to the charter which had been given them.
"On the 31st of October, 1687, Sir Edmund Andros, attended by members of his council and a bodyguard of sixty soldiers, entered Hartford to take the charter by force. The General Assembly was in session; he was received with courtesy, but with coldness. He entered the assembly-room and publicly demanded the charter. Remonstrances were made, and the session was protracted till evening. The governor and his associates appeared to yield. The charter was brought in and laid upon the table. Sir Edmund thought that he had succeeded, when suddenly the lights were all put out, and total darkness followed. There was no noise, no conflict, but all was quiet. When the candles were again lighted, _the charter was gone_! Sir Edmund was disconcerted. He declared the government of Connecticut to be in his own hands, and that the colony was annexed to Massachusetts and the other New England colonies, and proceeded to appoint officers. Captain Jeremiah Wadsworth, a patriot of those times, had hidden the charter in the hollow of Wyllis's oak, whence it was afterward known as the Charter Oak."
"Then the English governor couldn't get it!" exclaimed Malcolm, delightedly. "Wasn't that splendid?"
"It was a grand hiding-place, certainly, for no one would think of looking inside a tree for such a thing as that, and they were grand men who preserved their country's liberties in those trying times. But more peaceful years were at hand. About eighteen months after the charter had disappeared so mysteriously, the tyrant James II. was compelled to give up his throne to his daughter and son-in-law, the prince and princess of Orange, and Governor Treat and his associates again took the government of Connecticut under the old charter, which the hollow oak had faithfully kept from harm. No tree in our whole country has received more attention than this historic Hartford oak; and when, at last, its mere shell of a trunk was laid low by a storm, it seemed as if a large part of the city had been swept away.
"Ancient oaks are apt to be almost entirely without branches; the huge trunk, with an opening at the top, and often with one also at the bottom, stands like a maimed giant, just tottering, perhaps, to its fall, because of the decay going on within, while outside all seems fair and sound. It was so with the Charter Oak; and when this monarch of the forest was unexpectedly laid low, rich and poor, great and small, were gathered to mourn its loss. A dirge was played and all the bells in the city were tolled at sundown, for this monument of the past was a link gone that could not be replaced."
"Thank you, Miss Harson," said Clara; "_true_ stories are so nice! But I wish I had seen the Charter Oak before it was blown down."
"You could not have done that, dear," was the reply, "unless you had been born about thirty years sooner."
CHAPTER V.
_BEAUTY AND GRACE: THE ASH_.
"What tree comes next, Miss Harson?" asked Clara, on an April day that was mild enough for the piazza. "You told us so many interesting things about the oak that I suppose we needn't expect to hear of another tree like that."
"No," was the reply; "not just like that, perhaps, for the oak is grand and venerable above all our familiar trees, but the ash, which is more especially an American tree, belongs to a large and interesting family, and I am quite sure that you will very much like to hear something about it. I have put it next to the oak because there is a sort of rivalry between the two as to which can get on its spring dress the soonest, and an old English rhyme says,
"'If the oak's before the ash, Then you may expect a splash; But if the ash is 'fore the oak, Then you must beware a soak.'"
"That must mean," said Malcolm, after considering this rather puzzling verse, "that it'll rain any way."
"I think it does," replied Miss Harson, with a smile at Malcolm's air of deep thought, "and it is quite safe to say that in England. But, as 'a soak' sounds more serious than 'a splash,' it is to be hoped that the ash will not get ahead of the oak. I do not know what they are doing in England this year, but here the oak is a day or two ahead. The foliage of the ash is entirely different, as it has _pinnate_ leaves, which means leaves arranged in two rows, one on each side of a common stem, or _petiole_, like--What, Clara?"
"Rose-leaves," was the prompt reply.
"And leaves of the locust trees on the other side of the road," added Malcolm.
[Illustration: THE COMMON ASH.]
"And the sumac," said their governess, "and a number of others that might be mentioned. This kind of foliage is always graceful, and the ash is one of our largest and handsomest trees. It is said to be more common in America than in any other part of the globe. In Europe, because of its beauty, it is called the painter's tree. It is a particularly neat and regular-looking tree, and its smooth gray trunk is higher than that of most trees before any branches appear. Where is there a tree on the grounds answering this description, Malcolm?"
"Down at the end of the vegetable-garden," was the reply, "and close beside the laundry."
[Illustration: AMERICAN WHITE ASH.]
"Yes; you are really learning to distinguish trees very well. There are several species--the white, red, black and mountain ash. The white ash is a graceful tree, rising in the forest to the height of seventy or eighty feet, with a straight trunk and a diameter of three feet or more at the base. On an open plain it throws out its branches, with a gentle double curvature, to a distance on every side, and forms a broad, round head of great beauty. The flowers of the ash are greenish white in color and appear with the leaves in loose clusters. 'The trunk of our largest American ash is covered with a whitish bark which in very young trees is nearly smooth; on older trees it is broken by deep furrows into irregular plates, and on very old stems it becomes smooth again, from the rough plates scaling off. The branches are grayish green dotted with gray or white.' Now who can tell _me_ something about this tree?"
"I know that furniture is made of the wood," said Clara, "because that pretty set in the large spare-room is ash. And it is very light-colored."
"The wood is used for a great many things," replied Miss Harson, "and the ash has been called the husbandman's tree because the timber is so much in demand for farming-implements, and for articles that need to be both strong and light. It does not last so long as the oak, but it is more elastic and can better resist sudden shocks and jerks; it is therefore particularly desirable for the spokes of wheels and ladders and the beams of floors. Staircases were made of it in olden times, and they may still be found in some English halls and abbeys. The forest ash makes better oars than any other wood, and the tree has so many good qualities that an old English poet spoke of it as
"'The ash for nothing ill.'
"But Malcolm looks as if he had something to say, and I shall be very happy to hear it."
"It is only about the red berries that they bear in autumn, Miss Harson; it looks queer to see berries growing on a tree."
"The mountain ash is the only one that has berries," replied his governess, "and the bloom is in clusters of white flowers. The berries are sometimes dark red and often of a bright scarlet, and they remain on the tree during the winter, to the great delight of the birds. We should find them very sour, although pretty to look at; but the little feathered wanderers eat them with great relish when the snows of winter make bird-food scarce and the bright-red berries gleam out most invitingly. In some parts of Europe the berries are dried and ground into flour. The rowan, or roan, tree is the English name of the mountain ash, and in some parts of Great Britain it is called _witchen_, because of its supposed power against witches and evil spirits and all their spells. In old times branches of it were hung about houses and stables and cow-sheds, for it was thought that
"'witches have no power Where there is roan-tree wood.'"
"But that isn't true, is it?" asked Edith.
"No, dear, not true of either the witches or the wood. But ignorant people believe a great many foolish things, and the leaves and twigs of the ash tree were thought to have peculiar virtue. In some places it was once the practice to pluck an ash-leaf in every case where the leaflets were of even number, and to say,
"'Even ash, I do thee pluck, Hoping thus to meet good luck; If no luck I get from thee, Better far be on the tree.'"
"It sounds like what children say on finding a four-leafed clover," said Clara.
"It is on the same principle," was the reply, "for clover-leaves grow naturally in threes and ash-leaves in sevens. Both rhymes are equally silly where luck is concerned, and those who believe God's words--that even 'the hairs of our head are all numbered'--will have no faith in 'luck.' In old times the ash was believed to perform wonderful cures of various kinds, and in remote parts of England a little mouse called the shrew-mouse bore a very bad character. If a horse or cow had pains in its limbs, they were said to be caused by a shrew-mouse running over it. Our forefathers provided themselves with what they called a shrew-ash, in order to meet the case. The shrew-ash was nothing more than an ash tree in the trunk of which a hole had been bored and a poor little shrew-mouse put in, with many charms and incantations happily long since forgotten."
"And couldn't the poor little mouse get out again?" asked Edith.
"I am afraid not, dear; and we can only rejoice that we did not live in those dark days. Among other beliefs in its virtues, the leaves and wood of the ash were regarded throughout Northern Europe as a protection from all manner of snakes, and in harvest-time children were suspended in their cradles from the branches of tall ash trees while their mothers were working in the harvest-field below. Even now serpents are said to dislike the tree so much that they will not come near it, and the leaf is considered a cure for the bite of a poisonous snake. I have been told that an ash-leaf rubbed on a mosquito-bite will at once take out the sting and itching, and no better remedy can be found for the sting of a bee or a wasp."
"It's ever so much nicer than mud," said Clara, who had rather a talent for getting into hornets' nests.
"But the mud, you see, is always to be had," replied Miss Harson, "while ash-leaves do not grow everywhere; and I do not know that they have any power to cure the sting.
"The other species of ash found in this country are not so important as the white, but the black ash is remarkable as the slenderest deciduous tree of its height to be found in the forest. It is often seventy or eighty feet tall, with a trunk not more than a foot around. The color of the trunk is a dark granite-gray and the bark is rough. The wood is remarkable for its toughness, and for making baskets the Indians prefer it to any other, except the trunk of a young white oak.
"The red ash is very much like the white, but the wood is less valuable. It is a spreading, broad-headed tree, and the trunk is erect and branching. It is not so tall as the black ash, yet its trunk is three times as thick.
"A species of ash grows in Sicily that yields a substance called _manna_ which used to be valuable as a medicine, and this manna is obtained in the same way as maple-sap--by making holes or incisions in the bark of the tree. At the proper season the persons whose business it is to collect manna begin to make incisions, one after the other, up the stem. The manna flows out like clear water, but it soon congeals and becomes a solid substance. It has a sweet taste, and while in a liquid state runs into a leaf of the tree that has been inserted in the wound. Afterward it flows into a vessel placed below, from which it is carried away and shipped off to other countries."
"Is there any story about the ash?" asked Malcolm.
"Not much of a story, dear," was the reply--"only a little legend of the manna trees; but, such as it is, you shall have it:
"The king of Naples, it is said, fenced a number of trees round and forbade any to collect the store they yielded unless they paid a tribute. By this means the royal revenue would be largely increased. But, according to the story, the manna trees, as if they disapproved of this ungenerous arrangement, refused to yield any manna, and suddenly became bare and barren. Upon this the king, finding his scheme a failure, revoked the tax and took away the fence. Then the trees poured out their manna, as usual, in the greatest abundance; so that it was said, 'When the king found he could not make a gain of what Providence had freely bestowed, he gave up the attempt and left the manna as free as God had given it.'
[Illustration: THE SWING.]
"There, now!" said Miss Harson; "after this long talk, you had better run off and see if there is not a tree somewhere on the grounds, with two ropes attached to it, that will bear better fruit than any tree we have studied yet."
The trio laughed and raced for the swing, which was first reached by Clara, who seated herself all ready for the push which Malcolm would not grudge, for he pronounced his sister sweeter than apple or peach; and so she was.
CHAPTER VI.
_THE OLIVE TREE_.
"The ash," said Miss Harson, "has some relations of which, I think, you will be rather surprised to hear. These relations are both trees and shrubs, and the lilac, for instance, is one of them."
"Why, they don't look a bit alike," exclaimed Clara.
"No, they certainly do not; for, although this fragrant shrub often grows as large as a tree, it is quite different from the ash tree. Yet both belong to the olive family."
"The kind of olives that papa likes to eat at dinner, and that you and I _don't_ like, Miss Harson?" asked Malcolm.
"The very same," replied his governess; "only that we are speaking now of the tree on which the olives grow. It is well said that the very name of 'olive' suggests the idea of Palestine and the sunny lands of the East. The olive tree is one of the most prominent trees of the Bible. It is mentioned in the very earliest part of the Scriptures, in the book of Genesis. I wonder if some one can tell me about it?"
"I remember: a dove found a leaf when it was raining and brought it to Noah in the ark," said little Edith, quickly.
"The rain had stopped falling, dear, after the deluge, and the waters were receding, or falling, when Noah sent forth the dove a second time to see what it would find. Here is the verse: 'And the dove came in to him in the evening; and lo, in her mouth was an olive leaf pluckt off; so Noah knew that the waters were abated from off the earth[7].' For this reason the olive-branch is a common emblem of peace. The olive tree is often mentioned in other parts of the Bible, and was considered one of the most valuable trees of Palestine, which is described as 'a land of oil-olive and honey.' It is not nearly so handsome as some other trees of the Holy Land, nor is it grand-looking or graceful. The leaves, which are long for the width, and smooth, are dark green on the upper side and silvery beneath; they generally grow in pairs. The fruit is shaped like a plum; it is green when first formed, then paler in color; and when quite ripe, it is black."
[7] Gen. viii. 9.
"But those that papa eats are olive-color," said Clara.
"Yes," replied Miss Harson, smiling, "but all these hues I have mentioned are olive-color in some stage of the fruit; and it is in the green stage, before it is quite ripe, that it is gathered for preserving."
"But that isn't _preserves_, is it?" asked Malcolm, drawing up his mouth at the recollection of an olive he had once tried to eat. "I thought preserves were always sweet."
"That is the shape in which you are accustomed to them, Malcolm; but to preserve a thing means to keep it from decay, and salt and vinegar will do this as well as sugar. Preserves of this kind are what _you_ call 'puckery.'--As to the color, Clara, 'olive-green' is a color by itself, because of its peculiar tint. It is a gray green instead of a blue or yellow green, and it has a very dull effect. The fruit is produced only once in two years, and in bearing-season the tree is loaded with white blossoms that drop to the ground like flakes of snow. It is said that not one in a hundred of these numerous flowers becomes an olive. Here," continued Miss Harson, pointing to a page of a book in her hand, "is a representation of an olive-branch with some of the plum-shaped fruit. The branch, you see, is hard and stiff-looking."
[Illustration: OLIVE-BRANCH WITH FRUIT.]
"I should think the tree would be prettier when all those white flowers are on it," said little Edith.
"It is--much prettier," replied her governess--"but not so useful. The fruit of the olive is so valuable that numbers of people depend upon it for their support. The wood, too, is very hard and durable, and, as it takes a fine polish, it is used for making many ornamental articles."
"And where does the olive-oil come from?" asked Clara. "Do they make holes in the tree for it, as they do for maple-sap?"
Malcolm was about to exclaim at this idea, but he remembered just in time that, should Miss Harson happen to question him, he himself could not tell where the oil came from.
"The oil is pressed from the olives," was the reply; "a large, vigorous tree is said to yield a thousand pounds of it. It is such an important article of commerce in the regions where it is prepared that every one desires to get as much as he can out of his olive trees, but those who are too greedy of gain will spoil the quality of the oil to make a larger quantity. The small olive of Syria is considered the most delicate, and Italian olives also are very fine; those of Spain are larger and coarser. The best olive-oil comes from the south-eastern portion of France and is a clear, pure liquid; it is obtained from the first pressing of the fruit. This must be only a gentle squeeze, to get the purest oil: the quality usually sold is made by a heavier pressure; and then, when the olives are worked over again, come the dregs, which are not fit for table-use."
"Do they mash 'em, like making apples into cider?" asked Malcolm.
"Something like that; and the olive-farmers take the most anxious care of their orchards, for they know that the more olives the more oil. This with the Italians means a living, and one of their proverbs says, 'If you wish to leave a competency to your grandchildren, plant an olive.' The poorest of the fruit is eaten in their own families, 'to save it,' and, as it does not taste so well, it will go much farther. They do not eat olives, though, as we see them eaten--one or two as a relish; but a respectable dishful is provided for each person, instead of the bread and potatoes which they do not have."
"I'd rather have the bread and potatoes," said Clara, "and I'm glad that I don't have to eat a whole plate of olives."
"If you had always been accustomed to having olives, as the Italians are," replied Miss Harson, "you would think them very nice. I do not suppose that their children ever think how much more inviting are the olives that are kept for sale. Olives intended for exportation are gathered while still green, usually in the month of October. They are soaked for some hours in the strongest lye, to get rid of their bitterness, and are afterward allowed to stand for a fortnight in frequently-changed fresh water, in order to be perfectly purified of the lye. It only then remains to preserve them in common salt and water, when they are ready for export."
"That's what they taste of," exclaimed Malcolm--"salt; and I don't like salt things."
"I think," said his governess, with a smile, "that I have seen a boy whom I know enjoying sliced ham and tongue very much indeed."
"So I do, Miss Harson," was the eager reply; "but ham and tongue, you know, don't taste like olives."
"No, because they are ham and tongue. But they certainly taste salty, and that is what you object to. It is generally found that sweeping assertions are not very safe ones. But to come back to our olive tree: it is an evergreen, and it grows very easily. The readiness with which a twig will take root reminds us of the willow. A fine grove of olive trees at Messa, in Morocco, was accidentally planted. It is said that one of the kings of the dynasty of Saddia, being on a military expedition, encamped here with his army. The pegs with which the cavalry picketed their horses were cut from olive trees in the neighborhood, and, some sudden cause of alarm leading to the abandonment of the position, the pegs were left in the ground. Making the best of the situation, the pegs developed into the handsomest group of olive trees in the district."
The children wondered if any trees had ever been planted in such a strange way before, and little Edith said thoughtfully,
"But, Miss Harson, why don't good people go around and plant trees wherever there aren't any? It would be so nice!"
"Some good people do plant trees, dear, wherever they can," replied her governess, "thinking, as they say, of those who are to come after them; a great many roadside trees have grown in this way. But no one is allowed to meddle with other people's property; waste-places might easily be beautified with trees if the owners cared for anything but for their own present interests. But here is something you will like to hear about the olives of Palestine: 'They are all planted together in the grove like the trees in a forest, and it would seem scarcely possible for the owners to distinguish their own property. But when the fruit is getting ripe, watchmen are appointed to guard the grove and prevent a single olive from being touched even by the person who has a right to the tree.'--You do not look as if you would like that, Malcolm."
[Illustration: OLIVE TREE.--GATHERING THE FRUIT.]
"Indeed I wouldn't!" replied the boy. "I rather think I'd take my own olives whenever I wanted 'em."
"Not if you lived where all were agreed on this point, as they seem to be in Palestine.--'Days pass on, and the autumn is at hand before the governor of the district issues the wished-for proclamation; then the watchmen are removed. Immediately the scene becomes a most animated one. The grove is alive with an eager throng of men, women and children shaking down the precious fruit. It is, however, scarcely possible to bring every berry down, nor would it seem desirable, since after this great harvest comes the gleaning-time, when the poor, who have no olive trees, are permitted to come into the grove and shake down what is left.'"
"Isn't there something about that in the Bible, Miss Harson?" asked Clara.
"Yes; it is in the book of the prophet Isaiah, 'Yet gleaning grapes shall be left in it, as the shaking of an olive tree, two or three berries in the top of the uppermost bough, four or five in the outmost fruitful branches thereof, saith the Lord God of Israel[8].' This is a prophecy about God's people, but the Jews were told by God to leave something, when they were harvesting, for the poor to glean. Does it not seem wonderful that the mighty Ruler of the universe should condescend to such small things? But nothing is small with him, and we see that his loving care extends to the poorest and the meanest."
[8] Isa. xvii. 6.
"Miss Harson," asked Edith, with great earnestness, "has each of our hairs got a number on it? I couldn't find any."
The young lady could scarcely keep from smiling, but she was obliged to call Malcolm to order, and even Clara seemed amused at her little sister's queer interpretation of the loving words, "The very hairs of your head are all numbered."
Miss Harson took her youngest pupil on her knee and explained to her the meaning of our Saviour's words in Luke xii. 7, where it is added, "Fear not,", because the heavenly Father's loving care is always around us.
"It was a natural mistake," she continued, "for a very little girl to make; but we must not try to find amusement in mistakes about God's word. Many grown people are irreverent in this way without knowing it: perhaps they were not properly taught when they were children. But _my_ children must not have this excuse, and I want them all to promise me that they will never utter nor listen to words from the Bible in any other but a reverent manner."
All promised, Malcolm with a flushed face and subdued tone; and Edith felt that one of the great puzzles of her small existence had been solved.
"Oil is the most important product of the olive tree," said Miss Harson, "and it has well been called its richness and fatness. The great demand for it in Europe and Asia prevents the best quality from being sent abroad, and it is said that even the most wealthy foreigners seldom get it pure. It is a most important article of food, taking the place held by butter and lard with us. Innumerable lamps, too, are kept burning by means of this oil, and so varied are its uses in the East that it was a greater thing than we can understand for the prophet Habakkuk to say, 'Although the labor of the olive shall fail, ... yet will I rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation.' Job says, 'The rock poured me out rivers of oil[9];' this means the oil of the olive, which will thrive on the sides and tops of rocky hills where there is scarcely any earth. It is a very long-lived tree, as well as an evergreen; the Psalmist says, 'I am like a green olive tree in the house of God.'"
[9] Job xxiii. 6.
"What does a _wild_ olive tree mean, Miss Harson?" asked Clara.
"It means, dear, one that has grown without being cultivated, like our wild cherry and plum trees. The wild olive is smaller than the other, and inferior to it in every way. There are a great many olive trees in Palestine, and a place where they must have been very plentiful is called by a name which we often see in the Bible.--What is it, Malcolm?"
"Is it 'the Mount of Olives'?" said Malcolm.
"Yes, and it is sometimes called 'Olivet.' It is mentioned in the Old Testament as well as in the New. In Second Samuel it is written: 'And David went up by the ascent of Mount Olivet, and wept as he went up, and had his head covered, and he went barefoot: and all the people that was with him covered every man his head, and they went up, weeping as they went up[10].'"
[10] 2 Sam. xv. 30.
"What was the matter?" asked Edith.
"King David's wicked son Absalom had risen up against his father because he wished to be king in his stead. You remember how he was caught by the head in the boughs of an oak during the very battle that he was fighting for this purpose; so we know that he did not succeed in his wicked plan, but lost his life instead.--The Mount of Olives is described as 'a ridge running north and south on the east side of Jerusalem, its summit about half a mile from the city wall and separated from it by the valley of the Kidron. It is composed of a chalky limestone, the rocks everywhere showing themselves. The olive trees that formerly covered it and gave it its name are now represented by a few trees and clumps of trees. There are three prominent summits on the ridge; of these, the southernmost, which is lower than the other two, is now known as 'the Mount of Offence,' originally 'the Mount of Corruption,' because Solomon defiled it with idolatrous worship. Over this ridge passes the road to Bethany, the most frequented route to Jericho and the Jordan. The side of the Mount of Olives toward the west contains many tombs cut in the rock. The central summit rises two hundred feet above Jerusalem and presents a fine view of the city, and, indeed, of the whole region, including the mountains of Ephraim on the north, the valley of the Jordan on the east, a part of the Dead Sea on the south-east, and beyond it Kerak, in the mountains of Moab. Perhaps no spot on earth unites so fine a view with so many memorials of the most solemn and important events. Over this hill the Saviour often climbed in his journeys to and from the Holy City. Gethsemane lay at its foot on the west, and Bethany on its eastern slope.'"
During the reading of this description of the Mount of Olives, Miss Harson showed the children pictures of the different spots mentioned, and thus they were not likely soon to forget what had been told them.
"Who can repeat some words from the New Testament about this mountain?" asked Miss Harson.
"'Jesus went unto the Mount of Olives,'" said Clara, who had learned this verse in her Sunday lesson, "and it is the first verse of the eighth chapter of St. John."
"And the verse just before it, at the end of the seventh chapter," replied her governess, "says that 'every man went unto his own house,' but 'Jesus went unto the Mount of Olives.' In another place it is said that 'at night he went out and abode in the Mount of Olives,' and in still another that he 'continued all night in prayer to God,' probably on the same mountain."
"And can people really go and see the very same Mount of Olives now?" asked Malcolm, eagerly.
"The very same," was the reply, "except, as I just read to you, many of the olive trees that gave it its name are no longer there. The Garden of Gethsemane, too, the most sacred spot near the mountain, is much changed, and a traveler who saw it lately says:
"'At the foot of the Mount of Olives is a garden enclosed by a wall. There are paths and there are plots of flowers, the work of loving hands in recent years. The flowers speak of to-day, but there are olive trees in the garden that testify of the history of far-away years. Their venerable trunks, gnarled and rugged, are like the rough, marred binding of old books, shutting in a history going back to a far-off date.
"'On one side of this garden slope upward the terraces of the Mount of Olives--terraces that are cultivated to-day even as the slopes of Olivet have been cultivated for generations and centuries. The other side of the garden looks toward the eastern wall of Jerusalem. Deep down in its shadowy bed, between the wall and the garden, lies the ravine of the Kedron.
[Illustration: GARDEN OF GETHSEMANE.]
"'If you visit that garden and look upon its old olive trees, the keeper of the place will tell you that you are in Gethsemane, the spot of our Saviour's betrayal. He will point out the "Grotto of the Agony," the place where the disciples slumbered, and that where Judas, before his brethren, ceased publicly to be a follower and became the betrayer of Jesus. Some things you very naturally may question as the guardian of the enclosure tells his story. Whether any one of the venerable olive trees ever threw its shadow across the prostrate form of Jesus is more than doubtful, but that these trees are burdened with the history of centuries all must concede. "Gethsemane" means "oil-press," and olive trees long ago gave Olivet its name. That somewhere in this neighborhood the Saviour suffered cannot be doubted, and within that closed wall may have been the very spot where he bowed in his agony, and where he heard the tongue of Judas utter his treacherous "Rabbi!" and where he felt the serpent-breath of the traitor as that traitor kissed him.'"
Miss Harson read of this solemn spot in a low, reverent tone; and the little audience were very quiet, until at last Clara said,
"Whenever we see an ash tree or olives, how much there will be to think of!"
CHAPTER VII.
_THE USEFUL BIRCH_.
"Oh, Miss Harson!" called out Clara, in great excitement, as she caught up with her governess on a run; "hasn't Edie poisoned herself? She has been eating this twig."
Edith, of course, at once began to cry.
"You are not poisoned, dear," said Miss Harson, very quickly, after trying the twig herself; "for this is birch-wood, and it cannot possibly hurt you. But remember, Edie, that this must not happen again; _never_ put anything to your mouth unless you know it to be harmless. The birds and squirrels and other animals that are obliged to pick up their own living as soon as they are able to use their limbs have the faculty given them of knowing what is good for them to eat, but little girls are not intended to live in the woods, and they cannot tell whether or not the things they find there are fit to eat."
"I took only a little bit," sobbed Edith; "Clara snatched it away as soon as it tasted good."
Malcolm laughingly tossed his little sister into a sort of evergreen cradle where the branches grew low--for they were enjoying an afternoon in the woods--and held her there securely, while their governess replied,
"'A little bit' is too much of a thing that might be harmful. You must remember to 'touch not, taste not, handle not,' until you have asked permission. But I am going to let you all chew as many birch-shoots as you want, and I too shall chew some; for when I was a little girl, I used to think they were 'puffickly d'licious.'"
The children were much amazed to think that Miss Harson had ever talked like Edith--indeed, the two older ones could scarcely believe that they once did so themselves; but all soon had their hands full of birch-twigs, and they began gnawing like so many squirrels. All approved of the "birchskin," as Edith called it, and Malcolm declared that "it would be grand fun to live in the woods all the time."
"Couldn't we have a tent, Miss Harson," asked Clara, "and try it?"
"I have no doubt," was the reply, "that your indulgent papa would have a tent put up here for you if he thought it would make you happier, but I have my doubts as to whether it would do so. In the first place, I should object very much to living in the tent with you, and how could you possibly live there alone?"
Clara and Edith were quite sure that they could not get along without their friend and governess, but Malcolm thought he would like to try being a hermit or an Indian, he was not quite ready to say which.
"While you are deciding," said Miss Harson, with a smile, "it may be as well for us to go on as usual; but I think that a little tent could be put up here somewhere, which we might enjoy for an hour or so on pleasant days. I will see about it."
The little girls were delighted, and Malcolm finally condescended to be pleased with the idea.
"This is a very young birch," continued their governess, "and you see how slender and graceful it is; also that the bark, or 'skin,' is very dark. For this reason it is called the black, or cherry, birch, and also because the tree is very much like the black cherry. It is also called sweet birch and mahogany birch; the _sweet_ part you can probably understand, and it gets its other name from the color of the wood, which often resembles mahogany and at one time was much used for furniture. There are larger trees of the same kind all around us, and I should like to know if anything else has been noticed besides the twigs of this little one."
"_I_ see something," replied Malcolm: "there are flowers--purple and yellow."
"And what is the particular name for these tree-blossoms?" asked Miss Harson.
"Isn't it _catkins_?" inquired Clara, timidly.
"Yes, catkins, or aments. They hang, as you see, like long tassels of purple and gold, and are as fragrant as the bark. Bryant's line,
"'The fragrant birch above him hung her tassels in the sky,'
"was written of this same black birch. Some of these trees are sixty or seventy feet high, and all are very graceful, this species being considered the most beautiful of the numerous birch family. The leaves, which are just coming out, are two or three inches long and about half as wide; they taper to a point and have serrate, or sawlike, edges. The wood is firm and durable, and is much used for cattle-yokes as well as for bedsteads and chairs. The large trees yield a great quantity of sweetish sap, which makes a pleasant drink. The trees are tapped just as the sugar-maples are, and in some parts of the country gathering this sap, which is sometimes used to make vinegar, is quite an important event."
"Oh! oh! _oh_!" screamed Edith, and began to run.
"Oh! oh! oh!" echoed Clara; and Malcolm declared that she was just like "Jill," who "came tumbling after."
"What is the matter, children?" asked their governess, in dismay; but she stood perfectly still.
"Only a poor little garter-snake," said Malcolm, "putting his head out to see if it's warm enough for him yet. But he has gone back into his hole frightened to death at such dreadful noises. Hello! what's the matter with Edie now?"
The little sister had fallen, tripped up by some rough roots, and, expecting the poor startled garter-snake to come and make a meal off her, she was calling loudly for help.
Miss Harson had her in her arms in a moment, and it was soon found that one foot had quite a bad bruise.
"If only you had not run away!" said her governess. "He was such an innocent little snake to make all this fuss about, and very pretty too, if you had stopped to look at him."
"Are snakes ever pretty?" asked Edith, in great surprise.
"Certainly they are, dear, and this one had lovely stripes. I wish you could have seen him."
The little girl began to wish so too, it was so funny to think of a snake being pretty, and she felt quite ashamed that she had scampered away in such a silly fashion.
"What a goose I was!" said Clara, doing her thinking aloud. "But I thought it must be something dreadful, when Edie screamed so."
"How much better it would have been to have found out before you screamed!" replied Miss Harson.--"But come, Edith; see what a nice cane Malcolm has just cut to help your lame foot with. He is offering you his arm, too, on the other side, and between the two I think you will get along finely."
Edith thought the same thing, and enjoyed being helped home in this fashion. Her foot was quite painful, though, and considerably swollen; and Clara bathed it with arnica when the little girl had been comfortably established on the schoolroom sofa.
"Perhaps," said Miss Harson, "our little invalid will not care to hear about trees this evening?"
But the little invalid did care, and it was decided to take a further ramble among the birches.
"I want to hear about birch-bark," said Malcolm--"not the kind we've been eating, but the kind that canoes and things are made of."
[Illustration: THE CUT-LEAVED WHITE BIRCH.]
"You have already heard about the black birch," replied his governess, "and, besides this, we have the white, or gray, birch, the bark of which is white, chalky and dotted with black; the red birch, with bark of a reddish or chocolate color; the yellow birch, bark yellowish, with a silvery lustre; and the canoe birch, which has a white bark with a pearly lustre. There is also a dwarf, or shrub, birch. The list, you see, is quite a long one."
"What kind grow in _our_ woods?" asked Clara.
"You certainly know of one kind," was the reply--"the black, or sweet, birch, which we have all tried and like so well. Besides this, there is the white, or little gray, birch, which is seldom over twenty-five or thirty feet high. It is, however, a graceful and beautiful object, enjoying to an eminent decree the lightness and airiness of the birch family, and spreading out its glistening leaves on the ends of a very slender and often pensile spray with an indescribable softness. An English poet has called this tree the
"'most beautiful Of forest-trees, the lady of the woods.'"
The children laughed at the idea of calling a tree a _lady_, it seemed so comical; but Miss Harson said that she thought this was a very good description of a slender, graceful tree.
[Illustration: WHITE-BIRCH LEAF.]
"Four or five inches," she continued, "will span its waist, or trunk, and this seems a very good reason for calling it _little_. Another name for this tree is poplar birch, because the triangular-shaped leaves, which taper to a very long, slender point, have a habit of trembling like those of the poplars. The branches are of a dark chocolate color which contrasts very prettily with the grayish-white trunk, and their extreme slenderness causes them to droop somewhat like those of the willow. The white birch will spring up in the poorest kind of soil, and it is found in the highest latitude in which any tree can live. Its leaf is 'deltoid' in shape and indented at the edge. The bark of this species is said to be more durable than any other vegetable substance, and a piece of birch-wood was once found changed into stone, while the outer bark, white and shining, remained in its natural state,"
"I don't see how it could," said Malcolm. "What kept it from turning into stone too?"
"Its peculiar nature," was the reply, "which is a thing that we cannot explain, and we shall have to take the story just as it is. We certainly know that the wood has been proved to be very strong, and it is much used for timber."
"Is the red birch really red, Miss Harson?" asked Clara, who thought that this promised to be the prettiest member of the family.
"The bark has a reddish tinge, and it is so loose and ragged-looking that it has been said to roll up its bark in coarse ringlets, which are whitish with a stain of crimson. The red birch, which is more rare than any of the other kinds, is a much larger tree than the white birch, but, like all its relations, it is very graceful. The wood is white and hard and makes very good fuel, while the twigs are made into brooms for sweeping streets and courtyards."
"But there isn't very much red about it, after all," said Malcolm.
"It wasn't red," murmured Edith; "it was green;" and the next moment "the baby" was fast asleep, but Miss Harson was afraid that she had taken the snake with her to the land of Nod, so restless was her sleep.
"I hope the yellow birch is yellow," said Clara again.
"We will see what is said of its color," replied her governess, "and here it is: 'Distinguished by its yellowish bark, of a soft silken texture and silvery or pearly lustre,' It is a large tree, and has been named _excelsa_--'lofty'--because of its height. The slender, flowing branches are very graceful, and the tree is often as symmetrical as a fine elm, but droops less. The roots of the yellow birch seem to enjoy getting above the ground and twisting themselves in a very fantastic manner, and, taken altogether, it is a strikingly handsome and ornamental tree. The wood was at one time much liked for fuel, and many of the logs were of immense size."
"Now," said Malcolm, gleefully, "the canoe birch has _got_ to come next, because there isn't anything else to come."
"That is an excellent reason," replied Miss Harson, "and the canoe birch it shall be. There is more to be said of it than of any of the others, and it also grows in greater quantities. Thick woods of it are found in Maine and New Hampshire--for it loves a cold climate--and in other Northern portions of the country. The tall trunks of the trees resemble pillars of polished marble supporting a canopy of bright-green foliage. The leaves are something of a heart-shape, and their vivid summer green turns to golden tints in autumn. The bark of the canoe birch is almost snowy white on the outside, and very prettily marked with fine brown stripes two or three inches long, which go around the trunk. This bark is very smooth and soft, and it is easily separated into very thin sheets. For this reason the tree is often called the paper birch, and the smooth, thin layers of bark make very good writing-paper when none other can be had."
"Oh, Miss Harson!" exclaimed Clara; "did you ever see any that was written on?"
"Yes," was the reply; "I once wrote a letter on some myself."
"Did you _really_?" cried two eager voices. "How _could_ you? Oh, do tell us about it!"
"I was making a visit at a village in Maine," said their governess, "where the beautiful trees are to be seen in all their perfection, and I thought it would be appropriate to write a letter from there on birch bark. So I split my bark very thin and got a respectable sheet of it ready; then I cut another piece, to form an envelope, and gummed it together. I had quite a struggle to write on it decently with a steel pen, because the pen would go through the paper; but I persevered, and finally I accomplished my letter. It seemed odd to put a postage-stamp on birch bark, and I smiled to think how surprised the home-people would be to get such a letter. They _were_ surprised, and they told me afterward that the postman laughed when he delivered it."
The children thought this very interesting, and they wished that there were canoe-birch trees growing at Elmridge, that they might be enabled to try the experiment for themselves.
"Now," continued Miss Harson, "I am going to read you an account of canoe-making, and of some other uses to which the bark is put:
"'In Canada and in the district of Maine the country-people place large pieces of the bark immediately below the shingles of the roof, to form a more impenetrable covering for their houses. Baskets, boxes and portfolios are made of it, which are sometimes embroidered with silk of different colors. Divided into very thin sheets, it forms a substitute for paper, and placed between the soles of the shoes and in the crown of the hat it is a defence against dampness. But the most important purpose to which it is applied, and one in which it is replaced by the bark of no other tree, is in the construction of canoes. To procure proper pieces, the largest and smoothest trunks are selected. In the spring two circular incisions are made, several feet apart, and two longitudinal ones on opposite sides of the tree; after which, by introducing a wooden wedge, the bark is easily detached. These plates are usually ten or twelve feet long and two feet nine inches broad. To form the canoe, they are stitched together with fibrous roots of the white spruce about the size of a quill, which are deprived of the bark, split and suppled in water. The seams are coated with resin of the balm of Gilead.
"'Great use is made of these canoes by the savages and by the French Canadians in their long journeys into the interior of the country; they are very light, and are easily transported on the shoulders from one lake or river to another, which is called the _portage_. A canoe calculated for four persons, with their baggage, weighs from forty to fifty pounds; some of them are made to carry fifteen passengers.'
"And now let me show you a picture of the Kentucky pioneer in a birch-bark canoe."
"Why, Miss Harson, the Indians are trying to kill him!" exclaimed Malcolm.
"Yes," she replied; "when you read the history of the United States, you will find that not only Daniel Boone, but the most of the early settlers of these Western lands, had trouble with the Indians. Nor is this strange. These pioneers were often rough men, and were looked upon by the natives as invaders of their country and treated as enemies. But to come back to the uses of the bark of the birch:
"'In the settlements of the Hudson Bay Company tents are made of the bark of this tree, which for that purpose is cut into pieces twelve feet long and four feet wide. These are sewed together by threads made of the white-spruce roots; and so rapidly is a tent put up that a circular one twenty feet in diameter and ten feet high does not occupy more than half an hour in pitching. Every traveler and hunter in Canada enjoys these "rind-tents," as they are called, which are used only during the hot summer months, when they are found particularly comfortable.'"
[Illustration: IN THE BIRCH-BARK CANOE]
"Well, that's the funniest thing yet!" exclaimed Malcolm. "'Rind-tents'! I wish I could see one. Did they have any in Maine where you were, Miss Harson?"
"No," was the reply, "I did not even hear of such a thing there, and to see it you would probably have to go far to the north. The English birch, which is found also in many parts of Europe, is put to a great many uses; the leaves produce a yellow dye, and the wood, when mixed with copperas, will color red, black and brown. An old birch tree that is supposed to be giving an account of itself says,
"'How many are the uses of my bark! Thrifty men who sit beside the blazing hearth when my branches throw up a clear bright flame, and follow the example of their fathers in making their own shoes and those of their families, tan the hides with my bark. Kamschadales construct from it both hats and vessels for holding milk, and the Swedish fisherman his shoes. The Norwegian covers with it his low-roofed hut and spreads upon the surface layers of moss at least three or four inches thick, and, having twisted long strips together, he obtains excellent torches with which to cheer the darkness of his long nights. Fishermen, in like manner, make great use of them in alluring their finny prey. For this purpose they fit a portion of blazing birch in a cleft stick and spear the fish when attracted by its flickering light.'"
The children exclaimed at this queer way of fishing, but Malcolm was very much taken with the idea of doing it by night with blazing torches, and he thought that he would like to be a Norwegian fisherman even better than a hermit or an Indian.
"The old tree goes on to say," continued Miss Harson, "that 'Finland mothers form of the dried leaves soft, elastic beds for their children, and from me is prepared the _mona_, their sole medicine in all diseases. My buds in spring exhale a delicious fragrance after showers, and the bark, when burnt, seems to purify the air in confined dwellings.'
"In Lapland the twigs of the birch, covered with reindeer-skins, are used for beds, but they cannot be so comfortable, I should think, as the leaves. The fragrant wood of the tree makes the fires which have to be kept up inside the huts even in summer to drive away the mosquitoes, and the people of those Northern regions would find it hard to get along without the useful birch."
"I like to hear about it," said Clara. "Can you tell us something more that is done with it, Miss Harson?"
"There is just one thing more," replied her governess, with a smile, "which I will read out of an old book; and I desire you all to pay particular attention to it."
Little Edith was wide awake again by this time, and her great blue eyes looked as if she were ready to devour every word.
"Birch rods," continued Miss Harson, "are quite different from birch _twigs_, and the uses to which they were put were not altogether agreeable to the boys who ran away from school or did not get their lessons. 'My branches,' says the birch, 'gently waving in the wind, awakened in those days no feelings of dread with truant urchins--for _all_ might be truants then, if so it pleased them--but at length a scribe arose who thus wrote concerning my ductile twigs: "The civil uses whereunto the birch serveth are many, as for the punishment of children both at home and abroad; for it hath an admirable influence upon them to quiet them when they wax unruly, and therefore some call the tree _make-peace_"'" Malcolm and Clara both laughed, and asked their young governess when the birch rods were coming; but Edith did not feel quite so easy, and, with her bruised foot and all, it took a great deal of petting that night to get her comfortably to bed.
CHAPTER VIII.
_THE POPLARS_.
The bruised foot was not comfortable to walk on for two or three days, and Edith was settled in the great easy arm-chair with dolls and toys and picture-books in a pile that seemed as if it would not stop growing until every article belonging to herself and Clara had been gathered there. "We can go on with our trees," said Miss Harson, "even if we do not see them just yet; and this evening I should like to tell you something about the poplar, a large tree with alternate leaves which is often found in dusty towns, where it seems to flourish as well as in its favorite situation by a running stream. An old English writer calls the poplars 'hospitable trees, for anything thrives under their shade.' They are not handsomely-shaped trees, but the foliage is thick and pretty. In the latter part of this month--April--the trees are so covered with their olive-green catkins that large portions of the forests seem to be colored by them."
[Illustration: IN THE EASY CHAIR]
"Are there any poplars at Elmridge?" asked Malcolm.
"Not nearer than the woods," was the reply, "where we must go and look for them when Edith's foot is quite well again, though there are a good many in the city. The poplar is often planted by the roadside because it grows so rapidly and makes a good shade. The _Abele_, or silver poplar, is an especial favorite for this purpose.
"The balm of Gilead, or Canada poplar, is the largest of the species, and really a handsome tree, often growing to the height of fifty or sixty feet, with a trunk of proportionate size. It has large leaves of a bright, glossy green, which grow loosely on long branches, A peculiarity of this tree is that before the leaves begin to expand the buds are covered with a yellow, glutinous balsam that diffuses a penetrating but very agreeable odor unlike any other. The balsam is gathered as a healing anodyne, and for many ailments it is a favorite remedy in domestic medicine. All the poplars produce more or less of this substance.
"The river poplaris found on the banks of rivers and brooks and in wet places, and is a noble and graceful tree. The trunk is light gray in color, and the young trees have a smooth, leather-like bark. The broad leaves, of a very rich green, grow on stems nearly as long as themselves, and the flowering aments are of a light-red color. The leaf-stalks and young branches are also brightly tinted. Another of these trees has a very singular name: it is called the necklace poplar."
[Illustration: LOMBARDY POPLAR.]
"Do the flowers grow like real necklaces?" asked Clara.
"Not quite," replied her governess, "but the reason given is something like it. The tree is so called from the resemblance of the long ament, before opening, to the beads of a necklace. In Europe it is known as the Swiss poplar and the black Italian poplar. Its timber is much valued there for building. There are also the black poplar and that queer, stiff-looking tree the Lombardy poplar. Cannot one of you tell me where there are some tall, narrow trees that look almost as if they had been cut out of wood and stuck there?"
"I know where there are some," said Malcolm: "right in front of Mrs. Bush's old house; and I think they're miserable-looking trees."
"When old and rusty, they are not in the least cheerful," replied Miss Harson; "and it is so long since Lombardy poplars were admired that few are found except about old places. The tree is shaped like a tall spire, and in hot, calm weather drops of clear water trickle from its leaves like a slight shower of rain. It was once a favorite shade-tree, and a century ago great numbers of Lombardy poplars were planted by village waysides, in front of dwelling-houses, on the borders of public grounds, and particularly in avenues leading to houses that stand at some distance from the high-road.
[Illustration: A GROUP OF POPLARS IN CASHMERE]
"The poplar is found in many lands. The Lombardy poplar, as its name indicates, was brought from Italy, where it grows luxuriantly beside the orange and the myrtle; but after one of our cold winters many of its small branches will decay, and this gives it a forlorn appearance. When fresh and green, the Lombardy poplar is quite handsome. Some one wrote of it long ago: 'There is no other tree that so pleasantly adorns the sides of narrow lanes and avenues, and so neatly accommodates itself to limited enclosures. Its foliage is dense and of the liveliest verdure, making delicate music to the soft touch of every breeze. Its terebinthine odors scent the vernal gales that enter our open windows with the morning sun. Its branches, always turning upward and closely gathered together, afford a harbor to the singing-birds that make them a favorite resort, and its long, tapering spire that points to heaven gives an air of cheerfulness and religious tranquillity to village scenery.'"
"I wish we had some," said Edith, "with singing-birds in 'em."
"Why, my dear child," replied her governess, "have we not the beautiful elms, in which the birds build their nests and where they fly in and out continually? They are the very same birds that build in the Lombardy poplars."
"I thought that singing-birds always lived in cages," said the little queen in the easy-chair.
"And did you think they were hung all over the Lombardy poplars?" asked Malcolm, in a broad grin.
Edith laughed too, and Miss Harson said smilingly.
"I thought that the birds about Elmridge did a great deal of singing, and the blue-birds and robins kept it up all day. But I should not like to see the old Lombardy poplars hung with gilded cages, and the birds which should happen to be prisoners in the cages would like it still less."
"Well," said Edith, contentedly, as she settled herself again to listen.
"The poplar," continued Miss Harson, "has a great many insect enemies, and the Lombardy is not often seen now, because a great many of these trees were destroyed on account of a worm, or caterpillar, by which they were infested. Poplar-wood is soft, light and generally of a pale-yellow color; it is much used for toy-making and for boarded floors, 'for which last purpose it is well adapted from its whiteness and the facility with which it is scoured, and also from the difficulty with which it catches fire and the slowness with which it burns. A red-hot poker falling on a board of poplar would burn its way without causing more combustion than the hole through which it passed.'"
"I should think, then," said Malcolm, "that all wooden things would be made of poplar."
"It is generally thought not to be durable," was the reply, "but it is said that if kept dry the wood will last as long as that of any tree. Says the poplar plank,
"'Though heart of oak be ne'er so stout, Keep me dry and I'll see him out.'
"The poplar has been highly praised, for every part of this tree answers some good purpose. The bark, being light, like cork, serves to support the nets of fishermen; the inner bark is used by the Kamschadales as a material for bread; brooms are made from the twigs, and paper from the cottony down of the seeds. Horses, cows and sheep browse upon it.
"And now," said Miss Harson, when the children were wondering if that were the end, "we have come to the most interesting tree of the whole species--the aspen, or trembling poplar. It is a small, graceful tree with rounded leaves having a wavy, toothed border, covered with soft silk when young, which remains only as a fringe on the edge at maturity, supported by a very slender footstalk about as long as the leaf, and compressed laterally from near the base. They are thus agitated by the slightest breath of wind with that quivering, restless motion characteristic of all the poplars, but in none so striking as this. 'To quiver like an aspen-leaf has become a proverb. The foliage appears lighter than that of most other trees, from continually displaying the under side of the leaves.
"The aspen has been called a very poetical tree, because it is the only one whose leaves tremble when the wind is apparently calm. It is said, however, to suggest fickleness and caprice, levity and irresolution--a bad character for any tree. The small American aspen, which is quite common, has a smooth, pale-green bark, which gets whitish and rough as the tree grows old. The foliage is thin, but a single leaf will be found, when examined, uncommonly beautiful. A spray of the small aspen, when in leaf, is very light and airy-looking, and the leaves produce a constant rustling sound. 'Legends of no ordinary interest linger around this tree. Ask the Italian peasant who pastures his sheep beside a grove of _Abele_ why the leaves of these trees are always trembling in even the hottest weather when not a breeze is stirring, and he will tell you that the wood of the trembling-poplar formed the cross on which our Saviour suffered.'"
"Oh, Miss Harson!" said Clara, in a low tone. "Is that _true_?"
"We do not know that it is, dear, nor do we know that it is not. Here are some verses about it which I like very much:
"'The tremulousness began, as legends tell, When he, the meek One, bowed his head to death E'en on an aspen cross, when some near dell Was visited by men whose every breath That Sufferer gave them. Hastening to the wood-- The wood of aspens--they with ruffian power Did hew the fair, pale tree, which trembling stood As if awestruck; and from that fearful hour Aspens have quivered as with conscious dread Of that foul crime which bowed the meek Redeemer's head.
"'Far distant from those days, oh let not man, Boastful of reason, check with scornful speech Those legends pure; for who the heart may scan Or say what hallowed thoughts such legends teach To those who may perchance their scant flocks keep On hill or plain, to whom the quivering tree Hinteth a thought which, holy, solemn, deep, Sinks in the heart, bidding their spirits flee All thoughts of vice, that dread and hateful thing Which troubleth of each joy the pure and gushing spring?'"
CHAPTER IX.
_ALL A-BLOW: THE APPLE TREE_.
It certainly was a beautiful sight, and the children exclaimed over it in ectasy. It was now past the middle of April, and Miss Harson had taken her little flock to visit an apple-orchard at some distance from Elmridge, and the whole place seemed to be one mass of pink-and-white bloom.
"And how deliciously _sweet_ it is!" said Malcolm as he sniffed the fragrant air.
"Oh!" exclaimed Edith, turning up her funny little nose to get the full benefit of all this fragrance; "I can't breathe half enough at once."
"That is just my case," said her governess, laughing, "but I did not think to say it in that way. Get all you can of this deliciousness, children; I wish that we could carry some of it away with us."
"And so you shall," replied a hearty voice as Mr. Grove, the owner of the orchard, came up with a knife in his hand and began cutting off small branches of apple--blossoms. "I like to see folks enjoy things."
"I hope you don't mind our trespassing on your grounds?" said Miss Harson. "I can engage that my little friends will do no injury, and I particularly wished them to see your beautiful orchard in bloom; it is almost equal to a field of roses."
"Don't mind it at all, miss," was the reply--"quite the contrary; and I think, myself, it's a pretty sight. Smells good, too. Now, here's a nosegay big enough for you three young ladies, and Bub there can carry it."
Malcolm, who was quite proud of his name, felt so indignant at being called "Bub" that he almost forgot the farmer's generosity; but his governess acknowledged it, very much to the worthy man's satisfaction.
Edith, however, was rather shocked.
"I thought it was wicked," said she, "to cut off flowers from fruit trees? Won't these make apples?"
"Not them particular ones, Sis," replied Mr. Grove, with a laugh; "they're done for now. But it ain't wicked to cut off your own apple blows when there's too many on the tree to make good apples, and there's plenty to spare yet." He was very much amused at the little girl's serious face over this wholesale destruction of infant apples, and he invited them all to come to the house and get a drink of fresh milk. The children thought this a very pleasant invitation, and Miss Harson was quite willing to gratify them.
The farmer led his guests into a very cheerful and wonderfully clean kitchen, where Mrs. Groves was busy with her baking, and the loaves of fresh bread looked very inviting. She was as pleasant and hospitable as her husband, and after shaking up a funny-looking patchwork cushion in a rocking-chair for the young lady to sit down on she told the little girls that she would get them a couple of crickets if they would wait a minute, and disappeared into the next room.
The two little sisters looked at each other in dismay and wondered what they could do with these insects, but before they could consult Miss Harson good Mrs. Grove had returned carrying in each hand a small flat footstool. The girls sat down very carefully, for they were not accustomed to such low seats; but the whole party were tired with their walk and glad to rest for a short time. Malcolm, being a boy, was expected to sit where he could, and he speedily established himself in the corner of a wooden settle.
In spite of the apple-blossoms, the kitchen fire was very comfortable; and, as the baking was just coming to an end, Mrs.
Grove said that "she would be ready to visit with them in a minute:" she did not seem to allow herself more than a "minute" for anything. Besides the milk, some very nice seed-cakes in the shape of hearts were produced, and Edith thought them the most delightful little cakes she had ever tasted. Clara and Malcolm, too, were quite hungry, and Miss Harson enjoyed her glass of milk and seed-cake as well as did the young people. The farmer and his wife seemed really sorry to part with their guests when they rose to go, but Miss Harson said that it was time for them to be at home, and the children were obedient on the instant.
"Well," said the worthy couple, "you know now where to come when you want more apple-blows and a drink of milk."
Malcolm was quite laden with the mass of rosy flowers which Mr. Grove piled up in his arms, and he enjoyed the delicious scent all the way home.
"I must get out the big jar," said Miss Harson as she surveyed their treasures, "and there are so many buds that I think we may be able to keep them for some days.--What would you say, Edith, if I told you that people cut off not only the blossoms, but even the fruit itself, while it is green, to make what is left on the tree handsomer and better?"
Edith looked her surprise, and the other children could not understand why all the fruit that formed should not be left on the tree to ripen.
"It is very often left," replied their governess, "but, although the crop is a large one, it will be of inferior quality; and those who understand fruit-raising thin it out, so that the tree may not have more fruit than it can well nourish. But now it is time for papa to come, and after dinner we will have a regular apple-talk."
"How nice it was at Mrs. Grove's to-day!" said Clara, when they were gathered for the talk. "I think that kitchens are pleasanter to sit in than parlors and school-rooms."
"So do I," chimed in Edith; "but I was afraid about the crickets at first. I thought we'd have to hold 'em in our hands, and I didn't like that."
Why _would_ people always laugh when there was nothing to laugh at? The little girl thought she had a very funny brother and sister, and Miss Harson, too, was funny sometimes.
"Have you so soon forgotten about the real insect-crickets, dear?" asked her governess, kindly. "Why, it will be months yet before we see one. Besides, I thought I told you that in some places a little bench is called a 'cricket'?--Do you know, Clara, why you thought Mrs. Grove's kitchen so pleasant? It is larger and better furnished than kitchens usually are, there were pleasant people in it, and you were tired and hungry and ready to enjoy rest and refreshments; but I am quite sure that, on the whole, you would like your own quarters best, because you are better fitted for them, as Mrs. Grove is for hers. We had a very pleasant visit, though, and some day we may repeat it--perhaps when the apples are ripe."
"Good! good!" cried the children, clapping their hands; and Malcolm added that he "would like to be let loose in that apple-orchard."
"Perhaps you would like it better than Farmer Grove would," was the reply. "But we haven't got to the apples yet; we must first find out a little about the tree. We learn in the beginning that it was one of the very earliest trees planted in this country by the settlers, because it is both hardy and useful. There is a wild species called the Virginia crab-apple, which bears beautiful pink flowers as fragrant as roses, but its small apples are intensely sour. The blossoms of the cultivated apple tree are more beautiful than those of any other fruit; they are delicious to both sight and scent."
"And do look, Miss Harson," said Clara, "at these lovely half-open buds! They are just like tiny roses, and _so_ sweet!"
Down went Clara's head among the clustered blossoms, and then Edith had to come too; and Malcolm declared that between the two they would smell them to death.
"It seems," continued Miss Harson, "that the apple tree grows wild in every part of Europe except in the frigid zone and in Western Asia, China and Japan. It is thought to have been planted in Britain by the Romans; and when it was brought here, it seemed to do better than it had done anywhere else. It is said that 'not only the Indians, but many indigenous insects, birds and quadrupeds, welcomed the apple tree to these shores. The butterfly of the tent-caterpillar saddled her eggs on the very first twig that was formed, and it has since shared her affections with the wild cherry; and the canker-worm also, in a measure, abandoned the elm to feed on it. As it grew apace the bluebird, robin, cherry-bird, king-bird, and many more, came with haste and built their nests and warbled in its boughs, and so became orchard-birds and multiplied more than ever. It was an era in the history of their race in America. The downy woodpecker found such a savory morsel under its bark that he perforated it in a ring quite round the tree before he left it. It did not take the partridge long to find out how sweet its buds were, and every winter eve she flew, and still flies, from the wood to pluck them, much to the farmer's sorrow. The rabbit, too, was not slow to learn the taste of its twigs and bark; and when the fruit was ripe, the squirrel half rolled, half carried, it to his hole. Even the musquash crept up the bank from the brook at evening, and greedily devoured it, until he had worn a path in the grass there; and when it was frozen and thawed, the crow and the jay were glad to taste it occasionally. The owl crept into the first apple tree that became hollow, and fairly hooted with delight, finding it just the place for him; so, settling down into it, he has remained there ever since.'
"Speaking of these buds, Clara," said her governess, "I think I forgot to tell you that the apple tree belongs to the family Rosaceae, and therefore the half-opened blossoms have a right to look like roses. The tree is not a handsome one, being a small edition of the oak in its sturdy outline, but it is less graceful or picturesque-looking, being often broader than it is high and resembling in shape a half globe. The leaves are not pretty except when first unfolded, and their color is then a beautiful light tint known as apple-green. But the foliage soon becomes dusty and shabby-looking. An old apple tree, with its gnarled, and often hollow, trunk, is generally handsomer than a young one, unless in the time of blossoms; for only a young apple-orchard is covered with such a profusion of bloom as that we saw to-day."
"I am glad," said Clara, "that it belongs to the rose family, for now the dear little buds seem prettier than ever."
"The apples are prettier yet," observed
Malcolm; "if there's anything I like, it's apples."
"I am afraid that you eat too many of them for your good," replied his governess; "I shall have to limit you to so many a day."
"I have eaten only six to-day," was the modest reply, "and they were little russets, too."
"Oh, Malcolm, Malcolm!" said Miss Harson, laughing; "what shall I do with you? Why, you would soon make an apple-famine in most places. Three apples a day must be your allowance for the present; and if at any time we go to live in an orchard, you may have six."
"Why, _we_ have only one," exclaimed little Edith, "and we don't want any more.--Do we, Clara?"
[Illustration: Apple Blossoms.]
"If you don't want 'em," said Malcolm, "there's no sense in eating 'em.--But I'll remember, Miss Harson. I suppose three at one time ought to be enough."
Malcolm's expression, as he said this, was so doleful that every one laughed at him; and his governess continued:
"The apple tree is said to produce a greater variety of beautiful fruit than any other tree that is known, and apples are liked by almost every one. They are a very wholesome fruit and nearly as valuable as bread and potatoes for food, because they can be used in so many different ways, and the poorer qualities make very nourishing food for nearly all animals."
"Rex fairly snatches the apple out of my hand when I go to give him one," said Malcolm.
"So does Regina," added Clara, who trembled in her shoes whenever she offered these dainties to the handsome carriage-horses.
Edith had not dared to venture on such a feat yet, and therefore she had nothing to say.
"All horses are fond of apples," said Miss Harson, "and the fruit is very thoroughly appreciated. Ancient Britain was celebrated for her apple-orchards, and the tree was reverenced by the Druids because the mistletoe grew abundantly on it. In Saxon times, when England became a Christian country, the rite of coronation, or crowning of a king, was in such words as these: 'May the almighty Lord give thee, O king, from the dew of heaven and the fatness of the earth, abundance of corn and wine and oil! Be thou the lord of thy brothers, and let the sons of thy mother bow down before thee. Let the people serve thee and the tribes adore thee. May the Almighty bless thee with the blessings of heaven above, and the mountains and the valleys with the blessings of the deep below, with the blessings of grapes and _apples_! Bless, O Lord, the courage of this prince, and prosper the work of his hands; and by thy blessing may his land be filled with _apples_, with the fruit and dew of heaven from the top of the ancient mountains, from the _apples_ of the eternal hills, from the fruit of the earth and its fullness!' You will see from this how highly apples were valued in England in those ancient times."
"I should like to pick them up when they are ripe," said Clara, and Malcolm expressed a desire to hire himself out by the day to Mr. Grove when that time arrived.
"An apple-orchard in autumn," continued their governess, "is often a merry scene. Ladders are put against the trees, and the finest apples are carefully picked off, but such as are to be used for cider-making are shaken to the ground. Men and boys are at work, and even women and children are there with baskets and aprons spread out to catch the fruit; and they run back and forth wherever the apples fall thickest, with much laughter at the unexpected showers that come down upon their heads and necks. Large baskets filled with these apples are carried to the mill, where, after being laid in heaps a while to mellow, they are crushed and pressed till their juice is extracted; and this, being fermented, becomes cider. From this cider, by a second fermentation, the best vinegar is made."
[Illustration: THE APPLE-HARVEST.]
"Miss Harson," asked Edith, as the talk seemed to have come to an end, "isn't there any more about apple trees? I like 'em."
"Yes, dear," was the reply; "there is more. I was just looking over, in this little book, some queer superstitions about apple trees in England, and here is a strange performance which is said to take place in some very retired parts of the country:
"'Scarcely have the merry bells ushered in the morning of Christmas than a troop of people may be seen entering the apple-orchard, often when the trees are powdered with hoarfrost and snow lies deep upon the ground. One of the company carries a large flask filled with cider and tastefully decorated with holly-branches; and when every one has advanced about ten paces from the choicest tree, rustic pipes made from the hollow boughs of elder are played upon by young men, while Echo repeats the strain, and it seems as if fairy-musicians responded in low, sweet tones from some neighboring wood or hill. Then bursts forth a chorus of loud and sonorous voices while the cider-flask is being emptied of its contents around the tree, and all sing some such words as these:
"'"Here's to thee, old apple tree! Long mayest thou grow. And long mayest thou blow, and ripen the apples that hang on thy bough!
"'"This full can of apple wine, Old tree, be thine: It will cheer thee and warm thee amid the deep snow;
"'"Till the goldfinch--fond bird!-- In the orchard is heard Singing blithe 'mid the blossoms that whiten thy bough."'"
"But what did they do it for?" asked Malcolm, who enjoyed the account as much as the others. "There doesn't seem to be any sense in it."
"There _is_ no sense in it," replied his governess, "but these ignorant people had inherited the custom from their fathers and grandfathers, and they really believed--and perhaps still believe--that this attention would be sure to bring a fine crop of apples. We are distinctly told, though, that 'it is God that giveth the increase;' and to him alone belong the fruits of the earth. Sometimes the crop is so great that the trees fairly bend over with the weight of the fruit, and there is an old English saying: 'The more apples the tree bears, the more she bows to the folk.'"
"How funny!" laughed Edith. "Does the apple tree move its head, Miss Harson?"
"It cannot go quite so far as that," was the reply; "it just stays bent over like a person carrying a heavy burden. The branches of overladen fruit trees are sometimes propped up with long poles to keep them from breaking. There is another strange custom, which used to be practiced on New Year's eve. It was called 'Apple-Howling,' and a troop of boys visited the different orchards--which would scarcely have been desirable when the apples were ripe--and, forming a ring around the trees, repeated these words:
"'Stand fast, root! bear well, top! Pray God send us a good howling crop-- Every twig, apples big; Every bough, apples enow.'
"All then shouted in chorus, while one of the party played on a cow's horn, and the trees were well rapped with the sticks which they carried. This ceremony is thought to have been a relic of some heathen sacrifice, and it is quite absurd enough to be that."
"What is 'a howling crop,' Miss Harson?" asked Clara. "That name sounds so queer!"
"I don't know what it can be," replied her governess, "unless it refers to the strange expression sometimes used, 'howling with delight.' We hear more commonly of 'howling with pain,' but 'a howling crop' must be one that makes the owner scream, as well as dance for joy."
"Why, _I_ scream only when I'm frightened," said Edith, who began to think that there were much sillier people in the world than herself.
"At garter-snakes," added Malcolm, giving his sister a sly pinch; but Edith did not mind his pinches, because he always took good care not to hurt her.
Miss Harson said that the best way was not to scream at all, as it was both a silly and a troublesome habit, and the sooner her charges broke themselves of it the better she should like it. Clara and Edith both promised to try--just as they had promised before, when the ants were so troublesome; but they were nine months older now, and seemed to be getting a little ashamed of the habit.
"Are apples mentioned anywhere in the Bible?" asked Miss Harson, presently.
Clara and Malcolm were busy thinking, but nothing came of it, until their governess said,
"Turn to the book of Proverbs, Clara, and find the twenty-fifth chapter and the eleventh verse."
Clara read very carefully:
"'A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver.' But what does it mean?" she asked.
"It probably means 'framed in silver' or 'in silver frames[11],'" was the reply; "and then it is easy to understand how important our words are, and that 'fitly-spoken' ones are as valuable and lasting as golden apples framed in silver. The apple tree is mentioned in Joel, where it is said that 'all the trees of the field are withered[12],' and both apple trees and apples are mentioned in several places of the Old Testament. But, to tell the whole truth, scholars are not agreed as to whether the Hebrew word denotes the apple or some other fruit that grew in the land of Israel."
[11] The Revised Version renders the phrase "in baskets of silver."
[12] Joel i. 12.
The children had all enjoyed the "apple-talk," and they felt that the fruit which they were so accustomed to seeing would now have a new meaning for them.
CHAPTER X.
_A FRUITFUL FAMILY: THE PEACH, ALMOND, PLUM AND CHERRY_.
Snowdrops, crocuses, hyacinths and tulips were blooming out of doors and in-doors; the grass looked green and velvety, and the fruit trees were, as John expressed it, "all a-blow." The peach trees, without a sign of a leaf, looked, as every one said of them, like immense bouquets of pink flowers, while pear, cherry and plum trees seemed as if they were dressed in white.
One cloudy, windy day, when the petals fell off in showers and strewed the ground, Edith declared that it was snowing; but she soon saw her mistake, and then began to worry because there would be no blossoms left for fruit.
"If the flowers stayed on, there would be no fruit," said Miss Harson. "Let me show you just where the little green germ is."
"Why, of course!" said Malcolm; "it's in the part that stays on the tree."
Edith listened intently while her governess showed her the ovary of a blossom safe on the twig where it grew, and explained to her that it was this which, nourished by the sap of the tree, with the aid of the sun and air, would ripen into fruit, while the petals were merely a fringe or ornament to the true blossom.
At Elmridge, scattered here and there through garden and grounds, as Mr. Kyle liked to have them, there were some fruit trees of every kind that would flourish in that part of the country, but there was no orchard; and for this reason Miss Harson had taken the children to see the grand apple-blossoming at Farmer Grove's. Two very large pear trees stood one on either side of the lawn, and there were dwarf pear trees in the garden.
"I think pears are nicer than apples," said Clara as they stood looking at the fine trees, now perfectly covered with their snowy blossoms.
But Malcolm, who found it hard work to be happy on three apples a day, stoutly disagreed with his sister on this point, and declared that nothing was so good as apples.
"How about ice-cream?" asked his governess, when she heard this sweeping assertion.
The young gentleman was silent, for his exploits with this frozen luxury were a constant subject of wonder to his friends and relatives.
"You will notice," said Miss Harson, "that the shape of these trees is much more graceful than that of the apple tree. They are tall and slender, forming what is called an imperfect pyramid. Standard pear trees, like these, give a good shade, and the long, slender branches are well clothed with leaves of a bright, glossy green. This rich color lasts late into the autumn, and it is then varied with yellow, and often with red and black, spots; so that pear-leaves are not to be despised in gathering autumn-leaf treasures. The pear is not so useful a fruit as the apple, nor so showy in color; but it has a more delicate and spicy flavor, and often is of an immense size."
"Yes, indeed!" said Clara. "Don't you remember, Miss Harson, that sometimes Edith and I can have only one pear divided between us at dessert because they are so large?"
"Yes, dear; and I think that half a duchess pear is as much as can be comfortably managed at once."
"Well," observed Malcolm, "I don't want half an apple.--But, Miss Harson, do they ever have 'pear-howlings' in England?"
"I have never read of any," was the reply, "and I think that strange custom is confined to apple trees. And there is no mention made of either pears or pear trees in the Scriptures."
"What are prickly-pears?" asked Clara. "Do they have thorns on 'em?"
"There is a plant by this name," replied her governess, "with large yellow flowers, and the fruit is full of small seeds and has a crimson pulp. It grows in sandy places near the salt water; it is abundant in North Africa and Syria, and is considered quite good to eat; but neither plant nor fruit bears any resemblance to our pear trees: it is a cactus."
"Won't you have a story for us this evening, Miss Harson?" asked Edith, rather wistfully.
"Perhaps so, dear--I have been thinking of it--but it will not be about pear trees."
"Oh, I don't care," with a very bright face; "I'd as soon have it about cherry trees, or--'Most anything!"
Miss Harson laughed, and said,
"Well, then, I think it will be about cherries; so you must rest on that. This morning we will go around among the fruit trees and see what we can learn from seeing them."
Of course it was Saturday morning and there were no lessons, or they would not have been roaming around "promiscuous," as Jane called it; for the young governess was very careful not to let the getting of one kind of knowledge interfere with the getting of another.
"How do you like these pretty quince trees?" asked Miss Harson as they came to some large bushes with great pinkish flowers.
"I like 'em," replied Edith, "because they're so little. And oh what pretty flowers!"
"Some more relations of the rose," said her governess. "And do you notice how fragrant they are? The tree is always low and crooked, just as you see it, and the branches straggle not very gracefully. The under part of the dark-green leaves is whitish and downy-looking, and the flowers are handsome enough to warrant the cultivation of the tree just for their sake, but the large golden fruit is much prized for preserves, and in the autumn a small tree laden down with it is quite an ornamental object. The quince is more like a pear than an apple. As the book says, 'it has the same tender and mucilaginous core; the seeds are not enclosed in a dry hull, like those of the apple; and the pulp of the quince, like that of the pear, is granulated, while that of the apple displays in its texture a firmer and finer organization.' The fruit, however, is so hard, even when ripe, that it cannot be eaten without cooking. It is said to be a native of hedges and rocky places in the South of Europe."
[Illustration: PEACH-BLOSSOM.]
"These peach trees," said Clara, "look like sticks with pink flowers all over 'em." "They are remarkably bare of leaves when in bloom," was the reply: "the leaves burst forth from their envelopes as the blossoms pass away; but how beautiful the blossoms are! from the deepest pink to that delicate tint which is called peach-color. But do you know that we have left the apple and rose family now, and have come to the almond family?"
The children were very much surprised to hear this, and they looked at the peach trees with fresh interest.
"Yes," continued Miss Harson, "the family consists of the almond tree, the peach tree, the apricot tree, the plum tree and the cherry tree; and one thing that distinguishes them from the other families is the gum which is found on their trunks.--Look around, Malcolm, at the peach, plum and cherry trees, which are the only members of the family that we have at Elmridge, and you will find gum oozing from the bark, especially where there are knotholes."
Malcolm not only found the gum, but succeeded in helping himself to some of it, which he shared with his sisters. It had a rather sweet taste, and the children seemed to like it, having first obtained permission of their governess to eat it.
"That is another of the things that I thought 'puffickly d'licious' when I was a child," said the young lady, laughing. "But there is another peculiarity of this family of trees which is not so innocent, and that is that in the fruit-kernel, and also in the leaves, there is a deadly poison called prussic acid."
"O--h!" exclaimed the children, drawing back from the trees as though they expected to be poisoned on the spot.
"But, as we do not eat either the kernels or the leaves," continued their governess, "we need not feel uneasy, for the fruit never yet poisoned any one. Here are the cherry trees, so covered with blossoms that they look like masses of snow; and the smaller plum trees are also attired in white. We will begin this evening with the almond tree, and see what we can find out about the family."
"Do almond trees and peach trees look alike?" asked Clara, when they were fairly settled by the schoolroom fire; for the evenings were too cool yet for the piazza.
"Very much alike," was the reply; "only the almond tree is larger and it has white instead of pink blossoms. Then it is the _fruit_ of the peach we eat, but of the almond we eat the kernel of the stem. I will read you a little account of it:
"'The common almond is a native of Barbary, but has long been cultivated in the South of Europe and the temperate parts of Asia. The fruit is produced in very large quantities and exported in to northern countries; it is also pressed for oil and used for various domestic purposes. There are numerous varieties of this species, but the two chief kinds are the bitter almond and the sweet almond. The sweet almond affords a favorite article for dessert, but it contains little nourishment, and of all nuts is the most difficult of digestion. The tree has been cultivated in England for about three centuries for the sake of its beautiful foliage, as the fruit will not ripen without a greater degree of heat than is found in that climate. The distilled water of the bitter almond is highly injurious to the human species, and, taken in a large dose, produces almost instant death.' The prussic acid which can be obtained from the kernel of the peach is found also in the bitter almond."
[Illustration: THE ALMOND.--BRANCH AND FRUIT.]
"But what do they want to find it for," asked Malcolm, "when it kills people?"
"Because," replied his governess, "like some other noxious things, it can be made valuable when used moderately and in the right way. But it is often employed to give a flavor to intoxicating liquors, and this is _not_ a right way, as it makes them even more dangerous than before. But we will leave the prussic acid and return to our almond tree. It flourishes in Palestine, where it blooms in January, and in March the ripe fruit can be gathered."
This seemed wonderfully strange to the children--flowers in January and fruit in March; and Miss Harson explained to them that in that part of the world they do not often have our bitter cold weather with its ice and snow to kill the tender buds.
"This tree," continued Miss Harson, "is occasionally mentioned in the Old Testament. In Jeremiah the prophet says, 'I see a rod of an almond tree[13];' also in Ecclesiastes it is said that 'the almond tree shall flourish[14].'"
[13] Jer. i. II.
[14] Eccl. xii. 5.
"Are there ever many peach trees growing in one place," asked Clara, "like the apple trees in Mr. Grove's orchard?"
"Yes," was the reply, "for in some places there are immense peach-orchards, covering many acres of ground; and when the trees in these are in blossom, the spring landscape seems to be pink with them. These great peach-fields are found in Delaware and Maryland, where the fruit grows in such perfection, and also in some of the Western States. We all know how delicious it is, but, unfortunately, so does a certain green worm, who curls up in the leaves which he gnaws in spite of the prussic acid. This insect will often attack the finest peaches and lay its eggs in them when the fruit is but half grown. In this way the young grubs find food and lodging provided for them all in one, and they thrive, while the peach decays."
"What a shame it is," exclaimed Malcolm, in great indignation, "to have our best peaches eaten by wretched little worms who might just as well eat grass and leave the peaches for us!"
"Perhaps they think it a shame that they are so often shaken to the ground or washed off the trees," replied Miss Harson; "and, as to their eating grass, they evidently prefer peaches. 'Insects as well as human beings have discriminating tastes, and the poor plum tree suffers even more than the peach from their attentions. In some parts of the country it has been entirely given up to their depredations, and farmers will not try to raise this fruit because of these active enemies. The whole almond family are liable to the attacks of insects. Canker-worms of one or of several species often strip them of their leaves; the tent-caterpillars pitch their tents among the branches and carry on their dangerous depredations; the slug-worms, the offspring of a fly called _Selandria cerasi_, reduce the leaves to skeletons, and thus destroy them; the cherry-weevils penetrate their bark, cover their branches with warts and cause them to decay; and borers gnaw galleries in their trunks and devour the inner bark and sap-wood.' So you see that, with such an army of destroyers, we may be thankful to get any fruit at all."
"I'm glad to know the name of that fly," said Malcolm, who considered it an additional grievance that it should have such a long name, "but I won't try to call him by it if I meet him anywhere."
"I think it's pretty," said Clara, beginning to repeat it, and making a decided failure.
"Fortunately," continued their governess, after reading it again for them, "there are other things much more important for you to remember just now, and I could not have said it myself without the book. And now let us see what else we can learn about the plum. It is a native, it seems, of North America, Europe and Asia, and many of the wild species are thorny. The cultivated plums, damsons and gages are varieties of the _Prunus domestica_, the cultivated plum tree. These have no thorns; the leaves are oval in shape, and the flowers grow singly. The most highly-valued cultivated plum trees came originally from the East, where they have been known from time immemorial. In many countries of Eastern Europe domestic animals are fattened on their fruits, and an alcoholic liquor is obtained from them; they also yield a white, crystallizable sugar. The prunes which we import from France are the dried fruit of varieties of the plum which contain a sufficient quantity of sugar to preserve the fruit from decay."
"Do prunes really grow on trees, Miss Harson?" asked Edith, who was rather disposed to think that they grew in pretty boxes.
"Yes, dear," was the reply; "they grow just as our plums do, only they are dried and packed in layers before they reach this country. We have two species of wild plum in North America--the beach-plum, a low shrub found in New England, the fruit of which is dark blue and about the size of damsons; while the other is quite a large tree, and very showy when covered with its scarlet fruit. In Maine it is called plum-granate, probably from its red color," "I know what's coming next," said Clara--"cherries; because all the rest have been used up. And then we're to have the story."
"But they're all interesting," replied Malcolm, gallantly, "because Miss Harson makes them so."
"I hope that is not the only reason," said his governess, laughing, "for trees are always beautiful and interesting and it is a privilege to be able to learn something of their habits and history.--Like most fruit trees, the cherry has many varieties, but it is always a handsome tree, and less spoiled by insects than others of the almond family. The black cherry is the most common species in the United States, and is both wild and cultivated. The garden cherry has broad, ovate, rough and serrate leaves, growing thickly on the branches, and this, with the height of the tree, makes a fine shade. Some old cherry trees have huge trunks, and their thick branches spread to a great distance. The branches of the wild cherry are too straggling to make a beautiful tree, and the leaves are small and narrow. The blossoms of the cultivated cherry are in umbels, while those of the wild cherry are borne in racemes."
"I remember that, Miss Harson," said Clara, pleased with her knowledge. "'Umbel' means 'like an umbrella,' and 'raceme' means 'growing along a stem.'"
"Very well indeed!" was the reply; "I am glad you have not forgotten it.--Of our cultivated cherries, we have here at Elmridge, besides the large black ones, which are so very sweet about the first of July, the great ox-hearts, which look like painted wax and ripen in June, and those very acid red ones, often called pie-cherries, which are used for pies and preserves. The cherry is a beautiful fruit, and one that is popular with birds as well as with boys. The great northern cherry of Europe, which was named by Linnaeus the 'bird-cherry,' is encouraged in Great Britain and on the Continent for the benefit of the birds, which are regarded as the most important checks to the over-multiplication of insects. The fact not yet properly understood in America--that the birds which are the most mischievous consumers of fruit are the most useful as destroyers of insects--is well known by all farmers in Europe; and while we destroy the birds to save the fruit, and sometimes cut down the fruit-trees to starve the birds, the Europeans more wisely plant them for the food and accommodation of the birds."
"Isn't it wicked to kill the poor little birds?" asked Edith.
"Yes, dear; it is cruel to kill them just for sport, as is often done, and very foolish, as we have just seen, to destroy them for the sake of the fruit, which the insects make way with in much greater quantities than the birds do."
"Miss Harson," asked Clara, "do people cut down real cherry trees to make the pretty red furniture like that in your room?"
"It is the wood of the wild cherry," replied her governess, "that is used for this purpose. It is of a light-red or fresh mahogany color, growing darker and richer with age. It is very close-grained, compact, takes a good polish, and when perfectly seasoned is not liable to shrink or warp. It is therefore particularly suitable, and much employed, for tables, chests of drawers, and other cabinet-work, and when polished and varnished is not less beautiful for such articles than are inferior kinds of mahogany."
"'Cherry' sounds pretty to say," continued Clara. "I wonder how the tree got that name?"
"That wonder is easily explained," said Miss Harson, "for I have been reading about it, and I was just going to tell you. 'Cherry comes from 'Cerasus,' the name of a town on the Black Sea from whence the tree is supposed to have been introduced into Italy, and it designates a genus of about forty species, natives of all the temperate regions of the northern hemisphere. They are trees or shrubs with smooth serrated leaves, which are folded together when young, and white or reddish flowers growing in bunches, like umbels, and preceding the leaves or in terminal racemes accompanying or following the leaves. A few species, with numerous varieties, produce valuable fruits; nearly all are remarkable for the abundance of their early flowers, sometimes rendered double by cultivation. And now," added the young lady, "we have arrived at the story, which is translated from the German; and in Germany the cherries are particularly fine. A plateful of this beautiful fruit was, as you will see, the cause of some remarkable changes."
CHAPTER XI.
_THE CHERRY-STORY._
On the banks of the Rhine, in the pleasant little village of Rebenheim, lived Ehrenberg, the village mayor. He was much respected for his virtues, and his wife was greatly beloved for her charity to the poor. They had an only daughter--the little Caroline--who gave early promise of a superior mind and a benevolent heart. She was the idol of her parents, who devoted their whole care to giving her a sound religious education.
Not far from the house, and close to the orchard and kitchen-garden, there was another little garden, planted exclusively with flowers. The day that Caroline was born her father planted a cherry tree in the middle of the flower-garden. He had chosen a tree with a short trunk, in order that his little daughter could more easily admire the blossoms and pluck the cherries when they were ripe.
When the tree bloomed for the first time and was so covered with blossoms that it looked like a single bunch of white flowers, the father and mother came out one morning to enjoy the sight. Little Caroline was in her mother's arms. The infant smiled, and, stretching out her little hands for the blossoms, endeavored at the same time to speak her joy, but in such a way as no one but a mother could understand:
"Flowers! flowers! Pretty! pretty!"
The child engaged more of the parents' thoughts than all the cherry-blossoms and gardens and orchards, and all they were worth. They resolved to educate her well; they prayed to God to bless their care and attention by making Caroline worthy of him and the joy and consolation of her parents. As soon as the little girl was old enough to understand, her mother told her lovingly of that kind Father in heaven who makes the flowers bloom and the trees bud and the cherries and apples grow ruddy and ripe; she told her also of the blessed Son of God, once an infant like herself, who died for all the world.
The cherry tree in the middle of the garden was given to Caroline for her own, and it was a greater treasure to her than were all the flowers. She watched and admired it every day, from the moment the first bud appeared until the cherries were ripe. She grieved when she saw the white blossoms turn yellow and drop to the earth, but her grief was changed into joy when the cherries appeared, green at first and smaller than peas, and then daily growing larger and larger, until the rich red skin of the ripe cherry at last blushed among the interstices of the green leaves.
"Thus it is," said her father; "youth and beauty fade like the blossoms, but virtue is the fruit which we expect from the tree. This whole world is, as it were, a large garden, in which God has appointed to every man a place, that he may bring forth abundant and good fruit. As God sends rain and sunshine on the trees, so does he send down grace on men to make them grow in virtue, if they will but do their part."
In the course of time war approached the quiet village which had hitherto been the abode of peace and domestic bliss, and the battle raged fearfully. Balls and shells whizzed about, and several houses caught fire. As soon as the danger would permit, the mayor tried to extinguish the flames, while his wife and little daughter were praying earnestly for themselves and for their neighbors.
In the afternoon a ring was heard at the door, and, looking out of the window, Madame Ehrenberg saw an officer of hussars standing before her. Fortunately, he was a German, and mother and daughter ran to open the door.
"Do not be alarmed," said the officer, in a friendly tone, when he saw the frightened faces; "the danger is over, and you are quite safe. The fire in the village, too, is almost quenched, and the mayor will soon be here. I beg you for some refreshment, if it is only a morsel of bread and a drink of water. It was sharp work," he added, wiping the perspiration from his brow, "but, thank God, we have conquered," Provisions were scarce, for the village had been plundered by the enemy, but the good lady brought forth a flask of wine and some rye bread, with many regrets that she had nothing better to offer. But the visitor, as he ate the bread with a hearty relish, declared that it was enough, for it was the first morsel he had tasted that day.
Caroline ran and brought in on a porcelain plate some of the ripest cherries from her own tree.
"Cherries!" exclaimed the officer. "They are a rarity in this district. How did they escape the enemy? All the trees in the country around are stripped."
"The cherries," said the mother, "are from a little tree which was planted in Caroline's flower-garden on her birthday. It is but a few days since they became ripe; the enemy, perhaps, did not notice the little tree."
"And is it for me you intend the cherries, my dear child?" asked the officer. "Oh no; you must keep them. It were a pity to take one of them from you."
"How could we refuse a few cherries," said Caroline, "to the man that sheds his blood in our defence? You must eat them all," said she, while the tears streamed down her cheeks. "Do, I entreat you! Eat them all."
He took some of the cherries and laid them on the table, near his wine-glass; but he had scarcely placed the glass to his lips when the trumpet sounded. He sprang up and girded on his sword.
"That is the signal to march," said he. "I cannot wait one instant."
Caroline wrapped the cherries in a roll of white paper and insisted that he should put them in his pocket.
"The weather is very warm," said she, "and even cherries will be some refreshment."
"Oh," said the officer, with emotion, "what a happiness it is for a soldier, who is often obliged to snatch each morsel from unwilling hands, to meet with a generous and benevolent family! I wish it were in my power, my dear child, to give you some pledge of my gratitude, but I have nothing--not so much as a single groat. You must be content with my simple thanks." With these words, and once more bidding Caroline and her mother an affectionate farewell, he took his departure, and walked rapidly out of sight.
The joy of the good family for their happy deliverance was, alas! of short continuance. Some weeks after, a dreadful battle was fought near the village, which was reduced to a heap of ruins. The mayor's house was burned to the ground and all his property destroyed. Alas for the horrors of cruel war! Father, mother and daughter fled away on foot, and wept bitterly when they looked back on their once happy village, now but a mass of blazing ruins.
The family retired to a distant town, and lived there in very great distress. The mayor endeavored to obtain a livelihood as a scrivener, or clerk; his wife worked at dressmaking and millinery, and Caroline, who soon became skillful in such matters, faithfully assisted her.
A lady in town--the Countess von Buchenhaim--gave them much employment, and one day Caroline went to this lady's house to carry home a bonnet. She was taken to the garden, where the countess was sitting in the summer-house with her sister and nieces, who had come to visit her. The young ladies were delighted with the bonnet, and their mother gave orders for three more, particularly praising the blue flowers, which were the work of Caroline's own hands.
The Countess von Buchenhaim spoke very kindly of the young girl to her sister, and related the sad story of the worthy family's misfortunes. The count was standing with his brother-in-law, the colonel, at some little distance from the door of the summer-house, and the colonel, a fine-looking man in a hussar's uniform and with a star on his breast, overheard the conversation. Coming up, he looked closely at Caroline.
"Is it possible," said he, "that you are the daughter of the mayor of Rebenheim? How tall you have grown! I should scarcely have recognized you, though we are old acquaintances."
Caroline stood there abashed, looking full in the face of the stranger, her cheeks covered with blushes. Taking her by the hand, the colonel conducted her to his wife, who was sitting near the countess.
"See, Amelia," said he; "this is the young lady who saved my life ten years ago, when she was only a child."
"How can that be possible?" asked Caroline, in amazement.
"It must indeed appear incomprehensible to you," answered the colonel, "but do you remember the hussar-officer that one day, after a battle, stood knocking at the door of your father's house in Rebenheim? Do you remember the cherries which you so kindly gave him?"
"Oh, was it you?" exclaimed Caroline, while her face beamed with a smile of recognition. "Thank God you are alive! But how I could have done anything toward saving your life I cannot understand."
"In truth, it would be impossible for you to guess the great service you did me," said he, "but my wife and daughters know it well; I wrote to them of it at once. And I look upon it as one of the most remarkable occurrences of my life."
"And one that I ought to remember better than any other event of the war," said his lady, rising and affectionately embracing Caroline.
"Well," said the countess, "neither I nor my husband ever heard the story. Please give us a full account of it."
"Oh, it is easily told," said the colonel. "Hungry and thirsty, I entered the house in which Caroline and her parents dwelt, and, to tell the plain truth, I begged for some bread and water. They gave me a share of the best they had, and did not hesitate to do so, though their village and themselves were in the greatest distress. Caroline robbed every bough on her cherry tree to refresh me. Fine cherries they were--the only ones, probably, in the whole country. But the enemy did not give me time to eat them; I was obliged to depart in a hurry. Caroline insisted, with the kindest hospitality, that I should take them with me, but that was no easy matter: my horse had been shot under me the day before. I took from my knapsack whatever articles I could in a hurry, and, thrusting them into my pockets, I fought on foot until a hussar gave me his horse. All that I was worth was in my pockets, so that to make room for the cherries I was obliged to take the pocket-book out of my pocket and place it here beneath my vest. The enemy, who had been driven back, made a feint of advancing on us, and I led down my hussars in gallant style. But suddenly we found ourselves in front of a body of infantry concealed behind a hedge. One of them fired at me, and the fellow had taken good aim, for the ball struck me here on the breast. But it rebounded from the pocket-book; otherwise, I should have been shot through the body and fallen dead on the spot. Tell me," said he, in a tone of deep emotion; "was not that little child an instrument in the hand of God to save me from death? Am I right or not when I give Caroline the credit, under God, of having saved my life? Her must I thank that my Amelia is not a widow and my daughters orphans."
All agreed with him. His wife, who had Caroline's hand locked in her own during the whole narrative, now pressed it affectionately and with tears in her eyes.
"You, then," said she, "were the good angel that averted such a terrible misfortune from our family?"
Her two daughters also gazed with pleasure at Caroline.
"Every time we ate cherries," said the younger, "we spoke of you without knowing you."
All had kind and grateful words for the young girl, but the colonel soon bade her farewell for the present, and said that he had some business to attend to with his brother-in-law. This business was to urge the count to appoint Ehrenberg his steward in place of the one who had died a few months before. A better man, he said, could not be found; for when he had visited Rebenheim to make inquiries for the family, although none could tell where they had gone, all were loud in their praise, and the mayor was pronounced a pattern of justice, honor and charity.
The count drew out the order, signed it, and gave it to his brother-in-law, who wished himself to take it to Mr. Ehrenberg; and he went at once to the house and saluted him as "master-steward of Buchenhaim."
"Read that," he said to the astonished man as he handed him the paper in which he was duly appointed steward of Buchenhaim, with a good salary of a thousand thalers and several valuable perquisites.
"And you," said the colonel to Caroline and her mother, "must prepare to remove at once. Your lodgings are so confined! But you will find it very different in the house which you are to occupy in Buchenhaim. The dwelling is large and commodious, with a fine garden attached, well stocked with cherry trees. Next Monday you will be there, and this very day you must start. What a happy feast we shall have there!--not like the hasty meal you gave the hussar-officer amid the thunder of cannon and the blazing roofs of Rebenheim. Do not forget to have cherries, dear Caroline, for dessert; I think they will be fully ripe by that time."
With these words the colonel hurried away to escape the thanks of this good family, and, in truth, to conceal his own tears. So rapidly did he disappear that Ehrenberg could scarcely accompany him down the steps.
"Oh, Caroline," said the happy father when he returned, "who could have imagined that the little cherry tree I planted in the flower-garden the day you were born would ever produce such good fruit?"
"It was the providence of God," exclaimed the mother, clasping her hands. "I remember distinctly the first time the blossoms appeared on that tree, when you and I went out to look at it, and little Caroline, then an infant in my arms, was so much delighted with the white flowers. We resolved then to educate our daughter piously, and prayed fervently to God that she, who was then as full of promise as the blossoms on the tree, might by his grace one day be the prop of our old age. That prayer is now fulfilled beyond our fondest anticipations. Praise for ever be to the name of God!"
Edith declared that this was one of the very sweetest stories Miss Harson had ever told them, and Clara and Malcolm were equally well pleased with it.
"Were those cherries like ours?" asked Clara.
"They were larger and finer than ours generally are, I think," was the reply, "being the great northern cherry, or bird-cherry, of Europe, which grows in Germany to great perfection. And the little German girl's plate of cherries, which she so generously urged upon a stranger when food of any kind was so scarce, is a beautiful illustration of the first verse of the eleventh chapter of Proverbs: 'Cast thy bread upon the waters; for thou shalt find it after many days.'"
CHAPTER XII.
_THE MULBERRY FAMILY_.
"There is a fruit tree," said Miss Harson, "belonging to an entirely different family, which we have not considered yet; and, although it is not a common tree with us, one specimen of it is to be found in Mrs. Bush's garden, where you have all enjoyed the fruit very much. What is it?"
"Mulberry," said Clara, promptly, while Malcolm was wondering what it could be.
"Oh yes," said Edith, very innocently; "I like to go and see Mrs. Bush when there are mulberries."
Mrs. Bush was not a cheerful person to visit, as she was quite old and rather hard of hearing, and she lived alone in the gloomy old house with the Lombardy poplars in front, where everything looked dark and shut up. A queer woman in a sunbonnet, nearly as old as Mrs. Bush, lived close by, and "kept an eye on her," as she said.
Mrs. Bush's great enjoyment was to have visitors of all ages, to whom she talked a great deal, and cried as she talked, about a daughter who had died a few years ago. The little Kyles did not care to go there except when, as Edith said, there were ripe mulberries; but Mrs. Bush liked very much to have them, and Miss Harson took her little charges there occasionally, because, as she explained to them, it gave pleasure to a lonely old woman, and such visits were just as much charity, though of a different kind, as giving food and clothes to those who need them. The children delighted in the mulberries just because they did not have them at home, although they had fruit that was very much nicer; but Miss Harson never wished even to taste them, although she too had liked them when a little girl.
"The mulberry tree," continued their governess, "belongs to the bread-fruit family, but the other members of this remarkable family, except the Osage orange, are found only in foreign countries. The bread-fruit tree itself, the fig, the Indian fig, or banyan tree, and the deadly upas tree, are all relations of the mulberry."
"Well, trees are queer things," exclaimed Malcolm, "to belong to families that are not a bit alike."
"They are alike in important points, when we examine them carefully," was the reply. "The bread-fruit genus consists, with a single exception, of trees and shrubs with alternate, toothed or lobed or entire leaves and milky juice. This reminds me that the famous cow tree of South America, which yields a large supply of rich and wholesome milk, is one of the members; and you see what a number of famous trees we have on hand now. There are several kinds of mulberries--the red, black, white and paper mulberry, which are all occasionally found in this country, and they were once quite popular here for their shade. The fruit is unusually small for tree-fruit, and very soft when ripe, as you all know; it is not unlike a long, narrow blackberry, and forms, like it, a compound fruit, as though many small berries had grown together. The tree in Mrs. Bush's garden is the black mulberry, as any one might know by the stained lips and hands that sometimes come from there; and it has been cultivated from ancient times for its fine appearance and shade. It is found wild in the forests of Persia, and is thought to have been taken from there to Europe. The tree is more beautiful than useful, for the silkworms do not thrive well on the leaves and the wood is neither strong nor durable."
"Why, I thought," said Clara, "that silkworms always lived on mulberry-leaves?"
"The white mulberry is their favorite food; and another species, called the _Morus multicaulis_--for _Morus_ is the scientific name of the family--has more delicate leaves than any other, and produces a finer quality of silk. These trees are natives of China, and the white mulberry grows very rapidly to the height of thirty or forty feet. The paper mulberry is so called because in China and Japan--of which it is a native--its bark is manufactured into paper. In the South-Sea Islands, where it is also found, the bark is made into the curious dresses which we sometimes see imported thence. It is a low, thick-branched tree with large light-colored downy leaves and dark-scarlet fruit."
"I wonder," said Malcolm, "if the bark is like birch-bark?"
"It does not look like it," replied Miss Harson, "but it seems to be very much of the same nature. The red mulberry and black mulberry are the most hardy of these trees, and the red mulberry will thrive farther north than any of the family. The wood is valuable for many purposes for which timber is used, and especially in boat-building. And now, as we learned something about silkworms and their cocoons in our talks about insects[15], there is little more to be said of the mulberry tree which any but learned people would care to know."
[15] See _Flyers and Crawlers_. Presbyterian Board of Publication.
"I want to hear about the bread tree," said little Edith, "and how the loaves of bread grow on it."
"Do they, Miss Harson?" asked Clara, not exactly seeing how this could be.
"I don't believe they're very hot," remarked Malcolm, who was puzzled over the bread-fruit tree himself, but who laughed at his little sister's idea in a very knowing way. It was not an ill-natured laugh, though, and a glance from his governess always quieted him.
"No, dear," replied Miss Harson, answering Clara; "loaves of bread do not grow on any tree. But I will tell you about the bread-fruit presently; let us finish the _Morus_ family and their kindred in our own country before we go to their foreign relations. The Osage orange is so much used in the United States, and in this part of it, for hedges, on account of its rapid growth and ornamental appearance, that we really ought to know something about it. 'It is a beautiful low, spreading, round-headed tree with the port and splendor of an orange tree. Its oval, entire, polished leaves have the shining green of natives of warmer regions, and its curiously-tesselated, succulent compound fruit the size and golden color of an orange. It was first found in the country of the Osage Indians, from whom it gets its name, and it has since been cultivated in many parts of this country and in Europe. The Osages belonged to the Sioux, or Dacotah, tribe of Indians, and their home was in the south-western part of the old United States. The Osage orange--a tree from thirty to forty feet high with leaves even more bright and glossy than those of the ordinary orange--was first found growing wild near one of their villages."
"But what a very high hedge it would make!" said Malcolm.
"Yes, if left to its natural growth, it would be a very absurd fence indeed. But this is not the case; the branches spread out very widely, and by cutting off the tops and trimming the remainder twice in a season a very handsome thickset hedge is produced, with lustrous leaves and sharp, straight thorns. Another name for this tree is yellow-wood, or bow-wood, because the wood is of a bright-yellow color, and the grain is so fine and elastic that the Southern Indians have been in the habit of using it to make their bows. The experiment of feeding silkworms upon the leaves has been tried, but it was not very successful."
"I suppose the worms didn't know that it belonged to the mulberry family," said Clara, "and I don't see now why it does."
For reply, her governess read:
"'The sap of the young wood and of the leaves is _milky_ and contains a large proportion of caoutchouc.'"
"Oh!" exclaimed Malcolm; "that sounds just like sneezing. What is it, Miss Harson?"
"Something that you wear on your feet and over your shoulders in wet weather; so now guess."
"Overshoes!" replied Clara, in a great hurry.
"How many of them do you wear over your shoulders at once?" asked her brother. "And it must be a queer kind of sap that has overshoes in it. Why couldn't you say 'India-rubber'?"
"And why couldn't _you_ say it before Clara put it into your head by saying 'Overshoes?" asked Miss Harson. "Clara has the right idea, only she did not express it in the clearest way. The sap of the caoutchouc, or India-rubber, tree is the most valuable yet discovered, and, as it is of a milky nature, it can very properly be brought into the present class of trees."
"Is _that_ a mulberry too?" asked Clara, who thought that the size of the family was getting beyond all bounds.
"It is not really set down as belonging to the bread-fruit family," was the reply, "but it certainly has the peculiarity of their milky sap. However, as I know that you are all eager to hear about the bread-fruit tree, we will take that next. This tree is found in various tropical regions, but principally in the South-Sea Islands, where it is about forty feet high. The immense leaves are half a yard long and over a quarter wide, and are deeply divided into sharp lobes. The fruit looks like a very large green berry, being about the size of a cocoanut or melon, and the proper time for gathering it is about a week before it is ripe. When baked, it is not very unlike bread. It is cooked by being cut into several pieces, which are baked in an oven in the ground. It is often eaten with orange-juice and cocoanut-milk. Some of the South-Sea islanders depend very much upon it for their food. The large seeds, when roasted, are said to taste like the best chestnuts. The pulp, which is the bread-part, is said to resemble a baked potato and is very white and tender, but, unless eaten soon after the fruit is gathered, it grows hard and choky."
[Illustration: THE BREAD-FRUIT.]
"So Edie's 'loaves of bread' are green?" said Malcolm, rather teasingly.
"That's because they grow on a tree," replied Clara. "Our loaves of bread are raw dough before they're baked, and they are grains of wheat before they are dough."
"That is quite true, dear," replied her governess, laughing, "and we must teach Malcolm not to be quite so critical.--The bread-fruit is a wonderful tree, and it certainly does bear uncooked loaves of bread, at least, for they require no kneading to be ready for the oven. The fruit is to be found on the tree for eight months of the year--which is very different from any of our fruits--and two or three bread-fruit trees will supply one man with food all the year round."
"Put what does he do when there is no fresh fruit on them?" asked Malcolm. "You told us that it was not good to eat unless it was fresh."
"We should not think it good, but the native makes it into a sour paste called _mahé_, and the people of the islands eat this during the four months when the fresh fruit is not to be had. The bread-fruit is said to be very nourishing, and it can be prepared in various ways. The timber of this tree, though soft, is found useful in building houses and boats; the flowers, when dried, serve for tinder; the viscid, milky juice answers for birdlime and glue; the leaves, for towels and packing; and the inner bark, beaten together, makes one species of the South-Sea cloth."
"What a very useful tree!" exclaimed Clara.
"It is indeed," replied Miss Harson; "and this is the case with many of the trees found in these warm countries, where the inhabitants know little of the arts and manufactures, and would almost starve rather than exert themselves very greatly. There is another species of bread-fruit, called the jaca, or jack, tree, found on the mainland of Asia, which produces its fruit on different parts of the tree, according to its age. When the tree is young, the fruit grows from the twigs; in middle age it grows from the trunk; and when the tree gets old, it grows from the roots."
[Illustration: JACK-FRUIT TREE.]
There was a picture of the jack tree with fruit growing out of the trunk and great branches like melons, and the children crowded eagerly around to look at it. All agreed that it was the very queerest tree they had yet heard of.
"The fruit is even larger than that of the island bread-fruit," continued their governess, "but it is not so pleasant to our taste, nor is it so nourishing. It often weighs over thirty pounds and has two or three hundred seeds, each of which is four times as large as an almond and is surrounded by a pulp which is greatly relished by the natives of India. The seeds, or nuts, are roasted, like those of smaller fruit, and make very good chestnuts. The fruit has a strong odor not very agreeable to noses not educated to it."
"Miss Harson," said Malcolm, "what is the upas tree like, and why is it called _deadly_?"
"It is a tree eighty feet high, with white and slightly-furrowed bark; the branches, which are very thick, grow nearly at the top, dividing into smaller ones, which form an irregular sort of crown to the tall, straight trunk. There is no reason for calling it _deadly_ except a foolish notion and the fact that a very strong poison is prepared from the milky sap. The tree grows in the island of Java, and for a long time many fabulous stories were told of its dangerous nature. Travelers in that region would send home the wildest and most improbable stories of the poison tree, until the very name of the upas was enough to make people shudder. It is said that a Dutch surgeon stationed on the island did much to keep up the impression. He wrote an account of the valley in which the upas was said to be growing alone, for no tree nor shrub was to be found near it. And he declared that neither animal nor bird could breathe the noxious effluvia from the tree without instant death. In fact, he called this fatal spot 'The Valley of Death.'"
"And wasn't it true, Miss Harson?"
"Not all true, Clara; some one who had spent many years in Java proved these stories to be entirely false. Instead of growing in a dismal valley by itself, the graceful-looking upas tree is found in the most fertile spots, among other trees, and very often climbing plants are twisted round its trunk, while birds nestle in the branches. It can be handled, too, like any other tree; and all this is as unlike the Dutch surgeon's account as possible. One of his stories was that the criminals on the island were employed to collect the poison from the trunk of the tree; that they were permitted to choose whether to die by the hand of the executioner or to go to the upas for a box of its fatal juice; and that the ground all about the tree was strewed with the dead bodies of those who had perished on this errand."
"Oh," exclaimed Edith, "wasn't that dreadful?"
"The story was dreadful, dear, but it was only a story, you know: the upas tree did not kill people at all; and to turn the milky juice into a dangerous poison took a great deal of time and trouble. It was mixed with various spices and fermented; when ready for use, it was poured into the hollow joints of bamboo and carefully kept from the air. Both for war and for the chase arrows are dipped in this fatal preparation, and the effect has been witnessed by naturalists on animals, and also on man. The instant it touches the blood it is carried through the whole system, so that it may be felt in all the veins and causes a burning sensation, especially in the head, which is followed by sickness and death."
"Well," said Clara, drawing a long breath, "I'm glad that I don't live in Java."
"The poisoned arrows are not constantly flying about in Java, dear," replied her governess, with a smile, "and I do not think you would be in any danger from them; but there are a great many other reasons why it is not pleasant, except for natives, to live in Java. There are a number of Dutch settlers there, because the island was conquered by the Dutch nation, but while war with the natives was going on they suffered terribly from these poisoned arrows; so that the very name of upas caused them to tremble. The word 'upas,' in the language of the natives, means poison, and there is in the island a valley called the upas, or poison, valley. It has nothing, however, to do with the tree, which does not grow anywhere in the neighborhood. That valley may literally be called 'The Valley of Death.' We are told that it came to exist in this way: The largest mountain in Java was once partly buried in a very dreadful manner. In the middle of a summer night the people in the neighborhood perceived a luminous cloud that seemed wholly to envelop the mountain. They were extremely alarmed and took to flight, but ere they could escape a terrific noise was heard, like the discharge of cannon, and part of the mountain fell in and disappeared. At the same moment quantities of stones and lava were thrown to the distance of several miles. Fifteen miles of ground covered with villages and plantations were swallowed up or buried under the lava from the mountain; and when all was over and people tried to visit the scene of the disaster, they could not approach it on account of the heat of the stones and other substances piled upon one another. And yet as much as six weeks had elapsed since the catastrophe. This upas valley is about half a mile in circumference, and the vapor that escapes through the cracks and fissures is fatal to every living thing. Here, indeed, are to be seen the bones of animals and birds, and even the skeletons of human beings who were unfortunate enough to enter and were overpowered by the deadly vapor. And now," added Miss Harson, "I have given you this account to make you understand that the famous upas valley of Java is not a valley of upas trees, but one of poisonous vapors."
"And the deadly upas," said Malcolm, "is not deadly, after all! I think I shall remember that."
"And I too," said Clara and Edith, who had listened with great interest to the description.
"Shall we have some figs now, by way of variety?" was a question that caused three pairs of eyes to turn rather expectantly on the speaker; for figs were very popular with the small people of Elmridge.
[Illustration: THE BANYAN TREE.]
"Not in the way of refreshments, just at present," continued their governess, "but only as belonging to the mulberry family; and we will begin with that curious tree the banyan, or Indian fig. This stately and beautiful tree is found on the banks of the river Ganges and in many parts of India, and is a tree much valued and venerated by the Hindu. He plants it near the temple of his idol; and if the village in which he resides does not possess any such edifice, he uses the banyan for a temple and places the idol beneath it. Here, every morning and evening, he performs the rites of his heathen worship. And, more than this, he considers the tree, with its out-stretched and far-sheltering arms, an emblem of the creator of all things."
"Is that only one tree?" asked Malcolm as Miss Harson displayed a picture that was more like a small grove. "Why, it looks like two or three trees together."
"Does it grow up from the ground or down from the air?" asked Clara. "Just look at these queer branches with one end fast to the tree and the other end fast to the ground!"
Edith thought that the branches which had not reached the ground looked like snakes, but, for all that, it was certainly a grand tree.
"The peculiar growth of the banyan," continued Miss Harson, "renders it an object of beauty and produces those column-like stems that cause it to become a grove in itself. It may be said to grow, not from the seed, but from the branches. They spread out horizontally, and each branch sends out a number of rootlets that at first hang from it like slender cords and wave about in the wind.--Those are your 'snakes,' Edith.--But by degrees they reach the ground and root themselves into it; then the cord tightens and thickens and becomes a stem, acting like a prop to the widespreading branch of the parent plant. Indeed, column on column is added in this manner, the books tell us, so long as the mother-tree can support its numerous progeny."
"How very strange!" said Clara. "The mulberry seems to have some very funny relations."
"Such a great tree ought to bear very large figs," added Malcolm.
"On the contrary," replied his governess, "it bears uncommonly small ones--no larger than a hazel-nut, and of a red color. They are not considered eatable by the natives, but birds and animals feed upon them, and in the leafy bower of the banyan are found the peacock, the monkey and the squirrel. Here, too, are a myriad of pigeons as green as the leaf and with eyes and feet of a brilliant red. They are so like the foliage in color that they can be seen only by the practiced eye of the hunter, and even he would fail to detect them were it not for their restless movements. As they flutter about from branch to branch they are apt to fall victims to his skill in shooting his arrows."
"If they would only keep still!" exclaimed Edith, who felt a strong sympathy for the green pigeons. "Poor pretty things! Why don't they, Miss Harson, instead of getting killed?"
"They do not know their danger until it is too late, and it is quite as hard for them to keep still as it is for little girls."
Edith wondered if that meant her; she was a little girl, but she did not think she was so very restless. However, Miss Harson didn't tell her, and she soon forgot it in listening to what was said of the queer tree with branches like snakes.
"The leaves of the banyan tree are large and soft and of a very bright green, and the deep shade and pillared walks are so welcome to the Hindu that he even tries to improve on Nature and coax the shoots to grow just where he wishes them. He binds wet clay and moss on the branch to make the rootlet sprout."
"Will it grow then?" asked Malcolm.
"Yes, just as a cutting planted in the earth will grow, although it seems a very odd style of gardening.--The sacred fig tree of India--_Ficus religiosa_--is a near relative of the banyan, and very much like it in general appearance; but the leaves are on such slender stalks that they tremble like those of the aspen. It is known as the bo tree of Ceylon, and is said to have been placed in charge of the priests long before the present race of inhabitants had appeared in the island."
"Where do the real figs grow?" asked Clara.
"In a great many moderately warm or sub-tropical countries," was the reply, "but Smyrna figs are the most celebrated. Immense quantities of the fruit are dried and packed in Asiatic Turkey for exportation from this city, and it is said that in the fig season nothing else is talked about there."
"I didn't know that they were dried," said Malcolm, in great surprise; "I thought they were just packed tight in boxes and then sent off."
[Illustration: LEAF AND FRUIT OF THE FIG TREE.]
"'In its native country,'" read Miss Harson, "'and when growing on the tree, the fig presents a different appearance from the dried and packed specimens we see in this country. It is a firm and fleshy fruit, and has a delicious honey-drop hanging from the point.' And here," she added, "is a small branch from the fig tree, with fruit growing on it."
"Why, it's shaped like a pear!" exclaimed Malcolm.
"And what large, pretty leaves it has!" said Clara.
"'The fig tree is common in Palestine and the East,'" Miss Harson continued to read, "'and flourishes with the greatest luxuriance in those barren and stony situations, where little else will grow. Its large size and its abundance of five-lobed leaves render it a pleasant shade-tree, and its fruit furnishes a wholesome food very much used in all the lands of the Bible.' Figs were among the fruits mentioned in the 'land that flowed with milk and honey,' and it was a symbol of peace and plenty, as you will find, Malcolm, by reading to us from First Kings, fourth chapter, twenty-fifth verse."
"'And Judah and Israel dwelt safely, every man under his vine and under his fig tree, from Dan even to Beersheba, all the days of Solomon.'--That's what it means, then!" said Malcolm, when he had finished reading the verse. "I've heard people say, 'Under your own vine and fig tree,' and I couldn't tell what they meant."
"Yes," replied his governess, "some persons make very free with the words of Holy Scripture and twist them to suit meanings for which they were not intended. Having a house of one's own is usually meant by this quotation, and almost the same words are repeated in other parts of the Old Testament. The fig is often mentioned in the Bible, and two kinds are spoken of--the very early fig, and the one that ripens late in the summer. The early fig was considered the best; and I think that Clara will tell us what is said of it by the prophet Jeremiah."
Clara read slowly:
"'One basket had very good figs, _even like the figs that are first ripe_; and the other basket had very naughty figs, which could not be eaten, they were so bad[16].'"
[16] Jer. xxiv. 2.
"But can figs be naughty, Miss Harson?" asked Edith, with very wide-open eyes. "I thought that only children were naughty,"
"There are 'naughty' grown people as well as naughty children," was the reply, "and inanimate things like figs in old times were called naughty too, in the sense of being bad.--The fruit of the fig tree appears not only before the leaves, but without any sign of blossoms, the flowers being small and hidden in the little buttons which first shoot out from the points of the sterns, and around which the outer and firm part of the fig grows. The leaves come out so late in the season that our Saviour said, 'Now learn a parable of the fig tree; when his branch is yet tender, and putteth forth leaves, ye know that summer is nigh[17].' Did not our Lord say something else about a fig tree?"
[17] Matt. xxiv. 32.
"Yes," replied Clara; "the one that was withered away because it had no figs on it."
"The barren fig tree which was withered at our Saviour's word, as an awful warning to unfruitful professors of religion, seems to have spent itself in leaves. It stood by the wayside, free to all, and, as the time for stripping the trees of their fruit had not come--for in Mark we are told that 'the time of figs was not yet[18]'--it was reasonable to expect to find it covered with figs in various stages of growth. Yet there was 'nothing thereon, but leaves only.' Find the nineteenth verse of the twenty-first chapter of Matthew, Malcolm, and read what is said there."
[18] Mark xi. 13.
"'And when he saw a fig tree in the way, he came to it, and found nothing thereon, but leaves only, and said unto it, Let no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever. And presently the fig tree withered away.'"
"A fig tree having leaves," said Miss Harson, "should also have figs, for these, as I have already told you, appear before the leaves, and both are on the tree at the same time; so that, although unripe figs are seen without leaves, leaves should not be seen without figs; and if it was not yet the season for figs, it was not the season for leaves either. The barren fig tree has often been compared to people who make a show of goodness in words, but leave the doing of good works to others; and when anything is expected of them, there is sure to be disappointment. 'Nothing but leaves' has become a proverb; and when it can be used to express the barren condition of those who profess to follow the teachings of our Lord, it is sad indeed."
"Do fig trees grow wild?" asked Clara, presently.
"Yes," was the reply, "and very curious-looking things they are. 'Their roots twist into all kinds of whimsical contortions, so as to look more like a mass of snakes than the roots of a tree. They unite themselves so closely to the substances that come in their way, such as the face of rocks, or even the stems of other trees, that nothing can pull them away. And in some parts of India these strong, tough roots are made to serve the purpose of bridges and twisted over some stream or cataract. The wild fig is often a dangerous parasite, and does not attain perfection without completing some work of destruction among its neighbors in the forest. A slender rootlet may sometimes be seen hanging from the crown of a palm. The seed was carried there by some bird that had fed upon the fruit of a wild fig, and it rooted itself with surprising facility. The rootlet, as it descends, envelops the column-like stem of the palm with a woody network, and at length reaches the ground. Meanwhile, the true stem of the parasite shoots upward from the crown of the palm. It sends out numberless rootlets, each of which, as soon as it reaches the ground, takes root; and between them the palm is stifled and perishes, leaving the fig in undisturbed possession. The parasite does not, however, long survive the decline; for, no longer fed by the juices of the palm, it also, in process of time, begins to languish and decline.'"
"What a mean thing it is!" exclaimed Malcolm--"as mean as the cuckoo, that lays its eggs in other birds' nests. And I'm glad it dies when it has killed the palm tree; it just serves it right. But don't figs ever grow in this country, Miss Harson?"
"Yes," replied his governess; "they are cultivated in the Southern States and in California, like many other semi-tropical fruits, and are principally eaten fresh, but for drying they are not equal to the imported ones. No doubt the cultivation of figs in California will become a prosperous trade, for the climate and circumstances there are much like those of Syria."
[Illustration: DWARF FIG TREE IN A POT.]
CHAPTER XIII.
_QUEER RELATIONS: THE CAOUTCHOUC AND THE MILK TREE_.
"What dark, strange-looking trees!" exclaimed the children while looking at an illustration of caoutchouc trees in Brazil. "How thick and strong they are! And what funny tops!--like pointed umbrellas."
"The India-rubber tree is not likely to be mistaken for any other," said their governess, "and it does not look very dark and gloomy in that forest, where everything seems to be crowded close and in a tangle, because South American vegetation grows so thickly and rapidly. This is the country which supplies the largest quantity of India-rubber. Immense cargoes are shipped from the town of Para, on the river Amazon, and obtained from the _Siphonia elastica_."
"Are the stems all made of India-rubber?" asked Edith, who thought that was exactly what they looked like.
"Are the stems of the maple trees made of maple-sugar?" replied Miss Harson. "The India-rubber is got from its tree as the sugar is from the maple tree. It is taken from the trunk in the shape of a very thick milky fluid, and it is said that no other vital fluid, whether in animal or in plant, contains so much solid material within it; and it is a matter of surprise that the sap, thus encumbered, can circulate through all the delicate vessels of the tree. Tropical heat is required to form the caoutchouc; for when the tree is cultivated in hothouses, the substance of the sap is quite different. The full-grown trees are very handsome, with round column-like trunks about sixty feet high, and the crown of foliage is said to resemble that of the ash."
"Did people always know about India-rubber?" asked Clara.
"No indeed! It is not more than a hundred and fifty years--perhaps not so long--since it was a great curiosity; so that a piece half an inch square would sell in London for nearly a dollar of our money, but now it comes in shiploads, and a pound of it costs less than quarter of that sum. It is used for so many purposes that it seems as if the world could never have gone on without it. All sorts of outside garments to keep out the rain are made of it. Waterproof cloaks are called macintoshes in England because this was the name of the person who invented them. India-rubber is also used for tents and many other things, and, as water cannot get through it, there is a great saving of trouble and expense."
"It must be splendid for tents," said Malcolm; "no one need care, when snug under cover, whether or not it rained in the woods."
"People do care, though," was the reply, "for they expect, when in the woods, to live out of doors; but the India-rubber is certainly a great improvement on tents that get soaked through."
"I like it," said Edith, "because it rubs things out. When I draw a house and it's all wrong, my piece of India-rubber will take it away, and then I can make another one on the paper."
"That is the very smallest of its uses," replied Miss Harson, smiling at the little girl's earnestness, "and yet we find it a great convenience. An English writer, speaking of it when it was first known in England, said that he had seen a substance that would efface from paper the marks of a black-lead pencil, and he thought it must be of use to those who practiced drawing."
"How funny that sounds!" exclaimed Malcolm. "Why, I couldn't get along without my India-rubber when I make mistakes,"
"You might," said his governess, "if you had some stale bread to rub with; for people _have_ gotten along without a great many things which they now think necessary."
"Miss Harson," said Clara, "won't you tell us, please, how they get the caoutch--whatever it is--and make it into India-rubber?"
"I will," was the laughing reply, "when you can say the word properly. C-a-o-u-t-c-h-o-u-c--koochook."
As Clara said, Miss Harson made things so easy to understand! and in a very short time the hard word was mastered.
"As I have never seen the sap gathered," continued the young lady, "I shall have to read you an account of it, instead of telling you from my own experience; but the description is so plain that I think we shall all be able to understand it very well: 'At certain seasons of the year the natives visit some islands in the river Amazon that for many months are covered with water. As soon as the water subsides and a footing can be obtained the Indians arrive in parties, to seek for the trees. The Indian who comes every morning to collect the juice from the trunk has a number of trees allotted to him, and goes the round of the whole. The previous night he has made a long, deep cut in the bark of each and hung an earthen vessel beneath, to receive the thick, creamlike substance that trickles down. The vessel is filled by morning, and he pours the contents into one much larger and carries it to his hut. He is provided with a number of moulds of different shapes and sizes, and he dips them into the juice and puts them aside to dry. They are then dipped again, and the process is continued until the coat of India-rubber on the mould is of sufficient thickness. It is made black by passing it through the smoke of burning palm-nuts. The moulds are broken and taken out, leaving the India-rubber ready for sale, and pretty much as we used to see it in the shops before the people of this country had learned how to work it.'"
"That seems easy enough," said Malcolm, "but how do they make it into gutta-percha?"
"Gutta-percha is not made," replied his governess, "and it is taken from an entirely different tree, the _Icosandra gutta_, which grows in Southern Asia. The milky fluid is procured in the same way, but it is placed in vessels to evaporate, and the solid substance left at the bottom is the gutta-percha. It is not elastic, like India-rubber, and is called 'vegetable leather' because of its toughness and leathery appearance. It was discovered by an English traveler a long time before it was supposed to have any useful properties, but now it is considered a very valuable material. The wonderful submarine telegraph could not convey its messages between the Old World and the New were not its wires protected from injury by a coating of gutta-percha. Its unyielding nature and its not being elastic render it the very material needed. The long straps used in working machines are also made of gutta-percha, and this is another instance where its non-elasticity gives it the preference over India-rubber."
"And what is vulcanite?" asked Clara.
"It is caoutchouc mixed with sulphur. Unless a small quantity of brimstone is added in the manufacture of overshoes, they become soft when exposed to heat and hardened when exposed to cold; but it was discovered that the sulphur will keep them from being affected by changes in temperature. When a large amount of sulphur is used, the India-rubber, becomes as hard as horn or wood, and this is the substance called vulcanite. Now the gum is imported in masses, to be wrought over by our skillful mechanics."
The children were very much pleased to find that they had learned the nature of three important articles--India-rubber, gutta-percha and vulcanite--and they thought it would be quite easy to remember the differences between them.
"And now," said Miss Harson, "the last of these useful trees--the cow tree, or milk tree--is the most curious one of all. Like the caoutchouc, it is a native of South America; but the sap is a rich fluid that answers for food, like milk. It is a fine-looking tree with oblong, pointed leaves about ten inches in length and a fleshy fruit containing one or two nuts. The sap is the most valuable part; and when incisions are made in the trunk of the tree, there is an abundant flow of thick milk-like sap, which is described as having an agreeable and balmv smell. The German traveler Humboldt drank it from the shell of a calabash, and the natives dip their bread of maize or cassava in it. This milk is said to be very fattening; and when exposed to the air, it thickens into a substance which the people call cheese."
"Milk and cheese from a tree!" exclaimed Malcolm. "Do you think we'd like them as well as ours, Miss Harson?"
"No," was the reply, "I do not think we should; but if we had never known any other kind, it would be quite a different matter, and the traveler says that both smell and taste are agreeable. The sap, it seems, is like curdled milk, and the natives say that they can tell, from the thickness and color of the foliage, the trunks that yield the most juice. This wonderful tree will be found growing on the side of a barren rock, and its large, woody roots can scarcely penetrate into the stone. For several months of the year not a single shower moistens its foliage. Its branches then appear dead and dried; but when the trunk is pierced, there flows from it a sweet and nourishing milk. It is at the rising of the sun that this vegetable fountain is most abundant. The negroes and natives are then seen hastening from all quarters, furnished with large bowls to receive the milk, which grows yellow and thickens at its surface. Some empty their bowls while under the tree itself; others carry the juice home to their children."
"Isn't it funny," said Edith, laughing, "to go and get their breakfasts from a _tree_? I wish we had some milk trees here."
"But you would not find it pleasant," replied their governess, "to have some other things that are always found where the milk tree grows. The intense heat and the swarms of mosquitoes and biting flies, the serpents and jaguars and other disagreeable and dangerous creatures, make life in that region anything but pleasant, and the curious vegetation and delicious fruits are not worth the suffering inflicted by all these torments."
On hearing of these drawbacks the children soon decided that their own dear home was the best, and no longer envied the possessors even of the cow tree.
CHAPTER XIV.
_HOME AND ABROAD: LINDEN, CAMPHOR, BEECH_.
"Now," said Miss Harson to her expectant flock, "it is to be hoped that our foreign wanderings among such wonderful trees have not spoiled you for home trees, as there are still a number of them which we have not yet examined."
"No indeed!" they assured her; "they liked to hear about them all, and they were going to try and remember everything she told them about the trees."
Their governess said that would be too much to expect, and if they remembered the most important things she would be quite satisfied,
"We will take the linden, lime, or basswood, tree--for it has all three of these names--this evening," she continued, "and there are nine or ten species of the tree, which are found in America, Europe and Western Asia. It is a very handsome, regular-looking tree with rich, thick masses of foliage that make a deep shade. The leaves are heart-shaped and very finely veined, have sharply-serrated edges and are four or five inches long. The leaf-stalk is half the length of the leaf. It blooms in July and August, and the flowers are yellowish white and very fragrant; when an avenue of limes is in blossom, the whole atmosphere is filled with a delightful perfume which can hardly be described."
[Illustration: THE LINDEN OR LIME TREE (_Tilia_).]
"There are no lime trees here, are there?" asked Clara.
"No," was the reply, "I do not think there are any in this neighborhood; but they grow abundantly not many miles away. Our native trees are not so pretty as the English lime, which, clothed with softer foliage, has a smaller leaf and a neater and more elegant spray. Ours bears larger and more conspicuous flowers, in heavier clusters, but of inferior sweetness. Both species are remarkable for their size and longevity. The young leaves of the lime are of a bright fresh tint that contrasts strongly with the very dark color of the branches; and these branches are so finely divided that their beauty is seen to the greatest advantage when winter has stripped them bare of leaves.
"'The linden has in all ages been celebrated for the fragrance of its flowers and the excellence of the honey made from them. The famous Mount Hybla was covered with lime trees. The aroma from its flowers is like that of mignonette; it perfumes the whole atmosphere, and is perceptible to the inhabitants of all the beehives within a circuit of a mile. The real linden honey is of a greenish color and delicious taste when taken from the hive immediately after the trees have been in blossom, and is often sold for more than the ordinary kind. There is a forest in Lithuania that abounds in lime trees, and here swarms of wild bees live in the hollow trunks and collect their honey from the lime.'"
[Illustration: LEAF AND FLOWER OF LIME TREE _(Tilia)._]
"What fun it would be, if we were there, to go and get it!" exclaimed Malcolm. "But don't bees make honey from the lime trees that grow in this country, too, Miss Harson?"
"Certainly they do; and the beekeepers look anxiously forward to the blossoming of the trees, because they provide such abundant supplies for the busy swarms. The flowers have other uses, too, besides the making of honey: the Swiss are said to obtain a favorite beverage from them, and in the South of France an infusion of the blossoms is taken for colds and hoarseness, and also for fever. 'Active boys climb to the topmost branches and gather the fragrant flowers, which their mothers catch in their aprons for that purpose. An avenue of limes has been ravaged and torn in pieces by the eagerness of the people to gather the blossoms, and they are often made into tea which is a soft sugary beverage in taste a little like licorice.'"
"How queer," said Clara, "to make tea from flowers!"
"Is it any queerer," asked her governess, "than to make it from leaves? I should think that the flowers might even be better, and yet I should scarcely like lime-tea that tastes like licorice."
The children, though, seemed to think that they would like it, and Miss Harson had very little doubt that such would be the case.
"Both the bark and the wood of the lime tree are valuable," she continued. "The fibres of the bark are strong and firm, and make excellent ropes and cordage. In Sweden and Russia they are made into a kind of matting that is very useful for packing-purposes and in protecting delicate plants from the frost. 'The manufacture of this useful material is carried on in the summer, close by the woods and forests where the lime trees grow in abundance. As soon as the sap begins to ascend freely the bark parts from the wood and can be taken away with ease. Great strips are then peeled off and steeped in water until they separate into layers; the layers are still further divided into smaller strips or ribbons, and are hung up in the shade of the wood, generally on the very tree itself from which they have been taken. After a time they are woven into the matting and sent to market for sale. The Swedish fishermen also manufacture it into a coarse thread for fishing-nets, and from the fibres of the young shoots the Russian peasant makes the strong shoes he wears, using the outer bark for the soles. In Italy the garments of the poorer people are often made of cloth woven from this material."
"Why, people can fairly _live_ on trees," said Malcolm. "I didn't know that they were good for anything but shade--except the trees that have fruit and nuts on 'em."
"There is a great deal for us all to learn of the works of the Creator," replied Miss Harson, "and the blessing of trees is not half known. The wood of the lime is said never to be worm-eaten; it is very soft and smooth and of a pale-yellow color. It is used for the famous Tunbridge ware, and is called the carver's tree, because, as the poet says,
"'Smooth linden best obeys The carver's chisel--best his curious work Displays in nicest touches.'
"The fruits and flowers carved for the choir of St. Paul's cathedral in London are done in lime-wood.
"So numerous are the purposes to which the bark, wood, leaves and blossoms of the lime, or linden, tree can be applied that centuries ago it was called the tree of a thousand uses. Linden is the name by which it is always known on the continent of Europe, and there it is indeed a magnificent tree, forming the most delightful avenues and branching colonnades. One of the principal streets in Berlin is called 'Unter den Linden.' In the Middle Ages, when the Swiss and the Flemings were always struggling for liberty, it was their custom to plant a lime tree on the field of battle, and many of these old trees still remain and have been the subject of ballads and poetical effusions:
"'The stately lime, smooth, gentle, straight and fair.'"
"Is there any story about it, Miss Harson?"
"No," was the reply, "not much of a story; only descriptions of some very large and very ancient trees. One of these, the old linden tree of Soleure, in Switzerland, was spoken of by an English traveler two hundred years ago as 'right noble and wondrous to behold. A bower composed of its branches is capable of holding three hundred persons sitting at ease; it has also a fountain set about with many tables formed solely of the boughs, to which men ascend by steps; and all is kept so accurately and thick that the sun never looks into it.'"
"It is just like a tent," said Malcolm, "it must be pleasant to sit by the fountain. Wouldn't you like it, Miss Harson?"
"I am sure I should," replied his governess; "and I should also like to see the famous lime tree of Zurich, the boughs of which will shelter five hundred persons. At Augsburg, in Germany, feasts and weddings have often been celebrated under the shade of some venerable limes that branch out to an immense distance. In early times divine honors were paid to them as emblems of immortality. And now," said Miss Harson, "the last of these famous trees is a noble lime tree which grew on the farm belonging to the ancestors of Linnaeus, the great naturalist, beneath the shade of which he played in childhood, and from which his ancestors derived their surname. That noble tree still blossoms from year to year, beautiful in every change of seasons."
"Lime, linden and basswood," said Clara--"three names to remember for one tree. But didn't you say, Miss Harson, that it's always called basswood in our country?"
"Often, but not always. The name linden is quite common with us, and it will be well for you to remember that it is also called lime, so that when you go to Europe you will know what is meant by _lime_ and _linden_."
The children laughed at this idea, for it seemed very funny to think of a little girl like Clara going to Europe, but, as their governess told them, little girls did go constantly; besides, this was the time to learn what would be of use to them when they were grown.
"The fragrant lime," said Miss Harson, "has a relative in Asia whose acquaintance I wish you to make, and you know it already in one of its products, which is common in every household. It is also very fragrant--or rather, I should say, it has a strong aromatic odor which is very reviving in cases of faintness or illness, although it has quite a contrary effect on insects, particularly on mosquitoes. I should like to have some one tell me what this white, powerful substance is."
This was quite a conundrum, and for a little while the children were extremely puzzled over its solution; but presently Clara asked,
"Do the moths hate it too, Miss Harson? And isn't it camphor?"
"Camphor doesn't grow on a _tree_," said Malcolm, in a superior tone; "it is dug out of the earth."
"I have never read of any camphor-mines," replied his governess, laughing, "and I think you will find that camphor--which is just what I meant--is obtained from the trunk of a tree."
"Like India-rubber?" asked Edith.
"No, dear, not like India-rubber, for it grows in even a more curious way than that, masses of it being found in the trunk of the camphor tree--not in the form of sap, but in lumps, as we use it."
"I thought it was like water," said Edith, in a puzzled tone.
"So it is when dissolved in alcohol, as we generally have it; but it is also used in lumps to drive away moths and for various other purposes. But I will tell you all about the tree, which grows in the islands of Sumatra and Borneo and bears the botanical name _Dryobalanops camphora_. The camphor is also called _barus_ camphor, to distinguish it from the _laurus_, of which I will tell you afterward, and it is of a better quality and more easily obtained. The tree grows in the forests of these East Indian islands and is remarkable for its majestic size, dense foliage and magnolia-like flowers. The trunk rises as high as ninety feet without a single branch, and within it are cavities, sometimes a foot and a half long, which cannot be perceived until the bark is split open. These cavities contain the camphor in clear crystalline masses, and with it an oil known as camphor oil, that is thought by some to be camphor in an immature form. But the oil, even when crystallized by artificial means, does not produce such good camphor as that already solidified in the tree."
"To think," exclaimed Clara, "of camphor growing in that way! But how do they get it out, Miss Harson? Do they cut great holes in the trunk of the tree?"
"No, dear; I have just read to you that the camphor cannot be seen until the bark is split open, and the grand trees have to be cut down. But to do this is no easy matter. The hard, close-grained timber requires days of hewing and sawing to get it severed. The masses of roots are as unyielding as iron, and run twisting through the soil to the distance of sixty yards. Even at their farthest extremity they are as thick as a man's thigh."
"I shouldn't think the camphor was worth all that trouble," said Malcolm; "it don't seem to amount to much, any wary."
"It is more valuable than you suppose," replied Miss Harson; "for, besides preserving furs and woolen fabrics from the devouring moth, it protects the contents of cabinets and museums from the attacks of the minute creatures that prey upon the dried specimens of the naturalist. Not any of the insect tribe can endure the powerful scent of the camphor, and they either retreat before it or are killed by it. But its principal value is in medicine. It is used both internally and externally. It acts as a nervous stimulant, and is a favorite domestic remedy.--So you see, Malcolm, that camphor really amounts to a great deal, and we could not very well do without it."
"How can people tell when there is any camphor inside the tree?" asked Clara.
"They cannot tell," was the reply, "until the trunk is split open, although a tribe of men in Sumatra say that they know before-hand, by a kind of magic, which is the right tree to cut down. But the beautiful, stately tree is often wasted in vain, and after all their hard work the camphor-seekers find the cavities of the split-up trunk filled with a thick black substance like pitch instead of the pure white camphor."
"Poor things!" said Edith, pityingly; "that's too bad."
"Camphor is found in many trees and shrubs," continued her governess, "but in all others except the camphor tree of Sumatra and Borneo it has to be distilled from the wood and roots. The camphor-laurel, which is about the size of an English oak, is the most important of these trees. It grows abundantly in the Chinese island of Formosa, and 'camphor mandarin' is the title of a rich Chinaman who pays the government for the privilege of extracting all the camphor, which he sends to other countries at a large profit. Every part of this tree is full of camphor, and the tree gives out, when bruised, a strong perfume.
"The European bay tree, which is more like an immense shrub, is also a member of this singular tribe, and its leaves have the strong family flavor. They were used in medicine, as well as the berries, before the camphor-laurel became known in Europe; in the time of Queen Elizabeth the floors of the better sort of houses were strewed with bay-leaves instead of being carpeted as now. The bay was an emblem of victory in old Roman times, and victorious generals were crowned with it. A wreath of this laurel, with the berries on, was placed on the head of a favorite poet in the Middle Ages, and in this way came the title 'poet-laureate'--_laureatus_,' crowned with laurel.'
"Do you remember," continued Miss Harson, "the tall, straight tree that I showed you yesterday when we were out in the woods--the one with a fluted trunk? What was its name?"
"I know!" said Malcolm, quite excited. "Think of the seashore! Beach! That's what I told myself to remember."
[Illustration: AMERICAN BEECH.]
"A very good idea," replied his governess, laughing; "only you must not spell it with an _a_, like the seashore, for it is _b-e-e-c-h._--The fluted, or ribbed, shaft of this grand-looking tree is often sixty or seventy feet high, and, although it is found in its greatest perfection in England, it is a common tree in most of the woods in this country. For depth of shade no tree is equal to the beech, and its long beautiful leaves, with their close ridges and serrated edges, are very much like those of the chestnut. The leaves are of a light, fresh green and very neat and perfect, because they are so seldom attacked by insects; they remain longer on the branches than those of any deciduous tree, and give a cheerful air to the wood in winter. In the autumn they change to a light yellow-brown, which makes a pretty contrast to the reds and greens and purples of other trees. The branches start out almost straight from the tree, but they very soon curve and turn regularly upward. Every small twig turns in the same direction, making the long leaf-buds at the end look like so many little spears. I showed you these 'stuck-up' buds when we were looking at the tree, and you noticed how different they were from the other trees."
Yes, the children remembered it; and it always seemed to them particularly nice to have part of the talk out of doors and the rest in the house.
"Doesn't the beech tree have nuts?" asked Malcolm. "John says it does."
"Yes," replied Miss Harson; "it has tiny three-cornered nuts which seem particularly small for so large a tree. But these nuts are eagerly devoured by pigeons, partridges and squirrels. Bears are said to be very fond of them, and swine fatten very rapidly upon them. Most varieties are so small as not to repay the trouble of gathering, drying and opening them. Fortunately, this is not the case with all, as it is a delicious nut. In France the beech-nut is much used for making oil, which is highly valued for burning in lamps and for cooking. In parts of the same country the nuts, roasted, serve as a substitute for coffee."
"I'd like to find some when they're ripe," said Clara, "if they _are_ little."
"We will have a search for them, then," was the reply, "when the time comes.--The flowers which produce these little nuts are very showy and grow in roundish tassels, or heads, which hang by thread-like, silky stalks, one or two inches long, from the midst of the young leaves of a newly-opened bud. A traveler says of these leaves, 'We used always to think that the most luxurious and refreshing bed was that which prevails universally in Italy, and which consists entirely of a pile of mattresses filled with the luxuriant spathe of the Indian corn; which beds have the advantage of being soft as well as elastic, and we have always found the sleep enjoyed on them to be particularly sound and restorative. But the beds made of beech-leaves are really no whit behind them in these qualities, whilst the fragrant smell of green tea, which the leaves retain, is most gratifying. The objection to them is the slight crackling noise which the leaves occasion as the individual turns in bed, but this is no inconvenience at all; or if so in any degree, it is an inconvenience which is overbalanced by the advantages of this most luxurious couch."
"But how funny," said Malcolm, "to sleep on leaves! That's what the Babes in the Wood did."
"No," replied Clara, very earnestly, "they didn't sleep _on_ leaves, you know; but when they had laid down and gone to sleep, the robins came and covered them with leaves."
"Yes," chimed in little Edith; "I like that way best, because they'd be so cold in the woods."
"And that really was the case," said Miss Harson, after listening with a smile to this discussion, "although there were probably leaves on the ground for the children to lie upon. A bed of leaves is not a bad thing where there are no mattresses, and such a bed is often used as a matter of course. You will remember my reading to you about the beds which the Finland mothers make for their children of the leaves of the canoe-birch. 'Leafy beds' are no strange thing--not mere poetry."
CHAPTER XV.
_THE TENT AND THE LOCUSTS_.
There came a bright balmy day in May when the children found a delightful surprise awaiting them. The tent in the woods, which had been proposed on the day when birch-twigs were found to be eatable, was almost forgotten--or if thought of, it was as a thing that could not possibly be--when, on the day in question, Miss Harson took her charges out as usual, and led them to a very pretty cleared space with a fringe of rocks and trees all around it. But on this spot, which hitherto had been quite bare, there now stood some sort of a little house different from other houses and quite pretty.
"It's a tent!" exclaimed Malcolm. "Who put it there, I should like to know, on _our_ land?"
"Are there gypsies here, Miss Harson?" whispered Clara, rather fearfully.
But the young lady walked deliberately up to the entrance of the tent and invited her little flock to come inside.
"I know the gentleman who had it put here," she said, "and he is quite willing that we should use it; but he will not give any one else this liberty."
"I think I know him too," said Malcolm as he walked in after Miss Harson.
"And I!"--"And I!" exclaimed the little girls. "It is our own papa. How very kind of him!"
"Yes," replied their governess; "he said, when I spoke of a tent, that it would be a good thing for the wood-ramblers to have a place of shelter when they were over-taken by a sudden shower, and also a place in which to rest comfortably when they were tired; and this pretty tent, you see, is all ready for us at any time."
It was a very nice tent indeed, having a long cushioned seat inside, two little rocking-chairs that were at once appropriated, a small table, and a bracket with books on it. On the table there was a round basket of oranges, which made every one thirsty at once.
"I do believe," said Malcolm, suddenly, "that it's made of India-rubber."
"Not the orange, I hope?" replied Miss Harson, while the little sisters looked up in surprise.
An India-rubber orange was a thing to be laughed at, though not to be eaten, and the children were in such a state of glee over this pleasant surprise that they were ready to laugh almost at nothing.
Presently their governess said,
"Malcolm means the tent, of course; and he is quite right, for the covering is India-rubber cloth."
"But why isn't it dark and ugly, like the waterproofs?" was the next question.
"Simply because it need not be so, and it is prettier to have it white or of this pale gray. But these shades are too conspicuous for overshoes or waterproof cloaks, so the latter are made as dark as possible. The caoutchoue, you know, is naturally white or very light colored."
"How do they make the cloth?" asked Malcolm.
"It is first made as cloth," was the reply; "then a thin coating of India-rubber is spread over two layers of it. The cloth is then put together and pressed between rollers, so that the two pieces firmly adhere, with the caoutchoue between them. No rain can penetrate such a screen as this,"
It was delightful to know that they would be safe and dry in case of a shower, and the children thought it must be just the prettiest tent that ever was made. The cushioned seat was covered with scarlet, and so were the little chairs, which Clara and Edith knew were meant for them; the edges of the cloth were scalloped with the same bright color, and there was even a rug to match spread in front of the "divan," as Miss Harson laughingly said the cushioned seat must be called.
"Haven't we 'most come to the end of the trees?" asked Clara. "I never thought that there were so many different kinds,"
"Look around and see if you feel acquainted with them all," replied her governess.
They had left the tent after quite a long "sitting," and were now on their way to the house.
Clara's first glance, on doing as she had been directed, fell on three trees by the side of a fence, that were different from any they had yet studied.
"What do you notice about them?" continued Miss Harson; "for I wish you to use your own eyes and thoughts as much as possible."
"Why, the trunk is dark gray, and it isn't smooth, but it looks as if some one had dug out long, thin pieces of bark."
"We will call it 'deeply furrowed,'" said her governess, "as that is a better expression; but your description is very good indeed."
"The leaves are ever so pretty," said Malcolm--"so many of 'em on one stem!--and the green looks as if it was just made."
"You mean by that, I suppose," replied Miss Harson, "that it is a very fresh tint; and we are seeing it in its first beauty now. This is the locust tree, and May is its time for leafing out in the tenderest of greens. The pinnate--from _pinna_, Latin for feather'--leaves are composed of from nine to twenty-five leaflets, which are egg-shaped, with a short point, very smooth, light green above and still lighter beneath. These leaves are much liked by cattle, and they are said to be very nutritious to them."
[Illustration: FOLIAGE OF HONEY-LOCUST.]
"How can you remember everything so, Miss Harson?" asked Malcolm, lost in wonder, as the young lady, looking up at the trees, said these things as if they had been written there. John had declared that she talked like a book, and this seemed more like it than ever.
"Oh no," was the laughing reply; "I do not remember _everything_, Malcolm, and perhaps it is just as well that I do not. But I will not tax my memory any more about the locust just now; we can take it up again this evening."
"I should like to know," exclaimed Clara, after some thought, "why a tree is called _locust_, when a locust is such a disagreeable insect?"
"I am afraid that I cannot tell you," replied Miss Harson, "unless the color of the leaves is similar to that of the 'disagreeable insect,' which is really very handsome, or unless the insects are very partial to the tree; I have seen no explanation of it. But the tree itself is very much admired, with its profusion of pinnate leaves and racemes of flowers that fill the air with the most agreeable odors."
"What color are the flowers, Miss Harson?" asked Malcolm.
"This description will tell you," was the reply. "The tree is not pretty in winter, and has no promise of beauty until 'May hangs on these withered boughs a green drapery that hides all their deformity; she infuses into their foliage a perfection of verdure that no other tree can rival, and a beauty in the forms of its leaves that renders it one of the chief ornaments of the groves and waysides. June weaves into this green foliage pendent clusters of flowers of mingled brown and white, filling the air with fragrance and enticing the bee with odors as sweet as from groves of citron and myrtle.'"
"That sounds pretty," said Clara, who liked imposing sentences, "but brown and white are not very handsome colors for flowers."
"The white is certainly prettier without the mixture of brown," replied her governess, "but we have to take our flowers ready-made, and can hardly expect them to be beautiful and fragrant too. The separate blossoms are shaped like those of the pea and bean; they hang in long clusters somewhat resembling bunches of grapes. The leaves--or, rather, leaflets--are very sensitive and have a habit of folding over one another in wet and dull weather, and also in the night--a habit that is peculiar to all the members of the acacia family, to which the locust belongs."
"I should think it ought to belong to the pea family," said Malcolm, "if the flowers are shaped like pea-blossoms."
"So it does," replied Miss Harson--"or, rather, to the bean family, of which the pea is a member, on account of its blossoms; but the acacia, like many others, is a brother, or sister, on account of its leaves as well as its blossoms. The peculiar distinction of this family is that its flowers are butterfly-shaped or its fruit in pods, and it often possesses both these characters. By one or the other all the plants of the family are known, and the butterfly-shaped flowers are of a character not to be mistaken, as they are found in no other family. It includes herbs, shrubs and trees--an immense and perfectly natural family, distributed throughout almost every part of the globe. There are at present in all not less than thirty-seven hundred species. So you see that the locust tree is certainly rich in relations."
The children thought that it must have some family claim on almost every plant in the world.
[Illustration: CAROB TREE AND FRUIT.]
"Do you remember that in the story of the Prodigal Son, told by our Lord, it is said that the bad son became so poor that he wanted to eat the 'husks' that the swine ate? Those 'husks' were the fruit of a Syrian member of this family. The tree is the carob tree, of which you have here a picture--a fine large tree bearing a sweet pod containing the seeds. I have seen these pods for sale in this country, and foolishly called St. John's bread, as if the 'locusts' eaten by John the Baptist were pods of a locust tree, and not insect locusts."
"Yes," said Malcolm, "I have tasted those pods, and they are real sweet; but I wouldn't care to make a breakfast from them."
"I like calling the flowers 'butterfly-shaped,'" said Clara, "because that is just what the pea and bean-blossoms look like; though Kitty calls 'em 'little ladies in hoods.' Isn't that funny, Miss Harson?"
"It is very quaint, I think, but I do not dislike it: it is like seeing faces in pansies; and some people are full of these odd imaginations. There is a kind of locust, called the clammy-barked, found in the Southern parts of the United States, which is a smaller tree than the common locust and has large pale-pink flowers, while the rose acacia is a very beautiful flowering shrub. The sweet, or honey, locust is another variety, which is also called the three-thorned acacia, because the thorns consist of one long spine with two shorter ones projecting out of it, like little branches, near its base. This is said to display much of the elegance of the tropical acacia in the minute division and symmetry of its compound leaves. These are of a light and brilliant green and lie flat upon the branches, giving them a fan-like appearance such as we observe in the hemlock."
"But why is it called honey-locust?" asked Malcolm. "Do the bees make honey in the trunk?"
"No," replied his governess; "the name comes from the sweetness of the pulp around the seeds, which ripen in large flat pods, and of which boys and girls are fond. But the flowers of this species are only small greenish aments. Locust-wood is very durable, and, as it will bear exposure to all kinds of weather, it is much used in shipbuilding and as posts for gates. It is thought that the shittah and shittim wood of the Bible, of which Moses made the greater part of the tables, altars and planks of the tabernacle, was the same as the black acacia found in the deserts of Arabia and about Mount Sinai and the mountains which border on the Red Sea, and is so hard and solid as to be almost incorruptible.
"And now," added Miss Harson, "reading of the numerous relations of the locust, considering that 'the acacia, not less valued for its airy foliage and elegant blossoms than for its hard and durable wood; the braziletto, logwood and rosewoods of commerce; the laburnum; the furze and the broom, both the pride of the otherwise dreary heaths of Europe; the bean, the pea, the vetch, the clover, the trefoil, the lucerne--all staple articles of culture by the farmer--are so many species of Leguminosae, and that the gums Arabic and Senegal, kino and various precious medicinal drugs, not to mention indigo, the most useful of all dyes, are products of other species,--it will be perceived that it would be difficult to point out an order with greater claims upon the attention.'"
CHAPTER XVI.
_THE WALNUT FAMILY AND THE AILANTHUS_.
"The walnut family," said Miss Harson, "with the ugly name _Juglandaceae_, are distinguished by pinnate, or compound, leaves, which have an aromatic odor when crushed, and by blossoms in catkins. Of these trees, the black walnut is one of the handsomest and most highly prized."
"Are there any of them here?" asked Malcolm.
[Illustration: THE WALNUT TREE.]
"No," was the reply; "I do not think you have ever seen one. They are more common in the western part of the Middle States and in the Western States; in Ohio particularly they grow to a very large size. Solitary trees are sometimes seen in this part of the country, and the branches, extending themselves horizontally to a great distance, spread out into a spacious head, which gives them a very majestic appearance. The trunk is rough and furrowed, and the leaves have from six to ten pairs of leaflets and an odd one. They are smooth, strongly serrated and rather pointed; the color is a light, bright green. The catkins are green, from four to seven inches long, and hang from the axils of the last year's leaves. The leaves are much longer than those of the locust, and the leaf-stalk is downy. The nut, which is very oily, is shaped like an English walnut, but resembles it in no other way, as the shell is very thick and dark-colored. When thoroughly dried, the black walnut is very much liked--as I think some witnesses here could testify--and is used in making candy."
"And just the nicest kind of candy, too," said the children, with one voice.
Their governess smiled, for this was very much her own opinion.
"You do not know," she continued, "how strangely these nuts grow. They have an outer husk, or rind, which when green is hard and has a very pleasant smell; the tree then seems to be covered with green balls. As the nuts ripen this outer part becomes so dark that it is almost black and grows soft and spongy. A rich brown dye is made from it. Black-walnut wood has long been famous for its beauty, and it grows deeper and darker with age. It is handsomely shaded and takes a fine polish, and this, with its durability, makes it very valuable for furniture. Posts made of it will last a long time, and it can be put to almost any use for which hard-wood is available.
"The walnut tree has a great variety of good qualities in addition to its fine appearance and generous shade. From the kernel a valuable oil may be obtained for use in cookery and in lamps. Bread has also been made from the kernels. The spongy husk of the nuts is used as dyestuff. It thus unites almost all the qualities desirable in a tree--beauty, gracefulness and richness of foliage in every period of its growth; bark and husks which may be employed in an important art; fruit valuable as food; wood unsurpassed in durability and in elegance."
"I like English walnuts," said Clara, "they have such thin, pretty shells; and papa, you know, can open them in just two halves with a knife."
"Once," said Miss Harson, "I had a little bag sent to me made of two very large walnut shells with blue silk between, and in this bag there was a pair of kid gloves rolled up very tight."
"Oh!" exclaimed the children. It sounded like a fairy-tale, but they knew that it was true, because Miss Harson said that it had really happened. They were very much surprised, though, that a bag could be made of nutshells, and that a pair of gloves could be crowded into so small a compass.
"Did it come from England?" asked Malcolm.
"No," replied his governess; "it was sent to me from the island of Madeira, where these nuts grow so abundantly that they have often been called Madeira-nuts. It also grows abundantly in Europe, and the nuts are used for dessert, pickling, and many other purposes, while the poorer classes often depend largely on them for food."
"Do they eat 'em instead of bread?" asked Edith. "I'd like that; they're ever so much nicer!"
"Perhaps you would not think so if you had hardly anything else to eat; you would get tired of them then. In many places on the continent of Europe the roads are lined with walnut trees for miles together, and in the proper season the people may feast upon the fruit as much as they like. A person, it is said, once traveled from Florence to Geneva and ate nothing by the way but walnuts; but I must say that I should not like to do it. One species bears a nut as large as an egg; but if kept any time, it will shrink to half its natural size. The shell of this great walnut, we are told, is sometimes used for making little ornamental boxes to hold gloves and small fancy-articles; so you see that mine was not the only glove-bag made of two walnut-shells."
"How pretty they must be!" said Clara. "I should like to see one."
"I think that I can make one when I get a large nut, and I shall be glad to show you how it is done."
This was a delightful prospect, and the children volunteered to save for that especial purpose all the large nuts they could find.
"The English walnut tree," continued Miss Harson, "is a native of Persia or the North of China, and the long pinnated leaves seem to mark its Oriental origin; but it has taken very kindly to its European home. In some parts of Germany the walnut trees were considered to be such a valuable possession that no young man was allowed to marry until he owned a certain number; and if one tree was cut down, another was always planted."
"Don't they grow in this country?" asked Malcolm.
"Not very often in our more northern States," was the reply, "for the climate here is too cold for them; but at a house where I visited there was an English walnut tree in the garden, and it seemed to do very well. The nuts were always gathered while they were green, and made into pickles."
This was considered quite dreadful, for ripe nuts were certainly a great deal better than pickles.
"But there was a great deal of uncertainty about having the ripe nuts, for there were bad boys all around who would not have hesitated to rob the tree. Besides, pickled walnuts are considered a great delicacy by those who eat such things. There are some other ways, too, of using the nuts, which you would not like any better. One of these is to make them into oil, as the people do in the South of Europe; this oil is used to burn in their lamps and as an article of food. 'In Piedmont, among the light-hearted peasantry, cracking the walnuts and taking them from the shell is a holiday proceeding. The peasants, with their wives and children, assemble in the evening, after their day's work is over, in the kitchen of some château where the walnuts have been gathered, and where their services are required. They sit round a table, and at each end is a man with a small mallet, who cracks the walnuts and passes them on; the rest of the party take them out of their shells. At supper-time the table is cleared, and a repast of dried fruit, vegetables and wine is set out. The remainder of the evening is spent in singing and dancing. The crushing and pressing of the nuts, for oil, take place when the whole harvest is in.'"
"But don't walnuts come from California? Our grocer said he had California nuts," remarked Malcolm.
"Yes; that wonderful country is beginning to supply us with English walnuts."
"Are you going to tell us a story, Miss Harson?" asked Edith, hopefully.
"I have no story, dear," was the reply, "but there is something here which you may like about birds stealing the nuts."
Of course they would like this; for if there was to be no story, birds and stealing promised to furnish a good substitute.
"'Birds are as fond of walnuts as we are,'" read Miss Harson, "'and rob the trees without any mercy. Not only the little titmouse, but the grave and solemn rook'--a kind of crow, you remember--'is not above paying a visit to the walnut tree and stealing all he can find. There is a walnut tree growing in a garden the owner of which may be said to have planted it for the benefit of the rooks. Not that he had any such purpose, but, as it happens, he cannot help himself. The rooks begin a series of robberies as soon as the fruit is ripe, and carry them on with an adroitness that would be amusing but for the result. As many as fifty rooks come, one after the other, and each will carry off a walnut. The old ones are the most at home in the process, and the most daring. The bird approaches the tree and floats for a second in the air, as if occupied in finding out which of the walnuts will be the easiest to obtain; then, with a bold stroke, he darts at the one selected, and rarely misses his aim.
"'The young rooks are much more timid and not so successful. They settle on the branch and knock down a great many walnuts in their clumsy attempts to secure one. Even when the walnut has been obtained, the young rook is not sure of his prize: one of his older and stronger brethren is very likely to attack him and knock the walnut out of his bill. Then, by a dextrous swoop, the robber catches it up before it reaches the ground, and carries it off in triumph. The feasting ground of the rooks is the next field, and here they come to eat their walnuts. They crack the shell with their beaks and devour the kernel with great relish. Then, when one walnut is finished, they fly back to the tree for another. There is no chance for the owner of the garden, who does not think it worth while even to shake his tree: he knows there will not be a single walnut left.'"
"I should think not, with those greedy creatures," exclaimed Malcolm. "Why doesn't the man shoot 'em?"
"He probably thinks it would be of little use, when there are such numbers of the birds; besides, he may prefer losing his walnuts to disturbing them, for rooks are treated with great consideration in England, and there is no such wholesale destruction of birds as is seen here."
The rooks were certainly very comical, and the children thought this little account of their antics over the walnut tree the next best thing to a story.
"Another fine shade-tree," continued Miss Harson, "and one very much like the black walnut, is the butternut, or oil-nut, tree. It is low and broad-headed, spreading into several large branches; the leaves are pinnate, like those of the walnut, but have not so many leaflets. The nut has an entirely different taste, and is even more oily. To many persons it is not at all agreeable. It is a great favorite, though, with country-boys, and in October, when the kernel is ripe, they may be seen with deeply-stained hands and faces, as the thin, leathery husks when handled leave plentiful traces. The butternut is not round like the walnut, but oblong, and pointed at the end; it is about two inches in length and marked by deep furrows and sharp irregular ridges. It is very pretty when sawn across in slices, and looks like scroll-saw work.--We shall have to get some, Malcolm, for you to practice on with your saw."
[Illustration: THE BUTTERNUT TREE.]
As his scroll-saw was just then the delight of Malcolm's heart, he felt particularly interested in butternuts, and immediately mapped out in his mind something very beautiful to be wrought with them for his governess.
"The bark and the nutshells have long been used to give a brown color to wool, and the Shakers dye a rich purple with it. The bark of the trunk will give a black and that of the root a fawn-colored dye, while an inferior sugar has been made from the sap. The young half-grown nuts are much used for pickles. Butternut-wood is exceedingly handsome, of a pale, reddish tint, and durable when exposed to heat and moisture. It makes beautiful fronts for drawers and excellent light, tough and durable wooden bowls. It is also used for the panels of carriages, as well as for posts and rails. It is a more common tree than the walnut in our part of the country; there is a large one in front of a house a few miles from here which I will show you on our next drive."
"I am glad of it," said Clara, "for I can remember about the trees so much better when I have seen them. I wish we could see every one of the trees you have told us of, Miss Harson."
"Perhaps you will some day," replied her governess, "and you will then find that a little knowledge of them before-hand is a great help."
"Are there any more of the walnut family?" asked Malcolm.
"Yes, the hickory belongs to it; and this is a tree which is peculiar to America. The European walnut is more like it than any other. It is always a stately and elegant tree and very valuable for its timber. There are several varieties, which are much alike, the principal difference being in the nuts. You have all seen most of the trees and gathered the nuts. They are:
"1. The shellbark, with five large leaflets, a large nut, of which the husk is deeply grooved at the seams, and a rough, scaly trunk.
"2. The mocker-nut, with seven or nine leaflets, a hard, thick-shelled nut, and leaflets and twigs very downy when young, and strongly odorous.
"3. The pignut, with three, five or seven narrow leaflets, small, thin-shelled fruit and a pretty hard nut.
"4. The bitternut, with seven, nine or eleven small, narrow, serrated leaves, small fruit with long, prominent seams, bitter and thin-shelled nuts and very yellow buds.
"The shellbark is often called 'shagbark,' and it is the finest of the hickories and one that is seldom mistaken for any of the others. It may readily be distinguished by the shaggy bark of its trunk, the excellence of its globular fruit, its leaves, which are large and have five leaflets, and by its ovate, half-covered buds. It is a tall, slender tree with irregular branches, and the foliage seems to lie in masses of dense, dark green. But in October, when the nuts ripen, the leaves turn to orange-brown, and finally to the color of a russet apple; so that they do not add greatly to the beauty of the forest."
"But the nuts are good," said Malcolm. "Didn't we have fine times picking 'em up?"
"We did indeed," replied Miss Harson, "and I hope we shall again."
"How long will it be before they are ripe?" asked the little girls.
"Just about five months, I think."
"Oh dear!" was the reply; "that's _so_ long to wait!"
"But you needn't wait," said their governess; "you can enjoy each season as it comes, and all the good things that our heavenly Father sends with it. Remember that, as you cannot expect ripe nuts in May or June, neither can you look for strawberries and roses in October. Tents are of very little use then, too."
"Oh!" exclaimed the children, to whom the tent was still a delightful novelty; and they decided not to wish just yet for nutting-time to come.
"The nut, as you have so often seen, is covered with a brown husk that is very thick and marked with four furrows, by which it separates into as many distinct pieces, one being larger than the rest. The nuts differ very much in size and shape, and also in hardness, but the best kinds have thin shells and soft kernels; they are also rounder and fuller than the poorer sorts. There is a peculiar sweetness in the taste of this nut when in its best condition, and it is quite equal to the European walnut. The wood of this tree is particularly valuable for fuel, and in old times, when wood-fires were the only kind known, a good hickory back-log was sure to be found on every hearth. It is the heaviest of our native woods, and the wise men say that it yields, pound for pound or cord for cord, more heat than any other, in any shape in which it may be consumed."
"But what a pity," said Clara, "to burn up trees that bear nuts! Why can't they take those that don't?"
"They are not so desirable for fuel," was the reply; "and when people own trees which they are willing to turn into money, they generally consider in what way they can get the most for them. Nuts which grow in the woods and fields are a very uncertain crop, of which every one seems to gather more than the owner, and it is therefore more profitable for him to cut his trees down and sell them for their wood, which the people in the cities and towns are so glad to get."
"What's the use," asked Malcolm, "of calling a tree such a name as _mocker-nut_? What does it mean?"
"That is just what I have not been able to find out," replied Miss Harson, "but it has an Indian sound, and it seems that the Indians used to make a black dye from the bark; so we will give them the credit for it. The name is not often used, for the tree is generally known as the white walnut. The nut is the largest of the hickories, being often from four to six inches around, and it is shaped somewhat like a pear. One variety, however, is known as the square nut. The shell is very thick and hard, but the kernel is sweet when once it is gotten out. This tree is as stately and finely-shaped as the shagbark. It varies from the other hickories in the number of its leaflets, which are seven or nine, the down on its leaves and recent shoots, the hardness of the husk and thickness of the nut, the roundness of its large covered buds, and the strong resinous odor in leaves, buds and husks. In its general appearance it resembles the shellbark, as well as in the fullness of its foliage and the size of its leaves. 'White-heart hickory' is a name often given to this species, because the wood is supposed, when young, to be whiter than that of any of the others,"
"_Pignut_ is another beautiful name," said Malcolm, who was disposed to be critical. "Do pigs ever eat the nuts, Miss Harson?"
"I dare say that they do when they have the chance," was the reply, "as they delight in nuts; but that is said not to be the proper name for the species. Some of the nuts are shaped like a fresh fig, and 'fig-nut' seems to be the name originally intended. But there is a great variety in the shape of the nuts, as some are nearly round and others very irregular. They are alike, however, in having very hard, tough shells, and the kernel is not pleasant enough to repay the trouble of getting at it. These nuts are very apt to grow in pairs, and several bushels of them can be gathered from one tree."
"Aren't they good to eat?" asked Clara.
"Not at all good," replied her governess, "except to those who are not particular about what they eat; and this may be the reason for calling them 'pignuts,'"
"_Bitternut_ doesn't sound much better," said Malcolm, again. "I wonder what that species has to say for itself?"
"Not very much, I am afraid, for it is sometimes called the bitter pignut, and even boys will not eat it, while squirrels refuse to feed on it when any other nut can be found. The shell of this nut is so thin that it can be broken in the fingers, but, as no one cares to break it, it is safer than many a thicker shell. It is intensely bitter, and well deserves its name. The tree, however, is handsome and the most graceful of all the hickories; the small, slender leaves give it the look of an ash, and the trunk is smoother than that of most large trees. In summer the finely-cut foliage is of a bright green, and in autumn it changes to a rich orange, which lasts after the other species have become russet and brown."
"Is there anything more about hickory trees?" said Clara.
"Only to speak of the great value of the wood," replied Miss Harson. "Its uses are almost endless. Great numbers of walking-sticks are made of it, as for this purpose no other native wood equals it in beauty and strength. It is next in value to white oak for making hoops; it makes the best screws, the smoothest and most durable handles for chisels, augurs, gimlets, axes, and many other common tools. As fuel, hickory is preferred to every other wood, burning freely, making a pleasant, brilliant fire and throwing out great heat. Charcoal made from it is heavier than that made from any other wood, but it is not considered more valuable than that of birch or alder. The ashes of hickories abound in alkali, and are considered better for the purpose of making soap than any other of the native woods, being next to those of the apple tree."
"There, Clara!" said Malcolm; "you see now why people cut down hickory trees. The nuts are nowhere, with all these other things."
"We have finished the walnut family," said Miss Harson, "but there is a tree that I wish to speak of here because of its long pinnate leaves, which appear to connect it with the walnuts and hickories. This is the ailanthus, a large tree which you have often seen in the village, and which used to be popular as a shade-tree. It is very clean-looking, for the only insect that will eat its leaves is the silkworm."
"Oh, Miss Harson!" exclaimed the children. "Are there real silkworms on 'em? and can we see 'em?"
"Why, do you not remember our talk about silkworms?" replied their governess. "I am sure I told you that they would not live here in the open air, but they do in China; and the ailanthus is a Chinese tree. It was planted in Great Britain over a hundred years ago for the express purpose of feeding silkworms, because a species of silkworm which was known to be hardy and capable of forming its cocoons in the English climate is attached to this tree and feeds upon its leaves. It was not successful, however, for silkworms, but as a stately and ornamental tree with tropical-looking foliage it was much admired. The ailanthus is quite common in this country as a wayside tree. It possesses a good deal of beauty, from the size and graceful sweep of its large compound leaves, that retain their brightness and verdure after midsummer, when our native trees have become dull. These leaves have nine or ten leaflets as large as a beech-leaf."
"Isn't that the tree that smells so in summer?" asked Clara, with a disgusted face.
"Yes; the greenish flowers have a particularly disagreeable odor, which is very strong and penetrating, and this is probably the reason why the tree has lost favor in so many places. But this is only during the season of blossoming, and for several months it is a beautiful Oriental-looking tree with every leaf perfect, while nearly all other foliage is more or less ravaged by insects."
CHAPTER XVII.
_SOME BEAUTIFUL TREES: THE CHESTNUT AND HORSE-CHESTNUT._
The nearest trees to the tent, and standing just back of it, were two magnificent chestnuts, now in full leaf-beauty; and Miss Harson and her little flock stood admiring their majestic size and beautiful color.
"These are the handsomest trees yet," said Malcolm.
"I almost think so myself," replied his governess, gazing up into the rich green depths, "and I wish you particularly to notice these radiated--or star-like--tufts of foliage. The leaves, you see, are long, lengthened to a tapering point, serrated--or notched like a saw--at the edge, and of a bright and nearly pure green. Though arranged alternately, like those of the beech, on the recent branches, they are clustered in stars containing from five to seven leaves on the fruitful branches that grow out from the perfected wood. Now stand off a little and see how the foliage seems to be all in tufts, each composed of several long, pointed leaves drooping from the centre. The aments, too, with their light silvery-green tint, glisten beautifully on the darker leaves."
"How high do you think these trees are, Miss Harson?" asked Clara. "It makes me dizzy to look up to the top."
[Illustration: LEAF OF THE CHESTNUT.]
"They can be scarcely less than ninety feet," was the reply, "and they are very fine specimens of the family; but the great chestnut which is the only tree in the field on the left of the house is broader. It spreads out like an apple tree, because it has abundance of room, and it is nearly as broad as it is high."
"And aren't its chestnuts just splendid?" exclaimed Malcolm--"the biggest we find anywhere."
[Illustration: THE CHESTNUT TREE.]
"The bark, you see," continued his governess, "is very dark-colored, hard and rugged, with long, deep clefts. In smaller and younger trees it is smooth. I suppose I need not tell you that the fruit is within a burr covered with sharp, stiff bristles which are not handled with impunity. It opens by four valves more than halfway down when ripe, and contains the nuts, from one to three in number, in a downy cup. These green burrs are very ornamental to the tree; and when they are ripe, the green takes on a yellow tinge."
"You didn't say anything about the cunning little tails of the nuts, Miss Harson," said Edith, in a disappointed tone. "I think they're the prettiest part, and they stick up in the burr like little mice-tails."
"Well, dear," was the smiling reply, "_you_ have told us about them, and I think you have given a very good description. That is just what they always reminded me of when I was about your age--little mice-tails."
Edith looked pleased and shy, and she did not mind Malcolm's laughing at her "little tails," because Miss Harson used to think the same as she did about them.
"This beautiful tree came from Asia, and it belongs to the _Castanea_ family, the Greeks having given it that name from a town in Pontus where they obtained it. It was transplanted into the North and West, and is now found in most temperate regions. The wood of the chestnut is very valuable, as it is strong, elastic and durable, and is often used as a substitute for oak and pine. It makes very beautiful furniture."
"What kind of chestnuts," asked Clara, "are those great big ones, like horse-chestnuts, that they have in some of the stores? Are they good to eat?"
"Yes," replied Miss Harson; "they are particularly good, and many people in the southern countries of Europe almost live on them. They are three or four times larger than our nuts, these Spanish and Italian chestnuts, and they are eaten instead of bread and potatoes by the peasantry of Spain and Italy. The Spanish chestnut is one of the most stately of European trees, and sometimes it is found growing in our own country, but never in the woods. It is carefully planted and cultivated as an ornamental tree for private grounds. And now," added the young lady, "as we have sufficiently examined our American chestnut trees and it is rather damp and cool to-day for tent-life, suppose we return to the house and get better acquainted with the foreign chestnuts?"
Edith asked if there was to be a story, but she did not complain when Miss Harson thought not, only an account of a very large tree; for the children always felt quite sure that there would be something which they would like to hear.
*       *       *       *       *
The evening was damp, and Clara said that, the schoolroom looked like a mixture of summer and winter. The fire was both pleasant and comfortable, but there were lilacs and tulips and hyacinths and plenty of wild flowers in vases and baskets; the leaves were all out on the trees by the windows, and the grass was like velvet.
"One of the largest trees in the world, if not the largest," said Miss Harson, "is a chestnut tree on the side of Mount Etna, in Sicily, which abounds with chestnut trees of giant proportions and remarkable beauty. It is called 'The Chestnut Tree of a Hundred Horses,' and this title is said to have originated in a report that a queen of Aragon once took shelter under its branches attended by her principal nobility, all of whom found refuge from a violent storm under the spreading boughs of the tree. At one time it was supposed that the tree really consisted of a clump of several united, but this is not the case; for on digging away the earth the root was found entire, and at no great depth. Five enormous branches rise from the trunk, the outside surface of each being covered with bark, while on the inside is none. The verdure and the support of the tree thus depend on the outer bark alone. The intervals between the branches are of various extent, one of them being sufficient to allow two carriages to drive abreast. In the middle cavity--or what is called the hollow--of the tree a hut has been built for the use of persons employed in collecting and preserving the fruit. They dry the chestnuts in an oven, and then make them into various conserves for sale. A whole caravan of men and animals were once accommodated in the enclosure, and also a flock of sheep folded there. The age of this prodigious tree must be very great indeed. It belongs to the tribe which bears sweet, or edible, chestnuts, that form an agreeable article of food. The foliage is rich, shadowy and beautiful.
"The wood of the chestnut is much used in England for hop-poles, and old houses in London are floored or wainscoted with it. The beautiful roof of Westminster Abbey is made of chestnut wood.
"There are magnificent forests of Spanish chestnuts in the Apennines, and it was the favorite tree of the great painter Salvator Rosa, who spent much time studying the beautiful play of light and shade on its foliage. The peasants make a gala-time of gathering and preparing the nuts. A traveler, having penetrated the extensive forest which covers the Vallombrosan Apennines for nearly five miles, came unexpectedly upon those festive scenes, which are not unfrequent among the chestnut-range. It was a holiday, and a group of peasants dressed in the gay and picturesque attire of the neighborhood of the Arno were dancing in an open and level space covered with smooth turf and surrounded with magnificent chestnuts, while the inmost recesses of the forest resounded with their mirth and minstrelsy. Some beat down the chestnuts with sticks and filled baskets with them, which they emptied from time to time; others, stretched listlessly upon the turf, picked out the contents of the bristling capsules in which the kernels were entrenched, for these, when newly gathered, are sweet and nutritious; others again, and especially young peasant-girls, pelted their companions with the fruit."
"Like snowballing," said Malcolm; "only the prickers must have stung. What grand times they had with their chestnuting!"
"These gay, thoughtless people," replied his governess, "almost live in the open air and enjoy the present moment. It is not easy to tell what they would do without these bountiful chestnut-harvests, for their principal article of food is a thick porridge called _polenta_, which they make from the ground nuts. In France a kind of cake is made from the same material, and the chestnuts are prepared by drying them in smoke. Another dish is like mashed potatoes, and large quantities are exported in the shape of sweetmeats, made by dipping them, after boiling, into clarified sugar and drying them."
"Miss Harson," asked Clara, "why are horse-chestnuts _called_ 'horse-chestnuts '? Do horses like 'em?"
"Not usually," was the reply. "The nuts are sometimes ground and given to horses, but, as sheep, deer and other cattle eat them in their natural state, it would seem more reasonable to name them after some of those animals, if that was the reason. It is likely that because they look like chestnuts, but are much larger, they were called 'horse-chestnuts,' The tree is not in any respect a chestnut; and when it was first planted in England, some centuries ago, it was called 'a rare foreign tree,' and was much admired. It is supposed to have come from India. The large nuts are like chestnuts in appearance.--Except, Edith, that they have no 'cunning little tails.'--In the month of May there is not a more beautiful tree to be found than the horse-chestnut, with its large, deeply-cut leaves of a bright-green color and its long, tapering spikes of variegated flowers, which turn upward from the dense foliage. The tree at this time has been compared to a huge chandelier, and the erect blossoms to so many wax lights. The bitter nuts ripen early in the autumn and fall from the tree, but long before this the beautiful foliage has turned rusty in our Northern States, and is no longer ornamental. The overshadowing branches, which give such a pleasant shade in summer, early in autumn begin to show the ravages of the insects or the natural decay of the leaves."
"Then," said Malcolm, "it isn't a nice tree to have, and I'm glad that there are elms here instead."
"I should like to have some of all the trees," replied Clara, "because then we could study about them better.--Wouldn't you, Miss Harson?"
"I think so," said her governess, "if they were not undesirable to have, as some trees are. If it were always May, I should want horse-chestnut trees; for I think there is scarcely anything so pretty as those fresh leaves and blossoms. The branches, too, begin low down, and that gives the tree a generous spreading look which is very attractive in the way of shade. In more southern States they have a longer season of beauty than those in the North."
"Do people ever eat the horse-chestnut?" asked Edith.
"Not often, dear--it is too bitter; but an old writer who lived in the days when it was first seen in England says that he planted it in his orchard as a fruit tree, between his mulberry and his walnut, and that he roasted the chestnuts and ate them. It is like the bitternut-hickory, which even boys will not eat."
"I should think that somebody or something ought to eat it," said Clara, thoughtfully; "it seems like such a waste."
Everyone laughed at her wise air, and she was asked if she intended to set the example. She was not quite ready, though, to do that; and Miss Harson continued:
"A naturalist once took from the tree a tiny flower-bud and proceeded to dissect it. After the external covering, which consisted of seventeen scales, he came upon the down which protects the flower. On removing this he could perceive four branchlets surrounding the spike of flowers, and the flowers themselves, though so minute, were as distinct as possible, and he could not only count their number, but discern the stamens, and even the pollen."
"Oh!" exclaimed the children; "how very curious!"
"Yes," replied their governess; "it shows how perfect and wonderful, from the beginning, are all the works of God."
CHAPTER XVIII.
_AMONG THE PINES_.
"How good it smells here!" exclaimed Edith, with her small nose in the air to inhale what she called "a good sniff" in the fragrant pine-woods.
Miss Harson had taken the children in the carriage to a pine-grove some miles from Elmridge, and Thomas and the horses waited by the roadside while the little party walked about or stood gazing up at the tall slender trees that seemed to tower to the very skies. Thomas was not fond of waiting, but he thought that he had the best of it in this case: it was more cheerful to sit in the carriage and "flick" the flies from Rex and Regina than to go poking about in the gloomy pine-woods. Yet, notwithstanding the darkness of its interior and the sombre character of its dense masses of evergreen foliage as seen from without--whence the name of "black timber," which has been applied to it--the shade and shelter it affords and the sentiment of grandeur it inspires cause it to become allied with the most profound and agreeable sensations; and it was something of this feeling, though they could not express it in words, which possessed the young tree-hunters as they stood in the pine-grove.
"It's nice to breathe here," said Clara.
"It is delicious," replied her governess, enthusiastically, her eyes kindling as she repeated the lines:
"'His praise, ye winds, that from four quarter blow, Breathe soft and loud; and wave your tops, ye pines, With every plant, in sign of worship. Wave!'"
"What a queer brown color--almost like red--the ground is!" said Malcolm. "And look, Miss Harson! it's made of lots of little sharp sticks."
"The sharp sticks are pine-needles," was the reply--"the dead pine-leaves of last year; and when the new growth of leaves have been put forth, they cover the ground with a smooth brown matting as comfortable as a gravel-walk, and yet a carpet of Nature's making. 'The foliage of the pine is so hard and durable that in summer we always find the last year's crop lying upon the ground in a state of perfect soundness, and under it that of the preceding year only partially decayed.'"
"It's kind of slippery in some places," continued Malcolm, taking a slide as he spoke. "And see those queer-looking roots sprouting out of the ground!"
"I see the roots," said Miss Harson, "but no sprouts. That is the white pine, the roots of which are often seen above the ground, spreading to some distance from the trunk. Generally the roots of pine trees are small, compared with the size of the trunks, and spread horizontally instead of descending far into the ground. For this reason pines are often uprooted by high winds, which break off the deciduous trees near the ground. But I wish you particularly to notice the trunks of these trees and tell me if you can see any difference in them."
Those particular trees had probably never been stared at so hard before, and the three children exclaimed almost together:
"Some are rough, and some are smooth, and the rough ones have little bunches of leaves on 'em."
"These are the pitch-pines," replied their governess. "They are the roughest of all our forest-trees, and they have a rounder head than any of the other American evergreens. The branches, you see, turn in various directions and are curved downward at the ends. This tree has also the peculiar habit of sending out little branchlets full of leaves along the stem from the root upward, and this has a very pretty effect, like that of some elm trees. It is the pitch-pine that produces the fragrance we are all enjoying so much. What do you notice about the smoother trees?"
"They are very tall and big," replied Clara--"ever so much handsomer than the rough ones."
[Illustration: THE WHITE PINE.]
"The white pine," said Miss Harson, "is one of the loftiest and most valuable of North American trees. Its top can be seen at a great distance, looking like a spire as it towers above the heads of the trees around it. You see that it has widespread branches and silken-looking, tufted foliage. The leaves are in fives and not so stiff as those of the other pines, and you will notice that the branches are in whorls, like a series of stages one above another. The foliage has a tasseled effect with those long silky tufts at the ends of the branches, and the whole outline of the tree is very pleasing."
"This isn't a pine tree, is it?" asked Malcolm, touching a small tree with very slender branches, some of them as slight as willow-withes and covered with grayish-red bark, while that on the main stem was bluish gray.
[Illustration: THE LARCH.]
"It is a species of pine," was the reply, "because it belongs to the Coniferae, or cone-producing, family; but it is not an evergreen, although it ranks as such. This is the larch--generally called in New England by its Indian name of _hacmatack_--and it differs from the other pines in its crowded tufts of leaves, which, after turning to a soft leather-color, fall, in New England, early in November. The cones, too, are very small."
"What's the use of cones, any way?" asked Malcolm as he picked up some very large ones under the white and pitch pines.
"Their principal use," replied his governess, "is to contain the seeds of future trees: they are the fruit of the pine; but they have a number of uses besides, which you shall hear about this evening."
"The little cones at Hemlock Lodge are pretty," said Edith, "and Clara and me play with 'em. We play they're a orphan-'sylum."
[Illustration: FOLIAGE OF THE LARCH (_Larix Americana_).]
"'Clara and I,' dear," corrected Miss Harson, smiling at the "orphan-'sylum," while Malcolm said he had never thought of that before, and it must be what they were meant for. Edith could not quite understand whether this was fun or earnest, but Miss Harson shook her head at Malcolm and called him "naughty boy."
"The spruce and hemlock," continued their governess, "and many of the other evergreens, we have at Elmridge, but I brought you here to-day for our drive that you might examine these magnificent pine trees, and so be better able to understand whatever we can find out about them this evening. Thomas is probably tired of waiting by this time; so we will leave the fragrant pine-woods for the present, and promise ourselves some future visits."
Every green thing was now in full summer beauty, and daisies and buttercups gemmed the fields, while the garden at Elmridge was all aglow with blossoms, The children remembered their flower-studies of last year, and took fresh pleasure in the woods because of them; but the trees now seemed quite as interesting as the flowers had been.
*       *       *       *       *
"The trees known as evergreens," said Miss Harson, "are not so bright and cheerful-looking as those which are deciduous, or leaf-shedding, but they have the advantage of being clothed with foliage, although of a sober hue, all the year round. They consist of pines, firs, junipers, cypresses, spruces, larches, yews and hemlocks, with some foreign trees, and form a distinct and striking natural group. 'This family has claims to our particular attention from the importance of its products in naval, and especially in civil and domestic, architecture, and in many other arts, and, in some instances, in medicine. Some of the species in this country are of more rapid growth, attain to a larger size and rise to a loftier height than any other trees known. The white pine is much the tallest of our native trees.'"
"How high does it grow, Miss Harson?" asked Clara.
"From one hundred and fifty to two hundred feet," was replied, "and on the north-west coast of America one called the 'Douglas's pine' is the loftiest tree known; it is said to measure over three hundred feet. 'From the pines are obtained the best masts and much of the most valuable ship-timber, and in the building and finishing of houses they are of almost indispensable utility. The bark of some of them, as the hemlock and larch, is of great value in tanning, and from others are obtained the various kinds of pitch, tar, turpentine, resin and balsams,' The pines and firs have circles of branches in imperfect whorls around the trunk, and, as one of these whorls is formed each year, it is easy to calculate the age of young trees. In thick woods the lower whorls of branches soon decay for want of light and air, and this leaves a smooth trunk, which rises without a branch, like a beautiful shaft, for a hundred feet or more.
"These trees are found everywhere except in the hot regions around the equator. The white pine is the most common, but in the evergreen woods of our own country it is mixed with pitch-pine and fir trees. In our Southern States there are thin forests, called pine-barrens, through which one can travel for miles on horseback. The white pine is easily distinguished by its leaves being in fives, by its very long cones, composed of loosely-arranged scales, and when young by the smoothness and delicate light-green color of the bark. It is known throughout New England by the name 'white pine,' which is given it on account of the whiteness of the wood. In England it is called the Weymouth pine.
"Many very large trees are found in Maine, on the Penobscot River, but most of the largest and most valuable timber trees have been cut down. The lumberers, as they are called, are constantly hewing down the grand old trees for timber, white pine being the principal timber of New England and Canada."
"And they float it down the rivers on rafts, don't they?" said Malcolm. "Won't you tell us about that, Miss Harson?"
"Yes," was the reply.--"But do not look so expectant, Edie; it is not a story, dear, only a description of pine-cutting in the forests of Maine and Canada. But I should like you to know how these great trees are turned into timber, and you will see that, like many other necessary things, it is neither easy nor pleasant. We do not get much without hard work on the part of somebody: remember that. Now I will read:
"'The business of procuring trees suitable for masts of ships is difficult and fatiguing. The pines which grew in the neighborhood of the rivers and in the most accessible places have all been cut down. Paths have now to be cleared with immense labor to the recesses of the forest, in order to obtain a fresh supply. This arduous employment is called "lumbering," and those who engage in it are "lumberers." The word "lumber," in its general sense, applies to all kinds of timber. But though many different trees, such as oak, ash and maple, are cut down, yet the main business is with the pines. And when a suitable plot of ground has been chosen for erecting a saw-mill,' to prepare the boards, 'it is called "pine-land," or a spot where the pine trees predominate.
"'A body of wood-cutters unite to form what is called a "lumbering-party," and they are in the employ of a master-lumberman, who pays them wages and finds them in provisions. The provisions are obtained on credit and under promise of payment when the timber has been cut down and sold. If the timber meets with any accident in its passage down the river, the master-lumberman cannot make good the loss, and the shopkeeper loses his money.
"'When the lumbering-party are ready to start, they take with them a supply of necessaries, and also what tools they will require, and proceed up the river to the heart of the forest. When they reach a suitable spot where the giant trees which are to serve for masts grow thick and dark, they get all their supplies on shore--their axes, their cooking-utensils and the casks of molasses'--and too often of whisky or rum, too, I am sorry to say--'that will be used lavishly. The molasses is used instead of sugar to sweeten the great draughts of tea--made, not from the product of China, but from the tops of the hemlock.
"'The first thing to be done is to build some kind of shelter, for they must remain in the forest until spring, and the cold of those Northern winters is terrible. Their cabin--for it cannot be called by any better name--is built of logs of wood cut down on purpose and put together as rudely as possible. It is only five feet high, and the roof is covered with boards. There is a great blazing fire kept up day and night, for the frost is intense, and the provisions have to be kept in a deep place made in the ground under the cabin. The smoke of the fire goes out through a hole in the roof, and the floor is strewn with branches of fir, the only couch the poor hardworking lumberers have to rest upon. When night comes, they turn into the cabin to sleep, and lie with their feet to the fire. If a man chances to awaken, he instantly jumps up and throws fresh logs on the fire; for it is of the utmost importance not to let it go out. One of the men is the cook for the whole party, and his duty is to have breakfast ready before it is light in the morning. He prepares a meal of boiled meat and the hemlock tea sweetened with molasses, and the rest of the party partake heartily of both, and in some camps also of rum, under the mistaken notion that it helps them to bear the severe toil. When breakfast is over, they divide into several gangs. One gang cuts down the trees, another saws them in pieces, and the third gang is occupied in conveying them, by means of oxen, to the bank of the nearest stream, which is now frozen over.
"'It is a hard winter for the lumbermen. The snow covers the ground until the middle of May, and the frost is often intense. But they toil through it, felling, sawing and conveying until a quantity of trees have been laid prostrate and made available for the market. Then, at last, the weather changes; the snow begins to melt and the streams and rills are set at liberty. The rivers flow briskly on and are much swollen with the melting snow, and the men say that the freshets have come down.
"'Hard as their toil has been, the most difficult and fatiguing has yet to be encountered. The timber is collected on the banks of the river, and has now to be thrown into the water and made into rafts, so that it can be floated down to the nearest market-town. The water, filled with melting snow, is deadly cold and can scarcely be endured, but the men are in it from morning till night constructing the rafts, which are put together as simply as possible, and the smallest outlay made to suffice. The rafts are of different sizes, according to the breadth of the stream; and when all is ready, they are launched, and the convoy fairly sets out on its voyage.
"'The great ugly masses of floating timber move slowly along under the care of a pilot, and the lumberers ride upon the rafts, often without shelter or protection from the weather. They guide themselves by long and powerful poles fixed on pivots, and which act as rudders. As they journey down the stream they sing and shout and make the utmost noise and riot. If there comes a storm or a change of weather, the pilot steers his convoy into some safe creek for the night, and secures it as best he can.
"'Thus by degrees the raft reaches the place of destination, occasionally with some loss and damage to the timber. In this case the master-lumberer bears the loss, and is obliged to refund the expenses incurred as best he can. At any rate, the men are now paid off, and set out on foot for their homes.'"
Malcolm was particularly delighted with this narrative of stirring activity, and even the little girls seemed very much interested in it. They were so sorry for the poor lumbermen who had such dreary winters off there in the Northern woods, and Clara wondered if they couldn't have warm comforters and mittens.
"They probably have those things when they go into camp," said Miss Harson, "but they are likely to find them in the way of working, and to cast them aside.--Great ships are not built for nothing: even to get the timber in readiness costs heavy labor, but, after all, no doubt, the men get interested in it and enjoy its excitement. Fortunately for the many uses to which its timber is put, the white pine grows very rapidly, gaining from fifteen inches to three feet every year. In deep and damp old woods it is slower of growth; it is then almost without sap-wood and has a yellowish color like the flesh of the pumpkin. For this reason it is called 'pumpkin-pine.' The bark of young trees of the white-pine species is very smooth and of a reddish, bottle-green color. It is covered in summer with a pearly gloss. On old trunks the bark is less rough than that of any other pine. This tree has the spreading habit of the cedar of Lebanon. In addition to its grand and picturesque character, the white pine, says a lover of trees, may be 'regarded as a true symbol of benevolence. Under its outspread roof numerous small animals, nestling in the bed of dry leaves that cover the ground, find shelter and repose. The squirrel feeds upon the kernels obtained from its cones; the hare browses upon the trefoil'--clover--'and the spicy foliage of the _hypericum_'--St. John's wort--'which are protected in its shade; and the fawn reposes on its brown couch of leaves unmolested by the outer tempest. From its green arbors the quails are often roused in midwinter, where they feed upon the berries of the _Mitchella_ and the spicy wintergreen. Nature, indeed, seems to have specially designed this tree to protect her living creatures both in summer and in winter.'"
"Hurrah for the white pine," said Malcolm, with great energy, "the grand old _American_ tree!"
"I'm glad that the little birds and animals have such a nice home under it in winter," said Clara.
"I'm glad too," added Edith, "but I wish we could find some and see how they look in their soft bed. Don't they ever put their heads out the least bit, Miss Harson?"
"Not when they suspect that there is any one around, dear, and the little creatures are very sharp to find this out. Our heavenly Father, you know, takes thought for sparrows and all such helpless things, and they are fed and cared for without any thought of their own.--The white pine," she continued, "is truly a magnificent tree, but I think we shall find that the pitch-pine is also very useful."
"That's the rough one," said Malcolm; "I remember how it looks, with little tufts sticking out along the trunk."
"Yes," replied his governess, "and out authority says this tree is distinguished by its leaves being in threes--the white pine, you know, has them in _fives_--by the rigidity and sharpness of the scales of its cones, by the roughness of its bark, and by the denseness of the brushes of its stiff, crowded leaves. Its usual height is from forty to fifty feet, but it is sometimes much taller. The trunk is not only rough, but very dark in color; and from this circumstance the species is frequently called black pine. The wood is very hard and firm, and contains a quantity of resin. This is much more abundant in the branches than in the trunk, and the boards and other lumber of this wood are usually full of pitch-knots."
"What are pitch-knots?" asked Clara.
"'When a growing branch,'" read Miss Harson, "'is broken off, the remaining portion becomes charged with resin,' which is deposited by the resin-bearing sap of the tree, 'forming what is called a pitch-knot, extending sometimes to the heart. The same thing takes place through the whole heart of a tree when, full of juice, its life is suddenly destroyed.' 'Resin' is another name for turpentine, but is used of it commonly when hardened into a solid form. The tar is obtained by slowly burning splintered pine, both trunk and root, with a smothered flame, and collecting the black liquid, which is expelled by the heat and caught in cavities beneath the burning pile. Pitch is thickened tar, and is used in calking ships and for like purposes."
"I am going to remember that," said Malcolm; "I could never make out what all those different things meant."
"What are you thinking about so seriously, Clara?" asked her governess. "If it is a puzzle, let me see if I cannot solve it for you."
"Well, Miss Harson, I was thinking of those brown leaves, or 'needles,' in the pine-woods, and it seems strange to say that the leaves of evergreens never fall off."
"It would not only be strange, dear, but quite untrue, to say that; for the same leaves do not, of course, remain for ever on the tree. The deciduous trees lose their leaves in the autumn and are entirely bare until the next spring, but the evergreens, although they renew their leaves, too, are never left without verdure of some sort. Late in October you may see the yellow or brown foliage of the pines, then ready to fall, surrounding the branches of the previous year's growth, forming a whorl of brown fringe surmounted by a tuft of green leaves of the present year's growth. Their leaves always turn yellow before the fall."
CHAPTER XIX.
_GIANT AND NUT PINES_.
Great was the surprise of Edith when Miss Harson gave the little sleeper a gentle shake and told her that it was time to be up. But the birds without the window told the same story, and the little maiden was soon at the breakfast-table and ready for the day's duties and enjoyments, including their "tree-talk."
"Are there any more kinds of pine trees?" asked Malcolm.
[Illustration: "AWAKE, LITTLE ONE!"]
"Yes, indeed!--more than we can take up this summer," replied Miss Harson. "There is the Norway pine, or red pine, which in Maine and New Hampshire is often seen in forests of white and pitch pine. It has a tall trunk of eighty feet or so, and a smooth reddish bark. The leaves are in twos, six or eight inches long, and form large tufts or brushes at the end of the branchlets. The wood is strong and resembles that of the pitch-pine, but it contains no resin. The giant pines of California belong to a different species from any that we have been considering, and the genus, or order, in which they have been arranged is called _Sequoia_[19]. They are generally known, however, as the 'Big Trees.' In one grove there are a hundred and three of them, which cover a space of fifty acres, called 'Mammoth-Tree Grove.' One of the giants has been felled--a task which occupied twenty-two days. It was impossible to cut it down, in the ordinary sense of the term, and the men had to bore into it with augers until it was at last severed in twain. Even then the amazing bulk of the tree prevented it from falling, and it still kept its upright position. Two more days were employed in driving wedges into the severed part on one side, thus to compel the giant to totter and fall. The trunk was no less than three hundred and two feet in height and ninety-six in circumference. The stump, which was left standing, presented such a large surface that a party of thirty couples have danced with ease upon it and still left abundant room for lookers-on."
[19] _Sequoia gigantea_.
When the children had sufficiently exclaimed over the size of this huge tree, their governess continued:
"It is thought that these trees must have been growing for more than two thousand years, which would make them probably two hundred years old at the birth of our Saviour. Does it not seem wonderful to think of? There are other groups of giant pines scattered on the mountains and in the forests, and some youthful giants about five hundred years old."
"I suppose they are the babies of the family," said Clara; and this idea amused Edith very much.
"There is still another kind of pine," said Miss Harson--"the Italian, or stone, pine. It is shaped almost exactly like an umbrella with a very long handle. The _Pinus pinea_ bears large cones, the seed of which is not only eatable, but considered a delicious nut. The cone is three years in ripening; it is then about four inches long and three wide, and has a reddish hue. Each scale of which the cone is formed is hollow at the base and contains a seed much larger than that of any other species. When the cone is ripe, it is gathered by the owners of the forest; and when thoroughly dried on the roof or thrown for a few minutes into the fire, it separates into many compartments, from each of which drops a smooth white nut in shape like the seed of the date. The shell is very hard, and within it is the fruit, which is much used in making sweetmeats. The stone-pine is found also in Palestine, and is supposed to be the cypress of the Bible. The author of _The Ride Through Palestine_[20] speaks of passing through a fine grove of the stone-pine, 'tall and umbrella-topped,' with dry sticks rising oddly here and there from the very tops of the trees. These sticks were covered with birdlime, to snare the poor bird which might be tempted to set foot on such treacherous supports; and if the cones were ripe, they would be quite sure to do it. Here is the picture, from the book just mentioned. Italian pine is a prettier name than stone-pine, and this is the name by which it is known to artists, who put it into almost every picture of Italian scenery.
"'Much they admire that old religious tree With shaft above the rest upshooting free, And shaking, when its dark locks feel the wind, Its wealthy fruit with rough and massive rind.'"
[20] Presbyterian Board of Publication.
[Illustration: STONE-PINE--"FIR" _(Pinus maritima_)].
"But how queer it sounds to call fruit _wealthy_!" said Malcolm.
"It is odd," replied his governess, "only because the word is not now used in that sense; but the fruit is wealthy both because of its abundance and because it can be put to so many uses. Let us see what is said of it:
"'The kernels, or seeds, from the cones of the stone-pine have always been esteemed as a delicacy. In the old days of Rome and Greece they were preserved in honey, and some of the larders of the ill-fated city of Pompeii were amply stored with jars of this agreeable conserve, which were found intact after all those years. The kernels are also sugared over and used as _bonbons_. They enter into many dishes of Italian cookery, but great care has to be taken not to expose them to the air. They are usually kept in the cones until they are wanted, and will then retain their freshness for some years. The squirrels eagerly seek after the fruit of this pine and almost subsist upon it. They take the cone in their paws and dash out the seeds, thus scattering many of them and helping to propagate the tree.
"'There is a bird called the crossbill that makes its nest in the pine. It fixes its nest in place by means of the resin of the tree and coats it with the same material, so as to render it impervious to the rain. The seeds from the cones form its chief food, and it extracts them with its curious bill, the two parts of which cross each other. It grasps the cone with its foot, after the fashion of a parrot, and digs into it with the upper part of its bill, which is like a hook, and forces out the seed with a jerk.'"
[Illustration: PINE-CONE (_Pinus Sylvestris_.)]
The children enjoyed this account very much, and they thought that stone-pine nuts--which they had never seen, and perhaps never would see--must be the most delicious nuts that ever grew.
"What nice times the birds have," said Clara, "helping themselves to all the good things that other people can't reach!"
"They are not exactly 'people,'" replied Miss Harson, laughing; "and, in spite of all these 'nice times,' you would not be quite willing to change with them, I think."
No, on the whole, Clara was quite sure that she would not.
CHAPTER XX.
_MORE WINTER TREES: THE FIRS AND THE SPRUCES_.
There were some beautiful evergreens on the lawn at Elmridge, and, although the foliage seemed dark in summer, it gave the place a very cheerful look in winter, when other trees were quite bare, while the birds flew in and out of them so constantly that spring seemed to have come long before it really did arrive.
"This balsam-fir," said Miss Harson as they stood near a tall, beautiful tree that tapered to a point, "has, you see, a straight, smooth trunk and tapers regularly and rapidly to the top. You will notice, too, that the leaves, which are needle-shaped and nearly flat, do not grow in clusters, but singly, and that their color is peculiar. There are faint white lines on the upper part and a silvery-blue tinge beneath, and this silvery look is produced by many lines of small, shining resinous dots. The deep-green bark, striped with gray, is full of balsam, or resin, known as balm of Gilead or Canada balsam, and highly valued as a cure for diseases of the lungs. The long cones are erect, or standing, and grow thickly near the ends of the upper branches. They have round, bluish-purple scales, and the soft color has a very pretty effect on the tree. They ripen every year, and the lively little squirrel, as he is called, feasts upon them, as the crossbill does on the cones of the stone-pine. But the mischievous little animal also barks the boughs and gnaws off the tops of the leading shoots, so that many trees are injured and defaced by his depredations."
[Illustration: AMERICAN WHITE SPRUCE.]
"He _is_ a lively little squirrel," observed Malcolm. "How he does race! But he doesn't gnaw our trees, does he?"
"No, I think not, for he prefers staying in the woods and fields; but fir-woods are his especial delight. Our balsam-fir is the American sister of the silver fir of Europe, both having bluish-green foliage with a silvery under surface, in a single row on either side of the branches, which curve gracefully upward at the ends. The tree has a peculiarly light, airy appearance until it is old, when there is little foliage except at the ends of the branches. The silver fir is one of the tallest trees on the continent of Europe, and it is remarkable for the beauty of its form and foliage and the value of its timber."
"I know what this tree is," said Clara, turning to an evergreen of stately form and graceful, drooping branches that almost touched the ground: "it's Norway spruce. Papa told me this morning."
[Illustration: THE NORWAY PINE.]
"Yes," replied her governess, "and a beautiful tree it is, like the fir in many respects, but the bark is rougher and the cones droop. The branches, too, are lower and more sweeping. But the fir and the spruce are more alike than many sisters and brothers. The Scotch fir, about which there are many interesting things to be learned, is more rugged-looking, and the Norway spruce, which will bear studying too, is more grand and majestic."
[Illustration: THE HEMLOCK SPRUCE.]
"I know this one, Miss Harson," said little Edith as they came to a sweeping hemlock near the bay-window of the dining-room.
"Yes, dear," was the reply; "Hemlock Lodge has made you feel very well acquainted with the tree after which it is named. It is one of the most beautiful of the evergreens, with its widely-spreading branches and their delicate, fringe-like foliage; but, although the branches are ornamental for church and house decoration, they are very perishable, and drop their small needles almost immediately when placed in a heated room. And now," continued the young lady, "we have come back to warm piazza-days again, and can have our talk in the open air."
So on the piazza they speedily established themselves, with Miss Harson in the low, comfortable chair and her audience on the crimson cushions that had been piled up in a corner.
"We shall find a great deal about the fir tree," said Miss Harson, "as it is very hardy and rugged, and as common in all Northern regions as the white birch--quite as useful, too, as we shall soon see. This rugged species--which is generally called the Scotch fir--is not so smooth and handsome as our balsam-fir, but it is a tree which the people who live near the great Northern forests of Europe could not easily do without. It belongs to the great pine family and is often called a pine, but in the countries of Great Britain especially it is called the Scotch fir. Although well shaped, it is not a particularly elegant-looking tree. The branches are generally gnarled and broken, and the style of the tree is more sturdy than graceful. The Scotch fir often grows to the height of a hundred feet, and the bark is of a reddish tinge. 'It is one of the most useful of the tribe, and, like the bountiful palm, confers the greatest blessing on the inhabitants of the country where it grows. It serves the peasants of the bleak, barren parts of Sweden and Lapland for food: their scanty supply of meal often runs short, and they go to the pine to eke it out. They choose the oldest and least resinous of the branches and take out the inner bark. They first grind it in a mill, and then mix it with their store of meal; after this it is worked into dough and made into cakes like pancakes. The bark-bread is a valuable addition to their slender resources, and sometimes the young shoots are used as well as the bark. Indeed, so largely is this store of food drawn upon that many trees have been destroyed, and in some places the forest is actually thinned."
"They're as bad as the squirrels," said Malcolm. "But how I should hate to eat such stuff!"
"It may not be so very bad," replied his governess. "Some people think that only white bread is fit to eat, but I think that Kitty's brown bread is rather liked in this family."
The children all laughed, for didn't papa declare--with _such_ a sober face!--that they were eating him out of house and home in brown bread alone? Kitty, too, pretended to grumble because the plump loaves disappeared so fast, but she said to herself at the same time, "Bless their hearts! let 'em eat: it's better than a doctor's bill."
"A great many other things besides pancakes are made from the tree," continued Miss Harson, "and the fresh green tops furnish very nice carpets."
There was a faint "_Oh!_" at this, but, after all, it was not so surprising as the cakes had been.
"They are scattered on the floors of houses as rushes used to be in old times in England, and thus they serve as carpet and prevent the mud and dirt that stick to the shoes of the peasants from staining the floor; and when trodden on, the leaves give out a most agreeable aromatic perfume."
"I'd like that part," said Clara.
[Illustration: THE BLUE SPRUCE.]
"But you cannot have one part without taking it all; almost everything, you see, has a pleasant side.--'The peasant finds no limit to the use of the pine. Of its bark he makes the little canoe which is to carry him along the river; it is simple in its construction, and as light as possible. When he comes within safe distance of one of those gushing, foaming cataracts that he meets with in his course, he pushes his canoe to land and carries it on his shoulders until the danger is past; then he launches it again, and paddles merrily onward. Not a single nail is used in his canoe: the planks are tightly secured together by a natural cordage made of the roots of the pine. He splits them of the right thickness, and with very little preparation they form exactly the material he needs.'"
Malcolm evidently had some idea of making a canoe of this kind, but he became discouraged when his governess reminded him that he could not cut down trees, and that his father would prefer having them left standing. It did not seem necessary to speak of any difficulties in the way of putting the boat together.
"Another use for the fir is to light up the poor hut of the peasant. 'He splits up the branches into laths and makes them into torches. If he wants a light, he takes one of the laths and kindles it at the fire; then he fixes it in a rude frame, which serves him for a candlestick. The light is very brilliant while it lasts, but is soon spent, and he is in darkness again. The same use is made of the pine. It is no unusual circumstance, in the Scotch pine-woods, to come upon a tree with the trunk scooped out from each side and carried away: the cottager has been to fetch material for his candles. But this somewhat rough usage does not hurt the tree, and it continues green and healthy.' In our Southern States pine-fat with resin is called lightwood, and is used for the same purpose."
"That's an easy way of getting candles," said Clara.
"Easy, perhaps, compared with the trouble of moulding them," replied Miss Harson, "but I do not think we should fancy either way of preparing them."
"Is there anything to tell about the spruce tree?" asked Malcolm.
"It is too much like the fir," replied his governess, "to have any very distinct character; but there are species here, known as the white and black spruce, besides the hemlock."
But the children thought that hemlock was hemlock: how did it come to be spruce?
"Because it has the family features--leaves solitary and very short; cones pendulous, or hanging, with the scales thin at the edge; and the fruit ripens in a single year. The hemlock-spruce, as it is sometimes called, is, I think, the most beautiful of the family. 'It is distinguished from all the other pines by the softness and delicacy of its tufted foliage, from the spruce by its slender, tapering branchlets and the smoothness of its limbs, and from the balsam-fir by its small terminal cones, by the irregularity of its branches and the gracefulness of its whole appearance.' The delicate green of the young trees forms a rich mass of verdure, and at this season each twig has on the end a tuft of new leaves yellowish-green in color and making a beautiful contrast to the darker hue of last year's foliage. The bark of the trunk is reddish, and that of the smooth branches and small twigs is light gray. The branchlets are very small, light and slender, and are set irregularly on the sides of the small branches; so that they form a flat surface. This arrangement renders them singularly well adapted to the making of brooms--a use of the hemlock familiar to housekeepers in the country towns throughout New England. The leaves, which are extremely delicate and of a silvery whiteness on the under side, are arranged in a row on each side of the branchlets. The slender, thread-like stems on which they grow make them move easily with the slightest breath of wind, and this, with the silvery hue underneath, gives to the foliage a glittering look that is very pretty. But I think you all can tell me when the hemlock is prettiest?"
"After a snow-storm," said Clara. "Don't we all look, almost the first thing, at the tree by the dining-room window?"
"Yes," replied Miss Harson; "it is a beautiful sight with the snow lying on it in masses and the dark green of the leaves peeping through. 'The branches put forth irregularly from all parts of the trunk, and lie one above another, each bending over at its extremities upon the surface of those below, like the feathers upon the wings of a bird,' And soft, downy plumes they look, with the snow resting on them and making them more feathery than ever."
"So they are like feathers?" said Malcolm, to whom this was a new idea, "I'll look for 'em the next time it snows; yet--" He was going to add that he wished it would snow to-morrow; but remembering that it was only the beginning of June, and that Miss Harson had shown them how each season has its pleasures, he stopped just in time.
"The pretty little cones of the hemlock, which grow very thickly on the tree, have a crimson tinge at first, and turn to a light brown. They are found hanging on the ends of the small branches, and they fall during the autumn and winter. This tree is a native of the coldest parts of North America, where it is found in whole forests, and it flourishes on granite rocks on the sides of hills exposed to the most violent storms. The wood is firm and contains very little resin; it is much used for building-purposes. A great quantity of tannin is obtained from the bark; and when mixed with that of the oak, it is valuable for preparing leather.
"We have taken the prettiest of the spruces first," continued Miss Harson, "and now we must see what are the differences between them. 'The two species of American spruce, the black and the white--or, as they are more commonly called, the double and the single--are distinguished from the fir and the hemlock in every stage of growth by the roughness of the bark on their branches, produced by little ridges running down from the base of each leaf, and by the disposition of the leaves, which are arranged in spirals equally on every side of the young shoots. The double is distinguished from the single spruce by the darker color of the foliage--whence its name of black spruce--by the greater thickness, in proportion to the length, of the cones, and by the looseness of its scales, which are jagged, or toothed, on the edge.' It is a well-proportioned tree, but stiff-looking, and the dark foliage, which never seems to change, gives it a gloomy aspect. The leaves are closely arranged in spiral lines. The black spruce is never a very large tree, but the wood is light, elastic and durable, and is valuable in shipbuilding, for making ladders and for shingles. The young shoots are much in demand for making spruce-beer. The white spruce is more slender and tapering, and the bark and leaves are lighter. The root is very tough, and the Canadian Indians make threads from the fibres, with which they sew together the birch-bark for their canoes. The wood is as valuable as that of the black spruce."
"Does the Norway spruce come from Norway?" asked Clara.
"Yes; that is its native land, where it presents its most grand and beautiful appearance. There it 'rivals the palm in stature, and even attains the height of one hundred and eighty feet. Its handsome branches spread out on every side and clothe the trunk to its base, while the summit of the tree ends in an arrow-like point. In very old trees the branches droop at the extremities, and not only rest upon the ground, but actually take root in it and grow. Thus a number of young trees are often seen clustering around the trunk of an old one.'"
"Why, that's like the banyan tree," said Malcolm.
"Only there is a difference in the manner of growth, for the branches of the banyan are some distance from the ground and send forth rootlets without touching it. The Norway spruce is also the great tree of the Alps, where it seems to match the majestic scenery. The timber is valuable for building; and when sawed into planks, it is called white deal, while that of the Scotch fir is red deal.
"And now," said Miss Harson, "before we leave the firs, let us see what is said about them in the Bible. They were used for shipbuilding in the city of Tyre; for the prophet Ezekiel says, 'They have made all thy ship boards of fir trees of Senir[21],' and it is written that 'David and all the house of Israel played before the Lord on all manner of instruments made of firwood[22].' The same wood was used then in building houses, as you will find, Malcolm, by turning to the Song of Solomon, seventh chapter, seventeenth verse."
[21] Ezek. xxvii. 5.
[22] 2 Sam. vi. 5.
"'The beams of our house are cedar, and our rafters of fir,'" read Malcolm.
"In Kings it is said, 'So Hiram gave Solomon cedar trees and fir trees, according to his desire[23],' and these trees were to be used for the very house, or palace, of which the Jewish king speaks in his Song. Evergreens are often mentioned in the Bible, and in that beautiful Christmas chapter, the sixtieth of Isaiah, you will find the fir tree again.--Read the thirteenth verse, Clara."
[23] I Kings v. 10.
"'The glory of Lebanon shall come unto thee, the fir tree, the pine tree, and the box together, to beautify the place of my sanctuary; and I will make the place of my feet glorious.'--What is 'the glory of Lebanon,' Miss Harson?"
"The cedar of Lebanon, dear; and we will now turn our attention to that and the other cedars."
CHAPTER XXI.
_THE CEDARS_.
"The cypress tribe," said Miss Harson, "differ from the pines, or Coniferae, by not having their fruit in a true cone, but in a roundish head which consists of a small number of scales, sometimes forming a sort of berry. One of the most common of this family is the arbor vitae, or tree of life--a tree so small as to look like a pointed shrub, and more used for fences than for ornament. An arbor-vitae hedge, you know, divides our flower garden from the kitchen-garden and goes all the way down to the brook."
"I like the smell of it," said Clara. "Don't you, Miss Harson?"
[Illustration: SIBERIAN ARBOR VITAE]
"Yes," was the reply, "there is something very fresh and pleasant about it; and when well kept, as John is sure to keep ours, it makes a beautiful hedge. As a tree it has been known to reach forty or fifty feet in height, with a trunk ten feet in circumference. The leaves are arranged in four rows, in alternately opposite pairs, and seem to make up the fan-like branchlets. These branchlets look like parts of a large compound, flat leaf. The bark is slightly furrowed, smooth to the touch, and very white when the tree stands exposed. The wood is reddish, somewhat odorous, very light, soft and fine-grained. In the northern part of the United States and in Canada it holds the first place for durability."
"I thought the cypress was a flower," said Malcolm.
"So one kind of cypress is," replied his governess--"the blossom of an airy-looking and beautiful creeper; but the name also belongs to a family of trees. The white cedar, or cypress, is a very graceful tree which generally grows in swamps. 'It is entirely free from the stiffness of the pines, and to the spiry top of the poplar it unites the airy lightness of the hemlock. The trunk is straight and tall, tapering very gradually, and toward the top there are short irregular branches, forming a small but beautiful head, above which the leading shoot waves like a slender plume.' The leaves are very small and scale-like, with sharp points, and grow in four rows on the ends of the branchlets, giving them the appearance of large compound leaves. The wood is very durable, and is used for many building-purposes. It is generally of a faint rose-color, and always keeps its aromatic odor."
[Illustration: IRISH JUNIPER.]
"Is that what our cedar-chests are made of to keep the moths from our winter clothes?" asked Clara.
"Yes," replied Miss Harson, "but the name 'cedar' is; not correct, though it is one commonly given to this tree. The wood of the European cypress is also used for many purposes where strength and durability are required, for it really seems never to wear out. This tree is described as tapering and cone-like, with upright branches growing close to the trunk, and in its general appearance a little resembling a poplar. Its frond-like branches are closely covered with very small sharp-pointed leaves of a yellow-green color, smooth and shining, and they remain on the tree five or six years. The cypress is often seen in burying-grounds in Europe, and in Turkey it often stands at each end of a grave. The oldest tree in Europe is thought to be an Italian cypress said to have been planted in the year of our Saviour's birth; it is an object of great reverence in the neighborhood. This ancient tree is a hundred and twenty feet high and twenty-three feet around the trunk.
"The juniper--or red cedar, as it is improperly called--is not a handsome tree, but it is a very useful one. It has a scraggy, stunted look, and the foliage is apt to be rusty; but it will grow in rocky, sandy places where no other tree would even try to hold up its head, and the wood, when made into timber, lasts for a great many years. Posts for fences are made of the juniper or red cedar, and the shipbuilder, boatbuilder, carpenter, cabinet-maker and turner are all steady customers for it. The 'cedar-apples' found on this tree are one phase of the life of a very curious fungus. They are covered with a reddish-brown bark; and when fresh, they are tough and fleshy, somewhat like an unripe apple. When dry they become of a woody nature."
"They pucker up your mouth awfully," said Malcolm, who had made several attempts to eat them; but, do what he would, he could not even "make believe" they were nice.
"I have no doubt of it," was the reply, "remembering the dreadful faces I have seen on some of our rambles. But the birds like them, as they do everything of the kind that is not poisonous."
*       *       *       *       *
"Isn't it beautiful?" exclaimed the children, in delight. They were admiring a magnificent cedar of Lebanon in one of the pictures which Miss Harson had collected for their benefit, and it seemed no wonder that the grand spreading tree should be called "the glory of Lebanon."
"It is indeed beautiful," replied their governess; "and think of seeing a whole mountain covered with such trees! A traveler speaks of them as the most solemnly impressive trees in the world, and says that their massive trunks, clothed with a scaly texture almost like the skin of living animals and contorted with all the irregularities of age, may well have suggested those ideas of royal, almost divine, strength and solidity which the sacred writers ascribe to them.--Turn to the ninety-second psalm, Clara, and read the twelfth verse."
"'The righteous shall flourish like the palm tree; he shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon.'"
"In the thirty-first chapter of Ezekiel," continued Miss Harson, "it is written, 'Behold, the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon with fair branches, and with a shadowing shroud, and of an high stature; and his top was among the thick boughs. The waters made him great, the deep set him up on high with her rivers running round about his plants, and sent out her little rivers unto all the trees of the field. Therefore his height was exalted above all the trees of the field and his boughs were multiplied, and his branches became long because of the multitude of waters, when he shot forth. All the fowls of heaven made their nests in his boughs, and under his branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young, and under his shadow dwelt all great nations.'"
[Illustration: CEDAR OF LEBANON.]
"Are the leaves like those of our cedar trees?" asked Malcolm, who was studying the picture quite intently. "The tree doesn't look like 'em."
"They are somewhat like them," replied his governess, "being slender and straight and about an inch long. They grow in tufts, and in the centre of some of the tufts there is a small cone which is very pretty and often brought to this country by travelers for their friends at home. In _The Land and the Book_ there is a picture of small branches with cones, and the author says of the cedar: 'There is a striking peculiarity in the shape of this tree which I have not seen any notice of in books of travel. The branches are thrown out horizontally from the parent trunk. These again part into limbs, which preserve the same horizontal direction, and so on down to the minutest twigs; and even the arrangement of the clustered leaves has the same general tendency. Climb into one, and you are delighted with a succession of verdant floors spread around the trunk and gradually narrowing as you ascend. The beautiful cones seem to stand upon or rise out of this green flooring.' The same writer says that by examining the different growths of wood inside the trunk of one of the trees these ancient cedars of Lebanon have been proved to be three thousand five hundred years old."
"Oh, Miss Harson!" exclaimed her audience; "could any tree be as old as that?"
"It is possible. The circle of growing wood which is made each year is a pretty good method of telling the age of a tree, and these cedars of Lebanon are considered the oldest trees in the world. Travelers have always spoken of the beauty and symmetry of these trees, with their widespreading branches and cone-like tops. All through the Middle Ages a visit to the cedars of Lebanon was regarded by many persons in the light of a pilgrimage. Some of the trees were thought to have been planted by King Solomon himself, and were looked upon as sacred relics. Indeed, the visitors took away so many pieces from the bark that it was feared the trees would be destroyed. The cedars stand in a valley a considerable way up the mountain, where the snow renders it inaccessible for part of the year."
"Are the trees just in one particular place, then?" asked Malcolm. "I thought they grew all over that country?"
"The principal and best-known grove of very large and ancient cedars of Lebanon is found in one place," replied his governess, "but there are other groves now known to exist. The famous grove was fast disappearing, until there were but few of them left. The pilgrims who went to visit them in such numbers in olden times were accompanied by monks from a monastery about four miles below, who would beseech them not to injure a single leaf. But the greatest care could not preserve the trees. Some of them have been struck down by lightning, some broken by enormous loads of snow, and others torn to fragments by tempests. Some have even been cut down with axes like any common tree. But better care is now taken of them; so that we may hope that the grove will live and increase."
"But why weren't they saved," asked Clara, "when people thought so much of them?"
"It seems to be a part of the general desolation of the land of God's chosen but rebellious people. In the third chapter of the prophet Isaiah, verses eleven and twelve, it is said, 'For the day of the Lord of hosts shall be upon every one that is proud and lofty, and upon every one that is lifted up; and he shall be brought low; and upon all the cedars of Lebanon, that are high and lifted up, and upon all the oaks of Bashan.' The same prophet says, in the tenth chapter and nineteenth verse, 'And the rest of the trees of his forest shall be few, that a child may write them.' These words have been particularly applied to the stately cedars of Lebanon, for 'the once magnificent grove is but a speck on the mountain-side. Many persons have taken it in the distance for a wood of fir trees, but on approaching nearer and taking a closer view the cedars resume somewhat of their ancient majesty. The space they cover is not more than half a mile, but, once amidst them, the beautiful fan-like branches overhead, the exquisite green of the younger trees and the colossal size of the older ones fill the mind with interest and admiration. Within the grove all is hushed as in a land of the past. Where once the Tyrian workman plied his axe and the sound of many voices came upon the ear, there are now the silence and solitude of desertion and decay.'--Malcolm," added his governess, "you may read us what is written in the sixth verse of the fourteenth chapter of Hosea."
"'His branches,'" read Malcolm, "'shall spread, and his beauty shall be as the olive tree, and his smell as Lebanon.' What does that mean, Miss Harson?"
"It means the fragrant resin which exudes from both the trunk and the cones of the beautiful cedar. It is soft, and its fragrance is like that of the balsam of Mecca. 'Everything about this tree has a strong balsamic odor, and hence the whole grove is so pleasant and fragrant that it is delightful to walk in it. The wood is peculiarly adapted for building, because it is not subject to decay, nor is it eaten of worms. It was much used for rafters and for boards with which to cover houses and form the floors and ceilings of rooms. It was of a red color, beautiful, solid and free from knots. The palace of Persepolis, the temple of Jerusalem and Solomon's palace were all in this way built with cedar, and the house of the forest of Lebanon was perhaps so called from the quantity of this wood used in its construction.' We are told in First Kings that Solomon 'built also the house of the forest of Lebanon[24],' and that 'he made three hundred shields of beaten gold' and 'put them in the house of the forest of Lebanon[25].' All the drinking-vessels, too, of this wonderful palace, which is always spoken of as 'the house of the forest of Lebanon,' were of pure gold, and its magnificence shows how highly the beautiful cedar-wood was valued."
[24] I Kings vii. 2.
[25] I Kings x. 17.
CHAPTER XXII.
_THE PALMS_.
"There is a wonderful evergreen," said Miss Harson, "which grows in tropical countries, and also in some sub-tropical countries, such as the Holy Land, and is said to have nearly as many uses as there are days in a year. You must tell me what it is when you have seen the picture."
[Illustration: PALM TREE.]
Malcolm and Clara both pronounced it a palm tree, and Clara asked if there were any such trees growing in this country.
"Some of its relations are found on our Southern seacoast," replied their governess; "South Carolina, you know, is called 'the Palmetto State.' There is a member of the family called the cabbage-palmetto, the unexpanded leaves of which are used as a table vegetable, which you may see in Florida. Its young leaves are all in a mass at the top, and when boiled make a dish something like cabbage. The leaves of the palmetto are also used, when perfect, in the manufacture of hats, baskets and mats, and for many other purposes. But its stately and majestic cousin, the date-palm of the East, with its tall, slender stalk and magnificent crown of feathery leaves, has had its praises sung in every age and clime. 'Besides its great importance as a fruit-producer, it has a special beauty of its own when the clusters of dates are hanging in golden ripeness under its coronal of dark-green leaves. Its well-known fruit affords sustenance to the dwellers on the borders of the great African desert; it is as necessary to them as is the camel, and in many cases they may be said to owe their existence to it alone. The tree rears its column-like stem to the height of ninety feet, and its crown consists of fifty leaves about twelve feet in length and fringed at the edges like a feather. Between the leaf and the stem there issue several horny spathes, or sheaths, out of which spring clusters of panicles that bear small white flowers,' These flowers are followed by the dates, which grow in a dense bunch that hangs down several feet."
"But how do people manage to climb such a tree as that," asked Malcolm, "to get the dates? It goes straight up in the air without any branches, and looks as if it would snap in two if any one tried it."
"It does not snap, though, for it is very strong; and the climbing is easier than you imagine, even when the tree is a hundred feet high, as it sometimes is. The trunk, you see, is full of rugged knots. These projections are the remains of decayed leaves which have dropped off when their work was done. As the older leaves decay the stalk advances in height. It has not true wood, like most trees, but the stem has bundles of fibres that are closely pressed together on the outer part. Toward the root these are so entwined that they become as hard as iron and are very difficult to cut. The tree grows very slowly, but it lives for centuries. I have a Persian fable in rhyme for you, called
"'THE GOURD AND THE PALM.
"'"How old art thou?" said the garrulous gourd As o'er the palm tree's crest it poured Its spreading leaves and tendrils fine, And hung a-bloom in the morning shine. "A hundred years," the palm tree sighed.-- "And I," the saucy gourd replied, "Am at the most a hundred hours, And overtop thee in the bowers."
"'Through all the palm tree's leaves there went A tremor as of self-content. "I live my life," it whispering said, "See what I see, and count the dead; And every year of all I've known A gourd above my head has grown And made a boast like thine to-day, Yet here I stand; but where are they?"'"
The children were very much pleased with the fable, and they began to feel quite an affection for the venerable and useful palm tree.
"The date tree," continued their governess, "as this species of palm is often called, blossoms in April, and the fruit ripens in October. Each tree produces from ten to twelve bunches, and the usual weight of a bunch is about fifteen pounds. It is esteemed a crime to fell a date tree or to supply an axe intended for that purpose, even though the tree may belong to an enemy. The date-harvest is expected with as much anxiety by the Arab in the oasis as the gathering in of the wheat and corn in temperate regions. If it were to fail, the Arabs would be in danger of famine. The blessings of the date-palm are without limit to the Arab. Its leaves give a refreshing shade in a region where the beams of the sun are almost insupportable; men, and also camels, feed upon the fruit; the wood of the tree is used for fuel and for building the native huts; and ropes, mats, baskets, beds, and all kinds of articles, are manufactured from the fibres of the leaves. The Arab cannot imagine how a nation can exist without date-palms, and he may well regard it as the greatest injury that he can inflict upon his enemy to cut down his trees."
"Miss Harson," asked Edith, very earnestly, "isn't the palm tree in the Bible?"
[Illustration: DATE-PALM AT JERICHO.]
"It certainly is, dear," replied her governess, "and it is one of the trees most frequently mentioned. In Deuteronomy, thirty-fourth chapter, third verse, Jericho is called the 'city of palm trees.' Travelers still speak of these trees as yet growing in Palestine, but they are not nearly so abundant as they once were; near Jericho only one or two can be found. There are many allusions to the palm in the Scriptures. King David, in the ninety-second psalm, says that the righteous shall flourish like the palm tree: 'Those that be planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God. They shall bring forth fruit in old age.' The palm is always upright, in spite of rain or wind. 'There it stands, looking calmly down upon the world below, and patiently yielding its large clusters of golden fruit from generation to generation. It brings forth fruit in old age.' The allusion to being planted in the house of the Lord is probably drawn from the custom of planting beautiful and long-lived trees in the courts of temples and palaces. Solomon covered all the walls of the holy of holies round about with golden palm trees.--You will find this, Clara, in First Kings."
Clara read:
"'And he carved all the walls of the house round about with carved figures of cherubim and palm trees and open flowers, within and without[26].'"
[26] I Kings vi. 29.
"In the thirty-second verse," continued Miss Harson, "it is written that he overlaid them with gold, 'and spread gold upon the cherubim, and upon the palm trees.' 'They were thus planted, as it were, within the very house of the Lord; and their presence there was not only ornamental, but appropriate and highly suggestive--the very best emblem not only of patience in well-doing, but of the rewards of the righteous, a fat and flourishing old age, a peaceful end, a glorious immortality.'"
"What does a 'palmer' mean, Miss Harson?" asked Malcolm. "Is it a man who has palm trees or who sells dates? I saw the word in a book I was reading, but I couldn't understand what it meant."
"In olden times," replied his governess, "when people made so many pilgrimages, some of the pilgrims went to the Holy Land and some to Rome and other places; but those who went to Palestine were thought to be the most devout, both because it was so much farther off and because there were so many sacred spots to visit there. These pilgrims always brought home with them branches of palm, to show that they had really been to the land where the tree grew; and so they were called _palmers_. To say that such-a-one was a palmer was far more than to say that he was a pilgrim."
"Miss Harson," said Clara, holding up one of the books, "here is a picture called 'the cocoanut-palm,' but I didn't know that cocoanuts grew on palm trees. Will you tell us something about it?"
[Illustration: COCOANUT-PALM TREES IN SOUTH-EASTERN AFRICA.]
"Certainly I will, dear," was the reply. "I fully intended to do so, for the cocoanut-palm is too valuable a member of the family to be passed over. This species does not grow in Palestine, and it is not one of the trees of the Bible; its home is in the warmest countries, and it grows most luxuriantly in the islands of the tropics or near the seacoast on the main-lands. Although its general form is similar to that of the date-palm, the foliage and fruit are quite different. The leaves are very much broader, and they have not the light, airy look of the foliage of the date-palm. But 'the cocoanut-palm is the most valuable of Nature's gifts to the inhabitants of those parts of the tropics where it grows, and its hundred uses, as they are not inaptly called, extend beyond the tropics over the civilized world. The beautiful islands of the southern seas are fringed with cocoanut-palms that encircle them as with a green and feathery belt. The ripe nuts drop into the sea, but, protected by their husks, they float away until the tide washes them on to the shore of some neighboring island, where they can take root and grow.'"
"Wouldn't it be nice," said Edith, "if some would float here?"
"A great many cocoanuts float here in ships," replied Miss Harson, "but they would not take root and grow, because the climate is not suited to them; it is too cold for them. We cannot have tropical fruit without tropical heat, and I am sure that none of us would want such a change as that. You may sometimes see small cocoanut trees in hothouses or horticultural gardens, where they are shielded from our cold air. The island of Ceylon, in the East Indies, is full of cocoanut-palm trees, for they are carefully cultivated by the inhabitants, and the feathery groves stretch mile after mile. The tree shoots up a column-like stem to the height of a hundred feet, and is crowned with a tuft of broad leaves about twelve feet long. The flowers are yellowish white and grow in clusters, and the seed ripens into a hard nut which in its fibrous husk is about the size of an infant's head."
"I've seen the nut in its husk," said Malcolm, "when papa took me down to the wharf where the ships come in. There were lots of cocoanuts, and some of 'em had their coats on."
"This brown husk," continued his governess, "is a valuable part of the nut, for the toughest ropes and cables are made of its fibres, as well as the useful brown matting so generally used to cover offices and passages. Brushes, nets and other domestic articles are also manufactured from the husk. Scarcely any other tree in the world is so useful to man or contributes so much to his comfort as the cocoanut-palm. Food and drink are alike obtained from it. The kernel of the nut is an article of diet, and can be prepared in many ways. The native is almost sustained by it, and in Ceylon it forms a part of nearly every dish. The spathe that encloses the yet-unopened flowers is made to yield a favorite beverage called palm-wine, or, more familiarly, 'toddy.' When the fresh juice is used, it is an innocent and refreshing drink; but when left to ferment, it intoxicates, and is the one evil result from the bountiful gifts of the tree. Oil is prepared in great quantities from the nuts and used for various purposes."
"Are there any more kinds of palm trees?" asked the children.
"Yes," was the reply; "there are a great many members of this most useful family, but the one that will interest you most, after the date-and cocoanut-palm, is, I think, the sago-palm."
[Illustration: YOUNG COCOANUT TREE IN POT (_Cocos nucifera_).]
"Why, Miss Harson!" exclaimed Clara, in surprise; "does sago really grow on a tree?"
"It really grows _in_ a tree--for it is a kind of starch secreted by the tree for the use of its flowers and fruit--and in order to obtain it the tree has to be cut down. The pith is then taken out and cut in slices, soaked in water and roasted; and when it assumes the shape of the small globules in which we see it, it is ready for exportation."
"Well!" said Malcolm; "I never knew _that_ before. We've learned ever so many things, Miss Harson."
"There is one thing about the palm," said Miss Harson, "which I have purposely left for the last--especially as it is the last also of our trees for the present--and that is the sacred associations which its branches have for both Jews and Christians. The Jews were commanded on the first day of the feast of tabernacles to 'take the boughs of goodly trees, branches of palm trees, and the boughs of thick trees, and willows of the brook, to rejoice before the Lord their God.' The palm was a symbol of victory, and branches of it were strewn in the path of conquerors, more especially of those who had fought for religious truth. It is the emblem of the martyr, as a conqueror through Christ. The Sunday before Easter is called Palm Sunday because in the ancient churches leaves of palm were carried that day by worshipers in memory of those strewn in the way on the triumphal entry of the King of Zion into Jerusalem. You will find it, Malcolm, in John."
Malcolm read very reverently:
"'On the next day, much people that were come to the feast, when they heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, took branches of palm trees, and went forth to meet him, and cried, Hosanna; Blessed is the King of Israel that cometh in the name of the Lord[27].'"
[27] John xii. 12, 13.
"Here," said Miss Harson, "is a little hymn written on these very verses:
"'See a small procession slowly Toward the temple wind its way; In the midst rides, meek and lowly, One whom angel-hosts obey.
"'How the shouting crowd adore him, Now, for once, they know their King; Some their garments cast before him, Green palm-branches others bring.
"'Calmly, yet with holy sorrow, Christ permits the sacrifice. Knowing well that on the morrow Changed will be those fickle cries.
*       *       *       *       *
"'Children, when in prayers and praises Loudly we with lips adore, While the heart no anthem raises, Are not we like those of yore?
"'O Lord Jesus, let us never Lift the voice in heartless songs; Help us to remember ever All that to thy name belongs.'"

= = = PG21131 = = =
AMOS HUNTINGDON
Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England
Amos Huntingdon
By Reverend T.P. Wilson ________________________________________________________________________ This a very well written and interesting story, well up to Wilson's best.  It deals with the various moral issues that beset a rather well-off family.  The old father makes his two sons an allowance, which one of them, Amos, manages well, while the other does not.  Stability in the family is provided by an old maiden aunt, Kate, the sister of the old man.  There was also a daughter, Julia, who had married a ne'er-do-well, and who had been shown the door on that account by the old father, but who was still of great concern to the two young men, particularly to Amos, as she had small children, who were so destitute that Amos was spending all his allowance in looking after his sister and her children, thus making it impossible for him to lend his brother any money.
Because there are not many people in the story, and because their characters are so well-described, the reader is drawn into the family, and follows their concerns with interest.  It makes a good audiobook of about eleven hours duration. NH ________________________________________________________________________
AMOS HUNTINGDON
BY REVEREND T.P. WILSON
CHAPTER ONE.
BRAVELY DONE.
"Help! help! holloa there!  Master Walter--Mr Amos--Jim--Harry--quick-- bring us a light!--lend a hand here!"  Such were the words which suddenly broke the stillness of a dark October night, and roused up the household of Mr Walter Huntingdon, a country gentleman living on his own estate in Derbyshire.  The voice was the coachman's, and came apparently from somewhere near the drive-gate, which was about a couple of hundred yards from the front door of the house.  The evening had been dark and stormy; and it was in a lull of the tempest that the ominous sounds of distress reached the ears of the inmates of Flixworth Manor.
In a few moments all was bustle and excitement--lights flashing; feet hurrying; voices shouting; and then a rush for the scene of danger and trouble.
Outside the grounds in which the Manor-house stood were extensive grass lands on either side of the public road.  In the field nearest to the drive-gate, and on the left as you entered it, was a deep and precipitous chalk-pit, now disused.  This pit was some little distance from the road itself, and was not noticeable by persons unacquainted with the locality.  It had been there no one knew how long, and was a favourite resort of adventurous children, a footpath to the village passing not far from its edge.  Towards this chalk-pit the startled party of rescue from the house hurried with one consent, several of them carrying lanterns or extemporised torches.
Ten o'clock was striking in the distant church-tower as they gathered round the spot from which the cries for help had proceeded.  A terrible sight was dimly revealed to them in the uncertain glare cast upon it by the lights which they carried.  Hanging over the edge of the chalk-pit was the squire's carriage.  One horse had broken away from the traces, but the other was struggling violently, and seemed likely, in its plungings, to force the carriage still further over the precipitous side of the pit.  The coachman, who had managed to spring unharmed from the box, was doing his best to restrain the violence of the terrified animal, but with only partial success; while the situation of Mr Huntingdon himself and of his maiden sister, who were inside the carriage, was perilous and distressing in the extreme.
The accident had been caused by a strange and savage dog suddenly springing at the horses' heads as the carriage was nearing the outer gate.  The night was very dark, and the horses, which were young and full of spirit, being startled by the unexpected attack of the dog, which belonged to some passing traveller, sprang violently out of the road, and, easily crashing through the wooden fence, which happened to be unusually weak just at that part, carried the carriage along with them to the very edge of the chalk-pit, spite of all the efforts of the coachman to hold them in; so that when the people of the Manor-house came to the rescue, they found the carriage and its occupants in a most critical position.
Not a moment was to be lost.  Jim, the stable-boy, was quickly by the side of the coachman, who was almost exhausted with his efforts to curb the terrified horse, the animal becoming still more excited by the flare of the lights and the rush of the newcomers.
"Cut the traces, man! cut the traces!" cried Harry the butler, as he gained the spot.
"Do nothing of the sort," said a voice close by him.  "Don't you see that there may be nothing to hold the carriage up, if you cut the traces? it may fall sheer over into the chalk-pit.--Steady, Beauty! steady, poor Beauty!"  These last words came from a young man who evidently had authority over the servants, and spoke calmly but firmly, at the same time patting and soothing the terror-stricken animal, which, though still trembling in every limb, had ceased its frantic plungings.
"William," continued the same speaker, addressing the coachman, "keep her still, if you can, till we have got my father and aunt out."
Just at that moment a boy of about seventeen years of age sprang on to the front wheel, which was a little tilted on one side, and with a violent wrench opened the carriage-door.  "Father, dear father," he cried, "are you there? are you hurt?"
For a moment no reply was made; then in a stifled voice came the words, "Save your aunt, my dear boy, save your aunt!"
Miss Huntingdon, who was nearest the door, and had contrived to cling to a stout strap at the side of it, was now dragged with difficulty, by the joint efforts of her nephew and the butler, out on to the firm ground. Walter, her young deliverer, then sprang back to extricate his father. "Give me your hand, father," he cried, as he stooped down into the carriage, which was now creaking and swaying rather ominously.  "A light here, Harry--Jim!" he continued.  It was plain that there was no time for delay, as the vehicle seemed to be settling down more and more in the direction of the chasm over which it hung.  A light was quickly brought, and Mr Huntingdon was released at last from his trying and painful durance; but not without considerable difficulty, as he had been much bruised, and almost stunned, by being dashed against the undermost door, and by his poor sister having been thrown violently on him, when the carriage had turned suddenly on its side.
"Hip, hip, hurrah!" shouted Walter, springing on to the hind wheel; "`all's well that ends well.'  No bones broken I hope, dear father, dear aunt."
"Have a care, Master Walter," cried the coachman, who had now managed, with the elder son's help, to release the frightened horse from the traces, and had given it in charge to the stable-boy,--"have a care, or you'll be over into the chalk-pit, carriage and all."
"All right, William," cried the boy; "you look after Beauty, and I'll look after myself."  So saying, he jumped down, making the carriage rock as he sprang to the ground.
And now, while Miss Huntingdon, who had suffered nothing more serious than a severe shaking, was being led to the house by her elder nephew and the female servants who had joined the rescuing party, Mr Huntingdon, having made a careful inspection of the position of his carriage, found that it was in no danger of falling to the bottom of the chalk-pit, as a stout tree, which sprang from the side of the pit, close to the top, had become entangled in the undermost hind wheel, and would form a sufficient support till the proper means of drawing the vehicle fully on to the level ground could be used on the morrow.  All parties then betook themselves slowly to the Manor-house.
In the kitchen, William the coachman was, of course, the great centre of attraction to a large gathering of domestics, and of neighbours also, who soon came flocking in, spite of the lateness of the hour, to get an authentic version of the accident, which, snowball-like, would, ere noon next day, get rolled up into gigantic proportions, as it made its way through many mouths to the farther end of the parish.
In the drawing-room of the Manor-house a sympathising group gathered round Mr Huntingdon and his sister, eager to know if either were seriously the worse for the alarming termination to their journey. Happily, both had escaped without damage of any consequence, so that before they retired to rest they were able, as they drew round the cheery fire, and heard the stormy wind raging without, to talk over the perilous adventure with mutual congratulations at its happy termination, and with thankfulness that the travellers were under the shelter of the Manor roof, instead of being exposed to the rough blasts of the storm, as they might still have been had the mishap occurred further from home. "Walter, my boy," exclaimed Mr Huntingdon, stretching out his hand to his younger son, "it was bravely done.  If it had not been for you, we might have been hanging over the mouth of the chalk-pit yet--or, perhaps, been down at the bottom.  You are a lad after your father's own heart,--good old-fashioned English pluck and courage; there's nothing I admire so much."  As he said these words, his eye glanced for a moment at his eldest son Amos, who was standing at the outside of the group, as though he felt that the older brother had no claim on his regard on the score of courage.  The young man coloured slightly, but made no remark. He might, had he so pleased, have put in his claim for loving notice, on the ground of presence of mind in stilling the plunging horse,--presence of mind, which commonly contributes more to success and deliverance in an emergency than impulsive and impetuous courage; but he was not one to assert himself, and the coachman and stable-boy, who knew the part he had taken, were not present to speak a word for him.  So his younger brother Walter got the praise, and was looked upon as the hero of the adventure.
CHAPTER TWO.
UNDER A CLOUD.
Mr Huntingdon was a country gentleman of good fortune and popular manners, warm in his temper, hasty in his speech, upright in his transactions, and liberal in his dealings.  No man could make a better speech, when he had those to address who substantially agreed with him; while in ordinary conversation he generally succeeded in silencing an opponent, though, perhaps, more by the vehemence of his utterances than by the cogency of his reasonings.  He had a considerable knowledge of field-sports and farming, rather less of literature, and less still of character.  Naturally, he had a high opinion of his own judgment, in which opinion his dependants agreed with him before his face, but differed from it behind his back.  However, every one allowed that he was a worthy man, a good landlord, a kind master, and a faithful friend. A cloud, however, rested on his home.
He had married early, and had made, in the estimation of his friends and of the county generally, an excellent choice of a wife in the person of the eldest daughter of a neighbouring squire.  The marriage was apparently a very happy one; for the bride brought her husband a fair face, a loving heart, and a good fortune, and entertained his friends with due courtesy and cordiality.  Moreover, she neither thwarted his tastes nor squandered his money; while he, on his part, pursued his hunting, shooting, and fishing, and his occasional magisterial duties, with due consideration for his wife's domestic and social engagements, so that their married life ran its course with as little friction or creaking as could reasonably be expected.  Then there came, in due time, the children: first, a little girl, the object of her mother's passionate love, and as dear to her father as the mistake of her not having been a boy would allow her to be; then, after an interval of three years, came a son.
Now it so happened that at the time of this son's birth there was residing as a guest at the Manor-house a middle-aged gentleman reputed to be very rich.  His name was Amos Sutterby.  Mr Huntingdon had met him abroad in the second year after his marriage when taking a tour in Switzerland with his wife.  Mr Sutterby was an old bachelor, rather bluff in his manners, but evidently in easy circumstances.  The Huntingdons and himself had met on the Rigi, and the squire had taken to him at once--in a great measure, it may be, because Mr Amos was a good listener, and was very ready to ask Mr Huntingdon's opinion and advice. So the squire gave his new acquaintance a general invitation to Flixworth Manor, which the other cordially accepted: and in a little while this acquaintanceship ripened into a steady friendship, though by no means entirely to the satisfaction of Mrs Huntingdon.  The result, however, was that Mr Sutterby spent several weeks of every year, at the close of the summer and beginning of the autumn, at the Manor, and was the constant companion of the squire in his field-sports.  Mr Huntingdon had taken care to satisfy himself that his new friend, though somewhat of an oddity, was a man of substance.  True, he was only living in bachelor style, and possessed no landed property; but then he was able at all times to command ready money, and was reputed by persons who had long known him to be the holder of a large amount in the funds, an impression which seemed to be justified by some elegant and costly presents of which Mr Sutterby begged his friend's acceptance, as a token of his esteem and a mark of his appreciation of that kind hospitality which, as he said, an eccentric old bachelor living in lodgings in London was unable to return in kind.
Now it was, as has been said, during a visit of Mr Sutterby to Flixworth Manor that a son and heir was given to the Huntingdons.  Of course there were great rejoicings, and no one seemed more glad than Mr Sutterby; and when he was asked if he would stand godfather to the child, he declared that nothing could please him more.  So the christening day was fixed, and now the question of a name for the child was discussed, as father, mother, and their guest were sitting round the fire after dinner on the first day of Mrs Huntingdon's appearing downstairs.
"Of course he must be `Walter,' after yourself," said the lady.
"Unless you would like to call him `Amos,' after his godfather," said the squire, laughing.
"Capital!" exclaimed Mr Sutterby, with a roar of merriment.  "In that case, of course, I shall feel it nothing less than my duty to make him my heir."
Now these words of their guest, though spoken just on the spur of the moment, and probably only in jest, made an impression on the mind of Mr Huntingdon which he could not get rid of.  Why should not his friend have really meant what he said?  He was rich, and an old bachelor, and had no near relations, so far as the squire knew; and though Mr Huntingdon's estate and fortune were large, yet his open-house way of living left him little to spare at the year's end, so that Mr Sutterby's money would be very acceptable, should he see fit to leave it to his godson.  He therefore represented this view of the matter to his wife in private; but she would not hear of such a name as Amos being given to her son.
"Better lose a thousand fortunes, and quarrel with every friend they had or might have, rather than bring such an odious combination as `Amos Huntingdon' into the family genealogy."  The squire's temper, however, was roused by this opposition, and he wound up the only sharp altercation which had occurred between himself and his wife since their marriage by a vehement asseveration that "Amos" and nothing but "Amos" should be the Christian name of his first-born son.
Sorely against her will, his wife was obliged to yield; for though Mr Huntingdon had his own secret regrets that he had gone so far, yet he was one of those who, wanting that true greatness of character which leads its possessor to change a hastily adopted decision for one resulting from a maturer judgment, abide by what they have said simply because they have said it, and thus mistake obstinacy for a right-minded firmness.  "Amos," therefore, was the name given, considerably to the satisfaction of Mr Sutterby, who made his godson handsome presents from time to time, and often spoke of him playfully as "my godson and heir." His mother, however, never forgave his name, and it was clear to all that the poor child himself had but a cold place in that mother's heart.
What wonder, then, that the boy grew up shy and reserved, dreading the sound of his own name, and shrinking within himself; for seldom was he gladdened by a father's or mother's smile.  Added to this, he was not naturally of a lively temperament, and so never exhibited those boisterous spirits which might have won for him in a measure his father's heart.  So he was brought up with all due care, as was suitable for an eldest son, and was sent to a public school as soon as he could be safely trusted from home.  Indeed, all his wants were supplied but one, and that one was what his heart craved with a painful intensity-- love.  They gave him no real love, at least none that came like sunshine to his spirit.  Such love as they did measure out to him was rather like the feeble sunlight on a cloudy winter day, that seems to chill as it scarcely struggles through the mists that almost quench it.
Such was Amos Huntingdon in his early childhood.  But the cloud grew darker over him when he had reached the age of ten.  It was then that the news came one morning that Mr Sutterby had died, leaving no will, for indeed he had nothing to bequeath except a few small personal effects, which went to some distant cousin.  The fact was that, having an eye to his own personal comfort and well-doing, he had sunk a nice little fortune, which he had inherited from a maiden aunt, in a handsome annuity.  Thus he was able to travel and spend his money like a man of wealth, and was very glad of the opportunity of making Mr Huntingdon's acquaintance, which gave him access to a house where he could spend a portion of every year amidst bountiful hospitality and in good society. He had no deliberate intention of deceiving Mr Huntingdon about his son, but having once given him the impression that he would leave that son a fortune, he did not trouble himself to undeceive his friend on the subject; but being a man in whom self-interest spoke with a louder voice than conscience, he was not sorry to find the conviction strongly rooted in the squire's mind that Amos was to be his godfather's heir, as this conviction evidently added to the warmth of the welcome with which he was received at the Manor-house whenever he chose to take up his quarters there.  And as he had always carefully avoided making any definite statement of his intentions, and had only thrown out hints from time to time, which might be either serious or playful, he was content that a state of things should continue which brought considerable satisfaction to himself, and could not deprive the squire or his son of anything to which either had a legal claim.  The disgust, however, of Mr Huntingdon, when he found out how he had, as he considered it, been taken advantage of and imposed upon, was intense in the extreme.  No one dared refer to Mr Sutterby in his presence, while the very name of the poor boy Amos was scarcely ever spoken by him except in a tone of bitterness; and even his mother looked forward to his holidays with more of apprehension than rejoicing.
There was one, however, who felt for that desolate-hearted child, and loved him with a mother's tenderness.  This was his aunt, Miss Huntingdon, his father's unmarried and only sister.  Half his holidays would be spent at her house; and oh, what happy days they were for him! Happy, too, at last in the brightest and fullest sense; for that loving friend was privileged to lead her nephew gently to Him who says to the shy schoolboy, as much as to the mature man, in his sorrows, "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest."
In the meanwhile, when Amos was five years old, another son was born at Flixworth Manor.  The baby was christened Walter, and nearly all the love that was the share of the elder brother was poured by both father and mother on the younger son.  Years rolled on, and when our story opens Amos was twenty-two years of age.  He had passed creditably through the university course at Oxford, but had not settled down to any profession.  Walter was seventeen; his father's delight and constant companion in his holidays; full of life, energy, and fun, with an unlimited good opinion of himself, and a very limited good opinion of his brother; while all around who knew him only a little were loud in his praises, which were not, however, echoed by those who knew him more thoroughly.  At present he was remaining at home, after completing his school education, neither his father nor himself being able to make up their minds as to the sphere in which his abilities would shine the best.
And where was his sister, the eldest of the three, who was now twenty- five years of age?  Alas! she had grievously disappointed the hopes of both father and mother, having clandestinely married, when not yet arrived at womanhood, a man altogether beneath her in position.  From the day of that marriage Mr Huntingdon's heart and house were closed against her.  Not so the heart of her mother; but that mother pleaded with her husband in vain for a reconciliation, for permission even to have a single meeting with her erring child.  And so the poor mother's mind came under partial eclipse, and herself had been some years away from home under private superintendence, when the accident above recorded occurred to her husband and his sister.
CHAPTER THREE.
A TALK AT THE BREAKFAST-TABLE.
The morning after the accident, Miss Huntingdon, who was now keeping her brother's house, and had been returning with him the night before after a visit to a friend, appeared as usual at the breakfast-table, rather to Mr Huntingdon's surprise.
"My dear Kate," he said, "I hardly expected to see you at breakfast, after your fright, and shaking, and bruising.  Most ladies would have spent the morning in bed; but I am delighted to see you, and take it for granted that you are not seriously the worse for the mishap."
"Thank you, dear Walter," was her reply; "I cannot say that I feel very brilliant this morning, but I thought it would be kinder in me to show myself, and so relieve you from all anxiety, as I have been mercifully preserved from anything worse than a severe shaking, the effects of which will wear off in a day or two, I have no doubt."
"Well, Kate, I must say it's just like yourself, never thinking of your own feelings when you can save other people's.  Why, you are almost as brave as our hero Walter, who risked his own neck to get us out of our trouble last night.--Ah! here he comes, and Amos after him.  Well, that's perhaps as it should be--honour to whom honour is due."
A cloud rested on Miss Huntingdon's face as she heard these last words, and it was deepened as she observed a smile of evident exultation on the countenance of her younger nephew, as he glanced at the flushed face of his elder brother.  But now all seated themselves at the table, and the previous evening's disaster was the all-absorbing topic of conversation.
"Well," said the squire, "things might have been worse, no doubt, though it may be some time before the horses will get over their fright, and the carriage must go to the coachmaker's at once.--By-the-by, Harry," speaking to the butler, who was waiting at table, "just tell James, when you have cleared away breakfast, to see to that fence at once.  It must be made a good substantial job of, or we shall have broken bones, and broken necks too, perhaps, one of these days."
"I hope, Walter," said his sister, "the horses were not seriously injured."
"No, I think not," was his reply; "nothing very much to speak of. Charlie has cut one of his hind legs rather badly,--that must have been when he flung out and broke away; but Beauty hasn't got a scratch, I'm pleased to say, and seems all right."
"And yourself, Walter?"
"Oh, I'm all safe and sound, except a few bruises and a bit of a sprained wrist.--And now, my boy, Walter, I must thank you once more for your courage and spirit.  But for you, your aunt and myself might have been lying at the bottom of the chalk-pit, instead of sitting here at the breakfast-table."
Walter laughed his thanks for the praise, declaring that he exceedingly enjoyed getting his father and aunt on to dry land, only he was sorry for the carriage and horses.  But here the butler--who was an old and privileged servant in the family, and therefore considered himself at liberty to offer occasionally a remark when anything was discussed at table in which he was personally interested--interrupted.
"If you please, sir, I think Master Amos hasn't had his share of the praise.  'Twas him as wouldn't let us cut the traces, and then stood by Beauty and kept her still.  I don't know where you'd have been, sir, nor Miss Huntingdon neither, if it hadn't been for Master Amos's presence of mind."
"Ah, well, perhaps so," said his master, not best pleased with the remark; while Amos turned red, and motioned to the butler to keep silent.  "Presence of mind is a very useful thing in its way, no doubt; but give me good manly courage,--there's nothing like that, to my mind.--What do _you_ say, Kate?"
"Well, Walter," replied his sister slowly and gravely, "I am afraid I can hardly quite agree with you there.  Not that I wish to take away any of the credit which is undoubtedly due to Walter.  I am sure we are all deeply indebted to him; and yet I cannot but feel that we are equally indebted to Amos's presence of mind."
"Oh, give him his due, by all means," said the squire, a little nettled at his sister's remark; "but, after all, good old English courage for me.  But, of course, as a woman, you naturally don't value courage as we men do."
"Do you think not, Walter?  Perhaps some of us do not admire courage quite in the same way, or the same sort of courage most; but I think there can be no one of right feeling, either man or woman, who does not admire real courage."
"I don't know what you mean, Kate, about `the same sort of courage.' Courage is courage, I suppose, pretty much the same in everybody who has it."
"I was thinking of moral courage," replied the other quietly; "and that often goes with presence of mind."
"Moral courage! moral courage!  I don't understand you," said her brother impatiently.  "What do you mean by moral courage?"
"Well, dear brother, I don't want to vex you; I was only replying to your question.  I admire natural courage, however it is shown, but I admire moral courage most."
"Well, but you have not told me what you mean by moral courage."
"I will try and explain myself then.  Moral courage, as I understand it, is shown when a person has the bravery and strength of character to act from principle, when doing so may subject him, and he knows it, to misunderstanding, misrepresentation, opposition, ridicule, or persecution."
The squire was silent for a moment, and fidgeted on his chair.  Amos coloured and cast down his eyes; while his brother looked up at his aunt with an expression on his face of mingled annoyance and defiance.  Then Mr Huntingdon asked, "Well, but what's to hinder a person having both what I should call old-fashioned courage and your moral courage at the same time?"
"Nothing to hinder it, necessarily," replied Miss Huntingdon.  "Very commonly, however, they do not go together; or perhaps I ought rather to say, that while persons who have moral courage often have natural courage too, a great many persons who have natural courage have no moral courage."
"You mean, aunt, I suppose," said her nephew Walter, rather sarcastically, "that the one's all `dash' and the other all `duty.'"
"Something of the kind, Walter," replied his aunt.  "The one acts upon a sudden impulse, or on the spur of the moment, or from natural spirit; the other acts steadily, and from deliberate conviction."
"Can you give us an example, aunt?" asked the boy, but now with more of respect and less of irritation in his manner.
"Yes, I can," she replied; "and I will do so if you like, and my example shall be that of one who combined both natural and moral courage.  My moral hero is Christopher Columbus."
"A regular brick of a man, I allow; but, dear aunt, pray go on."
"Well, then, I have always had a special admiration for Columbus because of his noble and unwavering moral courage.  Just think of what he had to contend with.  It was enough to daunt the stoutest heart and wear out the most enduring patience.  Convinced that somewhere across the ocean to the west there must be a new and undiscovered world, and that it would be the most glorious of enterprises to find that new world and plant the standard of the Cross among its people, he never wavered in his one all-absorbing purpose of voyaging to those unknown shores and winning them for Christ.  And yet, from the very first, he met with every possible discouragement, and had obstacle upon obstacle piled up in his path.  He was laughed to scorn as a half-mad enthusiast; denounced as a blasphemer and gainsayer of Scripture truth; cried down as an ignoramus, unworthy of the slightest attention from men of science; tantalised by half promises; wearied by vexatious delays: and yet never did his courage fail nor his purpose waver.  At last, after years of hope deferred and anxieties which made him grey while still in the prime of life, he was permitted to set sail on what was generally believed to be a desperate crusade, with no probable issue but death. And just picture him to yourself, Walter, as he set out on that voyage amidst the sullen murmurs and tears of the people.  His ships were three `caravels,' as they were called,--that is, something the same as our coasting colliers, or barges,--and there was no deck in two of them. Besides, they were crazy, leaky, and scarcely seaworthy; and the crews numbered only one hundred and twenty men, most of them pressed, and all hating the service.  Nevertheless, he ventured with these into an ocean without any known shore; and on he went with one fixed, unalterable purpose, and that was to sail westward, westward, westward till he came to land.  Days and weeks went by, but no land was seen.  Provisions ran short, and every day's course made return home more hopeless.  But still his mind never changed; still he plunged on across that trackless waste of waters.  The men mutinied--and one can hardly blame them; but he subdued them by his force of character,--they saw in his eye that which told them that their leader was no common man, but one who would die rather than abandon his marvellous enterprise.  And you remember the end?  The very day after the mutiny, a branch of thorn with berries on it floats by them.  They are all excitement.  Then a small board appears; then a rudely-carved stick; then at night Columbus sees a light, and next day lands on the shores of his new world, after a voyage of more than two months over seas hitherto unexplored by man, and in vessels which nothing but a special providence could have kept from foundering in the mighty waters.  The man who could carry out such a purpose in the teeth of such overwhelming opposition, discouragement, and difficulty, may well claim our admiration for courage of the highest and noblest order."
No one spoke for a moment, and then Mr Huntingdon said, "Well, Kate, Columbus was a brave man, no doubt, and deserves the best you can say of him; and I think I see what you mean, from his case, about the greatness and superiority of moral courage."
"I am glad, Walter, that I have satisfied you on that point," was her reply.  "You see there was no sudden excitement to call out or sustain his courage.  It was the bravery of principle, not of mere impulse.  It was so grand because it stood the strain, a daily-increasing strain, of troubles, trials, and hindrances, which kept multiplying in front of him every day and hour as he pressed forward; and it never for a moment gave way under that strain."
"It was grand indeed, aunt," said Walter.  "I am afraid my courage would have oozed out of every part of me before I had been a week on board one of those caravels.  So all honour to Christopher Columbus and moral courage."
That same morning, when Miss Huntingdon was at work in her own private sitting-room, there came a knock at the door, followed by the head of Walter peeping round it.
"May I come in, auntie?  I've a favour to ask of you."
"Come in, dear boy."
"Well, Aunt Kate, I've been thinking over what you said at breakfast about moral courage, and I begin to see that I am uncommonly short of it, and that Amos has got my share of it as well as his own."
"But that need not be, Walter," said his aunt; "at least it need not continue to be so."
"I don't know, auntie; perhaps not.  But, at any rate, what father calls old-fashioned courage is more in my line; and yet I don't want to be quite without moral courage as well,--so will you promise me just two things?"
"What are they, Walter?"
"Why, the first is to give me a bit of a hint whenever you see me--what I suppose I ought to call acting like a moral coward."
"Well, dear boy, I can do that.  But how am I to give the hint if others are by? for you would not like me to speak out before your father or the servants."
"I'll tell you, auntie, what you shall do--that is to say, of course, if you don't mind.  Whenever you see me showing moral cowardice, or want of moral courage, and I suppose that comes much to the same thing, and you would like to give me a hint without speaking, would you put one of your hands quietly on the table, and then the other across it--just so--and leave them crossed till I notice them?"
"Yes, Walter, I can do that, and I _will_ do it; though I daresay you will sometimes think me hard and severe."
"Never mind that, auntie; it will do me good."
"Well, dear boy, and what is the other thing I am to promise?"
"Why, this,--I want you, the first opportunity after the hint, when you and I are alone together, to tell me some story--it must be a true one, mind--of some good man or woman, or boy or girl, who has shown moral courage just where I didn't show it.  `Example is better than precept,' they say, and I am sure it is a great help to me; for I shan't forget Christopher Columbus and his steady moral courage in a hurry."
"I am very glad to hear what you say, Walter," replied his aunt; "and it will give me great pleasure to do what you wish.  My dear, dear nephew, I do earnestly desire to see you grow up into a truly noble man, and I want to be, as far as God permits me, in the place of a mother to you."
As Miss Huntingdon uttered these words with deep emotion, Walter flung his arms passionately round her, and, sinking on his knees, buried his face in her lap, while tears and sobs, such as he was little accustomed to give vent to, burst from him.
"O auntie!" he said vehemently, when he had a little recovered himself, "I know I am not what I ought to be, with all my dash and courage, which pleases father so much.  I'm quite sure that there's a deal of humbug in me after all.  It's very nice to please him, and to hear him praise me and call me brave; but I should like to please you too.  It would be worth more, in one way, to have _your_ praise, though father is very kind."
"Well, my dear boy, I hope you will be able to please me too, and, better still, to please God."  She spoke gently and almost sadly as she said these words, kissing at the same time Walter's fair brow.
"I'm afraid, auntie," was the boy's reply, "I don't think much about that.  But Amos does, I know; and though I laugh at him sometimes, yet I respect him for all that, and I believe he will turn out the true hero after all."
CHAPTER FOUR.
THE CRIPPLED HORSE.
Nature and circumstances had produced widely differing characters in the two brothers.  Walter, forward enough by natural temperament, and ready to assert himself on all occasions, was brought more forward still and encouraged in self-esteem and self-indulgence, by the injudicious fondness of both his parents.  Handsome in person, with a merry smile and a ripple of joyousness rarely absent from his bright face, he was the favourite of all guests at his father's house, and a sharer in their field-sports and pastimes.  That his father and mother loved him better than they loved Amos it was impossible for him not to see; and, as he grew to mature boyhood, a feeling of envy, when he heard both parents regret that himself was not their heir, drew his heart further and further from his elder brother, and led him to exhibit what he considered his superiority to him as ostentatiously as possible, that all men might see what a mistake Nature had made in the order of time in which she had introduced the two sons into the family.  Not that Walter really hated his brother; he would have been shocked to admit to himself the faintest shadow of such a feeling, for he was naturally generous and of warm affections; but he clearly looked upon his elder brother as decidedly in his way and in the wrong place, and often made a butt of him, considering it quite fair to play off his sarcasms and jokes on one who had stolen a march upon him by coming into the world before him as heir of the family estate.  And now that their mother--who had made no secret of her preference of Walter to her elder son--was removed from them, the cords of Mr Huntingdon's affections were wound tighter than ever round his younger son, in whom he could scarce see a fault, however glaringly visible it might be to others; while poor Amos's shortcomings received the severest censure, and his weaknesses were visited on him as sins.  No wonder, then, that, spite of the difference in their ages and order of birth, Walter Huntingdon looked upon himself as a colossal figure in the household, and on his poor brother as a cipher.
On the other hand, Amos, if he had been of a similar temperament to his brother, would have been inevitably more or less cowed and driven into himself by the circumstances which surrounded him, and the treatment which he undeservedly received at the hands of his parents and younger brother.  Being, however, naturally of a shy and nervous disposition, he would have been completely crushed under the burden of heartless neglect, and his heart frozen up by the withholding of a father's and mother's love, had it not been for the gentle and deep affection of his aunt, Miss Huntingdon, who was privileged to lead that poor, desolate, craving heart to Him whose special office it is to pour a heavenly balm into the wounded spirit.  In herself, too, he found a source of comfort from her pitying love, which in a measure took the place of that which his nearest ought to have given him, but did not.  And so, as boy and young man, Amos Huntingdon learned, under the severe discipline of his earthly home, lessons which were moulding his character to a nobility which few suspected, who, gazing on that timid, shrinking youth, went on their way with a glance or shrug of pity.  But so it was.
Amos had formed a mighty purpose; it was to be the one object of his earthly life, to which everything was to bend till he had accomplished it.  But who would have thought of such an iron resolution of will in a breast like that poor boy's?  For to him an ordinary conversation was a trial, and to speak in company an effort, though it was but to answer a simple question.  If a stranger asked his opinion, a nervous blush covered his face as he forced out a reply.  The solitude which others found irksome had special charms for him.  With one person only in his own home did he feel really at ease,--that person was his aunt, for he believed that she in a measure really understood and sympathised with him.  And yet that shy, nervous, retiring young man, down-trodden and repulsed as he was, was possessed by one grand and all-absorbing purpose: it was this, to bring back his sister to her father's home forgiven, and his mother to that same home with the cloud removed from her mind and spirit.
That both these objects _might_ be accomplished he was firmly persuaded. At the same time, he was fully aware that to every one else who knew his father and the circumstances which had led to the sad estrangement of the daughter and removal of the mother, such a restoration as he contemplated bringing about would appear absolutely hopeless.  Yet he himself had no doubts on the subject.  The conviction that his purpose might and would be accomplished was stamped into his soul as by an indelible brand.  He was perfectly sure that every hindrance could be removed, though _how_ he could not tell.  But there stood up this conviction ever facing him, ever beckoning him on, as though a messenger from an unseen world.  Not that he was ignorant of nor underrated the magnitude of the obstacles in his way.  He knew and felt most oppressively that everything almost was against him.  The very thought of speaking to his father on the subject made a chill shudder creep over him.  To move a single step in the direction of the attainment of his object required an effort from which his retiring nature shrank as if stung by a spark of white heat.  The opposition, direct or indirect, of those nearest to him was terrible even to contemplate, and was magnified while yet at a distance through the haze of his morbid sensitiveness. Yet his conviction and purpose remained unshaken.  He was, moreover, fully aware that neither mother nor sister had any deep affection for him, and that, should he gain the end he had set before him, he might get no nearer to their hearts than the place he now occupied.  It mattered not; he had devoted himself to his great object as to a work of holy self-denial and labour of love, and from the pursuit of that object nothing should move him, but onward he would struggle towards its attainment, with the steady determination which would crush through hindrances and obstacles by the weight of its tremendous earnestness.
This purpose had hovered before his thoughts in dim outline while he was yet a boy, and had at length assumed its full and clear proportions while he was at Oxford.  There it was that he became acquainted with a Christian young man who, pitying his loneliness and appreciating his character, had sought and by degrees obtained his friendship, and, in a measure, his confidence, as far as he was able to give it.  To his surprise Amos discovered that his new friend's father was the physician under whose charge and in whose house his own mother, Mrs Huntingdon, had been placed.  Mr Huntingdon had kept the matter a profound secret from his own children, and no member of his household ever ventured to allude to the poor lady or to her place of retirement, and it was only by an inadvertence on his young friend's part that Amos became aware of his mother's present abode.  But this knowledge, after the first excitement of surprise had passed away, only strengthened the purpose which had gradually taken its settled hold upon his heart.  It was to him a new and important link in the chain of events which would lead, he knew, finally to the accomplishment of his one great resolve.  And so he determined to communicate with his friend's father, the physician, and ascertain from him in confidence his opinion of his mother's mental condition, and whether there was any possibility of her restoration to sanity.  The reply to his inquiries was that his mother's case was far from hopeless; and with this he was satisfied.  Then he took the letter which conveyed the opinion of the physician to him, and, spreading it out before God in his chamber, solemnly and earnestly dedicated himself to the work of restoration, asking guidance and strength from on high.
From that day forward he was gradually maturing his plans, being ever on the watch to catch any ray of light which might show him where to place a footstep on the road which led up to the end he had in view.  Earthly counsellors he had none; he dared not have any--at least not at present. Even Miss Huntingdon knew nothing of his purpose from himself, though she had some suspicions of his having devoted himself to some special work, gathered from her own study of his character and conduct; but these suspicions she kept entirely to herself, prepared to advise or assist should Amos give her his confidence in the matter, and seek her counsel or help.  Such was the position of things when our story opens. Amos was waiting, hoping, watching; but no onward step had been taken since he had received the physician's letter.
A fortnight passed away after the accident, when Miss Huntingdon, who had now completely recovered from her fright and bruises, was coming out of a labouring man's cottage on a fine and cheery afternoon.  As she stood on the doorstep exchanging a few parting words with the cottager's wife, she was startled by the sound of furious galloping not far off, and shrank back into the cottage, naturally dreading the sight of an excited horse so soon after her perilous upset in her brother's carriage.  Nearer and nearer came the violent clatter, and, as she involuntarily turned her eyes towards the road with a nervous terror, she was both alarmed and surprised to see her nephew Walter and another young man dashing past on horseback at whirlwind speed, the animals on which they rode being covered with foam.
In a few moments all was still again, and Miss Huntingdon continued her rounds, but, as she turned the corner of a lane which led up to the back of the Manor-house, she was startled at seeing her nephew Walter in front of her on foot, covered with mud, and leading his horse, which was limping along with difficulty, being evidently in pain.  His companion was walking by his side, also leading his horse, and both were so absorbed with their present trouble that they were quite unconscious of her approach.  Something plainly was much amiss.  Walter had had a fall, and his horse was injured; of this there could be no doubt.  Could she be of any service?  She was just going to press forward, when she observed Mr Huntingdon's groom coming from the direction of the house, and, as her nephew did not walk as if he had received any serious injury, she thought it better to leave him to put matters straight for himself, knowing that young men are very sensitive about being interfered with or helped when their pride has been wounded by any humiliating catastrophe.  So she turned aside into a small copse through which was a short cut to the house, intending to go forward and be prepared to render any assistance should Walter desire it.
None of the party had seen her, but she passed near enough to them on the other side of a tall hedge to overhear the words, "Won't the governor just be mad!" and then, "Here's a sovereign, Dick, and I'll make it all straight for you with my father."  What could have happened? She was not long left in suspense; for her brother's voice in high anger soon resounded through the house, and she learned from her maid, who rushed into her room full of excitement, that Forester, Mr Huntingdon's favourite hunter, had been lamed, and otherwise seriously injured, and that Dick the groom, who had been the author of the mischief, had been dismissed at a moment's notice.
Poor Miss Huntingdon's heart misgave her that all had not been quite straightforward in the matter, and that the blame had been laid on the wrong person.  So she went down to dinner, at the summoning of the gong, with a heavy heart.  As she entered the drawing-room she saw her brother, who usually advanced to give her his arm with all due courtesy, sitting still in his easy-chair, hiding his face with the newspaper, which a glance showed her to be turned the wrong way up.  Amos also and Walter were seated as far apart from their father and from each other as was possible, and for a few moments not a word was spoken.  Then, suddenly remembering himself, the squire dismissed the paper from his hand with an irritable jerk, and, with the words, "I suppose that means dinner," gave his arm to his sister, and conducted her in silence to the dining-room.
Nothing in the shape of conversation followed for a while, Mr Huntingdon having shut up his sister by a very curt reply to a question which she put on some commonplace subject, just for the sake of breaking through the oppressive stillness.  At length, when the meal was half-way through, Mr Huntingdon exclaimed abruptly,--
"I can't understand for the life of me how that fool of a Dick ever managed to get poor Forester into such a scrape.  I always thought the boy understood horses better than that."
"I hope, Walter," ventured his sister in a soothing tone, "that the poor animal is not seriously, or at any rate permanently, damaged."
"Nonsense, Kate," he exclaimed peevishly;--"but, pardon me, it's no fault of yours.  Damaged!  I should think so.  I doubt if he will ever be fit to ride again.  But I can't make it out quite yet, it's very vexing.  I had rather have given a hundred pounds than it should have happened.  And Dick, too; the fellow told the queerest tale about it.  I should have thought he was telling a lie, only he was taking the blame to himself, and that didn't look like lying.--By-the-by, Amos, have _you_ been out riding this afternoon?"
"Yes, father."
"What horse did you ride?"
"My own pony, Prince."
"Did you meet Dick exercising the horses?"
"No; I didn't see anything of him."
"That is strange.  Where were you riding to?"
"I was off on a little business beyond the moor."
"Beyond the moor! what can you have been wanting beyond the moor?"
Amos turned red and did not reply.
"I don't know what has come to the boy," said the squire surlily.  But now Walter, who had not uttered a word hitherto, broke in suddenly, "Father, you mustn't be hard upon Dick.  It's a misfortune, after all. There isn't a better rider anywhere; only accidents will happen sometimes, as you know they did the other night.  Forester bolted when the little girl's red cloak blew off and flapped right on to his eyes. Dick was not expecting it, and tried to keep the horses in; but Forester sprang right through a hedge and staked himself before Dick could pull him in.  It's a mercy, I think, that Dick hadn't his neck broke."
He said these last words slowly and reluctantly, for his eye had rested on his aunt's hands, which were being laid quietly one across the other on the table in front of her.
"Red cloak!" exclaimed the squire; "why, Dick told me it was a boy's hat that blew off and flapped against Forester's eyes."
"Ah! well, father, it may have been a hat.  I thought he said a cloak; but it comes pretty much to the same thing."
There was an unsteadiness about the boy's voice as he said these last words which every one noticed except his father.  The subject, however, was now dropped, and was not again alluded to during the evening.
Next morning after breakfast Walter knocked at his aunt's door.  When he had entered and taken the offered chair by her side, he sat for a minute or so with eyes cast down, and silent.
"Well, Walter," she said after a while.
"_Ill_, auntie," he replied, in a voice between a laugh and a sigh.
"What is it, dear Walter?"
"Only those two hands of yours, dear auntie."
"Was there not a cause, Walter?"
No reply.
"Shall I tell you one of the stories you asked me to tell about moral courage?"
"Do, auntie dear," he said in a low tearful voice.
"My hero this morning, Walter, is George Washington, the great American general and statesman, the man who had so much to do in the founding of that great republic which is called the United States.  A braver man never lived; but he was a brave boy too, brave with moral courage.  Not that he wanted natural courage in his early years, for at school none could beat him in leaping, wrestling, swimming, and other athletic exercises.  When he was about six years old, his father gave him a new hatchet one day.  George was highly pleased, and went about cutting and hacking everything in his way.  Unfortunately, amongst other things he used the hatchet with all the force of his little arm on a young English cherry tree, which happened to be a great favourite with his father. Without thinking of the mischief he was doing, George greatly injured the valuable tree.  When his father saw what was done he was very angry, and asked the servants who had dared to injure the tree.  They said they knew nothing of it; when little George entering the room and hearing the inquiry, though he saw that his father was very angry, went straight up to him, his cheeks colouring crimson as he spoke, and cried, `I did it. I cannot tell a lie.  I cut your cherry tree with my hatchet.'  `My noble boy,' said his father, as he clasped him in his arms, `I would rather lose a hundred cherry-trees, were their blossoms of silver and their fruit of gold, than that a son of mine should dare to tell a lie.'--Dear Walter, that was true noble courage; and George Washington grew up with it.  Those are beautiful lines of one of our old poets, George Herbert,--
"`Dare to be true, nothing can need a lie; The fault that needs it most grows two thereby.'"
She paused.  Her nephew kept silent for a time, nervously twisting the fringe of her little work-table; and then he said very slowly and sadly,--
"So, auntie, you have found me out.  Yes, I've been a beastly coward, and I'm heartily ashamed of myself."
"Well, dear boy," replied his aunt, "tell me all about it; happily, it is never too late to mend."
"Yes, dear Aunt Kate, I'll tell you all.  Bob Saunders called yesterday just after luncheon, and asked me to go out for a ride with him, and if I could give him a mount, for his own horse was laid up with some outlandish complaint.  I didn't like to say `No;' but my own pony, Punch, was gone to be shod, and Bob had no time to wait.  Well, Dick was just coming out of the yard as I got into it; he was riding Forester and leading Bessie, to exercise them.  `That'll do,' I said.  `Here, Dick; I'll take Forester out and give him a trot, and Mr Saunders can ride Bessie.'  `Please, Master Walter,' says Dick, `your father's very particular.  I don't know what he'll say to me if I let you exercise Forester.'  `Oh, nonsense!'  I said.  `I'll make that all straight.' Dick didn't like it; but I wouldn't be denied, so he let us mount, and begged me to be very careful.  `Never fear,' I said; `we'll bring them both back as cool as cucumbers.'  And I meant it, auntie.  But somehow or other our spirits got the better of us; it was such a fine afternoon, and the horses seemed wild for a gallop; so at last Bob Saunders said, `What do you say, Walter, to a half-mile race just on to the top of the common? it'll do them no harm.'  Well, I didn't say yes or no; but somehow or other, off we were in another minute, and, do what I would, I couldn't keep Forester back.  Down the lane we went, and right over the common like lightning, and, when I was pulling hard to get Forester round, he went smack through a hedge, and left me on the wrong side of it.  Bob laughed at first, but we soon saw that it was no laughing matter.  He caught Forester directly, for the poor beast had hurt his foot, and limped along as he walked; and there was an ugly wound in his chest from a pointed stick in the hedge which had struck him.  So we crawled home, all of us in a nice pickle, you may be sure.  And then I began to think of what father would say, and I couldn't bear to think that he would have to blame me for it all; so I turned into a regular sneaking coward, and gave Dick a sovereign to tell a lie and take the blame on himself, promising him to make it all right with my father. There, auntie, that's just the whole of it; and I'm sure I never knew what a coward I was before.  But only let me get well through this scrape, and my name's not Walter if I ever get into such another."
"And now, dear boy, what are you going to do about this matter?" asked his aunt after a pause.
"Do, auntie?  I'm sure I don't know; I've done too much already.  It's a bad business at the best, and I don't see that I can do anything about it without making it worse."
"Then, Walter, is the burden still to rest on the wrong shoulders? and is Dick to be punished for your fault?"
"Oh, as to that, auntie, Dick shan't be the worse for it in the end: he has had a _sovereign_ remedy already; and I'll beg him off from being turned away when I see my father has quite cooled down."
Miss Huntingdon said nothing in reply, but laid one of her hands across the other on her little work-table.  Walter saw the action, but turned his head away and fidgeted in his chair.  At last he said, "That's rather hard, auntie, to make me a moral coward again so soon."
"Is it hard, Walter?" she replied gently.  "The next best thing to not doing wrong is to be sorry for it when you have done it."
"Well, Aunt Kate, I _am_ sorry--terribly sorry.  I wish I'd never touched the horses.  I wish that fellow Bob had been a hundred miles off yesterday afternoon."
"I daresay, Walter; but is that all?  Are you not going to _show_ that you are sorry?  Won't you imitate, as far as it is now possible, little George Washington's moral courage?"
"What! go and tell my father the whole truth?  Do you think I ought?"
"I am sure you ought, dear boy."
Walter reflected for a while, then he said, in a sorrowful tone, "Ah, but there's a difference.  George Washington didn't and wouldn't tell a lie, but I would, and did; so it's too late now for me to show moral courage."
"Not at all, Walter; on the contrary, it will take a good deal of moral courage to confess your fault now.  Of course it would have been far nobler had you gone straight to your father and told him just how things were; and then, too, you would not have been Dick's tempter, leading him to sin.  Still, there is a right and noble course open to you now, dear boy, which is to go and undo the mischief and the wrong as far as you can."
"Well, I suppose you are right, auntie," he said slowly, and with a heavy sigh; "but I shan't find _my_ father throwing his arms round me as George Washington's father did, and calling me his noble boy, and telling me he had rather I told the truth than have a thousand gold and silver cherry-trees."
"Perhaps not, Walter; but you will have, at any rate, the satisfaction of doing what will have the approval of God, and of your own conscience, and of the aunt who wants you to do the thing that is right."
"It shall be done," said her nephew, pressing his lips together and knitting his brows by way of strengthening his resolution; and he left the room with a reluctant step.
He found his father, who had just come from the stables, in the dining- room.  "Well, Walter, my boy," he said cheerily, "it isn't so bad with Forester after all.  He has got an ugly cut; but he doesn't walk but very slightly lame.  A week's rest will set him all right; but I shall send that Dick about his business to-morrow, or as soon as his quarter's up.  I'd a better opinion of the boy."
"Dick's not to blame," said Walter slowly.
"Not to blame!  How do you make out that?  I'm sure, if he had had Forester well in hand, the accident couldn't have happened."
Walter then gave his father the true version of the mishap, and confessed his own wrong-doing in the matter.  For a few moments Mr Huntingdon looked utterly taken aback; then he walked up and down the room, at first with wide and excited strides, and then more calmly.  At last he stopped, and, putting his hand on his son's shoulder, said, "That's right, my boy.  We won't say anything more about it this time; but you mustn't do it again."  The truth was, the squire was not sorry to find that Dick, after all, was not the culprit; for he had a great liking for the lad, who suited him excellently as groom, and had received many kindnesses from him.  No doubt he had told him an untruth on the present occasion; but then, as he had done this to screen his master's favourite son, Mr Huntingdon did not feel disposed to take him to task severely for the deceit; and, as Walter had now made the only amends in his power, his father was glad to withdraw Dick's dismissal, and to pass over the trouble without further comment.
CHAPTER FIVE.
IS HE RIDICULOUS?
Few people besides the actual sufferers can at all conceive or appreciate the intense misery which shy and retiring characters experience when themselves or their conduct are made the subjects of open ridicule, especially in company.  Amos was peculiarly sensitive on this point; and Walter knew it, and too often ungenerously availed himself of this knowledge to wound his brother when he owed him a grudge, or was displeased or out of temper with him.  He would watch his opportunity to drag Amos forward, as it were, when he could present him to his father and his friends in a ridiculous light; and then he would clap his hands, point to his brother's flushed face, and make some taunting or sarcastic remark about his "rosy cheeks."  Poor Amos, on these occasions, tingling in every nerve, and ready almost to weep tears of vexation, would shrink into himself and retreat into another room at the earliest opportunity, followed not unfrequently by an outspoken reproach from his brother, that "he must be a regular muff if he couldn't bear a joke."  Sometimes Walter's unfeeling sallies would receive a feeble rebuke from his father; but more often Mr Huntingdon would join in the laugh, and remark to his friends that Amos had no spirit in him, and that all the wit of the family was centred in Walter. Not so Miss Huntingdon.  She fully understood the feelings of both her nephews; and, while she profoundly pitied Amos, she equally grieved at the cruel want of love and forbearance in her younger nephew towards his elder brother.
Some weeks had passed away since the disastrous ride, and Forester being none the worse for his mishap, Mr Huntingdon allowed Walter to exercise him occasionally, accompanied by Dick, who had been fully restored to favour.  It was on a lovely summer afternoon that the two had trotted briskly along to a greater distance from home than they had at all contemplated reaching when they started.  They had now arrived at a part of the country quite unknown to Walter, and were just opposite a neat little cottage with a porch in front of it covered with honeysuckle, when Walter checked his horse, and said, "Dick, it's full time we turned back, or my father will wonder what has become of us."  So they turned homewards.  They had not, however, ridden more than a quarter of a mile, when Walter found that he had dropped one of his gloves; so, telling Dick to walk his horse, and he would join him in a few minutes, he returned to the little cottage, and, having recovered his glove just opposite the gate, was in the act of remounting, when he suddenly exclaimed, "Holloa! what's that?  Well, I never!  It can't be, surely! Yes, it is, and no mistake!"
The sight which called forth these words of surprise from Walter was one that might naturally astonish him.  At the moment when he was about to spring into his saddle, the cottage door had opened, and out ran a little boy and girl about four or five years of age, followed by Amos Huntingdon, who chased them round the little garden, crying out, "I'll catch you, George; I'll catch you, Polly;" laughing loud as he said so, while the children rushed forward shouting at the fun.  They had gone thus twice round the paths, when Amos became suddenly aware that he was being observed by some one on horseback.  In an instant he made a rush for the house, and, as he was vanishing through the porch, a woman's head and a portion of her dress became visible in the entrance.
Walter paused in utter bewilderment; but the next minute Amos was at his side, and said, in a hoarse, troubled voice, "Not a word of this, Walter, not a word of this to any one at home."  Walter's only reply to this at first was a hearty peal of laughter; then he cried out, "All right, Amos;" and, taking off his hat with affected ceremony, he added, "My best respects to Mrs Amos, and love to the dear children.  Good- bye."  Saying which, without stopping to hear another word from his brother, whose appealing look might well have touched his heart, he urged his horse to a canter, and was gone.
Amos did not appear among the family that evening.  He had returned home just before dinner-time, and sent a message into the drawing-room asking to be excused as he did not feel very well.  Miss Huntingdon went up to his room to see what was amiss, and returned with the report that there was nothing seriously wrong; that her nephew had a bad sick headache, and that bed was the best thing at present for him.  Mr Huntingdon asked no further questions, for Amos was not unfrequently kept by similar attacks from joining the family circle.  His father sometimes thought and called him fanciful, but for the most part left him to do as he liked, without question or remark.  And so it was that Amos had grown up to manhood without settling down to any profession, and was left pretty much to follow the bent of his own inclinations.  His father knew that there was no need to be anxious about him on the score of worldly provision.  He had seen well to his education, having sent him to a good school, and in due time to the university, and, till he came of age, had made him a sufficient allowance, which was now no longer needed, since he had come into a small fortune at his majority, left him by his mother's father; and, as he was heir to the entailed property, there was no need for concern as to his future prospects, so no effort was made by Mr Huntingdon to draw him out of his natural timidity and reserve, and induce him to enter on any regular professional employment.  Perhaps he would take to travelling abroad some day, and that would enlarge his mind and rouse him a bit.  At present he really would make nothing of law, physic, or divinity.  He was sufficiently provided for, and would turn out some day a useful and worthy man, no doubt; but he was never meant to shine; he must leave that to Walter, who had got it naturally in him.  So thought and so sometimes said the squire; and poor Amos pretty much agreed with this view of his father's; and Walter did so, of course.  The Manor-house therefore continued Amos's home till he should choose to make another for himself.
But was he making a new home for himself?  This was Walter's bewildering thought as he cantered back, after his strange discovery of his brother at the cottage.  Was it really so?  Had this shy, silent brother of his actually taken to himself a wife unknown to any one, just as his poor sister had married clandestinely?  It might be so--and why not?  Strange people do strange things; and not only so, but Walter's conscience told him that his brother might well have been excused for seeking love _out_ of his home, seeing that he got but little love _in_ it.  And what about the children?  No doubt they were hers; he must have married a widow. But what a poky place they were living in.  She must have been poor, and have inveigled Amos into marrying her, knowing that he was heir to Flixworth Manor.  Eh, what a disgrace!  Such were Walter's thoughts as he rode home from the scene of the strange encounter.  But then, again, he felt that this was nothing but conjecture after all.  Why might not Amos have just been doing a kind act to some poor cottager and her children, whom he had learned to take an interest in?  And yet it was odd that he should be so terribly upset at being found out in doing a little act of kindness.  Walter was sure that not a shadow of moral wrong could rest on his brother's conduct.  He might have made a fool of himself, but it could not be anything worse.
One thing, however, Walter was resolved upon, he would have a bit of fun out of his discovery.  So next day at luncheon, when they were seated at table, unattended by a servant, Amos being among them, but unusually nervous and ill at ease, Walter abruptly inquired of his brother across the table if he could lend him a copy of the "Nursery Rhymes."  No reply being given, Walter continued, "Oh, do give us a song, Amos,--`Ride a Cock Horse,' or `Baby Bunting,' or `Hi, Diddle, Diddle.'  I'm sure you must have been practising these lately to sing to those dear children."
As he said this, Amos turned his eyes on him with a gaze so imploring that Walter was for a moment silenced.  Miss Huntingdon also noticed that look, and, though she could not tell the cause of it, she was deeply pained that her nephew should have called it forth from his brother.  Walter, however, was not to be kept from his joke, though he had noticed that his aunt looked gravely and sorrowfully at him, and had crossed one hand upon the other.  "Ah, well," he went on, "love in a cottage is a very romantic thing, no doubt; and I hope these darling little ones, Amos, enjoy the best of health."
"Whatever does the boy mean?" exclaimed the squire, whose attention was now fairly roused.
Amos looked at first, when his father put the question, as though he would have sunk into the earth.  His colour came and went, and he half rose up, as though he would have left the table; but, after a moment's pause, he resumed his seat, and, turning quietly to Mr Huntingdon, said in a low, clear voice, "Walter saw me yesterday afternoon playing with some little children in a cottage-garden some miles from this house. This is all about it."
"And what brought you there, Amos?" asked Walter.  "Little baby games aren't much in your line."
"I had my reasons for what I was doing," replied the other calmly.  "I am not ashamed of it; I have done nothing to be ashamed of in the matter.  I can give no other explanation at present.  But I must regret that I have not more of the love and confidence of my only brother."
"Oh, nonsense!  You make too much of Walter's foolish fun; it means no harm," said the squire pettishly.
"Perhaps not, dear father," replied Amos gently; "but some funny words have a very sharp edge to them."
No sooner had Miss Huntingdon retired to her room after luncheon than she was joined by Walter.  He pretended not to look at her, but, laying hold of her two hands, and then putting them wide apart from one another, he said, still keeping his eyes fixed on them, "Unkind hands of a dear, kind aunt, you had no business to be crossed at luncheon to-day, for poor Walter had done no harm, he had not showed any want of moral courage."
Disengaging her hands from her nephew's grasp, Miss Huntingdon put one of them on his shoulder, and with the other drew him into a chair.  "Is my dear Walter satisfied with his behaviour to his brother?" she asked.
"Ah! that was not the point, Aunt Kate," was his reply; "the hands were to be crossed when I had failed in moral courage; and I have not failed to-day."
"No, Walter, perhaps not; but you told me you should like to be taught moral courage by examples, and what happened to-day suggested to me a very striking example, so I crossed my hands."
"Well, dear auntie, please let me hear it."
"My moral hero to-day is Colonel Gardiner, Walter."
"Ah! he was a soldier then, auntie?"
"Yes, and a very brave one too; indeed, never a braver.  When he was a young man, and had not been many years in the army, he was terribly wounded in a battle, and lay on the field unable to raise himself to his feet or move from his place.  Thinking that some one might come round to plunder the dead and dying before his friends could find him--as, alas! there were some who were heartless enough to do in those days--and not wishing that his money should be taken from him, as he had several gold pieces about him, he managed to get these pieces out of his pocket, and then to glue them in his clenched hand with the clotted blood which had collected about one of his wounds.  Then he became insensible, and friends at last recovered his body and brought him to consciousness again, and the money was found safe in his unrelaxed grasp.  I mention this merely to show the cool and deliberate courage of the man; his wonderful pluck, as you would call it."
"Very plucky, auntie, very; but please go on."
"Well, many years after, he died in battle, and showed the same marvellous bravery then.  It was in the disastrous engagement of Prestonpans, in the year 1745.  The Highlanders surprised the English army, turned their position, and seized their cannon.  Colonel Gardiner exerted himself to the utmost, but his men quickly fled, and other regiments did the same.  He then joined a small body of English foot who remained firm, but they were soon after overpowered by the Highlanders. At the beginning of the onset, which in the whole lasted but a few minutes, Colonel Gardiner received a bullet-wound in his left breast; but he said it was only a flesh-wound, and fought on, though he presently after received a shot in the thigh.  Then, seeing a party of the foot bravely fighting near him, who had no officer to head them, he rode up to them and cried aloud, `Fire on, my lads, and fear nothing!' Just then he was cut down by a man with a scythe, and fell.  He was dragged off his horse, and received a mortal blow on the back of his head; and yet he managed to wave his hat as a signal to a faithful servant to retreat, crying out at the same time, `Take care of yourself.'"
"Bravo! auntie, that was true courage if you like; that's old-fashioned courage such as suits my father and me."
"I know it, Walter.  But Colonel Gardiner showed a higher and nobler courage; higher and nobler because it required far more steady self- denial, and arose from true religious principle.  I want you to notice the contrast, and that is why I have mentioned these instances of what I may call his animal bravery.  I have no wish to rob him of the honour due to him for those acts of courage; but then, after all, he was brave in those constitutionally,--I might say, indeed, because he could not help it.  It was very different with his moral courage.  When he was living an utterly godless and indeed wicked life, it pleased God to arrest him in his evil career by a wonderful vision of our Saviour hanging on the cross for him.  It was the turning-point of his life.  He became a truly changed man, and as devoted a Christian as he had formerly been a slave to the world and his own sinful habits.  And now he had to show on whose side he was and meant to be.  It is always a difficult thing to be outspoken for religion in the army, but it was ten times as difficult then as it is now, seeing that in our day there are so many truly Christian officers and common soldiers in the service. Drunkenness and swearing were dreadfully prevalent; indeed, in those days it was quite a rare thing to find an officer who did not defile his speech continually with profane oaths.  But Colonel Gardiner was not a man to do things by halves: he was now enlisted under Christ's banner as a soldier of the Cross, and he must stand up for his new Master and never be ashamed of him anywhere.  But to do this would bring him persecution in a shape peculiarly trying to him,--I mean in the shape of ridicule.  He would, he tells us, at first, when the change had only lately taken place in him, rather a thousandfold have marched up to the mouth of a cannon just ready to be fired than stand up to bear the scorn and jests of his ungodly companions; he winced under these, and instinctively shrank back from them.  Nevertheless, he braved all, the scorn, the laughter, the jokes, and made it known everywhere that he was not ashamed of confessing his Saviour, cost what it might; and he even managed, by a mixture of firm remonstrance and good-tempered persuasion, to put down all profane swearing whenever he was present, by inducing his brother officers to consent to the payment of a fine by the guilty party for every oath uttered.  And so by his consistency he won at length the respect of all who knew him, even of those who most widely differed from him in faith and practice.  There, Walter, that is what I call true and grand moral courage and heroism."
"So it was, so it was, dear auntie; but why have you brought forward Colonel Gardiner's case for my special benefit on the present occasion?"
"I will tell you, dear boy.  You think it fine fun to play off your jokes on Amos, and nothing seems to please you better than to raise the laugh against him and to bring the hot flush into his cheeks.  Ah! but you little know the pain and the misery you are inflicting; you little know the moral courage it requires on your brother's part to stand up under that ridicule without resenting it, and to go on with any purpose he may have formed in spite of it.  I want you to see a reflection of Colonel Gardiner's noblest courage, his high moral courage, in your own dear brother, and to value him for it, and not to despise him, as I see you now do.  You say you want to be free from moral cowardice; then, copy moral courage wherever you can see it."
"Well, auntie," said her nephew after a minute's silence, "I daresay you are right.  Poor Amos!  I've been very hard upon him, I believe.  It wasn't right, and I'll try and do better.  But it's such a funny idea taking _him_ as a copy.  Why, everybody's always telling me to mark what Amos does, and just do the very opposite."
"Not everybody, Walter; not the aunt who wants to see you truly good and noble.  There are a grandeur of character and true nobility in Amos which you little suspect, but which one day you also will admire, though you do not see nor understand them now."
Walter did not reply.  He was not best pleased with his aunt's last remarks, and yet, at the same time, he was not satisfied with himself. So he rose to go, and as he did so he said, "Ah, Aunt Kate, I see you are in Amos's confidence, and that you know all about the little children and their cottage home."
"Nay, my boy," replied his aunt, "you are mistaken; Amos has not made me his confidante in the matter.  But I have formed my opinion of him and his motives from little things which have presented themselves to my observation from time to time, and I have a firm conviction that my nephew Walter will agree with me in the end about his brother, whatever he may think now.  At least I hope so."
"So do I, dear auntie.  Good-bye, good-bye."  And, having said these words half playfully and half seriously, Walter vanished from the room with a hop, skip, and jump.
CHAPTER SIX.
MISAPPREHENSION.
Miss Huntingdon was not the only person in the family at Flixworth Manor who entertained a deep affection for Amos Huntingdon, and highly valued him.  Harry the butler loved him as if he had been his own son.  The old man had been inherited with the estate by its present owner, who remembered him almost as long as he could remember anything, and had a sincere regard for him, knowing him to be one of those old-fashioned domestics who look upon their employer's interests as their own. Harry's hair was now snowy-white, but he retained much of his vigour unimpaired, the winter of his old age being "frosty, but kindly."  So he had never gone by any other name than "Harry," nor wished to do so, with his master and his master's friends.  However, in the kitchen he expected to be called "_Mr_.  Frazer," and would answer to no other name when addressed by boys and strangers of his own rank.  When the first child was born Harry took to her with all his might.  He knew that his master was disappointed because she was not a boy, but that made no difference to Harry.  Nothing pleased him better than to act now and then as nurse to Miss Julia when she was still in long clothes; and many a peal of hearty and innocent mirth resounded from the kitchen premises as the servants gazed, with tears of amusement running down their faces, at _Mr_.  Frazer, by the nurse's permission, pacing up and down a sunny walk in the kitchen garden, with steps slow and grotesquely dignified, holding the infant warily and tenderly, affirming, when he gave her back to the nurse, in a self-congratulatory tone, that "little miss" would be quiet with him when she would be so with no one else; which certainly might be cause for some wonder, seeing that he would usually accompany his nursings with such extraordinarily guttural attempts at singing as were far better calculated to scare any ordinary baby into temporary convulsions than to soothe it to rest when its slumbers had once been broken.  And how the old man did rejoice when the little thing could toddle into his pantry!  And no wonder that she was very ready to do so, for Harry had an inexhaustible store of plums, and bonbons, and such like enticements, which were always forthcoming when little miss gladdened his heart with a visit.  So they were fast friends, and thoroughly understood each other.
When, however, a son and heir was born, and there was in consequence a perfect delirium of bell-ringing in the village church-tower, Harry by no means entered heart and soul into the rejoicings.  "Well," he said with a sigh, "there's no help for it, I suppose.  It's all right, no doubt; but Miss Julia's my pet, and so she shall be as long as my name's Harry."  The new infant, therefore, received none of the attention at his hands which its predecessor had enjoyed.  When pressed by the housekeeper, with an arch smile on her good-natured face, to take "baby" out for an airing, he shook his head very gravely and declined the employment, affirming that his nursing days were over.  The name also of the new baby was a sore subject to Harry.  "`Amos,' indeed!  Well, what next?  Who ever heard of an `Amos' in the family?  You might go as far back as Noah and you'd never find one.  Mr Sutterby might be a very good gentleman, but his Christian name was none the better for that." And, for a while, the old man's heart got more and more firmly closed against the young heir; while Amos, on his part, in his boyish days, made no advances towards being on friendly terms with the old servant, who yet could not help being sometimes sorry for his young master, when he marked how the sunshine of love and favour, which was poured out abundantly on Miss Julia, came but in cold and scattered rays to her desolate-hearted brother.
This kindly feeling was deepened in Harry's heart, and began to show itself in many little attentions, after the death of Mr Sutterby.  He could not avoid seeing how the father's and mother's affections were more and more drawn away from their little son, while he keenly felt that the poor child had done nothing to deserve it; so in a plain and homely way he tried to draw him out of himself, and made him as free of his pantry as his sister was.  And when Walter came, a few years before Mr Sutterby's death, putting Amos into almost total eclipse, Harry would have none of this third baby.  "He'd got notice enough and to spare," he said, "and didn't want none from him."  And now a new cord was winding itself year by year round the old butler's heart--a cord woven by the character of the timid child he had learned to love.  He could not but notice how Amos, while yet a boy, controlled himself when cruelly taunted or ridiculed by his younger brother; how he returned good for evil; and how, spite of sorrow and a wounded spirit, there was peace on the brow and in the heart of that despised and neglected one. For he had discovered that, in his visits to his aunt, Amos had found the pearl of great price, and the old man's heart leapt for joy, for he himself was a true though unpretending follower of his Saviour.
So Harry's attachment to his young master grew stronger and stronger, and all the more so as he came to see through the more attractive but shallower character of Walter, whose praises were being constantly sounded in his ears by Mr Huntingdon.  And there was one thing above all others which tended to deepen his attachment to Amos, which was Amos's treatment of his sister, who was still the darling of Harry's heart.  Walter loved his sister after a fashion.  He could do a generous thing on the impulse of the moment, and would conform himself to her wishes when it was not too much trouble.  But as for denying himself, or putting himself out of the way to please her, it never entered into his head.  Nevertheless, any little attention on his part, spite of his being so much younger than herself, was specially pleasing to Julia, who was never so happy as when she and he could carry out by themselves some little scheme of private amusement.  Harry noticed this, and was far from feeling satisfied, observing to the housekeeper that "Master Walter was a nasty, stuck-up little monkey; and he only wondered how Miss Julia could be so fond of him."  On the other hand, Amos always treated his sister, even from his earliest boyhood, with a courtesy and consideration which showed that she was really precious to him.  And, as she grew up towards womanhood and he towards mature boyhood, the beauty and depth of his respectful and unselfish love made themselves felt by all who could value and understand them, and among these was Harry.  He could appreciate, though he could not explain, the contrast between a mere sentiment of affection, such as that which prompted Walter to occasional acts of kindness to his sister which cost him nothing, and the abiding, deep-seated principle of love in Amos which exhibited itself in a constant thoughtful care and watchfulness to promote the happiness of its object, his beloved sister.
So Harry's heart warmed towards his young master more and more, especially when he could not help noticing that, while Amos never relaxed his endeavours to make his sister happy, she on her part either resented his kindness, or at the best took it as a matter of course, preferring--and not caring to conceal her preference--a smile or word or two from Walter to the most patient and self-denying study of her tastes and wishes on the part of her elder brother.  The old man grieved over this conduct in his darling Miss Julia, and gave her a hint on the subject in his own simple way, which to his surprise and mortification she resented most bitterly, and visited her displeasure also on Amos by carefully avoiding him as much as possible, and being specially demonstrative in her affection to Walter.  Amos of course felt it deeply, but it made no alteration in his own watchful love to his sister.  As for Harry, all he could do was to wait in hopes of brighter times, and to console himself for his young mistress's coldness by taking every opportunity of promoting the happiness and winning the fuller confidence of the brother whom she so cruelly despised.
But then came the crash; and this well-nigh broke the faithful old servant's heart.  She whom he still loved as though she were his own, following her own unrestrained fancies, left her father's house to unite herself to a heartless adventurer before she had reached full womanhood, and thus closed the door of her old home against her.  Then followed a frightful blank.  An allusion by the old butler to "Miss Julia," when the squire and he were alone together, was met by a burst of violence on his master's part, and a threat that Harry must leave if he ever again mentioned his old favourite's name to her father.  So his lips were closed, but not his heart; for he waited, watched, and prayed for better times, even after a still heavier cloud had gathered over the family in the removal of poor Mrs Huntingdon, and all the love he had to spare was given to his poor desolate young master, whose spirit had been crushed to the very dust by the sad withdrawal of his mother and sister from his earthly home.
Walter too was, of course, grieved at the loss of his sister and mother, but the blow was far lighter to him than to his brother, partly from his being of a more lively and elastic temperament, and partly because he did not, being so young a boy when the sad events took place, so fully understand as did his elder brother the shame and disgrace which hung over the family through his sister's heartless and selfish conduct.  His aunt soon came to supply his mother's place, and completely won the impulsive boy's heart by her untiring and thoughtful affection.  And one lesson he was learning from her, which was at first the strangest and hardest of lessons to one brought up as he had been, and that was, to respect the feelings and appreciate, though by very slow degrees, the character of his brother.  His own superiority to Amos he had hitherto taken as a matter of course and beyond dispute.  Everybody allowed it, except perhaps old Harry; but that, in Walter's eyes, was nothing.  Amos was the eldest son, and heir to the family estate, and therefore the old butler took to him naturally, and would have done so if he had been a cow without any brains instead of a human being.  So said Walter, and was quite content that a poor, ignorant fellow like Harry, who could have no knowledge or understanding of character, should set his regards on the elder son, and not notice the otherwise universally acknowledged bodily and intellectual superiority of his more worthy self.  No wonder, then, that pity more than love was the abiding feeling in Walter's heart towards his less popular and less outwardly attractive brother.  And it was a very strange discovery, and as unwelcome as strange, which his aunt was now leading him gradually to make spite of himself, that in real sterling excellence and beauty of character the weight, which he had hitherto considered to lie wholly in his own scale, was in truth to be found in the opposite scale on his brother's side of the balance. Very slowly and reluctantly indeed was he brought to admit this at all, and, even when he was constrained to do so, he by no means surrendered at discretion to his aunt's view of the matter, but fought against it most vigorously, even when his conscience reproved him most loudly.  And thus it was that a day or two after his conversation with Miss Huntingdon on the moral courage exhibited by Colonel Gardiner, he was rather glad of an opportunity that presented itself of exhibiting his brother in an unamiable light, and "trotting him out with his shabby old horsecloth on," as he expressed it, for the amusement of himself and friends.  It was on a summer evening, and very hot, so that Miss Huntingdon, her two nephews, and two young men, friends of Walter, were enjoying tea and strawberries in a large summer-house which faced a sloping lawn enamelled with flower-beds glowing with masses of richly tinted flowers.  Mr Huntingdon was not with them, as this was Bench day, and he was dining after business hours with a brother magistrate. Walter, full of life and spirits, rattled away to his heart's content, laughing boisterously at his own jokes, which he poured forth the more continuously because he saw that Amos was more than usually indisposed to merriment.
"By-the-by, Tom," he said suddenly to one of his companions, "what about the boat-race?  When is it to come off?"
"In September," replied his friend.  "But we are in a little difficulty. You know Sir James has lent us the Park for the occasion, and a capital thing it will be; for we can make a good two miles of it by rowing round the ornamental water twice.  It is to be a four-oared match; four Cambridge against four Oxford men, old or young, it doesn't matter.  It is to be part of the fun on the coming of age of Sir James's eldest son. I rather think he was born on the eighth.  Young James is a Cambridge man and a capital oar, and I'm of the same college, and so is Harrison here, as you know, and we shall have no difficulty in finding a fourth; but we are rather puzzled about the Oxford men.  We can calculate upon three, but don't know where to look for the fourth.  I wish, Walter, you'd been old enough, and a member of the university."
"Ay, Tom, I wish I had been.  But, by-the-by, there's no difficulty after all.  Here's Amos, an Oxford man, and a very good oar too--he's just the very man you want."
It was quite true, as Walter said, that Amos had been a good rower at the university.  Rowing was one of the few amusements in which he had indulged himself, but he had never joined a racing boat though often solicited to do so.
"What do you say, Amos?" asked his young companion.  "Will you join us, and make up the Oxford four complete?  We shall be really much obliged if you will; and I'm sure you'll enjoy it."
"Thank you," replied Amos; "it's very kind of you to ask me, I'm sure. I should have liked it had I been able to undertake it, but I am sorry to say that it cannot be."
"Cannot be!" exclaimed Walter.  "Why, what's to hinder you?"
"I cannot spare the time just now," said his brother quietly.
"Not spare the time!--not spare half-an-hour one fine afternoon in September!  Dear me! you must be oppressed with business.  What is it? It isn't farming, I know.  Is it legal business?  Have you got so many appointments with the Lord Chancellor that he can't spare you even for one day?"
"It will not be only for one day," replied Amos quietly.  "If the race is to be a real trial of skill and strength we must train for it, and have many practices, and I cannot promise to find time for these."
"Oh, nonsense!  Why not?  You've nothing to do."
"I have something to do, Walter, and something too that I cannot give up for these practisings."
"What!  I suppose you think such vanities as these waste of precious time."
"I never said nor thought so, Walter; but I have a work in hand which will prevent my having the pleasure of taking a part in this race, for it really would have been a pleasure to me."
"Ah! it must be a precious important work, no doubt," said his brother satirically.  "Just tell us what it is, and we shall be able to judge."
Amos made no reply to these last words, but turned first very red and then very pale.
"Humph!" said Walter; "I guess what it is.  It's a new scheme for paying off the national debt, by turning radishes into sovereigns and cabbage- leaves into bank-notes; and it'll take a deal of time and pains to do it."  He laughed furiously at his own wit, but, to his mortification, he laughed alone.  There was a rather painful silence, which was broken by the gentle voice of Miss Huntingdon.
"I think, dear Walter," she said, "that you are a little hard on your brother.  Surely he may have an important work on hand without being engaged in such a hopeless task as attempting to turn radishes into sovereigns and cabbage-leaves into bank-notes.  And does it follow that he despises your boat-race because he prefers duty to pleasure?"
"Ah! that's just it," cried Walter, in a tone of mingled excitement and displeasure.  "Who's to know that it _is_ duty?  I think one duty is very plain, and I should have thought you would have agreed with me here, and that is to give up your own way and pleasure sometimes, when by doing so you may help to make other people happy."
"I quite agree with you in that, Walter," said his aunt.  "It may be and often does become a duty to surrender our own pleasure, but never surely to surrender our duty."
"True, aunt, if it's really duty; but some people's duty means merely their own fancy, and it's very convenient to call _that_ duty when you don't want to be obliging."
"It may be so, Walter; but, on the other hand, if we have seen cause even to impose upon ourselves something as a duty, we are bound to carry it out, although others may not see it to be a duty and may call it fancy; and certainly we should at least respect those who thus follow what they firmly believe they _ought_ to do, even though we cannot exactly understand or agree with their views of duty.  So you must bear with Amos; for I am certain that he would not say `No' to you about the race if he were not persuaded that duty stands in the way of his taking a part in it."
"Ah, well! happy Amos to have such a champion," cried Walter, laughing, for he had now recovered his good-humour.  "I suppose you are right, and I must allow brother Amos to have his duty and his mystery all to himself.  But it's odd, and that's all I can say about it.  Such short- sighted mortals as I am can't see those duties which are up in the clouds, but only those which lie straight before our eyes."
"And yet, Walter, there may be the truest and noblest heroism in sacrificing everything to these self-imposed duties, which _you_ call duties up in the clouds."
"O aunt, aunt!" exclaimed Walter, laughing, "are you going to be down upon me again about moral courage?  You have not crossed your hands this time, and yet I daresay it will do us all good, my friends here as well as myself, to have a lesson on moral courage from you; so listen all to my dear aunt.  She is teaching me moral courage by examples.  Who is your hero, dear auntie, this time?"
"Shall I go on?" said Miss Huntingdon, looking round on her hearers; then seeing an expression of interest on every countenance, she continued, "Well, I will, if you wish it.  My hero to-day is John Howard."
"Not a soldier this time, Aunt Kate."
"Not in your sense, Walter, but one of the truest and bravest in mine."
"Pray, then, let us hear all about his exploits, dear aunt."
"You shall, Walter.  His exploits just consisted in this, that he imposed a great duty on himself as the one object of his life, and never let anything turn him from it, though obstacles met him in every direction such as nothing but the highest sense of duty could have nerved him to break through.  In the first place, he was of a weakly constitution, and might therefore well have excused himself from any unnecessary labours, and might have indulged in luxuries which might almost have been considered as necessaries to one whose appetite was not strong.  He could well have afforded such innocent indulgence, for he was a man of good fortune.  He was, however, remarkable for his abstemious habits; and having been led, when high sheriff of his county, to look into the state of Bedford jail, he was so shocked with the miserable condition of the prisoners and their being crowded together in a place filthy, damp, and ill-ventilated, that he set himself to make a tour of inspection of all the county jails in England, and soon completed it, and was examined before the House of Commons on the state of our prisons.  And here he had to suffer from that misrepresentation and misunderstanding which are too often the lot of those who have set themselves to some great and noble work.  It seemed so extraordinary to some members of Parliament that a gentleman, out of pure benevolence, should devote himself to such a painful work, and run the risk of contagion, that they could hardly understand it; and one gentleman asked `at whose expense he travelled,'--a question which Howard could scarcely answer without some indignant emotion.  You see, they could not appreciate such exalted heroism; and surely it required no little moral courage to persevere.  But he did persevere, and his work grew upon him.
"From England he went abroad, and visited the prisons on the Continent, devoting his time and fortune to the great work of discovering, and, as far as might be, remedying, the abuses he found in these sad places of misery and often cruelty; and though he was introduced to the noble and the great wherever he went, he paid no visits of mere ceremony, but spoke out most fearlessly, even to the most exalted in rank, about the abuses he found in the prisons under their control.  He had set himself one great work to do, and he did it.  Suffering, toil, hardship were endured without a murmur.  Ah! was not this true heroism?
"And now I come to a point which I want you, dear Walter, specially to notice.  Howard might have spent a portion at least of his time when abroad in visiting the beautiful picture-galleries and other works of art in the towns to which his great work led him, but he never suffered himself to do so.  He would not even read a newspaper, lest it should divert his thoughts from the one great purpose he had in view.  I am not saying for a moment that he would have been wrong to indulge himself with relaxation in the shape of sight-seeing and reading the news; but surely when he made everything bend to his one grand self-imposed duty, we are constrained to admire and not to blame, far less to ridicule, his magnificent heroism.  Yes; he never swerved, he never drew back; and, best of all, he did his work as a humble and earnest Christian, carrying it on by that strength and wisdom which he sought and obtained by prayer.
"I cannot give you a better summing up of my hero's character than in the words of the great Edmund Burke.  I have them here."  Saying which she opened a small manuscript book containing extracts from various authors in her own handwriting, which she kept in her work-basket, and read as follows:--"`He has visited all Europe, not to survey the sumptuousness of palaces, or the stateliness of temples; not to make accurate measurements of the remains of ancient grandeur, nor to form a scale of the curiosities of ancient art; not to collect medals, nor to collate manuscripts: but to dive into the depths of dungeons, and to plunge into the infection of hospitals; to survey the mansions of sorrow and pain; to take the gauge and dimensions of misery, depression, and contempt; to remember the forgotten, to attend to the neglected, to visit the forsaken, and to compare the distresses of men in all countries.  His plan is original, and it is as full of genius as it is of humanity.  It was a voyage of discovery--a circumnavigation, of charity.'  Such was Burke's true estimate of my hero.  And surely never was a nobler heroism--it was so pure, so unselfish; for when they would have erected a monument to him in his lifetime, and had gathered large sums for that purpose during his absence abroad, he at once put a stop to the project on his return home.--Am I wrong, dear Walter, in taking John Howard for one of my special moral heroes?"
"Not a bit of it, dear aunt.  I confess myself beaten; I give in; I hand over the laurel crown to Amos: for I see that Howard's greatness of character was shown especially in this, that he imposed upon himself a work which he might have left undone without blame, and carried it out through thick and thin as a matter of duty.  Bravo, Howard! and bravo, Amos, with your duty-work!--three cheers for you both! and one cheer more for Aunt Kate and moral courage."  So saying, with a low bow, half in fun and half in earnest, to Miss Huntingdon and his brother, with a request to the latter to learn the Canadian boat-song, "Row, Brothers, Row," at his earliest convenience, he left the summer-house, taking his two friends with him.
Amos, who had been silent during the latter part of the discussion, lingered behind for a moment, and rising from his seat, took his aunt's hand between his own, pressing it warmly as he said, in a voice subdued and trembling with emotion,--"Thank you, dearest aunt; I see you partly understand me now.  Some day, I hope, you may understand me more fully."
CHAPTER SEVEN.
HARRY IN THE SECRET.
A week or more had passed since the conversation in the summer-house, and all the family were seated at luncheon in the dining-room of Flixworth Manor, when a shabby and dirty-looking note was handed to Amos by the butler.  Having hastily read it, Amos exclaimed in an agitated voice, "Who brought this? where is he?"
"It's no one as I ever seed afore," replied Harry.  "He said there was no answer, but I was to take it in straight; and I doubt he's gone now far enough away, for he was nothing but a rough-looking lad, and he ran off when he had given me the note as fast as his legs would carry him."
"Nothing amiss, I hope?" said Miss Huntingdon kindly.
"I hope not," replied her nephew.  He was evidently, however, greatly troubled and confused, and looked nervously towards his father, whose attention at the time was being given to a noble-looking dog which was receiving a piece of meat from his hand.
"What's up now?" cried Walter, who, although he was learning to treat his brother with more respect and consideration, was still rather on the look-out for opportunities to play off his fun upon him.  "Why, surely there's something amiss.  What's the good, Amos, of putting a spoonful of salt into your gooseberry tart?"
Mr Huntingdon now looked round and stared at his elder son, who had by this time partly recovered his self-possession.  "Nothing serious, my boy, I hope?" he said.
"I hope not, dear father.  It's only about a little child that I take an interest in; he seems to have got away from home, and his friends can't find him."
"Is it one of my tenants' children?"
"No; it's a child that lives in a cottage on the Gavelby estate.  We have struck up a friendship.  I ride up there sometimes, so they have sent to me about him; and I will ride over after luncheon and see what can be done."
Nothing more passed on the subject during the meal; but Miss Huntingdon's watchful care of her nephew made her notice the deep lines of anxiety which had gathered on the forehead of Amos, and her heart ached for him, for she was sure that he was burdened with some unexpected trouble connected with the work he had set himself to accomplish.  Dinner-time came, but Amos did not make his appearance. Ten o'clock struck, but he still lingered.  Never before had he been absent for a night except when at school or college, or on a visit to some friend; for his habits were most regular, and he always rose and retired to rest early, his custom in this respect having been often the subject of remark and merriment to Walter, who would say to his friends that, "although Amos would never join in a lark, he had no objection to rise with one; nor to lie down with a lamb, though he hadn't it in him to skip like one."  So when the family met next morning at breakfast, and nothing had been seen or heard of Amos, there was a shade of anxiety on every one's face.
"Where can the boy have been?" exclaimed Mr Huntingdon; "we never knew him go off like this before.--Hasn't he sent any message of any kind, Harry?"
"Not a word, sir, as far as I know."
"What's best to be done, then?--What do you say, Kate?" asked the squire.
"Perhaps Walter can make inquiries," suggested his sister.
"Well," replied her nephew, "I wouldn't mind, but really I don't know where to look exactly.  I may be riding about all day, for he's gone after the missing child, I suppose, so it will be no use looking for him at the child's home.  And, besides, I've an engagement to play lawn- tennis and go to luncheon at the Worthingtons', and I can't disappoint them."
"Not in such a case as this?" asked his aunt reproachfully.  "Can't you send a note of apology to the Worthingtons?  Suppose something serious has happened to your brother!"
"Oh, nonsense, Aunt Kate," cried Walter, who was not prepared to give up his engagement of pleasure; "don't be afraid about Amos; he'll turn up all right.  He's on his way home, you may depend upon it; only perhaps he has been trying to solve some wonderful problem, and has forgotten all about such commonplace things as time and space, and has fallen asleep under a hedge."
"I will go myself, then," said Miss Huntingdon, "and see if I can hear anything of him from the neighbours."
"Indeed, Kate," said her brother, "you must do nothing of the sort.  Set your mind at rest.  I will go myself and make inquiries; and if the boy does not make his appearance by luncheon time, we must take further steps to find him."
"Can _I_ be of any use, sir, in the matter?" asked Harry.
"Ah, that's just the thing!" cried Walter.  "If you can spare Harry, father, Jane can wait at luncheon; and I'll just put Harry myself on what I think will be the right scent."
"Well, my boy, it can be so, and you can do as you say," replied his father.  "I know we can trust Harry to do his best; he can take the old mare, and we shall do very well with Jane till he comes back."
Nothing loath, but rather gratified with the part he had to play and the trust placed in him, the old butler set out about noon on the old mare, accompanied by Walter, who was on his way to the Worthingtons'.  Harry would have preferred managing matters in his own fashion, which would have been to go on a tour of inquiry from farm to farm; but, having no choice, he surrendered himself to the guidance and directions of Walter. So they rode on together for some miles till they came within sight of the cottage where Amos had been seen by his brother playing with the little children.
"There, Harry," said Walter, "you see that cottage? just you call in there, and you will either find my brother there, if I am not mistaken, or, at any rate, you will find somebody who will tell you where to look for him."  Then he turned and put spurs to his horse, and was soon out of sight, leaving the old servant to jog along at his leisure to the little dwelling pointed out to him, the roof of which he could just see distinctly in the distance.
"Humph!" said Harry half out loud, as he rather reluctantly made his way towards the cottage; "you might have gone yourself, Master Walter, I think, and saved an old man like me such a shaking as I've had on the old mare's back.  But I suppose that `lawn tens,' as they call it, is a mighty taking thing to young people; it seems all the go now; all the young gents and young ladies has gone mad after it.  Knocking them balls back'ards and for'ards used to be called `fives' when I were a boy, but they calls it `tens' now; I suppose 'cos they does everything in these days twice as fast as they used to do.  Well, it don't matter; but if it had been Master Amos, and t'other road about, he'd never have let `tens,' or `twenties,' or `fifties' stand between him and looking arter a lost brother.  But then people don't know Master Amos and Master Walter as I do.  Their aunt, Miss Huntingdon, does a bit, and p'raps master will himself some day."
By the time he had finished this soliloquy Harry had neared the cottage. Then he quickened his pace, and having reached the little garden gate, hung his horse's bridle over a rail, with the full knowledge that the animal would be well content to stand at ease an unlimited time where she was left.  Then he made his way up to the cottage door and knocked. His summons was immediately answered by a respectably dressed middle- aged woman, who opened the door somewhat slowly and cautiously, and then asked him civilly what was his business with her.  "Well, if you please, ma'am," said the butler, "I'm just come to know if you can tell me anything about my young master, Mr Amos.  He ought to have come home last night, and none of us has set eyes on him up to the time when I left home, about an hour since."
The person whom he addressed was evidently in a difficulty what to answer.  She hesitated, and looked this way and that, still holding the door ajar, but not inviting Harry into the house.  The old man waited a few moments, and then he said, "If you please, ma'am, am I to understand as you don't know nothing about my young master, Mr Amos, and where he's gone?"
Still the other made no reply, but only looked more and more uneasy.  It was quite clear to Harry now that she could give him the information he wanted, if only she were willing to do so.  He waited therefore another minute, and then said, "You've no cause, ma'am, to fear as I shall get Master Amos into trouble by anything you may tell me.  I love him too well for that; and I can be as close as wax when I like.  You may trust me, ma'am, and he'd tell you the same if he was here."
"And what may your name be, friend?" asked the woman.
"Well," he replied, "the quality calls me `Harry;' but every one else calls me Mr Frazer,--at least when they behaves as they ought to do.  I am butler at Flixworth Manor, that's Mr Amos Huntingdon's home; and I've been in the family's service more nor fifty years come next Christmas, so it ain't likely as I'd wish to do any on 'em any harm."
"Well, Mr Frazer," said the woman, opening the door, "come in then; the fact is, I am almost as puzzled to know where Mr Amos is as you are.  I have been expecting him all the morning, and he may be here any minute. But pray come in and wait a bit."
Accepting the invitation, Harry stepped into a neat little parlour, prettily but not expensively furnished.  Over the chimney-piece was a large drawing in water-colours of Flixworth Manor-house, and, on either side of this, photographs of Mr and Mrs Huntingdon.  What could it mean?  But for Harry every other thought was swallowed up in a moment by his attention being called to a little girl, about four years of age, who stole into the room, and stood for a while staring at him with one finger in her mouth, and her head drooping slightly, but not so much as to hide a pair of lustrous hazel eyes.  A neat and beautifully white pinafore was bound round her waist by a red belt, and a profusion of glossy brown ringlets fell upon her shoulders.  The old man started at the sight as if he had been shot, and then gazed at the child with open mouth and raised eyebrows, till the little thing shrank back to the side of the woman who had opened the door, and hid her little face in her apron.  "It's herself, her very own self," said Harry half out loud, and with quivering voice; "tell me, ma'am, oh, pray tell me what's this child's name!"
"Well, Mr Frazer," replied his companion, though evidently with some hesitation, "I understand that I may trust you.  This dear child's names are Julia Mary, and I am her nurse, employed by Mr Amos to look after her for him."
"I begin to see it all now," said Harry half to himself.  "Don't trouble yourself, ma'am; I don't need to ask no more questions.  I don't want any one to tell me who Miss Julia's mother is; there can be no doubt about that, they're as like as two peas; and I begin to see a bit what Mr Amos has been a-doing.  God bless his dear, unselfish heart!  Come here to me, my child," he added with a pleasant smile.  The little Julia looked hard at him from behind the shelter of her nurse's gown for a moment, but soon lost all fear, for there was something attractive to her in the old man's snow-white hair and venerable face, as, surely, there is commonly a sweet sympathy between the guileless childhood of infancy and the holy childhood of God--fearing old age.  So she shyly drew towards him, and let him place her on his knee; and then she looked up wonderingly at him, as his tears fell fast on her brown hair, and his voice was choked with sobs.  "Yes," he said, "my precious Miss Julia, you're the very image of what your blessed mother was at your age.  I've had her like this on my knee scores of times.  Ah! well, perhaps a brighter day's coming for us all."
We must now leave the old man happy over his gentle charge, and go back to the previous day when Amos, at luncheon time, received the little note which so greatly disturbed him.  That note was as follows:--
"Respected Sir,--About ten o'clock this morning, as Master George and Miss Mary were playing in the garden, a strange man looked over the hedge and called Master George by name.  He held out something to him in his hand, which Master George went out of the gate to look at.  Then the man took him up into his arms, whispered something into his ear, and walked away with him.  I was in the house at the time, and was told this by Miss Mary.  What am I to do?  Please, sir, do come over at once if you can.--Your obedient servant, Sarah Williams."
Amos, as we have seen, left home after luncheon, and did not return.  He made his way as quickly as he could to the little cottage, and found Mrs Williams in great distress.  The poor little girl also was crying for her brother, declaring that a wicked man had come and stolen him away.  What was to be done?  The cottage where the nurse and children dwelt together was in rather a retired situation, the nearest house to it being a farm-house, which, though only a few hundred yards distant, was built in a hollow, so that what was going on outside the cottage would not be visible to persons about the farm premises.  Mrs Williams was the wife of a respectable farm labourer, of better education and more intelligence than the generality of his class.  They had no children of their own, so that Mrs Williams, who was a truly godly woman, was glad to give a home for a time and a motherly care to the two little ones committed to her charge by Amos.  The husband was, of course, absent from home during the working hours, so that his wife could not call him to her help when she missed the little boy; indeed, on the day of her loss her husband had gone with his master, the farmer, to the neighbouring market-town, some six miles off, so that she could have no assistance from him in the search for the missing child till late in the evening.  As far as Amos could gather from the little girl's description, the man who had stolen away her brother was tall, had a long beard, and very black eyes.  He was not on horseback, and there was no one else with him.  But this was very meagre information at the best on which to build for tracking the fugitives.  So Amos called Mrs Williams into the little parlour, and spread the matter out in prayer before God, whose "eyes are in every place, beholding the evil and the good."  Then wishing the nurse good-bye, with a heart less burdened than before, but still anxious, he remounted his pony, and turned him in the direction of the neighbouring farm-yard.
Having ascertained at the farm-house that no one had seen a man with a boy in his arms or walking by him pass that way, he proceeded down a long and not much frequented grassy lane at a jog-trot, but with small expectation of finding any clew that might guide him to the discovery of the lost child.  He had ridden on thus about half a mile, when he paused at a place where another grassy lane crossed at right angles the one down which he had been riding.  It was a lonely spot, but yet was a thoroughfare from which the roads diverged to one or two large villages, and led in one direction ultimately to the market-town.  Close to the ditch opposite the road down which Amos had come was a white finger- post, informing those who were capable of deciphering its bleared inscriptions whither they were going or might go.  Amos hesitated; he had never been on this exact spot before, and he therefore rode close up to the sign-post to read the names, which were illegible at a little distance off.  To his great surprise, and even dismay, he noticed, dangling from one of the post's outstretched wooden arms, a silk handkerchief of a rather marked pattern.  Could it really be?  Yes, he could not doubt it; it belonged to little George: it was a present to the child from himself only a few days before.  Amos's blood ran cold at the sight.  Could any one in the shape of humanity have had the heart to lay violent hands on the poor boy?  There was no telling.  He scarce dared to look towards the ditch lest he should see the lifeless body there.  But perhaps a gipsy had got hold of the child, and stripped him for his clothes: such things used to be done formerly.  But, then, why hang the silk handkerchief in such a conspicuous place? for it could not have got there by accident, nor been blown there, for it had been manifestly fastened and suspended there by human fingers.  Trembling in every limb, Amos unfastened the handkerchief from the post.  There was something stiff inside it.  He unfolded it slowly; an envelope disclosed itself.  It was directed in pencil.  The direction was, "Amos Huntingdon, Esq.  Please forward without delay."
Here, then, was a clue to the mystery.  Amos opened the envelope and read the enclosure, which was also written in pencil, in a neat and thoroughly legible hand.  It ran thus:--
"You are doubtless anxious to know what has become of the little boy George.  Come _alone_ to-morrow morning to the old oak in Brendon wood, and you shall be duly informed.  Mind, come _alone_: if you attempt to bring one or more with you, it will be simply lost labour, for then there will be no one to meet you.  You have nothing to fear as to any harm to your own person, or interference with your liberty."
There was no signature to the letter, either of name or initials.  Amos was sorely puzzled what to do when he had read this strange epistle.  Of course it was plain that the writer could put him in the way of recovering little George if he would; but, then, where was Brendon wood? and how was he to get to it on the following morning?  And yet, if he did not act upon this letter and follow its directions, the child might be lost to him for ever, and that he could not bear to think of.  The nearest town to the finger-post was yet some five miles distant; and should he reach that, and make his inquiries about the wood with success, it would be difficult for him to return home the same evening by any reasonable hour.  Still, he could not find it in his heart to abandon the search, and he therefore made the best of his way to the little town of Redbury.
As he was giving up his pony to the care of the hostler at the Wheatsheaf, the principal inn in the place, he observed a man--tall, with long beard, and very dark eyes--stepping down into the inn-yard, who, as soon as he saw Amos, immediately retreated into the house.  Had Amos seen him before?  Never, as far as he knew; and yet a strange suspicion came over him that this was the man who had enticed little George away, and was also the writer of the pencilled letter.  Still, it might not be so; he had no proof of it; and how was he to ascertain if it was the case or no?  He lingered about the yard for a time, but the stranger did not again make his appearance; so he strolled out into the town, and ascertained that Brendon wood was about two miles from Redbury, and had an old oak in the centre of it.  Turning matters over in his mind, he at last came to the not very comfortable conclusion that, as the evening was now far advanced, his best course was to put up for the night in the little town, and betake himself to the wood at an early hour next day.  Grieved as he was to give his friends at home anxiety by not returning that night, he felt that, if his object was to be attained, he had better remain where he was; and he was sure that his aunt would believe that he would not absent himself without good reason, and would do her best to allay in his father any undue anxiety on his account.  Having come to this conclusion, he returned to the Wheatsheaf and secured a bed, and then passed the rest of the evening in the coffee-room, watching very carefully to see if he could catch anywhere another glimpse of the mysterious stranger, but to no purpose.
After a restless and anxious night he rose early; and, after commending himself and his cause to God in earnest prayer, set off, after a hasty breakfast, in the direction given him as leading to the place of appointment.  It was a glorious summer day; and as he rode briskly along the country road, out of which he soon turned into a long lane skirted on either side by noble trees, he could not help sighing to think how man's sin had brought discord and deformity into a world which might otherwise have been so full of beauty.  The wood soon appeared in sight, and a lonely as well as lovely spot it was.  Many bridle-roads intersected it; he chose one which seemed to lead into the centre, and in a short time the great oak was visible.  There was no mistaking the venerable forest giant, with its rugged fantastic limbs towering high above the neighbouring trees.  So he made straight for it at once.  Amos was no coward, though naturally of a timid disposition; for he had patiently acquired habits of self-control, learned partly in the school of chastisement, and partly in the school of self-discipline.  And yet it was not without a feeling of shrinking and misgiving that he saw a man approaching the oak from a path opposite to that by which he himself had come.  Trees, mingled with thick brushwood, covered the ground on all sides, except where the roads and bridle-paths ran, and not a creature had he met before since he turned out of the main road.  Little time, however, was allowed him for further reflection; in a minute more he was joined by the other traveller.  A single glance was sufficient to satisfy him that he had before him the same man who had attracted his attention the evening before at the Wheatsheaf.
The stranger was, as has been said, tall, and wore a long beard.  On the present occasion he was wrapped in an ample cloak, and had on his head a high-crowned hat encircled with a feather.  Amos could not make him out;--what was he?  As they came close up to one another, the stranger saluted Amos with an air of mingled ease and affectation, and motioned him to a seat when he had dismounted from his pony.  So Amos, still holding Prince's bridle in his hand, placed himself on a grassy mound near the base of the old oak, while the other seated himself a few paces from him.  Neither spoke for a little while; then the stranger broke the silence.  His voice was not, in its natural tones, otherwise than pleasing; but there was an assumption in his manner of speaking and a spice of sarcastic swagger which grated very painfully on the sensibilities of his companion.  However, it was pretty evident that the stranger had no particular care to spare the feelings of the person whom he was addressing.
"I may as well explain at once, Mr Huntingdon," he began, "how I came to communicate with you in a way somewhat uncommon.  The fact is, that I have reasons for not wishing to make myself known more than I can help to the good people in these parts.  Now, had I sent you my note by the hand of any messenger, this would have drawn attention to myself, and might have led to inquiries about me which are not just now convenient. I was quite sure that yourself, or some one belonging to you, would be searching up and down the lanes for the little boy, and that his silk handkerchief, placed where I put it, would attract notice, and the note tied up in it be conveyed to yourself without my appearing personally on the scene.  And so it has turned out.  You have read my note, I see; and no one has been in communication with the writer but yourself.  This is as it should be.  And now, may I ask, do you know me? or at any rate, do you guess who I am? for we have not seen each other, I believe, before yesterday evening."
"I do not know your name," replied Amos sadly; "but I cannot say that I have no suspicion as to who you are."
"Exactly so," replied the other; "I am, in fact, none other than your brother-in-law, or, if you like it better, your sister Julia's husband."
"I have feared so," replied Amos.
"Feared!" exclaimed his companion in a tone of displeasure.  "Well, be it so.  I am aware that our marriage was not to the taste of the Huntingdons, so we have kept out of the way of the family as much as possible; and, indeed, I believe that your father has never even known the name of his daughter's husband, but simply the fact of her marriage."
"I believe so," said Amos; "at any rate, all that has been known by the family generally has been that she married"--here he hesitated; but the other immediately added,--
"Beneath her, you would say.  Be it so, again.  Well, you may as well know my name yourself, at any rate, for convenience' sake.  It is, at your service, Orlando Vivian.  Shall I go on?"
"If you please."
"You are aware, then, of course, that I deserted your sister, as it is called, for a time; the fact being, that we discovered after marriage that our tastes and habits of thought were very dissimilar, and that we should be happier apart, at least for a season.  And in the meantime you stepped in, and have acted very nobly, I must say, in taking charge of my two little children, for which I must tender you my best thanks."
There was a brief pause, and then Amos inquired anxiously, "Is it your intention to take the children from me?"
"Well, not necessarily, but perhaps so; certainly not the girl, at present, unless you yourself wish it."
"And the boy?" asked Amos.
"Ah, I have not quite made up my mind about him," was the reply.  "It may be that I shall keep him with me, and bring him up to my own profession."
"And what may that profession be?" asked the other.
"The stage," was the reply.
"What!" exclaimed Amos in a tone of horror, "bring up the poor child to be an actor!  Why, it will be his ruin, body and soul!"
"And if so, Mr Huntingdon," said the other sternly and bitterly, and with his dark eyes glaring fiercely, "I suppose I, as his father, have a right to bring him up as I please.  The father's profession is, I imagine, notwithstanding your disparaging remarks, good enough for the son."
Amos leaned his head on his hand for a while without reply; then he looked his companion steadily in the face, and said, "And is there no other course open?"
"Why, yes.  To be frank with you, Mr Huntingdon, there is; and, without any more beating about the bush, I will come to the point at once.  The fact is, I want money, and--not an uncommon thing in this not over agreeable or accommodating world--don't know where to get it.  I have, therefore, just this to say,--if you will pledge me your word to send me a cheque for fifty pounds as soon as you get home, I, on my part, will at once deliver up little George to you; and will pledge my word, as a man of honour, not again to interfere with either of the children.  You may think what you please of me, but such is my proposal."
These words were uttered in a tone of the most imperturbable self- possession, and perfectly staggered poor Amos by their amazing effrontery.  But all was now plain enough to him.  This needy adventurer, who had entangled poor Julia in his cruel meshes, and had deserted her for a time, was hard up for money; and, having found out that Amos had taken upon himself to provide for his children at present, had hit upon the scheme of withdrawing one of them from the cottage, as a way of extorting money from his brother-in-law.  It was also pretty clear that he was afraid to show himself openly, lest the officers of justice should lay hold of him and bring him to trial for some breach of the law.  He had, therefore, betaken himself to the expedient of hanging up the little boy's handkerchief on the way-post, being sure that persons would be out immediately in all directions searching for the child, and that some one of them would light upon the handkerchief with the letter in it, and would forward it to Amos without delay, as the young man would be sure to be informed of the loss as soon as the nurse discovered it, and would lose no time in making personally search for the missing child; and thus the writer's purpose would be answered without his having given any clew by which himself could be discovered and brought into trouble.  All this was now plainly unfolded to Amos. And what was he to do?  That the man before him was utterly selfish and unscrupulous, he had no doubt, and little good, he feared, could be done by appealing to the conscience or better feelings of one who could act deliberately as he had done.  Was he, then, to leave his little nephew in his father's hands, to be brought up to the stage--or, in other words, to certain ruin under the training of such a man?  The thought was not to be endured.  No, he must make the sacrifice.
While these things were passing through his mind, his companion looked about him with cool indifference, kicking the leaves and sticks at his feet, and whistling in a low tone some operatic air.  Then he broke silence.  "Which is it to be, Mr Huntingdon?" he asked.  "Am I to keep little George, or do you wish to have him back again?  You know the conditions; and you may be sure that I should not have taken the trouble to meet you here if I had any thoughts of changing my mind."
Amos looked sadly and kindly at him, and then said, "And can you really, Mr Vivian, justify this conduct of yours to yourself?  Can you feel really happy in the course you are pursuing?  Oh! will you not let me persuade you--for my poor sister's sake, for your own sake--to leave your present mode of life, and to seek your happiness in the only path which God can bless?  I would gladly help you in any way I could--"
But here his companion broke in, scorn on his lip, and a fierce malignant anger glaring from his eyes.  "Stop, stop, Mr Huntingdon! enough of that.  We are not come here for a preaching or a prayer- meeting.  The die has long since been cast, and the Rubicon crossed. You can take your course; I will take mine.  If you have nothing more agreeable to say to me, we had better each go our own way, and leave matters as they are."
"No," said Amos, firmly but sorrowfully; "it shall not be so.  I promise that you shall have my cheque for fifty pounds when you have placed little George in my hands, and on the understanding that you pledge your word, as a man of honour, to leave the children with me unmolested."
"Exactly so," replied the other; "and now, as a little matter of business, I shall be obliged by your making out the cheque to `John Smith or Bearer,'--that, certainly, will tell no tales."
"And where shall I send it to meet you? to what address?"
"To no address at all, if you please.  I will be myself at the spot where the four lanes meet near your house, to the north of the Manor; it is about a quarter of a mile from you.  Of course you know the place well.  I will be there at five o'clock to-morrow morning, before the general world is astir.  You can either meet me there yourself, or send some trusty person who is sure not to know me.  I need hardly say that any attempt to surprise or lay violent hands on me on that occasion would be fruitless, as I should be well on my guard; and, further, should there be any foul play of any kind, you may depend upon my removing _both_ my children from your cottage at the earliest opportunity."
"I understand you," said Amos, "and will send my father's old butler to take you the cheque at the hour and to the place you name.  The old man will ask no questions; he will be satisfied to do just what I tell him, neither more nor less.  You will easily recognise him, as he has snowy- white hair, and he will be riding on this pony of mine."
"So far so good," said the other; "I have no doubt you will keep your word.  And now as to the boy.  You will find him at the finger-post on which his silk handkerchief was tied, at two o'clock this afternoon; that is to say, if you come alone, and are there punctually."  Then he rose, and, stretching himself to his full height, saluted Amos with a bow of exaggerated ceremoniousness, and, turning on his heel, was soon hidden from view by the trees of the wood.
Sadly and slowly Amos made his way back to the market-town, his thoughts, as he rode along, being far from pleasant companions.  What was to be the end of all this?  Could he have done differently?  No.  He was satisfied that duty plainly called him to the sacrifice which he had made.  He would have reproached himself bitterly had he lost the opportunity of recovering his little nephew from such a father.  He had no doubt, then, taken one right step; the next he must leave to the same heavenly guidance which never had misled nor could mislead him.  So having waited in the town till he had refreshed himself with a mid-day meal, he made his way back along the roads he had travelled the day before, and in due time arrived in sight of the finger-post, and of the child who was sitting alone beneath it, his little head buried in his lap, till, roused by the sound of the pony's feet, he looked up, and with a joyful cry ran to meet his uncle.  Another moment, and Amos had sprung from his saddle and was clasping the sobbing, laughing child to his heart.
"O dear, dear Uncle Amos!" cried the little boy; "how good it is of God to send you for me.  Oh, don't let the tall, ugly, cruel man take me away again."
"Not if I can help it, dear child," said his uncle.  "There now, jump up, Georgie," he added; "we shall soon be at home again."
As he was in the act of remounting, having placed the child on the front of the saddle, he thought he heard a rustling in the hedge behind the post, and that he saw the glancing of a dark body through the trees beyond the hedge.  However, that mattered not; in a very little time, having put his pony to a brisk canter, he reached the cottage, and received a hearty welcome from the nurse, and also from old Harry, whose presence at the house he was not surprised at, when he remembered that his brother Walter would no doubt have directed the old man to seek for him there.  But now he began to see that Harry had become acquainted, in a measure, with his secret; for the nurse called him aside into another room soon after his return, and told him of the old servant's emotion at the sight of the little girl, and of his recognising in her the child of his master's daughter.
Amos was at first considerably disturbed at the old man's having made this discovery.  Then, by degrees, the conviction grew upon him that this very discovery might be an important step in the direction of carrying out the work he had set himself to do.  Surely it had been permitted for that end; and here was one who would become a helper to him in the attainment of his purpose.  So, after having pondered over the matter, as he walked backwards and forwards in the little garden for some half-hour or more, he called Harry out to him, and took him into his confidence.
"Harry," he began, "can you keep a secret?"
"Well, Master Amos, that depends upon what sort of a secret it is, and who tells it me.  Some folks give you secrets to keep which everybody knows, so that they're gone afore you gets 'em.  But if _you've_ got a secret for me to keep, you may depend upon it no one shall get it from me."
"Just so, Harry.  Then I have a secret which I want you to keep for me-- or, perhaps, I had better say that I have something which I should like to tell you, because I believe you may be able to help me in an important matter.  And instead of binding you to keep my secret, I shall just leave it to your own good sense to say nothing about the matter till the right time comes; and I am sure, when you know all, you will have no wish to make my business a subject of conversation in the family, nor of idle gossip out of it."
"You're right there, sir," was the old butler's hearty reply; "you may trust me.  I've too much respect for the family to go about like a sieve, shaking such things as I've a notion you're a-going to speak to me about all up and down the country, for every idle man, woman, and child to be wagging their tongues about them."
"Well then, Harry," continued his young master, "I shall count upon your discretion as to silence, and on your help, where you can be of use to me."
"They're both at your service, Mr Amos."
"Then I shall speak openly to you, and without any reserve.  I need hardly remind you of the sad beginning of our family troubles.  You will remember too well how my poor sister left her home, and married secretly a man altogether beneath her.  You know how terribly my poor father was cut up by that marriage, and how he closed the door of our home against Miss Julia, as I must still call her to you.  I am not blaming him nor excusing her, but just referring to the facts themselves.  I never knew till to-day who or what my poor sister's husband was.  I never dared mention the subject to my father, especially after my dear mother had to leave us; but ever since they were gone from us I have had it on my heart to make it the great business of my life to get them back again. I know it can be done, and I believe, with God's help, it will be done. I have found out to-day that my poor sister's husband is an actor, evidently a thoroughly unprincipled man.  She went about with him from one place to another for a while; then he deserted her, before the children were old enough to know him as their father; and about a year ago I got a letter from her, telling me that she was left in a miserable lodging with two little children, and must starve unless somebody helped her.  I went to see her, and found her mixed up with a number of her husband's stage acquaintances, from whom she seemed unable to free herself.  So I promised to supply her with what would keep her from want till her husband should return to her; and got her to let me have her two children, whom she was quite unable to feed and clothe, and who would soon be ruined, I saw, if they were left with their poor mother as she then was, and with such people about her as friends or acquaintances.  So I brought the children here, and have put them under the charge of good Mrs Williams, who knows all about them; and since then I have been just watching and waiting to see how the Lord would guide me, and have been content to move as he directs me, one step at a time.  But yesterday I got a sad check.  The father of the children enticed away his little boy, and got me to meet him this morning some miles away from here.  He cared nothing for the child, but only took him away that he might get some money out of me.  So, when we met this morning, he engaged to give me back the child if I would promise to send him a sum of money which he named; and if I would not do so, then he said he would keep the boy, and bring him up as a stage-player.  That I would not hear of; so I promised him the money, and he has given me back the little boy as you see, and has solemnly undertaken not to meddle with either of the children again.  And now I want you to take the money for me when we get home.  He is to be at the four turnings above the Manor-house at five o'clock to-morrow morning, and I am to send him a cheque in an envelope.  This I have promised, and I want your help in the matter.  You understand, Harry, how things are?--they are black enough just now, I grant, but they might be blacker."
The old man, who had listened with breathless interest, now stood still and looked his young master steadily in the face, while two or three big tears rolled down his cheeks.
"And so you've been a-sacrificing yourself, Master Amos, for your sister and her dear children," he said.  "I see it all; but shouldn't I just like to have fast hold of that rascal's neck with one hand, and a good stout horsewhip in the other.  But I suppose it's no use wishing for such things.  Well, I'm your man, sir, as far as I can be of any service.  But as for him and his promises, what are they worth?  Why, he'll be just squeezing you as dry as an old sponge as has been lying for a month in a dust-pan.  He'll never keep his word, not he, while there's a penny to be got out of you.  And yet, I suppose, you couldn't have done different for the sake of the poor children, bless their little hearts.  And I'm to take the money to him?  Yes; and a policeman or two at the same time would be best.  But no, I suppose not, as you've promised, and for the credit of the family.  Well, it's a shocking bad business altogether; but when a man's been and tackled it as you've done, Master Amos, it'll come right in the end, there's no doubt of it."
"Thank you, Harry, a thousand times," said the other; "and I am sure you shall see the wisdom of keeping quiet on the subject for the sake of the family."
"You're safe there with me, Master Amos," was the old man's reply.
So, when Amos and Harry returned to Flixworth Manor, the young man explained to his father that the little child at the cottage, in whom he was interested, had been enticed away by a stranger, and that he had been unable to recover him till that morning, and had, in his search for the child, been obliged to spend the previous night at the market-town. Mr Huntingdon, who was just then very fully occupied in planning and carrying out some improvements on his estate, was satisfied with this explanation.  So the subject was not further discussed in the family. On the morning after his return, Amos duly conveyed the cheque, through Harry, to his brother-in-law.
CHAPTER EIGHT.
BEARING THE CROSS.
Walter's good intentions and resolutions respecting his treatment of his brother, though sincere when he uttered them in the presence of his aunt, were by no means strong enough to make him curb his wit or his displeasure when Amos did anything to annoy or thwart him.  And not only so; but there abode in his mind a feeling of mingled jealousy and annoyance when he was constrained to admit to himself his brother's superiority.  If Amos had some self-imposed duty to perform, why should he thrust this duty into other people's faces?  Duty was a very fine thing in its way, no doubt, but grave Mr Duty was a very sour-tempered, troublesome old fellow when he trode on his neighbour's toes.  And why should Amos make himself disagreeable by adopting a course of duty which unfitted him for cordially co-operating with his younger brother in his schemes?  There was a sort of monasticism in this conduct in Walter's eyes.  Here was his brother living amongst them, and yet, having taken the vows of some self-imposed duty upon him, he was looking down upon them all as though from some higher standing-ground.  What a pity that he did not retire into a monastery, where he could act out his vows and his duty without troubling the noses of ordinary mortals like his relations with this oppressive "odour of sanctity."  So thought Walter; and he made no concealment of his feelings from Amos, whom he now began to call "the Monk," or "Father Gengulphus."
Amos took it all very quietly, fully understanding that Walter was vexed with him for pursuing a path alone, along which his brother neither could nor would follow him at present.  He was content that it should be so, and bore the cross patiently, being willing to bide his time, thankful to notice in Walter a kindlier feeling towards himself on the whole, and convinced that, in the end, his own motives and work would be duly appreciated by that brother whom he sincerely loved.
Miss Huntingdon saw what was going on, and rejoiced.  She knew well that the discipline would only tend to brighten the character of her elder nephew, and felt sure that Walter would learn by degrees fully to understand and value his brother.  Meanwhile, she was ever ready to throw in a little oil when the waters were more than usually troubled. She knew, too, the strength of Amos's religious character, and the weakness of any higher or holier principles in Walter's heart; and she was sure that the steady consistency of her elder nephew would gradually win on the generous heart of his brother, spite of himself.
Nothing special had occurred to spoil the harmony of feeling between Amos and Walter for some weeks after the unexpected absence of the former from home; so that the hearts of the brothers were really being drawn closer together, notwithstanding natural dissimilarity of disposition, and the absence in Walter of that high principle and self- discipline which were moulding his elder brother's character into daily nearer conformity to Him who is the one only perfect pattern of humanity.
It was while Walter was thus increasingly becoming sensible of the superior beauty of his brother's sterling worth and consistency, and was at the same time secretly resenting the pressure of that nobler life's influence upon him, being unprepared to follow it out himself and submit to its gentle restraints and self-denial, that a party of friends was assembled at dinner one summer evening at the Manor-house.  Mr Huntingdon did not give dinner-parties now as frequently as in happier days, and his friends and neighbours understood and appreciated the cause; but now and then he felt it to be his duty to entertain his friends in the old way; so, on the present occasion, some thirty guests sat down to table.
Among those present were an old Mrs Morse, a widow lady, and her daughter.  The mother was a kind-hearted woman of the world, reasonably well-to-do, and visited by all the good families in the neighbourhood. She was very anxious to see her daughter, who was her only child, and was now passing out of her youthful days, well married, as the world esteems it; so she was very glad of an opportunity of drawing out Amos Huntingdon, whom she looked upon as a worthy, weak, shy, dull young man, rather depressed by his discouraging home surroundings, and not a likely person to attract or seek the affections of any young lady who might be fortunate enough to combine the allurements of wealth and beauty.  He might, however, with a little judicious management, be led to look with interest on her daughter, and would prove, no doubt, an excellent husband, as he had means of his own, the prospect of inheriting the Manor, and was exceedingly amiable, and free from habits of extravagance.  Gladly, therefore, did she avail herself of the present opportunity to engage Amos in conversation before dinner was announced, expressing, at the same time, her regret that she had so seldom the pleasure of meeting him, and how much it would gratify herself and her daughter if he would come over now and then and spend a quiet afternoon or evening with them.  "You know," she continued, "we are quiet people, and, if report says true, Mr Amos, your own tastes and habits are of the quiet sort.  We should be so glad to see you in our simple way; and I think we could show you, in the beauties of our charming neighbourhood, what would really be a pleasure to you and a refreshment to your mind."
Amos thanked her, and listened with due decorum to a good deal of small talk on the old lady's part till dinner was announced, when she so contrived that he should take her daughter down and sit between them.
Walter was seated just opposite his brother, full of life and fun, as he threw off his gay remarks now on this side and now on that.  Suddenly he looked across at Amos, and something in the situation of his brother between the old lady and her daughter struck him as so irresistibly funny, that it was with the utmost difficulty that he restrained himself from a violent outburst of laughter.  And, certainly, to one easily moved to merriment there was something singularly quaint and almost comic in the contrast between the subdued but courteous manner of Amos, who was patiently endeavouring to make himself agreeable to his two immediate neighbours, and the excited frivolity of Miss Morse's running fire of worldly commonplaces, occasionally interrupted by her mother's more staid utterances of a similar character.
Walter thoroughly comprehended the situation, and the reason why such pains were being taken to draw out his brother; and his satisfaction and amusement were unbounded at the manifest failure of the effort.  The old lady caught Walter's eye, and divining somewhat of the cause of its merry twinkle, coloured, and was silent.  Her daughter also looked uneasily across the table, and then exclaimed,--
"Were you at Lady Gambit's garden-party last Tuesday, Mr Walter?"
"No," he replied; "I was not there."
"Then I can tell you that you missed a treat," said the other.
"Why, what was the special attraction?" he asked.
"Oh, everything that you can imagine!"
"Well, I can imagine so many things," said Walter laughing, "that I am quite sure her ladyship's garden could never have held them all.  Pray, tell me what you yourself thought _the_ attraction _par excellence_."
"Yes, I can do that.  You know these garden-parties are generally rather dull affairs after all."
"What! with those numberless attractions?"
"Yes; one gets weary of them.  You know, go where you will, it's the same thing over and over again."
"But it seems that it was not so in this case."
"No, it was not.  Her ladyship, no doubt, wished to make a little variety, and so she was good enough to provide us with something new."
"Dear me!" cried Walter; "how I should have liked being there!  What was the novelty?  Was it a temperance lecture, or a Band of Hope meeting for the benefit of the old boys and girls of sixty or seventy years of age? That must have been very lively.  Or perhaps it was a Protestant address against nunneries and monasteries.  My brother Amos would have liked to have had a word on that subject."
"No, no, Mr Walter; you must not be foolish."
"Well, do tell me.  I am all anxiety to know what this attractive novelty was.  Not a conjurer? that would have been capital fun."
"No, not a conjurer exactly."
"Well, then, something of the sort?"
"Yes; Lady Gambit had engaged a celebrated mimic--a man, I mean, who can take off other people to the life."
"Indeed," said Walter.  "Perhaps it might have been as well if he had taken himself off.  But, excuse my nonsense; what did he mimic?"
"Oh, all sorts of funny people.  We all gathered round him under the great sycamore tree, and he kept us in peals of laughter for an hour."
"Tell me, please, some of the characters he took off."
"I can remember two especially.  One of them was a drunkard, and the other was a hypocrite.  In taking off the drunkard he called himself `Mr Adolphus Swillerly.'  You never heard anything more amusing in your life."
"And the hypocrite?" asked Walter, but with less of amusement in his tone.
"Ah, I think that was better still!  He assumed the character of `Simon Batter-text;' and he mimicked his preaching, and his praying, and his sighs, and his `ahmens' in a wonderful way.  It really was perfect.  I'm so sorry you were not there, you would have so thoroughly enjoyed it."
There was a pause, and a general silence, for the attention of the rest of the company had been drawn to the subject and the speakers.
"Surely you don't see any harm in a little fun like that?" asked the young lady in some dismay, as she noticed that Walter's face and manner were troubled as he hesitated in his reply.
All eyes were on him.  What should he say?  He turned very red; and then, having helped himself to a glass of wine, he said, carelessly, and with a short, merry laugh, "Harm! oh, of course not!  The man meant no harm; he didn't attack individuals.  All the better if he made drunkenness and hypocrisy ridiculous.--Don't you think so, Amos?"
For a moment his brother hesitated, for every eye was directed towards him.  No one spoke; not a knife nor fork clattered.
"Well, my boy," said his father, "let us have your opinion."
Thus appealed to, Amos no longer hesitated, but said calmly, and in a low distinct voice, heard by every one at the table, "I had rather not have given my opinion; but, when I am thus openly appealed to, I must not shrink from expressing it.  I think it wrong, utterly wrong, to ridicule sin in any shape or form.  To put sin in a funny light is not the way to make us hate it as we ought to do.  Our Saviour never made light or a jest of sin; and I believe that the man who mimicked a drunkard and a hypocritical preacher had no love for either sobriety or holiness."
The profoundest silence reigned while Amos uttered these words.  At first his voice had trembled, but it immediately became perfectly firm, and a quiet peace rested on his sweet face as he finished.  A sudden chill seemed to have fallen on most of the party.  Some shrugged their shoulders, some smiled, others looked annoyed.  Mrs Morse and her daughter exchanged looks of bewilderment behind Amos's back.  Walter, with feelings of mingled shame and vexation, glanced at the bright face of his aunt, whose eyes swam with grateful tears.  Then he glanced down: her hands were crossed; yes, he knew that it would be so.  And how felt Mr Huntingdon?  To the surprise of all, and of none more than Amos himself, he exclaimed, "That's right, Amos; you've spoken out like a man, and I believe you are right."
For a while there was silence; then a gentleman near the squire's end of the table asked his next neighbour, "What sort of a looking man was this same mimic?  I believe you were at Lady Gambit's."
"Yes, I was there," replied the other.  "I can't say much in his favour. He was not a bad-looking fellow,--black hair, if it was his own, black piercing eyes, and a black beard.  I can't imagine where her ladyship picked him up."
"But _I_ can," said a gentleman opposite.  "He is some strolling player. He got, it would seem, access to Lady Gambit's ear in some underhand way; and he has done now what our young friend Walter suggested a little while ago that he might as well have done sooner.  Having taken other people off, he has taken himself off also, and has contrived to carry some twenty pounds of her ladyship's money with him, which he managed to swindle her out of; and the police are on the look-out for him.  I heard that only this morning from the sergeant himself."
Poor Amos! how terribly his heart sank within him when he heard these words!  Yes; he could have little doubt about it.  This mimic and swindler, he felt assured, was none other than his own brother-in-law. Happily, however, he was pretty sure to be now out of the neighbourhood, and was not likely to show himself soon again.  But what of his unhappy wife?  Alas!  Amos dreaded to think what the unprincipled man might do with or against her.
Glad, heartily glad, were both the brothers when the dinner was over, and the rest of the evening, after "dragging its slow length along," had at last come to an end.  Walter, indeed, rattled away in the drawing- room to every one's content but his own.  Still, a chill had fallen on more than one of the party; and as for poor Mrs Morse and her daughter, after endeavouring to make themselves agreeable by gusts which were followed by portentous lulls, they were glad to order their carriage and take their departure at the earliest hour consistent with politeness.
And now, when all the guests had taken leave, and Miss Huntingdon had retired to her room, happy in the prospect of coming rest, she heard a sort of half scuffle at her door, followed by a knock.  Then in came Walter, dragging in some one after him who was evidently reluctant to be thus introduced.  "Can you, oh, can you, dear aunt, spare me--ay, spare _us_,--that means me and Amos, or, rather, it ought to be Amos and me,-- just a few minutes?  Amos doesn't want to come, just like his unselfish self, but I do.  No, I don't want to tire you after all your fatigues, but I can't go to sleep till I have had a word from you.  If you don't let me stop, if you don't say that word, I shall lie awake all night, thinking of those hands--not _cross_, for their owner is never cross, but _crossed_--those crossed hands.  Or if I do go to sleep, I shall do nothing but dream of them.  So pray let me stop; and Amos must stop too."
The permission to remain having been cheerfully granted, Walter hauled his brother into a chair, and then, stooping over him, kissed his forehead.  Then he flung himself on his knees and looked up wistfully into Miss Huntingdon's face.  Oh, how entirely did she forget all weariness, as she marked the effect that Walter's kiss had on his brother; how it brought tears from those eyes which had long known little of weeping except for sorrow.
"Well, dear boy," she said, "and what would you have with me now?"
"Ah! auntie, I want those hands to talk to me, and I want Amos to hear them talk.  I want you to tell us both some of your moral courage anecdotes; they will strengthen him and be a lesson to me; for I don't want you to tell me this time that I was wrong.  There sits the brave man, here kneels the coward."
"Dear, dear boy," was Miss Huntingdon's reply, with a warm embrace, "yes; what you say is true.  It _did_ require true moral courage to speak up as Amos did, at such a time and before so many; and we have some noble instances on record of such a courage under somewhat similar circumstances, and these show us that conduct like this will force respect, let the world say and think what it pleases.  I have two or three heroes to bring forward on this topic, but I must be brief, as the hour is late.
"You remember Frederick the Great, as he was called.  Alas! he was great in infidelity as well as in war; and he delighted to gather round him those who shared in the same unbelieving views.  God and his truth were subjects of ridicule with them; and a bold man indeed would he be who would venture to say in their presence a word in favour of the gospel or of respect for its divine Author.  But there was such a one amongst those who had the privilege of sitting at the king's table; an old grey- headed man of rank, who had fought his country's battles nobly, and whose wise counsels in state affairs were highly prized by his sovereign.  He was dining one day at the palace, and saw all round him none but those who made a mock of sin and religion.  The conversation flowed freely, and the smart jests of Frederick called forth similar flashes of wit from his different guests.  The subject of Christianity soon came up, and was immediately handled in the most profane and bitter style by the king and those around him.  No wit is so cheap as profane wit; for the devil seems to give a special facility of sarcasm to those who attack God's truth; and, besides that, there seems nothing which ungodly men relish so much, for giving point to their blasphemies, as Scripture facts or words misquoted, misapplied, or parodied.  So the gospel and its Founder were bandied from tongue to tongue as a theme for unholy mirth.  But presently there was a pause and a dead silence; for the grey-headed old soldier, who had sat perfectly silent and deeply pained, as he listened to the unhallowed talk of his companions, rose to his feet, his face flushed, and his hoary head bowed down.  What was coming now?
"`May it please your majesty,' the old man began, while the tears ran down his cheeks, and his voice was troubled, `I have always, as I am sure you will acknowledge, behaved with due respect to your majesty whenever in your majesty's presence; nor can any one here say that he has ever heard me speak evil of your majesty behind your back.  Your majesty knows, also, that I have endeavoured to serve you faithfully on the field and in the council-chamber.  You must therefore bear with me while I say that I cannot sit patiently by and hear your majesty join with your friends in speaking evil of the dearest friend I have, one dearer to me than my life, and whom I must hold in greater honour than even your majesty.  I mean my Saviour and heavenly King, the Lord Jesus Christ.  Pardon me, therefore, your majesty, if I ask leave to withdraw at once.'
"Just imagine, dear boys, such a speech in such a company, for to such effect were the words spoken by that noble old soldier of the Cross. Ah! it is comparatively easy to stand up for the truth in our day and country, because religion is now universally respected by all people of good sense and refinement, even by those who do not follow it; and anything like an open attack upon Christianity, in a mixed company, would be frowned upon by society as being ungentlemanly and in bad taste.  But it was not so in Frederick's court, where a profession of infidel opinions was almost held to be an essential in one who would make any pretension to intellectual acuteness.  And the old officer knew this well.  He knew the scorn which would glare upon him from the eyes of the other guests.  He expected nothing but sneering pity, where such sentiments as his own could not be visited with a severer penalty.  But he did not hang back through fear of man.  He could say, as David says in the Psalms, `I will speak of thy testimonies even before kings, and will not be ashamed.'  Was he not a true moral hero, dear Walter?"
"An out-and-out one, dear aunt," was his reply.  "But what did the king say to this?"
"The king behaved on this occasion like a king and a man.  Poor king, he was not without a heart that could, at times, feel as it ought to do. He at once turned to the faithful old servant of the great Master, and, checking all attempts at ridicule or retort in the other guests, assured him that he thoroughly respected and appreciated his feelings and motives and his present conduct, and that never again would he himself say anything against the old man's faith nor his Saviour while he was by, nor would he suffer any who might be with him to do so."
"Hip, hip, hurrah!" said Walter.  "The old man got the best of it after all; and so will my brother Amos here, spite of his having such an unworthy coward of a brother as poor Walter.  But you have another example for us, auntie; nothing like knocking the nail on the head.  I feel better already, and mean to be a perfect moral lion for bravery in future; at least I hope so."
"I hope so too, Walter," said his aunt with a smile.  "I will give you, then, one other instance of the same sort of moral courage, but taken from quite a different country, and occurring in our own days; and then I think we shall have had lessons enough for to-night.  My hero this time is an American, and a young man too.
"You will have heard of the remarkable revival which took place in that country, I mean in the United States, some few years since.  Of course, at such seasons there will be a mixture of good and evil.  Not all who make a profession will stand firm; while those who have been merely carried along by the current of excitement will return at last to the world, from which they have never really separated themselves, when the excitement has passed away.  But, indeed, a great and lasting work for God was accomplished in that revival, and the young man I am speaking about was one of the fruits of it.
"He had been living a very gay and thoughtless life.  I am not sure that he had been indulging in any openly sinful practices; but, at any rate, he had been giving himself up wholly to the pursuit of this world.  He was in a good social position, and possessed of abundant means. Moreover, he had received a good education, so far as mere learning went, and was of pleasing and popular manners.  The last thing he would have thought of would have been turning a Christian.  But God, whose thoughts are not as our thoughts, had better things in store for him. The revival wave swept over the neighbourhood where he was, and carried him along with it.  His heart, his views, his aims were all really changed; he was, indeed and in truth, a new creature.  And now he felt that he must not hide his colours, he must nail them to the mast, or, rather, he must wrap them round him that, go where he might, every one might see them.  His was that thorough-going, energetic, outspeaking disposition which has accomplished such marvellous earthly things through so many of his fellow-countrymen.  He was not the person to do anything by halves.
"Before his conversion, himself and several other young men, of like tastes and habits, used to meet weekly at one another's houses, in turn, for card-playing and carousing; and at these meetings he used to be the very life of the party, the gayest of the gay.  But what should he do now?  It would be no easy matter to confess to his young associates the change that had taken place in his heart.  What would they think and say?  Perhaps he might let it get known by degrees, and then he could just absent himself from the old gatherings, and merely drop out of a society no longer congenial to him.  This would save him a great deal of shame and reproach.  Would not this be as much as could be reasonably expected of him, and sufficient to show his sincerity and consistency? It might have satisfied ordinary characters, but it did not satisfy him. He wanted to be doing something at once for the Master, and to begin with those very young men who had been his companions in sin.  So he sent round his printed invitations to every one of them to a gathering in his own house.  Such had been the custom with all the members of their fraternity.  But this time the invitation was no longer to `Tea and Cards,' but to `Tea and Prayer.'  It was, indeed, a bold stroke, but it was not the act of the moment from mere impulse or excitement.
"The day of meeting came.  A few of his old acquaintances arrived, some, it may be, out of curiosity, or supposing that the `Prayer' was only a joke.  But none were left in doubt.  Plainly, lovingly, faithfully, he set before them how the change had been wrought in himself, and how happy it had made him; and then he affectionately urged them all to take the same course as he had done.  And I believe that his noble and courageous dealing was not in vain.  Am I wrong, Walter, in classing that young American gentleman among my moral heroes?"
"No, dear aunt, certainly not," replied her nephew thoughtfully.  "I think he deserves a foremost place;--don't you, Amos?"
"Yes," replied his brother; "he reminds me of the greatest, perhaps, of all moral heroes--I mean, of course, among beings like ourselves.  I am thinking of the apostle Paul, who changed at once from the persecutor to the preacher; gave up every earthly honour and advantage; braved the bitter scorn of his old friends; and, without hesitation, began immediately publicly to proclaim the gospel which he had before been mad to destroy."
Walter held out his hand to his brother, and the clasp was a close and mutual one; and then, hand in hand, they left their aunt, who laid her head on her pillow that night with deep thankfulness in her heart, for she saw that, spite of all drawbacks, there was a good work making progress in Walter, and that the high and holy character of the true and tried disciple of the Saviour was gaining strength and beauty in the once despised and misunderstood Amos.
CHAPTER NINE.
IS IT GENUINE?
But though Walter was learning to understand and appreciate his brother's character, and to acknowledge his superiority to himself in moral courage, he was not altogether satisfied with continuing to lie under the sense of that superiority on his brother's part.  He had himself been so constantly made the object of his father's admiration and outspoken praises, and had always been so popular with all friends of the family and guests at the Manor-house, that anything like a feeling of inferiority to his brother was one which he found it very hard to allow a lodging in his heart and thoughts.  So, while the generous impulse of the moment had led him to applaud and rejoice in his brother's noble moral courage, when they were discussing the matter in his aunt's room, he was by no means prepared, when that impulse had died away, to allow Amos to carry off and retain the palm which he acknowledged that he had won.  Jealousy of his brother's reputation for moral courage with Miss Huntingdon was a meanness which he would have thought himself incapable of, and which he would have repudiated indignantly had he been charged with it.  Nevertheless, it was there in his heart; it made him restless and dissatisfied, and kept him longing for an opportunity to display a moral courage which should shine with a light that might, even in his aunt's eyes, eclipse, or at any rate equal, that which glowed so brightly in Amos.  He was therefore on the watch for such an opportunity; and before long that opportunity, as he thought, presented itself.
One morning as the squire was reading the county paper, while his sister was superintending the preparations for breakfast, and her two nephews were seated near her, Mr Huntingdon exclaimed suddenly, in a tone of angry excitement, "Why, whatever is the meaning of this?  Walter, my boy, whatever does it mean?"
"What, father?" asked his son in a voice of mingled uneasiness and surprise.
"Why, just listen to this advertisement:--`I hereby challenge the working-men of this neighbourhood to a trial of skill in running, leaping, and shooting; and I promise to give a sovereign to any man who shall beat me in a mile race, a high jump, and firing at a mark.  The trial to come off on Marley Heath, on Tuesday, June 8th, at four o'clock p.m.
"`Signed, Walter Huntingdon, Flixworth Manor.'--Do you know anything about this, Walter?  Did you really put this advertisement into the paper? or is it a disgraceful hoax?"
Poor Walter looked perfectly astounded, as did also his aunt and brother.  Then he said, with some hesitation, "It is no advertisement of mine."
"No, I thought not," said his father indignantly.  "It must be, then, a most shameful hoax; and I shall speak or write to the editor about it in pretty strong terms you may be sure."
"Father," said Walter sadly, and after a pause, "it is no hoax."
"No hoax!  What do you mean?  You said you did not put the advertisement in; so it must be a hoax."
"I will explain it," said his son in a subdued voice.  "The other day, young Saunders, Gregson, and myself were discussing which of us was the best shot, and best at a race and a jump.  `Well,' said I, `we can easily put it to the test.  Let us meet to-morrow on Marley Heath and have it out.'  So we brought our guns with us next day; and Saunders and Gregson brought a few other fellows with them to look on and see all fair.  We three fired at a mark, and leapt over a rod hung across two poles, and tried who was best runner over a hundred yards; and I won the day in all three things.  So, as we were sitting down in the little roadside inn, where we all had some eggs and bacon and bread and cheese together for lunch, Gregson said to the other fellows, `Why, our friend Walter here might challenge the whole county.'  `That he might; and win too,' said more than one of them.  `I don't know,' I said; `but I shouldn't mind offering a sovereign to any working-man in the neighbourhood who would beat me.'  `Good,' said Saunders; `there's many a working-man that would like to have a try for your sovereign; and it would be capital fun to see the match come off.'  `What do you say to putting an advertisement in the county paper to that effect?' said Gregson.  `Not I,' I said; `I shall do nothing of the sort.'  `Ah, he's backing out,' said Saunders.  `Indeed, I'm not,' I cried; `I meant what I said.'  `Well, will you let me put the advertisement in in your name? Don't be modest, man; you're sure to win,' said Gregson.  `You can do so if you like,' I replied; `I have no intention to go back from my word.' I said this half in joke and half in earnest, and no doubt we were all a little excited with the sport and with the lunch; but I never dreamed that Gregson was serious when he talked about putting in the advertisement in my name, and I shall not soon forgive him for getting me into such a fix.  So, father, that's just all about it."
Mr Huntingdon listened to this explanation with much surprise and vexation, and then was silent.
"And what do you mean to do about it, Walter?" asked his aunt.  "You surely won't let the matter go on."
"I don't see how I can help it," was her nephew's reply; "the challenge has been publicly given in my name."
"It can't be--it mustn't be," exclaimed his father angrily; "it's perfectly preposterous.  We shall be the talk and the jest of the whole county.  It will do harm, too, to the working-classes.  Why, you'll have all the idle vagabonds there.  Some light-fingered and light-heeled poacher will win your sovereign--you'll be the laughing-stock of all the country round, and so shall I too.  And such a thing, instead of encouraging patient industry and sobriety, will be just the means of giving heart to the idlers and the profligates.  It must not be, Walter, my boy."
His son did not reply for some time; at last he said, "I don't see how I can back out of it; I've pledged my word.  I'm sorry for it, and I'm willing to take all the shame and blame to myself, and all the ridicule, if I'm beaten.  You may depend upon it I won't be caught in this way again, but I must go through with it now."
"Nonsense," said his father; "I don't see that at all."
"Perhaps not, father," replied his son; "but I can't go back from what I've said."  These last words were uttered with a dogged determination of tone and manner which showed that Walter had made up his mind, and was not to be turned from his purpose.
Like his father, he had a considerable share of obstinacy in his disposition, and Mr Huntingdon could call to mind several occasions on which a battle with his favourite son had ended in the boy's getting his own way.  And so, thinking further remonstrance useless, at any rate for the present, he let the matter drop, hoping, as he said afterwards to his sister, that Walter would come to his senses on the matter when he had had time to think the subject over coolly.  But he was mistaken in this hope.  Much as Walter was annoyed at having been thus taken at his word, which he had given half in jest, he nevertheless considered that he was pledged to abide by what had been advertised in his name and with his sanction.  So on the day appointed there was a considerable gathering of working-men, and also of women and children, on Marley Heath, and this gathering swelled into a crowd as the time of trial approached.
Gregson and Saunders--who enjoyed the whole thing amazingly, and none the less because, as they had expressed it to each other as they came along, "Young Huntingdon would be none the worse fellow for getting a little of the shine and brag taken out of him"--were on the spot in good time, with several like-minded companions.  These all gathered round Walter as he came on to the ground, and wished him good success, assuring him that no doubt he would keep his sovereign safe in his pocket, and come off conqueror.
Poor Walter's reply to his friends was not particularly cordial in its tone, and made Gregson see that he must put in a word of conciliation. "Come, old fellow," he said, "you must forgive me if I took you too literally at your word.  I really thought you meant it; it will do no harm to anybody, and will only show that you've got the old Huntingdon pluck and spirit in you."
"All right," said Walter, but not very cheerily; "I'm booked now, and must make the best of it.  How many are there who are going in for the trial, do you think?"
"We shall see," said Saunders, "if we wait a bit; it wants a quarter to four, still."
Everything was then duly arranged for the contest.  A mile's course had been previously marked out, and a shooting-butt set up, and also two poles with a leaping-rod across them.  As the hour approached, several young men respectably dressed came up, and among them a powerful and active-looking fellow whose appearance was hailed by a general shout of mirth.  His clothing was none of the best; his face was scarred in several places; and there was a free-and-easy manner about him, very different from that of the other competitors.  He answered the loud laughter by which his appearance had been greeted with a broad grin and a profound bow of mock salutation.  Each candidate for the trial had brought his gun with him, and stood prepared for the contest.  Gregson and Saunders managed all the arrangements after a brief consultation with Walter.
Four o'clock had now come, and Gregson, having ascertained the fact by looking at his watch, brought the competitors forward, and informed them that the shooting would be the first thing, and that six shots would be allowed to each, the winner being of course he who should place the greatest number of marks nearest the bull's-eye.  At the same time Gregson made it to be distinctly understood that the sovereign was only to be given to the man, if such should be found, who should beat Walter Huntingdon in all three things,--namely, in shooting, leaping, and running.
By his own request Walter came first.  Whatever may have been his feelings of annoyance or reluctance up to this time, they were now completely swallowed up in the excitement of the moment and the desire to maintain the high reputation he had previously gained.  So he threw his whole soul into the contest, and with steady eye and unwavering hand pointed his rifle towards the target.  Bang! a cloud of smoke.  Well shot! the bullet had struck the target, but not very near the centre.  A second and third were equally but not more successful.  The fourth struck the bull's-eye, the fifth the ring next it, and the sixth the bull's-eye again.  Bravo! shouted the excited crowd; would any one beat that?  Forward now came a sober-looking young man, and did his best, but this was far short of what Walter had achieved.  Two others followed with no better success.  Then came one who handled his gun very carefully, and took his aims with great deliberation.  Three shots in the bull's-eye! here was a winner--would any one come up to him?  Four more came forward, and two of these again scored three shots in the bull's-eye.  And now the rough-looking man, who had excited the general mirth of the crowd on his arrival, took his stand opposite the target. He gazed at it a full minute before raising his piece.  There was a derisive titter throughout the spectators as at last he did so in an awkward style, and with a queer twist of his mouth.  The next moment he was rigid as a statue cut out of stone.  Flash! bang! the bull's-eye; again the bull's-eye; two more very near it; twice again the bull's-eye. So he has made the best score after all.  "I thought so," he cried, with a swaggering toss of his head and a jaunty whistle, and then with a flourish of his rifle high in air he strode back into the midst of the onlookers.  Thus there were four of the competitors who had outdone Walter in the firing at the mark.
But the running and jumping yet remained to be contested.  The jumping was arranged to come next, and the four winners in the shooting prepared to do their best against their young challenger: Walter was now thoroughly roused, and, taking off his coat, and exchanging his boots for a pair of light shoes, stepped forward to exert himself to his utmost.  Higher and higher did he bound over the cross-rod as it was raised for him by his friends peg by peg.  Jumping was a feat in which he specially prided himself, and loud was the applause of Gregson, Saunders, and their friends as he sprang over the rod time after time. At last he failed to clear it, and his utmost was done.  And now the previous winners came on in turn.  The first who made the attempt soon gave in; he was clearly inferior to Walter in the high jump.  The next surpassed him by one peg.  The third equalled him.  And now came forward the strange-looking man on whom all eyes were eagerly bent.  He had divested himself of his coat and dirty neck-tie, and having kicked off his shoes, looked round him with a snort and a wild grimace, and then ran forward with a light, skipping step, and cleared the first stick without the slightest effort.  Each succeeding height was leapt over with the same ease, till he had equalled the most successful jumper. "And now for a topper," he cried, as the rod was raised by still another peg.  Throwing all his energies into the effort, with a rush and a mighty bound he cleared the stick by nearly a foot, and danced gaily back to the starting-point amidst the vociferous applause of all present.  Therefore Walter had now the two to contend with in the foot- race who had surpassed him in the high jump.  The interest of the crowd was now at boiling-point, and all sorts of conjectures, opinions, and affirmations were circulated as to the issue of the trial, while the three who were to run were resting a while.  At length, cheered on by the sympathising shouts of the impatient spectators, they placed themselves abreast, stripped of all superfluous garments, and at a signal from Gregson the race began.  Walter commenced warily, husbanding his strength, and not quickening his speed till he had reached the middle of the course; the one of the remaining two did much the same. As for the other, the wild-looking winner of the highest place in the two previous contests, he slouched along amidst peals of laughter all through the line.  Nevertheless, it was soon evident that, although dropping behind a little in the first quarter of a mile, he was gradually drawing up nearer and nearer to the front.  When Walter had accomplished three-fourths of his task, and was now putting on extra speed, the wild stranger, with a shout of "Victory for ever!" flung himself forward at a tremendous speed, and kept easily ahead to the end. The two remaining racers now pressed on abreast till within a yard of the place from whence they started, when, by a last vehement effort, Walter's companion came in a foot or two in advance.  All flung themselves on the grass, and when the hubbub of cheers and shouts had subsided, Walter rose to his feet, and holding out a hand to each of the victors, said with a laugh, "Fairly beaten."
Gradually now the crowd began to disperse, while the little band of competitors gathered round a cart which had been brought up by Walter's direction carrying some refreshments for himself and his friends, and those who had tried skill and endurance with him.  When the provisions had been duly partaken of, Walter, taking out his purse, turned to those about him and said: "And now, to whom am I to give the sovereign, for two have beaten me?"
"Oh, to our friend here, of course," said Gregson, placing his hand on the strange-looking man's shoulder, "for he has done the best right through."
"Come forward, then, my man," said Walter; "and pray, may I ask your name?"
"Oh," said the man addressed, with a laugh, "every one knows my name-- Jim Jarrocks they calls me."
"Well, Jim, here's your sovereign, and you've fairly won it."
"Thank'ee, sir," said Jim; "and so has Will Gittins here, if I'm not mistaken."
"How do you mean?" asked Saunders; "the sovereign was offered to the best man."
"Them's not the terms of the advertisement," said Jim, taking the newspaper out of his pocket.  "Here it is: `I promise to give one sovereign to any man who shall beat me in a mile race, a high jump, and firing at a mark.'  Now, I've done it and won my sovereign, and Will Gittins has done it and won his sovereign too."
It was even so.  Two had fairly won the prize.  So Walter, not with the best grace, felt in his purse for a second sovereign, which he handed to the other winner; and the two men walked away from the place of meeting arm in arm.
"Walter," said Gregson earnestly and apologetically as they left the ground, "I never meant this nor thought of it.  I can't let you be out of pocket this second sovereign; you must allow me to give it you back."
But Walter declined it, spite of earnest remonstrance and pressure on his friend's part.  "No," he said; "I've got myself into a nice mess by my folly; but what I've undertaken I mean to carry out, and take my own burdens upon myself."  And so, notwithstanding the applause and fine speeches showered on him by his friends, Walter returned home considerably crestfallen and out of spirits, the only thing that comforted him being a sort of half conviction that he had shown a considerable degree of moral courage in the way in which he had stuck to and carried out his engagement.
As for Mr Huntingdon, his mortification was extreme when there appeared in the next issue of the county paper a full description of the contest, from which it appeared that his favourite son had been beaten in a public trial of skill by Jim Jarrocks, well-known all over the county as the most reckless poacher and unblushing profligate anywhere about, and had thus given encouragement to a man who was constantly before the magistrates for all sorts of minor breaches of the law.  However, he felt that he must make the best of it, and he therefore spoke of it among his friends as a bit of foolish practical joking on his son's part, in which he had burned his fingers pretty severely, and which would therefore, he had no doubt, read him a lesson to avoid anything of the sort in the future.
As for Walter himself, he was only too glad to keep silent on the matter, and let it die out; and so were the family generally.  There was one, however, from whom Walter looked for sympathy, and even for a measure of approbation--this was his aunt.  In the evening, after the article in the county paper on his challenge and its results had been read with severe comments by his father at the breakfast-table, he found Miss Huntingdon sitting alone in the summer-house.  Having cut two or three small slips off a laurel, he brought them to her, and, as he sat down by her side, said, half mournfully, half playfully, "Auntie, I want you to make me a laurel crown or chaplet of these."
"Indeed, Walter; what for?"
"That I may wear it as a reward from you, and a token of victory in moral courage."
"Well, but, my dear boy, if the laurels are to be looked at as a reward from myself, I cannot crown you till I am satisfied that you have won them."
"Exactly so, auntie; now that is just what I am going to show you."
"Do so, dear boy, and I shall be only too rejoiced to make the chaplet, and to place it with my own hands on your head."
"Well then, dear aunt, you have heard all about this wretched business of the race; you may be sure that it has made me feel very small and very foolish."
"I can quite understand that," said Miss Huntingdon; "and I have felt very sorry for you in the matter; but I hope it may turn out for good, and make you a little more cautious."
"I hope so too, auntie; but this is not the point with me just now.  I want to get credit, from you at any rate, for a little bit, perhaps only a very little bit, of moral heroism or courage."
"Well, Walter?"
"Ah, now, auntie, that `well' didn't sound well.  I'm afraid I shan't get much credit or encouragement from you."
"Let me hear all about it, dear boy," said his aunt kindly.
"Why then, you see, I made a foolish offer, and might have backed out of it; and if I had done so I should have pleased my father and saved my money, and not have encouraged one of the biggest scamps going, and have been spared a lot of chaffing and ridicule.  But you see I had given my word, though it was only half a word after all, for I never dreamed that Gregson would have taken me up as he did.  But rather than break my word, I stood by what I had promised, and got all sorts of bother and trouble by doing so.  Now, wasn't that something like moral courage? Don't I deserve my laurels?"
"It was something _like_ it," replied his aunt gravely.
"Is that all, auntie?  Wasn't it the thing itself?  You know there has been no dash or mere impulse here.  I've had a deal of patience and forbearance to exercise, and these are quite out of my line."
"Yes, I see that; but then, Walter--"
"But then, Aunt Kate, it wasn't moral courage after all."
"Do you yourself think it was, dear boy?"
"Well, I don't know; I should like to think it was, but I am almost afraid.  What should you call it, dear aunt, if it wasn't truly moral courage?"
"I fear, dear Walter, you will think me very hard and unfeeling if I say what I really think."
"Oh, no, no! speak out, auntie--let me hear the truth; you are never really unkind."
"Then, Walter, I should call it obstinacy, and not moral courage.  You made a promise, and you would stick to it through thick and thin, let the consequences to yourself and others be what they might, just because you had said it.  Was it not so?"
Walter turned red, and looked very uncomfortable, and for a little time made no reply.  Then he said hastily, "And what _ought_ I to have done?"
"Well, my boy, in my judgment," replied his aunt, "you ought to have listened to your father, and to have withdrawn your offer, and to have borne patiently the shame and the annoyance this would have brought upon you from your friends Gregson, Saunders, and others."
"Ah, I see; and then I should have shown real moral courage.  What's the difference, then?"
"I think, Walter, the difference is just this: in the course you took, your firmness and patience were for an _unworthy_ object; had you taken the other course, they would have been for a _worthy_ object.  It seems to me that this makes all the difference.  I could not myself call that moral courage which made a man carry through, spite of all hindrances, opposition, and with much personal sacrifice, a purpose which he must know to be unworthy.  Now, I will give you an illustration of what I mean by an example.  And first, I would remind you that all my heroes hitherto have been those who showed their moral courage about worthy objects; for instance, Washington, Howard, Colonel Gardiner, the young man in the American revival.  But the person whose moral courage I am now going to mention was not on other occasions one of my heroes, but his conduct on one particular occasion is specially to the point just now.  For I want you to see, dear boy, that true moral courage is shown, not in sticking to a thing just because you have said it, when you must know that you ought not to have said it, but in giving up what you have said, and bearing the reproach of doing so, when you have become convinced that you have said or undertaken what was wrong.  It is duty, in fact, that makes all the difference."
"I see it, auntie; and who's your hero now?"
"Frederick the Great of Prussia, Walter."
"What! the man who ridiculed that good officer's religion?"
"The same; but remember that, while he ridiculed religion, he was constrained to honour that officer for his consistency.  But his moral courage was exhibited on a very different occasion.  Now, you must remember what sort of a man Frederick was,--he just resembled a spoiled child, who could not brook the slightest thwarting of his will or pleasure.  In some things he was a miser, and in others just the reverse.  He wore his uniform till it was patched and threadbare, while he gave two dollars each for cherries in the winter.  He would pay enormous sums to secure a singer, and then refuse to allow the opera- house to be lighted with wax-candles, so that the pleasure of the evening was spoiled by the smell of tallow.  He was, unhappily, well- known in the army for two peculiarities,--first, a temper of such iron unforgiveness that, if he had taken offence at any one, that man's career was closed, he was never employed again; and, second, a memory of such tenacity that not a hope existed of entrapping him into forgetfulness.
"Now, among his officers there was a colonel, a very brave man, and a capital soldier, who, on one occasion, had made some slight military slip or blunder.  This drew on him the king's displeasure, and was never forgotten.  So his pension or half-pay allowance was made the very lowest his rank would permit; for these allowances were regulated by the king himself.
"The poor colonel had a wife and a large family of children; he did not understand how to make the best of his small income, nor to improve it by other employment, so that he was at last reduced to what was little short of beggary and starvation.  Day after day he placed himself in the royal ante-chamber and begged an audience; but the king would not hear him, and one day got into a towering passion when the officer-in-waiting ventured to utter the poor man's name in the king's presence.  At last the colonel grew desperate.  He could not make up his mind to beg; his wife was ill, his children starving,--what was he to do?  He hit upon the curious idea of getting relief for his family by putting up, unobserved, in the night time, at the corners of the streets in Berlin, placards breathing the most venomous abuse of the king, in the hope that a reward would be offered to the person who should disclose who was the writer of the placard, that he might then himself claim the reward by informing against himself, and so might relieve the immediate pressing necessities of his wife and children, whatever might be the personal suffering and consequences to himself.
"The plan succeeded.  The king, in a transport of rage, offered a reward of fifty gold pieces to whoever should disclose the offender.  But you may imagine Frederick's amazement when the poor colonel, in ragged regimentals, and half perishing with hunger, obtained an interview, and named himself as the guilty libeller.
"And now, how did the king act, when the unhappy officer begged that the reward might be sent at once to his wife, that she might obtain medical help for herself and bread for her children?  What was such a man as Frederick likely to do?  The colonel, when he confessed his crime, acknowledged that his life was justly forfeited, and asked no pity for himself; and had the king acted up to his ordinary rules, he would have at once ordered the miserable officer off to execution, or, at least, lifelong imprisonment.  But it was not thus that he punished the crushed and miserable culprit.  His heart was touched, his conscience was pricked; he felt that he had acted wrongly to the colonel in times past, and that he must now undo the wrong as far as was possible.  But then remember the king's character and habits, especially in military matters.  When he had once said `No,' when he had once resolved upon a course of policy or action, he was the very last man to alter; the whole world might go to pieces sooner than he change.  And yet, in this instance, having become thoroughly convinced that he had been treating a deserving man with injustice, he had the moral courage to reverse his conduct, to unsay what he had before said, and to incur the risk of being called fickle or changeable by doing what he now believed to be the right thing.  So he at once laid the poor man on his own couch, for the colonel had fainted after making his confession.  Then he gave him food, and sent the doctor to his wife and provisions for the children; and then, having summoned an attendant, he bade him take the colonel's sword, and consider the officer himself as his prisoner.  After this he sat down and wrote a letter, and, having delivered it to the attendant, dismissed the unhappy man from his presence.
"The person who now had the colonel in charge was an old friend of his, who had often tried to put in a kind word for him to the king, but hitherto without any good result.  And now, as he conducted him from the palace, he said, `You are to be taken to the fortress of Spandau, but, believe me, you have nothing to fear.'  Spandau was a fortress near Berlin, to which at that time all state prisoners were sent.
"On reaching Spandau, the officer gave his prisoner in charge to the captain of the guard, while he himself carried the king's sealed order and the prisoner's sword to the governor of the fortress, who, having read the king's letter, told the colonel that, although he was his prisoner, yet he was not forbidden to invite him for once to join himself and his brother officers at the dinner-table.
"In due time the guests assembled, and with them the poor, half-starved colonel.  But imagine the astonishment of all when, after the dinner was over, the governor of the fortress read out to the whole company the king's letter, which ran thus:--`Sir Commandant, I hereby nominate and appoint the present half-pay colonel, who was this day delivered over to you as a prisoner, to the command of my fortress of Spandau, and I look to receive from him in his new service proofs of the same fidelity, bravery, and attention to duty, and strict obedience, which he so often exhibited in the late war.  The late commandant of Spandau now goes, in reward of his faithful services, as commandant of Magdeburg.'
"Now I call this, dear Walter, real nobility of conduct, real moral courage in such a man as Frederick, the courage of acting out his convictions, when in so doing he was going contrary to those cherished habits and principles which were part of his very self, and made him in a degree what he was in the eyes of the world.  This was indeed moral courage, and not weak changeableness or fickleness, because it had a noble object.  To have adhered to his ordinary course in the colonel's case, when he had become convinced that he had been wronging that officer, would have been obstinacy and littleness."
"Ay, auntie," said Walter thoughtfully, "I am sure your view is the right one.  So good-bye, laurels, for this time;" saying which, he threw the boughs among the trees of the shrubbery.  As he did so, he felt the loving arms of Miss Huntingdon drawing him closely to her, and then a warm kiss on his fair brow.
CHAPTER TEN.
PLUCK.
"Aunt," said Walter, as he sat at her feet, where he had placed himself after resigning his laurels, "I am afraid you are a little hard to please--or, at any rate, that I haven't much chance of getting you to see any moral courage in my unworthy self."
"Why not, dear boy?" she asked; "why should not you exhibit moral courage as well as any one else?"
"Oh, I don't know exactly; but it's so hard to know precisely what moral courage is after all, there are so many things that it is not.  Now, what do you say to `pluck,' auntie; is `pluck' the same as moral courage?"
"That depends upon what you mean by `pluck,' Walter."
"Oh! you must admire pluck.  Every true-born Englishman and Englishwoman admires pluck."
"That may be, my clear nephew.  I believe I do admire pluck, as far as I understand what it is.  But you must give me your idea of it, that I may be able to answer your question about its being the same as moral courage."
"Well, dear aunt, it is a thoroughly English, or perhaps I ought to say British, thing, you know.  It isn't mere brute courage.  It will keep a man who has it going steadily on with what he has undertaken.  There is a great deal of self-denial, and perseverance, and steady effort about it.  Persons of high refinement, and of very little physical strength, often show great pluck.  It is by no means mere dash.  There are plucky women too--plucky ladies also as well as plucky men.  Indeed I think that, as a rule, there is more true pluck among the weak than the strong, among the refined than the coarse-grained.  Thus you will find high-bred officers show more pluck and sustained endurance in sieges and fatigue parties than most of the common soldiers; and so it is with travellers through difficult unexplored countries.  Those who have had the least of rough training at home, but have given their mind more thoroughly to the work, will hold out and hold on pluckily when the big fellows with limbs and muscles like giants give in and knock up.  It's pluck that carries them through.  Now, isn't that pretty much the same as moral courage?"
"Hardly, I think, my dear boy."
"Well, where's the difference?"
"I think the difference lies in this, that, if I understand rightly what you mean, and what I suppose is commonly meant by pluck, it may be found, and often is found, where there is no moral element in it at all."
"I don't quite see it, auntie."
"Do you not? then I must go to examples to show what I mean.  I heard you tell a story the other day at breakfast of what you called a very `plucky' thing on the part of your friend Saunders."
"What! the fight he had with some bargees?  Oh yes, I remember."
"Now, Walter, what were the circumstances of that fight?"
"Ah, I remember; and I think I see what you are driving at, Aunt Kate. Saunders, who is only a slightly-built fellow, and almost as thin as a whipping post, got into a row with some of those canal men; he wanted them to turn out of his way, or to let him pass and go through a lock before them, and they wouldn't."
"And did he ask them civilly?"
"Nay, Aunt Kate, not he.  No, I'm sorry to say he swore at them; for he's a very hasty fellow with his tongue is Saunders."
"And were the bargemen unreasonably hindering him?"
"I can't say that.  They were just going into the lock when he rowed up, and he wanted them to get out of his way and let him go into the lock first.  I don't think myself that he was right."
"And what happened then?"
"Oh, he abused them, and they wanted to throw him into the canal; at least they threatened to do so.  And then he challenged the biggest of them to a stand-up fight, and a ring was made and they fought; and certainly it was a strange thing to see Saunders, with his bare arms looking no thicker than a hop-pole, tackling that great fellow, whose right arm was nearly as thick as Saunders's body.  Nevertheless, Saunders didn't shrink; he stood up to the bargee, and, being a capital boxer, he managed to win the day, and to leave the man he was fighting with nearly blind with two swollen black eyes.  And every one said what `pluck' little Saunders showed."
"Had the bargeman a wife and children?" asked Miss Huntingdon quietly, after a few moments' silence.
"What a strange question, auntie!" cried her nephew laughing.  "Oh, I'm sure I don't know.  I daresay he had."
"But I suppose, Walter, he was a plain working-man, who got bread for himself and his family by his work on the canal."
"Oh, of course, auntie; but what has that to do with it?"
"A very great deal, dear boy.  There may have been plenty of pluck shown by your friend Saunders on that occasion, but certainly no moral courage.  Indeed _I_ should call his conduct decidedly immoral and cowardly."
"Cowardly, aunt!"
"Yes, cowardly, and mean.  What right had he to use, or rather abuse, his superior skill as a pugilist for the purpose of carrying out an act of wrong-doing, and so to give pain and inflict loss on a plain working- man who had done him no harm, and had not had the same advantages of education as himself?"
"O aunt! you _are_ severe indeed."
"Not too severe, Walter.  Saunders, you acknowledge, spoke and acted hastily and improperly at first, and he must have known that he had done so.  Now the true moral courage would have been shown in his confessing that he was wrong, and expressing sorrow for it."
"What! to a bargee!"
"Yes, to a bargee, Walter.  The world might have called him mean or cowardly for such a confession, but he would have shown true moral courage and nobility for all that.  To do what will give pain to others rather than incur the reproach of cowardice is really acting under the tyranny of a mean and slavish fear of man, though it may be a plucky thing in the eyes of the World."
"Ah, well, auntie, that is certainly a new view of things to me; and I suppose, then, you would apply the same test to duelling,--affairs of honour, as they used to be called?"
"Most certainly so, Walter.  The duellist is one of the worst of moral cowards."
"Ah! but," cried the other, "to fight a duel used to be considered a very plucky thing, and it really was so, auntie."
"I don't doubt it, Walter; but it was a very immoral thing also. Happily, public opinion has quite changed on the subject of duelling in our own country, and no doubt this has been owing indirectly to the spread of a truer religious tone amongst us.  But what could be more monstrous than the prevailing feeling about duelling a few years ago, as I can well remember it in my young days.  Why, duelling was at that time the highroad to a reputation for courage, and the man who refused to fight was frowned upon in good society, and in some places scouted from it.  And--I say it with the deepest shame--my own sex greatly helped to keep up this feeling; for the man who had fought the most duels was, with the ladies of his own neighbourhood, for the most part, an object of special admiration and favour.
"And yet, what nobility or moral courage was there in the man who gave or accepted the challenge?  Just think of what the consequences might be, and what the ground of the quarrel often was.  A hasty word, or even a mere thoughtless breach of etiquette, would bring a challenge; and the person called out must not decline to meet his challenger, and give him `satisfaction,' as it was called, in the shape of a pistol bullet, under pain of being cut by all his friends and acquaintances as a coward.  So a man who was a husband and father would steal away from his home early in the morning, and go out to some lonely spot and meet the man whom he had offended, and be murdered in cold blood, and carried back a bleeding corpse to his miserable widow and fatherless children, just because he could not bear to be called a coward by the world.  And to call this `satisfaction!'  The devil never palmed upon his poor deluded slaves a more transparent lie.
"Just think of two men, for instance, who had been friends for years, and in some unguarded moment had used intemperate language towards each other.  Their companions tell them that this is a matter for giving and receiving satisfaction.  So, in perfectly cold blood, with the most ceremonious politeness, the time and place of meeting are fixed by the seconds, who make all arrangements for their principals; and at the time appointed these two men stand face to face, with no malice, it may be, in either heart, feeling rather that there were faults on both sides, and at any rate no more wrong done or intended than a little mutual forbearance and concession might easily set right.  And yet there they stand; at a given signal aim each at the other's heart; and, if that aim is true, each is murdered by his brother, and hurried in a moment red- handed into the awful presence of his Maker and Judge.  And this used to be called `satisfaction,' and the man who refused to give it was branded as a coward.  And such was the tyranny of this fashion which Satan had imposed upon thinking and immortal men, that rarely indeed was a man found who had the true moral courage to refuse to fight a duel when challenged to do so."
"Ah then, auntie," said her nephew, "you would give the laurels for moral courage to the man who declined to fight."
"Certainly I would.  Yes, I should have called him a truly noble and morally courageous man who, in those sad duelling days, should have declined a challenge on the ground that he feared God rather than man-- that he was willing to brave any earthly scorn and loss rather than be a cold-blooded murderer and do violence to his own conscience, and break the laws of his Creator and Redeemer.  Such courage as this would be worth, in my eyes, a thousandfold more than all the `pluck' in the world."
"Indeed, dear Aunt Kate," said Walter seriously, "I believe you are right; but can you give me any example of such moral courage?"
"Yes, dear boy, I think I can.  I call to mind the case of an excellent Christian man; I rather think he was an officer in the army, and that made his position more trying, because in the days when duelling was the fashion, for an officer to refuse a challenge would have raised up the whole of the service against him.  However, whether he was a military man or not, he was at any rate a true soldier of the Cross.  By something he had done, or left undone, he had grievously offended a companion, and this friend or acquaintance of his called on him one morning, and, being a hot-tempered man, charged him with the supposed offence or affront, and working himself up into a violent passion, declared that they must fight it out, and that he should send him a formal challenge.  The other listened very quietly to this outburst of wrath, and then said calmly and deliberately, `Fight you, must it be? certainly, I must not decline your challenge.  Yes, we will fight, and it shall be now; here, on this very spot, and with swords.  I have my weapon close at hand.'  Saying which, the good man pulled a small Bible out of his pocket, and holding it up before his companion, whose face had turned deadly pale, said, `Here is my sword, the sword of the Spirit, the only weapon I intend to fight you with.'  Telling a friend about it afterwards, the Christian man remarked, `Never did poor creature look upon a Bible with more satisfaction and relief than my adversary did on mine.'  But at the time when the angry man was speechless with astonishment, the other proceeded to say to him kindly, `Friend, I have a dear wife and children.  Now, would it have been right in me to meet you with pistols or other deadly weapons, and to have entailed lasting misery on those so dear to me, and so dependent on me, by either being myself your murderer or allowing you the opportunity of being mine?'  That was true moral heroism, dear Walter, and it had its reward there and then, for the challenger at once grasped the hand of his companion and said, `It would not have been right on your part; you have done just what it was your duty to do in declining my challenge, and I honour you for it.  Let us part friends.'"
"Thank you, auntie; I admire your hero immensely.  Now, pray give me another example, if you have one ready."
"I have read a curious story on this subject," replied Miss Huntingdon, "but I am not sure that it is a true one.  I read it in some book years ago, but what the book was I cannot call to mind.  However, the story may be true, and it may be useful to repeat it, as it just illustrates my present point about moral courage in reference to duelling.  The story is substantially this:--
"Some years ago, when a regiment was quartered for a time in one of our county towns, one of the officers of the regiment was challenged by a brother officer, and refused to accept the challenge.  This refusal soon flew abroad over all the town and neighbourhood, and the consequence was that every one turned his back on the man who refused to fight.  He was avoided by all of his own rank of both sexes as a craven and a coward. Of course, he felt this very keenly.  To be shut out from houses where he used to be welcomed; to be looked at with scorn by his brother officers; to have not a word addressed to him by any one of them when they met him on parade or at mess; to be the object of ill-concealed contempt even to the common soldiers;--these things were burdens almost intolerable to a man who had any respect for his own character as a soldier.  However, for a time he bore it patiently.  At last he hit upon an expedient to prove to the world that he was no coward, which was undoubtedly original and convincing, though, certainly, by no means justifiable.
"A large evening party was being given to the officers of the regiment by some distinguished person in the town; a ball probably, for many ladies were present.  While all were in the very midst and height of their amusement, suddenly the disgraced officer made his appearance among them in his dress uniform.  How could this be? how came he there? Assuredly no one had invited him.  As he advanced into the middle of the brilliantly lighted room an empty space was left for him, officers and ladies shrinking from him, as though his near approach brought defilement with it.  Looking quietly round, he deliberately produced and held up a hand-grenade, as it was called--that is to say, a small bombshell--and, before any one of the astonished spectators could stop him, lighted a match at one of the wax-candles, and applied it to the fusee of the shell.  A shower of sparks came rushing from the hand- grenade, which would explode in a minute or two or even less.  The consternation of the company was frightful, and a furious and general rush was made to the doors.  As the guests dashed out of the room, some just caught sight of the officer who had brought in and lighted the shell standing calmly over it with his arms folded.  A few moments more, all the company had vanished terror-stricken, and then a frightful explosion was heard.  One or two of the officers hurried back with horror on their faces.  The man who had been branded as a coward lay outstretched on the ground.  He had thrown himself flat on the floor the instant the room was cleared; the fragments of the shell had flown over him, and he was almost entirely uninjured.
"His object in this extraordinary proceeding was to show his brother officers and the world generally that a man might refuse, from conscientious motives, to fight a duel and yet be no coward.  I am not praising or approving of his conduct in taking such a dangerous course to prove his point; for he was endangering the lives of many as well as his own life, and nothing could justify that.  But, if the story be true, it shows at least that a man may decline to do an act from a high sense of duty, so as to bring upon himself the reproach of cowardice, and yet may be a man of undoubted bravery after all.  But I do not at all place this officer on my list of moral heroes.  I trust, however, dear Walter, that our conversation on this subject will strengthen in you the conviction that the noblest and truest courage is that high moral courage which enables a man to endure with patience any scorn, or loss, or blame, rather than deliberately do what he knows that his conscience and the Word of God condemn."
CHAPTER ELEVEN.
AN EXPLOSION.
It must not be supposed that Walter was prepared to follow out his brother Amos's moral courage at once and in everything.  He was quite willing to admire this high-toned courage, and was learning to be content that his brother should enjoy the praise for it which was his due.  He also fully intended to follow in the same steps some day or other; but then no real and radical change had taken place in his heart and character, nor had he any deliberate desire to give up old habits which were dear to him, and adopt new ones which would involve considerable and sustained self-denial.  So he contented himself for the present with being more kind to his brother, and more careful not to wound him by rash and unfeeling remarks.
One thing, however, in Amos's conduct sadly puzzled and annoyed him. Knowing that his brother was well provided with money of his own, he used not unfrequently to borrow from him when his own allowance ran short, which it very often did.  This borrowing from Amos used to be but rarely followed by any repayment; for he had been so fully indulged by his father when younger, that he had no idea, now that he was getting more from under his father's hand, of denying himself, or going without anything he might happen to fancy.  At first he used to tell the trades- people in the neighbouring town, when he made any purchases, to put them down to his father; but to this after a while Mr Huntingdon decidedly objected--finding, as he did, that expense was no consideration to Walter in the choice of an article, provided his father had to bear the cost.  So Walter was made to understand that he must make the liberal allowance which his father gave him _do_, and that there must be no more running up of bills in Mr Huntingdon's name.  But such an arrangement was very galling to Walter, who had lived all his early boyhood under the impression that, as being his father's favourite son, he had only to express a wish, or to ask for or to order a thing, and he would have it as a matter of course.  However, the squire stood firm in the matter. Walter, he said, was old enough now to understand something of the value of money, and he must learn to cut his coat according to his cloth. This coat, however, with Walter was usually of such exaggerated dimensions that his ordinary allowance of material would go only a small way towards completing it.  Consequently he used to have recourse to Amos, who invariably helped him through with a loan--for Walter would never receive help from his brother except as a loan--Amos at the same time hinting now and then at the hope of a partial repayment.  To this Walter would reply that his brother should have it all back, if he wished it, "one of these fine days;" but when such seasons of exceptionally fine monetary weather were likely to occur, Amos found it difficult to conjecture.  A change, however, had now come over the elder brother, much to the annoyance and disgust of Walter.  A decided refusal of a loan of money was accompanied by Amos with a remonstrance with his brother on his extravagance.
In a pet, Walter told Amos that he might keep his nasty sovereigns and shillings to buy toffee for dirty little boys and girls.  He was much obliged to him for his advice, but he knew his own concerns best; and as for extravagance, it was better to put a little money into the tradesmen's pockets than hoard it up like a stingy old miser, just to have the pleasure of saying, "See how rich I am."
To all this Amos made no reply at the time, but afterwards sent his brother a portion of the sum he wished to borrow, with a kind note, in which he said that Walter was welcome to this and to all other sums previously lent, as a free gift, but that for the future he could not lend him money beyond a few shillings occasionally, as he had a use for his own funds which made him unable to do for his brother what he had done for him in times past.
Partly touched at Amos's generosity, but more vexed at his present purpose respecting future loans, Walter was not disposed to look with a very favourable eye on his brother's money arrangements.  What could he be wanting with so much?  What could he be doing with it?  There was nothing to show for it.  If he had spent it in guns, or horses, or dogs, or travelling, or sight-seeing, Walter could have better acquiesced in the expenditure.  But the money seemed to be wanted for something which, as far as he could see, turned out to be nothing.  So his curiosity was considerably roused, and he resolved to find out, if he could, where his brother's spare cash went to.
Things were in this position, when one evening, as the whole family were seated on the lawn under some noble elms, enjoying the shade--for the weather had been exceedingly hot--a gentleman, well-known throughout the county for the interest he took in plans for doing good and alleviating the sorrows and sufferings of his poorer neighbours, called, and was invited by Mr Huntingdon to join his family on the lawn.  "And now, my dear sir," said the squire, "I know you are out on some errand of benevolence.  You are a grand worker yourself, and a grand giver too, so tell us what is your present charitable hobby, and we must try and give you a help, so that you may ride him easily."
"Thank you, Mr Huntingdon, with all my heart," said the other; "you are very kind.  My hobby this time is a very robust animal, and will want a good deal of feeding if he is to keep up his strength.  But to come to plain language, I am collecting subscriptions for a working-men's coffee-house in Redbury--a British Workman they call it.  You know, I dare say, that two ruinous old houses of mine in the market-place are being pulled down.  Now, I am going to give the ground which one of them stands on for the new coffee-house.  It is a capital situation, just in the centre of the town.  I shall want funds, however, for the erection of a new and suitable building, and also a few annual subscriptions to keep the establishment going and pay the expenses of management, as I don't suppose it will be self-supporting, at any rate not at first."
"Well," said the squire, "let me look at your subscription list, for I see you have one with you.  Ah, good! it is very generous of you to put down your own name for so large a sum to the building fund, besides giving the land.  Put me down then for fifty pounds, and an annual subscription of three guineas till the concern is self-supporting."
"May I look at the list?" asked Miss Huntingdon, when their visitor had expressed his thanks to her brother.  Having glanced at it, she also signified her willingness to be a helper in the work, and gave the list to Walter to return to the gentleman.
As her nephew was giving back the subscription list, he paused for a moment to run his eye over the names of the contributors.  "Ah!" he said, "I see your own sons down, Mr Johnson, for a guinea a piece.  I wish I could afford to follow their example."
"Perhaps, after all, you can," said the gentleman, smiling.  "I am sure it does young people good to practise a little self-denial in helping on a good cause like this."
"I don't doubt that, sir," replied Walter, "but I am ashamed to say that self-denial of that sort is not much in my line.  But, then, I am not a man of independent fortune like my brother Amos here.  Ask him, pray. He has, or ought to have, lots of spare cash, and he is always on the look-out to be doing good with it."  There was a tone of sarcasm in his voice which grated very painfully on Miss Huntingdon's ear.  Amos coloured deeply, but made no remark.
"What say you, my young friend?" asked Mr Johnson, in a kindly voice, turning to him.  "Your brother encourages me to hope that we may add your name to the list."
The young man, thus appealed to, looked uneasy and embarrassed, and then, in a few moments, said in an undertone, "I am sorry that just now I am not in a position to add my name, but I shall be glad to do so when I am better able."
Mr Johnson did not press the matter, but shortly left, having first partaken of a little fruit which had been brought to him by the butler while the conversation about the subscriptions had been going on.
It has already been said that the old man Harry was a privileged servant of long standing, almost a portion of the estate, so that he was allowed little liberties which would not ordinarily have been permitted to one in his place.  He had listened with burning cheeks and flashing eyes to Walter's sneering remarks about his brother's wealth, and now lingered near the group, as he was removing a little table on which he had placed the fruit for Mr Johnson.  There was a restlessness about his manner which Miss Huntingdon noticed and wondered at; but her attention was then drawn to Walter, who, lounging against a bench, said in a rather drawling voice, "I really wonder what some people do with their money. For my part, I don't see what's the use of it except to be jolly with it yourself, and to make other people jolly with it.--Amos," he added abruptly, "what's up with you that you've become so very poor all of a sudden?"
To this Amos made no reply, but turned away to hide his vexation.
"My boy," said Mr Huntingdon, addressing his elder son, "I'm a little surprised myself that you should be at all hard up.  I quite expected that you would have followed the example of Mr Johnson's sons, and have put down your name.  I think you could have afforded it."
Still Amos did not reply, but seemed hesitating what to say.  But here Walter broke in again.  "I call it downright mean!" he exclaimed bitterly; "but he's getting meaner and meaner, that he is.  What he does with his money nobody knows.  I suppose he spends it in religious pocket-handkerchiefs and pious bed-quilts for the little niggers in Africa, or something of the sort.  At any rate, he has none to spare for those nearer home."  He was about to say more, but happening to raise his eyes he was astonished to see the old butler, who had been slowly drawing nearer and nearer, raising his right arm, and looking at him almost fiercely, as though he were going to strike him.--"What's up now, Harry?" he cried; "is the black cat dead?"
The old man's appearance now attracted every one's attention.  He had drawn himself up to his full height, and had turned so as to confront Mr Huntingdon, who was sitting with his sister by his side on a garden bench facing the house.  His snow-white hair gave him ordinarily a venerable appearance, and this was now increased by the look of intense earnestness which glowed in his every feature.  His back was to Amos, who, noticing that the old man was evidently about to speak under the pressure of some unusual excitement, half rose to his feet, but too late to stop old Harry's purpose.
"Master," said the old man, in a voice hoarse with emotion, "hear me; if it's to be for the last time, you must hear me.  I can't hold in no longer; so it's no use, come what may."
Mr Huntingdon, struck with amazement at this speech of the old domestic, could only exclaim, "Well!" while his sister and Walter looked on and listened in mute wonder.
"Master," continued the old man, "you must hear me this once, if I'm to be turned away this blessed night for what I'm a-going to say.  I've been hearing Master Amos called by Master Walter mean about his money, and I can't stand it, for I knows better."
Here Amos sprang forward, and coming in front of Harry, strove by gesture and whispered remonstrance to stop him; but the other shook his head, and motioned his young master back.
"It's of no manner of use, Master Amos," he cried; "I must and will speak--the time's come for it.  _I_ know why Master Amos can't afford to subscribe: 'tain't because he hasn't got the will; 'tain't because he's been spending it on himself, or sending it to the niggers, though he might be doing worse with it than that.  His money goes to keep dear Miss Julia as was--bless her little heart!--from want; and it goes, too, to keep a home for her little ones, and one on 'em's a girl, and she's as like what her blessed mother was at her age as one lamb's like another.  O master, master! if you loved Miss Julia as was as I love her, and as Master Amos loves her, though she has married a vagabond of a husband, and had the door of her home closed agen her for ever for it, and oh, if you'd but a touch still of the dear Saviour's forgiving love towards your own flesh and blood, you couldn't blame Master Amos for doing as he's doing, if you only knew too how he's been a-sacrificing of himself, and bearing the shame and scorn all the while without a murmur. There, master, I've had it out.  And now I suppose I must pack up and be off for good; but it don't matter.  I couldn't keep it in, so there's an end of it."
The effect of this speech on all the members of the party was overwhelming, though in different ways.
Mr Huntingdon's face turned deadly pale, and then flushed fiery red. He half rose from the bench on which he was sitting, and then sank back again and buried his face in his hands.  Then he started up, and muttering something hoarsely, rushed into the house, and was not seen again by the family that night.  Next morning, before breakfast, his sister received a hasty note from him, merely stating that he was leaving home, and should not return that day, and perhaps not for a few days.
The old butler's disclosure was also most trying to Miss Huntingdon by its suddenness.  Not that she was unprepared for it altogether, for quiet observation of Amos had made her sure that he had some noble and self-denying work in hand, and that probably it might have something to do with the welfare of his sister, whom she knew that he dearly loved. She was grieved, however, that the old butler had blurted out the secret in such an abrupt manner, and at the terrible distress which the unexpected revelation had caused her brother.
As for Amos, he was ready to sink into the earth with dismay and vexation.  All he could do was to look up reproachfully at Harry, who, now that the explosion had burst forth, and had driven his master apparently almost out of his senses, looked round him with an utterly crestfallen air, and then, coming up to Amos, said, while the big tears rolled rapidly down his cheeks, "Oh, dear Master Amos, you must forgive me.  I didn't go for to do it with no bad meaning; but I couldn't bear it no longer.  I daresay the master 'll turn me off for it, so I shall be punished if I've done wrong."
And how felt Walter?  He was utterly crushed for a time beneath the old man's words.  All the truth flashed upon him now.  And this was the brother whom he had been holding up to ridicule and accusing of meanness.  As thoughts of shame and stings of conscience stabbed into his heart with their thousand points, he sank down lower and lower to the ground till he had buried his face in the grass, sobbing convulsively.  Then, before Amos could reply to the old butler's pitiful apology, he sprang up, and flinging his arms round his brother's neck and hiding his head in his bosom, wept for a time as if his heart would break.  At last he looked up at Amos, who had pressed him close to him and had lovingly kissed him, and cried out, "Was there ever such a beastly, ungrateful sneak of a brother as I am?  Here have I been calling Amos all sorts of names, and treating him worse than a dog, and he's been acting like a hundred thousand moral heroes all the time!  Can you forgive your cowardly snob of a brother, Amos dear?"
There was no reply to this but another long and close embrace.
As for old Harry, his face calmed down into its usual peacefulness.  He no longer waited for any reply from his young master, but turned towards the house with a smile beaming all over his countenance, and saying half out loud, "All's well as ends well.  There'll be good come out of this here trouble as sure as my name's Harry."
When he was fairly gone, both nephews drew close to their aunt, and took each a hand as they sat one on either side of her.  Smiling at Walter through happy tears, she said, "I cannot cross my hands, you see, for my dear nephews have each got possession of one."
"But they _ought_ to be crossed," said Walter in a low, sad voice.
"Not _now_, dear boy," she replied; "I think we may let bygones be bygones, for surely better and brighter days are coming."
"I hope so, aunt," said Walter, now more cheerily, "But you must give me the example for all that; for you have one to the purpose, I know."
"Yes," was her reply, "I think I have, and I will tell it because it may help to confirm you in keeping on the right side that new leaf which I feel sure you are now turning over."
"Ah, tell it me then, auntie; if it shames me a hit it will do me no harm."
"My hero then, this time, did not look much like one at the time when he displayed his heroism.  He was a poor schoolboy, a Christ's Hospital lad."
"What! one of those who go about without hats, in long coats and yellow stockings?"
"Yes, the same.  Charles Lamb, who tells the story, which is a true one, was himself one of these Bluecoat boys.  Among his schoolfellows was this boy, my present moral hero.  He was dull and taciturn, and no favourite with the other lads; but no one could bring any charge of improper conduct against him.  There was one thing, however, about him which none of the other boys could understand.  He always lingered behind all the rest after dinner was over, and came out of the dining- hall hiding something under his dress, and looking about him suspiciously.  What did it mean?  Had he an unnaturally large appetite, so that he was led by it to steal food and eat it by himself after the meal was over?  At any rate, if it was so, his extra provision did not improve his personal appearance, for he was still thin and hungry- looking.
"Some questioned him roughly on the subject, but they could get nothing out of him.  He stopped for a while the practice which had drawn attention to him, but resumed it again when he thought that curiosity had died out, and that he could follow his old ways unobserved.  But there were boys on the watch, and at last it was fairly ascertained that the poor lad used to gather, as far as he had opportunity, scraps of meat, pieces of fat, and fragments of bread and potatoes, which had been left on the boys' plates.  These he collected and carried off.  But then, what did he do with them?  It was not likely that he ate them. No.  Then he must sell them when he went home, for his parents lived in London, and he was a day boy.  No doubt he disposed of them to people who were ready to give a few pence for refuse food, and thus the little miser was making money in this mean and underhand way.  When this conclusion had been arrived at, the whole school was in a state of boiling indignation against the culprit.
"They might have taken the law into their own hands, and have punished him in their own rough and ready way.  But no; his conduct was too shameful for that.  It was looked upon as a serious disgrace to the whole school.  So the case was duly reported to the masters, and by them to the governors.  Witnesses were examined, and the offence proved.  And now, what was the defence of the poor lad?  He had borne shame, scorn, reproach, reviling; he had borne them all patiently, without murmur, without resentment.  What, then, was the reason for his strange conduct? what motive or inducement could make him thus brave the scorn and contempt, the daily jeers, and the cut direct from his schoolfellows? All was soon made plain.  This boy's parents were old and very poor--so poor, helpless, and friendless that they were often brought to the verge of starvation.  In those days, remember, there was not the same attention paid to the poor of all classes, nor loving provision made for their wants, as there is now.  So the noble son--for truly noble he was--submitted cheerfully to every trouble and shame that could fall upon himself, in order to get food from time to time for his almost famishing parents.  They were too respectable to beg, and would have never allowed their boy to beg for them; and yet so destitute were they that they were even glad of those miserable scraps, the after-dinner leavings on the boys' plates.  And these their son gathered for them, indifferent to the consequences which might happen to himself, while at the same time he added a portion of his own daily food to supply the wants of the old people.
"Ah! this was true moral courage, dear Walter; and it was all the greater and nobler because it was exercised in such humble elements, as it were--I mean under circumstances where there was everything to degrade and nothing to elevate the poor boy in the eyes of his schoolfellows."
"I see, aunt," said Walter, sadly and thoughtfully.  "Yes, they called him mean, and shabby, and selfish, and frowned and scowled at him, when all the while he was most nobly denying himself, and bearing all that trouble that he might help those who were dearer to him than his good name with his schoolfellows.  Ay, I see it all; and it's just a case in point.  That's just what I've been doing to my own dear noble brother, who has been sacrificing himself that he might help poor Julia and her little ones.  And it has been worse in my case, because those Bluecoat boys had perhaps no particular reason to think well of the other chap before they found out what he had been driving at, and so it was natural enough that they should suspect him.  But it's been exactly the reverse with me.  I've had no reason to suspect Amos of anything but goodness. All the baseness and meanness have been on my own part; and yet here I've been judging him, and thinking the worst of him, and behaving myself like a regular African gorilla to him.--Dear Amos, can you really forgive me?"
Hands were clasped tightly across Miss Huntingdon's lap, and then Amos asked, "And what was done to the poor boy?"
"Oh," replied his aunt, "the governors of course acquitted him of all blame, and not only so, but rewarded him also, and, if I remember rightly, proper provision was made for the poor parents of the noble lad."
"Bravo! that's right," cried Walter with a sigh of relief.  "Well, I don't like making big promises, but I do think I mean it when I say that Amos shall not have an ungenerous or reproachful word from me again."
"And so," said Miss Huntingdon with a smile, "good will come out of this evil, and it will turn out one of those `all things' which `work together for good to those who love God.'"
And Walter strove bravely to keep his word, and in the main succeeded.
Old Harry began, on the day after he had made the unlooked-for disclosure, to pack up his things and make preparations for his departure, feeling fully persuaded that, on his master's return, he should receive his instant dismissal.  However, when Mr Huntingdon came home, two or three days after the explosion, not a word was said about the butler's leaving; indeed, if anything, his master's manner was kinder to him than usual, but not the slightest reference was made on either side to what had passed.  With Amos, however, it was different. His father would scarcely speak to him beyond the coldest salutations morning and evening.  The poor young man felt it keenly, but was not surprised.  He could now open his mind fully to his aunt, and did so, and his own convictions and judgment agreed with her loving counsel that he should wait in trust and patience, and all would be well.
CHAPTER TWELVE.
PROGRESS.
Mr Huntingdon's conduct toward Amos was a great grief to his sister, but she felt that she must not openly interfere, and that she could only do her best to make up to her nephew, as far as was possible, for his father's coldness, and look for brighter times, which she felt sure were coming, though as yet scarcely the faintest streak of dawn could be seen on the horizon.  The old butler also was a great comfort to his young master, being most anxious to do everything in his power to undo any evil consequences which his own abrupt outspeaking might have brought upon Amos.  So he encouraged him to persevere in his great purpose, with all his might, assuring him that things would come nicely round in time. Amos shook his head sadly, for he was naturally of a desponding turn; he could see at present little but clouds and thorns before him.  Not that he wavered in his purpose for a moment, or had the least thought of holding back from the work he had set his hand to, even for a time.  But his father's harshness and manifestly abiding displeasure towards himself he found very hard to bear.  Nevertheless he was comforted by the reiterated affirmations of Harry that things were coming nicely round.
"Take my word for it," said the shrewd old man; "I knows the old master and his ways better than you do, Master Amos, though you're his son and I ain't.  But I've knowed him years longer than you have.  Now he's displeased with you; but I'll tell you who he's more displeased with, and that's just his own self.  I don't mean no disrespect to your father, Master Amos--he's as kind-hearted a gentleman and as good a master as ever was, only a bit hasty sometimes; but then, which on us ain't got faults of our own enough and to spare?  But I'm sure of this, he has never been fairly satisfied with keeping the door shut agen dear Miss Julia as was, and he won't _be_ satisfied, depend on it, till she's back again--I know it.  You see, though there was a reg'lar flare up when I spoke up for you the other night, he has never said a word of blame to me on the subject; and for why?  I'll tell you--it's just because he knows and feels down in his heart of hearts as I were _not_ to blame.  But he must be angry with somebody--'taint pleasant to be angry with one's own self; he's never been used to be angry with Master Walter; 'tain't no use being angry with Miss Huntingdon, 'cos she'd look the fiercest man as ever lived into a good temper--the mere sight of her face is enough for that, let alone her words.  So master's just showing his anger to you, Master Amos.  But it won't last; it can't last.  So you just stick to your work, and I'll back you up all in my power, and I'll keep my tongue inside my teeth for the future, if I possibly can."
As for Walter, he felt thoroughly ashamed of himself, and tried in many ways to make up to his brother for his past unkindness, by various little loving attentions, and by carefully abstaining from taunting and ungracious speeches.  This was very cheering to the heart of Amos, and lightened his trial exceedingly; but he felt that he could not yet take Walter fully into his confidence, nor expect him to join with him in a pursuit which would involve much quiet perseverance and habitual self- denial.  For how were the banished ones to be brought back?  What present steps could be taken for their restoration?  Any attempt to introduce the subject of his sister's marriage and present position in his father's presence he felt would, as things now were, be worse than useless.  Once he attempted to draw the conversation in that direction; but Mr Huntingdon, as soon as he became aware of the drift of his son's observations, impatiently changed the subject.  On another occasion, when Walter plunged headlong into the matter by saying at tea-time to his aunt, "Eh! what a long time it is since we saw anything of Julia.  I should so like to have her with us again; shouldn't you, auntie?" his father, striking his clenched fist on the table, and looking sternly at his son, said in a voice trembling with suppressed anger, "Not a word again on that subject, Walter, unless you wish to drive me out of my own house."  So Amos's great purpose, his life-work to which he had dedicated himself, his means, his best energies, seemed hopelessly blocked.
The great hindrance was, alas! in that father whose heart must be touched and subdued before any effectual and really onward steps could be taken.  But this barrier seemed to become daily more formidable. "What am I to do, Aunt Kate?"  Amos said, when discussing the matter with Miss Huntingdon in private; "what can I do now?"
"Not in detail.  He just mentioned that he was very anxious to get hold of a former butler in your grandfather's family who is now in the ranks.  They had his testimony in part before he was called into service, but he had not been cross-examined.  Andre seems to feel sure that he can extract information from him that will aid your mother to come into possession of the estate.  Andre's judgment is good, and as you know, he is one of the leading lawyers of Paris."
"He is too good, and you also, to take all this trouble in our behalf," said Frank warmly.  "My mother and I can never thank you enough."
"The debt will be always on our side," responded the colonel with a wave of the hand.  "By the way, how is your mother?  I hope she is well."
"She was well when I last heard from her," replied Frank, "and happy--that is as happy as she can be while we are separated from each other."
"She is a true daughter of France," said the colonel, "and she should be happy to have so brave a son.  Please remember me to her when you write.  _Au revoir_," and with a friendly smile he passed on.
"Still hobnobbing with the swells, I see," remarked Billy, as Frank rejoined his chums.
"He was telling me of a letter that his brother had written me about my mother's property," explained Frank.  "Queer that it hasn't reached me. Did any of you fellows get any mail yesterday?"
"I got a couple of letters," replied Billy.  "Tom handed them to me just before we went into action yesterday morning."
"Come to think of it, Tom was asking for you at the same time," said Bart.  "He'd brought down the mail for the bunch.  He said he had a letter for you.  But you weren't around at the time and he stuck it into his pocket.  Then the boches came swinging at us, and in the excitement I suppose he forgot all about it.  Likely enough he has it with him now--that is if the Huns have let him keep it."
"That must be the explanation," said Frank.  "Well, all I can do is write to the colonel's brother and ask him to send me a duplicate of the letter.  Poor Tom!  I'd give all the letters in the world to have him safe with us just now."
"Same here," said Billy and Bart in chorus.
"I guess the Huns have got him," said Frank gloomily.  "He isn't among the dead or wounded as far as we've been able to find.  But I'll bet they thought they had hold of a wildcat when they nabbed him."
"Trust Tom for that," said Bart.  "He was a terror when he had his blood up.  He must have got knocked on the head, or they wouldn't have taken him alive."
"Perhaps he'd have been luckier if he had been killed," said Billy sadly.  "From all I hear there are plenty of prisoners in German camps who would welcome death."
"It makes me grit my teeth to think of the humane way we treat the men we capture, and then compare it with the way the Huns treat our soldiers," said Frank bitterly.  "Look at the German prisoners we saw working on the roads that time we went away on furlough.  Plenty of food, kind treatment, good beds.  Why, lots of those fellows are living better than they ever did in their own country.  They're getting fat with good living."
"Nothing like that in German prison camps," growled Bart.  "Horrible food, mouldy crusts, rotten meat, and not enough of that to keep body and soul together.  In a few months the men are little more than skeletons.  They work them sixteen or eighteen hours a day in all kinds of weather.  They set dogs on them and prod them with bayonets.  Did you read of the forty they tortured to death by swinging them by their bound arms for hours at a time in freezing weather?"
"It's no mistake to call the Germans Huns," snapped Billy, clenching his fists.
"No," agreed Frank, "but it's rough on the Huns."
CHAPTER V
NICK RABIG TURNS UP
"Guess who's here," said Billy a few mornings later, as he came up to Bart and Frank.  "Give you three guesses."
"That's generous," remarked Frank.  "Well, I'll bite.  Who is it?  The Kaiser?"
"Come off."
"The Crown Prince?"
"Quit your kidding."
"I know," said Bart.  "Hindenburg."
"Blathering boobs, both of you," pronounced Billy.  "But with your limited intellects one ought to be patient.  I'll give you one more chance.  Think of the fellow you like the least in all the world."
"Nick Rabig!" the others exclaimed in one breath.
"Right," grinned Billy.  "I knew that would get you.  Nick seems to be as popular with you as poison ivy at a church picnic."
"What cat dragged it in?" groaned Bart.
"Our unlucky day," growled Frank.  "I knew something would happen when I picked up the wrong shoe this morning."
"But how did he get back?" asked Bart, his curiosity overcoming his repugnance.
"Came in on his own feet," replied Billy.  "Escaped, so he says, after performing prodigies of valor.  To hear Nick talk you'd think he'd wiped out half the German army."
His comrades laughed.
"I suppose we ought to kill the fatted calf," said Frank sarcastically.
"Where's the calf?" asked Bart.  "Unless we take Billy here," he added as an afterthought.
He dodged the pass that Billy made at him, and just then Fred Anderson, another young soldier, strolled up.
"Heard the news?" he inquired.
"About Nick Rabig?  Yes," replied Frank.  "Billy's just been telling us about it."
"Bad news travels fast," growled Bart.
"Nick doesn't seem to cut much ice with you fellows," commented Fred. "I never thought much of him myself, but you seem to have it in for him especially.  I suppose it's because he tried to play that dirty trick on Frank in the boxing bout."
"No, it isn't that," replied Frank.  "I got satisfaction for that then and there, and I don't hold grudges.  It's something altogether outside of personal matters.  Have you heard any details about how Nick made his escape?"
"Only a bit here and there," answered Fred.  "I suppose it will all come out later on.  But it seems that he has a lot of information about the German plans and he's now at headquarters being questioned by the officers."
Frank turned the conversation into other channels, because although he had the gravest reasons for believing Rabig to be a traitor, he did not want to do the fellow an injustice or voice his suspicions until he was able to confirm them by absolute proof.
Fred passed on after a few minutes and the boys looked at each other.
"Did you hear what Fred said about Nick's 'important information'?" asked Frank.
"Important misinformation," growled Bart.
"Bunk," declared Billy.
"Of course, Nick has an advantage in understanding German," said Frank cautiously, "and a loyal fellow in his situation might have picked up something that would be of advantage to our people, though it isn't likely, for the Germans guard their secrets pretty well."
"What's the use of talking?" burst out Bart.  "We fellows are all onto Rabig.  We know at this minute that he'd like nothing better than to see the United States licked by Germany.  Don't we know that he let that German prisoner escape?  Don't you know that he was talking in the woods at night with that German spy that you shot?  I tell you straight, Frank, that if Rabig escaped it was because the Germans let him escape.  If he has information, it is because the Germans filled him up with just the kind of information they wanted our officers to believe."
"I think Bart's right," remarked Billy.  "It'll be the best day this regiment ever saw when Rabig's stood up before a firing squad."
"In my heart I believe the same," assented Frank.  "But the tantalizing thing is that we haven't a bit of legal proof.  Rabig had that cut on his hand to explain the escape of the prisoner.  He seemed to be sleeping in his bunk that night I got back from the woods.  So far he has an alibi for everything.  We can't prove that he let himself be captured.  We can't prove that the Germans let him escape.  As for the information he claims to have, our suspicions are based only on what we know of the man's character."
"That legal stuff doesn't make a hit with me," growled Bart.  "Some day I'll break loose and take it out of him myself.  My fingers itch every time I see him.  I'd hoped I'd never have to see him again."
"You're doomed to be disappointed, then," grinned Billy, "for here he comes now."
They looked in the direction he indicated and saw Rabig coming along the company street.
His step was swaggering and he looked immensely satisfied with himself.
Bart's fist clenched.
"Nothing doing, Bart," Frank counseled in a low tone.  "Hold your horses.  I know just how you feel.  I had to lick him once and maybe you'll have your turn.  But not now.  I want to find out whether he knows anything about Tom."
"All right," said Bart, "but it comes hard."
Nick saw them standing there, and for a fraction of a second seemed to be of two minds about keeping on.  He hated them all cordially and he had no doubt of the feeling with which they regarded him.  But his hesitation was only momentary, and he came on with just a little additional swagger in his gait.
He would have passed without stopping but Frank spoke to him pleasantly enough.
"Hello, Nick!" he said.  "See you've got back."
"That's plain enough to see," responded Nick surlily.
"Papa's little sunshine," murmured Billy under his breath.
"Huns seem to have fed you pretty well," remarked Frank.
Rabig only grunted and looked at Frank suspiciously.
"Did you see anything of Tom Bradford over there?" asked Frank.
A look of surprise came into Rabig's little eyes.
"No," he answered.  "Was he captured?"
"We're afraid so," answered Frank.
"I didn't see him," declared Rabig.  "Perhaps he's killed," he added, almost smacking his lips with satisfaction.
They longed to kick him, but restrained themselves, and Rabig passed on.
"Isn't he a sweet specimen?" asked Bart in disgust, as he looked at Rabig's receding figure.
"Did you see how his eyes lighted up when he heard that Tom was gone?" put in Billy.  "The only thing that would give him more satisfaction would be to have the same thing happen to Frank."
"I guess he hates us all alike," said Frank.  "Down in his heart he knows that we believe him to be a traitor.  His only comfort is that we haven't been able to catch him with the goods.  But that will come in time.  A little more rope and he can be depended on to hang himself. But that can wait.  What I'm more interested in is that he didn't have any news of Tom."
"Perhaps he was lying," suggested Bart.  "He may have seen Tom over there, but wouldn't give us the satisfaction of telling us."
"No, I don't think it was that," commented Billy.  "I was watching him closely while Frank was talking to him, and I could see that he was really surprised as well as pleased to learn that Tom was gone."
"But even if he didn't see him, that doesn't prove that Tom isn't there," suggested Bart.  "He may have been captured by some other division.  Besides, to tell the truth, I don't believe that Rabig was in a prison camp at all.  Did you notice how fat and well fed he looked?  I'll bet that he's been living high on the best the Huns could give him."
"He didn't look like most escaped prisoners for a fact," assented Frank.  "We'll let his failure to see Tom go for what it's worth.  But there's one thing that's been growing in my mind right along.  We're sure that Tom isn't dead, for the burial parties cleared up the field and didn't find him.  We know too that he isn't on the hospital list. I got a squint at that no later than yesterday, and Tom's name isn't there.  That seems to cut out everything except capture by the Huns, doesn't it?"
"What else is there?" asked Bart gloomily.
"Just one thing," replied Frank, "and that is that Tom has got away from the Huns but hasn't yet got back to us.  I know what that boy is. He isn't the kind to settle down and tell himself that he's a prisoner and that's all there is to it.  There isn't a bone in his head, and he's been busy every minute thinking up some plan to get away.  You know what the boches are doing now.  They're getting so short of men that they're using prisoners right behind the lines in cutting brush and hauling guns and that sort of thing.  Of course it's dead against all the rules of war, but a little thing like that doesn't bother the Germans.  Now if that's going on there are lots of chances to escape that the prisoners wouldn't have if they were all huddled together in a prison camp under the rifles of their guards.  Get me?  Picture Tom out in the thick woods going meekly ahead doing as he is told without making a break for freedom.  Not on your life!  Some way or other he'll slip off, and some fine day you'll see the old scout come walking in and asking us if breakfast's ready."
"It sounds good," said Bart unconvinced, "but I'm afraid it's a dream."
"All guess work," chimed in Billy.  "We don't know anything."
"No," admitted Frank, "but we know Tom."
CHAPTER VI
THE COMING DRIVE
"That big German drive seems to have slipped a cog somewhere," Bart remarked to his comrades, a few days later, as they were resting after a hard morning's work at organizing the position that their division was holding.
"I suppose the Crown Prince is making up a new time-table," grinned Billy.  "He seems to have a passion for that.  He ought to have been a railroad man."
"The trouble is that they always go wrong," laughed Frank.  "I'll bet he's cross-eyed."
"Yet the Heinies fall for them every time," said Billy.  "I suppose they figure that just by the law of chance one of them will have to be right some time."
"I thought that the drive had started the other morning, when the Germans came down like wolves on a fold," said Bart.  "But it seems that things were quiet on other parts of the line, so that this must have been just a local operation."
"Local operation!" snorted Billy.  "In other days it would have been counted a big battle.  Why, if Waterloo were pulled off now do you know how the papers would describe it?  They'd say that there was 'considerable activity on a section of the line over near Hougomont Farm yesterday, where certain units under Napoleon and Wellington came in contact.  The artillery fire was fairly strong, and there were clashes between a few infantry regiments and the French were repulsed. Apart from this there is nothing to report.'"
The boys laughed.
"Everything's topsy-turvy nowadays," said Frank.  "It used to be armies that did the fighting.  Now it's whole nations.  But look at that scrap going on overhead.  Its a dandy."
They looked in the direction he indicated and their pulses quickened, for they themselves had once been engaged in a battle in the sky, and an aerial combat had a personal interest to them.
Far up in the sky, which just then was as clear as crystal, a duel was in progress between two planes.  It was evident at a glance that both of the rival aviators were masters of their profession.  They circled deftly about each other like giant falcons, jockeying for position, each trying to get the weather gauge on the other where he could rake his opponent with his machine gun without exposing himself to his enemy's fire in return.
Swooping, climbing, diving, the planes pursued their deadly purpose, while exclamations of admiration came from the lips of the fascinated onlookers as some specially daring manoeuvre promised to give the advantage first to one and then to the other of the antagonists.
"Classy work!" exclaimed Frank.
"They're both dandies," declared Billy.  "It's a toss up as to which will win."
"They're so far up that it's hard to tell which is which," said Bart, "but I've got a nickel that says the Hun will be downed."
"Great Scott," cried Frank.  "One of them was hit that time.  See it swerve."
"And look at the smoke!" Billy shouted.  "It's on fire!  A bullet must have hit the petrol tank."
A burst of smoke and flame shot out from the doomed plane, and it began to fall, fire streaming out in its wake like the tail of a meteor. Down it came like a plummet.
"It's coming right in our lines!" exclaimed Bart.  "Scatter, fellows, or it will be right on top of us!"
The wrecked plane had fallen about two hundred feet, when a figure shot from the burning mass, whirling over and over as it descended.  The aviator, knowing that his only choice lay between being burned or crushed, had chosen the less painful form of death.
The body fell some distance off, but the plane itself came down within a few rods of the boys.  It was blazing so fiercely that they could not approach very close to it, but they could easily detect the marking which indicated that it was a French plane.
The Army Boys looked at each other regretfully.
"Score one for the Huns," remarked Frank.  "You'd have lost your nickel, Bart."
"It's too bad," said Billy, as he straightened up and shook, his fist at the victorious plane.
But to the boys' amazement, the conqueror, instead of flying off toward his own lines, was coming down toward them in long sweeping spirals.
"Why, it looks as if he were going to land here!" exclaimed Billy in wonder.
"If he does, we'll have the satisfaction of taking him prisoner anyway," observed Bart.
"It must be that his own plane is injured and he has to descend," suggested Frank.
But there was no sign of injury to the descending plane and it seemed to be in perfect control.  Swiftly and steadily it came down, and a cry of astonishment broke from the boys as they saw that it bore American markings.
"How's that?" exclaimed Frank.  "There's been a fearful mistake somewhere.  This fellow has downed a French plane thinking that it was German."
"He'll be court-martialed for that or I miss my guess," said Bart with a frown.
"It's bad enough to have the Huns after us without trying to kill our own people," growled Billy.
There was a level place nearby that made an ideal place for a landing, and the American machine came down there with scarcely a jar.
The boys rushed toward it with reproaches on their lips, but their wrath was lost in astonishment when they recognized, in the aviator who stepped forth, Dick Lever, one of the most daring of the American "aces" and a warm personal friend of theirs.
The reproaches died when they saw him, for only a little while before he had saved them from a German prison by swooping down with his machine and carrying them off from their captors.  It was with mixed feelings that they greeted him, as he came gaily forward, a smile upon his handsome bronzed face.  But Dick seemed to feel a certain stiffness in their welcome that was unusual.
"Hello, fellows," he greeted.  "What's the grouch?"
"No grouch at all, Dick," answered Frank.  "We owe you too much for that.  We're only sorry that you happened to make a mistake and down a French plane thinking it was German."
Dick's eyes twinkled.
"Come out of your trance," he chuckled.  "I don't make that kind of mistakes."
For answer Frank led the way to the wrecked and partly burned plane and pointed out the markings.
But despite the evidence, Dick still seemed unabashed and his chuckle broke into a laugh.
"That's one on you fellows," he snorted.  "Those markings are pure camouflage.  Just another cute little German trick that went wrong. That fellow set out to take photographs over our lines and he didn't want to be disturbed, so he painted out his own markings, and put the French in their place.  If you'll come a little closer you can see the Hun marks under their coat of white."
The boys did so and, now that their attention had been called to it, they could readily see the tracings that had been almost obliterated.
"That's evidence enough," remarked Dick, "but to make assurance doubly sure we'll go over to where the aviator fell and you'll see that he was a German all right."
The body had been decently covered up before the boys reached there, but the clothing and the effects found proved beyond a doubt that the aviator had been one of their foes.
"Take it all back, Dick," said Frank.  "You knew what you were about. And I'm glad that you came out of the scrap safe and sound.  But it certainly was some scrap while it lasted."
"It sure was," replied Dick.  "That fellow was as skilful and plucky as they make them.  He kept my hands full, and there was one time when he came within an ace of raking me.  But luck was with me.  Poor fellow! I'm sorry for him, but I'd have been still more sorry if it had been myself."
"What beats me is the way you tumbled to him," puzzled Billy.  "You surely couldn't have read the German markings under their coat of paint.  How did you know he was a German?"
Dick smiled.
"Simple enough," he answered.  "We Allied aviators have a secret system of signals, something like Freemasonry.  When we come near another plane that seems to be one of our own, we make a certain dip of our plane.  That's like asking for the countersign.  If the other fellow's all right he makes a certain signal in return.  If he doesn't do it the first time, we try again, because there's always a chance that he hasn't noticed our signal, or is too busy in handling his plane to give the reply.  But if after two or three times we don't get the countersign, we know the fellow's a Hun and we open up on him."
"Good stuff!" approved Billy.
"That's what happened this morning," continued Dick.  "This fellow came sailing along as calm and cheeky as you please, and was having a bully time taking pictures of our positions.  At least I suppose that is what he was doing, as he evidently wasn't out looking for fight.  I thought it wouldn't do any harm to take a look at him, although I saw the machine had French markings.  I gave the signal, but of course he couldn't give the countersign.  I repeated it three times without getting an answer, and then I pitched into him.  That makes the thirteenth that I've brought down."
"Thirteen was an unlucky number for him, all right," remarked Billy.
"How are you fellows getting along?" asked Dick, stretching himself out on the ground for a brief resting spell.  "I notice that you've been right up to your neck in fighting lately."
"Its been pretty hot along this sector," Frank admitted, "though I suppose it's nothing to what it will be after the big German drive gets started.  That is if it ever does start.  I sometimes think they've given up the idea."
"Don't kid yourself," replied the aviator grimly.  "It's coming, all right.  If you fellows had been up in the air with me you wouldn't have any doubt about it.  The roads back of the German lines are just black with troops.  It's like an endless swarm of ants.  The trains move along in endless procession and they're packed.  Big guns, too, till you can't count them.  It seems as if all Germany was on the move. It's the old invasion of the Huns over again."
"Where do they get them all, I wonder," remarked Billy.
"That's easy," replied Frank bitterly.  "They're coming from the Russian front.  The breakdown of Russia means a cool million at the very least added to the German troops on the western front."
"That accounts for most of them," agreed Dick.  "Then in addition Germany's combing out her empire to put every available man into service.  She's enslaving the Belgians to work in her factories so that German workmen can be sent into the ranks.  She's calling up mere boys who ought to be at their schoolbooks.  I tell you, boys, Germany's desperate.  She's beginning to realize what a fool she was to bring America into the war, and she's going to try to get a decision before we get a big army over here."
"She'll have to get busy mighty soon, then," said Bart, "for Uncle Sam's boys are coming into France by the hundreds of thousands.  And those hundreds of thousands will be millions before long."
"Right you are," agreed Dick.  "The jig's up with Germany and she's the only one that doesn't see it.  It's fun to see the way she tries to belittle America to her own people.  Almost every week she has to change the story.  At first she said that America wouldn't fight at all.  We were a nation of money grabbers.  Then even if we wanted to fight the U-boats would keep us from getting over; Then even if we got over, our troops would be green and run like hares as soon as they caught sight of the veteran Prussian regiments."
The boys looked at each other with a grin.
"We've run, all right," chuckled Billy, "but we've run toward them instead of away from them."
"They thought our marines would run too," laughed Frank, "but do you see what they're calling them now?  _Teufelhunden_.  They're devil-hounds, all right, and the dachshund yelps when he sees them coming."
"What do you think the Germans will aim for when they do begin their drive?" queried Bart.
"The Allied commanders would give a good deal to know that," smiled Dick.  "Of course the thing the Huns want to do above everything else is to separate and crush the Allied armies.  Everything would be easy after that.  But if they can't do that, they'll probably make a break for Paris.  They figure that if they once got that in their hands the French would be ready to sue for peace.  Or they may try to take the Channel Ports, where they'd be in good position to take a hack at England.  The only thing that's certain is that the drive is coming and when it does come it's going to be the biggest fight in the history of the world."
"Let Heinie do his worst," said Bart.
"Yes," agreed Frank.  "And no matter what he does, he'll have to reckon with Uncle Sam."
CHAPTER VII
IN THE HANDS OF THE HUNS
The last thing that Tom Bradford remembered in the fight that separated him from his comrades was the sight of Frank in a bayonet duel with two Germans.  He was trying desperately to get to his friend's side and help him in the unequal combat, when a great blackness seemed to sweep down upon him and he knew nothing more.
When he came to consciousness, he felt himself dragged roughly to his feet and thrust into a group of other prisoners who were being sent to the rear under guard of a squad of German soldiers.  He reeled and would have fallen had he not been supported by some of his other companions in misfortune.  Then the line was set in motion and he stumbled along dazedly, abused verbally by his guards and prodded with bayonets if he lagged or faltered.
Gradually his head stopped whirling and his brain grew clearer.  His face felt wet and sticky, and putting his hand to it he drew his fingers away covered with blood.
He felt his head and found a ragged gash running almost the length of the scalp.  It must have bled freely, judging from the weakness he felt and the way his hair was matted and his face smeared.  But the blood had congealed now and stopped flowing.  He figured from the character of the wound that it had been made by a glancing blow from a rifle.
It was fully dark when the gloomy procession halted at a big barn where the prisoners were counted and passed in to stay for the night.
A little later some food was passed in to the prisoners, but Tom had no appetite and even if he had been hungry it would have been hard to stomach the piece of dry bread and watery soup that was given him as his portion.  So he gave it to others, and sat over in a corner immersed in the gloomy thoughts that came trooping in upon him.
He was a prisoner.  And what he had heard of Hun methods, to say nothing of a former brief experience, had left him under no delusion as to what that meant.
What were his comrades Frank, Bart and Billy doing now?  Had they come safely through the fight?  He was glad at any rate that they were not with him now.  Better dead on the field of battle, he thought bitterly, than to be in the hands of the Huns.
But Tom was too young and his vitality too great to give himself up long to despair.  He was a prisoner, but what of it?  He had been a prisoner before and escaped.  To be sure, it was too much to expect to escape by way of the sky as he had before.  Lightning seldom strikes twice in the same place.  But there might be other ways--there should be other ways.  While breath remained in his body he would never cease his efforts to escape.  And sustained and inspired by this resolve, he at last fell asleep.
When he awoke in the morning, his strength had in large measure returned to him.  His head was still a little giddy but his appetite was returning.  Still he looked askance at the meagre and unpalatable breakfast brought in by the guards.
"Don't be too squeamish, kid," a fellow prisoner advised him, as he saw the look on the young soldier's face.  "Take what's given you, even if it isn't fit for Christians.  You'll get weak soon enough.  Keep strong as long as you can."
There was sound sense in this even with the woeful prophecy and Tom, though with many inward protests, followed the well-meant advice.
Bad as it was, the food did him good, and he was feeling in fairly good condition when, a little later, he was summoned before a German lieutenant to be examined.
That worthy was seated before a table spread with papers, and as Tom entered or rather was pushed into his presence he compressed his beetling black brows and turned upon the prisoner with the face of a thundercloud.
But if he expected Tom to wilt before his frowning glance he was disappointed.  There was no trace of swagger or bravado when Tom faced his inquisitor.  But there was self-respect and quiet resolution that refused to quail before anyone to whom fate for the moment had given the upper hand.
The officer spoke English in a stiff and precise way so that an interpreter was dispensed with, and the examination proceeded.
"What is your name?" the lieutenant asked.
Tom told him.
"Your nationality?"
"American."
The officer snorted.
"There is no such thing as American," he said contemptuously.  "You are just a jumble of different races."
Tom said nothing.
"What is your regiment?" the officer continued.
There was no answer.
"Did you hear me?" repeated the lieutenant impatiently.  "What is your regiment?"
"I cannot tell," answered Tom.
"You mean you will not?"
"I refuse to tell."
"Refuse," exclaimed the officer, growing red in the face.  "That is not a safe word to say to me."
Tom kept quiet.
The officer after a moment of inward debate shifted to another line.
"What are your commanders' plans, as far as you know?"
"To beat the Germans," returned Tom promptly.
The officer's face became apoplectic.
"Yankee pig!" he roared.  "You know that is not what I meant.  Tell me if you know anything of their tactics, whether they intend to attack or stand on the defensive."
"I don't know," replied Tom truthfully.
"Have you plenty of ammunition?"
"More than we can use," replied Tom promptly, glad to tell what could do no harm and would only increase the chagrin of his enemy.
"How many troops have the Americans got in France?"
"A good many hundreds of thousands," answered Tom, "and they're coming over at the rate of two hundred thousand a month."
"Yankee lies," sneered the officer.  "You are very ready to give me more information than I ask for when it will suit your purpose."
Tom kept discreetly silent, but he chuckled inwardly at the discomfort shown by his enemy.
The officer pondered a moment, and evidently decided that there was not much to be got out of this young American who faced him so undauntedly. Perhaps other prisoners would prove more amenable.  But his dignity had been too much ruffled to let Tom get off without punishment.
"You think that you have baffled me," he said, "but you will find that it is not wise to try to thwart the will of a German officer.  We have ways to break such spirits as yours."
He called to the guard, who had been standing stolidly at the door.
"Take him out in the woods and put him to work where the enemy's shell fire is heaviest," he commanded.  "It doesn't matter what happens to him.  If his own people kill him so much the better.  It will only be one less Yankee pig for us to feed."
The guard seized Tom and thrust him roughly out of the door.  Then he took him back to the barn and a whispered conversation ensued, with many black glances shot at Tom.
A short time afterward he was placed with some others in the custody of a squad of soldiers, and taken into the woods close behind the German lines.  Of course this was a flagrant breach of all the laws of war. But there was no use in protesting.  That would only arouse the amusement of the German guards.
As a matter of fact, when Tom came to think it over, he did not want to protest.  His captors could have taken no course that would have suited him better.  At first his heart had sunk, for he realized that the officer's purpose was to sign his death warrant.  The chances of being killed by the American shells was very great.  And then the significant word of the lieutenant that it didn't matter what happened to him, was a hint to the guards that they could murder him if they liked, and there would be no questions asked.
But after all, to be in the open was infinitely better than to be eating his heart out in a squalid prison camp.  His health stood less chance of being undermined.  As to the shells, he had grown so used to that form of danger that it hardly disturbed him at all.
But the one thing that stood out above all others was that in the woods he would have a chance of escape, while in the camp he would have practically none at all.  His limbs would have to be free in order to do the work demanded of him.  And he was willing to match his keen American wits against the heavy and slow-thinking guards who might stand watch over him.
He soon reached the section where he was to work, and was set to felling trees to make corduroy roads over which guns and supplies could be brought up from the enemy's rear to the advanced lines.
He had never done that kind of work, and at first the tremendous efforts demanded of him amounted to sheer physical torture.  He was hounded on unceasingly under the jibes and threats of his brutal guards.  Not half enough food was supplied, and he was forced to work for sixteen and eighteen hours on a stretch.
But he had great reserves of youth and vitality to draw on, and he kept on doggedly, his brain alert, his eyes wide open, his heart courageous, looking for his opportunity.
On the third night his opportunity came.
CHAPTER VIII
FRYING-PAN TO FIRE
The third day of Tom's captivity had been more trying than the two that preceded it.
A new piece of woodland had been ordered to be cleared and, as there was a scarcity of labor, Tom had been taxed to even a greater degree than usual.  By the time night came, he was feeling utterly exhausted and ready to drop.
But dusk brought him little relief, for he was told that he must keep on by lantern light until ten o'clock, before he would be permitted to stop.
His troubles were aggravated by the fact that this afternoon a change of guards had brought him under the control of an especially brutal one who made his life a burden by abuse.
His guard had ordered him into a thick part of the woods where the high underbrush cut them off from the sight of other working parties a hundred yards away.  Here the German had seated himself comfortably on a fallen tree while he watched his prisoner toil, occasionally hurling a threat or epithet at him.
The guard's watch was out of order, and he had borrowed a small clock from the mess room in order to know when the time came to report with his prisoner at quarters.  He had placed the clock in the light of the lantern and kept looking at it frequently and yawning.  It was plain that he would welcome the hour that released him from his monotonous duty.
The night was warm and the guard's gun was heavy.  He stood it against the tree, but within instant reach, and unbuckled his belt.
In working around the tree, Tom's foot as though by accident knocked against the clock and it fell over on its face.  The guard thundered a curse against his awkwardness, and stooped down to pick it up.
Quick as thought Tom picked up the heavy lantern and brought it crashing down on the German's head.  The next instant his hands were on the German's throat.
The struggle was brief, for the German at his best would have been no match for the young American.  Tom had soon choked him into unconsciousness, and when he felt the man become limp beneath him he relaxed his hold.
He tied the German's hands with his belt and gagged him securely.  The lantern had gone out with the blow and he did not dare to relight it. Darkness was now his best friend.
His eyes fell on the clock.  It had done him good service, but now was of no further use to him.  But a second thought made him pick it up and put it in his blouse.
He had no compass, but the clock would do in a pinch.  His woodcraft had taught him how the hands of a clock could find for him the cardinal points.  More than once his watch in more peaceful times had done him a similar service.
The first thing necessary was to put as wide a distance as possible between himself and the place where he now was.  Afterwards he could figure out how to regain his own lines.  By ten o'clock at latest his attack on the guard would be discovered.  He must be miles away before then, or his life would not be worth a cent.
His impulse was to take the German's gun, but he discarded the thought at once.  His only salvation lay in hiding.  The gun would count for nothing among the innumerable foes that surrounded him.  It was heavy and cumbrous, and would only retard his progress through the woods.  He must travel light if he would travel fast.
He gathered up some fragments of food left from the lunch that the guard had been munching and tucked them in his pocket.  Then like a shadow he slipped away through the woods.
From what he had seen and bits of information that he had picked up from other prisoners, some of whom were Frenchmen and knew the country well, Tom had a pretty good idea of the lay of the land.  He knew that the country was rolling, with here and there a range of hills that rose almost to the dignity of mountains.  Here there ought to be plenty of hiding places where he could stay while he planned a way to get across the lines.
Of course his route would be within the German lines for miles.  But the inhabitants were in sympathy with the Allied cause, prisoners in almost as great a degree as he himself had been, and he might find among them aid and comfort, though such assistance if discovered would be sure to be visited with hard punishment by the German oppressors.
The way was full of difficulties and almost every step would be attended by danger.  But for the present at least he was free.  Free! The word had never appealed to him so strongly before.  He drew in great draughts of the mountain air.  They seemed in a way to cleanse his lungs from the prison taint.
For what seemed to him hours he never slackened his pace.  Many times he stumbled in the darkness and his body was full of bruises, but in the joy of his recovered freedom, he scarcely felt the pain.  On he went and on until he felt certain he had placed a safe distance between himself and the scene of his recent captivity.
To be sure, the German command had other things to rely on than mere physical pursuit.  There were the long arms of the telegraph and telephone, through which every division on the sector might be warned to be on the lookout for him.  But it was wholly unlikely that this would be done.  On the eve of the great drive, the authorities were too busy to expend their energies on the recapture of an escaped prisoner. Even if he should fall into the hands of another body of his enemies, it was unlikely that they would know anything of his recent exploit.
So with body tired after his strenuous exertions, but with his mind as much at rest as it could be under the circumstances, Tom threw himself down at last to take a brief rest under the shadow of a giant beech.
The sun streaming through the branches woke him a little later.  For a moment he did not know where he was and lay trying to get his thoughts in order.  Then it all came back to him with a rush and he sprang to his feet and looked about him.
There was nothing in sight to alarm him.  The place seemed to be wild and unvisited.  A squirrel sat in the boughs over his head chattering his surprise and perhaps his displeasure at the sight of the intruder. A chipmunk slipped along a grassy ridge and vanished in the undergrowth.  Birds sang their welcome to a new day.  Everything about him spoke of peace and serenity.  It seemed as though there were no such thing as war in the world.
Yet even while this thought lingered with him there came a discordant note in the booming of a distant gun.  But it seemed far off and though other guns soon swelled the menacing chorus there seemed to be no immediate cause for alarm.
A little way off from where he had slept, a small brook wound its way through the sedge grass.  Tom welcomed it with a grin, for he had not had a bath since he had been captured.
In a moment he had undressed and plunged into the brook.  The water was scarcely deeper than his waist, but its coolness was like balm to Tom's bruised and heated body.  When he resumed his clothing he felt infinitely strengthened and refreshed.
The young soldier worked his way into a dense thicket as a measure of precaution, before he ate the remnants of food that he had carried away with him the night before.  It was a meager breakfast and he could have eaten four times as much if he had had it.  But even crumbs were grateful to him in his famished condition.
He had just finished when an ominous sound fell on his ears.  Voices mingled with the tread of feet and the clank of weapons.  He looked through the bushes and saw a squad of soldiers wearing helmets coming over a little rise of ground beyond where he lay concealed.
He counted them as they came into view.  There were at least forty Germans going along in loose marching order.  They might have been a patrol out for scout duty or, what was more likely, a foraging party.
He had scarcely established their numbers when on the other side of the thicket and not more than fifty feet away another squad of Germans came into view.  They apparently belonged to the same party, but had separated somewhat from the others, probably for more ease in marching.
They seemed to have come from some distance for they were warm and perspiring.  The sight of the brook was refreshing, and after a brief conference between the lieutenant in command and a sergeant, the order was given to break ranks, and the men threw themselves down in sprawling attitudes for a rest under the trees.
Tom's heart was in his mouth.  What kind of a trick was fate playing on him?  Was this to be the end of his heartbreaking struggle, his wild flight through the woods?  Was he to get just a tantalizing glimpse of liberty to have it immediately snatched from him?  At that moment he tasted the bitterness of death.
How lucky it was, though, that he had sought refuge in that thicket before he commenced his breakfast.  There was still a chance.  The men were tired and would not be likely to wander about.  They were only too glad of a chance to rest.
He burrowed deeper and deeper into the recesses of the thicket.  He lay as close to the ground as possible.  What would he have given for the friendly shelter of a trench!
The men conversed lazily together while the officer sat some distance apart.  At times the Germans' eyes rested carelessly on Tom's shelter, but without any sign of suspicion.
At last the order came to resume the march, and Tom drew an immense sigh of relief.  A few minutes more and they would be gone.
The men had formed in loose marching order and the lieutenant lifted his hand to give the signal.
Suddenly a loud ringing came from the center of the thicket, whirring, rattling, clanging.
_The time-piece Tom was carrying was an alarm clock!_
CHAPTER IX
THE CONFESSION
To poor Tom that ringing was the crack of doom.
The world seemed to end for him then and there.  The first surprise had paralyzed him.  Then he rolled upon the betraying clock, tried to crush it, strangle it, press it into the earth.  But it kept on remorselessly until the alarm ran down.
The Germans had been almost as startled at first as Tom himself.  But they hesitated only for a moment.  There could be no mistaking where that insistent buzzing was coming from.  There was a rush for the thicket, and the next moment Tom was hauled out and stood upon his feet among his captors.
It took only a glance to tell them that Tom was an American.  His face as well as his uniform betrayed that fact.  Amid a hubbub of excited exclamations he was taken before their leader.
But this time the officer was not able to talk English and there was no interpreter at hand, so that Tom for the present was spared the ordeal of questioning.
The fateful clock was passed around among the men with jest and laughter.  It was a good joke to them, but Tom was in no mood to see the humor of the situation.  To him it meant that all his strivings had come to naught.
Why had he not noticed that the clock was of the alarm variety and that the alarm had been set?  He promised that he would never forgive himself for that.
A number of men were counted off to take Tom to the local prison camp, while the rest of the party went on with their expedition.
The journey was long, but it was not attended by the rough treatment that would ordinarily have been meted out to the prisoner.  The men were glad, for one thing, that they were relieved from going on the special duty for which the party had been formed.  Then, too, Tom's misadventure had given them a hearty laugh, and laughs were something to be prized in their arduous life.
After reaching the camp, Tom was taken before an officer for examination.  But the officer was busy and preoccupied, and the questioning was largely a matter of form.  Tom was vague or dense as the case demanded, and the impatient officer curtly ordered him to be thrust in with the other prisoners and promptly proceeded to forget him.
Tom passed through several stages of emotion when he was left to himself.  First he moped, and then he raged.  Then, as the comical side of the situation forced itself even upon his misery, he laughed.
A proverb says that "the man is not wholly lost who can laugh at his own misfortunes."  Tom laughed and immediately felt better.  His natural buoyancy reasserted itself.  But he had imbibed a prejudice against alarm clocks that promised to last for the rest of his life.
The sector was a quiet one and Tom was not sent out to work under shell fire.  For a few days he was left unmolested to the tedium of prison life, and he began with renewed zest to formulate plans for his escape.
He had a chance also to become more or less acquainted with his fellow-prisoners.  There were not many and Tom reflected with satisfaction that the Americans held more German prisoners than the Huns had captured of his own countrymen.
There was a sprinkling of nationalities.  There were a few American and British, but the majority were French and Belgians.
About the only French prisoner that Tom grew to know intimately was one who could speak English fairly well.  This he explained was due to the fact that the man in whose employ he had been as a butler had a daughter who had married an American, and English had been much spoken in the household.
"What part of France do you come from?" asked Tom one day, when they were chatting together.
"From Auvergne," answered the Frenchman, whose name was Martel.  "Ah," he continued wistfully, "what would I not give to see the gardens and vineyards of Auvergne again!  But I never will."
"Sure you will," said Tom cheerily.  "Brace up, Martel.  You won't stay in this old hole forever."
Martel shook his head.
"I'm doomed," he said.  "I was in the first stage of consumption when I came here, and the disease is gripping me more tightly every day. Perhaps it's a judgment on me."
"What do you mean by that?" asked Tom, but Martel did not reply except by a shrug of the shoulders.
"Speaking of Auvergne," remarked Tom after a pause, "reminds me that I have a special chum whose mother came from that province.  She married an American, too."
"_Vrai_?" exclaimed Martel with quickened interest.  "What was her name, _mon ami_?"
"Blest if I remember," answered Tom.  "I've heard it, too, but I don't recall it.  But I'll tell you how I can find out," he went on, rummaging in his pockets.  "I've got a letter somewhere that was sent to my chum.  I got it from the headquarters post-office the day I was captured and forgot to give it to him.  The Huns tore the envelope off when they saw me, but when they saw that it was of no importance to them they tossed it back.  I've kept it carefully ever since because it's from some lawyer fellow in Paris telling him about his mother's property, and I hope some time to be able to hand it to him.  It's simply a business letter with nothing private or personal in it.  Here it is," and Tom produced from his pocket a crumpled letter without an envelope.  "Let's see, the name of Frank's mother is Delatour--why, what's the matter, Martel?" he added anxiously, as he saw the Frenchman turn white and start back at the mention of the name.
"Nothing," answered Martel, controlling himself with difficulty.  "A little weakness--I'm not very strong, you know."
The conversation turned then in other channels, and Tom soon forgot it in his absorption of his one idea of escape.
A week had passed when a sudden hemorrhage that attacked Martel brought the prison doctor to his side.  He shook his head after an examination. There was no hope.  It was a matter of days only, perhaps of hours.  He was heartless and perfunctory.  What did it matter?  The sufferer was only a prisoner.
A little while after, Martel called Tom to him.
"I told you, _mon ami_, that it would not be long," he said with the ghost of a smile.  "And I also told you that perhaps it was a judgment on me.  Do you remember?"
"Why, yes," answered Tom reluctantly.  "But perhaps you'd better not excite yourself talking about it.  I guess we've all done things we're sorry for afterwards."
"But I committed a crime," said Martel.  "I perjured myself.  And I did it for gain."
"There, there," soothed Tom, but Martel continued:
"No, I must speak.  _Le bon Dieu_ has sent you to me.  Listen, _mon brave_, I was in the household of Monsieur Delatour.  I had seen Mademoiselle Lucie grow up from childhood.  She was charming.  But she married and passed largely out of our life.  Monsieur Delatour grew old.  He had made his will leaving the property chiefly to his daughter.  But there was a nephew, a spendthrift--what you call in English the black sheep--and after Monsieur Delatour died this _mauvais sujet_ offered me money to swear that there was a later will.  The object?  To tie up the estate, to delay the settlement, to force a compromise with the daughter.  I took the money.  I perjured myself. There was no later will.  The property belongs to Mademoiselle Lucie--pardon, Madame Sheldon."
He fell back exhausted on his pillow.  Tom was shocked, but he was also greatly excited at the prospect of the wrong that had been done to Frank's mother being righted.  At Martel's request the confession was reduced to writing with many details added, and then a number of the prisoners signed their names as witnesses.
Tom was not sure how far the confession would stand in law, but he felt reasonably certain that it would be regarded as good evidence and he was jubilant at the chance that had made him of such great service to his chum, Frank.
The confession was made none too soon, for that same night Martel died.
"Well, Frank, old scout," said Tom to himself the next day, as he carefully read and re-read the important document, "that alarm clock played me a lowdown trick, but it's sure been a good friend of yours, all provided I can get this confession to you!"
CHAPTER X
A MIDNIGHT SWIM
"A pretty tight place we're in," remarked Bart to Frank as the Army Boys stood side by side behind a barricade of logs where they had just repelled a German attack that had surged up close before it fell back in confusion.
"Tight is right," grunted Bart, as he reloaded his rifle which was getting hot from firing.
"We ought to be used to tight places by this time," put in Billy, stopping long enough to wipe the perspiration from his face.  "It seems that when our division has a specially tough job to do they always call upon the old Thirty-seventh to do it."
There was no exaggeration in describing the position the soldiers were holding as a tight place.  While the great drive had not yet begun, the enemy was carrying on a nibbling process in the attempt to improve his position before the start of the big offensive.
There was a piece of woodland surmounting a broad plateau that had considerable strategic importance.  Its possession would enable the Germans to straighten their lines and permit their guns to dominate the valley beyond.  They had made several attacks previously which had been driven back; but on the morning in question the assaults had been particularly ferocious and determined.  It was evident that the Germans had received orders to carry it at all costs, and they had thrown their forces ahead again and again regardless of their heavy losses in men.
Their attacks on the direct front had remained without result, but they had been able to gain some advantages on the side that separated the detachment in the woods from their main divisions.  It was necessary that American reinforcements should be sent at once, for the comparatively small force that held the position was rapidly thinning out, owing to the terrific shell fire of the enemy's guns.
Several couriers had been sent to notify the main command of the perilous position in which the defenders were placed, but these had evidently been killed or captured, and at last Major Blake, the officer in command, had to use his last resort.
There was a cage of carrier pigeons that the detachment had brought with them, beautiful, soft-eyed creatures that had been thoroughly trained.  It seemed a pity that things so gentle should have to serve the harsh purposes of war.  But human lives were at stake, and one of the birds was quickly selected, and a message tied on it securely. Then it was thrown up in the air.  It circled about for a moment to get its direction, and then straight as an arrow to its mark made for division headquarters.
A cheer rose from the men as they watched the feathered messenger, but this quickly changed to a groan when the bird was seen to falter and then plunge downward.  An enemy shot had winged or killed it.
Two more were sent and met with the same fate.  The need was growing fearfully urgent, for the enemy had been reinforced and the attacks were growing in intensity.  Unless help came very soon the position would be overwhelmed.
Frank and his comrades were fighting like tigers, their faces covered with grime and sweat.  The last time the enemy came on they had reached the breastworks and had been beaten back with savage bayonet fighting and clubbed rifles.  But they still kept coming as though their numbers were endless.
"The boys had better hurry up if they want to find any of us alive," muttered Billy.
"They'll probably find us dead," grunted Bart, "but they'll find, too, that we've taken a lot of the Huns with us."
"There goes the fourth bird," said Frank.  "Perhaps he'll have better luck."
Through the tempest of shot and shell the bird winged its way unhurt, and with new hope the desperate defenders buckled down to their work. They knew their comrades would not leave them in the lurch.
Two more attacks came on, but the gray-clad waves broke down before the gallant defense.  And then, above the roar of battle, came a rousing American cheer, and into the woods came plunging rank after rank of fresh troops to relieve their hard-pressed comrades.
They rapidly fell into position, and the next time the Germans came for what they believed would be their crowning success they had the surprise of their lives.  A withering rifle fire ploughed their ranks, and then the American boys leaped over the barricade and chased the enemy back to his own lines.  The position was saved, and the hardy fighters who had held it so gallantly looked at each other and wondered that they were alive.
"The narrowest shave we ever had!" gasped Billy as, utterly exhausted, he threw himself at full length on the ground.
"It was nip and tuck," panted Bart.  "I know now how the besieged British at Lucknow felt when they heard the bagpipes playing: 'The Campbells are coming.'"
"We pulled through all right," said Frank, "and don't forget, boys, that we owe it to the birds."
Two days later the position of the divisions was shifted and the Army Boys found themselves on the banks of a small river that forms the dividing line between the hostile armies.
The squad to which Frank and his comrades were assigned under the command of Corporal Wilson, who had now fully recovered from his wounds, was stationed at a point where the river was about a hundred and fifty yards wide.  Desultory firing was carried on, but the sector at the time was comparatively quiet, as both armies were engrossed in their preparations for the great battle that was impending.  It was the lull before the storm, and the boys improved it to the utmost.  Their duties were light compared to what they had been, and they rapidly recuperated from the great strain under which they had been for some weeks past.
"If only Tom were here now," remarked Frank for perhaps the hundredth time, for their missing comrade was always in the thoughts of the other Army Boys.
"Poor old scout!" mourned Bart.  "I wonder where he is now?"
"Working his heart out in some German camp, I suppose," said Billy savagely.
"You see, Frank, your hunch hasn't worked out as you thought it would," said Bart.  "You felt sure that Tom would be with us again before this."
"I know," admitted Frank.  "My time-table has gone wrong, but I haven't given up hope.  Tom is only human and he can't work miracles.  He may have been so placed that it simply wasn't possible to make a break. But one thing you can gamble on, and that is that he hasn't given up trying.  And when a man has that spirit his chance is sure to come."
"I wish I had your optimism," said Bart gloomily.
"Look at those skunks on the other side of the river," interrupted Billy.
He pointed to a group of German soldiers who were making insulting gestures and holding up huge placards with coarse inscriptions on them.
"Cheap skates," replied Frank.  "You notice they're not quite so gay when we get to close quarters with them."
"They get my goat," said Billy with irritation.  "I'd like to cram those placards down their throats."
"Pretty big mouthful," laughed Frank.
"We'll get them yet," said Billy vengefully.
"What's the use of saying 'yet,'" suggested Frank.  "Why not say 'now'?"
They looked at him curiously.
"What do you mean?" queried Bart.
"Got anything up your sleeve?" asked Billy.
"An idea just came to me," replied Frank.  "I don't know whether it's any good, but perhaps it's worth chewing over."
"Let's have it," demanded Billy eagerly.
"Well," said Frank slowly, "I figure that there must be about twenty Germans in that detachment just opposite us.  What would be the matter with a few of us going over there some dark night and cleaning up the bunch?"
A delighted shout met the suggestion.
"Bully!" exclaimed Bart.
But though the approval was enthusiastic, practical difficulties soon presented themselves.
"How are we to get across?" asked Bart dubiously.
"We haven't any boat on this side that's big enough," said Billy.  "In fact, I don't think we have any at all."
"That's an easy one," answered Frank.  "Do you see that big lobster of a boat on the other side?  That looks as though it would carry almost a dozen anyway.  We won't need any more than that to nab the Huns, because we'll have the advantage of the surprise if our plans go through all right."
"But how are we going to get the boat?" asked Bart.
"Swim over for it," replied Frank.  "I'll attend to that.  Give me a dark night and it's all I ask."
"Let's see what the corporal has to say about it," suggested Bart.
The corporal listened with interest.  It was a plan after his own heart.
"You young roosters are always looking for fight," he grinned.  "I'll put it up to the captain and see what he says."
The assent of the captain was readily obtained as he knew the value of such exploits in keeping the spirits of the men up to high fighting pitch.
The night following there would be no moon until late, and it was fixed on for carrying out the raid.  Frank was to swim across the river and get the boat.  On the American side Wilson with eight men would be in waiting.  They would embark and try to reach the other side without detection.  Quick thinking and Yankee grit could be depended on to do the rest.
The night came, black as pitch.  Frank slid into the water as noiselessly as a fish and struck out for the other side.
CHAPTER XI
GALLANT WORK
The water had a chill in it that struck to Frank's marrow, but the reaction soon came and he proceeded swiftly, making as little noise as possible, and keeping body and head low in the water.  He was a powerful swimmer, and the distance was as nothing to him.  But the greatest caution had to be exercised lest he be discovered by a sentry whose shot would alarm his comrades and put an end to the projected raid.
But fortune favored him and he soon reached the boat, which seemed to be large enough, with some crowding, to carry the American party.  It swung with its stern toward the shore, to which it was held by a rope that was passed about a cleat.
Frank clung for a moment to the bow and listened intently.  He could hear no breathing nor any other sound that indicated that any one was on board.  The Germans had evidently not dreamed of any such exploit as that on which Frank was bent.
But that a watch was kept on the shore was evident, for Frank could hear the measured step of a sentinel some distance away.  The steps receded as he listened, and he gathered that the patrol was an extended one.  Now was his time, while the sentry was at the further limit of his beat.
Swiftly he climbed on board, slipped the rope from its cleat, and with a push of an oar against the bank sent the boat some distance out into the stream.  He did not dare to row for he feared that the oars grating in the rowlocks might betray him.  But he made a paddle of one of the oars, dipping it in alternately on opposite sides of the bow, paddle fashion, and before long reached his party, by whom he was received with intense though subdued jubilation.
In whispers Frank explained to Wilson what he had observed and action was agreed on accordingly.  The party, ten in all, bestowed themselves as best as they might in their narrow quarters and the boat started on its perilous expedition.
A paddle was employed as before, and the journey was necessarily slow, for the boat sank in the water almost to the gunwales.  But they reached the other side at last, and Frank, slipping into the water, waded to the bank, where he fastened the boat securely.
Whether they would ever step into that boat again was known to none of the party that slipped like shadows up the grassy bank.  They were outnumbered two to one, or more, and their success depended mainly on surprise.  The slightest slip in their plans would bring the expedition to grief.
They lay flat on the bank and listened.  There was no sound except the tread of the sentry's feet coming nearer.  It was unlikely that the absence of the boat had been discovered.  Still, it might have been, and the dead silence might portend an ambush by the enemy.
This was a chance, however, that they had to take.  But the first thing to do was to dispose of the sentry.
The path along which he seemed to be coming was bordered with a small and uncared-for hedge.
In a hurried whisper Wilson gave his commands.
"You, Sheldon and Raymond, creep ahead and lie on opposite sides of the ledge.  When the sentry comes along, close on him at the same time. Keep him from making a noise if you can.  The one thing is to be quick."
Frank and Bart glided along and took up positions opposite each other.
"You grab his gun, Bart, and I'll make for his throat," whispered Frank.
The sentry came on unsuspectingly.  Lithe as panthers the boys leaped upon him, Bart grasping the gun, while Frank's sinewy hands fastened on his throat.
There was a muffled exclamation and a short sharp struggle.  Then the sentry lay on the ground unconscious, while Frank and Bart hastily improvised a gag, and bound the man's hands and feet.
"Good work," commended the corporal, as Frank and Bart rejoined their comrades.  "That was the most ticklish part.  The rest ought to be easy."
But he was mistaken, for just then the door of a dugout in a small trench opened, and two men came out with lanterns.  It was evidently the corporal of the guard who had come out with a private to relieve the sentry.
There was an exclamation of surprise and alarm, and as the light of the lanterns revealed the group of dark figures at the head of the trench, the men started to leap back into the dugout.  But a rifle cracked and one of them fell.  The other, however, got inside and slammed and barred the door.
"Rush them, men!" shouted the corporal, and charged, at their head, toward the dugout.
Two or three of them launched themselves against the door, but it held.
"Splinter it with your gun butts!" yelled the corporal, and a series of heavy blows thundered against the barrier.
Some of the planks started to give, but before the door had completely yielded, it was thrown open from within and the Germans rushed out, firing as they came.
They were met by a return volley, and two of them fell.  But the others charged fiercely, and in an instant the two forces were engaged in a terrible hand-to-hand battle.
In the narrow confines of the trench there was no chance for shooting after the first volley.  It was a matter of fists and knives and in this the Germans proved, as they had many times before, that they were no match for the sinewy young Americans who with a yell went at them like wild-cats.
Sullenly they retreated and their leader held up his hands and shouted "_Kamerad!_"
His followers did the same.  The fight was over.  None of the Americans had been killed though one was slightly and another severely wounded. Three of the Germans would never fight again and two others stood supported by their comrades.
Two of the Americans stood at the door of the dugout and searched the Germans for arms as they came through.  Others stood at the head of the trench and herded the prisoners together for transportation to the other side.
The German corporal looked about him as he and his men stood guarded by Americans with loaded rifles, and his chagrin was evident as he realized that he had been captured by so small a force.
"Are these all the men you have?" he asked in passable English of Wilson.
"They were enough, weren't they?" answered Wilson with a grin that reflected itself on the faces of his comrades.
"_Donnerwetter!_" growled the German.  "You would never have taken us if we had known!"
"We don't tell all we know," answered Wilson with a grin.
The prisoners were ferried across in groups of half a dozen at a time, but not before Billy had had the satisfaction of gathering up the insulting placards that had aroused his ire and tearing them up before the Germans' faces.
"Feel better now?" laughed Frank.
"Lots," replied Billy.  "I couldn't exactly make them swallow them, but they must have felt almost as bad to see so much German Kultur going to waste."
The party was greeted with exuberant delight on their return, and received the special thanks of the captain.
"It was a big risk," he smiled, "but risks have a way of going through when they are carried out by the boys I'm lucky enough to command."
"You forget, Captain," smiled the lieutenant who stood nearby, "that there are no American soldiers in France."
"That's so," laughed the captain.  "The U-boats stopped us from coming over, didn't they?"
CHAPTER XII
THE DRUGGED DETACHMENT
A scouting party was being made up a few days later, and the Army Boys were glad that they were included in it.  In the region where they were stationed the woods were thick, and there was a sort of "twilight zone" that afforded excellent opportunities for individual fighting.  The lines were rather loosely kept, and it was no uncommon occurrence to have raiding parties slip across, have a brush with their opponents, and retire with what forage or prisoners they might be lucky enough to take.
There had been a good deal of "sniping" that, while it only caused occasional losses, was a source of harassment and irritation, and Frank's squad had orders to "get" as many of these sharpshooters as possible.
A little way from the camp there was a deep gorge.  Along its top were many huge trees whose branches reached far out over the precipice. They drew so close together that their branches in many cases were interwoven.
The squad was moving along without any attempt to keep formation in such rough country, when there was the crack of a rifle and a bullet zipped close by Frank's ear.
He started back.
"Did it get you, Frank?" called out Bart in alarm.
"No," replied Frank, "but it came closer than I care to think about."
At the corporal's command they took shelter behind trees, from which they scanned the locality in the direction from which the shot had come.
There was no trace of any concealed marksman, search the coverts as they would.  But that he was there, and that he was an enemy to be dreaded, was shown a moment later when a bullet ridged the fingers of the hand that Billy had incautiously exposed.
With an exclamation, Billy put his bleeding fingers to his mouth.  The injury was slight and Bart bound his hand up for him, using extreme care to keep behind the trees.
"We have to hand it to that fellow," remarked the corporal.  "He certainly knows how to shoot."
"I'd hand him something if I only knew where he was," growled Billy.
"I know where he is," said Frank.
"Do you?" asked the corporal eagerly.
"Where?"
"In the tallest of that clump of trees on the edge of the gorge," replied Frank.  "I caught a glimpse of his rifle barrel the last time he fired."
"We'll give him a volley," decided the corporal, and a moment later, at his command, the rifles rang out.
Several times this was repeated in the hope that one of the bullets would find its mark.  But the tree trunk was enormously thick and bullets imbedded themselves in it without injury to the marksman, snugly sheltered on the further side.
If they could have surrounded the tree and shot from different sides there would have been no trouble in bagging their quarry.  But the tree had been cunningly chosen for the reason that the further side hung over the precipice and could only be attacked from the side where the party now were.
Frank's keen eyes had been sizing up the situation and he now had a proposal to make.
"I think I see a way to dislodge him if you'll let me try it, Corporal," he said.
"What is it?" asked Wilson.
"You'll notice that the branches of those trees are mixed in with each other," replied Frank.  "If you can keep him busy with your shooting, so that he won't be thinking of anything else, I think I can make a detour and climb up one of those other trees on the side away from him. I could carry my rifle strapped on my back.  Then I might work my way along the branches and perhaps catch sight of him."
"It's worth trying," decided the corporal.  "Go ahead, Sheldon, but be mighty careful."
Frank slipped away in the shelter of the trees, described a semi-circle, reached the third tree from the one where the German was stationed, and commenced to climb.
It was hard work, for the tree was thick and he could not get a good grip on it with his arms.  But he persisted until he reached the first limb and drew himself up on it.  Then he examined his rifle carefully and with the utmost caution began to work his way among the branches.
Some of these were so thick as to be themselves almost like tree trunks, and he had no apprehension on the score of his weight.  He passed to the next tree, and then to the next.  There he paused, parting the branches carefully.
He knew that his comrades were keeping their part of the bargain, for the thud of bullets against the tree that sheltered the enemy was almost continuous.
For several minutes Frank looked for his enemy.  Then his search was rewarded, and through an open space he found himself looking squarely into the eyes of the man who, a few minutes before, had tried to send a bullet through his brain.
The man saw him at the same instant.  Like a flash he leveled his rifle and fired.
For such a hurried aim the shot was good.  Frank felt the whistle of the bullet as it almost grazed him.  But it was not good enough.
The next instant Frank's rifle spoke.  The man flung out his arms, toppled over and fell with a crash into the gorge that the tree overhung.  The rifle clanged after him.  There would be no more sniping by that particular marksman from that particular tree.
There was a shout from the squad who had witnessed the duel, and as Frank slid down the tree he was greeted with acclamations.
"A nervy thing, Sheldon," commended Wilson.
"He almost got me, though," returned Frank.  "It was a case of touch and go."
"He was a brave man," was the tribute of the corporal, "though that particular kind of work has always seemed to me something like murder. He shot his victims without giving them a chance.  His work on land was that of the U-boats on the sea--a species of assassination."
The squad went on with special caution and with a close watch on the trees.  But noon came without further adventure and they got out their rations and prepared to enjoy them at the foot of a spreading maple.
They were perhaps half way through the meal, which they had seasoned with jokes and laughter, when there was a rustling in the bushes near at hand.  Instantly they leaped to their feet and reached for their rifles.
"Who goes there?" demanded the corporal.
There was no answer.
"Answer or we shoot!" cried Wilson.
The bushes parted and a young peasant girl stepped forth.
She was a pretty girl of about eighteen.  Her face bore the marks of tears, her hair was dishevelled, and she was in a state of extreme agitation.  She began to talk feverishly and with many gestures.
"Here, Sheldon," said the corporal, "you speak French.  See if you can understand what the girl is saying."
Frank stepped forward.
"_Que voulez-vous, Mademoiselle?_" he asked.
The relief of the girl when she heard her own language was evident.
"These are English soldiers, Monsieur?" she asked.
"No," said Frank, "they are Americans."
"Oh, _les braves Americains_!" she exclaimed.  "How glad I am!  I know you will help me."
"Be sure of that," replied Frank.  "But tell me now just what has happened."
"The boches," she answered.  "They are at our house."
"How many are there?" asked Frank with quickened interest.
"About thirty," she replied.  Then as she saw Frank glance at the ten who made up his party, she went on: "But you can capture them, I am sure.  They are drugged."
"Drugged?"
"Yes.  They came to our house early this morning.  They upset everything.  They smashed the furniture.  They tied my father and brother in chairs.  They said they were going to burn the house when they got ready to go away."
"But how were they drugged?"
"They made me get them all the food and wine there was in the house.  I did so.  I put some laudanum in the wine.  They ate and drank.  Then they got sleepy.  They dropped off one by one.  Then I ran out to find help.  I find you.  Heaven is good."
Frank consulted the corporal as the others crowded around in great excitement.
The corporal meditated.
"It may be a trap," he said cautiously.
"I don't think so," replied Frank.  "Look at the girl.  She's no actress.  I think she's telling the truth."
"But even if they were drugged, they may have recovered from the effects by this time," pondered the corporal.
Then he made up his mind.
"We'll take a chance," he decided.  "Ask the girl how far the house is from here."
"About a mile," the girl answered to Frank's query.  "And there is one other thing," she added.  "They have a prisoner with them.  He is young and he has a uniform like yours, only it is torn and soiled.  They threw him on the floor in a room upstairs.  He was tied with ropes."
"What does he look like?" asked Frank.  "Tell me as well as you can."
She described the prisoner amid the growing excitement of the Army Boys.
"Tom, for a thousand dollars!" cried Frank.
"It must be!" echoed Bart.
"Sure as guns!" chimed in Billy.
"Do you know him, then?" asked the girl, who had been looking at them wonderingly.  "Oh, then hurry!  For they are going to hang him.  They put a rope over the tree near the well and said they would hang him when they got through eating and drinking."
Hang Tom!  If there had been any hesitation before, there was none now. The chums would have run every step of the way if the corporal had not restrained them.  As it was they covered the mile in double-quick time.
As they came to where the farm bordered on the woods and caught sight of the house, their eyes turned with dread toward the well.  An exclamation of heartfelt relief broke from them.  The rope was there as the girl had said, but no hideous burden dangled from it.
No one was in sight, and a death-like silence brooded over the place. They waited in the shelter of the trees.  Perhaps the enemy had recovered and was waiting for them with a force three times their own.
Five minutes passed.  Then the corporal gave an order.
"Fix bayonets!  We're going to rush the house."
There was a sharp click.
"Charge!"
With a cheer they rushed across the brief space that separated them from the house and up to the open door.
The corporal looked in.
"Put up your guns, boys," he said quietly.  "We've got them."
The others crowded after him into the long low-ceiled room.  The enemy had been delivered into their hands.  There, sprawled over the floor in all sorts of ungainly attitudes among the smashed furniture, were the invaders in various stages of stupor.  Some of them opened their eyes at the sudden interruption and stared hard at the newcomers.  The lieutenant himself sat at the table on which his head had fallen forward.
But the Army Boys did not tarry long.  A word of permission from the corporal and they bounded up the narrow stairs and burst into the room where the girl had said Tom had been left.
The room was empty!
They searched and called frantically.
"Tom!  Tom!  Where are you?  Come out!  It's friends, Frank, Billy, Bart!"
They looked in every cranny and corner of the house upstairs and then down.  Then they rushed out to the barn.  Then with fear at their hearts they sounded the well.
All was to no purpose.  Tom--if it had really been Tom--might have vanished into thin air for any trace they found of him.
Where had he gone?  What had become of him?  Or, worst of all, what had the enemy done to him?
There was no answer, and at last they rejoined their comrades in the hope that questioning of the German lieutenant or some of his men might tell them what they wanted to know.
The first precaution that the corporal had taken was to disarm and bind his prisoners.  Then the farmer and his son were released.  They were wild with rage at the treatment they had undergone and the wanton havoc wrought in their home.  If the choice had been left to them they would have killed every prisoner on the spot.
At the corporal's command water was brought from the well and buckets of it were dashed over the Germans.  There was sputtering and yelling, but the soldier boys enjoyed it hugely, and they worked with a hearty good will.
It was a drastic remedy for sleepiness but it worked, and before long the Germans, looking like so many drowned rats, had come out of their stupor and began to realize their situation.  The privates were sheepish, but the lieutenant went almost crazy with anger when he realized how he had been trapped.  His eyes looked venom at the girl, who laughed at him triumphantly.  His rage was increased by his consciousness of the pitiable figure he presented.  His smart uniform was dripping, his hair was matted over his face and even his ferocious mustache had lost its Kaiser-like curl.  Even one of his own men ventured to snicker at him, and the look the officer turned on him was not good to see.
The corporal began to question him, but the lieutenant looked at him in disdain.
"A German officer does not answer the questions of a corporal," he sneered.
"Just as you like," retorted Wilson coolly.  "Perhaps you'd like to have me leave you here with the owner of the house and his son.  I think they'd like nothing better than to have five minutes alone with you.  Perhaps even one minute would be enough."
The lieutenant took one glance at the glowering faces of the farmer and his son and wilted instantly.
"I will answer your questions," he said, shortly.
CHAPTER XIII
A DEEPENING MYSTERY
"He came off his perch mighty quick," remarked Bart to Frank in a whisper.
"I don't wonder," replied Frank.  "He'd be a pretty poor insurance risk if these people could get a whack at him."
The corporal asked a few formal questions as to the lieutenant's regiment and division, which were answered sullenly though promptly. But these had little interest just then, and their asking was really a matter for headquarters.  They were simply the prelude to other questions in which the company were much more deeply concerned.
"You had a prisoner here?" asked the corporal.
"Yes."
"Where is he now?"
"He was placed upstairs."
"He is not there now.  What have you done with him?"
"Nothing."
"What were you going to do with him?"
The officer moved uneasily.
"Take him back to my quarters," he finally answered.
"Why did you have that rope put over the tree by the well?"
There was no answer, but the officer grew red in the face.
"Did you hear the question?"
"It was to frighten him," the lieutenant finally blurted out.  "Anyway he was a spy and deserved to be hung.  He had come into our lines in disguise."
The corporal motioned to Frank.
"Ask the girl again if she is sure the prisoner had on an American uniform," he directed.
Frank did so.
"_Oui, oui,_" she affirmed emphatically.
To make sure, Frank repeated the question to the farmer and his son and received the same answer.
He reported to the corporal.
"These people all say that the prisoner was not in disguise, Lieutenant," said Wilson.  "Do you still wish to insist that he was?"
"Yes."
"That is enough," replied the corporal with quiet scorn.  "Line up the prisoners, men," he commanded.
This was quickly done, and the homeward march commenced, but not until another search had been made for the missing captive of the Germans.
It had the same result as the previous one and the boys were full of questionings and forebodings as they marched back guarding their prisoners.  But there were some elements of comfort in their perplexity.
In the first place, they had saved some American soldier, whether Tom or another, from a horrible death.  Then, too, they had in their power the brute who had planned that death.  It was not impossible, too, that, under further questioning of the lieutenant and his men at headquarters, more might be learned of what they wanted so badly to know.
Another subject of congratulation also was that the prisoner, if he had escaped, was not far from the American lines.  He might find his way in at any time.
But there was one thing that bothered Frank considerably, and he mentioned it that night when he found himself alone with Bart and Billy.
"Do you remember the minute at the edge of the wood when the corporal gave the order to fix bayonets?" he asked.
"Sure thing," replied Bart.  "What about it?"
"Just this," replied Frank.  "At that minute I caught sight of a man running away from the farmhouse into the woods on the other side.  I got the picture of him in my mind, but I didn't have time to think about it just then, for we were making a rush for the house.  Then other things crowded it out of my mind altogether.  But it came back to me on the way home this afternoon."
"What did the man look like and how was he dressed?" asked Billy eagerly.
"He had on an American uniform," replied Frank slowly, as he tried to make the picture clear in his own mind.
"Perhaps it was Tom!" cried Bart.
"No, it wasn't," said Frank positively.  "The uniform was smart and newer than ours.  Tom's must be in tatters and you remember the girl said it was.  Then, too, I'd know Tom's gait among a thousand just as you would.  No, it wasn't Tom, worse luck."
"Who was it, then?"
"I think it was Nick Rabig," replied Frank.
"Nick Rabig!" the others cried together.
"Mind, I only say I think," repeated Frank, looking around to see that no outsider was within hearing.  "I wouldn't be willing to swear to it. But the motions were Nick's--you know he runs like a cart horse--and you know that Nick has been togged out in a new uniform since he came back from that queer captivity of his among the Huns."
"Nick Rabig there," mused Bart perplexedly, as he began to pace up and down.  "What on earth could he have been doing there?"
"Say," put in Billy with agitation, "could he have done anything to Tom?  Suppose he went there, no matter for what purpose; suppose he found that German crowd dead to the world; suppose he found Tom upstairs bound and helpless.  You know how Nick hated him."
"Keep cool, old man," counseled Frank, though there was a trace of anxiety in his own voice.  "No, I don't think anything of that kind has happened.  If it had we'd have found some traces of it.  I think we can leave that out of our calculations."
"I'm only too glad to," said Billy.  "But what was Nick's reason for being around that farmhouse anyway?"
"What have always been Nick's reasons for being where there are Germans, or where he expects there will be Germans?" said Bart. "Suppose--just suppose--that Nick knew--had a tip, let us say--that a certain German lieutenant on a certain day would be in a certain place, ready to receive and pay for any information about the American forces that Nick had been able to gather.  Do you get me?"
"I get you, all right," answered Frank, "and from what we know of Nick we've got a right to think so.  Well, he didn't sell anything today anyway.  He didn't find the German lieutenant in any condition to talk business."
The bugle blew for "taps" just then, and the conversation came to an end.  And the two days that followed were so crowded with events that their own personal interests were thrust into the background.
For the great drive was coming, the drive for which they had been looking for months, looking not with fear but with eager anticipation, their ardent young hearts aflame with the desire to fight to the death the enemies of civilization.
The weather had favored the enemy in his preparations.  Usually at that time of the year the ground was soft and not fit for military operations on a grand scale.  But the ground this year had dried out unusually early and was suitable for the bringing forward of men and guns.
There were all sorts of rumors afloat as to what the enemy had in store.  There were said to be monster guns that could throw shells more than seventy miles.  There were new and diabolical inventions in the way of gas that were to cause unspeakable agonies to their victims. There was talk of gigantic mirrors that would act as burning-glasses and blind the opposing troops.
Some of these things proved to be true.  Others were mere lies, designed to sap the morale of the Allied armies and civil populations before the fight began.
"Heinie's the biggest boob that ever happened," grinned Billy, when the boys were discussing the coming conflict.  "He acts as if the Allies were a lot of children.  He thinks that all he has to do is to dress up a bugaboo and we'll all roll over and play dead."
"He'll get something into that thick head of his after a while," predicted Frank.  "It will have to be jabbed in, but there are a lot of us ready to do the jabbing."
"Let him bring on his bag of tricks," scoffed Bart.  "When all's said and done, it's going to be man-stuff that will decide this war.  And there's where we've got him on the hip.  Man to man we're better stuff than the Huns.  We know it and they know it.  They can't stand before our bayonets."
"Right you are, old scout!" said Frank, enthusiastically, giving him a resounding slap on the back.  "Let them bring on their old drive as soon as they like.  They can begin the drive.  We'll end it.  And we'll end it in the streets of Berlin!"
CHAPTER XIV
THE STORM OF WAR
"Listen to that music," said Frank to his comrades the next morning, as a furious cannonade opened up that made the ground shake and filled the air with flying missiles of death.
"Too many bass notes in it to be real good music," remarked Billy with a grim.
"Maybe it's the overture just before the rising of the curtain," suggested Bart.
"Perhaps it is," agreed Frank.  "The Hun has got to start his drive some time, and this would be just the kind of morning for it.  See how heavy that mist lies on the ground?  We couldn't see the Germans at a distance of fifty yards."
"It's mighty thick for a fact," observed Bart.  "But I guess our advanced posts are on the job.  They'll give us warning in plenty of time."
"Not that we need much warning as far as I can see," said Billy. "We've been ready for a long time to fight at the drop of a hat.  I'll bet the Hun doesn't carry a foot of our line."
"That's where you're wrong, Billy, old scout," warned Bart.  "It stands to reason that he'll get away with something at first.  You take any one man, no matter how strong he is, and if ten fellows rush him all at once they're bound to drive him back at the start.  The Huns have got the advantage of knowing where they're going to strike.  We don't know and so we have to spread our forces out so as to be ready to meet him at any point.  Then, too, the man who comes rushing in has the advantage of the fellow who's standing still because he's got momentum. That's why generals would rather fight on the offensive than on the defensive.  They're able to pick the time and place and the other fellow has to follow his lead."
"I don't see why the Allies can't take the offensive," grumbled Billy. "It gets my goat to let the Huns hit first."
"It does mine too," admitted Frank, "and if it hadn't been for Russia quitting, we'd be looking now at the coattails of the Kaiser's generals as they scooted back to Berlin.  But that's a bit of hard luck that we can't help.  Russia's back-down has taken ten million soldiers from the Allies' strength.  But America will make that all up in time and then you'll see us doing the chasing."
"It can't come too soon to suit me," said Billy.  "I only wish Uncle Sam had started sooner to get ready."
"So do I," replied Frank.  "But there's no use crying over spilt milk. We're getting ahead now with leaps and bounds.  I was talking to Will Stone the other day, and he'd just got back from a flying trip to one of the French seaports.  He says it simply knocked him stiff to see the transports coming in loaded to the guards with American troops.  And he says the roads are fairly choked with doughboys moving this way. They're coming like a swarm of locusts.  And there's millions more where they came from.  Oh, Uncle Sam is awake now, all right, and don't you forget it!  And when he once gets started there's nothing on earth can stop him."
"Right you are!" said Bart.
"We've won every war we've ever been in and it's got to be a habit," grinned Billy.
The old Thirty-seventh was stationed on the second line, or what is called in military terms, "the line of resistance."  In modern fighting, when a heavy attack is expected the defending army is usually arranged in three lines.  The first is the advanced line, and this is hardly expected to be held very long.  Its chief aim is to hold back the enemy for a while and weaken him as far as possible.  Not many troops are employed on this line nor many big guns.  The chief reliance is on rifle fire and machine guns, which are so placed as to deliver a withering cross-fire and cut up the enemy divisions.
By the time the first line is driven back the defending army knows where the enemy has chosen to strike and is ready for him on the second line or "line of resistance."  Here the battle is on in all its fury. If here again the enemy advances, there is still a third line of "battle positions."  This is practically the last entrenched position that the defenders have.  If they are driven back from this into the open country beyond, it becomes a serious thing for the retreating army, as many of their big guns will have been lost, and their forces are apt to be more or less disorganized, while the enemy is flushed with the victory he has so far gained.
The cannonade kept on with increasing fury all through the early morning.
"Heinie must have plenty of ammunition," remarked Frank.  "He's spending it freely."
"It beats anything we've been up against since we came to the front," observed Billy.
"It seems to be coming nearer and nearer all the time," said Bart.  "I guess this is going to be our busy day."
There was intense activity all through the lines.  Orderlies galloped from place to place with orders.  Big motor cars rumbled up, loaded with troops who were hastily placed in position.  The big guns of the Allied forces had opened up and were sending back shell for shell over the enemy lines.
For over two hours the artillery kept up the Titanic duel.  The fog was lifting, though still heavy in some of the low-lying sections.  The Thirty-seventh was resting easily on its arms, ready for whatever might happen.
"We may not see so much fighting after all," remarked Billy, after a while.  "The fellows in front seem to be holding pretty well.  Perhaps they'll throw the Huns back right from the start."
"Don't kid yourself," replied Frank grimly.  "That first line is almost sure to go.  It's expected to.  It's only a forlorn hope anyway.  We'll get our stomachs full of fighting before the day is over."
Even while he spoke there were signs of confusion up in front.  Groups of men came in sight evidently retreating.  Machine gun crews, bringing their weapons with them, were hurriedly setting them up in new positions.  There would be a few discharges and then they would be forced to retreat still further.  They were fighting splendidly, and putting up a dogged resistance, yielding ground only foot by foot, but to the experienced eyes of the boys there was no mistaking the signs. The enemy had broken through the first line positions.
"Well, it's nothing more than we knew would happen," remarked Frank, as his frame tingled with the excitement of the coming fight which he knew would soon be upon him.
"That's so," agreed Bart.  "But what gets me is that the line was broken so quickly.  I thought it would be afternoon at least before the Huns got as far as this."
The lines opened up to let the newcomers through so that they could go to the rear and re-form.
"How about it?" Frank asked of a machine gunner whom he knew, as the man limped by him, supported by a comrade.  "We didn't expect to see you fellows so soon."
"It was the mist," was the reply.  "The Huns got within thirty yards before we tumbled to it.  We did the best we could but they just swamped our position before we could get our cross-fire going.  Even at that we mowed them down in heaps with our rifle fire, but they kept on coming.  For every dead man there were twenty live ones to take his place.  We put up a stiff fight, but there were too many of them.  It seemed like millions.  They're coming now like a house afire and you boys want to brace."
"We're braced already,"  muttered Billy through his clenched teeth, as he gripped his rifle until it seemed as though his fingers must leave their imprint on the stock.
There was a short period of waiting, more trying by far than any actual fighting.
Then the storm broke!
In front of them rank after rank of gray-clad troops came in sight, stretching back as far as the eye could see.  The mist had wholly vanished now and the boys could see their enemy.  It seemed as though the machine gunner had not exaggerated when he said that there were millions.  They were like the waves of the sea.
But the stout hearts of the American boys never quailed.  Time and again they had met these men or their fellows and driven them back at the point of the bayonet.  They had outfought and outgamed them.  They had sent them flying before them.  They had seen their backs.
The blood of heroes and of patriots ran in the veins of the defenders. Their ancestors had fought at Bunker Hill, at Palo Alto, at Gettysburg. Above them floated the Stars and Stripes, an unstained flag, a glorious flag, a flag that had never been smirched by defeat.
Their eyes blazed and their muscles stiffened.
Then like an avalanche the enemy struck!
CHAPTER XV
FURRY RESCUERS
The satisfaction that Tom felt at having in his pocket the confession of Martel helped to make his imprisonment much more bearable in the week that followed.  His heart warmed at the thought of the delight Frank would feel in clearing up the matter that had long laid heavy upon his mother's mind.
For the conviction never left him that some time he was going to put that confession in his friend's hand.  He had escaped before from German captivity, not once but twice.  What he had done then he would do again.  And every minute of his waking hours found that active brain of his working hard at the problem.
He confessed to himself that the solution would not be easy.  The guards were many and were changed frequently.  The windows of the old barracks where he slept were fortified with steel bars, and the open camp where the prisoners were employed in outside work was surrounded with wires through which a strong electric current ran.  To touch them would mean instant death, and they were so close together that it would be impossible to squeeze through without touching.
He fell to studying the routine of the various conveyances that were constantly arriving and departing.  Some of them brought bales of goods, others barrels.  The latter were especially common.  They were in a part of the country that abounded in vineyards, and great hogsheads of wine were being constantly brought in to supply the demands of the division stationed there.
They did not stay full long.  The German officers were notoriously heavy drinkers, and there were days when there were great drayloads of empty hogsheads ready to be taken away to be refilled.
Tom developed a great interest in these hogsheads.  The work of loading them on the drays was performed by prisoners, and he managed to be in the vicinity as often as possible to help.  He was stronger than most of the prisoners and he worked with such good will at loading the bulky hogsheads that little by little it became a habit with the guards to assign him to this work whenever it was to be done.
A day came when the rain poured down in torrents.  Tom had waited and prayed for just such a day.  The air was full of fog and a cloud of steam rose from the horses' backs.  Everything in the prison yard was dim and gray and spectral.  The guards were enveloped in heavy raincoats and the flaps of oilskin on their caps fell halfway over their faces.
Tom had managed to get on one of the trucks and was tugging at one of the hogsheads to make room for others further back.  Other prisoners were lifting on the last hogsheads.  Tom leaned over one of the hogsheads and suddenly let himself go into it headfirst.  It was all over in a flash.
There was an awful moment of suspense.  Had anyone seen him?  He listened intently.  No shout was raised.  Nothing happened out of the usual.
The driver climbed up to his seat and the horses started.  There was a momentary delay as the gates were opened to let him pass.  Then the horses started on a jog trot and the truck was bumping its way over an uneven country road.  A thrill of exultation shot through Tom, crouching at the bottom of the hogshead.  He had made the first step on the road to freedom.
He was still in the most imminent danger.  At any moment he might hear the clattering of horsemen in pursuit.  And he knew the kind of treatment he would get if he were recaptured.
How to get out of the hogshead without detection was another problem. But this worried him least of all.  He felt sure that the driver would stop at the first tavern he came across to refresh himself.  Then he would make his break.
His faith was justified, for before long the truck came to a halt and the driver got down.  The weather had driven all the tavern idlers indoors and the streets of the little hamlet were deserted.  Like an eel, Tom squirmed over the edge of the hogshead, dropped into the roadway on the side of the truck away from the tavern, and, with assumed carelessness, went on down the road.
A few rods brought him into the open country.  He had not the least idea where he was.  In the gloom he could not tell which was north or south or east or west.  But for the moment he was free.
He made his way across some fields in the direction of a dark fringe of woods.  There he would find shelter for the present.  It would be a poor kind of shelter, but just then Tom asked nothing better.  The day would bring counsel.
For some days past he had been stowing away fragments from his scanty meals in his pockets.  They were only dry and mouldy crusts, but they would at least sustain life.
Up in the streaming woods he hollowed out a place under a fallen tree. He was drenched to the skin, but he was so exhausted with the strain he had undergone that no bodily discomfort could prevent his falling asleep.
When he awoke the rain had ceased and the sun was striking through the branches of the trees.  With the morning came new courage.  He would yet win through.
He studied the sun and got a general idea of the direction in which he must go.  He knew that the American lines lay to the south and west. He could hear the distant thunder of the guns.
All that day he traveled in the friendly shadow of the woods.  He did not dare to approach a cottage or go to any of the peasants he could see working in the fields.  Some of them, he felt sure, would befriend him, but at any moment he might come in contact with one of the oppressors who held the land in their grip.  He would take no chances.
His food was almost gone now although he had husbanded it with the greatest care.  But he tightened his belt and kept on.
On the morning of the second day he was crossing a small brook and was just stepping up on the other side when a wet stone rolled beneath his foot and threw him headlong.  His head struck a jagged stump and he lay there stunned.
When he regained consciousness, he found himself looking into the face of a German officer who was amusing himself by kicking the youth.
"Awake, are you, Yankee pig?" the officer greeted him.  "It's time.  I had half a mind to give you a bayonet thrust and put you to sleep forever.  You needn't tell me how you came here.  I know.  You're the schweinhund that escaped two days ago.  Here," he called to some of his men, "tie this fellow and throw him over a horse.  We'll settle his case later on."
The command was promptly obeyed and poor Tom found himself once more in the grasp of his foes.  And from this captivity there seemed little promise of escape.  The deadly purpose of the brute who held him in his power had been plainly written on his face.
After what seemed an endless journey, the party reached a farmhouse. The detachment took possession of the place and an orgy of pillage and destruction ensued.  Tom was taken to an upper room and thrown roughly on the floor.  Here he lay bound hand and foot.  He could hear cries of terror and smashing of furniture going on below.
He had no companion but his own thoughts, except when some of the drunken roysterers invaded his room to remind him of the rope that hung over the tree near the well and to drive home the information with kicks of their heavy boots.
His thoughts were black and bitter.  This, then, was the end.  He was to be hung to furnish an occasion of laughter to a horde of drunken brutes.  Well, there would be no whine from him.  He would show them how an American could die.
His attention was attracted by a pattering of tiny feet.  He looked in the direction from which the sound came.
A rat had emerged from a hole in the corner and was busy nibbling a lump of cheese that had been dropped by one of the soldiers who had just left.  The nibbling ceased as Tom turned his head and the rat scurried back to the corner.  There he stayed, his bright eyes looking longingly at the cheese.
A thought shot through Tom's mind that set him tingling from head to foot.  Was it possible?  Of course it was only a forlorn hope.  But he would try it.  He would be no worse off if it failed.
He rolled himself over to the cheese and rubbed the rope that tied his hand in the soft substance until it was thoroughly smeared with it. Then he lay on his side with his hands outstretched and pretended to sleep.
Through his nearly closed lids he watched the rat.  For some minutes it stayed motionless.  Tom never moved a muscle.  Then the rat crept stealthily forward, and, with many half retreats, at last started in to nibble at the rope to get the cheese.  Soon another rat came and then another.
Tom conquered the sense of repulsion that their close proximity inspired in him.  His life depended on his self-control.  The least movement might send them scurrying back to their holes.  And out in the yard there was that rope that hung from the tree near the well!
So he nerved himself and his reward came at last.  He could feel the tension of the rope yielding as one strand after another was torn by the tiny teeth of his unknowing rescuers.
Finally they ceased and sat up on their haunches washing their faces, and the need for inaction had passed.  With a mighty effort Tom strained at the rope and it snapped.
He could have shouted with exultation.  He waved his arms in the air and the frightened rats vanished.  He rubbed his hands and arms until the circulation came back.  It was an easy matter then to untie the rope that bound his feet.
The noise on the floor beneath had ceased, He stole to the window and looked out.  No one was stirring in the space around the house.  He shuddered as he saw the dangling rope on the tree near the well.
There was the sound of a stealthy step below.  Tom drew his head from the window.  Standing in the shadow of the frame he could see a young girl emerge and run swiftly away.
Where were the others?  Consulting perhaps as to how they could get the most enjoyment from the spectacle of his hanging.
There was only one way of exit that promised safety.  He must escape by the window.
He measured with his eye the distance from the ground.  It seemed to be about eighteen feet.  He himself was six feet high.  That would leave a clear drop of twelve feet.  He could probably make it without injury. At any rate he had no choice.
He let himself down gently with his hands and dropped.  The shock brought him to his knees, but he arose unhurt.
The next moment he was racing for the woods with the speed of the wind.
CHAPTER XVI
CLOSING THE GAP
A sheet of flames leaped from the American rifles.  A blasting torrent of death poured from the machine guns.  The heavy field artillery, that had the range to a dot, tore gaping holes in the serried German ranks. Great lanes opened up in the advancing hosts.  The target was broad and there was no need to take aim, for every bullet was bound to find a mark.
The enemy ranks faltered before that terrific fire and fell back, leaving hundreds of dead and wounded on the open space in front of the lines, while hundreds more were strewn along the barbed wire entanglements.
But the German commanders were prodigal of the lives of their men, and after a brief time for re-forming, the divisions came on again, only to be hurled back again with still more fearful losses.  A third attempt met with a similar result.  The Americans were standing like a rock.
"Guess Fritz is getting more than he bargained for," grinned Billy, as the Germans were forming for another attack.
"Yes," agreed Frank, "but he'll try again.  He'll stand a whole lot of beating."
For several hours the fight continued with a bitterness that had not been paralleled before in the whole course of the war.  Again and again the enemy attacked, only to be beaten back before the stonewall defense.
But the Americans were not satisfied with merely defending their position.  About two hours after noon they organized a counterattack. With splendid vim and ardor, and in a dashing charge, they smashed the division confronting them, driving them back in confusion and bringing hundreds of prisoners back with them to the trenches.
"I guess that will hold them for a while," crowed Billy, as they rested for a few minutes after their return.
"We certainly slashed them good and plenty," exulted Frank, as he washed up a scratched shoulder that had been struck by a splinter of shrapnel.
"If the rest of the line is holding as well as our fellows, the drive will be ended almost as soon as it began," remarked Bart.
"And Heinie was going to walk all over us, was he?" grinned Billy. "He's got another guess coming."
But their amazement was great a few minutes later when the order came for the regiment to fall back.
"Fall back!" howled Billy when he heard the order.  "What is this, a joke?"
"Why should we fall back, when we've just licked the tar out of the Heinies?" growled Bart.
"Orders are orders," said Frank briefly.  "I suppose our commanders know what they're doing.  But it certainly is tough luck."
Their officers no doubt felt an equal chagrin, but the need was imperative.  The Germans had struck along a front of fifty miles.  At many points they had encountered a resistance as fierce and determined as that put up by the old Thirty-seventh and its companion regiments of the same division.
But at others they had been more successful.  They had introduced a new kind of tactics that had never been used before on the western front, although it had been employed successfully in Russia.  These were the so-called Von Hutier tactics whereby, when a division was used up, instead of falling back it simply opened up and let a fresh division pass through and take up the burden.
The old plan had been to clear up everything as one went along.  The idea of the new tactics was to press swiftly ahead even if they left behind them machine-gun nests and strong enemy positions.  These could be cleaned up later one by one, while in front the swift advance was intended to demoralize the opposing army and throw it out of formation by the very speed of the progress.
The plan, like every other, had its weak points.  It involved a very heavy loss of men because of the masses in which they moved forward, and it also exposed its flank by penetrating too rapidly into the host lines before the artillery could be brought up for support.  But if successful, it was almost sure to break the enemy's line and throw it into confusion.
Later on the Allies were to learn how they might most easily frustrate these tactics.  But at the start of the great drive the plan met with considerable success because of its novelty.
It was this that had brought the command to retreat.  The British forces on the right wing of the Allied armies had been forced to give way.  The line had not been broken, but it had been badly bent.  The British retreated doggedly, fighting with the splendid heroism that was in accordance with their traditions, and at no time did the retreat become a rout.  But in order to keep the line straight the American forces too were ordered to fall back, even though they had been successful on their section of the line.
"It's a shame!" growled Billy, as the retirement began.  "It makes me sore to have those Heinies think they've got us going."
"We'll come back," said Frank cheerfully.  "It's a good general that knows when to retreat as well as to advance.  We're only going to get space enough to crouch for a spring."
The division withdrew in good order, keeping up a rear-guard action that kept the enemy at a respectful distance.  When night fell the Americans had reached the position assigned to them, and the backward movement was halted.  The troops entrenched, and with the Allied line straightened out once more, faced the foe that it had decisively defeated earlier in the day.
"Nothing to do till tomorrow," exclaimed Frank as he threw himself on the ground.
"Don't fool yourself that way," said Corporal Wilson, who had just come up and heard the remark.  "Unless I lose my guess you've got something to do tonight.  Didn't you tell me the other day that you understood how to handle a motorcycle?"
"Why, yes," said Frank.  "I've ridden one a good deal.  I won a race on Camport Fair Grounds a couple of years ago."
"Then you're just the man the general wants to see," replied Wilson. "He sent a message to the colonel asking for the services of a man who was cool and plucky, and who could also ride a motorcycle.  I don't know of any one else who can fill the bill better than you."
"I'll be glad to do whatever's wanted of me," replied Frank, and with a word of farewell to his comrades he accompanied the corporal to headquarters.
Here he was ushered into the presence of a group of officers who were poring over a large map spread out upon a table.
"Is this the young man you were telling me about, Colonel?" asked the general, a tall, powerfully built man, looking sharply at Frank from beneath a pair of bushy eyebrows.
"Yes, General," replied the colonel.  "Captain Baker vouches for his coolness and courage and his quick thinking in an emergency.  And I'm told he understands all about motorcycles."
"Just the man," commented the general.  "I want you," he continued, addressing Frank, "to carry a message for me to the British commander on our right.  Our division has lost touch with him and the field telephone is not working.  Probably it has been cut by the enemy.  The message is most important and I want you to make all the speed you can. Go and get ready now and report to your captain, who will hand you the papers.  He will have a machine ready for you.  That is all."
Frank hurried back and made his preparations, which were brief.  While he worked he told his eager companions of the errand with which he had been entrusted.
"Wish I were going with you," remarked Bart.
"Same here," said Billy.
"That would be dandy," agreed Frank.
He shook hands with them and hurried away to the captain's quarters, where he found that officer waiting for him with the papers.
"There's no answer," he said, as he handed them over.  "When you've delivered the papers your work is done.  Good luck."
Frank thrust the papers in his pocket after receiving full directions as to his route.  The motorcycle was standing at the door.  It was a powerful machine of the latest make and everything about it suggested strength and speed.  He noticed that there was a saddle in the rear and a thought came to him.
"I see that this machine will carry double," he said.  "Would you mind if I took a companion with me?  The machine will carry two as swiftly as it will one.  Then, too, if one of us were hurt or shot the other one could still go on with the message."
"An excellent idea," said the captain after pondering a moment.  "Get him, but make haste."
Frank rushed back to his chums.
"Which one of you wants to go with me?" he asked breathlessly.
"I do," they yelled in chorus.
"Sorry," laughed Frank, "but there's only room for one.  Toss a coin."
The luck favored Bart, much to Billy's disappointment.  In a jiffy Frank and Bart had bidden Billy good-by, jumped to their places, and with a leap the powerful machine darted off.
The night was clear, and as soon as they were away from the camp Frank had no trouble in finding the road that he had been ordered to take. It was a good one in ordinary times, but now it had been torn by shells from the German guns in many places and care had to be taken to avoid a spill.  The shaded light threw its rays a considerable distance ahead, but they were going at a speed that did not leave them much time to avoid obstacles even after they were detected.
The road swung around in a wide semi-circle and led through a number of French villages.  These the Army Boys found in great confusion.  The approach of the Huns was a terrible threat to the towns that might fall into German hands.  What the enemy had done in the occupied parts of France and Belgium had given warning of what any other places they might capture would have to expect.
Wagons were being hastily piled with household belongings, men were shouting, children were crying, and the whole scene was desolate and pitiful beyond description.
The roads were so congested at these places that rapid progress was impossible.  They had to thread their way among the crowd of vehicles, and in some cases were compelled to resort to the fields.  But they made up for this on other stretches, and were congratulating themselves that on the whole they were making pretty good time when suddenly they were startled by a number of rifle shots and bullets whizzed by uncomfortably close.
"It's the Huns!" cried Frank.
"I didn't know they'd got as close as this!" exclaimed Bart.  "More gas, Frank!  Quick!"
There were hoarse commands to halt, and another volley followed the first.  At the same time a number of dark figures threw themselves in the road, shouting and waving their hands.
Frank leaned forward, threw on all speed, and the machine responded with a leap that almost unseated the riders.  The crowd in front scattered as the machine rushed at them, but one of them was not quick enough and was hurled twenty feet away.
More shots followed the daring riders, but they were now beyond range. For another mile they kept up the killing pace and then Frank slowed up a little.
"Ran right into their arms that time," he ejaculated.
"We were mighty lucky to come through with a whole skin," replied Bart.
"More than the machine has done, I'm afraid," remarked Frank.  "I can tell by the way she runs that there's something wrong with the tires."
He looked behind, and seeing no signs of pursuit, he stopped the motorcycle and dismounted.
Something had indeed happened to the tires.  Both the front and rear ones had been punctured by bullets.  The air had gone out of them.
"Hard luck," exclaimed Bart.
"Never mind," returned Frank.  "We'll ride her flat as long as we can and if worse comes to worse we'll ride her on the rims.  We've got to get that message to the general no matter what happens."
"We'll get it there if we have to travel on our hands and knees," affirmed Bart.
"It won't come to that, I hope," laughed his companion, as he bound the flat tires fast with straps.  Then he settled himself again in his seat and started the machine.
It went along more slowly now, and their troubles were increased by the fact that their route had carried them into a main road that was filled with motor lorries--huge trucks loaded with men and supplies that rushed on with the speed almost of an express train.
The lorries had the right of way, and individual riders had to look out for themselves.  Sometimes they came down two abreast, filling the whole width of the road, and in such cases the boys had to dismount and draw to the side of the road until they had passed.  If their machine had been in condition, they might have kept ahead by sheer speed, but in its present crippled state they would have been run down.  And to be run down by one of those Juggernauts would have meant instant death.
On one such occasion they were hugging the fence, with their machine standing between them and the road.  A lorry came thundering by, but just as it was nearly opposite, it swerved and struck the machine.  It was torn from Frank's hand and hurled in front of the lorry which ran over and completely wrecked it.
The lorry tore on, leaving the two chums looking at each other in consternation.
"That's worse by long odds than the German bullets," exclaimed Frank. "I guess we'll have to do the hands and knees stunt you were talking about a little while ago."
"We must be pretty near to the English general's headquarters now anyway, aren't we?" asked Bart.
Frank consulted his route by the aid of a flashlight that he carried with him.
"About two miles," he announced.  "Put on some speed now, Bart.  We'll run most of the way and jog-trot the rest."
They let no grass grow under their feet, and fifteen minutes later they had reached the general's headquarters and were ushered into his presence.  He seemed to be greatly agitated and was talking with great emphasis to a group of officers who surrounded him.
He took the papers that the boys had brought and read them over hurriedly.
"Very good," he announced briefly.  "There is no answer.  Were your orders to go back to your regiment to-night?"
"No, sir," replied Frank.
"In that case my orderly will find quarters for you," replied the general, and he gave directions to an officer who took them in charge and saw them safely bestowed for the night.
"That was some wild ride?" grinned Frank, as they were getting ready for sleep.
"It sure was," laughed Bart, "especially that part where the German bullets were zipping all around us.  Wait till we tell Billy about it. He'll be green with envy."
"Well, we carried out our orders anyway," said Frank.  "I'm glad that we'll be able to tell the captain so tomorrow morning."
But they did not report to their captain the next morning, nor for several following mornings, for when they woke they found that a condition had developed that was full of peril to the Allied cause.
The German plan had been to strike at the junction point of the Allied armies.  If they could separate them there would be a chance to turn upon one of them and crush it with overwhelming forces and then at their leisure destroy the other.
In this they had come very near succeeding.  A threatening gap had developed between two of the most important armies that were holding that portion of the front.  The armies had lost touch with each other and the gap had gradually widened until at one place the armies were eight miles apart.
The only helpful thing about the situation was that the Germans themselves did not know of the gap until it was too late to take advantage of it.  The very speed with which they had pushed forward had thrown their forces into confusion.  Brigades and regiments had become badly mixed and it took some time to straighten matters out.
But if the Germans did not know how matters stood, the Allied commanders knew it only too well.  It was this that explained the agitation that the boys had noticed in the general the night before. He had been called upon to close the gap.  Upon his shoulders rested for the time the salvation of the Allied cause.
If he had had sufficient forces at his command, the problem would have been comparatively simple, provided he had been given time to solve it. But he had neither time nor men.  He had only fifty cavalrymen.  He lacked guns and ammunition.  The hard-pressed armies at the right and left were battling desperately against the on-rushing German hordes and could spare him little.
"Looks as if he had to make bricks without straw," said Frank to Bart the next morning, when the state of things had been explained by the orderly who had taken them in charge.
"It's a case of must," said Bart, "and from the squint I had at the general last night he's the one who can do the job if it can be done at all."
"Will you stay and help?" asked the orderly.  "Every man will help. The general's picked up three hundred American engineers working on a road nearby.  Every one of them has thrown down his pick and shouldered a rifle."
"Bully for the engineers!" cried Frank.
"Will you stay?" asked the orderly.  "Of course you can return to your own command if you want to."
"Will we stay?" exclaimed Frank.  "Give me a gun.  I know my captain would be willing."
"You can't drive us away," Bart almost shouted.
It was a scratch army that the general finally got together.  Some of his men had never handled a gun before.  Some were drivers, some were telegraph linemen, some were cooks.  But he made the most of what he had.  He himself was here, there and everywhere, having trees felled to obstruct the roads, planting machine guns in strategic places, digging shallow trenches, resting neither by day or night.
Frank and Bart worked like beavers.  They were placed in charge of machine-gun crews, and their deadly weapons kept spitting fire until they were almost too hot to handle.  Again and again they beat back German detachments.  They fought like fiends.  They never expected to come out of that fight alive.  The odds seemed too tremendous.
"It's like Custer's last charge," panted Frank.  "There wasn't one of his troopers left alive.  But I'll bet that not one of them was sorry he was there."
"I'm glad that motorcycle carried double," replied Bart.  "I'd have been cheated out of a lot of lovely fighting if it hadn't."
They fought desperately, savagely, their bodies tired to the breaking point, but their courage never failing.  And at last they won out.  The armies rejoined each other.  The gap was closed.  And Frank and Bart rejoiced beyond measure that they had been able to do their part in the closing.
"Some fellows have all the luck," remarked Billy, when they had rejoined their regiment two days later, and were telling him all about it.  "Now if that coin we flipped had only come down heads instead of tails----"
"Stop your grouching," laughed Frank.  "You'll have all the fighting that's good for you by the time we've driven the boches over the Rhine."
CHAPTER XVII
THE MINED BRIDGE
For several days the drive continued.  At first it had been quite as successful for the Germans as they could have hoped.  Their initial surprise had carried them a long way into French territory, and this had involved the capture of a considerable number of men and guns.
But they had fallen far short of their ambitious aims.  They had not rolled up the Allied armies.  They had not reached Paris.  They had not captured the Channel ports.
The Allied armies had stretched like an elastic band, but had not broken.  They knew now what the enemy's plans were and they were rapidly taking measures to check them.
The Germans had had a great advantage in being under a single command. There was no clash of plans and opinions.  If they wanted to transfer a part of their forces from one point to another they could do so.
With the Allies it had been different.  There had been a French army, a British army, an Italian army, a Belgian army, a Russian army and latest of all an American army.  They had tried to work together in harmony and in the main had done so.  But the British naturally wanted above all to prevent the German armies from reaching the coast where they could threaten England.  The French were especially anxious to prevent Paris being captured.  Either side was reluctant to weaken its own army by sending reinforcements to the other.
But the German success in the first days of the drive changed all this. The Allies got together and appointed General Foch as the supreme commander of all the Allied forces.  He had done brilliant work in driving the Germans back from the Marne in the early days of the war, when they had approached close to Paris.
"Have you heard the news?" asked Frank of his chums the day after the appointment had been made.
"No," said Bart.
"What is it?" asked Billy.
"We've got just one man that's going to boss the job of driving back the Huns," answered Frank.
Bart gave a whoop of delight and Billy threw his hat in the air.
"Best news I've heard yet," crowed Billy.
"That's as good as a battle lost for the Huns," exclaimed Bart.  "The only wonder is that it wasn't done before.  Who's the man they've chosen?"
"General Foch," was the answer.
"Better and better," pronounced Bart.  "That man's a born fighter.  He licked the Germans at the Marne, and he can do it again."
"What I like about him," commented Billy, "is that he's a hard hitter. He isn't satisfied to stand on the defensive.  He likes to hand the other fellow a good one right at the start of the fight."
"That's what," agreed Frank.  "He hits out right from the shoulder.  Of course he'll have to wait a little while yet until he sizes up his forces and sees what he has to fight with.  But you can bet it won't be long before he has the boches on the run."
In the days that followed, the advantage of the appointment became clear.  The armies worked together as they never had before.  The khaki of the British mingled with the cornflower blue of the French. Reserves were sent where they were most needed, no matter what army they were drawn from.  And, fighting side by side, each nation was filled with a generous rivalry and sought bravely to outdo the other in deeds of valor.
The old Thirty-seventh had been in the thick of the fighting and had covered itself with glory.  It had taught the Germans that there were Americans in France, and that they were fighters to be dreaded.
The course of the fighting had taken Frank and his comrades in the vicinity of the farmhouse where they had rounded up the German lieutenant and his squad.  But it was a very different place now from what it had been when they had first seen it.  Shells had torn away part of the roof, and the attic lay open to the sky.  But the farmer and his family still stayed there although in daily peril of their lives.  They lived and slept in the cellar, which was the only place that afforded them a chance of safety.
One day when only an artillery duel was going on and the infantry was getting a rest that it sorely needed, the Army Boys went over to the house.  The girl saw them coming and recognized them at once.  She came out to meet them with a smile on her face.
"_Les braves Americains!_" she exclaimed.  "You have not then been killed by those dreadful Germans."
"Don't we look pretty lively for dead men?" asked Frank jokingly.
"And that lieutenant?" she inquired.  "Oh, I hope you have hanged him."
"No," said Frank, "but he's a prisoner."
"It is not enough," she said with a shudder of repulsion.
"Have you heard anything of the young soldier that the lieutenant was going to hang?" asked Frank eagerly.
"No," she answered.  "But stay," she added, "I have something here that you may want to see."
She darted back in the house and quickly returned with a very-much crumpled card in her hand.
"It is a _carte postale_," she explained.  "We found it in the yard some days after you had been here.  It had been trampled in the mud by the horses' feet and the writing had been scraped or blotted out. Perhaps it belonged to the young man.  It may have fallen from his pocket.  I do not know."
Frank took it eagerly from her hand, while his comrades gathered around him.
The card was almost illegible, but it could be seen that it was a United States postal.  There was not a single word upon it that could be made out in its entirety, but up in the corner where the postmark had been they could see by straining their eyes the letters C and M.
"That's Camport, I'm willing to bet!" exclaimed Bart excitedly.
"And here's something else," put in Billy pointing to where the address would naturally be looked for.  "See those letters d-f-o-r----"
"It's dollars to doughnuts that that stands for 'Bradford,'" Frank shouted.  "A card from Camport to Tom Bradford.  Boys, we didn't guess wrong that day.  That was Tom that that brute of a lieutenant was going to hang!"
They were tingling with excitement and delight.  To be sure, they did not know what had become of their friend.  But he had escaped from this house.  He was perhaps within a few miles of them.  He was, at any rate, not eating his heart out in a distant prison camp.
Then to Frank came the thought of Rabig.  Perhaps Tom hadn't escaped. Perhaps Rabig had added murder to the crime of treason of which they were sure he was guilty.
"Are you sure that you haven't found anything else that would help us in finding our friend?" he asked of the girl, whose face was beaming at the pleasure she had been able to give to her deliverers.
"No," she answered.  "There is nothing else.  I am sorry."
"Let's take a look around the house again, fellows," suggested Frank. "We may have overlooked something the other day.  It's only a chance, but let's take it."
They made a careful circuit of the house, but nothing rewarded the search until Frank, with an exclamation, picked up some pieces of rope that had been lying in the grass not far from the window from which the prisoner had dropped.
"Are these yours?" he asked of the girl who had accompanied them and had been as ardent in the search as themselves.
She examined them.
"I do not think so," she declared.  "I do not remember seeing any rope like that around the house."
They scrutinized the pieces carefully.
"Look at these frayed edges," said Frank, laying them together.  "You see that these two pieces were part of one rope."
"I'll tell you what that means," put in Billy.  "The girl says that Tom was bound with ropes.  That cut or broken one was the one that was used to tie his hands.  In some way he cut that.  He didn't have a knife or the cut would be cleaner.  Perhaps he sawed the rope against a piece of glass that he might have managed to get near."
"Good guess," commended Bart.  "And this long rope was the one that was used to tie his feet.  Tom didn't need to cut that for his hands were free then and he could untie it."
"Good old scout!" exclaimed Frank in tribute to his absent chum. "Trust that stout heart of his to keep up the fight to the last minute. Think of the old boy sawing away at the rope when he didn't know what minute he'd be taken out and hanged."
"He's all wool and a yard wide," agreed Bart.
"The real goods," said Billy.  "But what were the ropes doing out here in the grass?"
"Oh, I suppose he hated them so that he chucked them as far away as he could," suggested Bart.
"No," said Frank, measuring the window with his eye.  "I'll tell you how I think it was.  Tom knew, of course, that he couldn't get out of the house by the downstairs way without being nabbed.  He didn't know, of course, that the bunch of Huns weren't in condition to nab anybody. So the window was the only way left to him.  He took the ropes to the window with the idea of splicing them and climbing down by them.  But that would have taken time, and when he saw that the window wasn't very high up he made up his mind to drop.  The ropes were in his hand and he simply threw them out of the window as the easiest way of getting rid of them."
"That sounds reasonable," said Billy.  "But, oh boy! if poor Tom had only known that all he had to do was to walk downstairs and bag the whole blooming bunch!"
"I wish he had," said Frank mournfully.
"If he had, that lieutenant wouldn't have got off so easily as he did," declared Bart.  "Do you know what would have happened?  Of course the first thing Tom would have done would have been to untie the farmer and his son.  Can you picture, then, what would have happened to that lieutenant and probably to his men, too?  The United States wouldn't have been put to any expense for feeding them."
"That rope by the well would probably have been put to work," agreed Frank.  "But poor Tom didn't know and there's no use of our speculating."
Encouraged by the information they had gained, they looked still further.  But nothing more was found, and they at last said good-by to the girl and made their way back to their quarters with their hearts lighter than they had been for days.  In a sense they had got in touch with their missing comrade, had seemed near to him, and their hopes were high that before long they would have him with them again.
"It's disposed of one thing that was worrying me anyway," remarked Frank.  "We know that Rabig had nothing to do with making away with Tom."
"Yes," said Bart, "that's one thing the fellow can't be charged with. But I'm still mighty curious to know what he was hanging around that farmhouse for."
"It sure was a mighty strange coincidence that he should be there at the time the Germans were," declared Billy.  "But Rabig is the only one who knows why and you can bet that he won't tell."
The comparative lull that had occurred in the fighting was only temporary, and the next day the drive was resumed in all its fury.
This time the use of gas was greater than it had been at any previous time in the battle.  And the Germans had made still greater strides in this diabolical contrivance which they were the first to inflict upon an outraged world.
At first the gas had been light and volatile.  It caused terrible suffering to those caught by it, but it did not hover long over any given place and a gust of wind was sufficient to drive it away.
But that was not vile enough to satisfy the infernal ingenuity of the foes of humanity.  Now they were using gas that settled on the ground so that nothing but a gale would drive it away, and that lasted for hours and even for days.  And then there was mustard gas, that penetrated everywhere through the clothing, through the skin, and that burned and ate up the living tissues like so much vitriol.
But the Allies were on the alert and soon found a way to avert or modify the worst consequences of the various kinds of gases.  And they were forced to fight fire with fire simply in self-defence.  It was a question of kill or be killed, and they were left no alternative.  They asked nothing better than to fight as knightly and honorable nations always have fought and always will fight when they are left free to choose their weapons.
But whatever the methods used by the Germans, whether gas or guns or men, they were finding increasing difficulty in keeping up the momentum of their drive.  Sheer force of numbers had sufficed at first to carry them forward, but now the Allies with American help coming over the sea at the rate of two hundred thousand men a month--and the finest kind of men at that--were gradually getting on even terms.
"I see the Germans had a good day yesterday," remarked Frank, as he and his comrades were at mess.
"I didn't notice it," said Bart, looking at his friend in surprise. "We drove them back and gained ground from them."
"Oh, I don't mean here," exclaimed Frank.  "I mean in Paris."
Billy almost choked in surprise and alarm.
"You don't mean to say they've got to Paris?" he sputtered.
"Not by a jugful," laughed Frank.  "But they're sending shells into it."
"Then they must be pretty close to it," said Bart in some apprehension.
"The gun they're shooting with is seventy miles away from the city," replied Frank.
"Quit your kidding," commanded Billy.
"Where do you get that stuff?" asked Bart incredulously.
"Cross my heart and hope to die," said Frank seriously.  "Honestly, fellows, they've got a gun that shoots a shell seventy miles or more. The shell weighs two hundred pounds.  It rises twenty miles in the air, and it takes three minutes on the trip to Paris."
"Is that straight goods?" asked Billy suspiciously.
"It sure is," Frank assured him.  "I was reading about it in a Paris paper I got hold of this morning."
"What was it you were saying about yesterday being a good day for the Germans," asked Bart, when he had digested the facts.
"Oh, one of the shells hit a church where they were having a service and killed seventy-five people, mostly women and children," answered Frank.  "Don't you imagine the Germans call that a good day?  Can't you see them grinning and rubbing their hands?  It's as good as bombing a hospital or an orphan asylum.  The Kaiser felt so good about that he sent a special message of congratulation to the manager of the Krupp works, where the gun was made.  Oh, yes, it was a good day!"
"The swine!" exclaimed Bart furiously, while Billy's fist clinched.
"Let's get busy," cried Frank, springing to his feet.  "I can't wait to get at those barbarians.  I hope there's lots of bayonet work today.  I never felt in better trim for it."
They fought that day as they had never fought before, for they had never felt so strongly that the world would never be a decent place to live in until their barbarous enemies were humbled to the dust.
The next day the old Thirty-seventh was ordered to take up its position at a bridgehead that it was of the utmost importance should be strongly held.  The enemy attacks were converging there, and it was evident that they were planning to cross the river in force.  The country behind the American troops was flat and difficult to defend, and if the enemy should make good his crossing the consequences to the Allied cause might prove serious.
The enemy advance had reached the further side of the river, which at that point was about two hundred yards in width.  A fierce artillery duel was kept up between the hostile forces.  A wooden bridge with stone arches afforded the only means of crossing, and this was swept by such a fierce shell fire from the Allied guns that it did not seem as though anything could live on it for a moment.
As an additional precaution the bridge had been secretly mined by the Allied engineers.  Electric wires ran to the concealed charges.
A pressure of a button--and the bridge would be reduced to atoms.
CHAPTER XVIII
A DESPERATE VENTURE
"The Huns will get a surprise party if they try to cross that bridge," remarked Billy with a grin, as the boys were talking over the present situation.
"I don't see why we don't blow it up right away," said Bart.  "Then the Germans would have to rely on pontoons and what we would do to them would be a crime."
"Our officers know what they're about," objected Frank.  "We might want that bridge to go across on ourselves if things take the right turn. So it's just as well to have it handy.  If there's any blowing up to do, we can do it later just as well as now.  And it's just as well to have it go skyward when it's crowded with Germans as when it's empty. Get me?"
"I get you, all right," replied Bart.  "But suppose something should go wrong when the time came to blow it up?"
"That would be something else again," laughed Frank.  "But I guess there isn't much danger Of that.  Just one little pressure of a button--and--zowie!"
Just then Frank caught sight of his friend, Colonel Pavet, coming toward him and went forward to meet the French officer.
The colonel's greeting was a very cordial one.
"I'm glad to see that you've come safely so far through this fierce fighting," he said.
"Fierce is the right word," answered Frank smilingly.
"I was at Verdun," went on the colonel, "and I thought at the time that nothing could be more ferocious than the fighting there.  But this has been much worse."
"We've got a pretty stiff proposition right now in holding this bridge," observed Frank.
"Indeed you have," agreed the colonel, "and it is a compliment to the American forces that the defense of such an important position has been entrusted to them.  Oh, you Americans!  Where would we have been without your aid?  And your fighting qualities!  You grow men on your side of the ocean, Monsieur Sheldon."
"The superb fighting of the French has been an inspiration to us," replied Frank warmly.
"To come to personal matters," went on the colonel, "I have heard more in detail from my brother Andre about your mother's property.  He has traced the butler--Martel is his name--in the official records, and has found that he was taken prisoner in an attack several months ago.  He was very anxious to cross-examine him on some testimony he had given previously.  It seems that Martel had testified that he had witnessed the execution of a later will than that in which the property was left to your mother.  You can easily see how unfortunate that might be if it could be proved.  Andre has a suspicion that cross-examination might show Martel's testimony to be false."
"It is too bad that the man is a prisoner," said Frank anxiously.
"There is more to be told," went on the colonel gravely.  "I myself have put investigations on foot through the Swiss Red Cross.  They were able to find out from German prison records that Martel died recently."
Frank started back visibly perturbed.
"Died!" he echoed.  "Then his statement about the will stands uncontradicted."
"As far as he is concerned, yes," replied the colonel soberly.  "I am bitterly disappointed, and I know that Andre will be, too, for he has made a very strong point of disproving that special testimony.  But we will not remit our efforts in the least, _mon ami_.  Be assured of that.  I will let you know when I have any further news," and with a friendly wave of the hand the colonel passed on.
"What's the matter, Frank?" asked Billy as he went slowly back to his friends.  "You look as jolly as a crutch."
"I'm no hypocrite, then," answered Frank soberly, "for that's exactly how I feel."
He told his chums of what the colonel had said, and they were sincere in their expressions of sympathy.
"I don't care a button about it for myself," explained Frank, "but I hate to have to tell my mother about it.  She has little enough to make her happy nowadays, and I know how badly she will feel about this."
All that day the artillery kept up a ceaseless fire and the Germans did not venture on the bridge.  But great activity was observed among them, and Dick Lever, who was leader of the aviation detachment that was operating in that sector, brought the news that evening that they were preparing pontoons and other small boats with which they would probably attempt a crossing at points that were not so well guarded.
"Your officers over here want to keep their eyes peeled," he remarked to the Army Boys after he had just made his report at division headquarters.  "Those Heinies have made up their minds to get across this river by hook or crook.  They figure that with the open country behind you they'll have a good chance to throw you back if they can only get a footing on this side."
"Don't you worry about our officers," replied Frank with a conviction that had been deepened by the skilful leadership the American troops had had so far in the drive.  "It'll be as hard to find them napping as it is to catch a weasel asleep."
"I know they're good stuff," agreed Dick, "but we're all human, you know."
"All except the boches," grunted Billy.  "They're inhuman."
"We've had plenty of proofs of that," laughed Dick.  "They like to think they're superhuman, but we're teaching them differently."
"Seen anything of Will Stone lately?" asked Frank.
"Ran across him about a week ago," replied Dick.  "He's fighting about ten miles north of here, where the country's suitable for tank work. He's doing some great fighting, too."
"I don't need to be told that," replied Frank.  "That fellow would rather fight than eat."
"Well, so long, fellows," said Dick, as he rose to his feet.  "Keep a sharp eye on those boches across the river."
"Trust us," replied Frank.  "They'll never get over here."
The aviator's warning had been heeded by the officers, and detachments were stationed at places along the river above and below the main bridge.
Suddenly one morning, a whole fleet of boats, large and small, shot out at the same instant from the enemy side of the river.  They were loaded with men and machine guns, and the evident plan was to get a footing on the American side which could be held until reinforcements could be hurried over and make the footing secure.
At the same time a tremendous gunfire strove to protect the crossing and clear the banks at the points where the boats were planning to land.
Before the American guns could get the range on the rapidly moving targets, the boats were halfway across the river, and the rowers were pulling like mad.  One boat after another was struck and the occupants thrown into the river.  But the Germans had allowed for the loss of some of the boats, and were perfectly resigned to lose them, provided a certain percentage of all could effect a crossing.
"Let them get here," muttered Frank, who, with Bart and Billy, was among the force which had been assigned to that point where the passage was being attempted.  "They'll never get back again."
The surviving boats drew closer to the shore.  The men on the boats were using their machine guns, and the banks were swept by a rain of bullets.  More of the boats went down under the return fire, but a full dozen of them finally struck the shore.  The crews jumped out in the shallow water and commenced to wade ashore.
But they were doomed men.  With a yell the American boys swept down upon them.  Frank and his comrades rushed into the water, and there was a battle that must have resembled those of the old Vikings.  Back and forth the combatants struggled, shooting, hacking, swinging their gun butts.  Some of them, locked in a death grip, went down together in the water that was taking on a reddish tinge.  Others floated away on the stream.  Others of the enemy, seeing that the fight was going against them, leaped back into the boats and strove desperately to push out into the river.  But Frank leaped at the bow of one boat and held it, while Bart and Billy with their comrades did the same to others.
In a few minutes the fight was over.  It had been a hot one while it lasted.  Several of the Americans had been killed and quite a number wounded, but their loss had been largely exceeded by that of the enemy. Not a boat got back, and all who had not been killed remained as prisoners in American hands.
While the action was in progress, another fleet of equal size had started out.  This had been designed to reinforce the first party if it had succeeded in gaining a footing.  But the utter collapse of the first effort had taught the enemy that the bank was too strongly held and they stopped in midstream and rowed back.
"Even a Heinie can see through a milestone when there's a hole in it," commented Billy, as he watched the enemy retreating.
"It's a pity they don't keep on," said Bart.  "I'm just getting my blood up."
"First bit of marine fighting we've done yet," laughed Frank.  "We can say now that we belong to both branches of the service."
"All we need now is a fight in the air to make the thing complete," said Bart, "and we came pretty near to that, too, when we were with Dick that time in his bombing machine."
With their boat plan thwarted, the German commanders now centered all their attention on the bridge.  One or two surprise attacks at night were detected and driven back, but the enemy did not give up.
At dusk on the day following the fight in the stream they made the great attack.  True to their tactics, they apparently took no account of the lives of their men.  The taking of the bridge was bound to result in tremendous slaughter.  Every foot of it was swept by the American guns.  But the enemy leaders had determined that the bridge must be taken, no matter how high a price they paid for the taking.  It was easier for the leaders to reach this conclusion since it was the men who would pay the price rather than themselves.
A tremendous artillery fire paved the way for the operation.  Then, just as twilight was gathering, a strong body of enemy troops, marching in heavy columns, attempted to storm the bridge.
Beyond the first ranks could be seen other columns standing in reserve. The great climax was approaching.  The German command at that point had determined to stake everything on one throw.
On they came to the death awaiting them.  The American artillery and machine guns swept the bridge with a withering fire.  The front ranks melted away like mist.
But their places were filled with others and still others, despite the frightful slaughter.  The American machine guns got too hot to handle from their unceasing fire.
And still the German horde kept crowding forward as though their reserves were inexhaustible.  It was known that they had been heavily reinforced of late and that they largely outnumbered the American troops opposed to them.  Over the dead bodies of their comrades which strewed the bridge they were creeping nearer, urged by the irresistible pressure from behind.  Considering the disparity of forces, it was sound tactics to destroy the bridge before the foremost ranks could get a footing on the side where their overwhelming numbers would begin to tell.
The American commander gave the order to blow up the bridge.  But when the button was pressed that should have sent the electric current into the powder mine there was no response.
Several times the pressure was repeated and still no explosion followed.  A hasty consultation ensued between the leaders who were standing close by the place where the Army Boys were fighting.
"The electric wires must have been cut by the enemy's fire," Frank heard one of them say.
Cut!  Then all the elaborate plans for blowing up the bridge had come to naught.  And that apparently inexhaustible gray force was getting nearer and nearer!
CHAPTER XIX
THE JAWS OF DEATH
"There's just one possible chance," said Frank's colonel.
"What is that?" asked the general in command.
"An explosive bullet sent into the mine might explode it," replied the colonel.  "But it would have to be fired from a boat.  We can't do it from here."
"It would be certain death to whoever tried it," replied the general, looking at the shell-swept stream.
"Not certain, perhaps, but probable," said the colonel.  "It's the only chance, though, to explode the mine.  It can only be reached from underneath."
"We'll try it," said the general with decision.  "But I won't assign any one to it.  It's a matter for volunteers."
When the call came for volunteers, Frank sprang forward and saluted. Bart and Billy followed close behind him.
The officer's eye swept the three and rested on Frank.
"You volunteer?" he asked.  "You know the danger?"
"Yes, sir," they responded.
A gleam of pride and admiration came in the general's eyes.
"Very well," he said.  "I'm proud to be your commander."
Orders were hurriedly given, explosive bullets were furnished; and a few minutes later a small boat carrying the three Army Boys shot out from the shore.
The dusk had thickened now, and Bart and Billy, who were rowing, hugged the bridge as closely as they could, so as to profit by its shadow.
None of this bombardment had been directed at them as yet, because their little boat had not been seen.  But when they were forced to move a little way from the shadow of the bridge, so that Frank could get the proper angle from which to fire, they were detected, and a perfect tempest of fire opened up not only from the batteries on the further shore, but from the soldiers who were on the bridge.
Frank knew exactly where the powder charges had been located.  His rifle was loaded and he had sufficient confidence in his marksmanship to believe that only one shot would be needed.
All he dreaded was that a bullet might strike him before he had done his work.  After that it did not so much matter.  He knew that he had taken his life in his hand and he had already counted it as lost.
Bart and Billy were rowing like fiends.  At last they reached the point that Frank had indicated.  He peered through the dusk and could see the outlines of the mine.
The bridge now was black with Germans.  They had covered two-thirds of the distance over it, and they were packed so closely, crowding on each other's heels, that the rails of the bridge bulged outward with the pressure.
Frank raised his rifle to his shoulder, took steady aim and fired.
There was a hideous roar, and then the shattered timbers of the bridge went hurtling toward the sky.  Hundreds of bodies were mingled with the debris, and the water surged up in great waves as the mass fell back into the river.
Where the bridge had been there was a yawning gap of two hundred feet. At either end there was a remnant of the bridge still standing, and on these the survivors were rushing frenziedly toward the land before the remaining timbers should give way.
Those Germans who were left on the American side, severed from the help of their comrades, were surrounded and disarmed as soon as they reached the shore.  The attempt at capture had ended in a terrible disaster to the German forces.
The instant Frank fired.  Billy and Bart plunged their oars in the water and started rowing with all their might away from the bridge.
But despite their efforts they could not get out of the danger zone in time.  A heavy piece of timber struck the side of the boat, crushing it in and throwing the occupants into the water.
Frank and Billy came to the surface a moment later and shook the water from their eyes.  They looked about for Bart, but he was not to be seen.
Instantly Frank dived, searching frantically for his chum.  His arm came in contact with someone's hair.  He grasped it and drew the body to the surface.
It was Bart, but he was unconscious.  The timber that had smashed the boat had caught him a glancing blow on the head and stunned him.
Frank held his comrade's face above the water and shouted to Billy, who also had been searching and had just come up.  He swam to Frank's side and helped him in bearing up Bart.
They found a floating plank, over which they placed Bart's arms and then with Frank holding on to Bart's body and Billy guiding the plank they struck out for the nearer shore.
They had been nearer the American than the German side when the explosion took place.  But the current was bearing strongly toward the German side and they had been carried some distance by it while they were taking care of Bart.  The consequence was that, while they thought that the nearer bank was that held by their own troops, it was the German side towards which they were moving with their unconscious burden.
They were within a few feet of the shore at some distance below where the bridge had stood, when Frank's quick ear heard the sound of voices speaking in German.  At first he thought it was probably some of the prisoners whom the American troops had captured.  But a moment later he recognized a dilapidated fishing pier that he had often gazed at from his own side of the river, and the truth burst upon him.
They were on the wrong side of the river!  If Bart had been in the same condition as Billy and himself, their situation, though dangerous, would not have been desperate.  They were all strong swimmers and although fearfully tired from their exertions would have been able to swim across to comrades and safety.
But it was another matter with Bart unconscious.  Frank did not know what had caused his friend's injury.  Perhaps he had been shot.  At this very moment, for all Frank knew, his chum might be bleeding to death.  Above all things he wanted to find dry land, where he could examine his chum and render him first aid if necessary.
He communicated with Billy in whispers.
"We've gone and done it, old scout," he whispered.  "We're on the German side."
"That's good news--I don't think," returned Billy.
"Let's swim in under this old pier," suggested Frank, "We'll be out of sight then and we may strike a bit of beach up toward the head of it."
They followed the suggestion and were relieved to find that there was a little stretch of dry sand beyond the water line.  They took Bart from the plank and bore him out on the sand.  Here they rubbed his wrists and tried as far as they could in the darkness to ascertain the extent of his injuries.  Frank did not dare to use his flashlight for fear of betraying their presence to the enemy.
To their immense relief Bart soon showed signs of returning animation. He opened his eyes and was about to speak, when Frank put his hand gently on his lips.
"Don't speak, old man," he whispered.  "You're all right.  It's Frank speaking.  Billy's here.  Just whisper to me and tell where you're hurt.  But be careful, for the Germans are all around us."
"Guess I'm not hurt much," whispered Bart.  "Got a clip on the head when that beam struck the boat."
"Sure you didn't get a bullet?" asked Frank anxiously.
"I don't think so," replied Bart.  "Head's dizzy from that crack, but I feel all right everywhere else."
"Bully!" said Frank.  "Now you just lie there till you get your strength back, and then we'll figure out what's to be done."
It was a hard problem, and it became none the easier a few minutes later when a boat came along under oars and was tied up at the end of the pier.  It was a big boat and similar to those in which the Germans had made their unsuccessful attempt to cross the river a few days before.
It had evidently been out in the river picking up the wounded who had been thrown into the stream by the explosion.  The rickety planks creaked as the soldiers carried the wounded survivors over the pier to the bank beyond.  It would have been an exceedingly bad time for the Army Boys to be discovered and they crowded back as far as they could to escape detection.
The Germans were in a terrible rage over the body blow that had been dealt them in the destruction of the bridge.  Apart from the heavy losses in men their entire plan of campaign would have to be reconstructed.
"That one bullet of yours was a mighty effective one, Frank," whispered Billy.
"It was classy shooting," said Bart.  "From a rocking boat with shells bursting all around and so much depending on it, there'd have been lots of excuse for missing."
"Maybe the old Thirty-seventh isn't feeling good over the way the thing went through," chuckled Billy.
"And maybe we won't get the glad hand when we get over there," murmured Bart.
"We've got to get there first," whispered Frank, "and we've got a mighty slim chance of doing that as long as this boat stays here."
Every instant was fraught with peril.  They had no weapons and even if they had they would have stood no chance against the throng of enemies surrounding them.  Their only hope of safety lay in not being discovered.
But at last, to their great relief, the German rowers resumed their places at the oars and the boat pulled out into the darkness.
"Thank heaven, they're gone at last!" breathed Billy.
"Do you feel equal to the swim over, Bart?" asked Frank.
"Sure thing," replied Bart.  "My head's dizzy yet, but with you and Billy to give me a hand, if necessary, I'll get through all right."
As silently as so many otters they slipped into the water and struck out for the other side.
The current was strong and the work was arduous, especially with the care they had to exercise lest any splash should be heard by the enemy. There was also the chance that one of the boats that were abroad might come in their direction.  But aided by the pitch darkness that prevailed, they made the trip in safety and Bart had no need of calling on the aid of his comrades.
As they drew near the other side a sentry hailed them.
"Halt!" he cried.  "Who goes there?"
"That's Fred Anderson," murmured Billy, as he recognized the voice.
"Friends!" called Frank.  "Hello, Fred.  It's Raymond, Waldon and Sheldon."
There was a shout of delight, and Fred, accompanied by several other sentries, came running to the water's edge.
"Glory, hallelujah!" shouted Fred, as eager hands pulled the Army Boys up on the bank.  "So you pulled through after all.  The whole regiment had given you up.  Say, if they'd known you were coming every mother's son of them would have been down here to meet you and they'd have brought the band with them.  Come along now, but I warn you in advance that all the fellows will shake your hands off."
They still had their hands when their mates got through with them, but Fred had not over-estimated the royal welcome that awaited them.  They had always been prime favorites with the boys of the old Thirty-seventh, and that afternoon's exploit made them more popular than ever.  Their officers, too, were jubilant at their return.
They were taken to headquarters, where the general thanked them and shook hands with each in turn.
"I don't need any report from you," he smiled.  "I heard that when the bridge went up.  It was a brave deed, most gallantly done.  I thank you in the name of the army.  Your names will be cited to-morrow in the orders of the day and I shall personally bring the matter to the attention of General Pershing."
CHAPTER XX
A TRAITOR UNMASKED
When Tom Bradford found himself racing toward the woods, the only thought in his mind was to put as great a distance as possible between himself and his would-be executioners.
At every step he expected to hear a shout raised and see a crowd of pursuers rush from the house like a pack of wolves after their prey.
The thought lent wings to his feet and he covered the distance in record time.  And not until he was safe in the shelter of the friendly trees did he pause to draw breath and cast a glance toward the house.
If his escape had been noticed, there was absolutely no sign of it. The landscape lay in serene and smiling beauty.  Not a trace of life was to be seen about the house.  It seemed scarcely possible that so much tragedy and so much peace could exist side by side.
But he had no time for musing, and after a moment's glance he turned and burrowed deeper into the woods.  There alone for the moment lay safety.  In those leafy coverts he could lie concealed, while he took breath and thought out the situation.
He had no idea of where the American lines lay.  Bound hand and foot as he had been during that terrible journey, and tortured by the thoughts that had assailed him, he had taken little note of the way he was traveling.  And even if he had, he could not have told with certainty what was the dividing line between the hostile armies.
All that he could do was to exercise the utmost caution, get as deeply into the recesses of the wood as he could, and let his future course be guided by circumstances.  In a battle area that was so full of soldiers it would not be long before he would catch sight of some of them.  The great thing was to see them before they saw him.  If they wore German helmets he would keep his distance.  If, on the contrary, he should see the old familiar khaki uniform of his American comrades, his troubles would be over.
But if the most important thing was concealment, another problem almost as important was the question of food.  He had had only the scantiest kind of nourishment since his escape from the prison yard.  The last crumb had been eaten that morning.  He had no weapon of any kind with which to shoot squirrels or rabbits or birds.  And he did not dare to approach a cottage for fear that he might again be placed in the power of his enemies.
But he was not yet starving, though exceedingly hungry, and he kept on in the woods, intent upon putting as many miles behind him as possible before he stopped for rest.
Far up in the wooded hills he came in sight of a little cabin.  It was a dilapidated little shack that perhaps had been used by hunting parties in happier days.  It seemed to be entirely deserted, but he was wary and lay in the bushes for an hour or more, watching it closely for any sign of life.  Only when he felt perfectly sure that there was no one about, did he creep up to the door and look in.
He drew a sigh of relief when he saw that it was indeed uninhabited. Not only that, but there was no evidence that any one had visited it of late.  There was no sign of a path and the bushes had grown up close to the door.  One of the hinges of the door had rusted away and the door sagged heavily upon the other.
There was absolutely nothing in the hut except a rough board table and a three-legged stool.  Tom searched about eagerly in the hope that he might find some food left by its last occupants.  He was not particular, and even mouldy crusts would have been eagerly welcomed. But even in this he was doomed to be disappointed.
Still it was something to be under a roof.  Human beings once had been there, and the fact seemed to bring him in contact with his kind.  And even this rough shelter was better than being compelled to sleep in the woods.  If he had only had something to still the terrible gnawing at his stomach he would have been content--at least as far as he could be contented while a fugitive, with his life and liberty in constant danger.
After he had rested a while he went outside, with the double purpose of watching for enemies and trying to find something to eat.  He fashioned a club from a stout branch and made several attempts to get a squirrel or a bird by hurling it at them.  But the weapon was too clumsy and they were too quick, and this forlorn hope came to nothing.  So that when night at last dropped down upon him he was more hungry than ever and had to go to sleep supperless.
The next morning he was more fortunate, for he came upon a stream that abounded in fish.  He improvised a hook and line and landed several fair-sized ones.  He had some matches in an oilskin pouch, and he made a little fire in a deep depression, so as to hide the smoke, and roasted fish over it.  He had no salt, but never had a meal tasted more delicious in his life.
Now a burden was lifted from his mind.  At least he would not starve. Fish, no doubt, would grow wearisome as a diet if it were varied with nothing else.  But at least it would sustain life and give him strength for the tasks that lay before him.
He listened for the booming of the guns and tried to figure out from the sound just where the contending armies were facing each other. Sometimes they grew louder and fiercer, and at other times seemed to recede, as the tide of battle ebbed and flowed.  But there was rarely any lull in the ominous thunder, and Tom knew that the fiercest kind of fighting was going on.  He thought of Frank and Bart and Billy, who he felt sure were in the very thick of it, and he grew desperate at the thought that he was not at their side, facing the same dangers, and, as he hoped, sharing in the same victories.
Gradually he worked his way down the mountain, taking the utmost care to avoid detection, until he felt sure from the increasing din that he was not far from one or the other of the hostile armies.  But it was of the utmost importance to him to know whether he was within the German or the American lines.
The question was solved for him when, some days later, he caught sight of a file of German soldiers passing through a ravine a little way below him.  These were followed by others.  He sought shelter instantly upon catching his first glimpse of them, but the bushes were thin at that point, and a huge tree seemed to offer a more secure refuge.  He climbed it quickly, and, peering through the leaves, tried to figure out the situation.  Rank after rank passed, and seemed to be taking up a position with the view of making an attack.  Batteries were drawn up, and their guns pointed in a direction away from where Tom was hiding. This was a valuable, but at the same time a painful, bit of information, because it showed Tom that he was behind the German lines instead of in front of them.  If he had been in front, it would be simply a matter of making his way in all haste to where the American armies lay.  Now he knew that in order to reach his own lines he would have to cross through the German positions.  And without weapons this could only be a forlorn hope.  Even had he been armed it would have been a desperate chance.
He was pondering this fact with a sinking of the heart, when suddenly he saw approaching a man in American uniform.  What could it mean?  The man was not a prisoner, or he would have been under guard.  Yet what other explanation was there for the appearance of the uniform in the midst of the Germans, who swarmed all about?
The man came nearer, until he paused beneath the tree.  He looked about as though expecting to see some one.  Then he glanced at the watch on his wrist, and uttered an exclamation of impatience.  It was evident that he had made an appointment, and that the other party to the tryst was slow in coming.
The day was warm, and the upward climb through the woods had been arduous.  The man took his hat from his head and wiped his forehead with his handkerchief.  As he did so, Tom caught his first glimpse of the newcomer's face, and his heart gave a leap of surprise as well as repulsion when he recognized Nick Rabig.
The last news that Tom had had of Rabig was that he had been taken prisoner in the preceding Fall.  He had not known, of course, of Nick's alleged escape from German captivity, and of his return to the American lines, but his quick mind readily reached the correct conclusion.  He had always distrusted Rabig and had felt sure that the fellow was at heart a traitor.  He was morally certain that the German corporal, whom Nick had been assigned to guard, had escaped with Rabig's connivance, and he remembered what Frank had told him about hearing Rabig's voice in the woods the night the German spy was shot.  But Rabig's cunning, or perhaps his luck, had prevented his treachery being proved.
Whatever errand had brought Rabig to this spot, Tom felt sure that it boded no good to the American cause, and even in the precarious position in which he found himself he rejoiced at the thought that he might be instrumental in unmasking a traitor.
While these thoughts were passing through his mind, a German officer approached from another direction.  He saw Rabig, and hastened toward him.  He greeted Nick coldly, and with an air that scarcely concealed the contempt he felt for the man whose services he was using.
An animated colloquy began at once.  But unluckily for Tom it was in German.  He hated the language, but just then he would have given anything if he could have understood what was passing between the two men.
The conversation continued for some time.  Rabig handed over some papers which the German officer carefully looked over, using a pencil to follow some lines that seemed to be the tracing of a map or plan. Then he folded them up and put them carefully in his pocket, and after a few more sentences had been exchanged Tom heard the clink of money and saw Rabig tuck something away in his belt.  Then the officer stood up and with a curt nod went away toward the bottom of the hill.
For some minutes more Rabig remained sitting at the foot of the tree. Then he took money from his belt and counted it carefully.  Tom couldn't help wondering whether it consisted of thirty pieces of silver!
In Tom's mind a plan was rapidly forming.  He looked through the trees in every direction.  No one was in sight.  From the slope below came the hum of the camp, but no helmets were visible.
If Rabig had come through the German lines he had done so by means of a pass.  That pass would take him back just as it had brought him through.  He must have it in his pocket now.
Tom measured the distance between himself and the figure sitting beneath him.  Then with the litheness of a panther he dropped plump on Rabig's shoulders.
The shock was terrific and knocked the breath from the traitor's body. He rolled over and over.  Tom himself was thrown forward on his hands and knees, but the next moment he had risen and his hands fastened like a vise around Rabig's throat.
CHAPTER XXI
CROSSING THE LINE
Nick Rabig was a young man of powerful build, and under ordinary conditions Tom would have had his work cut out for him.  But the surprise and the shock had taken all the fight out of the traitor, and Tom's sinewy hands never relaxed until Rabig's face was purple and he lay limp and gasping.  Then Tom improvised a gag and thrust it into the rascal's mouth and rapidly bound his hands and feet.
When he had the miscreant helpless, Tom rose panting to his feet and looked about him.  There was no sign that the struggle had attracted attention.  Rabig himself had had no time to utter a cry for help.
The renegade had revived sufficiently now to understand what had happened, and his face was a study of conflicting emotions.  Rage and hate and fear showed in his features.  He recognized Tom, and he knew that his treachery stood discovered.  He knew that with the evidence against him he was doomed to stand before a firing squad if he should be taken into the American lines.
Tom looked at him as one might look at a leper.
"You low-down traitor!" he said bitterly.  "You vile scoundrel!  I've caught you at last and caught you dead to rights.  You're the most contemptible thing that breathes.  You're a disgrace to your uniform. You ought to be wearing a wooden overcoat and you will when Uncle Sam lays his hands on you.  I ought to kill you myself this minute."
His hand clenched the pistol which he had taken from Rabig's pocket, and a look of craven fear came into the traitor's eyes.
"Oh, don't be afraid," said Tom scornfully.  "I'm not going to do it. Perhaps you'll suffer more if I let you live than if I killed you. You're a marked and branded man.  You're a man without a country.  The very men you've sold yourself to look upon you as a yellow dog.
"Now, Rabig, listen to me," Tom went on with deadly earnestness.  "I'm going to strip you of the uniform you've disgraced.  I'll have to untie your hands for a minute to get the coat over your arms, but I've got the drop on you and if you make the slightest move except to do what I tell you to you're a dead man."
Rabig was too cowed to do anything but obey, and in a few minutes Tom had stripped him of coat and trousers and put them on himself.  He re-bound Rabig's hands tightly.  Then he went through the pockets of the coat.
As he had expected he found the pass that had admitted Rabig to the German lines.  Opposite the word "_Losung_," which Tom knew meant "countersign," was scribbled the word "Potsdam."
"I guess this thing that brought you over will take me back," Tom remarked.  "Now, Rabig, I'm going to leave you here with your German friends.  They'll pick you up after a while, though I don't care whether they do or not.  I'm going back to the boys of the old Thirty-seventh and tell them just what has happened to Nick Rabig, the traitor.  So long, Benedict Arnold."
With a parting glance of contempt Tom left the traitor and went down the hill with a confidence that he was very far from feeling.
He had the pass and the countersign, but he was not sure that these would be sufficient.  Perhaps an officer would be called by the sentry to make sure that everything was all right.  Perhaps the sentry at the point where he should try to pass the line might be the same one who had let Rabig through, and he might notice the difference in personal appearance.  Any one of a dozen things might happen to arouse suspicion.
Luckily it was growing dark and Tom had pulled Rabig's hat well down over his face, yet not so far as to make it appear that he was trying to evade scrutiny.  He walked on briskly to a point where a sentry on duty before an opening in the wire fence was standing.
"_Halt!  Wer da?_" hailed the sentry.
"_Ein Freund_," replied Tom.
"_Losung._"
"_Potsdam._"
At the same time Tom carelessly extended the pass which the sentry glanced at and returned to him with a curt gesture, in which Tom thought he saw contempt.  But it meant that he was free to pass, and he did so with an air of indifference.
His heart was beating so fast that it seemed as if he would suffocate. At every step he feared to hear a shout behind him that would tell him that the ruse was discovered.  But the fortune that had frowned upon him so many times of late this time was friendly.  Behind him were the usual camp noises and nothing more.
In a few minutes he had gotten out of sight of the lines and was in the woods at a point where the trees grew thickly and only a half-beaten trail led through the underbrush.  Then he quickened his pace and soon found himself running.
If he were pursued, he had fully made up his mind what he would do.  He would never again see the inside of a German prison.  He had the revolver and he would fight to the last breath.  He might go down, probably would, considering the odds that there would be against him, but he would die fighting, and would take one or more of his enemies with him.
He was racing along now at top speed and he only slackened his gait when he knew that he had put miles behind him.  By that time it had grown wholly dark, and in the woods it was as black as pitch.  He was safe for that night at least.  His enemies could not have seen him if they had been within ten feet of him.
And the darkness brought with it a word of warning.  While in one sense it was a protection, on the other it had in it an element of danger. He could no longer know the direction in which he was traveling.  He knew the danger there was of traveling in a circle.  If he kept on he might swing around in the direction of the German lines.  And it would be a sorry ending to his flight to have it finish at the very point from which he had started.
He made up his mind that he would curl himself up in some thicket and snatch a few hours of sleep.  At the first glimmer of dawn he would resume his journey.  Then he could see, no doubt, the American lines, from which he knew he could not be very far away.  The big guns, too, that had now settled down to their nightly muttering, would be in full cry at dawn, and sound as well as sight would help him.
He found a heavy clump of bushes into which he crawled.  He had no fear of oversleeping.  He knew that his burdened mind would keep watch while his body slept, and that he would surely wake at the first streak of dawn.
Some distance ahead of where the old Thirty-seventh was posted on the far-flung battle line, the Army Boys were on sentry duty.  It was the turn of Corporal Wilson's squad to perform this irksome task, and they were glad that it was nearly over and that soon they would be relieved.
Their beats adjoined each other and there were times when they met and could exchange a few words to break the monotony of the long grind.
"This sentry stuff doesn't make a hit with me," grumbled Bart.  "I'm getting blisters on my feet from walking."
"Where do you expect to get them, on your head?" laughed Frank.  "Cheer up, old man.  The sun will be up in a few minutes and then the relief will be along."
"It can't come too soon," chimed in Billy.  "Gee, but I'm hungry!  This early morning air does sure give you an appetite."
"If only something would happen," complained Bart.  "It's the deadly monotony of the thing that gets my goat.  Now if a Hun patrol should come along and stir things up, it would be worth while."
A sharp exclamation came from Frank.
"Look out, fellows!" he warned.  "I saw those bushes moving over on the slope of that hill just now and there isn't a bit of wind."
In an instant they had their rifles ready.
The bushes parted and a figure stepped forth into the open.
"Why, it's one of our fellows!" said Bart, as he saw the American uniform.
"Been out on scout duty, I suppose," remarked Billy.
Frank said nothing.  His keen eyes noted the newcomer and his heart began to thump strangely.
As the soldier came nearer he took off his hat and waved it at them.
A yell of delight broke from the startled group.
"It's Tom!  It's Tom!  It's Tom!"
CHAPTER XXII
A JOYOUS REUNION
Shouting like so many maniacs, they rushed toward him.  At the same instant Tom, too, began to run, and in a moment they had their arms around him, and were hugging him, pounding him, mauling him, exclaiming, questioning, laughing, rejoicing, all in one breath.
Tom was back with them again, good old Tom, their chum, their comrade, Tom, over whose fate they had spent so many sleepless hours, Tom, for whom any one of them would have risked his life, Tom who they knew was captured, and who they feared might be dead.
There he was, the same old Tom, with face and body thin, with hair unkempt and matted, with traces showing everywhere of the anxiety and suffering he had undergone, and yet with the same indomitable spirit that neither captivity nor threatened death had broken, and the same smile upon his lips and twinkle in his eyes.
"Easy, easy there, fellows," he protested laughing.  "Let me come up for air.  And before anything else, lead me to some grub.  I haven't eaten for so long that there's only a vacuum where my stomach ought to be."
"You bet we'll lead you to it," cried Bart.
"An anaconda will have nothing on you when we get through filling you up," promised Billy.
"What did I tell you, fellows," cried Frank delightedly.  "Didn't I say the old boy'd be coming in some morning and asking us if breakfast was ready?"
Tom was giving Frank the long-lost letter he had been carrying when Corporal Wilson came up with the relief and their greeting was almost as boisterous and hilarious as that of his own particular chums had been, for Tom was a universal favorite in the regiment, and they had all mourned his loss.
They would have overwhelmed him with questions, but Frank interposed.
"Nothing doing, fellows," he said.  "This boy isn't going to say another word until we've taken him to mess and filled him up till he can't move.  After that there'll be plenty of time for a talk and we'll keep him talking till the cows come home."
It was a rejoicing crowd that took Tom back to the main body of the regiment, where he almost had his hands wrung from him.  They piled his plate and filled his coffee cup again and again and watched him while he ate like a famished wolf.
"Tom's running true to form," joked Frank, as they saw the food vanish before his onslaught.
"Whatever else the Huns took away from him, they left him his appetite," chuckled Billy.
"Left it?" grinned Tom, as he attacked another helping.  "They added to it.  I never knew what hunger was before.  Bring on anything you've got, and I'll tackle it.  All except fish.  I'm ashamed now to look a fish in the face."
It was a long time before he had had enough.  Then with a look of seraphic contentment on his face he sat back, loosened his belt a notch, and sighed with perfect happiness.
"Now fellows, fire away," he grinned, "and I'll tell you the sad story of my life."
They needed no second invitation, for they had been fairly bursting with eagerness and curiosity.  Questions rained on him thick and fast. Their fists clenched when he told them of the cruelties to which he had been subjected.  They were loud in admiration of the way in which he had met and overcome his difficulties.  They roared with laughter when he told them of the alarm clock, and Tom himself, to whom it had been no joke at the time, laughed now as heartily as the rest.
"So that's the way you got those ropes gnawed through when you were at the farmhouse," exclaimed Frank, when Tom told them of the aid that had come to him from the rats.  "We figured out everything else but that. We thought that you must have frayed them against a piece of glass."
"I used to hate rats," said Tom, "but I don't now.  I'll never have a trap set in any house of mine as long as I live."
"If you'd only known how safe it would have been to walk downstairs that day!" mourned Frank.
"Wouldn't it have been bully?" agreed Tom.  "Think of the satisfaction it would have been to have had the bulge on that lieutenant who was going to hang me.  I wouldn't have done a thing to him!"
"Well, we got him anyway and that's one comfort," remarked Bart.
"To think that you were legging it away from the house just as we were coming toward it," said Billy.
"It was the toughest kind of luck," admitted Tom.  "Yet perhaps it was all for the best, for then I might not have had the chance to get the best of Rabig."
"Rabig?" exclaimed Frank, for the traitor had not yet been mentioned in Tom's narrative.
"What about him?" questioned Billy eagerly.
"Hold your horses," grinned Tom.  "I'll get to him in good time.  If it hadn't been for Rabig I wouldn't be here.  I owe that much to the skunk, anyway."
It was hard for them to wait, but they were fully rewarded when Tom described the way in which he had trapped and stripped the renegade, and left him lying in the woods.
"Bully boy!" exclaimed Frank.  "That was the very best day's work you ever did."
"Got the goods on him at last," exulted Bart.
"The only man in the old Thirty-seventh that has played the yellow dog," commented Billy.  "The regiment's well rid of him.  He'll never dare to show his face again."
"He can fight for Germany now," said Frank, "and if he does, I only hope that some day I'll run across him in the fighting."
"You won't if he sees you first," grinned Billy.  "He doesn't want any of your game."
Tom had left one thing till the last.
"By the way, Frank," he remarked casually, "I ran across a fellow in the German prison camp who came from Auvergne, the same province where you've told me your mother lived when she was a girl.  He said he knew her family well."
"Is that so?" asked Frank with quick interest.  "What was his name?"
"Martel," replied Tom.
"Why that's the name of the butler who used to be in my mother's family!" cried Frank.  "Colonel Pavet was telling me that he had been captured, and had died in prison.  I was hoping that he was mistaken in that, for the colonel said he had information that might help my mother to get her property."
"The colonel is right about the man's dying," replied Tom, "for I was with him when he died."
"It's too bad," said Frank dejectedly.
"I shouldn't wonder if he did not know something," said Tom, "for he seemed to have something on his mind.  He told me one time that his imprisonment and sickness happened as a judgment on him."
"If we could only have had his testimony before he died," mourned Frank.
"I got it," declared Tom triumphantly.
CHAPTER XXIII
CUTTING THEIR WAY OUT
Frank sprang to his feet.
"What do you mean?" he cried.
"Just this," replied Tom, taking the confession from his pocket.  "He told me the whole story and there it is in black and white, names of witnesses and all."
Frank read the confession with growing excitement, while his comrades clustered closely around him.
"Tom, old scout!" Frank exclaimed, as the whole significance of the confession dawned upon him, "you've done me a service that I'll never forget.  Now we can see our way clear, and my mother will come into her rights."
"I'm mighty glad, old boy," replied Tom with a happy smile.  "I've held on to that paper through thick and thin, because I knew what it would mean to you and your mother.  But now," he went on, "I've been answering the questions of all this bunch and turn about is fair play. Tell me how our boys are doing.  How is the big drive going on?  Have we stopped the Germans yet?"
"They're slowing up," said Bart.
"We're whipping them," declared Billy.
"I wouldn't quite say that," objected Frank.  "We haven't whipped them yet except in spots.  Of course we're going to lick them.  The whole world knows that now except the Germans themselves, and I shouldn't wonder if they were beginning to believe it in their hearts.  But they'll stand a whole lot of beating yet, and we don't want to kid ourselves that it's going to be an easy job.  But we're holding them back, and pretty soon we'll be driving them back."
"I'll bet the old Thirty-seventh has been doing its full share," said Tom proudly.
"You bet it has," crowed Billy.  "Tom, old man, you've missed some lovely fighting."
"You fellows have had all the luck," refilled Tom wistfully.
"Don't grouch, Tom," laughed Frank.  "There's plenty of it yet to come. And I'll bet you'll fight harder than ever now, when you think of all you've been through.  You've got a personal score to settle with the Huns now, as well as to get in licks for Uncle Sam."
"You're right there," replied Tom, as his eyes blazed.  "I can't wait to get at them.  My fingers fairly itch to get hold of a rifle."
"But you ought to have a little rest and get your strength back before you get in the ranks again," suggested Bart.
"None of that rest stuff for me," declared Tom.  "When you boys get in I'm going to be right alongside of you."
His wish was not to be gratified that day, however, for there was a lull in the fighting just then while the hostile armies manoeuvred for position.  But the pause was only temporary, and the next day the storm broke in all its fury.
Of course Tom had to make a report at headquarters.  There his story, especially as it related to Nick Rabig, was listened to with much interest.
When the fighting began again it was not trench work.  That was already in the past.  Of course the armies took advantage of whatever shelter was offered them, and there were times when shallow trenches were dug with feverish haste.  But these were only to be used for minutes or for hours, not for weeks and months at a time.  The great battle had become one of open warfare, and it ebbed and flowed over miles of meadow and woodland, of hill and valley.
It was just the style of fighting that suited the American troops. They wanted action, action every minute.  They wanted to see their enemies, to get at grips with them, to pit their brawn and muscle, their wit and courage against the best the enemy could bring forth.  It was the way their ancestors had fought, man to man, bayonet to bayonet, where sheer pluck and power would give the victory to the men who possessed them in largest measure.
"We'll be in it up to our necks in a few minutes now," muttered Bart, as they waited for the order to charge.
"It's going to be hot work," remarked Billy.  "They've got a pile of men in that division over there, and they've been putting up a stiff fight so far this morning."
"They're in for a trimming," declared Frank.  "Just wait till the old Thirty-seventh goes at them on the double quick."
"Why don't the orders come?" grumbled Tom.
They came at last and, with a rousing cheer, the regiment rushed forward.  The enemy's guns opened up at them, and a deadly barrage sought to check the wild fury of their charge.  Men went down as shot and shell tore through them, but the others never faltered.  The old Thirty-seventh was out to win that morning, and a bad time was in store for whoever stood in the way of its headlong rush.
In the front ranks the Army Boys fought shoulder to shoulder, and when the regiment struck the enemy line, they plunged forward with the bayonet.  There was a furious melée as they ploughed their way through.
So impetuous was their dash that it carried them too fast and too far. They found themselves fighting with a group of their comrades against a fresh body of enemy troops who had just been thrown in in a fierce counterattack.  For the moment they were greatly outnumbered and as the enemy closed around the little band it seemed as though they were doomed to be cut off from the support of their comrades.
They must cut their way through and rejoin the main body.  And not a moment must be lost, for the ring surrounding them was constantly being augmented by fresh reinforcements.
A shot tore Frank's rifle out of his hands.  He looked around and saw an axe that had been left there by some one of an engineer corps.
He stooped and picked it up.  He swung it high above his head.  In his powerful hands it was a fearful weapon, and the enemy detachment hi front of him faltered and drew back.
With a shout of "Lusitania!" Frank leaped forward, his eyes flashing with the fury of the fight, his axe hewing right and left.  Foot by foot he cut his way through the crowded ranks.
Then suddenly a great blackness came down upon him and he knew nothing more.
CHAPTER XXIV
WOUNDS AND TORTURE
When long hours afterward Frank came to himself, he lay for a time wondering where he was and what had happened to him.
His brain was not clear, and he had the greatest difficulty in concentrating his thoughts.  Little by little he pieced events together.  He remembered the charge made by his regiment, the pocket in which he had found himself when he had gone too far in advance of his comrades, the axe with which he had started to cut his way through the ring of enemies that surrounded him.  There his memory stopped.
He must have been wounded.  He raised his head painfully and looked himself over.  He did not seem to be bleeding.  He put his hand to his head.  There was a cut there and a great lump that was as big as a robin's egg.  The movement set his brain whirling, and he fell back dizzy and confused.
How thirsty he was!  His mouth felt as though it were stuffed with cotton.  His veins felt as if fire instead of blood was in them.  His tongue seemed to be double its normal size.  He would have given all he possessed for one sip of cool water.
He seemed to be alone.  There were bushes all about him.  He remembered that he had been fighting on the edge of a wood where there was a great deal of underbrush.  This no doubt accounted for his being alone.  Out in the meadow beyond there were lying a number of dead and wounded, as he could see by peering through the bushes.  There were some dead men in the bushes, too, but no wounded.  It would have been a comfort at that moment to have had some wounded companions to whom he might speak, whom he might help, or by whom he might be helped.  He felt as though he were the only living man in a world of the dead.
He tried to rise, but a horrible pain shot through his right leg as he bore his weight upon it, and it crumpled under him.  He wondered if it were broken.  He felt of it carefully.  No bone seemed to be broken as far as he could tell, but the ankle was swelled to almost double its normal size.  He must have strained or twisted it.  The mere touch gave him agony and he was forced to desist.
His fever increased and he was afraid that he was getting delirious. Some way or other he must get back to his own lines before his senses left him.  He got up on his hands and feet and began to crawl in what he thought was the right direction.
He had no idea of time.  Things seemed dark around him, but he was not sure whether this was due to the sky being overcast or to the approach of twilight.  Perhaps it was neither.  It might be only that his eyes were dimmed by the fever that was raging in him.
His wounded leg dragged behind him as he slowly worked along and every moment was torture.  Sometimes it caught in a bush, and the resulting wrench almost caused him to swoon.  But he kept on doggedly.
He passed many dead men, and painfully worked his way around to avoid touching them.  One of them, he noticed, had a sack full of hand grenades.  But the stiffening hand of the owner would never hurl another of those messengers of death.
On and on Frank toiled.  His head felt so light that it seemed to be detached from his shoulders.  He caught himself talking aloud, speaking the names of Bart and Billy and Tom.  Where were they?  What were they doing?  Why were they not there with him?
And what had happened to the regiment?  Had it been driven back?  He remembered the heavy reinforcements that the enemy had thrown into the fight.  Perhaps the old Thirty-seventh was getting ready for another attack.  But the effort to think was too painful and Frank gave it up.
Suddenly he heard the sound of voices a little way in front of him, and a thrill of joy shot through him.  He was paid at that moment for all his suffering.  How lucky that he had steeled himself to the task of crawling back to his comrades!  Soon he would be with the boys again. They would give him water.  They would bind up his leg.  His head would stop aching.  The hours of torture would be over.
He was about to shout to them, when through a thick clump of bushes he saw the helmets of German soldiers.  They were working feverishly to get some machine guns in position.  It was evident that they were expecting an attack.
In that moment of terrible disappointment Frank tasted the bitterness of death.  All that agony had been endured only to bring him into the hands of the Huns!
But this revulsion of feeling lasted only for an instant.  The sight of his enemies had cleared his brain and awakened his indomitable fighting instinct.  The Huns were working like mad at the machine-gun nest. That meant that the old Thirty-seventh was coming back!  He must help them.  These guns, cunningly placed, would do terrible execution if they were allowed to work their will.
But what could he do unaided and alone?  He was wounded and weaponless.
Like a flash the thought came to him of the dead man whose sack was full of hand grenades.
His body quailed at the thought of the journey back to where the man lay.  But his spirit mastered the flesh.
With his dragging leg one quivering pain, he crawled back.  It seemed ages before he got there, but at last he had secured three of the grenades and started back for the machine-gun nest.
He had no more than time.  Behind him, he heard the well-known cheer of his regiment.  The boys were coming!
The gun crews heard it, too, and they gathered about their weapons, whose deadly muzzles pointed in the direction from which the rush was coming.
Supporting himself on one hand and knee, Frank hurled his grenades over the top of the bush in quick succession.  They fell right in the midst of the startled Germans.  There was a terrific explosion and the guns and crews were torn to pieces.  Another instant and the old Thirty-seventh came smashing its way to victory.
CHAPTER XXV
DRIVEN BACK
Two weeks later and Frank had left the hospital and was back again with the Army Boys.  The injury to his head was found to be not serious, and the leg although badly wrenched and strained had no bone broken.  It yielded rapidly to treatment, and Frank's splendid strength and vitality aided greatly in his cure.
There was immense jubilation among the Army Boys when their idolized comrade resumed his place in the ranks.
"You can't keep a squirrel on the ground," exulted Tom, as he gave his friend a tremendous thump on the back.
"Or Frank Sheldon away from the firing line," grinned Bart, looking at his friend admiringly.
"You didn't think I was going to stay in that dinky hospital when there was so much doing, did you?" laughed Frank.  "Say, fellows, if my leg had been broken instead of just sprained, I'd have died of a broken heart.  I've got to get busy now and get even with the boches for that crack on the head they gave me.  It's a good thing it's solid ivory, or it would have been split for fair."
"You don't need to worry about paying the Germans back," chuckled Billy.  "You paid them in advance.  You don't owe them a thing.  Say, what George Washington did to the cherry tree with his little hatchet wasn't a circumstance to what you did to the Huns with that axe of yours.  The axe is your weapon, Frank.  A rifle doesn't run one, two, three, compared with it."
"I'll admit that the axe work was good as a curtain raiser," remarked Tom.  "But the real show was when those machine guns and their crews were blown to pieces.  That made the work of the regiment easy."
"It was classy work," agreed Will Stone, who came along just then and heard what they were talking about.
"How are the tanks?" asked Frank of the newcomer.  "I suppose old Jumbo is just spoiling for a fight."
"I guess he is," replied Stone, with a touch of affection in his voice for the monster tank that he commanded, "and from all I hear he's going to get lots of it."
"I guess we all are," said Bart.
"All little pals together," hummed Billy.
"And it's going to be a different kind of fighting," went on Stone. "The tide is turning at last.  The Hun has been doing the driving.  Now he's going to be driven."
"Glory hallelujah!" cried Billy.
"Do you think that General Foch is going to take the offensive?" asked Bart eagerly.
"It looks that way," replied Stone.  "Of course, I'm not in the secrets of the High Command, and only General Foch himself knows when and where he's going to strike.  But by the way they're massing tanks here I think it will be soon.  They're gathering them by the hundreds in the woods, so that the movement can't be seen by enemy aviators.  When the blow comes it will be a heavy one.  And do you notice the way the American divisions are being brought together here?  That means that they'll take a big part in the offensive.  Foch has been watching what our boys have been doing, and he's going to put us in the front ranks."
"Better and better," chortled Billy.  "That boy's got good judgment. He's a born fighter himself and he knows fighters when he sees them."
"Well, you boys keep right on your toes," said Stone, as he prepared to leave them, "and I'll bet a dollar to a doughnut that within three days you'll see the Heinies on the run."
Two days passed and nothing special happened.  Then at dawn on the third day, Foch struck like a thunderbolt!
He had gathered his forces.  He had chosen the place.  He had bided his time.
The German forces were taken utterly by surprise.  Their General Staff was caught napping.  They had underestimated their enemy's daring and resources.  Their flank was exposed, and it crumpled up under the terrific and unexpected blow.
Thousands of prisoners and hundreds of guns were taken on the first day, and the success was continued for many days thereafter.  The Allies were elated and the Germans correspondingly depressed.  Their boasted drive had been held back, and now they themselves were the pursued, with the Allies, flushed with victory, close upon their heels.
The Army Boys were in their element, and they fought with a dash and spirit that they had never surpassed.  Other volumes of this series will tell of the thrilling exploits, with the tanks and otherwise, by which they upheld the honor and glory of the Stars and Stripes.
"Well," said Frank one evening, after a day crowded with splendid fighting, "we've put a dent in the Kaiser's helmet."
"Yes," grinned Bart, as he wiped his glowing face.  "Considering that we're green troops that were going to run like sheep before the Prussian Guards, we haven't done so badly."
"I guess the folks at home aren't kicking," remarked Tom.  "They told us to come over here and clean up, and so far we've been obeying orders."
"We've held back the German drive," put in Billy, "but that's just the beginning.  Now we've got to tackle another job.  We've got to drive the Hun out of France----"
"And out of Belgium," added Tom.
"And back to the Rhine," chimed in Bart.
"Get it right, you boobs," laughed Frank.  "Straight back to Berlin!"

= = = PG69115 = = =
ARNE AND THE CHRISTMAS STAR
Arne and the Christmas Star
_Far out to sea, the freighter ~Stjerne~ fought the storm bravely. At home in the little Norwegian fishing village, Arne and his family waited and prayed. It was the Christmas season, and the ~Stjerne~ was the Christmas ship this year, bearing Yuletide gifts and other good things for the village._
_But more important than the gifts, the ~Stjerne~ carried her gallant crew—and Arne’s brother Gustav, her first mate._
_How Arne does his part to help bring the Christmas ship safely into port makes a thrilling tale._
By the author of THE CHRISTMAS STOVE.
Arne and the Christmas Star
_a story of Norway_
Alta Halverson Seymour
_illustrated by Frank Nicholas_
_Wilcox and Follett Company_ CHICAGO
ARNE AND THE CHRISTMAS STAR _by_ ALTA HALVERSON SEYMOUR _Copyright 1952, by Wilcox & Follett Co._ _Manufactured in the United States of America_
Arne and the Christmas Star
_To Todd who was the first to make friends with Arne_
[Illustration]
1
“Oh, Mother, I hear Uncle Jens’s folks are going up the mountain to the saeter tomorrow. Can I go along this time, do you suppose?” Arne’s tongue was flying as he burst into the kitchen, and his blue eyes looked eagerly around for his mother.
No one was in sight but his grandmother, busy with her mixing bowl at the kitchen table. “Where’s Mother, Besta?” he asked. “Cousin Bergel just told me they’re going to take the cows and goats up the mountain tomorrow. Do you know who all are going? Do you suppose I can—”
“For goodness’ sake, boy, you go on like a spinning wheel! It must be that red hair of yours that drives you along so fast. Just be quiet a minute, will you? I can only answer five or six questions at a time. Your mother and sister Margret are over helping Aunt Tina get things ready for the trip tomorrow.”
[Illustration]
“They’re going, then! Oh, I hope I get to go too. I think I will, don’t you?” Arne helped himself to a bit of cooky dough from the sticky yellow mass on his grandmother’s floured board, looking warily at her out of the corner of his eye. Her hand was quick, and he might get a sharp rap on the knuckles.
But he didn’t this time. She merely moved her board away from him and began adding flour to the dough. “Such a boy!” she exclaimed. “It would be a rest to me if your mother let you stay up on the mountain all summer.”
Arne knew she didn’t mean that. The two were the best of friends. Grandmother Dalen, whom everyone called Besta as a shortened form of the dignified Norwegian _bedstemor_, seemed to enjoy his tricks and teasing. She had even been heard to say, when she didn’t know Arne was around, “I like naughty boys.” Then she had caught sight of him and added briskly, “They give you something to work on.”
Now she nipped off a piece of dough and molded it into a soft long roll which she deftly tied into a bowknot. She filled her pan with rows of similar bowknots and slipped it into the hot oven.
“Who’s going, Besta, do you know?” asked Arne, watching the cooky-making with interest but wishing she would hurry and answer his questions. “I just wish we had a saeter of our own.”
[Illustration]
“Lots of use your father would have for such a thing!” scoffed Besta.
Arne’s father was in the fish-packing business and owned just enough land to grow a little hay and keep a cow or two and some goats. But Uncle Jens was a real farmer; and, like most farmers in Norway, he had his own skyland pastures high in the mountain valleys where the grass grew green and lush. These were called saeters, and each had its little cabin where some of the daughters of the family spent their summers. The girls milked the cows and goats which were taken from the home farm to be pastured up there, made the cheese, and churned the butter. Arne thought some of the best fun of the summer was at the saeter. The day of moving up there was especially jolly.
“Cousin Signe will have to go, of course,” he said, “and Bergel, I suppose.”
“Yes, Bergel’s old enough to help this year—almost as old as you. She’s eleven now. Your sister Margret will take our own cows and goats up and tend to them. And of course Uncle Jens and Aunt Tina and little Knut will take the housekeeping things and help get the girls settled. And Cousin Evart—”
“And me—did they say I’m going?” Arne asked eagerly, as she paused.
Besta was something the shape of one of her own butterballs, but that did not keep her from moving fast, or talking fast either, as a rule. Now, however, she seemed intent on her work, and when she answered she spoke almost reluctantly. “I haven’t heard anything about your going, Arne. I did hear your father say he needed some extra help baling _lutfisk_. He said he was glad school is out so you can help.”
“Baling _lutfisk_!” said Arne despairingly. He had done that before, plenty of times, especially when father had a shipment he wanted to get off in a hurry. “That’s such a tiresome job, and so smelly! Do I have to stay home for that stuff?”
“You like _lutfisk_ as well as anyone when it comes to the table,” Besta reminded him. “Don’t you know how good it is, with melted butter or nice milk gravy?”
Arne knew that well enough, but he certainly did not relish the idea of staying home from the first saeter trip of the summer to bale _lutfisk_. Part of the work connected with _lutfisk_ was all right. It was fun to help unload the big cod from the fishing boats, to watch the men expertly split and clean the fish and spread them to dry. Ole Berg, the old fisherman who was father’s right-hand man, had showed Arne how it was done, and even let him help.
Father thought Arne was a little young to handle the big, sharp knives, but Ole said the boy was very quick with his hands. So Herr Dalen gave his son a good Norwegian hunting knife with a silver handle shaped like a horse’s head and a neat leather sheath which fitted on his belt. Arne was very proud of it and put it to good use under Ole’s directions. But baling those bundles of dried fish was a very different matter. And certainly tomorrow was no day to spend on the packing-house dock at a tedious job like that. Then a hopeful thought struck him, and he asked, “Well, then, is Gustav going to help bale _lutfisk_ too?”
His big brother Gustav was at home just now between voyages to sea—Gustav, who was going to be a ship’s captain some day. He would sail as first mate the very next time the steamer _Laks_ came to port here in Nordheim on its way up the fjord.
“What’s that about Gustav?” called out a big voice; and a tall, dark-eyed young man with curly black hair came into the kitchen. “Oh, good for you, Besta! You’re making _kringler_! Are those for the trip to the saeter?”
“Are you going to the saeter too, Gustav?” cried Arne accusingly. “And I have to stay home and bale smelly old _lutfisk_!”
Disappointment swept over him. It was worse than ever if Gustav was going and he couldn’t. There was a lump in his throat, and it seemed to him he could hardly breathe. All spring he had been looking forward to this trip. He longed to be in the gay procession that would wind its way from the little village up the mountain road. Up it would go until the road became only a path, then still up and up. At last they would come to the little log house right on the cliff overlooking the fjord, with the pastures and valleys behind and mountains, gray with granite and green with pines, rising above it all.
First would go Suri, Uncle Jens’s fat, light tan fjord pony with its black mane and tail. Arne was a great favorite of Suri’s, for he always had a lump or two of sugar in his pocket, and she had learned to nuzzle for it as he patted and talked to her. Suri would pull the light hay cart piled with pots and kettles, milk pails and cans, chums and bedding, and all the other housekeeping things. When they reached the place where the road became no more than a trail, they would tether the pony and leave her to spend a pleasant day cropping tender mountain grass.
Aunt Tina would drive, and little Knut would ride beside her. The girls would be in charge of the cows and goats. Uncle Jens and Evart and Gustav would carry big packs, because they couldn’t burden fat little Suri too heavily. No horse-loving Norwegian would think of it.
There they would go, the bells on the pony’s harness jingling, the cowbells ringing, little Knut tooting or whistling, everyone singing and laughing. Even his cousin Bergel, just a girl and almost a year younger than he was, would be in that jolly procession; and he couldn’t go. This year it would be more fun than ever, for Gustav was going too, and there was always a special lot of fun where Gustav was. It seemed to Arne he would fairly burst with disappointment.
He had hard work to keep from crying, but of course you couldn’t do that when you were twelve years old—especially when there were people around. But his nose pricked and his throat ached; he had to wink fast and turn and walk over to the sink as if he wanted a drink of water—which he didn’t.
Gustav stood looking at Besta, and Besta stood looking back to him.
“You’ll be going up later on in the summer, Arne,” said Besta comfortingly.
“I don’t care about going later,” said Arne, and his voice came out something like a croak. “I want to go now, when Gustav’s going, and everything getting ready—”
“I was thinking,” said Gustav slowly. “They’re going to need all the help they can get to carry the stuff from where we leave Suri. Arne’s a pretty big boy now, and he could be a lot of help. I know that’s one of the reasons they want me to go.”
“They want you because everyone wants to have you around,” said Arne, his voice still muffled. But the heavy feeling in his chest lightened a little, and he turned half around, looking hopefully at his brother. Gustav was pretty good at finding a way out of things.
Gustav said, “_Lutfisk_ could be baled tonight as well as tomorrow. Father wants to have the shipment ready to send off day after tomorrow, that’s all. We can work down there tonight. It’s light on the dock till nearly midnight, these June nights.”
“We?” Arne’s grin began to break out. “Do you mean you’re going to help?”
“Why not? I baled _lutfisk_ when I was smaller than you are, and helped pack the kegs of pickled herring too, sampling as I packed. I used to kind of like to hang around that packing house. And it’s fun to think of fish from the little port of Nordheim going all over, even as far as America. Come on, boy.”
Arne dashed joyfully across the room. “Say, I like to hang around the warehouse, too, but I can do that any time, and the saeter—well, that’s different. And this year Uncle Jens is going to rig up an extra good kind of special works to send the milk cans and hay from the top of the cliff down to the level land. We’ve been talking a lot about it. I want to help with that.”
“Well, why not? You’re pretty good at that kind of thing. Now we’ll go down to the packing house, and I’ll show you how to grab up those stiff old _lutfisk_ and wind the wire around in a hurry. I’ve got a good technique. We’ll work fast, and if we get enough done, maybe Father will let you go tomorrow.”
The two brothers did not have very far to go, although their white house with its red roof and doors stood near the edge of the little harbor town far up on the Norwegian coast, where a mighty fjord joins the sea. They walked quickly along the narrow, cobbled street that twisted its way down to the wharf, past the brightly-painted houses—orange, green, and red—past the _stavkirke_ with its roofs and gables rising one above another.
Arne liked that old church. He liked the carved dragon heads which sprung from the highest gables and rose above the small turret that topped the whole edifice.
“We’re lucky to have it, you know,” said Gustav. “There aren’t many of those old churches around Norway, and none at all anywhere else. It’s nearly a thousand years old; did you know that? It’s lasted since the days the old Vikings used to have to carry spears or bows and arrows when they went to church.”
“I like those old Vikings. And those were good days, Gustav,” said Arne. “They didn’t have to be sending _lutfisk_ to America in those days.”
Gustav laughed. “Well, we do. So shake a leg.”
The packing house stood at the edge of the fjord, handy for unloading the fishing boats and for loading the ships that carried the kegs and cans and bales of fish to far-off ports.
Father was a little surprised to see them; and he was pleased, too, though he didn’t say so. Usually he had to make it very clear when he expected Arne to report for duty. And here the boy had come down himself and offered to help. Here was Gustav, too, who was on a vacation and not expected to do real work.
Gustav did have a very quick way of handling that _lutfisk_. He picked up several of the long stiff pieces of fish which Arne thought looked exactly like pieces of wood. These he arranged neatly in a bundle, bound it with wire, fastened and clipped it. As he worked, he sang some of the rollicking folk songs Besta had taught them long ago; and that made the job go even faster. Old Ole worked with them; he knew songs Arne had never heard. Before long Father joined the group; and by the time they stopped for supper, a good share of the work was out of the way.
“There, now,” said Father with satisfaction. “We are going to see to it that those poor folks in America do not starve for good Norwegian _lutfisk_. Time to stop for supper. I wonder what Mother will have for us to eat.”
“Hope it won’t be _lutfisk_,” said Arne fervently, and they all laughed.
When they entered the kitchen a few minutes later, they were pleased to see that Mother was cooking a large pan of meat balls.
Arne thought his mother was very pretty, with her coppery hair that shone like one of her own brightly-polished pots, her deep blue eyes and quick smile. And he knew very well she was the most comfortable person in the world to be around. There was a capable air about her that made one feel good inside.
His mouth watered as she filled a large platter with meat balls while Margret set big mugs of milk on the table and Besta brought a large bowl of steaming hot potatoes. It was a favorite meal of Arne’s, but for once he was the first to finish. He ran around the table to bow to his mother and father with the customary Norwegian, “_Tak for mad_,” which meant, “Thank you for the meal.” Then he said, “Now, let’s get back to that _lutfisk_.”
Father glanced at Mother, and his voice sounded as if he wanted to smile. But all he said was, “I’m afraid Arne is working himself out of a job.”
Mother had been talking to Besta, and now she answered soberly, though her eyes twinkled. “It may be he will have to go along on that saeter trip and help there, if he’s so eager to work.”
Arne looked from one to the other. They sounded serious, but they often joked that way. He grinned and brought his hands together in a noisy clap. “Am I going to the saeter, then?”
“Let’s see how we get along this evening with the work,” was all Father would say. But Arne’s heart felt light as he went back to the dock with the others. His fingers flew, and he sang louder than anyone.
[Illustration]
2
The sun was still high in that land of the midnight sun when Father said, “Past nine o’clock. Time for a boy to be in bed if he’s to be up early to start for the saeter.”
“Oh, Father! I can go?” cried Arne.
“Well, the _lutfisk’s_ nearly all baled. We don’t want you around here tomorrow eating up all the pickled herring. Uncle Jens is going to need help. See that you give it to him.”
“Oh, I will! Oh yes, sir!” cried Arne joyfully.
He wanted to say a special thank-you to Gustav for making it possible, but he didn’t quite know how. Gustav was likely to make a joke of things, and this wasn’t a joke at all. He did look up at his big brother, half shyly, as they walked up the hill toward home, and say, “I’m glad I am going. It was your doing, really.”
“Oh that was just because I wanted you to carry the heaviest loads,” said Gustav, with a wink. “I plan to take it easy. Don’t you loaf on the job, boy.”
He smiled and gave a friendly yank at a lock of Arne’s red hair, and the boy felt so happy he ran and jumped nearly all the way home.
It was still broad daylight when Arne tumbled into his feather bed and pulled another feather bed over him for covering. June nights grew cold along the fjord.
It seemed to him he had hardly fallen asleep when his sister Margret was calling, “Get up, lazybones, if you want to come with the rest of us.”
Almost before Arne had finished his breakfast of mush and milk and cheese, he heard a clatter on the upper road behind the house and dashed out.
There they all came, just as he had pictured it. His cousin Bergel ran to meet him, her blue eyes shining. “Can you go, Arne?” she cried, and at his nod, “Oh, good! I like it lots better if you’re along.”
“So do I,” said Arne, and they both laughed.
He adjusted his pack and fell in with Gustav and Uncle Jens and Evart. Margret, flushed and pretty, ran around trying to persuade their two cows and the goats to fall in with the others. Arne would have enjoyed helping her with that, but cows and goats were definitely the province of womenfolk. He knew very well that Margret didn’t want any interference from him. Bergel and Signe came to her aid; and soon the procession was on its way, bells ringing, everyone singing and waving and laughing, while Mother and Father and Besta called out, “A pleasant trip!” “Good luck!” “God be with you!”
The road ran at first along the foot of the mountain. It was a good road, though there were fences across it in many places, marking someone’s land boundary. But each fence had a gate which was opened to let the little cavalcade through, and then carefully closed. Before long they branched off to a road which climbed the mountain ever more steeply and presently turned into a trail. Here they tethered fat little Suri, and the cart’s load was divided among them. The men would have to make more than one trip down to get the rest of the goods.
Arne had been here many times before, and he rushed ahead so fast that Uncle Jens called him a mountain goat and told him not to fall into the fjord if he got to the saeter before the others.
[Illustration]
They came at last to a log cabin with a sod roof. Pansies and bluebells were growing on the roof, and even a few little bushes and a tiny birch tree. The cabin stood in a wide clearing not far from the edge of the cliff which overlooked the fjord. Little Knut had to be tethered to a tall fir tree for safety.
The older girls drove the cattle and goats into the pastures which sloped through the valley up toward the mountain.
Bergel wanted to go and gather wild flowers. “Come on, Arne,” she urged. “There are foxgloves up here, and wild pansies and—”
“Oh, let’s go fishing,” Arne answered. “You can get wild flowers any time.”
“That’s right, do that,” said Aunt Tina. “We could use some nice mountain trout. But first get in some wood, you two. It’s high time for midmorning coffee.”
“Evart, let’s you and me get another load from the cart, and then go fishing with Bergel and Arne as soon as we’ve had coffee,” said Gustav. “All right with you?”
“I’m always ready to go fishing,” replied Evart, with a grin.
“I’ll help get the load up; then I must get busy fixing our milk-can elevator,” said Uncle Jens. “I’ve arranged with my neighbor to see to the end of it down at the bottom.”
Arne was delighted to have the older boys in the fishing party. They were really experts, and he liked to watch them. Also they knew the best spots to fish. Up the trail a little way was a clear, deep stream, and there they soon got all the mountain trout they could use. Arne himself caught six, and Bergel four.
“Oh, I wish we could stay all summer,” said Arne. “Don’t you, Gustav?”
Gustav laughed. “This isn’t man’s work,” he declared. “This is just fun.”
“You’re getting anxious to sail off,” said Evart. “When do you go?”
“The _Laks_ arrives in a few days. Then it will go up the fjord with me on it,” said Gustav. He sounded happy at the prospect, but Arne’s heart sank. He didn’t like to think of Gustav going away again.
“Wish I could go,” said Arne, with a gusty sigh. “I haven’t even been on a boat and bicycle trip yet like some of the boys.”
“You’re too young,” said Bergel in her practical way. “And you haven’t a bicycle.”
Gustav looked thoughtfully at his brother as they walked down to the cabin. “Could be we might take you along on one trip on the _Laks_, Arne. Put you to work, you know, swabbing the deck and peeling potatoes and all kinds of things.”
“Oh, boy!” cried Arne. “Do you think I could, Gustav? And say, if you’re going to be going up and down the fjord, you can touch home every now and then.”
“That’s just for a few trips,” said Gustav. “Then I sail with Captain Olsen on the _Stjerne_. He says that will be the Christmas boat this year.”
“Oh, good, the Christmas _Star_!” cried Bergel, for _Stjerne_ is the Norwegian word for star. “That will be just right. It’ll be fun to have you on the Christmas boat.”
“First he goes clear to South America. Don’t you, Gustav?” said Arne proudly.
“Yes, to South American ports and others too. We’ll bring back meat and fruit and grain and unload a lot of it at Oslo. Then we’ll take on more cargo—mostly Christmas things—and make the Christmas trip up the coast.”
“And bring in toys and candies and fruit and nuts and gifts and everything nice,” said Arne, his eyes glowing. “And you’ll stay home for Christmas, won’t you?”
“Yes, Captain Olsen says the Christmas crew should be home for Christmas. Nordheim is one of the last stops before Captain Olsen’s home at Tromsö, where they’ll put in for a couple of weeks or more. One of the other boys will take my place for that short pull.”
“Everyone’s going to be glad to see that Christmas boat come in,” said Evart.
“And Mother’ll be glad right now to see these fish come in,” remarked Bergel.
Aunt Tina and the girls stopped their work of scrubbing every floor and wall and stick of furniture in the cabin to admire the morning’s catch. Bergel stayed to help with the cleaning, and the boys went to help Uncle Jens, who was busy with wires and tools.
Uncle Jens had had a wire elevator before this for use in sending down milk cans and hay, but he felt it had been a somewhat makeshift affair. This year he wanted it to be strong and secure enough for any reasonable load, for his herd was an extra large one.
Arne liked this kind of a job, and he felt proud to be working with Uncle Jens and Gustav and Evart. Strong wires were fastened securely to trees and firmly anchored below to posts driven at some distance from the foot of the cliff. A milk can or a large bundle of hay could be sent down those wires in a rope sling, easily and swiftly.
When the little elevator was ready at last, Uncle Jens said they must send down a large milk can to make sure everything was all right. They filled one with water, tied it securely with a heavy rope, and watched as it slid and swayed its way down. Then the wires were tightened again, and they drew the milk can up and made more tests.
“I think it will do,” Uncle Jens said at last.
With all the outdoor air and work, Arne was getting hungry again. So were the others, and every one was glad when Aunt Tina appeared with a large white coffeepot. “Time for afternoon coffee,” she called.
Gustav sat where he could look out over the fjord, as if he hoped he might see the _Laks_ coming in ahead of time. Suddenly he gave an exclamation and jerked his field glasses out of his pocket. “Some kid down there has turned over in a sailboat!” he exclaimed, jumping up and rushing to the cliff edge. The others followed.
“Don’t believe that kid knows much about swimming,” Gustav said, taking another quick look through his glasses. “He isn’t making for shore—just trying to hang on to that capsized boat. That’s slippery business. The water’s deep and cold.”
“It’s Oscar Blessom’s boat!” cried Arne. “But Oscar’s on a bicycle trip. Must be Torger! He isn’t very big, and I know he can’t swim much. And there’s no one near enough to see or help him.” Arne looked at Gustav hopelessly. Not even Gustav could help now.
But Gustav’s lips were set, and he went quickly toward the wire elevator.
“What are you going to do?” cried Margret anxiously.
“Go down the wires,” said Gustav tersely.
“Oh, you can’t! You can’t do that!” protested Aunt Tina and the girls. “It isn’t strong enough! It wasn’t made for a man.”
“Got to try it. Don’t see any other way. Got to get there fast or it will be too late. Have you got some cloths, Aunt Tina? I have to wind them around my hands, or they’ll be torn on the wires so I can’t use them.”
Aunt Tina flew for cloths and wound them quickly around his hands while Uncle Jens and Evart made a rope loop for Gustav to sit in.
All this was speedily accomplished. Uncle Jens and Evart helped adjust him in the loop while Arne watched, proud of Gustav, fearful he might get hurt, afraid he might not get there in time.
“Here I go,” said Gustav. “Hold onto that rope, Uncle Jens, tight as you can.”
The group at the top of the cliff watched breathlessly as Gustav went down. At first the wires swayed dangerously under his weight. Arne’s heart seemed to come right up into his throat. Gustav was a good deal heavier than a full milk can. But he adjusted his weight to one side and another and then shot down swiftly.
The moment Gustav reached level ground, he jumped free of the rope. Torger must have lost his hold now. They could see that the boat had drifted away. Gustav knew that, too, for he was racing toward the water, pulling off his coat as he ran. He snatched off his shoes and plunged in.
[Illustration]
Arne wished he had field glasses so that he could see every detail of what was going on. He could tell that Gustav was moving fast. But would he get there in time?
“He’s making it,” said Uncle Jens, his voice full of relief. “He’s got hold of whoever it is. Bringing him in to shore.”
“It’s Torger Blessom, all right,” said Arne. Gustav had the little boy on shore now. He laid him down on a large rock and bent over him, working quickly.
Arne looked at the wires and then at his uncle. Gustav could use some help down there. If they’d pull the rope right back up, maybe he could muster the courage to go down those wires as Gustav had done.
But to his relief, Uncle Jens said, “See, he has Torger on his feet. He’ll be all right now.”
“We must be thinking of getting started, now,” said Aunt Tina. “We can’t go down like Gustav. We have to take the long way around. I’ll be up in a week or two, Signe, and give you a hand with making the cheese. And Bergel can help. She’s eleven now, and it is time she learned.”
Bergel smoothed her apron as they walked toward the cabin. She felt pleased and proud that Arne had heard her mother say this. He sometimes acted as if he didn’t think girls amounted to much. But she liked him and longed for his good opinion.
“Arne, you come again,” said Bergel. “We’ll go fishing.”
“We’ll be up, all of us, from time to time,” said Aunt Tina, who loved the mountain saeter as much as anyone. It made her feel like a girl again to be up here, for in her younger days she too had had her turn at tending cows and goats on the mountain in summer, at caring for the milk and making the cheese. “Just for tonight I want to be the first to blow the saeter horn. Run and get it, Bergel.”
Bergel ran into the house and came out with a long wooden horn, which she handed to her mother. The little girl longed to try it herself. They had told her, other summers, that she was too little; but perhaps if she was considered big enough to help with the cheese, she might be big enough to blow the horn, too.
She watched eagerly as her mother lifted it to her lips and blew a deep, mellow blast to call the cows home. Then, to her delight, her mother handed it to her and said, “You try it, Bergel. It will take more than one blast to bring the cows home.”
Perhaps Bergel would have blown a good blast the first time if Arne had not stood mimicking her, pretending with great effort to lift an imaginary horn to his lips, puffing out his cheeks, pursing his lips, and bringing out a small squeak.
Bergel had to laugh, and so did the others. But Margret gave her brother a brisk shake and told him to try to behave himself for once. “Try again, Bergel,” she said. This time the little girl managed to bring out, if not as long and deep a blast as her mother had, at least a very creditable sound.
The girls would have to go out into the woods and valleys and up the mountainside to get some of the goats and even some of the cows, for the first few evenings at any rate. But before long, most of them would answer the call of the saeter horn.
The bells on the cows and goats were ringing over the valleys, and the saeter horn sounded again and again through the clear mountain air as they started down the path, Arne running ahead of everyone.
It had been a wonderful day, but he was glad to be going home. He wanted to hear all about the rescue of Torger Blessom, to see Torger himself and make sure he was all right. And he wanted very much to find out how Gustav felt going down those wires.
[Illustration]
3
Gustav only laughed when Arne asked him how it felt to go down those wires. “You’ll really have to try it yourself to find out,” he said. “It wasn’t much. Now you’d better run over and see Torger.”
Torger was still a little pale and more than a little mortified over his accident. “Gustav said he’d give me a lesson in handling a boat,” he told Arne. “He said maybe we could go out tomorrow, the three of us.”
“If Gustav teaches you, believe me, you’ll learn how,” said Arne. “He’s the one who taught me to sail and swim. Wonder why your brother Oscar didn’t teach you.”
“They are too near of an age,” said Torger’s mother. “Gustav is quite a bit older than you, and you are willing to learn from him. When Oscar tries to show Torger how to do something, it generally ends up in a fight.”
The boys couldn’t help grinning, for they knew Fru Blessom was right.
The next morning, Gustav took both boys out on the fjord. There was a stiff wind blowing, and the sailboat was not easy to manage. He said it would be good experience for Arne, and that if Torger learned in this wind, he’d never be afraid of a sailboat. Gustav was thorough in his instructions, and both boys worked manfully.
“I’ve got the hang of it now,” Torger said confidently. “I bet I won’t turn over in a boat again.”
“I don’t believe you will, Torger,” said Gustav. “Now you two lads be sure to get out on the fjord and sail every chance you have. The best summer fun in the world is on a fjord.”
“And the best thing to have fun with is a boat,” said Arne.
“You’re right about that,” Gustav agreed heartily. Then he gave a sudden exclamation, “Put her hard over to the left, Arne! We’re going in now as fast as we can! Do you see what’s coming in from the sea? The _Laks_ is almost in port.”
Gustav sounded very happy, but Arne’s heart felt heavy as he steered toward shore. It had been such fun to have his brother home, and the time had gone all too quickly. Now it would be months before he would be here for more than a short visit.
But Gustav wouldn’t let anyone be gloomy today. No sooner had they tied the little sailboat up at the warehouse dock than he was rushing toward the big wharf, the younger boys beside him.
“From the way Arne’s going, I’ll have to hurry to get there first. He’ll be going as first mate in my place, or maybe skipper,” Gustav called out.
He stopped to smooth his hair and shake his coat into place before he talked to the captain. After that he hurried home to get his things, which were ready packed.
Besta and Mother came back with him, and Father, too, came down to the wharf to see him off. Half the town was gathering there, indeed, especially the boys and girls. They liked to watch the boat unload its cargo of mail and freight and take on other cargo to go up through the fjord.
Arne and Torger watched as a bright new spinning wheel was unloaded. “That’s for my grandmother,” said Torger, “and about time, too. She’s been complaining that she wouldn’t have wool ready for the Christmas knitting if that wheel didn’t come soon.”
Crates of oranges from America were next, boxes of groceries and drygoods, and windows for the new house going up at the edge of town. There was not very much to load on the boat here. The fish from the packing house went to ports farther away. Towns along the fjord could catch their own fish. There was mail to go. A few passengers got on. Arne saw a group of boys on board with sleeping bags and rucksacks. He knew their bicycles were stowed away somewhere and that they were on a holiday jaunt up the fjords and over the mountains. One of these days he’d be going on such a jaunt, too.
A little flutter of interest in the crowd made him turn quickly. To his surprise, he saw Uncle Jens coming down the street, leading Suri. He went straight over to the captain and said, “I want to send Suri up to Blegen for a little while. My wife’s brother needs an extra pony to help with some farm work, and I can spare Suri just now. So can you take her aboard and make her comfortable?”
“_Ja, Ja_, certainly we can take care of Suri,” the captain assured him.
But Suri did not seem to care for such a trip in the least. A broad band was securely fastened around her and a derrick swung over to lift her aboard. But little Suri stamped and champed and lifted her head, her eyes rolling in fright as she complained in loud whinnies.
No one thought of such a thing as trying to force the little mare aboard. Uncle Jens talked to her, and she quieted down a bit; but when the derrick came toward her again, once more she backed and stamped and whinnied nervously.
The other loading was finished. The sailors were closing the holds. But the _Laks_ could not weigh anchor because little Suri, in spite of all wheedling, was flatly refusing to go aboard.
Arne only wished he had the chance Suri was refusing, but nevertheless he felt very sorry for the frightened little horse. Perhaps he could coax her a bit—he had done it often enough before.
He went over to try, fishing in his pockets as he went. Yes, there were two lumps of sugar. He put an arm over Suri’s neck and offered her one, talking to her softly the while. She nuzzled her soft brown nose into his hand and seemed to feel comforted.
“Go on, Arne,” Uncle Jens encouraged him. “She seems to listen to you.”
So Arne stood there, coaxing little Suri, feeding her sugar, talking to her, patting her, until she stopped trembling and champing and at last let him fasten the big hook in the band which was fastened firmly about her. Then he ran onto the boat and stood there talking to her from the deck. Now at last she let them swing her aboard, and though she stamped anxiously at first, she allowed Arne to take the band off and lead her down into the hold.
“Wish I could go along with you, Suri,” he said, putting his cheek against her neck and giving her a pat.
[Illustration]
Gustav had come down to see that everything was in good order, and now he gave his young brother an encouraging nod. “That was a pretty good job, Arne; you saved the skipper a lot of time, and that may turn out to be a good thing.”
“Do you think he might let me go on the boat some time, Gustav?” asked Arne eagerly.
“I can’t promise a thing yet. You skip ashore now, and we’ll see. The ship’s bell is ringing. They want to get started. And our captain wouldn’t care for a stowaway aboard, I know that.”
So it came about that Arne was laughing as he ran down the gangplank just as they were about to pull it up. And instead of feeling sad as the boat steamed away with Gustav aboard, he was thinking of the day when he might be aboard too.
He looked up to see his father standing there, smiling down at him. “I thought for a minute there I was going to have two sons on that ship this time,” he said. “Looked to me as if the captain could find a use for you.”
“Oh, I wish I could be aboard, especially when the _Stjerne_ sails out,” said Arne, heaving a great sigh. “That’s the life, isn’t it, Father?”
His father laughed, a contented, good-natured laugh. “That’s the natural way for a Norwegian boy to feel, I guess. I did my share of sailing, too, in my early days. But I understand there’s such a thing as school. I hear boys are expected to go to that in Norway.”
Arne knew his father was joking; so he smiled back, though school never seemed to him a very good subject for a joke. “I suppose so,” he said. “But I like outdoor things so much better than schoolwork. I just wish it were summer all the year around.”
Arne was not the only one who wished it were summer all the year around. Up at the saeter, the girls were having a merry time in spite of the work of caring for the cows and goats, milking and making cheese. There were berry-picking excursions through the woods and valleys to gather blueberries, raspberries, and the lovely bright _multer_ berries which grew thick and red on their low bushes. There were visits with girls in neighboring saeters and fishing trips up the mountain.
“Don’t forget I’m to learn to make cheese,” Bergel reminded Signe one day.
“Oh, yes. Mother wouldn’t like it a bit if we didn’t get that tended to. We’ll start with _gammelost_. That’s best, anyway.”
Under Signe’s direction, Bergel warmed the milk and let it stand until the curds and whey could be separated. Then she dried the curds, crumbling them carefully with her hand, and set it all aside to ripen. Signe even let her add the caraway seed and salt.
When it was brought out some days later for inspection, Margret looked at it with approval. “We should save that for company,” she said, sniffing with appreciation.
Bergel nodded, looking very grown-up as she tasted it with a businesslike air and added a little more salt. Then she put it away in a covered jar to ripen further. “I hope the company will be Arne and Evart and some of the other boys,” she said, and though the other girls laughed, they agreed with her.
Down in the town, Arne was keeping busy, too. He had jobs of many kinds at home, running errands and getting in the wood for the old cookstove Besta preferred to Mother’s new electric range. And he had to help Besta cut the hay in the little patch of ground that sloped from their house up the mountain. It was fun to get in there with a scythe, and to help Besta and Mother hang the hay over the wooden hay fences to dry before it could mildew on the damp ground.
He helped around the packing house, too. There were errands there as well as at home, and there was cleaning to do, and packing. Sometimes he was allowed to go out with the fishermen. He especially liked to go with Ole to fish for _torsk_ and herring and halibut. Sometimes they took a rowboat or a small sailboat up the fjord. Sometimes they took Ole’s big boat and went out to sea.
There was time for play, too, in the summer afternoons and long, light evenings. More than once Arne went away on a day’s jaunt with Oscar and Torger and half a dozen other boys. They sailed and swam and fished on the fjord, and took long hikes up and down the fjord path and up the mountainside.
But Arne never let any of his activities keep him from being right on the dock when the _Laks_ was due. Each time he hoped to hear the glad news that he was to be on board when the ship weighed anchor. Each time he asked Gustav eagerly if he was to go on this trip.
When two or three weeks went by with no invitation for Arne, he began to lose hope. But then one day Gustav jumped off the gangplank calling out, “Where’s that Arne? You better go get some packing done, boy.”
“Really, Gustav? Do I go this time?” cried Arne.
“Looks that way,” answered Gustav. “The skipper says we’re bringing Suri back this trip, and you’d be a good one to have aboard to help with that.”
Arne gave a big, “Oh!” on a deep, blissful sigh, and was off up the hill like a shot to tell Mother the good news and to see to that all-important packing. He had a lot of things he wanted to take, and he had a feeling Mother wouldn’t think half of them were necessary.
“We’ll be here for a couple of hours, at least,” Gustav called after him. “Tell Mother to put the coffeepot on.”
Arne loved that journey up and down the fjord, stopping at each small village with mail and freight. There were a few passengers, and he liked to see them get off amid the joyful greetings of their friends. Often they were met by a light boat which would take them aboard and then skim swiftly and quietly off to some town across the fjord or to some nearby farm.
He made friends with a little party of English lads who had bicycles on board and planned to leave the boat at the head of the fjord and go off through the valleys and over the mountains which Arne taught them to call by the Norwegian name of _fjelds_. He wished he had a sleeping bag like theirs and that he could sleep out with them on deck, though they told him it got pretty cold.
They let him share some of the meals they cooked over their tiny portable stove, and Gustav saw to it that he contributed fish balls or cheese or some other delicacy.
On the afternoon the _Laks_ neared the head of the fjord, Gustav was at the wheel and Arne stood near him, watching the waterfalls dash violently down the high, steep mountain walls.
Suddenly he gave a shout, “Gustav, look out! Rocks falling! Big ones! Right ahead!”
Gustav gave one quick look, and his face was grim. Arne’s heart beat fast. He knew it would be terribly dangerous to hit those rocks here where the _Laks_ steamed between sheer mountain walls. But he saw that his brother wasn’t losing his head for a moment. He was proud of the resolute look on Gustav’s white face, the sure, firm way he managed to turn the wheel and guide the boat to avoid the rocks.
The captain came running up, his face as pale as Gustav’s. “Good work, Gustav,” was all he said, but his relief was plain to see.
At the head of the fjord, the English boys left them, though they stayed on the dock to watch little Suri taken aboard.
Arne kept a sharp lookout for falling rocks as they steamed homeward between the steep rocky cliffs. He was glad when they came to the places where the country flattened out a bit and there was room for a small village or a few farms at the foot of the mountain. Often he caught a glimpse of a saeter high above them.
“Do you think we’re going to get up to the saeter again this summer?” he asked Gustav, after one such glimpse. “I know the girls are counting on it.”
“I’ll have two or three days between my last trip on the _Laks_ and the time the _Stjerne_ sails,” said Gustav. “That will be early in August. Let’s go then.”
“Shall I make a trip up and tell the girls?” asked Arne eagerly. “They’ll have a lot of getting ready to do—a lot of baking and things.”
“You hope,” said Gustav, laughing. “Well, I hope so too, Arne. So we’ll figure out the time and you can hike up that mountain and tell them about it.”
Arne had made many pleasant journeys to the saeter, but there had never been one as gay as the trip up there with Gustav and Evart and a dozen other lads.
“Look! Look what the girls are using for pasture!” cried Arne, as they came in sight of the saeter. A shout of laughter went up, for Bergel had tethered a small white kid to the tiny birch tree on the roof of the cabin.
[Illustration]
The shout brought out the girls, gay in their special holiday dresses. Arne thought they looked very pretty in their full, striped skirts with crisp, lace-trimmed white aprons and bright laced bodices over white blouses. A hand-made silver brooch fastened each blouse at the throat. Margret’s brooch was handed down to her by Besta, Arne knew; and he thought it was the prettiest one of all. These brooches were treasured possessions in Norwegian families.
Signe and Margret and Bergel had invited girls from neighboring saeters, and a good thing, too, for Gustav had brought his accordion and Evart his fiddle. There was dancing and singing and laughter under the trees. Arne and Bergel joined in the fun, for they could do the old folk dances as well as any of them.
Then a feast was spread out on the long table—fish and cheese and _lefse_ and big bowls of berries with whipped cream, and _kringler_ and cakes and cookies of all kinds. Bergel’s _gammelost_ was praised enough to make the young cheesemaker very proud.
The fun stopped toward evening, but only long enough for the girls to get in the cows and goats and do their milking, to make fresh coffee and replenish the dishes on the table. Then the dancing started again and went on far into the long summer evening.
At last the party from the village started down the trail for home, reluctantly, to be sure, but singing and laughing nevertheless.
It was a sleepy Arne who tumbled into his feather bed at last. This had been a long day, but a wonderful one.
[Illustration]
4
The _Stjerne_ came into port a few days later, and Gustav sailed away as first mate. He was so happy about it that Arne couldn’t help feeling some of that happiness too. He remembered what fun it had been to go up the fjord on the _Laks_, and he didn’t blame anyone for wanting to go to sea.
But Gustav was sailing far away this time, all the way to South America, touching at many ports on the voyage. It would be a long time before he returned.
“Oh, Gustav!” The words fairly burst from Arne as he stood watching the final packing. “I wish South America wasn’t so far away!”
Perhaps Gustav knew how he would have felt if he had been in Arne’s place. He put his arm around Arne’s shoulder and said, “Look here, fellow, I’ve got something I want to leave with you. Father gave me new field glasses as a parting gift. I want you to have my old ones.”
“For keeps?” cried Arne. It would be wonderful to have those glasses.
“For keeps,” said Gustav, and was fully rewarded by Arne’s shining face.
“Now you can watch us till we get clear out to sea and turn down the channel between the shore and the islands. In fact, if you go up on the cliff, you can watch us farther than that.”
“Oh, I will! Oh, Gustav! And I’ll be watching when the time comes for you to come home, too, you can bet on that.”
The gift took most of the sadness out of the parting, though Gustav would be gone now until December when the _Stjerne_ would come in with its load of Christmas goods. Then he would be home all through the holidays. That was something to look forward to.
The rest of the summer slipped quickly away. It was time for the girls to come home from the saeter, and Arne went with Uncle Jens and the others to help bring down the girls and the gear, the cows and the calves, the goats and the kids and the cheeses.
School was to start the next week, and he felt a little dismal about it as he talked it over with Bergel. “I hear that new teacher is very strict—Herr Professor Engstrand. Oscar said Pastor Beckstrom’s son told him so.”
Bergel nodded. “I heard so, too. But maybe we have to expect that, now that we’re going to be in the upper room. Just think, Arne. We’ll start learning English, and do a lot of things we couldn’t do before.” Bergel, very quick at her lessons, was in the same grade as her cousin.
“I’ll like being in the same room with Nels and Oscar and those boys instead of a lot of little kids,” Arne admitted.
“Yes, I think it’s wonderful we’re going to be in with the upper grades. And a man teacher. Makes me feel pretty grown-up.”
Arne was surprised when he entered school that first morning and got his first glimpse of Herr Professor Engstrand. Somehow, from Oscar’s remarks, he had expected to see an elderly gentleman. Herr Professor didn’t look much older than Gustav. But he certainly was not like Gustav in any other way. There was no laughter in those stern gray eyes, and his mouth, straight and firm, didn’t look as if it ever even smiled. He stood stiffly beside his desk, his shoulders squared.
When the school was assembled, he made a short speech. “I am new here,” he said, “but we shall soon get to know one another. If you do your work well, we shall get along without trouble. I shall put up with no laziness, no disobedience. You are old enough to know how to work, and that is exactly what I expect you to do.” His words were clipped and curt, and Arne was sure you could have heard a pin drop in that quiet room. Lessons were assigned and classes were held in the most methodical order. Any lack of attention, any slightest sign of disorder, was promptly reprimanded or punished more severely.
[Illustration]
Arne very soon made up his mind about one thing. He would try to obey orders to the letter. He could see there would be trouble ahead if he did anything else. He didn’t know, of course, that this was Herr Professor Engstrand’s first school and that he was desperately anxious to make a good job of it.
Winter set in early, and it was always a relief to Arne to get out of school. He liked to get his skis and go flying down the steep slopes behind the town with Nels and Oscar and Torger and some of the other boys. Evart was away at school this year, and sometimes Arne took Bergel with him coasting. She knew how to steer the long sled almost as well as he did.
He would stop at home in the kitchen first, for he was sure to find Mother and Besta having a cup of afternoon coffee. Sometimes Aunt Tina would be there, too, and Signe and Margret. Sometimes one of the neighbors would come in. But whether there was company or not, there was sure to be something good to go with the coffee—slices from a big, round loaf of ryebread with _gjetost_, Besta’s special goats’ milk cheese, or coffeecake, or _bakkelse_—crisp, delicious little cakes fried in deep fat, or some other of their many specialties. Mother and Besta were as good cooks as you’d find in all Norway, Father often said; and he added that that was saying a lot, for Norway was famous for its good cooks.
Sometimes as he came in, after skiing or skating or coasting, he would hear Besta’s spinning wheel whirring comfortably away. She liked to spin the wool for her knitting and weaving. Even Margret, up-to-date as she considered herself, preferred the soft wool her grandmother spun to any other. Besta never looked as contented as when her foot was on that treadle, her practiced hand drawing out the fine strong woolen yarn.
Arne usually came from school with a rush and a bang. But one day he came into the kitchen without saying a word. Bergel was with him, and she too was quiet.
“Fresh _lefse_, Arne,” said his mother.
Arne nodded, but for once he didn’t make a move to take any.
Besta looked at him keenly. “Trouble in school, Arne?” she asked.
Arne’s face darkened, and he doubled up his fists. “That Herr Professor!” he exclaimed. “He’s just so mean and unreasonable. All I did was to ask Sigurd, just behind me, how far we were to study. And I had to stand up in front of the whole room for an hour.” He flushed as he thought of it.
“Perhaps he thought you would have known how far to study if you had been paying attention,” said Mother, shaking her head, though she felt sorry for Arne.
“Well, I was thinking of something more important than English grammar.” In spite of himself, Arne’s face lighted a little. For right in the midst of class, he had suddenly thought of a delightful plan—a surprise for everyone for Christmas. Mother was exactly right, though he didn’t like to admit it. He had been thinking out details of his project instead of paying attention.
“How do you get along with Herr Professor, Bergel?” asked Besta.
“Oh, of course she gets along fine!” exploded Arne. “She always has her lessons, and she behaves like a little lady.” The mincing tone he assumed almost made Mother and Besta smile, though they realized very well that this was no laughing matter. “Herr Professor likes Bergel, but he sure doesn’t like me. I might just as well stop trying to please him.”
“Oh, don’t do that, Arne,” urged Bergel. “You’ll get used to him. And he does know a lot.” She wished from the bottom of her heart that Herr Professor would say “well done” to Arne once in a while. He did do well in his history and arithmetic.
“Well, have some _lefse_ and some _ost_ and try harder tomorrow,” said his mother sensibly. “You’ll get along all right if you pay attention and study.”
Arne took the _lefse_, but it didn’t taste as good as usual. It didn’t seem to him he could ever learn to get along with Herr Professor Engstrand. It certainly looked as if he were headed for trouble. And with Christmas coming, too.
But he did make an effort, and school went better for some time.
Bergel mentioned it with pleasure as they walked home one afternoon. “You’re really doing fine in school, Arne,” she said. “You haven’t been in a bit of trouble lately. Herr Professor hasn’t even had to look your way. I bet you could be right up at the head of the class if you’d try.”
“There are so many things I like to do better than to have my nose in a book,” said Arne carelessly. “I like to work out in the workshop for one thing. Right now,” he added, his face brightening, “I’m working on—” Then he broke off abruptly and laughed. “Can’t tell you what—it’s a surprise.”
“Oh, go on, tell me,” coaxed Bergel, but Arne only shook his head mysteriously.
“You’ll see,” was all he would say. “I’d better be getting home to get at it. There’s a lot left to do if I’m going to have it ready in time.”
From early November, Arne had been spending every moment he could spare in the little workshop out in back. He was making a number of small ships, some with tiny sails, some with little oars, sawing and cutting and gluing and painting with great care. They would be hung all over the tree—red and green and yellow and blue.
There was to be at least one special one for each member of the family—a fishing boat for Father, the tiniest sailboat for Margret, a red rowboat for Besta, and a blue one for Mother. There should be one for each of the cousins, too, and Uncle Jens and Aunt Tina. And he wanted to make several for Gustav.
No one else in Nordheim or probably anywhere else would have a tree trimmed like that. It would be a surprise for everyone. Arne almost chuckled aloud whenever he thought of it.
His face was bright today as he ran into the kitchen. There were Mother and Besta, having their afternoon cup of coffee. The kitchen was filled with the good smell of baking. _Rosettes_ were spread out on the table—delicate, beautifully-shaped cakes fried in deep fat. There were also crisp star-shaped cinnamon cookies.
He pulled off his cap and asked eagerly, “Any broken pieces for me?” He knew all the well-shaped cakes and cookies would be put away carefully for Christmas.
“Besta broke a few for you,” said his mother, with a twinkle. “And before you go out to that workshop, get me some soap from the storeroom. I am going to take down the curtains and put them to soak.”
For weeks, now, the house had been in a bustle and flurry of Christmas cleaning. Every spot was shining—floors and furniture, brass and copper. The house fairly seemed to twinkle.
He couldn’t see why they had to take down the lace-trimmed window curtains to be washed and stiffly starched. Those curtains looked white as snow to him. But when he said that to Mother, she laughed out loud. “Not have clean curtains for Christmas!” she exclaimed. “What a boy you are, Arne! If your mother did such a thing, _Julenissen_ would be so horrified he would run right away from our house.”
Arne laughed, too. You certainly wouldn’t want to scare away _Julenissen_, the little elf with the pointed red cap and little red suit. He was supposed to live in the attic and bring special good luck at Christmas time, particularly if one always remembered to set out his bowl of milk and give him his Christmas rice porridge. Arne had never actually seen _Julenissen_, but he knew someone in the family always saw to that milk and the porridge.
“_Julenissen_ hates dirt,” said Besta.
“I guess he’ll never get scared away from our house, then,” said Arne. “And I should think he’d like the Christmas baking even better than the cleaning.”
“If he doesn’t, I know somebody else who does,” chuckled his mother.
Arne knew there would be stacks of _flatbrod_, hard and crisp and round, each piece larger than a plate. Besta baked these right on top of her well-scrubbed cookstove. There would be heart-shaped waffles, and _lefse_ and _bakkelse_ and _rosettes_ and all kinds of good coffeecakes. His mouth watered at the thought. If a boy hung around the kitchen at the right times, he was sure to come in for a good many samples, especially broken bits.
He knew there would also be a final scouring of the house just before Christmas, that the windows and the copper flowerpots on the window sills would be gleaming. The geraniums and begonias would be coaxed into bloom for Christmas.
And of course the womenfolk would be busy planning and preparing food to last through the Christmas season, for no one wanted to do much work during the two weeks of the holidays. And there would be a great deal of company.
Father would see to it that they had all the best kinds of fish—the smoked and pickled herring. And the _lutfisk_—which he had so disliked to bale in the summer—would be a favorite part of the Christmas feasting. There would be cheeses, too, of many kinds, and pickled pigs’ feet and headcheese, roasted meats and sausages. Mother always set out a good _koltbord_—a table laden with all these good things and many others; people could help themselves to suit their tastes.
Arne thought of all this as he fortified himself with a substantial snack. Then he went out to the workshop. He had almost enough little ships now, ready for sandpapering and painting. His worries about school were forgotten, and the time flew as he worked, his lips puckered in a low, contented whistle.
Suddenly he straightened with a start. It certainly couldn’t be supper time yet. But Margret was coming down the path calling him.
“Don’t come in! Don’t come in!” he shouted, throwing an old blanket over his work. Then he ran out and closed the door behind him.
“I wouldn’t come in, Arne. You know that,” she said. Her voice sounded muffled and unnatural. In the light which streamed from the kitchen window, he could see that her face looked as if she were trying not to cry.
“What is it? What is it, Margret?” he asked anxiously. “Is something wrong?”
“We heard something over the radio,” said Margret; and now, in spite of her efforts, her voice broke into a sob. “Oh, Arne, there are storms at sea—bad ones—sleet storms and ice storms right where the _Stjerne_ must be now!”
Arne’s heart seemed to turn right over. He knew very well the danger his brother was in. All his life he had heard of those winter storms at sea. He wished with all his might that Gustav’s ship was safe right here in Nordheim harbor.
[Illustration]
5
A very quiet family gathered around the supper table that evening. Even the thought of his little ships didn’t bring Arne any cheer. Indeed, he could hardly bear even to think of ships. Mother tried to talk as usual, and so did Father, but no one’s heart was in it.
Arne could not settle down to anything. He wanted to ask questions, but knew there could be no comforting answers. At last, without being told, he wandered off to bed.
It was hard for him to keep his mind on schoolwork the next morning. He rushed home at the midday recess, bolted his meal, got his field glasses, and went up to the cliff as fast as he could get there. Gustav’s ship should be coming in soon, if it hadn’t run into trouble. You never knew for sure when a freighter would be in. Father said it was always best to allow a little extra time even in good weather. But Arne had been hoping it might come in a little ahead of time. Perhaps he’d even catch sight of it today. Then there would certainly be rejoicing!
There was no sign of the ship as he looked out over the stormy waters, but he lingered so long on the cliff that he barely got into the schoolroom in time. Herr Engstrand looked at him severely, and though he said nothing, Arne realized he had better not cut it so close again.
He couldn’t keep away from the cliff at noon. But each day he stood there, looking, only a short time and was careful to get to school before the bell rang.
[Illustration]
At home, Mother was trying her best to keep everything normal, but she looked more and more anxious as the news of storms continued. Even Father, accustomed as he was to ships and storms at sea, looked anxious as he listened to the reports over the radio.
Christmas preparations went on, but there wasn’t much laughing or singing over them now.
“Why don’t we hear something?” Arne asked his father in desperation. “Couldn’t they let someone know if they’re in trouble? Couldn’t help go to them?”
“We hear the names of some of the ships in trouble. But no word comes of the _Stjerne_,” his father said, and paused. “I hope it is just that their radio has gone bad. Yes, that must be it.” He spoke as if he wanted to reassure himself as much as Arne.
That day the bell had rung before Arne slid into his seat at school. He got a sharp reprimand from the teacher, but for once he didn’t care. He could only think of Gustav, out there on the stormy sea.
But Bergel _did_ care. She knew Christmas plans were afoot in school, and she could not bear to have him get into trouble now. The next noon Bergel was watching for her cousin, and when she saw him start toward the cliff, she seized her sled and ran after him.
“Arne! Arne!” she called over and over as she neared the cliff, but the wind was strong, and he did not hear her. She hurried on, faster than ever, looking anxious but determined. If they didn’t look out, they’d both be late for school.
Yes, there he was, high up on the very peak of the cliff, looking out to sea through his field glasses. She called and shouted, waving her arm in a frantic signal. This time he heard, put his glasses away, and started down.
“Look here, Bergel, you didn’t need to come—” he began, slightly annoyed.
“I know,” interrupted Bergel. “But today I think Herr Professor is going to announce the trip up the mountain for Christmas greens. You don’t want to be late and maybe have to stay home from that. I think my sled will get us there on time.”
“So!” said Arne. Bergel was a pretty good kid. “Hop on, then. We’ll beat that school bell. We’ll take the short cut, shall we? That’ll get us there all right.”
“Well,” said Bergel, hesitating a little. “It’s dangerous, but—”
“Not with your cousin Arne as navigator! Come on!”
Arne was daring, Bergel knew that, but he was skillful, too. And she certainly didn’t want to be late today. Herr Professor might punish latecomers by refusing to let them go on that expedition up the mountain for the Christmas greens. She got on the sled and shut her eyes tight as they went flying down the steep hill toward the schoolgrounds. She was a little frightened, it is true, but almost too excited to realize it. If they avoided that big rock now, they’d be all right.
[Illustration]
Arne’s face was grim as they whizzed downward. This was a dangerous hill. He had to give all his attention to steering and braking. Bergel had risked her own good record and the chance of going up the mountain in order to warn him. He just had to get her back safely and on time.
It was a triumphant moment when the breathless ride was accomplished safely, and the cousins jumped off the sled. Then they made a dash across the schoolground.
Arne’s thoughts were racing as fast as his feet. Where was that ship, anyway? It was really overdue now, several days. Maybe something had happened to Captain Olsen. Maybe Gustav had to bring in the ship. What if he had had to take command and had failed to bring it safely to port? Arne couldn’t bear to think of such a thing.
He looked so anxious that Bergel, glancing at him as they pulled off their coats, said softly, “Don’t forget—it’s the Christmas _Star_ we’re waiting for. And remember, that’s always come in safe and sure.”
Arne nodded and hurried across the schoolroom and slid into his seat just as the bell rang. His spirits, never down for very long, rose a little. He and Bergel had made port safely, anyhow, and in time, too.
But Herr Professor Engstrand looked at him gravely for a moment and said, “Tardiness is a fault I do not wish my pupils to develop. Arne Dalen, you have come in once this week just after the bell rang, and you have repeatedly got in barely on time. I shall have to take strong measures if you are tardy again.”
Arne’s face flushed, and he looked down in embarrassment. If he could only explain! But you couldn’t explain things to Herr Professor.
He was heartily glad when the teacher went on in an entirely different tone, “I have a pleasant announcement to make. On Friday afternoon, all you older pupils are to go up the mountain for greens to decorate the schoolhouse for the Christmas program. All bring flashlights and sandwiches. We shall make a campfire and have a picnic. Froken Utvig promises we shall practice some of our Christmas songs there.”
There was a stir of delight throughout the room. The trip up the mountain for Christmas greens was a favorite yearly event. Getting the greens and decorating was even more fun than the Christmas program itself. This was the first time Arne and Bergel’s class had been included in the expedition. Arne’s eyes glowed as he thought of the picnic supper, the campfire up there on the dark mountain, the singing that would float all up and down the mountainside.
But some of the girls looked a little perturbed, and the teacher almost smiled as he said, “We shall not stand out there in the snow eating our supper. Froken Utvig says we can find shelter in her father’s saeter cabin.”
The Utvig saeter! Oh, that would be something, Arne thought. Everyone said the Utvig cabin was the finest on the mountain. Arne had never been there, and he almost forgot about the _Stjerne_ in his excitement. It was wonderful fun to go up to a saeter in summer, but in winter it would be a real adventure. He resolved to be on time for the rest of the week. He certainly could not run the chance of being left out of that trip up the mountain.
Arne could hardly keep his feet from taking the familiar cliff path the next noon. If only there were just a little daylight after school. Then he’d hurry as fast as he could up the cliff, get out those field glasses, and stand looking as long as he liked. But it would be dark by that time. And tomorrow was the day of the trip up the mountain. No, he couldn’t run the risk of being late.
With a mighty effort he managed to trudge straight to school. He even got there a little early. He was too anxious and miserable to stay out playing, so he earned the pleased surprise of Herr Professor by going straight into the schoolroom, opening his book, and settling down. But his thoughts were not on his Norwegian history, though that was a subject he really liked, full as it was of stirring events. His thoughts were with the freighter _Stjerne_, in peril out there on the stormy sea.
Arne hurried home right after school, hoping better news had come in. His mother was in a perfect fury of baking. She was making _lefse_, and he usually liked to watch her doing that. But today he didn’t care much, for one look at her face told him that the news was not good.
She whisked the kettle of potatoes off the fire, mashed them violently, mixed in flour and salt and cream. Then she rolled out the dough into large, thin, round cakes, and Besta baked them on the top of the cookstove.
Both of them nodded a greeting to him, but no one seemed to feel like talking. Presently Besta buttered a piece of warm _lefse_, spread it with brown sugar, rolled it, and handed it to Arne. Even now he did not forget the polite Norwegian “_Mange tak_,” “Many thanks.”
He took his _lefse_ and wandered off to the workshop, but there was a lump in his throat as he drew the covering back and looked at his little ships. It didn’t seem to him he could work at them today, and he started to cover them again. Then he stopped and said fiercely right out loud, “Look here, Arne Dalen! Gustav wouldn’t do that. He’s a great one to stick at something until he gets it done.”
Somehow that idea comforted Arne. Wherever Gustav was, even if he was in serious difficulties, he’d be doing something to try to put things right. He remembered how quick and sure his brother had been last summer on the _Laks_ when the rocks had fallen. And Gustav had weathered bad storms before this. Captain Olsen, too. They were two good men, Father said. And they had a good crew of Norwegian sailors. Arne picked up one of the little ships and began a careful job of sandpapering. Even after supper he came out and found comfort in working. When Gustav came home, the surprise would be ready.
He lingered in the kitchen next morning for a few minutes after the others had gone about their various duties. He wanted to talk to Mother about preparations for that trip up the mountain. But more than that, he wanted very much to say something encouraging to her.
It was hard to know just what to say. The Dalens came from a long line of seafaring people, and no one talked much about it when there were storms and ships were overdue. But Arne couldn’t bear that bleak look on his mother’s face. It was not at all like her. She was a cheerful, busy person, almost as full of lively plans and ideas as Arne himself.
It didn’t take long to settle about the lunch. Mother promised to make him some extra nice _smörbröd_, or sandwiches. At a picnic like that, all the sandwiches would be spread out and shared, and hers must do both Arne and herself credit. She promised to decorate them in all kinds of fancy patterns. She would put in some of the _bakkelse_, too, and other cakes.
Arne was well pleased with this, but he didn’t quite know how to go on to the next subject. Then Bergel’s words of comfort came back to him. They had made him feel better. Maybe Mother would like them too. He cleared his throat and said gruffly, “Gustav’s ship is the Christmas _Star_, you know, Mother. It’ll come in safe, I’m just sure it will.”
Tears sprang into his mother’s eyes and brimmed over, and Arne wished earnestly that he had not spoken at all. He didn’t know whether to keep still now or to try again, so he just put his arm around her and gave her a quick, fervent hug.
She swallowed hard, shook herself, and wiped her eyes fiercely. “There now, Arne,” she said, hustling the dishes off the table. “Of course it will come in.” And somehow she managed to smile. “Run to school now, boy. Don’t be late.”
When Arne came home at noon, a lunch was ready packed for him to take up the mountain. He got out his flashlight and skis and put all the things together. His mother tried to talk cheerfully of all these preparations as they ate their lunch, but her sentences trailed off in a way not at all like her.
The boy’s heart was heavy as he left the house. He started for school, then stopped and swung swiftly around. He’d go like lightning up the cliff, and maybe he’d see Gustav’s ship. Then he’d ski down the slope and tell his mother. He’d have time. He was starting back to school earlier than usual.
He hesitated just an instant. This was no day to be late. Then he set off at full speed toward the cliff.
He caught his breath in exultation as his glasses swept the angry, heaving waves. It was beginning to snow, but in spite of that he could see there was a ship far out—a ship that could be the _Stjerne_! But it was much too far away for him to make sure. And yet he couldn’t bear to leave in uncertainty. The minutes flew by as he stood there, too intent on watching to think of anything else.
Suddenly a bell far down below brought him up with a jerk. That was the school bell. First bell, only. If he skied like mad, he might make it.
But though he felt as if he were actually flying down the slope, the last bell sounded loud and clear through the wintry air before he even reached the schoolground.
With all his heart Arne wished he didn’t have to go into that schoolroom. But he knew he did. He paused for an instant at the door. Then he braced himself and entered, his head erect but his cheeks crimson as he walked quickly and quietly to his desk.
There was an air of excitement in the room, and Herr Engstrand had evidently been talking, for no books were open. Now he paused and waited till Arne took his seat.
“I am very sorry you chose to be late this noon, Arne,” he said, and though his tone was stern, it did sound a little regretful, too. “I dislike very much to keep you in today of all days, but you have been warned and spoken to more than once. Get out your English grammar and do the exercises on pages 63 and 64. Have them on my desk before you leave the schoolroom. And now the rest of you may get your wraps and skis. As I was beginning to explain, it has been decided on account of the threatening snow that we start at once and get back before too late. The afternoon session is excused.”
Arne sent a stunned glance at Bergel. They were actually going to have a half-holiday and go up the mountain. And they were leaving him out of it. Her face, sorrowful and reproachful, didn’t make him feel any better. In the flurry of leaving, she seemed very busy with one or two papers. Then she gave him a long look and rose to go with the others.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
6
As the other children trooped out, Arne pretended to be deep in his work. Let them go then, and have a good time. What did they care about his troubles? They didn’t have a brother out on the stormy sea and a worried family at home. Let them go, and see if he cared! But he did care, tremendously. There was a lump in his throat he couldn’t swallow.
Bergel passed his seat and touched his shoulder gently. He shrugged off her hand, but she slid it down toward his and left a piece of paper there. He acted as if he didn’t see it, for he was hurt and disappointed and angry. Probably just a note saying he should have been more careful. He wouldn’t even look at it.
The shouting and laughter died away at last, and Arne looked gloomily down at his books. He felt more like crying than doing exercises. But of course he was too big to do a thing like that. If only Herr Engstrand had given him anything but English grammar to do! He must know how Arne disliked that. Arithmetic, now—he could have got that done in a hurry and maybe he could have caught up with the others. But English grammar! And two long exercises! He’d never get those done.
Suddenly he remembered another trip up the mountain—the summer trip, when he had thought he would have to stay home to bale _lutfisk_. With Gustav’s help, he had got that job done in time to go with the others. No one was here to help him now, but perhaps he could get this job done himself and follow the others. His usual hopefulness began to come to his rescue. Herr Engstrand hadn’t said he couldn’t come on the trip. He had only said he must finish the exercises before he left.
Arne turned to his books in earnest, now. He knew how to do that first sentence, anyway. Maybe this wasn’t such a hard exercise, after all. He was half through it, his spirits rising as he worked, when his hopes fell again. He didn’t know the way to the Utvig saeter, and he was well enough acquainted with mountains to realize that a snowy day in December was no time to strike out on unfamiliar ways.
He gave a deep sigh and turned back to his work. No use to try to get it done fast. It didn’t matter when he finished. But he went doggedly on, and a sudden thought came to him. Bergel had certainly looked as if she wanted to tell him something. He picked up the note, his face brightening as he read: “Utvig saeter is above ours. Go up the Ahlness trail, then take the left fork where there are three saeter cabins.” She had even scrawled a little map. With fresh energy, Arne bent to his lesson.
The schoolroom clock had ticked an hour away when the boy laid his exercises on Herr Professor’s desk. He put on his skis, settled his knapsack on his back, and set off on his trip up the mountain through the falling snow.
The boy felt confident and light-hearted as he hastened up toward his uncle’s saeter. Though the familiar landmarks looked different in their winter dress, he could recognize them without difficulty. He knew he was making better time alone than the others could in a large company. As he sped along he began to hope he might overtake them, or at least get there in time to help bring in the greens.
The snow, which fell heavily at first, began to slacken a little. He managed to go along at a steady pace, but it seemed a long time before he came out where Uncle Jens’s cabin faced the fjord. The little log house looked forlorn with all its windows boarded over for winter, and Arne was anxious to hurry on. Far out at sea he could detect the faint light of a ship. He wondered if it could possibly be the _Stjerne_.
The snow had stopped now, and strong winds blew in steadily from the sea. Dusk had closed in, and Arne shivered as he stood there, not sure how to go ahead. “Take the Ahlness trail,” Bergel’s note had said. There was more than one path zigzagging about up here, he knew, but as far as he could remember, there was only one good trail that led way up the mountain. That must be the one. Those folks up there ahead must have left plenty of tracks. But he had difficulty in finding them because of the drifting snow. At last, however, with the aid of his flashlight, he did manage to find some traces.
If only Bergel had said how far it was! It seemed to Arne that the way was much longer than he had expected it to be. Though he got out his flashlight often, he didn’t see anything of three saeter cabins in a cluster, to say nothing of a fork in the trail. The way was very steep in places, and he did wish those tracks were plainer.
And now he had come to a place where the snow was so drifted he couldn’t see any tracks at all. He was uncertain what to do, which way to take, and almost wished he had never started on this difficult journey alone.
Then he looked up toward the mountain top, and just above it, where the wind had ripped the clouds apart, he saw one bright star shining. Christmas star again, thought Arne, and felt a little better. He pressed on and at last came to the three small houses. Now for the fork in the trail!
But he could not make out any tracks in the drifted snow, and there didn’t seem to be any real trail, though there was a break in the bushes here. He’d start that way. But he hadn’t gone far when he was brought up short by a great boulder in the way. This certainly could not be the trail. He went back and started again, but this time a thicket of bushes blocked the path. Perhaps, after all, he had come the wrong way. Perhaps those three cabins were not the ones Bergel had meant. His heart was thumping. What if he was lost in these mountains?
He stood there straining his eyes in the gray darkness. If only he could catch some gleam of the campfire! He could see no sign of light on the dark mountain, but as he stood, trying to think of something he could do, a familiar sound came down to him—a long-drawn blast that could only come from a saeter horn. Someone was certainly sending him a signal, and he felt sure it was Bergel.
Arne stood still, trying to determine just where that call had come from. As he waited, it came again, over and over. The star would be a good guide now, for the horn’s blast had come from exactly that direction. Now, a little to the left, he found a way through the thicket; with the help of the horn and of his bright star, he forged steadily ahead.
At last, to his great relief and delight, he caught sight of a glimmer of light above him. Soon he began to hear voices in the distance—faint at first, then louder. Now he could hear calls and shouts and laughter and bits of song, and above all, the sound of the horn.
In a few moments the full brightness of the campfire burst upon him. He saw people scurrying about; but one small, valiant figure caught his eye and warmed his heart. It was Bergel, standing in the firelight, the long saeter horn at her lips. She blew a blast that Arne felt must be heard clear down at Nordheim, and he almost felt like giving her a hug. Instead he skied silently to her side and stood there grinning. “Calling someone, Bergel?” he asked.
“Arne!” she cried, and threw both arms around him. “Oh, I was so worried! I knew you’d try to come, and then it snowed so hard for a while, and drifted so, and you didn’t know the way. How did you ever manage to find it?” Her tone showed plainly that she considered that quite a feat.
[Illustration]
“Well, you helped,” said Arne. He slipped away from her embrace, but his voice was gentle. “And then I guess the Christmas star helped, too.” He nodded to where the bright star shone among drifting clouds.
“You see! Isn’t that a good sign?” said Bergel triumphantly. “And now you’re in time to help with the greens, Arne. The boys have gone up there just a little ways. Got your hunting knife?”
“Do you suppose I’d come up here without it?” asked Arne. But he smiled at her, and she smiled back before she turned to help with the supper.
Everyone was glad to see Arne, though nobody said much about it. He pulled his silver-handled hunting knife from the sheath at his belt and was soon in the thick of the work, helping cut branches and put them in bundles.
In spite of himself, his respect for Herr Professor Engstrand increased as he watched him directing and helping. The teacher had obtained permission to take what they needed, and seemed to know exactly how to go about getting it. When he climbed easily up a big tree, Arne could hardly believe his eyes. Was this the same dignified man who didn’t seem to be interested in anything but books and lessons and keeping order?
Eager to do his part now that he was here, Arne went right up to a treetop to get some specially fine branches with clusters of cones. When he came nimbly down, he saw, with some dismay, that the other boys had gone on and that only Herr Engstrand was at hand. He was probably in for a good scolding now, but surely Herr Professor wouldn’t send him home when he had toiled so hard to get up here alone.
Arne started to run after the other boys, but the teacher took two or three long strides, laid a hand on his shoulder, and turned him around. “Just a minute, my boy,” he said. “I have something to say to you.”
Arne’s heart seemed to go right down into his boots. “Yes, sir,” he managed to mumble. “Maybe I shouldn’t have come, but I—well, I did my exercises first, and I didn’t think you said—” His voice trailed miserably off.
“I didn’t say you shouldn’t come,” said the teacher in a matter-of-fact tone. “In fact, I hoped you would, though I didn’t feel I could encourage you to do so, in view of the weather and the distance. Of course I know it takes more than a snowstorm to keep a Norwegian boy off a mountain. In fact, people say mountains and snow are all a Norwegian needs for fun. But I didn’t think you knew the way here.”
“I didn’t really, but—” Arne began and then stopped short, uncertain and embarrassed. He certainly could not tell Herr Professor about Bergel’s note. How could he explain?
Herr Engstrand was going on, “But your cousin told me—” He stopped so long that Arne looked up and, to his great surprise, saw that his teacher was smiling a little. “She is a conscientious little girl, as well as a good pupil, and I think she felt she might not have done right. And then, too, I think she began to get worried about you. So she told me about leaving you the note. And I’ll admit we were all a little anxious when you did not arrive.”
“Those grammar exercises,” said Arne, with a gusty sigh. “They took quite a while. But who thought of the saeter horn? That was a life-saver.”
“It was Bergel who thought of that, and Froken Utvig found it for her. Bergel told me something else, Arne. She told me why you had been late those times. I should have been glad if you had told me yourself.”
“You would?” exclaimed Arne in astonishment, and added, with complete honesty, “I never thought of that.”
Herr Engstrand dropped his hand from Arne’s shoulder. “I see,” was all he said, but his voice made Arne think of the way he himself sometimes felt when he tried very hard to do something and did not succeed.
That tone made Arne want to mend matters, and he hurried on, “I didn’t know you’d be interested, but I guess you are. So I want to tell you why I was late this noon. Bergel didn’t know about that. I saw a ship way out in the storm and I thought it might be Gustav’s. And from Uncle Jens’s saeter I could still see the lights of a ship a good ways out.”
“I see,” Herr Engstrand said again. But this time his tone was quite different. “A ship would have a hard time making port in a sea like this.”
Arne looked up at him in alarm. “Oh, Herr Professor Engstrand!” he exclaimed. “Do you suppose—what if Gustav’s ship got nearly home only to be dashed to pieces on the rocks?”
“Of course the chances are it was not the _Stjerne_ at all,” said Herr Engstrand. His voice was thoughtful.
“Oh, I wish that wind would go down,” said Arne fervently. “There aren’t even any stars out, now.”
“Well, Arne, these Norwegian skippers know our coast pretty well, don’t forget that. And from what I hear, Captain Olsen is a fine navigator. Come, Bergel is blowing the horn again. That is the signal for supper.”
Arne gathered with the others around the great fire piled high in the kitchen fireplace. Froken Utvig and the girls had scrubbed a long table, laid a bright cloth over it, and spread it with gaily-decorated sandwiches and cakes. Everyone was hungry and ready for the good food and the singing.
There were Christmas songs first, and folk songs followed. Then everyone stood to sing the national anthem:
“_Yes, we love with fond devotion_ _Norway’s mountain domes,_ _Rising storm-lashed o’er the ocean_ _With their thousand homes._”
“‘Storm-lashed’ is right,” thought Arne. But he loved the fine old anthem, just as the others did, and joined in the singing with all his heart.
“I think those songs all but lifted the roof,” said Froken Utvig, smiling. “But now, as it is still snowy and drifting, and the wind is strong, we had better start home.”
Everyone hurried about—putting out the fire, getting things in order. Arne was as busy as anyone, but he couldn’t help thinking about the _Stjerne_. What if she was tossing about out there, very close to the rocky shore, driven by the wind? What if Gustav should be almost in port, only to have his ship go down tonight?
His face was troubled as he bent to fasten his skis, but he looked up quickly as Herr Professor came over to him and said, “Arne, I want you to help me with some of these greens. Can you carry a load as big as this, do you think? We’ll fasten it on your back if you can.”
Ordinarily Arne would have been proud of such a request, for the load was a large one. But tonight he had planned to rush ahead with all speed and see if it could be possible that his brother’s ship had come in. He couldn’t make much time with such a load. But he could do nothing but answer, “Yes, sir, I can.”
“Good boy,” said Herr Engstrand. “Now, Arne, I want you to stay behind with me just a little. I have one or two things to do.”
“Yes, sir,” said Arne, but his disappointment showed so plainly that Herr Professor said, “What is it, boy?”
“It’s my brother’s ship, sir,” said Arne, in a low tone. “I thought she might have come in. I wanted to—”
“Yes, yes, I see. Well, Arne, that’s why I want you to stay behind. An idea has occurred to me—a way you and I may be able to help your brother. I have told Froken Utvig to let some of the big boys guide the party.”
“Yes, sir,” said Arne again, but this time he was thoroughly puzzled. How could he and Herr Engstrand up here on the mountain possibly be of any help to Gustav out there on the stormy sea?
[Illustration]
7
There was a good deal of laughter as the boys divided the greens and arranged the loads on their backs. Then away they went, singing and shouting, the girls insisting on carrying some of the smaller branches with especially fine cones.
How Arne wished that he could be a member of the merry group! He wanted to get down to Nordheim fast, and it seemed to him that Herr Engstrand was taking a good deal of time over things that were not necessary.
But once the others were out of sight, the teacher said, “Now, Arne, full speed ahead down to your uncle’s saeter. The wind is getting higher. It feels to me as if it’s going to snow again, and we’ve got work to do, you and I.”
Arne was more puzzled than ever. What work could they possibly have to do up here? But Herr Engstrand was skiing down the mountain with a speed that Arne found hard to follow. When he reached Uncle Jens’s saeter, Herr Engstrand was already there, playing his flashlight all around the little clearing.
From the high point near the cliff, the boy could see lights moving out on the open sea leading to the fjord. “Looks as if a ship’s in trouble out there,” he said anxiously. “Are we going on down, sir?”
“No, here’s where we stop, Arne. Let us make a big fire, you and I, and keep it going to give a signal to that ship. They can tell from the height that this is the cliff, and if I’m not mistaken, they’ll know the harbor is below here.”
“Oh, that’s the plan!” exclaimed Arne. It was such a good one, and yet so simple, he wondered why he hadn’t thought of it himself. Neither of them said much; but they worked fast, and a fire was soon started near the edge of the cliff.
“Now, Arne,” said Herr Engstrand, “we will pile our boughs on this and make a big blaze right away while we collect more.”
“So that’s why you wanted me to take such a big load!” said Arne. “And you took a lot more than I did, even.”
“I wanted to get this thing going right away. There!” He threw his bundle on the fire. “Pitch yours on, Arne.”
Arne threw his pine boughs on and watched with satisfaction as they burst into a great blaze.
“Now we must collect plenty of fuel, Arne. I have my small hatchet, of course. And you have your hunting knife. We must keep this fire burning high and bright. Then we’ll watch to see what happens out there.”
Arne did a good deal of thinking as he dragged in branches and twigs. This wasn’t a bit like the Herr Professor who had been so stern and strict and had seemed interested only in lessons. This was really smart—like something Gustav himself might have thought of. He’d like to tell Herr Professor so, but even now he could not quite get up his courage to do that. But when they had collected a large pile of wood and were standing by the fire watching those lights out at sea, he did manage to ask, “Herr Professor, how did you happen to think of doing this?”
“Well, Arne, I was a commando in the war,” Herr Engstrand said quietly.
“A commando!” gasped Arne.
“Yes. We learned to think of all sorts of ways to do things in emergencies. More than once we guided a vessel safely to port just this way.”
“A commando! That’s what Gustav wanted to be. But he wasn’t quite old enough. He says they learned everything, just about.”
“Well, we did learn a lot of things. For one thing, we learned to obey orders fast and to the letter.” He paused for a moment and went on, more as if he were thinking aloud than speaking to his companion, “But schoolboys aren’t commandos, and I don’t suppose you can expect—” He broke off and looked at Arne with a quizzical expression.
Arne was standing very straight, his eyes eager and alert as he looked back at Herr Engstrand. “Oh, sir, but I think you can expect us to—” He stopped as if he had just remembered something. “From now on,” he said emphatically, “I’m sure you can expect that.”
“I believe I can, Arne,” said Herr Professor.
His voice was serious; but it was friendly, too, and now Arne did not find it very hard to muster courage to say, “All the boys would like to know about your being a commando. The girls, too. Couldn’t you—wouldn’t you tell them about that? We’d all be interested.”
“You would?” In the firelight, Arne could see that his teacher was smiling a little. “I had an idea school was for lessons. But maybe there are several kinds of lessons. And now, Arne, up and at ’em. More wood!”
Arne rushed off, but this time he had new hope. He was working with a commando! And the commandos had got out of all sorts of dangerous situations. Herr Engstrand seemed confident that Captain Olsen and Gustav would do the same thing and bring the _Stjerne_ in safely.
Each time they returned to the fire, they stopped to watch the ship struggling out there against the wind. Then they dashed back to work harder than ever. It was not easy to collect enough fuel in the snow, but both of them worked with a will.
At last Arne said hopefully, “I think she’s making progress out there, sir.”
“Yes, looks as if she’s making for the channel. Come on, Arne. We have to keep the fire high and bright now.”
When they returned the next time, Arne gave a great shout. “She’s coming in! She’s coming in! Oh, if she can just hold her course, she’ll be safe.”
“Yes, she’s making headway all right. Looks as if it could be the _Stjerne_, Arne.”
Arne fairly flew off to get more wood, his heart beating so hard he couldn’t even talk. This time, when they came back to the fire, there was no doubt about it. “She’s past the barrier now, and moving into the channel,” said Herr Professor.
“Oh, Herr Professor!” Arne shouted, and in his exuberance he snatched off his cap and threw it so high it almost came down in the fire. “It’s Gustav’s ship! It’s Gustav’s ship, safe and sound. I know it is.”
“How would you like to start down, Arne, and be there on the dock to greet your brother? Everybody will be there, and I know you’d like to be on hand with the others.”
“Oh, boy!” cried Arne joyfully. “Oh, boy!” But then he looked quickly at the teacher. “But we couldn’t leave the fire, could we? They still need it, don’t they? This is about as important a time as any, isn’t it?”
“Yes, we have to keep it going till we’re sure they’re safe. But I could manage to tend it alone now, if you’d like to get started down.”
Arne hesitated just a moment. He wanted dreadfully to be right down there on the dock when the _Stjerne_ came in. But then he shook his head. “No,” he said. “One commando would never walk out on another. I’m going to help keep this fire going.”
“Good boy, Arne. I think your brother would like that,” said Herr Professor. There was an expression of such approval and pleasure on his face that Arne’s cheeks flamed and he looked away, feeling very happy. “We’ll both work hard, then; and we’re pretty fast on our skis. We’ll go down a lot faster than we came up. The ship won’t beat us in by much.”
In the very midst of gathering his next load of wood, Arne stopped and laughed right out loud. “I’ve thought of something, Herr Professor!” he cried. “I’ve thought of how I can get down there fast—just like a commando. We can keep the fire going as long as necessary, and I can still beat the ship to the dock.”
“And how are you going to do that, Arne?”
“I can go right down the wires Uncle Jens arranged to let the milk and stuff down the cliff. Gustav did that last summer when he saw Torger Blessom’s boat overturned.” He hesitated a moment. “I was wishing then I had the nerve to do it.”
“And now you have!” said Herr Professor with a nod. “You’ll need rope for that, Arne.”
“Yes, there’s one up here. I know where it’s kept. And can’t we sort of bundle me up in greens, a little?”
“Yes, and you’ll need something more than mittens to put on your hands to keep them from getting cut.”
“Yes, Gustav wound a lot of cloth around his, I remember that. And I know where Aunt Tina keeps some rags we can use. One good thing—there’s plenty of snow at the foot of the cliff; so I should make a good landing.”
Herr Engstrand laughed. “Arne, I see plainly you’ve got the makings of a first-rate commando!” he said. “You’ve got good Viking blood. Your brother is going to be proud of you. We’ll send you right down those wires to welcome him, all right.”
“She’s coming in! She’s coming in, Herr Professor! Here she comes, the Christmas _Star_! She doesn’t look very big, way down there!”
“No, we usually think of a Christmas star high above us in the heavens, instead of far below us on the water,” said Herr Professor.
“I guess a Christmas star isn’t out of place anywhere, is it?” said Arne. “The _Stjerne_ is sure going to look good to us in that harbor. We won’t need to bring in many more loads now, will we?”
The fire on the cliff blazed high, and the two worked fast to keep it replenished. The ship came closer and closer to port; and at last Herr Engstrand said, “They don’t need our fire any more, Arne. The lights of the town will be enough. Now we’ll get you ready, and down you go!”
Both of them worked fast to get Arne ready for his journey down. Herr Engstrand made sure the rope was safe and strong before he tied the loop in which Arne was to sit. Soon the boy was bundled up in greens, his hands well wrapped. Herr Professor settled him securely in the rope sling.
“I’ll hold as tight as I can at first,” he said. “But once you get going, you’ll have a fast ride. Ready now? Here you go, down the wires to meet the Christmas _Star_!”
“Ready!” Arne managed to say, but his mouth was dry, and when he tried to swallow it seemed to him his heart was right up in his throat. The lights of Nordheim looked far, far below him.
Then Herr Professor gave him a little push and started him downward. Arne knew his teacher was holding the rope as firmly as possible, but the sling went in jerks along the wires. Probably they were rusty. What if they should break? The rope, too! It had been used all summer long. It might be a little frayed. What if it should break, with all this jerking?
Then he remembered how Gustav had thrown his weight first one way and then another to steady his progress. He tried to do the same now, and he began to go faster and more smoothly.
Once fairly started, it was a swift, breathless ride Arne had down those wires. Fast as he was used to going on skis and sleds, he had never had such a ride as this. The blood pounded in his ears as he rushed through the air toward the foot of the cliff.
He hoped fervently that there would be a good, deep snowdrift where he landed. There was! In another instant, Arne, encased in greens, his hands bound with rags, plumped right into the midst of a great drift.
He heard the deep, throaty blast of the ship and a loud cheer from the people who had gathered on the dock. He struggled and pushed, trying to get free. After all he had gone through, here he was stuck in a drift. And the _Stjerne_ was almost in port.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
8
Arne managed to struggle out of the snowdrift at last, and to get free of the rope, but even then he could not rid himself of the greens nor the rags so firmly tied about his hands. But he was determined not to miss meeting that ship, even if he had to roll all the way to the dock. Once he got there, someone would help him out of his strange trimmings. What if he did look like a combination snowdrift and walking Christmas tree?
It was Bergel who saw him coming. She gave a scream of alarm and then burst into laughter as Arne shouted, “It’s just me—Arne!”
She flew to his rescue, and Mother hurried to him too, and Margret and Besta. He soon stood free of his greens and rags, explaining a little in quick, eager sentences. But there was scant time for explanation, for the _Stjerne’s_ bells were ringing, her whistle was blowing, and she was in port.
All of them rushed to be right there when Gustav came down the gangplank. Then there was excitement and joy, talk and laughter, and even happy tears.
“I want to hear everything, Gustav—what happened—tell us all about it!” cried Arne, rushing at his brother.
“Wait now,” said his mother. “Gustav, we have such a supper for you! Uncle Jens and all are coming over. It is enough now we have you safe home. We will hear the story at supper.”
[Illustration]
What a story Gustav had to tell—a story of storms, of a ship for a time fairly sheeted with ice. He told of the injury to the engines, of the radio going bad, of a struggling trip home, then another storm when they were almost there.
“It was a big fire on the cliff that helped us—perhaps really saved us,” he said. “We were trying to stay away from shore, the winds out there were so violent. Then this fire guided us in. I wonder who made that fire.”
“Arne did that,” said Bergel proudly. “Arne and Herr Professor Engstrand.”
“Of course it was his idea,” Arne said modestly. And the little company listened in wonder as he explained how Herr Engstrand had thought of the plan and they had worked together to carry it out.
“That was smart, Arne, really smart!” said Gustav. “I want to know this Herr Professor of yours. He must have had confidence in you, too, to have you help like that. It was a big job, and a good one.”
Arne hadn’t thought of that idea, and it pleased him enormously.
“Do you like our Herr Engstrand better now, Arne?” asked Bergel.
“Like him!” cried Arne. “A commando like that—someone who knew just the right thing to do? Of course I like him. Not many boys have such a teacher!”
His mother smiled at him. She had a feeling there wouldn’t be much trouble about school from now on. “I think we must ask Herr Professor here to share our Christmas Eve,” she said. “I believe he is far from his home.”
Christmas preparations were redoubled now. There were only a few days left, and work had lagged a little of late. Mother and Besta and Margret cleaned and baked and cooked from morning till night.
Arne was very thankful he had stuck at his shipmaking in spite of everything. Those ships would all be ready in time. He had only a little more painting to finish. His big problem now was how to get them on the Christmas tree without having everyone find out about them.
Mother and Besta and Margret always trimmed the tree. It stood in the best room; the door was shut, and Mother kept her eye on it. Arne certainly didn’t see how he was going to get those ships hung.
This year Uncle Jens’s family was to share Christmas Eve with them. Arne knew Signe and Bergel were bringing some new tree ornaments they had made—little straw goats, such as _Julenissen_ was supposed to ride. These would be entrusted to Mother. But Arne couldn’t do that with his ships. They were to be a surprise for everyone.
The night before Christmas Eve he was still turning the problem over in his mind when he went to bed, and he stayed awake at least ten minutes, thinking it over. When he awoke the next morning, the solution had come to him. It was so simple he laughed out loud. He should have thought of that right away. He would take Gustav into his confidence, and after the tree was trimmed they would somehow smuggle in the little ships and hang them all over the tree.
Gustav agreed readily to this plan. “Say, I want to see those ships,” he said, and to Arne’s pleasure insisted on going out to the workshop then and there. “These are good, Arne,” he said, picking up one and another. “Really good.”
Arne was pleased yet a little shy, too, at the praise. “I did them mostly for you,” he said, “and when you were so late coming it was awfully hard to keep at them.”
Gustav nodded. “I can believe that all right, boy, but I’m glad you stuck,” he said, and his dark eyes were softer than usual. “You practically built Norway a new merchant fleet here.”
“Now how are we going to get them in there, Gustav?” asked Arne.
“We’ll smuggle them in while the womenfolk are busy about supper. You’ll have them all bundled up ready, won’t you? We may have to make a foray in through the parlor window.”
“Commando raid!” said Arne with a grin.
Gustav grinned back and rumpled Arne’s hair so that it stuck up even more than usual. “That’s right. And on defenseless womenfolk at that. Now I’d say late this afternoon would be about right. How does that strike you?”
Arne chuckled. “About the time Father fires off the gun that tells us it’s Christmas Eve. You and I will be putting up the sheaves of grain for the birds, and it will give us a good chance to get away.”
“You’ve got the idea, boy! And there’s lots to do between then and now.”
There was plenty to do indeed. Mother was calling Arne even as he came out of the workshop. She had many errands for him, but her voice was so happy Arne felt he wouldn’t mind running his legs off. Anyway, Christmas errands were always fun.
There were baskets of good things to be carried to half a dozen houses. Mother delighted especially in remembering anyone less fortunate than themselves at Christmas time. And Arne went with Father to get the smoked and pickled herring that was a favorite part of the _koltbord_ feast.
It was fun, too, to dash in and out of the kitchen where mutton was roasting for the Christmas Eve supper, where the _lutfisk_ was soaking ready to be simmered and drenched with butter, where everything was in the most delightful bustle of preparation.
But whatever he was doing, his mind was not far from those ships he must get ready to smuggle into the parlor. It was well into the afternoon before he could find an opportunity to get out to the workshop. He worked fast yet carefully, grinning to himself as he bundled up the little ships.
Gustav was busy with affairs of his own, back and forth to the dock many times. Once Arne saw him whisk around the corner of the house with a large crated affair that made the boy’s hopes go way up. Could it be possible that the _Stjerne_ had brought him his longed-for bicycle? That might mean he could take a holiday jaunt next summer, up the fjords and through the mountain valleys with some of the other boys. Herr Professor Engstrand was planning to conduct such a trip, he knew, and wouldn’t it be wonderful if he could go along?
His work was done now, and a good thing, too, for Mother was calling him to scrub himself thoroughly and get into his new Christmas clothes.
He was just ready when it was time for Father to fire that Christmas salute. Then Gustav was calling him, and together they went to the barn to get the two sheaves of grain that were ready to be put up on poles for the birds. To Arne’s annoyance, Margret for once insisted on helping with that. She ought to know it was men’s work. Perhaps it was because she was so glad to have Gustav safe home that she wanted to be with him more than usual. Arne looked at his brother in despair. How could they manage about those ships if Margret stuck with them?
But he could see Gustav wasn’t worried, just amused; so he dropped his own worries and enjoyed the little ceremony as much as the others did.
“I think Mother’s looking for you, Margret,” said Gustav, when the birds were swooping down on their feast. Margret picked up her full holiday skirts and ran to the house, while Gustav winked at Arne.
“It was all right, Arne. I did see Mother looking out and beckoning,” he said, as they hurried off to the workshop. “Now, boy, we work fast. You’ve got the bundle ready, I see. Good!”
In a twinkling he was around the house, Arne at his heels, and through the parlor window, taking care not to muss those stiff white curtains. Without a word he brought out a very small pocket flashlight, and Arne had hard work not to giggle as they hung the little ships all around the tree.
It was done so fast that Arne could hardly believe they had finished the job, but in another moment they were safely around the corner of the house and sauntering in at the kitchen door.
“Just in time,” said Besta. “Light the candles, you two. I see the folks coming, Herr Engstrand from one direction and Uncle Jens and his family from the other.”
Soon the Christmas greeting of “_God Jul_” sounded through the house, and the guests assembled at that bountiful Christmas Eve table.
Christmas Eve supper was a wonderful meal, but Arne and Bergel could hardly wait for the parlor doors to open. Bergel was thinking of the straw goats she had helped Signe make, and Arne was anxious to hear what the others would say when they saw the boats. Perhaps some of them found it almost as hard to wait as Bergel and Arne did. When little Knut slipped down from the table and went straight to that mysterious door, Mother and Father rose from the table.
That was the signal for everybody to stand up. Father went over to throw the door open.
There stood the tree in the lovely glow of candlelight—straw goats, ships, and all.
Arne was sure they had never had a prettier tree. There were all sorts of delighted comments. But Mother said, “Why, look at those ships! Where did those lovely things come from? Did you bring them, Gustav?”
“Arne’s the lad who gets the credit for those. He made them all by himself—one for every person here, from Knut up. How’s that for a good surprise!”
Arne stood there, his cheeks red, his eyes shining. No one could quite believe he had done it, and everyone was even more surprised than he had hoped.
“That took patience as well as skill,” said Herr Engstrand. And perhaps that quiet comment was the one that pleased Arne most of all.
The straw goats were admired, too, and the other ornaments the girls had made. Then it was time for the gifts.
There was a beautiful hand-knit blue and red sweater for Arne, with mittens to match and fine socks for skiing. But when Father trundled a bicycle out from behind the tree straight toward him, Arne could hardly see anything else.
Bergel was exclaiming in delight over a small and lovely tea set. And all the others were just as pleased with their gifts.
In the excitement, Gustav went quietly out of the room, and even Arne did not notice him. He was eagerly examining his bicycle, turning the wheels, feeling the pedals, noting every detail of handlebar and seat, headlight and horn and luggage carrier.
“Herr Professor, do you think I might be big enough to go on that trip you’re going to conduct next summer?” he asked eagerly. “Now that I have my bicycle?”
“You’re big enough to suit me. But let’s see what your father says.”
“We will wait to hear what _Julenissen_ says,” answered Herr Dalen, his eyes twinkling. “If he seems to think you’re a good boy—” He broke off as a great noise was heard in the hallway and a pair of astonishing figures burst in.
Everyone laughed and clapped, for here was _Julenissen_ himself, with his pointed red cap and long whiskers. He was larger than _Julenissen_ really should be, for his feet touched the ground as he bestrode the straw-trimmed goat, _Julebuken_. But no one minded that, and everyone screamed and laughed and tried to get out of his way.
There seemed to be no bad children in the Dalen relationship, for _Julebuken_ stamped about the room without bumping anyone. He went so fast, _Julenissen_ had hard work to keep up with him, and soon the lively pair were on their way again, _Julenissen_ explaining, in a voice very like Gustav’s, that this was a busy night.
“I didn’t get bumped, Father!” cried Arne.
“Must be _Julenissen_ thinks you are a good boy, then,” said his father gravely, though his eyes twinkled. “I guess that means there’s a summer trip ahead for you, Arne.”
[Illustration]
And now Mother and Besta brought out the special treat of Yule porridge—a delicate rice pudding made with spices and milk. Gustav, his hair somewhat rumpled, was there eating with the others.
“We mustn’t forget the bowl for _Julenissen_,” said Arne, with a sidewise grin at his brother.
“No, he likes that,” said Gustav soberly, and took another helping.
There would be Christmas songs and games to follow, but first Father read the Christmas story. At the beginning, Arne’s mind was so full of his bicycle he could scarcely pay attention. But then a few of the beautiful, familiar words caught his ear.
“‘When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceeding great joy,’” Father was reading.
Why, that’s exactly what they had done, right up here in Nordheim.
Arne thought of the star that had helped guide him to safety on the mountain. And he remembered what Bergel had said when he was so worried about Gustav. “The Christmas _Star_ has always come in safe and sure,” she had said.
Why, of course. The Christmas star was always safe and sure. And wherever you saw it, it brought “exceeding great joy.” Arne drew a sigh of deep content and settled to listen. This was really Christmas.

= = = PG59751 = = =
ARNOLD OF WINKELRIED
Produced by D A Alexander, Stephen Hutcheson, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by the Library of Congress)
[Illustration: _The Winkelried statue_ (_After a photograph by Guccione, Rome_)]
_Life Stories for Young People_
ARNOLD OF WINKELRIED THE HERO OF SEMPACH
_Translated from the German of Gustav Höcker_
BY GEORGE P. UPTON _Translator of “Memories,” etc._
WITH THREE ILLUSTRATIONS
[Illustration: A. C. McCLURG & CO.]
CHICAGO A. C. McCLURG & CO. 1908
Copyright
A. C. McClurg & Co. 1908 Published August 22, 1908
THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A.
Translator’s Preface
The story of Arnold of Winkelried, the famous hero of Switzerland, and of his heroic death in the battle of Sempach, will never lose its interest. The learned iconoclasts, having the advantage of the obscurity of fourteenth-century history, may continue to declare that he is only a legendary hero, as they have asserted of William Tell, but Winkelried, like Tell, still lives in the hearts of the Swiss people as the actual embodiment of patriotic devotion, love of freedom, and love of humanity, and thus he will remain in the hearts of men for all time. The narrative in this little volume might be called a collection of short sketches illustrating the great events of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, with Winkelried as their dominant figure and connecting link. The author tells us the legends which cluster around Pilatus, and good father Vincentius’s thrilling story of the battle of Morgarten. He shows us how a mystery play was performed. The ravages of the Black Death are vividly set forth. Then he tells us of the robber knights and Duke Leopold’s tournament at Basle. He describes in detail the curious methods employed in storming a castle, introduces Winkelried in his daring adventure as a beggar monk, and closes the graphic story with a thrilling account of the famous Sempach battle and the way in which Winkelried gave himself to death by making a passage for the Confederates through the forest of Austrian spears. There is no nobler example of patriotic devotion and sublime courage in history.
G. P. U.
Chicago, May 1, 1908.
Contents
Illustrations
The Winkelried statue                                   _Frontispiece_ Monument commemorating the Battle of Sempach                        54 Winkelried’s heroic death at the Battle of Sempach                 122
Arnold of Winkelried
Chapter I Knight Schrutan and the Pilatus
The Lake of the Four Forest Cantons, lying amidst the four cantons, Uri, Unterwalden, Schwyz, and Lucerne, from which it derives its name, surpasses all other Swiss lakes in the grandeur of its natural beauty and in the wealth of its historical associations.
In the year 1315, which is about the period in which the events of this story occurred, there was upon this lake a little flotilla, which seems insignificant enough when compared with the powerful fleets of the present day. At that time the cantons of Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden were frequently engaged in hostilities with their neighbor Lucerne, which still adhered to Austria. Their encounters took place on skiffs and boats and clumsy vessels along the shores of the lake. One big, sharp-pointed, oaken craft, called the “Goose,” was the flagship of the Lucerne fleet. The “Fox” was the flagship of Uri. One day the Lucerne flagship ventured too near the shore and was struck by a millstone which the Unterwaldeners hurled down upon it from a watch-tower, and which so disabled it that Lucerne’s naval power was virtually destroyed.
At the point where the lake makes a wide bend to the south into the very heart of the Alps lies Unterwalden, among precipitous cliffs and mountain pastures. It is a majestic sight when the mists clear away on a bright summer’s morning and the Rigi, Pilatus, the rocky summits of Schwyz, and the range of mountain-peaks extending even to the distant dazzling Jungfrau and the Black Monk are revealed in the brilliant atmosphere. The name “Unterwalden” was applied to this picturesque region in modern times. It is not known what it was called in ancient times, but there can be no doubt that it was inhabited, as it contains unusually rich pasturage for animals and offers favorable opportunities for hunting and fishing.
Not far away from the lake is the little city of Stans, situated in a luxuriant garden, whose fruitfulness is unimpaired, although from the middle of November until the beginning of February the sun is visible only in the morning between Briefenberg and the Staufer Horn, and in the afternoon never gilds the roofs of the little place.
At the eastern extremity of the city stands, even to this day, the Winkelried house, to which we shall now introduce our readers. They must imagine themselves in the middle of the fourteenth century. Although it had ample sleeping-rooms, spacious closets, and large, gayly colored chests in which the linen and garments were kept, as well as other conveniences, a single room was the family’s living apartment. A long wooden bench stood against the wall, in front of which was a large oaken table with massive feet. Some wooden chairs and a leathern arm-chair completed the furniture. Tankards, dishes, and glasses were arranged on shelves, and some silver vessels were enclosed in a beautifully carved cabinet. A holy-water ewer was fastened near the door, and a crucifix hung between the windows. Instead of a stove there was an open coal fire, into which thyme was sprinkled to diffuse a pleasant odor throughout the room. Several tiny cages were suspended from the low ceiling. The sprightly little singers which occupied them were quiet now, having gone to sleep with their heads tucked under their wings, for it was evening and the room had grown dark.
A woman of middle age was seated in the easy-chair absorbed in meditation. A boy sat in her lap, and as he tenderly embraced his mother his eyes turned to the window through which he saw the moon rising over the peaks of Pilatus and the summit of the Felsenhorn, outlined like a sharp black shadow against the sky.
“Little mother,” said the boy, breaking the silence, “why is that mountain called ‘Pilatus’? That is the name of the Roman governor who delivered our Saviour to the Jews.”
“You are right, my Arnold. The mountain was named for him,” replied his mother.
“Why?” asked Arnold.
“Pontius Pilate, who was the Governor of Judea, administered the affairs of the province so corruptly that the Emperor Tiberius recalled him to Rome and shut him up in prison,” said his mother. “Rather than suffer this disgrace, Pilate took his own life. As he was a self-murderer his body was thrown into the Tiber. A terrible tempest of rain and hail at once swept down upon Rome. For weeks the thunder crashed and shook the city. The people at last decided that the storm was caused by the dead Pilate, so they took the body from the river and carried it away. But wherever they deposited it—in the Rhone or in other rivers—violent storms and tempests raged, as they had done in Rome. At last they brought the body here and threw it into the little solitary lake near the top of yonder lofty, rugged, and almost inaccessible mountain. It was then called the Pilatus Lake and at a later day the name was also given to the mountain. Before that the mountain was called Fracmont, which comes from a Latin word signifying its jagged appearance. The lake has neither inlet nor outlet. It is not increased by the rain or the snow, nor does the most intense Summer heat lower it. It does not freeze in Winter. The wind does not agitate its dark surface, but when its quiet is disturbed by human hands frightful tempests arise.”
“Does the dead Pontius Pilate who is buried there make these storms?” said Arnold.
“Yes, my child. At times he rises from the lake and sits upon a mountain-peak, and from thence stirs up the storms which spread such devastation over the country. But once there came a wandering scholar—”
“What kind of persons are those?” asked the lad.
“They are scholars who go from one school to another, pursuing their studies, now in this one, now in that. They are poor, and the ecclesiastics and other religious people whom they visit in their wanderings support them. Last Summer one of them ate at our table.”
“Was he a scholar?” asked Arnold, in great surprise; “why, he was as big as father, and had a long beard, besides.”
“Yes,” replied his mother, with a smile; “it is not unusual for these learned beggars to remain in the schools until their thirtieth year, when they sometimes get positions as under-teachers.”
“One of these travelling scholars came, you were saying,” said Arnold, thus recalling to his mother the interrupted story.
“Yes, one of them came into our neighborhood who knew how to exorcise evil spirits, and the valley people promised to pay him well if he would quiet Pilate. The student betook himself to the lake and hurled such powerful incantations at him that he promised to rest quietly in the lake upon condition that he might rise from his watery grave one day in each year. Since that time, upon every Good Friday, Pilate leaves the lake and sits in his red robes of office as he used to do. During the remainder of the year he is quiet and invisible. But when he becomes provoked by unusual noises in the vicinity of the lake, or stones are thrown into it, then the clouds gather about the mountains, terrible storms break loose, and the lake emits fiery exhalations. On this account people are forbidden to go near the lake lest some one may ignorantly or maliciously provoke him and thereby endanger this region as well as himself.”
The mother ceased. The boy gazed steadily at the mysterious mountain, at that instant illuminated by the rising moon and gleaming like silver in its snowy drapery.
“Do you know anything more about Pilatus?” he asked, after a little.
“No, my darling, I have told you all that people say about it.”
The story greatly excited Arnold. He wanted to hear more of the same thrilling kind. A dim recollection of an extraordinary adventure connected with his own family rose in his mind.
“Little mother,” he said, “what was that horrible animal which once lived in this region? I heard you tell about it once, but I have forgotten most of the story. I know that a knight called Winkelried killed it.”
“That was Henry of Winkelried, your grandfather, usually called ‘Schrutan.’”
“Why Schrutan?”
“The name was probably given to him by his companions in the tournaments; for like all knights he was fond of tilting.”
“If my grandfather was a knight, why are there no knights now?” asked Arnold, raising his head from his mother’s shoulder and gazing at her earnestly.
“The times have greatly changed,” she replied. “Once the powerful family of Hohenstaufen[1] ruled over the German Empire. It occupied the throne more than a hundred years. The emperors fought many great battles, and the Winkelrieds, who were in their service, were elevated to knighthood. But when the Hohenstaufens ceased to rule, an evil time ensued. As it was no longer an honor to be a knight, the Winkelrieds discarded knighthood and lived like plain country people.”
“And what is it about the terrible animal and my grandfather who was called Knight Schrutan?” said Arnold.
“Listen,” said his mother, as she began to tell him the story once more. “You know the little village of Odwylen, between Stans and the Kernwald. In the mountains near it there is a vast cavern which is said to have been occupied by heathens in the ancient days. Perhaps they were the old Romans who took refuge there because they had committed crimes and been banished from their own country. About a century ago a huge dragon had its lair in this cavern. It killed both men and beasts. The people of the little village, which is called Wylen to this day, had to flee, and as it was forsaken and desolate it took the name of Odwylen.[2] Along the roads which lead across the moors and meadows between Stans and Sarnen to the little village, not a person could be seen, nor were any animals pastured there, for the dragon concealed itself in the swamps and attacked every living thing. To be safe from the monster they laid out new roads, traces of which are visible even to-day. The people of Unterwalden sometimes undertook to attack the dragon, but it was always on the alert, and as soon as it discovered its enemies it retreated to the mountain cavern or some other place where it could defy pursuit. It was so agile that it could run up the steepest mountain-side as swiftly as a lizard and as easily as if it were on level ground. Knight Schrutan heard about this dragon. He was no longer in his own country, for in his wrath he had slain an Unterwaldener who had wronged him, and he had been banished for it. He requested permission to attack the dragon, asking no other compensation than the remission of his penalty of exile. Being a valiant knight, the Unterwaldeners granted his petition and allowed him to return home. The knight made a long spear with a sharp spike for its tip, and at once sought the dragon, which he was not long in finding. When the monster saw that it had to deal with but one man, it rushed upon him with open jaws. Knight Schrutan hurled the spear with all his strength into its throat, where the spike held it securely. Then he drew his sword and smote the dragon until, bleeding from numerous wounds, it died in terrible convulsions.”
Arnold scarcely breathed during the story, so spellbound was he. At last a deep sigh escaped him. He slid down from his mother’s lap and stood before her with his arms crossed, impatiently awaiting her next words, for he knew the story was not yet finished. He was sure there was something else, but could not remember what it was. His mother continued:
“When the knight saw that his task was complete and successful he raised both arms and praised God for His personal assistance. But, alas! he kept his sword in his hand and the poisonous blood of the dragon dripped upon the unprotected parts of his body. A few days afterwards the valiant hero died, mourned by all the people of that region, whom he had rescued from the ravages of the cruel monster.”
Arnold stood lost in thought as his mother brought the story to an end. Had his brave ancestor gone forth to battle, and had he returned victorious, and been overwhelmed with gold and honors by the grateful Unterwaldeners it would not have been half so inspiring to the lad as this tragic fate of the hero who paid for his brave deed with his life. Young as he was, he too longed to achieve something great and bequeath to others a legacy of glorious memories. The spark of self-sacrifice was kindled at that instant in the boy’s breast, not to be extinguished except with his last breath.
“Little mother,” cried Arnold, with glowing cheeks, “I will be such a knight!”
His mother smiled, but made no reply. She knew the Winkelrieds’ love of freedom. She knew, also, how different it was from the conceptions of freedom in the days of chivalry, and she was sure that Arnold’s was the true Winkelried love. She had long been aware of the boy’s heroic spirit, but she had never thought of him as an armed warrior in the field.
That night Arnold dreamed of nothing but Pilatus, the Knight Schrutan, and the dragon, and they were mingled together in the strangest manner. He dreamed he was on Lake Pilatus and saw the knight engaged in a desperate struggle with the dragon. Nearer and more near the hero forced the monster to the water’s edge, and with one last desperate effort he drove it into the gloomy lake, which rose high above the sinking reptile. The sky was instantly overspread with black clouds. The region was enveloped in darkness, and, accompanied by deafening crashes of thunder, Pilate rose from the lake in his red robes, holding in his hand a spear set with sharp spikes, and making menacing gestures at the knight. Schrutan plunged into the lake without hesitation, and notwithstanding his heavy armor, breasted the waves with strong arms, prepared to struggle with the evil spirit. Before he could reach him, however, the water changed to dragon’s blood in which the knight was overwhelmed.
On the next day, Florian Häbli, Arnold’s friend and playmate, came to see him. Notwithstanding Florian’s father was poor and had to earn a living for his large family by fishing and felling trees, Arnold preferred him to all the other boys, and admired his courage, though Florian sometimes was bolder in words than in action. The two boys at first indulged in a vigorous snowball fight. Then they made a snow man, and when it was finished Arnold placed a hat upon its head. As this reminded him of the cloud caps which at times covered the summit of Pilatus, he called the snow man the wicked Pontius Pilate, and bade Florian help him to destroy Pilate. Both lads began a fierce bombardment of the snow man, and kept it up until it was reduced to a shapeless mass. Then Arnold told Florian about Schrutan and his adventure; and he said he would like to encounter a dragon, but unfortunately there were no more of them in that neighborhood.
“Do you really mean to say that you, such a little fellow, would really fight a dragon?” rather contemptuously replied Florian, who was half a head taller than Arnold. “Why, it would bury you in the cavity of one of its teeth.”
Arnold, with equal contempt, answered back: “You shall yet see what I will do. And I shall not kill a dragon,” he said, with a glance at the fragments of the snow man. “The wicked Pilate is up there in the lake. He sends storms over the land, which destroy the crops just as the dragon killed men and beasts. He rises from the lake every Good Friday, and then we can attack him.”
“Have you the courage to do it?” said Florian, incredulously.
“Yes, I have,” replied Arnold, in a manner so serious that Florian was deeply impressed. He stated the perils of such an undertaking to his companion, and also informed him that no one was allowed to go near the banks of the lake. But Arnold was not to be dissuaded from his purpose. He replied by setting forth with such enthusiasm the duty of some one to perform the heroic deed of ridding the region of the evil spirit that Florian resolved not to be outdone by his brave comrade. He decided on the spot to accompany him on his dangerous expedition, and to help him to overcome Pilate. The two lads talked of nothing else from day to day, and carefully guarded their secret. Florian agreed to all the details of the plan and worked them out assiduously. Most of his time was spent in devising the weapons they should use. He was eager to construct a catapult, like those used to batter down the walls of fortresses, but found it impossible. Then he considered other methods of attack. He thought of Greek fire, but he did not know how to make it. At last he thought of a thunder-machine, for he had heard that these machines, by some mysterious force, could hurl great iron balls. But as all his plans proved impracticable, he next began to devise methods of protection against the enemy’s attack which would make up for the lack of these terrible weapons,—such as an invulnerable coat of mail, or some wonderful ointment which could be rubbed on the body from head to foot, and make the skin as hard as horn.
Arnold listened to all of Florian’s suggestions without making any reply. He had long since settled the whole matter himself. His courage was sufficient armor for him, and his weapon was the simple sling, with which David smote the giant Goliath. He was sure he could overcome Pilate if he had a fair chance, and to make sure of it he practised with the sling until he became so expert that he could hit any mark within stone’s throw.
The two little adventurers impatiently awaited the spring-time, which would bring Holy Week and the eventful day. The mountains took on fresh tints. The sky was gorgeously colored, and the atmosphere so transparent that the most distant mountains seemed near by. There was a certain relaxation in the air and a peculiar rustle in the woods. The dwellers in the valley went around anxiously and extinguished the fire on every hearth, for these manifestations of nature were the harbingers of the violent Föhn. This dreadful wind (the Föhn) sweeps down from the mountains upon the valleys, but gentle Spring follows in its train. The Föhn melts the Winter snows even more rapidly than the sun, on which account it is called the “snow-eater,” and its warm breath imparts new life to the grasses and buds.
The valley was already clothed in tender green when Good Friday came. On that eventful morning, armed only with his sling, Arnold and his companion-at-arms set out for Lake Pilatus. Arnold did not know the way, but Florian was familiar with it. His godfather, Peter Ruttimer, whose duty it was to keep strangers away from it, had sometimes taken Florian with him, so that he knew the road, and now and then had even been near the lake.
After a troublesome and painful tramp of several hours, climbing up steep places on all fours, and frequently stopping to rest, the venturesome lads reached the accursed water, enclosed all round with gloomy forests. Florian would have greatly preferred to abandon the expedition, of which he was growing very tired, and visit his godfather; but Arnold’s cool contempt of every danger deeply impressed him and strengthened his wavering courage.
There was not a ripple on that gloomy water; not a trace of Pilate, who should have been sitting there in his official robes, was to be seen. Florian, after all, was right when he said that Pilate would not allow any one to see him.
“You see, he does not come,” whispered Florian, after they had waited a long time.
“He will come yet,” replied Arnold; and to expedite the wished-for moment he picked up a large stone, and before Florian could stop him, hurled it into the lake with all his might. It struck with a great splash. With a loud outcry, brave Florian took to his heels and ran away as fast as he could.
Arnold, however, was not in the least disturbed. After waiting a little while, he sent Pilate a second invitation. He repeated it a dozen times, making longer pauses between the throws so as to give him time to consider it. His efforts were useless. He could not even rouse the sluggish water into activity again. But he did not mind that, for he was certain that Pilate was in the lake. At last he decided that more energetic measures were necessary to entice him to the surface. He arranged for a general bombardment by collecting a veritable arsenal of stones. When he had piled them up in a small pyramid he began operations. He hurled one stone after another into the lake and kept up the assault with such vigor that the sweat poured down his face. But Pilate treated these unprecedented insults with silent contempt. While Arnold was making preparations to renew the bombardment, for which he was collecting fresh ammunition, he heard footsteps rapidly approaching. Turning round, he saw the powerful figure of Peter Ruttimer, and Florian, who had turned informer, by his side.
The guardian of Pilatus had already thrown up his hands in dismay when he noticed that the water of the lake had been disturbed by some one throwing stones. White with rage, he rushed after the malefactor. Little he cared that that malefactor’s ancestor was a knight. He would have liked to give him a sound whipping on the spot, but refrained, fearing that Arnold would make an outcry which would only add another offence to his disobedience of orders; so he contented himself by hissing out the maledictions which herdsmen employ when their animals are refractory, after which he drove both boys down the mountain. He would have had the legal penalty imposed upon Arnold had not his godson also been concerned in the offence.
Nearly two hundred and fifty years later, imitators of these boys went to the lake. Johann Müller, the Lucerne magistrate, climbed to the notorious spot with many others. They shouted to Pilate to arise from his watery grave, and they threw stones into the lake; but neither Pilate nor the tempest appeared. Some walked into the water to see if it was bottomless or would emit fiery exhalations, as was the general belief. Several years later the lake was drained,—only an ugly and dangerous morass remaining. The herdsmen, however, did not give up their belief in the legend. For a long time an old custom prevailed among them of shouting an incantation every evening through their milk-funnels to prevent Pilate from harming them or their animals during the night.
Chapter II The Battle of Morgarten
About ten miles distant from Stans, and high above the glistening Lake of the Four Forest Cantons, is a somewhat long valley, about three miles in width, surrounded by huge mountains, among which the Titlis is the loftiest. A pastoral village occupies the right bank of the Aar,[3] which furnishes it with fresh spring water. Both the valley and the village take the name of Engelberg[4] from the Benedictine monastery, established there in 1120. Its founder was the wealthy and childless Baron Conrad of Seldenbüren. He gave the valley, which was one of his possessions, to the monastery, besides endowing it with valuable property in Zurichgau. “Engelberg” is the equivalent of the Latin name, “Mons Angelorum,” which Pope Calixtus the Second gave to the monastery.
The entire valley was tributary to the monastery. Every household had to furnish it a Shrovetide fowl or thirty eggs. When a valley person died, his heir had to give the monastery the best pair of cattle left by the deceased, as well as the clothes he last wore to church. Twice a year the Abbot went to the castle at Zurichgau, belonging to the monastery, to administer justice. Eight days previous to the journey, those of the same rank and fief, and belonging to the same order, between the Reuss and the Rhine, were invited to accompany him. The Abbot, on these journeys also took his chaplain, a provost, a priest in ordinary, and a knight with three hounds and a hawk. When the Abbot stopped at a house, the housewife had to receive him at her door, with a loaf in one hand and a fowl in the other, the fowl being for the hawk and the loaf for the hounds. She must also provide a roast, a sufficient number of fowls, and enough of good Alsatian wine for the dinner of the Abbot and his company, and if he remained over night, the farm attached to the place had also to furnish fowl.
Berthold of Winkelried was abbot at the time of our story, and his two sisters, Adelheid and Elspeth, were in charge of the convent, which was also located in the valley. As the brother and sisters were near relatives of Arnold, our hero, he was sent to the famous school of the Benedictine monastery to acquire his education and to become thoroughly acquainted with the history of the fatherland, and thereby acquire the inspiration of its struggles and heroic deeds.
The original sources of this history are lost in the traditions of the past. The first inhabitants of Switzerland probably were the Rætians. They were followed by the Helvetians, a Celtic tribe which occupied the plains, leaving the Rætians only the mountains. Both these tribes were subjugated by the Romans in the first century of our era, who laid out the first roads and established settlements. Eastern Switzerland was assigned to the Rætians, who belonged to Italy, and western to the Gauls. The name “Helvetia” disappeared in the third century. When the great migrations occurred, which built up new empires and pulled down old ones, the fierce Huns first invaded the country. Following them, the Burgundians conquered the western part, whereupon the Ostrogoths took possession of the southern and the Alamanni of the northern part. All these tribes in turn were subjugated by the Franks,[5] who not only overran the country, but established Frankish advowsons there. Although the Alpine people were subject to them yet they retained a certain independence, and Charles the Great granted them many privileges, for they had rendered him important service in his Italian wars. After the dissolution of the great Frankish empire the eastern part of Switzerland was acquired by the Duchy of Swabia and the western by the newly organized kingdom of Burgundy. Subsequent to this, the German sovereigns took over the country and permitted the house of Zäringen to administer it. During the reign of the Emperor Frederick the Second (1215-1250) the Swiss were subordinate to the Empire and free from the exactions of the landowners, but after the extinction of the Hohenstaufen dynasty, the imperial power declined. Ecclesiastics and non-ecclesiastics, counts, and princes sought to increase their possessions and revenues at the expense of their neighbors; and the Swiss cities, as well as the country people, who had previously resisted thraldom, were forced to protect themselves by making individual alliances with their oppressors. Thus it happened that Zurich and Uri united with the counts of Hapsburg. Schwyz made another alliance. When Count Rudolph of Hapsburg[6] was elected to the imperial throne, 1273, he endeavored to enlarge his possessions. Several Swiss cities which had been loyal to the Hapsburgs and had fought so stoutly in Rudolph’s campaigns began to fear for their own security; but in the last year of Rudolph’s life (1291) the men of Schwyz, Uri, and Unterwalden met and organized “the Everlasting League,” under the provisions of which they agreed to protect each other from a common enemy. They also agreed to recognize no local officials who had bought their positions or who were strangers in the country. Following their example, the people of every valley and community made the same agreement.
What the death of the Emperor Rudolph had prevented him from accomplishing, Albert, his son and successor, sought to carry out. He aimed to dominate the country and make its free people his vassals. When at last his tyranny was too severe for endurance, three men from the three cantons, Werner Stauffacher of Schwyz, Walter Fürst of Uri, and Arnold of Melchthal, and thirty more with them, met at the Rütli,[7] and renewed the League of 1291. Two months after this, the tyrannical governors were expelled, their brutal rule was ended, and the country was free.
Duke Albert, thirsting for revenge, sought to destroy the League, but while striving to accomplish that purpose he was murdered by his nephew, Duke John of Swabia. The German imperial power was supplanted by that of the Austrian dukes. Henry, the next emperor, was chosen from the Luxembourg and Bavarian family. He recognized the League and confirmed the people in all their rights and privileges, which subjected him to the ill-will of Albert’s sons and grandsons. After Henry’s death Louis of Bavaria was elected Emperor over Frederick of Austria. The Forest Cantons paid allegiance to him because they knew they had nothing good to expect from Austria. Thereupon Leopold, Frederick’s brother, decided to retaliate, and nearly all the nobles of Swabia and German Switzerland joined him.
The events now to be related, which took place in 1315, Arnold learned from the lips of an aged monk in the Engelberg monastery, who had been a participant in them. This still vigorous old man, Father Vincentius, was known throughout the valley as the “one-eyed,” for he had lost his left eye. He was not a man of great erudition, but having had experience in the art of healing he knew how to compound medicines for the sick, and to treat wounds and broken limbs. He was reverenced and loved by the pastoral folk of the valley, for many of them owed their good health and their lives to his skill. As he was always ready, by day or by night, in good or in bad weather, to visit sick-beds, he was looked upon as an angel of mercy. Father Vincentius had been wild and reckless in his youth, but in his later years he returned to the Church and consecrated himself as a Benedictine monk to the service of suffering humanity. Arnold was very fond of the monk, and his devotion was returned by Father Vincentius, who occasionally took the lad with him on his visits to the sick. Upon one of these visits, which took them to the end of the valley, the monk told him about the war which Leopold waged against the three cantons.
“In November of the year 1315,” he began, “Leopold assembled a large force at Zug, composed of the flower of the nobility and his own horsemen. There were also many foot soldiers from Lucerne, Entlebuch, Aargau, Oberhasli, Frutigen, and other places in the hill country. His plan was to have the entire cavalry and part of the infantry make the main attack upon Schwyz. This force numbered fifteen thousand men, and the Duke himself was leader. The remaining infantry, six thousand strong, commanded by the Austrian marshal, Count Otto of Strasburg, was to invade Unterwalden—one division attacking the Nidwald by land and water, the other the Obwald,[8] so as to divide and weaken their opponents as much as possible.
“Two highroads led from Zug to Schwyz, but the Schwyzers were uncertain which of them the Duke’s army would take. When they found at last that they were menaced by such an overpowering force they became somewhat alarmed. They had made tenders of peace to Leopold through Count Frederick of Toggenburg, who was well disposed toward them, but the furious Leopold would not consider the offers, so that no alternative was left them but to defend themselves to the last drop of their blood. They summoned all their people to arms and fortified the principal passes and roads of their little country. They thoroughly strengthened Arth, a post station at the southeast corner of the Lake of Zug, where it makes a bend, for at that point, as at Lucerne, they might be attacked by land and water. They constructed strong and well protected entrenchments, extending from the Rossberg to the Rigi. If the enemy should break through at any one point the entire defence might be lost, so particular care was paid to the entrenchments. As there were frequent skirmishes between the Schwyzers and the Austrians at Saint Adrian, it was thought the main attack would be made there, and that Leopold’s army might be expected on the road to Arth. These skirmishes proved to be the first step toward the subsequent success of the Confederates. Among the Austrian liegemen from Lucerne and Zug there were many who sympathized with their neighbors and who were serving in the Duke’s army under constraint. One of these was Henry of Hünenberg, who had friends and relatives among the Schwyzers. He determined to give his old friends some valuable information. A favorable chance offered itself in one of these encounters. During its progress he rushed up to the entrenchment and shot an arrow over it, which lodged in a tree. A Schwyzer, noticing that a paper was wrapped round it, pulled it out. The paper contained the brief but significant message, ‘Defend yourselves at Morgarten.’
“Now they were sure where the attack would be made. The Duke chose for his advance that one of the two roads that leads to the rocky ridge known as the Morgarten, and by way of Stein directly to Schwyz. Every effort was made to give the enemy a vigorous reception. The Morgarten is a natural defence of itself. At the upper part of it extends a plain called the ‘Alte Matte,’ intersected by a mountain ridge. This runs to the Morgarten and presents an admirable opportunity for attacking an army approaching through the pass upon the flank, or to cut him off entirely. In making their plans, they followed the counsels of Rudolf Reding, who had fought in many of his country’s battles in his younger life, and now had the valuable experience of seventy years.
“On the evening of November fifteenth their companions from Uri and Unterwalden arrived in Schwyz. Their numbers all told were thirteen hundred—six hundred from Schwyz, four hundred from Uri, and three hundred from Unterwalden. The rest of their men were engaged in holding important places among the passes. As night came on, the little army took up its march to Morgarten, determined to conquer, or, like Leonidas and his Spartans, die for freedom and the fatherland.
“On the following day Duke Leopold left Zug with his fifteen thousand men early in the morning. After a council with his leaders at the village church of Ober Ägeri on the way, he decided to make the attack the next morning. The Confederates in the meantime, following Reding’s advice, did not remain on the mountain ridge, but crossed the Alte Matte to Haslern, so that Morgarten was on their right and the little Lake Ägeri, extending to the southeastern slope of Morgarten, on their left.
“The Confederates suddenly found an unexpected and even unwelcome reinforcement, though it was but a mere handful of men.”
Father Vincentius paused in his story, apparently absorbed in a reverie, which his little auditor did not venture to disturb though he longed to know how the impending battle came out. The old man muttered a few inaudible words to himself and nodded his head twice. At last he resumed:
“You must know, my son, that the government of the Confederates was severe in its administration of law and authority. Whoever disobeyed the law or disturbed the public peace in any way was severely punished. It is so now, and it has always been so. There were some young, hot-headed fellows who thought it was their mission to reform the world, and as one alone could not do it, they formed societies for that purpose, which became dangerous political parties to the State and the community. Such fellows as these were always expelled from the country. Just about the time of which I am talking a number of young men had suffered this penalty for violation of the law; but when they heard of the danger which threatened the fatherland, the old home-love was aroused, and fifty of them started for the Schwyz frontier to serve their country. They sent messengers to the Confederates, asking permission to serve in the ranks of their countrymen, but their service was declined and the messengers were rudely dismissed. I can confirm this, for I was one of those messengers. Yes, my son, I was one of the exiles. I was one of those heaven-stormers, before I became Father Vincentius. Although our offer of help was rejected we still loved the fatherland, and so we fifty determined to fight for it by ourselves. We knew where to find the enemy, and, unknown to any one, we went to the Morgarten and took up a position on the ridge to the right, called Mattligütsch—it was early in the morning of November sixteenth. In very early times a slide had been made there for sending down the firewood cut for the Winter. There were plenty of logs at hand, which could be rolled down upon the passing enemy with terrible effect, and we also collected an ample supply of rocks and boulders. A dense fog hung over Lake Ägeri and its shores, through which we suddenly heard drum-beats and trumpet-calls in the distance. Leopold’s army was approaching, with the fifteen hundred nobles of Swabia, Alsatia, Aargau, and Thurgau, heavily armed, led by Duke Leopold himself, and Count Henry of Montfort-Tettnung in the advance, the infantry bringing up the rear.
“Just then the fog lifted and the sun rose. Brightly gleamed the polished steel armor and helms gayly adorned with many-colored plumes, and the dense forest of spears flashed in the dazzling light. It was a fascinating and awe-inspiring spectacle, but it only strengthened our courage all the more. We calmly awaited our opportunity, entirely unobserved by the enemy. As the cavalry, little recking of any danger, advanced through the narrow pass between the Mattligütsch and Lake Ägeri we let loose a tremendous avalanche of logs and tree trunks, followed by a hail-storm of rocks. They were at once plunged into frightful disorder. Many men and horses were felled to the earth and crushed. The terrified steeds, almost as heavily weighed down as their riders, reared and threw them. Count Montfort and other leaders attempted to restore order and resume the march, but we gave them no time. We hurled rocks and logs into their ranks incessantly and their panic increased every moment. Though barely able to extricate themselves, some rode back and urged the rear ranks forward. But the enemy was overcome with terror. Threats and imprecations mingled with groans and screams on all sides. The commands of their leaders were not even respected.
“In the first moment of their rage at this unexpected obstruction to their march, several horsemen made a rash attempt to ride along the Haselmatt, where they thought they would be least exposed to our assault, and a part of the vanguard followed them. Observing this movement we redoubled our exertions, and most of them were crushed as they were toilsomely ascending. We charged upon those who escaped, and it was then my eye was put out by the thrust of a lance.
“The thirteen hundred confederates at Haslern, who had heard the tumult and din of arms, suddenly came up and attacked the cavalry. Their clubs, spears, and swords made frightful havoc, and they dealt such stout blows with their halberds that even the heaviest armed foe could not have withstood them. Hundreds struggled in the stream of blood, filled with demoniac rage, and many were wounded by them in their blind fury or were trampled upon by their horses. Some were so paralyzed by fear that they made no attempt to defend themselves, and were killed. Those who managed to extricate themselves took to flight. Several dived into Lake Ägeri, where most of them were drowned because of their heavy armor. Leopold’s horsemen, who rode along so gallantly and proudly only a short time before were now killed or fugitives. While the great battle-horns of Uri and Unterwalden were sounding their blasts of victory, the flying horsemen encountered the foot-soldiers just coming up. As they did not turn aside quickly enough, the latter were trodden underfoot by the wild horses. Among the fugitives were the Count of Montfort and Leopold. The Duke, usually a brave soldier, furiously galloped miles away to Winterthur,[9] although no one was pursuing him; such was his consternation over his surprising defeat.
“At last we met the terrified and panic-stricken ranks of the foot-soldiers, but among them were men from Zurich and Zug, who fought like lions. But they were doomed, for who could withstand the impetuosity of the Schwyzers, whose like was only to be found among the old German conquerors of the Romans. Like grass before the scythe these picked men of Zurich and Zug fell in heaps where they stood. Surely, heroism like this was worthy of a better cause! The other foot-soldiers fled to the adjacent mountains, and at nine o’clock the battle of Morgarten was over.
“The victors could not afford to follow the fugitives, for during the battle messengers had been sent from Unterwalden calling for help. In pursuance of their plan of battle Count Otto of Strasburg had made the attack on Unterwalden with his six thousand men. Our division made its approach in boats on the Lake of the Four Forest Cantons, and as the few defenders of the shore-line were powerless to prevent them, they destroyed everything in their way throughout the entire Nidwald. The other division, led by the Count, invaded the Obwald and ravaged it with the rapacity of a flock of wolves. After the enemy’s main force had been routed at Morgarten, the Unterwaldeners went at once to the relief of their own hard pressed countrymen and hundreds of stout Schwyzers accompanied them. They first rescued the Nidwaldeners from their unbidden guests, recovered the spoils, and drove them to their boats in such haste that many of them fell into the water and were drowned. Then they moved against the Strasburg force, which they found at Alpnach. As the Austrian count saw the Unterwaldeners approaching he was seized with a panic, which spread through his entire army; for he knew that the Unterwaldeners were at Morgarten and rightly concluded that the Duke’s army had been defeated. The Strasburgers lost courage and began retreating without even offering resistance. But some of them failed to escape, for the rear column was overtaken and several hundred were killed.
“Thus in one day the Confederates achieved a three-fold victory over an army which was sixteen times as strong as their own, and which lost fifteen hundred horsemen and as many foot-soldiers. The loss of the Confederates was small, but three of their bravest leaders were found among the dead. Horses, costly weapons, rider and horse equipment, ten banners, many decorated helmets such as the nobility wear to distinguish them from others, were among the rich spoils captured. Permission was granted to those among the enemy who had dead relatives on the field to take their bodies home. The rest were buried on the spot. The wounded were treated with special kindness. We who had made the first assault and prepared the way for victory were allowed to remain in the homeland, and it was sacred to us ever after.”
Such is the story of the battle at Morgarten as the monk, who had participated in the events of that memorable day, related it to the lad. Arnold gazed with admiration upon this old man who had once fought so stoutly and now went about in his sandals and black cowl as a messenger of peace. He looked with a kind of reverential awe at the blinded eye, and the scar seemed to him a mark of honor and victory.
Arnold had always loved his country, but now he was deeply moved by a feeling of pride as he thought of the skill and courage which had characterized the deeds of his countrymen, and his heart glowed with the fire of patriotism. His most ardent wish was to distinguish himself by his devotion to home and freedom, to swing the halberd in the hot fight, and to drive the enemy from the fatherland. He no longer wished to be a knight.
Chapter III The Mystery Play at Engelberg
The monasteries in those days were the nurseries of the arts and sciences. The German stage also owes its origin to them. The so-called “mystery plays” originated in church ceremonials representing the Passion of Christ, and were intended to familiarize the people with the events narrated by the Evangelists. They were given in a semi-musical way by various ecclesiastics. One spoke the narrative parts, another the words of the Saviour, a third all the words of the remaining personages, and the chorus recited those of the people and priests. These plays were performed at the monastery of Engelberg, where young Arnold was studying, with all the scenic display possible at that time.
As the Easter festival drew nigh the men of the valley came with hammers and hatchets and built a large stage upon an open place near the monastery, where the life of the Saviour from His birth to His resurrection was to be represented before a vast concourse of spectators assembled from far and near. The stage was open on all sides, for they knew nothing about wings or curtains in those days. The play lasted an entire day. The players were monks and students; but as their number was too small because bystanders and crowds of people were necessary to the performance, intelligent outsiders were called in to help. Upon this account German was generally used in place of the earlier Latin text.
When everything was in readiness the performers entered and occupied a large semicircle of seats, after which the customary blessing was invoked. The man chorus pronounced the “Veni sancte Spiritus,” after which two students sang the “Emitte Spiritum.” They were dressed to represent angels, with wings on their shoulders; and in this guise the little Arnold, the great war hero of after days, took part in the sacred performance.
The angels as well as Christ and his apostles wore the mediæval costumes of that time. The risen Christ was clad in the official garments of a bishop—the dalmatic and the red chasuble. He also wore a crown and carried a cross and banner. This costume was intended to express the perpetuity of His episcopal authority as supreme head of the church. Next appeared Saint Augustine as herald or narrator. He called the assemblage to order, pointed out the persons sitting around, explaining who each one was, and introduced the play with a pious address. In the course of his remarks he interested the audience with digressions from the story and explanations of the significance of individual events.
Whenever a player was to appear in a scene he rose from his seat, but returned to it as soon as he had finished. For instance, Jesus went to John to be baptized and then took His seat again. Nearly all the events of the life and passion of the Saviour were represented in this way, and each important scene was followed by the chorus, in Latin. King Herod’s followers were in his immediate vicinity and behind them stood the servants who led John the Baptist to prison. At first the apostles were distributed about the stage, and the Master was obliged to go from one to the other and gather them together when He ordered them to follow Him. The Jewish people and their priests occupied a place set apart for them; and whenever Jesus wished to communicate with them, or to instruct them how to heal the blind, the dumb, the lepers, and the cripples, He had to go to them. Upon the awakening of Lazarus, at Jesus’s entrance into Jerusalem, and in some other scenes the people flocked to Him.
All the women mentioned in the sacred story were represented by monks and students. Various services were required of the angels. They had to demand order with the words “Silentium habete,” to perform many interpolated sacred songs, and to sing certain strophes explaining scenes that had not been described by the narrator, but which were arranged for music. It was also part of their duty to make changes necessitated by the stage conditions, and to explain the situation clearly. The palsied man was in bed, and when Jesus bade him arise he took his bed with him. The severed head of John was brought upon the stage. The foot-washing was literally represented. When the Saviour entered Jerusalem, both the ass upon which He rode and the palm-branches which the people strewed along the way, were provided. Everything connected with the death of Jesus, from the purple mantle and crown of thorns to the lance and the sponge, was used. The crowing of the cock, when Peter denied his Master, was imitated, as well as the thunder and the rising of the dead. A table covered with food and drink served for Herod’s banquet, before which the boy who represented Herodias danced; it served also for the supper at Simon’s, when the repentant Magdalen came to the Saviour, and for the Last Supper. The tombs of Lazarus and Christ, John’s prison, and the house of Martha and Lazarus were represented, as well as the pinnacle of the temple to which Satan led our Lord, and the Mount of Olives, set with exotic plants.
While the Chorus sang, living pictures were exhibited. They represented old Biblical events relating to the preceding scenes, so as to show the close connection of Old and New Testament occurrences. Sometimes events were artistically interwoven: While Jesus prayed on the Mount of Olives, Judas was making his treacherous bargain with the priests; and while Pontius Pilate was conducting the trial of Jesus, in another scene Peter was denying the Lord.
[Illustration: _Monument commemorating the Battle of Sempach_]
To relieve the serious treatment of the subject, pleasant interludes were devised for the entertainment of the audience, showing various contrasts of life, so that smiles might follow tears. Satan appeared clad in a wolf-skin, with mighty horns and long tail, and must have presented a ludicrous sight. A merry fellow announced the arrival of the three wise men sent by Herod, and made fun of the timid sovereign who was afraid of a Child. Then he entered again with the derisive announcement that the three wise men would not go back, and a third time to say that the Holy Child would be represented in the temple. Every time he came in Herod would get enraged and threaten to hang him for making fun of a king. Another curious scene was that in which Peter smote off Malchus’s ear after the seizure of Christ. Malchus wofully exclaims: “Alas! what an outrage; what a shame! I have lost my ear. They will call me a fool.”
Thereupon Christ said to Peter: “Put up your sword, or you will not be safe, for those who seek revenge with the sword will perish by it.” Then He turned to the Jews and said: “Bring the man to me. I will replace his ear.”
After Malchus’s ear was put on, he said to one of his friends: “Tell me truly about my ear. See if it is on securely, for it aches very badly.”
After examining it carefully, the friend assured him it was all right.
Then Malchus expressed his gratitude to the Lord, after remarking: “Jesus is a very good man; He knows how to put on ears.”
Before the three Marys went to the sepulchre a man entered, dressed in the ordinary costume of the time, who was a familiar figure at fairs and markets. This was the travelling quack. With the words, “God greet you, gentlemen all, as the fox said when he peeped into the goose-pen,” he introduced himself, and stated that he was in need of a helper. Rubin, the merry fellow, applied for the situation, and after considerable haggling they agreed upon a price. Rubin then opened out the quack’s stock, helped to prepare the medicines, and explained their virtues to the crowd. At last he decided he would also have helpers. A second buffoon, called Purterbalk, and a third named Listerbalk, who was hunchbacked, applied; and while they were squabbling together a strophe of the three Marys’ song was heard, as they were on their way to the sepulchre. The three wags advanced to the front of the stage and began selling the medicines, and when the quack thought they were selling them too cheap, Rubin sharply reprimanded him. While the three Marys were still on their way the quack lay down and went to sleep; whereupon Rubin made off with his entire stock. His awakening and wrathful imprecations ended the humorous interlude. The three Marys were seen at the sepulchre and the angel announced to them the resurrection of the Lord.
The effect of this drama was so overpowering that reverence for the sacred associations was not affected in the least by these merry interludes, which were peculiarly adapted to the childish sentiment of the people. The denouement of the play represented the arrival of the Saviour in Heaven with a number of the elect, and God the Father, sitting in His majesty, welcoming them.
Chapter IV The Black Death
While Arnold was staying at the monastery and approaching young manhood, a terrible calamity visited the world and made its way into the peaceful little valley. Year after year reports had come that a frightful pestilence was raging in the eastern part of Asia and spreading from country to country. Ships laden with rich cargoes were found at sea, drifting about and their crews all dead.
The trade route from China led through central Asia to the Tauric coast,[10] whence the products of the Orient were transported to Constantinople, at that time the emporium for the three divisions of the earth. Over this route the plague spread into all lands. The terrible disease first appeared in Europe in the maritime cities of Italy, France, and Spain, and in the course of three years gradually but surely spread all over central Europe, Poland, and Russia, climbed the chalk cliffs of England, and ascended to the extreme northern part of Scandinavia. It was attended by strange manifestations, unknown up to that time, such as cramps, heart palpitation, lethargy, and in some cases delirium. Swellings as large as eggs appeared under the arms and knees. Black or blue spots came on various parts of the body, sometimes large and single, sometimes in small groups. At first it was denied that the disease was a pestilence, but when the strange malady spread so rapidly it was recognized as an actual pestilence. There was no other name for it.
Several causes were assigned for it. It was variously attributed to the just wrath of God at the wickedness of humanity; to the influences of the heavenly bodies; to the conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter; to unusual convulsions of nature which had either preceded or followed it. Reports had long before come from China of great earthquakes, sunken mountains, droughts, floods, crop failures, and subsequent famines. Syria and Egypt also had been visited by earthquakes. The same manifestations, followed by raging storms and floods, had also appeared in Cyprus and in Naples and other cities. Similar convulsions had been experienced in Germany. Many houses had been hurled into the Rhine by a great earthquake at Basle. In Carinthia, cities and castles had been destroyed. As the excited imagination of the people connected these events with the dreadful disease, it was natural for them to consider these manifestations as the cause, and crop failures and famines as the result. The pestilence, which so readily found victims among people condemned to want, wretchedness, and despair, came to be known as the Black Death. When it attacked a household it was not contented with one victim. Almost every well person who breathed the same air as the sick one, or who had even touched his clothing, was stricken with it. Human science and medical skill were of no avail. It was in vain that cities were cleansed of filth and offal, and that infected persons were forbidden to enter them. Sanitary measures were of no avail. Flight was useless, for the terrible malady overtook the fleetest and spared neither the distinguished nor the insignificant, neither the strong nor the weak, neither the layman nor the priest. It was in vain that the church framed three prayers, to be offered at daybreak, midday, and evening, at the summons of the church bells. The mass which Pope Clemens the Sixth, who resided at Avignon, arranged for the supplication of divine mercy was fruitless. The head of Christendom himself withdrew from contact with the outside world, behind a perpetually burning fire of coals. Ceremonial processions were also arranged to avert the evil. The people joined them in multitudes. Many women walked barefooted, clad in sackcloth. Ecclesiastics, brotherhoods carrying lighted tapers, and guilds bearing banners and singing prayers and the litany also marched. Suddenly it was discovered that the number of victims was increasing because of the densely crowded throngs watching these processions. In the large cities people died by hundreds; in the smaller ones, by scores. The closest family ties were dissipated like spiders’ webs. Brothers forsook brothers, wives their husbands. Parents forbore visiting their sick children. The best of friends avoided each other on the streets.
The sick were deserted save by their attendants, and the service of the latter was so difficult to procure, except at very high prices,—for nurses’ lives were in constant danger,—that many of the poor died absolutely alone. Depositing the dead in the church vaults and keeping them over night in the houses where they had died were strictly forbidden. It was ordered that they should be interred at once; and as the churchyards in the cities were not large enough to accommodate them, they were buried by thousands in great trenches. Every one expected the Black Death any moment. Trade and commerce were paralyzed. Merchants cared no longer for the valuables for which they had worked so hard; churches and schools were closed; the administration of justice ceased. There were no sounds in the factories, no rattle of carriages or cries of venders in the streets. The fields were left untilled. There was hardly one among the few who stole through the empty streets who did not show some sign of the awful visitation. Fear, sorrow, and despair were manifest in every face. If one wore a beard it was unkempt and the hair was long and straggling, for no one cared for his looks. Some held small metallic discs containing medicated sponges to their noses, hoping in this way not to inhale the tainted air. The few who recovered from the plague were regarded as a specially privileged class. They went about freely and fearlessly amid dangers, for it was something unheard of to have the disease twice. But among those who were liable to be attacked any instant there were some who were determined to do all they could at this time of universal gloom. Compassion and love were stronger in their hearts than ever before, and wherever they could be of help they were ready with word and deed.
The plague invaded Switzerland also, and raged more violently in its mountain regions than it did in the lowlands. The clear, healthy atmosphere of the high lying valley of Engelberg did not save it from the visitation of this gruesome guest, but it only met faces full of spiritual illumination in the death shadows which followed its track. Strengthened by holy love and despising danger, the Benedictines went among the sick and those struggling with death, to help the one and administer consolation to the other. Upon this small spot of earth the plague carried off sixteen victims in a single day and in four months twenty homes were devastated.
No one in those days of gloom and despair set a brighter example of courage and self-sacrificing love than Father Vincentius. It had always been his desire to give his life for his neighbors, and now the opportunity was granted him. Wherever there was sickness he was found performing every needful service; and Arnold, a faithful, courageous helper, was by his side. The youth had nothing more to lose, for both his parents were victims of the plague. He had closed the eyes of his uncle Berthold, abbot of Engelberg, after his two sisters, Adelheid and Elspeth, had passed away. Amid these dreadful scenes he had no other feeling than one of the deepest sympathy for those whom he visited daily; and death, even in its most terrible shapes, had no terrors for him. It was thus he strengthened himself for the heroic deed which was to perpetuate the name of Winkelried in the memory of the fatherland. Side by side with Father Vincentius he encountered the plague and often wondered why he kept so strong and well. He endured these extraordinary exertions, which kept him up day and night, because of his youthful vigor; but the old Benedictine felt his strength failing more and more every day. His once upright frame was bowed and his face grew thin and sunken. Spiritual strength alone sustained his exhausted body.
While returning to the monastery one evening with Arnold, he felt a depression, weariness in his feet, and difficulty in breathing, which he attributed to the day’s exertions. In the night he was visited by unpleasant dreams. In one of these he fancied he was in a great crowd of men with gray, faded, sightless faces. As they pressed against him, his nearest neighbor pushed his elbow into his side causing such a stinging pain that he awoke. His heart was beating violently. There was a ringing in his ears, severe pain in his limbs, and his whole body seemed on fire. He placed his hand upon the stinging spot—there was a great swelling!
Father Vincentius was not alarmed. “The Lord calls me,” he murmured, and clasped his hands in prayer.
When Arnold entered his cell the next morning and found him in bed, he recognized the signs of the disease the instant he saw him. He knew, as well as any physician, the remedies which should be given and he applied them all. With quiet resignation the monk awaited dissolution; but as the disease was making rapid progress, it became necessary for him to speak at once so that he should be clearly understood.
“Praised be the Lord for his justice! Praised be the Lord in healing as in death,” he said to himself. Then, turning to Arnold, he continued: “Many are called, but few are chosen. God has sent the Black Death to mankind to reserve a chosen few among its survivors who shall grow better by sorrow and nobler by gratitude, and find to their great joy what an inestimable boon life is. Devote it to good works and offer them to Him. You have learned this, my son. You have accomplished it. May God graciously guide you with His strong hand through these troubles, so that the lofty purpose and noble courage which you have displayed so splendidly in this narrow sphere of action may be devoted hereafter to the welfare of your fatherland. It needs just such men as you have already shown yourself to be.” Father Vincentius then gave Arnold his blessing and asked for the last sacrament which was administered by one of the brothers of the order.
Toward evening his sufferings ended, and that night the stars shone upon his grave, where Arnold lamented the last dear friend he had. But he must live on. So he still breathed the tainted air, still waited upon the sick, still placed the dead in their coffins; but the plague did not attack him. None of the brothers except his uncle and Father Vincentius died, but five students fell victims, and one hundred and sixty nuns were carried from the women’s cloisters to the grave in four months.
One day a young wanderer called at the monastery and begged for breakfast and a little money. It was Florian Häbli, Arnold’s old-time playmate. His father, mother, and sisters had perished, and the orphan was forced out into the world to look out for himself.
We have not yet reached the close of these terrible scenes. As if victims of the plague itself were too few, the despised and hated Jews, who lived near the Christians in the large cities, were accused by superstitious persons of poisoning the water in order to spread the plague and exterminate their enemies. These accusations were all the more readily believed when it was noticed that the Jews abstained from water and were less liable to take the disease than the Christians. It mattered not to their accusers that it was the Jews’ foresight which led them to avoid drinking water and that their greater moderation in living helped to protect them. And yet so many Jews died in Goslar and Vienna that their burial places were insufficient, and in cities like Leipsic and Magdeburg where no Jews resided the plague was as fatal as in other places. The popular clamor, however, increased. City authorities who harbored Jews were urged to adopt most cruel measures. The Jews were placed upon the rack and forced to confess crimes of which they were not guilty, and were banished from cities after their property had been confiscated. And this was not the worst. Every appeal of humanity was stifled by the unchristian and bitter hatred of the people. Only a few escaped with the penalty of exile and loss of property. Very many must have perished by fire. In almost all the Rhine cities and in some others also, not only in Germany but in neighboring countries, they were burned without trial or even examination. In utter despair they submitted to their terrible fate and even anticipated it. Six thousand Jews burned themselves in their own houses; and at Esslingen, Worms, and Speier they assembled in their synagogues and then fired them.
Still the plague did not cease, and the people soon decided that it was not caused by human agencies. The conviction became universal that it was the divine penalty for the prevailing immorality. Reconciliation with God became the watchword. It must be secured by expiation. The better classes sought for it by adopting a pious course of life. Parents taught their children to pray and to submit to the divine will. Others sought to propitiate God with gifts to the Church. Many others believed that the sins of their past wanton lives could be atoned for by physical suffering only, and castigated themselves relentlessly. This gave rise to the brotherhood of the Flagellants. They increased by hundreds and thousands all over Germany, and each brotherhood had its own head and regulations. One of these marched behind a cross. A red cross was also fastened upon the cloak and the hat of each Flagellant, and at his side hung the scourge—a short stick, with three stout thongs tied at the ends in a hard knot, in which were inserted two sharp iron prongs set crosswise. When the procession approached any place several Flagellants with showy banners of costly purple velvet or embroidered silk, waxen tapers flickering among them, assembled behind the cross-bearer. The rest marched two by two, with hats pulled down and looking before them silently and sorrowfully. Singing expiatory songs, they entered the place, greeted and accompanied by the tolls of the church bells. Great crowds of serious-faced persons followed the strange procession to the church, where the Flagellants prostrated themselves several times before the altar. On the next morning they formed their procession in the same order as on the day before and, followed by all the people, marched to the place of scourging. There they took off their shoes and removed their outer garments, leaving the upper part of the body nude. Then they advanced in the shape of a wide cross and prostrated themselves. Each one announced the offence for which he desired to make expiation. The perjurers rested upon one side, with three fingers raised above the head; liars stretched their hands out before them; drunkards placed their hands upon their mouths. Those who were not guilty of any particular offence lay with their arms outstretched on the ground in the shape of a cross. Then the leader, or master, arose, made a short address, and struck each with the scourge. The brothers arose in turn and imitated the master. The best singers then advanced, and while they sang with subdued voices, the Flagellants lashed each other with the iron thongs until blood streamed down their backs.
In the meantime the thousands of spectators stood in a profound silence, broken only by occasional sighs or loud weeping. Others imitated what they saw; and then followed the reading of a document which was said to be a direct message from God to sinful humanity. The Flagellants seldom left a place without gaining new members. A hundred of them went from Basle to Avignon and scourged themselves in the presence of the Pope. He did not believe, however, that God was pleased with such acts, and issued a bull forbidding Christians to perform flagellation in public, under penalty of excommunication.
Neither Jewish persecutions nor flagellation were of any avail in checking the plague. It spread through the terrified world. A fourth part of the population of Europe perished. After it subsided, the old worldly pleasures were resumed above those countless graves; but there were many who, in those terrible years of trial, had returned to the divine allegiance, and who consecrated the precious gift of life to that exercise of Christian love which Father Vincentius, before his departure, characterized as the noblest fruit of the divine justice.
Chapter V The Robber Knights
Zurich, which had long been a free imperial city, held an important position among the municipalities. Its trade and commerce flourished, nor was it lacking in intellectual activity. It was enjoying a rest from the domination of the great property-holders and nobles, known as the patricians. The guilds had now grown strong enough to assert their opinions. Under the new constitution the Council was composed of thirteen patricians and thirteen members of the guilds. An able and judicious man named Rudolph Brun, leader in the revolt, was appointed burgomaster, and administered his office with a strong, sure hand.
It was natural that the patricians, who had exercised such absolute authority, should not relish the new order of things. They had a numerous following among the nobles outside the cities. These nobles scrupled not to attack and rob city merchants travelling in the mountain regions and levy tribute upon them. They were not on good terms with the cities. Life in the castles grew constantly quieter and more lonesome; the attendants demanded higher remuneration, and if their demands were not granted they would take themselves off and seek shelter behind the city walls, where they were protected and had greater freedom and more privileges than in the castles. For these reasons the nobles were naturally incensed at the cities, which were continually growing stronger, while the castle power was continually growing less.
Castle Reienstein had experienced these depressing changes. It had been left in a wretched plight to the young nobleman Jörgel, by his father. We behold him sitting one day at a window which commanded a wide prospect, engaged in fitting a new leash for his falcon. “You accursed bird,” he growled, “I feel like flinging you away for your obstinacy. If you go hungry for a time and have to look out for yourself perhaps you will come to your senses.”
With these words he threw the hood over the falcon’s head and went to an inner apartment, the only one which was fit for occupancy in his present circumstances, and which served alike for kitchen and sleeping room.
“Jörgel, come to table,” said Brigitte, his old aunt, who shared with him the poverty of castle Reienstein. After removing several things which littered up the rickety old table, she placed upon it a mess of lentils in a not over clean dish, and brought two plates and rusty knives and forks from a shelf. Jörgel reluctantly seated himself and sniffed at the little piece of sausage which his aunt fished out of the lentils and divided with him.
“A feast for the gods,” growled Jörgel. “I tell you, Aunt, I can’t stand this kind of thing much longer.”
“You are always complaining about your lot,” replied Brigitte, as she poked the lentils with her fork. “It would be more reasonable if you would try to better it. Fine chances are open to you. Why do you not open your eyes like other folks?”
“What can help such a poor devil as I am?” replied Jörgel. “The Mörspergers and Waltihofners have fast, stout horses which can make ten miles on the road without hurting a hoof; my nag can scarcely go from here to Zurich in a day, and if I hurry him he is winded. All my neighbors have money and can pay handsomely for service, but I have to put up with a ragged, ignorant journeyman, as you well know. When we come to divide, I get the leavings. I must get about in all kinds of weather, attend to affairs, and go half starved, while others who are not a whit more deserving can live in clover. I am sick of such injustice, plague upon it.”
“You are very hard to satisfy, Jörgel, and a lazy lout besides,” said Brigitte. “Think of others who are no better off than you are, and yet have wives and children to look after, while you are single, and have a careful, economical aunt to run your house! You can go and come when you please, and always find something to eat and sometimes an abundance, for your affairs do not always turn out badly. When the highways fail you, the forests supply plenty of game. At home you can stretch out on your straw bed, or train your falcon, or fix things when they need it. You have always something to wear, so—”
“Have I? Just take a look at my coat,” interrupted Jörgel. “There is a hole in the elbow of the right sleeve.”
“Is that so?” said Brigitte. “Hand me my needle and thread from the window shelf, and I will soon fix that.”
Jörgel betook himself to a small grindstone in a corner of the room to sharpen his hunting-knife. “I tell you what, Aunt, sing me a song to drive away the blues and make the stone turn more easily.”
“Certainly, my Jörgel,” assented Brigitte. She hung the mended coat upon a hook in the wall, and after giving the cat the scanty bits left from the meal, she sang, while clearing up the dishes, a ballad about Count Rudolf of Hapsburg—how he besieged the city of Glanzenburg and floated huge wine-casks down the Rhine, out of which armed men suddenly sprang; and how the Count took advantage of the confusion of the people to storm the unprotected walls.
After she had finished singing, the old woman remarked: “The cat has scratched herself several times behind the ear and my nose itches all the time. These things betoken a visitor.”
“I hope it is not an unwelcome one,” said Jörgel, “that Waltihofener whom I still owe ten shillings lost at dice, or that laborer whose hay I carried off from his rick, or—”
“Have no fears on that account, Jörgel,” replied his aunt. “You can get rid of the Waltihofener with fine words, and you can pitch the laborer downstairs. Now, my left hand begins to itch, and that means good luck, or money, which amounts to the same thing.”
Jörgel’s wheel flew so fast that it emitted sparks, and the falcon upon its perch fluttered its feathers in affright. Suddenly a young man, who lived in the lower part of the tumble-down building, called out at the door: “Noble sir, my father bids me tell you that a gentleman from Mörsperg has just arrived, and is even now putting his horse in the stall.”
“Did I not prophesy rightly?” triumphantly exclaimed Brigitte. “All the signs pointed to a visit, and the itching of my left hand meant good luck.”
“We shall see,” replied Jörgel. He rose from his rough wooden seat, drew on his boots, and put on his waistcoat. His aunt hastily set things in order, and had hardly finished when steps were heard on the stairs, and the herculean figure of Veit of Mörsperg entered and saluted them with a roaring “Good day!” He shook Jörgel’s hand and roughly slapped Brigitte on her bent back.
“I bring you good news,” he said, stroking his great beard.
Jörgel’s face brightened up. “You look as happy as if you were breaking into some rich merchant’s treasure box,” said Jörgel, with difficulty restraining his curiosity.
“It is something better than that,” said Veit, as he sat down upon the bed. “The Zurich oligarchy has come to an end.”
“Is that true?” shouted Jörgel. “Then the mob of the workshops may be in the Council.”
“Seven hundred patricians have united against the aristocratic city regime,” replied Veit.
“They are few compared with the crowds in the guilds and corporations,” said Brigitte.
“Be patient! I know still more,” said Veit. “The patricians have very wisely united with the counts of Rupperschwyl, who will invade the city; and other knights near by are to join them.”
“And I fancy that you will have the same honor,” said Jörgel.
“You are right,” replied Veit; “and as I am going to join, I advise you to do the same.”
“It is very good of you,” said Jörgel, “but if this movement is intended merely to help the patricians to regain their seats in the Council, I have no desire to risk my head.”
“Blockhead!” shouted Veit. “Do you suppose that I am going to help pull chestnuts out of the fire for others without making sure of a good slice for myself? I intend to profit by the confusion of the others.”
“Ah! now I understand,” said Jörgel, with a cunning laugh. “Go ahead! I am with you. But when will the dance begin?”
“When the clock strikes ten to-morrow the gates will be secretly opened and the Rupperschwyls and their following will enter the city and fall upon their opponents, who little dream what is in store for them. In the meantime, friend Jörgel, we shall have been waiting our chance. We shall leave our armor at home so as not to arouse suspicion. A good dagger will be enough for our purpose. But we must be off at once, for your nag needs plenty of time for a ride to Zurich.”
“For Heaven’s sake, be off,” muttered Aunt Brigitte, as she went to a corner of the room and took down Jörgel’s riding cloak, which ordinarily served to conceal Brigitte’s old and torn best dress.
Jörgel girded on his rapier belt, stuck his dagger in it, put on his cap and plume, and threw the cloak over his shoulder. Then he took a hasty leave of his aunt, and promised her a new dress if everything went well. Whereupon she invoked the blessing of all the saints upon him. When everything was in readiness the two robber knights set off for the city at an easy trot.
Upon the following day we behold Veit striding into the smithy of an armorer which resounds with the lusty hammering of his workmen. The bellows groans, the hammers ring, and songs in Swiss, Swabian, and Bavarian dialects are heard on all sides. One is piling coal upon the fire; another cooling the glowing metal in water from which clouds of steam ascend; others are polishing the steel smooth and bright, while the apprentice is riveting a neckband. In the midst of the busy crowd stands the stately master, examining a steel headpiece, just finished. Seeing Veit, who was one of his customers, he came forward and asked what he wished.
Veit drew a dagger from his cloak. “Here, Master Hildprand,” said he, “the hilt of my dagger needs fastening. Fix it and send it as soon as it is done to the Rebstock, but be sure to send it to-day, for I must return home before night.”
Master Hildprand took the dagger and promised to do his utmost to accommodate him, although his work was very pressing.
“That is fine work,” said the knight with a well pleased glance at the headpiece in the master’s hand.
“This kind is coming more and more into use, and is replacing the helmet,” said the smith.
“But I still stick to the helmet,” replied Veit. “It is better fitted for resistance. I have no use for these new-fangled inventions.”
“And yet we are still far behind the times,” said the master with a smile. “When I was working in France they had already gone over to steel. There is no longer any chain armor.”
“But how do the French protect the shoulders?”
“With a broad iron band reaching from the neck to the upper part of the arm. That enables the wearer to move the head more freely, which he could not do with the old, awkward style of armor.”
“Zounds! There is no end to these improvements,” blurted out Veit. “It must take all of ten years to make a new suit of armor now. One needs to be as rich as Crœsus to keep up with them.”
“Some of the wealthy gentlemen are just beginning to wear the cuirass.”
“Desist, Master Hildprand,” said the knight, “else I shall have to stop my ears.”
With these words Veit turned to several of the workmen and watched them a short time. Then he stepped up to the apprentice, who was engaged in polishing a headpiece.
“This kind of headpiece is also fast disappearing,” said the master. “They are now replacing it with the brigantine, which gives much better service.”
“Don’t trouble yourself to explain, Master Hildprand! You can’t make me believe in your improvements,” replied Veit. “But be sure that I get my dagger before night at the Rebstock, do you hear?”
“My boy shall take it to you. Do you know where the Rebstock is, Florian?”
“Yes! that is where the baker’s boy was killed,” said the apprentice.
“It is not my usual resort,” said Veit, vexed at the remark which was far from complimentary to the knight’s choice of lodging, “but I am visiting an old acquaintance there.” Giving the apprentice a smart slap on the shoulder, he added: “You seem to have a glib tongue of your own, my boy, but you do good work, I see, and you are quick about it too.”
“Oh, he can polish that kind much better than the old-fashioned ones,” said the smith, with a glance of pride at the lad. “He is my sainted sister’s son and was born at Stans. He lost his father, mother, and all six sisters by the plague.”
“Ah! that evil plague,” sighed Veit; “it found victims in our family also. Now, good-bye, Master Hildprand.”
“Wait a moment, noble sir,” said the smith. “I will show you some more new things, among them a movable arrangement turning upon a pivot under the vizor. It protects the chin and neck, and will—”
“Curse you and your improvements. I have heard enough about them already,” said the knight as he hurried away.
The Rebstock stood in a blind alley, obscured by overhanging buildings. The reputation of the place was none of the best. It was patronized by the lower classes, and it was reported that its keeper received and sold the plunder stolen by the robber knights of that vicinity. In a little room which gave upon the narrow back yard, and was reserved for noble guests, sat Veit and Jörgel with a third companion. The latter was the young nobleman, Conrad of Waltihof, who is already known to us by name and who was invited to come there by Veit and participate in their plans during the great surprise which was to happen in the good city of Zurich that day.
It was already dark. A pair of tallow candles shed a feeble light upon a table near the window on which were some glasses of Alsatian wine and at which the three were passing away the time throwing dice. The faces of the players were flushed with the excitement of the game and their varying luck rather than by the effects of the wine, of which each could carry a heavy load. They disputed several times, gave vent to curses, and gesticulated as if they were about to fly at each others’ throat, but their quarrels invariably ended in words, not blows. Jörgel at first had won many times the ten shillings he owed Conrad, but he also frequently lost, and at last his losses increased so fast that his debt was very large. He cursed the caprices of the fickle goddess of fortune but consoled himself with the thought that these losses were trifling compared with the treasures he would soon acquire. “Ha! ha!” he roared, “there will soon be such a game as Zurich has never seen before.”
“Restrain yourself and don’t shout in that way,” said Veit, laying the dice aside. “It is a long time yet before the clock will strike ten and the gates open to the Rupperschwyls.”
“They ought to be all around the city before this time,” said Conrad.
“All my ten fingers are itching for our work,” said Jörgel, “but it is too bad we cannot get at the rich goods of the merchants.”
“We ought to have had wagons to carry the plunder to our castles,” said Conrad.
“Worse than that, we are expected to divide with the landlord,” said Veit, “and the thought does not please me. Therefore I think it would be better for us to take the money to the nearest bankers. And mark what I tell you: if any one interferes with us we can then swear we have clean hands. The Rupperschwyls and patricians can look after the slaughter, for they will kill Burgomaster Brun and the entire new Council.”
“Did you hear that?” said Conrad, laughing. “Just think, Jörgel, of Veit’s tender conscience. It is as easy as if he had never—”
Conrad suddenly ceased talking. A deep sigh was heard which did not come from any of the three. They sprang from their seats and looked about them. Jörgel had the most acute hearing of them all. He traced the unaccountable sound to the vicinity of the door and soon found a figure seated in a chair in a dark corner which the candles failed to light. Uttering a terrible curse he dragged the witness of their conspiracy into the light.
“Boy, you must die,” he cried furiously, at the same time holding his victim by the throat so tightly that he could only emit a feeble groan.
“First let him tell how he came here, and let him say his prayers before he dies,” said Veit.
“No,” said Conrad, “no mercy to a spy.” In his wrath he drew his dagger, but he weakened some when he saw a dagger flashing in the uplifted hand of the boy.
“Hold there!” exclaimed Veit. “This is Master Hildprand’s apprentice. Let him loose, Jörgel, let him loose, or I will release the poor fellow.” As Veit’s hand was already upon his weapon, and he was in no mood to be refused, Jörgel obeyed.
“Now, confess,” said Veit to the boy in a severe tone. “Your master sent you here with my dagger, but surely not to play the spy. Speak, youngster!”
Florian Häbli threw himself at the knight’s feet and protested his innocence. He said he was brought to the room by the landlord, and when he entered the gentlemen were so excited over the dice that they did not notice him. Then their furious dispute frightened him. He dared not advance, and was so terrified that he took the seat in the corner. He was speedily overcome by sleep, for he had been up all the previous night and was deadly sleepy. When or how he awoke he could not say.
“What have you heard of our talk?” said Veit, harshly.
Florian did not instantly reply, but at last said: “Nothing, not the slightest thing.”
“He is a lying knave,” said Jörgel. “Do you not see how he reddens at every word?”
“Let’s make an end of him,” said Conrad, seizing him by the throat.
“Take your hand away,” said Veit. “This lad is Master Hildprand’s apprentice and his favorite sister’s son, of whom he is very fond. We must do nothing that will hurt the master, for we all need him. He knows where he sent the boy, and if he does not return he will know where to look for him. Supposing we kill the lad, how can we conceal his body without taking the landlord into our confidence and placing ourselves completely in his power?”
“Supposing, then, we shut him up until everything is over,” said Jörgel.
“Then he will raise an alarm,” replied the knight.
“We can keep him here if we bind and gag him,” suggested Conrad.
“But we cannot keep him without the knowledge of the landlord,” objected Veit. “I would rather trust the lad than that throat-cutter.”
“What, then, shall we do?” asked the two conspirators.
“Let the boy take an oath that he will not reveal anything he has heard.”
The other two laughed derisively. “How will an empty oath help us?” said Conrad.
“Silence!” said Veit. “An oath is sacred to this lad.”
He held his dagger hilt as a cross before the apprentice and recited the words of the oath. He was to promise in the name of God and all the saints, and as he valued his own soul, never to reveal to any one what he had heard. He would call down upon himself terrible punishment in this world and everlasting damnation in the next if he violated his oath.
With visible emotion the boy repeated the words after him. Veit expressed his satisfaction and let him go, with the injunction to return to the smithy without delay.
When Florian found himself in the street once more his experience seemed like a feverish dream, yet he remembered all that the three men had said, notwithstanding he had denied it when death threatened him. The danger which was hovering over the city and the fate of the people weighed heavily upon his spirit. And yet his lips were sealed by a terrible vow not to make any disclosures, even to a priest, without bringing eternal condemnation upon himself. As he went homeward, suffering with this agony of soul, his comrades were returning joyfully from their work, and fathers were sitting upon the doorsteps with their families, enjoying the beautiful moonlight. On this very day, in a few hours, this peaceful scene would give place to murder and pillage and the horrible work of bloody hands.
He was soon in front of the cathedral. It was still open, inviting the repentant and suffering, and involuntarily he entered. Not a soul was to be seen in the vast interior. The moon shone through the tall windows upon the high altar. Seized by a sudden impulse, Florian knelt upon the altar steps and prayed to God for help for the endangered city and consolation for himself. After a fervent prayer he started to leave the sacred place. As he did so, his ear caught the sound of low voices, and looking in the direction from which it proceeded, he perceived a soft gleam of light. He advanced unheard to the confessional. A dark figure, whether man or woman he could not distinguish, was kneeling before it and whispering confession to the priest, who after a few questions said something in response. The white statue of a saint stood near the confessional. An idea flashed through the boy’s mind like lightning. He knelt before the statue, stretched out his arms imploringly and loudly exclaimed: “Oh, thou blessed image, the greatest danger threatens the city. The patricians have sworn to kill the burgomaster and Council, and at ten o’clock the gates will open to the Rupperschwyls and their followers. I am vowed to silence. I have sworn not to reveal this to any one, but I can keep the secret no longer. Therefore I confide it to thee, and if God, the Lord, does not perform a miracle and open thy mouth, then my words will fall upon deaf ears. But God is my witness that all I have said is true. Amen.” Florian noticed that the whispers had ceased. He arose and hastened out of the church.
The night wore on and the streets grew more deserted and silent. The three robber knights in the back room of the Rebstock were dicing again, and in the excitement of the game had forgotten all about the smith’s apprentice. A bell sounded in a neighboring tower and all three counted its strokes.
“Nine o’clock,” said Veit; “only one hour more and the devil will be loose.”
They resumed their dice-throwing, but suddenly the bell was heard again. Its strokes followed in rapid succession, and now all the other bells in the city began to ring. From the summits of the towers the watchmen’s horns sounded clear and loud. The storm was about to break. The terrible news spread all over the city that it would be attacked at ten o’clock and given over to fire and sword. There was excitement in every house, and lights suddenly flashed in the windows. The glare of pitchy torches made the streets light as day. The soldiers’ quarters resounded with the shrill din of trumpets, and the guilds in armor marched under their banners to make such resistance as they could. At last the enemy poured through the gates, but the Zurich nobles and their Rupperschwyl allies went down in defeat.
Our three robber knights meanwhile had been warned by the signals and wisely remained at the Rebstock, which they did not venture to leave for several days. At last they returned empty-handed to their castles. At first they swore they would kill the apprentice, for they had no doubt that he was the traitor, notwithstanding his oath. The truth, however, gradually dawned upon them and relieved Florian from suspicion. It was everywhere related that the wife of one of the patricians had become conscience-stricken and confided the secret to a priest, and that in this way the burgomaster was warned of the approaching danger.
As the outcome of the “murder night,” Zurich joined the League. Lucerne had already done so, and Berne, Zug, and Glarus soon followed, so that the League spread to the confines of Burgundy and became very powerful. Thus Uri, Schywz, Unterwalden, Lucerne, Zurich, Zug, Glarus, and Berne were united in an offensive and defensive alliance. These are the eight old cantons.
Chapter VI The Tournament at Little Basle
At the time the League had grown so strong, Duke Albrecht the Second ruled in Austria and enjoyed the friendship of the Emperor Charles the Fourth, of the house of Luxemburg. In preparing for a struggle with the League he had strengthened his castles and cities and had assured himself of the loyal service of his vassals. The war, however, was confined to pillaging expeditions and petty encounters which did the League little harm, and at last an unconditional peace was made between the two parties. After Albrecht’s death, his oldest son, Rudolph the Fourth, succeeded. This prince, the first of his house to receive the title of archduke, had the hereditary Hapsburg spirit and strove to the utmost to extend the supremacy of the empire. Notwithstanding the Emperor Charles was his father-in-law, he opposed him by every kind of artifice and continually interfered with his plans. He strengthened himself by alliances with neighboring powers, especially with Basle and other imperial cities, and weakened the Emperor’s power in Italy. By the marriage of his brother Leopold to the daughter of Bernabo Visconti of Milan he secured the adherence of many noble Italian families. He appointed Brun, the Zurich burgomaster, a member of his privy council and thus attached him to his interests. He drove in a wedge between Lake Zurich and Schwyz, by the purchase of territory, and to secure control of the commercial highway from Italy to Germany he built a bridge across the lake upon the pretext of shortening the route for pious pilgrims on their way to retreats. While engaged in these various enterprises the prince died in his twenty-sixth year and was succeeded by his brother Leopold, in 1365.
Leopold, although inclined to mysticism, was of martial spirit and handled the lance at tournaments in a masterly way. Hardly a year of his life had passed without finding him engaged in war. While he had a numerous following of knights and nobles, his devoutness and straightforwardness also commended him to the favor of the people, among whom many stories of his acts of generosity were told, like those reported later about his Uncle Maximilian, “the last of the knights.”
Leopold took such advantage of the quarrels between the petty princes in upper Italy that he soon checked the designs of the powerful republic of Venice. His father-in-law Visconti was of great service to him in this. The predecessors of Visconti had established their power when the Lombardy League was swallowed up in a multitude of petty sovereignties. The masters of Milan at this time, Bernabo and his brother Galeazzo the Second, needing brave soldiers for their wars of conquest, many young men of the mountain country organized into troops which were granted special privileges because of their loyalty to the Viscontis. The two Milan lords were excellent army leaders but tyrannical toward their subjects. At last they became so bold as to take up arms against Pope Gregory the Eleventh, for which they were excommunicated. At the same time the Pope forbade these young mountaineers to render service to them. They recognized the papal authority and most of them returned to their homes.
Among them was Arnold of Winkelried. His home possessions were insignificant. We have already seen that even as a boy he had shown a warlike spirit in numerous ways. He had practised all the feats of arms with indefatigable activity, and had been well instructed in them, but as there were few opportunities for their use at home he had taken service at Milan. He fought for strangers to learn how to fight for his fatherland whenever it should need his help. He had participated in numerous encounters, had been wounded several times, and had won such distinction that he was admitted to knighthood.
In the beginning of the year 1370 Arnold of Winkelried once more stood upon his native soil. He was tall, powerful, and in the very prime of his manhood. He vainly sought for the opportunity to perform active deeds. Peace and quiet prevailed all over the country. His restless spirit was not satisfied with managing the small home affairs. He longed for the tumult of battle and the strenuous life of the soldier, to which he had been accustomed of late. He endured the quiet of Stans for a few weeks only, after which notwithstanding the inclement season of the year he undertook a journey to the larger cities of the League, to see and hear what was going on. It was not mere chance that took him to Zurich. He had been told at Stans that his old-time playmate, Florian Häbli, whom he met as a houseless wanderer at the monastery of Engelberg and had helped to the utmost of his ability, was living with a famous armorer at Zurich. He sought him there to have a talk over old times, and found him in the midst of a crowd of workmen in the same place where we have seen him as Master Hildprand’s apprentice. The meeting was a cordial one. When the old-time fisherman and woodcutter’s son began by addressing Arnold as “sir knight” and “noble sir,” he was firmly bidden to use the familiar “thou.”
As they had much to talk about, the armorer entertained his distinguished visitor in his own house. Florian’s uncle was childless, and as he was comfortably off and wished to live quietly in his old age, he had transferred his prosperous business to his nephew, who was conducting it with like success. In the meantime Florian had gone about the world considerably, and had worked in many a famous city. He had been in Strasburg, where for more than three centuries they had been building a magnificent cathedral, the spire of which was just beginning to rise. He had also stood before a mighty cathedral in Cologne, which was begun a century before, but in late times the work had stopped. In no city, however, had he seen so much activity as at Prague. The Emperor Charles had laid out an entirely new section of the city in which numerous churches and monasteries were going up, and a great stone bridge was built over the Moldau. The finest structure, however, was the training school, the scholars in which were called students. Florian had also worked for a time at Frankfort-on-the-Main, and he could hardly find words to describe the fair which was held there twice a year. It was to this fair that the large cities on the Rhine, from Basle to Cologne, sent their merchandise; and heavily laden vessels brought goods there from France. Fur dealers from the Hanse towns, linen and lace dealers from the cities of Flanders, and goldsmiths from Burgundy met there. England’s steel wares as well as the various products of Wales were exhibited. Every building was packed with people and goods to the roof, great multitudes thronged the streets, and as the city could not accommodate all the strangers, many of them had to live in tents. It was one of the grandest of spectacles. Florian had seen an ostrich and an elephant there for the first time; and one of the numerous pickpockets had made off with his purse. He talked long about his adventures in other cities, but he made no mention of his exciting experiences at the Rebstock, for he still respected his oath. He felt a quiet satisfaction at having saved Zurich, and attributed to it all the blessings which had been so generously bestowed upon him within its walls.
Arnold talked of his war adventures in Italy, and as he came to the end he said: “But now my sword and armor are rusting. I vainly look for any place in the world where war is going on and glory can be found. I am sick of these peaceful times.”
Master Florian significantly placed his forefinger upon his nose. He could give him some information. There was a region in northern Prussia where the clash of arms never ceased. The pagan Prussians were not yet conquered, and there was always plenty of fighting in the adjacent Lithuania. Many a one who had been told this by Florian had been there and had brought back dreadful news about the country and its savage inhabitants.
Arnold was at last satisfied. The greater the danger the greater the glory, especially when gained in fighting for the spread of Christianity. Nothing would suit him better than to go to that northern country. It increased his delight when Florian told him there was an opportunity for him to go with a goodly company. Duke Leopold had arranged an expedition for that very purpose. It was said he had already assembled a thousand knights from Austria, Swabia, and other German countries. They were to meet at Basle, and the Duke was to hold a grand tournament there on Shrove Tuesday, and then leave at once for Marienburg, the castle of the Teutonic Order.
Arnold decided on the instant to join the expedition, but he was also anxious to show his prowess at the tournament, so that he should not be a stranger in this array of famous knights and nobles. But Shrove Tuesday was only a few days off, and as he must return to Stans, the time was too short to allow of his getting to Basle in good season. He explained the situation to Florian, who replied: “If it is your armor that delays you, as I surmise, the journey to Stans is unnecessary. You need armor and a horse. As far as armor and weapons are concerned, I have everything you want and you are welcome to use it; and as far as the horse is concerned, I have a friend here who has several fine ones, which even Duke Leopold himself would not be ashamed to ride. He will let you have one on my security, and all you have to do is to make your choice.”
Arnold cordially shook Florian’s hand and thanked him for his friendly assistance, of which he should certainly avail himself. “But you know, Florian,” he said with a smile, “that horse and armor belong to the knight who unseats his opponent. Supposing I should be the unfortunate one!”
“I am not afraid of that,” said Florian, regarding him with a look of pride. “I know my hero of Pilatus.”
Arnold soon made a choice of armor and weapons from the young master’s large stock. He selected a snow-white battle-horse which combined strength and suppleness of limb with a fiery nature. Thus equipped and well mounted, Arnold rode off one day to Basle, after taking a cordial farewell of Florian.
The free city of Basle is situated upon the Rhine. Great Basle is upon one bank and Little Basle upon the other. On the morning of Shrove Tuesday the city was crowded with a multitude of persons who had come on foot and horse, some to participate in the merry-makings of the city, and others to attend the tournament. The tilting-field was oval in shape, and surrounded by gayly decorated lists. The stands filled gradually. The marshals of the tournament, staves in hand, took their seats with their halberds placed before them. The referees sat below them, and the herald stood in front, clad in glistening mail, adorned with the heraldic symbols.
Suddenly there was a jubilant outburst from the musicians’ gallery as Duke Leopold appeared upon his proudly prancing steed, attended by a brilliant retinue of pages and squires. After he had dismounted, the Duke seated himself under a canopy, with his attendants stationed about him in a circle. He waved a white handkerchief as the signal for the tournament to begin. The gates were opened, and accompanied by strains of music the combatants rode around the lists with lances at rest. Six of them went to six tents at the north end of the arena. There they dismounted, leaving their steeds to the care of servants, and each went to his tent, upon which was suspended his escutcheon. These were the six challenging knights.
At a signal from the trumpet the herald rode to the centre of the arena and proclaimed the regulations so that all might hear. Then there was a sudden commotion at the south end, caused by the rush of knights who were to contest with the challengers. Only six could be chosen, and these were selected by lot. Each one of these touched the escutcheon of the one with whom he was to contend, with his lance, doing it with the blunt end and not the point, which signified that the contest was not a life and death one, but a test of skill and strength on each side.
When the six knights had ridden back and formed in line, the six challengers mounted their steeds and took their places a short distance away from the others. At the sound of the trumpet both parties rushed at each other. The challengers were apparently sure of success. Five of their opponents were unhorsed at the first onset, but the sixth knight kept his saddle. Both his own lance and that of his opponent were shivered at the same time, so that neither was victor. Amid the shouts of the crowd and the din of trumpets the challengers rode back to their tents, and the vanquished ones picked themselves up and disappeared from the arena. The contest was soon resumed. After many others had been defeated there was a pause. It seemed as if no one cared to enter the lists.
Suddenly a trumpet sounded at the southern end of the arena, and the crowd beheld a knight of stately figure riding up to the six tents at the northern end upon a milk-white steed. He halted, and his lance touched an escutcheon which was decorated with a tree and two ravens hovering over it. There was universal astonishment, for the owner of this escutcheon was the most dexterous and powerful of all the challengers. He instantly came from his tent to ascertain who his opponent was. The latter lifted his visor and disclosed the face of Arnold of Winkelried, as the reader probably has anticipated. The other, taking Arnold’s courtesy for an expression of scorn, also lifted his visor and disclosed the stern features of Veit of Mörsperg.
“Your steed pleases me. It looks to me as if it might soon have another stall, and I have one which will suit him, and there is plenty of room in my armor chamber for that mail of yours,” scornfully said Veit, as he gloated over the prizes of the contest, which he was sure were his.
“Many thanks for your warning,” replied Arnold, “but if you expect to secure the prize, I would advise you to take a fresh horse and new lance, for you are sadly in need of both.”
Hardly had the trumpet sounded when the two dashed from their places with lightning speed and met in the centre of the arena with such force that both their lances were shattered and the horses sank upon their haunches, but by the help of bridle and spurs they were soon up again. Fire flashed from Veit’s eyes as he looked at his opponent. Both went back for new lances. They rushed at each other again at the sound of the trumpet. Veit aimed a thrust at Arnold’s head, which would have been dangerous had it succeeded, but Arnold evaded it and thereupon struck Veit’s shield such a powerful blow in the centre that his opponent wavered in the saddle and the lance was shattered. After Arnold had secured another lance the two knights made the third attack. This time the order was reversed. It was now the Mörsperger’s lance which struck Arnold’s shield in the centre. Arnold wavered for a second, for the thrust was so powerful that the splinters flew far and wide; but at the same instant, Arnold with well directed aim had struck Veit’s helmet with such force that he was unhorsed and fell backwards. A cloud of dust hid them while the multitude were enthusiastically hailing the victor. When it cleared away, horse and rider were already up, and Veit, bleeding from a wound in the face, snarled at his conqueror, “We shall meet again.”
“There will be ample opportunity on our way to the North, I hope,” replied Arnold. Veit made no reply. He had no intention of going there, for there was not sufficient plunder among the savages to tempt him. The meeting, however, took place at another time, as we shall see.
Arnold, who had come to Basle with borrowed armor, won not less than five prizes that day. When the tournament was finished he sent back his steed and armor to their owners at Zurich and took for himself only those which he had won from Veit. He declined the rest as well as the money with which by the rules of the tournament the vanquished might redeem their property.
Chapter VII Storming of a Lithuanian Castle
Followed by a brilliant array of fifteen hundred knights and horsemen, among whom was Arnold of Winkelried, Duke Leopold set out from Little Basle to coöperate with the forces of the Teutonic Order in the far North. Moving from eight to ten hours a day, the march being occasionally interrupted by military exercises, the army passed through several small countries, territories of the Church, and free imperial cities, until it reached Marienburg, the seat of the Order.
After the subjugation of the Prussians still worse heathen remained. These were the Lithuanians, who had extended their domain to the Black Sea by repeated conquests from Russia. Their country was flat and covered with marshes, steppes, and sand dunes. In its impenetrable primeval forests, filled with gigantic trees, whose branches closely interlaced, roamed bears and wolves, elks and buffaloes.
It was not the purpose of the Order to subjugate the Lithuanian people, but to restore quiet in the Order’s own territory and protect it from continual ravages by pillaging hordes. A strong boundary wall had been constructed to prevent their incursions, but as this had proved insufficient it was determined they should be attacked in their own country.
The leaders of the Lithuanians at that time were the brothers Kynstutt and Olgjerd. Kynstutt was an enemy not to be despised; his restless energy had long kept the Order busy. The heathen army was between thirty and forty thousand strong, and among them were Russian auxiliaries and excellent archers. The Lithuanians carried heavy battle axes, though their principal weapons were the pike and shield, and they also had many horsemen. Notwithstanding their numbers, they were not the equals of the Order in military skill, whether in siege or field. Kynstutt knew this very well and for that reason would not risk battle in the open. He conducted his pillaging expeditions over as wide an area as possible. At one time he would swiftly and suddenly fall upon the Order’s supply trains and slaughter the guards; at others he would burn castles and seek by every means in his power to prevent the building of new ones. He erected castles himself, and as fast as they were destroyed by the knights he would rebuild them. The three most important of these castles were those of Wielun, Pisten, and Kauen. The last was the most remote and was the strongest, being built of stone.
Winrich of Kniprode, grand master of the Order, was completing his plans for the destruction of this castle, when Duke Leopold of Austria arrived at Marienburg with his brilliant array of knights—a strong and welcome reinforcement. The route of the army took them past both the castles of Wielun and Pisten, which were left unmolested. A landing was effected upon the island of Kauen, and a camp was established in which all the supplies were stored. A bridge of boats was also constructed to the right bank of the Niemen, where the castle stood upon a tongue of land—upon the spot where now stands the city of Kovno.[11] The building of this bridge took three days, and before it was finished Kynstutt appeared with an army for the relief of the castle. He fell back, however, after a brief encounter and occupied the heights on the land side, east of the castle. To prevent him from making a sudden descent upon the camp, a breastwork of stone and wooden stakes was made, stretching in the shape of a bow from the Vilia to the Niemen. The flower of the army was placed in this intrenched camp. Another part was assigned to guard the supplies, and the remainder occupied themselves with the management of the siege machines. Missiles from the castle could not reach far enough to disturb the work, which progressed under the direction of a master smith and carpenter.
The part of the castle called “the house” was built of wood. The fortified part consisted of high, strong walls, constructed in a parallelogram about the house. The garrison was amply provided with means of defence. Waydott, son of Kynstutt, was chief in command, and in his garrison were forty boyars, who were warriors of unusual distinction and wealth. There were also many Russian archers. The garrison in all numbered between four and five thousand men.
After all the preparations were made, an advance was ordered from the two rivers for assault at the main point, where the _tumler_ was already at work. The principal feature of this machine was a huge tree-trunk, a hundred feet in length, suspended by chains. It was drawn back by hand and then propelled against the wall with terrific force. At the head of it was a sickle-shaped iron, for tearing away dislodged stones. As the _tumler_ could only be used in the immediate vicinity of the enemy, its operators were protected by a low building called “the cat.” It had strong sides and a roof to which the chains were attached. The whole rested upon wooden block wheels by which it could be pushed up to the walls.
An assault was directed against a tower by the outer gate. Its defenders were by no means inactive. They hurled huge rocks from the wall upon the roof of “the cat,” and tried to tear it to pieces with long, hooked poles. They also poured burning pitch upon it, but as the roof was covered with wet, undressed skins, it resisted the fire. At last the outer gate tower gave way before the continuous concussion and fell in a mass of ruins.
Following up this first success, the besiegers prepared for an attack upon the wall itself. For this purpose the _helepolis_ was employed. This machine was also called the _ebenhöhe_ because it had to be of even height with the wall. The colossus was made of stout beams and rested upon a base forty feet square. It consisted of three stories. The first was occupied by the men who moved the machine forward on rollers. The second was arranged as a drawbridge, which could be connected with the wall when needed. The uppermost was for use by soldiers, who by means of the drawbridge might drive the enemy from the wall. Like the _tumler_, the _helepolis_ was protected from fire by wet skins.
One of these formidable machines was employed on both sides against the castle. At one side, the garrison fired burning pitch-besmeared arrows upon the monster, and tried to prevent the use of the drawbridge with long poles; but a whole section of wall upon which they were standing gave way, and they were buried in the ruins. Some of the besiegers also were killed.
In the meantime Olgjerd arrived with a force of boyars and stationed them along the Vilia, his brother Kynstutt still occupying the heights. The latter had an interview with the Grand Master by arrangement. He hoped to intimidate him by threatening to join Olgjerd, and boasted that he could annihilate his army. The Grand Master offered him battle, but Kynstutt only pointed contemptuously to the well-fortified camp of the Christians. He then offered to level the breastworks, but Kynstutt made no reply to him.
At last the Christians advanced for general assault, intending to take advantage of the numerous breaches in the wall. The Lithuanians, however, had erected strong barricades behind them, and the archers sent such a deadly shower of arrows into their ranks that they met with serious losses and had to fall back.
It was already the fourteenth day of the siege. The _tumler_ was kept steadily at work making breaches in the walls, but the garrison as steadily erected new barricades. The _helepolis_ was moved up to one of these breaches. The garrison greeted it with fiery arrows and hurled burning bunches of fagots upon it. The wet skins this time were of no avail. The flames mounted high, but while the occupants were seeking to make their escape the two managers of the machine seized the burning bunches, one by one, with hooks, and hurled them back, which fired the garrison’s barricades and destroyed them before they could extinguish the flames. The burning machine was replaced by another. The attack upon it had just commenced when the wall suddenly began to waver. Those upon it had barely time to escape when it fell. The troops raised a triumphant shout and could not be prevented from rushing through the wide breach. The Grand Master ordered them back, but it was too late, and the passion of battle, which had become all the more furious as the news of this fresh success spread, could not be curbed. In an army composed of various nationalities each wanted the honor of being first to lead the way. The English contingent claimed it because they carried the standard of Saint George, but in all their wars with the heathen the Germans carried it also; and as Duke Leopold of Austria was the most distinguished among the latter, the Grand Master assigned the leadership to him. As the Duke raised the sacred symbol, the gate which led out of the castle to the Vilia was suddenly opened, and a part of the garrison made a bold rush with the intention of cutting their way through. Leopold and his knights hurled themselves upon the desperate enemy. Arnold of Winkelried was one of the first to follow him. While engaged in a fearful hand to hand contest, Arnold noticed a Lithuanian furiously aiming a blow with his battle axe at the helmet of the princely standard-bearer. With lightning swiftness he swung his sword and clove the heathen’s skull.
The Lithuanians were forced back and the massacre began. The infuriated heathen set fire to great piles of fagots smeared with pitch; the flames spread to the interior of the castle, and many Christians as well as heathen were burned to death. Blinded with rage, the combatants strove with each other in the fire and smoke, man with man. The Lithuanian pikes had little effect upon the mail of the knights, who swept everything before them with their swords, but battle axes found their way through the mail and many a fallen heathen was avenged. Mercilessly steel clashed against steel. Terrible scenes were enacted, but at last the banner of Saint George flew from the turret of the castle, announcing the victory of the Christians. Kynstutt and Olgjerd witnessed the assault from the neighboring heights, but made no effort to come to the help of the garrison; for during the battle a considerable force of the Grand Master’s army was held in reserve to give the two brothers a hot reception if they advanced.
The Christian army celebrated its victory by singing the hymn, “Christ is Arisen,” and closed with the chorale, “Let us all be joyous for the heathen have been punished.” On the next day it was already Easter, and high mass was celebrated, at which the Bishop of Samland officiated. About two hundred Christians, among them seven brethren of the Order, were killed during the siege. Many a one of Leopold’s army never returned home, but was buried in unconsecrated heathen soil. The Lithuanians lost two thousand men, some of whom were burned in the castle fire. The rest were taken prisoners, except Waydot, Kynstutt’s son, who made his escape with thirty-six boyars. He embraced Christianity later and received the baptismal name of Henry, after which he went to the palace of the Emperor Charles the Fourth at Prague, where he was very kindly received, and remained many years. Before the army left Kauen the castle was completely demolished.
Duke Leopold wishing to thank the knight who had saved him from the axe of the murderous heathen, summoned all his men and requested the unknown knight to declare himself, but Arnold of Winkelried, caring little for princely favor, paid no attention to the Duke’s request. He had saved the Duke’s life, little dreaming that he himself would die a heroic death fighting against him at a later time. The Duke returned to his home filled with proud satisfaction at the victory, and Arnold was no less satisfied. The song of victory, “Let us all be joyous,” continually rang in his ears. He often recalled Father Vincentius’s advice that man should devote the inestimable boon of life to good works as an offering to God. Since his own life had been preserved amid these terrible scenes by the divine goodness, he resolved to devote it henceforth to the service of humanity and the fatherland. Mail and sword might rust, but his purpose should be maintained; and when the fatherland needed him he would again seize his arms to fight in the ranks of the people, not as a murderous knight, but as a plain, dutiful citizen.
After Arnold’s return to his native Stans he spent his days in managing his little property. Soon he married a gentle, lovely woman, who brought joy into his life and relieved his anxieties. In the course of the years beautiful children came to them; and the aforetime restless warrior found his greatest happiness in peaceful family life.
Chapter VIII The Beggar Monk
The Emperor Charles the Fourth died in the year 1378 and was succeeded by his son Wenzel. Duke Leopold was made governor of Upper and Lower Swabia, which gave him great power among the nobles and the cities. The relations between the latter meanwhile had grown more and more strained. The attendants of the knights flocked to the cities in ever increasing numbers and were cordially welcomed. As their privileges continued to diminish, the knights organized against the cities, and Duke Leopold encouraged them in their action.
The Duke knew that the nobles were on his side to a man. He regarded it therefore as a favorable time to break up the League and restore the old authority of Austria. The warning voices of some well-meaning counsellors were stifled by the embittered nobles of Aargau and Thurgau and those aggrieved knights who had suffered so much at the hands of the League.
In June, 1386, Duke Leopold went to Baden, where he was assembling an army of knights. Besides his own vassals, knights came from adjoining countries with their horsemen, as well as the Margrave of Baden and the counts of Würtemberg. The army was nine thousand strong, including a large contingent of foot soldiers. The League naturally armed its followers and barricaded the cities. Zurich was the first point threatened. It was only a few miles from Baden and was the bulwark of the League. Its people soon learned that the Baron of Bonstetten, one of the ablest of the Austrian generals, was advancing against the city to lay siege to it. Although Zurich at that time was supplied with good walls and gates, it had not sufficient fighting men to withstand a siege any great length of time, and so had to send to the Four Forest Cantons for help. As soon as the request was received fourteen hundred men were sent. Rather than remain in idleness the League’s auxiliaries undertook expeditions into Kiburg and Thurgau and captured supplies in these unfriendly places, which would be needed during the siege.
Not far from Zurich and a little off the road leading to Baden, there was a wretched inn which served as a lodging house for all kinds of lawless adventurers and a rendezvous for the robber knights of the neighborhood. On the night of June third, during a fearful thunder storm which had raged for hours, there was a knock upon its rickety window. The hostess, an ill-favored old woman, opened the door and found two knights dismounting from their horses.
“Put our steeds in your stable, Mother Ruschen, and give them some fodder,” said one of them, addressing her familiarly. He and his companion then entered the apartment, whose entire furnishings consisted of a few wooden tables and benches, and shelves upon which were filthy bottles and glasses. The two newcomers were our old acquaintances, Jörgel of Reienstein and Conrad of Waltihof.
“He has not come yet,” said the latter, glancing around the miserable place which was so dimly lighted by a half burned candle that only objects close at hand could be discerned. “I begin to think we have come too late.”
“This beastly storm may have detained him, as it did us,” said Jörgel.
“No storm could stop him, even if it rained rocks and poured down fire from the sky,” replied Conrad. “I am afraid he was angry at our delay and has gone on his way home alone.”
“Mother Ruschen,” said Jörgel to the old woman, who had just come in, “has the Mörsperger been here?” She replied in the negative. “Then bring us some wine, the best you have,” said Jörgel.
“And the dice,” added Conrad.
The old woman set a bottle of wine and two glasses on the table at which her guests were seated, and brought the dice; whereupon the two began playing and soon forgot everything else, while the old woman, as was her usual practice, sat by the fireplace and dozed. Suddenly she awoke. The quarrelling of the two players, and their shouts of exultation or curses, as one lost and the other won, had not disturbed her in the least, but the tramp of horses outside, which the excited players had not noticed, the old woman heard plainly. She arose and notified them that the man they were expecting had come. She then left the room, found Veit and his attendants just dismounting, and informed him his friends were waiting for him.
“Good,” said Veit. “I cannot stay long with you this time. Just give the horses a bundle of hay; and a good stout drink to the men.”
[Illustration: _Winkelried’s Heroic Death at the Battle of Sempach_ (_From a painting by Karl Jauslin_)]
As the men were leading the horses to the stable the old woman noticed that one of them was very lame. Veit went inside and was greeted by both the young men. They were still under the excitement of play and prepared to resume it.
“Put up your dice,” exclaimed Veit, harshly. “A pest upon it! Do you not know I have come straight from Baden, and that, too, on matters of importance, and here you two fools are courting the wench Fortune? I am bringing great news.”
The two laid aside the dice. Veit sat down on the bench and replied to their questioning glances: “The day after to-morrow we must join the army.” The news did not seem to surprise either of them. Jörgel, indeed, said with a yawn, “It’s an infernally doubtful pleasure, this going to Zurich!”
“There is nothing in it for us,” said Conrad.
“Blockheads!” said Veit, with a twinkle in his eye. Then he resumed in a lower tone: “The siege is only a sham manœuvre, if you must know. Bonstetter’s plan is simply to keep the Zurichers busy and to decoy the Waldstätters, who have been running all over Kiburg and Thurgau, back into the city.”
Jörgel and Conrad looked at each other. “And the Duke?” they asked, in one voice.
“Wait! Here is the real business,” said Veit. “With the large part of the army and the flower of the nobles, among whom we shall be, the Duke will secretly and quietly march past Wellingen and Bremgarten to Sempach, on the left bank of the Reuss, and afterwards advance upon Lucerne, to give the burghers a needed chastising, and set the League a terrible example. He will deal lightly with the peasant rabble, but Zurich will have to make the best bargain it can.”
“We will be there,” exclaimed Jörgel.
“A masterpiece of generalship,” said Conrad.
“Pst!” warned Veit, for the old woman was returning. She was about to provide them with wine, but Veit beckoned to her and said: “We have no wish for a carousal this time, Mother Ruschen. I will quench my thirst with a good drink from my own cellar, and don’t care to spoil the taste of it now.” Turning to his companions, he added: “You shall be my guests to-night. We must leave for home to-morrow at an early hour. We will make preparations for a little ride; it is bad luck that I cannot ride the black horse. The beast went suddenly lame, and that is why I wait here so long. It must have been bewitched.”
“Yes, yes!” said Jörgel, “I have no doubt witchery is back of it. I wonder who could have done it!”
“What is bewitched once is likely to be bewitched again,” said Conrad.
“That is what is troubling me,” said the knight.
“Why not depend upon the church’s ban and consult your chaplain? The priests understand this witchery business.”
“To be sure! I never thought of that,” said the old woman, who had listened to the conversation. “I know a pious father who can help your horse, noble sir.”
“Where is he?” all three exclaimed together.
Mother Ruschen pointed to a dark corner of the room. They went there and found a figure stretched out on the bench apparently sound asleep.
“Ho! wake up, reverend father,” cried the old woman, shaking him roughly. As he raised himself and looked up, the knights forgot all about the horse, and with furious execrations dragged him to his feet. His face was half hidden in a cowl.
“Who are you? and how did you come here?” thundered Veit.
“You ought to know who I am by my attire,” was the quiet answer. “I belong to the Dominican beggar order, and wander round seeking alms for the poor. The storm overtook me and I came to this place and found shelter by chance.”
“We have had bad luck with our secrets lately,” said Veit, with a significant glance at his companions.
“Why should we care whether he lay there with open ears, or slept like a marmot?” said Jörgel.
“We will not let this one off with an oath,” said Conrad, gesticulating furiously.
“No, that will not do this time,” said Veit, grimly. With that he tore off the monk’s cowl and looked him sharply in the face. “I think I have seen this pious man before. I cannot tell where or when. It may have been some time ago, but we have met before, and it could not have been a very pleasant meeting, I fancy, from the effect your face has upon me. Nevertheless, good father, you must go along with us. As foresight is the parent of wisdom, I will find a safe and cosy place for you in my castle, where you can remain until the storm of war has subsided and Duke Leopold is once more established in the land which rightfully belongs to him. Pray fervently that it may be soon accomplished, for you will not see the sun again until it is. You understand me.”
During these words the monk, who was tall and powerful, quickly glanced at the speaker and his companions and assumed an air of defiance. A wild gleam of wrath shot from his eyes, and he appeared as if about to attack them; but prudence prevailed, for the struggle would have been too uneven. He offered no resistance when they took him from the house. The horses were brought out and mounted. Veit rode ahead and the monk between the other two. The attendants brought up the rear, leading the lame horse slowly along.
The storm had ceased, but the sky was still overcast with dark clouds. Two hours later they reached castle Mörsperg and entered by a drawbridge lowered across a deep moat. The keep was below the watchtower, and an opening with a grated door, which also served as window, led into it. The monk was placed in this dungeon without further ado, and the robber knights betook themselves to the principal castle apartment, where the lady of Mörsperg had spread a repast of roasted venison.
Greatly as Veit was feared on the highroads, and careful as his best friends were not to anger him, this barbarian was little respected in his own castle. His energetic spouse managed things there to suit herself. Of late he had been forced to submit humbly to her strong sceptre. He was under the minor ban of the Church for his evil doings. The bishop had kept him subject to it for three years; and the noble lady, who sought to make reparation for his wickedness by her own piety, suffered even more than if she had been under the ban herself, for the chaplain who used to perform service there came no longer. Since that had happened, Veit hardly dared look his wife in the face and meet her injured, reproachful expression. He had also felt her displeasure in other ways. He was restrained in eating and drinking when guests were at the castle, and she strictly forbade dicing. But to-day the mistress’s flinty heart apparently relented. She lavished the best wine in the cellar upon the guests, and even brought the dice for them. The astonished husband attributed this change to his approaching departure, but there was an entirely different reason for it.
The noble lady had heard of the monk’s imprisonment from the servants. She could not endure such an indignity to a servant of the Church. She was not actuated by piety so much as by the fear that the ban would be prolonged by this new outrage, should it become known. She had played the part of a generous housewife only to divert the attention of her husband, and as soon as Veit and his companions were absorbed in gormandizing, she took a huge bunch of keys and hastened to the dungeon.
The monk had heard of the ban resting upon the castle, and when the lady implored him to celebrate mass and hear confession, from which she had already been barred a year and a day, he became embarrassed. “I dare not violate the stern decree of the Church. You know you have no right to ask for any of its sacred offices, and I have no right to perform them,” was his answer.
“Can I not enter the chapel just once, for brief devotion? It would not be wrong for you to pray for me. I can set you free, and it shall be done this very night if you will not refuse me this consolation. The attendant who keeps the watch is a pious soul, and is entirely devoted and obedient to me. At my command he will open the gate and let down the bridge for you.”
At these words the monk’s scruples vanished, for great results depended upon his speedy release. He gladly followed her into the desolate little chapel, which was directly over the dungeon. Half an hour later he breathed the air of freedom and was greeted by the morning star in a cloudless sky. With flying steps he rushed back over the same course he had come, past Mother Ruschen’s wretched inn, and thence through a narrow pass to the highroad which led to Zurich. It was broad daylight when the monk entered the city, but without stopping to rest, he hastened to the shop of Florian Häbli, the smith.
“Why, Arnold!” exclaimed Florian, in surprise at the sudden appearance of the supposed monk. “I have been very anxious about you,” he added. “God be praised that you are safe back from your daring journey. I did not expect you so soon.”
“I have not been far,” replied Arnold. “A thunder storm drove me to an inn on the way, and there I learned all the plans of the Duke without the trouble of going to Baden. I have been very fortunate. I will tell you the rest another time. Now procure me a fast steed while I take off this mummery and leave it with you. I must summon all our people back from Thurgau. Every hour’s delay is dangerous. The fate of the League hangs upon a hair.”
Chapter IX Winkelried’s Heroic Death
On the eighth of July, Duke Leopold appeared before the little city of Sempach with fourteen hundred knights and horsemen and several thousand foot-soldiers. He pitched his camp at the edge of a forest on a height facing the city. Before subduing Lucerne, he had resolved to teach Sempach a terrible lesson and punish it for its rebellious spirit. For use in the forthcoming attack he had brought with him huge machines, the first to throw heavy missiles. Partly to find a place where they could be set up, and partly to cut off the supplies of the besieged, he sent his infantry to drive off the peasants, after compelling them to cut their ripening corn. The nobles took great delight in mistreating the harvesters and jeering at the besieged. Veit of Mörsperg would ride up to the walls and contemptuously order them to bring out breakfast for the harvesters; and Jörgel would point to the loaded wagons, with the threat that all of them should be hanged.
How those in Thurgau learned Duke Leopold’s plans is no secret to the reader. They quickly left for their menaced homes, marched day and night, and on the way were assured of the good-will of Zug, Glarus, and other places. On the morning of July ninth they reached a wood, called the Meierholz, and there occupied a strong position. Just as Duke Leopold had issued orders for the attack upon Sempach to begin in earnest, he was surprised by the news of the arrival of the Confederates, whom he supposed to be far away from there. He called a council of war to decide whether battle should be given at once or be deferred. The older and more experienced knights, who knew the courage and iron resolution of the Confederates, voted for the latter plan, and advised the Duke first of all to get into communication with Bonstetten’s division. The young hot-heads outvoted them, however, and the Duke made the fatal decision to give battle at once. He took up his position on a piece of meadow land, gently sloping toward Sempach. At the request of those knights who were so certain of victory, and who wanted to secure the honor of the day for themselves alone, the foot-soldiers were placed in the rear near the baggage trains. The larger part of the horsemen were formed in three divisions, and as each came into action they were to dismount and fight on foot. The first of these divisions was formed in a square, twenty or thirty ranks deep, and armed with harpoon-shaped spears, about five metres in length, so arranged that one overlapped the next, thus apparently making the square impenetrable.
It was now midday. The sun beat fiercely down upon the heavily armored knights. Some in the middle ranks fainted; some died from suffocation. In all other ways the Austrian position was advantageous, for they occupied the higher point and could hurl themselves down upon the enemy. The Confederates, fearing the arrival of Bonstetten, rested a brief spell in the Meierholz and then advanced for immediate attack. They were between fifteen and sixteen hundred strong and were armed with swords, pikes, and halberds. Their leader, Schultheiss of Gundoldingen, formed them in wedge shape, the point toward the enemy. In this order they fell upon their knees and implored divine help. The haughty knights, supposing that they were begging for mercy, taunted them. They soon discovered their mistake, for hardly had they risen to their feet, before they rushed forward with a mighty shout and the fearful blasts of their battle-horns. The Lucerners formed the point of the wedge and attempted to force a way through the enemy, but the Austrians stood as immovable as a wall, helm to helm, mail to mail, shield to shield, and between the shields a forest of spears, which resisted the attack. The Urners next advanced. “Break down their spears; they are hollow!” shouted their leader; but the broken spears were replaced by those behind them, and the Urners gave way as the Lucerners had done. The brave Schwyzers fared no better, and in falling back suffered severe loss from the showers of arrows shot at them from behind hedges and bushes.
The knights felt sure of victory, and the Confederates were losing confidence. More than sixty of their bravest, among them their leader, were lying dead on the field; the knights had not yet lost a man, and their position remained unbroken. Every one in the Confederate ranks realized that it was a critical moment, and none more fully than Arnold of Winkelried, who led the men of the Nidwald. A decision must be made instantly, or Confederate blood would be uselessly shed and the fruits of the glorious victory of Morgarten would be wasted. Thus thought Arnold, and he made the decision at once. There are things more important than life. He had not shrunk from the poisonous breath of the plague. He had looked death in the face countless times in foreign wars. The time had now come for him to offer himself up for freedom and the fatherland.
“Brethren in arms!” he loudly shouted, “care for my wife and children. I will open a path for you. Follow me.”
With inevitable death before him he dashed forward, threw himself upon the enemy’s lances, and bent them down to the earth by the weight of his body. Pierced and gashed in every limb, he yielded up his heroic soul. His followers rushed into the gap and slashed right and left with their swords and halberds. In vain the knights attempted to close up, for other Confederates were constantly widening the gap. Strokes fell thick and fast; helmets and heads were split at a blow, and the victims fell and were trodden underfoot. Amidst this terrible slaughter the Confederates’ wedge steadily forced its way deeper and deeper into the square. It was soon in confusion. The victors forced their way through to the enemy’s standard. The Urners captured the Hapsburg lions; and the Lucerners, the standards of Alsace and Tyrol. As the Austrian standard-bearer fell, the standard was seized by Ulrich of Aarburg, who defended it with his life. “Austria to the rescue!” were his last words, as he fell bleeding from many wounds. The words reached the ear of Leopold, who was in command of the second division. No one could restrain him from plunging into the thick of the fight. “Better die with honor than live in dishonor,” he replied to those who were entreating him to save himself. He rushed forward, seized the blood-sprinkled banner and waved it high in air as the slaughter went on around him. In the midst of it he fell dead.
When the knights saw their leader fall, they gave up all hope and rushed, panic-stricken, to their horses; but their attendants had already mounted them and fled. The third division was not in the battle, and had made its escape when it realized all was lost. The foot-soldiers were driven in every direction by the Confederates. Thus was the great battle fought by the little army of the Four Cantons against this strong army of knights and nobles.
The battle had lasted all day, and the Confederates were too exhausted to pursue the defeated enemy. After kneeling on the field and giving thanks for the victory, they took possession of the enemy’s camp. Splendid arms and equipments fell into their hands, as well as eighteen standards. Victors and vanquished lost famous warriors, and among them nearly all their leaders. One hundred and twenty of the Confederates were killed, but the Austrian loss was much heavier, nearly two thousand having been slain. Besides Duke Leopold, three hundred and fifty princes, counts, great barons, and nobles had fallen, among them the Margrave of Baden-Hochberg, the count palatine of Würtemberg and Teck, and the counts of Hohenzollern, Fürstenberg, Aarberg, Schwartzenberg, and Thierstein. Several noble families were almost wiped out.
Following the old practice, the victors remained three days upon the field. The third day was devoted to the burial of the dead. Duke Leopold and twenty-seven knights and nobles were interred in the Church of the monastery of Königsfeld in Aargau. The bodies of other nobles were removed to their homes, and the rest of the dead were buried in a great trench.
A simple chapel was erected on the spot where Leopold’s body was found, which was dedicated July fifth, 1387. The titles and coats-of-arms of the nobles were placed upon the walls. In the centre stood a cross between two memorials, one representing Duke Leopold, the other the Lucerne leader, both in the act of prayer. A picture over the door commemorated Winkelried’s deed.
Hans Halbfutter of Lucerne, an eye-witness of the battle of Sempach, commemorated the victory in a poem, wherein Arnold of Winkelried’s heroic death is described. In the learned world it is still questioned whether he performed this deed; some historians have even denied the existence of William Tell and relegated him to the realm of legend. But the name of Arnold of Winkelried, the savior of his fatherland, still lives in the hearts of the Swiss people. A statue has been erected near the fountain in the market place of Stans which represents him at the moment of grasping the enemy’s spears. His birthplace and coat of mail are also shown in Stans, and a chapel has been erected to his memory.
On the ninth of July, 1886, five hundred years after the battle of Sempach, the Swiss held a national festival in honor of Arnold of Winkelried, the hero who exhibited a manly courage, self-devotion, and love of fatherland which secured the victory of the Confederates over their strongest enemy, and raised Switzerland to the position of a powerful Commonwealth.
Footnotes
[1]The Hohenstaufens were a princely German family, whose castle was at Hohenstaufen in Würtemberg. It furnished sovereigns to Germany and Sicily in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. The last of them was Conradin, who was executed in 1268.
[2]“Ode,” in German, signifies a desert or wilderness.
[3]The Aar, or Aare, rises in the Bernese Oberland and flows into the Rhine. Its length is about 170 miles.
[4]Engelberg is now a health resort in the Canton of Unterwalden, Switzerland, south of Lucerne. It still has a Benedictine Abbey.
[5]Rætia was a province of the Roman Empire, and its inhabitants were mountaineers. It was conquered by Tiberius in 15 B. C. The Helvetians were a Celtic tribe living near Lake Geneva, and were conquered by Cæsar. The Huns were a Mongolian race which invaded Europe in the fourth century. Their greatest leader was Attila. The Ostrogoths were the Eastern branch of the Gothic race, and were subjugated by the Huns. The Alamanni were a German race, whose territory in the third century included Alsace and part of Eastern Switzerland. “Franks” was a name assumed by a confederation of German tribes.
[6]Rudolph the First was the son of Albert the Fourth, Count of Hapsburg. He succeeded his father in 1239, and was elected German King in 1273, being the first of the Hapsburg line.
[7]The Rütli was a meadow in the mountains of Uri, fifteen miles southeast of Lucerne.
[8]Nidwald is the northern part of the Canton of Unterwalden; Oberwald is the southern part.
[9]Winterthur, one of the chief manufacturing towns in Switzerland, about thirteen miles northeast of Zurich.
[10]The Crimea.
[11]Kovno is the capital of the government of Kovno, at the junction of the Vilia and Niemen rivers in Russia.
Appendix
The following is a chronological statement of the principal events in Swiss-Austrian history connected with this narrative:
1273     Rudolph elected Emperor. 1291     Rudolph’s death. 1291     Formation of the Everlasting League. 1292     Adolph elected Emperor. 1298     Albert of Hapsburg elected Emperor. 1308     Murder of Alfred. 1308     Henry of Luxemburg elected Emperor. 1313     Death of Henry. 1315     Austrian defeat at Morgarten. 1315     Everlasting League renewed. 1336     Civic War at Zurich. 1336     Rudolph Brun made burgomaster of Zurich. 1351     Everlasting League enlarged. 1386     Austrian defeat at Sempach. 1386     Death of Winkelried. 1389     The Seven Years’ peace.
LIFE STORIES FOR YOUNG PEOPLE
_Translated from the German by_ _GEORGE P. UPTON_
_20 Volumes Ready_
Beethoven Mozart Bach Haydn Maid of Orleans The Little Dauphin Marie Antoinette’s Youth Frederick the Great Maria Theresa Arnold of Winkelried William of Orange Barbarossa William Tell The Swiss Heroes Herman and Thusnelda Undine Gudrun The Nibelungs The Frithiof Saga The Duke of Brittany
_Each, illustrated, 60 cents net_ A. C. McCLURG & CO., CHICAGO
Transcriber’s Notes
--Copyright notice provided as in the original—this e-text is public domain in the country of publication.
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--Silently corrected palpable typos; left non-standard spellings and dialect unchanged.
End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Arnold of Winkelried, The Hero of Sempach, by Gustav Höcker

= = = PG59874 = = =
AROUND THE END
Produced by Donald Cummings and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
AROUND THE END
BY RALPH HENRY BARBOUR.
Around the End. The Junior Trophy. Change Signals! For Yardley. Finkler’s Field. Winning His “Y.” The New Boy at Hilltop. Double Play. Forward Pass! The Spirit of the School. Four in Camp. Four Afoot. Four Afloat. The Arrival of Jimpson. Behind the Line. Captain of the Crew. For the Honor of the School. The Half-Back. On Your Mark. Weatherby’s Inning.
D. APPLETON & COMPANY, NEW YORK.
[Illustration: “To the right, off the port bow of the launch, a hulking shadow took shape.”]
AROUND THE END
[Illustration]
_By_ RALPH HENRY BARBOUR
AUTHOR OF “THE HALF-BACK,” “CHANGE SIGNALS,” “FORWARD PASS,” ETC.
[Illustration]
NEW YORK AND LONDON D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 1913
Copyright, 1913, by D. APPLETON AND COMPANY
Printed in the United States of America
CONTENTS
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
FACING PAGE
“To the right, off the port bow of the launch, a hulking shadow took shape.”                    _Frontispiece_
“The boy dropped to the floor and squirmed quickly from sight.”                                                      18
“‘Hello! Hello! This is Mr. Gibson.... What say?’”              142
“Something crashed against him, driving the remaining breath from his body.”                                      296
AROUND THE END
CHAPTER I
THE FIRST SCRIMMAGE
“This way, everyone!”
Coach Payson sent the call to each end of the field and then, swinging his small blue megaphone in his hand, waited for the panting players to gather about him in front of the bench. They came running in from all parts of the gridiron, a motley gathering of football aspirants; seasoned veterans of last year’s Yardley Varsity, Second Team men, substitutes, new boys; big, little, fat, thin, all sizes and conditions. Andy Ryan, the little red-haired trainer, stood over his pile of blankets and his water pail, back of the side-line, and viewed the sixty-odd candidates with a pessimistic shake of his head. John Payson, turning at the moment, saw it and smiled.
“What’s the matter, Andy? Don’t they look good?” he asked.
“I’ve seen some funny bunches in my day,” replied the trainer, “but never anything like them!”
“That’s what you say every year,” scoffed Payson good-naturedly. “I guess this lot will average about the same.” He turned to the breathless fellows gathering about him and pulled a little red book from his pocket. “All right, now. First scrimmage to-day, fellows. First squad: Cousins, Plant, Fales, Girard, Merriwell, Stark, Metz, Holmes, Greene, Fayette, Marion. Second squad: Fox, Steger, Keene, Johnson, McKesson, Fenwick, Adler, Simms, Crandall, Burtis, Brinspool. First squad take the south goal and kick off to the second. Men not playing get into blankets. On the run now. We’ll have two ten-minute periods. Get a couple of fellows to take the chains, will you, Andy?”
The two teams trotted to their positions, Andy tossed a horn to Davis, the manager, and summoned two blue-blanketed figures from the bench to act as linesmen, and in a moment the ball was hurtling from Merriwell’s toe.
Behind the benches, scattered over the grand stand, a hundred or more watchers who, during the preliminary practice, had lolled comfortably on the sunny seats, sat up and gave their attention to the scrimmage. Simms gathered in the long kick and, behind a quickly-formed interference, ran the ball back a good twenty yards before the first squad smothered him. Murmurs of applause arose from the audience.
“That was a dandy run, wasn’t it?” observed Harry Merrow, who, seated beside Gerald Pennimore halfway up the stand, was eating peanuts as though his life depended on it. Gerald nodded.
“I wonder why Payson put Simms on the second and Holmes on the first,” he said. “Holmes only got into the Broadwood game last year for a few minutes at the end.”
“He played all through the Nordham game, though, didn’t he? I think he’s every bit as good as Simms.”
“He’s just as good a player maybe, Harry, but he isn’t half the general Al is. I see Burtis is playing right half on the second. I wonder if he will make the team this year. Of course he will get into the games now and then if only to kick goals, but I guess he’s got a lot of football to learn yet.”
“Gee, they ought to make him a present of his position on the First Team,” responded Harry, flicking a peanut shell at a group of boys below. “Any fellow who will go into a Broadwood game without any experience and win for us by a goal from the field ought to have anything he wants.”
“Well, I guess Payson will take him on all right. I hope so. I like Burtis. Do you know him?”
“I met him once in your room last Spring. It was the day of the baseball game with Broadwood. He seemed a quiet sort of chap.”
“Yes, he’s a bit shy at first,” Gerald chuckled, and then, in response to his friend’s look of inquiry, continued: “I’ll never forget the night last year he came into our room and told Dan quite seriously that he ‘would like to play on the football team, please.’ Harold Towne put him up to it. Burtis was a pretty green lad then.”
“Towne always was a pup,” remarked Harry cheerfully. “There he goes now!”
“Who? Towne?”
“Burtis; he’s got the ball. Made a peach of a catch and―― Oh, good work, Burtis! Gee, Gerald, he must have made fifteen easily. Say, he can run with the ball, can’t he? Did you see him slip away from Fayette?”
“Yes. I wouldn’t be surprised if he made good this year. Goodness knows we need a couple of half-backs! We’re going to miss Tom Roeder and Stearns and Hammel like anything.”
“We’re going to miss a whole lot of fellows. We’ll never have an end as good as Dan Vinton, nor a guard like Ridge. Did you hear Payson say at the meeting the other night that only once before since he’s been coaching have we had so few veterans to build the team around?”
“Yes. So, too, I guess. Simms and Merriwell are really the only members of last year’s team we have; Holmes was more of a second-string man than anything else. Still, there’s good material out there; Marion for full, Stark for tackle, two good quarters, Fayette and Crandall and Greene for halfs; we’ll get along, I guess.”
“I wonder what sort of a captain Merriwell will make,” mused Harry. “He’s a good player, but――――”
“And a good fellow, and well liked, don’t you think? I don’t believe he’s the leader that Dan was, though.”
“I should say not! You must miss Dan a whole lot, Gerald.”
“It’s something fierce! Lonely’s no name for it! I had a letter from him yesterday. He’s out for the Yale Freshman Team, of course.”
“I dare say they’ll make him captain,” asserted Harry loyally.
But Gerald shook his head. “Not much chance of that, I guess. They made Alf Loring captain last year, and it isn’t likely they’d give the captaincy to Yardley fellows two years running. First’s going to score, Harry. Who’s playing center for them? Girard? He’s a whopping big brute, isn’t he? Pshaw! He’d better learn to pass back better than that. Blocked! _Ball, you idiots!_ Who’s got it! First, I think. No, second. Who? Burtis? It does look like him, but――no, it’s――It _is_ Burtis, for a fact! How the dickens did he manage to get around that end? If he doesn’t watch out Payson will have him on the First Team.”
“Then he’s not likely to watch out,” laughed Harry. “Time’s up.”
They watched the players return to the bench and don their blankets while Andy ladled out the water sparingly. Payson studied his memorandum book, talking the while with Percy Davis, the manager. Captain Merriwell, trailing his blanket behind him, joined them. Then the coach turned to the line of players.
“All right, Plant, Girard, Stark, Marion, Steger, Johnson, McKesson, Fenwick and Brinspool,” he called. “Once around the field on the trot and run in. And don’t forget to weigh.”
Nine blankets were tossed aside and the released players started their jog around the side-lines. Mr. Payson filled their places in the line-up, and a few minutes later the second half of the scrimmage began. Up on the stand, Harry Merrow, having finished the last of the peanuts, blew up the bag and demolished it with a loud report that made the audience jump in their seats. When his amusement had subsided he turned to Gerald again.
“I wish I’d gone in for football,” he sighed.
“You’re too light, you silly chump,” replied Gerald. “Besides, you can’t do cross-country work and play football. That’s what kept me out of football; that and the fact that Dan wouldn’t let me on!”
“When are we going to start work?” asked Harry.
“In about two weeks. Andy wants the weather to get a bit colder. Where did you finish last year? Eighth, wasn’t it?”
“Ninth. Holder beat me out at the line. We ought to have an easy time with Broadwood this year, Gerald. Most of their best men last year were seniors.”
“I hope not. I don’t want any runaway race. There’s no fun in that. Look, second’s going to try a goal from field. There goes Burtis back. I hope he makes it.”
“Where is it? About the twenty yards? He ought to make it, if they don’t get through on him. There it goes! Over, wasn’t it?”
“I think so, but it was pretty far to the left. Yes, it’s a goal. That chap’s playing half the game for the second squad to-day. I’ll bet they’ll have him in the first to-morrow.”
“I’ll bet they won’t.”
“Why?”
“Because to-morrow’s Sunday,” replied Harry with a chuckle. Gerald pulled Harry’s cap over his face, rumpled his hair and ran an elbow into his ribs.
“You’re a smart little joker, aren’t you?” he laughed. “Sit up and watch the kick-off; and behave yourself; or, as Ned Tooker used to say, hebave yourself.”
“He was a silly ass,” said Harry, smoothing his hair and adjusting his cap.
“Ned? Don’t you believe it, Harry. He was a dandy, Ned was. I’ll bet he has a better time than any other three fellows I know. That’s a punk kick-off. Fenwick’s got it. Go it, you slowpoke! They’ve got him. He ran the wrong way, the chump. Funny how easy it is to play the game from the grand stand, Harry.”
“Yes, I guess you and I would do some brilliant little stunts if we had to go out there,” agreed Harry, nodding his head toward the field. “If I had the ball and one of those big chaps like Girard came at me I’d drop it like a hot potato and never stop running until I was in 20 Whitson with the door locked behind me! Oh, I’d be a brave little football player!”
“Every man to his trade,” laughed Gerald. “Your trade――and mine――is running, Harry.”
“That’s so. Then I guess I’d get to my room ahead of Girard, wouldn’t I? Hello, time’s up. Let’s get back. I’m getting goose-flesh all over me. It certainly gets cold when the sun quits business. Did you have a good time this summer?”
“Dandy! Dad and I went across for two months; England, France, Switzerland, Holland, Germany and a little bit of Italy. It was great.”
“It must have been,” sighed Harry. “Wish _my_ father owned all the steamship lines in the world! I spent the summer down on the Jersey coast with the mosquitoes. Had a good time, though. Used to get into my bathing suit at eleven and keep it on until ’most dinner time. You ought to see my back. It’s like――like mahogany.”
“Your face is bad enough. I didn’t know you that day you yelled to me from the window. Thought you were a colored gentleman!”
They made their way down the stand and on to the field. Ahead of them the players, their blankets flapping grotesquely behind them, were racing up the path toward the gymnasium. Two or three, however, still lingered where coach, manager and trainer were in consultation. As Gerald and Harry reached the end of the field, one of these passed them at a trot, turned to look and stopped.
“Hello, Pennimore,” he said. “I guess you remember me, don’t you?”
“Of course I do, Burtis. Glad to see you again. How are you?” They shook hands. “You know Merrow?”
“I――think so. We met last year, didn’t we?” asked Kendall Burtis, as he shook hands again. Harry said yes, and Gerald asked:
“Are you in Clarke again this year, Burtis?”
“Yes, same place. I’m alone so far. My roommate, Towne, hasn’t shown up yet.”
“That so? What’s the matter with him?” asked Gerald as they went on.
“I don’t know. I asked at the Office the other day and the secretary there said they were expecting him.”
“It would be a terrible loss to the school if he didn’t come back,” observed Gerald gravely. Kendall shot a glance at him and smiled.
“Hope he stays away,” said Harry. “You played some football to-day, Burtis.”
“Much obliged. I had pretty good luck.”
“Luck didn’t kick that goal, did it?” laughed Gerald.
“Well, there’s always a lot of luck in trying for goal,” replied Kendall seriously. “Sometimes, just when you’re getting the ball away something happens, like a forward breaking through, and you get sort of rattled. Then there’s the pass, too. If that doesn’t come right you’re likely to miss. There’s a lot of luck in it. Well, I must be getting on. Glad to have seen you again, Pennimore. You, too, Merrow.”
“Thanks. What are you doing this evening, Burtis? Mind if I drop in for a minute?”
“I wish you would. I haven’t anything to do. I――I’ll look for you.” He nodded and trotted ahead.
“Funny about him,” mused Harry. “He’s as homely as a mud-fence until he smiles, and then blessed if he isn’t almost good-looking! What do you know about that, old Gerald?”
CHAPTER II
THE RABBIT AND THE DUKE
Harry Merrow’s remark was quite true, true in what it said and in what it implied. When he smiled Kendall Burtis was a different looking chap entirely, but he didn’t often smile, and when he didn’t it was no exaggeration to call him homely. He was sixteen years of age, of average height, with a figure that seemed to have more than the usual allowance of corners. He had the rugged appearance of a boy who has lived out of doors, and worked there, too. He had ashy-brown hair, dark gray eyes, a nose which was almost a pug, and a broad mouth. Add plenty of brown freckles to a face well tanned, and you have a fair idea of Kendall’s physiognomy. But the mouth was kindly, the nose suggested a sense of humor, and the gray eyes were clear and honest, and somehow, in spite of its homeliness, the face was attractive.
He sat at the table in 21 Clarke Hall after supper that evening, with his books open before him and a lead pencil protruding from a corner of his mouth. And as he conned his lesson, muttering to himself at times, the pencil wobbled about ludicrously. The room was on the second floor and at the back of the building. It was plainly furnished and had a somewhat threadbare look. What few pictures adorned the walls were mostly on one side of the room, the side sacred to the roommate who had not yet returned.
There was a knock on the door and in response to Kendall’s invitation Gerald Pennimore entered. “You know you said I might call, Burtis,” he announced, “but if you’re busy――――”
“I’m not, Pennimore. I was just having a go at Latin. Sit down, won’t you?” And Kendall arose and pushed forward a chair with eager shyness. “This is Harold’s; I don’t own anything as comfortable.”
Gerald seated himself in the Morris chair and looked about him. He was a decided contrast to his host. Rather tall, slim and lithe, with a graceful carriage and easy manners, fair-haired, blue-eyed, eager and alert, he was quite different from the almost delicate youngster who had entered Yardley Hall School three years before. To-day, in his senior year, he was Class President, captain of the Cross-Country Team, a valuable member of the Track Team, a hockey player of some ability and a power in the school. In age he was a year older than Kendall.
“Towne hasn’t shown up yet?” he asked.
“Not yet. They say at the Office that he is expected, but I have a notion he isn’t coming back.”
“You’ll be heart-broken about it, of course,” said Gerald, sympathetically. But there was a smile in his blue eyes.
Kendall looked across gravely. “Well, I got sort of used to him,” he answered. “Maybe they’d put some other fellow in I wouldn’t get along with as well. I suppose you miss Vinton a good deal, Pennimore. He was an awfully fine chap, wasn’t he?”
“Yes. Yes, I miss him a lot. You see, we were together three years here in school and we spent some of our vacations together, too. I’ve traveled with older fellows ever since I came here and now they’re about all gone. I suppose it’s a mistake not to pick your friends from your own class, but I couldn’t very well help myself. I had rather a hard time of it when I first struck this place.” Gerald smiled reminiscently. “You see, Burtis, I was handicapped by having a father so wealthy that everyone knew about him. Then, too, I’ve lived in the summer right here within a mile of the school. So when I came a lot of the fellows were down on me. They used to call me ‘Miss Nancy’ and ‘Money-bags’ and things like that, and I was pretty miserable for a while. If it hadn’t been for Dan and two or three other fellows, fellows like Alf Loring and Tom Dyer, I’d have given it up, I guess. Well, I’m glad I didn’t. How are the football prospects this year, Burtis? Are we going to do the usual thing to Broadwood?”
“I don’t know much about them. I hear that we’ve only got two or three first-string men left from last year, though.”
“Yes, but we’ve got a lot of good subs and fellows from last year’s Second. I suppose you’re fairly certain of a place, Burtis.”
“I don’t know,” replied Kendall slowly. “I haven’t had much experience, you see.”
“Experience! Great Scott, you had experience enough to go in in the last minute and land a goal from the forty-yard line!”
“That wasn’t hard. You see, Fogg made a fine pass and Simms aimed the ball just right, and all I had to do was kick it.”
“Yes, with the whole crazy Broadwood team charging through on you like a lot of madmen! Sure, it was dead easy――I don’t think!” Gerald laughed. “I saw you to-day, too, Burtis, and all I’ve got to say is that if you can kick as well as you did last year and run as well as you did to-day they’ll have an awfully hard time keeping you off the First Team! Of course, I’m not a football player――never had time for it except with a scrub team one year――but you can’t live with a fellow who has football on the brain for three years without getting the critical eye. And I’m going to tell you something that Dan said last Spring. Maybe I oughtn’t to, but I guess you’re not the sort to get a swelled head. Dan said, ‘That fellow Burtis is a born football player, and if he had got started earlier he’d have most of us looking like amateurs. They’ll make him captain before he gets through, see if they don’t!’”
Kendall colored with pleasure and embarrassment. “That’s――that’s awfully kind of Vinton,” he murmured, “but――but I guess he was mistaken――――”
“Yes, he was always making mistakes about football things,” replied Gerald dryly. “Dan is stupid like a fox. Anyway, I hope he’s right, Burtis.”
“Thank you. Maybe if I had gone to a school where they played football before I came here I’d know more about it. There’s――there’s a lot to learn, you see.”
“You’ll learn it,” affirmed Gerald heartily. “Well, you’ve got studying to do and I guess a little of it won’t hurt me any, so I’ll run along. Hold on, though! I very nearly forgot what I came for. I applied for a room in Dudley last Spring; you know, I guess, that Seniors have the privilege of rooming there if they want to; and I got my room――Number 14; I was to share it with a fellow named Kirk.”
“George Kirk? Captain of the Golf Team? I know him.”
“That’s the fellow. I’ve nothing against Kirk; rather like him, in fact; what I know of him, which isn’t very much; but afterwards I sort of hated the idea of giving up my old room here, and when I got back the other day and saw it I hiked around to the Office and begged Mr. Forisher to let me keep it. He kicked a lot, but finally said I might. Seems he had a couple of fellows down for it and had to switch them somewhere else. So, as it is, I’m alone in 28. Now, what I was going to suggest was this――why――hello!”
Gerald stopped and listened. In the hall above there was a slamming of doors and a scurry of feet. “They’d better cut that before they get downstairs or Collins will nab them!” The clamor increased. Through the partly open door they could hear someone taking the stairs at bounds, while above there was the clamor as of a pursuing mob. The quarry, whoever he was, reached the bottom of the flight with a final jump, and then, in a twinkling, the room door crashed wide open and a tall, lank youth plunged in. He was out of breath and the smile he summoned was too agitated to seem genuine.
“Say, let me hide here a minute, will you?” he whispered to Gerald hoarsely.
Gerald motioned to the further bed. “Slide under there,” he said quietly. The boy flew around the table, dropped to the floor and squirmed quickly from sight. Gerald stepped to the door to close it, but the pursuit was already at the bottom of the stairs, laughing and calling. Gerald left the door ajar, scurried back to his chair and, thrusting his hands into his pockets, leaned carelessly back.
[Illustration: “The boy dropped to the floor and squirmed quickly from sight.”]
“Yes, when it came to doing it, Burtis, I just couldn’t give up the old place. You get terribly fond of a room after――――”
There was a hurried knock and the door was pushed open, revealing a half-dozen laughing faces beyond.
“Hello, Pennimore! Is he in here?” The spokesman was a big fellow named Johnson, a Second Class boy, who roomed on the floor above.
“Hello,” returned Gerald with a display of mild curiosity. “Is who here?”
“The Rabbit! Cotton-Tail! Didn’t he slide in here?” Johnson looked suspiciously around.
“Of course he did,” cried another of the crowd. “He didn’t go downstairs and this is the only door that’s open! Where is he, Pennimore? We’ve got to have him! We need him in our business!”
“I don’t know the gentleman,” replied Gerald with a smile.
“Well, he’s in here just the same,” declared Johnson.
“Oh, sure! I’ve got him in my pocket!”
“He’s in a closet,” whispered another fellow audibly.
“Under a bed, probably,” growled a third. “Say, whose room is this, anyway?”
“This room belongs to my friend, Mr. Burtis,” returned Gerald amiably. “If you ask him nicely he will probably allow you to come in and search it to your heart’s content. Mind if this committee of thugs looks around, Burtis?”
“N-no, I suppose not,” answered Kendall. “But I don’t see why they should.”
“I don’t see any reason myself,” agreed Gerald, carefully avoiding a glance toward the further bed. “Johnson, on the whole, I guess you’d better run away. And you might close the door after you.”
“Then he isn’t here?” asked Johnson doubtfully.
“Who isn’t here?” demanded Gerald with a fine show of irritability. “Can’t you see he isn’t here? Who the dickens do you want, anyhow?”
“Maybe he did sneak downstairs, after all,” someone suggested. “We’ll get him when he comes back, fellows.”
“All right,” said Johnson. “Abject apologies for disturbing you, Pennimore, but the law must be enforced, you know.”
“Oh, certainly,” replied Gerald carelessly. “Go as far as you like, but close the door after you.”
The door closed and the footfalls died away up the stairs. After a minute:
“Come out, Mr. Rabbit,” said Gerald softly. “The hounds have gone.”
There was a scuffling under Kendall’s bed and, feet first, the quarry emerged. “Much obliged,” he panted. “Are you sure they’ve gone?”
“Mm; fairly sure. I’ll lock the door, anyhow. Sit down and recover your _savoir faire_, whatever that is. You must be a newcomer, Mr. Rabbit. I don’t recall your features.”
“Yes, I――I came last week,” replied the other, seating himself on the foot of the bed and brushing the dust from his clothes. He had eyes that, for want of a better word, might be called hazel, and the rims were inflamed; Gerald decided, however, that the redness was not from too much poring over text-books, for the youth didn’t look like that sort. He was lanky, ungainly and none too attractive. His mouth was unpleasant and his face didn’t look quite clean. And the red-rimmed eyes had a sly look in them very unlike a rabbit’s. In age he seemed about seventeen.
“May I ask,” continued Gerald, “why the gentlemen were so eager to discover you?”
The boy’s eyes shifted and dropped. “They――they were hazing me,” he muttered.
“Hazing you! Oh, surely not! Hazing isn’t indulged in here. Mister――er――what did you say the name was? Rabbit?”
“My name’s Cotton. I don’t care what you call it, but they were trying to make me hold my head in a basin of water.”
“In a basin of water? What an odd thing to do! Why, Mr. Cotton?”
“They said”――Cotton gulped angrily――“they said they wanted to see if I was absorbent.”
“Absorbent? Oh, I see; absorbent cotton.” Gerald laughed and even Kendall had to smile a little. “Well, were you?”
“I got away from them,” he growled.
“Oh, well, that wouldn’t have hurt you any, you know. In fact”――and Gerald smiled slightly――“in fact a little water might be beneficial, Cotton.”
Cotton scowled. “Well, they needn’t think they can do that sort of thing to me. I’m too old a bird. I’ve been to school before. And if they try any more of their funny stunts, someone will get hurt!”
“I don’t like your attitude,” said Gerald coldly. “A little fun doesn’t hurt anyone, and as you’re a newcomer, Cotton, you must expect a certain amount of ragging. I think you’ll find the coast clear now.”
“Besides,” went on Cotton aggrievedly, disdaining the hint, “they wanted to put ink in the water.”
“You should have reminded them that you were not blotting-paper; merely absorbent cotton,” replied Gerald with a smile.
There was a knock on the door and Gerald looked inquiringly at Kendall. Cotton slipped to the floor, prepared to again seek the refuge of the bed.
“Who is there?” asked Kendall.
“Wellington. May I come in a moment?”
“It’s all right, I guess,” said Gerald. “It’s The Duke.” He arose and unlocked the door and the newcomer slipped in. He had a round, merry face above which a tousled head of red-brown hair glinted in the light like copper. He was about Gerald’s age, but heavier, rounder, softer. He grinned at Gerald as he closed the door softly behind him, and then observed the other two boys.
“Trouble’s over, Cotton,” he announced. “The enemy is dispersed. Keep quiet and you can make it all right. Lock the door if you want to. Better start along, though, before they get together again.”
Cotton moved doubtfully toward the door. “They’d better not touch me,” he threatened, “or――――”
“Son,” said The Duke sternly, “you take my advice and don’t make any foolish remarks. I don’t care much whether they drown you in a basin. Rather wish they would. Beat it, Cotton!”
And Cotton “beat it,” only pausing long enough to cast a scowl at The Duke.
The latter watched him go and, when the door was closed behind him, turned with a comical look of despair to Gerald.
“Say, honest, Gerald, what would you do if you had a thing like that wished on you?”
“You don’t mean he’s rooming with you?” exclaimed Gerald.
“’Tis true, O Solomon! My chum got away from me this year and that’s what I drew. When I first saw it I thought to myself, it’s no use, Duke, you can’t do it! It’s too much! Send in your resignation and pack your little hand-bag. But then I got to thinking that if I didn’t suffer someone else would have to, and my self-sacrificing nature prevailed. So that’s how. Say, you might introduce me to your friend, if you think he can stand it, Gerald.”
“I beg pardon! I thought you fellows knew each other. Burtis, this is The Duke of Wellington; Duke, this is Mr. Kendall Burtis.”
“Ah, he of the nimble toe? I’m glad to know you, Burtis. I saw you kick that goal last Fall. I need not say that I am one of your humble but sincere admirers.”
Kendall smiled shyly as they shook hands.
“Where does this Cotton chap come from?” asked Gerald as they seated themselves again. “Somehow he――he doesn’t quite look as though he belonged, Duke.”
“He comes from some place in ‘Maryland, my Maryland.’ He’s been at school somewhere down there, I think. Anyhow, he’s always comparing Yardley with his last place to the detriment of Yardley. That’s what started the trouble to-night. Lin Johnson and Billy Richards and two or three others happened in and in about twenty seconds Cotton was telling us what was wrong with the school. I don’t know where this other place he’s been at is located, but to hear him talk about it you’d think it was just outside of Paradise! Well, the fellows stood it for a while, looking sort of pained and surprised, you know, and then Lin got started and began to josh him. He doesn’t take a joke very well, and so――oh, I don’t know, but pretty soon they decided they’d find out whether he was absorbent cotton or just plain batting. And so they tried to get him to put his head in a bowl of water. Of course, I couldn’t interfere with the pleasure of my guests, and of course I couldn’t take a hand at ragging my roommate, so I was forced to maintain a difficult neutrality. I rather wished they’d drown him, but he got away and bolted down the hall. His name, by the way, is Charles, Charles Cotton.”
“That sounds familiar,” mused Gerald.
“You’re thinking of the chap who helped Izaak Walton write his ‘Compleat Angler,’ but I don’t think this is the same. I’m not sure, though; he looks a good deal like a fish. The worst I can say about him, fellows, is that he has an apparently insurmountable hatred of water when applied to the outer person. I hope, however, to overcome his aversion. Each evening I recite to him that charming little poem:
“‘Water, cold water! For washing and drinking There’s nothing like water, cold water, I’m thinking.’”
And The Duke, having arisen to deliver the poetical gem, bowed deeply and vanished through the doorway.
“What did you say his name is?” asked Kendall. “The Duke of Wellington?”
“His name,” laughed the other, “is Lester Wellington, but he’s been known as The Duke of Wellington ever since he came here. The Duke is a good sort, but he’s horribly lazy about study. He’s been here five years, I believe, and has just got into the Second Class. Everyone likes him, though, and he’s as kind-hearted as can be. It’s a shame he doesn’t do better with his studies. I’d hate to be in his place and have that Mr. Rabbit rooming with me!” Gerald shuddered. “I don’t know why I should take such an aversion to the chap, but―――― Well, let’s forget him. What I started to say half an hour ago, Burtis, was this: I’ve got half a room that’s empty and I’d be glad to have you come and use it. What do you say?”
“You mean――share your room――with you?” stammered Kendall incredulously.
“Yes. Think it over. Let me know to-morrow, though, if you can. They are likely to plank someone down with me any moment, and with fellows like that Cotton chap floating around”――Gerald shook his head dubiously――“there’s no telling what might happen to me!”
“But――but I don’t see why you want _me_!” blurted Kendall.
“Great Scott, don’t be so modest!” laughed Gerald. “Why not? You are respectable, aren’t you? Well, think it over and――――”
“But I don’t need to think it over! I’d――I’d like to do it very much if you are sure you really want me to.”
“Good! That’s fine! To-morrow we’ll go and see the Office. I don’t believe Forisher will mind if we double up, considering that we are each alone. Anyway, we’ll see. Good-night, Burtis. Sorry you’ve had so much interruption. All my fault, I fear. See you to-morrow.”
CHAPTER III
COTTON TRIES FOOTBALL
Kendall emerged from the doorway of Whitson Hall and stood for a minute at the top of the flight of worn granite steps. It was a warm, lazy day in the last week of September, a day that promised to become even warmer and lazier as it progressed. Just now the time was only a little after half-past eight, and breakfast was just over. The first recitation hour was at nine and in front of the buildings fellows were loitering in the sunlight. Here on the steps of Whitson at least a dozen were holding forth: Girard, who played center on the football team; Jensen, another pigskin follower; Davis, the manager, who was somewhat handicapped with the given name of Percival, which had been mercifully shortened and amended to “Perky”; Perry Whitehall, the dignified editor-in-chief of the school weekly, _The Scholiast_; and others whom Kendall knew only by sight. Many looked up as he came out and nodded or spoke to him. Doubtless any one of the three or four groups sitting or standing about the steps would have been pleased had he joined them, for Kendall had been a school hero in a small way ever since when, nearly a year ago now, he had won the Broadwood game by a kick from placement in the last two minutes of play. But Kendall was still rather shy, still very modest in his estimate of his own merits, and would rather have taken a licking than intrude where he wasn’t wanted.
He had been rooming with Gerald Pennimore in 28 Clarke for four days now and was still wondering about it. Why Gerald, who was perhaps the richest boy in school――there was a Fourth Class fellow named Hodgkins who had just entered and whose father, a railway magnate, was popularly credited with the possession of more wealth than Mr. John T. Pennimore, the Steamship King――why Gerald, wealthy and popular, had selected him, who was anything but wealthy and whose circle of friends included possibly not more than a dozen or so, for a roommate was a puzzle. The only likely explanation, Kendall decided, was that Gerald had done it out of pure kindness of heart. Whatever the reason, however, Kendall was intensely grateful. It was fine to have such a fellow as Gerald Pennimore for a friend, fine to share such a comfortable, even luxurious room as Number 28, fine to get away from his former roommate, Harold Towne, a chap with whom anyone with less patience and good nature than Kendall could never have put up.
But there was something else that Kendall was yet more grateful for, and as he stood there at the top of the steps and let his gaze wander over the scene before him, he realized it anew. He was very grateful to his father, who, by more than one sacrifice, had found the money for Kendall’s second year at Yardley. There had been a time during the summer when the boy’s chances of returning to school had looked pretty slim. It had been a bad summer for potatoes, and up in Aroostook County, Maine, where the Burtis farm was, a failure of the potato crop spelled trouble. It had been not until almost a fortnight before the commencement of the Fall Term that Kendall had been quite certain of returning to Yardley, and he very well knew that back home more than one comfort would be dispensed with the coming Winter that he might keep on with his education. And he had made up his mind that none of the money spent on him should be wasted. He meant to study hard and learn all he could this year, for it might be his last. He had resolved to win a scholarship if hard work would do it. There was the Gordon Scholarship which rebated the entire tuition fee, or, failing that, there remained four Sidney Scholarships of eighty dollars. One of the five Kendall meant to win.
From where he stood, Long Island Sound, blue and still, stretched east and west, visible over the tops of the trees which ran for nearly a half-mile between the school grounds and the shore. The buildings circled about the edge of a plateau down which a well-kept roadway dropped to the meadow lands below and wound westward to the little village of Wissining, to the river beyond, and, finally, to the small city of Greenburg beyond that. The river flowed down from behind the school property, a placid tidal stream which in fair weather was usually alive with boats and canoes. There were six school buildings, four of them, Clarke, Whitson, Dudley and Merle, dormitories, one of them, Oxford, given over to recitation rooms, library, assembly hall, the Office, the Principal’s living quarters and the rooms of the two school societies, Cambridge and Oxford. Beyond Merle Hall, the dormitory for the Preparatory Class boys, was the Kingdon Gymnasium, completing the line. Between the gymnasium and the river lay the athletic grounds. Here were the tennis courts, the baseball and football fields, the hockey rink in winter, the quarter-mile cinder track and the boathouse and floats. The golf links began nearby and wandered away along the curving stream, uphill and down.
Yardley Hall School is so well known that it is perhaps unnecessary for me to bore you with description. Therefore, a few more words and I am done. The school’s enrollment is about two hundred and seventy students. There are five classes, First, Second, Third, Fourth and Preparatory. The faculty numbers twelve, ranging from the Principal, Dr. Tobias Hewitt, known as “Toby,” down to Mrs. Ponder, the matron, affectionately――and surreptitiously――called “Emily.”
Kendall descended the steps and turned to his left. At the first entrance of Clarke Hall he entered and climbed two flights of well-worn stairs, bore to his left again and opened the door of the last room on the front of the building. Number 28 was a big, square, well-lighted room. Beside the shallow bay windows in front there was a window on the side from which, past the obtruding shoulder of Whitson, one caught a brief view of Wissining and the mouth of the river in the distance and of The Prospect in the foreground. Each side of the room held a bed, a washstand and a bureau. A big, broad study table held the center and was flanked by easy chairs. There were many pictures, photographs and trophies on the walls, the carpet was cheerful in tones of brown and gold and the window-seat was piled high with many-hued cushions. Altogether the room looked home-like and cheerful, and while there were numerous evidences of wealth, from the silverbacked brushes and toilet articles on Gerald’s chiffonier to the heavy, soft-piled carpet underfoot, there was no ostentation.
Gerald, half-buried in the cushions of the window-seat, was having a last look at “Wilhelm Tell” before going into class. A German dictionary was lying beside him on the sill of the open window and a frown was playing about his brow. He looked up when Kendall came in and slammed the volume of Schiller shut with a sigh of relief.
“It’s criminal, Kendall, to have to translate German on a day like this. You can’t do justice to it. It needs a thick fog to gargle with. No one can manage a good German pronunciation on a fair day; no one, that is, but a German.” Gerald gathered the books together and sat up. “Thanks be, I’m not a German! Think of going through life having to call an insurance policy a――a――wait a minute!” He opened the dictionary and fluttered the leaves quickly. “Ha! Having to call it a _versicherungsschein_! Wouldn’t that be――well, _niederschlagend_? Wouldn’t it?”
“Worse than that,” laughed Kendall. “It would be _grimmig_!”
“_Grimmig?_” Gerald frowned a moment. “That’s furious, isn’t it?”
“Yes, or fierce!”
“Oh! I wonder if the Germans can talk slang. I bet they can’t. Any nation that calls an irregular verb an _unregelmässig Zeitwort_ must be far too deficient in humor to produce any George Ades. What time is it?”
Kendall glanced at a small traveling clock on Gerald’s chiffonier and informed him that it was twelve minutes to nine. Gerald sighed again.
“I’m off to the sacrifice then,” he murmured. “By the way, don’t make any engagement for to-morrow, please. I want you to have dinner with me at the house. Afterwards, if it doesn’t rain”――Gerald looked anxiously at the bank of haze along the horizon――“we’ll kick along shore in the launch. See you later.”
As the door closed Kendall, picking up his Cicero, smiled. It wasn’t very likely that he would have had an engagement on Sunday! Then the smile faded and he wondered, as he went out, what sort of an appearance he would make at Sound View. He had been there once before, but there had been several others with him and the occasion had been most informal. Sunday dinner, he reflected ruefully, was a different proposition. Perhaps, however, his blue serge suit, purchased in Greenburg last Spring and pretty well worn since, would do if it were well brushed. As he reached the stairs The Duke clattered down the flight above and overtook him. The Duke was radiant in a suit of intensely blue flannel, the coat of which, cut extremely low and secured with two buttons, allowed a generous view of a vividly pink shirt. The Duke was bare-headed and his coppery hair showed evidences of having been recently wet and brushed.
“Hello, Burtis,” he greeted, ranging himself alongside. “I’ve got grand news for you.”
Kendall looked politely curious.
“Yes, sir, stu-pend-ous news! Mr. Charles Cotton is going out for the football team!” The Duke chuckled. “Can you imagine it? Picture the doughty Charles hurling himself fiercely against the――the craven foe, his eyes lighted with the joy of battle and the ball clasped desperately to his heaving chest! Get it? What? He told me of his decision this morning, his epoch-marking decision. Epoch-marking is some language, what? I’ve been simply bursting with the news ever since, but you’re the first fellow I’ve told. My word, but I’ll bet Payson will be pleased!” He looked at Kendall and grinned. “Simply lays you flat, doesn’t it? Can’t express yourself at all, what? I knew you’d be overcome. I congratulated Charles with tears in my voice, Burtis. I said to him, ‘Charles, my boy, this is indeed a happy moment for the old school. I thank you. I thank you on behalf of my schoolmates, Charles, on behalf of the team, on behalf of the coach and the captain! And I thank you on my own behalf, Charles, for you have brought joy to my sad heart, light to my weary eyes and laughter to my lips!’ Yes, sir, I said all that. And do you think he was pleased? Not a bit of it! He turned upon me like――like a viper and called me――well, I think I’d better not tell you what he called me. It was distinctly in bad taste.”
Kendall laughed and The Duke, encouraged, rattled on. “Now the question is whether we’d better divulge the news all at once or sort of prepare folks for it. I tell you it’s going to make an awful difference to the team, having Cotton on it. With his noble example before you, you fellows can’t help but go in and win. I hope Broadwood won’t hear about it. If she did she’d probably disband her team to-morrow.”
“Has he ever played before?” asked Kendall as they joined the throng crowding its way into Oxford.
“No, never, I believe. I think he offered his services last year wherever he was, but they were not accepted. He lays the fact to jealousy. Isn’t it sad such things can be? Where are you headed? Latin? Me, too. And that reminds me that I forgot to do my composition. Won’t Collins be pleased!”
If the Assistant Principal was pleased he didn’t allow the fact to become evident, for he said several dryly sarcastic things to The Duke and ended by suggesting to him that he deliver the Latin composition to him at his room not later than six o’clock that evening. Whereupon The Duke, cheerful and forgiving, promised to accept the suggestion and the Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero engaged the attention of the class.
As it was Saturday, football practice began at three o’clock instead of four. Kendall joined the stream of candidates that flowed from the gymnasium locker room to the field and wondered whether Coach Payson would see fit to start him to-day with the first squad. Kendall’s opinion of his football ability was modest, but he firmly believed that, while there was undoubtedly plenty left for him to learn, he could play half-back as well as either Fayette or Crandall, players who thus far enjoyed the call for the position he coveted. However, he kept this opinion to himself, which was a wise thing to do.
Fifteen minutes later, one of a dozen candidates for places behind the line who were busily engaged in catching punts and running them back, he spied the redoubtable Cotton, long, lanky, awkward and bewildered, hurling himself to the ground in the effort to land upon a deceptive pigskin tossed by the hand of a bored and pessimistic veteran to whom the drudgery of breaking in a squad of green candidates had been entrusted. Cotton was suitably arrayed, and his canvas breeches and cleated shoes held the stamp of newness. The striped blue and white jersey, however, in which the upper part of his thin body was attired had evidently seen service of some kind. Observing him a moment, Kendall decided that the jersey had not reached its present faded and torn condition on the football field, for Cotton was so palpably out of his element that the spectacle he afforded was almost pathetic. Kendall, recalling Wellington’s nonsense, smiled. Cotton, he told himself, had a hard row to hoe before he reached the First Team!
Still later, after a full half hour of signal work in the squad directed by Holmes, Kendall walked back to the bench, draping a blanket over his shoulders, and spied an empty space beside Cotton. He was not favorably impressed by that youth, but the latter’s attempts had been so pathetic and his countenance now showed so much weariness that Kendall, from kindness of heart, squeezed into the space and asked cheerfully how he had got on. Cotton evidently did not for the minute recognize in football togs his host of a few nights before, nor did he respond very affably to the overture. Instead he shot a rather sullen and somewhat suspicious glance at Kendall and said, “All right,” in a tone that seemed to ask what business it was of the inquirer’s.
“Have you ever played before?” asked Kendall. “I think Wellington said you had, though.”
“A little.” He examined Kendall curiously, began to recall his features and thawed. “I went out for the team last Fall, but”――he shrugged his shoulders, hinting at things too regrettable to mention――“I didn’t make it. Say, you’re Burtis, aren’t you? I didn’t know you at first.”
Kendall acknowledged it. “What school were you at last year?” he asked, less from curiosity than a desire to seem friendly.
“Kingston Manor; near Baltimore. It’s a pretty good school; not as big as this, but I didn’t care much for the fellows there. It was awfully cliquish. That’s why I didn’t get on the team. I wasn’t swell enough for them.” He laughed disagreeably.
“Too bad.” Kendall tried to put into his voice sympathy he didn’t feel. For some reason Cotton awakened a feeling in him closely akin to dislike, and it troubled Kendall, for there seemed no excuse for it. Kendall could almost invariably find something to like in an acquaintance, and when he couldn’t he still stopped short of actual antipathy. In the present case, fearing that he was doing the other an injustice, he took especial pains to be nice. They talked football for a minute or two. Cotton expressed doubt of obtaining a fair trial.
“I guess if you don’t have friends here it’s about the same as it was at Kingston or――or anywhere else.”
“I don’t think that,” responded Kendall. “I don’t believe they care much here who or what you are if you can play football. Why, I didn’t know a soul in school when I got here last Fall. I don’t know very many yet.”
“Oh, well, you got taken up by Pennimore and that crowd,” replied Cotton with something like a sneer.
“Not exactly that,” said Kendall quietly. “I did make a few friends, though, of course, but the reason I got on at football was because I could do a little something and they found it out. You buckle down and learn the game, Cotton, and then, if you can play fairly well, you’ll get your chance. There isn’t a squarer man alive than Coach Payson, and Captain Merriwell is a mighty good sort, too. Just the same, it won’t do you any harm to meet fellows, and I tell you what you do, Cotton; you come down some evening and make a call. Fellows are always drifting in and out of our room. Lots of them I don’t know very well myself, but Gerald will introduce you.”
“Thanks,” replied Cotton almost gratefully. “I will. Wellington doesn’t like me very well, I guess, and I don’t think much of him, either. He’s a sort of a Smart Aleck, isn’t he?”
“I don’t know him very well,” answered Kendall noncommittally. “Here comes the scrimmage. Don’t forget, Cotton. Come and see us some evening.”
“First and second squads!” called Mr. Payson. “Line up as you did yesterday.”
Blankets were tossed aside, head-guards caught up and twenty-two eager aspirants thronged on to the field. Kendall trotted out to his place on the second squad. Across the field, at the other end of the fifteen-yard line, was Greene. Under the goal stood Holmes, who was fighting hard against Simms for the quarter-back position. Up the field the first squad were lined up for the kick-off, on their toes, awaiting the whistle. Then Fales, left-guard, swung his long leg and the brown oval came flying over the white lines, turning lazily in its flight. Down rushed the enemy. The second squad defenders moved to the left to meet the onslaught as the ball dipped into Greene’s arms. The interference formed quickly. Bodies thudded together, players went down. Greene, clutching the ball, shot forward, three players cutting a path for him. A feint to the left, a quick turn to the right and the opening was found. One, two, three white lines passed under his pounding feet. Then a lithe body sprang upon him. Greene struggled forward. Another foeman charged and the three went down. The whistle piped.
“First down! Ten to go!” called the referee.
There was a quick lining-up, Holmes rattled off the signal, Kendall trotted back to punting position, Best, at center, passed the ball, Kendall caught it breast-high, stepped forward, swung his leg and away hurtled the pigskin, arching high against the blue afternoon sky, and away sped the players to line up again on the first squad’s thirty yards. The punt had been a good one, forty-five yards in distance and high enough to let the ends down under it and upset the runner before he could more than get started.
There was no scoring in the first ten-minute period. Andy Ryan kept a close watch on the water pail, for the day was warm and the temptation to drink a dipperful was great. “Easy with the water, boys,” he counseled time and again. And, “Get your blankets on! Don’t stand around there getting cold! Have you no sense at all?” There were many changes for the last period, but Kendall was retained, and, since the first squad seemed to have gained more by the influx of fresh material than the second and forced the playing from the start, he was needed. Five times he was called on to punt out of danger from under his own goal and as many times, coolly and exactly as though he were practicing on an empty gridiron, he responded successfully. Then, in the last minute of play, the tragedy occurred. First swept down to the twenty yards. Two tries netted but four yards more. A forward pass, unexpected and well executed, went to Cousins, but Kendall downed him in his fourth stride and the ball went to the second on her fifteen-yard line. Folsom, who had taken Holmes’ place at quarter, called on Kendall and Kendall dropped back just under the cross-bar. For once Best passed badly. The ball struck the ground a yard in front of the punter and although Kendall got it on the bound and swung and even started the kick away, the first squad forwards crashed through, the ball struck an upraised hand and Captain Merriwell fell on it behind the goal-line. Simms missed a try-at-goal. Score, first squad, 6; second squad, 0.
A moment later, panting, tired, aching, the players trotted up the hill to the gymnasium, blankets trailing and flapping, to feel the grateful splash of the warm water over their bodies, to writhe and gasp as the icy-cold deluge followed, and to talk it all over, accusing, defending, explaining, regretting, exulting! Then to dress leisurely, weariedly and withal happily in an atmosphere of steam and witch hazel and arnica, in a babel of talk and laughter, silently resolving better things for next practice, wondering how they could live through the whole long hour that must elapse before they could have supper!
CHAPTER IV
AT SOUND VIEW
The Pennimore country place, Sound View, lies within a half mile of the school buildings and adjoins the school property on the west. Taking the path across The Prospect, as the terrace of lawn in front of Oxford Hall was called, descending a flight of steps, crossing the curving drive and continuing the path again beyond, you come to a rustic bridge which surmounts a twenty-foot cut. Through this the railroad runs almost due east and west, in the latter direction ultimately reaching, like so many of the boys who graduate in sight of the cut, the city of New Haven. Eastward, at a nearly corresponding distance, lies Newport. But Kendall was thinking of neither New Haven nor Newport, as, shortly after morning church the next day, he crossed the bridge and entered the woods. He was taking the shortest route to Sound View and he was wondering whether the suit of clothes he had put on in honor of the occasion really looked as well as it had seemed to him. He had brushed and rebrushed for a quarter of an hour, and had worked with soap and water and a corner of a towel for as much longer in an attempt to eradicate stains from the jacket. The latter effort had not been altogether successful, but he flattered himself that if you didn’t look very close you couldn’t see the obnoxious spots. At the dividing of the path he chose the right-hand way and in a minute or two came within sight of the high fence which divided the school grounds from Mr. Pennimore’s land. It was a warm but cloudy afternoon, with a little gusty breeze coming in off the Sound and lazily moving the leaves. Presently he reached a narrow gate set in the fence. There was a round hole in it and he put his hand through and lifted a latch on the further side. Then he stepped in, wound by a broad bed of shrubbery, following a well-trodden path, and found himself finally on the seaward side of the big stone house with a wide expanse of lawn and flower-beds and borders of shrubs near at hand, and the Sound, looking rather green and sullen to-day, stretching away into the distance beyond. A big white steam yacht swung idly at her moorings off the mouth of the river and near a long steel and granite wharf. A sudden barking of dogs brought Kendall’s gaze back to the direction of the house just in time for him to see Gerald vault over the low wall of the terrace and start to meet him. An instant later a wire-haired terrier rushed down the steps, frantic with excitement, followed more leisurely by a red setter.
“Hello,” called Gerald. “I thought you’d missed your way! Why didn’t you come earlier?”
“Well, you said to come for dinner,” replied Kendall, stooping to pat the setter who was wagging him a welcome. “I thought half-past twelve was early enough. What’s his name, Gerald?”
“The setter’s? His name is Jack. I’ve had him for years. The other little duffer, who wants to sample your trousers, but doesn’t quite dare to, is Three Foot, so called because when he is very anxious to get anywhere he picks up one foot and travels on the other three. Come on up and sit down. Warm, isn’t it? Dad had to go down to New York last night and hasn’t got back yet. I sent the car over to meet the eleven-thirty train, but he wasn’t on it. He will be sorry not to be here to meet you. You’ve never met the Dad, have you?”
“Once for a minute or two last Spring, over at Broadwood. But I guess he wouldn’t remember me.”
“Don’t you believe it! Dad never forgets anything. Sit down and get cool. Have some water or a glass of ginger ale or something?”
Kendall declined as he sank into a long rattan chair and fanned himself with his hat. “Is that your yacht?” he asked.
“Yes――that is, it’s Dad’s. Mine is a bit smaller.” Gerald smiled. “About a hundred and twenty-five feet shorter. We’ll try her after dinner. I asked Harry Merrow to go along. Don’t mind, do you?”
“Not a bit. I like Merrow, although I don’t know him very well. He spoke to me the other day after mathematics and we had a talk.”
“He’s a very decent kid. I suppose,” Gerald added with a laugh, “he’s only a year younger than I am, but he’s always seemed a lot younger to me.”
“I guess he’s about sixteen. You’re seventeen, aren’t you?”
“Yes. I’ll be eighteen next Fall when I get to Yale. I suppose that’s early enough, but I’d have made it this year if Dad hadn’t kept me on a diet of tutors for so long. It was funny the way I happened to go to Yardley. Jack was mixed up in it, weren’t you, old doggums?”
Jack, stretched on the stones at Gerald’s feet, thumped his tail affirmatively.
“How did it happen?” asked Kendall.
“Well, over there near where you came through the gate I used to have a playhouse when I was a kid. Once somebody gave me a fireman’s uniform as a present; you know, red blouse and helmet and a brass trumpet and so on. So one day I thought it would be a bright idea to have a real fire and do a rescue stunt. So I put on my fireman’s outfit, got an ax from the stable, shut Jack in the playhouse and set fire to it.”
“Thunder!” exclaimed Kendall.
“Also lightning,” agreed Gerald. “It was a fool thing to do and Jack might have been burned to a crisp because I locked the door and threw the key away for some unknown reason. And the first thing I knew the place was burning like a bonfire. Not that I was troubling much, however. I’d brought along a couple of those chemical extinguishers from the house and my plan was to break open the door, rescue Jack heroically, just like a sure-enough fire-fighter, and then put out the flames with the extinguishers. Poor old Jack was howling like a good one, and I was telling him to keep his courage up or something like that when a fellow sang out from the other side of the fence and wanted to know what I was doing. I told him and invited him over to help. I think he called me a silly little fool, which was impolite but dreadfully true. Then he jumped over, grabbed the ax away from me and beat in the door. The place was just a mass of flames inside and Jack was stretched out like dead. I guess the poor old fellow was scared stiff. So then there was nothing to do but go in and get him. The trouble was that after I reached Jack I was too choked up with smoke and too frightened to get out again, and if the other chap hadn’t lugged us both out――well, you wouldn’t be sitting here; and neither would I, nor Jack. We all got scorched a little and we boys were put to bed and had to be dosed and fixed up by the doctor, and there was a big old fuss.”
“What an awful thing to do!” said Kendall. “Why, you might have been burned horribly. Who was the other boy?”
“Dan Vinton. And that’s how I happened to go to Yardley to school. I’d had about half a dozen tutors and none of them would stay very long because I was a mean little brat and made their lives a burden to them, I guess. Dad sort of fell in love with Dan, just as I did, and after a while, when I insisted that I wouldn’t be happy if I couldn’t go to Yardley, Dad let me go on the understanding that Dan was to take charge of me. You see, Dad was away a good deal more then than he is now. So I went to room with Dan, and he made me toe the mark, too. I was like a kid with three nurses, for when Dan wasn’t looking after me then Alf Loring or Tom Dyer was! Well, I had my troubles for a while, but I got through with them. It did me a lot of good, I tell you, Kendall, for I was in a fair way to become a conceited, puny little idiot. Why, I didn’t know what it was to be hungry until I went to Yardley and played football and lived out of doors! I tell you, the fellow that doesn’t go to a school where he can mix with other fellows and be thrown on his own resources and fight his own battles is mighty unfortunate.”
“I suppose so,” agreed Kendall, “but it must be pretty hard on some fellows. Take chaps who are shy and have been made a lot of at home, Gerald; I guess they get pretty unhappy sometimes at boarding school.”
“Rather! I was so homesick and――and miserable that I ran away once and went home to New York. And Dan came after me and lugged me back. Oh, I know what it is about as well as any fellow. And that’s why I always try to be friendly with the youngsters that come to school looking as though they were walking into a den of lions. You come across them every day at this time of year, trailing around by themselves and looking sort of red about the eyes and doleful all over. I know about how they feel; homesick and scared of the other fellows and scared of faculty and scared of their lessons. It’s bad while it lasts, but it doesn’t last long. Some morning you wake up with an appetite for breakfast that almost makes you ache; and some fellow says, ‘Hello, kid,’ to you as you go downstairs, and smiles at you or maybe claps you on the back, and you eat a big breakfast and sort of look around and think how jolly everything looks and how friendly the fellows seem all of a sudden. And you wake up to the fact that you belong, that you’re one of the crowd, that you’re a Yardley Hall fellow. And you walk out of commons with a bit of a swagger and begin to try and decide whether to be captain of the football team or a First Honors man!”
Kendall smiled appreciatively. He had been through it himself and it was just as Gerald had described it. And he believed he knew a little better now why Gerald had picked him for a roommate!
“Another thing,” continued Gerald, rubbing Jack’s ribs with one foot, “that sort of thing has to come some time, anyway. I mean that――that stage-fright or whatever you want to call it. If you don’t go through with it at prep school you’ll have to face it later; perhaps when you go to college or perhaps when you go into business. Every fellow has to face it some time. It’s a good deal like being tossed into the water and told to swim. You swim after a fashion――because you have to to keep afloat, but you’re scared to death at first. After a bit you like it and they can’t keep you out of the water unless they tie you up!”
“That’s something I can’t do,” said Kendall, “swim.”
“You can’t?” asked Gerald incredulously. “It’s high time you learned then. Where have you been all your life?”
“On a farm,” laughed Kendall. “I’m a hayseed.”
“Aren’t afraid of the water, are you?”
“N-no, I think not. I rather like it, only I’ve never tried to swim in it.”
“That’s good. Just as long as you aren’t scared at the outset you’ll get on all right. You want to keep in your mind the fact that the Lord gave you air to breathe in, ground to walk on and water to swim in, and that you’re just about as safe one place as another. I’ll have to take you in hand some day soon and teach you to swim.”
“I wish you would. I’ve always wanted to know how.”
A minute later they went in to dinner, followed by the two dogs, and sat at opposite sides of a round table and were attended by a serious-faced butler. Kendall held the butler in a good deal of awe and marveled at the casual, almost disrespectful way in which his host addressed that functionary. Once or twice he almost held his breath for fear that the butler, whose name appeared to be Murdock at times and at other times Scout, would take umbrage at the way in which Gerald bossed him around. And when, finally, Gerald said carelessly, “That’s all, Murdock, for a while. Just beat it, will you?” Kendall was quite sure that Murdock would immediately pack his trunk and leave. But he didn’t, for when it was time for the dessert Gerald pressed a button and Murdock noiselessly reappeared, just as though nothing had happened. That dinner was one to remember and dream about, and both boys, though more especially Kendall, enjoyed it heartily from the funny little disks of toast covered with some sort of paste that tasted like fish, and which, following Gerald’s lead, Kendall anointed with lemon-juice, to the black coffee served in cups so frail that Kendall almost feared to lift one.
Afterwards they went upstairs to Gerald’s room and saw his treasures of various kinds and sat in a broad window-seat that overlooked the Sound. And at about three a maid announced the arrival of Harry Merrow, and they arose with sighs and returned to the terrace.
Harry Merrow didn’t look to be sixteen by a full year. He was small of build and slim of body, with a somewhat thin face that lacked color. He had nice eyes, which were the saving of an otherwise rather featureless face. He jumped out of a chair as the other boys emerged from the house and came to meet them.
“It’s all right,” he announced merrily. “I’ve insured my life for its full value, Gerald, and now where’s the boat?”
“I guess you didn’t have to pay a very heavy premium,” Gerald laughed. “Come inside and let’s get some sweaters. It may be cold on the water, even if it isn’t here.”
The dogs accompanied them down to the pier, barking excitedly, but there Gerald sent them sternly back to the house. The launch, which rocked gently at the side of the float, won loud praise from Harry.
“Say, Gerald, she’s a beauty! When did you get her? This summer? How fast can she go? My wordy, look at all the brass on her! Glad I don’t have to keep her polished.”
_The Dart_ was eighteen feet over all, with a six foot beam. She had a cruising cabin with two bunks and a tiny galley. Her hull was of white cedar painted light gray, with a gold line, while the inboard finish was mahogany. She was a handsome little craft, and even Kendall, whose knowledge of boats was limited, knew that she was a launch to be proud of. The boys sprang aboard and looked her all over from stem to stern. Harry had to stretch out on a bunk before he was satisfied, and insisted on having the small stove lighted so he could see just how it worked. Finally, returning to the cockpit, Gerald started the engine, Harry, under his directions, cast off the moorings, and _The Dart_ headed out to sea.
CHAPTER V
LOST IN THE FOG
Southward lay Plum Island, seven miles distant, and beyond it the main shore of Long Island was hazily visible. To the southeast, in clear weather, one could see Montauk Point, but to-day it was hidden by a fog bank. There were numerous sailing craft in sight, and an excursion steamer, well loaded with passengers, passed down the Sound a half mile away, an occasional blare of music from her band reaching them on the breeze. There was very little sea to-day and _The Dart_ sped along on an almost even keel. And how she did go! Fourteen miles, said Gerald, but it seemed to Kendall that it must be more than that. Gerald, from where he sat at the wheel in the cockpit, could look along the roof of the cabin and had a clear view of the course. Everything for the control of the launch was within reach, spark, throttle, clutches and a strident electric whistle.
“It’s just like an automobile, isn’t it?” said Harry with a sigh of envious admiration.
“It’s better,” laughed Gerald. “There aren’t any tires to blow out!”
Kendall perched himself in the stern where he could watch and enjoy the rush of the green water. Harry stretched himself along the cabin roof. “Are you going all the way across?” he asked.
Gerald shook his head. “No, I’m going to turn in a few minutes and run up toward Fishers Island. There’s fog over there and I don’t want to get caught in it. We’re three or four miles out now, I guess.”
When, presently, _The Dart_ turned her head eastward the breeze was less apparent. For a moment the sun broke through and the waters of the Sound took on new shades of paler green as they broke past the stern. But the clouds soon closed again. Harry, lying against the low handrail at the edge of the cabin roof, showed an inclination toward slumber. Gerald and Kendall chatted of a hundred things while the launch shot her way steadily and swiftly along. Fishers Island grew larger and nearer. A four-masted schooner lazily dipped by and a long, low torpedo destroyer, her battleship-gray hull scarcely distinguishable from the sullen water, steamed toward the mouth of the Thames River, probably on her way to the Navy Yard above New London. Suddenly a slight exclamation from Gerald brought Kendall’s attention back from the wicked-looking craft. Gerald was gazing southward in surprise. All vestige of Long Island was gone and a bank of gray fog was advancing across the Sound.
“I don’t like that,” muttered Gerald, and _The Dart_ circled rapidly and shot away toward home. The sudden turn disturbed Harry’s dreams and he looked down at the others, blinking inquiringly.
“What was that? Who shoved me? I say, Gerald, look at the fog out there, will you? Hadn’t we better beat it?”
“We’re beating it now,” answered Gerald grimly, advancing the throttle lever a little. The steady whirr of the propeller increased and there was a louder sound from the engine below. “Take the wheel a minute, Kendall, while I douse some oil. Hold her just as she is.”
Kendall scrambled over and gripped the rim of the wheel, while Gerald stepped into the cabin and poked around with a long-nosed oil-can. _The Dart_ was headed straight back for Wissining, but there was a good five miles ahead of her and the fog-bank was rolling in fast. Kendall viewed it apprehensively, without realizing just what it meant. It moved toward them steadily, inexorably. At first nearly a mile away, now it was less than half that distance. While he looked a sloop, beating toward Orient Point, grew suddenly faint to view, then disappeared utterly from sight. Gerald came back and took the wheel.
“We’ll be in it in another five minutes,” he said. “Hustle down, Harry, and dig the fog-horn out of that after locker. That’s it. Know how to work it? Just turn the handle around as though you were churning ice cream or grinding coffee.”
Harry obeyed and a most dismal bellow was emitted from the box. “Isn’t it sweet?” laughed Harry. “Want me to do it again, Gerald?”
“Not yet. Put it up on the roof and when the fog hits us give her a turn every half minute or so.”
“How far from home are we?” asked Gerald, looking down the shore.
“Oh, three miles or so. She’s making a good sixteen miles now, but I’ll have to bring her down to four or five in a minute or two. Here she comes, fellows!”
There was a faint, damp puff of wind in their faces. Then it passed over them and gradually the shore line was blotted from sight. Around them fell a gray blanket of mist. Twenty feet away in any direction the eye lost itself in the fog. _The Dart_ slowed down and the triumphant whirr of the screw died away to a timid thudding. The engine clicked feebly and the rods at the sides of the cylinders moved up and down as though grown suddenly weary.
“Harry, get busy with your horn,” directed Gerald. “Kendall, you crawl along to the bow and keep your eyes peeled. If you see anything, even a log of wood, yell back to me. We’ll be home in half an hour or so now, but I don’t want to run down a Fall River steamer or anything like that. It’s awfully bad for your paint!”
At intervals Harry turned the crank of the patent fog-horn and a lugubrious wail arose to lose itself in the impenetrable mist. Between times, from various directions, far and near, came similar sounds. Save for these warnings the silence was deep. What breeze there had been was scarcely perceptible, although the bank of fog was not stationary, but moved constantly across them toward the mainland. Once or twice its grayness was tinged with amber as, for a moment only, the sun came through the clouds above. Kendall, seated at the forward end of the cabin roof, strained his eyes into the blank wall ahead. Ten minutes passed. From somewhere off the bow came the faint shriek of a locomotive.
“Can’t be far out now,” observed Gerald. “Can you see anything, Kendall?”
“Not a thing, but――I think I hear something.”
“So do I. Get busy with that horn, Harry!” And Gerald, seizing the whistle pull, sent a series of frantic blasts into the air that so surprised Kendall that he almost fell overboard. Then Harry worked the horn again, and after that they listened intently. From somewhere ahead came the loud beat of an engine. Then a hoarse shriek broke the silence.
“She’s a steamer,” muttered Gerald, “and a big one, I guess.” Again he sent the short, sharp peals of the whistle into the air. Now they could hear the beat of the propeller on the approaching steamer. Again her fog-horn tore the silence asunder.
“She’s right on us!” cried Harry, grinding frantically at the crank. Gerald, standing at the wheel, peering forward, worked desperately at the whistle pull and jammed a lever over. _The Dart_ lost headway, slowed, stopped. The loud throb of the steamer’s screw seemed all about them. Uncertainly, Gerald started _The Dart_ forward again, turning her nose to starboard. Then, as another hoarse bellow came to them, he stopped the launch as suddenly and pulled the lever to reverse. The launch began backing away, circling slowly, to an accompaniment of hysterical shrieks of the whistle and agonized groans of the fog-horn.
“Come back here, Kendall!” called Gerald, and Kendall scurried for the cockpit. There was a sudden _swash_ as of a wave running up a beach, and then――――
“Hold on hard, fellows!” shouted Gerald, twirling the wheel.
To the right, off the port bow of the launch, a hulking shadow took shape, a shadow that loomed high above the water and broadened instantly into the black bow of a steamer. Somewhere up there a voice shouted and was drowned in the roar of the whistle. For a long moment the three boys cowering in the cockpit of the launch, frozen into silence, neither spoke nor moved. Then Gerald seized a cushion from a seat and thrust it at Kendall.
“Hold tight to that and jump,” he cried. “Quick.”
CHAPTER VI
THE RESCUE
Kendall, clutching the cork-filled cushion, hesitated, but another glance at the towering black shadow almost against them decided him. Harry was already in the water. Gerald, poised on the combing, cried to him again, and so, holding the cushion to his breast, Kendall leaped. He felt the water close over him, heard its surge in his ears. Then, fighting for breath, choked by the water he had swallowed, he found himself afloat, buoyed up by the cushion. Instinctively he worked his legs as he had seen swimmers do, striving to win out of the path of the steamer. A voice called near at hand.
“Gerald! Kendall!”
Kendall tried to answer, but seemingly had no voice, and only succeeded in choking and coughing. But Gerald, from somewhere in the fog, replied:
“Over here, Harry. Can you keep afloat? Where’s Kendall?”
This time Kendall managed to answer.
“I’m here. I’m all right. Did she hit us?”
“I don’t know. Find Kendall, Harry. He’s got a cushion that will keep you up, too. Call again, Kendall.”
Then from a distance away, muffled by the fog, came a hail:
“Launch ahoy! Are you all right?”
“We’re in the water,” called Gerald. “Can’t see our launch.”
“What?” asked the voice, evidently through a megaphone.
Gerald repeated.
“Hold on then! We’re dropping a boat!”
The voice was fainter. Gerald swam out of the mist and made toward Kendall, calling to Harry. Harry replied and in a moment joined the others. “Take hold of the cushion,” Gerald panted. “It’ll hold you both up.”
“Take hold yourself,” said Harry, struggling for breath. “I’m all right. If I――didn’t have these shoes on――――”
“I think this will hold us all up,” said Kendall weakly. He eased away from the cushion.
“Careful,” said Gerald. “Keep one arm over it. That’s it. Lay hold of a corner, Harry, and rest a bit.”
“I will if you will,” said Harry stubbornly.
“All right.” Gerald took a grip on the cushion and Harry followed suit, and although it sank a little it sustained them.
“They’re going to pick us up,” said Gerald. “All right, Kendall?”
“All right,” replied Kendall. But his teeth were chattering and he felt a little faint.
“If I could get this old sweater off,” Harry was muttering when a hail came across the water.
“Which way?” called a voice.
“Over here,” Gerald shouted loudly. Then they heard the creak of oars in locks, and after a moment of suspense, during which Gerald shouted again, a boat took shape in the grayness and came toward them. It was manned by two sailors and a young man in uniform who stood in the bow.
“All right, kids,” he said cheerfully. “We’ll get you in. Pull around a bit to starboard, men. Now then, one at a time, boys. Give me a hand.”
The young officer had made his way to the stern of the small boat while talking and now leaned over toward the group in the water as the rowers backed the boat nearer.
“You first, Kendall,” Gerald directed. Kendall stretched forth an arm and the young officer seized his wrist and in a moment he was squirming across the gunwale. Once inside he subsided between two seats and closed his eyes dizzily. When he opened them again Gerald and Harry were out of the water and the officer was asking Gerald if he wanted to pick up the cushion.
“Never mind it, thanks,” answered Gerald. “I guess the launch is gone, anyway.”
“No, we passed it back there and I guess we can find it again all right. Give way, men.”
“Then you didn’t strike it?” asked Gerald in surprise.
“Just grazed it, I guess. The lookout saw you and we sheered off in time not to sink you. You fellows take my advice and keep off the water in weather like this.”
The steamer sent a blast of her whistle and the rowers altered their course a little.
“We were trying to get home when the fog closed in on us,” replied Gerald.
“I see. Well, what do you want us to do with you? Put you aboard your launch or take you with us? We can’t tow that boat of yours, of course, but she’ll be picked up sooner or later, I guess. We’re bound for New Haven.”
“There she is, sir,” announced one of the sailors as the launch appeared through the fog.
“Just put us aboard her, if you please,” said Gerald. “We’ll be all right, thank you. It was very kind of you to pick us up.”
The officer laughed. He was a fine-looking chap of twenty-one or two, bronzed and blue-eyed. “Well, we couldn’t do much less, I guess. Glad things didn’t turn out any worse, boys. Live around here, do you?”
“Wissining,” answered Harry. “We go to school there; Yardley Hall, you know.”
“What’s your boat, please?” asked Gerald.
“_Conomoit_, Captain Livingstone; Newport News.”
“And what line, sir?”
“Blue Cross Line. Say, you’re a bit particular, ain’t you, about who pulls you out of the water? Or are you going to sue for damages? Anything else you’d like to know?” And the officer’s blue eyes twinkled.
“I’d like to know your name, please,” replied Gerald, smiling.
“Oh, my name? My name’s Hallet, Second Officer.”
“Thank you,” answered Gerald. “We’re very much obliged to you.”
“You’re welcome. Say, that’s a fine looking little launch there. Glad we didn’t rip her up, boys. Over with you, please.”
_The Dart_, apparently unscathed, although later Gerald found a long smear of black paint along the side where the steamer had grazed, was rocking quietly enough in the little oily waves as the sailors paddled the rowboat alongside. Gerald had thrown the clutch out before he jumped overboard, but the engine was still running. One by one the boys climbed across to the wet, fog-drenched cockpit.
“Good luck,” called their rescuer. “Keep your whistle going. Give way, men.”
The small boat disappeared into the fog, the crew of _The Dart_ waving good-by. Then, “Harry, you and Kendall go down there and get your wet clothes off,” said Gerald. “You’ll find towels in the bottom of the right-hand locker. Rub yourself dry and put some blankets around you. I’ll stay here and keep the horn going until you get fixed up.”
“What’s the matter with you doing it?” asked Harry. “You’re as wet as I am.”
“You do as I say,” replied Gerald shortly. “I’m boss on this ship. Hurry up now!”
Kendall’s teeth chattered so as he pulled and tugged at his wet garments that Harry became alarmed and went to his assistance. But when they had rubbed their bodies into a glow with the coarse bath towels they felt rather better for their bath than worse. They took Gerald’s place on deck and he disappeared to follow the same course of treatment. The discarded clothing was wrung out and hung about to dry if it would, and the three mariners, attired in gray blankets, presented a ludicrous appearance.
“I hope no one will see us,” laughed Harry as Gerald joined them in the cockpit. “We might be taken for the Flying Dutchman.”
“You look more like an Indian,” said Kendall. “What shall we do when we get ashore? We can’t go up to school in these blankets!”
“We’ll get ashore first,” replied Gerald, “and decide that afterwards. Have you heard the _Conomoit’s_ whistle lately?”
“Yes, a min――there it is now.”
Gerald stared into the fog, striving to locate exactly the direction of the steamer. “Which way did that come from?” he asked puzzledly.
“Over there,” said Harry, pointing to port.
“Over there,” said Kendall, pointing over the bow.
Then the three looked at each other in dawning dismay. “I thought it was more back there,” said Gerald doubtfully. “Let’s wait until we hear it again.” But when it came again it was further away and might have proceeded from almost any point at their right.
“That’s funny,” said Harry. “The last time it seemed more over there.”
“The launch has swung around, probably,” said Gerald. “Well, we’ll have to make a try, anyway. There’s no use staying here and drifting around the Sound.” He started the launch slowly ahead and turned her nose toward where, in his belief, the Connecticut shore lay some mile and a half away. Harry went back to the fog-horn and Kendall resumed his position as lookout in the bow. Now and then a whistle sounded at a distance in one direction or another, and once they heard the slow, steady beat of a propeller through the enveloping mist, but no craft came very near them, and _The Dart_, proceeding slowly and cautiously, with Harry winding lugubrious wails of warning from the patent fog-horn every half minute or so and Kendall straining his eyes into the gray wall ahead, slid through the water. In spite of the fact that it seemed quite probable that they might have to spend the night wandering around the Sound, the three boys were in high spirits, due, doubtless, to the reaction which usually follows a moment of peril, and chattered like magpies. It was unanimously agreed that it would be quite unnecessary to mention their misadventure to anyone.
“Toby would probably tell us to keep off the water,” said Harry. “And I guess your father would have something to say, too, Gerald.”
Gerald smiled. “He probably would. It’s all over and I’ve learned my lesson, which is keep on dry land when there’s a fog in sight. Kendall, were you scared?”
Kendall hesitated a moment. Then, “Yes,” he answered quite honestly. “I was. I wasn’t scared when I was in the water so much, but I certainly hated to take that jump!”
“I don’t blame you,” said Harry. “It’s no fun when you can’t swim. That’s something you’ll have to learn, Burtis.”
“I’m going to. I don’t believe it’ll be hard. I swam a little to-day.”
Harry laughed. “Of course you could with a cork cushion under your chin. You’ll find it different when there’s nothing to hold you up.”
“Don’t discourage him,” said Gerald, smiling. “We’ll take him down to the river some day, Harry, and put him through his stunts. See anything, Kendall?”
“Nothing,” replied the lookout at the bow. “There’s a sound somewhere, though.” They all listened. Then Harry gave a shout.
“It’s a train, Gerald. We must be getting near shore.”
“Yes. And I think I hear a bell. Do you?”
The others agreed that they did. “It’s a fog-bell on some ship,” said Gerald. “Let’s make for it and maybe they can tell us where we are.” He turned the bow of _The Dart_ a little more to starboard and they ran slowly on, the _ding-dong_ of the unseen bell growing momentarily louder.
Presently, “Why were you so anxious to find out the name of that steamer?” asked Harry.
“I thought that perhaps it was one of Dad’s boats,” replied Gerald.
“Oh! And was it?”
“Yes, a Blue Cross boat. I’m going to send that chap something. He was awfully decent to us.”
“Why not, seeing that he ran us down?” laughed Harry.
“I guess it was quite as much our fault as theirs. Yell if you see anything, Kendall.”
“Not a thing yet, Gerald. That bell’s getting pretty near, though.”
“That’s what I think,” responded Gerald, peering ahead. “I wonder where the dickens we are. It would be a joke on us if we found ourselves down near New London somewhere. Perhaps that bell’s on some lighthouse, fellows. Guess not, though; it doesn’t sound like it. Well, we’ll soon find out. Hello――――”
“What?” asked Harry, working another groan from the horn.
“I thought I saw something ahead there, but it’s gone now. Did you see anything, Kendall?”
“N-no, I don’t think so. Sometimes the fog sort of thickens and you think you see things like shadows.”
And then the bell, which had not sounded for a minute, clanged again and Gerald snatched at a lever, for it seemed almost at their bow. And as _The Dart_ slid through the water silently, with diminishing speed, something took shape in the fog ahead of them.
“Land!” exclaimed Harry.
“It’s a boat!” called Kendall. “Straight ahead of us, Gerald. You’d better stop.”
Gerald reversed the propeller, _The Dart_ churned the water at her stern and quivered as she began to back. By this time they could see the amidship section of a white vessel. Gerald raised his voice as the bell clanged its two notes once more.
“Ahoy there!”
“Ahoy!” answered a voice startlingly near.
“We’ve lost our bearings. How far is the shore?”
“About three hundred feet.”
“Oh! Well, where are we?”
“Pretty nigh off the mouth of the Wissining River. Where do you want to get to?”
“Wissining River! Then――then what boat’s that?”
“Steam yacht _Princess_, New York, at anchor.”
“Why, that――――” began Harry excitedly.
“S-sh!” cautioned Gerald. Then, “Thank you,” he called to the invisible informant. “We’re all right then.”
Very cautiously _The Dart_ circled away and made a detour of the yacht’s bow. “I didn’t want him to see us,” said Gerald with a chuckle. “He might have recognized the launch and told Dad some time. That was Purdy, the steward. Keep your eyes peeled, Kendall, and watch for the pier.”
A few minutes later _The Dart_ was snuggled up to the float, the lines were made fast and the three boys were stumbling up the gangplank with their blankets flapping around them and their wet clothing in their arms. The fog seemed less heavy on shore, but it was still so thick that they almost reached the house before they saw it. Gerald led the way around to a side entrance, from which, treading softly and giggling as they went, they climbed to Gerald’s room without being seen. One after another they took possession of the bath-tub and then scrambled for the dry clothing that Gerald provided. The garments didn’t fit very well, but they answered the purpose. When a maid arrived in response to Gerald’s ring she was sworn to silence and given the wet clothing.
“Put them where they’ll dry in a hurry,” said Gerald. “Has Father returned yet?”
“No, sir. He telephoned he wouldn’t be home until to-morrow morning.”
Gerald gave a sigh of relief as the maid closed the door. “Of course I’m sorry he’s not going to be here for supper,” he explained, “but it might have been difficult to explain the costumes you fellows are wearing. Harry, that coat looks as though you expected to grow a whole lot in the next half hour!”
“Well, it may be a bit large,” allowed Harry, “but it’s some coat, just the same. It’s a heap dressier than anything I own. What are we going to do while those things dry, Gerald?”
“Anything you like. We’ll go down and have a fire in the library and take it easy. You fellows will stay for supper, you know, and by the time I’ve killed this appetite of mine your clothes will be ready, I guess. Come on down.”
For an hour or more they sat in front of the fire and talked of a hundred things, their voices growing drowsier and drowsier as time passed. Then, just when Harry had begun to snore melodiously in his big armchair, supper was announced. In spite of all the dinner they had eaten their afternoon adventures had created fine new appetites, and all three did full justice to the supper. By eight o’clock the clothes were pronounced ready to wear again, and Harry and Kendall changed back to their own garments. Half an hour later the three trudged back to school by way of the village, Gerald having decided, since his father was not to be at home that evening, to return with the others. They parted from Harry at Whitson, after he had been again sworn to secrecy, and, rather tired and very sleepy, crawled the two flights of stairs to Number 28 Clarke. As Kendall lighted the light Gerald caught sight of a card on the table and picked it up.
“What the dickens is this?” he said. “‘Charles Phillip Cotton!’ Now who is he and why does he leave a visiting card?”
“He’s that chap who rooms with Wellington,” answered Kendall. “The fellow they chased into my room that night. Don’t you remember?”
“Oh, that duffer? Well, what does he want here?”
“I――I told him I’d be glad to have him look me up. He――he doesn’t know many fellows, and――――”
“Oh, I see.” Gerald crumpled up the card and tossed it into the waste basket. “All right, but he must be a silly chump to leave a calling card here. What does he think this is? Fifth Avenue?”
“If you’d rather he didn’t call――――” began Kendall.
“Not a bit of it. Maybe he’s better than he looks. You ask any fellows you want, Kendall. Personally, I don’t think I’d ever get very fond of Mr. Cotton, but if you like him it’s all right.”
“I don’t think I do――very much. Only he seemed kind of out of it, and I thought if he came in here some time he might meet some of the fellows. He’s out for the team, you know.”
“Not the football team?” asked Gerald, pausing in the middle of a yawn. Kendall nodded. Gerald grinned and completed his yawn. Then, “Well, he’s got plenty of cheek, hasn’t he? Fancy Mr. Cotton playing football! If I wasn’t so sleepy, Kendall, I’d laugh!”
“And if I wasn’t so sleepy,” murmured Kendall, “I’d have a go at my German.”
“Oh, hush,” said Gerald, crawling into bed with a long sigh of delight. “Don’t mention study to a man――who’s just been――rescued――watery grave――――”
Then he slept.
CHAPTER VII
GERALD MAPS A CAMPAIGN
Two afternoons later Kendall ran across Charles Cotton on the football field. Cotton was still struggling along with the awkward squad, and when Kendall, chasing a pigskin that had gone over his head, encountered him he was on his way to the bench.
“Sorry I wasn’t at home Sunday when you called,” said Kendall. “I hope you’ll try again.”
“Oh, it didn’t matter,” Cotton replied. “I didn’t have anything to do, and just thought I’d drop in for a minute.”
“Glad you did. Hope I’ll be there next time. How are you getting on?”
“Pretty fair.”
Kendall nodded and went his way, while Cotton, standing where he was, watched the other boy pick up the ball and hurl it cleverly back across the field. “Thinks he’s a smart guy,” he muttered with a curl of his lip. “Some day I’ll tell him what I think of him and his patronizing ways. Not till I get what I want out of him, though.”
The first game of the season, that with Greenburg High School, was only four days away, and this afternoon the scrimmage was longer than heretofore. For the first time the school was able to get an idea of how the First Team or Varsity would be made up. Cousins played left end that afternoon; Plant, left tackle; Fales, left guard; Girard, center; McKesson, right guard; Stark, right tackle; Adler, right end; Simms, quarter; Crandall, left half; Fayette, right half, and Marion, full-back. Of course, McKesson at guard was only temporary, for that was Captain Merriwell’s position; and a good many looked for a change at right end before the season was much older. But it was generally agreed that the First Team, as made up this afternoon, would, with one or two changes and barring accidents and unforeseen circumstances, play the season through. A Second Team, captained by Jim Hough, was also formed, and it was this Second Team that went up against the First for three twelve-minute periods and was badly beaten.
The first cut came on Wednesday and some twenty-odd fellows left the squad and swallowed their disappointment. The First Team retained thirty-six players for the present, and the Second Team twenty-three. Charles Cotton survived the weeding-out process and remained among the First Team substitutes. He was trying for end. Kendall was a little disappointed at finding himself second choice, but was comforted with the knowledge that he was certain of getting into a full share of the games since he was by far the best goal kicker in the squad. Holmes, who since the beginning of practice had been pushing Albert Simms hard for the quarter position, was more disappointed than Kendall. It was his last year, and he had been after the place ever since he had entered Yardley.
On Thursday the Second surprised themselves and everyone else by rushing the First Team off its feet in two periods and finally winning the practice game by 10 to 9, scoring two touchdowns and missing the goal in each case. The First Team got a touchdown, and Kendall, called on from the side-line, kicked the goal. Later, in the final period, having substituted Crandall, he added another three points by a goal from the field. But that wasn’t enough to beat the Second, and Hugh’s charges gamboled off highly pleased with themselves. There was no practice on Friday, although the players listened to a half-hour lecture in the gymnasium and afterward walked through a few simple plays.
Greenburg High School was not a formidable opponent, and the contest on Saturday was not much more than a glorified practice game. The school turned out to a fellow and filled the grand stand and nibbled peanuts and applauded every opportunity. Merriwell played through the first two periods and then gave way to McKesson. In the third period Yardley presented an almost entirely new line-up. Steger went in for Plant, Jackson for Fales, Best for Girard, Adler for Metz, Holmes for Simms, Kendall for Fayette, and Brinspool for Marion. Greenburg also seized the opportunity to try out her new material, and the latter part of the game was something of a comedy of errors. Yardley already had a score of 22 to 0, and Holmes received instructions to score by straight football only. That, however, proved easier to say than to do. Greenburg, even with a substitute back-field and a rather inexperienced line, was quick and heady and stopped the Yardley attack for short gains time after time. The third period ended without a score for either side.
Up on the grand stand, with a bag of peanuts between them, Gerald and Harry sat in the warm sunlight and viewed the contest with mild and critical interest.
“More changes,” murmured Harry as the fourth period was about to begin. “Best is coming off and Lin Johnson is going in. And there goes Folsom to take Holmes’s place. Say, wouldn’t you hate to be a football coach, Gerald?”
“Why?”
“Oh, think of having to lick a bunch like that into shape every year. Gee, I’d get so discouraged I’d want to quit sometimes!”
“But you mustn’t judge a team by the first game it plays,” answered Gerald. “Wait a month and then have a look.”
“I know. Somebody’s hurt. There goes Andy with the water pail. Isn’t it funny that as long as we’ve been playing football, Gerald, nobody’s ever thought to carry water on to the field in anything but a pail?”
“What would they carry it in? A tumbler?”
“No, but you can’t run with a pail of water without splashing most of it out. Look at that! Why not use a can or something with a lid? Who is that chap? Whoever he is, they’re taking him out. It’s Adler, isn’t it?”
“I don’t know him. Somebody’s given him a nasty looking eye, though.”
“I should say so! Yes, that’s Adler. He’s after Cousins’s place. Who’s the funny looking guy Payson’s sending in?”
“Oh, his name is Cotton. He doesn’t look much as though he could play end, does he?”
“Cotton?” Harry watched the substitute run on to the field. “Who is he?”
“I don’t know. I met him a week or so ago. He’s rooming with The Duke in Clarke. He’s new this Fall.”
“Funny,” muttered Harry, “but I seem to know that chap. Name sounds familiar, too. Cotton ... Cotton....”
“He’s a protégé of Kendall’s,” said Gerald. “Kendall has taken pity on him because he’s new and doesn’t know many fellows. He asked him around and he came last Sunday while we were away. Left his visiting card! What do you know about that for style?”
“Well, whoever he is, he can’t play end,” said Harry in disgust. “That Greenburg tackle is making him look like a canceled stamp――――”
Harry stopped so abruptly that Gerald turned to regard him curiously. “What’s the matter?” he asked.
Harry shook his head. He was staring across the field at Cotton with a frown of perplexity on his face. “Nothing,” he answered finally. “Only that fellow bothers me. I’m almost certain I’ve seen him somewhere before.”
“You’ve probably seen him in class or around school,” said Gerald. “That’s not quite impossible, you know.”
But Harry again shook his head. “If I’d seen him here before I’d remember it. Almost seems as if I’d met him. Where does he come from?”
“I don’t know. Hold on, though; seems to me The Duke said he came from Maryland.”
“Well, it wasn’t there, for I’ve never been in Maryland, except to go through it on a train. There goes Kendall with the ball. Good work, Burtis! That fellow is certainly a wonder at keeping his feet, Gerald!”
“And he’s pretty good at keeping his head, too,” replied Gerald with a smile.
“Funny idea you taking him in with you, though,” said Harry. “I like him first rate, but――――”
“But what?” asked Gerald.
“Oh, I don’t know. He seems hardly your style. That’s all.”
Gerald was silent a moment, watching the efforts of Yardley to carry the pigskin over the remaining four white lines intervening between it and the Greenburg goal. At last, “I’ll tell you, Harry,” he said, “I’ve always felt a sort of interest in Kendall ever since he butted into the room one night with the calm announcement to Dan that he’d like to join the football team. Towne put him up to it, you know.”
“I hear Towne isn’t coming back this year,” interpolated Harry.
“You can’t make me feel bad that way,” replied Gerald. “Well, I really meant to cultivate Kendall after that, but I got busy with the cross-country work and one thing and another and didn’t see much of him. Ned Tooker sort of took him up, though, and he seemed in pretty good hands. Then came that affair of the field goal and the school made a hero of him, or would have had he let them. Dan was interested in Kendall, too, and we got him over to the room once or twice, but he seemed afraid of coming when he wasn’t wanted, and we sort of gave him up after awhile.
“But Dan was a great believer in Kendall. Said he was the most ‘natural’ football player he had ever seen. And he also said”――Gerald lowered his voice――“that unless something happened, like Kendall getting hurt or leaving school, he would be captain before he got through here.”
Harry whistled softly but expressively.
“And you know Dan doesn’t make mistakes,” added Gerald, his fondness for his friend sounding in his voice.
“Looks as if he’d made one this time, though, doesn’t it?” asked Harry with a smile.
“Why?”
“Why? Well, look.” Harry nodded to where Kendall was racing up the field after a punt. “He’s only first sub now and next year is his last, isn’t it?”
“Yes. And that’s why we’ve got to get busy.”
“Eh? Who? Get busy doing what?”
“Proving that Dan wasn’t mistaken,” replied Gerald quietly. “If Kendall’s going to have the captaincy before he leaves here then next year’s his last chance. And that means that he’s got to win it this Fall.”
“Yes, but what did you mean when you said we’d got to get busy?”
“Just that,” answered Gerald with a smile. “Dan said Kendall would be captain. He expects him to be and wants him to be. Well, you know I’m pretty fond of old Dan, and so it’s up to me to see that things happen the way he wants them to.”
“But what the dickens can you do?” gasped Harry.
“I don’t quite know yet. But you can see what I have done. I’ve brought Kendall over to my room where he will meet a lot of fellows he ought to know. I want him to get close to the other fellows on the team, for one thing, for it’s those fellows who will elect the captain next month. Of course, it’s up to him to make good on the gridiron, and I think he will. He will if I can make him, anyway!”
“But――but, look here, Gerald――that――that’s rank politics!”
“No, it isn’t,” replied Gerald, shaking his head gently. “It’s politics, but it isn’t rank. It amounts to this, Harry: Kendall hasn’t the push to get himself elected captain if left to his own efforts. But there’s no reason why he shouldn’t be captain if he’s wanted――――”
“But he won’t be!”
“Not if he’s left to himself, but I intend to see that he is wanted. What I am conducting is a quiet campaign in the interests of Kendall Burtis. If he does his part you’ll find when it comes time to elect a captain for next year that they’ll be crying for Kendall!”
Harry viewed the other in rapt and admiring awe for a moment. Then, doubtfully, “But it doesn’t seem to me that he’s got it in him to be a good captain, Gerald. He――he isn’t a leader. I don’t say he can’t play football, for I think he can, although even that’s got to be proved a bit more, hasn’t it? But――well, it takes certain qualities to be a good captain.”
“What are they?”
“Eh? Oh, I don’t know. Pluck, of course, and brains and――and executive ability――――”
“Whatever that is,” laughed Gerald. “Well, you can’t say Kendall hasn’t pluck after the way he went overboard the other day without being able to swim a stroke. And as for brains, well, you think a minute.”
Harry nodded. “Yes, he’s got a good thinker, I guess.”
“And he can be wonderfully cool in an emergency,” continued Gerald.
“How do you know that?”
“By the way he stepped out on the field last year at the eleventh hour, grabbed off the grand stand in a pair of long trousers and hustled into a sweater, and stood there and kicked that goal with the whole Broadwood team trying to get through and kill him.”
“Y-yes, but――――”
“As for the other thing, what you call executive ability and what the rest of us, who haven’t your visiting acquaintance with fine English, call leadership, why, no, he hasn’t displayed any of that yet. He hasn’t had a chance, I guess. That’s something we’ll have to develop in him, or, at least, bring out. And he’s discouragingly shy. He will have to get over some of that. I don’t expect to make him popular in the general meaning of the word. That isn’t necessary. I don’t think you can call Charlie Merriwell a very popular chap.”
“He isn’t, and it remains to be seen what sort of a captain he will make. Simms ought to have had it.”
“Yes, Simms is popular, but he didn’t get the captaincy. I know of at least two fellows on the team who don’t really like Merriwell and who cast their votes for him because they knew he could play football and believed he’d make a good captain and because they respected him. See? Well, I mean to have Kendall prove that he can play football, show that he can lead, and win the respect of the fellows.”
“Gee, you’ve got a job! Sounds like a confidence game to me, too, Gerald. Hanged if you aren’t deliberately setting to work to――to――what’s that word?――to foist a captain on the school that they don’t even know!”
“But they will know him before the time comes,” replied Gerald confidently. “As for foisting”――he shrugged his shoulders――“it’s a fine old word, Harry, but it’s in wrong. Dan has chosen Kendall for next year’s captain; Dan knows; Kendall shall be captain. There it is in a nutshell!”
“You’ve certainly got plenty of cheek,” laughed Harry. “And you can bet I’ll be watching things with rapt attention, Gerald. I wish you luck, and Kendall, too, but I’m very much afraid you’ll be disappointed.”
“Perhaps. If we are we’ll stand it. There’s one thing you seem to miss, though. You talk about standing by and watching things. I have tried to convey the idea that you were in on the campaign, Harry.”
“Me! What the dickens can I do?”
“I don’t know yet. I think you can be useful, however. Perhaps I’ll make you head of the publicity department. Anyhow, I want your help. If I hadn’t I wouldn’t have told you all this. Because it’s got to be kept a secret from everyone, Harry, and especially Kendall.”
“What? Isn’t he to know?”
“Not a word of it!”
“Then I don’t see how you can expect him to――to do things, to get next to the fellows, to――――”
“Don’t you see that if we told him he’d back out right now? He hasn’t any more idea of getting the captaincy that he has of――of flying. And even if he agreed to it he’d be so self-conscious all the time that he’d make a horrible mess of it. No, you and I, and maybe another chap before we’re through, must keep this to ourselves. No one must even guess that we’re booming Kendall.”
“Sounds difficult,” Harry objected.
“Not very. There’s no reason why anyone should suspect that we are doing it, is there? Just now Kendall Burtis is about the last fellow anyone would think of as next year’s captain, isn’t he?”
“He certainly is,” agreed Harry, with conviction.
“Then why should anyone suspect that we’re pushing him for it? Diplomacy, Harry, diplomacy! Also secrecy!”
“Two orders of each,” said Harry. “Well, it sounds sort of crazy to me, but I’ll take a chance with you. And now, as the practice has been over for some five minutes and as we’re about the only fellows in sight, I’d like to move along. Even politicians have to eat, Gerald.”
CHAPTER VIII
COTTON MAKES A WAGER
I often wonder what Kendall’s sensations would have been had he learned of the plot to make him football captain. Disbelief, first of all, I fancy, and then wonder and alarm, and, finally, absolute stupefaction! But he never did learn, never so much as suspected what was going on. There was no reason why he should. Number 28 Clarke had long been a popular place of gathering, as Kendall, who had spent a year in the same corridor, well knew, and if it sometimes seemed to him that the room was rapidly degenerating into a club it never occurred to him that he had anything to do with it. He often wished that Gerald was less popular, for the gatherings in Number 28 often seriously interfered with his studying. All kinds of fellows came and went, and Kendall met them all sooner or later. Had he given the matter special thought he might have remarked on the fact that while the visitors represented about every interest in school they were all fellows worth knowing, fellows who had made good in one way or another, fellows whose words carried weight and who held influence. They were by no means all football chaps, nor even all athletic chaps. What Harry Merrow called “the High-Brow Element” was well represented. At one time or another in that month of October Gerald managed to attract to his room, and always in the most natural and casual way, about all the prominent fellows in Yardley. And Kendall thought it was very nice and enjoyed meeting the visitors, and, having no ax to grind, was diffidently polite and did more listening than talking. One evening after Merriwell and Simms, of the football team, and one or two others had been in and gone again Gerald took Kendall good-naturedly to task.
“Look here, Kendall,” he said, as they were getting ready for bed, “it’s a fine thing to be modest and all that, but, as the negro said, ‘it don’t get you nothin’!’ Why don’t you talk a little more?”
“Why, I――I guess I don’t think of anything to say, Gerald.”
“Rot! You talk more sense than most fellows when you do talk. I’m not suggesting that you jabber just to make a noise, but you’re overdoing the wise owl act, old man. Fellows may get it into their heads that you don’t approve of their statements and remarks, you see. Loosen up now and then, Kendall, loosen up!”
There was no more said, but the suggestion bore fruit. Kendall really made an effort on the next occasion. He wasn’t exactly chatty, but he hazarded an opinion now and then, and was both surprised and flattered to find that what he said was listened to with at least a show of interest. A chap who doesn’t talk often is pretty certain of a hearing when he does say anything, and as Kendall seldom spoke unless he had a remark of some value to offer he soon became certain of his audience. But all this took time, and in the meanwhile life was pretty busy with him and he had far more important affairs to think of than polite conversation in Number 28.
St. John’s School came and departed with trailing banners. Kendall played through two periods of that game and acquitted himself with honor. Jennings Academy proved a harder conundrum for the wearers of the Yardley blue. Jennings was a new opponent, having been given a place on the schedule that Fall for the first time, vice Carrel’s School. Jennings had Yardley pretty well scared for three periods, during which she ran up ten points to the Blue’s five. But in the final ten minutes Yardley buckled down and hammered her way almost the length of the field and sent Simms dodging and twisting across the line for another score. Luckily Fales barely managed to place the pigskin over the bars in the try-at-goal, and Yardley nosed out of the fray victor by one point. It was by this time well past the middle of October, and the remaining contests, with Porter Institute, Forest Hill, Nordham and Broadwood, were all of the major variety. Yardley was to go away from home for the Porter game, and this year it was Broadwood’s turn to entertain her rival, but the other two games were to be contested on the Yardley field. The Nordham game, for the reason that Nordham had trounced the Blue the preceding Fall, was looked forward to with unusual interest and a grim determination to wreak revenge. Not that Coach Payson meant to endanger his chances of defeating Broadwood the week afterward, or that any of the fellows wanted him to. However, if it was in any way possible to square accounts with Nordham without overexerting or injuring her players, Yardley meant to do it.
Football practice was no longer a romp, although Coach Payson never allowed the work to become so severe as to be distasteful. Many a day the players, First Team, Second Team and substitutes, trailed back up the hill to the gymnasium tired in every muscle and almost ready for mutiny. But always by the time they had had supper the bruises were forgotten, the muscles had stopped aching and their thoughts were set eagerly on the morrow’s practice. Of course, there were the usual minor injuries to contend with during the early season, the usual cases of overtraining, but no serious setback to the progress of the team occurred. That progress was slow and steady. More time than usual had been given this year to the fundamentals. It was not until after the Jennings game that tackling the dummy ceased to be a part of the afternoon programme. Even then the stuffed figure continued to swing and dance between the uprights and was occasionally visited by some player who had failed to grasp the knack of stopping the runner. The kickers, Kendall amongst them, held a half-hour of practice each day. Simms, the quarter, was a fairly proficient drop-kicker but had never showed much punting ability, and Payson meant he should learn the art. Graduation had deprived the team of one or two fair punters, and it was necessary to replace them. The material was not very promising at the beginning of the season, if we except Kendall. Kendall had proved himself a born kicker, but no coach wants to depend on one man for the whole season. So Fales and Crandall and Plant were added to the kicking staff, and by the middle of the season Fales had become a drop-kicker of some ability and Plant was getting off punts of forty and forty-five yards. But Kendall still held his superiority in both lines.
It was the Monday after the Jennings game that Kendall ceased being a substitute and took Fayette’s place at right half-back. The change surprised no one, not even Fayette, I think, for the school had all the Fall expected Kendall to make the team and had only wondered why Payson had not placed him before. A player with Kendall’s ability to punt, drop-kick or place-kick deserved a position on the team even if his football ability ended there. But Kendall’s didn’t, and he proved it time and again as the season wore on. He was a daring runner with the ball, a brilliant ground-gainer, who dodged and whirled through a broken field like a small cyclone, and was as difficult to seize and stop! He was so dependable, in fact, that when the First Team was in a tight place one was likely to hear murmurs along the side-lines of, “Why don’t they give it to Burtis?” But Kendall had his limitations, too, for at line-plunging he failed to gain as did either Marion or Crandall. He was lighter than those players and could not hit the line as hard. But if the opening was there Kendall could knife himself through as well as anyone, and once going he was harder to stop than the big Marion.
But if the Jennings contest decided favorably the fortunes of Kendall it also brought disaster to the ambitions of another of our acquaintances. Charles Cotton was dropped on that Monday. Others went with him in that final cut, and I doubt if any deserved banishment more than Cotton; and I’m sure none took it less gracefully. Cotton’s soul was filled with bitterness and wrath and his speech with condemnation.
Since that first unsuccessful visit to Number 28 Cotton had called many times. Gerald bore with him for the sake of Kendall, and Kendall, secretly weary to death of him and disliking him more and more each time, tried his best to blame himself for the distaste he felt for Cotton and, for fear he was doing that youth an injustice, was as nice as pie to him. Cotton always seemed to know when Captain Merriwell or other influential football fellows were in Number 28, and timed his visits by such knowledge. He “swiped” frankly and assiduously. He tried his hardest to make a hit with Merriwell, but only succeeded in making the captain loathe the sight of him. He was boastful, sarcastic and far from kind-hearted, but for a while he managed to make even Merriwell and, in a lesser degree, Gerald believe in his football prowess. He never hesitated to praise himself and his playing, and if one does that often enough and with sufficient enthusiasm one will impress the audience. Unfortunately, however, Cotton was unable to prove on the gridiron what he proclaimed in the dormitory, and as elocution doesn’t win football games Cotton’s career came to an end. He selected the evening of the day of his demise to call on Kendall. Perhaps he hoped to find Merriwell there and to make a plea for reinstatement. If so he was disappointed, for only Gerald and Kendall were in the room when he made his appearance.
“Well, I see you struck it, Burtis,” he announced after greetings were over. “Very glad, I’m sure. You can play all around Fayette.”
“Thanks,” murmured Kendall. “It was just because I am a bit handier at kicking than Fayette is that they gave me his place. He may have me out again before the big game.”
“Pshaw, don’t you worry! Payson loves you; Merriwell does, too; you’re popular. That makes a difference.”
“Just what do you mean by that?” asked Gerald, with a frown.
“Oh, you know well enough what I mean. A fellow hasn’t much show here to make anything unless he’s got plenty of friends. Look at me. I can play end as well as Fox can; better, for that matter; but I get pitched out and he stays in. Fox has been here two years and has a pull. I’m a new fellow and haven’t. That’s all.”
“If you can play better than Fox,” exclaimed Gerald impatiently, “why the dickens don’t you?”
“I have! All the Fall! Ask any one.”
“I don’t need to. I’ve watched practice myself almost every day until a week ago, and I’ll tell you frankly, Cotton, you never showed anything when I was looking!”
“I didn’t know you considered yourself an authority on football, Pennimore. I thought running was your specialty.”
“It is, but I’ve played some football, and I’ve seen a heap of it, and if you want my opinion I’ll tell you plainly that you play the game about as well as a piece of cheese! I don’t want to hurt your feelings, Cotton, but there’s no sense in making charges of favoritism here. In this school a fellow wins on his merits, and when you’ve been here longer you’ll realize it.”
“That’s your opinion,” growled Cotton. “You’ve always had everything you wanted, and you think you’ve earned it all. I’ll bet you that if you hadn’t known lots of the fellows who give out favors you’d be just where you were when you came.”
Kendall, who had been listening with an anxious countenance, attempted the rôle of peacemaker. “Well, you’ve got another year yet, Cotton. I wouldn’t feel badly about it. After all――――”
“Badly! Oh, I’m not breaking my heart,” replied Cotton, with a sneer. “It’s no great honor to win your place by a pull. Besides, that team will be beaten to a froth this year. Why, Broadwood will put it all over them! You wait and see!”
“You’re one of the sort who doesn’t want to play on the losing side, are you?” asked Gerald disdainfully. “Then I guess the team’s well off without you, Cotton.”
Cotton turned toward Gerald with an angry light in his pale eyes, but whatever the words were that sprang to his lips they never got past. His reply to the taunt was so gentle that both Gerald and Kendall stared in surprise. “I can take a licking as well as the next fellow,” said Cotton quietly. “But I do think it’s a shame to keep good players off the team and get beaten for it by Broadwood.”
“The team’s no worse than last year’s,” replied Gerald, regaining his good nature, “and that was good enough to lick old Broadwood, my friend.”
“Yes, by a goal from the field! Broadwood had you beaten before that.”
“What’s the odds? A field goal is a field goal, and we won. And we’ll do it again this year.”
“Bet you don’t!”
“Bet we do! That is, I might bet if betting was allowed,” continued Gerald with a chuckle.
“Well, what will you bet?” Cotton demanded eagerly.
“Not allowed,” responded Gerald. “Betting is barred.”
“You know you’d lose,” taunted the other.
Gerald’s eyes snapped. “Wait a bit, Mr. Cotton! Seems to me you are pretty certain, considering that the game is a month away.”
“I _am_ certain. Broadwood will make your team――――”
“Why mine? Why not _ours_?”
“Well, our team, then! Broadwood will make it look like――like a bunch of has-beens!”
“May I ask on what you base your judgment?” asked Gerald.
“On lots of things! On the players, and the coaching system――――”
“You don’t approve of our coaching system?”
“I certainly don’t! Payson works the fellows like a lot of dray horses, for one thing. And he’s old-fashioned, too. He sticks to old formations and plays that were worn out when Walter Camp was a baby. And look at the way he runs practice! Every fellow doing about what he likes! When does he begin to teach team-play, I’d like to know? In Saturday’s game there was about as much coördination”――Gerald blinked――“as there is in a pack of hens!”
“You mean a swarm of hens,” corrected Gerald gently. “Well, all that may be true. I wish, anyway, you’d mention it to Payson; he ought to be warned. But――_but_, my caustic and critical friend, we’ll send Broadwood home with its tail between its legs!”
“Maybe, but you don’t believe it hard enough to bet anything on it!”
“Merely because betting is not allowed and because I have been taught, besides, that it isn’t nice. Still――――” Gerald paused and considered. “Still, we might perhaps come to an agreement that would――er――add a personal interest to the outcome of the game. Let me see, Cotton. I’ll tell you!” Gerald viewed him in mild triumph. “If Broadwood wins I’ll invite you to spend Christmas recess with me in New York and give you a good time, all differences and animosities forgotten. On the other hand, if Broadwood is defeated you will――what the dickens _will_ you do?” Cotton opened his mouth to speak, but Gerald went on. “I have it! If Yardley wins you will stand on the steps of Oxford at five o’clock, give a cheer for Yardley, and proclaim a certain passage from a play of one William Shakespeare which I will indicate when the time comes.”
“That’s silly,” growled Cotton.
“Maybe; what’s the difference? Do you agree?”
“Yes. If Broadwood wins you’re to give me a week at your place in New York at Christmas――――”
“Ten days, if you like.”
“And if Broadwood loses I am to stand in front of Oxford Hall and cheer for Yardley and say something out of Shakespeare.”
“At five o’clock on the day of the game. And you’re to cheer and speak loud enough to be heard――er――at the farthest edge of the stupendous throng.”
“It’s a bargain,” agreed Cotton, with a grin. “I expect to have a pretty good time at recess. Much obliged. Now I’ll be going. I’m sort of sorry for you, though, Pennimore.”
“So shall I be if I lose,” laughed Gerald, as Cotton’s footsteps died away down the hall.
“What is it you want him to repeat?” asked Kendall.
“If he loses? Why, nothing but that famous passage from Mr. Shakespeare’s ‘Much Ado About Nothing.’ You remember the words of our old friend Dogberry? ‘Masters, remember that I am an ass; though it be not written down, yet forget not that I am an ass!’”
CHAPTER IX
HARRY SCENTS A MYSTERY
Life wasn’t all football, however. There was a lot of studying to attend to. Kendall was taking five courses, in preparation for that college he might never reach: Latin, Greek, mathematics, English and German. These made up a total of twenty-two hours a week. French, physics and chemistry he was leaving to his senior year. Luckily Kendall had the valuable gift of application, and application might also be called the royal road to results. Certainly an ounce of it is better than a pound of labor. Kendall was doing well in all his courses. He was fond of languages and learned easily, German, however, presenting a rather more difficult road than Greek or Latin. It was in mathematics that he had to work hardest. There are some who never manage to get themselves in sympathy with that science, and Kendall was one of these. Geometry was his bugbear that year. But, with the scholarship beckoning, he worked as hard as he knew how and usually secured creditable marks. Although he had only three hours of English, that course required a good deal of outside reading; just now they were digging at Milton, with Shakespeare looming ahead; and there were weekly compositions to be written, and, of course, one never quite got away from rhetoric. So Kendall had his hands full, and there were times when it seemed to him that it would be the part of wisdom to give up football and devote all his thought and time to digging for that scholarship. He didn’t, however, although he became panicky pretty often and assured himself discouragedly that he hadn’t the ghost of a show of winning even a Sidney. The panicky moments became more frequent as the Broadwood game drew near and as football made greater and greater demands on his time and thought. (But when the awards were made at the end of the term Kendall found that his fears had been groundless, for he won the Gordon Scholarship after all. And the pleasure he experienced in writing the news to his father more than made up for all the labor he had gone through.)
Studying in his room in the evening wasn’t a very great success, for, although the study hour was more or less strictly observed, the gatherings there continued, and it was difficult to get the mind settled on geometry or German, Latin or Greek when you had been listening for an hour to a discussion of the afternoon’s practice. Gerald, in his last year, had less to do than Kendall. He was taking but four courses, found them easy and so had to study but little. Kendall made use of the hours when he had no recitations to retire to the library in Oxford, and most of his studying was done there.
And, aside from football, there were other athletic interests demanding the attention of the school. The cross-country candidates were training five days a week. The golf team was preparing for the match with Broadwood. There was a Fall Handicap Tournament going on at the tennis courts. Even the baseball diamonds were occupied in fair weather. Boys who found no appeal in any of these pursuits took to the water, and as long as the Winter held off the river was dotted with canoes and skiffs, pair-oars and tubs. And yet, back of all this, one event loomed fatefully, growing each day larger and more portentous. That was the Big Game. All the athletic industries culminated with the Broadwood contest; the eighteenth of November marked the end of the Autumn season, and fellows had a way of making promises to themselves like this: “After the Broadwood game I’ll buckle down and get caught up with Latin”; or, “When the Broadwood game’s over I’ll have more time for study.” There was a subconscious spirit of nervous unrest pervading the school that grew as the days went by. After the eleven had journeyed away and returned with the scalp of Porter Institute the season settled into its final stride, and only two games intervened before the great test.
Yardley found Porter easy, and rolled up twenty-four points against her opponent, meanwhile denying Porter the consolation of a single score. The school declared that the team had found itself and that the rest was easy. More knowing ones, taking Porter’s weakness into consideration, found cause for doubts and criticisms. Twice Yardley had had the ball within Porter’s ten-yard line and had failed to score. There had been four bad fumbles. The team was still weak on offense. If Broadwood was to be beaten the Blue must improve vastly in the next three weeks. Thus the knowing ones. What Coach Payson thought no one knew.
In the meantime Gerald’s campaign went forward and bore results. Kendall made friends. Nowadays to walk from his room in Clarke to a recitation room in Oxford entailed more greetings than last year he would have been called on to accord in a month. He was really surprised to find how many fellows he knew well enough to stop and talk to, how many others demanded recognition, a word, a nod or a wave of the hand. Of course, among the younger boys he was a hero second only to Captain Merriwell himself, and the Preparatory Class youth who won a word from Kendall hurried off to tell the rest of the inhabitants of Merle of the talk he had had with Burtis, describing just how Kendall had looked and just what he had said, and, I’m afraid, enlarging a little on the incident. But that’s a weakness not confined to Preparatory Class boys. Had you asked some of Kendall’s fellow members of the team why they had taken a liking to him it is probable that they would each have said about the same thing――had they deigned to answer such a question at all! “Burtis?” they would have said. “Oh, I don’t know. He’s a good sort, don’t you think? Awfully quiet, of course, but has a lot of horse sense. Doesn’t butt in, either. Not much on the handsome, but sort of nice looking, too, somehow. Doesn’t have much to say about what he has done or is going to do or can do; just goes ahead and does it. Awfully square sort, I’d say. Besides, he certainly can play football!”
Gerald was pretty busy nowadays with the Cross-Country Team. He was captain of it and about the best performer. And so Kendall saw less of him than during the first of the term. But they usually spent the evenings together. Harry Merrow, also a member of the Cross-Country squad, was very likely to turn up at Number 28 after supper, and Kendall had grown to like him very much. There had been another jaunt on _The Dart_ since the day they had been lost in the fog, but the second voyage had been an affair without incident. Kendall had not yet become a proficient swimmer, principally because he had had but three lessons in the art. It was very hard to find time for anything just now. But he had managed thirty strokes on the last occasion and had swallowed only about three quarts of the Wissining River. Gerald and Harry had assured him that he had done excellently, and Kendall promised himself that when Spring came he would complete his education.
Another fairly frequent visitor to Number 28 was The Duke. The Duke had a way of knocking subduedly and entering on tiptoe, throwing fearful glances behind him and subsiding into a chair with a long sigh of relief.
“Ha!” he would whisper hoarsely. “Again I have thrown him off the track! Ah, the peace and quiet of this refuse!” (Perhaps it isn’t necessary to explain that in The Duke’s language “refuse” meant “refuge.”) He always pretended that Cotton was dogging his footsteps and that it was only by extraordinary stealth and cunning that he could escape his roommate. Once or twice it happened that Cotton followed him later, and on those occasions The Duke would throw up his hands, roll his eyes, and spend the rest of the time of his visit sitting silent and staring at Cotton as though hypnotized.
Cotton still insisted that he had been badly used by coach and captain and still predicted utter annihilation for the forces of Yardley. Gerald’s wager soon became known of and occasioned a lot of merriment. The Duke pretended to be――or perhaps really was――much concerned. “My word, Gerald, suppose we really did get licked! Have you paused to consider the fate you have――er――invited? Think of having Cotton on your hands every hour for a week or ten days! Breakfast, luncheon, dinner, Gerald! No time off for recitations! Oh, woe is you!”
Some of the other fellows, too, tried to alarm Gerald, declaring that they wouldn’t be a bit surprised if Broadwood won this year. Then they drew graphic word pictures of Gerald towing Charles Cotton around New York in Christmas recess. “Whatever you do, Gerald,” begged Bert Simms, “don’t take him to the Eden Musee! When you went out you’d get arrested for attempting to steal one of the wax figures!”
From all of which it will be seen that Mr. Cotton had unfortunately not ingratiated himself to any extent with the habitués of Number 28. One evening about midway between the Porter and Forest Hill games the room was pretty well filled. Merriwell and Simms and Girard, of the football element, were present, and George Kirk, captain of the golf team, had dropped in. These, with Gerald and Kendall, pretty well taxed the seating accommodations. Naturally the three subjects uppermost were football, cross-country running, and golf. Kirk had been bewailing the loss to the golf team of Ned Tooker, last year’s captain and star player, and had expressed himself as very doubtful of the outcome of the match to be played at Broadwood the following Saturday.
“Burtis, I thought you were going to play golf this year,” said Kirk.
“I am, I think, after the Broadwood game,” answered Kendall. “I like it first-rate, Kirk, but there isn’t much time for it now, you know.”
“I suppose not. Maybe you’ll get in shape to play with us in the Spring matches, though. It’s the hardest thing to get fellows to take an interest in golf here!”
“Everyone wants to play football in the Fall and baseball in Spring,” said Gerald. “You can’t get them to think of anything else, barring track sports. We’ve had a dickens of a time this year getting enough fellows together to make up the Cross-Country Team.”
“I thought you had lots of candidates,” said Charles Merriwell, a good-looking, dark-haired fellow of nineteen. “Anyhow, you’re going to win, aren’t you?”
“Oh, I suppose we’ll win all right enough, but if we do it will be because Broadwood’s weak this year. Our team doesn’t begin to compare with last season’s.”
“That’s what they all say,” scoffed big Girard, the center. “You hear that every year. Nothing ever compares with what we had last year. It’s rot!”
“Not always,” replied Bert Simms. “Our team isn’t as good as last year’s, and you know it, Pete.”
“What’s the matter with it?”
“Too light, for one thing. Broadwood’s got the heaviest team she ever put on the field. Bet you she’ll outweigh us four pounds to a man.”
“Oh, piffle! Look at O’Brien, their center; he’s a mite!”
“Well, he’s the only mite they’ve got, Pete. As for the back-field, they’re tons heavier than we are.”
“Then we’ll make up for it by getting the jump on ’em,” said Girard. “Weight isn’t everything.”
“Nice of _you_ to say so,” murmured Simms, causing chuckles of amusement from the others. Girard reached out with a big foot and, hooking it around a leg of Simms’ chair, brought that youth to the floor.
“Bert’s right, though,” declared Merriwell, when order had been restored, “and we’ll find when Payson shows his new plays that we’re in for a kicking game, with most of our gains on wide runs. You’ll be busy that day, Burtis.”
At that moment there was a rap at the door and The Duke entered, hands in pockets, whistling, his eyes roaming the ceiling, elaborately careless. He had an old felt hat on the back of his head, his coat was tightly buttoned and the collar was turned up, and a false mustache, fiercely red, hovered uncertainly under his nose. A burst of laughter greeted him. Once inside the room, however, his demeanor changed. Turning swiftly, he threw himself against the door and, as it crashed shut, quickly turned the key and leaned there breathing heavily, his eyes darting about with a haunted and terrified glare.
“What is it?” asked Merriwell. “Sherlock Holmes?”
“Old Sleuth,” suggested Gerald. “How did you cut your lip, Duke?”
Without replying The Duke leaned down and pressed an ear against the keyhole. Then, apparently satisfied, he unlocked the door and dramatically removed hat and mustache.
“Aha!” he exclaimed hoarsely; “foiled again!”
“Bet you he will be along inside five minutes,” laughed Gerald. “Sit on the bed, Duke, and try to look like a pillow. Maybe he won’t recognize you.”
The Duke followed the first part of the suggestion, but refused to disguise himself as a pillow, even when Simms suggested that that shouldn’t be a difficult stunt for anyone as feather-brained as The Duke.
“Don’t trifle with me,” hissed The Duke. “I’m a der-esperate man!”
“Where’d you get the red mustache?” asked Girard. “Let’s see it.”
“Bought in the village,” replied The Duke as he tossed it over. “It makes a perfect disguise, doesn’t it? I’m going to wear it to history recitation to-morrow so Collins won’t know me and won’t ask for my digest, which I have forgotten to prepare.”
“I stump you to,” said Simms. “If you will――――” But the rest was lost in the laughter caused by Girard’s appearance with the mustache on. After that they all had to try it, and just as it finally got around to Kendall there was another knock on the door.
“Ha!” muttered The Duke. “’Tis he! I am discovered! But I shall sell my life dearly!”
There was a moment of silence as the door swung slowly open, and then, as Cotton walked in with fine dignity, a howl of laughter went up. Only The Duke remained grave. Holding a pillow in front of him, he gazed fiercely over the top of it, muttering and hissing. Cotton paused in surprise. Simms was rolling on the bed in convulsions and Girard was sprawled back in his chair, holding his sides. Cotton viewed the scene at first with bewilderment and then with distaste. A flush crept into his cheeks as he closed the door behind him.
“Hello,” he said stiffly, “what’s the joke, you fellows?”
Kendall was the first to recover. “Oh, just some of Wellington’s nonsense,” he replied hastily. “Sit down, Cotton.”
“Y-yes,” gurgled Gerald, “s-sit down somewhere if you can find room. Sit on the bed there next to The Duke.”
The Duke lowered the pillow, his gaze fixed on Cotton with fearful intensity. Then, as the latter passed around the table to reach the bed, The Duke seized the false mustache from Kendall, clapped it to his face and confronted Cotton superbly.
“Aha, James Mortimer!” he drawled, stroking one end of the brilliant mustache. “So we meet again, do we? What have you done with the che-ild?”
Cotton, who had suspected himself to be in some way the subject of the laughter that had greeted him, was restored to equanimity. He joined in the laughter that followed and made himself comfortable on the bed.
“Where’d you get that thing?” he asked. “Let’s see how I’d look in it, Duke.”
“Heaven forfend!” replied The Duke vehemently as he thrust it into his pocket. “It wouldn’t become you, Charles, it really wouldn’t.”
Cotton smiled in the manner of one humoring a child or harmless lunatic and turned to Merriwell. “How’s the team getting on?” he asked.
“Fair, thanks,” replied the captain without enthusiasm.
“Going to win on Saturday?”
“Hope to.”
“You’ll have to brace up your line, then. I was reading to-day that Forest Hill has a wonderful attack this year.”
“What sort of an attack?” asked The Duke interestedly. “Not mumps, I hope.”
“She’s got most of her last year’s team, hasn’t she?” asked Kendall hurriedly.
“Blessed if I know,” answered Merriwell. “I guess Payson isn’t much worried about it, though. I do hope we’ll trim Nordham, though, fellows.”
“Oh, we’ll run away with her this year,” asserted Girard.
There was another knock on the door.
“Well, we’re some popular to-night,” said Gerald. “Come in!”
It was Harry Merrow. “Hello, everybody,” he greeted. “What is this? A mass meeting?” Just then his gaze fell on Cotton and his eyes narrowed suddenly, and for some time after he had perched himself beside Gerald on the latter’s bed he continued to observe Cotton curiously across the room. The conversation went on for a minute or two. Then Harry whispered to Gerald, and the latter broke in with:
“Cotton, I believe you haven’t met Merrow. He’s in your class, by the way. Sorry; I thought you knew each other.”
Harry reached over Girard’s head and shook hands with Cotton.
“Glad to know you,” he said. “We’ve met before, though, haven’t we?”
“I don’t think so,” replied Cotton. “I’ve only been here this Fall.”
“I mean before that,” said Harry. “Your face seems very familiar.”
“How about his manner?” asked The Duke innocently. Cotton flushed as he took his seat again.
“That’s an old joke,” he said contemptuously.
“How dear to my heart are the jokes of my childhood,” chanted The Duke. “When fond recollection presents them to view!”
Harry, looking polite and incredulous, sat down again, but every now and then he shot a puzzled glance at Cotton. The latter, however, appeared to have forgotten Harry’s existence after the introduction and steadily kept his eyes away from that youth. Soon after, Merriwell and Girard took their departure, followed later by Kirk and Simms. Cotton stayed on until at last The Duke, giving Gerald a look of despair, said good night. Cotton left with him, and as soon as the door was shut Harry broke out:
“I’d give a thousand dollars to know where I’ve seen that fellow!” he declared.
“That’s a lot of money,” yawned Gerald.
“Not if you say it quick. But honest, fellows, that chap bothers me. I know I’ve met him before and talked with him, but I can’t imagine where it could have been. You remember, Gerald, that day at practice I told you he looked familiar? Well, I was right. There’s――there’s some mystery about Cotton.”
“Oh, he probably looks like someone else,” said Gerald soothingly. “Although, to be strictly truthful, Harry, I never saw anyone who looked just like him!”
“He knew to-night that I recognized him,” mused Harry, “and he wouldn’t look at me once. Well!” He moved toward the door. “I mean to find out. Good night, fellows!”
CHAPTER X
THE SPY
However, Harry did not at once borrow The Duke’s red mustache and go sleuthing. As curious as he was about Cotton, he was much too busy these days to play detective, for, although he was pretty certain of winning the cross-country race from Broadwood, Gerald wasn’t taking any chances, and the way he and Andy Ryan kept the team on the go was a caution.
The race was to be held, as usual, on the morning of the day of the football game between the rivals, and over a course which might be called neutral, lying as it did practically halfway between the two schools. Broadwood Academy was situated some four miles from Yardley on the other side of Greenburg and so far inland that at Yardley they spoke of it humorously as a “freshwater college.” Broadwood was slightly smaller than Yardley in point of enrollment, but for all of that was an ideal rival, since she fought hard in every competition and obligingly went down in defeat oftener than she triumphed. There was no student now in Yardley who could recall a Broadwood victory on the gridiron, although there had been some heart-breaking struggles and alarmingly close scores. In baseball Broadwood was not so obliging, although since John Payson’s advent at Yardley she had experienced more defeats than victories. The rivalry between the two preparatory institutions, both good ones, was healthy. Yardley fellows simulated a contempt for the wearers of the Green that they really didn’t feel, and Broadwood pretended similar sentiments toward the Blue. In reality, however, each school entertained a deep-seated respect for the other. While Yardley graduates were likely to go up to Yale to complete their education, Broadwood traditions favored Princeton.
But while Broadwood usually excelled at hockey, garnered a full share of the track and field honors, proved herself as good as her rival at baseball, and accepted defeat on the gridiron only after the gamest battles, she was weak at cross-country running and had been beaten each of the few times that she had met Yardley. Gerald, who would have liked to complete his hill-and-dale career and celebrate his year as captain with a hard-fought victory, lamented Broadwood’s weakness this year.
“I wish we might give them a handicap,” he confided to Harry that Saturday morning as they went back to the gymnasium after a two-mile jaunt. It was the day of the Forest Hill game, and partly because it seemed fair to let the cross-country runners witness the afternoon contest and partly because it was advisable to accustom the team to morning work, since the race was to be run in the forenoon, to-day’s work had started at ten-thirty. Gerald seemed as fresh as when he had started out, and save for the disks of red which had not yet faded from his cheeks, one would never have suspected that he had led nine others over approximately two miles of the hardest sort of going. Harry Merrow, however, showed the pace. He had managed to finish fourth and was rather proud of himself, although when Gerald had clapped him on the back at the finish and congratulated him he had only smiled depreciatingly.
“We might give them a quarter-mile start,” proposed Harry, with a laugh, in response to Gerald’s remark. “But I don’t see why you’re so anxious to get beaten, Gerald.”
“I’m not, but I’d like to have the race a really close one. As it is, we’re just as likely as not to finish the first four men ahead of them. I’m pretty certain we will if you run as well as you did to-day.”
“I ought to do three or four minutes better on the eighteenth,” said Harry. “How far behind you was I to-day?”
“About six minutes. And I did as well within three minutes as I ever did,” said Gerald.
Harry thought that over for a minute as they climbed the footpath that affords a short cut to the gymnasium from the village road, and before he had succeeded in figuring out what their relative positions would probably be in the race Gerald introduced a change of subject.
“How do you think the campaign is going, Harry?” he asked.
“Campaign? Oh, you mean Kendall’s. Why, pretty well, I think. But I hear that there’s a good deal of talk of making Crandall captain. He’s pretty popular, you know. And a good player, too.”
“That so? I hadn’t heard it. Well, Howard’s a fine chap, and if our candidate loses he ought to make a good captain. Have you heard talk of any other fellows for captain?”
“No, I guess not. Fales would take it if he could get it. So would two or three others. Pete Girard, for one.”
“He’d be a wonder,” laughed Gerald. “No, I guess it will be up to either Howard Crandall or Kendall. You haven’t heard Kendall’s name mentioned, have you?”
“For the captaincy? No, but I don’t hear much of the talk. But Kendall has certainly made good so far, hasn’t he? I mean with the fellows. They all seem to like him. If he’d get busy and pull off some brilliant stunt this afternoon or next week, or win the Broadwood game with a field-goal, I guess he could have the captaincy, eh?”
“I think so. Unfortunately, we can’t advise him to get off any gallery plays. He wouldn’t if we did. Besides, a fellow can’t make opportunities. All he can do is to grab them when they come. I hope, though, that Kendall will put up a good game to-day. It’s time the fellows began to consider him as a possibility. If they don’t we’ll have to drop a hint pretty soon.”
“You’re a regular old politician,” laughed Harry.
“Say diplomat,” said Gerald. “It sounds more respectable.”
“Schemer is more like it,” responded Harry, as they entered the gymnasium. “Something tells me that a shower is going to feel mighty good.”
Half an hour later, when they rounded the front of Oxford, the Golf Team was just setting off for Broadwood, after an early dinner, in a three-seated carriage. George Kirk waved to them and then spoke to the driver, and the carriage stopped. Kirk leaned out and called to Gerald.
“Say, Gerald, do something for me? Find The Duke; he’s at the telephone, I think, and tell him never mind about New York; I’ll call up this evening.”
“Never mind about New York, you’ll call up this evening. All right, George; I’ll tell him. Good luck! Go to it and eat ’em alive!”
Kirk nodded and waved, and the carriage went on down the drive.
“I suppose,” mused Harry as he followed Gerald back to Oxford, “that Kirk is just as much excited about his old golf match as you and I will be about the race two weeks from now. Funny, isn’t it?”
“Funny?” repeated Gerald as he ran up the steps. “Why?”
“Oh, funny to think it matters who wins a golf match!”
“It’s evident you’re not a golfer,” laughed Gerald. “I’ll bet that if George’s outfit gets licked this afternoon he will be like a bear with a sore head! There’s The Duke in the booth.”
The long-distance booth was halfway down the main corridor of Oxford, and, although it was rather dim, they could descry a figure behind the glass. It was dinner hour and Oxford was otherwise quite deserted. Gerald walked down the corridor, Harry sauntering behind.
“Hi, Duke! Kirk says never mind about New York!” shouted Gerald.
The Duke looked very angry and red-faced behind the window as Gerald drew near, and was gesticulating wildly. He was also saying things, but what they were Gerald was still too far away to hear.
“The Duke’s having a fit, Harry,” he announced interestedly. “Come and watch him.”
“... Door ... lemme out....”
“What’s he saying?” asked Harry grinning as he realized The Duke’s dilemma. Gerald shook his head.
“Can’t understand him. Can you? Seems quite worked up about something, though.”
“Lemme out! Don’t be a fool! Can’t you see this blamed door’s stuck?” And The Duke mouthed and grimaced behind the glass.
Gerald and Harry, maintaining a respectful distance, viewed him gravely.
“Can’t get his number, I suppose,” said Harry sympathetically.
“Maybe he’s got hold of a live wire somehow. Anything wrong, Duke?”
“You open this door, Gerald! I’m suffocating in here!”
“He wants you to open the door,” explained Harry brightly. “But do you think you’d better? He looks a bit dangerous, doesn’t he?”
“Y-yes,” responded Gerald doubtfully. “Perhaps we’d better have help in case he gets――――”
But there was such a rattling of the door, such an assault on the side of the booth that Gerald’s words were drowned. “I do hope he’s hung up the receiver so that the operator can’t hear him,” said Harry. “It might give the school a bad name.”
Gerald, at last taking pity on the prisoner, turned the door knob and The Duke stumbled out, angry of countenance and incoherent of speech.
“Wish you’d get yourself locked up in that blamed thing,” he sputtered, “and see how you like it! It’s ninety-eight in there, and you can’t breathe! Why didn’t you open that door before? Wanted to be smart, I suppose?”
“What’s the matter with the door?” asked Harry.
“It’s crazy, I guess. You can’t open it from inside to save your life. It ought to be fixed.”
“Oh, I guess you didn’t go at it right,” said Harry soothingly. “Let me try it.”
So Harry stepped into the booth and closed the door behind him, The Duke’s expression of wrath changing slowly to a wicked grin. Harry turned the knob inside and pushed. The door remained firm. Then he tried again and with no better success. The Duke was thoroughly enjoying himself now, applauding and encouraging. Gerald observed smilingly. At last Harry gave it up.
“Can’t be did,” he announced from within in a smothered voice. “Open her up, Gerald.”
Gerald looked inquiringly at The Duke and The Duke gazed questioningly at Gerald. “Strange,” observed the latter, “that you can’t hear what he says. Perhaps if he put his mouth to the keyhole――――”
“There isn’t any,” said The Duke.
“That’s so.” Gerald shook his head sadly. “I don’t see what he can do then.”
Harry threatened them behind the glass. “You open that door, you silly chumps! I want my dinner.”
“Did you get that?” asked The Duke.
Gerald shook his head. “Only a faint murmur. These sound-proof booths are wonderful, aren’t they?”
“Marvelous! Who’d ever suppose that a person could be as near as that and not be heard?”
Harry was now doing his best to kick a hole through the wooden paneling, his expression an interesting mixture of amusement and annoyance.
“Listen!” said The Duke. “I think I hear a tapping!”
“He is probably trying to signal to us, the way they do in the mines, you know, when they’re imprisoned.”
“I know. They let food down to them through pipes somehow, don’t they? I wonder if we could get his dinner to him anyway? We might telephone it, perhaps.”
“If you don’t open this door,” announced Harry desperately, “I’ll break the glass and you fellows will have to pay for it. Fair warning!”
“I hear a little better now,” said The Duke. “Perhaps he wants to come out, Gerald!”
“I wonder! How stupid of us! I’ll bet that’s it, Duke. Suppose we open the door and see.”
“Silly asses!” grunted Harry as he emerged, warm and disgusted.
“It makes an awful difference who the joke is on, doesn’t it, dearie?” asked The Duke sweetly.
“Somebody ought to tell someone about that,” said Harry, “and have it fixed.”
“And someone had better get into commons before someone loses someone’s dinner,” replied The Duke. “You fellows been in?”
“No, we were on the way when Kirk asked us to find you and give you a message.”
“He was in a rush and asked me to call up his folks in New York and say he’d telephone this evening. Couldn’t get the house, though. Central said they didn’t answer. I wonder if he knew about that door!”
“I don’t think so,” laughed Gerald as they ran up the steps of Whitson. “He didn’t look to be in a very――very flippant mood.”
After dinner the three boys went up to Gerald’s room and loafed until it was time to go to the game. They reached the field early, but found the grand stand already nearly filled. Forest Hill School had sent over nearly a half hundred rooters and these had taken possession of one end of the stand and were already tuning up for the afternoon’s vocal performance. A good many folks had come over from Greenburg and, of course, Yardley had turned out to a man. The crowds was still streaming on to the field when the Forest Hill team trotted past the corner of the stand and crossed the gridiron to throw off blankets along the further side-line. Gerald, Harry and The Duke were idling by the ropes on the Yardley side when “Perky” Davis, the football manager, stopped. Davis was a thin, light-haired youth with an habitual expression of care and concern. Just now he seemed more worried than ever, and the creases on his forehead were many and deep.
“Look who’s here, Gerald,” he said in a low voice.
Gerald’s gaze followed the manager’s toward the grand stand.
“Who, Perky?” he asked.
“Gibson, of Broadwood; the fellow who substitutes at guard. See him? The big chap with the light gray overcoat and the derby hat, sitting next to the Forest Hill crowd. He’s here to spy on us. Probably thinks we won’t recognize him. I wish he’d choke. We were going to use four or five new plays to-day, too. I’ll have to tell Payson.”
“I remember him,” said The Duke. “He’s got his nerve, hasn’t he? I think he sees us looking at him.”
“Let him,” muttered Davis. “It’s just like Broadwood to send spies over here.”
“Seen any more?” asked Gerald.
Davis shook his head, searching the throng suspiciously. “Not yet. Maybe he’s the only one. They wouldn’t send more than one, I guess. He isn’t much of a player, but they say he’s a mighty clever chap at sizing up things.”
“Well, I suppose they have a right to do it if they want to,” said Gerald. “And we can’t very well put him out, can we?”
“No, but he won’t learn much, because when I tell Payson he will shut down on any new stuff. It’s too bad, though, because we need to try out those plays.”
At that moment the Yardley team came on and the Yardley cheerers started into action. “We’d better find some seats or there won’t be any,” suggested Harry.
“Wait a minute,” said Gerald. Davis had hurried away and was speaking to the coach. When he turned back Gerald hailed him.
“What did Payson say, Perky?”
“Asked me if I was certain, and I said I was. Then he nodded and called Charlie and Bert. I guess they’re making over the programme.”
At a little distance Payson, Merriwell and Simms were in consultation. The rest of the team had taken the field and the footballs were already flying through the air.
“Someone ought to kick him out,” said Harry, fixing the Broadwood youth with hostile regard.
“We might kidnap him,” suggested The Duke dreamily. “Anyone got a gunny-sack handy? We could tie him up in it and drop him into the Bosphorus――I mean the Wissining.”
“What we should have done,” said Davis, “is to have sent someone to watch Broadwood play Nordham to-day. If it’s fair for them it’s fair for us.”
“It’s extremely low-bridge,” replied The Duke disapprovingly. “Quite reprehensible, whatever that may be. Also, fellows, if anything should happen to him he’d have only himself to thank.”
“What’s going to happen to him?” asked Gerald, eyeing The Duke with suspicion. The Duke only smiled carelessly.
“Why ask me? I don’t say anything is going to happen. I only say if anything should happen――――”
“Oh,” murmured Davis disappointedly, “I thought perhaps you had a plan to get rid of him.”
The Duke viewed him reprovingly. “Perky, if you want anyone put out of the way you must do it yourself. I refuse to stain my hands with the life blood of even a Broadwood fellow. I’m that particular!”
“Well, I hope he enjoys himself,” muttered the manager. “He won’t learn much, anyway.” He nodded and hurried off, drawing his note-book and pencil into sight. The Duke quietly beckoned Gerald and Harry toward the entrance. Outside the three stood for several minutes with their heads together. When they ambled carelessly back their countenances were as innocent of guile as the faces of three babies. Only there was a suspicious twinkle in The Duke’s eyes.
The grand stand being filled, the three found a space on the grass near the rope and watched the two teams take their positions. It was a clear, nippy Fall day, with a brisk northwest breeze quartering across the field and streamers of white clouds scudding by overhead. Forest Hill had won the toss and chosen the north goal. The whistle blew and Fales kicked off.
CHAPTER XI
BROADWOOD IS FOILED
Yardley’s first chance to score came within three minutes of the kick-off, after Forest Hill’s quarter had fumbled on the second play and Stark had fallen on the ball near the twenty-yard line. But although the Blue worked down to within twelve yards of the goal, the attack weakened and the pigskin changed hands. Forest Hill kicked on first down and the play went to the middle of the field. And about the middle of the field, with small advantage to either side, it stayed for the rest of the twelve-minute period, with neither team being able to gain much ground.
A minute or two before the whistle sounded The Duke carelessly arose, yawned, stretched and wandered away down the line. Now and then he paused to look back at the play or to speak to an acquaintance, but presently, having left the grand stand far behind, he doubled back and hurried around between the stand and the tennis courts, reappearing at the entrance just as the two teams, donning blankets, paused for the two-minute intermission. The Duke pushed his way through the throng with an important air and faced the sloping tiers.
“Mr. Gibson wanted at the telephone!” announced The Duke loudly. “Is Mr. Gibson here?”
Without appearing to look in his direction The Duke saw the Broadwood fellow start in his seat, look indecisively down and settle back again.
“Mr. Gibson wanted at the ’phone!” he continued, passing along in front of the stand. “Mr. Gibson wanted at the ’phone immediately. Is Mr. Gibson here?”
The fellows took up the cry. “Is Mr. Gibson here? O you Mr. Gibson! Show yourself, Gib! There he goes! Here he is! Who wants Gibson? I don’t! O you Mr. Gibson!”
At the first aisle a tall, broad-shouldered youth in a derby hat was picking his way down as unostentatiously as possible. The Duke turned back and met him as he reached the ground.
“Is your name Gibson?” he asked. The other nodded. “You’re wanted at the ’phone. I’ll show you where it is.”
Followed by the youth in the derby, The Duke pushed his way through the crowd about the entrance. Back of him a whistle shrilled and the teams lined up once more.
“Do you know who wants me?” asked Gibson as they started up the path.
“I couldn’t say,” replied The Duke. “Nice day for the game, isn’t it? You’re a Forest Hill fellow, aren’t you?”
“Hm,” responded the other noncommittally. “Where is this telephone?”
“Oxford,” replied The Duke, leading the way around the front of the gymnasium and thereby lengthening the journey. “It’s right around the corner here.” A burst of cheering came from the field below them and Gibson looked regretfully over his shoulder.
“Those are your fellows cheering,” said The Duke. “I shouldn’t wonder if you beat us to-day. How many of you came along?”
“Er――quite a number; forty or fifty, I guess. This the building?”
“Next,” said The Duke, conducting the visitor past Merle. “Here we are.” They went up the steps of Oxford and The Duke led the way down the dim and silent corridor to the telephone booth. Politely he opened the door and, Mr. Gibson once inside, politely and very carefully he closed it. The click of the lock was simultaneous with the lifting of the receiver from the hook.
“Hello! Hello! This is Mr. Gibson.... What say?... Gibson!...”
[Illustration: “‘Hello! Hello! This is Mr. Gibson.... What say?’”]
The Duke, stealing softly down the corridor, heard no more. At the doorway he cast a fleeting glance back at the booth. Then he slipped from sight. Halfway back to the field he paused and did an erratic breakdown, with much snapping of fingers and many loud chuckles. Then, pulling his features back into their former innocence of expression, he went on. He reached the gridiron at an exciting moment and had seated himself between Gerald and Harry before his fellow-conspirators realized his return. Then,
“All right?” whispered Gerald.
The Duke, supremely interested in the game, closed one eye slowly and portentously. Gerald grinned. Harry hugged a foot ecstatically. “Like a sheep to the slaughter,” whispered The Duke gloatingly. “Oh, _what_ do you suppose he’s saying to Central?”
“How long will he stay there?” asked Harry.
“Until he gets out. There’s no one in the Office on Saturday afternoons. Anyway, they couldn’t hear him――unless he broke a window and yelled like sixty. Did you tell Perky?”
“Yes, and they’ve worked a couple of the new plays already.”
“Tried to, you mean,” corrected Harry gloomily. “They didn’t gain much.”
“Anyone scored?” asked The Duke.
“Not yet. No one’s had a chance. Kendall tried a placement from the forty-five yards and missed by a yard. Too bad. He had the wind with him, too.”
“Pete made a rotten pass, though,” said Gerald. “Simms had to scramble for it. It’s a wonder they got the kick off at all. There’s the whistle. Half’s over.”
As the players seized their blankets and trotted off the field Davis hurried up to the trio beside the rope.
“What did you do with him?” he asked in a hoarse whisper.
“Do with him? With who?” asked The Duke innocently.
“Gibson.”
“Perky, you jump to conclusions,” returned The Duke calmly. “If anything has been done to Mr. Gibson you shouldn’t lay it to me. I have nothing but the kindest, sweetest sentiments toward the gentleman.”
“Oh, chop it! Is he――is he _safe_?”
“Oh, I do hope so!” replied The Duke. “Don’t tell me that anything has happened to him, Perky!”
“Quit kidding,” begged Davis. “I want to know. Can we go ahead with the new plays, Duke? Will he be back?”
“Blessed if I know. I know he isn’t here now, but there’s no telling how long he’s going to stay away. Tell you what, Perky. I’ll stand at the entrance and keep watch. If I see him coming back I’ll pass the word to you and you can tell Payson.”
“All right. I’ll tell Payson that. Don’t miss him, though.”
“Nary a miss, Perky!”
The Duke, followed by Gerald and Harry, went to take up a position at the corner of the grand stand and Davis scurried off to the gymnasium in the wake of the team. The Duke, hands in pockets, wandered outside and viewed the path. But save for the players trotting up the steps of the gymnasium and Davis speeding to overtake them no one was in sight.
“Look here,” said Gerald, who had been studying the situation in his mind, “what that fellow will do is to tell Central that he’s locked up in the booth. Then Central will telephone to Merle or Clarke and they’ll let him out. We didn’t think of that.”
The Duke frowned. “That’s so,” he acknowledged. “And it’s dollars to doughnuts Central will get Collins on the ’phone and then there will be the dickens to pay!”
“Thunder!” breathed Harry.
“Just so,” agreed The Duke. “Well, I’m in for it now, so there’s no use worrying and getting a wrinkle. After all, it was a patriotic deed and my conscience is at peace. I done it for the good of my fellow critters.”
“I don’t see how Collins will know it was you,” said Harry hopefully. The Duke viewed him with a pitying eye.
“Merely because I paraded up and down in front of the grand stand yelling my little heart out for Mr. Gibson, Harry. Collins may be dense, but I think he will be able to follow that clue; what?”
“He will get you,” acknowledged Gerald sadly. “The question is――――”
“The question is what will I get! Well, never mind. What’s done is did. And here comes the team again and Mr. Gibson is not in sight. What I should have done after getting him in there was cut the line!” He looked longingly up the hill. “Maybe it isn’t too late yet,” he added musingly.
“Then you _would_ get it!” said Gerald. “I guess you’ve done enough, Duke.”
“Sure; too much is plenty! Anyway, if Mr. Gibson doesn’t get back before the game’s over I’ll be satisfied.”
The Yardley team came piling through the entrance, Merriwell in the lead, Coach Payson and Davis following. As he passed Davis lifted his eyebrows questioningly and The Duke returned a reassuring shake of the head. Davis whispered to the coach and the latter smiled demurely as he passed on to the field.
“You fellows,” said The Duke presently, “had better get away from here. If they see you sticking around with me they’re bound to think you had a hand in it.”
“So we did,” replied Gerald.
“So you didn’t! What did you do, I’d like to know. Move on now, move on! Don’t block the sidewalk!”
“Oh, who cares?” asked Harry. “It’s only a joke, anyway. They can’t do anything to any of us.”
“Besides, Gibson won’t make a fuss,” said Gerald. “He won’t want to confess that he came over to spy on the team.”
“Well, suit yourselves,” replied The Duke with a shrug of his shoulders. “If you must have trouble, have it. They’re kicking off.”
The three saw the game, or as much of it as they could, from their post, at the same time keeping a sharp watch for the reappearance of Mr. Gibson. The third period proved conclusively that Yardley still had much to learn about offense. Her attack in the middle of the field was fairly strong and at times showed flashes of brilliancy, but once past the thirty-yard line her play slowed up and all the “punch” vanished. Forest Hill, although light, was remarkably quick and decidedly “scrappy.” She had many defeats to atone for and when the third period ended, like the previous ones, without a score against her it was evident that she had come to the conclusion that here was the opportunity to obtain vengeance. She started the fourth quarter with a dash and vim that startled the spectators and staggered the Blue team. Her back-field, working together beautifully, fooled Yardley time and again and made short and steady gains until the ball was well down in the Blue’s territory and Simms was imploring his men to “stop them!” It was only the Blue’s secondary defense that stood between Forest Hill and a score, for the Yardley line was too slow and played too high and the Forest Hill backs sliced through it almost at will. Payson made two changes when the ball was down on the Blue’s thirty-two yards, putting in Jackson for Fales and Jensen for Stark. And later, just before the end of the game, Best relieved Girard at center. The rest of the team, however, played the contest through, and that without gaining much credit. Yardley captured the ball on her twenty-five-yard line, worked a double pass for a slight advance and then punted out of danger.
But Forest Hill came back desperately. Her quarter led a glorious attack and what had been on the point of happening for two periods finally happened. An on-side kick was recovered by a Forest Hill back, Metz and Crandall each missed a tackle and the runner after tearing off nearly twenty yards, was finally downed by Simms on the Blue’s seventeen yards. The ball was well over toward the side of the field when the two teams lined up again and a skin-tackle play gained two yards and brought the pigskin nearer the center of the field. The full-back trotted to the twenty-five-yard line and, although the angle was severe, it seemed that a drop-kick might put the ball over. But Forest Hill, smarting under many defeats, disdained a victory so simply bought. The ball went back to the outstretched arms, but the full-back didn’t kick. Instead he dashed off across the field, with the two teams trailing after him, found a chance to turn in, eluded one player after another while the Forest Hill supporters on the stand shrieked their triumph, and, finally, dragging two Yardley players after him, staggered and crawled across the goal line!
That touchdown spelled defeat for Yardley and even the staunchest supporter of the Blue realized it. Even though Forest Hill failed at the goal the lead was too big to overcome in the two or three minutes that remained. But Yardley went desperately to work again. It was agreed afterward that had she played during the first of the game as she played then there would have been a different tale to tell. Using every play he knew, Simms, when a lucky fumble gave Yardley the ball after the kick-off, hurled his backs and tackles against the weakening Forest Hill line. From their own forty yards to the enemy’s thirty-five they went, gaining their distance at times by only an inch or two, but always gaining it. And there, with the timekeeper proclaiming forty seconds left, Kendall was sent back to the forty-five-yard line, while the stand held its breath, took the ball breast-high from Best, dropped it lightly to earth and sent it spinning as straight as an arrow over the very center of the cross-bar!
Let us be thankful for small favors. Five to three was better than five to naught, and Yardley cheered philosophically and rose up in the grand stand and called Kendall blessed. And at the entrance The Duke, casting one final glance up the hill, derived what satisfaction he might from a plot well carried out.
Forest Hill, all smiles, hurried off with the captured football, and Yardley, rather glum and very tuckered, wrapped her blankets about her and trotted back to the gymnasium under the stigma of her first defeat.
Gerald and Harry were inclined to dejection, although Kendall’s brilliant goal from the field was a mitigating ray in the surrounding gloom of failure. But The Duke, with the fine bravado of one on the way to the guillotine, refused to be downcast.
“Who cares?” he demanded. “What’s Forest Hill to us? She showed us we weren’t as good as we thought we were and that ought to help. It’s Broadwood’s scalp we want, fellows, and to-day’s little setback will do us a lot of good. Besides,” he chuckled, “our friend Gibson is returning empty-handed. Let us rejoice and make merry, O my comrades, for to-morrow we die! At least, I do!”
CHAPTER XII
COTTON MEETS A FRIEND
Mr. William Gibson, of Broadwood Academy, really deserves no place in this narrative, yet I hardly see how we can keep him out inasmuch as his trip to Yardley that Saturday afternoon proved to be the first link in a chain of events involving many of the principal actors in our little drama. For if Gibson had not come to Yardley he would not have been ignominiously imprisoned in the telephone booth, and if he had not been shut up in the booth he would not have run across Charles Cotton, and――but I am getting ahead of the story.
The practice of detailing players or coaches to attend games played by a rival school or college in order to gain information that may aid in defeating such rival is a questionable one, in spite of its prevalence, and I have no intention of defending it. At the same time I very much doubt if William Gibson――over at Broadwood they called him Billy――considered that he was doing anything out of the way. I am willing, even eager, to attribute the highest patriotic motives to Mr. Gibson, up to the time he met Charles Cotton. For what happened subsequently I offer no excuses. Even the most rabid patriotism will not explain it.
Gibson had purposely attired himself to look as little like a student as possible. That is, he had donned a derby hat instead of the usual cap and a rather dressy light overcoat, hoping perhaps to give the impression of being a young gentleman of mercantile pursuits, say a youthful but promising bank clerk or a budding broker. Unfortunately, Billy’s countenance and figure, once seen, were nearly unforgettable. The countenance was heavy and pugnacious and the figure broad-shouldered and massive, massive even for his eighteen years. He had never actually attained a first choice position on the Broadwood eleven, but he was a good player and an excellent substitute guard, and he had more than once opposed Yardley during his football career. He had taken pains to arrive early at the field and was in his seat before the teams came on the field, and it is probable that his presence would not have been discovered by the enemy had not Davis’s eyes gone roaming over the Forest Hill contingent in search of an acquaintance. Gibson saw that he was recognized; the hostile stares of the group below told him that; and he was disappointed. However, there was no help for it, and, as he was there, he might as well remain. Even if Yardley failed to show any new tricks it was still possible to get a line on her formations in attack and defense and get a general idea of her ability. When The Duke summoned him to the telephone Gibson had no suspicions. It was quite possible that the Broadwood coach had thought of some feature of Yardley’s playing that he wanted information on. He hesitated for a moment to show himself, thinking that perhaps his presence might be resented. Then, realizing that he had already been recognized and that to disregard the summons would look strange, he answered it. It was only when, cooped up in the telephone booth, he learned from the Greenburg operator that there was no record of any call for him that it began to dawn upon him that he had been made the victim of a hoax.
Very angrily he slammed up the receiver and pushed at the door. A minute or so later his anger had visibly increased. It was too dark in the booth to examine the latch with any hope of discovering the trouble. There was nothing for it but to raise his voice in a demand for release, which he did. Unfortunately, however, it is very doubtful if there was a living soul from one end of Oxford Hall to the other. Eventually, perhaps ten minutes after he had unsuspectingly entered the booth, the plan of breaking open the door occurred to him. He tried it. The telephone company, however, had caused that booth to be constructed of exceedingly strong materials, and finally Gibson, very warm and breathless, gave up the attempt. Next he considered breaking the glass. There were several panes and he could take his choice. But while he had not hesitated to try to force the lock or wreck a panel the idea of breaking glass struck him as peculiarly destructive and he paused to consider. And at about that time it occurred to him that a very simple way of escape confronted him. He snatched down the receiver and explained his predicament to a sympathetic Central.
“I will call up the Office,” said the operator.
But the Office was empty and no one answered her ring. So she tried Clarke Hall and was successful. The telephone in Clarke was in the study of Mr. Collins, the Assistant Principal. Ordinarily Mr. Collins would have been out at this hour of the afternoon, but it so happened that a slight cold had suggested to him the advisability of remaining indoors and taking a nap. The imperative ringing of the telephone bell put an end to the nap, and, some five minutes later, having discarded dressing-gown and slippers in favor of outer clothing and shoes, Mr. Collins, none too pleased with the necessity, strode down the corridor of Oxford and liberated a strange, perspiring youth from his cell. Gibson, failing in the dimness of the hall to recognize authority in the slight, medium-sized person before him, immediately gave vent to his wrath.
“Say, what kind of a fool thing is that?” he demanded. “I’ve been suffocating in there for twenty minutes!”
Mr. Collins viewed him gravely.
“Wonder you wouldn’t have that latch fixed! It would have served you right if I’d bust the glass out of it!”
“It pains me deeply to learn of your discomfort,” replied the Assistant Principal dryly. “Perhaps if you had telephoned to Central at once you’d have been released sooner. May I ask who you are and how you happen to have been using the booth?”
Gibson, having now discovered that he was talking to neither a student nor the janitor, changed his tune. “My name is Gibson. I――I came to see the football game. A fellow sung out that I was wanted on the telephone and showed me up here. When I asked the operator she said no one had called me. Then I tried to get out and couldn’t.”
“Hm,” said Mr. Collins. “We have reported the matter to the company and they have agreed to send up and fix that latch. As a matter of fact, I presumed that they had done so. I am very sorry, Gibson. I don’t understand, however, why the messenger should have deceived you. Some mistake, doubtless.”
“He――he did it on purpose,” blurted Gibson, still too angry to be discreet. Mr. Collins looked surprised. They had reached the steps and now the Assistant Principal viewed the boy thoughtfully.
“Why?” he asked.
“I――I don’t know,” muttered Gibson. “It doesn’t matter, though. I――I’ll be going. Thank you, sir.”
“One moment, please. You live in Greenburg?”
Gibson hesitated. Then, “No, sir, I――I’m at Broadwood. I just came over to see the game.”
“Really?” Mr. Collins raised his brows. “Your Broadwood team doesn’t play to-day, then?”
“Yes, sir, they play Nordham.”
“At home?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You, however, preferred to see this game, eh? I see. Now this boy who brought you up here, Gibson; what was he like?”
Gibson, rather uncomfortable under the other’s sarcastic gaze, thought a moment and at last gave a very excellent description of The Duke. Mr. Collins nodded again. Then he smiled. It was a fleeting smile, but Gibson saw it.
“He knew I’d get locked up in there,” he declared aggrievedly. “He closed the door after me himself!”
“I find no difficulty in crediting that, Gibson,” replied Mr. Collins gravely. “I think I know the young gentleman and I’ll have something to say to him. Good-day, Gibson. I regret exceedingly that you have missed seeing so much of the game. Perhaps, however, it is not yet entirely over.”
But whether it was or wasn’t Gibson had no idea of returning to the field. He remained on the steps a moment, watching Mr. Collins out of sight around the corner of the old stone building, and then, thrusting his hands into his pockets, set off with a frown down the drive. He had almost reached the entrance gate at the foot of The Prospect when he saw a boy walking rapidly toward him from the direction of the village. Gibson wasn’t at all interested in the other pedestrian and gave him no more than a thought. But when they drew abreast he glanced up casually. Recognition was mutual.
“Hello, Cotton, what the dickens are you doing here?”
“Hello, Gibson! What are _you_ doing here?”
“Me? Just came over to see the game. Say, you aren’t at school here, are you?”
Cotton nodded. “Yes, I entered this Fall. I don’t like it, though.”
Gibson grinned none too kindly. “You don’t like it anywhere very long, do you? I thought someone said you were at school somewhere down South.”
“I was last year. But I’d rather be up North.”
“Gee, did _they_ fire you, too?” laughed Gibson.
Cotton colored. “No,” he answered shortly, “I didn’t like it. So I didn’t go back.”
“They didn’t like you, you mean! How you getting on here?”
“All right,” replied Cotton, ignoring the statement in favor of the question. “It’s a punk school, though. Not half as good as Broadwood.”
“Wonder you didn’t behave yourself when you were with us, then,” said Gibson. “You’re a bit of a mutt, Cotton, I guess. Well, I must be getting on. How far is it to Greenburg?”
“Oh, twenty minutes, maybe. Is the game over?”
“No, judging by the sounds it isn’t. I’ve had enough of it, though. You’ve got a rotten team here this year, Cotton.”
“You bet we have!” assented the other eagerly. “That’s what I tell them. You’ll lick the stuffing out of them, Gibson. Are you on the team this year?”
“Me? Not exactly. I’m running Browne pretty hard, though. I may get on next week. Why aren’t you at the game?”
“I had to get a letter off on the three o’clock mail and the only way to do it was to take it to Greenburg. They only have two collections a day up here. It’s a rotten place. I wanted to see the game, too. That’s why I was hurrying back.”
“Well, don’t let me keep you.”
“Oh, that’s all right. They’ll get licked, anyway.”
Gibson, who had turned to go on, paused and observed Cotton attentively, speculatively. “You don’t seem to love your team, Cotton,” he suggested.
“Oh, they’re a great bunch of snobs,” replied Cotton bitterly. “If you haven’t got some sort of a drag you can’t get any show. It’s that way with everything here. Now, at Broadwood――――”
“Your admiration for your dear old alma mater is touching,” sneered Gibson. “I suppose you tried for the team and got chucked, eh?”
“I didn’t have any pull. They don’t care how well you play. If you don’t know the fellows――――”
“Hm,” said Gibson thoughtfully. “Well, say, if you aren’t crazy to see the end of the game, Cotton, why don’t you turn around and walk back to Greenburg with me? I’ll treat to a soda, if you like, and we’ll have a chin.”
“Sure! I don’t care about the game. It must be almost over now, anyway. But what were you doing over here, Gibson?” Cotton frowned his perplexity.
“Me? Oh, just watching.” Gibson winked slowly and meaningly.
“By Jove!” Cotton smiled delightedly. “That’s your game, eh? Did you get anything?”
“Think I’d tell you if I did?” laughed Gibson, taking the other boy’s arm.
“Oh, shucks!” said Cotton. “You can trust me, old man; you know that.”
“Well, come along and I’ll tell you about it.”
CHAPTER XIII
THE DUKE STARTS SOMETHING
The day after the Forest Hill defeat was warm and languid, more like a November day. Gerald had gone to Sound View the evening before, as was his custom when his father was at home, and Kendall, having attended church in the forenoon and eaten a dinner at the training table for which he had had little appetite, was at a loss how to spend his afternoon. There were fellows whom he might look up and who would doubtless be glad to see him, but somehow he didn’t feel very sociable. For one thing, he had been through forty-eight minutes of hard play the day before and felt lame and battered, although there were no scars to show. Perhaps, too, the weather induced a feeling of apathy; it was too warm. He wrote his Sunday letter, taking a good deal of time over it, and managing to fill six pages. But after that was sealed and addressed there seemed nothing left to do. Gerald had suggested that he might come up after dinner and take him to ride in the automobile, but evidently Gerald had changed his mind. The dormitory was quiet and probably pretty well deserted, for it was no sort of a day to stay indoors. Kendall finally reached that conclusion himself and, pulling a cap on to the back of his head, he sauntered along the hall and down the stairs and so out into the afternoon world, wincing now and then when his sore muscles protested and dimly oppressed with the emptiness of existence. Kendall’s condition of mind was, had he but known it, no uncommon one for the football player the day after a hard game and a defeat. One cares very little for bruises and weariness after a victory, but a defeat takes all the glory from them.
There was a handful of fellows on the steps as he came out and he spoke to them, but had no wish to join them. There were other groups in front of Whitson and Oxford, and several boys were lolling on the grass near the flag-pole on The Prospect. One or two had books, but it was a noticeable fact that none was reading. Even the effort of holding a book was too much on such a day. Kendall nodded now and then, refused an invitation to join the group on the grass and skirted Oxford with a dim idea of walking down to the river. But back of Merle he heard a hail and, turning, saw The Duke waving to him across the yard. The Duke was resplendent to-day. There was a suit of blue-gray flannel, a vividly pink shirt, dark blue socks, tan shoes and a green tie. And The Duke seemed in high feather. Kendall sat down on the step of Merle and waited for the gorgeous one to join him. He had not seen The Duke since shortly after the game the day before and now he wondered whether that youth had got into difficulties over the affair of Mr. Gibson. He certainly didn’t have the appearance of a fellow in trouble! One would have thought, seeing him coming along the path, hands in pockets, whistling cheerfully, that he hadn’t a care in the world.
“Greetings, O doughty warrior!” saluted The Duke.
“Hello,” replied Kendall apathetically. “Where’s the party?”
“Party? Oh, you refer to my chaste get-up.” The Duke viewed his apparel approvingly. “Some togs, what?” He seated himself beside Kendall. “There’s no party, Sir Knight. I have merely dressed myself according to my mood. My mood to-day is one of triumph and joy. Where’s Gerald?”
“Home,” replied Kendall moodily.
“He’s a lucky chap to have a home around the corner. Be it never so humble there’s no place like home. What’s the matter with you to-day? Got the dumps?”
“N-no.”
“Meaning ye-es? Perk up! Observe the cerulean sky and the waving tree tops, the bright sun and the――the――――”
“It’s a beast of a day.”
“_What?_ It’s a wonderful day! What do you want? Rain? Snow? Hail? Well, if the things I’ve mentioned don’t cheer you, look at my shirt! That ought to drive away any case of blues!”
“It looks sort of pink,” said Kendall, smiling with an effort.
“_Sort_ of pink! Sort of _pink_! Man alive, it’s the quintessence of pink! It’s the pinkest thing that ever happened. That’s why I bought it. Got it cheap, too. They’d had it in the store for years and years. No one would buy it. No one had the courage to. But pink suits me, you know. Goes well with my shell-tint complexion.”
“But why the green tie?”
“A happy conceit of mine own, O Youth of the Festive Toe! I am impersonating a carnation. The dash of green represents the leaves. Get me? Pretty thought, what?”
“Very. And the rest of the――the things? Blue socks――――”
“Contrast, dear boy, contrast! Also variety. Also gladness and joy and triumph. Come on!” The Duke jumped up gayly.
“Where?” asked Kendall with no enthusiasm.
“Where? Anywhere! Who knows? Let us start out in search of adventure. This is no day to mope and pine. I am consumed by a desire to start something!”
“You started something yesterday, didn’t you? How did you come out? Did Collins get after you?”
“Oh, that?” The Duke smiled carelessly and brushed an imaginary speck from his sleeve. “That is too trifling to speak of.”
“What did he say?”
“Say? What was there he could say? I had merely to explain the circumstances to him, Burtis. After all, he is reasonable――for a faculty. Or mayhap I spoke convincingly. In any case”――The Duke waved a hand magnificently――“we parted with sentiments of mutual respect and esteem. If you will join me in a stroll toward yon purling stream I will regale your ears with a brief narration of the event.”
“All right.” Kendall pulled himself up with a sigh and they moved on.
“We met by appointment,” continued The Duke gayly. “Collins made the appointment. In his study. He suggested eight o’clock as a time convenient to him and, as I am noted for my good nature, I agreed. Also, as I have ever held punctuality to be the soul of wit or the thief of time or the shortest way home or something――I forget the exact quotation――I was there on the stroke.”
“I’ll bet you were!” agreed Kendall grimly. The Duke smiled.
“On the very dot, O Wisdom Personified. And then――we talked. At first he did most of it. It seems”――The Duke interrupted the narrative to chuckle――“it seems that our friend Gibson had the brilliant thought to call up Central and tell his troubles. Central thereupon called up Collins. I could speak harshly to Central about that, but as it has all turned out satisfactorily I won’t. Well, Collins formed himself into a rescue party and trailed over to Oxford. Having liberated our prisoner they passed the time of day and in the course of the conversation Mr. Gibson, let us hope inadvertently, gave a description of my physical appearance and Collins, being a great friend of mine, recognized the portrait, or thought he did. Hence the appointment. Of course I don’t know just what those two said to each other, but I have a strong hunch that Collins wormed out of Mr. Gibson the fact that he was a Broadwood unfortunate and surmised the fact that he was, to put it courteously, over here to rubber at our splendid team of football heroes.”
“What time is it?” asked Kendall.
“Time? I don’t know,” replied The Duke, fumbling at his watch-fob. “Why? Got something on?”
“No, I was only thinking that if you didn’t get started pretty soon it would be supper time.”
“Oh!” The Duke laughed. “You have a dry wit, my friend, a dry wit and a ready. Well, to cut out the non-essentials and the rhetorical effects, Burtis, Collins asked me if I had enticed Mr. Gibson to the ’phone. Of course I ’lowed as how I had. Then he asked me why. ‘Because,’ quoth I, ‘he was over here to spy on the team and Payson wanted to try out some of the new plays for the Broadwood game.’ ‘But you told him that he was wanted at the telephone,’ says Collins. ‘Wasn’t that a lie, Wellington?’ ‘No, sir,’ I retorted, ‘not at all. We wanted him at the telephone so he wouldn’t see what was going on at the field.’ Whereupon Collins said ‘Um’ in two or three different tones, and looked kind of funny at me. Of course I was looking as nearly like an innocent little George Washington as I knew how. ‘But still, Wellington, hardly truthful, eh?’ he asked. I considered. ‘Perhaps not strictly, sir,’ I said, ‘but we had to do something, and what else was there?’ Well, I had him stumped there! He opened his mouth a couple of times, but he couldn’t answer. There _wasn’t_ anything else, was there? Of course not. Collins saw it, too, after a minute, but he wouldn’t say so. He hemmed a few hems and hawed a few haws and smiled in his funny dry way. And finally he said, ‘Wellington, if you applied some of your ingenuity to mastering your studies you’d be better off.’ I said, ‘Yes, sir.’ Then he frowned and waved his hand, you know, like that. ‘You may go,’ he said. And I thanked him and went. Only when I got to the door he stopped me. ‘Mind you,’ said he, ‘you’re not to think that I approve of what you did, Wellington, because I don’t. It smacks too much of deceit. It would have been better had you gone to a telephone and really called him up!’ ‘I never thought of that!’ I said. Then he grinned a little, and I grinned and came out!”
Kendall laughed. “The next time we’d better consult Collins, I guess! I suspect he was just as pleased as we were that Gibson got left.”
“Probably. Aside from being a member of faculty he’s fairly human. Anyhow, I got off easy. Hence my mood of triumph. Let’s go for a paddle.”
They had reached the boathouse. The porch and float were well sprinkled with fellows and the river as far as they could see was dotted with canoes and skiffs.
“I don’t know how to row,” Kendall demurred.
“Who wants to row? Can you paddle?”
“Less than I can row.”
“Well, you go as ballast then. I’ve got a canoe in here somewhere if it hasn’t fallen to pieces. Haven’t been in it since Spring. Come on.”
Kendall followed the other into the boathouse and helped him lift a battered green canvas canoe from the rack. When it was outside The Duke viewed it dubiously. “Looks sort of leaky, doesn’t it?” he asked. “Guess we’d better take a bailer along. Hi, Lin, got something I can bail out with?”
Lin Johnson picked up a tin can from the bottom of the canoe he was disembarking from and tossed it across. The Duke caught it deftly, dropped it in the bottom of the green canoe and pushed the latter into the water. In a minute they were afloat, Kendall facing The Duke from the bow and watching rather enviously the skill with which the latter managed a paddle from the blade of which a good two inches had been splintered. They went up the little river, meeting other craft and exchanging greetings. Once The Duke remarked laughingly:
“Funny how tickled everyone is to see me to-day. It pays to travel in good company.”
“How do you mean?” asked Kendall innocently.
“Why, don’t you see how cordial the fellows are? That’s because you’re here, O Mighty Warrior. If I were alone they’d just nod and say ‘’Lo, Duke!’ Now they nearly fall out of their canoes being polite!”
“Nonsense!” said Kendall, blushing a little. “Why, lots of those fellows we’ve passed hardly know me.”
“That’s only because you won’t let them. They’d all be tickled to death to be in my place. Why, my stock will go up a hundred per cent this afternoon!”
Kendall smiled doubtfully. “I guess they’d a good deal rather know you than me,” he murmured.
“Think so, my Modest Violet? You miss your guess, then. I wonder if you’re as innocent as you seem, Burtis.”
“Innocent?”
“Yes. You’re really a school hero, you know, but you don’t seem to be on to the fact. You could put on all sorts of lugs and the fellows would stand for it, but instead you hardly notice anyone and go around looking as humble as――as a worm! Of course I’m not saying it isn’t a clever scheme, because the less you seem to want to know fellows the more anxious they’ll be to have you. Get me? And being modest is a good game, too. Lots of fellows in your place would be swaggering all around the shop, patronizing us lesser mortals. We’d stand for it all right enough, but we’d resent it a bit, too, and if you ever came a cropper, fell down in the big game, you know, or something of that sort, how we’d jump on you! No, a fellow can have a swelled head and get by with it if he’s making good, but you don’t love him any more for it. Your way is much better, Burtis.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Kendall a trifle indignantly. “I’m not a hero and don’t pretend to be. I don’t want to be and I’m not trying to be!”
The Duke grinned. “Of course not. I understand. You’re not one of our star players on the football team and you don’t win games for us by the niftiest kicking that’s ever been seen in these parts. You seem to, but you don’t. Appearances are against you.”
“You’re an idiot,” grunted Kendall.
“Oh, certainly!”
“Besides, it’s silly to say I don’t want to know fellows. I do. There are lots of tip-top fellows I’d like awfully well to know, but I can’t butt in the way――the way――――”
“The way I do,” suggested The Duke helpfully.
“The way some fellows do.”
“I really believe you mean it!” marveled The Duke. “Why, you poor benighted heathen, don’t you realize that there’s hardly a fellow in school who wouldn’t be proud to paddle you up and down the river all the afternoon just for the glory of being seen with you?”
“No, I don’t,” replied Kendall shortly, “and neither do you. And I wish you’d stop kidding me, Duke.” Kendall was looking red and embarrassed, and The Duke, observing, took pity on him.
“All right,” he said soothingly. “You’re a mere worm after all, Burtis. No one loves you. And when a fellow falls into the river trying to be polite it’s just because he wants me to notice him. But will I? I will not! They can drown before I’ll give them a glance!”
“You’re an awful idiot,” said Kendall smilingly.
“You said that before and so there must be something in it,” was the cheerful response. “And now here is the island, and with your approval I suggest we get out and find a nice warm spot and lie on our backs and think great thoughts.”
So the canoe was pulled up on the little strip of beach at Flat Island and the boys threw themselves down on the bank in the sunlight. It was getting toward four o’clock and a slight chill was making itself felt. But in the lee of the trees it was still comfortably warm. The Duke put his hands under his head, cocked one foot over his knee and gazed up into the peaceful blue sky. Kendall followed his example and for the space of several minutes nothing was said. Finally, though, Kendall broke the silence.
“Did you――did you really mean any of that stuff you said awhile ago in the canoe, Duke?” he asked.
“What stuff?” asked the other drowsily.
“About――about fellows being willing to know me.”
“Of course I meant it. You, my shy and retiring friend, are one of our notables. We’re proud of you because you play good football and won the Broadwood game for us last year. And because you kept Forest Hill from shutting us out yesterday. We’re proud of any fellow here who does what he’s set to do and does it well, but when a fellow wins a game from Broadwood for us we put our heads in the dust and say, ‘Walk on us, O Conqueror!’”
“That sounds silly,” objected Kendall.
“Then it’s the way I say it. It really isn’t silly. Look here, didn’t you want to run out and hug Dan Vinton last Spring when he hit out that two-bagger that tied the Broadwood game? Weren’t you proud of him? Didn’t you think he was about the finest thing that ever played baseball?”
“You bet!”
“Well, there you are! You did the same thing, didn’t you, last Fall? And you’re still doing it, aren’t you? That’s why you’re some pumpkins here, old scout; why the Prep Class youngsters get in your way and stare at you soulfully until you fall over them. Then they get together and show the toe you stepped on and boast how much it hurts! That’s why fellows try to be nice to you, even if you don’t see it, and why dozens of them will be as sweet as candy to me for days because I know you well enough to go paddling with you. And that’s why I’m here now. It isn’t because I care a cent about you; you bore me to death, but I want the other fellows to see me with you. Reflected glory. Get me?”
Kendall looked startledly at The Duke until the latter began to grin. Then he smiled and looked relieved.
“I never thought of that,” he murmured. “I――I’m glad.”
“Well, don’t think of it too much, now,” cautioned The Duke. “Perhaps I oughtn’t to have said anything about it. I guess the reason we all like you so well is partly because you――because you’re so unconscious of it. Don’t spoil it, Burtis.”
“I’ll try not to. I don’t more than half believe it, anyway, I guess,” he answered shyly. “I’d like to think, though, that――that fellows did like me a little.”
“You may, O Startled Fawn! And if you take my advice you’ll be a trifle more――more――what’s the word?――responsive. It’s a good thing for a fellow to have friends. It helps here and hereafter. If you go up to college you’ll find that having friends there will make a lot of difference. I’ve never been to college, but that’s what they tell me. And in the meanwhile if there’s any little thing you’d like――a place on the hockey team or the baseball nine or next year’s class presidency or the presidency of your society――what are you, by the way? Oxford, aren’t you?――just mention the fact quite casually. It’s a good time. Maybe you won’t get all you want, but it’s a good plan to let fellows know.”
“I don’t want a thing,” replied Kendall in an alarmed voice.
The Duke laughed. “All right; you needn’t get scared, though. I just mentioned it. There’s Jensen and Jim Hough coming down the placid stream. Just for fun, now, let’s see what they do when they catch sight of us here. Would it be quite convenient for you to sit up?”
“What for?”
“So they can recognize your charming countenance, of course. It’s dollars to doughnuts they’ll come ashore.”
“I’d rather not,” said Kendall hurriedly.
“Oh, all right. It isn’t necessary, anyhow. I guess they’ve seen you, for they’re headed this way. And behind them come Perky Davis and Whitehall. Know Whitehall?”
“I’ve met him. He’s the editor of the paper, isn’t he?”
“He is. Whitehall is our one best high-brow. He’s an awful bore, but he’s a good-hearted chap for all that. Yes, here they come. Hello, Jim! Come ashore and hear the birdies sing. Greetings, Jensen, you old Dutchman. You fellows know Burtis, don’t you? Hello, Perky! Well, well, if it isn’t our old friend Horace Greeley Whitehall! Wonders never cease! Step ashore, Horace, and join the crowd! You’re just the fellow I’ve been wanting to see. I’ve been telling Burtis that he ought to get out and try for the _Scholiast_ next term.”
“Really?” asked Whitehall, turning eagerly to Kendall. “By Jove, Burtis, I wish you would, you know! We need fellows of your kind on the paper!”
“That’s what I tell him,” said The Duke mendaciously. “He hasn’t decided about it yet, you know, but he’s terribly interested, aren’t you, Burtis?”
“Why――why――why, I think it would be very nice,” stammered Kendall. “Do you think I could do anything?”
“I don’t know who could if you couldn’t,” responded Whitehall.
CHAPTER XIV
KIRK EXACTS A PROMISE
Kendall returned to his room a half hour before supper time in a condition of mental amazement. He had practically agreed to “go out” for the _Scholiast_ after Christmas recess and had made the startling discovery that an editorship on the school weekly was just what he wanted! Whitehall had kindly and almost apologetically explained that at first, “just for a while, you know,” Kendall would have to do reporting so as to learn the ropes. But none of the group on the island had seemed to doubt for a moment that Kendall would ultimately succeed to the position of editor-in-chief! When he had spoken modestly of his lack of experience the fellows had waved the thing aside as of no consequence.
“That will be all right,” Davis had declared. “It won’t take you any time to get the hang of it.” And there had been a most flattering emphasis on the “you.”
Only Jim Hough had seemed unenthusiastic. Jim had expressed doubt that a fellow could be on the _Scholiast_ and give the proper amount of time and attention to football. Whereupon had ensued an argument between Jim and Whitehall as to the comparative importance of football and journalism, the latter making the absolutely absurd claim that journalism was the greater pursuit of the two! In the end they had appealed to Kendall for his opinion and he had put an end to the dispute by smilingly suggesting that they allow him to defer judgment until he knew more about journalism, a suggestion that seemed to impress everyone with its marvelous wisdom. Or everyone save The Duke. The Duke had grinned like the Cheshire cat all the time and had more than once favored Kendall with a surreptitious and knowing wink, thereby adding to Kendall’s embarrassment.
For it was embarrassing. To discover suddenly that instead of the nonentity one supposes oneself to be one is in reality a public character, a person of prominence, in short a quasi-hero, is bound to be both embarrassing and disturbing. But once having had his eyes opened, Kendall could not doubt that The Duke had spoken truly. He had only to observe how attentively the others listened to what he said, how eager they seemed to have him express opinions, how stoutly they believed in his ability to make the _Scholiast_ and succeed at the work. But it was pleasant, almost intoxicatingly pleasant, and Kendall went back to Clarke Hall in a mood far different from that in which he had left. The world no longer seemed dull or empty. It was, indeed, a very wonderful world, filled with many likable people and teeming with possibilities! Kendall’s feelings were reflected so plainly in his countenance when he entered Number 28 that Gerald, who had unexpectedly returned for supper and was entertaining George Kirk, viewed him in surprise.
“Hello,” he exclaimed, “what’s happened to you, Kendall? Anybody left you a fortune?”
“Not that I know of,” replied Kendall after greeting Kirk. “I――I’ve been on the river with The Duke. We had a bully time.”
“With The Duke? What the dickens did you do?”
“Oh, nothing much. Just paddled up to the island and sat there. Some fellows came along and we talked.”
“And that’s your idea of a bully time!” marveled Gerald. “George, observe our young friend and take a lesson from him. Forget that Broadwood beat you yesterday. Paddle on the river and cheer up!”
“Did they really beat us?” asked Kendall.
Kirk nodded gloomily. “They simply slaughtered us.”
“Don’t get him on the subject again, Kendall,” begged Gerald. “I found him moping on the steps and brought him along to brighten him up. He’s wailed and bewailed for half an hour and I can stand no more of it. Let’s find a cheerful subject of conversation, such as supper.”
“I’m awfully sorry,” said Kendall sympathetically.
“Let it go at that, then,” said Gerald. “You’ll start him off again if you aren’t careful. What lovely weather we’re having, George!”
Kirk laughed. “Well, we’ll get back at them in the Spring,” he said hopefully. “I wish you’d try for the team, Burtis.”
“I don’t think I’d ever make a golfer,” replied Kendall. “You know I tried last year, Kirk.”
“I know you did. And did mighty well, too. All you need is practice. I wish you’d think it over. It’s so hard to get good fellows for the team!”
“Maybe I will, if you want me to,” said Kendall. “I like golf very much, only I don’t believe I’d ever become much of a player.”
“I think you would,” replied Kirk earnestly. “Any fellow who can do as well in football as you’re doing, and has such a dandy sense of directions and distance as you must have to kick those goals, ought to make a good golfer.”
Kendall smiled, and, seeing the inquiring look on Kirk’s face, explained. “I was thinking of something Ned Tooker said last year. Ned said that a good football player couldn’t be a good golf player; that the one spoiled him for the other; I forget just why.”
Kirk laughed. “Well, Ned was the best golfer we’ve ever had here, but he didn’t know everything. And, besides, Ned was fond of saying things just for the sound of them!”
“A common failing,” grieved Gerald as he splashed and gurgled at the stand. “Alas, how”――gurgle――“few of us”――sniff! splash!――“consider the sense”――sniff! sniff!――“of our utterances! Where’s that towel?”
“Then it’s a promise, is it, Burtis?” asked the golf captain eagerly.
“Why――er――yes, if you like. At least, I’ll give it a fair try, Kirk.”
“Good stuff! We’ll have some games together after the Broadwood game’s over. Well, I’ll run along. ’Bye, Gerald.”
“’Bye,” answered Gerald from behind a towel. “Call again, Georgie.”
“Perhaps I will some day. By the way!” Kirk stopped at the door. “What sort of a chap is that Cotton? I mean the fellow who rooms with The Duke. All right, is he?”
“All right?” echoed Gerald. “I’d say he was pretty much all wrong. There’s no harm in him, though, I guess. Ask Kendall. He’s a great chum of Kendall’s. Thick as thieves, they are!”
“Oh, well, I guess he’s all right, then,” said Kirk. “I asked because――――” He stopped, looked thoughtfully puzzled a moment and then, nodding, went out.
“Wonder what Cotton’s done to him,” said Gerald cheerfully. “If I were a punster I’d say it was evident Kirk doesn’t cotton to him. But I’m not, and so I won’t. Did I hear you murmur your thanks?”
“Eh?” asked Kendall blankly.
“Well, where have you been? Still thinking of what a wonderful time you had on the river?” Gerald seemed a little disgruntled over that.
“No, I was just――just thinking.”
What he had been thinking was that if he succeeded in making the _Scholiast_ and the Golf Team, he would be a pretty busy chap the rest of the year!
Just how the trick played on Gibson of Broadwood got out is not known. Neither Gerald nor Kendall divulged it, and The Duke refused to own to having spoken of the matter. But get out it did, for by Monday the whole school knew about it and was laughing delightedly. Even the _Scholiast_, most dignified of school publications, could not forebear a fling and the next issue contained at the bottom of a page this brief note:
“The Broadwood Academy Press announces for early publication ‘Personal Recollections of Booth’; by Gibson.”
Football practice on Monday was hard and long. Several second string players were temporarily promoted to the First Team, for a number of the regulars were still showing the effects of Saturday’s game. Kendall played two periods and then yielded his position to Fayette and was sent off. On Tuesday, however, strains and bruises were healed and the First Team lined up as on Saturday, with the exception that Adler was in place of Metz at right end. Oliver Colton, a former Yardley captain, arrived on Tuesday and stayed until the end of the week, putting in three days of hard coaching. Under his tuition the guards and tackles improved perceptibly. The first serious accident of the season happened Wednesday, when Lin Johnson, center of the Second Team, broke a shoulder blade and did it in such a messy way that there was no question of any more football for him that season. Ireland, who had been playing full-back on Hough’s team, took Johnson’s place, but he didn’t make much of a center and the First, when it wanted a gain through the middle of the opposing line, spoke of taking “a short trip through Ireland.” But the Second struggled on gamely and, if it was no longer able to score touchdowns on the First, sometimes got a field-goal over.
The mass-meetings began Thursday night. Everyone piled into Assembly Hall on the top floor of Oxford and listened to speeches by Mr. Payson and Captain Merriwell and Mr. Bendix, Physical Director, and sang the old songs and experimented with new ones, and cheered themselves hoarse. The Banjo and Mandolin Club provided the music, assisted by Perky Davis at the piano, and its efforts to master some of the tunes offered by enthusiastic amateur composers occasioned much merriment among the audience below the stage. Afterward Kendall, who had promised himself an hour’s tussle with algebra that evening, went back alone to Number 28, Gerald and Harry wandering off with Pete Girard to the latter’s room in Dudley. To Kendall’s disgust, when he reached Number 28 he found the door ajar and Charles Cotton seated at the table apparently deeply immersed in calculations with pencil and paper. Kendall disguised his surprise and disappointment and greeted the visitor politely if without overmuch enthusiasm. Cotton, however, seemed to notice no lack of warmth.
“Just the fellow I wanted to see,” he announced, without rising from Kendall’s chair. “Saw you at the meeting, but lost you outside. I want you to see what you think of this scheme, Burtis.”
“What is it?” asked Kendall, tossing aside his cap and leaning over the other’s shoulder. On the table lay a square of paper rudely scrawled with circles and figures. “I’m not much good at puzzles, Cotton.”
“Oh, this isn’t a puzzle. It’s something new in football signals.”
“You don’t say? What’s the idea?”
“Well, look here. Have you got another chair? Bring it up, like a good fellow. I’m awfully interested in this and I want you tell me what you think of it. Now then,” he continued when Kendall had drawn a chair to the table and seated himself, “here’s the idea. You know the signals they use now are dreadfully complicated.”
“Are they?”
“Well, aren’t they? Take the Yardley system, for instance. We have two sets of signals, like this.” Cotton indicated his diagram. “Here are the holes numbered from 1 to 8. Then the two ends, the two tackles and the four backs are numbered from 1 to 8. Now that’s confusing, isn’t it?”
“I don’t see why,” Kendall objected, getting interested now. “We use three numbers, the first a fake, the second indicating the runner, and the third the hole. That’s not hard.”
“Then we have special plays numbered, too.”
“Yes, a special play is called by tacking its number on to 500 and when Simms calls that he calls it right after the fake. You can’t get mixed up there, can you?”
“N-no,” replied Cotton doubtfully. “I suppose not. Still――now suppose left half was to take the ball through guard-tackle hole on the right. How would you call that?”
“We haven’t any such play. If we had, though, Simms would give us, say, 22, 76, 36.”
Cotton studied his diagram. “That sounds harder than need be. Your 22 is your fake, your 76 is your runner, the second numeral of the number indicating left half-back, and the 36 is the hole, the 6 meaning between right guard and tackle. That’s it, isn’t it?”
“Of course.”
“Have I got the positions numbered right?”
“Not quite. You’ve got quarter numbered 7; should be 5.”
“That so? Well, you draw a diagram for me, will you? I’m a lobster at it. Got another piece of paper?”
Kendall drew a pad toward him and quickly made a row of circles for the forwards and added four more beneath for the backs. Then he numbered the holes and the players. Cotton nodded approvingly.
“That’s fine and neat,” he commended. “Now suppose you were to punt, Burtis; what would be the signal for that?”
“‘Burtis back; 24, 49, 16.’”
“Nine means kick, doesn’t it?”
“Yes, and the 16 means nothing. When you get to the 9 you know it is to be a kick and pay no attention to anything afterwards. Same way with special plays, Cotton. For instance, ‘75, 506, 102’ means that the play is to Play Number 6. The 102 means nothing; it’s just tagged on to fill out.”
“Well, that isn’t as complicated as it seemed at first,” owned Cotton. “As long as I was on the team we used only hole numbers, you know, and the quarter indicated the runner with his fingers on his hip.”
“Yes, the Second does that still, I think. It’s not a bad way if all the backs can see the quarter’s fingers. What is this scheme of yours, though?”
Cotton frowned a minute. Then he shook his head. “It doesn’t seem so good now,” he confessed. “My plan was to use numbers for the holes and letters for the players. It seemed to me it would be easier to remember.”
“That’s not new,” smiled Kendall. “They used to use letters altogether sometimes, I’ve heard. Used to take a word with ten or eleven letters, no two the same, of course, and let a letter stand for the hole and the player, too. I guess the number codes are better, though.”
“I suppose so, or they wouldn’t use them,” replied Cotton thoughtfully folding up the paper. “Still, I think a fellow might figure out a simpler scheme than the one we use.”
“Try it,” laughed Kendall. “If you hit on anything good I guess Payson will be glad to use it.”
“I suppose the best thing about the number signals is that they can be changed easily. Now I suppose these signals won’t be used in Saturday’s game.”
“Yes, they will. But they’ll be changed for Broadwood.”
“I see.” Cotton absently dropped the sheet of paper in his pocket as he stood up. “Well, I’m going to have another go at it, anyway. I’ll bet I can beat this scheme. I hope I haven’t been in the way. Were you going to do anything?”
“Only grind a little,” replied Kendall. “There’s plenty of time yet. So long, Cotton. Let me know how you get on with that.” He nodded toward the pocket in which lay the paper.
“I will.” Cotton patted his jacket as though he wasn’t at all sure where he had placed the sheet, and nodded. “Good-night.”
Kendall, hunting his books, reflected that Cotton wasn’t so bad, after all. Why, to-night he had been quite human! Of course, he shouldn’t have taken possession of the room in the absence of the occupants. There was an unwritten law at Yardley that if a fellow was not in, you went no further than the threshold unless you happened to be a particular friend and had permission to make yourself at home. However, Cotton had behaved so amiably that Kendall was ready to forgive the breach of manners. He had almost liked the fellow to-night!
CHAPTER XV
THE _NEWS_ PREDICTS DEFEAT
Gerald sat on the lowest step in front of Oxford. It was Friday morning and a chilly, depressing gray fog was driving in from the Sound. Somewhere in the distance a whistle buoy was moaning and at intervals a steamer, creeping along off shore, bellowed hoarsely. It was twenty minutes before first recitation hour and Gerald had the entrance to himself. A copy of the morning’s Greenburg _News_ was held in front of him, getting damper and limper every minute, and Gerald was perusing the football column. The _News_ chronicled each day the progress of the Yardley and Broadwood teams, and as the game between the rival schools approached the _News_ devoted more and more space to them. To-day the football specialist of the paper came out flat-footed with the prediction that Broadwood would win the contest. The _News_ had of late years shown a strong partiality to Yardley and this prediction troubled Gerald the more for that reason.
“It’s some time,” said the _News_, “since the Green has defeated the Blue and lots of people around here have begun to wonder whether she is ever going to repeat. Even the longest road has its turning, though, and the luck has to change some time. And it looks very much now as if the change would take place a week from to-morrow when Broadwood and Yardley meet in their fourteenth annual contest. In fact those who have seen both teams in action don’t hesitate to hand the victory to the Green right now. This may sound rash, but they have plenty of good argument to support their verdict with.
“On the season’s showing Broadwood is undoubtedly ahead. She has met teams equal to those Yardley has played and has survived every battle without a defeat, whereas Yardley fell an easy victim to Forest Hill last week. In total of points made, Broadwood leads her ancient rival by 88 to 67, not a wide margin certainly, but sufficient to prove Broadwood’s greater scoring power. Broadwood has been scored against twice for a total of 8, Yardley as many times for a total of 10. Taking the work of the two teams last Saturday as a basis of comparison, the Green is still in the lead. She piled up a score of 11 points against a worthy opponent and was scored on herself by a goal-from-field. In the last two quarters Broadwood played solely on the defensive. Meanwhile Yardley had the utmost difficulty to keep from being shut out ignominiously by Forest Hill, a much weaker team than Nordham. Forest Hill found the Yardley defense easy, and, especially in the third period, did about as she wanted with it. She should have had at least one more touchdown on the showing made. Yardley secured her three points when play was almost over, the infallible Burtis toeing a very pretty field-goal from the forty-five yards. It will be interesting to see how Yardley performs against Nordham to-morrow, by the way, for there is a strong sentiment on the hill in favor of beating Nordham at any cost, in view of the defeat which the latter institution handed to the Blue last year.
“But comparative scores don’t always tell the truth. Nor does a team’s showing up to the moment of her final game mean very much. Many a team has gone through an unfortunate season and then turned in and taken the measure of its rival in fine style. Yardley, therefore, may surprise us by showing a reversal of form to-morrow and piling up a bigger score against Nordham than did Broadwood, in which case those who are predicting a Broadwood victory a week from to-morrow would have cause for thought. But there are other things to be considered besides the season’s showing of the two teams and their comparative scores. Broadwood looks better on the field and in action as well as on paper. She has a hard-playing, powerful team which will outweigh Yardley three or four pounds to the man at least. Her back-field will average five pounds heavier. And, unlike heavy teams of previous years, this season’s Broadwood aggregation is fast, fully as fast as Yardley’s. With a dry field and no favor Broadwood’s team should be worth at least one score more than Yardley’s.
“In style of play the rivals are much alike. Both depend largely on line plays to gain ground, although Yardley, with Burtis in the line-up, will naturally do a good deal of kicking. That phenomenon, by the way, although practically a new man this season, has come at a fast clip, and those who consider him only as a brilliant punter and drop-kicker are in for a surprise. As a dodging back he has no equal on his own team and will suffer but little by comparison with Captain Raynor of Broadwood. The Green is ahead at present in the matter of team-play. She seems to have got together earlier in the season than usual, and both defense and offense are running smoothly. On the whole, the Green has a big, powerful team this year, one at least twenty-five per cent. better than that which suffered defeat last year by the narrowest of margins. On the other hand, it can’t be said that Yardley is a whit better off than she was last November; rather, it is doubtful if she is as well off. She has had to build almost a whole new team, having suffered badly by graduation, and so far whatever there is in the team hasn’t shown to be dangerous. It may be that in the few practice days remaining before the big show Coach Payson, who is one of the cleverest men handling a school eleven to-day, will manage to work a miracle. If he doesn’t we can’t see but what there will be cause for rejoicing in the Broadwood camp at sunset of the 17th――a rejoicing likely to be worth seeing because so long delayed.”
Gerald lowered the paper thoughtfully. “If you believe that,” he murmured, “we’re beaten this minute. I guess Broadwood is pretty good this year; everybody is saying so. I’d hate to have the school get beaten my last year, though.” He shook his head. “I wonder if Payson has anything up his sleeve. Kendall says he’s developing end run plays to beat the band. Maybe that’s the answer. Broadwood can’t be so terribly fast if she’s as heavy as this fellow says, and perhaps Payson expects to work the ends and try field goals. Seems to me that would be his best plan. There’s no denying that our back-field is weak on line-plunging. They showed that Saturday.” He took up the paper again. “Let’s see what the games are to-morrow. Yale plays Brown. That’ll be a cinch. Harvard plays Cornell――――”
“What are you muttering about?” asked a voice. Gerald looked up to find Harry beside him. “What are you trying to do, Gerald? Get rheumatism and pneumonia and a few other things?”
“No, I’m doing this for my complexion,” replied Gerald with a grin. “They say fog is great for the complexion.”
“Brr! I’d rather go without the complexion. Come on inside, unless you’re doing penance out here.”
“Seen the _News_ this morning?” asked Gerald, as he followed the other up the steps.
“No, anything in it?”
“A column or so about the teams. We’re going to get licked. It says so.”
Harry smiled untroubledly. “You’ll have to show me,” he said. “Why, what does the paper know about it?”
“You’d think it knew everything about it to read it,” answered Gerald sadly. “Who _is_ going to win, anyhow?”
“Little old Yardley,” replied Harry unhesitatingly. “Cheer up! You’re full of fog. Isn’t this a peach of a day?”
“Fine!” They laid their books on a radiator near the entrance and backed up to the warmth. “What are your reasons for thinking so?”
“Thinking what? Oh, about the game? Why, we always do win, don’t we? What’s to keep us from doing it again?”
“The luck has to change,” answered the other unconsciously quoting the _News_. “They say Broadwood has a dandy team this year.”
“Of course; she always has. But what of it? So have we.”
“The _News_ says we haven’t.”
Harry seized the paper and dropped it behind the radiator. “If you wouldn’t read such stuff you wouldn’t be worried. They have to fill the paper up with something, and they might as well say one thing as another. How’s Kendall?”
“Blooming. Have you noticed anything about him the last three or four days?”
“No, what? I haven’t seen very much of him.”
“Well, he seems――different, somehow. Has more――more assurance. Why, I came across him yesterday talking with Perry Whitehall, as thick as two thieves. And Wednesday he actually got into a discussion with Simms about something and threshed it right out with him and made Simms back down. Something about some formation in football. And he looks different, too.” Gerald frowned thoughtfully at the bust of Pallas across the corridor. “Looks as though he kind of thought more of himself.”
“Well,” laughed Harry, “there’s no harm in that. But what about the campaign? Do we make progress?”
“We surely do; but a whole lot depends on what Kendall does in the next two games. If he will do a star act or two he can’t help getting the captaincy. I’ve been sort of sleuthing around, Harry. None of the fellows seem to have picked a candidate yet. There’s talk of Crandall, but it’s only talk. What I’m wondering is whether it wouldn’t be a good idea to casually suggest Kendall’s name to one or two of the football bunch; just offhand, you know.”
“I suppose it would. Only the fellows mustn’t think we want him for captain. It ought to be done mighty carefully.”
“Yes, and I guess it would be a good idea to wait until after to-morrow’s game and see what happens then. If Kendall kicks a couple of field goals or distinguishes himself any other way perhaps we won’t have to say a word.”
“He won’t, though,” answered Harry. “Just because we want him to, he will get hurt at the beginning of the game and have to be laid off. You see if he doesn’t! That’s the way things happen.”
“Who’s full of fog now?” laughed Gerald. “You’re as pessimistic as an owl. And you’re all wrong, too. Something tells me that we are going to win to-morrow and that Kendall is going to make a blooming hero of himself. Still, if he doesn’t it will be up to us to start the ball rolling. We might each drop a hint, you know. Who do you know best on the team? Charlie Merriwell?”
“No, Pete or Bert, I suppose.”
“Well, you go for Bert, then. You could just say something about it’s being pretty near time to think about a new captain, and wonder who he will be. Then you could say that you think Kendall would make a pretty good one. See?”
“Ye-es. But, say, Gerald, have you thought how we’d feel if they did make Kendall captain and he didn’t turn out to be the right fellow, after all?”
“No, because he will be the right fellow. What’s the use of considering things that aren’t so? Dan picked Kendall for the place, and Dan knows.” The corridor was filling with students, and Gerald dropped his voice. “I had a letter from him the other day, and he particularly asked about Kendall. Come on, it’s nine o’clock.”
Harry groaned. “What do you suppose we have recitations for?” he asked. “Life would be so much nicer without them!”
CHAPTER XVI
COTTON WRITES A LETTER
That afternoon the fog changed to a soft drizzle that puffed in from the Sound on a southwest breeze and cast a pall of gloom and moisture over the school. Luckily there was no outdoor practice scheduled, for the field was soft and slippery and just in condition to produce a crop of sprains and bruises. Instead, there was a solid two hours of signal drill and talk in the gymnasium. The plays selected for the morrow were drawn on the blackboard and explained again by the Coach, after which the players were “quizzed” on each and afterwards were made to go through them, first at a walk and then at a trot, until they went off smoothly. Toward the last the lights had to be turned on, and the players, their rubber soles patting the boards, moved back and forth, two squads of them, with their foreshortened shadows dodging and leaping about the floor with strange effect. The voices of Simms and Holmes, the first high and sharp and the latter like an angry growl, called the signals, the centers shot back the balls, the poised players broke into seeming confusion, there was the sound of pattering shoes on the floor, of hurried breathing, and then quiet again as the teams reformed, quiet broken by the even voice of Coach Payson.
“Cousins, you started too soon. Wait until quarter turns. Your duty is to make the play safe. If there had been a fumble you’d never have got the ball. Try that again, please. And, Burtis, keep your head straight. If you turn it you may give away the play. Remember that, everyone. Don’t indicate by a look or movement where the ball is going or where the attack is to be made. Same play, Simms.”
At the edge of the shadow cast by the running track a half-dozen substitutes watched and awaited their turns. With them were Davis, making interminable notes in his book, and Andy Ryan, the little red-headed trainer, his sharp eyes following the players’ every movement. Finally it was over, and the fellows trooped down the stairs to the showers, the edict “Ten o’clock bed, fellows!” ringing in their ears.
Meanwhile Gerald was leading a dozen or so scantily attired youths over the cross-country course, plugging up the slippery hillsides and splashing through puddles, with the rain soaking their running clothes and squish-squashing in their spiked shoes, and all for the glory of Yardley. And, although no one knew it, far out on the golf links, a solitary figure in the rain-swept landscape, George Kirk was tramping doggedly along in the wake of a wee white ball. The golfing days were growing fewer and fewer and, although it would be a good six months before he could lead his warriors against Broadwood again, he must miss no chance to prepare for a victory. And this, too, was for the glory of Yardley.
By supper time the drizzle had turned to a driving rain that beat against the front windows of the halls and filled the walks with unexpected puddles into which you walked unseeingly. It was what The Duke, sprinting back from the library after supper――even The Duke had to look up a reference occasionally――termed to himself “a dark, dank, drooly nicht.” He reached the entrance to Clarke out of breath and somewhat damp, but his spirits were not affected. It took more than that to affect them. Even the fact that authority in the person of one Edmund Gaddis, instructor in English, familiarly known as “Old Tige,” had decreed that The Duke should hand in a theme before Saturday noon, and that Saturday noon was less than seventeen hours away, cast no spell of gloom over his gayety. When, having reached the head of the first flight, he descried Adler coming along the corridor, he immediately stationed himself against the newel post, clapped a hand to an imaginary sword hilt and scowled silently at the approaching figure. Adler, sighting his foe at the same moment, placed a quick hand on his own weapon and, hugging the further wall, advanced cautiously, with an insolent expression. No word was spoken. Eyeing each other intently, haughtily, they met and passed. The weapons were not drawn. Adler, circling at a safe distance, reached the stairs and, with a last malevolent glare, which was met and returned, passed from sight. Whereupon The Duke dropped his hand from his sword hilt and proceeded upstairs, three steps at a time. Just why the two went through this procedure they did not know, but they always did, wherever and whenever they met. Doubtless it added spice to life.
Cotton was writing at the study table when The Duke flung open the door of Number 47. At sight of his roommate Cotton quickly turned the written sheet face downward and drew a blotter half over it, afterward pretending to trace figures on the blotter with his pen. The Duke observed him disgustedly.
“Oh, chuck the mystery, Cotton! I don’t want to see what you’re writing. Every time anyone comes around you you hide something like a silly conspirator. Why the dickens don’t you write something you aren’t ashamed of, eh?”
“I’m not ashamed of anything I write,” replied Cotton with intense dignity. “But I don’t want fellows to read my letters, do I?”
“You do not! Nor does anyone want to read your old letters. I’ll bet a dollar and seven cents no one _could_ read ’em!”
The Duke had seized a towel and was vigorously mopping the rain from his face and hair. Cotton scowled.
“If I couldn’t write better than you I――I’d use a typewriter!”
“Is that impossible?” scoffed The Duke, tossing the towel aside and slicking his hair with a pair of military brushes. “Sweet youth, I wouldst tell thee something an thou willst hearken. My name is Lester S. Wellington, and the S stands for Spencerian. I, O Colossal Lump of Ignorance, invented the art of writing!”
Cotton said “Humph!” in an unflattering tone and gathered up his writing. The Duke, feeling better after his burst of confidence, pulled a slip of crumpled paper from a pocket and smoothed it out. It contained the notes written in the library. He had started for his room with his mind made up to sit down at once and compose that English theme. But now he viewed the notes distastefully. The virtuous impulse was dying fast. Besides, how could a fellow do anything with Cotton there? An English theme――especially to The Duke――was something requiring ideal conditions of quiet and vast concentration. And it was absolutely impossible to concentrate when Cotton was scratching his pen or shuffling his feet at the other side of the table. Besides, there was still to-morrow morning. He would arise early and do the theme before chapel. One’s faculties are always at their best in the early morning. The Duke slipped the notes between the pages of a blue book and smiled relievedly. He even viewed his roommate with a forgiving smile.
“Coming over to Oxford?” he asked.
“What for?” growled Cotton, not so ready to make up.
“Why, for the mass-meeting, O Flower of Chivalry!”
“What do I care about the mass-meeting?” inquired Cotton with a scowl. “A lot of idiots howling and some more idiots making speeches! What does it amount to?”
“Why, you unpatriotic sinner!” exclaimed The Duke. “I honestly believe you’d rather see us beaten than not!”
“We’re going to be beaten, whether I want it or don’t. Besides, there’ll be plenty of fellows there to make a noise without me.”
The Duke viewed him with deep disgust for a moment. Finally, “Cotton, at times I experience a most frantic temptation to kick you out of the window. Isn’t that strange? Can you explain it?”
“You’d better try it,” replied the other belligerently.
“No, I shall try to resist,” answered The Duke, shaking his head gently. “You just say that so I’ll spoil a perfectly good window and get in trouble. I don’t think that is very nice of you, Cotton. In fact, I think it shows a mean spirit. No, when I do kick you, O Delectable One, it will be through the door, with the door open.”
“You――you――――” began Cotton angrily.
“Don’t ask me!” interrupted The Duke, holding up a hand. “I’d like to oblige you, Cotton, but I will _not_ kick you out the window. You must try to be reasonable about it. Put yourself in my place, Cotton. As much as I love you, O Joy of My Heart, I will not sacrifice a good window merely to satisfy your selfish whim. No, no, Cotton, it must be the door! You must be satisfied with the door. Not another word, I beg of you! I am adamant!”
And The Duke, smiling sweetly but reprovingly, passed out, leaving Cotton sputtering with indignation and rage. By the time The Duke’s footsteps had died away in the corridor, however, his roommate’s wrath had wasted to grumblings.
“Silly fool,” muttered Cotton. “Stuck-up idiot! Thinks he’s so beastly clever, does he? Huh!” He caught sight of the paper The Duke had slipped into the book, and he reached across the table and drew it out. “Notes, eh?” he murmured. “For his theme, I guess. Well, he can go and get some more, he’s so smart!” And very deliberately, grinning the while, Cotton tore the sheet into tiny pieces and, opening the window, let them flutter out. Then, chuckling, he returned to the table, uncovered his letter, dipped his pen and began to write again:
“And as near as I can find out they won’t learn the new signals until about Tuesday. I guess I can find out what they are. I’ll try anyway. If I do I’ll let you know right away. It looks like they’d get licked to-morrow, and I hope they do. Two or three of the fellows are overtrained, they say, but I don’t know if it’s really true. Look for a letter Wednesday or Thursday. Best regards.”
He didn’t sign his name. Folding the letter he slipped it into an envelope and addressed it to “William Gibson, Esq., Broadwood Academy, Greenburg, Ct.” Then, putting it into his pocket, he slipped quietly down the stairs and across, through the rain, to the letterbox in front of Oxford. Although there was no one in sight Cotton took no risks of being seen, and the way in which he extracted the letter from his pocket and slid it through the slot was a marvel of dexterity. Then, as a sudden burst of cheering reached him from upstairs, he passed into the hall and sought the meeting, just as, in spite of his declaration to the contrary, he had intended to do all along.
CHAPTER XVII
A FUMBLE
The morning of the Nordham game dawned gray and cold and cheerless. The rain still continued and water lay in pools along the drive and walks. What the field would be like in the afternoon no one cared to predict. There was talk of canceling the game, and rumors to the effect that Andy Ryan had called on Mr. Bendix, the court of final appeal in such cases, to ask him to declare the game off, were rife about the school in the morning. It was explained that the trainer was afraid of injury to the players on such a slippery field. Perhaps had there not been such a desire to obtain revenge from Nordham for last year’s defeat the contest might have been canceled. But it wasn’t. There was a conference at eleven o’clock, attended by Mr. Payson, Mr. Bendix, Captain Merriwell, Manager Davis and Andy Ryan, and during its progress the school at large held its breath in painful suspense. When the result of the conference was announced there was both relief and joy. In spite of Andy’s advice, the game was to take place, the only alteration of original plans consisting of a shortening of the playing periods from fifteen minutes to twelve.
Yardley flocked to the field at two o’clock clad in raincoats and rubber hats. The attendance from outside the school was naturally small, although perhaps a hundred and fifty or two hundred townsfolk came up to pick their way across the soggy grass under bobbing umbrellas and view the game from the water-soaked seats. Nordham sent over some twenty or thirty devoted supporters, who managed to make a large amount of noise considering their number. Two First Class fellows, detailed by Gerald on request of Mr. Manager Davis, stood at the entrance and watched for the appearance of inquisitive Broadwood gentlemen. None sought admission, however, which was fortunate, since the guards would have been powerless to exclude them. Practice was cut short to-day, and after one or two dashes about the field and a few kicks of the wet ball the two teams retired to their respective sides and the captains met to decide the choice of goals. It was raining steadily, but not so hard as during the forenoon, and optimistic ones predicted that the weather would clear before the game was finished. The field was soft and slippery, and here and there held shallow pools of water. In the stand, Gerald, seated between Harry and The Duke, was retelling an old joke called to mind by the condition of the field.
“You fellows may have heard it,” he said. “It’s rather a classic.”
“Cut out the apologies,” begged The Duke. “They’re going to start in a minute.”
“Well, once when Pennsylvania and Princeton used to play football together――――”
“That must have been in the dark ages,” murmured Harry.
“――there was a Thanksgiving Day game in Philadelphia. It had snowed during the night and when it came time to start the game it was raining, and the field was covered with slush two or three inches deep. The Princeton captain won the toss. ‘Do we have to play in this fluid?’ he asked bitterly. ‘Of course you do,’ they told him impatiently. ‘Come on, now; you won the toss; which end do you want?’ The Princeton man looked around over the waste of gray slush and shook his head. ‘Well,’ he said finally, ‘I guess we’ll kick with the tide.’”
“That’s what we’re going to do,” laughed Harry. “We’ve won the toss.”
Nordham was spreading out over her end of the field and Fales was trying to make a tee with the soft mud. “I wonder,” said Gerald, “if he wouldn’t like Kirk to drive off for him.” The whistle blew, Fales stepped forward and the ball took flight. Nordham at once tested the field, trying to get a back away around Adler’s end, but the attempt was a failure. There was no such thing as quick starting to-day, and the runner was tackled before he had reached his own line. Nordham kicked then and the ball went to mid-field. Marion tried the center of the Nordham line and netted two yards, Crandall slid off right tackle for two more and Simms kicked. A red-stockinged Nordhamite caught the pigskin near his twenty yards and dodged back to the thirty-five before he was downed. Then came a forward pass that failed, followed by two attempts at the right of the Yardley breastworks. The Red missed her distance by a scant half-foot, and Yardley took the ball away. Kendall secured three yards outside left tackle on a double pass, and made three more through left guard. Simms ran back and passed to Cousins, who was tackled where he caught. It was first down again. Crandall and Kendall, alternating, worked the tackles for gains until the ball was on the Reds’ twenty-six-yard line. There Simms fumbled the slippery ball and a Nordham forward fell on it.
Nordham kicked on first down, getting off a fine long punt that went over Simms’ head far down the field. The Nordham ends were on him by the time he had secured the ball and Simms went down in the mud. An exchange of punts secured five yards for Yardley and then Marion banged through for twelve and laid the oval on the fifty-yard line. Another attempt, however, failed of gain and Kendall fell back to punt. Girard made a wretched pass and Kendall had to fall on the ball to save it. With twenty-three yards to gain Simms sent Kendall back again as if to kick and himself took the ball through the Nordham center for ten yards and would have got away for the necessary distance had he not slipped and fallen. Nordham tried a forward pass that netted fifteen yards and then worked a delayed pass for five more, the entire Yardley team being fooled on the play. The whistle blew with the ball in Nordham’s possession on Yardley’s twenty-five yards.
So far neither team had shown much strength in attack and neither had reached scoring distance of the opponent’s goal. In weight Nordham was perceptibly lighter than Yardley, while her better speed was handicapped by the slippery field.
In the second period Nordham ripped open the Blue line on two tries for a first down, bringing the ball to the twenty yards. An end run was spoiled and a fake kick with an attack on the center of the line netted but two yards. Then Nordham’s full-back retired to the thirty-five yards and the quarter knelt in front of him. The ball was almost in front of the goal and it looked as though a score was to follow. But the Blue forwards smashed through in time to spoil the place-kick, the ball thumping against Girard’s upstretched arm and bounding away toward the side of the field, where it was secured by Kendall.
From her twenty-eight yards the Blue began a series of plays directed at the tackles that soon worked the ball past the middle of the field. Stark, right tackle, was drawn back frequently, and Marion and the two half-backs had their turns. The Red team was weakening, it seemed, her secondary defense especially making poor work of stopping the advance. On the stand the Yardley supporters were shouting lustily for a touchdown, and it looked as though the Blue was well started on a triumphant journey. With some three or four minutes of the half remaining, and the Red line allowing gains at every attack, it seemed that Yardley might well cross that last white line. But near the thirty-five yards there was a mix-up on signals and Crandall was thrown for a loss. Simms raged and stormed and Kendall took the ball for a wide end run. Across the field he raced, protected by fair interference, watching for a chance to turn in, and finally, just when it seemed that his chance had come and he had a clear field between him and the opposing quarter-back, an intrusive Nordham man dodged by the interference and made a flying tackle that fairly lifted Kendall off his feet and hurled him to earth.
Away bounded the pigskin. A Nordham player, foiled a moment before, was in the path of the ball. Those who saw the incident declared that the red-stockinged chap hardly had to stretch out his hands, that the ball actually bounced into his arms! In any case, having got it, he knew what to do. Off he went on a wild effort to cover the seventy-odd yards between him and Yardley’s goal. Behind him the Yardley players, aghast at the sudden turn of fortune, trailed in desperate pursuit. Fayette led the pack, and for a time it seemed that he might reach the runner before the last white streak was crossed. But twenty yards from the goal Fayette gave out and was passed by Plant who, in turn, for a moment raised Yardley hopes. But Plant was heavy, and the streak down the field told on him before he could reach the Nordham runner, and the latter staggered over the line, reeled behind a post and fell on top of the ball in the very middle of the goal, subsequently turning calmly over on his back and losing all interest in events for a minute.
The tackle that had dislodged the ball from Kendall’s grasp had been a terrific one, and even the most disappointed spectator grudgingly acknowledged that to have clung to a wet pigskin after such collision with the ground would have been almost impossible. Breathless and dazed, with his left arm filled with tearing pains, Kendall climbed to his feet in time to see the Nordham runner settle into his stride. Doggedly Kendall joined the pursuit, but a dozen steps was all he could manage. Having by then reached a nice pool of water he sank down into it, clasped his left wrist with the other hand and came so near fainting that it almost turned him sick. For a moment no one noticed his collapse. Then Pete Girard went to his assistance, somewhere a whistle blew, and Andy Ryan, the water pail slopping beside him, raced on. A big wet sponge was swashed over Kendall’s face and he opened his eyes. Girard, kneeling across his thighs, was pumping his arms, and at every moment the left one hurt excruciatingly. Kendall tried his best to keep his lips tight, but in spite of him a moan got by, and Andy’s eyes flashed hither and thither and his cunning fingers began a quick search over the boy’s ribs.
“Where does it get you?” demanded Andy.
Kendall shook his head. Merriwell and some others had come up, and Kendall could hear their hoarse breathing.
“Can you stand up?” demanded Andy suspiciously.
Kendall doubted it, but he nodded. “I――I’m――all right,” he whispered. Girard and another lifted him, and again Kendall winced. Andy, watching, pounced upon him again.
“Hold up, boys,” he said quietly. “Something’s wrong.” He felt of Kendall’s collarbone, working clever fingers like lightning along the back of his neck. “Hurt?” he asked. Kendall shook his head. Andy’s fingers slid down along the left arm, his little green eyes watching Kendall’s face sharply. The boy held his breath and gritted his teeth. The awful fingers reached the wrist, closed――――
Kendall felt the blood ebbing away from his face, already pale, but he returned the trainer’s gaze unflinchingly. Andy’s fingers stopped kneading, lingered inquiringly at the wrist. Then his eyes left Kendall’s and Kendall, following the trainer’s gaze, saw a white lump on the back of his hand.
Andy grunted. “Come off,” he said.
“It’s nothing, Andy, really!” pleaded Kendall. “I――I don’t even feel it!”
For answer Andy laid a compelling hand on his shoulder. “Sure, I know. ’Tis rather pleasant than otherwise, maybe. But just the same you’ll come along with me, Burtis, me boy!”
Payson awaited them on the side-line. “Dislocated wrist,” announced Andy.
“Sorry, Burtis. Fayette! Fayette! Right half, and hurry up!”
“I may go in again, mayn’t I, Andy?” begged Kendall as he lowered himself to the bench.
“Maybe. I don’t know. Hold your arm out. One o’ you boys put your arms around his chest. That’s it. Hold steady now.” Slowly Andy pulled at the hand and pressed against the white lump. There was a squirmish, gritting sort of jar as the bone fell into place again. “All right. Hold it so a minute.” Andy reached into his bag for splints and bandage just as a shout of satisfaction traveled across the field. Kendall, glancing quickly toward the Yardley goal, saw the pigskin dropping to earth beyond the farther upright. Nordham had failed at goal!
With quick hands Andy wound the bandage. The shooting pains had already gone, but there was a dull, throbbing ache at the wrist, and Kendall viewed the white-swathed member scowlingly. “I wonder――――” he began.
“What?” asked Andy as he tied the knot.
“I wonder if I hurt that before I dropped the ball, Andy.”
“Sure you did! You likely got it doubled under you when you went down.”
“Did I? That’s not so bad, then, is it? I mean there might be more excuse for fumbling, mightn’t there?”
“No man on earth would have held the ball after getting that,” responded the trainer, nodding at the hand. “Don’t bother your head about it, son.” He fashioned a sling of a broad strip of gauze and placed the arm in it so that the fingers lay over Kendall’s right chest. “Keep it so. We’ll have the doctor see it later. Time’s up! Get the blankets ready, boys!”
CHAPTER XVIII
KENDALL GOES BACK
Kendall, trotting awkwardly with one arm out of commission, followed the team and substitutes up the hill to the gymnasium. Feeling sadly out of it, he found a seat in a corner and watched the others. The rubbers were busy as soon as the doors had swung shut, and the air was already redolent of arnica and witch hazel. There was a rush of water and a babel of voices. Andy was busy at his store of rubber anklets and bandages. Fales had twisted his knee and Crandall had a cut over one eye that gave him a particularly wicked and disreputable appearance. Payson was talking with Captain Merriwell, the latter stretched at full length on a table with a rubber massaging his back. Payson was frowning intently as he talked. One by one the fellows came over to ask Kendall about his injury. They all seemed really sorry; even Fayette, who had profited by the other’s misfortune, expressed concern in tones that sounded genuine! After awhile the coach began to talk and the room quieted. What he said was not very different from what coaches have said at such times from the beginning of football. He pointed out mistakes and explained how to avoid them. There was no scolding. At the end he said gravely:
“The school wants you to win to-day. Just keep that in mind. You’ve been outplayed so far by a team that’s no better than you are; not quite so good, I think. You’re no more handicapped than they are by the wet field and wet ball. There’s no reason why you can’t make a touchdown in each period, fellows. But you’ve got to do better than you have done. You’ve got to play together and put more snap into it. Perhaps you’ve forgotten what Nordham did to you last year. Or perhaps you don’t care. If you don’t care, go on playing as you’ve been playing. If you do care, go back there and show them how to play football!”
On the way back Payson sought Kendall. “I’m sorry you got hurt, Burtis,” he said kindly. “Take care of that wrist, though, and we’ll have you playing next week. Andy says he will have you in shape by then.” He nodded and moved ahead.
“Next week!” muttered Kendall. “That means I don’t get back to-day! I could, though, if it wasn’t for this silly sling around my neck.” He removed his hand and lowered it. It began to hurt as the blood flowed down into it, and Kendall scowled. “Gee, but it’s mean luck! First I went and fumbled the ball and they scored a touchdown, and then I had to bust my wrist and can’t play any more!” He worked his fingers experimentally. They hurt some, but he decided that he could manage to hold a ball with them in spite of the splints if they’d only give him a chance. He looked about for Andy Ryan as they trotted on to the field to the long cheers of the stand. The trainer was busy, and Kendall waited until he was for an instant alone. Then――
“Andy, you said I could go back,” he charged.
“Go back? Do you mean play football?”
Kendall nodded.
“I said that, did I?” Andy grinned. “Was I snoring at the time?”
“You know you weren’t,” answered Kendall indignantly. “And you did say maybe I could――――”
“Maybe! Sure I said maybe, Burtis. But what would you be doing out there with one arm in a sling――――”
“I don’t need to keep it in a sling, Andy!”
“You don’t, eh? Listen, son. Do you keep your hand where I put it and take care of it. Then maybe you can play next week. If you don’t――――”
“Maybe!” gasped Kendall in dismay. “Is――is there any doubt of it?”
“There is,” replied Andy dryly. “All ready, men!”
Kendall, staring blankly before him, turned to find a seat on the bench, and heard his name called. Gerald was leaning across the barrier with an anxious countenance.
“What did you do?” he called. “Break anything?”
“Dislocated,” answered Kendall, tapping the bandaged wrist. He moved nearer to Gerald. “They say I can’t play any more to-day, and――and――――”
“Of course you can’t,” agreed Gerald frowningly. “You’ve got to take care of it. Isn’t it mean luck, Kendall?” One might have thought that it was Gerald who had injured himself instead of Kendall. The latter nodded gloomingly, waved his well hand and found a seat between Metz and Jackson. Metz was not very cheerful company these days, since he had but lately been deposed from right end in favor of Adler and was not yet viewing the matter philosophically. Jackson, who was a substitute guard, a big, raw-boned chap with lantern jaws and eyebrows that met companionably above his nose, glanced at Kendall’s injury and asked laconically:
“Broke, Burtis?”
“No, just a dislocation.”
“Too bad ’tain’t broke. They say breaks heal quicker’n dislocations.”
“My, but you’re a cheerful comforter,” muttered Kendall, as he turned to watch the kick-off. Merriwell had elected to give that honor to Nordham. There was no advantage attached to the possession of either end of the field to-day, for there was no wind. The rain still descended, but it was more like a heavy mist now. Nordham booted the ball far down the field, and Simms got it near his own ten-yard line and by a wonderful effort that brought the onlookers to their feet carried it past mid-field. By that time the Yardley back had dodged and fought his way past the entire Nordham team save its quarter and seemed well on his way for a touchdown. Having outstripped his interference, Simms ran directly at the Red’s quarter-back at full speed. But that youth was not to be fooled. He approached Simms slowly and cautiously. Just as the runner swerved to his left the red-legged player made a diving plunge at Simms and brought him down, the two sliding through mud and water for yards after the tackle.
Yardley hammered the center for small gain and then slid off the tackles and made her distance. A fumble was recovered and an end run lost ground. Simms tried a quarter-back kick, and Nordham got the ball near her thirty yards. An exchange of punts gave no advantage to either side, and Nordham tried the Yardley center and squeezed through for two short gains. Crandall got the punt and trailed off twenty-odd yards before he was pulled down. Yardley went back to her former tactics of direct attack, plugging the guards and tackles and now and then trying a wide end run. In this manner the ball was carried down to Nordham’s twenty-three-yard line. Marion got through for three, Crandall made five on a skin-tackle play, and the pigskin rested squarely on the fifteen-yard line. There was a pause here, Simms and Merriwell holding a consultation. Kendall guessed that they were discussing the chances of making that needed two yards. To try a field goal then seemed absurd.
Finally Fales dropped out of the line and went back as though to kick, and, although there were one or two cries of “Fake!” Nordham seemed pretty well convinced that a try-at-goal was to be the play. She pulled her wings in a little and made ready to break through. This left the Yardley ends free and Kendall, noting the fact, wondered whether Simms meant to chance a forward pass. The ball went back to Fales and the big guard stepped forward and swung his long leg. The Nordham forwards came crashing through with upstretched arms, leaping and stumbling. Fales, however, had not kicked. With the nearest Nordham players almost upon him he side-stepped and hurled the ball straight over the center of the line toward where Cousins awaited it. There was an instant of suspense, of wild scrambling on the part of the defenders, and then the ball, aimed too high, went over Cousins’ head, struck an upright of the goal and bounded back. A dozen bodies threw themselves after it. But under the rules it went to Nordham for a touchback and a groan of disappointment arose from the stand. Nordham kicked from behind her goal line and Crandall made the catch on Yardley’s forty-three yards. From there Yardley hammered out two yards and then the whistle blew for the end of the third period.
As the players separated to don their blankets and change positions Coach Payson strode over to Andy Ryan. Kendall, watching, saw the trainer swing around and look at him. Payson’s gaze followed. Kendall’s heart leaped into his throat. For a moment the two talked. Once Andy shook his head slowly. Once he shrugged his shoulders. Then Payson was calling.
“Burtis!”
Kendall sprang from the bench and hurried to the side-line.
“Do you think you can go in and kick if you have a chance?” asked the coach hurriedly. “If you’re to go in at all I’ve got to put you in now. You may tell Simms not to use you except for kicking.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Take your sling off,” said Andy, “but keep your arm up all you can. And keep out of scrimmage, too.”
“Yes, you needn’t rough it up any, Burtis. All I want you to do is punt when necessary, and if we get inside their thirty yards try a goal unless Simms is pretty certain of making a touchdown. You tell him that. Tell him he’s to use you only when necessary, and to try for a field-goal inside their thirty yards unless he’s sure he can make it by rushing. Send Fayette out. Go ahead!”
The teams were already forming at the farther end of the field as Kendall sped on. A cheer burst forth from the stand, and then another as Brinspool raced after Kendall to relieve Marion. Kendall made for the referee.
“Right half,” he panted. “You’re off, Fayette. Let me have your head-guard.” Then he drew Simms aside and whispered the instructions. Captain Merriwell joined them and listened. Neither he nor Simms seemed very well pleased.
“A goal from field won’t do much good,” muttered Simms. “We’ll have to have two to even tie the game.”
“He’d better have left Fayette in,” said Merriwell. “Well――――”
“Ready, Yardley?”
“All ready, sir!” Simms trotted to his place. Brinspool snatched Marion’s head-guard and sent that youth dejectedly off. The whistle blew.
CHAPTER XIX
9-6
Nordham had made three changes, one in her line and two in her back-field. With only twelve minutes left to play she was hoping to stave off a Yardley score and when, on the second play, Brinspool dropped the ball and she recovered it on her forty-yard line, she kicked on first down and sent the pigskin twenty yards into the Blue’s territory. Undismayed, Yardley took up the journey again. Nordham put all her skill into defensive playing, and twice Yardley made her distance on the third down only by inches. Then the middle line was crossed. Crandall swung far around right end for a seven-yard gain, and Brinspool banged his way through right guard for two more. Plant was drawn back and made four yards off left tackle. Then Simms concentrated the attack on the left of the Nordham line and found a weak place at guard. But the Red’s secondary defense played fiercely and stopped the runners almost as soon as they were through. Brinspool had found his pace, however, and went through time and again for two- and three-yard gains. Twice play was stopped while the distance was measured, but each time the Blue had an inch or two to spare. Then the thirty-yard line was reached and Kendall, who all this time had never once been given the ball and had done no more than interfere for the runner, observed Simms anxiously. But that youth was not ready to try a field-goal yet. Plant and Brinspool hammered the left guard and slid off the left tackle, Crandall made a slight gain on an end run, and the twenty-yard line was under foot. But then Nordham, desperate, made a stand. Crandall sliced through between right guard and tackle for two yards and Brinspool made four straight through center. But with four to go on the third down the prospect didn’t look encouraging. Merriwell whispered to Simms and Simms nodded.
“Kick formation! Burtis back! Hold that line, fellows!”
Kendall trotted back to the thirty yards and the defense for the kicker grouped in front. Whether he could catch the pass Kendall didn’t know. That splinted hand seemed terribly awkward to him. But when the ball came back, breast high, his hands closed upon it automatically, and he stepped forward, dropped it, swung and sent it high and straight over the bar!
A burst of cheering swept across the field, and Crandall was patting him on the back. “One more like that, Kendall, and we’ll have ’em tied!” he shouted.
Seven minutes remained as Nordham brought out the ball and lined up for a scrimmage. Two tries netted her six yards, and then again she punted. This time the ball went out at the fifty-five-yard line, and there was no chance to run it back. Yardley started again toward the Red’s goal with an end run by Simms that tore off twelve yards. Then Crandall, taking the ball on a delayed pass, swung around the left end of the Red’s line and secured nearly fifteen yards before he was brought down from behind. In the tackle his knee was badly wrenched and, although he got into the next play, his usefulness for that day was at an end and Greene took his place. Payson also seized the opportunity to relieve Girard and Captain Merriwell, Best and McKesson going in. Plant plowed through for four and Greene made three. Kendall, by this time forgetting his injured hand, was in every play, and it was after Brinspool had staggered around right tackle for enough to make the distance, with Kendall putting out the opposing end, that the latter had cause to remember that left wrist. Brinspool, following him closely, lurched against him as he staggered by, and the full weight of the big fellow came against that injured arm. For an instant Kendall wanted to crumple up on the soggy turf and forget everything. But he didn’t, and the pain soon passed.
A fumble by Greene on the next play set them back five yards, Kendall falling on the ball in a puddle just ahead of a frantic Nordham tackle. Brinspool failed to gain at center, Plant got four yards through the right side, and, with six to gain, Kendall punted. By this time the ball was soaked through to the rubber and was pretty “dead,” and the punt carried only thirty yards. The result was that the Nordham quarter had to run forward for it, and just as he reached it the treacherous ground took a hand in affairs. The pigskin went through his arms as he recovered his stride, bounded along the wet turf, throwing a spray behind it, and then rolled toward the side-line. Adler, who had been put out of the running by a Nordham back, had got to his feet again and was coming down fast. The other Yardley end, Cousins, had overrun. Adler, without easing his pace, swung sharply toward the right, slipped, recovered himself and dived a good ten feet for the ball just as a Nordham half-back raced by. The two came together and the water spouted as they rolled in the mud. But Adler had the ball, and it was down on Nordham’s twenty-eight yards, and the Yardley supporters, who had by this time abandoned the stand and were clustered deep along the rope, set up a triumphant frenzied shout.
“Touchdown! Touchdown! Touchdown!” they clamored.
Holmes raced on with waving hand. “Quarter, sir!” he called. “You’re off, Simms!”
“Oh, get out of here!” snapped Simms.
“Payson’s orders,” answered Holmes.
“You’re delaying the game, Yardley,” came the warning. Simms looked at Holmes indecisively. Then his head went down and he walked away.
“Now then, fellows,” called Holmes. “Get into it! You’re not playing! Brace up, Stark, brace up! Let’s put this over in six plays, fellows!”
Brinspool got a yard and a half through center and Greene followed with four yards past left tackle. Holmes darted through right guard for the distance, squirming and fighting.
“First down!” The referee waved his arm to the linesmen.
“Line up quick!” roared Holmes. “Over with it! Let’s try their left, fellows!”
And Holmes actually sent Greene against the left wing, but gained less than a yard. Brinspool tried the other side and got past for four.
“Kick formation! Burtis back! Hold hard now!”
But the ball went to Holmes and he passed to Brinspool, and the big full-back charged into the line like a steam engine and went through with half the Nordham team hanging about him. There was an anxious moment while the ball was hunted, but when it came to light it lay a good two feet beyond the tenth yard. Only nine yards away was the goal line. Across the trampled field the Yardley supporters were shouting incessantly. Holmes raised an imploring hand and comparative quiet fell. The Nordham captain was begging and scolding up and down his line:
“Now stop ’em, men! Don’t give ’em another foot! Throw ’em back! Into it hard and _watch the ball_!”
Holmes barked his signals. Kendall dashed at the guard-tackle hole on the left, Brinspool followed him, Greene darted across, took the ball at a hand-pass and, followed by Holmes, squirmed between guard and tackle on the other side for two yards. Seven yards to go!
“Kick formation! Burtis back! Now hold them, fellows!”
“_Block this kick!_” shouted the Nordham captain.
Holmes shouted his signals.
“Fake!” yelled the Red’s captain. “Watch it! Watch it!”
And a fake it was, the pigskin going to Plant, who had dropped back of the line. The tackle swung to the left and darted at the opposite tackle. But Nordham was there, and he went down as though he had run against a wall.
“Get up! Get up!”
“That’s the way to hold ’em! We’ve got ’em now! They don’t dare to kick!”
“Third down! Six to go!”
“Line up, fellows! You’ve got to put it over! Get down there, Best! Kick formation! Burtis――――”
But Holmes paused, for Kendall was whispering to him.
“A field goal will only tie it, Holmes,” said Kendall eagerly. “They’re looking for a kick. Let me try a run around the left end. Their ends are away in. I can do it! Fake a kick, Holmes, and let me try it!”
For an instant Holmes hesitated. Then, with a flash in his eyes, “All right! But I’ll get the dickens if we lose the ball, Burtis. You’ve got to make it go, remember!”
“I will,” answered Kendall grimly.
“Kick formation! Burtis back! Do your best, fellows! Remember last year!” Then came the signals and Kendall saw the sudden look of surprise in Greene’s face as he shifted a few inches nearer the play. Cousins edged out a step, the opposing end eyeing him doubtfully. Then Best shot the ball back and Kendall, standing near the twenty-yard line, caught it. Snuggling it close in his injured elbow, he darted to the left. Then the field was in movement, the two teams racing between him and the goal. Luckily the Yardley line had held firmly, and in the second between his catching of the ball and the discovery of the play by the opponents Kendall had gained three good strides. The interference formed a moving wall between him and the pursuit as he pounded across the slippery turf. The only thing he feared was to miss his footing.
“In! In!” shrieked Holmes, sending a Nordham man sprawling, and Kendall, swinging to the right, made for the goal-line. A red-sleeved figure sprang in front of him, and Kendall’s right arm went out, there was a shock and the red sleeves slipped from view. One more white line passed under his feet. The air was filled with shouts. One of his own men stumbled into his path and went down. Kendall sprang over him, slipped, found his stride again, and looked into the wild, wide eyes of the Nordham quarter. Out went the straight arm again, but the quarter darted aside and sprang. His hands clutched at Kendall’s hips as the latter pivoted. The quarter’s hands slid from the slippery, rain-soaked canvas and closed like a vise about one leg. Kendall, gasping for breath, struggled on, that dead weight sliding behind him. He had lost all sense of location and had no idea how near to the goal-line he was. His only thought was to go on and on, somehow, as long as they would let him. Then a long red arm shot across his chest, a body banged against him, and he fell to one knee, clutching the ball desperately with both hands. He struggled to rise again, felt himself being pulled backward, resisted to the limit of his strength, and finally squirmed forward, burying his face in the cold, wet grass just as the whistle shrilled.
Someone pulled him over onto his back and wrested the ball away from him. For a moment, with closed eyes, he fought for breath. Then, conscious of a numbing pain in one arm and of a sound that beat upon his ears like breakers on a beach, he opened his eyes. The first thing he saw was a shock of red hair, then something brown and dripping, and, when the sponge was gone, leaving him gasping and half-blinded, a white-painted post so near that he could have stretched out his arm and touched it. Slowly his gaze traveled up the post until it found a bar set at right angles with it. He smiled satisfiedly. “It’s――over, isn’t it?” he asked weakly.
“A yard over,” answered Andy’s voice. “And now you’ll come off.”
“No, I must kick the goal,” Kendall demurred.
“Here, boys, get him out of this,” was Andy’s reply, and Kendall found himself being lifted to his feet.
“All right,” he muttered. “I can walk. Let me go, you fellows.”
But when they let him go he staggered and reeled and Andy had to hold him up. After that he went off to the bench quite docilely between two substitutes, regarding the faces that forever got in his way, faces with blazing eyes and wide-open mouths, through a haze of perplexity. Somehow, there was a great deal of noise going on!
Presently, blanketed, his arm once more in a sling, he was leaning back against the stand, quite satisfied with the world. From where he sat, quite alone save for Andy, he could see only the backs of the crowd, a crowd gone suddenly silent. He knew then that someone, probably Fales, was preparing to try a goal, and would have got up and gone to see had not Andy pushed him gently back into his seat.
“Be easy, can’t you?” he grumbled. “How do you think that wrist is going to get well if you don’t take care of it? If I’d had my way you’d never gone back there to-day. It’s a wonder you didn’t snap it out again.”
“All right, Andy,” replied Kendall happily. “I just wanted to see if we’d get the goal.”
“No matter if we do or we don’t,” said Andy, snapping his bag shut. “We beat ’em anyway, don’t we?”
“Yes, but――but what _is_ the score?”
“Nine to six, and that’s good enough. How do you feel?”
“Oh, I’m all right, feeling fine. Nine to――――”
“No goal!” someone cried, and “No goal!” ran the verdict as the throng broke up to follow the ball back to the center of the field.
“Who kicked?” asked Kendall, as Jensen, substitute tackle, came by trailing his blanket in the mud.
“Fales. Missed it by only a foot, I guess. That was a great run, Burtis.”
“Can you walk all right?” asked Andy. Kendall got to his feet and tried it, finding that the dizziness was gone. “Then go on up before the crowd starts,” directed the trainer. “Get your duds off and take a hot tub. I’ll look after you when I come up.”
“Couldn’t I see the rest of the game?” begged Kendall.
“You could not,” answered Andy shortly. “Do as I tell you to do for once. First thing you know them howling hyenas will be wanting to lug you around on their shoulders and you’ll get hurt again. Off with you now. Go slow, but keep going!”
“All right. Will you find my sweater for me?”
“I will. Get out!”
So Kendall, feeling rather as though he had had a skyscraper fall on him and had been kicked by a mule, trudged out and up the path to the gymnasium, the clamor of shouts and cheers and the piping of the whistle lessening as he went. Halfway to the gymnasium, warned by a sudden burst of triumphant cheering, he turned and looked back. They were diving under the ropes and flooding onto the field. The game was over. Kendall, smiling blissfully, hurried on.
CHAPTER XX
HARRY REMEMBERS
“Broadwood had a little team, It couldn’t play at all, And ev’ry time it tried to pass It dropped the blooming ball! The ball, the ball, the ball, the ball, It dropped the blooming ball!
“It tried to play with Yardley once, And, oh, it was a shame To see the way old Yardley went And took away that game! The game, the game, the game, the game, And took away the game!”
“Some range, what?” asked The Duke, slapping Harry Merrow on the shoulder as they clattered up the last flight in Clarke. “Honestly, I don’t see how grand opera’s got along all these years without me! ‘The game, the game, the game, the game; And took away the ga-a-me!’ Get that chord? Kind of bad, what? Sometimes I have to pity Caruso and Scotti, old man.”
“Why, they don’t have to hear you, do they?” asked Harry innocently, as The Duke flung open the portal of Number 47.
“Good thing for them they can’t! They’d swallow a couple of solos and commit suicide. Sit down and be miserable. For once that Fido of mine isn’t here.”
“That what?” asked Harry, mystified.
“Pardon me; I should have said fidus, fidus Achates. Get me? Honestly, old man, I don’t know how I’m going to go on living with him. Here it is only the middle of November, and I’m worn to a string. My health is giving way under the strain. If I was only certain about one thing――――”
“What’s that?” asked the other, as The Duke paused thoughtfully.
“Whether he’s a skink or a bombyx. If I knew that I’d be able to get on better.”
“What the dickens is a――a skink?”
“A skink? Well, it’s something like a grus, only not nearly so intelligent.”
“You’re a silly chump,” laughed Harry.
“Worse than that, O Discerning One! I’m crazy, absolutely crazy! So would you be if you had to live with Cotton. Look at that table! See the mess! It’s always like that. I, personally, am naturally neat and tidy, Merrow, but Cotton――well, see for yourself! He――he annoys me!”
“Things do look a bit messy,” acknowledged Harry.
“Messy! My word! Messy, say you? That’s no name for it. It takes half my time keeping this place picked up. Well, let’s forget my troubles and talk about yours.”
“I haven’t any, I guess. Except that Kilts is down on me just at present and I’m having a bad time with math.”
“Well, you heard about me, didn’t you? Had a terrible falling-out with Old Tige; he got quite――quite insulting Saturday. You see, I――er――neglected to hand in a theme, and he said I’d have to do it by Saturday noon. And I really meant to because, of course, he was quite within his rights, you know. So Friday evening I went over to the library and worked and worked and delved and delved in the――the musty archives getting notes for one of the nicest little themes you ever saw! Oh, I must have worked for ten or fifteen minutes! Armed with my notes I returned here fully intending to sport my oak, as we say in dear old England, and do that theme. But here was Cotton scratching away with his old pen and shuffling his silly feet and making noises in his throat. It was quite impossible to write a theme under such circumstances. So I――well, I didn’t. Says I to myself, I will arise betimes in the morning and do it. Which I did; that is, fairly betimes. But where were my notes? I ask you, Merrow, as man to man, where were my notes? Flown! Decamped! Utterly vanished! So, as there was no time to get more notes, I started in to write a theme on the simple little subject of Walter Scott. It was a――well, a hurried effort, and as it turned out I got Sir Walter mixed up in my mind with Thackeray. Result, disapproval on the part of Mr. Edmund Gaddis; disapproval and hard words. I was patient with him, Merrow, but it was difficult, for he said things no gentleman should say to another. We parted――well, scarcely friends. And I’ve got two themes now hanging over my head instead of one. And only until to-morrow evening to do them.” The Duke sighed and shook his head. “But such is life!”
“Too bad,” murmured Harry sympathetically. “And the dickens of it is that this is no time to push a fellow’s nose to the grindstone. No fellow can do decent work just before the Broadwood game; it isn’t fair to expect it.”
“I wish that silly game was over with,” said The Duke fervently. “Honest, I get so excited and nervous and stirred up about it you’d think I was going to play quarter-back. By the way, Duffey――he rooms with Bert Simms, you know――Duffey says Bert is all up in the air over the game; doesn’t sleep for calling signals all night, and can’t eat.”
Harry looked incredulous. “Why, I saw Simms this morning and talked to him, and he seemed as untroubled as you please.”
“That so? Well, it’s only what I heard. How is Burtis’s arm getting on? I haven’t seen him since Sunday.”
“All right. They’re having a leather cuff made that’s to fit right over the wrist. I didn’t know a simple dislocation could be so bad.”
“What’s the difference between a dislocation and a sprain?” demanded The Duke.
Harry shook his head. “I don’t know. I suppose that when you sprain your ankle you just pull the tendons, don’t you, or the ligaments? And when you dislocate it you throw the bone out of joint.”
“I’m glad we don’t have to take an exam in physiology right now,” said The Duke.
“Yes, lucky for us,” laughed Harry. “They say the trouble with Kendall’s wrist is that he’s likely to dislocate it again very easily if he isn’t careful. Payson has let him off practice for the rest of the week, Gerald says.”
“Good stuff! After the way he played Saturday they’d ought to let him do as he pleases. I certainly thought they had us beaten there for a while!”
“Me, too. What do you think about Broadwood? Think we have any show, Duke?”
“If Payson plays the right sort of game, yes. If he keeps those heavy beef-eaters eternally on the jump by hitting their ends we may tire them out enough to get within kicking distance. When we do we want to let Burtis do the rest, for we’ll never get a touchdown by straight line-plunging. Did you see the score they rolled up on Forest Hill?”
Harry nodded. “Twenty-seven to six. Forest Hill scored, though.”
“On a forward pass that ought never to have worked. They can say what they like about Broadwood being fast, and maybe they are fast for their weight, but they can’t be fast enough to stand a running game very long. Payson ought to send our backs around their ends, try forward passes and all his bundle of tricks, Merrow. Just plain, old-fashioned football won’t make a dent in that team!”
“That’s what I think. And they say he’s got a lot of good plays outside tackles. But the trouble is that our own team isn’t so all-fired fast, Duke.”
“It’s the slowest Yardley team I ever saw,” replied The Duke. “If Payson doesn’t get some jump and ginger into it between now and Saturday we’re goners.”
“And as this is Tuesday and there wasn’t much jump yesterday, I guess we are!”
“Oh, you can’t tell by yesterday. Monday’s always a bad day. There ought to be a difference by to-morrow, though. He’s got nothing to do except put pep into them and teach the new signals, as I understand it. I suppose they’re learning signals to-day, and that’s why practice is secret, eh?”
“I suppose so. To-morrow’s is to be secret, too, I hear. The only time we’ll see them in action again before the game will be Thursday. Oh, well, we’ll hope for the best.”
“And fear the worst! By the way, I understand there’s talk of making Burtis captain next year.”
“What?” exclaimed Harry. “Who says so?”
“Well, it seems to interest you! Why, I don’t know just where I heard it; someone said something about it yesterday; said the players had been talking about it since Saturday’s game. I suppose Burtis made rather a hit with them Saturday.”
“He made a hit with all of us, I guess! It was mighty plucky to make that touchdown with his wrist all banged up. I wish they would give him the captaincy.”
“Well, I don’t know. Yes, I’d like him to have it if he wants it, because I think he’s a mighty nice, straight sort. But whether he’s got the stuff in him that leaders are made of――――”
“I know. I’ve wondered about that myself. And here’s what I’ve concluded, Duke. I’ve concluded that Kendall Burtis is the sort of chap who doesn’t show goods until they’re called for. I mean that while he seems very quiet and easy-going and not especially brilliant, just put responsibility on him and he sort of blazes up. See what I mean?”
“I get you, O Solomon! I guess you’re right, too. Look at Saturday. He was the man of the hour then, wasn’t he? And, anyhow, he’s as promising as any of the other fellows who are eligible. Goodness knows, Pete Girard or Fales wouldn’t make a captain. Howard Crandall might do. It’s too bad Holmes isn’t going to be with us another year.”
“Yes, he’d make a good one. Hello, I didn’t know you were interested in postage stamps, Duke.” Harry had taken a yellow covered pamphlet from the table and was reading the inscription on it: “Parkinson’s Bulletin for November――Rare Stamps for Collectors.” “Stamps used to be a hobby of mine. I’ve got a couple of thousand of them at home.”
“That isn’t mine, that’s Cotton’s. He gets more truck like that than you can shake a stick at. He collects the foolish things, he says. Got me cornered one night and babbled about ‘cancellations’ and ‘watermarks’ and ‘perforations’ until I had the earache. He says―――― Say what’s the matter with you? Feel ill, do you?”
“Wait!” replied Harry sharply. He was staring intently, scowlingly at the window. Suddenly his face cleared and he gave a laugh of triumph. “I’ve got him!” he cried. “I’ve got him!”
“Hooray! Who have you got?”
“Cotton!”
“You may keep him,” declared The Duke with enthusiasm. “And I don’t care what you do with him!”
“Look here,” exclaimed Harry eagerly. “Do you remember some time ago my saying I was certain sure I’d seen Cotton before somewhere?”
The Duke shook his head doubtfully. “I don’t remember. Maybe. Well?”
“I was positive I’d seen him, even talked to him. It bothered me a lot. I used to stare at him in class and cudgel my brains about it, but I couldn’t place him. But I was right all the time, and this gave me the clue.” He tapped the stamp catalogue on his knee. “And when you said he was a stamp collector it all came back to me like a flash.”
“Well, go on; where did you meet him?”
“Do you remember two years ago when some of the fellows went to Broadwood one night and put a sign on the campus?”
“Sure!”
“Well, I don’t know whether you ever knew who the fellows were, but I did. And one day I got a letter from a fellow named Charles Cotton, at Broadwood――――”
The Duke whistled.
“――――asking me to exchange stamps with him; duplicates, you know. We arranged a meeting in Greenburg, at Wallace’s, and we got together there and chinned awhile. I think we made one or two swaps, but I don’t remember for certain. Anyway, it turned out that what Cotton really wanted was to find out the names of the fellows who had played the trick on Broadwood. You remember how mad they were over there? Well, Cotton had a stamp――it was a blue Cape of Good Hope――that I wanted terribly. I offered him a lot of revenues for it――he was rather keen on revenues――but he wouldn’t let go; wanted four or five dollars cash, I think. Finally, though, he as much as said that if I’d tell him the names of the fellows who had been at Broadwood that night he’d make me a present of the stamp. But I got suspicious and finally went away. You know they did learn who one of the fellows was.” Harry paused, darting a doubtful glance at The Duke.
The latter nodded. “I remember. You had a grouch with Thompson and squealed on him. If I’d been Thompson I’d have broken your neck.”
“I deserved it,” replied Harry. “I must have been an awful little brute then. But I didn’t realize what I was doing, and I was good and sorry for it afterward, Duke.”
The Duke nodded again. “We always are when it’s too late. But never mind about that. You and Thompson made it up all right. So that was Cotton, was it? By Jove, I can well believe it! It’s just the sort of thing I could imagine him doing. If I wanted a piece of dirty work done, Merrow, I’d ask Cotton to do it. That’s the way he’s impressed me all along. And to think that I’ve got to have him on my hands the rest of the year!”
“But why do you suppose he doesn’t own up to having been at Broadwood two years ago?”
“Probably ashamed of it. Maybe he left under a cloud. It’s a fair wager he did, too. I’m blessed if I’m going to have him in here with me, Merrow. He will have to change his room. If he won’t, I’ll make it so hot for him he won’t want to stay here! You don’t mind if I make use of what you’ve told me?”
“N-no, I suppose not. I don’t want to make trouble for the fellow, of course. As long as he behaves himself here――――”
“You don’t have to put up with him all day,” growled The Duke. “I can be as charitable as the next chap, but charity begins at home, and I don’t see why I’m required to room with a fellow like Cotton. I hate a sneak, anyway!”
“Maybe I oughtn’t to have said anything,” doubted Harry, “but when it came to me who he was I couldn’t help blurting it out. Funny I didn’t remember him before. His face was so familiar all the time that it worried me to death. I seemed to be always on the point of remembering, but never did.”
“I’m going to find out why he left Broadwood,” said The Duke resolutely. “I know a chap over there――Billy Deemer――I’ll write and tell him to let me know.”
“Well, I wouldn’t tell it around,” said Harry. “After all, Cotton never did anything to me.”
“He’s never done anything to me, either,” replied The Duke grimly, “and I’m going to see that he never has a chance to! All I want is to get him out of here. After that he can do as he pleases. I’ll write to Billy this evening. Let’s get out of doors, Merrow. By Jove, do you know it’s almost four? Let’s walk over to the gym and see the team come in.”
CHAPTER XXI
KENDALL MAKES A SPEECH
Yardley was in the final throes of excitement, an excitement that approached the border of hysteria as Saturday drew nearer and nearer. Rumors of all kinds filled the air. Furniss, Broadwood’s clever left-end, who, it was generally agreed, would cause more trouble to Yardley’s end-running game than any other member of the rival team, was down with mumps and wouldn’t be able to play. Furniss was not down with mumps; at least, not that Furniss; it was a younger brother in the Junior Class who was ill. Broadwood had gone all to pieces after the Forest Hill game; had played too hard and was in the middle of an awful slump. Broadwood had showed up better at practice on Wednesday than any day all season. Simms was a nervous wreck and wouldn’t begin the game Saturday. Simms never felt better in his life, and was as cool as a cucumber. Burtis was out of the game, inflammation having set in in his broken wrist. Burtis’s injury was doing finely and he would at least start the game for Yardley. Stark was having trouble with the Office and might not be allowed to play against Broadwood; his case was to come up at faculty meeting Friday night. Stark was all square with the faculty and anyone who said otherwise didn’t know what he was talking about!
And so it went, one rumor crowding on the heels of another until it took a good part of one’s time keeping up with the gossip! Tuesday’s practice was held in secret and so was Wednesday’s. Most of the time was devoted to familiarizing the team with the new signals and smoothing out the plays to be used on Saturday. Those two days were hard ones and everyone was kept on the jump every minute. The actual scrimmage was short and often interrupted. On Wednesday night there was a signal drill in the gymnasium. The doors were closed more as a matter of habit than anything else, since it was a well understood thing that none save the team, the coaches and trainer were to enter. Consequently when, toward the end of the blackboard instruction, Manager Davis suddenly sprinted across the floor and up the stairs to the running track and spent ten minutes poking around in corners for spies he was well laughed at.
“But I did see him,” protested Perky excitedly. “I saw his head right up there at the curve of the balcony. Had some sort of a cap on and he was peeking over the railing!”
“You imagined it,” said Merriwell. “Anyhow, if you did see someone where the dickens did he get to?”
Davis couldn’t answer that, though, and finally he acknowledged that he might have been mistaken; that since the Gibson affair he had had spies on the brain, so to speak.
The Duke was in the throes of composition that evening, having at last settled down to the writing of the themes, when Cotton, who had disappeared a half-hour before with a vague mention of the library, returned unostentatiously with a book. The Duke glanced up incuriously, his mind on his work, favored Cotton with a brief and somewhat hostile stare, and was in the act of returning his gaze to the paper before him when a detail of the other’s attire caught his eye.
“Did you know you’d torn your coat there at the pocket?” he asked.
Cotton pulled his coat quickly around and looked at the rip.
“Yes, I――I did that this morning,” he answered carelessly. “I caught it on a door knob.”
But The Duke was already immersed again in his labor, scowling at the sheet and muttering as he wrote.
The next day the janitor found a small round window in an alcove off the running-track in the gymnasium swinging open. Not having heard of Davis’s hallucination, however, he merely fastened it again and thought nothing of it.
The weather turned mild on Thursday, and when in the afternoon the team held open practice and the school lined the ropes and cheered and sang for a full half-hour, the warm sunlight and gentle southerly breeze suggested baseball rather than football. Later the fellows crowded about the front of the gymnasium and cheered some more, cheered every member of the team individually, cheered Coach Payson and Andy Ryan and Manager Davis and the two rubbers, and cheered long and loud and repeatedly for “Yardley! _Yardley!_ YARDLEY!”
In the evening there was a grand mass-meeting, the supreme gathering of the season, with the whole team seated about the platform and the musical clubs grouped behind them, with Mr. Payson and Mr. Collins and Mr. Bendix for guests of honor and Andy Ryan peeping out from a corner, and with the President of the First Class, Mr. Gerald Pennimore, acting as master of ceremonies. The Assembly Hall was filled long before the hour set for the meeting. The audience was in high feather, and while it waited for the proceedings to formally commence it sang and cheered and stamped and indulged in mild “rough-house” to its heart’s content.
Promptly at seven-thirty the team and the musical clubs filed on to the platform, followed by the head coach and the faculty members, and Gerald held up a hand for silence. As the fellows were busily cheering the players, Gerald had to stand there patiently several minutes before he could make himself heard. Even then he had to wait while a cheer was given “for Pennimore, fellows! And make it good!”
Gerald’s address was short and earnest. He asked for the loyal support of the team, whether in victory or defeat, and introduced Mr. Collins. The Assistant Principal, trim and smiling, said about what he usually said on such occasions, was duly applauded, and yielded to Captain Merriwell. Merriwell was very earnest, but, not being a fluent speaker, made poor going and relied more on repetition than variety. However, the spirit of his discourse met with enthusiastic approval, and after he had returned to his seat it was some time before Coach Payson found a chance to have his say. The coach started out in a rather jocular mood and told two or three stories that set the audience shouting with laughter. In the end, however, with a sudden change to gravity, he said: “I’d like to be able this evening to assure you all that we are going to win on Saturday, fellows, but I can’t. Frankly, to my mind this year’s contest is more in doubt than any contest for two years. I don’t know whether we’ll win or lose, fellows. Broadwood has a far better team than she had last year. She’s farther advanced, is playing together well and is powerful. In weight she has the better of us. So far, her record beats ours. On the other hand, we have a team that has not yet played as well as it is able to play――――”
A shout of approval broke forth.
“――――and a team that has strong possibilities. It isn’t a great team to-day judged by Yardley standards, but it may be a great team on Saturday. It’s a well-rounded team, a team of hard-working, willing players, every one of whom is ready to do his utmost――and a little more――for the school the day after to-morrow. And now it’s up to the school to help the team, fellows. I want you all to believe in it, to stand back of it, to encourage it by thought and action every minute between now and the last whistle on Saturday. (Cheers.) We’re going to play the game on foreign soil, so to speak, but whatever handicap that proves to us can be offset by your support. During the game let the team know that you’re there and right with them all the time. Don’t cheer just to make a noise, and don’t cheer just to rattle the other fellow, but cheer because you want your team to win and want to tell them so. And don’t stop cheering if the luck goes against them. If they find themselves losing they’ll play all the harder. Do the same, fellows; if the team gets in a hole, cheer all the harder――until it’s out!”
The applause was so loud and prolonged that the coach had to wait a minute before he could go on.
“I guess that’s about all I have to say. I want to thank you all on my behalf, just as Captain Merriwell has thanked you on behalf of the team, for the way you’ve stood behind me all the season, just as you’ve stood behind me so many seasons previous. It’s a great thing for a coach to feel that the school has confidence in him. There are always moments of discouragement, and at such moments the loyalty of the school is what helps most. Saturday will show whether our team is a great team or merely a good team, fellows. But whether we win or lose it will still be _the_ team just the same!”
In the midst of the cheering that followed, the Banjo and Mandolin Club started “Fighting for Old Yardley,” and the Glee Club took it up and presently the whole hall was singing:
“All together! Cheer on cheer! Now we’re charging down the field! See how Broadwood pales with fear, Knowing we will never yield! Wave on high your banner blue, Cheer for comrades staunch and true; We are here to die or do, Fighting for old Yardley!”
The second verse followed, and by this time the instruments were quite drowned out by the voices that roared the words of the song. At the end Gerald arose and, with upheld hand, smilingly begged silence. When, finally, the appeal was heeded he called on Mr. Bendix, and the Physical Instructor made a rather dry little speech, fortunately as brief as dry. Then someone called “Simms! We want Simms!” and the meeting took up the cry with laughter and approval. Simms, very red of face, shook his head in grinning embarrassment, but the demand increased, and Gerald went across and held out his hand to the quarter. Simms, however, thrust his own hands in his pockets and shook his head vehemently. The meeting laughed, but persisted. Gerald was seen to bend down and speak to Simms, and at last the quarter rather indignantly jumped up and strode to the front of the platform. The shouts died suddenly, and a couple of hundred of smiling faces confronted him.
“I can’t make a speech, and you fellows know it,” said Simms accusingly. “But Pennimore says I’ve got to say something to shut you up. So I’ll just say that if you make half as much noise Saturday when you cheer as you have to-night ragging me we can’t help winning!”
Simms nodded and strode back to his chair, while the audience laughed and cheered and stamped. Then someone demanded, “Andy! We want Andy Ryan!” and eventually Andy had to stand up at the back of the platform and make a bow. But the cries of, “Speech, Andy! Speech!” fell on deaf ears. The Glee Club leader consulted with the leader of the Banjo and Mandolin Club while the turmoil continued, and the musicians began to pick at their instruments. But evidently the meeting was not yet ready for songs. “We want more speeches!” declared a voice in front. “A-a-ay! More speeches!” agreed the hall at large. Feet began to stamp in time to the refrain: “Speeches, speeches, we want speeches! Speeches, speeches, we want speeches!” Suddenly a voice at the left of the room, and it sounded a lot like Harry Merrow’s, cried, “Burtis! Burtis! We want Burtis!”
A howl of approval thundered forth. The clamor took on new strength. “Burtis! Burtis! We want Burtis!” declared the assembly. Feet stamped wildly, and fellows at the back of the hall stood up in order to shout louder. Gerald turned and searched with his gaze for Kendall, who, sitting in the second row, had slunk down behind the broad back of Pete Girard. “Burtis! Burtis! We want Burtis!” clamored the throng. Finally Jensen and Marion, who were seated on either side of Kendall, strove to drag him to his feet. The audience applauded them. Girard arose and dragged his chair away, revealing Kendall, red of face, striving mightily to escape publicity. Gerald spoke to him, and Kendall got up and bowed awkwardly and sank into his seat again. But the school was not satisfied. “Speech, Burtis! We want a speech!” “Kick us a speech, Burtis!” Kendall, smiling wanly, was seen shaking his head at Gerald, who was bending over him and evidently trying to persuade him to say something. The turmoil continued, gathering in volume rather than diminishing. Gerald had Kendall by his well arm now, and was pulling him out of the chair. Reluctantly Kendall allowed himself to be conducted to the front of the platform. Gerald, smiling, waved his hand and stepped back. The hall quieted quickly, and a most appalling silence succeeded the tumult. Kendall, no longer blushing, but white-cheeked from fright, began to speak. None, however, save those in the front rows could hear him, although the hall was so still that one might have heard a pin drop. Finally, “Louder, please!” called a distant voice. “You’re misjudging the distance!” There was a laugh at that and even Kendall smiled rather tremulously, and when he went on his voice had gained strength.
“I’ve been saying that I never made a speech before,” he said, “and so you’ll please excuse me now. I――I hope we will win the game, and I’m sure we fellows on the team will do the best we know how. Thank you.” He bowed and turned. At that moment a small Prep at the back of the hall piped up:
“How’s your arm, Burtis?”
Kendall turned back, looked in the direction of the voice and replied quite naturally: “Getting along nicely, thank you.”
A howl of delight and laughter arose as Kendall, blushing again now, fairly scuttled to his seat and disappeared from sight, while a deep voice down front was heard to proclaim, “Anyway, he doesn’t kick with his arm!” At which the laughter increased.
The demand for more speeches began again, but Gerald sprang to the edge of the platform and asked for a cheer for Yardley. It came with a will. Then the players were cheered one after another, beginning with Captain Merriwell and ending with the last substitute, and Coach Payson was cheered, and Andy Ryan, and, finally, “The team, fellows! A long cheer, and get into it!”
Afterward the music began, and they went through the half-dozen songs selected for the game, finally ending up with “The Years Roll On,” every fellow on his feet, many of them a little choky as they sang. More cheers then, somewhat indiscriminate, a scraping of settees and feet, and the meeting was over.
Gerald and Kendall met in the corridor and walked back to Clarke together. In front of Oxford some fifty or sixty fellows were still singing and cheering, declaring at intervals that “We want a parade! We want a parade!” When Gerald and Kendall reached the steps of Clarke, Mr. Collins was doing his best to persuade the throng that it wanted nothing of the sort, that what it really wanted to do was to go to its rooms and behave itself. From the fact that the singing gradually died away it may be inferred that Mr. Collins was right.
“Why did you make me get up there and try to talk?” demanded Kendall aggrievedly as the two climbed the stairs.
“Good practice,” replied Gerald imperturbably. “It’s a handy thing to know how to make a speech.”
“I guess I’ll never have to make many,” returned Kendall.
Gerald smiled knowingly. “You never can tell,” he said.
CHAPTER XXII
TWO SHEETS OF BUFF PAPER
The warm weather continued on Friday. Between recitations The Prospect and entrances of the halls swarmed with boys, all intent on the discussion of just one subject, the morrow’s game. There was a wide difference of opinion as to the outcome of it. Fellows who two weeks ago had predicted a Yardley victory were now shaking their heads gloomily and talking defeat, while others, erstwhile pessimists, were now jubilantly prophesying a glorious triumph for the Blue. Perhaps there was somewhere a fellow who managed to put the game out of his thoughts and attend to his duty in the form of study, but if so he wasn’t in evidence. Yardley frankly consigned lessons to the limbo of things left undone, and the faculty wisely shut its eyes.
In the afternoon the Cross-Country Team trotted over the course for the last time before the race, and the Football Team held what was expected to be and what would ordinarily have been its final signal drill. But to the surprise of the fellows who gathered in the gymnasium that afternoon the coach announced that it had been decided to make a change in the signal code. Payson said he regretted the necessity, but made no explanation of the reason.
“I’ll make it as easy as possible, fellows,” he said. “There isn’t time to learn thoroughly a new set of signals, and so we will change the code by making the second number the fake instead of the first. That is, the second digit of the first number will indicate the man, the second number will be a fake, and the second digit of the third number will indicate the hole. Thus 28, 76, 93 means that full-back carries the ball for a plunge through guard-tackle hole on the left, the 76 being the fake number. In the same way, on a kick the signal will be ‘Kick formation, So-and-so back; 59, 107, 22, the first number, 59, holding the kick digit, 9, and the other numbers being fillers. Just remember that the first number indicates the player instead of the second, that the second is the fake, and that the third indicates the hole. Now, as to special plays. The key number has been any number over 500 for those, given as the second number in the signal. We’ll change that, I think, and make the key number any number over 200 and have it the first number in the series. Thus the signal for the delayed forward pass to the left will be 217, 21, 175, the last two numbers being merely fillers. You’ll have to study this, fellows, between now and to-morrow afternoon, for there mustn’t be any mix-up on signals. There’ll be another drill here this evening at eight o’clock. And between now and then I want every one of you to plot out on a sheet of paper one or more plays. Indicate each position with circles or squares, label each one with letters, as ‘R. E.’ for right end, and so on, trace the progress of the ball, show how the interference moves, and underneath give the correct signals for the play. Also be sure and sign your name in the upper right-hand corner of the sheet. Don’t neglect this matter, if you please. I want to know that each one of you is familiar with the signals. Bring the papers here this evening and hand them to Mr. Davis. All right now; let’s see those plays!”
There was much speculation and not a little dissatisfaction among the fellows after the drill was over. Simms especially was bitter and sarcastic, but Simms’s nerves were pretty taut just then and he may be excused some show of annoyance.
“Just when we get the signals down pat he goes and changes them,” said Simms in the locker room later. “And what for, I’d like to know? Putting the fake number in the middle is a fool piece of business, I think.”
Captain Merriwell, to whom Simms addressed his remarks, was noncommital. “I suppose Payson has a good reason for it,” he replied. “It isn’t likely he’d do it unless he had, Bert. You can bet he doesn’t want to risk a mix-up on signals to-morrow unless it’s absolutely necessary.”
“Well, the only reason for changing signals at the last hour that I can think of,” muttered Simms, “is that the other fellow has got on to them; and I don’t believe that!”
“I think he will explain this evening or to-morrow,” said Merriwell soothingly. “Meanwhile we’ve got to make the best of it and learn the new signals.”
“That’s well enough for you,” replied Simms bitterly. “You haven’t got to have the whole thing at the end of your tongue to-morrow. If I make a mistake I’ll get blamed for it.”
“Then don’t make any mistakes,” answered Merriwell quietly.
Simms stared at him a moment, outraged, and finally said, “Humph!” and relapsed into silence.
But Coach Payson didn’t explain that evening, or ever; at least, not to the team at large. After the evening’s session, however, he and Merriwell and Davis went over to the captain’s room, and there the only member of the trio who was in ignorance of the reason for the eleventh-hour change, Manager Davis, was enlightened.
“Now,” said Payson, when they were seated, “let’s see those papers, Davis.”
One by one he looked them over, comparing each with a much-creased sheet of buff paper which he extracted from his bill-book and laid beside him. Davis looked on curiously. Now and then Payson paused as he turned the papers over and glanced doubtfully at the buff sheet. Finally, when he had reached almost the bottom of the pile, he said “Hm!” very softly. A second sheet of buff paper was in front of him and he was studying it attentively. Presently, as though satisfied, he handed it to Captain Merriwell, following it with the creased sheet. The latter had been folded several times and was soiled, as though it had passed through many hands. Merriwell, frowning, compared one sheet with the other. Finally he nodded.
“I can’t believe, though, that he’d do a thing like that, sir,” said Merriwell troubledly.
“I can scarcely believe it myself,” replied the coach, “but there is the evidence. Show them to Davis. Davis, should you say that those two diagrams had been made by the same person?”
“Certainly,” replied the manager after a brief survey of them. “There can’t be any doubt of that, can there?” He looked at the name written in the corner of the fresher sheet. “But when did Burtis do this other one, sir?”
“That’s what we don’t know. Have you got that letter there, Merriwell?”
For reply Merriwell opened a drawer in the table, searched a moment and then handed a folded sheet of writing paper across to Perky. The latter opened it and read as follows:
“MR. CHARLES MERRIWELL, “Yardley Hall School, “Wissining, Ct.
“Dear Sir:
“There’s been a leak over at your place and some dirty work over here. The enclosed sheet, which, as I understand it, is supposed to be an explanation of your signals to be used Saturday, has just come into my hands. I’m sending it to you thinking that perhaps you will be able to find the sneak who sent it. We had nothing to do with it here. The fellow who obtained it did so without authorization on his own hook. I’m sorry about it, but I guess the only thing for you to do is to change your signals for the game. Let me know whether this reaches you. I don’t think it has been seen by more than three or four people here, including the fellow who received it, our coach, and myself, and we haven’t made any study of it. Nevertheless, you’d better protect yourself by changing your signals before the game. We’ll look after the fellow at this end, and I hope you’ll find the traitor at your end and give him what he deserves. You fellows can’t say we haven’t always played fair and you mustn’t blame us for this business. I hope we’ll have a good day for the game and a dandy contest.
“Yours truly, “WILLIAM L. RAYNOR.”
Davis laid down the letter and stared in bewilderment.
“Merriwell got that this morning,” said the coach. “We decided that the best way to trace the authorship of that document was to get all the players to make similar diagrams. There’s one peculiar thing about that first paper, Davis. You’ll notice that Burtis――supposing he did it, and I can’t see any reason to doubt it――labeled the positions with small letters. See what I mean? He has written, or, rather, printed, ‘l. h. b.’ in what printers call lower case, instead of ‘L. H. B.’ in capitals. Now, if you look through all the diagrams submitted to-night, and every fellow handed one in, you’ll find that Burtis is the only one who does that. Then, too, there is the evidence of the paper. Both sheets apparently were torn from the same block. The paper is the same, a deep buff in color. There’s one other paper there that is buff――I think it’s Brinspool’s――but it is lighter. Now, two and two usually make four, Davis.”
“Yes, but――but why should he do it? Why, the fellows were talking of him for captain!”
“Too bad! It’s beyond me; I can’t see any motive. The only explanation I can think of is that some Broadwood fellow got hold of him and fooled him. I’m not willing to think that Burtis did this realizing what it meant. It――it’s absolutely contrary to my conception of the boy’s character, Davis.”
“It was Gibson!” declared Perky. “I’ll bet you anything it was that fellow Gibson! You remember the day he came over to spy on us? We fooled him then, and so he got back at us. But I didn’t know Burtis knew him.”
“It’s a funny affair,” said Merriwell thoughtfully. “Anyway, there’s no use raising a fuss until after the game. We’re in a bad enough fix as it is. We’ve got to work like the very dickens to win to-morrow, and if we let this thing get out the team will be upset, probably, and we’ll get licked as sure as shooting. You aren’t going to say anything to him about it now, are you, sir?”
“No, I think not. Better let him alone. I don’t believe he is morally guilty, fellows. And we need him to-morrow if we ever did.”
“There’s one thing that puzzles me,” observed Davis. “It doesn’t seem as if the writing was in the same hand as the printing.”
“Yes, I noticed that. But very often a man writes differently with a pen than with a pencil. Besides, you can’t very well compare printing with writing. Anyway, whoever did it managed to give a very pretty exposure of our signal code. They’ve even got two special plays down there.”
“It’s a rotten piece of business,” exclaimed Davis. “And I’ll bet you anything that chap Gibson is at the bottom of it. Look here, Mr. Payson, suppose you let me have a talk with Burtis. Maybe I could find out about it without letting him know.”
But Payson shook his head and Merriwell dissented with a frown.
“Better not,” said the coach. “Wait until after the game. There’s enough to contend with now, Davis; don’t let us have any more upsets. We’ll let Burtis play his game to-morrow, giving him the benefit of the doubt, and ask an explanation later. It’s a good thing we are all agreed that he isn’t really guilty, fellows, for if we weren’t we’d have no right to let him play; and if he didn’t play”――Payson shrugged his broad shoulders――“we’d be in a hole, to say the least. Merriwell, you keep this truck until it’s wanted. Put it away somewhere where it won’t be seen. Great Scott, I wish this hadn’t happened!”
“So do I,” muttered Merriwell.
“Will the fellows know the new signals all right, sir?” asked Davis anxiously.
“I think so. The change is slight. You see, I’m taking Raynor’s word for it that they haven’t tried to profit by that document. If I thought they had I’d have changed the whole code over; made a new set of signals right through. As it is, I’ve only altered them enough to safeguard us. Well, I must be off. Get to bed, Merriwell, and try to forget the whole thing. After all, we’re no worse off than we were, or but very little. I must drop in on Simms a minute. He’s the one who is probably having fits. Good night. Good night, Davis. Not a word about this!”
“Not a word, sir. Good night.”
“Look here, Charlie,” said Perky, after the door had closed behind the coach, “I just don’t believe he did it!”
“Burtis?” Merriwell shrugged his shoulders wearily. “There’s the evidence.” He nodded at the littered table.
“Then he was fooled; someone got at him! He――he isn’t that sort, and you know it. Look here, they can’t make him captain with this thing hanging over his head, Charlie!”
“I don’t think he had a show anyway, Perky. Crandall’s the man for the job. I shall propose Crandall.”
“We-ell, yes, Howard’s all right, but――――”
“But what?”
“Well, there are a lot of the fellows want Burtis,” replied Perky frankly. “It’s too bad.”
“Oh, never mind about who’s the next captain,” exclaimed Merriwell crossly. “What we’ve got to do now is to win to-morrow’s game! Good night!”
CHAPTER XXIII
“NO GOAL!”
At last! The day of the game!
Many a boy awoke that morning to blink sleepily for a moment and then, full consciousness sweeping upon him, to experience a sudden tightening at the heart and a resultant shortness of breath. The moment he had been looking forward to for fifty-odd days was at hand! The greatest event of the school year was rushing toward him! It was enough to make any fellow feel a bit queer, a bit scared, too, for that matter. By evening he would be either triumphant and proud and happy or sickeningly disappointed, with the feeling that everything had dropped away from under him! So much depended on those short two hours of the afternoon!
The morning had a keen nip to it. The warm spell had taken its departure. The sky was blue, with an occasional slowly sailing cloud, and the sun was warm in sheltered places. But there was a frosty tang in the air, and Winter seemed just over the hills, ready at a moment’s notice to pounce down upon the Autumn world. A light breeze came out of the northwest and forbade loitering in shaded places. It was an ideal day for the game, with a dry field assured and small favor to either end of it.
In the forenoon Yardley got her first taste of victory, Gerald’s Cross-Country Team simply running away from Broadwood and winning 22 to 83. Yardley finished five men ahead of the first Broadwood runner, and then brought her sixth man in in eighth place and her seventh in ninth. Harry finished in fourth position, two minutes behind Gerald, who easily led the field all the way and trotted over the line smiling and seemingly fresh after his three-mile journey.
Later there was an early dinner in commons, and at a little past one o’clock the boys began to depart for Broadwood. Every sort of conveyance that the town of Greenburg afforded was on hand. Gerald piled his big automobile full of friends: Harry and The Duke and Lin Johnson, still in bandages, and others we haven’t met. The First Team journeyed to the scene of the game in a long barge drawn by three horses, and the Second Team had chartered a similar vehicle and followed close behind, in a cloud of dust and a holiday mood. The game was to begin at two-fifteen, and by half after one Yardley presented the appearance of a deserted village. I doubt if there remained behind more than three or four of the faculty and “Mr. McCarthy,” the janitor.
For details regarding the two teams which lined up against each other that afternoon we can do no better than consult the Greenport _News_. Here, then, is what the _News_ published:
HOW BIG PREP SCHOOLS WILL LINE UP TO-DAY
YARDLEY                                               BROADWOOD
Average weight of line, 170 lbs.        Average weight of line 175-1/7 lbs. Average weight of back field, 160 lbs.  Average weight of back field, 164 lbs. Average weight of team, 166-5/11 lbs.   Average weight of team, 171-1/11 lbs. Officials――A. D. Stone, Brown, Referee; Chas. Parent, Princeton, Umpire; H. I. Morris, Yale, Linesman. Time――15 minute quarters.
By two o’clock Yardley had taken possession of its section of the small stand and was overflowing all along the ropes on the west side of the field. Blue flags, white lettered, were abundant. Across the gridiron Broadwood massed her cohorts and waved her green banners. Fathers and mothers, sisters and brothers, aunts and cousins, faculty and townsfolk were present in numbers, while Old Boys of both schools swaggered about, patronizing, resplendent. The cheering began when the two teams trotted on from opposite corners, and it continued with only brief pauses until the final whistle sounded.
Broadwood won the toss and chose the north goal, Yardley kicking off to Saunders on his ten-yard line. The Green’s quarter ran back to the thirty-eight yards before he was smothered. The same player immediately fumbled, and Plant fell on the ball after it had rolled to Broadwood’s forty-seven yards. Two plays gained little, the Green line showing wonderful defensive powers, and Kendall kicked to Broadwood’s five-yard line. Saunders caught and ran back seven yards before he was downed. A Broadwood back fumbled, but the Green recovered the ball just inside the goal-line. Yardley was cheering like a band of wild Indians. A plunge at the line netted two yards, and then Reid kicked from behind his line, the ball going to Crandall in mid-field. Yardley was set back fifteen yards for holding on the first play. A forward pass went wrong and Kendall punted to Broadwood’s twenty yards, the ball going out. Broadwood got started then, and after three tries secured her first down of the game. The Yardley line showed weakness at the left of center. The Green worked a fake kick for twelve yards around Cousins’ end and followed it with two plunges at Fales which netted another first down. Fales braced then and Broadwood’s heavy full-back was pushed back for a loss. Saunders punted and Simms caught on Yardley’s thirty-two yards and was thrown in his tracks.
Yardley opened up with her end plays and Crandall and Kendall reeled off enough around Furniss to make her distance. Simms tried a forward pass again, and Adler got the ball for a small gain. A fumble by Simms, and the pigskin rolled ten yards back before Crandall recovered. Stark was caught holding, and Yardley was again put back fifteen yards. A try at right end failed, and Simms kicked from position, Cousins recovering for Yardley on his fifty-yard line. Two tries at tackle netted eight yards, and Kendall failed to make the distance through the left of center. Broadwood hammered the Blue line for short gains, and worked to Yardley’s thirty-five yards. A penalty for off-side set her back, a skin-tackle play put her on the Blue’s twenty-eight yards, and Saunders tried a goal from placement. The kick went short.
Yardley kicked off and Raynor caught and reeled off fifteen yards before he was thrown. Time was called, the Broadwood captain having been hurt in the tackle. Broadwood now made a desperate assault on her enemy’s defenses and twice made her distance. Fales and Plant were both playing high. Broadwood was caught using her hands and set back. Saunders punted, and Simms caught on his fifty-yard line and ran back twelve yards before he was thrown. The Broadwood line held firm, and after two tries at it Simms ran around his right end and made his distance. Marion went straight through center for six, but failed to gain on a second attempt in the same place. Kendall tried a wide run around his own left, but was thrown for a loss and the pigskin went to Broadwood. Concentrating on Yardley’s left wing the Green made eight yards in two tries. Fales was taken out, and Jackson went in. Gordon, of Broadwood, stole four yards around Stark, and the quarter ended.
So far Broadwood had shown better defensive power than her rival, and Yardley had exhibited a rather more varied attack. Simms was running the team too slowly, however, and seemed at times uncertain of his signals, although he had made no mistakes.
The second quarter opened with the ball in Broadwood’s possession near the center of the field. Two plays gained little, and Broadwood put in a substitute for Gordon. On the first play the ball went back to the new full-back, and the latter reeled off twenty-three yards through a broken field before he was finally run off at Yardley’s twenty-seven yards. After the ball was brought in Broadwood twice tried Plant and gained only four yards. Reid again tried a place kick, but Yardley’s forwards broke through and the ball bounded from Merriwell’s head and rolled to the forty yards, where Saunders fell on it for the Green. Broadwood now began to rip through the Yardley line between tackles and soon had the pigskin back within scoring distance. Girard was weakening fast, and on the eighteen yards Best was sent in for him. Broadwood’s backs were proving wonderful ground-gainers. Faking another try-at-goal from placement, the Green’s quarter took the ball for a run around his own left end. Kendall brought him down after a three-yard gain. With the ball on Yardley’s twelve yards Broadwood concentrated on Merriwell and made seven yards in two tries, a quick double-pass play being difficult to fathom for Yardley. With the pigskin on the five-yard mark and three to go on third down, with Broadwood thundering for a score and Yardley’s cheerers imploring the Blue to “Hold ’em! Hold ’em!” a touchdown seemed inevitable. The Green’s full-back took the ball and plunged at the guard-tackle hole on the right. For an instant the Blue yielded, but the secondary defense piled in to the rescue and when the whistle blew and the pile-up was untangled Broadwood had failed of her distance by six inches.
Kendall fell back between his goal-posts and got off a wonderful punt of fifty yards that Saunders found difficult to handle. The ball got away from him and rolled up the field, and by the time he had fallen on it on his fifty-yard line both Yardley ends were pinning him to the ground. Broadwood took up her journey again, but lost fifteen yards for holding, and finally punted from the Blue’s forty-five yards. The ball went over the line and Yardley put it in scrimmage on her twenty-five yards. End runs gained twice, and a forward pass took the ball to the Blue’s forty-eight yards. Marion found a weak place at the Green’s left wing and plunged through for seven, Kendall following this with a hair-raising run outside of tackle for twelve more. Yardley’s supporters howled their delight and went frantic a moment later when Simms took the ball on a trick play and dashed straight through the enemy’s center for ten yards. Someone, however, had been off-side, and the ball went back. Another end run went wrong and Kendall punted. Saunders caught, dodged Cousins and Stark, and came back fourteen yards. A fumble by the quarter was recovered for a loss. Broadwood failed to gain through the line and Reid punted. Simms ran back ten yards and was thrown. Kendall and Crandall worked a double-pass, and the latter got five yards around the Green’s right end, Thurston for once being caught napping. The half ended with the ball near the middle of the field in Yardley’s territory.
The teams trotted back to the gymnasium, and the rival camps sang their songs. Yardley had had the worst of it thus far, but her supporters were far from acknowledging the possibility of defeat. “Wait until we get the ball where Burtis can try a goal,” was the frequent prophecy. “Then you’ll see something!”
Fales was back at left guard when the third quarter began. Broadwood kicked off. Simms caught on his ten yards, and on the first line-up brought the Yardley students to their feet when, on a fake kick play, he dashed around Broadwood’s right end for twelve yards. A forward pass failed, Marion made three through left guard and Kendall booted. Broadwood came back desperately from her thirty yards, and in ten plays planted the pigskin squarely on the fifty-five-yard line. A plunge at the center gave her her distance. Stark was hurt, and after being patched up went back. But a minute later he was taken out and Jensen took his place. With two yards to go on a third down, Broadwood was thrown back and it was Yardley’s ball on her forty-three yards. Broadwood’s left end was negotiated twice, and it was first down for the Blue. Furniss was taken out and a red-headed, rangy youth took his place. But the gains still continued there, and, with Crandall and Kendall and Simms carrying the ball, four and five yards were torn off at a time. Marion provided variety by crashing through twice between right guard and tackle. Simms was running the team faster now and no longer seemed bothered about signals. There was one mix-up, however, which set the Blue back a good six yards. But this distance and two more yards was regained by Kendall, who sliced past left tackle. Broadwood was on the run and along the west side of the gridiron the blue flags waved triumphantly. Past the forty-yard line went the ball, past the thirty-five, Yardley still making her distance on each three tries. A mighty plunge by Crandall through left guard set the pigskin on Broadwood’s thirty yards. But Crandall was badly injured in the play and had to give place to Greene. Greene celebrated his arrival by immediately fumbling, and the ball went to the enemy on the threshold of her goal!
But Fate played fair for once. Two attempts at the Yardley line netted the Green six yards and Reid fell back to punt. There was a poor pass, Jensen got through and Reid was thrown, the ball bobbing out of his hands and across the field to where a half-dozen players of both sides scrambled for it. Plant was the fortunate one, and it was once more Yardley’s ball on Broadwood’s twenty-five yards. Marion tried the center and got two and Greene shot around the enemy’s left for three more, bringing the pigskin nearly opposite the goal-posts. Yardley waved and howled along the side-line as it saw Kendall walk back up the field. He pulled a handful of dry grass and tossed it into the air to study the wind. Then, with feet well apart, he raised his arms for the pass. The clamor died to silence and Simms’s signals came across the field sharp and brittle:
“_99-17-11!_”
Back shot the ball, the two lines heaved and struggled, the big Broadwood forwards plunged through, a tackle brushed Greene from his path and leaped with upstretched arms at the kicker. Too late, though! Calmly and slowly Kendall’s leg swung forward, the ball tapped on the ground, a foot met it squarely and it started upward and forward for the bar. A dozen hands strove in front of it, but it cleared them all. A veritable babel of triumph arose to the sky from the Yardley side, faltered, failed and died away as a volume of sound crashed from across the gridiron.
“No goal! No goal!” shrieked Broadwood.
CHAPTER XXIV
AROUND THE END
The blue-clad players were walking disconsolately back to the other end of the gridiron. The ball had passed under the bar instead of over; Kendall had missed goal by a foot only, but missed it he had. Murmurs of disappointment traveled along the west side of the field. For a minute the blue flags trailed discouragedly. But the teams were at it again, and there was still a good four minutes left of the quarter. Yardley advanced and lost the ball on a fumble. Broadwood made one first down and was forced to kick. Greene made a startling run after the catch, getting twenty-odd yards before he was stopped. Marion made two desperate plunges at left tackle and slid by each time for a short gain, and Kendall made the rest of the distance through right guard. Then came a penalty for off-side playing, and Kendall punted on the second down. Saunders caught and was downed, and the whistle blew for the third period. And there was still no score.
Payson sent Crandall back when the last quarter began, and made two other changes. Holmes took Simms’s place, and Brinspool went in for Marion. Fifteen minutes remained in which to conquer or lose, and as the two teams, each showing the effects of the struggle, faced each other again on Broadwood’s thirty-eight yards it was still anybody’s game.
Broadwood secured six yards on two plays, and then Reid, starting as if to round Yardley’s right end, suddenly stopped, turned and aimed a well-directed pass at the red-haired left end. The latter was quite alone and made a good catch, and in an instant he was streaking down the field. Only Holmes was between him and a touchdown, and Holmes was well over on the further side of the gridiron. Ten yards, fifteen yards, and the green-jerseyed youth was still running. Past the center of the field he sped, Holmes closing in on him cautiously, the rest of the enemy trailing along desperately in the rear. On Yardley’s forty-five yards the runner swung to the right as though to pass inside of Holmes, but the latter was wary and refused to follow. Another ten yards and the two met. The runner dodged to the left as Holmes dived, but the quarter’s tackle was sure, and after three struggling paces the Broadwood runner came to earth. Thirty-five yards he had reeled off, the ball was on Yardley’s twenty-seven and Broadwood cheered frantically. It was now or never for the Green, and all seemed to realize it. Yardley was for the moment disorganized, and her defense crumbled. The Green swept through for eight yards on the first play, gained her distance on the next and stood victoriously on the Yardley sixteen-yard line. A conference followed. Evidently Saunders was for trying a field goal, while Captain Raynor wanted a touchdown. Broadwood went back to her line-plunging. Holmes and Merriwell pleaded and threatened, and the Yardley line braced. Two yards was all Broadwood gained on her first attack, a yard and a half on her second. There seemed nothing for it then but a try at goal. Reid paced back and took kicking position. Saunders fell to his knees behind center. “Hold ’em now! Hold ’em! Get down, Smith! Stop that man, Peebles!” cried Saunders.
“Break through, fellows!” implored Holmes hoarsely. “Block this kick! Block it!”
Back went the ball, but not to Saunders. That youth flattened himself out of the way, and Reid was running to his right. A cry of warning broke from Holmes.
“Watch a pass! Watch a pass!”
But too late! Adler had been drawn in, and far to the right of the Yardley end the red-haired youth stood poised for the pass! Frantically a half-dozen Yardley players strove to reach Reid before he could throw. But already he had stopped, turned and was taking aim. Then away shot the ball, arching gently across the field to the waiting Broadwood end. Adler and Kendall rushed down upon him, but the ball descended into his hands on the five-yard line and he was away on the instant. Three strides and he was over the last lime mark and heading in toward goal. Simms pulled him down before he had centered the ball, but the damage was done. Broadwood had scored! On the blackboard at the end of the field appeared an ominous white figure 6!
The punt-out was caught but Saunders failed to kick the goal, and Yardley took what comfort it might from that. Eleven minutes of playing time still remained, and the Blue’s supporters refused to give up hope. Yardley had only to score a touchdown to tie, while a goal from the touchdown would win the game. The blue flags began to wave again half-heartedly, and the cheering started anew. The cheer leaders, their blue megaphones gyrating, did their utmost, but for a time the responses were weak. Broadwood took the defensive immediately after the kick-off and held to it. Yardley played desperately and every trick in her bundle was tried. Twice end runs were started that seemed destined to change the complexion of the game, but each time the runner was stopped before he could quite get away. From one forty-yard line to the other the play went back and forth, Broadwood punting on second down if not first and Yardley coming back with her end and tackle plays, punting only when forced to. And so nearly ten of the remaining eleven minutes passed away and Broadwood’s title to the contest grew momentarily stronger. The linesman had announced two minutes left and Yardley had just failed to gain on her second down near the Blue’s trampled forty-five-yard line. Holmes tried a quarter-back kick, and it worked, Cousins getting the ball on the Blue thirty-five yards. He was immediately tackled, however, and downed. Near at hand the blue flags were tossing ecstatically, and hundreds of throats were roaring an imploring chorus of “_Touchdown! Touchdown! Touchdown!_”
It was a time for desperate measures. The seconds were ticking off fast. Holmes hurried the line together.
“Come on! Come on! Signals! 38-107-45! 38-107――――”
Back went the ball, thudding against Brinspool’s stomach as he dashed forward. Merriwell and Jensen opened the hole and Brinspool staggered through, twisting, panting, the ball clutched tightly. The sound of rasping canvas, of bodies straining together, of grunts and cries, of panting breaths! A wild confusion of lunging, struggling forms, of grasping arms, of wide, anxious eyes, of white, tired faces, dirt-streaked and convulsed with effort! A faint, grumbling cry of “_Down!_” and the shrilling of the whistle! And Yardley had wrested four yards from the enemy!
“Line up, quick!” howled Holmes. “Get into this! We’ve got ’em going, fellows! They can’t hold us! Signals! Right tackle over! 98-16-107! 98-16――――”
It was Brinspool again; he was playing to-day as he had never played before all season; it was Brinspool between his tackle and end at the right, Brinspool taking the ball at a short throw and crashing past the Broadwood tackle for another three yards! Then the whistle again, and Merriwell, staggering out toward the side-line, asking the time, and Holmes begging him to come back and never mind.
“We’ve time to put it over,” he cried. “Line up, fellows!”
“Forty seconds!” called the linesman.
Holmes faltered and passed a hand over his face. Broadwood, jubilant, broke into exultant cries. “Hold them, Broadwood! It’s their last play! Stop this! Throw them back! Get under ’em!”
“Signals!” growled Holmes. “Kick formation! Burtis back!” He turned and viewed the positions. Greene and Brinspool were crouched already at the right, and Kendall, white-faced but steady, was raising his hands. “Get this, Burtis, and make it good, boy! Signals! 17-11-21!”
“Signals! Signals!” shrieked Greene, as Kendall’s heart leaped. Holmes darted a look of murder at the offending Greene.
“Signals!” he cried again, chopping out the numbers with hoarse barks. “17-89-31! 17-89――――”
“Block this kick! Block it!” shrieked Broadwood.
Back swept the ball from between Best’s wide-set feet, back to Kendall at head-height. Up went his hands, out swung a leg and then, with the ball tucked in the crook of his left elbow, he was plunging across the field to his left, while shrieks and cries filled the air. It was the play that had won the Nordham game, a simple run from kick formation, a play easy to stop if expected, but likely to gain if not. And in this case Broadwood had looked for a kick, reasoning that Yardley had given up all idea of trying to win by rushing, that in the few seconds remaining she would try to mitigate her defeat by securing the three points that a goal from field would yield her. And Broadwood was napping on the right of her line. The brilliant Thurston who had made himself feared all through the game, who had spoiled more than one attempt at his end of the line, had crept in and up, desperately determined to get inside of the Yardley end and spoil the kick. It was Broadwood’s right half-back, Reid, who first scented the danger and started to intercept Kendall. Saunders pounded behind him. But the Yardley interference was well formed, well spaced and desperate. Reid went down with Holmes, and Greene blocked Saunders. At that instant Kendall turned in and leaped toward the goal-line, his right elbow locked and his arm stretched out to meet the foe. Six white lines lay between him and the goal. He crossed two in safety, Greene speeding beside him. Then the enemy swept upon him. Greene threw himself in the path of a frantic foe and went down, and Kendall ran alone.
Three white streaks danced before his eyes now. A form leaped at him, all blue-clad arms, and Kendall’s open hand flattened against a face and he was still free. Two lines more now, only two! A shock almost threw him from his feet; hands were clutching at his hips; he whirled on one heel, staggered and broke away; a form dashed in front of him, hands stretching upward; Kendall leaped and went over the falling foe; the last line was under foot! One stride――another!―― Many hands fell upon him, dragging him down! He tried to shake free, but they were too many for him! He fell to his knees, something crashed against him, driving the remaining breath from his body, and he toppled over on the turf, the old injury paining horribly and his lungs bursting for air.
[Illustration: “Something crashed against him, driving the remaining breath from his body.”]
They led him away to the side-lines, for the leather harness had failed him and the bones had slipped out again. And while the spectators held their breaths, Fales tried to kick a goal. Victory for the Blue depended on his efforts, and he knew it. Weary and panting, he directed the poising of the ball, stepped forward and kicked. The pigskin rose erratically, turned lazily over and dropped weakly to earth in front of the charging Broadwood line. And Fales sat down on the turf, rolled onto his face, buried his head in his arms and wept!
Said the scoreboard: Broadwood 6; Visitors 6.
CHAPTER XXV
KENDALL IS MISTAKEN
Kendall sat in a corner of the barge as it rattled its way through clouds of dust back to Wissining. They had pulled his wrist into place again, bandaged it and put it back in a sling. Every bump of the barge’s weak springs made it throb painfully. But it was not his injury that Kendall minded. It was the knowledge that he had failed his fellows and the school. That was what hurt. He had lost the game, he told himself miserably. It had needed only that goal from the field to win, and he had missed it. He still wondered how it had happened. He had dropped the ball as well as he knew how, had kicked at the right instant, his instep had met it squarely, he was convinced that he had made no miscalculation of the distance. And yet, by some unhappy chance, the ball had barely cleared the bar underneath instead of sailing over. Since the whistle had blown he had avoided the glances of his teammates, was avoiding them now. He knew that by to-morrow they would find excuses for him, the kinder-hearted ones at least, but now they must all loathe him; and he didn’t want to read that loathing in their faces. So he kept his eyes on the roadside all the way back to school, only occasionally conscious of his aching wrist, and was very unhappy and weary and sore.
Here and there some of the fellows were conversing jerkily in tired voices, but there was no joking to-day, no bantering, no laughing, no singing as the team went home. It seemed to them all that the tie had been a defeat. For the moment they had lost sight of the fact that Broadwood had outweighed them and that in playing their rival to a tied score they had perhaps gained some glory after all. Yardley had grown accustomed to victory on the gridiron, and anything less than a victory spelled disgrace to them. They were thankful, each and every one of them, that until the barge reached Yardley they would not have to face their fellows. Now and then a lighter vehicle passed, and the occupants leaned out and shouted and waved their flags as they went by. But the players made no response. Perhaps one or two grinned stoically; perhaps here and there a fellow’s face worked and his throat choked up. To-morrow――even later this same evening――they would begin to see things less pessimistically, but now, thoroughly tired, aching and sore, it seemed to them that they were little better than pariahs. The bottom had just dropped out of everything and they were left dangling in space!
When the barge rolled up the drive to the front of Oxford a crowd had already gathered about the steps, a throng of nearly a hundred, and the returning warriors were met with cheers that were hearty and loyal. A look of dull surprise overspread some of the faces in the barge; some of the fellows smiled a little; others grew frankly tearful. All shouldered their way through the crowd and sought their rooms, avoiding the hands that would have detained them and the questions that met them. Afterward, as other vehicles returned and emptied their loads, the gathering grew and the cheers became louder and louder, and when, finally, some two hundred voices took up the strains of the school song and sang it through proudly and lovingly and even exultantly, you’d never have guessed that Yardley held herself defeated!
Number 28 was dark when Kendall reached it. Gerald was not there, and he was very glad. He didn’t light the lights, but crossed to the window-seat, after he had taken off his coat and cap, and threw himself down among the cushions to think it all over again. Thinking, however, made it no better. It seemed to him that he was disgraced; that even his usefulness to the school was over. He hated to think of the morrow when he would have to face the fellows and read the verdict in their faces. He could imagine the whispers as he went by. “That’s the failure that lost the Broadwood game for us!” Of course, there would be some who wouldn’t let it make any difference. They’d be disappointed in him, but they’d try not to let him see, and they’d be loyal still――Gerald, for instance, and Harry and, yes, probably The Duke. And perhaps one or two others. And maybe after a while he would get over it. Perhaps by the time the Winter term began it would be half forgotten and he could hold up his head again.
Once it occurred to him that had Fales kicked the goal after the touchdown they would still have won a victory. But he was charitable toward Fales. Fales had been worn out, almost ready to collapse, and it was no wonder he had missed. Besides, Fales was not supposed to excel at goal-kicking. With Kendall it was different. He was first of all a kicker, he had been given his place on the team because they believed he could be depended on to score from the field. And he had failed at the one most important moment of the season! Kendall groaned and turned his head as though to get away from his thoughts.
The world outside the windows got blacker and blacker. He knew that in the next building they were gathering for the banquet and the election. But he had no intention of going. He didn’t want to face them yet, while as for eating, he didn’t care if he never saw food again! Now and then a voice or a strain of whistling or a bar of song came up to him as fellows passed under the window. Once there was a long burst of cheering from commons. One of the Old Boys, perhaps a former football hero, had entered the dining-hall probably. Well, they’d never cheer him that way; never, unless――yes, there was another year coming, after all. Perhaps they’d give him a chance to retrieve, to make up then! For a moment he felt better. But then the thought that if he failed to win his scholarship this year he wouldn’t be likely to get back again sent his spirits down once more. And so for another hour he lay there in self-abasement and self-accusation and got a little tearful at times and felt pretty miserable. And finally, tired out physically and mentally, he fell asleep and only awoke when someone thumped on the door and called his name loudly. He sat up, with a wince as his injured arm was jolted, and rubbed his eyes.
“Burtis! You in there?” demanded the caller imperatively. The knob rattled, but Kendall had turned the key and the door denied admittance. For a brief instant Kendall clung to his desire for seclusion. But then, as there came a kick which threatened to drive a panel in, he answered:
“Hello! Who is it, please?”
“Simms! Open the door, you silly chump! What time do you think it is?”
Kendall crossed the room in the darkness and turned back the key. The door was pushed open, admitting a flood of light from the corridor. Simms stared in at him.
“What the dickens are you doing?” he demanded. “Been asleep?”
“Yes, a little while,” answered Kendall.
“Well, find your cap and come on. We’re half through dinner! We’ve been looking for you for an hour.”
“I――I don’t think I want to go over there, thanks,” murmured the other. “I――my arm’s pretty sore, and I’m tired――――”
“What of it? Don’t you think the rest of us are tired, too? And sore? Gosh, I haven’t a bone in my body that isn’t yelping! Besides, we’ve got to elect a new captain pretty soon.”
“You won’t need my vote,” Kendall demurred. “I’d vote for Crandall if I was there. You could tell them that, couldn’t you?”
“Crandall! Well, say――――” Simms paused and chuckled. “Just the same you’d better come, Burtis. They sent me for you, and I can’t go back without you. Get your cap, like a good fellow.”
“They sent for me? Who, Simms?”
“Why, the lot of them, the whole push, of course,” replied the quarter impatiently.
“Do you mean――that they――really want me?” faltered Kendall.
“Really want you? Say, what’s the matter with you, old man?” Simms looked curiously into the other boy’s face. Then he whistled softly. “So that’s it, eh?” he asked, as though of himself. He put one hand on Kendall’s shoulder. “Look here, Burtis,” he said affectionately, “you’ve got some fool notion in your head, haven’t you? Feeling sore, I guess, about that goal you didn’t make. Is that it?”
“Why――why, of course, I feel pretty rotten about it,” answered the younger boy. “And I thought――perhaps the other fellows――――” His voice dwindled away into silence.
Simms laughed cheerfully. Then his fingers closed reassuringly on Kendall’s shoulder. “Poppycock, Burtis! Poppycock, my son! No one’s holding that against you! How could they? Great Scott! haven’t we all made mistakes to-day? You don’t think _you_ lost the game, do you? Well, you didn’t! No more than I did, or Merriwell or Fales or any of the rest of us――alone! We all had a hand in it, Burtis. Besides, Payson’s been giving us a whole earful of guff about what a little band of heroes we are! Why Payson says we never had any show for that game, by rights! Says we only tied ’em because we didn’t know we were licked!” Simms’s voice dropped. “Burtis, don’t be a silly chump. Get your cap and come along. There’s a seat by me you can have. Come and see for yourself whether we want you there!”
It seemed too good to be true, and as he turned away to dash a sponge across his face his eyes got leaky again, and it took him a long time to get through with the towel and find his cap. Then he was following Simms down the stairs and along the walk and through the entrance to Whitson, alive with students awaiting the result of the election. As the two pushed their way through, the fellows fell back for them, cheering and shouting, laughing and joking. Kendall followed the quarter as in a daze. The big door opened, and he saw the long table spread in the middle of the hall and lined on each side with the fellows. There was Merriwell at the head and John Payson at the foot, turning at the sound of the opening door, and Perky Davis, and, yes, Andy Ryan, too, and all the other fellows between, talking and laughing as though Yardley had really won!
Kendall faltered at the door, but Simms dragged him on. “Got him, fellows!” he announced, pushing Kendall forward into the flood of light about the table. “Found him sound asleep, and almost had to kick the door in!”
“Hello, Burtis, you old top!” shouted Girard.
“Everything’s eaten up, Burtis!” cried Marion.
Kendall found himself pushed into a chair between Simms and Adler. Everyone was talking at him, laughing at him, it seemed, and, wonder of wonders, every face was kindly! If an expression of doubt crept now and then into Merriwell’s countenance as he glanced at the newcomer, Kendall didn’t see it. Nor did he discern that Coach Payson was viewing him in a half-puzzled way. For a space, in fact, he saw very little. Eager hands passed him things and piled his plate high and Kendall pecked at the viands, too happy to really eat.
But after a while he began to hear what was going on about him. They were still talking over the game, but the former despondency was all gone. Rather, they were slightly boastful now! Plant, in high spirits, was explaining loudly what would have happened if one tiny, infinitesimal thing――Kendall couldn’t make out just what it was――had been different. “Why, in that case, we’d have knocked the green sawdust out of ’em!” declared Plant. And he appealed to Mr. Payson for confirmation. The coach smiled and nodded. Holmes was already predicting the horrible fate that awaited Broadwood next year. “Next year” seemed the keynote now. Simms and Adler talked in front of Kendall, and had a hot discussion over some unimportant happening of the day, and threatened each other with fruit knives. There was much noise and confusion, all very jolly and happy. Kendall drank a cup of coffee and nibbled a banana that someone thrust at him, settled contentedly back in his chair, stretched his tired legs under the table and began to see the world through a wonderful mellow, golden haze.
Then, it must have been a half-hour later, when the last spoon had been laid reluctantly aside, although many diners were still sipping their second or third cups of black coffee, Captain Merriwell arose and hammered the table for attention. One by one the voices died away and the captain made his speech. He thanked them all for the bully way in which they had stood by him and the school, for the great game they had put up to-day; and he thanked Coach Payson for his patience and hard work and――――
But the rest was lost in the sound of cheers and the tinkling of silver against goblets and the thumping of feet.
And now it remained to choose a captain for next year, Merriwell went on. It was customary for the retiring captain to make the first nomination, but he wasn’t going to do that to-night. He was going to let them make their selection without any suggestion from him, knowing that whoever they chose would be the right man! And nominations were in order!
More cheering then, and some laughter, and finally a quieter mood, while the fellows glanced curiously around the table and waited. Cousins pushed back his chair and stood up, smiling as the fellows began to clap.
“I can’t make a speech, fellows, and I don’t need to. We’ve got plenty of fellows on this team who would make good captains, and for my part I say it’s hard to choose (Applause and cries of “That’s right!”). But in my opinion I think there’s one in especial that deserves the position. He’s played three full years on the team, he’s a fellow we all like――I might say love――and――well, I think he’s the captain we want. Fellows, I place in nomination Howard Crandall.”
Lots of cheering then, and lots of kindly looks toward the blushing Crandall. Simms and Fales, who sat on his other side, had their heads together. Then Simms started up, but Stark was ahead of him. Stark was saying nice things about Pete Girard, and Pete was struggling to throw a napkin at him and repeating, “Sit down, you big chump! I don’t want to be captain!” much to the amusement of the table. But Pete got his meed of applause when Stark finished, and then Simms sprang up.
“Fellows, we’ve had good names put before us. Crandall, bless his old hide, would make a good captain! So would Girard, if he could keep awake! (Sit down, Pete!) Either one of them would do to lead us――I mean the rest of you fellows, because some of us will be out of it next year――to lead you to victory. But, fellows, there’s one here who hasn’t been named yet, and I know you’re waiting for it. We’ve got a fellow here who would make the sort of captain we want, the sort we love to follow, the sort that Chase was in the old days before we came here, and that Vinton was, and that Merriwell has been. He hasn’t served his three years, fellows, but that can’t be helped. It isn’t his fault, it’s our misfortune. He’s only been two seasons on the team, but in that time he’s yanked one game out of the fire for us and saved us from defeat in the other! And, fellows――――” Simms paused and seemed debating with himself. Then: “Fellows, when the rest of us were feeding our faces here to-night and jollying up, this chap was staying away because he thought he’d failed us to-day and that we didn’t want him here! Fellows, I nominate for the captaincy of the Yardley Hall Football Team for the Season of 1911, Mr. Kendall Burtis!”
CHAPTER XXVI
GERALD IS SURPRISED
Simms must have been right when he said they were waiting for that name, for such a burst of applause went up as to set the fixtures shaking above the table. Napkins waved and goblets rang. Kendall, staring bewilderedly, told himself that it was a dream; that he had not heard aright! And yet they were all looking at him and waving at him and crying his name! He gazed about, the color rushing into his cheeks, and showed such a terrified countenance that the cheers grew into laughter. Merriwell was rapping for silence again. “Are there any more nominations?” he asked, trying to make himself heard. It seemed that there were not. “Then please come to order, fellows. You have three candidates to vote on――――”
“Leave me out, Charlie!” called Pete Girard. “I decline the honor!”
“Then two,” began Merriwell again. But Crandall was on his feet.
“I want to thank the fellows who nominated me,” he announced, “but I withdraw, too, please. And I’d like to make Burtis’s nomination unanimous!”
In the confusion of cheering that followed, Merriwell had hard work making himself heard. Finally, though: “Those in favor of the election of Kendall Burtis will stand up,” he announced. Every chair was pushed back save those of Merriwell, who was already standing, of Coach Payson and Andy Ryan, who had no voice in the proceedings, and of Kendall himself. Marion mounted a chair and called for “Three cheers for Burtis, fellows! Let her go!” The cheers came with a will and were followed by cries of “Speech! Speech!” Kendall, his eyes on the table, and his well hand nervously employed in the manufacture of bread pills, felt himself being lifted to his feet. It was an awful thing to have to say anything, for his voice was nowhere to be found at first; and when it did come it was so shaky and low that for a moment no one could hear it.
Finally, however, his halting words reached them.
“――Awfully afraid you’ve made a――a most horrible mistake,” he was saying, “and I wish you’d change your minds, fellows. Honestly――” and he looked appealingly about――“I don’t think I could do it, fellows!”
A howl of delight and derision went up. Kendall faltered again.
“I――I’d like you to excuse me, please, and――――”
“Not on your life! You’re elected, Burtis!”
Kendall turned questioningly, pleadingly, to Simms. Simms, laughing, shook his head. “No use,” he said. “You’re it!”
Kendall gulped, smiled wanly, started to sit down, reconsidered and went on: “Then all I can say is that I’m awfully much obliged and that I――I’ll do the best I know how. But I hope you’ll all help me a lot, because――because I don’t know much about my job!”
Merriwell, looking worried, went down the table and for a minute conversed in whispers with Coach Payson. The coach frowned and, nodding, finally arose and walked to the side of the room. Merriwell tapped Kendall on the shoulder.
“I say, Burtis, just come over here a minute, will you?”
Kendall, wondering, accompanied the other to where the coach stood. The rest of the team followed them with curious eyes.
“Burtis,” said Payson, pulling a folded sheet of paper from his pocket, “have you ever seen this before?”
Kendall looked at it in surprise. Then, “Why, yes, sir, I think so. I drew that diagram, but I didn’t do all that writing.”
“How did you happen to make the diagram?” asked Merriwell.
“Why, a fellow came to my room one night, and we got to talking about signals; the different systems, you know; he had some scheme of his own and wanted to know what I thought of it. I didn’t think much of it, though.”
“Who was this fellow?” asked Payson.
Kendall hesitated. “Is there――is there any trouble about this?” he asked.
It was Payson’s turn to hesitate, and he looked uncertainly at Merriwell. Finally: “Yes, this has made some trouble, or very nearly.”
“Then I guess I’d better not say who the fellow was,” replied Kendall.
“I’m afraid you’ll have to, Burtis. This sheet of paper contains a full explanation of our signals for the Broadwood game, the original signals, you understand. It was sent to someone at Broadwood and got to the hands of the captain. He returned it to Merriwell. Now you see some explanation is necessary, Burtis.”
“But I only made the diagram. It was before we learned the new signals, Mr. Payson.”
“This other chap, whose name you won’t tell, took this paper away with him when he left?”
“Yes, sir. I never thought――――”
“And you did not tell him afterwards about the signals for the Broadwood game?”
“No, sir. We never spoke of the thing again.”
“And you say this is not your writing?”
“No, sir; it isn’t.”
“And you know nothing more of this than you’ve told us, Burtis?”
“I really don’t. I’m awfully sorry I made that diagram, but――he said――――”
“This other fellow?”
“Yes, sir. He said he wanted to work out a better system, and asked me to explain the one we were using then. That was all there was to it, Mr. Payson.”
Payson frowned. “I’m very much inclined to believe you, Burtis,” he said kindly, “but you must see that until this matter is cleared up you can’t――er――very well accept the captaincy. If I were you I’d see that other fellow right away and get him to tell what he knows, Burtis.”
“Yes, sir. And――and am I to――to tell them that I can’t be captain, sir?”
“No, that isn’t necessary. I think――Hello, Davis! Want to see me?”
“Why, yes, I guess so, Mr. Payson. Are you talking about that business of the signals? Because if you are I can clear that up in a jiffy.”
“Well, for goodness sake, do it!” ejaculated Payson. “What do you know?”
“I know the whole story,” replied Perky importantly. “Here’s how it was. Cotton got Burtis to make that diagram for him. Then he sneaked into the gym that night we were having signal drill――I told you I saw someone, but you wouldn’t believe me!――and got the signals. Maybe he was there another time, but he doesn’t own to it.”
“Then he acknowledges this?” asked Merriwell.
“Sure! He had to; I made him!”
“How did you get hold of it, Perky?”
“Did a little detective work. Got a clue from George Kirk just by accident. Kirk saw Cotton and that fellow Gibson together in Greenburg the day he came back from the golf match with Broadwood. I put two and two together, found that Cotton was at Broadwood two years ago, and then went and told him I knew all about it. He thought I did and ’fessed up.”
“Where is he now?” asked Merriwell angrily.
Perky shrugged his shoulders. “Search me,” he said. “He left here this morning. That’s all I know!”
A half-hour later Kendall opened the door of Number 28. Outside there were still faint echoes of the cheering that had greeted the announcement of the election. Gerald, who had dined at home that evening, was in the room, and with him was Harry Merrow. Had Kendall been especially discerning just then he might have told from the expressions on their faces that they had heard the news. But he wasn’t; he was too excited for one thing. And, being excited, he tried not to show it. He said, “Hello” restrainedly, laid his cap down and took a chair.
“Hello,” responded Gerald carelessly. “Been to the banquet?”
Kendall nodded.
“Did they elect a captain?” asked Harry gravely.
Kendall nodded again. There was a silence. Finally and rather sheepishly Kendall said:
“What do you suppose those fellows did, Gerald?”
“What fellows?” asked Gerald, suppressing a grin.
Kendall nodded vaguely in the direction of commons. “Those fellows, the――the football team.”
“Oh, I don’t know. Raised rough-house, I suppose. What did they do, Kendall?”
“They――they”――Kendall found himself blushing――“they made me captain!”
“_What!_” Gerald turned and viewed the grinning Harry in wild amazement. “Why, I was never so surprised in all my life!”
THE END
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D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, NEW YORK
Transcriber’s Notes:
――Text in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_); text in bold by “equal” signs (=bold=).
――Except for the frontispiece, illustrations have been moved to follow the text that they illustrate.
――Printer's, punctuation and spelling inaccuracies were silently corrected, except as noted.
――Accepted possessive “s” variants (e.g. Simms’ vs. Simms’s, Holmes’ vs. Holmes’s, etc.) were retained.
――Archaic and variable spelling has been preserved.
――Variations in hyphenation and compound words have been preserved.
End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Around the End, by Ralph Henry Barbour

= = = PG19907 = = =
AROUND THE WORLD IN TEN DAYS
E-text prepared by Al Haines
AROUND THE WORLD IN TEN DAYS
by
CHELSEA CURTIS FRASER
Author of "Work-a-Day Heroes," "Secrets of the Earth," "Boys' Book of Battles," "Boys' Book of Sea Fights," "The Young Citizens Own Book," etc.
The World Publishing Company Cleveland, Ohio ------ New York City
Copyright, MCMXXII, By The World Syndicate Publishing Company Printed in the United States of America
PREFACE
In the infancy of aviation, the early 1920's, no one dreamed that the close of the decade would see it firmly and permanently established--a leader among the nation's industries. Heavier-than-air flight is perhaps the most amazing contribution of the 20th century.
It is easy to thrill to the seeming marvels of our own times, but only the short-sighted thinker believes in the perfection of present scientific progress.  The 300-mile-an-hour airplane which Fraser conceived in this book for the speed of the Sky-Bird II was little more than so many words when he wrote it. . . . today we have 400-mile-an-hour fighting planes.  Today we have in this country an intricate highway system, but perhaps within your own lifetime our highways, and the automobiles which skim over them, will be laughed at as obsolete and useless.
Thus it is that "the seemingly impossible of the fiction of today becomes outdone by the facts of tomorrow," as the author aptly phrased it.
In 1920 the idea of going around the world in ten days was as preposterous as that projected by Jules Verne in 1873 when he wrote _Around the World in Eighty Days_.  But time has a way of hurling ridicule back as effectively as a boomerang.  For we have seen and marvelled at the shattering not only of the mythical eighty-day record but even the ten-day record, as progress wends its ceaseless, ambitious, difficult and almost fantastic way through the years.
And so it will be gratifying and, no doubt, amazing to many to read this book and realize the advancement made in aviation since this story was written by Mr. Fraser, and how many of the ideas he prophesied for airplane advancement that have materialized in less than a score of years.
Around-the-world flyers, even the most recent, have all flown more or less northerly routes, not following the equatorial belt, which is, as we all know, the earth's greatest circumference.  It is this course that our four young heroes take in Sky-Bird II, a plane designed and constructed by themselves, containing many features that aeronautics now takes for granted, and some not yet realized, which are, nevertheless, "within the scope of mechanical science," as Fraser says.
So, it is our opinion, young readers, that in addition to enjoying an exciting story, you will benefit by carefully reading the technical passages, and in doing so, learn to observe your present-day surroundings with a greater perspective--thus adding infinitely greater interest to your view of the world today!
THE PUBLISHERS.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I  PAUL AND BOB II  THE BROTHERS' INVENTION III  THE SUCCESSFUL MODEL IV  PLANNING A BIG AIRPLANE V  AN AIR RACE FINISH AND A CHALLENGE VI  THE MISSING BLUE-PRINTS VII  WHO'S AT THE WINDOW? VIII  THE SKY-BIRD II IX  THE TEST FLIGHT X  FINAL PREPARATIONS XI  OFF FOR PANAMA XII  FIGHTING A DEVIL-FISH XIII  THE STRANGE AIRPLANE XIV  A FAMILIAR FACE XV  THE START XVI  TRICKED BY RIVALS XVII  ACROSS THE ATLANTIC XVIII  AN IRRITATING DELAY XIX  SAVED BY THE SEARCHLIGHT XX  A JUNGLE ADVENTURE XXI  THE DOUBLE LOOP XXII  ABOVE THE CLOUDS XXIII  BOMBED BY ROCKS XXIV  RIDING AN AIRPLANE'S TAIL XXV  ENGULFED IN A VOLCANO'S DUST XXVI  IN AUSTRALIA XXVII  PAUL VERSUS PETE XXVIII  A MIX-UP IN DATES XXIX  A FLYING RESCUE XXX  AN ALARMING DISCOVERY XXXI  THE FINISH
Around the World in Ten Days
CHAPTER I
PAUL AND BOB
"Did you say this big Air Derby around the world takes place this coming summer, Bob?"
"So dad told me at the breakfast table this morning, Paul.  The plans have just been completed.  He said full details would be in to-day's papers."
"And the afternoon edition is out now, for there's a newsie just ahead of us who is calling out the _Daily Independent_.  That's your father's newspaper, too."
"It will be in there sure pop, Paul."
"Then I'm going to get a copy right now."
The two youths, who but a few moments before had come out of the broad doors of the Clark Polytechnic Institute along with a noisy throng of other students, paused when they reached the newsboy in question, and the taller of the pair bought a newspaper which he shoved into an inner pocket of his raincoat.
"We'll look at this in the car on our way home; a fellow can't do any reading in a storm like this," said the purchaser.  "Let's hurry up a bit, Bob; I'm so eager to see what it says about that Derby that I can hardly wait to get to the station.  Say, just think of it--a race around the world by air!  Won't that be great?"
"I'll say so, Paul old boy!  They ought to smash all existing records. You know that a man named Mears made the circuit in thirty-five days about seven years ago, and he had to depend on slow steam trains and steamships, aided by a naphtha-launch."
"That's true, Bob.  Now that we have planes we ought to do a lot better.  But the big oceans are the trouble for aircraft.  The Atlantic has been crossed by Alcock and Brown in a Vimy-Vickers biplane, and also by our NC-4 flying-boat under the command of Lieutenant Read, and by the big English dirigible R-34; but the Pacific, with its greater breadth, has seemed so impossible that it has never been attempted."
"Why should it seem impossible?"
"Because they can't carry sufficient gasoline to cross the Pacific."
"But how about the islands?"
"The majority are not level enough to permit a landing, and others are too widely scattered.  I have made quite a study of transoceanic flight since Harry Hawker and his partner, Grieve, made their unsuccessful attempt last spring to cross the Atlantic in a Sopwith machine, and for my part I can't see how this proposed Derby around the world can all be done by air, when no machine has ever yet been able to hop the Pacific."
"Well, Paul, we'll soon be at the station out of this storm, and then we can see what the paper says about it," was the philosophical conclusion of his companion.
With that they hurried on down the street, bowing their heads to ward off the sharp sleet as much as possible, while they gripped their school-books under their arms.  They were a splendid-looking pair of young Americans, probably about eighteen years old, and the manner in which they swung along through the disagreeable drizzle, paying scant attention to it as they laughed and talked, showed them to be full of that boundless energy and gaiety of spirits which only perfect health and participation in athletics can bestow.
As Paul Ross and Robert Giddings approached the next corner, a young man with umbrella held low in front of him hurried around it and ran into a small Italian girl who was carrying a basket of fruit.  She was staggered by the collision; her basket was knocked from her arm, and the oranges began to roll in every direction.  The child broke into tears, but the cause of her misfortune only paused long enough to say angrily, "Confound you, you careless little beggar!  Why don't you watch where you are going?" and hurried on his way.
"Say, Paul, did you see the way that swarthy-faced chap used that little girl?" cried Bob indignantly.
"I certainly did," was the no less indignant answer.  "That lazy dog ought to be horse-whipped.  Let's help the child."
Both boys fell to work with a will, rescued the escaping oranges, and tucked them back in their owner's basket.  Then, with her grateful thanks ringing in their ears, they hurried on once more.
After they had gone a few steps, Paul Ross observed:
"Bob, I've seen that fellow before.  That was Pete Deveaux.  He used to be an Air Mail pilot on the same run as my brother John, but was discharged for drunkenness.  Since that he has blamed John, and has written him several threatening letters, but is too cowardly to face him."
By this time they had reached the West 137th Street station of the suburban railroad which runs between the metropolis and various shore towns along the picturesque Hudson.  They were just in time to catch a train, and found a comfortable seat in a rear coach.  Then Paul brought forth the newspaper he had purchased.  What they sought was found on the very first page, prominently displayed under a black-faced heading.
"Read it aloud, Paul," suggested Bob, and his friend proceeded to do so.  The article was to the effect that the Aero Club of America, in conjunction with eminent aviation associations of the kind in Europe and Asia, had planned to stimulate interest in flying by holding an aircraft race around the world, which would start on the morning of July 4th.  All contestants must be at least twenty-one years of age, and furnish an entrance fee of two hundred dollars.  They might use any type of aircraft they chose, and could carry as many assistants as they wished, even utilizing trains or steamships, if not less than three-fourths of their journey were made by air; and they must stop at least once in each of four continents, and cross the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.  Aside from these provisions, the selection of route was left entirely to each contestant.  Then followed an imposing list of names of well-known flyers who, it was said, had signified their intention of competing.  The article wound up with the statement that prizes aggregating a million dollars would be offered the winners.
"One million dollars!" exclaimed Bob Giddings.  "Paul, old man, you'd better go in for this!"
Paul Ross's eyes sparkled, but the next moment he laughed and shook his head.  "I surely would like to," said he, "but there are just three little things in the way of it."
"I suppose you need a machine for one thing?"
"Yes--and you must admit that's a good-sized item.  Second, I need two hundred dollars to enter--something I don't happen to have, and something I know mother can't spare in such a hazard.  Third, I need three years added to my age in order to be eligible."
"It does look rather hopeless for you, that's a fact," admitted Bob. "That second handicap might be overcome with my father's help, but the other two are real obstacles."
"It's mighty nice of you and your father, Bob, to wish to help me out in this fashion," said Paul; "but, as you state, the other drawbacks cannot be swept aside so easily.  Perhaps later on, another 'round the world Air Derby will be pulled off, and I shall have a chance to enter it."
"Well, if you do, don't forget to count me in as an assistant," declared his friend.  "Nothing would please me better than to make a trip like that with you, Paul."
"You certainly shall be welcome if the time ever comes.  By the way, Bob, John and I have designed a new type of monoplane in our spare time, and for the past two months I have been busy making a three-foot model of this.  I hope to finish it in a day or two, and I want you to go with me over to the old fair-grounds next Saturday afternoon and give it a test flight, if you will."
Bob Giddings was all interest at once, and plied his friend with many questions concerning his new model, many others of which he had in times past helped Paul fly with the keenest delight.  The truth is, Paul Ross and his brother John, the latter a pilot in the government Air Mail service, were known all over the State of New York as makers of the best-flying model airplanes to be found anywhere.  Ever since they were small boys in grammar school, the brothers had been constructing miniature monoplanes, biplanes, and seaplanes, which they had pitted against the best product of other lads in the neighborhood and surrounding towns, without once meeting defeat.  Many of these specimens of youthful ingenuity they still preserved, suspended in bedroom and attic, where they were a never-ending source of interest to visitors at the Ross homestead in the outskirts of Yonkers.
The war had called John into the aviation service of his country, but Paul had still continued his experiments in making tiny airplanes, getting his friend Robert Giddings, who lived in a fine house on Shadynook Hill, to assist him in the flying.  Thrown together by their mutual love for mechanics, and being in the same classes all through high-school, Paul and Bob had formed a strong attachment for each other, although the latter's home was far more pretentious than the former's, since Paul's mother was a widow in only moderately comfortable circumstances, while Bob's father was the editor and owner of the _Daily Independent_, one of the leading evening newspapers of New York City.
When John returned from the war it was with an incurable passion for flying, and within a few months he had re-entered the service of his country in the peaceful but dangerous work of carrying Uncle Sam's mails between Washington and New York in a big Martin bomber.  He found that his younger brother's love for aviation had also developed, as well as his skill in constructing and flying model airplanes.  Some of these recent ones were so novel in design and of such wonderfully ingenious workmanship, that John, who had won unusual honors as an aviator on the French front, was quite thunderstruck, and determined to encourage Paul's talents in this line in every way he could. Therefore, when the boy graduated from the Yonkers high school, and expressed a wish to take up a special course in aeronautical engineering at Clark Polytechnic Institute, John backed him up, and the mother, who would have preferred a less hazardous profession for her younger son, sighingly consented.
Paul's chum, Robert Giddings, had also gone to Clark Polytechnic upon leaving high school, his ambition being to become an electrical engineer.  Thus both boys continued to be thrown in daily contact.  It was their habit to go into the city to school each morning in the sedan with Mr. Giddings; but as he left the city late in the afternoon they usually took the train back.
As the friends now parted, Bob Giddings' last words were: "Don't forget to get that new model airplane done by Saturday, Paul.  I'm crazy to see it."
"I'll be ready for you," was Paul's assurance; "but remember to keep this under your hat.  It's to be a secret test, you know."
"Trust me," said Bob.
CHAPTER II
THE BROTHERS' INVENTION
When Paul Ross reached home that afternoon, it was to find someone there whom he had not expected to see.  A tall, broad-shouldered young man, with a bronzed face and pleasant blue eyes, sat in the living-room, talking to his mother.
Paul rushed forward and joyfully grasped his brown hand.  "Why, John!" he exclaimed, "I didn't expect to find you here!"
"Of course you didn't, Buddy," was the smiling response of the young man, who was wont to call his younger brother by this affectionate war-mate term.  "The fact is, as I was just telling mother, two days ago I didn't know myself that I would be anywhere at this hour except speeding through the air between New York and Washington on my usual mail run in my trusty old Martin-bird.  As it is, Buddy, it looks now as if neither you nor I would ever handle her controls again."  There was a note of sadness in John's voice as he said this.
"Why, what's the matter, John?" asked Paul quickly.
"It's this way, lad: You know I told you and mother a couple of weeks ago, when I was here on my last regular lay-over, that Congress was talking about cutting a big slice out of the Air Mail appropriation, in order to reduce expenses.  Well, the upshot of it all is, they made the cut, and not having enough money to carry on the service as it has been, the head of the Air Mail has ordered the abandonment of all flying divisions except the main line between New York and San Francisco.  Only those pilots will be kept.  So that's why I am here."
"Won't they take you on again soon, John?" asked Mrs. Ross.
"I fear not, mother," replied her elder son, shaking his head soberly. "Our field-superintendent did say that he would give me the first opening in the transcontinental line, since my records lead the bunch, and he even offered to displace one of the boys on that route and put me in his place, but--"
"But you refused," interrupted Paul, with conclusive pride in his big brother.
John grinned.  "Well, put it that way if you like, Buddy," said he; "anyhow, as I said before, here I am.  Some chap may quit or 'go West'--you know a round dozen of the poor chaps have been killed in the last year--and that may let me back in again.  But I won't wait for it; I'll get after some of the commercial flying companies next week and see if I can't land a berth with them.  I simply can't think of working on the ground.  I guess I should have been born a bird, mother, instead of a human being, I love flying so much."
"I really believe you would be safer if you were a bird, John," asserted Mrs. Ross, with an uneasy smile.  "Birds have no motors to fail them, no fire to ignite and burn them up, as our present airplanes.  How many of your own unfortunate associates can lay their untimely deaths to either one of these causes!  It was only the last time you were here that you were telling Paul and me about the terrible fall Howard Smith had because his motor stopped, and how his machine ignited, and how he was burned past recognition."
"I know," said the veteran airman; "those things will happen at times, mother, even with the most careful fellows.  The time will come, I think, and very soon, when stalled motors can be restarted in the air, and when accidentally ignited fuel will burn itself out with no harm to either the machine or its occupants.  The fact is, Paul and I have some ideas now as to how to overcome those very troubles, along with other improvements, and the first chance we get we are going to build an airplane along these lines and put it to the test, aren't we, Buddy?"
"We surely are," was Paul's enthusiastic response.  "One of these fine days, mother, when we get our patents and sell them, you shall live in as fine a home as the Giddings's over on Shadynook Hill, and when you wish to go into the city to do any shopping, John or I will take you in a beautiful sedan airplane which will be safer than an automobile, and which will be guaranteed not to raise a dust or wear out tires."
Mrs. Ross laughed heartily at the glowing picture her second son had drawn, more because he spoke with such seriousness, and because John too wore a matter-of-fact look during the prophecy.
"Oh, I have some great dreamers here in this little family," she said, as she arose to resume her household duties.  "We will hope that some of your dreams come true."
Her sons laughed good-naturedly; then Paul turned to his brother. "Come on down in the basement, John," he said; "I wish to show you our latest miniature model, the Sky-Bird.  Another day's work ought to finish it."
John followed him downstairs.  In one corner of the large basement was a good-sized workbench, lighted by two windows, and equipped with several neatly-arranged shelves, which now held a divers collection of chisels, bits, countersinks, etc.  In a splendid oak cabinet attached to the wall above was a more extensive array of wood- and metal-working tools, some of which the brothers had bought with money earned at odd jobs when they were still small boys.  Since, they had added to their set from time to time, as they needed this tool or that, until now few professional mechanics could boast of a finer assortment.
Suspended from a hook directly over the bench was a beautiful six-foot model of a racy-looking monoplane of peculiar and striking design.  It was glistening in several coats of spar-varnish, and so light and delicate was its spidery frame that, as John reached out to take it in his hand, the exhalation of his breath set it swaying away from him.
"My word, it's a light boy all right!" exclaimed John admiringly, as he carefully took hold of the pretty thing.  "That's just the feature we've tried to get, too, Buddy,--lightness."  He looked closely at the long, graceful pair of wings, which were of an unusual thickness and a slight upward thrust like those of a bird, and which widened batlike as they ran back and joined the rear fuselage or body of the craft.  "Have you put the helium-gas in these wings yet, Paul, as we planned?  I see you have installed the valves.  There's a valve in the after-fuselage, too."
"The wings and fuselage are both filled," said Paul; "that is what makes the Sky-Bird so light.  If you had brought more helium the last time you were here, I could have pumped in twice the quantity, I think, and that would have made her so light she would rise of her own accord, I really believe.  As it is, she now weighs less than a half-ounce.  I had the scales on her yesterday."
John shared his brother's enthusiasm.  "Fine!" he cried, with sparkling eyes.  "Why, that's almost a neutral condition, as she is!  Buddy, if we can apply this principle to a full-size machine--and I don't know why we can't--we shall have solved the biggest problem facing airplane designers to-day.  With a machine weighing only a trifle more than her load of fuel and baggage, she will not only fly a lot faster but go a lot farther, with a given supply of fuel, than the present-day planes. And what is more, she could attain good speed with a single engine of reasonable power, where now many machines are handicapped with the burdensome weight of an extra power-plant.  When will she be ready to test out?"
"I had planned to give her a trial in the old fair-grounds Saturday afternoon," said Paul.  "I've asked Bob Giddings to go along."
"That's all right; Bob is a fine lad," said John; "but since you have set the trial for Saturday afternoon, and Bob's father is usually at home at that time, why don't you ask him to view the affair also?  I'm sure he would enjoy it.  He's a great sportsman, you know, like most newspaper men, and considerably interested in aeronautics."
"I had not thought of it; I'll do it," was the prompt response of Paul. "But we must warn him to silence, John.  Whatever happens, we don't wish this to get into the _Daily Independent_."
"I'd say not," rejoined the former Air Mail pilot sententiously. "Mum's the word; we've got something here, Buddy.  Unless I'm greatly mistaken we'll be consulting with the Patent Office at Washington much sooner than little mother anticipates."  He poked Paul in the ribs as he spoke, and both young men gave vent to a low chuckle of intense satisfaction.  It was an even greater pleasure to look forward to surprising their mother than to astonishing the world and winning its plaudits.
As good an airplane mechanic and flyer as John Ross was, his younger brother was little behind him in the matter of skill in handling a modern machine.  It had been John's habit to return to Yonkers every two weeks for a week's lay-off, as customary with other pilots in the Air Mail service.  On these occasions he had arrived in his plane, and during the term of his stay had often taken Paul up into the air for pleasure flights, as well as his chum Bob Giddings.  Both boys were keen students, and it was not long before John could trust them to operate his big Martin with every confidence.  Once, indeed, he and Paul had been caught over Long Island Sound in a bad storm, when the latter was in the pilot's seat, but Paul had brought the craft through like a veteran, winning his brother's unstinted praise and undying respect.
CHAPTER III
A SUCCESSFUL MODEL
Mr. Giddings was glad to accept the invitation to the trial flight.  He and his son met the Ross boys at the old race-course Saturday afternoon.  This immense, level field, with its one-mile oval and great empty sheds, at one time had been the county's boasted fair-grounds, but two years prior to the opening of our story it had been sold to Mr. Giddings, whose residence property stretched down the side of Shadynook Hill and joined it.  New fair-grounds had then been established in another and more centrally located section of the district.  In the old grounds the boys of the neighborhood now went to fly their kites and model airplanes, to hold impromptu bicycle and foot races, and to play tag and hide-and-go-seek in the cavernous sheds and around the numerous sagging stables.
It was late in the afternoon--just before dusk, when the winds would be at their quietest, and others not likely to be present--that our friends arrived at the field.  There was not a soul to be seen.  Paul, who had carried his precious Sky-Bird, freed it from the wrapper and held it up for Mr. Giddings to see.  The night before he and John had put the finishing touches to the delicate structure by adding another coat of varnish and attaching the little rubber-tired aluminum wheels to the axle.
As Paul now held it up before the gaze of the great newspaper man, Mr. Giddings made no effort to restrain his admiration.  "What a little beauty!" he cried.  "Why, it's almost a perfect mechanical representation of a bird!"
"Isn't she a dandy, dad?" put in Bob, his eyes snapping.
"The Sky-Bird is really more of a bird than you may think, Mr. Giddings," declared Paul.
"Yes," added his brother John.  "As you probably know, sir, a bird gets its great buoyancy from the fact that every bone in its body is hollow; in flight it fills these bones with a very light gas, which is formed by an action of its lungs in drawing in air.  We have adapted this principle in the wings and fuselage of this little machine.  They are airtight and filled with compressed helium-gas, which is non-inflammable and nearly as light as its highly volatile rival, hydrogen-gas."
"Hydrogen-gas is surely a dangerous commodity around fire," said Mr. Giddings.  "I understand that when the big English dirigible R-34 came across the Atlantic last summer she was filled with hydrogen, and that her commander and crew all wore felt-soled shoes, so that they would not by any chance cause a spark when they walked over her metal floors and ladders just beneath her great bag."
"That is true," vouched John Ross.  "One little spark reaching any of that stored hydrogen would have torn that great dirigible into fragments in one gigantic blast."
"We have handled recent newspaper copy containing mention of this new gas, helium; but I must confess I am in the dark regarding its nature and source," said Mr. Giddings.  "What is it, anyway?"
"I will refer your question to Paul here," replied John.  "He is the one who worked out this idea of using helium in an airplane and giving it the best properties of a dirigible without any of the dirigible's handicap of clumsiness and excessive wind resistance.  He has been studying the properties of helium in school, also the flight of birds."
"Well, not to get into a tiresome discourse, as Professor Herron would say, I shall make this description very rudimentary," said Paul, with a smile.  "During a total eclipse of the sun in India in 1868, Lockyer, a British astronomer, saw in the spectroscope a bright, yellow line of light around the sun.  He called it _helium_, after the Greek word for sun.  So much for him.  Twenty-seven years later an element was found on earth in natural-gas in Kansas, which gave the same bright, yellow light viewed through the spectrum.  The people, finding it would not burn, disgustedly let millions of barrels of this valuable element escape into the air, before a scientist told them that it was of untold value for balloon and airship purposes.  It is thought the gas comes from radium deposits.  It has never been found in any country except the United States, and only here in Kansas and northern Texas, where it occurs in sands from 14,000 to 16,000 feet deep.  Our government is now securing about 50,000 cubic feet of helium per day, refusing to sell it to foreign countries, as it is all needed here, besides which it might be used against us in case of another war."
While Paul had been telling this, Mr. Giddings had been busy jotting something down in shorthand in a notebook.
"Pardon me, Paul," he said, looking up with a smile, "but this is so mighty interesting that, before I knew it, my old-time reportorial instinct had gotten the best of me, and I found my pencil at work.  If you have no objection I should like to use this in the columns of the _Daily Independent_ some time when it seems to fit in."
"No objection at all, sir," assured Paul.
Mr. Giddings began twirling the little twelve-inch two-bladed propeller at the nose of the model airplane.  "What do you use for power to turn this propeller?" he asked, after admiring its perfect proportions for a moment.  "I don't see any rubber-bands, such as Robert here has always used on his little machines."
John deftly lifted off the thin veneer hood of the airplane, and disclosed a very small four-cylindered rotary pneumatic engine of bewitching simplicity and lightness, which a baby could have held out in its pudgy palm.
"Paul has worked this little motor out of aluminum and brass and steel, from odds and ends," said John.
"With more or less help on the part of my elder brother," interjected Paul.
"Well, perhaps with a little," admitted John, "more suggestive than otherwise."
"What sets it going?" questioned Bob, curiously.
"The fuselage is divided into three sections," said Paul.  "The forward section contains the engine here; the rear section is an airtight chamber containing helium; and the central section is also an airtight chamber, but contains ordinary air which has been pumped into it through a valve, using the bicycle pump John is carrying, until it is under strong pressure.  When I turn this little valve an outlet is opened for the air to escape by a tube into branches communicating with each of these four cylinders.  This works the tiny pistons, much the same as gas in a gasoline-motor, and they turn the little crank-shaft to which they are connected, and the crank-shaft in turn revolves the propeller on its end."
"Wonderfully simple!" Mr. Giddings exclaimed.  "Wonderfully ingenious, too!  Is this your invention, young men?"
"Partly, sir," replied Paul.  "I understand, a company in New York is making a somewhat similar pneumatic motor for model airplanes, but John and I have made some radical improvements, to our notion.  To-day's test will tell the story."
"Let's see the propeller spin 'er up once for the fun of it," suggested Bob.  "It won't do any harm, will it?  Dad and I will hold on to the airplane."
"Get a good grip then," warned John Ross, "for you will find there's a terrific pull to the little rascal.  Paul and I tried her in that fashion early this morning down in the basement."
Bob and his father secured firm holds of the little Sky-Bird, one on each side, where the propeller could not strike them.
"Ready?" asked Paul, with a smile.
"Ready!" came the answer in unison.
Paul touched the little valve in the tank chamber of the fuselage.  The next moment there was a quiver, and then the propeller began fairly to hum.  A strong, steady gust of air began to blow in the faces of the Giddingses, while they had to hang on grimly in order to keep their little charge from jumping out of their arms and dashing away into the air.  For fully three minutes the propeller continued to whirl with undiminished speed, then slowly it began to slow up, and finally stopped.
Both Mr. Giddings and his son wiped their hot brows as they handed the plane over to its makers.
"Whew!" said Bob, "that little mule has got a lot of pull to her."
"That she has," supplemented his father.  "What sort of material is her frame made of?"
"Balsa-wood," said John.
"I never heard of that.  Is it something new?"
"Yes,--to the arts of civilization, but I presume it has been used by the Indians of Ecuador, where it grows, for scores of years in the making of rafts, for which it is particularly well adapted.  The tree looks much like our southern cottonwood, and the wood apparently has no grain.  It has a surprising toughness and strength, and is a trifle over half the weight of cork, weighing only 7.8 pounds per cubic foot, while the same sized piece of cork weighs 13.7 pounds."
"Has this wood ever been used in constructing full-sized airplanes?" asked Mr. Giddings.
"I think not; but Paul and I believe it will be the coming wood for them," said John with enthusiasm.  "We have used it plain on this machine.  On a large airplane it ought to be reinforced with transverse sections of very thin spruce laid latticewise.  That would add considerably to its natural strength, and increase the total weight very little."
"H'm, h'm!" said the great newspaper publisher, "this is very interesting, I am sure.  Now let us see how this little affair behaves itself in the air."
Paul and his brother led the way out into one corner of the big field, so as to bring what slight breeze might spring up into the head of the airplane, explaining that machines without a pilot would keep a better keel under such conditions.  John then carefully attached the bicycle-pump and recharged the air-tank, following which he took out his watch to time the flight.  Mr. Giddings and Bob also took out their watches.
Paul set the little Sky-Bird down on the hard earth, in a spot where there was no grass or other obstacle, and with his finger on the air-valve, said: "Practically all rubber-band motors require starting the model airplane off by picking it up and tossing it away from you up into the air; but I think this machine will rise from the ground like a large plane, on account of its great lightness and unusual power.  We will now see if I am right."
To tell the truth, this being the first time he had really tried the Sky-Bird in a flight, Paul was nervous as he turned the valve, removed his hands from the graceful little plane, and straightened up.
With a whirr like the wings of a partridge as it is flushed out of the grass by the huntsman's dog, the small machine shot forward a few feet over the smooth ground, then gracefully arose in the air and started away toward the opposite corner of the field.  As it proceeded it continued to rise, until it reached a height of possibly ninety or a hundred feet, when it began to dip unsteadily.
"It's a gust of wind striking it," remarked John uneasily.  "I hope she weathers it.  If there was only a pilot in her now, he could----"
But even as he spoke the Sky-Bird seemed to recover her balance. Making a pretty circle, away she sped on her course, neither rising nor falling.  Like a real bird she sailed onward, the noise of her whirring propeller now lost to her fliers, but her little pale-yellow silk wings against the blue sky plainly tracing her course for them.  Paul was running after her now as fast as his legs could carry him.  What if she should keep right on and go over the far fence?--he might lose the little darling!
That fence was a good half-mile away.  For his pet to cover such a distance had not seemed within the bounds of probability to either himself or John at the start, for all of their great confidence in the flying powers of the new model.  Now, as he kept on running and the Sky-Bird continued going with no sign of dropping, Paul really became alarmed for her safety in landing.
But just before it reached the boundary of the grounds, the youth saw that the airplane was slowly settling.  Into the next field it flew, and the high board fence shut it from Paul's view as he came up to it. With a jump he caught the top boards, and scrambled up, springing down on the opposite side.  It was to see his little machine just miss the branches of an oak tree and settle down into some long grass about a hundred yards beyond.
He found it undamaged, and hurried back to his friends in the fair-grounds, his heart beating jubilantly at the splendid results of the flight.  He hugged the small airplane to his heart as if it were the most precious possession in the world, as indeed it was to him.
Mr. Giddings and Bob were loud in their praise, and John smiled in that quiet way that told the younger brother how well pleased he was.  It was found that the Sky-Bird had passed over the lower fence in just one minute and three seconds, which was certainly good speed for such a diminutive contrivance.  Several other flights were then made, all of which were equally successful.  At the conclusion Bob Giddings was so excited that he could hardly stand still.
"Dad, isn't this little thing simply a wonder?" he exclaimed.  "I'd give anything in the world if I could own a big fellow built on this principle.  I'll bet it would pass anything now made."
His father looked thoughtful for a moment.  Then, turning to the Ross brothers, he observed:
"Do you think, boys, that these features could be successfully applied to a full-sized airplane?"
"There's no doubt at all about it, to my mind, sir," replied John Ross. "That's the next thing Paul and I propose doing, although I expect we shall have a hard time getting enough money to meet the expense of materials.  Of course we shall have the regular type of gasoline engine in place of this pneumatic arrangement, as this principle won't apply to big machines.  I figure a 400 horse-power Liberty engine would carry such a machine two hundred miles an hour."
Again Mr. Giddings was silent a moment.  Then he resumed: "John, I hear that you have been laid off from your Air Mail job.  Is that right?"
"It is, sir."
"Well, then, I am going to make a proposition to you and Paul, and in a way Robert may consider himself involved, too, I expect.  As you may know, Robert plans to be an electrical engineer, and Mrs. Giddings and myself are anxious to encourage him in every way we can.  For some time he has been experimenting with wireless telegraph and telephone apparatus, and has made some sets of the latter which it seems to me are an improvement over anything now on the market, particularly a set for airplane use, which he has no means of properly testing out on account of the lack of the airplane.  Now my proposition is just this: I will meet every expense of making a first-class full-sized airplane like the Sky-Bird, and pay you, John, a wage equal to that which the government allowed you as a pilot, if you three young men here will do the construction work secretly, and if Robert may be allowed a one-third interest in the venture, both in the plane to be made, and in any future benefits to be derived from the patent rights."
Of course the delighted John and Paul accepted this splendid offer, and Bob Giddings was so happy at the prospect of a fine big airplane in which to install his wireless apparatus that he actually hugged his father.  They repaired to the Giddings home, and there, in true business form, a contract was drawn up and duly signed by all interested parties, with a notary's seal attached.
With a copy in their possession, the Ross boys hurried home, after having dinner with the Giddings family, to acquaint Mrs. Ross with the good news.
CHAPTER IV
PLANNING A BIG AIRPLANE
As planned, the much-talked-of Air Derby around the world took place from Mineola Field, New York, on the 4th of July.  A great crowd had been attracted, owing to the extensive accounts of the affair in the big newspapers for the past several months, and a thrilling hush fell over the assemblage as, at high noon, one after another of the famous flyers took off in various types of aircraft.  There were four big dirigibles, two of which started to cross the Atlantic at once, while the others took a northerly course with the intention of making the final hop from St. John's, Newfoundland, in accordance with several previous attempts of other aircraft.  Besides these, seven heavier-than-air machines started, all making for Newfoundland also. Four of these were flying-boats, two were seaplanes, and the other was a double-propellered biplane.
Needless to say, the Ross boys and Bob Giddings and his father were present to see the machines off.  They had arrived in the big automobile of the publisher, and were greatly interested in every detail of the departure.  Several of the contestants John Ross knew, having met them at some time during his flying periods, and it gave him a chance briefly to renew old acquaintanceship and personally to wish them good luck on their long journey.  Of course our friends would have given a whole lot to have been able to compete in the novel contest themselves, but that was out of the question.
When the last machine had disappeared from sight, they took their departure.  Mr. Giddings left them at the office of the _Daily Independent_, following which Bob drove Paul and John out to some of the city's beautiful parks.  Late in the afternoon they again stopped at the newspaper building and picked up Bob's father, thereupon turning the car in the direction of Yonkers.  Altogether they had passed a very pleasant holiday.
"Robert tells me that your plans for the new airplane, the Sky-Bird II, are just about finished, John," remarked Mr. Giddings, as they sped northward along the smooth surface of Riverside Drive, with its beautiful greenery on the left and its fine residences at the right.
"Yes, sir," said John; "we have been devoting every spare moment to them.  Of course a good many changes had to be made to adapt conditions from the little airplane to the big fellow, and to incorporate the extra pet features we all agreed upon were desirable.  You know it never pays to start building an important and costly affair like an airplane without having every detail thoroughly planned out, and perfect working drawings in hand.  I think Paul will complete the drawings early next week, including copies for accompanying the specifications when we apply to Washington for patent rights.  As soon as the drawings are done, we will drop in at your home in the evening and show them to you."
"Good!" said Mr. Giddings.  "I shall await them with great interest.  I suppose as soon as I approve these drawings, you fellows will all pitch into the actual work."
"We surely will, sir," laughed Paul, while Bob, at the wheel in front, having caught some of the conversation, called back with energy: "That's just the size of it, dad."
"We have everything all ready," continued Paul.  "The balsa-wood and spruce we ordered some time ago is on hand, and that will keep us busy until other needed materials arrive.  We have repaired the big exhibition building in the old fair-grounds, put on new double doors and purchased a good Yale lock for them.  John and I have taken our workbench and tools over there, and Bob has helped us rig up a nice little five-horse power motor and small handsaw, also a circular saw, home-made sand-drum, a small planer, and a boring-machine.  That building is dry, and has lots of room in it for housing the new airplane as it grows to maturity.  When cold weather comes we can easily install a couple of heating-stoves to keep ourselves comfortable and protect our materials and the machine from frost damage."
Mr. Giddings expressed himself as well pleased with these arrangements. As he noted the foresightedness of the young mechanics his confidence in them expanded.
"Don't hesitate to order anything you need, young men," he said warmly. "Have them send the bills to me.  If my trust in you is misplaced, I am willing to stand the consequences.  This is not only the best kind of a practical education for Bob, but it is good business training for all of us.  Go ahead; go ahead!"
With such strong encouragement, is it any wonder that the three young men continued their operations vigorously?  Not one of them scarcely wanted to stop long enough to eat and sleep, _a la_ Edison; and as it was now summer vacation time, Paul and Bob were able to be with John all day long in the old exhibition building.  Neighboring boys and even older people hung around the open doors to watch operations, but the builders were careful not to let them get close enough to gain any ideas which might be harmful to their interests.
On Tuesday evening of the week following the start of the Air Derby, John and his brother put on their best clothes and hied themselves over to the Giddings home.  In Paul's hand was an envelope containing the precious plans for the Sky-Bird II--completed at last by the young draftsman, and ready to be shown to the financial member of the quartet.
When they were all seated in the Giddings library a little later, Mr. Giddings scrutinized the plans with every evidence of satisfaction written upon his strong features.  Now and then he would ask a question, as Paul explained view after view and detail after detail. At length he pointed to an oblong object situated in the pilot's cockpit just under the dashboard.  "What is that?" he asked, curiously.
"That is what John and I call an 'automatic pilot,'" answered Paul. "It is a new form of stabilizer, and made so as to overcome the defects of others which are on the market.  A stabilizer should automatically keep an airplane on a fairly level keel no matter how air conditions are, even so steady that it will travel along on its course for a considerable distance with the pilot paying no attention to his controls, perhaps eating his lunch or reading his orders."
"A mighty useful contrivance," commented Mr. Giddings.  "I should think that would also prevent lots of accidents in bad winds."
"It will--if it turns out as we expect," Paul remarked.
"Give me the full details of this," was the request.  "Remember, I am not much of an airplane man."
"Well," said Paul, "you know, sir, that it is far more difficult to drive an airplane than to guide an automobile, not merely because you have two steering-gears or rudders to take care of, one for sidewise and the other for up-and-down travel, but also because there are movable planes in the wings of the machine, which have to be worked to tip or 'bank' it when making a turn or to keep it on an even keel when a gust of wind strikes it.  The 'rudder' is the vertical plane at the tail of the machine, and is used for steering sideways, while the 'elevators' are the two horizontal movable planes just below the rudder, which are used for steering up and down.  Similar planes to the latter, one situated in the back edge of each upper wing, are called 'ailerons,' and one or the other is raised or depressed according to whether the aviator wishes to bank to the right or left.
"The driver of an automobile has nothing to do but watch his steering-wheel, and be ready to touch a pedal when he wishes to slow up or go faster or stop.  If he makes a curve he does not have to bank his machine owing to his comparatively slow speed; but the aviator, traveling much faster through the air, must do this, bringing his airplane to a steep angle if he makes a very short turn.  If he does not calculate just right, he is likely to turn upside down and meet this death in a nasty fall.
"While the careful automobilist can always see the road in front of him and avoid rough spots or obstacles before he reaches them, the aviator cannot do this.  It is true that he can see another airplane if it gets in his way, or a church steeple when he is flying low; but his greatest dangers are in the clear air itself, where they cannot be detected.  He may suddenly drop into a 'hole,' which is really a downward current of air, or he may get a terrific bump when he strikes a rising current.  A freakish whim of the winds may unexpectedly take away the air support from under one of the wings, and he will lurch and dip sharply to one side."
"And I suppose sometimes lose all control?" said Mr. Giddings.
"Yes, sir; that has very often happened," put in John.  "A flyer friend of mine took a nasty tumble that way near Cleveland last year, breaking three ribs.  It's a wonder he wasn't killed."
"The pilot is blind to these pitfalls," went on Paul.  "He must control his machine largely by intuition and the sense of feeling, although the veteran airman, John says, can tell a good deal about what to expect from the nature of the earth or clouds below him."
"That's true," averred John.  "The closer you are to the earth the more you will feel the 'bumps,' as we call them.  They are a whole lot like the waves of the ocean, only invisible, and there will be one straight over every protuberance or depression of size in the surface of the earth.  Mountains, hills, houses, lakes, valleys, rivers, forests, all cause bumps or holes in the air up above them.  At one thousand feet they are pretty bad.  At ten thousand feet they are scarcely noticeable.  That's why most pilots prefer to fly high whenever they can."
"What causes the air to act in this way over such configurations?" propounded the publisher.
John looked helpless, and smiled.  "You've got me there," he admitted. "I haven't had the opportunity to study aerostatics the same as Paul here.  He can probably tell us."
"I'm not through my course yet," reminded his brother, "but I think I can answer that.  The air surrounding the earth is a great belt forty or more miles through and is of an even thickness.  As our globe sweeps through it, the lower stratum of air naturally sinks down into the valleys and like depressions.  This action pulls down the upper stretches of air, thus creating what are termed 'air-pockets' or 'air-holes.'  Very dangerous they are, too."
"That is plain enough," declared Bob.  "Now, dad, let Paul go on explaining this 'automatic pilot.'"
"If the aviator is enshrouded in fog or tries to sail through a heavy bank of clouds, he is quite likely to lose all sense of direction," continued Paul.  "He will not know whether he is banking or traveling on an even keel.  Sometimes pilots have come out of a low cloud to find themselves dangerously close to the earth and in an awkward position, perhaps in a steep bank, a side-slip, or even in the terrifying nose-dive, and they have not had time to right themselves before crashing to earth.  So you see that before flying can become reasonably safe, some way must be found of keeping the machine automatically on a level keel.
"To operate this stabilizer of ours all the pilot will have to do is to guide the rudder with his feet.  The automatic pilot works the elevator and the ailerons.  It takes care of 'bumps' and 'holes' and sees that the machine banks at just the right angle on the turns.  This makes the operation of an airplane containing the stabilizer even more simple than running a motor-car, because you do not have to worry about going into different speed gears when climbing or descending.  You will notice on this drawing that strong piano-wires connect the instruments with all the necessary controlling planes of the machine."
"Instruments?" interrogated Mr. Giddings.  "I thought there was but one."
"No; there are two stabilizers, as you will see,--here, and here," was Paul's response, pointing his finger to the parts.  "But, as each one is exactly like the other in its construction, only the one has been drawn in detail.  The other stabilizer runs lengthwise of the cockpit and takes care of the elevator.  Both of these are operated by compressed air, which proceeds from a little tank, right here.  The tank is kept supplied by two tubes which lead into it, and each of which joins a small pump operated by a fan which is right here on each side of the fuselage where the onrush of wind will keep it humming as the airplane travels.
"Each equalizer has a bore in it half-filled with mercury, working a good deal like a carpenter's level.  If the airplane tilts to one side or the other, the mercury will try to keep its level and will immediately flow to the high side of the bore.  At each end of this mercury tube there are electrical contact points.  As one becomes submerged in the mercury by a tilting of the plane, a connection is made whereby two electro-magnets are energized on that side.  One of these magnets closes an exhaust-valve, and the other opens an inlet-valve, in the compressed air tank.  At once air is forced into this double cylinder, which you see at the bottom of the stabilizer, filling the half which is to operate its own set of rudders; and a piston begins to work inside.  The piston is connected to a toothed rack, as you will note, causing this to turn a sector engaging it.  The control wires connect with this sector."
"Very clever arrangement; but I don't quite see how, in banking, the ailerons can be brought back automatically to a neutral position as soon as the turn has been completed," ventured Mr. Giddings.
"John and I have provided for that, while Bob is responsible for the electrical features I have just mentioned," said Paul.  "You will notice that at the top of the mercury channel there is a dividing wall. A tube runs from the left side of this wall to the right wing of the airplane, also from the right side of the wall to the left wing.  At the end of each tube there is what we call a 'venturi tube.'  This is a kind of suction device operated by the wind.  The wind which blows through the left venturi tube sucks the air out of the right-hand side of the mercury tube, and the right venturi tube sucks the air out of the left-hand side of the mercury tube.  The stronger the wind, the greater the suction.  Now, when making a turn to the right the left wing must travel faster than the right wing, and so there must be more suction in the left venturi.  This produces a greater suction in the right-hand side of the mercury tube, which draws the mercury up on that side and down on the other, until the proper electrical contact is broken and the ailerons are returned to neutral position."
"Can the mechanism be thrown out of gear when desired?  I should think such a feature might be desirable," remarked Mr. Giddings.
"Indeed it is desirable, sir," declared Paul.  "No red-blooded pilot wishes to sit still and let his machine run itself all the time, no more than an automobilist.  That would spoil all the sport.  By merely disengaging the automatic pilot's wires here at the sector--the work of a couple of seconds--the airplane is ready for hand control."
"How much does it weigh?" was the gentleman's next query.
"A trifle less than a hundred pounds."
"That oughtn't to handicap an airplane any."
"Not a bit," said Paul.
CHAPTER V
AN AIR RACE FINISH AND A CHALLENGE
All in all, Mr. Giddings expressed himself as more than pleased with the drawings for the Sky-Bird II.  At the end of the explanation, he put the papers back in the envelope, and asked:
"Have you another set of these drawings in ink, Paul?"
"Yes, sir; this is a copied set; the original drawings from which we will make our tracings and blue-prints are at home."
"You had better leave them there in a safe place, and work from your blue-prints in the old exhibition building at the fair-grounds, being careful to lock them up in your workbench every time you depart.  I think you boys have a valuable thing here, and it is to your interest to keep others from knowing your plans or seeing the airplane until we have full government protection in the shape of patent rights.  I shall turn this set of drawings over to a patent attorney in the city and ask him to make application to the Patent Office in Washington without delay."
The next morning all three boys, filled with new confidence and energy, met at the fairgrounds as soon as they had had their breakfasts.  Paul carried two rolls of fresh blue-prints, which he and John had made while their mother was preparing the meal.  One of these sets he gave to Bob to take home as his own special property, and the other one he spread out on the workbench for consultation as their needs required.
Up to this time no effort had been made to keep children and curious adults out of the grounds, but as their machine was now beginning to take on real form, they determined to do this.  On a piece of board, Paul printed in large letters, "Private Grounds; Keep Out," and Bob nailed this up on the outside of the high board fence at the entrance. The gate itself they closed and barred on the inside.
"Guess that will be a sufficient hint to the grown-ups," said Bob with a grin.  "If the kids climb over, we'll fasten a red flag to the front of our big hangar and paint 'Dynamite' in letters a yard long across the front of the building."
"Yes, and if that doesn't keep them away we'll turn the hose on them," laughed John.
Then they fell to work on the new airplane, applying themselves like beavers.  All three boys had had the splendid benefits of manual training when they were in the public schools, and knew how to handle every machine they had set up.  In addition to this, Paul and Bob were first-class amateur machinists, as their courses of engineering in Clark Polytechnic embraced the use of metal-working appliances of the latest design, as well as wood-working machinery, and they could have operated other machines had they needed them.
That evening the workers went back home tired but well satisfied with their progress.  The next day the shavings flew again, and by the latter part of the week they had begun to assemble portions of the fuselage, using a waterproof glue which had been especially prepared for airplanes, and applying galvanized screws to withstand rust in damp atmospheres.
As the days went by, the boys, like almost everybody in the country, watched the newspapers eagerly for reports of the progress of the contestants in the big Air Derby around the world.  Only four of the eleven aircraft to start had succeeded in getting across the treacherous Atlantic, two of these being dirigible balloons, one a flying-boat, and the other a Vickers-Vimy biplane.  After landing on European soil one of the lucky airships came to grief in Italy in making a stop for fuel, but the driver had obtained an Italian Caproni plane and was making his way eastward with all haste.  The other dirigible, commanded by Americans, had reached Teheran, Persia, where gas-bag troubles had compelled her crew to continue by train.  About the same time the flying-boat, piloted by a Boston man, and the biplane, in control of two Englishmen, had reached Yokohama, Japan, within a few hours of each other.  It was said that these contestants would wait there for the first steamship going to San Francisco, as they feared it would be impossible to fly across the great Pacific stretch of almost five thousand miles.  Upon reaching San Francisco they planned to continue the journey to New York in airplanes furnished by California aeronautical friends.
The newspapers shortly after this announced the sailing of the rival parties at Yokohama.  Storms and fog delayed the vessel.  Finally she arrived at the Golden Gate, and then came the mad race across the North American continent in fresh airplanes.  Near Cheyenne, Wyoming, the American plane was forced to the ground by engine trouble, allowing her competitor to get ahead several hours.  This lead the American could not overcome, and the race ended at 5:15 o'clock on the afternoon of July 27th, with the English crew first and the American crew second. Three days later the belated French crew, who had met with mishap in Italy, came in, winning third prize.
The Ross brothers were at work in the hangar when Bob Giddings, who had gone into town on his motorcycle after some more screws, came back waving the copy of the _Daily Independent_ containing this last account.
"Cartier and his bunch have arrived," he cried, springing from his machine.  "Here it is on the first page.  That accounts for all the prize-winners, and the excitement is practically over.  The others will just lob in now--and they might as well."  He tossed the paper to John. "Here, read it, you fellows," he said.  "You can quit on the Sky-Bird long enough for that, I guess.  I'll work while you lay off a few minutes."
Bob rolled up his sleeves, and John and Paul spread out the newspaper on the bench and interestedly read the article in question.  As they finished, and were turning around to resume work, Bob observed:
"Dad's got a rattling good editorial on this Air Derby, if I do say it. Take a look at page 5 and see how he rips 'em up the back."
Shoulder to shoulder, the two brothers leaned over the bench and read as follows:
"AROUND-THE-WORLD" RECORDS
The world has just witnessed the finish of another effort on the part of mankind to circle the globe in record-breaking time.  And once more the newspapers of the universe, and the sporting chroniclers, are registering a new record in this class of human endeavor.  When, three days ago, the English team, headed by Chester Hodge, dropped out of a Curtis plane into Mineola Field, it was just 23 days, 6 hours and 15 minutes after the same crew had left that field in their Vickers-Vimy. This beats the former record of 36 days and some odd hours, made in 1913 by John Henry Mears, by the substantial margin of approximately 12 days.  It is a big gain--a startlingly short time for encompassing the world as compared with the efforts of the past.
All of the three contesting crews to finish have broken Mears's record, and deserve great credit for their praise-worthy performance.  The sponsors for this first great Air Derby around the world, the prominent aero clubs of this country and the Eastern Hemisphere, also deserve much praise for conceiving and promoting such a successful contest, and in posting such magnificent prizes.
But, in the interests of other similar tours likely to follow, this newspaper thinks it high time to declare itself opposed most vigorously to two fundamental features governing the competition just closed.
First, why was this contest called by its promoters an "Air Derby"?  In our opinion, with rules allowing the use of other modes of travel as well as aircraft, the title is a decided misnomer.  It should have been termed a "Go-As-You-Please Derby."  Not a single one of these contestants accomplished the girdle by airplane alone; every winner took a steamship across the Pacific.  Here's hoping that when another 'round-the-world contest is pulled off it will be tagged with a title which fits.
Second, when a specific record trip around the world is promulgated, is it scientifically correct to take a route which is approximately 30 per cent shorter than the actual circumference of the universe on which we live?  In a foot race around a circular track judges do not let sprinters pick out their own course and "cut across lots" whenever they choose.  Nor is it allowed in horse races, auto races, or any form of sport where time records are registered on curving courses.
The _Daily Independent_ contends that beginning with Jules Verne's mythical hero Phileas Fogg, who in the story negotiated the journey in the improbable time of 80 days, back in 1872, every record-maker in the flesh and blood has followed northerly routes averaging the 30th parallel, thus traversing only about 16,000 miles of the world's actual circumference of 24,899 miles; and these records have gone down as true and complete accomplishments!  But, because a wrongful practice, one misrepresentative of its purpose, has been carried on for almost a century, is it any reason for arguing that the process should continue in this advanced and enlightened day?
We say NO!  It is time for this practice of around-the-world humbug and cheatery to stop right now.  If it takes our fastest modern globe-trotters a whole year to go around the world by a route equal to or approximating the equatorial girth, then let it take them a year; for the sake of our pride and all that is good and sincere let us do our stunts on the square.
There are no records of an equatorial trip around the world.  Who will be the first to establish one?   Let us run a pen through all these short-cut records of the past, and turn a clean page for the entry of the first real journey around the fat old world's belt.
As Paul finished the editorial his heart was beating very fast.  He was a true sportsman, and he realized the truth in the bold stand taken by the _Daily Independent_.  His brother John was no less favorably affected by it.
"Bang me, if that isn't a good article!" said John enthusiastically. "Mr. Giddings may get a lot of criticism for this from a certain class of people, but he's taking the right course."
"He certainly is," approved Paul.  "I had never thought of it before, but he points the error out so clearly that almost anybody ought to realize the need of a fairer route after reading his statements.  Just as he says, it's never too late to correct matters which have been going wrong, no matter how long."
"I'd give anything I've got if I could be the first fellow to go around the world's belt," declared John, his brown cheeks glowing with deeper color at the thought; "I wouldn't care so much about beating these other chaps in the matter of time, just so long as I made a fair trail."
"Oh, John, wouldn't that be a great trip!" cried Paul.
"Say, look at here," broke in Bob Giddings, who had been near enough to overhear all of this conversation.  His face was glowing, too, as he turned toward the brothers.  "When we get the Sky-Bird II done, why couldn't the three of us pick out a new course around the globe in her? If she's as good as we think she will be, we could travel over any kind of land or water with her, and I think we could pick out islands in the Pacific so that we could cross that and make the entire journey by air."
"I believe this old ship could do it all right," said John, full of confidence and thrilled at the idea, as he stepped back and looked at the partly-assembled fuselage with a loving eye.  "But, Bob, a trip like that would cost a lot of money just for gas, and you know Paul and I could hardly afford it."
"I'm going to speak to dad about it, anyhow," decided Bob; "he has been talking airplanes and world routes at home to mother and me for the last three months, and maybe he will be interested enough to back us up.  He never stops at anything when he once sets his mind on it."
It was several days after this that Bob Giddings came to work with another newspaper in his hands.
"Things seem to be coming our way as fast as they can," he said, with a mysterious smile.  "Take in what Mr. Wrenn, the editor of this paper, says in this framed insert on the front page."
John and Paul did as directed.  The article was prominently displayed, and was to the effect that the _Clarion_ disagreed very strongly with the attitude adopted by its contemporary, the _Daily Independent_, in regard to around-the-world routes.  It declared that it was physically impossible by any mode of modern travel to follow a route along, or even within twenty degrees of, the equatorial line, and said it was a shame to assail the creditable records made in the past.  In conclusion it stated:
If our esteemed sheet, the _Daily Independent_, feels so cock-sure of its position, why does it not do a little demonstrating?  Why does it not organize an expedition, and prove its claim?  This is all bunk!  We are so sure of it, that we right now challenge our misguided friend to run us a race around the world on a course of his own selection, at any time, by any mode of travel he may choose.  There! we have knocked the chip off of the _Daily Independent's_ shoulder.  Now let's see if our friend is really a bluffer or a fighter.
"You know the _Clarion_ is a powerful evening newspaper, too," said Bob, when the Ross boys looked up from their reading.  "It has always been a hot rival of dad's paper, but it never got quite so sarcastic as this before.  Dad was good and mad when he read this last night.  'I'll show both the _Clarion_ and the public whether I'm a bluffer or not,' he said to mother.  'If it takes the last cent I've got I'll organize an expedition to meet their challenge and prove my theory to be the correct one.'  Then I woke up to our opportunity.  I suggested to dad that if the Sky-Bird turned out as we hoped, she would be the very thing to pioneer such a route and give the _Clarion_ people a race to make their eyes stick out; and I said John Ross was willing to head a crew including Paul and myself."
"What did he say?" asked John and Paul, almost in the same breath.
"Well, he gave a little gasp; his eyes snapped, and he quit walking the floor and sat down on the davenport.  'Robert,' he said, 'I'll think this matter over.'  Then he lit a cigar and went to smoking.  Dad seldom smokes except when he's got something heavy on his mind."
John and Paul now joined Bob in putting a knee-brace in the new airplane body.  Somehow they had a feeling that the parts they were assembling with such care would one of these days go on a very long and arduous journey.
CHAPTER VI
THE MISSING BLUE-PRINTS
The Air Derby created interest all over the world.  People in foreign lands talked about it and read about it in their newspapers, just as they had done in the United States and Canada.  With the keenest kind of interest they had followed the reports of its progress and its finish.  Several nations had hoped to have their own representatives come in first, only to be disappointed.
All this interested world pricked up its attention anew when the bold editorial of the _Daily Independent_ was widely copied.  As John Ross had predicted, and as probably Mr. Giddings knew before he wrote it, this particular article caused a furore of comment editorially and otherwise.  Much of this,--indeed, it seemed the most of it--was favorable to the stand taken by the New York publisher.  But when the rival sheet, the _Clarion_, arrayed its strong force in opposition, the conservative element of the public felt vastly encouraged, and many were the heated personal arguments as well as newspaper duels, which ensued.  Aviators all over the land were particularly concerned, and it goes without saying that the winners of the late competition were all lined up with the _Clarion_ contingent.  This paper's challenge to the _Daily Independent_ for a two-party race around the world on the _Independent's_ own conception of what it considered a fair route awoke great joy in the hearts of the leave-things-as-they-have-been adherents.  Few, if any of them, particularly the publishers of the _Clarion_, thought Mr. Giddings would ever take up the challenge.
Therefore, judge of the surprise of everybody, and the dismay of the _Clarion_ staff, when a few days following the flaunting of its challenge, the front page of the Giddings paper contained the following, under a heavy black type heading:
THIS PAPER ACCEPTS THE "CLARION'S" CHALLENGE
A short time ago the _Daily Independent_ in an editorial strongly criticized the methods or rather routes used in the past in making world tours for a time record, stating that such journeys had all been made unfairly, in that the routes adopted were about a third less than the actual circumference of the globe, and that in our opinion the only legitimate around-the-world record could be made by following approximately the equatorial line.
We expected a good deal of criticism, of course, when we came out thus boldly against a custom which had prevailed since the beginning of so-called "around the world" record trips.  But we did not expect to be challenged to prove our sincerity by ourselves making such a journey in competition with our esteemed but rabid contemporary, the _Clarion_.
To show the _Clarion_ that we are not "bluffing," and that we are perfectly willing to demonstrate practically any position we ever take, we herewith accept its challenge.  Even now we have in process of construction a new type of airplane, by means of which we are confident we can fly approximately straight around the belly of this old world entirely by air.  A little later we shall announce a time, place, and route, in our columns, and sincerely trust the _Clarion_ will be satisfied with them.
It is quite unnecessary to say that Paul and John Ross read the foregoing article with the keenest pleasure the night they reached home from the hangar and found their mother just finishing its perusal. Naturally Mrs. Ross felt all of the average mother's anxiety at the thought that her sons would be exposed to the perils such a long journey would invite, but on the other hand she was very proud to think their talents had placed them in such an honored position.  It had only been an evening or two before that Mr. Giddings, in company with his son Robert, had called at the Ross homestead, and after a long conference with the boys as to the suitability of the new Sky-Bird II for making a world cruise, had taken his departure with his mind fully made up as to how he should meet the rival paper's challenge.
A few days subsequently, Bob Giddings found, upon reaching home for lunch, that his motorcycle, which he was in the habit of riding back and forth to work, so that he could rush into town on short notice and get emergency materials for the airplane, had a flat tire.  As he could not fix the tire then, he decided to walk back to the fair-grounds.
As he emerged from the big front yard of his home, he chanced to look toward town, and observed an orange-colored taxicab standing near the first crossing.  This would not have especially attracted Bob's attention, except for the fact that a man sitting on the front seat was just at that moment pointing his index finger toward the Giddings' place, and a slender-looking man just descending from the cab was looking that way and nodding his head.
It seemed to Bob that he had seen the passenger before, but a second look made him think he must be mistaken; at least he could not place him.
"It's probably somebody to see dad.  If so, he'll get disappointed, as dad won't get back from the city before evening."
Dismissing the incident from his mind with this thought.  Bob hurried down the road, eager to reach the hangar and get to work again on the new airplane.
A few moments after he had passed the home of a youth he knew, he heard a familiar salutation, and turned around to wave his hand in a greeting to this friend, who had come to the front door.  As he turned, his eye fell on a slender figure some distance behind, a figure which stepped behind a tree and stopped.
"Humph! that's funny," mused Bob.  "It looks a lot like that fellow who got out of the taxi back there by our house; I wonder what he's up to, anyhow?"
He continued his way, but as he reached the fair-grounds gate and got out his key to unlock it, the whim to look back again seized him.  As he turned, his gaze once more rested on the slender form of the wayfarer, who had crossed to the opposite side of the road, and who now, finding himself observed once more, promptly stopped and began to fuss with his shoe-lace.
"Say now, this is funny!" ejaculated Bob under his breath, vainly trying again to recall the identity of the lean figure and dark complexion.  "I believe that chap is trying to shadow me.  I wonder what in the dickens he really is up to?"
It was the second time Bob had asked that question of himself, but as he was a poor source of information just then, he was forced to pass into the fair-grounds and relock the gate in as mystified a state of mind as before he put the query.
A little later, when he reached the big hangar he whirled about again, as if half expecting to see the stranger still skulking behind him in the grounds.  To his relief he did not detect this situation exactly, but he did see a dark face, which had been peering over the top of the highboard fence near the gate, drop down from view on the other side.
Bob gave a grunt as he passed into the hangar and took off his coat. "As I live, I believe he's up to some sort of mischief," growled the boy.  And when, shortly afterward, John and Paul Ross appeared he told of his experience and repeated his suspicions.
"That is funny," asserted John; "Paul and I saw nothing of any such man when we came along, and we passed down the same road.  Perhaps he mistook you for somebody else."
"I hope so, but I don't like his actions a little bit," declared Bob stoutly.
With that he picked up a try-square and pencil and began laying out some work for Paul to cut on the circular saw, while John busied himself at the boring-machine in putting a hole through the center of the big twelve-foot balsa-wood propeller which a little later would be reinforced with a thin jacket of a new metal called "salinamum," which was made chiefly from salt but whose fused components made it as light as aluminum and stronger than tool steel.
Soon the queer actions of the stranger were quite forgotten in the deep interest of the three young men in their work.  With the prospect of a world tour before them if the Sky-Bird turned out well, they now had more incentive than at the beginning to build the machine with the utmost skill and attention to every detail.  Some changes, calculated to make the craft better adapted to the peculiar conditions she would be likely to meet in such a varied temperature were put into effect, but on the whole they found their original plans so well laid that no important features seemed to require modification or abandonment.
But if the man who had followed Bob dropped out of their minds the rest of that day, he was soon to occupy a prominent place in their thoughts. For the very next morning, when Paul and John arrived at the hangar, they were met at the door by a very agitated Bob Giddings.
"Fellows, what do you think has happened?" cried Bob, clearly very much excited.  Without giving his friends time to answer the question he blurted out: "Somebody got in here last night and stole our plans!"
"Stole our plans!" reiterated Paul and John in the same gasp.
"That's it," said Bob,--"stole the set of blue-prints we have been working from.  What's more, they must have seen the airplane before they got out.  I went to take the plans out of the bench drawer here where we have kept them locked up, and there was the drawer wide open, the lock picked, and the drawings gone.  I'll bet a herring we can thank my dark-skinned shadow of yesterday for this little visit!"
"It does look as if he might have had something to do with this," agreed John soberly.  "I wonder how the rascal, whoever he is, could have gotten in the building.  There's a heavy Yale lock on the doors."
"The doors were locked all right when I came this morning," vouched Bob.  "I don't see myself how--"
"Here you are, gentlemen!" called Paul, who had stepped to a good-sized window near the head of the workbench.  "Here's the fellow's private entrance!"  And he pointed to where a heavy nail locking the lower sash had been forced aside, also to a series of indentations in the outer sill, where some prying tool had obviously been recently at work.
"It's a clear case of theft, that's sure," observed John; "and since its only our plans that have been taken, it goes to show that this chap is very much concerned about this new airplane."
"Perhaps he wishes to beat us out in getting the patent rights," Bob hinted darkly.
"No, I don't think it's that," differed Paul; "our application was sent in to Washington some weeks ago, and you know the first one to apply for a certain patent gets the attention."
"Well, then, he could use our plans and make and sell airplanes of their pattern, couldn't he?" asked Bob, whose ideas of patent laws were still a little vague.
"Not at all; if he did we could sue him for infringement," was Paul's answer.  "The only way he could profit by this theft, so far as I can see, would be to construct a machine for his own private use, or to give to another person.  We could not touch him for that."
"And that would be bad enough for us--if such a machine were used against us in this proposed race around the world, wouldn't it?" demanded Bob Giddings.
Paul and John Ross looked at him in dismayed astonishment.  They had not thought of this contingency before.
CHAPTER VII
WHO'S AT THE WINDOW?
The making of a big airplane is a good-sized job.  Especially is this the case with the first airplane made up from new plans.  And when the job has to be done by no more than three young men, it becomes an unusually formidable task.
The loss of the blue-prints did not hold up the progress of our friends in the least, as it was only the matter of fifteen or twenty minutes' work for Paul to make a new set from the tracings he had at home; but there were unexpected difficulties met here and there in the constructive work, as is always the case in large mechanical undertakings of an original nature, besides which the young builders ran into the usual delays caused by slow deliveries of parts and materials from distant dealers and manufacturers; and sometimes the railroads were tardy in transporting shipments.
All in all, the summer slipped away only too quickly, and it came time for Paul and Bob to go back to school again with Sky-Bird II not more than half finished.  It is true that the long fuselage of the craft was done, with its graceful curves and splendid, roomy, enclosed cabin, accommodating five persons; but all concerned were a little disappointed that more progress had not been made.  Mr. Giddings had been quite a frequent visitor at the fair-grounds all through the summer, lending a voice of encouragement throughout the operations.  He looked really concerned, however, when Paul and Bob had to return to Clark Polytechnic Institute for the new term of study.
"This is rather hard on us, isn't it, boys?" he observed, with a light laugh in which he unsuccessfully tried to conceal his anxiety.  "Here we are with a half-completed airplane, a race staring us in the face for next summer, and two of our workmen snatched away for the whole winter by the inexorable demands of school life, leaving only one lone fellow to finish the job."
"We'll be able to work Saturdays, dad," ventured Bob, trying to wedge a little bit of cheer into the gloomy prospect.
"And evenings.  I'd be willing to work after supper every night for a couple of hours," proposed Paul.
"You won't do any such thing," came the firm answer.  "While you are at school you two fellows need your evenings for rest and study, and your Saturdays for the school-team sports.  Only when there isn't a game on in which you are a contestant will I allow you to help John on the machine--even if it isn't finished for five years.  I have been thinking this situation over for some time, for I have seen it coming," went on the great publisher after a moment's pause; "and I have come to the conclusion that the best thing I can do to hustle our ship along is to call in another workman on the job, some chap we can trust and who knows how to handle tools.  In fact, if he were a regular airplane mechanic it would be all the better."
John Ross spoke up at once.  "Mr. Giddings," he said, "I think you have the right idea.  Bob and Paul can't help me much from now on, and if we take that trip around the world next summer this machine must be done some weeks ahead, so that we can have a chance to test her out and tune her up.  Now, it happens that Paul and I have a cousin--Tom Meeks--who is about my age and who flew in the same squadron with me over on the French front during the war.  I will vouch for Tom's ability as a mechanic and flyer, also as to his trustworthiness.  It happens my mother just received a letter from Tom's folks in Illinois the other day in which she said the factory had closed down in which he was working and he was out of a job."
"And you think this Tom Meeks would be willing to come up here, then, and help you this winter for the salary I am paying you?" questioned Mr. Giddings with interest.
"I think he would, sir."
"Then write to him immediately, and tell him to come right on."
In less than a week a strapping big young man, suitcase in hand, got off the train at the Yonkers depot, and was warmly greeted by his cousins, Paul and John Ross, who then introduced him to Bob Giddings. Bob had been so eager to see the new helper on the airplane that he could not wait for a later meeting with him.  He took instant liking to the jolly newcomer, who seemed to be ever smiling, and after a short exchange of conversation with him hurried home to tell his father what a splendid fellow Tom Meeks was.
Tom was domiciled in the Ross home, to which he had been a visitor in other years, and of course for the rest of that evening was kept busy visiting with Mrs. Ross and looking at the numerous miniature airplanes of Paul's.  His praise of the little Sky-Bird, and particularly of the drawings of Sky-Bird II was very strong, and when he went to the fair-grounds the following morning with John and actually saw what a fine-looking ship the big craft was, he was stumped for words to express his full admiration.
Then while John and Tom went industriously to work, Paul and Bob rode away to Clark Polytechnic in New York with Mr. Giddings.  Just before starting into the city that morning, the newspaper man had met Tom, and there was little doubt that he was well pleased with this addition to his force of workers.  Of course Paul and Bob were sorry to have to interrupt their labors on Sky-Bird II, but there was no help for it, and there was some consolation in the thought that undoubtedly their instructors would let them work on some of the airplane's smaller parts as a portion of their school mechanical practice.  This supposition indeed proved correct, and as the fall days passed they found the two student chums not only partaking with full spirit in the sports of their comrades, but also contributing in no small measure to the progress of the work on the new airplane.
As a rule, Paul and Bob managed to stop in each Saturday for at least an hour or so to lend some assistance to John and Tom, and when there were no school contests on, they spent practically the entire holiday in the hangar.
The cool days of November soon compelled the boys to install a couple of heating stoves in the big building, and after that the place was warm and cheery throughout the working day, no matter how blustery and nippy the weather.  At night the coals were carefully banked with ashes, to keep up a fair degree of warmth until the following morning.
Up to this time nothing had been seen of any suspicious person lurking around the premises, but one afternoon late in the month, when Tom Meeks was working alone in the hangar and John had gone to town after some bolts, Tom thought he heard a strange sound at one of the two windows near the workbench.
Turning quickly from the wing-strut which he had been setting in place, Tom faced the window just in time to see a swarthy-looking countenance, adorned with a toothbrush-like mustache, pulled out of range.  The mechanic had been informed of Bob's experience with the man who had evidently followed him to the grounds during the summer, also of the blue-prints which had been stolen, and now as he observed the similarity in looks between this eavesdropper and the reported shadow of Bob, he became quite excited.
With that lack of coolness and presence of mind characterizing a more reserved temperament, the impulsive Tom rushed straight up to the window, and peered out.  Of course he could see nothing, for the peeper had been cute enough upon finding himself observed to keep close to the side of the building as he moved swiftly toward its rear.
Tom now seized the lower sash and tried to throw it up, so as to get a sidewise view.  To his disgust he found it double-spiked, and realized that he had put that very second nail in himself upon first learning of the loss of the blue-prints.
"Huckleberry pie!" sputtered Tom, using his favorite expression when excited.
He whirled about and started for the door of the building.  On account of the extensive size of the structure it was quite a little way to this.  To make matters worse Tom dashed forward in such haste and flurry that he did not watch his step very closely; when he was about half-way to the door, his toe caught the protruding leg of an innocent sawhorse, and the next moment Tom Meeks and the sawhorse were both overturned.
"Huckleberry pie!" gasped the big fellow.  His right shin hurt like fury, but he would not stop to examine it, and covered the remaining distance to the door in very ludicrous limping jumps.  Dashing around the front of the building, he reached the corner which gave him a view of the side.
Not a soul was in sight.  Not to be outdone completely, Tom hurried along the side of the building.  As he came near the rear end he saw a slender figure just clambering over the highboard fence of the field in the rear of the hangar.
Lame as he was, big Tom knew there was no chance of his overtaking the fleet-footed and cunning stranger, so he returned to his work very much crestfallen in spirit.
When John heard what had happened, on his return to work, he was considerably disturbed, and suggested to his comrades the advisability of placing a night-guard on the premises for a while at least, since this unknown enemy might make an effort some night to burn or irreparably damage the Sky-Bird.  The others sanctioned this precaution, and thereafter took turns in watching, although this vigilance was apparently all for naught, as no suspicious character appeared.
CHAPTER VIII
THE SKY-BIRD II
"Well, Mr. Giddings, what do you think of Sky-Bird II?" asked John Ross, one memorable day.
There was a smile of deep satisfaction on John's own bronzed features as he put the question, a smile which was duplicated on the faces of his three co-workers--Paul, Bob, and Tom Meeks.  It was the latter part of March, Easter vacation week for Paul and Bob, and the two chums had been working every one of the last three days helping John and Tom put the finishing touches on the big new airplane.  And now this Friday morning it rested gracefully upon its own rubber-tired wheels, its great stretch of wings spread out as airily as those of a monster bird, its huge two-bladed propeller glistening like burnished silver, and its body running backward in a splendid symmetrical taper, to end at the well-proportioned tail.  Sky-Bird II was done at last.
Mr. Giddings was so lost in admiration at the beautiful lines of the craft that he did not reply immediately to John's question.  He had not seen it for almost two weeks, and in that time, under the onslaughts of the four boys, it had changed appearance in a striking way, numerous finished parts having been connected and paint and varnish having been applied.
"All I have to say, young men, is that if she performs anywhere near as well as she looks, I shall be thoroughly satisfied with the money I have invested thus far," declared the great newspaper man with an enthusiasm which he did not try to conceal.  His eyes were shining, as he walked around the craft looking at it from all sides.  He rubbed his fingers lingeringly over the smooth fuselage, and smiled quietly as he regarded the name "Sky-Bird II" lettered in large blue characters on her sides and underneath each long bird-like wing.  Then he mounted a folding step and went through a neat door into the glass-surrounded cabin.  This was deep enough to stand up in, and provided comfortable upholstered cane seats for the pilot and four passengers or assistants. All of these seats except the pilot's and observer's were convertible, forming supports for the swinging of as many hammocks, and in a small space at the rear was a neat little gasoline-burner, and over it a built-in cupboard containing some simple aluminum cooking ware.
"Well, I declare!" said Mr. Giddings in amazement at the convenience of things, "it looks as if you fellows hadn't left out a single item needed in a long and enjoyable cruise."
"There's nothing like being fixed up for all emergencies, sir," laughed John.  "As you notice, we have everything for night-flying as well as day-flying.  With such a machine as this there is no reason why a crew of four or five could not run nights as well as days, two operating while the others sleep in the hammocks.  Cold foods can be cooked or warmed up on the gas-stove when needed, and the enclosed cabin protects all hands from the worst effects of bad storms."
"Wouldn't this glass break in a hailstorm?" asked Mr. Giddings.  "It seems to be pretty thin."
"It is thin," said Paul; "that is to give it lightness.  It might check some in a hailstorm, but it could not break out, as it is made of two layers of glass between which is cemented a thin sheet of celluloid."
"I think you had two Liberty motors here in the hangar when I was here last.  I neglected to ask you the power of these, and what you need two for," observed Mr. Giddings.  "I thought you said in the beginning that you considered one 400 horse-power engine of sufficient strength to carry this plane at a fast clip."
"It is this way, sir," responded John.  "The regular big biplane of the bomber type carries two propellers with an engine for each propeller. If one motor fails them when flying, about all the other is good for is to make a landing with.  By reason of the great lightness of our airplane one good 400 horse-power motor is all we need for pulling purposes.  But suppose this should fail, as any motor might do?  We could not continue, any more than the other fellow, and would have to volplane to the ground.  Again, suppose we wished to fly continuously more than twelve hours?  We could not do so, as such a steady run would heat the best motor and ruin it.  These two Liberty motors, which we have, overcome all these troubles.  Both are so arranged that a simple switch connects and disconnects either one with the propeller, and both can be put at work at the one time if needed in a bad storm.  If one stalls, the other can immediately be thrown in and a forced landing obviated.  Moreover, if we could get fuel when needed, with this arrangement I am safe in saying we could fly steadily day and night, resting one motor and working its mate, for a week or more."
"What is this?"  As he spoke the publisher touched a peculiar-looking helmet hanging from a hook near the pilot's seat.
Bob laughed.  "Why, don't you recognize the products of your talented son, dad?" he cried, as he took the object down and clapped it over his father's iron-gray head.  "That's my new wireless telephone headpiece, and right underneath it here is the mahogany cabinet containing the sending and receiving instruments.  You see, these two wires run from the plug up to the receivers, there being one receiver in each side of the helmet, right over your ear, pressing against the ear tightly by means of a sponge-rubber gasket."
"A man looks like a padded football player with this thing on," said Mr. Giddings with a smile.  "Why is a helmet required at all?"
"We wouldn't require it so much with these motors, as they are equipped with a new kind of muffler which shuts out about four-fifths of the noise other airplanes get," explained Bob.  "But for all that there are always noises in airplanes; for instance, they say the whirr of the propeller when it is revolving about 1450 revolutions per minute, or at the full speed of this one, makes quite a roar; so you see the need of the helmet to shut out all undesirable sounds possible.  In ordinary planes the crew cannot talk to each other except by using phones or putting their lips to each other's ears and yelling at the top of their voices, according to what John and Tom tell me.  But we don't expect to have that trouble in this enclosed cabin and with this new muffler working, do we, fellows?"
"I'm sure we won't," said John.
"Not if I'm any judge," grinned Tom.
"Can you talk with a ground station when you're flying, say a couple of miles high?" asked Mr. Giddings, examining a transmitter attached to a yoked wire support which his son slipped over his shoulders.
"Farther than that.  With this particular vacuum tube, which will amplify sounds three or four times over any other I have tried, we expect to talk with ground stations or other aircraft at a distance of three thousand miles.  Notice what a simple thing it is, dad," and Bob indicated a little glass bulb which looked a lot like an ordinary incandescent light, but which had a peculiar arrangement of wires and substances inside.
"Is the transmitter or receiver made just like the ordinary kind?" asked Mr. Giddings.
"Practically the same, dad.  The wireless transmitter, like that of the wire telephone, contains a sensitive diaphragm which your voice strikes and sets to vibrating.  These vibrations compress and release a capsule of carbon granules which agitate and set in motion an electrical current in two magnets connecting with them.  The magnets convey the sound-waves in the form of electrical waves, along wires out to the tip of each wing, where the wires hang down a little way.  When a message comes in it is caught by a webbing of antennae wires in our wings."
"Then I suppose these sound-waves, in other words the words one speaks, run out of the end of these wires into the atmosphere?"
"Exactly, sir," agreed Bob.  "That is, the electrical waves are projected into the air and disturb this air in a way to make it pulsate in the same manner as your voice makes the diaphragm pulsate.  These waves are then carried through the atmosphere in every direction, and sooner or later reach the antennae wires of some station equipped to receive them.  Down these wires they dash, are registered and magnified in the wonderfully delicate vacuum tube, and from it are carried up into the receivers at your ears."
"I should think they would be electrical impulses when they reach the receivers," argued Mr. Giddings.  "How can a person hear _words_ from electrical discharges?"
Bob smiled.  "Easy enough, dad," he went on.  "You see, this vacuum tube does the business.  The electrical current agitates this in unison, and the impulses are immediately converted into words again,--and there you are!"
"I acknowledge my understanding now," admitted Mr. Giddings, with a hearty laugh; "but there's just one thing yet I want light on: Where do you get your electrical current?  It takes a dynamo to make electricity, else storage batteries.  I don't see either."
"Come outside here a moment, dad."
Bob smiled as he led the little party out of the Sky-Bird's cabin. When they once more stood on the hangar floor, he pointed to a peculiar T-shaped object just beneath the nose of the airplane.  This had escaped the gentleman's observation until now.
"It looks like a small propeller with a torpedo sticking out from the middle of it," laughed Mr. Giddings.
"So it does, dad," agreed Bob.  "Well, that's our wireless dynamo.  You will notice that the propeller faces ahead, like the big fellow here. When the airplane is flying, the rush of wind spins the fan at a terrific rate, its axle operates a little dynamo in this torpedo-like case and manufactures electric current.  The current then passes into this small apparatus here with a bulb attached, which regulates the voltage and sends it up to the instruments in a uniform flow, no matter at what speed the airplane may be going."
"That's a cheap way of getting current," declared the newspaper man, "and a mighty good one, too."  He now changed the subject by asking: "How much do you suppose this machine weighs?"
"I have been in smaller ones which weighed, unloaded, as much as three thousand pounds," admitted John Ross, with a peculiar smile.  "Put your hands under the Sky-Bird's nose here and see if you can lift her, Mr. Giddings."
"Don't joke that way, John," expostulated Mr. Giddings.  "Why, her engines are right above this portion of her, and I couldn't lift one of them alone."
"Just try it anyhow, dad," persisted Bob, who also wore that queer smile.
More to accommodate them than because he expected to accomplish anything, the publisher half-heartedly braced himself in a crouching position and pushed upward on the airplane's front.  To his amazement the whole forward part of the machine rose upward a foot in the air, as if it were made of paper.
"My word!" exclaimed Mr. Giddings, letting the craft back upon its wheels.  "Who would have thought such a thing?  I had faith in this principle of the hollow wings and helium-gas, boys, but I never thought it could reduce the normal weight of the plane to such a vast extent, It is truly a wonderful idea."
"You might not believe it, but the Sky-Bird weighs less than two hundred pounds as she stands," said Paul.  "Just before you came today, Mr. Giddings, Bob and I, one at each end, easily lifted her clear off the floor."
"It's what we aimed for, and we've got it," added John with satisfaction, while Tom Meeks nodded his head and ejaculated, "I'd say so!  I'd say so!" his whole broad face abeam.  "This feather lightness means great lift, great speed, and great cruising range."
"I should think so surely," was the decided response of the newspaper man.  "I notice you have installed that 'automatic pilot' too.  And what's that up here in front on top of the cabin?  A searchlight, as I live!"
"Yes, dad," said Bob; "we thought that would be a good thing in case we do any night traveling on this tour of the world.  It ought to have good power, being operated with current from the storage batteries of the wireless wind-dynamo."
After a little more inspection and further questions, Mr. Giddings took his departure, promising to be on hand at the hangar the following morning for the test flight.
CHAPTER IX
THE TEST FLIGHT
John, Paul, and Tom reached the fairgrounds a good full hour ahead of the scheduled start that Saturday morning.  In fact, Mrs. Ross had given them an earlier breakfast than usual, so that they could give the Sky-Bird II a general going over before it came time for her to make her initial flight.
Of course all three young men were a good deal excited, although they were careful not to let each other know it, for fear of being the target for a little fun from the others.  In this effort at reserve, the irrepressible Tom was the least successful of the trio, as might be expected, and when he caught John and Paul slyly winking at each other and glancing in his direction as he nervously tried the same control for the third time, he blurted out: "Oh, you fellows needn't laugh at me!  You're just as much on edge as I am, now that we're really going to fly this old bird!"
"Come, Tom, don't try to cover up your nervousness by accusing us of the same thing," protested Paul.
"You're as agitated as a young kid with his first electric toy train, Tom," laughed John.  "How much gasoline have we got in the tanks now?"
"The gauge shows ten gallons," said Tom, bending down and looking at the instrument-board in front of the pilot's seat.
"That isn't enough for a decent flight," declared John.  "We'll probably be out for at least an hour, and we may use as much as fifteen gallons in that time; that's about half the consumption of ordinary airplanes, you know.  We'll shove in twenty gallons more so as to be on the safe side."
"We haven't put in any oil yet," reminded Tom.  "We'd better put in about two gallons, I should say.  Most planes use about a half-gallon to the hour; if we use half as much, that will give us plenty of grease."
The tanks were in the lower part of the forward fuselage.  With the caps removed, a hose was inserted by Paul, and then John forced the gasoline up by a small but powerful handpump until the gauge told that the required additional twenty gallons were in.  The same pump would work with the oil also, and soon the viscid fluid had been transferred from the storage can on the hangar floor to its proper tank in the airplane.  Thence it would feed itself up into the carbureter of the working engine by a force-pump attached to the engine, as with the gasoline.
The boys had just finished putting in the fuel when Mr. Giddings and Bob drove up in the former's automobile.
"I expect this is a great day for you young men?" said the publisher, with a smile of greeting to all.  "I know it is a time I have looked forward to myself for a good many months,--ever since I accepted the challenge of the _Clarion_, in fact.  Is the Sky-Bird supplied with gasoline?"
"Yes, sir," said John; "we just got through with that job.  We have easily enough fuel aboard now for a couple of hours' flight, and that will be long enough for a first one.  New engines are always 'stiff' and should not be run too long at a stretch."
"Have you run this pair yet?"
"Oh, yes," said Bob.  "We have tried them out several times, dad, and in connection with the propeller, too.  They work tip-top, either connected or disconnected.  I tell you, when they're in connection they certainly do make this big propeller hum!"
"I can't understand how you can operate the propeller in here," said Mr. Giddings, much puzzled.  "All the airplanes I have seen have always dashed forward as soon as their propellers began to revolve under impulse of the motor or motors; there was no restraining them.  I should think this machine would run through the front end of the hangar here as soon as you--"
"Pardon me, sir," interrupted John, "but we have gone those fellows one better.  You forget that in the drawings we showed you there was a set of brakes designed to be worked by a control within reach of the pilot, brakes which will engage these ground wheels a good deal the same as brakes work on automobiles--by a flexible band of steel and grit-filled cotton which is made to compress over a large sort of hub on the inner side of each wheel."
"Very good," said Mr. Giddings; "but I understand that has been tried before, with the result that the airplane at once tipped forward and stuck its nose into the ground, or rather tried to, smashing its propeller to smithereens."
"They will do that every time unless something has been devised to counteract this tendency to pitch over," explained John.  "We have devised the thing to prevent it, Mr. Giddings."
"See here, dad," put in Bob at this point.  "Stoop down a bit and look under the forward end of the body here."
His father did as requested, and Bob pointed out a circular opening about the size of a saucer, from which protruded the end of an aluminum-encased shaft bearing a small rubber-tired wheel of very sturdy proportions.
"That is our preventer, dad," smiled his son.
"In a few minutes we'll show you how it works," added John Ross.  "I see you are wearing a cap, sir, as I suggested.  That is all the special dress you will need, as our enclosed cabin makes helmets and close bundling unnecessary.  We fellows will wear our regular working togs."
Everything being in readiness, the four young men easily pushed the big airplane out of the building and to a place where it would have a smooth runway for a hundred yards ahead.  The weather was ideal for the trip.  There was little wind, and the few strato-cumulus clouds which were visible showed great stretches of azure-blue sky between them.
"Everybody climb in," ordered Tom, with a wave of his hand.  "I'll crank her up.  You take the joy-stick, John."
All hands complied.  Then Tom began to turn the big burnished propeller, just as John threw a lever from the inside which caused the auxiliary ground wheel to shoot down and engage the sod.  At the same time the movement of another lever by Paul set the airplane's brakes.
Several times Tom turned the propeller around.  Then, with a pop, the engine cylinders began to fire, Tom jumped swiftly back, and the propeller whirred like a mad thing.  At the same time the Sky-Bird gave a start, as though to dash forward; but beyond a steady, slight vibration of her whole body, as Tom slowed down the motor to four hundred revolutions per minute, there was no indication to her inmates that she was straining to get away.  Tom now quietly mounted the step, and came into the cabin, pulling the step up after him and closing the self-locking door.
"That shows you how this third ground wheel acts, dad!" cried Bob triumphantly to his father, who sat in a chair adjoining.  "Now watch the old girl jump ahead when Paul throws back the brake lever and his brother lifts the third wheel and gives her more gas!"
The changes were made even as he spoke; the propeller's hum grew into a mild roar through the cabin walls, and the Sky-Bird leaped away over the ground, gaining momentum at every yard.  To the surprise of even two such veteran flyers as John Ross and Tom Meeks, the airplane had gone less than fifty yards when she began to rise as gracefully as a swallow in response to her up-turned ailerons and elevators.  In less than ten seconds she was well up over the fair-grounds, and the roofs of all the buildings in the neighborhood were seen below them.
John kept the machine mounting at a good angle until the altimeter showed them to be up two thousand feet.  Then he straightened out the ailerons and elevators, and began to run on a level keel.  The other inmates of the cabin noticed, by looking through the observation windows, that he was gradually bearing in a great circle about the town of Yonkers.  Off to the northwestward were the rugged blue crags of the Catskills, covered with patches of milk-white snow, and just in front, winding like a huge serpent among the picturesque foothills, was the sparkling Hudson, dwindling away to a mere silver thread in the north, tapering away in the same manner toward the south, where it lapped the piers of the city of New York and immediately afterward lost itself in the waters of the Upper Bay.  Although the great skyscrapers of the big city itself could be dimly seen, they looked very small at that distance.
Directly below them our friends could make out the familiar buildings and landmarks of their own town as they swept past one by one, John purposely flying at reduced speed so that a clearer vision could be had.  He also shot down to within a thousand feet, presently, as he saw his own home approaching.  Someone, whom both John and Paul immediately recognized as their mother, stood in the door waving a handkerchief. In recognition, Paul drew down one of the sliding windows, and put out his head and fluttered his own handkerchief.  Shortly afterward--it seemed not more than a minute--the machine was over Shadynook Hill, and Bob and his father were waving a similar salute to Mrs. Giddings.
As they swept on, men and women and children could be seen looking up from the streets beneath.  Most of these people were used to seeing airplanes, but obviously the bright finish of the Sky-Bird II, and its striking eagle-like appearance created more than passing notice.
Those in the cabin were amazed to note how effectually the new muffler and the walls of the cabin shut out the sounds of operation.  It was very easy for them to talk back and forth with each other by using a fairly strong pitch of voice, even when the machine was running at a good rate, as it now began to do, for John once more gave the engine more gas, and turned the airplane skyward.  Up, up they shot like a rocket.  The hand on the dial of the altimeter moved along steadily--it reached 2 again, passed to 3, 4, 5, 6; the earth seemed literally to be falling away from them.  All at once, when they were between six and seven thousand feet high, and watching the minute patches of color far below, which represented buildings, houses, hills, and the like, these objects were swept away, and through the glass plates of the cabin floor they could see nothing but a gray vapor below them.  It was also around them.
"We're passing up through a cloud," said Bob to his father, who had never been in an airplane before.  A moment or two later, the boy added, as the blue sky could once more be seen below, "Now we're above it, dad."
"It seems to be getting colder," remarked Mr. Giddings.
"It always gets colder the higher one goes," informed Paul.
"I hope you're not getting cold feet, dad?" grinned Bob.
"Oh, I'm comfortable, thank you," laughed his father.  "Say, son, isn't this as good a time as any to try out the merits of that wireless 'phone of yours?  Can you work it from this height?"
"I don't know why I can't--and three times higher," Bob said; "we'll try it right now.  When I left home I told Sis to mind the set there in my room, and watch for my signal.  We'll see now if I can get in touch with her."
So saying, Bob put on the wireless helmet, threw the switch, and kept repeating, "Hello, Sis! hello, Sis! hello, Sis!" for a few moments in the transmitter.  Then he said, after a brief silence: "I get you, Betty.  Won't answer you now, as I want dad to talk to you."
With that Bob smiled, removed the headpiece, and slipped it over his father's head, exchanging seats with him.
Mr. Giddings now heard a voice--the voice of his own daughter--asking quite distinctly:
"Do you hear me, daddie?"
"I certainly do, Betty," said he; "where are you?"
"Here at home--up in Robert's room.  I never thought I'd be sometime talking with you when you were flying through the air.  Mother just called upstairs and says she can't see the Sky-Bird any longer.  Where are you now?"
"Up above the clouds somewhere just north of Yonkers," replied Mr. Giddings laconically.
"Oh, goodness!  I must run right down and tell mother.  Please don't go too high or too far, daddie, will you?" came the clearly agitated tones of the daughter.  "Is Robert all right?"
"Indeed he is.  We'll soon be back with you and tell you all about it. Everything is working perfectly.  Good-bye, Betty!"
And Mr. Giddings arose with a pleased laugh, and hung up the helmet. "I'll take off my hat to you, Robert," he said.  "I never thought your fussing at home all these years with electric batteries, buzzers, and what not, would amount to anything like this."
The Sky-Bird II was now running straight ahead with the speed of the wind, John giving the craft more and more gas, and crowding her pretty close to the limit.  The wind swept by both sides of the streamlike cabin with a rushing sound like the distant roar of a huge cataract; the flexible window glass gave slightly to its pressure, but there was no sign of it breaking.  One minute they were in the midst of a cumulus cloud; the next, through it.  Now they saw the faint outline of the earth, now sky; now the earth was screened by cloud, but above were the blue heavens.
"Guess how fast we're making it now?" cried John, one eye on the dial which connected with the propeller-shaft.
"A hundred miles," ventured Mr. Giddings.
"Hundred and thirty," guessed Paul and Bob.
"Hundred and eighty," stated the more experienced Tom.
"All too low," said John.  "We're going just exactly two hundred and fifty, if this speedometer doesn't lie!"
He now announced that he was going to throw in the idle engine.  This was done successfully, and under the extra power they were soon making the remarkable speed of three hundred miles an hour!  John then slowed up and disconnected first one motor and then the other, the airplane continuing to fly with unimpaired smoothness.
As a last test, he dropped to a level of three thousand feet, at which time they were considerably north of Albany, and throwing the automatic-pilot into operation calmly removed his hands and feet from every control except the rudder.  In this fashion they ran for fifteen or twenty miles on a perfectly even keel, the apparatus automatically working the elevators and ailerons of the craft as various wind currents tended to disturb its equilibrium.  At length, John gave a little twist to the rudder, and the way the Sky-Bird began to circle, and to bank of her own accord, was a splendid sight to behold.  No hawk, sailing over a barnyard in quest of an unwary fowl, could have performed the trick more beautifully.
As the flyers now headed for home they were all much elated at the success of the first flight of the new airplane.  And as it gracefully swooped down into the fair-grounds a little later, coming to a stop in a surprisingly short run over the ground owing to her braking feature, this elation was increased.
CHAPTER X
FINAL PREPARATIONS
After getting out of the airplane, Mr. Giddings was thoughtful for some minutes.  Nor did he speak until the boys had pushed the machine into the hangar.  Then he said, with deep earnestness:
"Young men, a great load has been removed from my mind by this recent performance of the Sky-Bird II.  I have now not the slightest doubts of her adaptability to make a round-the-world trip, and if she performs then as she did this morning, we are not only going to defeat the _Clarion_'s crew, but we are going to smash all existing records for a journey of the kind.  I wish to know if you really think you could operate this machine steadily night and day, say for a couple of weeks, stopping only for fuel and food?"
"By alternating the engines--yes, sir; no doubt of it," declared John Ross without a moment's hesitation, while Tom Meeks nodded his frowsy head energetically.
"Then," said Mr. Giddings, "you may consider that's what the entire four of you will have to do in a few months, as soon as we can pick out a route and get fuel supplies at the different airports or stops for you.  John, you and Tom may consider yourselves under salary right on until after this race; there will be enough for you to do, helping me with arrangements and taking care of the airplane."
"Well, but how about Paul and me, dad?" broke in Bob anxiously; "aren't we going to have anything to do?"
"Oh, you two will have enough to do going to school, I think," laughed Mr. Giddings; "but, to satisfy you, I will let you both help John and Tom select a route and make out a schedule.  Do this just as soon as you can, so that I may be able to give Mr. Wrenn, the publisher of the _Clarion_, a copy.  He can then make intelligent preparations for his own crew.  I am going to give my rival every consideration in this matter, so that he cannot do any howling if we beat him.  It must be an out-and-out fair race, do you understand?"
All nodded.
"Have you heard anything about the other crew yet, Mr. Giddings?" inquired Paul.  "I mean, do you know what sort of a craft they are going to use, or who is going to fly against us?"
"I am as much in the dark about those points as you young men," was the reply.  "I judge that Mr. Wrenn, who is an astute business man, will keep us in ignorance of his personnel until the last minute.  The fact is, I am going to treat him to a dose of his own medicine in this respect.  So be careful not to let the public get close to this machine, and talk with no one about it."
With that the publisher and Bob drove home, but the latter came back in the afternoon, and all four young men immediately repaired to the Yonkers Public Library with a blank tablet, there to work out the route and schedule.
It was no easy task.  In the first place, they wished the route to be as close to the equator at all times as possible, so that their line of travel would approximate in distance the world's estimated circumference of 24,899 miles.  In the second place, for stops they must choose cities or towns with either established landing-fields, or with grounds level enough for this purpose.  In the third place, these airports must be so divided that they would not have to be visited during the hours of darkness, for few if any of them would be likely to have efficient enough lighting systems to make night landings safe.
Within fifteen minutes the boys had the long table in front of them literally covered with geographies, atlases, loose maps, and encyclopaedias.  Paul even brought up a globe as large as a pumpkin, while Bob was not content until he had secured a score of back numbers of travel magazines.  Into this divers collection of diagrams and reading matter they dove with an avidity which would have surprised the teachers they had when they were in grammar school, if they could have seen them.  It soon became evident that they would not only need a route and schedule to make their journey successful, but also an enormous amount of general information about the countries they would pass over.
"We'll have to study trade winds, oceanic storm conditions, temperatures, inhabitants, topography, and so forth, and so forth," drawled Tom Meeks.  "Say, fellows, I feel like kicking myself to think I didn't study my geography more and shoot paper-wads less, when I was a kid at school."
"We'll have to do a lot of cramming, that's sure," averred John; "but we have several months for that.  Just now we want to jump into this route and schedule."
They made up several tentative routes, only to discard them.  Finally, after several hours' work, they had one which everybody seemed to agree was the best that could be picked out.  With the schedule, which was figured on the basis of 120 miles an hour airplane speed, the draft looked like this:
* Gain of 1 day by reason of crossing 180th Meridian, or International Date Line, between Port Darwin and Apia.
Bob Giddings carried home a copy of this schedule, and the following Monday morning all four young men met by appointment in the private office of the publisher of the _Daily Independent_.  After they were seated, Mr. Giddings brought forth the tentative draft, studied it a few moments, and then asked:
"What is your fuel capacity, boys?"
"Our tanks will hold enough gasoline and oil to carry us a little better than five thousand miles, throttled down to an average of one hundred and twenty miles an hour, the basis on which we figured out this schedule, sir," answered John.
"Would it make a difference if you flew faster than that?"
"Oh, yes," said John; "the faster a pilot flies the more fuel he uses per mile.  Full out--that is, going at the limit of her speed--the Sky-Bird probably would not cover more than three-thousand miles."
"I am glad to know this," said Mr. Giddings.  "I see that your cruising radius is sufficient to cover your longest jumps at any reasonable speed.  Let me see; you allow yourselves three hours' stop at each airport; will that be long enough?"
"Plenty, sir," said Tom; "we figure that we can easily refuel in that time, and attend to any local affairs we may have."
"I notice your total mileage is exactly equal to the estimated circumference of the world," remarked the publisher.  "That shows great care in the selection of this route to meet my viewpoint; but may I ask how you know your distances between airports, as here recorded, are correct?  From whence did you get these mileages?"
"Bob and I figured them out, sir," spoke up Paul.
"How?"
"Why, like this, dad," explained Bob.  "We knew there were 360 degrees to the world; we divided the circumference of 24,899 miles by 360, and obtained approximately 69.5 miles to a degree.  By taking a map of the world and finding the number of degrees between any two airports it was not difficult to come pretty close to the actual distance in miles between them."
"Very good; very good, indeed," approved his father.  "I think I have the right sort of men on this job.  But here is another thing which occurs to me: Have you based your time of arrival and leaving at each port upon local time or New York time?"
"Local time," stated Paul.  "If we had not done so we could not have arranged the schedule with any accuracy at all, as regards daylight and darkness and the lapping of time.  With our watches set to New York time, we might expect to land at a station in broad daylight, only to find that we were really coming in after dark.  Another thing: Our figuring showed us that the lappages of time, all added together, exactly totaled one day of twenty-four hours, which we gain by traveling eastward.  So, while the schedule on a calendar at home would only show ten days which we would be gone, we would in reality be away one day longer, or eleven."
"Your local times may be wrong," hinted Mr. Giddings.
"I don't think so, sir; we proved them correct," stated Paul, with conviction.
"How?"
"After the same method we used in getting the mileage, sir.  You see, we knew that time eastward keeps getting later, and that this rate is four minutes to every degree.  We just counted the degrees between places and figured it out on that basis."
"Splendid!" exclaimed Mr. Giddings, who was far from as ignorant of these processes as he led his visitors to suppose.  "Boys, I wish to compliment you very highly upon this piece of work.  When I first looked at the schedule and saw that an airplane meeting its requirements would make this trip squarely around the world in seven and a half hours less than ten days I could scarcely credit my senses, and I figured it all over to make sure you had made no mistake.  I found out you had not.  If you can maintain an average speed of one hundred and twenty miles, and can make up any unforeseen delays by greater speed, I must admit it really looks possible for you to be back inside of ten days.  That is better than I actually hoped for, young men,--far better!  In fact the situation, as I view it, contains wonderful opportunities for both newspapers in the way of sales and advertising.  I do not doubt but that I can handle this affair in such a manner that I can afford to give each of you five thousand dollars if you make the journey within these ten days."
"Five thousand dollars!" cried our friends in unison, while Bob exploded: "But, dad, just how do you figure this out?"
"Mr. Wrenn and I will exploit this contest in our newspapers--let the whole universe know that it is coming off; advise the people that the aviators are to be provided with the most modern airplanes, and equipped with wireless by means of which they will keep us informed frequently of their whereabouts; that they will have cameras and send us pictures; that these bulletins shall be issued in extra editions of our newspapers at least three or four times a day; and to cap the climax, we will put up large bulletin boards in front of our buildings, on which there will be painted a chart of the trip, showing every scheduled stop, country, and ocean crossed.  This will be electrically lighted at night, and as you boys fly in your machine away off in some distant part of the world, our bulletin board operators will follow your course on their huge charts, and represent you with a miniature airplane.  In fact, I plan to get the _Clarion_ to 'phone over reports of their crew as fast as received, I doing likewise with them, and then we can have two dummy airplanes on each of our boards, showing the race in earnest at all stages of the journey.  This would cause great excitement to the street onlookers.  All in all, it would make our newspapers the most talked about in the whole country, we would gain thousands of new subscribers, millions of extras would be sold, thousands of dollars' worth of new advertising contracts could be made, and our present rates increased on account of our new prestige.  Now, you see, it will be up to you young men to keep our office supplied with your whereabouts as often as you can.  Do that, and beat our rival crew, and I shall be pretty well satisfied if you don't quite make the trip in ten days."
"We will do our part, sir," responded John, speaking for all.
There was a little further talk; and then they took their leave, well satisfied with the turn of events, and each determined to win his five thousand dollar trophy if it were at all possible.
CHAPTER XI
OFF FOR PANAMA
That same afternoon Mr. Giddings called upon his business rival, Mr. Wrenn, of the _Clarion_, and presented to him the tentative program for the great race around the world's girdle, as the _Daily Independent_ had planned it.  Mr. Wrenn declared that he was willing to stand by his former agreement to allow the _Independent_ to select the route, and said it was entirely satisfactory to him, and that he would at once take steps to have fuel supplies on hand at the various airports for his crew when they should arrive.  He made no comments as to his own airplane, but agreed that the advertising plan his caller had worked out was a capital one, stating that he would co-operate heartily with him in carrying it to a successful conclusion.
Mr. Giddings was considerably surprised that Mr. Wrenn made no objection to the longest "hops" on the route, which were of greater extent than the average airplane could make, and was ready to modify the arrangement if there had been any objection.  But even when he particularly called this matter to the other publisher's attention, Mr. Wrenn only smiled serenely, saying, "Those hops are perfectly satisfactory to us," leaving Mr. Giddings with a deep wonderment as to what sort of aircraft the _Clarion_ proposed using.
"I am under the impression that our contemporary has something up his sleeve, but I cannot conceive what it can be," Mr. Giddings confided to his son that evening upon reaching home; and when Bob repeated this to the Ross boys and Tom Meeks next day, they too began to wonder more than ever what type of an airplane the _Clarion_ proposed using against them, and who the crew might be.
"Did your father and Mr. Wrenn decide upon a date for the start?" asked Paul.
"Yes," replied Bob; "they made it the 20th of July, this summer, weather permitting.  We start from Panama at one o'clock in the afternoon."
"Our curiosity as to the identity of our competitors will be satisfied then, at least," laughed John.
"And their curiosity, too!" put in Tom.  "I'll stake my last cent they're just as much in the dark about us and the Sky-Bird II as we are about their outfit."
"We'll hope so, anyhow," remarked Bob; "but ever since we had those blue-prints stolen, and found we had a stranger sneaking around the hangar, I've been uneasy."
At this reference, all the young men felt a strange oppression.  They had talked over it more than once, and each time it had left them with a sense of peril to their interests, why they could not tell.  As before, they now tried to laugh it off, and began to talk about other subjects.
There was still considerable to do in the way of preparing the Sky-Bird and themselves for the long trip, and for weeks all four boys were kept hustling to make the final installations of accessories and equipment. Bob rigged up a wireless telegraph in connection with his telephone set, and for protection, four good repeating rifles and an automatic shotgun were put in racks in the after-cabin, while each fellow provided himself with an automatic revolver which he would carry in a holster attached to a belt.  Medium-weight flying suits, with a heavy, wool-lined coat to slip on in case they flew very high, and trim flying boots and soft gloves, made up the personal toggery.
Whenever the boys found a chance they went to the public library and absorbed all the knowledge they could about the countries over which they would pass and the places at which they were destined to stop.  By writing to the authorities in these localities, Mr. Giddings also secured much valuable information for them as to present weather conditions and landing-fields--information which was further supplemented by numerous special airway maps supplied by the Aero Club of America and similar aviation organizations in foreign countries. From these maps Paul worked out a very clear chart of their own course from beginning to end.  A copy was given to each of the newspaper publishers concerned, to reproduce on their large electric street boards, and another was framed and placed immediately in front of the pilot's seat in the cabin of the Sky-Bird II.
All this time the columns of the _Daily Independent_ and the _Clarion_ contained frequent vivid references to features of the trip calculated to awaken the interest of the public, and as the time slipped along into July, the attention of people all over the land was centered upon the forthcoming contest, and it became the principal subject for comment.  The secrecy maintained by both principals as to the kind of aircraft to be used, and the mystery as to identity of the members of the respective crews, only whetted curiosity and interest the more, as the sharp newspaper men knew it would.  Every man, woman, and child in the wide world seemed to be eagerly waiting for the moment to come when he or she would see the promised pictures of the bold aviators and their machines in the big newspapers, and hear that they had made their first jump eastward from Panama.
All being in readiness, at daybreak on the morning of July 16th the Ross boys and Tom Meeks appeared at the Sky-Bird's hangar, and pushed the airplane outside.  As they were doing so, Mr. Giddings and Bob joined them.  The publisher had planned to accompany his crew to Panama in the machine, to see them officially off, while his reporters made the journey by train, in company with the writing force of the rival paper.
"We'll keep the time of our going secret, leaving before people are generally up," Mr. Giddings had said to the boys; "and by going on the 16th we'll not only be ahead of their smart calculations, but we shall have about half a week to rest up and see the country down there before you begin your strenuous journey.  I need a little vacation anyway, so I will accompany you.  We will stop off at Miami on the way, and enjoy some big-game fishing in the Florida waters with some of my friends."
So the young men were very much excited and eager to be off this morning of the 16th, you may be sure.  The Sky-Bird was tuned up a little to make certain she was in first-class condition, then they all climbed in and the big glistening creature of wood, metal, and silk shot up into the air.  It would probably be close to three weeks before they would see that familiar field and hangar again, and in that time if all went well they would circle the huge globe upon which they and their fellow-men lived.  It was truly a most inspiring thought--one to have filled less phlegmatic blood than theirs with the wildest pulsations!
The weather was not at all promising, masses of gray nimbus-cloud threatening to shut out the sun as it arose, with a promise of uncertain winds, if not rain; but John and Tom declared the conditions all the better for giving the machine a good test-out.
They climbed slowly upward through the cheerless, mist-laden skies, the engine well throttled back and running as smoothly as any engine could. To make sure that all was in perfect working order, they circled for ten minutes over the town, trying the different controls, then turned the Sky-Bird southward.
At two thousand feet they suddenly emerged from the fog belt into brilliant sunshine, but the world below was lost to sight, screened by a dense pall of mist.  Accordingly, Tom Meeks, who was acting as pilot, set a compass course for Cape Hatteras, the first guide-post along the Atlantic coast, some five hundred miles distant.  After an hour's steady running, John took the throttle, followed later by Bob, and finally Paul.  It was a new sensation to the last-named youths to be piloting the airplane out of view of the earth's surface, relying solely for safety and position upon the compass and altimeter, and knowing that somewhere far below them swept the rolling billows of the ocean; but they enjoyed it immensely.
Finally, just as John declared they ought to be close to their objective, the winds freshened and made a great rift in the fog below them, through which they could plainly see the grand old Carolina coast-line a little way ahead and to their right.  Between the main shore and the long spine-like series of reefs constituting the cape itself, sparkled the waters of numerous sounds, while the weather-beaten lighthouse on the extreme elbow of Hatteras stood out like a stick of white chalk against the rocky gray background of its support.
All were delighted with the accuracy with which they had made their first guide-post, as John and Mr. Giddings checked their bearings on the chart.  The Sky-Bird had behaved splendidly so far, and if she continued in that way they ought to reach their destination well before nightfall, even at the reduced speed at which they had been flying, which had averaged not much more than a hundred miles an hour.
It now became a question whether they should leisurely follow along the inwardly curving coast-line, taking in Savannah, Charleston, and Jacksonville, as guide-posts, or save a hundred miles or more by flying straight across the waters to Miami.  As they wished to test out each member's ability to operate by compass rather than by landmarks, it was decided to take the shorter route.  So gradually they left the rugged American shore behind and swept farther and farther out to sea.
The Sky-Bird II was flying as steady as a rock.  All the bracing wires were tuned to a nicety, the wind humming through them and along the smooth sides of the great creature's body with a whistling monotone which arose and fell with bewitching rhythm as the force fluctuated. The varnish and fire-proofing compound glistened brightly in the sunshine, attracting the attention of numerous seabirds, mostly gulls and ospreys, which followed them at times for short distances, only to be outdistanced.  The engine was running at less than half its possible speed, and purring like a contented kitten after a meal of fresh milk. The clouds and fog had cleared away; the sky was as bright now as a sky ever gets; far beneath, the blue-green waters of the Atlantic, flecked with white-topped waves, spread on all sides.  Two torpedo-boats, looking like toys, went northward, and tiny white waving specks showed that the Jacks aboard were waving a salute to them.  Off seaward a black trailing blot against the horizon showed where some unseen steamship plowed her way between ports.  Mr. Giddings and the boys were filled with admiration.
A small airplane is ideal for short flights, joyriding the heavens, or sight-seeing among the clouds; but there is something more majestic and stable about a big machine like the Sky-Bird II which a pilot soon begins to love with a passion he never feels toward the little 'plane. An exquisite community of spirit grows up between machine and pilot; each, as it were, merges into the vitals of the other.  The levers and controls are the nervous system of the airplane, through which the will of the aviator may be expressed--expressed in an infinitely fine degree.  Indeed, a flying-machine is something entirely apart from and above all other contrivances of man's ingenuity.  It is the nearest thing to animate life which man has created.  In the air an airplane ceases to be a mere piece of dumb mechanism; it seems to throb with feeling, and is capable not only of primary guidance and control, but actually of expressing a pilot's temperament.
The lungs of the machine--its engines--are the crux of man's mechanical wisdom and skill.  Their marvelous reliability and intricacy are almost as awesome as the human anatomy.  When both engines are going well, and synchronized to the same speed, the roar of the exhausts develops into one long-sustained and not inharmonious _boom-m-m-m-m!_  It is a song of pleasant melody to the pilot, whose ear is ever pricked to catch the first semblance of a "sharp" or "flat" note telling him that one or more of the twelve cylinders of each busy engine is missing fire and needs a little doctoring.
It was about four o'clock that afternoon when our party first sighted the low, out-jutting sea-coast of Florida.  As they came slowly toward it, by reason of their angular course of approach, they could gradually make out a group of green palms here and there along the white stretches of sand, and see clusters of light-colored buildings, piers, shipping, and people moving about.  Thus they passed Juno and Palm Beach, and then saw the thicker cluster of fine dwellings of Miami itself, the most southerly city on the Florida mainland.
Paul was guiding the Sky-Bird at this time, and turned her across the limpid waters of Biscayne Bay, cutting a huge circle above the town and slowly swooping downward toward the broad white beach, as he picked out a level stretch for landing.  Townspeople who had been watching the strange airplane, so much like a great bird, now ran forward to see it land.
A moment later, with a graceful drop and upward curve, it struck the sandy beach and ran forward lightly until the brakes were applied and it was brought to a standstill.
CHAPTER XII
FIGHTING A DEVIL-FISH
Many questions were asked our friends by the onlookers, but they gave them evasive replies, being careful to let out no hint as to their real identity and connection with the approaching race around the world. Two husky negroes were engaged to watch the airplane until relieved from such responsibility, and Mr. Giddings then led the boys to the home of a Mr. Choate, a close and trusted friend and superintendent of the big Miami Aquarium, one of the most noted repositories for live fish in the country.
Mr. Choate was astonished beyond measure when he learned that his old friend had come in the big airplane which he and his wife had noticed over the town a short time before, and was still further surprised when Mr. Giddings bound him to secrecy and told him that the young men with him constituted the crew of one of the two airplanes which was so soon to circle the earth by way of the equator.  He shook hands warmly with them, and with his charming wife made them all very much at home.
Than Mr. Choate, no man in the South knew more about the multitudinous varieties of fish inhabiting Florida waters.  He was not only an authority on them, but he was also recognized as a most skillful catcher of fish.  For over an hour that evening he told them absorbing stories of the habits of Gulf Stream denizens, and recited stirring tales of battles with some of the biggest of them.  And when he finally announced, "To-morrow I shall see that you are given a taste of our wonderful fish-life by joining me in a fishing expedition," they could hardly get to sleep for thinking of the fine prospect.
After breakfast the next morning, their host conducted them down to the waterside and into the beautiful white concrete buildings of the aquarium, and here he proceeded to show them, swimming about in great glass tanks, the most wonderful collection of fish they had ever seen outside of the big New York aquarium itself.
"You probably never realized before," said Mr. Choate, "that in the warm waters of the Gulf Stream, between Miami and Key West, more than 600 varieties of fish are to be found.  They vary in size all the way from the tiny sea-horse, the size of a baby's little finger, to the great tarpon and killer-whale, the latter a vicious creature weighing many tons and large enough to swallow a good-sized boy without scraping the buttons off his jacket."
"It must be a lot of sport to catch some of these fairly big fish," remarked John Ross.
"Well, this afternoon I shall take you fellows where you can all have a chance at them," said Mr. Choate with a smile.  "It would be interesting to have a motion-picture record of the thoughts which flash through the mind of the average inland fisherman the first time he feels the tiger-like swoop of a five-foot barrancuda, the fierce yank of a hundred-pound amber-jack, or the sullen surge of a big grouper on his line; for even when armed with the heaviest rod, and a line as big around as a silver dollar, he is pretty sure to wish, at least subconsciously, that his tackle might be twice as formidable and his arm twice as strong.  Just imagine yourself, for instance, out in the clear blue waters of the Gulf Stream, looking overboard at your baited hook thirty feet below, which you can see as plainly as if it were in no water at all.  Then up comes a great jewfish, which is just as likely to weigh five hundred pounds as fifty, and to be as large as a good-sized Shetland pony, and he makes a lunge for your bait, and-- Well, you can go right on imagining the rest, too."
In all, they visited a half-hundred tanks of fish before they were through, watching this group and that group of inmates disporting themselves about in the salty water with apparent unconcern of visitors.  In markings some of them rivaled the most beautiful designs the mind could picture, and others were so brilliant and wonderful in color that the rainbow was mild in comparison.
From the aquarium our party went up the beach to where the Sky-Bird II was resting under guard, and putting two new negroes to the task, they returned and had lunch with Mr. Choate, following which he conducted them down to the pier and aboard his sea-going motor-yacht, _L'Apache_. This trim vessel had a crew of five men, and as she started away, headed for the Bahama Islands, a 25-foot motor-driven tender bobbed along in her wake.  In this they were to do most of their fishing, their host declared.
Assisted by the northeastward pressure of the Gulf Stream, they made splendid progress, and that evening cast anchor behind Bimini, a tiny isle which rests like a jeweled feather on a summer sea.  It was like pulling teeth to go below deck for sleep and leave the wondrous beauty of the tropical night, with the soft, cool touch of the ever-blowing trade wind, the shadowy grace of the giant coconut-palms swaying and whispering on the nearby beach in the moonlight, while the surf, lapping upon the coral reef on the outer side of the isle, lulled them with its crooning obligato.
At sunrise all hands were up and ready for the sport.  A hot breakfast was served by the cook, after which they piled aboard the motor-tender, throwing in rods, lines, and harpoons.
Through the island channel out to the open sea they went, all except the steersman hanging over the side of the craft and enjoying the amazing sights in the clear depths below.  Bob excitedly pointed out a group of six or eight big tarpon lazily wallowing about fifty feet beneath them.  And less than two minutes afterward, Paul, in no less excitement, announced the discovery on his side of a big nurse-shark which was rolling an eye at him from the ocean's floor.  John pointed out, from the bow, a great school of fish numbering possibly ten thousand, which Mr. Choate stated were small mangrove-snappers.  They were parading up and down a stretch of coral shelf along the bottom, and they made a wild dash and hid in crannies under the coral as a big barracuda unexpectedly shot into their midst and grabbed one unlucky snapper.
In a little while the fishermen were out into the open sea, and all began to scan the pulsating bosom of the Gulf Stream with fresh interest.  Strange as it may seem, the fish of tropical waters do not appear to have the slightest apprehension of danger from the noise of a motor-boat, and one cannot only get very close to them, but can follow them about and observe their movements without trouble, particularly if he is familiar with their habits.
In a little while Mr. Giddings called the attention of all to a dark shadow not far below the surface, about two boat-lengths on the quarter.  Mr. Choate promptly announced this to be a "herring-hog," a species of porpoise, and ordered the boat turned that way.
The creature proved to be a full-grown herring-hog, weighing around four hundred pounds, and as this species destroys great numbers of foodfish, Mr. Choate made preparations to attack it.  Reaching the proper position, a hand harpoon was thrown by him.  It found its mark, and away went the great fish at so fast a clip that the line fairly smoked as it shot from the reel barrel.  In a few moments it was all out, and then the motor-boat gave a jump forward and rushed after the herring-hog.  He was towing it, as if it had been a chip!
The engineer now reversed the propeller.  This act slowed up the herring-hog noticeably, but still his prodigious strength carried the craft forward.  It was ten minutes or more before he tired sufficiently for them to haul him in.
As they were making the big fish fast to the gunwale, a considerable disturbance was observed on the surface of the water about a quarter of a mile away.  Mr. Choate judged this fuss to be caused either by a leopard-shark killing its prey, or by some battle royal between two equally big denizens of the deep.
Mr. Giddings and the boys were all excited at the thought of getting a harpoon into a huge leopard-shark, which will fight any and everything that swims, as well as many things of flesh which do not swim, not excepting man himself.
But as the boat drew closer, Mr. Choate, who seemed to have uncanny eyesight plus long experience with subsea life, added greatly to the nervousness of his guests by suddenly exclaiming: "Stand by, men; it's the biggest devil-fish I have ever seen!"
At once everybody who could find one, seized a harpoon; and in his excitement Tom Meeks even picked up an oar, as if to defend himself against attack!
In a few minutes they were close enough to note that the entire bottom of the ocean in the area where the creature had been seen had gone suddenly dark; and in the translucent depths above nearly all of the party discerned a gigantic shadow moving along.  It looked for all the world like an immense pancake with bat-like wings.  These wings were fluttering queerly, and from the action of the fish Mr. Choate said he was sure it was devouring prey which it had just killed.  He now asked Paul if he would like to try a cast.  The boy assented eagerly. Bracing his feet in the bottom of the motor-boat he took good aim and let his harpoon fly.
Paul had hardly hoped to hit the devil-fish.  And probably he would not have done so, inexperienced as he was with a harpoon, except for the fact that the creature was of unusual size and presented a broad mark. As it chanced, the steel went true.  The devil-fish arose to the surface as though hurled upward by a submarine explosion.  One of its great battle-like fins broke above the water, sending gallons of spray over the occupants of the boat, and splintering the harpoon staff against the boat's side as if it had been a match stem; then its ten-foot pectoral wing struck the water with a terrific impact, making a noise which could have been heard several miles away.
For a moment the monster seemed bewildered, and that moment cost it dear, for it enabled Bob to throw another harpoon, which stuck deep into its body near the spine.  With a mad dash it started off to sea, taking the harpoon lines with it.  As the lines sped out of their barrels Mr. Choate grasped one and Mr. Giddings the other, aided respectively by John and Tom, and all hands strained to hold them, but although they went out slowly, they could not be held, until at length Paul and Bob came to the rescue and managed to get the ends around cleats in the boat.
However, this did not stop the devil-fish.  It made out to sea with remarkable speed for so clumsy-looking a monster, towing the heavy boat and its inmates after it with the ease of a horse pulling a toy carriage!  As it went, all hands bore on the lines, adding to its burden, but for a long time this seemed to have little or no effect.
Every once in a while the devil-fish would literally hurl itself several feet out of the water, and its huge flat body would come down with a crack like the explosion of a gun shell.  Perhaps it was imagination, but each time it broke the surface in one of these cavortings it seemed to the boys that the fish was bigger than the last time.
Now and then the creature would sound for deep water, in an effort to shake its captors off, and several times it went down so far that Mr. Choate stood ready with upraised hatchet to cut the lines at the last moment, in the event the bow should show signs of diving under.
All of a sudden the lines slackened, and all hands frantically hauled in slack, as the devil-fish turned and dashed toward the boat.  He came up almost under the craft, one great wing actually lifting one side of the heavy launch well out of the water and giving everybody a pretty stiff scare.
With quick presence of mind, Mr. Choate at this moment let drive another harpoon, which found lodgment in the monster's flat head, and away it dashed again with the greatest vigor.  As there was now a line leading to each side of the devil-fish's body, those in the motor-boat found they were able actually to drive their captive as if it were a runaway horse, a gradual bearing on one "rein" or the other tending to direct the uncertain creature in that direction.  Thus very adroitly they swerved the huge fish toward the now distant shore of Bimini, hoping to master it in the shallower waters of the isle.
By this time the monster had carried them out fully ten miles.  It had not forgotten its old tactics of deep diving either, and there were numerous occasions when, after one of these submersions, it came up and started fiercely toward the boat, and it took the most skillful maneuvering on the part of the steersman, as well as wicked use of oars on the part of those in the craft, to drive the creature off and keep from being upset.
They let their anchor drag, and at times reversed the propeller, hauling on this side and that on the harpoon lines when the devil-fish would not be going to suit them.  In this fashion it was slowly but surely tired out; they began to reel in slack line, and finally the immense fish was wallowing within twenty feet of the boat, surrounded by hungry sharks which had been attracted by its blood.  It would never do to goad it now by hauling in on the lines, as it might dart under the boat and upset it, and the waiting sharks could then make a meal of its luckless inmates.  So Mr. Choate told the boys to use their automatic revolvers and see if they could not dispatch the devil-fish at once.  This was done, John, Tom, Paul, and Bob all firing several shots each, which put the monster in such a helpless state that they could handle it with less danger to themselves.
Until that moment not one of them realized that nearly five hours had elapsed since they first attacked this Jumbo of the sea, so busy had they been every moment of the time in trying to conquer the creature. And everybody was quite exhausted, now that the excitement was over.
Although this fish had three harpoons in his body and a dozen shots in its head and heart, it was by no means dead, and the fishermen found considerable difficulty in towing it into the harbor, some miles away.
The natives of Bimini were greatly interested in the capture, and our friends were able to get fifteen of them to help draw the enormous carcass ashore where all could get a good look at it.  They were amazed at the unusual size of the devil-fish, and Mr. Choate declared again that he had never seen such a large one of its kind.  It measured twenty-two feet across, and must have weighed close to 5,000 pounds.
"Some people call the octopus a devil-fish," said Mr. Choate.  "This is all wrong.  They are both large and vicious creatures, but entirely different in looks.  The devil-fish belongs to the ray family, and, as you see, is a huge bat-like creature which uses its body fins with a waving, undulating motion, and propels itself through the water at remarkable speed."
"It is built on the principle of our airplane--in looks," said Tom with a grin; "and in speed, too."
"So it is," responded Mr. Choate.  "It derives its satanic name from these cephalic fins or lobes which extend outward and upward from each side of its flat head, like curling horns.  When it dashes into a school of smaller fish, these fins whirl about in every direction, and as they are often four feet long they easily reach more than one hapless fish and he is swept into the yardwide mouth of the monster and devoured with almost lightning speed."
After a rest, the party went out in the motorboat again, this time to catch foodfish.  They had fine luck, and after an appetizing meal aboard the _L'Apache_, in which their small catch played an important part, all set out for Miami, tired and happy.
CHAPTER XIII
THE STRANGE AIRPLANE
The first thing the boys did the following morning, after spending the night at the home of Mr. Choate, was to go down to the beach and see if their airplane was all right.  They found one of the two negroes asleep, but the other fellow was faithfully on guard, and everything about the Sky-Bird seemed just as they had left it, although the watchers said that a considerable number of curious townspeople had come to look at the machine the day before and they had been very busy keeping venturesome boys off the craft.
Our friends let the negroes go to get their breakfasts and some sleep, and engaged two others to take up the watch.  Following this, in company with Mr. Choate, they all retired to the bathhouse, secured bathing suits and had a fine time disporting themselves in the warm surf for the next hour.  The youths had never experienced Gulf Stream bathing before, and the water was so enticing that it was hard to drag themselves out of it.
As they were in the act of emerging to dress themselves, a black speck, which all had noticed in the northern sky, had developed by nearer approach so that they thought they could recognize it as an airplane.  It was coming down the coast very rapidly.  Wondering if its pilot intended to land in the vicinity, they gathered on the beach and curiously waited for it to come nearer.
At times they were puzzled to know whether the approaching object were really an airplane or a great bird, for it surely looked like a bird with its swelling breast-line and slightly tilted broad-shouldered wings. Closer and closer it came.  It was flying very high.
When it was almost over them, Mr. Giddings uttered a startled ejaculation; "My stars, boys!  It's _our_ machine!"
Paul and John Ross and Tom Meeks were equally astonished.  They had noticed the strong resemblance at the same moment.  Involuntarily, with Mr. Giddings and Mr. Choate, they turned their heads up the beach to see if the Sky-Bird II was where they had left it.
They saw its huge outline and its patrolling black guards.  It had not changed position.  Even a group of gaping Miami citizens lent reality to the situation, and some of the latter were gazing aloft at the other flying-machine, as our friends had been doing.
The stranger above them evidently had no intention of stopping.  Instead of circling the town, as he would have done had he intended to land, he swept straight over and kept on his southward course, heading across Florida Strait.
On the face of every one of our friends, as they saw this image of the Sky-Bird II cross the sky overhead and disappear in the mists beyond, was a look of amazement, incredulity, and finally dark suspicion.
"Can it be--?"  Mr. Giddings hesitated, and looked inquiringly at his younger companions.
"It looks that way," said John Ross, with a reluctant nod.
None needed to explain that the same thought had struck him, also.  The stolen blue-prints--the skulking man with the swarthy face!  He had duplicated the Sky-Bird!
More than that, each recalled the _Clarion's_ secrecy about the kind of airplane it planned to use; and its willingness to attempt the long "hops" which ordinary machines would have had difficulty in negotiating. It all pointed to but one logical meaning.  And Bob Giddings expressed the opinion of all when he observed:
"Dad, I believe there goes our prospective competitor in the race around the world!  He's making for Panama now!"
Further comment on the situation would have been useless.  All hands, each with disturbing thoughts of his own, went silently into the bathhouse and resumed his regular garb.
Mr. Choate and his wife begged them so hard to remain over another day at least that Mr. Giddings assented.  That afternoon they went for a long automobile ride along improved roads, both sides of which were lined with palms in places, luxuriant tropical grasses in others, and towering forests covered with creeping vines.  They stopped the car a number of times to visit great orange groves, and the boys had their first taste of the luscious fruit just as it ripened on the trees.
The following morning, directly after breakfast, they were besieged by two or three local newspaper reporters.  Seeing no use of further concealing their identity, Mr. Giddings gave out a little information to the gleeful newspaper men, but was careful to wire in to his own newspaper much more detail of their doings since leaving Yonkers, even mailing some photographs which they had taken of the tussle with the big devil-fish.
In the afternoon our party paid a visit to the aquarium again, extending it to the Biological Laboratory nearby; and took supper in the beautiful white casino, which fronts the beach, after they had had a refreshing plunge in the ocean's waters.  Then Paul and Bob took up Mr. and Mrs. Choate for a short flight in the airplane.
Early the next morning they bade their Miami friends good-bye, and once more took to the air, this time to complete the last leg of their journey to Panama.  It was found that the Sky-Bird's fuel tanks were apparently still full enough to carry them to their destination, so it had not been necessary to store either gasoline or oil in Miami.  This was very gratifying, as it showed quite conclusively that, later on in the race, the Sky-Bird would be able to make her longest jumps without the peril of fuel shortage.
At a height of close to two thousand feet they headed across Florida Strait, with Paul at the throttle.  It was a real joy to be looking through the glass panels of the airplane's cabin once more, to hear the muffled roar of her engine and propeller, and to realize that probably before dark they would be across the five hundred miles of blue waters of the Caribbean and hovering over the world-famous Canal Zone.
It was a fine morning.  What clouds could be seen were well above them--light, billowy, and white, reflecting the sunlight so strongly upon the white-capped waters below, that the sea seemed much closer to the voyagers than it really was.
Shortly after eight o'clock they crossed over the long, low-lying island of Cuba, dipping down close enough to get a fairly good view of the topography.  Then rising to three thousand feet, they swerved a little to the eastward and made off across the Caribbean Sea itself.
At a few minutes of eleven they sighted the shore of Jamaica, five miles or so to the eastward of them.  Then John took the throttle, both engines were put into the work, and they began to whizz through the air at a clip which would have made them gasp for breath had they been in an open cockpit.  As it was, the rush of air as it swept along each side of the fuselage and off its narrowing tail, became a veritable howl in whose noise they found conversation very difficult.  Tom Meeks, who was leaning over John's shoulder and watching the instrument-board, triumphantly announced presently that they were traveling at the rate of 280 miles an hour!
For thirty minutes or more John Ross kept the Sky-Bird going at this terrific speed, then he slowed up, and transferred into mono-engine gear, as there was no use in unnecessarily heating the power-plants.  As the indicator of the speedometer retreated to 150 miles, he turned the throttle over to Bob Giddings, and said: "Hold her at this rate, Bob; it's plenty fast enough for the present."
It was a little after one o'clock when Paul and Tom announced land to the westward.  After looking at the object, which surely had the appearance of land, Mr. Giddings laid down the glasses and consulted the chart.
"That's undoubtedly the outer point of Nicaragua," he said; and upon taking a look themselves with the binoculars, the others all agreed with him.
Keeping the low-lying coastline of the continent on their right, and buffeted considerably by contrary winds which now began to make themselves manifest, Bob threw the automatic-pilot into gear at a suggestion from John, as this insured greater safety, and steered with the rudder only.  At once the riding became easier, for the moment a gust of wind hit the machine on one side, the elevators and ailerons shifted and counteracted its uneven effect.
After a while Bob turned slightly to the eastward, and about mid-afternoon they came in sight of Colon, the Atlantic terminal city of the great Canal.  Sweeping over its collection of houses, at an elevation of about fifteen hundred feet, they passed the big white Gatun locks, and followed the trail of the Panama Railroad across the great neck of rugged land which joined North and South America--followed, too, the tortuous, wonderful channel which American enterprise had cut through.
Thus over Gatun Lake they flew, over the Chagres River; along the course of Culebra Cut, with its high banks, across the Pedro Miguel and Miraflores locks on the other side of the isthmus; over Ancon; and finally below them lay clustered the white-robed buildings of Panama itself, with the swelling blue reaches of the big Pacific to the southward and westward, and the bold shore-line of South America to the southeastward.
Looking down as they circled the narrow tongue of land on which the city proper nestled, our friends soon made out the big Government landing-field and airdrome, distinguished by its whitewashed cobblestone markers at either end.  And, now, as the Sky-Bird II swooped downward, several attendants in white pantaloons could be seen running out of the building.
When the airplane had settled, these men came up.  Two were short, black fellows, probably San Blas Indians; but the other two were whites, though well-burned by the tropical suns.  The taller of the white men introduced himself as Henry Masters, superintendent of the landing-field, and was extremely courteous when he learned the identity of the new-arrivals.
"We have been looking for you gentlemen," said he, "and I'm glad to know you had such a fine run from Miami.  There are a lot of strangers in town--been arriving for the last three or four days--all to witness the start of this big race.  Most of them seem to be newspaper men from the States, though there are a number from South America, and even Africa and Europe.  Is this the plane that you fellows representing the _Daily Independent_ are going to fly in?"
"This is the one, Mr. Masters," responded John.
"It is a beauty," said the superintendent with enthusiasm, as he glanced over the graceful outlines of the Sky-Bird.  "I never saw one built on these lines until the other day, when what seems to be its twin came in."
"Much like-um lot," remarked one of the natives, and his companion, added more concisely: "Same like-um lot."
In spite of the fact that our party had been fearing some such information as this upon reaching Panama, the actual announcement of it made their hearts jump wildly.
"Where is this machine now?" asked Mr. Giddings as calmly as he could.
"In the hangar," was the reply of Masters.  "It is the one that is going to fly against you."
"Who is in charge of it?" inquired John Ross.
"Five arrived in it.  Four of them are to be in the contest, they say. The other gentleman is Mr. Wrenn, of the New York _Clarion_."
A few minutes later, when they pushed the Sky-Bird into one of the big double hangars, their suspicions were conclusively clinched.  For there at one side stood the very counterpart of their own airplane, differing only in the name painted upon its sides and under its big hollow wings. These letters spelled "_Clarion_"!
CHAPTER XIV
A FAMILIAR FACE
Our friends exchanged glances.  The brow of every one of them contracted into so plain a frown that Mr. Masters, the superintendent of the airdrome, could not help noticing it.
"I hope nothing is wrong, gentlemen," he ventured half-interrogatively.
"So do we," responded Mr. Giddings, "but if there is, it is nothing concerning you, sir, at least.  We thank you for your attention to our machine, and wish you to take the best care of it while it is here. Don't let anybody meddle with it, will you?"
"We'll look after it right, you may depend upon that," said the flying official; and the party turned and left the building.
Outside, where they would be secure from the hearing of others, all came to a pause, for there was a lot on their minds.
"Well, boys," said the publisher, "you see our suspicions back there in Miami were certainly well-founded.  It seems that in some manner those stolen blue-prints have fallen into the hands of our rivals, and they have been wise enough to profit by the fact."
"Do you think, dad, that Mr. Wrenn could have been back of this theft?" propounded Bob who, although the publisher was a business rival of his father's, had always thought him above such operations.
"I really do not know what to think," was Mr. Giddings's answer.  "I have always entertained the greatest respect for this gentleman's honesty, if he does differ with me politically.  But I must admit that since this thing has happened--"
"Sh-h!" warned Bob suddenly.  "Here comes Mr. Wrenn now!"
It was as he said.  Turning his head in the direction of the entrance to the landing-field, Mr. Giddings instantly recognized, in the short figure in linen coming toward them, the person of the publisher of the _Clarion_.
"I shall have this matter out with him right now," was the grim declaration of the _Daily Independent's_ director.
"Well, well! how are you, Giddings?  How are you, Robert?" cried Mr. Wrenn, sticking out his pudgy hand when he came up to the little group. Such was his gusto that he did not seem to notice the lukewarmness of the father's and son's greeting.  Mr. Giddings introduced John, Paul, and Tom, and then the publisher of the _Clarion_ continued with good-humored raillery: "I'm mighty glad to see you fellows here, for I began to think you would get scared and flunk us at the last moment. Was over on the hotel veranda when I saw a plane land here, and I guessed it might be you, and hurried right over.  Put your machine up yet?"
"We did," said Mr. Giddings rather sourly.  "And do you know, Wrenn, when we ran the Sky-Bird in the hangar we saw yours in there and received quite a disagreeable surprise--I may say shock."
Mr. Giddings and the boys watched the broad face of their rival very narrowly as this statement was put.  Would he act guilty?
There was an explosion of laughter, the heartiest of laughter, from the _Clarion_ director.  "Oh, say, that's one on you, Giddings!  I knew you'd be down in the mouth when you saw our machine and realized that you would have to contend against one as good or better than your own--one of the same type!"  And he laughed again, until he had to wipe tears from his little blue eyes.
This was incomprehensible conduct from a guilty conscience!  What could it mean?  Surely Mr. Wrenn, of the _Clarion_, was either the coldest and deepest-dyed rogue in the world or a man entirely innocent!
"How did you know that we had an airplane like yours?" asked John sharply.
The fat man broke into renewed chuckles at this question, and it was a moment or two before he could find words.  Then he said:
"There's a little story connected with this, and now that we're right on the eve of the race and there's nothing to be gained by further secrecy, I'll tell it to you.  You see, about a year and a half ago, possibly two years, a young man came to me for a job as sporting reporter; said he had been a flyer in France and that the Government wanted him as an Air Mail pilot, but he would rather take up the newspaper game.  I put him to work, and he proved very good in gathering news of sports, especially aviation stuff.  A week or so after you challenged me to this race--which I would have liked to back out of, but couldn't and save my honor--this chap showed me some blue-prints of a novel kind of airplane which he claimed to have co-devised with a flyer friend who, he said, was helping to make you a machine of the same type for this contest.  He--"
"What is this young man's name?" inquired John Ross excitedly.
"Peter Deveaux."
"Peter Deveaux!" exclaimed John and Paul at once.  And John added: "Mr. Wrenn, that fellow did not refuse to fly in the Air Mail service; he _did_ fly, and was dishonorably discharged for drunkenness. Furthermore, he stole those plans from our hangar!"
The publisher of the _Clarion_ opened his eyes wide.  "Can you prove those assertions?" he inquired.  "That last one is a serious charge, sir."
"Nevertheless we can prove it when we get back to New York," declared John warmly.
"Well," said Mr. Wrenn, "I'll finish my story, and then we can talk over this new development more understandingly.  As I said, Deveaux claimed to have a half-right in the plans, and having no reason to doubt it, I told him to proceed, when he proposed to make an airplane for us from the designs and to head a crew for the _Clarion_ in this race around the world.  Now you will understand my position in the matter."
"Wrenn," spoke up Mr. Giddings with quick frankness, "I beg your pardon.  The young men here and myself fancied you must have had a guilty part in the production of this fac-simile of our airplane.  We now see who is really to blame."
"I do not blame you for your suspicions," was the candid reply of the fat man, "if things are as you state; and I will do you the honor, Giddings, to say that, although we are business rivals, your word is as good as gold with me.  This is a lamentable situation.  What shall we do about it?"
Mr. Giddings studied deeply before making answer.  Then he observed: "Wrenn, this contest, as you know, has been too widely advertised to wreck it just as it is about to begin by the arrest of this man, Peter Deveaux.  Say nothing to him about it; in fact, we will none of us mention a word of this to anybody; but when the race is over you can quietly dismiss him from your service, if you wish.  As I now look at it, no great harm has been done, if any, by his duplicity; with two planes practically alike, the race will really be a fairer one, and a more exciting one for the public who read our newspapers, and supremacy will probably go to the better crew."
"I don't know about my crew, as Deveaux picked them up; but they did good work when they brought me down here the other day in the plane," said Mr. Wrenn.  "Giddings, I think your plan is all right, and we'll let the race go on as if nothing had happened; but you bet your last dollar I'll fire Pete when it's all over, if he has done what you say!"
With that the publisher of the _Clarion_ accompanied our friends back to the hangar, where he had a good look at the Sky-Bird II, and showed his own airplane, which was in all essentials an exact copy of the other.  Following this they left the airdrome and went to their hotels.
All had a good night's rest--probably the last one they would have on earth for more than a week,--and after a hearty breakfast they proceeded to get what supplies they would need to last them until they should reach Georgetown, British Guiana, on the north coast of South America.  This would be their first stop.  Somehow the townspeople quickly guessed their identity, and they were followed from store to store as they shopped by a curious and motley throng of dark-skinned natives, among whom were noticed quite a few white children, presumably belonging to American employees of the Government.
With such eatables as they had bought stored in a basket, and carrying a few other packages, the boys went out to the airdrome.  A guard stood at the door to keep out those having no business in the hangar, and as the young flyers passed in they noticed that Mr. Wrenn and a group of four fellows in flying-suits were going over the rival airplane.
"Here, boys, come over here a minute!" called the fat man.  As they approached, the aviators with him turned from their work.  One, a slender fellow with swarthy skin and a scrubby black mustache, scowled when he looked at John Ross, and as Bob Giddings and Tom Meeks got their eyes on him, they gave an involuntary start, for they recognized in the man the fellow they had seen hanging around the fair-grounds in Yonkers when their machine was in process of construction.
"It's time you fellows got acquainted with each other," said Mr. Wrenn, and he forthwith proceeded to introduce his crew as Pete Deveaux, Chuck Crossman, Oliver Torrey, and Sam Lane.
"How are you, Ross?" greeted Pete Deveaux.  He uttered a sour sort of laugh, as his companions offered their hands around the group.  "I won't do any shaking," said he, "as my hands are kind of greasy."
"Don't worry, Deveaux," advised John quickly.  "We won't feel bad over a little thing like that."
"That your plane over there?" asked the swarthy fellow.
"That's it; quite a strong resemblance to yours here," said John with cutting sarcasm.
"That's so," was Deveaux's comment, casting a quick look toward Mr. Wrenn.  Apparently he was as anxious to drop the subject as a chicken would a red-hot kernel of corn, for he immediately observed, with an ill-concealed sneer: "I suppose you guys think you're going to leave us a good ways behind in this race?"
"We're not telling what we think," put in Paul; "but one thing is sure: we're going to keep you hustling some."
"Oh, that's too bad, now, ain't it?" drawled Oliver Torrey, as he leered out of one eye.
"Say, kid, we'll beat youse so bad you'll be squallin' before you're half-way round the globe," put in Sam Lane.
"You bet!  Ain't no use o' flying against such veterans as us," supplemented Chuck Crossman, with a wag of his frowsy head.
Mr. Wrenn frowned.  While these might be his own men, it was hard to countenance such bragging.
CHAPTER XV
THE START
By eleven o'clock the tanks of the Sky-Bird II had been filled with gasoline and oil, and the radiator of each engine supplied with twelve gallons of water.  In addition to this, its crew had carefully gone over every brace, control, bolt, and nut to make sure that everything was tight, the engines had been run detached from the propeller for a few minutes to warm them up, and every bearing not reached by the lubricating system was well oiled by hand.
Mr. Giddings had appeared about an hour earlier, bringing with him the two special correspondents of the _Daily Independent_, as well as several other newspaper men representing various prominent foreign publications.  As soon as our boys had finished shaking hands with these, they were introduced to a number of well-known Government officials and aviation representatives, who added their good wishes for the success of the big undertaking.  Then came Mr. Wrenn with a party of his own distinguished friends, which called for more hand-shaking.
At twelve-fifteen the rival machines were pushed out of the hangar and took up positions in the field, ready for the signal to "hop."  At twelve-fifty both crews, with the exception of their respective crankers-up, entered their machines, and a heavy hush fell over the great crowd which had assembled to see the start of the first race around the world's circumference.  It was without denial an auspicious moment, and as they stood there and looked at the two big mechanical birds which were to attempt this prodigious feat, embracing almost 25,000 miles, threading every mile of the distance through the air in the astounding time of ten days, the situation was so fraught with awe, particularly to the native Panamanians, that now at the last moment all were practically voiceless.
The rival publishers gave their parting instructions as their crews climbed into the cabins, and these were to the same effect: "Don't forget, boys, to report to us at every stop, and mail us all the pictures you can.  Between stops use your wireless for reports whenever possible.  Good-bye, and the best of luck!"
Lieutenant-Colonel Warren J. Hess, a gentleman prominent in American aviation circles, had been selected as judge of the contest.  He was not only to give the signal to start off the flyers, but with Mr. Giddings, was to await in Panama their return, and demand from each crew upon arrival a document containing the signature of the port official at each scheduled landing.
Colonel Hess, looking at his watch, now raised his hand, and instinctively those in the front of each of the long lines of spectators flanking the run-way crowded back so that the airplanes would not strike them as they dashed down the field for the take-off. Tom Meeks and Chuck Crossman spun the propellers, sprang back to escape their vicious whirr as the respective engines fired, and quickly clambered into their machines.
It was exactly one o'clock.  Both airplanes taxied down the runway side by side.  They also arose together, amid a great cheering, some ninety feet apart, shooting grandly up into the air above the heads of the people in the lower end of the field.  At a height of a thousand feet, the gray _Clarion_ bent eastward.  At fifteen hundred feet, the Sky-Bird did likewise.  From the open windows of each of the cabins fluttered white handkerchiefs in a final farewell, and many a broad-brimmed hat in the hands of the excited populace below was waved in answer.
Flying low, the _Clarion_ started away in the lead, while her rival had been mounting to her own preferred higher level.  By the time the Sky-Bird had straightened out, her contemporary was well in advance.
"We're losing ground," said Bob Giddings anxiously.
"Don't worry about that," said Paul Ross, who was at the throttle; "we can catch them when we're ready.  We'll get a better current of air up here."
Paul's maneuver had been due to the fact that heavy head-winds were blowing, and he was quite sure if he went higher he would get above the worst of these.
As they now shot along on an even keel, it seemed hard to realize that they had at last started out on the important flight for which they had been planning and working so long; and as Paul watched his instruments and the scudding rival machine ahead, he could not help wondering what the issue of it all might be--if the fates would be so kind as to smile enough on the Sky-Bird to bring her in ahead of the _Clarion_ and within schedule time.  Many weary miles must be covered before they would see Panama again.  And when they would land in that air-drome again--if in truth they ever did!--would it be as victors, or as listeners to the jeers of the rough crew of the other plane?
It was not an ideal day for the start from a weather standpoint.  In fact, a consultation of the weather reports at the Panama Bureau before they left had shown a prophecy of strong northeasterly winds and possible showers.  The sun was almost shut out by patches of cloud, glinting through only occasionally; but neither crew had felt like postponing the start, so eager were they to be off and so confident were they in the capabilities of their respective machines to meet almost any sort of bad weather.
Straight along the Isthmus both machines proceeded, making a bee-line for Georgetown, which it was hoped to reach at daylight.  The coastline was low along here and very uneven, with numerous pretty little islands on the Pacific side, the waters surrounding them sparkling like jewels when the sun's rays would struggle through the clouds and strike the tossing waves.
In the northern part of the Republic of Colombia they passed just to the right of the western terminal range of the great Andes Mountains, and within an hour's time were sailing through Quindiu Pass of the central arm of the same mountains.  At this time they were over twelve thousand feet above sea-level.  Then came the table-lands of western Venezuela, open in places and covered with thick growths of tropical forests in others.
As they approached the foothills of the eastern chain or arm of the mountains, Paul took the throttle, and they steadily arose in order to clear the high pinnacles facing them, and finally, at a height of fifteen thousand feet--the greatest height they had yet attained--they went over them.  The airplane encountered several "air pockets" in this process, which might have been disastrous to them except for the stabilizing effect of the automatic-pilot.  As it was, the machine pitched rather roughly in surviving them.
In sweeping past the last crag they had come very near to striking, owing to a cloud which enwrapped it.  Just in time Paul's sharp eyes had seen the white bank of snow on the crag ahead, and he elevated his craft enough to pass over.  It was so cold up here, even in the cabin, that the boys had to don their heavy coats.
Just as they turned the nose of their machine toward a lower level, running at reduced speed, a huge bird with curving beak, which John said was a condor, dashed from the crags after the airplane.  It was followed a moment later by five or six others.  The great birds seemed to resent the appearance of so strange a giant in the mountain fastnesses where they had always held the supremacy of the air, all the time darting angrily at it, flapping their long, black and white wings, some of which had the immense span of fourteen feet, and croaking hoarsely.
The boys laughed at first, but when the creatures commenced to come closer, frequently hitting the windows with their sharp beaks, and cracking two of them, they began to get really alarmed.  Once the propeller struck the tail of one bold and incautious condor, and feathers flew in all directions; but after a quick circle he was back again, madder than ever.
"Say, fellows," cried Paul; "we've got to do something with these birds right away!  First thing we know, one of them will get hit a squarer blow with the propeller and smash it.  Then we'll crash as sure as I'm sitting here."
This peril was very imminent, as all could see.
John seized the shot-gun from its rack, and Tom one of the rifles. These were loaded.  Stationing themselves on either side of the cabin, the young men drew down the windows in front of them, poked out their weapons and watched for a chance to use them.
Tom's gun was the first to blaze away, but it is difficult to hit a bird on the wing with a rifle, and he missed.  A moment later, as a condor dashed viciously toward his window, John fired, and the great bird, mortally stricken, tumbled into the mists below.
Tom was more fortunate the next time.  A condor, with a fluttering of his immense wings, had settled right on the tail of the machine, where he clung with his sturdy talons, threatening to prevent Paul from manipulating the rudder.  When Bob called Tom's attention to this alarming situation, the latter joined him at the rear window of the cabin.  Tom took careful aim, pulled the trigger, and the condor fell with a broken wing, uttering hoarse cries until the clouds below swallowed him up.
Two more of the fierce creatures were killed before the remaining birds were frightened off.  It was with a sigh of relief that Paul now resumed his descent to lower levels.
When presently they emerged out of the last cloud, and could see the green earth below them once more, they were across the last chain of mountain they would encounter in South America.  They gazed with their glasses on all sides, and checked up their position on the chart, although in doing this they had great difficulty on account of a curtain of thin fog which hung over the land, and only a very low altitude of about five hundred feet would allow of it at all.
As soon as they were sure of their bearings they again took a searching observation in quest of the rival airplane, but no sign of it could they see.
"They're probably quite a bit ahead of us by this time," observed John; "but now that we're through the last chain of the Andes we can make better speed.  Shoot her up to two thousand feet, Buddy.  We'll set our course for Georgetown by compass."
Paul bore upward, and at the level mentioned he straightened the machine with her nose once more pointed eastward, and the compass hand pointing along the left wing of the machine.
It was now growing dark.  Not knowing whether this was caused by the closing in of the clouds or the natural declension of the sun, Bob looked at his watch.  To his surprise he found it was seven o'clock Panama time, which would make it probably close to nine in their present locality.  Night should now be upon them.
As it had been decided to let John and Tom operate the night shift, at least for the first few days, John now took his trick at the throttle, changed to the fresh engine, and Bob and Paul turned into their hammocks for the first sleep aboard the airplane.  They were both pretty tired, as each had spent several hours at the helm that afternoon, and it was only a few minutes before the gentle rocking of the plane on the billows of air had sent them into a sound oblivion. Just before retiring, Bob had wirelessed Panama of their safe passage through the mountains and fight with the condors, stating that several snapshots of the birds had been secured and that these would be mailed to the _Daily Independent_ upon reaching Georgetown.
Not long after the change of pilots a fine rain began to fall, covering the windows of the cabin with a film of moisture; but as it was now too dark to see anyhow, John did not care whether he could look outside or not.  However, for the good of the machine, as well as the betterment of their speed, he decided to get out of the storm.  So, switching on the little dashboard electric lights to illuminate his instruments, he turned the Sky-Bird upward again.  Through the very clouds which were expelling the rain, gathered from the warm Atlantic trade-winds, he guided the machine.  At nine thousand feet he was above them, in clear dry air, with a blue, star-studded sky above his head and in the mellow glow of a full moon.
"Well, John, this is more like night-flying," remarked Tom Meeks, who sat just behind the pilot, ready to assist him at a moment's notice if the need should appear.
"As long as I know there are no mountains ahead to smash into I'm not worrying a bit," replied John, "and I guess we're all right on that score.  I'm going to let the old girl out now, Tom."
"Might as well," was the response.
Thereupon John threw on the gas by degrees until the indicator showed them to be whizzing along at 150 miles.  He easily could have gone fifty more on the one engine had he chosen, but was afraid such a speed would carry them beyond their destination and out into the Atlantic before daylight could show them their position.  Had they not previously been running somewhat behind scheduled time, he would not have accelerated even now.
Shortly after midnight Tom relieved him at the throttle, and running slightly slower, to make sure they would not pass over Georgetown in the darkness, Tom began to hum softly to himself as he kept a sharp lookout upon his instruments.  John settled back in the seat behind, as alert for any sudden peril as his mate had been before.
But no mishap marred the night's run, which was as smooth up there above the clouds as any veteran flyer could have wished.  And when at last the bright sun of another day chased the moon and its haze into obscurity, it lighted up the flying craft some time before its orb had peeped high enough over the Atlantic's horizon to shed its rays upon the affairs of earth itself.
Gradually, as the sun arose in the heavens, Tom brought the Sky-Bird lower, until presently he and John could see the ground, bathed in glistening color from its recent wetting, far below them.
At this time Paul and Bob awoke, and washing their hands and faces, came to the windows to look out.  The first thing they all did was to sweep the sky-line for some vision of the rival airplane, but without success.  Then they put their attention on the country below and around.
Just beneath was a pretty little blue lake, walled in with great forest trees some of which must have been over a hundred feet high.  A short way beyond was an immense field covered with what they were sure must be sugar-cane, and in which they could see dark-skinned men at work with queer carts and clumsy oxen.  At the right, a mere thread of silver, was a river, hedged with tropical vegetation.  This swept around toward their front, enlarging as it came, and at what seemed no farther than five miles away, poured its waters out into a great sea of apparently limitless expanse.
The boys concluded at once that this great body of water must be the Atlantic Ocean, and when they saw a fair-sized town nestling among the trees at the point where the river joined the sea, their chart told them that the stream was the Essequibo River, and the collection of low-roofed buildings was none less than Georgetown!
A few minutes later, they were circling the town to locate their landing-field which was to be marked with a large white letter T. Seeing it on the second turn, they swept down amongst a curious and half-frightened throng, and taxied to a stop.
To their relief and gratification, they found that their rivals had not yet appeared.
CHAPTER XVI
TRICKED BY RIVALS
Correcting their watches with Georgetown time, as given to them by Mr. Whiteshore, the Englishman in charge of the field, the boys found to their joy that they had arrived five minutes ahead of schedule.  This would give them, if they wished to take it, a trifle more than three hours to spend in Georgetown.
But first must come business; they must go over the machine very carefully and see if the long, hard run from Panama had done any damage; and they must replenish their fuel, oil, and water supply. They were happy to find both engines in fine shape, thanks to the possibility of alternating them in transit, and beyond a number of scratches and the cracked glass made by the condors in their attack in crossing the Andes the airplane was in perfect shape.  Paul climbed up and examined the helium-gas valves, of which there were three in each wing, one for each of three compartments, and announced that the pressure showed only an insignificant decrease.  At the rate of escapage indicated, they would have plenty to last them for the whole trip.  This was reassuring knowledge, for no envelope can be made so impervious that light gases will not escape at all.  The body compartment also showed good pressure.
It took them an hour and fifteen minutes to replenish the fuel tanks and water radiator and put everything in shape.  Just as they were finishing up, a cry from the curious crowd around them called their attention to the western sky, and they saw an airplane approaching. This developed rapidly into the unmistakable outlines of the _Clarion_, and in a few minutes the rival crew landed in the field.
Pete Deveaux sauntered over to the crew of the Sky-Bird II.
"Well, fellows," he said, with the sneer which seemed to be on his leathery countenance most of the time, "I notice you got in a little ahead of us.  Congratulations!  I suppose you're tickled to death."
"We're not quite that far gone; just a little bit alive," grinned Tom Meeks.  "What made your crew so slow, Deveaux?  Did you get wet in that rain last night and have to stop off and dry out your clothes?"
"Aw, cut it out; talk sense!" snarled the French flyer.  He turned on his heel, fearing more of Tom's sharp thrusts if he lingered longer, and shot back: "You guys will have another laugh coming one of these days, mark my words!"  With that he rejoined his companions.
Not at all worried at such a prophecy, our friends secured a native boy to guide them into the town, a quarter of a mile distant, leaving their airplane under guard of two Chinese out in the open, the field boasting no such thing as a hangar.  At the little telegraph office of the town, John dispatched their report to the _Daily Independent_, also mailed at the local postoffice the promised films of the encounter with the condors.
They then purchased some breakfast and began to look about them.  While it was still early, the narrow streets were quite well crowded with people, so much so that it looked to the visitors as if the inhabitants never slept.  What they saw almost made them rub their eyes to make sure they were not in Asia instead of South America.  There were dozens of almond-eyed Chinese within sight, dozens of black Hindoos in turbans and flowing garments, dozens of Parsees wearing long black coats and hats like inverted coal-scuttles; to say nothing of numerous Portuguese and English, the latter mostly merchants and plantation owners.
The roofs of the buildings were slanting, with wooden or galvanized iron walls.  Some of the more important of them, such as stores, warehouses, government buildings, etc., were quite large, and stood upon piles to keep them out of the way of floods which often sweep the lowlands in the rainy season.  In many of the streets ran canals, which their small guide told them, in pidgeon-English, were drains for the floods.  And he also said that the long embankments which the boys saw stretching along the sea front were dykes built at great expense by the sugar planters to keep these same floods from washing the rich soil of their fields out into the ocean.
After purchasing some fresh fruit and groceries for their aerial larder, the little party betook themselves back to the landing-field, on the way passing numbers of pretty little houses which stood in the midst of beautiful gardens filled with tropical plants.
As they neared the field, they saw that quite a crowd had collected since their departure.  Pushing their way through the concourse about their own airplane, they were surprised to find Pete Deveaux and Chuck Crossman just jumping down from the wings.  These flyers hurried away through a gap in the circle of onlookers toward their own machine before our friends could accost them.
The Sky-Bird crew were considerably put out at noting this situation, for they had particularly told the Chinese guards to let no one meddle with the Sky-Bird.  The Celestials were squatting unconcernedly upon the ground, one on either side of the airplane, as John rushed up and said to one of them; "Didn't I tell you not to let any strangers around this machine?"
"No lettum stranger lound," protested the fellow.  "Him both flylers alla samee you.  Like-um see, you see; like-um see, he see."
"Oh, ginger!" exclaimed John, turning to his comrades, in clear disgust, "the stupid dunce thinks those fellows belong to us and we to them, just because we all wear the same sort of flying clothes!  Did you ever see the like?"
Paul now took up the questioning.  "What were those fellows doing up there?" he asked of the Chinaman.
"No tellee me; no tellee Lee," was the response, as the fellow jerked his head in the direction of his comrade.  "Just lookee over alla samee you do li'l bit ago."
"Were they in the cabin?" demanded Paul.
"No go in klabin."
They walked around the machine giving it a cursory looking over, but could find nothing out of the way, and every one of them felt considerable relief.
"I guess they were only taking a look to see if our construction was the same as theirs," suggested Bob.  This seemed a plausible explanation, and they accepted it, although with some misgivings.
About ten minutes later they saw the crowd over in the other side of the field scattering, and then the _Clarion_ shot up into the air.  In a few minutes it was pointed down the coast and making good headway.
Our friends were not quite ready, but when the other machine was a mere speck against the southwestern sky, they hopped off themselves, with Paul at the throttle.  Not one of the party had any doubt but that they could catch their rivals before the latter should arrive at Para, where they were due at six o'clock that evening.  It needed only that first stage of the journey from Panama to Georgetown to show them that they had either the speediest craft or the most skillful crew.
Paul mounted to a height of about two thousand feet, then let the Sky-Bird straighten out in the direction of their next stop.  He opened up the throttle little by little, and the machine rapidly gained momentum.  But somehow the young pilot was dissatisfied.  Finally he hitched the stick over to the notch which should have brought the craft into a speed of 150 miles, and watched the speedometer closely.
"Humph!" he ejaculated, after fifteen or twenty minutes.
"Say, Paul," cried Bob just then, "we're losing on the _Clarion_. She's clear out of sight now."
"Why don't you tell me something I don't know?" growled Paul in a tone very queer for him.
"What's the matter with you, Buddy?" demanded John, stepping up.  "You seem to have an awful grouch on, some way!"
"Got a good reason for it," snapped Paul.  "This is enough to make a preacher almost swear."
"Don't talk, but speed her up a bit if you don't want them to get away," advised John.
"She doesn't act right, somehow," said Paul.  "The Sky-Bird ought to be hitting it up to a hundred and fifty right now, but she's only making a hundred and fifteen.  She acts groggy; don't you notice it?"
"I thought myself she was riding a little rocky--sort of out of balance," admitted John.
"Take the stick and try her yourself," said his brother.
John did so.  For fifteen minutes he said nothing, but worked the throttle and watched the speedometer.  Then he called Paul again to the seat.
"You might as well take her, Buddy," declared John with a puzzled shake of his head; "I can't do any better with her than you.  She wallows along like a man with a load of buckshot in his pockets--heavy--and seems out of equilibrium, too!"
"What do you suppose is the matter, John?" asked Tom Meeks.
"I'll bet Pete Deveaux and that Chuck Crossman have been tampering with her, back there in Georgetown," declared Bob.
"I don't know; it certainly looks kind of suspicious," admitted John Ross.  He thought a moment.  "Cattails and jewsharps!" he exclaimed very suddenly.
"What now?" asked Bob.
"I believe I've hit the trouble," stated John, with his brown face a shade paler.  "You know we saw those fellows monkeying around our wings.  It would be an easy matter to trip one or more of those valves and let some of the helium out!  That would make us heavier, and if more gas were let out from one wing than from the other, we would be out of balance in the bargain."
This declaration of John's brought a startled and troubled look to the faces of his companions.  All knew that if Pete Deveaux had engineered such a dastardly trick as John hinted at, a handicap would be in store for the Sky-Bird's crew all through the remainder of the race, for it would be impossible to get a renewal of their helium-gas supply before reaching their own country again, and then it would be too late.
"What shall we do?" came from Bob.
"Do?  There's nothing to do now, but to keep on flying at the best gait we can until we reach Para," decided John.  "When we get there we'll have a chance to find out what is really wrong."
This seemed the wisest course to pursue.  So Paul, vexed though he was at the contrary actions of the airplane, buckled down to the job of guiding the machine and complained no more.  But he made up his mind that if investigations proved the rival crew had been tampering with the Sky-Bird II he, for one, would do his part in giving them a warm time should they meet on the ground again.
At noon while John and Tom slept, Bob relieved Paul, and for an hour they made a little better time by working both engines; but, afraid of overheating the one they termed their "night engine", they went back to one motor for the rest of the journey into Para, where they arrived an hour late.  And it was to find bad news awaiting them.
The landing-field official announced that the _Clarion's_ flyers had left not fifteen minutes before for Freetown, Africa.  And upon investigating the helium valves in the wings of the Sky-Bird, our boys found to their dismay that fully a third of the pressure was gone, indicating that an equal quantity of gas had escaped in some manner.
It may be added that there was very little doubt in their minds as to this manner.
CHAPTER XVII
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC
Our friends looked at each other dismally when they had ascertained the cause of the Sky-Bird's sluggish flying.  Paul and Tom even gave the craft a tentative push, and found that the loss of her helium had made her so much heavier to move over the ground that the difference was manifest at once.
"This looks kind of black for us, fellows," remarked Bob.
"And we've got those scoundrels to thank for it without the shadow of a doubt," put in Paul, with flashing eyes.  "I'd give a year of my life to get my hands on that Pete Deveaux right now."
"It's lucky they got out ahead of us," added Tom significantly.
"Well, if they were here, and if we thrashed the stuffing out of the entire bunch, that wouldn't put back our lost helium and former speed," said the practical John.  "What we've got to do now is to try to remedy matters."
"Easier said than done, I'm thinking," Tom observed.  "We can't get any more helium here; in fact, not until we get back to Panama.  Of course that will be too late."
"I don't know about that," hinted John.
"What's your remedy?" asked Bob.
"I know," said Paul.  "The machine's out of balance now, because they have let more helium out of one wing than the other, and none at all out of the fuselage.  By letting some out of our body tank, and enough out of the lightest wing to bring it in equilibrium with its mate, we can get a perfect balance again, and that ought to give us air steadiness and more speed."
"Right you are, Buddy," declared John.  "Good head!  That's my idea exactly."
"But won't that make us even heavier than we are now?" inquired Bob.
"Sure," responded John, "but balance is the main thing in an airplane, you know.  When we get that, the old girl will act a whole lot better than she did coming here."
"Still, our rivals will have some advantage over us," argued Tom.
"That's true--in the way of a lighter machine.  But we've shown we could outspeed them when the Sky-Bird was all right, and now we ought to be about an even match for them," said John.
"That means a nip-and-tuck race of it, then, the rest of the way," commented Paul.
At this point a bright idea struck Bob.  "Say, fellows," he cried, "why can't we send a wire message from here to Mr. Giddings at Panama, and ask him to have a fast vessel drop a tank of helium off at Nukahiva, Marquesas Islands, for us?"
His comrades slapped Bob so hard upon the back when he made this suggestion that he had to stagger.
"Fine idea, Bob!" declared John.  "A fast boat ought to reach Nukahiva before we do, and that will give us a full load of helium again for the last four or five thousand miles of the race.  If it's a close contest up to that point, the new supply may save the day for us!"
They now set to work equalizing the gas supply in the wings of the Sky-Bird and reducing that in the fuselage to the proper pressure for perfect equilibrium, which they were able to get by the use of the pressure-gauge and a little figuring.  Then they went over all parts of the machine, put in gasoline and oil, and attended to watering the radiators, following which Paul and Bob departed for town.
As in Georgetown, they created a vast interest, and were considerably annoyed by the crowds of natives which followed at their heels, many of whom carried baskets of fruit on their heads and constantly importuned them to buy some of their wares.  Even in the windows of the houses they passed women holding naked babies, who stared out at them, and in the doorways stood girls, some of them beautifully gowned in silks, their dark hair falling like a shower about their comely nut-brown faces, while their eyes opened wide in wonder or dropped in abashment when they saw one of the handsome young Americans look their way.
Para is directly on the equatorial line.  It is also the metropolis of the mighty Amazon, the king of all the world's rivers, whose width here at its mouth is close to two hundred miles, and which carries into the Atlantic so much mud from the interior of South America that it is said the waters of that ocean are stained yellow for five hundred miles outward.  This mighty stream is formed by countless mountain creeks and rivers draining practically the whole northern half of the continent, and these streams are formed in their turn by the heavy rains which fall frequently from swiftly-gathered clouds.  In fact, it rains nearly every afternoon in Para, and the air is always moist, so much so, that articles made of steel and iron quickly rust, and furniture must be pegged together rather than glued to keep it from coming apart.
Paul and Bob found Para quite a good-sized city, but on very low ground.  Along the docks of the mighty river were many kinds of boats and ships, from stately ocean-liners to the tub-like barges used to float down from Bolivia great cargoes of raw rubber.  There were numerous schooners unloading vegetables and fruit, and countless dugouts paddled by natives.  Cargadores, in their bare feet, were carrying goods in and out of the various large craft, supporting the heaviest of bundles on their bare heads.  Their faces were all shades of white, brown, and black.  Among them were negroes from Jamaica, and Spaniards, Portuguese, and mulattoes from all parts of Brazil.
The business buildings were three and four stories high, and built close to the sidewalks along narrow streets.  Their walls, the boys noticed as they crowded their way along, were of all colors, some being faced with blue, yellow, and green porcelain tiles.
By asking questions they found the telegraph office, and there sent the message to Mr. Giddings at Panama, requesting that the helium-gas be sent to Nukahiva by fastest boat.  They also wired a report of their progress.  They had by this time another roll of exposed kodak films, and this was mailed to the _Daily Independent_.
No sooner had they reappeared from the post-office than they were once more besieged with peddlers asking them to make a purchase of their wares.  Paul and Bob stopped when they saw some particularly luscious-looking oranges and bananas, and were surprised upon asking the price to find that they could have a dozen of each kind for the value of five cents; and oh! how sweet and juicy they were when they sank a tooth into them.
They bought some baked goods in a little shop, and as they emerged an old man with a parrot on one shoulder and a small monkey on the other blocked their pathway, and begged them to look at "nice parryote, nice monk."
They shook their heads, when they saw other vendors crowding forward, and were about to push by when the monkey sprang nimbly upon Paul's own shoulder, snatched off his cap, shook it in front of his eyes, and put it back in place again.
Paul and Bob both laughed, and harder yet as the bright little animal shot a paw into Paul's pocket and adroitly drew out a Brazilian gold coin called a milreis, worth about fifty-four cents in American money.
"You give five milreis, me give monk," said the old mulatto.
Paul shook his head.
"You give four milreis, me give monk."
"No; that's more than I have of these coins."
"You give three milreis, me give--"
"Only have two of them left," said Paul.
"You give two milreis, take monk."
"It's a bargain," laughed Paul.
And he fished another of the coins out of his pocket, accepted the end of the rope tied to the monkey, and went off with Bob, his newly-acquired pet still contentedly occupying his shoulder.
"We'll surprise John and Tom when we get back to the field," chuckled Paul.  "They won't be looking for this addition to the crew of the Sky-Bird."
"I'd say not," declared Bob, also chuckling.
And indeed Paul's little hairy friend did create a lot of interest when they arrived beside the airplane, John and Tom both playing with him, for several minutes, and going into hilarious laughter at the funny antics of the weazened-faced creature, which looked so much like the wrinkled old mulatto from whom he had been purchased, that Paul said he should henceforth be called "Grandpa."
They put the monkey in the cabin, and climbed in themselves, since all was in readiness for the departure.  Night had fallen, but the sky was clear and moonlit.  So there was no trouble, by helping matters with their searchlight, in hopping off and turning their head across the big Atlantic toward the shores of Africa.
As the trade-winds were blowing quite stiffly in their faces, John, who was at the throttle, determined to mount high enough to overcome their most resistant effects.  When at an altitude of about five thousand feet, he brought the Sky-Bird out horizontally, with her nose set by compass toward Freetown.  Before they could reach this African seaport it would be necessary for them to travel considerably more than two thousand miles and meet whatever storms might develop.  But all had such confidence in the capabilities of the Sky-Bird that none had any worries, fierce as some of the Atlantic storms were known to be.
As they could no longer see the sea beneath them, owing to the darkness and fog which lay between, John had to rely entirely upon intuition and his compass to strike Freetown.  Aerial navigation over immense bodies of water is similar to navigation on the seas themselves, except that the indispensable sextant of the mariner is of little use in the air, owing to the high speed of travel and the fact that allowances have to be made for the drift of the machine when side-winds are blowing--an extremely difficult factor to determine accurately.
In side-winds the machine makes leeway in addition to its forward movement, and it is the ratio of one to the other which the successful pilot must work out correctly, especially when flying above clouds or when land features are unobserved.  In this particular instance our boys were supplied with charts indicating the trend of all normal winds in each locality and their approximate force at various altitudes. Thus, by consulting his speedometer, John was able to figure out with a fair degree of certainty what allowances he should make from dead reckoning in order to strike their destination--or rather, we should say that Tom, as John's aid, did most of this figuring, for a pilot generally has his hands full in guiding his steed.
The Sky-Bird was acting much better now, since her equalizing of weight back at Para.  She lacked some of the speed of her old-time self, but rode smoothly and evenly in the hardest gusts.  It was once more a pleasure to sit in her cabin, even if the rival airplane was ahead of them.
"We'll give them the race of their lives yet," observed Tom, as he studied the map and the speedometer alternately.
"We surely will," said his companion.
And both of them clicked their teeth in a way which boded no good for the rival craft ahead.
Shortly before midnight they crossed the equator for the second time since they had left Panama.  But, rolled in their comfortable hammocks and sound asleep, with Grandpa, the monkey, blinking drowsily in a corner nearby, neither Bob nor Paul was conscious of the fact.
CHAPTER XVIII
AN IRRITATING DELAY
Paul was awakened the next morning by feeling a gentle tug at his nose. Unused to such a summons as this, he opened his eyes with a start.
There on his breast squatted Grandpa, his little head cocked comically to one side, his beady little eyes glistening with mischief, and his slim fingers just reaching out for another tweak.  The monkey gave a lightning-like spring to the back of a nearby seat when he saw Paul looking at him, and here he set up a shrill chattering, which also awoke Bob and caused Tom and John to whirl around.
"You fellows have got a good alarm-clock now, the way it looks," called Tom, laughing, and taking in the situation.  "Grandpa will save John and me the trouble of stirring you sleepy heads up after this, I expect."
Paul and Bob sprang out of their hammocks, and the former seized the monkey and laughingly shoved his nose up against one of the window panes.  Far down below were the rolling billows of the great Atlantic, the early sun striking them into many beautiful tones of green and blue, and cutting a silver pathway across the curling crests.  A school of dolphins was leaping out of the water off to the left.  From the opposite window the youth could see a small emerald island in the distance, but everywhere else was water, vast reaches of it.
Grandpa evidently had no eye for nature, as viewed from this novel position, for he quickly twisted out of Paul's arms and jumped down to the floor of the cabin, where he pranced about excitedly.
"It's just a little bit too high to suit your exalted monkeyship, isn't it?" chuckled Paul.  "Well, you'll get used to it, Grandpa, before you get around the world with us!  I'll promise you, sir, that you will be the farthest-jumping and highest-jumping monkey that ever lived.  You ought to be proud!"
After getting something to eat, Paul relieved Tom at the throttle, and Bob tried to get Freetown by radio.  Failing, he did get Para, and advised them of their safety and approximate position over the Atlantic.
Now that the weather had cleared up so that they could run in view of the ocean, John and Tom themselves turned in for a much-needed sleep, leaving their younger companions to direct the course of the Sky-Bird on the last stage of the lap.  The trade-winds were blowing freely, but with a lack of gustiness which made progress against them quite rapid and smooth.
It was two hours later that those in the Sky-Bird saw the coastline of Africa jutting out into the sea in a great bulge, and a little afterward they recognized landmarks agreeing with their chart.  As they were slightly south of their course, Bob made the proper deviation, and in twenty minutes they were over a muddy field, marked with the looked-for white T, at Freetown, Sierra Leone.
As they were spiraling downward they saw a crowd of natives gathered in one portion of the field, and caught a glimpse of an airplane's wings in their midst.  Many of this throng now rushed over to where the newcomers had landed, among them a tall Englishman, who introduced himself as the port minister and person who was to supply them with a replacement of fuel.  Several other Englishmen, all officers in the garrison of the town, came up and were introduced.
"We 'av' been looking for you fellows, but not quite so soon," stated the port minister.  "Hif I had known--"
"How is that?" asked John.  "We are just about on schedule."
"So you are; but those other flyers over there, who 'av' been 'ere the past two 'ours declared you 'ad been delayed in South Hamerica hand would not be hin before to-morrow morning, so as we 'av' a coasting vessel with more petrol due 'ere then, I let them 'av' hall the petrol they wanted, hand I fear--"
"They had no reason for telling you we were delayed to such an extent as that, without it was to further their own interests," interrupted John, significantly.  "But I don't see their game."
"I don't know, I'm sure," was the response; "but has I was saying, they asked for an hextra filling of their tanks, hand so--well, gentlemen, I am sorry to say it, but there hisn't ten gallons left."
Our friends heard this with mixed feelings.  They were rightfully incensed at their rivals for such a dastardly trick, vexed with the port minister, and dismayed to think that they would have to wait until the following day before they could resume their journey, for at Para they had not filled their tanks to capacity.
At this point cries arose in the other part of the field.  They heard the familiar whir of an airplane propeller, and as they looked to where the _Clarion_ had stood, they saw the natives scatter and the gray machine of the other crew shoot up into the air.  Rapidly it gained altitude, and was soon a mere dot on the western sky.
Ignoring the yells of the port minister and his military countrymen, the _Clarion_ crew had gone straight on, and there seemed nothing for our boys to do now except await the arrival of more gasoline as patiently as they could.
John and Tom set to work cleaning up the Sky-Bird, for the field here was low and very muddy from recent rains, and as they had dashed through the slime in landing much of it had splattered over their propeller and under-carriage.
Paul and Bob went into town, followed by a throng of young negroes who fought for the privilege of getting closest to them.  They found the stores small and mostly unpainted, and the houses principally shambling and squatty, most of them having thatched roofs.  The streets were narrow, crooked, and dirty, but there were areas about some of the more pretentious dwelling-places which were really entrancing in the wealth of their tropical plants and stately palms.  On the whole, the stone garrison, setting a little remote from the town proper, was the largest and best-constructed building, although this looked old and somber. Freetown, the capital of the little British colony of Sierra Leone, is all on low ground, and the air is moist and extremely humid, even unhealthful for those not accustomed to it.
Just before dark a terrific thunder-shower sprang up with all of the suddenness of such equatorial storms, and Bob and Paul made for the field as fast as their legs could carry them.  They sprang inside of the Sky-Bird's cabin, wet to the skin, where John and Tom were already ensconsed, and Grandpa the monkey gave them a noisy and hearty welcome. A little later, with the rain pattering heavily down upon the roof, all hands turned in for the first ground sleep they had had since starting out upon their trip.
Shortly after daylight the next morning they were astir, to find the rain had ceased but that the field was a mass of ooze.  Through this Tom made his way to the cobblestone street and down to the piers.  But the coasting steamer had not yet arrived; in fact, she did not come in until after eight o'clock, and it was two hours later before the flyers succeeded in getting their tanks filled with the gasoline she had brought.  Then it was found necessary to secure the aid of a half-dozen negroes, and to lay down many strips of heavy bark for traction, before the Sky-Bird could be run out of her mired position.
Paul was at the throttle as they took off.  When he had attained a fair altitude, he gradually increased the speed until they were running full out.  Never since the beginning of the trip had they felt such urgent need of putting the airplane through at a fast clip, but that time had now come, for they were fourteen hours behind schedule time and sixteen hours behind their rivals.
The Sky-Bird fairly cut the air like a knife, and the roar of propeller, wind, and engine was so great that our friends found conversation out of the question except by shouting in one another's ears.  Poor Grandpa cowered in the farthest corner of the cabin, peeping out from behind one of the hammocks, as meek as a kitten, his tail crooking uneasily.  But finding that the strange noises did him no harm, he presently came out and took up a position where he could look through the glass-floor window at the fleeting country below.
It seemed only a few minutes before, rising higher, they shot over the ragged chain of the Kong Mountains in western Senegambia, passing within sight of Mount Loma's bare peak.  Then, dropping again until they were not more than a thousand feet high, they flew along over the tablelands to the eastward, recognized the Joliba River as it lay a yellow, twisting band below them, and a little later crossed the southern end of the district of Bambarra.
Great forests and jungles and canebrakes swept past them.  In those tangles of gnarled trees, matted vines, interlacing rank grasses, and clusters of towering plants, so dank with the odor of wet and decay that the air even up where the flyers were seemed charged with it, lurked many a monster reptile and ferocious beast.  Often the four boys saw the majestic form of a lion or the lumbering shape of an elephant as these animals were quenching their thirst at some open spot along a stream.  And once they caught a brief glimpse of a terrific combat between what seemed to be two enormous rhinos, which had met in a little glen in the midst of a cluster of mahogany trees.  How they would have liked to see the finish of this battle royal!  Indeed, they would have enjoyed nothing better than to land in some favored spot and do a little big-game hunting with their rifles!
If they had been ahead of their adversaries instead of behind, they might have indulged in such sport, they thought.  But now it would be unwise to waste a moment.  They must make every endeavor to reach their next airport, Kuka, by nightfall.  This small town was on the western bank of the salty Lake Chad, in the very heart of Africa, and on the southern border of the great Sahara Desert.  It possessed no railroads or telegraph service, being linked with the outside world only by caravan route, and its inhabitants were practically all half-civilized negroes of the Fulbee tribe, who retained all of their forefathers' superstitions and wore no garb over their frescoed black bodies except a short gikki or skirt.
Mr. Giddings and Mr. Wrenn had had great difficulty in getting an English-speaking man to set up a field at this point for their flyers, and it was only after considerable telegraphing that a Scotch trader named MacInnis, situated at Lagos, the nearest coast-port of any size, had agreed to get a supply of gasoline and oil to Kuka and meet the airplanes when they arrived.
It was five o'clock when the boys passed over the low banks of the Niger River.  By seven they were in the heart of the wild, level territory of Sokoto, skimming over vast expanses of plume-like grasses and extensive marshes and swamps.  Strange birds of enormous size flew up out of the morasses, startled at the sight and sound of the airplane.  Some tried to follow it, evidently to give it battle, but the swiftest of them were hopelessly outdistanced before they were well started.
When the sun disappeared behind the forest back of them, the flyers were still making speed for their destination, with Bob at the throttle.  Pretty soon the lengthening shadows and obscuring of detail below convinced the crew that night was just about upon them, and that if they did not reach Kuka within the next thirty minutes they were very likely to be in such darkness that they would overrun it and never know the difference.
Some of them began to wonder if they had not missed their course, when a cry came from Bob, and they all ran forward and looked out of the front windows at the object he was pointing out.
CHAPTER XIX
SAVED BY THE SEARCHLIGHT
What our flyers saw was a very large body of water, with a strong tone of blue to it.  As far to the north as they could see, it stretched, also to the east and south.  And the shoreline on the western side nearest them was covered with what seemed a never-ending border of great forest trees, many of which had all the characteristics of mangroves.
This great expanse of water they knew could not be the Red Sea, nor could it be the Indian Ocean; for they had not traveled far enough westward to reach these bodies.  Unquestionably, therefore, it was that which they were looking for--Lake Chad.
As they swept nearer, under reduced speed, they observed somewhat to their left a good-sized collection of dwellings in an opening among the mangroves, evidently a town.  Swerving in that direction they were soon circling above the place at an altitude of about five hundred feet, hoping that it might prove to be Kuka, their next stop.
By this time it had grown so dark that they could just make out the buildings and surroundings.  The former seemed to be nothing more than rude huts with rounded thatched roofs covered by saplings.  The flyers saw many dark figures, with little or no garb, running about and excitedly gesticulating upward to their position.  As they circled lower, these figures, evidently natives, suddenly vanished within their abodes.
"They seem scared to death of us," remarked Paul, laughing.
"Apparently they think the Sky-Bird is some gigantic member of the feathered kingdom about to swoop down and devour them for their sins," added Paul, who was equally amused.  "Pete Deveaux and his crowd ought to have landed here some time this morning, though, and you would think the sight of their machine taking on gas would have gotten the blacks used to an airplane."
Be that as it may, every one of the dusky figures below had vanished as though the earth had swallowed them up.  A strange if not foreboding stillness hung over the town.  You would have thought it contained not a single being, at least not one who was awake.
All at once John, who had been intently looking around the outskirts of the town, observed an open spot marked with the welcome sign of a white T.  He joyfully called the attention of his comrades to this, and as they looked they saw the form of a man emerge from the shadows bordering the field and wave his arms upward at them.  From the fact that this person was attired in European costume, they judged he must be Mr. MacInnis, the Scotch trader who had been appointed to look after their fuel interests at this point.
It was a novel experience to be able to make a landing unhampered by throngs of curious inhabitants, as they now did.  The field was quite level, though sandy, as might be expected so close to the big desert, and they had to dodge several clumps of small growths, presumably juju trees, before they could taxi to a stop.
The man in linen now rushed up to them, and introduced himself as Mr. MacInnis.  He hurriedly shook hands with the boys, displaying, they thought, great nervousness while greeting them, and several times he turned his head and looked in the direction of the nearest shacks of the town.
Then he asked what they thought a very queer question.  "Have you fellows enough petrol and oil to last you through to your next stop?"
"That's Aden," answered John; "we didn't fill to capacity at Freetown, and I'm afraid not.  Why, what is the matter?  Haven't you any fuel here for us?"
"I have plenty of both petrol and oil here for you," said the Scotchman, with another look toward the huts, "but I am afraid for your lives if you stay to put it aboard."
"How is that?" cried Tom, his usually smiling countenance growing sober for once, while his companions felt a vague uneasiness.
"It's this way," stated MacInnis.  "About eight o'clock this morning the airplane that is racing you came in.  It was the first machine of the kind the natives had ever seen, and they were greatly frightened, thinking Jobbajobba, one of their heathen devils, had appeared in the guise of a great bird, and was about to attack the children of the wicked of them.  When the aviators climbed out, and they saw that they were human, they lost some of this fear, but remained at a respectable distance all the time the 'great bird was being given a drink.'  Then two of the men--one was the slender and dark-complexioned fellow--went into the town sight-seeing.  In the course of their rounds they stole the ivory head, set with gold eyes and teeth, off of the body of one of the tribe's most cherished idols, the god of Ogu Nogo.  This was not discovered until the aviators had departed in their airplane, but then the Fulbees were wild with rage at the 'bird-men,' as they called them, and swore to kill them if they should ever return.  To-night they observed you landing, as I did.  They are now in hiding, probably with weapons, and are undoubtedly watching your every move, ready to strike when the time comes, thinking you to be those other fellows or men of as evil instincts.  As I said, I fear for your lives if you tarry here."  And as he finished he once more glanced nervously around at the huts and shacks in the gloom of the fast-gathering night.
But in that direction all was so quiet that John hopefully remarked: "I think they are too frightened to appear.  We need more gasoline, as we have been running very hard and our tanks are low.  We will hurry matters up, and three of us will fill while the other stands guard with a rifle."
Mr. MacInnis then helped John, Tom, and Paul carry the big square tins of British petrol, which is the same as American gasoline, from the field shelter to the Sky-Bird, where, in the course of a half-hour, two hundred gallons were poured into the tanks, also ten gallons of oil. In the meantime, Bob Giddings, rifle in hand, stood close by, alert for danger.  He watched the nearest buildings of the natives sharply, but though he saw numbers of black figures skulking in the shadows among them, no sign of hostility was observed.
The Scotchman had signed his name to the document certifying to the stop of the flyers at Kuka,--the paper on which they were to secure certifications at every scheduled airport,--and they were just in the act of starting over to the field tank to get some water for the airplane's radiators, when, without a moment's warning a hair-raising chorus of yells broke out on the brooding night air, and scores of savage-looking figures sprang from the shadows of the buildings into the open field.  They emerged in a long straggling line, hooting and brandishing guns, spears and bows.  They advanced toward the airplane in peculiar hops and side jumps, as if fearing an attack upon themselves.  Not once did they cease their blood-curdling shouts. Rapidly they neared the objects of their anger and hatred.
For a full five seconds the boys stood as if rooted in their tracks, too horrified and astounded to think or act.  The sharp voice of the Scotchman, however, brought them to their senses.
"You've fooled here too long; it's too late to get away now!  They're mad as wet hornets.  Jump inside your cabin quick, and defend yourselves as well as you can!"
"But you, sir?" cried Tom.
"They won't harm me, because I'm not a flyer."
The boys dashed into the cabin and shut the door, while the Scotchman hurried away from the airplane.  It was certain that there was no time to get out and crank the propeller and rise before the mad Fulbees would be upon them.  Cornered in the little cabin of the machine they would sell their lives as dearly as possible.
As they stood, guns in hand, watching through the windows, while the frenzied blacks drew cautiously nearer, spreading a cordon of hundreds all around the Sky-Bird, they could see in the moonlight that the Fulbees were grotesquely painted on arms and faces, while their bodies were entirely naked except for a dirty-looking cloth wrapped around their loins in the form of a short skirt.  Every one of them was armed, and as they contracted their circle, guns, spears, and bows were frequently raised in threatening position; but for some reason no shots were fired.  The inmates knew, however, that when nearer approach brought more assurance of hitting their target, the blacks could be counted upon to open up actual hostilities.
And now this thought brought a sudden and grave fear to their minds, one unnoticed before.  The helium-gas tanks in the hollow wings and rear fuselage!  Bullets, spears and arrows striking them would penetrate, and the tanks thus punctured would lose their last ounce of the precious gas!
It was a terrible predicament in which the flyers now found themselves, to be sure.  By fighting they might preserve their lives, but that very act would make their world-trip impossible.  What could they do?
As the drowning man catches with hope at the floating straw.  Bob now conceived an almost impossible but startling idea for delivering them from their dilemma.
"The searchlight!" he cried.  "These blacks never have seen one. Perhaps we can frighten them away with ours!"
"Great idea, Bob," approved John, while the others also applauded the scheme.  "Paul, you work the lever that revolves the lamp up on top of the cabin there, and, Bob, you throw in the juice."
No sooner had he spoken, than both boys were at their stations.  The next moment a great white path, widening as it went, streamed out into the darkness, lighting up everything in its reach with the brilliancy of day, but with a bluish-whiteness which must have been decidedly terrifying to the superstitious negroes.  Like an accusing finger the strange light swept around the field, raising and lowering, resting a few moments on this group and then that group of petrified, hideously-painted faces, from which eyeballs stood out like knobs of white marble.
In an instant their incensed cries had ceased, and they had shrunk, cringing, back in their tracks.  But only for a few moments, and then their gurgled yells arose once more, this time in ear-splitting fright, as all turned and fled toward the nearest forest.  And that great, terrifying white eye of the big "bird" followed them, shining for many a rod on black backs which were so wet with perspiration that they looked like oiled eelskin.  Weapons were thrown in every direction as the Fulbees fled.  Whenever one would look around and see that glaring eye looking straight at him, he would shut his own eyes and shriek, and then go dashing frantically on.  Some even threw themselves prostrate when the flood overtook them, and uttered invocations to their gods for protection from the monster, until they could pluck up courage enough to continue their flight.
Had the situation not recently been such a serious one for them--indeed they were not out of it yet!--the flyers would have roared with laughter.  As it was, they kept the light traveling over the Fulbees until the very last one had fled.  Then at a quick word from John, they all jumped out of the cabin and swung the airplane around for a quick take-off.
Tom spun the propeller; there was a roar as the engine caught, and a few seconds later they were mounting up into the starlit heavens of the equatorial night.  At a height of two thousand feet, they presently looked down, safe from the menace of the black populace whose reception had been so rabid.
But Kuka was blotted out in the mantle of gloom which lay between. Only the sparkling ripples of Lake Chad, struck by the beautiful tropical moon, could be seen.
CHAPTER XX
A JUNGLE ADVENTURE
So fast had the flyers in the Sky-Bird come across the western part of the African continent, at its greatest bulge, that, coupled with their very brief stop in Kuka, they found they were starting out for Aden, Arabia, with a gain of approximately seven hours upon their lost time of fourteen hours in Freetown.  They were now, therefore, just seven hours behind schedule--perhaps a little more than that behind their rivals,--but in the very fact that they were cutting down both items, they felt vastly encouraged, and as the airplane headed eastward across Lake Chad there was only one thing to worry them to any extent.
This was the need of water; that is, all felt that the need would become an urgent one before daylight should come and a chance be given to land and replenish the limited amount which they knew must now be in the radiator, owing to the impossibility of getting water as expected at Kuka.
John was at the throttle, with Tom assisting.  Paul and Bob were playing with Grandpa, still too excited over their recent adventure to turn in and get some sleep, as John said they ought to do.  After a little while they turned their attention to studying the chart and schedule.  Frequently they compared notes, and now and then jotted down some figures on a pad.
"Do you know, John," observed Paul, looking up very cheerfully, "that if we continue to travel at the rate we did between Freetown and Kuka we shall make up all lost time by morning, and arrive at Aden about on schedule?"
"You don't say!" exclaimed John.
"You kids have made a mistake," informed Tom disbelievingly.
"No mistake about it," protested Bob; "it's an out-and-out fact."
"Well, that's cheerful news, then," said Tom.  "I know we hit her up to well over two hundred an hour coming across to Kuka."
"And we'll do as much on this stretch, if our water only holds out," declared John determinedly.
"That's the rub," put in Paul.  "I'm sure it won't hold out, and if we work right up to the last drop, I'm afraid we may have to make a forced landing, and that may be in the tops of the trees, for all we know."
"Or on an elephant's back," added Bob jocosely.
"Well, I don't know but that we had better try to make a landing as soon as we come to a favorable spot where there is water," remarked John.  "It is a fine moonlight night, and if we strike the right place I think we can make the ground.  In a pinch, you know, we can use our searchlight."
"Speaking about searchlights--oh my! oh, my! will I ever forget how frightened those blacks were?"  And Paul laughed until the tears came into his eyes, now that the tension was off.  Tom joined him until both of them staggered and bumped together, causing Grandpa to set up an excited chatter of inquiry.
John kept the Sky-Bird low, down to less than a thousand feet, after crossing the lower neck of Lake Chad, for the chart showed no marked elevations which would make flying at that height hazardous, and it was certain that the closer they were to the earth the better they could detect a favorable place to land.
It was really a beautiful night, and they opened the cabin windows after a while to enjoy the soft balmy air to the full.  The wind then rushed through the cabin like a hurricane, roaring so that conversation was out of order; but they enjoyed its cool touch on their hot faces.
One by one the stars had made their appearance, until now the heavens fairly glittered with them.  How pretty they looked up there in the great blue vault in which they seemed the choicest settings of an angel's handiwork!  Somehow they seemed to sparkle more brightly, and the sky seemed a richer cobalt, than the sky the boys knew at home. But they missed many of the stars which they loved in America.  The swift airplane in which they rode had taken them, day by day, and night by night, away from them.  Many stars which were unknown to them had taken their places, and they realized more strongly than all the pictures in the world could have shown them how very unlike were the skies of the northern and southern hemispheres.
One of the most striking sights to them now was the constellation of the Cross, commonly known by mariners as the Southern Cross, and which is composed of four brilliant stars.  Sirius, Canopus, and Centaur also filled a part of the heavens with their splendid light.  Mars, Venus, Saturn, and Jupiter were old friends in new surroundings, and were all dazzlingly dressed.  The part of the Milky Way between the stars Sirius and Centaur was so rich in stars and crowded nebula: that it seemed a perfect blaze of illumination.  And there were the Magellanic clouds, white-looking patches made up of countless stars individually unseen to the naked eye, and nebulae--mists of radiating light--all shining brilliantly and revolving around the starless South Pole.  To the northward was the constellation of the Great Bear, which reaches its meridian altitude about the same time as the constellations of the Cross and the Centaur.  As the boys looked, stars appeared and disappeared.  They were like a succession of guests, coming and going.
After a while, the flyers saw a small river glinting in the moonlight and running along for the most part in the direction they were taking.
"The first time we come to a level, open spot along this stream we will try for a landing," stated John.  "It will afford us plenty of water for the radiator if we can get down to it."
"And plenty of water for a good plunge, too," said Paul.  "I haven't had a bath since we left Miami, and I'm fairly suffering for a wetting, if it's no more than a quick dip."
"Same here," seconded Bob and Tom.
They were running much lower now, on the lookout for a place to stop, and so once more they could hear each other's voices.
Presently, just after clearing a dense forest, they saw the opening they sought.  It was a grassy level, free of bushes and other obstructions, and well bathed in the soft light of the stars and moon.
After some careful maneuvering, John brought the Sky-Bird down, and though the tall grasses wound in the landing-gear in coming to a stop, they broke off without doing any damage.
"We'd better take the guns along," Tom remarked.
"That's so," agreed John; "we might run into some ferocious animal in this wild jungle."
So each armed himself with a rifle and a pail, and John led the way, as he was the only one of the party supplied with a lantern, the others having small flashlights which were none too good for breaking a path in such wilds.  They knew the river lay a short distance to the north, but in order to reach its banks from the place where they had landed, they had to cut through a strip of woods bordering it.
It was tedious work getting through.  The trees were close together and had to be dodged, and great leaves of plants as large as their bodies seemed to be everywhere, while vines of the toughest fiber frequently shut off their passage and had to be pushed aside or cut with knives. More than once one of the party tripped over unseen obstacles and measured his length in the soft, rank ground-vegetation.
But it was only a little way to the river, and soon they stood upon its grassy bank.  It was a pretty stream, not very deep, and seemed quite clear when John held the lantern down to it.  They filled their pails, and then, risking all dangers of snakes and crocodiles, disrobed for a plunge.
First one and then the other jumped in.  How refreshing the cool waters felt to their hot, sticky bodies!  They would have liked to do some diving, but were afraid of sunken logs, and contented themselves by splashing about, swimming a little, and making the woods ring with their laughter and shouts.
Then they came out and put on their clothes.  Picking up guns once more, and the pails now filled with water, they started back, John still leading.  But they had not gone far when somewhere in advance of them they thought they heard the sound of a breaking limb.  So sudden was the sound on the still night air, that all stopped very quickly, their hearts beating fast.
They listened, but the sound was not repeated.  They started on again, thinking the limb must have been a dead one and had fallen from some tree of its own weight.  But scarcely had they taken a dozen steps when they heard another sharp cracking of wood, this time very close in front of them.
Their intuition told them now that they were near to some night prowler of the animal kingdom, and perhaps one of considerable size, judging from the crash.  Hardly realizing what they were doing, they set down their pails, and cocked their rifles, facing, with alertness and uneasiness, the direction whence the sounds had come.
Now they heard some rustling, as of leaves, directly ahead.  It came slowly and cautiously closer.  Just as it seemed about to burst out upon their view it stopped.  There was no more noise.  All was silent; not even the note of a night-bird or the gentle chirp of an insect could be heard.  For the first time the soughing of the tree-tops in the soft breeze above failed to meet their ears.  What a deathly stillness it was!
Suddenly, right out of the black shadows ahead, there sounded on the hushed air of the night three terrific yells, one following immediately after the other.  These piercing cries had hardly died out when another, of deeper note, and a veritable roar, filled the forest with its din.  The leaves about the boys seemed fairly to quiver under the violent guttural reverberations.
John Ross may well have been excused for shaking as he held up his lantern in his right hand and threw its rays upon the tall undergrowth ahead, while his fingers tightened like bands of steel around the stock of his repeating-rifle.
As he and his companions looked, they saw peeping through the foliage a black, fierce face, one of the ugliest and most ferocious that man could have imagined.  It was staring straight at them.  The brute's eyes were sunken under a heavy overhanging ridge of dusky skin.  His eyes were small and black, and the iris of each shone like a diamond set in carbon.  His forehead was low, receding, and covered with short bristling hair.  His nose was broad and flat.  His great jaw protruded frightfully, with the upper thin lip pressed tight, the lower curving away and displaying a row of long yellow tusks which could have bitten the hand off a man with one crunch.
The animal now opened his cavernous mouth, and uttered yell after yell again, these sounding something like the bark of a dog but being a hundred times louder.  They were followed by terrific roars, somewhat similar to those of a lion, though of much greater volume.  The cries rang through the forest from hill to hill, and died away in the distance.  The woods was filled with the echo of his horrible voice.
Then, very slowly his whole body came in sight.  He advanced clumsily and ponderously towards the little party of flyers, walking erect, his plain intent being to kill them.  His short legs were hardly strong enough, as sturdy as they were, to support his huge body.  All at once he stopped to look at them.  How vindictive his eyes were!  They seemed to say to the boys: "I will soon finish you!"
Then he beat his chest with his great fists and the noise was like a bandman striking a bass-drum.  It was his challenge to combat.  How long and muscular were the shaggy arms that directed these blows!  How broad was his chest from which the sounds came!  The hair stood almost erect on his body, and the hair on his head moved up and down.
This hesitation of the monster proved the salvation of the flyers.  It gave them a chance to pull their shattered nerves together and elevate their rifles.  As he must keep the light on the creature, which now all recognized as a large gorilla, so that his companions and himself could see to shoot, John had only one arm with which to handle his gun.  But he brought the weapon up quickly, and pressed the trigger just as three other shots rang out from the guns of his companions, who had stepped on either side of their leader.
A hoarse yell of rage and pain answered the reports.  They saw the gorilla stagger, then drop to all fours, and lunge toward them.
There was no chance to retreat.  As quick as a flash John dropped his own rifle, so that he could hold the lantern in both hands and direct its rays better upon the beast, and cried to his comrades to fire again.
No sooner had the words left his lips than the others brought their repeaters once more to their shoulders.  On account of the poor light on the barrels of their weapons they were again compelled to take snap shots, shooting with both eyes open; but this time with greater success.
The big gorilla fell, uttering a fearful groan.  He rolled over upon his back, his massive limbs twitched convulsively, and then he was still.  Going up to him cautiously with the lantern, they found that he was dead.
Extended, his great arms measured nearly nine feet; his chest had a girth of seven feet, and he lacked only one inch of being six feet in height.  These facts Tom ascertained with the use of a small tapeline which he carried in his pocket.
"Let's skin him," said Tom; "I know how, and it won't take but a few minutes."
"Sure," agreed Paul; "his skin will be a valuable trophy to take back home with us.  Jiminy, I wish it had been daylight and we had brought our camera with us!  We could have secured some pictures worth while for the _Daily Independent_."
With his keen-edged sheath knife, Tom soon had the skin removed from the giant brute.  The performance of this operation was far from an agreeable one, however, both for surgeon and observers.  So human-like was the gorilla that it seemed like skinning a man!
As they made their way onward again, carrying their trophy in a roll tied with withes made from vines.  Bob ventured to say: "I wonder how the gorilla came to be awake and to attack us this way?"
"I think he must have had a mate, perhaps a family, nearby," replied John.  "I have read that the mother and her babies always go up into a tree to sleep, while the father squats down at its base to guard them, and here he sleeps with one eye open and the other closed, as the saying is.  At least he arouses at the slightest sound of an enemy.  We probably awakened him by our shouts while in bathing, and being so close to him when we came back along a slightly different path, he thought we were going to attack the family upstairs, and showed fight right away."
The little party regained their airplane without further incident; the radiator was drained, and the fresh water put in.  Then, feeling that there was no further danger of the engines running hot, they took off.
As the Sky-Bird arose into the air, the flyers noticed that Grandpa the monkey was slightly excited.  This they attributed to the presence of the gorilla's skin; but when they saw Grandpa continue to dash wildly about the cabin, from their shoulders to the rear window, out of which he would take a quick look only to fly back to them and chatter wildly and coweringly, Paul thought he would see what could be the trouble.
One glance was enough.  He shut the open window with a bang, and turned to his companions with a pale face.
"Fellows," said he; "we've got a passenger!"
"A passenger?" cried they.
"Yes," said Paul, "a monstrous big snake!"
CHAPTER XXI
THE DOUBLE LOOP
For a moment or two John and Bob stared at Paul blankly, unable to comprehend the import of his announcement.  Tom was at the throttle, and while he had heard the startling words, he was too occupied in guiding the Sky-Bird to do anything except take a quick glance backward.
"A snake?" repeated Bob.
"Not on the machine?" cried John.
"Yes," Paul said, with a seriousness which left no further doubt as to the truth of his statement.  "He's a whopper--must be twelve or fourteen feet long and as thick as my leg.  He's there on the fuselage just outside of the window, hanging on for dear life.  If I hadn't shut that window just as I did, I believe he would have crawled in here in a minute."
John and Bob now hurried to the window and looked out.  In the moonlight they could distinctly see a huge reptile, either a python or a boa-constrictor, coiled up in the angle formed by the juncture of the airplane body and the broad base of the left wing.  The creature was so long that its tail passed up over the rounded fuselage and out upon the other wing.  Bob flashed his electric pocket lamp upon it, and by the yellow and brown mottled spots upon its body and the double plates of whitish scale at its tale, and the wicked-looking triangular head, they were sure it must really be a python, one of the most dreaded of African snakes.  These creatures think a monkey a very choice morsel of food, and undoubtedly it had been attracted to the airplane, while it stood in the grass, by the appearance of Grandpa in the open cabin window, but had been frustrated in its designs by the return of the flyers and the sudden rising of the machine.
Now, with the window shut, the boys seemed safe enough for the present. They could see that the big snake was extremely uneasy.  As the wind whistled by him, his great tail twisted and untwisted, and he seemed to be trying to get a better hold on the smooth surface, while his beady eyes glared at them only a moment in the glow of the flashlight, and then he transferred his attention to the landscape below them.  His forked fangs darted in and out during this time with the angriest lightning-like movement.
Paul relieved Tom at the throttle for a few minutes, so that the latter could have a look at the reptile.
When Tom came back again to his post, he said, with plain uneasiness: "I never saw such a big snake before, Paul.  Between the rush of wind and the roar of the engine and propeller, he seems scared out of his wits."
"We've got to get him off of there somehow--and mighty soon, too," put in John, with decision.  "Tom, if that monster should begin to slip a little most likely he will coil his tail around some of our control wires,--and then what?"
Their faces blanched at this prospect.  They knew what that would mean. It would mean that the great creature would either operate the airplane's rudders when they should not be operated, or would prevent Tom from moving them when they must be moved.  In either event, the result would be disaster to machine and crew.
"Good heavens, boys!" said Tom, so nervous his voice shook, "get rid of that snake as quick as you can!"  He fancied he could see the rear control levers moving at that instant.
The other three flyers knew the importance of these instructions, but how were they to carry them out?  The reptile was too large to be shoved off with a stick or pole, and would probably squirm through the window while they were attempting it.  And they were afraid to use a gun, as, in the case of a miss or a little lurch of the airplane at the moment of firing, the bullet might puncture the hollow wing or rear fuselage and let helium escape.
It was Bob who solved the puzzle.
"Why not try a loop or two?" he asked.
Their hearts jumped with hope at this.  So everything was made tight in the cabin, with the straps and fastenings which had been provided when the machine was made.  Even Grandpa had to submit to being roped up in one of the swinging hammocks.  When the boys had buckled themselves down to their seats, John gave Tom the word, and he began to rise slowly.  At close to two thousand feet he brought the Sky-Bird quickly and smoothly upward until she stood almost on her tail end.
Then Tom threw the elevators and ailerons hard up, and held them there. They were going at a rate of close to a hundred miles an hour at the moment, and their velocity brought them around in a pretty loop.  There was no way for them to tell if the serpent had been dislodged, so, to make as sure as he could of accomplishing his purpose, Tom kept his controls as set, and they made another or double loop.
This time he straightened out his controls as he came up to the horizontal, and they ran swiftly ahead again on a level keel.
His companions quickly unloosened their straps, and ran for the rear window.  A feeling of the greatest thanksgiving filled their souls and joy lit up their faces.  The python was gone!  He had hurtled through the air during one or the other of the loops, and his long sinuous body was probably at that moment lying crushed upon the hard ground, or impaled upon the sharp stub of some forest tree, far below.
It had been a night of intense excitement.  Now that they began to beat through the air in the old tuneful way, and there was nothing more to claim their attention until they should arrive at Aden sometime in the morning, Bob and Paul took to their hammocks for sleep, but first Bob got Khartum on the wireless and delivered their position and a brief description of their adventures.  As may be imagined, however, the two youths did not shut their eyes immediately.  There was much to think about and to talk about before even fatigue could get the better of them.
Tom put the Sky-Bird through on a straight course for Aden as fast as he dared run the night engine, which was very close to its limit, now that it had had a chance to cool off and was well supplied with water. It was important that they should make speed, for in the stop for water and the subsequent maneuvering to rid themselves of their unwelcome passenger, the python, they had lost upwards of an hour's time.
Flying high, and depending entirely upon the compass for striking Aden, they shot through the starlit tropical night like a meteor, showing no lights except the two small ones on the dashboard in the cabin, by means of which Tom could observe the instruments and the controlling levers below.  Thus they crossed the famous Nile, sweeping below Khartum and across the plains of Kordofan, and when the first streaks of daylight appeared ahead of them they were just entering the plateaus of northern Abyssinia.
Paul and Bob now relieved Tom and John, and the latter young men took a nap.  It was their custom to work in pairs, the observer preparing food for himself and the pilot during the course of flight.  Sometimes the observer took the throttle long enough to give his friend a chance to eat, and sometimes the pilot retained his seat, allowing the automatic arrangement to do the guiding for him while he munched his food.
Just before seven o'clock Paul and Bob saw two large bodies of water ahead of them, one stretching to the right and the other to the left. The chart told them that the northern body was the Red Sea and the southern one the Gulf of Aden, which opens into the Indian Ocean. Between these bodies lay a narrow belt of water, flanked on the western or African side by rocky, wooded hills, and on the eastern side by low, sandy shores dotted with palms.  This was the Strait of Bab-el-Mandeb, and the country beyond was Persia.
Aden could not be more than fifteen minutes' run east now, and so Bob awakened his sleeping comrades while Paul guided the airplane across the strait.  They flew a little higher, later, following the general contour of the terraced slopes of the mountains along the Arabian coast.
As the Sky-Bird came leisurely over the hills surrounding this British seaport of Aden, they could see that the town nestled in the crater of an extinct volcano, as they had read.  All around the low, white buildings spread the rugged hillsides, and in declivities they passed over numbers of the great brick tanks or reservoirs which catch and store the scanty rainfall of the region and thus furnish Aden with its only water supply.
The flyers saw many gowned figures, some on camels, pause to look upward at them, as they began to circle the town in quest of their landing field.  Bob was the first to discern it--a fairly level stretch in the southern end of the valley or basin, marked in the way agreed upon, and containing two small buildings, neither of which was large enough to admit the machine.
But they cared nothing for shelter for the Sky-Bird, as they did not purpose staying any longer than necessary for fuel replenishment and news dissemination by telegraph and letter.  So they quickly settled down in the midst of a wondering ring of Arabs.
Mr. Griggs, the American consul here, now came forward with a couple of British military officers, and the flyers met with a hearty reception. It seemed good to run upon one of their own countrymen again, after seeing so many strange faces since leaving Panama.  Mr. Griggs insisted upon their going to his home with him for breakfast, and to this they consented as soon as they found he had made full arrangements for having some British workmen at the garrison refill the Sky-Bird's tanks.
They found that their rivals had arrived just after daylight, and had departed for Colombo, Ceylon, less than twenty minutes before their own appearance.  This was cheering news.  They had gained a lot on them in crossing the African continent.
CHAPTER XXII
ABOVE THE CLOUDS
Mr. Griggs, the American consul at Aden, proved an affable, pleasant entertainer.  His little wife was also very genial and painstaking for their comforts, declaring at their protests that she was doing no more for them than she had done for the other flyers when they came through, a short time before.  The couple had two children, a boy and a girl, and both of these plied the boys with innumerable questions about their journey, expressing the greatest interest and excitement when they worked out of Paul the story of the adventure with the gorilla and python.
After the meal, which was very appetizing and refreshing, they spent a short time preparing their reports to the _Daily Independent_, and then accompanied their host to the post-office, where the letter and roll of films were mailed.  At the telegraph office they received a pleasant surprise in the shape of a message from Mr. Giddings, which stated their reports were coming in to the newspaper all right, and that the greatest interest was being manifested in them by the world in general and by New York people in particular.
"Whatever you do, don't let the other crew beat you," were his concluding words.  "I have ordered the helium shipped to Nukahiva by fast steamer."
"That's good news," said John, with satisfaction, referring to the helium, and the others accorded with him.
They dispatched a telegram to Mr. Giddings, and then started out to buy some fruit and other foods.  As they went along the narrow, crooking street upon which they had been walking they met so many Arabs with small sprays of dark-green leaves which they put in their mouths and chewed, that their curiosity was aroused, and Bob asked Mr. Griggs what the leaves were.
"Those are the leaves of the khat bush," was the response.  "You must have passed numerous plantations of such bushes up on the hillsides as you flew over into the basin here.  The Yemen Arabs like to chew the leaves so well that they have all of the passion for them that a toper has for whiskey, and they will spend their last rupee for a small bundle."
"Does this chewing of the leaves intoxicate them?" asked John.
"Oh, no; the leaves are quite harmless.  But they do produce a strangely exhilarating effect upon those who chew them.  If you ask a Yemen Arab what he chews the leaves for, he will invariably look at you with astonishment and tell you that he forgets all his troubles, sees the most beautiful of fairies and the richest rose-gardens of Allah, and lives in a new world."
"Do they go to the fields after it themselves?" inquired Tom.
"Not at all," said Mr. Griggs; "the khat is brought into town every morning about eleven o'clock by long caravans of camels which proceed from the khat farms along the mountain slopes.  Long before these camels appear in the valley, with a bundle of khat swung on each side of the beasts, messengers on fleeter camels have brought the tidings of approach.  From the shelters of the shops, so silent except just now, cheerful cries break out; the streets are filled with Arabs who sing joyfully; tikka gharries rattle madly by, whips waving and turbans awry; there are flashes of color from rich men's gowns and the sounds of their clicking oryx-hide sandals as they rapidly strike the stony pavements; there is a continual blunt clatter from the tom-toms in the hands of long-gowned fellows.  They are all going to the market where the khat will soon arrive, each one anxious to have first choice and get the best bargain.  There they will bicker with the khat traders for an hour sometimes, then in will come the despised hadjis, the venders of firewood, who will buy up for a few pice the scraps which remain."
This was all very interesting to the flyers, but it was high time to hurry back and resume their flight; so, restraining their impulse to ask more questions or investigate the attractions of the town, they bought their supplies, and returned with the American minister to the landing-field.
Ten minutes later the Sky-Bird was mounting easily up into the sky, viewed by hundreds of shouting Arabs.  It was good-bye to Persia now.
Looking at his watch, Paul, at the throttle, saw that it was nine-fifty.  They were leaving Aden only fifty minutes behind schedule. That was not at all bad; but it was not pleasant to think that their rivals were still ahead of them.  And two hours was a pretty stiff lead.
They were not long in passing over the hills to the south, and then headed eastward out over the elongated gulf.  Looking back, John saw the sandhills by the sea glistening in the bright sunlight like mounds of gold-dust.  Every leaf and stem in the scrub stood out in black and silver filigree; and euphorbias and adeniums, gouty and pompous above the lower growths, seemed like fantasies of gray on a Japanese screen covered with cerulean velvet.  It was their last sight of Persia, and one not soon to be forgotten.
Our friends now settled down for a long hop, for they would have to fly all day and all night before reaching Colombo.
After a while they sighted Socotra, the little isle off the coast of Cape Guardafui, from whence comes most of the world's supply of frankincense; then leaving its rocky shores behind them they cut straight across the Persian Sea, braving whatever tropical storm might arise.
All that day they swept over the blue waters of this great body, frequently seeing ships below and sometimes small islands.  Toward night they ran into such hard headwinds that Bob went up higher.  He climbed steadily until the Sky-Bird had attained an altitude of nine thousand feet.  Here, as expected, they found the winds much less forceful, but the sea was blotted out entirely by the clouds through which they had passed in the process of rising and which now lay between.
Indeed, these clouds resembled a billowy ocean of white foam in themselves, or a landscape covered with hills and valleys of snow.  The rounded cloud contours could easily be likened to the domes of snow-covered mountains.  It was really difficult to conceive that that amorphous expanse was not actually solid.  Here and there flocculent towers and summits heaved up, piled like mighty snow dumps, toppling and crushing into one another, as the breezes stirred them.
Then there were tiny wisps of cloud, more delicate and frail than feathers or the down of a dandelion-blow.  Chasms hundreds of feet deep, sheer columns, and banks, extended almost beyond eye-reach. Between the flyers and the sun stretched isolated towers of cumulus, cast up as if erupted by the chaos below.  The sunlight, filtering through this or that gossamer bulk, was scattered into every conceivable shade and monotone.  And around the margins of the heaving billows the sun's rays played unhampered, unrestricted, outlining all with edgings of the purest silver.
The scene was one of such extravagance that the brain was staggered with what the eye tried to register.  Below the aviators, the shadow of their machine pursued them on white film like a grotesque gray bird of some supernatural region.  The shadow followed tirelessly, gaining as the hour of noon approached, gaining still as afternoon began to gather, swell, and wane; and always it skipped from crest to crest down there just below, jumping gulfs like a bewitched phantom.
It was so cold at this height that the aviators had to put on their heaviest garments, and they were content to open the windows only a slight way for ventilation.
When darkness fell, they were still flying high, though at reduced speed, as John was afraid that a rate too much over schedule might cause them to overrun their destination before daylight could disclose its outlines to them.  Every half-hour the pilot's helper checked up their position on the chart.  Had this not been done from the very start of the trip, they never could have struck their ports with the accuracy they did, and disaster would have been the result, if not death to the crew.
As it was, they had taken every precaution they could.  When they had crossed the Atlantic they had been careful to inflate the four spare inner tubes of their landing wheels, as these would make capital life-preservers in case the flyers were thrown into the sea; and one of the last things they did before leaving Aden was to see that the tubes were still inflated.
The long night passed with considerable anxiety on the part of Tom and John, but when dawn finally broke they felt like uttering a "hurrah," and called Paul and Bob up from their sleep to witness the cheering sight ahead of them.
At a distance of what must have been close to fifty miles, was a white patch in a haziness of green plain surrounded by hills and low mountains.  The land itself was encircled by the sea, and when they saw a great peninsula spreading away to the northward, they knew that the island was Ceylon, and the other land the peninsula of Hindustan.
Somewhat off their course, they wheeled a little north.  Soon details became apparent in the island.  The white patch grew, developing into a considerable town--Colombo.
They swept up and around it, then settled, and climbed stiffly out of the Sky-Bird not twenty yards from another airplane, about which four men in flying-suits had been working.  These fellows looked toward the new arrivals scowlingly.
But our flyers, overjoyed to think they had caught the _Clarion's_ crew, only smiled back indulgently.
CHAPTER XXIII
BOMBED BY ROCKS
Our friends had landed in the lowlands just to the north of Colombo, whose scattered buildings contained upwards of a hundred thousand inhabitants, most of whom were native Singhalese, descendants of the colonists who came from the valley of the Ganges and settled the island five hundred years before the birth of Christ.  To the southward arose the rocky headlands of the coast, and to the westward could be seen the somber peak of Pedrotallagalla, the highest mountain of the island. Numerous ships, some very crude and with queer sails, were in the harbor as the boys landed, and scores of natives in short skirts were loading and unloading these.  Undoubtedly the huge square boxes which some of them carried aboard so easily upon their heads contained tea, for which Ceylon is famous.
The person in charge of the landing-field here was a Mr. Young, an American clergyman connected with the local Baptist mission.  This tall gentleman came forward, accompanied by the British governor of the island, within a few moments after the flyers struck the ground.  In fact, they were still stretching their cramped legs and arms when he greeted them and introduced the governor, Sir Henry Hurst.
"Young men, I am more than delighted to shake hands with you," said the governor.  "It looks as if you and the other crew over yonder were upon an epoch-making tour, for you are not ten minutes behind your schedule, as we have it in the London papers and also in our own Colombian newspaper.  My only regret is that you do not represent England instead of America."  He laughed good-naturedly as he made the last remark.
"It was quite a task for the governor and myself to get up at this early hour to receive you, but the occasion is well worth the effort," observed Mr. Young, smiling.  "Here we usually sleep very late, often as late as nine o'clock.  Even the Singhalese and Burghers are not yet generally up from their beds, though those who work at the wharves have appeared.  If you had arrived a few hours later there would be thousands of the population here to see you."
"We are well satisfied with the hour, then," said John.  "The fewer natives we have around the Sky-Bird, the better we like it, both for working and taking off.  How long has that other crew been in, sir?"
"Not more than a half-hour.  They are taking on their fuel now, being assisted by a couple of Burghers.  They advised us that they would probably remain here until noon, being tired from their long flight from Aden.  I don't know; why, but the slender man with the dark skin and mustache particularly requested me to see that you knew this intention of theirs."
The flyers thought this was rather strange.  Why should the _Clarion's_ crew remain so long in Colombo, when their interests in the race demanded as much time put into flying as possible?  It was still more incomprehensible what object they would have in wishing the Sky-Bird's flyers to understand this intention, as by so doing our boys could make their plans to gain a heavy lead.
It was too much of a puzzle for them to work out, so Bob and Paul, aided by two Burghers (naturalized Europeans), went to work overhauling the machine and storing fuel, while John and Tom made their way into town with Sir Henry Hurst to transact their business.  When they returned they found the two younger members of their crew in a heated discussion with the _Clarion_ fellows.
"What's the matter here, anyhow?" demanded John, as he and Tom pushed their way through the little ring of natives who had gathered about the principals.
"It's just this way," said Pete Deveaux, with a grin meant to be very cool and indifferent, although his eyes roved uneasily; "We fellows were working on our machine here, minding our own business, when these two kids of yours came up and demanded to know why we had played you dirty at Freetown and Kuka.  They accused us of purposely carrying off your share of fuel at Freetown, and of stirring up the natives at Kuka so you couldn't make a safe landing."
"We simply couldn't stand keeping quiet any longer, John," put in Paul very heatedly.  "We thought it a good time to have it out with these fellows for their crookedness."
"That's right; they're a bunch of snakes!" supported Bob, his cheeks red with excitement and anger, and his fists doubled menacingly.
John turned to the slouching figures of the rival crew.  "Do you fellows deny these charges?" he asked quietly.
Crossman, Torrey, and Lane looked at their leader, merely shrugging their shoulders.  Pete Deveaux took a quick glance in their direction, in turn.  Then his face clouded a little darker, and he blurted out to his men: "You confounded babies, why don't you deny it?  You know we didn't do anything on purpose to hold these guys back!"
"That's right; we sure didn't," said Sam Lane.
"Of course not," added Chuck Crossman.
"Wouldn't think of it," interjected Oliver Torrey.
Our boys were disgusted by the cringing attitude of Pete Deveaux's cronies.  Two of them were larger than the Frenchman, yet they seemed to be afraid of him.  John saw that nothing was to be gained at this time by continuing the argument, so he pulled his comrades away with this parting and significant warning to their rivals: "Well, Deveaux, we'll let this drop now; but we certainly hope that you will take pains to see that nothing more of so strongly a suspicious character occurs on this trip!"
Pete Deveaux snarled back some answer which they could not make out.
Our friends returned to the Sky-Bird.  In a few minutes Bob, who had climbed on top of the fuselage to test the helium valves, came down and said: "Something new is going on over in our neighbor's yard, fellows. When I was up there I could see right over the natives' heads, and I noticed Chuck Crossman and Pete Deveaux hunting around the field till they found half-a-dozen rocks as big as a football, and they put these in the cabin of the _Clarion_.  Wonder what on earth they intend to do with those?"
"It's too hard a nut for me to crack," answered John.
The others expressed equal inability to discern the purpose of their rivals, and the incident was soon forgotten.
But twenty minutes later the familiar roar of a revolving airplane propeller greeted their ears, and they were surprised to observe the _Clarion_ rising up over the field.  They watched the machine until it had disappeared in the cloud mists to the east.  Then they awoke.
All saw the game of their rivals now.  By making the Sky-Bird's crew believe they did not intend to leave until noon, the latecomers would be inclined to take their time fitting up for the next hop, and this would give the _Clarion's_ party a chance to make a sudden exit and gain a good lead before the others could get under way.
There  was no getting around it--Pete Deveaux was clever, if he were a rascal.  This our friends had to admit to themselves, despite their dislike of the fellow.  His methods of getting the best of them seemed to have no limit; and yet thus far they had been able to cling, by the hardest kind of work, right at his heels.  This last trick was more honest strategy than Deveaux had exhibited before, and they could therefore admire it in that sense.  They hoped that from now on his maneuvers might be as free from maliciousness.
But their rivals had not fooled them as badly as they thought.  Our flyers had lost no time upon landing in refitting, and when they saw the _Clarion_ take off, they speeded up operations so fast that they were able to depart only fifteen minutes later.
Almost straight eastward they headed, bearing just a little to the southward, so as to strike Singapore on a bee-line.  They hoped to reach this stop some time before dark, which would give them approximately twelve hours' flying time.  Under ideal weather conditions, they could make the journey in considerably less time, but it was the season for the well-known monsoons of the Indian Ocean, and it was quite unlikely that they would be able to wing their way across the fourteen hundred odd miles of sea without encountering some of these deterrent trade-winds.
It took them just an hour to cross the island of Ceylon, and flying at about fifteen hundred feet, they winged their way out over the whitecaps of the ocean.  To their unspeakable pleasure they found the winds not at all bad, and made good speed.  Bob was at the throttle, Paul was observing, and John and Tom were sleeping.
They had been flying thus for perhaps two hours, when Paul saw that for which he had been keenly watching for some time.  It was a faint black speck, like a tiny bird, against the blue of the heavens ahead of them. He continued to watch this silently, after calling his chum's attention to it, until, under an increase of speed, the Sky-Bird had drawn close enough for them to observe that it was what they suspected--an airplane.
In another hour they were near enough to recognize in it the unmistakable outlines of the _Clarion_.  To all appearances their rivals had also observed them, and were crowding on power, for now they gained much slower.  Yet they still continued to narrow the breach between them, steadily, rod by rod, and minute by minute.  They could see that the _Clarion_ was not well handled, for she wavered in her flight considerably.
"They'd be wise if they'd throw those rocks out which they took aboard," commented Paul.  "That might help them to fly steadier."
"They're flying all of a thousand feet higher than we are," said Bob. "We're going to pass under them, I think, in the next half-hour."
That was the way matters looked.  The | _Clarion_ was riding high, and was so close by this time that the windows in her cabin could be made out.  Against those panels of glass our friends felt sure some of the rival crew were even at that moment pressing anxious faces as they watched the Sky-Bird steadily creeping up on them.
It was such an auspicious moment that Paul went and aroused John and Tom, so that they could see the Sky-Bird overtake and pass her adversary.  Those two worthies grumbled a whole lot for a few moments, being half asleep, but when they grasped the situation and saw the _Clarion_ just ahead, they were as much interested as anybody.
Slowly, surely the Sky-Bird overtook the rival machine.  When it seemed her nose was almost up to the tail of the _Clarion_, they saw a movement in the bottom of the fuselage of the craft above them, where her trapdoor of glass was situated in the floor of the cabin.  Then something gray streaked down through the air.  It went whizzing by just in front of the Sky-Bird, and a few moments later plunged into the sea with a great splash.
"Huckleberry pie!" ejaculated Tom Meeks, "one of their rocks has burst through their floor trap.  Say, that was a close call for us!"
"Watch out!  Here comes another!" cried Paul, as a second gray missile went by them on the other side.
Barely had it struck the waters beneath, when a third rock came so close that they could feel the rush of air as it passed downward.  It was as if they were being bombarded by an enemy above, who used great stones instead of explosives.  Their faces paled when the truth struck them like a thunderbolt.  With calm deliberation, deadly intent, and a skill born of dropping bombs on targets during the war, some of the fellows in the machine above were trying to wreck the Sky-Bird with the rocks they had gathered in the field back in Ceylon!
"Quick, Bob!" cried John to their pilot.  "Swerve out from under these devils as fast as you can!  If another stone comes down here, it may--"
The words he intended to say never were uttered.  At that very moment another gray object streaked its way down through the heavens, whirling uglily.  They thought sure it would strike the cabin roof and crash through, and intuitively they cowered back in the corners for protection.
But their speed carried the stone farther to the rear.  There was a tearing, rending sound.
Their faces blanched.  And then Bob called out: "Hi, fellows, something's gone wrong!  The Sky-Bird's bound to put her nose into the sea.  The tail elevators don't work!"
CHAPTER XXIV
RIDING AN AIRPLANE'S TAIL
Filled with the gravest fears for the safety of the Sky-Bird and themselves, all except Bob rushed to the rear windows of the cabin and looked out to see what had caused the ripping noise, and what could be wrong with the tail.
Paul reached a point of vantage first.  One swift look showed him the trouble.  The left elevator had a big hole through it, made by the stone, fragments of silk showing all round the ragged gap.  But this could not have caused the derangement of the steering controls entirely, and looking for a reason, Paul saw that the impact had caused the wire running to the right elevator to become twisted around a bracket near the end of the fuselage.  Under this condition neither elevator could be controlled.  With the good one held downward, it was no wonder that the airplane had started a stubborn, slow dive toward the ocean in spite of Bob's frantic efforts to work the lever normally effecting it.
"Shut off your engine!" called Paul to Bob.  "That will hold us back. Three minutes of time I think will save us!"
With the words, Paul seized the end of a long coil of rope which lay near, and fastened it about his waist.  Both Bob and John saw what he meant to do.  He would crawl out upon the fuselage and attempt to untangle the inactive control wire, freeing the now useless right elevating plane!
It was a daring thing to do--a most perilous proceeding.  But the older men knew that it was the only thing that could prevent them from plunging into the sea.  So John threw open a window for his brother, the nimblest one of them, gave his hand a parting squeeze, and Paul climbed through.
Paul never had realized as he did now how smooth that rounded body of the machine was, nor how strong the wind shot back along it when the machine was in flight.  Although he clutched it with both arms and legs, and lay as close to it as he could press, he thought two or three times, as he made his way out toward the tail, that he would be torn loose.  He knew that his friends in the cabin, whom it might be he would never speak to again, were watching his progress with fear gripping their hearts, and were probably inwardly praying for his success with every breath.
Finally the boy reached the tail.  He dare not look down at the sea to see how much closer they were now, for the sight might unnerve him and prove disastrous to his purpose.  So, glazing his vision to all except his environs and intent, he wrapped his legs around the narrowing body of the machine, let go with his arms, and in a crouching posture seized the tangled wires.  Two or three tugs and he had them free.  He announced this fact with as loud a yell as he could.
Immediately afterward he heard his brother's voice.  "Hang right there where you are, Paul!  Don't try to come back until we get elevation again and I give you the word."
He realized what this meant and looked down as he once more wrapped his arms around the fuselage, with his shoulders against the rudder bracket.  What he saw was the restless sea less than two hundred feet below!  Had Bob waited for him to attempt to crawl back into the cabin with the tail elevated, the Sky-Bird would have buried herself in the waters before he was half-way to his objective.  They must now rise, if that were possible, to a good height; then Bob would slowly spiral the airplane downward and afford him a declining surface to work back upon.
Luckily Paul's freeing of the right elevating plane, gave the pilot fairly good control over the machine, so Bob had no difficulty in bringing the Sky-Bird into a rising swoop, although none too soon. Mounting at a good angle, but one which would not be likely to displace the youth clinging at the tail, he brought the airplane up to two thousand feet.
"Now, Paul!  Slide for it!" cried John, as the machine began a slow descent in a great circle.
Paul then worked his way back like a crab, sliding a little, but not once allowing his tensioned limbs to relax to the danger point.  Before the airplane had come within five hundred feet of the sea, he felt his legs grasped in the strong hands of John and Tom, and the next moment they had hauled him bodily through the window.
"Ginger, Buddy, that was a close call for us--and you, too!" exclaimed John.  "I hope I never see you in such a ticklish place again!"
Paul sank into a seat.  He was too exhausted to do anything but smile. When at last he could find his voice he asked, anxiously: "Can Bob control her all right now?"
"Well enough to land us where we wish to go, he says," observed Tom.
"That's right," put in Bob himself, who had overheard the conversation. "The Sky-Bird isn't what she was before that rock went through her, but if nothing worse happens we'll reach Singapore, though it will probably be somewhat later than our sweet friends in the other plane."
"We can land at Sumatra, I think, if we have to make repairs before," ventured John.  "We ought to cross the northern end of that island in the course of an hour."
Searching the horizon for their rivals, they saw that, evidently satisfied with the mischief they had done, the _Clarion_ crew had gone on at full speed, for they were now far ahead.
"If I ever run onto Pete Deveaux again I believe I shall be angry enough to choke him till he's unable to speak his own name," declared Paul.
"I'm afraid I'll have to help you at that job, Paul," cried Tom.  "He's the most unprincipled scoundrel that ever went unhung."
"You are right, Tom; Deveaux is a brute," said John.  "His deviltry came near being the end of us.  When we get home, we must see to it that he is punished as he deserves.  But we must keep it out of the papers now, as it will look, in case we get beat, as if we wanted an excuse."
John and Tom now resumed their hammocks and broken sleep, for they saw that, although the shattered tail elevator caused the Sky-Bird to ride roughly and at reduced speed.  Bob and Paul could probably handle her all right from now on.  The cross winds of the monsoon also hindered their progress a good deal, blowing erratically from different directions, but they plugged along at a pace slow enough to keep themselves within the zone of safety.
A little later they came in sight of Sumatra, but as they were going fairly well, thought it best not to attempt a landing for repairs.  So they crossed the northern tip of the island, and proceeded on over the Strait of Malacca.  Sometime since, Paul had taken Bob's place at the throttle, and the latter had communicated with their destination by wireless, learning that the other airplane had arrived.
It was twilight when they at last reached Singapore, and made a landing in the race-course in the outskirts of the town.  By long odds this was the smallest island upon which they had so far stopped, but they found the city one of the busiest.  Their rivals had left fully two hours before.
Now came the task of repairing the broken tail elevator.  As the frame was undamaged, it was only necessary to straighten out a few bent supports and put new covering on.  The British official at the field showed them where to purchase the necessary silk and glue, also a good waterproof varnish for coating the covering.  From his own home he secured a pair of scissors with which to do the cutting, and John and Bob worked at the task, while Paul and Tom took on fuel and water and looked after other preparations for resuming their journey as soon as possible.
During this process, Grandpa the monkey was permitted to come out of the cabin and entertain the crowd of onlookers with his antics, which he did to perfection, as he had done at other stops.  To the ivory ring about his slender little waist, Paul always fastened a long thin rope, which he had bought in Para, when he let Grandpa out.  This leash prevented him from wandering off, something nearly all unfettered monkeys will do if not watched very closely by their masters.  Almost any place seems to be home to a monkey, and almost any man seems to suit him for a temporary master.
Grandpa himself delighted in running out upon the wings of the Sky-Bird at the stops.  He pulled the control wires and made the ailerons swing up and down, which always raised a laugh among the crowds.  Another favorite pastime with him was to post himself in front of the reflector of the big searchlight up on the cabin, and make the most comical grimaces at his image on the polished reflector inside, sometimes uttering queer noises as if he were crying, and at other times chattering with the utmost anger at the phantom monkey, mixing these demonstrations up with wild dashes around behind the lamp to see if the mimicking animal were there.  No matter what language the natives of each port might speak, they never failed to understand and appreciate these little sideshow comedies of Grandpa's.  And when it would become noised about among them that this particular monkey had traveled all the way from South America through the air with the "bird-men," their awe for him was amusing to behold.
CHAPTER XXV
ENGULFED IN A VOLCANO'S DUST
With three hundred gallons of gasoline in her tanks, and her broken tail-elevator well repaired, the Sky-Bird was ready at eleven o'clock that evening to take off.  Her crew were all tired out, but they knew they would soon be able to occupy the comfortable seats or hammocks in the cabin for another long stretch of over-sea travel, for it would be morning before they would reach Port Darwin, Australia, their next stop.
It had been raining very hard in Singapore just before they arrived, and the field was quite wet, with many puddles in the low spots. Through one or two of these they had had to run in landing, and it seemed that in hopping off they would be forced to do so again. Fortunately the ground was sandy, so they had come to a stop in a spot not at all muddy, and had thus been able to work upon the machine without the discomforts of wading in slime while doing it.
They now started the engine, Tom climbed in, and they were off, running over the soft ground at increasing speed.  Then the airplane struck a pool of water, five or six inches deep, which almost pulled them up. It also held them back so that when the machine emerged it was going very little faster than at the beginning.  The next patch of ground was a little longer, but they had not risen when they struck it at a rate of about twenty-five miles an hour.
This pool was also quite deep, and the sudden resistance almost threw the Sky-Bird onto her nose.  It did cause her to dip so that her long propeller struck the puddle, and immediately water and sand were sucked up and thrown in almost every direction by the swiftly revolving blades.  Much of it reached the natives, who in two long rows of curious humanity, formed a lane for the passage of the craft, and many a poor fellow gave a howl and fell back against those behind, spluttering and rubbing grit and water from his face, while rivulets coursed down his dusky body amid the howls of laughter of his mates.
The flyers had only a fleeting glimpse of this amusing incident before they found the front windows of the cabin so covered with the deluge of spray that they could scarcely see ahead.  Two of them quickly opened the portals, for a grave danger menaced them.
Less than sixty yards ahead was the lower fence of the field, and just back of this arose scrub trees and houses, with no opening between which could be utilized.  They must clear these formidable obstacles, looming bigger every second, and the distance was alarmingly short, for the last pool had again retarded their momentum to such an extent that they had just barely staggered through it.
Picking up speed once more at every turn of her propeller, the Sky-Bird shot down the last stretch of ground reaching to the fence.  How fast this obstruction loomed up!  Just in the nick of time the airplane left the ground.  They sailed over the tops of trees and houses so close that the wheels of their landing-gear almost scraped.  It was one of the finest maneuvers of the whole voyage, and the boys praised John so for his good piloting that he had to ask them to desist.
After a wide sweep above Singapore, they headed for the open water, which in this case happened to be South China Sea.
The weather was very threatening.  Dark-looking clouds began to efface the moon and stars, whose light had aided in the take-off at Singapore, and within fifteen minutes occasional flashes of sheet-lightning could be seen far ahead, throwing into relief the immense bulk of the foreboding clouds and shedding a pallid gleam over the sea. Occasionally a light zephyr came out of the east, but it would last only a moment.
"We ought to be just about over the equator now," announced John a little later.
Paul and Bob had stayed up on purpose to witness this event, and by dead reckoning had computed their position so closely that John's announcement had come just as they were about to make a similar statement.  Although they could see no "line" stretching along down there in the sea, they fancied they could, with the most pleasant imagery.  That great line, the belt of the universe, dividing the Northern and Southern hemispheres, they had already crossed once, in their zigzagging course, at the mouth of the Amazon.  Now here in the South China Sea they were crossing it a second time.  At no time had they been more than thirteen degrees away from it.  One more crossing of it, if all went well, and they would be almost within sight of the end of their journey--Panama!
With this pleasant thought Bob and Paul rolled up in their hammocks, trusting John and Tom to bring them safely through the bad weather that seemed in store, and were soon asleep.
To the two older flyers, used to all conditions of aerial passage as a result of several years' experience, the present conditions were not at all terrifying.  Although the spectacle of the dark clouds in front of them was extremely uncanny, they realized that they were only local thunder showers which could probably be avoided by a little careful navigating.
In this they were right.  By wheeling a little out of their course, to the left or right, and by flying up over one big cloud which could not be avoided in any other manner, they managed to dodge the most dangerous fields of lightning and the worst torrents of rain.
Presently they left the dark clouds far behind, and once more the stars appeared in the blue firmament above and the pale moon lit up the tropical sea.
With relief John guided the Sky-Bird lower, so that they could keep a sharp lookout for guide-posts of land.  They passed several small islets which were uncharted with them, but when, about midnight, they made out a great black blotch not far ahead, they recognized it as the southern end of the island of Borneo, and knew they were all right.
In a little while Borneo was sweeping along below them, its mangroved shores gloomy and desolate-looking, not to say weird, in the pale moonlight.  Among those dense forests and thickets the flyers knew many a wild animal was prowling at that very moment, and in the thatched huts in the glens slept many a fierce-visaged savage with weapons close at hand.
Toward morning the flyers observed a volcano in active eruption off to the southeastward, apparently on the island of Timor.  It was a beautiful sight, so wonderful that John awoke the sleepers, that they too might enjoy it.  Fantastic lights of various colors shot upward from the crater.  These shafts lit up billowing clouds of smoke and ashes, which poured out in awe-inspiring volume.  Back of it all stood the dark-blue velvet sky, against which the pyrotechnics were embossed in a stunning manner.  Man could never have wished to witness a more remarkable manifestation of nature than did the young aviators, as they viewed the spectacle from their own favored position in the air.
Swiftly the Sky-Bird drew them toward the volcano, for it was directly in their course.  As they approached, they could see flames licking their way upward from the dark mass of rock constituting the shaft, and could make out streams of lava pouring over the sides of the crater, going down into the unknown blackness below.  What a sight it was!  How their pulses beat!  How their hearts quickened!
But now, very unexpectedly, the sight was shut out.  Thin, pungent, volcanic smoke and ash began to surround them.  In a few moments it was so thick that they grew alarmed.  All had the same fearful thought--
If this should continue a little while, they would lose their bearings, and might run right into the fountain of fire itself!
This was a terrifying possibility, for it would mean a horrible death to every one of them.  Fireproof though the airplane was in the general sense of the word, every one of those in her cabin knew that if they should ever pass through those licking flames, the great heat in them would fairly melt the light structure of the machine in the twinkling of an eye.  No metal or wood could withstand that terrible blast a moment, much less human flesh.
It is small wonder, therefore, that Tom now sent the Sky-Bird off to the right, and higher, also.  They closed the windows, to keep out the foul smells, and anxiously awaited developments.  They could not see a yard in front of them, so thick were the smoke and gases.  It was a trying time.
Fortunately Tom had taken the best course he could.  Five minutes passed--ten minutes--fifteen--and then the air began to clear.  Slowly the curtain lifted; and presently looking back, they saw that they had passed the volcano and were leaving it and the island well behind.
Its fires, too, seemed to be burning out.  Only a few forks of ghostly light were coming up from the crater.  These grew fainter and fainter, and in a little while the eruption seemed to have entirely subsided, for Timor was swallowed up once more in the impenetrable mantle of night.
CHAPTER XXVI
IN AUSTRALIA
Shortly after five o'clock the next afternoon, Paul saw ahead and to port what appeared to be haze, but which he and Tom hoped was the coastline of Australia.  Ten minutes later the observer joyfully pointed out to the pilot unmistakable evidence of an island upon which stood a tall object--Bathurst Island lighthouse.
John and Tom were routed out, and all saw the rugged outline of the great island--a continent itself, as large as the United States and much the same shape--stretching away to the southward and slowly dwindling into low, sandy, barren shores as it went.
Less than forty minutes later they were circling over Port Darwin, on the northwest corner of the continent, while a good-sized crowd of people down below pointed excitedly upward.  The flyers soon made out the landing-field by reason of its white marker, and swooped gracefully down, while those below cheered.
Two zealous customs officials were anxious to examine the new arrivals, also a health officer; but this did not take long, and during the process they were able to converse pleasantly with Mr. Seth Partlow, the British official in charge of the field, also with the mayor of Darwin, who gave them the most cordial welcome.
They were sorry to learn that Pete Deveaux and his flyers had departed less than a half-hour before their own arrival; but they had been expecting such a report owing to the fact that they had been left so far behind at Singapore.  They now determined to hurry up refitting operations, and leave at the first opportunity, hot upon the trail.
Messages were dispatched to Mr. Giddings at Panama and to his newspaper in New York; and another roll of films containing numerous interesting views taken that morning just before and after landing, were mailed in to the _Daily Independent_.
Here, for the first time, they were able to secure a paper containing accounts of their own and their rival's passage.  It was a novel experience to read these glowing descriptions of incidents still fresh in their minds--descriptions which had in some cases flown by wire, in others by air-waves, from point to point, more than half-way around the world.  It provoked thoughts which made them marvel at the wonderful ingenuity and power of the very equipment which they were using themselves every chance they could get--their wireless telegraph and telephone sets.  The remarkable news-gathering efficiency of the world, the coordination of agencies in gathering and disseminating news, was astounding to contemplate.
The mayor of the town insisted upon the boys partaking of dinner at his home near by, and they thankfully agreed to do this when Mr. Partlow declared he would personally see to the filling of the Sky-Bird's tanks, for which task he had plenty of assistants.
They were most cordially received by the mayor's wife.  Within fifteen minutes they had the satisfaction of sitting down to one of the most satisfying meals they had ever had.  Not only was everything well cooked, but there was a great variety of viands.  They were all particularly impressed with the toothsomeness of the meat which the maid served, so much so that Paul could not refrain from remarking: "Mr. Bailey, I never ate sweeter chicken than that."
"No, I don't believe you ever did," laughed the mayor.  "The fact is, young man, that is not domestic chicken at all.  It is the flesh of the brush-turkey, a wild fowl which the bushmen or blackfellows bring in here to market.  It is a great delicacy."
"I have read of these bushmen," said Bob.  "Are they quite wild?"
"Indeed they are," the mayor replied.  "The blackfellow is, I believe, on the lowest rung of civilization.  He is unlike the negro, the Malay, the Mongolian, and the American Indian, in many ways.  If you could stay a few days, I would be glad to take you back in the bush and show you a few specimens in their native state.  They have a long skull, with a low, flat forehead, Their brows overhang deep-set, keen eyes, and they have a heavy lower jaw, with teeth as strong as a dog's. Their hair is generally wavy or curly, being usually auburn or black in color.  As a rule their faces are almost hidden by beards and whiskers, which they never comb and which, like the hair on top of their heads, are always in a beautiful tangle."
"How do they dress, sir?" asked Paul.
This brought another laugh from Mr. Bailey.  "That doesn't worry them in the least!" he declared.  "Most bushmen are covered from head to foot with hair, and I imagine they think this is a good enough uniform, for they wear nothing except what nature gave them.  In bad weather, however, they do add some artificial protection to their tough bodies by making a rough wrap out of the skin of a kangaroo or a piece of flexible bark.  Some tribes use rushes and seaweed for this purpose, while others make a blanket from the dried frog scum of the swamps and ponds.  For boats, pieces of eucalyptus bark, folded and tied at the ends and daubed with clay, suit them very well.  They are too lazy to dig out the trunk of a tree for a canoe, like the natives of most other countries."
"Do these blackfellows live in huts?" asked John.
"That's where their laziness manifests itself again," said the mayor, smiling.  "The blackfellow has no permanent dwelling.  His shelter is a cave or overhanging rock, as an animal might select one; sometimes it is only a large section of bark which he tears from a tree, and under which he walks or squats in storms or lies at night."
"Back in the States," remarked Tom, "we hear much about the skill of these fellows with the boomerang.  I dare say a lot of these stories are overdone."
"Possibly," said their host, "and yet it is a fact that these natives are undoubtedly more adept at casting various forms of wooden implements than any other people in the world.  Their very indolence leads them to adopt all sorts of easy-made weapons, and wood is surely one of the most common materials for the purpose one could find.  Clubs of all kinds are hurled at prey or human enemies.  Among these the boomerang is a favorite.  They have several forms.  One type is very light, round on one side and flat on the other, and slightly twisted on its axis.  It is used almost entirely for play, though sometimes to hurl at flocks of birds in the sky.  The war and hunting boomerangs are much heavier; they are bent differently, and do not return to the thrower, but are a deadly weapon in the hands of these bushmen at ranges up to four hundred feet.  But stone-pointed spears are their chief weapons."
"With this skill I presume they have no trouble in securing enough to eat," suggested Paul, sipping his cocoa.
"On the contrary, there are times when weather conditions, such as drouth, make it a very difficult matter for some tribes to get sufficient food.  Then they will turn to human flesh, and will eat men who have fallen to their weapons, or their own tribesmen who have succumbed to disease or hunger.  Even infants are sometimes killed and eaten by their parents."
"Horrible!" cried the flyers.  This seemed almost incredible, with civilization in abundance so near.
"I agree with you," said Mr. Bailey, failing to notice his wife holding up a protesting finger toward him.  "Of course the blackfellow prefers to have other foods when he can get them.  The kangaroo, wallaby, and opossum, form his chief food supply, but no animal or nourishing plant is neglected.  He even eats ants, caterpillars, moths, beetles, grubs, snakes, lizards, often uncooked----"
At that point Mr. Bailey felt a sharp twist of his ear, and looking up, found his wife gazing at him with a very severe expression.
"Thomas Bailey!  You are a cannibal yourself!  Where is your sense of propriety?  Have you lost your head in your interest in this subject? Don't you know you are _eating_?--that you have guests here who are also _eating_?"
"My! my!  Goodness gracious!" ejaculated their host, in a great fuss. "Young men, I was not thinking.  Will you ever pardon me for this transgression of etiquette?"
The flyers smilingly hastened to assure both their friends that they had not lost their appetites in the least; that they really had enjoyed every morsel of food and information passed out.  They remained to chat long enough to convince the lady and gentleman of this fact, and then took their departure.  They had actually spent a most entertaining hour, one which they would not have missed for a good deal.
At eight-fifty local time the Sky-Bird took off for her long hop to Apia, principal city of Upolu, an island of the Samoan group.  It was the beginning of their long flight across the big Pacific, an ocean so wide, so fraught with perils, that no aircraft had ever before attempted to negotiate it.  Some eight thousand miles away over those great waters lay Panama, their goal.  Would they reach it ahead of their rivals?  Would they reach it within their schedule of ten days?
To these two queries in their minds, our stout-hearted, young friends answered doggedly and determinedly, "Yes!"  Fortune might frown upon them, it is true; but if so they would face her smilingly, with confidence, with that pertinacity for which Americans are famous, and try to make her look pleasant, too!  They felt that they must win; that they would win.  And yet they left Port Darwin handicapped by being fully three hours behind their rivals.
As they wheeled over the town they waved a last farewell to the hundreds below, whose forms they could just make out in the fast-gathering darkness.  Then, turning off straight east, they flew over the dark-green canopy of eucalyptus forests of fertile Arnhem Land, and crossed the Gulf of Carpentaria in the full darkness of the night.  When they passed over Cape York peninsula, Tom was at the throttle, and the younger boys had been asleep for a number of hours. They had now left the whole continent of Australia behind them, and were facing the broad wastes of the Pacific.
Their perils had begun in earnest.  Should anything happen to cause them to be forced down, there was nothing but a vast basin of water miles deep to catch them, and there would not be one chance in a thousand that they would survive.  This, surely, was no place and no time for engines to fail or steering apparatus to go wrong.  Yet each flyer was ready for such a mishap--attested by the mute evidence of an inflated rubber tube about his waist.  Even Bob and Paul slumbered on the airy contrivances.
Fortunately the weather was ideal.  It is true that headwinds blew mildly and insistently, causing some bumpiness, but the night was calm and starry, and with the engine running close to full-out, they saw that they were making up lost time very fast.
When morning broke, and Paul took the throttle, fair skies looked down upon their skimming bird, and the sea was bathed in brilliant sunshine. Bob wirelessed Sydney their position about noon.  He made no attempt to get Apia, because he knew there was no telegraph or radio station there.
Flying low, early in the afternoon they passed close enough to the Vanikord islands to see hordes of natives watching them from the coral shores.  Numerous smaller islets, gems set in the ultramarine blue of the sea, were also passed within the next hour.  Gulls, ospreys, and other swift-winged seabirds sailed about these pretty outcroppings of the mighty deep, and sometimes the creatures came after the Sky-Bird with shrill cries of challenge, only to be quickly left behind.
Once more the shades of night fell, and once more John took the destinies of the airplane in hand.  For a time Bob and Paul worked on reports, then played with Grandpa, who in such tedious spells of flying as this was a never-ending source of entertainment to all.  Nine o'clock found them in their hammocks, hoping that when they opened their eyes again it would be to see the welcome shores of their destination.
Nor in this hope were they to be disappointed.  It seemed they had no sooner fallen asleep than they were aroused by a hand shaking them and the voice of John saying: "Come on, you sleepy-heads!  Rout out here and have a look at what's ahead!"
Having their clothes still on--so that they might be ready for an emergency at any time of the night--the two chums were up to the windows about as soon as John himself.  The latter had raised two of these a short time before, and the boys shoved their heads through to take a look.
It was broad day.  Light, fleecy clouds covered the heavens to the southeast, but in the blue between a huge rift the sun shone down benignly.  And in its bright rays they could count nine islands and islets, sprinkled here and there like emeralds in a sparkling sheet of mother-of-pearl.  It needed only a glance at the chart to tell them that these were the Samoan group, and a little searching also told them that the nearest large one was Upolu.
In less than another hour they were circling above the beautiful island of their choice, directly over the little town of Apia, which nestled in the center of a luxuriant forest of palms and other tropical trees. A number of boats and sailing vessels were in the harbor, and on board these as well as on the ground hundreds of people were looking up aloft and waving a welcome.
Now our flyers saw what they really were most concerned about--a T made of white stones in an open spot by the beach.  And in that field they also saw something else they were very glad to witness.  This was the airplane of their rivals.
They had caught up with them at last!
CHAPTER XXVII
PAUL VERSUS PETE
There was a wild scamper of natives as our flyers came down upon the smooth, hard sands of the beach.  In this operation they had to use the utmost care to avoid striking the machine of their contemporaries, but it was accomplished without mishap, and the Sky-Bird came to a stop about seventy feet from the _Clarion_.
They were immediately surrounded, at a very respectable distance, by a cordon of Samoans.  These were splendid-looking fellows. Their dusky bodies were strong and stalwart, and their faces were intelligent-looking.  It was plain to be seen that they had not the slightest hostile intentions toward the aviators.  On the contrary their features expressed clear friendliness, although it was obvious that their experience with the _Clarion_ was still too fresh to eradicate their natural timidity of such a strange thing as an airplane.
Our friends were very stiff and cramped from their long ride from Port Darwin.  It seemed so good now to be able to stretch their limbs, to feel solid ground once more under their feet, and to see the blue sky all around their heads!
The morning was hot, but a cool breeze blew inshore, giving a delightful freshness to the air.  Near at hand were rows of native huts, made of poles and bark, and back of these loomed fine groves of cocoanut trees and other tropical vegetation in the richest profusion. Even the elevations of this volcanic island had their barrenness alleviated by growths of greenery which seemed entirely to cover them.
No sooner had the boys sprung out of the machine than three white men approached them.  These introduced themselves as Mr. Plusson, in charge of the local mission; Mr. Hart, a British trader; and Mr. Shoreman, the American trader who had been engaged to look after their fuel at this airport.  These gentlemen expressed the liveliest cordiality in their welcome, and Mr. Plusson plead so hard for them to accompany him to his home and join him and his wife at breakfast that they consented.
They learned that their rivals had arrived about twenty minutes before. Ever since the dastardly attempt of Pete Deveaux and his crowd to wreck the Sky-Bird in the Indian Ocean, our flyers had been greatly incensed at them, or rather at Pete Deveaux himself, for they had no doubt but that it was he who had instigated the attack.  Paul Ross was particularly inflamed at the French aviator's act, and had more than once declared since, that the first time they met Deveaux again he was going to thrash him until he begged for mercy.  This was rather a bold statement for Paul to make, since he was but a youth of eighteen while Pete Deveaux must have been close to thirty; but the lad was strong and skillful with his fists, in addition to which his resentment was just. When justice is on one's side it goes a long way toward giving that person staying powers in any contest against wrong.
For these reasons, when Paul now declared that he could not bear to wait another minute before taking Pete Deveaux to account, his chums made no attempt to dissuade him, except in the matter of time.  John pulled him aside, so that explanations would not have to be made to their new acquaintances, and asked him to defer the matter until after they should have had breakfast, to which Paul reluctantly agreed.
When they once more reached the field, it was to see their rivals also just arriving.  Without further ado, Paul walked straight up to Pete Deveaux and said; "Deveaux, why did you drop those rocks down on us back there when we were overhauling you between Colombo and Singapore?"
The Frenchman's face paled visibly.  He did not like the look in Paul's eye, nor the stern countenances of his friends.  But he hoped to bluff his way through.
"Why accuse me of anything like this?" said he, trying to look surprised and hurt.  "We had nothing to do with those stones falling. Their weight broke the catch off of the glass trap, and they went through before we could stop them; didn't they, guys?"  He turned to his three flyers for support.
Crossman, Torrey, and Lane nodded their heads.
"Sure," averred Crossman.
"What did you have those stones on board for?" demanded John.
The _Clarion_ men were silent.  Their leader was the first to reply.
"We got some kola nuts from the natives at one of our stops, and wanted the stones to crack them with," stated Deveaux.
"It's a lie!" accused Paul.  "Stones do not accidentally fall as straight as those did.  Pete Deveaux, you and your crowd did the best you could to wreck us, and I'm going to take it out of your hide right now!"
"Oh, you are, are you?" sneered the French aviator.  "It seems to me I'll have something to say about that, you young whippersnapper!  If these friends of yours will keep out of this, I'll promise my boys will keep out, and I'll give you all the show you want."
"Fair play; that's right!" cried Mr. Shoreman, stepping forward.  He had heard enough to convince him that nothing but a fistic settlement of the controversy would be adequate, and, with the help of several white traders and sailors, he formed a ring.
Like lightning the word went out, and scores of natives came running up to see the encounter.  An affair of this kind just suited their primitive instincts; it was even a greater treat than seeing an airplane land upon their fair island.
So by the time that Paul and Pete Deveaux had thrown off their coats, a great ring of natives surrounded them, and in its front were numerous whites from the ships in the harbor.
Pete Deveaux was inwardly very nervous, although he was careful not to show it.  Had Paul not been so much younger, Deveaux would probably have made some excuse to back out of the fight.  As it was, he had a sneaking hope of getting the better of Paul, now that the youth's friends had agreed not to interfere.  He also hoped to injure the boy so badly in the encounter that he could not take his turn operating the Sky-Bird for the rest of the journey; at least, cripple him enough to delay his party in getting away from the island.
With these evil intents the French flyer conceived still another.  He stepped aside and whispered something in Chuck Crossman's ear, then came back and faced Paul.
Mr. Shoreman gave the signal, and Pete Deveaux feinted and shot his other fist savagely at Paul's eye.  But the boy was wary, dodged the blow, and struck his adversary a hard one in the chest.  For a moment Deveaux was staggered; but he quickly recovered, and once more sprang forward.
Missing with his right, he succeeded in hitting Paul in the shoulder with his left.  Wheeling like a flash, Paul shot out a fist before the Frenchman could recover his guard, and struck him a smash under the ear which sent him reeling back into his friends.
Pete Deveaux was now thoroughly alarmed.  He had not expected such science, nor such force, on the part of his opponent.  He approached Paul with much more caution, amid the howls of the natives, and decided to let him take the offensive.
Paul was willing.  Encouraged by his success thus far, and bent upon ending the fracas as soon as possible, he met his adversary with a heavy swing which just cleared the man's ear.  Deveaux struck, but missed also.  Pressed backward, he clinched to save himself, and in this position, where nobody could see his movements, he viciously tried to put some short jabs into Paul's abdomen.
Fortunately for himself Paul succeeded in breaking away before he was doubled up by the blows, one of which had landed with sufficient power to make him utter an involuntary smothered exclamation of pain.
"No more of that, Mr. Deveaux!" warned the referee suspiciously, as Paul shoved his opponent back.  "Keep out of the clinches!  Fight fair!"
"Fair!  Fair!" yelled the sailors; and the natives took up the cry in their own language.
Paul now advanced, and Pete Deveaux retreated.  The latter was really frightened.  Something was beginning to tell him that in this youth of eighteen he had met his superior.
"I think we'd better quit, Ross, before we hurt each other," suggested the French flyer cravenly.  "This flight business of ours won't stand such delays as this.  We can have this out when we land in Panama."
"No, we can't have it out in Panama!" cried Paul.  "Stand up if you're a man and settle this thing right now.  Watch out; I'm coming!"
By this time Pete Deveaux had retreated to the lower end of the improvised ring.  He saw that he was cornered; that he must fight once more.  Lunging forward like a trapped rat, he struck a wicked blow for his opponent's head.
Paul parried it, and as swift as a stroke of lightning his right hand streaked out and caught Deveaux under the jaw.  The Frenchman reeled backward a few steps, and toppled over, full length upon the ground. What a cry went up from the onlookers!  By this time the sympathies of every one, except Deveaux's own comrades, were with the youth.  No one, even a half-civilized savage, at heart likes a coward.
For a few moments Pete Deveaux was dazed.  But after his cronies had helped him to his feet, and started away with him, he still had enough spite left to shout back, as he shook a fist: "We're not done with you fellows yet!"
Paul was now the recipient of congratulations from all sides. Everybody wished to slap him on the shoulder or shake hands with him, it seemed, and the native populace gave him so many cocoanuts, bananas, and pineapples that he was literally hemmed in with fruit, and John, Bob, and Tom had to open up a pathway before he could get out of his sweet-smelling barricade.
Our flyers put as much of the gifts in the cabin of the Sky-Bird as they could find room for, including an abundance of nuts for the happy Grandpa, and then they turned their attention to the pressing business of overhauling the engines and storing fuel.
While they were thus engaged, the _Clarion's_ motor was heard to start; and a few moments later she arose and took off to sea.
"Humph!" ejaculated Tom, "those fellows have beat us to it again."
"They ought to; didn't they arrive ahead of us?" asked Tom.
"We'll be out of here in fifteen minutes more," stated John.
But the words were no more than out of his mouth when Paul, who had been inspecting the rear end of the machine came dashing excitedly forward, crying:
"Fellows, hob is to pay!  Those rascals have cut the wire braces that support the tail-skid, and it's lopping away over!"
CHAPTER XXVIII
A MIX-UP IN DATES
Paul's announcement threw his friends into a state of consternation. As they viewed the wire braces, neatly cut with a pair of nippers, they recalled Pete Deveaux's act of whispering in the ear of one of his party just preceding the recent fight, and realized now its full import.  This fellow had slunk out of the crowd, slipped over to the unguarded airplane, and performed the unprincipled trick without any risk of being caught at it.
Since there was no chance for immediate redress from the guilty party, who were almost out of sight to the eastward, all our flyers could do was to bend every effort to make repairs as fast as possible.  After considerable skirmishing around, they managed to secure some wire from one of the vessels in the harbor.  The severed strands were then removed and new pieces cut to length.
It was found that the weight of the machine upon the unsupported skid, had cracked the skid past repair; so they had to whittle out another from some tough wood, which the natives brought them from the nearby forest, before they could connect the new wires and were ready to start.
Finally they took off at a few minutes past noon, more than three hours behind their rivals.  It was disheartening, to say the least--all the more so on account of the fact that their delay had again been caused by the sinister acts of the other crew.  They made up their minds that if they should meet Pete Deveaux and his crowd at another stop, something worse than a single fistic encounter would take place!
As they soared away toward Nukahiva, with Upolu growing constantly dimmer, John, who had been studying the schedule, turned to his companions and asked:
"Do any of you fellows know what date this is?"
"Let's see," mused Bob, at the throttle; "we left Port Darwin the evening of the 26th; the evening of the 27th we were still at sea, and the next morning--the 28th--"
"You're ahead of time just one day," laughed John.  "This is the 27th of the month."
"How do you make that out?" asked Bob.  "Didn't we leave Port Darwin on the 26th?"
"Yes," admitted John.
"And the following evening we were at sea?'
"Granted.  That was last evening--the 27th."
"Then any dunce can see that to-day is the 28th," said Bob witheringly.
"That's what I say, too," supported Paul.
But John only laughed harder, and this time Tom joined him.
"John's right," said Tom; "to-day is the 27th."
"It _can't_ be," protested Bob.  "You own up that yesterday was the 27th, don't you?"
"I certainly do," chuckled John; "but you forget one thing, young man: that same evening, all in a moment's time, we crossed the One Hundred and Eightieth Meridian--the date-line of the world--and while it was Thursday, the 27th on the west side of this line, it became Wednesday, the 26th the instant we crossed over to the east side."
"Oh, sure!" exclaimed Bob and Paul, feeling very silly.  And the latter added: "That's where we gain a day in our lives--and to think that Bob and I were asleep at that auspicious moment!"
"I know an old maid who swears she is fifteen years younger than she really looks," commented Tom.  "I think she must have done a lot of globe trotting, and always east!"
"There's no danger of the fair sex ever circling the globe in a westerly direction," laughed John, "for that would make them one day older every time."
The day could not have been better.  Hardly a cloud was to be seen on the horizon, and the regular trade-winds blowing westward were soft and steady, and they were making excellent time.
Grandpa frisked about, perching on this object and that, and occasionally running back into some secret nook where he had hidden his supply of nuts.  With one of these in his paw he would jump up on something, crack it in his powerful small jaws, and look very wise and serious as he picked out the meats with his slim fingers.
Finally the monkey had his fill, and hopped up into Tom's lap.  He began to play with Tom's hair, smoothing it down pretty soon with the flyer's comb, which he discovered in a pocket.  So handy was Grandpa with this utensil that the others went into peals of laughter.  Tiring of this, the monkey's eye caught sight of several freckles upon the back of Tom's hand.  He tried in vain to pick the freckles off; then he became excited, for he could not understand why they would not lift up. He chattered scoldingly at everybody; then tried again.  Failing, he sprang down and went to a far corner, in a fine sulk.  Evidently he thought Tom was playing a trick on him, and had glued the freckles down someway just to tease him; for Tom, it must be admitted, was greatly given to bothering Grandpa in some such manner.
Shortly before ten o'clock the following morning all hands were up to take a look at their next stopping-off place--Nukahiva, the main island of the Marquesas group, the place where they hoped to find a supply of helium-gas awaiting them.
A fine island this--as fine a volcanic upheaval as one will find anywhere.  Sheer walls of cloud-capped rock 6,000 feet high, some literally overhanging the crystal-clear water, and all embossed and engraved with strangely patterned basalt.  There are pillars, battlements, and turrets; so that, with half-closed eyes, it seems you are approaching a temple, a medieval castle, or a mosque of the East. And the valleys--deep, choked with the most rampant growths of luxuriant vegetation, in the heart of which silvery streams gurgle their way tortuously along--fade away into mysterious purple mists. Small wonder that this gorgeously beautiful island should have been the home for a century of one of the finest races of primitive people the world has ever known!  Sad indeed is it that to-day the Marquesans are rapidly dying off from consumption and fever introduced into their fair domain by civilization itself.
Nestling in a good-sized valley near the harbor our flyers saw scores of native houses, as they drew nearer.  These were constructed of yellow bamboo, tastefully twisted together in a kind of wickerwork, and thatched with the long tapering leaves of the palmetto.  Here, too, was the big white T of their hopes.
In a short time they had safely landed, one hour behind schedule. Their rivals had left an hour and ten minutes before.  But joy of joys! here were four tanks of helium, and with a filling of this they would show those fellows how to fly!
As fast as they could work, our friends overhauled their machine and put it in shape for the long trip to San Christobal.  They would have given almost anything to have joined the many natives they saw swimming in the cool waters of the harbor, but felt that they could not afford to waste a single minute.
At twelve-thirty, with the sun at its zenith, they once more took to the air.  This was Thursday.  By Friday evening they should be at the Gallapagos Islands--their last stop before Panama.  What a cheering thought it was!
Heading just a trifle north of east, they ran almost full-out.  It was easy to note the difference in the behavior of the Sky-Bird since her helium tanks had been fully charged.  She sped along as she had in the very beginning of their journey--like a long bullet fired from some gigantic cannon.  How the engine did sing!  The wind rushed by them like a hurricane, and they had to shout in order to be heard when they had anything to say to each other.
Satisfied that all was going right, Tom and John soon turned in, for they were very sleepy.  When the operating crew awoke them it was dark. Bob then got into wireless communication with Panama, and delivered a message for Mr. Giddings.  Following this, he and Paul also took to the hammocks.
When the two youths awoke it was morning, and the Sky-Bird was not behaving as well as when they had retired.  Looking outside they saw the reason for this.  The entire heavens ahead were hidden under dun-colored clouds which in places seemed to be gathering themselves together into formidable leaden arrangement.  The gentle trade-winds had developed into a stiff wind.  Down below, the sea was covered with whitecaps, while in the distance the water was swinging into immense swells with foaming crests.
John and Tom both looked worried.  The two younger boys felt more uneasy when they noticed this.
"I guess we're in for a pretty hard storm," said John, as he gave the throttle up to Paul.  "Tom and I will stay up a while and see how things turn out.  The Sky-Bird's down to about a hundred an hour now. Better keep her there, Buddy.  That's fast enough in a blow like this."
A few minutes later a fork of lightning split the sky ahead.  This was followed by another off to the right, then by one off to the left. Then they heard the rumble of thunder, and a heavy gray haze slowly began to engulf the sea, rapidly approaching.
"That's rain," cried Paul.  "Say, John, if you're not too done out maybe you had better take the stick again; I'm afraid I won't be equal to what's coming."
His brother complied.  John did not wish to frighten his comrades, but the truth is he knew this would be the worst storm he had ever faced in his four years of flying.
"We'll try to get above those clouds," he said quietly.  He did not like to tell them just what he thought--that if they did not get above the clouds without delay they would either be struck by lightning or torn to pieces by the terrible whirlpool of winds which he knew those churning black masses ahead contained.
CHAPTER XXIX
A FLYING RESCUE
John turned the Sky-Bird upward at as stiff a slant as he felt would be safe for them in that high wind.  At nine thousand feet they emerged above the first layer; but eastward the clouds appeared to terrace up gradually, and in the distance there extended another great wall, towering several thousand feet higher.
Some of the rain was now beginning to reach them.  It came pattering down upon the roof; and under the strong impulse of wind and their speed, it struck the glass windows in front with a smack like buckshot. The moisture on the panes made it difficult to see out.
"Take a reading with the anemometer, Tom," ordered John, straining his eyes hard ahead.
This little instrument was something like a miniature windmill.  Its four wings were supplied with cups which, as Tom held the instrument out of the window facing the wind, caused the spider to revolve.  The latter was geared to a small dial, over the face of which passed a hand, much like a clock, indicating the speed of the wind.
"She's blowing fifty miles an hour, and gaining every minute," announced Tom.  "That's the hardest wind we've been in yet."
"If we stay down here it will be blowing sixty within ten minutes," was the pilot's grim response.
Just then there was a blinding flash of light a little way ahead of them, accompanied by such a terrific crash of thunder that their ears rang.
"Gee!" cried Bob, "that was a close call!  I'll bet that bolt came within a rod of striking us."
"A miss is as good as a mile," shouted John cheerfully.  He and the others found that they would have to yell in order to be heard, so great was the noise from engine and storm.
_Zip!_ went a zigzagging livid streak across their range of vision.  It seemed to be running straight for them, and instinctively they dodged--all but Tom and John.  These old veterans continued to gaze coolly straight ahead as though nothing had happened.  _Crash-h!_ went a clap of thunder.  It seemed as if the whole heavens were being turned topsy-turvy.  Even the airplane, usually so steady, heaved and rode like a rocking-horse.
The two younger members of the party were not to be blamed for feeling pretty well frightened by this time.  It was one thing to be cutting through the fleecy white clouds of a calm day, and quite another to go stabbing through murky black ones which were rolling angrily, ejecting both wind and rain, and spitting out vicious roars and jagged streaks of pale-blue flame.  One moment they would be in gloom; the next instant a cloud would be rent asunder with a ripping, tearing sound, and the whole turbid, boiling sky-universe would be bathed in the ghostly light.  What a weird, fantastic, chaotic world they were in!
But it was only for a few minutes that they were in the worst danger. Soon, to their infinite relief, they had reached their "ceiling."  They were now 15,000 feet up--almost three miles,--and below them lay the vast sea of troubled cloudland, dark and forbidding, rolling tumultuously like an ocean of curdled ink.  It was a novel experience to be running in the clear air over all of this infernality of sounds and sights, while above them the blue, star-studded heavens looked down upon them calmly and peaceably.
For almost an hour the furious storm continued in the lower regions. Then it began slowly to subside.  First the lightning stopped, then the thunder.  The banks of clouds took on a lighter hue, and began to drift apart; a pinnacle here and a crag there were swept off by the winds, until the masses of nimbus became flattened out into patches of sun-flecked foam as beautiful as fresh-fallen snow.
The anemometer spun slower and slower as the gale decreased in violence, and presently the airplane was gliding along with its normal smoothness.  Here and there, between the patches of white cloud, they caught glimpses of the ultramarine sea, thousands of feet below them.
It was so cold up here, even with the windows closed, that all the boys were shivering in their warmest wraps.  The air, too, was so rarefied that it was with considerable difficulty that they could breathe, for they had been in it for some time.  Not one flyer in a hundred can live at an altitude of twenty thousand feet, as he bleeds at the nose and mouth; and our aviators were up to within five thousand feet of that height.  It was now time to descend.
John shut off both engines, and they began to volplane down in a great stillness, sailing like an immense hawk.  Lower and lower they went--fourteen, thirteen, twelve, eleven, ten thousand feet.  Now they were gliding through clear, thin air; now cutting a hole through a heavy cloud so impregnated with moisture that it sweat over the glass and the boys would have to wipe a sleeve across hastily to improve the vision.  Eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two!
That was low enough.  All this time the propeller had been spinning from the rush of air alone.  Now John threw in the clutch; the revolving propeller shaft grabbed the crankshaft of the engine, and once more it began its rhythmic purr.  Just a little upthrust of the tail-elevators and ailerons brought them again into the horizontal in a huge swoop.  Nothing could have been prettier.  They had escaped the terrible tornado, leaving it still galloping westward far behind them, and were once more in normal position for continuing their flight toward the goal!
Below them, for miles around, they could once more see the ocean uninterruptedly.  Its mountainous waves and deep gorges of a short time previous had probably swallowed up many an unlucky ship that morning; but its temper was expended, and all it could do now was to sulk in long, even billows which every moment became flatter and flatter.
How had their rivals fared?  This question was in the minds of every one of our flyers as the Sky-Bird continued swiftly on her course.  In their hearts was a vague feeling that perhaps Pete Deveaux and his crowd might not have come out of the storm as lucky as they, for not one airplane out of a score could have outlived it.  Their own escape had been almost miraculous.  But for the good generalship of John they surely would have met with mishap.
So now, as they went along, a sharp lookout was not only kept for their rivals in the sky ahead, but anxious looks were cast over the expanse of white-capped waters.  Calculations told them that by this time the other airplane could not be far ahead.
Less than ten minutes later, Tom espied a small object far away on their port quarter.  It was bobbing about on the waves, rising and falling.  Bob seized a pair of glasses, and took a long look.  He turned around with his face full of excitement.
"Heavens, fellows!" he cried; "that object looks like an airplane!"
All took a look.  Then they, too, were excited, There could be no doubt about it--the object was a wrecked airplane.  And as it was extremely unlikely that there were other machines in the vicinity than their own and that of their adversaries', they were quite sure that it must be the remains of the _Clarion_.
John turned the Sky-Bird in the direction of the floating thing, and soon they saw what seemed to be the form of a human being clinging to one of the wings.  John threw in both engines in an effort to get all possible speed out of the craft.
In a little while they were close enough to see that the wreck was really the _Clarion_.  But what a sad-looking sight was the former handsome craft!  Her tail had been wrenched off, and only half of one of her long wings could be seen.  Out upon the other, on hands and knees, clinging desperately to the aileron brace, was the hatless, water-soaked figure of a man.  As they came closer still they could see him waving his hand frantically at them.
With a glass, Paul saw that this person was Oliver Torrey.  Anxiously his eyes roved over the wreck in quest of other survivors, but none could he discern.  Irony of fate! had all of the others been drowned?
John brought the Sky-Bird down to within seventy-five feet of the sea as they approached.  Tom seized the speaking trumpet, and as they swept over the _Clarion_ he bawled out: "Hang on, Torrey!  We'll stand by, and save you if we can!"
But they were facing a herculean task, and realized it.  They could not light upon the water.  Nor could they stop in midair.  How in the world could they effect the hapless flyer's rescue?
John circled at reduced speed while all of their minds were busy trying to work out the problem.  In the meantime Torrey's frantic pleadings for them not to go away and leave him to his fate filled their ears. It was a trying, nerve-racking situation.
Bob Giddings struck upon the first idea.
"Why can't we trail a rope for him to catch?" he asked.
"He's probably too weak to climb a rope," objected Tom.
"I'll tell you what we can do," said Paul, with a happy thought.  "We can take this coil of rope we have here and make a narrow ladder of it! That will be easy for him to catch, and easy to climb."
All agreed instantly that this was the only hope of rescue.  So John kept the Sky-Bird slowly wheeling, while his three mates cut and tied until they had formed a narrow rope ladder about fifty feet long.  One end of this they securely fastened in the cabin, while they let the other drop down through the glass trap in the floor.
To their dismay the rush of wind carried the light ladder out so horizontally behind that they saw they could never get low enough with safety for Oliver Torrey to reach it!  What could they do now?  It seemed they were destined to failure; that Torrey must be left to the cruel and hungry waves.
"I have it!" cried Bob.  "We'll fasten Grandpa near the lower end of the ladder.  His weight will be sufficient to keep it down straight."
This was a splendid scheme, surely.  Accordingly, the monkey, wondering what new form of teasing was about to be imposed upon him, was fastened about three feet from the bottom end of the ladder, and Grandpa and his strange trapeze was then slowly let down until all of the ladder had been paid out.  The crew were glad to note that it now hung almost perpendicularly.
Now the success of everything depended upon John.  He must be skillful enough to bring the ladder across Torrey's position in just the right place for the flyer to grasp it as it swept past.
They shouted to the man below to stand up if he could, and comprehending in an instant his part of the program, he struggled to his feet, spreading them wide apart to brace himself, for the wrecked airplane was rocking somewhat from the action of the waves.
The first time John brought the Sky-Bird by he was too high; Torrey could not reach the ladder.  The second time a sudden gust of wind blew the ropes too far to one side at the critical moment.  The third time the machine itself was a trifle too far to one side.  But on the fourth attempt success met their patient efforts; Torrey's hands seized the bottom rung of the ladder, and a few minutes later he had climbed up into the cabin and sunk weakly upon the floor.  Paul then brought in the ladder, laughing nervously, and released Grandpa, who had not relished his part of the proceedings in the least, to judge from his excited chattering, most of which was bestowed upon the rescued man.
CHAPTER XXX
AN ALARMING DISCOVERY
One of the first questions our flyers asked of Oliver Torrey, after they had helped him remove his wet clothing, was:
"Where are your friends?"
The _Clarion_ flyer shook his head sadly.  "They're done for--drowned. I'm the only one left of our crew.  That was an awful storm, boys!  I don't see how you ever survived it."
"We did it by flying over the greater part of it," said Tom.  "How did it happen to get you fellows?"
"Pete and Chuck were operating," explained Oliver Torrey.  "Sam and I both wanted to get above the tornado, but they said they thought it wouldn't amount to much.  When they saw how bad it really was, it was too late.  A whirlpool of wind struck us at three thousand feet, Pete lost control, and we went into a nose-dive from which we never recovered.  When we struck the sea the force crushed in the front of the cabin, stunning Pete, and before any of us could grab him the waves had washed him out of our sight.  Chuck, Sam, and I managed to get out and climb up on the fuselage; but the seas were running so high that half of the time we were buried in water.  Coming out of one of these deluges, I looked around and saw that I was alone.  Then the storm passed, and things looked better for me.  But I was just about ready to give up when I saw the Sky-Bird coming."
Oliver Torrey paused a moment, wiped his haggard face, and then continued, as he looked earnestly at his rescuers:
"Boys, I never can thank you enough for saving my worthless life.  It's awful to think that we guys let Pete Deveaux coax us into doing all those dirty things to hold you back.  I guess we deserved this punishment.  If I ever get back to Panama I'll certainly make what amends I can by telling the whole disgraceful story to the world."
Tom stepped in front of the _Clarion_ flyer, and shook his finger in his face.  "Torrey," said Tom, "I think at heart you are all right; but listen!  Mr. Wrenn, who hired you fellows, is a straight man through and through.  If this story gets out it will be published broadcast, and people will think he abetted your crimes against us.  So, for his sake----"
"I see; I hadn't thought of that," ejaculated Torrey.  "I will keep still; as far as the public'll ever know, they'll think this was a fair and square contest--and so it was on your part."
It must be remembered that John and Tom had had no sleep since the day previous.  They were so tired by now, especially John, that they were very glad to retire to the hammocks, leaving Paul and Bob to take care of the Sky-Bird.  Oliver Torrey was also exhausted, and accepted with alacrity Paul's invitation to him to jump into the spare hammock. Within five minutes the two youths were the only ones awake.
It seemed good to the boys to feel that soon they would be at San Cristobal, their last stop before the final hop.  They flew along with the throttle wide open for the next hour, eager to make up for the delay caused by the storm and the rescue of Torrey.  Then they reduced the speed a little, to make sure they would not overheat the engine, but still they made good time.
Shortly before six o'clock that afternoon they sighted a blue haze which a little later developed into a group of several islands.  These they knew, by consulting their chart, were the Gallapagos, the home of the largest land-turtles ever known, monsters so enormous that one of them could walk off with two half-grown boys on his broad back.
There are over two thousand volcano cones in these islands, and soon our friends were almost in the midst of them.  On all sides and at all distances were rugged peaks one hundred to two thousand feet high, rising sheer from a rose-pink sea over which the declining sun played ravishingly.  Along the shores pelicans soared above the shallow inlets, watching for unwary fish.  Tiny birds darted in and out among the cliffs.  Down in the crystal depths of the sea, over shelves of coral, vague shapes hovered and passed and repassed--sharks, dolphins, turtles, and grunts, even the ghastly devil-fish.
All life seemed confined to water and to air; never was dry land so desolate-looking as those myriads of barren volcanic cones.  Yet one of these islands was peopled with human beings--San Cristobal.
Which one was it?  The easternmost of the group, said the chart.
Circling that way.  Bob gave a yelp like a pup which sees his younger master after he has been away all day.
"I see Dalrymple Rock!" he cried, with the binoculars to his eyes.  "I see Wreck Point, too, and a bay between 'em, with houses on the beach. That looks like our number, all right.  What more do you want, Paul?"
"Nothing," laughed Paul,--"except our landing field.  Find that, wake up the other fellows, and I'll be satisfied."
In a moment Bob pointed out a flat field marked with the welcome white T, then he aroused John and Tom while Paul was bringing the Sky-Bird down.  From a rickety old pier, also from the shores where they had gathered, a crowd of curious natives rushed forward to witness the landing of the most startling object they had ever seen.  They were a mixture of South Americans, mostly Ecuadoreans, and not until our friends stepped out of the cabin did they summon up enough courage to get very close to the machine.
Among them was the owner of the island--a good-looking young Ecuadorean, highly educated, who was to look after their interests in the matter of fuel,--and the chief of police (presumably "chief," because there is only one representative of the law in the Galapagos).
The owner of San Cristobal informed the flyers in excellent French,--which all of them except Oliver Torrey could speak,--that he was delighted to welcome the first airplane crew to his little domain; that weeks ago the ship had brought gasoline and oil, which was now awaiting their pleasure in the little nearby shanty; that he and his police officer and the peons were eager to serve them in any way they could; and would the brave American aviators favor him and his police officer by joining them at the hacienda for dinner that evening?
Our friends graciously accepted this invitation, upon finding that their host would appoint a watch for the airplane.  They then went with him to his pretty hacienda in the valley--a green, undulating country, dotted with grazing cattle and horses, patches of sugar-cane, coffee bushes, and lime trees, stretching away to a cloud-capped range of mountains.
Situated upon a hillock, in the midst of this entrancing valley, and surrounded by the peons' grass houses, was the owner's home.  Here the flyers partook of an excellent repast, garnished with the best the island could afford, including tender wild duck from the surrounding lagoons and savory turtle soup.  Then followed songs by their host, and jolly college melodies by themselves, accompanied by the sweet strains of a guitar in the hands of the police officer.
Out in the compound, the peons also celebrated the occasion.  There were great oil flares, thrummings of guitars, gyrating dancers in bright-hued ponchos, merry cries, the laughing of children, the barking of dogs.
Everybody seemed thoroughly happy and contented.  And, after all, what else matters?  That is the Ecuadorean point of view, and who shall say it is a bad one?
It was difficult for the boys to remind themselves that here they were precisely on the equator, so positively chilly was it.  And yet they were.  It was the third time which they had touched that imaginary girdle of the earth in the past week or so; and it was to be their last crossing.  How inspiring the thought that they were now within one hop of their goal; that sometime on the morrow they would probably reach Panama well within their time limit of ten days!
The fact is, they had only 650 miles ahead of them--a distance which could easily be covered, barring accidents, inside of five hours, and they had until one o'clock the following day in which to reach their destination.  When they realized this, and were pressed most insistently by the owner of the island to spend the night, under the shelter of his roof, where there were two spare beds, the tired, bed-hungry flyers decided to remain over, Oliver Torrey going to the house of the police "chief."  Torrey was really in no physical condition, as it was, to continue the flight immediately, for he had suffered a chill as the result of his exposure, and felt very weak.
Next morning they were up at the break of day, and at once began the task of refilling the tanks of the Sky-Bird and giving her machinery a general overhauling.  Torrey felt much better, and assisted in these operations.  His gratitude to the boys for deciding not to divulge the duplicity of the unfortunate crew with whom he had been connected was very great, and he spared no effort to help them on toward success--which goes to show that this fellow was not at all bad at heart but had simply gotten in with a bad crowd.
It was a good thing that the flyers went over their engines.  John found a loose coupling in one, and a stretched fan belt in the other. Had they gone on in this condition trouble would have been sure to visit them.  It was small wonder, however, that something should not be out of good working order, for these faithful pieces of mechanism had been given the hardest kind of usage day in and day out, each in its turn, and sometimes working together, in this long flight around the earth.  Their final test had been the storm.  More than once the boys had marveled at the remarkable efficiency of their motive power.  What a tribute to the mechanical genius of modern man had these engines paid!  They were almost human in intelligence, more than human in their untiring zeal.
The repairs were not difficult to make; the belt was cut and fastened again with a leather lace borrowed from the police "chief's" shoe, and the careful use of a wrench and other tools out of their kit finally fixed the loose coupling.  But these operations had consumed unlooked-for valuable time, and when they had had breakfast with their friends and were ready at last to go, they found that the watch of their host indicated the hour of nine.
Setting their own watches to this local time, as had been their custom in all towns upon arriving or leaving, our flyers once more thanked their entertainers for courtesies extended, wished them good-bye, and got in their machine.
As they taxied swiftly down the course, the rush of wind from the big propeller sent more than one Ecuadorean's wide-brimmed hat flying from his head, and to the enjoyment of all, a native who was perched precariously upon an up-ended cask was blown heels-over-head backwards.
No sooner had they straightened out upon their northeasterly course than Bob sat down to his instruments and called up the Panama wireless station.  In about ten minutes he got it, and told of their position and the accident to the _Clarion_.  They all knew that when the news of this catastrophe reached the American newspapers there would be the greatest excitement, and that Mr. Wrenn would not only be grievously disappointed but horrified at the fate of the three members of his crew.
They now had just four hours in which to reach their goal.  That meant they must travel at an average rate of better than 160 miles an hour. Since they had gone considerably faster than this when the occasion had warranted it in the past, they felt no anxieties now.  John, who was at the throttle, opened the Sky-Bird up to 165, and at this gait they skimmed swiftly along over the blue-green waters of the big Pacific.
"This speed ought to bring us in by twelve-thirty--a good half-hour ahead of our limit,--so there's no need of rushing matters," said John, to which sentiment his comrades agreed.
By eleven o'clock all were keenly on the look-out.  Each flyer coveted the honor of being the first one to see the coastline of Central America, the resting-place of Panama.
Paul, with the binoculars to his eyes, was the one to win.  It was just exactly 11:25 when he shouted in true mariner's style: "Land ho, my hearties!"
Taking the glass, one by one his comrades gladly echoed the announcement.
But suddenly Bob's face turned chalky.  "Jiminy, fellows," he cried, "what boneheads we are!  We have been figuring on San Cristobal time all the while.  Panama's close to an hour ahead!"
"And we've only got thirty-five minutes in which to land!" said Tom. "Huckleberry pie!  Boneheads we are!  Boneheads, boneheads!  I repeat it--boneheads, boneheads!  It's all off now."
Tom actually wrung his hands in his misery, and the others felt just about as humiliated and disgusted with themselves.
"Here's where our prize goes a-flickering," groaned Paul.  "We never can make Panama in thirty-five minutes!"
"I don't know about that," declared his brother grimly.  "Here goes for the effort, anyhow.  I'll make the Sky-Bird fly as she has never flown before!"
With that he brought the throttle wide open, and two minutes later threw the second engine into commission.
CHAPTER XXXI
THE FINISH
They were not beaten yet!  The wind whistled, shrieked, and roared as it swept aft along the smooth body of the Sky-Bird.  The propeller whirred, and the engines purred like two huge twin cats.  So great were the noises combined that the voice was completely overwhelmed, and no effort was made by the flyers to talk with one another.
With their pulses beating wildly and hearts thumping in accord, they watched the hazy streak on the horizon line ahead rapidly develop into the unmistakable rugged form of land.  As they drew closer, they could even see the glint of water on the other side, and knew without the shadow of doubt that what they were looking at was the long belt of earth connecting the two Americas--the Isthmus of Panama itself.  And down their backs ran a new thrill at the recognition.
Larger and larger loomed the brown and green strip in advance. Presently, amid the checker-board of nature's colorations, they could make out a bay and on a tongue of land a considerable collection of buildings.  It was Panama City!  Five minutes later they could even distinguish the American flag--how glorious the sight!--fluttering at the staffhead of the courthouse, and could see the streets and ships in the harbor thronged with people who were evidently waiting to welcome them.
The excitement of the throngs increased as the airplane drew closer. People jumped up and down, yelled, and waved their hats.  It had been only a few minutes before that Bob had received the radio admonition from the Panama station; "Town gone wild; but hurry in.  You only have six minutes left!"
Now they were circling high over the heads of the populace, with one engine shut off and the speed of the other much reduced.  In graceful, pretty circles the Sky-Bird began to spiral her way downward, John's eyes fastened upon the big white T of the familiar airdrome.  As they came down, people in the outlying districts rushed madly toward the field, and the streets everywhere were choked with the concourse pouring toward the center of attraction.
Scores of others had previously posted themselves in the airdrome; but all were kept back by a cordon of ropes and a guard of Zone policemen. Inside of the barrier were a favored few Government officials and distinguished personages, newspaper men, photographers, and Mr. Giddings and Mr. Wrenn themselves.  Colonel Hess, the judge of the contest, was also present, ready to receive the flyers' affidavits of stops.
As the flyers stepped out of their machine many a camera clicked, and the air was filled with the cheers of the multitude.
Colonel Hess stepped quickly up.  In one hand was a watch; the other was extended.
"My heartiest congratulations, boys!" he exclaimed, as he received their paper.  "You have arrived just in the nick of time.  Panama time, it is now exactly fifty-nine minutes after twelve!"
They had won by one minute!  The flyers were so tickled that they also felt like cheering.  But they were sobered instantly when Mr. Wrenn came forward and they saw how sorrowful he looked in spite of the brave smile with which he greeted them.
"Young men," said the publisher of the Clarion, "as the loser in this contest I also wish to congratulate you.  We have suffered a heavy blow ourselves, but you deserve full credit for the good work you have done, and I am not the kind of a contemporary to withhold compliments so fairly earned.  I trust my men conducted themselves as true sportsmen, poor fellows."
Noticing that Oliver Torrey was on the point of making reply, John gave him a warning look, and a moment later pulled him aside and said in a low voice: "Mr. Wrenn should not know that you fellows did not conduct yourselves otherwise than fair in this race.  That would make him feel all the worse.  Keep mum to _everybody_ about this, and we'll do the same."
Oliver Torrey nodded--tears in his eyes as he saw how desirous the Sky-Bird's crew were of protecting his own interests as well as the good name of his former associates.  What fine fellows they were!  How he wished he could have been allied with them on this cruise, instead of with Pete Deveaux and his bunch!
The hardships and perils of the past ten days were forgotten in the excitement of the present.  Our flyers hardly knew what they were doing, so great was their joy.  They shook hands with scores, hearts swelling with those emotions invoked by achievement and the glamor of the moment.  It was--and always will be, perhaps,--the supreme hour of their lives.
Almost reverently they looked over the Sky-Bird.  Through every possible climatic rigor the airplane had passed, and practically without any attention.  Not once, from the time they had left this very airdrome until they had reached it again, after traversing close to 25,000 miles, had she been under shelter or sulked on them through deficient construction.  Given a few days to overhaul her engines, they felt they would be quite capable of repeating their world record-breaking achievement, if it were necessary.
These reflections were of brief duration, however; for the crowd, having forced its way past the barriers, and having satisfied its curiosity over the machine, directed their attention to the flyers. Brimming with enthusiasm, they lifted every one of them shoulder high, laughing and cheering, and conveyed them to an extemporized platform made from a large box.  From this elevation, each flyer in his turn was called upon for a speech.  The boys made these quite brief, but were vociferously applauded; and then the two famous publishers were asked to contribute.  Following came the governor of the Zone, who very eloquently expressed the pride the little Republic felt in starting off and witnessing the finish of this memorable event, and he said the keys of Panama were at the disposal of the young aviators until they should feel it incumbent upon them to leave for the States.
For three days our friends remained, and during that time they were the almost constant recipients of honors from civic clubs and associations of the city, as well as from the English-speaking citizenry in general. They were entertained at dinners, at the theater, and at sporting events out-of-doors--and not a penny were they allowed to spend themselves.
To the aviators it all seemed like a festival snatched from the covers of "Arabian Nights."  Had genii and fairies, elfs and goblins, appeared before them bearing gifts of gold and jewels they would hardly have been surprised, so unreal did everything appear to their tired minds; and tired bodies only grew more tired under the stress of the social demands.
Strange indeed were their feelings when, upon looking at back files of newspapers, they read the history of their exploits, recorded with a degree of detail which must have taxed the imaginative resources of editorial staffs to gray hairs; and saw picture after picture taken with their own camera and sent across many a continent in the form of undeveloped film, now to bring before their eyes once more the realism of the moment when they were taken.  There were photographs of themselves collectively and individually in many a place now far distant; views of the machine at rest, and of parts of it among the clouds and above them; two views of the fight with the condors; several of Grandpa in various amusing positions; many pictures of foreign places and of natives; illustrations showing the battle with the devil-fish; storms as seen from below, and storms as seen below when flying above them.  Even pictures of the wreck of the _Clarion_, and of Oliver Torrey climbing up the rope ladder, were not missing.
Before the flyers left Panama, Paul received many offers to sell Grandpa to various admirers, but no amount of money could have induced him to part with this faithful little mascot.  Oliver Torrey particularly felt that he owed a great debt of gratitude to the monkey.
When the party finally reached New York City, after a non-incidental flight of one night and the major portion of a day, they were given another ovation--one which far outrivaled in volume the one they had received at Panama.  The mayor and city officials wished to fête them, but the boys were too exhausted to stand more of such doings; they wished to get home as soon as possible, hide from everybody but those in their immediate families, and just rest--rest--rest.  They didn't think they would even care to see their dear old Sky-Bird again for several months.
It would be hard indeed to comprehend the feelings that surged through the flyers as they landed the airplane in the fair-grounds of their own native town--Yonkers--and were greeted by hundreds of familiar faces and voices, to say nothing of the hand-clasps of many old-time friends.
But, after all, the reunion with their own relatives was the cause for the greatest thanksgiving, as we may assume.  Both Paul's and Bob's mothers had prepared the choicest of dinners for their famous sons, and that evening the Ross and Giddings families were the happiest and merriest ones in town.
Mr. Giddings and Mr. Wrenn both realized more out of the advertising than the contest had cost them.  The former met his agreement by giving each of his flyers five thousand dollars, and his business rival did likewise by Oliver Torrey.  Later on, Bob and the Ross boys sold their patents on the Sky-Bird to a large airplane manufacturing company for a sum which promised to make them independent for the rest of their lives.

= = = PG57325 = = =
ARTFUL ANTICKS
Produced by David Edwards, Wayne Hammond and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
Artful Anticks
[Illustration]
Artful Anticks
By Oliver Herford
[Illustration]
New York The Century Co. 1901
Copyright, 1888, 1889, 1890, 1891, 1892, 1893, 1894, BY THE CENTURY CO.
Copyright, 1894, by OLIVER HERFORD.
THE DE VINNE PRESS.
Table of Contents.
PAGE
THE AUDACIOUS KITTEN                                               1
THE ARTFUL ANT                                                     4
THE GIFTED ANT                                                    10
SIR RAT. A Comedy                                                 16
THE DECEITFUL DORMICE                                             22
NATURE AND ART                                                    24
THE GEOMETRICAL GIRAFFE                                           25
THE EARLY OWL                                                     32
A DARK CAREER                                                     35
A PACKET OF LETTERS                                               37
THE NAUGHTY FAY                                                   43
THE MILLER’S QUEST                                                46
NELL’S FAIRY TALE                                                 50
THE UNFORTUNATE GIRAFFE                                           52
STOCKINGS OR SCALES                                               53
A RIDDLE                                                          54
GOOD-BYE                                                          56
THE PROFESSOR AND THE WHITE VIOLET                                58
THE FIRST ROSE OF SUMMER                                          60
THE ELF AND THE DORMOUSE                                          62
THE CROCODILE                                                     64
THE FORGETFUL FORGET-ME-NOT                                       69
THE BIRDS’ FAREWELL                                               72
THE SPIDER’S TALE                                                 73
HIGHLY CONNECTED                                                  78
THE MISER ELF                                                     79
THE POINT OF VIEW                                                 84
HEROES                                                            88
A BELATED VIOLET                                                  89
THE PARROT AND THE CUCKOO                                         92
THE ELF AND THE BEE                                               96
A FABLE                                                           97
THE FAIRIES’ CONCERT                                              98
The pictures in “The Point of View” are used by permission of Messrs. Harper and Brothers.
Artful Anticks
The Audacious Kitten.
[Illustration]
“Hurray!” cried the kitten, “Hurray!” As he merrily set the sails; “I sail o’er the ocean to-day To look at the Prince of Wales!”
“O kitten! O kitten!” I cried, “Why tempt the angry gales?” “I’m going,” the kitten replied, “To look at the Prince of Wales!
“I know what it is to get wet, I’ve tumbled full oft into pails And nearly been drowned--and yet I _must_ look at the Prince of Wales!”
“O kitten!” I cried, “the Deep Is deeper than many pails!” Said the kitten,“I shall not sleep Till I’ve looked at the Prince of Wales!”
“O kitten! pause at the brink, And think of the sad sea tales.” “Ah, yes,” said the kitten, “but think, Oh, think of the Prince of Wales!”
[Illustration]
“But, kitten!” I cried, dismayed, “If you live through the angry gales You _know_ you will be afraid To look at the Prince of Wales!”
Said the kitten, “No such thing! Why should he make me wince? If ‘_a Cat may look at a King_,’ A kitten may look at a Prince!”
[Illustration]
The Artful Ant.
[Illustration]
Once on a time an artful Ant Resolved to give a ball, For tho’ in stature she was scant, She was not what you’d call A shy or bashful little Ant. (She was not shy at all.)
She sent her invitations through The forest far and wide, To all the Birds and Beasts she knew, And many more beside. (“You never know what you can do,” Said she, “until you’ve tried.”)
Five score acceptances came in Faster than she could read. Said she: “Dear me! I’d best begin To stir myself indeed!” (A pretty pickle she was in, With five-score guests to feed!)
[Illustration]
The artful Ant sat up all night, A-thinking o’er and o’er, How she could make from nothing, quite Enough to feed five-score. (Between ourselves I think she might Have thought of that before.)
She thought, and thought, and thought all night, And all the following day, Till suddenly she struck a bright Idea, which was--(but stay! Just what it was I am not quite At liberty to say.)
[Illustration]
Approaching Nieuport, they discovered the Dunes to be full of soldiers, who had dug pits behind the sandy hillocks for protection, and in them planted the dog-artillery and one or two large machine guns. These were trained on the distant line of Germans, who were also entrenching themselves. All along the edge of the village the big guns were in action and there was a constant interchange of shot and shell from both sides.
As Maurie dodged among the houses with the big car a shell descended some two hundred yards to the left of them, exploded with a crash and sent a shower of brick and splinters high into the air. A little way farther on the ruins of a house completely blocked the street and they were obliged to turn back and seek another passage. Thus partially skirting the town they at last left the houses behind them and approached the firing line, halting scarcely a quarter of a mile distant from the actual conflict.
As far as the eye could reach, from Nieuport to the sea at the left, and on toward Ypres at the right of them, the line of Belgians, French and British steadily faced the foe. Close to where they halted the ambulance stood a detachment that had lately retired from the line, their places having been taken by reserves. One of the officers told Mr. Merrick that they had been facing bullets since daybreak and the men seemed almost exhausted. Their faces were blackened by dust and powder and their uniforms torn and disordered; many stood without caps or coats despite the chill in the air. And yet these fellows were laughing together and chatting as pleasantly as children just released from school. Even those who had wounds made light of their hurts. Clouds of smoke hovered low in the air; the firing was incessant.
Our girls were thrilled by this spectacle as they had never been thrilled before--perhaps never might be again. While they still kept their seats, Maurie started with a sudden jerk, made a sharp turn and ran the ambulance across a ridge of solid earth that seemed to be the only one of such character amongst all that waste of sand. It brought them somewhat closer to the line but their driver drew up behind a great dune that afforded them considerable protection.
Fifty yards away was another ambulance with its wheels buried to the hubs in the loose sand. Red Cross nurses and men wearing the emblem on their arms and caps were passing here and there, assisting the injured with "first aid," temporarily bandaging heads, arms and legs or carrying to the rear upon a stretcher a more seriously injured man. Most of this corps were French; a few were English; some were Belgian. Our friends were the only Americans on the field.
Uncle John's face was very grave as he alighted in the wake of his girls, who paid no attention to the fighting but at once ran to assist some of the wounded who came staggering toward the ambulance, some even creeping painfully on hands and knees. In all Mr. Merrick's conceptions of the important mission they had undertaken, nothing like the nature of this desperate conflict had even dawned upon him. He had known that the Red Cross was respected by all belligerents, and that knowledge had led him to feel that his girls would be fairly safe; but never had he counted on spent bullets, stray shells or the mad rush of a charge.
"Very good!" cried Maurie briskly. "Here we see what no one else can see. The Red Cross is a fine passport to the grand stand of war."
"Come with me--quick!" shouted Ajo, his voice sounding shrill through the din. "I saw a fellow knocked out--there--over yonder!"
As he spoke he grabbed a stretcher and ran forward, Maurie following at his heels. Uncle John saw the smoke swallow them up, saw Beth and Maud each busy with lint, plasters and bandages, saw Patsy supporting a tall, grizzled warrior who came limping toward the car. Then he turned and saw Doctor Gys, crouching low against the protecting sand, his disfigured face working convulsively and every limb trembling as with an ague.
CHAPTER VIII
THE COWARD
"Great heavens!" gasped Mr. Merrick, running toward the doctor. "Are you hit?"
Gys looked up at him appealingly and nodded.
"Where did it strike you? Was it a bullet--or what?"
The doctor wrung his hands, moaning pitifully. Uncle John bent over him.
"Tell me," he said. "Tell me, Gys!"
"I--I'm scared, sir--s-s-scared stiff. It's that yellow s-s-s-streak in me; I--I--can't help it, sir." Then he collapsed, crouching lifelessly close to the sand.
Uncle John was amazed. He drew back with such an expression of scorn that Gys, lying with face upward, rolled over to hide his own features in the sand. But his form continued to twist and shake convulsively.
Patsy came up with her soldier, whose gaudy uniform proclaimed him an officer. He had a rugged, worn face, gray hair and mustache, stern eyes. His left side was torn and bleeding where a piece of shell had raked him from shoulder to knee. No moan did he utter as Mr. Merrick and the girl assisted him to one of the swinging beds, and then Patsy, with white, set face but steady hands, began at once to cut away the clothing and get at the wound. This was her first practical experience and she meant to prove her mettle or perish in the attempt.
Uncle John skipped over to the sand bank and clutched Gys savagely by the collar.
"Get up!" he commanded. "Here's a man desperately wounded, who needs your best skill--and at once."
Gys pulled himself free and sat up, seeming dazed for the moment. Then he rubbed his head briskly with both hands, collected his nerve and slowly rose to his feet. He cast fearful glances at the firing line, but the demand for his surgical skill was a talisman that for a time enabled him to conquer his terror. With frightened backward glances he ran to the ambulance and made a dive into it as if a pack of wolves was at his heels.
Safely inside, one glance at the wounded man caused Gys to stiffen suddenly. He became steady and alert and noting that Patsy had now bared a portion of the gaping wound the doctor seized a thermos flask of hot water and in a moment was removing the clotted blood in a deft and intelligent manner.
Now came Jones and Maurie bearing the man they had picked up. As they set the stretcher down, Uncle John came over.
"Shall we put him inside?" asked Mr. Merrick.
"No use, I think," panted the Belgian.
"Where's the doctor?" asked Ajo.
Kelsey, who had been busy elsewhere, now approached and looked at the soldier on the stretcher.
"The man is dead," he said. "He doesn't need us now."
"Off with him, then!" cried Maurie, and they laid the poor fellow upon the sand and covered him with a cloth. "Come, then," urged the little chauffeur, excitedly, "lots more out there are still alive. We get one quick."
They left in a run in one direction while Kelsey, who had come to the ambulance for supplies, went another way. Mr. Merrick looked around for the other two girls. Only Maud Stanton was visible through the smoky haze. Uncle John approached her just as a shell dropped into the sand not fifty feet away. It did not explode but plowed a deep furrow and sent a shower of sand in every direction.
Maud had just finished dressing a bullet wound in the arm of a young soldier who smiled as he watched her. Then, as she finished the work, he bowed low, muttered his thanks, and catching up his gun rushed back into the fray. It was a flesh wound and until it grew more painful he could still fight.
"Where are the Germans?" asked Uncle John. "I haven't seen one yet."
As he spoke a great cheer rose from a thousand throats. The line before them wavered an instant and then rushed forward and disappeared in the smoke of battle.
"Is it a charge, do you think?" asked Maud, as they stood peering into the haze.
"I--I don't know," he stammered. "This is so--so bewildering--that it all seems like a dream. Where's Beth?"
"I don't know."
"Are you looking for a young lady--a nurse?" asked a voice beside them. "She's over yonder," he swung one arm toward the distant sand dunes. The other was in a sling. "She has just given me first aid and sent me to the rear--God bless her!" Then he trailed on, a British Tommy Atkins, while with one accord Maud and Uncle John moved in the direction he had indicated.
"She mustn't be so reckless," said Beth's uncle, nervously. "It's bad enough back here, but every step nearer the firing line doubles the danger."
"I do not agree with you, sir," answered Maud quietly. "A man was killed not two paces from me, a little while ago."
He shuddered and wiped the sweat from his forehead with a handkerchief, but made no reply. They climbed another line of dunes and in the hollow beyond came upon several fallen soldiers, one of whom was moaning with pain. Maud ran to kneel beside him and in a twinkling had her hypodermic needle in his arm.
"Bear it bravely," she said in French. "The pain will stop in a few minutes and then I'll come and look after you."
He nodded gratefully, still moaning, and she hurried to rejoin Mr. Merrick.
"Beth must be in the next hollow," said Uncle John as she overtook him, and his voice betrayed his nervous tension. "I do wish you girls would not be so reckless."
Yes; they found her in the next hollow, where several men were grouped about her. She was dressing the shattered hand of a soldier, while two or three others were patiently awaiting her services. Just beside her a sweet-faced Sister of Mercy was bending over a dying man, comforting him with her prayers. Over the ridge of sand could be heard the "ping" of small arms mingled with the hoarse roar of machine guns. Another great shout--long and enthusiastic--was borne to their ears.
"That is good," said a tall man standing in the group about Beth; "I think, from the sound, we have captured their guns."
"I'm sure of it, your Majesty," replied the one whom Beth was attending. "There; that will do for the present. I thank you. And now, let us get forward."
As they ran toward the firing Uncle John exclaimed:
"His Majesty! I wonder who they are?"
"That," said a private soldier, an accent of pride in his voice, "is our Albert."
"The king?"
"Yes, monsieur; he is the tall one. The other is General Mays. I'm sure we have driven the Germans back, and that is lucky, for before our charge they had come too close for comfort."
"The king gave me a ring," said Beth, displaying it. "He seemed glad I was here to help his soldiers, but warned me to keep further away from the line. King Albert speaks English perfectly and told me he loves America better than any other country except his own."
"He has traveled in your country," explained the soldier. "But then, our Albert has traveled everywhere--before he was king."
Betwixt them Maud and Beth quickly applied first aid to the others in the group and then Uncle John said:
"Let us take the king's advice and get back to the ambulance. We left only Patsy and Dr. Gys there and I'm sure you girls will be needed."
On their return they came upon a man sitting in a hollow and calmly leaning against a bank of sand, smoking a cigarette. He wore a gray uniform.
"Ah, a German!" exclaimed Maud. She ran up to him and asked: "Are you hurt?"
He glanced at her uniform, nodded, and pointed to his left foot. It had nearly all been torn away below the ankle. A handkerchief was twisted about the leg, forming a rude tourniquet just above the wound, and this had served to stay the flow of blood.
"Run quickly for the stretcher," said Maud to Uncle John. "I will stay with him until your return."
Without a word he hurried away, Beth following. They found, on reaching the ambulance, that Maurie and Jones had been busy. Five of the swinging beds were already occupied.
"Save the other one," said Beth. "Maud has found a German." Then she hurried to assist Patsy, as the two doctors had their hands full.
Jones and Maurie started away with the stretcher, Uncle John guiding them to the dunes where Maud was waiting, and presently they had the wounded German comfortably laid in the last bed.
"Now, then, back to the ship," said Gys. "We have in our care two lives, at least, that can only be saved by prompt operations."
Maurie got into the driver's seat.
"Careful, now!" cautioned Jones, beside him.
"Of course," replied the Belgian, starting the motor; "there are many sores inside. But if they get a jolt, now and then, it will serve to remind them that they are suffering for their country."
He began to back up, for the sand ahead was too deep for a turn, and the way he managed the huge car along that narrow ridge aroused the admiration of Ajo, who alone was able to witness the marvelous performance. Slowly, with many turns, they backed to the road, where Maurie swung the ambulance around and then stopped with a jerk that drew several groans from the interior of the car.
"What's wrong?" asked Mr. Merrick, sticking his head from a window.
"We nearly ran over a man," answered Jones, climbing down from his seat. "Our front wheels are right against him, but Maurie stopped in time."
Lying flat upon his face, diagonally across the roadway, was the form of a man in the blue-and-red uniform of the Belgian army. Maurie backed the ambulance a yard or so as Maud sprang out and knelt beside the prostrate form.
The firing, which had lulled for a few minutes, suddenly redoubled in fury. There rose a wild, exultant shout, gradually drawing nearer.
"Quick!" shouted Gys, trembling and wringing his hands. "The Germans are charging. Drive on, man--drive on!"
But Maurie never moved.
"The Germans are charging, sure enough," he answered, as the line of retreating Belgians became visible. "But they must stop here, for we've blocked the road."
All eyes but those of Maud were now turned upon the fray, which was practically a hand to hand conflict. Nearer and nearer came the confused mass of warriors and then, scarce a hundred yards away, it halted and the Belgians stood firm.
"He isn't dead," said Maud, coming to the car. "Help me to put him inside."
"There is no room," protested Gys.
The girl looked at him scornfully.
"We will make room," she replied.
A bullet shattered a pane of glass just beside the crouching doctor, but passed on through an open window without injuring anyone. In fact, bullets were singing around them with a freedom that made others than Dr. Gys nervous. It was chubby little Uncle John who helped Jones carry the wounded man to the ambulance, where they managed to stretch him upon the floor. This arrangement sent Patsy to the front seat outside, with Maurie and Ajo, although her uncle strongly protested that she had no right to expose her precious life so wantonly.
There was little time for argument, however. Even as the girl was climbing to her seat the line of Belgians broke and came pouring toward them. Maurie was prompt in starting the car and the next moment the ambulance was rolling swiftly along the smooth highway in the direction of Dunkirk and the sounds of fray grew faint behind them.
CHAPTER IX
COURAGE, OR PHILOSOPHY?
"I never realized," said Maud, delightedly, "what a strictly modern, professional hospital ship Uncle John has made of this, until we put it to practical use. I am sure it is better than those makeshifts we observed at Calais, and more comfortable than those crowded hospitals on land. Every convenience is at our disposal and if our patients do not recover rapidly it will be because their condition is desperate."
She had just come on deck after a long and trying session in assisting Doctors Gys and Kelsey to care for the injured, a session during which Beth and Patsy had also stood nobly to their gruesome task. There were eleven wounded, altogether, in their care, and although some of these were in a critical condition the doctors had insisted that the nurses needed rest.
"It is Dr. Gys who deserves credit for fitting the ship," replied Mr. Merrick, modestly, to Maud's enthusiastic comment, "and Ajo is responsible for the ship itself, which seems admirably suited to our purpose. By the way, how is Gys behaving now? Is he still shaking with fear?"
"No, he seems to have recovered his nerve. Isn't it a terrible affliction?"
"Cowardice? Well, my dear, it is certainly an unusual affliction in this country and in these times. I have been amazed to-day at the courage I have witnessed. These Belgians are certainly a brave lot."
"But no braver than the German we brought with us," replied Maud thoughtfully. "One would almost think he had no sensation, yet he must be suffering terribly. The doctor will amputate the remnants of his foot in an hour or so, but the man positively refuses to take an anaesthetic."
"Does he speak English or French?"
"No; only German. But Captain Carg understands German and so he has been acting as our interpreter."
"How about the Belgian we picked up on the road?"
"He hasn't recovered consciousness yet. He is wounded in the back and in trying to get to the rear became insensible from loss of blood."
"From what I saw I wouldn't suppose any Belgian could be wounded in the back," remarked Uncle John doubtfully.
"It was a shell," she said, "and perhaps exploded behind him. It's a bad wound, Dr. Gys says, but if he regains strength he may recover."
During this conversation Patsy Doyle was lying in her stateroom below and crying bitterly, while her cousin Beth strove to soothe her. All unused to such horrors as she had witnessed that day, the girl had managed to retain her nerve by sheer force of will until the Red Cross party had returned to the ship and extended first aid to the wounded; but the moment Dr. Gys dismissed her she broke down completely.
Beth was no more accustomed to bloodshed than her cousin, but she had anticipated such scenes as they had witnessed, inasmuch as her year of training as nurse had prepared her for them. She had also been a close student of the daily press and from her reading had gleaned a knowledge of the terrible havoc wrought by this great war. Had Patsy not given way, perhaps Beth might have done so herself, and really it was Maud Stanton who bore the ordeal with the most composure.
After a half hour on deck Maud returned to the hospital section quite refreshed, and proceeded to care for the patients. She alone assisted Gys and Kelsey to amputate the German's foot, an operation the man bore splendidly, quite unaware, however, that they had applied local anaesthetics to dull the pain. Dr. Gys was a remarkably skillful surgeon and he gave himself no rest until every one of the eleven had received such attention as his wounds demanded. Even Kelsey felt the strain by that time and as Maud expressed her intention of remaining to minister to the wants of the crippled soldiers, the two doctors went on deck for a smoke and a brief relaxation.
By this time Beth had quieted Patsy, mainly by letting her have her cry out, and now brought her on deck to join the others and get the fresh air. So quickly had events followed one another on this fateful day that it was now only four o'clock in the afternoon. None of them had thought of luncheon, so the ship's steward now brought tea and sandwiches to those congregated on deck.
As they sat together in a group, drinking tea and discussing the exciting events of the day, little Maurie came sauntering toward them and removed his cap.
"Your pardon," said he, "but--are the wounded all cared for?"
"As well as we are able to care for them at present," answered Beth. "And let me thank you, Jakob Maurie--let us all thank you--for the noble work you did for us to-day."
"Pah! it was nothing," said he, shifting from one foot to another. "I enjoyed it, mamselle. It was such fun to dive into the battle and pull out the wounded. It helped them, you see, and it gave us a grand excitement. Otherwise, had I not gone with you, I would be as ignorant as all in Dunkirk still are, for the poor people do not yet know what has happened at the front."
"We hardly know ourselves what has happened," said Uncle John. "We can hear the boom of guns yet, even at this distance, and we left the battle line flowing back and forth like the waves of the ocean. Have a cup of tea, Maurie?"
The man hesitated.
"I do not like to disturb anyone," he said slowly, "but if one of the young ladies is disengaged I would be grateful if she looks at my arm."
"Your arm!" exclaimed Beth, regarding him wonderingly as he stood before her.
Maurie smiled.
"It is hardly worth mentioning, mamselle, but a bullet--"
"Take off your coat," she commanded, rising from her seat to assist him.
Maurie complied. His shirt was stained with blood. Beth drew out her scissors and cut away the sleeve of his left arm. A bullet had passed directly through the flesh, but without harming bone or muscle.
"Why didn't you tell us before?" she asked reproachfully.
"It amounted to so little, beside the other hurts you had to attend," he answered. "I am shamed, mamselle, that I came to you at all. A little water and a cloth will make it all right."
Patsy had already gone for the water and in a few minutes Beth was deftly cleansing the wound.
"How did it happen, Maurie?" asked Jones. "I was with you most of the time and noticed nothing wrong. Besides, you said nothing about it."
"It was on the road, just as we picked up that fallen soldier with the hole in his back. The fight jumped toward us pretty quick, you remember, and while I sat at the wheel the bullet came. I knew when it hit me, but I also knew I could move my arm, so what did it matter? I told myself to wait till we got to the ship. Had we stayed there longer, we might all have stopped bullets--and some bullets might have stopped us." He grinned, as if the aphorism amused him, and added: "To know when to run is the perfection of courage."
"Does it hurt?" asked Uncle John, as Beth applied the lint and began winding the bandage.
"It reminds me it is there, monsieur; but I will be ready for another trip to-morrow. Thank you, mamselle. Instead of the tea, I would like a little brandy."
"Give him some in the tea," suggested Gys, noting that Maurie swayed a little. "Sit down, man, and be comfortable. That's it. I'd give a million dollars for your nerve."
"Have you so much money?" asked Maurie.
"No."
"Then I cannot see that you lack nerve," said the little Belgian thoughtfully. "I was watching you to-day, M'sieur Doctor, and I believe what you lack is courage."
Gys stared so hard at him with the one good eye that even Maurie became embarrassed and turned away his head. Sipping his tea and brandy he presently resumed, in a casual tone:
"Never have I indulged in work of more interest than this. We go into the thick of the fight, yet are we safe from harm. We do good to both sides, because the men who do the fighting are not to blame for the war, at all. The leaders of politics say to the generals: 'We have declared war; go and fight.' The generals say to the soldiers: 'We are told to fight, so come on. We do not know why, but it is our duty, because it is our profession. So go and die, or get shot to pieces, or lose some arms and legs, as it may happen.' The business of the soldiers is to obey; they must back up the policies of their country, right or wrong. But do those who send them into danger ever get hurt? Not to the naked eye."
"Why, you're quite a philosopher, Maurie," said Patsy.
"It is true," agreed the Belgian. "But philosophy is like courage--easy to assume. We strut and talk big; we call the politicians sharks, the soldiers fools; but does it do any good? The war will go on; the enemy will destroy our homes, separate our families, take away our bread and leave us to starve; but we have the privilege to philosophize, if we like. For myself, I thank them for nothing!"
"I suppose you grieve continually for your wife," said Patsy.
"Not so much that, mamselle, but I know she is grieving for me," he replied.
"As soon as we find time," continued the girl, "we intend to search for your wife and children. I am sure we can find them for you."
Maurie moved uneasily in his chair.
"I beg you to take no trouble on my account," said he. "With the Red Cross you have great work to accomplish. What is the despair of one poor Walloon to you?"
"It is a great deal to us, Maurie," returned the girl, earnestly. "You have been a friend in need; without you we could not have made our dash to the front to-day. We shall try to repay you by finding your wife."
He was silent, but his troubled look told of busy thoughts.
"What does she look like?" inquired Beth. "Have you her photograph?"
"No; she would not make a good picture, mamselle," he answered with a sigh. "Clarette is large; she is fat; she has a way of scowling when one does not bring in more wood than the fire can eat up; and she is very religious."
"With that description I am sure we can find her," cried Patsy enthusiastically.
He seemed disturbed.
"If you please," said he plaintively, "Clarette is quite able to take care of herself. She has a strong will."
"But if you know she is safe it will relieve your anxiety," suggested Beth. "You told us yesterday you had been searching everywhere for her."
"If I said everywhere, I was wrong, for poor Clarette must be somewhere. And since yesterday I have been thinking with more deliberation, and I have decided," he added, his tone becoming confidential, "that it is better I do not find Clarette just now. It might destroy my usefulness to the Red Cross."
"But your children!" protested Patsy. "Surely you cannot rest at ease with your two dear children wandering about, in constant danger."
"To be frank, mamselle," said he, "they are not my children. I had a baby, but it was killed, as I told you. The boy and girl I have mentioned were born when Clarette was the wife of another man--a blacksmith at Dinant--who had a sad habit of beating her."
"But you love the little ones, I am sure."
He shook his head.
"They have somewhat the temper of their father, the blacksmith. I took them when I took Clarette--just as I took the silver spoons and the checkered tablespread she brought with her--but now that a cruel fate has separated me from the children, perhaps it is all for the best."
The doctor gave a snort of disgust, while Ajo smiled. The girls were too astonished to pursue the conversation, but now realized that Maurie's private affairs did not require their good offices to untangle. Uncle John was quite amused at the Belgian's confession and was the only one to reply.
"Fate often seems cruel when she is in her happiest mood," said he. "Perhaps, Maurie, your Clarette will come to you without your seeking her, for all Belgium seems headed toward France just now. What do you think? Will the Germans capture Dunkirk?"
The man brightened visibly at this turn in the conversation.
"Not to-day, sir; not for days to come," he replied. "The French cannot afford to lose Dunkirk, and by to-morrow they will pour an irresistible horde against the German invader. If we stay here, we are sure to remain in the rear of the firing line."
CHAPTER X
THE WAR'S VICTIMS
While the others were conversing on deck Maud Stanton was ministering to the maimed victims of the war's cruelty, who tossed and moaned below. The main cabin and its accompanying staterooms had been fitted with all the conveniences of a modern hospital. Twenty-two could easily be accommodated in the rooms and a dozen more in the cabin, so that the eleven now in their charge were easily cared for. Of these, only three had been seriously injured. One was the German, who, however, was now sleeping soundly under the influence of the soothing potion that followed his operation. The man's calmness and iron nerve indicated that he would make a rapid recovery. Another was the young Belgian soldier picked up in the roadway near the firing line, who had been shot in the back and had not yet recovered consciousness. Dr. Gys had removed several bits of exploded shell and dressed the wound, shaking his head discouragingly. But since the young man was still breathing, with a fairly regular respiration, no attempt was made to restore him to his senses.
The third seriously injured was a French sergeant whose body was literally riddled with shrapnel. A brief examination had convinced Gys that the case was hopeless.
"He may live until morning," was the doctor's report as he calmly looked down upon the moaning sergeant, "but no longer. Meanwhile, we must prevent his suffering."
This he accomplished by means of powerful drugs. The soldier soon lay in a stupor, awaiting the end, and nothing more could be done for him.
Of the others, two Belgians with bandaged heads were playing a quiet game of écarté in a corner of the cabin, while another with a slight wound in his leg was stretched upon a couch, reading a book. A young French officer who had lost three fingers of his hand was cheerfully conversing with a comrade whose scalp had been torn by a bullet and who declared that in two days he would return to the front. The others Maud found asleep in their berths or lying quietly to ease their pain. It was remarkable, however, how little suffering was caused these men by flesh wounds, once they were properly dressed and the patients made comfortable with food and warmth and the assurance of proper care.
So it was that Maud found her duties not at all arduous this evening. Indeed, the sympathy she felt for these brave men was so strong that it wearied her more than the actual work of nursing them. A sip of water here, a cold compress there, the administration of medicines to keep down or prevent fever, little attentions of this character were all that were required. Speaking French fluently, she was able to converse with all those under her charge and all seemed eager to relate to their beautiful nurse their experiences, hopes and griefs. Soon she realized she was beginning to learn more of the true nature of war than she had ever gleaned from the correspondents of the newspapers.
When dinner was served in the forward cabin Beth relieved Maud and after the evening meal Dr. Gys made another inspection of his patients. All seemed doing well except the young Belgian. The condition of the French sergeant was still unchanged. Some of those with minor injuries were ordered on deck for a breath of fresh air.
Patsy relieved Beth at midnight and Maud came on duty again at six o'clock, having had several hours of refreshing sleep. She found Patsy trembling with nervousness, for the sergeant had passed away an hour previous and the horror of the event had quite upset the girl.
"Oh, it is all so unnecessary!" she wailed as she threw herself into Maud's arms.
"We must steel ourselves to such things, dear," said Maud, soothing her, "for they will be of frequent occurrence, I fear. And we must be grateful and glad that we were able to relieve the poor man's anguish and secure for him a peaceful end."
"I know," answered Patsy with a little sob, "but it's so dreadful. Oh, what a cruel, hateful thing war is!"
From papers found on the sergeant Uncle John was able to notify his relatives of his fate. His home was in a little village not fifty miles away and during the day a brother arrived to take charge of the remains and convey them to their last resting place.
The following morning Captain Carg was notified by the authorities to withdraw the _Arabella_ to an anchorage farther out in the bay, and thereafter it became necessary to use the two launches for intercourse between the ship and the city. Continuous cannonading could be heard from the direction of Nieuport, Dixmude and Ypres, and it was evident that the battle had doubled in intensity at all points, owing to heavy reinforcements being added to both sides. But, as Maurie had predicted, the Allies were able to hold the foe at bay and keep them from advancing a step farther.
Uncle John had not been at all satisfied with that first day's experience at the front. He firmly believed it was unwise, to the verge of rashness, to allow the girls to place themselves in so dangerous a position. During a serious consultation with Jones, Kelsey, Captain Carg and Dr. Gys, the men agreed upon a better plan of procedure.
"The three nurses have plenty to do in attending to the patients in our hospital," said Gys, "and when the ship has its full quota of wounded they will need assistance or they will break down under the strain. Our young ladies are different from the professional nurses; they are so keenly sensitive that they suffer from sympathy with every patient that comes under their care."
"I do not favor their leaving the ship," remarked Dr. Kelsey, the mate. "There seems to be plenty of field workers at the front, supplied by the governments whose troops are fighting."
"Therefore," added Jones, "we men must assume the duty of driving the ambulances and bringing back the wounded we are able to pick up. As Maurie is too stiff from his wound to drive to-day, I shall undertake the job myself. I know the way, now, and am confident I shall get along nicely. Who will go with me?"
"I will, of course," replied Kelsey quietly.
"Doctor Gys will be needed on the ship," asserted Uncle John.
"Yes, it will be best to leave me here," said Gys. "I'm too great a coward to go near the firing line again. It destroys my usefulness, and Kelsey can administer first aid as well as I."
"In that case, I think I shall take the small ambulance to-day," decided Ajo. "With Dr. Kelsey and one of the sailors we shall manage very well."
A launch took them ashore, where the ambulances stood upon the dock. Maurie had admitted his inability to drive, but asked to be allowed to go into the town. So he left the ship with the others and disappeared for the day.
Ajo took the same route he had covered before, in the direction of Nieuport, but could not get within five miles of the town, which was now held by the Germans. From Furnes to the front the roads were packed with reinforcements and wagon trains bearing ammunition and supplies, and further progress with the ambulance was impossible.
However, a constant stream of wounded flowed to the rear, some with first aid bandages covering their injuries, others as yet uncared for. Kelsey chose those whom he considered most in need of surgical care or skillful nursing, and by noon the ambulance was filled to overflowing. It was Jones who advised taking none of the fatally injured, as the army surgeons paid especial attention to these. The Americans could be of most practical use, the boy considered, by taking in charge such as had a chance to recover. So nine more patients were added to the ship's colony on this occasion, all being delivered to the care of Dr. Gys without accident or delay--a fact that rendered Ajo quite proud of his skillful driving.
While the ambulance was away the girls quietly passed from berth to berth, encouraging and caring for their wounded. It was surprising how interested they became in the personality of these soldiers, for each man was distinctive either in individuality or the character of his injury, and most of them were eager to chat with their nurses and anxious for news of the battle.
During the morning the young Belgian who had lain until now in a stupor, recovered consciousness. He had moaned once or twice, drawing Maud to his side, but hearing a different sound from him she approached the berth where he lay, to find his eyes wide open. Gradually he turned them upon his nurse, as if feeling her presence, and after a moment of observation he sighed and then smiled wanly.
"Still on earth?" he said in French.
"I am so glad," she replied. "You have been in dreamland a long time."
He tried to move and it brought a moan to his lips.
"Don't stir," she counseled warningly; "you are badly wounded."
He was silent for a time, staring at the ceiling. She held some water to his lips and he drank eagerly. Finally he said in a faint voice:
"I remember, now. I had turned to reload and it hit me in the back. A bullet, mademoiselle?"
"Part of a shell."
"Ah, I understand.... I tried to get to the rear. The pain was terrible. No one seemed to notice me. At last I fell, and--then I slept. I thought it was the end."
She bathed his forehead, saying:
"You must not talk any more at present. Here comes the doctor to see you."
Gys, busy in the cabin, had heard their voices and now came to look at his most interesting patient. The soldier seemed about twenty years of age; he was rather handsome, with expressive eyes and features bearing the stamp of culture. Already they knew his name, by means of an identification card found upon him, as well as a small packet of letters carefully pinned in an inner pocket of his coat. These last were all addressed in the same handwriting, which was undoubtedly feminine, to Andrew Denton. The card stated that Andrew Denton, private, was formerly an insurance agent at Antwerp.
Doctor Gys had rather impatiently awaited the young man's return to consciousness that he might complete his examination. He now devoted the next half hour to a careful diagnosis of Denton's injuries. By this time the patient was suffering intense pain and a hypodermic injection of morphine was required to relieve him. When at last he was quietly drowsing the doctor called Maud aside to give her instructions.
"Watch him carefully," said he, "and don't let him suffer. Keep up the morphine."
"There is no hope, then?" she asked.
"Not the slightest. He may linger for days--even weeks, if we sustain his strength--but recovery is impossible. That bit of shell tore a horrible hole in the poor fellow and all we can do is keep him comfortable until the end. Without the morphine he would not live twelve hours."
"Shall I let him talk?"
"If he wishes to. His lungs are not involved, so it can do him no harm."
But Andrew Denton did not care to talk any more that day. He wanted to think, and lay quietly until Beth came on duty. To her he gave a smile and a word of thanks and again lapsed into thoughtful silence.
When Ajo brought the new consignment of wounded to the ship the doctors and nurses found themselves pretty busy for a time. With wounds to dress and one or two slight operations to perform, the afternoon passed swiftly away. The old patients must not be neglected, either, so Captain Carg said he would sit with the German and look after him, as he was able to converse with the patient in his own tongue.
The German was resting easily to-day but proved as glum and uncommunicative as ever. That did not worry the captain, who gave the man a cigarette and, when it was nonchalantly accepted, lighted his own pipe. Together they sat in silence and smoked, the German occupying an easy chair and resting his leg upon a stool, for he had refused to lie in a berth. Through the open window the dull boom of artillery could constantly be heard. After an hour or so:
"A long fight," remarked the captain in German.
The other merely looked at him, contemplatively. Carg stared for five minutes at the bandaged foot. Finally:
"Hard luck," said he.
This time the German nodded, looking at the foot also.
"In America," resumed the captain, puffing slowly, "they make fine artificial feet. Walk all right. Look natural."
"Vienna," said the German.
"Yes, I suppose so." Another pause.
"Name?" asked the German, with startling abruptness. But the other never winked.
"Carg. I'm a sailor. Captain of this ship. Live in Sangoa, when ashore."
"Sangoa?"
"Island in South Seas."
The wounded man reached for another cigarette and lighted it.
"Carg," he repeated, musingly. "German?"
"Why, my folks were, I believe. I've relations in Germany, yet. Munich. Visited them once, when a boy. Mother's name was Elbl. The Cargs lived next door to the Elbls. But they've lost track of me, and I of them. Nothing in common, you see."
The German finished his cigarette, looking at the captain at times reflectively. Carg, feeling his biography had not been appreciated, had lapsed into silence. At length the wounded man began feeling in his breast pocket--an awkward operation because the least action disturbed the swathed limb--and presently drew out a leather card case. With much deliberation he abstracted a card and handed it to the captain, who put on his spectacles and read:
"Otto Elbl. 12th Uhlans"
"Oh," he said, looking up to examine the German anew. "Otto Elbl of Munich?"
"Yes."
"H-m. Number 121 Friedrichstrasse?"
"Yes."
"I didn't see you when I visited your family. They said you were at college. Your father was William Elbl, my mother's brother."
The German stretched out his hand and gripped the fist of the captain.
"Cousins," he said.
Carg nodded, meditating.
"To be sure," he presently returned; "cousins. Have another cigarette."
CHAPTER XI
PATSY IS DEFIANT
That evening the captain joined Dr. Gys on deck.
"That German, Lieutenant Elbl," he began.
"Oh, is that his name?" asked Gys.
"Yes. Will he get well?"
"Certainly. What is a foot, to a man like him? But his soldiering days are past."
"Perhaps that's fortunate," returned the captain, ruminatively. "When I was a boy, his father was burgomaster--mayor--in Munich. People said he was well-to-do. The Germans are thrifty, so I suppose there's still money in the Elbl family."
"Money will do much to help reconcile the man to the loss of his foot," declared the doctor.
"Will he suffer much pain, while it is getting well?"
"Not if I can help it. The fellow bears pain with wonderful fortitude. When I was in Yucatan, and had to slash my face to get out the poisoned darts of the cactus, I screamed till you could have heard me a mile. And I had no anaesthetic to soothe me. Your lieutenant never whimpered or cringed with his mangled foot and he refused morphine when I operated on it. But I fooled him. I hate to see a brave man suffer. I stuck a needle just above the wound when he wasn't looking, and I've doped his medicine ever since."
"Thank you," said Carg; "he's my cousin."
In the small hours of the next morning, while Patsy was on duty in the hospital section, the young Belgian became wakeful and restless. She promptly administered a sedative and sat by his bedside. After a little his pain was eased and he became quiet, but he lay there with wide open eyes.
"Can I do anything more for you?" she asked.
"If you would be so kind," replied Andrew Denton.
"Well?"
"Please read to me some letters you will find in my pocket. I cannot read them myself, and--they will comfort me."
Patsy found the packet of letters.
"The top one first," he said eagerly. "Read them all!"
She opened the letter reluctantly. It was addressed in a dainty, female hand and the girl had the uncomfortable feeling that she was about to pry into personal relations of a delicate character.
"Your sweetheart?" she asked gently.
"Yes, indeed; my sweetheart and my wife."
"Oh, I see. And have you been married long?" He seemed a mere boy.
"Five months, but for the last two I have not seen her."
The letters were dated at Charleroi and each one began: "My darling husband." Patsy read the packet through, from first to last, her eyes filling with tears at times as she noted the rare devotion and passionate longing of the poor young wife and realized that the boyish husband was even now dying, a martyr to his country's cause. The letters were signed "Elizabeth." In one was a small photograph of a sweet, dark-eyed girl whom she instantly knew to be the bereaved wife.
"And does she still live at Charleroi?" Patsy asked.
"I hope so, mademoiselle; with her mother. The Germans now occupy the town, but you will notice the last letter states that all citizens are treated courteously and with much consideration, so I do not fear for her."
The reading of the letters, in conjunction with the opiate, seemed to comfort him, for presently he fell asleep. With a heavy heart the girl left him to attend to her other patients and at three o'clock Ajo came in and joined her, to relieve the tedium of the next three hours. The boy knew nothing of nursing, but he could help Patsy administer potions and change compresses and his presence was a distinct relief to her.
The girl was supposed to sleep from six o'clock--at which time she was relieved from duty--until one in the afternoon, but the next morning at eight she walked into the forward salon, where her friends were at breakfast, and sat down beside Uncle John.
"I could not sleep," said she, "because I am so worried over Andrew Denton."
"That is foolish, my dear," answered Mr. Merrick, affectionately patting the hand she laid in his. "The doctor says poor Denton cannot recover. If you're going to take to heart all the sad incidents we encounter on this hospital ship, it will not only ruin your usefulness but destroy your happiness."
"Exactly so," agreed Gys, coming into the salon in time to overhear this remark. "A nurse should be sympathetic, but impersonally so."
"Denton has been married but five months," said Patsy. "I have seen his wife's picture--she's a dear little girl!--and her letters to him are full of love and longing. She doesn't know, of course, of his--his accident--or that he--he--" Her voice broke with a sob she could not repress.
"M-m," purred Uncle John; "where does she live, this young wife?"
"At Charleroi."
"Well; the Germans are there."
"Yes, Uncle. But don't you suppose they would let her come to see her dying husband?"
"A young girl, unprotected? Would it be--safe?"
"The Germans," remarked Captain Carg from his end of the table, "are very decent people."
"Ahem!" said Uncle John.
"Some of them, I've no doubt, are quite respectable," observed Ajo; "but from all reports the rank and file, in war time, are--rather unpleasant to meet."
"Precisely," agreed Uncle John. "I think, Patsy dear, it will be best to leave this Belgian girl in ignorance of her husband's fate."
"I, myself, have a wife," quoth little Maurie, with smug assurance, "but she is not worrying about me, wherever she may be; nor do I feel especial anxiety for Clarette. A woman takes what comes--especially if she is obliged to."
Patsy regarded him indignantly.
"There are many kinds of women," she began.
"Thank heaven!" exclaimed Maurie, and then she realized how futile it was to argue with him.
A little later she walked on deck with Uncle John and pleaded her cause earnestly. It was said by those who knew him well that the kindly little gentleman was never able to refuse Patsy anything for long, and he was himself so well aware of this weakness that he made a supreme effort to resist her on this occasion.
"You and I," said she, "would have no trouble in passing the German lines. We are strictly neutral, you know, we Americans, and our passports and the Red Cross will take us anywhere in safety."
"It won't do, my dear," he replied. "You've already been in danger enough for one war. I shudder even now as I think of those bullets and shells at Nieuport."
"But we can pass through at some place where they are not fighting."
"Show me such a place!"
"And distances are very small in this part of the Continent. We could get to Charleroi in a day, and return the next day with Mrs. Denton."
"Impossible."
"The doctor says he may live for several days, but it may be only for hours. If you could see his face light up when he speaks of her, you would realize what a comfort her presence would be to him."
"I understand that, Patsy. But can't you see, my dear, that we're not able to do everything for those poor wounded soldiers? You have twenty in your charge now, and by to-night there may be possibly a dozen more. Many of them have wives at home, but--"
"But all are not dying, Uncle--and after only five months of married life, three of which they passed together. Here, at least, is one brave heart we may comfort, one poor woman who will be ever grateful for our generous kindness."
Mr. Merrick coughed. He wiped his eyes and blew his nose on his pink bordered handkerchief. But he made no promise.
Patsy left him and went to Ajo.
"See here," she said; "I'm going to Charleroi in an hour."
"It's a day's journey, Patsy."
"I mean I'm going to start in an hour. Will you go with me?"
"What does Uncle John say?" he inquired cautiously.
"I don't care what he says. I'm going!" she persisted, her eyes blazing with determination.
The boy whistled softly, studying her face. Then he walked across the deck to Mr. Merrick.
"Patsy is rampant, sir," said he. "She won't be denied. Go and argue with her, please."
"I _have_ argued," returned Uncle John weakly.
"Well, argue again."
The little man cast a half frightened, half reproachful glance at his niece.
"Let's go and consult the doctor," he exclaimed, and together Uncle John and Ajo went below.
To their surprise, Gys supported Patsy's plea.
"He's a fine fellow, this Denton," said he, "and rather above the average soldier. Moreover, his case is a pitiful one. I'll agree to keep him alive until his wife comes."
Uncle John looked appealingly at Ajo.
"How on earth can we manage to cross the lines?" he asked.
"Take one of our launches," said the boy.
"Skim the coast to Ostend, and you'll avoid danger altogether."
"That's the idea!" exclaimed the doctor approvingly. "Why, it's the easiest thing in the world, sir."
Uncle John began to feel slightly reassured.
"Who will run the launch?" he inquired.
"I'll give you the captain and one of the men," said the boy. "Carg's an old traveler and knows more than he appears to. Besides, he speaks German. We can't spare very many, you understand, and the ambulances will keep Maurie and me pretty busy. Patsy will be missed, too, from the hospital ward, so you must hurry back."
"Two days ought to accomplish our object," said Uncle John.
"Easily," agreed Gys. "I've arranged for a couple of girls from the town to come and help us to-day, for I must save the strength of my expert nurses as much as possible, and I'll keep them with us until you return. The French girls are not experienced in nursing, but I'll take Miss Patsy's watch myself, so we shall get along all right."
Mr. Merrick and Jones returned to the deck.
"Well?" demanded Patsy.
"Get ready," said Uncle John; "we leave in an hour."
"For Charleroi?"
"Of course; unless you've changed your mind."
Patsy flew to her stateroom.
CHAPTER XII
THE OTHER SIDE
The launch in which they embarked bore the Red Cross on its sides, and an American flag floated from the bow and a Red Cross flag from the stern. Its four occupants wore the Red Cross uniforms. Yet three miles out of Dunkirk a shot came singing across their prow and they were obliged to lay to until a British man-of-war could lower a boat to investigate their errand. The coast is very shallow in this section, which permits boats of only the lightest draught to navigate in-shore, but the launch was able to skim over the surface at twelve miles an hour.
"This is pleasant!" grumbled Uncle John, as they awaited the approach of the warship's boat. "Our very appearance ought to insure us safe conduct, but I suppose that in these times every craft is regarded with suspicion."
The boat came alongside.
"Where are you going?" demanded an officer, gruffly.
"To Ostend."
"On what business?"
"Our own," replied Mr. Merrick.
"Be respectful, sir, or I'll arrest your entire outfit," warned the officer.
"You'll do nothing of the sort," declared Mr. Merrick. "You'll examine our papers, apologize for your interference and row back to your ship. We have the authority of the Red Cross to go wherever our duty calls us, and moreover we're American citizens. Permit me to add that we're in a hurry."
The officer turned first white and then red, but he appreciated the force of the argument.
"Your papers!" he commanded.
Uncle John produced them and waited patiently for their inspection, which was very deliberate. Finally the officer returned them and gave the order to his men to row back to the ship.
"One moment!" called Uncle John. "You haven't made the apology."
There was no answer. The boat moved swiftly away and at a gesture from Captain Carg the sailor started the launch again.
"I wonder why it is," mused Mr. Merrick, "that there is always this raspy feeling when the English meet Americans. On the surface we're friendly enough and our governments always express in diplomatic relations the most cordial good will; but I've always noticed in the English individual an undercurrent of antipathy for Americans that cannot be disguised. As a race the English hate us, I'm positive, and I wonder why?"
"I believe you're wrong, Uncle," remarked Patsy. "A few of the British may individually dislike us, but I'm sure the two nations are not antagonistic. Why should they be?"
"Yorktown," muttered the captain.
"I don't believe it," declared the girl. "They're too good sportsmen to bear grudges."
"All the same," persisted Uncle John, "the English have never favored us as the French have, or even the Russians."
From Dunkirk to Ostend, by the coast line, is only some twenty-five miles, yet although they started at a little after eleven o'clock it was three in the afternoon before they finally landed at the Belgian seaport. Interruptions were numerous, and although they were treated courteously, in the main, it was only after rigid questioning and a thorough examination that they were permitted to proceed. A full hour was consumed at the harbor at Ostend before they could even land.
As they stepped upon the wharf a group of German soldiers met them and now Captain Carg became the spokesman of the party. The young officer in command removed his helmet to bow deferentially to Patsy and then turned to ask their business at Ostend.
"He says we must go before the military governor," said Carg, translating. "There, if our papers are regular, permits will be issued for us to proceed to Charleroi."
They left the sailor in charge of the launch, which was well provisioned and contained a convertible bunk, and followed the officer into the town. Ostend is a large city, fortified, and was formerly one of the most important ports on the North Sea, as well as a summer resort of prominence. The city now being occupied by the Germans, our friends found few citizens on the streets of Ostend and these hurried nervously on their way. The streets swarmed with German soldiery.
Arriving at headquarters they found that the commandant was too busy to attend to the Red Cross Americans. He ordered them taken before Colonel Grau for examination.
"But why examine us at all?" protested Mr. Merrick. "Doesn't our sacred mission protect us from such annoying details?"
The young officer regretted that it did not. They would find Colonel Grau in one of the upper rooms. It would be a formal examination, of course, and brief. But busy spies had even assumed the insignia of the Red Cross to mask their nefarious work and an examination was therefore necessary as a protective measure. So they ascended a broad staircase and proceeded along a corridor to the colonel's office.
Grau was at the head of the detective service at Ostend and invested with the task of ferreting out the numerous spies in the service of the Allies and dealing with them in a summary manner. He was a very stout man, and not very tall. His eyes were light blue and his grizzled mustache was a poor imitation of that affected by the Kaiser. When Grau looked up, on their entrance, Patsy decided that their appearance had startled him, but presently she realized that the odd expression was permanent.
In a chair beside the colonel's desk sat, or rather lounged, another officer, encased in a uniform so brilliant that it arrested the eye before one could discover its contents. These were a wizened, weather-beaten man of advanced age, yet rugged as hickory. His eyes had a periodical squint; his brows wore a persistent frown. There was a broad scar on his left cheek and another across his forehead. A warrior who had seen service, probably, but whose surly physiognomy was somewhat disconcerting.
The two officers had been in earnest conversation, but when Mr. Merrick's party was ushered in, the elder man leaned back in his chair, squinting and scowling, and regarded them silently.
"Huh!" exclaimed the colonel, in a brusque growl. "What is it, von Holtz?"
The young officer explained that the party had just arrived from Dunkirk in a launch; the commandant had asked Colonel Grau kindly to examine them. Uncle John proceeded to state the case, Captain Carg interpreting. They operated a Red Cross hospital ship at Dunkirk, and one of their patients, a young Belgian, was dying of his wounds. They had come to find his young wife and take her back with them to Dunkirk in their launch, that she might comfort the last moments of her husband. The Americans asked for safe conduct to Charleroi, and permission to take Mrs. Denton with them to Dunkirk. Then he presented his papers, including the authority of the American Red Cross Society, the letter from the secretary of state and the recommendation of the German ambassador at Washington.
The colonel looked them all over. He uttered little guttural exclamations and tapped the desk with his finger-tips as he read, and all the time his face wore that perplexing expression of surprise. Finally he asked:
"Which is Mr. Merrick?"
Hearing his name, Uncle John bowed.
"Huh! But the description does not fit you."
Captain Carg translated this.
"Why not?" demanded Uncle John.
"It says you are short, stout, blue-eyed, bald, forty-five years of age."
"Of course."
"You are not short; I think you are as tall as I am. Your eyes are not blue; they are olive green. You are not bald, for there is still hair over your ears. Huh! How do you explain that?"
"It's nonsense," said Uncle John scornfully.
Carg was more cautious in interpreting the remark. He assured the colonel, in German, that the description of Mr. Merrick was considered close enough for all practical purposes. But Grau was not satisfied. He went over the papers again and then turned to face the other officer.
"What do you think, General?" he asked, hesitatingly.
"Suspicious!" was the reply.
"I think so, myself," said the colonel. "Mark you: Here's a man who claims to come from Sangoa, a place no one has ever heard of; and the other has endorsements purporting to come from the highest officials in America. Huh! what does it mean?"
"Papers may be forged, or stolen from their proper owners," suggested the squinting general. "This excuse of coming here to get the wife of a hurt Belgian seems absurd. If they are really Red Cross workers, they are not attending to their proper business."
When the captain interpreted this speech Patsy said angrily:
"The general is an old fool."
"An idiot, I'll call him," added Uncle John. "I wish I could tell him so."
"You _have_ told him," said the general in good English, squinting now more rapidly than ever, "and your manner of speech proves you to be impostors. I have never known a respectable Red Cross nurse, of any country, who called a distinguished officer a fool--and to his face."
"I didn't know you understood English," she said.
"That is no excuse!"
"But I _did_ know," she added, "that I had judged you correctly. No one with a spark of intelligence could doubt the evidence of these papers."
"The papers are all right. Where did you get them?"
"From the proper authorities."
He turned to speak rapidly in German to Colonel Grau, who had been uneasy during the conversation in English, because he failed to understand it. His expression of piquant surprise was intensified as he now turned to the Americans.
"You may as well confess your imposture," said he. "It will make your punishment lighter. However, if on further examination you prove to be spies, your fate is beyond my power to mitigate."
"See here," said Uncle John, when this was translated to him, "if you dare to interfere with us, or cause us annoyance, I shall insist on your being courtmartialed. You are responsible to your superiors, I suppose, and they dare not tolerate an insult to the Red Cross, nor to an American citizen. You may have the sense to consider that if these papers and letters are genuine, as I declare they are, I have friends powerful enough to bring this matter before the Kaiser himself, in which case someone will suffer a penalty, even if he is a general or a colonel."
As he spoke he glared defiantly at the older officer, who calmly proceeded to translate the speech to the colonel. Carg reported that it was translated verbatim. Then the general sat back and squinted at his companion, who seemed fairly bewildered by the threat. Patsy caught the young officer smothering a smile, but neither of them interrupted the silence that followed.
Once again the colonel picked up the papers and gave them a rigid examination, especially that of the German ambassador, which was written in his own language. "I cannot understand," he muttered, "how one insignificant American citizen could secure such powerful endorsements. It has never happened before in my experience."
"It is extraordinary," said the general.
"Mr. Merrick," said Patsy to him, "is a very important man in America. He is so important that any indignity to him will be promptly resented."
"I will investigate your case further," decided Colonel Grau, after another sotto voce conference with the general. "Spies are getting to be very clever, these days, and we cannot take chances. However, I assure you there is no disposition to worry you and until your standing is determined you will be treated with every consideration."
"Do you mean that we are prisoners?" asked Uncle John, trying to control his indignation.
"No, indeed. You will be detained, of course, but you are not prisoners--as yet. I will keep your papers and submit them to the general staff. It will be for that august body to decide."
Uncle John protested vigorously; Patsy faced the old general and told him this action was an outrage that would be condemned by the entire civilized world; Captain Carg gravely assured both officers that they were making a serious mistake. But nothing could move the stolid Germans. The general, indeed, smiled grimly and told them in English that he was in no way responsible, whatever happened. This was Colonel Grau's affair, but he believed, nevertheless, that the colonel was acting wisely.
The young officer, who had stood like a statue during the entire interview, was ordered to accompany the Americans to a hotel, where they must be kept under surveillance but might follow, to an extent, their own devices. They were not to mail letters nor send telegrams.
The officer asked who should guard the suspects.
"Why not yourself, Lieutenant? You are on detached duty, I believe?"
"At the port, Colonel."
"There are too many officers at the port; it is a sinecure. I will appoint you to guard the Americans. You speak their language, I believe?"
The young man bowed.
"Very well; I shall hold you responsible for their safety."
They were then dismissed and compelled to follow their guard from the room.
Patsy was now wild with rage and Uncle John speechless. Even Carg was evidently uneasy.
"Do not mind," said the young lieutenant consolingly. "It is merely a temporary inconvenience, you know, for your release will come very soon. And since you are placed in my care I beg you to accept this delay with good grace and be happy as possible. Ostend is full of life and I am conducting you to an excellent hotel."
CHAPTER XIII
TARDY JUSTICE
The courtesy of Lieutenant von Holtz was beyond criticism. He obtained for his charges a comfortable suite of rooms in an overcrowded hotel, obliging the landlord to turn away other guests that Mr. Merrick's party might be accommodated. The dinner that was served in their cosy sitting room proved excellent, having been ordered by von Holtz after he had requested that privilege. When the young officer appeared to see that it was properly served, Patsy invited him to join them at the table and he laughingly consented.
"You are one of our party, by force of circumstances," said the girl, "and since we've found you good-natured and polite, and believe you are not to blame for our troubles, we may as well be friendly while we are together."
The young man was evidently well pleased.
"However evil your fortune may be," said he, "I cannot fail to be impressed by my own good luck. Perhaps you may guess what a relief this pleasant commission is to one who for days has been compelled to patrol those vile smelling docks, watching for spies and enduring all sorts of weather."
"To think," said Uncle John gloomily, "that _we_ are accused of being spies!"
"It is not for me," returned von Holtz, "to criticize the acts of my superiors. I may say, however, that were it my province to decide the question, you would now be free. Colonel Grau has an excellent record for efficiency and seldom makes a mistake, but I suspect his judgment was influenced by the general, whose son was once jilted by an American girl."
"We're going to get even with them both, before this affair is ended," declared Patsy, vindictively; "but although you are our actual jailer I promise that you will escape our vengeance."
"My instructions are quite elastic, as you heard," said the lieutenant. "I am merely ordered to keep you in Ostend, under my eye, until your case has been passed upon by the commandant or the general staff. Since you have money, you may enjoy every luxury save that of travel, and I ask you to command my services in all ways consistent with my duty."
"What worries me," said Patsy to Uncle John, "is the delay. If we are kept here for long, poor Denton will die before we can find his wife and take her to him."
"How long are we liable to be detained?" Uncle John asked the officer.
"I cannot say. Perhaps the council of the general staff will meet to-morrow morning; perhaps not for several days," was the indefinite reply.
Patsy wiped away the tears that began to well into her eyes. She had so fondly set her heart on reuniting the Dentons that her disappointment was very great.
Von Holtz noticed the girl's mood and became thoughtful. Captain Carg had remained glum and solemn ever since they had left the colonel's office. Uncle John sat in silent indignation, wondering what could be done to influence these stupid Germans. Presently the lieutenant remarked:
"That sailor whom you left with the launch seemed an intelligent fellow."
Patsy gave a start; Uncle John looked at the young man expectantly; the captain nodded his head as he slowly replied:
"Henderson is one of the picked men I brought from Sangoa. He is both intelligent and loyal."
"Curiously enough," said von Holtz, "I neglected to place the man under arrest. I even forgot to report him. He is free."
"Ah!" exclaimed Patsy, her eyes lighting.
"I know a civilian here--a bright young Belgian--who is my friend and will do anything I ask of him," resumed von Holtz, still musingly. "I had the good fortune to protect his mother when our troops entered the city, and he is grateful."
Patsy was thinking very fast now.
"Could Henderson get to Charleroi, do you imagine?" she asked. "He has a passport."
"We do not consider passports of much value," said the officer; "but a Red Cross appointment--"
"Oh, he has that, too; all our men carry them."
"In that case, with my friend Rondel to guide him, I believe Henderson could accomplish your errand."
"Let us send for him at once!" exclaimed Uncle John.
Carg scribbled on a card.
"He wouldn't leave the launch without orders, unless forced by the Germans," asserted the captain, and handed the card to von Holtz.
The young lieutenant took his cap, bowed profoundly and left the room. In ten minutes he returned, saying: "I am not so fortunate as I had thought. All our troops are on the move, headed for the Yser. There will be fighting, presently, and--I must remain here," he added despondently.
"It won't be your last chance, I'm sure," said Patsy. "Will that dreadful Colonel Grau go, too?"
"No; he is to remain. But all regiments quartered here are now marching out and to-morrow a fresh brigade will enter Ostend."
They were silent a time, until someone rapped upon the door. Von Holtz admitted a slim, good-looking young Belgian who grasped his hand and said eagerly in French:
"You sent for me?"
"Yes. You may speak English here, Monsieur Rondel." Then he presented his friend to the Americans, who approved him on sight.
Henderson came a few minutes later and listened respectfully to the plan Miss Doyle unfolded. He was to go with Monsieur Rondel to Charleroi, find Mrs. Denton, explain that her husband was very ill, and bring her back with him to Ostend. He would report promptly on his return and they would tell him what to do next.
The man accepted the mission without a word of protest. Charleroi was in central Belgium, but that did not mean many miles away and Rondel assured him they would meet with no difficulties. The trains were reserved for soldiers, but the Belgian had an automobile and a German permit to drive it. The roads were excellent.
"Now, remember," said Patsy, "the lady you are going for is Mrs. Albert Denton. She lives with her mother, or did, the last we heard of her."
"And her mother's name and address?" inquired Henderson.
"We are ignorant of either," she confessed; "but it's not a very big town and I'm sure you'll easily find her."
"I know the place well," said Rondel, "and I have friends residing there who will give me information."
Uncle John supplied them liberally with money, impressed upon them the necessity of haste, and sent them away. Rondel declared the night time was best for the trip and promised to be on the way within the hour, and in Charleroi by next morning.
Notwithstanding the fact that they had succeeded in promoting by proxy the mission which had brought them to Belgium, the Americans found the next day an exceedingly irksome one. In the company of Lieutenant von Holtz they were permitted to walk about the city, but they found little pleasure in that, owing to the bustle of outgoing troops and the arrival of others to replace them. Nor did they care to stray far from their quarters, for fear the council would meet and they might be sent for.
However, no sign from Colonel Grau was received that day. Patsy went to bed with a nervous headache and left Uncle John and the captain to smoke more than was good for them. Both the men had now come to regard their situation as serious and as the American consul was at this time absent in Brussels they could think of no way to secure their freedom. No one knew when the consul would return; Mr. Merrick had been refused the privilege of using the telegraph or mails. During one of their strolls they had met the correspondent of an American newspaper, but when the man learned they were suspects he got away from them as soon as possible. He did not know Mr. Merrick and his own liberty was too precarious for him to argue with Colonel Grau.
"I'm beginning to think," said Uncle John, "that we're up against a hard proposition. Letters and endorsements from prominent Americans seem to have no weight with these Germans. I'd no idea our identity could ever be disputed."
"We must admit, sir," returned the captain, reflectively, "that the spy system in this war is something remarkable. Spies are everywhere; clever ones, too, who adopt every sort of subterfuge to escape detection. I do not blame Grau so much for caution as for lack of judgment."
"He's a blockhead!" cried Mr. Merrick testily.
"He is. I'm astonished they should place so much power in the hands of one so slow witted."
"He has insulted us," continued Uncle John. "He has dared to arrest three free-born Americans."
"Who came into a troubled country, occupied by a conquering army, without being invited."
"Well--that's true," sighed the little millionaire, "but what are we going to do about it?"
"Wait," counseled the captain.
The next day dawned dark and rainy and the weather had a depressing effect upon the prisoners. It was too damp to stir out of doors and the confinement of the hotel rooms became especially irksome. Not only were they anxious about their own fate but it was far past the time when they should have heard from Henderson and Rondel. Patsy's nerves were getting beyond her control; Uncle John stumped around with his hands thrust deep in his pockets and a frown wrinkling his forehead; the captain smoked innumerable pipes of tobacco and said not a word. Von Holtz, noting the uneasiness of his charges, discreetly forbore conversation and retired to a far corner where he hid behind a book.
It was nearing evening when a commotion was heard on the stairs, followed by the heavy tramp of feet in the corridor. A sharp rap sounded on the door of their sitting room. Uncle John stepped forward to open it, when in stalked a group of German officers, their swords and spurs clanking and their cloaks glistening with rain-drops. At sight of the young girl off came cap and helmet and with one accord they bowed low.
The leader was a tall, thin man with a leathern face, hooked nose and piercing gray eyes. His breast glittered with orders. It was von Kargenbrut, the military governor.
"Pardon our intrusion," he said in English, his harsh voice having a guttural accent. "Which gentleman is Mr. John Merrick?"
"I am John Merrick."
The eagle eyes swept over him with a swift glance.
"We owe you our apology," continued the governor, speaking as fiercely as if he were ordering Uncle John beheaded. "I have been too busy to take up your case before to-day, when I discover that we have treated you discourteously. You will consider our fault due to these troubled times, when mistakes occur in spite of our watchfulness. Is it not so?"
"Your error has caused us great inconvenience," responded Mr. Merrick stiffly.
The governor whirled around. "Colonel Grau!" he called, and from the rear of the group the colonel stepped forward. His face still wore the expression of comical surprise. "Return to Mr. Merrick his papers and credentials."
The colonel drew the packet of papers from his breast pocket and handed it to Uncle John. Then he glanced hesitatingly at his superior, who glared at him.
"He cannot speak the English," said the governor to Mr. Merrick, "but he owes you reparation."
"Grau's stupidity has been very annoying, to say the least," was the ungracious reply. "We came here on important business, and presented our papers--all in proper order--on demand. We had the right to expect decent treatment, as respectable American citizens engaged in humanitarian work; yet this--this--man," pointing an accusing finger at the colonel, "ordered us detained--arrested!--and kept our papers."
The governor listened coldly and at the end of the speech inclined his head.
"Colonel Grau," said he, "has been relieved of his duties here and transferred to another station. To you I have personally apologized. You will find my endorsement on your papers and, in addition, an order that will grant you safe conduct wherever you may wish to go. If that is not enough, make your demands and I will consider them."
"Why, that is all I can expect, your Excellency, under the circumstances," replied Mr. Merrick. "I suppose I ought to thank you for your present act of justice."
"No; it is your due. Good evening, Mr. Merrick."
He swung around on his heel and every officer of the group turned with him, like so many automatons, all facing the door. But Mr. Merrick touched the governor upon the arm.
"One moment, your Excellency. This young officer, Lieutenant von Holtz, has treated us kindly and courteously. I want you to know that one of your men, at least, has performed his duty in a way to merit our thanks--and yours."
The governor scowled at Lieutenant von Holtz, who stood like a statue, with lowered eyes.
"Lieutenant, you are commissioned to guide Mr. Merrick as long as he remains within our lines. You will guard his safety and that of his party. When he departs, come to me personally with your report."
The young officer bowed; the governor tramped to the door and went out, followed by his staff. Grau left the room last, with hang-dog look, and Patsy slammed the door in the hope of bumping his wooden head.
"So we're free?" she said, turning to von Holtz.
"Not only that, Fraulein, but you are highly favored," he replied. "All German territory is now open to you."
"It's about time they came to their senses," remarked Uncle John, with a return to his accustomed cheerfulness.
"And, best of all," said Patsy exultantly, "they've fired that awful colonel!"
The captain thoughtfully filled and lighted his pipe.
"I wonder," said he, "how that happened. Was it the council, do you think, Lieutenant?"
Von Holtz shook his head.
"I think it was the governor," he replied. "He is a just man, and had you been able to see him personally on your arrival you would have been spared any annoyance."
"Perhaps," said Patsy doubtfully. "But your governor's a regular bear."
"I believe that is merely his way," asserted Uncle John. "I didn't mind the man's tone when I found his words and deeds were all right. But he--"
Another rap at the door. Patsy opened it and admitted Henderson. He saluted the captain, bowed to the others and said:
"We've got her, sir."
"Mrs. Denton?" cried Patsy, delightedly.
Henderson nodded.
"Yes, Miss Doyle; Mrs. Denton and the children."
"The children! Why, there aren't any."
"I beg your pardon, Miss; there are two."
"Two children!" she exclaimed in dismay. "There must be some mistake. The young people have only been married five months."
Henderson stood stiff as a poker, refusing to argue the point.
"A governess, maybe," suggested the captain.
"More likely," said Uncle John, "young Denton married a widow, with--eh--eh--incumbrances."
"That's it, sir," said Henderson earnestly.
"What's it?"
"The incumbrances, sir. No other word could describe 'em."
Patsy's heart sank; she was greatly disappointed.
"And she so young and pretty!" she murmured.
Henderson started to smile, but quickly suppressed it.
"Shall I show them up, Miss?" he inquired.
"Of course," answered Uncle John, as the girl hesitated. "You should have brought her to us at once. Where is that Belgian--Rondel?"
"He is guarding the woman, sir."
"Guarding her!"
"She's a little difficult to manage, sir, at times. She left Charleroi willingly enough, but she's tricky, and it is our duty to deliver her to you safely."
"Get her at once, Henderson," exclaimed Patsy, recovering her wits; "and the dear children, too."
Presently there was a sound of shuffling on the stairs and through the corridor. The door opened to admit the arrivals from Charleroi.
Henderson first pushed in a big woman dressed in a faded blue-checked gown, belted around the waist in a manner that made her look like a sack tied in the middle. Her head was bare, her hair awry, her face sullen and hard; she was undeniably "fleshy" and not altogether clean. She resisted Henderson at every step and glared around her with shrewd and shifting eyes.
Following her came Monsieur Rondel leading a boy and a girl, the latter being a small replica of the woman. The boy was viciously struggling to bite the hand of the Belgian, who held him fast.
"Ah, well," said Rondel, first sighing and then turning with a smile to face the lieutenant, "we have performed our mission. But heaven guard us from another like it!"
Patsy stared hard at the woman.
"This cannot be Mrs. Denton," she gasped, bewildered.
"Indeed?" answered Rondel in English. "She declares that is her name. Question her in French or Flemish, Miss Doyle."
Patsy addressed the woman in French but could elicit no reply. She stood impassive and silent.
"How did you make the mistake?" asked the girl, looking reproachfully first at Henderson and then at Rondel, both of whom were evidently astonished to find themselves at fault. "I have seen a photograph of Mrs. Andrew Denton, taken recently, and she is young and pretty and--and--rather small."
Monsieur Rondel cleared his throat to answer:
"It happened in this way, mademoiselle: We searched one whole day in Charleroi for Mrs. Denton but could not find her. My friends, on whom I had relied for assistance, had unfortunately moved away or joined the army. The townspeople were suspicious of Monsieur Henderson, who is a foreigner. We could get no information whatever. I appealed to the burgomaster and he said he would try to find Mrs. Denton for us the next day. In the morning came to us this woman, who said she was the person we sought. If we promised her safe conduct to Dunkirk, she would go with us. She had wanted to go to Dunkirk for some weeks, but the Germans would not let her pass the lines. We suspected nothing wrong, for she admitted she was aware that her husband is in Dunkirk, and she wanted to get to him. So we brought her to you."
Patsy faced the woman resolutely and said in French:
"Why did you wish to get to Dunkirk?"
"He has said it. To find my husband," replied the woman in a surly tone.
"What is your name?"
No reply.
"Answer me!"
The woman eyed her obstinately and remained silent.
"Very well. Release those children, Monsieur Rondel. Madam, you have imposed upon us; you have tricked us in order to get to Ostend at our expense. Now go, and take your children with you."
She pointed dramatically at the door, but the woman retained her position, only moving to cuff the boy, who was kicking Henderson on his shins. Then, setting her hands on her hips she said defiantly:
"They promised me passage to Dunkirk, and they must take me there."
"Who promised you?"
"Those men," pointing to them, "and the burgomaster."
"Yes," admitted Henderson, "we agreed with the burgomaster to take her out of the country. We signed a paper to that effect."
"But she is a Belgian. And she is not the person she claimed to be."
To this neither Rondel nor Henderson had an answer.
"See here," said Uncle John, "I'll untangle this matter in a jiffy. Here is money; give it to the woman and tell her to get out--or we'll eject her by force."
The woman grabbed the money eagerly, but after placing it in an ample pocket she said: "I will go no place but Dunkirk. I will not leave you until you take me there."
But here the lieutenant interfered. He suddenly faced the woman, who had not noticed his presence before, and she shrank back in fear at sight of his uniform. The boy and girl both began to cry.
"I know you," said von Holtz sternly. "You are the wife of a spy who has been condemned to death by both the Belgians and the Germans, since he betrayed them both. The last time you came to Ostend to annoy us you were driven out of the city. There is still an edict against you. Will you leave this room peaceably, or shall I order you under arrest?"
"Dog of a German!" she hissed, "the day is coming when I will help to drive you out of Belgium, even as you now drive me. Brave soldiers are you, to make war on women and children. Guh! I would kill you where you stand--if I dared." With venomous hate she spat upon the floor, then seized her wailing children, shook them and waddled out of the room.
There was a general sigh of relief.
"You may return to the launch, Henderson," said the captain.
"Monsieur Rondel," said Uncle John, grasping the young Belgian's hand, "we are grateful to you for your kindness. The failure of your mission was not your fault. We thank you. The governor has given us our liberty and permission to travel where we please, so to-morrow we will go to Charleroi ourselves to search for Mrs. Denton."
"My motor car is at your disposal, sir, and my services."
"To-morrow? Oh, let us go to-night, Uncle!" cried Patsy.
Mr. Merrick looked inquiringly at the Belgian.
"I am ready now," said Rondel with a bow.
"Then," said Patsy, "we will start in half an hour. You see, we have wasted two whole days--two precious days! I hope Dr. Gys will keep his promise, and that we shall find poor Denton alive on our return."
CHAPTER XIV
FOUND AT LAST
The pretty city of Charleroi had suffered little damage from the German invasion, yet many of the townspeople had gone away since the occupation and those who remained kept well within their houses or huddled in anxious groups upon the streets. The civic affairs were still administered by the Belgian burgomaster, but the martial law of the Germans prevailed over all.
When Patsy Doyle, escorted by Uncle John and accompanied by Captain Carg, Lieutenant von Holtz and Monsieur Rondel, arrived in the early morning, the streets were comparatively deserted. The Hotel Royal received them hospitably and the landlord and his daughters prepared them an excellent breakfast.
While eating, Patsy chatted with the Belgian girls, who were neat, modest and intelligent. She found that Henderson and Rondel had not stopped at this hotel while in Charleroi, but at a smaller inn at the other end of the town. The girls remembered hearing of their visit and of their inquiries for a Mrs. Denton, but did not know whether they had succeeded in their quest or not.
"We have lived here all our lives," said the eldest of the landlord's three daughters, "but we have not known, during that time, any family of Dentons in Charleroi."
Patsy reflected.
"They were married only five months ago, these Dentons," said she, "and the young man may have come from some other town. Do you remember that any of your young girls were married about five months ago?"
Yes; there was Hildegarde Bentel, but she had married Anthony Mattison, who was not a soldier. Could the American mamselle remember what the girl's first name was?
"Oh, yes!" exclaimed Patsy. "She signed her letters 'Elizabeth.'"
They shook their heads.
"My name is also Elizabeth," said one. "We have many Elizabeths in Charleroi, but none has lately married."
"And her husband told me that she was now living here with her mother."
"Ah, let us see, then," responded another. "Could she have been a lady of rank, think you?"
"I--I do not know."
"Is her husband an officer?"
"No; a private, I believe."
"Then we are on the wrong scent," laughed the girl. "I had in mind the daughter of the Countess Voig, whose name chances to be Elizabeth. She was educated at a convent in Antwerp, and the countess has lived in that city for several years, in order to be nearer her daughter. There was some gossip here that the young lady had married in Antwerp, just after leaving the convent; but we know little of the life of the Voigs because they are very reserved. Two or three months ago they returned to their castle, which is four miles to the north of Charleroi, and there they are still living in retirement. Every day the old steward drives into town to visit the post office, but we have not seen the countess nor her daughter since they came back."
Patsy related this news to Uncle John, who did not understand French.
"Let us drive over to Castle Voig the first thing," she said.
"But, my dear, it's unreasonable," he objected. "Do you suppose a high-born young lady would marry a common soldier? In America, where we have no caste, it would be quite probable, but here--"
"He wasn't a soldier five months ago," said Patsy. "He's just a volunteer, who joined the army when his country needed him, as many of the wealthy and aristocratic Belgians did. He may be high-born himself, for all we know. At any rate I mean to visit that castle. Tell Rondel to bring around the automobile."
They had no trouble in passing the guards, owing to the presence of von Holtz, and in half an hour they were rolling through a charming, peaceful country that as yet had suffered no blemish through the German conquest.
At Castle Voig they were received by an aged retainer who was visibly nervous at their arrival. He eyed the uniform of young von Holtz with ill-concealed terror and hurried away to carry their cards to the countess. After a long wait they learned that the countess would receive the Americans, but it was a full half hour after that when they were ushered into a reception room where a lady sat in solitary state.
Under other circumstances Patsy could have spent a day in admiring the quaint, old-fashioned furniture and pictures and the wonderful carvings of the beamed ceiling, but now she was so excited that she looked only at the countess. The lady was not very imposing in form or dress but her features were calm and dignified and she met her guests with a grave courtesy that was impressive if rather chilly. Before Patsy had summoned courage to explain her errand a younger woman--almost a girl--hurriedly entered the room and took a position beside the other.
"Oh, it's Elizabeth--it really is!" cried Patsy, clapping her hands together joyfully.
Mother and daughter regarded the American girl wonderingly and somewhat haughtily, but Patsy was not in the least dismayed.
"Isn't this Mrs. Denton?" she asked, stepping forward to lay a hand upon the other girl's arm.
"Yes," was the quiet reply.
Patsy's great eyes regarded her a moment with so sad and sympathetic a look that Mrs. Denton shrank away. Then she noticed for the first time the Red Cross uniform, and her hand went swiftly to her heart as she faltered:
"You--you have brought bad news of Andrew--of my husband?"
"Yes, I am sorry to admit that it is bad news," answered Patsy soberly. "He has been wounded and is now lying ill in our hospital ship at Dunkirk. We came here to find you, and to take you to him."
Mrs. Denton turned to her mother, a passionate appeal in her eyes. But it was some moments before the hard, set look on the face of the countess softened. It did soften at last, however, and she turned to Patsy and said simply:
"We will prepare for the journey at once. Pray excuse us; Niklas will serve refreshments. We will not detain you long."
As they turned to leave the room Elizabeth Denton suddenly seized Patsy's hand.
"He will live?" she whispered. "Tell me he will live!"
Patsy's heart sank, but she summoned her wits by an effort.
"I am not a surgeon, my dear, and do not know how serious the wound may be," she answered, "but I assure you it will gladden his heart to see you again. He thinks and speaks only of you."
The girl-wife studied her face a moment and then dropped her hand and hurried after her mother.
"I fibbed, Uncle," said Patsy despondently. "I fibbed willfully. But--how could I help it when she looked at me that way?"
CHAPTER XV
DR. GYS SURPRISES HIMSELF
Henderson was waiting with the launch at the Ostend docks. Lieutenant von Holtz was earnestly thanked by Patsy and Uncle John for his kindness and in return he exacted a promise from them to hunt him up in Germany some day, when the war was ended. The countess and Mrs. Denton, sad and black-robed, had been made comfortable in the stern seats of the boat and the captain was just about to order Henderson to start the engine when up to them rushed the fat Belgian woman and her two children.
Without an instant's hesitation the two youngsters leaped aboard like cats and their mother would have followed but for the restraining hand of Captain Carg.
"What does this mean?" cried Mr. Merrick angrily.
The woman jabbered volubly in French.
"She says," interpreted Patsy, "that we promised to take her to Dunkirk, so she may find her husband."
"Let her walk!" said Uncle John.
"The Germans won't allow her to cross the lines. What does it matter, Uncle? We have plenty of room. In three hours we can be rid of them, and doubtless the poor thing is really anxious to find her lost husband, who was last seen in Dunkirk."
"He is a spy, and a traitor to both sides, according to report."
"That isn't our affair, is it? And I suppose even people of that class have hearts and affections."
"Well, let her come aboard, Captain," decided Uncle John. "We can't waste time in arguing."
They stowed her away in the bow, under Henderson's care, and threatened the children with dire punishment if they moved from under her shadow. Then the launch sped out into the bay and away toward Dunkirk.
Three days had brought many changes to the hospital ship _Arabella_. Of the original batch of patients only Lieutenant Elbl, the German, and Andrew Denton now remained. All the others had been sent home, transferred to the government hospitals or gone back to the front, according to the character of their injuries. This was necessary because their places were needed by the newly wounded who were brought each day from the front. Little Maurie was driving the ambulance again and, with Ajo beside him and Dr. Kelsey and a sailor for assistants, the Belgian would make a dash to Ypres or Dixmude or Furnes and return with a full load of wounded soldiers.
These were the days of the severest fighting in Flanders, fighting so severe that it could not keep up for long. There would come a lull presently, when the overworked nurses and surgeons could get a bit of sleep and draw a long breath again.
Gys had elected to remain aboard the ship, where with Maud and Beth he was kept busy night and day. Two French girls--young women of good birth and intelligence--had been selected by Dr. Gys from a number of applicants as assistant nurses, and although they were inexperienced, their patriotic zeal rendered them valuable. They now wore the Red Cross uniforms and it was decided to retain them as long as the ship's hospital remained crowded.
There was plenty of work for all and the worry and long hours might have broken down the health and strength of Beth and Maud had not the doctor instituted regular periods of duty for each member of the force and insisted on the schedule being carried out.
This hospital ship was by no means so gloomy a place as the reader may imagine. The soldiers were prone to regard their hurts lightly, as "a bit of hard luck," and since many had slight injuries it was customary for them to gather in groups upon the deck, where they would laugh and chat together, play cards for amusement or smoke quantities of cigarettes. They were mainly kind-hearted and grateful fellows and openly rejoiced that the misfortunes of war had cast their lot on this floating hospital.
Under the probe of the surgeon to-day, a fortnight hence back on the firing line, was not very unusual with these brave men. The ambulances had gathered in a few German soldiers, who would become prisoners of war on their recovery, and while these were inclined to be despondent and unsociable they were treated courteously by all, the Americans showing no preference for any nation. The large majority of the patients, however, came from the ranks of the Allies--French, English and Belgian--and these were men who could smile and be merry with bandaged heads, arms a-sling, legs in splints, bullet holes here and there, such afflictions being regarded by their victims with a certain degree of pride.
Dr. Gys was in his element, for now he had ample opportunity to display his skill and his patients were unable to "jump to another doctor" in case his ugly features revolted them. His main interest, however, lay in the desperately wounded Belgian private, Andrew Denton, whom he had agreed to keep alive until the return of Miss Doyle and her uncle.
In making this promise Gys had figured on a possible delay of several days, but on the second day following Patsy's departure the sudden sinking of his patient aroused a defiant streak in the surgeon and he decided to adopt drastic measures in order to prevent Denton from passing away before his wife's arrival.
"I want you to assist me in a serious operation," he said to Maud Stanton. "By all the rules and precedents of human flesh, that fellow Denton ought to succumb to his wound within the next three hours. The shell played havoc with his interior and I have never dared, until now, to attempt to patch things up; but if we're going to keep him alive until morning, or until your cousin's return, we must accomplish the impossible."
"What is that?" she inquired.
"Remove his vital organs, tinker them up and put them back so they will work properly."
"Can that be done, doctor?"
"I think not. But I'm going to try it. I am positive that if we leave him alone he has less than three hours of life remaining; so, if we fail, Miss Stanton, as it is reasonable to expect, poor Denton will merely be spared a couple of hours of pain. Get the anaesthetics, please."
With all her training and experience as a nurse, Maud was half terrified at the ordeal before her. But she realized the logic of the doctor's conclusion and steeled her nerves to do her part.
An hour later she stood looking down upon the patient. He was still upon the operating table but breathing quietly and as strongly as at any time since he had received his wound.
"This shows," Dr. Gys said to her, his voice keen with elation, "what fools we are to take any human condition for granted. Man is a machine. Smash his mechanism and it cannot work; make the proper repairs before it is too late and--there he goes, ticking away as before. Not as good a machine as it was prior to the break, but with care and caution it will run a long time."
"He will live, then, you think?" she asked softly, marveling that after what she had witnessed the man was still able to breathe.
Gys leaned down and put his ear to the heart of the patient. For two minutes he remained motionless. Then he straightened up and a smile spread over his disfigured features.
"I confidently believe, Miss Stanton, we have turned the trick! Luck, let us call it, for no sensible surgeon would have attempted the thing. Rest assured that Andrew Denton will live for the next ten days. More than that, with no serious set-back he may fully recover and live for many years to come."
He was so pleased that tears stood in his one good eye and he wiped them away sheepishly. The girl took his hand and pressed it in both her own.
"You are wonderful--wonderful!" she said.
"Don't, please--don't look in my face," he pleaded.
"I won't," she returned, dropping her eyes; "I will think only of the clever brain, the skillful hand and the stout heart."
"Not even that," he said. "Think of the girl wife--of Elizabeth. It was she who steadied my hand to-day. Indeed, Miss Stanton, it was Elizabeth's influence that saved him. But for her we would have let him die."
CHAPTER XVI
CLARETTE
So it was toward evening of the fourth day that the launch finally sighted the ship _Arabella_. Delays and difficulties had been encountered in spite of government credentials and _laissez-passer_ and Patsy had begun to fear they would not reach the harbor of Dunkirk before dark.
All through the journey the Belgian woman and her children had sat sullenly in the bow, the youngsters kept from mischief by the stern eye of Henderson. In the stern seats, however, the original frigid silence had been thawed by Patsy Doyle's bright chatter. She began by telling the countess and Elizabeth all about herself and Beth and Maud and Uncle John, relating how they had come to embark upon this unusual mission of nursing the wounded of a foreign war, and how they had secured the services of the clever but disfigured surgeon, Dr. Gys. She gave the ladies a clear picture of the hospital ship and told how the girls had made their dash to the firing line during the battle of Nieuport and brought back an ambulance full of wounded--including Andrew Denton.
Patsy did not answer very fully Elizabeth Denton's eager questions concerning the nature of her husband's injuries, but she tried to prepare the poor young wife for the knowledge that the wound would prove fatal. This was a most delicate and difficult thing to do and Patsy blundered and floundered until her very ambiguity aroused alarm.
"Tell me the worst!" begged Elizabeth Denton, her face pale and tensely drawn.
"Why, I cannot do that, you see," replied Patsy, "because the worst hasn't happened yet; nor can I tell you the best, because a wound is such an uncertain thing. It was a shell, you know, that exploded behind him, and Dr. Gys thought it made a rather serious wound. Mr. Denton was unconscious a long time, and when he came to himself we eased his pain, so he would not suffer."
"You came to get me because you thought he would die?"
"I came because he asked me to read to him your letters, and I found they comforted him so much that your presence would, I knew, comfort him more."
There was a long silence. Presently the countess asked in her soft, even voice:
"Will he be alive when we get there?"
Patsy thought of the days that had been wasted, because of their detention at Ostend through Colonel Grau's stupidity.
"I hope so, madam," was all she could reply.
Conversation lagged after this episode. Elizabeth was weeping quietly on her mother's shoulder. Patsy felt relief in the knowledge that she had prepared them, as well as she could, for whatever might wait upon their arrival.
The launch made directly for the ship and as she came alongside to the ladder the rail was lined with faces curious to discover if the errand had been successful. Doctor Gys was there to receive them, smiling horribly as he greeted the two women in black. Maud, seeing that they recoiled from the doctor's appearance, took his place and said cheerfully:
"Mr. Denton is asleep, just now, but by the time you have bathed and had a cup of tea I am quite sure he will be ready to receive you."
"Tell me; how is he? Are you his nurse?" asked the young wife with trembling lips.
"I am his nurse, and I assure you he is doing very well," answered Maud with her pleasant, winning smile. "When he finds you by his side I am sure his recovery will be rapid. No nurse can take the place of a wife, you know."
Patsy looked at her reproachfully, thinking she was misleading the poor young wife, but Maud led the ladies away to a stateroom and it was Dr. Gys who explained the wonderful improvement in the patient.
"Well," remarked Uncle John, "if we'd known he had a chance, we wouldn't have worried so because we were held up. In fact, if we'd known he would get well, we needn't have gone at all."
"Oh, Uncle John!" cried Patsy reprovingly.
"It was your going that saved him," declared the doctor. "I promised to keep him alive, for that little wife of his, and when he took a turn for the worse I had to assume desperate chances--which won out."
Meantime the big Belgian woman and her children had been helped up the ladder by Henderson, who stood respectfully by, awaiting orders for their disposal. The mother had her eye on the shore and was scowling steadily upon it when little Maurie came on deck and strolled toward Mr. Merrick to greet him on his return. Indeed, he had approached to within a dozen feet of the group when the woman at the rail suddenly turned and saw him.
"Aha--mon Henri!" she cried and made a dash toward him with outstretched arms.
"Clarette!"
Maurie stopped short; he grew pallid; he trembled. But he did not await her coming. With a howl that would have shamed a wild Indian he leaped upon the rail and made a dive into the water below.
Even as her engulfing arms closed around the spot where he had stood, there was a splash and splutter that drew everyone to the side to watch the little Belgian swim frantically to the docks.
The woman grabbed a child with either arm and held them up.
"See!" she cried. "There is your father--the coward--the traitor--the deserter of his loving family. He thinks to escape; but we shall capture him yet, and when we do--"
"Hurry, father," screamed the little girl, "or she'll get you."
A slap on the mouth silenced her and set the boy wailing dismally. The boy was accustomed to howl without provocation. He kicked his mother until she let him down. By this time they could discern only Maurie's head bobbing in the distant water. Presently he clambered up the dock and ran dripping toward the city, disappearing among the buildings.
"Madam," said Uncle John, sternly, "you have cost us the best chauffeur we ever had."
She did not understand English, but she shook her fist in Mr. Merrick's face and danced around in an elephantine fashion and jabbered a stream of French.
"What does she say?" he asked Patsy, who was laughing merrily at the absurd scene.
"She demands to be put ashore at once. But shall we do that, and put poor Maurie in peril of being overtaken?"
"Self preservation is the first law of nature, my dear," replied Uncle John. "I'm sorry for Maurie, but he alone is responsible. Henderson," he added, turning to the sailor, "put this woman ashore as soon as possible. We've had enough of her."
CHAPTER XVII
PERPLEXING PROBLEMS
Although the famous battle of Nieuport had come to an end, the fighting in West Flanders was by no means over. All along the line fierce and relentless war waged without interruption and if neither side could claim victory, neither side suffered defeat. Day after day hundreds of combatants fell; hundreds of disabled limped to the rear; hundreds were made prisoners. And always a stream of reinforcements came to take the places of the missing ones. Towns were occupied to-day by the Germans, to-morrow by the Allies; from Nieuport on past Dixmude and beyond Ypres the dykes had been opened and the low country was one vast lake. The only approaches from French territory were half a dozen roads built high above the water line, which rendered them capable of stubborn defence.
Dunkirk was thronged with reserves--English, Belgian and French. The Turcos and East Indians were employed by the British in this section and were as much dreaded by the civilians as the enemy. Uncle John noticed that military discipline was not so strict in Dunkirk as at Ostend; but the Germans had but one people to control while the French town was host to many nations and races.
Strange as it may appear, the war was growing monotonous to those who were able to view it closely, perhaps because nothing important resulted from all the desperate, continuous fighting. The people were pursuing their accustomed vocations while shells burst and bullets whizzed around them. They must manage to live, whatever the outcome of this struggle of nations might be.
Aboard the American hospital ship there was as yet no sense of monotony. The three girls who had conceived and carried out this remarkable philanthropy were as busy as bees during all their waking hours and the spirit of helpful charity so strongly possessed them that all their thoughts were centered on their work. No two cases were exactly alike and it was interesting, to the verge of fascination, to watch the results of various treatments of divers wounds and afflictions.
The girls often congratulated themselves on having secured so efficient a surgeon as Doctor Gys, who gloried in his work, and whose judgment, based on practical experience, was comprehensive and unfailing. The man's horribly contorted features had now become so familiar to the girls that they seldom noticed them--unless a cry of fear from some newly arrived and unnerved patient reminded them that the doctor was exceedingly repulsive to strangers.
No one recognized this grotesque hideousness more than Doctor Gys himself. When one poor Frenchman died under the operating knife, staring with horror into the uncanny face the surgeon bent over him, Beth was almost sure the fright had hastened his end. She said to Gys that evening, when they met on deck, "Wouldn't it be wise for you to wear a mask in the operating room?"
He considered the suggestion a moment, a deep flush spreading over his face; then he nodded gravely.
"It may be an excellent idea," he agreed. "Once, a couple of years ago, I proposed wearing a mask wherever I went, but my friends assured me the effect would be so marked that it would attract to me an embarrassing amount of attention. I have trained myself to bear the repulsion involuntarily exhibited by all I meet and have taught myself to take a philosophic, if somewhat cynical, view of my facial blemishes; yet in this work I can see how a mask might be merciful to my patients. I will experiment a bit along this line, if you will help me, and we'll see what we can accomplish."
"You must not think," she said quietly, for she detected a little bitterness in his tone, "that you are in any way repulsive to those who know you well. We all admire you as a man and are grieved at the misfortunes that marred your features. After all, Doctor, people of intelligence seldom judge one by appearances."
"However they may judge me," said he, "I'm a failure. You say you admire me as a man, but you don't. It's just a bit of diplomatic flattery. I'm a good doctor and surgeon, I'll admit, but my face is no more repellent than my cowardly nature. Miss Beth, I hate myself for my cowardice far more than I detest my ghastly countenance. Yet I am powerless to remedy either defect."
"I believe that what you term your cowardice is merely a physical weakness," declared the girl. "It must have been caused by the suffering you endured at the time of your various injuries. I have noticed that suffering frequently unnerves one, and that a person who has once been badly hurt lives in nervous terror of being hurt again."
"You are very kind to try to excuse my fault," said he, "but the truth is I have always been a coward--from boyhood up."
"Yet you embarked on all those dangerous expeditions."
"Yes, just to have fun with myself; to sneer at the coward flesh, so to speak. I used to long for dangers, and when they came upon me I would jeer at and revile the quaking I could not repress. I pushed my shrinking body into peril and exulted in the punishment it received."
Beth looked at him wonderingly.
"You are a strange man, indeed," said she. "Really, I cannot understand your mental attitude at all."
He chuckled and rubbed his hands together gleefully.
"I can," he returned, "for I know what causes it." And then he went away and left her, still seeming highly amused at her bewilderment.
In the operating room the next day Gys appeared with a rubber mask drawn across his features. The girls decided that it certainly improved his appearance, odd as the masked face might appear to strangers. It hid the dreadful nose and the scars and to an extent evened the size of the eyes, for the holes through which he peered were made alike. Gys was himself pleased with the device, for after that he wore the mask almost constantly, only laying it aside during the evenings when he sat on deck.
It was three days after the arrival of Mrs. Denton and her mother--whose advent had accomplished much toward promoting the young Belgian's convalescence--when little Maurie suddenly reappeared on the deck of the _Arabella_.
"Oh," said Patsy, finding him there when she came up from breakfast, "where is Clarette?"
He shook his head sadly.
"We do not live together, just now," said he. "Clarette is by nature temperamental, you know; she is highly sensitive, and I, alas! do not always please her."
"Did she find you in Dunkirk?" asked the girl.
"Almost, mamselle, but not quite. It was this way: I knew if I permitted her to follow me she would finally succeed in her quest, for she and the dear children have six eyes among them, while I have but two; so I reposed within an ash-barrel until they had passed on, and then I followed them, keeping well out of their sight. In that way I managed to escape. But it proved a hard task, for my Clarette is very persistent, as you may have noticed. So I decided I would be more safe upon the ship than upon the shore. She is not likely to seek me here, and in any event she floats better than she swims."
Patsy regarded the little man curiously.
"Did you not tell us, when first we met you, that you were heart-broken over the separation from your wife and children?" she inquired in severe tones.
"Yes, of course, mamselle; it was a good way to arouse your sympathy," he admitted with an air of pride. "I needed sympathy at that time, and my only fear was that you would find Clarette, as you threatened to do. Well," with a deep sigh, "you did find her. It was an unfriendly act, mamselle."
"They told us in Ostend that the husband of Clarette is a condemned spy, one who served both sides and proved false to each. The husband of Clarette is doomed to suffer death at the hands of the Germans or the Belgians, if either is able to discover him."
Maurie removed his cap and scratched the hair over his left ear reflectively.
"Ah, yes, the blacksmith!" said he. "I suspected that blacksmith fellow was not reliable."
"How many husbands has Clarette?"
"With the blacksmith, there are two of us," answered Maurie, brightly. "Doubtless there would be more if anything happened to me, for Clarette is very fascinating. When she divorced the blacksmith he was disconsolate, and threatened vengeance; so her life is quite occupied in avoiding her first husband and keeping track of her second, who is too kind-hearted to threaten her as the blacksmith did. I really admire Clarette--at a distance. She is positively charming when her mind is free from worry--and the children are asleep."
"Then you think," said Ajo, who was standing by and listening to Maurie's labored explanations, "that it is the blacksmith who is condemned as a spy, and not yourself?"
"I am quite sure of it. Am I not here, driving your ambulance and going boldly among the officers? If it is Jakob Maurie they wish, he is at hand to be arrested."
"But you are not Jakob Maurie."
The Belgian gave a start, but instantly recovering he answered with a smile:
"Then I must have mistaken my identity, monsieur. Perhaps you will tell me who I am?"
"Your wife called you 'Henri,'" said Patsy.
"Ah, yes; a pet name. I believe the blacksmith is named Henri, and poor Clarette is so accustomed to it that she calls me Henri when she wishes to be affectionate."
Patsy realized the folly of arguing with him.
"Maurie," said she, "or whatever your name may be, you have been faithful in your duty to us and we have no cause for complaint. But I believe you do not speak the truth, and that you are shifty and artful. I fear you will come to a bad end."
"Sometimes, mamselle," he replied, "I fear so myself. But, _peste_! why should we care? If it is the end, what matter whether it is good or bad?"
Watching their faces closely, he saw frank disapproval of his sentiments written thereon. It disturbed him somewhat that they did not choose to continue the conversation, so he said meekly:
"With your kind permission, I will now go below for a cup of coffee," and left them with a bow and a flourish of his cap. When he had gone Patsy said to Ajo:
"I don't believe there is any such person as the blacksmith."
"Nor I," was the boy's reply. "Both those children are living images of Maurie, who claims the blacksmith was their father. He's a crafty little fellow, that chauffeur of ours, and we must look out for him."
"If he is really a spy," continued the girl, after a brief period of thought, "I am amazed that he dared join our party and go directly to the front, where he is at any time likely to be recognized."
"Yes, that is certainly puzzling," returned Ajo. "And he's a brave little man, too, fearless of danger and reckless in exposing himself to shot and shell. Indeed, our Maurie is something of a mystery and the only thing I fully understand is his objection to Clarette's society."
At "le revue matin," as the girls called the first inspection of the morning, eight of their patients were found sufficiently recovered to be discharged. Some of these returned to their regiments and others were sent to their homes to await complete recovery. The hospital ship could accommodate ten more patients, so it was decided to make a trip to Dixmude, where an artillery engagement was raging, with the larger ambulance.
"I think I shall go to-day," announced Gys, who was wearing his mask. "Dr. Kelsey can look after the patients and it will do me good to get off the ship."
Uncle John looked at the doctor seriously.
"There is hard fighting, they say, in the Dixmude district. The Germans carried the British trenches yesterday, and to-day the Allies will try to retake them."
"I don't mind," returned the doctor, but he shuddered, nevertheless.
"Why don't you avoid the--the danger line?" suggested Mr. Merrick.
"A man can't run away from himself, sir; and perhaps you can understand the fascination I find in taunting the craven spirit within me."
"No, I can't understand it. But suit yourself."
"I shall drive," announced Maurie.
"You may be recognized," said Patsy warningly.
"Clarette will not be at the front, and on the way I shall be driving. Have you noticed how people scatter at the sound of our gong?"
"The authorities are watching for spies," asserted Ajo.
Maurie's face became solemn.
"Yes; of course. But--the blacksmith is not here, and," he added with assurance, "the badge of the Red Cross protects us from false accusations."
When they had gone Uncle John said thoughtfully to the girls:
"That remark about the Red Cross impressed me. If that fellow Maurie is really in danger of being arrested and shot, he has cleverly placed himself in the safest service in the world. He knows that none of our party is liable to be suspected of evil."
CHAPTER XVIII
A QUESTION OF LOYALTY
During the morning they were visited by a French official who came aboard in a government boat and asked to see Mr. Merrick.
The ship had been inspected several times by the commander of the port and the civil authorities, and its fame as a model hospital had spread over all Flanders. Some attempt had been made to place with the Americans the most important of the wounded--officers of high rank or those of social prominence and wealth--but Mr. Merrick and his aids were determined to show no partiality. They received the lowly and humble as well as the high and mighty and the only requisite for admission was an injury that demanded the care of good nurses and the skill of competent surgeons.
Uncle John knew the French general and greeted him warmly, for he appreciated his generous co-operation. But Beth had to be called in to interpret because her uncle knew so little of the native language.
First they paid a visit to the hospital section, where the patients were inspected. Then the register and records were carefully gone over and notes taken by the general's secretary. Finally they returned to the after-deck to review the convalescents who were lounging there in their cushioned deck-chairs.
"Where is the German, Lieutenant Elbl?" inquired the general, looking around with sudden suspicion.
"In the captain's room," replied Beth. "Would you like to see him?"
"If you please."
The group moved forward to the room occupied by Captain Carg. The door and windows stood open and reclining upon a couch inside was the maimed German, with Carg sitting beside him. Both were solemnly smoking their pipes.
The captain rose as the general entered, while Elbl gave his visitor a military salute.
"So you are better?" asked the Frenchman.
Beth repeated this in English to Carg, who repeated it in German to Elbl. Yes, the wounded man was doing very well.
"Will you keep him here much longer?" was the next question, directed to Mr. Merrick.
"I think so," was the reply. "He is still quite weak, although the wound is healing nicely. Being a military prisoner, there is no other place open to him where the man can be as comfortable as here."
"You will be responsible for his person? You will guarantee that he will not escape?"
Mr. Merrick hesitated.
"Must we promise that?" he inquired.
"Otherwise I shall be obliged to remove him to a government hospital."
"I don't like that. Not that your hospitals are not good enough for a prisoner, but Elbl happens to be a cousin of our captain, which puts a different face on the matter. What do you say, Captain Carg? Shall we guarantee that your cousin will not try to escape?"
"Why should he, sir? He can never rejoin the army, that's certain," replied Carg.
"True," said the general, when this was conveyed to him by Beth. "Nevertheless, he is a prisoner of war, and must not be allowed to escape to his own people."
Beth answered the Frenchman herself, looking him straight in the face.
"That strikes me as unfair, sir," said she. "The German must henceforth be a noncombatant. He has been unable, since he was wounded and brought here, to learn any of your military secrets and at the best he will lie a helpless invalid for weeks to come. Therefore, instead of making him a prisoner, it would be more humane to permit him to return to his home and family in Germany."
The general smiled indulgently.
"It might be more humane, mademoiselle, but unfortunately it is against the military code. Did I understand that your captain will guarantee the German's safety?"
"Of course," said Carg. "If he escapes, I will surrender myself in his place."
"Ah; but we moderns cannot accept Pythias if Damon runs away," laughed the general. "But, there; it will be simpler to send a parole for him to sign, when he may be left in your charge until he is sufficiently recovered to bear the confinement of a prison. Is that satisfactory?"
"Certainly, sir," replied the captain.
Elbl had remained silent during this conversation, appearing not to understand the French and English spoken. Indeed, since his arrival he had only spoken the German language, and that mostly in his intercourse with Carg. But after the French officer had gone away Beth began to reflect upon this reticence.
"Isn't it queer," she remarked to Uncle John, "that an educated German--one who has been through college, as Captain Carg says Elbl has--should be unable to understand either French or English? I have always been told the German colleges are very thorough and you know that while at Ostend we found nearly all the German officers spoke good English."
"It is rather strange, come to think of it," answered Uncle John. "I believe the study of languages is a part of the German military education. But I regret that the French are determined to keep the poor fellow a prisoner. Such a precaution is absurd, to my mind."
"I think I can understand the French position," said the girl, reflectively. "These Germans are very obstinate, and much as I admire Lieutenant Elbl I feel sure that were he able he would fight the French again to-morrow. After his recovery he might even get one of those mechanical feet and be back on the firing line."
"He's a Uhlan."
"Then he could ride a horse. I believe, Uncle, the French are justified in retaining him as a prisoner until the war is over."
Meantime, in the captain's room the two men were quietly conversing.
"He wants you to sign a parole," said Carg.
"Not I."
"You may as well. I'm responsible for your safety."
"I deny anyone's right to be responsible for me. If you have made a promise to that effect, withdraw it," said the German.
"If I do, they'll put you in prison."
"Not at present. I am still an invalid. In reality. I am weak and suffering. Yet I am already planning my escape, and that is why I insist that you withdraw any promise you have made. Otherwise--"
"Otherwise?"
"Instead of escaping by water, as I had intended, to Ostend, I must go to the prison and escape from there. It will be more difficult. The water route is best."
"Of course," agreed the captain, smiling calmly.
"One of your launches would carry me to Ostend and return here between dark and daylight."
"Easily enough," said Carg. It was five minutes before he resumed his speech. Then he said with quiet deliberation: "Cousin, I am an American, and Americans are neutral in this war."
"You are Sangoan."
"My ship is chartered by Americans, which obliges the captain of the ship to be loyal to its masters. I will do nothing to conflict with the interests of the Americans, not even to favor my cousin."
"Quite right," said Elbl.
"If you have any plan of escape in mind, do not tell me of it," continued the captain. "I shall order the launches guarded carefully. I shall do all in my power to prevent your getting away from this ship."
"Thank you," said the German. "You have my respect, cousin. Pass the tobacco."
CHAPTER XIX
THE CAPTURE
There was considerable excitement when the ambulance returned. Part of the roof had been torn away, the doors were gone, the interior wrecked and not a pane of glass remained in the sides; yet Ajo drove it to the dock, the motor working as smoothly as ever, and half a dozen wounded were helped out and put into the launch to be taken aboard the hospital ship.
When all were on deck, young Jones briefly explained what had happened. A shell had struck the ambulance, which had been left in the rear, but without injuring the motor in any way. Fortunately no one was near at the time. When they returned they cleared away the rubbish to make room for a few wounded men and then started back to the city.
Doctor Gys, hatless and coatless, his hair awry and the mask making him look more hideous than ever, returned with the party and came creeping up the ship's ladder in so nervous a condition that his trembling knees fairly knocked together.
The group around Ajo watched him silently.
"What do you think that fool did?" asked the boy, as Gys slunk away to his room.
"Tell us," pleaded Patsy, who was one of the curious group surrounding him.
"We had gone near to where a machine gun was planted, to pick up a fallen soldier, when without warning the Germans charged the gun. Maurie and I made a run for life, but Gys stood stock still, facing the enemy. A man at the gun reeled and fell, just then, and with a hail of bullets flying around him the doctor coolly walked up and bent over him. The sight so amazed the Germans that they actually stopped fighting and waited for him. Perhaps it was the Red Cross on the doctor's arm that influenced them, but imagine a body of soldiers in the heat of a charge suddenly stopping because of one man!"
"Well, what happened?" asked Mr. Merrick.
"I couldn't see very well, for a battery that supported the charge was shelling the retreating Allies and just then our ambulance was hit. But Maurie says he watched the scene and that when Gys attempted to lift the wounded man up he suddenly turned weak as water. The Germans had captured the gun, by this time, and their officer himself hoisted the injured man upon the doctor's shoulders and attended him to our ambulance. When I saw the fight was over I hastened to help Gys, who staggered so weakly that he would have dropped his man a dozen times on the way had not the Germans held him up. They were laughing, as if the whole thing was a joke, when crack! came a volley of bullets and with a great shout back rushed the French and Belgians in a counter-charge. I admit I ducked, crawling under the ambulance, and the Germans were so surprised that they beat a quick retreat.
"And now it was that Gys made a fool of himself. He tore off his cap and coat, which bore the Red Cross emblem, and leaped right between the two lines. Here were the Germans, firing as they retreated, and the Allies firing as they charged, and right in the center of the fray stood Gys. The man ought to have been shot to pieces, but nothing touched him until a Frenchman knocked him over because he was in the way of the rush. It was the most reckless, suicidal act I ever heard of!"
Uncle John looked worried. He had never told any of them of Dr. Gys' strange remark during their first interview, but he had not forgotten it. "I'll be happier when I can shake off this horrible envelope of disfigurement," the doctor had declared, and in view of this the report of that day's adventure gave the kind-hearted gentleman a severe shock.
He walked the deck thoughtfully while the girls hurried below to look after the new patients who had been brought, not too comfortably, in the damaged ambulance. "It was a bad fight," Ajo had reported, "and the wounded were thick, but we could only bring a few of them. Before we left the field, however, an English ambulance and two French ones arrived, and that gave us an opportunity to get away. Indeed, I was so unnerved by the dangers we had miraculously escaped that I was glad to be out of it."
Uncle John tried hard to understand Doctor Gys, but the man's strange, abnormal nature was incomprehensible. When, half an hour later, Mr. Merrick went below, he found the doctor in the operating room, cool and steady of nerve and dressing wounds in his best professional manner.
Upon examination the next morning the large ambulance was found to be so badly damaged that it had to be taken to a repair shop in the city to undergo reconstruction. It would take several weeks to put it in shape, declared the French mechanics, so the Americans would be forced to get along with the smaller vehicle. Jones and Dr. Kelsey made regular trips with this, but the fighting had suddenly lulled and for several days no new patients were brought to the ship, although many were given first aid in the trenches for slight wounds.
So the colony aboard the _Arabella_ grew gradually less, until on the twenty-sixth of November the girls found they had but two patients to care for--Elbl and Andrew Denton. Neither required much nursing, and Denton's young wife insisted on taking full charge of him. But while the hospital ship was not in demand at this time there were casualties day by day in the trenches, where the armies faced each other doggedly and watchfully and shots were frequently interchanged when a soldier carelessly exposed his person to the enemy. So the girls took turns going with the ambulance, and Uncle John made no protest because so little danger attended these journeys.
Each day, while one of the American girls rode to the front, the other two would visit the city hospitals and render whatever assistance they could to the regular nurses. Gys sometimes accompanied them and sometimes went to the front with the ambulance; but he never caused his friends anxiety on these trips, because he could not endanger his life, owing to the cessation of fighting.
The only incident that enlivened this period of stagnation was the capture of Maurie. No; the authorities didn't get him, but Clarette did. Ajo and Patsy had gone into the city one afternoon and on their return to the docks, where their launch was moored, they found a street urchin awaiting them with a soiled scrap of paper clenched fast in his fist. He surrendered it for a coin and Patsy found the following words scrawled in English:
"She has me fast. Help! Be quick. I cannot save myself so you must save me. It is your Maurie who is in distress."
They laughed a little at first and then began to realize that the loss of their chauffeur would prove a hardship when fighting was resumed. Maurie might not be a good husband, and he might be afraid of a woman, but was valuable when bullets were flying. Patsy asked the boy:
"Can you lead us to the man who gave you this paper?"
"Oui, mamselle."
"Then hurry, and you shall have five centimes more."
The injunction was unnecessary, for the urchin made them hasten to keep up with him. He made many turns and twists through narrow alleys and back streets until finally he brought them to a row of cheap, plastered huts built against the old city wall. There was no mistaking the place, for in the doorway of one of the poorest dwellings stood Clarette, her ample figure fairly filling the opening, her hands planted firmly on her broad hips.
"Good evening," said Patsy pleasantly. "Is Maurie within?"
"Henri is within," answered Clarette with a fierce scowl, "and he is going to stay within."
"But we have need of his services," said Ajo sternly, "and the man is in our employ and under contract to obey us."
"I also need his services," retorted Clarette, "and I made a contract with him before you did, as my marriage papers will prove."
The little boy and girl had now crowded into the doorway on either side of their mother, clinging to her skirts while they "made faces" at the Americans. Clarette turned to drive the children away and in the act allowed Patsy and Ajo to glance past her into the hut.
There stood little Maurie, sleeves rolled above his elbows, bending over a battered dishpan where he was washing a mess of cracked and broken pottery. He met their gaze with a despairing countenance and a gesture of appeal that scattered a spray of suds from big wet fingers. Next moment Clarette had filled the doorway again.
"You may as well go away," said the woman harshly.
Patsy stood irresolute.
"Have you money to pay the rent and to provide food and clothing?" she presently asked.
"I have found a few francs in Henri's pockets," was the surly reply.
"And when they are gone?"
Clarette gave a shrug.
"When they are gone we shall not starve," she said. "There is plenty of charity for the Belgians these days. One has but to ask, and someone gives."
"Then you will not let us have Maurie?"
"No, mademoiselle." Then she unbent a little and added: "If my husband goes to you, they will be sure to catch him some day, and when they catch him they will shoot him."
"Why?"
"Don't you know?"
"No."
Clarette smiled grimly.
"When Henri escapes me, he always gets himself into trouble. He is not so very bad, but he is careless--and foolish. He tries to help the Germans and the French at the same time, to be accommodating, and so both have conceived a desire to shoot him. Well; when they shoot him he can no longer earn money to support me and his children."
"Are they really his children?" inquired young Jones.
"Who else may claim them, monsieur?"
"I thought they were the children of your first husband, the blacksmith."
Clarette glared at him, with lowering brow.
"Blacksmith? Pah! I have no husband but Henri, and heaven forsook me when I married him."
"Come, Patsy," said Ajo to his companion, "our errand here is hopeless. And--perhaps Clarette is right."
They made their way back to the launch in silence. Patsy was quite disappointed in Maurie. He had so many admirable qualities that it was a shame he could be so untruthful and unreliable.
As time passed on the monotony that followed their first exciting experiences grew upon them and became oppressive. December weather in Flanders brought cutting winds from off the North Sea and often there were flurries of snow in the air. They had steam heat inside the ship but the deck was no longer a practical lounging place.
Toward the last of the month Lieutenant Elbl was so fully recovered that he was able to hobble about on crutches. The friendship between the two cousins continued and Elbl was often found in the captain's room. No more had been said about a parole, but the French officials were evidently keeping an eye on the German, for one morning an order came to Mr. Merrick to deliver Elbl to the warden of the military prison at Dunkirk on or before ten o'clock the following day.
While the German received this notification with his accustomed stolid air of indifference, his American friends were all grieved at his transfer. They knew the prison would be very uncomfortable for the invalid and feared he was not yet sufficiently recovered to be able to bear the new conditions imposed upon him. There was no thought of protesting the order, however, for they appreciated the fact that the commandant had been especially lenient in leaving the prisoner so long in their care.
The Americans were all sitting together in the cabin that evening after dinner, when to their astonishment little Maurie came aboard in a skiff, bearing an order from the French commandant to Captain Carg, requesting him to appear at once at military headquarters.
Not only was Carg puzzled by this strange summons but none of the others could understand it. The Belgian, when questioned, merely shook his head. He was not the general's confidant, but his fee as messenger would enable him to buy bread for his family and he had been chosen because he knew the way to the hospital ship.
As there was nothing to do but obey, the captain went ashore in one of the launches, which towed the skiff in which Maurie had come.
When he had gone, Lieutenant Elbl, who had been sitting in the cabin, bade the others good night and retired to his room. Most of the others retired early, but Patsy, Uncle John and Doctor Gys decided to sit up and await the return of the captain. It was an exceptionally cool evening and the warmth of the forward cabin was very agreeable.
Midnight had arrived when the captain's launch finally drew up to the side and Carg came hastening into the cabin. His agitated manner was so unusual that the three watchers with one accord sprang to their feet with inquiring looks.
"Where's Elbl?" asked the captain sharply.
"Gone to bed," said Uncle John.
"When?"
"Hours ago. I think he missed your society and was rather broken up over the necessity of leaving us to-morrow."
Without hesitation Carg turned on his heel and hastened aft. They followed him in a wondering group. Reaching the German's stateroom the captain threw open the door and found it vacant.
"Humph!" he exclaimed. "I suspected the truth when I found our launch was gone."
"Which launch?" asked Uncle John, bewildered.
"The one I left with the ship. On my return, just now, I discovered it was not at its moorings. Someone has stolen it."
They stared at him in amazement.
"Wasn't the deck patrolled?" asked Patsy, the first to recover.
"We don't set a watch till ten-thirty. It wasn't considered necessary. But I had no suspicion of the trick Elbl has played on me to-night," he added with a groan. Their voices had aroused others. Ajo came out of his room, enveloped in a heavy bathrobe, and soon after Maud and Beth joined them.
"What's up?" demanded the boy.
"The German has tricked us and made his escape," quietly answered Dr. Gys. "For my part, I'm glad of it."
"It was a conspiracy," growled the captain. "That rascal, Maurie--"
"Oh, was Maurie in it?"
"Of course. He was the decoy; perhaps he arranged the whole thing."
"Didn't the general want you, then?"
Carg was so enraged that he fairly snorted.
"Want me? Of course he didn't want me! That treacherous little Belgian led me into the waiting room and said the general would see me in a minute. Then he walked away and I sat there like a bump on a log and waited. Finally I began to wonder how Maurie, who was always shy of facing the authorities, had happened to be the general's messenger. It looked queer. Officers and civilians were passing back and forth but no one paid any attention to me; so after an hour or so I asked an officer who entered from an inner room, when I could see the general. He said the general was not there evenings but would be in his office to-morrow morning. Then I showed him my order and he glanced at it and said it was forged; wasn't the general's signature and wasn't in proper form, anyhow. When I started to go he wouldn't let me; said the affair was suspicious and needed investigation. So he took me to a room full of officers and they asked me a thousand fool questions. Said they had no record of a Belgian named Maurie and had never heard of him before. I couldn't figure the thing out, and they couldn't; so finally they let me come back to the ship."
"Strange," mused Uncle John; "very strange!"
"I was so stupid," continued Carg, "that I never thought of Elbl being at the bottom of the affair until I got back and found our launch missing. Then I remembered that Elbl was to have been turned over to the prison authorities to-morrow and like a flash I saw through the whole thing."
"I'm blamed if _I_ do," declared Mr. Merrick.
The others likewise shook their heads.
"He got me out of the way, stole the launch, and is half way to Ostend by this time."
"Alone? And wounded--still an invalid?"
"Doubtless Maurie is with him. The rascal can run an automobile; so I suppose he can run a launch."
"What puzzles me," remarked Patsy, "is how Lieutenant Elbl ever got hold of Maurie, and induced him to assist him, without our knowing anything about it."
"I used to notice them talking together a good bit," said Jones.
"But Clarette has kept Maurie a prisoner. She wouldn't let him come back to the ship."
"He was certainly at liberty to-night," answered Beth. "Isn't this escape liable to be rather embarrassing to us, Uncle John?"
"I'm afraid so," was the reply. "We agreed to keep him safely until the authorities demanded we give him up; and now, at the last minute, we've allowed him to get away."
Anxiety was written on every countenance as they considered the serious nature of this affair. Only Gys seemed composed and unworried.
"Is it too late to go in chase of the launch?" asked Ajo, breaking a long pause. "They're headed for Ostend, without a doubt, and there's a chance that they may run into a sand-bank in the dark, or break down, or meet with some other accident to delay them."
"I believe it's worth our while, sir," answered Carg. "The launch we have is the faster, and the trip will show our good faith, if nothing more."
"Then make ready to start at once," said Ajo, "and I'll dress and go along."
Carg hurried away to give orders and the boy ran to his stateroom. Five minutes later they were away, with four sailors to assist in the capture of the fugitives in case they were overtaken.
It was a fruitless journey, however. At daybreak, as they neared Ostend, they met their stolen launch coming back, in charge of a sleepy Belgian who had been hired to return it. The man frankly stated that he had undertaken the task in order to get to Dunkirk, where he had friends, and he had been liberally paid by a German on crutches, who had one foot missing, and a little Belgian whom he had never seen before, but who, from the description given, could be none other than Maurie.
They carried the man back with them to the _Arabella_, where further questioning added nothing to their information. They now had proof, however, that Elbl was safe with his countrymen at Ostend and that Maurie had been his accomplice.
"I would not believe," said Patsy, when she heard the story, "that a Belgian could be so disloyal to his country."
"Every nation has its quota of black sheep," replied Uncle John, "and from what we have learned of Maurie's character he is not at all particular which side he serves."
CHAPTER XX
THE DUNES
The escape of a prisoner of war from the American hospital ship was made the subject of a rigid inquiry by the officials and proved extremely humiliating to all on board the _Arabella_. The commandant showed his irritation by severely reprimanding Mr. Merrick for carelessness, while Captain Carg had to endure a personal examination before a board of inquiry. He was able to prove that he had been at headquarters during the evening of the escape, but that did not wholly satisfy his inquisitors. Finally an order was issued forbidding the Americans to take any more wounded Germans or Austrians aboard their ship, and that seemed to end the unpleasant affair.
However, a certain friction was engendered that was later evidenced on both sides. The American ambulance was no longer favored on its trips to the front, pointed preference being given the English and French Red Cross Emergency Corps. This resulted in few wounded being taken to the _Arabella_, as the Americans confined their work largely to assisting the injured on the field of battle. The girls were not to be daunted in their determined efforts to aid the unfortunate and every day one of them visited the trenches to assist the two doctors in rendering first aid to the wounded.
The work was no longer arduous, for often entire days would pass without a single casualty demanding their attention. The cold weather resulted in much sickness among the soldiers, however, and Gys found during this period of military inactivity that his medicine chest was more in demand than his case of surgical instruments.
A slight diversion was created by Clarette, who came to the ship to demand her husband from the Americans. It seemed almost impossible to convince her that Maurie was not hidden somewhere aboard, but at last they made the woman understand he had escaped with the German to Ostend. They learned from her that Maurie--or Henri, as she insisted he was named--had several times escaped from her house at night, while she was asleep, and returned at daybreak in the morning, and this information led them to suspect he had managed to have several secret conferences with Lieutenant Elbl previous to their flight. Clarette announced her determination to follow her husband to Ostend, and perhaps she did so, as they did not see her again.
It was on Sunday, the twentieth of December, that the Battle of the Dunes began and the flames of war burst out afresh. The dunes lay between the North Sea and the Yser River in West Flanders and consisted of a stretch of sandy hillocks reaching from Coxyde to Nieuport les Bains. The Belgians had entrenched these dunes in an elaborate and clever manner, shoveling the sand into a series of high lateral ridges, with alternate hollows, which reached for miles along the coast. The hollows were from six to eight feet deep, affording protection to the soldiers, who could nevertheless fire upon the enemy by creeping up the sloping embankments until their heads projected sufficiently to allow them to aim, when they could drop back to safety.
In order to connect the hollows one with another, that an advance or retreat might be made under cover, narrow trenches had been cut at intervals diagonally through the raised mounds of sand. Military experts considered this series of novel fortifications to be practically impregnable, for should the enemy defile through one of the cross passages into a hollow where the Allies were gathered, they could be picked off one by one, as they appeared, and be absolutely annihilated.
Realizing this, the Germans had not risked an attack, but after long study of the defences had decided that by means of artillery they might shell the Belgians, who held the dunes, and destroy them as they lay in the hollows. So a heavy battery had been planted along the German lines for this work, while in defence the Belgians confronted them with their own famous dog artillery, consisting of the deadly machine guns. The battle of December twentieth therefore began with an artillery duel, resulting in so many casualties that the Red Cross workers found themselves fully occupied.
Beth went with the ambulance the first day, worked in the hollows of the dunes, and returned to the ship at night completely worn out by the demands upon her services. It was Patsy's turn next, and she took with her the second day one of the French girls as assistant.
When the ambulance reached the edge of the dunes, where it was driven by Ajo, the battle was raging with even more vigor than the previous day. The Germans were dropping shells promiscuously into the various hollows, hoping to locate the hidden Belgian infantry, while the Belgian artillery strove to destroy the German gunners. Both succeeded at times, and both sides were equally persistent.
As it was impossible to take the ambulance into the dunes, it was left in the rear in charge of Jones, while the others threaded their way in and out the devious passages toward the front. They had covered fully a mile in this laborious fashion before they came upon a detachment of Belgian infantry which was lying in wait for a call to action. Beyond this trench the doctors and nurses were forbidden to go, and the officer in command warned the Americans to beware of stray shells.
Under these circumstances they contented themselves by occupying some of the rear hollows, to which the wounded would retreat to secure their services. Dr. Kelsey and Nanette, the French girl, established themselves in one hollow at the right, while Dr. Gys and Patsy took their position in another hollow further to the left. There they opened their cases of lint, plaster and bandages, spreading them out upon the sand, and were soon engaged in administering aid to an occasional victim of the battle.
One man who came to Patsy with a slight wound on his shoulder told her that a shell had exploded in a forward hollow and killed outright fifteen of his comrades. His own escape from death was miraculous and the poor fellow was so unnerved that he cried like a baby.
They directed him to the rear, where he would find the ambulance, and awaited the appearance of more patients. Gys crawled up the mound of sand in front of them and cautiously raised his head above the ridge. Next instant he ducked to escape a rain of bullets that scattered the sand about them like a mist.
"That was foolish," said Patsy reprovingly. "You might have been killed."
"No such luck," he muttered in reply, but the girl could see that he trembled slightly with nervousness. Neither realized at the time the fatal folly of the act, for they were unaware that the Germans were seeking just such a clew to direct them where to drop their shells.
"It's getting rather lonely here, and there are a couple of vacant hollows in front of us," remarked the doctor. "Suppose we move over to one of those, a little nearer the soldiers?"
Patsy approved the proposition, so they gathered up their supplies and moved along the hollow to where a passage had been cut through. They had gone barely a hundred yards when a screech, like a buzz-saw when it strikes a nail, sounded overhead. Looking up they saw a black disk hurtling through the air, to drop almost where they had been standing a moment before. There was a terrific explosion that sent debris to their very feet.
"After this we'll be careful how we expose ourselves," said the doctor gravely. "They have got our range in a hurry. Here comes another; we'd better get away quickly."
They progressed perhaps half a mile, without coming upon any soldiers, when at the brow of a hill slightly higher than the rest, they became aware of unwonted activity. A trench had been dug along the ridge, with great pits here and there to serve as bomb-proof shelters. Every time a head projected above the ridge, a storm of bullets showed that the enemy was well within rifle range. In fact, it was to dislodge the Germans that the present intrenchments were being made; machine guns would be mounted as soon as positions had been prepared.
The German bullets had already taken their toll. In the little valley a poor Belgian pressed his hand against a bad wound in his side, while another was nursing an arm roughly bandaged by his fellows in the trenches. First aid made the two comfortable for the time being at least and the men were directed toward the ambulance. As they left, the man with the wounded arm pointed down the narrow valley to where a deep ravine cut through. "We were driven from there," he said. "The big guns dropped shells on us and killed many; there are many wounded beyond--but you cannot cross the ravine. We lost ten in doing it."
Nevertheless, the doctor and Patsy strode off. Just within the shelter of the ridge they found another Belgian, desperately wounded, and the doctor stopped to ease his pain with the hypodermic needle. Patsy looked across the narrow defile; it was a bare fifty feet, and seemed safe enough. Her Red Cross uniform would protect her, she reasoned, and boldly enough she stepped out into the open. A cry from a wounded soldier ahead hastened her footsteps. Without heeding the warning shout of Doctor Gys she calmly stooped over the man who had called to her.
And then there was a sudden rending, blinding, terrifying crash that sent the world into a thousand shrieking echoes. A huge shell had fallen not fifty feet away, plowing its way through the earthworks above. Its explosion sent timbers, abandoned gun-carriages, everything, flying through the air. And one great piece of wood caught Patsy a glancing blow on the back of her head as she crouched over the wounded Belgian. With a weak cry she toppled over, not unconscious, but unable to raise herself.
Another shell crashed down a hundred yards away, and then one closer that sent the sand spouting high in a blinding cloud. She raised herself slowly and glanced back toward Doctor Gys. He stood, his face ashen with fear, hiding behind the shelter of the other hill. He looked up as she stirred; a cry of relief came to his lips.
"Wait!" he called, bracing up suddenly. "Wait and I will get you."
Bending his head low he sprang across the unprotected space. He stopped with a sudden jerk and then came on.
"You were hit!" cried Patsy as he bent over her.
"It is nothing," he answered brusquely. "Hold tight around my neck." "Now--" another shell scattered sand over them--"we must get away from here."
Breathing thickly, he staggered across the open, dropping her with a great groan behind the protection of the ridge.
"The man you were helping," he gasped. "I must bring him in."
"But you are wounded--" Patsy cried.
He straightened up--his hand clutched his side--there came across his disfigured features a queer twisted smile--he sighed softly and slowly sank in a crumpled heap. A clean little puncture in the breast of his coat told the whole story. Patsy felt herself slipping.... All grew dark.
*       *       *       *       *
It was Ajo who found her and carried her back to the ambulance, where Dr. Kelsey and Nanette were presently able to restore her to consciousness. Then they returned to the _Arabella_, grave and silent, and Patsy was put to bed. Before morning Beth and Maud were anxiously nursing her, for she had developed a high fever and was delirious.
The days that succeed were anxious ones, for Patsy's nerves had given away completely. It was many weeks later that the rest of them met on deck.
"It's the first of February," said Uncle John. "Don't you suppose Patsy could start for home pretty soon?"
"Perhaps so," answered Maud. "She is sitting up to-day, and seems brighter and more like herself. Have we decided, then, to return to America?"
"I believe so," was the reply. "We can't keep Ajo's ship forever, you know, and without Doctor Gys we could never make it useful as a hospital ship again."
"That is true," said the girl, thoughtfully. "Now that Andrew Denton, with his wife and the countess, have gone to Charleroi, our ship seems quite lonely."
"You see," said Ajo, taking part in the discussion, "we've never been able to overcome the suspicious coldness of these Frenchmen, caused by Elbl's unfortunate escape. We are not trusted fully, and never will be again, so I'm convinced our career of usefulness here is ended."
"Aside from that," returned Uncle John, "you three girls have endured a long period of hard work and nervous strain, and you need a rest. I'm awfully proud of you all; proud of your noble determination and courage as well as the ability you have demonstrated as nurses. You have unselfishly devoted your lives for three strenuous months to the injured soldiers of a foreign war, and I hope you're satisfied that you've done your full duty."
"Well," returned Maud with a smile, "I wouldn't think of retreating if I felt that our services were really needed, but there are so many women coming here for Red Cross work--English, French, Swiss, Dutch and Italian--that they seem able to cover the field thoroughly."
"True," said Beth, joining the group. "Let's go home, Uncle. The voyage will put our Patsy in fine shape again. When can we start, Ajo?"
"Ask Uncle John."
"Ask Captain Carg."
"If you really mean it," said the captain, "I'll hoist anchor to-morrow morning."

= = = PG10059 = = =
AUNT JANE'S NIECES ON VACATION
Produced by Afra Ullah, Brett Koonce and PG Distributed Proofreaders
AUNT JANE'S NIECES ON VACATION
BY
EDITH VAN DYNE
1912
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
CHAPTER I
THE HOBO AT CHAZY JUNCTION
Mr. Judkins, the station agent at Chazy Junction, came out of his little house at daybreak, shivered a bit in the chill morning air and gave an involuntary start as he saw a private car on the sidetrack. There were two private cars, to be exact--a sleeper and a baggage car--and Mr. Judkins knew the three o'clock train must have left them as it passed through.
"Ah," said he aloud; "the nabobs hev arrove."
"Who are the nabobs?" asked a quiet voice beside him.
Again Mr. Judkins started; he even stepped back a pace to get a better view of the stranger, who had approached so stealthily through the dim light that the agent was unaware of his existence until he spoke.
"Who be you?" he demanded, eyeing the man suspiciously.
"Never mind who I am," retorted the other in a grumpy tone; "the original question is 'who are the nabobs?'"
"See here, young feller; this ain't no place fer tramps," observed Mr. Judkins, frowning with evident displeasure; "Chazy Junction's got all it kin do to support its reg'lar inhabitants. You'll hev to move on."
The stranger sat down on a baggage truck and eyed the private car reflectively. He wore a rough gray suit, baggy and threadbare, a flannel shirt with an old black tie carelessly knotted at the collar, a brown felt hat with several holes in the crown, and coarse cowhide shoes that had arrived at the last stages of usefulness. You would judge him to be from twenty-five to thirty years of age; you would note that his face was browned from exposure, that it was rather set and expressionless but in no way repulsive. His eyes, dark and retrospective, were his most redeeming feature, yet betrayed little of their owner's character. Mr. Judkins could make nothing of the fellow, beyond the fact that he was doubtless a "tramp" and on that account most unwelcome in this retired neighborhood.
Even tramps were unusual at Chazy Junction. The foothills were sparsely settled and the inhabitants too humble to be attractive to gentlemen of the road, while the rocky highways, tortuous and uneven, offered no invitation to the professional pedestrian.
"You'll hev to move on!" repeated the agent, more sternly.
"I can't," replied the other with a smile. "The car I was--er--attached to has come to a halt. The engine has left us, and--here we are, I and the nabobs."
"Be'n ridin' the trucks, eh?"
"No; rear platform. Very comfortable it was, and no interruptions. The crazy old train stopped so many times during the night that I scarcely woke up when they sidetracked us here, and the first thing I knew I was abandoned in this wilderness. As it grew light I began to examine my surroundings, and discovered you. Glad to meet you, sir."
"You needn't be."
"Don't begrudge me the pleasure, I implore you. I can't blame you for being gruff and unsociable; were you otherwise you wouldn't reside at--at--" he turned his head to read the half legible sign on the station house, "at Chazy Junction. I'm familiar with most parts of the United States, but Chazy Junction gets my flutters. Why, oh, why in the world did it happen?"
Mr. Judkins scowled but made no answer. He was wise enough to understand he was no match in conversation for this irresponsible outcast who knew the great world as perfectly as the agent knew his junction. He turned away and stared hard at the silent sleeper, the appearance of which was not wholly unexpected.
"You haven't informed me who the nabobs are, nor why they choose to be sidetracked in this forsaken stone-quarry," remarked the stranger, eyeing the bleak hills around him in the growing light of dawn.
The agent hesitated. His first gruff resentment had been in a manner disarmed and he dearly loved to talk, especially on so interesting a subject as "the nabobs." He knew he could astonish the tramp, and the temptation to do so was too strong to resist.
"It's the great John Merrick, who's got millions to burn but don't light many bonfires," he began, not very graciously at first. "Two years ago he bought the Cap'n Wegg farm, over by Millville, an'--"
"Where's Millville?" inquired the man.
"Seven mile back in the hills. The farm ain't nuthin' but cobblestone an' pine woods, but--"
"How big is Millville?"
"Quite a town. Eleven stores an' houses, 'sides the mill an' a big settlement buildin' up at Royal, where the new paper mill is jest started. Royal's four mile up the Little Bill Hill."
"But about the nabob--Mr. Merrick, I think you called him?"
"Yes; John Merrick. He bought the Cap'n Wegg place an' spent summer 'fore last on it--him an' his three gals as is his nieces."
"Oh; three girls."
"Yes. Clever gals, too. Stirred things up some at Millville, I kin tell you, stranger. Lib'ral an' good-natured, but able to hold their own with the natives. We missed 'em, last year; but t'other day I seen ol' Hucks, that keeps their house for 'em--he 'n' his wife--an' Hucks said they was cumin' to spend this summer at the farm an' he was lookin' fer 'em any day. The way they togged up thet farmhouse is somethin' won'erful, I'm told. Hain't seen it, myself, but a whole carload o' furnitoor--an' then some more--was shipped here from New York, an' Peggy McNutt, over t' Millville, says it must 'a' cost a for-tun'."
The tramp nodded, somewhat listlessly.
"I feel quite respectable this morning, having passed the night as the guest of a millionaire," he observed. "Mr. Merrick didn't know it, of course, or he would have invited me inside."
"Like enough," answered the agent seriously. "The nabob's thet reckless an' unaccountable, he's likely to do worse ner that. That's what makes him an' his gals interestin'; nobody in quarries. How about breakfast, friend Judkins?"
"That's my business an' not yourn. My missus never feeds tramps."
"Rather ungracious to travelers, eh?"
"Ef you're a traveler, go to the hoe-tel yonder an' buy your breakfas' like a man."
"Thank you; I may follow your advice."
The agent walked up the track and put out the semaphore lights, for the sun was beginning to rise over the hills. By the time he came back a colored porter stood on the platform of the private car and nodded to him.
"Folks up yit?" asked Judkins.
"Dressing, seh."
"Goin' ter feed 'em in there?"
"Not dis mohnin'. Dey'll breakfas' at de hotel. Carriage here yit?"
"Not yit. I s'pose ol' Hucks'll drive over for 'em," said the agent.
"Dey's 'spectin' some one, seh. As fer me, I gotta live heah all day, an' it makes me sick teh think of it."
"Heh!" retorted the agent, scornfully; "you won't git sick. You're too well paid fer that."
The porter grinned, and just then a little old gentleman with a rosy, cheery face pushed him aside and trotted down the steps.
"Mornin', Judkins!" he cried, and shook the agent's hand. "What a glorious sunrise, and what crisp, delicious air! Ah, but it's good to be in old Chazy County again!"
The agent straightened up, his face wreathed with smiles, and cast an "I told you so!" glance toward the man on the truck. But the stranger had disappeared.
CHAPTER II
THE INVASION OF MILLVILLE
Over the brow of the little hill appeared a three-seated wagon, drawn by a pair of handsome sorrels, and in a moment the equipage halted beside the sleeper.
"Oh, Thomas Hucks--you dear, dear Thomas!" cried a clear, eager voice, and out from the car rushed Miss Patricia Doyle, to throw her arms about the neck of the old, stoop-shouldered and white-haired driver, whose face was illumined by a joyous smile.
"Glad to see ye, Miss Patsy; right glad 'ndeed, child," returned the old man. But others were waiting to greet him; pretty Beth De Graf and dainty Louise Merrick--not Louise "Merrick" any longer, though, but bearing a new name she had recently acquired--and demure Mary, Patsy's little maid and an old friend of Thomas Hucks', and Uncle John with his merry laugh and cordial handshake and, finally, a tall and rather dandified young man who remained an interested spectator in the background until Mr. Merrick seized and dragged him forward.
"Here's another for you to know, Thomas," said the little millionaire. "This is the other half of our Louise--Mr. Arthur Weldon--and by and by you can judge whether he's the better half or not."
The aged servant, hat in hand, made a respectful bow to Mr. Weldon. His frank eyes swept the young man from head to foot but his smile was the same as before.
"Miss Louise is wiser ner I be," said the old fellow simply; "I'm safe to trust to her jedgment, I guess."
There was a general laugh, at this, and they began to clamber aboard the wagon and to stow away beneath the seats the luggage the colored porter was bringing out.
"Stop at the Junction House, Thomas," said Mr. Merrick as they moved away.
"Nora has the breakfast all ready at home, sir," replied Thomas.
"Good for Nora! But we can't fast until we reach home--eight good miles of jolting--so we'll stop at the Junction House for a glass of Mrs. Todd's famous milk."
"Very good, sir."
"Is anyone coming for our trunks and freight? There's half a car of truck to be carted over."
"Ned's on the way, sir; and he'll get the liveryman to help if he can't carry it all."
The Junction House was hidden from the station by the tiny hill, as were the half dozen other buildings tributary to Chazy Junction. As the wagon drew up before the long piazza which extended along the front of the little frame inn they saw a man in shabby gray seated at a small table with some bread and a glass of milk before him. It was their unrecognized guest of the night--the uninvited lodger on the rear platform--but he did not raise his eyes or appear to notice the new arrivals.
"Mrs. Todd! Hey, Mrs. Todd!" called Uncle John. "Anybody milked the cow yet?"
A frowsy looking woman came out, all smiles, and nodded pleasantly at the expectant group in the wagon. Behind her loomed the tall, lean form of Lucky Todd, the "proprietor," who was serious as a goat, which animal he closely resembled in feature.
"Breakfas' all 'round, Mr. Merrick?" asked the woman.
"Not this time, Mrs. Todd. Nora has our breakfast waiting for us. But we want some of your delicious milk to last us to the farm."
"Las' night's milkin's half cream by this time," she rejoined, as she briskly reentered the house.
The man at the table held out his empty glass.
"Here; fill this up," he said to Lucky Todd.
The somber-faced proprietor turned his gaze from the Merrick group to the stranger, eyed him pensively a moment and then faced the wagon again. The man in gray got up, placed the empty glass in Todd's hand, whirled him around facing the door and said sternly:
"More milk!"
The landlord walked in like an automaton, and a suppressed giggle came from the girls in the wagon. Uncle John was likewise amused, and despite the unknown's frazzled apparel the little millionaire addressed him in the same tone he would have used toward an equal.
"Don't blame you, sir. Nobody ever tasted better milk than they have at the Junction House."
The man, who had resumed his seat, stood up, took off his hat and bowed. But he made no reply.
Out came Mrs. Todd, accompanied by another frowsy woman. Between them they bore a huge jug of milk, a number of thick glasses and a plate of crackers.
"The crackers come extry, Mr. Merrick," said the landlady, "but seein' as milk's cheap I thought you might like 'em."
The landlord now came out and placed the stranger's glass, about half filled with milk, on the table before him. The man looked at it, frowned, and tossed off the milk in one gulp.
"More!" he said, holding out the glass.
Todd shook his head.
"Ain't no more," he declared.
His wife overheard him and pausing in her task of refilling the glasses for the rich man's party she looked over her shoulder and said:
"Give him what he wants, Lucky."
The landlord pondered.
"Not fer ten cents, Nancy," he protested. "The feller said he wanted ten cents wuth o' breakfas', an' by Joe he's had it."
"Milk's cheap," remarked Mrs. Todd. "It's crackers as is expensive these days. Fill up his glass, Lucky."
"Why is your husband called 'Lucky,' Mrs. Todd?" inquired Patsy, who was enjoying the cool, creamy milk.
"'Cause he got me to manage him, I guess," was the laughing reply. "Todd ain't much 'count 'nless I'm on the spot to order him 'round."
The landlord came out with the glass of milk but paused before he set it down.
"Let's see your money," he said suspiciously.
It seemed to the girls, who were curiously watching the scene, that the tramp flushed under his bronzed skin; but without reply he searched in a pocket and drew out four copper cents, which he laid upon the table. After further exploration he abstracted a nickel from another pocket and pushed the coins toward the landlord.
"'Nother cent," said Todd.
Continued search seemed for a time hopeless, but at last, in quite an unexpected way, the man produced the final cent and on receiving it Todd set down the milk.
"Anything more, yer honor?" he asked sarcastically.
"Yes; you might bring me the morning paper," was the reply.
Everyone except Todd laughed frankly at this retort. Uncle John put two silver dollars in Mrs. Todd's chubby hand and told Thomas to drive on.
"I dunno," remarked old Hucks, when they were out of earshot, "whether that feller's jest a common tramp or a workman goin' over to the paper mill at Royal. Jedgin' from the fact as he had money I guess he's a workman."
"Wrong, Thomas, quite wrong," said Beth, seated just behind him. "Did you notice his hands?"
"No, Miss Beth."
"They were not rough and the fingers were slender and delicate."
"That's the mark of a cracksman," said Arthur Weldon, with a laugh. "If there are any safes out here that are worth cracking, I'd say look out for the gentleman."
"His face isn't bad at all," remarked Patsy, reflectively. "Isn't there any grade between a workman and a thief?"
"Of course," asserted Mr. Merrick, in his brisk way. "This fellow, shabby as he looked, might be anything--from a strolling artist to a gentleman down on his luck. But what's the news, Thomas? How are Ethel and Joe?"
"Mr. an' Mrs. Wegg is quite comf't'ble, sir, thank you," replied old Hucks, with a show of eagerness. "Miss Ethel's gran'ther, ol' Will Thompson, he's dead, you know, an' the young folks hev fixed up the Thompson house like a palace. Guess ye'd better speak to 'em about spendin' so much money, Mr. Merrick; I'm 'fraid they may need it some day."
"Don't worry. They've a fine income for life, Thomas, and there will be plenty to leave to their children--if they have any. But tell me about the mill at Royal. Where _is_ Royal, anyhow?"
"Four mile up the Little Bill Creek, sir, where the Royal Waterfall is. A feller come an' looked the place over las' year an' said the pine forest would grind up inter paper an' the waterfall would do the grindin'. So he bought a mile o' forest an' built a mill, an' they do say things is hummin' up to the new settlement. There's more'n two hundred hands a-workin' there, a'ready."
"Goodness me!" cried Patsy; "this thing must have livened up sleepy old Millville considerably."
"Not yet," said Hucks, shaking his head. "The comp'ny what owns the mill keeps a store there for the workmen, an' none of 'em come much to Millville. Our storekeepers is madder'n blazes about it; but fer my part I'm glad the two places is separated."
"Why?" asked Louise.
"They're a kinder tough lot, I guess. Turnin' pine trees inter paper mus' be a job thet takes more muscle than brains. I don't see how it's done, at all."
"It's simple enough," said Mr. Merrick. "First the wood is ground into pulp, and then the pulp is run through hot rollers, coming out paper. It's a mighty interesting process, so some day we will all go to Royal and see the paper made."
"But not just yet, Uncle," remarked Patsy. "Let's have time to settle down on the farm and enjoy it. Oh, how glad I am to be back in this restful, sleepy, jumping-off-place of the world again! Isn't it delightful, Arthur Weldon? Did you ever breathe such ozony, delicious mountain air? And do you get the fragrance of the pine forests, and the--the--"
"The bumps?" asked Arthur, as the wagon gave a jolt a bit more emphatic than usual; "yes, Patsy dear, I get them all; but I won't pass judgment on Millville and Uncle John's farm just yet. Are we 'most there?"
"We're to have four whole months of it," sighed Beth. "That ought to enable us to renew our youth, after the strenuous winter."
"Rubbish!" said Uncle John. "You haven't known a strenuous moment, my dears, and you're all too young to need renewals, anyhow. But if you can find happiness here, my girls, our old farm will become a paradise."
These three nieces of Mr. Merrick were well worth looking at. Louise, the eldest, was now twenty--entirely too young to be a bride; but having decided to marry Arthur Weldon, the girl would brook no interference and, having a will of her own, overcame all opposition. Her tall, slender form was exceedingly graceful and willowy, her personality dainty and refined, her temperament under ordinary conditions essentially sweet and agreeable. In crises Louise developed considerable character, in strong contrast with her usual assumption of well-bred composure. That the girl was insincere in little things and cultivated a polished manner to conceal her real feelings, is undeniable; but in spite of this she might be relied upon to prove loyal and true in emergencies.
Patricia Doyle was more than two years the junior of her cousin Louise and very unlike her. Patsy's old father, Major Gregory Doyle, said "she wore her heart on her sleeve," and the girl was frank and outspoken to a fault. Patsy had no "figure" to speak of, being somewhat dumpy in build, nor were her piquant features at all beautiful. Her nose tipped at the end, her mouth was broad and full-lipped and her complexion badly freckled. But Patsy's hair was of that indescribable shade that hovers between burnished gold and sunset carmine. "Fiery red" she was wont to describe it, and most people considered it, very justly, one of her two claims to distinction. Her other admirable feature was a pair of magnificent deep blue eyes--merry, mischievous and scintillating as diamonds. Few could resist those eyes, and certain it is that Patsy Doyle was a universal favorite and won friends without a particle of effort.
The younger of the three nieces, Elizabeth De Graf, was as beautiful a girl as you will often discover, one of those rarely perfect creations that excite our wonder and compel admiration--as a beautiful picture or a bit of statuary will. Dreamy and reserved in disposition, she lacked the graciousness of Louise and Patsy's compelling good humor; yet you must not think her stupid or disagreeable. Her reserve was really diffidence; her dreamy, expressionless gaze the result of a serious nature and a thoughtful temperament. Beth was quite practical and matter-of-fact, the reverse of Patsy's imaginative instincts or Louise's affected indifference. Those who knew Beth De Graf best loved her dearly, but strangers found her hard to approach and were often repulsed by her unresponsive manner. Underneath all, the girl was a real girl, with many splendid qualities, and Uncle John relied upon Beth's stability more than on that of his other two nieces. Her early life had been a stormy and unhappy one, so she was but now developing her real nature beneath the warmth of her uncle's protecting love.
Topping the brow of a little hill the wagon came to a smooth downward grade where the road met the quaint old bridge that spanned Little Bill Creek, beside which stood the antiquated flour and feed mill that had given Millville its name. The horses were able to maintain their brisk trot across the bridge and through the main street of the town, which was merely a cluster of unimposing frame buildings, that lined either side of the highway for the space of an ordinary city block. Then they were in the wilds again and rattling over another cobblestone trail.
"This 'ere country's nuth'n' but pine woods 'n' cobblestones," sighed old Hucks, as the horses subsided to a walk. "Lor' knows what would 'a' happened to us without the trees! They saves our grace, so's to speak."
"I think the scenery is beautiful," observed Patsy. "It's so different from other country places."
"Not much farming around here, I imagine," said Arthur Weldon.
"More than you'd think, sir," replied Thomas. "There's certain crops as thrives in stony land, an' a few miles north o' here, towards Huntingdon, the soil's mighty rich 'n' productive. Things ain't never as bad as they seem in this world, sir," he added, turning his persistently smiling face toward the young man.
Mr. Merrick sat beside the driver on the front seat. The middle seat was occupied by Patsy and Beth, between whom squeezed little Mary, the maid. Louise and Arthur had the back seat.
A quarter of a mile beyond the town they came to a sort of lane running at right angles with the turnpike, and down this lane old Hucks turned his team. It seemed like a forbidding prospect, for ahead of them loomed only a group of tall pines marking the edge of the forest, yet as they came nearer and made a little bend in the road the Wegg farm suddenly appeared in view. The house seemed so cozy and homelike, set upon its green lawn with the tall pines for a background, that the girls, who knew the place well, exclaimed with delight, and Arthur, who now saw it for the first time, nodded his head approvingly.
Uncle John was all excitement over the arrival at his country home. An old fashioned stile was set in a rail fence which separated the grounds from the lane, and Hucks drew up the wagon so his passengers could all alight upon the step of the stile. Patsy was out at a bound. Louise followed more deliberately, assisted by her boy husband, and Beth came more sedately yet. But Uncle John rode around to the barn with Thomas, being eager to see the cows and pigs and poultry with which the establishment was liberally stocked.
The house was of two stories, the lower being built of cobblestones and the upper of pine slabs; but it had been artistically done and the effect was delightful. It was a big, rambling dwelling, and Mr. Merrick had furnished the old place in a lavish manner, so that his nieces would lack no modern comfort when they came there to spend a summer.
On the porch stood an old woman clothed in a neat gingham dress and wearing a white apron and cap. Her pleasant face was wreathed in smiles as she turned it toward the laughing, chattering group that came up the path. Patsy spied her and rushed up to give old Nora a hug and kiss, and the other two girls saluted the blind woman with equal cordiality, for long ago she had won the love and devotion of all three. Arthur, who had heard of Nora, pressed her hand and told her she must accept him as another of her children, and then she asked for Mr. Merrick and ran in to get the breakfast served. For, although blind, old Nora was far from being helpless, and the breakfast she had prepared in anticipation of their arrival was as deliciously cooked as if she had been able to use her eyes as others did.
CHAPTER III
THE DAWN OF A GREAT ENTERPRISE
The great enterprise was sprung on Mr. Merrick the very morning following his arrival at the farm. Breakfast was over and a group had formed upon the shady front lawn, where chairs, benches and hammocks were scattered in profusion.
"Well, Uncle, how do you like it?" asked Louise. "Are you perfectly comfortable and happy, now we've escaped so far from the city that its humming life is a mere memory?"
"Happy as a clam," responded Uncle John, leaning back in his chair with his feet on a foot rest. "If I only had the morning paper there would be nothing else to wish for."
"The paper? That's what that queer tramp at the Junction House asked for," remarked Beth. "The first thought of even a hobo was for a morning paper. I wonder why men are such slaves to those gossipy things."
"Phoo!" cried Patsy; "we're all slaves to them. Show me a person who doesn't read the daily journals and keep abreast of the times and I'll show you a dummy."
"Patsy's right," remarked Arthur Weldon. "The general intelligence and cosmopolitan knowledge of the people are best cultivated by the newspapers. The superiority of our newspapers has been a factor in making us the greatest nation on earth, for we are the best informed."
"My, what big words!" exclaimed Louise.
"It is quite true," said Uncle John soberly, "that I shall miss our daily paper during our four months' retirement in these fascinating wilds. It's the one luxury we can't enjoy in our country retreat."
"Why not?" asked Patsy, with startling abruptness, while a queer expression--as of an inspiration--stole over her bright face.
"Chump!" said Beth, drily; "you know very well why not, Patsy Doyle. Mooley cows and the fourth estate don't intermingle, so to speak."
"They can be made to, though," declared Patsy. "Why hasn't some one thought of it before? Uncle John--girls!--I propose we start a daily paper."
Louise laughed softly, Beth's lip curled and Arthur Weldon cast an amused glance at the girl; but Uncle John stared seriously into Patsy's questioning blue eyes.
"How?" he asked in a puzzled tone. If anything could interest this eccentric little millionaire more than the usual trend of events it was an original proposition of this sort. He loved to do things that other people had not attempted, nor even thought of. He hated conversational platitudes and established conventions, and his nieces had endeared themselves to him more by their native originality and frank disregard of ordinary feminine limitations than in any other way. It was generally conceded that Patsy was his favorite because she could advance more odd suggestions than the other girls, and this niece had a practical aptitude for carrying out her whimsical ideas that had long since won her uncle's respect. Not that she could outdo Mr. Merrick in eccentricity: that was admitted to be his special province, in which he had no rival; but the girl was so clever a confederate that she gave her erratic uncle much happiness of the sort he most appreciated.
Therefore, this seemingly preposterous proposition to establish a daily paper on a retired country farm did not strike the old gentleman as utterly impossible, and anything within the bounds of possibility was sure to meet his earnest consideration, especially when it was proposed by one of his favorite nieces.
"How?" responded Patsy; "why, it's easy enough, Uncle. We'll buy a press, hire a printer, and Beth and Louise will help me edit the paper. I'm sure I can exhibit literary talents of a high order, once they are encouraged to sprout. Louise writes lovely poetry and 'stories of human interest,' and Beth--"
"I can't write even a good letter," asserted that young lady; "but I'd dearly love to edit a newspaper."
"Of course," agreed Louise; "we all would. And I think we could turn out a very creditable paper--for Millville. But wouldn't it cost a lot of money?"
"That isn't the present question," replied Uncle John. "The main thing is, do you girls want to be tied down to such a task? Every day in the week, all during our summer holiday--"
"Why, you've made our whole lives a holiday, Uncle John," interrupted Patsy, "and we've been so coddled and swamped with luxuries that we are just now in serious danger of being spoiled! You don't want three spoiled nieces on your hands, do you? And please make allowance for our natural impetuosity and eagerness to be up and doing. We love the farm, but our happiness here would be doubled if we had some occupation to keep us busy, and this philanthropic undertaking would furnish us with no end of fun, even while we were benefiting our fellow man."
"All jabber, dear," exclaimed Beth. "I admit the fun, but where does the philanthropy come in?"
"Don't you see?" asked Patsy. "Both Uncle John and that tramp we encountered have met on common ground to bewail the lack of a daily newspaper 'in our midst'--to speak in journalistic parlance. At the paper mill at Royal are over two hundred workmen moaning in despair while they lose all track of the world's progress. At Huntingdon, not five miles distant, are four or five hundred people lacking all the educational advantages of an up-to-date--or is 'down-to-date' proper?--press. And Millville--good gracious! What would sleepy Millville folks think of having a bright, newsy, metropolitan newspaper left on their doorsteps every morning, or evening, as the case may be?"
"H-m," said Uncle John; "I scent a social revolution in the wilds of Chazy County."
"Let's start it right away!" cried Patsy. "The 'Millville Tribune.' What do you say, girls?"
"Why 'Tribune?'" asked Louise.
"Because we three will run it, and we're a triumvirate--the future tribunal of the people in this district."
"Very good!" said Uncle John, nodding approval. "A clever idea, Patsy."
"But it's all nonsense, sir," observed Arthur Weldon, in astonishment. "Have you any idea of the details of this thing you are proposing?"
"None whatever," said the little millionaire. "That's the beauty of the scheme, Arthur; it may lead us into a reg'lar complicated mix-up, and the joy of getting untangled ought to repay us for all our bother."
"Perhaps so--if you ever untangle," said the young man, smiling at the whimsical speech. Then he turned to his young bride. "Do you want to go into this thing, Louise?" he asked.
"Of course I do," she promptly replied. "It's the biggest thing in the way of a sensation that Patsy's crazy brain has ever evolved, and I'll stand by the _Millville Tribune_ to the last. You mustn't forget, Arthur, that I shall be able to publish all my verses and stories, which the Century and Harpers' so heartlessly turned down."
"And Beth?"
"Oh, I'm in it too," declared Beth. "There's something so delightfully mysterious and bewildering in the idea of our editing and printing a daily paper here in Millville that I can hardly wait to begin the experiment."
"It's no experiment whatever," asserted Patsy boldly. "The daily newspaper is an established factor in civilization, and 'whatever man has done, man can do'--an adage that applies equally to girls."
"Have you any notion of the cost of an outfit such as is required to print a modern daily?" asked Arthur.
"Oh, two or three hundred, perhaps, but--"
"You're crazy, child! That wouldn't buy the type."
"Nevertheless," began Patsy, argumentatively, but her uncle stopped her.
"You needn't figure on that," he said hastily. "The outfit shall be my contribution to the enterprise. If you girls say you're anxious and willing to run a newspaper, I'll agree to give you a proper start."
"Oh, thank you, Uncle!"
"Of course we're willing!"
"It is all absolutely settled, so far as we are concerned," said Patsy, firmly. "How long will it take to get the things here, Uncle?"
Mr. Merrick considered a moment.
"There's a long-distance telephone over at Cotting's General Store, in town," he said. "I'll drive over and get Major Doyle on the wire and have him order the stuff sent out at once."
"Oh, no!" protested Patsy; "don't tell daddy of this plan, please. He'd think we were all fit subjects for the lunatic asylum."
"Major Doyle wouldn't be far wrong in that conclusion," suggested Arthur.
"I'd like to surprise him by sending him the first copy of the _Millville Tribune_," added the major's daughter.
"Then," said Mr. Merrick, "I'll call up Marvin, my banker. He'll perhaps attend to the matter more understandingly and more promptly than the major would. Tell Hucks to harness Joe to the buggy, Patsy, and I'll go at once."
"We'll all go!" exclaimed Beth.
"Of course," added Louise; "we are all equally interested in this venture."
So Patsy had old Hucks hitch Joe to the surrey, and the three girls accompanied their uncle in his drive to town, leaving Arthur Weldon shaking his head in a deprecating way but fully realizing that no protest of his would avail to prevent this amazing undertaking.
"That old man is as much a child as Beth or Patsy," he reflected. "It puzzles me to explain how he made all those millions with so little worldly wisdom."
CHAPTER IV
THE WAY INTO PRINT
Sam Cotting's General Store at Millville divided importance with Bob West's hardware store but was a more popular loafing place for the sparse population of the tiny town. The post office was located in one corner and the telephone booth in another, and this latter institution was regarded with much awe by the simple natives. Once in awhile some one would telephone over to the Junction on some trivial business, but the long-distance call was never employed except by the "nabobs"--the local name for John Merrick and his nieces--or by the manager of the new mill at Royal, who had extended the line to his own office in the heart of the pine forest.
So, when Uncle John and the girls entered Cotting's store and the little gentleman shut himself up in the telephone booth, a ripple of excitement spread throughout the neighborhood. Skim Clark, the youthful hope of the Widow Clark, who "run the Emporium," happened to be in the store and he rushed out to spread the news that "the nabob's talkin' to New Yoruk!"
This information demanded immediate attention. Marshall McMahon McNutt, familiarly known as "Peggy" McNutt--because he had once lost a foot in a mowing machine--and who was alleged to be a real estate agent, horse doctor, fancy poultry breeder and palmist, and who also dabbled in the sale of subscription books, life insurance, liniment and watermelons, quickly slid off his front porch across the way and sauntered into Cotting's to participate in the excitement. Seth Davis, the blacksmith, dropped his tools and hurried to the store, and the druggist three doors away--a dapper gentleman known as Nib Corkins--hurriedly locked his door and attended the meeting. Presently the curious group was enlarged by the addition of Nick Thome the liveryman, Lon Taft, a carpenter and general man-of-all-work, and Silas Caldwell the miller, the latter a serious individual who had "jest happened to come acrost from the mill in the nick o' time."
Sam Cotting, being himself of great local importance, had never regarded with favor the rivalry of the nabob, but he placed stools near the telephone booth for the three girls, who accepted the courtesy with a graciousness that ought to have disarmed the surly storekeeper. They could not fail to be amused at the interest they excited, and as they personally knew every one of the town people they pleasantly nodded to each arrival and inquired after their health and the welfare of their families. The replies were monosyllables. Millville folks were diffident in the presence of these city visitors and while they favored the girls with rather embarrassing stares, their chief interest was centered on the little man in the telephone booth, who could plainly be seen through the glass door but might not be heard, however loudly he shouted.
"Talkin' to New Yoruk" was yet a marvelous thing to them, and much speculation was exchanged in low tones as to the probable cost of such a conversation as Mr. Merrick was now indulging in.
"Costs a dollar to connect, ye know," remarked Peggy McNutt to Ned Long. "Bet a cookie he's runnin' the blame bill up to two dollars, with all this chinnin'. Why can't th' ol' nabob write a letter, like common folks, an' give his extry cash to the poor?"
"Meanin' you, Peggy?" asked Nib Corkins, with a chuckle.
"He might do wuss ner that," retorted Peggy. "Lor' knows I'm poor enough. You don't ketch _me_ a-talkin' to New York at a dollar a throw, Nib, do ye?"
Meantime Mr. Merrick had succeeded in getting Mr. Marvin, of the banking house of Isham, Marvin & Co., on the wire.
"Do me a favor, Marvin," he said. "Hunt up the best supply house and have them send me a complete outfit to print a daily newspaper. Everything must be modern, you know, and don't let them leave out anything that might come handy. Then go to Corrigan, the superintendent of the railroad, and have him send the freight up here to Chazy Junction by a special engine, for I don't want a moment's delay and the regular freight takes a week or so. Charge everything to my account and impress upon the dealer the need of haste. Understand all that, Marvin?"
"I think I do, sir," was the reply; "but that's a pretty big order, Mr. Merrick. The outfit for a modern daily will cost a small fortune."
"Never mind; send it along."
"Very well. But you'd better give me some details. How big a newspaper do you want to print?"
"Hold the wire and I'll find out," said Uncle John. Then he opened the door of the booth and said: "Patsy, how big a thing do you want to print?"
"How big? Oh, let me see. Four pages will do, won't it, Louise?"
"Plenty, I should say, for this place," answered Louise.
"And how many columns to a page?" asked Uncle John.
"Oh, six or seven. That's regular, I guess."
"Make it six," proposed Beth. "That will keep us busy enough."
"All right," said Uncle John, and closed the door again.
This conversation was of the most startling nature to the assembled villagers, who were all trying to look unconcerned and as if "they'd jest dropped in," but were unable to dissemble their curiosity successfully. Of course much of this interchange of words between the man in the booth and the girls outside was Greek to them all, but "to print" and "columns" and "pages" could apply only to one idea, which, while not fully grasped, was tremendously startling in its suggestion. The Merrick party was noted for doing astonishing things in the past and evidently, in the words of Peggy McNutt, they were "up to some blame foolishness that'll either kill this neighborhood or make it talked about."
"It's too dead a'ready to kill," responded Nick Thorne gloomily. "Even the paper mill, four mile away, ain't managed to make Millville wiggle its big toe. Don't you worry over what the nabob'll do, Peggy; he couldn't hurt nuthin' if he tried."
The door opened again and Mr. Merrick protruded a puzzled countenance.
"He wants to know about a stereotype plant, Patsy. What'll I tell him?"
Patsy stared. Louise and Beth shook their heads.
"If it belongs to the--the thing we want, Uncle, have 'em send it along," said Patsy in desperation.
"All right."
A few minutes later the little man again appealed to them.
"How'll we run the thing, girls; steam or electricity?"
Patsy's face was a blank. Beth giggled and Louise frowned.
"Of course it'll have to be run," suggested Mr. Merrick; "but how? That's the question."
"I--I hadn't given that matter thought," admitted Patsy. "What do you think, Uncle?"
He considered, holding open the door while he thoughtfully regarded the silent but interested group of villagers that eagerly hung upon every word that passed.
"Cotting," called Mr. Merrick, "how do they run the paper mill at Royal?"
"'Lectricity! 'Lectricity, sir!" answered half a dozen at once.
"They develops the power from the Royal Waterfall of the Little Bill," explained Cotting, with slow and pompous deliberation. "Mr. Skeelty he tol' me they had enough 'lectric'ty to light up the whole dum country fer ten mile in all directions, 'sides a-runnin' of the mill."
"Who's Skeelty?"
"Manager o' the mill, sir, an' part owner, he says."
"Has he a telephone?"
"Yes, Mr. Merrick."
"Thank you."
Mr. Merrick shut the door and called up Skeelty. Five minutes of bargaining settled the question and he then connected with Mr. Marvin again and directed him to have the presses and machinery equipped to run by electricity. Thinking he had now given the banker all the commissions he could attend to with celerity, Uncle John next called up Major Doyle and instructed his brother-in-law to send four miles of electric cable, with fittings and transformers, and a crew of men to do the work, and not to waste a moment's time in getting them to Millville.
"What in blazes are ye up to now, John?" inquired the major, on receiving this order.
"None of your business, Gregory. Obey orders."
"Going to light the farm and turn night into day?" persisted the major.
"This is Patsy's secret, and I'm not going to give it away," said Mr. Merrick. "Attend to this matter promptly, Major, and you'll see the result when you come to us in July for your vacation."
Having attended to all the requirements of the projected _Millville Tribune_, as he thought, Mr. Merrick called the operator for the amount of his bill and paid it to Sam Cotting--three dollars and eighty cents. The sum fairly made the onlookers gasp, and as the Merrick party passed out, Silas, the miller, said solemnly:
"Don't anybody tell me talk is cheap, arter this. John Merrick may be a millionaire, but ef he keeps this thing up long he'll be a pauper. Thet's _my_ prophe-sigh."
"Yer off yer base, Si," said McNutt "Joe Wegg tol' me once thet the nabob's earnin's on his money were more'n he could spend ef he lays awake nights a-doin' it. Joe says it keeps pilin' up on him, till sometimes it drives him nigh desp'rit. I hed an idee I'd ask him to shuck off some of it onter me. _I_ could stan' the strain all right, an' get plenty o' sleep too."
"Ye won't hev no call to stan' it, Peggy," pre-dcted Lon Tait. "Milyunhairs may spend money foolish, but they don't never give none away. I've done sev'ral odd jobs fer Mr. Merrick, but he's never give me more'n jest wages."
"Well," said McNutt with a sigh, "while he's in easy reach there orter be _some_ sort o' pickings fer us, an' it's our duty to git all we can out'n him--short o' actoo-al robbery. What do ye s'pose this new deal means, boys? Sounds like printin' somethin', don't it?"
"P'raps it's some letterheads fer the Wegg Farm," suggested Nib Corkins. "These Merricks do everything on a big scale."
"Four pages, an' six columns to a page?" asked Cotting scornfully. "Sounds to me more like a newspaper, folks!"
There was a moment's silence, during which they all stared at the speaker fearfully. Then said Skim Clark, in his drawling, halting way:
"Ef thet's the case, an' there's goin' ter be a newspaper here in Millville, we may as well give up the struggle, fer the town'll be ruined!"
CHAPTER V
DIVIDING THE RESPONSIBILITY
The rest of that day and a good share of the night was devoted to an earnest consultation concerning the proper methods of launching the _Millville Daily Tribune_.
"We must divide the work," said Patsy, "so that all will have an equal share of responsibility. Louise is to be the literary editor and the society editor. That sounds like a good combination."
"There is no society here," objected Louise.
"Not as we understand the term, perhaps," replied Miss Doyle; "but every community, however small, believes it is a social center; and so it is--to itself. If there is a dance or a prayer meeting or a christening or illness, it must be recorded in our local columns. If Bob West sells a plow we've got to mention the name of the farmer who bought it; if there's a wedding, we'll make a double-header of it; if a baby is born, we will--will--"
"Print its picture in the paper. Eh, Uncle John?" This from Beth.
"Of course," said Mr. Merrick. "You must print all the home news, as well as the news of the world."
"How are you going to get the news of the world?" asked Arthur.
"How? How?"
"That was my question."
"Private wire from New York," said Mr. Merrick, as the girls hesitated how to meet this problem. "I'll arrange with the telegraph company to-morrow to have an extension of the wire run over from Chazy Junction. Then we'll hire an operator--a girl, of course--to receive the news in the office of the paper."
"But who will send us the news?" asked Beth.
"The Associated Press, I suppose, or some news agency in New York. I'll telegraph to-morrow to Marvin to arrange it."
Arthur whistled softly.
"This newspaper is going to cost something," he murmured. Uncle John looked at him with a half quizzical, half amused expression.
"That's what Marvin warned me yesterday, when I ordered the equipment," said he. "He told me that before I got through with this deal it would run up into the thousands. And he added that Millville wasn't worth it."
"And what did you say to that, Uncle John?" asked Beth.
"In that case, I said, I would be sure to get some pleasure and satisfaction out of your journalistic enterprise. My last financial statement showed a frightful condition of affairs. In spite of Major Doyle's reckless investments of my money, and--and the little we manage to give to deserving charities, I'm getting richer every day. When a small leak like this newspaper project occurs, it seems that Fortune is patting me on the back. I've no idea what a respectable newspaper will cost, but I hope it will cost a lot, for every dollar it devours makes my mind just that much easier."
Arthur Weldon laughed.
"In that case, sir," said he, "I can make no further protest. But I predict you will find the bills--eh--eh--entirely satisfactory."
"You mentioned an office, just now, Uncle," observed Louise. "Must we have a business office?"
"To be sure," Mr. Merrick replied. "We must find a proper location, where we can install the presses and all the type and machinery that go to making up a newspaper. I hadn't thought of this before, but it is a serious matter, my dears. We may have to build a place."
"Oh, that would take too long, entirely," said Patsy. "Can't we put it in the barn, Uncle?"
"What would happen to the horses and cows? No; we'll take a look over Millville and see what we can find there."
"You won't find much," predicted Beth. "I can't think of a single unoccupied building in the town."
"Then we'll put it in a tent," declared Patsy.
"Don't borrow trouble," advised Uncle John. "Wait till we've gone over the ground together. Our truck will require a pretty big place, for Marvin said one freight car wouldn't hold all the outfit. He's going to send two cars, anyhow."
"Have him fill up the second with print paper," proposed Arthur.
"Ah; that's another thing I hadn't thought of," said Mr. Merrick. "How big a daily edition will you print, Patsy?"
"Let's see," pondered the girl. "There are about two hundred at Royal, say four hundred at Huntingdon, at Millville about--about--"
"Say fifteen," said Uncle John; "that's six hundred and fifteen, and--"
"And the farmers, of course. There must be at least a hundred and fifty of 'em in the county, so that makes seven hundred and seventy-five copies a day."
"Wait a moment!" cried Arthur, somewhat bewildered by this figuring. "Do you suppose every inhabitant--man, woman and child--will subscribe for your paper?"
Patsy blushed.
"Why, no, of course not," she acknowledged frankly. "How many do you think _will_ subscribe, Arthur? Remember, it's to be a great newspaper."
"Four pages of six columns each. Plenty big enough for Millville," he said, thoughtfully. "My advice, girls, is to print a first edition of about four hundred copies and distribute the papers free in every house within a radius of five or six miles from Millville. These will be samples, and after the people have had a chance to read them you can ask them to subscribe. By the way, what will you charge for subscription?"
"How much, Uncle?" asked Patsy, appealingly.
"A penny paper is the most popular," he said, regarding her with merry, twinkling eyes. "Say thirty cents a month, or three-fifty a year. That's as much as these poor people can stand."
"I think so too," replied the girl, seriously.
"But it seems to me a penny paper isn't dignified," pouted Louise. "I had intended to print all my poems in it, and I'm sure that ought to make it worth at least five cents a copy."
"That will make it worth more, my dear," commented Uncle John; "but frequently one must sell property for less than it's actually worth. You must remember these people have not been used to spending much money on literature, and I imagine you'll have to coax them to spend thirty cents a month. Many of the big New York papers are sold for a penny, and without any loss of dignity, either."
"Do you think we can make it pay on that basis, Uncle?" asked Beth.
Uncle John coughed to gain time while he thought of a suitable reply. "That, my dear," he informed his niece, "will depend upon how many subscribers you can get. Subscribers and advertisers are necessary to make any paper pay."
"Advertisers!"
"Of course," said practical Beth. "Every merchant in Millville and Huntingdon will naturally advertise in our paper, and we'll make the major get us a lot from New York."
"Oh," said Patsy; "I see. So _that_ difficulty is settled."
Arthur smiled, but held his peace. Uncle John's round face was growing merrier every minute.
"Patsy, do you think we shall make any money from this venture?" asked Louise.
"We ought to, if we put our hearts and souls into the thing," was the reply. "But before we divide any profits we must pay back to Uncle John the original investment."
"We don't especially care to make any profit, do we?" inquired Beth. "It's fun for us, you know, and a--a--great educational experience, and--and--a fine philanthropy--and all that. We don't need the money, so if the paper pays a profit at a cent a copy we'd better cut down the price."
"Don't do that yet," advised Uncle John, soberly. "There will be expenses that as yet you don't suspect, and a penny for a paper is about as low as you can go."
"What's to be my position on the staff, Patsy?" asked Beth, turning to her cousin.
"You're a good mathematician, Beth, so I propose you act as secretary and treasurer, and keep the books."
"No; that's too mechanical; no bookkeeping for me. I want something literary."
"Then you can be sporting editor."
"Goodness, Patsy! There will be no sporting news in Millville."
"There will be a ball game occasionally, and I saw some of the men pitching quoits yesterday. But this is to be a newspaper reflecting the excitement of the entire world, Beth, and all the telegraphic news of a sporting character you must edit and arrange for our reading columns. Oh, yes; and you'll take care of the religious items too. We must have a Sunday Sermon, by some famous preacher, Uncle. We'll print that every Saturday, so those who can't go to church may get as good a talk as if they did--and perhaps a better one."
"That will be fine," he agreed. "How about murders, crimes and divorces?"
"All barred. Nothing that sends a cold chill down your back will be allowed in our paper. These people are delightfully simple; we don't want to spoil them."
"Cut out the cold chills and you'll spoil your newspaper," suggested Arthur. "People like to read of other folks' horrors, for it makes them more contented with their own lot in life."
"False philosophy, sir!" cried Fatsy firmly. "You can't educate people by retailing crimes and scandals, and the _Millville Tribune_ is going to be as clean as a prayer book, if I'm to be managing editor."
"Is that to be your office, dear?" asked Louise.
"I think so. I've a heap of executive ability, and I'm running over with literary--eh--eh--literary discrimination. In addition to running the thing, I'll be the general news editor, because I'm better posted on newspaper business than the other girls."
"How does that happen?" inquired Louise, wonderingly.
"Why, I--I _read_ the papers more than you or Beth. And I've set myself to master every detail of the business. No more crocheting or fancy work--no novel reading--no gossipy letter writing. From this day on we must attend strictly to business. If we're to become journalist, girls, we must be good ones--better than the ordinary--so that Uncle John may point to us with pride, and the columns of the _Millville Daily Tribune_ will be quoted by the New York and Chicago press. Only in that way can we become famous throughout the world!"
"Pass me the bonbons, dear," sighed Louise. "It's a high ambition, isn't it?"
"A very laudable ambition," added Uncle John approvingly. "I hope my clever nieces will be able to accomplish it."
"How about pictures?" asked Beth. "Modern newspapers are illustrated, and have cartoons of the leading events of the day."
"Can't we buy those things somewhere?" asked Patsy, appealing to Uncle John again. "There isn't an artist among us, of any account; and we shall be too busy to draw pictures."
"We must hire an artist," said Mr. Merrick, adding the item to his memoranda. "I'll speak to Marvin about it."
All these details were beginning to bewilder the embryo journalists. It is quite possible that had not Uncle John placed his order for presses and type so promptly the girls might have withdrawn from the proposition, but the die was now cast and they were too brave--perhaps too stubborn--to "back down" at this juncture.
"I realize," said Patsy, slowly and with a shake of her flaming head, "that we have undertaken an important venture. Our new enterprise is a most serious one, girls, for there is nothing greater or grander in our advanced age than the daily newspaper; no power so tremendous as the Power of the Press."
"Yes, the press must be powerful or it wouldn't print clearly," remarked Beth.
"We are to become public mentors to the simple natives of Chazy County," continued Patsy, warming up to her subject and speaking oratorically. "We shall be the guiding star of the--er--er--the benighted citizens of Millville and Huntingdon. We must lead them in politics, counsel them in the management of their farms and educate them to the great World Movements that are constantly occurring."
"Let's put all that rot in our prospectus," said Louise, looking at her cousin admiringly. "Can you remember it, Patsy, or had I better write it down now? I like that about teaching the farmers how to run their farms; it's so practical."
"You wait," said Patsy unflinchingly. "I'll write 'em an editorial that will make their eyes roll. But it won't do a bit of harm for you and Beth to jot down all the brilliant thoughts you run across, for the benefit of our subscribers."
"We haven't any subscribers yet," remarked Beth, placidly.
"I'll overcome that defect," said Uncle John. "I want to subscribe right now for ten copies, to be mailed to friends of mine in the city who--who need educating. I'll pay in advance and collect of my friends when I see 'em."
This was certainly encouraging and Patsy smiled benignantly.
"I'll take five more yearly subscriptions," said Arthur.
"Oh, but you're going to be on the staff!" cried Patsy.
"Am I?"
"Certainly. I've been thinking over our organization and while it is quite proper for three girls to run paper, there ought to be a man to pose as the editor in chief. That'll be you, Arthur."
"But you won't print my name?"
"Oh, yes we shall. Don't groan, sir; it's no disgrace. Wait till you see the _Millville Tribune_. Also we shall print our own names, in that case giving credit to whom credit is due. The announcement will run something like this: 'Arthur Weldon, General Manager and Editor in Chief; P. Doyle, General News Editor; L. Merrick Weldon, Society and Literary Editor; E. DeGraf, Sporting Editor, Secretary and Treasurer.' You see, by using our initials only, no one will ever suspect we are girls."
"The Millville people may," said Arthur, slyly, "and perhaps the disguise will be penetrated by outsiders. That will depend on the paper."
"I don't like that combination of sporting editor and secretary and treasurer," objected Beth. "It isn't the usual thing in journalism, I'm sure. Suppose you call me Editor of Special Features, and let it go at that?"
"Have we any special features?" asked Louise.
"Oh, yes," said Arthur; "there's Beth's eyebrows, Patsy's nose, and--"
"Do be sensible!" cried Patsy. "This isn't a joking matter, sir. Our newspaper will have plenty of special features, and Beth's suggestion is a good one. It sounds impressive. You see, Arthur, we've got to use you as a figurehead, but so you won't loaf on your job I've decided to appoint you Solicitor of Advertising and Subscriptions."
"Thank you, my dear," he said, grinning in an amused way.
"You and Louise, who still like to be together, can drive all over the county getting subscriptions, and you can write letters on our new stationery to all the big manufacturers of soaps and breakfast foods and beauty powders and to all the correspondence schools and get their advertisements for the _Tribune_. If you get a good many, we may have to enlarge the paper."
"Don't worry, Miss Doyle; I'll try to keep within bounds."
And so they went on, laying plans and discussing details in such an earnest way that Uncle John became as enthusiastic as any of them and declared in no uncertain tone that the _Millville Daily Tribune_ was bound to be a "howling success."
After the girls had retired for the night and the men sat smoking together in Uncle John's own room, Arthur said:
"Tell me, sir, why you have encouraged this mad project."
The little millionaire puffed his pipe in silence a moment. Then he replied:
"I'm educating my girls to be energetic and self-reliant. I want to bring out and develop every spark of latent ability there is in them. Whether the _Millville Tribune_ succeeds or fails is not important; it will at least keep them busy for a time, along new lines, and tax their best resources of intellect and business ability. In other words, this experience is bound to do 'em good, and in that way I figure it will be worth all it costs--and more. I like the originality of the idea; I'm pleased with the difficulties I see looming ahead; I'm quite sure my girls will rise to every occasion and prove their grit." He paused to knock the ashes from his pipe. "I'm worth a lot of money, Arthur," he continued, meekly, "and some day these three girls will inherit immense fortunes. It is my duty to train them in all practical business ways to take care of their property."
"I follow your line of reasoning, sir," observed Arthur Weldon; "but this absurd journalistic venture is bound to result in heavy financial loss."
"I know it, my boy. I'm sure of it. But can't you see that the lesson they will learn will render them more cautious in making future investments? I'm going to supply a complete newspaper outfit--to the last detail--and give 'em a good running start. Then I shall sit back and watch results. If they lose money on running expenses, as they surely will, they'll first take it out of their allowances, then sell their jewelry, and finally come to me for help. See? The lesson will be worth while, Arthur, and aside from that--think of the fun they'll have!"
CHAPTER VI
MR. SKEELTY OF THE MILL
The next morning they drove to town again, passing slowly up the street of the little village to examine each building that might be a possible location for a newspaper office. Here is a map that Patsy drew of Millville, which gives a fair idea of its arrangement:
[Illustration: Village Street]
Counting the dwellings there were exactly twelve buildings, and they all seemed occupied.
When they reached the hardware store, opposite Cotting's, Mr. West, the proprietor, was standing on the broad platform in front of it. In many respects Bob West was the most important citizen of Millville. Tall and gaunt, with great horn spectacles covering a pair of cold gray eyes, he was usually as reserved and silent as his neighbors were confiding and talkative. A widower of long standing, without children or near relatives, he occupied a suite of well-appointed rooms over the hardware store and took his meals at the hotel. Before Mr. Merrick appeared on the scene West had been considered a very wealthy man, as it was known he had many interests outside of his store; but compared with the multi-millionaire old Bob had come to be regarded more modestly, although still admitted to be the village's "warmest" citizen. He was an authority in the town, too, and a man of real importance.
Mr. Merrick stopped his horse to speak with the hardware man, an old acquaintance.
"West," said he, "my girls are going to start a newspaper in Millville."
The merchant bowed gravely, perhaps to cover the trace of a smile he was unable to repress.
"It's to be a daily paper, you know," continued Mr. Merrick, "and it seems there's a lot of machinery in the outfit. It'll need quite a bit of room, in other words, and we're looking for a place to install it."
West glanced along the street--up one side and down the other--and then shook his head negatively.
"Plenty of land, but no buildings," said he. "You might buy the old mill and turn it into a newspaper office. Caldwell isn't making much of a living and would be glad to sell out."
"It's too dusty and floury," said Patsy. "We'd never get it clean, I'm sure."
"What's in that shed of yours?" asked Uncle John, pointing to a long, low building' that adjoined the hardware store.
West turned and looked at the shed reflectively.
"That is where I store my stock of farm machinery," he said. "There's very little in there now, for it's a poor season and I didn't lay in much of a supply. In fact, I'm pretty well cleaned out of all surplus stock. But next spring I shall need the place again."
"Good!" cried Mr. Merrick. "That solves our problem. Has it a floor?"
"Yes; an excellent one; but only one small window."
"We can remedy that," declared Uncle John. "Here's the proposition, West: Let us have the shed for six months, at the end of which time we will know whether the _Millville Tribune_ is a success or not. If it is, we'll build a fine new building for it; if it don't seem to prosper, we'll give you back the shed. What do you say?"
West thought it over.
"There is room on the rear platform, for all the farm machinery I now have on hand. All right, Mr. Merrick; I'll move the truck out and give you possession. It won't make a bad newspaper office. But of course you are to fit up the place at your own expense."
"Thank you very much, sir!" exclaimed Uncle John. "I'll set Lon Taft at work at once. Where can he be found?"
"Playing billiards at the hotel, usually. I suppose he is there now."
"Very good; I'll hunt him up. What do you think of our newspaper scheme, West?"
The old merchant hesitated. Then he said slowly:
"Whatever your charming and energetic nieces undertake, sir, will doubtless be well accomplished. The typical country newspaper groans under a load of debt and seldom gets a fair show to succeed; but in this case there will be no lack of money, and--why, that settles the question, I think. Money is the keystone to success."
"Mr. West," said Louise, with dignity, "we are depending chiefly on the literary merit of our newspaper to win recognition."
"Of course; of course!" said he hastily. "Put me down as a subscriber, please, and rely upon my support at all times. It is possible, young ladies--nay, quite probable, I should say--that your originality and genius will yet make Millville famous."
That speech pleased Uncle John, and as the hardware merchant bowed and turned away, Mr. Merrick said in his cheeriest tones: "He's quite right, my dears, and we're lucky to have found such a fine, roomy place for our establishment. Before we go after the carpenter to fix it up I must telephone to Marvin about the things we still need."
Over the long-distance telephone Mr. Marvin reported that he had bought the required outfit and it was even then being loaded on the freight cars.
"I've arranged for a special engine," he added, "and if all goes well the freight will be on the sidetrack at Chazy Junction on Monday morning. The dealer will send down three men to set up the presses and get everything in running order. But he asks if you have arranged for your workmen. How about it, Mr. Merrick? have you plenty of competent printers and pressmen at Millville?"
"There are none at all," was the reply. "Better inquire how many we will need, Marvin, and send them down here. And, by the way, hire women or girls for every position they are competent to fill. This is going to be a girls' newspaper, so we'll have as few men around as possible."
"I understand, sir."
Uncle John ordered everything he could think of and told his agent to add whatever the supply man thought might be needed. This business being accomplished, he found Lon Taft at the hotel and instructed the carpenter to put rows of windows on both sides of the shed and to build partitions for an editorial office and a business office at the front.
This was the beginning of a busy period, especially for poor Uncle John, who had many details to attend to personally. The next morning the electricians arrived and began stringing the power cables from the paper mill to the newspaper office. This rendered it necessary for Mr. Merrick to make a trip to Royal, to complete his arrangement with Mr. Skeelty, the manager. He drove over with Arthur Weldon, in the buggy--four miles of hill climbing, over rough cobble-stones, into the pine forest.
Arriving there, the visitors were astonished at the extent of the plant so recently established in this practically unknown district. The great mill, where the wood pulp was made, was a building constructed from pine slabs and cobblestones, material gathered from the clearing in which it stood, but it was quite substantial and roomy. Adjoining the mill was the factory building where the pulp was rolled into print paper. Surrounding these huge buildings were some sixty small dwellings of the bungalow type, for the use of the workmen, built of rough boards, but neat and uniform in appearance. Almost in the center of this group stood the extensive storehouse from which all necessary supplies were furnished the mill hands, the cost being deducted from their wages. The electric power plant was a building at the edge of Royal Waterfall, the low and persistent roar of which was scarcely drowned by the rumble of machinery. Finally, at the edge of the clearing nearest the mills, stood the business office, and to this place Mr. Merrick and Arthur at once proceeded.
They found the office a busy place. Three or four typewriters were clicking away, operated by sallow-faced girls, and behind a tall desk were two bookkeepers, in one of whom Uncle John recognized--with mild surprise--the tramp he had encountered at Chazy Junction on the morning of his arrival. The young fellow had improved in appearance, having discarded his frayed gray suit for one of plain brown khaki, such as many of the workmen wore, a supply being carried by the company's store. He was clean-shaven and trim, and a gentlemanly bearing had replaced the careless, half defiant attitude of the former hobo. It was evident he remembered meeting Mr. Merrick, for he smiled and returned the "nabob's" nod.
Mr. Skeelty had a private enclosed office in a corner of the room. Being admitted to this sanctum, the visitors found the manager to be a small, puffy individual about forty-five years of age, with shrewd, beadlike black eyes and an insolent assumption of super-importance. Skeelty interrupted his task of running up columns of impressive figures to ask his callers to be seated, and opened the interview with characteristic abruptness.
"You're Merrick, eh? I remember. You want to buy power, and we have it to sell. How much will you contract to take?"
"I don't know just how much we need," answered Uncle John. "We want enough to run a newspaper plant at Millville, and will pay for whatever we use. I've ordered a meter, as you asked me to do, and my men are now stringing the cables to make the connection."
"Pah! a newspaper. How absurd," said Mr. Skeelty with scornful emphasis. "Your name, Merrick, is not unknown to me. It stands for financial success, I understand; but I'll bet you never made your money doing such fool things as establishing newspapers in graveyards."
Uncle John looked at the man attentively.
"I shall refrain from criticising your conduct of this mill, Mr. Skeelty," he quietly observed, "nor shall I dictate what you may do with your money--provided you succeed in making any."
The manager smiled broadly, as if the retort pleased him.
"Give an' take, sir; that's my motto," he said.
"But you prefer to take?"
"I do," was the cheerful reply. "I'll take your paper, for instance--if it isn't too high priced."
"In case it is, we will present you with a subscription," said Uncle John. "But that reminds me: as a part of our bargain I want you to allow my nieces, or any representative of the _Millville Tribune_, to take subscriptions among your workmen."
Mr. Skeelty stared at him a moment. Then he laughed.
"They're mostly foreigners, Mr. Merrick, who haven't yet fully mastered the English language. But," he added, thoughtfully, "a few among them might subscribe, if your country sheet contains any news of interest at all. This is rather a lonely place for my men and they get dissatisfied at times. All workmen seem chronically dissatisfied, and their women constantly urge them to rebellion. Already there are grumblings, and they claim they're buried alive in this forlorn forest. Don't appreciate the advantages of country life, you see, and I've an idea they'll begin to desert, pretty soon. Really, a live newspaper might do them good--especially if you print a little socialistic drivel now and then." Again he devoted a moment to thought, and then continued: "Tell you what I'll do, sir; I'll solicit the subscriptions myself, and deduct the price from the men's wages, as I do the cost of their other supplies. But the Company gets a commission for that, of course."
"It's a penny paper," said Uncle John. "The subscription is only thirty cents a month."
"Delivered?"
"I suppose so."
"Well, I'll pay you twenty cents, and keep the balance for commission. That's fair enough."
"Very well, Mr. Skeelty. We're after subscriptions more than money, just now. Get all you can, at that rate."
After signing a contract for the supply of electrical power, whereby he was outrageously robbed but the supply was guaranteed, Mr. Merrick and Arthur returned to the farm.
"That man," said Louise's young husband, referring to the manager of the paper mill, "is an unmitigated scoundrel, sir."
"I won't deny it," replied Mr. Merrick. "It occurs to me he is hiring those poor workmen at low wages and making a profit on all their living necessities, which he reserves the right of supplying from his own store. No wonder the poor fellows get dissatisfied."
CHAPTER VII
THE SKETCH ARTIST
During the next three days so many things happened at Millville that the natives were in a panic of excitement. Not only was electricity brought from the paper mill, but a telegraph wire was run from Chazy Junction to Bob West's former storage shed and a telephone gang came along and placed a private wire, with long-distance connections, in the new newspaper office. The office itself became transformed--"as full o' winders as a hothouse!" exclaimed Peggy McNutt, with bulging eyes--and neat partitions were placed for the offices. There was no longer any secret as to the plans of the "nabobs"; it was generally understood that those terribly aggressive girls were going to inflict a daily paper on the community. Some were glad, and some rebelled, but all were excited. A perpetual meeting was held at Cotting's store to discuss developments, for something startling occurred every few minutes.
"It's a outrage, this thing," commented young Skim Clark despondently. "They're tryin' to run mother out o' business--an' she a widder with me to look after! Most o' the business at the Emporium is done in newspapers an' magazines an' sich; so these gals thought they'd cut under an' take the business away from her."
"Can't the Widder Clark sell the new paper, then?" asked the blacksmith.
"I dunno. Hadn't thought o' that," said Skim. "But the price is to be jus' one cent, an' we've ben gittin' five cents fer all the outside papers. Where's the profit comin' from, on one cent, I'd like to know? Why, we make two or three cents on all the five cent papers."
"As fer that," remarked the druggist, "we'll get a cheap paper--if it's any good--an' that's somethin' to be thankful for."
"'Twon't be any good," asserted Skim. "Ma says so."
But no one except McNutt was prepared to agree with this prediction. The extensive plans in preparation seemed to indicate that the new paper would be fully equal to the requirements of the populace.
On Monday, when the news spread that two big freight cars had arrived at the Junction, and Nick Thorne began working three teams to haul the outfit to Millville, the rest of the town abandoned all business other than watching the arrival of the drays. Workmen and machinists arrived from the city and began unpacking and setting up the presses, type cases and all other paraphernalia, every motion being watched by eager faces that lined the windows. These workmen were lodged at the hotel, which had never entertained so many guests at one time in all its past history. The three girls, even more excited and full of awe than the townspeople, were at the office early and late, taking note of everything installed and getting by degrees a fair idea of the extent of their new plaything.
"It almost takes my breath away, Uncle," said Patsy. "You've given the _Tribune_ such a splendid start that we must hustle to make good and prove we are worthy your generosity."
"I sat up last night and wrote a poem for the first page of the first number," announced Louise earnestly.
"Poems don't go on the first page," observed Patsy; "but they're needed to fill in with. What's it about, dear?"
"It's called 'Ode to a Mignonette,'" answered Louise. "It begins this way:
"Wee brown blossom, humble and sweet, Content on my bosom lying, Who would guess from your quiet dress The beauty there is lying Under the rust?"
"Hm," said Patsy, "I don't see as there's any beauty under the rust, at all. There's no beauty about a mignonette, anyhow, suspected or unsuspected."
"She means 'fragrance,'" suggested Beth. "Change it to: 'The fragrance there is lying under the rust.' That'll fix it all right, Louise."
"It doesn't seem right, even then," remarked Uncle John. "If the fragrance lies under the rust, it can't be smelt, can it?"
"I did not anticipate all this criticism," said Louise, with an air of injured dignity. "None of the big publishing houses that returned my poems ever said anything mean about them; they merely said they were 'not available.' However, as this poem has not made a hit with the managing editor, I'll tear it up and write another."
"Don't do that," begged Patsy. "Save it for emergencies. We've got to fill twenty-four columns every day, remember!"
By Wednesday night the equipment was fully installed and the workmen departed, leaving only Jim McGaffey, an experienced pressman, and Lawrence Doane--familiarly called Larry--who was to attend to the electrotyping and "make-up." The press was of the best modern construction, and folded, cut and counted the papers automatically, with a capacity for printing three thousand copies an hour.
"And at that rate," observed Patsy, "It will run off our regular edition in eight minutes."
Aside from the newspaper press there were two "job" presses and an assortment of type for printing anything that might be required, from a calling card to a circus poster. A third man, who came from the city Thursday morning, was to take charge of the job printing and assist in the newspaper work. Three girls also arrived, pale-faced, sad-eyed creatures, who were expert typesetters. Uncle John arranged with Mrs. Kebble, the landlady at the hotel, to board all the "help" at moderate charge.
It had been decided, after much consultation, to make the _Tribune_ a morning paper. At first it was feared this would result in keeping the girls up nights, but it was finally arranged that all the copy they furnished would be turned in by nine o'clock, and Miss Briggs, the telegraph editor, would attend to anything further that came in over the wires. The advantages of a morning edition were obvious.
"You'll have all day to distribute a morning paper," Arthur pointed out, "whereas an evening paper couldn't get to your scattered subscribers until the next morning."
Miss Briggs, upon whom they were to rely so greatly, proved to be a woman of tremendous energy and undoubted ability. She was thirty-five years of age and had been engaged in newspaper work ever since she was eighteen. Bright and cheerful, of even temper and shrewd comprehension, Miss Briggs listened to the eager explanations of the three girls who had undertaken this queer venture, and assured them she would assist in making a newspaper that would be a credit to them all. She understood clearly the conditions; that inexperience was backed by ample capital and unpractical ideas by unlimited enthusiasm.
"This job may not last long," she told herself, "but while it does it will be mighty amusing. I shall enjoy these weeks in a quiet country town after the bustle of the big city."
So here were seven regular employees of the _Millville Daily Tribune_ already secured and the eighth was shortly to appear. Preparations were well under way for a first edition on the Fourth of July and the office was beginning to hum with work, when one afternoon a girl strolled in and asked in a tired voice for the managing editor.
She was admitted to Patsy's private room, where Beth and Louise were also sitting, and they looked upon their visitor in undisguised astonishment.
She was young: perhaps not over twenty years of age. Her face bore marks of considerable dissipation and there was a broad scar underneath her right eye. Her hair was thin, straggling and tow-colored; her eyes large, deep-set and of a faded blue. The girl's dress was as queer and untidy as her personal appearance, for she wore a brown tailored coat, a short skirt and long, buttoned leggings. A round cap of the same material as her dress was set jauntily on the back of her head, and over her shoulder was slung a fiat satchel of worn leather. There was little that was feminine and less that was attractive about the young woman, and Patsy eyed her with distinct disfavor.
"Tommy sent me here," said the newcomer, sinking wearily into a chair. "I'm hired for a month, on good behavior, with a chance to stay on if I conduct myself in a ladylike manner. I've been working on the _Herald_, you know; but there was no end of a row last week, and they fired me bodily. Any booze for sale in this town?"
"It is a temperance community," answered Patsy, stiffly.
"Hooray for me. There's a chance I'll keep sober. In that case you've acquired the best sketch artist in America."
"Oh! Are you the artist, then?" asked Patsy, with doubtful intonation.
"I don't like the word. I'm not a real artist--just a cartoonist and newspaper hack. Say, it's funny to see me in this jungle, isn't it? What joy I'll have in astonishing the natives! I s'pose a picture's a picture, to them, and Art an impenetrable mystery. What sort of stuff do you want me to turn out?"
"I--I'm not sure you'll do," said Miss Doyle, desperately. "I--we--that is--we are three quite respectable young women who have under-taken to edit the _Millville Daily Tribune_, and the people we have secured to assist us are all--all quite desirable, in their way. So--; ahem!--so--"
"That's all right," remarked the artist composedly. "I don't know that I blame you. I can see very well the atmosphere is not my atmosphere. When is the next train back to New York?"
"At four o'clock, I believe."
"I'll engage a nice upholstered seat in the smoking car. But I've several hours to loaf, and loafing is my best stunt. Isn't this a queer start for girls like you?" looking around the "den" critically. "I wonder how you got the bug, and what'll come of it. It's so funny to see a newspaper office where everything is brand new, and--eminently respectable. Do you mind my lighting a cigarette? This sort of a deal is quite interesting to an old-timer like me; but perhaps I owe you an apology for intruding. I had a letter from Tommy and one from a big banker--Marvin, I guess his name is."
She drew two letters from her satchel and tossed them on the desk before Patsy.
"They're no good to me now," she added. "Where's your waste basket?"
The managing editor, feeling embarrassed by the presence of the artist, opened the letters. The first was from Mr. Marvin, Uncle John's banker, saying:
"After much negotiation I have secured for you the best newspaper illustrator in New York, and a girl, too, which is an added satisfaction. For months I have admired the cartoons signed 'Het' in the New York papers, for they were essentially clever and droll. Miss Hewitt is highly recommended but like most successful artists is not always to be relied upon. I'm told if you can manage to win her confidence she will be very loyal to you."
The other letter was from the editor of a great New York journal. "In giving you Hetty," he said, "I am parting with one of our strongest attractions, but in this big city the poor girl is rapidly drifting to perdition and I want to save her, if possible, before it is too late. She has a sweet, lovable nature, a generous heart and a keen intellect, but these have been so degraded by drink and dissipation that you may not readily discover them. My idea is that in a country town, away from all disreputable companionship, the child may find herself, and come to her own again. Be patient with her and help her all you can. Her wonderful talent will well repay you, even if you are not interested in saving one of God's creatures."
Silently Patsy passed the letters to Beth and Louise. After reading them there was a new expression on the faces they turned toward Hetty Hewitt.
"Forgive me," said Patsy, abruptly. "I--I think I misjudged you. I was wrong in saying what I did."
"No; you were quite right." She sat with downcast eyes a moment, musing deeply. Then she looked up with a smile that quite glorified her wan face. "I'd like to stay, you know," she said humbly. "I'm facing a crisis, just now, and on the whole I'd rather straighten up. If you feel like giving me a chance I--I'd like to see if I've any reserve force or whether the decency in me has all evaporated."
"We'll try you; and I'm sure you have lots of reserve force, Hetty," cried Patsy, jumping up impulsively to take the artist's soiled, thin hand in her own. "Come with me to the hotel and I'll get you a room. Where is your baggage?"
"Didn't bring it. I wasn't sure I'd like the country, or that you'd care to trust me. In New York they know me for what I'm worth, and I get lots of work and good advice--mixed with curses."
"We'll send for your trunk," said Patsy, leading the girl up the street.
"No; it's in hock. But I won't need it. With no booze to buy I can invest my earnings in wearing apparel. What a picturesque place this is! Way back in the primitive; no hint of those namby-pamby green meadows and set rows of shade trees that make most country towns detestable; rocks and boulders--boulders and rocks--and the scraggly pines for background. The wee brook has gone crazy. What do you call it?"
"Little Bill Creek."
"I'm going to stab it with my pencil. Where it bumps the rocks it's obstinate and pig-headed; where it leaps the little shelves of slate it's merry and playful; where it sweeps silently between the curving banks it is sulky and resentful. The Little Bill has moods, bless its heart! Moods betoken character."
Patsy secured for Hetty a pleasant room facing the creek.
"Where will you work, at the office or here?" she asked.
"In the open, I guess. I'll run over the telegraph news to get a subject for the day's cartoon, and then take to the woods. Let me know what other pictures you want and I'll do 'em on the run. I'm a beast to work."
Arthur Weldon, in his capacity as advertising manager, wrote to all the national advertisers asking their patronage for the _Millville Daily Tribune_. The letters were typewritten by the office stenographer on newly printed letterheads that Fitzgerald, the job printer, had prepared. Some of the advertisers were interested enough in Arthur's novel proposition to reply with questions as to the circulation of the new paper, where it was distributed, and the advertising rates. The voting man answered frankly that they had 27 subscribers already and were going to distribute 400 free copies every day, for a time, as samples, with the hope of increasing the subscription list. "I am not sure you will derive any benefit at all from advertising in our paper," he added; "but we would like to have you try it, and you can pay us whatever you consider the results warrant."
To his astonishment the advertisements arrived, a great many from very prominent firms, who accepted his proposal with amusement at his originality and a desire to help the new venture along.
"Our square statement of facts has given us a good start," he told the girls. "I'm really amazed at our success, and it's up to you to make a paper that will circulate and make trade for these trustful advertisers."
With the local merchants the results were less satisfying. Bob West put in a card advertising his hardware business and Nib Corkins cautiously invested a half dollar to promote his drug store and stock of tarnished cheap jewelry; but Sam Cotting said everybody knew what he had for sale and advertising wouldn't help him any. Arthur drove to Huntingdon with Louise and while the society editor picked up items her husband interviewed the merchants. The Huntingdon people were more interested in the new paper than the Millville folk, and Arthur quoted such low prices that several advertisements were secured. Two bright boys of this thriving village were also employed to ride over to Millville each morning, get a supply of _Tribunes_ and distribute a sample copy to every house in the neighborhood.
"Fitz" set up the "ads" in impressive type and the columns of the first edition began to fill up days before the Fourth of July arrived. Louise had a story and two poems set in type and read over the proofs dozens of times with much pride and satisfaction, while Beth prepared an article on the history of baseball and the probable future of our national game.
They did not see much of their artist during the first days following her arrival, but one afternoon she brought Patsy a sketch and asked:
"Who is this?"
Patsy glanced at it and laughed gleefully. It was Peggy McNutt, the fish-eyed pooh-bah of Millville, who was represented sitting on his front porch engaged in painting his wooden foot. This was one of McNutt's recognized amusements. He kept a supply of paints of many colors, and every few days appeared with his rudely carved wooden foot glistening with a new coat of paint and elaborately striped. Sometimes it would be blue with yellow stripes, then green with red stripes, and anon a lovely pink decorated with purple. One drawback to Peggy's delight in these transformations was the fact that it took the paint a night and a day to dry thoroughly, and during this period of waiting he would sit upon his porch with the wooden foot tenderly resting upon the rail--a helpless prisoner.
"Some folks," he would say, "likes pretty neckties; an' some wears fancy socks; but fer my part I'd ruther show a han'some foot ner anything. It don't cost as much as wearin' socks an' neckties, an' it's more artistic like."
Hetty had caught the village character in the act of striping the wooden foot, and his expression of intense interest in the operation was so original, and the likeness so perfect, from the string suspenders and flannel shirt to the antiquated straw hat and faded and patched overalls, that no one would be likely to mistake the subject. The sketch was entitled "The Village Artist," and Patsy declared they would run it on an inside page, just to make the Millville people aware of the "power of the press." Larry made an etching of it and mounted the plate for a double column picture. The original sketch Patsy decided to have framed and to hang it in her office.
CHAPTER VIII
THE MILLVILLE DAILY TRIBUNE
The first edition of the _Millville Daily Tribune_ certainly proved it to be a wonderful newspaper. The telegraphic news of the world's doings, received and edited by the skillful Miss Briggs, was equal to that of any metropolitan journal; the first page cartoon, referring to the outbreak of a rebellion in China, was clever and humorous enough to delight anyone; but the local news and "literary page" were woefully amateurish and smacked of the schoolgirl editors who had prepared them. Perhaps the Chazy County people did not recognize these deficiencies, for the new paper certainly created a vast amount of excitement and won the praise of nearly all who read it.
On the eventful night of the _Tribune's_ "first run" our girls were too eager to go home and await its appearance, so they remained at the office to see the birth of their enterprise, and as it was the night preceding the Fourth of July Uncle John gave an exhibition of fireworks in front of the newspaper office, to the delight of the entire population.
The girl journalists, however, were not so greatly interested in fireworks as in the birth of their fascinating enterprise. Wearing long gingham aprons they hovered over the big table where the forms were being locked up, and watched anxiously every movement of the workmen. It was exceedingly interesting to note how a column of the first page was left open until the last, so that copy "hot from the wire" of the very latest news might be added before going to press. Finally, at exactly two o'clock, the forms were locked, placed upon the bed of the press, and McGaffey, a sour-faced individual whose chief recommendation was his ability as a pressman, began to make ready for the "run."
Outside the brilliantly lighted windows, which were left open for air, congregated a wondering group of the Millville people, many of whom had never been up so late before in all their lives. But the event was too important to miss. The huge, complicated press had already inspired their awe, and they were eager to "see it work" as it printed the new paper.
The girls tolerated this native curiosity with indulgent good humor and at midnight even passed out sandwiches to the crowd, a supply having been secured for the workmen. These were accepted silently, and as they munched the food all kept their eyes fixed upon the magicians within.
There was a hitch somewhere; McGaffey muttered naughty words under his breath and plied wrenches and screwdrivers in a way that brought a thrill of anxiety, approaching fear, to every heart. The press started half a dozen times, only to be shut down abruptly before it had printed a single impression. McGaffey counseled with Larry, who shook his head. Fitzgerald, the job printer, examined the machinery carefully and again McGaffey screwed nuts and regulated the press. Then he turned on the power; the big cylinder revolved; the white paper reeled out like a long ribbon and with a rattle and thump the first copy of the _Millville Daily Tribune_ was deposited, cut and folded, upon the table placed to receive it. Patsy made a rush for it, but before she could reach the table half a dozen more papers had been piled above it, and gathering speed the great press hummed busily and the pile of _Tribunes_ grew as if by magic.
Patsy grabbed the first dozen and handed them to Beth, for they were to be reserved as souvenirs. Then, running back to the table, she seized a bunch and began distributing them to the watchers outside the window. The natives accepted them eagerly enough, but could not withdraw their eyes from the marvelous press, which seemed to possess intelligence almost human.
Each of the three girl journalists now had a copy in hand, scanning it with boundless pride and satisfaction. It realized completely their fondest hopes and they had good cause to rejoice.
Then Uncle John, who ought to have been in bed and sound asleep at this uncanny hour of night, came bouncing in, accompanied by Arthur Weldon. Each made a dive for a paper and each face wore an expression of genuine delight. The roar of the press made conversation difficult, but Mr. Merrick caught his nieces in his arms, by turn, and gave each one an ecstatic hug and kiss.
Suddenly the press stopped.
"What's wrong, McGaffey?" demanded Patsy, anxiously.
"Nothing, miss. Edition off, that's all."
"What! the entire four hundred are printed?"
"Four twenty-five. I run a few extrys."
And now a shriek of laughter came from the windows as the villagers, slowly opening the papers they held, came upon the caricature of Peggy McNutt. The subject of the cartoon had, with his usual aggressiveness, secured the best "standing room" available, and his contemplative, protruding eyes were yet fixed upon the interior of the workroom. But now, his curiosity aroused, he looked at the paper to see what his neighbors were laughing at, and his expression of wonder slowly changed to a broad grin. He straightened up, looked triumphantly around the circle and exclaimed:
"By gum, folks, this 'ere paper's going to be a go! I didn't take no stock in it till now, but them fool gals seem to know their business, an' I'll back 'em to the last ditch!"
CHAPTER IX
TROUBLE
Of course the girls exhausted their store of "effusions" on the first two or three papers. A daily eats up "copy" very fast and the need to supply so much material began to bewilder the budding journalists. There was not sufficient local news to keep them going, but fortunately the New York news service supplied more general news than they could possibly use, and, besides, Mr. Marvin, foreseeing this dilemma, had sent on several long, stout boxes filled with "plate matter," which meant that a variety of stories, poems, special articles and paragraphs of every sort had been made into stereotyped plates of column width which could be placed anywhere in the paper where a space needed to be filled. This material, having been prepared by skilled writers, was of excellent character, so that the paper gained in its class of contents as the girlish contributions began to be replaced by "plates." The nieces did not abandon writing, however, and all three worked sedulously to prepare copy so that at least one column of the Tribune each day was filled with notes from their pens.
Subscriptions came in freely during those first days, for farmers and villagers alike were proud of their local daily and the price was so low that no one begrudged the investment. But Uncle John well knew that if every individual in the county subscribed, and the advertising patronage doubled, the income would fall far short of running expenses.
Saturday night, when the pay roll had to be met, the girls consulted together seriously. In spite of the new subscriptions received, a deficiency must be supplied, and they quietly advanced the money from their private purses. This was no great hardship, for each had an ample allowance from Uncle John, as well as an income from property owned in her own name.
"It's only about thirty dollars apiece," said Patsy. "I guess we can stand that until--until more money begins coming in."
On Saturday evening there was an invasion of workmen from Royal, many of whom we're rough foreigners who came to Millville in search of excitement, as a relief from their week's confinement at the pine woods settlement at the mill. Skeelty, who thought he knew how to manage these people, allowed every man, at the close of work on Saturday, to purchase a pint of whiskey from the company store, charging an exorbitant price that netted a huge profit. There was no strong drink to be had at Millville, so the workmen brought their bottles to town, carousing on the way, and thought it amusing to frighten the simple inhabitants of the village by their rude shouts and ribald songs.
This annoyance had occurred several times since the establishment of the mill, and Bob West had protested vigorously to Mr. Skeelty for giving his men whiskey and turning them loose in a respectable community; but the manager merely grinned and said he must keep "the boys" satisfied at all hazards, and it was the business of the Millville people to protect themselves if the workmen became too boisterous.
On this Saturday evening the girls were standing on the sidewalk outside the printing office, awaiting the arrival of Arthur with the surrey, when a group of the Royal workmen appeared in the dim light, swaggering three abreast and indulging in offensive language. Uncle John's nieces withdrew to the protection of the doorway, but a big bearded fellow in a red shirt discovered them, and, lurching forward, pushed his evil countenance in Patsy's face, calling to his fellows in harsh tones that he had "found a partner for a dance."
An instant later he received a swinging blow above the ear that sent him sprawling at full length upon the sidewalk, and a quiet voice said:
"Pardon me, ladies; it seemed necessary."
All three at once recognized the supposed tramp whom they had seen the morning of their arrival, but whom Uncle John had reported to be one of the bookkeepers at the paper mill. The young fellow had no time to say more, for the downfall of their comrade brought a shout of rage from the group of workmen, numbering nearly a dozen, and with one accord they rushed upon the man who had dared champion the defenseless girls.
Beth managed to open the door of the office, through which Patsy and Louise slipped instantly, but the younger girl, always cool in emergencies, held the door ajar while she cried to the young man:
"Quick, sir--come inside!"
Really, he had no time to obey, just then. With his back to the door he drove his fists at his assailants in a dogged, persistent way that felled three more of them before the others drew away from his stalwart bows. By that time Larry and Fitzgerald, who had been summoned by Louise, rushed from the office armed with iron bars caught up at random, both eager for a fight. The workmen, seeing the reinforcements, beat a retreat, carrying their sadly pommeled comrades with them, but their insulting language was not restricted until they had passed out of hearing.
Then the young man turned, bowed gravely to the girls, who had now ventured forth again, and without waiting to receive their thanks marched calmly down the street.
When Arthur reached home with the girls, Mr. Merrick was very indignant at his report of the adventure. He denounced Skeelty in unmeasured terms and declared he would find a way to protect Millville from further invasion by these rough and drunken workmen.
There was no Sunday paper, so the girlish editors found the morrow a veritable day of rest. They all drove to Hooker's Falls to church and returned to find that old Nora had prepared a fine chicken dinner for them. Patsy had invited Hetty Hewitt, in whom she was now greatly interested, to dine with them, and to the astonishment of all the artist walked over to the farm arrayed in a new gown, having discarded the disreputable costume in which she had formerly appeared. The new dress was not in the best of taste and its loud checks made dainty Louise shudder, but somehow Hetty seemed far more feminine than before, and she had, moreover, washed herself carefully and tried to arrange her rebellious hair.
"This place is doing me good," she confided to her girl employers, after dinner, when they were seated in a group upon the lawn. "I'm getting over my nervousness, and although I haven't drank a drop stronger than water since I arrived. I feel a new sort of energy coursing through my veins. Also I eat like a trooper--not at night, as I used to, but at regular mealtime. And I'm behaving quite like a lady. Do you know, I wouldn't be surprised to find it just as amusing to be respectable as to--to be--the other thing?"
"You will find it far more satisfactory, I'm sure," replied Patsy encouragingly. "What most surprises me is that with your talent and education you ever got into such bad ways."
"Environment," said Hetty. "That's what did it. When I first went to New York I was very young. A newspaper man took me out to dinner and asked me to have a cocktail. I looked around the tables and saw other girls drinking cocktails, so I took one. That was where I turned into the rocky road. People get careless around the newspaper offices. They work under a constant nervous strain and find that drink steadies them--for a time. By and by they disappear; others take their places, and they are never heard of again except in the police courts. I knew a girl, society editor of a big paper, who drew her five thousand a year, at one time. She got the cocktail habit and a week or so ago I paid her fine for getting pinched while intoxicated. She was in rags and hadn't a red cent. That set me thinking, and when Tommy fired me from his paper and said the best he could do was to get me a job in the country, it seemed as if my chance to turn over a new leaf had arrived. I've turned it," she added, with a pathetic sigh; "but whether it'll stay turned, or not, is a question for the puzzle page."
"Haven't you a family to look after you--or for you to look after?" asked Beth.
"No. Brother and I were left orphans in a Connecticut town, and he went out West, to Chicago, and promised to send for me. Must have forgot that promise, I guess, for I've never heard of Dan since. I could draw pictures, so I went to New York and found a job. Guess that's my biography, and it isn't as interesting as one of Hearst's editorials, either."
Hetty seemed pleased and grateful to note the frank friendliness of her girlish employers, in whom she recognized the admirable qualities she had personally sacrificed for a life of dissipation. In the privacy of her room at the hotel she had read the first copy of the Millville Tribune and shrieked with laughter at the ingenuous editorials and schoolgirl essays. Then she grew sober and thoughtful, envying in her heart the sweetness and simplicity so apparent in every line. Here were girls who possessed something infinitely higher than journalistic acumen; they were true women, with genuine womanly qualities and natures that betrayed their worth at a glance, as do ingots of refined gold. What would not this waif from the grim underworld of New York have given for such clear eyes, pure mind and unsullied heart? "I don't know as I can ever swim in their pond," Hetty reflected, with honest regret, "but there's a chance I can look folks square in the eye again--and that wouldn't be so bad."
Monday morning, when Patsy, Louise and Beth drove to their office, Miss Briggs said nonchalantly:
"McGaffey's gone."
"Gone! Gone where?" asked Patsy.
"Back to New York. Caught a freight from the Junction Saturday night."
"Isn't he coming back?" inquired Beth.
"Here's a letter he left," said Miss Briggs.
They read it together. It was very brief; "Climate don't suit me. No excitement. I've quit. McGaffey."
"I suppose," said Patsy, with indignation, "he intended to go, all the while, and only waited for his Saturday pay."
Miss Briggs nodded. She was at the telegraph instrument.
"What shall we do?" asked Louise. "Can anyone else work the press?"
"I'll find out," said Patsy, marching into the workroom.
Neither Fitz nor Larry would undertake to run the press. They said the machine was so complicated it required an expert, and unless an experienced pressman could be secured the paper must suspend publication.
Here was an unexpected dilemma; one that for a time dazed them.
"These things always happen in the newspaper business," remarked Miss Briggs, when appealed to. "Can't you telegraph to New York for another pressman?"
"Yes; but he can't get here in time," said Patsy. "There's no Monday train to Chazy Junction, at all, and it would be Wednesday morning before a man could possibly arrive. To shut down the paper would ruin it, for everyone would think we had failed in our attempt and it might take us weeks to regain public confidence."
"I know," said Miss Briggs, composedly. "A paper never stops. Somehow or other it always keeps going--even if the world turns somersaults and stands on its head. You'll find a way, I'm sure."
But the bewildered girls had no such confidence. They drove back to the farm to consult with Uncle John and Arthur.
"Let's take a look at that press, my dears," said Mr. Merrick. "I'm something of a mechanic myself, or was in my young days, and I may be able to work this thing until we can get a new pressman."
"I'll help you," said Arthur. "Anyone who can run an automobile ought to be able to manage a printing press."
So they went to the office, took off their coats and examined the press; but the big machine defied their combined intelligence. Uncle John turned on the power. The cylinder groaned, swung half around, and then the huge wooden "nippers" came down upon the table with a force that shattered them to kindlings. At the crash Mr. Merrick involuntarily shut down the machine, and then they all stood around and looked gloomily at the smash-up and wondered if the damage was irreparable.
"Couldn't we print the paper on the job press?" asked the little millionaire, turning to Fitzgerald.
"In sections, sir," replied Fitz, grinning. "Half a page at a time is all we can manage, but we might be able to match margins so the thing could be read."
"We'll try it," said Uncle John. "Do your best, my man, and if you can help us out of this bog you shall be amply rewarded."
Fitz looked grave.
"Never knew of such a thing being done, sir," he remarked; "but that's no reason it's impossible."
"'Twill be a horror of a make-up," added Larry, who did not relish his part in the experiment.
Uncle John put on his coat and went into the front office, followed by Arthur and the girls in dismal procession.
"A man to see the manager," announced Miss Briggs, nodding toward a quiet figure seated on the "waiting bench."
The man stood up and bowed. It was the young bookkeeper from the paper mill, who had so bravely defended the girls on Saturday night. Uncle John regarded him with a frown.
"I suppose Skeelty has sent you to apologize," he said.
"No, sir; Skeelty is not in an apologetic mood," replied the man, smiling. "He has fired me."
"What for?"
"Interfering with his workmen. The boys didn't like what I did the other night and threatened to strike unless I was put in the discard."
"And now? asked Uncle John, looking curiously at the man.
"I'm out of work and would like a job, sir."
"What can you do?"
"Anything."
"That means nothing at all."
"I beg your pardon. Let me say that I'm not afraid to tackle anything."
"Can you run a power printing press?"
"Yes, sir."
"Ever had any experience?"
The young man hesitated.
"I'm not sure," he replied slowly; "but I think I have."
This statement would not have been encouraging under ordinary circumstances, but in this emergency Uncle John accepted it.
"What is your name?" he asked.
Another moment's hesitation.
"Call me Smith, please."
"First name?"
The man smiled.
"Thursday," he said.
All his hearers seemed astonished at this peculiar name, but Mr. Merrick said abruptly: "Follow me, Thursday Smith."
The man obeyed, and the girls and Arthur trotted after them back to the pressroom.
"Our pressman has deserted us without warning," explained Mr. Merrick. "None of our other employees is able to run the thing. If you can master it so as to run off the paper tonight, the job is yours."
Thursday Smith took off his jacket--a cheap khaki affair--and rolled up his sleeves. Then he carefully looked over the press and found the damaged nippers. Without a word he picked up a wrench, released the stub ends of the broken fingers, gathered the pieces in his hand and asked: "Where is there a carpenter shop?"
"Can you operate this press?" asked Mr. Merrick.
"Yes, sir."
"The carpenter shop is a little shanty back of the hotel. You'll find Lon Taft there."
Smith walked away, and Mr. Merrick drew a long breath of relief.
"That's good luck," he said. "You may quit worrying, now, my dears."
"Are you sure he's a good pressman, Uncle?"
"No; but _he_ is sure. I've an idea he wouldn't attempt the thing, otherwise."
Mr. Merrick returned to the farm, while Arthur drove Louise over to Huntingdon to gather items for the paper, and Patsy and Beth sat in the office arranging copy.
In an hour Smith came back with new nippers, which he fitted to the steel frame. Then he oiled the press, started it going a few revolutions, to test its condition, and handled the machinery so dexterously and with such evident confidence that Larry nodded to Fitz and muttered, "He'll do."
McGaffey, knowing he was about to decamp, had not kept the press very clean; but Thursday Smith put in the afternoon and evening removing grease, polishing and rubbing, until the huge machine shone resplendent. The girls went home at dinner time, but they sent Arthur to the office at midnight to see if the new pressman was proving capable. The Tuesday morning _Tribune_ greeted them at the breakfast table, and the presswork was remarkably clean and distinct.
CHAPTER X
THURSDAY SMITH
In a day or so Mr. Merrick received a letter from Mr. Skeelty, the manager of the paper mill. He said: "I understand you have employed one of my discharged workmen, who is named Thursday Smith. My men don't want him in this neighborhood, and have made a strong protest. I therefore desire you to discharge the fellow at once, and in case you refuse to accede to this reasonable demand I shall shut off your power."
Mr. Merrick replied: "Shut off the power and I'll sue you for damages. My contract with you fully protects me. Permit me a request in turn: that you mind your own business. The _Millville Tribune_ will employ whomsoever it chooses."
Uncle John said nothing to the girls concerning this correspondence, nor did he mention it to the new pressman.
On Wednesday Larry and Fitz sent in their "resignations," to take effect Saturday night. They told Patsy, who promptly interviewed them, that the town was altogether too slow for men accustomed to the city, but to Smith they admitted they feared trouble from the men at the mill.
"I talked with one of the mill hands last night," said Larry, "and they're up to mischief. If you stay here, my boy, you'd better watch out, for it's you they're after, in the first place, and Skeelty has told 'em he wouldn't be annoyed if they wiped out the whole newspaper plant at the same time."
Thursday nodded but said nothing. He began watching the work of the two men with comprehensive care. When Mr. Merrick came down to the office during the forenoon to consult with his nieces about replacing the two men who had resigned, Smith asked him for a private interview.
"Come into the office," said Uncle John.
When the man found the three girl journalists present he hesitated, but Mr. Merrick declared they were the ones most interested in anything an employee of the paper might have to say to his principals.
"I am told, sir," Thursday began, "that the people at the mill have boycotted this paper."
"They've cancelled all their subscriptions," replied Beth; "but as they had not paid for them it won't hurt us any."
"It seems the trouble started through your employing me," resumed the young man; "so it will be best for you to let me go."
"Never!" cried Mr. Merrick, firmly. "Do you suppose I'll allow that rascal Skeelty to dictate to us for a single minute? Not by a jug full! And the reason the men dislike you is because you pounded some of them unmercifully when they annoyed my girls. Where did you learn to use your fists so cleverly, Smith?"
"I don't know, sir."
"Well, you have earned our gratitude, and we're going to stand by you. I don't mind a bit of a row, when I'm on the right side of an argument. Do you?"
"Not at all, sir; but the young ladies--"
"They're pretty good fighters, too; so don't worry."
Thursday was silent a moment. Then he said:
"Fitzgerald and Doane tell me they're going to quit, Saturday."
"It is true," replied Patsy. "I'm sorry, for they seem good men and we may have trouble replacing them."
"They are not needed here, Miss Doyle," said Smith. "There isn't a great deal of electrotyping to do, or much job printing. More than half the time the two men are idle. It's the same way with my own job. Three hours a day will take care of the press and make the regular run. If you will permit me, I am sure I can attend to all the work, unaided."
They looked at one another in amazement.
"How about the make-up?" asked Uncle John.
"I can manage that easily, sir. I've been watching the operation and understand it perfectly."
"And you believe you can do the work of three men?"
"Three men were unnecessary in a small plant like this, sir. Whoever sent them to you did not understand very well your requirements. I've been watching the compositors, too, and your three girls are one too many. Two are sisters, and can set all the type very easily. I recommend that you send the other back to New York."
They considered this advice seriously.
"I think Mr. Smith is right," observed Patsy. "The girls have not seemed busy, at all, and spend most of their time laughing and talking together."
"It will cut down expenses a lot," said Beth, "and I'm sure we ought to be able to run this paper more economically than we have been doing."
Uncle John looked at the man thoughtfully.
"Where did you learn the printing business?" he asked.
"I--I don't know, sir."
"What offices have you worked in?"
"I cannot tell you that, sir."
"You seem to answer all my questions with the statement that you 'don't know,'" asserted Mr. Merrick, with an annoyed frown. "Is there any reason you should refuse to tell us of your former life?"
"None whatever, sir."
"Who are you, Smith?"
"I--I don't know, sir."
Mr. Merrick was getting provoked.
"This obstinacy is not likely to win our confidence," he said. "Under the circumstances I think we ought to know something more about you, before we allow you to undertake so much responsibility. You seem a bright, able young man, and I've no doubt you understand the work you're about to undertake, but if we have no knowledge of your antecedents you may cause us considerable future trouble."
Smith bowed his head and his cheeks flamed red.
"I have no knowledge of my antecedents to confide to you, sir," he said in a low voice.
Uncle John sighed regretfully and turned away, but Patsy looked at the man with new interest.
"Won't you please explain that a little more fully?" she gently inquired.
"I am quite willing to tell all I know," said he; "but that is very little, I assure you. Two years ago last May, on the morning of Thursday, the twenty-second, I awoke to find myself lying in a ditch beside a road. Of my life previous to that time I have no knowledge whatever."
The three girls regarded him with startled eyes. Uncle John turned from the window to examine the young man with new interest.
"Were you injured?" he asked.
"My right ankle was sprained and I had a cut under my left eye--you can see the scar still."
"You have no idea how you came there?"
"Not the slightest. I did not recognize the surrounding country; I had no clear impression as to who I was. There was a farmhouse a quarter of a mile away; I limped to it and they gave me some breakfast. I found I was fifty-six miles from New York. The farmer had heard of no accident; there was no railway nearer than six miles; the highway was little used. I told the good people my story and they suspected me of being drunk or crazy, but did not credit a single word I said."
"That was but natural," said Uncle John.
"After breakfast I took stock of myself. In my pockets I found a twenty-dollar bill and some silver. I wore a watch and chain and a ring set with a good-sized diamond. My clothing seemed good, but the ditch had soiled it. I had no hat, nor could the farmer find one when I sent him back to look for it. My mind was not wholly a blank; I seemed to have a fair knowledge of life, and when the farmer mentioned New York the city seemed familiar to me. But in regard to myself, my past history--even my name--I was totally ignorant. All personal consciousness dated from the moment I woke up in the ditch."
"How wonderful!" exclaimed Louise.
"And you haven't solved the mystery yet, after two years?" asked Patsy.
"No, Miss Doyle. I hired the farmer to drive me to the railway station, where I took the train to New York. I seemed to know the city, but no recollection guided me to home or friends. I went to a small hotel, took a room, and began to read all the newspapers, seeking to discover if anyone was reported missing. The sight of automobiles led me to conceive the theory that I had been riding in one of those machines along a country road when something threw me out. My head might have struck a stump or stone and the blow rendered me insensible. Something in the nature of the thing, or in my physical condition, deprived me of all knowledge of the past. Since then I have read of several similar cases. The curious thing about my own experience was that I could find no reference to my disappearance, in any way, nor could I learn of any automobile accident that might account for it. I walked the streets day after day, hoping some acquaintance would accost me. I waited patiently for some impulse to direct me to my former haunts. I searched the newspapers persistently for a clue; but nothing rewarded me.
"After spending all my money and the proceeds of my watch and diamond, I began to seek employment; but no one would employ a man without recommendations or antecedents. I did not know what work I was capable of doing. So finally I left the city and for more than two years I have been wandering from one part of the country to another, hoping that some day I would recognize a familiar spot. I have done odd jobs, at times, but my fortunes went from bad to worse until of late I have become no better than the typical tramp."
"How did you secure employment as a book-keeper for Skeelty?" asked Uncle John.
"I heard a new mill had started at Royal and walked up there to inquire for work. The manager asked if I could keep books, and I said yes."
"Have you ever kept books before?"
"Not that I know of; but I did it very well. I seemed to comprehend the work at once, and needed no instruction. Often during these two years I have encountered similar curious conditions. I sold goods in a store and seemed to know the stocks; I worked two weeks in a telegraph office and discovered I knew the code perfectly; I've shod horses for a country blacksmith, wired a house for electric lights and compounded prescriptions in a drug store. Whatever I have undertaken to do I seem able to accomplish, and so it is hard for me to guess what profession I followed before my memory deserted me."
"You did not retain any position for long, it seems," remarked Uncle John.
"No; I was always impatient to move on, always hoping to arrive at some place so familiar that my lost memory would return to me. The work I have mentioned was nearly all secured during the first year. After I became seedy and disreputable in appearance people were more apt to suspect me and work was harder to obtain."
"Why did you come to Millville?" asked Louise.
"You brought me here," he answered, with a smile. "I caught a ride on your private car, when it left New York, not caring much where it might take me. When I woke up the next morning the car was sidetracked at Chazy Junction, and as this is a section I have never before explored I decided to stay here for a time. That is all of my story, I believe."
"Quite remarkable!" declared Mr. Merrick, emphatically. The girls, too, had been intensely interested in the strange recital.
"You seem educated," said Patsy thoughtfully; "therefore you must have come from a good family."
"That does not seem conclusive," replied Thursday Smith, deprecatingly, "although I naturally hope my family was respectable. I have been inclined to resent the fact that none of my friends or relatives has ever inquired what became of me."
"Are you sure they have not?"
"I have watched the papers carefully. In two years I have followed several clues. A bricklayer disappeared, but his drowned body was finally found; a college professor was missing, but he was sixty years of age; a young man in New York embezzled a large sum and hid himself. I followed that trail, although regretfully, but the real embezzler was caught the day I presented myself in his place. Perhaps the most curious experience was in the case of a young husband who deserted his wife and infant child. She advertised for him; he had disappeared about the time I had found myself; so I went to see her."
"What was the result?" asked Beth.
"She said I was not her husband, but if he failed to come back I might take his place, provided I would guarantee to support her."
During the laugh that followed, Thursday Smith went back to his work and an animated discussion concerning his strange story followed.
"He seems honest," said Louise, "but I blame a man of his ability for becoming a mere tramp. He ought to have asserted himself and maintained the position in which he first found himself."
"How?" inquired Patsy.
"At that time he was well dressed and had a watch and diamond ring. If he had gone to some one and frankly told his story he could surely have obtained a position to correspond with his personality. But instead of this he wasted his time and the little capital he possessed in doing nothing that was sensible."
"It is easy for us to criticise the man," remarked Beth, "and he may be sorry, now, that he did not act differently. But I think, in his place, I should have made the same attempt he did to unravel the mystery of his lost identity. So much depended upon that."
"It's all very odd and incomprehensible," said Uncle John. "I wonder who he can be."
"I suppose he calls himself Thursday because that was the day he first found himself," observed Patsy.
"Yes; and Smith was the commonest name he could think of to go with it. The most surprising thing," added their uncle, "is the fact that a man of his standing was not missed or sought for."
"Perhaps," suggested Louise, "he had been insane and escaped from some asylum."
"Then how did he come to be lying in a ditch?" questioned Patsy; "and wouldn't an escaped maniac be promptly hunted down and captured?"
"I think so," agreed Mr. Merrick. "For my part, I'm inclined to accept the man's theory that it was an automobile accident."
"Then what became of the car, or of the others in it?"
"It's no use," said Beth, shaking her head gravely. "If Thursday Smith, who is an intelligent young man, couldn't solve the mystery himself, it isn't likely we can do so."
"We know as much as he does, as far as that is concerned," said Patsy, "and our combined intelligence ought at least to equal his. I'm sorry for the poor man, and wish we might help him to come to his own again."
They all agreed to this sentiment and while the girls attended to their editorial duties they had the amazing story of Thursday Smith uppermost in their minds. When the last copy had been placed in the hands of Miss Briggs and they were driving to the farm--at a little after six o'clock--they renewed the interesting discussion.
Just before reaching the farm Hetty Hewitt came out of the wood just in front of them. She was clothed in her short skirt and leggings and bore a fishing rod and a creel.
"What luck?" asked Patsy, stopping the horse.
"Seven trout," answered the artist. "I might have caught more, but the poor little creatures squirmed and struggled so desperately that I hadn't the heart to destroy any more of them. Won't you take them home for Mr. Merrick's breakfast?"
Patsy looked at the girl musingly.
"Jump in, Hetty," she said; "I'm going to take you with us for the night. The day's fishing has tired you; there are deep circles under your eyes; and that stuffy old hotel isn't home-like. Jump in."
Hetty flushed with pleasure, but hesitated to accept the invitation.
"I--I'm not dressed for--"
"You're all right," said Beth, supporting her cousin's proposition. "We'll lend you anything you need."
"Do come, Miss Hewitt," added Louise.
Hetty sighed, then smiled and finally climbed into the surrey.
"In New York," she said, as they started on, "I've sometimes hobnobbed with editors; but this is somewhat different."
"In what way?" asked Patsy casually.
"You're not real journalists, you know, and--"
"Why aren't we journalists?" asked Louise.
For a moment Hetty was puzzled how to reply.
"You are doing very good editorial work," she said mendaciously, "but, after all, you are only playing at journalism. The real journalist--as I know him--is a Bohemian; a font of cleverness running to waste; a reckless, tender-hearted, jolly, careless ne'er-do-well who works like a Trojan and plays like a child. He is very sophisticated at his desk and very artless when he dives into the underworld for rest and recreation. He lives at high tension, scintillates, burns his red fire without discrimination and is shortly extinguished. You are not like that. You can't even sympathize with that sort of person. But I can, for I'm cut from a remnant of the same cloth."
"Scintillate all you want to, Hetty," cried Patsy with a laugh; "but you're not going to be extinguished. For we, the imitation journalists, have taken you under our wings. There's no underworld at Millville, and the only excitement we can furnish just now is a night with us at the old farm."
"That," replied Hetty, "is indeed a real excitement. You can't quite understand it, perhaps; but it's so--so very different from what I'm accustomed to."
Uncle John welcomed the girl artist cordially and under his hospitable roof the waif soon felt at ease. At dinner the conversation turned upon Thursday Smith and his peculiar experience. Beth asked Hetty if she knew the man.
"Yes," replied the girl; "I've seen him at the office and we've exchanged a word or two. But he boards with Thorne, the liveryman, and not at the hotel."
"You have never seen him before you met him here?"
"Never."
"I wonder," said Louise musingly, "if he is quite right in his mind. All this story may be an hallucination, you know."
"He's a very clever fellow," asserted Hetty, "and such a loss of memory is by no means so uncommon as you think. Our brains are queer things--mine is, I know--and it doesn't take much to throw their machinery out of gear. Once I knew a reporter who was worried and over-worked. He came to the office one morning and said he was George Washington, the Commander of the Continental Army. In all other ways he was sane enough, and we humored him and called him 'General.' At the end of three months the idea quit him as suddenly as it had come on, and he was not only normal but greatly restored in strength of intellect through the experience. Perhaps some of the overworked brain cells had taken a rest and renewed their energy. It would not surprise me if some day Thursday Smith suddenly remembered who he was."
[Footnote: This anecdote is true.--_Author._]
"In the meantime," said Uncle John, "I'm going to make an effort to discover his identity."
"In what way, Uncle?" asked Patsy.
"I'll set Fogerty, who is a clever detective, at work. No man can disappear from his customary haunts without leaving some sort of a record behind him, and Fogerty may be able to uncover the mystery in a short time."
"Then we'll lose our pressman," declared Beth; "for I'm positive that Thursday Smith was a person of some importance in his past life."
CHAPTER XI
THE HONER'BLE OJOY BOGLIN
One morning while Patsy was alone in her office, busied over her work, the door softly opened and a curious looking individual stood before her.
He was thin in form, leathery skinned and somewhat past the middle age of life. His clothing consisted of a rusty black Prince Albert coat, rusty trousers to match, which were carefully creased, cowhide shoes brilliant with stove polish, a tall silk hat of antiquated design, and a frayed winged collar decorated with a black tie on which sparkled a large diamond attached to a chain. He had chin whiskers of a sandy gray color and small gray eyes that were both shrewd and suspicious in expression.
He stood in the doorway a moment, attentively eyeing the girl, while she in turn examined him with an amusement she could not quite suppress. Then he said, speaking in a low, diffident voice:
"I'm lookin' for the editor."
"I am the editor," asserted Patsy.
"Really?"
"It is quite true."
He seemed disconcerted a moment, striving to regain his assurance. Then he took out a well-worn pocketbook and from its depths abstracted a soiled card which, leaning forward, he placed carefully upon the table before Patsy. She glanced at it and read: "Hon. Ojoy Boglin, Hooker's Falls, Chazy County."
"Oh," said she, rather surprised; "are you Mr. Boglin?"
"I am the Honer'ble Ojoy Boglin, miss," he replied, dwelling lovingly upon the "Honer'ble."
"I have not had the honor of your acquaintance," said she, deciding she did not like her visitor. "What is your business, please?"
The Hon. Ojoy coughed. Then he suddenly remembered he was in the presence of a lady and took off his hat. Next he slid slowly into the vacant chair at the end of the table.
"First," he began, "I want to compliment you on your new paper. It's a good thing, and I like it. It's what's been needed in these 'ere parts a long time, and it's talked about all over Chazy County."
"Thank you," said the editor briefly, for the praise was given in a perfunctory way that irritated her.
"The only other papers in this senatorial deestric', which covers three counties," continued the visitor, in impressive tones, "air weeklies, run by political mud-slingers that's bought up by the Kleppish gang."
"What is the Kleppish gang?" she asked, wonderingly.
"The supporters o' that rascal, Colonel Kleppish, who has been occupyin' my berth for goin' on eight years," he said with fierce indignation.
"I fear I do not understand," remarked Patsy, really bewildered. "What was your berth, which Colonel Kleppish has--has usurped?"
"See that 'Honer'ble' on the card?"
"I do."
"That means I were senator--state senator--which makes any common man honer'ble, accordin' to law, which it's useless to dispute. I were elected fer this deestric', which covers three counties," he said proudly, "an' I served my country in that capacity."
"Oh, I see. But you're not state senator now?"
"No; Kleppish beat me for the nomination, after I'd served only one term."
"Why?"
"Eh? Why did he git the nomination? 'Cause he bought up the newspapers--the country weeklies--and set them to yellin' 'graft.' He made 'em say I went into office poor, and in two years made a fortune."
"Did you?" asked the girl.
He shuffled in his seat.
"I ain't used to talkin' politics with a girl," he admitted; "but seein' as you're the editor of this paper--a daily, by Jupe!--you've probably got a head on you and understand that a man don't get into office for his health. There's a lot of bother in servin' your country, and a man oughter be well paid for it. I did jest like the others do--like Kleppish is doin' right now--but the reg'lar voters don't understand politics, and when the howl went up about graft, backed by Kleppish's bought-up newspapers, they turned me down cold. I've been eight years watchin' for a chance to get in again, an' now I've got it."
"This is very interesting, I'm sure," remarked Patsy; "but our paper doesn't go much into local politics, Mr. Boglin, and I'm very busy to-day."
"Honer'ble Ojoy Boglin," he said, correcting her; but he did not take the hint to leave.
Patsy picked up her pencil as if to resume her work, while he eyed her with a countenance baffled and uncertain. Presently he asked:
"Has Kleppish got this paper too?"
"No," she coldly replied.
"I thought I'd likely head him off, you being so new. See here, Editor--"
"I am Miss Doyle, sir."
"Glad to know you, Miss Doyle. What I was about to remark is this: The election for senator comes up agin in September and I want this paper to pull for me. Bein' as it's a daily it's got more power than all of Kleppish's weeklies put together, and if you work the campaign proper I'll win the nomination hands down. This is a strong Republican deestric', and to git nominated on the Republican ticket is the same as an election. So what I want is the nomination. What do you say?"
Patsy glared at him and decided that as far as appearances went he was not a fit candidate for any office, however humble. But she answered diplomatically:
"I will inquire into the condition of politics in this district, Mr. Boglin, and try to determine which candidate is the most deserving. Having reached a decision, the _Millville Tribune_ will espouse the cause of the best man--if it mentions local politics at all."
The Hon. Ojoy gave a dissatisfied grunt.
"That means, in plain words," he suggested, "that you'll give Kleppish a chance to bid against me. But I need this paper, and I'm willin' to pay a big price for it. Let Kleppish go, and we'll make our dicker right now, on a lib'ral basis. It's the only way you can make your paper pay. I've got money, Miss Doyle. I own six farms near Hooker's Falls, which is in this county, and six hundred acres of good pine forest, and I'm director in the Bank of Huntingdon, with plenty of money out on interest. Also I own half the stock in the new paper mill at Royal--"
"You do?" she exclaimed. "I thought Mr. Skeelty--"
"Skeelty's the head man, of course," he said. "He came to me about the mill proposition and I went in with him. I own all the forest around Royal. Bein' manager, and knowin' the business, Skeelty stood out for fifty-one shares of stock, which is the controllin' interest; but I own all the rest, and the mill's makin' good money. People don't know I'm in that deal, and of course this is all confidential and not to be talked about."
"Very well, sir. But I fear you have mistaken the character of our paper," said Patsy quietly. "We are quite independent, Mr. Boglin, and intend to remain so--even if we can't make the paper pay. In other words, the _Millville Daily Tribune_ can't be bought."
He stared in amazement; then scratched his ear with a puzzled air.
"Such talk as that means somethin'," he asserted, gropingly, "but what it means, blamed if I know! Newspapers never turn money down unless they're a'ready bought, or have got a grouch of their own.... Say!" he suddenly cried, as an inspiration struck him, "you ain't got anything agin the mill at Royal, or agin Skeelty, have you?"
"I have, sir!" declared Patsy, raising her head to frown discouragingly upon the Honer'ble Ojoy. "Mr. Skeelty is acting in a very disagreeable manner. He has not only boycotted our paper and refused to pay for the subscriptions he engaged, but I understand he is encouraging his workmen to annoy the Millville people, and especially this printing office."
"Well--durn--Skeelty!" ejaculated Mr. Boglin, greatly discomposed by this statement. "But I'll fix all that, Miss Doyle," he added, eagerly. "Skeelty's my partner and he's got to do what I say or I'll make trouble for him. You dicker with me for the support of your paper and I'll guarantee a hundred subscriptions from Royal and get you an apology from Skeelty and a promise he'll behave an' keep his men to home. And all that's outside the price I'll agree to pay."
Patsy's eyes were full of scorn.
"I won't dicker with you an instant," she firmly declared. "I don't know Colonel Kleppish, or what his character is, but I'm very sure he's the better man and that the people have made no mistake in electing him in your place. No respectable candidate for office would attempt to buy the support of a newspaper, and I advise you to change the wording on your card. Instead of 'Honorable' it should read 'Dishonorable' Ojoy Boglin. Good day, sir!"
Mr. Boglin's face turned white with rage. He half rose from his seat, but sat down again with a vicious snarl.
"I've coaxed, so far, young woman," he said grimly, "but I guess it's time I showed my hand. You'll either run this paper in my interest or I'll push Skeelty on to make the town too hot to hold you. I've got power in this county, even if I ain't senator, and you'll feel that power if you dare oppose me. Take your choice, girl--either to make good money out o' this campaign, or be run out of town, neck an' crop! It's up to you to decide."
"In thirty seconds," said Patsy, her face as white as was Boglin's, "I shall ring this bell to summon my men to throw you out."
The Honer'ble Ojoy slowly rose and put on his hat.
"Look out!" he said warningly.
"I will," snapped Patsy.
"This ain't the end of it, girl!"
"There are ten seconds left," she said.
He picked up his card, turned his back and walked out, leaving his opponent trembling betwixt agitation and righteous indignation. A few moments later Bob West came in and looked at the girl editor curiously.
"Ojoy Boglin has been here," he said.
"The Honer'ble Ojoy, if you please," answered Patsy, with a laugh that bordered on hysteria.
The hardware man nodded, his eyes reading her face.
"You were quite right to turn him down," he asserted.
"It was the only thing to do," responded the girl, wondering how he knew.
"But Boglin is a dangerous man," resumed West. "Look out for him. Miss Doyle."
"Yes; he told me to do that, and I will," said she, more quietly. "He is Skeelty's partner."
"And you're not afraid of him?"
"Why should I be, Mr. West?"
He smiled.
"I'm justice of the peace here. If there's a hint of trouble from Boglin or Skeelty, come directly to me."
"Thank you, Mr. West. I will."
With this he nodded cheerfully and went away.
CHAPTER XII
MOLLY SIZER'S PARTY
The people of Chazy County were very proud of the _Millville Tribune_, the only daily paper in that section of the state. It was really a very good newspaper, if small in size, and related the news of the day as promptly as the great New York journals did.
Arthur Weldon had not been very enthusiastic about the paper at any time, although he humored the girls by attending in a good-natured way to the advertising, hiring some of the country folk to get subscriptions, and keeping the books. He was a young man of considerable education who had inherited a large fortune, safely invested, and therefore had no need, through financial necessity, to interest himself in business of any sort. He allowed the girls to print his name as editor in chief, but he did no editorial work at all, amusing himself these delightful summer days by wandering in the woods, where he collected botanical specimens, or sitting with Uncle John on the lawn, where they read together or played chess. Both the men were glad the girls were happy in their work and enthusiastic over the success of their audacious venture. Beth was developing decided talent as a writer of editorials and her articles were even more thoughtful and dignified than were those of Patsy. The two girls found plenty to occupy them at the office, while Louise did the reportorial work and flitted through Millville and down to Huntingdon each day in search of small items of local interest. She grew fond of this work, for it brought her close to the people and enabled her to study their characters and peculiarities. Her manner of approaching the simple country folk was so gracious and winning that they freely gave her any information they possessed, and chatted with her unreservedly.
Sometimes Louise would make her rounds alone, but often Arthur would join her for an afternoon drive to Huntingdon, and it greatly amused him to listen to his girl-wife's adroit manner of "pumping the natives."
About halfway to Huntingdon was the Sizer Farm, the largest and most important in that vicinity. Old Zeke Sizer had a large family--five boys and three girls--and they were noted as quite the most aggressive and disturbing element in the neighborhood. Old Zeke was rude and coarse and swore like a trooper, so his sons could not be expected to excel him in refinement. Bill Sizer, the eldest, was a hard drinker, and people who knew him asserted that he "never drew a sober breath." The other sons were all quarrelsome in disposition and many a free fight was indulged in among them whenever disputes arose. They were industrious farmers, though, and the three girls and their mother worked from morning till night, so the farm prospered and the Sizers were reputed to be "well-off."
Molly, the eldest girl, had attracted Louise, who declared she was pretty enough to arrest attention in any place. Indeed, this girl was a "raving beauty" in her buxom, countrified way, and her good looks were the pride of the Sizer family and the admiration of the neighbors. The other two were bouncing, merry girls, rather coarse in manner, as might be expected from their environment; but Molly, perhaps fully conscious of her prettiness, assumed certain airs and graces and a regal deportment that brought even her big, brutal brothers to her feet in adoration.
The Sizers were among the first subscribers to the _Millville Tribune_ and whenever Louise stopped at the farmhouse for news the family would crowd around her, ignoring all duties, and volunteer whatever information they possessed. For when they read their own gossip in the local column it gave them a sort of proprietary interest in the paper, and Bill had once thrashed a young clerk at Huntingdon for questioning the truth of an item the Sizers had contributed.
One day when Louise and Arthur stopped at the farm, Mollie ran out with an eager face to say that Friday was her birthday and the Sizers were to give a grand party to celebrate it.
"We want you to come over an' write it up, Mrs. Weldon," said the girl. "They're comin' from twenty mile around, fer the dance, an' we've got the orchestry from Malvern to play for us. Pop's goin' to spend a lot of money on refreshments an' it'll be the biggest blow-out Chazy County ever seen!"
"I think I can write up the party without being present, Mollie," suggested Louise.
"No; you come over. I read once, in a novel, how an editor come to a swell party an' writ about all the dresses an' things--said what everybody wore, you know. I'm goin' to have a new dress, an' if ever'thing's described right well we'll buy a lot of papers to send to folks we know in Connecticut."
"Well," said Louise, with a sigh, "I'll try to drive over for a little while. It is to be Saturday, you say?"
"Yes; the birthday's Friday and the dance Saturday night, rain or shine. An' you might bring the chief editor, your husband, an' try a dance with us. It wouldn't hurt our reputation any to have you folks mingle with us on this festive occasion," she added airily.
They had a good laugh over this invitation when it was reported at Mr. Merrick's dinner table, and Patsy insisted that Louise must write up the party.
"It will be fun to give it a 'double head' and a big send-off," she said. "Write it up as if it were a real society event, dear, and exhaust your vocabulary on the gowns. You'll have to invent some Frenchy names to describe those, I guess, for they'll be wonders; and we'll wind up with a list of 'those present.'"
So on Saturday evening Arthur drove his wife over to the Sizer farm, and long before they reached there they heard the scraping of fiddles, mingled with shouts and boisterous laughter. It was a prohibition district, to be sure, but old Sizer had imported from somewhere outside the "dry zone" a quantity of liquors more remarkable for strength than quality, and with these the guests had been plied from the moment of their arrival. Most of them were wholly unused to such libations, so by the time Arthur and Louise arrived, the big living room of the farmhouse presented an appearance of wild revelry that was quite deplorable.
Molly welcomed them with wild enthusiasm and big Bill, her adoring brother, demanded in a loud voice if Arthur did not consider her the "Belle of Chazy County."
"They ain't a stunner in the state as kin hold a candle to our Molly," he added, and then with uncertain gait he left the "reporters" with the promise to "bring 'em a drink."
"Come, Louise," said Arthur, quietly, "let's get out of here."
He drew her to the door and as a dance was just starting they managed to escape without notice.
"What a disgraceful scene!" cried Louise, when they were on their way home; "and to think of such a shocking carousal being held in good old Chazy County, where morals are usually irreproachable! I shall not mention the affair in the _Tribune_ at all."
But Patsy, who had a managing editor's respect for news of any sort, combatted this determination and begged Louise to write up Molly Sizer's party without referring to its deplorable features.
"It isn't policy to offend the Sizers," she said, "for although they are coarse and common they have shown a friendly spirit toward the paper. Moreover, the enmity of such people--which would surely result from our ignoring the birthday party--would keep us in hot water."
So Louise, though reluctantly, wrote up the party and the manuscript was sent over to Miss Briggs Sunday afternoon, so it would get a place in Monday morning's _Tribune_.
Uncle John had the paper at breakfast on Monday, and he gave an amused laugh as his eye caught the report of the Sizer party.
"This is a good one on you, Louise," he exclaimed. "You say that Miss Molly, 'looking more lovely than ever in her handsome new gown, greeted her guests with a roughish smile.'"
"A what?" demanded Louise, horrified.
"A 'roughish' smile."
"Oh; that's a mistake," she said, glancing at the item. "What I said was a 'roguish' smile; but there's been a typographical error which Miss Briggs must have overlooked in reading the proof."
"Nevertheless," remarked Arthur, "the statement isn't far wrong. Everything was rough, including the smiles, as far as I noted that remarkable gathering."
"But--see here!" cried Patsy; "that's a dreadful mistake. That spoils all the nice things you said about the girl, Louise. I hope the Sizers won't notice it."
But the Sizers did, and were frantic with rage over what they deemed was a deliberate insult to Molly. Several young men who had come from distances to attend the birthday party had stayed over Sunday at the farmhouse, where the revelry still continued in a fitful way, due to vain attempts to relieve racking headaches by further libations. Monday morning found the dissipated crew still the guests of the Sizers, and when big Bill slowly spelled out the assertion made by the _Tribune_ that his sister had "a roughish smile" loud cries of indignation arose. Molly first cried and then had hysterics and screamed vigorously; Bill swore vengeance on the _Millville Tribune_ and all connected with it, while the guests gravely asserted it was "a low-down, measly trick" which the Sizers ought to resent. They all began drinking again, to calm their feelings, and after the midday dinner Bill Sizer grabbed a huge cowhide whip and started to Millville to "lick the editor to a standstill." A wagonload of his guests accompanied him, and Molly pleaded with her brother not to hurt Mrs. Weldon.
"I won't; but I'll cowhide that fresh husband of hers," declared Bill. "He's the editor--the paper says so--and he's the one I'm after!"
CHAPTER XIII
BOB WEST INTERFERES
It was unfortunate that at that time Thursday Smith had gone up the electric line toward Royal, to inspect it. In the office were Patsy, Hetty Hewitt--who was making a drawing--Arthur Weldon, engaged upon his books, and finally, seated in an easy-chair from which he silently watched them work, old Bob West, the hardware man. Louise and Beth had driven over to the Junction to write up an accident, one of the trainmen having caught his hand in a coupling, between two freight cars.
Bob West often dropped into the office, which was next door to his own place of business, but he was a silent man and had little to say on these visits. In his early days he had wandered pretty much over the whole world, and he could relate some interesting personal adventures if he chose. In this retired village West was the one inhabitant distinguished above his fellows for his knowledge of the world. In his rooms over the store, where few were ever invited, he had a fine library of unusual books and a rare collection of curios gathered from foreign lands. It was natural that such a man would be interested in so unique an experiment as the _Millville Tribune_, and he watched its conduct with curiosity but a constantly growing respect for the three girl journalists. No one ever minded when he came into the office, nodded and sat down. Sometimes he would converse with much freedom; at other times the old gentleman remained an hour without offering a remark, and went away with a brief parting nod.
It was West who first saw, through the window, the wagonload of men from the Sizer farm come dashing up the street at a gallop. Instinctively, perhaps, he knew trouble was brewing, but he never altered his expression or his attitude, even when the wagon stopped at the printing office and the passengers leaped out.
In marched Bill Sizer at the head of his following, cowhide in hand. Patsy, her face flushing scarlet, stood up and faced the intruders.
"Stand back, girl!" cried Sizer in a fierce tone; "it's that coward editor I'm after," pointing his whip with trembling hand at Arthur. "My sister Molly may be rough, an' hev a rough smile, but I'll be dinged ef I don't skin the man thet prints it in a paper!"
"Good fer you, Bill!" murmured his friends, approvingly.
Arthur leaned back and regarded his accuser in wonder. The big table, littered with papers, was between them.
"Come out o' there, ye measly city chap, an' take yer medicine," roared Bill, swinging his whip. "I'll larn ye to come inter a decent neighborhood an' slander its women. Come outer there!"
West had sat quietly observing the scene. Now he inquired, in composed tones:
"What's the trouble, Bill?"
"Trouble? Trouble, West? Why, this lyin' scroundrel said in his paper thet our Molly had a rough smile. That's the trouble!"
"Did he really say that?" asked West.
"'Course he did. Printed it in the paper, for all to read. That's why I've come to cowhide the critter within an inch o' his life!"
"Good fer you, Bill!" cried his friends, encouragingly.
"But--wait a moment!" commanded West, as the maddened, half drunken young farmer was about to leap over the table to grasp his victim; "you're not going at this thing right, Bill Sizer."
"Why ain't I, Bob West?"
"Because," answered West, in calm, even tones, "this insult is too great to be avenged by a mere cowhiding. Nothing but blood will wipe away the dreadful stain on your sister's character."
"Oh, Mr. West!" cried Patsy, horrified by such a statement.
"Eh? Blood?" said Bill, stupefied by the suggestion.
"Of course," returned West. "You mustn't thrash Mr. Weldon; you must kill him."
A delighted chorus of approval came from Sizer's supporters.
"All right, then," said the bully, glaring around, "I--I'll kill the scandler!"
"Hold on!" counselled West, seizing his arm. "This affair must be conducted properly--otherwise the law might cause us trouble. No murder, mind you. You must kill Weldon in a duel."
"A--a what? A duel!" gasped Sizer.
"To be sure. That's the way to be revenged. Hetty," he added, turning to the artist, who alone of the observers had smiled instead of groaned at the old gentleman's startling suggestion, "will you kindly run up to my rooms and get a red leather case that lies under the shell cabinet? Thank you, my dear."
Hetty was off like a flash. During her absence an intense silence pervaded the office, broken only by an occasional hiccough from one of Mr. Sizer's guests. Patsy was paralyzed with horror and had fallen back into her chair to glare alternately at Bob West and the big bully who threatened her cousin's husband. Arthur was pale and stern as he fixed a reproachful gaze on the hardware merchant. From Miss Briggs' little room could be heard the steady click-click of the telegraph instrument.
But the furious arrival of the Sizer party had aroused every inhabitant of Millville and with one accord they dropped work and rushed to the printing office. By this time the windows were dark with groups of eager faces that peered wonderingly through the screens--the sashes being up--and listened to the conversation within.
While Hetty was gone not a word was spoken, but the artist was absent only a brief time. Presently she reentered and laid the red leather case on the table before Bob West. The hardware man at once opened it, displaying a pair of old-fashioned dueling pistols, with long barrels and pearl handles. There was a small can of powder, some bullets and wadding in the case, and as West took up one of the pistols and proceeded to load it he said in an unconcerned voice:
"I once got these from an officer in Vienna, and they have been used in more than a score of duels, I was told. One of the pistols--I can't tell which it is--has killed a dozen men, so you are going to fight with famous weapons."
Both Arthur and Bill Sizer, as well as the groups at the window, watched the loading of the pistols with fascinated gaze.
"Bob's a queer ol' feller," whispered Peggy McNutt to the blacksmith, who stood beside him. "This dool is just one o' his odd fancies. Much he keers ef they kills each other er not!"
"Mr. West," cried Patsy, suddenly rousing from her apathy, "I'll not allow this shameful thing! A duel is no better than murder, and I'm sure there is a law against it."
"True," returned West, ramming the bullet into the second pistol; "it is quite irregular and--er--illegal, I believe. Perhaps I shall go to jail with whichever of the duelists survives; but you see it is a point of honor with us all. Molly Sizer has seemingly been grossly maligned in your paper, and the editor is responsible. Are you a good shot, Bill?"
"I--I guess so," stammered Sizer.
"That's good. Weldon, I hear, is an expert with the pistol."
Arthur did not contradict this statement, although he was positive he could not hit a barn at twenty yards.
"Now, then, are we ready?" staid West, rising. "Come with me, gentlemen."
"What ye goin' to do, Bob?" asked Sizer, anxiously.
"I'll explain," replied the hardware man, leading the way to the street. Everyone followed him and the crowd at the windows joined the group outside. "Of course you mustn't shoot in the main street, for you might hit some one, or break windows; but back of this row of buildings is a lane that is perfectly clear. You will stand back to back in the center of the block and then, at my word, you will each march to the end of the block and pass around the buildings to the lane. As soon as you come in sight of one another you are privileged to fire, and I suppose Bill Sizer will try to kill you, Mr. Weldon, on the spot, and therefore you will try to kill him first."
"But--look a-here, Bob!" cried Sizer; "it ain't right fer him to take a shot at me. You said fer me to kill him, but ye didn't say nuth'n about _his_ shootin' at _me_."
"That's all right, Bill," returned West. "You're in the right, and the right ought to win. But you must give the man a chance for his life, you know."
"That weren't in the bargain."
"It is now, by the laws of dueling."
"He--he might shoot me," urged Bill.
"It isn't likely. Although he's a dead shot, you have right on your side, and you must be sure to fire as soon as you get within good range. It won't be considered murder; it will only be a duel, and the law will deal lightly with you."
"That's right, Bill," asserted one of Sizer's friends. "Bob West's a justice o' the peace himself, an' he orter know."
"I do know," declared West gravely.
He placed Arthur Weldon and Bill Sizer back to back in the middle of the street and handed each a pistol.
"Now, then," said he, "you both understand the rules, which I have explained, and the spectators will bear witness that, whatever happens, this affair has been conducted in a regular manner, with no favor shown to either. You are both brave men, and this duel will vindicate your honor. If you are fortunate enough to survive, you will be heroes, and all your differences will be wiped off the slate. But as one or both may fall, we, the citizens of Millville, hereby bid you a solemn and sad farewell."
Impressed by this speech, Sizer's friends began to shake hands with him.
"All ready!" called West. "One--two--three----go!"
At the word the two, back to back, started for the opposite ends of the little street, and at once the crowd made a rush between the buildings to gain the rear, where they might witness the shooting in the lane when the duelists met. Arthur had been thinking seriously during these proceedings and had made up his mind it was in no degree his duty to be bored full of holes by a drunken countryman like Bill Sizer, just because there had been a typographical error in the _Millville Tribune_. So, when he got to the end of the street, instead of turning into the lane he made for the farm, holding the long dueling pistol gingerly in his hand and trotting at a good pace for home.
Footsteps followed him. In sudden panic he increased his run; but the other was faster. A heavy hand grasped his shoulder and swung him around, while old Bob West, panting for Breath, exclaimed:
"Stop, you fool--stop! The other one is running."
"The other one!" echoed Arthur, wonderingly.
"Of course. Bill Sizer was sure to run; he's a coward, as all bullies are. Quick, Weldon, save the day and your reputation or I'll never stand your friend again."
Arthur understood now. He turned and ran back faster than he had come, swung into the lane where the crowd was cautiously peering from the shelter of the buildings, and waving his pistol in a reckless way that made Bob West shudder, he cried out:
"Where is he? Where's Sizer? Why don't he show up and be shot, like a man?"
No Sizer appeared. He was even then headed cross-lots for home, leaving his friends to bemoan his cowardice. As for Arthur, the crowd gave him a cheer and condemned his opponent's conduct in no measured terms. They were terribly disappointed by Big Bill's defection, for while not especially bloodthirsty they hated to see the impending tragedy turn out a farce.
In the printing office Patsy was laughing hysterically as her horror dissolved and allowed her to discover the comic phase of the duel. She literally fell on Arthur's neck as he entered, but the next moment pushed him away to face the hardware merchant.
"I beg your pardon, Mr. West," said she with twinkling eyes. "I suspected you of being a cold-blooded ruffian, when you proposed this duel; but I now see that you understand human nature better than the whole caboodle of us put together! Arthur, thank Mr. West for saving you from a flogging."
"I do, indeed!" said Arthur fervently.
CHAPTER XIV
THE DANGER SIGNAL
By this time the _Tribune_ had become the pride of all Millville, yet the villagers could not quite overcome their awe and wonder at it. Also the newspaper was the pride of the three girl journalists, who under the tutelage of Miss Briggs were learning to understand the complicated system of a daily journal. Their amateurish efforts were gradually giving way to more dignified and readable articles; Beth could write an editorial that interested even Uncle John, her severest critic; Louise showed exceptional talent for picking up local happenings and making news notes of them, while Patsy grabbed everything that came to her net--locals, editorials, telegraphic and telephone reports from all parts of the world--and skillfully sorted, edited and arranged them for the various departments of the paper. It was mighty interesting to them all, and they were so eager each morning to get to work that they could scarcely devote the proper time to old Nora's famous breakfasts.
"We made a mistake. Uncle," said Patsy to Mr. Merrick, "in starting the _Tribune_ in the wrong place. In a few weeks we must leave it and go back to the city, whereas, had we established our paper in New York--"
"Then it never would have been heard of," interrupted practical Beth. "In New York, Patsy dear, we would become the laughing stock of the town. I shudder when I think what a countrified paper we turned out that first issue."
"But we are fast becoming educated," declared Patsy. "I'm not ashamed of the _Tribune_ now, even in comparison with the best New York dailies."
Beth laughed, but Uncle John said judicially:
"For Millville, it's certainly a marvel. I get the world news more concisely and more pleasantly from its four pages than when I wade through twenty or thirty of the big pages of a metropolitan newspaper. You are doing famously, my dears. I congratulate you."
"But we are running behind dreadfully," suggested Arthur, the bookkeeper, "even since Thursday Smith enabled us to cut down expenses so greatly. The money that comes in never equals what we pay out. How long can you keep this up, girls?"
They made no reply, nor did Uncle John discuss the financial condition of the newspaper. He was himself paying some heavy expenses that did not appear on the books, such as the Associated Press franchise, the telegraph bills and the electric power; but he was quite delighted to take care of these items and regretted he had not assumed more of the paper's obligations. He knew the expenses were eating big holes in the incomes of his three nieces, yet they never complained nor allowed their enthusiasm to flag.
Mr. Merrick, who had tested these girls in more ways than one, was watching them carefully, and fully approved their spirit and courage under such trying conditions. Major Doyle, Patsy's father, when the first copy of the _Millville Tribune_ was laid on his desk in the city, was astounded at the audacity of this rash venture. When he could command his temper to write calmly he sent a letter to Mr. Merrick which read: "Taken altogether, John, you're the craziest bunch of irresponsibles outside an asylum. No wonder you kept this folly a secret from me until you had accomplished your nefarious designs. The _Millville Daily Tribune_ is a corker and no mistake, for our Patsy's at the head of your lunatic gang. I'll go farther, and say the paper's a wonder. I believe it is the first daily newspaper published in a town of six inhabitants, that has ever carried the Associated Press dispatches, But, allow me to ask, why? The lonely inhabitants of the desert of Chazy County don't need a daily--or a weekly--or a monthly. A semi-annual would about hit their gait, and be more than they deserve. So I've decided it's merely a silly way to spend money--and an easy way, too, I'll be bound. Oblige me by explaining this incomprehensible eccentricity."
To this, a mild protest for the major, Uncle John replied: "Dear Major Doyle: Yours received. Have you no business of your own to attend to? Affectionately yours, John Merrick."
The major took the hint. He made no further complaint but read the paper religiously every day, gloating over Patsy's name as managing editor and preserving the files with great care. He really enjoyed, the _Millville Tribune_, and as his summer vacation was shortly due he anticipated with pleasure a visit to the farm and a peep at the workings of "our Patsy's" famous newspaper. The other girls he ignored. If Patsy was connected with the thing, her adoring parent was quite sure she was responsible for all the good there was in it.
The paper printed no mention of the famous duel. But Hetty made a cartoon of it, showing the lane, with its fringe of spectators, Arthur Weldon standing manfully to await his antagonist and big Bill Sizer, in the distance, sprinting across the fields in the direction of home. This cartoon was highly prized by those who had witnessed the adventure and Peggy McNutt pinned it on the wall of his real estate office beside the one Hetty had made of himself. Bill Sizer promptly "stopped the paper," that being the only vengeance at hand, and when Bob West sent a boy to him demanding the return of the pistol, Bill dispatched with the weapon the following characteristic note, which he had penned with much labor:
"Bob west sir you Beet me out uv my Reeveng and Made me look like a bag uv Beens. but I will skware this Thing sum da and yu and that edyter hed better Watch out. i don't stand fer no Throwdown like that Wm. Sizer."
However, the bully received scant sympathy, even from his most intimate friends, and his prestige in the community was henceforth destroyed. Arthur did not crow, for his part. He told the girls frankly of his attempt to run away and evade the meeting, which sensible intention was only frustrated by Bob West's interference, and they all agreed he was thoroughly justified. The young man had proved to them his courage years before and none of the girls was disposed to accuse him of cowardice for not wishing to shoot or be shot by such a person as Bill Sizer.
A few days following the duel another incident occurred which was of a nature so startling that it drove the Sizer comedy from all minds. This time Thursday Smith was the hero.
Hetty Hewitt, it seems, was having a desperate struggle to quell the longings of her heart for the allurements of the great city. She had been for years a thorough Bohemienne, frequenting cafes, theatres and dance halls, smoking and drinking with men and women of her class and, by degrees, losing every womanly quality with which nature had generously endowed her. But the girl was not really bad. She was essentially nervous and craved excitement, so she had drifted into this sort of life because no counteracting influence of good had been injected into her pliable disposition. None, that is, until the friendly editor for whom she worked, anticipating her final downfall, had sought to save her by sending her to a country newspaper. He talked to the girl artist very frankly before she left for Millville, and Hetty knew he was right, and was truly grateful for the opportunity to redeem herself. The sweet girl journalists with whom she was thrown in contact were so different from any young women she had heretofore known, and proved so kindly sympathetic, that Hetty speedily became ashamed of her wasted life and formed a brave resolution to merit the friendship so generously extended her.
But it was hard work at first. She could get through the days easily enough by wandering in the woods and taking long walks along the rugged country roads; but in the evenings came the insistent call of the cafes, the cheap orchestras, vaudeville, midnight suppers and the like. She strenuously fought this yearning and found it was growing less and less powerful to influence her. But her nights were yet restless and her nerves throbbing from the effects of past dissipations. Often she would find herself unable to sleep and would go out into the moonlight when all others were in bed, and "prowl around with the cats," as she expressed it, until the wee hours of morning. Often she told Patsy she wished there was more work she could do. The drawings required by the paper never occupied her more than a couple of hours each day. Sometimes she made one of her cleverest cartoons in fifteen or twenty minutes.
"Can't I do something else?" she begged. "Let me set type, or run the ticker--I can receive telegrams fairly well--or even write a column of local comment. I'm no journalist, so you'll not be envious."
But Patsy shook her head.
"Really, Hetty, there's nothing else you can do, and your pictures are very important to us. Rest and enjoy yourself, and get strong and well. You are improving wonderfully in health since you came here."
Often at midnight Hetty would wander into the pressroom and watch Thursday Smith run off the edition on the wonderful press, which seemed to possess an intelligence of its own, so perfectly did it perform its functions. At such times she sat listlessly by and said little, for Thursday was no voluble talker, especially when busied over his press. But a certain spirit of comradeship grew up between these two, and it was not unusual for the pressmen, after his work was finished and the papers were neatly piled for distribution to the carriers at daybreak, to walk with Hetty to the hotel before proceeding to his own lodgings in the little wing of Nick Thorne's house, which stood quite at the end of the street. To be sure, the hotel adjoined the printing office, with only a vacant lot between, but Hetty seemed to appreciate this courtesy and would exchange a brief good night with Smith before going to her own room. Afterward she not infrequently stole out again, because sleep would not come to her, and then the moon watched her wanderings until it dipped behind the hills.
On the night we speak of, Hetty had parted from Thursday Smith at one o'clock and crept into the hallway of the silent, barnlike hotel; but as soon as the man turned away she issued forth again and walked up the empty street like a shadow. Almost to Thompson's Crossing she strolled, deep in thought, and then turned and retraced her steps. But when she again reached the hotel she was wide-eyed as ever; so she passed the building, thinking she would go on to Little Bill Creek and sit by the old mill for a time.
The girl was just opposite the printing office when her attention was attracted by a queer grating noise, as if one of the windows was being pried up. She stopped short, a moment, and then crept closer to the building. Two men were at a side window of the pressroom, which they had just succeeded in opening. As Hetty gained her point of observation one of the men slipped inside, but a moment later hastily reappeared and joined his fellow. At once both turned and stole along the side of the shed directly toward the place where the girl stood. Her first impulse was to run, but recollecting that she wore a dark gown and stood in deep shadow she merely flattened herself against the building and remained motionless. The men were chuckling as they passed her, and she recognized them as mill hands from Royal.
"Guess that'll do the job," said one, in a low tone.
"If it don't, nothin' will," was the reply.
They were gone, then, stealing across the road and beating a hasty retreat under the shadows of the houses.
Hetty stood motionless a moment, wondering what to do. Then with sudden resolve she ran to Thorne's house and rapped sharply at the window of the wing where she knew Thursday Smith slept. She heard him leap from bed and open the blind.
"What is it?" he asked.
"It's me, Thursday--Hetty," she said. "Two men have just broken into the pressroom, through a window. They were men from Royal, and they didn't steal anything, but ran away in great haste. I--I'm afraid something is wrong, Thursday!"
Even while she spoke he was rapidly dressing.
"Wait!" he called to her. In a few moments he opened the door and joined her.
Without hesitation he began walking rapidly toward the office, and the girl kept step with him. He asked no questions whatever, but us soon as she had led him to the open window he leaped through it and switched on an electric light. An instant later he cried aloud, in a voice of fear:
"Get out, Hetty! Run--for your life!"
"Run yourself, Thursday, if there's danger," she coolly returned.
But he shouted "Run--run--run!" in such thrilling, compelling tones that the girl shrank away and dashed across the vacant lot to the hotel before she turned again in time to see Smith leap from the window and make a dash toward the rear. He was carrying something--something extended at arms' length before him--and he crossed the lane and ran far into the field before stooping to set down his burden.
Now he was racing back again, running as madly as if a troop of demons was after him. A flash cleft the darkness; a deep detonation thundered and echoed against the hills; the building against which Hetty leaned shook as if an earthquake had seized it, and Thursday Smith was thrown flat on his face and rolled almost to the terrified girl's feet, where he lay motionless. Only the building saved her from pitching headlong too, but as the reverberations died away, to be followed by frantic screams from the rudely wakened population of Millville, Hetty sank upon her knees and turned the man over, so that he lay face up.
He opened his eyes and put up one hand. Then he struggled to his feet, trembling weakly, and his white face smiled into the girl's anxious one.
"That was a close call, dear," he whispered; "but your timely discovery saved us from a terrible calamity. I--I don't believe there is much harm done, as it is."
Hetty made no reply. She was thinking of the moments he had held that deadly Thing in his hands, while he strove to save lives and property from destruction.
The inevitable crowd was gathering now, demanding in terrified tones what had happened. Men, women and children poured from the houses in scant attire, all unnerved and fearful, crying for an explanation of the explosion.
"Keep mum, Hetty," said Smith, warningly. "It will do no good to tell them the truth."
She nodded, realizing it was best the villagers did not suspect that an enemy of the newspaper had placed them all in dire peril.
"Dynamite?" she asked in a whisper.
"Yes; a bomb. But for heaven's sake don't mention it."
Suddenly a man with a lantern discovered a great pit in the field behind the lane and the crowd quickly surrounded it. From their limited knowledge of the facts the explosion seemed unaccountable, but there was sufficient intelligence among them to determine that dynamite had caused it and dug this gaping hole in the stony soil. Bob West glanced at the printing office, which was directly in line with the explosion; then he cast a shrewd look into the white face of Thursday Smith; but the old hardware merchant merely muttered under his breath something about Ojoy Boglin and shook his head determinedly when questioned by his fellow villagers.
Interest presently centered in the damage that had been done. Many window panes were shattered and the kitchen chimney of the hotel had toppled over; but no person had been injured and the damage could easily be repaired. While the excitement was at its height Thursday Smith returned to his room and went to bed; but long after the villagers had calmed down sufficiently to seek their homes Hetty Hewitt sat alone by the great pit, staring reflectively into its ragged depths. Quaint and curious were the thoughts that puzzled the solitary girl's weary brain, but prominent and ever-recurring was the sentence that had trembled upon Thursday Smith's lips: "It was a close call, _dear_!"
The "close call" didn't worry Hetty a particle; it was the last word of the sentence that amazed her. That, and a new and wonderful respect for the manliness of Thursday Smith, filled her heart to overflowing.
CHAPTER XV
A CLEVER IDEA
Neither Thursday nor Hetty allowed a word to escape concerning the placing of the bomb in the _Tribune_ office, but the explosion was public knowledge and many were bothering their heads to explain its meaning.
John Merrick, when he heard the news, looked very grave and glanced uneasily into the unconscious faces of his three beloved nieces. A man of much worldly experience, in spite of his simple, ingenuous nature, the little man began carefully piecing together parts of the puzzle. Thursday Smith's defense of the girl journalists, whereby he had severely pounded some of the workmen who had insulted them, had caused the man to be denounced by the colony at Royal. Mr. Skeelty, the manager, had demanded that Smith be discharged by Mr. Mirrick, and being refused, had threatened to shut off the power from the newspaper plant. Skeelty dared not carry out this threat, for fear of a lawsuit, but his men, who had urged the matter of Smith's discharge upon their manager, were of the class that seeks revenge at any cost. At this juncture Ojoy Boglin, Skeelty's partner and the owner of all the pine forest around Royal, had become the enemy of the newspaper and was aware of the feeling among the workmen. A word from Boglin, backed by Skeelty's tacit consent, would induce the men to go to any length in injuring the _Millville Tribune_ and all concerned in its welfare.
Considering these facts, Mr. Merrick shrewdly suspected that the dynamite explosion had been the work of the mill hands, yet why it was harmlessly exploded in a field was a factor that puzzled him exceedingly. He concluded, from what information he possessed, that they had merely intended this as a warning, which if disregarded might be followed by a more serious catastrophe.
The idea that such a danger threatened his nieces made the old gentleman distinctly nervous.
There were ways to evade further molestation from the lawless element at the mill. The Hon. Ojoy could be conciliated; Thursday Smith discharged; or the girls could abandon their journalistic enterprise altogether. Such alternatives were mortifying to consider, but his girls must be protected from harm at any cost.
While he was still considering the problem, the girls and Arthur having driven to the office, as usual, Joe Wegg rode over from Thompson's Crossing on his sorrel mare for a chat with his old friend and benefactor. It was this same young man--still a boy in years--who had once owned the Wegg Farm and disposed of it to Mr. Merrick.
Joe was something of a mechanical genius and, when his father died, longed to make his way in the great world. But after many vicissitudes and failures he returned to Chazy County to marry Ethel Thompson, his boyhood sweetheart, and to find that one of his father's apparently foolish investments had made him rich.
Ethel was the great-granddaughter of the pioneer settler of Chazy County--Little Bill Thompson--from whom the Little Bill Creek and Little Bill Mountain had been named. It was he who first established the mill at Millville; so, in marrying a descendant of Little Bill Thompson, Joe Wegg had become quite the most important resident of Chazy County, and the young man was popular and well liked by all who knew him.
After the first interchange of greetings Joe questioned Mr. Merrick about the explosion of the night before, and Uncle John frankly stated his suspicions.
"I'm sorry," said Joe, "they ever started that mill at Royal Falls. Most of the workmen are foreigners, and all of them rude and reckless. They have caused our quiet, law-abiding people no end of trouble and anxiety already. It is becoming a habit with them to haunt Millville on Saturday nights, when they are partly intoxicated, and they've even invaded some of the farmhouses and frightened the women and children. I've talked to Bob West about it and he has promised to swear in Lon Taft and Seth Davis as special constables, to preserve order; but he admits we are quite helpless to oppose such a gang of rowdies. I've also been to see Mr. Skeelty, to ask him to keep his men at home, but he answered gruffly that he had no authority over his employees except during working hours, and not much authority even then."
"Skeelty doesn't seem the right man to handle those fellows," observed Mr. Merrick thoughtfully; "but as he owns the controlling interest in his company, and Boglin is fully as unreasonable, we cannot possibly oust him from control. If the men determined to blow up all Millville with dynamite I'm sure Skeelty would not lift a finger to prevent it."
"No; he's deathly afraid of them, and that's a fact," said Joe.
They sat in silence a while.
"Your report of Skeelty's threat to cut off your electric power," said young Wegg, "reminds me of a plan I've had in mind for some time. I find I've too much time on my hands, Mr. Merrick, and I cannot be thoroughly happy unless I'm occupied. Ethel's farms are let on shares and I'm a drone in the world's busy hive. But we're anchored here at Millville, so I've been wondering what I could do to improve the place and keep myself busy. It has seemed to me that the same rush of water in Little Bill Creek that runs the dynamos at Royal is in evidence--to a lesser extent--at the old milldam. What would you think of my putting in an electric plant at the mill, and lighting both Millville and Huntingdon, as well as all the farmhouses?"
"Not a bad idea, Joe," said Uncle John approvingly.
"Electric lights have a civilizing influence," continued the young man. "I'm quite sure all the farmers between here and Huntingdon would use them, at a reasonable price. I can also run a line to Hooker's Falls, and one to Chazy Junction. Plenty of poles can be cut from our pine forests and the wires will be the chief expense. I may not make money, at first, but I'll play pretty nearly even and have something to do."
"Do you think you could furnish enough power for our printing office?" asked Mr. Merrick.
"Yes; and a dozen factories, besides. I've an idea the thing may bring factories to Millville."
"Then get at it, Joe, and build it quick. I've a notion we shall have an open rupture with Skeelty before long."
Joe Wegg smiled.
"You're going to accuse me, sir, of asking advice after I've made up my mind," said he; "but the fact is, I have bought the mill of Silas Caldwell already. He's been wanting to dispose of the property for some time."
"Good!" exclaimed Uncle John.
"Also I--I've ordered a dynamo and machinery. It all ought to be here in a few days."
"Better yet!" cried Mr. Merrick. "You've relieved my mind of a great weight, Joe."
"Now about Thursday Smith," said the young man. "Don't you think it would be policy for you to let him go, Mr. Merrick?"
"No."
"He's a clever fellow. I can use him at my lighting plant."
"Thank you, Joe; but that wouldn't help any. As long as he's in Millville he will be an object of vengeance to those anarchistic mill hands. The only way to satisfy them in to drive Smith out of town, and--I'll be hanged if I'll do it! He hasn't done anything wrong, and I'm interested in the fellow's curious history. I've put his case in the hands of a famous New York detective--Fogerty--with instructions to discover who he is, and I can't let a lot of rowdies force me to abandon the man for no reasonable cause."
"Don't blame you, sir," said Joe. "If it wasn't this Thursday Smith, some other would incur the hatred of the Royal workmen, and as they're disposed to terrorize us we may as well fight it out on this line as any other. The whole county will stand by you, sir."
"The only thing I dread is possible danger to my girls."
"Keep 'em away from the office evenings," advised Joe. "During the day they are perfectly safe. If anything happens, it will be at night, and while the newspaper office may some time go flying skyward the girls will run no personal danger whatever."
"Maybe so, Joe. How queer it is that such a condition should exist in Millville--a little forgotten spot in the very heart of civilization and the last place where one might expect excitement of this sort. But I won't be cowed; I won't be driven or bullied by a pack of foreign hounds, I assure you! If Skeelty can't discipline his men, I will."
In furtherance of which assertion, Mr. Merrick went to town and wired a message to the great Fogerty.
CHAPTER XVI
LOCAL CONTRIBUTION
We hear considerable of the "conventional people" of this world, but seldom meet with them; for, as soon as we begin to know a person, we discover peculiarities that quite remove him from the ranks of the conventional--if such ranks exist at all. The remark of the old Scotch divine to his good wife: "Everybody's queer but thee and me, Nancy, and sometimes I think _thee_ a little queer," sums up human nature admirably. We seldom recognize our own queerness, but are prone to mark the erratic temperaments of others, and this is rather more comfortable than to be annoyed by a consciousness of our personal deficits.
The inhabitants of a country town are so limited in their experiences that we generally find their personal characteristics very amusing. No amount of scholastic learning could have rendered the Millville people sophisticated, for contact with the world and humanity is the only true educator; but, as a matter of fact, there was little scholastic learning among them, with one or two exceptions, and the villagers as a rule were of limited intelligence. Every one was really a "character," and Uncle John's nieces, who all possessed a keen sense of humor, enjoyed the oddities of the Millvillites immensely.
A humorous situation occurred through a seemingly innocent editorial of Beth on authorship. In the course of her remarks she said: "A prominent author is stated to have accumulated a large fortune by writing short stories for the newspapers and magazines. He is said to receive ten cents a word, and this unusual price is warranted by the eager demand for his stories, of which the reading public is very fond. However, the unknown author does not fare so badly. The sum of from thirty to fifty dollars usually remitted for a short story pays the beginner a better recompense, for the actual time he is engaged upon the work, than any other occupation he might undertake."
This was seriously considered the morning it appeared in the _Tribune_ by Peggy McNutt and Skim Clark, as they sat in the sunshine on the former's little front porch. Peggy had read it aloud in his laborious, halting way, and Skim listened with growing amazement.
"Thirty dollars!" he cried; "thirty to fifty fer a short story! Great Snakes, Peggy, I'm goin' into it."
"Heh? Goin' into what?" asked Peggy, raising his eyes from the paper.
"I kin write a story," declared Skim confidently.
"Ye kin, Skim?"
"It's a cinch, Peggy. Mother keeps all the magazines an' paper novils, an' we allus reads 'em afore we sells 'em. I've read the gol-durndest lot o' truck ye ever heard of, so I'm posted on stories in gen'ral. I'll write one an' sell it to the _Millville Tribune_. Do ye s'pose they'll give me the thirty, er the fifty, Peggy?"
"Anywheres between, they says. But one feller gits ten cents a word. Whew!"
"I know; but he's a big one, which I ain't--just now. I'll take even the thirty, if I hev to."
"I would, Skim," advised Peggy, nodding approval. "But make 'em put yer photygraf in the paper, besides. Say, it'll be a big thing fer Millville to turn out a author. I didn't think it were in you, Skim."
"Why, it hadn't struck me afore," replied the youth, modestly. "I've ben hankerin' to make money, without knowin' how to do it. I tell ye, Peggy, it pays to read the newspapers. This one's give me a hint how to carve out a future career, an' I'll write a story as'll make them girl edyturs set up an' take notice."
"Make it someth'n' 'bout Injuns," suggested Peggy. "I ain't read a Injun story fer years."
"No; they're out o' fashion," observed Skim loftily. "What folks want now is a detective story. Feller sees a hole in a fence an' says, 'Ha! there's ben a murder!' Somebody asks what makes him think so, an' the detective feller says, takin' out a magnifie-in' glass, 'Thet hole's a bullet-hole, an' the traces o' blood aroun' the edges shows the bullet went through a human body afore it went through the fence.' 'Then,' says some one, 'where's the body?' 'That,' says the detective, 'is what we mus' diskiver.' So the story goes on to show how the body were diskivered an' who did the murderin'."
"By Jupe, thet's great!" cried Peggy admiringly. "Skim, ye're a wonder!"
"Ma allus said I were good fer somethin', but she couldn't tell what."
"It's story-writin'," declared Peggy "Say, Skim, I put ye onter this deal; don't I git a rake-off on thet fifty dollars?"
"Not a cent!" said Skim indignantly. "Ye didn't tell me to write a story; I said myself as I could do it. An' I know where to use the money, Peggy, ev'ry dollar of it, whether it's thirty er fifty."
Peggy sighed.
"I writ a pome once," he said. "Wonder ef they'd pay fer a pome?"
"What were it like?" asked Skim curiously.
"It went someth'n' this way," said Peggy:
"I sigh Ter fly Up high In the sky. But my Wings is shy, So I mus' cry Good-bye Ter fly- in'."
"Shoo!" said Skim disdainfully. "Thet ain't no real pome, Peggy."
"It makes rhymes, don't it? All but the las' line."
"Mebbe it does," replied Skim, with assumption of superior wisdom; "but it don't mean nuth'n'."
"It would ef I got paid fer it," observed Peggy.
Skim went home to his mother's tiny "Emporium," took some note paper out of stock, opened a new bottle of ink and sat down at the sitting room table to write his story. The Widow Clark looked in and asked what he meant by "squanderin' profits that way."
"Shet up, mar. Gi' me elbow room," said her dutiful son. "I'm writin' a fifty dollar story fer the _Tribune_."
"Fifty dollars!"
"Thirty, anyhow; mebbe fifty," replied Skim. "What's a good name fer a detective, mar?"
The widow sat down and wiped her damp hands on her apron, looking upon her hopeful with an expression of mingled awe and pride.
"Kin ye do it, Skim?" she asked softly.
"I s'pose I kin turn out one a day, by hard work," he said confidently. "At thirty a day, the lowes' price, thet's a hunderd 'n' eighty a week, seven hunderd 'n' twenty a month, or over eight thousan' dollars a year. I got it all figgered out. It's lucky fer me the nabobs is rich, or they couldn't stan' the strain. Now, mar, ef ye want to see yer son a nabob hisself, some day, jes' think up a good name fer a detective."
"Sherholmes Locke," she said after some reflection.
"No; this 'ere story's got ter be original. I thought o' callin' him Suspectin' Algernon. Detectives is allus suspectin' something."
"Algernon's high-toned," mused the widow. "Let it go at that, Skim."
All that day and far into the evening he sat at his task, pausing now and then for inspiration, but most of the time diligently pushing his pen over the strongly lined note paper and hopelessly straying from the lines. Meantime, Mrs. Clark walked around on tiptoe, so as not to disturb him, and was reluctant even to call him to his meals in the kitchen. When Skim went to bed his story had got into an aggravating muddle, but during the next forenoon he managed to bring it to a triumphant ending.
"When I git used to the thing, mar," he said, "I kin do one a day, easy. I had to be pertickler over this one, it bein' the first."
The widow read the story carefully, guessing at the words that were hopelessly indistinct.
"My! but it's a thriller, Skim," she said with maternal enthusiasm; "but ye don't say why he killed the girl."
"That don't matter, so long's he did it."
"The spellin' don't allus seem quite right," she added doubtfully.
"I guess the spellin's as good as the readin'll be," he retorted, with evident irritation. "I bet I spell as well as any o' the folks thet takes the paper."
"And some words I can't make out."
"Oh, the edytur'll fix that. Say, air ye tryin' to queer my story, mar? Do ye set up to know more'n I do about story writin'?"
"No," she said; "I ain't talented, Skim, an' you be."
"What I orter hev," he continued, reflectively, "is a typewriter. When I git two er three hunderd ahead perhaps I'll buy one--secondhand."
"Kin ye buy one thet'll spell, Skim?" she asked, as she made a neat roll of the manuscript and tied a pink hair ribbon around it.
Skim put on a collar and necktie and took his story across to the newspaper office.
"I got a conter-bution fer the paper," he said to Patsy, who asked him his business.
"What, something original, Skim?" she asked in surprise.
"Ye've hit it right, Miss Doyle; it's a story."
"Oh!"
"A detective story."
"Dear me! Then you'll have to see Mrs. Weldon, who is our literary editor."
Louise, who was sitting close by, looked up and held out her hand for the beribboned roll.
"I don't jes' know," remarked Skim, as he handed it across the table, "whether it's a thirty dollar deal, er a fifty."
Having forgotten Beth's editorial, Louise did not understand this remark, but she calmly unrolled Skim's manuscript and glanced at the scrawled heading with an amused smile.
"'Suspecting Algernon,'" she read aloud.
"'It were a dark and teedjus night in the erly springtime while the snow were falling soft over the moon litt lanskape.' Why, Skim, how came you to write this?"
"It were the money," he said boldly. "I kin do one a day like this, at thirty dollers apiece, an' never feel the wear an' tear."
Patsy giggled, but Louise stared with a wondering, puzzled expression at the crabbed writing, the misspelled words and dreadful grammar. Indeed, she was a little embarrassed how to handle so delicate a situation.
"I'm afraid we cannot use your story, Mr. Clark," she said gently, and remembering the formula that usually accompanied her own rejected manuscripts she added: "This does not necessarily imply a lack of merit in your contribution, but is due to the fact that it is at present unavailable for our use."
Skim stared at her in utter dismay.
"Ye mean ye won't take it?" he asked with trembling lips.
"We have so much material on hand, just now, that we cannot possibly purchase more," she said firmly, but feeling intensely sorry for the boy. "It may be a good story--"
"It's the bes' story I ever heard of!" declared Skim.
"But we have no place for it in the _Millville Tribune,_" she added, handing him back the roll.
Skim was terribly disappointed. Never, for a single moment, had he expected "sech a throwdown as this."
"Seems to me like a bunco game," he muttered savagely. "First ye say in yer blamed ol' paper a story's wuth thirty to fifty dollars, an' then when I bring ye a story ye won't pay a red cent fer it!"
"Stories," suggested Louise, "are of various qualities, depending on the experience and talent of the author. An excellent story is often refused because the periodical to which it is offered is overstocked with similar material. Such conditions are often trying, Skim; I've had a good many manuscripts rejected myself."
But the boy would not be conciliated.
"I'll send it to Munsey's, thet's what I'll do; an' then you'll be durn sorry," he said, almost ready to cry.
"Do," urged Louise sweetly. "And if they print it, Mr. Clark, I'll agree to purchase your next story for fifty dollars."
"All right; the fifty's mine. I got witnesses, mind ye!" and he flounced out of the room like an angry schoolboy.
"Oh, Louise," exclaimed Patsy, reproachfully, "why didn't you let me see the thing? It would have been better than a circus."
"Poor boy!" said the literary editor, with a sigh. "I didn't want to humiliate him more than I could help. I wonder if he really will have the audacity to send it to Munsey's?"
And now the door opened to admit Peggy McNutt, who had been watching his chance to stump across to the printing office as soon as Skim left there. For Peggy had reasoned, not unjustly, that if Skim Clark could make a fortune as an author he, Marshall McMahon McNutt, had a show to corral a few dollars in literature himself. After lying awake half the night thinking it over, he arose this morning with the firm intention of competing with Skim for the village laurels. He well knew he could not write a shuddery detective story, such as Skim had outlined, but that early poem of his, which the boy had seemed to regard so disdainfully, was considered by Peggy a rather clever production. He repeated it over and over to himself, dwelling joyously on its perfect rhyme, until he was convinced it was a good poem and that Skim had enviously slandered it. So he wrote it out in big letters on a sheet of foolscap and determined to offer it to "them newspaper gals."
"I got a pome, Miss Patsy," he said, with unusual diffidence, for he was by no means sure the "gals" would not agree with Skim's criticism.
"What! Another contributor?" she exclaimed playfully. "Has the whole town suddenly turned literary, Peggy?"
"No; jest me 'n' Skim. Skim says my pome's no good; but I sort o' like it, myself."
"Let me see it," said Patsy, ignoring this time the literary editor, who was glad to be relieved of the responsibility of disappointing another budding author.
Peggy handed over the foolscap, and Patsy eagerly read the "pome."
"Listen, Louise! Listen, Beth!" she called, delightedly. "Here is certainly a real 'pome,' and on aviation--the latest fad:
"'SKY HIGH BY MARSHALL MCMAHON MCNUTT of Millville dealer in Real Estate Spring Chickens &c.
1. I sigh Too fly Up high In the sky.
2. But my Wings air shy And so I cry A sad goodby Too fly- Ing.'"
A chorus of hilarious laughter followed the reading, and then Patsy wiped her eyes and exclaimed:
"Peggy, you are not only a poet but a humorist. This is one of the best short poems I ever read."
"It's short 'cause I run out o' rhymes," admitted Peggy.
"But it's a gem, what there is of it."
"Don't, dear," remonstrated Louise; "don't poke fun at the poor man."
"Poke fun? Why, I'm going to print that poem in the _Tribune_, as sure as my name's Patricia Doyle! It's too good for oblivion."
"I dunno," remarked Peggy, uncertainly, "whether it's wuth fifty dollars, er about--"
"About forty-nine less," said Patsy. "A poem of that length brings about fifty cents in open market, but I'll be liberal. You shall have a whole dollar--and there it is, solid cash."
"Thank ye," returned Peggy, pocketing the silver. "It ain't what I expected, but--"
"But what, sir?"
"But it's like findin' it, for I didn't expect nuth'n'. I wish I could do more of 'em at the same price; but I did thet pome when I were young an' hed more ambition. I couldn't think of another like it to save my neck."
"I am glad of that, Peggy. One of this kind is all a paper dare print. We mustn't get too popular, you know."
"I s'pose you'll print my name as the one what did it?" he inquired anxiously.
"I shall print it just as it's written, advertisement and all."
She did, and Peggy bought two extra copies, at a cent apiece. He framed all three and hung one in his office, one in the sitting room and a third in his bedroom, where he could see it the first thing when he wakened each morning. His fellow villagers were very proud of him, in spite of the "knocking" of the Clarks. Skim was deeply mortified that Peggy's "bum pome" had been accepted and his own masterly composition "turned down cold." The widow backed her son and told all the neighbors that "Peggy never hed the brains to write thet pome, an' the chances air he stole it from the 'Malvern Weekly Journal.' Them gal edyturs wouldn't know," she added scornfully; "they's as ignerunt as Peggy is, mostly."
A few days later McNutt entered the printing office with an air of great importance.
"Goodness me! I hope you haven't done it again, Peggy," cried Patsy, in alarm.
"No; I got fame enough. What I want is to hev the wordin' on my business cards changed," said he. "What'll it cost?"
"What change do you wish made?" asked Patsy, examining the sample card.
"Instead of 'Marshall McMahon McNutt, dealer in Real Estate an' Spring Chickens,' I want to make it read: 'dealer in Real Estate, Spring Chickens an' Poetry.' What'll it cost. Miss Patsy?"
"Nothing," she said, her eyes dancing; "We'll do that job free of charge, Peggy!"
CHAPTER XVII
THE PENALTIES OF JOURNALISM
Two strange men appeared in Millville--keen, intelligent looking fellows--and applied to Joe Wegg for jobs. Having received a hint from Mr. Merrick, Joe promptly employed the strangers to prepare the old mill for the reception of the machinery for the lighting plant, and both of them engaged board at the hold.
"Thursday," said Hetty, as she watched the pressman that night, "there's a New York detective here--two of them, I think."
"How do you know?"
"I recognized one of them, who used to prowl around the city looking for suspicious characters. They say they've come to work on the new electric plant, but I don't believe it."
Thursday worked a while in silence.
"Mr. Merrick must have sent for them," he suggested.
"Yes. I think he suspects about the bomb."
"He ought to discharge me," said Thursday.
"No; he's man enough to stand by his guns. I like Mr. Merrick. He didn't become a millionaire without having cleverness to back him and I imagine he is clever enough to thwart Skeelty and all his gang."
"Perhaps I ought to go of my own accord," said Thursday.
"Don't do that. When you've found a friend like Mr. Merrick, stick to him. I imagine those detectives are here to protect you, as well as the printing plant. It won't be so easy to set a bomb the next time."
Smith looked at her with a smile. There was a glint of admiration in his eyes.
"You're not a bad sleuth yourself, Hetty," he remarked. "No detective could have acted more wisely and promptly than you did that night."
"It was an accidental discovery, Thursday. Sometimes I sleep."
That was a good deal of conversation for these two to indulge in. Hetty was talkative enough, at times, and so was Thursday Smith, when the humor seized him; but when they were together they said very little. The artist would stroll into the pressroom after the compositors had finished their tasks and watch the man make up the forms, lock them, place them on the press and run off the edition. Then he would glance over the paper while Thursday washed up and put on his coat, after which he accompanied her to the door of her hotel and with a simple "good night" proceeded up the street to his own lodging.
There are surprises in the newspaper business, as our girl journalists were fast discovering. It was a real calamity when Miss Briggs, who had been primarily responsible for getting the _Millville Daily Tribune_ into proper working order, suddenly resigned her position. They had depended a great deal on Miss Briggs, so when the telegraph editor informed them she was going back to New York, they were positively bewildered by her loss. Questions elicited the fact that the woman was nervous over the recent explosion and looked for further trouble from the mill hands. She also suspected the two recent arrivals to be detectives, and the town was so small and so absolutely without police protection that she would not risk her personal safety by remaining longer in it.
"Perhaps I'm homesick," she added. "It's dreadfully lonely here when I'm not at work, and for that reason I've tried to keep busy most of the time. Really, I'm astonished to think I've stood this isolation so long; but now that my mind is made up, I'm going, and it is useless to ask me to remain."
They offered her higher wages, and Mr. Merrick himself had a long talk with her, but all arguments were unavailing.
"What shall we do, Thursday?" asked Patsy in despair. "None of us understands telegraphy."
"Hetty Hewitt does," he suggested.
"Hetty! I'm afraid if I asked her to assume this work she also would leave us."
"No; she'll stay," he said positively.
"But she can't edit the telegraph news. Suppose she took the messages, who would get the night news in shape for the compositors? My uncle would not like to have me remain here until midnight, but even if he would permit it I have not yet mastered the art of condensing the dispatches and selecting just such items as are suitable for the _Tribune_."
"I'll do that, Miss Doyle," promised Smith.
"I've been paying especial attention to the work of Miss Briggs, for I had an idea she was getting uneasy. And I can take all the day messages, too. If Hetty will look after the wires evenings I can do the rest of the telegraph editor's work, and my own, too."
"Good gracious, Thursday!" exclaimed Patsy; "you'll be running the whole paper, presently."
"No; I can't do the typesetting. But if the Dwyer girls stick to their job--and they seem quite contented here--I'll answer for the rest of the outfit."
"I'm glad the Dwyer girls seem contented," she answered; "but I'm afraid to depend upon anyone now--except you."
He liked that compliment, but said nothing further. After consulting with Louise and Beth, Patsy broached the subject to Hetty, and the artist jumped at the opportunity to do something to occupy her leisure time. The work brought her in contact with Thursday Smith more than ever, and when Miss Briggs departed bag and baggage for New York, the paper suffered little through her defection.
"Newspaper folk," remarked Major Doyle, who was now at the farm enjoying his vacation and worshipping at the shrine of the managing editor in the person of his versatile daughter, "are the most unreliable of any class in the world. So I've often been told, and I believe it. They come and go, by fits and starts, and it's a wonder the erratic rascals never put a paper out of business. But they don't. You never heard of a newspaper that failed to appear just because the mechanical force deserted and left it in the lurch. By hook or crook the paper must be printed--and it always is. So don't worry, mavourneen; when your sallow-faced artist and your hobo jack-of-all-trades desert you, there'll still be a way to keep the _Millville Tribune_ going, and therefore the world will continue to whirl on its axis."
"I don't believe Thursday will ever desert, and Hetty likes us too well to leave us in the lurch; but suppose those typesetters take a notion to flit?"
"Then," said matter-of-fact Beth, "we'll fill the paper with ready-made plate stuff and telegraph for more compositors."
"That's it," agreed the major, "Those people are always to be had. But don't worry till the time comes. As me grandfather, the commodore, once said: 'Never cross a bridge till ye come to it.'"
"It wasn't your grandfather who originated that remark," said Uncle John.
"It was, sir! I defy you to prove otherwise."
"I'm not certain you ever had a grandfather; and he wasn't a commodore, anyhow."
"Sir!" cried the major, glaring at his brother-in-law, "I have his commission, somewhere--laid away."
"Never mind," said Patsy, cheerfully, for these fierce arguments between her father and uncle--who were devotedly attached to one another--never disturbed her in the least, "the _Tribune's_ running smoothly just now, and the work is keeping us delightfully busy. I think that never in my life have I enjoyed myself more than since I became a journalist."
"Is the thing paying dividends?" inquired the major.
Arthur laughed.
"I've just been figuring up the last month's expenditures and receipts," said he. "The first month didn't count, for we were getting started."
"And what's the result?" asked the Major.
"Every paper we send out--for one cent--costs us eighty-eight cents to manufacture."
There was a painful silence for a time, broken by the major's suggestive cough.
"I hope," said the old soldier, solemnly, "that the paper's circulation is very small."
"The smallest of any daily paper in all the civilized word, sir," declared the bookkeeper.
"Of course," remarked Louise, with dignity; "that is what distinguishes it. We did not undertake this publication to make money, and it does not cost us more than we are willing to pay for the exceptional experiences we are gaining."
The major raised his eyebrows; Arthur whistled softly; Uncle John smiled; but with one accord they dropped the disagreeable subject.
CHAPTER XVIII
OPEN WARFARE
Joe Wegg's machinery and dynamos arrived promptly and the electric plant was speedily installed at the old mill. So energetically had the young man supervised his work that poles and wires were all in place as far up the road as Thompson's Crossing and a branch line run to the Wegg Farm, by the time the first test was made.
All Millville celebrated that first night when its streets shone resplendent under the glare of electric lights. There was a public bonfire near the mill, speeches were made, and afterward Mr. Merrick served a free supper to the villagers, in the hall over Sam Cotting's General Store, where the girls assisted in waiting upon the guests, and everybody was happy and as hilarious as the fumes of good coffee could make them.
More speeches were made in the hall, and one of these was by Peggy McNutt, who had painted his wooden foot blue with red stripes in honor of the occasion. He said, according to the report afterward printed in the Tribune:
"Feller Citizens! This 'ere town's bloomin' like a new mown rose. I'll bet anybody anything there ain't another town in Ameriky what's gone ahead like we hev in the past few months that's jest past. (Applause.) If I do say it myself, we're the mos'--eh--the mos'--eh--progressioning community in--in--this community. Our community hes put out a daily paper what's a credit to--to--our community, especially the poetry; we've got a paper mill at Royal what makes paper fer New Yoruk; an' now, to cap the climate, our community hes lighted our community with 'lectric lights fit fer Lundon, New Yoruk, Canada or--or--or--our community. (Laughter and cries of "Cut out the community, Peggy!") No! Never, feller citizens, will I cut out a community what's done so much fer our--our community. If I do say it myself, the eyes of the com--of the world is upon us, an' I'm proud of the things that's ben did by our feller citizens, with my full approval, in this 'ere--this 'ere--er--community!" (Cheers and a sandwich, which last offering was received by Mr. McNutt in his back hair as he turned to descend from the rostrum.)
Joe Wegg is reported to have said: "Neighbors, this electric plant is no plaything. It is going to give you all better light, at no more cost to you than kerosene. But it will do more than that: it will run machinery of all kinds better than steam will. You've seen electricity running the newspaper press, and the same current has operated the big paper mills at Royal. Here in this audience is a gentleman from Connecticut who has accepted my invitation to look over our village with a view to building a factory here, using the power I shall hereafter be able to furnish. I am in correspondence with two other manufacturers, whom I hope to induce to locate in Millville. (Enthusiastic cheers.) Job Fisher, who used to live at Malvern, is planning to start a lumber mill, to cut the pine just north of here; so you see we are about to arouse from our long sleep and have a great future before us if we keep wide awake. Another item of news merits your attention. Bartlett has sold sixty acres of his farm to Dr. Adam Matthews, for many years a prominent physician of Boston, who is going to build a good house on the land and become a citizen of Millville. We've always had to go to Huntingdon for a doctor, but now Dr. Matthews has promised to look after the health of the Millville people, although he has retired from city practice. More people will come here from time to time, attracted by our enterprise and the rugged beauty of our county; real estate will become more valuable, trade will prosper and every one of the old inhabitants will find opportunities to make money." (Great applause.)
A general discussion followed concerning the "doin's of Joe Wegg" and the prophecies he had made. Opinion seemed divided as to whether the promised "boom" was desirable for Millville or not. Some of the good villagers were averse to personal activity and feared the new order of things might disturb their comfort; in others a mild ambition had been awakened. But while they feasted at Mr. Merrick's expense and gravely canvassed the situation, the newly installed electric lights suddenly failed. Darkness fell upon the assemblage and there was an awed hush until Sam Cotting lighted the old reliable kerosene lamps.
Joe Wegg was as much astonished as anyone.
"There has been an accident to the machinery," he said to Mr. Merrick. "I'll run over to the mill and see what has happened."
"I will go with you," said Arthur Weldon, and Major Doyle also decided to accompany the young man.
Uncle John and his three nieces remained in the hall, and Mr. Merrick took occasion to make a little speech in which he explained that a hitch in the working of the electric plant was liable to happen at first, but after a few days the dynamos could be fully depended upon.
He had scarcely finished this explanation when Arthur came running back into the hall in much excitement. He approached Mr. Merrick and said in a low voice:
"The machinery is all right, sir. Some one has cut the wires."
"Cut the wires!"
"Yes. Joe thinks it's the work of the mill hands. The wires are cut in all directions, and several of the men from Royal have been seen loitering around by Cox and Booth, the detectives."
The girls overheard this assertion, and Patsy exclaimed:
"I'm going to the office, to make sure our power hasn't been tampered with."
The meeting broke up at once and the villagers trooped out to investigate. Mr. Merrick and Arthur walked with the girls to the printing office, where they found Thursday Smith and Hetty working by the light of tallow candles.
"The power is off," said Smith quietly.
"Then the wire from Royal has also been cut," said Patsy. "What shall we do? His paper must come out to-morrow morning, in spite of anything and everything!"
"Do you know who cut the wires?" inquired Thursday.
"We think the mill hands must have done it."
"Not with Skeelty's consent, I'll be bound," said Mr. Merrick. "The manager is too fearful of a damage suit to play any tricks."
"A cut wire may be repaired," suggested the pressman, and even as he spoke Joe Wegg came in, accompanied by the two detectives and the major.
"Cox has interviewed one of the workmen from Royal," said Joe, "and the fellow says there's a strike at the mill and everything is closed down. Skeelty is barricaded in his office building, wild with fear, for the men have captured the company's store and helped themselves to the stock of liquors. The man Cox spoke with, who seems to be a well disposed fellow, predicts all kinds of trouble, and perhaps rioting, before this thing is ended."
They listened to this report in amazement.
"I conjecture," said the major, "that the rascally manager has given his men too much leeway. He's encouraged them in mischief until they've taken the bit between their teeth and turned against even their master. I have no personal acquaintance with the villain, but I imagine it serves him right."
"But, dear me!" cried Patsy, wringing her hands; "what'll become of the paper? It's nearly ten o'clock now."
Thursday turned to Joe Wegg.
"Can't we connect our supply wire with your new plant, so as to use your power?" he asked.
"Easily. An hour's work will serve to make the connection. But unless we watch the wire every minute those fellows will cut it again. The town's full of the rascals, and they're not exactly sober, either."
"Watch the wire; that's the idea," said Uncle John. "It's only a short distance to the mill, and I'm sure the villagers will volunteer for this duty."
"Of course," said Joe. "Major Doyle, will you mount guard over my men at the dynamos, to see they're not interfered with, while I look after the wire?"
"Sure enough; it'll remind me of the old war times," said the major readily.
"Where is Arthur?" asked Louise.
"We left him at the mill."
They left the office at once, Joe to get his line-men at work, and the major to join Weldon in guarding the dynamos. One of the detectives went with Mr. Wegg, but the other, whose name was Booth, remained to guard the printing office. Mr. Merrick now proposed that he take the girls home. Patsy and Beth refused to leave until the emergency was past, when the major and Arthur could drive them to the farm, but Louise was tired and went with Uncle John in his buggy, the surrey being left for the rest of the party to use. Arthur ran over for a moment to say everything was quiet at the mill and he did not think there would be any further trouble, and the report considerably reassured them.
CHAPTER XIX
A MERE MATTER OF REVENGE
Hetty and Thursday continued to work on the paper.
"We'll have everything ready by the time the line is connected," said the artist. "Then it will be but a few moments' work to run off the edition."
Patsy and Beth held candles for them, for the electric lights had been cut off with the power; so, seeing them all busily engaged, Arthur Weldon decided to return to the mill to join the Major. Booth sat in the front office, near the door, and in the darkness Arthur nearly stumbled over him.
"Going away, sir?" asked the man.
"Yes; I'll see if I can be of any assistance at the mill."
"Be careful. Those workmen have been drifting into town in squads, the last few minutes, and most of them are reckless with drink."
"I'll watch out," said Arthur.
In the middle of the road a group of mill hands conversed excitedly in some foreign tongue; but they paid no attention to Weldon as he passed them. Others joined them, presently, and one began a harangue in a loud voice, to which they listened eagerly. Then Bob West slipped across from the hardware store and ran against the detective in the doorway of the printing office.
"Who's this?" he demanded, holding the man in a firm grip.
"Booth, sir."
"Good. I could not recognize you in this darkness. Are you armed?"
"Yes."
"Then you and I will defend this door. Who is inside?"
"The pressman--Thursday Smith--and three of the girls."
"The compositors?"
"No; they've gone to the hotel. Miss Doyle, Miss DeGraf, and--Hetty Hewitt."
West went into the hack room, which was faintly illumined by candles stuck here and there. The girls and Smith were all bending over the imposing stone, where the forms of the paper were being made up.
"Here," said West, taking a revolver from his pocket and laying it on the table; "I'm afraid there may be an attack on this office in a few minutes, for I understand the language of those strikers and have been listening to them. If any of the mill hands attempt to break into this room don't be afraid to shoot."
"Why should the men wish to attack us, sir?" asked Patsy wonderingly.
"There are several reasons. They're after Smith, for one thing. They've an old grudge against him to settle. Aside from the mere matter of revenge I overheard one of them telling his friends to smash the press and keep the paper from coming out, and Mr. Boglin would pay them well for the job."
Smith carelessly thrust the revolver into his hip pocket.
"The paper will come out if Mr. Wegg gives us the power," he said.
"Can you let me have a revolver, Mr. West?" asked Hetty.
"Could you use it?"
"I think so."
He looked at her a moment and then took a second revolver from his pocket.
"I've robbed my hardware stock," he said with a smile. "But I advise you girls to keep your hands off the thing unless a crisis arises. I don't imagine the gang will get past me and Booth at the entrance, but if any stragglers come your way Smith has authority to drive them back. I'm justice of the peace, and I hereby appoint you all special officers of the law."
He said this lightly, fearing to alarm the girls unnecessarily, and then passed through the doorway and joined Booth at the front.
The telephone rang and Patsy answered it.
"How soon will the forms be ready?" asked Arthur's voice.
"In ten minutes--perhaps five," she answered.
"We'll have the power on in ten minutes more. Tell Smith not to lose an instant's time in running off the edition, for we don't know how long we can keep the line open. The strikers are threatening us, even now."
"All right," called Patsy; "just give us the power for a few minutes, and we'll be through for to-night."
She went back to Thursday and reported.
"There may be a few typographical errors, and I'm afraid it's a bad make-up," he remarked; "but I'll have the thing on the press in five minutes."
With mallet and shooting-stick he tightened the quoins, then lifted the heavy iron frames filled with type and slid them onto the bed of the press. They gave him all the light the flickering candles afforded as he adjusted the machinery, and all were bending over the press when a low, distant growl was heard, rising slowly to a frenzied shout. A revolver popped--another--followed by wild cries from the street.
The girls grew a little pale, but Thursday Smith put his hand on the lever of the press and said:
"All right. The moment they give us the current we're ready to run."
Patsy straightened up with a sigh of relief, then gave a low cry as the screens of the two windows of the pressroom were smashed in and through the openings men began to tumble into the room. At once Hetty confronted them with leveled revolver and the sight caused them to hesitate.
"Out o' the way, you women!" called a burly fellow who wore a green sweater and an oilskin hat; "we don't want to hurt you if we can help. There's the one we're after!" He pointed a finger at Thursday Smith.
"You can't have him," retorted Beth, half shielded behind the militant Hetty. "This is private property, and you're trespassing. Unless you go away at once you will suffer the consequences."
This defense seemed to surprise them, for they fell back a little toward the windows. At that moment, with a low rumble, the press started, moving slowly at first but gradually acquiring speed. The sight aroused the resentment of the invaders.
"Stop that press!" yelled their spokesman excitedly. "Stop it, Smith, or we'll put both you and the machine out of business."
Thursday paid no attention to anything but his press. The huge cylinder of white paper was unrolling, passing under the platen and emerging at the other end as neatly folded copies of the Millville Daily Tribune.
With a roar of rage the big fellow leaped forward, but at the action a shot rang out and he fell headlong almost at the foot of the press.
Beth and Patsy turned their heads an instant to glance at Hetty. The artist's face was white and set; her eyes sparkled brilliantly; she held the still smoking weapon in readiness for another shot.
But the men were awed by the fall of their leader. They watched Beth leap to the platform beside Thursday Smith and draw his revolver from his pocket, where he had placed it. Hetty's courage had inspired her, and Beth had handled pistols before. The men read the determined eyes fixed upon them; they noted Smith's indifference to their threats. The defenders of the press and pressman were only girls, but they were girls evidently not afraid to shoot.
No advance was made and the tableau was dramatic. Smith watched his press with undivided attention and it clattered away at full speed until the frail building shook with its powerful, steady motion. Then suddenly it began to slow down. The power was off, and the machine came to an abrupt stop.
Thursday stepped from the platform and looked at the index of the counter.
"Four hundred and sixty-three. Twenty-two short, Miss Doyle," he announced.
"That'll do, Thursday."
He came to her side, then, facing the sullen, glowering group of mill hands.
"Boys," said he, "it won't do you any good to interfere with us to-night. The paper for to-morrow morning is already printed, and Ojoy Boglin isn't a big enough man to stop it, now or ever. Better go back to Royal and settle your troubles with Skeelty, for if you stay here the citizens of Millville are in the mood to shoot you down like dogs."
They stood undecided a moment, but the argument had evidently struck home.
"What's the matter with Harris?" asked one, pointing to the motionless form of the man in the green sweater. "Is he dead?"
"I suppose so," answered Thursday coolly; but he stooped to examine Hetty's victim, rolling him over so that his face was upward. "No; he isn't hurt much, I'm sorry to say. The bullet glanced off his forehead and stunned him, that's all. Take the brute, if you want him, and go."
They obeyed in silence. Several stepped forward and raised the unconscious Harris, bearing him to the window, where they passed him to those without. Then they also retreated through the windows and the room was cleared.
Only then did Hetty and Beth venture to lower their weapons.
"Oh, dear!" cried Patsy, in a low, agitated voice; "I'm so glad you didn't kill him, Hetty."
"I'm not," returned the artist doggedly. "He deserved death, at the least, and by killing him I'd have cheated the gallows."
Then she glanced around at the horrified faces of her friends and burst into tears.
CHAPTER XX
DEFENDING THE PRESS
In the front room Bob West and the detective were having a busy time. At the first rush they each fired a shot over the heads of the mob, merely to let them know the place was guarded. In the darkness it was impossible for the strikers to tell how many armed men confronted them, so they fell back a little, but formed a cordon around the entire building. From the printing office to the old mill was a distance of only a few hundred feet, and every able-bodied inhabitant of Millville except Peggy McNutt and Sara Cotting--who had discreetly disappeared at the first sign of danger--was assisting Joe Wegg to protect the electric cable he was trying to connect. The men from Royal were scattered all along the line, peering through the dim light to discover a vulnerable point of attack but deterred from interfering by the determination of the stalwart defenders. Mobs are invariably cowardly, and this one, composed of the lowest strata of mixed American and foreign laborers, was no exception to the general rule. However, when word was finally passed along from the mill that the dynamo was running and supplying power to the printing press, a howl of rage went up and a sudden rush was made for the line, the attack concentrating at one point.
The defenders promptly grouped themselves in front of the threatened pole and Seth Davis, the blacksmith, wielding a heavy sledge hammer, did valiant service, clearing a space around him with little difficulty. Joe Wegg, Arthur Weldon, Cox the detective, Lon Taft, Nick Thome and even little Skim Clark were all in the melee, fighting desperately for time to enable Thursday Smith to work his press, using whatever cudgels they had been able to pick up to keep the assailants from the pole. Slowly, however, they were forced back by superior numbers until finally one of the mill hands clambered up the pole and cut the wire.
"Never mind," said Arthur to Joe, as they retreated fighting toward the printing office; "I think they've had time to run off the edition, provided Smith was ready with the forms."
The mob was by this time in an ugly mood and the nearer Joe and Arthur edged toward the printing office the more numerous their enemies became. The Millville people were getting rather the worst of the scrimmage when out rushed Thursday Smith, swinging a stout iron bar he had taken from the press, and with this terrible weapon he struck out so vigorously that the diversion in their favor enabled the retreating villagers to gain the office, where Booth and Bob West fired several shots that effectually checked the mob.
"Stand back, ye villains!" cried a loud voice, as Major Doyle marched calmly down the road from the mill; "how dare ye interfere with a gentleman?"
One of the leaders confronted him menacingly. The major slapped his face with the flat of his hand and then kicked the fellow in the shins.
"Didn't I say to get out o' my way?" he roared, and to the surprise of everyone--even the major, perhaps--they fell hack and allowed him to walk leisurely into the printing office.
Having succeeded in their primary attempt to cut the wire, and finding the determined band of defenders more dangerous than they had thought, the workmen retreated in the direction of Royal, where there was more to be gained by rioting than in Millville.
When at last the town was clear of them, Arthur, who was considerably battered and bruised but pleased with the triumphant ending of the adventure, drove the girls and the major to the farm. They urged Hetty to accompany them, but she declared she was not a bit nervous and preferred to sleep at the hotel.
"I think the trouble is over for to-night," said West, and all agreed with him. Cox and Booth decided to sleep in the printing office, and after the girls had driven away with their escorts and the villagers had dispersed to their homes, Thursday put on his coat and walked to the hotel with Hetty.
"All that row was about me," he remarked disconsolately.
"But they didn't get you," said Hetty, triumph in her voice.
"No."
He did not mention her bravery, or the loyal support of Beth and Patsy, but after a moment he added: "I'm not worth defending."
"How do you know?" asked Hetty. "It occurs to me, Mr. Smith, that you are as much a stranger to yourself as to us."
"That is true."
"And in emergencies you are not averse to defending others. Of course Miss DeGraf and her cousin wanted the paper printed, at all hazards. I don't blame them for that; but I--"
She hesitated.
"You simply stood by a comrade. Thank you, Hetty."
"Good night, Thursday."
"Will you be able to sleep to-night?"
"I'm going straight to bed. The rumpus has quieted my nerves."
"Good night, then."
In the early morning Mr. Merrick was awakened by a red glare that flooded his bedroom. Going to the window he found the sky at the north full of flame. He threw on his bathrobe and went to the door of Arthur Weldon's room, arousing the young man with a rap on the panels.
"The settlement at Royal is burning," he reported.
Arthur came out, very weary and drowsy, for he had not been asleep long and the strenuous work of the night had tired him.
"Let it burn," he said, glancing through a window at the lurid light of the conflagration. "We couldn't be of any use going over there and, after all, it isn't our affair to relieve Skeelty."
Then he told Uncle John of the riot in the village, for the old gentleman had been sound asleep when the party returned to the farm.
"The blaze is the work of those crazy strikers, I suppose," said Mr. Merrick. "It looks from here as if they had set fire to their own homes, as well as to the paper mills and office and store buildings. It will be fortunate if the forest does not also burn."
"Don't worry, sir," advised Arthur. "We'll discover the extent of the fire by daylight. For my part, I'm going back to bed, and it will be well for you to follow my example."
"Another item for the paper," whispered a soft voice, and there was Patsy beside them at the window.
Mr. Merrick sighed.
"I had no idea so much excitement could possibly happen at Millville," said he. "If this keeps on we'll have to go back to New York for quiet. But let us get to bed, my dear, for to-morrow is likely to be a busy day for us all."
CHAPTER XXI
THE COMING OF FOGERTY
The homeless mill hands flocked to Chazy Junction next day, from whence a freight train distributed them over other parts of the country. The clearing at Royal Falls was now a heap of charred embers, for every one of the cheap, rough-board buildings had been consumed by the fire.
Skeelty had watched the destruction of his plant with feelings of mingled glee and disgust. He was insured against loss, and his rash workmen, who had turned upon him so unexpectedly, had accidentally settled the strike and their own future by starting the fire during their drunken orgies. There being no longer a mill to employ them they went elsewhere for work, rather glad of the change and regretting nothing. As for the manager, he stood to lose temporary profits but was not wholly displeased by the catastrophe. Transportation of his manufactured products had been so irregular and undefendable that even while he watched the blaze he determined to rebuild his plant nearer the main line of a railway, for many such locations could be found where the pine was as plentiful as here.
At dawn he entered the hotel at Millville with his arms full of books and papers which he had succeeded in saving from the fire, and securing a room went directly to bed. It was afternoon when he awoke and after obtaining a meal he strolled out into the village and entered the newspaper office.
"Here's an item for your paper," he said to Patsy, who was busy at her desk. "The mills at Royal will never be rebuilt, and Millville has lost the only chance it ever had of becoming a manufacturing center. The whole settlement, which belonged to Boglin and myself, went up in smoke, and I'm willing to let it go at that. I shall collect the insurance, make myself good, and if anything's left over, that fool Boglin is welcome to it. I admit I made a mistake in ever allowing him to induce me to build at Royal. Boglin owned the land and I used his money, so I gave up to him; but I'm through with the _honer'ble_ ass now. Put it all in the paper; it'll make him feel good. You might add that I'm taking the evening train for New York, shaking the dust of your miserable village from my feet for good and all."
"Thank you, sir," said Patsy, brightly; "the Millville people will appreciate their good luck, I'm sure."
Skeelty hung around the town for awhile, sneering at the new electric light plant and insolently railing at any of the natives who would converse with him. Then he hired Nick Thorne to drive him over to Chazy Junction, and that was the last Millville ever saw of him.
During this day Joe Wegg's men succeeded in repairing all the wires which had been tampered with and in making a proper and permanent connection of the cable to the printing office. That evening the village was again brilliantly lighted and thereafter the big dynamos whirled peacefully and without interruption.
The girls had a busy day, as Uncle John had predicted, for all the exciting incidents of the evening and night before had to be written up and the next day's paper teemed with "news" of a character to interest all its readers. Beth's editorial declared the neighborhood well rid of the paper mill, which had been of little advantage but had caused no end of annoyance because of the rough and mischievous character of the workmen employed. In this statement nearly everyone agreed with her.
Several had been wounded in the riot of the eventful evening, but none seriously injured. The workmen took away their damaged comrades and Lon Taft drove over to Huntingdon and had his head sewed up by the doctor. Other villagers suffered mere bruises, but all who engaged in the fight posed as heroes and even Peggy McNutt, who figured as "not present," told marvelous tales of how he had worsted seven mill hands in a stand-up fight, using only his invincible fists.
The following forenoon the liveryman at the Junction brought to Millville a passenger who had arrived by the morning train--a quiet, boyish-looking man with a shock of brick-red hair and a thin, freckled face. He was driven directly to the Merrick farm, where Uncle John received him cordially, but with surprise, and at once favored the new arrival with a long interview in his private room.
The girls, who had not yet gone to the office, awaited somewhat impatiently the result of this conference, for they already knew the red-headed youth to be the great Fogerty--admitted by even his would-be rivals, the king of New York detectives. Also they knew that Uncle John had employed him some time ago to ferret out the mystery of the identity of Thursday Smith, and the fact of Fogerty's presence indicated he had something to report.
However, when Mr. Merrick came out of the private room his usually cheery countenance wore a troubled expression. Fogerty was invariably placid and inscrutable, so no explanation could be gleaned from his demeanor.
"Ready for town, my dears?" asked Uncle John.
"Yes; the surrey is waiting," answered Louise.
"Then go along, and Fogerty and I will join you at the office presently. I want to confer with the major and Arthur before--before taking any steps to--"
"What's the news, Uncle?" demanded Patsy, impatiently.
"You shall know in good time."
"Who is Thursday Smith?"
"By and by, dear. Don't bother me now. But that reminds me; you are to say nothing to--to--Thursday about Mr. Fogerty's arrival. Treat him--Thursday, you know--just as you have always done, for the present, at least. Whatever we determine on in regard to this man, during our conference, we must not forget that he has acted most gallantly since he came to Millville. We really owe him a debt of gratitude."
With this somewhat incomprehensible statement the girls were forced to content themselves. Feeling quite helpless, they drove to the office and left the men to settle the fate of Thursday Smith.
The "pressman" was now the man-of-all-work about the modest but trim little publishing plant. He attended to whatever job printing came in, made the etchings from Hetty's drawings, cast the stereotypes, made up the forms and operated the press. But aside from this mechanical work Smith took the telegraphic news received by Hetty, edited and condensed it and wrote the black-letter headings over the various items. All this, with a general supervision over the girl compositors, kept the man busy from daybreak to midnight.
In spite of this, the Tribune was essentially a "girls' paper," since Thursday Smith was the only man employed on it--not counting the "dummy" editor, Arthur Weldon, who did nothing but keep the books, and found this not an arduous task. Hetty, at Miss Briggs' desk, attended the telegraph instrument and long-distance telephone, receiving news over both wires, and still found time to draw her daily cartoons and additional humorous sketches which she "worked in" whenever the mood seized her. The typesetting was done by the Dwyer sisters--a colorless pair but quite reliable--while the reportorial and editorial work was divided between Louise, Beth and Patsy, none of whom shirked a single duty. Indeed, they had come to love this work dearly and were enthusiastic over the _Tribune_, which they fondly believed was being watched with envious admiration by all the journalistic world.
This belief was not wholly due to egotism. Their "exchanges," both city and country, had shown considerable interest in the "Millville Experiment," as they called it, and only a few days before the leading journal of a good-sized city had commented at length on the "girls' newspaper" and, after indulging in some humorous remarks, concluded quite seriously with the statement that "its evident sincerity, clean contents and typographical neatness render the _Millville Daily Tribune_ worthy a better setting than the somnolent country village whose census is too low to be officially recorded."
"But that's all right," said Patsy, smiling at the praise; "we'd never have dared to start a newspaper anywhere else, because a journal that will do for Millville might not make a hit if it bumped against experienced competition."
"We were woefully ignorant when we began, a few weeks ago," commented Beth, glancing with pride at her latest editorial, which she thought had caught the oracular tone of the big city newspapers.
"And we're not expert journalists, even yet," added Louise, with a sigh. "We've improved, to be sure; but I imagine there is still lots of room for improvement."
"One trouble," said Patsy, "is that every inhabitant of Millville wants to see his or her name in print every day, whether he or she has done anything worthy of publication or not. If the name isn't printed, we've made an enemy; and, if it is, the paper is sure to suffer more or less ridicule."
"That is quite true, my dear," responded Louise, the reporter. "I've said everything, about every one of them, that has ever happened, or threatened to happen, since we started the paper, and it is driving me crazy to discover anything more about these stupid natives that will do to print."
Hetty had overheard this conversation and now looked up with a smile.
"Has your 'local happenings' column been prepared for to-morrow, Mrs. Weldon?" she inquired.
"No; I'm about to start out to unearth some items," replied Louise, wearily.
"Let me do it for you. I've an hour or so to spare and I won't need to leave my desk," suggested the artist.
"It is my duty, you know, Hetty, and I've no right to evade it."
"Evade it for to-day. Go home and rest. I'll do your column for to-morrow, and after the vacation you can tackle the thrilling situations with better courage."
"Thank you, Hetty. But I won't go home. I'll wait here to see Fogerty."
"Fogerty!" exclaimed the artist, with a start of surprise. "Do you mean the detective?"
"Yes," said Louise, regretting she had inadvertently mentioned the name.
"But what is there now to detect?" asked Hetty suspiciously. "Our troubles seem ended with the burning of the mill and the flitting of Skeelty and his workmen."
Louise hardly knew how to reply; but Patsy, who trusted the queer girl artist, said quite frankly:
"There remains the mystery of Thursday Smith to fathom, you know."
Hetty flushed and an indignant look swept over her face.
"What right has anyone to solve that mystery?" she asked defiantly. "Isn't that Thursday Smith's own business?"
"Perhaps," returned Patsy, somewhat amused; "but Smith hasn't been able to discover who he is--or was, rather--and seems really anxious to know."
Hetty bent over her desk for a time. Then she looked up and her thin features were white and drawn with anxiety.
"When you discover who Thursday Smith is," said she, "the Millville Tribune will lose its right bower."
"Why?"
"Before his accident, or whatever it was that made him lose his memory, he was an unusual man, a man of exceptional ability. You know that."
"We are all inclined to admit it," answered Patsy. "But what then?"
"Men of ability," declared Hetty slowly, "are of two classes: the very successful, who attain high and honorable positions, or the clever scoundrels who fasten themselves like leeches on humanity and bleed their victims with heartless unconcern. What will you gain if you unmask the past of Thursday Smith? You uncover a rogue or a man of affairs, and in either case you will lose your pressman. Better leave the curtain drawn, Miss Doyle, and accept Thursday Smith as he is."
There was so much good sense in this reasoning that all three girls were impressed and began to regret that Uncle John had called Fogerty to untangle the skein. But it was now too late for such repentance and, after all, they were curious to discover who their remarkable employee really was.
Even while the awkward silence that had fallen upon the group of girls continued, the door opened to admit Uncle John, Fogerty, Major Doyle and Arthur Weldon. Except for the detective they were stern-faced and uncompromising.
CHAPTER XXII
UNMASKED
Quintus Fogerty was as unlike the typical detective as one could imagine. Small in size, slight and boyish, his years could not readily be determined by the ordinary observer. His face was deeply furrowed and lined, yet a few paces away it seemed the face of a boy of eighteen. His cold gray eyes were persistently staring but conveyed no inkling of his thoughts. His brick-red hair was as unkempt as if it had never known a comb, yet the attire of the great detective was as fastidiously neat as if he had dressed for an important social function. Taken altogether there was something mistrustful and uncanny about Fogerty's looks, and his habit of eternally puffing cigarettes rendered his companionship unpleasant. Yet of the man's professional ability there was no doubt; Mr. Merrick and Arthur Weldon had had occasion to employ him before, with results that justified their faith in him.
The detective greeted the young ladies with polite bows, supplemented by an aimless compliment on the neatness of their office.
"Never would have recognized it as a newspaper sanctum," said he in his thin, piping voice. "No litter, no stale pipes lying about, no cursing and quarreling, no excitement whatever. The editorial room is the index to the workshop; I'll see if the mechanical department is kept as neatly."
He opened the door to the back room, passed through and closed it softly behind him. Mr. Merrick made a dive for the door and followed Fogerty.
"What's the verdict, Arthur?" asked Louise curiously.
"Why, I--I believe the verdict isn't rendered yet," he hastily replied, and followed Mr. Merrick into the pressroom.
"Now, then," cried Patsy, grabbing the major firmly, "you'll not stir a step, sir, until you tell us the news!"
"What news, Patricia?" Inquired the old gentleman blandly.
"Who was Thursday Smith?"
"The identical individual he is now," said the Major.
"Don't prevaricate, sir! Who was he? What did he do? What is his right name?"
"Is it because you are especially interested in this man, my dear, or are ye simply consumed with feminine curiosity?"
"Be good, Daddy! Tell us all about it," said Patsy coaxingly.
"The man Thursday, then, was likely enough the brother of Robinson Crusoe's man Friday."
"Major, you're trifling!"
"Or mayhap an ex-president of the United States, or forby the senator from Oklahoma. Belike he was once minister to Borneo, an' came home in a hurry an' forgot who he was. But John Merrick will be wanting me."
He escaped and opened the door. Then, with his hand on the knob, he turned and added:
"Why don't ye come in, me journalistic investigators, and see the fun for yerselves? I suspect there's an item in store for ye."
Then he went in, and they took the hint and entered the pressroom in a fluttering group. Fogerty stood with his hands in his pockets intently watching the Dwyer girls set type, while at his elbow Mr. Merrick was explaining in a casual voice how many "m's" were required to make a newspaper column. In another part of the long room Arthur Weldon was leaning over a table containing the half-empty forms, as if critically examining them. Smith, arrayed in overalls and jumper, was cleaning and oiling the big press.
"A daily newspaper," said the major, loudly, as he held up a warning finger to the bevy of nieces, behind whom Hetty's pale face appeared, "means a daily grind for all concerned in it. There's no vacation for the paper, no hyphens, no skipping a day or two if it has a bad cold; it's the tyrant that leads its slaves by the nose, metaphorically, and has no conscience. Just as regularly as the world rolls 'round the press rolls out the newspaper, and human life or death makes little difference to either of the revolutionists."
While he spoke the Major led the way across the room to the stereotyping plant, which brought his party to a position near the press. Smith glanced at them and went on with his work. It was not unusual to have the pressroom thus invaded.
Presently Fogerty strolled over, smoking his eternal cigarette, and stood watching the pressman, as if interested in the oiling of the complicated machine. Smith, feeling himself under observation, glanced up again in an unconcerned way, and as he faced the detective Fogerty gave a cleverly assumed start and exclaimed:
"Good God!"
Instantly Thursday Smith straightened up and looked at the man questioningly. Fogerty stretched out his hand and said, as if in wonder:
"Why, Melville, old man, what are you doing here? We wondered what had become of you, all these months. Shake hands, my boy! I'm glad I've found you."
Smith leaned against the press and stared at him with dilated eyes. Everyone in the room was regarding the scene with intense but repressed excitement.
"What's wrong, Harold?" continued Fogerty, as if hurt by the other's hesitation to acknowledge their acquaintance. "You haven't forgotten me, have you? I'm McCormick, you know, and you and I have had many a good time together in the past."
Smith passed his hand across his forehead with a dazed gesture.
"What name did you call me, sir?" he asked.
"Melville; Harold Melville, of East Sixty-sixth street. I'm sure I'm right. There can't be two like you in the world, you know."
Thursday Smith stepped down from the platform and with a staggering gait walked to a stool, on which he weakly sank. He wiped the beads of perspiration from his forehead and looked at Fogerty with a half frightened air.
"And you--are--McCormick?" he faltered.
"Of course."
Smith stared a moment and then shook his head.
"It's no use," he said despairingly; "I can't recall a single memory of either Harold Melville or--or his friend McCormick. Pardon me, sir; I must confess my mind is absolutely blank concerning all my life previous to the last two years. Until this moment I--I could not recall my own name."
"H'm," muttered Fogerty; "you recall it now, don't you?"
"No. You tell me my name is Melville, and you seem to recognize me as a man whom you once knew. I accept your statement in good faith, but I cannot corroborate it from my own knowledge."
"That's queer," retorted Fogerty, his cold eyes fixed upon the man's face.
"Let me explain, please," said Smith, and related his curious experience in practically the same words he had employed when confiding it to Mr. Merrick. "I had hoped," he concluded, "that if ever I met one who knew me formerly, or heard my right name mentioned, my memory would come back to me; but in this I am sorely disappointed. Did you know me well, sir?"
"Pretty well," answered the detective, after a slight hesitation.
"Then tell me something about myself. Tell me who I was."
"Here--in public?" asked Fogerty, with a suggestive glance at the spectators, who had involuntarily crowded nearer.
Smith flushed, but gazed firmly into the faces surrounding him.
"Why not?" he returned. "These young ladies and Mr. Merrick accepted me without knowledge of my antecedents. They are entitled to as full an explanation as--as I am."
"You place me, Melville, in a rather embarrassing position," declared Fogerty. "This is a queer case--the queerest in all my experience. Better let me post you in a private interview."
Smith trembled a bit, from nervousness; but he persisted in his demand.
"These people are entitled to the truth," said he. "Tell us frankly all you know about me, and do not mince words--whatever the truth may be."
"Oh, it's not so bad," announced the detective, with a shrug; "or at least it wouldn't be in New York, among your old aristocratic haunts. But here, in a quiet country town, among these generous and simple-hearted folks who have befriended you, the thing is rather difficult to say."
"Say it!" commanded Smith.
"I will. Many New Yorkers remember the firm of Melville & Ford, the cleverest pair of confidence men who ever undertook to fleece the wealthy lambs of the metropolis."
"Confidence men!" gasped Smith, in a voice of horror.
"Yes, putting it mildly. You were both jolly good fellows and made a host of friends. You were well-groomed, rode in automobiles, frequented good clubs and had a stunning establishment on Sixty-sixth street where you entertained lavishly. You could afford to, for there was where you fleeced your victims. But it wasn't so very bad, as I said. You chose the wealthy sons of the super-rich, who were glad to know such popular men-about-town as Harold Melville and Edgar Ford. When one set of innocents had been so thoroughly trimmed that they compared notes and began to avoid you, you had only to pick up another bunch of lambs, for New York contains many distinct flocks of the species. As they could afford to lose, none of them ever complained to the police, although the Central Office had an eye on you and knew your methods perfectly.
"Finally you made a mistake--or rather Ford did, for he was not as clever as you were. He brought an imitation millionaire to your house; a fellow who was putting up a brazen front on the smallest sort of a roll. You won his money and he denounced you, getting away with a pack of marked cards for evidence. At this you both took fright and decided on a hasty retreat. Gathering together your plunder--which was a royal sum, I'm convinced--you and Ford jumped into a motor car and--vanished from New York.
"The balance of your history I base on premise. Ford has been located in Chicago, where, with an ample supply of money, he is repeating his New York operations; but Harold Melville has never been heard of until this day. I think the true explanation is easily arrived at. Goaded by cupidity--and perhaps envy of your superior talents--Ford took advantage of the situation and, finding the automobile speeding along a deserted road, knocked you on the head, tumbled you out of the car, and made off with your combined winnings. The blow had the effect--not so uncommon as you think--of destroying your recollection of your past life, and you have for two years been wandering in total ignorance of what caused your affliction."
During this recital Smith sat with his eyes eagerly fixed upon the speaker's face, dwelling upon every word. At the conclusion of the story he dropped his face in his hands a moment, visibly shuddering. Then again he looked up, and after reading the circle of pitying faces confronting him he bravely met Mr. Merrick's eyes.
"Sir," he said in a voice that faltered in spite of his efforts to render it firm, "you now know who I am. When I first came to you I was a mere irresponsible hobo, a wandering tramp who had adopted the name of Thursday Smith because he was ignorant of his own, but who had no cause to be ashamed of his manhood. To-day I am discovered in my true guise. As Harold Melville, the disreputable trickster, I am not fit to remain in your employ--to associate with honest men and women. You will forgive my imposition, I think, because you know how thoroughly ignorant I was of the truth; but I will impose upon you no longer. I am sorry, sir, for I have been happy here; but I will go, thanking you for the kindly generosity that prompted you to accept me as I seemed to be, not as I am."
He rose, his face showing evidence of suffering, and bowed gravely. Hetty Hewitt walked over and stood by his side, laying her hand gently upon his arm.
But Thursday Smith did not know John Merrick very well. The little gentleman had silently listened, observing meanwhile the demeanor of the accused, and now he smiled in his pleasant, whimsical way and caught Smith's hand in both his own.
"Man, man!" he cried, "you're misjudging both me and yourself, I don't know this fellow Melville. You don't know him, either. But I do know Thursday Smith, who has won my confidence and by his manly acts, and I'll stand by him through thick and thin!"
"I am Harold Melville--the gambler--the confidence man."
"You're nothing of the sort, you're just Thursday Smith, and no more responsible for Harold Melville than I am."
"Hooray!" exclaimed Patsy Doyle enthusiastically. "Uncle's right, Thursday. You're our friend, and the mainstay of the _Millville Daily Tribune_. We shall not allow you to desert us just because you've discovered that your--your--ancestor--wasn't quite respectable."
"That's it, exactly," asserted Beth. "It's like hearing a tale of an ancestor, Thursday, or of some member of your family who lived before you. You cannot be responsible, in any way, for another man's wickedness."
"As I look at it," said Louise reflectively, "you are just two years old, Thursday, and innocent of any wrongdoing before that day you first found yourself."
"There's no use our considering Melville at all," added Uncle John cheerfully. "I'm sorry we ever heard of him, except that in one way it clears up a mystery. Thursday Smith, we like you and trust you. Do not doubt yourself because of this tale. I'll vouch for your fairness and integrity. Forget Melville, who has never really existed so far as any of us are concerned; be yourself, and count on our friendship and regard, which Thursday Smith has fairly won."
Hetty was crying softly, her cheek laid against Thursday's sleeve. The man stood as if turned to stone, but his cheeks were flushed, his eyes sparkling, and his head proudly poised.
Fogerty lighted a fresh cigarette, watching the scene with an imperturbable smile.
Suddenly Smith awoke to life. He half turned, looked wonderingly at Hetty, and then folded her thin form in his arms and pressed a kiss on her forehead.
Fogerty coughed. Uncle John jerked out his handkerchief and blew his nose like a bugle call.
The major's eyes were moist, for the old soldier was sympathetic as a child. But Patsy, a little catch in her voice, impulsively put her arms around the unashamed pair and murmured: "I'm so glad, Hetty! I'm so glad, Thursday! But--dear me--aren't we going to have any paper to-morrow morning?"
That relieved the tension and everybody laughed. Thursday released Hetty and shook Uncle John's hand most gratefully. Then they all wanted to shake hands, and did until it came to Fogerty's turn. But now Smith drew back and looked askance at the detective.
"I do not know you, Mr. McCormick," he said with dignity.
"My name's not McCormick; it's Fogerty," said the other, without malice. "I was simply testing your memory by claiming to be an old friend. Personally I never knew Harold Melville, but I'm mighty glad to make Thursday Smith's acquaintance and will consider it an honor if you'll shake my hand."
Smith was too happy to refuse. He took Fogerty's hand.
CHAPTER XXIII
THE JOURNALISTS ABDICATE
Mr. Merrick told Thursday Smith, in an apologetic way, how he had hired Fogerty to unravel the mystery of his former life, and how the great detective had gone to work so intelligently and skillfully that, with the aid of a sketch Hetty had once made of the pressman, and which Mr. Merrick sent on, he had been able to identify the man and unearth the disagreeable details of his history.
Thursday was too humble, by this time, and too grateful, besides, to resent Uncle John's interference. He admitted that, after all, it was better he should know the truth.
"I've nothing to bother me now but the future," he said, "and with God's help I mean to keep the name of Thursday Smith clean and free from any reproach."
After the interview he went about his duties as before and Hetty sat down at her desk and took the telegraphic news that came clicking over the wire as if nothing important in her life had occurred. But the girl journalists were all excitement and already were beginning to plan the things they might do to Make Hetty and Thursday happier. Cox and Booth had gone away and Mr. Merrick thanked Fogerty for his skillful service and gave him a fat check.
"It's a mighty interesting case, sir," declared the detective, "and I'm as glad as any of you that it has ended so comfortably. Whatever Melville might have been--and his record is a little worse than I related it--there's no doubt of Thursday Smith's honesty. He's a mighty fine fellow, and Fate played a proper trick when she blotted out his unscrupulous mind and left him as innocent as an unborn babe. He will do well in his new life, I'm sure, and that girl of his, Hetty Hewitt--I've know of her reckless ways for years--has also redeemed herself and turned out a regular brick! All of which, Mr. Merrick is unusual in real life, more's the pity, and therefore it makes even a cold-blooded detective feel good to witness it."
Mr. Merrick smiled benignantly and Fogerty drove over to the Junction to catch his train.
After luncheon, Patsy, while arranging her galley proofs, inquired of Louise for the local column.
"Hetty said she'd attend to it," was the reply; "but we are all upset to-day and things are at sixes and sevens."
"The column is all prepared, Miss Doyle," announced Hetty.
"Where is it?"
"Thursday has made it ready for the press. It's--illustrated," she confessed. "I'd rather you wouldn't see it until the paper is out, if you can trust me."
"To be sure," said Patsy. "That's one responsibility I'm relieved of, anyhow."
The paper was a bit uneven in appearance next morning, but when Patsy came down to breakfast she found both Uncle John and the major roaring with laughter over Hetty's locals.
The first item stated that "Mrs. Thorne took tea at Sam Cotting's last evening," (the Cottings being notoriously inhospitable) and the picture showed Mrs. Thorne, a sour-faced woman, departing from the store with a package of tea. Then came the announcement that "Eph Hildreth got shot at West's hardware store," and there was a picture of West weighing out a pound of buckshot for his customer. The next item said: "Our distinguished fellow citizen, Marshall Peggy McNutt, was discovered unconscious on his front porch at 3 p.m." The drawing of McNutt was one of the best of the series. It was his habit to "snooze" in an easy chair on his porch every afternoon, and Hetty depicted the little man with both feet--meat and wood--on the rail, his mouth open and eyes shut, while lusty snores were indicated by radiating lines and exclamation points. The Widow Clark's cow occupied the next square, being tethered to a stake while Skim approached the animal with pail and milking-stool. Below the drawing were the words: "Mr. Skimton Clark, cowward." A few other local hits were concluded by a picture of Hon. Ojoy Boglin shaking his fist at Mr. Skeelty, who held a package of money in his grasp labeled "insurance." Below was the simple legend: "O Joy!"
The artist's cleverness became the subject of conversation at the breakfast table, and Arthur remarked:
"You won't be able to hold Hetty in Millville long. Her talent enables her to draw big salaries in New York and it isn't likely she will consent to bury herself in this little town."
"I'm not so sure," said Patsy. "If we can hold Thursday Smith we can hold Hetty, you know."
"We won't need to hold either of them for long," observed Beth; "for in another three weeks or so we must leave here and return to the city, when of course the _Millville Daily Tribune_ must suspend publication."
"I've been thinking of that," said Uncle John.
"So have I," declared Patsy. "For a long time I was puzzled what to do, for I hated dreadfully to kill our dear _Tribune_ after we've made it such a nice paper. Yet I knew very well we couldn't stay here all winter and run it. But last night I had an inspiration. Thursday will marry Hetty, I suppose, and they can both stay here and run the Tribune. They are doing most of the work now. If Uncle John agrees, we will sell out to them on 'easy terms.'"
"Good gracious, Patsy!" chuckled the major, "wherever can the poor things borrow money to keep going? Do you want to load onto an innocent bride an' groom the necessity of meeting a deficit of a couple of hundred dollars every week?"
Patsy's face fell.
"They have no money, I know," she said, "except what they earn."
"And their wages'll be cut off when they begin hiring themselves," added the major. "No; you can't decently thrust such an incubus on Hetty and Thursday--or on anyone else. You've been willing to pay the piper for the sake of the dance, but no one else would do it."
"Quite true," agreed Arthur. "The days of the _Millville Tribune_ are numbered."
"Let us not settle that question just yet," proposed Mr. Merrick, who had been deep in thought. "I'll consider Patsy's proposition for awhile and then talk with Thursday. The paper belongs to the girls, but the outfit is mine, and I suppose I may do what I please with it when my nieces retire from journalism."
Even the major could not demur at this statement and so the conversation dropped. During the next few days Uncle John visited the printing office several times and looked over the complete little plant with speculative eyes. Then one day he made a trip to Malvern, thirty miles up the railway line from the Junction, where a successful weekly paper had long been published. He interviewed the editor, examined the outfit critically, and after asking numerous questions returned to Millville in excellent spirits.
Then he invited Thursday Smith and Hetty to dine at the farm on Saturday evening, which was the one evening in the week they were free, there being no Sunday morning paper. Thursday had bought a new suit of clothes since he came to the _Tribune_, and Hetty, after much urging, finally prevailed upon him to accept the invitation. When the young man appeared at the farm he wore his new suit with an air of perfect ease that disguised its cheapness, and it was noticed that he seemed quite at home in the handsome living-room, where the party assembled after dinner.
"I am in search of information, Thursday," said Uncle John in his pleasant way. "Will you permit me to question you a bit?"
"Certainly, sir."
"And you, Hetty?"
"Ask anything you like, sir."
"Thank you. To begin with, what are your future plans? I understand, of course, you are to be married; but--afterward?"
"We haven't considered that as yet, sir," replied Thursday thoughtfully. "Of course we shall stay with the _Tribune_ as long as you care to employ our services; but--"
"Well?"
"I have been given to understand the young ladies plan to return to New York at the end of September, and in that case of course the paper will suspend."
"My nieces will be obliged to abandon journalism, to be sure," said Mr. Merrick; "but I see no reason why the paper should suspend. How would you and Hetty like to remain in Millville and run it?"
Both Thursday and Hetty smiled, but it was the man who answered;
"We cannot afford such a luxury, sir."
"Would you care to make your future home in Millville?"
"Oh, yes!" exclaimed Hetty. "I love the quaint little town dearly, and the villagers are all my friends. I'm sure Thursday doesn't care to go back to New York, where--where Harold Melville once lived. But, as he truly says, we couldn't make a living with the _Tribune_, even if you gave us the use of the plant."
"Let us see about that," said Uncle John. "I will admit, in advance, that a daily paper in such a place is absurd. None of us quite understood that when we established the _Tribune_. My nieces thought a daily the only satisfactory sort of newspaper, because they were used to such, but it did not take long to convince me--and perhaps them--that in spite of all our efforts the _Millville Daily Tribune_ would never thrive. It is too expensive to pay its own way and requires too much work to be a pleasant plaything. Only unbounded enthusiasm and energy have enabled my clever nieces to avoid being swamped by the monster their ambition created."
"That," said Patsy, with a laugh, "is very clearly and concisely put, my dear Uncle."
"It was never intended to be a permanent thing, anyhow," continued Mr. Merrick; "yet I must express my admiration for the courage and talent my nieces have displayed in forcing a temporary success where failure was the logical conclusion. Shortly, however, they intend to retire gracefully from the field of journalism, leaving me with a model country newspaper plant on my hands. Therefore it is I, Thursday and Hetty, and not my nieces, who have a proposition to place before you.
"While a daily paper is not appropriate in Millville, a weekly paper, distributed throughout Chazy County, would not only be desirable but could be made to pay an excellent yearly profit. Through the enterprise of Joe Wegg, Millville is destined to grow rapidly from this time on, and Chazy County is populous enough to support a good weekly paper, in any event. Therefore, my proposition is this: To turn the plant over to Mr. and Mrs. Thursday Smith, who will change the name to the _Millville Weekly Tribune_ and run it as a permanent institution. Your only expense for labor will be one assistant to set type and do odd jobs, since you are so competent that you can attend to all else yourselves. We will cut out the expensive news service we have heretofore indulged in and dispense with the private telegraph wire. Joe Wegg says he'll furnish you with what power you need free of all charge, because the paper will boost Millville's interests, with which his own interests are identified. Now, then, tell me what you think of my proposal."
Hetty and Thursday had listened attentively and their faces proved they were enthusiastic over the idea. They said at once they would be glad to undertake the proposition.
"However," said Thursday, after a little reflection, "there are two things that might render our acceptance impossible. I suppose you will require rent for the outfit; but for a time, until we get well started, we could not afford to pay as much as you have a right to demand."
"I have settled on my demands," replied Mr. Merrick, "and hope you will agree to them. You must pay me for the use of the outfit twenty per cent of your net profits, over and above all your operating and living expenses. When this sum has reimbursed me for my investment, the outfit will belong to you."
Thursday Smith looked his amazement.
"That seems hardly business-like, sir," he protested.
"You are right; but this isn't entirely a business deal. You are saving my nieces the humiliation of suspending the paper they established and have labored on so lovingly. Moreover, I regard you and Hetty as friends whom I am glad to put in the way of a modest but--I venture to predict--a successful business career. What is your second objection?"
"I heard Mr. West say the other day that he would soon need the building we occupy to store his farm machinery in."
"True; but I have anticipated that. I have completed plans for the erection of a new building for the newspaper, which will be located on the vacant lot next to the hotel. I purchased the lot a long time ago. The new building, for which the lumber is already ordered, will be a better one than the shed we are now in, and on the second floor I intend to have a cozy suite of rooms where you and Hetty can make a home of your own. Eh? How does that strike you, my children?"
Their faces were full of wonder and delight.
"The new building goes with the outfit, on the same terms," continued Mr. Merrick. "That is I take one-fifth of your net profits for the whole thing."
"But, sir," suggested Thursday, "suppose no profits materialize?"
"Then I have induced you to undertake a poor venture and must suffer the consequences, which to me will be no hardship at all. In that case I will agree to find some better business for you, but I am quite positive you will make a go of the _Millville Weekly Tribune_."
"I think so, too, Mr. Merrick, or I would not accept your generous offer," replied Smith.
"What do you think, Hetty?"
"The idea pleases me immensely," she declared. "It is a splendid opportunity for us, and will enable us to live here quietly and forget the big outside world. New York has had a bad influence on both you and me, Thursday, and here we can begin a new life of absolute respectability."
"When do you intend to be married?" asked Patsy.
"We have scarcely thought of that, as yet, for until this evening we did not know what the future held in store for us."
"Couldn't you arrange the wedding before we leave?" asked Beth. "It would delight us so much to be present at the ceremony."
"I think we owe the young ladies that much, Thursday," said Hetty, after a brief hesitation.
"Nothing could please me better," he asserted eagerly.
So they canvassed the wedding, and Patsy proposed they transfer the paper to Thursday and Hetty--to become a weekly instead of a daily--in a week's time, and celebrate the wedding immediately after the second issue, so as to give the bridal couple a brief vacation before getting to work again. Neither of them wished to take a wedding trip, and Mr. Merrick promised to rush the work on the new building so they could move into their new rooms in the course of a few weeks.
CHAPTER XXIV
A CHEERFUL BLUNDER
"We would like to ask your advice about one thing, sir," said Thursday Smith to Mr. Merrick, a little later that same evening. "Would it be legal for me to marry under the name of Thursday Smith, or must I use my real name--Harold Melville?"
Uncle John could not answer this question, nor could the major or Arthur. Hetty and her fiancÚ had both decided to cling to the name of Thursday Smith thereafter, and they disliked to be married under any other--especially the detestable one of Harold Melville.
"An act of legislature would render your new name legal, I believe," said Mr. Merrick; "but such an act could not be passed until after the date you have planned to be married."
"But if it was made legal afterward it wouldn't matter greatly," suggested the major.
"I do not think it matters at all," asserted Hetty. "It's the man I'm marrying, not his name. I don't much care what he calls himself."
"Oh, but it must be legal, you know!" exclaimed Patsy. "You don't care now, perhaps, but you might in the future. We cannot be certain, you know, that Thursday is entirely free from his former connection with Harold Melville."
"Quite true," agreed the major.
"Then," said Smith, with evident disappointment, "I must use the hateful name of Melville for the wedding, and afterward abandon it for as long as possible."
The nieces were greatly pleased with Uncle John's arrangement, which relieved them of the newspaper and also furnished Thursday and Hetty, of whom they had grown really fond, with a means of gaining a livelihood.
Millville accepted the new arrangement with little adverse comment, the villagers being quite satisfied with a weekly paper, which would cost them far less than the daily had done. Everyone was pleased to know Thursday Smith had acquired the business, for both he and Hetty had won the cordial friendship of the simple-hearted people and were a little nearer to them than "the nabob's girls" could ever be.
Preparations were speedily pushed forward for the wedding, which the nieces undertook to manage themselves, the prospective bride and groom being too busy at the newspaper office to devote much attention to the preliminaries of the great event.
The ceremony was to take place at the farmhouse of Mr. Merrick, and every inhabitant of Millville was invited to be present. The minister would drive over from Hooker's Falls, and the ceremony was to be followed by a grand feast, for which delicacies were to be imported from New York.
The girls provided a complete trousseau for Hetty, as their wedding present, while Arthur and the major undertook to furnish the new apartments, which were already under construction. Uncle John's gift was a substantial check that would furnish the newly married couple with modest capital to promote their business or which they could use in case of emergencies.
It was the very day before the wedding that Fogerty gave them so great and agreeable a surprise that Uncle John called it "Fogerty's Wedding Present" ever afterward. In its physical form it was merely a telegram, but in its spiritual and moral aspect it proved the greatest gift Thursday and Hetty were destined to receive. The telegram was dated from New York and read as follows:
"Harold Melville just arrested here for passing a bogus check under an assumed name. Have interviewed him and find he is really Melville, so Thursday Smith must be some one else, and doubtless a more respectable character. Shall I undertake to discover his real identity?"
Uncle John let Thursday and Hetty answer this question, and their reply was a positive "no!"
"The great Fogerty made such a blunder the first time," said Hetty, who was overjoyed at the glorious news, "that he might give poor Thursday another dreadful scare if he tackled the job again. Let the mystery remain unfathomable."
"But, on the contrary, my dear, Fogerty might discover that Thursday was some eminent and good man--as I am firmly convinced is the truth," suggested Mr. Merrick.
"He's that right now," asserted Hetty. "For my part, I prefer to know nothing of his former history, and Thursday says the present situation thoroughly contents him."
"I am more than contented," said Thursday, with a happy smile. "Hetty has cured me of my desire to wander, and no matter what I might have been in the past I am satisfied to remain hereafter a country editor."
End of Project Gutenberg's Aunt Jane's Nieces on Vacation, by Edith Van Dyne

= = = PG35859 = = =
AUNT JANE'S NIECES ON THE RANCH
AUNT JANE’S NIECES ON THE RANCH
BY
EDITH VAN DYNE
AUTHOR OF AUNT JANE’S NIECES SERIES THE FLYING GIRL SERIES, ETC., ETC.
The Reilly & Lee Co. Chicago
_Copyright_, 1913 _BY_ _The Reilly & Britton Co._
AUNT JANE’S NIECES ON THE RANCH
CONTENTS
· CHAPTER I—UNCLE JOHN DECIDES
· CHAPTER II—EL CAJON RANCH
· CHAPTER III—THAT BLESSED BABY!
· CHAPTER IV—LITTLE JANE’S TWO NURSES
· CHAPTER V—INEZ THREATENS
· CHAPTER VI—A DINNER WITH THE NEIGHBORS
· CHAPTER VII—GONE!
· CHAPTER VIII—VERY MYSTERIOUS
· CHAPTER IX—A FRUITLESS SEARCH
· CHAPTER X—CONJECTURES AND ABSURDITIES
· CHAPTER XI—THE MAJOR ENCOUNTERS THE GHOST
· CHAPTER XII—ANOTHER DISAPPEARANCE
· CHAPTER XIII—THE WAY IT HAPPENED
· CHAPTER XIV—PRISONERS OF THE WALL
· CHAPTER XV—MILDRED CONFIDES IN INEZ
· CHAPTER XVI—AN UNEXPECTED ARRIVAL
· CHAPTER XVII—THE PRODIGAL SON
· CHAPTER XVIII—LACES AND GOLD
· CHAPTER XIX—INEZ AND MIGUEL
· CHAPTER XX—MR. RUNYON’S DISCOVERY
· CHAPTER XXI—A FORTUNE IN TATTERS
· CHAPTER XXII—FAITHFUL AND TRUE
Aunt Jane’s Nieces on the Ranch
CHAPTER I—UNCLE JOHN DECIDES
“And now,” said Major Doyle, rubbing his hands together as he half reclined in his big chair in a corner of the sitting room, “now we shall enjoy a nice cosy winter in dear New York.”
“Cosy?” said his young daughter, Miss Patricia Doyle, raising her head from her sewing to cast a glance through the window at the whirling snowflakes.
“Ab-so-lute-ly cosy, Patsy, my dear,” responded the major. “Here we are in our own steam-heated flat—seven rooms and a bath, not counting the closets—hot water any time you turn the faucet; a telephone call brings the butcher, the baker, the candlestick-maker; latest editions of the papers chucked into the passage! What more do you want?”
“Tcha!”
This scornful ejaculation came from a little bald-headed man seated in the opposite corner, who had been calmly smoking his pipe and dreamily eyeing the flickering gas-log in the grate. The major gave a start and turned to stare fixedly at the little man. Patsy, scenting mischief, indulged in a little laugh as she threaded her needle.
“Sir! what am I to understand from that brutal interruption?” demanded Major Doyle sternly.
“You’re talking nonsense,” was the reply, uttered in a tone of cheery indifference. “New York in winter is a nightmare. Blizzards, thaws, hurricanes, ice, la grippe, shivers—grouches.”
“Drumsticks!” cried the major indignantly. “It’s the finest climate in the world—bar none. We’ve the finest restaurants, the best theatres, the biggest stores and—and the stock exchange. And then, there’s Broadway! What more can mortal desire, John Merrick?”
The little man laughed, but filled his pipe without reply.
“Uncle John is getting uneasy,” observed Patsy. “I’ve noticed it for some time. This is the first snowstorm that has caught him in New York for several years.”
“The blizzard came unusually early,” said Mr. Merrick apologetically. “It took me by surprise. But I imagine there will be a few days more of decent weather before winter finally sets in. By that time—”
“Well, what then?” asked the major in defiant accents, as his brother-in-law hesitated.
“By that time we shall be out of it, of course,” was the quiet reply.
Patsy looked at her uncle reflectively, while the major grunted and shifted uneasily in his chair. Father and daughter were alike devoted to John Merrick, whose generosity and kindliness had rescued them from poverty and thrust upon them all the comforts they now enjoyed. Even this pretty flat building in Willing Square, close to the fashionable New York residence district, belonged in fee to Miss Doyle, it having been a gift from her wealthy uncle. And Uncle John made his home with them, quite content in a seven-room-flat when his millions might have purchased the handsomest establishment in the metropolis. Down in Wall Street and throughout the financial districts the name of the great John Merrick was mentioned with awe; here in Willing Square he smoked a pipe in his corner of the modest sitting room and cheerfully argued with his irascible brother-in-law, Major Doyle, whose business it was to look after Mr. Merrick’s investments and so allow the democratic little millionaire the opportunity to come and go as he pleased.
The major’s greatest objection to Uncle John’s frequent absences from New York—especially during the winter months—was due to the fact that his beloved Patsy, whom he worshiped with a species of idolatry, usually accompanied her uncle. It was quite natural for the major to resent being left alone, and equally natural for Patsy to enjoy these travel experiences, which in Uncle John’s company were always delightful.
Patsy Doyle was an unprepossessing little thing, at first sight. She was short of stature and a bit plump; freckled and red-haired; neat and wholesome in appearance but lacking “style” in either form or apparel. But to her friends Patricia was beautiful. Her big blue eyes, mischievous and laughing, won hearts without effort, and the girl was so genuine—so natural and unaffected—that she attracted old and young alike and boasted a host of admiring friends.
This girl was Uncle John’s favorite niece, but not the only one. Beth De Graf, a year younger than her cousin Patsy, was a ward of Mr. Merrick and lived with the others in the little flat at Willing Square. Beth was not an orphan, but her father and mother, residents of an Ohio town, had treated the girl so selfishly and inconsiderately that she had passed a very unhappy life until Uncle John took her under his wing and removed Beth from her depressing environment. This niece was as beautiful in form and feature as Patsy Doyle was plain, but she did not possess Patsy’s cheerful and uniform temperament and was by nature reserved and diffident in the presence of strangers.
Yet Beth had many good qualities, among them a heart-felt sympathy for young girls who were not so fortunate as herself. On this disagreeable winter’s day she had set out to visit a settlement school where she had long since proved herself the good angel of a score of struggling girls. The blizzard had developed since she left home, but no one worried about her, for Beth was very resourceful.
There was another niece, likewise dear to John Merrick’s heart, who had been Louise Merrick before she married a youth named Arthur Weldon, some two years before this story begins. A few months ago Arthur had taken his young wife to California, where he had purchased a fruit ranch, and there a baby was born to them which they named “Jane Merrick Weldon”—a rather big name for what was admitted to be a very small person.
This baby, now five months old and reported to be thriving, had been from its birth of tremendous interest to every inhabitant of the Willing Square flat. It had been discussed morning, noon and night by Uncle John and the girls, while even the grizzled major was not ashamed to admit that “that Weldon infant” was an important addition to the family. Perhaps little Jane acquired an added interest by being so far away from all her relatives, as well as from the fact that Louise wrote such glowing accounts of the baby’s beauty and witcheries that to believe a tithe of what she asserted was to establish the child as an infantile marvel.
Now, Patsy Doyle knew in her heart that Uncle John was eager to see Louise’s baby, and long ago she had confided to Beth her belief that the winter would find Mr. Merrick at Arthur Weldon’s California ranch, with all his three nieces gathered around him and the infantile marvel in his arms. The same suspicion had crept into Major Doyle’s mind, and that is why he so promptly resented the suggestion that New York was not an ideal winter resort. Somehow, the old major “felt in his bones” that his beloved Patsy would be whisked away to California, leaving her father to face the tedious winter without her; for he believed his business duties would not allow him to get away to accompany her.
Yet so far Uncle John, in planning for the winter, had not mentioned California as even a remote possibility. It was understood he would go somewhere, but up to the moment when he declared “we will be out of it, of course, when the bad weather sets in,” he had kept his own counsel and forborne to express a preference or a decision.
But now the major, being aroused, decided to “have it out” with his elusive brother-in-law.
“Where will ye go to find a better place?” he demanded.
“We’re going to Bermuda,” said Uncle John.
“For onions?” asked the major sarcastically.
“They have other things in Bermuda besides onions. A delightful climate, I’m told, is one of them.”
The major sniffed. He was surprised, it is true, and rather pleased, because Bermuda is so much nearer New York than is California; but it was his custom to object.
“Patsy can’t go,” he declared, as if that settled the question for good and all. “The sea voyage would kill her. I’m told by truthful persons that the voyage to Bermuda is the most terrible experience known to mortals. Those who don’t die on the way over positively refuse ever to come back again, and so remain forever exiled from their homes and families—until they have the good luck to die from continually eating onions.”
Mr. Merrick smiled as he glanced at the major’s severe countenance.
“It can’t be as bad as that,” said he. “I know a man who has taken his family to Bermuda for five winters, in succession.”
“And brought ’em back alive each time?”
“Certainly. Otherwise, you will admit he couldn’t take them again.”
“That family,” asserted the major seriously, “must be made of cast-iron, with clockwork stomachs.”
Patsy gave one of her low, musical laughs.
“I think I would like Bermuda,” she said. “Anyhow, whatever pleases Uncle John will please me, so long as we get away from New York.”
“Why, ye female traitor!” cried the major; and added, for Uncle John’s benefit: “New York is admitted by men of discretion to be the modern Garden of Eden. It’s the one desideratum of—”
Here the door opened abruptly and Beth came in. Her cheeks were glowing red from contact with the wind and her dark tailor-suit glistened with tiny drops left by the melted snow. In her mittened hand she waved a letter.
“From Louise, Patsy!” she exclaimed, tossing it toward her cousin; “but don’t you dare read it till I’ve changed my things.”
Then she disappeared into an inner room and Patsy, disregarding the injunction, caught up the epistle and tore open the envelope.
Uncle John refilled his pipe and looked at Patsy’s tense face inquiringly. The major stiffened, but could not wholly repress his curiosity. After a moment he said:
“All well, Patsy?”
“How’s the baby?” asked Uncle John.
“Dear me!” cried Patsy, with a distressed face; “and no doctor nearer than five miles!”
Both men leaped from their chairs.
“Why don’t they keep a doctor in the house?” roared the major.
“Suppose we send Dr. Lawson, right away!” suggested Uncle John.
Patsy, still holding up the letter, turned her eyes upon them reproachfully.
“It’s all over,” she said with a sigh.
The major dropped into a chair, limp and inert. Uncle John paled.
“The—the baby isn’t—dead!” he gasped.
“No, indeed,” returned Patsy, again reading. “But it had colic most dreadfully, and Louise was in despair. But the nurse, a dark-skinned Mexican creature, gave it a dose of some horrid hot stuff—”
“Chile con carne, most likely!” ejaculated the major.
“Horrible!” cried Uncle John.
“And that cured the colic but almost burned poor little Jane’s insides out.”
“Insides out!”
“However, Louise says the dear baby is now quite well again,” continued the girl.
“Perhaps so, when she wrote,” commented the major, wiping his forehead with a handkerchief; “but that’s a week ago, at least. A thousand things might have happened to that child since then. Why was Arthur Weldon such a fool as to settle in a desert place, far away from all civilization? He ought to be prosecuted for cruelty.”
“The baby’s all right,” said Patsy, soothingly. “If anything serious happened, Louise would telegraph.”
“I doubt it,” said the major, walking the floor. “I doubt if there’s such a thing as a telegraph in all that forsaken country.”
Uncle John frowned.
“You are getting imbecile, Major. They’ve a lot more comforts and conveniences on that ranch than we have here in New York.”
“Name ’em!” shouted the Major. “I challenge ye to mention one thing we haven’t right here in this flat.”
“Chickens!” said Beth, re-entering the room in time to hear this challenge. “How’s the baby, Patsy?”
“Growing like a weed, dear, and getting more lovely and cunning every second. Here—read the letter yourself.”
While Beth devoured the news from California Uncle John replied to the major.
“At El Cajon Ranch,” said he, “there’s a fine big house where the sunshine peeps in and floods the rooms every day in the year. Hear that blizzard howl outside, and think of the roses blooming this instant on the trellis of Louise’s window. Arthur has two automobiles and can get to town in twenty minutes. They’ve a long-distance telephone and I’ve talked with ’em over the line several times.”
“You have!” This in a surprised chorus.
“I have. Only last week I called Louise up.”
“An expensive amusement, John,” said the major grimly.
“Yes; but I figured I could afford it. I own some telephone stock, you know, so I may get part of that investment back. They have their own cows, and chickens—as Beth truly says—and any morning they can pick oranges and grapefruit from their own trees for breakfast.”
“I’d like to see that precious baby,” remarked Beth, laying the letter on her lap to glance pleadingly at her uncle.
“Uncle John is going to take us to Bermuda,” said Patsy in a serious voice.
The little man flushed and sat down abruptly. The major, noting his attitude, became disturbed.
“You’ve all made the California trip,” said he. “It doesn’t pay to see any country twice.”
“But we haven’t seen Arthur’s ranch,” Beth reminded him.
“Nor the baby,” added Patsy, regarding the back of Uncle John’s head somewhat wistfully.
The silence that followed was broken only by the major’s low growls. The poor man already knew his fate.
“That chile-con-carne nurse ought to be discharged,” mumbled Uncle John, half audibly. “Mexicans are stupid creatures to have around. I think we ought to take with us an experienced nurse, who is intelligent and up-to-date.”
“Oh, I know the very one!” exclaimed Beth. “Mildred Travers. She’s perfectly splendid. I’ve watched her with that poor girl who was hurt at the school, and she’s as gentle and skillful as she is refined. Mildred would bring up that baby to be as hearty and healthful as a young savage.”
“How soon could she go?” asked Uncle John.
“At an hour’s notice, I’m sure. Trained nurses are used to sudden calls, you know. I’ll see her to-morrow—if it’s better weather.”
“Do,” said Uncle John. “I suppose you girls can get ready by Saturday?”
“Of course!” cried Patsy and Beth in one voice.
“Then I’ll make the reservations. Major Doyle, you will arrange your business to accompany us.”
“I won’t!”
“You will, or I’ll discharge you. You’re working for me, aren’t you?”
“I am, sir.”
“Then obey orders.”
CHAPTER II—EL CAJON RANCH
Uncle John always traveled comfortably and even luxuriously, but without ostentation. Such conveniences as were offered the general public he indulged in, but no one would suspect him of being a multi-millionaire who might have ordered a special train of private cars had the inclination seized him. A modest little man, who had made an enormous fortune in the far Northwest—almost before he realized it—John Merrick had never allowed the possession of money to deprive him of his simple tastes or to alter his kindly nature. He loved to be of the people and to mingle with his fellows on an equal footing, and nothing distressed him more than to be recognized by some one as the great New York financier. It is true that he had practically retired from business, but his huge fortune was invested in so many channels that his name remained prominent among men of affairs and this notoriety he was unable wholly to escape.
The trip to California was a delight because none of his fellow passengers knew his identity. During the three days’ jaunt from Chicago to Los Angeles he was recognized only as an engaging little man who was conducting a party of three charming girls, as well as a sedate, soldierly old gentleman, into the sunny Southland for a winter’s recreation.
Of these three girls we already know Patsy Doyle and Beth DeGraf, but Mildred Travers remains to be introduced. The trained nurse whom Beth had secured was tall and slight, with a sweet face, a gentle expression and eyes so calm and deep that a stranger found it disconcerting to gaze within them. Beth herself had similar eyes—big and fathomless—yet they were so expressive as to allure and bewitch the beholder, while Mildred Travers’ eyes repelled one as being masked—as concealing some well guarded secret. Both the major and Uncle John had felt this and it made the latter somewhat uneasy when he reflected that he was taking this girl to be the trusted nurse of Louise’s precious baby. He questioned Beth closely concerning Mildred and his niece declared that no kindlier, more sympathetic or more skillful nurse was ever granted a diploma. Of Mildred’s history she was ignorant, except that the girl had confided to her the story of her struggles to obtain recognition and to get remunerative work after graduating from the training school.
“Once, you know,” explained Beth, “trained nurses were in such demand that none were ever idle; but the training schools have been turning them out in such vast numbers that only those with family influence are now sure of work. Mildred is by instinct helpful and sympathetic—a natural born nurse, Uncle John—but because she was practically a stranger in New York she was forced to do charity and hospital work, and that is how I became acquainted with her.”
“She seems to bear out your endorsement, except for her eyes,” said Uncle John. “I—I don’t like—her eyes. They’re hard. At times they seem vengeful and cruel, like tigers’ eyes.”
“Oh, you wrong Mildred, I’m sure!” exclaimed Beth, and Uncle John reluctantly accepted her verdict. On the journey Miss Travers appeared well bred and cultured, conversing easily and intelligently on a variety of subjects, yet always exhibiting a reserve, as if she held herself to be one apart from the others. Indeed, the girl proved so agreeable a companion that Mr. Merrick’s misgivings gradually subsided. Even the major, still suspicious and doubtful, admitted that Mildred was “quite a superior person.”
Louise had been notified by telegraph of the coming of her relatives, but they had withheld from her the fact that they were bringing a “proper” nurse to care for the Weldon baby. The party rested a day in Los Angeles and then journeyed on to Escondido, near which town the Weldon ranch was located.
Louise and Arthur were both at the station with their big seven-passenger touring car. The young mother was promptly smothered in embraces by Patsy and Beth, but when she emerged from this ordeal to be hugged and kissed by Uncle John, that observing little gentleman decided that she looked exactly as girlish and lovely as on her wedding day.
This eldest niece was, in fact, only twenty years of age—quite too young to be a wife and mother. She was of that feminine type which matures slowly and seems to bear the mark of perpetual youth. Mrs. Weldon’s slight, willowy form was still almost childlike in its lines, and the sunny, happy smile upon her face seemed that of a school-maid.
That tall, boyish figure beside her, now heartily welcoming the guests, would scarcely be recognized as belonging to a husband and father. These two were more like children playing at “keeping house” than sedate married people. Mildred Travers observed the couple with evident surprise; but the others, familiar with the love story of Arthur and Louise, were merely glad to find them unchanged and enjoying their former health and good spirits.
“The baby!”
That was naturally the first inquiry, voiced in concert by the late arrivals; and Louise, blushing prettily and with a delightful air of proprietorship, laughingly assured them that “Toodlums” was very well.
“This is such a glorious country,” she added as the big car started off with its load, to be followed by a wagon with the baggage, “that every living thing flourishes here like the green bay trees—and baby is no exception. Oh, you’ll love our quaint old home, Uncle John! And, Patsy, we’ve got such a flock of white chickens! And there’s a new baby calf, Beth! And the major shall sleep in the Haunted Room, and—”
“Haunted?” asked the major, his eyes twinkling.
“I’m sure they’re rats,” said the little wife, “but the Mexicans claim it’s the old miser himself. And the oranges are just in their prime and the roses are simply magnificent!”
So she rambled on, enthusiastic over her ranch home one moment and the next asking eager questions about New York and her old friends there. Louise had a mother, who was just now living in Paris, much to Arthur Weldon’s satisfaction. Even Louise did not miss the worldly-minded, self-centered mother with whom she had so little in common, and perhaps Uncle John and his nieces would never have ventured on this visit had Mrs. Merrick been at the ranch.
The California country roads are all “boulevards,” although they are nothing more than native earth, rolled smooth and saturated with heavy oil until they resemble asphalt. The automobile was a fast one and it swept through the beautiful country, all fresh and green in spite of the fact that it was December, and fragrant with the scent of roses and carnations, which bloomed on every side, until a twenty-minute run brought them to an avenue of gigantic palms which led from the road up to the ranch house of El Cajon.
Originally El Cajon had been a Spanish grant of several thousand acres, and three generations of Spanish dons had resided there. The last of these Cristovals had erected the present mansion—a splendid, rambling dwelling built around an open court where a fountain splashed and tall palms shot their swaying crowns far above the housetop. The South Wing was the old dwelling which the builder had incorporated into the present scheme, but the newer part was the more imposing.
The walls were of great thickness and composed of adobe blocks of huge size. These were not sun-baked, as is usual in adobe dwellings, but had been burned like brick in a furnace constructed for the purpose by the first proprietor, and were therefore much stronger and harder than ordinary brick. In this climate there is no dampness clinging to such a structure and the rooms were extraordinarily cool in summer and warm in the chill winter season. Surrounding the house were many magnificent trees of tropical and semi-tropical nature, all of which had now attained their full prime. On the south and east sides were extensive rose gardens and beds of flowers in wonderful variety.
It was here that the last Señor Cristoval had brought his young bride, a lady of Madrid who was reputed to have possessed great beauty; but seclusion in this retired spot, then much isolated, rendered her so unhappy that she became mentally unbalanced and in a fit of depression took her own life. Cristoval, until then a generous and noble man, was completely changed by this catastrophe. During the remainder of his life he was noted for parsimony and greed for money, not unmixed with cruelty. He worked his ignorant Indian and Mexican servants mercilessly, denying them proper food or wage, and his death was a relief to all. Afterward the big estate was cut up and passed into various hands. Three hundred acres of fine orange and olive groves, including the spacious mansion, were finally sold to young Arthur Weldon.
“It’s an awfully big place,” said Louise, as the party alighted and stood upon the broad stone veranda, “but it is so quaint and charming that I love every stick and stone of it.”
“The baby!” shrieked Patsy.
“Where’s that blessed baby?” cried Beth.
Then came from the house a dusky maid bearing in her arms a soft, fluffy bundle that was instantly pounced upon by the two girls, to Uncle John’s horror and dismay.
“Be careful, there!” he called. “You’ll smother the poor thing.” But Louise laughed and regarded the scene delightedly. And little Jane seemed to appreciate the importance of the occasion, for she waved her tiny hands and cooed a welcome to her two new aunties.
CHAPTER III—THAT BLESSED BABY!
“Oh, you darling!”
“It’s my turn, Patsy! Don’t be selfish. Let me kiss her again.”
“That’s enough, Beth. Here—give me my niece!”
“She’s mine, too.”
“Give me that baby! There; you’ve made her cry.”
“I haven’t; she’s laughing because I kissed her wee nose.”
“Isn’t she a dear, though?”
“Now, girls,” suggested Louise, “suppose we give Uncle John and the major a peep at her.”
Reluctantly the bundle was abandoned to its mother, who carried it to where Mr. Merrick was nervously standing. “Yes, yes,” he said, touching one cheek gently with the tip of his finger. “It—it’s a fine child, Louise; really a—a—creditable child. But—eh—isn’t it rather—soft?”
“Of course, Uncle John. All babies are soft. Aren’t you going to kiss little Jane?”
“It—won’t—hurt it?”
“Not a bit. Haven’t Beth and Patsy nearly kissed its skin off?”
“Babies,” asserted Major Doyle, stiffly, “were made to be kissed. Anyhow, that’s the penalty they pay for being born helpless.” And with this he kissed little Jane on both cheeks with evident satisfaction.
This bravado encouraged Uncle John to do likewise, but after the operation he looked sheepish and awkward, as if he felt that he had taken an unfair advantage of the wee lady.
“She seems very red, Louise,” he remarked, to cover his embarrassment.
“Oh, no, Uncle! Everyone says she’s the whitest baby of her age they ever saw. She’s only five months old, remember.”
“Dear me; how very young.”
“But she’s getting older every day,” said Arthur, coming in from the garage. “What do you folks think of her, anyhow?”
The rhapsodies were fairly bewildering, yet very pleasant to the young father and mother. While they continued, Mildred Travers quietly took the child from Louise and tenderly bent over it. Only the major noted the little scene that ensued.
The eyes of the dark-skinned Mexican girl flashed sudden fire. She pulled Mildred’s sleeve and then fell back discomfited as the cold, fathomless eyes of the trained nurse met her own. For an instant the girl stood irresolute; then with a quick, unexpected motion she tore the infant from Mildred’s arms and rushed into the house with it.
Arthur, noticing this last action, laughed lightly. The major frowned. Mildred folded her arms and stood in the background unmoved and unobtrusive. Louise was chatting volubly with her two cousins.
“Was that the same Mexican girl who fed the baby chile con carne?” inquired Uncle John anxiously.
“Mercy, no!” cried Arthur. “What ever put such an idea into your head?”
“I believe the major suggested it,” replied the little man. “Anyhow, it was something hot, so Louise wrote.”
“Oh, yes; when Toodlums had the colic. It was some queer Mexican remedy, but I’m confident it saved the child’s life. The girl is a treasure.”
Uncle John coughed and glanced uneasily at Miss Travers, who pretended not to have overheard this conversation. But the major was highly amused and decided it was a good joke on Mr. Merrick. It was so good a joke that it might serve as a basis for many cutting remarks in future discussions. His brother-in-law was so seldom guilty of an error in judgment that Major Doyle, who loved to oppose him because he was so fond of him, hailed Uncle John’s present predicament with pure joy.
Louise created a welcome diversion by ushering them all into the house and through the stately rooms to the open court, where a luncheon table was set beneath the shade of the palms.
Here was the baby again, with the Mexican girl, Inez, hugging it defiantly to her bosom as she sat upon a stone bench.
Between the infant, the excitement of arrival and admiration for the Weldon establishment, so far surpassing their most ardent anticipations, Beth and Patsy had little desire for food. Uncle John and the major, however, did ample justice to an excellent repast, which was served by two more Mexican maids.
“Do you employ only Mexicans for servants?” inquired Uncle John, when finally the men were left alone to smoke while the girls, under Louise’s guidance, explored the house.
“Only Mexicans, except for the Chinese cook,” replied Arthur. “It is impossible to get American help and the Japs I won’t have. Some of the ranch hands have been on the place for years, but the house servants I hired after I come here.”
“A lazy lot, eh?” suggested the major.
“Quite right, sir. But I find them faithful and easy to manage. You will notice that I keep two or three times as many house servants as a similar establishment would require in the east; but they are content with much smaller wages. It’s the same way on the ranch. Yet without the Mexicans the help problem would be a serious one out here.”
“Does the ranch pay?” asked Mr. Merrick.
“I haven’t been here long enough to find out,” answered Arthur, with a smile. “So far, I’ve done all the paying. We shall harvest a big orange crop next month, and in time the olives will mature; but I’ve an idea the expenses will eat up the receipts, by the end of the year.”
“No money in a California ranch, eh?”
“Why, some of my neighbors are making fortunes, I hear; but they are experienced ranchers. On the other hand, my next neighbor at the north is nearly bankrupt, because he’s a greenhorn from the east. Some time, when I’ve learned the game, I hope to make this place something more than a plaything.”
“You’ll stay here, then?” asked the major, with astonishment. “It’s the most delightful country on earth, for a residence. You’ll admit that, sir, when you know it better.”
Meantime the baggage wagon arrived and Patsy and Beth, having picked out their rooms, began to unpack and “settle” in their new quarters.
CHAPTER IV—LITTLE JANE’S TWO NURSES
Louise had been considerably puzzled to account for the presence of the strange girl in Uncle John’s party. At first she did not know whether to receive Mildred Travers as an equal or a dependent. Not until the three nieces were seated together in Louise’s own room, exchanging girlish confidences, was Mildred’s status clearly defined to the young mother.
“You see,” explained Patsy, “Uncle John was dreadfully worried over the baby. When you wrote of that terrible time the dear little one had with the colic, and how you were dependent on a Mexican girl who fed the innocent lamb some horrid hot stuff, Uncle declared it was a shame to imperil such a precious life, and that you must have a thoroughly competent nurse.”
“But,” said Louise, quite bewildered, “I’m afraid you don’t understand that—”
“And so,” broke in Beth, “I told him I knew of a perfect jewel of a trained nurse, who knows as much as most doctors and could guard the baby from a thousand dangers. I’d watched her care for one of our poor girls who was knocked down by an automobile and badly injured, and Mildred was so skillful and sympathetic that she quite won my heart. I wasn’t sure, at first, she’d come way out to California, to stay, but when I broached the subject she cried out: ‘Thank heaven!’ in such a heart-felt, joyous tone that I was greatly relieved. So we brought her along, and—”
“Really, Beth, I don’t need her,” protested Louise. “The Mexicans are considered the best nurses in the world, and Inez is perfectly devoted to baby and worships her most sinfully. I got her from a woman who formerly employed her as a nurse and she gave Inez a splendid recommendation. Both Arthur and I believe she saved baby’s life by her prompt action when the colic caught her.”
“But the hot stuff!” cried Patsy.
“It might have ruined baby’s stomach for life,” asserted Beth.
“No; it’s a simple Mexican remedy that is very efficient. Perhaps, in my anxiety, I wrote more forcibly than the occasion justified,” admitted Louise; “but I have every confidence in Inez.”
The girls were really dismayed and frankly displayed their chagrin. Louise laughed at them.
“Never mind,” she said; “it’s just one of dear Uncle John’s blunders in trying to be good to me; so let’s endeavor to wiggle out of the hole as gracefully as possible.”
“I don’t see how you’ll do it,” confessed Patsy. “Here’s Mildred, permanently engaged and all expenses paid.”
“She is really a superior person, as you’ll presently discover,” added Beth. “I’ve never dared question her as to her family history, but I venture to say she is well born and with just as good antecedents as we have—perhaps better.”
“She’s very quiet and undemonstrative,” said Patsy musingly.
“Naturally, being a trained nurse. I liked her face,” said Louise, “but her eyes puzzle me.”
“They are her one unfortunate feature,” Beth agreed.
“They’re cold,” said Patsy; “that’s the trouble. You never get _into_ her eyes, somehow. They repel you.”
“I never look at them,” said Beth. “Her mouth is sweet and sensitive and her facial expression pleasant. She moves as gracefully and silently as—as—”
“As a cat,” suggested Patsy.
“And she is acquainted with all the modern methods of nursing, although she’s done a lot of hospital work, too.”
“Well,” said Louise, reflectively, “I’ll talk it over with Arthur and see what we can do. Perhaps baby needs two nurses. We can’t discharge Inez, for Toodlums is even more contented with her than with me; but I admit it will be a satisfaction to have so thoroughly competent a nurse as Miss Travers at hand in case of emergency. And, above all else, I don’t want to hurt dear Uncle John’s feelings.”
She did talk it over with Arthur, an hour later, and her boy husband declared he had “sized up the situation” the moment he laid eyes on Mildred at the depot. They owed a lot to Uncle John, he added, and the most graceful thing they could do, under the circumstances, was to instal Miss Travers as head nurse and retain Inez as her assistant.
“The chances are,” said Arthur laughingly, “that the Mexican girl will have most of the care of Toodlums, as she does now, while the superior will remain content to advise Inez and keep a general supervision over the nursery. So fix it up that way, Louise, and everybody will be happy.”
Uncle John was thanked so heartily for his thoughtfulness by the young couple that his kindly face glowed with satisfaction, and then Louise began the task of reconciling the two nurses to the proposed arrangement and defining the duties of each. Mildred Travers inclined her head graciously and said it was an admirable arrangement and quite satisfactory to her. But Inez listened sullenly and her dark eyes glowed with resentment.
“You not trust me more, then?” she added.
“Oh, yes, Inez; we trust you as much as ever,” Louise assured her.
“Then why you hire this strange woman?”
“She is a present to us, from my Uncle John, who came this morning. He didn’t know you were here, you see, or he would not have brought her.”
Inez remained unmollified.
“Miss Travers is a very skillful baby doctor,” continued Louise, “and she can mend broken bones, cure diseases and make the sick well.”
Inez nodded.
“I know. A witch-woman,” she said in a whisper. “You can trust me señora, but you cannot trust her. No witch-woman can be trusted.”
Louise smiled but thought best not to argue the point farther. Inez went back to the nursery hugging Toodlums as jealously as if she feared some one would snatch the little one from her arms.
Next morning Mildred said to Beth, in whom she confided most:
“The Mexican girl does not like me. She is devotedly attached to the baby and fears I will supplant her.”
“That is true,” admitted Beth, who had conceived the same idea; “but you mustn’t mind her, Mildred. The poor thing’s only half civilized and doesn’t understand our ways very well. What do you think of little Jane?”
“I never knew a sweeter, healthier or more contented baby. She smiles and sleeps perpetually and seems thoroughly wholesome. Were she to remain in her present robust condition there would be little need of my services, I assure you. But—”
“But what?” asked Beth anxiously, as the nurse hesitated.
“All babies have their ills, and little Jane cannot escape them. The rainy season is approaching and dampness is trying to infants. There will be months of moisture, and then—I shall be needed.”
“Have you been in California before?” asked Beth, impressed by Mildred’s positive assertion.
The girl hesitated a moment, looking down.
“I was born here,” she said in low, tense tones.
“Indeed! Why, I thought all the white people in California came from the east. I had no idea there could be such a thing as a white native.”
Mildred smiled with her lips. Her imperturbable eyes never smiled.
“I am only nineteen, in spite of my years of training and hard work,” she said, a touch of bitterness in her voice. “My father came here nearly thirty years ago.”
“To Southern California?”
“Yes.”
“Did you live near here, then?”
Mildred looked around her.
“I have been in this house often, as a girl,” she said slowly. “Señor Cristoval was—an acquaintance of my father.”
Beth stared at her, greatly interested.
“How strange!” she exclaimed. “You cannot be far from your own family, then,” she added.
Mildred shivered a little, twisting her fingers nervously together. She was indeed sensitive, despite that calm, repellent look in her eyes.
“I hope,” she said, evading Beth’s remark, “to be of real use to this dear baby, whom I already love. The Mexican girl, Inez, is well enough as a caretaker, but her judgment could not be trusted in emergencies. These Mexicans lose their heads easily and in crises are liable to do more harm than good. Mrs. Weldon’s arrangement is an admirable one and I confess it relieves me of much drudgery and confinement. I shall keep a watchful supervision over my charge and be prepared to meet any emergency.”
Beth was not wholly satisfied with this interview. Mildred had told her just enough to render her curious, but had withheld any information as to how a California girl happened to be in New York working as a trained nurse. She remembered the girl’s fervent exclamation: “Thank heaven!” when asked if she would go to Southern California, to a ranch called El Cajon, to take care of a new baby. Beth judged from this that Mildred was eager to get back home again; yet she had evaded any reference to her family or former friends, and since her arrival had expressed no wish to visit them.
There was something strange and unaccountable about the affair, and for this reason Beth refrained from mentioning to her cousins that Mildred Travers was a Californian by birth and was familiar with the scenes around El Cajon ranch and even with the old house itself. Perhaps some day the girl would tell her more, when she would be able to relate the whole story to Patsy and Louise.
Of course the new arrivals were eager to inspect the orange and olive groves, so on the day following that of their arrival the entire party prepared to join Arthur Weldon in a tramp over the three hundred acre ranch.
A little way back of the grounds devoted to the residence and gardens began the orange groves, the dark green foliage just now hung thick with fruit, some green, some pale yellow and others of that deep orange hue which denotes full maturity. “They consider five acres of oranges a pretty fair ranch, out here,” said the young proprietor; “but I have a hundred and ten acres of bearing trees. It will take a good many freight cars to carry my oranges to the eastern markets.”
“And what a job to pick them all!” exclaimed Patsy.
“We don’t pick them,” said Arthur. “I sell the crop on the trees and the purchaser sends a crew of men who gather the fruit in quick order. They are taken to big warehouses and sorted into sizes, wrapped and packed and loaded onto cars. That is a separate branch of the business with which we growers have nothing to do.”
Between the orange and the olive groves, and facing a little lane, they came upon a group of adobe huts—a little village in itself. Many children were playing about the yards, while several stalwart Mexicans lounged in the shade quietly smoking their eternal cigarettes. Women appeared in the doorways, shading their eyes with their hands as they curiously examined the approaching strangers.
Only one man, a small, wiry fellow with plump brown cheeks and hair and beard of snowy whiteness, detached himself from the group and advanced to meet his master. Removing his wide sombrero he made a sweeping bow, a gesture so comical that Patsy nearly laughed aloud.
“This is Miguel Zaloa, the ranchero, who has charge of all my men,” said Arthur. Then, addressing the man, he asked: “Any news, Miguel?”
“Ever’thing all right, Meest Weld,” replied the ranchero, his bright eyes earnestly fixed upon his employer’s face. “Some pardon, señor; but—Mees Jane is well?”
“Quite well, thank you, Miguel.”
“Mees Jane,” said the man, shyly twirling his hat in his hands as he cast an upward glance at the young ladies, “ees cherub young lade; much love an’ beaut’ful. Ees not?”
“She’s a dear,” replied Patsy, with ready sympathy for the sentiment and greatly pleased to find the man so ardent an admirer of the baby.
“Ever’bod’ love Mees Jane,” continued old Miguel, simply. “Since she have came, sun ees more bright, air ees more good, tamale ees more sweet. Will Inez bring Mees Jane to see us to-day, Meest Weld?”
“Perhaps so,” laughed Arthur; and then, as he turned to lead them to the olive trees, Louise, blushing prettily at the praise bestowed upon her darling, pressed a piece of shining silver into old Miguel’s hand—which he grasped with alacrity and another low bow.
“No doubt he’s right about little Jane,” remarked the major, when they had passed beyond earshot, “but I’ve a faint suspicion the old bandit praised her in order to get the money.”
“Oh, no!” cried Louise; “he’s really sincere. It is quite wonderful how completely all our Mexicans are wrapped up in baby. If Inez doesn’t wheel the baby-cab over to the quarters every day, they come to the house in droves to inquire if ‘Mees Jane’ is well. Their love for her is almost pathetic.”
“Don’t the fellows ever work?” inquired Uncle John.
“Yes, indeed,” said Arthur. “Have you any fault to find with the condition of this ranch? As compared with many others it is a model of perfection. At daybreak the mules are cultivating the earth around the trees; when the sun gets low the irrigating begins. We keep the harrows and the pumps busy every day. But during the hours when the sun shines brightest the Mexicans do not love to work, and it is policy—so long as they accomplish their tasks—to allow them to choose their own hours for labor.”
“They seem a shiftless lot,” said the major.
“They’re as good as their average type. But some—old Miguel, for instance—are better than the ordinary. Miguel is really a clever and industrious fellow. He has lived here practically all his life and knows intimately every tree on the place.”
“Did he serve the old Spanish don—Cristoval?” asked Beth.
“Yes; and his father before him. I’ve often wondered how old Miguel is. According to his own story he must be nearly a hundred; but that’s absurd. Anyhow, he’s a faithful, capable fellow, and rules the others with the rigor of an autocrat. I don’t know what I should do without him.”
“You seem to have purchased a lot of things with this ranch,” observed Uncle John. “A capital old mansion, a band of trained servants, and—a ghost.”
“Oh, yes!” exclaimed Louise. “Major, did the ghost bother you last night?”
“Not to my knowledge,” said the old soldier. “I was too tired to keep awake, you know; therefore his ghostship could not have disturbed me without being unusually energetic.”
“Have you ever seen the ghost, Louise?” inquired Patsy.
“No, dear, nor even heard it. But Arthur has. It’s in the blue room, you know, near Arthur’s study—one of the prettiest rooms in the house.”
“That’s why we gave it to the major,” added Arthur. “Once or twice, when I’ve been sitting in the study, at about midnight, reading and smoking my pipe, I’ve heard some queer noises coming from the blue room; but I attribute them to rats. These old houses are full of the pests and we can’t manage to get rid of them.”
“I imagine the walls are not all solid,” explained Louise, “for some of those on the outside are from six to eight feet in thickness, and it would be folly to make them of solid adobe.”
“As for that, adobe costs nothing,” said Arthur, “and it would be far cheaper to make a solid wall than a hollow one. But between the blocks are a lot of spaces favored as residences by our enemies the rats, and there they are safe from our reach.”
“But the ghost?” demanded Patsy.
“Oh, the ghost exists merely in the minds of the simple Mexicans, over there at the quarters. Most of them were here when that rascally old Cristoval died, and no money would hire one of them to sleep in the house. You see, they feared and hated the old fellow, who doubtless treated them cruelly. That is why we had to get our house servants from a distance, and even then we had some difficulty in quieting their fears when they heard the ghost tales. Little Inez,” added Louise, “is especially superstitious, and I’m sure if she were not so devoted to baby she would have left us weeks ago.”
“Inez told me this morning,” said Beth, “that the major must be a very brave man and possessed some charm that protected him from ghosts, or he would never dare sleep in the blue room.”
“I have a charm,” declared the major, gravely, “and it’s just common sense.”
But now they were among the graceful, broad-spreading olives, at this season barren of fruit but very attractive in their gray-green foliage. Arthur had to explain all about olive culture to the ignorant Easterners and he did this with much satisfaction because he had so recently acquired the knowledge himself.
“I can see,” said Uncle John, “that your ranch is to be a great gamble. In good years, you win; a crop failure will cost you a fortune.”
“True,” admitted the young man; “but an absolute crop failure is unknown in this section. Some years are better than others, but all are good years.”
It was quite a long tramp, but a very pleasant one, and by the time they returned to the house everyone was ready for luncheon, which awaited them in the shady court, beside the splashing fountain. Patsy and Beth demanded the baby, so presently Inez came with little Jane, and Mildred Travers followed after. The two nurses did not seem on very friendly terms, for the Mexican girl glared fiercely at her rival and Mildred returned a basilisk stare that would have confounded anyone less defiant.
This evident hostility amused Patsy, annoyed Beth and worried Louise; but the baby was impartial. From her seat on Inez’ lap little Jane stretched out her tiny hands to Mildred, smiling divinely, and the nurse took the child in spite of Inez’ weak resistance, fondling the little one lovingly. There was a sharp contrast between Mildred’s expert and adroit handling of the child and Inez’ tender awkwardness, and this was so evident that all present noticed it.
Perhaps Inez herself felt this difference as, sullen and jealous, she eyed the other intently. Then little Jane transferred her favors to her former nurse and held out her hands to Inez. With a cry that was half a sob the girl caught the baby in her arms and held it so closely that Patsy had hard work to make her give it up.
By the time Uncle John had finished his lunch both Patsy and Beth had taken turns holding the fascinating “Toodlums,” and now the latter plunged Jane into Mr. Merrick’s lap and warned him to be very careful.
Uncle John was embarrassed but greatly delighted. He cooed and clucked to the baby until it fairly laughed aloud with glee, and then he made faces until the infant became startled and regarded him with grave suspicion.
“If you’ve done making an old fool of yourself, sir,” said the major severely, “you’ll oblige me by handing over my niece.”
“_Your_ niece!” was the indignant reply; “she’s nothing of the sort. Jane is _my_ niece.”
“No more than mine,” insisted the major; “and you’re worrying her. Will you hand her over, you selfish man, or must I take her by force?”
Uncle John reluctantly submitted to the divorce and the major handled the baby as if she had been glass.
“Ye see,” he remarked, lapsing slightly into his Irish brogue, as he was apt to do when much interested, “I’ve raised a daughter meself, which John Merrick hasn’t, and I know the ways of the wee women. They know very well when a friend has ’em, and—Ouch! Leg-go, I say!”
Little Jane had his grizzly moustache fast in two chubby fists and the major’s howls aroused peals of laughter.
Uncle John nearly rolled from his chair in an ecstacy of delight and he could have shaken Mildred Travers for releasing the grip of the baby fingers and rescuing the major from torture.
“Laugh, ye satyr!” growled the major, wiping the tears from his own eyes. “It’s lucky you have no hair nor whiskers—any more than an egg—or you’d be writhing in agony before now.” He turned to look wonderingly at the crowing baby in Mildred’s arms. “It’s a female Sandow!” he averred. “The grip of her hands is something marvelous!”
CHAPTER V—INEZ THREATENS
“Yes,” said Louise, a week later, “we all make fools of ourselves over Toodlums, Really, girls, Jane is a very winning baby. I don’t say that because I’m her mother, understand. If she were anyone else’s baby, I’d say the same thing.”
“Of course,” agreed Patsy. “I don’t believe such a baby was ever before born. She’s so happy, and sweet, and—and—”
“And comfortable,” said Beth. “Indeed, Jane is a born sorceress; she bewitches everyone who beholds her dear dimpled face. This is an impartial opinion, you know; I’d say the same thing if I were not her adoring auntie.”
“It’s true,” Patsy declared. “Even the Mexicans worship her. And Mildred Travers—the sphinx—whose blood I am sure is ice-water, displays a devotion for baby that is absolutely amazing. I don’t blame her, you know, for it must be a real delight to care for such a fairy. I’m surprised, Louise, that you can bear to have baby out of your sight so much of the time.”
Louise laughed lightly.
“I’m not such an unfeeling mother as you think,” she answered. “I know just where baby is every minute and she is never out of my thoughts. However, with two nurses, both very competent, to care for Toodlums, I do not think it necessary to hold her in my lap every moment.”
Here Uncle John and the major approached the palm, under which the three nieces were sitting, and Mr. Merrick exclaimed:
“I’ll bet a cookie you were talking of baby Jane.”
“You’d win, then,” replied Patsy. “There’s no other topic of conversation half so delightful.”
“Jane,” observed the major, musingly, as he seated himself in a rustic chair. “A queer name for a baby, Louise. Whatever possessed you to burden the poor infant with it?”
“Burden? Nonsense, Major! It’s a charming name,” cried Patsy.
“She is named after poor Aunt Jane,” said Louise.
A silence somewhat awkward followed.
“My sister Jane,” remarked Uncle John gravely, “was in some respects an admirable woman.”
“And in many others detestable,” said Beth in frank protest. “The only good thing I can remember about Aunt Jane,” she added, “is that she brought us three girls together, when we had previously been almost unaware of one anothers’ existence. And she made us acquainted with Uncle John.”
“Then she did us another favor,” added Patsy. “She died.”
“Poor Aunt Jane!” sighed Louise. “I wish I could say something to prove that I revere her memory. Had the baby been a boy, its name would have been John; but being a girl I named her for Uncle John’s sister—the highest compliment I could conceive.”
Uncle John nodded gratefully. “I wasn’t especially fond of Jane, myself,” said he, “but it’s a family name and I’m glad you gave it to baby.”
“Jane Merrick,” said the major, “was very cruel to Patsy and to me, and so I’m sorry you gave her name to baby.”
“Always contrary, eh?” returned Uncle John, with a tolerant smile, for he was in no wise disturbed by this adverse criticism of his defunct sister—a criticism that in fact admitted little argument. “But it occurs to me that the most peculiar thing about this name is that you three girls, who were once Aunt Jane’s nieces, are now Niece Jane’s aunts!”
“Except me,” smiled Louise. “I’m happy to claim a closer relationship. But returning to our discussion of Aunt Jane. She was really instrumental in making our fortunes as well as in promoting our happiness, so I have no regret because I made baby her namesake.”
“The name of Jane,” said Patsy, “is in itself beautiful, because it is simple and old-fashioned. Now that it is connected with my chubby niece it will derive a new and added luster.”
“Quite true,” declared Uncle John.
“Where is Arthur?” inquired the major.
“Writing his weekly batch of letters,” replied Arthur’s wife. “When they are ready he is to drive us all over to town in the big car, and we have planned to have lunch there and to return home in the cool of the evening. Will that program please our guests?”
All voiced their approval and presently Arthur appeared with his letters and bade them get ready for the ride, while he brought out the car. He always drove the machine himself, as no one on the place was competent to act as chauffeur; but he managed it admirably and enjoyed driving.
Louise went to the nursery to kiss little Jane. The baby lay in her crib, fast asleep. Near her sat Mildred Travers, reading a book. Crouched in the window-seat was Inez, hugging her knees and gazing moodily out into the garden.
The nursery was in the East Wing, facing the courtyard but also looking upon the rose garden, its one deep-set window being near a corner of the room. On one side it connected with a small chamber used by Inez, which occupied half the depth of the wing and faced the garden. The other half of the space was taken by a small sewing-room letting out upon the court.
At the opposite side of little Jane’s nursery was a roomy chamber which had been given up to Mildred, and still beyond this were the rooms occupied by Arthur and Louise, all upon the ground floor. By this arrangement the baby had a nurse on either side and was only one room removed from its parents.
This wing was said to be the oldest part of the mansion, a fact attested by the great thickness of the walls. Just above was the famous blue room occupied by the major, where ghosts were supposed at times to hold their revels. Yet, despite its clumsy construction, the East Wing was cheery and pleasant in all its rooms and sunlight flooded it the year round.
After the master and mistress had driven away to town with their guests, Inez sat for a time by the window, still motionless save for an occasional wicked glance over her shoulder at Mildred, who read placidly as she rocked to and fro in her chair. The presence of the American nurse seemed to oppress the girl, for not a semblance of friendship had yet developed between the two; so presently Inez rose and glided softly out into the court, leaving Mildred to watch the sleeping baby.
She took the path that led to the Mexican quarters and ten minutes later entered the hut where Bella, the skinny old hag who was the wife to Miguel Zaloa, was busy with her work.
“Ah, Inez. But where ees Mees Jane?” was the eager inquiry.
Inez glanced around to find several moustached faces in the doorway. Every dark, earnest eye repeated the old woman’s question. The girl shrugged her shoulders.
“She is care for by the new nurse, Meeldred. I left her sleeping.”
“Who sleeps, Inez?” demanded the aged Miguel. “Ees it the new nurse, or Mees Jane?”
“Both, perhap.” She laughed scornfully and went out to the shed that connected two of the adobe dwellings and served as a shady lounging place. Here a group quickly formed around her, including those who followed from the hut.
“I shall kill her, some day,” declared the girl, showing her gleaming teeth. “What right have she to come an’ take our baby?”
Miguel stroked his white moustache reflectively.
“Ees this Meeldred good to Mees Jane?” he asked.
“When anyone looks, yes,” replied Inez reluctantly. “She fool even baby, some time, who laugh at her. But poor baby do not know. I know. This Meeldred ees a devil!” she hissed.
The listening group displayed no emotion at this avowal. They eyed the girl attentively, as if expecting to hear more. But Inez, having vented her spite, now sulked.
“Where she came from?” asked Miguel, the recognized spokesman.
“Back there. New York,” tossing her head in an easterly direction.
“Why she come?” continued the old man.
“The little mans with no hair—Meest Merrick—he think I not know about babies. He think this girl who learns babies in school, an’ from books, know more than me who has care for many baby—but for none like our Mees Jane. Mees Jane ees angel!”
They all nodded in unison, approving her assertion.
“Eet ees not bad thought, that,” remarked old Bella. “Books an’ schools ees good to teach wisdom.”
“Pah! Not for babies,” objected her husband, shaking his head. “Book an’ school can not grow orange, either. To do a thing many time ees to know it better than a book can know.”
“Besides,” said Inez, “this Meeldred ees witch-woman.”
“Yes?”
“I know it. She come from New York. But yesterday she say to me: ‘Let us wheel leetle Jane to the live oak at Burney’s.’ How can she know there is live oak at Burney’s? Then, the first day she come, she say: ‘Take baby’s milk into vault under your room an’ put on stone shelf to keep cool.’ I, who live here, do not know of such a vault. She show me some stone steps in one corner, an’ she push against stone wall. Then wall open like door, an’ I find vault. But how she know it, unless she is witch-woman?”
There was a murmur of astonishment. Old Miguel scratched his head as if puzzled.
“I, too, know about thees vault,” said he; “but then, eet ees I know all of the old house, as no one else know. Once I live there with Señor Cristoval. But how can thees New York girl know?”
There was no answer. Merely puzzled looks.
“What name has she, Inez?” suddenly asked Miguel.
“Travers. Meeldred Travers.”
The old man thought deeply and then shook his head with a sigh.
“In seexty year there be no Travers near El Cajon,” he asserted. “I thought maybe she have been here before. But no. Even in old days there ees no Travers come here.”
“There ees a Travers Ranch over at the north,” asserted Bella.
“Eet ees a name; there be no Travers live there,” declared Miguel, still with that puzzled look upon his plump features.
Inez laughed at him.
“She is witch-woman, I tell you. I know it! Look in her eyes, an’ see.”
The group of Mexicans moved uneasily. Old Miguel deliberately rolled a cigarette and lighted it.
“Thees woman I have not yet see,” he announced, after due reflection. “But, if she ees witch-woman, eet ees bad for Mees Jane to be near her.”
“That is what _I_ say!” cried Inez eagerly. She spoke better English than the others. “She will bewitch my baby; she will make it sickly, so it will die!” And she wrung her hands in piteous misery.
The Mexicans exchanged frightened looks. Old Bella alone seemed unaffected.
“Mees Weld own her baby—not us,” suggested Miguel’s wife. “If Mees Weld theenk thees girl is safe nurse, what have we to say—eh?”
“I say she shall not kill my baby!” cried Inez fiercely. “That is what _I_ say, Bella. Before she do that, I kill thees Meeldred Travers.”
Miguel examined the girl’s face intently.
“You are fool, Inez,” he asserted. “It ees bad to keel anything—even thees New York witch-woman. Be compose an’ keep watch. Nothing harm Mees Jane if you watch. Where are your folks, girl?”
“Live in San Diego,” replied Inez, again sullen.
“Once I know your father. He ees good man, but drink too much. If you make quarrel about thees new nurse, you get sent home. Then you lose Mees Jane. So keep compose, an’ watch. If you see anything wrong, come to me an’ tell it. That ees best.”
Inez glanced around the group defiantly, but all nodded approval of old Miguel’s advice. She rose from the bench where she was seated, shrugged her shoulders disdainfully and walked away without a word.
CHAPTER VI—A DINNER WITH THE NEIGHBORS
Escondido, the nearest town and post office to El Cajon Ranch, is a quaint little place with a decided Mexican atmosphere. Those California inhabitants whom we call, for convenience, “Mexicans,” are not all natives of Mexico, by any means. Most of them are a mixed breed derived from the early Spanish settlers and the native Indian tribes—both alike practically extinct in this locality—and have never stepped foot in Mexican territory, although the boundary line is not far distant. Because the true Mexican is generally a similar admixture of Indian and Spaniard, it is customary to call these Californians by the same appellation. The early Spaniards left a strong impress upon this state, and even in the newly settled districts the Spanish architecture appropriately prevails, as typical of a semi-tropical country which owed its first civilizing influences to old Spain.
The houses of Escondido are a queer mingling of modern bungalows and antique adobe dwellings. Even the business street shows many adobe structures. A quiet, dreamy little town, with a comfortable hotel and excellent stores, it is much frequented by the wealthy ranchers in its neighborhood.
After stopping at the post office, Arthur drove down a little side street to a weather-beaten, unprepossessing building which bore the word “Restaurant” painted in dim white letters upon its one window. Here he halted the machine.
“Oh,” said Beth, drawing a long breath. “Is this one of your little jokes, Arthur?”
“A joke? Didn’t we come for luncheon, then?”
“We did, and I’m ravenous,” said Patsy. “But you informed us that there is a good hotel here, on the main street.”
“So there is,” admitted Arthur; “but it’s like all hotels. Now, this is—different. If you’re hungry; if you want a treat—something out of the ordinary—just follow me.”
Louise was laughing at their doubting expressions and this care-free levity led them to obey their host’s injunction. Then the dingy door opened and out stepped a young fellow whom the girls decided must be either a cowboy or a clever imitation of one.
He seemed very young—a mere boy—for all his stout little form. He was bareheaded and a shock of light, tow-colored hair was in picturesque disarray. A blue flannel shirt, rolled up at the sleeves, a pair of drab corduroy trousers and rough shoes completed his attire. Pausing awkwardly in the doorway, he first flushed red and then advanced boldly to shake Arthur’s hand.
“Why, Weldon, this is an unexpected pleasure,” he exclaimed in a pleasant voice that belied his rude costume, for its tones were well modulated and cultured. “I’ve been trying to call you up for three days, but something is wrong with the line. How’s baby?”
This last question was addressed to Louise, who shook the youth’s hand cordially.
“Baby is thriving finely,” she reported, and then introduced her friends to Mr. Rudolph Hahn, who, she explained, was one of their nearest neighbors.
“We almost crowd the Weldons,” he said, “for our house is only five miles distant from theirs; so we’ve been getting quite chummy since they moved to El Cajon. Helen—that’s my wife, you know—is an humble worshiper at the shrine of Miss Jane Weldon, as we all are, in fact.”
“Your wife!” cried Patsy in surprise.
He laughed.
“You think I’m an infant, only fit to play with Jane,” said he; “but I assure you I could vote, if I wanted to—which I don’t. I think, sir,” turning to Uncle John, “that my father knows you quite well.”
“Why, surely you’re not the son of Andy Hahn, the steel king?”
“I believe they do give him that royal title; but Dad is only a monarch in finance, and when he visits my ranch he’s as much a boy as his son.”
“It scarcely seems possible,” declared Mr. Merrick, eyeing the rough costume wonderingly but also with approval. “How long have you lived out here?”
“Six years, sir. I’m an old inhabitant. Weldon, here, has only been alive for six months.”
“Alive?”
“Of course. One breathes, back east, but only lives in California.”
During the laughter that followed this enthusiastic epigram Arthur ushered the party into the quaint Spanish restaurant. The room was clean and neat, despite the fact that the floor was strewn with sawdust and the tables covered with white oilcloth. An anxious-eyed, dapper little man with a foreign face and manner greeted them effusively and asked in broken English their commands.
Arthur ordered the specialties of the house. “These friends, Castro, are from the far East, and I’ve told them of your famous cuisine. Don’t disappoint them.”
“May I join you?” asked Rudolph Hahn. “I wish I’d brought Nell over to-day; she’d have been delighted with this meeting. But we didn’t know you were coming. That confounded telephone doesn’t reach you at all.”
“I’m going over to the office to see about that telephone,” said Arthur. “I believe I’ll do the errand while Castro is preparing his compounds. I’m always uneasy when the telephone is out of order.”
“You ought to be,” said Rudolph, “with that blessed baby in the house. It might save you thirty precious minutes in getting a doctor.”
“Does your line work?” asked Louise.
“Yes; it seems to get all connections but yours. So I imagine something is wrong with your phone, or near the house.”
“I’ll have them send a repair man out at once,” said Arthur, and departed for the telephone office, accompanied by his fellow rancher.
While they were gone Louise told them something of young Hahn’s history. He had eloped, at seventeen years of age, with his father’s stenographer, a charming girl of eighteen who belonged to one of the best families in Washington. Old Hahn was at first furious and threatened to disinherit the boy, but when he found the young bride’s family still more furious and preparing to annul the marriage on the grounds of the groom’s youth, the great financier’s mood changed and he whisked the pair off to California and bought for them a half-million-dollar ranch, where they had lived for six years a life of unalloyed bliss. Having no children of their own, the Hahns were devoted to little Jane and it was Rudolph who had given the baby the sobriquet of “Toodlums.” At almost any time, night or day, the Hahn automobile was liable to arrive at El Cajon for a sight of the baby.
“Rudolph—we call him ‘Dolph,’ you know—has not a particle of business instinct,” said Louise, “so he will never be able to take his father’s place in the financial world. And he runs his ranch so extravagantly that it costs the pater a small fortune every year. Yet they are agreeable neighbors, artless and unconventional as children, and surely the great Hahn fortune won’t suffer much through their inroads.”
When Arthur returned he brought with him still another neighboring ranchman, an enormous individual fully six feet tall and broad in proportion, who fairly filled the doorway as he entered. This man was about thirty years of age, stern of feature and with shaggy brows that overhung a pair of peaceful blue eyes which ought to have been set in the face of some child. This gave him a whimsical look that almost invariably evoked a smile when anyone observed him for the first time. He walked with a vigorous, aggressive stride and handled his big body with consummate grace and ease. His bow, when Arthur introduced him, was that of an old world cavalier.
“Here is another of our good friends for you to know. He’s our neighbor at the north and is considered the most enterprising orange grower in all California,” announced Weldon, with a chuckle that indicated he had said something funny.
“Lemon,” said the man, speaking in such a shrill, high-pitched tenor voice that the sound was positively startling, coming from so massive a chest.
“I meant lemon,” Arthur hastened to say. “Permit me to introduce Mr. Bulwer Runyon, formerly of New York but now the pride of the Pacific coast, where his superb oranges—”
“Lemons,” piped the high, childish voice.
“Whose lemons are the sourest and—and—juiciest ever grown.”
“What there are of them,” added the man in a wailing tenor.
“We are highly honored to meet Mr. Bulwer Runyon,” said the major, noticing that the girls were for once really embarrassed how to greet this new acquaintance.
“Out here,” remarked Dolph Hahn, with a grin, “we drop the handle to his name and call him ‘Bul Run’ for short. Sounds sort of patriotic, you know, and it’s not inappropriate.”
“You wrong me,” said the big rancher, squeaking the words cheerfully but at the same time frowning in a way that might well have terrified a pirate. “I’m not a bull and I don’t run. It’s enough exertion to walk. Therefore I ride. My new car is equipped with one of those remarkable—”
“Pardon me; we will not discuss your new car, if you please,” said Arthur. “We wish to talk of agreeable things. The marvelous Castro is concocting some of his mysterious dishes and we wish you to assist us in judging their merits.”
“I shall be glad to, for I’m pitifully hungry,” said the tenor voice. “I had breakfast at seven, you know—like a working man—and the ride over here in my new six-cylinder machine, which has a wonderful—”
“Never mind the machine, please. Forget it, and try to be sociable,” begged Dolph.
“How is the baby, Mrs. Weldon?”
“Well and hearty, Bulwer,” replied Louise. “Why haven’t you been to see little Jane lately?”
“I heard you had company,” said Mr. Runyon; “and the last time I came I stayed three days and forgot all about my ranch. I’ve made a will, Mrs. Weldon.”
“A will! You’re not going to die, I hope?”
“I join you in that hope, most fervently, for I’d hate to leave the new machine and its—”
“Go on, Bulwer.”
“But life is fleeting, and no one knows just when it’ll get to the end of its fleet. Therefore, as I love the baby better than any other object on earth—animate or inanimate—except—”
“Never mind your new car.”
He sighed.
“Therefore, Mrs. Weldon, I’ve made Jane my heiress.”
“Oh, Bul! Aren’t you dreadfully in debt?”
“Yes’m.”
“Is the place worth the mortgage?” inquired Arthur.
“Just about, although the money sharks don’t think so. But all property out here is rapidly increasing in value,” declared Runyon, earnestly, “so, if I can manage to hold on a while longer, Toodlums will inherit a—a—several fine lemon trees, at least.”
Uncle John was delighted with the big fellow with the small voice. Even the major clapped Bul Run on the shoulder and said the sentiment did him credit, however big the mortgage might be.
By the time Castro brought in his first surprise—a delicious soup—a jovial and friendly party was gathered around the oilcloth board. Even the paper napkins could not dampen the joy of the occasion, or detract from the exquisite flavor of the broth.
The boyish Dolph bewailed anon the absence of his “Nell,” who loved Castro’s cookery above everything else, while every endeavor of Mr. Runyon to explain the self-starter on his new car was so adroitly headed off by his fellow ranchers that the poor fellow was in despair. The “lunch” turned out to be a seven course dinner and each course introduced such an enticing and unusual dish that every member of the party became an audacious gormandizer. None of the girls—except Louise—had ever tasted such concoctions before, or might even guess what many of them were composed of; but all agreed with Patsy when she energetically asserted that “Castro out-cheffed both Rector and Sherry.”
“If only he would have tablecloths and napkins, and decent rugs upon the floor,” added dainty Louise.
“Oh, that would ruin the charm of the place,” protested Uncle John. “Don’t suggest such a horror to Castro, Louise; at least until after we have returned to New York.”
“I’ll take you riding in my car,” piped Runyon to Beth, who sat beside him. “I don’t have to crank it, you know; I just—”
“Have you sold your orange crop yet?” asked Arthur.
“Lemons, sir!” said the other reproachfully. And the laugh that followed again prevented his explaining the self-starter.
The porch was shady and cool when they emerged from the feast room and Arthur Weldon, as host, proposed they sit on the benches with their coffee and cigars and have a social chat. But both Runyon and Hahn protested this delay. They suggested, instead, that all ride back to El Cajon and play with the baby, and so earnest were they in this desire that the proud young father and mother had not the grace to refuse.
Both men had their cars at the village garage and an hour later the procession started. Beth riding beside “Bul Run” and Patsy accompanying the jolly “Dolph.”
“We must stop and pick up Nell,” said the latter, “for she’d be mad as hops if I went to see Toodlums without her.”
“I don’t wonder,” replied Patsy. “Isn’t my niece a dear baby?”
“Never was one born like her. She’s the only woman I ever knew who refuses to talk.”
“She crows, though.”
“To signify she agrees with everyone on every question; and her angelic smile is so genuine and constant that it gets to your heart in spite of all resistance.”
“And she’s so soft and mushy, as it were,” continued Patsy enthusiastically; “but I suppose she’ll outgrow that, in time.”
Mrs. Helen Hahn, when the three automobiles drew up before her young husband’s handsome residence, promptly agreed to join Rudolph in a visit to the baby. She proved to be a retiring and rather shy young woman, but she was very beautiful and her personality was most attractive. Both Patsy and Beth were delighted to find that Louise had so charming a neighbor, of nearly her own age.
Rudolph would not permit the party to proceed further until all had partaken of a refreshing glass of lemonade, and as this entailed more or less delay the sun was getting low as they traversed the five miles to El Cajon, traveling slowly that they might enjoy the exquisite tintings of the sky. Runyon, who was a bachelor, lived a few miles the other side of Arthur’s ranch. All three ranches had at one time been part of the Spanish grant to the Cristovals, and while Arthur now possessed the old mansion, the greatest number of acres had been acquired by Rudolph Hahn, who had preferred to build for himself and his bride a more modern residence.
CHAPTER VII—GONE!
The Weldons and their guests were greeted at their door by a maid, for there were no men among the house servants, and as Louise ushered the party into the living room she said to the girl:
“Ask Miss Travers to bring the baby here.”
The maid departed and was gone so long that Louise started out to see why her order was not obeyed. She met the woman coming back with a puzzled face.
“Mees Traver not here, señora,” she said.
“Then tell Inez to fetch the baby.”
“Inez not here, señora,” returned the woman.
“Indeed! Then where is baby?”
“Mees Jane not here, señora.”
Louise rushed to the nursery, followed by Arthur, whose quick ears had overheard the statement. The young mother bent over the crib, the covers of which were thrown back as if the infant had been quickly caught up—perhaps from a sound sleep.
“Good gracious!” cried Louise, despairingly; “she’s gone—my baby’s gone!”
“Gone?” echoed Arthur, in a distracted tone. “What does it mean, Louise? Where can she be?”
A gentle hand was laid on his shoulder and Uncle John, who had followed them to the room, said soothingly:
“Don’t get excited, my boy; there’s nothing to worry about. Your two nurses have probably taken little Jane out for a ride.”
“At this time of night?” exclaimed Louise. “Impossible!”
“It is merely twilight; they may have been delayed,” replied Mr. Merrick.
“But the air grows chill at this hour, and—”
“And there is the baby-cab!” added Arthur, pointing to a corner.
Louise and her husband looked into one another’s eyes and their faces grew rigid and white. Uncle John, noting their terror, spoke again.
“This is absurd,” said he. “Two competent nurses, both devoted to little Jane, would not allow the baby to come to harm, I assure you.”
“Where is she, then?” demanded Arthur.
“Hello; what’s up?” called Patsy Doyle, entering the room with Beth to see what was keeping them from their guests.
“Baby’s gone!” wailed Louise, falling into a chair promptly to indulge in a flood of tears.
“Gone? Nonsense,” said Beth, gazing into the empty cradle. Then she put down her hand and felt of the bedding. It had no warmth. Evidently the child had been removed long ago.
“Before we give way to hysterics,” advised Uncle John, striving to appear calm, “let us investigate this matter sensibly. Babies don’t disappear mysteriously, in these days, I assure you.”
“Question the servants,” suggested Patsy.
“That’s the idea,” squeaked a high tenor voice, and there in the dim light stood big Bulwer Runyon, and with him little Rudolph and his wife Helen, all exhibiting astonished and disturbed countenances.
“I—I can’t see any reason for worry, Louise, dear,” remarked Mrs. Hahn, in a voice that trembled with agitation. “Not a soul on earth would harm that precious Jane.”
Arthur turned to the maid.
“Send all the servants here,” he commanded. “Every one of them, mind you!”
Presently they congregated in the roomy nursery, which had now been brilliantly lighted. There were five women—some old and some young, but all Mexicans—and a little withered Chinaman named Sing Fing, whose age was uncertain and whose yellow face seemed incapable of expression.
Uncle John, assisted at times by Rudolph and Arthur, did the questioning. Marcia had seen Miss Travers leave the house, alone, at about two o’clock, as if for a walk. She did not notice which way the nurse went nor whether she returned. Perhaps she wore a cloak; Marcia could not tell. The day was warm; doubtless Miss Travers had no wraps at all. A hat? Oh, no. She would have noticed a hat.
The only one who recollected seeing Inez was Eulalia, a chambermaid. She had observed Inez sitting in the court, in a despondent attitude, at about half past two. Yes; it might have been a little earlier; it was hard to remember. None of the house servants paid much attention to the nurses. They had their own duties to perform.
But the baby had not been seen at all; not since Inez had brought her in from her ride at noon. Then it was Miss Travers who had taken the child from the cab and with her disappeared into the nursery.
This report did not prove reassuring. Sing Fing announced that Miss Travers had prepared the baby’s liquid food in the kitchen at half past twelve, but that neither she nor Inez had joined the other servants at luncheon. This last was not an unusual occurrence, it seemed, but taken in connection with the other circumstances it impressed the questioners as suspicious.
“Perhaps they are all at the Mexican quarters,” exclaimed Patsy, with sudden inspiration.
Arthur and Rudolph immediately volunteered to investigate the quarters and started off on a run.
“It’s all right, you know,” consolingly panted Dolph, on the way. “The baby and her nurses can’t be lost, strayed or stolen, so don’t worry.”
“Common sense urges me to agree with you,” returned Arthur, “but there’s certainly something mysterious about the disappearance.”
“It won’t be mysterious when we discover the reason, you know.”
The men were all at work in the olive groves, but some of the women were in the huts and old Bella listened to Arthur’s frantic questions with blank amazement, as did the others who hastily congregated.
“Thees morn,” said Bella, “Inez bring Mees Jane here for little time—not long time. Then she takes her ’way again.”
“While Inez here,” said another woman, “I see that other—the American nurse—behind hedge, yonder, watching us.”
“How you know that?” demanded Bella sharply, as she turned to the speaker.
“I know because she is stranger,” was the calm reply. “Inez see her, too, an’ that ees why Inez hurry away.”
“Which way did she go?” asked Arthur, and they all pointed to the path that led to the house.
“It doesn’t matter,” suggested Dolph. “We know that both the nurses were in the house afterward. The main point is that the baby is not here.”
As they started to return they came face to face with old Miguel. The shadow was deep beneath the trees but there was no mistaking the Mexican’s snow-white hair.
“Have you seen baby?” demanded Weldon eagerly.
Miguel stared at them. He came nearer, putting his face close to his master’s, and stared harder.
“Mees Jane? You ask for Mees Jane?”
“Yes. Tell me, quick, do you know where she is?”
“Mees Jane mus’ be at house,” said Miguel, passing a hand over his eyes as if bewildered.
“She is not,” said Rudolph. “She is gone, and both her nurses are gone.”
“Inez gone?” repeated the old man, stupidly. “Ah; then she have carried away Mees Jane! I was ’fraid of that.”
“Carried her away! Why should she do that?” asked Arthur impatiently.
“She jealous of New York girl—Mees Travers. Inez say she kill Mees Travers; but I tell her no. I say better not. But Inez hate thees girl for taking Mees Jane away from her. Inez love baby, Meest Weld; too much to be safe nurse.”
While Arthur tried to comprehend this strange information Rudolph said to Miguel:
“Then you haven’t seen the baby? You don’t know where she is?”
The old Mexican gave him a keen look.
“No, Meest Hahn.”
“You don’t know where Inez has gone?”
“No, Meest Hahn.”
“Nor the other nurse—the American girl?”
“No, Meest Hahn.”
They hurried back to the house, leaving the old Mexican standing motionless beside the path.
CHAPTER VIII—VERY MYSTERIOUS
Arthur found Louise developing hysteria, while Beth, Patsy and Helen Hahn were working over her and striving to comfort her. Uncle John, the major and big Runyon stood gazing helplessly at the dolorous scene.
“Well? Well?” cried Mr. Merrick, as Weldon and young Hahn entered. “Any news?”
Arthur shook his head and went to his wife, bending over to kiss her forehead.
“Be brave, dear!” he whispered.
It needed but this tender admonition to send the young mother into new paroxysms.
“See here; we’re wasting time,” protested Runyon, his voice reaching high C in his excitement. “Something must be done!”
“Of course,” cried Patsy, turning from Louise. “We’re a lot of ninnies. Let us think what is best to do and map out a logical program.”
The others looked at her appealingly, glad to have some one assume command but feeling themselves personally unequal to the task of thinking logically.
“First,” said the girl, firmly, “let us face the facts. Baby Jane has mysteriously disappeared, and with her the two nurses.”
“Not necessarily with her,” objected Rudolph. “Let us say the two nurses have also disappeared. Now, the question is, why?”
A shriek from Louise emphasised the query.
“Don’t let’s bother with the ‘why?’” retorted Patsy. “We don’t care why. The vital question is ‘where?’ All we want, just now, is to find baby and get her back home again to her loving friends. She can’t have been gone more than four hours—or five, at the most. Therefore she isn’t so far away that an automobile can’t overtake her.”
“But she can’t walk, you know,” squeaked Runyon. “Baby didn’t go alone; some one took her.”
“True enough,” observed Uncle John. “You’re wrong, Patsy. We must try to decide who took baby, and why. Then we might undertake the search with a chance of success.”
“Whoever took baby went on foot,” persisted Miss Doyle. “The only four automobiles in the neighborhood are now standing in our driveway and in the garage. This is a country of great distances, and no matter in what direction the baby has been taken an auto is sure to overhaul her, if we don’t waste valuable time in getting started.”
“That’s right!” cried Arthur, turning from Louise. “The theory agrees with old Miguel’s suspicion about Inez, and—”
“What suspicion?” cried half a dozen.
“Never mind that,” said Rudolph, with a hasty glance toward Louise; “let’s be off, and talk afterward.”
“We men must decide on our routes and all take the road at once,” proposed Rudolph.
“It’s pitch dark,” said Runyon.
“Would you like to wait until morning?” demanded Rudolph, sarcastically.
“No; I want to rescue that baby,” said the big fellow.
“Then take the north road, as far as Tungar’s ranch. Stop at every house to inquire. When you get to Tungar’s, come back by the McMillan road. That’s a sixty mile jaunt, and it will cover the north and northwest. Take Mr. Merrick with you. Now, then, off you go!”
Runyon nodded and left the room, followed gladly by Uncle John, who longed to be doing something that would count. The others soon heard the roar of the motor car as it started away on its quest.
Then it was arranged for Arthur to drive back to Escondido to make inquiries and to watch the departure of the evening train, the only one to pass the station since baby had been missing. He was to carry Major Doyle with him and return by another route. Hahn promised to cover with his own car the only other two roads that remained to be searched, and he figured that they would all return to the house within two or three hours, when—if still there was no news—they might plan a further pursuit of the fugitive baby.
Helen Hahn had promised not to leave Louise until baby was found, and before starting Arthur assisted his wife to her room, where he left her weeping dismally one moment and screaming for little Jane the next.
Sing Fing had sent a maid to announce dinner, but no one paid any attention to the summons.
After the three automobiles had departed, Patsy and Beth remained in the nursery and left Helen and a maid with Louise. Once alone, Miss Doyle said to her cousin:
“Having started them upon the search, Beth, you and I must take up that pertinent suggestion made by Mr. Hahn and face the important question: ‘Why?’”
“I’m dying to be of some use, dear,” responded Beth in a disconsolate tone, “but I fear we two girls are quite helpless. How can _we_ tell why the baby has been stolen?”
“Has she been stolen?” inquired Patsy. “We mustn’t take even that for granted. Let us be sensible and try to marshal our wits. Here’s the fact: baby’s gone. Here’s the problem: why?”
“We don’t know,” said Beth. “No one knows.”
“Of course some one knows. Little Jane, as our friend Bul Run reminded us, can’t walk. If she went away, she was carried. By whom? And why? And where?”
“Dear me!” cried Beth, despairingly; “if we knew all that, we could find baby.”
“Exactly. So let’s try to acquire the knowledge.”
She went into Mildred’s room and made an examination of its contents. The place seemed in its usual order, but many of Mildred’s trinkets and personal possessions were scattered around.
“Her absence wasn’t premeditated,” decided Patsy. “Her white sweater is gone, but that is all. This fact, however, may prove that she expected to be out after dark. It is always chilly in this country after sundown and doubtless Mildred knew that.”
“Why, she used to live here!” cried Beth. “Of course she knew.”
Patsy sat down and looked at her cousin attentively.
“That is news to me,” she said in a tone that indicated she had made a discovery. “Do you mean that Mildred once lived in this neighborhood?”
“Yes; very near here. She told me she had known this old house well years ago, when she was a girl. She used to visit it in company with her father, a friend of old Señor Cristoval.”
“Huh!” exclaimed Patsy. “That’s queer, Why didn’t she tell us this, when we first proposed bringing her out here?”
“I don’t know. I remember she was overjoyed when I first suggested her coming, but I supposed that was because she had at last found a paying job.”
“When did she tell you of this?”
“Just lately.”
“What else did she say?”
“Nothing more. I asked if she had any relatives or friends living here now, but she did not reply.”
“Beth, I’m astonished!” asserted Patsy, with a grave face. “This complicates matters.”
“I don’t see why.”
“Because, if Mildred knows this neighborhood, and wanted to steal baby and secrete her, she could take little Jane to her unknown friends and we could never discover her hiding-place.”
“Why should Mildred Travers wish to steal baby?” asked Beth.
“For a reward—a ransom. She knows that Arthur Weldon is rich, and that Uncle John is richer, and she also knows that dear little Toodlums is the pride of all our hearts. If she demands a fortune for the return of baby, we will pay it at once.”
“And prosecute her abductor, Mildred, afterward,” said Beth. “No, Patsy; I don’t believe she’s that sort of a girl, at all.”
“We know nothing of her history. She is secretive and reserved. Mildred’s cold, hard eyes condemn her as one liable to do anything. And this was such an easy way for her to make a fortune.”
Beth was about to protest this severe judgment, but on second thought remained silent. Appearances were certainly against Mildred Travers and Beth saw no reason to champion her, although she confessed to herself that she had liked the girl and been interested in helping her.
“We have still Inez to consider,” said she. “What has become of the Mexican girl?”
“We are coming to her presently,” replied Patsy. “Let us finish with Mildred first. A girl who has evidently had a past, which she guards jealously. A poor girl, whose profession scarcely earned her bread-and-butter before we engaged her. A girl whose eyes repel friendship; who has little to lose by kidnapping Jane in the attempt to secure a fortune. She was fond of baby; I could see that myself; so she won’t injure our darling but will take good care of her until we pay the money, when Toodlums will be restored to us, smiling and crowing as usual. Beth, if this reasoning is correct, we needn’t worry. By to-morrow morning Arthur will receive the demand for ransom, and he will lose no time in satisfying Mildred’s cupidity.”
“Very good reasoning,” said Beth; “but I don’t believe a word of it.”
“I hope it is true,” said Patsy, “for otherwise we are facing a still worse proposition.”
“Inez?”
“Yes. Inez isn’t clever; she doesn’t care for money; she would not steal Jane for a ransom. But the Mexican girl worships baby in every fibre of her being. She would die for baby; she—” lowering her voice to a whisper, “she would _kill_ anyone for baby.”
Beth shivered involuntarily as Patsy uttered this horrible assertion.
“You mean—”
“Now, let us look at this matter calmly. Inez has, from the first, resented the employment of Mildred as chief nurse. She has hated Mildred with a deadly hatred and brooded over her fancied wrongs until she has lost all sense of reason. She feared that in the end baby Jane would be taken away from her, and this thought she could not bear. Therefore she has stolen baby and carried her away, so as to have the precious one always in her keeping.”
“And Mildred?” asked Beth.
“Well, in regard to Mildred, there are two conjectures to consider. She may have discovered that Inez had stolen baby and is now following in pursuit. Or—”
“Or what, dear?” as imaginative Patsy hesitated, appalled by her own mental suggestion.
“Or in a fit of anger Inez murdered Mildred and hid her body. Then, to escape the penalty of her crime, she ran away and took baby with her. Either one of these suppositions would account for the absence of both nurses.”
Beth looked at her cousin in amazement.
“I think,” said she, “you’d better go and get something to eat; or a cup of tea, at least. This excitement is—is—making you daffy, Patsy dear.”
“Pah! Food would disgust me. And I’m not crazy, Beth. Dreadful things happen in this world, at times, and Louise has a queer lot of people around her. Think a moment. Our baby has disappeared. Her two nurses, neither of whom are especially trustworthy, have also disappeared. There’s a reason, Beth, and you may be sure it’s not any common, ordinary reason, either. I’m trying to be logical in my deductions and to face the facts sensibly.”
“Inez would be as careful of baby’s welfare as would Mildred.”
“I realize that. If I thought for a moment that baby was in any peril I would go distracted, and scream louder than poor Louise is doing. Do you hear her? Isn’t it awful?”
“Let us tell Louise these things,” said Beth, rising from her chair. “What you call your ‘deductions’ are terribly tragic, Patsy, but they reassure us about baby. Shall we go to Louise?”
“I think it will be better,” decided Patsy, and they left the nursery and stepped out into the court. At the far end of the open space stood huddled a group of men, all of whom bore lanterns. Patsy advanced to the group and discovered them to be the Mexican laborers from the quarters. Old Miguel advanced a pace and bowed.
“We search for baby—for Mees Jane—eh?” he said, questioningly, as if desiring instructions.
“That is a happy thought, Miguel,” replied the girl. “The others are scouring the roads in their motor cars, but the country needs searching, too—away from the roads, in the fields and orchards. Send your men out at once, and scatter them in all directions.”
Miguel turned and rapidly harangued his followers in the Spanish patois. One by one they turned and vanished into the night. Only the old man remained.
“Ever’bod’ love Mees Jane,” he said simply. “They all want to find her, an’ ask me to let ’em go. Good. They will search well.”
In spite of the words there was a tone of indifference in Miguel’s voice that attracted the girl’s notice. He did not seem in the least worried or agitated, nor did he appear to attach much importance to the search. Yet Patsy knew the aged foreman was one of “Mees Jane’s” most devoted admirers.
“Where do you think baby is?” she asked abruptly.
“Quien sabe?” he answered, and then in English, “who knows?”
“Be sensible, Miguel! No one would hurt the dear child, I’m sure.”
His dark features wrinkled in an engaging smile.
“No one would hurt Mees Jane. I believe it.”
“But some one has carried her away.”
He shrugged his shoulders.
“Some time she come back,” said he.
“Now, see here, Miguel; you know more than anyone else about this affair. Tell me the truth.”
He raised his brows, shaking his head.
“I know nothing,” said he. “I not worry much; but I know nothing.”
“Then you suspect.”
The old man regarded her curiously; almost suspiciously, Patsy thought.
“What ees suspec’?” he asked. “It ees nothing. To suspec’ ees not to know. Not to know ees—nothing at all.”
The girl stamped her foot impatiently, for she caught Beth smiling at her.
“What is Inez to you, Miguel?” she demanded.
Again he smiled the childlike, engaging smile.
“She ees to me nothing,” said he. “Inez is Mexican, but her family ees not my family. Not all Mexicans ees—re—spec’—ble. Once I know Inez’ father. He drink too much wheesky, an’ the wheesky make heem bad.”
“But you like Inez?”
“She ees good to Mees Jane; but—she have bad tempers.”
Patsy thought a moment.
“Did you know Mildred Travers when she used to live near here?” she asked.
Old Miguel started and took a step forward.
“Where she leeve, when she ees here?” he asked eagerly.
“I don’t know. Have you ever seen her?”
“No. She do not come to our quarters.”
“Wait a minute,” said Patsy, and ran up to her room, leaving Beth to confront the ranchero and to study him with her dark, clear eyes. But she said nothing until her cousin returned and thrust a small kodak print into Miguel’s hand.
“That is Mildred Travers,” said Patsy.
Miguel held up his lantern while he examined the picture and both girls observed that his hand trembled. For a long time he remained bent over the print—an unnecessarily long time, indeed—but when he raised his head his face was impassive as a mask.
“I do not know Mees Travers,” was all he said as he handed back the picture. “Now I go an’ hunt for Mees Jane,” he quickly added.
They watched him turn and noticed that his steps, as he left the court, were tottering and feeble.
“He lied,” said Beth, softly.
“I am sure of it,” agreed Patsy; “but that does not enlighten the mystery any. I’m sorry we brought Mildred to this place. There’s just one thing you can bank on, Beth: that in some way or other Mildred is responsible for the disappearance of our precious Toodlums.”
CHAPTER IX—A FRUITLESS SEARCH
Meantime, Uncle John and big Runyon were bowling along the north road, the lights gleaming from the powerful lanterns of the car and illuminating every object on either side of the way. The road seemed deserted and it was fully twenty minutes before they came to the first ranch house beyond that owned by Runyon himself. Here Mr. Merrick got out to make inquiries.
A tall, slovenly dressed woman answered his ring. She carried an oil lamp in her hand and eyed her late visitor severely.
“Have you seen a woman with a baby pass this way to-day—this afternoon?” asked the little man.
“Yes,” was the reply; “she stopped here for supper.”
Uncle John’s heart gave a great bound.
“Have they gone on?” he inquired.
“Yes; an hour ago.”
“Which way, ma’am?”
She nodded toward the north and Mr. Merrick hastily turned away. Then, pausing as a thought occurred to him, he asked:
“Was the—the baby—quite well, ma’am?”
“Seemed so,” was the gruff answer and she slammed the door.
“Of course she was provoked,” mused Uncle John, as he hurried back to the car. “I forgot to thank her. Never mind; we’ll stop on our way back.”
“Well?” demanded Runyon.
“We’ve got ’em!” was the joyful response. “They stopped here for supper and went on an hour ago. Drive ahead, and keep a sharp lookout.”
“Who stopped here?” asked the other, as he started the car.
“Why the woman with the baby, of course.”
“Which woman?”
“Which one? Oh, I didn’t bother to ask. It doesn’t matter, does it, whether it’s Mildred or Inez. It’s the baby we want.”
Runyon drove on a while in silence.
“Did she describe little Jane accurately?” he asked, in his high, piping tenor.
“She didn’t describe her at all,” said Uncle John, provoked by such insistence. “There isn’t likely to be more than one baby missing, in this lonely section of the country.”
The big rancher made no reply. Both were keenly eyeing every object that fell under the light of the lamps. Presently they caught sight of a small white house half hidden by a grove of tall eucalyptus. There was no driveway, but the car was stopped at the nearest point and Uncle John got out. To his surprise Runyon followed him, saying:
“Two heads are better than one, sir.”
“What do you mean by that, sir?” asked Mr. Merrick, sternly. “Don’t you think I’m competent to ask a question?”
“You don’t ask enough questions,” returned Runyon frankly. “I’m not sure we’re on the right trail.”
“Well, I am,” declared Uncle John, stiffly.
It took then some time to arouse the inhabitants of the house, who seemed to have retired for the night, although it was still early. Finally a woman thrust her head from an upper window.
“What’s wanted?” she inquired in querulous tones.
“Have you seen a woman with a baby pass by here?” called Uncle John.
“No.”
“Thank you, ma’am; sorry to have troubled you,” said the little man, but in a very disappointed voice.
“Hold on a minute!” cried Runyon, as the woman was closing the window. “They told us at the last house that a woman with a baby stopped there for supper.”
“Oh; they did, eh?”
“Yes; and she came in this direction; so we thought you might have seen her.”
“Well, I might, if I’d looked in the glass,” she said with grim humor. “I’m the woman.”
“Oh, indeed!” cried Uncle John, feeling bewildered. “And the baby?”
“Safe asleep, if your yellin’ don’t wake him.”
“Then—it’s—_your_ baby!”
“I’ll swear to that. What do you want, anyhow?”
“We’re looking for a lost baby,” piped Bul Run.
“Then you’ll hev to look somewhere else. I’ve walked all the way to town, an’ back to-day, an’ I’m dead tired. Are you goin’ away, or not?”
They went away. Neither spoke as they again entered the car and started it upon the quest. Five minutes passed; ten; fifteen. Then Mr. Runyon said in a higher key than usual:
“There’s nothing on a car as handy as a self-starter. All you have to do is—”
“Oh, shut up!” growled Uncle John.
They drove more slowly, after this, and maintained a sharp watch; but both men had abandoned all hope of discovering the missing baby on this route. When they reached Tungar’s Ranch they crossed over to a less frequented road known as McMillan’s which would lead them back to El Cajon, but by a roundabout, devious route.
The nearer they drew to the ranch the greater vigilance they displayed, but the road was deserted and no one at any of the ranch houses had seen or heard anything of a stray baby. As they turned into Arthur’s driveway they overtook Rudolph Hahn, just returning from a quest as fruitless as their own. It was now half past nine o’clock.
Arthur Weldon and Major Doyle had both realized that the route awarded them was the most promising of all. It was scarcely conceivable that anyone who had stolen baby Jane would carry her farther into the unsettled districts. Far more likely that Toodlums’ abductor would make for the nearest town or the railway station.
“If we know which one of the girls had taken baby,” said Arthur, “we could figure better on what she would likely do. Inez would try to reach some Mexican settlement where she had friends, while Mildred might attempt to get into Los Angeles or San Diego, where she could safely hide.”
“I can’t believe either of them would steal little Jane,” declared the major. “They are too fond of her for that.”
“But the baby has been stolen, nevertheless,” returned Arthur; “we can’t get around that fact. And one of the nurses did it”
“Why?”
“Because the nurses disappeared with the baby.”
“Then perhaps they’ve entered into a conspiracy, and both are equally guilty in the abduction,” suggested the major.
“No; their hatred of one another would prevent any conspiracy between them. Only one stole the baby away, I’m quite sure.”
“Then where’s the other nurse?”
Arthur made no reply, but the major expected none. It was one of those mysteries that baffle the imagination. By and by Major Doyle made an attempt to answer his question himself, unconsciously using the same argument that his daughter Patsy had during her conversation with Beth.
“For the sake of argument, and to try to get somewhere near the truth,” said he, “let us concede that, after we had gone to town, the two nurses quarreled. That would not be surprising; I’ve been expecting an open rupture between them. Following the quarrel, what happened? In view of the results, as we find them, two deductions are open to us. One girl may have made away with the other, in a fit of unreasoning rage, and then taken baby and run away to escape the consequences of her crime. If that conclusion is true, Inez is the more likely to be the criminal and it is Mildred’s dead body we shall find in a clump of bushes or hidden in the cellar. That Mexican girl has a fierce temper; I’ve seen her eyes gleam like those of a wildcat as she watched Mildred kiss and cuddle little Jane. And she was so madly devoted to baby that she’d sooner die than part with her. Mildred is different; she’s more civilized.”
“To me, her eyes seem more treacherous than those of Inez,” declared Arthur, who had liked the little Mexican nurse because she had been so fond of Toodlums. “They never meet your gaze frankly, those eyes, but seem always trying to cover some dark secret of which the girl is ashamed.”
“Nevertheless, I maintain that she is the more civilized of the two,” insisted the major. “She has a calmer, more deliberate nature. She wouldn’t be likely to hurt Inez, while Inez would enjoy murdering Mildred.”
“What’s the other hypothesis?” asked Arthur.
“The more sensible one, by odds. After the quarrel, Inez grabs up baby and runs away, determined to escape from her hated rival and carry Jane beyond her influence. Soon after, Mildred discovers the flight of the Mexican and, impelled by her duty to you and her desire to circumvent Inez, rushes away in full chase, forgetting to leave any word. Perhaps she thought she would be able to return with baby before we arrived back from town; but Inez has led her a merry chase, which Mildred stubbornly refuses to abandon. I’m an old man, Arthur, and have seen a good deal of life, so mark my words: when the truth of this affair is known, it will be something like the story I’ve just outlined. I believe I’ve hit the nail on the head, and I’ll admit it’s bad enough, even that way.”
“Then,” said Arthur, more hopefully, “we may find Mildred and baby at home, when we return.”
“Yes; and we may not. If they are home, Arthur, there are plenty there to look after the wee darling, and Louise will be comforted. On the other hand, if they don’t return, it must be our business to find them. I can imagine Mildred, fagged out, in some far-away corner, resolving to stay the night and return to the ranch in the morning.”
They remembered to have passed along this road before, that afternoon, on their way home from town. At that time they had seen no sign of the nurses or the baby. But to make assurance doubly sure Arthur stopped at every house to make inquiries and the road was inspected carefully. When they reached town they first visited the local police station and then the telephone office. Here they arranged to have every ranch house within a wide radius called and questioned in regard to the missing baby. Arthur also tried to get his own house, but the wire was still out of service.
Then to the telegraph office, where messages were sent to all the neighboring towns, giving descriptions of the missing baby and the nurses and offering a liberal reward for any news of their whereabouts.
By this time it was necessary to go to the depot, as the evening train was soon due. While they awaited its arrival Arthur and the major closely scanned every member of the group gathered at the station. Weldon even managed to have the train held, on its arrival, until he had passed through all the cars and assured himself that neither Mildred, Inez or baby Jane was aboard.
That automobile would have carried two despairing men away from the little town had it not been for the ray of hope suggested by the major that they would find baby safe at home on their arrival. However, that no chance might be neglected, they took another route, as originally arranged, and patiently continued their vain inquiries all the way back to the ranch. As they entered the driveway at El Cajon the clock in the brilliantly lighted hall of the mansion was striking ten.
Arthur rushed in and was met by Patsy.
“Any news?” they both cried eagerly; and then their expectant faces fell.
“How is Louise?” faltered Arthur.
“More quiet, now,” answered the girl. “She became so violent, after you left, that we were all frightened; so Mrs. Hahn jumped into your little car and drove home, where she telephoned for the doctor. He happened to be at the Wilson place, so she caught him there and he came directly here. He is upstairs yet, but he gave Louise a quieting potion and I think she is now asleep.”
Arthur started to mount the stairs; then hesitated.
“Are the boys back yet?” he asked.
“Yes; they are now out in the grounds, helping the Mexicans search the shrubbery.”
The young man shuddered.
“I—I think I’ll join them,” he decided, and the major merely gave his daughter a solemn kiss and followed the bereaved father.
At the back of the mansion the lights of the lanterns were twinkling like fireflies, although the stars shone so brilliantly that all near-by objects were easily distinguished. Arthur and the major joined the men and for two hours longer the search was continued—more because they all felt they must be doing something, than through any hope of success.
Finally, at midnight, the chief searchers met in a group near the house, and Rudolph said: “Let’s go in and rest a bit, and have a smoke. I’m about fagged out and, as a matter of fact, we’ve covered every inch of these grounds several times over.”
Arthur silently turned and led the way into the house, where Patsy, Beth and Helen Hahn, all three worn and haggard, met them in the hall.
“Louise?” asked Arthur.
“Sleeping quietly,” replied Beth. “Marcia is sitting beside her.”
“Has Dr. Knox gone?”
“No; he’s in the library, smoking. Eulalia is getting him something to eat, for it seems he missed his dinner.”
“Why, so did I!” trilled big Runyon, in his clearest tenor. “I’ve just remembered it.”
“You must all eat something,” declared Patsy, “else you won’t be fit to continue the search. Go to the library—all of you—and Beth and I will see what we can find in the kitchen.”
CHAPTER X—CONJECTURES AND ABSURDITIES
In somber procession the men trailed up the stairs to the big library, where a dapper little man sat reading a book and puffing at a huge cigar. He looked up, as they entered, and nodded a head as guiltless of hair as was that of Uncle John. But his face was fresh and chubby, despite his fifty years, and the merry twinkle in his gray eyes seemed out of place, at first thought, in this house of anxiety and distress.
“Ah, Weldon; what news of little Jane?” he cheerfully inquired.
“None, Doctor.”
“No trace at all?”
“None, whatever.”
“That’s good,” declared the doctor, removing the ash from his cigar.
“Good!”
“Of course. No news is good news. I’ll wager my new touring-car that our Jane is sound asleep and dreaming of the angels, this very minute.”
“Has your new car a self-starter?” inquired Runyon anxiously, as if about to accept the wager.
“I wish I might share your belief, Doctor,” said Arthur with a deep sigh. “It all seems a terrible mystery and I can think of no logical explanation to assure me of baby’s safety.”
“Yes, it’s a mystery,” agreed Dr. Knox. “But I’ve just thought of a solution.”
“What is it?” cried half a dozen voices.
“Sit down and light up. I hope you all smoke? And you need refreshment, for you’ve been working under a strain.”
“Refreshments are coming presently,” said Rudolph. “What’s your solution, Doc?”
“The young ladies have been telling me every detail of the disappearance, as well as the events leading up to it. Now, it seems Mildred Travers is an old resident of this section of California. Was born here, in fact.”
This was news to them all and the suggestion it conveyed caused them to regard Dr. Knox attentively.
“The old Travers Ranch is near San Feliz—about thirty miles south of here. I know that ranch by reputation, but I’ve never been there. Now for my solution. The Travers family, hearing that Mildred is at El Cajon, drive over here in their automobile and induce the girl to go home with them. She can’t leave baby, so she takes little Jane along, and also Inez to help care for her. There’s the fact, in a nutshell. See? It’s all as plain as a pikestaff.”
For a moment there was silence. Then big Runyon voiced the sentiment of the party in his high treble.
“You may be a good doctor,” said he, “but you’re a thunderin’ bad detective.”
“If I could telephone to the Travers Ranch, I’d convince you,” asserted the doctor, unmoved by adverse criticism; “but your blamed old telephone is out of order.”
“As for that,” remarked Rudolph, taking a cigar from a box, “I’ve been a visitor at the Travers Ranch many times. Charlie Benton lives there. There hasn’t been a Travers on the place since they sold it, ten or twelve years ago.”
“Well,” said the doctor, “I’m sorry to hear that. It was such a simple solution that I thought it must be right.”
“It was, indeed, simple,” admitted Runyon. “Ah! here comes food at last.”
Patsy, Beth and Helen bore huge trays containing the principal dishes of the untasted dinner, supplemented with sandwiches and steaming coffee. This last the thoughtful Sing Fing had kept in readiness all the evening, knowing it would be required sooner or later.
Neither Uncle John nor the major was loth to partake of the much-needed refreshment. They even persuaded Arthur to take a cup of coffee. It was noticeable that now, whenever baby Jane was mentioned, they spoke her name in hushed whispers; yet no one could get away, for long, from the one enthralling subject of the little one’s mysterious disappearance.
“What can we do now?” asked Arthur pleadingly. “I feel guilty to be sitting here in comfort while my darling may be suffering privations, or—or—”
“Really, there is nothing more to be done, just now,” said Patsy, interrupting him before he could mention any other harrowing fears. “You have all done everything that mortals could do, for to-night, and in the morning we will resume the search along other lines. In my opinion you all ought to get to bed and try to rest, for to-morrow there will be a lot for you to do.”
“What?” asked Arthur helplessly.
“Well, I think you ought to telegraph for detectives. If ever a mystery existed, here is one, and only a clever detective could know how to tackle such a problem.”
“Also,” added Beth, “you ought to telegraph to every place in California, ordering the arrest of the fugitives.”
“I’ve done that already.”
“Can’t anyone think of a _reason_ for the disappearance of these three persons—the baby and her two nurses?” inquired Mrs. Hahn earnestly. “It seems to me that if we knew what object they could have in disappearing, we would be able to guess where they’ve gone.” Then the pretty little woman blushed at her temerity in making such a long speech. But the doctor supported her.
“Now that,” said he, “strikes me as a sensible proposition. Give us the reason, some of you who know.”
But no one knew a reason.
“Here are some facts, though,” said Patsy. “Inez was baby’s first nurse, and resented Mildred’s coming. Somehow, I always get back to that fact when I begin to conjecture. The two nurses hated each other—everybody admits that. Mildred hated mildly; Inez venomously.”
“Miguel told me that Inez has threatened to kill Mildred,” said Arthur. “And there is another thing: one of the women said Inez brought the baby to the quarters, at about noon, and while there they discovered Mildred watching them from the shelter of a hedge. This incensed Inez and she hurried away to the house, followed stealthily by Mildred.”
“That,” said Dolph, “was perhaps the beginning of the quarrel. We don’t know what happened afterward, except that both were seen in the court with baby at about two o’clock.”
“Afterward,” said Patsy, “one of the housemaids saw Inez go out—as if for a walk. She may have returned. I think she did, for otherwise it was Mildred who carried the baby away. I can see no reason for her doing that.”
“Of course Inez returned,” declared Arthur, “for nothing would induce her to run away from us and leave her beloved baby. I believe the poor girl would rather die than be separated for good from little Jane. You’ve no idea how passionately she worshiped the child.”
“All of which,” the doctor stated, “indicates a tragedy rather than some feminine whim—which last I much prefer as a solution. But if both nurses were fond of little Jane—who is the finest baby I ever knew, by the way—no quarrel or other escapade would permit them to injure the dear infant. Let us worry about the two girls, but not about little Jane.”
Such advice was impossible to follow, and doubtless the shrewd doctor knew it; but it was a comforting thought, nevertheless, and had already done much to sustain the despairing father.
No one seemed willing to adopt Patsy’s suggestion that they go to bed and get some much needed rest, in preparation for the morrow. Arthur left them for a time to visit Louise, but soon returned with word that she was quietly sleeping under the influence of the potion the doctor had administered. The three girls—for Mrs. Hahn was only a girl—sat huddled in one corner, whispering at times and trying to cheer one another. The doctor read in his book. Rudolph smoked and lay back in his chair, gazing reflectively at the ceiling. Bul Run had his feet on a second chair and soon fell into a doze, when he snored in such a high falsetto that Arthur kicked his shins to abate the nuisance. The major sat stiffly, gazing straight ahead, and Uncle John tramped up and down the room untiringly. The baby had grown very dear to the hearts of these last two men in the few days they had known her and her sudden loss rendered them inconsolable.
The suspense was dreadful. Had it been day, they could have done something to further the search, but the night held them impotent and they knew they must wear out the dreary hours as best they might.
At one o’clock Patsy drew her father aside and prevailed upon him to go to his room and lie down.
“This tedious waiting is merely wearing you out,” she said, “and for dear baby’s sake you should be fresh and vigorous in the morning.”
That seemed to the major to be very sensible, especially as he felt the need of rest, so he slipped away and went to the blue room, which was located in the old wing and just above the nursery.
Then the girl approached Uncle John, but he would not listen to her. He was too nervous to rest, he insisted, and she realized that he spoke truly. Just as she abandoned the argument they were all startled by the sound of wheels rolling up the driveway and Arthur rushed to an open window and looked out.
An automobile had just arrived.
“Who is it?” he called.
“Id’s me, Meisteh Veldon—id’s Peters, de constable,” called a rich voice in strong German dialect. “I got your baby here, und der Mexico girls to boots!”
“What!” they all shrieked, springing up to crowd around the window.
“Bring her in, Peters!” yelled Arthur, a great gladness in his voice, and now he was half running, half tumbling down the stairs in his haste to reach the door, while the others trailed after him like the tail of a comet.
As the door was thrown open Peters—a stout German—entered with a bundle in his arms, followed by a weeping, angry Mexican woman who was fat and forty and as unlike Inez as was possible.
Even as Arthur’s eyes fell on this poor creature his heart sank, and the revulsion of feeling was so severe that he tottered and almost fell. Runyon grabbed his arm and supported him while Peters fumbled with the wrappings of the baby.
“Do I gets me dot rewards—heh?” asked the constable, holding up a fat little Mexican baby, whose full black eyes regarded the group wonderingly.
The father turned away, heartsick.
“Give him some money and get rid of him,” he moaned.
Dolph took the constable in hand.
“You blooming idiot!” he exclaimed. “Why did you drag that poor woman here?”
“Id iss a rewards for der Mexico girl unt a baby; dot iss what ef’rybody say. How do I know id iss not Herr Veldon’s baby?” demanded the indignant German. “Do his baby gots a sign on id, to say id iss de right baby, vot iss lost unt must be foundt? No, py jimminy! He yust say he hass a lost baby, unt a Mexico girl hass runned avay mit id. * * * So I finds me a Mexico girl unt a baby—unt here id iss!”
Patsy took the baby, a good little thing, and placed it in its mother’s arms.
“Who are you, and where did this man find you?” the girl asked sympathetically.
The woman first shook her head and then burst into a voluble stream of Spanish, not a word of which could be understood.
“She cannot speak de Ingliss, like me, so I cannod tell if she iss de right Mexico vomans or nod,” explained the constable. “Bud I brings her mit me, yust de same, unt id costs me four dollars to rendt me an automobubbles.”
“Take her back,” said Hahn, giving him a ten-dollar note; and then he gave the woman some money and kissed the baby, which smiled at him approvingly.
Beth ran to get some of the sandwiches for the woman, while Patsy brought milk for the baby and Uncle John offered the constable a cigar. Then the three were sent away and the automobile rolled back to town.
CHAPTER XI—THE MAJOR ENCOUNTERS THE GHOST
Ascending once more to the library the weary watchers resumed their former attitudes of waiting, as patiently as they might, for the coming of the day. Uncle John looked at his watch and found it was only a little after two o’clock. The minutes seemed hours to-night.
Suddenly a tremendous shriek rent the night, a shriek so wild and blood-curdling in its intensity that they sprang up and clung to each other in horror. While they stood motionless and terror-stricken there came a thump!—thump!—as of some heavy object tumbling down the three or four steps leading from the hall to the corridor of the old South Wing, and then the door burst open and Major Doyle—clothed in red-and-white striped pajamas—fairly fell into the library, rolled twice over and came to a stop in a sitting position, from whence he let out another yell that would have shamed a Cherokee Indian and which so startled big Runyon that he held a tenor note at high C for fully a minute—much like the whistle of a peanut roaster—the which was intended for an expression of unqualified terror.
Patsy was the first to recover and kneel beside the poor major, whose eyes were literally bulging from their sockets.
“Oh, Dad—dear Dad!—what is it?” she cried.
The major shuddered and clapped his hands to his eyes. Then he rocked back and forth, moaning dismally, while Patsy clung to his neck, sobbing and nearly distracted.
“Speak, Major!” commanded Arthur.
“A—a ghost!” was the wailing reply.
“A ghost!” echoed the amazed spectators.
“Did you _see_ it?” questioned Uncle John in a trembling voice, as he bent over his brother-in-law.
“See it?” shouted the major, removing his hands to glare angrily at Mr. Merrick. “How could I see anything in the dark? The room was black as pitch.”
“But you said a ghost.”
“Of course I said a ghost,” retorted the major, querulously, as he rubbed his bare ankle with one hand to soothe a bump. “You don’t have to _see_ a ghost to know it’s there, do you? And this ghost—Oh, Patsy, darling, I can’t say it!—it’s too horrible.”
Again a fit of shuddering seized him and he covered his eyes anew and rocked his body back and forth while he maintained his seat upon the floor. His legs were spread wide apart and he wiggled his big toes convulsively.
Beth asked with bated breath:
“Did you _hear_ the ghost, then, Major?”
“Um! I heard it,” he moaned. “And it’s the end of all—the destroyer of our hopes—the harbinger of despair!”
“Look here, Major,” said Uncle John desperately, “be a man, and tell us what you mean.”
“It—it was baby—baby Jane!”
Arthur sobbed and dropped his head upon the table. Rudolph groaned. Runyon swore softly, but with an accent that did not seem very wicked. Uncle John stared hard at the major.
“You’re an ass,” he said. “You’ve had a nightmare.”
The major could not bear such an aspersion, even under the trying circumstances. He scrambled to his feet, this time trembling with indignant anger, and roared:
“I tell you I heard baby—baby Jane—and she was crying! Don’t I know? Don’t I know our baby’s voice?”
Arthur leaped to his feet, a resolute expression upon his face. Instantly they all turned and followed him from the room. Into the hall, up the steps and through the corridor of the South Wing they passed, and just inside the major’s room Rudolph struck a match and lighted a lamp that stood upon the table.
The place was in wild disorder, for when the major leaped from the bed he had dragged the coverings with him and they lay scattered upon the floor. The chair in which he had placed his clothing had been overturned and there was no question that his flight had been a precipitous rout. The casement of the window, set far back in the thick adobe wall, was wide open and the night breeze that came through it made the flame of the lamp flicker weirdly.
Beth proved her courage by bolding crossing the room and closing the window, while the others stood huddled just inside the door. Back of them all was the white face of Major Doyle, a brave soldier who had faced the enemy unflinchingly in many a hard fought battle, but a veritable poltroon in an imaginary ghostly presence.
Scarcely daring to breathe, they stood in tense attitudes listening for a repetition of the baby’s cry. Only an awesome, sustained silence rewarded them.
The major’s open watch upon the table ticked out the minutes—five—ten—fifteen. Then the doctor crept back to the library and quietly resumed his book. Presently Runyon joined him.
“Between you and me, Doc,” said the big fellow, “I don’t take much stock in ghosts.”
“Nor I,” returned Dr. Knox. “Major Doyle is overwrought. His imagination has played him a trick.”
Rudolph Hahn entered and lighted a fresh cigar.
“Curious thing, wasn’t it?” he said.
“No; mere hallucination,” declared the doctor.
“I don’t know about that,” answered the boy. “Seems to me a ghost would do about as a person in life did. The child cried—poor little baby Jane!—and the ghostly wail was heard in the one room in this house that is haunted—the blue room. Perhaps there’s something about the atmosphere of that room that enables those who have passed over to make themselves heard by us who are still in the flesh.”
He was so earnest that the doctor glanced at him thoughtfully over the top of his book.
“It’s the dead of night, and you’re agitated and unreasonable, Hahn. In the morning you’ll be ashamed of your credulity.”
Dolph sat down without reply. His wife came in and sat beside him, taking his hand in hers. In another quarter of an hour back came Uncle John, shivering with the chill of the corridor, and stood warming himself before the grate fire.
“If the major heard the baby,” he said reflectively, “it must be proof that—that something—has happened to the little dear, and—and we must face the worst.”
“Well, it was baby I heard,” asserted the major, who, having hastily donned his clothes, now made his reappearance in the library. “I was lying in a sort of dose when the cry first reached my ears. Then I sat up and listened, and heard it again distinctly, as if little Jane were only two feet away. Then—then—”
“Then you tested your lungs and made your escape,” added the doctor drily.
“I admit it, sir!” said Major Doyle, haughtily. “Had it been anyone else who encountered the experience—even a pill peddler—he would have fainted.”
In the blue room Patsy and Beth alone remained with Arthur Weldon. Not a sound broke the stillness. When an hour had passed, Patsy said:
“Won’t you go away, Arthur? Beth and I will watch.”
He shook his head.
“You can do no good by staying in this awful place,” pleaded the girl, speaking in a whisper.
“If she—if baby—should be heard again, I—I’d like to be here,” he said pathetically.
Patsy knew he was suffering and the fact aroused her to action.
“Father isn’t a coward,” she remarked, “and either he heard the cry, or he dreamed it. In the latter case it amounts to nothing; but if Jane really cried out, that fact ought to give us an important clue.”
He started at this suggestion, which the girl had uttered without thought, merely to reassure him. Yet now she started herself, struck by the peculiar significance of her random words.
“In what way, Patsy?” asked Beth, calmly.
That was the spur she needed. She glanced around the room a moment and then asked:
“Who built this wing, Arthur?”
“Cristoval, I suppose. I’ve heard it was the original dwelling,” he replied. “The rest of the house was built at a much later date. Perhaps two generations labored in constructing the place. I do not know; but it is not important.”
“Oh, yes it is!” cried Patsy with increasing ardor. “The rest of the house is like many other houses, but—these walls are six or eight feet in thickness.”
“Adobe,” said Arthur carelessly. “They built strongly in the mission days.”
“Yet these can’t be solid blocks,” persisted the girl, rising to walk nervously back and forth before the walls. “There must be a space left inside. And see! the major’s bed stands close to the outer wall, which is the thickest of all.”
He stared at her in amazement and then, realizing the meaning of her words, sprang to his feet. Beth was equally amazed and looked at her cousin in wonder.
“Oh, Patsy!” she exclaimed, “the baby hasn’t been lost at all.”
“Of course not,” declared Patsy, her great eyes brilliant with inspiration. “_She’s imprisoned!_”
CHAPTER XII—ANOTHER DISAPPEARANCE
For a time the three stood regarding one another with startled eyes. Then Arthur gasped: “Great heaven! what fools we’ve been.”
“Come!” cried Patsy. “The nursery.”
They rushed down the corridors to the staircase and thence into the court. The door of the nursery stood ajar and Arthur first entered and lighted a lamp.
The light fell full upon the face of a man seated in a low rocking chair and holding a half smoked cigarette in his mouth. He was fast asleep. It was old Miguel, the ranchero.
Arthur shook his shoulder, savagely, and the man wakened and rubbed his eyes. Then, seeing who had disturbed him, he quickly rose and made his characteristic low, sweeping bow.
“What are you doing here?” demanded Weldon, angry and suspicious.
“I am look for Mees Jane,” returned the old man calmly.
“In your sleep? Come, get out of here.”
“Wait a minute, Arthur,” said Beth, reading Miguel’s face. “He knows something.”
Arthur looked at the man critically, reflecting that there must be a reason for his presence in the nursery. Miguel had been fond of baby Jane. Was he merely disconsolate over her loss, or—did he really “know something”?
“Miguel once told me,” said Patsy, speaking slowly, “that he used to live in this house, in Cristoval’s time, and knows it thoroughly.”
The old man bowed.
“I theenk,” said he, “perhaps we find Mees Jane here—not somewhere else.”
“Why do you think that, Miguel?”
It was Patsy who questioned him. He mused a bit before replying.
“The old señor—the father of my Señor Cristoval—was strange mans,” said he. “He make thees house a funny way. Come; I show you.”
He led the way to the little room adjoining, the one Inez had occupied. In one corner of the floor was a square hole, with steps leading down to a sort of blind pocket. Holding a lamp in one hand Miguel descended the steps and pushed against a block of adobe that formed part of the outer wall. It swung inward, disclosing a cavity about four feet in width and fully six feet high. The interior could be plainly seen from the room, by stooping close to the floor. There were shelves in the cavity and upon one of them stood a jar of milk.
“Oh,” cried Patsy, clasping her hands together. “I told you the wall was hollow!”
Arthur followed Miguel down the steps. He took the lamp and examined the little room. All the walls that formed it seemed solid.
Miguel was holding the block that served as a door. He released his hold, when Arthur had again ascended, and the block swung back into place.
As they returned to the nursery, Weldon asked:
“Do you know of any other rooms in the wall, Miguel?”
The man shook his head, uncertainly.
“I know there be other rooms in thees wall,” said he, “for Señor Cristoval have told me so. Hees father make the places to keep things safe from robbers—perhaps to hide from others, too. But where such places are ees the secret of the Cristovals. The room I show you ees all I know about. I thought that was secret, too; but no; the New York nurse tell Inez of that room, an’ Inez she keep Mees Jane’s milk there, to be cool.”
“Mildred told of the room!” exclaimed Arthur in astonishment.
“Yes,” said Beth, “she used to visit this house as a girl, when Cristoval lived here, and she must have known some of the secret rooms.”
“Ah, that ees what I theenk,” agreed old Miguel. “There ees more room in thees wall; that I know. If thees Mildreed know one room, she may know more. So I theenk she and Inez have go into some room of the wall an’ take Mees Jane with them. Some way, they cannot get out again.”
“Exactly!” cried Patsy triumphantly. “They are somewhere in that wall, imprisoned, and the major really heard the baby cry.”
“But—Miguel, Miguel!” pleaded Arthur, earnestly, “can’t you remember how the wall opens? Think! Think carefully.”
“I do theenk, Meest Weld; I theenk till I go sleep, an’ you find me here.”
“Now, let’s do some thinking ourselves,” suggested Beth. “The opening that leads into the wall must be from this very room. Miguel thinks so, too, and that’s why he came here. Let us examine the wall.”
They undertook to do this, holding the lamps close to the adobe blocks and inspecting every crack. The cement used in joining the blocks had crumbled away at the outer edges in almost every instance, and it was impossible to tell if any block was removable or not. Miguel or Arthur pushed hard against every block in the room, from those nearest the floor to those far above their heads; but not one yielded a hair’s breadth.
“Suppose we go outside,” said Patsy. “Perhaps there is some window, or grating, that will give us a clue.”
So they took old Miguel’s lantern and went into the garden where they could view the outer side of the wall. A tangle of climbing vines grew against the wing, but there was no window or other opening on the first floor. Above, on the second floor, were two windows, one of which admitted light and air to the blue room.
“How about the other window?” asked Beth.
“That,” said Arthur, “must be in an unused room at the end of the corridor. We have never furnished it.”
“I think it might be well to examine that room,” suggested Patsy.
So they reentered the house and, followed by Miguel, ascended to the second floor. The door of the library was ajar and those seated there, seeing Arthur and the girls pass, came trooping out to ask what they were doing.
Patsy briefly explained the new theory they had conceived to account for the disappearance of baby and the two nurses, and the idea was so startling that all became eager to join in the investigation.
They invaded the vacant room in a body, several of the men carrying lamps. It was in size and shape a duplicate of the blue room, with its one window deeply embedded in the wall, the surface of the embrasure being covered with heavy redwood planks.
From the fact that this room lay directly over the small one occupied by Inez, in which was the wall cavity they had recently explored, they conceived the idea that the wall here might also be hollow. Pounding upon it, however, had no effect in determining this, for kiln-baked adobe is not resonant and it was impossible to discover from any surface indication whether there were eight feet of closely set blocks or less. Careful search for any sign of an opening proved futile.
Finally old Miguel said:
“Next room was room of Señor Cristoval. Eet was room hees father live in, too; the old señor who build thees part of house. If there ees way to get in wall, from upstairs, it ees there.”
“To be sure,” said practical Beth, catching at the suggestion; “it was there that Major Doyle heard the baby cry.”
So on they all trooped into the blue room, where the wall was likewise carefully inspected. While this was being done Rudolph looked at his watch and found it was after four o’clock.
“It will soon be daylight,” said he to his wife. “What a night it has been! It seems a month since we arrived here and found Toodlums gone.”
Old Miguel had been silent and unobtrusive in the vacant room, but here he was as eager in testing the wall as any one of them.
“You see, it’s this way,” Patsy was saying; “if the major could hear baby cry, through this wall, those inside could hear us, if we called to them. Who among us has the clearest, the most penetrating voice?”
“Suppose _I_ try?” squeaked Runyon, earnestly; but those who considered the remark at all merely gave him scornful looks.
“Let Rudolph call,” said Helen. “I think his voice might penetrate the pyramids of Egypt.”
Rudolph went close to the wall and shouted:
“Hello, there! Baby! I-nez!—eh—eh—what’s the other girl’s name?”
“Mildred,” said Beth.
“Mil-dred!” shouted Dolph; “Mil-dred!”
He paused between each name, which he roared so loudly that he nearly deafened those in the room, and everyone listened intently for a response.
No answer.
“Perhaps they’re asleep—worn out,” said Uncle John. No one now seemed to doubt that the missing ones were imprisoned in the wall.
“Let Beth try,” suggested Patsy.
Beth had a clear, bell-like voice and from where she stood she called out the names of Inez and Mildred. Then, in the stillness that followed, came a muffled cry in return—a cry that set all their nerves quivering with excitement.
The mystery was solved at last.
Beth repeated the call and now the answer was clearer, though still indistinguishable. It was a voice, indeed, but whose voice they could not tell. But now, to their astonishment, came another sound, quite clear and distinct—the wail of a baby voice.
“That settles it!” cried the major, triumphantly. “Was I right, or wrong? Was it a nightmare, or was I crazy?”
“Neither one, my dear sir,” replied the doctor. “You declared you heard a ghost.”
Arthur was capering about in frantic joy.
“She’s alive—my baby is alive!” he exclaimed.
“And probably she was sound asleep until your infernal yelling awakened her,” added the major.
“It wasn’t _our_ yelling,” said Uncle John, as delighted as even the father could be; “it was the yelling of whoever is inside, there, that frightened the baby. Thank goodness the dear child could sleep during all these weary hours, when we have been wearing our hearts out with anxiety.”
“We have yet cause for anxiety,” declared Patsy, “for little Jane is not rescued yet, by any means, and presently the poor thing will become very hungry and suffer for lack of food. We now know where baby is, but we can’t get at her; nor can Mildred or Inez find a way to get her out, or they would have done so long ago.”
“Very true,” agreed Helen Hahn, gravely. “Unless we can soon find a way to get to them, all three will starve.”
“Why, we will pull down the wall!” cried Arthur.
“Dynamite it!” piped Bul Run.
“Be sensible!” counseled Uncle John sternly. “We are wasting precious time. Miguel,” turning to the ranchero, “get some of your men, with picks and crowbars, and fetch them here quickly.”
The Mexican, who seemed bewildered by the discovery of the missing ones, although he had himself been the first to suspect where they were, started at once to obey this order. When he had gone, Patsy said:
“Of course there is some easy way to get inside the wall, and to get out again. Are we so stupid that none of us can penetrate the secret of the cunning Spaniard who built this place?”
The challenge merely led them to regard one another with perplexed looks.
“The fact that they’re alive, after all these hours,” said young Hahn, “is proof that they are supplied with air, and plenty of it. Then there is an opening, somewhere or other.”
“Also,” added Arthur, reflectively, “they are now opposite the second story rooms, when they must have entered the hollow wall at the first floor—perhaps from the nursery. That proves there is a stairway, or at least a ladder, inside.”
At this moment a maid entered to say that Mrs. Weldon had awakened and was calling hysterically for her baby. The doctor and Patsy at once hurried to Louise’s bedside, where the girl said:
“Don’t worry, dear. Little Jane has been found and is now in this very house. So try to be quiet and go to sleep again.”
“Bring her to me; bring my darling at once!” begged Louise. But the doctor now interfered.
“I don’t wish to disturb baby at present,” he said positively. “I think the child is sleeping. You have been quite ill, Mrs. Weldon, and I must insist on your remaining quiet. Here; drink this, if you please.”
Louise, reassured, drank the potion and presently sank into another doze. Dr. Knox remained beside her for a time but Patsy hurried back to the blue room, eager to assist in the rescue of the prisoners.
“I’m afraid we’re a stupid lot,” Uncle John was saying as she entered; “or else the Spanish don was remarkably clever. We know the wall is hollow, and we know there’s an opening, yet we can’t solve the riddle.”
But here came Miguel and two strong men laden with steel bars, cold chisels and picks. For a time it was a quandary where to attack the wall, but Arthur finally chose the place just back of the bed and bade the men begin their work.
The adobe proved harder than the hardest brick. Old Miguel knew that it must be broken away bit by bit, for he was not unacquainted with the material, yet even under his skillful direction the work progressed with aggravating slowness.
Daylight gradually crept into the room and rendered lamps unnecessary. The morning discovered a very disheveled, heavy-eyed group, not a single member of which was willing to retire from the fascinating scene of rescue.
Patsy went away to arouse Sing Fing and the servants, some of whom she found had remained awake all night. In half an hour steaming hot coffee was brought to the blue room and gratefully consumed by the weary watchers. Breakfast of a substantial character would soon be ready and it was agreed that part of them should eat at one time while the others remained to watch and to call them promptly if anything new developed.
Arthur, too nervous to stand idly by, insisted on attacking the wall in another place and Runyon assisted him, the latter’s strength and muscle winning the admiration of all observers. He worked fiercely for a time, driving in the bar with stalwart blows and chipping off huge pieces of adobe. Then, dripping with perspiration, he retired in favor of Arthur and rested by taking a seat in the window, where the cool morning air could fan him.
Patsy noticed Runyon in this position, his back against the redwood planks and his legs stretched out on the window-seat; but the work on the wall drew her attention, as it did that of everyone else.
Suddenly there was a crash and a loud report—followed by a shrill cry—and as every eye turned to the window they found that Runyon’s great body had absolutely disappeared. A rush was made to the window, but he did not seem to have fallen out. There was no sign of him at all. As if by magic, he was gone.
While they stood amazed and half frightened by the marvel of the thing, Patsy recovered sufficiently to say:
“Quick—let us get below! He must be under those rose vines, perhaps crushed and badly hurt.”
So they made for the door and flocked downstairs and out into the garden. The vines seemed undisturbed. When the men pushed them aside there was no evidence of the big rancher to be seen. In fact, they were all convinced that Runyon had not fallen out of the window.
Slowly they returned to the blue room, where the major exclaimed, with positive emphasis:
“This room is haunted. Don’t talk to me! There’s no other explanation. If we don’t watch out, we’ll all disappear—and that’ll be the end of us!”
CHAPTER XIII—THE WAY IT HAPPENED
Through consideration for the nerves and perhaps the credulity of the reader, it may be advisable at this juncture to go a little back in our story and relate the circumstances which led to the present perplexing crisis. A great detective once said that “every mystery has a simple solution”—meaning, of course, that the solution is simple when once discovered. Therefore, the puzzling mystery of the disappearance of baby Jane and her two nurses, followed later by the vanishment of Mr. Bulwer Runyon, was due to the one-time idiosyncracy of a certain Señor Cristoval, happily deceased, rather than to any supernatural agency.
Until now we have only known Mildred Travers, as she called herself, in a casual way. We know that she was considered a competent nurse and had proved her capability in the care of baby Jane. Also we know that she was silent and reserved and that her eyes bore an habitual expression that was hard and repellent. Without being able to find any especial fault with the girl, no one was attracted toward her—always excepting the baby, who could not be expected to show discrimination at her tender age.
A little of Mildred’s former history had escaped her, but not enough to judge her by. She had once lived in Southern California, near this very place. She had visited this house frequently with her father, when a small child, and old Señor Cristoval had confided to her some of the secrets of the mansion. That was all. What had become of friends and family, how she went to New York and studied nursing, or what might account for that hard look in her eyes, no one now acquainted with her knew.
The Mexican girl, Inez, was nearly as peculiar and unaccountable as Mildred. There was no mystery about her, however, except that she was so capable and intelligent, considering her antecedents. Inez’ people lived in a small town in another part of the county and the girl was one of a numerous brood of children whose parents were indolent, dissipated and steeped in ignorance. When fourteen years old she had left home to work for some of the neighboring ranchers, never staying in one place long but generally liked by her employers. The woman who had recommended Inez to Mrs. Weldon said she was bright and willing and more intelligent than most Mexicans of her class, but that she possessed a violent temper.
Louise had seen little evidence of that temper, however, for Inez from the first loved her new mistress and idolized the baby. It was only after Mildred came to supplant her, as she thought, that the girl developed an unreasoning, passionate hatred for the other nurse and was jealous of every attention Mildred lavished upon the little one.
The baby was impartial. She laughed and held out her chubby fists to either nurse, perhaps realizing that both were kind to her. It was this that made Inez so furious and caused Mildred to disdain the Mexican girl. The two were at sword’s points from the first, although after a little Mildred made an attempt to conciliate Inez, knowing that the untutored Mexican was by nature irresponsible and jealous, but withal loving and generous.
Inez did not respond to these advances, but as the days passed she became less sullen when in the presence of Mildred, and at times, when busied over her duties, so far forgot her animosity as to converse with her in her old careless, unaffected way. Only Mildred was able to note this slight change, and it encouraged her to believe she might win Inez’ confidence in the end. Inez herself did not realize that she had changed toward the “witch-woman,” and when brooding over her fancied wrongs hated Mildred as cordially as ever.
On the day when the Weldons and their guests rode into town, the two nurses had indulged in a longer and more friendly conversation than usual. It began by Mildred’s chiding the Mexican for taking baby to the quarters unknown to her, as she had been obliged to follow to see what had become of the child. Inez retorted by accusing Mildred of spying upon her. Their return to the house was anything but friendly, and Inez flatly refused to obey such instructions as Mildred gave her for the care of baby. She even walked out of the court in a temper and was gone for an hour. Then she stole in, a little ashamed of her revolt, but still defiant and rebellious.
They were in the nursery and Mildred pretended not to notice her assistant’s mood.
“I have prepared two bottles of baby’s food,” said she. “Please place one in the hollow of the wall, in your room, to keep cool until we need it.”
“I won’t!” said Inez.
“Why not?” asked Mildred quietly.
“Because you are witch-woman,” cried the Mexican; “because you use bad magic to make hollow in wall; because you try to make baby witch-woman, like yourself, by keeping her milk in the witch-place; because—because—I _hate_ you!” she concluded with a passionate stamp of her foot.
Mildred looked upon the girl pityingly as she crossed herself again and again as if in defiance of the supposed witchcraft. The poor girl sought by this method to ward off any evil charm Mildred might attempt in retaliation, and the action nettled the trained nurse because the unjust accusation was so sincerely made.
She slowly rose and taking the bottle of milk carried it herself to the hollow in the wall and placed it upon a shelf. Then, returning, she stood before the petulant, crouching Mexican and said gently:
“Were I truly a witch, Inez, I would not be working as a nurse—just as you are. Nor do I know any magic, more than you yourself know.”
“Then how you know about that hole in the wall?” demanded Inez.
“I wish you would let me explain that. Indeed, I think a good talk together will do us both good. Take this chair beside me, and try to believe in my good will. I do not hate you, Inez. I wish you did not hate me.”
Inez slowly rose from the floor and seated herself in the chair, turning it so that she could eye Mildred’s face as she spoke.
“When I was a girl,” continued Mildred, “I often came to this house to visit. Sometimes I stayed here for several days, while my father talked with his old friend, old Señor Cristoval.”
“That is a lie,” asserted Inez. “I have ask Miguel, who is here forty years, an’ was house servant for Señor Cristoval. Miguel say there is no Señor Travers who is friend of Señor Cristoval. No Señor Travers did ever come to this house for visit. What you say to that, Witch-Woman?”
Mildred flushed and seemed embarrassed. Then she answered calmly:
“I think Miguel speaks truly, for my father did not bear the name of Travers. He was called by another name.”
“Then why do you call yourself Travers?” retorted the other.
Mildred hesitated.
“I did not like my old name,” she said, “and so I changed it. But this is a secret I have told you, Inez, and you must not tell anyone of it.”
Inez nodded, looking at the other curiously. This confession had aroused her sympathy, for the first time, for her fellow nurse. The fact that there was a secret between them dissolved to an extent her antipathy for Mildred, and it might be a bond to eventually draw them nearer together. With more tolerance than she had yet shown she asked:
“Did Señor Cristoval show you the secrets of this house?”
“Yes. I was a little girl and he was good to me. I am not a witch-woman, Inez. Oh, if I were, I would witch a little happiness into my life!” she added miserably.
This burst of rebellious longing interested Inez even more than the secret. She could understand such a protest against fate.
“At first,” continued Mildred, reverting to her former cold speech, while the hard look, which for an instant had given way to a flash of sentiment, again crept into her eyes, “I thought I had forgotten the queer recesses and secret rooms built by the elder Cristoval; but now I am beginning to remember them. In the days when this wing was built, the country was wild and lawless. Robbers often visited a house in broad daylight and took away all that was of value; so the first Cristoval—the father of the one I knew—made the secret place to hide his treasure in, and even to hide himself and his family if the thieves threatened them.”
“Is the treasure there now?” asked Inez eagerly.
Mildred frowned, as if the question displeased her.
“Of course not. That was long ago. When I was a girl they no longer needed the rooms in the wall as a hiding-place from thieves; but they kept them secret, just the same. I think I am the only person Señor Cristoval ever told. He did it to please me, I suppose, because I was a child.”
Inez was much impressed. She began to regard Mildred more amicably. If she were not a witch-woman, she reflected, there was no reason to fear her. The Mexican girl thought deeply on what she had heard, during the next half hour. She watched Mildred put the baby to sleep and then take up a book to read as she sat beside the crib. Inez went out into the deserted court and squatting beside the fountain pondered upon the fascinating mysteries of the old house.
She crept back, presently, and reentered the nursery where Mildred was sitting.
“Tell me,” she began, in a friendly and familiar way that was new in her relations with the other girl, “are there indeed rooms hidden in these walls—big enough for people to hide in?”
Mildred smiled and laid down her book. Inez in this mood was worth cultivating, if she hoped to win her confidence. It would be far easier to get on in her new situation if Inez would learn to like her.
Another thing influenced her: a reflection that had not been absent from her mind since the Weldons departed for the day and had left her practically in charge of the house. She had come to this house for a purpose. Could that purpose be best accomplished to-day, or at some later period?
“I believe,” she answered musingly, “that this wall back of us is hollow and contains several rooms, which may be entered at various secret places—if one knows where the places are.”
“They cannot be very big rooms,” said Inez in a hushed, awed voice, as she glanced at the wall.
“No; they must be narrow. But they are quite long and high—some of them—and there are stairs leading from one floor to another, just like the big stairs in the hall.”
Inez stared at her.
“How you know that?” she inquired.
“Why, I’ve seen the rooms,” was the reply. “Let me think a moment.”
During the pause she scrutinized the Mexican girl closely, wondering if it would be advisable to take her into her confidence. Then she continued, speaking slowly:
“I’m almost sure it was in this very room that one of the secret entrances was built. It was not a nursery when I was here before, you know; it was Señor Cristoval’s office, where he kept his books and his money-boxes.”
She rose, as she spoke, and looked uncertainly up and down the wall. Then, with a nod of satisfaction, she quickly walked to the east corner and counted four blocks of adobe, starting from the floor. The fourth line of blocks she followed to the third one, and placed her hand upon it.
“I think I am right, so far,” she said. “This is the door to the secret rooms, but the key that unlocks it is somewhere in the floor. Turn back the rug, please, Inez.”
The girl obeyed, her brown fingers trembling with excitement. The floor was of adobe blocks similar to those which formed the wall, but smaller in size. Mildred regarded them reflectively and then placed her foot on the edge of the second block directly in a line with the place where her hand rested. The pressure of her foot made the block tip slightly, and observing this she pressed hard with her hand against the inner edge of the upper block.
The result seemed magical. Three seemingly solid blocks of the wall swung slowly outward, disclosing a dimly lighted recess beyond.
Mildred stepped in, stooping her head slightly because the opening was so small. Inez followed her, nervously seizing the other girl’s hand for support. The light seemed to come from some place far above and as their eyes grew accustomed to it they could discern a passage about three feet in width and fourteen feet long, which occupied the center of the wall. At the right, a flight of steps led upward, and to their left the place was occupied by some chairs and stools. Against the walls were several narrow shelves, easily reached by one standing upright.
“Why, they have left the place furnished, just as it was when Señor Cristoval first showed it to me,” said Mildred. “The mattings and upholstery must be ready to fall to pieces, by this time; but you see, Inez, I was right about the secret rooms.”
Just then little Jane wakened with a lusty cry.
“See to the baby,” said Mildred quickly, and the Mexican girl reluctantly turned away to obey.
Mildred remained in the recess, thoughtfully eyeing the various antique objects which had been allowed to remain there, some of which were of real value. She reflected that the last Cristoval had doubtless passed away without disclosing the secret of the wall to anyone, and his executors, in selling the mansion, had been quite unaware that anything was hidden in the adobe wall. Without doubt the property might now be justly claimed by the new owner, Arthur Weldon, and this thought made Mildred flush with eager resolve to take full advantage of her present opportunity. For here was the consummation of her hopes; here was the realization of the important plan which had brought her to Southern California and to this house.
Inez had caught the baby from its cradle and, holding a bottle of fresh milk-food to its lips to comfort it, again advanced through the opening. Mildred had stepped a few paces along the passage and Inez, the baby in her arms, started to join her.
At that moment she heard a sound in the court, as of some one approaching, and to avoid letting others know of this fascinating secret the girl thoughtlessly grasped the adobe door with her free hand and swung it shut behind her.
It closed with a sharp “click!” and Mildred, hearing the sound, turned with a low cry of fear.
“Great heavens, what have you done?” she exclaimed in tense tones and brushing the Mexican aside she threw her whole weight against the wall. It did not yield a hair’s breadth.
Inez, with terror in her eyes, stared at her companion.
“Is it lock?” she whispered.
Mildred pushed again, straining every muscle. Then she bent and examined the wall. It was easy to see, from this side, where the series of three blocks were firmly joined together. Also the butts of three huge iron hinges protruded slightly into the passage. There could be no mistake. The closing of the door had made them prisoners.
CHAPTER XIV—PRISONERS OF THE WALL
Mildred silently turned and regarded her companion. Her eyes were not hard and cold now. They were glowing with anxiety and terror.
“Cannot we get out?” demanded Inez.
Mildred shook her head.
“Not the way we came in,” she replied. “I remember now that Cristoval warned me never to close the door behind me; but I forgot to tell you that, so you are not to blame.”
Inez looked down at baby, who had again fallen asleep, snuggled close to her breast. Her fear at this time was not for herself. It was dreadful to think of the danger she had placed the darling baby in—the child she would have died rather than injure.
Mildred saw the look and read its anguish. Her own cheeks blanched for a moment, but there was an inherent quality of courage in this girl that forbade her to despair. Speaking as much to herself as to Inez she said:
“We were able to open this adobe door only by pressing downward on a block of the floor outside, which released a catch which is securely hidden in the lower edge of the opening—where I cannot reach it. So, unless some one knew the secret and could press that block in the nursery, the door cannot again be opened.”
Inez staggered to a stool and sat down.
“Must we stay here always?” she pleaded piteously.
“I think not. I am _sure_ not, Inez. They will find some way to break through the wall and rescue us.”
“But no one knows we are here!”
“True. Well, I believe there are other ways to get out of this hollow wall, besides the opening we came through. I am quite certain I was told that Señor Cristoval could enter from his room, on the second floor; and perhaps there are other entrances. Stay here and keep baby quiet and I will make an examination of our prison.”
As she started to ascend the stairs Inez arose to follow her.
“Let me come, too,” she begged. “I am afraid to stay alone.”
“Very well; but try not to waken baby.”
The stairs were built the full width of the space, completely blocking it at that end. At the top they stepped into another narrow room, which was not over the lower one but extended farther along the wall. It was, indeed, extraordinary to note how comfortable the genius of that ancient Cristoval who had planned the place, had made this originally comfortless corridor-like room, for room it was despite its narrow confines.
The ceiling was high, and light and air were admitted by gratings placed at the top, letting onto the bastion of the roof, where they could not be observed by those below. The gratings were covered by projections that kept out the rain and dew. On the floor was a thick carpet, somewhat musty and dusty now, and at the far end was placed a couch with silken curtains. This was still piled high with bedding and pillows and was boxed in, the full width of the passage, with elaborately carved woods. Upholstered seats, rather narrow but long and quite comfortable, were built against the wall and supported by richly carved frames of ebony and panels of cherry. There were pictures upon the walls; oil paintings of quite good quality. A sort of wall-cabinet and some small brackets supported numerous hooks, ornaments, and several boxes of metal and sandalwood, which last Mildred eyed expectantly but had now no leisure to examine.
The girls were both awed by this discovery, for Mildred had never been permitted to mount the stair to this room when Señor Cristoval had allowed her to peep into the lower passage. The intense silence lent a weirdness to the place that was at first quite disconcerting. A gray rat scuttled along the carpet, causing them to jump and cry out, and then disappeared somewhere beneath the couch. Inez, trembling with nervous fear, hugged the baby with one arm and clutched Mildred’s arm with the other, and then they sat together on one of the cushioned seats and tried to collect their thoughts.
Mildred reflected that no person had entered this place for at least eight years, for it was eight years since the last Cristoval had passed to his fathers. Yet, aside from the dust, everything seemed in an excellent state of preservation. The secret room had been fitted up by its builder more than fifty years before and much of the furnishings must have been placed there then.
“My first task,” she said to Inez, “must be to make a thorough examination of this place. Since there is no one to help us, we must help ourselves, and any weakness at this time would be fatal.”
With this she rose and carefully began to inspect the walls. The heavy carpet was merely laid flat on the adobe floor and she raised it here and there and tested the blocks to see if any was movable. There was no means of reaching the ceiling but an opening there was out of the question.
Near the center of the room, on the inner wall and about two feet from the floor, was a square of wood firmly embedded in the adobe. This, she thought, might possibly be a means of egress or ingress, so she tested it eagerly, pressing not only upon the wood but on all the blocks of adobe near it, in the endeavor to discover a hidden spring or some other clever mechanical contrivance which would prove the “open sesame.” But the panel and the wall defied all her efforts and she finally concluded it was solid planking placed there to support the wall or to allow cupboards or shelves to be nailed against it.
Another similar place, where a huge panel of plank was set in the wall, she found at the very end of the passage, beyond the couch, and was only able to reach it by mounting the bed and climbing over the bedding. This panel was also immovable and she decided it could not be an opening because the wall beyond it was doubtless solid. This space beyond the bed, where the room ended, contained a huge chest of quaintly carved oak. As she saw the chest her heart gave a great bound and forgetting for the moment her desire to escape she reached down and raised the lid.
Then her face fell. Despite the dim light in this corner, which she had grown somewhat accustomed to in investigating the panel, she could see that the chest contained merely papers, with which it was half filled. This might be the accumulated correspondence of the Cristovals, of no use to any but themselves, and losing all interest in the chest she closed the lid and again crossed over the high bed to Inez.
The result of this investigation, which had consumed a full hour, so thorough had she been, convinced Mildred that there was no immediate way for them to leave their prison. So she began to plan how they might keep themselves and baby Jane comfortable until they were rescued.
The bottle of milk, which Inez still held in her hand, was a prepared food of a highly nourishing quality. The contents of the bottle had scarcely been touched by baby when, rousing from her sleep, she had been taken up and comforted by Inez until slumber again overtook her. Usually Jane consumed two bottles of such food each day, and another during each night.
Mildred looked at her watch and found it was nearly four o’clock. With a little care in its administration the baby’s food might last until morning, but not longer. For themselves, they must be content without food, unless—
She decided to search the boxes and shelves while daylight lasted, and bade Inez place the sleeping infant on one of the cushioned seats and support it with a pillow brought from the couch. Then the two girls began to take down the boxes from the shelves and explore their contents. Some were of tin and square in shape; others were round, like canisters.
In one they found some tea and in another a small quantity of loaf sugar. There was no other food, except a few cracker crumbs in the bottom of a tin.
Leaving Inez to sit beside baby, Mildred next visited the room below. Here the light was more dim, but she discovered a box of wax candles—two or three dozen in number—and a quantity of matches in a small iron safe. She tried these last and after several attempts managed to light one of them and with it light a candle. The matches were at least eight years old, but there was not a particle of dampness in the place and so they had not greatly deteriorated.
A broad slab of redwood, hinged and fastened to the wall by turn-buttons, was made to let down and serve as a table. When Mildred lowered it she found that it covered a small recess or cupboard in the wall, in which stood three tin cans. One was labeled “tomatoes” and the other two “corn.”
Here was food, of a certain sort; but the cans were tightly soldered and there seemed to be no tool that might be used to open them. Although the place was littered with many small articles there was nothing else among them that especially interested the girl. Two sabers were crossed upon the wall over the table, and below them hung a big revolver. A panama hat, yellowed with age, hung upon a peg. A broom made of palm fiber stood in a corner.
Mildred returned to the upper floor, carrying with her several candles and some matches.
“Inez,” said she, “we must make the best of our misfortune. I hope that before long we shall be rescued, both on baby’s account and on our own. There are some tins of tomatoes and corn down stairs, but nothing that baby could eat. However, we shall suffer more from thirst than from hunger, as there is not a drop of water in the place.”
Inez had been thinking during Mildred’s absence.
“Can we not scream, and so make them hear us?” she asked.
“I have thought of that and we will make the attempt. The servants are all in the opposite wing, so it is useless to try to arouse their attention; but when Mr. and Mrs. Weldon return, with the others, they may be able to hear us and so rescue us.”
“When will they be back?” Inez inquired.
Mildred considered this question.
“I heard them say they were to stay in town for luncheon, but Mrs. Weldon remarked that they would be back soon after. I think, Inez, they may already have returned and even now may be searching for us. Stay here, and I will go below, so as not to disturb baby, and call.”
She went again down the steep stairs to the lower room where, standing near to the place where they had come through the wall, she uttered a sharp, shrill cry, such as she thought might penetrate the thick blocks of adobe. The sound echoed with startling reverberations through the secret chambers and baby Jane, wakening in affright, set up a series of such lusty screams that it seemed as if they ought to be heard a mile away.
Inez did her best to soothe and quiet the baby, but succeeded only when she had given little Jane the precious bottle of milk.
CHAPTER XV—MILDRED CONFIDES IN INEZ
Mildred had hastened upstairs in alarm at the pandemonium of sound her own cry had aroused, for the baby’s screams also gave back a thousand echoes and these sent the little one into fresh paroxysms of terror.
“This won’t do, at all,” she said anxiously, when baby Jane had sobbed herself into a doze, with the bottle to comfort her. “If we scream again it will frighten the child to death.”
“Perhaps they have heard us,” suggested Inez, rocking Jane to and fro in her arms.
“Perhaps. Let us hope so,” sighed Mildred.
Presently she went over to the couch and examined the condition of the bedding. The linen sheets had withstood the years very well, but the blankets and coverlets had a musty smell. She spread some of these out to air and then went back and sat beside Inez.
Together they watched the light fade until the narrow space was full of creeping shadows. The air began to grow chilly, so Mildred arranged the couch and they laid baby Jane upon it, covered her snugly with a blanket and drew the silk curtain to shield her eyes from the glare of the candles. They had lighted several of these, placing them in heavy brass candlesticks which they found ranged upon the shelves. Each of the girls took a blanket and folded it about her and then they sat down together to await their fate as patiently as they could.
They both realized, by this time, that their dilemma was likely to prove serious. Not a sound from within the house penetrated the adobe walls of their prison. They were unable to tell if their whereabout had yet been discovered.
“I think it best to wait until morning before we make any further effort to be heard,” said Mildred. “Our cries would only distract baby and if our screams have not already attracted notice it would be folly to continue them. Anyway, let us try to be brave and patient. Something may happen to save us, before morning.”
Even by the flickering candle-light the place was awesome and uncanny. Inez crept closer to Mildred’s side, quite forgetting her former aversion for her companion. Because the sound of their own voices lent them a certain degree of courage they conversed together in low tones, talking on any subject that occurred to them.
At one time Inez broke an oppressive stillness by saying:
“Tell me about yourself—when you were a girl. And why did you leave here to go to New York?”
Mildred regarded the girl musingly. She felt a strong temptation to speak, to confide in some one.
“Will you keep my secret, Inez?” she asked.
“Yes; of course. I do not tell all I know,” was the reply.
“If you told, it would drive me away from here,” said Mildred.
Inez gave a start, remembering that a few hours ago she would have done anything to drive Mildred away. But, somehow, she had come to regard her companion in misfortune more favorably. A bond of sympathy had been established between them by this terrible experience they were now undergoing. Whatever their fate might be, Inez could not hate Mildred after this.
“I do not wish to drive you away,” she asserted in a positive voice. “I will not tell your secret.”
For a time Mildred mused silently, as if considering how to begin.
“My mother died when I was a baby,” said she. “She was a Travers and lived on a ranch near here.”
“I know the Travers Ranch,” said Inez quickly. “But no Travers have live there in a long time.”
“My mother lived there,” continued Mildred, “until she married my father. Indeed, she lived there several years after, for I was born in the ranch house. But my mother’s people—the Traverses—did not like my father, and when mother died he took me away to a house in Escondido. I think he was sent away, and the family sold the ranch and went back to England, where they had originally come from.
“In Escondido an old Mexican woman kept house for us. She was named Izbel.”
“Ah!” cried Inez, nodding her head wisely; “I know.” Then, as Mildred looked at her questioningly, she added: “Go on.”
“My father was away from home much of the time. He traveled, and sometimes he took me with him into Mexico, and we went as far south as Matanzas, and once to Mexico City. That was when I was quite small, and I do not remember much about it. But often we came here to visit Señor Cristoval, with whom he had some secret business. I have seen him give my father big bags of golden coins, although everyone said he was a miser. I remember that at one time my father hid in this very wall for a day and a night, and officers came to the house and searched it, saying they were looking for a smuggler and had traced him here.
“But Señor Cristoval laughed at them and told them to examine the house thoroughly. This they did, and went away satisfied. Afterward my father came out of the wall and took me across the country to San Bernardino, where we stayed at a friend’s house for several days. Finally Señor Cristoval came there to visit us and I heard him tell my father it would not be safe for him to return home and advised him to go far away. He also gave my father much money, and one curious thing which he said to him I never forgot. ‘I will keep your fortune safely until you need it,’ was his remark. ‘I will hide it where no one will ever find it, any more than they could find you.’”
“Ah! then he hid your father’s fortune in this place?” cried Inez eagerly. Then her face fell. “But, no,” she added. “We have look, and there is no fortune here.”
Mildred sighed and continued her tale.
“After this Señor Cristoval shook my father’s hand, and kissed me—for he was always fond of me—and went away. I never saw him again. My father and I traveled to New York and as I was then eleven years of age I became much troubled over our exile and begged to be told why it was not safe for us to stay in California. He explained to me that he had purchased laces and other goods in Mexico and brought them into the United States secretly, without paying the duty which the robbing government officials imposed. For that he said he was liable to be arrested and put in prison, and if I ever allowed the secret to escape me I would be the means of ruining him. I was a very sensitive child, and the importance of this great secret weighed upon me heavily. My father declared he had done no wrong, but I knew that the officers of the law were constantly searching for him and it so crushed me and destroyed my happiness that at twelve years of age I was as nervous, as suspicious and evasive as any old woman could be.”
She paused and gave a little shudder. Said Inez, who had listened intently:
“I know now who you are. Your name is Mildred Leighton.”
“You know that!” cried Mildred, amazed.
“Of course I know that, when I know your father was the great smuggler that the officers never could catch. I am told many stories about Leighton the smuggler, and old Izbel, who kept his house, is my aunt. Old Izbel say Señor Cristoval give Leighton the money to buy with, and Leighton give Señor Cristoval, who love money so much, half of all he make. But no one could ever prove that. Leighton was very clever man. No one could ever catch him.”
Inez spoke admiringly, as if Mildred’s father was a hero and Mildred had gained added prestige by being his daughter. But the other girl frowned and continued her story.
“In New York,” she said, “we lived in a boarding house and I was sent to school. My father was not kind to me any more. He grew cross and gloomy and often would say if I told his secret he would kill me. I did not tell; I kept the secret safe locked in my heart and suffered agonies of apprehension for his sake, for I still loved him fondly. He now bought a little ship and began to make sea voyages to and from Cuba. He would not let me go with him and he only swore when I tried to get him to give up the wicked and dangerous life he was leading. Often he denounced Cristoval, who had in his possession valuable goods and money belonging to my father but would not give them up because he knew my father dared not go to California to get them.
“For years father continued to smuggle without being suspected. Then one morning I received a note asking me to come to the prison to see him. They had caught him at last and seized his ship, and he said there had been a fight in which several of the government agents had been shot, and one killed. My father did not shoot, he told me, but they would blame him for everything.
“He stayed in the prison for a month, and every day I went to see him. Then came the trial and he was sentenced to prison for life. They—they proved that he ordered his men to shoot,” she added, lowering her head as if ashamed.
“Well, that was right,” maintained Inez, cheerfully. “If they try to arrest him, Leighton was right to shoot.”
“No, Inez, he was very wrong,” replied Mildred sadly. “I would never be allowed to see my father after he was taken away, so they let us talk for the last time. He told me they had taken away all his money and he had nothing to give me, but that if I could manage to get to California old Señor Cristoval owed him much money and—and other things, and perhaps he would give it to me, although he had refused to give it to my father. Afterward they took him away to Sing Sing prison, and that was the last I ever saw of him, for a year later he died.
“I do not suppose, Inez, any girl was ever left with such a heritage of shame and trouble. You think me hard and cold; but can you blame me? Always I think some one will discover my secret, that they will say I am the daughter of Leighton the smuggler and point the finger of shame at me.
“I was a friendless girl with no money. The people at the boarding house would not let me remain and I took my little bundle and wandered out into the street in search of home and employment. It was then that a kind lady, a Mrs. Runyon, had pity on me and put me into a school for nurses. I was fifteen years old and big and strong for my age. At seventeen I was nursing in a charity hospital, but my father’s disgrace had made me an outcast and prevented my obtaining situations with good families. Mrs. Runyon tried to help me but my story was too well known. I changed my name from Leighton to Travers, but even that did not bring me better luck.
“For two years longer I worked for a bare pittance, and then suddenly a ray of sunshine appeared. Miss De Graf came to the hospital where I was caring for an injured child and offered me a position with her cousin out here in California, where I had known the happiest days of my life. More than that, I found to my joy that I was coming directly to the old Cristoval house, for although Señor Cristoval was long since dead—as I had found out by writing him—I remembered the secret rooms and hoped I might find at least a part of my father’s fortune still hidden there.
“Well,” she added after a pause, “these are the rooms, and there is nothing of value left in them; this is the old Cristoval home, where my father was forced to hide from the law; this is the country where the officers hounded the hated smuggler like a dog and finally drove him away. And here is the girl, Inez, who has passed through all these scenes and to-day finds nothing in life worth living for.”
Inez took her hand, shyly but tenderly.
“Meeldred,” she said softly, “perhaps your life will end here. It will be strange, will it not, if that is so? But if we cannot get out, it makes a good story to die in this old den of the smuggler, your father. I will die with you; but I do not mind—much. But Mees Jane—”
She broke off with a wail of anguish and Mildred said hastily:
“Inez, we must save the baby! And, if we do, we shall also save ourselves. Come; you, at least, have much to live for. You will care for the baby after I have gone far away, and you will be glad, then, that the hated Mildred is out of your life.”
“But I do not hate you any more!” cried the Mexican girl protestingly. “I like you now, Meeldred. We will be friends, an’ we will be happy together, if—if—”
“If what, Inez?”
“If we live to get out of this wall.”
CHAPTER XVI—AN UNEXPECTED ARRIVAL
As the night advanced the two girls continued to talk, in low and subdued voices because of their anxiety and growing fears. They kept the candles trimmed, for the light lent them courage. They were not hungry, although they had eaten nothing since noon, but they were beginning to suffer from thirst.
The baby wakened with shrill screams and the only way to quiet her was to give her the bottle, which was now less than a third full. Mildred was in a quandary whether to withhold the remainder of the food from little Jane, so as to prolong her life as much as possible, or to allow the baby to eat what she desired, as long as any of the food remained. She finally decided on the latter course, hoping the morning would bring some one to their rescue.
After the little one was again hushed in slumber and cuddled in warm blankets on a seat beside them, the two imprisoned girls renewed their desultory conversation. They realized it must be long after midnight but Mildred avoided looking at her watch because that made the minutes drag so slowly.
Finally a dull sound from the other side of the wall reached their ears. It seemed that some one was pounding upon the adobe. Both girls sprang to their feet in excitement, their heads bent to listen. The pounding was not repeated but a voice was heard—a far-away voice—as of one calling.
Mildred answered the cry, at the top of her lungs, and immediately Inez followed with a shrill scream that roused a thousand echoes in the hidden passage. And now Toodlums joined the chorus, startled from her sleep and terrified by the riot of sound.
They tried to listen, but the baby’s cries prevented anything else from being heard, so they devoted themselves to quieting little Jane. It took some time to do this, for the sobbing infant was thoroughly frightened, but finally Inez succeeded in comforting her and the bottle of precious milk was sacrificed to put baby to sleep again.
By this time the sounds on the other side of the wall had ceased; but the girls were now full of eager hope, believing they had succeeded in letting their friends know they were imprisoned in the wall.
Within the hour more dull pounding began and this continued so regularly that Mildred told Inez the rescuers were surely trying to break through the adobe. They listened alertly to each blow and for a time forgot both thirst and fatigue in the excitement of the moment. Daybreak was near, for already a gray light was creeping in through the gratings overhead.
Suddenly a crash like a thunder-clap resounded from the end of the passage. From the gloomy recess behind the couch a man’s form appeared, struck the bed, was rebounded by the springs into the air, turned a complete somersault and landed on the floor of the passage in a sitting position, facing the two startled nurses.
He did not seem to be hurt, but was evidently bewildered. He glared in amazement at the girls and they glared in amazement at him. Then, slowly, he turned his eyes to view his surroundings and blinked stupidly at the candles, the antique carved furniture, the baby bundled upon a cushioned seat and finally rested his eyes again upon the faces of the nurses.
“Why, it is Señor Bul-Run!” cried Inez, clapping her hands with joy. “He have come to save us.”
“Pardon me,” said the man, in a rather quavering falsetto, “I’m not sure whether I’ve come to save you or to share your peril. Where am I, please?”
“It is the hollow of the wall, sir,” replied Mildred, who had never seen the big fellow before. “It is the secret apartment constructed by Señor Cristoval, who built this house.”
“Well,” said he, slowly getting upon his feet and with another curious glance around, “I can’t say that I consider it a desirable place of residence. Certainly it’s no place for our precious Toodlums,” and he bent over the sleeping babe and tenderly kissed its forehead. Then, straightening up, he said in as determined a tone as his high voice would permit: “We must find a way to get out of here!”
“Can’t you get out the same way you got in?” asked Mildred.
He looked at her in perplexed astonishment.
“How did I get in?” he inquired.
“Don’t you know?”
“I’ve no idea. I was sitting in the window of the blue room, resting, when there was a bang, whirligig, fireworks—and here I am, your uninvited guest.”
“The blue room!” cried Mildred.
“Yes. Did you happen to notice my arrival? I don’t mean its lack of dignity, but the direction I came from?”
“You came from somewhere behind that bed. I saw you strike the mattress and—and bound up again.”
“To be sure. I remember bounding up again. I—I didn’t care to stop, you see. I was anxious to—to—see if baby Jane was all right.”
Mildred could not repress a smile, while Inez giggled openly.
“However,” continued the big man, good-humoredly, “the direction affords us a clew. Pardon my absence for a moment while I investigate.”
He took one of the candles, cautiously made his way over the couch and stood upon the oak chest at the end of the narrow chamber. Here he was able to examine the heavy planking set in the adobe, through which he had doubtless made his appearance but which now appeared as solid and immovable as the wall itself.
Runyon’s first act was to pass the light of the candle carefully over every joint and edge, with the idea of discovering a spring or hinge. But no such thing seemed to exist. Then he took out his big jackknife and began prying. When a blade snapped he opened another, only to break it in his vain twisting and jabbing. Finally he threw the now useless knife from him and began pounding with his fists upon the planking, at the same time shouting with the best voice he could muster. Perhaps the pounding might have been heard had not his friends at that moment been seeking for his mangled form in the garden, among the rose vines.
After listening in vain for a reply, Runyon came back to the girls, saying:
“This is certainly a singular occurrence. I came in as easily as I ever did anything in my life, I assure you; but the way out is not so easy. However, we won’t have to endure this confinement long, for the boys are breaking down the wall in two places.”
Then, in reply to their anxious questioning, he related the incidents of the night: how the discovery was made that Toodlums and her two nurses were missing; of the search throughout the country in automobiles; how the major had heard the “ghost” of baby Jane, which had given them their first intimation of the truth, and of the desperate and vain attempts made to get into the secret chamber.
Mildred, in return, explained the accident that had led to their imprisonment and of their failure to find any means of escape.
“There must be a way out, of course,” she added, “for Señor Cristoval would never invent such clever and complicated ways of getting into this hollow wall without inventing other means of getting out.”
“True enough,” agreed Runyon; “but I can’t see why he thought it necessary to make the means of getting _out_ a secret. These rooms were probably built as hiding-places, and there are at least two separate entrances. But whoever hid here should be master of the situation and have no difficulty in escaping when the danger was over.”
“Unless,” said Mildred, thoughtfully, “the rooms were also intended as a prison.”
“Well, perhaps that is it,” said the man. “Old Cristoval may have thought the occasion would arise when he would like to keep one or more prisoners here, so he concealed the exits as carefully as the entrances. Let us admit, young ladies, that it’s a first-class prison. But,” his tone changing to one of kindly concern, “how have you stood this ordeal? You must be worn out with anxiety, and desperately hungry, too.”
As he gazed into Mildred’s face it occurred to him, for the first time, that Jane’s new nurse was an interesting girl. She was not exactly beautiful, but—attractive. Indeed, at that moment Mildred was at her best, despite the night’s vigil. The hard, defiant look had left her eyes for the first time in years, driven out by a train of exciting events that had led her to forget herself and her rebellion against fate, at least for the time being.
“We are not very hungry,” she said, smiling at the big, boyish rancher, “but we are thirsty. I’d give anything for a good drink of water. And baby is now devouring the last few drops of her prepared food. When it is gone there is nothing here that she can eat.”
“Well,” said he, spurred to action by this report, “I’m going to explore this place carefully, for if we can manage to find a way out it will save Weldon and his men from ruining that wall, and also save time, for the blamed adobe is so hard and thick that it will still require hours for them to make a hole big enough to get us out.”
CHAPTER XVII—THE PRODIGAL SON
With the added light that now came from the gratings in the ceiling every object in the upper room was plainly visible. Runyon began his inspection in a methodical manner, starting at one corner and eyeing the inner wall on every inch of its surface. He tested each block at its corners and edges. The girls watched him listlessly, for they expected no result, having covered the same methods themselves.
At length Runyon was obliged to abandon the wall in despair.
“The opening is there, of course,” he said, “but that confounded Cristoval was too clever for us. If I had the rascal here now, I’d strangle him!”
As he stood in the center of the narrow space, looking around him, his eye fell upon the upholstered seats ranged along one side and he regarded them suspiciously. They were box-like affairs, with the surface of the covers padded and cushioned.
He reached down and lifted one of the lids. As he glanced within he uttered an exclamation of astonishment. The box was almost filled with bottles, lying regularly on their sides.
“Wine!” he cried. “Now, Miss—I don’t remember to have heard your name—I shall be able to relieve your thirst.”
“My name is Travers—Mildred Travers, sir; but I can’t drink wine.”
“Not to quench your thirst—just a few swallows?” he asked, taking a bottle and trying to remove the cork.
“Not a drop, even to save my life,” she replied positively.
“But I will, Señor Runyon—I will!” cried Inez eagerly.
“Runyon!” exclaimed Mildred, stepping back in amazement and looking at the man rather wildly.
“Excuse me; haven’t I introduced myself?” he asked, looking up. “Yes; my name’s Runyon.”
Something in her expression arrested his gaze and he regarded the girl curiously.
“Bulwer Runyon?” she said in a low voice.
He sat down on the box, holding the bottle between his knees.
“They christened me that. Very foolishly, I think. But what do you know of Bulwer Runyon?”
“Your mother—is—Martha Runyon?”
“To be sure—bless her heart! Ah, you know my mother, then, and that’s how you have heard of me. But nothing good, from the dear old lady’s lips, I’ll be bound.”
“She really loves you,” replied Mildred quickly; “only—you have disappointed her.”
“Indeed I have. I’ve always disappointed her, ever since I can remember.”
“You were very extravagant,” said Mildred in a reproachful tone.
“Yes; that was my fault. Father spoiled me; then he died and left all his fortune to mother. Quite right. But mother is pretty close with her money.”
“Did she not pay all your debts?”
“Yes; but that was foolish. She reproached me for owing people, which was one of my pet recreations. So she paid the bills, bought me a ranch out here, shipped me into exile and washed her hands of me, declaring that the ranch was my sole inheritance and I must never expect another cent of her fortune. She proposes, I believe, to invest her surplus in charity. Nice idea, wasn’t it?”
“It was very generous in her,” declared Mildred.
“Was it? Well, that’s a matter of opinion. But I regard her gift of this ranch as the first step to perpetual pauperdom. She tossed the land at me, shuffled me off, and then expected me to make a living.”
“Can’t you do that?” asked Mildred wonderingly.
“Make a living on a California ranch!” he said, as if astonished.
“Others do,” she asserted.
“There is no other just like your humble servant,” he assured her, again struggling with the cork. “I can’t grow enough lemons—it’s a lemon ranch she handed me—to pay expenses. The first year I decorated my estate with a mortgage; had to have an automobile, you know. The second year I put another plaster on to pay the interest of the first mortgage and a few scattering debts. Third year, the third patch; fourth year, the usual thing. Fifth year—that’s this one—the money sharks balked. They said the ranch is loaded to its full capacity. So, I’ll have to sell some lemons.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry!” cried Mildred.
“So am I, thank you. Stupid thing, selling lemons. But the wolf’s at the door and all I can do is shoot lemons at the brute. Lemons! Wasn’t it tart of the dear mother to load me with such an acidulous estate? Perhaps she imagined it would make me assiduous—eh?”
“Your mother hoped you would turn over a new leaf and—and redeem your past,” said the girl.
“Well, it’s too late to do that now. I can’t redeem the past without redeeming the ranch, and that’s impossible,” he declared with a grin. “But tell me, please, how you happen to be so deep in my mother’s confidence.”
Mildred hesitated, but reflected that she really owed him an explanation.
“She protected me when I was in trouble,” she said softly.
“Ah; that’s like the dear old girl. Do you know, I’ve an idea that when I’m down and out she’ll relent and come to my assistance with a fatted calf? It would be just like her. I’ve known of others she befriended. Her hobby is to help poor girls. There was that Leighton girl, for instance, whose smuggling, murderous father was imprisoned for life. The poor little thing hadn’t a friend in the world till mother took her in hand and put her in a training school for nurses. The mother wrote me how interested she was in that case. Her protege did her credit, it seems, for the child turned out a very good nurse, who—who—”
He suddenly paused, flushed red and stared at the girl uncertainly.
“You say your name is—Travers?” he asked.
“Yes,” she replied, casting down her eyes.
“Not—Leighton?”
“Cannot you pull the cork, Señor Runyon? I am so thirsty!” cried Inez quickly, to save her friend from disclosing her secret. But big Runyon was bright enough, in spite of his peculiarities. He read Mildred’s confusion and suspected the truth, but was too considerate to press the question.
“The cork is obstinate,” said he; “so we won’t argue with the thing,” and he struck the neck of the bottle against a corner of the seat and broke it so neatly that not a drop of the contents was spilled. Then he took a cup from the shelf and poured out some of the wine.
“It’s a native vintage,” said he, “but it ought to be mellow and mild after all the years it has lain here.”
Inez drank. The California Mexicans are accustomed to the native wines and consume them as freely as water. But Mildred, although again pressed to quench her thirst, steadfastly refused.
Runyon took a little of the wine, for he also was thirsty, and then he made an examination of the other seats. Some contained more wine; others were quite empty; but no water was discovered anywhere.
“Now I shall go below,” said Runyon, “and see if I can unearth anything of importance there. Do you hear those dull sounds on the other side of the wall? They tell us that our friends are busy drilling the holes. It’s wonderful how tough that adobe is.”
Little Jane had awakened again and Inez took baby Jane in her arms and, with Mildred, followed Runyon down the stairs into the lower chamber. Here they watched his careful inspection of the room but did not hope for any favorable result.
“Here is food,” he announced, as, having given up the idea of finding egress, he came upon the cans of tomatoes and corn.
“Yes; but we have no can-opener,” replied Mildred; “and, unless the contents were cooked, they would not be eatable.”
“I’m not thinking of the eatables,” said Runyon, taking out a small pen-knife, for he had already ruined the larger one he always carried. “Tomatoes usually have a lot of liquid in the cans, a sort of watery juice which I am sure would help to relieve your thirst.”
He began prying at the tin with a knife blade, but it was a heavy quality of plate, such as is rarely used nowadays, and resisted his attempt. Soon the blade of the frail tool snapped at the handle, and he tried the other blade. That, too, soon broke and Runyon regarded the can with a sort of wonder.
“It beats me,” he said, shaking his head. “But I don’t like to give up, and that tomato-juice would be of service if we could only get at it.”
Looking around for another implement his eye spied the revolver hanging upon its peg.
“Ah! if that weapon is loaded I’ll use a bullet as a can-opener,” he exclaimed, and reaching up he removed the revolver from its place.
“Good; six cartridges, 32 caliber,” said he. “Now, young ladies, if you can stand the noise, and the powder hasn’t spoiled, I believe I can make a hole in that can which will allow the juice to run out.”
“I don’t care,” said Inez, “but I will take Mees Jane upstairs, first.”
“The sound will echo like a regular battle,” said Mildred; “but as I am really thirsty and your suggestion of relief tempts me, I am willing to have you shoot the pistol.”
Runyon placed the can upon the edge of the low hinged table, where it stood about waist high. When Inez had gone above with little Jane, the man took a position whereby he faced obliquely the outer wall and aiming at the tomatoes said:
“Better stop up your ears, Miss—Mildred.”
She obeyed and he fired.
Even their anticipations could not prepare them for the wild riot of sound that followed the explosion. The bullet found its mark, for the can toppled and fell from the shelf and lay spilling its contents upon the floor. The bullet went farther and struck a crevice of the outer wall. A cloud of smoke for a moment obscured their view and Mildred, regarding the tomato-can, cried out:
“Oh, pick it up! Pick it up, quick! It is spilling.”
Runyon made no reply. He was staring straight ahead, in a dazed, bewildered way, and now Mildred’s eyes followed his.
The smoke was rolling out of a large aperture in the outer wall. Three huge blocks of adobe, neatly joined together, had swung outward, moved by a secret spring which the bullet had released.
Through the grim prison wall they were looking out at the sunshine that flooded the rose garden.
Mildred sank to her knees, sobbing with joy. Big Runyon walked to the staircase.
“Hi, there, Inez!” he called. “Come down here and take Toodlums to her mother. I’ll bet a button she’ll be jolly glad to see that kid again!”
CHAPTER XVIII—LACES AND GOLD
At four o’clock in the afternoon Patsy rubbed her eyes, yawned and raised her head from her pillow.
“Dear me!” she sighed, “I’m tired yet, but this sleeping in the daytime is unnatural. I wonder if Beth is awake.”
She went to the door of the adjoining room, opened it and found her cousin dressing.
“Do you suppose anyone else is up?” she inquired.
“See there,” replied Beth, pointing through the window.
Patsy saw. Mr. Runyon was seated on a garden bench in earnest conversation with Mildred Travers.
“Didn’t he go home this morning, after the excitement was over?” she asked.
“No,” replied Beth. “Mr. and Mrs. Hahn drove their car home, but our interesting neighbor at the north, Mr. Bul Run, declared there was nothing at his own ranch half so enticing as a bed here. He’s a bachelor, it seems, and leads rather a lonely life. So Arthur gave him a room and he went to bed; but it seems he has had his sleep out and is indulging in other recreations.”
Patsy was eyeing the couple in the garden.
“Mr. Runyon seems to have struck up a friendship with your protégé Mildred,” she observed.
“Yes,” answered Beth. “You know he was shut up in the wall with her and Inez for awhile and the adventure must have made them feel well acquainted. Wasn’t that imprisonment a most peculiar thing, Patsy?”
“Very peculiar. I haven’t had much time to think about it, for as soon as Toodlums was safe in Louise’s arms I went to bed. But it occurs to me to wonder how Mildred Travers knew so much of the secrets of this absurd old house and why she ventured to explore the hidden rooms in our absence. Put that with the fact that she lived in these parts as a girl, and with her eagerness to come out here—don’t you remember her fervent ‘thank heaven’?—and it seems the whole mystery isn’t unraveled yet; it’s only getting more tangled.”
Beth was thoughtful for a time.
“I am sure Mildred will have some explanation to make,” she said presently. “Don’t let us judge her just yet, Patsy. And I advise you to get dressed, for there’s Louise wheeling the baby, and perhaps everyone else is downstairs but us.”
“Louise and baby both slept all through that awful night,” remarked Patsy, again yawning. “No wonder they’re up and around and looking bright and happy.” But she took her cousin’s hint and dressed so rapidly that she descended the stairs only a few moments after Beth did.
Uncle John, the major and Arthur were in the court, smoking and sipping coffee. The events of the past night were still being earnestly discussed by them and much speculation was indulged in concerning the rooms in the hollow wall and the uses to which they had been put during the pioneer days when Cristoval constructed them, and even afterward when his son, the last owner, had occupied the premises.
“The entire ranch,” said Arthur, “as well as this house, was sold by the executors appointed by the court, for it seems that Cristoval had no heirs in this country. The money was sent over to Spain and divided among a host of relations, the executors were discharged, and that ended the matter as far as the law is concerned. But I am sure the secret of the wall was at that time unknown to any, for otherwise the furniture in those narrow rooms, some of which is expensive and valuable on account of its unique carving, and the bins of wine and other truck, would have been sold with the other ‘personal possessions.’ I bought this place of a man who had purchased it at the executors’ sale but never has lived in it. All the rooms were stripped bare, which goes to prove that the hidden recesses in the walls were unknown. Now, the question is, do I legally own the contents of that wall, or don’t I?”
“I stepped into the rooms, this morning, with the others, but merely glanced around a bit,” said Mr. Merrick. “I’ve an idea you may rightfully claim whatever is there. The value of such old, odd pieces is arbitrary and they wouldn’t total enough at an auction sale to bother about. My idea, Arthur, is that you remove whatever you care to retain, stop up the rat holes, and then seal up the place forever.”
“I suppose,” remarked the major, “those hollow places in the wall were of real value in the days of wild Indians and murdering highwaymen. But, as John Merrick says, they’re of no use to anyone now, but rather a source of danger.”
“Was that door left open?” asked Patsy.
“Yes; and I put a brace against it, so it couldn’t close and shut us out,” replied Arthur.
“That doesn’t matter; Mildred knows the way in,” said Beth. “The whole trouble was that Inez closed the door behind them and they couldn’t manage to get out again.”
Mr. Merrick sipped his coffee reflectively.
“That girl,” said he, “ought to explain how she knows so much—and so little.”
“And what she was doing in the secret rooms,” added the major.
“She’ll do that,” piped a high voice, and in sauntered Mr. Runyon and sat down to pour himself some coffee. “I’ve just left Miss—er—er—Travers, and she has decided to tell you all her whole story, frankly and without reservation, and then she wants to ask your advice.”
“Whose advice?” demanded Arthur.
“Everybody’s advice. She asked mine, a little while ago, and I told her to put it up to the crowd. The poor thing has had a sad history and there’s a bit of romance and tragedy connected with it; but she has been quite blameless. I haven’t known you people long, but I’ll bank on your generosity and fairness, and that’s what I told the poor girl.”
“Where is she now?” asked Patsy.
“In the garden with Mrs. Weldon and Toodlums. They’ll all be here presently.”
The little group remained silent and thoughtful until Louise entered wheeling the baby in her cab and followed by Mildred Travers. The nurse’s face was white and troubled but she had acquired a new attractiveness for the reason that her eyes had softened and were now pleading instead of defiant.
Inez came running from the nursery to take baby, but Louise would not let little Jane go. Although she had escaped much of the past night’s misery, thanks to Dr. Knox’s quieting powders, the young mother was still unnerved and liked to have the child where she could see it. So Inez sat on a bench and held Jane, who was the least concerned of anyone over her recent peril and fortunate escape.
The court was shady, cool and quiet. Those assembled eyed Mildred curiously and expectantly, so that she was really embarrassed at first. Beth, who felt in a measure responsible for this waif of a great city, because she had been instrumental in bringing her here, gently led Mildred to a beginning of her story by asking a few questions that afforded the girl an opening.
The entire party listened gravely to the recital, for only Inez, among those present, had ever heard any part of the strange tale before.
Mildred told practically the same story she had related to the Mexican girl the night before, but went more into details and explained more fully her girlhood acquaintance with Señor Cristoval.
“He was an unusual man,” said she; “aged and white-haired, as I remember him, and always dressed in white flannels, which threw his dark skin into sharp relief. He lived alone in the house, having but one man-servant to do all the work, cook his meals and cater to his slightest whim.”
“Miguel Zaloa,” said Inez in a low voice.
“Cristoval was not popular,” said Mildred, “for he loved money so well that he was reputed to be a miser. It was this love of money, I think, that induced him to go into partnership with my father in his illegal smuggling enterprises. Cristoval furnished the money and when my father had slipped across the border with his bales of rare laces, they were hidden in the hollow wall until they could be forwarded to San Francisco and sold.
“And this brings me to a relation of my present interest in this house,” she continued. “When we escaped from California a large lot of very valuable Mexican laces which belonged exclusively to my father was hidden in the wall. The sale of a former lot of smuggled goods had resulted in a large profit and Cristoval had received a bank draft for the amount, one half of which was due my father. When we last saw Cristoval at San Bernardino, before we left for New York, he promised my father to cash the draft and send him the proceeds. This he never did, although he advanced my father, at that time, a sum of money from other sources to pay our expenses until we could establish ourselves in the east.
“To avoid suspicion, my father always allowed Cristoval to bank the partnership money, drawing on the rich Spaniard from time to time for what he required. Father told me that altogether Cristoval owed him nine thousand dollars, besides the bale of laces, valued at ten thousand more. He wrote many times to demand this money, using a cipher they had arranged between them, but his letters were never answered. I know now that Cristoval died soon after we went to New York, so whoever got the letters, being unable to read the secret cipher, of course ignored them.
“Just as Leighton was being taken to prison, the last time I ever saw him, he told me to find some way to come here and get the money. He said that if Cristoval was dead, as he then suspected, the secret of the wall was still safe, for the old man had vowed never to disclose it. He thought I would find the laces still hidden in the wall, and perhaps the money.”
“Did you look to see, while you were there?” asked Arthur Weldon.
“Yes. There is no evidence of any property that I could rightfully claim.”
It was a strange recital, and a fascinating one to those who heard it.
“Who would think,” said Patsy, “that in this prosaic age we would get so close to a real story of smuggling, hidden treasure and secret recesses in walls? It smacks more of the romantic days of past centuries.”
“We must not forget,” replied Louise, “that of all our numerous states California has the most romantic history. It wasn’t so long ago that the Spanish don flourished in this section and even yet it is more Spanish than American except in the big cities.”
“As for smuggling,” added Runyon, “that is going on to-day—as merrily as in the days of the famous Leighton, if on a smaller scale. I’ve some choice cigars over at my ranch that have never paid duty, and I’ve an order with the smuggler for more. So, after all, there’s nothing very astonishing in Mildred Leighton’s story.”
“The wall we have practical evidence of,” said Uncle John. “I suppose it will hold its secret rooms for many years to come, for these adobe dwellings are practically fire-proof and are built to defy time.”
“But about Mildred’s fortune,” cried Patsy. “Don’t you suppose it is hidden, after all, some place in the wall?”
“From what I have heard of Cristoval,” said Arthur in a reflective tone, “he was not considered a dishonest man, but rather miserly and grasping.”
“My father,” explained Mildred, “trusted him fully until we went away and could get no answer to his letters. The old Spaniard was very fond of me, also, and he would hold me in his arms and say that one day I would be a rich lady, for my father and he were both making my fortune. I was very young, as you know, but I never forgot that statement.”
“Suppose,” suggested the major, “we make another and more thorough search of those secret rooms.”
“We will do that,” replied Arthur promptly. “It is too late to undertake the task to-night, but we will begin it right after breakfast to-morrow morning. Inez, I wish you would slip down to the quarters and ask Miguel to come and help us. Tell him to be here at nine o’clock.”
The girl nodded, gave the baby to Mildred and stole quietly out of the court.
CHAPTER XIX—INEZ AND MIGUEL
Inez found Miguel Zaloa smoking his cigarette among the orange trees. He was quite alone and looked at the girl in an expectant way as she approached.
“Oh, Miguel!” she cried. “I tell you a secret. Of course it is no secret any more, for now they all know it, up there at the house. Meeldred Travers, the girl from New York, is not Meeldred Travers. She is the child of Leighton the smuggler—she is Meeldred Leighton!”
The old ranchero stood as if turned to stone, but he bit his cigarette in two and it fell unnoticed upon the ground. While Inez regarded him with disappointment, because he had exhibited no emotion at hearing the wonderful news, Miguel turned his back and mechanically walked away through a row of trees. A dozen paces distant he halted and again stood motionless for the space of a full minute. Then he swung around and with slow, hesitating steps returned to Inez.
“You say—she—ees Meeldred Leighton?” he asked, as if he thought he had not heard aright.
“Of course. Don’t you remember, Miguel? She say, when she used to come here, a little girl, with Leighton the great smuggler, you did know her. It was then you served Señor Cristoval, at the big house.”
He nodded, his dark eyes fixed upon her face but displaying no expression.
“Leighton is dead,” continued Inez, delighted to be able to gossip of all she had heard. “They put him in a prison an’ he died. So Meeldred was ashame of her father’s bad name an’ call herself Travers. She is poor, an’ that is why she come here as nurse, so she can find the money that belong to her.”
Miguel suddenly seized her wrist in a powerful grip.
“What money?” he demanded.
“Don’t; you hurt my arm! It is the money Señor Cristoval owed her father. Take your hand away, Miguel Zaloa!”
Slowly he released her.
“Where will she find thees money?” he asked.
“She does not know. Perhaps it is not here at all. But there was a great heap of laces, worth much money, which Señor Cristoval hid in the wall to keep for Leighton.”
Miguel laughed. He seemed suddenly to have regained his equanimity. He began rolling another cigarette.
“They will be old, by now, thees lace,” said he.
“A lace is better when it is old,” asserted the girl.
The man paused, looked at the half-made cigarette and tossed it away. Then he glanced around to see if they were observed and taking Inez’ arm—gently, this time—he led her away from the path and into a thicket of orange trees.
“Thees Meeldred,” he said in soft tones, “you hate.”
“No, no! I do not hate her now. I love Meeldred.”
“So!” he said, drawing in his breath and regarding the girl with surprise. “You tell me once she is witch-woman.”
“I am wrong,” declared Inez earnestly. “She is good. She have been poor an’ friendless, all because of her father, the noble smuggler Leighton. But see, Miguel; I have been all night shut up in the wall with her. We talk, an’ I learn to know her better. I do not hate Meeldred any more—I love her!”
“Sit down,” said the old man, pointing to a hillock beside a tree. Inez obeyed, and he squatted on the ground facing her and coolly rolled another cigarette. “Tell me more about thees girl—Leighton’s girl,” he said.
Inez related Mildred’s story as well as she was able, exaggerating such romantic details as appealed to her fancy, but showing unbounded sympathy for her new friend. The aged ranchero listened intently, nodding his white head now and then to show his interest. When the girl had finished he smoked for a time in silence.
“What Meeldred do now?” he inquired.
“They will hunt in the wall, to-morrow, to find the lace,” she replied. “Meest Weldon say for you to come to the house at nine o’clock, in morning, to help them.”
“Meest Weld say that?”
“Yes. But we have search already—Meeldred an’ me—an’ Meest Bul-Run have search, an’ no lace is there. I am sure of that. I am sure no money is there, too. So Meeldred mus’ stay as nurse all her life an’ help me take care of Mees Jane.”
Miguel pondered this.
“B’m’by Mees Jane grow up,” said he. “What can Leighton’s daughter do then?”
“How can I tell that?” answered Inez, shaking her head. “Always poor people mus’ work, Miguel. Is it not so?”
“Rich people mus’ work, too,” continued the Mexican girl dreamily, as she embraced her drawn-up legs and rested her chin upon her knees. “Was old Señor Cristoval more happy than we, with all the money he loved? No! Meest Weldon works; Meest Hahn works; even Meest Bul-Run works—sometime. If one does not work, one is not happy, Miguel; an’ if one mus’ work, money makes not any difference. So, when Meeldred find she is still poor, an’ has no money an’ no laces, like she hope for, she will work jus’ the same as ever, an’ be happy.”
“I, too, work,” remarked the old man. “I have always work.”
“If you had much money, Miguel, you would still work.”
“Yes.”
“You would not care for money; not you. It would not do you any good. It would not change your life.”
“No.”
Again they sat in silence, as if reflecting on this primitive philosophy. Finally Inez said:
“You remember Leighton, Miguel?”
“Yes. He was good man. He make much money for Señor Cristoval an’ for heemself. Sometime I see them count gold—ten pieces to Señor Cristoval, ten pieces to Leighton—to divide even. Then Leighton will throw me a gold-piece an’ say: ‘That for you, Miguel, because you are faithful an’ true.’”
“An’ Señor Cristoval, did he throw the gold-piece to you, also?”
“No.”
“What did you do with the gold Leighton give you, Miguel?”
The old man shrugged his shoulders. “Tobacco. Some wine. A game of card.”
“An’ were you faithful an’ true, as Leighton say?”
He looked at her long and steadily.
“What you theenk about that, Inez?”
“When people talk about Miguel Zaloa, they always say he is good man. I hear Meest Weldon say: ‘Miguel is honest. I would trust Miguel with all I have.’”
“Meest Weld say that?”
“Yes.”
“Well?”
“I think you are sometime honest, sometime not; like I am myself,” replied the girl.
The old man rose and led the way back to the path.
“To be always honest is to be sometime foolish,” he muttered on the way. “Tell Meest Weld I will be there, like he say, at nine o’clock.”
CHAPTER XX—MR. RUNYON’S DISCOVERY
Sing Fing excelled himself at the dinner that evening, which was a merry meal because all dangers and worries seemed to belong to the past. Also it was, as Uncle John feelingly remarked, “the first square meal they had enjoyed since the one at Castro’s restaurant.” Of course Runyon stayed, because he was to help search the wall the next day, and as the telephone had been repaired Louise called up Rudolph and Helen Hahn and begged them to drive over and help them celebrate at the festive board.
So the Hahns came—although they returned home again in the late evening—and it was really a joyous and happy occasion. Inez brought in the baby, which crowed jubilantly and submitted to so many kisses that Patsy declared she was afraid they would wear the skin off Toodlum’s chubby cheeks unless they desisted.
Mildred had gone to her room immediately after her confession in the court and Louise had respected her desire for privacy and had ordered her dinner sent in to her.
As they all sat in the library, after dining, in a cosy circle around the grate fire, they conversed seriously on Mildred Leighton and canvassed her past history and future prospects.
“I cannot see,” said Beth, always the nurse’s champion, “that we are called upon to condemn poor Mildred because her father was a criminal.”
“Of course not,” agreed Patsy, “the poor child wasn’t to blame.”
“These criminal tendencies,” remarked the major gravely, “are sometimes hereditary.”
“Oh, but that’s nonsense!” declared Uncle John. “We can’t imagine Mildred’s becoming a smuggler—or smuggleress, or whatever you call it. That hard, cold look in her eyes, which we all so thoughtlessly condemned, was merely an indication of suffering, of hurt pride and shame for the disgrace that had been thrust upon her. I liked the girl better to-day, as with blazing cheeks she told of all her grief and struggles, than ever before since I knew her.”
“The expression of the eye,” said Arthur, “is usually considered an infallible indication of character.”
“That’s a foolish prejudice,” asserted Patsy, whose own frank and brilliant eyes were her chief attraction.
“I do not think so, dear,” objected Louise. “The eyes may not truly indicate character, but they surely indicate one’s state of mind. We did not read the hard look in Mildred’s eyes correctly, I admit, but it showed her to be on guard against the world’s criticism, resentful of her hard fate and hopeless in her longing for a respectable social position. She realized that were her story known she would meet with sneers and jeers on every side, and therefore she proudly held herself aloof.”
“But now,” said Patsy, “circumstances have changed Mildred’s viewpoint. She found that our knowledge of her story only brought her sympathy and consideration, and when she left us I noticed that her eyes were soft and grateful and full of tears.”
Big Runyon had listened to this conversation rather uneasily and with evident disapproval. Now he said, in as positive a tone as his unfortunate voice would permit:
“That girl’s a corker, and I’m proud of her. In the first place, my mother is a shrewd judge of character. You can’t fool her about a person’s worth; just see how accurately she judged _my_ character! When the dear old lady—whose only fault is being so close-fisted—picked up Mildred Leighton and defended her, that act vouched for the girl’s worth beyond dispute. Mrs. Runyon—bless her stingy old heart!—never makes a mistake. Just think of it: she actually spent money in giving Mildred an education as a trained nurse. To my mind that settled the girl’s character for all time. Now, I don’t care a continental whether she finds any smuggled laces or not; she needs a friend, and now that she is away from my mother’s care _I’m_ going to be that friend.”
“Oh, Bul!” cried Louise with lively interest, “are you in love?”
“Me? At my age? Cer-tain-ly not!”
“How old are you?”
“Thirty.”
“Old enough to know better,” said Uncle John.
“Old enough to need a wife to care for him,” suggested Helen Hahn.
“Honest Injun, Run; aren’t you a little soft on Mildred?” asked Rudolph.
“Well, perhaps a little; but it’s nothing like that currant-jelly, chocolate bonbon, glucose-like feeling which I’ve observed is the outward demonstration of love.”
“Oh, well; marry the girl and be done with it, then,” laughed Arthur.
“And rob me of my nurse?” protested Louise.
“Runyon needs a nurse as much as Jane. In fact, he’s a much bigger baby.”
Mr. Runyon accepted all this jollying with calm indifference.
“The days of chivalry are over,” he sighed. “If a fellow tries to protect a maiden in distress, they think he wants to marry her.”
“Don’t you?” asked Patsy, in a sympathetic tone.
“Why, I hadn’t thought of it before; but it wouldn’t be a half-bad idea,” he confessed. “Ranch life is a bit lonely without women around to bother one.”
“You are all talking foolishly,” observed Beth, who was not romantic. “Mildred might object to washing Mr. Runyon’s dishes.”
“Why, yes; I believe she would,” said Mr. Runyon. “I’m sure she disapproves of my character; that’s why I respect her judgment, so highly. She didn’t seem at all interested in those various mortgages, when I mentioned them; and what else have I to offer a wife?”
Even the cosy library could not hold them very late, for none had been fully restored by the sleep obtained during the day. Bed seemed more alluring than a grate fire and when the Hahns went home the party broke up, to meet again at an eight o’clock breakfast.
As soon as the meal was over Arthur Weldon announced that the first business of the day would be an examination of the secret rooms in the wall of the old East Wing.
“And this must be a thorough and final inspection of the place,” he added. “We must satisfy ourselves and Mildred Travers, without the shadow of a doubt, that we have inventoried every blessed thing in those rooms—even to the rats and beetles.”
“That’s right,” approved Mr. Merrick. “Let us do the job once and for all. We’ve plenty of time at our disposal and there are enough of us with sharp eyes to ferret out every mystery of the place. In Mildred’s interest we must be thorough.”
In the court they found old Miguel, sitting motionless and patient. He was carefully dressed in his best clothes and wore a red necktie, “just as if,” said Patsy, “he was going to a party instead of delving in dusty places.”
The ranchero arose and made his master and mistress one of his best bows. Then he waited silently for instructions.
Beth went to Mildred’s room and brought the girl to join the searchers, for this undertaking had been planned on her account. Her face wore an anxious look, for although she was not very hopeful of results it was the last chance of her securing any of her father’s personal possessions. Otherwise she greeted the party with modesty and with gentle dignity and had never seemed to them more womanly or agreeable.
Together they left the court and proceeded to the nursery. There were no laggards and everyone except the servants was determined to have a part in the fascinating investigation.
Mildred explained to them the manner in which she had first entered the wall, putting in action the secret method taught her as a girl by Cristoval and demonstrating the mechanism before their very eyes. They entered the lower chamber, one by one, and this time the adobe door was not closed behind them, although the light of broad day now flooded the place through the opening discovered by Runyon. This opening led into the garden and was half choked with rose vines. The series of swinging blocks had been propped back against the outer wall to insure a ready exit in case of accident.
And now they eagerly set to work to pry into every crack and corner of the place. The main idea was to find some secret cavity or cupboard in the wall which might contain the missing laces or other valuables. With this in view they had brought levers and pries and all sorts of tools that might be of service.
The girls were mainly useful in taking up and turning the matting, now somewhat decayed by age, and investigating those nooks and shelves already discovered. But they found little more than Mildred had done during her first exploration, and the men who were testing the wall met with no encouragement at all. Aside from the two cleverly constructed openings—one into the nursery and one into the garden—the blocks which composed the wall seemed every one solid and immovable and resisted every attempt to wrest them from their places.
After more than two hours of industry, during which every man believed he had examined every block, they were forced to abandon the lower chamber and ascend the steep stairs to the upper one.
“This,” said Arthur, looking around him, “seems far more promising. Let us give the floor our first attention, for it is not over the lower room but to one side of it. It strikes me that the builder would be quite likely to make a secret pocket in the floor.”
Following this advice they attacked the blocks of the floor with pry and crowbar, but found nothing to reward them. Old Miguel worked steadily and did whatever he was told, but displayed no particle of enthusiasm, or even of interest.
After the floor, the walls were examined, one by one, from floor to ceiling. The panel on the inner wall, which had baffled both Mildred and Runyon on that eventful night of their imprisonment, suddenly disclosed its secret when accidentally pressed on opposite corners at the same time. It slipped down and discovered a similar panel beyond it, which was operated by a spring placed in plain sight. Releasing this, they found they were looking into the vacant second story room which they had once before unsuccessfully searched.
So this was one way from the house into the upper chamber of the wall. Of course there was another way—that through which Runyon had been so abruptly precipitated. In order to find this the more readily, they sent the big rancher into the blue room and asked him to take the same position in the window he had on the night of his disappearance. This he did, pushing against the planking that boxed the window, with both elbows and with his back and shoulders, but without result. Finally, in his attempts, he inadvertently struck the opposite panel with his heel, and the response was startling. The panel, at his back, being released, fell backward without warning and for the second time Runyon tumbled unawares into the chamber of the wall. As soon as his body had fallen through, the panel slammed into place again, urged by a very powerful steel spring, but the major, who had been in the blue room to watch Runyon, had caught the trick and the mystery was solved.
As for Mr. Runyon, he again fell upon the bed and rebounded, knocking over both Mr. Merrick and Miguel as he alighted in the narrow chamber, but fortunately not injuring either of them.
A little dazed by his second precipitation, the big rancher stared a moment and then slapped his thigh a mighty stroke.
“I have it—I have it!” he cried.
“It occurs to me,” said Uncle John, a little resentfully, “that you deserve all you’ve got, and more. It’s a wonder you didn’t break your neck.”
“What have you, Run?” asked Arthur.
“I’ve found the laces.”
“What?—where?” they exclaimed.
“In the blue room, or on the way down?” added Beth sarcastically.
“After I got down,” he answered. “What fools we have all been!”
“Will you kindly explain, Mr. Runyon?” asked Mildred, very earnestly.
“I will. It’s simple enough. Just look at that bed.”
“The bed!” And now every eye was turned upon the couch.
“Of course,” said Runyon. “There’s something more than a mere mattress and springs. I’ve tumbled onto the thing twice, and I ought to know.”
CHAPTER XXI—A FORTUNE IN TATTERS
Already Arthur was pulling off the bedding and piling it upon the floor. They stood back of him in an excited group, every head craned forward to watch his movements.
Off came the pillows—blankets—sheets—finally the mattress. This last, a thin cotton affair, left a trail of fuzzy, lint-like debris behind it and disclosed on removal a canvas cover that had been spread underneath. The canvas, which was about on a level with the boxed-in bed frame, was as full of holes as a Swiss cheese and especially toward the center the weave had become disintegrated and given away to a dusty pulp.
“Rats!” exclaimed Uncle John, whose head was thrust between the shoulders of the major and Runyon.
As if his cry had been a summons, out sprang a huge gray rodent and the girls pushed back with loud screams as the dreaded beast struck the floor and scurried away down the passage. Another and another followed it, and now Louise, Patsy, Beth, Mildred and Inez were all dancing on top the seats, wrapping their skirts about their ankles and whooping like a tribe of Indians.
Amid this wild hullabaloo, which struck terror to the hearts of the brave men assembled, because at the instant they were too bewildered to realize what caused it, some six or eight monstrous rats leaped from the tattered canvas which covered the bed and vanished down the stairs.
Arthur put his hand down to raise the canvas and jumped back as he unearthed a nest of smaller vermin, squirming here and there in blind endeavors to escape their disturbers. Runyon brought a deep brass bowl from a shelf and dumped the small rats into it, standing by to capture others as they appeared.
Gradually Weldon drew back the cover and as he did so the truth of Runyon’s prophecy was apparent. The entire space boxed in by the carved bed-frame, from the floor to its upper edge, was packed solidly with valuable laces. That is, it had once been solidly packed, but now the rats had eaten tunnels and nests and boulevards through the costly laces in every direction. It was a scene of absolute ruin. However precious this collection might once have been, in its present state it was not worth a copper cent.
The party gazed upon the sight with mingled awe and astonishment. Regret for the destruction of the beautiful fabrics at first rendered them oblivious to the fact that the inheritance of Mildred Leighton was at last recovered—only to be proved worthless.
Arthur dragged out a few scraps and spread them upon the floor, thereby exhibiting portions of the beautiful patterns of the various pieces. Then, hoping to find some that had escaped the ruthless teeth of the rats, he and Runyon began pulling at the heap and working downward toward the floor. Just a few small pieces were found intact, but these were of slight value. Practically the entire lot was irretrievably ruined.
Scarcely a word was spoken as the investigation proceeded. Beth had clasped one of Mildred’s hands and Patsy the other, but neither dared look in the poor girl’s face, for they dreaded the poignant disappointment sure to reign there.
But after the first shock, Mildred bore up bravely. She had not expected, in the beginning, any tangible result; still it was very bitter to find her long sought fortune and realize that it amounted to nothing.
They sat around upon the benches, or leaning against the wall, and stared at the ruined laces with various emotions, the keenest being regret for the loss of so much beautiful handwork and sympathy for Mildred Leighton.
Suddenly Runyon broke the silence.
“This discovery is too thundering bad for mere words,” he said with feeling; “but Miss Travers—Mildred—must know we’re all as sorry as she is. She was right about the laces, but the laces are all wrong. This sad exhibit reminds me of my own perverse mortgages, and my mortgages remind me of something else. Mildred,” he added, turning to the girl in a dogged and rather shamefaced way, “I’m going to hold a private conversation with you right here before our good friends, for I know every one of them will back me up. Eh?” he questioned, glancing around the group.
There were some smiles, but many nods. As if encouraged, Runyon proceeded:
“This settles the question of your fortune. It’s gone—vanished into scraps. You’re a poor girl, now, with no glittering prospects, so what I’m going to say won’t seem quite so selfish as it would otherwise. In fact, had these laces been perfect, they would have rendered me dumb. As it is, here stand two impecunious ones—you and I. Between us we haven’t much more than enough to fry a fish, in solid cash, but among my encumbrances are a delightful little bungalow, nicely furnished, and a lot of lemon trees that can be coaxed to buy us groceries and ordinary comforts. I’m a lonely fellow, Mildred, and I need a companion. Will you marry me, and look after that bungalow?”
This extraordinary proposal was heard in breathless silence. The men were astounded, the girls delighted. Every eye turned curiously upon Mildred Travers, who regarded the big rancher with frank wonder, a wan smile upon her pallid features.
“You do not say you love me,” she suggested, striving through mild banter to cover her confusion.
“Well, isn’t that implied?” he answered. “No one would propose to a girl he didn’t love, would he?”
“You have only known me two days.”
“Two days and seven hours. But mother endorsed you and I’ll bank on her judgment.”
“When the mortgages come due, there won’t be any bungalow,” she continued.
“Don’t you believe it,” cried Runyon, earnestly. “With you to work for, I’ll make those tart old lemons pay the interest and a good income besides. In fact, if we live long enough, we may even manage to reduce the mortgages. You see, I’ve been extravagant and foolish, but it was because I had no aim in life. The minute you say ‘yes,’ I’m a reformed character.”
She shook her head and the smile faded from her face.
“Don’t think me ungrateful, Mr. Runyon,” she said quietly. “Unusual and—and—peculiar—as this proposal is, I believe you are sincere in what you say. But you are influenced just now by pity for me and I assure you I am quite capable of earning my own living.”
“But—oh, Mildred—he’s so lonely,” cried Patsy, impulsively.
“I’m sorry for that,” she said, “but it is not my fault.”
“It will be, though, if you refuse,” declared Runyon.
“I fear I must.”
“I see,” he said with a sigh. “Mother endorsed you, but she didn’t endorse me. You’ve heard some tough yarns about me—all true as gospel—and you’re prejudiced. I don’t know as I blame you. If I were a girl I’d hesitate to reform such a desperate character, I’m sure. But I’ve the notion there’s the making of a decent fellow in me, if the right workman undertakes the job.”
She looked at him earnestly, now—very earnestly. In spite of the squeaky voice and the inopportune time he had chosen for such a serious proposal, there was an innate manliness and ingenuousness in his attitude, as he stood there unabashed and towering above the other men, that seemed to her admirable and impressive. Both Beth and Patsy were reflecting that a girl might do much worse than to accept Bulwer Runyon as a mate.
Said Mildred, still speaking in the same quiet and composed voice:
“I will give you a positive answer in three days, Mr. Runyon. That delay is mere justice to us both.”
“Thank you,” he said. “Shall we fuss with these tattered laces any longer? It hardly seems worth while.”
Now that the strain of the situation was removed they all began chattering volubly in order to give countenance to Mildred. Runyon seemed not to need such consideration.
Old Miguel had witnessed and overheard this scene from the background and his bright black eyes had roamed restlessly from the girl’s face to Runyon’s as if trying to read their true feelings. The discovery of the laces had not drawn any exclamation from the ancient ranchero, whose stolid expression nothing seemed able to disturb. As the others filed down the stairs and out of the recess in the wall, into the roomy nursery, old Miguel followed imperturbable and serene as ever. In the court he touched his hat to his master.
“I go now, Meest Weld?” he asked.
“Yes. Thank you, Miguel, for your help.”
“I thank you, too,” said Mildred, stepping forward to take the Mexican’s hand. “I remember you well, Miguel. In the old days you often took care of me while my father and Señor Cristoval talked. Don’t you remember?”
He nodded, his eyes fixed full upon her face.
“Once a friend, always a friend, Miguel,” she continued brightly. “Even to-day you have been trying to help me, and I am grateful. Some time we will have a good talk together about the old days.”
Then he went away, and if one who knew old Miguel Zaloa could have followed him, his actions would have caused surprise.
First he wandered deep into the orange groves, where—when absolutely alone—he began muttering excitedly. At times he would kick his booted foot viciously against a tree-trunk, regardless of the impact that numbed his toes and sent a tingle up his legs. After a time this remarkable exhibit of passion subsided and for the period of half an hour he stood quite motionless, staring straight before him and seeing nothing. Then he started off through the groves, climbed the fence into the lane and marched away through miles and miles of the surrounding country.
It was growing dark when Miguel at last appeared at the quarters, growling at the men and ordering them to get into the groves and work. They marked his ill temper and took care not to arouse his further anger. In the morning he was up at daybreak and in more gentle mood directed the beginning of the day’s labors.
CHAPTER XXII—FAITHFUL AND TRUE
Late that afternoon Arthur and Louise sat in the court, chatting with their guests, who were occupied in coddling and amusing baby Jane, when Inez approached Mr. Weldon and said that Miguel wished to speak with him.
“Send him here,” said Arthur, and presently the old Mexican appeared, again arrayed in his best clothes and with the red necktie carefully arranged. He held his hat in his hand and looked uncertainly around the circle. Then his eyes wandered to the nursery and through the open door he saw Mildred sitting in a rocker, engaged in reading a book. Runyon had gone home that morning, “to see if the ranch is still there,” he said.
“I have—some—private talks to make, Meest Weld,” began the old ranchero.
“Speak out, Miguel,” said his master encouragingly.
“Oh; but he said ‘private,’” Patsy reminded him.
“I know. Miguel understands that he may speak before my friends.”
“It ees—about—Señor Cristoval, Meest Weld.”
“Yes? Well, what about him, Miguel?”
“I am once servant for Señor Cristoval. I stay here in house with him, long time. When he get sick, before he die, I care for him. Doctor say to me that Señor Cristoval can not get well; I say so to Señor Cristoval. He say never mind, he have live long enough.”
This was interesting to them all in view of the recent happenings, and the girls bent nearer to hear the old man’s story. Arthur, the major and Uncle John were equally intent.
“Señor Cristoval, he say, when he get very bad, there ees one thing he hate to leave, an’ that ees—his money,” continued Miguel. “He say, money ees his bes’ friend, all time. But he no can take money where he will go. He ees mad that many poor fools will spend the money he have love an’ cared for. So he make me take three big bag of gold an’ drive to bank an’ put away so the poor fools will find it. Much more money ees in bank, too. Then, when doctor come, he ask me when he will die, an’ doctor say when sun next shine Señor Cristoval will not see it. Doctor want to stay all night, but Señor Cristoval pay an’ tell him go. He want to die alone.
“But I am there. Some time in night Señor Cristoval he call an’ say: ‘Miguel, I mus’ not die till I have give to Leighton what belong to him. I have keep Leighton’s money for him. I will show you where it ees hid, so you can give it to Leighton.’”
Ah, they were intent enough now. Intuitively each listener seemed to know that a secret was about to be revealed and many glances were cast toward the unconscious Mildred, who continued to read placidly. But no one interrupted the old Mexican.
“I help Senor Cristoval to stand up. He ees not strong, so I hold him. He walk from blue room to back room an’ there he show me how to take block from wall. Behind block ees big place for money. Señor Cristoval he say all money what belong to Leighton ees there. He tell me count it. So I put Señor Cristoval in chair an’ he watch while I take out money an’ count. There ees four bag. I count three bag an’ he say good, it ees right. He say count last bag. So I empty bag on floor an’ count gold an’ put in bag again. When thees ees done I say: ‘Is eet right?’ But Señor Cristoval say nothing. I look up, an’ Señor Cristoval ees dead.”
The old man spoke simply and quietly, but they found his relation intensely dramatic. Patsy was trembling with excitement. Beth clasped Louise’s hand and found it cold from nervousness.
“And then, Miguel?” said Arthur.
“Then, Meest Weld, I put gold in wall an’ fix block so no one know an’ carry Señor Cristoval to his bed. That ees all, Meest Weld.”
“And you told no one of Leighton’s gold?”
“I tell no one. It ees belong to Leighton.”
“Where is it now, Miguel?”
“In wall, Meest Weld.”
“All of it?”
“All.”
There was a moment’s pause.
“You know now that it belongs to Mildred—to Leighton’s daughter,—do you not?” he asked, an accent of sternness in his voice.
“I know, Meest Weld.”
“Then why did you not tell us of this before?”
Old Miguel stood silent, shifting from one foot to another, his eyes cast down, his slender brown fingers spasmodically pressing the rim of his sombrero. But when he spoke it was in his former quiet manner.
“I am a bad man, Meest Weld. I theenk I keep gold for myself. Why not, when no one know? Long time after Señor Cristoval die no one come here. Some time I go to room an’ count gold. When I see it I have bad thought. I theenk it ees nice if I keep all myself. But when I go away an’ work in the grove, I tell Miguel many time that gold ees not his; it ees Leighton’s gold. I say when Leighton come for it he mus’ have it. But Leighton do not come. Many year the gold ees mine, an’ no one know. Then come Leighton’s girl, an’ I know I am bad man if I keep gold. But I say nothing. I theenk no one ever know.”
“But tell me,” said Arthur curiously, “what good is the money to you when it is hidden in a wall?”
“Not much, Meest Weld; but I know I am rich. I say I can buy ranch an’ be big man, an’ no one know I have steal Leighton’s gold.”
“Then why have you told us the secret?”
Miguel glanced toward the nursery.
“I am man for work,” said he. “Always I work; always I mus’ work. I am old. When I can no work, I mus’ die. Señor Cristoval mus’ leave gold when he die; it ees same with Miguel. Now I have good job. I can work an’ be happy. But—”
“Well, Miguel?”
“Leighton’s daughter, she ees a girl. A girl can not work like a man. It ees her gold, not mine. When you say it, I will show you where Leighton’s gold ees hid.”
Uncle John sprang up and grasped the man’s hand.
“You are an honest fellow, Miguel!” he cried.
“No, Meest Mereek,” was the reply. “I have wish to steal, so I am not honest.”
“But you have given up the gold.”
“Yes, Meest Mereek; because I am afraid.”
“I don’t believe a word of it,” said Patsy. “You were tempted to do wrong, Miguel, and if you had kept silent no one would ever have known; but you told us of the gold, and so you are faithful and true.”
“Ah, that ees what Meest Leighton tell me, some time,” said he. “An’ that ees what spoil me from being bad. Because Leighton say I am faithful an’ true, I have theenk I mus’ be that way. That ees it.”
————
Mildred’s gold proved to be a small fortune. Perhaps Cristoval had added to his partner’s earnings, for the child’s sake, for the total amounted to more than she had ever expected.
It was all in hard cash and Arthur drove over to the bank and deposited it to the credit of Mildred Travers, as she preferred to retain that name.
Patsy and Beth were curious to know what the girl would do with her windfall, but Mildred proved noncommittal.
“How about Bul Run?” asked Patsy.
Mildred smiled but blushed deeply at the question.
“Would my money be enough to pay his mortgages?” she inquired.
“Perhaps,” said Beth, “but that would be foolish. He would soon be in debt again.”
“No, no!” protested Patsy. “I’m sure he will reform if—”
“If Mildred marries him?”
“Yes.”
Mildred seemed troubled.
“The best way,” declared Beth, “would be to have Mildred keep her money in her own name, and help out in case of emergency.”
Mildred approved that, and being pressed by the two girls she frankly confided to them that she would accept Mr. Runyon when he came for his answer.
Runyon appeared on the third day and Arthur met him and told him the good news of the finding of Mildred’s inheritance. But the effect of this discovery on the big rancher was to overwhelm him with despair.
“She will never marry me now,” he asserted in doleful tones, “and I’d rather die than ask her. It would be beastly to take such an advantage of the poor child. When she was poor, I could offer her a home with good grace, but now that she’s rolling in gold the jig is up! If you’ll tell me, where I can find old Miguel, I’ll strangle the villain. Why in thunder couldn’t he hold his tongue?”
Arthur laughingly replied that money wouldn’t make a particle of difference with a girl like Mildred, but Runyon would not listen and remained disconsolate. He stayed at the ranch, but moped around with a woe-begone countenance and refused to speak with anyone.
Patsy and Beth skillfully contrived several opportunities for Runyon to approach Mildred, but he ignored all chances and preferred to remain miserable. The day passed without his demanding his answer. Mildred had been bright and expectant and the girls read her disappointment when her unaccountable wooer delayed putting his fortune to the test.
The next day he was no more cheerful, but rather seemed to have accumulated an added gloom. He sought a garden bench and smoked innumerable cigars in solitary grief. If anyone approached, Runyon would retreat to the shrubbery. At mealtime he was likewise silent but consumed enormous quantities of food, which made Patsy accuse him of being an impostor.
“No regulation lover,” she said to him, “ever had an appetite. The novels all say so. Therefore you can’t love Mildred a bit.”
Runyon groaned, cast her a reproachful glance and went on eating.
Several days passed without his asking Mildred for her answer, and now the absurd situation began to get on all their nerves. Mildred herself grew impatient and watched from the nursery window the garden bench on which Runyon sat gloomily in his perpetual cloud of smoke.
“He’ll make himself sick, with those black cigars, I’m sure,” observed Patsy, on one occasion.
“And he can’t afford to smoke so many,” added Beth. “Unless this thing stops, he’ll soon have to take out a new mortgage.”
“Or sell some lemons,” added Patsy.
“I believe,” said Mildred slowly, as if summoning her courage, “I will speak to him myself. Don’t you think that would be best?”
“Of course,” approved Patsy. “Runyon is a big baby, and needs a nurse more than little Jane. I’ll hold Toodlums, Mildred, while you sally forth and take the bull by the horns.”
Mildred looked at Beth for counsel.
“Unless you speak to him,” said that young lady, “you will never get together. Moreover, the rest of us will grow mad or idiotic. So, for all our sakes, you’d better take Mr. Runyon in hand. You’ll have to manage him afterward, anyhow, so the sooner you begin the better.”
Mildred handed little Jane to Patsy and left the nursery. Through the window the other girls watched her approach Mr. Runyon and stand before him. At once he stood up and threw away his cigar, but his face was toward them and they could see that he did not speak.
Mildred, however, was talking very earnestly. Runyon shook his head. He turned half away. Then he swung sharply around and caught the girl in his arms.
“Come, Beth,” said Patsy; “let’s go and tell Louise.”

= = = PG10432 = = =
AUNT JANE'S NIECES OUT WEST
E-text prepared by Afra Ullah, Mary Meehan, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
Aunt Jane's Nieces Out West
By Edith Van Dyne
1914
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I CAUGHT BY THE CAMERA
II AN OBJECT LESSON
III AN ATTRACTIVE GIRL
IV AUNT JANE'S NIECES
V A THRILLING RESCUE
VI A. JONES
VII THE INVALID
VIII THE MAGIC OF A NAME
IX DOCTOR PATSY
X STILL A MYSTERY
XI A DAMSEL IN DISTRESS
XII PICTURES, GIRLS AND NONSENSE
XIII A FOOLISH BOY
XIV ISIDORE LE DRIEUX
XV A FEW PEARLS
XVI TROUBLE
XVII UNCLE JOHN IS PUZZLED
XVIII DOUBTS AND DIFFICULTIES
XIX MAUD MAKES A MEMORANDUM
XX A GIRLISH NOTION
XXI THE YACHT "ARABELLA"
XXII MASCULINE AND FEMININE
XXIII THE ADVANTAGE OF A DAY
XXIV PICTURE NUMBER NINETEEN
XXV JUDGMENT
XXVI SUNSHINE AFTER RAIN
CHAPTER I
CAUGHT BY THE CAMERA
"This is getting to be an amazing old world," said a young girl, still in her "teens," as she musingly leaned her chin on her hand.
"It has always been an amazing old world, Beth," said another girl who was sitting on the porch railing and swinging her feet in the air.
"True, Patsy," was the reply; "but the people are doing such peculiar things nowadays."
"Yes, yes!" exclaimed a little man who occupied a reclining chair within hearing distance; "that is the way with you young folks--always confounding the world with its people."
"Don't the people make the world, Uncle John?" asked Patricia Doyle, looking at him quizzically.
"No, indeed; the world could get along very well without its people; but the people--"
"To be sure; they need the world," laughed Patsy, her blue eyes twinkling so that they glorified her plain, freckled face.
"Nevertheless," said Beth de Graf, soberly, "I think the people have struck a rapid pace these days and are growing bold and impudent. The law appears to allow them too much liberty. After our experience of this morning I shall not be surprised at anything that happens--especially in this cranky state of California."
"To what experience do you allude, Beth?" asked Uncle John, sitting up straight and glancing from one to another of his two nieces. He was a genial looking, round-faced man, quite bald and inclined to be a trifle stout; yet his fifty-odd years sat lightly upon him.
"Why, we had quite an adventure this morning," said Patsy, laughing again at the recollection, and answering her uncle because Beth hesitated to. "For my part, I think it was fun, and harmless fun, at that; but Beth was scared out of a year's growth. I admit feeling a little creepy at the time, myself; but it was all a joke and really we ought not to mind it at all."
"Tell me all about it, my dear!" said Mr. Merrick, earnestly, for whatever affected his beloved nieces was of prime importance to him.
"We were taking our morning stroll along the streets," began Patsy, "when on turning a corner we came upon a crowd of people who seemed to be greatly excited. Most of them were workmen in flannel shirts, their sleeves rolled up, their hands grimy with toil. These stood before a brick building that seemed like a factory, while from its doors other crowds of workmen and some shopgirls were rushing into the street and several policemen were shaking their clubs and running here and there in a sort of panic. At first Beth and I stopped and hesitated to go on, but as the sidewalk seemed open and fairly free I pulled Beth along, thinking we might discover what the row was about. Just as we got opposite the building a big workman rushed at us and shouted: 'Go back--go back! The wall is falling.'
"Well, Uncle, you can imagine our dismay. We both screamed, for we thought our time had come, for sure. My legs were so weak that Beth had to drag me away and her face was white as a sheet and full of terror. Somehow we managed to stagger into the street, where a dozen men caught us and hurried us away. I hardly thought we were in a safe place when the big workman cried: 'There, young ladies; that will do. Your expression was simply immense and if this doesn't turn out to be the best film of the year, I'll miss my guess! Your terror-stricken features will make a regular hit, for the terror wasn't assumed, you know. Thank you very much for happening along just then.'"
Patsy stopped her recital to laugh once more, with genuine merriment, but her cousin Beth seemed annoyed and Uncle John was frankly bewildered.
"But--what--what--was it all about?" he inquired.
"Why, they were taking a moving picture, that was all, and the workmen and shopgirls and policemen were all actors. There must have been a hundred of them, all told, and when we recovered from our scare I could hear the machine beside me clicking away as it took the picture."
"Did the wall fall?" asked Uncle John.
"Not just then. They first got the picture of the rush-out and the panic, and then they stopped the camera and moved the people to a safe distance away. We watched them set up some dummy figures of girls and workmen, closer in, and then in some way they toppled over the big brick wall. It fell into the street with a thundering crash, but only the dummies were buried under the debris."
Mr. Merrick drew a long breath.
"It's wonderful!" he exclaimed. "Why, it must have cost a lot of money to ruin such a building--and all for the sake of a picture!"
"That's what I said to the manager," replied Patsy; "but he told us the building was going to be pulled down, anyhow, and a better one built in its place; so he invented a picture story to fit the falling walls and it didn't cost him so much as one might think. So you see, Uncle, we are in that picture--big as life and scared stiff--and I'd give a lot to see how we look when we're positively terror-stricken."
"It will cost you just ten cents," remarked Beth, with a shrug; "that is, if the picture proves good enough to be displayed at one of those horrid little theatres."
"One?" said Uncle John. "One thousand little theatres, most likely, will show the picture, and perhaps millions of spectators will see you and Patsy running from the falling wall."
"Dear me!" wailed Patsy. "That's more fame than I bargained for. Do millions go to see motion pictures, Uncle?"
"I believe so. The making of these pictures is getting to be an enormous industry. I was introduced to Otis Werner, the other day, and he told me a good deal about it. Werner is with one of the big concerns here--the Continental, I think--and he's a very nice and gentlemanly fellow. I'll introduce you to him, some time, and he'll tell you all the wonders of the motion picture business."
"I haven't witnessed one of those atrocious exhibitions for months," announced Beth; "nor have I any desire to see one again."
"Not our own special picture?" asked Patsy reproachfully.
"They had no right to force us into their dreadful drama," protested Beth. "Motion pictures are dreadfully tiresome things--comedies and tragedies alike. They are wild and weird in conception, quite unreal and wholly impossible. Of course the scenic pictures, and those recording historical events, are well enough in their way, but I cannot understand how so many cheap little picture theatres thrive."
"They are the poor people's solace and recreation," declared Mr. Merrick. "The picture theatre has become the laboring man's favorite resort. It costs him but five or ten cents and it's the sort of show he can appreciate. I'm told the motion picture is considered the saloon's worst enemy, for many a man is taking his wife and children to a picture theatre evenings instead of joining a gang of his fellows before the bar, as he formerly did."
"That is the best argument in their favor I have ever heard," admitted Beth, who was strong on temperance; "but I hope, Uncle, you are not defending the insolent methods of those picture-makers."
"Not at all, my dear. I consider the trapping of innocent bystanders to be--eh--er--highly reprehensible, and perhaps worse. If I can discover what picture manager was guilty of the act, I shall--shall--"
"What, Uncle?"
"I shall hint that he owes you an apology," he concluded, rather lamely.
Beth smiled scornfully.
"Meantime," said she, "two very respectable girls, who are not actresses, will be exhibited before the critical eyes of millions of stupid workmen, reformed drunkards, sad-faced women and wiggling children--not in dignified attitudes, mind you, but scurrying from what they supposed was an imminent danger."
"I hope it will do the poor things good to see us," retorted Patsy. "To be strictly honest, Beth, we were not trapped at all; we were the victims of circumstances. When I remember how quick-witted and alert that manager was, to catch us unawares and so add to the value of his picture, I can quite forgive the fellow his audacity."
"It wasn't audacity so much as downright impudence!" persisted Beth.
"I quite agree with you," said Mr. Merrick. "Do you wish me to buy that film and prevent the picture's being shown?"
"Oh, no!" cried Patsy in protest. "I'm dying to see how we look. I wouldn't have that picture sidetracked for anything."
"And you, Beth?"
"Really, Uncle John, the thing is not worth worrying over," replied his niece. "I am naturally indignant at being drawn into such a thing against my will, but I doubt if anyone who knows us, or whose opinion we value, will ever visit a moving picture theatre or see this film. The common people will not recognize us, of course."
You must not think Beth de Graf was snobbish or aristocratic because of this speech, which her cousin Patsy promptly denounced as "snippy." Beth was really a lovable and sunny-tempered girl, very democratic in her tastes in spite of the fact that she was the possessor of an unusual fortune. She was out of sorts to-day, resentful of the fright she had endured that morning and in the mood to say harsh things.
Even Patricia Doyle had been indignant, at first; but Patsy's judgment was clearer than her cousin's and her nature more responsive. She quickly saw the humorous side of their adventure and could enjoy the recollection of her momentary fear.
These two girls were spending the winter months in the glorious climate of Southern California, chaperoned by their uncle and guardian, John Merrick. They had recently established themselves at a cosy hotel in Hollywood, which is a typical California village, yet a suburb of the great city of Los Angeles. A third niece, older and now married--Louise Merrick Weldon--lived on a ranch between Los Angeles and San Diego, which was one reason why Uncle John and his wards had located in this pleasant neighborhood.
To observe this trio--the simple, complacent little man and his two young nieces--no stranger would suspect them to be other than ordinary tourists, bent on escaping the severe Eastern winter; but in New York the name of John Merrick was spoken with awe in financial circles, where his many millions made him an important figure. He had practically retired from active business and his large investments were managed by his brother-in-law, Major Gregory Doyle, who was Miss Patsy's father and sole surviving parent. All of Mr. Merrick's present interest in life centered in his three nieces, and because Louise was happily married and had now an establishment of her own--including a rather new but very remarkable baby--Uncle John was drawn closer to the two younger nieces and devoted himself wholly to their welfare.
The girls had not been rich when their fairy godfather first found them. Indeed, each of them had been energetically earning, or preparing to earn, a livelihood. Now, when their uncle's generosity had made them wealthy, they almost regretted those former busy days of poverty, being obliged to discover new interests in life in order to keep themselves occupied and contented. All three were open-handed and open-hearted, sympathetic to the unfortunate and eager to assist those who needed money, as many a poor girl and worthy young fellow could testify. In all their charities they were strongly supported by Mr. Merrick, whose enormous income permitted him to indulge in many benevolences. None gave ostentatiously, for they were simple, kindly folk who gave for the pure joy of giving and begrudged all knowledge of their acts to anyone outside their own little circle.
There is no doubt that John Merrick was eccentric. It is generally conceded that a rich man may indulge in eccentricities, provided he maintains a useful position in society, and Mr. Merrick's peculiarities only served to render him the more interesting to those who knew him best. He did astonishing things in a most matter-of-fact way and acted more on impulse than on calm reflection; so it is not to be wondered at that the queer little man's nieces had imbibed some of his queerness. Being by nature lively and aggressive young women, whose eager interest in life would not permit them to be idle, they encountered many interesting experiences.
They had just come from a long visit to Louise at the ranch and after conferring gravely together had decided to hide themselves in Hollywood, where they might spend a quiet and happy winter in wandering over the hills, in boating or bathing in the ocean or motoring over the hundreds of miles of splendid boulevards of this section.
Singularly enough, their choice of a retreat was also the choice of a score or more of motion picture makers, who had discovered Hollywood before them and were utilizing the brilliant sunshine and clear atmosphere in the production of their films, which were supplied to picture theatres throughout the United States and Europe. Appreciating the value of such a monster industry, the authorities permitted the cameras to be set up on the public streets or wherever there was an appropriate scene to serve for a background to the photo-plays. It was no unusual sight to see troops of cowboys and Indians racing through the pretty village or to find the cameraman busy before the imposing residence of a millionaire or the vine-covered bungalow of a more modest citizen. No one seemed to resent such action, for Californians admire the motion picture as enthusiastically as do the inhabitants of the Eastern states, so the girls' "adventure" was really a common incident.
CHAPTER II
AN OBJECT LESSON
It was the following afternoon when Uncle John captured his casual acquaintance, Mr. Otis Werner, in the office of the hotel and dragged the motion picture man away to his rooms to be introduced to his nieces.
"Here, my dears, is Mr. Werner," he began, as he threw open the door of their apartment and escorted his companion in. "He is one of those picture makers, you'll remember, and--and--"
He paused abruptly, for Beth was staring at Mr. Werner with a frown on her usually placid features, while Patsy was giggling hysterically. Mr. Werner, a twinkle of amusement in his eye, bowed with exaggerated deference.
"Dear me!" said Uncle John. "Is--is anything wrong!"
"No; it's all right, Uncle," declared Patsy, striving to control a fresh convulsion of laughter. "Only--this is the same dreadful manager who dragged us into his picture yesterday."
"I beg your pardon," said Mr. Werner; "I'm not a manager; I'm merely what is called in our profession a 'producer,' or a 'stage director.'"
"Well, you're the man, anyhow," asserted Patsy. "So what have you to say for yourself, sir?"
"If you were annoyed, I humbly apologize," he returned. "Perhaps I was unintentionally rude to frighten you in that way, but my excuse lies in our subservience to the demands of our art. We seldom hesitate at anything which tends to give our pictures the semblance of reality."
"_Art_, did you say, Mr. Werner?" It was Beth who asked this and there was a bit of a sneer in her tone.
"It is really art--art of the highest character," he replied warmly. "Do you question it, Miss--Miss--"
"Miss de Graf. I suppose, to be fair, I must admit that the photography is art; but the subjects of your pictures, I have observed, are far from artistic. Such a picture, for instance, as you made yesterday can have little value to anyone."
"Little value! Why, Miss de Graf, you astonish me," he exclaimed. "I consider that picture of the falling wall one of my greatest triumphs--and I've been making pictures for years. Aside from its realism, its emotional nature--'thrills,' we call it--this picture conveys a vivid lesson that ought to prove of great benefit to humanity."
Beth was looking at him curiously now. Patsy was serious and very attentive. As Uncle John asked his visitor to be seated his voice betrayed the interest he felt in the conversation.
"Of course we saw only a bit of the picture," said Patsy Doyle. "What was it all about, Mr. Werner?"
"We try," said he, slowly and impressively, as if in love with his theme, "to give to our pictures an educational value, as well as to render them entertaining. Some of them contain a high moral lesson; others, a warning; many, an incentive to live purer and nobler lives. All of our plots are conceived with far more thought than you may suppose. Underlying many of our romances and tragedies are moral injunctions which are involuntarily absorbed by the observers, yet of so subtle a nature that they are not suspected. We cannot preach except by suggestion, for people go to our picture shows to be amused. If we hurled righteousness at them they would soon desert us, and we would be obliged to close up shop."
"I must confess that this is, to me, a most novel presentation of the subject," said Beth, more graciously. "Personally, I care little for your pictures; but I can understand how travel scenes and scientific or educational subjects might be of real benefit to the people."
"I can't understand anyone's being indifferent to the charm of motion pictures," he responded, somewhat reproachfully.
"Why, at first they struck me as wonderful," said the girl. "They were such a novel invention that I went to see them from pure curiosity. But, afterward, the subjects presented in the pictures bored me. The drama pictures were cheap and common, the comedy scenes worse; so I kept away from the picture theatres."
"Educational pictures," said Mr. Werner, musingly, "have proved a failure, as I hinted, except when liberally interspersed with scenes of action and human interest. The only financial failures among the host of motion picture theatres, so far as I have observed, are those that have attempted to run travel scenes and educational films exclusively. There are so few people with your--eh--culture and--and--elevated tastes, you see, when compared with the masses."
"But tell us about _our_ picture," pleaded Patsy. "What lesson can that falling wall possibly convey?"
"I'll be glad to explain that," he eagerly replied, "for I am quite proud of it, I assure you. There are many buildings throughout our larger cities that were erected as cheaply as possible and without a single thought for the safety of their tenants. So many disasters have resulted from this that of late years building inspectors have been appointed in every locality to insist on proper materials and mechanical efficiency in the erection of all classes of buildings. These inspectors, however, cannot tear the old buildings down to see if they are safe, and paint and plaster cover a multitude of sins of unscrupulous builders. Usually the landlord or owner knows well the condition of his property and in many cases refuses to put it into such shape as to insure the safety of his tenants. Greed, false economy and heartless indifference to the welfare of others are unfortunately too prevalent among the wealthy class. No ordinary argument could induce owners to expend money in strengthening or rebuilding their income-producing properties. But I get after them in my picture with a prod that ought to rouse them to action.
"The picture opens with a scene in the interior of a factory. Men, girls and boys are employed. The foreman observes a warning crack in the wall and calls the proprietor's attention to it. In this case the manufacturer is the owner of the building, but he refuses to make repairs. His argument is that the wall has stood for many years and so is likely to stand for many more; it would be a waste of money to repair the old shell. Next day the foreman shows him that the crack has spread and extended along the wall in an alarming manner but still the owner will not act. The workmen counsel together seriously. They dare not desert their jobs, for they must have money to live. They send a petition to the owner, who becomes angry and swears he won't be driven to a useless expense by his own employees. In the next scene the manufacturer's daughter--his only child--having heard that the building was unsafe, comes to her father's office to plead with him to change his mind and make the needed repairs. Although he loves this daughter next to his money he resents her interference in a business matter, and refuses. Her words, however, impress him so strongly that he calls her back from the door to kiss her and say that he will give the matter further thought, for her sake.
"As she leaves the office there is a cry of terror from the factory and the working people come rushing out of the now tottering building. That was when you two young ladies came walking up the street and were dragged out of danger by the foreman of the shop--in other words, by myself. The owner's daughter, bewildered by the confusion, hesitates what to do or which way to turn, and as she stands upon the sidewalk she is crushed by the falling wall, together with several of her father's employees."
"How dreadful!" exclaimed Patsy.
"Of course no one was actually hurt," he hastened to say; "for we used dummy figures for the wall to fall upon. In the final scene the bereaved father suddenly realizes that he has been working and accumulating only for this beloved child--the child whose life he has sacrificed by his miserly refusal to protect his workmen. His grief is so intense that no one who follows the story of this picture will ever hesitate to repair a building promptly, if he learns it is unsafe. Do you now understand the lesson taught, young ladies?"
Mr. Werner's dramatic recital had strongly impressed the two girls, while Uncle John was visibly affected.
"I'm very glad," said the little man fervently, "that none of my money is in factories or other buildings that might prove unsafe. It would make my life miserable if I thought I was in any way responsible for such a catastrophe as you have pictured."
"It seems to me," observed Patsy, "that your story is unnecessarily cruel, Mr. Werner."
"Then you do not understand human nature," he retorted; "or, at least, that phase of human nature I have aimed at. Those indifferent rich men are very hard to move and you must figuratively hit them squarely between the eyes to make them even wink."
They were silent for a time, considering this novel aspect of the picture business. Then Beth asked:
"Can you tell us, sir, when and where we shall be able to see this picture?"
"It will be released next Monday."
"What does that mean?"
"It means that we, as manufacturers, supply certain agencies in all the large cities, who in turn rent our films to the many picture theatres. When a picture is ready, we send copies to all our agencies and set a day when they may release it, or give it to their customers to use. In this way the picture will be shown in all parts of the United States on the same day--in this case, next Monday."
"Isn't that very quick?"
"Yes. The picture we took yesterday will to-night be shipped, all complete and ready to run, to forty-four different centers."
"And will any picture theatre in Hollywood or Los Angeles show it?"
"Certainly. It will be at the Globe Theatre in Los Angeles and at the Isis Theatre in Hollywood, for the entire week."
"We shall certainly see it," announced Uncle John.
When Mr. Werner had gone they conversed for some time on the subject of motion pictures, and the man's remarkable statement concerning them.
"I had no idea," Beth confessed, "that the industry of making pictures is so extensive and involves so much thought and detail."
"And money," added Uncle John. "It must be a great expense just to employ that army of actors."
"I suppose Mr. Werner, being a theatrical man, has drawn the long bow in his effort to impress us," said Patsy. "I've been thinking over some of the pictures I've seen recently and I can't imagine a moral, however intangible or illusive, in connection with any of them. But perhaps I wasn't observant enough. The next time I go to a picture show I shall study the plays more carefully."
CHAPTER III
AN ATTRACTIVE GIRL
On Saturday they were treated to a genuine surprise, for when the omnibus drew up before the hotel entrance it brought Arthur Weldon and his girl-wife, Louise, who was Uncle John's eldest niece. It also brought "the Cherub," a wee dimpled baby hugged closely in the arms of Inez, its Mexican nurse.
Patsy and Beth shrieked in ecstasy as they rushed forward to smother "Toodlums," as they irreverently called the Cherub, with kisses. Inez, a handsome, dark-eyed girl, relinquished her burden cheerfully to the two adoring "aunties," while Uncle John kissed Louise and warmly shook the hand of her youthful husband.
"What in the world induced you to abandon your beloved ranch?" inquired Mr. Merrick.
"Don't ask me, sir!" replied Arthur, laughing at the elder gentleman's astonishment. He was a trim young fellow, with a clean-cut, manly face and frank, winning manners.
"It's sort of between hay and grass with us, you know," he explained. "Walnuts all marketed and oranges not ready for the pickers. All our neighbors have migrated, this way or that, for their regular winter vacations, and after you all left, Louise and I began to feel lonely. So at breakfast this morning we decided to flit. At ten o'clock we caught the express, and here we are--in time for lunch. I hope it's ready, Uncle John."
It was; but they must get their rooms and settle the baby in her new quarters before venturing to enter the dining room. So they were late for the midday meal and found themselves almost the only guests in the great dining hall.
As they sat at table, chatting merrily together, Arthur asked:
"What are you staring at, Patsy?"
"A lovely girl," said she. "One of the loveliest girls I have ever seen. Don't look around, Arthur; it might attract their attention."
"How many girls are there?"
"Two; and a lady who seems to be their mother. The other girl is pretty, too, but much younger than her sister--or friend, for they do not resemble one another much. They came in a few minutes ago and are seated at the table in the opposite corner."
"New arrivals, I suppose," remarked Uncle John, who from his position could observe the group.
"No," said Patsy; "their waitress seems to know them well. But I've never before seen them in the hotel."
"We are always early at meal time," explained Beth, "and to-day these people are certainly late. But they _are_ pretty girls, Patsy. For once I concur in your judgment."
"You arouse my curiosity," said Arthur, speaking quietly, so as not to be overheard in the far corner. "If I hear more ecstatic praises of these girls I shall turn around and stare them out of countenance."
"Don't," said Louise. "I'm glad your back is toward them, Arthur, for it preserves you from the temptation to flirt."
"Oh, as for that, I do not need to turn around in order to see pretty girls," he replied.
"Thank you, Arthur," said Patsy, making a face at him. "Look me over all you like, and flirt if you want to. I'm sure Louise won't object."
"Really, Patsy, you're not bad to look at," he retorted, eyeing her critically. "Aside from your red hair, the pug nose and the freckles, you have many excellent qualities. If you didn't squint--"
"Squint!"
"What do you call that affection of your eyes?"
"That," she said, calmly eating her dessert, "was a glance of scorn--burning, bitter scorn!"
"I maintain it was a squint," declared Arthur.
"That isn't her only expression," announced Uncle John, who loved these little exchanges of good-humored banter. "On Monday I will show you Patsy as a terror-stricken damsel in distress."
"Also Beth, still more distressful," added Patsy; and then they told Louise and Arthur about the picture.
"Fine!" he cried. "I'm deeply gratified that my own relatives--"
"By marriage."
"I am gratified that my secondhand cousins have been so highly honored. I'd rather see a good moving picture than the best play ever produced."
"You'll see a good one this time," asserted Patsy, "for we are the stars."
"I think that unscrupulous Mr. Werner deserves a reprimand," said Louise.
"Oh, he apologized," explained Beth. "But I'm sure he'd take the same liberty again if he had the chance."
"He admits that his love of art destroys his sense of propriety," said Patsy.
As they rose from the table Arthur deliberately turned to view the party in the other corner, and then to the amazement of his friends he coolly walked over and shook the elder lady's hand with evident pleasure. Next moment he was being introduced to the two girls. The three cousins and their Uncle John walked out of the dining hall and awaited Arthur Weldon in the lobby.
"It is some old acquaintance, of course," said Louise. "Arthur knows a tremendous lot of people and remembers everyone he ever has met."
When he rejoined them he brought the lady and the two beautiful girls with him, introducing Mrs. Montrose as one of his former acquaintances in New York, where she had been a near neighbor to the Weldons. The girls, who proved to be her nieces instead of her daughters, were named Maud and Florence Stanton, Maud being about eighteen years of age and Florence perhaps fifteen. Maud's beauty was striking, as proved by Patsy's admiration at first sight; Florence was smaller and darker, yet very dainty and witching, like a Dresden shepherdess.
The sisters proved rather shy at this first meeting, being content to exchange smiles with the other girls, but their aunt was an easy conversationalist and rambled on about the delights of Hollywood and southern California until they were all in a friendly mood. Among other things Mrs. Montrose volunteered the statement that they had been at the hotel for several weeks, but aside from that remark disclosed little of their personal affairs. Presently the three left the hotel and drove away in an automobile, having expressed a wish to meet their new friends again and become better acquainted with them.
"I was almost startled at running across Mrs. Montrose out here," said Arthur. "After father's death, when I gave up the old home, I lost track of the Montroses; but I seem to remember that old Montrose went to the happy hunting grounds and left a widow, but no children. I imagine these people are wealthy, as Montrose was considered a successful banker. I'll write to Duggins and inquire about them."
"Duggins seems to know everything," remarked Louise.
"He keeps pretty good track of New York people, especially of the old families," replied her husband.
"I can't see what their history matters to us," observed Patsy. "I like to take folks as I find them, without regard to their antecedents or finances. Certainly those Stanton girls are wonderfully attractive and ladylike."
But now the baby claimed their attention and the rest of that day was passed in "visiting" and cuddling the wee Toodlums, who seemed to know her girl aunties and greeted them with friendly coos and dimpled smiles.
On Sunday they took a motor trip through the mountain boulevards and on their way home passed the extensive enclosure of the Continental Film Company. A thriving village has been built up at this place, known as Film City, for many of those employed by the firm prefer to live close to their work. Another large "plant" of the same concern is located in the heart of Hollywood.
As they passed through Film City Uncle John remarked:
"We are invited to visit this place and witness the making of a motion picture. I believe it would prove an interesting sight."
"Let us go, by all means," replied Arthur. "I am greatly interested in this new industry, which seems to me to be still in its infancy. The development of the moving picture is bound to lead to some remarkable things in the future, I firmly believe."
"So do I," said Uncle John. "They'll combine the phonograph with the pictures, for one thing, so that the players, instead of being silent, will speak as clearly as in real life. Then we'll have the grand operas, by all the most famous singers, elaborately staged; and we'll be able to see and hear them for ten cents, instead of ten dollars. It will be the same with the plays of the greatest actors."
"That would open up a curious complication," asserted Louise. "The operas would only be given once, before the camera and the recorder. Then what would happen to all the high-priced opera singers?"
"They would draw royalties on all their productions, instead of salaries," replied Arthur.
"Rather easy for the great artists!" observed Patsy. "One performance--and the money rolling in for all time to come."
"Well, they deserve it," declared Beth. "And think of what the public would gain! Instead of having to suffer during the performances of incompetent actors and singers, as we do to-day, the whole world would be able to see and hear the best talent of the ages for an insignificant fee. I hope your prediction will come true, Uncle John."
"It's bound to," he replied, with confidence. "I've read somewhere that Edison and others have been working on these lines for years, and although they haven't succeeded yet, anything possible in mechanics is bound to be produced in time."
CHAPTER IV
AUNT JANE'S NIECES
The picture, which was entitled "The Sacrifice," proved--to use Patsy's words--"a howling success." On Monday afternoons the little theatres are seldom crowded, so Mr. Merrick's party secured choice seats where they could observe every detail of the photography. The girls could not wait for a later performance, so eager were they to see themselves in a motion picture, nor were they disappointed to find they were a mere incident in the long roll of film.
The story of the photo-play was gripping in its intensity, and since Mr. Werner had clearly explained the lesson it conveyed, they followed the plot with rapt attention. In the last scene their entrance and exit was transitory, but they were obliged to admit that their features were really expressive of fear. The next instant the wall fell, burying its victims, and this rather bewildered them when they remembered that fully half an hour had elapsed while the dummies were being placed in position, the real people removed from danger and preparations made to topple over the wall from the inside of the building. But the camera had been inactive during that period and so cleverly had the parts of the picture been united that no pause whatever was observable to the spectators.
"My! what a stuffy place," exclaimed Louise, as they emerged into the light of day. "I cannot understand why it is necessary to have these moving picture theatres so gloomy and uncomfortable."
"It isn't necessary," replied Uncle John. "It's merely a habit the builders have acquired. There seemed to be a total lack of ventilation in that place."
"No one expects much for ten cents," Arthur reminded him. "If the pictures are good the public will stand for anything in the matter of discomfort."
"Did you notice," said Patsy, slowly, "how many children there were in that theatre?"
"Yes, indeed," answered Beth. "The pictures seem to be an ideal amusement for children. I do not suppose they can understand all the dramas and love stories, but the pictures entertain them, whatever the theme may be."
"They are not allowed to go unless accompanied by a parent or guardian," Arthur stated; "but I saw a group of eleven under the care of one cheery-looking old lady, so I suppose the little ones evade the law in that way."
On Tuesday forenoon they drove to the office of the Continental Film Manufacturing Company and inquired for Mr. Werner. Every approach to the interior of the big stockade was closely guarded in order to prevent the curious from intruding, but Werner at once hurried out to greet them and escorted them into the enclosure.
"You are just in time," said he, "to witness one of the scenes in our great picture, 'Samson and Delilah.' They're getting it on now, so you must hurry if you want to see the work. It's really the biggest thing our firm has ever turned out."
They passed a group of low but extensive frame buildings, threading their way between them until finally they emerged within a large open space where huge frames covered with canvas were propped up in broad daylight and apparently in great disorder. Huddled here and there were groups of people wearing Oriental costumes of the Bible days, their skins stained brown, the make-up on their faces showing hideously in the strong light. A herd of meek donkeys, bearing burdens of faggots, was tethered near by.
"Follow me closely," cautioned their guide, "so you will not step over the 'dead line' and get yourselves in the picture."
"What is the 'dead line'?" inquired Uncle John.
"The line that marks the limit of the camera's scope. Outside of that you are quite safe. You will notice it is plainly marked in chalk."
They passed around to the front and were amazed at the picture disclosed by the reverse of the gaunt, skeleton-like framework. For now was displayed Solomon's temple in all its magnificence, with huge pillars supporting a roof that seemed as solid and substantial as stone and mortar could make it.
The perspective was wonderful, for they could follow a line of vision through the broad temple to a passage beyond, along which was approaching a procession of priests, headed by dancing girls and musicians beating tomtoms and playing upon reeds. The entire scene was barbaric in its splendor and so impressive that they watched it spellbound, awed and silent.
Yet here beside them was the motion-picture camera, clicking steadily away and operated by a man in his shirt-sleeves who watched the scene with sharp eyes, now frowning and now nodding approval. Beside him at times, but rushing from one point to another just outside the chalk-marks that indicated the "dead line," was the director of this production, who shouted commands in a nervous, excited manner and raged and tore his hair when anything went wrong.
Something went very wrong presently, for the director blew a shrill blast on his whistle and suddenly everything stopped short. The camera man threw a cloth over his lenses and calmly lighted a cigarette. The procession halted in uncertainty and became a disordered rabble; but the director sprang into the open space and shouted at his actors and actresses in evident ill temper.
"There it is again!" he cried. "Five hundred feet of good film, ruined by the stupidity of one person. Get out of that priest's robe, Higgins, and let Jackson take your place. Where's Jackson, anyhow?"
"Here," answered a young man, stepping out from a group of spectators.
"Do you know the work? Can you lead that procession into the temple so they will leave room for Delilah to enter, and not crowd her off the platform?" asked the director.
Jackson merely nodded as he scrambled into the priest's robe which the discomfited Higgins resigned to him. Evidently the bungling actor was in disgrace, for he was told to go to the office and get his pay and then "clear out."
So now the procession was sent back into the passage and rearranged in proper order; the signal was given to begin and in an instant the camera renewed its clicking as the operator slowly revolved the handle that carried the long strip of film past the lenses. The musicians played, the girls danced, the procession slowly emerged from the passage.
This time it advanced properly and came to a halt just at the head of the staircase leading up to the entrance to the temple.
"Delilah!" shouted the director, and now appeared a beautiful girl who made a low obeisance to the chief priest.
"Why--goodness me!" cried Patsy. "It's--it's Maud Stanton!"
"Nonsense!" returned Arthur, sharply; and then he looked again and drew a long breath; for unless it were indeed the elder niece of Mrs. Montrose, there must be two girls in the world identically alike.
Mr. Werner settled the question by quietly remarking: "Of course it's Maud Stanton. She's our bright, particular star, you know, and the public would resent it if she didn't appear as the heroine of all our best pictures."
"An actress!" exclaimed Arthur. "I--I didn't know that."
"She and her sister Flo are engaged by us regularly," replied Werner, with an air of pride. "They cost us a lot of money, as you may imagine, but we can't afford to let any competitor have them."
If Arthur Weldon felt any chagrin at this, discovery it was not in the least shared by the others of his party. Beth was admiring the young girl's grace and dignity; Patsy was delighted by her loveliness in the fleecy, picturesque costume she wore; Louise felt pride in the fact that she had been introduced to "a real actress," while Uncle John wondered what adverse fortune had driven this beautiful, refined girl to pose before a motion picture camera.
They soon discovered Florence Stanton in the picture, too, among the dancing girls; so there could be no mistake of identity. Mrs. Montrose was not visible during the performance; but afterward, when Samson had pulled down the pillars of the temple and it had fallen in ruins, when the "show" was over and the actors trooping away to their dressing-rooms, then the visitors were ushered into the main office of the establishment to meet Mr. Goldstein, the manager, and seated by the window was the aunt of the two girls, placidly reading a book. She looked up with a smile as they entered.
"Did you see the play?" she asked. "And isn't it grand and impressive? I hope you liked Maud's 'Delilah.' The poor child has worked so hard to create the character."
They assured her the girl was perfect in her part, after which Mr. Merrick added: "I'm astonished you did not go out to see the play yourself."
She laughed at his earnestness.
"It's an old story to me," she replied, "for I have watched Maud rehearse her part many times. Also it is probable that some--if not all--of the scenes of 'Samson and Delilah' will be taken over and over, half a dozen times, before the director is satisfied."
"The performance seemed quite perfect to-day," said Uncle John. "I suppose, Mrs. Montrose, you do not--er--er--act, yourself?"
"Oh. I have helped out, sometimes, when a matronly personation is required, but my regular duties keep me busily engaged in the office."
"May we ask what those duties are?" said Louise.
"I'm the reader of scenarios."
"Dear me!" exclaimed Patsy. "I'm sure we don't know any more than we did before."
"A 'scenario,'" said the lady, "is a description of the plot for a photo-play. It is in manuscript form and hundreds of scenarios are submitted to us from every part of the country, and by people in all walks of life."
"I shouldn't think you could use so many," said Beth.
"We can't, my dear," responded the lady, laughing at her simplicity. "The majority of the scenarios we receive haven't a single idea that is worth considering. In most of the others the ideas are stolen, or duplicated from some other picture-play. Once in a while, however, we find a plot of real merit, and then we accept it and pay the author for it."
"How much?" inquired Arthur.
"So little that I am ashamed to tell you. Ideas are the foundation of our business, and without them we could not make successful films; but when Mr. Goldstein buys an idea he pays as little for it as possible, and the poor author usually accepts the pittance with gratitude."
"We were a little surprised," Uncle John ventured to say, "to find you connected with this--er--institution. I suppose it's all right; but those girls--your nieces--"
"Yes, they are motion picture actresses, and I am a play reader. It is our profession, Mr. Merrick, and we earn our living in this way. To be frank with you, I am very proud of the fact that my girls are popular favorites with the picture theatre audiences."
"That they are, Mrs. Montrose!" said Goldstein, the manager, a lean little man, earnestly endorsing the statement; "and that makes them the highest priced stars in all our fourteen companies of players. But they're worth every cent we pay 'em--and I hope ev'rybody's satisfied."
Mrs. Montrose paid little deference to the manager. "He is only a detail man," she explained when Goldstein had gone way, "but of course it is necessary to keep these vast and diverse interests running smoothly, and the manager has enough details on his mind to drive an ordinary mortal crazy. The successful scenario writers, who conceive our best plays, are the real heart of this business, and the next to them in importance are the directors, or producers, who exercise marvelous cleverness in staging the work of the authors."
"I suppose," remarked Arthur Weldon, "it is very like a theatre."
"Not so like as you might imagine," was the reply. "We employ scenery, costumes and actors, but not in ways theatrical, for all our work is subservient to the camera's eye and the requirements of photography."
While they were conversing, the two Stanton girls entered the office, having exchanged their costumes for street clothes and washed the make-up from their faces, which were now fresh and animated.
"Oh, Aunt Jane!" cried Flo, running to Mrs. Montrose, "we're dismissed for the day. Mr. McNeil intends to develop the films before we do anything more, and Maud and I want to spend the afternoon at the beach."
The lady smiled indulgently as Maud quietly supported her sister's appeal, the while greeting her acquaintances of yesterday with her sweet, girlish charm of manner.
"A half-holiday is quite unusual with us," she explained, "for it is the custom to hold us in readiness from sunrise to sunset, in case our services are required. An actress in a motion picture concern is the slave of her profession, but we don't mind the work so much as we do waiting around for orders."
"Suppose we all drive to the beach together," suggested Mr. Merrick. "We will try to help you enjoy your holiday and it will be a rich treat to us to have your society."
"Yes, indeed!" exclaimed Patsy Doyle. "I'm just crazy over this motion picture business and I want to ask you girls a thousand questions about it."
They graciously agreed to the proposition and at once made preparations for the drive. Mrs. Montrose had her own automobile, but the party divided, the four young girls being driven by Mr. Merrick's chauffeur in his machine, while Uncle John, Arthur and Louise rode with Mrs. Montrose.
It did not take the young people long to become acquainted, and the air of restraint that naturally obtained in the first moments gradually wore away. They were all in good spirits, anticipating a jolly afternoon at the ocean resorts, so when they discovered themselves to be congenial companions they lost no time in stilted phrases but were soon chattering away as if they had known one another for years.
CHAPTER V
A THRILLING RESCUE
"It must be fine to be an actress," said Patsy Doyle, with enthusiasm. "If I had the face or the figure or the ability--all of which I sadly lack--I'd be an actress myself."
"I suppose," replied Maud Stanton, thoughtfully, "it is as good a profession for a girl as any other. But the life is not one of play, by any means. We work very hard during the rehearsals and often I have become so weary that I feared I would drop to the ground in sheer exhaustion. Flo did faint, once or twice, during our first engagement with the Pictograph Company; but we find our present employers more considerate, and we have gained more importance than we had in the beginning."
"It is dreadfully confining, though," remarked Florence, with a sigh. "Our hours are worse than those of shopgirls, for the early morning sun is the best part of the day for our work. Often we are obliged to reach the studio at dawn. To be sure, we have the evenings to ourselves, but we are then too tired to enjoy them."
"Did you choose, this profession for amusement, or from necessity?" inquired Beth, wondering if the question sounded impertinent.
"Stern necessity," answered Maud with a smile. "We had our living to earn."
"Could not your aunt assist you?" asked Patsy.
"Aunt Jane? Why, she is as poor as we are."
"Arthur Weldon used to know the Montroses," said Beth, "and be believed Mr. Montrose left his widow a fortune."
"He didn't leave a penny," asserted Florence. "Uncle was a stock gambler, and when he died he was discovered to be bankrupt."
"I must explain to you," said Maud, "that our father and mother were both killed years ago in a dreadful automobile accident. Father left a small fortune to be divided between Flo and me, and appointed Uncle George our guardian. We were sent to a girls' school and nicely provided for until uncle's death, when it was found he had squandered our little inheritance as well as his own money."
"That was hard luck," said Patsy sympathetically.
"I am not so sure of that," returned the girl musingly. "Perhaps we are happier now than if we had money. Our poverty gave us dear Aunt Jane for a companion and brought us into a field of endeavor that has proved delightful."
"But how in the world did you ever decide to become actresses, when so many better occupations are open to women?" inquired Beth.
"Are other occupations so much better? A motion picture actress is quite different from the stage variety, you know. Our performances are all privately conducted, and although the camera is recording our actions it is not like being stared at by a thousand critical eyes."
"A million eyes stare at the pictures," asserted Patsy.
"But we are not there to be embarrassed by them," laughed Flo.
"We have but one person to please," continued Maud, "and that is the director. If at first the scene is not satisfactory, we play it again and again, until it is quite correct. To us this striving for perfection is an art. We actors are mere details of an artistic conception. We have now been in Hollywood for five months, yet few people who casually notice us at the hotel or on the streets have any idea that we act for the 'movies.' Sometimes we appear publicly in the streets, in characteristic costume, and proceed to enact our play where all may observe us; but there are so many picture companies in this neighborhood that we are no longer looked upon as a novelty and the people passing by pay little attention to us."
"Were you in that picture of the falling wall?" asked Beth.
"No. We were rehearsing for 'Samson and Delilah.' But sometimes we are called upon to do curious things. One night, not long ago, a big residence burned down in the foothills back of our hotel. At the first alarm of fire one of the directors wakened us and we jumped into our clothes and were whisked in an automobile to the scene of the conflagration. The camera-man was already there and, while we had to dodge the fire-fighters and the hose men, both Flo and I managed to be 'saved from the flames' by some of our actors--not once, but several times."
"It must have been thrilling!" gasped Patsy.
"It was exciting, at the moment," confessed Maud. "One of the pictures proved very dramatic, so an author wrote a story where at the climax a girl was rescued from the flames by her lover, and we took our time to act the several scenes that led up to the fire. The completed picture was a great success, I'm told."
"Those directors must be wonderfully enterprising fellows," said Beth.
"They are, indeed, constantly on the lookout for effects. Every incident that occurs in real life is promptly taken advantage of. The camera-men are everywhere, waiting for their chance. Often their pictures prove of no value and are destroyed, but sometimes the scenes they catch are very useful to work into a picture play. A few weeks ago I was shipwrecked on the ocean and saved by clinging to a raft. That was not pleasant and I caught a severe cold by being in the water too long; but I was chosen because I can swim. Such incidents are merely a part of our game--a game where personal comfort is frequently sacrificed to art. Once Flo leaped over a thirty-foot precipice and was caught in a net at the bottom. The net was, of course, necessary, but when the picture was displayed her terrible leap was followed by a view of her mangled body at the bottom of the canyon."
"How did they manage to do that?" asked Patsy.
"Stopped the camera, cut off the piece of film showing her caught by the net, and substituted a strip on which was recorded Flo's body lying among the jagged rocks, where it had been carefully and comfortably arranged. We do a lot of deceptive tricks of that sort, and sometimes I myself marvel at the natural effects obtained."
"It must be more interesting than stage acting."
"I believe it is. But we've never been on the stage," said Maud.
"How did you happen to get started in such a queer business?" inquired Patsy.
"Well, after we found ourselves poor and without resources we began wondering what we could do to earn money. A friend of Aunt Jane's knew a motion picture maker who wanted fifty young girls for a certain picture and would pay each of them five dollars a day. Flo and I applied for the job and earned thirty dollars between us; but then the manager thought he would like to employ us regularly, and with Auntie to chaperon us we accepted the engagement. The first few weeks we merely appeared among the rabble--something like chorus girls, you see--but then we were given small parts and afterward more important ones. When we discovered our own value to the film makers Auntie managed to get us better engagements, so we've acted for three different concerns during the past two years, while Aunt Jane has become noted as a clever judge of the merits of scenarios."
"Do both of you girls play star parts?" Beth inquired.
"Usually. Flo is considered the best 'child actress' in the business, but when there is no child part she makes herself useful in all sorts of ways. To-day, for instance, you saw her among the dancing girls. I do the ingenue, or young girl parts, which are very popular just now. I did not want to act 'Delilah,' for I thought I was not old enough; but Mr. McNeil wanted me in the picture and so I made myself took as mature as possible."
"You were ideal!" cried Patsy, admiringly.
The young girl blushed at this praise, but said deprecatingly:
"I doubt if I could ever be a really great actress; but then, I do not intend to act for many more years. Our salary is very liberal at present, as Goldstein grudgingly informed you, and we are saving money. As soon as we think we have acquired enough to live on comfortably we shall abandon acting and live as other girls do."
"The fact is," added Flo, "no one will employ us when we have lost our youth. So we are taking advantage of these few fleeting years to make hay while the sun shines."
"Do many stage actresses go into the motion picture business?" asked Beth.
"A few, but all are not competent," replied Maud. "In the 'silent drama' facial expression and the art of conveying information by a gesture is of paramount importance. In other words, action must do the talking and explain everything. I am told that some comedians, like 'Bunny' and Sterling Mace, were failures on the stage, yet in motion pictures they are great favorites. On the other hand, some famous stage actors can do nothing in motion pictures."
On their arrival at Santa Monica Mr. Merrick invited the party to be his guests at luncheon, which was served in a cosy restaurant overlooking the ocean. And then, although at this season it was bleak winter back East, all but Uncle John and Aunt Jane took a bath in the surf of the blue Pacific, mingling with hundreds of other bathers who were enjoying the sport.
Mrs. Montrose and Uncle John sat on the sands to watch the merry scene, while the young people swam and splashed about, and they seemed--as Miss Patsy slyly observed--to "get on very well together."
"And that is very creditable to your aunt," she observed to Maud Stanton, who was beside her in the water, "for Uncle John is rather shy in the society of ladies and they find him hard to entertain."
"He seems like a dear old gentleman," said Maud.
"He is, indeed, the dearest in all the world. And, if he likes your Aunt Jane, that is evidence that she is all right, too; for Uncle John's intuition never fails him in the selection of friends. He--"
"Dear me!" cried Maud; "there's someone in trouble, I'm sure."
She was looking out across the waves, which were fairly high to-day, and Patsy saw her lean forward and strike out to sea with strokes of remarkable swiftness. Bathers were scattered thickly along the coast, but only a few had ventured far out beyond the life-lines, so Patsy naturally sought an explanation by gazing at those farthest out. At first she was puzzled, for all the venturesome seemed to be swimming strongly and composedly; but presently a dark form showed on the crest of a wave--a struggling form that tossed up its arms despairingly and then disappeared.
She looked for Maud Stanton and saw her swimming straight out, but still a long way from the person in distress. Then Patsy, always quick-witted in emergencies, made a dash for the shore where a small boat was drawn up on the beach.
"Come, Arthur, quick!" she cried to the young man, who was calmly wading near the beach, and he caught the note of terror in her voice and hastened to help push the little craft into the water.
"Jump in!" she panted, "and row as hard as you ever rowed in all your life."
Young Weldon was prompt to obey. He asked no useless questions but, realizing that someone was in danger, he pulled a strong, steady oar and let Patsy steer the boat.
The laughter and merry shouts of the bathers, who were all unaware that a tragedy was developing close at hand, rang in the girl's ears as she peered eagerly ahead for a sign to guide her. Now she espied Maud Stanton, far out beyond the others, circling around and diving into this wave or that as it passed her.
"Whoever it was," she muttered, half aloud, "is surely done for by this time. Hurry, Arthur! I'm afraid Maud has exhausted all her strength."
But just then Maud dived again and when she reappeared was holding fast to something dark and inanimate. A moment later the boat swept to her side and she said:
"Get him aboard, if you can. Don't mind me; I'm all right."
Arthur reached down and drew a slight, boyish form over the gunwale, while Patsy clasped Maud's hand and helped the girl over the side. She was still strong, but panted from her exertions to support the boy.
"Who is it?" inquired Patsy, as Arthur headed the boat for the shore.
Maud shook her head, leaning forward to look at the face of the rescued one for the first time.
"I've never seen him before," she said. "Isn't it too bad that I reached him too late?"
Patsy nodded, gazing at the white, delicate profile of the young fellow as he lay lifeless at her feet. Too late, undoubtedly; and he was a mere boy, with all the interests of life just unfolding for him.
Their adventure had now been noticed by some of the bathers, who crowded forward to meet the boat as it grounded on the beach. Uncle John, always keeping an eye on his beloved nieces, had noted every detail of the rescue and as a dozen strong men pulled the boat across the sands, beyond the reach of the surf, the Merrick automobile rolled up beside it.
"Now, then!" cried the little man energetically, and with the assistance of his chauffeur he lifted the lifeless form into the car.
"The hospital?" said Patsy, nodding approval.
"Yes," he answered. "No; you girls can't come in your wet bathing suits. I'll do all that can be done."
Even as he spoke the machine whirled away, and looking after it Maud said, shaking her head mildly: "I fear he's right. Little can be done for the poor fellow now."
"Oh, lots can be done," returned Patsy; "but perhaps it won't bring him back to life. Anyhow, it's right to make every attempt, as promptly as possible, and certainly Uncle John didn't waste any time."
Beth and Florence now joined them and Louise came running up to ask eager questions.
"Who was it, Patsy?"
"We don't know. Some poor fellow who got too far out and had a cramp, perhaps. Or his strength may have given out. He didn't seem very rugged."
"He was struggling when first I saw him," said Maud. "It seemed dreadful to watch the poor boy drowning when hundreds of people were laughing and playing in the water within earshot of him."
"That was the trouble," declared Arthur Weldon. "All those people were intent on themselves and made so much noise that his cries for help could not be heard."
The tragedy, now generally known, had the effect of sobering the bathers and most of them left the water and trooped to the bathhouses to dress. Mrs. Montrose advised the girls to get their clothes on, as all were shivering--partly from nervousness--in their wet bathing suits.
They were ready an hour before Mr. Merrick returned, and his long absence surprised them until they saw his smiling face as he drove up in his car. It gave them a thrill of hope as in chorus they cried:
"Well--Uncle John?"
"I think he will live," returned the little man, with an air of great satisfaction. "Anyway, he's alive and breathing now, and the doctors say there's every reason to expect a rapid recovery."
"Who is he?" they asked, crowding around him.
"A. Jones."
"A--what?" This from Patsy, in a doubtful tone.
"Jones. A. Jones."
"Why, he must have given you an assumed name!"
"He didn't give us any name. As soon as he recovered consciousness he fell asleep, and I left him slumbering as peacefully as a baby. But we went through his clothes, hoping to get a trace of his friends, so they could be notified. His bathing suit is his own, not rented, and the name 'A. Jones' is embroidered on tape and sewn to each piece. Also the key to bathhouse number twenty-six was tied to his wrist. The superintendent sent a man for his clothing and we examined that, too. The letters 'A.J.' were stamped in gold on his pocketbook, and in his cardcase were a number of cards engraved: 'A. Jones, Sangoa.' But there were no letters, or any other papers."
"Where is Sangoa?" inquired Beth.
"No one seems to know," confessed Uncle John. "There was plenty of money in his pocket-book and he has a valuable watch, but no other jewelry. His clothes were made by a Los Angeles tailor, but when they called him up by telephone he knew nothing about his customer except that he had ordered his suit and paid for it in advance. He called for it three days ago, and carried it away with him, so we have no clue to the boy's dwelling place."
"Isn't that a little strange--perhaps a little suspicious?" asked Mrs. Montrose.
"I think not, ma'am," answered Mr. Merrick. "We made these investigations at the time we still feared he would die, so as to communicate with any friends or relatives he might have. But after he passed the crisis so well and fell asleep, the hospital people stopped worrying about him. He seems like any ordinary, well-to-do young fellow, and a couple of days in the hospital ought to put him upon his feet again."
"But Sangoa, Uncle; is that a town or a country?"
"Some out-of-the-way village, I suppose. People are here from every crack and corner of America, you know."
"It sounds a bit Spanish," commented Arthur. "Maybe he is from Mexico."
"Maybe," agreed Uncle John. "Anyhow, Maud has saved his life, and if it's worth anything to him he ought to be grateful."
"Never mind that," said Maud, flushing prettily with embarrassment as all eyes turned upon her, "I'm glad I noticed him in time; but now that he is all right he need never know who it was that rescued him. And, for that matter, sir, Patsy Doyle and Mr. Weldon did as much for him as I. Perhaps they saved us both, while your promptness in getting him to the hospital was the main factor in saving his life."
"Well, it's all marked down in the hospital books," remarked Uncle John. "I had to tell the whole story, you see, as a matter of record, and all our names are there, so none can escape the credit due her--or him."
"In truth," said Mrs. Montrose with a smile, "it really required four of you to save one slender boy."
"Yes, he needed a lot of saving," laughed Flo. "But," her pretty face growing more serious, "I believe it was all Fate, and nothing else. Had we not come to the beach this afternoon, the boy might have drowned; so, as I suggested the trip, I'm going to take a little credit myself."
"Looking at it in that light," said Patsy, "the moving picture man saved the boy's life by giving you a half-holiday."
This caused a laugh, for their spirits were now restored to normal. To celebrate the occasion, Mr. Merrick proposed to take them all into Los Angeles to dine at a "swell restaurant" before returning to Hollywood.
This little event, in conjunction with the afternoon's adventure, made them all more intimate, so that when they finally reached home and separated for the night they felt like old friends rather than recent acquaintances.
CHAPTER VI
A. JONES
There was work for the Stanton girls at the "film factory," as they called it, next morning, so they had left the hotel before Mr. Merrick's party assembled at the breakfast table.
"I must telephone the Santa Monica hospital and find out how our patient is," remarked Uncle John, when the meal was over; but presently he returned from the telephone booth with a puzzled expression upon his face. "A. Jones has disappeared!" he announced.
"Disappeared! What do you mean, Uncle?" asked Beth.
"He woke early and declared he was himself again, paid his bill, said 'good morning' to the hospital superintendent and walked away. He wouldn't answer questions, but kept asking them. The nurse showed him the book with the record of how he was saved, but she couldn't induce him to say who he was, where he came from nor where he was going. Seems a little queer, doesn't it?"
They all confessed that it did.
"However," said Patsy Doyle, "I'm glad he recovered, and I'm sure Maud will be when she hears the news. The boy has a perfect right to keep his own counsel, but he might have had the grace to tell us what that initial 'A.' stands for, and where on earth Sangoa is."
"I've been inquiring about Sangoa," announced Arthur, just then joining the group, "and no one seems wiser than we are. There's no record of such a town or state in Mexico, or in the United States--so far as I can discover. The clerk has sent for a map of Alaska, and perhaps we'll find Sangoa there."
"What does it matter?" inquired Louise.
"Why, we don't like to be stumped," asserted Patsy, "that's all. Here is a young man from Sangoa, and--"
"Really," interrupted Beth, who was gazing through the window, "I believe here _is_ the young man from Sangoa!"
"Where?" they all cried, crowding forward to look.
"Coming up the walk. See! Isn't that the same mysterious individual whose life Maud saved?"
"That's the identical mystery," declared Uncle John. "I suppose he has come here to look us up and thank us."
"Then, for heaven's sake, girls, pump him and find out where Sangoa is," said Arthur hastily, and the next moment a bell boy approached their party with a card.
They looked at the young fellow curiously as he came toward them. He seemed not more than eighteen years of age and his thin features wore a tired expression that was not the result of his recent experience but proved to be habitual. His manner was not languid, however, but rather composed; at the same time he held himself alert, as if constantly on his guard. His dress was simple but in good taste and he displayed no embarrassment as he greeted the party with a low bow.
"Ah," said Uncle John, heartily shaking his hand, "I am delighted to find you so perfectly recovered."
A slight smile, sad and deprecating, flickered for an instant over his lips. It gave the boyish face a patient and rather sweet expression as he slowly replied:
"I am quite myself to-day, sir, and I have come to assure you of my gratitude for your rescue of me yesterday. Perhaps it wasn't worth all your bother, but since you generously took the trouble to save me, the least I can do is to tender you my thanks." Here he looked from one to another of the three girls and continued: "Please tell me which young lady swam to my assistance."
"Oh, it was none of us," said Patsy. "Miss Stanton--Maud Stanton--swam out to you, when she noticed you were struggling, and kept you afloat until we--until help came."
"And Miss Stanton is not here?"
"Not at present, although she is staying at this hotel."
He gravely considered this information for a moment. As he stood there, swaying slightly, he appeared so frail and delicate that Uncle John seized his arm and made him sit down in a big easy chair. The boy sighed, took a memorandum from his pocket and glanced at it.
"Miss Doyle and Mr. Weldon pulled out in a boat and rescued both Miss Stanton and me, just as we were about to sink," he said. "Tell me, please, if either Miss Doyle or Mr. Weldon is present."
"I am Arthur Weldon," said that young gentleman; "but I was merely the boatman, under command of Miss Doyle, whom I beg to present to you."
A. Jones looked earnestly into Patsy's face. Holding out his hand he said with his odd smile: "Thank you." Then he turned to shake Arthur's hand, after which he continued: "I also am indebted to Mr. Merrick for carrying me to the hospital. The doctor told me that only this prompt action enabled them to resuscitate me at all. And now, I believe it would be courteous for me to tell you who I am and how I came to be in such dire peril."
He paused to look around him questioningly and the interest on every face was clearly evident. Arthur took this opportunity to introduce Jones to Louise and Beth and then they all sat down again. Said Uncle John to the stranger, in his frank and friendly way:
"Tell us as much or as little as you like, my boy. We are not unduly inquisitive, I assure you."
"Thank you, sir. I am an American, and my name is Jones. That is, I may claim American parentage, although I was born upon a scarcely known island in the Pacific which my father purchased from the government of Uruguay some thirty years ago."
"Sangoa?" asked Arthur.
He seemed surprised at the question but readily answered:
"Yes; Sangoa. My father was a grandnephew of John Paul Jones and very proud of the connection; but instead of being a sailor he was a scientist, and he chose to pass his life in retirement from the world."
"Your father is no longer living, then?" said Mr. Merrick.
"He passed away a year ago, on his beloved island. My mother died several years before him. I began to feel lonely at Sangoa and I was anxious to visit America, of which my mother had so often told me. So some months ago I reached San Francisco, since when I have been traveling over your country--my country, may I call it?--and studying your modern civilization. In New York I remained fully three months. It is only about ten days since I returned to this coast."
He stopped abruptly, as if he considered he had told enough. The brief recital had interested his auditors, but the ensuing pause was rather embarrassing.
"I suppose you have been visiting relatives of your parents," remarked Uncle John, to ease the situation.
"They--had no relatives that I know of," he returned. "I am quite alone in the world. You must not suppose I am unaccustomed to the water," he hastened to add, as if to retreat from an unpleasant subject. "At Sangoa I have bathed in the sea ever since I can remember anything; but--I am not in good health. I suffer from indigestion, a chronic condition, which is my incubus. Yesterday my strength suddenly deserted me and I became helpless."
"How fortunate it was that Maud noticed you!" exclaimed Patsy, with generous sympathy.
Again the half sad smile softened his face as he looked at her.
"I am not sure it was wholly fortunate for me," he said, "although I admit I have no wish to end my uninteresting life by drowning. I am not a misanthrope, in spite of my bad stomach. The world is more useful to me than I am to the world, but that is not my fault. Pardon me for talking so much about myself."
"Oh, we are intensely interested, I assure you," replied Patsy. "If some of us were indeed the instruments that saved you yesterday, it is a pleasure to us to know something of the--the man--we saved."
She had almost said "boy," he was such a youthful person, and he knew it as well as she did.
"I would like to meet Miss Stanton and thank her personally," he presently resumed. "So, if you have no objection, I think I shall register at this hotel and take a room. I--I am not very strong yet, but perhaps Miss Stanton will see me when I have rested a little."
"She won't return before five o'clock," explained Mr. Merrick. "Miss Stanton is--er--connected with a motion picture company, you know, and is busy during the day."
He seemed both surprised and perplexed, at first, but after a moment's thought he said:
"She is an actress, then?"
"Yes; she and her sister. They have with them an aunt, Mrs. Montrose, for companion."
"Thank you. Then I will try to meet them this evening."
As he spoke he rose with some difficulty and bade them adieu. Arthur went with him to the desk and proffered his assistance, but the young man said he needed nothing but rest.
"And just think of it," said Patsy, when he had gone. "We don't know yet what that 'A' stands for!"
"Arthur," suggested Louise.
"Albert," said Beth.
"Or Algernon," added Uncle John with a chuckle.
"But we haven't seen the last of him yet," declared Miss Doyle. "I've a romance all plotted, of which A. Jones is to be the hero. He will fall in love with Maud and carry her away to his island!"
"I'm not so sure of that result," observed Uncle John thoughtfully. "It wouldn't astonish me to have him fall in love with Maud Stanton; we've all done that, you know; but could Maud--could any girl--be attracted by a lean, dismal boy with a weak stomach, such as A. Jones?"
"Even with these drawbacks he is quite interesting," asserted Beth.
"He is sure to win her sympathy," said Louise.
"But, above all," declared Patsy, "he has an island, inherited from his royal daddy. That island would count for a lot, with any girl!"
CHAPTER VII
THE INVALID
The girls intercepted Maud Stanton when she returned to the hotel that evening, and told her all about A. Jones. The tale was finished long before that dyspeptic youth had wakened from his slumbers. Then they all dressed for dinner and afterward met in the lobby, where Uncle John told them he had arranged to have a big round table prepared for the entire party, including a seat for A. Jones, who might like to join them.
However, the young man did not make his appearance, and as they trooped into the dining room Patsy said resentfully:
"I believe A. Jones is in a trance and needs rolling on a barrel again."
"He probably found himself too weak to appear in public," replied Flo Stanton. "I'm sure if I had been all but drowned a few hours ago, I would prefer bed to society."
"I'm astonished that he summoned energy to visit us at all," declared Mrs. Montrose. "He may be weak and ill, but at least he is grateful."
"Jones seems a vary gentlemanly young fellow," said Mr. Merrick. "He is a bit shy and retiring, which is perhaps due to his lonely life on his island; but I think he has been well brought up."
As they came out from dinner they observed the porters wheeling several big trunks up the east corridor. The end of each trunk was lettered: "A. Jones."
"Well," said Beth, with an amused smile, "he intends to stay a while, anyhow. You'll have a chance to meet him yet, Maud."
"I'm glad of that," answered Maud, "for I am anxious to calculate the worth of the life I helped to save. Your reports are ambiguous, and I am undecided whether you are taking the boy seriously or as a joke. From your description of his personal appearance, I incline to the belief that under ordinary circumstances I would not look twice at Mr. Jones, but having been partly instrumental in preserving him to the world, I naturally feel a proprietary interest in him."
"Of course," said Flo. "He's worth one look, out of pure curiosity; but it would be dreadful to have him tagging you around, expressing his everlasting gratitude."
"I don't imagine he'll do that," observed Patsy Doyle. "A. Jones strikes me as having a fair intellect in a shipwrecked body, and I'll wager a hatpin against a glove-buttoner that he won't bore you. At the same time he may not interest you--or any of us--for long, unless he develops talents we have not discovered. I wonder why he doesn't use his whole name. That mystic 'A' puzzles me."
"It's an English notion, I suppose," said Mrs. Montrose.
"But he isn't English; he's American."
"Sangoese," corrected Beth.
"Perhaps he doesn't like his name, or is ashamed of it," suggested Uncle John.
"It may be 'Absalom,'" said Flo. "We once knew an actor named Absalom, and he always called himself 'A. Judson Keith.' He was a dignified chap, and when we girls one day called him 'Ab,' he nearly had hysterics."
"Mr. Werner had hysterics to-day," asserted Maud, gravely; "but I didn't blame him. He sent out a party to ride down a steep hill on horseback, as part of a film story, and a bad accident resulted. One of the horses stepped in a gopher hole and fell, and a dozen others piled up on him, including their riders."
"How dreadful!" was the general exclamation.
"Several of the horses broke their legs and had to be shot," continued Maud; "but none of the riders was seriously injured except little Sadie Martin, who was riding a bronco. The poor thing was caught under one of the animals and the doctor says she won't be able to work again for months."
"Goodness me! And all for the sake of a picture?" cried Patsy indignantly. "I hope you don't take such risks, Maud."
"No; Flo and I have graduated from what is called 'the bronco bunch,' and now do platform work entirely. To be sure we assume some minor risks in that, but nothing to compare with the other lines of business."
"I hope the little girl you mentioned will get well, and has enough money to tide her over this trouble," said Uncle John anxiously.
"The manager will look after her," returned Mrs. Montrose. "Our people are very good about that and probably Sadie Martin's salary will continue regularly until she is able to work again."
"Well," said Beth, drawing a long breath, "I suppose we shall read all about it in the morning papers."
"Oh, no!" exclaimed Maud and added: "These accidents never get into the papers. They happen quite often, around Los Angeles, where ten thousand or more people make their living from motion pictures; but the public is protected from all knowledge of such disasters, which would detract from their pleasure in pictures and perhaps render all films unpopular."
"I thought the dear public loved the dare-devil acts," remarked Arthur Weldon.
"Oh, it does," agreed Mrs. Montrose; "yet those who attend the picture theatres seem not to consider the action taking place before their eyes to be real. Here are pictures only--a sort of amplified story book--and the spectators like them exciting; but if they stopped to reflect that men and women in the flesh were required to do these dangerous feats for their entertainment, many would be too horrified to enjoy the scenes. Of course the makers of the pictures guard their actors in all possible ways; yet, even so, casualties are bound to occur."
They had retired to a cosy corner of the public drawing room and were conversing on this interesting topic when they espied A. Jones walking toward them. The youth was attired in immaculate evening dress, but his step was slow and dragging and his face pallid.
Arthur and Uncle John drew up an easy chair for him while Patsy performed the introductions to Mrs. Montrose and her nieces. Very earnestly the boy grasped the hand of the young girl who had been chiefly responsible for his rescue, thanking her more by his manner than in his few carefully chosen words.
As for Maud, she smilingly belittled her effort, saying lightly: "I know I must not claim that it didn't amount to anything, for your life is valuable, Mr. Jones, I'm sure. But I had almost nothing to do beyond calling Patsy Doyle's attention to you and then swimming out to keep you afloat until help came. I'm a good swimmer, so it was not at all difficult."
"Moreover," he added, "you would have done the same thing for anyone in distress."
"Certainly."
"I realize that. I am quite a stranger to you. Nevertheless, my gratitude is your due and I hope you will accept it as the least tribute I can pay you. Of all that throng of bathers, only you noticed my peril and came to my assistance."
"Fate!" whispered Flo impressively.
"Nonsense," retorted her sister. "I happened to be the only one looking out to sea. I think, Mr. Jones, you owe us apologies more than gratitude, for your folly was responsible for the incident. You were altogether too venturesome. Such action on this coast, where the surf rolls high and creates an undertow, is nothing less than foolhardy."
"I'm sure you are right," he admitted. "I did not know this coast, and foolishly imagined the old Pacific, in which I have sported and played since babyhood, was my friend wherever I found it."
"I hope you are feeling better and stronger this evening," said Mr. Merrick. "We expected you to join us at dinner."
"I--I seldom dine in public," he explained, flushing slightly. "My bill-of-fare is very limited, you know, owing to my--my condition; and so I carry my food-tablets around with me, wherever I go, and eat them in my own room."
"Food-tablets!" cried Patsy, horrified.
"Yes. They are really wafers--very harmless--and I am permitted to eat nothing else."
"No wonder your stomach is bad and you're a living skeleton!" asserted the girl, with scorn.
"My dear," said Uncle John, gently chiding her, "we must give Mr. Jones the credit for knowing what is best for him."
"Not me, sir!" protested the boy, in haste. "I'm very ignorant about--about health, and medicine and the like. But in New York I consulted a famous doctor, and he told me what to do."
"That's right," nodded the old gentleman, who had never been ill in his life. "Always take the advice of a doctor, listen to the advice of a lawyer, and refuse the advise of a banker. That's worldly wisdom."
"Were you ill when you left your home?" inquired Mrs. Montrose, looking at the young man with motherly sympathy.
"Not when I left the island," he said. "I was pretty well up to that time. But during the long ocean voyage I was terribly sick, and by the time we got to San Francisco my stomach was a wreck. Then I tried to eat the rich food at your restaurants and hotels--we live very plainly in Sangoa, you know--and by the time I got to New York I was a confirmed dyspeptic and suffering tortures. Everything I ate disagreed with me. So I went to a great specialist, who has invented these food tablets for cases just like mine, and he ordered me to eat nothing else."
"And are you better?" asked Maud.
He hesitated.
"Sometimes I imagine I am. I do not suffer so much pain, but I--I seem to grow weaker all the time."
"No wonder!" cried Patsy. "If you starve yourself you can't grow strong."
He looked at her with an expression of surprise. Then he asked abruptly:
"What would you advise me to do, Miss Doyle?"
A chorus of laughter greeted this question. Patsy flushed a trifle but covered her confusion by demanding: "Would you follow my advice?"
He made a little grimace. There was humor in the boy, despite his dyspepsia.
"I understand there is a law forbidding suicide," he replied. "But I asked your advice in an attempt to discover what you thought of my absurd condition. Now that you call my attention to it, I believe I _am_ starving myself. I need stronger and more nourishing food; and yet the best specialist in your progressive country has regulated my diet."
"I don't believe much in specialists," asserted Patsy. "If _you_ do, go ahead and kill yourself, in defiance of the law. According to common sense you ought to eat plenty of good, wholesome food, but you may be so disordered--in your interior--that even that would prove fatal. So I won't recommend it."
"I'm doomed, either way," he said quietly. "I know that."
"_How_ do you know it?" demanded Maud in a tone of resentment.
He was silent a moment. Then he replied:
"I cannot remember how we drifted into this very personal argument. It seems wrong for me to be talking about myself to those who are practically strangers, and you will realize how unused I am to the society of ladies by considering my rudeness in this interview."
"Pshaw!" exclaimed Uncle John; "we are merely considering you as a friend. You must believe that we are really interested in you," he continued, laying a kindly hand on the young fellow's shoulder. "You seem in a bad way, it's true, but your condition is far from desperate. Patsy's frankness--it's her one fault and her chief virtue--led you to talk about yourself, and I'm surprised to find you so despondent and--and--what do you call it, Beth?"
"Pessimistic?"
"That's it--pessimistic."
"But you're wrong, sir!" said the boy with a smile; "I may not be elated over my fatal disease, but neither am I despondent. I force myself to keep going when I wonder how the miserable machine responds to my urging, and I shall keep it going, after a fashion, until the final breakdown. Fate weaves the thread of our lives, I truly believe, and she didn't use very good material when she started mine. But that doesn't matter," he added quickly. "I'm trying to do a little good as I go along and not waste my opportunities. I'm obeying my doctor's orders and facing the future with all the philosophy I can summon. So now, if you--who have given me a new lease of life--think I can use it to any better advantage, I am willing to follow your counsel."
His tone was more pathetic than his words. Maud, as she looked at the boy and tried to realize that his days were numbered, felt her eyes fill with tears. Patsy sniffed scornfully, but said nothing. It was Beth who remarked with an air of unconcern that surprised those who knew her unsympathetic nature:
"It would be presumptuous for us to interfere, either with Fate or with Nature. You're probably dead wrong about your condition, for a sick person has no judgment whatever, but I've noticed the mind has a good deal to do with one's health. If you firmly believe you're going to die, why, what can you expect?"
No one cared to contradict this and a pause followed that was growing awkward when they were all aroused by the sound of hasty footsteps approaching their corner.
CHAPTER VIII
THE MAGIC OF A NAME
The newcomer proved to be Goldstein, the manager of the Continental. His face was frowning and severe as he rudely marched up to the group and, without the formality of a greeting, pointedly addressed the Stanton girls.
"What does it mean?" he demanded in evident excitement, for his voice shook and the accusing finger he held out trembled. "How does it happen that my people, under contract to work for the Continental, are working for other firms?"
Maud paled and her eyes glistened with resentment as she rose and faced her manager. Florence pulled her sister's sleeve and said with a forced laugh: "Sit down, Maud; the man has probably been drinking."
He turned on the young girl fiercely, but now it was Arthur Weldon who seized the manager's arm and whirled him around.
"Sir, you are intruding," he said sternly. "If you have business with these ladies, choose the proper time and place to address them."
"I have!" cried Goldstein, blusteringly. "They have treated me shamefully--unprofessionally! They have played me a trick, and I've the right to demand why they are working for a rival firm while in my pay."
Mrs. Montrose now arose and said with quiet dignity:
"Mr. Goldstein, you are intruding, as Mr. Weldon says. But you have said so much to defame my nieces in the eyes of our friends, here assembled, that you must explain yourself more fully."
The manager seemed astonished by his reception. He looked from one to another and said more mildly:
"It is easy enough for _me_ to explain, but how can the Stantons explain their conduct? They are under contract to act exclusively for the Continental Film Company and I pay them a liberal salary. Yet only yesterday, when I was kind enough to give them a holiday, they went down to the beach and posed for a picture for our rivals, the Corona Company!"
"You are mistaken, sir!" retorted Arthur. "The young ladies were in our company the entire afternoon and they did not pose for any picture whatever."
"Don't tell me!" cried Goldstein. "I've just seen the picture down town. I was going by one of the theatres when I noticed a placard that read: 'Sensational Film by Maud Stanton, the Queen of Motion Picture Actresses, entitled "A Gallant Rescue!" First run to-night.' I went in and saw the picture--with my own eyes!--and I saw Maud Stanton in a sea scene, rescuing a man who was drowning. Don't deny it, Miss," he added, turning upon Maud fiercely. "I saw it with my own eyes--not an hour ago!"
After a moment's amazed silence his hearers broke into a chorus of laughter, led by Flo, who was almost hysterical. Even A. Jones smiled indulgently upon the irate manager, who was now fairly bristling with indignation.
"The Corona people," remarked Arthur Weldon, "are quite enterprising. I did not know they had a camera-man at the beach yesterday, but he must have secured a very interesting picture. It was not posed, Mr. Goldstein, but taken from life."
"It was Maud Stanton!" asserted, the manager.
"Yes; she and some others. A man was really drowning and the brave girl swam to his rescue, without a thought of posing."
"I don't believe it!" cried the man rudely.
Here A. Jones struggled to his feet.
"It is true," he said. "I was the drowning man whom Miss Stanton saved."
Goldstein eyed him shrewdly.
"Perhaps you were," he admitted, "for the man in the picture was about your style of make-up. But how can you prove it was not a put-up job with the Corona people? How do I know you are not all in the employ of the Corona people?"
"I give you my word."
"Pah! I don't know you."
"I see you don't," returned the youth stiffly.
"Here is my card. Perhaps you will recognize the name."
He fumbled in his pocket, took out a card and handed it to the manager. Goldstein looked at it, started, turned red and then white and began bobbing his head with absurd deference to the youth.
"Pardon, Mr. Jones--pardon!" he gasped. "I--I heard you were in our neighborhood, but I--I did not recognize you. I--I hope you will pardon me, Mr. Jones! I was angry at what I supposed was the treachery of an employee. You will--will--understand that, I am sure. It is my duty to protect the interests of the Continental, you know, sir. But it's all right now, of course! Isn't it all right now, Mr. Jones?"
"You'd better go, Goldstein," said the boy in a weary tone, and sat down again.
The manager hesitated. Then he bowed to Maud Stanton and to the others, murmuring:
"All a mistake, you see; all a mistake. I--I beg everybody's pardon."
With this he backed away, still bowing, and finally turned and beat a hasty retreat. But no one was noticing him especially. All eyes were regarding the boy with a new curiosity.
"That Goldstein is an ill-bred boor!" remarked Uncle John in an annoyed tone.
"I suppose," said Maud, slowly, "he thought he was right in demanding an explanation. There is great rivalry between the various film manufacturers and it was rather mean of the Corona to put my name on that placard."
"It's wonderful!" exclaimed Patsy. "How did they get the picture, do you suppose?"
"They have camera-men everywhere, looking for some picture worth while." explained Mrs. Montrose. "If there's a fire, the chances are a camera-man is on the spot before the firemen arrive. If there's an accident, it is often caught by the camera before the victim realizes what has happened. Perhaps a camera-man has been at the beach for weeks, waiting patiently for some tragedy to occur. Anyway, he was on hand yesterday and quietly ran his film during the excitement of the rescue. He was in rare luck to get Maud, because she is a favorite with the public; but it was not fair to connect her name with the picture, when they know she is employed by the Continental."
Young Jones rose from his chair with a gesture of weariness.
"If you will excuse me," he said, "I will go to my room. Our little conversation has given me much pleasure; I'm so alone in the world. Perhaps you will allow me to join you again--some other time?"
They hastened to assure him his presence would always be welcome. Patsy even added, with her cheery smile, that they felt a certain proprietorship in him since they had dragged him from a watery grave. The boy showed, as he walked away, that he was not yet very steady on his feet, but whether the weakness was the result of his malady or his recent trying experience they could not determine.
"What staggers me," said Maud, looking after him, "is the effect his name had on Goldstein, who has little respect or consideration for anyone. Who do you suppose A. Jones is?"
"Why, he has told us," replied Louise. "He is an islander, on his first visit to this country."
"He must be rather more than that," declared Arthur. "Do you remember what the manager said to him?"
"Yes," said Beth. "He had heard that A. Jones was in this neighborhood, but had never met him. A. Jones was a person of sufficient importance to make the general manager of the Continental Film Company tremble in his boots."
"He really did tremble," asserted Patsy, "and he was abject in his apologies."
"Showing," added Flo Stanton, "that Goldstein is afraid of him."
"I wonder why," said Maud.
"It is all very easy of solution," remarked Arthur. "Goldstein believes that Jones is in the market to buy films. Perhaps he's going to open a motion picture theatre on his island. So the manager didn't want to antagonize a good customer."
"That's it," said Uncle John, nodding approval. "There's no great mystery about young Jones, I'm sure."
CHAPTER IX
DOCTOR PATSY
Next morning Uncle John and the Weldons--including the precious baby--went for a ride into the mountains, while Beth and Patsy took their embroidery into a sunny corner of the hotel lobby.
It was nearly ten o'clock when A. Jones discovered the two girls and came tottering toward them. Tottering is the right word; he fairly swayed as he made his way to the secluded corner.
"I wish he'd use a cane," muttered Beth in an undertone. "I have the feeling that he's liable to bump his nose any minute."
Patsy drew up a chair for him, although he endeavored to prevent her.
"Are you feeling better this morning?" she inquired.
"I--I think so," he answered doubtfully. "I don't seem to get back my strength, you see."
"Were you stronger before your accident?" asked Beth.
"Yes, indeed. I went swimming, you remember. But perhaps I was not strong enough to do that. I--I'm very careful of myself, yet I seem to grow weaker all the time."
There was a brief silence, during which the girls plied their needles.
"Are you going to stay in this hotel?" demanded Patsy, in her blunt way.
"For a time, I think. It is very pleasant here," he said.
"Have you had breakfast?"
"I took a food-tablet at daybreak."
"Huh!" A scornful exclamation. Then she glanced at the open door of the dining-hall and laying aside her work she rose with a determined air and said:
"Come with me!"
"Where?"
For answer she assisted him to rise. Then she took his hand and marched him across the lobby to the dining room.
He seemed astonished at this proceeding but made no resistance. Seated at a small table she called a waitress and said:
"Bring a cup of chocolate, a soft-boiled egg and some toast."
"Pardon me, Miss Doyle," he said; "I thought you had breakfasted."
"So I have," she replied. "The breakfast I've ordered is for you, and you're going to eat it if I have to ram it down your throat."
"But--Miss Doyle!"
"You've told us you are doomed. Well, you're going to die with a full stomach."
"But the doctor--"
"Bother the doctor! I'm your doctor, now, and I won't send in a bill, thank your stars."
He looked at her with his sad little smile.
"Isn't this a rather high-handed proceeding, Miss Doyle?"
"Perhaps."
"I haven't employed you as my physician, you know."
"True. But you've deliberately put yourself in my power."
"How?"
"In the first place, you tagged us here to this hotel."
"You don't mind, do you?"
"Not in the least. It's a public hostelry. In the second place, you confided to us your disease and your treatment of it--which was really none of our business."
"I--I was wrong to do that. But you led me on and--I'm so lonely--and you all seemed so generous and sympathetic--that I--I--"
"That you unwittingly posted us concerning your real trouble. Do you realize what it is? You're a hypo--hypo--what do they call it?--hypochondriac!"
"I am not!"
"And your doctor--your famous specialist--is a fool."
"Oh, Miss Doyle!"
"Also you are a--a chump, to follow his fool advice. You don't need sympathy, Mr. A. Jones. What you need is a slapstick."
"A--a--"
"A slapstick. And that's what you're going to get if you don't obey orders."
Here the maid set down the breakfast, ranging the dishes invitingly before the invalid. His face had expressed all the emotions from amazement to terror during Patsy's tirade and now he gazed from her firm, determined features to the eggs and toast, in an uncertain, helpless way that caused the girl a severe effort to curb a burst of laughter.
"Now, then," she said, "get busy. I'll fix your egg. Do you want more sugar in your chocolate? Taste it and see. And if you don't butter that toast before it gets cold it won't be fit to eat."
He looked at her steadily now, again smiling.
"You're not joking, Miss Doyle?"
"I'm in dead earnest."
"Of course you realize this is the--the end?"
"Of your foolishness? I hope so. You used to eat like a sensible boy, didn't you?"
"When I was well."
"You're well now. Your only need is sustaining, strengthening food. I came near ordering you a beefsteak, but I'll reserve that for lunch."
He sipped the chocolate.
"Yes; it needs more sugar," he said quietly. "Will you please butter my toast? It seems to me such a breakfast is worth months of suffering. How delicious this egg is! It was the fragrance of the egg and toast that conquered me. That, and--"
"And one sensible, determined girl. Don't look at me as if I were a murderess! I'm your best friend--a friend in need. And don't choke down your food. Eat slowly. Fletcherize--chew your food, you know. I know you're nearly famished, but you must gradually accustom yourself to a proper diet."
He obeyed meekly. Patsy's face was calm, but her heart beat fast, with a thrill of fear she could not repress. Acting on impulse, as she had, the girl now began to consider that she was personally responsible for whatever result might follow this radical treatment for dyspepsia. Had she been positive it _was_ dyspepsia, she would never have dared interfere with a doctor's orders; but she felt that the boy needed food and would die unless he had it. He might die from the effect of this unusual repast, in which case she would never forgive herself.
Meantime, the boy had cast aside all fear. He had protested, indeed, but his protests being overruled he accepted his food and its possible consequences with philosophic resignation and a growing satisfaction.
Patsy balked on the third slice of toast and took it away from him. She also denied him a second cup of chocolate. He leaned back in his chair with a sigh of content and said:
"Bless the hen that laid that egg! No dainty was ever more delicious. And now," he added, rising, "let us go and inquire the address of a good undertaker. I have made my will, and I'd like to be cremated--it's so much nicer than the old-fashioned burial, don't you think?"
"I'll attend to all that, if you wish," she replied, trying to repress a shudder as she followed him from the room. "Do you smoke?"
"I used to, but the doctor forbade it; so I gave it up entirely."
"Go over to that stand and buy a cigar. Then you may sit beside Beth and me and smoke it."
The girl did not wholly approve of smoking and had often chided Uncle John and her father and Arthur Weldon for indulging in the habit; but this advice to young Jones was given in desperation, because all the men of her family stoutly affirmed that a cigar after a meal assisted digestion. She resumed her former seat beside Beth, and her cousin quickly read the anxiety on her face.
"What did you do, Patricia?"
"I fed him."
"Did he really eat?"
"Like a starved cat."
"Hm-m-m," said Beth. "What next, I wonder?"
Patsy wondered, too, the cold shivers chasing one another up and down her back. The boy was coming toward them, coolly puffing a cigar. He did not seem to totter quite so much as before, but he was glad to sink into an easy chair.
"How do you feel?" asked Beth, regarding him curiously.
"Like one of those criminals who are pampered with all the good things of life before being led to the scaffold."
"Any pains?"
He shook his head.
"Not yet. I've asked the clerk, whenever I signal him, to send someone to carry me to my room. If I'm not able to say good-bye to you, please accept now my thanks for all your kindness to a stranger. You see, I'm not sure whether I'll have a sudden seizure or the pains will come on gradually."
"What pains?" demanded Patsy.
"I can't explain them. Don't you believe something is bound to happen?" he inquired, nervously removing the ash from his cigar.
"To be sure. You're going to get well."
He made no reply, but sat watching Beth's nimble fingers. Patsy was too excited to resume her embroidery.
"I wonder if you are old enough to smoke?" remarked Beth.
"I'm over twenty-one."
"Indeed! We decided you were about eighteen."
"I suppose I look younger than my age. At home, in Sangoa, I am still  regarded as a mere child. That is because I had no brothers and sisters, and my father never could realize that I was growing up. The people  still call me--"
He paused, in an embarrassed way, till Patsy asked:
"Call you what?"
"By my old childish name."
Both the girls were distinctly disappointed. But bluff Patsy Doyle would  not be denied the satisfaction of her curiosity. Within the last hour  she had felt as if she had adopted this friendless boy, and some  information concerning him was her due.
"Your name is A. Jones?" she aid.
"Yes."
"What does the 'A' stand for?"
There! The question was out, at last. He hesitated, flushing read. Then  he replied slowly:
"It stands for one of my father's peculiarities. I think I have told you  how proud he was that we are direct descendants of John Paul Jones.  'John Paul,'" he would often say, 'has ennobled the name of Jones, so  that to be a Jones is to bear the proudest name known to mankind.' When  I was born they were undecided what to name me. 'There is no hurry about  it,' said my father; 'whatever we call him, he is a Jones.' My mother  must have been something of a humorist. She kept referring to her baby  as 'a Jones' until father caught the absurd idea of letting it go at  that, and had me christened merely 'A. Jones.'"
"How delightful?" cried Patsy, clapping her hands gleefully. "Then 'A'  doesn't stand for anything at all?"
"Oh, yes; it stands for _a_ Jones," said the boy, making a wry face. "I  think it is dreadful."
"But what did they call you, afterward? What was the childish name you  referred to?"
"Another of my mother's humorous fancies. She called me 'Ajo,' and  others quickly caught up the horrid nickname. It is merely a contraction  of A. Jones, and in Sangoa I am called nothing else."
"Ajo," repeated Beth, her sweet voice giving the title a pleasant sound.  "In Spanish it would be pronounced 'Ah-ho.'"
"But we are not Spanish in Sangoa."
"What are your people?"
"Formerly all Americans. The younger generation are, like myself I suppose, Sangoans by birth. But there isn't a black or yellow or brown man on our island."
"How many inhabitants has Sangoa?"
"About six hundred, all told."
There was silence for a while.
"Any pains yet?" inquired Beth.
"Not yet. But I'm feeling drowsy. With your permission I'll lie down and take a nap. I slept very little last night."
He threw away his cigar, which he had smoked nearly to the end, and rising without assistance, bowed and walked away.
"Will he ever waken, I wonder?" said Beth softly.
"Of course," declared Patsy. "He has crossed the Rubicon and is going to get well. I feel it in my bones!"
"Let us hope," responded Beth, "that Ajo also feels it in his bones, rather than in his stomach."
CHAPTER X
STILL A MYSTERY
The day advanced to luncheon time and Uncle John and the Weldons came back from their mountain trip. Hollywood is in the foothills and over the passes are superb automobile roads into the fruitful valleys of San Fernando and La Canada.
"Seen anything of the boy--A. Jones?" inquired Arthur.
"Yes; and perhaps we've seen the last of him," answered Beth.
"Oh. Has he gone?"
"No one knows. Patsy fed him and he went to sleep. What has happened since we cannot tell."
The girls then related the experiences of the morning, at which both Uncle John and Arthur looked solemn and uncomfortable. But Louise said calmly:
"I think Patsy was quite right. I wouldn't have dared such a thing myself, but I'm sure that boy needed a square meal more than anything. If he dies, that breakfast has merely hastened his end; but if he doesn't die it will do him good."
"There's another possibility," remarked Uncle John. "He may be suffering agonies with no one to help him."
Patsy's face was white as chalk. The last hour or two had brought her considerable anxiety and her uncle's horrible suggestion quite unnerved her. She stole away to the office and inquired the number of Mr. Jones' room. It was on the ground floor and easily reached by a passage. The girl tiptoed up to the door and putting her ear to the panel listened intently. A moment later a smile broke over her face; she chuckled delightedly and then turned and ran buck to her friends.
"He's snoring like a walrus!" she cried triumphantly.
"Are you sure they are not groans?" asked Arthur.
"Pah! Can't I recognize a snore when I hear it? And I'll bet it's the first sound sleep he's had in a month."
Mr. Merrick and Arthur went to the door of the boy's room to satisfy themselves that Patsy was not mistaken, and the regularity of the sounds quickly convinced them the girl was right. So they had a merry party at luncheon, calling Patsy "Doctor" with grave deference and telling her she had probably saved the life of A. Jones for a second time.
"And now," proposed Uncle John, when the repast was over, "let us drive down to the sea and have a look at that beautiful launch that came in yesterday. Everyone is talking about it and they say it belongs to some foreign prince."
So they motored to Santa Monica and spent the afternoon on the sands, watching the bathers and admiring the graceful outlines of the big yacht lying at anchor a half mile from the shore. The boat was something of a mystery to everybody. It was named the "Arabella" and had come from Hawaii via San Francisco; but what it was doing here and who the owner might be were questions no one seemed able to answer. Rumor had it that a Japanese prince had come in it to inspect the coast line, but newspaper reporters were forbidden to scale the side and no satisfaction was given their eager questioning by the bluff old captain who commanded the craft. So the girls snapped a few kodak pictures of the handsome yacht and then lost interest in it.
That evening they met Mrs. Montrose and the Stanton girls at dinner and told them about the boy, who still remained invisible. Uncle John had listened at his door again, but the snores had ceased and a deathlike silence seemed to pervade the apartment. This rendered them all a trifle uneasy and when they left the dining room Arthur went to the hotel clerk and asked:
"Have you seen Mr. Jones this evening?"
"No," was the reply. "Do you know him?"
"Very slightly."
"Well, he's the queerest guest we've ever had. The first day he ate nothing at all. This morning I hear he had a late breakfast. Wasn't around to lunch, but a little while ago we sent a meal to his room that would surprise you."
"Indeed!"
"Yes. A strange order it was! Broiled mushrooms, pancakes with maple syrup and ice cream. How is that for a mix-up--and at dinner time, too!" said the clerk, disgustedly.
Arthur went back and reported.
"All right," said Patsy, much relieved. "We've got him started and now he can take care of himself. Come, Uncle; let's all go down town and see the picture that drove Mr. Goldstein crazy."
"He was very decent to us to-day," asserted Flo Stanton.
"Did he ask any explanation about Maud's appearing in the picture of a rival company?" inquired Arthur.
"No, not a word."
"Did he mention Mr. Jones, who conquered him so mysteriously?" asked Beth.
"Not at all. Goldstein confined himself strictly to business; but he treated us with unusual courtesy," explained Maud.
They were curious to see the films of the rescue, and the entire party rode to the down-town theatre where the Corona picture was being run. Outside the entrance they found the audacious placard, worded just as Goldstein had reported, and they all agreed it was a mean trick to claim another firm's star as their own.
"I do not think the Corona Company is responsible for this announcement," said Uncle John. "It is probably an idea of the theatre proprietor, who hoped to attract big business in that way."
"He has succeeded," grumbled Arthur, as he took his place at the end of a long line of ticket buyers.
The picture, as it flashed on the screen, positively thrilled them. First was shown the crowd of merry bathers, with Patsy and Maud standing in the water a little apart from the others. Then the boy--far out beyond the rest--threw up his arms, struggling desperately. Maud swam swiftly toward him, Patsy making for the shore. The launching of the boat, the race to rescue, Maud's effort to keep the drowning one afloat, and the return to the shore, where an excited crowd surrounded them--all was clearly shown in the picture. Now they had the advantage of observing the expressions on the faces of the bathers when they discovered a tragedy was being enacted in their midst. The photographs were so full of action that the participants now looked upon their adventure in a new light and regarded it far more seriously than before.
The picture concluded with the scene where Uncle John lifted the body into the automobile and dashed away with it to the hospital.
Maud Stanton, used as she was to seeing herself in motion pictures, was even more impressed than the others when observing her own actions at a time when she was wholly unconscious that a camera-man had his lens focused upon her.
"It's a great picture!" whispered Flo, as they made their way out of the crowded theatre. "Why can't all our films be as natural and absorbing as this one?"
"Because," said her sister, "in this case there is no acting. The picture carries conviction with a force that no carefully rehearsed scene could ever accomplish."
"That is true," agreed her Aunt Jane. "The nature scenes are the best, after all."
"The most unsatisfactory pictures I have ever seen," remarked Uncle John, "were those of prominent men, and foreign kings, and the like, who stop before the camera and bow as awkwardly as a camel. They know they are posing, and in spite of their public experience they're as bashful as schoolboys or as arrogant as policemen, according to their personal characteristics."
"Did you notice the mob of children in that theatre?" asked Patsy, as they proceeded homeward. "I wish there were more pictures made that are suitable to their understandings."
"They enjoy anything in the way of a picture," said Arthur. "It isn't necessary to cater to children; they'll go anyhow, whatever is shown."
"That may be, to an extent, true," said Beth. "Children are fascinated by any sort of motion pictures, but a lot of them must be wholly incomprehensible to the child mind. I agree with Patsy that the little ones ought to have their own theatres and their own pictures."
"That will come, in time," prophesied Aunt Jane. "Already the film makers are recognizing the value of the children's patronage and are trying to find subjects that especially appeal to them."
They reached the hotel soon after ten o'clock and found "Ajo" seated in the lobby. He appeared much brighter and stronger than the day before and rose to greet Patsy with a smile that had lost much of its former sad expression.
"Congratulate me, Dr. Doyle," said he. "I'm still alive, and--thanks to your prescription--going as well as could be expected."
"I'm glad I did the right thing," she replied; "but we were all a little worried for fear I'd make a mistake."
"I have just thrown away about a thousand of those food-tablets," he informed her with an air of pride. "I am positive there is no substitute for real food, whatever the specialists may say. In fact," he continued more soberly, "I believe you have rescued me a second time from certain death, for now I have acquired a new hope and have made up my mind to get well."
"Be careful not to overdo it," cautioned Uncle John. "You ordered a queer supper, we hear."
"But it seemed to agree with me. I've had a delightful sleep--the first sound sleep in a month--and already I feel like a new man. I waited up to tell you this, hoping you would be interested."
"We are!" exclaimed Patsy, who felt both pride and pleasure. "This evening we have been to see the motion picture of your rescue from drowning."
"Oh. How did you like it?"
"It's a splendid picture. I'm not sure it will interest others as much as ourselves, yet the people present seemed to like it."
"Well it was their last chance to observe my desperate peril and my heroic rescue," said the boy. "The picture will not be shown after to-night."
"Why not?" they asked, in surprise.
"I bought the thing this afternoon. It didn't seem to me quite modest to exploit our little adventure in public."
This was a new phase of the strange boy's character and the girls did not know whether to approve it or not.
"It must have cost you something!" remarked Flo, the irrepressible. "Besides, how could you do it while you were asleep?"
"Why, I wakened long enough to use the telephone," he replied with a smile. "There are more wonderful inventions in the world than motion pictures, you know."
"But you like motion pictures, don't you?" asked Maud, wondering why he had suppressed the film in question.
"Very much. In fact, I am more interested in them than in anything else, not excepting the telephone--which makes Aladdin's lamp look like a firefly in the sunshine."
"I suppose," said Flo, staring into his face with curious interest, "that you will introduce motion pictures into your island of Sangoa, when you return?"
"I suppose so," he answered, a little absently. "I had not considered that seriously, as yet, but my people would appreciate such a treat, I'm sure."
This speech seemed to destroy, in a manner, their shrewd conjecture that he was in America to purchase large quantities of films. Why, then, should Goldstein have paid such abject deference to this unknown islander?
In his own room, after the party had separated for the night, Mr. Merrick remarked to Arthur Weldon as they sat smoking their cigars:
"Young Jones is evidently possessed of some means."
"So it seems," replied Arthur. "Perhaps his father, the scientific recluse, had accumulated some money, and the boy came to America to get rid of it. He will be extravagant and wasteful for awhile, and then go back to his island with the idea that he has seen the world."
Uncle John nodded.
"He is a rather clean-cut young fellow," said he, "and the chances are he won't become dissipated, even though he loses his money through lack of worldly knowledge or business experience. A boy brought up and educated on an island can't be expected to prove very shrewd, and whatever the extent of his fortune it is liable to melt like snow in the sunshine."
"After all," returned Arthur, "this experience won't hurt him. He will still have his island to return to."
They smoked for a time in silence.
"Has it ever occurred to you, sir," said Arthur, "that the story Jones has related to us, meager though it is, bears somewhat the stamp of a fairy tale?"
Uncle John removed his cigar and looked reflectively at the ash.
"You mean that the boy is not what he seems?"
"Scarcely that, sir. He seems like a good boy, in the main. But his story is--such as one might invent if he were loath to tell the truth."
Uncle John struck a match and relit his cigar.
"I believe in A. Jones, and I see no reason to doubt his story," he asserted. "If real life was not full of romance and surprises, the novelists would be unable to interest us in their books."
CHAPTER XI
A DAMSEL IN DISTRESS
The day had not started auspiciously for the Stanton sisters. Soon after they arrived at the Continental Film Company's plant Maud had wrenched her ankle by stumbling over some loose planks which had been carelessly left on the open-air stage, and she was now lying upon a sofa in the manager's room with her limb bandaged and soaked with liniment.
Flo was having troubles, too. A girl who had been selected by the producer to fall from an aeroplane in mid-air had sent word she was ill and could not work to-day, and the producer had ordered Flo to prepare for the part. Indignantly she sought the manager, to file a protest, and while she waited in the anteroom for an audience, Mr. A. Jones of Sangoa came in and greeted her with a bow and a smile.
"Good gracious! Where did _you_ come from?" she inquired.
"My hotel. I've just driven over to see Goldstein," he replied.
"You'll have to wait, I'm afraid," she warned him. "The manager is busy just now. I've been wiggling on this bench half an hour, and haven't seen him yet--and my business is very important."
"So is mine, Miss Flo," he rejoined, looking at her with an odd expression. Then, as a stenographer came hurrying from the inner room, he stopped the girl and said:
"Please take my card to Mr. Goldstein."
"Oh, he won't see anybody now, for he's busy talking with one of our producers. You'll have to call again," she said flippantly. But even as she spoke she glanced at the card, started and turned red. "Oh, pardon me!" she added hastily and fled back to the managerial sanctum.
"That's funny!" muttered Flo, half to herself.
"Yes," he said, laughing, "my cards are charged with electricity, and they're bound to galvanize anyone in this establishment. Come in, Miss Flo," he added, as Goldstein rushed out of his office to greet the boy effusively; "your business takes precedence to mine, you know."
The manager ushered them into his office, a big room with a busy aspect. At one end were two or three girls industriously thumping typewriters; McNeil, the producer, was sorting manuscript on Goldstein's own desk; a young man who served as the manager's private secretary was poring over a voluminous record-book, wherein were listed all the films ever made by the manufacturers of the world. On a sofa in a far corner reclined the injured "star" of the company, Maud Stanton, who--being half asleep at the moment--did not notice the entrance of her sister and young Jones.
"Sit down, Mr. Jones; pray sit down!" exclaimed Goldstein eagerly, pointing to his own chair. "Would you like me to clear the room, so that our conversation may be private?"
"Not yet," replied the boy, refusing the seat of honor and taking a vacant chair. "Miss Stanton has precedence, and I believe she wishes to speak with you."
Goldstein took his seat at the desk and cast an inquiring glance at Flo.
"Well?" he demanded, impatiently.
"Mr. Werner has ordered me to do the airship stunt for his picture, because Nance Holden isn't here to-day," began the girl.
"Well, why annoy me with such trifles? Werner knows what he wants, and you'll do as well as the Holden girl."
"But I don't want to tumble out of that airship," she protested.
"There's no danger. Life nets will be spread underneath the aeroplane," said the manager. "The camera merely catches you as you are falling, so the thing won't be more than twenty or thirty feet from the ground. Now run away and don't bother. I must speak with Mr. Jones."
"But I'm afraid, Mr. Goldstein!" pleaded the girl. "I don't want to go up in the aeroplane, and these stunts are not in my line, or what I was engaged to do."
"You'll do what I tell you!" asserted the manager, with marked irritation. "I won't stand for any rebellion among my actors, and you'll do as Werner orders or you'll forfeit your week's pay."
Here Maud half rose from her sofa to address her employer.
"Please, Mr. Goldstein," she said, "don't make Flo do that fall. There are plenty of other girls to take her place, and she--"
"Silence, Miss Stanton!" roared the manager. "You'll disrupt all discipline if you interfere. A nice time we'd have here, if we allowed our actors to choose their own parts! I insist that your sister obey my producer's orders."
"Quite right, Goldstein," remarked young Jones, in his quiet voice. "You've carried your point and maintained discipline. I like that. Miss Flo Stanton will do exactly what you request her to do. But you're going to change your mind and think better of her protest. I'm almost sure, Goldstein, from the expression of your face, that you intend to issue prompt orders that another girl must take her place."
Goldstein looked at him steadily a moment and the arrogant expression changed to one of meek subservience.
"To be sure!" he muttered. "You have read my mind accurately, Mr. Jones. Here, Judd," to his secretary, "find Werner and tell him I don't approve his choice of Flo Stanton as a substitute for Nance Holden. Let's see; tell him to put that Moore girl in her place."
The young fellow bowed and left the room. McNeil smiled slyly to himself as he bent over his manuscript. Jones had gone to Maud's side to inquire anxiously after her injury.
"I don't imagine it will amount to much," she said reassuringly. "Mr. Goldstein wants me to rest quietly until this afternoon, when our new photo-play is to be produced. I'm to do the leading part, you know, and he thinks I'll be able by that time to get through all right."
Goldstein overheard this and came toward them, rubbing his hands together nervously.
"That seems unwise, Miss Maud," objected Jones. "To use your foot so soon might make it much worse. Let us postpone the play until some other time."
Goldstein's face was a study. His body twitched spasmodically.
"Oh, Mr. Jones!" he exclaimed; "that's impossible; it wouldn't do at all! We've been rehearsing this play and preparing for its production for the last two weeks, and to-day all our actors and assistants are here and ready to make the picture. I've already postponed it four hours--until this afternoon--to favor Miss Stanton, but, really--"
"Never mind the details," interrupted the boy. "I do not consider Miss Stanton able to do her work to-day. Send her back to her hotel at once and order the play postponed until she is able to attend."
Goldstein was greatly disturbed by this order, issued quietly but in a tone of command that brooked no opposition. Again he glanced shrewdly at the young man, and in the manager's face astonishment and fear were intermingled.
"Sir," he said in repressed tones, for he was really angry and had been accustomed to wield the power of an autocrat in this establishment, "you are placing me in an embarrassing position. I am expected to make every day count, so that the Continental may pay a liberal profit to its owners. To follow your instructions would burden us with an enormous expense, quite useless, I assure you, and--"
"Very well. Incur the expense, Goldstein."
"All right, Mr. Jones. Excuse me a moment while I issue instructions for the postponement."
McNeil rose and faced the manager.
"Are you really going to postpone this important play?" he demanded, in a voice of wonder.
Goldstein was glad to vent his chagrin on the producer.
"No insolence, sir!" he roared. "Come with me, and," as he dragged McNeil to the door and paused there, "if you dare lisp a word of what you've overheard, I'll fire you like a shot!"
When they had left the room Maud said with a puzzled air:
"I can't understand your power over Goldstein, Mr. Jones. He is a dictator--almost a tyrant--and in this place his word is law. At least, it was until you came, and--and--"
"Don't try to understand it, Miss Stanton," he answered in a careless manner. "Do you think you can manage to crawl to the automobile, or shall we carry you?"
"I'll bet Goldstein has murdered someone, and Mr. Jones knows all about it!" exclaimed Flo, who had been an interested witness of the scene.
Maud stood up, with her sister's support, and tested her lame ankle.
"It still hurts a little," she said, "but I can manage to hobble on it."
"Get your sister's wraps," the boy said to Flo, "and we'll send her straight home."
"I expect Goldstein will dock my salary, as well as fine Flo," remarked Maud musingly, as she waited for her hat and coat. "He obeyed you very meekly, Mr. Jones, but I could see a wicked glitter in his eye, nevertheless."
"I am sure the manager will neither dock nor fine either of you," he replied reassuringly. "On the contrary, you might sue the company for damages, for leaving that lumber where you would fall over it."
"Oh, no," she returned, laughing at the idea. "We have signed contracts waiving any damages for injuries sustained while at work on the premises. We all have to do that, you know, because the business is hazardous at its best. On the other hand, Mr. Goldstein has a physician and surgeon always within call, in case of accident, and the service is quite free to all the employees."
He nodded.
"I know. But the fact that you signed such a contract, under compulsion, would not prevent the court from awarding damages, if you sustained them while on duty."
"This hurt is nothing of importance," she said hastily. "In a day or two I shall be able to walk as well as ever."
Flo came running back with Maud's things. Aunt Jane followed, saying that if Maud was to go to the hotel she would accompany her and take care of her.
"I've examined the ankle," she said to young Jones, "and I assure you it is not a severe strain. But it is true that she will be better off in her own room, where she can rest quietly. So I will go with her."
"How about Miss Flo?" asked the boy.
"Flo is very self-reliant and will get along to-day very nicely without me," replied Mrs. Montrose.
Mr. Goldstein entered, frowning and still resenting the interference of this Mr. A. Jones of Sangoa. But he ventured no further protest nor did he speak until Maud, Flo and Aunt Jane had all left the room.
"You're not going, Mr. Jones?" he asked.
"Only to see Miss Stanton started for home. Then I'll come back and have a little talk with you."
"Thank you, sir."
CHAPTER XII
PICTURES, GIRLS AND NONSENSE
"Well, Aunt Jane," said Maud Stanton, when their car was rolling toward the hotel and the girl had related the remarkable interview in the office, "what do you think of Ajo now?"
"He is certainly an amazing young man," was the reply. "I cannot in any way figure out his connection with Goldstein, or his power over the man. The Continental Film Manufacturing Company is a great corporation, with headquarters in New York, and Mr. Goldstein is the authorized head and manager of the concern on the Pacific coast. I understand his salary is ten thousand a year. On the other hand, young Jones has only been in this country for a year, coming from an insignificant island somewhere in the South Seas, where he was born and reared. Much of the time since he arrived in America he has been an invalid. Aside from this meager information, no one seems to know anything about him."
"Putting the case that way makes it all the more remarkable," observed Maud. "A big, experienced, important man, cowed by a mere boy. When Goldstein first met this callow, sallow youth, he trembled before him. When the boy enters the office of the great film company he dictates to the manager, who meekly obeys him. Remember, too, that A. Jones, by his interference, has caused a direct loss to the company, which Goldstein will have to explain, as best he may, in his weekly report to the New York office. A more astonishing state of affairs could not be imagined, Aunt Jane!"
"The puzzle will solve itself presently," said the lady. "Abnormal conditions seldom last long."
Maud passed the day in bed, quietly reading a book. Her injury was really slight and with rest it mended rapidly. Patsy and Beth came in to see her and in the conversation that ensued the girls were told of the latest mystery surrounding A. Jones.
"It is surely queer!" admitted Miss Doyle, impressed and thoughtful. "Uncle John and Arthur were saying this noon, at lunch, that Ajo was a helpless sort of individual and easily influenced by others--as witness his caving in to me when I opposed his doctor's treatment. Arthur thinks he has come to this country to squander what little money his father left him and that his public career outside the limits of his little island will be brief. Yet according to your story the boy is no weakling but has power and knows how to use it."
"He surely laid down the law to Goldstein," said Maud.
"He is very young," remarked Beth, ignoring the fact that she was herself no older, "and perhaps that is why we attach so much importance to his actions. A grown-up man is seldom astonishing, however eccentric he may prove to be. In a boy we expect only boyishness, and young Jones has interested us because he is unique."
After a little the conversation drifted to motion pictures, for both Patsy and Beth were eager to learn all about the business details of film making, which Maud, by reason of her months of experience, was able to explain to them in a comprehensive manner. Flo came home toward evening, but had little more to tell them, as the day had passed very quietly at the "studio." Jones had remained closeted with the manager for a full hour, and it was remarked that after he had gone away Goldstein was somewhat subdued and performed his duties less aggressively than usual.
Maud's visitors now left her to dress for dinner, at which meal she was able to rejoin them, walking with a slight limp but otherwise recovered from her accident. To their surprise, young Jones appeared as they were entering the dining room and begged for a seat at their table. Uncle John at once ordered another place laid at the big round table, which accommodated the company of nine very nicely.
Ajo sat between Patsy and Maud and although he selected his dishes with some care he partook of all the courses from soup to dessert.
The morning interview with Goldstein was not mentioned. Ajo inquired about Maud's hurt but then changed the subject and conversed upon nearly everything but motion pictures. However, after they had repaired to the hotel lobby and were seated together in a cosy, informal group, Patsy broached a project very near to her heart.
"Beth and I," said she, "have decided to build a Children's Picture Theatre."
"Where?" asked Uncle John, rather startled by the proposition.
"Here, or in Los Angeles," was the reply.
"You see," explained Beth, "there is a crying need for a place where children may go and see pictures that appeal especially to them and are, at the same time, quite proper for them to witness. A great educational field is to be opened by this venture, and Patsy and I would enjoy the work of creating the first picture theatre, exclusively for children, ever established in America."
"You may say, 'in the world,'" added Arthur. "I like this idea of yours, girls, and I hope you will carry it out."
"Oh, they'll carry it out, all right," remarked Uncle John. "I've been expecting something of this sort, ever since we came here. My girls, Mr. Jones," he said, turning to the young man, "are always doing some quaint thing, or indulging in some queer enterprise, for they're a restless lot. Before Louise married, she was usually in these skirmishes with fate, but now--"
"Oh, I shall join Patsy and Beth, of course," asserted Louise. "It will make it easier for all, to divide the expense between us, and I am as much interested in pictures as they are."
"Perhaps," said Patsy musingly, "we might build two theatres, in different parts of the city. There are so many children to be amused. And we intend to make the admission price five cents."
"Have you any idea what it costs to build one of these picture theatres?" asked Arthur.
"We're not going to build one of 'these' theatres," retorted Patsy. "Many of the dens I've been in cost scarcely anything, being mere shelters. The city is strewn with a lot of miserable, stuffy theatres that no one can enjoy sitting in, even to see a good picture. We have talked this over and decided to erect a new style of building, roomy and sanitary, with cushioned seats and plenty of broad aisles. There are one or two of this class already in Los Angeles, but we want to make our children's theatres a little better than the best."
"And the expense?"
"Well, it will cost money, of course. But it will be a great delight to the children--bless their little hearts!"
"This is really a business enterprise," added Beth gravely.
Uncle John chuckled with amusement.
"Have you figured out the profits?" he inquired.
"It really ought to pay, Uncle," declared Patsy, somewhat nettled by this flaccid reception of her pet scheme. "All the children will insist on being taken to a place like that, for we shall show just the pictures they love to see. And, allowing there is no money to be made from the venture, think of the joy we shall give to innumerable little ones!"
"Go ahead, my dears," said Uncle John, smiling approval. "And, if you girls find you haven't enough money to carry out your plans, come to me."
"Oh, thank you, Uncle!" exclaimed Beth. "But I feel sure we can manage the cost ourselves. We will build one of the theatres first, and if that is a success we will build others."
"But about those films, made especially for children," remarked Arthur. "Where will you get them?"
"Why, there are lots of firms making films," replied Patsy. "We can select from all that are made the ones most suitable for our purpose."
"I fear you cannot do that," said Mrs. Montrose, who had listened with wonder to this conversation. "There are three combinations, or 'trusts,' among the film makers, which are known as the Licensed, the Mutual and the Independents. If you purchase from one of these trusts, you cannot get films from the others, for that is their edict. Therefore you will have only about one-third of the films made to select from."
"I thought money would buy anything--in the way of merchandise," said Louise, half laughing and half indignant.
"Not from these film dictators," was the reply.
"They all make a few children's pictures," announced Maud Stanton. "Even the Continental turns out one occasionally. But there are not nearly enough, taken all together, to supply an exclusive children's theatre."
"Then we will have some made," declared Patsy. "We will order some fairy tales, such as the children like. They would be splendid in motion pictures."
"Some have already been made and exhibited," said Mrs. Montrose. "The various manufacturers have made films of the fairy tales of Hans Andersen, Frank Baum, Lewis Carroll and other well-known writers."
"And were they successful?"
"Quite so, I believe; but such films are seldom put out except at holiday time."
"I think, Beth," said Patsy to her cousin, in a businesslike tone, "that we must organize a company and make our own films. Then we can get exactly what we want."
"Oh, yes!" replied Beth, delighted with the suggestion. "And let us get Maud and Flo to act in our pictures. Won't it be exciting?"
"Pardon me, young ladies," said A. Jones, speaking for the first time since this subject had been broached. "Would it not be wise to consider the expense of making films, before you undertake it?"
Patsy looked at him inquiringly.
"Do you know what the things cost?" she asked.
"I've some idea," said he. "Feature films of fairy tales, such as you propose, cost at least two thousand dollars each to produce. You would need about three for each performance, and you will have to change your programmes at least once a week. That would mean an outlay of not less than six thousand dollars a week, which is doubtless more money than your five-cent theatre could take in."
This argument staggered the girls for a moment. Then Beth asked: "How do the ordinary theatres manage?"
"The ordinary theatre simply rents its pictures, paying about three hundred dollars a week for the service. There is a 'middleman,' called the 'Exchange,' whose business is to buy the films from the makers and rent them to the theatres. He pays a big price for a film, but is able to rent it to dozens of theatres, by turns, and by this method he not only gets back the money he has expended but makes a liberal profit."
"Well," said Patsy, not to be baffled, "we could sell several copies of our films to these middlemen, and so reduce the expense of making them for our use."
"The middleman won't buy them," asserted Jones. "He is the thrall of one or the other of the trusts, and buys only trust pictures."
"I see," said Uncle John, catching the idea; "it's a scheme to destroy competition."
"Exactly," replied young Jones.
"What does the Continental do, Maud?" asked Patsy.
"I don't know," answered the girl; "but perhaps Aunt Jane can tell you."
"I believe the Continental is a sort of trust within itself," explained Mrs. Montrose. "Since we have been connected with the company I have learned more or less of its methods. It employs a dozen or so producing companies and makes three or four pictures every week. The concern has its own Exchange, or middleman, who rents only Continental films to the theatres that patronize him."
"Well, we might do the same thing," proposed Patsy, who was loath to abandon her plan.
"You might, if you have the capital," assented Mrs. Montrose. "The Continental is an immense corporation, and I am told it has more than a million dollars invested."
"Two millions," said A. Jones.
The girls were silent a while, seriously considering this startling assertion. They had, between them, considerable money, but they realized they could not enter a field that required such an enormous investment as film making.
"I suppose," said Beth regretfully, "we shall have to give up making films."
"Then where are we to get the proper pictures for our theatre?" demanded Patsy.
"It is quite evident we _can't_ get them," said Louise. "Therefore we may be obliged to abandon the theatre proposition."
Another silence, still more grave. Uncle John was discreet enough to say nothing. The Stantons and Mrs. Montrose felt it was not their affair. Arthur Weldon was slyly enjoying the chagrin visible upon the faces of Mr. Merrick's three pretty nieces.
As for A. Jones, he was industriously figuring upon the back of an envelope with a stubby bit of pencil.
CHAPTER XIII
A FOOLISH BOY
It was the youthful Sangoan who first broke the silence. Glancing at the figures he had made he said:
"It is estimated that if twenty picture theatres use any one film--copies of it, of course--that film will pay for its cost of making. Therefore, if you build twenty children's theatres, instead of the one or two you originally proposed, you would be able to manufacture your own films and they would be no expense to you."
They gazed at him in bewilderment.
"That is all simple enough!" laughed Arthur. "Twenty picture theatres at twenty thousand dollars each--a low estimate, my dears, for such as you require--would mean an investment of four hundred thousand dollars. A film factory, with several producing companies to keep it busy, and all the necessary paraphernalia of costumes and properties, would mean a million or so more. Say a million and a half, all told. Why, it's a mere bagatelle!"
"Arthur!" Severely, from Louise.
"I advise you girls to economize in other ways and devote your resources to this business, which might pay you--and might not," he continued, oblivious to stony glares.
"Really, Mr. Jones," said Beth, pouting, "we were not joking, but in real earnest."
"Have I questioned it, Miss De Graf?"
"Mr. Jones was merely trying to show you how--er--er--how impractical your idea was," explained Uncle John mildly.
"No; I am in earnest, too," said the boy. "To prove it, I will agree to establish a plant and make the pictures, if the young ladies will build the twenty theatres to show them in."
Here was another suggestion of a bewildering nature. Extravagant as the offer seemed, the boy was very serious. He blushed a little as he observed Mr. Merrick eyeing him earnestly, and continued in an embarrassed, halting way: "I--I assure you, sir, that I am able to fulfill my part of the agreement. Also I would like to do it. It would serve to interest me and keep me occupied in ways that are not wholly selfish. My--my other business does not demand my personal attention, you see."
To hear this weak, sickly youth speak of investing a million dollars in a doubtful enterprise, in spite of the fact that he lived on a far-away island and was a practical stranger in America, set them all to speculating anew in regard to his history and condition in life. Seeing that the boy had himself made an opening for a logical query, Uncle John asked:
"Do you mind telling us what this other business is, to which you refer?"
A. Jones moved uneasily in his chair. Then he glanced quickly around the circle and found every eye regarding him with eager curiosity. He blushed again, a deep red this time, but an instant later straightened up and spoke in a tone of sudden resolve.
"Most people dislike to speak of themselves," he said, "and I am no exception. But you, who have kindly received me as a friend, after having generously saved me from an untimely death, have surely the right to know something about me--if, indeed, the subject interests you."
"It is but natural that we should feel an interest in you, Mr. Jones," replied Mr. Merrick; "yet I assure you we have no desire to pry into your personal affairs. You have already volunteered a general statement of your antecedents and the object of your visit to America, and that, I assure you, will suffice us. Pardon me for asking an impertinent question."
The boy seemed perplexed, now.
"I did not consider it impertinent, sir. I made a business proposal to your nieces," he said, "and before they could accept such a proposal they would be entitled to know something of my financial standing."
For a green, inexperienced youth, he spoke with rare acumen, thought Mr. Merrick; but the old gentleman had now determined to shield the boy from a forced declaration of his finances, so he said:
"My nieces can hardly afford to accept your proposition. They are really able to build one or two theatres without inconveniencing themselves, but twenty would be beyond their means. You, of course, understand they were not seeking an investment, but trying, with all their hearts, to benefit the children. I thoroughly approve their original idea, but if it requires twenty picture theatres to render it practical, they will abandon the notion at once."
Jones nodded absently, his eyes half closed in thought. After a brief pause he replied:
"I hate to see this idea abandoned at the very moment of its birth. It's a good idea, and in no way impractical, in my opinion. So permit me to make another proposition. I will build the twenty theatres myself, and furnish the films for them, provided the young ladies will agree to assume the entire management of them when they are completed."
Dead silence followed this speech. The girls did some rapid-fire mental calculations and realized that this young man was proposing to invest something like fourteen hundred thousand dollars, in order that they might carry out their philanthropic conception. Why should he do this, even if he could afford it?
Both Mr. Merrick and Arthur Weldon were staring stolidly at the floor. Their attitudes expressed, for the first time, doubt--if not positive unbelief. As men of considerable financial experience, they regarded the young islander's proposition as an impossible one.
Jones noted this blank reception of his offer and glanced appealingly at Patsy. It was an uncomfortable moment for the girl and to avoid meeting his eyes she looked away, across the lobby. A few paces distant stood a man who leaned against a table and held a newspaper before his face. Patsy knew, however, that he was not reading. A pair of dark, glistening eyes peered over the top of the paper and were steadfastly fixed upon the unconscious features of young Jones.
Something in the attitude of the stranger, whom she had never seen before, something in the rigid pose, the intent gaze--indicating both alertness and repression--riveted the girl's attention at once and gave her a distinct shock of uneasiness.
"I wish," said the boy, in his quiet, firm way, yet with much deference in his manner and tone, "that you young ladies would consider my offer seriously, and take proper time to reach a decision. I am absolutely in earnest. I want to join you in your attempt to give pleasure to children, and I am willing and--and able--to furnish the funds required. Without your cooperation, however, I could do nothing, and my health is such that I wish to leave the management of the theatres entirely in your hands, as well as all the details of their construction."
"We will consider it, of course, Mr. Jones," answered Beth gravely. "We are a little startled just now, as you see; but when we grow accustomed to the immensity of the scheme--our baby, which you have transformed into a giant--we shall be able to consider it calmly and critically, and decide if we are competent to undertake the management of so many theatres."
"Thank you. Then, I think, I will excuse myself for this evening and return to my room. I'm improving famously, under Dr. Doyle's instructions, but am not yet a rugged example of health."
Patsy took his hand at parting, as did the others, but her attention was divided between Ajo and the strange man who had never for a moment ceased watching him. Not once did the dark eyes waver, but followed each motion of the boy as he sauntered to the desk, got his key from the clerk, and then proceeded to his room, turning up one of the corridors on the main floor.
The stranger now laid his newspaper on the table and disclosed his entire face for the first time. A middle-aged man, he seemed to be, with iron-gray hair and a smoothly shaven, rather handsome face. From his dress he appeared to be a prosperous business man and it was evident that he was a guest of the hotel, for he wandered through the lobby--in which many other guests were grouped, some chatting and others playing "bridge"--and presently disappeared down the corridor traversed by young Jones.
Patsy drew a deep breath, but said nothing to the others, who, when relieved of the boy's presence, began to discuss volubly his singular proposal.
"The fellow is crazy," commented Arthur. "Twenty picture theatres, with a film factory to supply them, is a big order even for a multi-millionaire--and I can't imagine this boy coming under that head."
"He seemed in earnest," said Maud, musingly. "What do you think, Aunt Jane?"
"I am greatly perplexed," admitted Mrs. Montrose. "Had I not known of the conquest of Goldstein by this boy, who issued orders which the manager of the Continental meekly obeyed, I would have laughed at his proposition. As it is, I'm afraid to state that he won't carry out his plan to the letter of the agreement."
"Would it not be a rash investment, ma'am?" inquired Uncle John.
"Frankly, I do not know. While all the film makers evade any attempt to discover how prosperous--financially--they are, we know that without exception they have grown very wealthy. I am wondering if this young Jones is not one of the owners of the Continental--a large stockholder, perhaps. If so, that not only accounts for his influence with Goldstein, but it proves him able to finance this remarkable enterprise. He doubtless knows what he is undertaking, for his figures, while not accurate, were logical."
"Of course!" cried Patsy. "That explains everything."
"Still," said Uncle John cautiously, "this is merely surmise on our part, and before accepting it we must reconcile it with the incongruities in the case. It is possible that the elder Jones owned an interest in the Continental and bequeathed it to his son. But is it probable? Remember, he was an islander, and a recluse."
"More likely," said Beth, "Ajo's father left him a great fortune, which the boy invested in the Continental stock."
"I have been told," remarked Aunt Jane thoughtfully, "that Continental stock cannot be bought at any price. It pays such enormous dividends that no owner will dispose of it."
"The whole thing is perplexing in the extreme," declared Arthur. "The boy tells a story that at first seems frank and straightforward, yet his statements do not dovetail, so to speak."
"I think he is holding something back," said Beth; "something that would explain all the discrepancies in his story. You were wrong, Uncle John, not to let him speak when he offered to tell you all."
"There was something in his manner that made me revolt from forcing his confidence," was the reply.
"There was something in his manner that made me think he was about to concoct a story that would satisfy our curiosity," said Louise with a shrug.
Uncle John looked around the circle of faces.
"You are not questioning the young fellow's sincerity, I hope?" said he.
"I don't, for a single second!" asserted Patsy, stoutly. "He may have a queer history, and he may not have told us all of it, but Ajo is honest. I'll vouch for him!"
"So will I, my dear," said Uncle John.
"That is more than I can do, just at present," Arthur frankly stated. "My opinion is that his preposterous offer is mere bluff. If you accepted it, you would find him unable to do his part."
"Then what is his object?" asked Maud.
"I can't figure it out, as yet. He might pose as a millionaire and a generous friend and philanthropist for some time, before the truth was discovered, and during that time he could carry out any secret plans he had in mind. The boy is more shrewd than he appears to be. We, by chance saved his life, and at once he attached himself to us like a barnacle, and we can't shake him off."
"We don't want to," said Patsy.
"My explanation is that he has fallen in love with one of us girls," suggested Flo, with a mischievous glance at her sister. "I wonder if it's me?"
"It is more likely," said Louise, "that he has discovered Uncle John to be a very--prosperous--man."
"Nonsense, my dear!" exclaimed that gentleman, evidently irritated by the insinuation. "Don't pick the boy to pieces. Give him a chance. So far he has asked nothing from us, but offers everything. He's a grateful fellow and is anxious to help you girls carry out your ambitious plans. That is how I read him, and I think it is absurd to prejudge him in the way you are doing."
The party broke up, the Stantons and Weldons going to their rooms. Beth also rose.
"Are you coming to bed, Patsy?" she inquired.
"Not just now," her cousin replied. "Between us, we've rubbed Uncle John's fur the wrong way and he won't get composed until he has smoked his good-night cigar. I'll sit with him in this corner and keep him company."
So the little man and his favorite niece were left together, and he did not seem in the least ruffled as he lit his cigar and settled down in a big chair, with Patsy beside him, to enjoy it.
CHAPTER XIV
ISIDORE LE DRIEUX
Perhaps the cigar was half gone when Patsy gave a sudden start and squeezed Uncle John's hand, which she had been holding in both her own.
"What is it, my dear?"
"The man I told you of. There he is, just across the lobby. The man with the gray clothes and gray hair."
"Oh, yes; the one lighting a cigar."
"Precisely."
Uncle John gazed across the lobby reflectively. The stranger's eyes roved carelessly around the big room and then he moved with deliberate steps toward their corner. He passed several vacant chairs and settees on his way and finally paused before a lounging-chair not six feet distant from the one occupied by Mr. Merrick.
"Pardon me; is this seat engaged, sir?" he asked.
"No," replied Uncle John, not very graciously, for it was a deliberate intrusion.
The stranger sat down and for a time smoked his cigar in silence. He was so near them that Patsy forbore any conversation, knowing he would overhear it.
Suddenly the man turned squarely in their direction and addressed them.
"I hope you will pardon me, Mr. Merrick, if I venture to ask a question," said he.
"Well, sir?"
"I saw you talking with Mr. Jones this evening--A. Jones, you know, who says he came from Sangoa."
"Didn't he?" demanded the old gentleman.
The stranger smiled.
"Perhaps; once on a time; allowing such a place exists. But his last journey was here from Austria."
"Indeed!"
Mr. Merrick and Patsy were both staring at the man incredulously.
"I am quite sure of that statement, sir; but I cannot prove it, as yet."
"Ah! I thought not."
Patsy had just told her uncle how she had detected this man stealthily watching Jones, and how he had followed the boy when he retired to his room. The present interview had, they both knew, something to do with this singular action. Therefore Mr. Merrick restrained his indignation at the stranger's pointed questioning. He realized quite well that the man had come to their corner determined to catechise them and gain what information he could. Patsy realized this, too. So, being forewarned, they hoped to learn his object without granting him the satisfaction of "pumping" them.
"I suppose you are friends of this Mr. A. Jones," was his next remark.
"We are acquaintances," said Mr. Merrick.
"Has he ever mentioned his adventures in Austria to you?"
"Are _you_ a friend of Mr. Jones?" demanded uncle John.
"I am not even an acquaintance," said the man, smiling. "But I am interested in him, through a friend of mine who met him abroad. Permit me to introduce myself, sir."
He handed them a card which read:
"ISADORE LE DRIEUX Importer of Pearls and Precious Stones 36 Maiden Lane, New York City."
"I have connections abroad, in nearly all countries," continued the man, "and it is through some of them that I have knowledge of this young fellow who has taken the name of A. Jones. In fact, I have a portrait of the lad, taken in Paris, which I will show you."
He searched in his pocket and produced an envelope from which he carefully removed a photograph, which he handed to Uncle John. Patsy examined it, too, with a start of surprise. The thin features, the large serious eyes, even the closely set lips were indeed those of A. Jones. But in the picture he wore a small mustache.
"It can't be _our_ A. Jones," murmured Patsy. "This one is older."
"That is on account of the mustache," remarked Le Drieux, who was closely watching their faces. "This portrait was taken more than a year ago."
"Oh; but he was in Sangoa then," protested Patsy, who was really bewildered by the striking resemblance.
The stranger smiled indulgently.
"As a matter of fact, there is no Sangoa." said he; "so we may doubt the young man's assertion that he was ever there."
"Why are you interested in him?" inquired Mr. Merrick.
"A natural question," said Le Drieux, after a moment of hesitation. "I know you well by reputation, Mr. Merrick, and believe I am justified in speaking frankly to you and your niece, provided you regard my statements as strictly confidential. A year ago I received notice from my friend in Austria that the young man had gone to America and he was anxious I should meet him. At the time I was too busy with my own affairs to look him up, but I recently came to California for a rest, and noticed the strong resemblance between the boy, A. Jones, and the portrait sent me. So I hunted up this picture and compared the two. In my judgment they are one and the same. What do _you_ think, sir?"
"I believe there is a resemblance," answered Uncle John, turning the card over. "But here is a name on the back of the photograph: 'Jack Andrews.'"
"Yes; this is Jack Andrews," said Le Drieux, nodding. "Have you ever heard the name before?"
"Never."
"Well, Andrews is noted throughout Europe, and it is but natural he should desire to escape his notoriety by assuming another name out here. Do you note the similarity of the initials? 'J.A.' stand for Jack Andrews. Reverse them and 'A.J.' stand for A. Jones. By the way, what does he claim the 'A' means? Is it Andrew?"
"It means nothing at all," said Patsy. "He told us so."
"I see. You caught him unprepared. That isn't like Jack. He is always on guard."
Both Patsy and Uncle John were by this time sorely perplexed. They had a feeling common to both of them, that the subject of this portrait and A. Jones were two separate and distinct persons; yet the resemblance could not be denied, if they were indeed the same, young Jones had deliberately lied to them, and recalling his various statements and the manner in which they had been made, they promptly acquitted the boy of the charge of falsehood.
"For what was Jack Andrews noted throughout Europe?" inquired Mr. Merrick, after silently considering these things.
"Well, he was a highflier, for one thing." answered Le Drieux. "He was known as a thorough 'sport' and, I am told, a clever gambler. He had a faculty of making friends, even among the nobility. The gilded youth of London, Paris and Vienna cultivated his acquaintance, and through them he managed to get into very good society. He was a guest at the splendid villa of Countess Ahmberg, near Vienna, when her magnificent collection of pearls disappeared. You remember that loss, and the excitement it caused, do you not?"
"No, sir; I have never before heard of the Countess of Ahmberg or her pearls."
"Well, the story filled the newspapers for a couple of weeks. The collection embraced the rarest and most valuable pearls known to exist."
"And you accuse this man, Andrews, of stealing them?" asked Uncle John, tapping with his finger the portrait he still held.
"By no means, sir; by no means!" cried Le Drieux hastily. "In fact, he was one of the few guests at the villa to whom no suspicion attached. From the moment the casket of pearls was last seen by the countess until their loss was discovered, every moment of Andrews' time was accounted for. His alibi was perfect and he was quite prominent in the unsuccessful quest of the thief."
"The pearls were not recovered, then?"
"No. The whole affair is still a mystery. My friend in Vienna, a pearl merchant like myself, assisted Andrews in his endeavor to discover the thief and, being much impressed by the young man's personality, sent me this photograph, asking me to meet him, as I have told you, when he reached America."
"Is his home in this country?"
"New York knows him, but knows nothing of his family or his history. He is popular there, spending money freely and bearing the reputation of an all-around good fellow. On his arrival there, a year ago, he led a gay life for a few days and then suddenly disappeared. No one knew what had become of him. When I found him here, under the name of A. Jones, the disappearance was solved."
"I think," said Uncle John, "you are laboring under a serious, if somewhat natural, mistake. The subject of this picture is like A. Jones, indeed, but he is older and his expression more--more--"
"Blase and sophisticated," said Patsy.
"Thank you, my dear; I am no dictionary, and if those are real words they may convey my meaning. I feel quite sure, Mr. Le Drieux, that the story of Andrews can not be the story of young Jones."
Le Drieux took the picture and replaced it in his pocket.
"To err is human," said he, "and I will admit the possibility of my being mistaken in my man. But you will admit the resemblance?"
"Yes. They might be brothers. But young Jones has said he has no brothers, and I believe him."
Le Drieux sat in silence for a few minutes. Then he said:
"I appealed to you, Mr. Merrick, because I was not thoroughly satisfied, in my own mind, of my conclusions. You have added to my doubts, I must confess, yet I cannot abandon the idea that the two men are one and the same. As my suspicion is only shared by you and your niece, in confidence, I shall devote myself for a few days to studying young Jones and observing his actions. In that way I may get a clue that will set all doubt at rest."
"We will introduce you to him," said Patsy. "and then you may question him as much as you like."
"Oh, no; I prefer not to make his acquaintance until I am quite sure," was the reply. "If he is not Jack Andrews he would be likely to resent the insinuation that he is here trading under a false name. Good night, Mr. Merrick. Good night, Miss Doyle. I thank you for your courteous consideration."
He had risen, and now bowed and walked away.
"Well," said Patsy. "what was he after? And did he learn anything from us?"
"He did most of the talking himself," replied Uncle John, looking after Le Drieux with a puzzled expression. "Of course he is not a jewel merchant."
"No," said Patsy, "he's a detective, and I'll bet a toothpick to a match that he's on the wrong scent."
"He surely is. Unfortunately, we cannot warn Ajo against him."
"It isn't necessary, Uncle. Why, the whole thing is absurd. Our boy is not a gambler or roysterer, nor do I think he has ever been in Europe. Mr. Le Drieux will have to guess again!"
CHAPTER XV
A FEW PEARLS
The next morning Patsy, Beth and Louise met in earnest conference over the important proposition made them by young Jones, and although Uncle John and Arthur Weldon were both present the men took no part in the discussion.
"Some doubt has been expressed," said Beth judicially, "that Ajo is really able to finance this big venture. But he says he is, and that he will carry it through to the end, so I propose we let him do it."
"Why not?" asked Louise. "If he succeeds, it will be glorious. If he fails, we will suffer in no way except through disappointment."
"Well, shall we accept this offer, girls?"
"First," said Louise, "let us consider what we will have to do, on our part, when the twenty theatres are built and the film factory is in operation."
"We are to be the general managers," returned Patsy. "We must select the subjects, or plots, for the pictures, and order them made under our direction. Then we must see that all of our theatres present them in a proper manner, and we must invite children to come and see the shows. I guess that's all."
"That will be enough to keep us busy, I'm sure," said Beth. "But we will gladly undertake it, and I am sure we shall prove good managers, as soon as we get acquainted with the details of the business."
"It will give us the sort of employment we like," Patsy assured them. "Our first duty will be to plan these theatres for children, and make them as cosy and comfortable as possible, regardless of expense. Ajo will pay the bills, and when all the buildings are ready we will set to work in earnest."
So, when A. Jones appeared he was told that the girls would gladly accept his proposition. The young man seemed greatly pleased by this verdict. He appeared to be much better and stronger to-day and he entered eagerly into a discussion of the plans in detail. Together they made a list of a string of twenty theatres, to be built in towns reaching from Santa Barbara on the north to San Diego in the south. The film factory was to be located in the San Fernando Valley, just north of Hollywood.
This consumed the entire forenoon, and after lunch they met a prominent real estate man whom Jones had summoned to the hotel. This gentleman was given a copy of the list of locations and instructed to purchase in each town the best site that could be secured for a motion picture theatre. This big order made the real estate man open his eyes in surprise.
"Do you wish me to secure options, or to purchase the land outright?" he asked.
"Be sure of your locations and then close the deals at once," replied Jones. "We do not wish to waste time in useless dickering, and a location in the heart of each town, perhaps on the main street, is more important than the price. You will, of course, protect me from robbery to the best of your ability; but buy, even if the price is exorbitant. I will this afternoon place a hundred thousand dollars to your credit in the bank, with which to make advance payments, and when you notify me how much more is required I will forward my checks at once."
"That is satisfactory, sir. I will do the best I can to guard your interests," said the man.
When he had gone the girls accompanied Ajo in a motorcar to Los Angeles, to consult an architect. They visited several offices before the boy, who seemed to estimate men at a glance, found one that satisfied him. The girls explained with care to the architect their idea of a luxurious picture theatre for children, and when he had grasped their conception, which he did with enthusiasm, he suggested several improvements on their immature plans and promised to have complete drawings ready to submit to them in a few days.
From the architect's office they drove to the German-American Bank, where Ajo gave his check for a hundred thousand dollars, to be placed to the credit of Mr. Wilcox, the real estate agent. The deference shown him by the cashier seemed to indicate that this big check was not the extent of A. Jones' credit there, by any means.
As they drove back to Hollywood, Patsy could not help eyeing this youthful capitalist with wonder. During this day of exciting business deals the boy had behaved admirably, and there was no longer a shadow of doubt in the minds of any of Uncle John's nieces that he was both able and anxious to carry out his part of the agreement.
Patsy almost giggled outright as she thought of Le Drieux and his ridiculous suspicions. One would have to steal a good many pearls in order to acquire a fortune to match that of the Sangoan.
He was speaking of Sangoa now, in answer to a question of Beth's.
"Yes, indeed," said he, "Sangoa is very beautiful, and the climate is even more mild than that of your Southern California. The north coast is a high bluff, on which is a splendid forest of rosewood and mahogany. My father would never allow any of these magnificent trees to be cut, except a few that were used in building our house."
"But how do your people live? What is the principal industry of your islanders?" asked Beth.
"My people are--fishermen," he said, and then the automobile drew up before the hotel entrance and the conversation ended.
It was on the following afternoon, as they all met in the hotel lobby after lunch, that a messenger handed young Jones a neat parcel, for which a receipt was demanded. Ajo held the parcel in his hand a while, listening to the chatter of the girls, who were earnestly discussing plans for the new picture enterprise. Then very quietly and unobtrusively he unwrapped the package and laid upon the table beside him several small boxes bearing the name of a prominent jeweler.
"I hope," said he, taking advantage of a pause caused by the girls observing this action, and growing visibly confused by their involuntary stares of curiosity; "I--I hope that you, my new friends, will pardon a liberty I have taken. I wanted to--to present those who were instrumental in saving my life with--with a--a slight token of my gratitude--a sort of--of--memento of a brave and generous act that gave me back the life I had carelessly jeopardized. No," as he saw surprise and protest written on their faces, "don't refuse me this pleasure, I implore you! The little--eh--eh--mementos are from my own Island of Sangoa, with the necessary mountings by a Los Angeles jeweler, and--please accept them!"
As he spoke he handed to each of the girls a box, afterward giving one to Uncle John and another to Arthur. There remained upon the table three others. He penciled a name upon the bottom of each and then handed them to Patsy, saying:
"Will you kindly present these, with my compliments, to the Misses Stanton, and to their aunt, when they return this evening? Thank you!"
And then, before they could recover from their astonishment, he turned abruptly and fled to his room.
The girls stared at one another a moment and then began laughing. Arthur seemed crestfallen, while Uncle John handled his small box as gingerly as if he suspected it contained an explosive.
"How ridiculous!" cried Patsy, her blue eyes dancing. "And did you notice how scared poor Ajo was, and how he skipped as fearfully as though he had committed some crime? But I'm sure the poor boy meant well. Let's open our boxes, girls, and see what foolishness Ajo has been up to."
Slipping off the cover of her box, Beth uttered a low cry of amazement and admiration. Then she held up a dainty lavalliere, with a pendant containing a superb pearl. Louise had the mate to this, but the one Patsy found had a pearl of immense size, its color being an exquisite shade of pink, such as is rarely seen. Arthur displayed a ring set with a splendid white pearl, while Uncle John's box contained a stick pin set with a huge black pearl of remarkable luster. Indeed, they saw at a glance that the size and beauty of all these pearls were very uncommon, and while the others expressed their enthusiastic delight, the faces of Mr. Merrick and Patsy Doyle were solemn and perplexed. They stared at the pearls with feelings of dismay, rather than joy, and chancing to meet one another's eyes they quickly dropped their gaze to avoid exchanging the ugly suspicion that had forced itself upon their minds.
With a sudden thought Patsy raised her head to cast a searching glance around the lobby, for although their party was seated in an alcove they were visible to all in the big room of which it formed a part. Yes, Mr. Isidore Le Drieux was standing near them, as she had feared, and the slight sneer upon his lips proved that he had observed the transfer of the pearls.
So the girl promptly clasped her lavalliere around her neck and openly displayed it, as a proud defiance, if not a direct challenge, to that detestable sneer.
Arthur, admiring his ring in spite of his chagrin at receiving such a gift from a comparative stranger, placed the token on his finger.
"It is a beauty, indeed," said he, "but I don't think we ought to accept such valuable gifts from this boy."
"I do not see why," returned his wife Louise. "I think these pretty tributes for saving Mr. Jones' life are very appropriate. Of course neither Beth nor I had anything to do with that affair, but we are included in the distribution because it would be more embarrassing to leave us out of it."
"And the pearls came from Sangoa," added Beth, "so all these precious gifts have cost Ajo nothing, except for their settings."
"If Sangoa can furnish many such pearls as these," remarked Arthur, reflectively, "the island ought to be famous, instead of unknown. Their size and beauty render the gems priceless."
"Well," said Patsy soberly, "we know now where A. Jones got his money, which is so plentiful that he can build any number of film factories and picture theatres. Sangoa must have wonderful pearl fisheries--don't you remember, girls, that he told us his people were fishermen?--for each of these specimens is worth a small fortune. Mine, especially, is the largest and finest pearl I have ever seen."
"I beg your pardon!" sternly exclaimed Uncle John, as he whirled swiftly around. "Can I do anything for you, sir?"
For Mr. Le Drieux had stealthily advanced to the alcove and was glaring at the display of pearls and making notes in a small book.
He bowed, without apparent resentment, as he answered Mr. Merrick: "Thank you, sir; you have already served me admirably. Pardon my intrusion."
Then he closed the book, slipped it into his pocket and with another low bow walked away.
"What rank impertinence!" cried Arthur, staring after him. "Some newspaper reporter, I suppose. Do you know him, Uncle John?"
"He forced an introduction, a few evenings ago. It is a pearl merchant from New York, named Le Drieux, so I suppose his curiosity is but natural."
"Shall we keep our pearls, Uncle?" asked Beth.
"I shall keep mine," replied the little man, who never wore any ornament of jewelry. "It was generous and thoughtful in young Jones to present these things and we ought not offend him by refusing his 'mementos,' as he calls them."
Perhaps all the nieces were relieved to hear this verdict, for already they loved their beautiful gifts. That evening the Stanton girls and their Aunt Jane received their parcels, being fully as much surprised as the others had been, and their boxes also contained pearls. Flo and Maud had lavallieres, the latter receiving one as large and beautiful as that of Patsy Doyle, while Mrs. Montrose found a brooch set with numerous smaller pearls.
Patsy urged them all to wear the ornaments to dinner that evening, which they did, and although Jones was not there to observe the effect of the splendid pearls, Mr. Le Drieux was at his place in the dining room and made more notes in his little book.
That was exactly what Patsy wanted. "I can't stand the suspense of this thing," she whispered to Uncle John, "and if that man wants any information about these pearls I propose we give it to him. In that way he will soon discover he is wrong in suspecting the identity of Jack Andrews and A. Jones."
Mr. Merrick nodded absently and went to his corner for a smoke. Arthur soon after joined him, while Aunt Jane took her bevy of girls to another part of the loge.
"Le Drieux will be here presently," said Uncle John to young Weldon.
"Oh, the fellow with the book. Why, sir?"
"He's a detective, I think. Anyhow, he is shadowing Jones, whom he suspects is a thief."
He then told Arthur frankly of his former conversation with Le Drieux, and of the puzzling photograph.
"It really resembles the boy," he admitted, with a frown of perplexity, "yet at the same time I realized the whole thing was absurd. Neither Patsy nor I can believe that Jones is the man who robbed an Austrian countess. It's preposterous! And let me say right now, Arthur, that I'm going to stand by this young fellow, with all my influence, in case those hounds try to make him trouble."
Arthur did not reply at once. He puffed his cigar silently while he revolved the startling accusation in his mind.
"Both you and Patsy are staunch friends," he observed, after a while, "and I have noticed that your intuition as regards character is seldom at fault. But I advise you, in this instance, not to be hasty, for--"
"I know; you are going to refer to those pearls."
"Naturally. If I don't, Le Drieux will, as you have yourself prophesied. Pearls--especially such pearls as these--are rare and easy to recognize. The world does not contain many black-pearls, for instance, such as that you are wearing. An expert--a man with a photograph that strongly resembles young Jones--is tracing some stolen pearls of great value--a collection, I think you said. We find Jones, a man seemingly unknown here, giving away a number of wonderful pearls that are worthy a place in any collection. Admit it is curious, Uncle John. It may be all a coincidence, of course; but how do you account for it, sir?"
"Jones has an island in the South Seas, a locality where most of the world's famous pearls have been found."
"Sangoa?"
"Yes."
"It is not on any map. This man, Le Drieux, positively stated that there is no such island, did he not?"
Uncle John rubbed his chin, a gesture that showed he was disturbed.
"He was not positive. He said he thought there was no such island."
"Well, sir?"
"If Jones could lie about his island, he would be capable of the theft of those pearls," admitted Mr. Merrick reluctantly.
"That is conclusive, sir."
"But he isn't capable of the theft. Le Drieux states that Jack Andrews is a society swell, an all-around confidence man, and a gambler. Jones is a diffident and retiring, but a very manly young fellow, who loves quiet and seems to have no bad habits. You can't connect the two in any possible way."
Again Arthur took time to consider.
"I have no desire to suspect Jones unjustly," he said. "In fact, I have been inclined to like the fellow. And yet--his quaint stories and his foolish expenditures have made me suspicious from the first. You have scarcely done justice to his character in your description, sir. To us he appears diffident, retiring, and rather weak, in a way, while in his intercourse with Goldstein he shows a mailed fist. He can be hard as nails, on occasion, as we know, and at times he displays a surprising knowledge of the world and its ways--for one who has been brought up on an out-of-the-way island. What do we know about him, anyway? He tells a tale no one can disprove, for the South Seas are full of small islands, some of which are probably unrecorded on the charts. All this might possibly be explained by remembering that a man like Jack Andrews is undoubtedly a clever actor."
"Exactly!" said a jubilant voice behind them, and Mr. Isidore Le Drieux stepped forward and calmly drew up a chair, in which he seated himself. "You will pardon me, gentlemen, for eavesdropping, but I was curious to know what you thought of this remarkable young man who calls himself 'A. Jones.'"
Arthur faced the intruder with a frown. He objected to being startled in this manner. "You are a detective?" he asked.
"Oh, scarcely that, sir," Le Drieux replied in a deprecating way. "My printed card indicates that I am a merchant, but in truth I am a special agent, employed by the largest pearl and gem dealers in the world, a firm with branches in every large European and American city. My name is Le Drieux, sir, at your service," and with a flourish he presented his card.
The young rancher preferred to study the man's face.
"I am a sort of messenger," he continued, placidly. "When valuable consignments of jewels are to be delivered, I am the carrier instead of the express companies. The method is safer. In twenty-six years of this work I have never lost a single jewel."
"One firm employs you exclusively, then?"
"One firm. But it has many branches."
"It is a trust?"
"Oh, no; we have many competitors; but none very important. Our closest rival, for instance, has headquarters on this very coast--in San Francisco--but spreads, as we do, over the civilized world. Yet Jephson's--that's the firm--do not claim to equal our business. They deal mostly in pearls."
"Pearls, eh?" said Arthur, musingly. "Then it was your firm that lost the valuable collection of pearls you mentioned to Mr. Merrick?"
"No. They were the property of Countess Ahmberg, of Vienna. But we had sold many of the finest specimens to the countess and have records of their weight, size, shape and color. The one you are now wearing, sir," pointing to Uncle John's scarf pin, "is one of the best black pearls ever discovered. It was found at Tremloe in 1883 and was originally purchased by our firm. In 1887 I took it to Tiffany, who sold it to Prince Godesky, of Warsaw. I carried it to him, with other valuable purchases, and after his death it was again resold to our firm. It was in October, 1904, that I again became the bearer of the pearl, delivering it safely to Countess Ahmberg at her villa. It was stolen from her, together with 188 other rare pearls, valued at a half million dollars, a little over a year ago."
"This pearl, sir," said Uncle John stiffly, "is not the one you refer to. It was found on the shores of the island of Sangoa, and you have never seen it before."
Le Drieux smiled sweetly as he brushed the ashes from his cigar.
"I am seldom mistaken in a pearl, especially one that I have handled," said he. "Moreover, a good pearl becomes historic, and it is my business to know the history of each and every one in existence."
"Even those owned by Jephson's?" asked Arthur.
"Yes; unless they were acquired lately. I have spoken in this manner in order that you may understand the statements I am about to make, and I beg you to listen carefully: Three daring pearl robberies have taken place within the past two years. The first was a collection scarcely inferior to that of the Countess Ahmberg. A bank messenger was carrying it through the streets of London one evening, to be delivered to Lady Grandison, when he was stabbed to the heart and the gems stolen. Singularly enough, Jack Andrews was passing by and found the dying messenger. He called for the police, but when they arrived the messenger had expired. The fate of the pearls has always remained a mystery, although a large reward has been offered for their recovery."
"Oh; a reward."
"Naturally, sir. Four months later Princess Lemoine lost her wonderful pearl necklace while sitting in a box at the Grand Opera in Paris. This was one of the cleverest thefts that ever baffled the police, for the necklace was never recovered. We know, however, that Jack Andrews occupied the box next to that of the princess. A coincidence--perhaps. We now come to the robbery of the Countess Ahmberg, the third on the list. Jack Andrews was a guest at her house, as I have explained to you. No blame has ever attached to this youthful adventurer, yet my firm, always interested in the pearls they have sold, advised me to keep an eye on him when he returned to America. I did so.
"Now, Mr. Merrick, I will add to the tale I told you the other night. Andrews behaved very well for a few weeks after he landed at New York; then he disposed of seven fine pearls and--disappeared. They were not notable pearls, especially, but two of them I was able to trace to the necklace of Princess Lemoine. I cabled my firm. They called attention to the various rewards offered and urged me to follow Andrews. That was impossible; he had left no clue. But chance favored me. Coming here to Los Angeles on business, I suddenly ran across my quarry: Jack Andrews. He has changed a bit. The mustache is gone, he is in poor health, and I am told he was nearly drowned in the ocean the other day. So at first I was not sure of my man. I registered at this hotel and watched him carefully. Sometimes I became positive he was Andrews; at other times I doubted. But when he began distributing pearls to you, his new friends, all doubt vanished. There, gentlemen, is my story in a nutshell. What do you think of it?"
Both Mr. Merrick and young Weldon had listened with rapt interest, but their interpretation of the tale, which amounted to a positive accusation of A. Jones, showed the difference in the two men's natures.
"I think you are on the wrong trail, sir," answered Mr. Merrick. "Doubtless you have been misled by a casual resemblance, coupled with the fact that Andrews is suspected of stealing pearls and Jones is known to possess pearls--the pearls being of rare worth in both cases. Still, you are wrong. For instance, if you have the weight and measurement of the Tremloe black pearl, you will find they do not fit the pearl I am now wearing."
Le Drieux smiled genially.
"It is unnecessary to make the test, sir," he replied. "The pearl Andrews gave to Miss Doyle is as unmistakable as your own. But I am curious to hear your opinion, Mr. Weldon."
"I have been suspicious of young Jones from the first," said Arthur; "but I have been studying this boy's character, and he is positively incapable of the crimes you accuse him of, such as robbery and murder. In other words, whatever Jones may be, he is not Andrews; or, if by chance he proves to be Andrews, then Andrews is innocent of crime. All your theories are based upon a desire to secure rewards, backed by a chain of circumstantial evidence."
"A chain," said Le Drieux, grimly, "that will hold Jack Andrews fast in its coils, clever though he is."
"Circumstantial evidence," retorted Mr. Merrick, "doesn't amount to shucks! It is constantly getting good people into trouble and allowing rascals to escape. Nothing but direct evidence will ever convince me that a man is guilty."
Le Drieux shrugged his shoulders.
"The pearls are evidence enough," said he.
"To be sure. Evidence enough to free the poor boy of suspicion. You may be a better messenger than you are a detective, Mr. Le Drieux, but that doesn't convince me you are a judge of pearls."
The agent rose with a frown of annoyance.
"I am going to have Jack Andrews arrested in the morning," he remarked. "If you warn him, in the meantime, I shall charge you with complicity."
Uncle John nearly choked with anger, but he maintained his dignity.
"I have no knowledge of your Jack Andrews," he replied, and turned his back.
CHAPTER XVI
TROUBLE
Uncle John and Arthur decided not to mention to the girls this astounding charge of Isidore Le Drieux, fearing the news would make them nervous and disturb their rest, so when the men joined the merry party in the alcove they did not refer to their late interview.
Afterward, however, when all but Arthur Weldon had gone to bed and he was sitting in Uncle John's room, the two discussed the matter together with much seriousness.
"We ought to do something, sir," said Arthur. "This Jones is a mere boy, and in poor health at that. He has no friends, so far as we know, other than ourselves. Therefore it is our duty to see him through this trouble."
Mr. Merrick nodded assent.
"We cannot prevent the arrest," he replied, "for Le Drieux will not listen to reason. If we aided Jones to run away he would soon be caught. Absurd as the charge is, the youngster must face it and prove his innocence."
Arthur paced the floor in a way that indicated he was disturbed by this verdict.
"He ought to have no difficulty in proving he is not Jack Andrews," he remarked, reflectively; "and yet--those pearls are difficult to explain. Their similarity to the ones stolen in Europe fooled the expert, Le Drieux, and they are likely to fool a judge or jury. I hope Jones has some means of proving that he brought the pearls from Sangoa. That would settle the matter at once."
"As soon as he is arrested we will get him a lawyer--the best in this country," said Mr. Merrick. "More than that we cannot do, but a good lawyer will know the proper method of freeing his client."
The next morning they were up early, awaiting developments; but Le Drieux seemed in no hurry to move. He had breakfast at about nine o'clock, read his newspaper for a half hour or so, and then deliberately left the hotel. All of Mr. Merrick's party had breakfasted before this and soon after Le Drieux had gone away young Jones appeared in the lobby. He was just in time to see the Stanton girls drive away in their automobile, accompanied by their Aunt Jane.
"The motion picture stars must be late to-day," said the boy, looking after them.
"They are," answered Patsy, standing beside him at the window; "but Maud says this happens to be one of their days of leisure. No picture is to be taken and they have only to rehearse a new play. But it's a busy life, seems to me, and it would really prove hard work if the girls didn't enjoy it so much."
"Yes," said he, "it's a fascinating profession. I understand, and nothing can be called _work_ that is interesting. When we are obliged to do something that we do not like to do, it becomes 'work.' Otherwise, what is usually called 'work' is mere play, for it furnishes its quota of amusement."
He was quite unconscious of any impending misfortune and when Beth and Louise joined Patsy in thanking him for his pretty gifts of the pearls he flushed with pleasure. Evidently their expressions of delight were very grateful to his ears.
Said Uncle John, in a casual way: "Those are remarkably fine pearls, to have come from such an island as Sangoa."
"But we find much better ones there, I assure you," replied the boy. "I have many in my room of much greater value, but did not dare ask you to accept them as gifts."
"Do many pearls come from Sangoa, then?" asked Arthur.
"That is our one industry," answered the young man. "Many years ago my father discovered the pearl fisheries. It was after he had purchased the island, but he recognized the value of the pearls and brought a colony of people from America to settle at Sangoa and devote their time to pearl fishing. Once or twice every year we send a ship to market with a consignment of pearls to our agent, and--to be quite frank with you--that is why I am now able to build the picture theatres I have contracted for, as well as the film factory."
"I see," said Uncle John. "But tell me this, please: Why is Sangoa so little known, or rather, so quite unknown?"
"My father," Jones returned, "loved quiet and seclusion. He was willing to develop the pearl fisheries, but objected to the flock of adventurers sure to descend upon his island if its wealth of pearls became generally known. His colony he selected with great care and with few exceptions they are a sturdy, wholesome lot, enjoying the peaceful life of Sangoa and thoroughly satisfied with their condition there. It is only within the last two years that our American agents knew where our pearls came from, yet they could not locate the island if they tried. I do not feel the same desire my father did to keep the secret, although I would dislike to see Sangoa overrun with tourists or traders."
He spoke so quietly and at the same time so convincingly that both Arthur and Uncle John accepted his explanation unquestioningly. Nevertheless, in the embarrassing dilemma in which Jones would presently be involved, the story would be sure to bear the stamp of unreality to any uninterested hearer.
The girls had now begun to chatter over the theatre plans, and their "financial backer"--as Patsy Doyle called him--joined them with eager interest. Arthur sat at a near-by desk writing a letter; Uncle John glanced over the morning paper; Inez, the Mexican nurse, brought baby to Louise for a kiss before it went for a ride in its perambulator.
An hour had passed when Le Drieux entered the lobby in company with a thin-faced, sharp-eyed man in plain clothes. They walked directly toward the group that was seated by the open alcove window, and Arthur Weldon, observing them and knowing what was about to happen, rose from the writing-desk and drew himself tensely together as he followed them. Uncle John lowered his paper, frowned at Le Drieux and then turned his eyes upon the face of young Jones.
It was the thin-featured man who advanced and lightly touched the boy's arm.
"Beg pardon, sir," said he, in even, unemotional tones. "You are Mr. Andrews, I believe--Mr. Jack Andrews?"
The youth turned his head to look at his questioner.
"No, sir," he answered with a smile. "A case of mistaken identity. My name is Jones." Then, continuing his speech to Patsy Doyle, he said: "There is no need to consider the acoustic properties of our theatres, for the architect--"
"Pardon me again," interrupted the man, more sternly. "I am positive this is _not_ a case of mistaken identity. We have ample proof that Jack Andrews is parading here, under the alias of 'A. Jones.'"
The boy regarded him with a puzzled expression.
"What insolence!" muttered Beth in an under-tone but audible enough to be distinctly heard.
The man flushed slightly and glanced at Le Drieux, who nodded his head. Then he continued firmly:
"In any event, sir, I have a warrant for your arrest, and I hope you will come with me quietly and so avoid a scene."
The boy grew pale and then red. His eyes narrowed as he stared fixedly at the officer. But he did not change his position, nor did he betray either fear or agitation. In a voice quite unmoved he asked:
"On what charge do you arrest me?"
"You are charged with stealing a valuable collection of pearls from the Countess Ahmberg, at Vienna, about a year ago."
"But I have never been in Vienna."
"You will have an opportunity to prove that."
"And my name is not Andrews."
"You must prove that, also."
The boy thought for a moment. Then he asked:
"Who accuses me?"
"This gentleman; Mr. Le Drieux. He is an expert in pearls, knows intimately all those in the collection of the countess and has recognized several which you have recently presented to your friends, as among those you brought from Austria."
Again Jones smiled.
"This is absurd, sir," he remarked.
The officer returned the smile, but rather grimly.
"It is the usual protest, Mr. Andrews. I don't blame you for the denial, but the evidence against you is very strong. Will you come? And quietly?"
"I am unable to offer physical resistance," replied the young fellow, as he slowly rose from his chair and displayed his thin figure. "Moreover," he added, with a touch of humor, "I believe there's a fine for resisting an officer. I suppose you have a legal warrant. May I be permitted to see it?"
The officer produced the warrant. Jones perused it slowly and then handed it to Mr. Merrick, who read it and passed it back to the officer.
"What shall I do, sir?" asked the boy.
"Obey the law," answered Uncle John. "This officer is only the law's instrument and it is useless to argue with him. But I will go with you to the police station and furnish bail."
Le Drieux shook his head.
"Oh, I guess we'll make it free for all--any fellow is welcome to the idea," replied Teeter. "So your dad's an inventor, eh, Matson?"
"Yes, harvester machinery--his latest was a corn reaper and binder, and he nearly lost it," and Joe briefly told how Isaac Benjamin and Rufus Holdney had nearly ruined his father, as related in detail in "Baseball Joe of the Silver Stars."
"Ever hear anything more of those fellows?" asked Tom, following the recital of the schemes of the plotters.
"No, they seem to have disappeared," answered Joe. "They cleared out after dad won his case in the courts. But he's on the watch for them, he told me. His business isn't all settled yet, and there is some danger. But I guess Benjamin or Holdney won't bother him, though some other rascals may."
"Anything more to eat?" asked Peaches, during the pause that followed.
"Say, what are you, a human refrigerator?" demanded Teeter. "I couldn't carry any more pie if I tried."
"It'll be our treat next time," observed Joe. "Why didn't George Bland come with you?"
"Had to bone on trigonometry, I guess," replied Peaches.
"Does he play on the team?" Joe wanted to know.
"Yes, we all do. George is short, I'm on third, and Teeter holds down first sometimes. But you never can tell what Hiram is going to do. He and Luke are always making shifts, and that's what lost us the Blue Banner last season. The fellows would no more than get familiar with their positions than Hiram would shift 'em. Oh, he runs things to suit himself."
The hour of ten boomed out from the big school clock and the visitors left.
"Spring fever!" exclaimed Joe one day, as he and Tom came from a physics lecture.
"Yes, I've got it, too," admitted Tom. "It's in the air, and I'm glad of it. What's that Shakespeare says about 'now is the winter of our discontent?'"
"Oh, cheese it! Don't begin spouting poetry. Besides I'm not sure it was Shakespeare, and I don't give a hang. All I know is that Spring is coming, and soon they'll begin getting the diamond in shape."
"Precious lot of good that will do you--or me, either. Hiram is as down on me as he is on you."
"I know it, and I was going to speak of that, Tom. There's no use in your losing a chance to play on the nine just because I'm on the outs. Why don't you cut loose from me? You can get another room, and maybe if you do----"
"Hold on!" cried Tom quickly. "Do you want me to go, old man?" and he looked sharply at Joe.
"Nonsense! Of course you know I don't."
"Then drop that kind of talk, unless you want a fight on your hands. You and I stick together, Hiram Shell or no Hiram Shell--and Luke Fodick."
"Well, I didn't know," spoke Joe softly.
"Here, come on; let's have a catch," proposed Tom. "I've got an old ball that we used in one of the Star games. Get over there and sting some in to me. Wait until I get my glove on," and he adjusted his mitt.
"Jove! This is like old times!" exclaimed Joe, as he lovingly fingered the horsehide--dirty and stained as it was from many a clouting and drive into the tall grass and daisies. "I wish we could go and see a game, even if we couldn't play."
"Same here," came from Tom, as he crouched to receive the ball his chum was about to deliver. Joe wound up and sent in a "hot" one. It landed squarely in Tom's glove for the first-baseman (a position he sometimes had played on the Stars) was not a half bad catcher.
"How was that?" asked Joe.
"Pretty good. Not quite over the plate, but you can get 'em there. Let 'em come about so," and Tom indicated a stone that would serve for home.
"Watch this," requested Joe as he wound up again and let drive.
"A beaut!" cried Tom. "Give me some more that way, and you'll have the man out."
"Say, what are you fellows doing?" demanded a voice, and the two chums looked up to see Hiram Shell gazing at them with mingled expressions on his fleshy face.
"Oh, having a little practice," replied Joe easily. The feeling between himself and the bully had nearly worn off, and they were on speaking, if not on friendly terms.
"Practice for what?" demanded Hiram.
"Well, the baseball season opens pretty soon," went on Joe, "and Tom and I sort of felt the fever in our veins to-day. Want to have a catch?"
"No," half snarled Hiram. "Say, did you fellows play ball before you came here?" he demanded.
"Sure," put in Tom. "Joe was one of the best pitchers on the Silver Stars."
"The Silver Stars? Never heard of 'em!" sneered Hiram.
"Oh, it was only an amateur nine," Joe admitted modestly. "Tom here was first baseman, and we had some good country games."
"Huh! Maybe you came _here_ to play baseball!" suggested Hiram with a leer. "Seems to me I heard that you had some such notion."
"Well, I have," asserted Joe confidently. "I like the game, and I'd give a good deal to get on the nine. So would Tom, I guess."
"First base is filled," snapped Hiram.
"How about pitcher," asked Tom eagerly, anxious to put in a good word for his chum. "I hear you need a new pitcher."
"Oh, you did; eh?" exclaimed the bully with an unpleasant laugh. "Well, you've got another 'hear' coming. Besides, if there wasn't another pitcher in the country, you wouldn't get a chance, Matson!"
"No?" queried Joe easily.
"No, and a dozen times no! What, you pitch? Say, you may have been all right on a sand-lots team, but there's some class to Excelsior Hall. We don't want any dubs on our nine. You think you might pitch on _my_ team? I guess nixy! We want some fellow who can deliver the goods."
"Joe can!" exclaimed Tom eagerly.
"Aw, forget it!" sneered Hiram. "Why, you'd be knocked out of the box first inning with some of the teams we play. You pitch! Ha! Ha! That's pretty rich. I'll have to tell the fellows about this!"
"I didn't ask you to let me pitch," said Joe quietly though an angry spot burned in either cheek.
"No, and you'd better not!" snapped Hiram. "You pitch! Ha! Ha! It makes me laugh," and with a sneering look at Joe the bully strode off, chuckling unpleasantly.
CHAPTER VII
A CLASH WITH LUKE
For several minutes Joe stood staring after the baseball manager. The young pitcher's arm hung listlessly at his side. There was a look on his face that would have been sad, had Joe been that kind of a lad--showing his feelings needlessly. But our hero was full of spunk and grit, and, though Hiram's unnecessarily cruel words hurt him grievously, Joe shut his teeth with a firmer grip, squared his shoulders, drew himself up, and then he smiled at Tom.
"Well, of all the mean, unmitigated, low-down, cantankerous, sneaking, bulldozing and----" sputtered the first baseman.
"Hold on!" exclaimed his companion. "You'll blow up if you go on that way, Tom. Besides, save some of those big words for a time when you may need 'em."
"Need 'em? Say if I don't need 'em now I never will. I wish I had thought to get rid of a few when that bully was here."
"You'd only gotten into trouble. Better keep still about it."
"I can't Joe. Just think of it! We came here to play ball, and the first crack out of the box that fellow goes and tells us we can't."
"Well, I don't know as I have any particular right to play on the nine here."
"Yes, you have, the best right in the world! I'll bet they haven't got a pitcher here who can stand up to you, and I'm going to tell that sneaking bully so, too," and Tom started off after the departing Hiram.
"No, don't!" cried Joe quickly. "It will only make matters worse."
"But you want to pitch; don't you?"
"Sure, but that would be the best way in the world to insure that I wouldn't. Hiram Shell is just the kind of a fellow who, if he thinks a chap wants anything, is going to do his best--or worst--to stop him."
"What are you going to do then?"
"I'm going to lie low and saw wood. The baseball season hasn't opened yet. The team isn't made up. Nobody knows who is going to play and----"
"Well, Hiram as good as told us two fellows who weren't going to play," interrupted Tom. "That's you and I."
"Wait a bit," advised Joe. "I was going to say that when the season has started and several games have been played there may be a change. I may get a chance to play then, just as I did on the Stars. I'm willing to wait. The Summer is long, and there'll be more than one game. Just say nothing."
"Well, if you say so, I suppose I'll have to," answered his chum, "but it's mighty hard to keep still when a fellow like Hiram Shell rubs your nose in the dirt, and then kicks you in the bargain. He'll have to ask me to play now. I won't volunteer!" and Tom shook his fist in the direction of the manager. "Yes, he'll have to get down on his knees and----"
"Precious little danger of that," remarked Joe with a laugh. He was feeling more like himself now, though the memory of the bully's sneering words rankled. They had cut deep.
"Guess there's no use catching any longer," resumed Tom after a pause. "I don't exactly feel like it."
"Me either. I guess we've gotten over our touch of spring fever," and Joe's voice was a bit despondent. Really, he cared more about what Hiram had said than he liked to admit, even to himself. He had had high hopes when he left the Riverside High School to come to Excelsior Hall that he would at once become a member of the nine. His ambition, of course, was to pitch, but he would have accepted any position--even out in the field, for the sake of being on the school team. Now it seemed that he was fated not even to be one of the substitutes.
"What are you fellows up to?" asked a voice suddenly, and the two chums turned to behold Peaches and Teeter walking toward them.
"Oh, we were having a catch," replied Tom, "until we got called down for it. It seems you have to have a permit at Excelsior to indulge in a little private practice," he added sarcastically.
"What's up your back now?" asked Teeter.
"Yes, who's been rubbing your fur the wrong way?" Peaches wanted to know. "What's riled Sister?"
"Who do you reckon would, if not Bully Shell?" asked Tom. "He's the limit," and he rapidly told how Hiram had sneered at Joe's efforts, and had said that he never would be on the team.
"Well, it's too bad, for Hiram has the inside track," admitted Teeter. "I'm as sorry about it as you are, and so are a lot of the fellows. The trouble is that the athletic committee is too big. There are a lot of lads on it who don't care a rap for baseball or football, who don't even play tennis, yet they have a vote, and it's their votes that keep Hiram as manager, and Luke as captain."
"Can't it be changed?" Tom wanted to know. Joe was maintaining a discrete silence, for he did not want to urge his own qualifications as a pitcher. Tom was eager to fight for his chum.
"Well, it's been tried," spoke Peaches, "but Hiram has his own set with him--a set that isn't the sporting element of Excelsior by a good lot, and their votes keep him in. He spends his money freely and toadies to them, and they fairly black his shoes. Luke Fodick, too, helps out. He has his crowd and they're all with him. I tell you it's rotten, but what are you going to do?"
"I know what I'm going to do if I stay here!" declared Tom.
"What?" demanded Peaches and Teeter eagerly.
"I'm not going to tell until I'm ready to spring it," said Tom, "and when I do I think you'll see some fur fly. How soon before the school team is picked?"
"Well, they ought to get at it pretty soon now," answered Teeter. "There is a meeting of the athletic committee some time next week, and a manager and captain will be elected. It's always done that way here, though in some places they do it right at the close of the season. But it has always been a cut-and-dried affair as long as Hiram has been here. He got in--he and Luke--and they've stayed in ever since."
"Can we go to that athletic meeting?" asked Tom.
"Oh, yes," said Teeter quickly. "It's open to every lad in the school, but lots don't take the trouble to go,--they know how it will turn out."
"Well, maybe there'll be a different turn to it this time," predicted Tom.
"I'm afraid you've got another guess coming," was the retort of Peaches; and then the four friends strolled toward the school buildings.
"What do you say to a scrub game?" asked Teeter.
"I'm willing!" said Joe eagerly; and so it was arranged.
The school diamond was not in very good shape, but two teams, of seven lads on a side, gathered for the first impromptu baseball game of the season the following afternoon. Tom, Joe, Peaches and Teeter tried to get more out, but there were various excuses, and it might be noted that aside from Teeter and Peaches not one of the former regular nine appeared.
"I guess they're afraid Hiram will release them if they play with us," commented Tom.
"Maybe so," admitted Teeter. "George Bland would come only he had some experimental work to finish. George isn't any more afraid of Hiram than we are."
"Well, let's play ball," suggested Joe; and the game started. Joe occupied the box for his side, an honor that came easily to him since none of the others had had any experience as a twirler of the horsehide.
Our hero felt a little nervous as he took his place, for he knew he was out of practice. Also he felt that he was being watched, not only by his particular friends, but by others. And some of them might not be friendly eyes--nay, some might be spying on behalf of Hiram Shell.
But Joe pulled himself well together, laughed at his idle fears, and sent in a swift curve. It broke cleanly and completely fooled the batter.
"Say, that's the way to get 'em over!" cried Teeter admiringly from behind the bat as the ball landed in his mitt. "Do it some more!"
"I'll try," laughed Joe, and he repeated the trick.
The man was easily struck out, and the next at the bat fell for a like fate, but the third found Joe's curve and swatted the ball for two bags.
"Oh, well, Joe just allowed that so you fellows wouldn't get discouraged," exclaimed Teeter as an excuse for his pitcher. "Get ready to slaughter the next man, Joe."
And Joe did. He was delighted to find that his ability to curve the ball, and send it swiftly in, had not deserted him during the long winter of comparative inactivity. He knew that he could "come back with the goods," and there was a feeling of hope welling up within him, that, after all, there might come a chance for him to pitch on the Excelsior nine.
The game went on, not regular, nor played according to the rules by any means. But it was lots of fun, and some of the lads discovered their weak points, while others found themselves doing better than they expected. Joe's side won by a small margin, and just as the winning run came in our hero was aware of a figure walking toward the bench on which the side was sitting.
"Huh! Starting off rather early, ain't you?" demanded a voice, and they turned to behold Luke Fodick. "Who said you fellows could use the diamond, anyhow?"
"We didn't ask anybody," retorted Teeter with a snap.
"Well, you want to--after this," was the surly command. "I'm captain of the nine and what I say goes. I'm not going to have the diamond all torn up before the season opens, see! I'm captain!"
"Not yet," spoke Peaches quietly. "The election isn't until next week."
"What's that got to do with it? You ain't thinking of running opposition to me; are you?"
"No," and a bright spot burned on the fair cheeks of the light-complexioned lad.
"Because if you are you'll have a fight on your hands," threatened Luke. "Who's been pitching?" he asked, his gaze roving over the crowd of lads.
"I was for our side," replied Joe quietly.
"Oh, you--yes I heard about you!" exclaimed Luke with a grating laugh. "You're the fellow who wants to pitch on the nine; ain't you? Well, you want to get that bee out of your bonnet, or you may get stung, see? Hiram told me about you. Why, you are only an amateur. We want the best here at Excelsior. By Jove, it's queer how tacky some of you high school kids get as soon as you come to a real institution. Talk about nerve, I----"
Joe fairly leaped from the bench. In another stride he confronted Luke.
"Look here!" cried our hero, anger getting the best of him for the time being. "I've taken all of that kind of talk I'm going to either from you or Bully Shell! Now you keep still or I'll make you. I'll give you the best licking you ever had; and I'll do it right here and now if you say another word about my pitching! I didn't come here to take any of your sneers, and I don't intend to. Now you put that in your pipe, and smoke it, and then close up and stay closed," and shaking his finger so close to the astonished Luke that it hit the buttons on his coat, Joe turned back and sat down.
CHAPTER VIII
"WHO WILL PITCH?"
For a moment there was silence--a sort of awed silence--and Teeter uttered a faint cheer.
"That's the way to talk!" he exclaimed.
"You're all right!" declared Peaches.
Luke turned and glared at them. Afterward several lads said the bully's toady looked dazed, as if he did not understand what had happened.
"He'll go tell Hiram now, and he'll be laying for you, Joe," was Tom's opinion.
"Let him. I'm ready to meet that bully whenever he is, and I'm not afraid, either."
"That's the way to talk!" exclaimed Teeter admiringly. "If Hiram got one good licking he wouldn't be quite so uppish. But I'm afraid this will put you on the fritz for the nine, Joe."
"I don't care if it does. I'm going to let 'em know what I think."
Yet in the quietness of his room that night Joe rather regretted what he had done. He realized that he might have turned off Luke's insult with a laugh.
"For if I had done so I'd stand a better chance of getting on the nine," mused Joe.
Then a different feeling came to him.
"No, I couldn't do that either," he reflected. "I'm not built that way. I'm not going to lie down and be walked on, nine or no nine, and I'm going to find some way to play ball, at that!"
There was a determined look on Joe's face, and he squared his shoulders in a way that meant business. If Hiram and his crony could have seen our hero then they might not have been so sure of what they would do to him.
"So that's how he acted, eh?" asked the bully, when his crony had reported to him what Joe had said. "Well, he'll get _his_ all right. He'll never play ball here as long as I am manager."
"No, nor while I'm captain," added Luke. "Nor that friend of his either, Tom Davis."
"That's right; we'll make it so hot here for both of 'em that they'll leave at the end of the term," predicted Hiram.
What a pity he did not know that Joe and Tom were not of the "leaving" kind. The hotter it was the better they liked it, for they both came of fighting stock.
But with all his nerve, and not regretting in the least what he had done, Joe was a bit uneasy as the time for the baseball organization meeting drew near. He hoped against hope that somehow he might get on the team, but he did not see how. He talked with other students, and they all told him that Hiram, Luke and their crowd ran things to suit themselves.
"But I've got something up my sleeve," declared Tom. "There may be a surprise at the meeting."
"What are you up to?" asked Joe. "Nothing rash, I hope."
"You wait and see," his chum advised. "I'm not saying anything."
As the days went by, Tom might have been seen talking in confidential whispers to many students. He made lots of new friends, and it was remarked that they were neither of the "sporting set," nor the crowd that trained with Hiram and Luke. To all questions Tom turned a deaf ear, and went on his way serenely.
It was almost a foregone conclusion as to who would constitute the nine, with the exception of the pitchers. As already explained, the students who, as regular and substitute, had filled the box the previous season had left, and it was up to Hiram and Luke to find new pitchers. Hiram did not play on the nine, being content to manage it, but Luke was catcher and some of the friends of Joe and Tom filled regular places.
"How do you dope it out?" asked Tom of Peaches one day, shortly before the organization meeting.
"Well, it'll be about like this," was the reply. "We will all gather in the gymnasium--as many as want to--and Hiram will be in the chair. He'll call the meeting to order and state what we're there for, which everyone knows already, without being told. Then he'll ask for nominations for secretary, and one of his friends will go in. Then he'll spout about what we ought to do to win this season, and how to do it, and say we're sure to be at the head of the league and win the Blue Banner and all like that.
"Then he'll ask for nominations for players and they'll be voted on; we'll have a little chinning about money matters, Hiram may say who the first few games will be with, and it will be all over but the shouting."
"Well, won't lots of fellows have a chance to nominate players, or won't the players themselves ask to be given a chance?"
"Oh, yes, but what's the use? It's all cut and dried."
"Who'll be on the nine?"
"I can pretty near tell you, all but the pitcher. And that will lay between Frank Brown and Larry Akers--both friends of Hiram. Luke will catch--that's a cinch. George Bland will be in centre-field. I may be at first, though I doubt it."
"Why?"
"Oh, because I dared to say Joe was right for answering Luke back that time. I'll probably be sent out in the daisies, but I don't care, for with Luke catching it's no easy matter to hold down the first bag. He throws so rotten high. Then Teeter will be on second. Nat Pierson on third, Harry Lauter in right, Jake Weston at short, and Charlie Borden in left. That's how it will be."
"And no show for Joe?"
"I can't see any, nor for you, either."
"Oh, I don't care about myself, but I'm interested in Joe. I _do_ wish he could pitch."
"I'm afraid he can't," answered Peaches with a sigh. "I'd almost be willing to give my place to him, but I'm not altogether sure that I'll get on the nine, though I'm going to make a big fight for it."
"Oh, Joe wouldn't think of doing anything like that!" objected Tom. "But maybe my plan will work. If it does, Hiram won't have so much to say as he does now."
"I hope to gracious you can work something. It's rotten the way things are now, and it is our own fault, too. But I'm afraid it's too late to change. No, you can figure that the nine is already made up between Hiram and Luke--that is, all but pitcher."
"Then I think Joe has a chance!" exclaimed Tom. "I'm not going to give up until the last minute. I'm working hard for him, but don't say anything to him about it. I want to surprise him."
"I'm afraid it will be a disagreeable surprise," commented Peaches, as he left his friend.
The time for the meeting was at hand and on all sides there seemed to be but one question:
"Who will pitch?"
There were many shakes of heads and much speculation, but Hiram and Luke kept their own counsel.
CHAPTER IX
TOM'S PLAN FAILS
"The meeting will come to order!" called Hiram. "I'll cuff some of you fellows over the head if you don't sit down."
It was rather an unparliamentary way of doing things, but it proved effective, and at length quiet reigned. As Peaches had said, Hiram began by stating what they were there for, and by announcing that the make-up of the nine was in order.
Some unimportant business was disposed of, there were remarks from several lads about what the season might have in store, there were many determinations expressed about how well the Excelsior team would play that season, and then Hiram said:
"Nominations for the team are in order. Of course we expect that there will be a lot more fellows named than we can use, but there'll probably be a weeding-out when we get at practice. The team named to-night will only be a tentative one."
"Like pie!" murmured Tom. "You and Luke have it all up your sleeves."
"Has the nominating committee anything to report?" asked Hiram, looking over at Luke. His crony arose. Luke was chairman of the nominating committee, as well as chairman of the committee on membership.
"Your committee would recommend the following names," said Luke, and then he read off most of those named by Peaches to Tom. He did not call off his own name, however, and there was a blank opposite the positions of pitcher and left field.
"Say, what's the matter, don't I play?" demanded Peaches, jumping up.
"Oh, yes," answered Luke quickly. "But we haven't just decided where. I'm going to leave that with Hiram, and also the position for left field."
"Well, I'll settle it right now!" exclaimed the manager. "You'll play left field, Peaches, and Charlie Borden will move up from there to first base."
"What did I tell you?" murmured Peaches to Tom. "What about the stunt you were going to pull off?"
"It isn't time yet. See the gang I have with me?" and Tom motioned to a lot of lads in the rear of the hall.
"What is it--a rough house?" asked Peaches, and then he noticed for the first time that the athletic meeting was much better attended than usual.
"Those are new members," declared Tom in a whisper. "I'm counting on turning the balance of power away from Hiram and the crowd with him. I've been canvassing the last week, and I've got a lot of fellows to join who never took an interest in sports before."
"Oh, ho! So that's your game!" exclaimed Peaches. "Well, it's a good one all right."
"They'll all vote for Joe for pitcher," went on Tom.
"I notice that there are still two vacancies in the team," spoke Jake Weston, who had been named as shortstop. "We had such success with Luke as catcher last year, that I move that he again go behind the bat."
"Second it," sung out Harry Lauter.
"It has been moved and seconded," began Hiram, and there came a shout of "ayes" before he had finished.
"That's the way it always is," whispered Peaches. "Luke pretends he's too modest to name himself, and some one else does it for him. Oh, the cut-and-dried program is going through all right!"
"Wait and see," suggested Tom with a wink.
"Are the selections of the nominating committee sanctioned?" asked Hiram.
Again came a chorus of "ayes."
"What about the pitcher?" asked Luke. "Will you name him, Hiram?"
"Yes!" said the manager and he looked about the room until his eyes lit on those of Joe. "I'll name Frank Brown as regular pitcher with Larry Akers as substitute."
Again came the chorus of confirmation.
"Just as I told you," murmured Peaches.
Tom was on his feet as the murmurs died away. Hiram was speaking.
"That completes the regular nine," the manager said, "and it only remains to name the substitutes. I think we will let them go until you fellows have had some practice, so we can get a line on you. There's time enough. We'll begin regular practice next week, if the weather permits, and then I'll arrange for games. I have some in prospect, and the Blue Banner----"
"Mr. Chairman!" interrupted Tom.
"Well, what is it?" snapped Hiram. "I'm talking, and I don't want anyone to butt in."
"I rise to a point of order," went on Tom, in a loud voice. "The nominations have not been closed, and I want to put in nomination the name of a friend, who is one of the best pitchers that ever----"
"None of that!" cried Hiram. "Get down to business. I'll allow your point of order. Who do you name?"
"Joe Matson!" cried Tom, "and----"
"You can't elect him, what's the use of trying?" sneered Luke.
"Maybe I can't, with your crowd, but I came here to-night with some friends of mine, new members of the athletic committee, and they'll vote for Joe, and I think we can outvote you!" cried Tom defiantly.
"That's right!" yelled the lads toward whom he waved his hand. "Joe Matson for pitcher."
Luke turned pale. So did Hiram as they looked at each other. This was something they had not counted on--an effective trick.
"For myself and for these new members I demand a vote on the name of Joe Matson!" went on Tom, ignoring Joe's efforts to stop him.
"That's right--we're for Joe!" yelled the new crowd. There were many of them, and with the usual element always ready to break away from him, Hiram knew that he would lose on the combination.
"One moment!" he shouted, banging his gavel. Then he hurried over to Luke and the two conferred excitedly, while there was a near-pandemonium in the gymnasium.
"I have an announcement to make!" shouted Hiram after a bit, making his way back to the platform. "It is true that you have the right to nominate any one you please--that is, a member of the athletic committee has, and members have the right to vote as they please. But I have to inform this audience that Sister Davis is not yet a fully-qualified member of this committee. That is not just yet." Hiram sneered disagreeably.
"Why not? I signed my application, was properly endorsed, and paid in my dues!" cried Tom. "And so did these other fellows."
"That's right," shouted his crowd in a chorus.
"Very true," went on Hiram coolly. He was master of the situation now, and he knew it. "But there is a rule of this organization, which states that at the discretion of the chairman, and the manager and captain of the team, or any two of them, new members may be taken on probation for three months, and during that term of probation they have no voting power, so you see----"
"That's an old rule!"
"It's never been enforced!"
"It's rotten!"
"That's only a trick!"
These were some of the cries that greeted the announcement Hiram made.
"It may never have been enforced, but it's going to be _now_!" he shouted. "It was made to cover just such snap cases as this. You tried to work a trick, Tom Davis, but you got left. You and those other lads can't vote for three months, and so the team stands as originally named."
"But we have no captain--your rule won't work. You said the manager, chairman and captain could apply that rule. Who is the captain?" demanded Tom, as he saw his game blocked.
"Luke Fodick is captain of this nine; isn't he?" shouted Hiram, closing the last loophole.
"Aye!" yelled the bully's crowd.
"No!" yelled Tom's.
"The ayes have it," announced the chairman, "and Luke and I agreed on enforcing that rule at this time. Besides, I am acting as chairman in place of Henry Clay, who isn't present, and I have his voting proxy, so Henry and I also agree on it, if you question the election of Luke."
"That ends it," murmured Peaches in Tom's ear. "Henry Clay never does preside as chairman. He's only a figurehead for Hiram, and that's well known. Hiram always votes for him. I guess you're beaten Tom."
"I'm afraid so. I wish I'd known about that rule."
"I'd forgotten it myself," admitted Peaches. "It's rotten, but you can't do anything unless you outvote Hiram."
The bully was smiling mockingly at Tom and Joe. The young pitcher felt rather foolish, but he gave Tom credit for originating a bold move and one that, under ordinary circumstances, would have been effective.
"You may renew your nomination in three months, if you like, Sister Davis," spoke Hiram sarcastically "as you and the others will then be voting members. I believe that is about all the business to come before us to-night." And he announced the adjournment of the meeting.
CHAPTER X
THE BANNER PARADE
Instantly following Hiram's words a hub-bub burst out in the gymnasium. Everyone seemed to be talking at once, and the crowd of boys split up into two factions.
There were those who were with Joe and Tom in their contention, and who thought that they had not been given a fair opportunity. Among these were, of course, the lads who had not hitherto belonged to the athletic committee, and who had been induced by Tom to put in their applications.
On the other side were what might be called the "conservatives," those who, while not exactly favoring Hiram and his high-handed methods, preferred to take the easiest way and let the old order of things prevail.
Then, too, was a smaller crowd of distinct "Shellites" as Peaches dubbed them--friends and close cronies of the manager who sided with him in all things and looked upon him as a sort of hero. Chief among them, of course, was Luke Fodick, and perhaps next in line stood Charlie Borden, who had replaced Peaches at first.
"It's a rotten, mean shame!" burst out Teeter as he came over to where Tom, Joe and Peaches were standing. "I'm not going to stand for it, either!"
"Well, what can you do?" asked the practical Peaches. "They have it on us good and proper. There's the rule."
"Well, I don't like it, but I'm going to stay here just the same," snapped Tom.
"And so am I," added Joe frankly. "There's no use saying I don't care, for I do. I'd like to get on the team. But if I can't--why I'll root for 'em, that's all."
"Maybe you'll be picked as one of the subs," was what Charlie Borden said. "We always have lots of them to make up the scrub nine. But frankly, Matson, I don't think you'll pitch. Frank Brown is going to make good, and if he doesn't Larry Akers will."
He turned to join some of his own particular crowd, and with them continued the discussion of the unexpected turn given to the athletic meeting. Hiram and Luke were surrounded by a throng of their cronies, and from time to time there could be heard from them such remarks as:
"Serves 'em good and right for trying to butt in."
"What right have new fellows to try to run our affairs for us, anyhow?"
"You sat on 'em proper, Hiram."
"Yes, Luke and I fixed up that scheme," answered the bully, with no little pride.
Joe heard, and the thought came to him that possibly there might be a split in the ranks of the lads--a school divided against itself, and on his account. He took a quick resolve.
Striding over to Hiram he held out his hand, saying with a frank smile:
"Hiram, don't think for a minute I'm sore. It's all right, and I haven't a word to say. I did want to get on the nine, but I realize that I am a new lad here, and maybe next year things will be different. I'm for the team first, last and always. Will you shake on it--you and Luke?"
For a moment the bully eyed our hero. Luke, too, gazed at him with a sneer on his face. Then as a little murmur of admiration for Joe's conduct arose--a murmur in which some of Hiram's own friends joined--the latter knew that it was the wisest policy to be at least outwardly friendly with Joe.
"All right, Matson," replied Hiram. "I guess you can come in. I'm sorry if you feel hurt about the way we run things here at Excelsior Hall, but----"
"Not at all--'to the victors belong the spoils,'" quoted Joe. "Maybe you'll let me play on the scrub."
"Sure, if there's a chance," put in Luke eagerly. He, too, saw which way the wind was likely to blow, and noting that Hiram had changed his conduct toward Joe it was up to the bully's toady to do the same. "You can play on the scrub all you want to," Luke added.
Hiram held out his hand and, though the clasp he gave Joe might have been more friendly, our hero took the will for the deed. Luke, also, shook hands, and thus, for the time being, the threatened breach was closed. But Joe knew, and Hiram knew, that never could there be real friendship between them.
Some of the lads began leaving the gymnasium now. There was more talk about the coming ball season, and some still persisted in denouncing the high-handed methods of the manager and his crowd. But in the main the feeling was smothered, due chiefly to Joe's manly act. The young pitcher even remained for a while chatting with Hiram, Luke and some of their cronies.
"Say, you sure did have your nerve with you, when you shook hands with those two sneaks," remarked Tom, when he and Joe reached their room, a little later.
"Yes, it did take nerve, but it was the only thing to do. I'm a thousand times obliged to you, Tom, for what you did for me, and----"
"For what I didn't do for you, I guess you mean," interrupted his chum with a smile. "Well, I meant all right, but they beat us out. But I'm not done trying. Joe, you're going to pitch on the first nine of Excelsior Hall before this season is over, or I'll eat my hat."
"I wish I could believe so," replied Joe with a little sigh of longing.
Baseball practice formally opened the next day, which proved unexpectedly warm and springlike. The diamond was in good shape, and a crowd of lads turned out. A host of candidates did their "stunts" and Luke and Hiram "sized them up." Joe wanted to pitch on the tentative scrub nine that was picked to play against the first team, but Luke, who seemed to manage the second squad as well as the first, sent our hero out in the field, as he also did Tom.
"Never mind," consoled Peaches, who was on the first team. "Luke doesn't captain the scrub when it's formed regularly, and when the fellow is picked out who is to have charge I'll speak for you, Joe."
"Thanks. I would like a chance to get in the box."
That the first nine had many weak spots was soon made plain to captain and manager, and, to give them credit, they at once set at work correcting them.
"I'll get Dr. Rudden out to give you fellows some pointers as soon as we're in a little better shape," said Hiram, referring to the instructor who usually acted as coach.
"Yes, and you fellows need it all right," said Tom in a low voice.
"Everybody in the gym right after the game," ordered Hiram, during a lull in the play. "We're going to arrange about the Blue Banner parade."
"What's that," asked Joe of Teeter.
"Oh, every year all the teams in the Interscholastic League meet and have a parade to sort of open the season. The nine that holds the banner marches at the head, we have a band, and after that a little feed and it's jolly fun. You'll like it."
"Morningside holds the banner now, doesn't she?"
"Yes, worse luck. It ought to come here, and would have if Hiram and Luke had run things differently last year. But they wouldn't listen to reason. Well, I've got to play ball. See you at the meeting."
The regulars won the ball game by a small margin, and then the lads trooped off to the gymnasium to the meeting. It was much more friendly and enthusiastic than the organization session had been, and arrangements were quickly made for taking part in the annual parade.
"As is the custom," said Hiram, "we will all meet on the grounds of the school that holds the Blue Banner--that's Morningside, I'm sorry to say, but next season will be different. We are going to win the Blue Banner this time."
"That's what he always says," murmured Peaches in Tom's ear.
"So we will meet on the Morningside diamond, do the regular marching stunt and have a feed there. It will be necessary for you fellows to chip in for part of the expenses as our treasury is low just now. It won't be much. Now the parade committee will meet to talk over details, and so will the rooting crowd. Get busy now, fellows; we want to make a good showing in the parade."
The Interscholastic League, of which the Blue Banner was the trophy, consisted of these schools beside Morningside Academy and Excelsior Hall: Trinity School, Woodside Hall and the Lakeview Preparatory Institute--or, more briefly the Lakeview Prep., which I shall call it.
In the parade of the nines of these institutions, and the followers of them, there were always some novel features, and the lads tried to outdo each other in singing, cheering or giving their school yells. A committee generally had charge of the cheering and yelling contingents, and this body of students for Excelsior now got busy making up new war-cries.
The day of the parade was a glorious one. It was Saturday, naturally, as that was the only time the students could be free. Early in the afternoon a big crowd left Excelsior Hall, the nine and the substitutes, including Joe and Tom, in their uniforms, each carrying a bat as an insignia of office. Morningside Academy was about five miles from Excelsior, and could be reached by trolley. Several special cars carried our hero and his companions.
All the other marching contingents save Trinity were on hand when the Excelsior lads arrived at Morningside, and they were noisily greeted. A few minutes later the Trinity lads arrived and then pandemonium broke loose.
"Say, this is great!" cried Joe, as cheer after cheer, and school-yell after school-yell, rent the air. "I guess we'll have some fun after all, Tom."
"Oh, sure. It's jolly."
The managers of the parade were rushing wildly to and fro, trying to get things in shape for the start. Lads who had not seen each other for some time were exchanging greetings, and the members of the various nines were talking "shop" to their hearts' content.
"Get in line! Get in line!" cried the marshals. "We're going to start."
The lads were to parade around the Morningside diamond, as a sort of tribute to the winning team of the league, and then go down through the town to the public square, where the yelling, cheering and singing would take place. Then they were to come back to Morningside for the feast.
The band struck up a lively air and a silence fell over the crowd. Then, out from the midst of the throng came the lads of Morningside. They were to lead the line, as was their right, by virtue of being champions, and as they swung into formation Joe looked at them with critical eyes. Here was the doughty foe of his school.
His gaze fell upon one sturdy lad who carried a staff--carried it proudly--and no wonder, for, floating from it was the Blue Banner, glorious in gold embroidery and silver lace--the Blue Banner of the Interscholastic League--the trophy which meant so much.
"'Rah! 'Rah! 'Rah!" yelled the lads. "Three cheers for the Blue Banner!"
And how those cheers welled out! The lad carrying the banner dipped it in response to the salute.
Joe felt his heart strangely beating. A mist of tears came into his eyes--not tears of regret, but rather tears of joy and pride, that he belonged to the school which had a right to fight for that banner. Ah, if he could but enter that struggle himself!
Slowly the Morningside lads filed to their places. Louder played the band. There were more cheers, more salutes to the blue trophy, and then the banner parade was under way.
CHAPTER XI
JOE HOPES AND FEARS
Around the Morningside diamond marched the singing, cheering and yelling lads. The Blue Banner fluttered in the Spring breeze, and not a student in the crowd but either hoped it would stay in the possession of the present owners, or would come to his school, the desires varying according to the allegiance of the wisher.
[Illustration: AROUND THE MORNINGSIDE DIAMOND MARCHED THE SINGING, CHEERING AND YELLING LADS.]
It was a gala occasion for the town of Morningside, this Blue Banner parade, and the people turned out in great numbers to watch the lads. Throngs came from neighboring towns and villages, and some even from a distant city, for the boys could always be depended on to make the occasion enjoyable.
The Excelsior Hall crowd did some new "stunts." Under the leadership of Luke and Hiram they rendered some odd songs and yells, and then, as they passed around the public square, Hiram executed his main surprise. The leader of Excelsior, none other than Luke Fodick, had been carrying a pole, on the top of which was a canvas bundle. It was tied about with strings in such a manner that, by pulling on one cord the wrapping would fall off, as when a statue is unveiled. To all questions as to what was on the pole under the canvas Luke and Hiram returned only evasive replies.
But on reaching the public square, when the cheering was at its height, Luke pulled the string. At once there floated from the staff an "effigy" of the Blue Banner. It was made of blue calico and worked on it in strands of yellow rope were the words:
WE'LL HAVE THE REAL BANNER THIS YEAR!
Surmounting the odd trophy was a stuffed eagle, rather the worse for being moth-eaten, and worn "to a frazzle," as Tom said. But it made a hit, and the yells of laughter bore evidence of how the crowd appreciated it.
"Guess we've made good all right," said Hiram to his crony. "There's nothing else like it in the parade."
"That's right," answered Luke. "Oh, it takes us to do things."
"And sometimes _not_ do them," murmured Teeter. "We ought to have the real banner."
"Maybe we will," spoke Joe.
The other schools had their own specialties in singing, cutting queer capers, or in cheers, and made hits in their own way. Around the square marched the lads, and then, with a final chorus, rendered by all the students, the parade was over. Back to Morningside Academy they went, and sat down to what the papers described later as a "sumptuous repast; a feast of reason and a flow of soul."
Jolly good fellowship prevailed at the board. Speeches were made, toasts responded to, and baseball talk flowed on all sides. Hiram and Luke made remarks, as did the managers and captains of the other nines. Predictions were freely expressed as to who would have the banner the next year, and then came more singing, more cheering and more yelling.
The dinner broke up finally, and then the various managers and captains got together to arrange the Interscholastic League schedule of games.
"Well, it was all right; wasn't it?" asked Tom of Joe, when they were on their way back to Excelsior Hall.
"Fine and dandy," was the answer. "They're a nice lot of fellows--all of 'em."
"Quite some class to those Trinity School lads," remarked Tom. "It's a swell place--a lot of millionaires' sons go there I understand."
"Yes, but I hobnobbed with some of 'em, and they weren't a bit uppish. Right good fellows, I thought."
"Oh, yes, all millionaire lads aren't cads though money sometimes makes a chap that way. Trinity must be quite a school."
"I guess it is, but Excelsior is good enough for me. We're in with a dandy crowd of fellows, though, and that makes it nice if you've got to play a lot of games with 'em. Nothing like class when it comes to sport. We ought to have some corking good games this Summer."
"I only wish you and I were more in it," went on Tom.
"Wait until we see about the scrub," suggested him chum. "I'm not worrying as much as I was at first."
But, though Joe thus lightly passed over the matter, deep down in his heart there was a great longing. To him baseball meant more than to the average player. From the time when he had seen his first game, as a little chap, our hero had fairly lived, eaten and slept in an atmosphere of the diamond. He had organized a team of lads when he was scarcely nine years old, and played those little chaps in a sort of improvised circuit.
Then, as he grew, and developed, and found that he could pitch, the world seemed to hold something worth while for Joe Matson. "Baseball Joe," he had been dubbed, when as a small chap he shouldered his bat and started off across the lots to a game, and "Baseball Joe" he was yet.
How he longed to be on the regular nine, even in the outfield, none but himself knew. And when he dreamed of the possibility that he might some time occupy the pitching mound--well, he had to stop short, for he found himself indulging in a too high flight of fancy.
"Get back to earth, Joe," he told himself. "If you want to pitch for Excelsior you've got to do a heap of waiting, and you are pretty good at that game."
And so Joe had hopes and fears--hopes that his dream might come true, and fears lest the enmity of Hiram and Luke would keep him one of the "scrubbiest of the scrubs."
He was tired after the excitement of the parade, and so was Tom, but they were not too weary to accept an invitation to gather in the room of Teeter and Peaches that night for a surreptitious lunch of ginger snaps, cheese and bottled soda water, which had been smuggled in. And, as before, the lads took the same precautions with the fake books and the tubes, hose and bottles. But they were not disturbed.
"Well, we'll have to get busy next week," remarked Teeter as he slowly sipped his glass.
"How so?" asked Joe.
"Hard practice against the scrub starts Monday."
"Who's captain of the scrub; did you hear?" asked Peaches eagerly.
"Yes, Ward Gerard--a nice fellow, too."
"That's the stuff!" cried Peaches. "Now there's a chance for you, Joe. Ward's room is on this corridor. I'm going to see him."
"You'll be caught," warned Teeter.
"Caught nothing!" retorted his chum. "It's so late none of the profs. or monitors will think a fellow will dare go out. Ward isn't an early sleeper, and I'm going to see him and ask him to let Joe pitch on the scrub before some one else gets the place. I'll be back in a few minutes, fellows. Don't eat up all the grub," and with that Peaches slipped noiselessly from the room.
CHAPTER XII
ON THE SCRUB
"It doesn't take Peaches long to make up his mind," remarked Tom.
"No, he's always right on the job," agreed Teeter.
"It's mighty good of him--and all of you--to go to all this trouble and fuss on my account," added Joe. "I appreciate it, too."
"Nonsense!" exclaimed Teeter, as he balanced himself on his toes to see if it was safe to indulge in any more cheese and ginger snaps. "We're glad to do it. I only hope you do make the team, and pitch, at that."
"If I can pitch on the scrub, I'll be satisfied for a while."
"We want to make Excelsior the best nine in the league this year," went on Teeter. "We've got to have the Blue Banner, and one way we can cinch it is to have a good pitcher."
"Thanks!" laughed Joe.
"Well, I mean it," resumed Teeter, helping himself to a handful of the crisp snaps. "That's where our weak point was last season. Many a game we gave away after we had it practically won, just because our pitchers went up in the air. And I'm afraid it'll be the same now. Frank Brown isn't much, unless he's improved a whole lot over season, and I don't believe he has. And as for Larry Akers--well, he's only a makeshift. Now, I'd like to see----"
But Teeter's little talk was interrupted by the sound of footsteps in the corridor outside. For a moment the lads gazed anxiously at each other, and Tom made a grab for one of the fake books, but a look of relief came over their faces when the door opened and Peaches entered, followed by some one.
"I brought Ward with me," explained the lad with the fair complexion. "Thought it was the safest way. Come on in, Ward; I guess these Indians haven't scalped all the grub."
"Yes, fall to," invited Teeter. "There's plenty."
"Charmed, I'm sure," murmured Ward with an assumed society air.
"You know Joe Matson, of course," went on Peaches.
"Oh, sure. He beat me in physics class the other week and I haven't forgotten it."
"He wants to pitch on the scrub," went on the originator of the scheme. "He's all to the mustard, too, and----"
"Say, let me say a word for myself," put in Joe. "I'm not a political candidate in the hands of my friends. Is there a show for me on the scrub, Ward?"
"Well, I haven't made up the team yet, and you're the first applicant for pitcher, so you'll have first choice."
"Then it's as good as settled!" declared Peaches. "When do you make up the team, Ward?"
"To-morrow, I guess. I'll put you down as first pitcher, Joe, and I hope you can throw a scare into the school team--not because I'm not on it myself, but the better opposition they have, the better they'll play for the banner."
"What about Hiram?" asked Tom. "Won't he kick up a fuss if he knows you've got Joe? And what about Luke?"
"Say, I'm running the scrub!" exclaimed Ward. "They haven't anything to say after I take charge. What I say goes!"
"That's right," agreed Teeter. "I'll do Hiram that much justice. He never interferes with the scrub after the season starts. Neither does Luke. They have their hands full managing their own players."
"Then I guess I'll get a chance to pitch," murmured Joe, and he was happier than he had been in some time. It was only a small beginning, but it was a start, and that meant a good deal.
Ward Gerard, whom Joe and Tom did not know very well, turned out to be a good-natured and pleasant companion. He was one of the new arrivals at the school, but already stood well in his classes and on the athletic field. Football was his specialty, but he was none the less a good baseball player and might have made the first team had he tried harder.
The boys talked of the diamond until the booming of the big school clock warned them that they had better get to bed; so with good-nights and a renewed promise on the part of Ward to place Joe in the box, the conference broke up.
"Oh, things are coming your way slowly," remarked Tom, as he and Joe reached their room, having successfully dodged a prying monitor on the look-out for rule violators.
"Yes, and now I've got to make good."
"You can do that easily enough. You always have. And when the three months are up I'm going to make my motion over again, and I'll bet we'll elect you as regular pitcher."
"I guess you forget that when the three months are up the Summer vacation will be here and the nine will be out of business," remarked Joe. "No, I've got to work my own way, I guess."
There were some murmurs of surprise when it was announced the next day that Joe Matson was to be the scrub pitcher. Friends of rival candidates urged their claims on Ward, but he stuck to his promise and the place went to Joe.
"Did Hiram or Luke say anything when you told them?" asked Tom of the scrub captain.
"Oh, yes--a little."
"What was it?"
"Nothing very pleasant, so don't repeat it to Joe, but Hiram wanted to know why I didn't pick out a decent fellow to pitch against the first team, and Luke remarked that Joe would be knocked out of the box in the first practice game, and that I'd have to get some one else."
"Oh, Luke said that, did he?" asked Tom, and there was a look of smothered anger in his eyes.
"Yes, and then some more."
"Just wait until the first game--that's all," requested Tom quietly. "If they knock Joe Matson out of the box it will be the first time it's happened since he found that he was a real pitcher."
"There are some pretty good batters on the first team," warned Ward.
"That's the kind Joe likes," replied his chum. "Just you wait; that's all."
It was the day for the first regular practice between the scrub and first teams. For several afternoons Joe had been pitching to Bob Harrison, who often acted as the scrub catcher, and as there was so much other individual playing going on no one had paid much attention to the work of our hero.
"Say, I think we've got a 'find' all right," announced Bob to Ward, just before the practice game was called.
"How so?" asked the scrub captain.
"Why, that Matson can sting 'em in for further orders, and he's got some of the prettiest curves that ever came over the plate. The Hiram-Luke crowd is going to sit up and take notice, take it from yours truly."
"I'm glad of it!" declared Ward. "We'll do our best to beat 'em, and it will be for their own good. They're soft, naturally at the beginning of the season, and so are we, but if we can wallop 'em, so much the better. Have you and Joe got your signals down?"
"Yes, he's better at that than I am. He must have played some pretty good games."
"So Sister Davis says. Well, here they come. Now to see what we can do?"
There was a conference between Luke and Ward, and in order to give his team the most severe kind of a try-out, Luke arranged to let the scrub bat last.
The first practice game was important in more ways than one. Not only did it open the season for Excelsior Hall, but it would show up the weak players, and, while the first team was practically picked, there might be a change in it. At least so every lad who was not on it, but wanted to be, thought, and he hoped against hope that his playing might attract the attention of the manager.
Another thing was that Dr. Rudden, the coach, sometimes took a hand in the baseball affairs and occasionally he had been known to over-ride the judgment of Hiram and Luke, insisting that some player whom they had not picked be allowed to show what he could do on the first team. So there were many hearts that beat high with hope, and among them was Joe's. And there were hearts that were a bit anxious--to wit, members of the first team who were not quite sure of themselves.
There was a large crowd in the grandstand and on the bleachers when the gong rang to start the game--a throng of students mostly, for the general public was not admitted so early in the season.
It was a good day for the game, albeit the ground was a trifle soft, and the Spring wind not as warm as might be. The boys in their spick and span new uniforms made a natty appearance as they trotted out on the diamond.
According to custom, Dr. Fillmore, the venerable head of the school, pitched the first ball formally to open the season. It was a sort of complimentary ball, and was not expected to be struck at.
"Play ball!" yelled the umpire as he took the new horsehide sphere from its tinfoil wrapping and handed it to Dr. Fillmore. The president bowed as though about to make a speech, and Joe, who was in the box, stepped back. Our hero's heart was thumping under his blouse, for at last he was about to pitch his first game at Excelsior Hall, even if it was but on the scrub.
CHAPTER XIII
JOE'S GREAT WORK
"Let her go, Doctor!"
"Make him hit it, Professor!"
"Strike him out!"
"Give him an old Greek curve!"
These were some of the cries that reached Dr. Fillmore as he stood in Joe's place in the pitching box. The president of the faculty smiled pleasantly. He was used to this mild "joshing," which was always indulged in by the lads of Excelsior on the occasion of the opening of the season. Not that it was at all offensive; in fact, it rather showed the good feeling existing between the instructors and their pupils.
"Are you all ready?" asked Dr. Fillmore, as though he was inquiring whether a student was prepared to recite, and as if he really expected to pitch a ball that was to be hit.
"Play ball!" called Harvey Hallock, who was umpiring.
"Not too swift now, if you please, Doctor," stipulated Nat Pierson, who was first up.
Then the venerable president delivered the new, white horsehide sphere. He threw rather awkwardly, but with more accuracy than might have been expected from a man who had a ball in his hands but once a year. Right over the plate it went, and though usually the initial ball was never struck at, Nat could not resist the opportunity.
He "bunted," and the ball popped up in the air and sailed back toward the pitcher's box. To the surprise of all, Dr. Fillmore stepped forward and neatly caught it.
"Hurray!"
"That's the stuff!"
"Put him on the team!"
"Why didn't you say you were a ball-player, Doctor?"
"Let him play the game!"
These and many other cries greeted the president's performance. He bowed again, gravely, and smiled genially as he tossed the ball to Joe, who was waiting for it. A little round of applause came from some members of the faculty who had accompanied the doctor to the grounds, and then the head of the school walked off the diamond amid a riot of cheers. The baseball season at Excelsior Hall had opened under auspicious occasions everyone thought, and more than one lad had great hopes that the Blue Banner would come back there to stay for a while.
"Play ball!" called the umpire again, and this time the game was on in earnest.
Joe dug a little hole for the toe of his shoe, revolved the ball in his hands a few times, and looked to get the signal from Bob Harrison, the scrub catcher.
Bob, who knew the individual characteristics of each batter better than did Joe (though the latter was rapidly learning them) signalled for a high out, and our hero nodded his head in confirmation. The next instant he delivered the ball.
There was a vicious swing of the bat, and there could almost be heard the swish as it cut the air. And that is all it did do, for the horsehide landed squarely in Bob's glove with a resounding ping! and there was one strike against Nat.
"That's the way to do it!" cried Bob.
"Say, what's the matter with you?" angrily demanded Luke Fodick of one of his best batters. "What do you want to fan for?"
"Couldn't help it, I guess," answered Bob rather sheepishly. "It was a curve."
"Well, don't you know how to handle them by this time?" fairly snarled Hiram, who was closely watching every player. "If you don't know how to hit out a hot one you'd better go back on the scrub. Don't do it again."
"I'll kill the next ball!" declared Nat, but he did not like the looks of it as Joe delivered it, and did not swing his bat.
"Strike!" called the umpire sharply.
"Wha--what?" cried Nat.
"I said strike. It was right over the plate."
"Plate nothing!"
"What's he doing, calling strikes on you?" demanded Hiram.
"It looks that way," spoke Nat.
"Well, say----" began the manager in his bullying manner, as he strode toward the umpire.
"Hold on now!" interposed Luke, who sometimes had better judgment than Hiram. "It's all right. Don't get excited. It may have been a strike. The fellows haven't got on to all the points of the game yet this season. Go on."
"All right," growled Hiram. "But don't you dare strike out, Nat."
Joe's next delivery was called a ball, though it was rightly a strike. Joe said nothing, realizing that the umpire was naturally a bit afraid of offending Hiram and Luke too much. Then Nat knocked a little pop fly, which was easily taken care of by the second baseman, and the first man on the regular, or school team, as it was called, was out.
"All ready for the next one!" called Catcher Bob.
"Don't you fan!" warned Hiram to Jake Weston, who was next up.
"Just watch me!" exulted Jake as he walked confidently to the plate.
Joe sent in a puzzling drop, with considerable swiftness, but to his chagrin Jake "killed" it, landing on it squarely and lining it out for two bags.
"That's the way to do it!" yelled Luke, capering about.
"Now, where's your star pitcher?" inquired Hiram, and he looked toward Tom Davis, who was playing first. "I guess he isn't so much!"
Tom said nothing. He realized that perhaps his advocacy of Joe's abilities had brought his friend and himself too much in the limelight. But he meant well.
"Oh, well, we just let you hit that one to see how it felt," shouted Bob Harrison, and that brought back Joe's nerve, which, for the moment, had deserted him as he saw his effort go for naught. Jake was on second, but he only got one bag farther, stealing to third as Joe struck out the next man.
The school nine members were now whispering uneasily among themselves. Never before, at the opening of the season had they had a scrub pitcher who did such things to them. They realized that they had to play the game for all it was worth.
Luke and Hiram were whispering earnestly together and when Harry Lauter, whom Joe had struck out walked to the bench, Luke stepped up to the plate.
"Hold on!" cried Ward Gerard quickly. "You are out of your turn, Luke."
"How's that?" indignantly demanded the school captain.
"George Bland is up next, according to the batting order you gave me."
"Well, we've changed the batting order," put in Hiram quickly.
The truth of the matter was that George was not a very good hitter, while Luke was, and both the latter and the manager had seen the necessity of making at least one run the first inning in order to inspire confidence in the school team. They had hoped to change the batting order unobserved, and bring up a good hitter when he was most needed. But the scrub captain had been too sharp for them.
"Changed the batting order, eh?" asked Ward. "You can't do it now under the rules."
"Oh, well, we ain't playing strictly according to rules yet," said Luke weakly. "I'm going to bat, anyhow. You can change your batting order if you like."
"We don't have to," responded Ward. "But go ahead, we'll allow it."
"Thanks--for nothing!" exclaimed Hiram sarcastically, and Luke held his place at home plate.
The situation was now rather tense. There were two men out, a man was on third and the captain of the school team himself was at bat. It was up to Luke to bring in his man and save his side from a goose egg in the first inning. Luke fairly glared at Joe, as if daring our hero to strike him out, and Joe was no less determined to do that feat if possible.
He looked at Bob for a signal, and got one that meant to deliver a swift in. Then Joe knew that Luke, for all his boasting was a bit afraid--afraid of being hit by the ball, and, being timid would involuntarily step back if the horsehide seemed to be coming too close to him.
"Here goes!" murmured Joe, and he sent in one with all his force.
As he had expected, the school captain did step back, and, an instant later, the umpire cried:
"Strike!"
"What?" fairly yelled Luke turning at him. There was a laugh from some of the scrubs, and it was joined in by a number of the other students--lads who were kept from the athletic committee by the snap ruling of Luke and Hiram. The captain realized that there was a feeling against him, and he quickly swallowed his wrath.
"Watch what you're doing," warned Hiram.
"Oh, that was only a fluke," declared Luke. Joe smiled. He was going to send in another "fluke," but not the same kind. He delivered a quick ball, with a peculiar upward twist to it, and, as Luke swung viciously at it, but too low, naturally his bat passed under the ball.
"Strike two!" yelled the umpire, as the ball landed safely in Bob's big mitt.
There was a murmur of astonishment from the school nine and its particular sympathizers, and a breath of delight from the despised scrubs. Hiram flushed angrily, yet he dared say nothing, for there was no doubt about this strike. As for Luke, he was too surprised to make any comment.
"I'll get the next one!" he declared, as he tapped his bat on the home plate. He did hit it, but it was only a foul, and, being on the last strike, did not count against him.
"That's the way to do it. You're finding his curves if he has any!" cried Hiram. "Swat it!"
"Sure!" assented Luke.
With all his might he hit at the next ball, only to fan the air.
"Strike three--batter's out!" called the umpire amid a tense silence. Luke had done what he was seldom guilty of; he had struck out, and to a pitcher whom he not only hated but despised. Joe's great work had enabled the scrub to retire the school team without a run--a thing that had not been done at Excelsior in many years.
"Wow! That's the stuff!" yelled Tom, as he raced in from first. "I knew you could do it, Joe."
"Great work, old man!" complimented Ward. "Now we'll see what we can do."
There were gloomy and dubious looks on the faces of Hiram and Luke as the school team filed out on the field.
CHAPTER XIV
THE GAME AT MORNINGSIDE
Interest, especially for Joe, centered in what Frank Brown, the school pitcher, might do. So, as a matter of fact, was the attention of nearly all the players and spectators on him. For, to a large extent, the victories of the Excelsior team would depend on what their battery could do. Of course it was up to the other players to lend them support, but it was pretty well established that if the pitcher and catcher did well, support would not be lacking.
At the catching end of it Luke Fodick could be depended on nearly every time. But Frank Brown had yet to show what he could do as a twirler. In practice he had made out fairly well, but now the real test was to come.
Naturally he was a bit nervous as he walked to the box, to face his first opponent, none other than Ward Gerard, the scrub captain; and Ward was a good hitter. He managed to hit a two bagger.
Luke and Hiram cast anxious looks at each other. Well they knew how much depended on the showing their pitcher would make.
"Watch yourself, Frank," called Hiram--just the very advice to make poor Frank more nervous. But he braced up, struck out the next man, and managed to hold the succeeding one hitless.
The school nine was now about in the same position as the scrub had been. Their opponents had a man on third and two out. It was a time when Frank needed to brace up, and repeat Joe's trick. But he could not do it. Joe himself came to the bat, and with watchful eyes picked out just the ball he wanted after two strikes had been called on him. He rapped out as pretty a single as had been seen on the diamond in many a long day, and brought in Ward with the first run.
"Wow! Wow!" yelled the scrubs, capering about. "That's the way to do it!"
Luke and Hiram were almost in a panic. They saw the team they had so carefully built up in danger of disintegration; and holding a hasty conference, warning was sent to every school player to do his very best to get the scrub side out without another run.
Frank did it, for he struck out the next man, and Joe died at second. But the scrub had one run and the school nine nothing. It was a poor beginning for Excelsior's chances at the Blue Banner when the players realized what a strong team Morningside had, and how efficient were the other nines in the league.
I am not going to describe that first school-scrub game in detail. I shall have other more important contests to tell you about, as the story goes on. Sufficient to say that after the ending of the first inning Hiram and Luke went at their lads in such a fierce spirit that there was a big improvement.
Joe kept up his good work in the box, but he had not yet "found" himself that season. He was not hardened enough; he lacked practice, and his arm soon gave out. Then, too the fielding of the scrubs was ragged, after Joe once began to be hit. The result was that the school nine began to pile up runs, and Hiram and Luke were jubilant.
"Now, where's your wonderful pitcher?" asked Luke of Ward.
"Oh, he's coming on. No use to work him too hard at first," replied the scrub captain good naturedly. "Look out for your own."
This advice was needed, for, after helping his team to get a good lead, Frank Brown also rather went to pieces and when the game was over the school team led by only two runs.
"That's too close for comfort," observed Hiram to Luke, as they walked off the diamond. "Frank has got to do better than that."
"Oh, he'll be all right after a little more practice," spoke the captain.
"If he isn't Larry Akers will go in," warned the manager.
"Sure. Well, we've got lots of time before the first Morningside game. We'll win that."
"I hope we do," but Hiram's tone was not confident. Somehow he was worried over the way Joe Matson pitched.
As for our hero, he was warmly congratulated by his friends. Tom Davis was particularly enthusiastic.
"We'll have you in the box for the school nine before long," he predicted.
"I don't know," answered Joe rather dubiously. "It's a close combination between Hiram and Luke, and they may get Frank Brown into shape."
"Don't you believe it. He can't pitch as good as you in a thousand years."
"That's right," chimed in Teeter.
"Nothing like having good friends," remarked Joe laughingly.
Now that the season was started the baseball practice went on with a vim. Luke and Hiram had some of their players out every day, batting or catching the ball. Others were sent around the track to improve their wind, and in the gymnasium others were set at work on the various machines, as Dr. Rudden found their weak spots.
The school nine battled against the scrub, too, and though Joe improved in his pitching so did the members of the first team in their batting, so that there were no other contests as close as the first one.
The time for the first Morningside game was approaching. It was the first regular contest of the season and as such was always quite an affair. This time it was to be played on the Morningside diamond, and Luke and Hiram were bending every effort to win the game.
The nine picked to play was practically the same as the one that played the first game against the scrub. There had been some shifts, and then shifts back again, and under the urging of the coach, the captain and the manager, the lads had improved very much.
The day of the first game came. In special cars or in stage coaches, for those who preferred that method of locomotion, while some of the more wealthy lads hired autos, the nine and its supporters made their way to Morningside. Hiram, Luke and a few of their cronies went in a big touring car that Spencer Trusdell, a millionaire's son, owned.
"Some class to them," remarked Joe, as he and Tom with a squad of the scrub and substitutes, got aboard a trolley car.
"They may have to walk back," predicted Tommy Barton, one of the scrub.
"Why?" asked Joe.
"Spencer may not have money enough left to buy gasolene. He's a sport, you know, and always betting."
"Well, he'll bet on his own nine; won't he?"
"Oh, yes--but----" and Tommy paused significantly.
"You don't mean to say you think Morningside will win, do you?" asked Ward Gerard. "You old traitor, you!"
"I shouldn't be surprised to see our side licked," replied Tommy calmly. "They're soft, and Morningside has already played one game with Trinity and trimmed them."
And as Joe and Tom journeyed to the grounds they heard others say the same thing. Nevertheless, Luke, Hiram and their own particular crowd were very confident.
There was a big attendance at the game. The stands were filled with a rustling, yelling, cheering and vari-colored throng--the colors being supplied by scores of pretty girls, whose brothers, or whose friends, played on either nine.
"Jove! What wouldn't I give to be booked to pitch to-day!" exclaimed Joe, as he and Tom found their seats, for neither was on the list of substitutes.
"I know how you feel, old man," sympathized Tom. "But just hang on, and things may come your way."
"Play ball!" cried the umpire, and the first big game of the season for Excelsior Hall was underway.
That contest is still talked about in the annals of the two schools. It started off well, and Excelsior, first to the bat, rapped out two runs before the side was retired. Then came the first real intimation that the opponents of Morningside were weak in several places, notably in the pitching box, and in fielding and stick-work.
Frank Brown, after striking out two men in succession, and giving the impression to his mates that he was going to make good, and to his rivals that they had a strong boxman to fight against--Frank, I say, literally went up in the air.
He was not used to being hooted at and jeered, and this is just what the Morningsideites did to him to get his "goat." They got it, for before the first inning closed he had been unmercifully pounded, and four runs were chalked up to the credit of the foes of Excelsior Hall.
Still that score might not have been so bad had Hiram and Luke kept their heads. They changed their batting order, put in some substitutes, and Hiram used strong language to Frank.
"You've got to do better!" insisted the bullying manager. This had the further effect of getting on Frank's nerves, and he did worse than ever.
"Say, why don't you fellows get a real pitcher?" asked Halsted Hart, manager of the Morningsides.
"This is too easy," added Ted Clay, the opposing pitcher with a laugh.
In desperation Luke finally sent in Larry Akers to pitch. At first he tightened up and stopped the winning streak of Morningside, and then, he, too, fell by the wayside, and the hooting, yelling crowd had his "Angora," as Peaches dolefully remarked.
It might be said in passing that both Peaches and Teeter did well, and George Bland not quite so well. But the rest of the Excelsior team made many errors. Even Luke was not exempt, and this had the further effect of worrying his players.
It is no pleasure to write of that first game, and that is why I have not gone into details about it, for Excelsior Hall is a school dear to my heart, and I do not like to chronicle her defeats.
When the ninth inning came the score stood fourteen to six. In desperation, Luke had sent in Ned Turton to replace Larry. Several of his own friends asked him to give Joe a chance, but neither he nor Hiram would listen. In fact, there was a disagreement between Hiram and Luke. The manager wanted to shift Peaches back to first base but Luke would not hear of it until Hiram threatened to resign as manager, and that so alarmed the captain that he let him have his way.
That settled matters, not because Peaches went to first, though he did good service there, but it was too late to stem the losing tide. The Excelsior team could not get a run in their share of the ninth, and Morningside did not take the trouble to finish out, the final score being fourteen to six in their favor. The opponents of Excelsior had snowed them under.
CHAPTER XV
A STRANGE DISCOVERY
"Three cheers for Excelsior Hall!" cried Captain Elmer Dalton of the Morningside team. "All ready boys, with a will!"
The cheers were deafening and perhaps they were all the more hearty because it was the winning nine and its supporters who were giving them.
The crowd swarmed over the diamond, players and spectators mingling. Everybody was talking at once, the losing side and their supporters trying to explain how the defeat had come about, and the victors exulting in their victory.
"I don't see what's the matter with you fellows, anyhow," growled Hiram, as he strode over and joined the little group of disconsolate ones who were walking toward the dressing room. "You ought to have beaten 'em."
"And so we would have if they'd given me decent support," broke in Luke. "There were too many changes on the team."
"And I suppose you think I'm responsible for that," retorted Hiram quickly.
"I didn't say so. One thing, though; there's got to be another change."
"That's right," added the manager scowling at the team, but neither he nor Luke intimated where the change ought to be made.
"They're right on that one point," said Peaches, "a big shift is needed, and I can tell 'em one place to make it, if not two."
"Where?" asked Teeter.
"Pitcher for one," replied Peaches quickly, "and catcher for the other. If we had two good men as a battery there would have been a different story to-day."
"What's that?" quickly demanded Hiram, turning around, for Peaches had unconsciously spoken louder than he intended.
"I said I agreed with you," spoke the lad diplomatically, "that if we'd had some changes the result would have been different to-day," but he did not mention the changes.
"Well, it's all over," remarked Joe to Tom, as they descended from the grandstand. "Let's get back home. Jove! But it's too bad to start the season with a defeat."
"Somebody had to lose," replied Tom philosophically. "We couldn't both win, and I didn't expect it would turn out much different when I heard the talk on the way to the game. But it will teach Luke and Hiram a lesson."
"If they want to learn it--yes."
"Oh, don't worry. They'll be only too anxious, after to-day. But I notice some of the Trinity Hall and Lakeview Prep. players here. Getting a line on us, I guess."
"Shouldn't wonder. We play Trinity next week."
"Well, we ought to win that game. Hurry up, Joe, and we can get the next trolley back. No autos for us."
As the two chums hurried across the diamond they found themselves in the midst of a crowd of Morningside players and students. At the sight of one lad in the uniform of Morningside, a uniform not soiled by the dust and grime of the diamond, Tom plucked Joe by the sleeve.
"For the love of Mike, look there!" exclaimed the former first baseman of the Silver Stars.
"Where?" asked Joe, and Tom pointed to the player in the spick and span new uniform.
"Sam Morton!" gasped Joe, as he recognized his former rival on the Stars and his sometime enemy. "Sam Morton! What's he doing here?"
"Looks as if he was on the nine," replied Tom. "He's in one of the Morningside uniforms, but he didn't take part in the game."
"Sam Morton here!" went on Joe, wonderingly. "It doesn't seem possible. I wonder why we didn't hear something about it? It sure is he, and yet----"
"Wait, I'll ask some one," volunteered Tom, and tapping on the shoulder a Morningside player near him, he asked: "Is he one of your nine?" Tom pointed to Sam Morton, who had not yet observed our heroes.
"What? Oh, yes; he's a newcomer here I believe, but he had quite a reputation, so Captain Dalton put him on as substitute pitcher."
"Substitute pitcher!" gasped Joe.
"Yes, he's rather good I believe. He hasn't had much practice with us as yet or we'd have played him part of the time against you fellows to-day. Why, do you know him?"
"Yes. He used to be on the same town team with me," replied Joe.
"He'll probably play next week," went on the Morningside lad, "and when we meet you fellows again he'll probably do what Ted Clay did to-day," and he grinned cheerfully--there is nothing like a cheerful enemy.
"Sam Morton here," murmured Joe, as if unable to believe it, while his old enemy strode on without having seen him, and the Morningside lad, who had given them the information swung about on his way to the dressing rooms.
"Say, that's going some!" exclaimed Joe, as he and Tom walked on. "Fancy meeting Sam Morton here. I didn't hear that he was going to boarding school."
"Neither did I. He must have made up his mind lately. Probably he began right after the Easter vacation. I didn't spot him at the time of the banner parade."
"Me, either. But there was such a mob of fellows that it was hard to find anyone. But if he's here and he makes good, and pitches in some of the games, and if----"
"If you get the chance to pitch for the school nine, you and Sam may fight your old battles over again," finished Tom.
"That's right," agreed Joe.
It was a discouraged, disgruntled and altogether unhappy crowd of lads that returned to Excelsior Hall late that afternoon. Despondency perched like a bird of ill-omen on the big flagstaff; and a celebration that some of the lads had arranged for, in case of a victory, did not come off.
Tom and Joe were seated in their room, talking over various matters, including the game of the day, when there came the usual signal on their door, indicating that a friend stood without.
"That's Teeter," predicted Tom.
"Peaches," was Joe's guess, but when he swung open the portal both lads stood there. On their faces were looks of suppressed excitement.
"What's up?" demanded Joe.
"Lots. Special meeting of the athletic committee called. In the gym. Come on!" panted Peaches.
"We're going to protest against the way Hiram manages the team!" added Teeter.
"Come on!" urged Peaches, recovering his breath. "We want you with us. There's a lot of feeling against Hiram and Luke. They practically lost the game for us to-day. The revolt is spreading. It's a chance for you, Joe. Come on."
"There's going to be a hot time!" predicted Teeter. "We have permission to hold a meeting. All the fellows are coming. Get a move on."
Joe and Tom grabbed up their caps and hurried after their chums, Joe with a wildly-beating heart. Had his chance come?
CHAPTER XVI
A HOT MEETING
"The meeting will come to order!"
Teeter was in the chair, looking over a talking, shifting, excited crowd of lads gathered in the school gymnasium. He had assumed the office, and no one had disputed him.
"The meeting will come to order!" he cried again.
"Order! Order!" begged George Bland and Peaches. "We can't do anything like this."
"What are we going to do?" asked Tommy Barton.
"Try and fix things so we can win ball games," answered Tom Davis.
Joe did not say much. He realized that this was, in a measure, a meeting to aid him, and he felt it would be best to keep quiet. His friends were looking out for his interests.
"Order! Order!" begged Teeter again, and after many repetitions, and bangings of his gavel, he succeeded in producing some semblance of quietness.
"You all know what we're here for," went on Teeter.
"No, we don't; tell us!" shouted some one.
"We're here in the first place to make a protest against the way Hiram Shell and Luke Fodick managed the baseball team to-day," went on Teeter, "and then we'll consider what can be done to make things better. We ought to have won against Morningside to-day, and----"
"That's the stuff!"
"That's the way to talk!"
"Hit 'em again!"
These were a few of the cries that greeted Teeter's announcement. He was very much in earnest.
"This isn't a regular session of the athletic committee at all," he resumed. "It's a protest meeting, and it's going to be sort of free and easy. Any fellow that wants to can speak his mind. I take it you all agree with me that we ought to do something."
"That's right!" came in a chorus.
"And we ought to protest against Hiram's high-handed method. What about that?"
"That's right, too," responded several. Joe looked over the crowd. As far as he could see it was composed in the main of lads who were only probationary members of the school society--lads without voting power.
Neither Hiram nor Luke was present, and Joe could not see any of their particular crowd. He was mistaken in thinking that Hiram had no friends there, however, for no sooner had Teeter asked the last question than Jake Weston arose and asked in rather sneering tones:
"Do you call this giving a fellow a square deal?"
"What do you mean?" inquired Teeter. The room was quiet enough now.
"I mean just this," went on the lad who was perhaps the closest of all on the nine to Hiram save Luke. "I mean that Hiram Shell isn't here to defend himself, and you're saying all sorts of mean things against him."
"We intend to have him here--if he'll come," spoke Teeter significantly. "Luke, too. We want them to hear what we say about them."
"You're trying to disrupt the team!" yelled Jake, who had lost his temper.
"I am not! I'm trying to do anything to better the team. We ought to have won that game to-day, and you know it."
"I know that I played my best!" shouted Jake, "and if you accuse me of----"
"Nobody's accusing you," put in Peaches.
Several lads were on their feet, all seeking to be heard. Teeter was vainly rapping with his gavel. It looked for a few moments as if there would be several fights, for lads were shaking their fists in each other's faces.
"Why don't you give Hiram a show?" demanded Jake. "Let him know this meeting is being held."
"I sent word to him, but he didn't come," called Teeter, above the din.
"Well, he's here now!" interrupted a sudden voice, and Hiram Shell fairly jumped into the room, followed by Luke and a score of their particular friends. "I just heard of this snap session, and I want to know what it's about. How dare you fellows hold a meeting of the athletic committee when I didn't call it?"
"Say, you drop that kind of talk!" fairly yelled Teeter. "This isn't a meeting of the athletic committee!"
"Come on down off that platform!" demanded the bully striding toward the chairman _pro tem_. "What right have you got there?"
"Just as much right as you have, and I'm going to stick! This is just a meeting of the fellows of Excelsior Hall, and I've got just as much right to preside as you have."
Perhaps it was the gavel which Teeter clenched in his hand, perhaps it was the fearless manner in which he faced Hiram, or perhaps it was the way in which Joe, Tom, Peaches and several of the larger students crowded up around Teeter, like a bodyguard, that caused Hiram to pause in his progress toward the chairman.
Whatever it was, it proved effective and probably prevented a serious clash, for Hiram was in the mood to have struck Teeter, who surely would have retaliated.
"Well, what's it all about?" asked the bully, after a pause. "What do you fellows want, anyhow?"
"We want the ball team managed differently," retorted Teeter.
"That's right!" came from a score of ringing voices.
Hiram turned a bit pale. It was the first time he had ever witnessed an organized revolt against his authority.
"Aren't you fellows satisfied with the way I manage things?" the bully sneered.
"No, and not with the way Luke Fodick captains the team," went on the now fully aroused Teeter. "There's got to be a change."
"Aw, you're sore because some of your friends can't play!" cut in Jake Weston.
"Not at all," spoke Teeter. "Everyone knows we should have won to-day, and what a miserable exhibition of baseball we gave! It was rotten, and we want to protest. We're willing to let you continue as manager, Hiram, and have Luke for captain, only we fellows want to have more of a say in how the team is run."
"Why, you fellows haven't any rights!" cried Hiram. "A lot of you are only probationary members, anyhow, and can't vote."
"They don't need to vote," declared Teeter. "It isn't a question of voting. We're students at Excelsior--all of us--and we have a right to say what we think. We think things ought to be done differently."
"That's right--we're with him," was shouted in such a volume of energy that it clearly showed to Hiram that, even though he held the balance of power in the committee proper, yet he did not in the whole school, and it was to the whole school that the team would have to look for support. It was a crisis in the affairs of Excelsior Hall.
CHAPTER XVII
THE INITIATION
For a moment after the unexpected support of Teeter's ultimatum to Hiram there was a tense silence. The lads who had come in with the bully--his supporting army so to speak--remained grouped around him and Luke. On the other side stood Teeter, Peaches, Tom, Joe and their friends, and a number of the better players of the school nine. Included among them were a number of the substitutes.
Hiram Shell looked around him. He must have been aware that his power might slip very easily from him now, unless something was done. It was no time to pursue his usual tactics. He must temporize, but he made up his mind that those who had revolted from his authority would pay dearly for it sooner or later.
"Well, what do you fellows want?" he fairly growled.
"I'll tell you what we want," said Teeter firmly. "In the first place we want this business of shifting players all about, stopped. A fellow gets used to playing in one position and he's best there. Then you or Luke change him."
"Well, hasn't the captain the right to do that?" demanded Luke.
"Sure, yes," spoke Peaches, "but when you get a good lad in a good place keep him there."
"Is that all?" sneered Hiram.
"No, we think there ought to be better pitching," went on the self-constituted chairman.
"Ha! I guess that's where the whole trouble is!" cried Hiram quickly. "This meeting is for the benefit of Joe Matson."
"Nothing of the sort!" exclaimed Joe quickly. "I knew nothing about it until Teeter told me. Of course I'd like to pitch; there's no use denying that, but I don't want any fellow to give way for me if he's making good."
"That's the trouble--he isn't," put in Teeter.
Hiram took a quick resolve. He could smooth matters over now, and later arrange them to suit himself and Luke. So he said:
"All right, I admit that we didn't make a very good showing to-day. But it was our first game, and Brown and Akers didn't do very well in the box. But don't be too hasty. Now I'll tell you what I'll do," and he acted as though it was a big favor. "I'll let you fellows have a voice when I make changes after this. We'll do some harder practice. I'll make Brown and Akers pitch better----"
"I don't believe he can," murmured Tom.
"We won't make any more shifts--right away," went on Hiram. "Maybe you fellows were right. I haven't given as much time to the team as I should. But wait--we'll win the Blue Banner yet."
"That's all we ask," said Teeter. "We just wanted you to know how we felt about it, and if things are better and our nine can win, we won't say another word."
"All right, let it go at that," and Hiram affected to laugh, but there was not much mirth in it. "Might as well quit now, I guess. Everybody out for hard practice next week. I want to see some better stick-work, and as for pitching--where are Brown and Akers?"
"Here!" cried the two boxmen.
"You fellows will have to brush up a bit on your speed and curves," went on the bully manager. "Isn't that right, Luke?"
"Sure," grunted the captain. There was more talk, but it was not of the fiery kind and, for the time, at least, the threatened disruption had passed. But there was still an undercurrent of dissatisfaction against Luke and Hiram.
"Well, I don't see as it did an awful lot of good," remarked Tom Davis to Peaches and Teeter, as they walked out of the gymnasium with Joe, a little later. "I don't see that Joe is benefitted."
"I didn't expect much," spoke our hero. "It was well meant and----"
"And it did good, too," interrupted Teeter. "It's the first time any one ever talked to Hiram like a Dutch Uncle, and I guess it sort of jarred him. He'll sit up and take notice now, and it will be for the good of the team."
"But where does Joe come in?" asked Peaches.
"Well, I figure it out this way," replied Teeter. "Brown and Akers will try to make good but they can't. The fellows will see that we've got to have a new pitcher, and Hiram will have to give 'em one. Then Joe will step in."
"There are others as good as I in the school," remarked Joe modestly.
"Well, they haven't shown themselves if there are," was Teeter's retort. "No, Joe will be pitching before the season is over, you see if he isn't."
The question was discussed pro and con, as they went to their rooms, and continued after they got there until a monitor warned them that though permission had been given to hold a meeting it did not extend to midnight lunch.
It was one night, after a hard day on the diamond, that Joe and Tom, who were studying, or making a pretense at it, heard the usual knock on their door.
"Teeter and Peaches--I wonder what's up now?" asked Tom.
"Let 'em in and they'll tell us," suggested Joe, as his roommate went to the door. It was kept locked, for often some of the fun-loving students would come in unannounced to create a "rough-house," to the misery of the two chums.
As the portal swung back, there was revealed to Joe and Tom several sheet-clad white figures, each one with a mask of black cloth over his head. The sight was rather a weird one, and for the moment Tom was nonplussed.
"Shut the door," commanded Joe quickly. "They're up to some high jinks!"
Tom hesitated for a moment. If it was Peaches, Teeter and their friends, he did not want to shut them out, but, on the contrary might want to join the fun. If, on the contrary, it was a hostile crowd there was no use getting into trouble. So Tom hesitated and was lost.
For a moment later, the throng of white-clad and unrecognizable figures (because of the masks) stepped into the room.
"We have come," announced one in a voice that sounded hollow and deep, "to initiate you into the Mystic and Sacred Order of the Choo-Choo!"
"Get out, Peaches, I know your voice," said Joe, not quite sure whether he did or not.
"Prepare to join the Mystic and Sacred Order of the Choo-Choo! Shall he not, comrades?" demanded a second figure.
"Toot! Toot! He shall!" was the answer in a chorus.
"That's Teeter all right," affirmed Tom.
"Come!" commanded the first figure, advancing to take hold of Tom's arm.
"Shall we go, Joe?" asked his chum.
Joe thought a minute. There had been rumors in the school of late, that several initiations had been held into a newly-formed society. Reports differed as to what society it was, some lads stating that they had been made to join one and some another. But all agreed, though they did not go into particulars, that the initiations were anything but pleasant. Joe was as fond of fun as anyone but he did not like being mistreated--especially when it was not by his friends.
"Don't go!" he called suddenly to Tom.
"Then we'll make you!" said the disguised voice. "Grab 'em fellows!"
Instantly there was a commotion in the room. Joe leaped back to get behind a sofa, but one of the black-masked figures was too quick for him and seized him around the neck. Our hero tried to tear the mask from the face to see who his assailant was, but other hands clasped his arms from behind and he was helpless.
Tom, too, was having his own troubles. He was beset by two of the unknowns and held in such a way that he could do nothing. The struggle though sharp was a quiet one, for the students did not want to attract the attention of a monitor or prowling professor.
"'Tis well," spoke the lad who was evidently the leader, when Tom and Joe were held safely, their hands having been tied behind their backs. "Away with them to the dungeon deep, and they will soon be good, faithful and true members of the Mystic and Sacred Order of the Choo-Choo!"
Then, realizing that discretion was probably now the better part of valor, Joe and Tom meekly followed their captors.
CHAPTER XVIII
"FIRE!"
"Where are you fellows taking us?" demanded Joe, as they walked softly down the corridor.
"Toot-Toot!" was all the answer he received.
"Say, we don't mind having fun," added Tom, "but if you fellows are going to cut up any, we want to know it."
"Toot-Toot!" came again in imitation of a whistle. It was evident that this was a sort of signal or watchword among the members of the Order of Choo-Choo.
"These aren't Peaches, Teeter, and our fellows," spoke Joe into Tom's ear as they were forced to descend a back and seldom used staircase.
"That's right," agreed Tom. "I wonder who they are?"
"Some of the seniors, maybe," suggested the young pitcher. "I wish I knew where they are taking us."
"The candidates who are about to be initiated into the Mystic and Sacred Order of the Choo-Choo will kindly keep quiet!" came the quick command from the leader. "Silence is imperative to have the spell work."
"Oh, you dry up!" retorted Joe.
"Silence!" came the command again, emphasized this time by a dig in the ribs.
"You quit----" began our hero, but his voice ended in a grunt, for some one had hit him in the stomach, knocking the wind out of him. He was indignant, and had half a mind to make a fight for it then and there. But he was practically helpless, and was descending a flight of stairs which made it dangerous to chance a scuffle. He made up his mind to fight when the time came.
"If you fellows----" began Tom.
"Silence over there!" hissed one of the white-robed figures. "If they talk any more, Master of Ceremonies, gag 'em."
"Right, Chief Engineer," was the hollow answer.
Tom thought it best to keep quiet. Silently the little crowd advanced. They halted at the door of one of the many store-rooms in the basement of the largest of the school dormitories. One of the lads opened the portals with a key. It was as black as pitch beyond.
"Enter, timid and shrinking candidates," commanded some one. "Enter into the sacred precincts of the Choo-Choo."
"Not much I won't!" declared Joe. "I can't see my hand before my face, and I'm not going into a dark room, not knowing what is there."
"Me either!" declared Tom.
"It is so ordered," came the deep voice of the leader. "Enter or be thrown in!"
Joe turned, trying in vain to pierce the disguise of the black mask. He struggled to free his arms from the rope that bound them, but could not. He was half-minded to strike out with his feet, but he was now so surrounded by the initiators that he could not. Besides, if he did that he might lose his balance and fall hard. Tom was in like straits.
"Forward, march!" came the command.
"I'm not going in I tell you!" insisted Joe.
"If he doesn't go in, shove him," came the command.
Joe, as he felt that resistance was useless, started forward. It was better to keep his own footing, if he had to go in the room and not run the risk of being shoved down.
Advancing cautiously, followed by Tom, the young pitcher stepped over the threshold. Almost instantly he felt cold water spurting up around his ankles, and he sought to draw back. He did not want to fall into a deep tank, with his arms bound.
"Go on! Go on in!" was the command and he felt himself being shoved from behind. There was no help for it, but to his relief he found, as he advanced, that the water did not come higher than his knees.
"Great Scott! What are we up against?" asked Tom.
"Search me," responded Joe.
"Silence! Blindfold 'em!" came a command, and before they could have prevented it, had they been able, Joe's and Tom's eyes were covered with big handkerchiefs.
"Keep on!" was the order again, and the candidates did, soon stepping out of the water upon the solid floor.
"Tie their feet," was the next order, and this was done. "Now, candidates," spoke the leader, "you have crossed the river of blood and the first part of your journey is over. But, to be good and loyal members of the Mystic and Sacred Order of Choo-Choo, it is necessary that you make a noise like a locomotive. Go ahead now, puff!"
For a moment Joe and Tom hesitated and then, absurd as it was, they entered into the spirit of the affair and gave as good an imitation as possible of a steam locomotive in operation.
"Very good! Very good," was the comment. "Now go up grade," and the blindfolded candidates were forced to go up a steep incline of boards, slipping and sliding back half the time.
"They are coming on," commented some one. "At the next stop they take water. Hose-tender, get ready!"
"Hold on! What are you going to do?" demanded Joe.
"You'll see," was the answer. Joe and Tom were led to another part of the room. It was dimly lighted now, as they could see, for a faint glow came under the handkerchiefs.
A moment later each of the luckless candidates felt a cold stream of water strike him full in the face. They tried to duck, and to turn their heads away, but the others held them until the upper part of their bodies were thoroughly soaked.
"That's enough for steam," came the order from one of the party. "Now to see how they can carry passengers. Off with their bonds, but keep the blinders on."
This was done.
"Down on your hands and knees, candidates," came the order, and Joe and Tom had nothing for it but to obey.
A moment later some one sat on each back and again came the order:
"Forward march!"
Now Joe, while liking fun as well as any lad, thought there was a limit to it, and to the indignities of the initiation, especially in a mythical society which they did not care about joining. When a heavy lad, therefore, sat down on our hero's back Joe made up his mind that matters had gone far enough.
"Go ahead! Carry your passenger!" was the command.
"Not by a jugful!" cried Joe, and with a quick motion he stood up, spilling off the lad on his back. The latter hit the floor with a resounding whack. The next instant Joe had torn off the blinding handkerchief, and made a grab for the lad whom he had upset. He tore off his mask and there was revealed the scowling face of Hiram Shell.
At the same moment Tom had done the same to his tormentor, discovering Luke Fodick under the black mask.
"Oh, so it's your crowd, is it Hiram?" asked Joe.
"Yes, and by Jove, you'll suffer for this! Why aren't you sports enough to take your initiation as the others do?"
"Because we don't choose to," replied our hero.
"Then I'll make you!" cried Hiram, doubling up his fists and leaping at Joe. "Come on, Luke, give 'em what's coming to 'em!"
"Two can play at that game," spoke Joe coolly. He noted that the room had been roughly fitted up as a sort of society meeting chamber. At the entrance was a long, narrow and shallow tank of water. It was through this that Joe and Tom had waded.
"I'll fix you!" cried Hiram.
"All right," agreed Joe easily. "As well here and now as anywhere, anytime."
He threw himself into a position of defense as Hiram came on. Luke was advancing toward Tom, while the others, still wearing their masks, looked on in anticipation.
There might have been two stiff fights the next moment had there not suddenly sounded from without a series of startled cries. Then came the clanging of bells, and above the riot of noise the lads heard some one shouting:
"Fire! Fire! Fire!"
CHAPTER XIX
A THRILLING RESCUE
"What's that?" asked half a dozen of the white-robed lads.
"Fire, somewhere," answered Hiram, pausing in his rush toward Joe.
"Come on, this can wait," added one of his companions. "We're through with this initiation, anyhow."
"But I'm not through with him," snapped the bully with a glance of anger at the young pitcher. "I'll settle with him later."
"Fire! Fire!"
Again the cries rang out on the night air.
"The school must be on fire!" yelled Luke Fodick. "Come on, fellows!"
"Fire! Fire!"
Many voices now took up the cry outside, and through a partially-curtained window could be seen the dancing light of flames.
"Come on!" cried Joe to Tom. "We've got to be in on this, whatever it is!"
"Surest thing you know," agreed his chum.
They rushed from the room, following after Hiram and Luke. The others straggled out as fast as they disrobed, for they did not want to be seen in their regalia by any of the school authorities who might be on hand after the alarm of fire.
"I hope it isn't any of the school buildings!" exclaimed Joe as he and Tom raced along.
"That's right. So do I. Look, you can see the reflection from here."
The boys were opposite a window in the corridor, and over the roof and spire of the school chapel could be seen a lurid glare in the sky, but what was burning could not be made out.
"It's the gym!" gasped Tom.
"Don't you dare say that!" cried Joe, "and with the baseball season just starting."
"Well, it looks like it anyhow."
Together they raced on until they came to a door that gave egress to the campus. Students were pouring out from their rooms in all directions, some eagerly questioning, and others joining in the cries of "Fire!" No one seemed to know where the blaze was.
Professor Rodd came out with his precious tall hat in one hand and a bundle of books in the other.
"Is the school doomed, boys?" he asked. "How did it start? Have I time to save anything else? I have some Latin books----"
"I don't know where it is, Professor," answered Joe. "But it isn't this building, anyhow."
"Good! I'm glad of it. I mean I'm sorry it's anywhere. Wait, and I'll be with you to help fight the flames."
He ran back to his quarters to return quickly minus his silk hat and the books, and he wore an old fashioned night-cap.
"There now, I'm ready," he announced, and he ran on as though he had donned a modern smoke helmet, used by the firemen. The boys laughed, serious and exciting as the situation was.
Dr. Rudden saw our two friends hurrying across the campus together.
"Why, boys!" cried the coach and athletic director. "You're all wet! How did it happen? Have you been playing the hose on the fire? Did it burst?"
"No, we haven't been to the blaze yet," answered Joe. "We had----"
"A sort of accident," finished Tom, as his chum hesitated for the right explanation. Then they avoided further conversation by racing toward the blaze, the light of which was becoming every minute more glaring.
A stream of students and teachers was now hurrying across the campus, heading for the path around the chapel, which building hid the fire from sight. As Tom and Joe turned the corner they saw at a glance what was burning.
It was an old disused factory about half a mile from the school, a building pretty much in ruins and of little value save as a sleeping place for tramps. Several times in the past there had been slight fires there but they had been quickly extinguished, though many said it would have been as well to let the old structure burn down.
This time it seemed as if this would happen. The factory was of wood, and there had been no rain recently, so it was quite dry, and there was a brisk wind to fan the flames.
"I guess it's a goner," panted Tom.
"Looks that way," agreed his chum.
"Here comes the fire department," went on the other, as they heard the clanging of a bell down the road. A little later they could see, by the glare of the fire, a crowd of village men and boys dragging, by the long rope attached to it, a combined chemical engine, and hook and ladder vehicle. It was a new acquisition in the town of Cedarhurst, and the citizens were very proud of it, though they had no horses to pull it. But everyone who could do so grabbed hold of the long rope.
"They're making good time," commented Joe.
"But they might as well save themselves. The old factory is better burned than standing. Guess some more tramps went in there."
"Then they'd better be getting out by now," observed the young pitcher, "for it must be pretty hot."
The lads ran on, and soon found themselves close to the burning structure. The heat of the flames could be felt, and Tom and Joe moved back into the crowd that had gathered. Up clattered the fire apparatus, and there was the usual excitement, with everyone giving orders, and telling how it ought to be done.
Finally a chemical stream was turned on, the whitish foaming mixture of bicarbonate of soda, sulphuric acid and water spurting upon the flames. There was a hiss, and the part of the fire that was sprayed quickly died out.
But it was evident that several chemical streams would be needed if the fire was to be completely extinguished, whereas two lines of hose were all that were available. In fact nothing but a smothering deluge of water would have been effective, and this was not obtainable.
"They'll never get that fire out!" cried a man in the crowd. "Why don't you let it burn, Chief?"
"Because we're here to put out fires. I'm going to----"
But what the chief was going to do he never said, for at that moment, above the crackling of the fire and the shouts of the men and boys, there arose an agonized shout.
"Help! Help! Save me!"
All eyes turned instinctively upward, and there, perched on the ledge of what had once been the clock tower of the factory, high above the roaring, crackling flames, stood a man, wildly waving his arms and crying:
"Help! Help! Save me!"
"Look! A man! He'll be burned to death!" yelled a score of persons as they saw the danger.
"That's about right, unless he gets down pretty soon," shouted Tom into Joe's ear. "Why doesn't he go down?"
"Probably because the stairs are burned away," was Joe's shouted answer--everyone was shouting, partly to make themselves heard and partly because of the excitement, which was contagious.
"Help! Help!" cried the man again. He gave one look below him and crowded closer to the outer edge of the tower.
"Look out! Don't jump!" someone cried.
"We'll save you!" shouted the chief. "Get the ladder, boys! Lively now!"
Scores of willing ones raced to the wagon and began pulling out the ladders. They were the extension kind, and could be made quite long. Several men ran with one toward the building.
"Not that side! The flames are too hot! You can't raise it there!" cried the chief. "Try around back!"
The men obeyed but a moment later there came a disappointing shout:
"Too short! The ladder's too short! Get a longer one!"
"That's the longest we've got!" answered the chief.
"Then splice two together!" urged some one, but the suggestion could hardly have been carried out with safety. No one knew what to do. The flames were mounting higher and higher, bursting out on all sides now, so that in a few moments, even had there been a ladder long enough to reach to the man, it could not have been raised against the building.
"Help! Help!" continued to call the seemingly-doomed one. He moved still nearer to the edge of the tower.
"Don't jump! Don't!" yelled the crowd. "You'll be killed!"
"He might just as well be killed by the fall as burned to death," remarked one man grimly. "In fact I'd prefer it."
"Can't someone do something?" begged a woman hysterically.
The man held out his hands appealingly.
"Oh, if we only had an airship, we could rescue him!" murmured Tom.
"By Jove!" exclaimed Joe. "I have an idea. If I could only get a rope up to him he could slide down it, if we held the outer end away from the fire--a slanting cable you know."
"That's it!" yelled his chum.
"How are you going to get a rope up to him?" asked Luke Fodick, who was standing beside our hero. "No one could throw a rope up there."
"No, perhaps not a rope," admitted Joe, "but if I could throw a string we could tie the rope to the string and he could haul it up and fasten it."
"But you can't even throw a string up there," insisted Luke.
"Of course not!" added Hiram, who had joined his crony. "Nobody could."
"Yes they can--I can!" cried Joe. "I'll throw up this ball of cord. It will unwind on the way up if I keep hold of one end of it," and he pulled from his pocket a ball of light but strong cord. Joe used it to wind around split bats. "I'm going to throw this," cried the young pitcher. "Hey there!" he yelled to the man on the tower. "Catch this as it comes, and pull up the rope we're going to fasten on!"
The man waved his hands helplessly. He could not hear.
"Where you going to get the rope?" asked Tom.
"Off the fire apparatus, of course. It's long and strong. Tom, you go get the rope off; I've got to make the man hear and understand before I can throw the cord."
"That's the stuff! The rope from the engine!" cried the man near Joe. "That's the idea, young fellow!"
Accompanied by Tom, the man raced to the engine. He quickly explained what the plan of rescue was, and others aided in taking from the reel the long rope by which the apparatus was pulled. Once more Joe shouted his instructions, while the fire raged and crackled and the crowd yelled.
"Quiet! Quiet!" begged Joe. "I've got to make him hear!"
"Make a megaphone--here's a newspaper," suggested a man. He quickly rolled it into a cone, tore off the small end to make a mouthpiece and Joe had an improvised megaphone. Through it he begged the crowd to keep silent, and at last they heard and understood.
"I'm going to throw you a ball of cord!" called Joe through the paper cone to the man on the tower. "Catch it, and when I yell again, pull up the rope. Fasten it to the tower and we'll hold the ground end out and away from the flames. Then slide down."
The man waved his hands to show that he understood. Then Joe got ready to throw up the cord.
"He can't do it! He'll never be able to get that ball up to the man. It will fall short or go into the flames," said Luke Fodick.
"He can't, eh?" asked Tom, who came back, helping to pull the long rope. "You don't know how Joe Matson can throw. Just watch him."
And, amid a silence that was painfully tense, the young pitcher got ready to deliver a ball on which more depended than on any other he had ever thrown in all his life.
CHAPTER XX
THE WARNING
Joe hesitated a moment. Everything would depend on his one throw, because there was no chance to get another ball of cord, and if this one went wide it would fall into the fire and be rendered useless.
The fire was increasing, for all the chemicals in the tank on the wagon had been used, and no fresh supply was available. Below the tower on which the man stood, the flames raged and crackled. Even the tower itself was ablaze a little and at times the smoke hid the man from view momentarily.
"I'll have to wait until it clears," murmured the young pitcher, when, just as he got ready to throw, a swirl of vapor arose.
"You can't wait much longer," said Tom, in an ominously quiet voice.
"I know it," agreed Joe desperately, and it was but too evident. The tower itself, weakened by the fire, would soon collapse, and would carry the man down with it into the seething fire below.
"Throw! Throw!" urged several in the throng.
Joe handed the loose end of the cord to Tom. He wanted to give all his attention to throwing the ball. He poised himself as if he was in the pitching box. It was like a situation in a game when his side needed to retire the other in order to win, as when two men were out, three on bases and the man at bat had two strikes and three balls. All depended on one throw.
With a quick motion Joe drew back his arm. There was an intaking of breath on the part of the crowd that could be heard even above the crackling of the flames. All eyes were centered on the young pitcher.
"He'll never do it," murmured Hiram Shell.
"If he does he's a better pitcher than I'll ever be," admitted Frank Brown.
Suddenly Joe threw. The white ball was plainly visible as it sailed through the air, unwinding as it mounted upward. On and on it went, Joe, no less than every one in the crowd, watching it with eager eyes. And as for the man on the tower he eagerly stretched out his hands to catch the ball of cord, on which his life now depended.
[Illustration: THE WHITE BALL WAS PLAINLY VISIBLE AS IT SAILED THROUGH THE AIR.]
Straight and true it went, as swift and as direct a ball as Baseball Joe had ever delivered. Straight and true--on and on and then----
Into the hands of the anxiously waiting man went the ball of cord. Eagerly he clutched it, while the crowd set up a great cheer.
"That's the stuff!" yelled a man in Joe's ear. "You sure are one good pitcher, my boy!"
"Never mind about that now," said the practical Joe. "Fasten on the rope. Quick!"
Willing hands did this, and Joe looked to see if the knot would not slip. He seemed to have assumed charge of the rescue operations.
"Haul up!" he yelled to the man through the newspaper megaphone. "Haul up the rope and make it fast. Then, when I give the signal, slide down."
The man waved his hands to show that he understood, and the next moment he began pulling on the cord. The rope followed. Quickly it uncoiled from where the strands had been piled in readiness for just this. Up and up the man on the tower pulled it until he held the end of the heavy rope in his hands.
There now extended from the tower to the ground a slanting pathway of rope, such as is sometimes seen leading down into a stone quarry. It was high enough above the flames to enable a man to swing himself along above them, though doubtless he would have to pass over a zone of fierce heat.
"All ready! Come on down!" yelled Joe, and the man on the tower lost no time in obeying.
He let go the rope as his feet touched the earth and then with a groan he collapsed. The crowd closed in around him, and two minutes later the tower, with a crash, toppled into the midst of the seething furnace of fire. The rescue had been made none too soon.
"Don't crowd around him so!" shouted Joe, hurrying over to where the man lay.
He pushed his way into the throng, followed by Tom, and the two lads actually forced the men and boys away from the man, who had evidently fainted. Joe whipped off his coat and made a pillow for the sufferer's head.
As he bent over him, the man's face was illuminated by the glare from the burning factory, and our hero started back in astonishment.
"Isaac Benjamin!" he exclaimed, as he recognized the former manager of the Royal Harvester works where Mr. Matson had been employed. Isaac Benjamin, the man who, with Mr. Rufus Holdney, had conspired to ruin Joe's father by getting his patents away from him.
"Isaac Benjamin!" said Joe again.
Mr. Benjamin opened his eyes. Into them came the light of recognition as he gazed into Joe's face. He struggled to a sitting position.
"Joe--Joe Matson!" he murmured. "I--I hope your father will forgive me. I--I----"
"There, don't think of that now," said Joe gently. "Are you hurt?"
"No--nothing of any consequence. I'm not even burned, thanks to you. I climbed up into the tower when I found the place on fire. I--I--Joe, can you ever forgive me for trying to ruin your father?"
"Yes, of course. But don't talk of that now," Joe said, while the crowd looked on and wondered at the man and boy knowing each other--wondered at their strange talk.
"I--I must talk of that now--more--more danger threatens your father, Joe."
Joe thought perhaps the man might be in a delirium of fright, and he decided it would be best to humor him.
"That's all right," he said soothingly. "You'll be taken care of. We've sent for a doctor. How did you come to be in the old factory?"
"I--I was sleeping there, Joe." Mr. Benjamin's tones did not indicate a raving mind.
"Sleeping there?" There was surprise in the boy's voice.
"Yes, Joe, I'm down and out. I've lost all my money, my friends have gone back on me--though it's my own fault--I have lost my home--my position--everything. I'm an outcast--a tramp--that's why I was sleeping there. There were some other tramps. They were smoking--I guess that's how the fire started. They got away but I couldn't."
The man's voice was excited now, and Joe tried to calm him. But Mr. Benjamin continued.
"Wait, Joe, I have something to tell you--something important--a warning to give you. If we--can we talk in private?"
"Yes, later, when you are stronger," answered the lad soothingly.
"Then it may be too late," went on Mr. Benjamin. "I am strong enough now. It was just a passing faintness. I--I am weak--haven't had much to eat--I'm hungry. But no matter. Here, come over here, I'll tell you."
He struggled to his feet with Joe's aid and led the lad aside from the crowd, which parted to make way for them.
"I'm down and out, Joe. Money and friends all gone."
"What about Mr. Holdney?"
"He too, has deserted me--turned against me, though I helped him in many schemes. I'm nothing but a tramp now, Joe."
The young pitcher looked at the wreck of the man before him. Truly he was "down and out." His once fine and well-dressed appearance had given place to a slouchy attire.
"But I must tell you, Joe. Your father's patent rights are again in danger. Rufus Holdney is going to try to get some valuable papers and models away from him. That's what he and I quarreled over. I'd do anything to spoil his plans, after he has thrown me off as he has. I left him, and since then I have had only bad luck. I don't know how I came to come here. I didn't know you were here. But warn your father, Joe, to look well after his new patents. Warn him before it is too late."
"I will," promised Joe. "I will. Thank you for telling me. Now we must look after you." And indeed it was high time, for, as the young pitcher spoke Mr. Benjamin tottered and would have fallen had not our hero caught him.
"Quick, get a doctor!" cried Joe, as the crowd surged up again around the unfortunate man, who had fainted.
CHAPTER XXI
BAD NEWS
Attention was divided, on the part of the crowd, between the man who had been rescued, and the fire. The old factory was now burning fiercely and it was useless to try to save the structure. In fact, nearly everyone was glad that it had been destroyed, for it would harbor no more tramps. So the man who had been so thrillingly rescued was the greater attraction.
Fortunately there was a doctor in the throng, and he gave Mr. Benjamin some stimulants which quickly brought him out of his faint. Then a carriage was secured, and the man was taken to the village hotel, Joe agreeing to be responsible for his board. Though Mr. Benjamin had treated Mr. Matson most unjustly, and had tried to ruin him, yet the son thought he could do no less than to give him some aid, especially after the warning.
"Well, I guess it's all over but the shouting, as they say at the baseball games," remarked Tom to Joe. "Let's get home. I'm cold," for they had both been drenched over the upper part of their bodies by the initiation, and the night wind was cold, in spite of the fact that Spring was well advanced.
"So am I," admitted Joe, as he watched the carriage containing Mr. Benjamin drive off. "I'd like some good hot lemonade."
The fire now held little attraction for our friends and they hastened back to the dormitory, Joe explaining on the way how he had unexpectedly rescued a former enemy of his father's.
"And aren't you going to send some word home about that warning he gave you?" asked Tom, as Joe finished. "That Holdney scoundrel may be working his scheme now."
"Oh, yes, sure. I'm going to write to dad as soon as we get back to our room. Sure I'm going to warn him. I'm mighty sorry for Mr. Benjamin. He's a smart man, but he went wrong, and now he's down and out, as he says. But he did me a good service."
"It doesn't even things up!" spoke Teeter. "He surely would have been a gone one but for you."
"Oh, some one else might have thought of that way of getting him down if I hadn't," replied Joe modestly. "I remember a story I read in one of the books I had when I was a kid. A fellow was on a high chimney, and a rope he had used to haul himself up slipped down. A big crowd gathered and no one knew how to help him. His wife came to bring his dinner and she got onto a scheme right away.
"'Hey, John!' she called 'unravel your sock. Begin at the toe!' You see he had on knitted socks. Well, he unravelled one, got a nice long piece of yarn and lowered it to the ground. He tied on his knife, or something for a weight. Then they fastened a cord to the yarn, and a rope to the cord, he pulled the rope up and got down off the chimney."
"Your process, only reversed," commented Tom. "I say fellows," he added, "let's run and get warmed up. I'm shivering."
"It was warm enough back there at the fire," said Teeter, as he looked to where the blaze was now dying out for lack of material on which to feed.
"Beastly mean of Hiram and Luke," commented Peaches. "They're getting scared I guess. I hope we get 'em out of the nine before the season's over."
Joe and Tom entertained their friends with crackers and hot lemonade, and none of the professors or monitors annoyed them with attentions. They must have known of it, when Peaches went to get the hot water in the dormitory kitchen, but it is something to have a hero in a school, and Joe was certainly the hero of the night.
The two lads, who had been thoroughly soaked, stripped and took a good rub down, and this, with the hot lemonade, set them into a warm glow. Then they sat about and talked and talked until nearly midnight.
Joe wrote a long letter to his father explaining all the circumstances and warned him to be on the lookout. One of the janitors who had to arise early to attend to his duties promised to see that the missive got off on the first morning mail.
"There, now, I guess we'll go to bed," announced Joe.
There was much subdued excitement in chapel the next morning, and Dr. Fillmore made a reference to the events of the night before.
"I am very proud of the way you young gentlemen behaved at the fire," he said. "It was an exciting occasion, and yet you held yourselves well within bounds. We have reason to be very proud of one of our number who distinguished himself, and----"
"Three cheers for Joe Matson!" yelled Peaches, and they were given heartily--something that had never before happened in chapel. Dr. Fillmore looked surprised, and Professor Rodd was evidently pained, but Dr. Rudden was observed to join in the ovation, over which Joe blushed painfully.
Joe caught a cold from his wetting and exposure. It was nothing serious, but the school physician thought he had better stay in bed for a couple of days, and, much against his will the young pitcher did so.
"How is baseball practice going on?" he asked Tom after the first day. "I wish I could get out and watch it."
"Oh, it's going pretty good. We scrubs have a hard job holding the school nine down when you're not there to pitch. There's a game with Woodside Hall to-morrow, and I guess we'll win."
Excelsior Hall did win that contest, but not by as big a score as they should have done. It was the old story of Hiram and Luke not managing things right, and having weak pitchers. Still it was a victory, and served to elate the bully and his crony.
It was on the third day of Joe's imprisonment in his room, and his cold was much better. He had heard that Mr. Benjamin had recovered and left the hotel; no one knew for what place.
He sent Joe a note of thanks, however, and it came in with some mail from home. Joe opened the home letters first. There was one from his father, enclosed in one from his mother and Clara.
"Dear Joe," wrote Mr. Matson. "I got your warning, but it was too late. Why didn't you telegraph me? The night before your letter got here some valuable papers and models were stolen from my new shop. I have no doubt but that Holdney did it--he or some of his tools. It will cripple me badly, but I may be able to pull through. I appreciate what Benjamin did for us, and it was mighty smart of you to save him that way. But why didn't you telegraph me about the danger to my models?"
"That's it!" exclaimed Joe bitterly to himself. "What a chump I was. Why didn't I telegraph dad, and then it would have been in time. Why didn't I?"
CHAPTER XXII
BITTER DEFEAT
Joe's first act, after receiving the bad news from home, was to sit down and write his father a letter full of vain regrets, of self-accusation, upbraiding himself for having been so stupid as not to have thought of telegraphing. He hastened to post this, going out himself though barely over his cold.
"I'm not going to take any more chances," he remarked to Tom. "Maybe that other letter wasn't mailed by the janitor, or it would have gotten to dad in time."
"Hardly," remarked his chum. "Your father says the things were taken the night before your letter arrived, so you would have had to write the day before to have done any good. Only a telegram would have been of any use."
"I guess so," admitted Joe sorrowfully. "I'm a chump!"
"Oh, don't worry any more," advised his friend. "Let's get at some baseball practice. The school has two games this week."
"Who with?" asked Joe.
"Woodside Hall and the Lakeview Preps. We ought to win 'em both. They need you back on the scrub. The first nine has had it too easy."
"And I'll be glad to get back," replied the young pitcher earnestly. "It seems as if I hadn't had a ball in my hands for a month."
Joe mailed his letter and then, as the day was just right to go out on the diamond, he and Tom hastened there, finding plenty of lads awaiting them. A five-inning game between the scrub and school teams was soon arranged.
"Now boys, go in and clean 'em up!" exclaimed Luke, as his men went to bat, allowing the scrub the advantage of being last up. This was done to make the first team strive exceptionally hard to pile up runs early in the practice.
"Don't any of you fan out," warned Hiram. "I'm watching you."
"And so am I," added Dr. Rudden, the coach, as he strolled up. "You first team lads want to look to your laurels. You have plenty of games to play before the finals to decide the possession of the Blue Banner, but remember that every league game counts. Your percentage is rather low for the start of the season."
He was putting it mildly. The percentage of Excelsior Hall was exceedingly low.
"Beat the scrub!" advised the coach-teacher.
"They can't do it with Joe in the box!" declared Tom; and Luke and Hiram sneered audibly. Their feeling against our two heroes had not improved since the event of the initiation.
The scrub nine was not noted for its heavy hitting, but in this practice game they outdid themselves, and when they came up for their first attempt they pulled down the lead of four runs which the school nine had, to one. There was an ominous look on the faces of Luke and Hiram as the first team went to bat for the second time.
"Make 'em look like a plugged nickel," advised Tom to his pitching chum. "The worse you make 'em take a beating the more it will show against Hiram and Luke. We want to get 'em out of the game."
"All right," assented Joe, and then he "tightened up," in his pitching, with the result that a goose egg went up in the second frame of the first team.
Even Dr. Rudden looked grave over this. If the school nine could not put up a better game against their own scrub, all of whose tricks and mannerisms they knew, what could they do against the two regular nines with whom they were to cross bats during the week? When the scrubs got another run, Joe knocking a three bagger, and coming home on Tommy Barton's sacrifice, there was even a graver look on the face of the coach. As for Luke and Hiram, they held a consultation.
"We'll have to make a shift somewhere," declared Hiram.
"I'll just let Akers go in the box in place of Frank Brown," decided the captain.
"No, that's not enough," insisted the manager. "You don't know how to play your own men."
"I know as much as you do about it!" fired back Luke. Of late the bully and his crony had not agreed overwell.
"No, you don't!" reaffirmed Hiram. "I tell you what you ought to do. You ought to get rid of Peaches, Teeter and George Bland."
"Why, they're three of the best players on the nine."
"No, they're not, and besides they're too friendly with Joe Matson and Sister Davis. They don't half play. They make errors on purpose, just to make the school team have a bad reputation."
"Why should they do that?"
"Don't you understand, you chump? They want to force you and me out. That's their game. They're sore about that meeting, and Matson and Davis are sore about lots of things. Peaches and the other two think if they get us out there'll be a chance for Joe to pitch."
"So that's their game, is it?" exclaimed Luke. "Well, I'll put a stop to it. I'll make subs of Peaches, Bland and Teeter, and put in some other players. They can't come it over me that way."
"Play ball!" called the umpire, for the talk between the captain and manager was delaying the game.
"Oh, we'll play all right," snapped Luke, and he knew that he and his nine had to, for the score was now tie. "Peaches, Teeter, Bland, you can sit on the bench a while!" went on Luke. "Wilson, Natch and Gonzales, you'll take their places."
"What's that for?" asked the innocent and unoffending Peaches.
"Have we played so rotten?" Teeter wanted to know.
"I made the changes because I wanted to," snapped Luke. "Go sit down with the other subs, and we'll see if we can't play a decent game."
Perhaps Peaches and his chums may have understood the reason for Luke's act, but if they did, they did not say so. The game went on with the three new players, and the result may be imagined. The scrub continued to get ahead, and the school nine could not catch up because Joe was pitching in great form, and striking out man after man, though he was hit occasionally.
"This is worse than ever," growled Hiram, when another inning passed and the scrub was five runs ahead. "Change back again, Luke."
"Say, they'll think I'm crazy."
"Can't help it. We'll be worse than crazy if we don't win this little measly game. And think what will happen Friday and Saturday. Change back."
So Peaches, Teeter and George were called from the bench again, and they played desperately. There was a general tightening all along the line, and the school nine began to see victory ahead. Joe got a little wild occasionally, principally because he was out of practice, but the best the school nine could do was to tie the score in the fifth inning, and it had to go to seven before they could win, though they had planned to play only five. The school nine won by a margin of one.
"That's too close for comfort, boys," said the coach. "Why didn't you have a little mercy, Joe?" he asked of the young scrub pitcher.
"I will next time--maybe," was the laughing answer. Luke and Hiram scowled at him as they passed. They would have witnessed with pleasure his withdrawal from the school. But Joe was going to stick.
"What are we going to do?" asked Luke of Hiram as they walked on.
"About what?"
"The nine. We've just _got_ to win these two games."
"Well, we'll have to do some more shifting, I guess, and Brown and Akers have got to tighten up on their pitching. We'll try some more shifting."
"Oh, you make me sick!" exclaimed the captain. "Always changing. What good does that do?"
"Say, I'm manager of this nine!" declared the bully, "and if you don't like the way I run things, you know what you can do."
Luke subsided after that. He was afraid of Hiram, and he wanted to remain as captain. The two discussed various plans, but could come to no decision.
The inevitable happened. In the game with Woodside the Excelsiors managed to get a few runs in the early innings, but their opponents did likewise, because the Hall pitcher could not hold the batters in check. Then Woodside sent in another pitcher, better than the first, and the Excelsiors got only a few scattering hits, while, after shifting from Brown to Akers, Luke's nine did even worse, for Akers was pounded out of the box. The score was fifteen to six in favor of Woodside when the final inning ended, and the Excelsiors filed off the diamond in gloomy mood.
"Well, it couldn't have been much worse," growled Luke to the manager.
"Oh, it was pretty bad," admitted Hiram, "but we'll whitewash the Preps."
The Excelsior Hall nine journeyed to the Lakeview school full of hope, for the lads there did not have a very good reputation as hitters, and their pitcher was not out of the ordinary. But it was the same old story--mismanagement, and a captain of the Excelsiors who didn't dare speak his own mind.
If Luke had been allowed to run the team to suit himself he might have been able to do something with it, but Hiram insisted on having his way.
The result can be imagined. Instead of beating the Lakeview boys by a large score, as they had done the previous year, Excelsior was beaten, nine to seven.
"Well, it's not as bad as the last game," was all the consolation Hiram could find.
"Say, don't talk to me!" snapped Luke. "Something's got to be done!"
"That's right," put in Peaches, who came up just then. "Something has got to be done, Hiram Shell, and right away, too."
He looked the bully squarely in the face. Behind Peaches came Teeter, George Bland and several of the subs.
"What--what do you mean?" stammered Hiram.
"I mean that it's either you or us," went on Peaches.
"Either you get out as manager or we get out as players," added Teeter. "We're tired of playing on a nine that can't win a game. We can play ball, and we know it. But not with you, Hiram. What's it going to be--you or us?"
"Say!" burst out the bully. "I'll have you know that----"
A hand was placed on his shoulder. He wheeled about to confront Dr. Rudden.
"I think something _must_ be done," said the coach quietly. "Call a meeting of the Athletic Committee, Shell."
"What for?" asked the bully.
"To discuss the situation. There has got to be a change if Excelsior Hall is to have a chance for the Blue Banner. If you don't call the meeting, Shell, I will."
It was perhaps the best thing that could have happened, and to save friction among the students, many of whom were still for the manager, Hiram knew he had to give in to Dr. Rudden.
"All right," he growled. "The meeting will take place to-night."
Quickly the word went around through the precincts of Excelsior Hall.
"There's going to be another hot meeting."
"Hiram's on his last legs."
"His game is up now."
"This means that Joe Matson will pitch, sure, and we'll win some games now."
"If Hiram goes, Luke will, too, and there'll be a new captain."
These were only a few of the comments and predictions made by the players and other students as they got ready to attend the session.
CHAPTER XXIII
HIRAM IS OUT
There was an ominous silence over the gathering in the gymnasium. It was entirely different from the former meeting which started in such a hub-bub, and which created such a stir. This time it meant "business," as Peaches said.
Hiram called the session, but refused to preside. He wanted to be able to say what he thought from the floor, and from the manner in which he and Luke and one or two of their friends conferred before the session opened, it was evident that Hiram was going to make a fight to maintain his prestige.
"Come to order, young gentlemen," suggested Dr. Rudden, when the gymnasium was well filled. It seemed as if every lad in Excelsior Hall was there. "You know what we are here for----"
"To elect a new manager and captain!" shouted someone.
"Stop!" commanded the coach, banging his gavel.
"Who said that?" cried Hiram, springing to his feet. "If I find out----"
"Silence!" commanded the chairman, while Luke pulled his crony to his seat.
"This meeting will be conducted in a gentlemanly manner, or not at all," went on the professor quietly; but the boys knew what he meant. "We are here to discuss the baseball situation, and try to decide on some plan for bettering the team. I will hear suggestions."
"I just want to say one thing," began Hiram. "I have managed this team for three seasons, and----"
"Mis-managed it," murmured someone.
"Why didn't we get the Blue Banner?" asked another voice.
"Young gentlemen, you will have to keep from making side remarks, and interrupting the speakers," said Dr. Rudden. "Go on, Shell."
"I never had any kicking on my management before," continued Hiram, glaring at those around him. "I can manage it all right now, and it's only some soreheads----"
"Rather unparliamentary language," the chairman warned him.
"If we had a few good players we could win every game," went on the bully. "But the season is young yet, and----"
"I don't think that is a valid excuse," said the professor. "You had your choice of the whole school in picking the nine, so it is the fault of yourself and the captain if you haven't a good team. As for the earliness of the season, the boys have had plenty of practice and they ought to have struck their gait before this. I'm afraid something else is to blame."
"We need better pitchers for one thing!" called someone.
"That's right!" yelled a double score of voices, and Dr. Rudden, seeing the sway of sentiment, did not object.
"We've got two good pitchers!" fairly yelled Hiram. "I know what this all means--that Joe Matson and his crowd----"
"That will do," the chairman warned him.
"It's true!" exclaimed Frank Brown, jumping to his feet. "I'm not a good pitcher, and I don't mind admitting it. I can't hold the other fellows down enough. If I could, we would have won these last two games, for our boys can bat when they haven't the heart taken out of them."
"That's the way to talk!" cried Tom Davis.
"Nothing like being honest about it," commented Dr. Rudden. "That statement does you credit, Brown. How many of you think the same--that a different pitcher would strengthen the team?"
"I! I! I!" yelled scores.
"It's not so! Our pitchers are good enough!" These cries came from Luke, Hiram and a few of their cronies.
"There seems to be a division of opinion," began the chairman. "I think we had better vote on it."
"There are a lot of fellows here who have no right to vote!" cried Hiram.
"That won't do, Shell," said Dr. Rudden sternly. "This is a matter that concerns the entire school--to have a winning nine. Every student is entitled to vote."
"Hurrah!" yelled Tom. "This is a victory all right. The end of Hiram, Luke and Company has come."
"You'll pitch on the school team, Joe!" called Peaches in our hero's ear.
"I'd like to," Joe answered back, "but I'm afraid----"
"All in favor of having a change in pitchers, since Frank Brown has been good enough, and manly enough, to say that he knows his own weakness--all in favor of a change vote 'aye,'" directed the chairman.
"Aye!" came in a thunderous chorus.
"Contrary minded----"
"No!" snapped Hiram. Luke and Jake Weston followed with feeble negatives. They, too, were beginning to see which way the wind blew.
"Whom will you have for pitcher?" asked the Professor. "Can you decide now, or will you wait and----"
"Decide now!" was yelled. "Joe Matson for pitcher! Baseball Joe. Joe Matson!" was cried in different parts of the room.
"Very well," assented the chairman. "This may be a wise move. All in favor of Joe Matson as pitcher, since Frank Brown, the regular boxman, has practically resigned--all say 'aye.'"
Again came the hearty assent, and again the feeble objection of Hiram.
"Joe Matson is now the regular pitcher for the school nine," said Dr. Rudden.
"And I want to say that I'm glad of the change," put in Larry Akers.
"Hurray! Hurray!" yelled the now excited and enthusiastic students. Things seemed to be coming out right after all.
"I want to say," exclaimed Joe, "that while I appreciate the honor done me, we may need substitute pitchers. In fact, I'm sure we will, and I wish Frank and Larry would remain to help me. I'll coach them all I can, and I know they both have pitching stuff in them. I've made quite a study of pitching as an amateur. Some day I hope to be a professional, and I'm willing to tell Frank and Larry all I know."
"Good!" exclaimed the chairman. "I think they'll take your offer. Well, we have now made one change. Are there any more that you think necessary?"
It was rather a delicate question, for everyone knew what was meant. But the lads were saved from doing what most of them knew ought to be done.
"Do I understand that Joe Matson is the regular pitcher on the school team?" asked the manager, sourly.
"That seems to be the sentiment of the students, Shell," answered Dr. Rudden.
"And without me, or the captain, having anything to say about it?"
"You were out-voted, Shell."
"Well, then all I've got to say is that I don't manage this nine any more!" fairly yelled Hiram. "There's my resignation, and it takes effect at once!" and, walking down the aisle he threw a folded paper on the table at which the professor sat.
"Shall this resignation be accepted?" asked the chairman, amid a rather tense silence.
"Yes!" came so quickly and with such volume that there was no doubt about the sentiment of the crowd. Perhaps Hiram had hoped that he would be asked to reconsider it, but if so he was disappointed. He walked back to where Luke sat. He leaned over the captain and said something in a whisper.
"I'm not going to," replied Luke, loudly enough for all in the room to hear.
"Go on!" ordered the bully. "If you don't, I'll----" and then his voice sank to a whisper again.
"All right," assented Luke, and walking forward as his crony had done, he, too, tossed a paper on the table. "There's my resignation as captain and a member of the Excelsior baseball nine!" he exclaimed.
There was a gasp of surprise from the crowd. Hiram and Luke both out! It was rather unexpected, but Tom and his friends felt elated. Now they would have a chance to play. It looked like the dawn of a brighter day for Excelsior Hall.
CHAPTER XXIV
TWO OF A KIND
"There is another resignation to act on," said Dr. Rudden, after a pause, and, somehow he did not seem half as worried over it as Luke had hoped he would be. "What shall we do with it?"
"Take it!" exclaimed Tom, and it was accepted with a promptness that startled the former captain.
"The action taken to-night makes it necessary to elect a new manager and a captain," went on the professor. "Perhaps the manager should be elected first. Whom will you have?"
"Peaches Lantfeld," called some.
"Teeter Nelson," said others.
"George Bland! Sister Davis! Ward Gerard! Tommy Barton," called various lads. There were more nominations, but Peaches received the majority of votes, and was declared elected. Teeter was the first to congratulate him, and the others followed.
"Now a captain," suggested the chairman.
"Joe Matson!" yelled scores of voices.
"No, I can't accept," cried Joe, jumping to his feet. "If I'm going to pitch I want to give all my time to that. I'm much obliged, but I decline."
"I think it would not be wise to make your pitcher the captain, especially at this time," spoke Dr. Rudden. "The catcher is in a better position to captain a team, for he can see all the plays. You will have to have a new catcher, and----"
"Ward Gerard!" called Joe. "He's caught for me on the scrub, and----"
"Ward! Ward Gerard!" Scores of lads took up the calling of his name. He was very popular, and was elected in a minute, while Hiram and Luke, followed by Jake Weston, filed from the room in plainly-shown disgust, sneers on their faces.
Nothing more remained to do save to have a conference of the new captain and manager, to arrange for future practice and playing. This was soon done, and Ward told the lads to report early the next Monday afternoon, when they would play the scrub, which organization had also to select a new captain and pitcher, as well as catcher.
"Now, all I want is to get Tom Davis on the school nine, and I'll be happy," said Joe to Peaches and Teeter, as the meeting broke up.
"I think you can," declared Teeter. "Jake Weston is going to get out, I hear, and Tom will fit in. Charlie Borden can take Jake's place at short and Tom can play first, which he's used to. Oh, I guess old Excelsior Hall has come into her own again, and we'll make some of these other teams sit up and take notice."
And Jake did resign, following the example of his two cronies. This made a place for Tom, and he promptly filled it.
There was a snap and a vim to the playing of the school nine when they first went at it with the changed players, that fairly took the breath out of the scrub. Of course that unfortunate collection of players was weakened by the withdrawal of Joe, Ward and Tom, but even with players of equal strength it is doubtful if they could have held the school nine down.
Joe and his mates struck a winning streak, and the young pitcher never was better than in that practice game on Monday afternoon.
"Joe's pitching his head off," observed Tom Davis, and when Ward missed holding one or two particular "hot" ones he thought the same thing. The school team won a decisive victory.
"But that doesn't mean we will beat Trinity on Saturday," said Peaches, the new manager. "Don't begin to take it easy, fellows. And then follows the second game in the series with Morningside. We've got to get that or those boys will think they've gotten into the habit of beating us."
"We'll trim 'em both!" cried Tom.
"Sure," assented Joe. It was like old times now, he reflected, he and Tom together on a team as they had been on the Silver Stars. The only thing that worried Joe was the theft of his father's papers and patent models. He knew it would mean a serious loss to his parents, and Joe was rather in fear that he might have to leave boarding school.
"If I have to go away, I hope it won't be until after I have helped win back the Blue Banner," he confided to Tom.
"Oh, don't worry," advised his chum; and a few days later Joe received a letter from home, telling him the same thing.
Mr. Matson wrote that whereas the loss would badly cripple him, yet he did not want Joe to worry.
The game with Trinity was a source of delight to the Excelsior team. Their rivals came to the diamond battlefield eager for a victory, and they worked hard for it, but the new combination was too much for them. When the final run was chalked up the score stood:
Excelsior Hall, 11; Trinity, 4.
"That's what we want to do to Morningside," said Tom.
"And we will!" predicted Joe.
They had hard practice before the second game with their ancient rivals--for Morningside was a foe whom Excelsior Hall was always eager to beat. In the series for the possession of the Blue Banner she had three games with Morningside and a like number with the other teams in the league.
It was the day of the second Morningside game, and it was to take place on the Excelsior diamond. The weather could not have been better. Spring was just merging into Summer, and the lads were on their mettle. There had been a big improvement in their playing, and they were ready to do battle to a finish.
Luke and Hiram had not been much in evidence since their resignations. They occasionally came to a game, or to practice, but they made sneering remarks, and few of the students had anything to do with them. It was quite a jolt for Hiram, used as he was to running matters to suit himself.
The crowd began arriving early at the Excelsior diamond, for word had gone around that it was to be a game for "blood," and both teams were on edge. If Excelsior had improved, so had Morningside. They had strengthened their men by long, hard practice, and they were confident of victory.
Joe and Tom had expected before this to hear something about their old enemy, Sam Morton, at Morningside, but the former pitcher for the Silver Stars was seldom mentioned. However, it was learned that he was to substitute in the Morningside-Excelsior game.
Out on the diamond trotted the renovated Excelsior nine. They were received with a burst of applause, and at once got to practice. A little later out came their rivals, and there was a cheer for them. Immediately the opposition cheering and shouting contingents got busy, and there was a riot of sound.
"Going to stay and see the game?" asked Luke of Hiram, as they entered the gate.
"Yes, might as well. Gee! But I hope our fellows lose!"
Nice sentiments, weren't they for an Excelsior student? But then Hiram was very sore and angry.
"So do I," added Luke. "It would show them what a mistake they made by dropping us."
"That's right," agreed the conceited Hiram. "If they had only waited we'd have come out all right. It was all the fault of Joe Matson and Tom Davis. I'll get square with 'em yet."
They strolled over the grounds, winding in and out amid the throngs. They almost collided with a Morningside player.
"Beg your pardon," murmured Luke. "Oh, it's Sam Morton," he added, for he had met Sam in town a week or so previously. "Have you met Hiram Shell, Sam," and he introduced the two.
"Oh, yes, you're the manager of the Excelsiors," said Sam. "Glad to know you. I think we'll beat you again. I may pitch after the fifth inning. I'm only the sub now, but I expect to be the regular soon."
"I _was_ manager," replied Hiram bitterly, "but Joe Matson and his crowd put up a game on me, and I resigned."
"Joe Matson, eh? He's the same fellow who made a lot of trouble for me."
"Excuse me," murmured Luke. "I see a friend of mine. I'm going to leave you for a minute."
"All right," assented Hiram. "So Joe Matson made trouble for you, too, eh?" he went on to Sam, curiously.
"Yes, he played a mean trick on me, and took my place as pitcher," which wasn't exactly true, as my old readers know. "I'd like to get square with him some way," concluded Sam.
"Say, so would I!" exclaimed Hiram eagerly. "Shake hands on that. He's a low sneak, and he played a mean trick on me. I'd do anything to get even."
"Maybe we can," suggested Sam.
"How?"
"Oh, lots of ways. Come on over here where no one will hear us. Maybe we can fix up some scheme on him. I'd give a good deal to get even."
"So would I," added Hiram. "I wish I could get him off the nine, and out of the school."
"I'll help you," proposed Sam eagerly; and then the two, who were very much of a kind when it came to disliking our hero, walked off, whispering together.
"Play ball!" came the distant cry of the umpire, and the great Excelsior-Morningside game was about to start. But the plotters did not turn back to watch it.
CHAPTER XXV
BY A CLOSE MARGIN
"Whew!" whistled Captain Elmer Dalton of the Morningside nine, as he greeted some of the lads against whom his team was to play, "you fellows have been making a lot of changes, haven't you?" and he looked at the several new members of the school team, including Joe and Tom.
"Yes, a bit of house cleaning," replied Ward Gerard. "I am captain now. Hiram and Luke got out."
"Yes, I heard there was some sort of a row."
"Oh, I suppose it's all over the league by this time," put in Peaches. "But it couldn't be helped. It was like a dose of bitter medicine, but we took it, and I think it's going to do us good."
"You mean _we're_ going to do you good," laughed Elmer. "We're going to trim you again to-day."
"Not much!" cried Ward. "We'll win. Come now, a little wager between you and me--for the sodas, say."
"You're on!" agreed Elmer. "Where's your batting list?"
The two captains walked over to the scoring bench to arrange the details of the game. The two teams were made up as follows, this being the batting order:
EXCELSIOR-- George Bland      centre field Dick Lantfeld       left field Harry Nelson       second base Nat Pierson         third base Tom Davis           first base Charles Borden       shortstop Harry Lauter       right field Joe Matson             pitcher Ward Gerard            catcher
MORNINGSIDE-- Dunlap Spurr      centre field Will Lee             shortstop Wilson Carlburg     left field Ted Clay               pitcher Wallace Douglass       catcher Elmer Dalton        first base Walker Bromley      third base Loftus Brown       second base Harry Young        right field
The Excelsiors were to bat last, and while the rival crowds of school boys were singing, cheering and giving their class yells, Joe Matson walked to the box for the second time as pitcher on the school nine in a big school league game. No wonder he felt a trifle nervous, but he did not show it, not even when some one yelled:
"Look at the new pitcher they've got! We'll get his number all right."
"Yes, we'll have his goat in about a minute!" added another Morningside partizan.
"Go as far as you like," answered Joe with a smile.
"Play ball!" yelled the umpire, and Joe faced the first batter, Dunlap Spurr, who had the reputation of being a heavy hitter. Ward signalled for a low one, for he knew that Dunlap had a tendency to hit over such a ball. Joe nodded his head to show that he understood, and the next moment the horsehide went speeding toward the plate.
The batter swung viciously at it but--missed. He had gone half a foot over it.
"Strike!" cried the umpire.
"Make him give you a pretty one!" called Elmer. "He will if you wait."
"He won't have long to wait," retorted our hero. This time he decided to send one over the corner of the plate, as he noticed that Dunlap had a free swing. Joe hoped he would strike at it and miss, and that was exactly what happened.
"Strike two!" howled the umpire, and there followed a gasp of dismay. Dunlap was not in the habit of doing this, and he rather scowled. Joe smiled.
"One more and we'll have him down!" called the catcher.
"Where'd you get the pitcher?" asked a Morningside wit.
"Oh, we had him made to order," replied Tom Davis, who was anxiously waiting on first.
Joe hoped he could make it three straight strikes, but his next was called a ball, and the Morningside supporters let out a yell of gratification.
"There's his glass arm showing! He's going to pieces!" they yelled. Joe shut his jaw grimly. He was going to fool the batter if possible, and the next ball he sent in was a puzzling inshoot.
Instinctively Dunlap started away from the plate, but he need not have moved, for the ball, with a neat little twist, passed him at a safe distance, and at a point where he could almost have hit it had he tried. But he did not move his bat, and an instant later the umpire called:
"Three strikes--batter out!"
Then indeed was there a gasp of dismay and protest from the big crowd of Morningside sympathizers, and the visiting nine.
"Say," began Dunlap Spurr, "that was never----"
"You dry up!" commanded his captain with a laugh. "It was a peach of a ball, and you ought to have hit it. Don't begin that way. We can beat 'em without that. Good work, Matson, but you can't keep it up. Come on, Lee; you're up next. Carlburg on deck."
Joe was immensely pleased, but he knew it was only the beginning of the battle. He got two strikes on Lee and that player began to get worried. Then, after one ball, Lee hit the next one for a pop fly that Joe hardly had to step out of his box to get.
"Two down, play for all you're worth, Joe," called Ward; but Joe needed no such urging. However, something went wrong. Either Joe did not have as good control, speed or curving ability as when he had started in, or the next players found him. At any rate Carlburg knocked a dandy two bagger, and Ted Clay, who followed, duplicated the trick. Carlburg came in with the first run of the game, amid a riot of noise, and when Wallace Douglass hit safely to first, Clay got to third, coming in with the second run a little later, when Captain Dalton also singled.
"We've got 'em going! We've got 'em going!" yelled the delighted Morningside crowd, and it did seem so. Joe felt that he must tighten up, and strike out the next man, or all would be lost.
He glanced at the bench, where the jubilant Morningside players were sitting, all regarding him sharply. It was a supreme test. Then Joe caught the eyes of some one else on him. The eyes of Sam Morton, his old enemy.
It was like a dash of cold water. For the time being he had forgotten that Sam was the substitute pitcher on the visiting team, but had Joe seen him and Hiram in close consultation a little while previously, our hero would have had reason long to remember it.
"I'll show 'em I am still in the ring!" Joe murmured, and when he wound up for his next delivery he knew that he had himself well in hand again.
"Come on now, bring us all in!" urged Captain Dalton, when Walker Bromley got up to the plate. "He'll walk you, and then Loftus and Harry will have a show. We'll have the whole team up."
It began to look so, for already seven of the nine had been at bat. Joe might have wasted time trying to nail some lad who was playing too far off base, but he did not. Instead he sized up Bromley and sent him a swift one. The batter struck at it and missed. The next ball was called a strike, and attention was at fever heat. Would Walker hit it?
The question was answered in the negative a moment later, for he swung at it with all his force and fanned the air.
"Out!" called the umpire, and the side was retired. But Morningside had two runs, and the way Joe had been hit by four men did not augur well for Excelsior's chances.
"Oh, we'll do 'em!" said Ward, with more confidence than he felt.
"I hope they pound Joe out of the box," murmured Hiram to Luke.
"So do I," said the former catcher.
Excelsior hoped for great things when it came her turn at stick-work, but alas for hopes! A series of happenings worked against her. George Bland rapped out as pretty a two bagger as one could wish, but he tried to steal third, slipped on a pebble when almost safe, and was thrown out. Peaches Lantfeld knocked a sharp grounder that looked almost certain to get past the shortstop; and it did, but the third baseman, who was a rattling good player, nabbed it and Peaches went down.
"Now, Teeter!" called Ward. "See what you can do."
Teeter got to first on a muffed fly, and it was Nat Pierson's turn. Nat could usually be depended on, but this time he could not. He fanned twice and the third time got two fouls in succession.
"Well, we're finding the ball, anyhow," said Ward cheerfully. "Kill it next time, Nat, and give Sister Davis a show."
Nat tried to, but he knocked an easy fly, which the pitcher gathered in, and the opportunity of the Excelsior nine was over for that inning. A big goose egg went up in their frame. Score: 2--0, in favor of the visitors.
Joe took a long breath when he went into the box again, and facing Loftus Brown, struck him out in such short order that his friends began to breathe easier again. The game was far from lost, and as long as Joe did not allow his "goat" to be gotten, Excelsior might win yet. Then Harry Young, probably the poorest batter the visitors had, fanned thrice successively, and it was Dunlap Spurr's turn again. Joe knew just what to give him, and when he struck him out, after two foul strikes had been made, the crowd set up a yell.
The visitors did not get a run in their half of the second, and once more Excelsior had a show. Tom Davis singled, got around to third when Charlie Borden knocked a two-bagger, and slid home in a close play when Harry Lauter was thrown out at first. There was only one gone when Joe came to bat, and one run had come in. Joe knocked a safety, or at least it looked as if it was going to be that, but the shortstop, by a magnificent jump into the air, nabbed it, and then came as pretty a double play as had ever taken place on that diamond. Joe was put out and Charlie Borden, who had been hugging third, was caught at home, for he was not a fast runner.
That retired the side, and there was only one run to match the two which Morningside had. Still it was something, and the home team began to take heart.
Then began what was one of the most remarkable games in the series. Joe did not allow a hit in the first half of the third inning and the Excelsiors got one run, tying the score. In the fourth the visitors pulled a single tally down, putting them one ahead, and then, just to show what they could do, the home team knocked out two, gaining an advantage of one.
The crowd was wild with delight at the clean playing, for both teams were on their mettle, and the rival pitchers were delivering good balls. But the fifth inning nearly proved a Waterloo for our friends. The Morningsides got four runs, which made Joe groan inwardly in anguish, for he was severely pounded.
"Maybe you'd better let Brown or Akers go in," he suggested to Ward.
"Not on your life!" cried the captain. "You are all right. It was just a slip. Hold hard and we'll do 'em."
Joe held hard, and there was a little encouragement when his team got one run, making the score at the ending of the fifth inning seven to five in favor of the Morningside team.
Once more in the opening of the sixth Joe did the trick. He allowed but one single, and then three men fanned in succession, while, just to make things more than ever interesting, the Excelsiors got two runs, again tying the score.
"Say, we'll have to wake up if we're going to wallop these fellows," confided the visiting captain to his lads. "They have certainly improved a lot by getting Hiram and Luke out."
"Oh, we'll do 'em," predicted Ted Clay, the pitcher.
From then on the Excelsiors fairly "played their heads off," and they ought to have done much better than they did when their hard work was taken into consideration. But there were many weak spots that might in the future be eliminated by good coaching, and Joe needed harder practice.
But in every inning thereafter the home team got at least one run, save only in the seventh. In their half of the sixth they got two, as I have said, and though the visitors got one in their half of the seventh, again making the score one in their favor, in the eighth our friends got three, while the visitors got only two. So that at the close of the eighth the score was: Excelsior, 10; Morningside 10.
"A tie! A tie!" cried hundreds of voices. Indeed it had pretty nearly been a tie game all the way through, and it might go to ten innings or more.
"We've got to beat 'em!" declared Captain Ward. "Joe, whitewash 'em this inning, and in the next we'll get the winning run."
"I'll do it!" confidently promised the young pitcher, and he did. He was tossing the ball according to his old form again, and not a man landed his stick on it during the first half of the ninth. Then, as the home team came up for their last whacks (except in the event of the score being a tie), they were wildly greeted by their schoolmates.
"One run to beat 'em! Only one!" yelled the crowd.
"I guess it's all up with us," remarked the visiting captain to his men, as they took the field. "They're bound to get that one."
"Not if I can help it!" exclaimed the pitcher fiercely.
And it looked as if he was going to make good his boast, for he struck out two men in quick order. And then up came Tom Davis.
"Swat it, Tom. Swat it!" was the general cry. "Bring in a home run!"
"Watch me," he answered grimly.
Two strikes were called on him, and two balls. There was a nervous tension on everyone, for, unless Tom made good, the game would have to go another inning, when all sorts of possibilities might happen.
Ping!
That was the mighty sound of Tom's bat landing on the ball. Away sailed the horsehide--up and away, far over the head of the centre fielder, who raced madly after it.
"Go on! Go on!"
"Run, you swatter, run!"
"A homer! A homer!"
These cries greeted and encouraged Tom as he legged it for first base. On and on he went, faster and faster, rounding the initial bag, going on to second and then to third. The centre fielder had the ball now, but he would have to relay it in. He threw as Tom left third.
"Come on! Come on!" yelled Joe, jumping up and down.
"If you don't bring in that run I'll never speak to you again!" shouted Ward.
The crowd was in a frenzy. Men and women were standing up on the seats, some jumping up and down, others yelling at the tops of their voices, and some pounding each other on the back in their excitement.
On and on ran Tom, but he was getting weary now. The second baseman had the ball and was swinging his arm back to hurl it home. But Tom was almost there now, and he slid over the plate a full two seconds ere the ball landed in the catcher's big mitt.
"Safe!" howled the umpire.
"And we win the game!" yelled Joe, as he raced over to Tom and slapped him on the back, an example followed by so many others that poor Tom nearly lost his breath. "You won the game for us, Tom!"
"Nonsense! If you hadn't held 'em down by your pitching, Joe, my run wouldn't have done any good."
"That's right!" cried the others, and it was so. Excelsior Hall had won the second of the big games with her ancient rival, though it was by the narrow margin of one run.
CHAPTER XXVI
THE OVERTURNED STATUE
"Three cheers for the Excelsiors!" cried the visiting captain, swinging his hat around in the air as a signal to his crowd, after the excitement had somewhat calmed. "Three good cheers, boys! They beat us fair and square! Three big cheers!"
And how they rang out! And how also rang out the return cheers, which Joe and his mates rendered. Never had applause sounded sweeter in the ears of our hero, for it seemed that the school nine had now begun to live in better days, since the dismissal of Hiram and Luke.
Joe kept at his pitching practice, and he himself knew, even had others, including Tom, not told him, that he was doing well.
"You're better than when you pitched for the Silver Stars," said Tom, "and you were no slouch then."
"Yes, I think I _am_ more sure of myself," admitted Joe. "And I've got more speed and better curves." It was natural that he should have. He was growing taller and stronger that Summer, and he had most excellent practice. He had not given up the idea of becoming a professional pitcher, and everything he could do tended that way for him.
He had heard nothing more definite from home, but Mr. Matson said he was still trying to trace the stolen models and papers.
"I'll help you when vacation time comes," said Joe in a letter. "But I'm playing ball for all I'm worth now."
"Keep at it," his father wrote back.
There were many games played that season by Excelsior Hall--many more than the previous Summer--for Spring had now given place to warm weather. The school term was drawing to a close, but there were still many more games to play in the league series.
In succession Excelsior met and defeated Trinity, the Lakeview Preps. and Woodside Hall. She was near the top of the list now, though Morningside was quite a way in advance. It looked as if eventually there would be a tie for first place between the old rivals--a tie for the possession of the Blue Banner, and if there was it meant a great final game. Joe looked forward to it with mingled fear and hope.
"How I hate him!" exclaimed Hiram to his crony, Luke, one day after a close game, when Joe's pitching had won again for Excelsior. "I wish I could get him out of the school, or off the nine, or something."
"Why don't you? I thought you and Sam Morton had some scheme."
"We thought so, too, but it fell through. But I've thought of something else, and if you and Sam will help me carry it out, I think we can put it all over that fresh guy."
"Sure, I'll help; what is it?"
"First we've got to get hold of something belonging to him--his knife, if it's got his name on; a letter addressed to him, that he's opened and read; a handkerchief with his name on; anything that would show he'd been in a certain place at a certain time."
"Suppose we do?"
"Leave the rest to Sam and me, if you can get us something."
"I'll do it!" promised Luke. "I'm on the same corridor with Joe now; I changed my room, you know. I shouldn't wonder but what I could sneak in and get something belonging to him."
"Do it, then. I've got a date with Sam, and I'll go see him. See if you can get something this afternoon or evening, and if you can we'll do it."
"I will," and the two plotters parted, the chief one to keep an appointment with Joe's enemy. Sam's hatred against our hero was increased because Sam was not allowed to pitch for his own team.
"I've got to keep Ted Clay in condition, so that when we meet Excelsior again he'll be on edge," said Captain Dalton of the Morningsides. "That Matson is a wonder and we can't take any chances. I don't dare risk letting you pitch."
"That's another one I owe to Joe!" muttered Sam. "I must certainly get even with him. Hiram and I ought to pull off something," and then he sent word to the Excelsior bully. That afternoon the three conspirators, with guilty looks, met in a secluded place and talked over their plans.
There was a knock on Joe's door. His chum Tom had gone out that evening to a lecture, and our hero was all alone.
"Come!" called Joe, and from down the corridor Luke Fodick peered out of his slightly-opened door to see what was going on.
"Here's a telegram for you," said one of the school messengers, handing in a yellow envelope.
"A telegram for me," murmured Joe. "It must be from dad. I may have to send an answer. Did the messenger wait?"
"No, he's gone."
"All right, if I do have to wire, perhaps I can get permission to go in to town to do it."
Quickly Joe tore open the message. It was brief, and it was from his father.
"Understand Holdney is somewhere near Cedarhurst," the message read. "Keep a lookout, and if you get trace notify police there at once. Arrest on larceny charge."
"Rufus Holdney near here," murmured Joe. "I must keep my eyes open. I'll wire dad at once, telling him I'm on the job."
He hurried from his room, stuffing the telegram in his pocket as he went, and never noticing as he passed Luke's door that it fell out into the corridor.
"I hope I can get permission to go to the telegraph office," mused Joe as he hastened to the office. "I guess the doctor will let me when I tell him what it's about."
As Joe turned a corner out of sight, Luke sprang out, picked up the message and envelope, and exclaimed:
"This will do the trick! Now to find Hiram and Sam."
He hurried to tell his crony, who was being visited by Sam, and once more the three put their heads together, to work the ruin of our hero.
Joe easily obtained permission to go to town to send his message. He was rather surprised on looking in his pocket for his father's telegram, not to find it, but concluded that he had left it in his room. He did not really need it, anyhow, as he knew the contents perfectly well.
The telegraph office was closed when he reached it, but the operator lived near by, and agreed to open his place, and tick off the message. This delayed Joe, however, and he was rather late getting back to the school. He did not see a teacher to report to him, as he had been bidden to do, but hurried to his own room.
He was tired and soon fell asleep, noting that Tom was already in bed and slumbering. Joe did not look for his lost message.
There was a thundering knock at Joe's door the next morning. It awoke him and Tom.
"What's the matter?" he asked. "Fire!"
"Fire! No. Haven't you heard the news?" asked the voice of Peaches. "There's a big row on."
"What's up?" demanded Tom, slipping out of bed, and opening the door.
"The Founder Statue has been pulled from its base, and overturned!" said Teeter, who was with Peaches. "Look, you can see it from your window."
Tom and Joe hastened to the casement to look. On the campus, not far from the school, stood a bronze statue of Dr. Theodore Whittleside, the original founder of the institution. It was a fine piece of work, the gift of several of the alumni societies, and was almost sacred. Now some ruthless hand had pulled it from its base, and part of one of the hands was broken off.
For a moment Joe and Tom stood aghast, looking at it. Then the meaning of it came to them. Some sacrilegious student, or students, had done the deed.
"There'll be a peach of a row over this!" declared Teeter. "Hurry up and get to chapel. Old Cæsar is sure to spout a lot about it. It's sure dismissal for whoever did it."
"And it ought to be!" exclaimed Joe wrathfully.
"If they catch them," added Tom, thoughtfully. "I wonder who did it?"
CHAPTER XXVII
ON PROBATION
Joe did not get to chapel that morning. He was all ready to go with Tom and the others after making a hasty toilet, when a messenger came to the door.
"Dr. Fillmore wants to see you in his office, Joe," said the messenger--a nice lad who did this work to help pay for his tuition.
"Wants to see me--what for?" demanded our hero. "Are you sure that's right, Georgie?"
"Sure, and a teacher's there with him. I'm not sure but I think it's something about the overthrown statue. I heard them mention it as they called me to go for you."
"The overturned statue? I don't know anything about it!" exclaimed Joe. "I only just this moment saw it--from my window."
"Well, the doctor wants you, anyhow," repeated the messenger lad. "You'd better go."
"Oh, sure," assented Joe, and he started for the doctor's study with wonder in his heart and a puzzled and rather an ominous look on his face. His companions regarded him seriously.
"What do you s'pose is in the wind?" asked Peaches.
"Give it up," remarked Teeter. "Are _you_ on, Tom?"
"Nary a bit. First I knew of it was when you fellows came and told me."
"Was Joe out last night?" asked Peaches.
"That's so, he did go into town," replied Tom. "He left a note to tell me--but that was all straight--he had permission. It can't be that."
"Well, we'll hear in chapel," said Teeter.
"Ah, it's you is it, Matson?" asked the doctor, as our hero entered the study. There was a curious note in the master's voice, and he glanced narrowly at Joe. "Come in. I am sorry to have to summon you on such an unpleasant and important matter, but I have no choice. As you probably know, the Founder's Statue was overturned last night."
He looked questioningly at Joe.
"I just saw it from my window," was the simple answer.
"It was done last night," went on the doctor with a look at a teacher who acted as proctor. "It was a disgraceful, vile piece of vandalism. The guilty one will be severely punished. Doubtless you are wondering why we sent for you. It was on account of this, which was picked up by one of the janitors in front of the statue, when he discovered its fallen position this morning."
Dr. Fillmore held out to Joe the telegram our hero had received from his father the night previous!
"Is this yours?" asked the doctor.
"Ye--yes, it came to me last night. It's from my father."
"What did you do after you got it?"
"Put it in my pocket and went out to answer it. I had permission from the proctor."
"That is right," assented that official. "But I did not see you come in."
"No, I was late. The telegraph office was not open, and I had to rouse the operator."
"When did you last see this telegram?" asked the doctor.
"I missed it soon after I started, but I concluded that I had dropped it," said Joe. Then it all came to him. The school authorities believed that the telegram had dropped out of his pocket when he was at the work of overturning the statue, in which vandalism he had no hand.
"It was picked up near where the vile work went on," said the doctor bitterly. "It is evidence that even if you had no actual hand in the dastardly horseplay, that you might have witnessed it, and you can tell us who did it. That is what we now call on you to do, Matson. Tell us who did it."
"But I don't know!" cried poor Joe. "I didn't see anything of it. I got in a little late, and went at once to my room. That telegram may have dropped from my pocket at any time, someone may have picked it up and put it--I mean dropped it--as they were passing the statue--either before or after it was pulled from the base."
"That is hardly likely," said the doctor. "I am very sorry, Matson, but I must conclude that even if you had no hand in the vandalism, that you know who did it, or suspect."
"But I don't!" cried Joe eagerly. "Someone may have put this telegram there to make it look----"
He stopped in some confusion. He never had been a "squealer," and he was not going to begin now.
"I think I know what you mean," said the proctor quietly. "You mean that some enemy of yours may have had an object in making it appear as if you had a hand in this work." He looked narrowly at Joe.
"I--I, well, it might have happened that way."
"And of the students here, whom would you regard as your enemy?" asked Dr. Fillmore quickly.
"I--I--I must refuse to answer," said Joe firmly. "It would not be fair."
"You mean you won't tell?"
"I can't, Doctor. I haven't any right to assume that the telegram came there that way. I know that I didn't pass very near the statue, either on leaving or coming back to school. The message dropped from my pocket, I'm sure of that, but the wind may have blown it near the statue."
"There was no wind last night," said the proctor severely.
"Then--then----" stammered Joe.
"That will do, Matson," said the doctor quietly, and there was sorrow in his voice. "I will not question you further. I am convinced that if you had no hand in the actual overturning of the statue, that you know something of how it was done, or who did it. Are you prepared to tell us?"
"No, sir, I am not. I--can't."
"I think I understand," said Dr. Fillmore. "Very well. Understand, we do not accuse you of anything, but under the circumstances I must put you on probation."
"Probation?" murmured Joe.
"Yes," added the proctor as the doctor turned away. "That means that you will not be allowed to leave the school grounds. You will report to your classes and lectures as usual, but you will not be allowed to take part in athletic contests."
"Not--not baseball?" gasped Joe.
"Not baseball," replied the proctor. "I am sorry, but that is the rule for one who is on probation. When you make up your mind to make a complete confession, and tell whom you saw at the work of tearing down the statue----"
"But I didn't----" began Joe.
"That will do," interrupted the proctor gently. "You are on probation until then. And you will not be allowed to play baseball."
Joe felt his heart wildly thumping under his coat. Without a word he turned aside and went back to his room. And that is why he missed chapel that morning.
CHAPTER XXVIII
LUKE'S CONFESSION
The anticipation of Teeter, Peaches and the others that there would be a sensation in chapel that morning was borne out. Never, in all their experience, had the boys recalled Dr. Fillmore being more bitter in his denunciation of what he characterized as "sensational vandalism."
He liked boys to have good, clean healthy fun, he said, and an occasional prank was not out of order, but this pulling the statue from its base passed all bounds. More and more bitter the good doctor became. Perhaps part of his feeling was due to the fact that the Founder had written a book on Cæsar that the head of the school considered an authority, and you remember how fond Dr. Fillmore was of the writer of the "Commentaries."
The boys looked at each other as the denunciation proceeded, and there were whispers of:
"Who did it? Why doesn't he name some one?"
The doctor came to that part in a moment.
"We are unable to say who perpetrated this act of sensational vandalism," he went on, "but I may say that once the students are discovered they will be instantly dismissed from Excelsior Hall--this is no place for them. I say we do not know who did it, but we have reason to suspect----"
Here the good doctor paused and there was an uneasy movement among several lads.
"We have reason to suspect that some one knows who did it, but will not tell. I am sorry to say that we have been obliged to inflict the usual punishment on this--ahem--student and he is now on probation. The usual exercises will now be held."
They went on, but it is doubtful if the lads were in a very devotional spirit. Joe's absence was at once noted, and of course it was guessed why he was not there, though being on probation did not bar one from chapel or classes.
"By Jove!" exclaimed Tom, when they were on their way to first lectures. "It's Joe! Who'd ever dream it?"
"So that's why he was wanted in the office," added Peaches.
"I don't believe he had a thing to do with it!" declared Teeter vehemently.
"Of course not!" chorused the other two.
"But they evidently think he does," went on Tom. "Here he comes now; let's ask him."
"Say, what does it all mean anyhow?" inquired Teeter when he had warmly clasped Joe's hand.
The young pitcher told of the finding of the telegram, and its result.
"But, hang it all, that's no evidence!" burst out Tom.
"The doctor thinks so," replied Joe grimly.
"Some one who has a grudge against you--Say!" exclaimed Teeter with a sudden change of manner. "I'll bet it was Luke or Hiram who did it--pulled the statue down and then tried to blame it on you."
"Sure!" chorused Tom and Peaches.
"Wait!" cried Joe. "It's bad enough for me to be suspected of knowing something that I don't, but we can't go to accusing even Hiram or Luke on mere guesswork. It won't do."
"But hang it all, man!" cried Peaches. "You _can't play ball_."
"No," answered Joe quietly.
"And the league season is closing! How are we going to win without you in the box?"
"You'll have to--that's all. Brown or Akers will have to twirl--they're pretty good at it now."
There were sorrowful shakes of the heads, but so it had to be. It may well be imagined that there was a sensation in Excelsior Hall when it was known that Joe was the one on probation, and he was urged by more than one to tell all he knew, no matter on whose shoulders the guilt would fall.
"But I don't know!" he insisted again and again. "And it wouldn't be fair to guess."
The days went on. Frank Brown was tried out in the box and did fairly well, thanks to the efficient coaching Joe had given him. Excelsior even won a game with him twirling, though by a narrow margin, and against a weak team.
But there were dubious shakes of the heads of the students--especially those on the team--when they thought of the games to come--the important final with Morningside. Still there was no help for it, and Brown and Akers redoubled their practice in anticipation.
There was no objection to Joe practicing, or in coaching the two substitute pitchers, and he did this every day. Our hero did not write home about the disgrace that had come so undeservedly upon him, merely telling general news, and assuring his father that he had kept a lookout, and made inquiries, but had neither seen nor heard anything of Mr. Holdney.
Meanwhile the affairs of Mr. Matson--due to the theft of the models--were in anything but good shape. Still nothing could be done.
Joe bitterly felt his position. So did his chums, and they even tried their hand at amateur detective work, endeavoring to discover who had pulled down the statue and put Joe's telegram where it had been found. That it was put there was certain, for Joe, on the night in question, had not gone near the statue. In the meanwhile the bronze had been put back in place and repaired. Among the students there were those who thought they knew the guilty ones, but nothing definite was disclosed.
The school term was drawing to an end. After the hard work of getting the ball team into shape for championship honors it was hard to see it begin to slip back. Yet this is what took place. Brown and Akers could not keep up the pace set by Joe, and several games were lost.
By hard work, and more due to errors on the part of their opponents, Excelsior won victories over Trinity and the preparatory school. This made her percentage just high enough so that if she should win from Morningside in the final game the Blue Banner would come to her. But could Excelsior win? That was what every lad there asked himself.
It was rumored that Morningside was never in better shape. Ted Clay, the pitcher, was twirling in great form it was said, and Sam Morton, as substitute, was sure to go in for several innings in the final contest.
"They say he's a wonder for a short time," Peaches confided to Joe.
"He is," frankly admitted our hero. "I know his style. He can't last, but he's good for part of a game. With him and Ted against us I'm afraid it's all up with our chances."
"Oh, Joe, if you could only play!"
"I want to as much as you want me, Peaches, but it's out of the question."
"Maybe if we were to put it up to the doctor--that we would lose the Blue Banner without you--he'd let you play."
"I couldn't play that way, Peaches--under a ban. I want vindication--or nothing."
"Yes, I suppose so--only it's hard."
At last came the night before the final game with Morningside. There was a spirit of unrest and a sense of impending disaster abroad in Excelsior. Every student was talking of it, even Hiram and Luke. The latter, for some days past had not been his usual self, and his crony could not understand it.
"What's the matter with you, anyhow?" Hiram asked. "Aren't you glad we did that chump Matson up good and brown?"
"Oh, well, I don't know," answered Luke slowly. "I didn't think it would mean that we'd lose the Blue Banner."
"How do you know we are going to lose it?"
"Of course we are. Morningside will win, with no good pitcher to hold her down, and Joe is a good pitcher, no matter what hand he had in getting us out of the nine. I'm sorry I got out anyhow. I'd like to be on it now."
"You're sorry?" gasped Hiram.
"Yes, I wouldn't have resigned only you made me."
"_I_ made you! Say, what's eating you, anyhow? You were as hot against Matson and his crowd as I was."
"No, I wasn't, and while we're on this subject I'll tell you another thing. I'm mighty sorry I had a hand in that statue business."
"You didn't do anything--Sam and I yanked it down."
"I know, but I put Joe's telegram there--I'm responsible for him being on probation, so he can't play to-morrow."
"Oh, you are; eh?" sneered Hiram. "Then you'd better go tell the doctor that."
"By Jove I will!" suddenly exclaimed Luke with a change of manner. "I haven't had a decent night's sleep since I did it. I am going to tell. I can't stand it any longer. I want to see Excelsior win the Blue Banner. I'm going to tell the doctor!"
"Hold on!" Hiram fairly hissed. "If you squeal I'll make it so hot for you that you'll wish you'd never seen me--and so will Sam."
"I'm not afraid! Besides I'm not going to tell on you--only on myself. I'll say I put the telegram there. The doctor can think what he likes about who pulled down the statue. He can put me on probation for I won't tell, but it doesn't matter, for I don't play ball. But that will let Joe play, and it's not too late for him to get in shape--in fact, he's at top notch, for I saw him practice to-day. I'm going to tell, and you can do as you like, Hiram."
"I say you shan't tell. I'll----"
But Luke slipped from Hiram's room, where the talk had been going on, and made his way to the doctor's office.
Dr. Fillmore, as may well be imagined, was surprised to see Luke at that late hour, for it was past eleven. He laid aside a book on the immortal Cæsar, looked over his glasses at the conscience-stricken lad, and asked in his kind voice:
"Well, Fodick, what is it?"
"I--I--Doctor Fillmore, I've come to--confess. I put that telegram by the statue. Joe Matson didn't do it. He dropped it--I picked it up. He had nothing to do with pulling down the statue and doesn't know who did it. But he's got to play ball to-morrow or we'll lose the Blue Banner again. I'm the guilty one, Doctor--not of pulling the statue down--I won't tell who did that, no matter what you do to me. But I want Joe to play. Oh, I--I couldn't stand it any longer. I haven't slept, and--and----"
Poor Luke burst into a fit of weeping--hot, passionate tears of real sorrow--the best thing he had done in many a long day--and Dr. Fillmore, understanding a boy's heart as few heads of schools do, put his big arm over Luke's shoulder. Thus was the confession made, and of its effect you shall soon hear.
That night Luke slept soundly.
CHAPTER XXIX
A GLORIOUS VICTORY
It was the morning of the day of the big game--the final contest between Morningside and Excelsior for the possession of the Blue Banner. So far the two nines were tied as regards their percentage of victories, and the banner would go to whoever won the diamond battle on this occasion.
Dr. Fillmore, after hearing Luke's confession, had sent a messenger to Joe's room with instructions to see if our hero and Tom were asleep. The apartment was in darkness and quiet reigned when the messenger listened, so he reported that both lads were slumbering. But he was not altogether right, for Joe tossed restlessly on his pillow and thought bitterly of the morrow.
"Well, as long as he is asleep," remarked the good doctor to the coach whom he had summoned, "we won't tell him the good news until to-morrow. He'll need his rest if he is to pitch against Morningside."
"Then you're going to remove the probation ban, Dr. Fillmore?" asked Dr. Rudden eagerly.
"Of course. I shall make the announcement at chapel, and wish Matson and the others of the nine all success."
"And you don't yet know who pulled down the statue?"
"No. It was manly of Fodick to confess, and though I shall have to suspend him, of course, I didn't even ask him to inform on the guilty ones. I really couldn't, you know."
"No, I suppose not. But I'm glad Joe is going to play. I think we shall win."
"I hope so," murmured Dr. Fillmore.
The surprise and gratification of the students may easily be surmised when the next morning at chapel, Dr. Fillmore made his announcement, stating that Joe had been on probation under a misapprehension, and that now the ban was removed he could play ball.
"And I hope that he and the others of the nine play their very best," concluded the head of the school, "and win!"
There was a spontaneous cheer, and neither the doctor nor any of the teachers took the trouble to stop it. Joe's face was burning red, his heart was thumping like a trip hammer, but he was the happiest lad in school.
"Oh, it's great! Glorious! I can't talk! Whoop!" yelled Teeter, once out of chapel, as he balanced himself on his toes.
"Say, old man, it's too good to be true!" cried Peaches, yelling and capering about until his usually fair complexion was like that of a beet.
"We'll make Morningside look like thirty cents!" declared Tom.
"Come on, you and Ward get in all the practice you can," ordered Peaches.
The game was to be played on the Morningside diamond, this having been decided by lot, the choice having fallen to the rivals of Excelsior.
"Well, we'll beat 'em on their own grounds!" declared Peaches, when he and the others of the nine, with some substitutes, and a host of "rooters" and supporters, departed for the contest.
What a crowd was there to see! What hosts of pretty girls! Men and women, too; old graduates, students from both schools, many from other schools in the league, for this was the wind-up of the season.
Out on the diamond trotted the Morningside nine, to be greeted with a roar of cheers. They began practice at once, and it was noticed that Sam Morton was "warming up."
"They're going to use two pitchers all right," observed Tommy Barton. "Guess they heard that Joe was going to be on deck again."
A noisy welcome awaited the Excelsior nine as they trotted out, and they, too, began batting and catching practice. Then, after a little delay and the submitting of batting orders, the details were completed, and once again the umpire gave his stirring call:
"Play ball!"
Morningside was to bat last and so George Bland was the first of the Excelsior players to face Pitcher Clay. The two nines were the same as had met a few weeks previously.
"Play ball!" called the umpire again, and the game was on.
It was a memorable battle. They talk of it to this day at Excelsior and Morningside. For three innings neither side got a run, goose eggs going up in regular succession until, as is generally the case "pitchers' fight" began to be heard spoken on the stands and side lines. And truly it was rather that way. Both Joe Matson and Ted Clay were at their best, and man after man fanned the air helplessly, or stood while the umpire called strikes on them.
But there had to be a break, and it came in the fourth inning. In their half of that Excelsior again had to retire without a run, and the four circles looked rather strange on the score board.
Then something happened. Joe was delivering a puzzling drop, but his hand slipped, the curve broke at the wrong moment and the batter hit it for three bases. That looked like the beginning of the end for a little while, as the Morningside lads seemed to have struck a winning streak and they had three runs to their credit when Joe, after having struck two men out, caught a hot liner himself and retired the third man.
"Three to nothing," murmured Captain Ward as his men came in to bat again. "It looks bad--looks bad."
"That will only give us an appetite," declared Joe. "You'll see," and it did seem as if he were a prophet, for the rivals of Morningside, evidently on desperation bent, "found" Ted Clay, rapped out five runs, putting them two ahead, and then the crowd went wild.
So did Joe and his mates. They fairly danced as they took the field again; danced and shouted, even jumping over each other in the exuberance of their joy.
"We've got 'em going! We've got 'em going!" they yelled.
Glumly, and almost in a daze, the Morningside players looked at the figures. Their rivals were two ahead in the fifth inning and Baseball Joe, the pitcher on whom so much depended, was "as fresh as a daisy," as Tom declared.
"But we haven't won the game by a whole lot!" warned Captain Ward to his enthusiastic lads. "Play hard--play hard!"
Morningside managed to get one run in their half of the fifth, but when Excelsior came up for her stick-work again she easily demonstrated her superiority over the other lads. Four runs went to her credit, and only one to the rival team, and then, as Peaches said, "it was all over but the shouting."
"The game is in the ice box now, all right," Teeter added.
And so it was. Two runs for Excelsior in the seventh to one for her opponent; four in the eighth, while Joe held the enemy hitless in their half of that inning, brought the score to the tally of fifteen to six in favor of our friends.
"Let's make it an even 20 fellows!" proposed Teeter when they came to have their last raps in the ninth. "We can do it!"
"Sure!" his mates assured him, and it did seem possible, for Morningside appeared to have gone to pieces. Ted Clay was being batted all over the field, his support was poor, while the Morningside lads could not seem to find the ball.
In desperation, that last inning, Sam Morton was sent in, and he faced Joe with a scowl on his face. But Sam could not stem the winning tide, and he was batted for five runs, making the even twenty.
"Now, hold 'em down, Joe--don't let 'em get a run!" urged Teeter, when Morningside prepared to take her last chance to retrieve her falling fortunes.
And Joe did. Amid a riot of cheers he struck three men out in quick succession, and a final goose egg went up in the last frame, the score reading:
Excelsior, 20; Morningside, 6.
"The Blue Banner is ours! The Blue Banner comes back where it belongs!" yelled Joe, and then, amid a silence, the banner was taken from in front of the Morningside stand, where it had flaunted in the breeze, and presented to Captain Ward Gerard, who proudly marched about the diamond with it at the head of his victorious lads.
CHAPTER XXX
GOOD NEWS--CONCLUSION
There were the usual cheers first by the victors and then by the vanquished, and it would be hard to say which were the heartiest. For Morningside was a good loser and next to a well-beaten rival, she loved a staunch victorious one.
"You fellows certainly did us up good and proper--the worst beating we ever got," admitted Captain Dalton to Ward.
"That's what we came here for," was the reply. "It was Joe's twirling that did it."
"Get out!" cried the modest pitcher.
"Yes, that certainly held us down," went on Dalton. "We couldn't seem to find you. I'll need some new pitchers next season, I guess, for you certainly batted Ted and Sam all over. But I'm not kicking. How are you fixed for next year, Joe? Don't you want to come to Morningside?" and he laughed.
"I don't know," answered our hero. "I haven't quite made up my mind what I shall do. I'm going to play ball, I know that much, anyhow."
"I should think you would--any fellow who can twirl the horsehide as you can. Well, might as well get off these togs," spoke Dalton. "I won't need 'em here any more this season, though I'm going to join some amateur team for the vacation if I can."
The cheering and yelling kept up for some time; and then with the glorious Blue Banner, that meant so much to them in their possession, the Excelsior Hall lads started back for the school.
"So you don't know what you are going to do next season, eh, Joe?" asked Tom, as he and his chum were riding back. "I thought you'd stick on here."
"Well, I'd like to, first rate but I don't know how dad's business is going to be since this second robbery. I may have to leave school."
"Oh, I hope not. So they haven't any trace of the missing papers and models?"
"Not according to what I last heard. I'm going to get on the trail of that scamp, Holdney, this vacation, though."
As might have been guessed, there was a big banquet for the baseball team that night. And such a spread as it was, held in the big gymnasium. Every player came in for his share of praise, and there was so much of it for Joe; and his health was drunk in soda and ginger ale so often that his complexion was like that of Peaches'--red and white by turns. But nearly everyone felt that he deserved all the nice things that were said about him, not only for his share in the victory, but for what he had suffered.
There were two absentees at the banquet--and only two. One was Hiram Shell and the other Luke Fodick. Luke humbly told Dr. Fillmore that he thought it best to leave the school after what had happened. The good doctor thought so, too, for it would have been hard for Luke to live down what he had done.
As for Hiram, he said nothing, but when he knew that Luke had made his confession, the bully, after using harsh language to his former crony, quietly packed his things and went also. He sent word to Sam, at Morningside, that "the jig" was up, and there was a pre-vacation vacancy on the books of that institution.
It was never definitely stated who had pulled down the statue, but the withdrawal of Hiram, Luke and Sam was confession enough.
It was in the midst of the banquet, when Joe had been called upon to respond to the toast, "The Baseball Nine," that a messenger was seen to enter with a telegram.
"It's for Joe Matson," the boy announced loudly enough for all to hear. "Gee, but he's de stuff; eh? I'd like to shake hands wit a pitcher like dat! I'm goin' t' be one mysel' some day. Here's de tick-tick, sport," and he passed the message to Joe, at the same time regarding our hero with worshipful eyes.
Joe read the message at a glance, and a change came over his face.
"No bad news, I hope," murmured Tom, who stood near him.
"No, it's the very best!" cried the young pitcher, and he showed Tom the telegram. "I wired dad that we'd won the game," Joe stated.
Mr. Matson said in his telegram:
"Best of congratulations. Models and papers recovered. Everything all right."
"Hurray!" yelled Tom, waving the message above his head. "Three cheers for Baseball Joe!" and, when the cheers had subsided he briefly informed his mates what the telegram meant to our hero. Mr. Matson would still retain his fortune, and probably make more money than ever out of his patents.
"Gee! Dis is great!" murmured the diminutive messenger, as he listened to the cheers and watched the jolly crowd of students. "I wish I was studyin' here!"
Joe shook the messenger's hand and left in it a crisp bill, to show his appreciation of the good news the lad had brought. And the toasting, the cheering and singing went on again.
"Now you can continue your studies," said Tom to Joe.
"Yes, I suppose so," was the answer.
"Maybe I'll even go to college."
What were his further fortunes on the diamond I shall tell you in the next book of this series, to be called: "Baseball Joe at Yale; or Pitching for the College Championship." In that we shall see him in adventures as strenuous as any he had yet encountered.
"One last song, fellows, and then we'll quit!" called Peaches. "I want you all to join with me in singing: 'For He's a Jolly Good Fellow,' and by '_He_' I mean Joe Matson--Baseball Joe!"
And as the strains of that ever-jolly, and yet somewhat sad, song are dying away, we will take our leave for a time of Baseball Joe and his friends.
THE END
THE BASEBALL JOE SERIES
BY LESTER CHADWICK
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[Illustration]
=BASEBALL JOE OF THE SILVER STARS= _or The Rivals of Riverside_
Joe is an everyday country boy who loves to play baseball and particularly to pitch.
=BASEBALL JOE ON THE SCHOOL NINE= _or Pitching for the Blue Banner_
Joe's great ambition was to go to boarding school and play on the school team.
=BASEBALL JOE AT YALE= _or Pitching for the College Championship_
Joe goes to Yale University. In his second year he becomes a varsity pitcher and pitches in several big games.
=BASEBALL JOE IN THE CENTRAL LEAGUE= _or Making Good as a Professional Pitcher_
In this volume the scene of action is shifted from Yale college to a baseball league of our central states.
=BASEBALL JOE IN THE BIG LEAGUE= _or A Young Pitcher's Hardest Struggles_
From the Central League Joe is drafted into the St. Louis Nationals. A corking baseball story all fans will enjoy.
=BASEBALL JOE ON THE GIANTS= _or Making Good as a Twirler in the Metropolis_
How Joe was traded to the Giants and became their mainstay in the box makes an interesting baseball story.
=BASEBALL JOE IN THE WORLD SERIES= _or Pitching for the Championship_
The rivalry was of course of the keenest, and what Joe did to win the series is told in a manner to thrill the most jaded reader.
=BASEBALL JOE AROUND THE WORLD= (_New_) _or Pitching on a Grand Tour_
The Giants and the All-Americans tour the world, playing in many foreign countries.
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CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY, Publishers    New York
THE Y. M. C. A. BOYS SERIES
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_This new series relates the doings of a wide-awake boys' club of the Y. M. C. A., full of good times and every-day, practical Christianity. Clean, elevating and full of fun and vigor, books that should be read by every boy._
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=THE Y. M. C. A. BOYS OF CLIFFWOOD= _or The Struggle for the Holwell Prize_
Telling how the boys of Cliffwood were a wild set and how, on Hallowe'en, they turned the home town topsy-turvy. This led to an organization of a boys' department in the local Y. M. C. A. When the lads realized what was being done for them, they joined in the movement with vigor and did all they could to help the good cause.
=THE Y. M. C. A. BOYS ON BASS ISLAND= _or The Mystery of Russabaga Camp_
Summer was at hand, and at a meeting of the boys of the Y. M. C. A. of Cliffwood, it was decided that a regular summer camp should be instituted. This was located at a beautiful spot on Bass Island, and there the lads went boating, swimming, fishing and tramping to their heart's content.
=THE Y. M. C. A. BOYS AT FOOTBALL= _or Lively Doings On and Off the Gridiron_
This volume will add greatly to the deserved success of this well-written series. The Y. M. C. A. boys are plucky lads--clean minded and as true as steel. They have many ups and downs, but in the end they "win out" in the best meaning of that term.
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=THE BANNER BOY SCOUTS= _or The Struggle for Leadership_
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Two zealous young patriots volunteer and begin their military training. On the train going to camp they meet two rookies with whom they become chums. Together they get into a baffling camp mystery that develops into an extraordinary spy-plot. They defeat the enemies of their country and incidentally help one another to promotion both in friendship and service.
=THE KHAKI BOYS ON THE WAY= _or Doing Their Bit on Sea and Land_
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_When Uncle Sam sent forth the ringing call, "I need you!" it was not alone his strong young sons who responded. All over the United States capable American girls stood ready to offer their services to their country. How two young girls donned the khaki and made good in the Motor Corps, an organization for women developed by the Great War, forms a series of stories of signal novelty and vivid interest and action._
=THE KHAKI GIRLS OF THE MOTOR CORPS= _or Finding Their Place in the Big War_
Joan Mason, an enthusiastic motor girl, and Valerie Warde, a society debutante, meet at an automobile show. Next day they go together to the Motor Corps headquarters and in due time are accepted and become members of the Corps, in the service of the United States. The two girl drivers find motoring for Uncle Sam a most exciting business. Incidentally they are instrumental in rendering valuable service to the United States government by discovering and running down a secret organization of its enemies.
=THE KHAKI GIRLS BEHIND THE LINES= _or Driving with the Ambulance Corps_
As a result of their splendid work in the Motor Corps, the Khaki Girls receive the honor of an opportunity to drive with the Ambulance Corps in France. After a most eventful and hazardous crossing of the Atlantic, they arrive in France and are assigned to a station behind the lines. Constantly within range of enemy shrapnel, out in all kinds of weather, tearing over shell-torn roads and dodging Boche patrols, all go to make up the day's work, and bring them many exciting adventures.
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Transcriber's Notes:
--Text in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_).
--Text in bold is enclosed by "equal" signs (=bold=).
--Punctuation and spelling inaccuracies were silently corrected.
--Archaic and variable spelling has been preserved.
--Variations in hyphenation and compound words have been preserved.
--Normalized instances of "Lakeville" (p. 180, p. 181) to the more frequent "Lakeview" Preparatory Institute.
End of Project Gutenberg's Baseball Joe on the School Nine, by Lester Chadwick

= = = PG44716 = = =
BASEBALL JOE, CAPTAIN OF THE TEAM
Produced by Donald Cummings and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
[Illustration: JOE SLID INTO THE RUBBER IN A CLOUD OF DUST.]
Baseball Joe Captain of the Team
OR
Bitter Struggles On the Diamond
_By_ LESTER CHADWICK
AUTHOR OF
“BASEBALL JOE OF THE SILVER STARS,” “BASEBALL JOE, HOME RUN KING,” “THE RIVAL PITCHERS,” “THE EIGHT-OARED VICTORS,” ETC.
_ILLUSTRATED_
NEW YORK
CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY
BOOKS BY LESTER CHADWICK
=THE BASEBALL JOE SERIES=
=12mo. Cloth. Illustrated.=
=THE COLLEGE SPORTS SERIES=
=12mo. Cloth. Illustrated.=
THE RIVAL PITCHERS A QUARTERBACK’S PLUCK BATTING TO WIN THE WINNING TOUCHDOWN FOR THE HONOR OF RANDALL THE EIGHT-OARED VICTORS
CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY, New York
Copyright, 1924, by CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY
=Baseball Joe, Captain of the Team=
Printed in U. S. A.
CONTENTS
BASEBALL JOE CAPTAIN OF THE TEAM
CHAPTER I
QUEER TACTICS
“No use talking, Joe, we seem to be on the toboggan,” remarked Jim Barclay, one of the first string pitchers of the Giant team, to his closest chum, Joe Matson; as they came out of the clubhouse at the Chicago baseball park and strolled over toward their dugout in the shadow of the grandstand.
“You’re right, old boy,” agreed Joe--“Baseball Joe,” as he was known by the fans all over the country. “We seem to be headed straight for the cellar championship, and at the present rate it won’t be long before we land there. I can’t tell what’s got into the boys. Perhaps I’m as much to blame as any of the rest of them. I’ve lost the last two games I pitched.”
“Huh!” snorted Jim. “Look at the way you lost them! You never pitched better in your life. You had everything--speed, curves, control, and that old fadeaway of yours was working like a charm. But the boys played behind you like a lot of sand-lotters. They simply threw the game away--handed it to the Cubs on a silver platter. What they did in the field was a sin and a shame. And when it came to batting, they were even worse. The home run and triple you pasted out yourself were the only clouts worth mentioning.”
“The boys do seem to have lost their batting eyes,” agreed Joe. “And when it comes to fielding, they’re all thumbs. What do you think the trouble is?”
“Search me,” replied Jim. “We’ve got the same team we had when we started the season. Look at the way we started off: Three out of four from the Brooklyns, the same from the Bostons, and a clean sweep from the Phillies. It looked as though we were going to go through the League like a prairie fire. But the instant we struck the West we went down with a sickening thud. Pittsburgh wiped up the earth with us. The Reds walked all over us. The Cubs in the last two games have given us the razz. We’re beginning to look like something the cat dragged in.”
“I can’t make it out,” observed Joe, thoughtfully. “Of course, every team gets in a slump sometimes. But this has lasted longer than usual, and it’s time we snapped out of it. McRae will be a raving lunatic if we don’t.”
“He’s pretty near that now,” replied Jim. “And I don’t wonder. He’d set his heart on winning the flag this season, and it begins to look as though his cake was dough.”
“Even Robbie’s lost his smile,” said Joe. “And things must be pretty bad when he gets into the doleful dumps.”
“I thought that when we got those rascals, Hupft and McCarney, off the team, everything would be plain sailing,” remarked Jim. “They seemed to be the only disorganizing element.”
“Yes,” agreed Joe. “And especially when we got such crackerjacks in their places as Jackwell and Bowen. But speaking of them, have you noticed anything peculiar about them?”
“Great Scott!” exclaimed Jim, in some alarm. “You don’t mean to intimate that they’re crooks, too?”
“Not at all,” replied Joe. “From all I can see, they are as white as any men on the team. And they certainly know baseball from A to Z. They can run rings around Hupft and McCarney. But, just the same, I’ve noticed something odd about them from the start.”
“What, for instance?” asked Jim, with quickened interest.
“They seem nervous and scared at times,” answered Joe. “Jackwell, at third, keeps looking towards that part of the grandstand. The other day I was going to throw to him, to catch Elston napping; but I saw that Jackwell wasn’t looking at me, and so I held the ball. And I’ve noticed that when he’s coming into the bench between innings he lets his eyes range all over the stands.”
“Looking to see if his girl was there, perhaps,” laughed Jim.
“Nothing so pleasant as that,” asserted Joe. “It was as though he were looking for some one he didn’t want to see. And the same thing is true of Bowen. Of course he’s out at center, and I can’t observe him as well as I can Jackwell. But when he’s been sitting in the dugout waiting for his turn at bat, he’s always squinting at the fans in the stands and the bleachers. The other boys aren’t that way.”
“This is all news to me,” remarked Jim. “I’ve noticed that they’ve been rather clannish and stuck close together, but that’s natural enough, seeing that they were pals in the minor-league team from which McRae bought them and that they don’t feel quite at home yet in big-league company.”
“Well, you keep your eye on them and see if you don’t notice what I’ve been telling you about,” counseled Joe. “Of course, it may not mean a thing, but all the same it’s struck me as queer.”
By this time the two pitchers had reached the Giants’ dugout, where most of their teammates had already gathered.
It was a beautiful day in early summer. The Eastern teams’ invasion of the West was in full swing, and baseball enthusiasm was running high all over the circuit. The Giants, after a disastrous series of games in Pittsburgh and Cincinnati, had struck Chicago. Or, perhaps, it would be more correct to say that Chicago had struck them, for the Cubs had taken the first two games with ease.
No doubt that accounted for the tremendous throng that had been pouring into the gates that afternoon, until now the stands and bleachers were crowded with enthusiastic fans. For if there was anything in the world that Chicago dearly loved, it was to see the Giants beaten. One game from the haughty Giants, the champions of the world, was more keenly relished than two games from any other club.
The rivalry between the teams of the two great cities was intense, dating from the days when the old Chicagos, with “Pop” Anson and Frank Chance at their head, had been accustomed to sweeping everything before them. Now the tables had been turned, and for the last few years, the Giants, with McRae as their astute manager and Baseball Joe as their pitching “ace,” had had the upper hand. Twice in succession the Giants had won the championship of the National League and had wound up the season in a blaze of glory by also winning the World Series.
This year they were desperately anxious to repeat. And, as Jim had said, it looked at the beginning of the season as though they were going to do it. They got off on the right foot and had an easy time of it in the games with the other Eastern clubs.
But with the Western clubs it was another story. A “jinx” seemed to be pursuing them. Pittsburgh had tied the can to them, and the Reds, not to be outdone, had tightened the knot. The Cubs thus far had clawed them savagely. They had tasted blood, and their appetite had grown with what it had fed upon. And for that reason the sport lovers of the Windy City had turned out in force to see the Cubs once more make the Giants “their meat.”
McRae, the manager, was sitting on the bench with Robson, his assistant, as Joe and Jim approached. There was an anxious furrow on his brow, and even the rotund and rubicund “Robbie,” usually jolly and smiling, seemed in the depths of gloom.
McRae’s face lightened a little when he saw Joe.
“I’m going to put you in to pitch to-day, Matson,” he said. “How’s the old soup-bone feeling?”
“Fine and dandy,” returned Joe, with a smile.
“I want you to stand those fellows on their heads,” said the manager. “They’ve been making monkeys of us long enough.”
“I’ll do my best, Mac,” promised Joe, as he picked up a ball preparatory to going out for warming-up practice.
“Your best is good enough,” replied McRae.
Joe and Jim went out with their respective catchers and limbered up their pitching arms.
“How are they coming, Mylert?” Joe called out to the veteran catcher, who was acting as his backstop.
“Great,” pronounced Mylert. “You’ve got speed to burn and your curves are all to the merry. That hop of yours is working fine. You’ll have them breaking their backs to get at the ball.”
McRae, in the meantime, had beckoned to Iredell, the captain of the team.
“Look here, Iredell,” he asked abruptly, “what’s the matter with this team? Why are they playing like a lot of old women?”
“I’m sure I don’t know,” replied Iredell, flushing and twirling his cap nervously.
“Don’t know?” snapped McRae. “Who should know if you don’t? You’re the captain, aren’t you?”
“Sure,” admitted Iredell. “But for all that, I can’t always get onto what’s in the minds of the fellows. I’ve talked to them and razzed them and done everything except to lam them. They’re just in a slump, and they don’t seem able to get out. Some of them think a jinx is on their backs. I’m playing my own position well enough, ain’t I?”
“Yes, you are,” McRae was forced to admit, for Iredell was one of the crack shortstops of the League, and so far had been batting and fielding well. “But that isn’t enough. To be a good shortstop is one thing, and to be a good captain is another. I figured you’d be both. Tell me this. Are there any cliques in the team? Any fellows out to do another or show him up? Any fights in the clubhouse that I haven’t been told about?”
“No,” replied Iredell, “nothing that’s worth noticing. Of course, the boys are as sore as boils over the way they keep on losing, and their tempers are on a hair trigger. Once in a while something is said that makes one of them take a crack at another. But that’s usually over in a minute and they shake hands and make up. There aren’t any real grudges among the boys that I know of.”
“Well, things have got to change, and it’s largely up to you to change them,” growled McRae. “If the job’s too big for you, perhaps somebody else will have to take it. I’ve often found that a shake up in the batting order will work wonders. Perhaps the same thing’s true of a shake up in captains.”
The flush in Iredell’s face grew deeper and his eyes glinted with anger. But he said nothing, and as McRae turned to say something to Robbie, indicating that the interview was ended, he moved away sullenly from the dugout.
Just then the bell rang as a signal for the Giants to run out for practice. The white uniforms of the Chicagos faded away from the diamond, while the gray-suited Giants scattered to their several positions in the field and on the bases.
Jackwell, who had been standing near Joe while the latter was putting the balls over to Mylert, started to run out with the rest, but suddenly he halted and stood in his tracks like a stone image.
Joe, who, out of the corner of his eye, had noted the action, turned to him in surprise.
“What’s the matter, Jackwell?” he asked, eying the new third baseman keenly.
“I--I can’t go on,” stammered Jackwell.
Joe noted that he had suddenly turned white.
CHAPTER II
A BITTER STRUGGLE
Jackwell’s legs were sagging, and Joe, alarmed at his condition and afraid that he was going to fall, put his arm about the baseman’s shoulder to support him.
“Brace up, old man,” he counseled. “What’s come over you?”
“I--I don’t know,” answered Jackwell, trying desperately to get a grip on himself. “I suddenly felt faint. Everything got black before my eyes.”
“Touch of the sun, maybe,” said Joe, kindly. “Come over and get a drink of water and then sit down on the bench for a few minutes. I’ll ask one of the other fellows to take your place at third for practice.”
Jackwell sank down on the bench, while Joe returned to his practice with Mylert, somewhat upset by the incident.
A moment later, Bowen, the new centerfielder, came along, and Jackwell beckoned to him. He sat down beside him, and the two conversed in whispers, casting surreptitious glances at a part of the grandstand almost directly behind the third-base position.
Joe kept his eye on the two men and saw Bowen start violently at something Jackwell whispered to him. His face seemed suddenly to have been drained of every drop of blood, and he shook like a man with the ague.
Just then McRae, who had been having an exchange of repartee with Evans, the manager of the Chicago team, who had chaffed him unmercifully about the playing of the Giants, came back to the dugout. He glanced in surprise at the two players.
“What are you fellows doing here?” he asked sharply, glowering at them. “Didn’t you hear the bell ring for practice? Why aren’t you in your places on the field?”
“I’m sick, Mr. McRae,” replied Jackwell. “I wish you’d put somebody else in my place. I ain’t in condition to play to-day.”
“I’m in the same fix,” put in Bowen. “I feel like thirty cents.”
“That’s what the whole team’s worth,” growled McRae. “And even at that price the fellow that bought them would get stung. What do you mean, sick? Are you sick or just lazy, soldiering on the job? You seemed husky enough this morning.”
“It--it may have been something we ate at noon,” suggested Jackwell, rather lamely. “A touch of ptomaine poisoning, or something like that.”
“Of course, I’ll play if you tell me to,” put in Bowen. “But I don’t feel up to my work.”
McRae stood for a moment in exasperated study of the two. For some reason their excuses did not ring true. Yet their pale faces and evidently unstrung condition seemed to bear out their words.
“Guess there is a jinx after this team all right,” he growled. “You fellows go over to the club doctor and let him find out what’s the matter with you. I’ll put other men in your places for the present.”
They hurriedly availed themselves of the permission, and McRae, after a consultation with Robbie, put Renton in Jackwell’s place and sent McGuire out in center to hold down Bowen’s position.
Again the bell rang, and the Cubs took their final practice. That they were in fine condition for the fray was evident from the way they shot the ball across the diamond. Dazzling plays and almost impossible catches brought round after round of applause from the spectators. It was plain that the whole team was in fine fettle, and that the Giants had their work cut out for them if they were to win.
The Giants, as the visiting team, were first at bat. Axander, the star twirler of the Cubs, picked up the ball and went into the box with a jaunty air that bespoke plenty of confidence.
“Play ball!” cried the umpire.
Axander dug his toes into the box and wound up for the first pitch.
And while the crowd watched breathlessly to see the ball leave his hand, it may be well for the benefit of those who have not read the preceding volumes of this series to tell who Baseball Joe was and trace his career up to the time this story opens.
Joe Matson had been born and brought up in the little town of Riverside in a middle western state. From early boyhood he had been a great lover of the national game, especially of the pitching end of it, to which he had taken naturally. His coolness, quick thinking, good judgment and powerful arm specially fitted him for the box. He soon became known for his skill as a twirler on his home team, and his reputation spread to surrounding towns. His early exploits and the difficulties he had to encounter and overcome are told in the first volume of this series, entitled: “Baseball Joe of the Silver Stars; or, The Rivals of Riverside.”
Later, on his school nine, he overcame the obstacles thrown in his way by the bully of the school and pitched his team to victory over his rivals. His field was widened when he went to Yale, and in an emergency he assumed the pitcher’s burden and downed Princeton in a glorious battle.
That victory proved a turning point in Joe’s life, for the game had been witnessed by a scout for a minor-league team, always on the alert for talent, and he made Joe an offer to join the Pittston team of the Central League. Joe accepted the offer, and soon climbed to the position of the leading twirler in the League.
Still, he was only a “busher,” and his delight can be imagined when, at the end of the season, he was drafted into the St. Louis team of the National League. Now he was really in fast company, and had to test his skill against the greatest twirlers in the country. But the fans were quick to learn that he could hold his own with the best of them.
McRae, the manager of the Giants, one of the ablest men in baseball when it came to judging the ability of a player, determined to get Joe for the Giants. He did get him, and had never ceased congratulating himself on the stroke that brought Joe to his team. He soon became its mainstay, and had been the main factor in winning the championship of the National League and the World Series twice in succession. He was a wizard in the box, and his record as pitcher had never been equaled in the history of the game.
And not only in the box, but at the bat he had proved himself without a peer. He was a natural batsman, timing and meeting the ball perfectly and leaning all the weight of his mighty shoulders against it so that it soared far beyond the reach of the fielders. When he hit the ball it was very often ticketed for a homer, and at every city on the League circuit thousands were attracted to the games not only to see a marvelous exhibition of pitching but to see Matson “knock out another home run.” What celebrity he gained by his work in both departments is told in a previous volume, and the way in which he saved the game from scandal when it was threatened by a gang of crooked gamblers is narrated in the last volume of the series entitled: “Baseball Joe Saving the League; or, Breaking Up a Great Conspiracy.”
But Joe had won other triumphs than those of baseball. He had fallen in love with Mabel Varley, a charming girl whose life he had saved in a runaway accident, and he had married her at the end of the previous season on the diamond. They were ideally happy.
Jim Barclay, a Princeton man who had joined the Giants, had speedily developed into a pitcher only second to Joe himself. He and Joe had become the closest of chums, and on a visit to Riverside Jim had fallen a victim to the charms of Joe’s pretty sister, Clara, and was now engaged to her and hoped for an early marriage.
And now to return to the tense situation on the Chicago ball field, where the Cubs and Giants faced each other in one of the critical games of the series.
Curry, the rightfielder of the Giants, was first at bat. He was a good hitter and was as fast as a flash in getting to first.
Axander shot over a high fast one at which Curry refused to bite, and it went as a ball. Then came a pretty first strike right over the heart of the plate. Axander came back with a slow one that lobbed up to the plate looking as big as a balloon. Curry nearly dislocated his spine reaching for it, and though he connected with it he raised an easy fly, which the Cubs’ third baseman caught without moving from his tracks.
Iredell came next to the plate, swinging three bats. He threw away two of them, tapped each of his heels with the other for luck, faced the pitcher and glared at him ferociously.
“Put one over, you false alarm, and see me murder it,” he called to Axander.
Axander grinned at him.
“You’re the captain of the team, aren’t you?” he asked. “Well, you’ll be only a lieutenant when I get through with you.”
He whizzed one over that Iredell swung at savagely and missed. The next he fouled off, making the second strike. Then came a ball and then a third strike, so swift that Iredell struck at it as it settled in the catcher’s glove.
“You’re out!” shouted the umpire.
Iredell threw down his bat in chagrin and retired to the bench.
Then Burkett, the burly first baseman of the Giants, strode to the plate. He caught the first ball pitched right near the end of his stick and belted it into the rightfield stands. It looked like a sure homer, and the contingent of loyal Giant rooters burst into a cheer. But the cheer was premature, as the umpire called it a foul, and Burkett, who had already rounded first, returned, disgruntled, to the plate.
“Had your eyes tried for glasses lately?” he asked the umpire.
“That’ll be about all from you,” returned that functionary. “Another wise crack like that, and it’s you for the showers.”
Axander’s next throw went for a ball. On the next Burkett whaled a sharp single over second. A moment later, however, he was caught napping at first by a quick throw from the pitcher, and the inning ended without a score. Burkett, who found himself in his regular position at first, put on his glove and stayed there, glad enough that he was not near enough to the Giants’ dugout to get the tongue lashing that McRae had all ready for him.
“Did you see that boob play, Robbie?” McRae growled. “Did you see the way that perfectly good hit was wasted?”
“Sure, I saw it, John,” replied Robson, laying his hand soothingly on the knee of his irate friend. “’Twas enough to make a man tear his hair out by the roots. But the game’s young yet and we may have the last laugh. I’m banking heavily on what Joe’s going to do to them birds.”
Joe in the meantime had walked out to the box. It was a tribute to the admiration that was felt for him by fans everywhere that even the Chicago partisans welcomed his coming with a hearty round of applause. He was more than a Giant standby. He was the idol of all true lovers of the national game.
Burton, the heaviest slugger on the Chicago team, was first at bat. Joe looked him over and then sent the ball over for a perfect strike. It came in like a bullet. Burton did not even offer at it.
“Strike one!” called the umpire.
The next one had a fast hop on it, and Burton swung six inches beneath it.
“Strike two!”
Burton set himself for the next one, and succeeded only in fouling it off. Mylert got the ball and returned it to Joe on the bound. The latter caught it carelessly and then, without his usual wind-up, sent it whistling across the plate. It caught Burton entirely off his guard, and his futile stab at it caused even the Chicago fans to break into laughter.
“Out!” cried the umpire, and the discomfited Burton retired sheepishly to the bench.
“That’s showing them up, Joe,” called up Larry Barrett from second.
“Why didn’t you soak that first ball?” demanded Evans, the Chicago manager. “It was a beauty, right in the groove.”
“Aw,” growled Burton, “how can I hit a ball that I can’t see? That came like a shot from a rifle. I ain’t no miracle man.”
Gallagher came next and had no better luck. One strike was called on him, and the other two he missed.
“Look at that boy, John,” exulted Robbie, his red face beaming. “He’s got them fellows buffaloed right from the jump. He’s making them eat out of his hand. He’s skinning ’em alive.”
“Fine work,” agreed McRae, his anxious features relaxing somewhat. “’Twas the best day’s work I ever did when I got him on the team. He’s a whole nine by himself. And--blistering billikens! Look at that!”
The “that” was a hot liner that Weston had sent right over the box. Like a flash Joe had leaped into the air and speared it with his gloved hand. The force of the hit was so great that it knocked him down, but he came up smiling with the ball in his hand.
There was a moment of stupefied silence, and then the stands rocked with applause, contributed by the Cub as well as the Giant rooters. That play alone was worth the price of admission.
Joe drew off his glove and came in from the box, while the Chicagos ran out to take their places in the field.
“Great stuff, Joe,” cried Jim jubilantly, as he hit his chum a resounding whack on the shoulder. “They didn’t have a chance. Keep it up and you’ll have those Cubs crawling into their hole and licking their wounds.”
“Oh, it will do for a start,” said Joe, modestly. “But that’s only one inning out of nine, and those fellows may break loose any time. But if our fellows will only give me a run or two, I’ll try to hold them down.”
But the wished-for runs did not materialize in the Giants’ second turn at bat. Wheeler made a strong bid for a run when he sent the ball on a high line between right and center, but the Chicago rightfielder was off at the crack of the bat and just managed to get his hands on the ball and shut off what seemed to have all the earmarks of a homer. It was a sparkling catch and evoked rounds of applause from the Chicago rooters.
McGuire dribbled a slow one to the box that Axander had no trouble in getting to first on time. Renton was an easy victim on strikes.
“Looks as if you’d have to win your own game, Joe,” grumbled McRae. “These boobs have more holes in their bats than a chunk of Swiss cheese.”
In the Cubs’ half Joe mowed them down as fast as they came to the bat. His curve and hop ball were working to perfection. He varied his fast and slow ones with such cunning that he had his opponents up in the air. It was just a procession of bewildered batters to the plate and then back to the bench. It looked as though Joe were in for one of the best days of his brilliant career.
In the third inning the Giants at last broke the ice. Barrett lay down a well-placed bunt along the third base line that the Cub third baseman got all mixed up on in his efforts to field. When at last he did get his hands on it he threw wild, and Barrett easily reached second before the ball was retrieved.
It looked like the possible beginning of a rally, and instantly all was commotion on the Giants’ bench. McRae himself ran out to the coaching line near first, while he sent Jim over to third. The Giant players began a line of chatter designed to rattle the Cub pitcher.
But Axander only smiled as he took up his position in the box. He was too much of a veteran to let his opponents get him fussed. But his smile, though it did not entirely disappear, lost some of its brightness when he saw that Baseball Joe was the next man to face him.
Cries of encouragement rose from Joe’s mates and from the Giant rooters in the stands.
“Oh, you home-run slugger!”
“Give the ball a ride!”
“Show him where you live!”
“Send it to kingdom come!”
Amid the babel of cries, Joe took up his position at the plate. His brain was alert and his nerves like steel.
“Sorry, Matson, but I’ll have to strike you out,” said Axander, with a grin. “All Giants look alike to me to-day. Giant killer is my middle name.”
“Don’t waste any sympathy on me,” retorted Joe. “You can send flowers to my funeral later on. But first give me a chance at the ball.”
Axander wound up and put one over the corner of the plate with all the force he could muster. Joe caught it near the end of his bat and sent it soaring out toward rightfield. It was a mighty clout, but when it came down it was just about six inches on the wrong side of the foul line.
Joe, who was well on his way to second, came back and again took up his position at the bat.
But that tremendous hit had given Axander food for thought. The next ball that came over was so wide of the plate that the catcher had to jump for it.
Another ball followed in the same place, and the stands began to murmur.
“He’s afraid to let him hit it!”
“He’s going to walk him!”
“Matson’s got his goat!”
But Axander had resolved to play safe, and the next ball was so wide that it was plain he was doing it with deliberate design.
“Thought you were a giant killer,” jeered Joe. “Have you lost your nerve? I can see from here you’re trembling.”
Stung by the taunt, Axander put all the stuff he had on the ball and sent in a swift incurve.
Joe timed it perfectly. There was a terrific crash as the bat met the ball, and the next instant Joe had dropped the bat and was running to first like a deer.
CHAPTER III
THROWN AWAY
On went the ball almost on a dead line to center, but rising as it went as though it were endowed with wings. On and still on, as though it would never stop. The centerfielder had cast one look at it, and then he turned and ran toward the distant bleachers in the back of the field. He took another look over his shoulder and then threw up his hands in a gesture of despair.
The ball cleared the bleacher rail, still going strong, and finally came to rest in the top row, where it was hastily gobbled up and concealed by an enthusiastic bleacherite, anxious to retain a memento of one of the longest hits ever made on the Chicago grounds.
Joe rounded first, going like a railroad train, but as he saw where the ball was going he moderated his speed in order to conserve his wind and just jogged around the bases until he reached the plate, where Barrett had preceded him.
Again and again he was forced to doff his cap in response to the shouts of the crowd, who had forgotten all partisanship for the moment in the excitement of that mighty homer. And his teammates mauled and pounded him until he laughingly made them desist, and made his way to the bench, where McRae and Robbie were beaming.
“I’ve been thirty years in baseball, Joe,” said McRae, “and I’ve seen lots of home runs. But if any one of them was finer than that whale of a hit, I’ve forgotten it.”
“If it hadn’t been for the bleachers in the way, the ball would be going yet,” grinned Robbie. “That swat will break Axander’s heart.”
But the heart of the Cub pitcher was made of stouter material than Robbie gave it credit for, and Axander settled down and prevented further scoring for that inning. But the Giants had two runs to the good, and the way Joe was pitching made those two runs look as big as a house.
For the next two and a half innings the game developed into a pitchers’ duel. Neither side was able to tally, although a scratch hit put a Giant on first and a passed ball advanced him to second. It seemed quite possible that the game would end with the score still two to none.
Joe came up again in the sixth, amid cries by the Giant rooters to repeat. But Axander was going to take no more chances. The memory of that screaming homer still lingered. The catcher stood wide of the plate, and Axander deliberately pitched four bad balls, regardless of the jeers of the crowd.
It was the finest kind of a compliment to Joe’s prowess, but he was not looking for compliments. What he wanted was another crack at the ball. There was no help for it, however, and he dropped his bat and trotted down to first.
He watched Axander like a hawk, took a long lead off the bag, and on the second ball pitched started to steal second. He would have made it without difficulty, but the Cub catcher threw the ball to the right of the bag, and the second baseman, in order to grab it, had to get in the way of Joe. There was a mix-up as they came together, and both went down. The baseman dropped the ball, and Joe managed to get his hand on the base before the ball could be recovered.
But when Joe attempted to get up on his feet, his left leg gave way under him, and he had to steady himself by catching hold of Holstein, the second baseman. The latter looked at him in surprise.
“Trying to kid me?” he asked.
“Not at all,” replied Joe. “My leg’s gone back on me. Must have wrenched or twisted it, I guess, when we came together.”
The umpire saw that something had happened and called time, while McRae, Robbie, and the other men on the Giant team gathered around their injured comrade in alarm and consternation.
“Nothing broken, is there, Joe?” cried McRae, as he came running out to second.
“Nothing so bad as that,” answered Joe, summoning up a smile. “Guess it’s only a sprain. But I’m afraid it puts me out of the running for to-day. I can scarcely bear my weight on it.”
The club trainer, Dougherty, ran his hands over Joe with the dexterity of an expert.
“No breaks,” he pronounced. “But a wrench to the leg and the ankle sprained. No more work for you, Joe, for a week, at least. Here, some of you fellows help me get him over to the clubhouse.”
“Maybe after a little rest and rubbing I can go on with the pitching,” suggested Joe.
“Nothing doing,” replied Dougherty, laconically. “Get that right out of your noddle. Your work’s done for the day.”
A rookie was put on second to run for Joe, and the latter was assisted to the clubhouse, where Dougherty and his assistants set to work on the leg and ankle at once.
Gloom so thick that it could have been cut with a knife came down on the Giants’ bench. Here was another proof that the “jinx” was still camping on their trail.
But there was no time for grizzling then, for the game had to go on. Jim and Markwith were sent out to warm up, while the Giants finished their half of the inning.
Joe’s hit had not gone for nothing, for Ledwith, the rookie, got to third on a fielder’s choice, and came home on a long sacrifice fly to center. Iredell swung viciously at the ball and sent up a towering skyscraper that Axander was waiting for when it came down. The inning was over, and, despite the injury to their star pitcher, another run had been stowed away in the Giants’ bat bag.
McRae selected Jim to finish the game in his chum’s place.
“Go to it, Barclay, and show them what stuff you’re made of,” admonished the manager. “The boys have given you a lead of three runs, and all you’ve got to do is to hold those birds down.”
“I’ll pitch my head off to do it,” promised Jim.
He only permitted three men to face him in the Chicago’s sixth inning. All the attempts of the Cub coaches and players to rattle him at the send-off resulted in failure.
Mollocher, the first Cub at bat, let a speeder go past because it was a trifle wide. The next was a slow curve that the umpire called a strike. Mollocher looked surprised, but apart from glaring at the umpire made no protest. He laced out at the next one and fouled it to the top of the grandstand for a second strike. The next ball he hit on the upper side, and it went for a harmless hopper to Barrett, who fielded him out at first.
Greaves, who came next, refused to offer at the first, which was high and went as a ball. The next cut the plate for a strike. He fouled the next two in succession, and finally sent a looping fly to Renton at third.
Lasker stood like a wooden man as Jim sent over a beauty for the first strike. The second came over below his knees, and was a ball. He struck at the next and missed, and then Jim fanned him with a slow outcurve that he almost broke his back in reaching for.
It was good pitching, and showed that the Giants had more than one string to their bow. The score was now 3 to 0 on even innings, and, with only three more innings to go, it looked as though the Giants were due to break their long run of hard luck.
“You’re doing fine, Jim,” encouraged Robbie. “Just keep that up and we’ll not only beat ’em but rub it in by giving ’em a row of goose eggs.”
“Knock wood,” cautioned McRae, giving three sharp raps with his knuckles on the bench. “For the love of Pete, Robbie, cut out that kind of talk. The game isn’t over yet by a long shot.”
Axander, as cool as an iceberg, put on extra speed and set down the Giants in their half in one, two, three order. Not a man reached first, and the last two were disposed of by the strike-out route.
“Stretch” was the word that ran through the stands as the Chicagos came in for their half of the “lucky seventh,” and the crowd rose as one man and stretched while cries of encouragement went up for their favorites.
The charm failed this time, however, for though they gathered one hit off Jim, it counted for nothing, as the next three went out in succession. Jim was certainly pitching airtight ball.
But in the latter half of the eighth, after the Giants had failed to add to their score, there came one of the sudden changes that illustrated once more the uncertainty of the national game.
The head of the Cubs’ batting order was up, and their supporters were frantically urging them to do something.
Burton did his best, and sent up a high fly to Curry at right. It looked as though it were made to order for the latter, who did not have to budge from his tracks. The ball came down directly in his hands--and he dropped it!
A mighty roar went up from the crowd, who had looked upon it as an easy out, which it should have been, and Burton, who had slowed up a little, put on speed, rounded first and started for second.
Curry, rattled by his error, fumbled at the ball, and when he did recover it lined it in the direction of second. But it went wide of Barrett, and though Jim, who was backing him up, caught and returned it, Burton was already on the bag.
Gallagher, the next man up, popped a Texas leaguer that Burkett and Barrett ran out for.
“I’ve got it,” cried Barrett.
“It’s mine,” shouted the burly first baseman.
Each unfortunately believed the other and held back, waiting for his comrade to make the catch. As a result, the ball dropped between them and rolled some distance away.
Burton, who had held the bag, started for third. Burkett retrieved the ball and without getting set hurled it to third. It went high over Renton’s head and rolled to the stands. Burton kept right on and crossed the plate for the first run of the game. Gallagher, in the general excitement, reached second.
Pandemonium broke loose among the Chicago rooters.
“We’ve got them going!” was the cry.
“All over but the shouting!”
Evans, the Chicago manager, sent in his best pinch hitter, Miller, and put a fast rookie, Houghton, on second to run in the place of Gallagher, who was of the ice-wagon type.
To give his comrades time to recover somewhat from their demoralization, Jim stooped down to lace his shoe. He was a long time doing this, and then was very deliberate in taking his place on the mound.
He whizzed over a high fast one that Miller struck at and missed. The next he fouled off. The third just missed cutting the corner of the plate, and it went for a ball. On the next, Miller lay down a bunt that rolled slowly along the third base line.
It looked as though it were going to roll foul, and Renton gave it a chance to do so. However, it kept on the inside of the line, and by the time Renton had gathered it up, Miller had easily reached first.
Wallace went to the bat with orders to wait Jim out, trusting to the hope that the latter would by this time be rattled, because the breaks of the game seemed to be going against him. But when two beauties in succession cut the corners of the plate for strikes, while he stood there like a wooden Indian, he changed his mind.
To make him hit into a double play, Jim made the next an outcurve. Nine times out of ten the batter hits that kind of ball into the dirt. It ran according to form this time also. Wallace hit a grounder that went straight to Larry Barrett at second. Larry set himself for the ball, while Iredell ran over to cover the bag for a double play.
But just before the ball reached Barrett, it took a high bound, went over his head and rolled out into centerfield. Gallagher scored, Miller reached third, and Wallace got to second on a long slide, just escaping being nipped by McGuire’s return of the ball.
With two runs in, no one out, and a man each on second and third, it looked bad for the Giants. A single hit would probably score both of the occupants of the bags. Even two outfield sacrifice flies would do it.
The din was tremendous as the crowds yelled in chorus, trying to rattle the already shaky visiting team. But the noise subsided somewhat as Jim put on steam and set down Mollocher on three successive strikes.
Greaves came up next, and lashed out at the first ball pitched, sending a grasser toward first. Burkett made a good pick-up, stepped on the bag, putting out Greaves, and then hurled to Mylert to catch Miller, who was legging it to the plate. But although Mylert made a mighty leap, the ball went over his head and before it could be recovered both Miller and Wallace had crossed the plate, making the score four to three in favor of the Chicagos.
And the Chicago rooters promptly went mad!
CHAPTER IV
FROM BAD TO WORSE
That nightmare inning came to an end without further scoring, as Jim struck out Lasker on four pitched balls. Then, with a sigh of relief, Jim pulled off his glove and went in to the bench, while a sheepish and disgruntled lot of Giants followed him in for their last inning. McRae was white with anger, and had no hesitation in telling the team what he thought of them.
“You bunch of four-flushers!” he stormed. “Throwing the ball all around the lot like a gang of schoolboys. You fellows are Giants--I don’t think. You’re a disgrace to your uniforms. You’re drawing your salaries on false pretenses. Letting those fellows get four runs in a single inning without making a real hit. What do you want the pitcher to do--strike out every man that comes to the bat, while you go to sleep in the field? You make me tired. You ought to join the Ladies’ Bloomer League. And even then Maggie Murphy’s team would put it all over you. Go in there now and get those runs back.”
With their faces burning from the tongue lashing of their irate manager, the Giants went in for their last inning.
Larry was first up and cracked out a sharp single to right that looked at first as though he might stretch it to a double, but it was so smartly relayed that he found it advisable to scramble back to the initial bag.
Jim was next up. The first two balls pitched were wide of the plate and he refused to bite. The next one, however, he caught right on the seam for a liner that went whistling into right for a double.
Larry had started at the crack of the bat, and had rounded second by the time Jim got to first. He kept on to third, where Iredell was on the coaching line. There he should have been retained, for Burton, who was renowned for his throwing arm, had by this time got the ball and was setting himself for the throw. Iredell, however, urged Larry on, with the consequence that when he slid into the plate the ball was there waiting for him. Jim, in the meantime, had reached second.
Larry picked himself up, brushed himself off and went to the bench, muttering growls against Iredell for having egged him on. Had two men been out there might have been some excuse for taking the chance. But with none out, it was almost certain that, either by a hit or a sacrifice, he could have been brought in with the run that would have tied the score.
Mylert tried to kill the ball, but hit it on the under side and it went up in a high fly that was easily gobbled up by the Cubs’ first baseman.
Curry, the last hope of the Giants, came to the bat. He was in a frenzy of eagerness to redeem himself, as it was his inglorious muff that had started the Cubs on their way to those four unearned runs.
Axander himself was beginning to feel the strain, and was a bit wild. Curry looked them over carefully and let the bad ones go by. A couple of good ones were sandwiched in, at which he swung and missed.
With three balls and two strikes, both pitcher and batter were “in the hole.” Axander had to put the next one over under penalty of passing the batter. And if Curry missed the next good one, the game was over.
Axander wound up and let one go straight for the plate. Curry caught it full and fair and the ball soared off toward left.
Weston, the Cub leftfielder, was off with the crack of the ball, running in the direction the latter was taking. It seemed like a hopeless quest, but he kept on, and just as the ball was going over his head he made a tremendous leap and caught it with one hand. He was off balance and turned a complete somersault, but when he came up he still had hold of the ball. It was a catch such as is seldom seen more than two or three times in a season.
The game was over, and the Cubs had triumphed by a score of 4 runs to 3. The crowd swarmed down on the diamond to surround and applaud their favorites, who had plucked victory from the very jaws of defeat, or, to put it more correctly, had accepted the game which the Giants had generously handed over to them.
It was a sore and dejected band of Giants that made their way to the clubhouse. The end had come so suddenly that they could hardly realize what had happened. Some were inclined to blame the “jinx,” but the more intelligent knew that their own errors and those of some of their comrades had alone brought about their downfall. The defeat was all the more exasperating, because they had had superb pitching throughout--pitching that would have won nine games out of ten and would certainly have won that one if their twirlers had been given half-way decent support.
“Hard luck, Jim,” was Joe’s greeting to his comrade, as the latter came in and made ready for the showers. “You pitched a dandy game. It’s tough when four runs come in without one of them being earned.”
“All in a day’s work,” replied Jim, affecting a cheerfulness that he was far from feeling. “But you’re the one I’m worrying about. How’s that leg and foot?”
“Dougherty says it will be all right in a week,” replied Joe. “He’s rubbed most of the soreness out of them, but I’ll have to favor them for a while.”
“Glory be!” exclaimed Jim with fervor. “If you were out of the game for a long time it would be all up with the Giants. Then they’d go to pieces for fair.”
“Not a bit of it,” disclaimed Joe. “It’s too great a team to be dependent on any one man. I’m only just one cog in a fine machine.”
“Looked like a rather wobbly machine this afternoon,” said Jim, ruefully.
“Sure,” agreed Joe. “The boys did play like a bunch of hams. But every team does that once in a while. The boys will shake off this slump, and then they’ll begin to climb. Remember that time when we won twenty-six straight? What we’ve done once, we can do again. I’m not a seventh son of a seventh son, but I have a hunch that we’re just about due to do that very thing.”
“I hope you’re as good a prophet as you are a pitcher,” replied Jim, grinning. He was beginning to find Joe’s optimism contagious.
Their conversation was interrupted by the coming of McRae. A sudden silence fell over the occupants of the clubhouse, for they knew the danger signals, and a glance at the manager’s face told them that a storm was brewing.
“Giants!” exclaimed McRae, and they winced at the bitter sarcasm in his tone. “Where have I heard that word before? A fine bunch of pennant winners! Why, you couldn’t win the pennant in the Podunk League. Put you up against a gang of bushers, and they’d laugh themselves to death. Any high school nine would make you look foolish. Giants? Dwarfs, pigmies, runts! Easy meat for any team you come across! Champions of the world? Cellar champions! Sub-cellar champions! Just keep on this way, and the other teams will bury you so deep you’ll be coming out in China. I’m going to change my name. I’m ashamed to be known as the manager of such a bunch of dubs.”
Nobody ventured to interrupt the tirade, partly because they felt that he was justified in his anger and partly because no one cared to play the part of lightning rod. When McRae was in that mood, it was best to let him talk himself out.
From the general roast he came down to particulars. He glared around and singled out Curry. That hapless individual evaded his glance and pretended to be very busy in tying his shoe.
“You’re the one that started that bunch of errors in the eighth inning,” McRae shouted, pointing an accusing finger at him.
“Aw,” muttered Curry, “any one can make a muff once in a while.”
“It isn’t for the muff I’m calling you down,” retorted McRae. “I know that can happen to any man, and I never roast any one for it. Why, we lost the World’s championship one year in Boston when Rodgrass made that muff in centerfield. I never said a word to him about it, and in the next year’s contract I raised his salary. What I’m panning you for is that rotten throw that followed the muff. That’s when you lost your head. You could easily have caught Burton at second and stopped the rally.
“And you, Burkett,” he went on, turning to the first baseman. “For a man who calls himself a major leaguer, you certainly went the limit this afternoon. Don’t you get sleep enough at night that you have to go to sleep on first? And those wild throws, one over Renton’s head and the other over Mylert’s. Oh, what’s the use,” he continued, throwing his hands in the air. “I’ve got a doctor on this club that can take care of any bone in the leg or bone in the arm, but he can’t do anything with bones in the head.”
If they thought he had worn himself out, they were greatly mistaken. He turned to Iredell.
“Come outside, Iredell,” he said, “I want to have a word with you.”
Once outside the clubhouse, he turned a grim face on the captain.
“I didn’t want to call you down before your men, Iredell,” he snapped, “because I didn’t care to weaken the discipline of the team--that is, if there’s any discipline left in the club. But I want to tell you that if your work to-day is a sample of the way you captain the team, why, the sooner there’s a change in captains the better.”
“I don’t know just what you mean,” muttered Iredell, an angry red suffusing his face.
“You know perfectly well what I mean,” declared McRae. “How about that ball that fell to the ground between Larry and Burkett? Either one of them could have got it. Why didn’t they?”
Iredell remained silent, fingering his cap.
“Because you didn’t call out which was to take it,” McRae himself supplied the answer. “Their eyes were on the ball, and when each said he could get it each left it to the other. All you had to do was to call out the name of one of them, and he’d have got it. That’s what you’re captain for--to use your judgment in a pinch.
“Then there was that rotten coaching at third base,” McRae went on with his indictment. “Why didn’t you hold Larry there? You know what a terror Burton is on long throws to the plate and that he’d probably get him. With nobody out, it was a cinch that one of the next three batsmen would have brought Larry in. And with him dancing around third, he might have got Axander’s goat. Then, too, the infield would have been drawn in for a play at the plate, and that would have given a better chance for a hit to the outfield. Am I right or am I wrong?”
“I suppose you’re right,” conceded Iredell. “But a fellow can’t always think of everything. If Larry had got to the plate, you’d be patting me on the back.”
“No, I wouldn’t,” snapped McRae, “because it would have been just fool’s luck. Why, I fined a man twenty-five dollars once for knocking out a home run when I had ordered him to bunt. That he came across with a home run didn’t change the fact that at that point in the game a bunt was the proper thing, and nine times out of ten would have gone through. You’ve got to use your sense and judgment and do the thing that seems most likely to bring home the bacon.”
“I don’t seem to please you these days, no matter what I do,” said Iredell sullenly.
“You’ll only please me when you do things right,” returned McRae. “You know as well as any one else that I never ride my men. I’ve been a ball player myself as well as manager, and I can put myself in the place of both. But what I want are men who are quick in the head as well as the feet. Give me the choice between a fast thinker and a fast runner, and I’ll take the fast thinker every time. Look at Joe Matson, the way he shot that ball over on Burton to-day before he knew where he was at. He’s always doing something of that kind--outguessing the other fellow. His think tank is working every minute. He puts out as many men with his head as he does with his arm. And that’s what makes him the greatest pitcher in this country to-day, bar none.
“Now, take it from me, Iredell, that’s the kind of thinking that’s going to pull this team out of the mud. I’m paying you a good salary to play shortstop. There, you’re delivering the goods. But I’ve tacked a couple of thousands onto your salary to act as captain. There, you’re not delivering the goods. And those goods have got to be delivered, or, by ginger, I’ll know the reason why!”
CHAPTER V
A STARTLING SUGGESTION
With this ultimatum, the irate manager stalked off to join Robbie, while Iredell, his face like a thunder cloud, returned to the clubhouse.
Nor was his wrath at the “roasting” he had received at the hands of McRae lessened by the consciousness that it was deserved. He knew in his heart that he had neglected his duties, or, at least, had failed to take advantage of his opportunities. The game might have been won if he had been on the job. To be sure, the team had played like a lot of bushers, but that did not relieve him of his responsibility. It was when they were playing badly that it was up to him to step into the breach. And that was what he had lamentably failed to do.
“Look at the face of him,” whispered Larry to Wheeler. “The old man has been giving him the rough edge of his tongue.”
“And when that tongue gets going it can certainly flay a man alive,” remarked Wheeler. “I’m sore yet from what he gave the bunch of us. Let’s hurry and get out of this. It’s too much like a funeral around here to suit me.”
McRae in the meantime was unburdening his heart to Robbie. The latter was his closest friend and adviser. They had been teammates in the early days on the old Orioles of Baltimore, when that famous team had been burning up the League. Both of them knew baseball from beginning to end. Together they had worked out most of the inside stuff, such as the delayed steal, the hit and run, and other clever bits of strategy that had now become the common property of all up-to-date major-league teams.
Yet, though as close friends as brothers, they were as different in temperament as two men could be. Robbie caught his flies with molasses. McRae relied on vinegar to catch his. Robbie knew how to salve the umpires. McRae was on their backs clawing like a wildcat. McRae ruffled up the feathers of his men, while Robbie smoothed them down. Each had his own special qualities and defects. But both were square and just and upright, and commanded the respect of the members of the team. Together they formed an ideal combination, whose worth was attested by the way they had led the Giants to victory. Into that wonderful team they had put the fighting spirit, the indefinable something that made them the “class” of the League and more than once the champions of the world. Even when they failed to win the pennant, they were always close to the top, and it was usually the Giants that the winning team had to beat.
Just now, however, the Giants were undeniably in the slump that at times will come to the best of teams, and both McRae and Robbie, who were hard losers, were at their wits’ end to know how to get them out of it.
“We’re up against it for fair, Robbie,” said McRae, as they walked to the gate on their way to the hotel at which the Giants were stopping. “Think of the way the Chicagos are giving us the merry ha ha! We just gave them that game to-day. Looked as though we had it sewed up for fair. People had started to leave their seats, thinking it was all over. Then we turn around and hand the game over to them.”
“It’s tough luck, to be sure,” Robbie agreed. “If Matson hadn’t been hurt, we’d have copped it sure. They couldn’t get within a mile of him. And now as the capsheaf, he’s probably out of the game for a week. But cheer up, Mac. The season’s young yet, and we’ve got out of many a worse hole than this.”
“It wasn’t so much the boys going to pieces in that one inning that makes me so sore,” returned the manager. “Any team will get a case of the rattles once in a while and play like a lot of dubs. What gets my goat are the blunders that Iredell made. As a captain, supposed to use his brains, he did well--I don’t think.”
“It was rotten judgment,” agreed Robbie, thoughtfully. “And what makes it worse is that it isn’t the first time it’s happened. He’s overlooked a lot of things since we started on this trip. Some of them have been trifling and haven’t done much damage. Some of them the spectators wouldn’t notice at all. But you’ve seen them and I’ve seen them.”
“And what’s worse, some of the team have seen them,” returned McRae. “That’s taken some of their confidence away from them and made them shaky. A captain is a good deal like a pitcher. If he’s good, the team play behind him like thoroughbreds. If he’s poor, they play like a lot of selling platers. I shouldn’t wonder if that’s the whole secret of this present slump.”
“Perhaps you’re right, John,” assented Robbie. “We’ll have to coach Iredell, wise him up on the inside stuff, and see if he doesn’t do better.”
McRae shook his head.
“That won’t do the trick,” he replied. “A good captain is born, not made. He’s got to have the gray matter in his noddle to start with. If he hasn’t got it, all the coaching in the world won’t put it into him. It’s a matter of brains, first, last and all the time. I’ve come to the conclusion that Iredell hasn’t got them. He’s got a ball player’s brains. But he hasn’t got a captain’s brains, and that’s all there is to it.”
“Well, admitting that that’s so, we seem to be up against it,” mused Robbie, ruefully. “Who else on the team is any better in that respect? Run over the list. Mylert, Burkett, Barrett, Jackwell, Curry, Bowen, Wheeler. I don’t know that any one of them has anything on Iredell in the matter of sense and judgment.”
“Haven’t you overlooked some one?” asked McRae, significantly.
Robbie looked at him in wonderment.
“Nobody except the substitutes,” he said. “And of course they’re out of the question.”
“How about the box?” asked McRae.
“Oh, the pitchers!” returned Robbie. “I didn’t take them into consideration. But of course a pitcher can’t be captain. That goes without saying.”
“Not with me it doesn’t go without saying,” said McRae. “Why can’t a pitcher act as captain?”
“Why--why,” stammered Robbie, “just because it isn’t done. I don’t remember a case where it ever was done.”
“That cuts no ice with me at all,” declared McRae, incisively. “Whatever success I’ve had in the world has been got by doing things that aren’t done. How was it that we made the old Orioles the class of the League and the wonder of the baseball world? By doing the things that aren’t done--that no other team had thought of. They went along in the old groove, playing cut and dried baseball. We went after them like a whirlwind with a raft of new ideas, and before they knew where they were at, we had their shirts.”
“Wriggling snakes!” exclaimed Robbie, his face lighting up, as he gave his friend a resounding slap on the back. “Mac, you’ve got me going. You’re the same old Mac, always getting up something new. Matson, of course! Joe Matson, not only the greatest pitcher, but the brainiest man in all baseball! Matson, who thinks like lightning. Matson, that the whole team worships. Matson, who can give any one cards and spades and beat him out. Mac, you old rascal, you take my breath away. You’ve hit the bull’s-eye.”
McRae smiled his gratification.
“That’s all right, Robbie, but you needn’t go knocking me down with that ham of a hand of yours,” he grumbled.
“Have you mentioned the matter to Joe yet?” asked Robbie, eagerly.
“Not yet,” replied the manager. “I wouldn’t do that anyway until I had talked the matter over with you and learned what you thought of it. And then, too, with that bruised leg and ankle of his, he won’t be in the game for a week or so, anyway. So you really cotton to the idea, do you?”
“I fall for it like a load of bricks,” was the response. “Of course, Matson’s yet to be heard from. It’s a pretty heavy responsibility to be placed on a man that’s already carrying the team along with his wonderful pitching. Perhaps he’ll think it’s a little too much to ask of him.”
“I’ll take a chance on that,” replied McRae, confidently. “He’s got a marvelous physique, and he always keeps himself in the best of condition. He’s strong enough to carry any load that he’s asked to bear. Then, too, you know how he’s wrapt up in the success of the team. He’s never balked yet at anything I’ve asked him to do. He’s playing baseball not only for money, but because he loves it. He talks baseball, thinks baseball, eats baseball, dreams baseball. He’s hep to every fine point in the game and he’s on the job every second. And when it comes to thinking fast and acting quickly--well, you know as well as I do that nobody can touch him.”
“He’s a wizard, all right,” agreed Robbie. “But here’s a point to be thought over, John. A captain’s got to be in every game. Joe pitches perhaps two games a week.”
“I’ve thought of that, too,” McRae replied. “On the days he’s not in the box, he can play in the outfield. And think of the batting strength that will add to the team. He’s liable to break up any game with one of the same kind of homers he knocked out to-day. He’s as much of a wonder with the bat as he is in the box, and that’s going some.”
“Better and better,” declared Robbie, exultantly. “Mac, I take off my hat to you. You’ve hit on an idea that’s going to win the pennant of the League this season, with the World Series thrown in for good measure. Who cares for to-day’s game? Who cares if the Giants are in a slump? Just make Joe Matson captain of the team and then see the Giants climb!”
CHAPTER VI
PERPLEXING PROBLEMS
“I hope you’re right, Robbie,” replied McRae, “and I believe you are. But not a word about this to anybody yet until we’ve mulled it over in our minds from every angle and are ready to spring it. I don’t want Iredell to get any inkling of it yet, for then perhaps he’d get sullen and indifferent and things will be even worse than they are now.”
“I’ll keep it under my hat,” promised Robbie. “How do you think Iredell’s going to take it? He’s an ugly sort of customer, you know, when he gets roiled.”
“I guess he’ll be easy enough to handle,” returned McRae. “I’ll let him down easy and heal his wounds with a little increase in salary. But whether he does or not, I’m not going to let any one’s personal ambitions stand in the way of the success of the team. That comes before anything.”
“Well now, to change the subject,” said Robbie, “who are we going to put in the box to-morrow? We’ve got to have that game, or the Chicagos will have a clean sweep of the series.”
“I guess we’ll have to depend on Markwith,” replied McRae. “The Chicagos have never been able to do much against his southpaw slants. Other things being equal, I’d put Barclay in the box. But he pitched the last part of to-day’s game, and perhaps it will be too soon to ask him to repeat. Even at that I may take a chance. I’ll see how they warm up before the game.”
“It’s too bad that Matson was hurt in to-day’s game,” remarked Robbie. “We were counting on him to take at least two games from St. Louis. Barclay, perhaps, could take another. Three out of four would help us some in winding up the trip. But if they trim us, too, as all the other Western teams have done, I’ll hate to go back and face the New York fans.”
“I’ll work Jim in two of them,” said McRae. “Markwith, Bradley and Merton will have to help him out. Possibly Joe will be in shape for the last game. And maybe the team will take a brace and wake up. At any rate, we can only hope. There isn’t much nourishment in hope, but it’s all we’ve got.”
In the meantime, Jim and Joe had finished their dressing and were preparing to leave the clubhouse.
Jackwell and Bowen were the only occupants left in the place. They were sitting in a corner engaged in earnest conversation.
“How is the leg, Matson?” asked Bowen, as the two chums passed near them.
“None too good,” returned Joe. “But it doesn’t feel as sore as I feel inside to see that game go flooey. Pity you fellows weren’t in it. McGuire and Renton weren’t so bad in the field, but they’re not as good stickers as you fellows, and your bats might have turned the tide. By the way, are you feeling any better now?”
“I’m all right,” answered Jackwell, a little confusedly.
“I’m not feeling exactly up to snuff,” said Bowen. “But I guess I’ll be able to go in to-morrow.”
“Ptomaine poisoning’s a pretty bad thing,” said Joe, looking at them rather quizzically. “It usually hangs on for days. You’re lucky to get over it so quickly.”
“You look fit as a fiddle,” added Jim, dryly. “Or is it the hectic flush of disease that gives you such a good color?”
“I guess it was only a slight attack,” said Jackwell. “Just enough to put us out of our stride for the day.”
“I’ve got to get to the hotel and get there quickly,” declared Joe, a twinge going through his foot as he stepped down from the threshold of the clubhouse. “Mabel will be at the hotel, wondering what on earth has happened to me.”
“By jiminy, that’s so!” cried Jim, turning to stare at his chum. “What will you think of me, old boy, if I confess that in the excitement of the game I’d forgotten about her coming?”
Joe grinned.
“You wouldn’t have been so quick to forget if Clara had been able to come along with her,” he said, as he walked along gingerly, favoring his injured leg.
“Say, Joe, that leg must be pretty bad,” said Jim, anxiously. “Better rest a while, don’t you think, before starting out?”
“I tell you I’ve waited too long already,” returned Joe. “Just call a taxi, will you? and we’ll spin down to the hotel in no time.”
Jim went personally in search of a conveyance. It was not hard to find one, and he returned almost immediately to find Joe limping toward him with the aid of a cane furnished by Dougherty. The latter had offered him his shoulder, but Joe, with a smile, refused.
“I may be a cripple, but I refuse to be treated as such,” he told Jim, in response to the latter’s protest. “Next thing you know, they’ll be offering to carry me on a stretcher.”
Nevertheless, Jim noted that Joe sighted the taxicab with eagerness, and leaned back in its shabby interior with a sigh of relief.
“Hate to show myself to Mabel in this shape,” he said ruefully. “Looks as though I’d had the worst end of the fight.”
“Rather step up lively to the tune of ‘Hail the Conquering Hero Comes,’ I suppose?” said Jim, with an understanding grin. “I think I get your train of thought all right, old man. But I wouldn’t worry, if I were you. Nothing you could do would ever make Mabel think you anything but a hero.”
“Let’s hope you have the right dope,” said Joe.
He looked abstractedly from the dingy windows of the cab at the spectacle of the crowded streets. At that moment he really saw nothing but his young wife as she had looked the last time they had been forced to say good-bye. It had seemed to him then that he could never bear to part from her again. He was so eager to get to her that he had a ludicrous desire to get out and push the taxicab along.
“Thought it was to-night that Mabel was coming,” remarked Jim, interrupting his reverie. “You could have met her at the train then.”
“Reggie found that he would have to come to the city on business, and since it was necessary for him to come on an earlier train, Mabel decided to change her own plans so that she could come along with him,” explained Joe.
“Oh, so we’re about to see our old friend, Reggie, again!” exclaimed Jim, with real enthusiasm. “Glad to see the old boy, though I can’t help wishing he’d mislay that monocle of his. ‘The bally thing makes me nervous, don’t you know?’” he finished, in perfect imitation of the absent Reggie.
Reginald Varley not only had the fact that he was Mabel’s brother to recommend him to Joe and Jim, but despite his affectation of a supposed English accent and the absurdity of a monocle, Reggie was a fine and likable fellow.
For his part, Reggie professed a great admiration for the chums, especially for his brother-in-law, Baseball Joe. When he could help it, he never missed an opportunity of following the exploits of the two, and, therefore, he had been grateful on this occasion to business for furnishing him an excuse for accompanying his sister to Chicago while the Giants were still there.
“Suppose we go light on this accident, Jim,” suggested Joe, indicating his injured leg and foot. “Just a slight sprain you know.”
“I get you,” returned Jim, adding, as his suddenly startled gaze leaped to the traffic that whirled past the rapidly moving taxicab: “Look at that car coming toward us. On the wrong side of the street, too! That driver’s either drunk or crazy!”
Instantly Joe took in the danger. A big automobile, being driven at terrific speed, had rounded the corner on two wheels and was charging down upon them. It seemed that the driver of their taxicab would be a superman if he should prove able to avoid a terrible accident.
Jim had opened the door as though to jump, but Joe called to him.
“Sit tight, Jim,” he gritted. “It’s the only way.”
Lucky for them that the taxi man was keen witted. He saw the only thing that was possible to do in such an emergency, and did it without hesitation.
With a wild bumping of wheels and screeching of emergency brake, the car skidded up on the sidewalk, slithered along for a few feet and came to a standstill. The oncoming car had missed the rear wheels of the taxicab by the fraction of an inch!
Pedestrians, sensing the imminent peril, had scattered wildly, and now returned vociferously to view the curious spectacle of a taxicab planted squarely in the middle of the sidewalk.
Joe’s relief at the narrow escape from disaster changed immediately to impatience with the rapidly gathering and gaping crowd.
“More delay! Say, Jim, can’t we beat it out of here?”
“Fine chance! Especially with your game leg,” Jim retorted, adding with a chuckle: “Here comes a cop. Watch him get rid of the crowd.”
“More likely to arrest us for disorderly conduct and disturbing the peace,” said Joe, disconsolately. “Fine husband Mabel will think she has. She’ll think I’m mighty anxious to get to her.”
“Don’t be such a gloom hound,” laughed Jim. “This cop has a pleasant face. Wait till I give him some blarney.”
At that moment the policeman, having interviewed the sullen and angry chauffeur, opened the door of the cab. The constantly gathering crowd pressed forward curiously to get a glimpse of Joe and Jim.
The officer, a round-faced, good-natured-looking individual, stared at Joe for a moment and then broke into a broad grin.
“Begorry, if you ain’t the livin’ image of Baseball Joe, the greatest slinger in captivity, my name ain’t Denny M’Lean!”
“Sure, it’s Baseball Joe! And we owe the fact that he’s still living to the quick wits of our friend here,” broke in Jim, indicating the still furious chauffeur. “That fool in the other car was driving on the wrong side of the road, officer----”
“Sure he was!”
“I saw it myself!”
“Looked like a head-on collision, I’ll tell the world!”
These and other cries came from the crowd, among whom the news that the great Baseball Joe occupied the cab with another famous twirler had spread like wildfire.
“Do me a favor, will you, officer?” urged Joe, taking out his watch and glancing at it hastily. “I’m already late for an appointment. Clear the road, will you, and let us get going?”
“So far as I see, there ain’t no particular objection to that,” returned the bluecoat, with exasperating deliberation. “The sidewalk ain’t no proper parkin’ place for an automobile, as you know. But as you seem to be havin’ plenty of witnesses that say ye couldn’t have done no different, ’twill be easy to overlook yer imperdence. Now thin,” turning to the crowd, “did any one of ye notice the license plate of that law-breakin’ car?”
Several persons came forward with more or less reliable information. After making a note of this, while Joe fumed with increasing impatience, the officer returned and grinned at them, his eyes snapping with humor.
“Lucky for McRae of the Giants that Baseball Joe kept a whole skin on him this day. When I get that truck driver I’ll be tellin’ him what I think of him in no unsartin terms. Good-bye to yez, and good luck.”
He thrust his huge paw inside the cab, and Joe gripped it heartily. For many years after this meeting with the great Giant twirler, Sergeant Dennis M’Lean was to exhibit proudly the hand that had been gripped by Baseball Joe.
They were off at last, crawling through the close-packed crowd, and with tremendous relief found themselves once more part of the traffic, speeding toward the Wheatstone Hotel where Mabel and Reggie were waiting for them.
“Suppose we’ll have a few blowouts now, just to make the thing real good,” grumbled Joe, and Jim laughed.
“Here we are before the Wheatstone now,” he said. “Just goes to show how sound your gloomy prophecies are!”
Joe’s heart leaped as he saw the great building which he was making his headquarters during the stay of the club in Chicago and where he had also engaged a room for Reggie. He started to leap from the cab, which had slowed at the curb, but a sharp twinge from his injured leg reminded him of his partly crippled condition.
“Take it easy, old man,” warned Jim. “If you don’t favor that foot, you may find yourself laid up for a month instead of a week.”
It was all very well for Jim to say “take it easy,” but when a young married man has been separated from his wife for weeks, the thing isn’t so easily done.
They rode in the elevator to the fifth floor where, leaning on his cane and refusing the help of Jim’s arm, Joe got out and hobbled down the corridor to the door of his apartment.
“Remember, I’m not really hurt, I just imagine I am,” he cautioned Jim once more, as he put his hand on the knob.
Instantly the door opened and a vision of bright hair and rosy face seized him by the hand and dragged him into the room.
“You too, Jim! Come in, do!” cried Mabel, breathlessly. “Reggie and I have been waiting ages for you. Joe--Joe, dear--that cane! You----”
“It’s nothing, nothing at all, little girl,” soothed Joe, his arms about her. “Just a little spill on the field. Be all right in a week. Ask Doc Dougherty, if you don’t believe me.”
Mabel held him off anxiously at arm’s length and looked appealingly at Jim.
“Is he telling me the truth? Is he?”
“Well, I like that!” said Joe, before Jim could answer. “As if I didn’t always tell you the truth?”
“You know, I never make it my business to interfere in the quarrels of husband and wife,” drawled the familiar tones of Reggie, as, attracted by the sound of voices, he strolled in from the other room. “In fact, quarrels of any kind are foreign to my gentle disposition, don’t you know. But on this occasion, I really feel called upon to interrupt. Jim, my dear fellow, how is the old bean to-day? Rippin’, from the looks of it, what? My word, brother-in-law,” turning to Joe and adjusting his monocle so as to scrutinize him the better, “you have been indulging in a fisticuff of some sort, yes? Tried to do for the old teammates, did you?”
“Oh, leave him alone, Reggie, do!” protested Mabel, all tender solicitude, as she led Joe to a chair and forced him into it. “Can’t you see he is all tired out? Now don’t talk, dear, unless you want to,” she added to Joe, placing a cushion behind his head and looking at him anxiously, her pretty head on one side.
Joe heaved a contented sigh and smiled up at her.
“As long as you don’t tell me not to look at you, I don’t care!” he said.
CHAPTER VII
BAD NEWS FOR JIM
“My word, I do believe they have forgotten us completely,” said Reggie, plaintively, as he placed his monocle in his eye and stared at the absorbed young couple. “Perhaps we had better be making ourselves scarce, Jim, old chap.”
“Nothing doing,” retorted Jim, moving a chair up toward Joe and Mabel and placing himself in it as though he intended remaining there indefinitely. “I don’t stir a step from this place until Mabel tells me all the news from home.”
“He means all the news about Clara,” laughed Joe, as Mabel obediently sat down beside him and turned her attention to Jim.
“Oh, Clara is all right,” said Mabel, but in spite of her cheerful words, the others saw that a cloud had darkened her face. “It is Mother Matson I am worrying about,” she added slowly.
Mrs. Matson, Joe’s mother, had lately been in poor health. Because of this fact, Mabel had stayed with her mother-in-law for a time after her marriage to Joe. But recently she had yielded to the urging of her own family to visit them in Goldsboro, North Carolina, her old home. Although Mabel had been busy renewing old friendships there, she had kept in almost daily touch with Mrs. Matson and Clara through the mails. As a matter of fact, Jim had more than once complained that Mabel heard a great deal more from his fiancée than he did himself. Owing to the constantly changing address of the team, Jim’s mail, as well as Joe’s, was often delayed.
Because of Mrs. Matson’s illness, Clara had postponed her marriage with Jim, hoping for her mother’s restoration to health. Until that happy time came, nothing remained to Jim but to possess his soul in patience, which was often very hard to do.
Now, at Mabel’s mention of his mother, Joe started forward, fixing his anxious gaze upon his wife.
“What has happened to mother?” he demanded. “Is she--nothing serious, is it?”
“Oh, no, no!” said Mabel, patting his hand soothingly. “There is nothing fatally wrong. She is--oh, I might as well tell you at once, Joe dear, for you would only worry the more if I tried to keep things from you. It is feared that Mother Matson must undergo an operation, a rather serious operation, I am afraid.”
“What for?” asked Joe, quietly, although his face had become suddenly white.
“Clara didn’t say in her letter,” returned Mabel, soberly. “Your family doctor, Doctor Reeves, is calling a consultation. Clara will undoubtedly write more fully after that is over.”
“A consultation!” cried Joe, leaping to his feet, only to slump down again in his chair at the pain in his injured leg. “Why, this is horrible, girl! Do you know when they expect to--do it?”
“They certainly won’t operate right away, Clara says,” Mabel returned. “They think her heart is too weak to stand the ordeal just now. Dr. Reeves is going to put her through a special course of treatment, and he thinks that in a month or two she will be ready.”
“My poor mother!” groaned Joe. “How can I go on playing ball with that thing in prospect? I got a letter from mother a day or two ago,” he added, feeling in the pocket of his coat for the note from home. “She didn’t say anything about any trouble then.”
“Of course she wouldn’t, you old silly,” said Mabel, gently. “Don’t you know that mothers always worry about everybody else but themselves? Mother Matson never would take her illness seriously, you know, and if she had she would have been the very last one to worry you with it. It was Clara, not your mother, who decided you ought to be told now and asked me to do it.”
“That sure is tough luck, Joe,” said Jim, gravely. “I had no idea your mother was as sick as that.”
“But, I say, don’t pull such a long face over it, old chap,” urged Reggie, trying to strike a cheerful note in the general gloom of the place. “People are operated on, you know, some of them again and again, and come up smilin’ in the end. It’s a bally shame and all that, but no need giving up hope altogether, you know. Hope on, hope ever, as the poet sings. Now, I knew of a person once who had a complication of diseases--most distressin’--and the doctors insisted that there must be an operation. But when the day came for the operation, old chap, they found----”
“Spare me the details, will you, Reggie?” urged Joe. “I can’t go them just now.”
“Certainly, old chap, certainly,” agreed Reggie, with swift compunction. “I might have known the subject would be, well, distasteful to you. To change the topic of conversation, just cast your eye for a moment in the direction of our old friend, Jim. He is dyin’ to learn more about Clara, you know, and can’t for the life of him decide how to tell you about it. How about it, old chap? Am I right?” Saying this, he tapped Jim playfully with his monocle, and the latter reluctantly smiled.
“You sure are a mind reader, old boy,” he said. “I must confess that a little first-hand news of Clara would be welcome, and Mabel’s seen her since I have.”
Joe, looking at Mabel at that moment, was again surprised to find her eyes shadowed and anxious. The expression passed in a moment, however, and she smiled upon Jim reassuringly.
“Clara was dreadfully disappointed at not being able to be here with Reggie and me, and of course she is worried to death about Mother Matson, but aside from that she’s all right.”
“No news of any kind?” urged Jim, regarding Mabel closely. It seemed to Joe that Jim also had noticed the faint hesitation that had crept into Mabel’s manner at mention of Clara’s name. “Even the smallest scrap of news, first hand, would be mighty welcome, you know.”
Mabel seemed to hesitate, then got to her feet and walked over to the window. The boys watched her uneasily, but when she turned back to them her face was bright and untroubled.
“I wish I had some news, Jim,” she said, in her normal tone. “But you must remember that I have been in Goldsboro for some time, and the only news I get of Clara is through the mails. But now I think I’ve been answering questions enough,” she added lightly, a hand on Joe’s shoulder. “I think I will start asking a few in my turn. First of all, I want to know just how you happened to get hurt, Joe.”
Despite the fact that, just then, he wished to talk about nothing so little as about himself, Joe recounted as quickly as he could the details of his accident. From that the conversation turned to the condition of the team and the discouraging slump it had taken.
“We sure seem to be headed straight for the bottom,” remarked Jim, adding, as he looked ruefully at Joe: “And now with our champion twirler laid up for an indefinite period, things look pretty tough for the Giants. If only Jackwell and Bowen would quit looking over their shoulders and watch the ball, we might have a chance to rattle the jinx that’s after us.”
Both Mabel and Reggie--the latter was an ardent baseball fan and fairly “ate up” anything that concerned the game--demanded to know more about Jackwell and Bowen, and there ensued an animated discussion as to the meaning of the peculiar actions of the two men.
It was Reggie who finally repeated his suggestion that he and Jim “toddle on” in order to leave Joe and Mabel a few minutes of private conversation before joining them again for dinner.
Joe did not protest very hard, for he was aching to have Mabel to himself. He was very anxious about his mother, and more than a little curious to know what, if anything, was amiss with Clara.
Mabel came to him herself as soon as the door was closed behind Jim and Reggie. She held out her hands to him and Joe took them gently.
“What is it, little girl?” he asked. “You were holding back something about mother and Clara. Now suppose you tell me.”
“Oh, Joe, I am so worried. I’ve told you everything about poor mother. But Clara--well, I think she ought to be soundly scolded!”
For the first time since he had heard of his mother’s illness, Joe’s grave face relaxed in a smile.
“Who’s going to do it--you?” he chaffed. “You never scolded me but once, and then I liked it.”
“But you don’t take me seriously, and this really is serious, Joe,” said Mabel, her pretty forehead marred by an anxious frown. “If you could see this fellow with his handsome eyes and his beautiful clothes----”
“What fellow?” interrupted Joe, becoming suddenly interested. “You don’t mean----”
“Yes I do, just that!” returned Mabel, shaking her head solemnly. “This Adonis I’m talking about is pestering Clara with his attentions.”
“Give me his name,” cried Joe. “I’ll soon show this little cupid where he gets off----”
“He isn’t little, Joe. He’s broad-shouldered and six feet tall and he has a million dollars--maybe ten million for all I know----”
“What’s his name?” roared Joe again, with undiminished ire. “What do I care if he’s twenty feet tall and has a billion dollars? Hang around my sister, will he?”
“Oh, hush, Joe, hush!” cautioned Mabel, putting a finger to his lips and looking apprehensively toward the door. “Some one will be coming in to see where the fire is.”
Joe took her hand gently away and looked at her intently.
“What is there behind all this?” he asked quietly. “Clara doesn’t encourage this fellow, does she? She wouldn’t do that?”
Mabel looked troubled.
“I hope not, Joe. Oh, I hope not!” she said, and for a moment there was silence while the two studied the pattern of the rug upon the floor, busy with troubled thoughts. It was Joe who again broke the silence.
“You haven’t told me his name yet,” he reminded Mabel, quietly.
“His name is Tom Pepperil. He used to live near Riverside, but he went away for a long time and made a fortune. Now he has come back, and, according to Clara’s letters, is making desperate love to her.”
“But she has no right to listen to him! She’s Jim’s!”
Mabel glanced up at him swiftly and then down at the pattern of the rug again.
“No,” she said. Then, after a long minute, she came close to Joe and put her hand over his again.
“Wouldn’t it be dreadful,” she said, “if the worst we fear should happen, and she should give up good old Jim for that fellow, whose chief recommendation is his money?”
“I couldn’t bear to think of it,” groaned Joe. “I’d rather lose every cent I have in the world than have it happen. Tell me that you don’t think it will ever come to that!”
“I don’t know, Joe,” said Mabel, sadly. “She’s so tantalizingly vague. Perhaps it’s the strain she’s under on account of mother that makes her so different from her usual self. I can’t understand Clara any more.”
There was a long silence, and then Joe roused himself to ask dully:
“Do you think we ought to tell Jim?”
CHAPTER VIII
THE HIDDEN-BALL TRICK
“Oh, I wouldn’t tell Jim!” exclaimed Mabel, in alarm. “In the first place, we’re not clear enough about what Clara means to do. Perhaps it won’t amount to anything after all. And if it does, it’ll be bad enough when it comes without our doing anything to hasten it.”
“I can’t understand it,” said Joe, gloomily. “There never seemed to be two people more perfectly made for each other than Jim and Clara--always excepting ourselves,” he hastened to add, as he pressed her hand--“and it will be one of the greatest blows of my life if there should be any break between them. Clara seemed to be dead in love with Jim; and as for him, he fairly worships the ground she walks on. When he gets one of her letters, he’s dead to the world. And he’s one of the finest fellows that ever breathed. I look on him as a brother. He hasn’t any bad habits, is as straight as a string, a splendid specimen of manhood, handsome, well educated--what on earth could any girl ask for more? And he’s making a splendid income too. Has Clara suddenly gone crazy?”
“It’s beyond me,” replied Mabel. “Clara is the dearest girl, but just now I’d like to give her a good shaking. Lots of girls of course are dazzled by millions, but I never believed Clara would be one of them. And perhaps she isn’t, Joe dear. We may be doing her a great injustice. We’ll have to wait and see.”
“Well, promise me, anyway, that you’ll write to her at once,” urged Joe. “I’d do it myself, but you girls can talk to each other about such things a good deal better than any man can. Try to bring her to her senses and urge her not to wreck her own life and Jim’s simply for money or social position. She’d only be gaining the shadow of happiness and losing the substance.”
“I’ll write to-morrow,” promised Mabel. “But now let’s dismiss all unpleasant thoughts and remember only that we’re together.”
While Joe was desperate at the injury to his foot that kept him out of the game just at a time he was sorely needed by his team, he found some compensation in the fact that he could spend more time with Mabel than would otherwise have been possible. He did not have to take part in the morning practice, and in the afternoons he and Mabel attended the games together as spectators.
On the other hand, Mabel was deeply disappointed that she could not see Joe pitch, as she had joyously counted on doing. She was intensely proud of her famous young husband, and was always one of the most enthusiastic rooters when he was scheduled to take his turn in the box. More than once Joe had won some critical game because of the inspiration that came to him from the knowledge that Mabel was looking on. But there was no use murmuring against fate, and they had to take things as they were, promising themselves to make up for their disappointment later in the season.
Reggie, too, felt that fate had treated him unfairly.
“Why, to tell the bally truth, old topper,” he declaimed to Joe, “I didn’t have to come to Chicago at all, don’t you know! I just drummed up the excuse that I ought to look over our branch in this city, and the guv’nor fell for it. It’s rippin’, simply rippin’, the way you’ve been pitchin’ and battin’ ever since the season opened, and I’d been countin’ on seem’ you stand the blighters on their heads. And just when I got here, the old leg had to go bad! It’s disgustin’!”
“Hard luck, old boy,” laughed Joe. “But you’ll see many a game yet through that blessed monocle of yours. If you feel sore, think how much sorer I am and take comfort.”
The crowning disgrace of having the Cubs take four games in a row was happily spared the Giants. McRae put in Jim again, and this time the team gave him better support and he pulled out a victory.
“Great stuff, old man,” congratulated Joe, as Jim, after the game, came up to the box in which Joe and Mabel were sitting.
“You pitched beautifully, Jim,” was Mabel’s tribute, as she smiled upon him.
“Awfully nice of you to say so,” responded Jim, in a sort of lifeless way. “But most of the credit was due to the team. They played good ball to-day. Guess I’ll go and dress now and see you later.”
Joe and Mabel looked at each other, as Jim stalked away across the diamond to the clubhouse.
“Doesn’t seem very responsive, does he?” remarked Mabel.
“No, he doesn’t,” said Joe thoughtfully. “Generally he’s bubbling over with enthusiasm after the Giants have won. He’s been very quiet since our talk last night.”
“Do you think he suspected there was anything wrong?” asked Mabel, anxiously.
“I shouldn’t wonder,” answered Joe somberly. “He’s quick as a flash to sense anything, and I noticed a shadow on his face as he watched you when we were talking about Clara. Hang it all!” he burst out, with a vehemence that startled Mabel. “If Clara throws him down, I’ll never forgive her, even if she is my sister. What’s the matter with the girls nowadays, anyway? Haven’t they any sense?”
“Some of them have,” answered Mabel. “Myself, for instance. That’s the reason I married you, Joe dear.”
“For which heaven be thanked,” responded Joe, with a fervor that left nothing for Mabel to desire. “I’m the luckiest fellow on earth. And just because I am so happy, I want Jim to be happy too.
“Then, there’s another thing,” he went on, “which, while it’s infinitely less important than Jim’s happiness, is important, just the same. That is the effect it will have on the chances of the Giants. We never needed men to be in shape to do their best work as much as we need them now. And the most important men on any team are the pitchers. I’m not saying that because I’m a pitcher, but because it’s a simple fact that every one knows. Let the pitchers go wrong, and the best team on earth can’t win. And a pitcher that has a load of trouble on his mind can’t do his best work. How do you suppose Jim can keep up to his standard if Clara does her best to break his heart?”
“I suppose that’s true,” assented Mabel. “And yet I thought he pitched well to-day.”
“He doesn’t know all we know,” replied Joe. “He just has a suspicion, and he’s trying to assure himself that it’s groundless. But even at that, he wasn’t in his usual form this afternoon. You may not have noticed it, but I did. He got by because the boys played well behind him and because the Cubs let down and played indifferent ball. But he wasn’t the old Jim. Already that thing is beginning to work on him. And if the worst happens, it will break him all up--at least, for the present season. If I had that sister of mine here this afternoon, I’ll bet she’d hear something that would make her ears burn.”
Mabel soothed him as best she could, but her own heart was heavy as she thought of the possibilities that the future held in store for poor Jim.
From Chicago the Giants went to St. Louis, the last stop on their Western schedule. Here they had some hopes of redeeming themselves and making up for their recent failures, for the Cardinals were going none too well. Mornsby, their famous shortstop, had had a quarrel with the manager, and was seeking to get his release to some other team, any one of which would have snapped him up at a fabulous price. There were rumors of cliques in the team, and their prospects for the season were none too flattering.
But no matter how poorly a team had been going, they always seemed to brace up when they were to meet the Giants. They reserved their best pitchers for those games, and the fans came out in droves in order to see the proud team of the Metropolis humbled.
So the clean sweep that the Giants had been hoping for did not materialize. Markwith, to be sure, carried off the first game by a comfortable margin. He was one of the pitchers who when he was good was very good indeed, and on that day his southpaw slants were simply unhittable.
But the St. Louis evened things up the next day by beating Bradley, one of the Giants’ second string pitchers, by a score of eight to five. On the following day, the pendulum swung again to the other side of the arc, and Jim chalked up a victory, despite some pretty free hitting by the home team.
The Giants pinned their hopes once again to Markwith in the last game of the series. He was not so good as on the opening day, but even then he might have won, had it not been for a stupid play by Iredell in the ninth inning.
One man was out in the Giants’ last half. The score was seven to six in favor of St. Louis. Iredell had reached first on a single, and on a wild pitch had advanced to second. Burkett, the heavy hitting first baseman, was at the bat. A hit would probably bring Iredell in and tie the score.
Iredell was taking a pretty long lead off second and “Red” Smith, the Cardinal catcher, shot the ball down to second, hoping to catch him napping. Iredell, however, made a quick slide back to the bag and got there before Salberg, the Cardinal second baseman, could put the ball on him.
Iredell got up, grinned triumphantly at Salberg, dusted off his clothes, and again took a lead off the bag. Quick as a flash, Salberg, who had concealed the ball under his arm, ran up to Iredell and touched him out.
A groan of distress came from the Giants and their supporters and a roar of derision from the St. Louis crowd. That a big-league player could be caught by a trick that was as old as the hills seemed almost incredible. It was years since the moth-eaten play had been seen on a major-league diamond, and the crowd yelled itself hoarse.
Iredell stood for a moment as if stupefied, then he walked slowly into the bench, his face a flaming red. If McRae forebore to tell him what he thought of him, it was because he was so choked that the words would not come. But the glare that he turned on the luckless player was more eloquent than any words, even in his rich vocabulary.
Joe turned to Mabel, where he was sitting beside her in the stands immediately back of the pitcher.
“Did you see that?” he asked. “To think of a Giant player being caught by a sand-lot trick!”
“I didn’t quite get it,” answered Mabel. “I was looking at the batter at the time. Just what was it that happened?”
“Salberg hid the ball under his arm instead of throwing it back to the pitcher,” explained Joe. “Iredell took it for granted that he had thrown it, and was so busy dusting off his clothes that he didn’t make sure of it. Why, Shem tried that on Japhet when they came out of the ark. And to think that he chose this moment to pull that bonehead play! Look at that hit by Burkett. It would have brought Iredell home with the run which would have tied the score.”
Their eyes followed the flight of the ball, which was a mighty three-bagger that Burkett had lined out between right and center. It brought a rousing cheer from the Giant partisans, and hope revived that the game might yet be saved. But the hope was vain, for the fly that Wheeler sent out into the field settled firmly in the leftfielder’s hand, and the inning and the game were over, with the St. Louis having the big end of the score.
It was a hard game to lose, and it was a disgruntled lot of Giant players that filed off dejectedly to their dressing rooms. A sure tie, at least, had been within their grasp, and, as a matter of fact, a probable victory. For if Iredell had scored, as he could easily have done on the three base hit of Burkett, the latter would have been on third with only one man out instead of two and with the score tied. Then Wheeler’s long hit, even though an out, would have gone for a sacrifice and Burkett could easily have scored from third, putting the Giants one run ahead. To be sure, the St. Louis would still have had the last half of the ninth, but the Giants, fighting to hold their advantage, would have had all the odds in their favor.
But all the post mortems in the world could not change the fact that the game had gone into the St. Louis column and that the Giants, instead of taking three out of four, had had to be content with an even break. It was small consolation that that was better than they had been able to do with the other Western teams. The trip had been a terrible flivver, one of the worst that the Giant team had ever made while swinging around the circle.
“That’s the last straw that breaks the camel’s back,” growled McRae, savagely. “It’ll make us the laughing stock of the League. Why, at this minute, the crowds before the bulletin boards all over the United States are snickering at the Giants. Not merely a Giant player--that would be bad enough--but the Giant captain--get me?--the Giant captain, supposed to show his men how the game should be played, gets caught by the oldest and cheapest trick in the game. It’s all we needed to wind up this trip. I want to go away somewhere and hide my head. I hate to go back and face the grins of the New York fans.”
“It sure is tough,” agreed Robbie. “Of course that finishes Iredell as captain.”
“That goes without saying,” replied McRae. “Even if I were disposed to overlook it and give him another chance, I couldn’t do it now. When a captain, instead of being respected by his men, becomes the butt of the team and a joke to the fans all over the circuit, he’s through.”
A little later the stocky manager sought out Iredell and found him alone.
“I know what you want to see me about,” Iredell forestalled him. “You want my resignation as captain of the team. Well, here it is,” and he handed over a paper.
“All right, Iredell,” returned McRae, after he had scanned the paper carefully and stowed it away in his pocket. “I’ll accept this, and I won’t say anything more about that play, because I know how sore you’re feeling and I don’t want to rub it in. I’ll admit that at the time it happened, I saw red. But what’s past is past, and there’s no use crying about spilled milk.”
“You can have my resignation as shortstop too, if you want it,” growled Iredell, who was evidently in a nasty humor.
“I don’t want it,” said McRae, kindly. “You’re a good shortstop, and I’ve no fault to find with your work as such. And now that you’ve got nothing to think about except playing your position, I hope you’ll do better than ever. One thing I’m counting on, too, is that you cherish no grudges and give full loyalty to the man I’m going to make captain. Is that a go?”
Iredell grunted something that McRae chose to accept as an affirmative. But he would have changed his opinion if he had seen the ugly glare in Iredell’s eyes and the clenched fist that Iredell shook at the manager’s back as the latter walked away.
“Give me a dirty deal and expect me to take it lying down, do you?” he snarled. “You’ve got another guess coming, and don’t you forget it!”
CHAPTER IX
THE NEW CAPTAIN
Although Iredell had himself offered his resignation, he had only done it to take the wind out of McRae’s sails and put himself in a better strategic position. If worst came to worst, he could save his pride by saying that he had resigned of his own accord instead of being “fired.”
But he had hoped, nevertheless, that the resignation would be refused and that McRae, after perhaps giving him a lecture, would accord him another chance. The prompt acceptance had caught him off his balance, and he was full of rage at the conviction that McRae had sought him out for the express purpose of displacing him.
As Robbie had previously intimated, Iredell was a poor sport. The events of the last few days should have taught him that the duties of captain were too much for him. But like many other people, he was inclined to blame everything and everybody else for his own shortcomings. He had been intensely vain of his position as captain of the team. His nature was, at bottom, petty and vindictive, and from the moment it dawned upon him what had happened to him, he framed a resolution to do all that lay in his power to thwart the plans of his successor. If he had failed, he would try to prove that whoever took his place could do no better.
With his resentment was mingled curiosity as to the man that was to succeed him. Who could it be? He ran over in his mind the other members of the outfield and infield, never once thinking of the pitchers, who were assumed to be out of the question. The more he pondered, the more puzzled he became. Well, after all, it did not matter. He would know soon enough. And whoever it was would find his work mighty hard for him, as far as he, Iredell, could make it so.
That night the Giants shook the dust of St. Louis from their feet, and with a sigh of relief, not unmingled with apprehension, took the train for the long jump home. Relief that the disastrous Western trip was at last over. Apprehension at the reception they would meet from the newspapers and fans of New York.
Mabel was to accompany Joe back to New York and remain there for about two weeks before she returned for a while to Goldsboro. Joe looked forward to these as golden days, and the outlook went far to console him for his chagrin at the Giants’ poor showing.
His leg and foot were mending rapidly, and he hoped to be in form again almost as soon as he reached New York and to be able to go in and take his regular turn in the box. And if ever the Giants needed his pitching and batting strength, it was now!
He and Mabel had just returned from the dining car to the Pullman that first evening on the train that was bearing them East, when McRae and Robbie came along.
They knew Mabel well, because, on the trip of the Giants around the world, she had gone along with Mrs. McRae and other married women as chaperons.
“Blooming as a rose,” said Robbie, gallantly. “When it comes to picking, we have to hand it to Joe.”
“Still as full of blarney as ever,” laughed Mabel. “I suppose you say that to every girl you meet.”
“Not at all, not-at-all!” disclaimed Robbie, his round face beaming.
“King of Northern pitchers and queen of Southern women,” put in McRae. “It’s a winning combination.”
“I’ll admit the part about the women,” agreed Joe.
“And I’ll admit the part about the pitchers,” said Mabel, her smile enhanced by a bewitching dimple.
“Then we’re all happy,” laughed McRae. “But now I’m going to ask the queen to let the king come along with Robbie and me into the smoking car for a while. I’ve got a little business to talk over.”
“Hold on to me, Mabel,” cried Joe, in mock alarm. “Mac wants to fire me, but he won’t do it as long as I’m with you.”
“I’m not very much worried,” responded Mabel, merrily. “For that matter, I shouldn’t wonder if you were honing to get rid of me. Go along now, and I’ll console myself with a magazine until you get back.”
The three men went into the smoking car and settled themselves comfortably. Then when the two older men had lighted cigars, McRae hurled a question.
“Joe, how would you like to be captain of the Giants?” he asked.
Joe was completely taken aback for a moment.
“Great Scott! You sure do hit a fellow right between the eyes, Mac,” he responded. “Just what do you mean? You’ve got a captain now, haven’t you?”
“I had an apology for a captain up to this afternoon,” was the reply. “But I haven’t even that now. Here, read this,” and he thrust Iredell’s written resignation into his hand.
Joe read it with minute attention.
“I’m sorry for Iredell,” he remarked, as he refolded the paper and handed it back. “But I won’t pretend that I’m surprised. But what strikes me all in a heap is your question to me. Remember that I’m a pitcher. As my brother-in-law, Reggie, would remark, ‘it simply isn’t done.’”
“You’re a pitcher, all right,” responded McRae, “and the best that comes. But you’re more than that. You’re a thinker. And that’s the kind of man I’ve got to have for captain. There’s no other man on the team that fills the bill. They’d rattle around in the position like a pea in a tincup. You’d fill it to perfection. That’s the reason I offer it to you. You know, of course, that it means an increase in your salary, but I know that isn’t the thing that would especially appeal to you. I want you to take the position because I think it will be the best thing for the Giants. Think it over.”
There was silence for a few minutes while Joe thought it over and thought hard. He knew that it would mean an immense addition to his work and his responsibilities. He would have to play every day, while now he played, at the most, only twice a week.
Without self-conceit, he knew that he could qualify for the position. Again and again he had groaned inwardly at baseball sins of omission and commission that he felt sure would not have occurred had he had the deciding voice on the field.
It finally simmered down to this: Would it help the Giants? Would it increase their chances for the pennant? He decided that it would. And the moment he reached that conclusion his answer was ready.
“I’ll take it, Mac,” he announced.
“Bully!” exclaimed McRae, as he reached over and shook Joe’s hand to bind the bargain. “Don’t think for a minute, Joe, that I don’t appreciate the immense amount of work that this will put upon you. I don’t want to ride a willing horse to death.”
“That’s all right, Mac,” answered Joe. “The only possible doubt in my mind was as to whether it might affect my pitching or hitting. I wouldn’t want to let down in those things. But if you’re willing to take a chance, I am.”
“I’ll take all the chances and all the responsibility,” replied McRae, confidently. “I haven’t watched you all these years for nothing. I’ve never asked you to do anything yet that you haven’t done to the queen’s taste. You’ve developed into the best pitcher in the game. You’ve developed into the best batter in the game. Now I look for you to develop into the best captain in the game.”
“I’ll bet dollars to doughnuts that he will,” broke in Robbie, his rubicund face aglow with satisfaction. “Now we’ll begin to see the Giants climb.”
“I’m sure they will,” affirmed McRae. “We’ve added fifty per cent. to the Giants’ strength by this night’s work. You know as well as I do, Joe, that the class is there. All it needs is to be brought out. And you’re the boy that’s going to do it. Put your fighting spirit into them. I was going to say put your brains into them, but that couldn’t be done without a surgical operation. But you can teach them to use the brains they have, and that itself will go a long way.”
“How did Iredell take it when you saw him?” asked Joe, thoughtfully.
“Of course he was sore,” answered McRae. “But how much of that was due to his soreness over that bonehead play, and how much to the fact that I accepted his resignation so promptly, I can’t say. But I don’t think you’ll have any trouble with him.”
Joe, who knew Iredell’s nature a good deal better than McRae, was not at all sure, but he said nothing.
“As for the other members of the team,” went on McRae, “they all think you’re about the best that ever happened, and I’m sure they’ll be delighted with the change. You’ll find them backing you up to the limit. The rookies, too, look up to you as a kingpin pitcher and batter, and they’ll be just clay in your hands. You can do with them whatever you will. We’ve picked up some promising material there, and you’re the one to bring out all that’s in them.”
“You can depend on me to do my best,” Joe responded warmly.
“That means that we’ll win the flag even with our bad beginning,” declared McRae. “And now just one other thing, Joe. I want you to feel perfectly free to discuss with Robbie and me anything you think will be for the best interests of the team. If you think any man ought to be fired, tell me so. If you think of any player we can go out and get, tell me that, too. We’ll welcome any suggestions. Have you anything of that kind now in mind? If so, let’s have it.”
“I certainly don’t want any one fired,” said Joe, with a smile. “At least, not for the present. As to getting any new players, I saw something in the evening papers a half an hour ago that set me thinking. Have you seen that the Yankees have determined to let Hays go?”
“No, I haven’t,” replied McRae with quickened interest. “I haven’t looked at to-night’s papers. But after all that won’t do us any good. Some other club in the American League will snap him up.”
“That’s what I should have thought,” answered Joe. “But the surprising thing is that all the other clubs in the American have waived claims upon him. That leaves us free to make an offer for him, if we want him.”
“That’s funny,” mused McRae. “Remember the way he played against us in the World Series? He had us nailed to the mast and crying for help.”
“He sure did,” agreed Robbie. “But he hasn’t been going very well since then. Rather hard to manage in the first place, and then, too, he seems to be losing his effectiveness. If no other club in the American League wants him, he must be nearly through.”
“That’s the way it struck me at first when I read the telegram,” said Joe. “Then I got to thinking it over. Why don’t the other clubs in the American League want him?”
“I’ll bite,” said McRae. “What’s the answer?”
“Perhaps it’s this,” suggested Joe. “Hays, as you know, has that peculiar cross-fire delivery that singles him out among pitchers. No other pitcher in either League has one just like it. It isn’t that it’s so very effective when you come to know it. But because it’s so unlike any other, it puzzles all teams until they get used to it. That’s the way it was with us in the Series. The first two games we couldn’t do a thing to him. In the third we were beginning to bat him more freely.
“Now, what does that lead up to? Just this. The other teams in the American League have become so used to his pitching that it’s lost its terrors. If any one of them bought him from the Yankees, they’d have to stack him up against the seven other teams in their League who have learned to bat him without trouble.
“But with the National League it’s different. It would take them considerable time to get on to him. In the meantime, he might have won two or three games from each of them before they solved him. He might be good for fifteen or twenty victories before this season is over. He might----”
“By ginger!” interrupted McRae. “Joe, that think tank of yours is working day and night. I’ll get in touch with the Yankee management by wire at the next station.”
CHAPTER X
GETTING IN SHAPE
“There’s something right off the bat for a starter,” exulted Robbie. “Now, how about the rest of the team?”
“I think they’re just about as good as they come,” remarked Joe. “Jackwell and Bowen are a big improvement on Hupft and McCarney both in fielding and batting. Burkett is digging them out of the dirt at first all right, and Larry takes everything that comes into his territory. Our outfield is one of the heaviest hitting in the League----”
“And it will hit harder yet when you’re playing out there the days you’re not in the box,” chuckled Robbie. “They’ll have to move back the fences in the ball parks for your homers. You’ll break up many a game with that old wagon spoke of yours.”
“Oh, the days I play in the outfield, one of the men will have to be benched,” mused Joe. “Which one shall it be?”
“We’ll let that depend on the way they keep up with the stick,” said McRae. “That will be a spur to them. Neither Curry nor Wheeler nor Bowen will want to sit on the bench, and they’ll work their heads off to keep on the batting order. There again it will be a good thing for the team. Every man will be fighting to make the best showing possible.”
“Talking about Jackwell and Bowen,” remarked Robbie. “Have you ever noticed anything queer about those birds?”
“They don’t seem to be as husky as they might be,” observed McRae. “Just the other day they begged to be let off because they said they were sick. Over eating, perhaps. That’s a common fault with young players when they first come into the big League and eat at the swell hotels.”
“It wasn’t that I meant,” explained Robbie. “They seem to be nervous and jumpy. Looking around as though they expected every minute to feel somebody’s hand on their shoulder.”
“I’ve noticed that,” said Joe. “It was only the other day I was speaking to Jim about it. Probably it will wear off when they get a little better used to big-league company. I’ll have a quiet little talk with them about it.”
For another hour they discussed matters bearing on the welfare of the club, and then Joe went back to Mabel.
“I thought you’d forgotten all about poor little me,” she said, with an adorable pout of her pretty lips.
Joe looked around to see that no one was observing them, and straightened out the pout in a manner perfectly satisfactory to both.
“Well, did McRae fire you, as you call it?” asked Mabel.
“Hardly,” answered Joe, as he settled himself beside her. “In fact, instead of kicking me downstairs he kicked me up.”
“Meaning?” said Mabel, with a questioning intonation.
“Meaning,” repeated Joe, “that he made me captain of the Giant team.”
“What!” exclaimed Mabel, as though she could not believe her ears.
“Just that,” was the reply.
“Oh, Joe, what an honor!” exclaimed Mabel, with pride and delight. “I’m so proud! That’s another proof of what they think of you.”
“I suppose it is an honor,” agreed Joe, “and it will mean a nice little addition to my salary. I’ll clean up over twenty thousand this year altogether. And, if we get into the World Series, there will be a few thousands more. But it means a great addition of work and responsibility.”
“You mustn’t overtax yourself, dear,” said Mabel, anxiously. “Remember that your health and strength are above everything.”
“If I felt any healthier or stronger than I am now, I’d be afraid of myself,” replied Joe, grinning. “Don’t worry, honey. All I care for is to make good in my new job.”
“You’ll do that,” said Mabel, proudly, as she patted his hand. “You’d make good in anything. You’d make a good president of the United States.”
“I’d be sure of one vote, anyhow, if I ran for the presidency,” laughed Joe. “In fact, I’m afraid they’d have you pinched for repeating. You’d try to stuff the ballot boxes.”
The long journey ended at last, with all the players glad to be back in what they fondly referred to as “little old New York.” There was no brass band to meet them at the station, nor had the fans turned out in any great numbers, as they did when the Giants returned from a triumphant trip. It was an unusual experience for the Giants, who had the reputation of a great road team and commonly arrived with scalps at their belt. At present, however, they were distinctly out of favor. Nor did they derive any comfort from the brief and sarcastic references to their return in the columns of the city press.
Joe and Mabel took a taxicab to the hotel where they usually made their headquarters. Reggie, to his regret, had not been able to accompany them, though he promised to come on later.
“Beastly shame,” he had said, in parting, “that I could only see the Giants when they were coming a cropper. But I’ll get to the big city soon and see them get even with those rotters. My word! It’s been simply disgustin’!”
The perfect rest during the journey had been of immense benefit to Joe’s injured leg and foot, and he was overjoyed to find that he was now as fit as ever. The perfect physical condition in which he kept himself had contributed toward a quick recovery.
The relief and satisfaction of McRae and Robbie over his condition were unbounded, for with Joe out of the game the Giants were a different and far inferior team.
Mabel had plenty of shopping and sightseeing to keep her spare time employed through the day, and at night she and Joe had a delightful time taking in the best shows on Broadway.
The first morning that the team turned out for practice on the Polo Grounds, Joe sought an opportunity for a quiet talk with Iredell.
The fact that McRae had made a generous interpretation of the clause in Iredell’s contract regarding his salary as captain had not abated the resentment of that individual. He had been moody and grouchy ever since his displacement, and had nursed his supposed grievance until his heart was fairly festering with bitterness. He was sore at McRae, but even more so at Joe, as his successor. The latter, he persuaded himself, had intrigued to get his place.
“I’m going to have a talk with all the boys together, Iredell,” Joe greeted him pleasantly, in a secluded corner of the grounds. “But first I wanted to see you personally. I just want to say that we’ve always got along together all right, that I value you as one of the best players on the team, and that I hope our pleasant relations will continue.”
But Iredell was in no mood to take the olive branch that Joe held out to him.
“I suppose I’ll have to do what you tell me to,” he muttered sourly. “You’re the boss now.”
“I don’t like that word ‘boss,’” returned Joe. “I don’t have any of the feeling that that word implies. If I have to exercise the authority that has been given me, it will be simply because that’s my job, and not because I have a swelled head. McRae’s the boss of all of us. You say you’ll have to do what I tell you to. But I’m hoping you’ll do your best, not because I tell you to, but because you want to do whatever is for the best interests of the team. How about it, Iredell? Does that go?”
“Oh, what’s the use of talking about it,” snapped Iredell. “I’ll do my work as shortstop. You’ve got the job you’ve been working for. Let it go at that.”
His tone was so offensive, to say nothing of the implication of his words, that Joe had to make a mighty effort to restrain his naturally quick temper. But he knew that he could not rule others unless he had first learned to master himself. So that it was with no trace of anger that he replied:
“Listen to me, Iredell. I haven’t worked for this job. I didn’t want it. I hadn’t even thought of it. I was struck all in a heap when McRae asked me to take it. And at that time, you’d already resigned. That’s the absolute truth.”
Iredell made no answer, but his sniff of unbelief spoke volumes. Joe saw that while he was in this mood there was nothing to be gained by talking longer.
“Think it over, old boy,” he said pleasantly. “I’m your friend, and I want to stay your friend. I know how well you can play, and I’m sure you’re going to do your best with the rest of us to bring the pennant once more to New York.”
He moved away, and a little later had gathered the rest of the team in the clubhouse.
“I’m not going to do much talking, fellows,” he said. “McRae has already told you that I’m to be captain of the team. I’m proud to be captain of such a bunch. I feel that all of us are brothers. We’ve been comrades in many a hard fight, and there are lots of such fights ahead of us. But all our fighting will be done against the other fellows and not among ourselves. I’m counting on every one of you to go in and work his head off for the good of the team. That must be the only thing that counts with any of us.
“I don’t want to exercise a single bit of authority that I don’t have to. But I’m not going to fall down on my job if I can help it. If I have to call a man down, I’ll call him down. While we’re out on the field, what I say will have to go. You may think it’s right or you may think it’s rotten, but all the same it will have to go. But you’ll understand that there’s nothing personal and that whatever’s done is for the good of the team. You know I’d rather boost than roast, and that I’ll praise a good play just as readily as I’d blame a bad one. Now how about it, fellows? Are you with me?”
“We’re wid ye till the cows come home!” shouted Larry, enthusiastically. “Three cheers for the new captain!”
Rousing cheers shook the clubhouse and sealed the compact.
Then, with a new spirit, the Giants plunged into the pennant fight. It was a hard fight that lay before them, and none of them underrated it. But the grim determination that had been in evidence many times previously was now again to the fore, and it boded ill for their rivals.
Mabel, after a tender parting, had returned for a brief while to Goldsboro, and Joe concentrated all the energies of brain and body on his new task. Like the war horse, he “sniffed the battle from afar,” and was eager to plunge into the thick of the fray. Would he emerge the winner?
Baseball Joe, for the time being, gave no more attention to Iredell’s grouchiness. He knew the player felt sore, but never realized how far that soreness might carry the fellow.
“I’ll fix him some day, see if I don’t,” muttered Iredell to himself when on his way to the hotel that night. “I’ll fix him. Just wait and see! I’ll teach him to ride over me!”
CHAPTER XI
WINGING THEM OVER
“So ’tis your birthday, I do be hearin’, Joe,” remarked Larry Barrett, the jovial second baseman of the team, as the Giants were getting into their uniforms preparatory to going out on the field.
“That’s what,” laughed Joe, as he finished tying his shoe laces.
“I’ll bet you were a ball player from the cradle,” grinned Larry.
“I guess I bawled all right,” Joe replied. “And once, my mother tells me, I pitched headlong from my baby carriage.”
“What would you like for a birthday present?” queried Wheeler.
“Ten runs,” replied Joe, promptly. “Give me those to-day and I won’t ask for anything else.”
“Pretty big order,” remarked Wheeler, dubiously. “Ten runs are a lot to make against those Brooklyn birds. I hear they’re going to put in Dizzy Rance to-day, and he’s a lulu. Won his last eight games and has started in to make a record. Have a heart, Joe, and make it five.”
“Five’s plenty,” asserted Jim, confidently. “I’m willing to bet that’s more than the Dodgers will get, with Joe in the box.”
“We’ll know more about that when the game’s over,” said Joe, as he moved toward the door.
“Gee! Look at those stands and bleachers,” remarked Jim, as he and his chum came out on the field. “Seems as though all New York and Brooklyn had turned out. And it’s nearly an hour before the game begins. They’ll be turning them away from the gates.”
“Almost like a World Series crowd,” agreed Joe, as they made their way across the green velvet turf of the outfield toward the Giants’ dugout.
It was a phenomenal throng for that stage of the playing season, and was accounted for by the traditional rivalry between the two teams, which, while hailing from different boroughs, were both included within the limits of Greater New York. They fought each other like Kilkenny cats whenever they came together. No matter how indifferently they might have been going with other teams, they always braced when they had each other as opponents. It was not an uncommon thing, even in the seasons when the Giants had taken the series from every other team in the League, to lose the majority of the games with the Brooklyns, even though the latter might be tagging along in the rear of the second division.
But this year the Brooklyns were going strong, and it was generally admitted that they had a look-in for the pennant. Several trades during the previous winter had strengthened the weak places in the line-up, and their pitching staff was recognized as one of the best in either League.
“Going to pick the feathers off those birds to-day, Joe?” asked McRae, as Joe came up to the Giants’ bench, where the manager was sitting.
“I sure am going to try,” replied Joe. “It’s about time we put a crimp in their winning streak.”
Joe beckoned to Mylert, and they went out to warm up. He was feeling in excellent fettle, and he soon found that he had all his “stuff” with him. His curve had a sharp break, his slow ball floated up so that it seemed to be drifting, and his fast ones whizzed over like a bullet.
“You’ve got the goods to-day, Joe,” pronounced Mylert, and he fairly winced at the way the ball shot into his hands. “You’ve got speed to burn. Those balls just smoke. With that control of yours you could hit a coin. They can’t touch you. They’ll be rolling over and playing dead.”
“That listens good,” laughed Joe. “At that, I’ll need all I’ve got to make those fellows be good.”
The preliminary practice gave evidence that the game would be for blood. Both teams were on their toes, and the dazzling plays that featured their work brought frequent roars of applause from the Giant and Brooklyn rooters. Then the bell rang, the umpire dusted off the plate and the vast throng settled down with delighted anticipation to watch the game.
The Brooklyns, as the visiting team, went first to bat. A roar went up from the stands as Joe walked out to the mound. The Giant rooters promptly put the game down as won. But the Brooklyns pinned their faith to their phenomenal pitcher, Dizzy Rance, and had different ideas about the outcome of the game.
The first inning was short and sweet. Leete, the leftfielder of the Dodgers, who, year in and year out, had a batting average of .300 or better, swung savagely at the first ball pitched and raised a skyscraping fly that Jackwell at third promptly gathered in. Mornier, with the count at three balls and two strikes, sent up a foul that Mylert caught close to the stands after a long run. Tonsten lunged at the first ball and missed. The second was a beauty that cut the outer corner of the plate at which he did not offer and which went for a strike. Then Joe shot over a high fast one and struck him out.
“Atta boy, Joe!” and similar shouts of encouragement came from stands and bleachers, as Joe pulled off his glove and went in to the bench.
Rance, the Brooklyn pitcher, did not lack a generous round of applause as he took up his position in the box. He had already pitched two games against the Giants and won them both. But he had never happened to be pitted against Joe, and despite his air of confidence he knew he had his work cut out for him.
Curry made a good try on the second ball pitched and sent a long fly to center that was caught by Maley after a long run. Iredell sent a sharp single to left. Burkett slammed one off Rance’s shins, and the ball rolled between short and second. Before it could be recovered, Burkett had reached first and Iredell was safe at second. Wheeler tried to wait Rance out, but when the count had reached three and two he sent a single to center that scored Iredell from second and carried Burkett to third. A moment later the latter was caught napping by a snap throw from catcher to third and came in sheepishly to the bench. Rance then put on steam and set Jackwell down on three successive strikes.
“There’s one of the runs we promised you, Joe,” sang out Larry, as the Giants took the field.
“That’s good as far as it goes,” laughed Joe. “But don’t forget I’m looking for more.”
For the Brooklyns, Trench was an easy out on a roller to Joe, who ran over and tagged him on the base line. Naylor dribbled one to Jackwell that rolled so slowly that the batter reached first. But no damage was done, for Joe pitched an outcurve to Maley and made him hit into a fast double play, Iredell to Barrett to Burkett.
It was snappy pitching, backed up by good support, and that it was appreciated was shown by the shouts that came from the Giant rooters, who cheered until Joe had to remove his cap.
But Rance, although the Giants had got to him for three hits in the first inning, showed strength in the second that delighted his supporters. He mowed the Giants down as fast as they came to the bat.
The best that Larry could do was to lift a towering fly to center that was taken care of by Maley. Bowen lifted a twisting foul that the Brooklyn catcher did not have to stir out of his tracks to get. Joe hit a smoking liner that was superbly caught by Tonsten, who had to go up in the air for it, but held on.
In the Brooklyns’ third, Joe made a great play on a well-placed bunt by Reis that rolled between the box and third base. Joe slipped and fell as he grasped it, but while in a sitting position he shot it over to first in time to nail the runner. Rance hit a sharp bounder to the box that Joe fielded in plenty of time. Tighe went out on a Texas leaguer that was gathered in by Larry.
“That boy’s got ’em eating out of his hand,” exulted Robbie, his red face beaming with satisfaction.
“Yes, now,” agreed the more cautious McRae. “But at any time they may turn and bite the hand that’s feeding them. They’re an ungrateful lot.”
In their half of the inning, the Giants failed to score. Rance was pitching like a house afire. Mylert went back to the bench after three futile offers at the elusive sphere. Curry popped a weak fly to Trench, and, Iredell, after fouling the ball off half a dozen times, grounded to Mornier at first, who only had to step on the bag to register an out.
It was Larry’s turn to be in the limelight in the Brooklyns’ half of the fourth. Leete raised a fly that seemed destined to fall between second and left. It was certain that Wheeler at left could not get to it in time, though he came in racing like an express train. But Larry had started at the crack of the bat, running in the direction of the ball. He reached it just as it was going over his head, and with a wild leap grasped it with one hand and held on to it.
It was one of the finest catches ever made on the Polo Grounds. For a moment the crowd sat stupefied. Then, when they realized that a baseball “miracle” had occurred, they raised a din that could have been heard a mile away.
“Great stuff, Larry, old boy!” congratulated Joe, as the second baseman resumed his position. “No pitcher could ask for any better support than that.”
“Let that go for my share of your birthday present,” returned the grinning Larry.
The next two went out in jig time, one on a grounder and the other on strikes.
The Giants added one more run in their half of the fourth by a clever combination of bunts and singles. Joe knew that Rance was weak on fielding bunts, and he directed his men to play on that weakness. The Brooklyn pitcher fell all over himself in trying to handle them, and this had a double advantage, for it not only let men get on bases but it shook for a moment the morale of the boxman and made it easier for the succeeding batsman. It was only by virtue of a lucky double play that Rance got by with only one run scored against him in that inning.
With two runs to the good, the Giants went out on the field in a cheerful mood. They were getting onto the redoubtable Rance, not heavily, but still they were hitting him. Joe, on the other hand, seemed to be invincible. He was not trying for strike-outs except when necessary. But his curves were working perfectly, his control was marvelous, and when a third strike was in order he called upon his hop ball or his fadeaway and it did the trick.
And the boys behind him were certainly backing him up in fine style. They were fairly “eating up” everything that came their way, digging them out of the dirt, spearing them out of the air, throwing with the precision of expert riflemen. None of them was playing that day for records. They were playing for the team. Already the new spirit that Joe had infused as captain was beginning to tell.
In the Giant’s half of the fifth, Joe was the first man up. Rance tried him on an outcurve, but Joe refused to bite. The next was a fast, straight one, and Joe caught it fairly for a terrific smash over the centerfielder’s head. The outfield had gone back when he first came to the bat, but they had not gone back far enough. It was a whale of a hit, and Joe trotted home easily, even then reaching the plate before Maley had laid his hand on the ball.
“Frozen hoptoads!” cried Robbie, fairly jumping up and down in exultation. “It’s a murderer he is. He isn’t satisfied with anything less than killing the ball.”
“He’s some killer, all right,” assented McRae. “With one other man like him on the team, the race would be over. The Giants would simply walk in with the flag.”
That mammoth hit should have been the beginning of a rally, but Rance tightened up and the next three went out in order, one on strikes and the other two on infield outs.
Joe still had control of the situation, and he seemed to grow more unhittable as the game went on. He simply toyed with his opponents, and their vain attempts to land on the ball made them at times seem ludicrous.
“Sure, Joe, ’tis a shame what you’re doin’ to those poor boobs,” chuckled Larry, as they came in to the bench together.
“But don’t forget that they’re always dangerous,” cautioned Joe. “Do you remember the fourteen runs they made in one of their games against the Phillies? They may stage a comeback any minute.”
“Not while you’re in the box, old boy,” declared Larry. “You’ll have to break a leg to lose this game.”
Burkett thought it was up to him to do something, and lammed out a terrific liner to left for three bases, sliding into third just a fraction of a second before the return of the ball. Wheeler tried to sacrifice, but Tonsten held Burkett at third by a threatening gesture before putting out Wheeler at first. With the infield pulled in for a play at the plate, Jackwell double-crossed them by a single over short that scored Burkett with the fourth run for the Giants. Barrett went out on a grounder to Mornier, Jackwell taking second. Bowen made a determined effort to bring him in, but his long fly to center was gathered in by Maley.
The “lucky seventh” was misnamed as far as the Brooklyns were concerned, for their luck was conspicuous by its absence. Although the heavy end of their batting order was up, they failed to get the ball out of the infield. Leete, their chief slugger, was utterly bewildered by Joe’s offerings and struck out among the jeers of the Giant fans. Mornier popped up a fly that Joe gobbled up, and Larry had no trouble in getting Tonsten’s grounder into the waiting hands of Burkett.
The Giants did a little better, and yet were unable to add to their score. Joe started off with a ripping single to left. Mylert tried to advance him by sacrificing, but after sending up two fouls was struck out by Rance. Curry sent a liner to the box that was too hot to handle, but Rance deflected it to Tonsten who got Curry at first, Joe in the meantime getting to second. Iredell was an easy victim, driving the ball straight into the hands of Mornier at first.
“Well, Joe,” chuckled Jim, as the eighth inning began, “we haven’t given you your present yet, but we’re in a fair way to put it over. Not to say that you’re not earning most of the present yourself.”
“I don’t care how it comes as long as we get it,” laughed Joe, as he slipped on his glove.
The time was now growing fearfully short in which the men from the other side of the bridge could make their final bid for the game. Those four runs that the Giants had scored were like so many mountains to be scaled, and with the airtight pitching that Joe was handing out, it seemed like an impossible task.
Still, they had pulled many a game out of the fire with even greater odds against them, and they came up to the plate determined to do it again, if it were at all possible.
Trench got a ball just where he liked it, and sent it whistling to left field for a single. Naylor followed with a fierce grasser that Iredell knocked down, but could not field in time to catch the runner. It looked like the beginning of a rally, and the Brooklyn bench was in commotion. Their coaches on the base lines jumped up and down, alternately shouting encouragement to their men and hurling gibes at Joe in the attempt to rattle him.
“We’ve got him going now,” yelled one.
“We’ve just been kidding him along so far,” shouted another. “All together now, boys! Send him to the showers!”
Maley came next, with orders to strike at the first ball pitched. He followed orders and missed. Again he swung several inches under Joe’s throw, which took a most tantalizing hop just before it reached the plate.
He set himself for the third and caught it fairly. The ball started as a screaming liner, going straight for the box. Joe leaped in the air and caught it in his gloved hand. Like a flash he turned and hurled it to Larry at second. Trench, who had started for third at the crack of the ball, tried frantically to scramble back to second, but was too late. Larry wheeled and shot down the ball to first, beating Naylor to the bag by an eyelash. Three men had been put out in the twinkling of an eye!
It was the first triple play that had been made that season, and the third that had been made on the Polo Grounds since that famous park had been opened. It had all occurred so quickly that half the spectators did not for the moment realize what had occurred. But they woke up, and roar after roar rose from the stands as the spectators saw the Giants running in gleefully, while the discomfited Brooklyns, with their rally nipped in the bud, went out gloomily to their positions.
“You’ll send him to the showers, will you?” yelled Larry to the Brooklyn coaches, as he threw his cap hilariously into the air.
Rance’s face was a study as he took his place in the box. He saw his winning streak going glimmering. It was a hard game for him to lose, for he had pitched in a way that would have won most games. But he had drawn a hard assignment in having to face pitching against which his teammates, fence breakers as they usually were, could make no headway.
Still, he was game, and there was still another inning, and nothing was impossible in baseball. If the Giants had expected him to crack, they were quickly undeceived. Burkett grounded out to Trench, who made a rattling stop and got him at first with feet to spare. Wheeler fouled out to Tighe. Jackwell went out on three successive strikes.
It was a plucky exhibition of pitching under discouraging conditions, and Rance well deserved the hand that he received as he went in to the bench.
“I say, Joe,” remarked Jim, as his chum was preparing to go out for the ninth Brooklyn inning. “Celebrate your birthday by showing those birds the three-men-to-a-game stunt. It will be a glorious wind-up.”
“I’ll see,” replied Joe, with a grin that was half a promise.
Thompson, the manager of the Brooklyns, who had been having a little run-in with the umpire, and was standing in a disgruntled mood near the batter’s box, overheard the dialogue and stared in wonderment at Jim.
“What’s that three-men-to-a-game stunt you’re talking about?” he asked.
“Haven’t you ever heard of it?” asked Jim.
“I never have,” replied Thompson. “And I was in the game before you were born.”
“Then you’ve got a treat in store for you,” Jim assured him. “Just you watch this inning, and you’ll see that only three men will be needed to turn your men back without a run, or even the smell of a hit. They’ll be the pitcher, the catcher and the first baseman. The rest of the Giants will have nothing to do and might as well be off the field. In fact, if it wasn’t against the regulations of the game, we would call them into the bench just now.”
Thompson looked at Jim as though he were crazy.
“Trying to kid me?” the Brooklyn manager asked, with a savage inflection in his voice.
“Not at all,” replied Jim, grinning cheerfully. “Just keep your eye on that pitcher of ours.”
CHAPTER XII
AN AMAZING FEAT
Thompson, still believing that Jim was trying to get a rise out of him, walked back to his own bench, growling to himself.
Reis was the first to face Joe in the last half of the ninth. Joe measured him carefully, took his time in winding up, and then, with all the signs of delivering a fast high one, sent over a floater that Reis reached for and hit into the dirt in front of the plate. Joe ran on it, picked it up and tossed it to Burkett for an easy out.
Rance, the Brooklyn pitcher, came to the plate. Joe sent over a hop that Rance caught on the under side for a foul high up back of the rubber that Mylert caught without moving from his position.
With two out, Tighe missed the first one that came over so fast that it had settled in Mylert’s glove before the batter had completed his swing. The next he fouled off for strike two. Then Joe whizzed over his old reliable fadeaway.
“You’re out!” cried the umpire.
The game was over and the Giants had beaten their redoubtable foes by a score of four to none. They had whitewashed their opponents and broken their winning streak.
And what was sweeter to Jim at the moment was that Joe had fulfilled his prediction. Only the pitcher, catcher and first baseman had been necessary to turn the Brooklyns back. The other six men of the Giant team had had nothing to do and might as well have been off the field. It was almost magical pitching, the climax of the art.
Joe and Jim grinned at each other in a knowing way as the former came into the bench.
“You pulled it off that time all right, Joe!” exclaimed Jim gleefully, as he threw his arm around his chum’s shoulder. “I piped off Thompson to what you were going to do and he thought I had gone nutty. He’d have given me an awful razz if it had failed to go through.”
“You were taking awful chances,” laughed Joe. “Of course, I might do that once in a while, but only a superman could do it all the time. But in this inning, luck was with us.”
Thompson at this moment came strolling over toward them. He was evidently consumed with curiosity.
“I’ll take the wind out of your sails at the start by admitting that you put one over on me,” he said, addressing himself to Jim. “Though how you knew what was about to happen is beyond me. How did you do it?” he asked, turning to Joe. “Have you got a horseshoe or rabbit’s foot concealed about you?”
“I assure you that I have nothing up my sleeve to deceive you,” Joe said, rolling up his sleeves in the best manner of the professional conjurer. “It simply means that the hand is quicker than the eye.”
“Cut out the funny stuff and tell me just how you did it,” persisted Thompson.
“I’ll tell you,” said McRae, who had been an amused listener to the conversation. “That’s an old trick of Joe’s that he’s tried out when we’ve been playing exhibition games in the spring training practice. More than once, we’ve called in the whole team, except Joe, the catcher, and the first baseman. Then Joe’s done just what he did this afternoon. Of course, it doesn’t always go through, but in many cases he has put it over.”
“There isn’t another pitcher in the League who would dare try it!” exclaimed Thompson.
“There’s only one Matson in the world,” said McRae simply. “On the level, Thompson, what would you give to have him on your team?”
“A quarter of a million dollars,” blurted out Thompson.
“You couldn’t have him for half a million,” said McRae, with a grin, as he turned away.
It was a jubilant crowd of Giants that gathered in the clubhouse after the game.
“How was that for your birthday present, Joe?” sang out Larry. “It wasn’t quite what you asked for, but it was the best we could do.”
“It was plenty,” laughed Joe. “I’d rather have those runs you gave me than a diamond ring. Keep it up, boys, and we’ll soon be up at the top of the League. We’ve been a long time in getting started, but now just watch our smoke. This game pulls us out of the second division. We’re right on the heels of the Brooklyns. Let’s give those fellows to-morrow the same dose they got to-day. Then we’ll get after the Pittsburghs and the Chicagos.”
“That’s the stuff!” cried Larry. “We’ll show ’em where they get off. They’ve been hogging the best seats in this show. Now we’ll send ’em back to the gallery.”
Joe smiled happily at the enthusiasm of the boys. It was what he had been trying to instill ever since he had been made the captain of the team. He knew that the material was there--the batting, the fielding, and the pitching. But all this counted for nothing as long as the spirit was lacking, the will to victory, the confidence that they could win.
There was just one piece of the machinery, however, that was not working smoothly, and that was Iredell. He had been sulky and mutinous ever since he had been displaced by Joe in the captaincy of the team. Joe had been most considerate and had gone out of his way to be kind to him, but all his advances had been rebuffed.
“You’re certainly getting the team into fine shape, Joe,” said Jim, as they made their way out of the grounds. “They played championship ball behind you this afternoon.”
“They sure did,” agreed Joe. “Those plays by Larry, especially, were sparklers. I never saw the old boy in better form. He’s one of the veterans of the game, and you might expect him to be slipping, but to-day he played like a youngster with all a veteran’s skill. If everybody had the same spirit, I’d have nothing more to ask.”
“Meaning Iredell, I suppose,” said Jim.
“Just him,” replied Joe. “It isn’t that there’s anything especially I can lay my hands on. He plays good mechanical ball. His fielding is good and he’s keeping up fairly well with the stick. But the mischief of it is, it’s all mechanical. He’s like a galvanized dead man going through the motions, but a dead man just the same. I wish I could put some life into him. After a while, that dulness of his will begin to affect the rest of the team. It takes only one drop of ink to darken a whole glass of water.”
“I noticed that in the clubhouse this afternoon,” said Jim thoughtfully, “all the rest of the fellows were bubbling over, while he sat apart with a frown on his face as though we’d lost the game instead of having won it.”
“Well, he’ll have to get over that and get over it quickly,” said Joe with decision. “We can’t have him casting a wet blanket over the rest of the team. The trouble is, we haven’t any one available to put in his place just now, and it’s hard to get one at this stage of the season. Renton’s a likely youngster, but he needs a little more seasoning before I could trust him in such a responsible position as that of shortstop.”
“If that Mornsby deal had only gone through, we’d have had a crackerjack,” said Jim regretfully.
“We sure would!” replied Joe. “But I felt from the beginning that we didn’t have much chance of getting him. If the St. Louis management had let him go, they might as well have shut up shop. The fans would have hooted them out of town. Anyway, I’d rather develop a player than buy him. I’m going to coach young Renton with a possible view to taking Iredell’s place, if it becomes necessary.”
The next day Brooklyn again came to the Polo Grounds, determined to regain their lost laurels of the day before. This time they relied on Reuter, while McRae sent Jim into the box.
That Reuter was good, became evident before the game had gone very far. He had a world of speed and his curves were breaking well. Up to the seventh inning, only two hits had been made off of him, one of which was a homer by Joe and another a two-base hit by Burkett. His support was superb, and more than one apparent hit was turned into an out by clever fielding.
Jim, in the early innings, was not up to his usual mark. He had most of the stuff that had given him such high repute as a pitcher, except that he could not handle his wide-breaking curve with his usual skill. The failure of that curve to break over the plate got him several times in the hole. He relied too much also on his slow ball when, with the dull, cloudy weather that prevailed, speed would have been more effective.
But, although he was not in his best form, his courage never faltered. He was game in the pinches. Leete, for instance, in the fifth inning, laced the first ball pitched into leftfield for a clean homer. There was no one out when the mighty clout was made, but Jim refused to be disconcerted. He struck out Mornier, the heavy hitting first baseman of the Dodgers, made Tonsten hit a slow roller to the box that went for an easy out, and fanned Trench, after the latter had sent up two fouls in his unavailing attempt to hit the ball squarely.
Again in the sixth, after a triple and a single in succession had scored another run, he settled down and mowed the next three down in order.
But though his nerve was with him, the Brooklyn batsmen kept getting to him, picking up one run after the other until at the end of the seventh inning they had four runs to their credit while only one lone score had been made by the Giants. The Brooklyn rooters were jubilant, for it looked as though their pets had just about sewed up the game.
But in the Giants’ half of the eighth Reuter began to crack. He started well enough by making Curry pop to Mornier. Iredell came next and shot a single to left, his first hit of the game and the third that had been made off Reuter up to that time. Then Burkett followed suit with a beauty to right that sent Iredell to third, though a good return throw by Reis held Burkett to the initial bag.
The two hits in succession seemed to affect Reuter’s control, and he gave Wheeler a base on balls. Now the bags were full, with only one man out, and the Giant rooters, who had hitherto been glum, were standing up in their places and shouting like mad.
McRae sent Ledwith, a much faster man than Wheeler, to take the latter’s place on first, while he himself ran out on the coaching line and Robbie scurried in the direction of third.
Jackwell was next at bat, and the chances were good for a double play by Brooklyn. But Reuter’s tired arm had lost its cunning and, try as he would, he could not get the ball over the plate. Amid a pandemonium of yells from the excited fans he passed Jackwell to first, forcing a run over the plate. And still the bases were full.
It was evident that Reuter was “through,” and Thompson signaled him to come in. He took off his glove and walked into the bench to a chorus of sympathetic cheers from the partisans of both sides in recognition of the superb work he had done up to that fateful inning.
Grimm took his place and tossed a few balls to the catcher in order to warm up. It was a hard assignment to take up the pitcher’s burden with the bases full.
The first ball he put over came so near to “beaning” Larry that the latter only saved himself by dropping to the ground. McRae signaled to him to wait the pitcher out. He did so, with the result that he, too, trotted to first on four bad balls, forcing another run home and making the score four to three in favor of the Brooklyns.
Grimm braced for the next man, Bowen, and struck him out, as Bowen let even good balls go by, hoping to profit by the pitcher’s wildness. But this time he reckoned without his host and retired discomfited to the bench.
Joe came next and received a mighty hand as he went to the plate. His three comrades on the bases implored him to bring them home.
Grimm was in a dilemma. Under ordinary circumstances he would have passed Joe and taken a chance on Mylert. But to pass him now meant the forcing home of another run, which would have tied the score. On the other hand, a clean hit would bring at least two men home and put the Giants ahead. There was still, however, the third chance--that Joe might not make a hit. In that case there would be three men out, leaving the Brooklyns ahead.
He took the third alternative and pitched to Joe, putting all the stuff he had on the ball. Joe swung at it and missed. Two balls followed in succession. Then he whizzed over a high, fast one that Joe caught fairly and sent out on a line between left and center for a sizzling triple, clearing the bases and himself coming into third standing up.
The Giants and their partisans went wild with joy as the three men followed each over the plate, making the score six to four in favor of the home team.
And at that figure the score remained, for Jim pitched like a man possessed in the Brooklyn’s half of the ninth and set them down as fast as they came to the bat.
“That’s what you call pulling the game out of the fire,” exulted Larry, as the Giants were holding a jubilee in the clubhouse after the game.
“Yes,” agreed Jim. “But it was a hard game for Reuter to lose. He outpitched me up to that fatal eighth inning. He had a world of stuff on the ball.”
“He’s a crackerjack, all right,” agreed Joe. “And it certainly looked as though he had us going.”
“Didn’t have you going much that I could notice, except going around the bases,” declared Larry, with a wide grin. “That was a corking homer of yours, and the triple was almost as good.”
“Better, as far as the results were concerned,” put in Jim. “For it brought home three men and settled the game. It was a life saver, and no mistake. Talk about Johnny on the spot. Joe on the spot is the salvation of the Giants!”
CHAPTER XIII
CLEVER STRATEGY
“Quit your kidding,” laughed Joe. “Let’s just say that the breaks of the game were with us and let it go at that. The main thing is that we’ve put another game on the right side of the ledger. We’ve turned the Brooklyns back, and now it’s up to us to give the same dose to the Bostons and the Phillies.”
“They’ll be easy,” prophesied Curry, as he finished fastening his shoe laces.
“Don’t fool yourself,” cautioned Joe. “They’re playing better now than they were earlier in the season, and they won’t be such cinches as they were in the last series. We’ll have to step lively to beat them, and keep trying every minute. Ginger’s the word from now on.”
“Ginger” had been his watchword ever since he had been made captain of the team. He had tried to inspire them with his own indomitable energy and vim, and was gratified to see that with the exception of Iredell he was succeeding. It was doubly necessary in the case of the Giants, for most of the team was composed of veterans. They were superb players, but some of them were letting up on their speed and needed prodding to keep them at the top of their form.
Still there had been an infusion of new blood, and McRae was constantly on the lookout for more. The Giants’ roster contained a number of promising rookies, such as Renton, Ledwith, Merton and others, and Joe was constantly coaching them in the fine points of the game.
In Merton, especially, he thought he had all the material of a promising pitcher. The youngster had been obtained from the Oakland Seals, and had won a high reputation in the Pacific Coast League. He had speed, a good assortment of curves, and a fair measure of control. But pitching against big leaguers was a very different matter from trying to outguess minor league batters, and Joe had not thought it advisable as yet to send him in for a full game.
One of his chief faults was that opponents could steal bases on him with comparative impunity. It was almost uncanny to note the ease with which a runner on the bases could detect whether Merton was going to pitch to the batter or throw the ball to first. Joe was not long in discovering the reason.
“Here’s your trouble, Merton,” he said. “You invariably lift your right heel from the ground when you are about to throw to the plate. You keep it on the ground when you’re planning to throw to first. So, by watching you, those fellows can get a long lead off first and easily make second. Just try now, and see.”
“You’re right,” admitted Merton, after practising a few minutes. “Funny that I never noticed that before. But none of the fellows in the Pacific Coast League noticed it, either. They didn’t steal much on me there.”
“That’s just because they were minor leaguers,” returned Joe. “But you’re in big-league company now, and the wise birds on the other teams get on to you at once.”
Merton was grateful for the tip, and practised assiduously until he had got rid of the mannerism. He was docile and willing to learn, and Joe could see his pitching ability increase from day to day.
Not only in pitching, but in batting, Joe was able to be of incalculable value to the younger members of the team. How to outguess the pitcher, when to wait him out, how to walk into the ball instead of drawing away from it, the best way of laying down bunts--these and a host of other things in which he was a past master were freely imparted to his charges and illustrated by object lessons that were even more effective than the spoken word.
McRae and Robbie were delighted with the results of the change of captains, and more and more they gave him a free hand, knowing that Joe would get out of the Giants all that was in them. And, knowing the power of the Giant machine when going at full speed, that was all that they asked.
The next series on the Giants’ schedule was with the Boston Braves on the latter’s grounds. As Joe had anticipated, the Braves put up a much stiffer fight than they had earlier in the season. They were going well, had already passed the Phillies and the Cardinals and were making a desperate attempt to get into the first division.
Markwith pitched the first game, and did very well until the last two frames. Then a veritable torrent of hits broke from the Bostons’ bats and drove the southpaw from the mound. Joe took his place, and the hitting suddenly ceased. But the damage had already been done, and the game was placed in the Boston column.
Jim pitched in the second game and chalked up a victory. Young Merton was given his chance in the third, and justified Joe’s confidence by also winning, although the score was close.
Joe himself went in for the fourth and won, thus getting three out of four in the series, which, for a team on the road, was not to be complained of.
With the Phillies, on the latter’s grounds, the Giants cleaned up the first three games right off the reel. In the fourth, the Phillies woke up and played like champions. They fielded and batted like demons, so well indeed that when the ninth inning began, the Phillies were ahead by a score of three to two.
In the Giants’ half, with one man on base, Joe cut loose with a homer that put his team a run to the good. Not daunted, however, the Phillies came in for their half. Two men were out, and a couple of Giant fumbles had permitted two to get on the bases.
Mallinson, the heaviest batter of the Phillies, was up. He shook his bat menacingly and glared at Joe. With the team behind him the least bit shaky on account of the fumbles, Joe tried a new stunt on Mallinson.
“I’m going to tell you exactly the kind of a ball I’m going to throw to you,” he remarked, with a disarming grin.
“Yes, you are,” sneered Mallinson, unbelievingly, while even Mylert, the Giant catcher, looked bewildered.
“Honest Injun,” declared Joe. “This first one is going to be a high fast one right over the plate and just below the shoulder.”
“G’wan and stop your kidding,” growled the burly Philadelphia batter.
He set himself for a curve, not believing for a moment that Joe would be crazy enough to tell him in advance what he was going to pitch. It was just on that disbelief that Joe had counted.
Joe wound up and hurled one over exactly as he had promised. Mallinson, all set for a curve, was so flustered that he struck at it hurriedly and missed.
Joe grinned tantalizingly, while Mallinson glowered at him.
“Didn’t believe me, did you?” Joe asked. “Why don’t you have more faith in your fellow men? I ought to be real peeved at you for your lack of confidence. But I’m of a forgiving nature and I’ll overlook it this time.”
“Cut it out,” snapped Mallinson savagely. “Go ahead and play the game.”
“No pleasing some fellows,” mourned Joe plaintively. “Now this time, I’m going to pitch an outcurve. Ready? Let’s go.”
Mallinson, sure that this time he was going to be double-crossed, got ready for a high fast one, and the outcurve that Joe pitched cut the corner of the plate and settled in Mylert’s glove for the second strike.
“You see!” complained Joe. “There you are again. What’s the use of my tipping you off if you don’t take advantage? Don’t you believe me? Doesn’t anybody ever tell the truth in Philadelphia?”
Mallinson tried to say something, but he was so mad that he could only stutter, while his face looked as though he were going to have a fit of apoplexy.
“Now,” said Joe, “this is your last chance. I’m going to give you my hop ball this time, and that’s just because it’s you. I wouldn’t do it for everybody. It’ll take a jump just as it comes to the plate.”
By this time Mallinson was in an almost pitiable state of bewilderment. Would the pitcher again keep his word? Or would Joe figure that now that he had twice tipped him off correctly, Mallinson would really get set for the hop ball and that now was the time to fool him with something else?
He was so up in the air by this time that he could not have hit a balloon, and he struck six inches below the hop ball that Joe sent whistling over the plate for an out. The game was over and the Giants had won.
“What was all that chatter that was going on between you and Mallinson?” asked McRae, as he and Robbie, with their faces all smiles, came up to Joe. “I couldn’t quite get what it was from the bench. But you seemed to get his goat for fair.”
Joe told them, and the pair went into paroxysms of laughter, Robbie choking until they had to pound him on the back.
“For the love of Pete, Mac!” he gurgled, as soon as he could speak, “you’ll have to do something with this fellow or he’ll be the death of me yet. To win a ball game just by telling the batsman what he was going to pitch to him! Did you ever hear anything like it before in your life?”
“I never did,” replied the grinning McRae.
At the clubhouse later, there were guffaws of laughter as Mylert described the way that Joe had stood Mallinson on his head.
“And me thinking Joe had simply gone nutty!” Mylert said. “When he pitched that first ball just as he said, I didn’t know where I was at. Then the second one got me going still more. But I saw that it had Mallinson going, too, and then I began to catch on. How on earth did you ever come to think of that, Joe?”
“Just a matter of psychology,” Jim answered for him. “And mighty good psychology, if you ask me. Baseball Joe’s a dabster at that.”
“Sike-sike what?” asked Larry, whose vocabulary was not very extensive.
“Psychology,” repeated Jim, with a grin. “No, it isn’t a new kind of breakfast food. Joe simply knew how Mallinson’s mind would work and he took advantage of it. Mallinson coppered everything Joe said to him. He figured that Joe was there to deceive him. He couldn’t conceive that Joe would tell him the truth. And so it was just by telling the truth that Joe got him.”
“It just got by because it was new,” laughed Joe. “I couldn’t do it often, for if I did they’d begin to take me at my word, and then they’d bat me all over the lot.”
By the time the Eastern inter-city games were over, the Giants had considerably bettered their team standing. They had passed the Brooklyns, who had let down a good deal and were now playing in-and-out ball. The Chicagos were still in the lead, with Pittsburgh three games behind them, but pressing them closely. Then came the Giants, two games in the rear of the men from the Smoky City. The Cincinnati Reds brought up the rear of the first division, but the conviction was strong in the minds of the Giants that it was either the Pirates or the Cubs they had to beat in order to win the pennant.
On the eve of the invasion of the East by the Western teams, McRae called his men together for a heart-to-heart talk in the clubhouse.
“You boys know that I can give you the rough edge of my tongue when you lay down on me,” he said, as he looked around on the group of earnest young athletes, who listened to him with respectful attention. “But you know, too, that I’m always ready to give a man credit when he deserves it. I’m glad to say that just now I’m proud of the men who wear the Giant uniform. You’ve done good work in cleaning up the Eastern teams. You’ve played ball right up to the end of the ninth inning, and many a game that looked lost you’ve pulled out of the fire.
“Now, that’s all right as far as it goes. But the Western clubs are coming, and they’re out for scalps. You remember what they did to us on our first trip out there. They gave us one of the most disgraceful beatings we’ve had for years. They took everything but our shirts, and they nearly got those. Are you going to let them do it again?”
There was a yell of dissent that warmed McRae’s heart.
“That’s the right spirit,” he declared approvingly. “Now, go in and show the same spirit on the field that you’re showing in the clubhouse. Beat them to a frazzle. Show them that you’re yet the class of the League. Don’t be satisfied with an even break. That won’t get us anywhere. Take three out of four from every one of them. Make a clean sweep if you can. Keep on your toes every minute. You’ve got the pitching, you’ve got the fielding, you’ve got the batting, and you’ve got the best captain that ever wore baseball shoes. What more does any club want?”
“Nothing!” shouted Larry. “We’ll wipe up the earth with them!”
“That’s the stuff,” replied McRae. “Now go out and say it with your bats. I want another championship this year, and I want it so bad that it hurts. You’re the boys that can give it to me, and I’m counting on you to do it. Show them that you’re Giants not only in name, but in fact. That’s about all.”
“What’s the matter with McRae?” cried Curry, as the manager, having said his say, turned to leave.
“He’s all right!” came in a thundering chorus from all except Iredell, who maintained a moody silence.
McRae waved his hand and vanished through the door.
The Cincinnati Reds were the first of the invaders to make their appearance at the Polo Grounds. They always drew large crowds, not only because they usually played good ball against the Giants, but especially because of the popularity of Hughson, their manager, who for many years had been a mainstay of the Giants and the idol of New York fans.
Hughson was one of the straight, clean, upstanding men who are a credit to the national game. McRae had taken him when he was a raw rookie and given him his chance with the Giants to show what he could do. The result had been a sensation. In less than a year Hughson had leaped into fame as the greatest pitcher in the country. He had everything--courage, speed, curves and control--and with them all a baseball head that enabled him to outguess the craftiest of his opponents.
For a dozen years he had been the chief reliance of the Giants and one of the greatest drawing cards in the game. At the time that Joe had joined the Giants, however, Hughson’s arm was beginning to fail. The latter was quick to discover Joe’s phenomenal ability and, instead of showing any mean jealousy, had done his best to develop it. Between him and Joe a friendship had sprung up that had never diminished.
Hughson’s services were in demand as a manager and he was snapped up by the Cincinnati club to take charge of the Reds. With rather indifferent material to start with, he had built up a strong team that had several times given the Giants a hot race for the championship.
On the afternoon of the first game, Hughson, big and genial as ever, shook Joe’s hand warmly when the latter met him near the plate.
“We’re going to give you the same dose that we did when you were on our stamping ground the last time, Joe,” he remarked, with a laugh, after they had interchanged greetings. “I love the Giants, but, oh, you Reds!”
“If you’re so sure of it, why go through the trouble of playing the game?” retorted Joe.
“Oh, we’ll have to do that as a matter of form and to give the crowd their money’s worth,” joked Hughson. “But honestly, Joe, we’re going to put up the stiffest kind of a battle. My men have their fighting clothes on, and they’re going good just now.”
“I’ve noticed that,” replied Joe. “You took the Pirates neatly into camp in that last series. The return of Haskins has plugged up a weak point in your outfield. I see he didn’t lose his batting eye while he was a hold-out.”
“No,” said Hughson, “he’s as good as ever. I began to think we’d never come to terms on the question of salary. You see, after his phenomenal season last year he got a swelled head and demanded a salary that was out of all reason. Said he wouldn’t play this year unless he got it. But we got together on a compromise at last, and now he’s in uniform again and cavorting around like a two-year-old. Wait until you see him knock the ball out of the lot this afternoon.”
“I’ll wait,” retorted Joe with a grin, “and I’ll bet I’ll wait a good long while.”
CHAPTER XIV
DEEPENING MYSTERY
After a little more chaffing, Joe left Hughson and walked over towards the Giants’ dugout. He felt a touch on his shoulder and, turning around, saw Jackwell.
“What is it, Dan?” he asked, noting at the same time that the player was pale.
“I don’t feel quite in shape, Captain,” said Jackwell in a voice that was far from steady. “I was wondering whether you couldn’t put someone in my place to-day.”
“What’s the matter?” asked Joe. “Look here, Jackwell,” he went on sharply, “are you trying to pull some of that ptomaine poisoning stuff again? Because, if you are, I tell you right now, you’re wasting your time.”
“It--it isn’t that,” stammered Jackwell, nervously fingering his cap. “I just feel kind of unstrung, shaky-like. I’m afraid I can’t play the bag as it ought to be played, that’s all.”
“Jackwell,” commanded Joe sternly, “come right out like a man and tell me what’s the matter with you. Lay your cards on the table. Are you playing for your release? Do you want to go to some other team?”
“No, no! Nothing like that!” ejaculated Jackwell, in alarm. “I’d rather play for the Giants than for any other team in the country.”
“Well, I’ll tell you straight that you won’t be playing for the Giants or any other team very long if this sort of thing keeps on,” said Joe sharply. “What do you think this is, a sanitarium for invalids? Here, McRae’s taken you from the bush league and given you the chance of your lives with the best team in the country. Do you want to go back to the sticks?”
“Nothing like that,” muttered Jackwell, twisting about uneasily.
“Then go out and play the game,” commanded Joe. “I’m getting fed up with all this mystery stuff. There’ll have to be a show-down before long, unless you get back your nerve.”
Jackwell said no more and went back to the bench, where he had a whispered colloquy with Bowen, who seemed equally nervous.
When they went out to their positions, Joe noticed that both had their caps drawn down over their faces much more than usual. It could not have been to keep the sun out of their eyes, for clouds obscured the sky and rain threatened.
Fortunately, that is, for the Giants, for despite Hughson’s prediction, it was not the Reds’ winning day. Jim pitched for the Giants, and though he was nicked for seven hits, he was never in danger and held his opponents all the way. He did not have to extend himself, as his teammates, by free batting, gave him a commanding lead as early as the third inning, and after that the Giants simply breezed in.
Allison was the first of the Cincinnati pitchers to fall a victim to the fury of the Giants’ bats. In the third inning, with the Giants one run to the good, Barrett, the first man up, sent a sharp single to left. Iredell followed with another in almost identically the same place, and an error by the Red shortstop filled the bases. Then Jackwell singled sharply over second, bringing in two runs.
It was clear that Allison’s usefulness for that day was at an end, and Hughson replaced him by Elkins. Bowen lifted a sacrifice to Gerry in center and another run came over the plate. Mylert doubled and Jackwell scampered home. Curry hit to third and Mylert was tagged on the base line. Burkett was passed, as was also Wheeler. Then Joe, who, in the new shake-up of the batting order, occupied the position of “clean-up” man, justified the name by coming to the plate and hammering out a mighty triple that cleared the bases. There he was left, however, for Larry, up for the second time in the same inning, popped an easy fly that was gathered in by the second baseman. Seven runs had been the fruit of that avalanche of hits in that fateful inning.
From that time on it seemed only a question of how big would be the score. Two other pitchers were called into service by Hughson before the game was over, and although the torrent of Giant hits had almost spent its force, they came often enough to keep the Red outfielders on the jump.
In the eighth the Reds made a rally and succeeded in getting three men on bases with only one man out. But the rally ended suddenly when Jim made Haskins, the star batter of the Reds, hit to short for a snappy double play that ended the inning.
No further runs were made by either side, and the first game of the Western invasion went into the Giants’ column by a score of ten to two.
In the clubhouse, after the game, Joe asked Jackwell and Bowen to stay after the others had gone, in order that he might have a word with them.
“I don’t want to pry into your personal affairs, boys,” he said to them kindly, when they were at last left alone. “I’d be the last one to do that. But I’m captain of this team, and I’ve got to see that my men are in fit condition to play. And if there’s anything that prevents you showing your best form, it’s up to me to find just what it is.”
They made no answer, and Joe went on:
“I notice that whatever it is that’s bothering you seems to affect you both. You both were sick, or said you were, at the same time the other day. You, Jackwell, told me that you were not feeling fit to-day, and although Bowen didn’t say anything, I suppose it was because you told him it was of no use. I noticed that right after your talk with me, you went back to Bowen and held a whispered conversation with him. And when you went out on the field, you both pulled your caps over your faces more than usual.
“Then, too, neither of you played your usual game to-day. Luckily, we had such a big lead that the errors didn’t lose the game, but in a close game any one of them might have been fatal. That was a ridiculously easy grounder, Jackwell, that you fumbled in the fourth, and in the sixth you failed to back up Iredell on that throw-in by Curry. And that was a bad muff you, Bowen, made of Haskins’ fly to center, to say nothing of the wild throw you made to second right afterwards.
“Now, what’s the trouble? Let’s have a showdown. Speak up.”
CHAPTER XV
TROUBLE BREWING
Still Jackwell and Bowen stood mute, neither of them venturing to meet Joe’s gaze.
“If you don’t tell it to me, you’ll have to tell it to McRae,” suggested Joe. “I’m trying to let you down easy, without calling it to his attention. If we can settle it among ourselves, so much the better. Is it some trouble at home that’s weighing on your mind? Is it something about money matters? If it’s that, perhaps I can help you out.”
“That’s very kind of you, Mr. Matson,” said Jackwell, who seemed by common consent to be the spokesman for the two. “But it isn’t either of those two. It’s something else that neither Ben nor I are quite ready yet to talk about.
“I know very well that you have a right to know anything that’s interfering with our playing the game as it ought to be played. And I’ll admit, and I guess Ben will, too, that we were off our game to-day. But I think we’ll soon be able to settle the trouble so it won’t bother us any more.
“I wish you could see your way clear to give us a little more time. Let Ben and me have time to think and talk it over together. If we can settle the matter without letting any one else know about it, we’d much rather do so.”
Joe pondered for a moment.
“I’m willing to go as far as this,” he announced at last. “I’ll give you a little more time, on this condition. If I note any further falling off in your play, or you come to me with any excuses to be let off from a game, I’m going to come down on you like a load of brick. Then you’ll have to come across, and come across quick, or you’ll be put off the team. Do you understand?”
“That’s all right,” said Jackwell. “You won’t have any further cause to complain of me, Mr. Matson. I’ll play my very best.”
“I’ll work my head off to win,” declared Bowen.
They kept their promise in the series of games with the Western teams that followed. Jackwell played at third with a skill that brought back the memory of Jerry Denny, and Bowen covered his territory splendidly in the outfield. It seemed as though Joe’s problem was solved, as far as they were concerned.
But the worry about them was replaced by another regarding Jim. There was no denying that the latter was not doing his best work. He was intensely loyal and wrapped up in the success of the team. But the opposing teams were getting to him much more freely than they had before that season. He was getting by in many of his games because the “breaks” happened to be with him, and because the Giants, with the new spirit that Joe had infused into them, were playing a phenomenal fielding game. But there was something missing.
There was nothing amiss in Jim’s physical condition. His arm was in perfect shape and his control as good as ever. But his mind was not on the game, as it had formerly been. He worked mechanically, sometimes abstractedly. He was always trying, but it was as though he were applying whip and spur to his energies, instead of having them act joyously and spontaneously.
Joe knew perfectly well what was worrying his chum. Ever since that involuntary hesitation of Mabel’s, when asked about Clara, Jim had been a different person. Where formerly he and Joe had laughed and jested together on the closest terms of friendship and mutual understanding, there was now a shadow between them, a very slight and nebulous shadow, but a shadow nevertheless. Jim’s old jollity, the bubbling effervescence, the sheer joy in living, were conspicuous by their absence.
It was a matter that could not be talked about, and Joe, grieved to the heart, could only wait and hope that the matter would be cleared up happily. To his regret on his chum’s account was added worry about the influence the trouble might have on the chances of the Giants.
For if there was any weak place in the Giants’ armor, it was in the pitching staff. At the best, it was none too strong. Joe himself, of course, was a tower of strength, and Jim was one of the finest twirlers in either League. But Markwith, though still turning in a fair number of victories, was past his prime and unquestionably on the down grade. In another season or two, he would be ready for the minors. Bradley was coming along fairly well, and Merton, too, had all the signs of a comer, but they were still too unseasoned to be depended on.
If the deal for Hays had gone through, he would have been a most welcome addition to the ranks of the Giant boxmen. But the Yankees had had a change of heart, and had decided to retain him for a while.
So Joe’s dismay at the thought of Jim, his main standby, letting down in his efficiency was amply justified.
The Cincinnatis came back, as Hughson had prophesied, and took the next game. But the two following ones went into the Giants’ bat bag, and with three out of four they felt that they had got revenge for the trimming that had been handed to them on their last trip to Redland.
St. Louis came next, and this time the Giants made a clean sweep of the series. They were not so successful with the Pittsburghs, and had to be satisfied with an even break. But when the latter went over the bridge the Brooklyns rose in their might and took the whole four games right off the reel, thus enabling the Giants to pass them and take second place in the race.
Then came the Chicagos, who were still leading the League, but only by the narrow margin of one game. If the Giants could take three out of four from them, the Cubs would fall to second place.
Joe had made his pitching arrangements so that he himself would pitch the first and fourth games. He did so, and won them both. He had never pitched with more superb skill, strength and confidence, and the ordinarily savage Cubs were forced to be as meek as lapdogs.
They got even, to an extent, with Markwith, whom they fairly clawed to pieces in the second game. Jim pitched in the third, and but for a senseless play might have won.
That play was made by Iredell in the ninth inning, with the Giants making their last stand. The Cubs were three runs to the good. One man was out in the Giants’ half, Curry was on third and Iredell was on second, with Joe at the bat.
Suddenly, moved by what impulse nobody knew, Iredell tried to steal third, forgetting for the moment that it was already occupied.
“Back!” yelled Joe in consternation. “Go back!”
With the shout, Iredell realized what he had done, and turned to go back. But it was too late. The Cub catcher had shot the ball down to second, and Holstein, with a chuckle, clapped the ball on Iredell as he slid into the bag.
A roar, partly of rage, partly of glee, rose from the spectators, and Iredell was unmercifully joshed as he made his way back to the bench.
Joe, a minute later, smashed out a terrific homer on which Curry and he both dented the plate. But the next man went out on strikes, and with him went the game. If Iredell had been on second, he also would have come home on Joe’s circuit clout and the score would have been tied. The game would have gone into extra innings, with the Giants having at least an even chance of victory.
As it was, the Chicagos were still leading the League by one game when they packed their bats and turned their backs upon Manhattan.
McRae was white with rage, as he told Iredell after the game what he thought of him.
“You ought to have your brain examined,” he whipped out at him. “That is, if you have enough brain to be seen without a microscope. To steal third when there was a man already on the bag! You ought to have a guard to see that the squirrels don’t get you. What in the name of the Seven Jumping Juggernauts did you do it for?”
“I didn’t know there was a man there,” said Iredell lamely.
McRae looked as though he were going to have a fit.
“Didn’t know a man was there!” he sputtered. “Didn’t know a man was there! Didn’t know a-- Look here, you fellows,” he shouted to the rest of the Giants gathered round. “I want you to understand there are no secrets on this team. You tell Iredell after this whenever there’s a man on third. Understand?”
He stalked away from the clubhouse in high dudgeon to share his woes with the ever-faithful Robbie.
It was a hard game to lose, but Joe, as he summed up the results of the Western invasion felt pretty good over the record. The Giants had won eleven out of sixteen games from the strongest teams in the League, and were now only one game behind the leaders. They had climbed steadily ever since he had become captain.
But though he was elated at the showing of the team his heart was heavily burdened by his personal troubles. His mother was still in a precarious condition. He tore open eagerly every letter from home, only to have his hopes sink again when he learned that she was no better. Sometimes the strain seemed more than he could bear.
Then there was Jim, dear old Jim, with the cloud on his brow and look of suffering in his eyes that made Joe’s heart ache whenever he looked at him. From being the soul of good fellowship, Jim had withdrawn within himself, a prey to consuming anxiety. He seemed ten years older than he had a year ago. And as a player, he had slipped undeniably. He was no longer the terror to opposing batsmen that he had been such a short time before. Joe gritted his teeth, and mentally scored Clara, who had brought his friend to such a pass.
But, troubled as he was, Joe summoned up his resolution and bent to his task. His work lay clearly before him. He was captain of the Giants. And the Giants must win the pennant!
CHAPTER XVI
OUT FOR REVENGE
“Joe,” said McRae, on the eve of the Giants’ second trip West, “I want to have a serious talk with you.”
“That sounds ominous, Mac,” replied Joe, with a twinkle in his eye. “What have I been doing?”
“What I wish every member of the team had been doing,” responded McRae. “Pitching like a wizard, batting like a fiend, and playing the game generally as it’s never been played before in my long experience as a manager. No, it isn’t you, Joe, that I have to growl about. You’re top-notch in every department of the game, and as a captain you’ve more than met my expectations. You’ve brought the team up from the second division to a point where any day they may step into the lead.”
“Give credit to the boys,” said Joe, modestly. “They’re certainly playing championship ball. That is, with one exception,” he added hesitatingly.
“With one exception,” repeated McRae. “Exactly! And it’s just about that exception I want to talk to you. Of course, we’re both thinking of the same man--Iredell.”
Joe nodded assent.
“I’ve worked myself half sick trying to brace him up,” he said. “But he’s taken a bitter dislike to me since he was displaced as captain of the team. He only responds in monosyllables, or oftener yet with a grunt. He’s such a crack player when he wants to be that I’ve been hoping he’d wake up and change his tactics.”
“Same here,” said McRae. “He’s been with the team for a long time, and for that reason I’ve been more patient with him than I otherwise would. But there comes a time when patience ceases to be a virtue, and I have a hunch that that time is now.”
“You may be right,” assented Joe. “I’m sorry for Iredell.”
“So am I,” replied McRae. “I’m sorry to see any man throw himself away. And that’s just what Iredell is doing. If it were only a slump in his playing, such as any player has at times, it would be different. But it’s more than that. I’ve had detectives keeping track of him for the last week or two, and they report that he has been drinking and frequenting low resorts. You know as well as I do, that no man can do that and play the game. So I’m going to bench him for a while and see if that doesn’t bring him to his senses. If it does, well and good. If it doesn’t, I’ll trade him at the end of the season.”
“That’ll mean Renton in his place,” said Joe, thoughtfully.
“Do you think he measures up to the position?” inquired McRae.
“I’m inclined to think he will,” affirmed Joe. “Of course, he isn’t the player that Iredell is when he’s going right. But he’ll certainly play the position as well as Iredell has since we returned from the last trip. He is an upstanding, ambitious young chap, and he’ll play his head off to make good. He has all the earmarks of a coming star. With Larry on one side of him and Jackwell on the other, and with you and me to drill the fine points of the game into him, I think he’ll fill the bill.”
“Then it’s a go,” declared McRae. “I’ll have a talk with Iredell to-night. You tell Renton that he’s to play short to-morrow, and that it’s up to him to prove that he’s the right man for the job.”
Joe did so, and the young fellow was delighted to learn that his chance had come.
“I’ll do my best, Mr. Matson,” he promised, “and give you and the team all I’ve got. If I fall down, it won’t be for the lack of trying.”
Pittsburgh was the first stop on the Giants’ schedule, and Forbes Field was crowded to repletion when the teams came out on the field. The local fans had been worked up to a high pitch of enthusiasm by the closeness of the race, and they looked to see their favorites put the Giants to rout, as they had on the first visit of the latter to the Smoky City.
“Look who’s here,” said Jim to Joe, as the two friends drew near to the grandstand before the preliminary practice.
“Meaning whom?” asked Joe, as his eyes swept the stands without recognizing any one he knew.
“In the second row near that post on the right of the middle section,” indicated Jim.
Joe glanced toward that part of the stand, and gave a violent start of surprise, not unmixed with a deeper emotion.
“That lob-eared scoundrel, Lemblow!” he ejaculated. “And confabbing with Hupft and McCarney.”
“Evidently as thick as thieves,” commented Jim. “A precious trio. I wonder they have the face to show themselves at a baseball game when they’ve done the best they could to bring the sport into disgrace.”
“Three of the worst enemies we have in the world,” murmured Joe, as his mind ran over the exciting events of the previous season.
Hupft and McCarney had been members of the Giant team that year. They were good players, but had entered into a conspiracy with a gang of gamblers--who had bet heavily against the Giants--to lose the pennant. Lemblow was a minor-league pitcher who had long wanted to get a chance to play with the Giants. If Joe, their star pitcher, could be put out of the game, Lemblow figured that his chance for a berth would be better. He also, therefore, had fallen in with the plans of the gambling ring, and had, seemingly, stopped at nothing to bring Joe to grief. How their plans miscarried, how Hupft and McCarney had been put on the blacklist that debarred them forever from playing in organized baseball, how Lemblow had been exposed and disgraced, are familiar to those who have read the preceding volume of this series.
“Wonder what they’re doing here,” puzzled Joe.
“Rogues naturally drift together,” said Jim. “I heard some time ago that the bunch was playing with one of the semi-pro teams in the Pittsburgh district. But they usually play only on Saturdays and Sundays, so I suppose they’re choosing this way to spend their off time. I suppose if we could hear what they’re saying about us at this moment, our ears would be blistered.”
“Whatever it is doesn’t matter,” laughed Joe. “They made acquaintance with our fists once, and I don’t think they’re anxious to repeat the experience. But I guess we’d better pick out catchers and begin to warm up. I’ve a hunch that the Pirates are going to pitch Miles to-day, and if they do we’ll need the best we have in stock to turn them back.”
By the time the bell rang for the beginning of the game, the stands were black with spectators. The Giant supporters were comparatively few, but they made up in vehemence what they lacked in numbers.
From the beginning it was evident that the game would be a pitchers’ duel. Miles was in superb form, and up to the ninth inning had only given three hits, and these so scattered that no runs resulted.
But Joe was in the box for the Giants and was pitching for a no-hit game. Up to the ninth, not even the scratchiest kind of hit had been registered from his delivery.
Could he keep it up? The crowd waited breathlessly for the answer.
CHAPTER XVII
STEALING HOME
With Burkett, Barrett and Joe at the bat for the Giants in their half of the ninth inning, it looked as though the nine might have a chance to score.
But Miles had turned those same batters back earlier in the game, and he nerved himself to repeat.
“Murderer, are you?” he sneered, as the burly Burkett came to the bat, and referring to a nickname gained because of the many balls “killed.” “Well, see me send you to the electric chair.”
“Aw, pitch with your arm instead of your mouth,” retorted Burkett. “You’re due to blow up anyway. You’re only a toy balloon, and I’m going to stick a pin in you.”
But Miles had the last laugh, for he fanned Burkett with three successive strikes, and the latter went sheepishly back to the bench.
“That pin must have lost its point,” Miles called after him. “I knew you were bluffing all the time.”
Larry came up to the plate, swinging three bats. He threw away two of them and faced the pitcher.
“Why don’t you throw that one away too?” queried Miles. “You might as well, for all the good it’s going to do you.”
“Your name is Miles, ain’t it?” asked Larry. “Well, that’s the way I’m going to hit the ball--miles.”
He lunged savagely at the first ball that came over the plate and lashed it into the crowded grandstand for what would have been a sure homer, if it had not been a few inches on the wrong side of the foul line.
Larry kicked at the decision, but to no avail, and he came back disappointedly to the plate. But the mighty clout had sobered Miles somewhat, and the next two were out of Larry’s reach and went as balls. Larry fouled off the next for strike two, and let the next go by for the third ball.
“Good eye, Larry,” called Joe approvingly. “He’s in the hole now and will have to put the next one over. Soak it on the seam.”
Larry caught the next one fairly, and it started on a journey between right and center. Platz, the Pirate rightfielder, took one look at it and turned and ran in the direction the ball was going. At the back of the park was a low fence that separated the field from the bleachers. Just as the ball was passing over this, Platz reached out his hand and grabbed it. The force of the ball and the rate at which he was running carried him head over heels to the other side, but when he rose, the ball was in his hand.
It was a magnificent catch, and well deserved the thunderous applause that rose from the stand, applause in which even the Giant supporters joined, though it seemed to sound the death knell of their hopes.
“Hard luck, old man, to be robbed that way,” said Joe consolingly, as Larry came back, sore and muttering to himself.
“To crack out two homers in one turn at bat and not even get a hit,” mourned Larry. “Sure, if I was starvin’ and it started to rain soup, I’d be out in it with only a fork to catch it with.”
Joe received a generous hand as he came to the bat, due not only to his general popularity but to the wonderful game he had so far pitched.
“Oh, you home-run king!” shouted an enthusiastic fan. “Show them that you deserve the name. Win your own game.”
“Watch Miles pass him,” yelled another.
Whether Miles was deliberately trying to pass him, Joe could not tell. In any event, the first two balls pitched were wide of the plate, and the crowd began to jeer.
The third was by no means a good one, but still it was within reach, and Joe reached out and hit it between third and short to leftfield. With sharp fielding it would have gone for only a clean single, but the leftfielder fumbled it for a moment, and Joe, noting this, kept right on to second, which he reached a fraction of a second before the ball.
That extra base was worth a great deal at that stage, for now a single would probably bring Joe in for the first and perhaps the winning run of the game.
But would that single materialize? There were already two men out, and the chances were always against the batter.
Joe noticed that Miles was getting nervous. Wheeler was at the bat, and Miles was so anxious to strike him out that he was more deliberate than usual in winding up. Joe took a long lead off the bag, and watched the pitcher with the eye of a hawk.
The first ball whizzed over the plate for a strike. Joe noted that Wheeler hit full six inches under the ball. Evidently his batting eye was off. There was little to be hoped for from that quarter.
When Miles started his long wind-up, Joe darted like a flash for third. The startled catcher dropped the ball, and Joe came into the bag standing up.
“Easy to steal on you fellows,” Joe joshed Miles, as he danced around the bag.
“That’s as far as you’ll get,” snapped Miles. “I’ve got this fellow’s number.”
And Joe was inclined to think he was right, for when the next ball went over, Wheeler missed it “by a mile.” One more strike, and the inning would be over.
Jamieson, the Pirate catcher, threw the ball back to Miles. Before it had fairly left his hand Joe was legging it to the plate. There was a yell from the spectators, and Miles, aghast at Joe’s audacity, threw hurriedly to Jamieson.
Twenty feet from the plate, Joe launched himself into the air and slid into the rubber in a cloud of dust. The ball had come high to Jamieson, and he had to leap for it. He came down with it on Joe like a thunderbolt, and the two rolled over and over.
“Safe!” cried the umpire.
CHAPTER XVIII
A TEST OF NERVE
The play was so close and so much depended on it that there was a rush of Pirate players to the plate to dispute the decision. But the umpire refused to change it, and curtly ordered them to get back into the game.
Joe picked himself up, and, smiling happily, walked into the Giants’ dugout, where he was mauled about by his hilarious clubmates, while McRae and Robbie beamed their delight.
“You timed that exactly, Joe,” cried Robbie, “and you came down that base path like a streak. It’s plays like that that stand the other fellows on their heads. Look at Miles. He’s mad enough to bite nails. You’ve got his goat for fair.”
“It looks like the winning run,” said McRae. “And it’s lucky that you didn’t depend on Wheeler to bring you in, for there goes the third strike. Now it’s up to you to hold the Pirates down in their last half.”
“And rub it in by making it a no-hit game,” adjured Robbie, as Joe put on his glove and went out to the box.
Joe needed no urging, for his blood was up and his imagination was fired by the prospect of doing what had not been done in either League so far that season.
But the Pirates were making their last stand in that inning, and he knew that he would have his work cut out for him. Their coachers were out on the diamond, trying to rattle him and waving their arms to get the fans to join in the chorus. From stands and bleachers rose a din that was almost overpowering.
Joe sized up Murphy, the first man up, and sent one over that fairly smoked. Murphy lashed out savagely and hit only the empty air.
“Strike one!” cried the umpire.
Murphy gritted his teeth, got a good toe hold, and prepared for the next. Joe drifted up a slow one that fooled him utterly.
Then for the third, Joe resorted to his fadeaway, and Murphy, baffled, went back to the bench.
Jamieson, who succeeded him, gauged the ball better and sent it on a line to the box. A roar went up that died away suddenly when Joe thrust out his gloved hand, knocked it down and sent it down to first like a bullet, getting it there six feet ahead of the runner.
Then Miles, the last hope, came up, and Joe wound up the game in a blaze of glory by letting him down on three successive strikes.
The Giants had won 1 to 0 in the best-played game of the year. The newspaper correspondents exhausted their stock of adjectives in describing it in the next day’s papers.
Only twenty-seven men had faced Joe in that game. Not a man had reached first. Not a pass had been issued. Not a hit had been made. It was one of the rarest things in baseball--a perfect game.
And as the crowning feature, the one run that gave the victory to the Giants had been scored by Joe himself by those dazzling steals to third and home.
It was a good omen for the success of the Western trip, and the Giant players were jubilant.
“No jinx after us this time,” chuckled Larry.
“If there is, he got a black-eye to-day,” laughed Jim. “Gee, Joe, that was a wonderful game. You won it almost by your lonesome. The rest didn’t have much to do.”
“They had plenty,” corrected Joe. “More than one of those Pirate clouts would have gone for a hit if it hadn’t been for the stone-wall defense the boys put up. No man ever won a no-hit game with bad playing behind him.”
At the hotel table that night Joe noticed that Iredell was not present.
“Wonder where Iredell is,” he remarked to Jim, who was sitting beside him.
“Search me,” answered the latter. “He may be in later. He’s so grouchy just now that he seems to be keeping away from the rest of the fellows as much as he can. You can’t get a pleasant word out of him these days. I spoke to him to-day on the bench, and he nearly snapped my head off.”
“Too bad,” remarked Joe, regretfully. “I’ve gone out of my way to be friendly with him, but he won’t have it. Seems to think that I’m to blame for all his troubles.”
They would have been still more concerned about the missing member of the team, could they have seen him at that moment.
Iredell, on his way to the hotel, had drifted into one of the low resorts which ostensibly sold only soft drinks, but where it was easy enough to get any kind of liquor in the back room. To his surprise, he saw Hupft, McCarney and Lemblow sitting at one of the tables.
There was a momentary hesitation on the part of the trio before they ventured to speak to him, for they did not feel sure how their advances would be received. But a glance at his face showed that he was in a dejected and reckless mood, and that decided them.
“Hello, Iredell,” called out McCarney, with an assumption of boisterous cordiality. “Sit down here and take a load off your feet. Have something with us at my expense.”
Three months before, Iredell would have scorned the invitation. Now he accepted it.
They talked of indifferent matters, the others studying Iredell intently.
“I noticed you weren’t playing to-day,” remarked McCarney, with a sickly grin.
“No,” said Iredell, bitterly. “I ain’t good enough for the Giants any more. They’ve benched me and put that young brat, Renton, in my place.”
“Case of favoritism, I suppose,” said McCarney, sympathetically. “Why, you can run rings around Renton when it comes to playing short!”
“That fellow, Matson, has got it in for me,” growled Iredell. “But I’ll get even with him yet.”
“Sure, you will,” broke in Hupft. “Nobody with the spirit of a man would take that thing lying down. He’s jealous of you, that’s what he is. You’ve been captain once, and he’s afraid you may be again, and so he wants to freeze you off the team.”
CHAPTER XIX
THE WARNING BUZZ
“Matson has a swelled head,” declared McCarney. “He thinks he’s the whole show. He’s done us dirt, and now he’s thrown you down. Are you going to stand for it?”
“No, I’m not!” snarled Iredell, now in the ugliest of moods. “I’ll get even with him if it’s the last thing I do.”
“That’s the way I like to hear a man talk,” said Lemblow. “I owe him a lot for the way he’s treated me, and so does every man here. We all hate him like poison. Then why don’t we do something? It ought to be easy enough for the four of us to figure out some way to put the kibosh on him.”
“It would be easy enough if he weren’t so much in the limelight,” said Hupft, uneasily. “If we put anything across on him, the whole country would be ringing with it. The League itself would spend any amount of money to run us down.”
“Bigger men than he is have got theirs,” rejoined McCarney. “It all depends on the way it’s done. Now, a scheme has popped into my head while we’ve been talking. I don’t know how good it is, but I think it may work. If it goes through, we’ll have our revenge. If it doesn’t we’ll be no worse off and we can try something else. Now listen to me.”
They put their heads together over the table, while McCarney in a low voice unfolded his scheme. That it was a black one was evident from the involuntary start the others gave when it was first broached. But as McCarney went on to explain the impunity with which he figured it could be carried out and the completeness of their revenge if it succeeded, they gave their adhesion to it. Iredell was the most reluctant of the four, but his drink-inflamed brain was not proof against the arguments of the others, and he finally acquiesced and put up his share of the estimated expense.
The next day witnessed another battle royal between the Giants and the Pirates. Jim pitched, and although his work was marked by some of the raggedness that Joe knew only too well the reason for, he held the Pittsburghs fairly well, and the Giants batted out a victory by a score of 7 to 3.
“Sure of an even break, anyway, on the series,” remarked Curry complacently, after the game.
“Yes,” replied Joe. “But that doesn’t get us anywhere. That only shows that we’re as good as the other fellows. We want to prove that we’re better. To play for a draw is a confession of weakness. I want the next two games just as hard as I wanted the first two. That’s the spirit that we’ve got to have, if we cop the flag.”
But though Markwith twirled a good game the next day and was well supported, the best he could do was to carry the game into extra innings, and the Pirates won in the eleventh.
“Beaten, but not disgraced,” was Joe’s laconic comment, as he and Jim made their way to the hotel. “Let’s hope we’ll have better luck to-morrow.”
“I’ve had a box sent up to your room, Mr. Matson,” said the hotel clerk, as he handed the young captain his key. “It came in a little while ago.”
“Thanks,” said Joe, and went upstairs with Jim to the room they occupied together.
In the corner was a wooden box, about two feet long, a foot wide, and of about the same depth. On the top was Joe’s name and the address neatly printed, but nothing else, except the tag of the express company.
“Wonder what it is,” remarked Joe, with some curiosity.
“It isn’t very heavy,” said Jim, as he lifted it and set it down again. “Some flowers for you perhaps from an unknown admirer,” he added, with a grin.
“It’s nailed down pretty tightly,” said Joe. “Got anything we can open it with?”
“Nothing here,” answered Jim, as he searched about the room. “Guess we’ll have to phone down to the office and have them send us up a chisel to pry the cover off.”
“Oh, well, it will keep,” said Joe. “I’m as hungry as a wolf, and I want to get my supper. We’ll stop at the desk on our way back and get something from the clerk.”
They had a hearty meal, over which they lingered long, discussing the game of the afternoon. Then they stopped at the desk, secured a chisel, and returned with it to their room.
Jim switched on the electric light, while Joe lifted the box and placed it on a table, preparatory to opening it.
“What’s that?” Jim exclaimed suddenly, turning from the switch.
“What’s what?” queried Joe in his turn.
“That buzzing sound.”
“You must be dreaming,” scoffed Joe. “I didn’t hear anything.”
“It seemed to come from the box when you lifted it up,” said Jim. “Lift it up again.”
Joe did so, and this time both of them heard a faint buzzing, whirring sound that, without their exactly knowing why, sent a little thrill through them.
Again he lifted it with the same result.
The two young men looked at each other with speculation in their eyes.
“Lay off it, Joe,” warned Jim, as a thought struck him. “Perhaps it’s an infernal machine.”
“Nonsense,” laughed Joe, though the laugh was a little forced. “Who’d send me anything like that?”
“There are plenty who might,” affirmed Jim, earnestly. “Remember those crooks we saw at the game the other day! They hate you for exposing them. I wouldn’t put anything past them. They’d go to all lengths to injure you.”
Joe took out his flashlight and sent the intense beam all over the sides of the box. Suddenly he uttered an ejaculation, and pointed to a number of small holes, not visible on a casual inspection.
“Look!” he cried. “Air holes! Jim, there’s some living thing in that box!”
CHAPTER XX
THE PACKAGE OF MYSTERY
“A living thing!” exclaimed Jim, in wonderment.
“Yes,” replied Joe, whose quick mind had already reached a conclusion. “And I can make a guess at what it is. It’s a rattlesnake!”
“What?” cried Jim, aghast. “Oh, no, Joe, you must be dreaming. No one would send you a thing like that.”
“Well, I’ll bet that somebody has,” said Joe, grimly. “That would explain the buzz we heard just now. It was the whirr of the snake’s rattles. We disturbed him when we lifted the box, and he’s given us warning that he’s on the job. Lucky we didn’t open the box while it was on the floor. See here.”
He lifted the box and let it fall with a sharp jolt on the table. This time there was no mistaking the angry rattle that issued from the box. They had heard it more than once when they had occasionally come across one of the deadly reptiles while out hunting. It was one of the sounds that once clearly heard could never be mistaken for anything else. Even now, with the box closed, it sent a thrill of horror through them.
Their faces were pale as they looked at each other and realized what might have been the fate of one or both of them but for that ominous warning.
“You see the dope?” questioned Joe, with an angry note in his voice. “I would be curious to see what had been sent to me, and would open the box probably with my face close above it. Then something would strike me like a bolt of lightning, and it would be good-night. I would have been out of the game with neatness and dispatch.”
“The scoundrel!” ejaculated Jim, fiercely. “Oh, if I only had my hands on whoever did it!”
“I’d like to have a hand in settling that little matter, too,” said Joe, with a blaze in his eyes that boded ill for the miscreant if he should ever be discovered. “But that can wait. The first thing to do is to put this rattler beyond the power of doing mischief.”
Jim’s eyes searched the room for some weapon.
“No,” said Joe, “there’s a safer way than that. That ugly head must never be thrust alive out of that box. Just turn on the water in the bathtub.”
They had a private bath adjoining their room, and Jim turned on the tap. When the tub was half full, Joe brought in the box and put it in the tub, placing sufficient weight upon it to keep it beneath the surface of the water.
“Those air holes will do the business, I think,” said Joe. “In a few minutes the box will be full of water. We’ll leave it there a little while, and then we’ll open the box and see if we guessed right.”
At the expiration of twenty minutes, they drained the water out of the tub. Then Joe got the chisel, and with considerable effort forced open the cover of the box.
“You see,” he said.
Jim saw and shuddered.
Lying in the water that was still seeping out through the air holes was a rattlesnake all of four feet long.
They viewed the creature with a feeling of loathing. But still deeper was the feeling they had against the scoundrels who had chosen that cowardly way of attempting to injure Joe. The snake, after all, was just the instrument. Infinitely worse were the rascals who had employed it as their weapon.
“We’ve had some pretty narrow escapes,” said Joe. “And this is one of them. If you hadn’t happened to hear that buzz, I might be a dead man this minute.”
“It’s too horrible for words!” exclaimed Jim, “It seems incredible that any one could plan such a thing for their worst enemy. Who do you think did it?”
“One guess is as good as another,” replied Joe. “But if you ask me, I should say that the man or men who did it sat in the grandstand on the first day we played in this city.”
“Lemblow, Hupft and McCarney,” said Jim. “One or perhaps all of them. Well, why not? Lemblow tried deliberately to harm us both last year when he pushed that pile of lumber over from the scaffold above us. We came within an ace of being killed. If he were ready to harm us then, why shouldn’t he be again, especially as he hates us worse now than he did before?”
“The box was certainly sent from somewhere in this city,” said Joe, examining the cover carefully. “There’s nothing to indicate that it came by railroad. And there are plenty of rattlesnakes in this part of Pennsylvania. Some of the stores exhibit them as curiosities.”
“It’s up to us to put the police on the trail right away,” suggested Jim.
“I don’t know about giving this thing publicity,” mused Joe thoughtfully. “In the first place, it would create a sensation. It would be featured on the first page of every newspaper in the country. And you can see in a minute how it might react against baseball. The public would begin to figure that gamblers were trying to put the Giants out of the race. They haven’t forgotten the Black Sox scandal that came near to ruining the game. We’ve got to think of the game first of all. You remember what hard work we had to save the League last year, and how we had to forego punishing the scoundrels in order to keep every inkling of the gamblers’ scheme from the public. Baseball has to be above suspicion.”
“Then do you mean to say that whoever did this is to get away scot free?” demanded Jim, hotly.
“No,” said Joe, grimly, “I don’t mean that. When the season closes, I’m going to make a quiet investigation of my own. And if I find the villains I’ll thrash them within an inch of their lives and make them wish they had never been born. But they won’t tell why I did it, and I certainly won’t. At any cost, this thing must be kept from the public. The good of the game comes before everything else.”
CHAPTER XXI
DROPPING BACK
“I suppose you are right, Joe,” assented Jim, regretfully. “But it makes me boil not to be able to put the scoundrels behind prison bars. Those human snakes ought to have some punishment meted out to them.”
“They surely ought,” agreed Baseball Joe. “But we’ll have to postpone their punishment. Everything will have to wait till the end of the season. Apart from anything else, if we found them out now and had them arrested, see how it would break into our work. We’d have to leave the team to come here to testify at the trial and perhaps stay away for weeks, and that would cost the Giants the pennant. But speaking of this fellow here in the box, what are we going to do with him? We can’t leave him here.”
“It’s rather awkward,” remarked Jim. “I suppose we could take him down to the cellar and have him burned in the furnace.”
“Not without arousing the curiosity of the furnace man and leading to talk,” objected Joe. “I’ll tell you what we’ll do. We leave town to-morrow night. We’ll wrap the snake up in a compact package and carry it along in a suitcase. Then at night while the train is speeding along, we’ll open a window and drop him out.”
They agreed on this as the best solution.
“I suppose there’s no question that the snake is dead,” remarked Jim, with an inflection of uncertainty in his voice. “It would be mighty awkward to have him come to life again in the suitcase.”
“I guess he’s drowned all right,” returned Joe. “He was a long time under water. But just to make assurance doubly sure, I’ll cut off his head.”
He took out his heavy jackknife and severed the reptile’s head from his body. Handling the grisly creature was a repugnant task, and they were glad when it was finished.
“Guess I’ll keep this head,” remarked Joe, as a thought came to him. “I’ll slip it into a jar of alcohol and that will preserve it indefinitely.”
“What on earth do you want it for?” queried Jim. “I shouldn’t think you’d care for that kind of souvenir.”
“I have a hunch it may come in handy some time,” answered Joe. “Now let’s wrap up this body and get it out of our sight.”
Their dreams that night were featured by wriggling, writhing forms.
“I’m glad I’m not scheduled to pitch to-day,” remarked Jim, at breakfast. “I’m afraid the Pirates would bat me all over the lot. I never felt less fit.”
“Such an experience isn’t exactly the best kind of preparation for box work,” replied Joe, with a ghost of a smile. “I guess Bradley will start, while I’ll stand ready to relieve him if he gets in a jam. I’m hoping, though, that he’ll pull through all right.”
After lunch they took a taxicab to the grounds, but the vehicle got in a traffic jam, and it was later than they expected when they finally reached Forbes Field.
They hurried over to the clubhouse and were entering the door when they met Iredell, who was coming out.
Iredell gave a sharp ejaculation and started back, while his face went as white as chalk.
“Why, what’s the matter, Iredell?” asked Joe.
“N--nothing,” stammered Iredell, by a mighty effort regaining control of himself and walking away.
Their wondering glances followed him, and they noticed that his gait was wavering.
“What do you suppose was the reason for that?” asked Jim.
“I’m afraid he’s been drinking again,” conjectured Joe, regretfully. “His nerves seem to be all unstrung. When he looked at me, you might think that he saw a ghost.”
“Perhaps he did,” said Jim, slowly but significantly.
“What do you mean?” asked Joe, quickly.
“Just what I say,” answered Jim. “Perhaps he thought that you were--well, in the doctor’s hands, and that what he saw must be a ghost.”
“You don’t mean----”
“You know what I mean.”
“No, no!” exclaimed Joe, in horror. “Lemblow, Hupft, McCarney? Yes! But Iredell! A man on our own team! A man we’ve played with for years! No, Jim, I can’t believe it possible.”
“Perhaps not,” admitted Jim. “I hate even to think of it. I hope I’m wrong. But drink, you know, will weaken a man’s moral fiber until he’s capable of anything. Iredell’s been steadily going to the dogs of late. Perhaps he’s fallen in with McCarney’s gang. He knows all of them, and a drinking man isn’t particular about his company. Let a man hate you and then let him drink, and you have a mighty bad combination. Just suppose Iredell was in the plot. Suppose he knew that rattler was sent to you yesterday. Wouldn’t he act just as he did when he saw you turn up safe and sound to-day?”
“It certainly was queer,” admitted Joe, half-convinced. “I can only hope you’re wrong. At any rate, it won’t hurt to keep our eyes on him and be doubly on our guard.”
Bradley showed more form that afternoon than he had before that season, and took the Pirates into camp in first class fashion by a score of 5 to 3. Apart from victory itself, it was gratifying to McRae and Robbie to note that Bradley was improving rapidly and furnishing a reinforcement to Joe and Jim, who, in a pitching sense, had been carrying the team on their backs.
Three out of four from so strong a team as the Pittsburghs was a good beginning for the swing around the Western circuit, and the Giants were in high feather when they arrived in Cincinnati.
“Hate to do it, old boy,” declared the grinning McRae, as he shook hands with Hughson, “but we’ll have to take the whole four from you this time.”
“Threatened men live long, Mac,” retorted Hughson. “Just for being so sassy about it, I don’t think we’ll give you one. Just remember the walloping we gave you the last time you were here. That wasn’t a circumstance compared to what’s coming to you now.”
As it turned out, both were false prophets, for each team took two games.
“Five out of eight aren’t so bad for a team away from home,” Jim remarked.
“Better than a black eye,” admitted Joe. “But still not good enough. We want twelve games out of the sixteen before we start back home.”
It was an ambitious goal, but the Giants reached it, taking three out of four from the Chicagos and making a clean sweep in St. Louis. It was the best road record that the Giants had made for a long time past, and it was a jubilant crowd of athletes that swung on board the train for New York.
“I’m already spending my World Series money,” crowed Larry, the irrepressible, to his comrades gathered about him in the smoker.
“Better go slow, Larry,” laughed Joe. “There’s many a slip between the cup and the lip. We haven’t got the pennant clinched yet, by any means. And even if we win the pennant, there’s the World Series, and that’s something else again. It looks as though the Yankees would repeat in the American, and you know what tough customers they proved last time. And when Kid Rose gets going with that old wagon-tongue of his----”
“Kid Rose!” interrupted Larry, with infinite scorn. “Who gives a hoot for Kid Rose? What’s Kid Rose compared with Baseball Joe?”
Joe’s caution was justified by what followed after the Giants’ return home. Suddenly, without warning, came one of the mysterious slumps that no baseball man can explain. If they had gone up like a rocket, they came down like the stick. They fielded raggedly, batted weakly, and fell off in all departments of the game. Perhaps it was the reaction after the strain of the Western trip. Whatever the cause, the slump was there.
McRae raged, Joe pleaded. They shook up the batting order, they benched some of the regulars temporarily, and put the reserve men in their places. Nothing seemed to avail. The “jinx” was on the job. The Phillies and Boston trampled them underfoot. In three weeks they had lost the lead, and the Chicagos and Pittsburghs had crowded in ahead of them.
Still Joe kept his nerve and struggled desperately to turn the tide. He himself had never pitched or batted better, and what occasional victories were turned in were chiefly due to him. But he was only one man--not nine--and the Giants kept on steadily losing.
Only one ray of light illumined the darkness for Baseball Joe. Mabel had come to him.
CHAPTER XXII
UNDER HEAVY STRAIN
“I can’t believe you are real,” said Joe, contentedly, lounging in a big chair and watching Mabel as she flitted about the room, putting small things in order and seeming by her very presence to make the hotel room a home. “I think you must be a dream or something. Come sit down here and let me look at you.”
Mabel sat down beside him and looked at him with dancing eyes.
“I might almost think you were glad to see me, Joe dear,” she said. Then, as Joe moved toward her, added quickly: “Do you know you haven’t asked me a single thing about the home folks yet?”
Joe’s face clouded and he rubbed a hand across his forehead.
“Truth is, I’ve been afraid to,” he confessed. “I have a hunch that neither mother nor Clara has been frank in their letters to me. I’ve been worried sick!” he finished, in an unusual outburst of feeling.
Mabel, studying the new lines about his mouth and the strained look of his eyes, was inclined to be worried herself, though not so much for Mother Matson as for Joe. She said, as cheerfully as she could:
“I wouldn’t worry so dreadfully, Joe, if I were you. Mother’s heart is stronger than it has been for some time and she is wonderfully brave and courageous.”
“She would be,” muttered Joe, adding in swift anxiety: “In the last letter I had from her she said she was in the hospital and the operation was slated to take place in about a week’s time. That would make it somewhere around day after to-morrow. Good heavens! I can’t bear to think of it!”
“You mustn’t, any more than you can help,” said Mabel, gently. “It won’t do Mother Matson or the rest of us any good for you to get down sick yourself, Joe. I wonder Dougherty doesn’t order you off the team for a rest.”
“You wrote in one of your letters that you had taken a flying trip to Riverside,” Joe reminded her, and Mabel nodded.
“I didn’t want to stay long. Mother Matson was so sick and I was afraid she would think she must exert herself to entertain me. So I just stayed overnight and caught the morning train back to Goldsboro.”
“Did Mother give you any message for me?” Joe’s voice was husky.
“Just her love--and this,” said Mabel, softly. She held out her hand, and in the palm of it lay a tiny, heart-shaped locket. Joe recognized it as one that had long rested in his mother’s jewelry case. He took it and opened it, and the sweet face of his mother in her youth smiled back at him.
Joe got up abruptly and went to the window, standing for a long time looking out, with his back to his wife. Mabel knew that he was having a struggle with himself, and waited quietly until he turned and came back to her.
“If I could get away from the team long enough to go to her!” he said huskily. “But I can’t just now. It’s impossible. I’ve got to keep after the men every minute, or they’re apt to go to pieces.”
“She doesn’t expect you just now, dear,” said Mabel, soothingly. “She knows you can’t leave the team. Now don’t worry.”
Joe sank down in the chair again, his head in his hands. Finally he looked up and asked:
“How about Clara? Are things as bad there as we thought they were?”
“I’m afraid so, Joe. It seems to me that Clara is getting more and more entangled with that millionaire all the time. He reads poetry to her, too, in spite of the fact that he’s a great, strapping, athletic looking chap.”
“Oh, then you saw him?” cried Joe, all interest at once.
“Saw him!” repeated Mabel, with a short laugh. “You might better ask me if I saw anything else. He was around the place from morning to night. I think if Mother Matson hadn’t been in such poor health he would have come around to breakfast, too.”
Joe got to his feet and strode around the room, hands thrust deep in his pockets.
“Serious as all that!” Mabel heard him mutter to himself. “How does Clara act? How does she treat this--boob?” he demanded, suddenly stopping short in front of Mabel and glaring at her in exasperation. “Does she encourage him?”
“You might call it that,” Mabel returned, with a puzzled frown. “She certainly accepts his attentions. Lets him take her out in his beautiful car, plays tennis with him, and listens while he reads his foolish poems to her.”
Joe literally ground his teeth in futile rage and exasperation. He began again his restless pacing of the room.
“Did you have a chance to talk to her?” he continued his cross-examination. “Did you ask her what she meant by treating a fine fellow like Jim so shabbily?”
“You forget, Joe dear, that I’m not Clara’s guardian. It wasn’t my place to take her to task. All I could do was try to sound her. She evaded all my questions with some light answer, and when I asked her point-blank whether she intended to turn Jim down in favor of her millionaire----”
“What did she say?” interrupted Joe, swiftly.
“She merely remarked that I ought to know better. She seemed to be offended, and if I had pressed things just then the result might have been a real quarrel. I thought the best thing to do was drop the whole thing. After all, Clara is old enough to know her own mind.”
“I doubt it!” said Joe, bitterly, adding in helpless indignation as he again faced his wife: “Can you imagine any reasonably intelligent girl turning down good old Jim for a flossy millionaire?”
“Well, money sometimes dazzles a girl, especially young and very pretty ones like Clara,” returned Mabel, judicially. “I tell you what let’s do, Joe. I know it would be lovely to have our first dinner alone to-night, but don’t you think we might include Jim? It might cheer him up.”
“It would be an act of charity,” agreed Joe. “Jim is pretty low in his mind these days. I’m sure he guesses there is something wrong.”
But in spite of their whole-souled attempt to give Jim a good time that night, both Joe and Mabel felt that they had failed. Jim tried to rouse himself and meet their fun with some of his own, but nothing could disguise the fact that his heart was not in it.
He asked one or two listless questions about Clara, almost, Mabel thought, as though from a sense of duty, and after that maintained a dead silence on the subject they both knew was uppermost in his mind.
They had dined in a jolly restaurant full of lights and music, but despite the hilarity all about them, their party had been a dismal failure. They were glad when the last course was over and they could leave the place.
It was when they had reached the hotel and Mabel had slipped into another room to remove her hat and cloak that Joe turned to his chum with a casual question.
“Got your letter from Clara all right this week, did you?” he asked, in a tone that was not quite natural.
Jim looked at him, surprised, then turned away before he answered shortly:
“Not yet.”
CHAPTER XXIII
BLUNDERING OLD REGGIE
“Oh, Joe, I do believe I’ll go shopping to-day.”
Mabel turned from the window where she had been standing looking down into the street. It was a glorious day, bright and sunshiny, and her face reflected the brightness of it.
“I do so like to shop in nice weather,” she added, as she saw Joe’s indulgent smile. “And if you like, I’ll stop and buy you some gorgeous neckties.”
“Dear girl, is that a threat or a promise?” teased Joe.
“Very well, I shall be completely selfish and buy everything for myself,” Mabel promptly replied, adding with a sigh: “How you do wreck my generous impulses!”
“Didn’t mean to, honey, honestly,” said Joe, contritely, adding with a courage that none appreciated more than Mabel herself: “If you buy me a necktie, I swear to wear it whatever happens!”
Mabel made a face at him and disappeared into the other room, returning almost immediately with her hat and coat on.
“I won’t have much time between practice and the game,” Joe told her, as they went down together in the elevator. “So have a good time, girl. Take in a show if you like.”
Mabel promised to enjoy herself, and a few moments later they parted in the sunny street, going their separate ways. Mabel turned to wave to him before she was swallowed up in the crowd, and Joe thought with a full heart how lucky he was.
“If I were in poor old Jim’s place now, how would I feel?” he asked himself, and instinctively thrust the unpleasant thought away from him. He knew the agony of mind he would have suffered if at any time he had been in danger of losing Mabel, and pity for his chum took on a new intensity. He was almost afraid to meet Jim for fear of seeing that hopeless, lost look in his eyes.
“He certainly knows--or guesses--something,” he told himself. “If I get a chance to-day I’ll sound him out on the subject. After all, it sometimes helps a patient to have the wound lanced.”
After the Giants had dropped another game, the chums, tired and disgruntled, turned their steps toward the hotel again. Jim seemed more than ordinarily depressed and met Joe’s attempts at conversation with discouraging monosyllables. Several times Joe tried to lead up to the subject of Clara, only to be rebuffed by Jim’s laconic replies.
After that Joe relapsed into silence, studying his chum thoughtfully. The thing was getting serious. Jim’s silence and moroseness were growing on him. And the worst of it was that he did not seem to care. It was this very lethargy that Joe found most alarming. He would have welcomed an outburst of some sort, even condemnation of Clara and her actions. It was Jim’s brooding taciturnity that baffled him.
They had almost reached the hotel when Joe felt a hand on his arm and turned to find himself confronted by a dazzling person. He blinked, and discovered that the vision was Reggie, dressed as always, in the latest fashion from smart soft hat to immaculate spats. Reggie swung his cane and beamed. Perhaps because the friendly face with its inevitable monocle was a welcome contrast to Jim’s moodiness, Joe greeted his brother-in-law with more than usual enthusiasm.
“Say, but you’re a sight for sore eyes, old chap!” he cried. “When did you blow in?”
“About an hour ago. Been busy all this time lookin’ up a novel tie or two. Stopped in all the shops hereabouts and, bah Jove, the best they could show me was a creation of salmon pink with yellowish polka dots. No taste, no taste whatever, one might say!”
“Poor old Reggie!” said Joe, piloting him toward the hotel entrance and looking invitingly at Jim. “I’ll put you wise to a couple of shops where you can get all the novel neckties you want. Come on upstairs, old boy, and see Mabel. She’ll be pleasantly surprised. Coming, Jim?”
Jim hesitated for a moment, then nodded. The three stepped into the elevator and were swiftly shot up to the fourth floor. As they left the elevator, Reggie looked Jim over critically and gave vent to one of his too-frank observations.
“Lookin’ rather seedy, old chap,” he said. “Off the feed bag and sleepin’ badly, eh?”
“Not at all. I’m feeling as fit as a fiddle,” retorted Jim, brusquely.
The curt tone caused Reggie to look at the other in mild surprise, and, seeing that he was about to give voice to this emotion, Joe quickly changed the subject, keeping the conversation on safe ground until they reached the door of his rooms.
Mabel had not yet returned from her shopping expedition, and Joe felt curiously deserted as he led the way into the quiet place.
“Mabel is out buying up the department stores,” he said. “Reckon she will be back most any time now. Tell us about yourself, Reggie. Every one well at home?”
Reggie glanced briefly at Jim, who had slumped into a chair and was staring abstractedly out of a window, then turned to Joe.
“Very well, old chap. In excellent health and spirits,” he replied, puffing at a cigarette. “Missing Mabel, of course. It is really quite remarkable how that girl stirs things up. Bah Jove, it’s a gift. Bally place gone dead without her, you know.”
“Do you think you can tell me anything about that?” inquired Joe, with a humorously uplifted eyebrow. “I know all there is to know about missing Mabel!”
Jim turned from the window, rousing himself with difficulty from his abstracted mood.
“I think she’s coming now,” he said. “Thought I caught a glimpse of a red hat in the crowd. Guess I’ll be going, Joe,” he added, listlessly. “You three will have a lot to talk about.”
“Hang around, old boy,” urged Reggie, cordially, placing the monocle in his eye the better to stare at the disconsolate Jim. “Always regard you as one of the family, don’t we? You would be offending Mabel by running away just as she arrives, you know. Stick around, old chap. She will be here presently. Ah, here she is now.” He rose quickly, the monocle falling to his immaculate waistcoat, the most genuine pleasure on his thin face.
He took a step toward the door, but Joe was before him. He caught his young wife--and several bulky parcels--in a bear’s hug, and when she emerged several seconds later, her face was flushed and the little red hat was set distractingly over one eye.
“Oh, Joe, and it was a new one, too!” she wailed, evidently referring to the hat. “I had such a gorgeous time. I bought and bought and bought-- Who is that in the corner? Reggie, you old darling! Come here and give me a hug. Oh, this is just the best surprise ever.”
“Rippin’. Had an idea you would like it all along,” replied Reggie, complacently, as he favored his sister with a brotherly embrace. “You look perfectly stunning, you know. I say,” he added thoughtfully, “did you see old Jim, hidin’ over here in his corner? I take it your neglect is not intentional? No feud or the like, is there?”
“Oh, Reggie, don’t be so silly,” said Mabel, flushing a little as she went over to Jim. “I just didn’t see him at first, that’s all.”
She held out her hand and Jim squeezed it heartily. There was a dumb suffering in his eyes that tugged at her heart. If she could only tell him something about Clara, something reassuring and heartening!
Mabel was in the midst of a laughing recital of her shopping tour when the telephone rang and Joe, answering it, found that McRae was in the hotel lobby waiting to speak to him. Reluctantly Joe excused himself, while Mabel disappeared into the other room to get ready for dinner.
Reggie, left alone with Jim, turned his quizzical gaze upon the latter. It was evident that Reggie was very much puzzled by Jim’s strange behavior. And when Reggie scented a mystery he headed straight for the solution of it with a doggedness worthy of a better cause.
“Hard luck the team’s been runnin’ in lately, old chap?” he began.
“No hard luck about it. Bad playing. Bad team work,” snapped Jim.
“Well, you shouldn’t worry, anyway, old chap, you really shouldn’t,” reproved Reggie, mildly. “Bad for the game you know, and bad for the good old constitution.”
Jim looked at him, a slow anger in his eyes.
“If I never had anything worse than my constitution to worry about, I’d be all right,” he said, and turned his back upon Reggie, hoping that such action would terminate the conversation. But Reggie, in sublime ignorance, blundered on.
“I say, Jim, I’ve got it now. Worried because Clara couldn’t come on with Mabel, eh? No doubt she wanted to come--rather. I say, old chap,” he added, archly, lighting another gold-tipped cigarette, “better tend to your knittin’.”
Jim, who had risen and was moodily pacing up and down, stopped and looked at Reggie.
“What’s that?”
The quiet of his tone disarmed Reggie, who went on beaming pleasantly.
“Why, that millionaire who is hangin’ around Clara, you know. Mabel has told you, hasn’t she? Have I spilled the beans, Jim--let the jolly old cat out of the bag, and all that? Frightfully sorry. I thought you knew----”
Reggie’s explanations and excuses wavered into silence before the expression on Jim’s face. At that moment he thought of nothing but escape, and with a few muttered phrases about “huntin’ up Joe,” blundered from the room, leaving Jim to his furious thoughts.
When, a few moments later, the door opened to admit Joe, Jim turned upon him, all the pent-up worry and nerve strain of the last few weeks finding vent in a flood of words.
“I knew you and Mabel were holding something back all the time, Joe. I’ve known from Clara’s letters, for a long time, that something was wrong. If you’re a friend of mine and have any regard for me, tell me about this millionaire who is hanging around Clara.”
“Has Reggie----”
“Yes, Reggie has!” retorted Jim, grimly. “Go ahead, Joe, and tell me the truth.”
Seeing that there was nothing for it, Joe told all he knew about Jim’s rival, glossing over the details and making as light of the whole thing as possible.
“So that’s that!” said Jim, quietly, when Joe’s explanation had stumbled into silence. “The end of everything!”
Joe, feeling deeply for his chum but powerless to comfort him, said, with a forced cheerfulness, “All this probably sounds a hundred times worse than it really is, Jim. When you go down there----”
“If she wants to marry for money, let her!” interrupted Jim, with sudden ferocity. “Do you suppose I’d deprive her of her pet millionaire? Not much!”
CHAPTER XXIV
GETTING A CONFESSION
“It cuts me to the heart, Jim,” said Joe, with deep feeling, laying his hand affectionately on his chum’s arm. “I can’t tell you how sick I feel about the whole thing. Nothing that affects you can fail to affect me. You know that, don’t you, Jim?”
“Of course I do, Joe. You’ve been a brother to me ever since I joined the Giants. Whatever success I’ve had in my work has been due to your kindness, your teaching, your encouragement. Don’t think I’ll ever forget it. I shouldn’t have burst out the way I did, but you can’t know the misery I’ve endured in the last few weeks. It was bad enough when I only had a vague suspicion that things weren’t right. Now it seems more than I can stand. It’s hard, Joe, to see your house of cards come tumbling to the ground.”
“I know it is, Jim,” replied Joe, with warm sympathy. “But take it from me, Jim, your house hasn’t fallen yet. I’m sure that Clara is true blue at heart, and that no matter how things look, there must be some explanation that will clear up everything.”
“I hope so,” said Jim, though there was not much hopefulness in his tone. “I’ve got to know soon or I’ll go crazy. You see how this thing has knocked me out of my stride. I’m not pitching up to my usual form, and you know it.”
“I’ve noticed it, of course,” said Joe. “And I’ve guessed the reason. You’ve got all the old stuff, all the strength and cunning, but you haven’t been able to use it because of the burden on your mind. Even at that, though, you’ve been turning in more victories than the other fellows.”
“Which isn’t saying much, the way the team is running now.”
“All the more reason for taking a big brace, old boy!” exclaimed Joe, giving him a hearty slap on the shoulder. “Try to throw off your troubles and work your head off for the success of the team.”
“I’ll do it,” promised Jim, as he shook his chum’s hand to bind the bargain.
“Good,” said Joe, heartily. “And promise me one thing, Jim. Don’t hint at anything of this in your letters to Clara. Nothing can really be explained in a letter. Nothing in the world has caused so much estrangement, so much heartache, as trying to arrange a misunderstanding by letter. You can’t say just what you want, and what you do say is never understood just in the way you want it to be. Wait until you can see Clara face to face, and I’ll bet the whole thing will be cleared up in five minutes.”
“But that will be at the end of the season!” exclaimed Jim, in dismay.
“Not so long as that, I guess,” said Joe. “I’m going to see if I can’t by some means get Clara to make a flying visit to New York.” He paused a moment, and his brow clouded with anxiety. Then he resumed: “Of course she can’t do it right now because my mother is in too critical a condition. But if the operation turns out all right and she has a good recovery, it might be managed. If not, I have something else in mind that I’ll talk to you about later.”
To Joe’s already overburdened mind was added another worry in the game with the Bostons the next afternoon.
Jackwell and Bowen, while they had been affected by the general slump of the team, had given no evidence of a return of the peculiar nervousness that had marked their actions earlier in the season. But Joe noticed on that afternoon, the frequent looks at the stand and the pulling of their caps over their faces for which he had before taken them to task.
Merton was pitching, and Joe was playing in left. In the fourth inning, an easy fly came out to Bowen and he made a miserable muff. Jackwell also made a couple of errors at third. In each case the blunders were costly, as they let in runs.
“What made you drop that fly, Bowen?” Joe asked, as the Giants came in from the field.
“I lost it in the sun,” replied Bowen. “At this time in the year the sun comes over the grandstand in such a way that it’s right in my eyes.”
“Haven’t heard you complain of it before,” remarked Joe, dryly. “For the rest of this game I’ll play center, and you shift over to left.”
The change was made accordingly. In the eighth inning another fly came to Bowen and again he dropped it while the crowd booed. The error let in what proved to be the winning run for the Bostons.
“I want to see you fellows after the game,” said Joe, curtly, to the two men. “Wait around the clubhouse after the others have gone.”
When the clubhouse was finally deserted by all but the three, Joe turned to them sternly.
“I’m fed up with this mystery stuff,” he said. “It’s got to end right here. It lost the game for us this afternoon, but it isn’t going to lose another. Come across now and make a clean breast of it.”
The two men looked at each other uncertainly.
“You heard me,” said Joe. “Out with it now, or I’ll see that you’re fired off the team.”
“All right, Mr. Matson,” Jackwell spoke up with sudden resolution. “I’ll tell you just what the trouble is. Ben and I are afraid that detectives are after us.”
“Detectives!” ejaculated Joe, with a start. “What are they after you for? What have you been doing?”
“Nothing wrong,” declared Jackwell, earnestly, and Bowen echoed him.
“Why should they be after you, then?” asked Joe, with a faint tinge of skepticism in his tone.
“We got mixed up in a shady business,” explained Jackwell, with a look of misery on his face. “But we didn’t know there was anything wrong about it till it went up with a bang. You see, Mr. Matson, this is the way it came about. Last winter, Ben and I were rather up against it--short of ready money. You know what poor salaries they pay in the league we came from. We were down in Dallas, Texas, and the oil boom was on. We saw an ad for men to sell oil stocks, and we answered it. The fellow at the head of it--Bromley was his name--was a smooth sort of chap and could talk any one into anything. From his description, we thought his oil well was an honest-to-goodness well, and we sold a lot of stock for him. Then came the blow-up, and it turned out that his well was just a dry hole in the ground. He got out from under just before the crash came, and I heard he went to Mexico. The federal officers got after him and all connected with it. We heard that warrants were out for us, and we skipped North. But until the company broke we thought they were straight as a string. We wouldn’t have had anything to do with it if we had thought it was crooked. We were just roped into it. That’s as true as that we’re sitting here this moment. All that either of us got out of it was part of our salaries and part of the commissions that were promised.”
CHAPTER XXV
IN THE DEPTHS
The story had a ring of sincerity that was not without its appeal to Joe. Still, he knew that some of the most plausible stories are told by the worst of crooks, and before accepting it fully he determined to make some investigations on his own account.
“Dallas is a long way from here,” he remarked, as he eyed the two men keenly. “What makes you think the federal agents are looking for you?”
“Because we know some of the men that are in the Dallas branch,” replied Jackwell, “and on several occasions we’ve seen one or more of them at the Polo Grounds and at other fields on the circuit.”
“That doesn’t say they’re looking for you,” said Joe. “I suppose all of them take in a game when they get a chance. Besides,” he went on, as another thought struck him, “if they really wanted you, it would be no trick to get you. Your names appear in the papers in the scores of the game every day. Every one that follows the game knows Jackwell and Bowen.”
“True enough,” admitted Jackwell, a little shamefacedly. “But, as a matter of fact, we didn’t go by our own names while in Dallas. You see we thought the rest of the baseball players would think that we were kind of hard up to be working in the season when most of them are resting. I can see now that it was a foolish sort of feeling. But, as Ben said, actors and actresses don’t go by their right names, and authors use names that are not their own, and we had as much right to do it as they had.”
“I suppose you had,” admitted Joe. “Though in business I think it’s a mistake not to go under your own name. What names did you go by?”
“Dan was Miller and I was Thompson,” put in Bowen, who up to now had let Jackwell do most of the talking. “So you see they don’t know Jackwell and Bowen, but they might recognize our faces, just the same. I suppose they have descriptions of us, and that’s the reason we hate to go on the field when we see they’re around.”
“And why you pull your caps down over your faces when you do go out,” added Joe. “Well, boys, I’m glad you’ve told me what’s been bothering you. Perhaps the very telling will take some of the load off your mind. For the present, I’m going to take your word for it that you didn’t knowingly do any wrong. But I tell you frankly that I’m going to have the matter looked up, and if you haven’t told me the truth, you’ll have to get off the team. McRae won’t have any one on the Giants that isn’t as white as a hound’s tooth, as far as character is concerned.
“But in the meantime, you’ve got to play ball. We can’t let your personal troubles interfere with the success of the Giants. There’s been many a time when I’ve had a load of trouble on my mind, but I’ve played ball just the same. The chances are that you’re magnifying this thing, anyway. You don’t really know that there are any warrants out for you at all. You say you heard there were, but the chances are that if there were they’d have nabbed you before you heard anything about the warrants. Those government fellows don’t hire a brass band to let you know they’re coming. Perhaps you’re tormenting yourselves about something that never happened. And even if it did, the agents have lots of bigger cases to look after, and they may have forgotten that you’re alive. But whether they have or not, the thing that interests me just now as captain of the Giants, is whether or not you fellows are going to play the game. How about it?”
“I will, Mr. Matson,” said Jackwell, with decision. “I’m going to put this thing out of my mind and play the game for all it’s worth.”
“Count me in on that,” declared Bowen, with emphasis.
“That’s the stuff!” returned Joe. “Just remember that the coward dies a thousand deaths while the brave man dies only once. Half the troubles that worry us in life are those that never happen. Now forget everything but that you’re ball-players, that as honest men you owe your best services to the team, and that the Giants have got to win the flag this year. That’s all for now.”
The results of this heart-to-heart talk were not long in coming. Both Jackwell and Bowen seemed to brace up wonderfully. The former took in everything that came his way and made plays that seemed almost impossible. Bowen ranged the outer garden in first-class style and put Wheeler and Curry on their mettle to keep up with him.
The brace that they had taken was not long in communicating itself to other members of the team, and the Giants began to come out of their slump. A stern chase is proverbially a long chase, and it proved so in this case, for the Pirates and the Chicagos had made hay while the sun shone, and had piled up a commanding lead. But the case, though hard, was not yet desperate, and the Giants had not relinquished hope of coming out ultimately at the head of the heap.
As Joe had promised himself, he looked up the Dallas matter. He had fully made up his mind that if the men had been guilty of crookedness they would have to get off the team. He would miss their playing sorely, and would have all kinds of trouble in plugging up the holes that would be left by their departure, but anything was better than a scandal that would damage the game. Of course, the ultimate decision would be made by McRae, but Joe knew his manager well enough to feel sure that he would be in accord with him in this matter.
Joe got in touch with a lawyer, who in turn communicated confidentially with a Dallas law firm, asking it to make inquiries in the oil-well case and find out whether there had been any warrants or indictments out for men named Miller and Thompson, and if so, to find out the exact charges on which the instruments were based.
A week or so elapsed before a reply was received. Joe tore the letter open eagerly and ran his eyes over the contents. Then he gave a shout of exultation and brought his hand down on his knee with a resounding slap.
“What’s the matter?” asked Jim, looking up in some surprise. “Any one left you a million dollars?”
“Not exactly that,” laughed Joe. “But I’ve just learned something that makes me feel mighty good, just the same.”
His elation was caused by these words in the letter:
“In re Miller and Thompson, we beg to report that there were no warrants or indictments handed down for these men in the Bromley case. Investigation convinced officials that they had no guilty knowledge of the fraud. The only documents connected with them were subpœnas calling them as witnesses before the Grand Jury. Their testimony was not needed, however, as a true bill was found against Bromley, who is an international swindler with many aliases. He is believed to have fled to Mexico. A reward of five thousand dollars is offered for his capture.”
“Maybe this won’t be good news for Jackwell and Bowen,” chuckled Joe, as he folded up the letter.
CHAPTER XXVI
OFF HIS STRIDE
Joe pitched the next day against the Phillies, and won a hard fought battle. Atkins, the Philly pitcher, was in capital form, and the game was a seesaw affair, first one and then the other getting the lead, and it was not until the ninth inning that the contest was decided.
Farley, the third baseman of the Quaker team, was a “rough house” player, who never hesitated to transgress the rules of the game, provided that he could get away with it.
One of his favorite tricks was to grab the belt of an opposing player as he rounded third base. This was often sufficient to throw the runner off his stride and slow him up for a second, and in a game where fractions of a second often marked the difference between a run and an out, the momentary delay many times permitted the ball to get to the plate before the runner.
He resorted to the same trick also, when the third base was occupied by an opponent and a long fly was hit to the outfield. If the ball was caught, the runner, of course, had to touch the bag after the catch before he started for the plate. Just as he started, Farley would grab his belt. The umpire’s eyes would be on the ball to see if it were caught, and Farley could do this with impunity.
It was of little use complaining to the umpire, for that functionary, not having seen the action, could not well punish it. His eyes were his only guide in making decisions.
Twice in this series with the Phillies the Giants had lost in this way what would have been sure runs.
On the day in question, Joe had made a two-bagger and had got to third on a fielder’s choice. There was but one man out, and the proper play at this juncture was a long sacrifice fly to the outfield.
Wheeler got the signal and obeyed orders. He sent out a towering fly that settled into the rightfielder’s hands. The ball had gone high rather than far, which gave the outfielder a good chance to get it home in time to nail the runner.
If Joe was to make the plate, he had to get a quick start and do some fast running. The fly was caught, and Joe broke from the bag just as Farley grabbed his belt. But not for a second did Joe slacken speed. He flew along the base path at a rattling clip and beat the ball to the rubber by an eyelash.
With the roar that went up from the crowd was mingled boisterous laughter.
Farley was standing at third with a ludicrous look of bewilderment on his face, holding in his hand Joe’s belt. He did not seem to know what to do with it, and shifted it from one hand to another as though it were a hot potato.
Joe had unfastened it on the sly as he stood at the bag, and when Farley grabbed it, it came away in his hand without Joe even feeling it. Farley had braced himself for the pull, and the lack of resistance nearly threw him to the ground. He had to stagger some steps before he could regain his balance.
Peal after peal of uproarious laughter at Farley’s foolish appearance rose from the spectators. If ever there was a case of being “caught with the goods,” Farley furnished it at that moment.
And the merriment swelled up anew when Joe walked out to third, and with his hand on his heart and a ceremonious bow, politely asked Mr. Farley to return his property. With his face flaming red from mortification, Farley threw it to him with a scowl and a grunt, and Joe with a tantalizing grin took his time in putting it on.
“Joe,” said McRae, as he shook his hand, “when it comes to outguessing the other fellow there’s nobody in the game that can compare with you. You spring things that nobody ever thought of before. To-day’s an instance. More power to you, my boy.”
Though the Giants had made an immense improvement over their previous recent showing, they were still far from the form they had showed on their last Western trip. And a great part of this, Joe had to admit to himself, was due to Jim’s indifferent showing.
It was not that Jim did not try. He was intensely loyal to the team, of which he had been one of the principal supports. But the old spontaneity was lacking. He had to force himself to his work, where formerly it had been a joy to him. And no man can do his best work under those conditions. Twice within the last few weeks he had been batted out of the box.
“Joe,” said McRae to his captain, “on the dead level, what is the matter with Jim? He isn’t the pitcher he was last season or in the early part of this. What ails him?”
“I’ll tell you, Mac,” replied Joe, who saw the opening he desired. “Jim has heart trouble.”
“What?” cried McRae, in consternation. “Did a doctor tell him so?”
“It isn’t a case for a doctor,” explained Joe. “The only one who can cure Jim’s trouble is a certain girl.”
“Oh, that’s it!” exclaimed McRae with relief. “The girls! The girls! The mischief they make!”
“Don’t forget you were young once yourself, Mac,” said Joe, with a grin. “Now I want to ask you a favor. I have an idea that five minutes’ talk with that girl will set things all right. Why not give Jim a few days off? I don’t ask this simply because Jim is my friend. I think it will be for the good of the team.”
“We’re pretty hard up for pitchers,” said McRae, dubiously.
“I’ll double up while he’s gone,” promised Joe. “I’ll pitch his game as well as my own. I’m as fit as a fiddle.”
“You’re always that,” answered McRae. “Well, have it your own way,” and he walked away muttering again: “The girls! The girls!”
“Jim,” said Joe, later that afternoon, “how about taking a train to-morrow afternoon for Riverside?”
Jim jumped about a foot.
“Do you mean it?” he cried.
“Sure thing,” replied Joe. “I’ve fixed it up with Mac.”
“Glory hallelujah!” shouted Jim. “Joe, you’re the best ever! Where’s that suitcase of mine?”
CHAPTER XXVII
TAKEN BY SURPRISE
“At last I’ll know where I stand, anyway,” muttered Jim to himself, as the train sped on toward Riverside. “It wouldn’t have done a bit of good to write to her. Her letters are so vague and unsatisfactory these days. I must see her. Then I’ll be able to tell whether there is anything to this story of my millionaire rival.”
He tried to make himself think that there was nothing in what Reggie had let slip, in what Joe had reluctantly told him. Surely, they had been mistaken. Clara, after all that had passed between them, could not treat him so shabbily!
And yet--the thought made him frown and bite his lip fiercely--where there was so much smoke it seemed certain there must be some fire. Long before he had known definitely of a rival with millions who had been besieging Clara with his attentions, he had thought he sensed a change in her attitude toward him. Her letters had not been so regular. Once or twice he had missed them altogether. Those that did come had left him vaguely disappointed, unhappy. The reason for his dissatisfaction had eluded him. Then suddenly, it had all become clear. Clara was being won away from him by a chap with more money than he had! He clenched his hands and his mouth became grim. At any rate he would have one satisfaction. He would tell this fellow just what he thought of him, and that in no uncertain terms! Perhaps the chap would give him some excuse for thrashing him. His eyes glinted and his fists clenched.
The swift motion of the train was grateful to him. It seemed to keep time with his hurried thoughts. But the knowledge that every mile of ground they covered brought him nearer to Clara was more terrifying than anything else. He thought of the last time he had boarded a train to go to his sweetheart, and the lines about his mouth grew deeper. He dreaded what he might find at the end of the journey.
He had expected a letter from Clara that morning, had hoped he would get it before leaving. But, as had been the case more and more often in the last few weeks, he had been disappointed, had been forced to start on his trip with no word from her.
He took out a magazine and tried to read. The words were a meaningless blur before his eyes, and he threw the magazine away from him with an exclamation of disgust. What good was he, anyway? He could not, even for a few moments, force his mind away from his troubles.
And so it was with a mixture of perturbation and relief that he at last came to an alert consciousness of his surroundings, to find himself at the next station to Riverside. He pulled himself together and prepared to face facts. His uncertainty was nearly at an end. It seemed to him that nothing that could happen in the future could be any worse than what he had already been through.
Before the train had stopped at Riverside, Jim had flung himself and his one bag on to the platform. He glanced about him quickly to assure himself that no old acquaintances were around the place, then started off at a brisk pace in the direction of the Matson home.
As he approached nearer his destination, he unconsciously slackened his pace. He had sent Clara no word of his coming. That part had been intentional. Since he was about to find out the truth, it would be far better to take the girl by surprise than to warn her of his coming and so give her time to prepare for it.
Perhaps, he thought bitterly, and his steps lagged still more, Clara would not even care to deceive him with a show of affection. This hated millionaire might even have dazzled her to the extent of a broken engagement with him, Jim.
At the thought, new anger kindled in him, and he strode forward with resolution. At the moment, all he cared about was a meeting with his rival. He did not know how soon that desire was to be gratified.
A turn in the road brought him within view of the pleasant Matson home. At the familiar sight of it, something swelled in Jim’s throat. He had felt so a part of that household, had been so wonderfully sure of Clara’s love. Could it be possible that all his faith had been misplaced, all his hopes and dreams only idle and vain imaginings?
The house was coming nearer, seemed to be rushing to meet him. With every step he dreaded more to know the secret it was hiding from him.
He had reached the gate, had swung it open noiselessly. The porch steps invited--the steps where he and Clara had often sat in the twilight, dreamily planning their life together. But for some reason he avoided them.
He had no desire to see any one but Clara just then, and instinct told him he would find her in the garden. So to the garden he turned, hungrily drinking in the fragrance of the flowers, the ache at his heart more poignant as each new and familiar object met his eye.
He heard voices and stopped still. One of them was Clara’s. She was laughing lightly at some pleasantry directed to her in a deep, masculine voice.
At the sound, Jim suddenly saw red. All the anxiety, the worry, the heartache of the last few weeks, took toll at once. With a grumble of wrath away down in his throat, he almost ran the remaining few feet that hid from him the two in the garden.
Clara was sitting on a rustic bench. She wore a pretty dress of rosy material that matched the color in her cheeks. She was looking up at a blond giant whose attitude expressed complete devotion. The giant was speaking in the deep, musical voice which had so infuriated Jim.
“Miss Matson, I’m going to Europe in a few days and I must know if I have any chance at all with you. It isn’t possible for me to go on this way----”
“Good afternoon,” said Jim, in a voice of suppressed emotion. “Sorry to intrude.”
CHAPTER XXVIII
A FRESH SPURT
Joe had taken the first occasion to see Jackwell and Bowen alone after he had received the letter from Dallas.
“I’ve learned that there were papers out against you in Dallas in connection with that oil swindle,” he said, with an assumed expression of gloom.
“Then they were after us, just as we thought!” exclaimed Jackwell, in alarm, while Bowen turned pale.
“They were after you all right, but only as witnesses,” laughed Joe, tossing them the letter. “Read that.”
The expression of relief and happiness that came to both, as they scanned the welcome lines, was good to see.
“I’d rather have that than a million dollars!” cried Jackwell, his face fairly beaming with delight.
“We can’t thank you enough for such good news,” said Bowen, equally jubilant.
“That’s all right,” said Joe. “I had a hunch right along that you fellows were on the square. All the thanks I want now is to have you play the game. You’ve been doing well lately, and I want you to keep it up.”
“That isn’t a circumstance to what we’re going to do,” promised Jackwell, and Bowen nodded assent. “From this time on, just watch our smoke.”
And Joe had no reason to complain of their work for the rest of the season. With the incubus removed that had been lying on their spirits, they played like wild men, and their work soon enthroned them as favorites with the Giant fans.
Now the Giants were really climbing again, and the grounds began to be crowded as in the days of old. The games were played “for blood” from the ring of the gong.
And what put the capsheaf on Joe’s satisfaction was that Jim came bursting in upon him one morning like a whirlwind, his face radiant, and sheer delight in living shining in his eyes.
Joe sprang up to greet him, and Jim grabbed him and whirled him around the room until both of them were gasping for breath.
“For the love of Pete, Jim!” expostulated Joe, laughingly.
“I’m a curly wolf!” shouted Jim. “I eat catamounts for breakfast and pick my teeth with pine trees! Where are those Cubs and Pirates and all the rest of that riffraff? Lead me to them! I want ber-lud!”
“You’ll get your chance,” answered Joe, grinning. “Now sit down and try to be sensible for a minute.”
“Sensible!” scoffed Jim. “Who wants to be sensible? I’m happy!”
“And so am I,” laughed Joe, “because of the news you bring.”
“I haven’t told you any yet,” countered Jim.
“Yes, you have,” declared Joe. “You’ve told me everything. I know that everything’s all right between you and Clara.”
“Clara!” repeated Jim, dwelling on the name. “Clara! Say, Joe, that sister of yours is--is-- Oh, well, what’s the use? There isn’t any word in the English language to describe her. She’s--she’s----”
“Yes, I know,” laughed Joe. “I’m her brother. Now, old boy, take a minute to get your breath, and then tell me the whole story.”
So Jim perforce had to restrain his ecstasies and get down to earth, while Joe listened happily to all the details of the visit that had swept away the last shadow of misunderstanding between his sister and his dearest friend.
“You were right, Joe, when you said that five minutes’ talk, face to face, would wipe out all misunderstanding,” said Jim. “Why, in less than five minutes after I saw her I was the happiest fellow on earth. If you could have seen the way she flew to me!”
“What about that Pepperil?” asked Joe.
“Never was in it for a minute,” declared Jim, happily. “Of course, the poor man was in love with her; but you can’t blame him for that. Who wouldn’t be? As a matter of fact, I think he was trying to propose to her at the time I got there. But she forgot he was alive when she saw me. You see, she’d simply tolerated him for the sake of your father’s invention that Pepperil had arranged to finance. She couldn’t be rude to him for fear of injuring the deal, though he bored her to death. What with the nuisance of his hanging around there and your father’s anxiety about his invention and your mother’s sickness and the cares of the household bearing down upon her, the poor girl was nearly crazy. Told me that when she sat down to write to me her head was in such a whirl that she hardly knew what she was writing. That’s why her letters sometimes seemed so abstracted and unsatisfying. But now the deal has gone through, your mother’s getting steadily better, Pepperil’s sailing for Europe, and we’re going to be married as soon as the baseball season is over.”
“Fine!” cried Joe, his eyes beaming.
“And to think that I ever doubted her for a minute!” Jim berated himself. “Joe, I’m the meanest hound dog that ever lived. I’m not fit for such a girl. Why, Joe, she’s----”
“Yes, I know,” interrupted the grinning Joe. “Write me a letter and describe her perfections in that. But honestly, Jim, I’m as happy as you are.”
“You can’t be!” declared Jim. “It isn’t possible for any one to be as happy as I am.”
“Well, only a little less happy,” corrected Joe. “And there’s some one else that will be just as happy as I am. Mabel will be in the seventh heaven. She’s worried herself sick.”
“Too bad.”
“Feel fit to pitch now?” asked Joe, after a while.
“Fit?” cried Jim. “That’s no word for it. Bring on your teams. They’ll all look alike to me.”
And Jim proved in the games that followed that this was no idle boast. He was superb, the old invincible Jim, toying with his opponents and turning in victory after victory. McRae rubbed his eyes and Robbie chortled in glee.
“Sure, Mac, ’twas the best thing you ever did, letting Jim off to see that girl of his,” said Robbie. “’Tis a new man he is since he came back.”
The Giants were now like a team of runaway horses. They could not be stopped. With their pitching staff going at top speed, the team played behind them like men possessed. At home or on the road made no difference. The Giants were simply bent on having that pennant, and they strode over everything in their way.
They kept their stride without faltering, and in the last weeks of the season were rapidly closing in on the Chicagos, who were struggling desperately to maintain their lead.
On the last Western trip, their strongest opposition was encountered in Pittsburgh, and they had to exert themselves to the utmost.
The first game resulted in a Giant victory by a close margin, the visiting team just managing to nose through after a terrific struggle.
Just after the game had ended, Jackwell made a sudden rush for the grandstand. Bowen, to whom he had shouted, was close behind him.
Joe and Jim followed to see what it was all about, and found a stout, red-faced man in the grasp of the two athletes, while a policeman was edging his way through the crowd.
“Arrest this man!” cried Jackwell, to the officer. “He’s a swindler. His name is Bromley, and he’s wanted in Texas. Detectives have been searching all over the country for him.”
The man denied it, but Jackwell persisted. The officer turned uncertainly to Joe.
“I don’t know the man,” said Joe. “But I know that the federal agents are after a man named Bromley. If this isn’t the man, he can easily establish his identity at headquarters. These men seem to be pretty sure of him.”
The officer put his hand on the man’s arm.
“Better come with me and see the Chief,” he said, and the man, still protesting, was led away. Later, federal agents identified him as the man wanted, and Jackwell and Bowen split the five thousand dollar reward between them.
“Glad those boys have settled their account with that rascal,” remarked Joe, after the crowd had dispersed.
“Yes,” replied Jim. “I wish we could say as much.”
“You mean with the McCarney crowd?”
“Just that. My blood fairly boiled when I saw those scoundrels in the stand this afternoon.”
“Were they there?” asked Joe.
“Very much there! Heads close together and talking all the time. Probably hatching up some other plan to down you. I tell you, Joe, you’re in danger every minute that you’re in this town!”
CHAPTER XXIX
THE SNAKE’S HEAD
“I suppose I am,” replied Joe, impressed by the earnestness of Jim’s tone. “It’s up to us to keep our eyes open. Luckily, we have only three more days to stay here. All I want is to have them keep away from me till the season’s ended. Then the tables will be turned, and I’ll get after them.”
Joe and Jim changed into their street clothes and came out of the clubhouse. All the other men had gone, except Iredell, who had not quite finished dressing.
“Dandy weather,” remarked Joe, as they lingered for a moment on the steps. “What do you say, Jim, to a little auto ride to-morrow morning, along the Lincoln pike? Splendid road and fine scenery.”
“I’m on,” assented Jim. “I’d like nothing better.”
The weather was perfect the next day, and shortly after breakfast the chums hired a speedy little car and set out for their ride. The machine purred along smoothly, with Joe at the wheel, and as travelers were comparatively few at that early hour, they had the road largely to themselves, and on the long stretches could let the car out to an exhilarating speed.
“This is the life!” exclaimed Jim, jubilantly, as he settled back in his seat and drew in long breaths of the invigorating air. “It does a fellow good sometimes to-- Look out, Joe! Look out!”
His shout of alarm was torn from him by a great motor truck that came darting at high speed from a side road that had been partially concealed by trees and underbrush.
It came thundering down upon the little car as though it were bent on annihilating it.
Joe’s quick glance took in the danger, and he swerved sharply to one side. Not sharply enough, however, to escape the impact altogether. The truck caught the car a glancing blow that hurled it like a catapult against a fence at the side of the road, which at that point ran along the edge of a deep ravine.
The car crashed through the fence, and had it not been that one of the wheels struck the trunk of a tree, would have plunged headlong into the gulch. The blow slewed the machine around, where it hung partly over the edge.
Jim had been thrown against the windshield and his hands were cut by the flying glass. Joe had clung desperately to the wheel, and though badly shaken up, had sustained no injury.
Without waiting to see the extent of the damage, the truck had gone on at breakneck speed. By the time the young men had leaped to the ground, the truck had vanished around a turn in the road.
Joe and Jim looked at each other, pale with anger.
“Are you hurt, Jim?” asked Joe, as he saw the blood on his comrade’s hands.
“Only scratches,” was the reply. “And I’m so thankful I’m not dead that I don’t mind little things like that.”
“It’s almost a miracle that we’re not lying at this moment at the bottom of the ravine,” said Joe, soberly. “What do you think of those fellows? Did you ever see such reckless driving?”
“It wasn’t reckless,” declared Jim, grimly. “It was deliberate. That fellow was trying to run us down.”
“What?” exclaimed Joe.
“Just that,” reiterated Jim. “Did you see the man who was driving?”
“No,” said Joe. “I only saw the truck. I was too busy trying to get the car out of the way to notice the driver.”
“Well, I saw him,” said Jim. “That is, I saw part of him. He had his coat drawn up and his cap pulled down so as to hide his face. But I caught sight of the biggest pair of lob ears I ever saw on any man. Does that mean anything to you?”
“Lemblow!” exclaimed Joe.
“Lemblow,” assented Jim. “And probably the rest of the gang were in the truck back of him. I tell you, Joe, those fellows are out to do you. They failed in their first attempt, and so they tried this.”
“And they came mighty near putting this across,” said Joe. “But how on earth did they know we were going on this ride? We didn’t mention it to anybody.”
“No,” agreed Jim, “not directly. But when we first spoke of it yesterday afternoon, we were on the clubhouse steps. Iredell was still in there, dressing, and the door was open.”
“By George, you’ve hit it!” cried Joe. “Jim, the time has come for a showdown. We won’t wait till the end of the season. We may not see the end of the season if this kind of thing is allowed to go on. I’m going to get even with those scoundrels before we leave Pittsburgh.”
“I’m with you till the cows come home,” declared Jim. “I’m aching to get my hands on them. But how are you going to do it?”
“By shadowing Iredell,” replied Joe. “It’s a dead certainty that he’ll meet the rest of the gang to talk things over before we leave the city. We’ll keep him in sight every night from now on and follow him to their meeting place. Then we’ll trim the bunch.”
“Good dope!” ejaculated Jim. “And now let’s get this car out to the side of the road where the owners can send for it. There’ll be a good-sized dent in our bankrolls by the time we get through paying for the damage.”
They took care not to speak of the incident to any one, and at the game that afternoon showed no antipathy or suspicion in regard to Iredell. Several times they noticed the covert glances of that individual directed toward Jim’s scratched hands--glances in which malignity was mingled with disappointment--but they gave no sign, and conducted themselves exactly as usual.
But not for a moment was Iredell out of their sight without their knowing where he was. All their faculties were intent upon using him as an unwitting guide to the rendezvous of the gang.
For a time after supper, Iredell hung around the lobby of the hotel. It was nearly ten o’clock before he sauntered carelessly into the street, where Joe and Jim were ensconced in the shadow of convenient doorways.
Iredell walked along slowly at first, glancing about from side to side, but as he saw nothing to arouse his suspicion, he quickened his steps and soon was making rapidly for the outskirts of the city. Joe and Jim followed at some distance, keeping in the shadows as much as possible.
In a little while they found themselves in a cheap quarter of the city, not far from the bank of the Allegheny River. Factories and slag heaps alternated with shabby dwellings, dimly lighted stores, and low resorts.
Standing in a lot, with no houses for a considerable distance on either side, was an old one-story shack. From its battered and dilapidated appearance, it seemed unfit for human habitation. But that some one was in it was indicated by the light from a smoky oil lamp that threw a flickering beam through the open window.
Iredell pushed his way along the weed-grown path and knocked three times. After a moment the door was opened and Iredell entered.
Joe and Jim waited for a brief time, and then, with the stealth of Indians, crept up near the open window. Bushes were growing all around the house, and behind these the two friends crouched. The brushwood was so thick that they were perfectly safe from detection, while at the same time they had a clear vision of the room and its inmates.
They had no difficulty in identifying the latter. Hupft, McCarney, Lemblow and Iredell were seated around a table, engaged in an excited conversation.
There was practically no other furniture in the room than the table and chairs. It was evident that none of the gang lived there, but that they had picked out an abandoned house where they could meet in security and talk with freedom.
There was no attempt to lower their voices, and the unseen listeners had no difficulty in hearing every word that was said.
“So we’ve made another flivver,” growled McCarney, pounding the table angrily with his fist.
“Seems so,” said Iredell, moodily. “They turned up at the game this afternoon just as though nothing had happened. Barclay had some scratches on his hand, but Matson was unhurt. At least he didn’t show any signs of injury.”
“I’m beginning to think we can’t down that fellow,” muttered Hupft. “No matter what we do, he comes up smiling.”
“Nonsense!” snarled Lemblow. “He’s had luck, that’s all. The pitcher that goes to the well too often is broken at last. There’s luck in odd numbers, and the third time we’ll get him.”
Joe felt in his pocket and took out an object that was roughly oblong in shape. He gripped it tightly in his hand and waited.
Jim, who had noted the action, reached out and touched his friend’s arm.
“What’s the game?” he whispered.
“You’ll see in a minute,” returned Joe. “When I start, you follow me.”
“Lemblow’s right,” cried McCarney, rising to his feet, his face inflamed with passion. “We’ve failed twice, but the third time we’ll get him. We’ll get him so hard----”
He never finished the sentence.
Something whizzed through the open window with terrific force and caught him right between the eyes. Taken by surprise, and partly stunned by the force of the blow, he went down heavily to the floor.
With startled shouts, the other three leaped to their feet and stood staring at the table on which the missile had fallen. Iredell leaned forward, took one look and jumped back with a terrified yell.
“It’s a rattlesnake’s head!” he screamed in horror.
His shriek was echoed by the other rascals as they fell back from the table, trembling as though with palsy.
The next instant, Joe and Jim, who had jumped through the window, were upon the rascals, dealing out blows with the force of trip-hammers. Iredell went down from a terrific right on the chin, and lay motionless. Hupft and Lemblow tried to fight back, but their nerves were so unstrung and they had been so overwhelmed with surprise at the sudden onslaught that their efforts were pitiful. Joe and Jim, all their pent up indignation putting double strength into their muscular arms, gave them the beating of their lives, until they cowered in a corner, covering their faces with their hands and whimpering for mercy.
“I guess that will do, Jim,” said Joe at last. “They’ll carry the marks of this for a long time, and they’ll remember this night as long as they live.
“Now listen to me, you rascals,” he said, with withering scorn, as his eyes bored through the discomfited conspirators. “What you’ve got to-night isn’t a circumstance to what’s coming to you if you ever dare to lift a finger against me again. I could have every one of you arrested and put behind bars for years to come if I wanted to, but I prefer to settle my own quarrels. But just one more move on your part, and you’ll go where the dogs won’t bite you for a while.
“As for you, Iredell,” he continued, in a slightly gentler tone, addressing his teammate who was now sitting up on the floor, still half dazed, “I could have you fired off the team in disgrace and blacklisted forever, if I told McRae of this dirty work of yours. But I remember that you have a family and that you’ve played on the same team with me for years, and I’m going to give you one more chance. No one will hear of this if you go straight from now on. Cut out these dogs of companions and play the game like a man.
“Come along, Jim,” he concluded, “I guess our night’s work is done. We’ll leave the snake’s head behind as a souvenir.”
The night’s work was indeed done, and done so effectively that Joe suffered no more trouble from the precious trio. As for Iredell, the lesson had been sufficient, and while there never was a resumption of the cordial relations of previous years, he gave no further cause for complaint. At the end of the season he was traded, as young Renton had filled his place so well that the Giants could do without him.
The Giants “cleaned up” in Pittsburgh, and did so well with the other teams that the last day of the season found them tied with Chicago for the lead. The Cubs had played out all their games. The Giants still had one to play with Brooklyn. If they won, they would have the pennant. If they lost, the flag would go to Chicago.
CHAPTER XXX
THE FINAL BATTLE
The game was to be played on the Polo Grounds, and excitement was at fever heat. It seemed as though the whole male population of Greater New York had determined to see that game. Men waited in line all night, and from early morning the surface cars and elevated trains were packed with people going to the grounds.
The weather was fair, and the lovers of the game had a day that was all that could be desired. The turf had been rolled and groomed till it looked like green velvet.
The odds were in the Giants’ favor, because they were the stronger team and because they were playing on their own grounds. Still, they had been whipped by the same team before on the same grounds, and they might be again. And the nervous tension they were under because of the importance of the game made them the more liable to break at critical points in the contest. The Brooklyns, on the other hand, had nothing to lose, and for that very reason might be the cooler-headed.
McRae had picked Joe as his pitching “ace” for this deciding contest. Grimm had been selected as the boxman for the delegation from across the bridge. At the moment, he was going better than any other of the Dodgers’ staff, and any team that whipped him would know at least that it had been in a fight.
But on that day Joe feared no pitcher in the League. He was in magnificent shape in mind and body. In the preliminary practice with Mylert he made the latter wince, as the balls came over smoking hot.
“Save that stuff for the Brooklyns, Joe,” Mylert protested, “or you’ll have me a cripple before the bell rings.”
Not only Joe’s arm but his heart felt good that day. Mabel was sitting in a box, watching him proudly, and he felt that he simply couldn’t lose. She was his mascot, and he carried near his heart the little glove that had rested there when he won the championship of the world.
Beside her sat Clara, flushed and happy and as sweet as a rose. She had come on from Riverside, bringing the glad news that Mrs. Matson was making astonishing progress and had now almost entirely regained her health.
So it was with a mind at peace and spirits high that Joe faced the doughty sluggers of the team from across the big bridge.
From the very start, it was apparent that he had “everything.” Never had he been in finer form. Brain and muscle worked in perfect unison. Every ball he pitched had a reason behind it. He knew the weaknesses of every batter, and played upon them. The man who was death on low balls got a high one, and _vice versa_. His speed, his change of pace, his curve, his fadeaway, his hop, his control--all of these obeyed him as though under the spell of a magician. If ever a man made a ball “talk,” Joe did that day.
Again and again the Brooklyns switched their tactics. Sometimes they lashed out at the first ball pitched. Again they tried to wait him out. These failing, they resorted to bunting. Nothing was of any avail. They were simply up against unhittable pitching.
Inning after inning went by without a score. In the fourth, Naylor made a scratch, and in the seventh, Leete hit the ball for a clean single. But on these occasions, Joe tightened up, and no man got as far as second, despite the desperate efforts of their comrades to advance the runner.
Grimm, too, was pitching fine ball, but not by any means airtight. The Giants had gotten to him for six hits, but, with one exception, no two had been allowed in the same inning, and the Giants were as scoreless as their opponents.
Grimm had thought discretion the better part of valor when Joe had faced him, and had twice passed him deliberately to first. The boos of the spectators failed to disturb Grimm’s equanimity. His motto was “safety first.” On a third occasion, his cunning miscarried, and Joe, walking into the ball in desperation, had clouted it for a two baser. But as two were out at the time and the next man fanned, he was left holding second.
In the ninth, Joe put on extra steam and fanned three men in a row, amid the cheers of the Giant rooters.
Then the Giants came in for their last half. Grimm made Burkett hit a grounder to first that was an easy out. Larry sent a Texas leaguer behind second that was gathered in by the guardian of that bag. Then Joe came to the bat.
Grimm still had no mind to give him a hit, and the first two balls were wide of the plate. He tried to put the third in the same place, but his control faltered and the ball came within Joe’s reach.
There was a mighty crash, and the ball started on a line between right and center. At the crack of the bat, Joe was off like a frightened jackrabbit. He rounded first and started for second.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the right- and centerfielders running for the ball, which had struck the ground and was rolling toward the wall. He knew that it would rebound, and that one of the fielders would “play the angle,” and thus get it the sooner.
The people in the stands had risen now, and were shouting like madmen. He caught just one glimpse of Mabel, standing in her box with her hands pressed on her heart.
He made second and kept on for third. On and on he went, as though on wings. His heart beat like a trip hammer. His lungs seemed as though they would burst. The wind whistled in his ears. He had never run like that in his life.
He rounded third and made for home. The ball was coming, as he knew from the shouts of the spectators and the warning yells of his comrades. Down that white stretch he tore. He saw the catcher set himself for the coming ball, knew from his eyes that the ball was near. With one mighty leap, he threw himself to the ground in a marvelous hook slide that swung his body out of the catcher’s reach and yet just permitted his outstretched fingers to touch the plate before the catcher put the ball on him.
“Safe!” cried the umpire. The game was won, the pennant cinched, and the Giants once more were the champions of the National League.
What Mabel thought of Joe she told him privately. What McRae and Robbie and his teammates thought of him they told him publicly. What the newspapers thought of him they told the world. As pitcher, as batter, and as captain, Baseball Joe was proclaimed the king of them all.
And what Mr. and Mrs. Matson, the former happy because of the success of his invention, the latter because of her restoration to health, thought of their famous son they told to him a few weeks later at a wedding ceremony in the Riverside home, when Clara placed her hand in Jim’s and made him the happiest of men.
THE END
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Transcriber’s Notes:
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--Punctuation and spelling inaccuracies were silently corrected.
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End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Baseball Joe, Captain of the Team, by  Lester Chadwick

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BASEBALL JOE, HOME RUN KING; OR, THE GREATEST PITCHER AND BATTER ON RECORD
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[Illustration: IT WAS THE LONGEST HIT THAT EVER HAD BEEN MADE ON THE POLO GROUNDS.]
BASEBALL JOE, HOME RUN KING
Or
The Greatest Pitcher and Batter on Record
by
LESTER CHADWICK
Author of "Baseball Joe of the Silver Stars," "Baseball Joe in the Big League," "The Rival Pitchers," "The Eight-Oared Victors," etc.
ILLUSTRATED
New York Cupples & Leon Company
*      *      *      *      *      *
BOOKS BY LESTER CHADWICK
=THE BASEBALL JOE SERIES=
=12mo. Cloth. Illustrated.=
=THE COLLEGE SPORTS SERIES=
=12mo. Cloth. Illustrated.=
THE RIVAL PITCHERS A QUARTERBACK'S PLUCK BATTING TO WIN THE WINNING TOUCHDOWN FOR THE HONOR OF RANDALL THE EIGHT-OARED VICTORS
CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY, New York
*      *      *      *      *      *
Copyright, 1922, by CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY
=Baseball Joe, Home Run King=
Printed in U. S. A.
CONTENTS
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
IT WAS THE LONGEST HIT THAT EVER HAD BEEN MADE ON THE POLO GROUNDS.
THERE WAS NO DOUBT OF THE WARMTH OF THAT WELCOME.
SUDDENLY PICKING UP THE BALL HE HURLED IT TO SECOND.
"GREAT SCOTT!" HE CRIED. "WHAT’S THE MATTER WITH YOUR HAND?"
BASEBALL JOE, HOME RUN KING
CHAPTER I
A DANGEROUS PLUNGE
"I'm going to tie you up in knots, old man," said Jim Barclay, with a smile, as he picked up the ball and stepped into the box in batting practice at the training camp.
"I've heard that kind of talk before," retorted Joe Matson, known all over the country as "Baseball Joe," the king pitcher of the Giants. "But untying knots is the best thing I do. Give me the best you have in the shop."
Jim wound up and put one over that just cut the corner of the plate. Joe made a mighty swing at it, but it was just beyond his reach.
"Nearly broke your back reaching for that one, eh?" laughed Jim, as the ball was thrown back to him.
"I was just kidding you that time," grinned Joe. "I'm going to kill the next one."
Again the ball whizzed to the plate. It was a fast, straight ball with a slight hop to it. Joe caught it near the end of his bat and "leaned on it" heavily. The ball soared out between right and center, and the outfielders covering that position gave one look at it and then turned and ran with the ball. But it kept on and on until it cleared the fence, and the discomfited fielders threw up their hands and came slowly back to their positions.
Jim looked sheepish, and Joe, who was his chum and best friend, laughed outright as he relinquished the bat to the next man in line.
"A sweet home run, Jim," he remarked.
"I should say so!" snorted Jim. "That hit was good for two home runs. The ball was ticketed for kingdom come."
"Who was it said that pitchers couldn't hit?" laughed Mylert, the burly catcher of the Giant team, as he took Joe's place.
"I'll tell the world that some of them can!" exclaimed Jim, as he prepared to try his luck again. "Gee, Joe, if that had happened to me in a regular game, it would have broken my heart."
Two keen-eyed men in uniform had been standing near the side lines, watching intently every move of the players, as they tried out their batting eyes and arms. One was stocky and of medium height, with hair that had begun to grey at the temples. The other was stout and ruddy, with a twinkle in his eyes that bespoke good nature. Both were veterans of many hard-fought baseball campaigns, and both had played on the Baltimore Orioles when that great organization of stars was the sensation of the baseball world.
"Did you see that hit, Robbie?" asked McRae, the manager of the Giants, of his stout companion.
"Not all of it," replied Robson, the coach of the team. "But I followed it as far as the fence. That was a whale of a wallop. I'll bet the ball's going yet," and the man chuckled gleefully.
"Of course, this was only in practice," mused McRae. "Perhaps Barclay wasn't trying over hard."
"Don't kid yourself, Mac," replied Robson. "Barclay wasn't just lobbing them up. That ball came over like a bullet. It had a hop on it too, but Joe gauged it just right. I tell you that boy is a wonder. If he wasn't a wizard in the box, he'd be a terror at the bat."
"I wish there were two of him, Robbie," said the manager, smiling. "One to cover the mound and the other to use as a pinch hitter or play him in the outfield. That would make a combination hard to beat."
"It was the best day's work you ever did when you got that lad from St. Louis," remarked Robson. "I'll bet the Cardinal's manager feels like throwing a fit every time he thinks what a fool he was to let him go."
"Well," said McRae, "if everybody's foresight in baseball was as good as his hindsight, there'd be no trading done. I don't mind saying that I throw out my chest a little for having seen what was in the kid. He's certainly been the making of the team."
"One thing is certain; and that is that you wouldn't have the World's Championship tucked away if it hadn't been for his great work in the Series," rejoined Robson. "He just had those Chicago birds eating out of his hand."
"Right you are," admitted McRae. "Here's hoping he'll repeat this season."
"Don't worry a bit about that," was Robson's confident answer. "You can see for yourself that he's been going great guns in practice. And even at that he hasn't been letting himself out. He's taking good care of that old soup-bone of his."
"He was never better in his life," declared McRae. "I'll admit that I was a little worried for fear that the trip around the world had taken something out of him. You know what a strain he was under in that All-Star League affair, Robbie. But it hasn't seemed to affect him at all."
"He'll need all he's got this year," said Robbie thoughtfully. "We'll have to depend more on the pitching than we did last year, because we're not so strong on the batting end. When Burkett quit, it took away a good deal of our hitting strength, and you've seen that Mylert is slipping. On the form he's shown in practice this spring, he won't be good for more than a two hundred and fifty per cent average, and that's about sixty points below what he showed last year."
"I know it," agreed the manager, a worried look coming into his face. "And what makes it worse is that Larry, too, is slow in rounding into form. Instead of lining them out, he's sending them up in the air. He'll be just pie for the fielders if he keeps it up. I can't understand the thing at all."
"Oh, well," said Robbie, whose jolly disposition never let him stay long under a cloud, "here's hoping that they'll come to the scratch when the season opens. Some of the rookies look pretty good to me, and if the old-timers fall down we may be able to fill their places all right. Come along, Mac; let's finish working out that schedule for the trip north. We'll have to get a hustle on to be in shape to start to-morrow."
McRae gave the signal to his men that practice time was over, and the young athletes, nothing loth to drop their work and get down to the hotel for dinner, began to gather up their bats preparatory to jumping into the bus which was waiting outside the grounds. But before they got to it, McRae and Robson had climbed in and given the signal to the driver to start.
"No, you don't!" he called out with a grin, as the bus started away. "You fellows leg it down to the hotel. It's only two miles, and you need the exercise. Get a move on, or Robbie and I will clear the table before you get there."
There were grunts and groans from the players, for the sun was warm and the practice had been strenuous. But there was no help for it, and they dropped into a dog trot that was quickened by the thought of the dinner that was waiting for them at the end of the journey.
They reached the hotel in good time, took a shower bath, changed into their regular clothes, and were soon at the table with an appetite that swept the board and made the colored waiters roll their eyes in wonder, not unmixed with awe.
After the meal was finished, Joe and Jim were on their way to the room they shared together when they passed McRae and Robbie, who were sitting in the lobby enjoying their after-dinner cigars.
McRae beckoned to them, and they went over to where the pair was sitting.
"Well, boys," said the manager, as he motioned to a couple of chairs into which they dropped, "our spring practice is over and I don't mind saying that I'm feeling good over the way you fellows ate up your work. Both of you look as fit as fiddles."
"That's sure the way we feel," answered Joe, and Jim murmured acquiescence.
"In fact you look so good," went on McRae, knocking the ashes from his cigar and settling back comfortably in his chair, "that I'm going to call training finished, as far as you two are concerned. Just now you're right at the top of your form, and I don't want to take any chances on your going stale. So I'm going to let you rest up for the next week or ten days. All you have to do is to take good care of yourselves--and I know you boys well enough to be sure you'll do that--and turn up in shape when the season opens week after next."
Joe and Jim looked at each other, and the same thought was in the mind of each. This seemed too good to be true!
"We start north to-morrow," went on McRae, "in two lots, playing minor league teams on the way to keep in practice. The regulars will go along with me, while Robbie will take the second string men and the rookies. We'll jog along in easy fashion and hope to reach the Polo Grounds in the pink of condition."
By this time Joe had found his voice. He smiled broadly.
"That's mighty good of you, Mac," he said. "I suppose you want us then to go right through to New York."
"That's the idea," replied the manager. "Robbie will see to your transportation this afternoon."
But just here, Robson, who had been watching the boys' faces, broke into a laugh.
"For the love of Mike, wake up Mac!" he adjured his friend. "Don't you know that Joe lives only a couple of hundred miles from here right over the border? And don't you remember those two pretty girls that were with us on the World Tour? And didn't we hear Joe telling Jim a few days ago that his sweetheart was visiting his folks? And here you are sending the lads straight through to New York with never a stop on the way. Mac, old man, I'm ashamed of you."
McRae grinned as he looked at the faces of the young men--faces that had grown suddenly red.
"Robbie hit the nail on the head, did he?" he said, with a chuckle. "Well, I'm Irishman enough to have a soft spot in my heart for the lads and their colleens. Fix it up, boys, to suit yourselves. As long as you report on time, that's all I ask. Get along with you now, as Robbie and I have got to fix up our routes."
Joe and Jim were only too glad to "get along," and after thanking McRae hurried to their room, where they indulged in a wild war dance.
"Glory, hallelujah!" shouted Joe. "A whole week or more to ourselves, and home only two hundred miles away!"
"Your home is," replied Jim. "Mine's more than a thousand miles away."
"You old sardine!" cried Joe, throwing a book at his head. "Isn't my home yours? Do you think I'd dare show my face there without bringing you along? Clara would never forgive me. Neither would Mabel. Neither would Momsey nor Dad. Get a wiggle on now, old man, and hunt up a time-table."
Jim, with his face jubilant at the thought of soon seeing Joe's pretty sister, hustled about for the time-table; and with heads close together the young men were soon poring over the schedules. At last Joe straightened up with a vexed exclamation.
"Of all the roundabout ways!" he ejaculated. "We'll have to change three or four different times with all sorts of bad connections, and can't reach Riverside until to-morrow afternoon."
"Wait a minute," said Jim, running his pencil along a column. "Here's a line that will get us to Martinsville early to-morrow morning, just before daylight. How far is Martinsville from Riverside?"
"About fifty miles more or less," replied Joe. "But crickey, Jim, that gives me an idea! What's the matter with going to Martinsville and hiring an auto there? I know Hank Bixby who keeps a garage there and has autos for hire. He used to live in Riverside, and played with me on the old school nine before his folks moved away. I'll send him a wire telling him what time we'll get there and asking him to have a first-class car ready for us."
"You know the road all right, do you?" asked Jim. "Remember it will be dark when we get there."
"I know it like a book," replied Joe. "I've been over it many a time. I could travel it in the dark. It's as level as a table until you get to Hebron. Just beyond that there's a steep hill that will give the car something to do. But Hank will give me a machine that can climb it, and, besides, it will be just about daylight by the time we get there. It's a cinch that we won't have any trouble. I'll bet a hat--what's the matter, Jim?"
For Jim had risen and moved quickly toward the door, which had been standing partly open. He put out his head and looked down the corridor. Not satisfied with that, he went down the hall to the head of the stairs. Then he slowly retraced his steps.
Joe, who had followed his chum to the door, looked at him with open-mouthed wonder.
"What's the matter with you?" he queried. "Have you gone daffy?"
"Not exactly," replied Jim. "I thought I saw somebody I knew go past the door."
"Likely enough," said Joe, with a touch of sarcasm. "It wouldn't be at all surprising. The hotel is full of our fellows."
"It wasn't one of our boys," returned Jim slowly.
"Well, who was it then?" asked Joe, a little impatiently. "Come out of your trance, old man."
"I think it was a fellow we know only too well," Jim replied. "I think it was Braxton."
"Braxton!" exclaimed Joe with sudden interest. "The fellow that was with us on the World Tour?"
"The same one," affirmed Jim. "The fellow you licked within an inch of his life in the old Irish castle."
"Are you sure?" asked Joe. "It doesn't seem at all likely that we'd run across that rascal in this little training-camp town. What on earth would he be doing down here?"
"That's just what I want to know," replied Jim soberly. "As you say, it's all against the chances that we should run across him here by accident. If he's here, he's come with some purpose. And that purpose means nothing good for you. He's exactly the sort of man that won't forget that thrashing."
"I guess he won't," replied Joe grimly. "My knuckles ache now when I think of it. But if he's looking for another licking, he sure can have it."
"He isn't looking for another," Jim returned. "He's looking to get even for the first one you gave him. You know he swore at the time that he'd pay you up for it."
"He's welcome to try," declared Joe indifferently. "But really, Jim, I think you're mistaken. It seems too improbable. There are plenty of men in the world who look like Braxton."
"Of course, I wouldn't swear it was he," admitted Jim. "I only saw him side-face, and he slipped past the door like a ghost."
"Well, we'll keep our eyes open about the hotel and around the town," rejoined Joe. "But now let's think of pleasanter things. Our train goes at six, and we've got lots to do in getting our duds packed. Then, too, I've got to wire to Hank and must get the tickets for as far as the cars will carry us."
The afternoon proved a busy one, but by train time they had completed their packing, said good-by to the rest of the team, who frankly envied them their luck, and were snugly ensconced in the day coach, as the little road had no sleeping cars, and even if they had the frequent changes they had to make would have made a sleeper not worth while. As it was, they slept in snatches, had luck in their connections, and about an hour before dawn stepped off the train at the little station of Martinsville.
Both Baseball Joe and Jim Barclay had expected to find the town asleep, but were surprised to find a large number of the inhabitants, chiefly the younger men, at the station. Still another group stood in the lighted doorway of Hank Bixby's garage, which was directly across the street.
"What's the big idea?" Jim asked Joe, as he looked in surprise at the crowd that drew close about them.
"Blest if I know," replied Joe. "Maybe there's been a fire or something."
But they were soon enlightened, as Hank came bustling across the street, his face aglow with welcome and self-importance.
"Howdy, Mr. Matson!" he exclaimed, as he wrung Joe's hand.
"Mr. Matson!" laughed Joe, returning the handshake. "Where do you get that stuff? What's the matter with Joe?"
"Well, Joe, then," beamed Hank. "You see, Joe, you've got to be such a big fellow now, known all over the United States, that I felt a bit shy about calling you by your first name. I got your wire and mentioned it to a fellow or two, and by heck it was all over town in no time that the greatest pitcher in the country was going to be here. This crowd's been waiting here all night to say howdy to you."
The people were all crowding around him by now, waiting their turn to shake hands, and Joe, although embarrassed, as he always was when he found himself the center of attention, did his best to respond to the expressions of good will and admiration that were showered upon him. Jim also came in for his share of the crowd's interest as a promising and rapidly rising pitcher of the baseball champions of the world. It was with a sigh of relief that they settled themselves at last in the speedy car which Hank had provided for them and which he proudly assured them would "just burn up the road" between Martinsville and Riverside.
Joe took the wheel and the car started off, amid a waving of hands and a roar of farewell from the crowd.
"Great day for Martinsville," said Jim mischievously, as he settled down by the side of his chum and the car purred along over the level road. "How does it feel to be a hero, Joe?"
"Quit your kidding," replied Joe, with a grin. "If they'd wrung this old wing of mine much more, McRae would have been minus one of his pitchers."
"One of the penalties of greatness," chaffed Jim.
"And now for home!" exulted Joe, as he put on added speed and the car leaped forward.
"And Clara," murmured Jim under his breath, as he thought of Joe's charming sister.
Joe did not hear him, for his thoughts were engrossed with Mabel, the girl who had promised to marry him and who he fondly hoped might be at this moment dreaming of him, as without her knowledge he was speeding toward her. She had been visiting at his father's home as the guest of his sister Clara. Since their trip together around the world the two girls had become almost inseparable, and Mr. and Mrs. Matson already regarded Mabel as a second daughter.
The day for the marriage of Joe and Mabel had not yet been set, but Joe was determined that it should take place soon, and he hoped that now he would be able to get Mabel to set a definite date for that happy event.
Jim, too, had his dreams, and they all centered about Clara. He had fallen desperately in love with her at their first meeting, and he had made up his mind that on this visit he would ask the all-important question, on the answer to which his happiness depended.
The car dashed along at rapid speed, and as they came near Hebron Joe roused himself from his reverie. The darkness was disappearing, and in the faint light of the spring morning they could see a steep hill a little way ahead. At the side of the road ran a little river, of whose murmur they had been conscious for some time, although in the darkness they could scarcely see it.
"Here's where we'll see whether Hank was bragging overmuch about this car," remarked Joe, as he tightened his grasp on the wheel and put his foot on the accelerator. "I'll give her a good start and see how she can climb."
The car gathered speed as it neared the bottom of the hill. Joe peered forward, and then from his lips came a startled shout.
Directly in front of them, completely blocking the road, was a mass of heavy timbers. To strike them at that speed meant maiming or death!
At one side of the road was a steep cliff. On the other side was the river.
Joe's brain worked like lightning. There was but one chance. He swung the wheel around, the car crashed through a fence at the side of the road, suddenly stopped short, and Joe and Jim were sent headlong into the river!
CHAPTER II
A SURPRISE
The water was icy and deep, and at this point the current was swift. The force with which the luckless occupants of the car had been propelled sent them far beneath the surface and some distance out into the stream.
A moment later their heads appeared above the water, and they struck out for the shore. Both were strong swimmers, and in a few strokes they reached the bank. Fortunately they had escaped striking any part of the car in their wild hurtling through space, and apart from the chill and wetting were unharmed.
From the mud at the river's edge, they dragged their dripping feet to the solid ground of the road. Then they stood still and looked at each other. The shock and suddenness of it all still affected them, but as they continued to look at the comical figure that each presented, with hair plastered over their faces and clothes clinging to their bodies, their sense of the ludicrous got the better of them and they burst into laughter.
"Talk about scarecrows!" gurgled Jim, as he dragged a wet handkerchief from his pocket and mopped his face in a vain attempt to dry it.
"None of them have anything on us," admitted Joe, as he threw off his coat and wrung one dripping trousers leg after the other.
"If only the team could get a snapshot of us now, they'd kid us for the rest of our natural lives," remarked Jim.
"You said it," agreed Joe. "But now," he added more soberly, "just let's take a look at what it was that so nearly killed us or crippled us for life."
They made their way to the mass of timber in the road. At first Jim thought that it might have fallen off some wagon, unknown to the driver. But a closer examination showed that this was an error. The timbers were piled in a way that could have been done only by human hands, and what made this certain was the fact that rocks had been placed on either side to prevent the logs from slipping. It was a formidable barrier, and if the car had dashed into it at the rate it was going, the occupants would almost certainly have been killed.
"Whoever put those timbers there meant harm," said Joe solemnly, when the examination had been completed.
"It looks that way," agreed Jim. "Whoever did it was a scoundrel who ought to be in jail."
"It might have been the work of a crazy man," suggested Joe.
"As crazy as a fox," rejoined Jim, looking squarely into his chum's eyes.
"What do you mean?" asked Joe, in some perplexity.
"I mean," said Jim, carefully weighing every word, "that the man who put that mass of timber there was just as sane as you or I. I mean that he intended that some one should be seriously hurt. I'll go even further. That man meant to injure Joe Matson, whom he hated with a deadly hatred."
"You mean that Braxton did it?" cried Joe.
"I mean that Braxton did it," replied Jim quietly.
They stared at each other with strange emotions stirring in their hearts. And while they stand there, as if turned to stone, it may be well, for the benefit of those who have not read the earlier volumes of this series, to trace the fortunes of Baseball Joe up to the time that this story opens.
Joe Matson was born in a little inland village of the Middle West, and grew up in a pleasant home amid wholesome surroundings. His first experience in the great national game, where he was destined to become famous as the greatest pitcher of his time, was gained on the simple diamond of his home town, and his natural aptitude was such that he soon became known as a rising player all over the county. What obstacles he met and surmounted at that time are related in the first volume of the series, entitled: "Baseball Joe of the Silver Stars."
Some time later, when playing on his school nine, he had considerable trouble with a bully who tried to down him, but found out, as so many trouble makers did later on in life, that Joe Matson was not easily downed. He put into his playing all that experience, combined with his native ability, could teach him, and he served an apprenticeship that stood him in good stead when later he went to Yale. The trials and triumphs of his school experience are told in the second volume of the series, entitled: "Baseball Joe on the School Nine."
With the natural buoyancy of youth, Joe had hoped when he entered Yale that he would have a chance to show his mettle in the box in some of the great annual games that Yale played with Harvard and Princeton. There were many rivals, however, for the honor, including those who had already won their spurs in actual contests. But Joe's light was not made to shine under a bushel, and one day when the cohorts of Princeton came down in their orange and black prepared to "tie the can" to the Bulldog's tail, Joe got his chance and sent a very bedraggled Tiger back to his lair in Princeton. How Joe won gloriously is told in the third volume of the series, entitled: "Baseball Joe at Yale."
Though he enjoyed his college days at Yale, stood high in his studies, and was popular with his mates, he felt that he was not cut out for one of the learned professions. His mother had hoped that he would be a clergyman and had been urgent in having him adopt that profession. But Joe, though he respected the noble aims of that calling, was not drawn to it. It was the open air life that he craved and for which he was fitted, and the scholastic calm of a study had little attraction for him. He felt that he had it in him to win supremacy in athletic fields.
His mother, of course, was greatly disappointed when she learned how he felt, but she was too wise to insist on her plan when she realized that it was contrary to his special gifts. She knew very little about baseball, but she had the impression that it was no place for an educated man. The fact, however, that so many college men were entering the ranks of professional baseball was made the most of by Joe, and she finally yielded to his wishes.
His chance was not long in coming, for he was soon picked up by one of the scouts who are always looking for "diamonds in the rough," and was offered a contract with the Pittston team of the Central League. The League was a minor one, but Joe had already learned that a man who proved that he had the makings of a star in him would soon have an opportunity with one of the majors. How speedily his ability was proved and recognized is narrated in the fourth volume of the series, entitled: "Baseball Joe in the Central League."
From the bushes to the National League was a big jump, but Joe made it when he was drafted into the ranks of the St. Louis Cardinals. The team was in the second division when Joe came into action, and was altogether out of the running for the championship. But Joe's twirling was just what it needed to put new heart and life into it, and before the season ended it had climbed into the first division and if the race had been a little longer might have made a big stroke for the pennant. The story of the team's climb, with all its exciting episodes, is told in the fifth volume of the series, entitled: "Baseball Joe in the Big League."
McRae, the crafty and resourceful manager of the New York Giants, had had his eye on Joe all the season, and when the race was ended he made an offer for him that the St. Louis management could not refuse. Now, indeed, Joe felt that the ambition of his life was in a fair way to be realized. McRae had intended to bring him along slowly, so that he could be thoroughly seasoned, but circumstances put on him the heft of the pitching, and how fully he justified his manager's confidence is narrated in the sixth volume of the series, entitled: "Baseball Joe on the Giants."
After the winning of the National League Championship by the Giants, came the World Series with the Boston Red Sox, who had won the title that year in the American League. The Sox were a hard team to beat, and the Giants had their work cut out for them. In addition to the strain of the games in which he was slated to pitch, Joe had to contend with the foul tactics of a gang of gamblers who had wagered heavily on the Sox and did all they could to put Joe out of action. But his indomitable will and quick wit triumphed over all obstacles, and his magnificent pitching in the last game of the series won the World's Championship for the Giants. The story of that stirring fight is told in the seventh volume of the series, entitled: "Baseball Joe in the World Series."
During these experiences, Joe had not escaped the toils of Cupid. Mabel Varley, a charming young girl, had been rescued by Joe at the moment that a runaway horse was about to carry her over a cliff. The romantic acquaintanceship thus begun soon grew into a deep affection, and Joe knew that Mabel held the happiness of his life in her hands. Jim Barclay, also, a promising young Princeton man and second string pitcher for the Giants, who was Joe's special chum, had grown very fond of Clara, Joe's pretty sister, and hoped that some day she would promise to be his wife.
The World Series had scarcely ended before Joe and Jim were invited by McRae to make a trip around the world with the Giant and All-American teams. They were eager for the chance, and their delight was increased when it developed that there were to be a number of wives of the players in the party so that Mabel and Clara could go along.
The teams played in Japan, in China, and in many of the cities of Europe, and the experience would have been a thoroughly happy one for Joe, had it not been for the machinations of men who were trying to form a rival league and had by the meanest trickery secured Joe's signature to what afterward turned out to be a contract. How Joe finally unmasked the plotters and had the satisfaction of giving the ringleader a tremendous thrashing is narrated in the preceding volume of the series, entitled: "Baseball Joe Around the World."
And now to return to Joe and Jim, as they stood in their dripping clothes on the country road in the growing light of the spring morning.
For some seconds after Jim's startling statement, Joe stood as though rooted to the spot. Then he pulled himself together.
"Come now, Jim, isn't that pretty far-fetched?" he said, with a forced laugh, in which, however, there was little mirth. "You haven't a shred of proof of anything of the kind."
"No," admitted Jim, "there isn't anything--yet--that would convince a judge or a jury. I'll agree that it wouldn't go far in a court of law. But just put two and two together. Yesterday afternoon we were talking about this trip. You distinctly mentioned the hill near Hebron. It was just after you spoke that I saw Braxton pass the door."
"Thought you saw," corrected Joe.
"All right, then," said Jim patiently, "let it go at that--thought I saw Braxton passing the door. Now just suppose for a minute that I was right and see what comes of it. The man who hates you worse, probably, than any man on earth--the man to whom you gave a terrible thrashing--knew that you would be driving a car just before daylight--knew that you would have to climb a hill--knew that as you got near it you'd probably put on speed to carry the car up--knew that an obstacle put near the bottom of the hill would almost certainly wreck the car and hurt the driver. Knowing all this, might not such a man as we know Braxton to be see his chance and take it?"
There was silence for a moment. Then:
"It certainly sounds strong the way you put it," Joe said thoughtfully. "But how on earth could Braxton get here in time to do all this? Think of the distance."
"It isn't so great a distance," rejoined Jim. "That is, if a man came straight across country in a speedy car for instance. It seemed long to us because of the roundabout way we had to go by train. Then too that was early in the afternoon, and Braxton could have had four hours' start of us. He's a rich man and probably has a fast car. He could have made it all right and got here hours ago."
"Yes, but even then," argued Joe, "he couldn't have done it all alone. It's as much as you and I can do together to handle these timbers."
"That's true," conceded Jim. "But he may have had one or more confederates with him. Money you know can do almost anything. I shouldn't wonder if that fellow Fleming helped him. He owed you a debt too, you remember, and the pair were as thick as thieves on the world tour."
"Well, it may be just as you say," replied Joe. "But I hate to think that any man hates me so badly as to try to injure me in such a cowardly way as that. At any rate, it won't do any harm for us to keep our eyes open in the future. But we've got plenty of time to think of that. Now let's get busy and hustle these timbers over to the side of the road so that nobody else can run into them. Then we'll take a look at the car."
They set to work with a will, and in a few minutes had removed the obstacles from the road.
"Now for the machine," said Joe, as he led the way to the river bank. "I've got an idea that what we owe Hank will put a dent in our bank rolls."
To their delight they found, however, that, apart from superficial injuries, the car seemed to be intact. The wind shield had been shattered and the mud guards were badly bent. But the axles seemed to be sound, the wheels were in place, and as far as they could judge there had been no injury to the engine. To all appearances the expenditure of a hundred dollars would put the car in good shape again.
But the wheels were so firmly imbedded in the mud of the shore that despite all their efforts they could not budge the car. They strained and pushed and lifted, but to no avail. Joe climbed into the driver's seat and set the engine going, but the car was stubborn and refused to back.
"Swell chance of our getting home in time for breakfast," grumbled Joe, as he stopped to rest for a moment.
"Lucky if we get there in time for supper," muttered Jim. "We'll have to go somewhere and borrow a shovel so that we can dig the wheels out of the mud."
But just at this moment they heard the rumbling of a cart, and running to the road they saw it coming, drawn by two stout horses, while the driver sat handling the reins in leisurely fashion.
They waved their hands and the cart came to a halt, the driver scanning curiously the two young men who had appeared so unexpectedly from the side of the road. He was a bluff, jovial person, and his eyes twinkled with amusement as he noted the wet garments that were clinging to their limbs.
"Been taking a bath with all your clothes on?" he asked, as he got down from his seat.
"Something like that," replied Joe, with a laugh, "but the bath came as a sort of surprise party. The road was blocked, and it was either the morgue or the river for us, so we chose the river."
"Road blocked?" repeated the newcomer, looking about with a puzzled expression. "I don't get you. Looks clear enough to me."
"It wouldn't if you'd been here half an hour ago," replied Joe, and then, as the man listened with interest that soon changed to indignation, he recounted briefly the events of the morning.
"Whoever did that ought to be jailed," he burst out, when the boys had concluded their story. "And he can't be very far away, either. This road was clear when I passed over it last night. Jump in and I'll drive you into town and we can send out an alarm."
"Not much use of that I'm afraid," replied Joe. "The man or men may be fifty miles away by this time. But if you'll give us a hand to get this auto out of the mud, you'll do us a big favor."
"Sure I'll help you," said the friend in need, whose name they learned was Thompson. "I've got a spade right here in the cart. We'll dig around the wheels a little. Then I'll hitch a trace chain to the machine and my horses will yank it out in a jiffy."
A few minutes of work sufficed to clear the wheels. Then boards were placed behind them, the chain was attached to the rear axle, and the horses drew the car back into the road.
It presented rather a forlorn appearance, but the boys cared little for that. What they were far more concerned about was their own bedraggled condition.
"We match the car all right," remarked Jim disgustedly, as he looked at his own clothes and those of his companion.
"It will never do to let Mabel and Clara see us like this," responded Joe lugubriously.
"Don't let that worry you," laughed their new friend. "Just drive into town and stop at Eph Allen's tailor shop. It's pretty early, but Eph sleeps in the back of his shop and he'll let you in and fix you up in no time."
This was evidently the best thing to be done, and the young men, after repeated thanks to their newly made friend and with fullest directions as to how to find the tailor shop in question, jumped into the auto and started on the way back to Hebron.
"Old bus seems to work as well as ever," commented Joe, as the car moved on without any visible evidence of injury.
"That's one bit of good luck," replied Jim. "And it's certainly coming to us to make up in part for the bad."
They thanked their stars that it was too early yet for many people to be stirring in the town, and were relieved when they found themselves in front of Allen's shop. Eph must have been a pretty sound sleeper, for it took a good deal of knocking to wake him up, and when at last he thrust his tousled head through the door to ask what was wanted, he was not in the best of temper. But as soon as he learned the circumstances that had occasioned the early call, he became at once all interest and attention, and hustled about to put their clothes in presentable shape.
It was a fairly good job that he at length turned out after he had ironed and pressed their suits, though they had by no means the Beau Brummel effect with which the boys had planned to impress the girls.
By this time the sun had fully risen and Joe looked at his watch.
"Perhaps we'll be in time to catch them at breakfast yet," he remarked. "It's only about twenty miles from here to Riverside. Maybe they won't be surprised when we break in on them. They don't think we're within several hundred miles of them."
"Perhaps we ought to have telegraphed that we were coming," said Jim.
"It might have been just as well, I suppose," admitted Joe. "But that would have taken away the fun of the surprise. I want to see the look on their faces."
"Of course we won't say anything about what happened to us this morning," suggested Jim, as the machine bowled along over a road that with every minute that passed was growing more familiar.
"Not on your life," replied Joe earnestly. "None of them would ever have another easy minute. They'd be seeing our mangled remains every night in their dreams. All we'll tell them is that we had a little spill and got wet. But not a word about the blocked road or what we suspect regarding Braxton."
Before long they were passing the straggling houses that marked the outskirts of Riverside. Joe pulled his cap down over his eyes so that he would not be recognized and stopped by any of the people of the town, where he was regarded as something of an idol. All he wanted to do was to get to his family and Mabel, or, as perhaps he would have put it, get to Mabel and his family.
His ruse was successful, for there was no sign of recognition from the few he passed on the streets, and in a few minutes he brought the car to a stop in front of the Matson home.
The young men jumped out, and with Joe leading the way ran lightly up the steps. He tried the front door and found that it yielded to his touch. With his finger on his lips as a warning to Jim, he tiptoed softly through the hall to the door of the dining room.
The odor of coffee and bacon came to them and from the click of plates and cups, as well as the murmur of several voices, they knew that the family was still at the breakfast table.
Joe waited no longer but threw open the door.
"Hello, folks!" he cried.
CHAPTER III
REGGIE TURNS UP
If Joe had counted upon producing a surprise, his success surpassed his wildest expectations.
At first there was a second of paralyzed silence. Then there was a wild hubbub of delighted cries, as four figures started up from the table and launched themselves upon the stalwart figure that stood framed in the doorway.
"Joe!" "Mabel!" "Clara!" "Momsey!" "Dad!" "Jim!" The names were repeated in quick succession and were punctuated with hugs and kisses.
In a moment Joe had his right arm around Mabel, his left about his mother, while Clara had thrown her arms about his neck and his father was attempting to get hold of one of his hands. There was no doubt of the warmth of that welcome.
[Illustration: THERE WAS NO DOUBT OF THE WARMTH OF THAT WELCOME.]
Nor was Jim left out in the cold. Joe naturally had the center of the stage, but after the first rapturous greeting had passed, they all made Jim feel how delighted they were that he had come along with Joe. In Clara's eyes especially there was a look that Jim hoped he read aright. Her flushed and sparkling face was alive with happiness that might not be due altogether to the return of her brother, dearly as she loved him.
For a few minutes questions and answers followed close on each other's heels, and it was Mrs. Matson at last who suggested that probably the boys were hungry. They agreed with her emphatically that they were. The girls flew about, and in a short time fresh coffee and hot biscuits and bacon and eggs were set before them in tempting profusion. Then while they ate like famished wolves, the others, who had been just finishing breakfast when they burst in upon them, sat about the table and talked and laughed and beamed to their hearts' content. Perhaps in all the broad land there was no happier group than was gathered about that table in the little town of Riverside.
"You ought to have telegraphed that you were coming, Joe," said Mrs. Matson. "Then we could have had a good breakfast ready for you."
"What do you call this?" laughed Joe, as he helped himself to another biscuit, watching at the same time the bewitching way in which Mabel was pouring him another cup of coffee. "There couldn't be anything better than this this side of kingdom come."
"You're right there, old man," observed Jim, his own appetite keeping pace with that of his chum.
"Seems to me, Joe, that your clothes look a little seedy this morning," Clara remarked, with a sister's frankness, during a moment's pause in the conversation. "The last time you came home you looked like a fashion plate. But now your shirt front is wrinkled, your collar is wilted, and the colors in your necktie have run together. Looks as though you'd got wet through and hadn't dried out yet."
"Perhaps they've been in the river," laughed Mabel gaily, little thinking how near she came to hitting the nail on the head.
Mrs. Matson's motherly heart was quick to take alarm.
"What's that?" she asked. "Nothing really has happened to you, has it, Joe?" she inquired, looking anxiously at her son, who after one glare at the sister who had precipitated the topic, was trying to assume an air of nonchalance.
But this direct inquiry from his mother left him no recourse except to tell her a part of the truth, though not necessarily the whole truth.
"We did have a little spill this morning," he returned indifferently. "I turned the car a little too much to the right and we went through a fence and into a little stream at the side of the road. Jim and I got wet, but after we got over being mad we had a good laugh over it. Neither one of us was a bit hurt, and it's only our clothes that got the worst of it."
"Oh, but you might have been killed!" exclaimed Mrs. Matson, clasping her hands together nervously. "You must be more careful, Joe. It would break my heart if anything happened to you."
"Don't worry a bit, Momsey," replied Joe, placing his hand affectionately over hers. "Only the good die young, you know, and that makes me safe."
They all pressed him for the details of the accident, and he and Jim both made light of it, making a joke out of their plight and their visit to the tailor, so that apprehension vanished, and after a while the matter was dropped.
Joe was eager for a chance to get alone with Mabel, and Jim was quite as keen for a tête-à-tête with Clara. The girls were quite as eager, but as there was no servant in the simple little household the girls flew around to clear the table, while Joe had a chance for a quiet talk with his mother, and Jim beguiled his impatience by going out on the porch with Mr. Matson for a smoke before the latter had to go downtown to business.
"How have you been feeling, Momsey?" Joe asked when they had settled down in a cosy corner of the living room. "It seems to me that you're a little thinner than you were."
"I'm not feeling any too well," replied Mrs. Matson. "I have trouble with my breathing whenever I go up or down stairs. But I'll be all right pretty soon," she added, with an attempt at brightness.
"I'm afraid you've been working too hard, Momsey," replied Joe, patting her hand. "Why don't you let me get you a maid to help out with the work? The money doesn't matter, and you know how glad I'd be to bear the expense."
"I don't want any regular servant, Joe," replied Mrs. Matson. "I haven't been used to one, and she'd be more bother than help. We have a wash woman. There isn't much to be done in this little house, and Clara is the dearest girl. If I did what she wanted, I'd just fold my hands and sit around in the living room. And Mabel, too, has spoiled me since she's been here. She's already like a second daughter to me."
"She'll be really your daughter before long, if I have anything to say about it," replied Joe. "I'm going to put it right up to her to marry me while I'm here this time."
Mrs. Matson was both delighted and flustered at the boldness of this announcement.
"You take my breath away, talking like that," she replied. "But I'm afraid Mabel won't let herself be carried off her feet in that way. A girl wants to get her trousseau ready. And then, too, she'll want to be married in her father's house. You're a dear boy, Joe, but you've got a lot to learn about women."
"Mabel will agree all right," replied Joe confidently, though his masculine assurance had been slightly dashed by his mother's prediction.
The opportunity to make sure about that important matter came a few minutes later, when Mabel came into the room looking more lovely, Joe thought, than he had ever seen her before. Mrs. Matson lingered only a moment longer, and then made an excuse to leave the room. The door had hardly closed behind her before Mabel was in Joe's arms.
It was a long time before they were able to talk coherently, and when at last Mabel told Joe that he was too greedy and laughingly bade him be sensible, she was more rosy and beautiful than ever, and Joe was deeper in love than before, if that could be possible.
Joe was not long in putting his mother's prediction to the test.
"Do you remember what Jim said when we said good-by to McRae after the World Tour was over?" he asked, with a twinkle in his eye.
The flush in Mabel's cheeks deepened.
"Jim talks so much nonsense," she countered.
"Think a minute." Joe was jogging her memory. "Wasn't it something about bells?"
"How should I remember?" asked Mabel, though she did remember perfectly.
"Well, I remember," said Joe. "He said I'd soon be hearing wedding bells. Now do you remember?"
"Y-yes," admitted Mabel at last, hiding her face on Joe's shoulder, which was very close to her.
"I want to hear those wedding bells, very soon, dearest," said Joe tenderly. "Next week--this week--to-morrow----"
Mabel sat up with a little scream.
"Next week--this week--to-morrow!" she repeated. "Why, Joe dear, we can't!"
"Why can't we?" asked Joe with masculine directness.
"Why--why--we just can't," replied Mabel. "I haven't got my wedding clothes ready. And I'll have to be married in my own home. What would my family think? What would my friends think? It would look like a runaway affair. People would talk. Oh, Joe dear, I'd love to, but I just can't. Don't you see I can't?"
Joe did not see at all, and he renewed his importunities with all his powers of persuasion. But Mabel, though she softened her refusal with lover-like endearments, was set in her convictions, and Joe at last was forced to confess in his heart with a groan that his mother was right, and that he had a lot to learn about women.
He suggested in desperation that they go on at once to her home in Goldsboro and be married there, but although that would have taken away one of her arguments, the others still continued in full force, and she added another for good measure.
"You see, Joe, dear, your mother isn't well enough just now to travel so far, and it would break her heart if she weren't present at our marriage. By fall she may be better."
"By fall!" echoed Joe in dismay. "Have I got to wait that long?"
"I think it would be better, dear," said Mabel gently. "You see if we got married any time after the baseball season had commenced, you would find it hard to get away from your club. In any case, our honeymoon trip would have to be very short. Then, too, if I traveled about the circuit with you, you'd have me on your mind, and it might affect your playing. But I promise you that we shall get married in the fall, just as soon as the baseball season is over."
And as she sealed this promise in the way that Joe liked best, he was forced to be content.
The days passed by, as though on wings, with Joe grudging every minute as it passed that brought him nearer to the day when he would have to rejoin his team. The hours were precious and he spent every one of them that he could with Mabel.
Jim, too, was finding his vacation delightful. He was getting on famously with Clara, and the latter's heart was learning to beat very fast when she heard the step and saw the face of the handsome young athlete. The prospects were very good that two weddings would be celebrated in the fall, and that Baseball Joe would gain not only a wife but a brother-in-law.
During that week the moon was at its full, and almost every night saw the two couples out for a stroll. They would start out from the house together and walk down the village street, with only a few yards separating them. However, they usually lost sight of each other before they had gone far.
Joe was happy, supremely happy. Mabel had never been so dear, so affectionate. He knew that he possessed her heart utterly. Yet there was a faint something, a mysterious impression to which he could scarcely give a name, that at times marred his happiness and caused him to feel depressed. He chased the feeling away, and yet it returned.
There were moments when Mabel grew quiet and seemed as though brooding over something. Her face would become sad, and only brighten with a gayety that seemed a little forced, when she saw that he was studying her and seeking to learn what troubled her. At times she would cling to him as though she feared he was to be taken from her. Once or twice he questioned her, but she laughed his fears away and declared that there was nothing the matter. Despite her denials, he remained vaguely uneasy.
The day before his brief vacation came to an end there was a ring at the bell of the Matson home. Mabel, who happened to be in the hall at the time, opened the door. There was an exclamation of surprise and delight as the newcomer threw his arms about her.
"Reggie!"
"Mabel!"
There was a fond embrace, and then Mabel came into the living room where the family were assembled, while close behind her came Reggie Varley, her brother, the same old Reggie, monocle, cane, lisp, English clothes, English accent, fancy waistcoat, fitted in topcoat, spats and all--a vision of sartorial splendor!
CHAPTER IV
THE ANONYMOUS LETTER
All rose to their feet in hearty welcome. It was not the first time Reggie had visited the Matson home, and all were fond of him. Joe and Jim especially gave him a hilarious greeting.
"Hello, Reggie, old man," cried Joe, as he shook hands. "I'm tickled to death to see you. What good wind blew you down this way? I didn't think you were within a thousand miles of here."
"Well, old top," explained Reggie, as he gracefully drew off his gloves and divested himself of his topcoat, "it was so beastly quiet in Goldsboro, don't y'know, that I got fed up with it and when the guv'nor suggested that there was a bit of business I could attend to in Chicago I just blew the bally town and ran out there. Then bein' so near, I thought I'd run down and see Sis and the rest of you. It's simply rippin' to see y'all again, don't y'know."
He sat down in a chair, carefully adjusting his trousers so as not to mar the creases in the legs, and beamed blandly upon the friendly faces that surrounded him.
Joe and Reggie had first met under rather unpleasant circumstances, that bore no promise of a close friendship later on. Reggie had left his bag in a seat of a railroad station while he went to buy his ticket. Upon his return he missed his bag, which had been left in a seat adjoining the one in which Joe had in the meantime seated himself, and had practically accused Joe of taking it. As may be readily imagined, Joe was not the one to take lightly such an accusation, and Reggie had to apologize. It was only after Joe had met Mabel that he again encountered Reggie and learned that he was the girl's brother. But apart from his relationship to Mabel, Joe had found further reason for liking Reggie, as time wore on and he became better acquainted with him.
Reggie had never been restrained much by his father, who was rich and indulgent. He had an inordinate love of fine clothes and an affectation of English customs and manner of speech. But these, after all, were foibles, and at heart Reggie was "true blue." He was a staunch friend, generous, kindly and honorable. He idolized his charming sister, who in return was devotedly attached to him.
Another thing that strengthened the friendship between Joe and Reggie was that they were both ardent lovers of the great national game. Reggie was a "dyed-in-the-wool fan," and though his general information was none too great he had the records of individual players and the history of the game at his tongue's end, and could rattle on for an hour on a stretch when he once got started on his favorite theme. He was a great admirer of Joe as a player, and intensely proud that he was going to be his brother-in-law. Whenever the Giants played and Joe was slated to pitch, the latter could be perfectly certain that Reggie, even if he chanced to be at the time in San Francisco, was "rooting" for him to win.
Jim also had met Reggie frequently and liked him thoroughly. The other members of the Matson family liked him, both for Mabel's sake and his own. So it was a very friendly circle into which Reggie had come so unexpectedly.
"But I didn't expect to see you two chaps here," said Reggie, as he looked from Joe to Jim. "I thought you were down in the training camp, or else on your way to New York with the rest of the Giants."
"It was just a bit of luck that we are here," replied Joe. "McRae thought that we were trained fine enough, and might go stale if we worked out in practice any longer. He wants us to be at the top of our form when the bell rings at the Polo Grounds."
"Bally good sense, I call it, too," replied Reggie, looking admiringly at their athletic forms. "Just now you look fit to fight for a man's life, don't y'know."
"Never felt better," admitted Joe. "Nor happier either," he added, as he glanced at Mabel, who dropped her eyes before his ardent look.
"You came just in time to see the boys," put in Mrs. Matson. "They're starting to-morrow for New York."
"Bah Jove, I'd like to go with them," said Reggie. "I'd give a lot to see that opening game on the Polo Grounds. But this beastly business in Chicago will make it necessary for me to go back there in a few days. In the meantime I thought that perhaps you might put me up here for a little while, don't y'know?"
He looked toward Mr. Matson as he spoke, and both he and Mrs. Matson hastened to assure the young man that they would be only too glad to do so.
All had a lot to talk about, and the evening passed quickly, until at last Mrs. Matson excused herself on the plea that she wanted to see about Reggie's room. Mr. Matson soon followed, and the young people were left to themselves.
"Well, what do you think the chances are of the Giants copping the flag again, old top?" asked Reggie, as he pulled down his cuffs and put up his hand to make sure that his immaculate tie was all right.
"The Giants look mighty sweet to me," answered Joe. "They've had a good training season and shown up well in practice. They've won every game they've played with the minor leaguers so far, and haven't had to exert themselves. Of course that doesn't mean very much in itself, as the bushers ought to be easy meat for us. But we've got practically the same team with which we won the pennant last year, and I can't see why we shouldn't repeat. Jim here has been coming along like a house afire, and he'll make the fans sit up and take notice when they see him in action."
"Oh, I'm only an also ran," said Jim modestly.
"Indeed you're not," Clara started to say indignantly, but checked herself in time. Not so quickly, however, that Jim failed to catch her meaning and note the flush that rose to her cheek.
"Funny thing happened when I was in Chicago," mused Reggie. "I heard a chap say in one of the hotels that there was heavy betting against the Giants winning this year. Some one, he didn't know who, was putting up cash in great wads against them, and doing it with such confidence that it almost seemed as though he thought he was betting on a sure thing. Taking ridiculous odds too. Queer, wasn't it?"
"A fool and his money are soon parted," remarked Joe. "That fellow will be a little wiser and a good deal poorer when the season ends, or I miss my guess. Who's going to beat us out? Nothing short of a train wreck can stop us."
"Now you're talking!" cried Jim.
"Another thing that's going to help us," said Joe, "was that trip we had around the world. We had some mighty hot playing on that tour against the All-Americans, and it kept the boys in fine fettle."
"Speaking about that trip, old chap," put in Reggie, "reminds me of another thing that happened in Chicago. I was going down State Street one afternoon, and almost ran into that Braxton that you handed such a trimming to over in Ireland."
"Braxton!" cried Joe.
"Braxton!" echoed Jim.
"Sure thing," replied Reggie, mildly puzzled at the agitation that the name aroused in the two chums. "I'm not spoofing you. Braxton it was, as large as life. The bounder recognized me and started to speak, but I gave him the glassy eye and he thought better of it and passed on. Funny what a little world it is, don't y'know."
"It surely is a little world," replied Jim, as a significant glance passed between him and Joe.
"I glanced back," Reggie went on, "and saw him getting into a car drawn up at the curb. As classy a machine as I've seen, too, for a long time. Built for speed, y'know. If he hadn't driven off too quickly, I'd have made a note of the make. My own is getting rather old, and I've been thinking about replacing it."
The conversation turned into other channels and finally began to drag a little. The others made no sign of being ready to retire, and at last Reggie woke to the fact that he would have to make the first move. He looked at his watch, remarked that he was rather tired after his journey, and thought that he would "pound the pillow."
Joe showed him to his room, chatted with him a few minutes, and then returned to the living room where he found Mabel alone, as Clara and Jim had drifted into the dining room. It was the last night the boys would have at home, and the two young couples had a lot to talk about. To Jim especially the time was very precious, for he had made up his mind to ask a very momentous question, and there is little doubt but that Clara knew it was coming and had already made up her mind how it should be answered.
It was an exceedingly agitated Jim that asked Mr. Matson for a private interview the next morning, and it was an exceedingly happy Jim that emerged from the room a few minutes later and announced to the family already seated at the breakfast table that Clara had promised to be his wife. There was a stampede from the chairs, to the imminent danger of the coffee being upset, and Clara was hugged and kissed by Mabel and hugged and kissed and cried over by her mother, while Jim's hand was almost wrung off by Joe and Reggie in the general jubilation. For Jim was a splendid fellow, a Princeton graduate, a rising man in his chosen calling, and an all round good fellow. And there was no sweeter or prettier girl than Clara in all Riverside, or, as Jim stood ready to maintain, in the whole world.
Needless to say that for the rest of that morning Reggie and Joe had no other masculine society than each could furnish to the other, for Jim had shamelessly abandoned them. Soon Reggie, too, had to chum with himself, as Joe and Mabel had found a sequestered corner and seemed to be dead to the rest of the world.
Just before noon, however, when Mabel had gone in to help Mrs. Matson to prepare lunch, Joe had a chance to talk with Reggie alone.
"Mabel's looking rippin', don't you think?" remarked Reggie, as he caught a glimpse of his sister passing the door of the room in which they sat.
"Most beautiful girl that lives," returned Joe, with enthusiasm.
"I guess she's stopped worrying about----" began Reggie, and then checked himself as though he had said more than he intended to.
"Worrying about what?" asked Joe, with the quick apprehension of a lover.
"Oh, about--about things in general," replied Reggie, in some confusion and evading Joe's searching eyes.
"Look here, Reggie," said Joe with decision. "If anything's worrying Mabel, I've got a right to know what it is. I've noticed lately that she seemed to have something on her mind. Come now, out with it."
Reggie still tried to put him off, but Joe would have none of it.
"I've got to know, Reggie," he declared. "You've simply got to tell me."
Reggie pondered a moment.
"Well, old top," he said at last, "I suppose you have a right to know, and perhaps it's best that you should know. The fact is that Mabel got a letter a little while ago telling her that it would be a sorry day for her if she ever married Joe Matson. Threatened all sorts of terrible things against you, don't y'know."
"What!" cried Joe, wild with rage and leaping to his feet. "The scoundrel! The coward! Who signed that letter? What's his name? If I ever lay my hands on him, may heaven have mercy on him, for I won't!"
"That's the worst of it," replied Reggie. "There wasn't any name signed to it. The bounder who wrote it took good care of that."
"But the handwriting!" cried Joe. "Perhaps I can recognize it. Where is the letter? Give it to me."
"I haven't got it with me," Reggie explained. "It's at my home in Goldsboro. The poor girl had to confide in somebody, so she sent it to me. And even if you had it, it wouldn't tell you anything. It was in typewriting."
"But the postmark!" ejaculated Joe. "Perhaps that would give a clue. Where did it come from?"
"There again we're stumped," responded Reggie. "It was postmarked Chicago. But that doesn't do us any good, for there are two million people in Chicago."
"Oh!" cried Joe, as he walked the floor and clenched his fists until the nails dug into his palms. "The beastliness of it! The cowardice of it! An anonymous letter! That such a villain should dare to torture the dearest girl in the world! But somewhere, somehow, I'll hunt him out and thrash him soundly."
"Don't take the beastly thing so much to heart," returned Reggie. "Of course it's just a bluff by some bally bounder. Nobody ought to do anything with such a letter but tear it up and think no more about it. Some coward has done it that has a grudge against you, but he'd probably never have the nerve to carry out his threats."
"It isn't that I care about," answered Joe. "I've always been able to take care of myself. I'd like nothing better than to have the rascal come out in the open and try to make his bluff good. But it's Mabel I'm thinking about. You know a woman doesn't dismiss those things as a man would. She worries her heart out about it. So that's what has been weighing on her mind, poor, dear girl. Oh, if I only had my hands on the fellow that wrote that letter!"
And here he yielded again to a justified rage that was terrible to behold. It would have been a bad day for the rascally writer of that anonymous letter if he had suddenly stood revealed in the presence of Joe Matson!
CHAPTER V
"PLAY BALL!"
Just then Mabel came in with her hands full of flowers that she meant to arrange for the table. She stopped short in consternation as she saw the thundercloud on Joe's brow. For a moment she thought that he and Reggie had been quarreling.
"Oh, Joe, what is it?" she asked in alarm.
Joe looked at her lovingly and his brow cleared.
"Nothing, honey," he said, as he came up to her and slipped his arm around her. "It's only that I've just found out from Reggie what it is that's been worrying you."
Mabel shot a reproachful glance at Reggie, who looked a little embarrassed.
"Joe got it out of me, Sis," he explained. "Said he had a right to know and all that sort of thing, don't y'know. And 'pon honor, Sis, I don't know but what he's right about it."
"Of course I'm right about it," affirmed Joe. "There can't be anything now that concerns Mabel that doesn't concern me. Don't you agree with me, dearest?"
"I suppose so," returned Mabel, as Joe drew her closer. "But, oh, Joe, I didn't want to distress you about it. I was afraid that it would weigh on your mind and affect your work this season, and I knew how your heart was set on making a record. It was just for your sake, dearest, that I kept it to myself. Of course I would have told you sooner or later."
"Well, now Mabel, listen to me," said Joe, as he placed a chair and sat down beside her. "I don't know what fellow has done this. But whoever he is, he is a coward as well as a rascal, and will never dare to carry out his threats against me. And even if he should, you know that I am perfectly able to take care of myself. You know that others have tried to injure me, but I always came out on top. Fleming tried it; Braxton tried it, and you know what happened to them. Now what I want you to promise me is to banish this beastly thing entirely from your memory. Treat it with the contempt it deserves. Will you promise me this?"
"I will promise, Joe," answered Mabel. "I'll try to forget that it ever happened."
"That's the girl," commended Joe. "And to set your mind at rest I'll promise on my part to take especially good care of myself. That's a bargain."
But while Joe had secured the promise of Mabel to forget the letter, he had made no such promise himself, and he vowed that if he could ever get any trace of the writer of that letter he would give him the punishment he so richly deserved.
The train Baseball Joe and Jim Barclay would take was to leave late that afternoon.
Somehow general knowledge of that fact had got abroad, and the boys were dismayed, on reaching the station, to find that half the population of the little town had gathered there to say good-by and wish them luck. To many of the townspeople, Joe was a bigger man than the President of the United States. He had put Riverside "on the map," and through the columns of the papers they followed his triumphs and felt that in a sense they were their own.
Of course Joe appreciated this affectionate interest, but just at the moment all he wanted was to be alone with Mabel. He had already bidden his mother a loving farewell at the house, as she was not well enough to go to the station. Jim also had eyes and thoughts only for Clara.
But there was no help for it, and they had to exchange greetings and good wishes with the kindly friends who clustered around them. At the last minute, however, the young folks had a chance to say a few words to each other, and what they did not have time to say was eloquent in their eyes.
The train moved off, and the boys leaned far out of the windows and waved to the girls as long as they were in sight. Then they settled back in their seats, and for a long time were engrossed in their thoughts. Usually they were full of chaff and banter, but to-day it was some time before they roused themselves from reverie and paid attention to the realities around them.
It was after they had come back from the dining car after supper that Joe told Jim about his interview with Reggie and the anonymous letter. Jim's wrath was almost as great as that which had shaken Joe himself.
"And the worst of it is," said Joe, "that there doesn't seem the slightest chance of getting hold of the cowardly fellow that did it. You might as well look for a needle in a haystack."
"Yes," agreed Jim, "that's the exasperating feature of it. It may be the work of gamblers who have bet against the Giants and want to worry you so that you won't pitch your best ball. Some of those fellows will do anything for money. Or it may have been done by some enemy who chose that way of striking in the dark."
"If it's an enemy," mused Joe, "that narrows it down. There's old Bugs Hartley, but I don't think he has intelligence enough to write a letter. Then there's Fleming, with whom I'm just about as popular as poison ivy. Add to that Braxton and a few old-time enemies, and you've about completed the list."
"I wouldn't put it past Braxton," remarked Jim thoughtfully. "That fellow's a rattlesnake. He wouldn't stop at anything to get even with you."
"I hate to think he'd stoop as low as to try to strike me through a woman," replied Joe. "But, by Jove!" he went on, as a thought struck him, "do you remember what Reggie said about meeting Braxton in Chicago? You know while we were on the trip he mentioned Chicago as his home town. And that letter had the Chicago postmark."
"Oh, well, you couldn't hang a yellow dog on that," Jim replied. "But what struck me was what Reggie said about the speedy car that Braxton had. It must have been a mighty speedy car that got the fellow who laid that trap on the road from the training town to Hebron. Of course those things are only straws, of no value separately, though straws show which way the wind blows. One thing is certain. We've got to keep one man in our mind and guard against him. And that man's name is Braxton."
They reached New York without incident the day before the opening game, and found the city baseball mad. The front pages of the newspapers had big headlines discussing the opening of the season. The sporting pages overflowed with speculation and prophecy as to the way the different teams would shape up for the pennant race. In the street cars, in the subways, in the restaurants, in the lobbies of the theatres, wherever men congregated, baseball was the subject of discussion. The long winter had made the populace hungry for their favorite game.
On the following day, the migration toward the Polo Grounds began long before noon. Every train was packed with eager, good-natured humanity on its way to the game. By noon the bleachers were packed, and an hour before the game was scheduled to begin, every inch of the grandstands were packed to overflowing.
The Bostons were to be the Giants' opponents in the opening game. The team had finished poorly the year before, but many winter trades had strengthened the weak spots, and the spring training of the nine had been full of promise. A close game was looked for, with the chances favoring the Giants.
McRae was anxious to win the opening game, and had selected Joe to "bring home the bacon." Hughson's arm was not yet in shape, and the prospects were that Joe would have to bear the heft of the pitcher's burden if the Giants were to carry off the flag.
Both teams were greeted with hearty cheers as they came out on the field. The Bostons as the visiting team, had the first chance at practice, and they uncovered a lot of speed in their preliminary work. Then the Giants took their turn in shooting the ball across the diamond and batting long flies to the outfielders.
The bell rang and the field was cleared, while a hush of expectation fell on the crowds. The blue-uniformed umpire stepped to the plate.
"Ladies and gentlemen," he bawled, "the batteries for to-day's game are Albaugh and Menken for Boston, and Matson and Mylert for New York. Play ball!"
CHAPTER VI
GETTING THE JUMP
Neale, the heavy hitting center fielder of the Bostons, who led off in the batting order, came to the plate, swinging three bats. He discarded two of them and took up his position, after having tapped his heel for luck.
Joe looked him over for a moment. Then he wound up and whipped one over the plate. It was a high fast one, and Neale swung at it, his bat missing the ball by fully three inches.
"Strike one!" called the umpire, and the crowd roared in approval. It was an auspicious beginning.
The next one was wide, and Neale refused to "bite." Again Joe tempted him with a bad one, and again Neale was too wary. The next ball was a swift incurve that broke so suddenly that it buffaloed Neale completely. The lunge he made at it swung him round so that he almost lost his balance, and he looked rather sheepish as Mylert, the burly catcher of the Giants, grinned at him.
"Had that in my mitt before you swung at it," taunted Mylert. "Gee, but you're slow."
Neale glared at him, but made no reply and tightened his grip on the bat.
This time Joe floated up a slow teaser that looked as big as a balloon as it sailed lazily for the plate. Neale, who was all set for a fast one, nearly broke his back reaching for it.
"You're out," declared the umpire, while shouts and laughter came from the crowded stands, as Neale, flinging down his bat disgustedly, went back to the dugout.
Kopf, the next man up, dribbled a slow one to the box that Joe had no trouble in getting to first on time. Mitchell lifted a towering fly that Iredell gobbled up without moving in his tracks.
"Classy work, old man!" cried out Robbie, his face glowing with satisfaction, as Joe drew off his glove and came in to the bench. "The old wing seems to be working as well as ever."
The Giants did a little better in the first inning, though not well enough to chalk up a run. Curry started well by lining to center for a single, the ball just escaping Warner's fingers, as he leaped into the air for it. Iredell tried to sacrifice, but the ball went too quickly to the pitcher, who turned and caught Curry at second. Iredell tried to get down on the first ball pitched, but Menken showed that his throwing arm was right and nipped him by three feet. Burkett lifted one between right and center that had all the earmarks of a home run, but Mitchell, by a great run, got to it with one hand and froze on to it. It was a remarkable catch, and the sportsmanlike New York crowd applauded it as heartily as though it had been made by one of their favorites.
"Highway robbery," growled Burkett, who had almost reached second before the ball was caught, and was cherishing hopes of having knocked out the first home run of the season.
It seemed clear that the Bostons were not to be trifled with, at least as far as their fielding was concerned, and the crowd settled down in expectation of a close struggle.
The second inning for the Bostons was short. Douglas sent up a pop fly to Willis at third. Barber fouled to Mylert. Warner tapped a little one in front of the plate that Mylert heaved to first. Each had offered at the first ball pitched, so that only three balls had been thrown for the entire inning.
The hard hitting that the Giants had done in the first session had resulted in nothing, but it had shown them that Albaugh could be hit, and they faced him with confidence when they next went to the bat.
But Albaugh had braced in his short breathing spell, and he set the Giants down in short order. The best that Wheeler could do was to lift a high fly behind second that nestled comfortably in Douglas' hands. Willis got to first base on an error by Warner, but Denton hit into a double play, Ellis to Douglas to Kopf, and the inning was over.
In the third inning, the Bostons swung their bats in vain. Joe struck out Ellis, Menken and Albaugh, one after the other. His fast ball shot over the plate as though propelled by a gun. It came so swiftly that the Boston batsmen either winced and drew back, or struck at it after the ball had passed. His outcurve had a tremendous break, and Mylert had all he could do to get it. It was a superb example of pitching, and Joe had to remove his cap in response to the thunderous applause of the stands.
"Isn't that boy a wonder, Mac?" asked Robbie in exultation. "He's simply standing those fellows on their heads. They just can't touch him."
"He's the goods all right," agreed the less demonstrative McRae. "But don't let's crow too loud. The game isn't over yet by a long shot, and anything can happen in baseball."
Allen was the first man up in the Giants' half, and he went out on a grasser to Warner, who got him at first by yards. It was Joe's turn next.
"Win your own game now, Joe," said Jim, as his chum left the bench for the plate. "None of the other boys seem to be doing much. Show them one of the clouts you made at the training camp."
Joe grinned in reply and went to the plate. Albaugh looked at him and thought he sensed an easy victim. He seldom had much trouble with pitchers.
The first ball was wide and Joe let it go by. The second and third also went as balls.
"Good eye, Joe," sang out Robbie, who was coaching at third. "Make him put it over."
Albaugh now was "in a hole." Three balls had been called on him, and he had to get the next one over the plate. He wound up carefully and sent over a swift straight one about waist high.
Joe timed it perfectly and caught it near the end of his bat. The ball went on a line straight toward the right field stands. On and on it went, still almost in a line. Neale and Barber had both started for it from the crack of the bat, but it stayed so low and went so fast that it eluded them and struck just at the foot of the right field bleachers.
Joe in the meantime was running like a deer around the bases, while his comrades leaped about and howled, and the crowds in the stands were on their feet and shouting like madmen. He had rounded second and was well on toward third before Neale retrieved the ball. He relayed it to Douglas like a shot. By this time Joe had turned third and was dashing toward the plate. It was a race between him and the ball, but he beat the sphere by an eyelash, sliding into the rubber in a cloud of dust.
For a few moments pandemonium reigned, as Joe, flushed and smiling, rose from the ground and dusted himself off while his mates mauled and pounded him and the multitude roared approval.
"Jumping jiminy!" cried Jim, "that was a lallapaloozer! It was a longer hit than you made off of me this spring, and that's going some. And on a line too. I thought it was never going to drop."
"It was a dandy, Joe," commended McRae, clapping him on the shoulder. "It's only a pity that there weren't men on bases at the time for you to bring in ahead of you. But we've broken the ice now, and perhaps the rest of the boys will get busy."
Albaugh was rather shaken by the blow, and gave Mylert his base on balls. Curry too was passed to first, advancing Mylert to second. The stage seemed set for more Giant runs, but Iredell hit a liner to Ellis who took it at his shoe tops and made a smart double play by getting it to second before Mylert could scramble back.
Still the Giants were a run to the good, and as the fourth and fifth innings went by without a score that run began to look as big as a meeting house. Albaugh had stiffened up and was pitching superbly, while his mates were giving him splendid support. He mowed down the heavy batters of the Giants one after another, and McRae began to fidget about uneasily on the bench. One run was a slender margin, and he was intensely eager to win this first game, not only because of the enormous crowd that had turned out to see their favorites win, but because of the moral effect on his players of "getting the jump" on at least four of the other teams by winning the first game of the season.
When Joe came to the bat for the second time, there was a short consultation between Albaugh and his catcher, in which the astute manager of the Braves, Sutton, joined. Then Albaugh deliberately pitched four wild balls, and Joe trotted down to first.
There was a chorus of jeers and catcalls from the crowds.
"Got you rattled by that homer, did he?"
"You're a sport--I don't think!"
"Don't blame you for being afraid to let him hit it!"
"He'll lose the ball next time!"
"Crawl into a hole and pull the hole in after you!"
But although it was not exactly sportsmanlike, it was within the rules of the game, and when Mylert went out on a fly a moment later, making the third out and leaving Joe stranded at first, Albaugh took off his glove and waved it mockingly at his tormentors.
In the sixth inning the Bostons took their turn at scoring. Kopf sent an easy grounder to Iredell, who ordinarily would have eaten it up. This time, however, he fumbled it for a moment, and then in his haste to make up for the mishap threw wild to first. Burkett made a great jump for it, but it went high over his head to the right field fence, and before Burkett could regain it Kopf was on third. Mitchell tried to bring him home, but his efforts resulted in a weak grounder along the third base line. It looked as though the ball would roll over the foul line, and Willis waited too long. It proved to be fair, and by this time Mitchell was legging it for second. Willis threw low and the ball hit the bag, bounding out into center field. Wheeler ran in and got it, making a superb throw to the plate. But it was too late, and both Kopf and Mitchell had scored, putting Boston in the lead by two runs to one.
Joe put on steam and struck out the next three batters. But the mischief had been done. Two miserable errors had given them as many unearned runs. Now all they had to do was to keep the Giants scoreless and the game would be won.
Poor Iredell and Willis were disconsolate as they came in to the bench and their discomfiture was not lessened by the tongue lashing that McRae gave them. Joe, too, might naturally have been angered at the wretched support accorded to him in a game where he was showing such airtight pitching, but he was too fair and generous to find fault with comrades for a blunder that all athletes make more or less often.
"Never mind, boys," he said to them in an undertone, as he sat beside them on the bench. "Just get busy with your bats and we'll pull the game out of the fire yet."
Although the Giants made a desperate rally and in each of the next two innings got men on second and third, the score was unchanged and the game still "in the fire" when the eighth inning ended. Joe in the meantime had pitched with such effect that in the two innings not a man reached first.
The ninth inning came, and the Giants took the field for the last time.
"Now Joe," said McRae, as the former picked up his glove to walk out to the box, "hold them down just for one more inning, and we'll have a chance either to tie or win, if our boobs can wake up enough to do a little batting. The head of their batting order is coming up, but the way you've been pitching up to now they all look alike to you."
"I'll pitch my head off if necessary," Joe assured him.
The twirling that Joe did in that last inning was phenomenal. His control of the ball was almost uncanny. It writhed and twisted about the bats like a snake. Neale, the slugger of the Braves, struck out on the first three balls pitched. Kopf lifted a foul that came down straight over the plate, where Mylert gathered it in. Mitchell drove the ball straight over Joe's head, but the latter leaped high in the air and speared it with his gloved hand, while the stands rocked with applause.
McRae gathered the Giants about him as they came in from the field.
"Now you fellows listen to me," he commanded. "You've got to cop this game. No excuses. You've got to. Show these bean-eaters where they get off. Make them look like thirty cents. Knock the cover off the ball. Go in and win!"
CHAPTER VII
STEALING HOME
Willis was first to the bat, and he strode to the plate with blood in his eye. He was still smarting from the sharp words of the manager and was anxious for a chance to redeem himself. A hit would help to wipe out the memory of his error.
The first ball was an outshoot that just cut the corner of the plate. Willis struck at it and missed. The next one was a straight ball about knee high. Willis gave it a resounding clout, and it soared out toward the flagpole in left field.
Willis was off with the crack of the bat, footing it down to first, while a roar went up from the stands. It looked like a sure home run, and it was clear that the Boston left fielder could not get under it. The runner was well on his way to second before the ball touched the ground.
"Foul ball!" called the umpire.
There was a groan from the Giant rooters, and Robbie rushed from the dugout to protest. The umpire coldly waved him off.
"I said foul and that settles it," he declared, at the same time waving to Willis to come back to the plate.
It was a very disgruntled Willis that complied, and he took up his bat mumbling something about "blind" and "robber."
"What's that?" asked the umpire sharply.
"Nothing," growled Willis, as he squared himself to meet the next ball. It was a bad one, and he let it go by. The next suited him, and he sent a sizzling grounder between second and third, on which he might have made a double, had he been quicker on his feet. But he was of the "ice wagon" type and had to be content with a single.
Still it was a hit, and it put all the Giants on their toes in an instant. Their coachers at first and third began a chattering designed to rattle the pitcher. McRae hustled Denton out of the dugout with directions to sacrifice. The latter did his best, but Albaugh pounced on the ball and shot it to second, putting Willis out. Douglas whipped the ball to first in an endeavor to complete a double play, but Denton beat the ball by a step.
With one man out and the tail end of the Giant batting order coming up the outlook was decidedly gloomy. Hope revived, however, when Allen laced a single to left. It was a clean hit, but Mitchell ran in on it and fielded so smartly that Denton was held at second.
With two men on bases, Joe came to the bat, while the great throng gave him an ovation.
"Win your own game, Matson," was shouted at him from thousands of throats.
"Give the ball a ride!"
"Another homer, Joe!"
"Give the ball a passport and send it out of the country!"
These and other encouraging cries greeted Joe as he waited for the ball. Albaugh looked at him with some apprehension. His respect for him as a batter had grown considerably since the beginning of the game.
Joe refused to offer at the first ball, which was high and wide. Menken caught it and instead of returning it to the pitcher shot it down to second. Denton had taken too long a lead off the base and was trapped. His first impulse was to slide back to the bag, but he saw that he was too late for that and set out for third. The whole Boston infield joined in running him down, and despite his doubling and twisting, he was run down and put out near third. During the fracas, Allen reached second, but this was poor consolation, for now two men were out.
Albaugh grinned as he picked up the ball and stepped on the mound. Baseball Joe resolved to knock that grin off his face.
The ball came toward the plate like a bullet. Joe timed it perfectly, and poled a tremendous hit out toward center.
"A homer! A homer!" yelled the crowd, wild with excitement.
By the time Allen had galloped over the plate, Joe had rounded second, running like a frightened jackrabbit. But in the meantime, Mitchell, by a herculean effort, had managed to knock down the ball, after it had struck the ground and was speeding toward the fence. He straightened up and threw it in a line to third. It came plump into the waiting hands of the guardian of the bag. But Joe had already pulled up there, panting a little, but with his heart full of exultation.
"Jumping Jehoshaphat, how that boy can hit!" cried McRae, while Joe's comrades jigged about and threw their caps into the air.
"As pretty a three-bagger as I ever saw," declared Robson. "That ties the score anyway. Now if Mylert can only bring him in, the game's ours."
Albaugh, though sore and enraged, still maintained perfect control of the ball. Twice in succession he sent it whizzing over the plate, and twice Mylert missed it by inches. Perhaps he was too anxious, but it was evident that his batting eye was off.
Albaugh sensed this, and felt so sure of his victim that he paid little attention to third. Suddenly, as Albaugh began to wind up for his pitch, Joe darted down the line for the plate. A warning cry from Menken and a roar from the crowd told Albaugh what was happening. He stopped his windup and threw to Menken, who was covering the rubber and yelling to him to throw. He threw high in his excitement. Menken caught the ball and bent down, just as Joe slid over the plate in a cloud of dust. Menken dabbed frantically at him, and they rolled on the ground together.
"Safe!" cried the umpire.
The game was won and the Giants had "got the jump."
The crowd went mad. By thousands they rushed down from the stands and swarmed down over the field. Joe saw them coming and made a dash for the clubhouse. But before he had reached it, the crowd had closed in about him, and it was only by the assistance of his mates, who cleared a way for him, that he could get away from their wild enthusiasm and slip into its welcome shelter.
In a few minutes more the whole team had gathered there, laughing and shouting and going over the details of the game, while they took the showers and changed into their street clothes. There too came Robbie and McRae, as full of glee and happiness as the rest.
"You old rascal!" chortled Robbie, as he slapped Joe on the back. "What are you trying to do? Be the whole team--gyp the other fellows out of their jobs? Such pitching, such batting--and then to cap it all by stealing home! Joe, old boy, I've seen lots of ball games, but your work to-day takes the cake."
McRae, though less demonstrative, was not a whit less delighted.
"Great work, Matson," he said. "Keep that up and there isn't a man in either league will be able to touch you."
Jim too was fairly stuttering with his pride in his chum's achievements.
"Picked the game right out of the fire," he exulted. "Tied it first and won it afterward. Joe old fellow, you're in a class by yourself. And that steal home! They'll talk about it all the season."
"Well," replied Baseball Joe, with a grin, "I got rather homesick on third, and that home plate looked mighty good to me."
Then Hughson came along with his congratulations, and these perhaps were the greatest reward that Joe could have asked for his day's work.
For Hughson had been Joe's baseball idol for the last ten years. For at least that period of time, Hughson had been confessedly the greatest pitcher that baseball had ever seen. During that decade he had been the mainstay of the Giant team. When Hughson was slated to pitch, his mates were ready to chalk that game up in advance as won. And on the other hand, the opposing team was almost ready to concede the game before it was played. He had speed, curves and everything. At the most critical stage of a game he never lost his head. There might be three men on bases and none out, but that never disturbed Hughson. He would bring his wonderful "fadeaway" into action and the batters would go down like ninepins. He had brawn--plenty of it--but in addition he had brain, and when it came to strategy and quick thinking there was no one to be compared with him.
But it was not merely his remarkable skill that had made him the hero of the baseball world. He was a gentleman through and through. He had had a college training and could meet and talk with educated men on equal terms. He was upright in his principles, clean in his living, quiet, plain, and unassuming. He was hail fellow well met with the other members of his team, and in fact with baseball players everywhere. Everybody liked him, and those who knew him best had a warm affection for him.
Nor was there the slightest touch of jealousy about him. If any one else could take his laurels by showing that he was a better pitcher, Hughson welcomed the opportunity to give him every chance to do so. He was wholly wrapped up in the success of his team, and was only too glad to see any one helping to gain that success. His treatment of Joe since the latter had joined the team had been cordial in the extreme. He coached him, encouraged him, and did everything in his power to make him the star pitcher he saw he was destined to become.
Hughson had been hurt in a collision just before the final games of the previous year, and had not been able to take part in the World Series. His arm had become better, but he was still in no condition to pitch. So that it had been merely as a spectator that he had witnessed the triumph of the Giants in this opening game of the season.
Joe's eyes lighted up as he saw Hughson coming toward him with extended hand.
CHAPTER VIII
A BASEBALL IDOL
"Put her there, Matson!" cried Hughson, his face beaming with pleasure. "I never saw better pitching than you showed us to-day."
Joe's face flushed. He shook Hughson's hand heartily.
"Oh, it's nothing compared with lots of games you've pitched, Hughson," he said. "I'm only in the infant class yet."
"A mighty husky infant," laughed Hughson. "At least that's what the Bostons think. It was a hard game for them to lose, just when they thought they had it tucked away in their bat bag."
"I feel rather sorry for Albaugh," said Joe. "He pitched a peach of a game and deserved to win."
"He sure did," conceded Hughson. "And nine times out of ten that kind of pitching would have won. But to-day he had the hard luck to be pitted against a better man. They got only one clean hit off of you. The other was a scratch. A little more and you'd have pitched a no-hit game. And that's going some for the first game of the season, I'll tell the world.
"Another thing that tickled me," he went on, "was to see him pass you to first rather than give you a chance to hit the ball. That's a compliment to all the boxmen of the country. As a rule we're easy meat. The other pitchers are glad to see us come up to the plate. It has got to be a proverb that pitchers can't hit. But you gave the lie to that proverb to-day. Those two hits of yours were ticketed for the fence. And that steal home was the classiest thing I've seen for a blue moon. That's the kind of thinking that wins ball games. Do the thing the other fellow doesn't expect you to do."
"It was a case of touch and go," replied Joe. "I knew that I had touched the plate before Menken put the ball on me, but I wasn't sure the umpire would see it the same way. But he did, and that's all that matters. By the way, Hughson, how is that arm of yours coming along?"
"Not as well as I should like," responded Hughson, while a touch of gloom came into his face. "There are days when it feels all right, and other days when I can't lift it without pain. I've been down to see Reese again about it, and he can't see anything radically wrong with it. Says I'll have to be patient and give it time. But it's mighty hard to have to sit on the bench when I'm fairly aching to get in the box again."
"I know just how you must feel," returned Joe sympathetically. "The boys are all rooting for you to get back into harness again. It doesn't seem the same old team with you out of the running."
"I'll be back with bells on before long," answered Hughson with a smile, as he moved on to have a chat with Robbie.
"Isn't he a prince?" Joe remarked admiringly to Jim, as they watched the back of the tall figure.
"He sure is an honor to the game," returned Jim. "Here's hoping that he'll soon be on deck again."
The next day the New York papers were full of the story of the game. There was a general feeling of jubilation over the auspicious start by the Giants, a feeling that was the more pronounced, because of the feeling that had previously prevailed that Hughson's continued disability would be a serious handicap to the chances of again winning the pennant.
One great subject dwelt upon in all the accounts was the marvelous pitching that Joe had shown. The sporting reporters "spread themselves" on the way he had held the Bostons in the hollow of his hand. To allow only two hits in the opening game, and one of them a scratch, was a feat that they dwelt upon at length.
But scarcely less space was devoted to his batting. Although it was recalled that in the previous year he had had a creditable average at the bat, considering that he was a pitcher, his power as a twirler had kept his other qualities in the shade. Comment was made on the perfect way he had timed the ball and of the fact that his homer had gone nearly to the end of the grounds almost on a straight line, a fact that attested the tremendous power behind the hit. One of the papers headed its article: "Is There to Be a New Batting King?" and went on to say among other things:
"It is an extraordinary thing to pitch a two-hit game at the beginning of the season. But it is still more extraordinary that, despite the strain on the muscles and nerves of the pitcher who achieves that distinction, he should also have a perfect batting average for the day. That is what occurred yesterday. In four times at the bat he was passed twice and the other times poled out a triple and a home run. And this was done against heady and effective pitching, for Albaugh has seldom showed better form than in yesterday's game.
"One might have thought that with this record Matson would have called it a day and let it go at that. But he was still not satisfied. In the ninth, with two men out and two strikes called on Mylert, he put the game on ice by stealing home from third--as unexpected and dazzling a play as we shall probably be fortunate enough to see this year. It was the climax of a wonderful game.
"McRae never made a shrewder deal than when he secured this phenomenal pitcher from St. Louis. We said this last year, when Matson's great pitching disposed of Chicago's chances for the pennant. We said it again when in the World Series he bore the heft of the pitcher's burden and made his team champions of the world. But a true thing will bear repeating twice or even thrice, and so we say it now with added emphasis."
All of the comment was in the same laudatory strain, although in reference to his batting, one paper cautioned its readers that not too much importance was to be attached to that. It was probably one of Matson's good days, and one swallow did not make a summer. But whether he kept up his remarkable batting or not, the New York public would ask nothing more of him than to keep up his magnificent work in the box.
Joe would not have been human if he had not enjoyed the praise that was showered upon him in the columns that he and Jim read with interest the next morning. It was pleasant to know that his work was appreciated. But he was far too sensible to be unduly elated or to get a "swelled head" in consequence. He knew how quickly a popular idol could be dethroned, and he did not want the public to set up an ideal that he could not live up to.
It was for that reason that he read with especial approval the article that warned against expecting him to be a batting phenomenon because of his performance of yesterday.
"That fellow's got it right," he remarked to Jim, as he pointed to the paragraph in question. "I just had luck yesterday in straightening out Albaugh's slants. Another time and I might be as helpless as a baby."
"Luck, nothing!" replied Jim, who had no patience with Joe's depreciation of himself. "There was nothing fluky about those hits. You timed them perfectly and soaked the ball right on the nose. And look at the way you've been lining them out in training this spring. Wake up, man. You're not only the king of pitchers, but you've got it in you to become the king of sluggers."
"Oh, quit your kidding," protested Joe.
"I'm not kidding," Jim affirmed earnestly. "It's the solemn truth. You'll win many a game this year not only by your pitching but by your batting too. Just put a pin in that."
At this moment a bellboy tapped at the door, and being told to come in, handed Joe two telegrams. He tore them open in haste. The first was from Reggie and read:
"Keep it up, old top. Simply ripping, don't you know."
Joe laughed and passed it on to Jim.
"Sounds just like the old boy, doesn't it?" he commented.
The second one was from Mabel:
"So proud of you, Joe. Not surprised though. Best love. Am writing."
Jim did not see this one, but it went promptly into that one of Joe's pockets that was nearest his heart, the same one that carried the little glove of Mabel's that had been his inspiration in all his victorious baseball campaigns.
After a hearty breakfast, the chums went out for a stroll. Neither was slated to pitch for that day, and they had no immediate weight of responsibility on their minds. Markwith, the left-handed twirler of the Giants, would do the box work that day unless McRae altered his plans.
"Hope Red puts it over the Braves to-day the way you did yesterday," remarked Jim, as they sauntered along.
"I hope so," echoed Joe. "The old boy seems to be in good shape, and they've usually had trouble in hitting him. They'll be out for blood though, and if they put in Belden against him it ought to be a pretty battle. Markwith beat him the last time he was pitted against him, but only by a hair."
It was a glorious spring morning, and as they had plenty of time they prolonged their walk far up on the west side of the city. As they were approaching a corner, they saw a rather shabbily dressed man slouching toward them.
Jim gave him a casual glance, and then clutched Joe by the arm.
"Look who's coming, Joe!" he exclaimed. "It's Bugs Hartley!"
CHAPTER IX
AN OLD ENEMY
Baseball Joe started as he looked at the man more closely.
"Bugs Hartley!" he ejaculated. "I thought we'd seen the last of that fellow. I imagined that by this time he'd be in jail or in a lunatic asylum."
"He'll get there some time likely enough," replied Jim. "But just now he's here. That's Bugs as sure as shooting."
It was evident that the man had recognized them also, for he stopped suddenly, as though debating whether to advance or retreat. He decided on the former course, and with an air of bravado came toward them. Joe and Jim would have passed him without speaking, but he planted himself squarely in their path, a malignant look glowing in his bleary eyes.
"So here you are again," he snarled, addressing himself to Joe.
"Sure thing," answered Joe coolly. "You see me, don't you?"
"I see you all right," replied Hartley, as his eye took in Joe's well-dressed form. "All dolled up too. The man who took the bread and butter out of my mouth. Oh, I see you all right, worse luck."
Bugs Hartley had been a well known character in baseball for some years. He had gained his nickname from his erratic habits. He had never been any too strong mentally, and his addiction to liquor had still further contributed to throw him off his balance. But he had been a remarkable pitcher, with a throwing arm that made up for some of his mental deficiencies, and had played in several major league clubs. For some years he had been a member of the Giants, and was still a member when Joe joined the team. His vicious habits and utter failure to obey the rules of discipline had made him a thorn in his manager's side, but McRae had tolerated him because of his unusual skill in the box.
Joe had felt sorry for the man, and had done all he could to help him along. Once he had found him wandering intoxicated in the streets on the eve of an important game, and had got him off quietly to bed so as to hide the matter from McRae. But there was no gratitude in Hartley's disposition, and besides he was consumed with envy at seeing Joe's rapid progress in his profession, while he himself, owing to his dissipation, was going backward.
On one occasion, he had tried to queer Joe by doping his coffee just before the latter was scheduled to pitch in a game with Philadelphia. His hatred was increased when, after being knocked out of the box during a game, Joe had taken his place and won out. McRae at last lost patience with him and gave him his walking papers. Hartley's twisted brain attributed this to Joe, though as a matter of fact Joe had asked McRae to give Bugs another chance.
Hartley's reputation was so bad as a man and it was so generally understood that he was through as a pitcher that no other club cared to engage him. This increased his bitterness against the supposed author of his misfortunes. On one occasion he had tried to injure Joe in a dark street by hurling a jagged bolt of iron at his head, and the only thing that saved Baseball Joe was that at the moment he had stooped to adjust his shoelace. At that time Joe might have handed him over to the police, but instead he let him go with a warning. Now he had again met this dangerous semi-lunatic in the streets of New York.
"Now look here, Bugs," said Joe quietly and decidedly. "I'm just about tired of that kind of talk. I've done everything I could for you, and in return you've doped me and otherwise tried to hurt me. You've been your own worst enemy. I'm sorry if you're hard up, and if you need money I'll give it to you. But I want you to keep away from me, and if there's any more funny business you won't get off as easily as you did last time."
"I don't want your money," snapped Bugs. "I'm after you, and I'll get you yet."
"I don't think you'd better try it. It won't get you anywhere, except perhaps in jail."
"There's ways of doing it," growled Hartley. "Ways that you ain't dreamin' of."
A sudden thought struck Joe.
"Do you mean anonymous letters?" he asked, looking keenly into Hartley's eyes.
"Anon-non--what do you mean?" the man asked sullenly. He was an illiterate man and had probably never heard the word before.
"Letters without any name signed to them," persisted Joe.
"Aw! what are you giving me?" snapped Hartley. "I don't know what you're talking about."
His mystification was so genuine that Joe knew that his shot, fired at random, had missed the mark. He could eliminate Hartley at once as a possible author of the anonymous letter Mabel had received.
"Never mind," said Joe. "Now one last word, Bugs. Twice you've tried to do me up and twice you've failed. Don't let it happen a third time. It will be three strikes and out for you if you do."
He made a move to pass on. Hartley seemed for a moment as though he would bar the way, but the steely look in Joe's eyes made him think better of it. With a muttered imprecation he stepped aside, and the two friends moved on.
"A bad egg," remarked Jim, as they walked along.
"I don't know whether he's just bad or is mad," replied Joe regretfully. "A combination of both I suppose. He's got the fixed idea that I've done him a wrong of some kind and his poor brain hasn't room for anything else. It's too bad to see a man that was once a great pitcher go to the dogs the way he has. I suppose he picks up a few dollars now and then by pitching for semi-professional teams. But most of that I suppose is dissipated."
"Well, you want to keep on your guard against him, Joe," warned Jim, in some anxiety. "A crazy man makes a dangerous enemy."
"Oh, I don't think there's any need of worrying about Bugs," rejoined Joe carelessly. "The chances are ten to one we'll never run across him again."
The encounter had rather spoiled their morning, and they hailed a taxicab to take them back to their hotel. There they had lunch and then rode up to the Polo Grounds for the game.
As Joe had predicted, the Bostons that afternoon were out for blood and they evened up the score. Markwith pitched a good game except for one bad inning when he lost control, and hits, sandwiched in with passes and a wild pitch, let in three runs. He braced up after that, but it was too late, and the Giants had to take the little end of the score.
In the next two weeks the Giants met the rest of the Eastern teams, and, taking it as a whole, the result was satisfactory. They had no trouble in taking the Phillies into camp, for that once great team had been shot to pieces. The majority of the Boston games also went to the Giants' credit. They met a snag, however, in Brooklyn, and the team from over the bridge took four games out of six from their Manhattan rivals. But then the Brooklyns always had been a hoodoo for the Giants, and in this season, as in many others, they lived up to the tradition.
Still the Giants wound up their first Eastern series with a percentage of 610, which was respectable if not brilliant. But now their real test was coming. They were about to make their first invasion of the West, where the teams were much stronger than those of the East. Cincinnati was going strong under the great leader who had once piloted the Phillies to a championship. Chicago was quite as formidable as in the year before, when the Giants had just nosed them out at the finish. St. Louis, though perhaps the least to be feared, was developing sluggers that would put the Giants' pitchers on their mettle. But most of all to be feared was Pittsburgh, which had been going through the rest of the Western teams like a prairie fire.
"Pittsburgh's the enemy," McRae told his men, and Robbie agreed with him. "Beat those birds and you'll cop the flag!"
CHAPTER X
THREE IN A ROW
The first jump of the team was to Cincinnati, and there they found their work cut out for them. The Reds had just lost three out of four to Pittsburgh, and they had got such a talking to from their manager, from the fans, and from the press of the city that they knew they had to do something to redeem themselves. They knew that if they could hold the Giants even, it would be something; if they could take three out of four they would be forgiven; while if they could make a clean sweep of the series they would "own the town."
It was a singular thing what delight all the Western teams, and for that matter all the teams of the League, took in beating the Giants. A victory over them, of course, did not count any more in the final score than a victory over one of the tailenders; but there was a fiendish satisfaction in taking the scalps of the team from the "Big Town." So that the managers always saved their best pitchers for the games with the Giants, while they took a chance with their second string pitchers against the other teams. This of course was a compliment; but it was a compliment that the Giants did not especially appreciate, for it made their task harder than that of any other team in the League.
So when the Giants learned that Dutch Rutter was to try his prowess against them in the opening game, they were not surprised. Rutter was a left-hander who had made a phenomenal record the preceding year, and he had been especially rested up and groomed with the Giant series in view. Meran, the manager, had figured that if he could win the first game with Rutter he could come back with him in the fourth, and thus have at least a chance of getting an even break on the series.
But McRae, anticipating such a move, had so arranged his own selection of pitchers that Joe was in line for the first game, and he was not afraid to pit his "ace" against the star boxman of the Cincinnatis.
His confidence was justified, for Baseball Joe won out after a gruelling struggle. In Rutter he had found an opponent worthy of his steel. For six innings neither team broke into the run column. Rutter had superb control for a left-hander, and he showed a most dazzling assortment of curves and slants. But Joe came back at him with the same brand of pitching that he had shown in the opening game, and the Cincinnati batsmen were turned back from the plate bewildered and disgruntled. In vain their manager raved and stormed.
"Why don't you hit him?" he asked of his star slugger, as the latter came back to the bench, after having been called out on strikes.
"Hit him!" Duncan came back at him. "What chance have I got of hitting him, when I can't even hit the ball he pitches?"
Still the Giants had a scare thrown into them when in the ninth inning, by a succession of fumbles and wild throws, the Cincinnatis had three men on bases and none out. As they themselves had only one run, scored in the seventh inning by a three base hit by Joe, aided by a clean single by Mylert, the chances looked exceedingly good that the Cincinnatis might tie the score or win the game. A clean single would have brought in one run and probably two.
But Baseball Joe was always at his best when most depended on him. While the coachers tried to rattle him and the crowds frantically adjured Thompson, who was at the bat, to bring the men on bases in to the plate, Joe was as cool as a cucumber.
He threw a swift high one to Thompson which the latter missed by three inches. Mylert threw the ball back to Joe, who stopped it with his foot and stooped as though to adjust his shoe lace. He fumbled an instant with the lace, and then suddenly picking up the ball hurled it to second like a shot. Emden, who was taking a long lead off the base, tried to scramble back, but Denton had the ball on him like a flash. Mellen who was on third made a bolt for the plate, but Denton shot the ball to Mylert, and Mellen was run down between third and home. While this was going on, Gallagher had taken second, and profiting by the running down of Mellen, kept on half way to third. He did not dare go all the way to third, because Mellen still had a chance to get back to that base. But the instant Mellen was touched out, Joe, who had taken part in running him down, shot the ball to Willis at third and Gallagher was caught between the second and third bags. Three men were out, the game was over, and the Giants had begun their Western invasion with a 1 to 0 victory.
[Illustration: SUDDENLY PICKING UP THE BALL HE HURLED IT TO SECOND.]
Joe's quick thinking had cleared the bags in a twinkling. It had all come so suddenly that the crowd was dumbfounded. Meran, the Cincinnati manager, sat on the bench with his mouth open like a man in a daze. His men were equally "flabbergasted." Thompson still stood at the plate with his bat in hand. It seemed to him that a bunco game had been played on him, and he was still trying to fathom it.
Then at last the crowd woke up. They hated to see the home team lose, but they could not restrain their meed of admiration and applause. The stands fairly rocked with cheering. They had seen a play that they could talk about all their lives, one that happens perhaps once in a generation, one that they would probably never see again.
McRae and Robbie for a moment acted like men in a trance. Over Robbie's rubicund face chased all the colors of the chameleon. It almost seemed as though he might have a stroke of apoplexy. Then at last he turned to McRae and smote him mightily on the knees.
"Did you see it, John?" he roared. "Did you see it?"
"I saw it," answered McRae. "But for the love of Pete, Robbie, keep that pile driver off my knees. Yes, I saw it, and I don't mind saying that I never saw anything like it in my thirty years of baseball. I have to pinch myself to make sure I'm not dreaming."
"A miracle man, that's what he is!" ejaculated Robbie. "That wing of his is wonderful, but it's the head on him that tops any other in the league. He wasn't behind the door when brains were given out."
Meran, the Cincinnati manager, who was a good sport, after he had recovered from his astonishment, came over to the Giants' bench and shook hands with McRae and Robson.
"It was a hard game to lose, John," he said to the Giants' manager. "I thought we had it sewed up in the ninth. But there's no use bucking against that pitcher of yours. I'm only glad that you can't pitch him in all your games."
Joe, flushed and smiling, was overwhelmed with congratulations, but he made light of his feat, as was his custom.
"It was simple enough," he protested. "I had the luck to catch Emden off second and the boys did all the rest."
"Simple enough," mimicked Jim. "Oh, yes, it was simple enough. That's the reason it happens every day of the week."
It was a good beginning, but the old proverb that "a good beginning makes a bad ending" was illustrated in this Western tour. For some reason most of the Giant pitchers could not "get going." Jim pulled out a victory in the Cincinnati series, but Markwith lost his game, and Hughson, who tried to pitch one of the games, found that he was not yet in shape.
That series ended two and two. In Chicago the Giants had to be content with only one victory out of the series. They hoped to make up for this in St. Louis. But they found that the fame of "Murderers' Row" had not been exaggerated, and there was a perfect rain of hits from the Cardinals' bats that took two games out of three, the fourth that had been scheduled being held up by rain.
When the team swung around to Pittsburgh, there were some added wrinkles between McRae's brows.
"If we can only break even with Cincinnati and get the little end of it in Chicago and St. Louis, what will Pittsburgh do to us?" he asked Robbie, with a groan.
"What Pittsburgh will do to us, John," replied Robbie soberly, "is a sin and a shame!"
CHAPTER XI
RIGHT FROM THE SHOULDER
The Smoky City was all agog over the games. It had won championships before, but that was in the days of Fred Clarke and Honus Wagner and other fence breakers. It had been a good many years since it had seen a pennant floating over Forbes Field, and old-timers were wont to shake their heads sadly and say they never would see it again.
But this year the "dope" pointed in the right direction. The management of the team had strengthened the weak point in the infield by a winter trade that had brought to them "Rabbit" Baskerville, the crackerjack shortstop of the Braves. The benefit of the change had been manifested in the spring practice when the Rabbit had put new pep and ginger in the team. And in the regular games so far they had had little difficulty in winning a large majority from their rivals. How they would hold out against the Giants was the problem that yet remained to be solved. But unless the Giants showed a decided reversal from the form in which they had been playing recently, it would not be so very hard to take them also into camp.
The Giants themselves felt none too much confidence, as they prepared for this important series. One bit of luck came to them, however, in the return at this juncture of Larry Barrett to the team. He had been down with an attack of intermittent fever that had kept him out of part of the spring practice and had prevented him thus far from playing in any of the regular games. But on the team's arrival in Pittsburgh, they found Barrett waiting for them, looking a little lighter than usual, but declaring himself in excellent condition and fit to play the game of his life.
The previous year he had guarded the keystone bag, and by general consent was regarded as the best second baseman in the League. His batting too was a powerful asset to the team, as season after season he ranked among the .300 hitters. Apart from his superb playing at bat and in the field, he also helped to keep the boys in good spirits. His wit and love of fun had gained him the nickname of "Laughing Larry," and no team of which Larry was a member could stay long in the doleful dumps.
His coming made necessary a change in the team. Allen, who had not made a success in playing the "sun field," was benched, and Denton, whose batting could not be spared, was shifted to right field in his place, while Larry resumed his old position at second.
On the morning of the day of the first game, McRae called his players together for a few words of counsel. At least he called it counsel. The players were apt to refer to it as roasting.
"I've been thinking," he said, "that I've got the greatest collection of false alarms of any manager in either of the big leagues."
This was not an especially encouraging beginning, but each of the men tried to look as though the manager could not by any possibility be referring to him. Some of them hoped that he would not descend from generalities to particulars.
The manager's keen eyes ranged around the circle as though looking for contradiction. There was a silence as of the tomb.
"You fellows haven't been playing baseball," he went on. "You've been playing hooky. Look at the way you've let the other teams walk over you. The Chicagos took three out of four from you. The Cardinals grabbed two out of three, and it's only the mercy of heaven that rain kept them from copping another. Look at the way you've been batting. Every team in the League except the Phillies has a better average. You've got enough beef about you to knock the ball out of the lot, and you've been doing fungo hitting, knocking up pop flies. What in the name of seven spittin' cats do you mean by it? Every time you collect your salaries you ought to be arrested for getting money on false pretenses."
He paused for a moment, and some of the more hopeful players thought that perhaps he was through. But he was only getting his breath. He faced them scornfully.
"Giants!" he exclaimed with sarcasm. "Giants you call yourselves. Get wise to yourselves. If you're Giants, I'm a Chinaman. It's dwarfs you are, pygmies. Now I want you boobs to get one thing into your heads. Get it straight. You've got to win this series from Pittsburgh. Do you get me? You've got to! If you don't, I'll disband the whole team and start getting another one from the old ladies' home."
Much more he said to the same effect, with the result that when the men, with heightened color and nerves rasped by his caustic tongue lashing, left the clubhouse, they were in red-hot fighting mood. Pygmies were they? Well, on the ball field they'd prove to McRae that he didn't know what he was talking about.
An immense crowd was present that filled Forbes Field to capacity when the bell rang for the beginning of the game. Joe had pitched only two days before, and McRae decided to send Markwith into the box.
In the first inning, Dawley, the Pittsburgh pitcher, found it hard to locate the plate, and Curry was passed to first. On the hit and run play, Iredell popped to the pitcher, and Curry had all he could do to get back to first. Burkett lined a clean hit over the second baseman's head, but by sharp fielding Curry was kept from going beyond the middle bag. On the next ball pitched, Curry tried to steal third but was thrown out. Burkett in the meantime had got to second, but he was left there when Wheeler sent a long fly to center that Ralston captured after a hard run.
The Pittsburghs were not long in proving that they had their batting clothes on. Ralston landed on the first ball that Markwith sent up for a home run. The crowd chortled with glee, and the Giants and the few supporters they had in the stands were correspondingly glum. The blow seemed to shake Markwith's nerve, and the next batter was passed. Bemis sent a sizzling grounder to Iredell and it bounced off his glove, the batter reaching first and Baskerville taking second on the play. Astley dribbled a slow one to Markwith, who turned to throw to third, but finding that Baskerville was sure of making the bag, turned and threw high to Burkett at first. The tall first baseman leaped high in the air and knocked it down, but not in time to get his man. With the bases full Brown slapped a two bagger to center that cleared the bases, three men galloping over the plate in succession.
It was evidently not Markwith's day, and McRae beckoned him to come in to the bench while the crowd jeered the visitors and cheered their own favorites. Poor Markwith looked disconsolate enough, and after a moment's conference with McRae, which he was not anxious to prolong, he meandered over the field to the showers.
"Bring on the next victim!" taunted some of the spectators. "All pitchers look alike to us to-day. Next dead one to the front."
McRae held a brief consultation with Robbie, and then nodded to Jim.
"Go to it, Jim," encouraged Joe. "I'm rooting for you, old man. Pull some of the feathers out of those birds. It's a tough job bucking against a four run lead, but you're the boy to do it."
"I'll do my best," answered Jim, as he put on his glove and went into the box.
It was the cue for the crowd to try to rattle him. The coachers began chattering like a lot of magpies, and the man on second began to dance about the bag and shout to Garrity, the next batsman, to bring him in.
Jim sent one over the plate that cut it in half, but the batsman had orders to wait him out, under the supposition that he would be wild. So he let the second one go by also.
"Strike two!" called the umpire.
Garrity braced. This was getting serious. This time Jim resorted to a fadeaway that Garrity swung at with all his might. But the ball eluded him and dropped into Mylert's mitt.
"You're out!" snapped the umpire, waving him away from the plate.
CHAPTER XII
JIM'S WINNING WAYS
"Good boy, Jim!" cried Joe, as his chum came in to the bench. "You put the Indian sign on that fellow all right. Just hold them down and trust to the boys to bat in some runs to even up the score."
But if the boys had any such intentions they certainly took their time about it. Larry, to be sure, poled out a long hit to right that had all the signs of a homer, but Astley backed up and fairly picked it off the wall. Denton cracked out a single between first and second. Jim hit sharply to third, and O'Connor by a superb stop got the ball to first in time, Denton in the meantime reaching second. Mylert swung savagely at the ball, but it went up straight in the air and Dawley gathered it in.
In their half of the second, the Pittsburghs increased their lead to five. O'Connor struck out on the first three balls pitched, but Jenkins caught the ball on the nose for a single to center. Curry thought he had a chance to make a catch, and ran in for it, instead of waiting for it on a bound. By this mistake of judgment the ball got past him, and before it could be retrieved Jenkins by fast running had crossed the plate. Dawley was easy on a bounder to Willis, and Ralston, in trying to duck away from a high incurve, struck the ball with his bat and sent it rolling to Burkett for an out.
"Not much nourishment for us in that inning," muttered McRae, as he watched the man chalking up another run for Pittsburgh on the big scoreboard at the side of the field.
"No," agreed Robbie. "But you'll notice that the run wasn't earned. If that hit had been played right, Jenkins would have been held for a single."
"Give them a row of goose eggs, Dawley," was the advice shouted to the Pittsburgh pitcher, as he stepped into the box.
Dawley grinned with supreme confidence. And for the third and fourth inning his confidence seemed justified. The ball came zipping over the plate with all sorts of twists and contortions, and the Giants seemed helpless before him. They either struck out or put up feeble flies and fouls that were easily gathered up. Only one hit went outside the diamond and that plumped square into the hands of the waiting center fielder.
But in the meantime, the Pittsburghs were getting a little uneasy about the kind of pitching that Jim was sending across. His fast ball went so swiftly that the eye could scarcely follow it. He had perfect control, and the "hop" on the ball just before it got to the plate was working to perfection. The way he worked the corners of the plate was a revelation. And in the fourth inning, when he struck out the side on nine pitched balls, a ripple of applause was forced from the spectators, despite their desire to see the home team win.
"You're going like a house afire, old man," exclaimed Joe, as the Giants came in for their turn.
"That's what he is," agreed Robbie, who had overheard the remark. "But it won't do any good unless our boys wake up and do something with their bats. That five run lead is bad medicine."
It did not look any better to the Giants than it did to Robbie, and in the fifth inning they began to come to life. Dawley, for the first time, seemed to be a little shaky in his control. He passed Iredell and then tried to fool Burkett on a slow ball. But the latter timed it exactly and poled it out between left and center for a beautiful three-bagger. Iredell scored easily and a roar went up from the men in the Giants' dugout as he crossed the plate.
"Here's where we start a rally, boys!" cried Robbie. "Every man on his toes now. Here's where we send this pitcher to the showers."
Wheeler went to the plate with directions to sacrifice, which he did neatly by sending a slow roller to first, on which Burkett scored. Willis clipped out a liner to right, which was really only good for a single, but in trying to stretch it to a two baser he fell a victim at second. Then Larry came to the bat.
"Show them that your layoff hasn't hurt your batting eye, Larry," sang out McRae.
The first ball was wide, and Larry held his bat motionless. On the second offering he fouled off. The third was about waist high, and Larry swung at it. The ball soared off to right field and landed in the bleachers. It was a clean home run and Larry trotted easily around the bases, a broad grin on his good-natured Irish face.
"We're finding him!" shouted McRae. "We've got him going! Now, Denton, put another one in the same place."
Denton did his best, but it was not good enough. Dawley had tightened up and was sending the ball over the plate as though thrown from a catapult. Two strikes were called on Denton, and then he put up a fly just back of second which Baskerville caught in good style.
The inning was over, but the Giants felt better. There was a big difference between five to none and five to three. Besides, they had learned that Dawley could be hit.
"Keep them down, Jim, and we'll put you in the lead next inning," prophesied Larry, as he passed him on his way out to second.
Jim proceeded at once to keep them down. He had never been in better form. The three runs that his mates had scored had put new heart in him and he made the Pittsburghs "eat out of his hand." They simply could not get going against him.
His sharp breaking curve had their best batters completely at sea. They were swinging in bewilderment at balls that they could not reach. For the next three innings not a man reached first base and in the eighth inning he mowed them down on strikes as fast as they came to the plate.
"Oh, if we'd only started the game with him!" groaned McRae, as the eighth inning ended with the score unchanged.
For in the meantime Larry's prophecy had not been fulfilled that the Giant batsmen would gain the lead. They had been hitting more freely than in the early part of the game, but had been batting in hard luck. Every ball they hit seemed to go straight to some fielder, and the Pittsburghs were giving their pitcher magnificent support. There was one gleam of hope in the eighth, when with two men out, a Giant was roosting on second and another on third. But hope went glimmering when Burkett's hoist to center was easily gathered in by Ralston.
"We can win yet," crowed Robbie, with a confidence he was far from feeling, as the Giants entered on their last inning. "There's many a game been won in the ninth. Go in now and knock him out of the box."
Wheeler started in with a single that just escaped the outstretched hands of Baskerville. McRae himself ran down to first to coach him. Willis followed with another single on which Wheeler went all the way to third. It looked as though the long-hoped for rally had at last commenced.
But a groan went up from the Giant dugout when Willis, on the next ball pitched, started for second and was nailed by three feet. Still Larry was next at bat, and his comrades, remembering his last home run, urged him to repeat.
Larry was only too eager to do so, and on the second ball pitched laced it to right field for what looked to be a homer but went foul by a few feet only. The next was a missed strike. Two balls followed in quick succession and then, with the count three to two, slapped out a rattling two-bagger to center. Wheeler scored and the tally was five to four in Pittsburgh's favor.
Then to Joe's surprise McRae beckoned him from the dugout.
"What's the big idea?" Joe asked, as he came up to his manager.
"I'm going to put you in as a pinch hitter," answered McRae. "I'd rather take a chance on you than Denton. Get in there now and knock the cover off the ball."
There was a gasp of surprise from the stands. In their experience it was usually a pitcher who was taken out to make room for a pinch hitter. It was almost unheard of that the procedure should be reversed. To them it seemed a sign that McRae was at the end of his rope, and there were catcalls and shouts of derision as Joe came to the plate. And these redoubled in volume as he missed the first ball that Dawley sent over.
"What did I tell you, boys?"
"Nit, on that!"
"Matson is all right as a pitcher, but as a batter, nothing doing."
"Give him two more like that, Dawley!"
"Take your time, Joe!"
"Make him give you the kind you want!"
"Here is where Pittsburgh chews the Giants up!"
"Maybe you can do it somewhere else, but you can't do it here!"
"One, two, three, Dawley, remember."
So the calls ran on as Joe waited for the pitcher to deliver the sphere again.
The Pittsburgh rooters thought they had Joe's "goat" and they were prepared to make the most of it. They began a chorus of yells and groans that grew louder and louder.
They stopped suddenly as Joe caught the next ball about a foot from the end of his bat. There was a mighty crack and the ball soared up and up into the sky over right field. The fielders started to run for it and then stopped short in their tracks, throwing up their hands in despair. The ball cleared the bleachers, cleared the wall, and went through the window of a house on the other side of the street.
Joe had started running like a deer at the crack of the bat, but as he rounded first McRae shouted at him to take his time, and he completed the rest of his journey at a jog trot, Larry of course having preceded him. There was a wild jubilee at the plate. Robbie threw dignity to the winds and danced a jig, and Joe was sore from the thumping of his mates.
"The longest hit that's ever been made on Forbes Field!" cried Larry exultingly.
"Old Honus Wagner in his best days never made such a clout," joined in Jim. "Joe, old boy, you've saved the game."
"It isn't over yet," cautioned Joe smilingly; "but if you keep up the same brand of pitching you've been showing us, they won't have a Chinaman's chance."
The next two batters were easy outs and the Giants' half was over. The Pittsburghs came in for their last chance, determined to do or die. It was exasperating for them to have the game snatched from them when they were just about to put it on their side of the ledger. But Jim put out the first one on a puny fly and sent the last two back to the bench by the strike-out route--and the game was over.
In their first clash with the redoubtable Pittsburghs, the Giants had won by six to five!
CHAPTER XIII
A BREAK IN THE LUCK
It was a highly elated crowd of Giants that chattered away excitedly in the clubhouse after the finish of the game. Jim and Joe came in for the major share of the honors, the first because of his superb pitching and the latter for the glorious home run that had clinched the victory.
"Some pitching, Barclay," said Hughson, clapping Jim on the shoulder. "Do you realize that only thirty-two batters faced you and that eleven of them went out on strikes? That's what I call twirling."
"It'll take some of the chestiness out of these Pirates," laughed Larry. "They thought we were going to be as easy meat for them as the rest of the teams. And, begorra, it looked as though we would from the way the game started."
"You did your share all right, Larry," replied Jim. "That home run of yours was a beauty. And that two-bagger was no slouch."
"But that clout of Joe's was the real cheese," said Denton generously. "Gee, Joe, I was a little sore when McRae put you in to take my turn at bat. But when I saw that old apple clear the fence I knew that the old man had the right dope. I haven't made a hit like that since I've been in the game."
"Who has?" queried Curry. "I'll bet it comes pretty close to being a record. If that house hadn't been in the way the ball would be going yet."
"Don't forget, Joe, that you'll have to pay for that broken window," laughed Wheeler.
"I guess McRae would pay for a hundred broken windows and never say a word," chuckled Iredell.
He would have been still more sure of this had he been able to see McRae's face at that moment and overheard what he was saying to Robson.
"You've had a real bit of luck to-day, John," the latter had remarked, his broad face radiant with satisfaction. "You've discovered that you have another first string pitcher. That work of young Barclay was simply marvelous."
"You said it, Robbie," agreed McRae. "It was a rough deal to give a young pitcher the job of beating the Pittsburghs after they had a four run lead. But he stood the gaff and came through all right. From this time on he'll take his regular turn in the box. But it isn't that that pleases me most in this day's work."
"What is it then?" asked Robbie.
"It's the batting of Matson," replied McRae thoughtfully. "I've been in the game thirty years, and I've seen all the fence-breakers--Wagner, Delehanty, Brouthers, Lajoie, and all the rest of them. And I tell you now, Robbie, that he's the king of all of them. The way he stands at the plate, the way he holds his bat, the way he times his blow, the way he meets the ball--those are the things that mark out the natural batter. It's got to be born in a man. You can't teach it to him. All the weight of those great shoulders go into his stroke, and he makes a homer where another man would make a single or a double. Now mark what I'm telling you, Robbie, but keep it under your hat, for I don't want the kid to be getting a swelled head. In Baseball Joe Matson we've got not only the greatest pitcher in the game, but the hardest hitter in either league. And that goes."
"Oh, come now, John," protested Robbie, "aren't you going a little too strong? The greatest pitcher, yes. I admit that. There's no one in sight now that can touch him, now that Hughson's laid up. And between you and me, John, I don't believe that even Hughson in his best days had anything on Matson. But when you speak of batting, how about Kid Rose of the Yankees?"
"He's all to the good," admitted McRae. "He's got a wonderful record; the best record in fact of any man that has ever broken into the game. He topped the record for home runs last season, and by the way he's starting in this year he'll do it again. Up to now we haven't had anyone in the National League that could approach him. But I'm willing to bet right now that he never made so long a hit as Matson made this afternoon. Of course Rose has had more experience in batting than Matson, and for the last two or three years he's hardly done any pitching. But if I should take Matson out of the box right now and play him in the outfield every day, I'll bet that by the end of the season he'd be running neck and neck with Kid Rose and perhaps a wee bit ahead of him."
"Well, maybe, John," agreed Robbie, though a little doubtfully. "But what's the use of talking about it? You know that we can't spare him from the box. He's our pitching ace."
"I know that well enough," replied McRae. "But all the same I'm going to see that he has many a chance to win games for us by his batting as well as by his pitching. On the days he isn't pitching, I'll use him as a pinch hitter, as I did to-day. Then, too, when he is pitching, I'm going to make a change in the batting order. Instead of having him down at the end I'm going to put him fourth--in the cleanup position. If that old wallop of his doesn't bring in many a run I'll miss my guess."
The very next day McRae had a chance to justify his theories. Hughson had told the manager that he thought he was in shape to pitch, and McRae, who had great faith in his judgment, told him to go in. The "Old Master," as he was affectionately called, used his head rather than his arm and by mixing up his slow ball with his fast one and resorting on occasion to his famous fadeaway, got by in a close game. In the sixth, Joe was called on as a pinch hitter, and came across with another homer, which, although not as long as that of the previous day, enabled him to reach the plate without sliding and bring in two runs ahead of him.
Two homers in two consecutive days were not common enough to pass without notice, and the Pittsburgh sporting writers began to feature Joe in their headlines. There was a marked increase in the attendance on the third day when Joe was slated to pitch. On that day he "made monkeys" of the Pittsburgh batters, and on the two turns at bat when he was permitted to hit made a single and a three-bagger. In two other appearances at bat, the Pittsburgh pitcher deliberately passed him, at which even the Pittsburgh crowd expressed their displeasure by jeers.
On the final day, Markwith was given a chance to redeem himself, and pitched an airtight game. But Hooper of the Pittsburghs was also at his best, and with the game tied in the ninth Joe again cracked out a homer to the right field bleachers, his third home run in four days!
Markwith prevented further scoring by the enemy, and the game went into the Giants' winning column.
"Four straight from the league leaders," McRae chuckled happily. "The break in the luck has come at last."
CHAPTER XIV
A DELIGHTFUL SURPRISE
"Well, we wound up the trip in a blaze of glory, anyway," remarked Jim to Baseball Joe, as they sat in the Pullman coach that was carrying them and the rest of the team back to New York.
"Yes, and we just saved our bacon by doing it," replied Joe. "Those last four games gave us eight out of fifteen for the trip. Not so awfully bad for a team on a trip, and yet not good enough to win the championship. But even at that I guess McRae won't supplant us with a team from the old ladies' home," he added, with a laugh.
"We've got a long series of games on the home grounds now," put in Larry, the optimist. "We'll show these other fellows how the game ought to be played. Just watch us climb."
"Here's hoping you're right," chimed in Burkett. "A slice of the World Series money this year would look mighty good to me."
"That's looking pretty far ahead," said Curry. "Still, if Joe keeps up the batting he's been showing us in Pittsburgh, I'll bet we cop the flag."
"That may be just a flash in the pan," cautioned Joe. "I may have had just a few good days when everything broke just right for me. I'm a pitcher, not a batter."
"Not a batter, eh?" remarked Larry, in feigned surprise. "How surprised Dawley and Hooper and the other Pittsburgh pitchers will be to hear that. They seemed to think you could pickle the pill all right."
The players found the baseball circles of New York in a ferment of interest and excitement over the team. There had been considerable despondency over the poor showing of the Giants in the first three series they had played on the trip. But the four rattling victories they had gained over Pittsburgh had redeemed them in the minds of their followers, and hopes for the pennant had revived.
But the one thing that obscured everything else was the tremendous batting that Joe had done in that last series. The sporting columns of the newspapers had headlines like: "The New Batting Star;" "A Rival to Kid Rose;" "Is There to Be a New Home-Run King?" and "The Colossus of Swat." Joe found his footsteps dogged by reporters eager to get interviews telling how he did it. Moving picture operators begged the privilege of taking him in all positions--as he gripped his bat--the way he stood at the plate--as he drew back for his swing. Illustrated weekly papers had full page pictures of him. Magazines offered him large sums for articles signed with his name. He found himself in the calcium light, holding the center of the stage, the focus of sporting interest and attention.
Joe was, of course, pleased at the distinction he had won, and yet at the same time he was somewhat uneasy and bewildered. He was not especially irked at the attention he was attracting. That had already become an old story as to his pitching. He was hardened to reporters, to being pointed out in the streets, to having a table at which he happened to be dining in a restaurant or hotel become the magnet for all eyes while whispers went about as to who he was. That was one of the penalties of fame, and he had become used to it.
But hitherto his reputation had been that of a great pitcher, and in his own heart he knew he could sustain it. The pitching box was his throne, and he knew he could make good. But he was somewhat nervous about the acclamations which greeted his batting feats. He was not at all sure that he could keep it up. He had never thought of himself as any more than an ordinary batter. He knew that as a pitcher he was not expected to do much batting, and so he had devoted most of his training to perfecting himself in the pitching art. Now he found himself suddenly placed on a pedestal as a Batting King. Suppose it were, as he himself had suggested, merely a flash in the pan. It would be rather humiliating after all this excitement to have the public find out that their new batting idol was only an idol of clay after all.
He confided some of his apprehension to Jim, but his chum only laughed at him.
"Don't worry a bit over that, old man," Jim reassured him. "I only wish I were as sure of getting a million dollars as I am that you've got the batting stuff in you. You've got the eye, you've got the shoulders, you've got the knack of putting all your weight into your blow. You're a natural born batter, and you've just waked up to it."
"But this is only the beginning of the season," argued Joe. "The pitchers haven't yet got into their stride. By midsummer they'll be burning them over, and then more than likely I'll come a cropper."
"Not a bit of it," Jim affirmed confidently. "You won't face better pitching anywhere than we stacked up against in Pittsburgh, and you made all those birds look like thirty cents. They had chills and fever every time you came to the bat."
The matter was not long left in doubt. In the games that followed Joe speedily proved that the Pittsburgh outburst was not a fluke. Home runs rained from his bat in the games with the Brooklyns, the Bostons and the Phillies. And when the Western teams came on for their invasion of the East, they had to take the same medicine. All pitchers looked alike to him. Of course he had his off days when all he could get was a single, and sometimes not that. Once in a long while he went out on strikes, and the pitcher who was lucky or skilful enough to perform that feat hugged it to his breast as a triumph that would help him the next season in demanding a rise in salary. But these occasions were few and far between. The newspapers added a daily slab to their sporting page devoted to Joe's mounting home run record, giving the dates, the parks and the pitchers off whom they were made. And there was hardly a pitcher in the league whose scalp Joe had not added to his rapidly growing collection.
In the business offices of the city, in restaurants, at all kinds of gathering places, the daily question changed. Formerly it had been: "Will the Giants win to-day?" Now it became: "Will Baseball Joe knock out another homer?"
And the fever showed itself in the attendance at the Polo Grounds. Day by day the crowds grew denser. Soon they were having as many spectators at a single game as they had formerly looked for at a double-header. The money rolled into the ticket offices in a steady stream, and the owners and manager of the club wore the "smile that won't come off." The same effect was noted in all the cities of the circuit. The crowds turned out not so much to see the Giants play as to see if Baseball Joe would knock another home run. Joe Matson had become the greatest drawing card of the circuit. If this kept up, it would mean the most prosperous season the League had ever known. For the Giants' owners alone, it meant an added half million dollars for the season. Already, with not more than a third of the games played, they had taken in enough to pay all expenses for the year, and were "on velvet" for the rest of the season.
Nothing in all this turned Joe's head. He was still the same modest, hardworking player he had always been. First and all the time he worked for the success of his team. Already the Giants' owners had voluntarily added ten thousand dollars to his salary, and he was at present the most highly paid player in his League. He knew that next year even this would be doubled, if he kept up his phenomenal work. But he was still the same modest youth, and was still the same hail fellow well met, the pal and idol of all his comrades.
What delighted Baseball Joe far more than any of his triumphs was the information contained in a letter he wore close to his heart that Mabel was coming on to New York with her brother Reggie for a brief stay on her way to her home in Goldsboro. They had been in almost daily correspondence, and their affection had deepened with every day that passed. Jim also had been equally assiduous and equally happy, and both players were counting the days that must elapse before the wedding march would be played at the end of the season.
Luck was with Joe when, in company with Jim, he drove to the station to meet Mabel and Reggie. The rain was falling in torrents. Ordinarily that would have been depressing. But to-day it meant that there would be no game and that he could count on having Mabel to himself with nothing to distract his attention.
Jim was glad on his friend's account, but nevertheless was unusually quiet for him.
"Come out of your trance, old boy," cried Joe, slapping him jovially on the knee.
Jim affected to smile.
"Oh, I know what you're thinking about," charged Joe. "You're jealous because I'm going to see Mabel and you're not going to see Clara. But cheer up, old man. The next time we strike Chicago we'll both run down to Riverside for a visit. Then you'll have the laugh on me, for you'll have Clara all to yourself while Mabel will be in Goldsboro."
Jim tried to find what comfort he could from the prospect, but the Chicago trip seemed a long way off.
They reached the station ahead of time and walked up and down impatiently. The rain and wet tracks had detained the train a little, but at length its giant bulk drew into the station. They scanned the long line of Pullmans anxiously. Then Joe rushed forward with an exclamation of delight as he saw Reggie descend holding out his hand to assist Mabel--Mabel, radiant, starry-eyed, a vision of loveliness.
Jim had followed a little more slowly to give Joe time for the first greeting. But his steps quickened and his eyes lighted up with rapture as behind Mabel Joe's sister Clara came down the steps, sweet as a rose, and with a look in her eyes as she caught sight of Jim that made that young man's heart lose a beat.
CHAPTER XV
AN EVENING RIDE
There was a hubbub of delighted and incoherent exclamations as the young people greeted each other with all their heart in their eyes. Of course in the crowded station the greetings could not be just what the boys--and the girls, too--desired, but those would come later. Reggie too came in for warm handshakes.
"My word!" he exclaimed, as he smiled affably upon them all, "you folks seem glad to see one another. I'll just slip over and look after the luggage."
They spared him without any regret at all. Indeed, it is doubtful if they even heard him. Joe was saying things to Mabel in an undertone, and Jim was doing the same thing to Clara. What they said was their own affair, but it seemed eminently satisfactory to all concerned.
When at last they had come somewhat to their senses, Joe poked Jim in the ribs.
"Some surprise, old man!" he remarked mischievously.
"Surprise!" repeated Jim. "It's Paradise. It's heaven. Don't tell me I'm going to wake up and find it all a dream. And you knew this all the time, you old rascal, and didn't let me in on it."
"Just a little scheme that Mabel and I cooked up," laughed Joe happily. "I thought Sis might like to come on and take a look at her only brother."
"Brother," mimicked Mabel saucily. "Don't flatter yourself. You won't be looked at much while Jim's around."
Clara flushed and laughed in protest. Joe, however, did not seem disturbed at the prospect. As long as Mabel looked at him the way she was looking now, he had nothing more to ask.
A taxicab whirled them up to the pretty suite that Joe had reserved for the girls in a hotel. There were two rooms in the suite, and it was surprising how quickly Joe and Mabel took possession of one of them, while Jim and Clara found the other one much preferable. They had so much to say to each other that required no audience. Reggie, who had an adjoining room, took himself off on the plea of an engagement that would keep him till luncheon time, and the happy young people had a long delightful morning to themselves.
"Oh, I'm so proud of you, Joe," Mabel assured him, among many other things. "You're making such a wonderful record. You don't know how I read and treasure all the things the papers are saying about you. They give you more space than they give the President of the United States."
"You mustn't make too much of it, honey," Joe replied. "I'm in luck just now; but if I should have a slump the same people that cheer me now when I make a homer would be jeering at me when I came to the bat. There's nothing more fickle than the public. One day you're a king and the next you're a dub."
"You'll always be a king," cried Mabel. "Always my king, anyway," she added blushingly.
In the meantime Clara and Jim were saying things equally precious to themselves and each other, but of no importance at all to the general public. Jim was surprised and pleased at the intimate acquaintance she had with all the phases of his rapid rise in his profession. She knew quite as well as the rest of the world that Jim already stood in the very front rank of pitchers, second only perhaps to Joe himself, and she had no hesitation in telling him what she thought of him. Sometimes it is not a pleasant thing for a man to know what a woman thinks of him, but in Jim's case it was decidedly different, if his shining face went for anything.
The young people took in a matinee in the afternoon and a musical show, followed by dinner, in the evening, and all were agreed in declaring it a perfect day.
Jim was slated to pitch the next day and with Clara watching from a box he turned in a perfect game, winning by a score of 1 to 0, the run being contributed by Joe, who turned loose a screaming homer in the sixth. Naturally both young men felt elated.
It was a beautiful summer evening, and they had arranged for an automobile ride out on Long Island. Joe had hired a speedy car, but dispensed with the services of a chauffeur. He himself was an accomplished driver and knew all the roads. A chauffeur would have been only a restraint on their freedom of conversation.
They bowled along over the perfect roads, happy beyond words and at peace with all the world. Mabel was seated in front with Joe, while Jim and Clara occupied the tonneau. All were in the gayest of spirits. Much of the time they talked, but speech and silences were equally sweet.
They had dinner at an excellent inn, about forty miles out of the city. There was a good string band and the young couples had several dances. The evening wore away before they knew it, and it was rather late when they turned their faces cityward.
The car was purring along merrily on a rather lonely stretch of road in the vicinity of Merrick, when a big car came swiftly up behind them. The driver tooted his horn and Joe drew a little to one side to give the car plenty of room to pass. The car rushed by and lengthened the distance until it was about a hundred yards ahead.
"Seems to be in a hurry," remarked Jim.
"A bunch of joy riders, I suppose," answered Joe. "Hello, what does that mean?"
For the car had suddenly stopped and the driver had swung it across the road, blocking it.
"Something gone wrong with the steering gear," commented Joe. "Looks like a breakdown. Perhaps we can help them."
He slowed up as he drew near the car. The next instant four men jumped out of the car and ran toward them. They had their caps drawn down over their eyes, and each of them carried a leveled revolver.
"Hands up!" commanded their leader, as he covered Joe with his weapon.
CHAPTER XVI
THE ATTACK ON THE ROAD
In an instant Baseball Joe brought the car to a stop.
But in that instant his brain worked like lightning.
Neither he nor Jim was armed. He must temporize. Resistance at the moment might be fatal. Shooting would result probably in the death of one or more of the party.
Before he had taken his hand from the wheel, he had formed a plan.
The women had screamed and Jim had jumped to his feet.
"Sit down, Jim," said Joe. "Don't you see they have the drop on us. I suppose it's money you want?" he went on coolly, addressing the leader of the gang.
"No," was the unexpected answer. "We're not after money this time. We want a man named Matson."
"I didn't know I was so popular," replied Joe jokingly, though the mention of his name in so ominous a way had sent a start through him. "My name is Matson, Joe Matson. What do you want of me?"
"Are you giving it to us straight?" asked the leader. "Are you Matson? How many men are there with you anyway?" he went on, peering into the tonneau.
"There are two of us," replied Joe.
"Then get down in the road, both of you," commanded the bandit. "I want to have a look at both of you so that there won't be any mistake. My orders are for the man named Matson. No monkey work now!"
Joe and Jim, inwardly boiling but outwardly cool, got down into the road. As they climbed down, Joe's hand nudged Jim ever so slightly. Jim knew what that meant. It meant to make no move until Joe gave the sign.
"Up with your hands!" ordered the leader curtly. "Bill, frisk them and see if they have guns."
The bandit called Bill ran his hands along their bodies and reported that they were entirely unarmed.
"Now strike a match and let's have a look at their faces," was the next order.
Bill obeyed, and as the light flared up, not only the leader but the rest of the band looked over the young men keenly.
"You're Matson, all right," said the leader to Joe, and the rest acquiesced. "I've seen your picture in the papers many a time, and I've seen you at the Polo Grounds too. All right. You get back in the car," he said to Jim, poking him in the side with his pistol, "and drive off."
"What do you want with me?" asked Joe steadily.
"Oh, we're not going to kill you," replied the leader, with an evil grin. "But," he muttered under his breath so low that only Joe could hear him, "by the time we're through with you, that pitching arm of yours will be out of business. Them's our orders."
"Who gave you those orders?" asked Joe.
"Never you mind who gave them," snarled the bandit. "I've got them, and I'm going----"
He never finished the sentence.
Like lightning Joe's foot shot up and kicked the weapon from the leader's hand. The next instant his fist caught another of the scoundrels a terrific crack on the jaw. The man went down as though he had been hit with an axe. At the same moment Jim's hard right fist smashed into another straight between the eyes. There was the snap of a breaking bone and the man toppled over. The fourth rascal, who had been paralyzed with astonishment, forgot to shoot and started to run, but Jim was on him like a tiger and bore him to the ground, his hands tightening on his throat until the rascal lay limp and motionless.
In the meantime, the leader, nursing his hurt wrist, had hobbled to the car, whose engine all this time had remained running. Joe made a dash for the car, but the chauffeur put on all speed and darted away into the darkness.
The first task of Joe and Jim was to gather up the weapons of the assailants. The three still lay dazed or unconscious. Under other circumstances, the boys would have waited until the trio had regained their senses. But their first duty now was to the girls, who were half hysterical with fright. Joe took Mabel in his arms, after assuring her again and again in answer to her frantic questions that he was unhurt, and Jim comforted Clara until she had recovered her composure.
They laid the bandits at the side of the road, so that they could not be run over, and then Joe took the wheel and drove on. To the first policeman they saw, Joe reported that he had seen some men who seemed to be hurt, alongside the road, and suggested that they be looked after. But he said nothing about the attempted holdup. Then he sped on, and soon they were in the precincts of the city.
The girls in their alarm had failed to gather the true significance of the affair. To them it was like a confused dream. Their general impression was that a holdup had been attempted for the purposes of robbery. Still Mabel did remember that they had asked specifically for Matson.
"Why was it that they asked for you especially, Joe?" she asked, snuggling closely to the arm that had so stoutly done its work that night. "Why was it?"
"How do I know, honey?" answered Joe. "Perhaps," he said jokingly, "they had heard of my increase in salary and thought I was rolling in money. Sometimes you know they kidnap a man, make him sign a check and then hold him prisoner until they cash it. No knowing what such rascals may do."
"Whatever it was, they've lost all interest in the matter now," said Jim, with a laugh, as he thought of the discomfited bandits by the roadside and the fleeing leader in the automobile.
Both Joe and Jim made light of it to the girls and laughed away their fears until they had seen them safely to their hotel. But later on two very sober and wrathful young men sat in their own room discussing the holdup.
Joe had told Jim what the bandit leader had said about putting his pitching arm out of business, and his friend was white with anger.
"The scoundrels!" he ejaculated. "That meant that they would have twisted your arm until they had snapped the tendons or pulled it from its socket and crippled you for life. If I'd known that when I had my hands on that rascal's throat, I'd have choked the life out of him."
"You did enough," returned Joe. "As it is they got a pretty good dose. I know I cracked the leader's wrist, and I heard a bone snap when you smashed that other fellow. Gee, Jim, you hit like a pile driver."
"No harder than you did," replied Jim. "That fellow you clipped in the jaw was dead to the world before he hit the ground."
"After all, those fellows were merely tools," mused Joe thoughtfully. "Did you hear the leader say that he had his orders? Who gave him those orders? If only the girls hadn't been there, I'd have trussed the rascals up, waited until they had got their senses back, and then put them through the third degree until I'd found out the name of their employer. But I wouldn't for the world have the girls know what those scoundrels were up to. They'd never have a happy moment. They'd worry themselves to death. We've got to keep this thing absolutely to ourselves."
"All the same, I can guess who the fellow was that employed them," said Jim.
"I think I can come pretty near it, too," affirmed Joe. "In the first place, it was a man who had money. Those fellows wouldn't have taken the job unless they had been well paid. Then, too, it was somebody who hated me like poison. There are two men who fulfil both of those conditions, and their names are----"
"Fleming and Braxton," Jim finished for him.
"Exactly," agreed Joe. "And knowing what I do of the two, I have a hunch that it was Braxton."
CHAPTER XVII
FALLING BEHIND
"Braxton's the more likely one of the two to use violence--or have it used," said Jim. "Not but what either one of them would be mean enough to do it. But Braxton has got more nerve than Fleming. Then, too, I happen to know that Fleming has run pretty well through his money, while Braxton is a millionaire. He was pretty hard hit by the failure of the All-Star League to go through last year, but he's got plenty left. He could give those rascals a thousand, or five thousand if necessary, and never feel it."
"Speaking of money," said Joe, "reminds me of something else that may be connected with this case. Do you remember what Reggie told us when he was in Riverside about that fellow in Chicago that was betting great wads of money that the Giants wouldn't cop the flag? Betting it, Reggie said, as though he had something up his sleeve, as though he were betting on a sure thing. Now what could be a surer thing in a race as close as this than to cripple the Giant team by robbing it of one of its pitchers? He'd be getting a double satisfaction then--making a pile of money to make up for his losses last season and getting even with me for the thrashing I gave him. That is, of course, if the man is really Braxton."
"By Jove, I believe you're right!" exclaimed Jim. "Of course that might seem a little far-fetched, if it weren't for the other things that point to the same man. But when you remember that Braxton hails from Chicago, that the anonymous letter had a Chicago postmark, when you recall that somebody tried to injure us in that road blockade the day after I thought I saw Braxton in the training town, and that he was the only one besides ourselves who knew the road we were going to take--when you take all these things together, it seems a dead open-and-shut proposition that Braxton was the man that plotted all this scoundrelism."
"Some day soon I hope we'll know the truth," said Joe. "And when that day comes----"
He did not finish the sentence, but his clenched fist and flashing eyes were eloquent.
The next morning the chums went around early, to learn how the girls were feeling after their trying experience. They found them still a little nervous and overwrought, but the society of the boys and the knowledge that they had come through without injury soon brightened them up, and before long they were their natural selves again. The way the boys had carried themselves in the fight with their assailants made them more than ever heroes in the eyes of those they loved best, and if it had not been for the deeper knowledge they had of the affair, Joe and Jim would have been rather glad it happened.
Reggie, of course, had been told of the holdup and was almost stuttering in his wrath and indignation. But he, like the girls, figured that it had been an attack simply for the purpose of robbery, and the boys were not sure enough of Reggie's discretion to tell him the real facts. They feared that some slip of the tongue on his part might reveal the matter, and they knew that a constant fear would from then on shadow the lives of Mabel and Clara.
In about ten days the next Western trip of the Giants was to begin, and then Clara would return home, while Mabel would go on with Reggie to Goldsboro. But those precious ten days were enjoyed to the full by the young folks. Every hour that the boys could spare from the games was spent in the society of the girls, and every day that a game was played Mabel and Clara occupied a box in the grandstand at the Polo Grounds. The knowledge of the bright eyes that were following their every move put the boys on their mettle, and they played up to the top of their form. Jim's progress as a boxman was evident with each succeeding game, and Joe covered himself with laurels as both pitcher and batsman. But more than once, after Joe had let down an opposing team with but a few hits, he had an involuntary shudder as he looked at the mighty arm that had scored the victory and thought of it as hanging withered and helpless at his side. And only by the narrowest of margins had he escaped that fate.
The hour of parting came at last, and it was a great wrench to all of them. There were promises on both sides of daily letters, that would serve to bridge the gulf of separation.
The fight for the pennant was waxing hotter and hotter. The Giants and the Pittsburghs were running neck and neck. First one and then the other was at the head in victories won. At times one would forge ahead for a week or two, but the other refused obstinately to be shaken off and would again assume the leadership. Everything promised a ding-dong, hammer-and-tongs finish.
Some of the other teams were still in striking distance, but the first two were really the "class" of the League. The great pitching staff of the Brooklyns had gone to pieces, and it looked as though they were definitely out of the running. The Bostons, after a poor start, had braced and were rapidly improving their average, but they seemed too far behind to be really dangerous. The unfortunate Phillies were in for the "cellar championship" and did not have a ghost of a chance. Of the Western teams, outside of Pittsburgh, no fear was felt, though the consistent slugging of the Cardinals gave the leaders some uneasy moments. Still, batting alone could not win games, and the Cardinals' pitching staff, though it had some brilliant performers, was surpassed in ability by several teams in the League.
In the American League also a spirited contest was going on. The White Sox, who had usually been a dangerous factor, were out of the running because they had had to build up practically a new team. But the Clevelands were as strong as they had been the year before, and were making a great bid for the flag. Detroit had started out brilliantly, and with its hard hitting outfield was winning many a game by sheer slugging. Washington loomed up as a dangerous contender, and only a little while before had won fifteen straight games.
But the chief antagonist of the Clevelands was the New York Yankee team. For many years they had struggled to win the championship, but though they had come so close at one time that a single wild pitch beat them out of it, they had never been able to gain the coveted emblem.
"It seems at times as though a 'jinx' were pursuing the Yankees," remarked Jim. "But this year they have got together a rattling good crowd in all departments of the game. Most of all that counts in their hopes, I imagine, is the acquisition of Kid Rose."
Kid Rose was a phenomenal batter of whom every baseball fan in the United States was talking. He had been a pitcher on the Red Sox and had done fine work in the box. It was only after he had been playing some time in that position that he himself, as well as others, began to realize the tremendous strength that resided in his batting arm and shoulders. He was a left handed batter, so that most of his hits went into right field, or rather into the right field bleachers, where they counted as home runs. In one season he accumulated twenty-nine home runs, which was a record for the major leagues.
The Yankee owners made a deal with the Red Sox by which the "Kid" was brought to the New York club at a price larger than had ever been paid for a player. It was a good investment, however, for the newcomer was excelling his home run record of the year before and drew so many people to the parks where he played that a constant golden stream flowed into the strong boxes of the club. He made as many home runs as all the other players of his team together. Now, owing to his work, the Yankees were fighting it out with the Clevelands for the lead, and the papers were already beginning to talk of the possibility of both championships coming to New York. If this should be the case, the World Series games would probably draw the greatest crowds that had ever witnessed such a contest, and the prize money for the players would undoubtedly be larger than ever before in the history of the game.
Joe and his comrades needed no such spur as this to make them play their best. A strong loyalty to the club marked every player of the team. Still it was not at all an unpleasing thought that the result of winning would add a good many thousand dollars to the salary of every member.
The Giants started out in high hopes on this second Western invasion.
"Sixteen games to be played on this trip, boys," McRae had said to them, as they boarded the train at the Pennsylvania Station. "And out of that sixteen I want at least twelve. Nix on the breaking even stuff. That won't go with me at all. I want to get so far ahead on this trip that we'll be on easy street for the rest of the race."
"Why not cop the whole sixteen, Mac?" asked Larry, with a broad grin.
"So much the better," answered McRae. "But I'm no hog. Give me an average of three out of four in each series and I'll ask for nothing better."
The team started out as though they were going to give their manager what he wanted. Their first stop this time was Pittsburgh, and here they won the first two games right off the reel. The third, however, was lost by a close margin. In the fourth the Giants' bats got going and they sent three Pirate pitchers to the showers, winning by the one-sided score of eleven to two. So that it was in high spirits that they left the Smoky City for Cincinnati.
Here they met with a rude shock. The Reds were in the midst of one of their winning streaks and were on a hitting rampage. They had the "breaks," too, and cleaned up by taking every game. It was a complete reversal, and the Giants were stunned.
CHAPTER XVIII
IN THE THROES OF A SLUMP
Robson's round face had lost its usual smile. McRae's was like a thundercloud, and the players evaded him as much as they could. Even Larry was "Laughing Larry" no longer. It was a disgruntled crowd of baseball players that shook the dust of Cincinnati from their feet and started for Chicago.
"Better luck next time," Joe comforted his mates. "After all it's the uncertainty of the game that makes baseball. How many people would have been at the park if they thought their pets didn't have a chance to win?"
"That's all very well," grumbled Curry, "but we ought at least to have had our share of the breaks. We hit the ball hard enough, but every time it went straight to the fielders. They didn't hit any better, but the ball went just out of the reach of our fellows. Talk about fool luck! If those Cincinnati players fell in the water they'd come up with a fish dinner."
"That's just the reason we're due for a change," argued Jim. "We'll get it all back from the Cubs."
But here again there was disappointment. Joe pitched the first game and won in a close fight, although the Cubs tied it up in the ninth and Joe had to win his own game in the eleventh by a homer. But the next two went to Chicago, and in the fourth game, which Jim pitched, the best he could do was to make it a tie, called in the twelfth on account of darkness.
This time it was not luck that gave to the Giants only one game out of three. They had as many of the breaks of the game as their opponents. They simply slumped. One of those mysterious things that come to almost every team once at least in a season had them in its clutches. Perhaps it was overanxiety, perhaps it was a superstitious feeling that a "jinx" was after them, but, whatever it was, it spread through the team like an epidemic. Their fingers were "all thumbs." Their bats had "holes" in them. The most reliable fielders slipped up on easy chances. They booted the ball, or if they got it they threw either too high or too low to first. Double plays became less frequent. Two of the best batters in the team, Larry and Burkett, fell off woefully in their hitting.
In vain McRae raged and stormed. In vain Robbie begged and pleaded and cajoled. In vain Jim and Joe, who still resisted the infection, sought to stem the tide of disaster. The members of the team with a few exceptions continued to act as if they were in a trance.
McRae did everything in his power to bring about a change. He laid off Willis and Iredell, and put two promising rookies, Barry and Ward, in their places. This added a little speed on the bases to the team, but did not materially add to the batting or fielding, for the rookies were nervous and made many misplays, while they were lamentably short on the "inside stuff" that takes long experience to acquire. He shook up the batting order. But the hits were still few and far between.
St. Louis gave the Giants a sound trouncing in the first game, but in the second the Giants came to life and reversed the score.
Joe was in the box in this contest, and as he came in to the bench in the fourth inning, he noted, sitting in the grandstand, a figure that seemed familiar to him. The man seemed to have seen Baseball Joe at the same time, but he hid himself behind the form of a big man sitting in front of him, so that Joe could not be sure of his identification.
"What were you looking at so steadily, Joe?" inquired Jim, as his friend sat down on the bench beside him. "Did you by any chance catch sight of the jinx that's been following us?" he continued jokingly.
"Maybe I did, at that," replied Joe. "I could have sworn that I got a glimpse of Bugs Hartley in the grandstand."
"Bugs Hartley?" echoed Jim in surprise. "How could that old rascal have got as far as St. Louis?"
"Beat his way, perhaps," answered Joe. "Of course I'm not dead sure but that I might have been mistaken. And I won't have much time to look for him while I'm in the box. But suppose in the meantime you go down to the coaching line near first. While you're pretending to coach, you can take an occasional look at the grandstand and see if you can pick out Bugs. He's somewhere about the third row near the center. Just where the wire netting is broken."
Jim did as suggested, and studied the grandstand with care. He had only a chance to make an affirmative nod of the head as Joe, the inning ended, went out again to the box, but when he returned after pitching the side out on strikes, Jim told Joe that he was right.
"It's Bugs all right," he said. "I had a good chance to see that ugly mug of his, and there can't be any mistake. But what in thunder can he be doing in St. Louis?"
"Oh, panhandling and drinking himself to death, I suppose," answered Joe carelessly, his mind intent upon the game.
"But how did he get here?" persisted Jim. "I don't like it, old man. It takes money to travel, and I don't think Bugs could hustle up railroad fare to save his life. And if somebody gave him the money to get here, why was it done? I tell you again, Joe, I don't like it."
"Well, perhaps it's just as well we caught sight of him," admitted Joe. "It will help us to keep our eyes open."
In the seventh inning for the Giants, with the score tied at 3 to 3, Larry started a rally for the Giants by lining out a screaming single to right. Denton followed with a hit to short that was too hot for the shortstop to handle. He knocked the ball down, however, and got it to first. Denton had thought the play would be made on Larry, who was already on his way to third. Denton, therefore, had rounded first and started for second, but saw the ball coming and scrambled back to first. There was a grand mixup, but the umpire declared Denton safe.
It was a close play, and the St. Louis team was up in arms in a moment. Some of them, including their manager, rushed to the spot to argue with the umpire. The crowd also was enraged at the decision and began to hoot and howl. One or two pop bottles were thrown at the umpire, but fell short.
Joe, who was next at bat, had taken his stand at the plate, awaiting the outcome of the argument. Suddenly a bottle, aimed with great skill and tremendous force, came through the broken wire netting, whizzed close by his head, the top of it grazing his ear in passing. If it had hit his head, it would have injured him greatly beyond a doubt.
Joe turned toward the stand and saw a man hastily making his way out toward the entrance. He could only see his back, but he knew at once to whom that back belonged.
"Stop him! Stop him!" he shouted, as he threw aside his bat and rushed toward the stand.
But Jim had already vaulted over the barrier and was rushing through the aisle.
CHAPTER XIX
A CLOSE CALL
The people in the grandstand had not fully grasped the significance of the cowardly attack, as the attention of most of them was centered upon the dispute at first base. But the shout of Baseball Joe and the rush of Jim through the aisle of the stand had brought them to their feet, and some of them started in pursuit or tried to stop the flying figure of the fugitive.
But this very desire of so many to apprehend him helped in his escape. Men crowded in the aisle, and Jim, who could otherwise have captured him, found himself in the midst of a throng that effectually hindered his progress. He pushed his way through desperately, using his arms and hands to clear a passage, but by the time he arrived at the outer edge, the man had disappeared. Either he had mixed with the enormous crowd or had found his way through one of the numerous exits. In any event, he was not to be seen, and at last Jim, flaming-eyed and dripping with sweat from his exertions, had to come back empty-handed.
In the meantime, the umpire had asserted his authority at first base, and given the St. Louis players one minute by his watch to resume play. With much muttering and grumbling they obeyed. The decision stood, and Larry was on third, while Denton danced around on first and "kidded" the Cardinal first baseman on the umpire's decision.
Joe again took up his position at the plate, the fairer-minded among the spectators giving him a cheer as he did so, to express their indignation at the dastardly attack that had been made on him. He was somewhat shaken by the close call he had had, and the first two balls were strikes. Then he took a grip on himself, and when the next one came over he smashed a beauty to right. It went for two bases, while Larry scored easily, and Denton by great running and a headlong slide also reached the plate. The next man up sacrificed Joe to third, but there he remained, as the next two batters, despite McRae's adjurations, were not able to bring him in.
The Giants, however, had now broken the tie and had a two-run lead, and although that ended their scoring, it was sufficient, as Joe put on extra steam and mowed down the Cardinals almost as fast as they came to the bat. One hit was made off him for the remainder of the game, but as the batter got no farther than first there was no damage done.
Joe and Jim did not care to discuss the matter before their mates, and the attack was put down to some rowdy who was sore at the umpire's decision and took that method of showing it. But the two friends knew that it was much more than that.
"Well, what do you think now of my hunch?" demanded Jim, when the chums were alone together. "Was I right when I said I was uneasy about that fellow being in the grandstand?"
"You certainly were, Jim," answered Joe. "It must have been Bugs who threw that bottle. I know at any rate that it was he whom I saw hustling out of the stands. And when I looked at where he had been sitting the seat was empty."
"It was Bugs all right," affirmed Jim with decision. "I saw his face once, when he glanced behind him while he was running. Then, too, only a pitcher could have hurled the bottle with the swiftness and precision that he did. It went nearly as far as the pitcher's box before it struck the ground. Gee! my heart was in my mouth for a second when I saw it go whizzing past your ear. If it had hit you fair and square, it would have been good night."
"It did barely touch me," replied Joe, pointing to a scratch on his ear. "The old rascal hasn't forgotten how to throw. How that fellow must hate me! And yet I was the best friend that he had on the team."
"He hates you all right," replied Jim. "But it wasn't only his own personal feeling that prompted him to do that thing to-day. That isn't Bugs' way. He'd dope your coffee on the sly. Or he'd throw a stone at your head in a dark street, as he did that time when we'd started on our tour around the world. But to do a thing in the open, as he did to-day, means that he had a mighty big incentive to lay you out. That incentive was probably money. Somebody has put up the cash to send him to St. Louis, and that same somebody has probably promised him a big wad of dough if he could do you up. The chance came to-day, when the fans began to throw bottles at the umpire. He figured that that was the time to get in his work. If he'd been caught, he could have said that he was only one of a good many who did the same thing, and that he had no idea the bottle was going to hit anybody."
"Then you think that Bugs this time was acting as the tool of Braxton, or whoever it is that's trying to put me out of business," remarked Joe.
"Think so!" cried Jim. "I'm sure of it. So many things, all pointing to deliberate purpose, don't happen by accident. The same fellow who hired those auto bandits to cripple you hired Bugs for the same purpose. Lots of people have heard of the hatred that Bugs has for you. I suppose he's panning you all the time in the joints where he hangs out. This fellow that's after your hide has heard of Bugs and put him on the job. If he can't get you in one way, he's going to try to get you in another. He figures that some time or other one of his schemes will go through. Gee!" he exclaimed, jumping up and pacing the floor, "what would I give just to come face to face with him and have him in a room alone with me for five minutes. Just five minutes! I'd change his face so that his own brother wouldn't know him."
"I hope that job's reserved for me," replied Joe, as his fist clenched. "He'd get a receipt in full for all I owe him."
"In the meantime, what shall we do about Bugs?" asked Jim anxiously. "He ought to be put in jail. It isn't right that a man who's tried to cripple another should be at large."
"No," agreed Joe, "it isn't. But I don't see just what we can do about it. The chances are ten to one against his being found. Even if he were, nobody could be found probably who saw him actually throw the bottle. We didn't ourselves, though we feel absolutely certain that he did. He could explain his leaving by saying that he was taken ill and had to leave. Then, too, if he were arrested, we'd have to stay here and prosecute him, and we can't stay away from the team. Besides the whole thing would get in the papers, and Mabel and Clara and all the folks would have heart failure about it. No, I guess we'll have to keep quiet about it."
"I suppose we will," admitted Jim reluctantly. "But some day this scoundrel who's hounding you will be caught in the open. And I'm still hoping for that five minutes!"
CHAPTER XX
SPEEDING UP
St. Louis was in good form on the following day, and a perfect deluge of hits came from their bats. The Giants, too, had a good hitting day, and the fans who like to see free batting had their desire satisfied to the full. And their pleasure was all the greater because the home team had the best of the duel, and came out on top by a score of 17 to 12.
Jim was in the box on the next day, and by superb pitching had the St. Louis sluggers hitting like a kindergarten team. They simply could not solve him. His team mates had scarcely anything to do, and only by the narrowest of margins did he miss turning the Cardinals back without a hit. One hit narrowly escaped the fingers of the second baseman, as he leaped in the air for it. But it did escape him, and counted for the only hit made by the St. Louis in the game. It was a magnificent exhibition and wound up a disastrous trip in a blaze of glory.
Still it could not be denied that the trip had put a big dent in the Giants' aspirations for the pennant. Instead of the twelve games out of sixteen that McRae had asked for, they had only turned in six victories. It was the most miserable record that the Giants had made for years.
"And we call ourselves a good road team!" snorted Curry in disgust, as they settled down in the Pullman for the long ride back from St. Louis to New York. "A bunch of school girls could have done better work."
"Luck was against us," ventured Larry. "It sure was against us."
"Luck, nothing!" exclaimed Curry. "We simply fell down, and fell down hard. The whole League is laughing at us. Look at the way the other Eastern teams held up their end. The Brooklyns copped ten games, the Bostons got eleven, and the Phillies pulled down seven. We ought to sneak back into New York on a freight train instead of riding in Pullmans."
"I guess there won't be any band at the station to meet us," remarked Joe. "But after all, any team is liable to have a slump and play like a lot of dubs. Let's hope we've got all the bad playing out of our systems. From now on we're going to climb."
"That's the way to talk," chimed in Jim. "Of course we can't deny that we've stubbed our toes on this trip. But we know in our heart that we've got the best team in the League. We've got the Indian sign on all of them. The fans that are roasting us now will be shouting their heads off when we get started on our winning streak. Remember, boys, it's a long worm that has no turning."
There was a general laugh at this, and the spirits of the party lightened a little. But not all of the gloom was lifted.
The prediction that their reception in New York would be rather frosty was true. Such high hopes had been built on the result of this trip that the reaction was correspondingly depressing. And what made the Giants feel the change of attitude the more keenly was the fact that while they had been doing so poorly, the Yankees at home had been going "like a house afire." They had taken the lead definitely away from the Clevelands, and it did not seem as though there was any team in their League that could stop them. New York was quite sure that it was going to have one championship team. But it was quite as certain that it was not going to have two. That hope had gone glimmering.
Both teams were occupying the Polo Grounds for the season, while the new park of the Yankees was being completed. The schedule therefore had been arranged so that while one of the teams was playing at home the other was playing somewhere out of town.
Thus on the very day the Giants reached home the Yankees were starting out on their trip to other cities. They went away in the glory of victory. The Giants came home in the gloom of defeat.
The change of sentiment was visible in the first home game that the Giants played. On the preceding day, at their last game, the Yankees had played before a crowd of twenty-five thousand. The first game of the Giants drew scarcely more than three thousand. Many of these were the holders of free season passes, others, like the reporters, had to be there, while the rest were made up of the chronic fans who followed the Giants through thick and thin. There was no enthusiasm, and even the fact that the Giants won did not dispel the funereal atmosphere.
And then the Giants began to climb!
At first the process did not attract much attention. The public was so thoroughly disheartened by the downfall of their favorites in the West, that they took it for granted that they were out of the running for the pennant. Of course it was assumed that they would finish in the first division--it was very seldom that a New York team could not be depended on to do that--and that by some kind of miracle it might be possible to finish second. But there was very little consolation in that. New York wanted a winner or nothing. If the Giants could not fly the championship flag at the Polo Grounds, nobody cared very much whether they came in second or eighth or anywhere between.
The first team to visit the Polo Grounds was the Bostons. They had greatly improved their game since the beginning of the season, and were even thought to have a look-in for the flag. They chuckled to themselves at the thought that they would catch the Giants in the slump that had begun out West and press them still deeper in the direction of the cellar. At first they thought they might even make a clean sweep. They lost the first game, but only by reason of a muff of an easy fly that let in two unearned runs in the sixth. That of course disposed of the clean sweep idea, but still, three out of four would do. But when they lost the second game also, their jubilation began to subside. Now the best they could hope for was an even break. But again they lost, and the climax was put to their discomfiture when the Giants simply walked away with the fourth game by a score of 10 to 0.
But even with this series of four in a row captured by the Giants, the public refused to enthuse. It might have been only a flash in the pan. It is true that the sporting writers were beginning to sit up and take notice. Most of their time hitherto had been spent in advising McRae through the columns of their paper how he might strengthen his team for next year. The present season of course was past praying for. Yet there was a distinct chirking up on the part of the scribes, although they carefully refrained from making any favorable predictions that afterward they might be sorry for. They would wait awhile and see. Besides, the Brooklyns were coming next, and they had usually found it easy to defeat the Giants. If the Giants could hold the men from over the big bridge to an even break, it might mean a great deal.
The Brooklyns came, saw and--were conquered. Four times in succession they went down before superb pitching and heavy batting. Four times they called on their heavy sluggers and their best boxmen, but the Giants rode over them roughshod. The sporting writers sat up and rubbed their eyes. Was this the same team that had come home forlorn and bedraggled after their last trip? Had the Giants really come to life? Was the pennant still a possibility?
By this time the public had begun to wake up. The stands at the Polo Grounds no longer looked like a desert. The crowds began to pack the subway cars on their way up to the grounds. Everywhere the question was beginning to be asked: "What do you think of the Giants? Have they still got a chance?"
It was the Phillies' turn next, and they had also to bend the knee. The Giants took them into camp as easily as they had the Braves and the Dodgers. And to rub it in, two of the games were shutouts.
Twelve games in a row, and the Giants tearing through the other teams like so many runaway horses!
CHAPTER XXI
THE WINNING STREAK
The Giants were in for a winning streak, and New York City promptly went baseball mad!
Now there was no question of filling the grounds. It was rather a question of getting there early enough to secure seats.
The Polo Grounds could accommodate thirty-five thousand, and again and again that number was reached and exceeded. The great amphitheatre was a sea of eager faces. Fans stood in hundreds in the rear of the upper grandstands. The lower stand too was filled to overflowing, and the bleachers were packed. It was astonishing how many business men closed their rolltop desks with a bang on those summer afternoons. Young and old alike were wild to be at the games and see the Giants add one more to their rapidly mounting list of victories.
Thirteen--fourteen--fifteen--sixteen! Were the Giants ever going to be stopped? If so, who was going to stop them? The Western teams were coming now and the St. Louis team had left their scalps in the Giant's wigwam. Chicago was next in line. Could they stop the Giants in their mad rush for the flag?
They could not, although they tried desperately, and Brennan, their resourceful manager, used all the cunning and guile that his long experience had taught him. The Giants tamed the Cubs with a thoroughness that left nothing to be desired from a New York point of view. And now the string of victories had mounted to twenty.
Old records were got out and furbished up. It was found that once before, when Markwith and Hughson were in their prime, the New Yorks had won twenty-six games in a row. Could they repeat? Could they beat their own record that had been hung up so long for other teams to aim at? That was the question that absorbed public interest, not only in New York, but in baseball circles all over the country.
The reason for this phenomenal spurt of the Giants, it was recognized, could be found in two chief factors. One was the wonderful work being done by Joe both as a pitcher and a batter. The other was the marvelous advance that had been made by Jim as a twirler.
Joe had never had such complete mastery of the ball as he was showing this season. Even the pitching he had done the previous year, in the World Series between the Giants and the Sox, paled in comparison with what he was doing now. His control was something almost magical. It was such a rarity for him to give a base on balls that when it happened it was specially noted by the sporting writers. He worked the corners of the plate to perfection. He mixed up his fast ones with slow teasers that made the opposing batsmen look ridiculous as they broke their backs reaching for them. His slants and twists and hops and curves had never been so baffling. It was fast getting to the point where the other teams were half beaten as soon as they saw Joe pick up his glove and go into the box.
But it was not even his pitching, great as it was, that held the worshiping attention of the crowds. It was the home run record that he was piling up in such an amazing fashion that already he was rated by many the equal of the wonderful Kid Rose. That wonderful eye of his had learned to time the ball so accurately as it came up to the plate that the bat met it at precisely the hundredth part of a second when it did the most good. Then all his mighty arm and shoulder leaned on the ball and gave it wings. Almost every other game now saw a home run chalked up to his credit. In three games of the winning streak he had made two home runs in a single game. It was common talk that he was out to tie the record of Ed Delehanty, the one-time mighty slugger of the Phillies, who in the years of long ago had hung up a record of four homers in a game. He had not done it yet, but there was still time before the season closed.
More still would have gone to his credit had not the opposing pitchers become so afraid of him that they would not let him hit the ball. Again and again when he came to the bat, the catcher would stand away off to the side and the pitcher would deliberately send over four balls, so wide that Joe could not possibly reach them without stepping out of the box. This was a mighty disappointment to the crowds, half of whom had come with no other object in view than to see Joe smash out a homer. They would jeer and taunt the pitcher for his cowardice in fearing to match his slants against Joe's bat, but the practice continued nevertheless.
Even this, however, was not a total loss to the Giants. It put Joe on first anyway, and counted at least for as much as a single would have done. And Joe was so fleet of foot on the bases that McRae once said jokingly that he would have to have detectives on the field to keep him from stealing so many bags. Many a base on balls thus given to Joe out of fear for his mighty bat was eventually turned into a run that helped to win the game.
One morning when Joe, with the rest of the Giant team, was going out on the field for practice, his eye caught sight of a long white streak of kalsomine that ran up the right field wall to the top, behind the bleachers.
"What's the idea?" he asked, turning to Robbie, who was close beside him.
"Don't you really know, you old fence-breaker?" asked Robbie, a smile breaking over his jovial face.
"Blest if I do," answered Joe.
"Well, I'll tell you," answered Robbie. "The fact is that you've got into such a habit of knocking the ball into the right field stands--mighty good habit, too, if you ask me--that the umpires have asked us to paint this line so that they can see whether the hit is fair or foul. The ordinary hit they can tell easy enough. But yours are so far out that they have to have especial help in judging them. It's the first time it's had to be done for any hitter in the history of the game. Some compliment, what?"
But Joe's work, wonderful as it was, would not alone have started and maintained the Giants' winning streak. No one man, however great, can carry a whole team on his shoulders. The next most important element was the pitching that Jim was showing. It was only second in quality to that turned in by Joe himself. Jim was a natural ball player, and his close association and friendship with Joe had taught him all the fine points of the game. He had learned the weaknesses of opposing batters. He knew those who would bite at an outcurve and those to whom a fast high one was poison; those who would offer at the first ball and those who would try to wait him out; those who would crowd the plate and those who would flinch when he wound the ball around their necks. He had a splendid head on his shoulders and a world of power in his biceps; and those two things go far to make a winning combination.
Another element of strength was the return of Hughson to the team and his ability to take his regular turn in the box. His arm still hurt him, and it was beginning to be evident that he would never again be the Hughson of old. But his skill and knowledge of the game and the batters was so great that it more than atoned for the weakness of his pitching arm. His control was as wonderful as ever, and he nursed his arm as much as possible. He did not attempt to do much striking out, as that would have been too severe a strain. More and more he let the batsmen hit the ball, and depended upon the eight men behind him to back him up. Often he would go through an inning this way and the three put outs would be made by the infield on grounders and the outfielders on flies. But once let a man get on first and the "Old Master" would tighten up and prevent scoring. By thus favoring his arm, he was able to turn in his share of the victories.
Markwith also had a new lease of life, and was winging them over as in the days when he had been without question the best port side flinger in the League.
In fact the pitching staff was at the height of its form and had never been going better. And the rest of the team, without exception, was playing great ball. There was not a cripple on the list. Willis and Iredell had been restored to their positions at third and short respectively, and were playing the best ball of their careers. With Larry at second and Burkett at first, they formed a stonewall infield that seldom let anything get away from them. They made hair-raising stops and dazzling double plays, gobbling up grounders on either side, spearing high liners that were ticketed for singles, and played like supermen. The outfielders had caught the spirit of enthusiasm that pervaded the team, and were making what seemed like impossible catches. Add to this that the team members were batting like fiends and running bases like so many ghosts, and the reason for the winning streak becomes apparent. The Giants were simply playing unbeatable ball.
So the Cincinnatis found when the time came for their heads to drop into the basket. That series was sweet revenge for the Giants, who had not forgotten the beating the Reds had given them on their last swing around the circuit.
Twenty-one--twenty-two--twenty-three--twenty-four. Two more games to tie their own previous record. Three more to beat it. Would they do it?
Many shook their heads. On the mere law of averages, a break for the Giants was now due. The team had been under a fearful strain. Such phenomenal work could not last forever.
Besides, the severest test was now at hand. The Pittsburghs were coming. The Smoky City boys had been playing great ball themselves. They had won nineteen games out of the last twenty-four, and the margin of seven games that they had had when the Giants began their streak still kept them in the lead by two games. They had boasted that they would break the Giants' streak as soon as they struck New York.
The time had come to make good their boast. Would they do it?
CHAPTER XXII
STRIVING FOR MASTERY
It was Jim's turn to go on the mound in the first game with the Pittsburghs, and in the practice work before the game he showed that he was keyed up for his work. For so comparatively young a pitcher, he might well have been a bit nervous at facing so redoubtable a team before the immense crowd that had gathered to see whether or not the Giants' winning streak was doomed to be broken. But there was no trace of it in his manner, and McRae, looking him over, concluded that there was no reason to change his selection.
His confidence was justified. Jim that afternoon was at as high a point of pitching form as he had ever reached in his career. He pitched a masterly game and held the Pirate sluggers to four hits. His support was all that could be desired, and some of the stops and throws of his comrades bordered on the miraculous. The Giants came out at the big end of the score, their tally being three to the solitary run scored by their opponents.
"Twenty-five!" chuckled Joe, as he slapped his friend on the back, when the Pirates had been turned back in their half of ninth. "Jim, you're a lulu! You had those fellows rolling over and playing dead."
"I guess we had all the breaks," returned Jim, smiling modestly.
"Nothing of the kind," disclaimed Joe. "If anything, they had whatever breaks there were. It was simply a case of dandy pitching. You had them buffaloed."
"Only one more game to go before we tie our own record," said Jim. "Gee, Joe, I wish you were going to pitch to-morrow. We're just in sight of the Promised Land. That will be the most important game of all."
"Oh, I don't know," replied Joe. "It will be something to tie the record, but I want to break it. Day after to-morrow will be the big day. That is, if we win to-morrow, and I think we shall. It's Markwith's turn to go in, and he's going fine. The Pittsburghs aren't any too good against left-handed pitchers, anyway."
But whatever the alleged weakness of the Pirates against southpaws, they showed little respect for Markwith's offerings on the next day. They had on their batting clothes and clouted the ball lustily. Only phenomenal fielding on the part of the Giants kept the score down, and again and again Markwith was pulled out of a hole by some dazzling bit of play when a run seemed certain. Still he worried through until the first part of the eighth. At that time the score was five to four in favor of the visitors. The Giants had been batting freely, but not quite as hard as the Pirates.
In the eighth, Markwith was plainly beginning to wobble in his control. He passed two men in quick succession. That was enough for McRae, and Joe, who had been warming up at the right of the grandstand, was sent into the box.
The Pirates' scoring stopped then and there. Astley, who was at the bat, fanned on three successive strikes. Brown hit to the box and Joe made a lightning throw to Larry at second, who relayed it to first for a sparkling double play, putting out the side.
The Giants' half of the eighth was scoreless. All the Pittsburghs had to do now was to hold them down for one more inning, and the winning streak would be broken.
Joe made short work of the visitors in their last inning and the Giants came in for their final half.
Willis was the first man up. He made a savage lunge at the first ball pitched, but caught it on the under side, and it went up directly over the plate. Jenkins the Pittsburgh catcher, did not have to move from his tracks to gather it in. Larry sent a fierce low liner to Baskerville at short, who made a magnificent catch, picking it off his shoe tops. Two out, and the crowd fairly groaned as the winning streak seemed at last about to be broken.
All hopes were now pinned on Denton. All he could do, however, was to dribble a slow one to the box. It seemed a certain out, and nine times out of ten would have been. But the Pittsburgh pitcher, in running in on it, snatched it up so hurriedly that it fell out of his hand. He recovered it in an instant and shot it to first. But that fumble had been fatal, and Denton by a headlong slide reached first before the ball.
A tremendous roar arose from the stands, and the people who had started to leave sat down suddenly and sat down hard.
In the Giants' dugout, all was excitement and animation. McRae ran down to first to coach Denton. Robbie rushed over to Joe, who was next in turn and had already picked up his bat.
"For the love of Pete, Joe," he begged, "paste the old apple. Show them again what you've been showing us all along. Kill the ball! Just once, Joe, just once! You can do it. One good crack, and you'll save the winning streak."
"I'll do my best," was Joe's reply.
Frantic adjurations of the same nature were showered on Joe as he took up his position at the plate. Then there was a great silence, as the crowd fairly held their breath.
But the crafty Pittsburgh pitcher was to be reckoned with. He had no mind to see the game go glimmering just at the moment it seemed to be won. He signaled to his catcher and deliberately pitched two balls wide of the plate. It was evident that he was going to give Joe his base on balls and take a chance with Mylert, the next batter.
But the best laid plans sometimes miscarry. The third ball he pitched did not go as wide of the plate as he had meant it should. Joe sized it up, saw that he could reach it, and swung for it with all his might.
There was a crack like that of a rifle as the bat met the ball and sent it mounting ever higher and higher toward the right field wall. It seemed as though it were endowed with wings. On it went in a mighty curve and landed at last in the topmost row of the right field seats. There it was pocketed by a proud and happy fan, while Joe, sending in Denton ahead of him, jogged easily around the bases to the home plate. The game was won! The winning streak was saved! The Giants had tied their record, which had stood untouched for so many years!
The scene in the stands and bleachers beggared description. Roar after roar went up, while the crazy spectators threw their straw hats into the air and scattered them by scores over the field. The Polo Grounds had been transformed into a madhouse, but differing from other insane asylums in that all the inmates were happy. All, that is, except the Pirates and their supporters, who thought unspeakable things as they saw the game in a twinkling torn from their grasp.
Joe's only escape from his enthusiastic well-wishers lay in flight, and he made a bee line for the clubhouse. He got inside not a moment too soon. For a long time afterward a great crowd hung about the entrance, waiting for him to reappear, and it was only by slipping out of a back entrance that he eluded them.
The old record had been tied. Could it be beaten?
CHAPTER XXIII
HOLDING THEM DOWN
Baseball circles had rarely been more deeply stirred than by the issue of the game, by winning which the Giants had tied their record. It was not merely the winning, but the sensational way in which Baseball Joe's home run had turned the scales in the last minute and snatched victory from defeat that excited the fans.
But now that the record was tied, would the Giants be able to hang up a new one? That was the question on every lip, the question whose discussion filled column after column of the sporting pages of the newspapers.
All agreed that the Giants had been lucky to win. If it had not been for the error of the pitcher on Denton's slow dribble, they would have lost. But it was conceded that it was not luck that had secured that mighty home run that Joe had hammered out to the bleachers. That was ball playing. That was muscle. That was determination. Once again his cool head and quick eye and powerful arm had shown that the game was not over until the last man was out.
It was Joe's turn to pitch, and it was upon that fact more than anything else that the vast crowd that stormed the Polo Grounds relied for annexing the twenty-seventh game. The Pittsburghs too were holding out their star pitcher, Hooper, for that critical game, and it was certain that they would put forth superhuman efforts to win.
In more senses than one, the game was an important one. The last two victories of the Giants had wiped out the lead that the Pirates had had over them, and the two teams were now on even terms in games won and lost for the season, so that the Pirates had a double incentive to win. If they took the game they would not only prevent the Giants from breaking their own record for a winning streak, but would also once more stand at the head of the League.
"It's up to you, Joe," McRae said, just before the bell rang for the game to begin. "How are you feeling? Are you tired at all from pitching those last two innings yesterday?"
"Not a bit tired," replied Joe promptly. "That little work yesterday was just the practice I needed to get into form. I'm feeling as fine as silk."
"You look it," said the manager admiringly, as his eye took in the strong, lithe figure, the bronzed face and clear eyes of his star pitcher. "Well go in now Joe and eat them up. Hooper will be in the box for them, and I'm not denying that he's some pitcher. But he never saw the day that you couldn't run rings around him. Go in and win."
It was evident from the start that there would be no such free hitting that day as there had been the day before. Both boxmen were in superb form, and by the time the first inning for each side was over, the spectators had settled down to witness a pitcher's duel.
Hooper was a spitball artist, and his moist slants kept the Giants guessing in the early part of the game. But while he depended chiefly on this form of delivery, he had other puzzlers in his assortment, and he mixed them up in a most deceptive manner. In the first three innings he had four strike-outs to his credit, and when the Giants did connect with the ball it went up into the air and into the hands of some waiting fielder. His control of the slippery sphere also was excellent, and he issued no passes.
In the fourth inning, the Giants began to nibble at his offerings. Curry rapped one out to right for the first single of the game. Iredell was robbed of a hit by a great jumping catch of O'Connor, who speared the ball with his gloved hand. Burkett lined out a two-bagger that carried Curry easily to third, but in trying to stretch the hit, he was caught by Ralston's magnificent throw to the plate. Burkett in the meantime had made a dash for third, but thought better of it, and scrambled back to second just in time. The next man up went out from short to first and the inning ended without scoring. But the Giants had proved to themselves that Hooper could be hit, and it was with renewed confidence that they took their places in the field.
Joe in the meantime was mowing his opponents down with the regularity of a machine. His mighty arm swung back and forth like a piston rod. He had never cared for the spitball, as he knew that sooner or later it destroyed a pitcher's effectiveness. But in his repertoire of curves and slants he had weapons far more deadly. His fast straight one whizzed over the plate like a bullet. He mixed these up with a slow, dipping curve that the Pirates endeavored in vain to solve. Only with the head of the Pittsburgh batting order did he at times resort to the fadeaway. That he kept in reserve for some moment when danger threatened. Twice in the first five innings he set down the side on strikes, and not a man reached first on balls. It was wonderful pitching, and again and again Joe was forced to doff his cap to the cheers of the crowd, as he came into the bench.
In the sixth inning, the Giants got busy. Wheeler lashed out a whale of a three-bagger to left. Willis laid down a neat sacrifice, bringing Wheeler home for the first run of the game. Larry hit the ball on the seam for a single, but was caught a moment later in trying to purloin second. The next batter up went out on strikes and the inning ended with the Giants one run to the good.
The seventh inning came and passed and not a hit had been made by the Pirates. Then it began to be realized that Joe was out for a no-hit game, and the crowd rooted for him madly.
Joe himself was about the only cool man on the grounds. He measured every man that came to the plate and took his time about pitching to him. Man after man he fanned or made him hit feeble grounders to the infield. And that wonderful control of his forbade any passes. The Pirates did not dare to wait him out. It was a case of strike or be struck out, and so they struck at the ball, but usually struck only the empty air.
That ball! Sometimes it was a wheedling, coaxing ball, that sauntered up to the plate as though just begging to be hit. Again it was a vanishing ball that grew smaller from the time it left Joe's hand until it became a mere pin point as it glinted over the rubber. Still again it was a savage ball that shot over the plate with a rush and a hiss that made the batter jump back. But always it was a deceptive ball, that slipped by, hopped by, loafed by, twisted by, dodged by, and the Pirate sluggers strained their backs as well as their tempers in trying to hit it.
McRae and Robbie on the bench watched with fascination and delight the work of their king pitcher.
"It's magic, I tell you, John, just magic!" blurted out Robbie, as another victim went out on strikes and threw down his bat in disgust.
"It sure looks like it," grinned McRae. "He has those fellows jumping through the hoops all right. I'm free to say I never saw anything like it."
"He's got the ball trained, I tell you," persisted Robbie, rubbing his hands in jubilation. "It's an educated ball. It does just what Joe tells it to."
Almost uncontrollable excitement prevailed as the Pirates came in for their last inning. Their heaviest sluggers were coming to the bat, and now if ever was the time to do something. They figured that the strain must have told on Joe and that a crack was due.
Their hope grew dimmer, however, when Ralston, after fouling off two, fanned on the third strike. But it revived again when Baskerville rolled an easy one to Larry, that the latter fumbled for a moment and then hurled to first a fraction of a second too late.
There was a roar of glee from the Pirates, and they began to chatter in the hope of rattling the pitcher. Bemis, the next man up, came to the plate swinging three bats. He discarded two of them and glared at Joe.
"Here's where you meet your finish," he boasted, as he brandished his bat.
Joe merely smiled and put one over. Bemis drove it straight for the box. Joe leaped into the air, caught it in his ungloved hand and shot it like lightning to first, catching Baskerville before he could get back.
It was as pretty a double play as had ever been made on the New York grounds!
CHAPTER XXIV
A CRUSHING BLOW
The play had been so swift that the eye could scarcely follow the ball, and it was a few seconds before the majority of the spectators could grasp what had happened.
Then a tremendous shout went up that rolled across the field in increasing volume as the crowds realized that they had seen what would probably never be seen again in a single game. They had seen the New York team break its own record for straight wins, and in addition they had witnessed that rarest of pitching exploits, a no-hit game. Not even a scratch hit had marred Joe's wonderful performance, nor had he given a single base on balls. It was a red-letter day for the Giants and for Joe, and the people who had been there would talk about that game for years.
If any one should have been elated by the marvelous result of that day's work, it was Joe. He had never stood on a higher pinnacle, except perhaps when he had won the last game of the World Series the preceding year. He was more than ever a hero in the eyes of the baseball public of New York, and within five minutes after the game was over the wires had flashed the news to every city of the country. But despite his natural pride in his achievement and his pleasure in knowing that he had won this critical game for his team, it was a very subdued and worried Joe that hurried to the clubhouse after the game was over. There his mates gathered, in the seventh heaven of delight, and there was a general jubilee, in which McRae and Robson joined.
"We did it, we did it!" cried Robbie, bouncing about like a rubber ball in his excitement. "We broke the record! Twenty-seven games in a row!"
"Where do you get that 'we' stuff, you old porpoise," grinned McRae, poking him jovially in the ribs. "Seems to me that Joe had something to do with it. Put it there, Matson," he went on, extending his hand. "You pitched a game that will go down in baseball history and you saved our winning streak from going up in smoke."
Joe put out his left hand, and McRae looked a little surprised. Then he glanced down at Joe's right hand, and a look of consternation swept over his face.
"Great Scott!" he cried. "What's the matter with your hand? It's swelled to twice its usual size."
[Illustration: "GREAT SCOTT!" HE CRIED. "WHAT'S THE MATTER WITH YOUR HAND?"]
"It was that drive of Bemis', I guess," replied Joe. "When I nabbed it, I seemed to feel something crack in the hand. Perhaps, though, it's only strained. It will probably be all right by to-morrow."
"To-morrow!" roared McRae, as all crowded around anxiously. "There'll be no waiting till to-morrow. That hand is worth a half million dollars to the New York club, to say nothing of its worth to yourself. Where's the trainer? Where's the doctor? Jump, some of you fellows, and get them here quick!"
There was a general scurrying around, and in a few minutes both of those men were examining the injured hand with the greatest solicitude. They looked grave when they had finished.
"It's hard to tell just what has happened until the swelling has been reduced," pronounced the doctor, as he busied himself with splints and lotions. "I'm afraid, though, that it's more than a sprain. When it swells as much as that it generally means that a bone has been broken."
There was a general groan.
"That means, does it, that he will be out of the game for the rest of the season?" asked McRae, in notes of despair.
"Oh, I wouldn't say that," the doctor hastened to reassure him. "It may be only a trifling fracture, and in that case he will have to be out only for a short time. But for the next few weeks anyway, he isn't likely to do any more pitching."
"Who's the best specialist in New York?" demanded McRae.
The doctor named a surgeon of national reputation.
"'Phone him to come at once," commanded McRae. "Or, better yet, Joe, you'd better come right with me now. My car's outside and I'll get you up there in fifteen minutes. Every minute counts now."
Joe hurriedly finished dressing, and McRae bundled him into his automobile. It was a speedy machine, and it was to be feared that the traffic laws were not strictly observed as it made its way downtown. But the traffic policemen all knew McRae and Joe, and there was nothing to prevent their getting to their destination in record time.
A telephone call from the clubhouse had already notified the eminent surgeon that the pair were coming, and he was waiting for them. Without a moment's delay, they were ushered into his inner office, where he stripped off the bandages from the hand and made a thorough examination.
"There is a small dislocation," he said when he had finished. "But I think it will yield readily to treatment. It will not be a permanent injury, and in a little while the hand will be as good as ever."
Both drew a sigh of immense relief.
"A little while," repeated McRae. "Just what do you mean by that, Doctor? You know we're fighting for the pennant, and we're depending on this king pitcher of ours more than on any one else to win out. Every day he's out of the race weakens our chances."
"I can't tell that definitely until to-morrow morning," the doctor replied. "But offhand I should say for two or three weeks at least."
"Two or three weeks!" repeated McRae in tones of mingled dismay and relief. "In those two or three weeks we may lose the flag. But thank heaven it's no worse."
After making an appointment for the next morning, McRae drove Joe to his hotel.
"It's bad enough, Joe," he said to him in parting. "I don't know how we're going to spare you while we're in the thick of the fight. But when I think of what it would mean to the team if you were knocked out altogether, I've got no kick coming. We're ahead of the Pittsburghs now, anyway, thanks to your splendid work, and if we can just hold our own till you get back, we'll pull out all right yet."
Joe found Jim waiting for him, full of anxiety and alarm. But his face lighted up when he learned that the injury was not a permanent one.
"It would have been a mighty sight better to have lost the game to-day than to have bought it at such a price," he said. "But after all, nothing matters as long as your hand is safe. That hand is your fortune."
"To-day was my unlucky day," remarked Joe ruefully, as he looked at his bandaged hand.
"In one sense it was," replied Jim, "but in another it wasn't. To-day you hung up a record. You saved the Giants' winning streak and you pitched a no-hit game!"
CHAPTER XXV
LINING THEM OUT
The pain in his injured hand was intense that night, and Joe paced the floor for hours before he was able to get to sleep. By morning, however, the hand had yielded to treatment, and the swelling had greatly decreased. At the earliest hour possible Joe, accompanied by Jim, was at the surgeon's office.
The doctor's face expressed his satisfaction, as, after an examination, he rendered his verdict.
"It isn't as bad as I feared," he said while he deftly rebandaged the injured member. "This dislocation is slight and you'll soon be as right as ever. But you've got to take good care of it. It will be some time before you can pitch."
"But how about batting?" asked Joe anxiously. "That isn't a steady strain, as I'd only have to do it three or four times in the course of the game."
"I don't know," replied the doctor with a smile. "I'm not familiar enough with the game to tell where the strain comes in that case. I can imagine, however, that it would be chiefly in the arm and shoulder. It's possible that you may be able to bat before you can pitch. But I can tell more about that later on, as I see how your hand mends. For the present, you'll have to go slow."
The sporting writers had no reason to complain of the dullness of news for that day's issue. The papers were ringing with the stirring events of the day before. Columns of space were devoted to the story of the game, and there was unstinted praise of Joe for his wonderful exploit.
But mingled with the jubilation was a strain of apprehension. The accident that had befallen the great pitcher was a subject of the keenest anxiety. It was recognized that a great blow had been struck at the Giants' hope for the pennant. To have the greatest twirler of the team put out of the game just in the hottest part of the fight was a disaster that might prove fatal. Pittsburgh stock took a decided upward bound in consequence.
The effect on the Giants themselves, as far as their morale was concerned, was almost certain to be hurtful. The tremendous strain under which they had been, while compiling their twenty-seven consecutive wins, had brought them to a point where a sudden blow like this might make them go to pieces.
As a matter of fact, that is just what did happen to them that very afternoon. The whole team was depressed and had a case of nerves. They played like a lot of schoolboys, booting the ball, slipping up on easy grounders and muffing flies that ordinarily they could have caught with ease.
The Pittsburghs, on the other hand, played with redoubled skill and courage. Their hopes had been revived by the misfortune that had befallen their most dangerous opponent. Joe was personally popular with all the players of the League, and they were sorry that he was hurt. But that did not prevent them from taking advantage of the chance to make hay while the sun shone.
The game developed into a farce after the third inning, and from that time on it was only a question of the size of the score. When the game ended, the Giant outfielders were leg-weary from chasing hits, and the visitors were equally tired from running bases. The Pittsburghs won by a score of 17 to 3, and the Giants' winning streak came to an end.
But for once the team escaped a roasting from McRae. The team had done wonderful work, and any nine that wins twenty-seven games in succession has a right to lose the twenty-eighth. Besides the break was due, and the manager hoped that with this one bad game out of their systems the team would pull itself together and start another rally.
For the next week or two, the race see-sawed between the two leading teams. By this time it had become generally recognized that the pennant lay between them. The other contestants had occasional spurts, when great playing for a short period would revive the waning hopes of their admirers, but they soon fell back again in the ruck. It was quite certain that the flag would fly either over Forbes Field or over the Polo Grounds.
In the meantime, Joe's hand was mending rapidly. His superb physical condition helped him greatly, and the doctor was visibly surprised and gratified by the progress of his patient. But it was hard work for Joe to be laid off just at the time that his team needed him most. Still he believed in the proverb "the more haste the less speed," and he tried to be patient, even while he was "chafing at the bit."
About ten days after the accident, the doctor delighted him by telling him that he need not come to see him any more. But he still ordered him to refrain from pitching. As to batting, he said cautiously that Joe could try that out a little at a time. If he found that after easy batting practice his hand did not hurt him, he might be permitted to bat in an actual game.
Joe was quick to avail himself of the permission. Very cautiously he tried batting out fungo hits. While at first the hand felt a little sore and stiff, this soon passed off. Then Joe had Jim pitch him some easy ones in practice, and found that he could line them out without ill effects. Finally he let Jim put them over at full speed, and was delighted to find that he could lift them into the right field stands and not suffer much of a twinge. At last he was himself again, as far at least as batting was concerned.
His recovery came just in time to be of immense benefit to the team. The men had slumped considerably in batting, though they still held up to their usual form in fielding. But fielding alone cannot win games. Defensive work is all very well, but combined with it must be the offensive work on the part of the batsmen. The best fielding in the world cannot put runs over the plate.
Joe's return put new spirit into the team at once. The batting picked up noticeably, with Joe leading the way. At first he was a little cautious about putting his whole strength into his blow, and for a few days when he was used in emergencies as a pinch hitter, he gathered a crop of singles with an occasional double and triple. But with every successive day he let out a new link, and at length he put his whole strength into his swing. Home runs became again a common feature, and the Giants started in joyously on a new upward climb.
The season was to end this year in the West, and by the time the Giants started on their last swing around the circuit, they had a lead of four games over the Pirates. It was not necessarily a winning lead, but it was very comforting just the same to have those four games as a margin. Still, the Pittsburghs were hanging on gamely, ready to forge to the front on the least sign of weakening shown by their competitors. It was one of the hottest races that had ever been seen in the National League, and there was a chance that it would not be decided until the last day of the season.
"The last lap," remarked Jim, as the team started on its trip. "Here's where we win or lose."
"Here's where we win," corrected Joe.
CHAPTER XXVI
THE TIRELESS FOE
The Giants opened at Chicago, and the results were none too good. The Cubs, who just then were in the midst of a spurt, clawed and bit their way to victory in two games of the four, and the Giants were lucky to break even. As it was, the two games they won were annexed by the terrific batting of Joe, who was hitting like a demon. In the four games he made three home runs, and two of them were lined out when there were men on bases. All pitchers looked alike to him, and he played no favorites. The rest he had had from pitching had made him all the more effective as a batsman.
His fame as a hitter had spread through all the cities of the League, and the Chicago grounds were filled to their capacity during the Giants' visit. Most of the spectators were as eager to see him hit one of his mammoth homers as they were to see the home team win. Cheers greeted him every time he came to the bat. He was the greatest drawing card that the Giants had or ever had had.
Opinion was divided as to whether he or Kid Rose of the Yankees was the greatest hitter. Each had his partisans. Rose had been longer in the limelight, and those who had made up their minds that he was the greatest hitter that ever lived were reluctant to see their idol replaced by a newcomer. Many confidently predicted that Joe would not last, that his work was only a flash in the pan. Others declared that he did not have to bat against as good pitching in the National League as was shown in the American, and that therefore Rose's work was superior. But as Joe kept on, day in and day out, lacing out tremendous hits that landed in the bleachers and at times sailed over the fence, the doubters grew silent, or joined in the wild applause as Joe jogged around the bases and crossed the plate standing up.
The keenest interest was manifested in the race that the Yankees were making to land the flag in the American League. If they should come out on top, the World Series would be held between New York teams, and Rose and Joe could be seen in action against each other. That would help to settle the question as to which had a right to wear the batting crown of the world. It would be a battle of giants, and it was certain that, if such a contest took place, there would be delegations to see it from all parts of the country.
McRae was no longer content to use Joe simply as a pinch hitter. He wanted to take full advantage of his marvelous hitting, and so he put him in the regular line-up and played him every day. Wheeler was relegated to the bench and Joe took his place in the field. The manager also changed his batting order, putting Joe fourth in the cleanup position. And again and again his judgment was vindicated by the way Joe cleaned up with homers, sending his comrades in ahead of him.
The day the third Chicago game was played was a very hot one, and Joe and Jim were tired and warm. Jim had pitched that day and won, after a gruelling contest, and Joe had varied his ordinary routine by knocking out two home runs instead of one.
Joe was seated in his hotel room, writing a letter to Mabel. Jim had stepped down to the office to get some stationery, for he had the pleasant task on hand of writing to Clara.
A knock came at the door, and in answer to his call to enter, a bellboy stepped into the room, bearing a pitcher and glasses.
"Here's the lemonade you ordered, boss," he said, as he put his burden on a convenient stand.
"Lemonade?" repeated Joe in some surprise. "I didn't order any."
"Clerk sent me up with it, sir," said the bellboy respectfully. "Said it was for Mr. Matson, room four-seventeen. This is four-seventeen, isn't it?" he asked as he glanced at the number on the door, which he had left open.
"This is four-seventeen, all right, and I'm Mr. Matson," Joe answered. "But I didn't order anything. I'll tell you how it is though," he added, as a thought struck him. "My friend who is sharing the room with me has just gone down to the lobby, and he's probably told the clerk to send it up. That's all right. Leave it there."
"Shall I pour you out a glass, sir?" asked the boy, suiting the action to the word.
"If you like," responded Joe carelessly, taking a quarter out of his pocket as a tip.
The boy thanked him and withdrew, closing the door behind him. Joe finished the paragraph he was writing, and then picked up the glass. He took a sip of it and put it down.
"Pretty bitter," he said to himself. "Not enough sugar. Still it's cooling, and I sure am warm."
Again he lifted the glass to his lips, but just then Jim burst into the room.
"Whom do you think I saw just now?" he demanded.
"Give it up," replied Joe. "But whoever it was, you seem to be all excited about it. Who was it?"
"Fleming!" answered Jim, as he plumped down into a chair.
"Fleming!" repeated Joe with quickened interest. "What's that fellow doing here? I thought he hung out in New York."
"That's what I want to know," replied Jim. "Wherever that fellow is, there's apt to be dirty work brewing. And the frightened look that came into his eyes when he saw me, and the way he hurried past me, made me uneasy. He acted as if he'd been up to something. I don't like the idea of a pal of Braxton being in the same hotel with us."
"I don't care much for it myself," answered Joe. "Still, a hotel is open to anybody, and this is one of the most popular ones in the city. It isn't especially surprising that you should happen to run across him."
"Not surprising perhaps, but unpleasant just the same," responded Jim. "It leaves a bad taste in my mouth."
"Well," laughed Joe, "take the bad taste out with a glass of this lemonade you sent up. It isn't very good--it has a bad taste of its own--but it will cool you off."
He raised his glass to his mouth as he spoke. But in an instant Jim was on his feet and knocked the glass from his hand. It fell on the floor and splintered in many pieces.
Joe looked at him in open-eyed amazement, too astonished to speak.
"Don't touch the stuff!" cried Jim. "What do you mean by saying I sent it up?"
"Didn't you?" asked Joe. "The bellboy said he had been told to bring it to me, and as I hadn't ordered it, I jumped to the conclusion that you had."
"Not I!" replied Jim. "But I can guess who did!"
"Who?"
"Fleming."
The two friends looked fixedly at each other.
"Do you mean," asked Joe, after a moment in which surprise and indignation struggled for the mastery, "that that lemonade was doped?"
"Doped or poisoned, I'll bet my life," affirmed Jim. "Let's get to the bottom of this thing. Quick, old man! Perhaps Fleming is still somewhere in the hotel."
"Not a chance," replied Joe, jumping to his feet. "If he's mixed up in this, he's getting away as fast as his legs or a car can carry him. But we'll go down and see what we can learn from the clerk."
They went to the head clerk, whom they knew very well. He was an ardent fan, and his face lighted up as he saw the friends approaching.
"Saw you play to-day, gentlemen," he said. "Those two home runs of yours were whales, Mr. Matson. And your pitching, Mr. Barclay, was all to the mustard."
"Sorry to beat your Chicago boys, but we needed that game in our business," laughed Joe. "But what I want to see you about just now is a personal matter. Did you get an order from me or from my room to send up any lemonade?"
The clerk looked surprised.
"No," he replied. "I didn't get any such request. Wait a moment until I see the telephone operator."
He consulted the girl at the telephone, and was back in a moment. "No message of any kind came from your room to-night," he announced.
"But one of your bellboys brought it up," persisted Joe.
"Which one of them was it?" asked the clerk, pointing to a group of them lounging about.
"None of them," responded Joe, as he ran his eye over them.
CHAPTER XXVII
CHAMPIONS OF THE LEAGUE
"There are three more of the bellboys doing various errands about the hotel," replied the clerk. "If you gentlemen will wait around they'll be back in a few minutes."
"All right, we'll wait," said Joe.
Before long, all the bellboys were back, and Joe had had a good look at the entire staff. Not one resembled the boy who had come to his room.
"I can't understand it," mused the clerk, to whom the boys had been careful not to impart their suspicions. "It must have been sent in by somebody from the outside. It's certain that it wasn't sent up from here."
"Oh, well," said Joe carelessly, "it doesn't matter. I just wanted to find out, so that I could thank the one who did it. Sorry to have troubled you."
They strolled off indifferently and returned to their room.
"'Thank' is good," said Jim, as soon as they were out of earshot.
"I'll thank him all right," replied Joe grimly. "In fact I'll thank him so warmly that it will stagger him."
"May I be there to see!" replied Jim gruffly. "I can figure out the whole thing now. Fleming had had that lemonade doped and it was meant to put you out of business. It was easy to find out what hotel you were stopping at, as that's been in all the papers. Then it was a simple thing to glance over the register and get the number of your room. He's either got a bellboy from some other hotel or dressed up somebody in a bellboy's uniform. He's probably bribed him well, and it's been all the easier because he didn't have to let on to the boy that there was anything crooked about it. Told him perhaps that he was just playing a little joke on a friend or something like that. There's the whole story."
"I guess that's about right," agreed Joe. "Gee, Jim, it's mighty lucky that you knocked that glass out of my hand. I had noticed that it tasted rather bitter, but put that down to too little sugar."
"Let's send some of the stuff to a chemist and have it analyzed," suggested Jim.
"No," objected Joe, "that wouldn't do any good. The thing would be apt to get into the papers, and that's the very thing we mustn't let happen for the sake of the folks at home. We know enough about the stuff to be sure that it was doctored in some way. Everything about the incident tells of crookedness. Fleming was probably the master hand, although he may have simply been the tool of Braxton. Those fellows are running up a heavy account, and some day I hope we'll get the goods on them. We'll just dump the stuff out so that nobody else will be injured. Then we'll lay low but keep our eyes open. It's all that we can do."
"Gee, that was one dandy homer, Joe," said the catcher some time later.
"Best ever," added the first baseman.
"Oh, I don't know," answered the young ball player modestly. "I think I have done better. But it was great to carry it along to eleven innings," he added, with a smile.
"That tenth had me almost going," said the shortstop. "We came close to spilling the beans," and he shook his head seriously.
"Well, 'all's well that ends well,' as Socrates said to General Grant," and Joe grinned.
From Chicago the Giants jumped to St. Louis, where, despite the stiffest kind of resistance, they took three games out of four. They were not quite as successful in Cincinnati, where the best they could get was an even break. The Reds saw a chance to come in third, in which case they would have a share in the World Series money, and they were showing the best ball that they had played all season. The Giants had all they could do to nose them out in the last game, which went to eleven innings and was only won by a home run by Joe in the wind-up.
Seven games out of twelve for a team on the road was not bad, but it would have been worse if the Pirates, in the meantime, had not also had a rocky road to travel. The Brooklyns had helped their friends across the bridge by taking the Pittsburghs into camp to the tune of three games out of four and the Bostons had broken even. With the Phillies, however, the Pirates had made a clean sweep of the four games. So when the Giants faced their most formidable foes, they still had the lead of four games with which they had begun their Western trip.
This, of course, gave the Giants the edge on their rivals. The Pittsburghs would have to win the whole four games to draw up on even terms with the leaders. In that case a deciding game would be necessary to break the tie. On the other hand all the Giants had to do was to win one game of the four and they would have the championship cinched. And that they would do at least that seemed almost a certainty.
But nothing is certain in baseball, as soon became evident. Perhaps it was overconfidence or a sense of already being on easy street that caused the Giants to lose the first game. That, however, could not be said of the second, when the Giants "played their heads off," Jim said, and yet could not win against the classy pitching and stonewall defense put up by the Smoky City team. Things were beginning to look serious for the Giants, and some of their confidence was vanishing.
Still more serious did they become when the third game went into the Pirates' basket. Jim pitched in that game and twirled wonderful ball, but his support was ragged, and several Pirate blows that ought to have been outs were registered ultimately as runs. They were unearned runs, but they counted in the final score as much as though they had been due to the team's hitting. The Giants were long-faced and gloomy.
McRae was clearly worried. If the next game were lost, the leaders would be tied, and the Pirates would still have a chance to win. It would be a bitter pill to swallow if the Giants lost the flag just when it had seemed that all was over except the shouting.
Moreover, the manager was in a quandary. All his first string pitchers had been beaten. His best one in active service at the present time, Jim, had pitched that day and it would not do to ask him to go into the box again to-morrow. In his desperation he turned to Joe.
"Joe," he said, "we're up against it unless you can help us out. How is your hand feeling? Would you dare to take a chance with it?"
"I think it's all right now, or nearly so," replied Joe. "I've been trying it out in practice right along, and it seems to me it's about as good as ever. I was putting them over to Mylert yesterday, and he told me he couldn't see any difference between them and those I threw before I was hurt. The only thing I'm a little skittish about is my fadeaway. That gives me a little twinge when I try it. But I guess I can leave that out and still pull through."
"That's good!" ejaculated McRae, with great relief. "Go in then, old boy, and show these pesky Pirates where they get off. We simply must win this game."
There was a startled murmur among the spectators who thronged Forbes Field that afternoon when they saw Joe go into the box. They had been gloating over the supposition that McRae would have to use again one of the pitchers whom the Pirates had already beaten in that series, and the way their pets were going, they looked for a sure victory. Now they saw the man who had always baffled the Pittsburghs again take up the pitcher's burden, and their faces took on a look of apprehension.
The Pirate players too shared in that apprehension. They had a profound respect for Joe's ability, and had always had a sinking of the heart when they saw him draw on his glove. Still, they comforted themselves with the hope that his long layoff had hurt his effectiveness, and they braced to give him the battle of his life.
Joe himself felt a thrill of exultation when he stepped on the mound. That was his throne. There he had won the laurels that crowned him as the greatest pitcher of his League. Now he was back again, back to buoy up the spirit of his team, back to justify the confidence of his manager, back to uphold his fame, back to bring the championship of the National League once more to New York.
He still carried in his pocket Mabel's glove, that he had come to regard as his mascot. He touched it now. Then he wound up for the first pitch and split the plate for a strike.
It was an auspicious beginning of one of the greatest games he had ever pitched in his whole career. The Pirates simply did not have a chance. All through the game they were swinging wildly at a ball that seemed to be bewitched, a ball that dodged their bats and appeared to be laughing at them. Angered and bewildered, they tried every device to avoid impending defeat. They bunted, they put in pinch hitters, they called the umpire's attention to Joe's delivery in the hope of rattling him, they tried to get hit with the ball.
Through it all, Joe kept on smiling and mowing them down. Only three men got to first. Not one got to second. Thirteen men went out on strikes. And then, to cap the climax, Joe sent a screaming homer into the right field bleachers, sending in two men ahead of him.
The final score was 8 to 0. The Giants had won the championship of the National League. Now they were to battle for the championship of the world!
CHAPTER XXVIII
THE WORLD SERIES
It was a happy team of Giants that left Pittsburgh that night on the sleeper for New York. The season's strain was over. The coveted flag was theirs. They had fought their way through many discouragements, had stood the gaff, and now they were at the top of their League, with none to contest their title as champions.
"Some victory, eh, Joe?" remarked Jim to his chum.
"Right, Jim," was the ready reply.
To be sure a great battle loomed up ahead of them, but they welcomed that with eagerness. It meant thousands of dollars to every member of the team, win or lose. But they had no thought of losing. The return of their king pitcher to the box that afternoon, and the proof that he was in magnificent form, had filled them chock full of confidence.
And they were doubly glad that the Yankees were to be their opponents. That had been settled three days before, when the American League season had closed with the Yankees just nosing out the Clevelands at the finish. It was settled that every game of the World Series would be played in New York.
This meant that there would be no long, tiresome, overnight journeys between cities. But it meant more than that. It meant that the question would now be settled once for all as to which of the New York teams was the better.
This had been a mooted question for a good many years past. Each team had its warm friends and admirers, who were ready to back it through thick and thin. The Giants, of course, had been established longer, and had gained a strong place in the affections of the metropolis. Their games, as a usual thing, drew many more spectators than those played by their rivals. But of late the acquisition of Kid Rose by the Yankees had drawn the greater attention to that team, and the Giants had been cast in the shade. They were not used to this and did not relish it. They knew the Yankees were a strong team, but at the same time they believed that they could take their measure if it ever came to a showdown. Now that showdown was at hand, and the Giants were glad of it.
The public, too, were eager to have the question of supremacy settled. The metropolis was fairly seething with excitement over the series, and the hotels already were filling up with visitors from as far off as the Pacific Coast. Not only columns but whole pages of the newspapers were filled with comments and prophecies respecting the chances of the respective teams.
More than anything else in the public mind was the coming duel between Kid Rose and Joe Matson as home run hitters. Which would make the longer hits? Which would make the more home runs? These were the questions that were on the lips of the fans wherever two or more of them met. And the sporting pages of the daily newspapers were full of it.
The series this year was to consist of nine games if so many should be necessary. The team that first won five games would be the champions of the world. The members of the teams were to share in the money taken in at the first five games played, so that there would be no inducement to spin out the series. After certain percentages had been deducted sixty per cent was to go to the winners and forty per cent to the losers. The outlook was that each member of the winning team would get about five thousand dollars and each member of the losing team between three and four thousand, a difference great enough to make each player do his best, apart from his loyalty to his team.
Reggie had come up from Goldsboro, bringing Mabel with him, a charge of which Joe promptly relieved him. She seemed to Joe more distractingly beautiful than ever, and his heart thumped as he realized that in less than a month she would be his own. That had been arranged in their correspondence. The wedding would take place in Mabel's home in Goldsboro, and after their honeymoon they were to go to Riverside, to witness the marriage of Jim and Clara. The latter had hoped to come on to see the World Series, but Mrs. Matson was not well enough to come along, and Clara did not want to leave her. So poor Jim had to exercise patience and not be too envious of the almost delirious happiness of Joe and Mabel at being together.
A more exciting World Series than that which now began between the Giants and Yankees had never been known in the history of the game. Both teams were out for blood. Every man was on his toes, and the excited spectators were roused almost to madness by the almost miraculous stops and throws pulled off by the fielders. From the start it was evident that the nines were very evenly balanced, and that whichever finally won would in all probability do so by the narrowest kind of margin.
Victory seesawed between the teams. Joe pitched the first game, and the Giants won by 3 to 1. The Yankees took the second by 5 to 2. Jim held them down in the third to two runs, while the Giants accumulated six. The Yankees made it "fifty-fifty" by galloping away with the fourth game in a free hitting contest, of which Markwith was the victim, the final score being 9 to 5. The Giants again assumed the lead by copping the fifth by 4 to 0, Joe decorating his opponents with a necklace of goose eggs. They repeated on the following day, and with only one more game needed to make the five, it looked as though they would be certain winners. But the Yankees were not yet through, and they came back strong on the two succeeding days and evened up the score. Each had won four games. The ninth and final game would determine which team was to be the champions of the world.
In these contests, Joe had batted like a fiend. McRae had played him in every game, putting him in the outfield on the days that he was not scheduled to pitch. In the eight games, Joe had made six circuit clouts, in addition to four three-baggers, three two-base hits, and some singles. He was simply killing the ball.
Kid Rose also had done sterling work, and had rapped out five homers, besides a number of hits for a lesser number of bags. But Baseball Joe so far had outclassed him, both in the number and the length of his hits. There was no stopping him. High or low, incurve or outcurve, they were all the same to him. That eagle eye of his located the course of the ball unerringly, and when the ash connected with the ball that ball was slated for a ride.
There was no mistake about it. Joe had arrived. The batting crown was his. He had long since been recognized as the king of pitchers. Now he was hailed by acclamation as the greatest hitter in the game!
CHAPTER XXIX
THE GAME OF HIS LIFE
For the ninth and deciding game, McRae had selected Joe to pitch.
"I don't need to tell you, Joe, how much depends on this game," McRae said soberly, as the two came out of the clubhouse and walked across the field towards the grandstand, which was crowded to suffocation. "You know it as well as I do. I'm just counting on you, my boy. You've never failed me yet in a pinch. You won't fail me now."
"Trust me, Mac," replied Joe. "I'll do my best to win out."
Hudson, the manager of the Yankees, was also pinning his faith on the leader of his pitching staff, Phil Hays. He was a master of the underhand delivery, and had already captured for the Yankees the two games of the series in which he had pitched. In both games he had sorely puzzled the Giants, for there was no pitcher in the National League who used that delivery, and they had found it almost impossible to gauge it. He also had a crossfire, that he used at times with telling effect. He had not yet matched his pitching strength against Joe's, and the crowd was all agog with curiosity to see them battle against each other.
Jim had been a little later than Joe in slipping into his uniform, and was still in the clubhouse, after his friend had gone out on the field, when Reggie came rushing in, panting and out of breath.
"Where's Joe?" he asked, looking wildly around.
"He's just gone out to practice," answered Jim. "Why, what's the matter, Reggie?"
"I've got to get Joe," Reggie panted, making a dash for the door.
But Jim caught his arm.
"Look here, Reggie," he said, holding to him tightly. "Joe mustn't be upset. I can see that something's happened. Tell me what it is, and I'll see about letting Joe know."
"It's M-Mabel!" answered Reggie, stammering in his excitement. "She's disappeared."
"Disappeared!" echoed Jim, in bewilderment. "What do you mean?"
"Just that," answered Reggie. "She went out this morning to call on a friend, but said she'd get back to go with me to the game. I got anxious when she didn't come, and called up her friend, who said she hadn't seen her. Just then a messenger boy brought me this," and he handed over a typewritten, unsigned note, which read:
"Miss Varley is in safe hands. If Matson loses his game to-day she will be returned this evening. If he doesn't, it will cost $25,000 to get her back. Personal in papers to-morrow, signed T. Z., will give exact directions for carrying on further negotiations."
"Now you see why I've got to see Joe right away," said Reggie in frenzied impatience, snatching the note from Jim's hands.
"You mustn't!" ejaculated Jim, barring the way. "Don't you see that that's just what the rascals want you to do? You'd just be playing their game. They want to get Joe so frightened and upset that he can't pitch. It's the scheme of some gamblers who have bet on the Yanks to win. They want to make sure that they will win, and so they want to bribe or frighten Joe into losing. But probably if he did, they'd demand the ransom money just the same. We'll have to keep it from Joe until the game is over. Nothing will be lost by that. I'll give McRae a tip and he'll let me off. Then you and I will get busy and do all that we can for the next two hours. If we turn nothing up, we'll be back here when the game ends and tell Joe all about it. Wait here a minute till I see McRae, and then we'll get on the job."
In five minutes he was back with the required permission, and as soon as he had got into his street clothes he hailed a taxicab, and he and Reggie jumped in and were off.
When the bell rang for the game to begin, the Giants took the field, and Milton, the big center-fielder of the Yankees, came to the plate. Joe wound a high fast one about his neck, at which he refused to bite. The next one split the rubber, and Milton swung savagely at it and missed. The next was a called strike. On the following ball, he rolled an easy grounder to Burkett at first, who made the put out unassisted. The next man, Pender, Joe put out on strikes in jig time. Then the mighty Kid Rose strode to the bat.
He grinned at Joe and Joe grinned back. They were both good fellows, and each thoroughly respected the other. There was no bitterness in their rivalry.
"Now little ball, come to papa!" sang out Rose.
"Here he comes!" laughed Joe. "Take a look at baby."
The ball whizzed over the plate, and Rose missed it by an inch. The next he fouled off, as he did the following one. Then Joe tried a fadeaway, and Rose fell for it, swinging himself halfway round with the force of his blow.
"You're out!" cried the umpire, and the Giant supporters in the stands broke out in cheers. It was not often that Rose struck out, and the feat was appreciated.
In the Giants' half, Hays set them down in one, two, three order. Curry flied to Russell in right, Iredell went out by the strike route, while Burkett's grounder to Pender at short was whipped smartly down to first.
The Yankees were easy victims in the second. Russell fanned, Walsh lifted a twisting foul, on which Mylert made a superb catch close to the Giants' dugout and Mullen hit a grounder between first and the box, which Joe captured and fielded to Burkett in plenty of time.
Joe was first up in the Giants' half, and had to doff his cap in response to the cheers which greeted him as he came to the plate.
Hays sized him up carefully and did not like his looks. The first ball he threw him was so wide that Banks, the catcher, had to reach far out to nab it with one hand.
That might have been lack of control on Hays' part, but when a second followed, that came nowhere in the range of Joe's bat, the crowd jumped to the conclusion that he was deliberately trying to pass him, and a storm of protests rained down on the diamond.
"You're a game sport--not!"
"Let Baseball Joe hit the ball!"
"Yellow streak!"
"Matson took a chance with Rose. Why don't you take a chance with Matson?"
"Where's your sand?"
Whether Hays was stung by these jibes or not, the next ball curved over the plate and just above the knee. There was a ringing crack, and the ball sailed aloft in the direction of the bleachers with home run written all over it. There was no need of hurrying, and Joe simply trotted around the bases, while pandemonium reigned in the stands and bleachers.
CHAPTER XXX
CHAMPIONS OF THE WORLD
Wheeler went out on a fly to Milton, Willis fanned, and Larry closed the inning with a pop up to second. But the Giants had scored first blood, and in such a close game as this promised to be, that run stood out like a lighthouse.
In the third, McCarthy fell victim to Joe's curves and went out on strikes. Banks was lucky and got to first on a grasser to Iredell that took a wicked bound just as the shortstop was all set to receive it and jumped into left. He was nipped a minute later, when Joe saw out of the corner of his eye that he was taking too long a lead off first and made a lightning throw to Burkett. Hays, after fouling off two, struck out on a mean drop, and the inning ended without damage.
Hays put one over for Denton that the latter pickeled for a dandy grasser between third and short. Rose at left was slow in retrieving the ball, and Denton by fleet running and a hook slide reached the middle station. Here, however, he was caught napping. Then Hays braced and set the next two players down on strikes. It was a deft exhibition of "getting out of a hole," and deserved the generous applause that it received.
In the Yankees' half of the fourth, Milton sent one to Willis at third that the latter stopped neatly but threw to first too wide, the ball almost missing Burkett's fingers as he reached for it. Pender knocked a grounder to Larry, but the latter hesitated a moment as to whether to make the play at first or second, and when he finally chose second, Milton had reached that bag, and both men were safe. Then Rose came to the bat, with the Yankee partisans shouting wildly for a homer.
Joe fooled him twice, but Rose caught the third one and poled a hit to right. Wheeler and Denton both raced for it, and the latter by a herculean effort just managed to get under it. In the meantime, Milton had started forward, and Pender too was on his way. Quick as a flash, Denton straightened up and sent the ball on a line to first. Pender had turned and was running back, but was an easy out. Burkett shot the ball to Larry, putting out Milton, who was scrambling back to second. It was a superb triple play and the crowd went crazy.
Iredell started the Giants' fourth with a liner to McCarthy, that settled comfortably in the third baseman's glove. Burkett lammed a single into right. Joe walloped a shrieking three-bagger between right and center, that brought Burkett galloping to the plate for the second run of the game. Wheeler was ordered to sacrifice, but his attempted bunt resulted in a little fly to Hays, and Joe was held on third. Hays turned on steam and struck Willis out.
The fifth inning passed without scoring by either side. Both Joe and Hays were pitching magnificent ball, and the crowds cheered each in turn lustily.
The first real hit that Joe yielded came in the sixth, when after McCarthy had struck out, Banks lined a beauty into right between first and second. It did no harm, however, for Joe tightened up immediately and made Hays and Milton hit at empty air.
The Giants in their half went the Yankees one better in the matter of hits, and yet could not score. Curry sent a twister over second that Mullen could not get under. Iredell followed with a slow roller down the third base line, that McCarthy could not reach in time to field. A moment later, however, Curry was caught napping at second, and Burkett hit into a snappy double play, retiring the side.
In the seventh, the Yankees broke the ice. Pender got a life, when his high fly to third was muffed by Willis. Kid Rose came to the bat.
"Put it over, Joe, and see me lose it," he called. "I was robbed last time."
"That's nothing, Kid," chaffed Joe. "You'll be killed this time."
The first ball, which completely baffled the most dangerous slugger of the American League, seemed to bear out this prediction. On the second, however, Rose sent a neat hit to right that was good for two bases and brought Pender over the plate, amid the thunderous roars of the Yankee supporters. Russell tapped a little one in front of the plate, that Joe got in time to put him out at first, but not to head Rose off at third. Walsh went out on strikes. Mullen rolled one to Burkett, and Joe ran over to cover the bag, but Burkett's throw hit the dirt and Rose came over the plate, tying the score. McCarthy fanned, and the inning was over. One hit, sandwiched in with errors, had knocked the Giants' lead into a cocked hat and tied up the game.
Not for long, however. Joe was the first man up, and came to the plate with blood in his eye. The first two offerings he let go by. The third was to his liking. There was an explosion like the crack of a gun and the ball started on its journey.
That journey was destined to be talked about for years to come. It was the longest hit that ever had been made on the Polo Grounds. On it went over right field, over the bleachers and over the fence, clearing it at a height of fifty feet.
In the wild roar that went up as Joe loped around the bases, even the Yankee supporters joined. It was an occasion that rose above partisanship, an outstanding event in the history of sport. The spectators cheered until they were hoarse, and it was a minute or two before play could be resumed.
The rest of the inning was short and sweet. Wheeler, Willis and Larry went out in order, the first two on strikes and the latter on a grounder fielded by Mullen.
The eighth was on the same snappy order. Joe was determined to maintain his advantage, and was invincible. Banks grounded to the box, and Joe tossed him out. Hays fanned for the second time and Milton followed suit.
Hays, too, was going strong, and the Giant batsmen went down before him like a row of tenpins. Denton made three futile attempts and threw down his bat in disgust. Mylert cut three successive swaths in the atmosphere and went back to the bench, while Curry fouled out to Banks.
In the ninth, the Yankees again sewed it up. Pender got to first, when Larry was slow in fielding his grounder. The mighty Rose came up amid frantic cheering. But Joe summoned all his cunning, and for the second time that day struck him out, while the crowd cheered his sportsmanship in not passing him to first. Russell popped up an infield fly that Willis and Iredell ran for but collided, the ball dropping between them. In the scramble that ensued, Pender reached third and Russell made second. Iredell was still a little shaken by the collision, and fumbled the easy grounder of Walsh that ought to have resulted in an out at the plate, Walsh reaching first in safety. In consequence Pender scored, and again the game was tied at 3 to 3. A single now would have brought in another run, but Joe by a quick throw caught Walsh asleep at first and struck out Mullen, thus ending the inning.
With the frenzied adjurations of McRae and Robbie in their ears, the Giants came to the bat for the last half of the ninth. Iredell made a mighty effort, but came back to the bench after three fruitless swings at Hays' benders. Burkett sent up a towering skyscraper that was gathered in after a long run by Milton in center.
On Joe now rested the Giants' hopes. Twice that day he had poled out homers, and once he had ripped out a three-bagger. Could he repeat?
Hays was determined that he shouldn't have a chance. Amid the jeers and taunts of the crowd, he deliberately sent three balls wide of the plate. In attempting to do the same with the fourth, however, he sent it a trifle too close. Joe caught it on the end of his bat.
How that ball traveled! Almost on a line it whistled through the air in the direction of the right field bleachers. On and on went that terrific, screeching liner straight into the crowd in the bleachers who scrambled frantically to get out of its path.
Round the bases went Joe, amid shouts and yells that were deafening. Down on the home plate he came with both feet. The game was won, the series was over and the Giants were the champions of the world!
Like a deer Joe made for the clubhouse, to escape the crowds that came swarming over the field. He reached it just as a man was being carried inside.
"What's the matter?" he asked. "Any one hurt?"
"Only a glancing blow," remarked the club doctor, who had been looking the man over. "He's dazed, but he'll come to his senses soon."
Joe bent over to look at him and started back in surprise.
"Why, I know that man!" he exclaimed. "His name's Fleming!"
"It's Fleming all right," said Jim's voice beside him. "And he's got just what was coming to him."
Joe looked up and saw Jim and Reggie. They were grave and worried, and Joe's sixth sense told him that something was wrong.
"What's happened?" he asked in alarm. "And where is Mabel? What kept her from the game? Don't stand there dumb! Tell me, quick!"
"Now, Joe----" began Jim soothingly, but was interrupted by the injured man who opened his eyes, looked wildly around and struggled to a sitting posture. His eyes dilated with fright when he saw Joe and Jim.
"I didn't do it!" he half screamed. "I didn't kidnap her! It was Braxton. He----"
Jim interposed.
"Clear a space here," he commanded. "This is a private matter for Joe and me. Now, Fleming," he went on in short, menacing words that cut like a knife, "tell me this instant where Miss Varley is. You know. Tell me. Quick! Don't lie, or I'll tear your tongue out by the roots."
Before the blazing fury in his eyes Fleming quailed.
"She's at Inwood," he muttered. "She's safe enough. She's----"
"Reggie," commanded Jim, "jump into the car and take the wheel. Joe, help me to get this man into the car. Don't talk. I'll explain as we go along. Doyle," he continued, turning to a police lieutenant who was a warm admirer of the boys and who happened to be standing near, "come along with us if you don't mind. It may be a case for you."
"Sure thing," replied Doyle. "I'm with you."
They half dragged, half carried, Fleming to the car, and Reggie put on speed. The lieutenant sat in front with him, and his uniform prevented any question on the part of the traffic policemen. Fleming, pale and apprehensive, was thrust into a corner of the tonneau, while Jim explained the situation to Joe, who was boiling with rage.
The headlong speed at which Reggie drove soon brought them to the vicinity of Inwood, and following the faltering directions of Fleming, they drew up before a little house that was a block away from any of its neighbors.
They tiptoed up the steps, Joe having his hand so tightly on Fleming's collar that his knuckles ground into his neck.
"You know what you've got to do, Fleming," he whispered. "If you don't do it----"
His grip tightened and his fist clenched.
Trembling, Fleming opened the front door with his latchkey, and the party went softly through the hall. They stopped in front of a door from behind which a man was heard talking.
"I'm sorry to have to incommode you, Miss Varley," he was saying in suave polished tones that the boys recognized at once as Braxton's. "But unfortunately it is necessary to the success of my plans. You can't complain that we haven't treated you with perfect respect outside of the little violence we had to use to get you into the car."
There was no reply, but the party could hear the sound of sobbing.
"Knock," whispered Joe, emphasizing the command by a twist of Fleming's collar.
Fleming knocked.
"Who's there?" came from within.
"It's Fleming," was the weak answer. "Open up."
The door opened and the party went in with a rush.
There was a cry of joy from Mabel and a startled exclamation from Braxton. He looked toward the door, but the burly policeman had closed it and stood with his back against it. The next instant Joe had smashed Braxton straight between the eyes and the rascal measured his length on the floor. An instant more, and Mabel was in Joe's arms, sobbing her heart out against his breast.
For a few moments the reunited ones were dead to the world around them. When at last they had come to their senses, Joe, with a final caress, relinquished Mabel to Reggie's care.
"You'd better go out to the car, dearest," he said to her. "I'll be with you soon. I've got a little business to attend to here."
The brother and sister went out, and Joe turned to the rest of the party. Braxton had been yanked to his feet by Jim and jammed down hard into a chair, where he sat glowering with rage and fear. Doyle stood guard over Fleming, who presented a miserable picture of abjectness.
"Shall I take them in charge, Mr. Matson?" asked the police lieutenant. "You seem to have a clear case against them. They ought to get ten years at least."
The fear in the rascals' faces deepened.
"No," answered Joe thoughtfully. "I don't want any scandal and I don't believe I'll make a charge. At least, not yet. Jim, can you skirmish around and find pen and ink?"
In a minute or two Jim had found them.
"Now, you contemptible skunks," began Joe, "listen to me. I'm going to get a written confession from you of this whole business. Put down, Jim, that matter of the anonymous letter. Don't try to lie out of it, you scoundrel," he said, as Braxton started to protest. "Put down, too, that hiring of the auto bandits to cripple me." Here Braxton gave a violent start. "Put down that attempt to dope me in Chicago. That hits you on the raw, doesn't it, Fleming?" he added, as the latter cringed still lower in his seat. "We'll pass over the matter of hiring Bugs Hartley to do me up in St. Louis, for he may have done that on his own account. Now add this kidnaping incident and the record will be complete."
Jim wrote rapidly and soon had the document ready.
"Now we'll ask these gentlemen to sign," said Joe, with exaggerated politeness.
"I won't sign," snarled Braxton, livid with rage.
"Oh, you won't?" said Joe. "All right, Lieutenant----"
"I'll sign," said Braxton hastily.
Both he and Fleming signed, and Joe put the document carefully into his pocket.
"Now," he said, "I have you rascals on the hip. Dare to make one other move against me as long as you live, and I'll have you clapped into jail so quickly it will make your heads swim. I'll put you where the dogs won't bite you."
Both Braxton and Fleming rose to their feet.
"Where are you going?" asked Joe, in apparent surprise.
"You're through with us, aren't you?" growled Braxton.
Joe laughed outright.
"Oh, dear no," he said, as he rose to his feet. "There's just one little thing to attend to yet. I'm going to thrash you within an inch of your life."
Braxton made a dash for the door, but Joe caught him a clip on the jaw that sent him staggering back into a corner.
"Now Jim," said Joe, "suppose you take that little rat out," pointing to Fleming, "and drop him somewhere. He got his dose when the ball knocked him out in the bleachers, and that perhaps will be enough for him. Lieutenant," he went on, turning to Doyle, "you're a policeman, and might feel called on to stop any scene of violence. I feel it in my bones that there's going to be a little violence here--just a little. Would you mind stepping outside and seeing whether the car is all right?"
"Sure," replied Doyle, with a grin and a wink.
"Now, you cur," said Joe, as he turned to Braxton, "take off your coat. It's a long account I have to settle with you, and I'm going to give you the licking of your life."
There was no way out, and Braxton took off his coat and closed in. He was a big man and fought with the desperation of a cornered rat. He got in one or two wild blows that did no damage. Joe smashed him right and left, knocked him down and lifted him to his feet to knock him down again, until Braxton, beaten to a finish, refused to get up, and lay in a heap in a corner, fairly sobbing with rage and pain and shame.
"Just one little bit of news, Braxton," said Joe, as he turned to leave. "You've lost your bets. The Giants won!"
He ran lightly down the steps and jumped into the car, where Mabel snuggled up to him.
"What kept you so long, Joe?" she asked anxiously.
"Just settling an account, honey," he replied, as he drew her closer. "It was a long one and took some time."
"An account? What do you mean?" the girl asked, and then added suddenly: "Oh, Joe, you are all--all mussed up!"
"Am I, dear? Well, if I am you ought to see the other fellow, that's all."
"It was a--a fight?" she faltered.
"Hardly that, Mabel. Braxton had it coming to him--and I gave it to him with interest. But let us forget it. It's over now, and all I want to think about is--you!" And he held her closer than ever.
*       *       *       *       *
A few weeks later the wedding march was played in Mabel's home, and she and Joe joined hands for life. Clara was bridesmaid and Jim was best man. Mr. and Mrs. Matson, the latter greatly improved in health, were present. It was a glorious occasion, and all of them, the bride and groom especially, were happy beyond words.
"I'm quite a royal personage," said Mabel, as the happy pair, amid a shower of rice, started off on their honeymoon. "To think of poor little me marrying the king of pitchers and king of batters."
"As Reggie would say, you're 'spoofing' me," he laughed. "At any rate, I'm luckier than most kings. I've picked a perfect queen." And Baseball Joe smiled broadly.
And he had a right to smile, don't you think so?
THE END
THE BASEBALL JOE SERIES
BY LESTER CHADWICK
_12mo. Illustrated. Price per volume, $1.00, postpaid_
[Illustration]
BASEBALL JOE OF THE SILVER STARS _or The Rivals of Riverside_
Joe is an everyday country boy who loves to play baseball and particularly to pitch.
BASEBALL JOE ON THE SCHOOL NINE _or Pitching for the Blue Banner_
Joe's great ambition was to go to boarding school and play on the school team.
BASEBALL JOE AT YALE _or Pitching for the College Championship_
Joe goes to Yale University. In his second year he becomes a varsity pitcher and pitches in several big games.
BASEBALL JOE IN THE CENTRAL LEAGUE _or Making Good as a Professional Pitcher_
From Yale college to a baseball league of our Central States.
BASEBALL JOE IN THE BIG LEAGUE _or A Young Pitcher's Hardest Struggles_
From the Central League Joe goes to the St. Louis Nationals.
BASEBALL JOE ON THE GIANTS _or Making Good as a Twirler in the Metropolis_
Joe was traded to the Giants and became their mainstay.
BASEBALL JOE IN THE WORLD SERIES _or Pitching for the Championship_
What Joe did to win the series will thrill the most jaded reader.
BASEBALL JOE AROUND THE WORLD _or Pitching on a Grand Tour_
The Giants and the All-Americans tour the world.
BASEBALL JOE: HOME RUN KING _or The Greatest Pitcher and Batter on Record_
Joe becomes the greatest batter in the game.
BASEBALL JOE SAVING THE LEAGUE _or Breaking Up a Great Conspiracy_
Throwing the game meant a fortune but also dishonor and it was a great honor to defeat it.
_Send For Our Free Illustrated Catalogue_
CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY, Publishers      New York
THE MOTOR BOYS SERIES
BY CLARENCE YOUNG
_12mo. Illustrated. Price per volume, $1.00, postpaid_
[Illustration]
The Motor Boys _or Chums Through Thick and Thin_
The Motor Boys Overland _or A Long Trip for Fun and Fortune_
The Motor Boys In Mexico _or The Secret of The Buried City_
The Motor Boys Across the Plains _or The Hermit of Lost Lake_
The Motor Boys Afloat _or The Cruise of the Dartaway_
The Motor Boys on the Atlantic _or The Mystery of the Lighthouse_
The Motor Boys in Strange Waters _or Lost in a Floating Forest_
The Motor Boys on the Pacific _or The Young Derelict Hunters_
The Motor Boys in the Clouds _or A Trip for Fame and Fortune_
The Motor Boys Over the Rockies _or A Mystery of the Air_
The Motor Boys Over the Ocean _or A Marvelous Rescue in Mid-Air_
The Motor Boys on the Wing _or Seeking the Airship Treasure_
The Motor Boys After a Fortune _or The Hut on Snake Island_
The Motor Boys on the Border _or Sixty Nuggets of Gold_
The Motor Boys Under the Sea _or From Airship to Submarine_
The Motor Boys on Road and River _or Racing to Save a Life_
THE MOTOR BOYS SECOND SERIES
BY CLARENCE YOUNG
Ned, Bob and Jerry at Boxwood Hall _or The Motor Boys as Freshmen_
Ned, Bob and Jerry on a Ranch _or The Motor Boys Among the Cowboys_
Ned, Bob and Jerry in the Army _or The Motor Boys as Volunteers_
Ned, Bob and Jerry on the Firing Line _or The Motor Boys Fighting for Uncle Sam_
Ned, Bob and Jerry Bound for Home _or The Motor Boys on the Wrecked Troopship_
CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY, Publishers      New York
THE GREAT MARVEL SERIES
BY ROY ROCKWOOD
_12mo. Cloth. Illustrated. Jacket in Colors_
_=Price per volume, $1.00, postpaid=_
[Illustration]
_Stories of adventures in strange places, with peculiar people and queer animals._
1. THROUGH THE AIR TO THE NORTH POLE _or The Wonderful Cruise of the Electric Monarch_
The tale of a trip to the frozen North with a degree of reality that is most convincing.
2. UNDER THE OCEAN TO THE SOUTH POLE _or The Strange Cruise of the Submarine Wonder_
A marvelous trip from Maine to the South Pole, telling of adventures with the sea-monsters and savages.
3. FIVE THOUSAND MILES UNDERGROUND _or The Mystery of the Center of the Earth_
A cruise to the center of the earth through an immense hole found at an island in the ocean.
4. THROUGH SPACE TO MARS _or The Most Wonderful Trip on Record_
This book tells how the journey was made in a strange craft and what happened on Mars.
5. LOST ON THE MOON _or In Quest of the Field of Diamonds_
Strange adventures on the planet which is found to be a land of desolation and silence.
6. ON A TORN-AWAY WORLD _or Captives of the Great Earthquake_
After a tremendous convulsion of nature the adventurers find themselves captives on a vast "island in the air."
_Send For Our Free Illustrated Catalogue_
CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY, Publishers      New York
THE JACK RANGER SERIES
BY CLARENCE YOUNG
_12mo. Cloth. Illustrated. Jacket in Colors_
_=Price per volume, $1.00, postpaid=_
[Illustration]
_Lively stories of outdoor sports and adventure every boy will want to read._
1. JACK RANGER'S SCHOOL DAYS _or The Rivals of Washington Hall_
You will love Jack Ranger--you simply can't help it. He is bright and cheery, and earnest in all he does.
2. JACK RANGER'S WESTERN TRIP _or From Boarding School to Ranch and Range_
This volume takes the hero to the great West. Jack is anxious to clear up the mystery surrounding his father's disappearance.
3. JACK RANGER'S SCHOOL VICTORIES _or Track, Gridiron and Diamond_
Jack gets back to Washington Hall and goes in for all sorts of school games. There are numerous contests on the athletic field.
4. JACK RANGER'S OCEAN CRUISE _or The Wreck of the Polly Ann_
How Jack was carried off to sea against his will makes a "yarn" no boy will want to miss.
5. JACK RANGER'S GUN CLUB _or From Schoolroom to Camp and Trail_
Jack organizes a gun club and with his chums goes in quest of big game. They have many adventures in the mountains.
6. JACK RANGER'S TREASURE BOX _or The Outing of the Schoolboy Yachtsmen_
Jack receives a box from his father and it is stolen. How he regains it makes an absorbing tale.
_Send For Our Free Illustrated Catalogue_
CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY, Publishers      New York
THE COLLEGE SPORTS SERIES
BY LESTER CHADWICK
_12mo. Cloth. Illustrated. Jacket in Colors_
_=Price per volume, $1.00, postpaid=_
[Illustration]
_Mr. Chadwick has played on the diamond and on the gridiron himself._
1. THE RIVAL PITCHERS _A Story of College Baseball_
Tom Parsons, a "hayseed," makes good on the scrub team of Randall College.
2. A QUARTERBACK'S PLUCK _A Story of College Football_
A football story, told in Mr. Chadwick's best style, that is bound to grip the reader from the start.
3. BATTING TO WIN _A Story of College Baseball_
Tom Parsons and his friends Phil and Sid are the leading players on Randall College team. There is a great game.
4. THE WINNING TOUCHDOWN _A Story of College Football_
After having to reorganize their team at the last moment, Randall makes a touchdown that won a big game.
5. FOR THE HONOR OF RANDALL _A Story of College Athletics_
The winning of the hurdle race and long-distance run is extremely exciting.
6. THE EIGHT-OARED VICTORS _A Story of College Water Sports_
Tom, Phil and Sid prove as good at aquatic sports as they are on track, gridiron and diamond.
_Send For Our Free Illustrated Catalogue_
CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY, Publishers      New York
THE WEBSTER SERIES
By FRANK V. WEBSTER
[Illustration]
Mr. Webster's style is very much like that of the boys' favorite author, the late lamented Horatio Alger, Jr., but his tales are thoroughly up-to-date.
=Cloth. 12mo. Over 200 pages each. Illustrated. Stamped in various colors.=
=Price per volume, 65 cents, postpaid.=
Only A Farm Boy _or Dan Hardy's Rise in Life_
The Boy From The Ranch _or Roy Bradner's City Experiences_
The Young Treasure Hunter _or Fred Stanley's Trip to Alaska_
The Boy Pilot of the Lakes _or Nat Morton's Perils_
Tom The Telephone Boy _or The Mystery of a Message_
Bob The Castaway _or The Wreck of the Eagle_
The Newsboy Partners _or Who Was Dick Box?_
Two Boy Gold Miners _or Lost in the Mountains_
The Young Firemen of Lakeville _or Herbert Dare's Pluck_
The Boys of Bellwood School _or Frank Jordan's Triumph_
Jack the Runaway _or On the Road with a Circus_
Bob Chester's Grit _or From Ranch to Riches_
Airship Andy _or The Luck of a Brave Boy_
High School Rivals _or Fred Markham's Struggles_
Darry The Life Saver _or The Heroes of the Coast_
Dick The Bank Boy _or A Missing Fortune_
Ben Hardy's Flying Machine _or Making a Record for Himself_
Harry Watson's High School Days _or The Rivals of Rivertown_
Comrades of the Saddle _or The Young Rough Riders of the Plains_
Tom Taylor at West Point _or The Old Army Officer's Secret_
The Boy Scouts of Lennox _or Hiking Over Big Bear Mountain_
The Boys of the Wireless _or a Stirring Rescue from the Deep_
Cowboy Dave _or The Round-up at Rolling River_
Jack of the Pony Express _or The Young Rider of the Mountain Trail_
The Boys of the Battleship _or For the Honor of Uncle Sam_
CUPPLES & LEON CO., Publishers,      NEW YORK
THE TOM FAIRFIELD SERIES
By ALLEN CHAPMAN
Author of the "Fred Fenton Athletic Series," "The Boys of Pluck Series," and "The Darewell Chums Series."
12mo. Illustrated. Price per volume, 65 cents, postpaid.
Tom Fairfield is a typical American lad, full of life and energy, a boy who believes in doing things. To know Tom is to love him.
[Illustration]
TOM FAIRFIELD'S SCHOOLDAYS _or The Chums of Elmwood Hall_
Tells of how Tom started for school, of the mystery surrounding one of the Hall seniors, and of how the hero went to the rescue. The first book in a line that is bound to become decidedly popular.
TOM FAIRFIELD AT SEA _or The Wreck of the Silver Star_
Tom's parents had gone to Australia and then been cast away somewhere in the Pacific. Tom set out to find them and was himself cast away. A thrilling picture of the perils of the deep.
TOM FAIRFIELD IN CAMP _or The Secret of the Old Mill_
The boys decided to go camping, and located near an old mill. A wild man resided there and he made it decidedly lively for Tom and his chums. The secret of the old mill adds to the interest of the volume.
TOM FAIRFIELD'S PLUCK AND LUCK _or Working to Clear His Name_
While Tom was back at school some of his enemies tried to get him into trouble. Something unusual occurred and Tom was suspected of a crime. How he set to work to clear his name is told in a manner to interest all young readers.
TOM FAIRFIELD'S HUNTING TRIP _or Lost in the Wilderness_
Tom was only a schoolboy, but he loved to use a shotgun or a rifle. In this volume we meet him on a hunting trip full of outdoor life and good times around the camp-fire.
CUPPLES & LEON CO., Publishers,      NEW YORK
THE SPEEDWELL BOYS SERIES
By ROY ROCKWOOD
Author of "The Dave Dashaway Series," "Great Marvel Series," etc.
12mo. Illustrated. Price per volume, 65 cents, postpaid.
All boys who love to be on the go will welcome the Speedwell boys. They are clean cut and loyal lads.
[Illustration]
THE SPEEDWELL BOYS ON MOTOR CYCLES _or The Mystery of a Great Conflagration_
The lads were poor, but they did a rich man a great service and he presented them with their motor cycles. What a great fire led to is exceedingly well told.
THE SPEEDWELL BOYS AND THEIR RACING AUTO _or A Run for the Golden Cup_
A tale of automobiling and of intense rivalry on the road. There was an endurance run and the boys entered the contest. On the run they rounded up some men who were wanted by the law.
THE SPEEDWELL BOYS AND THEIR POWER LAUNCH _or To the Rescue of the Castaways_
Here is an unusual story. There was a wreck, and the lads, in their power launch, set out to the rescue. A vivid picture of a great storm adds to the interest of the tale.
THE SPEEDWELL BOYS IN A SUBMARINE _or The Lost Treasure of Rocky Cove_
An old sailor knows of a treasure lost under water because of a cliff falling into the sea. The boys get a chance to go out in a submarine and they make a hunt for the treasure.
THE SPEEDWELL BOYS AND THEIR ICE RACER _or The Perils of a Great Blizzard_
The boys had an idea for a new sort of iceboat, to be run by combined wind and motor power. How they built the craft, and what fine times they had on board of it, is well related.
CUPPLES & LEON CO., Publishers,      NEW YORK
*      *      *      *      *      *
Transcriber's note:
--Punctuation and spelling inaccuracies were silently corrected except as indicated below.
--Archaic and variable spellings were preserved.
--Variations in hyphenation and compound words have been preserved.
--Inconsistencies in formatting and punctuation of individual advertisements have been retained.
--A List of Illustrations has been provided for the convenience of the reader.

= = = PG61857 = = =
BASHFUL FIFTEEN
E-text prepared by MWS, Martin Pettit, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by Internet Archive (https://archive.org)
Note: Images of the original pages are available through Internet Archive. See https://archive.org/details/bashfulfifteen00mead
BASHFUL FIFTEEN
by
L. T. MEADE
Author of "Out of the Fashion," "A Sweet Girl Graduate," "The Medicine Lady," "Polly, a New-Fashioned Girl," "A World of Girls," etc.
New York Cassell Publishing Company 104 & 106 Fourth Avenue
Copyright, 1892, by Cassell Publishing Company.
All rights reserved.
The Mershon Company Press, Rahway, N. J.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER                                        PAGE I. CURIOSITY,                                1
II. THE NEW GIRL,                            10
III. RIBBONS AND ROSES,                       24
IV. THE QUEEN OF THE SCHOOL,                 35
V. BREAKING IN A WILD COLT,                 52
VI. CAPTIVITY,                               62
VII. WHO IS TO PROVIDE THE NEEDFUL?           73
VIII. THE "JANET MAY STALL,"                   82
IX. TAKING SIDES,                            98
X. CHECKMATE,                              106
XI. A WILD IRISH PRINCESS,                  114
XII. LADY KATHLEEN,                          128
XIII. PEARSON'S BOOK OF ESSAYS,               147
XIV. "I'M BIG, AND I'M DESPERATE,"           158
XV. BRIDGET O'HARA'S STALL,                 177
XVI. STILL IN THE WOOD,                      193
XVII. PERSIAN CATS,                           200
XVIII. AN IRISH WELCOME,                       215
XIX. "BRUIN, MY DOG,"                        221
XX. THE SQUIRE AND HIS GUESTS,              232
XXI. THE HOLY WELL,                          244
XXII. WILD HAWK,                              260
XXIII. UNDER A SPELL,                          275
XXIV. NORAH TO THE RESCUE,                    289
XXV. HER MAJESTY THE WITCH,                  294
XXVI. A TERRIBLE NIGHT,                       303
XXVII. "SPEAK OUT,"                            310
XXVIII. WHAT THE O'HARAS SAID TO ONE ANOTHER,   318
XXIX. THE CHILD OF HIS HEART,                 323
BASHFUL FIFTEEN.
CHAPTER I.
CURIOSITY.
The school stood on the side of a hill, which faced downward to the sea. Its aspect was south, and it was sheltered from the east and west winds by a thick plantation of young trees, which looked green and fresh in the spring, and were beginning already to afford a delightful shade in hot weather.
A fashionable watering-place called Eastcliff was situated about a mile from Mulberry Court, the old-fashioned house, with the old-world gardens, where the schoolgirls lived. There were about fifty of them in all, and they had to confess that although Mulberry Court was undoubtedly school, yet those who lived in the house and played in the gardens, and had merry games and races on the seashore, enjoyed a specially good time which they would be glad to think of by and by.
The period at which this story begins was the middle of the summer term. There were no half-term holidays at the Court, but somehow the influence of holiday time had already got into the air. The young girls had tired themselves out with play, and the older ones lay about in hammocks, or strolled in twos or threes up and down the wide gravel walk which separated the house from the gardens.
The ages of these fifty girls ranged from seventeen to five, but from seventeen down to five on this special hot summer's evening one topic of conversation might have been heard on every tongue.
What would the new girl be like? Was she rich or poor, handsome or ugly, tall or short, dark or fair? Why did she come in the middle of the term, and why did Mrs. Freeman, and Miss Delicia, and Miss Patience make such a fuss about her?
Other new girls had arrived, and only the faintest rumors had got out about them beforehand.
A couple of maids had been seen carrying a new trunk upstairs, or old Piper had been discovered crawling down the avenue with his shaky cab, and shakier horse, and then the new girl had appeared at tea-time and been formally introduced, and if she were shy had got over it as best she could, and had soon discovered her place in class, and there was an end of the matter.
But this new girl was not following out any of the old precedents.
She was coming at mid-term, which in itself was rather exceptional.
Mrs. Freeman and Miss Patience had driven away in a very smart carriage with a pair of horses to meet her.
Miss Delicia was fussing in and out of the house, and picking fresh strawberries, and nodding to the girls she happened to meet with a kind of suppressed delight.
What _could_ it all mean? It really was most exciting.
The smaller girls chatted volubly about the matter, and little Violet Temple, aged ten, and of course one of the small girls, so far forgot herself as to run up to Dorothy Collingwood, clasp her hand affectionately round the tall girl's arm, and whisper in her impetuous, eager way:
"I'm almost certain, Dolly, that she's to sleep in a room by herself, for I saw the Blue Room being got ready. I peeped in as we were going down to dinner, and I noticed such jolly new furniture--pale blue, and all to match. Oh, what is it, Olive? Now you've pinched my arm."
"Run back to your companions this minute, miss," said Olive Moore. "You're getting to be a perfect tittle-tattle, Violet. There, I'm not angry, child, but you must learn not to talk about everything you see."
Violet frowned all over her fair, small face, but Olive Moore, a sixth-form girl, was too powerful an individual to be lightly disregarded. She shrugged her shoulders therefore, and walked sulkily away.
"Why did you speak so sharply to her, Olive?" exclaimed Dorothy. "After all, her curiosity is but natural--I must even own that I share it myself."
"So do I, Dorothy, if it comes to that, but Violet must be made to know her place. She is one of those little encroachers without respect of persons, who can become absolute nuisances if they are encouraged. But there, we have said enough about her. Ruth and Janet are going to sit in 'The Lookout' for a little; they want to discuss the subject of the Fancy Fair. Shall we come and join them?"
Dorothy turned with her companion; they walked along the wide gravel sweep, then entered a narrow path which wound gradually up-hill. They soon reached a rural tower, which was called by the girls "The Lookout," mounted some steep steps, and found themselves standing on a little platform, where two other girls were waiting to receive them.
Ruth Bury was short and dark, but Janet May, her companion, was extremely slim and fair. She would have been a pretty girl but for the somewhat disagreeable expression of her face.
"Here you are," exclaimed the two pairs of lips eagerly.
"Sit down, Dorothy," cried Ruth, "we have kept your favorite armchair vacant for you. Now, then, to discuss the Fancy Fair in all its bearings. Is it not kind of Mrs. Freeman to consent to our having it? She says it is quite an unusual thing for girls like us to do, but in the cause of that poor little baby, and because we wish the Fancy Fair to be our break-up treat, she consents. The only stipulation she makes is that we arrange the whole programme without troubling her."
"Yes," continued Janet, "she met me half an hour ago, and told me to let you know, Dorothy, and you, Olive, and any other girls who happen to be specially interested, that we are to form our programme, and then ask her to give us an audience. She will look herself into all our plans, and tell us which can and cannot be carried into effect. The only other thing she stipulates is that we do not neglect our studies, and that we leave room in the happy day's proceedings for the distribution of the prizes."
While Janet was speaking, Dorothy, who had refused to seat herself in the armchair assigned to her, and whose clear, bright blue eyes were roving eagerly all over the beautiful summer landscape, exclaimed in an eager voice:
"After all, what does the Fancy Fair signify--I mean--oh, don't be shocked, girls--I mean, what does it signify compared to a real living _present_ interest? While we are discussing what is to take place in six weeks' time, Mrs. Freeman and Miss Patience are driving up the avenue with _somebody else_. Girls, the new inmate of Mulberry Court has begun to put in an appearance on the scene."
"Oh, let me look; do let me look!" cried Ruth, while Olive and Janet both pressed eagerly forward.
From where they stood they obtained a very distinct although somewhat bird's-eye view of the winding avenue and quickly approaching carriage. Mrs. Freeman's tall and familiar figure was too well known to be worthy, in that supreme moment, of even a passing comment. Miss Patience looked as angular and as like herself as ever; but a girl, who sat facing the two ladies--a girl who wore a large shady hat, and whose light dress and gay ribbons fluttered in the summer breeze--upon this girl the eyes of the four watchers in the "Lookout" tower were fixed with devouring curiosity.
"Well, I never!" exclaimed Dorothy, after a pause. "I don't suppose Mrs. Freeman will allow that style of wardrobe long. See, girls, do see, how her long blue ribbons stream in the breeze; and her hat! it is absolutely _covered_ with roses--I'm convinced they are roses. Oh, what would I not give for an opera glass to enable me to take a nearer view. Whoever that young person is, she intends to take the shine out of us. Why, she is dressed as if she had just come from a garden party."
"I don't believe she's a new schoolgirl at all," cried Ruth; "she's just a visitor come to stay for a day or two with Mrs. Freeman. No schoolgirl that ever breathed would dare to present such a young lady, grown-up appearance. There, girls, don't let's waste any more time over her; let's turn our attention to the much more important matter of the Fancy Fair."
Notwithstanding these various criticisms, the carriage with its occupants calmly pursued its way, and was presently lost to view in the courtyard at the side of the house.
"Now, do let us be sensible," said Janet, turning to her companions. "We have seen all that there is to be seen. However hard we guess we cannot solve the mystery. Either a new companion is coming among us, who, I have no doubt, will be as commonplace as commonplace can be, or Mrs. Freeman is receiving a young lady visitor. Supper will decide the point, and as that is not half an hour away I suppose we can exist for the present without worrying our brains any further."
"Dear Janey, you always were the soul of sense," remarked Dorothy, in a somewhat languid voice. "For my part I pity those poor little mites, Violet and the rest of them. I know they are just as curious with regard to the issue of events as we are, and yet I can see them at this moment, with my mental vision, being driven like sheep into the fold. They'll be in bed, poor mites, when we are satisfying our curiosity."
"You have a perfect mania for those children, Dorothy," exclaimed Olive. "I call it an impertinence on their parts to worry themselves about sixth-form girls. What's the matter, Janet? Why that contraction of your angel brow?"
"I want us to utilize our opportunities," said Janet. "We have a few minutes all to ourselves to discuss the Fancy Fair, and we fritter it away on that tiresome new girl."
"Well, let's settle to business now," said Ruth; "I'm sure I'm more than willing. Who has got a pencil and paper?"
Dorothy pulled an envelope out of her pocket. Olive searched into the recesses of hers to hunt up a lead pencil, and Janet continued to speak in her tranquil, round tones.
"The first thing to do is to appoint a committee," she began.
"O Janey," exclaimed two of the other girls in a breath, "a committee does sound so absurdly formal."
"Never mind, it is the correct thing to do. In a matter of this kind we are nothing if we are not businesslike. Now, who _is_ coming to interrupt us?"
Steps--several steps--were heard clattering up the stone stairs of the little tower, and two or three girls of the middle school, with roughly tossed heads and excited faces, burst upon the seclusion of the four sixth-form girls.
"O Dolly," they exclaimed, running up to their favorite, "she has come--we have seen her! She is very tall, and--and----"
"Do let me speak, Marion," exclaimed little Violet Temple, coloring all over her round face in her excitement and interest. "You know I got the first glimpse of her. I did, you know I did. I was hiding under the laurel arch, and I saw her quite close. It's awfully unfair of anyone else to tell, isn't it, Dolly?"
"Of course it is, Violet," replied Miss Collingwood in her good-natured way. "But what a naughty imp you were to hide under the laurel arch. The wonder is you did not get right in the way of the horses' hoofs."
"Much I cared for that when I had a chance of seeing her," remarked Violet. "I _did_ get a splendid peep. She's awfully tall, and she was splendidly dressed; and O Dolly! O Ruthie! O Janey! she's just _lovely_!"
"I wish you'd go away, child!" said Janet in a decidedly cross tone. "What are all you small girls doing out and about at this hour? Surely it's time for you to be in bed. What can Miss Marshall be about not to have fetched you before now?"
"Cross-patch!" murmured Violet, turning her back on Janet. "Come, Marion; come, Pauline, we won't tell her any more. We'll tell _you_, Dolly, of course, but we won't tell Janet. Come, Marion, let's go."
The children disappeared in as frantic haste to be off as they were a few minutes ago to arrive.
"Now, let's go on," said Janet, in her calm tones. "Let us try and settle something before the supper bell rings. We must have a committee, that goes without saying. Suppose we four girls form it."
"What about Evelyn?" inquired Dorothy.
When she said this a quick change flitted over Janet's face. She bit her lips, and, after a very brief pause, said in a voice of would-be indifference:
"I don't suppose that Evelyn Percival is to rule the school. She is away at present, and we can't wait on her will and pleasure. Let's form our committee, and do without her."
"It's a distinct insult," began Dolly. "I disapprove--I disapprove."
"And so do I"--"And I"--cried both Ruth and Olive.
"Well," said Janet, "if you insist on spoiling everything, girls, you must. You know what Evelyn is."
"Only the head girl of the school," remarked Dolly in a soft tone. "But of course a person of not the _smallest_ consequence. Well, Janet, what next?"
"As I was saying," began Janet----
A loud booming sound filled the air.
Ruth clapped her hands.
"Hurrah! Hurrah! Supper!" she cried. "Your committee must keep, Janet. Now for the satisfaction of rampant, raging curiosity. Dolly, will you race me to the house?"
CHAPTER II.
THE NEW GIRL.
Although the booming sound of the great gong filled the air, the supper to which the head girls of the school were now going was a very simple affair. It consisted of milk placed in great jugs at intervals down the long table, of fruit both cooked and uncooked, and large plates of bread and butter.
Such as it was, however, supper was a much-prized institution of Mulberry Court; only the fifth-form and sixth-form girls were allowed to partake of it. To sit up to supper, therefore, was a distinction intensely envied by the lower school. The plain fare sounded to them like honey and ambrosia. They were never tired of speculating as to what went on in the dining room on these occasions, and the idea of sitting up to supper was with some of the girls a more stimulating reason for being promoted to the fifth form than any other which could be offered.
On this special night in the mid-term the girls who were ignominiously obliged to retire to their bedrooms felt a sorer sense of being left out than ever.
As Dorothy and her companions walked through the wide, cool entrance hall, and turned down the stone passage which led to the supper room, they were quite conscious of the fact that some of the naughtiest and most adventurous imps of the lower school were hovering round, hanging over banisters or hiding behind doors. A suppressed giggle of laughter proceeded so plainly from the back of one of the doors, that Dorothy could not resist stretching back her hand as she passed, and giving a playful tap on the panels with her knuckles. The suppressed laughter became dangerously audible when she did this, so in mercy she was forced to take no further notice.
The girls entered the wide, long dining hall and immediately took their places at the table.
Mrs. Freeman always presided at the head of the board, Miss Patience invariably sat at the foot, Miss Delicia wandered about restlessly, helping the girls to milk and fruit, patting her favorites on their backs, bending down to inquire tenderly how this girl's headache was, and if another had come off conqueror in her tennis match. No girl in the school minded or feared Miss Delicia in the least. Unlike her two sisters, who were tall and thin, she was a little body with a round face, rosy cheeks, hair very much crimped, and eyes a good deal creased with constant laughter. No one had ever seen Miss Delicia the least bit cross or the least bit annoyed with anyone. She was invariably known to weep with the sorrowful, and laugh with the gay--she was a great coddler and physicker--thought petting far better than punishment, and play much more necessary for young girls than lessons.
In consequence she was popular, with that mild sort of popularity which is bestowed upon the people who are all patience and have no faculty for inspiring fear.
Mrs. Freeman could be austere as well as kind, and Mrs. Freeman was ten times more loved than Miss Delicia.
The girls took their places at the table--grace was said, and the meal began.
A sense of disappointment was over them all, for the new girl upon whom their present thoughts were centered had not put in an appearance--nothing was said about her--Mrs. Freeman looked as tranquil as usual, Miss Patience as white and anxious, Miss Delicia as good-natured and downy.
Dorothy was beginning to whisper to her companion that all their excitement was safe to end in smoke, when the door at the farther end of the dining hall was softly pushed open, and a head of luxuriant nut-brown curling hair was popped in. Two roguish dark blue eyes looked down the long room--they greeted with an eager sort of delighted welcome each fresh girl face, and then the entire person of a tall, showily dressed girl entered.
"My dear Bridget!" exclaimed Mrs. Freeman, so surprised by the unexpected apparition that she was actually obliged to rise from her seat and come forward.
"Oh, my dear, ought you not to be asleep?" exclaimed Miss Patience in thin, anxious tones from the other end of the board, while Miss Delicia ran up to the girl and took one of her dimpled white hands in hers.
"I did not feel tired, Mrs. Freeman," replied the newcomer in an eager, irrepressible sort of voice. "You put me into my room and told me to go to bed, but I didn't want to go to bed. I have had my supper, thank you, so I don't want any more, but I have been dying with curiosity to see the girls. Are these they? Are these my schoolfellows? I never saw a schoolfellow before. They all look pretty much like other people. How do you do, each and all of you? I'm Bridget O'Hara. May I sit near you, Mrs. Freeman?"
"Sit there, Miss O'Hara, please," said Mrs. Freeman. She tried to suppress a smile, which was difficult. "Girls," she said, addressing the fifth and sixth forms, "girls, this young lady is your new schoolfellow--her name is Bridget O'Hara. I meant to introduce her to you formally to-morrow, but she has taken the matter into her own hands. I am glad you are not tired, Miss O'Hara, for you have had a very long journey."
"Oh, my!" exclaimed Miss O'Hara, "that's nothing. Goodness gracious me! what would you think of thirty or forty miles on an Irish jaunting car, all in one day, Mrs. Freeman? That's the sort of thing to make the back ache. Bump, bump, you go. You catch on to the sides of the car for bare life, and as likely as not you're pitched out into a bog two or three times before you get home. Papa and I have often taken our thirty to forty miles' jaunt a day. I can tell you, I have been stiff after those rides. Did you ever ride on a jaunting car, Mrs. Freeman?"
"No, my dear," replied the head mistress, in a rather icy voice, "I have never had the pleasure of visiting Ireland."
"Well, it's a very fine sort of place, as free and easy as you please; lots of fishing in the lakes and in the rivers. I'm very fond of my gun, too. Can you handle a gun, Mrs. Freeman? It kicks rather, if you can't manage it."
An audible titter was heard down the table, and Mrs. Freeman turned somewhat red.
"Will you have some fruit?" she said coldly, laying a restraining hand as she spoke on the girl's beflowered and embroidered dress.
"No fruit, thank you. Oh, what a lovely ring you have on! It's a ruby, isn't it? My poor mother--she died when I was only three--had some splendid rubies--they are to be mine when I am grown up. Papa is keeping them for me in the County Bank. You always keep your valuables in the Bank in Ireland, you know--that's on account of the Land Leaguers."
"I think, my dear, we won't talk quite so much," said Mrs. Freeman. "At most of our meals German is the only language spoken. Supper, of course, is an exception. Why, what is the matter. Miss O'Hara?"
"Good gracious me!" exclaimed Bridget O'Hara, "am I to be dumb during breakfast, dinner, and tea? I don't know a word of German. Why, I'll die if I can't chatter. It's a way we have in Ireland. We _must_ talk."
"Patience," said Mrs. Freeman, from her end of the supper table, "I think we have all finished. Will you say grace?"
There was a movement of chairs, and a general rising.
Miss Patience asked for a blessing on the meal just partaken of in a clear, emphatic voice, and the group of girls began to file out of the room.
"May I go with the others?" asked Miss O'Hara.
"Yes, certainly. Let me introduce you to someone in particular. Janet May, come here, my dear."
Janet turned at the sound of her name, and came quickly up to her mistress. She looked slight, pale, and almost insignificant beside the full, blooming, luxuriously made girl, who, resting one hand in a nonchalant manner on the back of her chair, was looking full at her with laughing bright eyes.
"Janet," said Mrs. Freeman, "will you oblige me by showing Miss O'Hara the schoolrooms and common rooms, and introducing her to one or two of her companions? Go, my dear," she continued, "but remember, Bridget, whether you are tired or not, I shall expect you to go to bed to-night at nine o'clock. It is half-past eight now, so you have half an hour to get acquainted with your schoolfellows."
"My! what a minute!" said Miss Bridget, tossing back her abundant hair, and slipping one firm, dimpled hand inside Janet's arm. "Well, come on, darling," she continued, giving that young lady an affectionate squeeze. "Let's make the most of our precious time. I'm dying to know you all--I think you look so sweet. Who's that love of a girl in gray, who sat next you at supper? She had golden hair, and blue eyes--not like mine, of course, but well enough for English eyes. What's her name, dear?"
"I think you must mean Dorothy Collingwood," said Janet in her clear, cold English voice. "May I ask if you have ever been at school before, Miss O'Hara?"
"Oh, good gracious me! don't call me Miss O'Hara. I'm Biddy to my friends--Biddy O'Hara, at your service--great fun, too, I can tell you. You ask my father what he thinks of me. Poor old gentleman, I expect he's crying like anything this minute without his Biddy to coddle him. He said I wanted polishing, and so he sent me here. I have never been in England before, and I don't at all know if I will like it. By the way, what's your name? I didn't quite catch it."
"Janet May. This is the schoolroom where the sixth form girls do their lessons. We have a desk each, of course. That room inside there is for the fifth form. I wonder which you will belong to? How old are you?"
"Now, how old would you think? Just you give a guess. Let me stand in front of you, so that you can take a squint at me. Now, then--oh, I say, stop a minute, I see some more girls coming in. Come along, girls, and help Miss May to guess my age. Now, then, now then, I wonder who'll be right? How you do all stare! I feel uncommonly as if I'd like to dance the Irish jig!"
Dorothy, Ruth, and Olive had now come into the schoolroom, and had taken their places by Janet's side. She gave them a quick look, in which considerable aversion to the newcomer was plainly visible, then turned her head and gazed languidly out of the window.
Bridget O'Hara bestowed upon the four girls who stood before her a lightning glance of quizzical inquiry. She was a tall, fully developed girl, and no one could doubt her claim to beauty who looked at her even for a moment.
Her eyes were of that peculiar, very dark, very deep blue, which seems to be an Irish girl's special gift. Her eyelashes were thick and black, her complexion a fresh white and pink, her chestnut hair grew in thick, curly abundance all over her well-shaped head. Her beautifully cut lips wore a petulant but charming expression. There was a provocative, almost teasing, self-confidence about her, which to certain minds only added to her queer fascination.
"Now, how old am I?" she asked, stamping her arched foot. "Don't be shy, any of you. Begin at the eldest, and guess right away. Now then, Miss Collingwood--you see, I know your name--the age of your humble servant, if _you_ please."
Dorothy could not restrain her laughter.
"How can I possibly tell you, Miss O'Hara?" she replied. "You are a tall girl. Perhaps you are seventeen, although you look more."
"Oh! hurrah, hurrah, hurrah! What will my dear dad say when I tell him that? Biddy O'Hara seventeen! Don't I wish I were! Oh, the lovely balls I'd be going to if those were my years! Now, another guess. It's your turn now--you, little brown one there--I haven't caught your name, darling. Is it Anne or Mary? Most girls are called either Anne or Mary."
"My name is Ruth," replied the girl so addressed, "and I can't guess ages. Come, Olive, let us find our French lessons and go."
"Oh, I declare, the little dear is huffed about something! Well, then, I'll tell. _I'll be fifteen in exactly a month from now!_ What do you say to that? I'm well grown, am I not, Janet?"
"Did you speak?" asked Miss May in her coldest tones.
"Yes, darling, I did. Shall we go into the common room now? I'm dying to see it."
"I'm afraid I have no more time to show you any of the house this evening," answered Janet. "The common room is very much the shape of this one, only without the desks. I have some of my studies to look over, so I must wish you good-evening."
Bridget O'Hara's clear blue eyes were opened a little, wider apart.
For the first time there was a faint hesitation in her manner.
"But Mrs. Freeman said----" she began.
"That I was to take you round and introduce you to a few companions," continued Janet hastily. "Miss Collingwood, Miss O'Hara--Miss Moore, Miss O'Hara--Miss Bury, Miss O'Hara. Now I have done my duty. If you like to see the common room for yourself, you can go straight through this folding door, turn to your left, see a large room directly facing you; go into it, and you will find yourself in the common room. Now, good-night."
Janet turned away, and a moment later reached the door of the schoolroom, where she was joined by Olive and Ruth. "Come," she said to them, and the three girls disappeared, only too glad to vent their feelings in the passage outside the schoolroom. Dorothy Collingwood lingered behind her companions. "Never mind," she said to Biddy, "it is rude of Janet to leave you, but she is sometimes a little erratic in her movements. It is a way our Janey has, and of course no one is silly enough to mind her."
"You don't suppose I mind her?" exclaimed Bridget. "Rudeness always shows ill-breeding, but it is still more ill-bred to notice it--at least, that's what papa says. She spoke rather as if she did not like me, which is quite incomprehensible, for everybody loves me at home."
There was a plaintive note in the girl's voice, a wistful expression in her eyes, which went straight to Dorothy's kind heart.
"People will like you here too," she said. "I am certain you are very good-natured; come and let me show you some of our snug little arrangements in the common room, and then I think it will be time for bed."
"Oh, never mind about bed--I'm not the least sleepy."
"But Mrs. Freeman wants you to go to bed early to-night."
"Poor old dear! But wanting Biddy O'Hara to do a thing, and making her do it, are two very different matters. I'll go to bed when I'm tired--papa never expected me to go earlier at home. I declare I feel quite cheerful again now that I have got to know you, Dorothy. Janet is not at all to my taste, but you are. What a pretty name you have, and you have an awfully sweet expression--such a dear, loving kind of look in your eyes. Would you mind very much if I gave you a hug?"
"I don't mind your kissing me, Bridget, only does not it seem a little soon--I have not known you many minutes yet?"
"Oh, you darling, what do minutes signify when one loves? There, Dolly, I have fallen in love with you, and that's the fact. You shall come and stay with me at the Castle in the summer, and I'll teach you to fire a gun and to land a salmon. Oh, my dear, what larks we'll have together! I'm so glad you're taking me round this house, instead of that stiff Janet."
Dorothy suppressed a faint sigh, took her companion's plump hand, and continued the tour of investigation.
The common room to which she conducted Miss O'Hara was entirely for the use of the elder girls; the girls of the middle and the lower school had other rooms to amuse themselves in. But this large, luxuriously furnished apartment was entirely given up to the sixth and fifth-form schoolgirls.
The room was something like a drawing room, with many easy-chairs and tables. Plenty of light streamed in from the lofty windows, and fell upon knickknacks and brackets, on flowers in pots--in short, on the many little possessions which each individual girl had brought to decorate her favorite room.
"We are each of us allowed a certain freedom here," said Dorothy. "You see these panels? It is a great promotion to possess a panel. All the girls who are allowed to have the use of this room cannot have one, but the best of us can. Now behold! Open sesame! Shut your eyes for a minute--you can open them again when I tell you. Now--you may look now."
Bridget opened her eyes wide, and started at the transformation scene which had taken place during the brief moment she had remained in darkness. The room was painted a pale, cool green. The walls were divided into several panels. One of these had now absolutely disappeared, and in its place was a deep recess, which went far enough back into the wall to contain shelves, and had even space sufficient for a chair or two, a sewing machine, and one or two other sacred possessions.
"This is my panel," said Dorothy, "and these are my own special pet things. I bring out my favorite chair when I want to use it, or to offer it to a guest; I put it back when I have done with it. See these shelves, they hold my afternoon tea set, my books, my paint box, my workbasket, my photographic album--in short, all my dearest treasures."
"I must have a cupboard like that," said Biddy. "Why, it's perfectly delicious!"
"Yes; you have got to earn it first, however," replied Miss Collingwood, slipping back the pale green panel with a dexterous movement.
"Earn it--how? Do you mean pay extra for it? Oh, that can be easily managed--I'll write to papa at once. He has heaps of money, even though he is Irish, and he can deny me nothing. He's paying lots more for me than most of the girls' fathers pay for them. That's why I have a room to myself, and why I am to have riding lessons, and a whole heap of things. But I mean to share all my little comforts with you, you darling. Oh, if the cupboard is to be bought, I'll soon have one. Now let us sit in this cosy, deep seat in the window, and put our arms round one another and talk." The great clock in the stable struck nine.
"Don't you hear the clock?" exclaimed Dorothy, unconscious relief coming into her tones.
"Yes, what a loud, metallic sound! We have such a dear old eight-day clock at the Castle; it's said to be quite a hundred years old, and I'm certain it's haunted. My dear Dolly, to hear that clock boom forth the hour at midnight would make the stoutest heart quail."
"Well, and our humble school clock ought to make your heart quail if you don't obey it, Bridget. Seriously speaking, it is my duty to counsel you, as a new girl, to go to bed at once."
"The precious love, how nicely she talks, and how I love her gentle, refined words. But, darling, I'm not going to bed, for I'm not tired."
"But Mrs. Freeman said----"
"Dolly, I will clap my hands over your rosebud lips if you utter another word. Come, and let us sit in this deep window-seat and be happy. Would you like to know what papa is doing at the Castle now?"
"I don't think I ought to listen to you, Bridget."
"Yes, you ought. I'm going to give you a lovely description. Papa has had his dinner, and he's pacing up and down on the walk which hangs over the lake. He is smoking a meerschaum pipe, and the dogs are with him."
"The dogs?" asked Dorothy, interested in spite of herself.
"Yes, poor old Dandy, who is so lame and so affectionate, and Mustard and Pepper, the dear little snappers, and Lemon. Poor darling, he is a trial; we have called him Lemon because he exactly resembles the juice of that fruit when it's most acrid and disagreeable. Lemon's temper is the acknowledged trial of our kennel, but he loves my father, and always paces up and down with him in the evening on the south walk. Then of course there's Bruin, he's an Irish deerhound, and the darling of my heart, and there's Pilate, the blind watchdog--oh! and Minerva. I think that's about all. We have fox hounds, of course, but they are not let out every day. I see my dear father now looking down at the lake, and talking to the dogs, and thinking of me. O Dolly, Dolly, I'm lonely, awfully lonely! Do pity me--do love me! O Dolly, my heart will break if no one loves me!"
Bridget's excitable eager words were broken by sobs; tears poured out of her lovely eyes, her hands clasped Dorothy's with fervor.
"Love me," she pleaded; "do love me, for I love you."
It would have been impossible for a much colder heart than Dorothy Collingwood's to resist her.
"Yes, I will love you," she replied; "but please go to bed now, dear. You really will get into trouble if you don't, and it seems such a pity that you should begin your school life in disgrace."
"Well, if I must go, and if you really wish it. Come with me to my room, Dorothy. O Dolly, if you would sleep with me to-night!"
"No, I can't do that; we have to obey rules at school, and one of our strictest rules is that no girl is to leave her own bedroom without special permission."
"Then go and ask, darling. Find Mrs. Freeman, and ask her; it's so easily done."
"I cannot go, Bridget. Mrs. Freeman would not give me leave, and she would be only annoyed at my making such a foolish proposition."
"Oh, foolish do you call it?" A passing cloud swept over Bridget O'Hara's face. It quickly vanished, however; she jumped up with a little sigh.
"I don't think I shall like school," she said, "but I'll do anything you wish me to do, dearest Dorothy."
CHAPTER III.
RIBBONS AND ROSES.
Dorothy shared the same bedroom as Ruth and Olive. Each girl, however, had a compartment to herself, railed in by white dimity curtains, which she could draw or not as she pleased. Dorothy's compartment was the best in the room; it contained a large window looking out over the flower garden, and commanding a good view of the sea. She was very particular about her pretty cubicle, and kept it fresh with flowers, which stood in brackets against the walls.
Ruth and Olive slept in the back part of the room. They had a cubicle each, of course, but they had not Dorothy's taste, and their little bedrooms had a dowdy effect beside hers.
They were both undressing when she entered the room this evening, but the moment she appeared they rushed to her and began an eager torrent of words.
"Well, Dolly, have you got rid of that horrible incubus of a girl at last? What a trial she will be in the school! She's the most ill-bred creature I ever met in my life. What can Mrs. Freeman mean by taking her in? Of course, she cannot even pretend to be a lady."
"And there's such a fuss made about her, too," interrupted Olive. "A carriage and pair sent to meet her, forsooth, and a separate room for the darling to sleep in. It was good-natured of you to stay with her, Dolly; I assure you Ruth, and Janet, and I could not have borne another moment of her society."
"She's not so bad at all," began Dorothy.
"Oh, oh, oh! if you're going to take her part, that is the last straw."
"I shan't allow her to be persecuted," said Dorothy, with some firmness. "She's the most innocent creature I ever met in my life. Fancy a girl of her age, who has simply never had a rebuff, who has been petted, loved, made much of all her days, who looks at you with the absolute fearlessness of a baby, and talks out her mind as contentedly and frankly as a bird sings its song. I grant she's an anomaly, but I'm not going to be the one to teach her how cruel the world can be."
"Oh, _if_ you take it up in that way," said Olive; but her words had a faint sound about them--she was a girl who was easily impressed either for good or evil.
If Dorothy chose to take the new girl's part, she supposed there was something in her, and would continue to suppose so until she had a conversation with Janet, or anyone else, who happened to have diametrically opposite opinions to Dorothy Collingwood.
Dorothy went into her own little cubicle, drew her white dimity walls tight, and, standing before the window, looked out at the summer landscape.
She had to own to herself that Bridget had proved a very irritating companion. She would take her part, of course; but she felt quite certain at the same time that she was going to be a trial to her. As she stood by her window now, however, a little picture of the scene which the Irish girl had described so vividly presented itself with great distinctness before Dorothy's eyes.
She saw the wild landscape, the steep gravel path which overhung the lake, the old squire with his white hair, and tall but slightly bent figure, pacing up and down, smoking his pipe and surrounded by his dogs. Dorothy fancied how, on most summer evenings, Bridget, impetuous, eager, and beautiful, walked by his side. She wondered how he had brought himself to part with her. She gave a little sigh as she shut the picture away from her mind, and as she laid her head on her pillow, she resolved to be very kind to the new girl.
Breakfast was at eight o'clock at Mulberry Court. The girls always assembled a quarter of an hour before breakfast in the little chapel for prayers. They were all especially punctual this morning, for they wanted to get a good peep at Miss O'Hara.
She was not present, however, and did not, indeed, put in an appearance in the breakfast room until the meal was half over.
She entered the room, then, in a long white embroidered dress, looped up here, there, and everywhere with sky-blue ribbons. It was a charming toilet, and most becoming to its wearer, but absolutely unsuitable for schoolroom work.
"How do you do, Mrs. Freeman?" said Bridget. "I'm afraid I'm a little late; I overslept myself, and then I could not find the right belt for this dress--it ought to be pale blue to match the ribbons, ought it not? But as I could not lay my hand on it, I have put on this silver girdle instead. Look at it, is it not pretty? It is real solid silver, I assure you; Uncle Jack brought it me from Syria, and the workmanship is supposed to be very curious. It's a trifle heavy, of course, but it keeps my dress nice and tight, don't you think so?"
"Yes, Bridget, very nice--go and take your place, my dear. There, beside Janet May. Another morning I hope you will be in time for prayers. Of course, we make all allowances the first day. Take your place directly, breakfast is half over."
Bridget raised her brows the tenth of an inch. The faintest shadow of surprise crossed her sweet, happy face. Then she walked down the long room, nodding and smiling to the girls.
"How do you do, all of you?" she said. "Well, Janet, good-morning"; she tapped Janet's indignant back with her firm, cool hand, and dropped into her place.
"Now, what shall I eat?" she said. "By the way, I hope there's a nice breakfast, I'm awfully hungry. Oh, eggs! I like eggs when they're _very_ fresh. Mrs. Freeman, are these new laid? do you keep your own fowls? Father and I wouldn't touch eggs at the Castle unless we were quite sure that they were laid by Sally, Sukey, or dear old Heneypeney."
A titter ran down the table at these remarks; Mrs. Freeman bent to pick up her pocket handkerchief, and Miss Delicia, rushing to Bridget's side, began to whisper vigorously in her ear.
"It is not the custom at school, my dear child, to make remarks about what we eat. We just take what is put before us. Here's a nice piece of bacon, dear, and some toast. Don't say anything more, I beg, or you will annoy Mrs. Freeman."
"Shall I really--how unfortunate; but she doesn't look a bad-tempered woman, and what is there in wishing for fresh eggs? Stale eggs aren't wholesome."
"Do try not to make such a fool of yourself," repeated Janet, angrily, in her ear.
Bridget turned and looked at her companion in slow wonder. Janet's remark had the effect of absolutely silencing her; she ate her bacon, munched her toast, and drank off a cup of hot coffee in an amazingly short time, then she jumped up, and shook the crumbs of her meal on to the floor.
"I've had enough," she said, nodding to Mrs. Freeman in her bright way. "I'm going out into the garden now, to pick some roses."
Bridget's movements were so fleet that the head mistress had no time to intercept her; there was a flash of a white dress disappearing through the open window, and that was all.
The eyes of every girl in the room were fixed eagerly on their mistress; they were all round with wonder, lips were slightly parted. The girls felt that a volcano had got into their midst, an explosion was imminent. This feeling of electricity in the air was very exciting; it stirred the somewhat languid pulses of the schoolgirls. Surely such an impulsive, such a daring, such an impertinent, and yet such a bewitching girl had never been heard of before. How sweet she looked in her white dress, how radiant was her smile. Those pearly white teeth of hers, those gleaming, glancing eyes, that soft voice that could utter such saucy words; oh! no wonder the school felt interested, and raised out of itself.
"My dears," said Mrs. Freeman, answering the looks on all faces, "your young companion's extraordinary conduct can only be explained by the fact that she has never been at school before. I am going out to the garden to speak to her. You girls will now go as usual to your separate schoolrooms and commence study."
"Come, my dears," said Miss Patience to the girls near her, "let us lose no more valuable time. Please don't scrape your chair in that atrocious way, Alice. Rose, _what_ a poke! Susie, hold back your shoulders. Now, young ladies, come to the schoolroom quietly; quietly, if you please."
Miss Patience had a thin voice, and her words fell like tiny drops of ice on the girl's excited hearts. They followed their teachers with a certain sense of flatness, and with very little desire to attend to French verbs and German exercises.
Dorothy Collingwood ran after Mrs. Freeman.
"Please remember----" she began.
"What is it, my dear?" The head mistress drew herself slightly up, and looked in some surprise at her pupil.
"I ought not to speak," said Dorothy, turning very red, "but if you are going to be hard on Bridget----"
"Am I ever hard to my pupils, my love?"
"No, no--do forgive me!"
"I think I understand you, Dorothy," said Mrs. Freeman. "Kiss me!"
Miss Collingwood was turning away, when her mistress stretched out her hand and drew her back.
"I shall look to you to help me with this wild Irish girl," she said with a smile. "Now, go to your lessons, my dear."
Dorothy ran away at once, and Mrs. Freeman walked down the garden in the direction where she had just seen a white dress disappearing.
She called Bridget's name, but the wind, which was rather high this morning, carried her voice away from the young girl, who was gayly flitting from one rosebush to another, ruthlessly pulling the large, full-blown flowers with buds attached.
"I don't think I ever felt my temper more irritated," murmured the good lady under her breath. "Why did I undertake an Irish girl, and one who had never been from home before? Well, the deed is done now, and I must not _show_ impatience, however I may _feel_ it. Bridget, my dear! Bridget O'Hara! Do you hear me?"
"Yes, what is it?"
Biddy turned, arrested in her gay flight from rosebush to rosebush.
As she cut the blossoms off, she flung them into her white skirt, which she had raised in front for the purpose. Now, as she ran to meet Mrs. Freeman, the skirt tumbled down, and the roses--red, white, and crimson--fell on the ground at her feet.
"Bridget, do look," said Mrs. Freeman; "you have trodden on that lovely bud!"
"Oh, I am sorry!"
Miss O'Hara stooped carelessly to pick it up. "Poor little bud!" she said, laying it on her hand. "But there are such a lot of you--such a lot! Still, it seems a pity to crush your sweetness out."
"It is more than a pity, Bridget," said her governess in a severe tone. "I am sorry to have to open your eyes, my dear child; but in picking any of my roses you have taken an unwarrantable liberty."
"What?" said Bridget, coloring high. "Do you mean seriously to tell me that I--I am not to pick flowers? I think I must have heard you wrong! Please say it again!"
"You are not to pick flowers, Miss O'Hara; it is against the rules of the school."
"Oh, how very funny--how--how unpleasant. Did you tell papa about that when he arranged to send me here?"
"I did not specially mention the flowers, my dear. There are many rules in full force at Mulberry Court, and the pupils are expected to obey them all."
"How disagreeable! I can't live without flowers. I suppose papa will not expect me to stay if I don't like the place?"
"He will expect you to stay until the end of the term."
"Good gracious, why, that's weeks off! I can't live without flowers for weeks! Look here, Mrs. Freeman; is there not to be an exception made for me? Papa said, when I was coming here, that my happiness was to be the first thing considered. Don't you agree with him? Don't you wish me to be very, very happy?"
"I do, my love. But your truest happiness is not secured by giving you your own way in everything."
"Oh, but I hate self-denial, and that dreadful motto--'No cross, no crown.' I'm like a butterfly--I can't live without sunshine. Papa agrees with me that sunshine is necessary for life."
"So it is, Bridget. But you will permit me, an old woman compared to you, to point out a fact--the self-denying people are the happy ones, the selfish are the miserable. Take your own way now in your youth, sip each pleasure as it comes, turn from the disagreeables, trample on those who happen to be in your way, as you did on that rosebud just now, and you will lay up misery for yourself in the future. You will be a very wretched woman when you reach my age."
"How solemnly you speak," said Bridget, tears coming slowly up and filling her eyes. "Is that a sermon? It makes me feel as if someone were walking over my grave. Why do you say things of that sort? I'm superstitious, you know. I'm very easily impressed. You oughtn't to do it--you oughtn't to frighten a stranger when she has just come over to your hard, cold sort of country."
"But, my dear child, our hearts are not cold. I assure you, Bridget, I am most anxious to win your love, and so also is Dorothy Collingwood."
"Is she? I love her--she is a sweet darling! And you really want me to love you, Mrs. Freeman? Well, then, I will. Take a hug now--there, that's comfortable."
Bridget's arms were flung impulsively round her governess's neck, and then one hand was tucked within the good lady's arm.
Mrs. Freeman could not help uttering a faint, inward sigh.
"I must break you in gradually, dear," she said. "As this is your first day at school you need not do any lessons, but you must come with me presently to the schoolroom in order that I may find out something about your attainments."
"My attainments! Good gracious, I haven't any!"
"Don't say 'good gracious,' Bridget; it's a very ugly way of expressing yourself. You have learnt something, haven't you?"
"Learnt something? I should rather think I have. You question me on dogs, their different breeds, and their complaints! Do you know, Mrs. Freeman, what's the best thing to do for a dog if he shows signs of distemper?"
"I don't mean that sort of learning, Bridget. I mean what you acquire from books--grammar, French, music."
"I adore music; I play by ear all the old Irish jigs and the melodies. Oh, doesn't father cry when I play 'The Harp that once through Tara's Halls,' and 'She is far from the Land,' and 'The Minstrel Boy.' And oh, Mrs. Freeman, even you, though you are a bit old and stiff, could not help dancing if I strummed 'Garry Owen' for you."
"Well, my dear, you must play it for me some evening, but we don't allow _strumming_ at the Court."
"Oh, good gra----! I mean, mercy Moses!"
"That's as bad as the other expression, Bridget."
"I expect I shan't be allowed to talk at all."
"Yes, you will. You'll soon learn to control your tongue and to speak in a ladylike way."
"I loathe ladylike ways."
"Now, my dear child, will you come into the house with me? I ought to be in the schoolroom now."
"Please wait one moment, Mrs. Freeman."
"Yes, my dear, what is it?"
"Are you going to be cross when you find I don't know your sort of things?"
"I hope not, Bridget."
"It will be awfully unfair if you are, for I could pose you finely on my subjects. What's the first thing to do for a dog who shows symptoms of hydrophobia? How do you land a salmon? What keeps a gun from kicking? How does a dear old daddy like his pipe filled with tobacco? What is the best way to keep your seat when you ride bare-backed, and the horse runs away? Ha, ha, I thought I'd pose you. I could have a very jolly school of my own, if I tried."
"Bridget, my dear, before you come into the schoolroom I must request that you go upstairs and change your dress."
"Change my dress! Now I really _don't_ understand you. Am I to come down in my dressing-gown?"
"No. You are to take off that unsuitable afternoon costume you are now wearing, and put on a neat print dress for your morning work."
"This is the very plainest dress I possess, Mrs. Freeman; I pulled a lot out of my trunk this morning to look at them. There was a sky-blue delaine with coffee lace, and a pink surah, and----"
"Spare me, my dear. I really am in too great a hurry to hear a list of your wardrobe. Is it possible that your father sent you to school with all that heap of finery, and nothing sensible to wear?"
"It wasn't father, it was Aunt Kathleen. She chose my outfit in Paris. Oh, I do think it's lovely. I do feel that it's hard to be crushed on every point."
"Well, dear, you are not to blame. I shall take you to Eastcliff this afternoon, and order some plain dresses to be made up for you."
"Oh, goodness--no, I mustn't--mercy! nor that either; oh, I--I _say_, Mrs. Freeman, don't let the new dresses be frumpy, or I'll break my heart. I do so adore looking at myself in a lovely dress."
"Come into the schoolroom with me," said Mrs. Freeman. She was wondering how it would be possible for her to keep Bridget O'Hara in her school.
CHAPTER IV.
THE QUEEN OF THE SCHOOL.
It is not an easy matter to break in a wild colt, and this was the process which had now to take place with regard to the new girl, whose eccentricities and daring, whose curious mixture of ignorance and knowledge, of affectionate sympathy and careless levity, made her at once the adored and detested of her companions.
In every sense of the word Bridget was unexpected. She had an extraordinary aptitude for arithmetic, and took a high place in the school on account of her mathematics. The word mathematics, however, she had never even heard before. She could gabble French as fluently as a native, but did not know a word of the grammar. She had a perfect ear for music, could sing like a bird, and play any air she once heard, but she could scarcely read music at all, and was refractory and troublesome when asked to learn notes.
"Just play the piece over to me," she said to her master. "I'll do it if you play it over. Yes, that's it--tum, tum, tummy, tum, tum. Oughtn't you to crash the air out a bit there? I think you ought. Yes, that's it--_isn't_ it lovely? Now let me try."
Her attempts were extremely good, but when it came to laboriously struggling through her written score, all was hopeless confusion, tears, and despair.
With each fresh study Bridget showed the queer vagaries of a really clever mind run more or less to seed. She did everything in a dramatic, excitable style--she was all on wires, scarcely ever still, laughing one moment, weeping the next; the school had never known such a time as it underwent during the first week of her residence among them.
After that period she found her place to a certain extent, made some violent friends and some active enemies, was adored by the little girls, on whom she showered lollipops, kisses, and secrets, and was disliked more or less by every girl in the sixth and fifth form, Dorothy Collingwood excepted.
All this time Miss Percival, the head girl of the school, was absent. She had been ill, and had gone home for a short change. She did not return until Bridget had been at the Court a fortnight.
By this time the preparations for the Fancy Fair were in active progress. Janet May had obtained her own wish with regard to the Committee, each member of which was allowed to choose a band of workers under herself, to make articles for the coming sale.
The Fair was the great event to which the girls looked forward, and in the first excitement of such an unusual proceeding each of them worked with a will.
Janet was the heart and soul of everything. She was a girl with a great deal of independence of character; she was not destitute of ambition--she was remarkable for common sense--she was sharp in her manner, downright in her words, and capable, painstaking, and energetic in all she did.
She was a dependable girl--clever up to a certain point, nice to those with whom she agreed, affectionate to the people who did not specially prize her affection.
Janet was never known to lose her temper, but she had a sarcastic tongue, and people did not like to lay themselves open to the cutting remarks which often and unsparingly fell from her lips.
She used this tongue most frequently on Bridget O'Hara, but for the first time she was met by a wondering, puzzled, good-humored, and non-comprehending gaze.
"What does Janet mean?" Bridget would whisper to her nearest companion. "_Is_ she saying something awfully clever? I'm sorry that I'm stupid--I don't quite catch her meaning."
These remarks usually turned the tables against Janet May, but they also had another effect. She began to be sparing of her sharp, unkind words in Bridget's hearing. This, however, did not prevent her hating the new girl with the most cordial hatred she had ever yet bestowed upon anyone.
Bridget was a fortnight at the school, and had more or less shaken down into her place, when the evening arrived on which Miss Percival was to return.
Dorothy, Bridget, and a number of the girls of the lower school were walking up and down a broad road which led to the shore. They were talking and laughing. The smaller girls were dancing and running about in their eagerness. Some very funny proposal had undoubtedly been made, and much explosive mirth was the result.
Janet and Olive Moore were returning slowly to the house after a vigorous game of tennis. They stopped to look down at the group who surrounded Dorothy.
"We have lost her," said Olive, with a sigh.
"Lost whom?" answered Janet in her tart voice.
"Why, Dorothy Collingwood; she has gone over to the ranks of the enemy."
"What do you mean, Olive?" Olive turned and looked at Janet.
"You know perfectly well what I mean," she answered; "you know who the enemy is--at least you know who is your enemy."
"I never knew before that I had an enemy," said Janet, in her guarded voice.
Olive looked at her steadily.
"Come now, Janet," she said, "confession is good for the soul--own--now do own that you cordially hate the new girl, Bridget O'Hara."
"I'm sick of the new girl," said Janet; "if you are going to talk about her I shall go into the house; I want to look over my French preparation. M. le Comte is coming to-morrow morning, and he is so frightfully over-particular that I own I'm a little afraid of him."
"Nonsense, Janet, you know you're one of the best French scholars in the school. You won't get out of answering my question by that flimsy excuse. Don't you hate Miss O'Hara?"
"Hate her?" said Janet; "there must be a certain strength about a girl to make you hate her. I've a contempt for Bridget, but I don't rouse myself to the exertion of hating."
"Oh, well; it's all the same," said Olive. "You won't admit the feeling that animates your breast, but I know that it is there, _chérie_. Now I have got something to confess on my own account--I don't like her either."
"You have too good taste to like her, Olive, but do let us talk about something more interesting. How are you getting on with that table cover for the fair?"
"Oh, I'll come to that by and by; now about Miss O'Hara. Janet, I deny that she's weak."
"You deny that she's weak," repeated Janet. "I wonder what your idea of strength is, Olive."
"She's not learned, I admit," replied Olive, "but weak! no, she's not weak; no weak character could be so audacious, so fearless, so indifferent to her own ignorance."
"If she had any strength, she'd be ashamed of her ignorance," retorted Janet.
"I don't agree with you," answered Olive. "Strength shows itself in many forms. Miss O'Hara is pretty."
"Pretty," interrupted Janet, scorn curling her lip.
"Yes, Janet, she's pretty and she's rich, and she's destitute of fear. She is quite certain to have her own party in the school. I repeat," continued Olive, "that there is no weakness in Bridget. I grant that she is about the most irritating creature I know, but weak she is not."
"Well, well," interrupted Janet impatiently, "have your own way, Olive. Make that tiresome, disagreeable girl a female Hercules if you fancy, only cease to talk about her. That is all I have to beg."
"I must say one thing," replied Olive, "and then I will turn to a more congenial theme. I hope Evelyn Percival won't take Miss O'Hara's part. You know, Janet, what strong prejudices Evelyn has."
"Oh, don't I!" said Janet, stamping her small foot.
"And if she happens to fancy Bridget she won't mind a word we say against her. She never does mind what anyone says. You know that, Janet."
"I know," echoed Janet, a queer angry light filling her eyes for a minute. "Oh, dear! oh, dear! What with our examinations and the Fancy Fair, and all this worry about the new girl, life scarcely seems worth living--it really doesn't."
"Poor darling!" said Olive, in a sympathetic tone. "I thought I'd tell you, Janet, that whatever happened I'd take your part."
"Thanks!" said Janet calmly.
She looked at her friend with a cool, critical eye.
Olive Moore belonged to the toadying faction in the school. Toadies, however, can be useful, and Janet was by no means above making use of Olive in case of need.
She scrutinized Olive's face now, a slightly satirical expression hovering round her somewhat thin lips.
"Thanks!" she repeated again. "If I want your help I'll ask for it, Olive. I'm going into the house now, for I really must get on with my preparation."
Janet turned away, and Olive was obliged to look out for a fresh companion to attach herself to.
She looked at the merry group on the lawn, and a desire to join them, even though of course she knew she was in no sense one of them, came over her.
She ran lightly down the grassy slope, and touched Dorothy on her arm.
"I'm here, Dolly," she said, in her rather wistful manner.
"Oh, well; it's all right for you to be here, I suppose," said Dorothy. "What were you saying, Bridget? I didn't catch that last sentence of yours."
"I was going up the staircase," continued Bridget. "I held a lighted candle in my hand. It was an awful night--you should have heard the wind howling. We keep some special windbags of our own at the Castle, and when we open the strings of one, why--well, there is a hurricane, that's all."
"Oh, she's telling a story," whispered Olive under her breath. She settled herself contentedly to listen.
"Go on; tell us quickly what you did with the candle, Biddy!" cried little Violet, pulling her new friend by the arm.
"Don't shake me so, Vi, my honey; I'm coming to the exciting place--now then. Well, as I was going up the stairs all quite lonely, and by myself, never a soul within half a mile of me----"
"But your castle isn't half a mile big," said Katie, another small girl. "And you did say your father lived there with you, and, of course, there must have been some servants."
"Well, dear, well! half a mile is a figure of speech. That's a way we have in Ireland--we figure of speech everything; it's much more graphic. Now, to go on. I was running up the stairs with my candle, and the wind rushing after me like mad, and the Castle rocking as if it were in an agony, when---- What do you think happened?"
"What?" said Katie, her eyes growing big with fascination and alarm.
"The wind dropped as if it were dead. After screeching as if it had the tongues of hundreds of Furies, it was mummer than the timidest mouse that ever crept. The Castle ceased to rock; it was the suddenest and deadest calm you could possibly imagine. It was miles more frightful than the storm. Just then there came a little puff of a breeze out of the solid stone wall, and out went my candle."
"O Bridget!" exclaimed the little girls, starting back in affright.
"Bridget, you are talking a great deal of nonsense," said Dorothy, "and I for one am not going to listen to you. We are much too sensible to believe in ghost stories here, and there is no use in your trying to frighten us. Good-by, all of you; I am off to the house!"
Dorothy detached herself from Bridget's clinging arm, and ran quickly up the sloping lawn.
Bridget stood and watched her. Olive kept a little apart, and the smaller girls clustered close together, watching their new friend's face with interest and admiration.
The Irish girl looked certainly pretty enough to win any number of susceptible small hearts at that moment. Her pale blue dress set off her graceful figure and fair complexion to the best advantage. Her mirthful, lovely eyes were raised to follow Dorothy as she disappeared into the house. Her lips were parted in a mischievous smile. She raised one hand to push back the rebellious locks of chestnut curls from her forehead.
"Now, Biddy, go on, Biddy!" exclaimed the children. "We love ghost stories, so do tell us more about the candle."
"No!" said Bridget. "_She_ says they aren't good for you, so you shan't have them. Let's think of some more fun. Who's that new girl, who, you say, is going to arrive to-night?"
"New girl!" exclaimed Katie, "why, she's about the very oldest girl in the school--the oldest and the nicest. She's the head of the school. We call her our queen. She's not like you, Biddy, of course; but she's very nice--awfully nice!"
"And what's the darling's name?" asked Bridget.
"Evelyn Percival. Doesn't it sound pretty?"
"Faix, then, it does, honey. I'm all agog to see this lovely queen. Why has she been absent so long? Doesn't Mrs. Freeman require any lessons of the sweet creature? Oh, then, it's I that would like to be in her shoes, if that's the case."
"She has been ill, Biddy," said Violet. "Evelyn has been ill, but she is better now; she's coming back to-night. We are all glad, for we all love her."
"Let's run down the road, then, and give her a welcome," said Bridget. "In Ireland we'd take the horses off the carriage, and draw her home ourselves. Of course, we can't do that, but we might go to meet her, waving branches of trees, and we might raise a hearty shout when we saw her coming. Come along, girls--what a lark! I'll show you how we do this sort of thing in old Ireland! Come! we'll cut down boughs as we go along. Come! be quick, be quick!"
"But we are not allowed to cut the boughs, Bridget," said Katie.
"And we are not allowed to go out of the grounds by ourselves," cried several other voices.
"We are not by ourselves when we are together," replied Bridget. "Come along, girls, don't be such little despicable cowards! I'll square it with Mrs. Freeman. You trust _me_. Mrs. Freeman will forgive us everything when the queen is coming back. Now, do let's be quick, we haven't a minute to lose!"
Small girls are easily influenced, and Bridget and her tribe rushed down the avenue, shouting and whooping as they went.
Olive had no inclination to join them. They had taken no notice of her, and she was not sufficiently fascinated by Bridget to run any risk for her sake. She knew that her present proceedings were wrong, but she was not at all brave enough to raise her voice in protest. She walked slowly back to the house, wondering whether she should go and tell Janet, or sink down lazily on a cozy seat and go on with a story book which was sticking out of her pocket.
As she was approaching the house she was met by Miss Delicia, who stopped to speak kindly to her.
"Well, my dear child," she said, "I suppose you, like all the rest of us, are on tenter hooks for our dear Evelyn's return. From the accounts we received this morning, she seems to be quite well and strong again, and it _will_ be such a comfort to have her back. I don't know how it is, but the school is quite a different place when she is there."
"We'll all be delighted to have her again, of course," said Olive. "And is she really quite well, Miss Delicia?"
"Yes, my love, or she would not be returning."
Miss Delicia hurried on, intent on some housewifely mission, and Olive entering the house went down a long stone passage which led to the sixth form schoolroom.
Janet was there, busily preparing her French lesson for M. le Comte. She was a very ambitious girl, and was determined to carry off as many prizes as possible at the coming midsummer examinations. She scarcely raised her eyes when Olive appeared.
"Janet!"
"Yes, Olive; I'm very busy. Do you want anything?"
"Only to tell you that that pet of yours, Bridget O'Hara, is likely to get herself into a nice scrape. She has run down the road with a number of the small fry to meet Evelyn. They are taking boughs of trees with them, and are going to shout, or do something extraordinary, when they see her arriving. Janet, what's the matter? How queer you look!"
"I'm very busy, Olive; I wish you'd go away!"
"But you look queer. Are you frightened about anything?"
"No, no; what nonsense you talk! What is there to be frightened about? Do go; I can't learn this difficult French poetry while you keep staring at me!"
"I wish you'd say what you think about Bridget. Isn't she past enduring, getting all the little ones to disobey like this? Why, she might be expelled! Yes, Janet; yes, I'm going. You needn't look at me as if you'd like to eat me!"
Olive left the room with slow, unwilling footsteps, and Janet bent her head over the copy of Molière she was studying.
"Nothing in the world could be stupider than French poetry," she muttered. "How am I to get this into my head? What a nuisance Olive is with her stories--she has disturbed my train of thoughts. Certainly, it's no affair of mine what that detestable wild Irish girl does. I shall always hate her, and whatever happens I can never get myself to tolerate Evelyn. Now, to get back to my poetry. I have determined to win this prize. I won't think of Evelyn and Bridget any more."
Janet bent her fair face again over the open page; a faint flush had risen in each of her cheeks.
She was beginning to collect her somewhat scattered thoughts, when the door was opened suddenly, and, to her surprise, Mrs. Freeman came into the room.
"Pardon me for disturbing you," she said; "I did not know anyone was in the schoolroom at present."
"I am looking over my French lesson, madam," answered Janet, in her respectful tones. "It's a little more difficult than usual, and I thought I'd have a quiet half hour here, trying to master it."
"Quite right, Janet, I am glad you are so industrious. I won't disturb you for more than a minute, my love. I just want to look out of this window. It is the only one that commands a view of the road from Eastcliff. Evelyn ought to be here by now."
Janet did not say any more. She bent forward, ostensibly to renew her studies, in reality to hide a jealous feeling which surged up in her heart.
What a fuss everyone _was_ making about that stupid Evelyn Percival. Here was the head mistress even quite in a fume because she was a minute or two late in putting in an appearance.
It really was too absurd. Janet could not help fidgeting almost audibly.
"Janet," said Mrs. Freeman, "come here for a moment. I want you to use your young eyes. Do you see any carriage coming down the hill?"
Janet sprang from her seat with apparent alacrity.
"Look, dear," said the governess. "What is that distant speck? I am so terribly near-sighted that I cannot make out whether it is a carriage or cart of some sort."
"It is a covered wagon," said Janet. "I see it quite plainly. There is no carriage at all in view, Mrs. Freeman."
"My dear, I must tell you that I am a little anxious. Hickman took that shying horse, Caspar, to bring Evelyn home. I intended Miss Molly to have been sent for her. Dear Evelyn is still so nervous after her bad illness that I would not for the world have her startled in any way. And really, Caspar gets worse and worse. What is the matter, Janet? _You_ have started now."
"Nothing," replied Janet. "I--I--shall I run out to the front, Mrs. Freeman, and listen if I can hear the carriage? You can hear it a very long way off from the brow of the hill."
"Do, my love, and call to me if you do. I would not have that dear girl frightened for the world. I am more vexed than I can say with Hickman."
Janet ran out of the room. Her heart was beating hard and fast. Should she tell Mrs. Freeman what Olive had just confided to her, that Bridget and a number of the smaller children of the school had rushed down the road to meet Evelyn, carrying boughs in their hands, and doubtless shouting loudly in their glee?
Caspar was a sensitive horse; even Janet, who had no physical fear about her, disliked the way he started, and shied sometimes at his own shadow. It was scarcely likely that he would bear the shock which all those excited children would give him.
Oh, yes, she ought to tell; and yet--and yet----
She stood wavering with her own conscience. Caspar was nervous, but he was not vicious.
All that could possibly happen would be a little fright for Evelyn, and a larger measure of disgrace for Bridget. And why should Janet interfere? Why should she tell tales of her schoolfellows? Her story would be misinterpreted by that faction of the girls who already had made Bridget their idol.
No, there was nothing to be alarmed about. Evelyn was too silly, with her nerves and her fads. Janet stood by the bend of the hill. Her thoughts were so busy that she scarcely troubled herself to listen for the approaching carriage.
She stood for a minute or two, then walked slowly back to the window, out of which her schoolmistress leaned.
"I don't hear any sound whatever, Mrs. Freeman," she said, "but please don't be alarmed; Evelyn's train may have been late."
"Hark! Stop talking!" said Mrs. Freeman.
There was a sound, a commotion. Several steps were heard; eager voices were raised in expostulation and distress.
"Let me go," said the head mistress.
She stepped out of the open window, and walked rapidly across the wide gravel sweep.
Alice, Violet, and several more of the little girls were running and tumbling up the grassy slope. The moment they saw Mrs. Freeman they ran to her.
"Oh, come at once!" said Violet, "there has been an accident, and Evelyn is hurt. Bridget is with her. Come, come at once!"
The child's words were almost incoherent. Alice, who was not quite so excitable, began to pour out a queer story.
"I know we've all been awfully naughty, but we didn't think Caspar would mind the boughs. He turned sharp round and something happened to the wheels of the carriage--and--and--oh, Mrs. Freeman, do come. I think Evelyn must be dead, she's lying so still."
"Are you there, Janet?" said Mrs. Freeman. "Go into the house, and ask Miss Patience to follow me down the road. And see that someone goes for Dr. Hart. Alice, you can come back with me. The rest of the little girls are to go into the playroom, and to stay there until I come to them."
Mrs. Freeman spoke calmly, but there was a look about her face which gave Janet a very queer sensation. The schoolmistress took Alice's hand, and walked as quickly as she could to the scene of the accident.
The carriage lay smashed a couple of hundred yards from the gates of the avenue.
Bridget was sitting in the middle of the dusty road with a girl's head on her lap. The girl's figure was stretched out flat and motionless; her hat was off, and Bridget was pushing back some waves of fair hair from her temples.
"It's all my fault, Mrs. Freeman," said Bridget O'Hara, looking up with a tear-stained face at her governess. "_I_ made the children come, and _I_ made them cut the branches off the trees, and we ran, and shouted as we ran. I didn't think it would do any harm, it was all a joke, and to welcome her, for they said she was the queen, but no one is to blame in all the wide world but me."
"Oh, what a wicked girl you are," said Mrs. Freeman, roused out of her customary gentle manner by the sight of Evelyn's motionless form. "I can't speak to you at this moment, Bridget O'Hara; go away, leave Evelyn to me. Evelyn, my darling, look at me, speak to me--say you are not hurt!"
When Mrs. Freeman told Bridget to go away and leave her, the Irish girl stopped playing with the tendrils of hair on Evelyn's forehead, and looked at her governess with a blank expression stealing over her face.
She did not attempt to rise to her feet, however, and Mrs. Freeman was far too much absorbed to take any further notice of her.
"If I had only some smelling salts," she began.
Bridget slipped her hand into her pocket, and pulled out an exquisitely embossed vinaigrette.
The governess took it without a word, and opening it applied it to Evelyn's nostrils.
After two or three applications the injured girl stirred faintly, a shade of color came into her cheeks, and she opened her eyes.
"There, thank Heaven, I haven't killed her!" exclaimed Bridget.
She burst into sudden frantic weeping.
"I believe I am more frightened than hurt," said Miss Percival, struggling to sit up, and smiling at Mrs. Freeman, "I'm so awfully sorry that I've lost my nerve. Where am I? what has happened? I only remember Caspar turning right round and looking at me, and some people shouting, and then the carriage went over, and I cannot recall anything more. But I don't think--no--I am sure I am not seriously hurt."
"Thank God for that, my darling," said Mrs. Freeman. She put her arm round the young girl, kissed her tenderly, and drew her away from Bridget.
CHAPTER V.
BREAKING IN A WILD COLT.
Miss Percival's accident, and Bridget O'Hara's share in it, were the subjects of conversation not only that night, but the next morning.
The doctor had come to see Evelyn, had pronounced her whole in limb, and not as much shaken by her fall out of her carriage as might have been expected. After prescribing a day in bed, and all absence of excitement, he went away, promising to look in again in a few days.
Mrs. Freeman breathed a sigh of relief.
"And now," she said, turning to her two sisters, "the question of questions is this: what is to be done with Bridget O'Hara? Is she to continue at Mulberry Court after such a daring act of disobedience? Must the safety of the other scholars be sacrificed to her?"
"I'd punish her very severely," said Miss Patience. "I am sure punishment is what she wants. She ought to be broken in."
"I don't believe you'll ever drive her," said Miss Delicia. "I know that sort of character. It's only hardened when it's driven."
"I shall do nothing to-night," said Mrs. Freeman. "But to-morrow, after morning school, I must speak to Bridget. Her conduct during that interview will more or less decide what steps I must take."
The next morning, after breakfast, Mrs. Freeman went upstairs to sit with her favorite Evelyn.
Evelyn Percival, the head girl of the school, was now between seventeen and eighteen years of age. She was a rather pale, rather plain girl; her forehead was broad and low, which gave indications of thoughtfulness more than originality; her wide open gray eyes had a singularly sweet expression; they were surrounded by dark eyelashes, and were the best features in a face which otherwise might have appeared almost insignificant.
But plain as Evelyn undoubtedly was, no one who knew her long ever remarked about her appearance, or gave a second thought to the fact that she could lay small claim to physical beauty.
There was a spirit that shone out of those gray eyes, and lent sweetness to that mouth, which was in itself so beautiful that it radiated all over Evelyn, and gave her that strong fascination which those who are striving heavenward ever possess.
She never came into a room without exercising in a silent, unobtrusive, very gentle way, a marked effect for good.
Uncharitable talk about others ceased when Evelyn drew near. Selfishness slunk away ashamed.
All the other girls in the school tried to be good when Evelyn was by, not because she would reproach them, but because she had a certain way about her which made goodness so attractive that they were forced to follow it.
She was not a specially clever girl, nevertheless she was now, in virtue of her seniority, and a certain painstaking determination, which made her capable of mastering her studies, at the head of the school.
There are some jealous people who dislike the beautiful because they are beautiful, the good because they are good. Girls with this special character are to be found in every school. Janet May was one of them, but perhaps in the whole of Mulberry Court she was the only person who at this juncture cordially disliked Evelyn Percival.
"It is delightful to have you back again," said Mrs. Freeman, bending over her pupil and kissing her. "And really, Evelyn, you look almost well. Oh, my dear child, what a fright I got about you last night."
"But I'm all right to-day," said Evelyn, in her bright voice. "I don't feel any bad effects whatever from my accident. I can't think why I was so stupid as to faint, and give you a fright. I ought really to have more control over my nerves."
"My dear, you have been ill, which accounts for your nervousness. But in any case a person with the stoutest nerves may be pardoned for fainting if she is flung out of a carriage. I cannot imagine how you escaped as you have done."
"I feel quite well," replied Evelyn, "quite well, and disinclined to stay in bed. I want to get up and see all my friends. You don't know how I have been looking forward to this."
"You shall see the girls one at a time in your room, darling, for whether you feel well or not, the doctor wishes you to remain quiet to-day."
Evelyn gave a very faint sigh, and turning her head looked out of the window.
Mrs. Freeman went over and drew back the curtains.
"You can watch the sea from your bed, my dear," she said, "and I will send Dorothy to sit with you after morning school. Now I want to ask you if you can give any idea of how the accident occurred?"
A slight additional color came into Miss Percival's cheeks.
"Caspar shied at something," she said.
"Yes, but at what?"
"Well, Mrs. Freeman, you know how fond the children are of me, and I of them. They came to meet me, several of the little ones, and one tall, beautiful girl, whom I do not know. Perhaps they were all over-excited. They shouted a good deal, and waved branches of trees. Poor Caspar evidently could not stand it; but they really did nothing that anyone could blame them about."
"Nonsense, Evelyn. They disobeyed my most stringent orders. Are they not to be blamed for that?"
"Hadn't they got leave to come to meet me?"
"No, it was that wild Irish girl's doing. I really don't know what to do with her."
"Is she the beautiful girl who was the ringleader? I don't think I ever saw anyone with such presence of mind. She absolutely caught me as I was flung out of the carriage. I felt her arms round me; that was why I was not hurt."
"Yes, I am sure she has a good deal of physical courage, but that does not alter the fact of her having defied my authority and led the children into mischief."
"Poor girl!" said Evelyn, a wistful expression coming into her eyes.
"Now, my dear, you are not going to plead for her. I must manage her my own way. I will leave you now, Evelyn. Rest all you can, dear, and if you are very good you may perhaps be allowed to join us at supper."
Mrs. Freeman left her pupil's room, and went downstairs.
Evelyn Percival was one of the few girls in the school who was privileged to have a room to herself. Her little room was prettily draped in white and pink. It was called the Pink Room, and adjoined the Blue Room, which was occupied by Bridget O'Hara.
On her way downstairs Mrs. Freeman stepped for a moment into Bridget's room. Her pupil's large traveling trunks had been removed to the box room, but many showy dresses and much finery of various sorts lay scattered about.
Bridget was evidently not blessed with the bump of order. Valuable rings and bracelets lay, some on the mantelpiece, some on the dressing table; ribbons, scarfs, handkerchiefs, littered the chairs, the chest of drawers, and even the bed. A stray stocking poked its foot obtrusively out of one of the over-packed drawers of the wardrobe. Photographs of friends and of scenery lay face downward on the mantelpiece, and kept company with Bridget's brushes and combs in her dressing-table drawer.
Mrs. Freeman was very particular with regard to tidiness, and the condition of this very pretty room filled her with grave displeasure. The rules with regard to tidy rooms, neatly kept drawers, a place for everything and everything in its place, were most stringent at Mulberry Court, but up to the present rules mattered nothing at all to Bridget O'Hara.
"There is nothing whatever for it," murmured Mrs. Freeman; "I must punish the poor child in a way she will really feel. If this fails, and I cannot break her in before the end of the term, I must ask her father to remove her."
Mrs. Freeman sighed as she said these words.
She went downstairs and entered her own private sitting room. It was now half-past eleven o'clock, and morning school was over. The weather was too hot for regular walks, and the girls were disporting themselves according to their own will and pleasure on the lawns and in the beautiful grounds which surrounded the school.
Mrs. Freeman could see them as she sat in her sitting room.
Janet, accompanied by Olive and Ruth, was pacing slowly backward and forward under some shady trees. Her satellites were devoted to her, and Janet's slender figure was very erect, and her manner somewhat dictatorial. Dorothy Collingwood was not to be seen, she had evidently gone to join Evelyn upstairs. The girls of the middle school were preparing to exert themselves over more than one tennis match. The smaller children were going down to the shore.
Bridget, her hat hanging on her arm, defiance very marked on her brow, came suddenly into view. She was alone, and Mrs. Freeman noticed that Janet and her two companions stopped to look at her as if they rather enjoyed the spectacle. They paused for a moment, stared rudely, then turned their backs on Miss O'Hara.
Bridget wore a white muslin dress with a long train. Her silver girdle was clasped round her waist. She went deliberately up to a rose tree in full flower, and, picking two or three half-opened buds, put them in her girdle.
Mrs. Freeman got up, and sounded an electric bell in the wall.
When the servant answered her summons, she desired her to ask Miss O'Hara to come to her immediately.
In about ten minutes' time Bridget came into the room without knocking. Her hat was still swinging on her arm; there was a wild-rose color on her cheeks; her eyes had a certain excited, untamed gleam in them.
"Did you want me, Mrs. Freeman?" she said, in her lazy, rich, somewhat impertinent voice.
"I certainly want you, Bridget. I am not in the habit of sending for my pupils if I don't wish to speak to them."
Bridget uttered a faint sigh.
"Well, I'm here," she said; "what is it?" She still used that half-mocking, indifferent voice.
Mrs. Freeman could scarcely restrain her impatience.
"I'm afraid I have some unpleasant things to talk about, Miss O'Hara," she said. "But, before I begin, I must distinctly request you to remember that you are a young girl in the presence of the lady who has been appointed by your father to guide, direct, and command you."
"Command me?" said Bridget, her nostrils dilating.
"Yes; does not a mistress always command her pupils?"
"When she can," replied Bridget. Her hands dropped to her sides. She lowered her eyes; her proud lips were firmly shut.
After a little pause, during which neither mistress nor pupil spoke, the pupil raised her head.
"I hate school," she said. "I want to go back to the Castle. Can I go to-day?"
"No, Bridget, you cannot. You have been sent here to be under my care, and you must remain with me at least until the end of the term."
"When will that be?"
"Not for over a month?"
"Couldn't you write to father, Mrs. Freeman, and tell him that I am not happy? Say, 'Biddy is not happy, and she wants to go back to you and the dogs.' If you say that, he'll let me come home fast enough. You might write by the next post, and father, he'd jump on the jaunting-car and drive into Ballyshannon, and send you a wire. If papa wires to you, Mrs. Freeman, the very moment he gets your letter, I may perhaps be home on Sunday."
Bridget's changeful face was now all glowing with excitement, eagerness, and hope. Her defiant attitude had vanished. As she looked full at Mrs. Freeman, her governess noticed for the first time that her eyelids were red, as if she had been crying. That, and a certain pathos in her voice, made the head mistress regard her in a new light.
“I’ll swim out.”
“Why, you’re crazy, Osceola! I know you’re a marvel in the water, but there isn’t a swimmer living who could breast that current. Believe me, I tried it, and I know.”
“Well, I can make a try at it, too, can’t I?”
“What’s the use? Hike along with me and we’ll be over there with the _Loening_ in half the time you could swim that distance in easy water. Anyway, there’s your rifle—you’d have to leave that behind. Don’t be a sap, old fella. You can’t fight ten or a dozen of the Sanders tribe with your fists!”
Osceola, who had led his class at Carlisle, and would captain the football team in the fall, was a young man whose brain worked fast. Moreover, he was never afraid to admit he might be wrong and to profit by another’s advice.
“Okay,” he said, after a moment’s hesitation. “I guess I let myself get carried away a bit. I’ll go with you. Let’s be on our way.”
“Good egg. I know you’re worried half sick about Deborah, and I don’t blame you. You lead on, old scout. We’ll make it, yet!”
Osceola started off at a sharp dog trot that he could keep up for hours if need be. Bill ran lightly behind him, glad to be in the open air and away from that uncanny house at last.
A ten-mile breeze blowing in from the sea rustled the treetops and shadows cast by a full moon danced over the undergrowth. Clouds were banking to the eastward, the salt tang of the ocean was in the air. Bill sensed rain or a storm and was glad that the cloud formation, creeping upward, would shortly blot out the silvery light. Should they be forced to land on Pig Island in moonlight nearly as bright as day, the odds would be all with their enemies.
Osceola, with that natural bump of direction which is inherent in all races of American Indians, struck an overgrown deer track and followed it. Bill, running on his second wind, saw the young Chief slacken his pace for an instant, then dart ahead at a stiffer gait.
“Here he comes!” the Indian called over his shoulder. “If we hustle, we’ll reach the shore soon after he lands.”
The white lad could hear nothing but the soft thud of his own footsteps and the gentle swish of the night wind in the treetops. Then, dimly at first, came the almost imperceptible drone of an engine far away. Within a very few minutes, the hum grew to a roar and the dark shape and tail-light of an airplane passed above their heads, flying low in the same direction they were traveling.
Osceola slowed down to a brisk walk. The ground sloped upward and rocky outcroppings made running impossible. Then he stopped altogether and waited for his companion.
“There we are!” He pointed forward and down.
Bill, who was not sorry for the breather, saw that they stood on the crest of the rise. Straight ahead the ground slanted sharply downward. Through breaks in the foliage, a wide stretch of moonlit water could be seen. Floating gently on the rippling cove near the shore lay the seaplane.
“You’re a wonder, Osceola! How were you able to draw a bead on Parker like that? I was sure we were in for at least a mile’s tramp along the shore before we’d get within hailing distance.”
“Nothing mysterious about it. That’s a cove off the main harbor you’re looking at. Parker told me of his rendezvous with you. I knew about this cove, and made it a bit more definite, that’s all. I’ll give him the signal and we’ll go on down.”
Two sharp barks of a fox came from Osceola’s throat. Immediately the idling hum of the airplane motor increased to a roar, awakening forest echoes and the amphibian commenced to move through the water toward the shore. Without a word the two friends scrambled down the rocky incline to meet it.
“Is that you, chief?” called Ezra Parker’s voice as they neared the water.
“Sure is. And I’ve got Bill Bolton with me.”
“Good enough,” answered the aviator, as they came onto the narrow beach. “How be yer, Bill?”
“Rearin’ to go, Ezra—and I reckon that’s what we’ve got to do, pronto!”
“Anything up?”
“Plenty. Sanders has got Charlie, and the gang’s over at Pig Island right now, trying to capture Deborah and old Jim.”
“Gosh all hemlock!” exploded Ezra. “Things are popping, that’s certain.”
“And that’s not the half of it,” cut in Osceola. “If Bill doesn’t hike down to Stamford, Connecticut, and prove to members of the Sanders outfit down there that he is out of this thing for keeps—those devils threaten to put Charlie out of the way, and Deborah too, if they can get her!”
“Well, that sure is the limit!” Ezra’s tone was filled with concern. “Jump aboard, boys, while I run her out in the harbor. There’s no telling who may be sneakin’ ’round in these woods. No sense takin’ any more chances than we have to.”
The Chief swung himself on to the amphibian’s deck which ran from amidships forward to her nose below the two cockpits and inverted motor. Bill meanwhile quickly doffed his clothes, which together with Sanders’ automatic he flung to the Seminole. He waded into the water, pushed the plane out until she floated clear, and walked out until he could grasp a wing tip. After much heaving and hauling, for the water was up to his armpits, he managed to swing the plane around until her nose was pointed toward the mouth of the cove.
“Thanks, Bill,” said Ezra, and Osceola gave his pal a hand aboard. “This place is too narrow for manœuvering. I was wonderin’ how I could get her out of here.”
“Gimme a towel!” Bill’s teeth were chattering. “There’s one in the locker in your cockpit, Ezra. Lucky you didn’t try swimming over to the island tonight, Osceola. If anything is colder than this Maine ocean when the sun’s off it, I’ve yet to find it.”
With Osceola he piled into the rear cockpit. Then while, Parker taxied the plane out to mid-harbor, Bill got into his clothes. Parker snapped off the ignition and twisted around in his seat.
“Now let’s have the lowdown on this, Bill.”
Bill climbed down to the deck and gave him a short outline of the events of the day and evening. “Kind of between the devil and the deep sea, aren’t we?” he finished grimly. “Time’s more than money now. So hop in aft with the chief, and let me in the fore cockpit. I’m going to fly the bus. There ought to be a couple of repeating rifles and ammunition in the locker aft. Pass one of them out to me, will you, Osceola? Ezra can use the other. You two, stick on head-phones. While I’m driving, see if you can’t come to some decision about this Stamford business.”
As Parker climbed out of the fore cockpit and went aft, Bill hopped into the vacated pilot’s seat. A rifle and ammunition were passed to him. He made sure that the magazine was full, then pulled forth a helmet and goggles from a small locker. These he put on, cast a hurried glance aft and satisfying himself that his companions were ready for the take-off, he switched on the ignition.
Chapter XIII PIG ISLAND AGAIN
Bill sent the amphibian roaring into the night wind, pulled her off the rippling waters of the harbor and skimming the twin bluffs at the entrance, sent his bus speeding seaward. A bank to starboard brought Pig Island dead ahead and Bill saw that the moon glare, playing on the islet, threw every detail into bold relief. On the instant he changed his plan.
Counting on the heavy cloud formation which was slowly spreading upward from the east, his first idea had been to land near the shore, and after securing the plane on one of the beaches, to rush the besiegers under cover of darkness. Now that the moonlight doomed such procedure to certain failure, he proceeded to climb.
At six hundred feet, he leveled off and sent the _Loening_ speeding in a circle around the island. The house, a one-story bungalow, built of native stone with hollow tile roof, stood on a craggy knoll near the center of the island. Bill saw that this slight eminence held unusual factors of defense. Not only was it impossible to look down on the house from any other point on the island, but the rocky ground sloped steeply on all sides from the top of the knoll. The one bad feature of the place was the number of large boulders nature had splattered up and down the incline. Behind twelve or fifteen of these big stones and completely ringing the little fortress above them, crouched the party of armed men.
As he circled, Bill saw the flashes from the gangster’s rifles and the answering flashes from the house. He noticed that there was method in the attack, and one that was likely to succeed in the capture of the bungalow. There would come a spurt of firing from one section of the attacking group on the hill, which naturally drew the two in the house to that side in order to repel a possible assault. Immediately the men on the farther side, out of range from the house, would dash ahead to take refuge behind boulders further up the knoll. Once under new cover, they would start a fusillade which gave the men on the opposite side a chance to advance. Three of the gang kept together and every time they moved, they picked up a heavy log and carted it up to the next boulder. It was evident that once Sanders got his crew well up to the house, these men, covered by the fire of their companions, would dash forward and batter in the door with their ram.
Three bodies lying stark on the hillside bespoke the courage and straight shooting of the besieged, but the rush must come soon, and the ultimate capture of the place was inevitable. “Unless we get busy—and get busy pronto!” muttered Bill.
He gave a lightning glance behind him. Ezra Parker and Osceola were firing from the rear cockpit, but so far without apparent result. To hit an object on the ground with a rifle bullet from a speeding airplane is a difficult feat, but Bill knew that the odds were against the gangsters. For it is even more difficult to hit an airplane in flight, that is, if she is being driven by an experienced pilot.
Much to the disgust of Osceola, who did not understand the manœuver, Bill levelled off and headed out to sea. A quarter of a mile from the island, he turned in his seat, and having attracted Parker’s attention, mouthed the words—“_Hold fast!_”
The two who were squeezed in the small cockpit aft nodded their understanding. For an instant or two longer Bill waited, then assured that they were secure, he sent the plane into a wingover. This manœuver is essentially a climbing turn followed by a diving turn, the two aggregating 180 degrees. The engine is kept running and control is maintained throughout.
A wingover is entered from level flight. At first it is merely a normal turn in which the nose is gradually raised, and slipping and skidding are to be avoided as usual. Elevation of the nose may be commenced simultaneously with the application of the bank. If so, the stick must be pulled back very slowly at first, as otherwise a stall will result and the wingover will be unsatisfactory. In flight training, unless the student’s judgment is particularly accurate, it is advisable for him to delay elevation of the nose until a bank of 15 to 20 degrees has been reached.
Bill steadily increased the bank until the amphibian was in a fairly steep reverse control turn with the nose well above the horizon, and headed approximately 90 degrees from his original course. He then gave the plane down rudder.
Inasmuch as a fairly good speed had been obtained, very little rudder was needed. Had the plane’s speed been close to the stalling point, he would have used more. At the same time Bill was careful to use the ailerons firmly to prevent the bank from increasing.
As the nose dropped below the horizon in response to the rudder, the plane assumed the position of a steep reverse control spiral, except that the engine was running. He kept it momentarily in this position; then as it approached a heading of 180 degrees from the entering course, he recovered as if from a spiral, at the same time raising the plane’s nose to level.
The entire manœuver of the wingover was executed, of course, in a fraction of the time it takes to describe it. Bill used it solely because he wished to bring the amphibian back on a course headed for the house on the island in the least time possible. He now waved a hand to his companions to make ready. Then he picked up the rifle he’d been sitting on, rested its barrel on the cowl of the cockpit and pushed forward the stick.
Over went the nose and down shot the plane in a breath-catching dive to be leveled off with a jerk, just beyond the breakers. Then with all three rifles pouring streams of spitting fire, Bill sent the airplane hurtling across the knoll at an altitude of less than ten feet above the heads of the cowering gangsters.
Up zoomed the amphibian on the farther side of the hill, gained altitude over the water, did another wingover and swept back across the knoll, but this time behind the house.
Again and again Bill repeated these telling evolutions. First one side, then the other was raked with fire from the plane. Then he would zoom the house itself in order to further confuse the besiegers.
On the plane’s eighth trip, Sanders’ forces broke. Flesh and blood could no longer stand this death-dealing hail of lead from a plane impossible to hit. Dragging their wounded with them, the routed gangsters dashed pell mell down to the shore. They piled into two motorboats beached in a cove and in less than no time, these two crafts were racing toward the mainland with everything wide open.
Bill let them go. Defense of the old man and the girl in the house on the hill was one thing: the shooting down of cowed men huddled in a couple of boats quite another. When he was convinced that the rout was a permanent fact, he landed the plane on the water, taxied into the same sandy cove from which the gunmen had departed, and beached her.
Deborah was waiting on the sand for them. Osceola was the first overboard and a moment later the two were clasped in each other’s arms.
Bill grinned at Ezra. “So far,” he said, “as you and I are concerned, well, we might be a couple of other rocks for all they mind!”
“That’s all right,” returned the older man as they went about making the plane secure. “They’re in love. We don’t exist for them just now. Don’t be so superior—you’ll be that way yourself some day!”
“Not me,” scoffed Bill.
“Oh, you don’t know what you’re talking about. I was like you before the right girl came along. I don’t suppose you’ve thought any more about the orders Sanders gave you?”
“You mean, not to interfere any more with his plans and to report to that guy in Stamford?”
“Yes. And this little adventure has torn the first part of that to pieces!”
“You mean the consequences to Charlie of course—”
“Just that. Sanders will now take it for granted you’ve decided to stick to the ship in spite of his threats. There’s no use crying over the milk we’ve spilt tonight, lad. We had a job to do, and I’m throwin’ no bouquets when I tell you it was done noble! Too bad we couldn’t have wiped out the entire crew while we were about it. By the way, I didn’t spot His Nibs in that gang, did you?”
“No, Sanders wasn’t with his men. Guess distance lends enchantment with Mr. Sanders when there’s a good chance of stopping lead! That guy hires men to do his fighting. Take it from me, he is sound asleep in his little white bed, wherever that may be—and I only wish I knew where!”
“That,” said Ezra with a chuckle, “is a worthy thought—but it doesn’t get us any forrider with the matter in hand, does it?”
Bill was silent for a moment. Vaguely conscious that the rising cloud formation had at last obscured the moon, and the darkness after the brilliant moonlight seemed inky black, he wracked his brain for a means to outwit their enemy.
Suddenly he laughed. “What a pack of blithering idiots we are!” he almost shouted. “Look here, Ezra! Sanders doesn’t know I was in the bus. It’s dollars to a penny postage stamp, he thinks I’m asleep in my own bed at Turner’s!”
“Maybe. That is, if he doesn’t send someone in there again to-night to find out.”
“Not Sanders. That guy has a Jehovah complex. He knows he’s a world beater and doesn’t hide his knowledge under any bushel, either. Why, he’s so sure he put cold, naked fear into me he’d bet on it!”
“You’re probably right,” agreed Ezra. “He’s been over to my dump a couple of times. He’s got one of those Buhl-Verville Airsters, with a man to chauffeur him ’round. Nice little job, too. A three-place biplane—he can fold the wings back. When they’re folded, the hangar space required is only 9 feet by 131⁄2 feet by 25!”
“That,” commented Bill, “is very likely the reason he picked on it—handy bus to hide. But what has a Buhl-Verville CW3 got to do with the price of spinach?”
“Nothin’, except your high-hat friend had me up to fix one of his shock absorbers. They’re of the Oleo rubber disc type on those crates. You see, under loading conditions, these rubber discs are in compression and an internal perforated plunger piston simultaneously travels into a loaded oil chamber at the lower end of the strut—”
“And,” interrupted Bill, “this absorbs the impact energy and neutralizes the effect of the rebound, which is so prevalent with the ordinary rubber spring shock absorbers. It cushions the landing shocks to the extent of saving the whole airplane structure from strains which are occasioned by shocks in bad landings over rough ground!”
“You win,” laughed Parker. “Up here in this out-of-the-way neck of the woods one forgets that there are other idiots crazy enough to waste time messing ’round with airbusses.”
“Thanks! But—”
“Oh, nothing. I got off the track, as usual. Just wanted to say that I got so gol-darned mad at that uppish little groundhog, Sanders, the last time he came ’round bellyachin’ ’bout the job I done on his shock absorbers—and all because his chauffeur got his training from a correspondence course—I told him to get out and stay out. No, he wasn’t on deck tonight—I’d know him a mile away!”
“Well, you said that before. So we’ll take it for granted that if I hop down to Stamford tomorrow and give that bozo Johnson an earful, he won’t start in making it nasty for Charlie in the meantime.”
“I think,” said Ezra, “we can be reasonably sure that he won’t. And now you and I had better get up the hill and help Jim with the—er—dear departed.”
“And while we’re about that, I’m going to wake up the lovers. You may not be hungry, but I can eat a horse. If Deborah is as good at cooking now that she has her little Indian Chief, as she was before he came to divert her mind from worthwhile things, maybe we can get her to scare up a meal.”
“What about Charlie? We’ve got to get that kid away from the gang just as soon as we can.”
“Of course we must. But I can think better when my stomach isn’t so doggone empty. Charlie is safe until the deadline that Sanders gave me. Now for the Seminoles. Lucky they’re not on their natural habitat—you and I would get a tomahawk between the eyes—eh, Osceola?” he cried.
Chapter XIV BILL BLOWS UP
Clocks in New Canaan were striking seven next evening when Bill turned the switch on the _Loening’s_ instrument board which released the retractable landing gear of the plane. Five or six seconds later he spiralled down on the level field back of the Bolton place, and taxied toward the hangar.
Wheelblocks in hand, he was climbing out of the cockpit when a man ran up from the direction of the Bolton garage.
“Evening, Master Bill,” he greeted. “Glad to see you back again.”
“Hello, Frank! I’m glad to get home myself, even though I won’t be staying long. Has my father returned home from Washington?”
“No sir. That is, he ain’t back in New Canaan.”
“After I get something to eat, I’m taking the Buick down to Stamford. It may be that I’ll come back tonight, but if not, I’ll need the _Loening_ tomorrow.”
“Very well, sir. I’ll fill her and give her a thorough looking over. Some doin’s there were here the night you left. By the time I waked up and got the cops on the phone, them guys had beat it. There was a wrecked car what had run into a rope, stretched out yonder, but they’d took the license plates with ’em. The cops think they can trace the car, though.”
“Well, that won’t get them anywhere. I’ll bet a hat the car was stolen. Anyway, I know who the men were. I’ve got a date with one of them tonight.”
“Is that so, sir? Better let me go with you, sir!” Frank was all eagerness. “There’s them what says I ain’t so worse in a scrap.”
Bill laughed and shook his head. “Thanks just the same, Frank. Some other time maybe. There won’t be any scrapping where I’m going this evening. This is just going to be a quiet conference.”
Frank looked disappointed. “Well, you never can tell, sir. If it looks like somethin’ interestin’, I hope you’ll give us a ring, an’ I’ll be wid yer in three shakes of a lamb’s tail.”
“I’ll remember, but don’t be too hopeful. So long now. I’m off to get a bite at the house before I start off again.”
“So long, Master Bill. I’ll have the Buick ’round front for you, soon as I wheel this crate into the hangar.”
“Thanks,” said Bill again, and marched off toward the house.
In the kitchen he encountered the cook. “Well, if it isn’t Master Bill home agin’,” beamed that buxom female. “Sure as I’m a sinner it’s yer dinner ye’ll be wantin’—an’ divil a bit av it cooked yet. I give the help theirn an hour ago!”
“Oh, that’s all right, Annie. But would it be too much trouble to rustle me a couple of sandwiches—or maybe three?”
Annie, hands on hips and arms akimbo, looked indignant. “It’s no sandwiches ye’ll be gettin’, Master Bill. In half an hour I’ll have something hot and tasty dished up. Can’t ye be waitin’ that long?”
“Gee, I sure can, Annie. But don’t bother too much. Anything will do. I’m hungry enough to eat shoe leather!”
“Now you leave that to me,” he heard her say as he went toward the front of the house and then up the stairs to his room.
He shut the door and picked up the French phone from a night table by his bed. As soon as central answered he called a Stamford number.
“Mr. Evans there?” he asked when a man’s voice answered.
“Evans speaking. It sounds like Bill Bolton?”
“Bill Bolton is right, Mr. Evans. I’m home—in New Canaan—just got here by plane. Deborah gave me your number.”
“Then it must be important. Spill the story, boy. Tell me why you’re not up in Maine looking after my interests.”
Bill told him, and it took him more than ten minutes to do so. “You see,” he ended, “while Deborah was giving us a midnight lunch on Pig Island, the five of us, Deborah, old Jim, Osceola, Ezra and myself, went into a session of the ways and means committee. After some argument, it was decided that on Charlie’s account, I must come down here, and at least pretend to follow Sanders’ orders—to report to Johnson at Gring’s Hotel, anyway.”
“Yes,” concurred Mr. Evans, “I’m afraid there’s nothing else that you can do.”
“I thought that perhaps you might have some men about, rush the joint and capture this Johnson. Kind of tit for tat, you know. We could swap him back to friend Sanders for Charlie. That would even up things a bit. Just now it seems to me that they have the bulge on us.”
“There’s no doubt about it, Bill—they have. Your plan’s a good one, but it is impossible.”
“But why?”
“In the first place, although Slim Johnson is a very young man, he is one of the cleverest gangsters outside Sing Sing. Secondly, if he didn’t have an A No. 1 organization of cutthroats and gunmen behind him, I’d have kidnapped that young gentleman long ago. But tell me,” he went on anxiously, “what are you fellows up there doing about my boy?”
“Just this: after it was arranged that I should come on here, Osceola elected himself a committee of one to locate Sanders’ hide-out, and to get his hands on Charlie. Parker decided to stay on the island to guard Deborah, for it seems that Jim is away most of the time on special duty for you, which he wouldn’t divulge.”
“And quite right, too,” murmured Mr. Evans. “Jim’s work is a most important factor—most important.”
“Well, it’s all Greek to me. And although you’re running this show, sir, and with all due apology, I must say it’s my opinion that you make a mistake in not putting more confidence in the people who are helping you. Look at me: Charlie blows in here and we beat it up to Maine as fast as my plane and good lead bullets will get us there. All kinds of hush stuff when we arrive, then you beat it off during the night, leaving us in a house that’s a warren of secret passages and what not—and to make it worse, you leave us absolutely no instructions. Consequently, one of us gets kidnapped, and the other all but loses his life, first by airgun bullets—and some airgun it must be to shoot that distance—and later, by drowning. Then I mistake the people on Pig Island for your enemies, make a fool of myself and darn near get kidnapped into the bargain. As a direct result, instead of being able to make myself useful in your interests around Clayton, I have to chase off down here to placate the chief of your enemies.”
“There’s a lot in what you say,” replied Mr. Evans. “But you must understand that this is an extremely serious affair—in which an enormous sum of money is involved.”
“Oh, you make me tired,” snapped Bill. “Why, I’ve had a sweet chance to sell you out—lock, stock and barrel. Money, money, money—that’s all you so-called big business men think of—and at that, you’re the guys we have to thank for the depression. Is any amount of money worth Charlie’s life?”
“They wouldn’t dare—”
“They dared with poor little Charlie Lindbergh. Are you any better than our national hero?”
“But I don’t like the way you’re talking—”
“And I don’t care a tinker’s hoop what you like. You’re not paying me anything. Listen to me—just as soon as we can find Charlie for you, I’m through! You want those who are helping you to trust you and your judgment, yet you won’t trust them, and seem to have as little respect for human life as did the German High Command during the war!”
“Anything else?” inquired an angry voice at the other end of the wire.
“Yes,” said Bill, “there is. A slight error on my part, or what might be construed as an error. When I inferred that you willingly risked human life in order to obtain money, I naturally made an exception.”
“And that is?”
“Your own valuable life, Mr. Evans!”
With this Parthian shot, Bill slapped on the receiver and switched off the telephone extension to his room. “I guess that’ll hold him,” he muttered. “Gosh, I’m glad I got that off my chest!”
He was under the shower in his bath when there was a knock on the door.
“You’re wanted on the telephone, Master William,” called a maid’s voice. “It’s a gentleman—wouldn’t give his name.”
“You tell the gentleman,” called back Bill, “that I’m busy. If he is insistent, say that I suggest he can go where snowballs melt the fastest.”
He dressed in a leisurely manner and went down to the dining room, where he found a hot meal awaiting him. He did full justice to it, and about eight-thirty he went out the front door, climbed in his car and drove off.
It was a twenty-minute drive down through the ridge country to the city of Stamford, where he parked his car in a garage off Atlantic Street. From there he walked down back streets and eventually came to Gring’s Hotel.
He had passed the place many times, and knew that it held an unsavory reputation. The building was a five-story frame structure, and back in the early years of the century, it had been a famous hostelry. The neighborhood had gradually deteriorated, until now the once-fashionable tavern reared its ornamental façade amid slums of the worst type. The police department had raided the place so often that newspapers no longer regarded that sort of thing as news. The hotel still had a reputation for excellent food and service, but it drew its patronage almost entirely from the rough element, sometimes criminal, sometimes merely tough, with which every New England manufacturing town is more or less cursed.
Bill ran lightly up the steps to the long veranda, a relic of better days. Paying no attention to the stares of the loungers in the lobby he crossed to the desk and caught the clerk’s attention.
“’Phone up to Mr. Harold Johnson,” directed Bill. “Say that Bill Bolton is down here and would like to see him.”
“One moment, sir,” returned the clerk and spoke a few low words into the phone at the rear of the desk.
“Mr. Johnson will see you,” he announced a moment later. “Take the elevator to the fourth floor and turn left. The room number is 49.”
Chapter XV THE LAUNDRY HAMPER
Bill stepped out of the elevator and turned left as the clerk had directed. He passed along the corridor until he came to a door marked “49.” He stopped and knocked. For a moment he waited, marshalling his thoughts, then the door swung inwards and he was confronted by a low-browed gorilla of a man who held an automatic in his hand.
“Is this Mr. Johnson’s room?” Bill inquired.
“Who wants to know?” the man rasped.
“The name is Bolton,” snapped Bill. “I’ve flown down here from Clayton, Maine, especially to see him if that means anything to you.”
“Let’s hear your business if you’ve got any.” The man continued to point the revolver at Bill’s chest.
“My business,” he said evenly, “is with Mr. Johnson. If you work for the man who sent me here I advise you to tell that to Mr. Johnson—and tell it pronto.”
“Cut the spiel and let him in, Jake!” called a soft voice whose owner was hidden by the half open door.
Jake muttered a surly curse, but he stepped aside and Bill walked into the room. The door slammed behind him and he heard the key turn in the lock.
He was surprised to find himself in a large and handsomely furnished sitting room. Thick hangings of gold brocade were drawn over the windows, shutting out the night and with it the air. The room was close and filled with tobacco smoke. Two massive couches upholstered in brocade were set back to back in the center of the room. One end of the sitting room was filled by a huge mahogany sideboard, loaded with bottles and glasses. At the other end stood a round card table covered with dark green felt. A number of heavily upholstered arm chairs lined the walls, and the polished floor was almost completely covered with handsome Oriental rugs. The walls were hung with a number of really good hunting prints.
Bill glimpsed a door behind the card table, but almost immediately his eyes focussed on a young man who sat on the arm of one of the couches. He was tall and very slender, immaculately dressed in white flannels and a light blue, double-breasted sports coat with dull gold buttons. Bill was astonished to see that the highly manicured nails of his white, tapering fingers were tinted carmine. His soft voice when he spoke lisped like a girl’s.
“I’m Slim Johnson,” he said languidly. “What did you want to see me about, buddy?”
Bill imitated Sanders’ quick, nervous nod.
“Zenas!” he said, and waited....
“Okay,” lisped young Johnson. “Bill Bolton, isn’t it?—The guy that dished von Hiemskirk’s hash?”
“It is,” Bill said shortly. “I had orders to be here at nine tonight.”
Slim Johnson glanced at a diamond-studded wristwatch. “You’re three minutes late,” he purred, “but I guess that’s near enough. Take one of those chairs and make yourself comfortable. I’ll talk to you in a few minutes.” He turned to a man who entered at that moment, a stockily built bruiser, as rough in his appearance as Jake.
Bill sat down in a chair near the wall. Except for the three men and himself, there was no one else in the room, though it was apparently furnished to accommodate a large number.
“Spill the beans, Hank,” Johnson smiled pleasantly on his henchman. “Make it snappy, though. I don’t want to keep Mr. Bolton waiting too long.”
“Humph! Ye had me drug up here,” snarled Hank. “I ain’t done nuthin’—I couldn’t help them guys highjackin’ the truck. If I’d ha’ made a move they’d have put me on the spot right there.”
“Oh, no,” Johnson smiled, “come now—surely that’s a bit of an exaggeration?”
The man glared belligerently about him. “If any guy says dat dem guys didn’t have the drop on me, he’s a liar!”
“I fancy that is the unadulterated truth, my boy, but the trouble is, you leave out a few things.”
“I ain’t left out nothin’—”
“Oh, yes, you have!” The purring voice directed itself toward Bill. “You see, Mr. Bolton, the sad story runs this way. Last night, Hank, who drives one of my trucks, got highjacked with a full load by the Muller gang up near Ridgefield. What he omits to tell us is that Tubby Muller passed over half a grand to him for his part of the job.”
Here, at a smothered exclamation from Hank, his inquisitor put up a slim hand in gentle protest. “Now don’t try to look like the picture of injured innocence, Hank. What Hank doesn’t know, Mr. Bolton, is that I have watched him for something like this ever since he and Tubby got together up at Glendale one night last week. And although they were not advertising the fact, I heard of it. Last night—and this will also be a surprise to Hank—I was behind the stone wall at the side of the road when he turned over the truck, and _I saw Tubby hand him the money_.”
Slim Johnson’s arm shot out like a serpent uncoiling. There came a sharp click and Hank rolled off the couch on to the floor.
Bill stared at the man’s body in horrified amazement. Then he heard the smooth voice of Johnson speak again to him. “Airguns,” he said pleasantly, “certainly have their uses.”
Johnson slipped the revolver up his sleeve again and crooked a finger at Jake. “Take that stiff out of here,” he ordered in his lisping tones, “he’s spoiling my rug and I paid five grand for it.”
While Jake dragged the dead man through the doorway beyond the card table, Slim Johnson drew out a gold case, selected a cigarette which he lighted, and filled his lungs with smoke.
“No doubt you’re shocked by the summary justice you saw meted out,” he remarked with a return of his languid air. “Treachery has its own reward in this business. I’m sorry if it disturbed you, Mr. Bolton.”
Bill did not reply. He was thinking that of all the cold-blooded murders he had ever heard of, this was certainly the worst. He saw now that the young man’s languid effeminacy was but a cloak to camouflage a nature hard as nails and utterly ruthless. Nobody had to tell him that he himself was in very dangerous waters and that unless he could handle this lady-like monster with kid gloves, he, too, would be removed from the Oriental rug as a piece of loathsome débris.
Bill made an effort to be matter-of-fact. “Suppose we come to business,” he suggested.
“Exactly what I was about to propose, Mr. Bolton, or shall I say ‘Bill’—you don’t mind if I call you Bill, do you? So much more clubby, you know—”
“Not at all.” Bill felt that anything would be preferable to this silly chatter. He, therefore, took the plunge. “You want to know where Mr. Evans may be found?”
“That is so. Where is he?”
“Somewhere in Stamford, I presume. Just where, I can’t say.”
“Oh, come now. How about your phone talk at seven-twenty?”
“What do you know about that?”
Slim Johnson took a sheet of paper from the inside pocket of his coat. “Just about everything, Bill, old thing,” he smiled. “Everything except the number you called. Here’s a report of the conversation. Amusing reading it makes, I must say. I might mention that we have tapped your home line, but the silly fool who listened in didn’t wake up until you’d been put through to your friend Evans. Come, let’s have the number!”
“Nothing doing, Johnson,” Bill said steadily, although he fully expected to see the gangster’s arm shoot forward the next instant, as it had done when Hank was killed. “You already know what I said to Evans. Well, that goes with you too, so far as I’m concerned.”
Slim Johnson gave him a quizzical glance. Then he lit another cigarette, which he smoked in a long gilded holder. For several minutes he stared at a print above Bill’s head and sent smoke rings toward the ceiling.
“From what I know of your character,” he said at last, and his voice sounded to Bill for all the world like the purr of a great cat playing with its prey, “you mean just what you say—at present. By morning, you may change your mind. Otherwise, I’m afraid we’ll have to use other methods. Go in to the bedroom now. I’m sorry that you will have to bear with all that’s left of dear Hank for a while; but we’ll remove the body later. Good night to you—and sweet dreams!”
Bill saw that Jake stood by the door with the automatic menacing him once more. Without a word he got to his feet and walked into the bedroom. Behind him the door closed and he heard a bolt shot home.
In the soft glow from rose-shaded lamps, Bill saw that this room was also of good size. The place reminded him of those impossible boudoir-bedrooms one sees portrayed on the screen. The bed was a huge, canopied affair of gilt and rose, and stood on a dais at one end of the room. Twenty or thirty small pillows covered with rose-colored silk were piled at the head on a rose damask coverlet. The walls and ceiling of the room were of white painted wood with panels of rose silk framed in gilt. On the hardwood floor, a rose rug, silk-piled, was spread. A chaise lounge, wicker arm chairs and mirrored tables laden with jars and bottles all bore out the same color scheme.
Bill thought that all that was needed to complete the screen picture was a movie actress lying back against the pillows, being served with breakfast on a tray by a “French” maid—“Gosh! what a dump!” He looked about him, but saw no sign of Hank.
He investigated the two closed doors at one end of the room, found that one led into the wardrobe closet, where thirty or forty of Slim’s suits hung on padded hangers, together with numberless other articles of wearing apparel on the shelves. The other door opened into a rose tiled bathroom. Onyx shelves held piles of towels, sponges, soap, bath salts in glass jars, and in one corner stood a large wicker hamper, painted rose color.
Bill noticed that the single stained glass window high in the bathroom wall was barred. That gave him a new slant on the plan. He went into the bedroom and pulled the curtains back from the two windows there. Both were crisscrossed with heavy bars of steel.
Slim Johnson’s bedroom was well protected from all intruders, and he, Bill Bolton, was as effectually a prisoner as though he had been cast into an underground dungeon.
He stood near the door to the sitting room, and through the panels he could hear the mumble of voices. Instinctively he moved nearer and placed his ear against the keyhole.
Slim Johnson was speaking: “Give him an hour. He’ll be in bed and asleep by that time. Then go in there and remove the—er—laundry. Better take Alec with you. It will be heavy. Come along with me, now. I’ve got to see Dago Mike about that shipment he landed tonight. It won’t take long and then we can come back to this job. If the big boss makes us let that lad go after we torture him in the morning—what he doesn’t know about the _laundry_ won’t hurt anybody, eh?”
Bill heard Johnson giggle, and then the door slammed to the corridor. He straightened himself thoughtfully, stared at the bed and saw that a pair of silk pajamas, rose-hued, had been laid out on the coverlet. Slowly he walked into the bathroom again.
The next instant he had the lid of the hamper open, and disclosed to view a bundle of soiled shirts, crumpled pajamas, collars and handkerchiefs. Bill scattered these articles to right and left.
Then uncontrollably, he shrank back. Huddled in the basket, doubled awry, was the body of a man. Only the head and shoulders were visible. But the head was the head of Hank.
Chapter XVI THROUGH THE SKYLIGHT
Bill bent swiftly, caught up some of the dirty linen and flung it into the hamper. He had to pull himself together. _That_—that was the explanation, of course, for Slim Johnson’s cryptic remarks about the laundry. They were coming back in an hour. Would they take the hamper and all?
“Yes,” he decided. “It would mean just that. Not even a gangster beer baron, or whatever role Slim Johnson plays in the criminal life of this state would permit him to carry dead bodies through the public halls of a hotel without causing comment! And possibly another police raid.... No—Hank was going out in the hamper. How many more,” he wondered, “had traveled that route before and would travel it again....”
Like a flash the idea came to him. Of course, it would be necessary to remove the body—
He went back to the bedroom and threw himself down on the chaise longue. He was tired after his long hop, and felt nauseated from his experience that evening. A glance at his watch showed that it still lacked a few minutes to ten o’clock. He had been in Gring’s Hotel only an hour, and in that short time, murder....
Resolutely he put the thought from him and the thought of what he soon must do. His eyes closed and gradually he dozed off into light slumber.
It was a quarter to eleven when Bill awoke. Chimes on a church clock somewhere in the neighborhood were striking the quarter hour. With a cry of annoyance, he sprang to the locked door and listened.
No sound came from the sitting room. Hastily extinguishing the bedroom lights, he hurried into the bathroom and switched on a single electric bulb.
He began to work with feverish haste, lifting the limp body of Hank from the hamper—_rigor mortis_ had not yet set in. He carried it to the bed, removed the coat and waistcoat, slipped on the jacket of the pajamas, turned down the rose-colored sheet and covered the body—all but the head and one arm, which appeared above the coverlet in a natural position.
Bill was trembling like a leaf when that was accomplished. But the worst was over. He had now only to switch off the bathroom light and take the place of Hank in the clothes hamper.
He collected the linen he had scattered on the floor, turned off the light and got into the hamper with his armful of shirts and pajamas, arranging himself as comfortably as he could inside. The lid was hinged, and fell back upon him when he had drawn a few pieces of clothing over his head and assumed the position formerly occupied by Hank.
He crouched, half-stifled, in the hamper, listening for ages—it seemed. At last—the bolt of the sitting room door clicked.
From within his hiding place Bill could hear almost clearly what was happening in the room. There came the faint creak of a boot on the floor boards.
“Keep to the rug, you fool!” hissed Johnson’s voice. “Do you want to wake him!”
For several minutes there was no other sound. In his mind’s eye he pictured the young gangster tiptoeing to the bed and looking down on the rose-colored pajamas—
Suddenly they were beside him. The hamper was dragged away from the wall, lifted and let down on the tiles again.
“Holy smoke! what a weight!” a voice whispered hoarsely.
“Shut up and come on!”
Again the hamper was lifted and carried from the room. Outside in the corridor it was set down for a moment while its bearers locked the door. Then the angle at which Bill was being carried shifted, the basket rocked slowly up and down, as he descended the stairs. There were a great many stairs—they seemed endless. Twice he was set down roughly, while the men paused for breath.
He had a desperate impulse to thrust open the lid, tear away the suffocating clothes and strike out for freedom. But the time was not yet. He must be patient.
The air became cooler and he was able to breathe more freely. He thought they must be in the open now. The hamper was banged down again.
“Slim,” a voice spoke somewhere above and he recognized it as Jake’s, “doesn’t want the bulls to get onto this. You remember last time they dug up Otto and raised an awful stink!”
“Well, what about this stiff?”
“Oh, Hank’s in luck. He gets a Christian burial. There’s one of them private family cemeteries up Sulvermine way. Hank goes in there. The tools are in the car.”
“It’s just too bad Slim can’t do his own diggin’,” growled Number Two.
“Not him—he’s got a heavy date. There he is now, watchin’ from the lobby. When we’re out of sight, he’ll beat it. He ain’t even takin’ a bodyguard tonight.”
“What is it—a skirt?”
“How should I know? But if we don’t get goin’ he will start raisin’ the roof. Git hold of this thing again—she’ll go on the back.”
Again Bill was lifted. The basket swung violently, then landed with a jar that shook his bones. He sensed that rope was being passed around the hamper to secure it to the back of the car. There came the crisp slam of a door, a continuous vibration, and a violent jerk. They were off at last. The car was moving.
Bill waited until he felt the automobile swerve around the corner. Then he thrust upward with all his might. The flimsy wicker catch snapped, the lid flew back, and amid a cascade of soiled laundry, he crawled out and dropped to the roadway. An instant later, he was strolling back toward the hotel. His late conveyance had already disappeared around the corner.
Swinging into the street upon which Gring’s Hotel fronted, halfway down the block, he saw Slim Johnson run down the steps and enter a taxicab. The car was headed away from him and started off directly. Bill at once sprinted after it, hoping that the Boston Post Road traffic would hold it up at the end of the block.
His hope was fulfilled. The cab slowed down, stopped and waited for the green light. Bill had just time to grasp the spare tire on the rear and take a precarious seat on the inner rim when it started up again.
Across the Post Road and under the raised tracks of the New York, New Haven and Hartford it went, then into that network of mean streets between the railroad and the shore like a frightened cat up a back alley.
Near the harbor the car slowed down and drew up before an open lot. Bill dropped off and hid behind a pile of rubbish. Slim Johnson got out, paid off the driver and started away at a smart pace toward the docks. With his weather eye open, Bill followed him, running swiftly across the patches of light from the street lamps and seeking the shadow.
The gangster followed the harbor toward the sea front, wending his way among the wharves. At length, by the side of a pier, he stopped, and gave a shrill whistle. Bill stepped behind a small wooden hut and took a survey.
Lying out among other vessels was the white prow of a large yacht. He could just discern its lines in the dim moonlight. There was a lantern at the bows, and a glimmer at one or two of the portholes.
Soon he heard the creak and dip of oars, and could see the silver sparkle of flashing water. A small boat drew into the pier. Slim made his way carefully down the steps, disappearing from Bill’s view. There was the rasp of an oar on stonework as the boat was pushed off. Bill could distinguish the man’s lisping tones as he talked. Then the boat melted into the darkness, in the general direction of the yacht.
For a few minutes Bill gazed across the water at its outlines. Suddenly there was a bright flood of light upon the deck. A door flung open, a tall figure blocked it, and the light narrowed to a slit and winked out as the door closed again. While Bill stood watching from the pier, he would have given anything to know who the others were on board that vessel. Still hot with anger and horror at being forced to witness the dastardly crime, and sickened with the part he had had to play later, Bill was not in the mood to forego an opportunity of evening things up.
It came to his mind that even to approach the yacht in a small boat, keeping his eyes and ears open, might be of some help in learning who was aboard her, or perhaps yield him a clue to the truth about Slim Johnson’s business. But a small boat was not easy to procure at that time of night, and in any case he did not want any inquisitive soul to know what he was doing. As he walked slowly along the wharf his foot struck a rope, and looking down, he saw it held a small dinghy that lay in the water at the edge of the dock. It probably belonged to a yachtsman who had come ashore. A find, if ever he needed one. No time now to have any compunctions about its owner.
Bill looked across at the yacht, with its portholes showing dim glints of light, and in a trice he was on his knees. He slipped the knot of the rope and hurried down the wet steps.
The white yacht was farther out than he had thought, and when he reached it, he was astonished at its size and magnificence. A shaft of light burst from the door where he had seen the gangster enter. Johnson appeared on deck, and Bill was actually so near that he could see the pleased expression on his smiling face. The dinghy drifted under the yacht’s bows, and he was shut out from view, but he could hear Slim’s feet passing along the deck and clattering down the companionway. Then there was the sharp slam of a door.
Softly Bill sculled along at the side of the yacht. Over the portholes curtains were drawn, so he could see nothing of what was going on inside. The moon was hidden behind clouds, and it was now so dark that he nearly ran into a tiny wooden landing stage. As he paused with the dinghy close under the narrow steps, he could hear the clink of dishes, as if a late meal was being prepared; and a skylight nearby threw the sound of excited conversation out on to the deck.
Each moment Bill kept reminding himself that he ought to be getting back. What if the owner of the dinghy were to appear and send angry halloos across the water? Still, having got so far, to retire without finding out what Johnson was up to seemed stupid. He made up his mind he would take a quick survey of the deck before moving off. He slung the rope around the bottom rung of the ladder, and cautiously felt his way upward.
The deck was empty so far as he could make out. If a hand was supposed to be on watch, Bill could not hear or see any signs of him. The large skylight came into view on deck, and the shimmer of its thick glass indicated that the saloon below was lighted up.
Bill crouched at the rail, listening. The snatches of animated talk he had heard from the water must have come from this saloon, for he could see that one of the skylight windows was raised a couple of inches. Now he could distinguish through the opening the clear tones of two voices in particular.
With the utmost caution, Bill crawled a couple of yards forward and looked down into the saloon. There was a white damask-covered table, with shaded lights, at which sat two men, busy with supper and conversation. He recognized the men at once.
Slim Johnson’s languid gestures emphasized his words, as he directed them, between sips of coffee, to no less a person than Zenas Sanders himself.
With a gasp, Bill realized that Sanders had come by plane, and that this yacht must be the leader’s present headquarters. To go back now was out of the question. He might be on the brink of a vital discovery. He glanced up and down the deck. Still it was deserted. Pulling himself close to the skylight, he lay listening, with every muscle taut.
Slim Johnson was speaking, and at first Bill could not pick up the trend of his remarks. But when Sanders replied, he realized their talk had been bearing on himself and the interview at Gring’s Hotel.
“You’re right, Slim,” said Sanders. “Young Bolton has practically broken with Evans. All he cares about now is getting the kid back. He said so over the phone.”
“Well, that darned Indian is sure to find your hideaway, Sanders. He’s got plenty of guts and so has that Parker fellow by all reports. Between them, they’ll get the boy before this yacht has a chance to reach Twin Heads Harbor.”
Sanders laughed and shook his head in a nervous negative. “Oh, no, they won’t,” he chuckled. “The boy isn’t up there. I brought him with me. At present he’s sound asleep in a cabin not twenty feet from where we’re sitting!”
“Well, that’s a good one!” Slim laughed. “What’s the orders now?”
“We sail in two hours. I want you to come along. Go back to the hotel now and use your gentle persuasion on Bill Bolton to find out where Evans is. We’ll hold them on board until the divers have brought the stuff up from the bottom of the harbor up there. Then we can either make all three of them pay heavy ransoms, or if they’re obdurate, tie them up and drop them overboard.”
“But supposing torture won’t make Bolton tell?” argued Slim. “What shall I do with him then? You aren’t giving me much time to persuade him, you know.”
“Oh, use your air gun if you like. It’s all the same to me!”
“And let Old Evans go?”
“That’s right. He’s tired of trying to watch us up there. And that old diver of his—Jim something-or-other, hasn’t located the stuff yet. Evans thinks that he has a better bet in watching you. So mind your step when you come back tonight. The longer Mr. Evans stops in Stamford the better pleased I’ll be.”
“Okay. It’s a swell break, and the luckiest thing about it is that he can’t bring in the bulls. He and his bank would pay a pretty fine if the government found out that he was taking that gold to Europe in his yacht when von Hiemskirk captured it. Nice of the noble baron to sink it in Twin Heads Harbor, and then go to Atlanta for thirty or forty years!”
“We may be able to blackmail Evans later, after he’s paid his ransom, and we’ve got away with the gold.—Listen!” Sanders dropped his voice and began to whisper across the table.
Bill pressed closer to the skylight, and at the same time a door clicked somewhere along the deck. In a second he was crouching on hands and knees, peering into the darkness. The figure of a man swung up the companionway and paused to light a cigarette. Bill could see his thin, swarthy face, lined and scarred, as the tiny flame leaped within his cupped palms. The match spun overboard in a luminous curve, and hissed into the water. Then the man began to walk slowly along the deck toward Bill.
Chapter XVII BILL’S WAY
The moment that the match struck the water found Bill wriggling across the deck like a sand-eel. The red tip of the cigarette in the man’s mouth glowed and waned as he drew in the smoke. A bright point in the darkness, it moved forward, and in its soft luster Bill could distinguish the shiny peak and white linen top of the man’s yachting cap, beneath which his face was a dim brown blur. Everything else was in black obscurity.
As quickly as a cat, Bill slipped down the ladder and, pressing his body against the side of the yacht, lay motionless. It was unlikely that the man would descend, for Bill had seen no boat tethered at the tiny square stage below. And now he prayed that this yacht’s officer would not select the spot directly above him to pause for contemplation of the night sky.
The man drew nearer, hesitated, as if halted by the sound of talk in the saloon below, then passed on. The slow tread of his rubber soles grew fainter, and Bill knew that he had strolled to the other side of the deck. Now was his chance. For an instant he glanced down at the dinghy. That would be the easier way, but—well, there was no telling what might happen if he went ashore.
He hastily unlaced his shoes, stuffed them in his coat pocket, and bending low, ran lightly along the deck toward the door whence the officer had emerged. Down the companionway he darted and at the bottom found himself in a narrow passage which bisected this part of the yacht fore and aft. Being familiar with this type of craft, he guessed that the passage ran forward from the saloon where Slim and Sanders were still conferring, to the galley and the crew’s quarters. On either side were the closed doors of the cabins. He listened for a second at the door nearest the stairs, turned the knob and pushed it open.
“That you, Petersen?” inquired a sleepy voice from within the dark cabin.
“The owner wants young Evans in the saloon,” growled Bill, trusting that his voice sounded not too unlike Petersen’s, who he guessed was finishing his smoke on deck. He was without weapon of any kind. If the man in the cabin became suspicious, he must run for it.
He heard a prodigious yawn. “Well, I ain’t that kid’s nurse,” he grumbled. “You ought to know, he’s in Number 3. The key’s in the door. Fetch him yourself. High tide’s at two bells and we shove off then. For the love of Mike, get out of here and let me catch forty winks!”
Bill hurriedly closed the door and looked around for Number 3. There was a night light burning in the passage and by its dim rays he soon found the cabin, just forward of the companionway. He unlocked it, slipped inside and shut the door after him.
“Say!” piped a shrill voice, and one that he recognized this time. “What’s the big idea? For the twenty-seventh time I’ll tell you I don’t know where my father is—and I care less. Beat it, and let a feller sleep!”
“Pipe down, Charlie, it’s Bill!”
“_Bill!_” almost shrieked the boy. “Gee whizz, but I’m glad you’ve come. It’s so dark in here—I thought—”
“Never mind what you thought. Hustle it up, kid—we’ve got to get out of here in a hurry.”
“Wait till I get my clothes on—”
Bill felt rather than saw the small figure beside him and caught Charlie’s arm. “No time for clothes. You’re wearing something—what is it?”
“One of old Sanders’ nightshirts,” Charlie ruefully returned. “It’s a million sizes too big—as usual, they chuck anything at a—”
“Who do you think you are—” whispered Bill, “the Prince of Wales?”
He pulled Charlie toward the door, opened it and looked out. Someone was coming down the companionway, whistling Yankee Doodle and flatting horribly. Bill jerked back, kept the cabin door on a crack and waited. Presently a door further down the passage slammed and Yankee Doodle was suddenly and mercifully cut short.
Bill wasted no time. Into the corridor, followed by Charlie, he sprang. Number 3 was hurriedly locked and the two ran up the companionway, their bare feet making no noise on the brass-bound rubber treads. Both lads leapt across the deck, slithered into the dinghy and pushed off.
The tide was on the flood and made a splashing noise against the hull sufficient to muffle the click of the oars as Bill dropped them into the row-locks. Gritting his teeth, he took three or four long strokes and then sat still. In the swing of the tide the dinghy drifted silently away from the vessel, and was lost among other crafts at anchor nearby.
They gave the yacht a wide berth, one lad at the oars, the other crouched in the stern of the rowboat. Bill used its lights, however, to get his bearings on the pier steps. He half expected some angry yachtsman to be waiting with threats to wring his neck for such bare-faced robbery. They were still a couple of hundred yards off the wharf when a sea-going tug swung round the riding lights of an anchored sloop. Bill heard the clang of the engine room bell, and almost directly the powerful craft slowed down, her propeller blades churning the water to foam. A voice hailed them from the deck forward.
“Dinghy ahoy! Scull over here and let’s see who ye are!”
“Who wants to know?” piped up Charlie.
“The Stamford Harbor Police Patrol wants ter know, sonny—that’s who. Give us no more of your lip. Come aboard and let’s see what ye got in that there rowboat!”
“Coming!” said Bill, and pulled toward the tug which was drifting slowly with the tide.
They were but a few yards off her side when a blinding light struck the dinghy.
“Why didn’t ye get that dum thing workin’ before, Pat?” growled another voice above their heads. “Them ain’t the guys we’re lookin’ for. There ain’t no booze aboard that dinghy—nothin’ but a couple o’ lads. An’ one of em’s stole his grandmother’s night shirt.”
“Grandmother, your eye!” sang out Charlie, who knew he looked ridiculous, and was in no mood to appreciate the tug crew’s laughter.
“Shut up, kid,” ordered Bill, and then in a louder voice: “We are looking for the police. There’s worse than booze-running going on out here tonight. Any objection to our coming aboard?”
“Come aboard, bub—tell us yer troubles.”
They were helped overside by a man in trousers and a cotton undershirt. Upon closer inspection he proved to be a short and stubby individual with very black eyes and hair and a round face badly in need of a shave.
“An’ now what’s the matter?” he asked.
“Are you in command of this craft?”
“I am, young man. Sergeant Duffy’s the name. Now let’s have yer monikers—an’ all about it.”
“My name is Bolton, I live in New Canaan,” began Bill.
“What? Not the midshipman whose name was in all the papers fer capturin’ that pirate liner!”
“I guess,” said Bill, “I have to plead guilty to the charge.”
Sergeant Duffy shook him warmly by the hand. “I recognize ye now from the pictures,” he beamed. “I’m glad to meet ye, sor. It’s an honor, it is.... An’ the young man wid ye—he’ll be Charlie Evans, if I’m not mistaken? Where in the seven seas did ye locate the lad? His father had his kidnappin’ broadcasted t’night, but it said them fellies had got him away down east—Clayton, Maine, was the place.”
“Well, I found him locked up aboard that yacht, the one that’s showing lights over there.”
“The _Katrina_?”
“I didn’t know her name—”
“The _Katrina’s_ right,” cut in Charlie.
“A feller by the name of Sanders is owner,” offered the Sergeant. “He lives on Shippan Point.”
“That,” said Bill, “is the guy. Anyway, he’s in cahoots with Slim Johnson, the gangster whom I saw murder a man called Hank tonight. They’re both on board the _Katrina_ now, and I have every reason to believe that Sanders was the brains of von Hiemskirk’s pirate gang. That yacht, by the way, is shoving off for Maine at the turn of the tide.”
“Oh, no, she ain’t—” declared the policeman. “By gorry, we’ll attend to the _Katrina_ in a jiffy. I’m sendin’ ye ashore wid Kelly. He’s got to call up headquarters, and you can ’phone Mr. Evans at the same time.”
“Can’t we go with you and see the fun?” begged Charlie.
“No, ye can’t, young man. Ye’re my responsibility now, and the two of ye have had enough excitement fer tonight, I’ll be thinkin’.”
“We’re very much obliged to you, Sergeant,” said Bill, shaking hands again.
Sergeant Duffy shook his bullet head. “It’s me who’s thankin’ you, sor. This is big business in our line. It’s the chanct I’ve been waitin’ more than five years for. It will mean my lieutenancy, Mister Bolton. And just remember, sor, if any o’ thim dumb motorcycle cops hold ye up fer speedin’ any time, tell ’em you’re a friend o’ Duffy’s! If they don’t let ye go, I’ll break ’em.”
Bill grinned and nodded and they hurried overside into the dinghy where a husky policeman was already at the oars.
“Beat it, Kelly,” Duffy flung after them, “and ’phone the chief to break out a bunch of his flat-feet and get ’em down to the wharf on the run. Now you men,” they heard him say as they drew away from the patrol boat, “rip them covers off the guns and git under way. The _Katrina_ over yonder’s got a bunch o’ murderin’ kidnappers on her, and we’re the lads what will run ’em in the cells, sure as Saint Patrick run the snakes out o’ the old country!”
The wharf was deserted. After knotting the dinghy’s painter to an iron ringbolt, the lads followed Kelly across the rough planking to the small shack Bill had hidden behind while watching Slim Johnson.
Kelly produced a key and went inside. From the doorway they heard him call Police Headquarters and pour forth the sergeant’s message into the ’phone.
“Well, Bill,” said Charlie, “you certainly handed Sanders and his bunch a red hot wallop. What will they do to them, do you think?”
“Murder is a hanging matter in this state, Charlie, and kidnapping means a long term in state’s prison. When Sanders and Company get through with that, there will still be a federal charge of piracy against them on the Flying Fish job that we cleaned up a few weeks ago.” He broke off as Kelly came out and told him he could use the ’phone. Two minutes later, he had Mr. Evans on the wire.
“Bill Bolton speaking, sir,” he said. “I’ve found Charlie. He’s safe and sound and with me now.”
“Thank God!” Bill heard him exclaim, and went on talking.
“I’m sorry I was so rude earlier this evening,” he apologized. “I misjudged you, sir.”
“I understand how you felt, Bill. But I’d already broadcasted the boy’s abduction when you called, and—but never mind about that now. Where are you, and what’s happened?”
Bill gave him a hurried resume of the evening’s adventures.
“Sanders,” said Charlie’s father, “got one thing wrong. I wasn’t transporting that gold to Europe in the _Merrymaid_. It was bound for two banks in New Orleans—ten million dollars of it. The reason I didn’t call in the police was not because I feared Federal censure, but because I was afraid if Sanders was frightened, he would drop depth bombs on the place and scatter the gold so that no one could find it. I knew it had been sunk by von Hiemskirk and his pirates somewhere off Twin Heads, but had no idea it was in the harbor. Now we’ll get it easily enough. And that reminds me, Deborah telephoned half an hour ago. Osceola found Sanders’ headquarters this afternoon. He had an armed camp in the woods across the harbor from Turner’s. The chief got the State’s police on the job and tonight they captured the place and every man-jack of them except Sanders, who you say is aboard his yacht down here—”
“Wait a minute,” interrupted Bill. He listened while Kelly called to him from the open doorway. “The policeman with us,” he continued, “says the _Katrina_ has been taken. He can see the prisoners being moved aboard the patrol boat. He also tells me he will run us up town in his flivver. Goodbye for the present. I’ll have Charlie with you just as soon as we can get there.”
Five minutes later, while they were being driven toward the heart of Stamford in the police car, Charlie turned to his friend.
“Gee whizz, Bill, I clean forgot to thank you for getting me away from that gang!”
Bill laughed. “Don’t mention it, kid. You’d do the same for me any day, I know.”
Charlie smiled complacently. “I sure would, Bill,” he declared, “but take it from me, if you’re going to get kidnapped, bring a pair of pajamas along—these nightshirts make a monkey out of a man!”
Those who have enjoyed this book and Bill’s previous adventures, _Bill Bolton—Flying Midshipman_, and _Bill Bolton and The Flying Fish_, will be sure to find even more to interest them in the next book of this series,—_Bill Bolton and The Winged Cartwheels_.
THE END
Books for Boys
THE GO AHEAD BOYS SERIES _By_ Ross Kay
“Be sure you’re right, THEN GO AHEAD,” was the advice old Davy Crockett left for succeeding generations and here is presented a series of rattling good adventure stories which every live “Go ahead” boy will read with unflagging interest. There is action, dash and snap in every tale.
On Smuggler’s Island The Treasure Cave Mysterious Old House In the Island Camp The Racing Motor Simon’s Mine
THE MUSKET BOYS SERIES _By_ George A. Warren
Here is a fine series for every boy who loves his country. These stories make you feel as if you were living through the strenuous Revolutionary days from the beginning of the struggle at Lexington and Concord to the victorious conclusion of that historical conflict.
The Musket Boys at Old Boston The Musket Boys Under Washington The Musket Boys on the Delaware
THE LEND-A-HAND BOYS SERIES _By_ St. George Rathborne COMPANION BOOKS FOR BOY SCOUTS
“The Lend-A-Hand Boys”—a group of boys who stick together through thick and thin, through high adventure and scrapes. They are always trying to do some good and have a tough time doing so.
Each book is a complete story in itself.
The Goldsmith Publishing Co. CHICAGO, ILL.
*      *      *      *      *      *
Transcriber’s note:
--Silently corrected obvious typographical errors; non-standard (or amusing) spellings and dialect lefgt unchanged.

= = = PG63394 = = =
BILL BOLTON AND THE FLYING FISH
Produced by Al Haines, Stephen Hutcheson & the online Distributed Proofreaders Canada team at https://www.pgdpcanada.net
BILL BOLTON _and the_ _Flying Fish_
BY Lieutenant Noel Sainsbury, Jr.
_Author of_ Bill Bolton, Flying Midshipman Bill Bolton and the Flying Fish Bill Bolton and Hidden Danger
★
THE GOLDSMITH PUBLISHING CO. CHICAGO
Copyright, 1933 The Goldsmith Publishing Company MADE IN U. S. A.
_To_ Philip Malseed
_grandson of a Marine Engineer, and who may become one himself some day_.
CONTENTS
Bill Bolton and The Flying Fish
Chapter I THE DERELICT
“There’s something wrong over yonder, Osceola.”
“Where, Bill? What are you talking about?”
The young Seminole chief spoke from the rear cockpit of Bill Bolton’s two-seater amphibian, into the transmitter of his headphone set. Bright August sunshine painted a calm Atlantic brilliant blue two thousand feet below the speeding airplane. Cirrus clouds like fleecy wisps of carded wool flecked a light blue sky which melted into the sea on the unbroken circle of their wide horizon. Since passing Cape Hatteras Light Ship flying north a quarter of an hour before, neither lad had seen a single thing to relieve the monotony of an empty ocean.
“I thought my eyesight was better than average,” Osceola continued, scanning the horizon, “but I don’t see a blessed thing.”
“It’s more habit than good vision—spotting something at sea,” returned Bill from his place at the controls. He clapped a pair of field glasses to his eyes. “There’s a single stacker off our starboard quarter. She’s almost hull down to the horizon. I’ve been watching her off and on for the past five minutes, and I’ll swear she hasn’t moved an inch. What’s more—the glasses don’t show the slightest sign of smoke.”
“I can make her out now. Think she’s worth while investigating?”
“Yes, I do. There’s something queer about that ship.”
“Why not investigate then?”
“That’s my idea. The people on board may be in a bad way. It’s our duty to be of help if we can.”
“I’m with you, but—how about the time, Bill? You father expects us in New York this afternoon.”
Young Bolton banked to starboard, then neutralized his ailerons when the plane’s nose was headed toward the dot on the horizon.
“The airline distance between Miami and New York City is one thousand and ninety-five miles,” said Bill, applying a normal amount of right rudder to offset the torque. “We’re a good deal better than half way now, and we’ve made swell time with this light wind on our tail all the way. Don’t worry, you’ll see the Statue of Liberty before they turn the floodlights on her tonight.”
“Okay. Your father is such a grand guy—he’s been so wonderful to me and my people ever since we cleaned up that Martinengo gang—I’d hate to disappoint him. And especially so now when he is giving me this trip north.”
“I savvy,” Bill replied. “I’m pretty fond of Dad myself—but he’d be the last person in the world to suggest we pass up anything like this, you know.”
He brought the glasses to his eyes again and stared through them for a full minute without speaking.
“The nearer we get, the queerer she looks,” he muttered finally.
“Some kind of a yacht, isn’t it?”
“It is. And a whopping big one. But that’s not the point, Osceola. She’s not moving, yet she hasn’t broken out her breakdown flag at the fore. She isn’t even flying her colors.”
“I can’t see anyone on board.”
“Neither can I—and still, if she was abandoned after sunset yesterday when her colors had been hauled down, why doesn’t she show her three red lights in vertical line—that’s the sign of a ship not under control?”
“Some mystery!”
“I should say you’re right, Osceola. And what’s more, I don’t like it—not one little bit.”
Bill banked until the amphibian was headed into the teeth of the light breeze. With the wings level once more, he closed the throttle and pushing his stick forward, sent the plane into a normal glide. At an altitude of about twenty-five feet, he began to break the glide with a slow backward movement of the stick. With expert precision he gradually decreased their gliding angle until they were in level flight with the bottom of the hull perhaps a foot above the water. Although the plane was steadily losing speed he did not yet permit his craft to make contact; but continued to pull back the stick gradually raising the nose and depressing the tail.
Like every other trained aviator he knew that as a plane approaches the stalling point, its nose-heaviness increases sharply and the stick must be pulled farther back to compensate for this. When his point of stall was reached, Bill pulled the stick fully back, completing the stall. The step of the hull made contact. There was no rebound. For an instant, the plane skimmed the surface, then floated forward. A few yards to windward lay the yacht, broadside to the gentle ground swell.
Bill ripped off his headgear.
“Slap your feet on the pedals, Osceola,” he called. “Keep her headed for that gangway amidships. She’ll fetch it all right!”
Without waiting for a reply, he caught up a looped mooring line and climbed out of the cockpit. An instant later he stood on the heaving grating, with the taut line wound about his arm.
“Come aboard!” he shouted. “Make it snappy, will you? This ship’s rolling like a drunken sailor!”
The agile Seminole landed beside him and the two lads ran swiftly up to the deck.
“Looks deserted, all right,” Bill eyed Osceola, while he played off the line to the plane, then made it fast. “Packed your gat, I hope?”
The young Chief grinned, and nodded emphatically. “You bet.” He produced an automatic from its holster below his left armpit. “I do everything except sleep with this since the Shell Island mixup.”
Bill nodded. “Me too, old man. From the lay of the land, we’re alone on this craft. Still, you never can tell. There’s something uncanny about a sea mystery——”
“She’s a swell ship.” Osceola motioned toward the polished brass and mahogany. “Some rich man’s plaything, I guess. Must have cost a pretty penny.”
“And she must have carried a large crew. I wonder where everybody disappeared to! I don’t know how you feel, but this ship gives me the creeps.”
“I’m glad I’ve got my gun.” Osceola released the safety catch.
“Well, we can’t stand here all day,” declared Bill. “Let’s take in the engine room first. There can’t be a leak. She’s too high in the water.”
“How do we get down there?”
“The thwartships passage forward of the main companionway is probably what we’re looking for. Let’s go see.”
Bill entered the passage with Osceola at his heels.
“Captain’s and chief engineer’s quarters,” said Bill, glancing through the open doorways on either hand.
“And everything is in apple-pie order,” added Osceola.
Bill stepped inside the captain’s cabin and began to rummage, pulling out drawers at the small desk and bureau. “Strange,” he murmured, “—not a sign of it.”
“What are you looking for?” Osceola sat down on the captain’s bunk.
“Not being a sea-faring man yourself, you probably don’t quite realize _how_ darned mysterious this business is.” Bill slammed a drawer shut in disgust and turned toward his friend. “This ship has no name!” he exploded. “Oh, she had one, all right. I spotted the marks on the hull, under a fresh coat of paint where the metal lettering had been—even before we came overside. And her boats, lifebuoys and belts are gone. I thought I would find the logbook or some of her ship’s papers in the skipper’s cabin—but I’ve drawn a blank. There isn’t the merest scrap of paper.”
“And yet,” remarked Osceola thoughtfully, “the lads who had these cabins left in a hurry. I may be what you Naval Academy midshipmen call a landlubber—but I can see that they left their clothes behind.”
Bill’s eyes crinkled. “Right you are. Let’s go below now. I don’t think Sherlock Holmes could dig any more dope out of these cabins.”
A steep stair further along the passage led down to a roomy forecastle, which, like the cabins above, they found empty. Next to the bunkroom were a crew’s mess, lazarette and galley—likewise deserted.
“Look here, Bill!” cried the Indian, lifting a lid from the cook range.
Bill bent over and was astonished to see the red bed of glowing coals. “Well, I’ll be doggoned! That fire has hardly burned down at all.”
“Somebody has put coal in that range less than three hours ago. I don’t know anything about ships, but fires are another matter.”
“This yacht seems to be the original question mark,” said Bill gloomily. “But in spite of it, we do know three things.”
“That the people on board left in a hurry, and left not more than a couple of hours ago.—What’s the third?”
“Why, that they were so keen on hiding the name of this craft that they either destroyed or took with them everything that could identify her.”
“Yes, that’s so. It sure is confusing. Everything was all right on board at breakfast time, too.”
“How do you fathom that one?”
Osceola took up a large bowl from a table-rack. “Taste that.” He pointed to a cream-colored, doughy mass in the bottom.
Bill dipped in a forefinger and brought it to his mouth. “Wheat cakes!” he exclaimed. “You’ve got it. The cook doesn’t feed the men wheat cakes knowing the ship is going to be abandoned shortly. They’re too much trouble to make in a rush.”
“Exactly!” Osceola looked pleased.
“I always knew you Carlisle lads were a wide-awake bunch,” grinned Bill. “Anything more, Mister Holmes?”
“Yes, there is, big boy—even if they do turn out real live kidders at Annapolis! I don’t know what time the ship was abandoned, but the cook left this kitchen—”
“Galley—” corrected his friend, with a wink.
“The cook left this _galley_—” Osceola continued, “shortly after breakfast.”
“And how—”
“Well, you see, he’d washed the griddle—it’s hanging up over there—”
“But he hadn’t got to this bowl yet, or those other dirty dishes on the table—” Bill broke in.
“For the first time in history,” said Osceola suavely, “Midshipman William Bolton, U.S.N., Second Class, and all the rest of it, shows a decided glimmer of almost human intelligence! ‘Sing ho, the jolly maiden and the tar’—or words to that effect . . .”
Bill saluted. “And seeing there’s no maiden, the tar suggests we beat it out of here before the famous Seminole Chief goes completely nerts! That door across the passage is marked ‘Engine Room—Keep Out.’”
“And so, naturally, we’ll go in,” laughed Osceola, and leaving the galley, he swung open the door.
The two stepped onto a metal grating. A steel ladder led down to the floor of the engine room ten feet below.
“You wait here while I have a looksee,” suggested Bill, and he ran lightly down the ladder.
From his stand on the grating, Osceola watched him make a hurried inspection of the main engines. “Diesels,” he called up, “they are certainly big ones—but there’s not a blooming thing wrong so far as I can see.”
He stayed below for about ten minutes, then joined Osceola above. “The machinery’s all in running order,” he began.
The young Indian suddenly raised a hand to his lips, cutting Bill short. He tiptoed across the grating and into the passage, and presently beckoned Bill forward, cautioning silence.
“There’s somebody on deck!” he whispered. “He walked across that passage one flight up just now, and went on deck over on the side by the captain’s cabin.”
“You certainly have a pair of ears,” murmured Bill. “I never caught a sound. Are you sure it wasn’t a cat or a dog that got left behind?”
“Dog nothing! My ancestry and early upbringing have been more or less of a hindrance in this white man’s country—but when it comes to distinguishing sounds, Bill, I’m one hundred per cent. Those were the footsteps of a human being. He knows we are down here, whoever he is—and he doesn’t want us to know he’s aboard, or he’d have come into the open long before this.”
“Well, let’s get after him then, and find out why he’s hiding.”
“Right. But let me go first. I’ve had more experience in tracking than you. Better take off your shoes. This is a ticklish business and it’s more than likely he’s armed.”
Osceola waited until Bill was in his stocking feet with his shoes tied together and hanging about his neck. Then he passed up the stair to the passage that led to the deck like a stealthy shadow, with the young aviator at his heels.
After pausing to make sure the way was clear, the two went out on deck. Osceola seemed at a loss for an instant, then started aft, motioning Bill to follow. He walked with his body bent forward so as to keep below the level of the deckhouse portholes, and darted into the main companionway. Then without the slightest hesitation he entered a large cabin on his right, evidently the main salon. For a moment, he gazed about, then he sprang back into the passage, pushing Bill ahead of him.
While his friend watched, Osceola did a peculiar thing. He dropped to the floor and wormed his way along the passage wall until he could peer round the open door. His hand, with the automatic revolver in it, came forward, and trained the gun on someone within the room.
“You’re covered,” he said in his deep voice, “come out from under that couch—and come pronto! _Or I’ll fire!_”
Chapter II SURPRISED
Bill didn’t care to be thrust out of danger’s way by Osceola. He stepped into the open doorway, his revolver leveled. At the far end of the yacht’s salon, taking up the entire space across the rear wall, stood the couch. It was so low from the floor that he wondered not only how a human being could squeeze beneath it, but how Osceola could possibly have known that anyone was hidden there.
“Come on! Get out of that!” growled the Seminole. “And come out feet first, or you’ll stop a bullet before you leave the floor.”
“Please don’t shoot!” cried a high-pitched, muffled voice. “I’m—I’m coming!”
A pair of rubber soled sneakers appeared from beneath the couch, soon followed by two stockinged legs. Then while the two friends stared in amazement a boy of possibly twelve years wriggled forth and got to his feet. He was a round-faced, red-headed youngster in khaki shorts and outing shirt, and across his nose and one side of his face he bore a great smudge of black coal-dust. He looked hot and badly rumpled, but did not appear to be frightened in the least; on the contrary, he was bursting with rage, and began to hold forth immediately.
“Look here, you!” he piped in his ridiculous treble, both hands thrust into trouser pockets and balancing on the balls of his feet against the roll of the ship. “What are you fellas doin’ here? Whose yacht do you think this is, anyway?”
Bill and Osceola broke into roars of laughter and holstered their automatics.
“That’s exactly what we want to know, young bantam-cock!” gasped Bill, when he could speak.
“Tell us all about it, bub,” seconded the chief. “We aren’t going to hurt you.”
For a full minute the boy stared at the two young men.
“Say!” he exploded. “You fellas don’t look like pirates!”
“Pirates?”
“Hijackers, then, or whatever you call ’em.”
“What _do_ we look like?” asked Osceola, smiling.
The boy looked puzzled. “You came in a plane—I saw you land—but you talk like college men.”
“Remarkable perception—” The chief winked at Bill.
“Oh, quit your kiddin’—who are you guys, anyway?”
Bill shook his head. “Who are _you_, and what are you doing here?”
“I asked you first,” stubbornly insisted the youngster.
“All right, then,” laughed Bill. “My name is Bolton, and I’m ‘commonly known as Bill.’”
“A college man?”
“Midshipman at the Naval Academy.”
“You aren’t in uniform,” said the boy doubtfully. “How do you happen to be here?”
“Oh, I change my clothes occasionally. And this is my second class summer—I’m on leave. Anything else you’d like to know?”
“Sure—heaps!”
“Well,” Bill drew a deep breath, “I was born an orphan at the age of five, and until I was ninety-seven I could only go upstairs backward with my hair parted on the side—”
“Raspberries!” flashed back redhead. “Come on, who’s the other fella? I’ll bet six bits his middle name is Mussolini!”
“The other fella, as you so elegantly put it, is Chief Osceola, Grand Sachem of the Seminole Nation and a senior at Carlisle. And incidentally, neither Chief Osceola nor myself permit grubby little schoolboys to get fresh when we’re around.” Bill shot out a long arm and gathered in the urchin. “Will you scalp him, Osceola?” he inquired solemnly. “Or shall I lay him across my knee and give him what he’s asking for? Stop wriggling, you young ruffian, or you’ll get a double dose!”
“Please, Mister Bolton—I didn’t mean to be fresh—really, I didn’t!” The youngster was all contrition now.
“Then snap out of it, and answer _our_ questions!”
“I will, sir, I will—” he broke off and stared up at Bill, awe and amazement written on his round face. “Say!” he fairly shouted. “You must be the two guys I read about in the newspaper. The ones that busted up that gang of gunmen down in Florida a couple of weeks ago!”
“What of it?” Bill released him. “That doesn’t give you license to show off your bad manners, does it?”
“Gee whiz! And to think I was trying to get fresh with a couple of real men like you! I’m darned sorry—and I apologize, Mr. Bolton, and to you, too, Chief Osceola.”
“That’s all right, kid. No harm done,” laughed Osceola. “Quit stalling and tell us something about yourself.”
“Well, I’m Charlie Evans,” returned the boy, still awestruck at his discovery of their identity. “My father is C. B. Evans. We live in Boston, and this is our yacht, the _Merrymaid_.”
Bill walked over to the divan and sat down, while Osceola leaned against the arm of a chair. “Come over here, Charlie,” he invited, “and tell me how it happens that we find you alone on this yacht. Chief Osceola and I are on our way from Miami to New York. We sighted the _Merrymaid_ adrift and evidently abandoned out here, so we naturally landed to investigate.”
“Gee, that was fine of you!” Charlie curled up on the couch beside him. “But you see, I can’t very well tell you what happened, because I don’t know!”
“You don’t know?” Osceola’s voice sounded rather gruff.
“Look here, Charlie,” cut in Bill. “This is a serious matter. We’ve got to be on our way soon. You are wasting our time and your own.”
Charlie flushed. “I ain’t kidding you, Mr. Bolton, really I’m not.”
“But there must have been a crew and passengers aboard this ship. Do you mean to say that they disappeared into thin air and you don’t know why or how?”
“Yes, sir, I do. You see, I went below to the trunk room after breakfast. When I came on deck again, there wasn’t a soul in sight. I searched the yacht, but you fellas are the first people I’ve seen since I came up on deck.”
“I reckon you’d better start at the beginning,” said Osceola. “I’ll ask questions and you answer them. And maybe we’ll be able to get somewhere. Suppose you tell us where this yacht was going and who were aboard her at breakfast time?”
“That’s easy,” returned young Evans. “We were out of Boston, bound for Savannah. Dad had business there, so he took Mother and me and Uncle Arthur along. Uncle Arthur is Mother’s brother, you know. The four of us had breakfast together at eight o’clock, and—”
“Woa, not so fast. I suppose somebody skippered this boat?”
“That’s right. Captain Ridley is skipper. I forgot to say that he had breakfast with us, too. And we carry a pretty big crew. I can’t tell you how many without counting them, but I know all their names.”
Osceola smiled at the boy’s earnestness. “Never mind the crew, now. What happened after breakfast? I take it everything was running as usual up to that time?”
“Yes, that’s right, chief. Well, you see, after breakfast, I wanted to practice that slow drop Harold Lane told me about. You see, I pitch on our team. So I asked Uncle Arthur if he would catch for me. He said he would, so we went out on deck—but say—Uncle Arthur can’t catch for nuts! He muffed the very first ball, and it went overboard—”
“You shouldn’t pitch balls,” interrupted Bill. “Strikes are what make a pitcher.”
“Who’s kidding now?” said Charlie delightedly.
“Say,” Osceola broke in, “I’m cross examining this witness. Don’t listen to him Charlie. What did you do after the ball was lost?”
“I went into my cabin, but I couldn’t find another one there. Then I remembered that I had one in my trunk—so I went below to get it. Well, when I got the trunk open, I got interested in some things I found that I didn’t know I’d brought with me—and I guess I stayed down there for some time.”
“About how long, do you think?”
“Oh, something over an hour, maybe. I came across a book I like, and got to reading it.”
“Did you know the ship had stopped moving?”
“Of course, but that was nothing. I mean, father often has her stopped on a hot day, and goes overboard for a swim. I do, too, and so does Uncle Arthur.”
“I see—and when you came upstairs again—”
“One says topside or above on shipboard,” suggested Bill, winking at Charlie.
“O-and likewise-K,” replied Osceola. “Not that it has a thing to do with the matter in hand. Now, Charlie, when you came—on deck, you found that everybody had vanished—that you were alone on board?”
“Yes, sir. And believe me but I was some scared! I went all over the ship, but even the cat had gone. And, well—I guess you men won’t tell on a fella—I came in here, and I guess I cried some—” He ended shame-facedly.
“Of course you did! I would probably have done the same thing in your place!” Bill encouraged him.
Charlie looked relieved. “Gee whiz, but it was lonesome!” he exploded. “I hung round a bit, didn’t know just what to do. Then I thought of sending out a call for help. I know the International Morse Code. But when I got to the radio room—someone had put the darn thing on the fritz. Wouldn’t that jar yuh!”
“Pretty tough!” agreed Bill. “What next?”
“Well, I kind of nosed around. Thought Dad or Mother might have left a note or something for me. I couldn’t find anything, though. Gosh, it was so quiet! Then I made myself a couple of sandwiches and ate half a plum cake I found in the pantry, and felt better.
“After that, I hunted some more, but it wasn’t any use. I heard your plane about that time. I didn’t know who you were, of course, so I decided I’d better lay low until I could size up what kind of guys you were. Oh, Mr. Bolton—can’t you find Mother and Dad for me?” Charlie’s voice broke suddenly and he sounded very much like a lost small boy.
Just then Osceola raised a warning hand. “Listen!”
There came a rush of feet on deck. Before the three in the salon could reach for revolvers, men with leveled rifles appeared at every porthole.
“Stick ’em up and keep ’em there!” cracked a voice from the open doorway, and a man in the smart white uniform of a ship’s officer strode into the room.
Chapter III MAN OVERBOARD
The man who entered so abruptly was a tall, heavy-set individual in the early thirties. Blond as only the Scandinavians or North Germans are blond, his very next words betrayed Teutonic origin.
“So!” he sneered as the three kept their hands level with their ears. “A boy and two half-grown men. Master Evans, and a pair of aviators, eh? The one, we miss the first time. The others descend on us like manna out of heaven,—I don’t think! Three more mouths to feed and no money in it for anyone. _Donnerwetter, noch ein Mahl!_”
“Nichts kom heraus, mahogany bedstead,” piped Charlie. The added danger seemed to revive his waning spirits with a vengeance. “The same to you and many of ’em, Dutchy. I know some more, too,” he went on proudly. “Schweitzerkäse, frankfurters and getthe-Houtofhere! That last is the longest word in the Heinie dictionary!”
“What’s the shortest?” inquired Bill, who was enjoying this byplay.
“Oh, I don’t know—but the one they say the quickest is ‘camerad.’”
“_Halts ’maul!_ Shut up, I mean!” thundered the blond stranger. The whites around the pupils of his light blue eyes became bloodshot with anger. “I am master here,” he roared. “_Silence!_ I will have it!”
Two sailors appeared in the doorway behind him. He wheeled about. “Adolph, you will keep the prisoners covered. Hans, take their weapons from them. And now,” he continued, when the three lowered their hands after they had been searched, “you will tell me what names you go by.”
Charlie sprang to his feet and made a stiff, military bow. “The dark gentleman over yonder,” he said solemnly, “is traveling incognito. So that you will not be confused by false appearances, I will breathe his secret. He is no less a personage than His Majesty, George the Fifth! Beside me on this couch is Mary, the Four-Fifths, and I am Herbert Hoover!—Oh, Doctor, why so angry? You may call me Herbie if you’re good!” He finished in falsetto, with rolling eyes toward Bill and Osceola.
“_Ruhig!_ Silence!” shouted the exasperated officer, while Bill and Osceola were convulsed with laughter at his fury. “Hans—take this devil-child on deck and keep him there until I come. If he offers more insolence, give him a taste of your belt!”
“Gosh, you can’t please the Doctor,” protested Charlie with an air of injured innocence as he was led forth. “He asked for the go-by, so I gave it to him.”
The stranger waved him away. “Now, you two will tell me who you are,” he commanded. “From American children one expects insolence—with you, it is different. Your names at once, if you please.”
“My name is Bolton.” Bill saw no reason for hiding his identity.
“And I,” said his friend, “am Osceola, Chief of the Seminoles.”
“So,” mused their captor. “The two young fellows that were mixed up in the Shell Island business. _So!_” He pronounced the last word as though it were spelled with a Z. Then for a minute or so he appeared lost in thought. Neither Bill nor Osceola uttered a word.
“So——It shall be done.” Apparently the blond man had arrived at an important decision. “I am the Baron von Hiemskirk. And remember, both of you—my word is the law. I am in command. You will earn your keep. _Ja_, you will be put to work and it will be well to remember that my discipline is that of the Imperial Navy. You will obey all orders—on the jump!”
“And the alternative?” Bill rose to his feet.
The baron stuck a single eyeglass in his eye and stared at Bill with an evil smile on his lips.
“We are now about sixty miles off the coast of North America,” he said coldly. “It is a long swim, my young friend. Come now—we will go on deck.”
He strode out of the room, and Bill and Osceola followed him, with a look of mutual understanding. The sailor brought up the rear.
Charlie called to them from the rail. “Say, look what I’ve found! That’s what took Mother and Dad and everybody off of here while I was in the trunk room. Hans says they’re going to take us too. I don’t care what happens now, I’ll be with Dad and Mother—but it’s pretty tough on you fellows! Say, you wouldn’t think these Heinies had brains enough to run one of those things, would you?”
He waved excitedly overside, and the two friends saw the long gray hull and conning tower of a submarine moored beside the yacht.
The baron, who had stopped to speak to a young officer, walked over to the boy and caught him roughly by the shoulder.
“Devil-child!” he roared in his deep bass. “I spoke to you regarding insolence for the last time a short while ago!” He turned to the officer. “Herr Lieutenant!” he commanded. “Take this boy forward and see that he is well punished.”
“The whip, Herr Baron?”
“Ten lashes—yes—and at once.”
“_Zum befehl_, Herr Baron!” He grabbed Charlie’s arm and yanked the struggling youngster along the deck.
Like a flash Bill darted after them. He caught up with the pair at the gangway, and gripping the young officer by the collar, he jerked him backward on to the deck. Then, as Charlie made a dash for Osceola, he bent down and deliberately slapped the lieutenant’s face with the palm of his open hand.
“Before you try to maltreat that boy, perhaps it would be as well to settle with me,” he said calmly, while along the deck came the click of the sailors’ rifles. “That is,” he added, “if you’ve got the guts to do it.”
“_Schweinhund!_” cried the enraged officer, as he sprang to his feet. Without an instant’s hesitation, he swung for Bill’s head.
The useful art of self-defense is well taught at the Naval Academy, and Bill had ever been a proficient pupil. He jerked back his head, dodging the man’s fist by a hair’s breadth. Then as the other overbalanced, he stepped in with a short-arm jab to his opponent’s kidneys. This he followed up immediately with a powerful left hook to the point of the jaw, and the Herr Lieutenant went crashing overside, through the ropes of the gangway. There came the dull thud of his head as it struck the metal side of the submarine, and he disappeared down the narrow strip of water between the vessels. Immediately Bill dived after him.
His lithe body cut the surface with hardly a splash, and he shot into the cool green depths from his twenty foot dive with eyes wide open. To right and to left dark blurs of the vessels’ hulls shadowed the translucent green. No other objects met his searching gaze, so using a powerful breast stroke, he forged further downward. All at once he saw something grayish white below. His lungs were bursting with lack of air and the heavy water pressure at this depth. It grew icy cold, but he continued to strain onward, backing his muscles with an indomitable force of will.
The white spot beneath him was taking shape now—surely the linen uniform of the unlucky lieutenant. Yes, there he was, sinking face down, arms and legs spread-eagled and useless, the wind knocked out of him by the double blow of Bill’s fists and the crash against the submarine side.
Bill caught the sprawling, inert figure, with a cupped hand beneath the chin. Instantly his legs and free arm got into action again, but heading this time in the opposite direction. Up shot the drowning man and his rescuer. Bill’s head was whirling, his faculties were leaving him. The man would sink again if he lost his hold. Slipping the crook of his elbow beneath the unconscious lieutenant’s chin, he held his head close to his side. Would they never reach the surface—and air? What if his own unprotected skull should strike the bulging curve of a vessel’s hull? Sharp pain stabbed him between the eyes—he knew no more.
Far away—fathoms above him—Bill heard a voice calling his name. He seemed to be floating upward in a sea-green haze, but there was air at last—heaven-sent air.
“He’s coming round now,” said the voice, which sounded like Osceola’s, and much nearer than before. “No wonder he went out—under water nearly two minutes and a half! How’s the other fellow, Baron?”
“Poor Fritz!” Surely this was the blond commander speaking and his voice seemed much louder and closer at hand than that of the young chief. And as the words grew more distinct, their meaning impressed itself on Bill’s dawning consciousness. “Poor Fritz!” repeated the baron. “We’ve got the water out of him now and he will live—but it will be a touch and go for some time. The poor lad has a bad case of concussion. I can’t tell whether his skull is fractured, but I don’t think so.”
“He got an awful crack on the back of his head, but you can’t hold that up against Bill Bolton,” returned Osceola.
“Oh, no, my dear chap. I assure you I hold no grudge at all.”
Something has happened, thought Bill, to alter Osceola’s status with the Baron.
“I wish you to know, my dear Chief, that both Fritz and I are sportsmen. Blows were struck in fair fight. When Fritz hit the submarine, I could have killed young Bolton without hesitation. But when he dived after my cousin—I loved the lad. It was splendid—_colossal_!”
“I’m glad you feel that way,” Osceola remarked. “Things were getting a bit strained, I thought.”
“Yes, yes, I know that. But I have had a terrible day, my friend. That devil-child put my temper on edge. And a dozen wildcats are as nothing to the boy’s mother when she found we’d left him behind. God be thanked, that is over. I cannot let you and Bolton continue your journey at present, but at least you will live well, and have an interesting time. In saving the life of Fritz, you two have rendered me a service. Karl von Hiemskirk does not forget such favors.”
“Thanks for dragging me in,” laughed Osceola. “I didn’t do anything.”
“Hah! You dived in after them while my men looked on like half-wits!” bridled the Baron. “You brought these two unconscious fellows to the surface! I call that a very great deal.”
Bill heard him sigh, but although he was now fully awake, he kept his eyes closed and listened attentively to the Baron’s next words.
“The thing of great importance that is worrying me is that Fritz was first pilot of my command. I, myself, am an aviator, a combat flyer, who had the great honor to be a member of what you call the circus of the unsurpassed Graf von Richthofen, of glorious memory.”
Bill opened his eyes to find himself on the _Merrymaid’s_ deck. He sat up and began to speak rapidly. “Richthofen was undoubtedly the greatest air strategean who ever flew,” he declared, “they tell me that his combat formations and the battle manoeuvers of his famous circus have never been improved upon. Sorry I wasn’t old enough then to take a crack at you myself—you must be a humdinger, Baron, when it comes to this flying game! If you want to use my bus and friend Fritz is temporarily out of the picture—why not fly her yourself?”
Osceola put his arm about Bill’s shoulders, and the Baron bowed from the waist.
“Thank you, indeed, my dear young friend,” he said formally, “both for your eulogy of my long-time-dead friend von Richthofen, and because, after stunning my cousin, you had the courage and graciousness to save his life at risk of your own.”
“Oh, please don’t.” Bill colored a dusky red. “Or I shall have to pass out a second time.” With the chief’s help he rose and held out his hand. The Baron shook it heartily.
“We will let our has-beens be never-wases.”
“I couldn’t help overhearing what you said to Osceola when I was regaining consciousness,” went on Bill. “So as long as you can’t see your way clear to letting us go, I’ll do my best to be peaceable in the future.”
“Say nothing more about it, my boy.” The Baron fairly oozed urbanity. “_Es tut mer sehr leid_, I mean, it makes me very sorry to have to detail you chaps, but it is the fate of war.”
Bill and Osceola looked their surprise. “War?”
“I have to inform you that my command is at war with society. I can not allow my liking for individuals to deter me from my aim.”
“And what is that?” inquired Osceola.
“We will talk of that later. Now, there is work to be done. Too much time has been wasted already. I need an airplane pilot, Bolton, because with my multitudinous duties, it is impossible for me always to handle the controls. I will make you two what you Americans call a proposition. You will fly where and when I tell you, Bolton. You will give me your word of honor to do that and no more. The chief here will also be given congenial duties. Obey my commands and you need not give your parole—there is no escape except by air and that will be circumnavigated by your word!”
“And you can sure use big words, Baron,” observed a much subdued Charlie, who had been silently taking in the conversation.
“Perhaps,” the Baron smiled, “but if you will take my advice, such things are better left unsaid. Your tongue has already got you and a number of others into trouble today.” He turned again to Bill. “I am awaiting your decision,” he said.
“And—the alternative in this case?”
“You and the chief will be kept prisoners until such time as I can negotiate your ransoms.”
Bill looked at Osceola, who nodded slightly. “All right, then, Baron, I promise to fly your planes as you dictate, but I suspect that your war is nothing more than hijacking on a big scale. And I’m hanged if I have anything to do with that!”
The Baron bowed. “It is a bargain. I will now conclude my work on this vessel. Fritz has already been taken aboard the other craft, and when I am through here, Chief Osceola will go in her with me and my men. You, Bolton, will follow us with Charlie, in your amphibian.”
“Aye, aye, sir,” returned Bill with Naval Academy crispness, now that he had recognized the baron as his superior officer. “You will keep above surface, I suppose, otherwise, I am likely to loose your ship.”
“Oh, no, we won’t,” broke in Charlie the irrepressible. “He’s going in the air!”
“The air? Don’t be silly, kid—”
“I’m not the silly one—” retorted the youngster. “I’m right, ain’t I, Baron?”
“That submarine is an invention of my own,” declared the commander. “The boy speaks correctly. I shall _fly_ her.”
Chapter IV VANDALS OF THE HIGH SEAS
An hour later, Charlie sat aboard Bill’s amphibian which now lay moored to a sea-anchor a quarter of a mile to leeward of the _Merrymaid_. A hundred yards from the plane, the gray submarine rocked gently to a long Atlantic ground swell. Charlie, a pair of field glasses glued to his eyes, focussed them alternately on the yacht and on the deck of the submarine which was crowded with men.
The object of all this interest was a group of three aboard the _Merrymaid_—three men and a youth. Left on board the vessel with a boat wherewith to make their escape, these men were to open the seacocks of the fated ship.
In the side of every vessel, somewhat below the waterline is a large circular manhole, two or more feet in diameter into which fits a steel plate or plug. The plate is fastened to the reinforced sides of the ship by means of bolts arranged at intervals of a few inches around the circumference of the hole. Into this plate fit large pipes which, communicating with the sea, form an intake for salt water. This plug and its manhole are together called the ship’s seacocks.
Opening a ship’s seacocks is a feat of not a little skill and danger. The nuts of the bolts which fasten the plate to its manhole must be unscrewed in such a manner that the plate loosens suddenly and not gradually, so that the sailor who opens it may work until the last minute and then escape from the inrushing water. To do this, special strategy is necessary.
The men from the submarine went about the operation in the following way: Early that morning when the _Merrymaid_ was first captured, some men were sent down into her hold to begin preliminary work on the seacocks. Two of these men carefully unscrewed one rusty nut at a time, thoroughly greased its threads, and then screwed it back into place again before loosening the next. While this was being done, the other men unbolted the pipes leading into the seacock and removed all obstructions in the way of hasty escape from its neighborhood.
This preliminary work of greasing and loosening was done merely in order that the seacocks might be in readiness for immediate opening without loss of time should an enemy appear or other emergency require hasty action. The seacocks thus greased and disencumbered of pipes and impediments were then left in place, and the men returned to the submarine.
The men who had accomplished this work were now aboard the fated yacht once more to finish the opening of her seacocks. With them were Bill Bolton and the Baron. Bill, who had had never witnessed this particular operation before, though heartily condoning the act, was deeply interested. Knowing that he was a midshipman on summer leave from the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis, Baron von Hiemskirk permitted him to remain as a responsible party.
The Baron, a sailor and Bill stood on deck while another seaman named Muller, a strong, heavy-faced fellow who made a specialty of this work, climbed down to the seacock, equipped with a monkey wrench and a sledge hammer. Around his waist was tied a rope, the other end of which was held by the three above for use in emergency.
Muller, under direction of the Baron, took off the nuts from every second bolt in the circle. Being recently loosened and greased, this was easily done. After he had gone completely around the circumference of the plate, the plug was being held by only half its former number of bolts. Beginning once more, the adroit seaman again removed every second nut, from the remaining bolts. The plate was now held by only one-fourth the original number of bolts. This process of halving was continued until the plug was finally being held by only two bolts on diametrically opposite sides of the circumference of the seacock. By this time, the pressure of the water outside was meeting with so little resistance that the plate was bending slightly inward, letting water spurt between the rubber packing and the steel plate up into the hold.
Muller, sweating in every pore, now thrust his wrench into his overalls pocket, picked up his sledge, and called out: “Ready!”
At his signal, the men on deck took in the slack of the rope so that if necessary they could hoist the imperilled seaman up out of danger.
Muller now lifted his sledge hammer, took accurate aim, and with a single vigorous blow, smashed one of the two protruding bolts through its nut and hole. As the plate did not fly loose, he let the heavy hammer fall again, throwing all his strength into the blow, this time upon the remaining bolt. With a dull explosion, the whole two-foot plate flew loose, and a geyser of sea water gushed upward into the hold.
Muller at once leaped for the ladder and, still holding the sledge, clambered to safety. Had he slipped, or been washed away by the force of the water, his comrades on deck would have fished him up by means of the rope.
By this time the yacht was rapidly filling. As the doors through all compartments had previously been opened, the water coming through this one seacock at once began flowing to all parts of the hold. The men on deck were now in real danger, for a sudden listing of the vessel, or its unexpectedly rapid sinking might mean their death.
All, therefore, at once scrambled overside to their boat, the Baron last of all, and pulled away as quickly as possible, lest they be sucked into the vortex of the sinking ship.
For a short space the _Merrymaid_ settled rapidly, giving the watchers reason to expect her to go to the bottom within fifteen or twenty minutes. Their expectations, however, were not realized, for the ship soon began to rest at the same level.
The Baron turned to Bill. “Doubtless air has lodged in the tops of compartments and is imprisoned elsewhere. She must ultimately go down, of course, but there is no telling how long it will take—and I am in a hurry to get away.”
“What are you going to do, use dynamite?”
“Yes. We’ve got sufficient here in the boat, for such an emergency. We’ll row back now, and get busy.”
Dynamite was presently placed at the base of the ship’s two masts and amidships, and the fuses lit. They then rowed swiftly away, and had hardly reached a position where they would be out of danger, when the explosion came. Three crashes, one after the other, shattered the sides and decks of the vessel. The _Merrymaid_ was sinking rapidly. First her bow filled; then the gallant yacht stood perpendicularly on her prow, and slid with a rush out of sight.
At the instant her funnel plunged under, a final tremendous explosion took place, throwing a cloud of steam and water high into the air. A moment later, only a vortex of oily, tossing water gave evidence that a million dollar yacht had gone to the bottom.
“It’s a dirty shame!” Bill spat the words without caring whether the Baron took umbrage or not.
“It is indeed,” that blond giant answered seriously. “But this is war, remember. I cannot use her, still less can I afford to have her discovered. Yes, it is a shame. Vandalism, if you like, but none the less, a necessity.” The Baron shook his head, then went on pompously: “An hour ago that splendid little ship might have been of great service to mankind. Now she is no more. Let it be her epitaph that she was fulfilling her destiny, with work well done. May the world say the same of me when I have gone to the eternal reward.”
Bill kept silent and managed to conceal his disgust. He did not appreciate such philosophizing. Neither could he agree with the Baron’s estimate of his own worth. His work might be well done, but in itself piracy on the high seas could hardly be called more than a disgraceful profession. Bill began to realize that the commander’s brain, although active enough, was more than slightly warped.
They rowed over the spot where the _Merrymaid_ had gone down, and looked about for any stray bits of wreckage which might have floated to the surface. They found none, so made for the amphibian at once.
“You will wait until you see us take off before you do the same, Mr. Bolton,” directed the Baron with a return of his superior-officer manner, as Bill boarded the plane.
“Aye, aye, sir. Any further orders?” Bill returned the military manner with interest.
“Yes. You will follow my craft as though you were number two of a patrol. Land when I land, and taxi over for further instructions.”
“Very good, sir.”
“A pleasant flight, Bolton.”
“Thank you, Baron. The same to you, sir.”
The boat moved off in the direction of the submarine and Bill climbed into his fore cockpit. Charlie was already in his place in the rear cockpit, and Bill noticed that he seemed strangely quiet, almost sullen.
“What’s eating you, old boy?” Bill turned round to face him, then added kindly, “I don’t blame you for feeling low. It’s hard lines about the _Merrymaid_. Made me feel rotten myself. Nastier piece of vandalism was never committed. But you mustn’t take it out on me.”
“Well, I thought you and the chief were my friends,” began Charlie aggrievedly.
“But we are—what makes you think we’re not?”
“Oh, I know you saved me a hiding—and risked your life for that pirate. That was a bully thing to do, but now you and Chief Osceola have joined up with them and—”
“How come—joined up with them?”
“Why, didn’t I hear you, myself, tell the Baron you would work for him—do exactly what he told you to do?”
“So that’s it.” Bill’s laugh was without humor. “There’s no good reason why I should explain my actions to you, but I like you, Charlie, and I’m sorry for you into the bargain. Now, pin back your ears—”
“Well, I’m listening!”
“But, before I tell you what’s what, I want your promise to keep your mouth shut!”
Charlie produced a packet of gum. He tossed Bill a stick and began to munch another. “Okay,” he said earnestly, his eyes on the older lad’s, “let’s have it.”
“I should think you might have guessed it—but neither Osceola nor myself have gone in with these pirates. I gave the Baron my word to obey orders—but only so far as they have to do with driving his planes. It was either that or being locked up—and cutting out any chance there might be to escape. It’s the same with Osceola. He saw my scheme quick as winking—which is more than you did—but then, you’re just a kid, of course.” Bill’s eyes twinkled as he saw the boy’s discomfiture, but he went on more seriously. “The Baron is so sure of himself and his strong organization that he has no fear that we two can do anything to hinder his plans. But unless we’re allowed some freedom, don’t you see, Osceola and I might just as well have given up before we started?”
Charlie was profoundly interested and ashamed of himself. “Gee, I was a pill, all right. But, Bill—do you really think the three of us could break up the gang?”
“Well, you never can tell till you try,” Bill answered. “First of all, we must pretend to work in with this bunch of sea bandits—do our best not to arouse their suspicions, you know. Then, when we learn more about them and their ways of doing business, it will be time enough to start planning on our own account.”
“That’s right. And don’t you worry. I’ll keep quiet. I wouldn’t breathe a word!”
“You mustn’t, kid—not even to your dad and mother when you see them.”
“Cross my heart—hope to die if I do, Bill.”
“That’s all right, then. And always remember that it’s the three of us against a great big organization. A single slip on our part—and well, so far as we’re concerned, it would be just too bad.”
“I’ll keep my promise, Bill. Any idea where these pirates have their hangout? Where we are bound for now?”
“I have not. Why?”
“Some hideout on the coast, I suppose. Shouldn’t wonder if maybe it was somewhere in Pamlico or Albemarle Sound. There used to be lots of pirates in those waters long ago, before the Revolution, I mean. There’s a book at home, tells all about them.”
“Times have changed a lot since then,” mused Bill, “and piracy, too, I reckon.”
“Then you don’t think they’ve a base of some kind over there?”
Bill was facing forward now, staring steadily out over the water. “Something quite different, Charlie,” he muttered; and then in a sharp tone that made the boy start—“So that’s the way they work it!”
“Gee whiz!” Charlie craned his neck and gazed in the same direction. “The submarine’s sprouting wings!”
Chapter V THE TRANSFORMATION OF A SEA MONSTER
The two lads, Bill and Charlie, stared with undivided attention at the astonishing spectacle. Two large fins which evidently had been lying close to the submarine’s sides, were rising into the air. With a speed that seemed remarkable these fins reached a vertical position. For a moment they remained pointing straight toward the high blue arc of the heavens. Then they swung outward, lowering horizontally from the ship’s sides, to come to rest when level with the deck, and about five feet above the surface of the water—a complete set of airplane wings.
“Gosh, she’s a monoplane now!” exclaimed Charlie.
“Wonder how they’ll produce a tail unit?”
“You mean a rudder?”
“Yes. That, together with a stabilizer, fin and elevator.”
But before the words were well out of Bill’s mouth, the miracle occurred. A large rudder lifted itself out of the water, and opening out as it came to rest, seemed to sprout like a giant seabud into a complete tail group.
“Can she use the water propeller in the air?” Charlie kept his eyes glued on the submarine. “It seems to me that would hardly be big enough to fly with.”
“Hardly. That outfit is the queerest engineering jumble I’ve ever seen. But unless the Herr Baron can work absolute miracles, it will take more than one motor and propeller to move her.”
The submarine lay to windward of the amphibian. The lads therefore obtained a stern view of the ship and it was difficult for them to see exactly what was going on forward.
Suddenly Charlie raised another shout. “Look, Bill, look! Here comes the motor. Some jack-in-the-box, I call it.”
“And there’s another one! And still another! Gee-jumpin’-gee-roosalem—the blamed thing is coughing up motors like—”
“Like a cat with the belly-ache,” suggested Charlie.
“Inelegant, but apt. Let’s see, there are one, two . . . _five_ of them!”
“Some packet!”
“Some packet is right. I’d pay admission to see this any day.”
The reason for this excited dialogue had been, first, the raising of that section of the deck between the two great wing sections until from wing-tip to wing-tip, one continuous horizontal plane was formed. Next, up through what was probably a hatch in this center wing section, though of course invisible at that distance from the lads, appeared an airplane motor. This rose on its own engine struts, slid to starboard along the wing and came to rest. Another made its appearance and moved to starboard in line with the first. The next two found places on the port wing, and the last engine remained directly above the hatch which probably closed with a sliding cover. Then the mechanics came topside, through another hatchway, bearing propellers which were fitted to the engines, fore and aft.
“That’s the first time I’ve ever seen two propellers on the same engine!” cried Charlie. “What’s the reason for it, Bill?”
Bill turned round in his seat. “Each one of those engines, as you call them, Charlie, is a double unit. In other words, two motors joined together, one forward and one aft. There are ten propellers, because there are ten motors in that line. The propellers forward are tractors, those aft pushers. The _Dornier_, the big German DO-X passenger plane, has the same arrangement of motors.”
“Guess they must generate a heap of power?”
“Plenty. But you need it to propel a heavy ship like that sub. By the way, do you happen to know what they call her?”
“The _Flying Fish_—one of the gobs told me.”
“Say, where do you get that Navy stuff?”
“Gobs?” Charlie chuckled. “Oh, I’ve got a sea-goin’ dad. He had a U.S.N.R.F. commission during the war.”
“That so? Great!”
“You bet yer. Say, Bill, hadn’t you better get our own engine going? The _Flying Fish_ will be taking off right away. She’s a regular monoplane now.”
Bill shook his head, and turned to face the submarine again.
“They won’t take off for a few minutes yet. As she is, those wings will never hold her weight in the air. And for another thing, she sets much too low in the water to ever get off.”
“But, see, Bill—she’s rising. She’s getting higher in the water all the time.”
“By Jingoes! She is, at that!”
“How do they do it?”
“Same method as a submarine helps to raise itself from the bottom. Water is forced out of certain compartments and air pumped in.”
“Gee, it’s a marvel! And look, there are short wings or fins, extending from the hull under each wing. What do they need them for?”
“Wing-strut supports, I guess. Yes, there come the men with the struts. See how they are securing them from the wing sections to the fins below, and shorter ones from the fins to the hull?”
“Is that what you meant when you said that the wings of the _Flying Fish_ wouldn’t hold her?”
“That’s it. Without struts to support that spread, the wings would surely crumple with her weight in the air.”
“Well, I guess she’s all set for the take off now.”
“Reckon she is. Yes, there go her motors idling! Hear ’em?”
“What shall I do now?”
“Strap on your helmet and your goggles. Then go forward and haul in our sea anchor. When you get back to your cockpit, keep your hands off the controls in there and adjust the headphone set hanging below the instrument board. Some day, if we ever get out of this mess, I may give you flight instruction, but not on this hop.”
“Anything else?”
“Yes. And this is important—for safety’s sake, remember. I’m skipper of this craft. What I say goes—and goes with a bang. Savez?”
“Yes, sir.” Charlie’s voice was sober and subdued.
“O.K., then. Hop to it, kid, I want to get moving.”
A very important Charlie quickly buckled the chin-strap of his helmet and scrambled forward. He followed directions exceedingly well, considering the fact that he had never been in a plane before. Once out on the nose he pulled in the mooring line and the collapsible canvas bucket known as the sea anchor, and carried them back to the rear cockpit. There he stowed them away. Back in the pilot’s seat again, he adjusted his goggles and the headphone set. Then he stood up, and grasping the cockpit’s cowl, he leaned forward so as to watch Bill manipulate the controls in the fore cockpit.
From the time that he was a little tad of a fellow, Charlie had been crazy to fly. At home, his bedroom was decorated with pictures of famous flyers and their planes. He fairly ate up airplane stories and his book shelves were crowded with literature on flying, although he found some of the volumes too technical. Now that he had a chance to witness a take-off at first hand, he wasn’t going to miss a single detail if he could help it.
Charlie knew that the take-off includes the handling of a plane from the time the throttle is opened until the ship is in level flight directly above the surface. He had also read somewhere that in order to leave the ground or the water, it is necessary for the plane to have flying speed, the minimum speed at which the lift of the wings will equal the weight; for the object of the take-off is to gain this speed. The plane must first be manoeuvered into an attitude which facilitates a quick increase in speed. It must be held in this attitude while moving forward at an increasing rate and must finally be taken off in such a way that it is under full control from the instant it leaves the surface. He also knew that _all take-offs must be made directly into the wind_.
The _Flying Fish_ was already moving through the water, her ten engines roaring like an express train, when Charlie saw Bill set their own motor idling. Rudder and ailerons were placed in neutral and the amphibian allowed to swing until it was headed directly into the wind. Then Bill slowly but steadily opened wide the throttle. At the same time, the youngster saw him pull the stick back in order to raise their bow out of the water. This he knew was necessary, both to gain planing speed and to keep the propeller out of the spray which might damage it.
Six or eight seconds after opening the throttle, with the bow well up and the amphibian gaining momentum every instant, Bill pushed the stick all the way forward, and did so in order to raise the tail and depress the nose. But as the plane was moving at some speed, the bow could not be pushed down into the water. Instead, the speed at which they were taxying gradually forced it upward until they were skimming the surface on their step. Bill then eased the stick back to neutral and maintained it there while speed was being gathered. Spray was dashing against Charlie’s face and chest as they sped along. The sensation of traveling at terrific speed was enormous.
“Gee! This sure is great!”
“Getting a kick out of it?” asked a voice in his ear, causing him almost to lose his balance. Then he remembered the transmitter on his chest and realized he had been talking into it.
“I sure am, Bill. What’s the next thing you have to do?”
“The next thing for _you_ to do, young feller, is to get back to your seat and buckle on your safety-belt. If you are so keen to learn, I’ll talk as I run this old crate into the air, and you watch what I’m doing. Maybe that will keep you from trying to climb down the back of my neck.”
“Thanks, Bill, that’ll be great. I’ll sit tight, honest I will.”
“All right, then. We are skimming the surface on the step now, as you’ve noticed. No more large movements of the controls may be made, as the plane is now sensitive to them. I’m paying particular attention to the lateral balance from this stage on.”
Bill stopped talking for a moment, then went on again:
“Remember this, Charlie. It’s important. _The plane must not be taken off until speed adequate to give complete control has been attained._ Any attempt on my part to pull it off prematurely will result in a take-off at the stalling point, where control is uncertain. Now we’ve gained flying speed, so I break her out of the water with a momentary pressure on the elevators. That pressure was very slight and I eased it at the moment of take-off.
“When the plane left the water, its speed was only slightly above minimum flying speed. Any decrease in this would naturally mean a stall. Therefore, I’m keeping the nose level for six to eight seconds in order to get a safe margin above the stalling point before beginning to climb. Safety first always—when flying, Charlie. Now she’s all right, the engine’s running smooth and sweet. So I pull my stick back gently, and as you see, we’re leaving the water behind.”
Chapter VI THE RAIDER
Half a mile or so ahead of Bill’s plane, the great sea monster, the _Flying Fish_, leveled off at an altitude of twenty-five hundred feet, and headed out on a northeasterly course.
Bill continued to climb his amphibian until they too reached that height, then he spoke to Charlie again.
“Now that we’re high enough, I’ve got to make a right turn in order to follow that ship. So I push my stick slowly forward, drop the nose to level like this, and maintain it there throughout the turn. Next I give her right aileron and increase right rudder considerably at the same time.”
“And we’ve gone into a bank. I see.” Charlie unconsciously leant toward the raised wing.
“That’s it. And now that I’ve tilted her far enough, I check the wing with the ailerons, and at the same time ease the pressure on the rudder. I maintain a constant bank, you see, and a constant pressure on the rudder bar throughout the turn.
“Now we are round to where we want to go, so I resume level flight by applying left aileron and left rudder. The wings are level once more, so I neutralize the ailerons and give her a normal amount of right rudder. And we’re pointed in a direct line for the _Flying Fish_!”
“Gosh, but there’s an awful lot to it,” muttered Charlie into his transmitter. “Looks so simple and easy when you’re on the ground, watching a plane flying. How do you ever remember it all?”
“Oh, at first it’s a bit confusing, until you get the hang of the thing—but it soon becomes second nature to do the right trick. When you come to fly you’ll find that there isn’t time for slow thinking in the air. In fact, as my instructor used to say, a flyer must develop instinctive coordination between the sensory organs and the muscles.”
“You can’t prove it by me!”
“Well, it simply means that when flying a pilot must act quicker than he can think.”
“Humph! Like Dad does when he gets mad and gives me a walloping.”
Bill laughed heartily. “Hair brush or slipper?”
“Oh, I always get the hair brush. He can get a better grip on it. But I get a choice at that—back or bristles.”
“I should think that bristles might be the less unpleasant.”
“So did I. Just once. Never again, though. I had to carry a pillow around with me for a week after that session.”
“If I,” remarked Bill, “had your imagination, Charlie, I’d be worth more than John D. Rockefeller!”
“Raspberries!”
For a time they kept silence, unbroken save for the humming drone of the engine.
“I wonder where that hideaway is we were talking about?” Charlie said after a while.
“Well, it isn’t located on our coast, if we’re bound there now. This plane is pointing straight for Northern Europe.”
“Gee! Do you really think we’re going across—making a trans-Atlantic flight?”
“Not a chance, kid, with the gas we’ve got aboard this crate. If you ask me, the _Flying Fish_ is heading for a mother ship of some sort. This gang will have to operate from a steamer if they have no land base. Slap on those sea glasses you were using and take a squint dead ahead beyond the _Fish_—Smoke on the horizon, isn’t there?”
“Sure is. Yes, I can make it out plainly now. Say, you don’t realize how fast we’re traveling until you get a bead on something in the distance. The ship is still hull down, but the smoke seems to be getting denser—”
“I can see it now,” said Bill, giving the amphibian more altitude in order to gain a better view. “That’s no single-stacker, or I’m a landsman.”
“You’re right—she isn’t! I can see—one—two—three—_four_ funnels! Jingoes! She must be a whopper!”
“I wonder,” muttered Bill, half to himself.
“What? But I can see—”
“Oh, I’m not doubting your word, Charles.”
“What are you wondering about then?”
“Remember the _Amtonia_?”
“_Amtonia?_ Why, she’s the big British liner that was held up at sea a couple of months ago!”
“Yes. A freighter SOS’d and when the _Amtonia_ went to offer help, the crew of the tramp forced the liner’s crew and passengers to swap steamers. Then they made off with the big ship.”
“Sure, I remember all about that. Harry Davis’ dad was on the _Amtonia_, coming home from England, when it happened. It was in the papers but I got the inside dope from Harry. His old man told him all about it.”
“Dollars to a dead stick, you’ll be able to tell Harry Davis more about the _Amtonia_ than he ever dreamed of, one of these days.”
“You mean—that ship over there is the _Amtonia_?”
“Exactly. See—she’s hove to now—and the _Flying Fish_ is nosing over for a landing!”
The two in the speeding amphibian saw the _Flying Fish_ descend in a long glide to the surface of the ocean and taxi toward the great steamer.
“She’s the _Amtonia_, all right, all right!” said Bill.
“Gosh, she’s big. What’s her tonnage?”
“Twenty-five thousand tons, I think.”
“Whew!—Say, listen, do you suppose Mother and Dad are on board her now?”
“I shouldn’t be surprised if your Mother and Father and some other boys’ papas and mammas, along with them.”
“That is, unless business in the ransom line is bad.”
“Which,” said Bill, “considering the number of passengers watching us and the _Flying Fish_ from her decks—it isn’t. Shut up now, kid,” he added, cutting his gun and pushing forward the stick. “We’re going down and it sure would look rotten to nose into the drink with that gallery’s eyes on us.”
“Humph! And what about us in that case?”
“Boston papers,” said Bill, “please copy!”
Down they soared, straight into the wind to land with hardly a splash, went skimming over the water for fifty or sixty yards and came to rest just behind the _Flying Fish_. Charlie, at Bill’s bidding, flung out the sea anchor.
To port lay the _Amtonia_, now Baron von Hiemskirk’s traffic raider, and neither lad was surprised to see that she was blatantly flying the flag of piracy, a skull and crossed bones of white on a black field.
Bill had no difficulty in recognizing the _Amtonia_. She was one of the largest passenger ships afloat, and consequently hard to disguise. Her camouflaged hull and stacks, painted in broad wavy stripes of grey-green and black made it still harder to judge her length on the waterline. He knew, however, that she must be quite as long as two city blocks, and her many decks rose above the amphibian to the height of a ten-story building. Her four gigantic funnels—so huge that the greatest locomotive could have passed through one of them lengthwise without scraping—and her tall masts, made her easily recognizable to the young midshipman.
“Hello!” exclaimed Charlie, “there’s a gob on the _Flying Fish_ signalling the liner. Gee, I wish I understood wigwag.”
“If you did,” said Bill, standing up on the pilot’s seat and flapping his arms like a semaphore, “you’d know he was signalling us and not the _Amtonia_. For heaven’s sake, kid, button that lip of yours. I want to get this message.”
Bill then snatched up the helmet he had just doffed and clapped it on again, buckling the flaps over his ears. Charlie watched proceedings with interest that for once was wordless. Presently the sailor aboard the _Flying Fish_ stopped waving his two red flags. Bill answered him with his arms, and the man rolled up his flags and went below.
Bill Bolton unbuckled the chin-strap of his helmet and turned toward the rear cockpit.
“Snap on that safety belt and put on your helmet again,” he ordered, “and don’t take it off this time until I tell you to. We are going aboard.”
“Aboard what?”
“The _Amtonia_, of course.”
“But how can I go aboard that liner if I’m tied to this seat?”
“Wait and see—I’m too busy to talk now—even if you’re not!”
Bill got down, started the engine idling and commenced to haul in their sea anchor.
Charlie stood up in the rear cockpit and called to him.
“Hey, Bill!”
“Well, what is it now?”
“How _are_ we going aboard if I’m to be tied up in this belt?”
“Great jumping snakes!” exploded Bill, with a furious glance over his shoulder. “Have you still got that safety-belt on the brain?”
“No—around the middle!”
“For a counterfeit two-cent piece with a hole in it, I’d throw you into the Atlantic and let you swim aboard!”
“Aw, please tell me, Bill!”
“Well, if you must know each detail, we’re going aboard by way of the electric crane—”
“Aw, quit yer kidding—there ain’t any electric trains out here!”
“Not train, bozo—_c-r-a-n-e_—hoist!”
“Oh! an electric crane! Are they going to hoist us up?”
“That,” said Bill, as he stowed away their mooring, “is the usual procedure when cranes are used. Sometimes up—sometimes down—and—chew on this one thoughtfully, for this is the point of the story: Sometimes when the tackle slips on a haul, there is a tendency to slip sideways. And then, little chatterbox, since it is this amphibian which is to be hauled upward, and you who will be sitting in said amphibian—the aforementioned safety belt is likely to prove mighty useful. _Now_ do you savez?”
“Yup. But my teacher usta tell me that a straight line is the shortest distance between two points.”
“And when,” replied Bill with a grin, “you want to make a home run, it is absolutely necessary to touch all three bases and the plate!”
“Oh, yeah? Well, I think it’s pretty tough when a feller can’t open his mouth without bein’ told to pipe down every other minute!”
“Cheer up, Charles. It’s a long worm—you know. And you’ve got this one on his back with your chatter. The Baron said that this was war, and I, for one, believe he’s right!”
“And,” Charlie chortled, “Sherman said that war was—”
“All that _and_ more. Nothing slow about you when it comes to pickup. Well, there’s the crane showing topside. Reckon I’d better feed the old girl a little more gas and mosey over there.”
Chapter VII ABOARD
The _Amtonia_ had stopped her engines and now lay broadside on to the gentle groundswell. Bill landed to leeward of the great ship, and taxied the amphibian upwind to a point off her leeward quarter. Then he shut off his motor and when the plane’s momentum carried her to within a few yards of the hull, towering high above the little aircraft, he ordered Charlie to fling out the sea anchor. Their drift, of course, was to leeward, so the manoeuver brought them nose on to the ship’s side, directly below the long arm of the hoist.
In order that seaplanes may be taken aboard ships, flying boats are provided with slings. Bill’s craft being an amphibian, was equipped with retractible landing gear, operated electrically from the cockpits. But inasmuch as the _Amtonia_ boasted no deck upon which an airplane might land, the hoist was the only means available.
A heaving line was cast to the amphibian as soon as her propeller stopped, and made secure while Bill and Charlie worked like beavers to secure the wing lines. That accomplished, the lads broke out the sling, and after considerable trouble, passed it completely around the hull of their craft, using spreaders to prevent crushing during the hoist aboard.
While they were working on these details, the hoisting hook was let down to them and presently the sling was made fast to it.
“Gee whiz! Look at the gallery now!” cried Charlie, staring up at the line of faces along the deck rails of the steamer. “Say! there’s Dad—and Mother! And there’s Uncle Arthur! See them up there, next to the top deck! They’re waving to us! Hi, Dad! Hello, Mother! Hello, Uncle Arthur!”
“Swell,” was Bill’s preoccupied comment. “I’m glad you’ve found your people, kid. But get into the rear cockpit now, and pipe down a bit, please. This is a ticklish job and unless you keep quiet so I can do a bit of talking to those guys on the ship, it’s likely to turn into a first class accident instead of a reunion.”
Charlie, only slightly abashed, subsided in his seat, but he kept on waving frantically to his parents.
Then a chief petty officer, who stood by the rail just below the arm of the hoist, raised a megaphone to his lips.
“Avast below!” he roared, showing a strong foreign accent. “Is that sling secure, sir?”
“All secure!” called back Bill. “But be sure your men keep the slack out of our wing lines when you hoist us. I don’t want the plane to start swinging.”
“Aye, aye, sir. Are you quite ready, sir?”
“All ready.”
“Stand by to be hoisted, sir.”
The officer raised a hand. There came a creaking of the sling as the hoist hook caught up the slack, then very slowly the plane rose out of the water on her upward journey.
“Sit down and keep perfectly quiet, Charlie,” ordered Bill. “If we start the plane see-sawing, there’ll be the dickens and all to pay.”
Charlie did as he was told. “Don’t worry about me, skipper,” he answered in a somewhat aggrieved tone. “It’s not me that’s raising all the row now.”
The passengers, or possibly they might better be termed prisoners on board the liner, were waving handkerchiefs and calling greetings to the boys. Any break in the monotony of ship life is always made the most of, and Bill surmised that many of these people had been held on board the liner for weeks.
The plane in its sling went slowly upward, watched by the enthusiastic gallery on the promenade deck. The hoist was situated far forward and as the amphibian topped the bulwarks, it was swung aboard and deposited on deck beside an open hatch. No more had she been landed and braced than Charlie jumped out and raced off to seek his parents.
Bill, in the meantime, had his hands full. It was explained to him that inasmuch as the _Amtonia_ was not equipped for the carrying of aircraft, the plane must be dissembled in order to permit its being stowed away in the hold. A number of men were told off to assist him and for the next couple of hours, he was busily engaged directing the work. Wing sections were removed first and lowered through the hatchway. The tail plane came next, and at the same time, the propeller was taken from the engine. Last of all, lines were riven about the hull and made fast to heavy fittings on the plane, such as engine bearers. Then the denuded hull was hoisted from the deck and lowered nose first into the hold. Even then Bill’s work was not completed, for it was necessary, of course, to secure everything below against possible damage from the rolling or pitching of the ship.
Sandwiches and coffee were served to him by a steward, while he was still on deck. He had sent his excuses when the captain had asked him to lunch, as he felt it imperative that he stay with the men on the job.
It was three-thirty before the work was finished to his satisfaction, and with a petty officer as guide, he located the Baron in his cabin. The _Amtonia_ had got under way again several hours earlier. Upon coming topside, he saw that the ship was steaming into the north-east. Close in their wake, the _Flying Fish_, once more a submarine, ploughed the smooth surface of the ocean.
When Bill entered the captain’s cabin, he found the Baron seated at his desk, reading a paper which had just been handed him by the wireless operator.
“Stand by for a few minutes, Mr. Bolton,” he said, putting the note aside. “Take a seat on the couch. I have need of you again.”
Bill sat down while Baron von Hiemskirk went on talking to the operator.
“Do your best to find out what other craft are in the vicinity and report to me on the bridge as soon as possible.” He said this in German which Bill understood but did not speak well.
“Aye, aye, sir,” returned the man, saluted and departed.
The Baron stood up, picked up his cap and turned to Bill who also rose.
“All secure with the plane below?”
“All secure, sir.”
“Good. Come along then.”
Together they passed through the thwartship passage and out on deck. They reached the top deck of the superstructure by a steep stair and went forward. From this deck another stair led to the bridge, where a sailor with rifle and sidearms stood sentry. The man brought his gun to “present” and both the Baron and Bill punctiliously returned the salute. Long before this Bill had come to realize that strict naval discipline was enforced to the letter aboard this pirate ship.
Once they were on the bridge an officer came forward and saluted.
The Baron said stiffly: “Commander Geibel—Mr. Bolton—in charge of flight operations.”
The Commander and Bill shook hands.
“Has the lookout reported anything during the past quarter of an hour?” inquired the Baron.
“Not a thing, sir.”
Commander Geibel and the others instinctively glanced toward the foremast where about halfway to the top was located the ship’s first lookout station. This station, Bill was to learn, always held an officer and his assistant. Still higher up the mast in the crow’s nest, a sharp-eyed seaman, especially trained to this service, kept a vigilant scrutiny on the horizon. When the man in the crow’s nest discerned smoke or haze which seemed to indicate a ship, he called to the men in the lookout below. Instantly all glasses would be trained in the direction he gave them, and the bridge would make ready to act upon the result of their discovery.
The Baron turned to Commander Geibel again. “We have just received a wireless that the French liner _Orleans_ is about sixty miles to the northward, steaming east. She carries the mails, you know, and a capacity load of first class passengers. I think she will be worth detaining.”
“Decidedly so, sir.”
“Make ready to stop the ship, if you please. Also signal the _Flying Fish_ to prepare for a flight. While I am away, you will be in supreme command, as usual.”
“Very good, Herr Baron. Any further orders?”
“No. You will maintain the usual routine. Good afternoon, Herr Commander.”
“May I wish the Herr Baron his usual success and a pleasant trip?”
“Thank you, Herr Geibel.” The two shook hands. “_Auf wiedersehn!_”
“_Auf wiedersehn_, Herr Baron! _Auf wiedersehn_, Herr Bolton.”
“_Auf wiedersehn_, Commander.”
They saluted. Commander Geibel stepped to the engine room telegraph and the Baron with Bill at his heels left the bridge.
“Come to my cabin. I want to say a few words to you.”
Bill knew that Commander Geibel had given the order “All engines ahead one-third.” So he was not surprised by the time they entered the Captain’s cabin to find that the vibration from the ship’s propellers had ceased.
“You understand, Mr. Bolton,” the Baron said, “that we are about to capture a trans-Atlantic liner?”
“I understand that such is your purpose, sir.”
“You are ready to obey orders—to pilot the _Flying Fish_ as we agreed?”
Bill was silent for a moment. “And if I refuse?” he asked at last.
“Then it will be my painful duty to place both you and Chief Osceola in the brig and keep you there until we make port.”
“Where is Osceola now?”
“He is still aboard the _Flying Fish_. He is to act as your assistant. You see, my dear fellow,” the Baron went on, his manner changing from curtness to affability. “As a midshipman in the United States Navy, you are too dangerous a person to allow you to mix freely with the other passengers of this ship, unless—shall I put it frankly?—unless I have a hold of some kind over you. Those people, wealthy men and women, or they should not be here, are nevertheless but a flock of sheep. You and the Chief proved in Florida that you were made of different stuff. Aboard the _Merrymaid_, I gave you my reasons for the offer. What is your final answer, now that you have had time to think it over?”
Bill hesitated no longer. “I will fly the plane as agreed,” he said. “But there, my duty to you and your organization ends.”
“That satisfies me. I am glad to take your word as an officer and a gentleman on this matter.” He rose from his chair and beamed at Bill. “My organization is perfect, Mr. Bolton—perfect. You will have no chance to escape—there is no where to escape to—but if you and your friend should wish to try—you have my permission to do so!”
Bill smiled, and said nothing.
“Time to shove off now,” continued the Baron bruskly. “The boat will be waiting for us.”
They went overside by means of a ship’s ladder and were rowed over to the _Flying Fish_. Her airplane engines were making their appearance topside by the time they stepped aboard. For a few minutes Bill watched them rise one by one, and slide on grooved tracks into place. At the same time, he noticed that the decking just forward of the central motor was moving upward to reveal itself as the roof of a glass-sided structure about two feet high.
“What’s under that?” he asked the Baron, “the pilot’s cockpit?”
“Just so. Come below and we’ll inspect it.”
Chapter VIII PIRACY
While they had been talking, Bill saw the conning tower lower itself until it stood not more than a foot above the deck aft of the huge wings.
“This certainly is the most remarkable ship I’ve ever seen, or ever hope to see,” he exclaimed as they descended into the hull through the conning tower hatch.
“I designed most of these gadgets before the close of the last war,” replied the Baron in his usual pompous manner. “The armistice interrupted my experiments and as there was no government that amounted to anything in my country then, I kept the results of my work for myself. Some little time ago, speculation in your American stocks gave me sufficient capital to build that ship with added improvements. Now I am cashing in on her.”
The Diesel engines were drawing air from an intake valve just under the small bridge as they dropped into the control room where Bill and the Baron studied the charts for a while, and he was given the course he was to fly. They passed through the battery room where the walls were lined with the crews’ bunks and into the pilot’s glassed-in cockpit.
“Hello!” Osceola beamed at them from one of the pilot’s seats. “It’s sure good to see you again, Bill, old boy. How do you do, Baron?”
The Baron was annoyed.
“It is customary aboard my ships for a superior officer to receive a salute when spoken to. And the salute should be rendered standing.”
Osceola smiled, stood up, clicked his heels together and brought the fingers of his right hand smartly to the edge of the soft helmet he wore.
“Thank you.” The Baron punctiliously returned the salute. “Good afternoon, Chief.”
Then he turned his back on the young Seminole and spoke again to Bill.
“When the buzzer rings in here, Mr. Bolton, you will start idling your engines and take off as soon as possible immediately afterward. You know your course and you have instructions with regard to landing. Further orders will be sent to you should I consider them necessary.”
“I understand, sir,” said Bill.
Both young fellows saluted. The Baron returned their salutes and left the cockpit, sliding the door to behind him.
“Gosh!” exploded Osceola. “That lad gives me the jim-jams with his confounded bowing and saluting. I’ll turn into a Prussian Yunker myself if we don’t get out of this soon!”
“Reckon you weren’t cut out for a Naval man,” laughed Bill, “I admit I’ve had my fill of that stuff at the Academy, but the Herr Baron certainly goes the whole hog. Let’s see what kind of a crate I’ve got to run,” he mused—“ten motors—dual control—aeromarine inertia starter!”
He studied the layout thoughtfully and glanced at the instrument board. Then he turned to Osceola again.
“Thank heaven, they’ve fitted this bus with the wheel and column type of control. The clever bird has stolen some of the Fokker features. That worm gear, operated by a crank and shaft from the pilot’s seat to adjust the stabilizer in flight proves it.”
“Maybe,” grinned his friend. “That’s all Greek to me. The joke of it is that these bozos think I understand—that I’m an aviator like you!”
“Well, I’ve given you some pointers, haven’t I? You ought to recognize a few of these gadgets.”
The Chief snorted. “_Few_ is right. Your amphibian is one thing—but this bus is fitted out like the engine room of an ocean liner!”
Bill laughed and picked up a soft helmet.
“Ever been in one?”
“An engine room?”
“Yes.”
“Not yet—and I hope never.”
“I thought so. Well, Mr. Assistant Pilot, get into your seat and look pretty. I’ll do the work. Confound, there goes the buzzer!”
He slipped into his seat and his hand sought the inertia starter. With her multiple engines roaring in deafening crescendo, the _Flying Fish_ leapt through the water and was jerked onto her step, quite as easily as the smallest seaplane. A few seconds later she was in the air, nosing upward into the ether.
Bill ran her up to thirty-five hundred feet, leveled off, did a sharp bank to port, then straightened out once more and spoke to Osceola.
“Some bus! Runs like a ladies’ wristwatch.”
“Aren’t you keeping pretty low?”
“There’s no sense climbing higher. The skipper wants to get there in a hurry.”
“Er—you know this is rank piracy?”
“I do, Osceola. But it’s a long chance—and a darned sight better for our plans than being cooped up in the brig. If I wasn’t driving this plane, the Baron would be. Friend von Hiemskirk is so sure of himself he says that we have his permission to escape—if we can. I’d like to give him a run, you know.”
“Yes, nice of him, isn’t it? Still, we got away from the Shell Island gang, didn’t we?”
“Sure did—and put those guys in a place where they belong.”
“Well, I’m entirely willing to try it with this bunch—but between you and me, I’m almost inclined to agree with the Baron—I don’t think we’ve the ghost of a show.”
“Maybe not. But we’ll make a good stab at it, just the same. First of all, we’ve got to know how they work their game. That’s the principal reason why I took over this job. It’s not only escape I’m after, but it’s busting up this organized piracy, as well.”
“Ambitious, aren’t you?”
“Well—hello! there’s smoke on the horizon!”
“Oh, yes, I see it. Dead ahead. Think she’s the ship we want?”
“Hope so. We’re following the course. Herr Pomposo plotted it himself, so he can’t strafe us if it isn’t.”
Osceola clapped a pair of glasses to his eyes and studied the distant smudge of black that was curling up a blue horizon.
“Three funnels. Looks like a pretty big ship—and she sure is moving along.”
“The _Orleans_ is a three-stacker. Also, she’s plenty big and fast. Push that button on the instrument board marked ‘C.R.’, will you?”
Osceola complied. “What’s C.R. mean?”
“Control room. I want to let his high-mightiness know we’ve sighted his prey.”
“This,” said Osceola, “begins to get exciting.”
“It will,” said Bill, “get a good deal more exciting than we bargained for unless you pipe down, old man. There’s some ticklish business ahead of us and I can’t afford to crack it. Now—get these instructions, and get ’em right. That handle yonder works the bomb release. When I say the word, take hold of it—but don’t pull until I tell you to.”
“But—Bill!” protested the Seminole. “You surely aren’t taking orders from von Hiemskirk or anyone else to bomb that liner!”
“Not if I know it,” Bill answered curtly. “Get your mind on the job. When I say NOW—you pull. Not one instant sooner, or an instant later. It’s a matter of life and death—so be careful.”
“Trust me,” said his mystified friend, lifting a nervous gaze to stare at the great steamer they were approaching so swiftly.
The _Orleans_ was a beautiful sight; a racing greyhound of the seas, tearing through a glassy ocean, bound for Europe with mail and passengers.
The _Flying Fish_ came upon her from the south. As he drew nearer the leviathan, Bill decreased the plane’s altitude to a meager five hundred feet. Below the belching funnels he could see passengers and crew crowding the starboard rails, for even the most _blasé_ traveler is still thrilled by the sight of an airplane in mid-ocean.
The great plane circled the ship. Then Bill dropped behind for a moment, did a flipper turn to port, levelled off and came racing up from the rear. When the _Flying Fish_ was directly over the steamer’s stern, Bill spoke to Osceola.
“Get ready!” he said.
“Good Lord! You can’t do it, Bill. It’s murder!”
“Shut up—and obey orders!” commanded his pilot. “This is my funeral—not yours.”
Osceola grasped the bomb release, his brain whirling in consternation and confusion.
Slowly they forged ahead, over the stacks, the foremast, the bow, and on until they had gained a lead of possibly two hundred yards on the _Orleans_.
“NOW!”
Back came Osceola’s hand, yanking the handle and at the same time Bill banked the plane in a sharp left turn. Osceola descried an object darting seaward beneath them. He glimpsed it strike the water and a geyser shot upward in front of the racing liner. Then as the _Flying Fish_ came about and landed, he saw that the _Orleans_ was slowing down. By the time their own craft was moored to a sea anchor, the liner’s propellers no longer turned and she lay like a “painted ship upon a painted ocean.”
Both lads stripped off their headgear as the Baron walked into the cockpit.
“I am about to board the _Orleans_,” he stated in that overbearing tone that was so irritating to Osceola. “You young gentlemen will accompany me. We leave directly. Once aboard, it will be your duty to make note of the quantity of gasoline and lubricating oils carried by the liner and render a report to me. I shall probably be found in the First Class dining salon, where passengers will be interviewed. Come now, it is time we were off.”
When Bill and Osceola came out on deck they saw that a three-inch gun had been brought topside and was trained on the _Orleans_. Signals had evidently passed between the _Flying Fish_ and the liner, which lay motionless a few hundred yards off their port quarter. Even as the boarding party, armed to the teeth, stepped into a small launch, a gangway was let down from the side of the leviathan.
The journey across took but a very few minutes. Bill had only time to note that the _Orleans_ no longer flew her colors and that the decks were still crowded with passengers, when the seaman in the bow of their launch caught the grating at the bottom of the steep flight of steps with his boathook.
The Baron immediately sprang onto the grating and, followed by another officer, Bill, Osceola and four seamen bearing rifles, mounted the gangway. The launch in the meantime hastened back toward the _Flying Fish_ to pick up another load of men.
An indignant officer, whose uniform proclaimed him to be the ship’s captain, met them as they stepped on deck.
“This is an outrage!” he thundered, addressing the Baron. “By what right do you threaten my ship and board her?”
Von Hiemskirk smiled cynically at the scowling captain, and bowed, including the row of ship’s officers and men who stood close behind him, in his salutation.
“You make a mistake, Captain,” he replied affably, “when you say ‘my ship.’ Allow me to inform you that she is no longer yours—but mine—by right of conquest!”
“But this is—piracy!”
“I am glad,” said the Baron, “that you realize the fact.” He changed his tone abruptly. “Permit me to inform you also that unless my orders are obeyed—obeyed on the instant,—it will be my unpleasant duty to sink this ship.”
A man in the uniform of the ship’s wireless operator pushed his way through the crowd of protesting passengers and saluting the _Orleans_ captain, whispered a few words in his ear.
“No secrets,” snapped the Baron. “Operator, what message have you brought?”
It was now the captain’s turn to smile.
“I will answer your question,” he returned. “We have been in touch with the United States Cruiser _Stamford_. At the present moment, she is steaming at full speed to this spot!”
Chapter IX THE BARON’S METHODS
Baron von Hiemskirk roared with laughter. “Splendid, Captain—splendid! To use an American expression, Herr Captain—we pirates are not always as dumb as we may look. I know all about that warship. It will take her five hours, fast steaming, to reach this ship.”
He turned his back contemptuously on the furious skipper and walked to the rail. A glance overside told him that the launch, crowded to the gunwales with more men from the _Flying Fish_ was nosing the landing stage below. He again approached the choleric officer.
“I now take over this ship. Order your crew to the forecastle and your officers to their cabins. You and I, my friend, will repair to your quarters. I want to look over your ship’s papers.”
By this time the second boarding party reached the deck, and commands snapped from the Baron like reports from a machine gun.
Accompanied by an armed seaman from the _Flying Fish_, Bill and Osceola followed the chief commissary steward below. The man had been told off for the duty by the Baron, with a promise that if there were any complaints upon their return, he would be shot. On second thought, he had expanded Bill’s orders.
“You will attend to the oil and gas,” he said, “and in addition, you will commandeer all stores leaving two days’ crews’ rations for the passengers. Break out what men you need and get the supplies to this deck on the port side. And just as quickly as possible, Mr. Bolton.”
“Aye, aye, sir.”
Arrived at the chief steward’s office, he was amazed to learn from the man’s lists the vast amount of eatables carried by the liner.
“Gosh, there’s everything here from caviar to oatmeal!”
“Well, orders are orders,” said Osceola. “While you’re deciding what to take and what to leave, I’ll get hold of the crew and meet you below in the storerooms.”
“Right-o! I’ll be with you in a jiffy. I hate to have to do this, but if we don’t make a clean job of it, you and I will finish out this cruise in the well-known brig!”
For the next few hours, both lads worked like beavers superintending the transportation of supplies. Leaving Osceola in charge below, Bill went up to the deck where the boxes, barrels and crates from the storerooms were being stacked by members of the captured liner’s crew. The _Flying Fish_, now transformed into her guise of submarine, came along side, a hoist was brought into use and the provisions lowered to her.
It soon became evident that the underseas boat’s cargo capacity would take but a fraction of the plunder, so Bill ordered the _Orleans’_ lifeboats to be lowered. One by one, these were loaded. The first boat to receive its quota of goods was secured to the _Flying Fish_ by a tow-line, and the bow of each succeeding lifeboat made fast by a line to the stern of the one ahead. When the last load of crates was being lowered overside, Bill found Osceola at his elbow.
“That tears it, I reckon. Good plan that—using the boats. I wondered how you were going to load all that stuff in the _Flying Fish_.”
“I hated to do it,” admitted his friend, “but now that the _Orleans_ is practically without provisions, she will have to return to New York, and she can make port in less than twenty-four hours. With this fine weather, there’s little or no danger of the passengers needing the boats.”
“What are we to do now?” asked Osceola.
“Report to Herr Baron, I reckon.”
Bill hailed one of the submarine’s petty officers who was herding the crew back to their quarters.
“Do you know where we’ll find Baron von Hiemskirk?”
“He is in the main dining salon, sir.”
“Come along, Osceola,” said Bill. “He must be pretty nearly finished with his own particular job. I hope so, anyway. If that cruiser shows up and we’re caught—well, it will take a lot of explaining to justify our part in this. The chances are, I’d be handed my discharge from the Navy, if nothing worse.”
Osceola nodded gloomily and the two made their way along an almost empty deck to the main companionway.
“I wonder where the passengers have disappeared to,” mused the young Seminole, as they descended the broad staircase.
“They’ve probably been sent to their cabins for the time being. If my guess is a good one, the big boy is at present engaged in robbing the entire first class of their valuables.”
“It’s certainly a bad bit of work, Bill.”
“Gee, I know it. But some day we may be able to get even with this polite pirate. Just now all we can do is to smile and take orders.”
They found the Baron seated at the head of the captain’s table. An angry gentleman, his wife and two pretty daughters, under guard of a seaman, stood before him.
“Mr. Rodney Conway and family, of New York.” The Baron glanced at a list he held. “I am glad to say that this little interview will conclude my business aboard the _Orleans_.”
“Look here!” cut in the passenger. “This whole thing is preposterous! Why, your men have ransacked our cabins and stolen nearly everything of value we have with us. If, as you seem to be, you are German citizens, I shall certainly make a complaint in person to the German ambassador, when this ship lands us in England!”
The Baron von Hiemskirk smiled, but the smile was not a pleasant one. “I do not recognize the present German government,” he said sneeringly, “and it also may interest you to know that they are quite as keen to apprehend me and put a stop to my business ventures as you are. Furthermore, Mr. Conway, you and your family are not going to England—not by this ship.”
Mr. Conway started visibly. Then he drew himself up: “I do not care for myself—but I must beg of you to spare my wife and daughters—”
The Baron put up a restraining hand. “There is no cause for alarm, Mr. Conway. Unless, of course, you prove to be unreasonable. Who’s Who tells me that you are president of the Western Hemisphere Bank in New York City, and that you are on the board of directors of other important financial institutions. Now, there will be a small matter of ransom to go into before we part company. At present, time presses. You and your family will go for a cruise with me—an agreeable one, I trust—until this business of ransom can be attended to. You will go on deck with this seaman now. Your cabin baggage has already left the ship. That will be all, I think.” He stood up in dismissal, and bowed.
“Good afternoon,” he beamed, “and bon voyage!”
The Conway family, under guard, left the salon. Baron von Hiemskirk beckoned to Bill and Osceola who had been silent witnesses of this charming scene.
“I have to report, sir,” said Bill at once, “that the supplies have been placed aboard the _Flying Fish_ and the lifeboats. They are now ready for transport to the _Amtonia_.”
“Thank you, Mr. Bolton, and you, too, Chief. I was certain that I could trust you with the job. That was a good idea to use the lifeboats. If a heavy sea had been running the greater part of the stuff must have been left behind.”
“I should think,” said Osceola, “that you would have brought up the _Amtonia_ and placed the stuff aboard her direct.”
The Baron smiled goodhumoredly. “Mr. Bolton can you tell him my reason for not doing so? I am not really a blood-thirsty person by nature, Chief.”
“Baron von Hiemskirk does not wish vessels like the _Orleans_ to know that the _Amtonia_ is in his service, Osceola.”
“But what has bloodthirstiness got to do with it, if I may ask?”
Bill answered this too. “I suppose the Baron feels it would be necessary to sink such vessels whose crews or passengers guess his secret. Am I right, Sir?”
“Quite, Mr. Bolton. That warship, for instance, will arrive here in an hour or so. All that she can learn from those left aboard this ship is that the _Flying Fish_ and the _Orleans_ boats have departed in such and such a direction—which, of course, will not be the one they will eventually take.”
“But won’t they wireless that news to the _Stamford_ just as soon as we leave the ship?” inquired the Chief.
“Nobody,” replied the Baron gently, “will use the wireless after we leave, for the simple reason that this ship’s wireless will not be in working order. Now we will go on deck.”
He led the way up the staircase without speaking further. At the entrance to the companionway, they were met by one of the Baron’s men.
“Beg to report, sir, that all decks have been cleared. Passengers and crew are locked in their cabins. The fires have been drawn and the wireless has been put out of commission.”
“Good. We shall shove off at once.”
The officer preceded them toward the gangway where a squad of armed seamen were drawn up.
“By Jove!” cried Osceola. “What’s become of the _Flying Fish_? She’s disappeared. Surely she can’t have submerged and carried the boats down with her.”
“No such luck,” muttered Bill sotto voce. “There she is, with her blooming boats in tow, off to the westward. She probably got underway about the time we went below. What’s the matter, Osceola? You seem to be in the dumps.”
“Well, I hate this work we’ve been doing, that’s all, Bill. Unless we can act pretty soon—do something to stop this robbing of innocent people, I’ll be so low, I’ll have to reach up to touch bottom!”
“Gosh, I’m with you. I could hardly keep quiet when that interview with the Conways took place. But tonight, we’ll talk. Keep smiling now—here we are at the gangway. Gee, we’re swiping the _Orleans_ launch! I wondered how we were going to get back to the _Amtonia_.”
“These guys,” said Osceola disgustedly, “snatch everything that’s loose. What’s nailed down they pull up and charge the owners for the nails!”
Following the Baron, who was conversing with an officer, they went down the steps of the gangway, and took seats in the waiting launch.
Chapter X BILL STARTS IN
The launch, a highpowered craft, soon caught up with the submarine and its string of loaded lifeboats. Darkness had fallen before the little flotilla reached the mothership, but the plunder was quickly taken aboard, and the lifeboats were sunk. Within an hour of their arrival, the _Amtonia_ with her submarine pilot-fish were heading into the northeast again.
The two lads were given a large, comfortable cabin together, where they found the baggage from their amphibian had been stowed. They had just taken a shower in the luxuriously appointed bathroom off their cabin, when there came a knock at the door.
“The Captain’s compliments, sir,” said the steward when Bill opened to him, “and will you gentlemen dine with him and his officers at eight thirty in the Palm Garden? He asks me to inform you, sir, that you will find uniforms in your closet. He begs that you will not wear civilian clothes while aboard.”
“Thank Baron von Hiemskirk on behalf of Chief Osceola and myself. We shall be glad to join the officers’ mess at half past eight. We shall also put on the uniforms he has provided, although I must say that nothing looks worse than a uniform one hasn’t been fitted for!”
“Beg pardon, sir, but the tailor has already altered the uniforms. He took measurements from the suits in your bags. He and his men are working on more of them tonight. He tells me that they will all be finished soon.”
“Thank you,” said Bill. “That will be fine. By the way, where is the Palm Garden?”
“Off A deck, sir. Thank you, sir.” He was gone.
“Well,” grinned Bill, “some system they have aboard this packet!”
“You said it. Too much system to suit me, Bill. We’re likely to come a bad cropper when we buck it.”
“You know the adage about crossing bridges before you have to, Osceola. Let’s get into these uniforms. It’s nearly time for mess and I’m hungry enough to chew rubber.”
The uniforms proved to be made of white duck, and the lads found their names stitched inside the blouses. An officer’s cap and pair of white canvas shoes went with each suit. To their further surprise, they found that all these articles fitted them exactly.
“Gee!” exclaimed Bill, as he saw the two gold stripes on his black shoulder straps. “This is promotion with a vengeance! When I woke up this morning, I was only a midshipman. Tonight I’m a full lieutenant! What’s the Baron made you, big boy?”
“I’ve got a broad stripe like yours, Bill, and a narrow one. I suppose that rates me something—but what, I don’t know!”
“That’s the insignia of a lieutenant j.g.”
“And what’s the j.g. mean?”
“Junior grade. A j.g. ranks with a first lieutenant in the army.”
“And you, with your two broad stripes rank with an army captain, I suppose, and you’re my superior officer on board here, I take it?”
“Right. Only we say full stripes, not broad stripes. In Navy parlance, I’m a two-striper, and you are a one-and-a-half striper.”
“Sounds to me like a convict gang,” laughed the Seminole, as he buttoned up his blouse. “Well, if you’re ready, I am.”
“Don’t forget your cap,” Bill reminded him. “Strictly speaking, no naval officer is in uniform without it.”
“Pirate officer, you mean,” grunted Osceola as they entered the corridor. “Last time we were kidnapped and lacked all this luxury, but at least what clothes we wore were comfortable. I feel as if somebody had laced me into a tight corset.”
“You’ll feel better after dinner.”
“Maybe. If the buttons hold!”
Together they mounted the stairs to A deck. A few of the _Amtonia’s_ passengers were lounging about on deck. They paid not the slightest attention to them, in fact, Bill noticed that their indifference was so marked that it could not be other than studied.
Then a voice spoke behind them. “Hello, men!” As they turned, Charlie joined them. “I wanted Father to meet you,” he said, rather breathlessly, “but he says you’ve joined the pirates, and— But you haven’t, have you?”
Osceola looked down at him quizzically. “Only pro tem!”
“Gee, what does that mean? I wish you’d talk American.”
“If I spoke my own language, which is real American, youngster, you wouldn’t understand me any better.”
Bill grinned. “Pro tem means for the time being,” he said. “But I’d better tell you, Charlie, that the Chief is feeling low tonight, so don’t get fresh. He’ll tomahawk you one of these days if you don’t look out!”
“Oh, yeah?” Charlie seemed unimpressed by this dire threat. Then his tone changed suddenly. “Please, Bill,” he whispered eagerly, “let me be a pirate, too. Gee, it would be such fun. Can’t I?”
Both Bill and Osceola burst into a shout of laughter. “But how about your Dad?” asked the Seminole.
“Well, what about him?”
Bill shook his head. “Talk like that to him, and he’ll be offering you the choice of back or bristles!”
“Aw, cut it out! I’m serious, Bill. Please let me be a pirate!”
“I’ll think about it, Charlie.” Bill took him by the arm and moved over to the rail. “But I do want you to do something for me,” he said in lowered tones. “You must keep it entirely to yourself, though. If you mention it to a single soul, you’ll get us all into a heap of trouble.”
“I won’t—honest, Bill. I’ll shut up like a clam! What is it?”
“All right then, I’ll trust you. I want you to make friends with the wireless operators. There are two of them. Find out when they relieve each other, whether the door is kept locked—in fact, find out everything you can—without making them suspicious. Got that?”
“You bet. Take it from me, they’ll never guess what I’m after!”
“Attaboy! Do you know where our cabin is?”
“No.”
“Well, it’s number 126 on the deck below, starboard side.”
“I can find it.”
“Good. Come there at eleven tonight, and report what you’ve found out.”
“I’ll be there with bells on.”
“Now be careful that nobody sees you come to our door. It won’t be locked—we’ll be there. Just open it and come in.”
“All right, Bill. You can trust me.”
“That’s all, so cut along now, and remember, eleven sharp. We’ve got a date for dinner, and I’m afraid we’re going to be late as it is. So long, Charlie.”
“So long, Bill. So long, Chief.”
Charlie raced away, intent on the importance of his trust and his two friends hurried toward the Palm Garden.
They found the Baron and his officers awaiting them in the foyer of the restaurant. The Baron beamed approval on their uniforms and introduced them to the members of the group they had not already met. These gentlemen each bowed from the waist and shook hands with continental formality upon being presented. The Baron spoke a few words, and then as the single stroke of the ship’s bell clanged, the chief steward appeared in the doorway.
“Dinner is served, Herr Captain.”
The Baron leading, they went into the restaurant. The meal which they sat down to proved to be a long, sumptuous affair of many courses. Every delicacy, in and out of season, was served. Evidently the Baron believed in living well—on other people. Both lads did full justice to the banquet. Muffled strains of the ship’s orchestra, hidden behind palms, lent gaiety to the atmosphere, but could not cut through the rigid formality of their companions’ demeanor.
It was after ten thirty by the time they left the table and went out on deck. The stars were like jewels flashing in the great inverted bowl of night. The dark water gleamed quiet as a mill-pond, reflecting the slender crescent of a new moon that had just appeared above the horizon.
The Baron puffed a long cigar while he conversed at his ease in a deck chair.
“This voyage,” he remarked complacently, watching the red ash glow on the end of his cigar, “is becoming quite a successful undertaking. A few more months and we can well afford to retire, and go our own ways.”
“But surely, Herr Baron, you are not contemplating ending this splendid venture?” It was the Chief Engineer who spoke.
“We must not try providence too far, Bauer. To date, this ship is a mystery to the world at large, it is true. But we have already created some stir. Personally, I consider it a positive compliment that the navies of the world are seeking us out to destroy us!”
“It must,” Bill remarked, “afford you a good deal of satisfaction, as well as profit, Baron.”
He was becoming restive. It was nearing eleven o’clock. The cabin door was locked and Charlie could not get in. But how to break away without arousing the Baron’s suspicions, he could not see.
That gentleman puffed contemplatively for a moment or two.
“Yes, you have it right, Mr. Bolton,” he observed at last. “Pleasure and profit. Outside of the vast sums in money and jewels we have taken from captured liners, you perhaps do not realize that we have more than two hundred very wealthy people as passengers. Their ransoms, at the lowest estimate will run well over a million dollars apiece. Yes, this is a most profitable business, Mr. Bolton. But of course, a most dangerous one. We must not practice it for too long a time.”
“Herr Baron,” Bill leaned forward in his seat, and smiled his most engaging smile, “neither Chief Osceola nor I have had the opportunity this evening to thank you for your consideration in the matter of our cabin and the uniforms you have provided us.”
“Yes, indeed, Baron,” Osceola seconded him and threw the stub of his cigarette over the rail. “Very kind of you, I must say.”
“Oh, do not mention it, my dear fellows.” The Baron was joviality itself. “Those are small matters and easily attended to.”
“But we appreciate your wish to make us comfortable.” Bill rose, and Osceola followed his example. “And now, sir, we will say good night. It has been a long day and a busy one.”
“Good night, my young friends,” beamed von Hiemskirk. “Pleasant dreams, and _auf wiedersehn_ until tomorrow.”
Everyone stood up and saluted and the lads marched off toward their cabin. Osceola was unlocking the door, when a stealthy figure appeared from out the shadows of a cross passage, and Charlie slipped into the room with them.
“Gee, I thought you were never coming,” he said, as Bill switched on the light.
“Sorry, Charles, so did we! Have you got any news?”
“Plenty, Bill. I—”
His words were cut short by a crash of gunfire from above. For an instant they stood listening to the thunder of the gun, then Bill broke their constrained silence.
“We’ll have to postpone our talk, Charlie, worse luck. There’s something doing out there, all right, and it’s up to the Chief and me to hustle up on deck pronto.”
Without further parley the three caught up their caps and ran out of the cabin.
Chapter XI DANGEROUS BUSINESS
The lads encountered a crowd of nervous and excited passengers on the stairs and were swept up with them and out on deck. By common instinct the flow was toward port. A few hundred yards away, the lights of a steamer, parallel with them, could be discerned. Signals were flashing, bells clanging, and the clamor of the startled passengers pressing the rail was deafening.
Bill gripped Osceola’s arm. “Let’s get out of this bedlam,” he shouted. “The skipper is sure to be on the bridge—come along!”
Diving across the ship they ran forward on the opposite deck and up the stair to the bridge. Baron von Hiemskirk stood with a pair of night glasses trained on the stranger across the water. Near him a group of white uniformed ship’s officers conversed in whispers. He lowered the binoculars as Bill and Osceola approached and rendered them a stiff salute.
“Good evening again, gentlemen. Thank you for your promptness. Chief Osceola, I want you and Lieutenant Schneider to go aft and quiet that rabble. Explain to the passengers that there is no cause for alarm. Tell them also in my name that unless they go at once to their cabins, they will be sent there forcibly.”
Osceola and the Lieutenant saluted and departed on their errand.
“Now, gentlemen,” continued the Baron, “as several of you already know, I have been aware for some time that we were overhauling that ship we see out there. Had she obeyed our signals and those of the _Flying Fish_, there would have been no need to waste shell fire on her. You will be interested to learn that she is the _Blake_ of Cardiff, loaded with twenty-five hundred tons of coal—enough to keep us going for a week at good speed, or two weeks at low speed. Tomorrow morning, we will start coaling, and for the next few days, every one of us will be especially busy. Those of you who are not on duty, will please me by turning in at once, and getting a good night’s rest. Good night, gentlemen.”
Back in his cabin, Bill undressed and got into bed. He was lying there, with the lights burning, thinking over the day’s events, when Osceola came in.
He tossed his cap on the lounge, and began to unbutton his blouse. “Well, we got the sheep herded into their respective barns. Did you find out anything about that ship?”
Bill told him what the Baron had said. “Filthy business, coaling,” he ended with a yawn.
“It will be interesting to find out how they work it at sea, especially when we’ve got at least one warship on our trail.”
“I don’t think the Baron’s worrying about the _Stamford_. We’ve changed our course at least twice in the last few hours. It’s a big ocean, Osceola.”
“Guess so. And some queer people on it. The noble Baron makes me laugh. He’s probably the greatest thief unhung, yet he purposely chatted with us and the other officers after dinner, on the side of the deck away from this collier, so that we would go to bed early and get a good night’s rest.”
“He’s an odd beggar, all right,” yawned Bill. “Switch off the light, and hop into that bed of yours, big boy, or I’ll be talking in my sleep.”
A steward called them at five next morning. By five-thirty they had dressed in uniform cap and dungarees, breakfasted and were out on deck. The collier was now steaming slowly alongside the big liner. The ships were kept together by a hawser across the lips of the _Amtonia’s_ bows, supplemented by a few lines across her poop; and a speed of two miles an hour was being maintained by both vessels. This kept their noses together. It also gave them a certain steadiness in the choppy sea that ran this morning. Above all, it kept the pirate ship constantly prepared, steamed up in readiness to dash away in case an enemy cruiser appeared. The lads noted that at each of the cables which held the vessels together, a man was stationed, ax in hand, to cut the strands should the emergency arise.
Bill and Osceola soon found that preparations for coaling on the high seas had already been made. Through the decks of the _Amtonia_ the carpenters had cut large circular holes, one directly beneath the other. In these openings, ship’s ventilator tubes were at that moment being inserted. They were then spliced together in such a manner that coal dumped on to the deck merely had to be pushed into the tubes to slide swiftly down into the bunkers.
Three temporary derricks had been erected, one fore, another amidships, and one aft, all electrically equipped. Bill was presently put in charge of the fore derrick, while Osceola crossed over to the collier, where he helped to superintend the loading of sacks and baskets with coal. These when filled were transferred from the _Blake’s_ derricks to those of the liner, in midair. The coal was then unloaded on the _Amtonia’s_ deck and shoveled into the tubes by the crew.
As the sun grew higher, the weather became increasingly hotter. So hot was this work of coaling that the men were soon working clad only in pantaloons, cut short like boys’ trousers, or even in tights. There were no feminine eyes about, for all passengers were being kept below, so that occasionally the scanty loincloths were cast aside and the men worked naked. Covered from head to foot with sweat and coal dust, they soon looked like gangs of negroes. The officers fared quite as badly, for, though they were spared manual labor and so did not discard their uniforms, they soon became as grimy as the men and fully as uncomfortable.
Work was carried forward night and day, in alternate watches. To Bill it became a nightmare of heat and sweat and coal dust. The ship, usually so immaculate, took on the appearance of a coalyard, and the fine black dust filtered into even the remotest nooks and crannies. When relieved of duty, the black counterpart of that smart young Lieutenant Bolton would satisfy his hunger at a buffet, get under a shower and then to bed. Here, between coal dust coated sheets, he would snatch a few hours sleep—then hurry above for his next trick at the derrick. He began to find out that the life of an officer aboard this pirate craft was not the bed of roses it had first appeared to be. As Osceola worked and ate and slept on board the _Blake_, the two saw nothing of each other.
Late in the afternoon of the third day, the last of the twenty-five hundred tons of coal was transferred and shovelled down the chutes. Bill saw to the taking down of his derrick and then went below to his cabin, thankful that the dirty job had come to an end. He was getting out of filthy clothes when Osceola walked in.
“Coolheavers ahoy!” he greeted. “I’m one black warrior, if you ask me.”
“And I’ve had pleasanter jobs.”
“Oh, you’ve had a nice, comfortable deck to work on,” returned the Chief, diving into the bathroom. “You’ve nothing to complain about. I haven’t had these clothes off since the day before yesterday! Been working down in the hold of that collier at a temperature that blew the top off our thermometer.” His voice was drowned by the sound of the shower.
“That is tough! I missed you, old fellow. Where did you sleep?”
“Where did I sleep!” spluttered the Chief. “Not in a downy white bed like you—you son of luxury! I slept, or rather, I tried to sleep in a ship’s hammock!”
Bill chuckled, and began to unlace his shoes. “Pretty difficult to navigate until you get on to them. Hard to get into—”
“Harder still to stay put when you’re once in the darned thing! Gosh-all-hemlock, this water is sure a sweet, cool dream, of Paradise! Let me tell you that my hammock had to be slung between-decks—iron decks, at that. Sleep! I’ve forgotten what it is. Every time I moved in that hammock, the confounded thing dumped me onto that dirty iron deck with a jar that nearly split my head! Push that bell for a steward, please. I want food and plenty of it, and I’m going to eat it in my comfortable bed. Then, I’m going to sleep _and_ sleep until tomorrow morning.”
“Oh, no, you’re not,” said Bill.
“And who says so?”
“Have your supper, by all means, and have it in bed if you like—but you and I have a date.”
“Date nothing! Keep it yourself. I’m only a poor Indian pirate. Neither am I popular with first class passengers.”
“Perhaps not—but this date isn’t with a passenger.”
“Who then?”
“Have you forgotten the wireless operator?”
“Gosh! Do you have to pull that stunt tonight? I’m half dead.”
“So are a few other people. That’s why I’m going to pull it off tonight. Snap out of it, old man. The fortunes, if not the lives of a lot of people depend on what we’re able to accomplish.”
“Well, what are we going to do? You never have spilled that plan of yours. Not to me, anyhow.” He came into the cabin, drying himself with a bath towel.
“You order your chow,” suggested Bill. “If you haven’t used all the hot water aboard ship, I want to get under that shower myself. When I’m dressed and you’re in your right mind, I’ve got to hunt up Charlie and see what he’s found out. We’ll be back later and I’ll explain the job in detail.”
He disappeared into the bathroom, closing the door after him to cut short further argument. It was after seven o’clock by the time Bill was dressed and ready to go on deck. He knew that Charlie would be in the passengers’ dining salon, and that was out of bounds for the ship’s officers. So leaving Osceola attending to a substantial dinner in bed, he went above to the Palm Garden, where the officers’ mess was held.
It was not a talkative crowd at dinner that evening. Every man at the table was dog tired and conversation flagged in consequence. The meal with its many courses seemed interminable to Bill. When at last it was over, he excused himself, while the others were smoking cigars and sipping liqueurs and went in search of young Evans.
Weary sailors were hard at work with hose and swabs on the promenade deck, getting rid of the accumulated grime of the coaling. Bill took a turn round to the opposite side of the ship, where he encountered a similar gang at work, but found no passengers about. Charlie was not in the smoking room. Eventually he found him, listening to the orchestra, which was playing in the lounge.
Without appearing to recognize the youngster, he caught his eye as he sauntered past, surreptitiously crooked a finger and went down to his cabin. There he found Osceola fast asleep in his bed, with all lights burning. He was wondering whether he should wake him then and there, or let him sleep, when Charlie softly opened the door and entered.
Bill put a hand up for silence, and led him into the bathroom. “Better let the poor Chief get some rest,” he said, closing the door. “He’s been going it night and day aboard that collier. He needs the sleep.”
“Well, I don’t, that’s a cinch! We’ve been kept off the decks ever since you fellows started coaling, and sleep was the only thing left to do. Say—did you see the _Blake_ go down?”
“No. I was sure they’d sink her, though, for the Baron told me he was going to take her captain and crew aboard the _Amtonia_ and dispose of her as soon as we got her coal. When did it happen?”
“Just before dinner—about quarter to seven.”
“I was cleaning up in here then.”
“Well, I got a peach of a view from the smoking room windows, with Dad’s field glasses. They cut the ropes and she drifted away from us. It wasn’t five minutes later, when she gave a great lurch and went down bow first. It certainly is a crime, the way the Baron sinks good ships. I guess he had dynamite planted on board just like he did with the _Merrymaid_.”
“Very likely. But there’s nothing we can do about it, Charlie. Not yet awhile. But tell me, what have you found out about that wireless room?”
“Well, since that first evening when we captured the _Blake_, I haven’t been able to get up there. But I did manage to get in soon after the gunfire that night. I copped a couple of Dad’s cigars and gave ’em to the guy who was on duty. These Heinies are a leadpipe cinch to kid. He isn’t such a bad guy at that—showed me the whole business—everything he had. I began to think he’s a swell fellow even if he is a pirate. I got a book on telegraphy out of the library and I’ve been boning up on the Morse Code ever since. That and sleeping. Say, I bet I could send a message now. Receiving’s not so easy, though.”
“Never mind that—”
“But I’m sure I can, Bill—”
“All right—I believe you—but lay off it. I want the dope first. How many operators does this ship run to? Did you find that out?”
“Yep. There’s three of ’em.”
“How long are their watches?”
“Four hours each. But sometimes they’re on for eight hours.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, there are two on duty daytimes—”
“Never mind that either—I’m not interested in their complete schedule. How many operators are in the wireless room now?”
“Only one. He’s doing his trick from eight till midnight.”
“Good. Now we’re getting somewhere. How about from midnight on?”
“Another guy comes on duty then.”
“For how long?”
“Till eight in the morning.”
“He’s alone all that time? Are you sure?”
“Yes. The other two lads relieve him then.”
“Do you know the operator who will go on at twelve tonight?”
“Well, I’m not sure. They vary their watches, you know.”
“I suppose it doesn’t matter,” Bill said to himself. “Tell me, is the door kept locked?”
“No, but they generally keep it shut.”
“Does the night operator sit facing it?”
“No. His back is toward the door.”
“Then that window in the wireless house must be to his right when he’s sending or receiving?”
“Yes, and it’s sure to be open now.”
“Thanks, Charlie. You’ve done splendidly. Run along to bed now. Osceola and I will attend to your friend later.”
Charlie’s face fell. “Aren’t you going to let me in on this?” he pleaded. “Oh, Bill, gee—I did all the work and you two are going to have all the fun!”
“Not much fun about it.” Bill grinned and was silent for a minute. “Well, I reckon we can use you. But you must remember that this is a very serious and dangerous business, Charlie. If anything goes wrong, von Hiemskirk is quite likely to have us shot out of hand. You’ll have to obey orders to the letter, and take no chances.”
“All right, Bill, of course, I will.”
“Okay. Then go to your cabin and turn in. And be back here at one o’clock sharp.”
Charlie’s face was transformed with joy. “Thanks, Bill!”
“Run along now,” directed the older lad. “I’ve got a lot to do before then. And be sure nobody sees you going or coming.”
“They won’t!” promised the youngster. “Say, are we going to shoot this operator?”
“Certainly not, you bloodthirsty wretch. None of us will have guns. Neither Osceola nor I have one.”
“What _are_ we going to do then?”
“Obey orders, kid. Get out of here now—I’m busy!”
Chapter XII THE JOB
When Charlie had gone, Bill glanced at his wrist watch. It was just ten minutes to nine. With a sigh of satisfaction, he picked up his cap. Then, snapping off the electrics in the bathroom and the cabin, he, too, went out.
It had been impossible for him to make preparations for this venture of his since its inception at the beginning of the week. As he went out on deck and forward toward the bridge, he could hardly believe that no longer ago than Monday morning, he had been flying his amphibian north to New York, with Osceola as passenger. Then had come the _Merrymaid_, and capture by these pirates, their flying submarine and the raider, this huge liner whose decks he was walking. That afternoon had come the _Orleans_ affair; in the evening the collier _Blake_ had been taken. Tonight, only Thursday. After the monotony of three days’ coaling, the adventures of Monday seemed far away, except when he stopped to realize that ever since then he had had no leisure whatsoever to develop his plan.
“Good evening, sir.” The guard at the foot of the stair that led to the bridge saluted, and Bill came back to the actual present with a start.
“Good evening, Schmidt.” He returned the man’s salute, and recognized him as one of his derrick’s crew. “You look so spick and span I didn’t know you at first glance.”
“Thank you, sir.” Schmidt smiled, keeping his rifle at present. “And I feel a good bit more comfortable this way, sir. Coaling is filthy work, Lieutenant.”
“Nothing dirtier.” Bill nodded and passed on up the stairs.
Above he found Lieutenant Schneider pacing slowly up and down. “Good evening,” said Bill. “Mind if I join you for a few minutes?”
“I shall be honored, Herr Lieutenant,” returned the officer. “An unlooked-for pleasure. A beautiful night, is it not? But I surmised that like the rest of the mess you turned in directly after dinner.”
“I admit I’m tired,” Bill went on chattily, “quite as tired as the other chaps, after the grind of the last few days. Chief Osceola was completely done up. Had his dinner in bed, and I found him sound asleep when I went below.”
“Don’t speak of bed,” grumbled the officer. “I wish I were there now. It is just my luck to be on duty tonight.”
“I found the cabin hot and stuffy, so I thought I’d come up for a breath of air before turning in. Heading more to northward, since we sank the _Blake_, I see.”
“Yes, the course is nor’nor’east now. Captain von Hiemskirk is heading the ship for the transatlantic passenger ship lane.”
“We don’t seem to be in any hurry, Lieutenant.”
“No, our speed is only sixteen knots. Everybody needs a rest, and the Herr Baron, being a wise man, is saving coal.”
“It sounds foolish of me, a ship’s officer, to admit it, but I honestly have only the haziest idea of our position now.”
“I don’t wonder at that,” laughed Schneider. “The way we changed our course during the past week would make a snake break its back. At noon today we were in latitude 38 degrees north, longitude 62 degrees west—and we aren’t far from there now at the rate we’ve been steaming.”
“Mm—I thought we were much farther east,” remarked Bill, and then changed the subject.
As he had now gained the information he wanted, he chatted for ten minutes more with young Schneider, then, wishing him good night, went below to his cabin.
Here he set the tiny alarm on his watch for twelve-thirty. From the closet, he brought forth a civilian suit of his own, and one of Osceola’s. These, together with two pairs of tennis shoes and two soft felt hats that he found in their bags, he placed on the lounge. Again he dug into the bottom of a kit bag and pulled forth a coil of rope, two monkey wrenches and a flashlight. Placing these conveniently near the clothing, he began to undress. Osceola still slept the sleep of exhaustion. Without awaking him, Bill crept into his bed and turned off the light.
It seemed but a moment or two later, though in reality three hours had crept away, when the tinkle of his alarm bell brought Bill back to a sleepy realization of the job before him. He switched off the alarm and sat up in bed. Osceola’s voice cut the throbbing drone of the ship’s machinery.
“What’s the big idea?”
“Time to get on the job,” Bill murmured in a low tone. “Had you forgotten it? Don’t turn on the light.”
“No, I hadn’t forgotten. You said something about working out a plan of yours tonight. But can’t we put it off for twenty-four hours? I’m bleary-eyed, I’m so tired.”
Bill got out of bed. “So is everybody else aboard this packet. And that’s why we’re pulling it off tonight.”
He tossed Osceola’s clothes on to the chief’s bed. “Here’s an old suit of yours—get into it.”
“Oh, if you say so—” yawned his friend. “What are we going to do with those wrenches? Crack the Baron’s safe?”
“What a pair of eyes you’ve got! I’d forgotten you could see in the dark. No, you big galoot, this is not robbery you’re in for now. We’re going to tie up the wireless operator. I want to do some broadcasting on my own.”
“So that’s the way the wind blows!” Osceola, fully awake now, was pulling on his trousers. “I have to hand it to you, boy, when it comes to action—you act!”
“Come on—I know it’s risky business, but if we’re ever going to break up this nest of pirates, we’ve got to have help.”
“You’re going to wire our position to that cruiser who was on our trail Monday?”
“And to whomever else it may concern—yes, that’s the idea!”
Osceola grunted. “And what is the Herr Baron going to be doing to us while the cruiser is trying to catch us?”
“Not a blooming thing, if the wireless man doesn’t spot who we are. I’ve got a couple of handkerchiefs cut with slits for eyeholes. We can drape them over our lovely features just like real thugs, when we get on deck!”
“Swell!” responded his companion. “Gimme one of those wrenches. I’m all set if you are.”
Bill glanced at the luminous dial of his watch. “We’ll give him three minutes.”
“Give who three minutes?”
“Charlie’s coming with us.”
“What? Not that crazy kid! He’s sure to gum the show.”
“No, he won’t. And we need a lookout, Osceola. The youngster worked like a hero, getting dope about the wireless routine. I know it’s a responsibility to let him take the risk—but the chap was so keen on being in at the death—I simply hadn’t the heart to refuse him.”
“Well, so long as this is your party, I’ll say no more about dragging Charlie into it. But I’d hate to be you if his mother finds out what you’ve let him in for.”
A crack of light appeared under the door, and Charlie opened it, slipped inside and closed the door behind him.
“Here I am,” he whispered.
“Not really,” Osceola whispered back, “why, I thought it was Christmas Eve and Santa Claus had come to fill my stocking!”
“Try the other side of your bed when you get up next time, Chief,” Charlie snickered. “Why the grouch? Don’t lose your nerve. If anybody tries to hurt you, I’ll put salt on his tail.”
Osceola laughed good-humoredly. “You young scamp, if you don’t cut the comedy and do what you’re told tonight, you’ll think you’ve had salt rubbed on yours, along with the hiding you’ll get from me.”
“Thar she blows! thar she blows!” teased Charlie. “What a whale of a guy you are, Chief!”
“Pipe down—both of you!” commanded Bill. “You make more noise than an old maid’s tea party. What do you want to do—wake up the ship?”
“Well, let’s shove off then,” said Charlie in a lower tone, and started for the door.
Bill caught his arm. “Not that way,” he warned. “The ports to this cabin are regular windows, and we’re going out through them. There’s less chance of being seen.”
“Shall I lock the door?” asked Osceola.
“No. If we’re able to pull this off, it will be a case of speed in getting back here. The door may be handier then. Come on—mum’s the word. I’ll go first—”
He stepped onto the window seat. A moment later he was through the broad porthole, and out on deck. Not a soul was in sight. A nod to Osceola brought the Chief to his side and they waited until Charlie reached the deck.
With Bill in the lead, they walked swiftly forward until they came to the open stair leading up to the boat deck. Motioning caution, Bill went silently up the rubber-coated treads with the others close behind. He knew that once above, they would be in plain sight of the bridge. Therefore, before reaching the stairhead, he dropped to his knees and crawled up to the deck level, careful to keep his head below the skyline. Then, turning back to Charlie, he drew the boy’s head close to his lips.
“I want you to stay here!” he whispered. “If anyone comes off the bridge and makes for this stair, run down to the deck below and get out of his way. When he’s gone, come back here. If anyone comes up the stair, crawl into the shadow of that lifeboat. If you see anybody at all going toward the wireless house, whistle twice and beat it back to your cabin, no matter what occurs. Got it clear, now?”
Charlie, tense with excitement and proud of the responsibility given him, nodded mutely. Then he moved to one side while Osceola slipped past him, to lie beside Bill.
Diagonally across the deck from the stairhead aft of the ship’s second funnel was a small superstructure, the little wireless house. Light shone through the open window at the forward end of the structure. Charlie, who had never seen an Indian travel over an open space when the red man didn’t wish to be seen, was surprised to see Bill and Osceola move forward flat on their stomachs. With the sinuous, wriggling motion of snakes, the two slid across the starlit deck. In a few moments he lost sight of them in the shadow of the ship’s great funnel.
“Gee,” he thought. “That sure is some stunt. Some day I’ve got to get one of those guys to show me how they do it.”
In the obscurity of deep shadow, the two plotters got to their feet and adjusted their masks.
“Can you see all right?” whispered Bill. “I wasn’t sure about the eyeholes.”
“I can see. What next?”
“Get that lad in the wireless house from the window. I’ll take the door.”
“Okay. Good luck!”
“Good luck to you. I’ll wait until I hear you speak.”
“I get you.”
Keeping always within the shadow cast by the big stack, and careful to avoid the broad ray of light from the open window, Osceola glided swiftly toward his goal.
The blond young man who sat at the open window, dozing, with a magazine in his lap, awoke with a start.
“Stick up your hands and keep them there!” muttered a low voice.
Just outside the window, the dazed operator saw a white-faced blur in the darkness. The grim figure behind the mask held a black object pointed directly at his head.
Like most North Germans, the wireless expert was a sensible young man. He held up his hands.
Chapter XIII RESULTS
The _Amtonia’s_ wireless operator heard the door at his back open and shut.
“Stand up!” ordered a harsh voice.
The man obeyed immediately, his magazine slipping to the floor. He did not turn to look at this second speaker. The shiny black object in the hand of the ominous figure outside the window held his eyes like an electric magnet.
The chair in which he had been dozing was whisked away. Strong hands gripped his wrists, brought his arms downward. With a speed and thoroughness that bespoke nautical experience, a rope lashed his arms behind his back, first at the elbows and then at the wrists.
Next, a cloth was bound over his eyes. A gag, made of a rolled-up handkerchief was stuffed in his mouth and fastened by a band of cloth tied at the back of his head. He felt wads of cotton being placed in his ears and his ankles were then strapped together. He was grasped by the shoulders, caught round the knees and lifted to a narrow couch where a cushion was slipped under his head. Deaf, dumb and blind, he nevertheless knew that he lay on the locker which ran along the farther side of the room. He also knew that locker to be little more than a narrow shelf, and at least four feet from the floor. If he moved an inch, he’d get a tumble. He therefore lay still and tried to imagine which of the passengers he had to thank for his present predicament.
“I reckon he’ll do,” said Osceola, studying the bound figure on the locker. “It’s lucky he didn’t try to put up a fight. Things might have got messy.”
“Would you have, in his place?” Bill was taking in the details of the room and spoke rather absently.
“No—can’t say I would. The poor beggar was scared stiff. That wrench stunt was a happy thought. In the darkness, I guess it passed darned well for an automatic!”
“Say, look at the map on the wall over there. These lads certainly have a system!”
“What are those colored pins stuck all over it supposed to be—ships?”
“Yes. Ships within a radius of several hundred miles that have been sending out radio messages.”
“But how does he do it?”
“Oh, I guess our little operator is clever all right. I’m no wireless expert and there are a lot of gadgets in here that I don’t understand. Undoubtedly they’re delicate instruments by which the operator is able to determine the approximate distance and direction of any ship sending out messages. You see, he keeps this map constantly before him, charted with the probable positions of ships. He changes the pins when his new readings seem to be in error. This is how the noble Baron knows exactly what is going on in his neighborhood. Just as if he were looking down on the sea from the moon with a telescope!”
“That list up there beside the chart is the key to the colored pins, I suppose.”
“Sure. There’s the _Stamford_.” Bill pointed to a gray pin. “Well, here’s where I get busy. The sooner that cruiser is put wise to our position, the better.”
“But how did you find out where we are?” Osceola looked his surprise. “When have you had a chance to shoot the sun? Do you keep a pocket sextant up your sleeve? Or are you just guessing?”
“Nothing like that. A sight must be taken when the sun reaches it’s highest point. I got the dope tonight from Schneider. While you were asleep, I went on the bridge and got him to give me our position this noon.”
“But that’s more than twelve hours ago!”
“Certainly. But I also found out the speed and direction we’ve been steaming this afternoon and evening. Where we are now is a simple sum in arithmetic.”
“I know, but—”
“Gee, fella, when we’re out of this mess, I’ll take a week or two off and go into detail. But right now, I’ve got to raise the _Stamford_!”
He sat down in the chair before the sending apparatus and adjusted the earphones. Then his left hand sought the sending key and the room was filled with the crash and snap of electric discharges.
Osceola took up a pencil and pad from the table. For a moment he scribbled, then placed the written sheet in front of Bill.
“Go easy!” the message read. “You’ll wake up the whole ship!”
Bill smiled and shook his head. He was sending call after call out for the _Stamford_. In his right hand he held a pencil. Presently Osceola’s note was passed back with a few lines scrawled below his own.
“Don’t worry. These fellows are continually sending out fake messages in order to gain information from other ships. I’ve heard them. If nothing was sent during this watch, somebody on the bridge would be sure to smell a rat.”
Osceola drew up a chair and sat down. Fascinated, he watched Bill’s left hand pressing the sending key, calling—calling—calling. The young Seminole’s education had been academic, not scientific, and his knowledge of radio was only rudimentary. Although the International Morse Code of dash-dot letters was as much of a mystery to him as it is to the average layman, he soon realized that his friend was sending out the same short message over and over again.
Suddenly Bill lifted his hand from the key. He smiled at Osceola, nodded and commenced to write hurriedly on the pad before him. The Seminole leaned over and watched intently.
“This is the _Stamford_. Who calls?” he read.
Again Bill’s supple fingers pressed out an answer—a long one this time. And for the next fifteen minutes the crash and crackle of an electric storm reverberated through the room.
Presently he stopped.
“You raised the cruiser, I take it.” Osceola only half stifled a yawn.
“I did that, old sport!” Bill was delighted with his success. “Got all the dope over in great style. Told the operator aboard her who I was and a short story of our capture. Dad probably thinks we were both lost at sea, you know. The _Stamford_, will relay a message, assuring him of our safety. Then I tapped out details of this ship, the _Flying Fish_, their crews and armament. Last of all I gave our position, course and speed. By this time, she and some other craft of Uncle Sam’s are making tracks for us.”
“You’re sure a right smart feller, Bill.”
Bill laughed. “I agree with you, Big Chief.”
“About when do you reckon they’ll catch up with us?”
“Sometime tomorrow—or, rather, this afternoon. And then—boy, oh, boy! There will be one sweet little rough house!”
“There’ll probably be one aboard this sweet little packet as you call her, before that,” prophesied the Seminole.
“How come?”
“The Herr Baron is sure to raise an awful stink when he finds that lad on the locker!”
“We should fret over that. We’ll both be sleeping the sleep of the just long before that time!”
“Well, I vote we get out of here and right now. This ain’t a healthy place for either you or me. And say, I’m dead enough to go to sleep under an ice-cold shower!”
“Wait a minute. We don’t want to leave any clues. Grab that paper I was writing on, will you?”
As he talked. Bill was busily engaged in undoing nuts and screws which he stuffed in his pockets, snapping wires and playing general havoc with the radio apparatus.
“Smash that line of glass jars on the shelf with your wrench,” he added, bringing his own down on the sending key with a crash. “There isn’t going to be any radio business aboard the _Amtonia_ when our friends arrive, if I can help it!”
“What’s to stop the _Flying Fish_ getting wise with their wireless?” inquired Osceola, who was systematically wrecking everything within reach.
“Oh, they haven’t much of a wireless outfit aboard the sub. This bunch of junk in here was the one that counted.”
“Bunch of junk is right—” Osceola stopped short.
He stood facing a small mirror that hung on the wall above the wet cells he had just destroyed. Reflected in the small oblong he saw the door to the deck open slowly—and Baron von Hiemskirk walked into the room.
“So!” he exclaimed harshly. “Passengers—mutiny!”
He got no further. As Osceola jumped for the switch to snap off the light, Bill dived through the air, tackling the commander just above his knees. There came a crash as the Baron’s head hit the deck—then darkness.
Osceola ran to the doorway. The Baron lay prone. Bill was bending over him.
“Nine—ten—out!” said that young gentleman rather breathlessly. “Grab his legs, big boy. We’ll move him inside. It’s a little too public out here for comfort.”
Together they carried the big man into the wireless house and deposited him on the floor.
“Here’s a bight of rope,” said Bill, switching on the light again. “Tie up his ankles—I’ll attend to his wrists.”
“Shall we gag him?”
“No, he’s breathing pretty hard. Slight concussion, probably. The back of his head hit the decking an awful crack. I don’t want him to choke to death.”
Osceola finished lashing the Baron’s legs together and stood up. “He’s a right powerful brute. Got a pair of legs like tree-trunks. Say,” he began to laugh, “I didn’t think our job would be done up as brown as all this tonight! That was a swell tackle of yours. The longer he’s out the better pleased I’ll be. That guy has never made a hit with me. I’m only sorry I didn’t get a crack at him. If you’ve got an extra wipe, pass it over. A blindfold won’t stop his breathing, and there’s no need for him to know where he is when he wakes up.”
“Okay. I’ve unhooked the collar of his blouse,” Bill said, surveying their captive critically. “He’ll do. Give me a hand with the other guy, now. I’m going to take out his gag and give him a drink.”
“Going to leave it out?”
“Sure, I’m no inquisitor!”
“But how about it when the pair of them start yelling for help?”
“With the door and window shut, this place is pretty well soundproof. Anyway, the Baron isn’t likely to kick up much of a row—not for a couple of days yet, if I know the signs. The operator couldn’t hear him if he did. I’m leaving the cotton in his ears. Make it snappy—I want to beat it while the going’s good.”
A few minutes later, two dark figures crossed the boat deck to the stairhead, ran lightly down and after climbing into their cabin by way of the open port, hurriedly undressed in the dark.
“By Jove!” Osceola paused in the act of removing a shoe. “I wonder what became of Charlie?”
“Oh, I guess he’s all right. I told him to vamoose if it looked like he’d get caught. He’s probably sound asleep in his bunk by this time.”
“Hope so. He’s a sassy brat, but I wouldn’t want him to get into trouble with the lads who run this ship. They’re likely to turn nasty when they find their beloved Baron has cracked his nut.”
“Charlie,” said Bill, “is quite capable of taking care of himself. Put away those clothes you were wearing. If anybody comes snooping round here looking for clues, those civvies would give us away. I’m pretty sure His Nibs didn’t recognize us. I ducked my head and the brim of my hat threw my face in shadow. You had your back turned. Too bad, though, we’d pocketed our masks—”
“Confound!” Osceola sprang for the door. “I’ve got to go up there again!”
“But what on earth for? Leave well enough alone, guy.”
“I’ve got to—it’s those handkerchiefs of yours, Bill.”
“The ones we used as blindfolds? By gosh, you’re right.”
“Of course I am. And we were idiots not to remember that all your wipes are initialled! Well, that was a bloomer we both made.”
Bill crawled into bed, and pulled up the sheet.
“Oh, no, we didn’t,” he retorted sleepily.
“How come?”
“Har-har! Had you goin’, didn’t I? Why, I changed the one on the wireless lad—found two in the Baron’s pockets, y’ see. The one you used on him was his own—the other’s on his little roommate!”
“Well, I’m a son-of-a-seacook! That’s a good one. I wonder if the rest of the bunch will figure that ‘they done it all themselves’? Smart work, Bill. You’re as full of ideas as Martinengo’s ship’s biscuit was of weevils!”
“Right the first and last time. Now shut up! I’m asleep.” Bill turned over, his back to the room, and buried his face in his pillow.
Chapter XIV TROUBLE AHEAD
“Isn’t that someone pounding the door?”
“You tell ’em!” sleepily suggested the chief, covering his face with a pajamaed arm to shut out the morning light.
“Oh, Lord!” Bill groaned and crawled out of bed. He glanced at his wrist watch. It was exactly seven-thirty.
He unlocked the door and a steward clicked his heels together and stood at attention.
“Well?” growled Bill.
“Commander Geibel’s compliments, sir—and will the gentlemen be good enough to meet him at half past eight in the executive office for officers’ conference.”
“Right-o. Give Commander Geibel our compliments—and say we’ll be there.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Bill shut the door, and looked over at Osceola. The chief was fast asleep again. Bill went into the bathroom, where an ice-cold shower worked wonders. When he returned to the cabin after a strenuous rub with a rough towel, he carried a dripping sponge with which he scientifically massaged Osceola’s face.
“Hey there! Cut it out!” The chief sprang from his bed as though he had had an electric shock.
“What’s the huge idea?” he stormed.
“The Exec.” said Bill, “wants to see us at eight-thirty sharp. It is now seven-forty-four. And we both want breakfast, I expect. Get under a shower and you won’t feel so crabby.”
“Um!” Osceola was considerably subdued by this news. “Think he smells a rat?”
“Oh, not a chance, so far as we’re concerned. We’d be in the brig by this time if he did!”
“Good enough!” yawned Osceola, scowling furiously as he stretched the kinks out of his powerful arms.
“Hop to it, then. I’m nearly dressed—and I’m hungry enough to eat shoe-leather.”
“All right, all right—don’t lose your shirt over it. I’ll be with you in a jiffy.” The bathroom door slammed and again came the sound of rushing water as the shower was turned on.
At eight-thirty sharp the two lads found Commander Geibel seated at his desk in the Executive Office, and took their places among the other ship’s officers. There was none of the joviality which usually preambled these meetings. The _Amtonia’s_ commissioned personnel seemed utterly mute this morning. Instead of the accustomed good-natured chaff, the various officers merely nodded to each other as they took their places and sat down. Bill noticed that all wore expressions of deep solemnity, yet the atmosphere of the cabin was charged with a current of tense excitement.
The nautical clock on the wall struck one bell. Commander Geibel, who had been studying papers on his desk blotter, came to life.
“Gentlemen—” he leaned forward, one hand on the papers before him, “I have here the report of first assistant wireless operator, Miller. Had I not seen Miller when he was first found with our beloved captain, I could not have believed this outrage possible. We, who have prided ourselves on the most efficient and strict discipline maintained on this ship, can no longer be proud. As a number of you gentlemen already know, at about one o’clock this morning, two passengers who were masked overpowered Miller in the wireless room and wrecked the premises. While these vandals were at work, the Herr Captain, Baron von Hiemskirk, entered the room, where these ruffians surprised him.”
“Pardon, sir,” interrupted the ship’s first lieutenant, Lieutenant-Commander Beerman. “It is rumored that the Herr Baron is seriously injured. Will you be good enough to ease our minds concerning the Herr Baron’s condition? I understand that he was knocked unconscious.”
“That is so, Herr Beerman. I regret to tell you gentlemen that he is still unconscious, and may continue in that state for a day or two. Doctor Thierfelder diagnoses his condition as concussion—a slight concussion only, I am thankful to say. The Herr Doctor, who is with him now, believes that Baron von Hiemskirk received a blow from a blunt instrument. Luckily, his service cap partially protected his head. With care, and no complications, our Captain will probably be able to get about again within a week.”
“May I ask,” inquired Bill, “what punishment has been meted out to the perpetrators of this dastardly crime?”
“I am sorry to say that they have not been apprehended, Lieutenant.”
“But I thought you spoke of two passengers, Herr Commander?”
“Miller states that the two men were dressed in civilian clothes. One of them at least had a revolver with which he menaced the operator, while the other bound him. As you know, every passenger, upon boarding this ship, was searched and his luggage thoroughly inspected for arms. Another search of their cabins has been made this morning. No weapons of any description have been found.”
Lieutenant Schneider caught the Commander’s attention. “I was on the bridge while this crime was being committed. During that time, I am certain that messages were radioed from the wireless room.”
“A very important fact, Herr Schneider, and one confirmed by Miller. Due to the cotton that had been placed in his ears, he was unable to decipher anything, but he is convinced that one or more messages were sent.”
“Could we not ascertain who among the passengers is capable of sending such messages?” It was the Chief Engineer who spoke.
The Executive Officer shook his head.
“Of course all possible suspects will be questioned,” he said. “I doubt, however, if we can learn much. Fifteen of our passengers are yacht owners. Three more are high executives of broadcasting corporations. Any of these men may understand wireless. On the other hand, all of them will probably deny it. But this is not so important. Outside of broadcasting a description of this ship, they can have sent little or no information, as they have no possible means of ascertaining the ship’s position. I must urge you all, nevertheless, to be more than ever on the alert. Now, one thing more, and we may go to our various duties.”
The Executive Officer cleared his throat and proceeded.
“Baron von Hiemskirk keeps muttering over and over in his delirium, ‘_Er ist einer Footballer_’—‘He is a football player—.’ These words may mean nothing; on the other hand, they may be the means of identifying his assailants. Until our beloved Captain regains his reason, nothing can be done about it. Thank you, gentlemen, for your interest and attention. I bid you all goodmorning.”
The meeting dispersed, the officers going their several ways. Bill and Osceola, having no duties to perform, strolled around the promenade deck.
“It is to be hoped that our beloved Captain does not regain his reason until this ship has been captured by the battleships on her trail,” muttered Osceola to Bill, mimicking the Executive Officer’s formal manner of address.
Bill nodded thoughtfully. “You said a mouthful, boy. I’m afraid you and I will be in for it good and plenty if he wakes up beforehand. That bunch we just left are a dumb crew. But there are no flies on the skipper. He had our histories down pat from the newspapers when we met him on the _Merrymaid_. He’s sure to know you play on Carlisle and that I’m on the Navy eleven. What with our previous record, so to speak, in the way of cleaning up dirty messes, that guy won’t miss any bets. We’ll be judged on suspicion if nothing else.”
“I wonder why Charlie didn’t warn us that the Baron was making for the wireless house?”
“Probably didn’t get a chance. If the kid had been caught, we’d have heard of it before this. Schneider told me that all passengers are being confined to their cabins, so we won’t see him today. Charlie and his doings don’t worry me just now—but the weather does!”
“What’s the matter with the weather?”
“See that haze over there to the northward? We’re steaming into fog.”
“You think that even if the _Stamford_ catches up to within firing distance we might be able to elude her after all?”
“That’s the big idea. In about half an hour we won’t be able to see ten feet over the side.”
“Well, maybe we’ll run through it by this afternoon. The _Stamford_ won’t catch up to us for some hours yet.”
“Maybe so,” replied Bill. “We’ve done all we could, anyway. From now on, the job’s up to the Navy.”
“Hello!” cried Osceola, as they swung round the end of the superstructure and into the long stretch of deck on the port side. “Look off yonder! What do you make that out to be?”
Bill shaded his eyes. The glare of the smooth ocean was dazzling in the sun. Away to the northeast a ship was nosing out of fog banks that lined the northern horizon.
“That looks to me mighty like a warship!” said the chief excitedly. “She certainly is humping it, brother. But I thought the _Stamford_ was to the south of us—and when she came, she’d come from behind!”
“You’ve certainly got a pair of eyes—and she certainly _is_ a warship. I can’t make her out very well at that distance, but she looks to me like a first class cruiser of the Plymouth type. Dollars to ditchwater the _Stamford_ wirelessed her! She’s heading for us all right, all right. Oh, boy—there’s going to be something doing aboard this packet in two shakes of a lamb’s tail!”
“Thar she blows!” sang out the chief, as the gong and bugle sounded for action.
“And it’s quite time you and I beat it for our battle stations. Everything is being made ready for attack. If we’re late, it won’t look so good.”
Osceola stopped and stared at Bill. “Don’t tell me that you, a midshipman of the United States Navy, are going to help these bum pirates fight one of your own battleships!”
Bill looked at him and laughed. “Some patriotic little flagwaver, aren’t you,” he jeered. “No, Herr Junior Lieutenant, I do not intend to shoot at the _Plymouth_ or the _Reading_, or whatever’s the name of that cruiser. Have you never played hare and hounds, Big Chief? Well, this time, you and I and everybody on board are hares. Those two 117-mm. guns forward, and the two on the poop are all right for scaring passenger liners and bringing unarmed merchant-men to haul down their colors. But they haven’t the caliber or the range of three-quarters of the guns aboard that cruiser. This is going to be a race—not a battle! Beat it!”
Chapter XV THE CHASE
By the time Bill reached his station on the poop, the quiet routine aboard the liner had given way to activity. The _Amtonia_ was awake to the heat and fever of desperate life.
Lieutenant Schneider, who was in command of the gun, seized Bill’s arm. “Bolton!” he cried, “look there—she’s changed her course! She’s going to head us off!”
Shading his eyes with his hand, Bill strained them toward the northern horizon. The great molten surface of the sun was already half obliterated by the spreading bank of fog that turned the sea to dull amethyst.
“I doubt it,” he replied. “If that fog keeps increasing, the visibility will soon be too poor for the cruiser to get our range.”
“There is Commander Geibel on the bridge. The ship is in good hands—that is a blessing!” Lieutenant Schneider’s tone betrayed his excitement.
“We’re sheering off to starboard—” said Bill. “That’s good news. It’s going to be a close thing, just the same.”
Schneider jumped on the rail and leaned outward in order to get a better view of the forward end of the ship.
“The Exec. has left the bridge!” he cried. “What’s happened now?”
“Calm down! He’s probably run down the steps and crossed that gangway to the foremast. Yes, there he is! See him? He’s climbed up to the lookout. Gosh, that lad’s got a voice. You can hear him bellowing orders all over the ship, I’ll bet.”
“He’s a good officer,” admitted the Lieutenant, getting off the rail. “Too bad the Herr Baron is not able to take command. He would use the _Flying Fish_ to get us out of this mess.” He pointed to the submarine racing along off their starboard quarter. “_Donner und Blitzen!_ I believe she is going to submerge!”
“The very best thing she could do, under the circumstances,” Bill asserted. “What would you have her do—head over yonder and let go a torpedo?”
“Wasn’t she built for that kind of thing?” Lieutenant Schneider’s tone was still nettled.
“Perhaps she was, but not in a position of this kind. That cruiser would blow her out of the water before she got near enough to make a torpedo effective!”
“If that’s the case, why don’t you go aboard her and get busy with her in the air?”
“And stop both the _Flying Fish_ and ourselves while a boat is being lowered and I am ferried over to her? Even if the _Amtonia_ was able to get away, the _Flying Fish_ would be blown to pieces long before she was ready to take off. Weren’t you in the merchant service before you shipped aboard this raider?”
“I was—but why?”
“Commander Geibel was an officer in the Imperial German Navy. He fought through the war. I’ve never been in action before, but I’ve had a couple of years at the U. S. Naval Academy and I know that our Commander is doing the one thing possible to save his ships.”
“Then I suppose you think it a waste of time and effort for us to be manning the guns?”
Bill laughed good-naturedly and clapped the incensed lieutenant on the shoulder. “Let’s not fight about it. Clearing for action and manning the guns is okay. It’s splendid discipline and helps the morale of the crew. But you know just as well as I do, Schneider, that if we win out, coal will do it, not gunpowder.”
“I’m sorry,” apologized the German, and offered his hand.
Bill took it, feeling rather silly.
“Here it comes!” he cried a moment later, as a white cloud of smoke enveloped the cruiser’s forward turret.
“Missed!” exclaimed the lieutenant. “I can’t hand your compatriots much on their shooting, Bolton. That shot didn’t come within a thousand meters of the ship.”
“That was just meant as a warning,” explained Bill. “Those gunners know they aren’t yet within range of this ship. It’s the next five minutes that’s going to tell the tale.”
Lieutenant Schneider studied the battleship through his sea glasses. “She’s steaming more to the eastward,” he remarked sharply.
“And we’ve sheered off a point or two. The fog’s coming our way—and coming fast. It’s getting darker by the minute. The sun’s almost washed out. Gosh, this is better than a horse race. Doesn’t it give you a thrill, Schneider?”
The young officer grimaced. “Not the kind of thrill I enjoy, thank you. If that cruiser suddenly blew up, I shouldn’t weep. There—she’s firing again. Oh, if our guns could only carry over to her!”
This time the projectile struck the water a bare twenty yards ahead of the speeding liner. So close was it that those aboard the _Amtonia_ felt the spray from the geyser that shot skyward.
“We’re within their range, now, that’s a cinch!” Bill said calmly.
“Do you think they’ll hull us, knowing that there are passengers aboard, Bolton?”
“They’re sure to, unless Commander Geibel puts on the brakes. It’s his responsibility, not theirs. That last shot was an order to stop. The Commander is paying no attention to it. He’s evidently decided to take the risk. You can’t blame him. Give us another minute and we’ll be in the fog. Those prisoners below-decks, or passengers, as you call them, will have to take their chance with the rest of us—”
There came a terrific crash which jarred the ship from end to end. Every man of the gun crew was thrown to the deck. For several seconds the _Amtonia_ trembled like a live thing in agony. Her speed slackened materially. But before the dazed men could scramble to their feet, she was blanketed in a protecting cloak of fog. Bells rang, men shouted orders, and the wounded ship swung round to the northwest with a suddenness that sent her over at a sharp angle while the crew went rolling into the starboard scuppers.
There was no more firing from the cruiser. The race, for the time being, was over.
“That,” said Bill, as he picked himself up, “is what I call a direct hit.”
“Don’t I know it!” stormed Schneider. “If my knee isn’t fractured it’s no fault of this deck!” He limped over to the rail and leaned against it. “Thanks be to Neptune for this fog—that’s a blessing, if nothing else is!”
“Never mind,” chaffed Bill. “When the skipper wakes up he’ll pin an iron cross on you. First casualty, you know. Wounded in the line of duty and all that—which reminds me,” he went on more seriously, “that there are likely to be other casualties aboard. That shot struck somewhere aft, if I know anything about it.”
“Look here,” said Schneider. “I’ve got to remain with the gun crew until we’re released from this duty. Suppose you go forward. See the Commander, if you can. If he’s not on the bridge, speak to whoever is in charge, and find out what the damage is. The ship is no more than limping along now. I’m sure there is serious trouble somewhere. Tell the Commander I’m standing by with these men and if extra help is needed, they can get busy at once. There’s nothing to do here. Oh, I forgot to say—give him my compliments. My knee is paining me so, I can hardly think!”
“Don’t worry,” chuckled Bill. “I won’t disgrace you. Bye-bye. I’ll fetch some liniment from the dispensary on my way back, if I can.”
He touched his cap and ran forward.
En route he met several parties of men hurrying toward companionways, but without stopping to question them, he made his way with all possible speed to the steps which led to the bridge and raced up. There he encountered Lieutenant Commander Hoffman, the navigation officer. He came to attention three paces in front of the frowning officer and saluted him.
“Lieutenant Schneider’s compliments, sir,” he said crisply. “The lieutenant wishes to know if his gun crew can be of service to you. He knows, of course, that the ship was hit, but so far has received no further information or orders.”
“Thank Lieutenant Schneider for me,” the officer replied with all the ramrod formality of the Imperial German Navy. “Say to him that the schwein-dog cruiser shot off one of our propellers. What other damage has been done, I have not as yet ascertained, but I believe it to be of a minor character. Commander Geibel has gone below to investigate. Until he returns, it will be well for the Lieutenant to stand by with his gun crew and await orders.”
“Aye, aye, sir.” Bill had been standing rigidly at attention while Herr Hoffman discoursed. His first salute had been of the type that any Navy Man would term “seagoing,” but into his parting gesture, he put all the snap that only an Annapolis Midshipman is capable of. Turning smartly on his heel, he ran lightly down the steps.
“Perhaps that will hold him for a while,” he muttered, making for a companionway. “Discipline is discipline, but that guy talks as if you were bilge under his feet, the pompous, hard-boiled egg! Dollars to ditchwater that pirate was either a C.P.O. or a Warrant when the Dutchmen had a Navy. That kind are always the snootiest when they’re sprouting gold stripes!”
Which was gross libel, as it happened, but it soothed Bill’s feelings, and he found himself whistling Yankee Doodle as he ran down to the ship’s dispensary.
“Lieutenant Schneider got a crack on the knee,” he told the mate in charge. “Got a bottle of liniment handy?”
“There’s enough stuff here to stock a hospital, sir. If the Lieutenant is willing, I’ll go with him. All I’ve done on this voyage is to hand out medicine and hold basins for seasick women. It will be a real pleasure, if my officer permits. Herman can look after the shop.”
“Your officer permits, all right,” laughed Bill. “Grab your bottle, Jack, and come along.”
“Thank you, sir,” beamed the man. He picked up a large black bag and heaving it to his shoulder, strode down the passage after Bill.
Back on the poop, Bill found Osceola talking to Lieutenant Schneider, who seemed in considerable pain. While the dispensary’s man brought out liniment and gauze and began to ease the young German’s suffering, Bill delivered Lieutenant Commander Hoffman’s message. Then the two friends moved over to the rail.
“I’ve just come up from the engine room,” said the Seminole. “There was a good deal of confusion below when the propeller was shot off, and the engines were racing and all. Things have quieted down a bit now. The chief told Geibel that the propeller was taken off clean as a whistle. He went down the shaft-tunnel and found she was leaking a little through the stuffing-box, but nothing to write home about. His men are attending to that and we’re running on the other propeller now. Nobody hurt, I’m glad to say.”
“I don’t think the Commander will try to have another fitted onto the shaft while we’re at sea,” remarked Bill.
“No. That’s why I looked you up as soon as I could. I heard him tell the chief engineer that it was his intention to make at once for their base. They didn’t go into detail, but from what they said I guess it’s an almost landlocked harbor on the Maine coast.”
“That’s news,” declared Bill. “Good news! Once we’re in touch with land our chances of escape will be a thousand percent better. Hello—” he broke off, “what are these chaps up to?”
Six seamen, armed with rifles, a Chief Petty Officer and Lieutenant Brinkerhoff, whom they both knew slightly, were advancing along the deck toward them.
“Lieutenants Bolton and Osceola,” said the officer stiffly, “you are hereby placed under arrest.”
Bill’s eyebrows shot up. “And by whose orders—may I ask?”
“By order of the Herr Baron von Hiemskirk,” thundered the officer. “You gentlemen will come with me at once, if you please!”
Chapter XVI PRISONERS
The seamen closed in about Bill and Osceola and they were marched off, walking side by side.
“Our noble Captain has evidently waked up,” said Bill in an undertone to his friend. “Here’s where we catch it, good and plenty!”
“You think then that he did recognize us last night?” Osceola’s voice was lowered to a whisper.
Bill nodded. “One or both of us. We can’t deny it, you know. He’d only make it the worse for those innocent suspects Geibel was talking about.”
“What do you suppose he’ll do?”
“Shoot us—very likely.”
“But, Bill—”
Lieutenant Brinkerhoff’s acid voice cut him short. “My orders are that you gentlemen will refrain from all conversation. You will be good enough to obey.”
Bill shrugged and Osceola nodded his acceptance of this dictum. They moved forward in silence.
With the ramrod form of Brinkerhoff leading the way, the little procession filed along the decks until they reached the captain’s cabin. Here the lieutenant knocked, then entered, closing the door.
Presently he reappeared and beckoned them inside. Bill noted that two of the armed seamen followed them over the threshold. Apparently the wounded captain was taking no chances of further assault.
They found Baron von Hiemskirk propped up in bed with a pile of pillows at his back. Around his head was a linen bandage. He looked pale and ill and seemed to be in some pain. Seated beside the bed Commander Geibel watched him devotedly, and at the foot stood the ship’s doctor.
At a sign from Brinkerhoff, the lads approached the sick man. He opened his eyes and looked at them with a keen, appraising glance.
“So—my young friends,” he sneered. “You couldn’t leave well enough alone, but must try to interfere with the excellent routine of my ship, eh?”
“When you captured us last Monday,” said Bill, “and we had our chat aboard the _Merrymaid_, I warned you that we would do our best to make things hot for you and your crew if you insisted upon our working for you. I believe you understood my warning. At that time you said that your system was perfect. And that we were at liberty to do what we could to disrupt it so long as we attended to the duties given us.”
“Ah! So you do not deny wrecking the ship’s wireless last night, and sending messages to enemy warships? Not to mention your attack upon my person—and the vast amount of trouble your disgraceful conduct has caused my officers and crew today?”
“No, we do not deny it,” Bill asserted steadily. “Chief Osceola and I did exactly what you describe. But believe me when I say that it was no part of our plan that you should be injured. You have been courteous to us on board here. We both regret your—accident.”
“Thank you. But that does not alter the rest of it.”
“No. My duty as an officer of the United States Navy is to break up your pirate organization by any means in my power.”
“And my duty, as Captain of this ship, is to have you both executed for mutiny. You are aware of that, of course?”
“I want to tell you, Baron,” Bill continued earnestly. “That I alone am to blame. It was my plan and only mine. Chief Osceola worked under my orders throughout.”
Osceola took a step forward. “Oh, cut out all this formality!” His dark eyes flashed, first on the Baron and then on Bill. “And don’t you try taking all the blame yourself. I’m just as guilty as you are. What’s more, you know right well that if I’d had my way I’d have thrown that Hun welcher over the rail instead of bothering to tie him up!”
“Be quiet, Osceola,” warned his friend. “I’m running our end of this show.”
“Not now, you’re not—by a darn sight, Bill! I’ve got a few words to say to the captain myself. Baron von Hiemskirk,” he turned to the big man on the bed, “do you realize that if you have us murdered, you put a rope around your own neck and the necks of every one of your officers and crew?”
“One has to catch his fish before eating it,” said von Hiemskirk.
“True. And every warship on the Atlantic has a description of this particular fish by now. Are you egotist enough to believe that you can buck the Naval forces of the world and get away with it? Don’t tell me that you, who have made an enemy of all society by your racketeering and piracy, spare crews and passengers of captured ships through any motive of kindness! You are afraid to send them to the bottom. Why? Because, Herr Baron von Bluff, you are afraid to kill them! You know the penalty for murder—you have funked it every time.”
“Ah! But not this time, young man. Secrets have a way of leaking out aboard ship, I admit. But in your case we shall take no chances whatever. In a day or two, you will be removed from the _Amtonia_ and disappear completely and effectually, far from the haunts of men.”
“If,” said Bill, “you think you will be any safer in the state of Maine than you are on the high seas—”
The Baron started up in bed. “And what do you know about the state of Maine?” he thundered, visibly perturbed.
“Only what I broadcasted last night,” grinned Bill. “As you remarked just now, ‘secrets have a way of leaking out on shipboard.’ You have implicit confidence in your officers and crew of course. Did it never occur to you that there might be a traitor amongst your devoted band?”
“Away with them!” shouted the Baron, now thoroughly angry.
“Just one moment—may I say a few words?”
The Baron was the type of bully who loves to see a victim cringe. From the young Seminole’s tone, he was sure the lad was frightened, and that he would beg for his life.
“Make it short. What is it you want to say?”
“Only this, sir. With such a captain, the Jolly Roger is no longer a fitting ensign for this ship. May I, in all humility, suggest that instead of a white skull and crossed bones on a black field, you substitute a lollipop? A green one would be appropriate—and floating on a broad field of bright yellow!”
“T-take them away!” stuttered the Baron, purple with rage.
As they were hustled along the passageway, they could hear him hoarsely shouting invective after them. But as his further rantings were in German, Osceola understood not a word of it.
“What’s he saying?”
“Plenty,” murmured Bill. “It would make me blush to tell you.”
As the brawny seaman who had Osceola by the arm, reminded him of the order for silence, Osceola merely chuckled. But he continued to do so until they were far below the waterline in the very bowels of the ship.
Eventually they came to a long passage running fore and aft. Electric bulbs in the ceiling brightly lighted the corridor on either side of which doors opened into tiny cabins, evidently the quarters for stewards and the ship’s petty officers. Half way down a steel-barred gate blocked this passageway from floor to ceiling. Before it lounged an armed sentry.
The man straightened to attention as the party approached. Brinkerhoff presented a paper which he read carefully.
“Very good, sir,” he pocketed the order and saluted. “All cells are full, sir, except the first on the right. Better stick them in there.”
He unlocked the gate while the Lieutenant pushed Bill and Osceola into an empty cell. Without a word the officer slammed shut the door. The gate clanged and they were left together in their prison.
The cell boasted no illumination of its own. What light and ventilation there was came through the door, which, like the gate in the passage, was constructed of crossed bars of steel. It was no more than a cubby-hole. There were two narrow bunks, one above the other on one side; across from these, a washbowl and toilet. There was no other furniture. Both the cell and the corridor were terribly hot and stuffy.
“Well, this isn’t so bad, I’ve had worse quarters,” Bill remarked philosophically. “When the Baron took over this ship and needed a special brig for his prisoners, he slapped that gate into the passageway and put others in place of the doors to these cabins. The sidewalls are of wood. If we had some tools, it wouldn’t be such a job to get out of here.”
“Humph! but we haven’t any! And _if_ we had, and could cut our way through into the next cabin, outside the gate, where would we go from there?”
They were speaking in whispers, for the sentry outside the gate was only a yard or so from their door.
“Well, we’ve been in worse fixes. This will take some thinking out,” answered Bill.
“Worse fixes?” Osceola’s shoulders moved impatiently. “I doubt it.” He sat down on the edge of a bunk. “Just because these bozos have been more or less polite, don’t get the idea they aren’t dangerous customers. That Baron means to put our lights out. You got him worried when you sprung that Maine story on him, and I purposely got him just as angry as I could.”
“What was your big idea?”
“Why, I figured that when he thought it over later, it would lead him to believe we really did have something up our sleeves—some certain means of rescue or escape. A big bully like he is would reason that we’d never have the nerve to bait him otherwise.”
“You think it may help to postpone the—er—evil day?”
“I am hoping so. If I size that guy up right, he’ll make watchful waiting his cue for a few days anyway. He’ll want to see if anything really happens before he puts his own head into a noose.”
“And _when_ nothing happens, we’ll be put on the spot for that same reason!”
“Tomorrow’s always another day, Bill. Say, you’re not up to your usual form this morning. I’ll bet you got no sleep last night. You’d better turn in now and take a siesta.”
“I’ll do that soon, Osceola. But I’m interested in our fellow prisoners. You know, we’re lucky—our one consolation is that there wasn’t room in this dump to separate us.”
“You bet.” Osceola yawned and standing up, stripped down to a pair of shorts. “I’ve got the dope on those lads,” he said, as he climbed into the upper berth. “I heard Geibel telling the Chief Engineer that he’d jailed all the suspects on the wireless business. We’re down here with a bunch of multi-millionaires. Does that make you feel any better?”
“It certainly does!”
“How come?” whispered the chief from his bunk.
“Why, don’t you see? With all the gaff we gave the Baron, he’ll suspect we’re in cahoots with one or more of them—and keep them down here, where they can’t help us.”
Osceola grunted. “You’ve sure got it in for the poor money kings—what have you got against ’em?”
“Gosh, you’re thick!” snorted his friend. “So long as they fill the cells we’ll be together. It’s a heap easier for us to get out of _one_ cell, together, than it would be to get out of two, separately!”
“Boy, you’re talking in circles. We now arrive at the fact, once more, that we have no tools with which to get out! Take my advice and snatch a nap. You need it worse than I do, and this little Indian is going shut-eye right now!”
Chapter XVII CHARLIE’S NOTE
For the next couple of days, Bill and Osceola sweated in their hot-box of a cell. What with the heat, the lack of proper ventilation, and the uncertainty of their fate, both lads sank into a state of mind that bordered on despondency.
The monotony of their existence was broken but three times a day, when meals were brought to the prisoners’ cells by a steward. The man was invariably accompanied by the armed sentry, who acted as turnkey.
There appeared to be no possible means of escape. Day and night the electric lights in the passage beyond the steel bars burned brightly. The sentry outside the gate was relieved by another seaman every four hours, with the change of watch. With nothing to read, nothing to do, the lads spent most of their time lying in the bunks or taking turns pacing the narrow confines of their cell.
Sunday night, shortly after ten o’clock the tremble of the ship’s engines stopped. The lads guessed that the _Amtonia_ had reached her destination at last. Half an hour later they heard the sentry speaking to someone in the passage just beyond the gate. Although the conversation was carried on in German, Bill was able to get the gist of it.
“What’s the matter, Hans?” inquired the sentry. “Aren’t you going ashore with the rest of the boys?”
“Not me,” replied Hans. “I’ve got to start swabbing out bathrooms at four o’clock.”
“Well, I’m going,” the sentry declared, “just as soon as Otto relieves me at midnight. It isn’t often we have the chance to stretch our legs ashore and have a good time.”
“If your idea of a good time is to swill American homebrew in a speakeasy, it’s not mine,” the other retorted. “I’m from Munich, I am. Good brown Lionsbrew for me. I can’t stomach the stuff they sell you on this side. Anyway, I’ve been on my feet all day long. My legs get all the stretching they want aboard this ship. I’m tired—good night!”
The lads heard the door of the cabin next to them slam shut as Hans went to his well-earned rest.
“That,” laughed Bill, “is the first bit of comedy I’ve heard since we landed aboard this blooming pirate. That Heinie’s a sensible man. We might as well turn in, too. Tomorrow, I suppose, they’ll take us ashore and stand us up against a stone fence. I for one don’t want to think any more about it than I have to.”
“Keep on talking—don’t stop!” said Osceola in a low voice. “Either Hans or someone else next door is scraping on his side of the wall. I’ll try to find out what it’s all about.”
Bill nodded and immediately launched into a long account of the Army and Navy football game in which he had played the previous fall. Meanwhile Osceola climbed into the lower bunk, and lying flat, pressed his ear against the wooden partition which separated their cell from the bath-steward’s cabin.
The slight scraping continued and presently the sharp-eyed Seminole saw the point of a knife appear through a board. The slit slowly widened, and a folded piece of paper was pushed halfway through. Osceola grabbed it and scanned the writing that covered both sides. He passed it to Bill, who accomplished the difficult feat of reading it while continuing his story of the football game. The handwriting, though tiny, was unformed and he guessed at once that the message was from Charlie. It ran:
“Dear Bill—Hans is my bath stewward. He is O.K. Have promissed Dad will make him rich for life if he helps you and the cheif. He will cut through the boards to your cell. Hang your blankits down over the edge of your upper bearth so as to deden sound. He will push through another knife so you can do some cuting. I think the other one better talk or sing or something so the centry can’t here you cuting. If you get away take Hans to. His name will be mud after this on board the _Amtonia_.
“Yours truley, “Charles Evans.”
Bill smiled broadly as he pocketed the boyish, misspelled note. Then, still keeping up his endless monologue anent football, he hung the blankets, forming a curtain which completely shut in the lower bunk. Osceola was already at work with a knife that Hans had passed through the opening.
Bill continued to talk for the next twenty minutes, but then he pulled aside one corner of the blanket. The bunk was like a bake oven. Osceola was sweating from every pore.
“My turn now. Come out, and don’t forget to talk.”
Osceola handed the knife to Bill, grabbed his clothes and slipped out of the bunk.
Immediately Bill climbed in and divested himself of the underclothes he wore. Because of the heat, neither of the lads had been clothed in more than their undershirts and shorts since their incarceration. As the blanket dropped back into place, he heard Osceola begin a recital of some hunting trip he had taken down in the Florida everglades. He was surprised to find how the double blankets deadened the sound of his friend’s voice.
It was pitch dark in the bunk. He was just beginning to wonder exactly where he should get to work when a light appeared through two parallel slits in the wall-boards. These, he saw, were about three feet long and perhaps a foot and a half apart. From the cabin beyond the voice of Hans came in a sibilant whisper.
“If the Herr Lieutenant will be good enough to start cutting across the boards from the bottom of one slit to the bottom of the other? I shall work on the top end. It is not necessary to tell the Lieutenant not to press too hard with his knife. The sound of splintering wood can be heard in the passage. There is no need to disturb the sentry—just yet.”
Bill heard the steward chuckle. Then, except for the very slight sound of the knives as they cut across the grain of the wood, no other came to his ears save the low mumble of Osceola’s voice beyond the blankets.
It was hard work and tedious, slicing across the grain of the boards. The heat made Bill dizzy, and he stopped frequently to wipe away the sweat that streamed down into his eyes. After what seemed an endless age, Hans spoke again.
“I have cut through to the farther slit, sir. Will the Herr Lieutenant be good enough now to place the palm of his hand against the piece that is to come out? There must be no cracking of the wood when we remove it.”
“Okay,” whispered Bill.
Less than five minutes later, he completed his job. Hans took the panel they had cut from the wall and switched off the light in his cabin.
“Stand by,” said Bill. “We’ll be with you just as soon as I can get a drink and put on my clothes.”
“Very good, sir,” returned the man, and Bill climbed out of the bunk.
He went at once to the washbasin where he rinsed out his mouth and drank a few swallows of the tepid water. A quick sluice and a rubdown followed. Then he got quickly into his white linen uniform. Osceola, who was already dressed, spent the time in taking down the blankets, folding them and tossing them onto the upper berth. Far down the passageway they heard a bell tinkle eight times.
“Midnight,” said Bill, in a low tone. “Yes, there’s Otto, relieving our weary sentry at last. We’ll give him five minutes to vamoose, then we’ll get out of here.”
That seemed the longest five minutes of their lives. They kept their eyes glued on the luminous dials of their wrist-watches.
“Time’s up!” said Bill at last.
“To the second,” was the Seminole’s sole comment. One after the other they got into the lower berth and squeezed through the opening in the wall.
“What’s the plan now, Hans?” Bill whispered in the darkness.
“With permission, sir, I will go into the passage and talk to Otto, who is on watch now. I will leave the cabin door ajar, sir, and as soon as his back is turned, it will be well if the gentlemen come out and—”
“Scrag him,” Bill supplied.
“That’s it, sir. Here are four pieces of rope and a gag. That ought to be enough to keep Otto quiet. Will the gentlemen please take me with them,” he asked somewhat diffidently, “when they leave the ship?”
“You bet we will!” said Osceola. “Only don’t be so darned polite. You make me nervous. Cut along now, we’ll attend to Otto just as soon as you get him facing the right way.”
“Very good, sir. Thank you, sir.”
Hans opened the door and went out, leaving it slightly ajar. From the shadows beside it, the lads saw him approach the sentry, who lounged on a stool by the gate.
“Too hot in there to sleep,” remarked Hans. “I’m going above to catch a breath of air.”
“Wish I could!” The sentry placed his rifle against the wall. “This ship is an oven below-decks. Practically the whole port watch has gone ashore. Just my bad luck to be stuck down here.”
“Look at the size of that rat!” exclaimed the steward, pointing down the prison corridor.
“Where?” Otto swung round toward the barred gate.
Hans immediately caught up the rifle and pressed the muzzle against the man’s side. “One peep out of you,” he muttered, “and I’ll give you a bellyful!”
Otto stared at him dazedly. Before he could decide whether or not to make a move, Bill thrust the gag in his mouth, while Osceola caught his wrists and lashed them fast behind his back.
It took only a moment longer to tie up his ankles. Otto was laid on the floor, and with Hans in the lead and carrying the rifle, the three hurried down the passage away from the gate.
Chapter XVIII THE FLYING FISH PLAYS ITS PART
Hans led them up through the galleys and pantries into the First Class Dining Saloon without encountering a single soul. They went boldly up the main staircase to the promenade deck, which seemed deserted. A small figure hiding in the shadows ran up to them, and Charlie gripped his friends’ hands.
“Never mind the thanks,” he whispered. “We’ve got to work fast. There’s an armed seaman at the gangway head. We must quiet him first. Then we’ll take the ship’s boat that’s moored below.”
“Okay, boy.”
Without another word, Bill walked up to the gangway sentry, who immediately brought his rifle to the present.
“There’s rust on that barrel,” growled Bill and held out his hand. “I can see it even in this light.”
“But—but I think,” stammered the sentry, “that my officer is mistaken!” He passed over the gun without suspicion.
Immediately afterward, he found himself in the same dilemma Otto had encountered ten minutes earlier. Tied up and gagged with a handkerchief, he was deposited behind a pile of deck chairs.
His captors wasted no further time. They ran down the gangway and piled aboard the skiff moored to the grating. Hans got out the single pair of oars, Osceola unloosed the painter, and Bill, who seated himself beside Charlie in the stern, steered their small craft away from the ship. There were men on the _Amtonia’s_ bridge but they received no hail to return.
Bill looked about. Although there was no moon, the brilliant starlight gave ample light for him to size up his surroundings. He found that they were floating in a large cove or harbor almost landlocked. The body of water was eggshaped; perhaps a mile long by half that distance in width. The shores were rocky, with black patches of sandy beach. Beyond grew a dense forest, except at one end of the bay, where twinkling lights marked a small settlement. The outlet to the ocean was narrow, and guarded by high cliffs. It was a perfect retreat for the Baron and his pirates.
Charlie piped up in his boyish treble. “The _Amtonia’s_ absolutely hidden by those heads from any ship passing up or down the coast. The harbor entrance makes a right-angled turn half way to the sea. I heard Lieutenant Brinkerhoff say that a warship passed the mouth, going west, about eleven-thirty. The lookout on the head signalled in. Brinkerhoff was laughing about it, I guess it made him feel good.”
“Well, his break is ours now,” declared Bill. “And there’s another one for us!”
He pointed to where the _Flying Fish_ lay moored, with her wings spread, a few hundred yards away.
“It’ll be hot as Tophet in her hull tonight! Row on, Hans. We’re going over there to pay a visit. By the way, does anyone know exactly where we are?”
“Yes, sir,” replied the man, “this harbor is on the coast of Maine. Washington County, I think, sir—not very far from Englishman’s Bay.”
“Good enough! What are those lights yonder?”
“You might call that our private Navy Yard, sir. It’s the Baron’s shore base. He keeps a crew on duty there, while the ships are at sea. There are storehouses, a machine shop, the men’s quarters and a store. It’s ten miles back to the railroad. He owns all the shore acreage hereabouts. A high wire fence shuts in the property from all outsiders. There are one or two big estates up and down the coast, but the nearest house is a good three miles away.”
“How are the roads?”
“There’s no road along the coast, sir. The one from the base runs back to the little town on the railroad. It’s in very bad condition, sir. There is no other way out.”
“Thank you, Hans. You’re a treasure-house of local knowledge.”
“Thank _you_, sir. May I make a suggestion?”
“Fire away.”
“My brother, August, is deck watch aboard the _Flying Fish_, sir. Usually, in port, only one man is kept aboard her. August does not like this life. Like me, he was shanghaied into it. Once with this outfit, there is no getting away, unless by a miracle, like tonight, sir. August speaks no English. May I ask him to join us?”
“By all means, Hans. It will save a lot of trouble. Offer him what Mrs. Evans said she would give you. I will see that it is paid.”
“Very good, sir. Thank you, sir.”
They were close to the converted submarine now. On the narrow deck, abaft the motors a man was seated on a camp chair, smoking. He stood up as the boat approached.
Hans hailed him and for several minutes the two brothers hurled harsh gutturals at each other. Bill guessed them to be speaking a low Bavarian dialect of German. He failed to understand a single word of what they said.
“He wants me to thank you—he will come,” Hans asserted presently.
“What a polite family you are—” chuckled Bill. “Let’s get aboard.”
Fifteen minutes later those officers and men who had remained on deck aboard the anchored pirate ship were astonished to see the _Flying Fish_ taxi down the harbor and take the air. A few seconds later her tail lights disappeared into the dark beyond the headlands. Aboard the _Amtonia_ orders were shouted, bells clanged, and presently the whining howl of her siren awoke the echoes of the night.
Half an hour passed. Bill, at the wheel of the _Flying Fish_, leaned forward, his eyes focussed on a pinpoint of light far below and about ten miles ahead of the speeding airplane.
“There she is on a bet,” he said to Osceola, who was in the other pilot’s seat.
“You mean the warship Charlie told us about? What makes you so sure?”
“I’ve got a hunch, that’s all. Anyway, nothing but a fishing boat or one of the little steamers that put in at the small seaports along this part of the coast would be so close to shore. That’s a big ship out there. I think I’m right about her.”
Bill’s hunch was correct, as the two in the cockpit presently saw.
“It’s the _Stamford_, or her twin!” he declared. “Uncle Sam sure is on the job!”
Catching up with the cruiser, he circled her three times. Then the _Flying Fish_ darted ahead, landed and came to rest half a mile beyond. By the time the warship hove to beside them, Bill had a sea anchor out and was waiting on the heaving deck. He held a megaphone in his hand. Beside him, staring at the big cruiser, stood Osceola, Charlie, Hans and August.
“What craft is that?” came a hail from the warship’s bridge.
“The convertible submarine-seaplane, _Flying Fish_, Midshipman William Bolton in command,” Bill yelled back. “She was part of von Hiemskirk’s pirate outfit. She belongs to Uncle Sam now. We captured her less than an hour ago. Are you the _Stamford_?”
“You’ve guessed it!” spoke a jubilant voice. “Commander Brown speaking,” it went on, “are you the chaps who sent out that wireless?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Congratulations, Mr. Bolton. Where is the _Amtonia_?”
“At anchor in a small harbor a few miles up the coast, sir. One of her propellers was shot off in the scrap the other day. She hasn’t got steam up, or didn’t have, when we left—so I guess she’s still there.”
“Good! Take off at once and lead us to her.”
“Aye, aye, sir. There’s plenty of water but the channel to the harbor is a narrow one between twin heads. You’ll have to be careful.”
“Thank you, Mr. Bolton. Any other suggestions?”
“Yes, sir. Please wireless to the state constabulary to guard the road from Twin Head Harbor to Clayton. That’s the only way von Hiemskirk and his crew can escape by land.”
“We’ll attend to it at once,” said the Commander. “Cut along now. We’ll follow you, so don’t get too far ahead.”
“Aye, sir,” said Bill, and sent Hans forward to haul in the sea anchor.
The first pale rays of summer dawn were brightening sea and land when the _Stamford_ navigated the entrance between Twin Heads and pushed her wicked snout into the harbor. At the same instant, Bill landed the _Flying Fish_ on the calm water.
Through the cockpit windows Bill saw that the _Amtonia_ was raising her anchors.
“Von Hiemskirk was all set to run for it,” he said to the chief.
“But he wasn’t quite quick enough,” grinned Osceola. “Next stop, Atlanta, for that bunch. There’s mighty little pirating to be done in a federal prison!”
“They’re hauling down the Jolly Roger!” cried Bill. “Well, that cuts it. Somebody will be sending a boat over here after awhile. Let’s see if we can rustle some chow in the meantime. I’m starved!”
The boat came alongside shortly after the five aboard the _Flying Fish_ had finished doing justice to a very substantial breakfast. And all five were on deck when the ensign in charge came over the side.
“Mr. Bolton?” inquired the young officer, as Bill stepped forward.
“Himself,” smiled Bill.
“I’m Pierce, of the _Stamford_.” The two shook hands.
“Commander Brown’s compliments,” he continued after Bill had introduced the quartet, “he wishes you to come aboard the _Amtonia_. We wirelessed the news, of course, and have just received a message of thanks addressed to you, signed by the President. You are to go to Washington, just as soon as this business here is cleaned up. In fact, the President wants to meet the five of you.”
“I bet Bill will get the Congressional Medal!” shrilled Charlie.
“I shouldn’t be surprised,” smiled Pierce. “Gosh!” he exploded, “this is a big thing you fellows have put over!”
“But Bill was the brains of it,” said Osceola.
“Without everybody’s help,” said Bill, “we never should have pulled it off.”
“Cut the argument,” laughed Ensign Pierce. “The skipper is waiting, and so are several hundred delighted passengers.”
“That’s just it,” protested Bill, “I’d rather be shot than face that mob!”
“_Not me!_” said Charlie. “Gee, it’ll be swell! Because I was the youngest on board, everybody took pleasure in jumping on me. Now I can tell them all where to shove off! Let’s go!”
THE END
Those who read and enjoyed this book and the one preceding it, (_Bill Bolton—Flying Midshipman_) will want to read the next of this series, _Bill Bolton and The Hidden Danger_.
Transcriber’s Notes
--Copyright notice provided as in the original—this e-text is public domain in the country of publication.
--Silently corrected palpable typos; left non-standard (or amusing) spellings and dialect unchanged.
--In the text versions, delimited italics text in _underscores_ (the HTML version reproduces the font form of the printed book.)
End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Bill Bolton and the Flying Fish, by  Noel Everingham Sainsbury, Jr.

= = = PG58407 = = =
BILL BOLTON--WINGED CARTWHEELS
Produced by Stephen Hutcheson and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
BILL BOLTON _and the Winged Cartwheels_
BY Lieutenant Noel Sainsbury, Jr.
_Author of_ Bill Bolton, Flying Midshipman Bill Bolton and the Flying Fish Bill Bolton and the Hidden Danger
★
THE GOLDSMITH PUBLISHING CO. CHICAGO
Copyright, 1933 The Goldsmith Publishing Company MADE IN U. S. A.
_To_ Ashton Sanborn, who is even a finer fellow than I have depicted, and who has done even more exciting and more interesting things than are narrated in this story.
CONTENTS
Bill Bolton and the Winged Cartwheels
_BY LIEUT. NOEL SAINSBURY, JR._
Chapter I THE FIRST FIND
“You and I, Bill,” said Osceola, “are on top of the world and throwing rocks at rainbows!” The young Seminole chief, stooping quickly, picked something out of the short grass at the side of the Bolton driveway. “A couple of months ago I was a slave in a cypress swamp without a dollar to my name. Now I stumble over them!”
“That’s queer,” said Bill, staring at the silver disk in his friend’s hand. “It’s one of those cartwheels they hurl at you out west instead of dollar bills.”
“Nobody,” declared Osceola, “ever hurled dollar bills at me!”
“I mean,” said Bill, “it’s queer finding one here. Wake up—don’t let this new-found wealth cramp your usual technic. You’re in New Canaan, Connecticut, now—not far away on the western pl—”
“There’s something queerer than that about this cartwheel—look!”
Bill took the extended silver piece and examined it. The coin seemed genuine enough. Minted in 1897, the head of Liberty was portrayed on one side and backed by the well-known National Bird, who flaunted a streamer of E Pluribus Unum in his beak. But this particular silver dollar was no longer good as “coin of the realm.” Across Liberty’s face a pair of spread wings was cut deep into the metal, while the American eagle was defaced by two numerals, 1 and 3.
“Somebody’s pocket-piece, don’t you think?” suggested Osceola.
Bill nodded. “That design and the numerals are diecut. Those wings over poor old Liberty’s pan look like an aviator’s device.”
“Some cloud-dodger’s mascot, I expect. Thirteen’s probably his lucky number.”
Bill handed back the coin. “Stick it in your pocket. If we see it advertised, you can easily return it. In the meantime, the mascot may help you to keep the luck you were crowing about just now.”
“And why shouldn’t I crow? Instead of having to work my way through my last year at Carlisle, your father puts me in charge of the foundation he has inaugurated to help the Seminole Nation. Now, Deborah and I can get married in the fall. Why shouldn’t I take the count on my worries? And you’ve got no kick coming. You’re sitting pretty yourself.”
“I sure am,” admitted Bill. “Our Navy’s a swell outfit but I never expected to stay in after my two years’ sea duty when I’d finished up at the Academy. Now that the President himself has let me resign and put me on Secret Service work—well, there’s only one thing I don’t like about it.”
“What’s that?”
“Oh, people—my friends, I mean, think I’m loafing. They don’t understand why I should suddenly leave the Navy. And of course I can’t tell them. This other job must be kept a secret. The President said so.”
“I don’t believe anybody thinks you’re a quitter or a loafer,” argued the chief, “—not after the three big stunts you’ve pulled off this summer, and all the newspaper publicity you’ve had out of them. You’re talking through your sombrero, old son. Bill Bolton is front page news from Maine to California. If you keep hitting any more bullseyes, they’ll slap your phiz on a postage stamp!”
“Oh, yeah? Speak for yourself, John—or words to that effect. Looks like a dead heat to me. How about it?”
Osceola abruptly changed the subject. “If this silver dollar was lost by an aviator,” he observed, fingering the coin, “he never dropped it out of an airplane, I know.”
“And so what?” Bill was mildly interested.
“Well, the fool thing was lying on a leaf—and the leaf was only slightly bruised—”
“Maybe it bounced or rolled onto the leaf after it fell onto the driveway?”
“Not this cartwheel. There’s not a scratch on it, except for the wings and the number thirteen. Six bits to a counterfeit two-cent piece with a hole in it, the yap who owns this has a hole in his trousers pocket!” Osceola dropped to his knees and studied the short grass at the edge of the drive. “Yep, just as I thought—” He stood up and flecked a dab of mold from his immaculate flannels, “here’s the fella’s spoor. He wore rubber-soled shoes.”
“I thought,” said Bill, “that Dorothy Dixon was the one and only Sherlock Holmes in this village. You certainly run her a close second, though. What did the aviator who didn’t aviate do next? Keep on out to the garage and scratch his initials on that new de luxe roadster you bought last week?”
“Not on this hop, he didn’t. He—wait a sec till I get a squint at this. Yes! by Jove! it wasn’t me he was interested in, but your own sweet self.”
“How do you get that way so soon after breakfast?”
“Listen, you blind paleface, even from here I can see that his tracks go straight over to the house. He climbed up to the farther window of your room by way of that leader, and the ivy. Several pieces of the vine are lying on the grass where he broke them off getting up or down! Even you ought to be able to see that the wire on that window-screen has been tampered with. If you don’t believe me, shin up there and take a look!”
“Oh, I’ll take your word for it.” Several times before, in his career, Bill had encountered evidence of the young Seminole’s truly marvelous eyesight. “Do those scintillating orbs of yours tell you _when_ all this occurred?”
“They most certainly do, you mole.”
“When, then?”
“Between nine and nine-thirty last night!”
“Sure it wasn’t quarter to ten?”
“Quite sure,” smiled Osceola.
“I know,” said Bill, “that you can spot anything in daylight, or in the dark, for that matter, but when you claim to turn yourself into a human time clock, I ha’e me doots—”
“Oh, yeah? Well, listen, kid, and I’ll prove to you that Red Men aren’t as bad as they’re painted. Last night I left you with the girls over at the Dixon’s, and walked in the front door just as your hall clock was striking nine-thirty.”
“That’s right. You came over here to work on some figures for your new Seminole schools.”
“O and likewise K. I went straight up to my room and took my work out on the sleeping porch, where it was cooler. You found me there when you got back at eleven, didn’t you?”
“That’s all right, too. But what’s that got to do with the climbing aviator?”
“Why, just this. From nine-thirty until eleven-thirty I was out on that porch with the light going. Then I went to bed there and slept till this morning. And let me tell you, Bill, old son, that the man has yet to be born who can shin up a rainpipe thirty feet away from me and I not know it, awake or asleep!”
“Maybe he came before nine.” Bill was already convinced that his friend knew what he was talking about, but he wasn’t hauling down his flag without a last struggle.
“It wasn’t dark last night until nine o’clock, daylight saving time,” Osceola explained patiently. “Also, last night there was a heavy dew, even _you_ can see it on the grass still, and—”
“And the silver dollar was wet while the leaf remained bone dry, showing that said cartwheel was dropped early in the evening!”
“You certainly are the boy to ring the quoits,” mocked the chief. “But now that we know all about it, we really aren’t much forwarder. I don’t suppose you’ve missed anything in your room? You haven’t said anything about it.”
“No,” Bill said thoughtfully, “I haven’t noticed anything, but we’d better go in and have a look. I wonder who that bird was and what he wanted. Funny! Nothing was disturbed so far as I can remember.”
The two tall lads turned back toward the house.
“And there’s where our second-story aviator swung off the grass on to the drive when he was going home,” exclaimed Osceola, pointing to a thin spot on the gravel which bore a well-defined footprint, pointing toward the road. “If it was worth while, which it isn’t, we could probably find the tire-marks of the car he drove off in beyond the stone fence down yonder.”
Bill grunted. “When you say ‘second story,’ you probably hit the nail on the head. In future we’ll substitute worker for aviator, if you don’t mind. There are a lot of bum flyers with licenses, and a lot of bums who fly, but I wouldn’t insult the worst of them by classing him with a cheap sneak thief.”
“Maybe,” remarked Osceola, “he wasn’t so cheap at that. But we’ll soon find out.”
They went up the front veranda steps, into the house and upstairs to Bill’s room.
“I don’t run to jewelry,” observed Bill, his eyes travelling around the bedroom, “but he hasn’t touched my silver-backed brushes, or that string of cups on the mantelpiece. And the maids didn’t report any silver missing downstairs, either. I wonder what in thunder he was after.”
“Got anything of value in that drawer?” his friend inquired, pointing to a flat-top table desk between the windows. “Somebody’s been fooling with the lock. I can see the scratches on the wood—”
“Nothing but some papers, worth nothing to anybody but me. Old newspaper clippings, Navy orders, my honorable discharge and the like. By gosh!” he cried, “the lock’s busted! And somebody’s messed up the entire drawer. Look here—these things were in piles with rubber bands around them. Now they’re scattered all over the place—”
“Anything gone?”
“Wait, I’ll see.” Hurriedly he sorted out his possessions, then shook his head. “Not a thing. What under the sky-blue canopy do you suppose that dollar-dropping buzzard was after?”
“You haven’t said anything to anyone about the new job, have you?”
“You and Dad are the only ones outside of the people in Washington who know about it.”
“But this doesn’t look like it, Bill.”
“You don’t mean that the goop who got in here last night was in the know! Why, I haven’t been assigned any work yet. What could he expect to find among my papers?”
“Perhaps,” mused Osceola, “he, or whoever sent him, has an idea that you’ve been put to work already, and they want to know how much you’ve found out or what your instructions are.”
“Some gang the government is after, you mean?”
“It’s quite possible.”
“But how could they learn that I—”
“A sieve,” said Osceola sententiously, “isn’t the only thing that leaks. Someone in Washington has spilled the goldarned beans, inadvertently or not.”
“If you’re right, Osceola, this is serious business.”
“Of course it is. What are you going to do about it?”
“Wait, watch and listen. I’m due in Washington next week to receive my orders. Until then, I shall do nothing.”
“And I guess you’re right, at that. My surmises may be all wet, though I doubt it. Just the same, we’ve nothing concrete to go on except that a lad climbs in the window and goes through your desk.”
Bill closed the drawer. “Let’s forget it, then,” he suggested. “At least for today. You and I, old Rain-in-the-face, have a heavy date. Had you forgotten it?”
“Not likely. When you’re engaged, a fella can’t think of anything else but the next date!”
“You’ve sure got it bad,” grinned Bill. “Thank goodness, I’m still heart whole and fancy free!”
“What about Dorothy Dixon?”
“Aw, shucks! We’re just good pals, and you know it.”
“Says you!”
“Says both of us. I’m seventeen, and she’s a year younger. Neither of us is thinking about getting married, or anything like that.”
“Gee, I forget you’re really only a kid,” laughed Osceola. “Well, let’s shove off. The girls are going up there in Dorothy’s plane. They said they’d bring lunch. Where is this place we’re going to picnic, anyway?”
“Up in the hills beyond Danbury. It’s quite near the far end of Candlewood Lake.”
“Was it up that way you and Dorothy corralled the New Canaan bank robbers?”
“Yes, quite near there. That’s how we learned of the wood lot. It’s secluded, there’s a good spring, and it’s really a peach of a place for a picnic.”
“Well, let’s get goin’ then.”
“Coming, Romeo—coming!” Bill followed his impatient friend out of the room. “What’s eatin’ you? It’s early yet.”
“Maybe it is, but—well, laugh if you want to, I’m uneasy as blazes about those girls!”
Bill caught up with him as they ran down the steps of the side porch and headed out to the hangar.
“It must be awful to be in love. The girls are all right. Dorothy is an A-1 pilot. I ought to know. I taught her myself.”
Osceola said nothing more until they had passed the garage and stables and were crossing the flat meadow where the Bolton hangar was located. “Thank goodness, Frank has run out that Ryan of yours,” he exclaimed as they came into view of a two-seater monoplane parked before the open doors of the converted haybarn.
“Getting lazy in your old age, are you?” jeered Bill.
“No, but I’ll admit the sooner we’re off and up in the hills, the better pleased I’ll be.”
“Well, you can hop right in, old fuss budget. While you were working on your school plan, early this morning, I came out here and went over the bus from nose to tailplane. Pull out those wheel blocks and carry them into the rear cockpit with you. Meanwhile I’ll show you how the new inertia starter I’ve rigged her with can swing a prop. Make it snappy, big chief—this is an emergency patrol—the women must be saved at all costs!”
Bill adopted a mock-heroic attitude and roared with laughter at Osceola’s disgust. Twenty minutes later, Bill, at the controls of the Ryan, sighted a rectangular patch of light green framed in the darker green of the Connecticut hills twenty-five hundred feet below the speeding plane. He clapped a pair of glasses to his eyes and the woodlot sprang up at him. It seemed he could almost reach out and pluck the flowers that dotted the high grass. Then he turned his gaze to the upper corner of the field.
There lay Dorothy Dixon’s small amphibian, parked near the road which wound up the wooded valley. Close by, a motor car was drawn up at the edge of the field. For a moment he failed to sight either Dorothy, or her pretty Seminole friend, Deborah Lightfoot.
“Under the trees beyond the plane!”
Osceola’s shout almost broke Bill’s eardrums, coming as it did through the close-pressed receivers of his headphone set. Automatically, he dropped the glasses, caught at his safety-belt to see if it was fastened and shoved forward.
The Ryan bucked into a nosedive and dropped earthward with the speed of a shooting star.
Osceola’s premonition of danger had been a wise one. Beneath the trees, Dorothy and Deborah were struggling with two men.
Chapter II NUMBER FIFTY-SEVEN
Bill levelled off with an abruptness that jarred the very vitals of the plane. Then he allowed the tail to drop slightly, the wheels made contact and the monoplane rolled forward over uneven ground, propelled by her own momentum. Before she actually came to a stop, both lads flung themselves from the cockpits and raced for the trees thirty or forty yards away.
It soon became evident that they would be too late to come to close quarters with the girls’ assailants. Brave enough when they had members of the opposite sex to deal with, the ruffians had no desire to mix it up with a couple of husky young aviators. Flinging the struggling girls aside, they turned tail and legged it toward their car with a burst of speed worthy of Olympic runners, and no split seconds to spare.
Bill and Osceola immediately sheered off toward the road, but by the time they reached the edge of the field, the motor was only a cloud of dust hurtling down the valley.
“If I’d had a gun,” said the Seminole, without the slightest catch of breath, “there’d have been a different ending to this affair!” He scowled at the disappearing car and turned to Bill. “I thought you always packed a gat aboard your crates—when we went into that nose dive, I nearly broke my neck trying to find one.”
“Sorry,” gasped Bill, whose sprint had left him winded, “I never thought of them as necessary adjuncts to picnics before! Next time I’ll come provided. It’s just as well those thugs got away, though. Two scalped bandits would mean all kinds of unpleasantness up here in New England. Here come the girls, now. They seem to be none the worse for their adventure.”
“You,” declared the chief, “make me infernally tired.” He strode off toward Deborah.
“You aren’t damaged, I hope?” asked Bill as he came up to the trio.
“Only rather mussed,” smiled Dorothy, a pretty girl with brown hair and the figure of an athlete. “In fact, I’ve kind of an inkling that those foreign gentlemen got more than they bargained for. The guy that started to rough-house me, ran away with a broken wrist. Some of the old frumps around New Canaan stick up their noses at my jiu jitsu, but I’ve found it a valuable asset several times in my hectic career!”
“And what did you do to your sparring partner, Deborah?” he asked the slender Indian girl who had slipped her arm through Osceola’s.
“Not much, I’m afraid, Bill. The brute made me break three perfectly good fingernails.”
“I’ll say he did,” chimed in Dorothy. “And his face looked like raw beefsteak when he broke away from her. He nearly knocked me over, he was in such a hurry, and I got a good look at him. If you boys want a first class imitation of a wildcat gone wild, pick on our gentle Deborah. Take my advice, Osceola, and handle her with kid gloves after you’re married.”
“One of these days, I’ll catch that hound,” promised the young chief. “And when I finish the job he’ll look worse than his passport picture. How did this all start, anyway?”
“Well, you see—” began Dorothy.
Deborah interrupted her with a smile. “Let’s feed this bloodthirsty pair,” she suggested. “I’m longing for iced tea myself, and men are so much more reasonable when they’ve eaten! This big brave of mine will be starting on the warpath again unless we give him his lunch.”
“I,” said Bill, “second the Seminole chieftainess’ motion! Also, I bar scalp locks in my food. Let’s get to the chow before Osceola gets going.”
“Some day,” retorted Osceola, “you’ll say something funny, and the rest of us will die of shock from the surprise.”
“Here, here,” interposed Deborah, seizing his arm, “come on, we’ll have to do some forcible feeding, I guess!”
“Aren’t they the cute pair!” whispered Dorothy as she and Bill followed toward the grove of maples where the lads had first sighted them from the plane. “Deb’s asked me to be maid of honor at their wedding. I suppose you’ll be Osceola’s best man?”
“I suppose so,” said Bill gloomily.
“Why, you don’t sound very much interested! The Indian braves will all be in their war paint, and the squaws—”
“—it is hoped will wear something warmer and more appropriate for this climate!”
“Don’t be silly. You know what I mean. And anyway, no self-respecting redskin puts on war paint for his chief’s wedding. I guess it’s too suggestive of what he’s to expect after the ceremony is over.”
“Oh, is that so! Well, you women can certainly get up a good fight, if that’s what you’re driving at. I’ll bet you’re just tickled foolish to be in on the wedding party, and the pageant the tribe will make of it.”
“Why—”
“And your father’s plan to bring the whole tribe to New Canaan is just grand!”
“Oh, that’s part of it. Look here!” Dorothy turned on him. “Just what don’t you like about it, Mister Stuck-up?”
“Well—er—you see,” Bill explained, “the ancient Seminole custom forces the best man to kiss the maid-of-honor right after the ceremony—and I—”
He ducked just in time to avoid her open palm on the side of his jaw, and ran off toward his plane. Over his shoulder, he called: “Naturally you’re keen on the wedding,” he teased, “but there’s no excuse to get affectionate beforehand. I’ve got to make the Ryan secure. Run along now, and put on your war paint. There’s a smudge on your nose.”
“There is not!” snapped Miss Dixon, then she stalked off as Bill doubled up with laughter. “Some day,” she muttered to herself, “I’ll make that smart-aleck the one and only also-ran in a first class massacre.”
However, the first thing Dorothy did, upon reaching the picnic spot, was to hunt for her handkerchief and bring forth a compact.
Bill strolled back, whistling, hands in pockets. The others were already seated about a white cloth laid on the ground, which was spread with a lunch that made his mouth water. He threw a glance at Dorothy, caught her eye and they both laughed.
He dropped down beside her. “Let’s call it quits,” he grinned.
“Not on your sweet life, young man. One of these days—but never mind, now you’re my guest at luncheon. We’ll call it an armistice. Dig in. Everybody helps himself at this party.”
Osceola, who had been piling Deborah’s plate with everything in sight, in spite of her protests, started in to gnaw a chicken leg, and began talking with his mouth full. “Cut the comedy, Bill. Waylaying girls, and especially, waylaying my girl, is serious business. I don’t intend to let it go at that either—not by a darn sight. And the more I know about what really happened, the sooner I’ll be able to get a line on those bozos.”
“I’m just as keen as you are,” Bill retorted, helping Dorothy, then helping himself to cold chicken and potato salad. “Men like that need a good thrashing. You can’t count me out on any move you make. In fact I’ve got some ideas of my own—I got their license number as a starter.”
“That,” said Dorothy, and she reached across Bill for the biscuits, “may give us a start and then again it may not. It didn’t help much in the bank robbery, if you’ll remember. From the looks of those two tramps, I should not be surprised if the car had been stolen.”
“And where do you get the ‘us’ stuff?” inquired Bill.
“If you two boys think you’re going to run this show without Deb and me, you’ve got another think coming. Isn’t that so, Deb?”
“It certainly is. We both saw the men and talked to them. Where would you get a description of them if not from us?”
“Now look here,” Osceola waved a chicken bone at her, “let’s call it a foursome, and can all the argument. What’s more, Dorothy’s idea about the car being stolen, is, ten-to-one the right dope. That was a big bus and this year’s model. Those things cost a heap of money.”
“That’s the way I figured it,” answered Dorothy. “And let me tell you that no two men who made such a fuss about losing a dollar would cough up four thousand of them for a car like that!”
Bill stared at Osceola meaningly. “What did you say—that one of them lost a dollar?”
“Yes—and a silver dollar at that—one of those cartwheels they use out West instead of bills.”
“GOOD NIGHT!” exploded Bill. Osceola stared at him in dumb amazement.
“Yes,” she went on, “but why the great excitement? The dollar that man lost—he was a Russian or something, by the way he talked—well, that dollar started the mixup. But you two look as though you’d seen a flock of ghosts—what?”
“Just one,” said Osceola, and his tone was deadly serious. “But never mind that now. Get on with your own story, then we’ll tell ours.”
She looked first at one and then at the other of the lads. “Well, just as you say. Of course, I know there’s something I don’t understand behind this, but I’ll be a sport and do my talking first. Deb and I flew over here and parked my bus where you see her now. We made things shipshape aboard, then toted the lunch over here and went to the spring to get water. It’s over by the road, you know, and we were just about to fill the pail, when that car came bumping along the dirt road, doing fifty, if I’m any judge of speed. I’d just said to Deb that the fellow who was driving couldn’t think much of his springs, when something bright flew out of the window. It lit in the high grass near us, and I went over to see what it might be. The grass was so high and the ground so rutty that I couldn’t find a thing. Then I thought I saw something shining in the rubble, but when I picked it up, it was nothing but a piece of quartz, so I dropped it again. By that time the car had stopped and was backing up the road. Two men sprang out and came running toward me. They were both dark, and both spoke rather broken English. The bigger of the men yelled at me to give him back his silver dollar. I told him I’d seen it fly out of the car, that I’d been looking for it, but couldn’t find it. My answer seemed to stump him for a minute, then without another word, he and his pal got on their knees and began to comb that part of the field for it. I wasn’t at all taken by their looks, neither was Deb, so we filled our pail and came back here.... Somebody give me a drink,” she broke off, “all this talking makes me thirsty—”
Bill filled her glass with water, and after taking a few sips, she went on with her story.
“Where was I? Oh, yes, well, we hadn’t been here long when the men gave up their search and followed us. It seems that they’d seen me stoop to pick up that quartz and they thought I must have their old dollar! Of course, I denied it, but they were only more insistent. To finish the tale, the big one said that if I wouldn’t hand it over, he’d take it from me! Well, as you saw, he tried to do just that. Deb horned in, like the peach she is, and number two tried to stop her. Things were getting more hectic than pleasant, when they suddenly broke away, and I saw you boys hot-footing it for us. And I want to end this long speech by saying that never in my life have I been gladder to see two human beings. I haven’t had a chance to thank you both before, but I certainly do it now! It was simply stunning to see the way you came at them!”
“And that goes for me, Bill,” cut in Deborah, “I’ve already told Osceola, but I want to tell you, too, how much we appreciated the wonderful way you dashed to our rescue.”
“I think,” said Bill, “that the rescue, as you call it, was all in favor of the assaulters. Those bohunks, or whatever they are, bit off a lot more than they could chew when they tackled you Amazons. The chief and I did no more than save them from taking the count on their backs, worse luck!”
“Dorothy, did you say that the dollar landed in the field just below the spring?” asked Osceola.
“Yes, just there—or thereabouts.”
“Excuse me,” he said and stood up. “I’ll be back in a minute or two.”
Bill watched the young Seminole stride away toward the road. “That guy,” he declared, with a wink at Dorothy, “has a one-track mind. Wild horses won’t drag him off the track, either, once he gets started.”
“And some people—have no minds at all!” Deborah ran swiftly after her fiance.
“Ha-ha! Put that into your pipe and smoke it,” Dorothy laughed at the surprised look on Bill’s face. “She’s quick on the come-back, isn’t she?”
“Too blooming touchy, if you want to know—”
“Oh, my goodness! A girl isn’t worth a thing who won’t stick up for the man she’s engaged to!”
“Perhaps not—but I’m no girl—and all this love business makes me sick. Osceola has acted like a hen with one chick ever since Deborah came into the picture.”
“Oh, cheer up, old gloomy, she didn’t mean anything by that—any more than you did by your wisecrack! And by the way, you and Osceola are invited to dinner at my house tonight. You’ll have to dash away early though. Daddy’s gone to Hartford on business and won’t be back till tomorrow. I don’t want to lose my rep, you know.”
“Thanks for the invite,—but I didn’t know you had any.”
“Oh, you didn’t! Well, let me tell you, young man—”
Osceola’s voice cut her short. “Here it is!” He flung a silver dollar onto the white cloth.
Dorothy picked up the coin and examined it.
“Number two of the series, on a bet?” said Bill, looking up at the chief.
“Almost,” replied his friend, “but not quite. This is number fifty-seven.”
That night at dinner the main topic of conversation among the four young people was the winged cartwheels, as Dorothy had named them. They had arrived home too late to do anything about tracing the car license, and after the meal was finished, Bill and Osceola noticed that the girls looked tired and decided to leave even earlier than they had planned. They walked across the ridge road to the Bolton place opposite, and were in bed and asleep by eleven o’clock.
The telephone in Bill’s room awoke him with a start. He glanced at the luminous dial of his wristwatch, and caught up the receiver. It was then exactly ten minutes past two.
“Bill! Oh, Bill—is that you?”
“Speaking, Dorothy. Anything wrong?”
“Oh, Bill—please come quickly—those men have got Deb and—”
The wire went dead. Bill guessed it had been cut. Dropping the receiver, he snatched an automatic from under his pillow, leaped from his bed, and raced for the hall.
Chapter III STOLEN!
Bill burst into the hall and almost collided with Osceola, who had just stepped out.
“What’s the matter?” hissed the Seminole. “The phone woke me.”
“Got a gun?”
“Yep—what is it?”
“Come on. Deborah’s kidnapped—they’re evidently after Dorothy. They’re in the house now!”
The last sentence was hurled at Osceola as the two lads, both barefoot and in pajamas, raced downstairs and across the broad entrance hall to the front door.
“Wire was cut while Dorothy phoned,” panted Bill, pushing back the bolt and twisting the key in the lock.
Osceola uttered not a word, but he was first through the open door and took the porch steps at a single leap, Bill at his heels. They sprinted down the turf along the driveway, and were nearing the stone wall that bounded the Bolton property, when a car without lights swung into the road from the Dixon place and sped toward Stamford.
Without slackening in speed, the young chief spoke quietly. “Don’t fire. The wall hides the wheels—Debby might get hurt.”
“Could you—see her?”
“No. But I heard that little gat of Dorothy’s go just now. She’s still in the house.”
By this time they were crossing the road in two bounds and side by side they hurdled the Dixons’ white picket fence like hounds let loose from a leash.
Leaping flowerbeds and vaulting shrubs they flew over the garden, darted through an opening in the high box hedge and came on to the smooth turf where ancient elms cast mottled shadows in the moonlight. Then from the white shingled house directly ahead came the terrified screams of women, punctuated by the bark of revolver shots.
As they dashed up to the house, a wire screen flew out of a second story window and a slender, boyish figure dove head first out after it. Two or three feet below the window sill the porch roof sloped downward at a slight angle. The diver seemed to land on her hands, crumple up, turn a complete somersault and come swiftly upon her feet again with the ease and precision of an acrobat.
“Look out, Dorothy!” yelled Bill, as a revolver was thrust out of the window.
With the agility of a springbok, she leaped aside, firing from her hip. The bark of the four shots was almost simultaneous. There came a shriek of pain from the window, the automatic rattled to the roof, and the hand that had held it disappeared.
Bill lowered his gun. “Wait here till she’s parked,” he ordered. “Then smash a porch window and go in. I’ll tackle them from above.”
With the butt of his smoking revolver between his teeth, he took a running leap and went up a pillar with an ease and swiftness that demonstrated his seaman’s training. His hands caught the gutter, his body swung up and sideways and springing to his feet he ran along the slanting roof to Dorothy.
“Did he hit you?”
“Missed by a mile!”
“Good—” Bill picked her up. “Come on—”
“But, Bill—I’m in pajamas—”
“So am I—down you go!”
He dropped her into Osceola’s waiting arms. As she landed safely and the young Seminole stood her on her feet, he called: “They must have another car, Dorothy. Put it on the fritz!”
Then without waiting to see whether this rather cryptic command was understood, much less executed, he zigzagged up the roof to the side of the house. With his back pressed against the shingles, he moved sideways to the window and peered in.
The room was full of smoke, but he made out a figure slipping through the doorway into the hall, and fired. The door slammed and someone shot home the lock on the other side. From below came a crash of broken glass.
“Good old chief!” muttered Bill and went in through the open window.
He realized instantly that the bed was on fire. He grabbed the flaming sheets and threw them on the floor, kicking a handsome rug out of the way. Determined to save the rug, if possible, for a moment he was at a loss how to put out the flames. He did not enjoy the thought of stamping out a fire with his bare feet. The room was dark, after the brilliance of the moonlight out of doors, and the acrid smoke stung his eyes and set him coughing. Flames began to shoot upward from the smouldering mattress. His eye sighted a wall switch by the head of the bed, and an instant later he clicked the room into bright illumination.
The door to the bathroom was open and Bill caught the sheets by the ends which the fire had not yet reached, dragged them across the room and tossed the blazing mass into the bath tub. He turned on both taps, and ran back to the bedroom.
He next seized the mattress, doubled it over at the center, and endeavored to smother the flames. In this he was only partly successful, for the charred padding continued to smoulder and smoke. In exasperation he rolled it up, carried it to the window and thrust it forth. Quick as a flash, he was on the porch roof and not until he had flung it to the ground did he pause to fill his lungs.
But he was impatient to discover what was happening to Osceola below stairs, while he had been engaged with this inopportune blaze. He darted back into the smoke-laden chamber, and made for the door to the hall. It was locked. He picked up his automatic from the chair where he had dropped it and was about to fire into the lock when the handle rattled. Someone in the hallway was trying the door.
“Open up or I’ll shoot—” snapped Bill, and was seized immediately afterward with a spasm of coughing that left him almost helpless.
The key turned in the lock and the door swung inward, disclosing Osceola and a leveled automatic. Directly behind him stood Dorothy.
“Gosh!” she exclaimed. “You still here! Where’s the fire?”
The cool draught of air started by the opening of the door momentarily cleared the atmosphere and Bill composed himself with an effort. “In your bed—if this is your room,” he wheezed. “I put it out—darn it. Where’s that man gone? The one who locked me in?”
“Got away,” grunted Osceola. “And the other one, too.”
“Did they have another car?”
“Yes, but Dorothy got to it first and put the engine out of business. She—”
Shrieks and howls from above their heads cut him short. He turned to Dorothy. “You’d better run upstairs and let those maids out so I can get straight with Bill. They’ll wake New Canaan if you don’t. The poor things have been raising the roof ever since those thugs locked them in their rooms. Now they’ve smelled smoke and probably think the house is on fire.”
“Right-o! I’ll go up and quiet ’em.” Dorothy hurried off toward the rear staircase.
Bill leaned against the wall and stared at the mess in the room. “Either the guy we winged, or his pal, set fire to Dorothy’s bedding. He hoped it might give us a job putting it out and they’d have a chance to make their getaway. So far as I’m concerned they did exactly that. You don’t seem to have had any better luck.”
“You’re right on that, too. When Dorothy beat it round the house to scout for their car, I went through the living room window. And it will take some mending, that window! I smashed it with a porch chair.”
“Never mind the window—what did you do then?—faint?”
“Don’t try to be funny—I beat it inside and up the front stairs. Just as I reached this floor, I saw the two thugs flit round the corner to the back hall, and the service stairs. They had got out of sight by the time I got to the top of the stairs, but I heard the creak of the swinging door and knew they were on their way out through the kitchen. So I plunged down after them. And let me tell you, boy, plunged is just what I did. When I woke up, Dorothy was pouring a pitcher of water over my head.”
“When you woke up!”
“Why, you see, one of the guys must have grabbed a broom some fool maid had left standing in the back hall, and he had laid the darned thing slantwise across the stairs, about a quarter of the way down, with the broom end jammed into the banisters. I never saw it in my hurry, and I took the rest of the flight head first. I’ve got a bump on my bean the size of an egg. Why I didn’t break my neck is a mystery to me!”
“Oh, you were born to be hung,” said Bill airily. “But let’s hear the rest of what happened.”
“Look here, old chap, I’ve been driven nearly frantic by this mess—here we are—I fall down stairs, you fight a tuppenny fire—and we’re supposed to be doing something—_anything_—to—to—”
“Oh, I know it—don’t you suppose I know how you feel? Gosh, it’s got me the same way. But we’ll get her back soon. Meanwhile, we have to check up on each other, don’t we? It’s the only way we can get started on the real business.” Bill spoke as encouragingly as he could, but he had no idea how to go about tracing Deborah ... any more than had his friend.
“Sure, you’re right, Bill. Only when I think of Deb in the hands of those—Well, I’ll go on. Nothing important happened after that tumble I took. Dorothy brought me round, and those lads had beat it for parts unknown with at least a five minute start. She told me that after she’d fixed their car, which was the same one Number 57 went off in this morning, she hiked round to the porch again. She’d just got in through the window I smashed when she heard my fall—and found me. Just about that time, she smelled smoke, so as soon as I could stand, we searched for it—you know the rest.”
As he finished, Dorothy came up to them. “They’re all quiet, now,” she said, referring to the maids. “What’s next on the program? Have you got a plan of any kind?”
“We know _what_ to do, all right—and that’s find Deborah—” admitted Bill bitterly, “but _how_ to do it is another question, and I, for one, don’t know the answer.”
Chapter IV WHAT HAPPENED AT THE DIXONS’
Osceola looked at Bill. “I think,” he said slowly, “the best thing you and I can do right now, Bill, is to get into some clothes.”
Bill nodded. “Good idea! Socks and shoes will make a particular hit with me. If the soles of my feet aren’t cut to ribbons, they certainly feel as if they were!”
Dorothy, tight-lipped, arms akimbo, glared at them in disgust. “Well! You certainly are an energetic pair!” Her eyes fairly snapped with scorn. “Deborah’s fiance and his best friend see her kidnapped under their very noses, and then decide the best thing to do is to get dressed! My word—you make me sick—”
Osceola gave the angry girl one look, shrugged his shoulders and walked silently downstairs. The front door slammed, and Bill turned on her.
“Well, that was a very pretty exhibition, I don’t think,” he began.
“Oh, go home and put on a necktie!” she retorted savagely. “Oh, _dear_, how can you boys—when—” She broke off and burst into tears.
“How could _you_ deliberately torture that splendid chap—I had no idea you could be so cruel, Dorothy. Why, Osceola’s the salt of the earth and you know it. He was too much of a gentleman to tell you what a little idiot you are, but I’m not!”
“Is that so!” With a quick gesture, she brushed away the tears and took a step toward him. “If Osceola is such a paragon, why doesn’t he light out and find Deb? He’s supposed to be in love with her, isn’t he?”
“He _is_ in love with her, and that is what makes the things you said to him so brutal!”
“Then how can he waste his time—and that goes for you too—in silly chatter—why not start something—”
“Yes? and what—”
“Action’s what’s needed, and spelled with a capital A!”
Bill smiled crookedly. “And what kind of action, spelled with a capital A, do you suggest?”
“I’ve heard that he can trail anything that runs. Those men had to leg it out of here. Why doesn’t he follow them, for heaven’s sake, if he’s such a star at that sort of thing?”
“My dear young lady, Osceola has been three jumps ahead of you all the time. He knows that those tracks will only lead through your grounds out to the road. I don’t know where you got your ideas of trailing but no man, red, white, black or yellow, can follow another’s trail on an automobile highway. Dirt roads are one thing, tar or solid concrete are something else again!”
Dorothy looked discomfited. “I never thought of that,” she said.
“You see, Osceola doesn’t know where to turn next. Neither do I, and for a matter of fact, neither do you.”
For a moment she stared at him and Bill braced himself for a flood of tears. Instead she ran to him and caught his arm.
“Bill—I’m so darned sorry—I—”
“Oh, never mind—that’s all right,” he said gruffly, embarrassed by her contrition.
She shook her head. “But it isn’t all right. I’m going to slip into some beach pajamas, then I’m going straight over to your house and tell him just what a pig I really am!”
“There’s no need of that, kid. He wants cheering up, all right, but he’ll be back here soon to give me a chance to run over and put on some duds.”
“But what’s the idea—”
“You don’t think we’re going to leave you alone tonight after what’s happened?”
“But I’m not scared. Those men won’t come back again, not tonight, anyway.”
“Maybe they won’t, but there’s no sense in taking chances. Go into your room and dress if it will make you feel more comfortable. We can talk through the door. I want to know exactly what happened before you telephoned me.”
“All right. Wait and I’ll pass out a chair. If you’re as tired of standing as I am, you’ll need it.”
She went into the bedroom and came out with a wicker armchair in tow. “By the way,” she said suddenly, “why do you suppose those men picked on us? One of them was the big Russian who lost his silver dollar and kicked up such a fuss about it.”
“That,” answered Bill, “is one of the things I’m not sure about. In fact, I haven’t had time to put my mind on it.”
“You don’t think they came back for that pocket-piece?”
“Hardly that. There’s a whole lot behind this business that we aren’t onto yet.”
“Well, what’s your idea?”
“If you must have it, I’m beginning to believe that we’ve come into contact with a gang whose tokens or badges of membership are the numbered, winged cartwheels. And the gang is undoubtedly a large one. We know that there are at least fifty-seven of them.”
“Gee!” Dorothy looked startled. “Really, Bill? But why under the sun do these cartwheelers pick on Deborah?”
“Of course, I haven’t the dimmest idea what these fellows are up to. But seeing what took place last night over at my house, I’ve got a hunch that they think either Osceola or I are wise to what _is_ going on. You two girls, after this morning’s experience, are probably the only two persons who have seen members of the gang, knowing them to be just that. Therefore, it’s quite on the cards that they want to put you both safely away where you won’t be able to identify those two until they’ve pulled off their big stunt—whatever that may be. Of course, I may be all wrong, but up to now we’ve had next to nothing to go on except those dollars!”
Dorothy looked at him admiringly. “I always knew you had a head on your shoulders, Bill.” She shut the door to her room.
“Better turn off the water in your bath tub,” Bill called after her. “And don’t forget I want your dope on tonight.”
“I won’t—just give me a chance,” her muffled voice came back to him. “Gosh, but this room is a mess!”
Bill set the chair just outside her door and sat down. He was tired and he wanted to think, but Dorothy didn’t give him much opportunity to do so.
“Can you hear me?” He guessed she was standing near the door.
“Perfectly,” he replied.
“Well, here’s the tale and there isn’t much to it. After you two went home this evening, Deb and I came upstairs. We got undressed and then went into her room, just across the hall from mine. I guess we talked for about an hour. She was telling me—oh, about this and that—whatever we talked about has nothing to do with what happened later.” Her voice grew fainter as she moved to another part of the room, but Bill could still hear her well enough. “After that I came back here. When Daddy’s away, I always lock my door, and it’s a mighty lucky thing I did tonight. I probably wouldn’t be talking to you now if I’d left it open. Deb locked hers, too, but it’s a warm night, and after I was in bed I heard her open it. I thought it might be a good idea to get more air myself, but the breeze was blowing in at this side of the house, and I was too lazy to get up. While I was thinking about it, I must have fallen asleep.
“Well, the next thing I knew, I heard Deb scream. Then I heard her shout—‘They’ve got me, Dorothy—phone Osceola!’ She knew I had an extension in my room, of course. She didn’t call again, and I figured someone had slugged her. The phone is right by my bed, but it took an awful time to get central. I could have killed that girl by the time she said ‘Number, please’ ... then when I gave her yours, it seemed an age before you answered. Then when we were cut off, I guessed that one of the thugs had cut the wires. Somebody tried my door, and I ran over to the bureau and got my little automatic. I was scared silly, but I knew you and Osceola would soon be here, so that helped a lot. I was just starting for the door, when the strangest thing happened. I heard the key turn in the lock and before I could do anything to stop it, the door was pushed open.”
“Wait a mo. Yes, the key sticks out about an eighth of an inch on this side. They must have got hold of it with a pair of pincers.”
“So that’s it! I couldn’t imagine—well, let me tell you, the sight of that key turning in the lock all by itself gave me the creeps!”
“What did you do when the door opened?”
“I started right in firing—of course I didn’t know what I was shooting at, but for a few minutes I had ’em buffaloed, I guess. Suddenly they made a rush. I fired once more, then beat it for the window and went through it—” She opened the door and came into the hall, clad now in a simple white linen dress. Bill saw that she had put on a pair of white tennis shoes and socks.
“Well, you’re some quick dresser—” he got up from the chair.
Dorothy smiled and made him a little bow. “And I timed it nicely, didn’t I? Just to the end of my speech—”
“You certainly made a dramatic entrance. Say—there’s the door bell—”
“Osceola?”
“Sure to be. I’ll cut along now and leave him to your tender mercies. See you later.” With a wave of his hand, he left her standing in the hall and ran swiftly down the stairs.
Chapter V BILL’S HUNCH
Bill opened the front door and let Osceola into the house. The chief was fully dressed. He looked tired and worried to death.
“You’d better go over and dress now,” he said dispiritedly. “I’ve phoned the New Canaan police station and the Chief will be along in a few minutes. Meantime, I’ll locate the place where the telephone wire was cut and splice it if I can. There isn’t much we can do until morning, worse luck. By that time, we’ll have a chance to line things up a little better, and perhaps have some course of action planned.”
“I’ve just got a hunch,” said Bill. “I’ll tell you about it when I come back. If the hunch turns out to be a good one, you and I will get on the job long before daylight.”
“Then here’s hoping it will be a good one—” Osceola’s tone was more cheerful now, “there’s nothing worse than this rotten inaction.”
Bill nodded. Then he called to Dorothy, who stood at the head of the stairs. “Where’s your father staying in Hartford?”
“The Hiblein, I think—he usually does. If you ’phone him, tell him I’m all right, and give him my love.”
“I will. So long!”
He ran down the porch steps, and hurried across the lawn toward the highroad. When he got to his room, he went straight to the telephone where he called up the Hiblein Hotel at Hartford, and eventually heard Mr. Dixon’s voice on the wire.
“Bill Bolton speaking—” he began abruptly and launched into an account of the night’s happenings.
“My thanks to you, boy, and to Osceola,” said Dorothy’s father. “I won’t waste time now in talking about this outrage—but you can count on me being in New Canaan just as soon as the car can get me there.”
“Just a moment, sir—there’s something else I want to tell you, and something you can do for us.”
“Shoot,” said Mr. Dixon.
Bill rapidly ran over the adventures of the silver dollars, gave his own suspicions of the case, and ended by mentioning his affiliation with a certain department in Washington.
“Good enough, Bill. That explains why you resigned from Annapolis, of course. You undoubtedly have a flair for this kind of thing. But there doesn’t really seem to be any tangible clue to go on in this beastly kidnapping affair. Have you hit on anything yourself?”
“The license number of the gangsters’ car, the one that’s parked in your drive at present, sir, may lead us somewhere. Of course it may have been stolen; and if not, the owner’s house would be the least likely place for them to take Deborah. Still, if we could locate that residence, Osceola and I might be able to get a line on the chap and his friends. What do you think, sir?”
“That sounds like a mighty good plan. No telling what you may stir up. But where do I come in?”
“Why, the office of the Commissioner of Motor Vehicles is in Hartford, you know, of course, and it won’t be open till nine in the morning. I thought that you, being the president of the New Canaan Bank, might have a drag with some of the politicians up there in the capitol, and that they might arrange it so you could get the information we want tonight. If you could do that, and ’phone it on to me, then Osceola and I might be able to get the jump on them, do you see? It’s not likely the owner of the car guesses that the girls took his license number this morning, especially as we did nothing about it right away. I’ll admit that that was an error on our part, but we hadn’t any idea of what we were up against then.”
“Don’t let that worry you,” replied Dorothy’s father. “You’ve done splendidly—you’ve figured a logical why-and-wherefor to this business, and that’s a piece of constructive work. What are you doing now?”
“I’ve come over here to put on some clothes, sir. I’m still wearing pajamas—”
“I see. By the way, what’s that license number?”
Bill gave it to him.
“All right. Now go ahead and get dressed, then wait at your house until you hear from me. It won’t be long, because it happens that the State Commissioner of Motor Vehicles is an old friend of mine. We played golf together this afternoon. I’ll have the name and address of that car owner for you in short order.”
He rang off and Bill hung up the receiver. He put on a bath robe and slipped his feet into a pair of moccasins. Then he went downstairs and out to the garage. There he saw to it that the gas tank of his own car, a high-powered sport coupe, was full, drove it round to the front door and went up to his room again.
When he was completely dressed he went downstairs. He was beginning to feel hungry, and the prospect of a motor trip with no breakfast at the end of it made the idea of food all the more interesting. After he had cooked a substantial meal of bacon, eggs, and coffee, and had consumed every particle of it, he felt decidedly better and more in the mood to carry on at this early hour.
Then he went into the living room and threw himself down on a large divan, where he relaxed tired muscles and brought his mind to bear on the matter of the winged cartwheels. Perhaps a quarter of an hour had gone by, when he sprang up and went into his father’s study. The telephone bell was jangling loudly.
“That you, Bill?” He recognized the voice as Mr. Dixon’s.
“Speaking, sir.”
“Well, I rang up the commissioner and here’s the car owner’s name. He is a Serge Kolinski, a naturalized Pole, and he has a house in Sherman Township, Connecticut. Do you know where that is?”
“Why, yes—the field where we picnicked is not so far from Sherman.”
“Well, this time you’d better run up there by motor. It will be handier for getting round than a plane, and a car may be more useful to you. Do you happen to know where the old Heartfield’s Club is?”
“No, I don’t. But I’ll find it.”
“Here are your directions. When you get to Danbury, take Route 136, going north. About twelve or thirteen miles farther on, you’ll find that the road winds through a narrow valley. Where the valley widens out you’ll see a large square white house on the right, and a red barn behind it. That is the old clubhouse. You can’t miss it, for it’s the only house near the road in that part of the valley. The club itself no longer exists. It failed financially a few years ago.”
“Then the club house is shut up?”
“No, it’s not. A chap named Davis and his sister have rented the place for the summer. But what I want to say is this: on the side of the hill above the club house are several houses, built by members when the club was flourishing. Mr. Kolinski has rented one of them and is living there. Knock up Davis, who is by way of being a solid citizen, and he can tell you which is the Kolinski bungalow.”
“Thanks very much,” said Bill. “We’ll get under way at once.”
“Now hold on, young man. There’s something else. I’m driving over there myself, and with me will be two other cars filled with state police. Deborah Lightfoot is Dorothy’s guest, and very naturally, I intend to be in on this. You will, of course, arrive at Heartfield’s before I do. Get a line on Kolinski, and do a bit of reconnoitering, if you like, but don’t start any offensive until we come. Those are orders, remember.”
“Suppose,” argued Bill, “that Deborah’s at Kolinski’s, and we see her being transferred to some other hiding place?”
“Use your own judgment in that case, my lad. The object is to get Deborah back, unharmed, of course. But you’ve evidently got a first class thug to deal with. And by the way, get one of your friends to stay in the house with Dorothy, if you possibly can. The thought of leaving her there worries me.”
“That will be taken care of,” returned Bill. “The New Canaan police have been notified. They are probably across the road now. I’ll see that she is well guarded.”
“Thanks, Bill. Good luck—and be careful.”
“I will—see you at Heartfield’s, sir.”
Bill hung up the receiver and went out to his car. He was surprised to find that it was raining.
CHAPTER VI HEARTFIELD’S
Bill’s car sped into the sleeping town of Danbury. It splashed through the rain along streets where the lights ran together in golden pools. The swish of the water flying gutterwards was like the sound of the sea.
Bill spoke to Osceola: “There’s a dog wagon open,” and he pointed to a lighted sign. “Better eat. I had breakfast while I waited for the dope from Mr. Dixon.”
“If you had, no need of stopping then. Dorothy fed me before I left. I meant to ask you if you wanted anything, but this news from Mr. Dixon took it out of my head. There’s a sign that says Route 136—guess that’s our road.”
Five miles north of Danbury the rain slackened and finally stopped. The cool wind of early dawn sprang up and by the time they started to climb the winding turns of the Heartfield’s Valley, every cloud had been blown out of the sky. The east was painted a faint grayish pink as they roared into a straightaway between the wooded hills. Then the valley opened out, the road hugging the base of the hill on their left, while on the right wide meadows spread a carpet of high grasses that reached to the foot of the opposite hillside.
Half a mile further on, they came upon the old club house, set back from the highway in a group of fine elms. Here some attempt had been made to fashion a lawn, but as they swung up the rough drive, Bill noticed that the house was badly in need of paint and repair. He drew up at the side of the house, facing the red barn and an extensive apple orchard whose gnarled trees had not felt the pruning knife for many years. There appeared to be no bell, so Bill rapped sharply on the side door.
“Hello!” A man’s voice answered from behind a window screen just above. “What do you want down there?”
“Mr. Davis?” Bill stepped back a few paces so that he could get a better view of the window.
“That’s me,” said the owner of the voice, and yawned prodigiously.
“Mr. Dixon, the New Canaan banker, sent me up here to get some information from you, sir.”
“Wait a minute—I’ll come down.”
Osceola got out of the car and walked over to Bill. “How much are you going to tell him?” he asked in a low tone.
“Mr. Dixon said he was O.K.” Bill answered quietly. “Wait till he comes out. We’ll size him up for ourselves.”
The side door opened and a heavy set man with gray hair, arrayed in khaki trousers, a pajama jacket, and slippers, came out to meet them.
“Well, you are early callers,” he said jovially, “the New Canaan bank has a lien on this place, of course. I hope you haven’t come to turn me out?”
“Oh, nothing like that, sir,” smiled Bill. “We merely want some information, as I said before.”
Mr. Davis looked relieved. “You see,” he explained, “I’m a stockholder in the old club, so I have as much right to live here as anybody, I suppose. My business went pot last spring, so my sister and I are camping out here for the summer. I notified the receiver of the property, and as he said nothing about rent, I haven’t paid any.”
“We have nothing to do with the receivership, so set your mind at rest about that. My name is Bolton, and this is Chief Osceola of the Seminole Nation.”
“Why, this is an unexpected pleasure,” beamed Mr. Davis, as they shook hands. “You’re the two young fellows we’ve been reading about in the papers all summer. Don’t tell me you’re on the track of more slavers or pirates up here in this quiet spot?”
“Do you know a man named Kolinski, a Pole, I think he is?”
“Why, yes, I do, though not well. He’s rented the Landons’ cabin for the season. That’s the one right up the hill here, back of the barn.”
“Then he’s not a particular friend of yours?”
Mr. Davis’ eyes twinkled. “Well, hardly,” he returned with a shake of his head. “Kolinski is hardly what one would call a good mixer. He parks his car in the barn here—the hill is too steep and the path too narrow to drive up—and he seems to be a rather surly sort of chap. What he and the man who is his servant do with their time, I’m sure I can’t imagine. We have a nodding acquaintance, that’s about all. So I’m afraid that the little I know about him won’t help you much. But I don’t mind saying frankly that I don’t like the looks of him, nor of his man. He’s a shifty-eyed individual, and on the few occasions we’ve spoken I’ve caught him in a couple of lies about small matters that really didn’t amount to a hill of beans. If he’s trying to swing a loan from Mr. Dixon’s bank,—well, I’d want to be mighty sure of his collateral.” Mr. Davis pulled out a briar pipe and proceeded to tamp in tobacco from a pouch.
“Do you happen to know whether he is in his house now?” Osceola spoke for the first time.
“No, I don’t think so, because his car isn’t in the barn. The one you see there belongs to me.”
Osceola gave Bill a meaning look. “It is the car—or rather its license—that brought us up here,” he went on. “About two o’clock this morning, my fiancee, Deborah Lightfoot, was kidnapped from Mr. Dixon’s residence in New Canaan. The kidnappers were forced to leave their car behind, and we have learned that it belongs to your neighbor, Mr. Kolinski. There were evidently two groups, and the first got away with Deborah in one car, but we arrived in time to forestall the others, though we weren’t able to capture them and they got away on foot.”
“What a dastardly business!” exploded Mr. Davis. “And you say Kolinski’s car was left behind?”
“Yes, Mr. Dixon, who was in Hartford at the time, is on his way over here with a cordon of state police. They ought to arrive within an hour or so.”
“Have you fellows got guns?”
Bill patted the holster under his left arm. “We have—and there are a couple of rifles in my car.”
“Wait till I get mine and slip on a pair of boots—” Mr. Davis made for the house. “I’m going up the hill with you.”
“He’s a good hombre!” declared Osceola to Bill, as Davis disappeared.
“He is that! Let’s corral the rifles.”
In a very few minutes, Davis reappeared. The only visible change in his costume consisted of a pair of high trapper’s boots laced to the knee. He wore a cartridge belt slung over one shoulder, and in the hollow of his right arm he carried a repeating rifle.
“Come along—” he led them down a path which cut a narrow swath through the field behind the house. “Maybe our friends are up there in the cabin and maybe they’re not. My sister tells me she heard a car stop out on the road a couple of hours ago, but she didn’t get out of bed to see who it might be. It was raining hard then, and as you aviators say, the visibility was poor. She didn’t hear anybody walk up the drive past the house, though.”
“They could have cut round the house and climbed the hill from a point farther up or down the valley—that is, if they were trying to establish an alibi—and if we find them at home, after all,” suggested Bill.
“Then,” said Osceola, who was bringing up the rear, “those guys had a good long way to hoof it.”
“How come?”
“Swamps. Down at the foot of this meadow, and as far as you can see along the valley.”
“That’s right,” agreed Mr. Davis. “Any other way but this would add at least three miles to their hike. That broad, sluggish stream ahead of us runs the full length of the swamp and only partly drains it. The bridge at the end of this path is the only way across.”
“Is that the house, half way up the hillside in that grove of trees and underbrush?” inquired Osceola.
“You’ve got good eyes to spot it at this time o’ day,” said their guide. “No—that house belongs to a man named Kennedy, although it is empty at present. Kolinski’s cabin is higher up and over to the left.”
Still in single file they passed onto a corduroy trail through the swamp and over the bridge. On the farther side, the ground rose steeply. A few yards beyond they came to a fork in the path.
“Take the left to Kolinski’s—” announced Mr. Davis. He stopped and turned to the lads. “My plan is to take this right hand path to Kennedy’s and up through the woods. In that way we can make a half circle so as to come down on Kolinski’s place from above and be under cover the whole way. We’ll have broad daylight to contend with by the time we get there. If we go direct, anybody in the house can see us pretty well the whole distance up the hill. What do you say?”
“I think that’s a first rate idea,” said Bill.
“The only thing to do,” agreed Osceola. “Surprise is half the battle on a job like this. If you two don’t mind, I’ll scout on ahead. Wait in the woods a hundred yards above Kolinski’s for me. I want to take a look-see, but you palefaces make too much noise going through underbrush!”
With a low chuckle, he darted up the path at a sharp trot and disappeared among the alders like a wraith in the half-light and quite as silently.
“That pace would kill me in fifty yards, going up hill,” admitted Mr. Davis, as they trudged in the direction Osceola had taken. “Is your friend really an Indian, Mr. Bolton? He looks no darker to me than a well tanned Spaniard or South American.”
“Oh, he’s a real live redskin, all right. But a great many of them aren’t noticeably different in coloring from a lot of us so-called Americans, you know. Osceola was born to the chieftainship of his clan. Last year, although only twenty, he was unanimously elected the Great Sachem of the entire Seminole Nation. He is one of the finest fellows I’ve ever met. I only wish I had half his talents or knowledge. He’s a senior at Carlisle this year, although he’s not going back. His fiancee, the girl who’s been kidnapped, is Chieftainess of another clan of the Seminoles. She is a college graduate, by the way, and a most charming person.”
“Well, you certainly have interesting friends—and you yourself have done more interesting things than most men meet up with in a lifetime,” contended Mr. Davis. “How old are you, may I ask?”
“Seventeen on the second of this month.”
“You don’t say! Remarkable—my word, when I was your age, I was still tied to apron-strings, and stayed tied to them most of my life. Now, that house just ahead is Kennedy’s. The path ends here. We’ll take to the woods, and I’ll do my best not to disgrace myself in the underbrush!”
Bill soon realized that Mr. Davis was a trained woodsman. Not a twig cracked as they pushed their way up the steep hill through a thick growth of young trees and bushes that in places became a veritable jungle.
It was bright daylight when they swung round to the left and came down the hill again to a shallow ravine some distance above the Kolinski cabin. As the two dropped down on the short grass, hot and nearly winded, Osceola slid from behind a tree trunk.
“Any luck?” whispered Bill.
“No,” replied the Seminole gloomily. “We’ve had this hike for nothing. There’s nobody in the cabin.”
Chapter VII BEYOND THE FALLS
“Well, that certainly is disappointing.” Mr. Davis wiped the perspiration from his brow. “I suppose you made absolutely sure?”
Osceola nodded. “A window was open in one of the bedrooms. I went in and went through all four rooms and the cellar. What’s more, when they left, they took their clothes and papers with them. Not a sign of either in the house. I don’t think they’ve been up here since early yesterday evening.”
Mr. Davis looked surprised. “How can you place the time?”
“In several ways. If they had taken a lot of stuff down the hill in daylight, the chances are that you or your sister would have seen them. We know that Kolinski and probably his man as well were in New Canaan at two this morning, and that is thirty-five miles from here. Though there’s plenty of dust in that house, I saw no particles of mud either on the mat inside the door or on the floors.”
“So we’re just about where we were before we started on this wildgoose chase,” proclaimed Bill wearily.
“Hardly that, Bill,” protested Davis. “We’ve got one more bet in this neck of the woods.”
“What?” Bill and Osceola stared at him. Mr. Davis got to his feet.
“Come along. We’ve got to go down to the club house. I’ll tell you about it as we go.”
They had passed Kolinski’s cabin, a one-storied house solidly built of native stone, and struck off down the path toward the bridge before Davis spoke again.
“I don’t want to raise false hopes,” he said, “and this hunch may come to a dead end, too. But here it is for what it’s worth. I was trying to remember if I had ever heard the couple’s name, but I’m sure I haven’t. Half a mile up the valley road from my quarters you come to an abandoned mill on the other side of the highway. The place has an old wheel and stands beside a stream that rushes down a gorge in the hillside. You can see from here that the hill opposite is much higher and steeper than this one. The only path up there is the trail that starts at the mill and runs along the side of the gorge. The stream is the outlet for a small lake up there on the plateau and drops down the gorge in a series of very beautiful falls. The lake and the woods are off the Heartfield’s Club property. They belong to an estate with a good-sized house on it, about half a mile beyond the falls. There’s a sort of path round the lake, I believe, that joins a path leading up to the house from the farther shore. I haven’t been up there for years, but I distinctly remember the woods round the lake were swampy. However, when the last owner bought it, he put a high wire deer fence around his land to prevent trespassing. This club was in full swing then, so you can hardly blame him. But no one has lived there for the last few years. I heard over in Sherman that the whole place, house, land, lake and everything, had been bought by a foreign couple who had moved in. Timkins, in New Milford, brought their furniture over there from the railroad, and there was an awful lot of it, he said. Most of the stuff was packed in big cases and enormously heavy. You see,” he said, as they reached the bridge, “I’m trying to give you every bit of information I can about that place beyond the falls, and the reason is this: several times during the last three weeks, I have seen both Kolinski and his man going up and coming down that path by the mill. Either they had been enjoying the beauty of the falls, which I doubt, or—they’d been visiting the owners of that estate!”
“Humph!” grunted Bill. “I suppose there’s a road up on the top of the hill?”
“Yes, a dirt road that passes the house and joins the highway some miles farther on after it leaves this valley.”
They walked on in silence toward the club house, each of the three busily formulating plans.
“I’ll tell you what,” Bill said suddenly as they reached his car. “Osceola and I will go up to this place you’ve been talking about, and we’ll go by the path near the mill. You wait here for the police, if you don’t mind, Mr. Davis, and pilot them round by road. If these rascals really have Deborah up there, they’re likely to have sentries posted near the house, so advise Mr. Dixon and the police to leave their cars some distance down the road. If you men don’t come across us by that time, surround the house and rush it. Because,” he added, with a grimace, “We’ll probably be needing your help rather badly.”
“But hadn’t you better wait for the police yourselves?” Davis looked worried.
“And have those guys cart Deb off through the woods while the bunch of us come up to the house from the road? No indeed,” Osceola answered vigorously. “Bill can do as he likes, but I’m going up by the mill path. They won’t be expecting visitors from this side.”
“I’m going with you, Osceola,” said Bill. “Thanks a lot for all you’ve done and are doing for us, Mr. Davis. The gang from Hartford ought to be here within the hour.”
Osceola stepped forward. “Sorry I spoke abruptly, Mr. Davis. I must apologize—”
“Don’t mention it, my boy,” Mr. Davis cut in. “No hard feelings—I understand your anxiety. Run along now and I’ll take care of the police when they arrive.”
The boys hurried off down the rutty road toward Route 136. Half a mile along the highway they came to a bridge across a bubbling stream. Above the road on their left the ruins of the mill pointed broken rafters toward a cloudless sky. On the water side, bearded by the spray from the falls, was the ancient wheel that indicated the industry of bygone days, when the farmers brought their grain to be ground.
“There’s the trail!” Osceola pointed to an overgrown path that led up the mountainside just beyond the mill, and with Bill at his heels, he darted up and under the overhanging arch of trees.
The beauty of the deep gorge, the milky water churning down the steep background of jet black rocks and green ferns, the series of waterfalls, blown in the breeze like filmy veils,—all were lost upon Bill and Osceola. With the thought of pretty Deborah a prisoner in the hands of ruffians, they concentrated upon two things only: to reach the house beyond the falls as quickly as possible, and to do so without attracting attention of watchers who might be on the lookout.
Osceola stopped shortly before they reached the top, and motioning caution, darted into the woods away from the stream. Then he paralleled the path upwards again for a hundred yards or so with Bill directly behind him. All at once, he dropped to the ground, Bill followed suit, and the two crawled over to a fallen log and peered over it.
Slightly ahead, and perhaps fifty yards to their left, was the lake Mr. Davis had described, sending its overflow down the gulley in a silver sheet of sparkling water. Between them and the waterfall, the path was bisected by a high gate in a fence of heavy wire mesh, whose top was at least ten feet above the ground. This ran in both directions, blocking intrusion along the mountain top. They could see that it ran even along the dam at the mouth of the lake, while on their side of the path it disappeared in the thick growth of bushes and trees.
But their whole interest was centered upon the man who lay flat on the ground behind the gate. They could see him plainly. He was watching the path, hidden from it by a tree trunk, and at his side lay a long-barrelled rifle.
“Deborah,” said Osceola in his normal tones, for the noise of the falls was almost deafening, “is over in that house behind the lake. I’d stake my life on it. Shall I pot this guy?”
Bill shook his head. “Better not—they might hear the shot at the house, you know. The buzzard deserves death, if he’s a kidnapper, and I suppose he is—but we’ll let the police settle with him.”
“Yeah, if they get him. Well, let’s be going. I wish I’d brought a tomahawk with me!”
Having uttered this altruistic thought, Osceola slithered off through the undergrowth very much in the same manner that a snake travels through long grass, and Bill, perforce, went after him. Presently the young Indian Chief stood up. The gate in the fence and its sentry were no longer in sight. Both lads climbed the high wire and dropped inside to the ground. Osceola took the lead again, and set off through the trees at a smart trot. When it came to woods-craft, Bill knew this young Seminole to be without a peer. He never argued with Osceola in the woods, but was content to do as his friend directed, for he knew that no white man could approximate the American Indian’s native cunning in the forest.
As they progressed the ground became hummocky, and soon developed into a swamp, but this did not cut the speed of the lads in the slightest. They leapt from tuft to tuft of the coarse grass clumps with the agility of mountain goats, and crossed the evil smelling place without wetting a foot.
Although he could not see it, Bill knew that the lake lay somewhere to their left. When Osceola struck off obliquely in that direction, he guessed that they had passed beyond it. And he soon saw that he was right. A few yards farther on the trees ended in a belt of thick and overgrown shrubbery. Just beyond, an unkempt lawn surrounded a hideously ugly house of the cupola-and-mansard-roof variety, painted bright yellow.
“Gosh!” muttered Bill to his guide, “if I lived in that dump, I’d perish of colic!”
Osceola gave him a savage look. “If you don’t keep quiet, we’ll both die with several ounces of lead in our hides! Shut up, now, and turn your mind to what I taught you down in Florida about crossing open spaces on your belly. I’ll go first.”
He dropped prone and wriggled through the grass to a large bush without a sound and at an amazing rate of speed. Bill then did likewise, and was soon at his friend’s side. Their next move was to a belt of rhododendrons which grew close to the yellow house, and in great profusion. Near them was an open window. Bill went to one side, Osceola to the other. They stood up and looked in.
Before them was evidently the living room of the house. At the far end, four men and a woman were seated about a small table, breaking their fast. On a couch across from the window, lay Deborah. She was neither bound nor gagged; she seemed to be asleep.
Bill’s eyes sought Osceola’s. The Chief nodded.
With the ease of the trained athlete, first Bill, then the Seminole, lifted himself swiftly to the window sill and sprang into the room.
Chapter VIII A NEAR THING
The woman at the breakfast table was the first in the room to see Bill and Osceola spring through the open window. She screamed, the four men jumped to their feet, sending chairs crashing backward to the floor, the table rocking—and pandemonium broke loose.
Gripping their rifles by the barrels and swinging them like clubs, the lads charged the surprised kidnappers, who pulled revolvers and began shooting almost immediately. But after the first few shots, attackers and attacked became involved in a scrimmage so close and so heated that firing was impossible. Bill, wielding his rifle like a singlestick, managed to ward off the clubbing revolvers of his assailants, but Osceola, dropping his gun, went at them like a wild man, using fists alone.
In the midst of the fracas, a man sprang onto Bill’s back. By use of a jiu jitsu trick he catapulted his attacker over his head and on to the breakfast table which collapsed, sending broken china and glass in every direction. Osceola staggered and fell to the floor under the blow from a revolver butt, and Kolinski pressed the muzzle against the stunned Seminole’s temple. Like a streak of light, Bill jerked his automatic from its holster and the Pole went over backward with a bullet through his shoulder. Then Bill saw the woman, who still stood behind the debris of the breakfast table, pick up a plate and sail it through the air at him. He tried to duck, but was again held fast from behind. A burning pain seared his eyeballs and he, too, dropped insensible to the floor.
Bill awoke, gasping and sputtering, his head and shoulders drenched in water. His head was splitting, and the darkness round about him was shot with a myriad of dancing lights.
“Give the Indian another bucketful,” wheezed a cracked voice from the gloom.
Bill heard Osceola’s characteristic grunt as the water splashed over him. His mind began to clear, and soon he realized that he was bound hand and foot and that his eyes were bandaged. Again he heard the unmistakable wheeze in the cracked voice, and this time the high-pitched tones were full of sarcasm.
“And all this comes from entering where angels fear to tread!” A man’s voice, surely, thought Bill, but an old man—
The unseen speaker chuckled and went on with his monologue. “Although we have not met before, my young friends, I have climbed these many stairs to bid you goodbye. It pains me to send you off in this abrupt fashion,” again he chuckled, “but I cannot take you with _me_—and you are probably familiar with the adage that dead men tell no tales. You will be glad to hear that the young lady, Miss Deborah Lightfoot, will not mind her passing on to Happy Hunting Grounds quite as much as you two will. She was given a hypodermic in the car on the way up here, and is, to all intents and purposes, asleep.”
“But—surely you don’t mean to kill an innocent girl!” raged Bill.
“Ha-ha!” tittered the old man. “So that gets you on the raw, eh? What says the bereaved husband-to-be?”
“Sachems of the Seminole Nation do not waste their words on buzzards.”
“Thank you, young man,” wheezed the voice. “It is interesting to learn at first hand that the American Indian is as stoical in undergoing mental torture as in burning at the stake! But to return to your girl-friend on the floor over there—Miss Lightfoot made two bad mistakes. She had the misfortune to get a good look at one of my associates when he was searching for a certain emblem. And in the car, she ripped off my mask, and _she saw me_! Against my wishes, I must send her away with you, or else certain plans of mine would be jeopardized.”
“Well, Osceola, old man,” said Bill, ignoring their tormentor. “Sorry I got you into this, and sorrier still we both have to listen to this pitiful drivel. Unless he stops his cackle soon, I’ll be forced to take a nap in self-defense.”
“So long, Bill, old sport,” Osceola replied in his deep, grave voice. “Happy hunting—and sweet dreams!”
“Very pretty, very pretty indeed, young gentlemen. So sorry to bore you longer. You will be interested to know that my lookout on the hill tells me the police have just left Heartfield’s in their cars. They should reach here in about fifteen minutes. But you must not become too impatient. You see, I have a surprise for you and for them. In slightly over a quarter of an hour, this house and those in it will go shooting skywards—in other words, blow up. Good-bye again,—I must fly now, and I’m sure my news will help you keep your courage to the very end.”
Bill heard footsteps creaking on bare boards, then a door slammed. He turned at once to his friend.
“How are you tied?”
“Roped—wrists behind my back—and ankles. Blindfolded, too.”
“Same here. Wriggle over and I’ll get my hands on the knots.”
“Coming—but rip off this bandage first, and I’ll do the same for you. Then I can use my teeth on your wrist bonds—it’ll be easier and quicker that way.”
Bill heard Osceola slither across the floor and the bandage was ripped from his head. He in turn pulled off the young Seminole’s bandage and while his friend’s sharp teeth were working on the knotted ropes that bound his wrists, Bill sat up and took in their surroundings.
He saw that they were in a small room, empty of furniture. There were two windows in each of the four walls of the room. A door cut off one corner, and near it, Deborah lay on the floor, deep in her drugged sleep.
“I’ll bet we’re in the cupola,” said Bill, his eyes on the girl. “If I’m right, it’s a four-story drop to the ground, and that door looks too strong for us to bash in before the explosion.”
Osceola grunted, then spat copiously. Bill found that his wrists were free, and swinging round, he began to work on the rope which bound his friend.
“Ugh,” uttered the Seminole in disgust, “my mouth is full of hemp. I always did hate the taste of it.”
“Well, what I want to know is how we’re going to get out of here—and with Deborah?”
“I can’t tell you. Wait till we get our legs free. Maybe the outlook from the windows will give us an idea.”
“And maybe it won’t,” snorted Bill, working with feverish haste on the tight knots. “You know, I believe that old devil hoped we’d get loose.”
“How come?” Osceola, his hands free at last, was tearing at the rope around his ankles.
“Wants us to get free of these things—then find out there’s no way down short of jumping—hello!” He cocked his head, “somebody’s idling an airplane engine!”
“So that’s what the old buzzard meant when he said he’d have to fly! The bunch are making their getaway, eh?”
“Guess so. Well, I’m free—how about you?”
“Yep.”
Both lads sprang to their feet, feeling very stiff and dizzy, and hobbled to a window. They saw that the cupola raised its ugly head on the very center of the slate roof. The roof looked almost flat, but in reality sloped slightly down to rusty tin gutters at its eaves. A glance to the sides showed that the house boasted two yellow brick chimneys. Directly in front of the old mansion, a large field spread out for a quarter of a mile toward the highway. On the field a large monoplane was taxying into the wind, preparatory to the take-off. “Fokker Universal,” muttered Bill.
“I wish we had her up here,” said the young Chief. “We’re wasting time, Bill. We can’t have more than five or six minutes left. Give me a hand with Deborah. We’ll get her out of this window and onto the roof.”
“And then what? There isn’t a tree near the house. If we had a rope—”
“I’ve got it! There must be rainpipes down from the gutters. We’ll go down by one of those.”
“You mean, the leader will go down with you! Those gutters are old and rusty and full of holes. The leaders are sure to be in as bad or worse shape. It would be suicide to try it, especially with one of us carrying Deborah’s weight.”
“Great grief, Bill! What can we do? Think of Deborah—blown to pieces—”
“Hey, hey—get a grip on yourself. Snap out of it and let me think.”
“Maybe the door isn’t locked, after all—” Osceola snatched at this desperate thought—
“Try it if you like. But I heard that old wretch or one of his men slam the bolt and so did you.”
Osceola ran to the door and tried the handle, but without success. Then he backed off and flung the full force of his weight against it. The sturdy oak hardly creaked.
“Don’t let the thought of Deb make you lose your nerve, man,” said Bill, still looking out of the window.
Osceola’s face grew grim. He walked back to Bill and grasped his hand. “Thanks, old pal. And goodbye. I’m going to Deborah now. At least, we can die together!”
Chapter IX AT A DEAD END
“Here—just a minute—” cried Bill, “yes, by Jove! I believe we can do it!”
Osceola turned back. “Not that chimney you’re staring at! It’s got funnels at the top. We—”
“No—not the chimney, guy! The lightning rod! I forgot these oldtime houses had them. Quick now, with Deborah! I’ll go first. You pass her out to me.”
He leapt through the open window onto the slates a few feet below. Almost immediately, Osceola lifted Deborah’s limp body over the sill, where Bill caught her in his arms and hurried with his sagging burden toward a corner of the roof. There he put down the unconscious girl and lying flat, peered over the edge of the rotting gutter.
Osceola dropped beside him. “The rod looks strong enough, but do you think those rusty iron stanchions will stand the strain?”
“Our weight may pull a few loose, but that won’t bring the rod down. I just wanted to be sure there wasn’t any break—that it ran all the way to the ground.” He jumped to his feet. “Give me a hand with Deb.”
“But I’ll—”
“No, you won’t. I was trained to this at the Academy. Pick her up and hang her on my shoulders—not that way—head one side and legs t’other, so her body drapes round my neck. That’s it. Now rip off your belt and lash her wrists to her ankles. She mustn’t slip and I’ll have to use both hands on the rod. Got it fast? Fine. Will you go first?”
“No—you—I’ll help you over the edge. And Bill—we’ve only a minute or two left—”
With Deborah’s dead weight balanced on his shoulders and the base of his neck, Bill got down on his knees and keeping firm hold of the lightning rod that ran from the chimney across the roof on raised iron stanchions, went gingerly backwards over the creaking gutter. Then slowly, hand over hand he let himself and his burden down the rod. Notwithstanding his confident words to Osceola, he was fearful of pulling loose the staples, that at intervals of three or four feet secured the rod to the side of the house. He was obliged to use his hands as his sole means of support. If he pulled outward, pressing the rubber soles of his sneakers against the siding, the chances were the rotten wood holding the staples would give. For the same reason, he refrained from planting his feet on the stanchions themselves, as he let himself down.
The strain of the double weight was fearful. His shoulder muscles and biceps felt as though they were at the cracking point. And the corrugated rod lacerated the palms of his hands until they were bleeding badly.
He was descending the side of the house that looked over the field and the road. Suddenly he heard a shout from below, and the answering hail from Osceola just above his head told him that the police were arriving.
“Get back! Get back—all of you!” yelled the chief. “There’s a bomb in the house—likely to explode any time now!”
Bill’s right hand slipped. For an instant he thought he was gone but he managed to gain a hold with his lacerated left. Deborah hung like a millstone about his neck. As he felt for the rod with his toes, her legs and thighs slipped over his right shoulder, pinning that arm to his side, and bringing the full weight of her body on the left side of his neck and head. Bill found himself in the terrible predicament of being totally unable to move—either upward or down. Searing pain shot through his left hand—his head reeled. In one more second he must drop—
“Let go, lad—” called Mr. Dixon’s voice from below. “You’re almost down.”
Strong arms caught him about the knees. He released his grip, as they let him down. Then Deborah’s now unbearable weight was taken from his shoulders. Somebody far away cried—“Good Lord! the boy’s hands are in ribbons!” And Bill, for the first time in his life, fainted.
* * * * * * * *
Bang! Crash!
He felt himself hurtling through space to light head first on something fairly soft, but with a jar that almost loosened his front teeth.
“Don’t kick—that’s my face—or was,” growled a deep voice.
Bill was pushed violently to one side. He opened his eyes and sat up, feeling as though he had been pounded with a sledge-hammer.
“The other way—” said the same deep voice. “The wind of the thing sent us heels over teakettle.”
Bill turned his head slowly and painfully. Beside him sat a large and husky individual in the dark uniform of the Connecticut State Police. Possibly two hundred yards away, a huge mass of debris was burning. Over it hung a heavy cloud of jet black smoke.
“Yes, that’s the house, or what’s left of it,” explained the policeman. “Lucky we weren’t nearer. Talk about your fireworks! Say, how are you feelin’, kid?”
“Kinda woozy, thanks.”
“Don’t mention it—”
“What do you mean?”
“Oh, nuthin’—except that when you and I went up in the air, you dove headfirst into me stomach—and it sure does feel lousy!”
“Gee, that’s too bad—” Bill sympathized. “I certainly hope I didn’t dent your pretty belt buckle with my teeth—or what’s left of them! You were toting me, I take it?”
“Yeah. I was runnin’ wid you over my shoulder when the blast come.”
“And—er—woke me up.”
“You said it. I’ll bet that head o’ yourn rammed into me belt buckle a good eight inches! The inside o’ me backbone feels black an’ blue.”
They got to their feet. Bill’s head, though aching, was now perfectly clear. He saw that they stood in the knee-high grass of the field. Two cars were approaching along the drive. Several groups of men were spread out over the field. He recognized Osceola, carrying Deborah in his arms. Beside him walked Mr. Dixon. They were making for the motor cars.
A familiar voice hailed Bill, and looking around, he saw Mr. Davis behind him.
“Well, that was a very pretty tumble you and the sergeant took a while ago,” he said, his eyes twinkling.
“It kind of woke me up,” said Bill, “but our friend here says he feels like the break-up of a heavy winter.”
“Square in the belly,” complained the policeman. He began to repeat the story of his bruised backbone, when Mr. Davis cut in on him.
“Goodness, Bolton, you’re covered with blood!”
“I am? Oh, it’s my hands—” Bill held out his torn palms.
Mr. Davis winced. “Great Scott! No wonder you passed out. How you ever managed to hold on—But here we stand talking. Come on over to the police car. They’ve got a first aid kit—we don’t want to let you in for blood poisoning.”
With the bleating sergeant bringing up the rear, he hurried Bill over the field to the car, where he pulled out a large tin case and laid it on the grass. Then he went to work on Bill’s hands with the deftness of a surgeon.
“Now then,” he said after a while, “that will hold you till you’re home and can get a doctor. This is only a makeshift.”
Bill stared at his bandaged hands. “Seems to me, Mr. Davis, you’ve made a mighty neat job of it. Looks like a full-fledged doctor’s work.”
“Oh, I had two years at medical school, when I was a youngster,” Davis said, as he closed the kit and replaced it in the car. “Couldn’t stand that racket longer, though, and went into business instead.”
“Well, I’m much obliged to you. Where do we go from here, now that the old gink has flew the coop and blown his house to smithereens?”
“So you saw the leader of the gang?”
“No. Only heard his voice. But you can take it from me, when it comes to being a real nasty customer, that guy wins hands down!”
Davis nodded. “I can quite believe it. You must tell us about it later. Hop in the car there, lean back and close your eyes. You look pretty rocky, and no wonder. I’ll have a chat with Dixon and find out what the plans are.”
Bill looked up a few minutes later as the car door opened, and saw that Davis had reappeared, with a tall man in the uniform of a police officer.
“Captain Simmonds, Mr. Bolton,” said Davis, as they took seats beside him.
“Glad to know you, Captain Simmonds,” Bill said affably, as the policeman in the driver’s seat threw the car into gear. “Sorry I can’t shake hands. Where do we go from here?”
“Back to Heartfield’s, first, Mr. Bolton. I want Mr. Davis, who, as you know, is something of a physician to take a look at Miss Lightfoot. Chief Osceola says she’s been drugged. They are in the car ahead with Mr. Dixon. Believe me, Mr. Bolton, when I say that I’ve never seen a finer piece of sheer grit and nerve than the way you brought the young lady down that rusty lightning rod.”
Bill shook his head. “We really ought to have waited for you chaps before we tackled that bunch in the house. But with Deb lying there on the lounge in plain sight, it seemed the only thing to do.”
“Suppose,” suggested Mr. Davis, “that you tell us about it—that is, if you feel able to do so now.”
“You see,” added Captain Simmonds, “except that we saw you shinning down the lightning rod, and that we got Chief Osceola’s warning just in time to prevent us breaking into the house, we really have no information as to what happened. The crowd of us arrived only in time to scamper off before the whole shebang blew up.”
“I realize that,” said Bill. Except for the burning pain in his hands and a certain stiffness in his arms and shoulder muscles, he was feeling pretty much himself again. “I’m quite able to talk about it now, and I’d like to. The sooner we get started after that old devil and put him behind the bars for keeps, the happier yours truly will be!”
“Let’s have it from the time you and the young Indian Chief left Heartfield’s,” suggested the Police Captain.
Bill told them the story in detail as the car bumped over the rutty road and his listeners sat silent, taking in every word.
“Jehosophat!” exploded Mr. Davis, when he had finished. “I’ve read about some of your other experiences, Bolton, but that is certainly one exciting tale! The old man with the wheezy voice is a maniac, of course, but people of that type can be exceedingly clever. In some ways, they often appear absolutely normal, too. That old bird, if he is really an old man, as you guessed from his voice, may appear to be a solid and possibly useful citizen, to the majority of his friends and associates. But he’s cracked, just the same—mad as a March hare on one subject—I’ll stake my oath on it!”
“And when we know what that one thing is,” chimed in Captain Simmonds, “We’ll be a long way ahead in solving this kidnapping. So he got away in a big Fokker! There aren’t so many of those busses around. You’d recognize his voice again, of course, Mr. Bolton?”
“I’ll never be able to forget it, Captain.”
“No, I guess not. Miss Lightfoot seems to be the only person we can lay our hands on who has seen his face, and she is under the influence of a drug! My men will search the ruins of that house. It’s unlikely, though, that they’ll find any clue in what’s left of it, and the ruins will be too hot for a couple of days, unless we have rain.”
“I wouldn’t pin too much hope on Miss Lightfoot, either,” said Mr. Davis. “It’s quite possible that she is suffering from shock, as well as having been drugged.”
“You mean,” said Bill, “that after the effects of the drug wear off, she may still be unconscious?”
“It is possible. On the other hand, the drug, plus what she went through before it was administered may make it impossible to question her without jeopardizing the poor girl’s reason.”
Captain Simmonds frowned. “That is serious,” he admitted. “How long will it be before we can get a description of this man from her, Mr. Davis?”
“Nobody can predict that, Captain. First, the effects of the drug must either be counteracted or it must wear off. Then it depends entirely upon the condition of the young lady herself. Please don’t think me a pessimist, but my advice is to follow any other clues you may have, and not count on Miss Lightfoot’s help at all. I’ve known cases where the patient was allowed to talk to no one for weeks.”
“My word,” said Bill. “Poor Deborah! And that is a pleasant prospect for us. I reckon, after what you’ve done to help us, Mr. Davis, that the Captain won’t mind my telling you that the only clue we have are the winged cartwheels, the numbered emblems of this organization we are up against. And so far, Mr. Davis, those silver dollars have brought us nothing but trouble.”
Chapter X ENTER WASHINGTON
The long shadows of late afternoon cut intricate figures on the Bolton’s lawn. Bill, from his chair on the porch, let the book he had been reading slip to the floor. He watched sunlight and shadow dance on a background of multi-colored green, for a gentle breeze had set the treetops stirring. As an open car, a familiar figure at the wheel, rolled up the driveway he sauntered over to the top of the steps.
“Hello there, Mr. Davis! Glad to see you.” He waved a bandaged hand, as the car drew up and stopped.
Mr. Davis got out and walked up the steps. He was no longer the rather rough looking figure of the morning, but was now immaculate in gray flannels and a spick and span panama.
“Glad to see you, Bolton,” he smiled pleasantly, and Bill was again impressed by the keen intelligence in this gray-haired man’s eyes. “This is a rather unexpected pleasure. I really did not expect to be in New Canaan this afternoon.”
Bill pointed to chairs and they sat down. “I’ve been trying to read, but it’s a nuisance turning the pages with these hands!”
“How are they coming along?”
“Nicely, thanks. Our local medico had a look at them when we got back from Heartfield’s this morning. He says that the salve you used must be wonderful stuff—he’d never seen anything heal so quickly.”
Mr. Davis smiled, and pulling out his briar pipe, filled and lighted it. “By tomorrow you’ll be able to discard the bandages,” he observed. “Although you will have to go easy on the hands themselves for a couple of days. I came across that salve in the Near East some years ago. Some day, when I can snaffle a few weeks off the job, I’ll put the ointment on the market, and let it make my everlasting fortune.” Bill looked surprised.
“But I thought—”
“That old Davis was taking a cheap vacation, rent free! That is the story I pass out just now, Mr. Secret Service Operative Bolton! But—and I’m rather sorry to confess it—the story, though plausible, is untrue.”
“And what,” Bill spoke quietly, watching his visitor through half-shut lids, “gives you the impression that I am a secret service operative, Mr. Davis?”
“Perhaps you’d like to look at this.” Mr. Davis took a small leather case from his breast pocket and snapped back the flap, disclosing a green card. He held it so Bill could read it.
“Suffering cats! So _you’re_ Ashton Sanborn—head of—”
“Quite so. But to you and everyone else while we are on this case of the winged cartwheels, just plain ‘Mr. Davis’, if you please.” He laughed quietly at the look of genuine amazement on Bill’s face. “You see, one is never sure who may be listening, and I am fairly certain that the gentry we are dealing with have not got onto _Mr. Davis_ yet!”
A telegraph messenger pedalled up the drive, sprang off his bicycle and ran up the steps to Bill.
“Wire for you, Mr. Bolton,” he said, handing him a yellow envelope. “The manager says he wrote out the message just as it came in, but he can’t make head nor tail of it—he—”
Bill ripped open the flap with his finger tips, drew forth the telegraph form and saw typewritten below his address a single line of words in an unknown language.
“Tell the manager,” he replied, “that the message is really for Chief Osceola and that it is written in the Seminole language. Anything to pay?”
“No, sir.”
“Well, stick your fist into this pocket of my coat and help yourself to a quarter.”
“Thanks, Mr. Bolton.” The boy grinned delightedly as he transferred the money to his own pocket. Then he ran down the steps, jumped on his wheel, and sped down the drive.
Bill looked at the secret service man and smiled. “No need to tell the manager all we know, Mister—er—Davis,” he said. “And especially when I really don’t know anything. Of course, the message is in code and although it was sent from New York City, I have a sneaking idea that it originated in Washington, D. C.”
The secret service man nodded. “You’re a good guesser, Bolton. Washington is taking no chances either. The code is a double interchange of letters. Simple enough when you know it and easy to remember. Hand it over. I’ll explain as I translate.” He laid the paper on his knee and took out a pencil.
“So you see,” he continued, after deciphering the code, “it reads: ‘Take your orders from Ashton Sanborn V8LR.’”
“V8 being my own number in the service,” said Bill, “and the initials those of the big boss. I want to add that I’m tickled to death to be working under you, Mr. Davis. All the world knows the big things you’ve put over. And just to think that when you were piloting Osceola and me up to Kolinski’s shack this morning, you probably knew a lot more than we did about the winged cartwheels!”
Mr. Davis made a gesture of dissent. “That’s where you’re wrong, Bolton. Until you told the story to Captain Simmonds and me in the car, I’d never heard of the emblems nor of the organization they represent.”
“But surely you—I mean, it is rather cheeky of me to ask questions, but if you knew nothing about the cartwheel gang, how did you happen to be in that out-of-the-way place?”
“It’s simple enough, Bill—I’m going to call you Bill. I’m old enough to be your father, and we’ll probably get pretty well acquainted before this case goes into the files completed.”
“Bill is what I like my friends to call me, Mr. Davis.”
“Thanks. Well, the truth of the matter is that I was in Heartfield’s to keep an eye on Kolinski. For some time, a big gang with headquarters in New York City has been doing a land-office business smuggling cocaine and other drugs into this country from Europe. The police came to a dead end on the case and that brought me into it. Kolinski, who is known to have been a dope pedlar in a small way, suddenly blossomed out with a big car and plenty of money. I had enough on that Pole before he took the house at Heartfield’s to put him behind bars for the remainder of his life. Instead, I followed him up there, because, after considering a number of things—I’ll tell you about them sometime—I had the hunch that he’d become a member of this big dope running gang.”
“Have you found out much about it?”
Mr. Davis tamped the glowing tobacco in his pipe with the flat end of a pencil. “Mighty little—nothing important, anyway. Kolinski has no flies on him, he’s a slick article. Even though he made one or two slips in the past, he _seems_ to have been walking the straight and narrow since he joined this racket; only of course I’m certain he’s been doing nothing of the kind!”
“Then you think this silver cartwheel business is nothing more than a dope smuggling ring?”
“I’m not so sure. However, our Department has been advised from France that large quantities of cocaine are being shipped to the United States. The French tracked down and located two of these shipments before they left Europe. The stuff was in small packets and had been placed in boxes containing truffles.”
“But surely,” argued Bill, “those truffles were addressed to someone in this country.”
“Right, they were. But those addresses led us nowhere. Upon investigation they proved to be two untenanted houses in New York City. The owners are perfectly respectable people. In both cases, the houses had been rented through agents and rent paid in advance for six months.”
“But how about the people who rented them?”
“They have never been seen. The business with the real estate firms was carried on entirely by correspondence. Inasmuch as postal orders covering the rent were sent by mail, references were not required. You must understand that because of the two shipments held up and confiscated by the French government, we naturally suppose that more of the stuff is being sent over. But we have no actual proof. On the other hand, when we find that several men like Kolinski, who are known to be small fry in this dope racket, suddenly desert their old haunts and become affluent without any visible means of support, we put two and two together. However, we have not been able to trace the source of supply further than I have already told you, nor have we been able to discover their method of distribution.”
“Has it occurred to you that it may be only a sideline of some much bigger racket?” Bill suggested diffidently. “It just doesn’t seem reasonable that that old geezer with the cracked voice would have got so stirred up if we’d merely horned in on a dope ring. The man talked like a lunatic, and as if we were spoiling some very definite object he had in view.”
“That, Bill, is exactly what I decided when I heard your story. Of course I had already disclosed my real identity to Captain Simmonds, and as soon as you left for New Canaan, we had a chat and I got Washington on the wire. I had known for a week or so that you’d been taken on by the Department, and so I requested your services on the job. The people down there thought it a good idea. They’ve given us free rein to handle this matter as we may see fit—and so here I am!”
“And I,” said Bill, “am very much honored that you should want me to help you.”
Mr. Davis smiled. “I think the regard is mutual, Bill, and I’m sure we’ll get on splendidly together. By the way, I suppose your Seminole friend is over at the Dixons’? I phoned their physician before leaving Heartfield’s and he said Miss Lightfoot was conscious now, but could not be spoken to until about eight.”
“Yes, I know. Osceola is with her, of course, and until you drove up here I’d nothing to do except think—and watch the shadows on the lawn. He’ll be coming back here for chow soon. We dine at seven. You’ll stop with us, of course?”
“Thanks very much, I’ll be glad to. And you will be interested to hear that I’ve been authorized to secure Chief Osceola’s services on this case. I’ve an idea he’ll prove a valuable man.”
“He sure will!” Bill replied enthusiastically, “—and after what these cartwheel fellows have done to Deborah, there’d be no keeping him out of it anyway.”
Mr. Davis looked grave. “That young lady holds the most important clue we have.”
“Yes,” said Bill. “Gosh, I can hardly wait till eight o’clock!”
Chapter XI THE MAN WITH THE WHEEZE
Bill, Osceola and Mr. Davis walked across the lawn to the Dixon house a few minutes after eight that evening. Mr. Dixon greeted them at the door.
“Come in, come in,” he said genially, shaking hands with Davis and nodding to the lads. “Deborah, I’m glad to say, is much better. She is just finished with her supper. We can go up in a moment or two.”
“I’m sorry to intrude at this time, Mr. Dixon,” apologized the secret service man. “Chief Osceola tells me that your maids departed, bag and baggage, this morning, to further complicate matters, and I should think your household must be very much upset.”
“Dorothy,” pronounced her father, “is a mighty good little housekeeper. She’s been running the place in great shape, with the help of a girl we got in from the village. You haven’t met my daughter yet, have you, Mr. Davis?”
“No, but I’ve heard of her flying exploits. She’s by way of being quite a detective, too, isn’t she?”
“Yes, indeed. She saved me and my bank a heap of trouble earlier this summer,” said her father proudly. “Dorothy—” he called, “come here for a moment, please.”
“What is it, Daddy?” A door at the back of the hall burst open and Dorothy ran toward them. Her girlish figure was clothed in a blue linen frock and a white apron covered her from throat to ankles. There were some faint traces of flour clinging to her wrists as if she had been suddenly summoned from the bread bowl. She looked fresh and sweet, strong and healthy, and a certain grace of manner pleased Mr. Davis instantly. He saw that she had her father’s eyes and coloring, his air of self-reliance. He noticed, too, that when she spoke to her parent her voice was tempered with a particular tenderness. This pleased him most of all, for he had expected to see somewhat of a hoyden. This girl, for all her prowess as a flyer, was totally feminine. Mr. Dixon introduced them.
“I didn’t know young ladies made bread these days,” said the detective as he shook hands with her.
Dorothy smiled and glanced at her arms. “Not bread, Mr. Davis, rolls for breakfast. Daddy likes them home-made, and I hate to get up early, so I’ve been mixing dough.”
“Do you think, dear, that Deborah can see Mr. Davis now? He is in charge of the case, you know.”
“Why yes, that will be perfectly all right, Daddy. When I took down her supper half an hour ago, the nurse said that any time would be convenient. She stipulated, though, that Mr. Davis have only one other person with him, and that the interview be as brief as possible.”
“Certainly, we want to spare her as much as we can,” said Mr. Davis. “I have only a few questions to ask. And I think I’ll take Bill with me. He’s been wounded in the fray, and I think that under the circumstances he has the right to hear first whatever Miss Lightfoot has to tell us.”
“He certainly has,” chimed in Osceola. “He saved Deb’s life. I’ve seen her this afternoon, but the nurse wouldn’t allow us to talk. Make it snappy, you two. I’m on pins and needles to learn her story.”
“All right—” Bill waved a bandaged hand, and with Dorothy leading the way, he and Mr. Davis went upstairs.
When they reached the door to Deborah’s room, Dorothy excused herself and went in, leaving them waiting in the corridor.
“Let me do most of the talking,” cautioned the detective. “And if she can’t remember, be sure not to press her. It might have a very serious effect on the girl’s health.”
Dorothy opened the door. “You may go in now. The poor child feels rather rocky still. Those brutes hit her over the head, you know, and she is still in a good deal of pain.”
Deborah lay on a lounge by the window. When they entered she was apparently asleep. Across her forehead, covering her temples, two narrow bandages bound up her wound. As the detective and Bill crossed the room, she opened her eyes, and her bruised, discolored face broke into a smile. Then, noticing their evident anxiety, she sat up, leaning an elbow on her pillow. A trained nurse hovered in the background a moment, then noiselessly left the room.
“Bill—don’t look so upset. It’s nothing—I’ll be all right in a day or two. We Seminoles are hard to down, you know. They tell me you saved my life, Bill. I don’t know what to say to thank you—”
“Please don’t!” Bill smiled down at her and took one of the two chairs that had been placed near her couch. “I’ll bet they forgot to tell you that I was saving my own life just about that time!”
“Oh, your poor hands!” she cried, spying the bandages. “Are they very badly torn?”
“Only scratched up a bit. We Boltons haven’t the honor to be Seminoles, but we’re pretty tough articles, just the same.” Deborah smiled, and Bill indicated his companion. “This is Mr. Davis, Deborah. He is in charge of the case and he wants to ask you a few questions.”
“How do you do, Mr. Davis?” Deborah spoke brightly enough, but Bill could see that the excitement of their visit was proving a strain.
“Now, if you don’t feel well enough to talk, Miss Lightfoot, we’ll postpone our chat until tomorrow,” said Mr. Davis in his pleasant voice.
Deborah shook her head. “No, Mr. Davis—I know that if I can tell you anything which will help you in your search for these men, then the sooner you have the information, the more valuable it will be to you. Of course, except for the fight with them in this room, after which they carried me downstairs, and then, for a few minutes in the automobile before they jabbed a hypodermic needle into my arm, I really know nothing—”
“I realize that, Miss Lightfoot. Bill said ‘questions’ just now, but there is only one thing I’ve come to ask you.”
Deborah looked relieved, yet faintly puzzled. “What is that, Mr. Davis?”
“Do you think you could describe the old man whose mask you pulled off in the automobile? We have reason to believe he is the leader of these kidnappers.”
“I am sure I can. You must know that the car was a seven-passenger Packard. I was placed in the middle of the rear seat between two men, who held me. The man you mentioned was sitting in one of the two extra seats that let down, just in front of me. Although I was still struggling with my captors, and half frantic, I noticed him particularly because he wore a black mask that entirely covered his face. Above the mask, a fringe of white hair showed at the edge of a black silk skullcap. Although I never saw him standing, I judged he was not much taller than five feet two or three. He was thin and small-boned, and narrow-shouldered. His head was very large, it seemed too large to be supported by his skinny neck. His voice was high-pitched and shrill. He wheezed, too, as though he might have asthma....”
“Splendid!” said Mr. Dixon, as the nurse brought Deborah a glass of water. “What did he look like when you pulled off the mask?”
Deborah smiled a little grimly. “For all the world like an old bird of prey, Mr. Davis. And a very much frightened bird, at that. Those men, you see, had gagged me with a handkerchief. I managed to get the thing out of my mouth and in the struggle that followed, the old man, who was wheezing orders all the time, leaned toward me. He tried to get hold of my right arm which I had wrenched free. The man on that side of me was temporarily out of the running, because I had jabbed him with my elbow just under the heart a moment before. Well, when the old man leaned toward me I made a grab for his head. My idea was to get a grip on the back of his thin neck and hurl him into the man on my left who had me by the arm. As it was, the old boy drew back suddenly, and instead of his neck, I got the mask.”
“Can you describe his features?”
“I’m quite sure I can. His forehead, below the fringe of white hair, was high and broad; the brow of a scholar, almost. Bushy white eyebrows shaded little dark eyes, brown, probably, which seemed too small for his face. Between these a very thin, high-bridged nose jutted out. He was clean-shaven, with rather high cheek bones and hollow cheeks. His mouth below his beak of a nose was a straight, thin-lipped line. From his nostrils, two deep furrows ran down to the corners of his mouth, and his chin was long and pointed. His throat was flabby and the Adam’s apple prominent. Oh, I forgot to say that, his entire face, nose and all was crisscrossed with the deep wrinkles of old age.”
“You are a most observant young lady, Miss Lightfoot. I never expected to receive such a detailed description. I can picture the old villain perfectly.”
“I am glad.” Deborah smiled back at him. “I am Seminole, you must remember, Mr. Davis. Indians, men and women, are trained from childhood to notice detail.”
The secret service man nodded. Then suddenly he uttered a sharp exclamation and leaned toward her.
“Can you tell me,” he asked, and all three of his hearers felt the excitement in his tone. “Can you remember, Miss Lightfoot, anything peculiar about this old man’s ears?”
“Yes, I—I can, Mr. Davis. I did notice them, particularly. They were small, set close to his head and absolutely lobeless. Also, with the single exception of Napoleon’s death mask, which I saw in New Orleans last year, I had never seen ears set so low on a person’s head. The top of both this man’s ears and those of the great French Emperor were on a line with the outside corners of their eyes!”
Mr. Davis leaned back in his chair, an oddly puzzled frown on his handsome features. “Miss Lightfoot,” he said slowly, “you will understand and pardon me when I say you are a very remarkable young woman—with a very fine memory.”
“I’m afraid I can’t agree with you, Mr. Davis. If my memory was really good, I could place the man. From the moment I glimpsed his face, I had a feeling that I’d seen him somewhere. Yet I haven’t the slightest idea where it could have been.”
“But you have told me who he is, just the same, hard as it is to believe the truth!”
“You know his name?” exclaimed Bill and Deborah simultaneously.
“I most certainly do. What’s more, I am pretty sure I know where Miss Lightfoot saw him—Excuse me for a moment.” He stood up. “I’m going downstairs, but I’ll be right back. In the meantime, I don’t want you young people to talk any more. Miss Lightfoot needs a rest and she must have it.”
He went swiftly out of the room and Deborah, now that further conversation was unnecessary, closed her eyes and lay back on the pillows. Bill sat, lost in thought, until Mr. Davis returned in a surprisingly short time.
In his hand he carried the Sunday roto-gravure section of a New York newspaper. Deborah looked up as he spread out the page and held it before her.
“Do you see your abductor here?”
Bill, who had risen and was looking over the detective’s shoulder, saw her point unhesitatingly to a large photograph at the top of the page, which portrayed two men, one middle-aged and the other old and wrinkled, seated in garden chairs on a lawn. Both were familiar faces, and the older was undoubtedly the man Deborah had just described. The picture was captioned: “President lunches with savant.”
Below, he read: “The President visited Professor Fanely on the latter’s ninetieth birthday, when he was the principal guest at the ‘Great Old Man’s’ birthday luncheon.”
“‘Great Old Man’ is right,” snorted Bill. “It takes some doing to run away with a young girl at ninety!”
“Do keep quiet, Bill!” Deborah’s pale face was serious. “Why, it seems impossible, doesn’t it, Mr. Davis? Of course I know Professor Fanely’s reputation as a scientist, everybody does, it’s world wide. Yet impossible as it may seem, I’m surer than ever that the old gentleman in the photograph there, sitting beside the President of the United States, was the man I unmasked early this morning!”
Mr. Davis took her hand in his. “I believe you, young lady,” he said kindly. “But Bill and I have a first class job on our hands. And I must ask both you and nurse over there not to breathe a word of this matter. What was formerly a serious affair has become a hundred-fold more so now. To know the truth is one thing: to be able to prove that truth quite another. And believe me when I say that if I am able to prove Professor Fanely, who is respected and loved the world over, the man who abducted you and tried to kill you, Bill and Osceola—I shall consider that I, too, am a world beater! Only I might as well say now that I haven’t the ghost of a show.”
Chapter XII ARGUMENT
“Before we can think of arresting Professor Fanely,” remarked Mr. Davis, “we must have indisputable evidence that we can put before a jury.”
“But surely, Mr. Davis,” argued Osceola, “Deborah’s description of the old man—her recognition of his photograph should be sufficient to convict him.”
“On the contrary,” declared Bill. “Although it has put us wise to the old buzzard, it really is no evidence at all. Am I right, Mr. Davis?”
“You certainly are, Bill. We’d be hooted out of court in no time; and probably have countercharges of criminal libel brought against us by old Fanely into the bargain.”
The trio had just walked back to the Bolton house. Ensconced in comfortable chairs on the side porch, they had constituted themselves a Ways-and-Means committee.
Bill came back at his friend again. “You’re letting your personal feeling for Deborah enter into this, Osceola. It just can’t be done.”
“But Deborah is perfectly sure. She was in the car with the man, wasn’t she? Her word—”
“Is quite good enough for us, or for anyone who really knows Miss Lightfoot’s admirable character,” broke in the secret service man. He shrewdly guessed the impatience that raged beneath the young Seminole’s calm exterior. But rational discussion of the problem, and not heated argument was their object in conferring. He therefore proceeded to pour oil upon troubled waters. “You see, Chief,” he went on to explain, “this is not a case where anybody’s word, no matter who he or she may be, will count in the balance with the word of Professor Fanely himself.”
“Obviously, he’d deny it—” said Bill.
“Not only deny any charge preferred against him,” Mr. Davis said earnestly. “He would be sure to bring forth a cast iron alibi that no one could break. And, however illogical it might seem, in all probability _his_ mere word would be adjudged sufficient. Think of the man’s life-long reputation—the things he has done. His name is a household word the world over. And with all that in his favor to prejudice public opinion, Professor Fanely is a Croesus. The patents on his scientific discoveries have brought him millions. And, to cap the pyramid of his fortifications, he counts as his friends the great men of both this country and Europe....”
Osceola turned his dark eyes from an unseeing study of the patterned porch rug, and nodded slowly. “I begin to see our difficulties—at least, some of them. I ask your pardon, Mr. Davis, for making a fool of myself!”
“Nonsense, my boy!” Davis leaned forward and patted him on the knee. “You made the natural mistake of believing we had to deal with a private individual.”
“Whereas,” grinned Bill, “the professor is really a national institution!”
“Exactly. We three are convinced that there is a screw loose somewhere in that great brain, but we’ve simply got to prove that. Merely saying that he is this and that would let us in for a lot of trouble, and only defeat our ends.”
“Yes, I suppose so. But what can we do about this mess if nobody will believe us?”
“Find out what racket old Fanely is running—and get him with the goods.”
“Easier said than done, Bill. Let’s kidnap the old boy and that Kolinski guy, for choice. Leave me alone in a room with those bozos for half an hour, and I’ll come out with a couple of signed confessions. They’re a pair of third degree artists themselves. I’m fed up with all this kid glove business. And they’ve got a whole lot coming from me before we break even.”
They were silent for a minute or two. Mr. Davis brought out his pipe, filled and lighted it. Tossing the glowing match over the porch rail, he turned toward the irate young chief.
“But such methods will get us nowhere. And even if we were able to follow out your suggestion, I, as servant of the Federal Government, could not countenance it. Bill is right. Only by learning what is really in back of this, will we be able to apprehend the ringleader, and put him where he can do no more harm. I’m old enough to be your father, chief, and I’ve been in this business since before you were born. As you know, I first thought that we were up against a dope smuggling gang. That is how I first came onto this case.”
“Then you’ve changed your mind about that?” inquired Bill.
“Yes and no. Dope smuggling from Europe may be part of it—but only part. That would be small potatoes for a man of the professor’s standing and wealth. There’s something else behind all this winged cartwheel affair, and we’ve touched only the edge of it. The next move on our program is to do exactly what Bill suggests: go and find out about it. Before Miss Lightfoot put us wise to Professor Fanely, I hadn’t the least idea where to turn. Her information gives us the lead and we shall certainly take advantage of it.”
Bill looked up. “The old boy has a big place in Greenwich, has he not?”
“Yes. And one or more of us will be in that house of his before thirty-six hours.”
“Why thirty-six hours?” This from Osceola. “Why not tonight? Greenwich is only just beyond Stamford—we can run down there in forty-five minutes by car.”
“There are two very good reasons, perhaps three, why we won’t do so tonight, chief. Fanely knows that Deborah has awakened by this time from the hypodermic injection he administered. He will figure that if she really got a good look at him, and knows him to be the famous scientist whose features the magazines and newspapers have made public property, he may expect trouble in some form at Greenwich tonight. He will therefore be very much on the lookout for it. Or he may take the initiative himself, and stage another kidnapping across the road before morning. In either case, we will be much more useful in New Canaan than in Greenwich.
“If his men do not come here tonight and nobody bothers him down there, the chances are, he will believe that your fiancee didn’t get such a good look at him after all. It was dark in that car last night. His vast knowledge and discoveries have been along chemical and electrical lines. It’s not likely he remembers or even knows the ability of your race to see so much better in the dark than his. So by tomorrow, when nothing happens, he’ll consider that incident closed and go about his business as usual.”
“And,” said Bill, “if we take a run down to his joint tomorrow night, I may be of some use. These bandages will be off my hands by then.”
“That is another point. Bill naturally wants to be in on anything we do—so you see, chief?—”
“I see,” nodded Osceola. “It never struck me, either, that there might be another attack on the Dixon’s tonight. What are your plans, Mr. Davis?”
“You and I will go over there in a little while. Mr. Dixon and I arranged for it earlier in the evening. We will sleep on cots in the library, and with Mr. Dixon we’ll divide the night into two-hour watches. With the three of us on hand, we can watch two hours and sleep four. The New Canaan police have two men patrolling the Dixon grounds right now. Two more relieve them at midnight and will remain on duty until daylight. And until this job is cleaned up, I’ve arranged to have a policeman on the place during the day as well.”
“Very nice, very nice indeed,” remarked Bill, only half stifling a yawn. “And where, may I ask, do I come in?”
Mr. Davis smiled. “Down at Greenwich tomorrow night, my boy. If anything happens across the way, you’d be no earthly use with your hands out of commission. My orders to you are to turn in and get a good rest tonight. Tomorrow when the Chief and I are making up for lost sleep, you can take your turn at duty.”
“Aye, aye, sir.” Bill spoke submissively enough, but it took no great exercise of perception to realize that he was not a bit keen on that part of Mr. Davis’ plan.
Chapter XIII PLANS
Bill awoke, yawned, then sat up in bed. Broad daylight was streaming into the room through the screened windows and a glance at his watch showed the time to be nine o’clock. The door opened and Osceola poked his dark head around the edge of it.
“How’s the bandaged hero this morning?” he inquired and came into the bedroom.
“Sleepy, thank you.” Bill swung his legs over the side of the bed, stretched luxuriously and stood up. “I’ll feel more human when I’ve had a shower. Nothing happened across the way last night?”
“Not a blessed thing, and Deborah, I’m glad to say, seems quite her old self this morning.”
“Good! Any orders from the boss?”
“Davis, you mean?”
“Yeah. What’s the old sleuth doing this merry morn?”
“He’s gone to New York. Left on the express an hour and a half ago, said he’d be back by six-thirty this evening at the latest.”
“What are we to do in the meantime?”
“Take it easy. I didn’t sleep a wink last night, so I’m going to make up for it. I peeped in here a couple of times, but you were a dead one.”
“Why did you wait for me to wake up?”
“Davis left some of that salve for your hands. I knew you couldn’t apply it yourself and get the bandages back on again, so—”
“You did yourself out of some sleep for my sake—Well, you certainly are a good chap, Osceola! Let me get under that shower and then we’ll go to it on the first aid job.”
When Bill’s hands were dressed, Osceola went to his room, while his host spent a quiet morning lazing about the house. After lunch the boys fetched Dorothy and Deborah and drove down to the Beach Club. While Bill lay on the sand in the sun, the other three took a dip in the invigorating waters of Long Island Sound.
After ice cream and cakes on the Club House porch, they drove up into the hills to New Canaan again, much refreshed by their outing. All mention of winged cartwheels had been taboo throughout the afternoon, and Bill felt that he was ready to face the forthcoming adventure in Greenwich with added vim and a head swept clear of the cobwebs of worry and too much excitement. They dropped the girls at the Dixons’ and after driving home, found Mr. Davis smoking on the porch.
“Well, you men,” he greeted them with a jolly smile, “have you had a real lazy—and therefore profitable—day of it?”
“We sure have,” said Osceola. “Not only ourselves but the girls as well. We’ve just come back from a swim in the Sound. Poor Bill missed out on that end of it, though.”
“Glad you’ve had a good rest,” observed the secret service man, “you both needed it. Let’s have a look at the hands, Bill.”
“They certainly feel all to the merry,” said their owner, as the bandages were removed.
“And they are all to the merry, Bill.” Mr. Davis gently wiped away the brown salve with a clean piece of linen. “Just a little red, that’s all. They’ve healed by first intention, as I knew they would. Go easy with them for a couple of days and they’ll give you no more trouble.”
Bill stared at them in amazement. “That salve sure is wonderful stuff, sir! It’s worried me all day—that they might put a crimp in my evening. But I guess I’d better wear a pair of gloves, eh?”
“Yes, cotton ones for choice.”
“I’ll drive down to the village and see if I can pick up a pair for you,” offered Osceola.
“You forget,” said Bill, “that once upon a time, I was a midshipman. White cotton gloves are part of the equipment.”
“That reminds me,” said Mr. Davis. “I had a wire early this morning in response to one I sent Washington last night. My conference today in New York was with no less a person that a member of the President’s cabinet. This is a very serious charge we’re making against a very big man—who is also a tremendous power in politics, unfortunately, although few people are aware of that fact. And when I tell you that the gentleman I met today came from the capital as the direct representative of the President of the United States and as his spokesman, you may begin to get an idea of the magnitude this winged cartwheels affair has assumed. Tonight’s reconnoiter, for it will be little more than that, must be handled with kid gloves.”
“White cotton for mine!” Bill grinned at Osceola.
“Right-o, boy!” laughed the detective. “Maybe I’m getting a little too serious. But I’ve staked my reputation on Professor Fanely’s being the person we are looking for and any slips on our part mean an end to your friend Ashton Sanborn so far as his career is concerned.”
“And whatever careers may be opening up for Bill Bolton, and Osceola, the Seminole, for that matter!” supplemented the young Chief.
“Exactly! Now I’m going to tell you this evening’s plans—and I expect implicit obedience.”
Both young fellows nodded.
“We—that is, the three of us, will leave here after dinner in my car, so as to arrive in Greenwich about nine o’clock. It will be dark then. You lads will get out of the car about a quarter of a mile before we come to the Fanely estate, while I go on in the car and call on Professor Fanely.”
“What? You’re going up to the house quite openly?” Osceola cried.
“Quite openly, Chief, and in by the front door. I shall have credentials with me, and the probabilities are I shall be granted an interview by the old man. My pretext for intruding upon him will be that the man Kolinski, for whom the federal authorities are seeking, has been seen in the grounds. I shall tell the old man that it is understood this Pole is in his employ, but that no matter what references Kolinski may have had, he is an impostor, and a pedlar of narcotics.”
Bill drew a deep breath. “Well, I know it’s not my place to criticize, and I hope you’ll forgive me. But don’t you think an approach like that is pretty poor stuff, Mr. Davis? It hardly seems reasonable to me that a man of Professor Fanely’s mentality would swallow bunk like that.”
Mr. Davis’ bright eyes twinkled. “I’ll be the most surprised man in Connecticut if he does,” he laughed. “But you’re missing the point, Bill, and naturally so. The only reason I’m calling on Professor Fanely is to make him talk.”
“But what about the master mind? _Will_ it spill the beans?” Osceola asked incredulously.
“Why, not at all. As I said before, the idea is to get him to talk—and while he’s talking, you chaps will be outside the window, listening to his voice. Incidentally, I expect to make a mental note of his expression when Kolinski is mentioned to him. But, my young critics, your listening stunt is the one and only reason we’re going to Greenwich tonight. By orders of the President, I am not permitted to go further in this case until both of you have identified Professor Fanely’s voice as the one you heard, blindfolded, in that tower room yesterday morning.”
“But how,” asked Bill, “are we going to know in which room you two will be swapping lies? I’ve been past the Fanely place, and though the house is too far back from the road to see it well, they tell me it is about the size of an orphan asylum, and just as ugly. Have you any idea where your interview will take place?”
“I have. The man I conferred with in New York today says that Fanely always sees callers in his library. The library is at the front of the house, on the northwest corner. You’ll be able to stand in the shrubbery and see into the room very easily.”
“Thank heaven, it’s on the ground floor!” sighed Bill with relief. “I’ve had just about all the climbing I want lately.”
Mr. Davis gave Bill a grave smile. “Yes, it is just as well you’ll have no climbing tonight, with those hands. But to get back to the plan of campaign. When I leave you chaps, get into the grounds and make for the house. Chances are the old fellow is well guarded, so be on the watch. After the way you two went through the woods up at Heartfield’s, I’m sure you’re capable of making your objective without being seen. Choose one of the windows at the side of the house, if possible. And keep under cover. Listen to the conversation until you’re sure that Fanely is our man. Then go back to the road. I will pick you up there.”
“What if the windows are closed?” Osceola inquired. “This weather is warm enough, but the aged are never keen on drafts or fresh air, you know.”
“That’s a good point, Chief, and I’ve got something here that will take care of it.” He produced a small package from his coat pocket. “Putty and a diamond-tipped glass-cutter’s tool,” he explained. “Slap the putty on the window pane, then cut round it with the tool. The piece of cut glass will come away with the putty. If you lads stick with me for any length of time, I’ll soon have you trained as expert housebreakers,” he laughed.
“That,” said Bill, “is all right as far as it goes, but also suppose the old buzzard gets nasty. Our one and only interview with him gave me the impression that he could be fiendishly cruel when he chose.”
Mr. Davis looked puzzled. “I don’t think I quite get you, Bill.”
“I mean, sir, what provision have you made for your own safety? Supposing Old Fanely, who is nobody’s fool by your own admission, gets an inkling of what is really in the wind, and has his men jump you? The fiend was capable of having us put out of the way. He may try the same thing on you.”
“Oh, no, he won’t. In the first place he will know exactly who I am and what I represent. If I were done away with, his plans, whatever they are, would come tumbling down like a house of cards. Such procedure would jeopardize his enormous interests and immediately place him in a position where the police would step in and apprehend him for murder. I talked over such possibilities with the man I saw in New York and we discounted them. Professor Fanely, unless pushed to the wall, will do nothing so crude as that. This is simply a business call I’m making. He will probably deny any knowledge of Kolinski; I will string him along for a while so you two can get an earful and then bid him good night,—with apologies for taking up his valuable time.”
“Couldn’t we notify Captain Simmonds, or even the Greenwich police to keep a watchful eye open?” persisted Bill. “I hate to think of you putting yourself in that old devil’s power. The Chief and I have been in direct contact with him—you haven’t!”
Mr. Davis seemed touched. “It’s good of you boys to take so much interest in my safety, and I appreciate it, I need hardly tell you. But the thing is impossible. My orders are to keep this absolutely to ourselves. Not even the police must hear a rumor against the Professor. The gentleman from Washington ridiculed the idea of Fanely’s being connected with any scandal. He said frankly that he believed it to be a case of mistaken identity. And it was only after a long and serious discussion that I obtained permission to call on Fanely. He allowed me to outline my suppositions, but told me that if we continue on this trail, we must go it alone.”
“Which means, of course,” Osceola remarked, “that if Bill and I are caught in the grounds and manhandled for trespassing, you will deny that we were acting under your orders, and we’re just as likely to get a jail sentence for our trouble.”
“That,” said Mr. Davis, “is the case in a nutshell. I won’t insult you chaps by asking whether you’re willing to follow my lead. I shall carry a revolver and you do as you choose about going armed. Now then, all well?”
Both lads laughed, and nodded vigorous affirmative.
“Let’s go in and eat,” suggested Bill. “And here’s hoping we really get something on old Fanely after dinner.”
Chapter XIV A FRIEND IN NEED
Shortly before nine o’clock that evening, Ashton Sanborn, or Mr. Davis, as he preferred to be known, waved a hand to Bill and Osceola and drove off along the highway. A minute or two later the road swung past the stone wall, fragrant with late honeysuckle, that bounded the Fanely estate. But instead of entering the drive, he kept going straight ahead for several miles.
When at last he felt that the lads had been given time enough to reach their destination, he turned the car round at a crossroad and came back, driving slowly. This time he turned in between the stone gate posts that marked the entrance. The bluestone road bed wound like a huge snake through wooded acres, and half a mile from the highway, entered a grove of tall elms that belted broad lawns landscaped with flower gardens and shrubs. The immense grey stone house looked much more like a public institution than a private dwelling.
Mr. Davis parked his car before a wide stone terrace. He walked sedately up the steps and rang the doorbell. While he waited he studied the beautiful outer door, intricately fashioned of wrought iron and glass. He could not see into the house, for a curtain was drawn close to the glass on the inside.
The door noiselessly opened, and framed in the ornate entrance stood a middle-aged man in evening dress. His left arm was held close to his body by a black silk sling.
“Ashton Sanborn!”
Mr. Davis peered closely at the man, who now looked as if he would willingly have bitten off his tongue for the ejaculation. But a moment later the recognition was mutual.
The secret service man smiled. “Blessed if it isn’t my friend Serge Kolinski! Fancy meeting you here, and without your mustache—no wonder I hardly recognized you!” Mr. Davis advanced with outstretched hand, while the Pole backed away.
While Sanborn stared at him, the man glanced furtively over his shoulder into the gloom of the spacious hall. He seemed to be in the grip of some overwhelming fear. Then, wetting his dry lips with the tip of his tongue, he turned to the detective.
“Mr. Sanborn—I—you must clear out of here—get away!” His speech now bore no trace of the foreign accent which the girls had mentioned. “You’ve always played the white man to me, Mr. Sanborn—never tried to frame me, or—But clear out, sir—do you hear?”
Sanborn laughed shortly. “I thought you knew me better than that, Kolinski.”
“Look here, Mr. Sanborn—don’t say I haven’t warned you—don’t say I’ve done you dirt!” Kolinski’s whisper was almost inaudible.
Mr. Davis frowned uneasily. The man’s fear was so genuine, his manner so agitated, that the detective felt a creepy feeling touch his spine. He shuddered involuntarily, then pulled himself together.
“I’d like to speak to Professor Fanely, Kolinski—”
“Don’t do it, Mr. Sanborn, don’t do it—you—”
“Show Mr. Ashton Sanborn into the library, Kolinski!”
The high-pitched, wheezing voice was cold and toneless, yet held an undercurrent of evil. Kolinski shivered, then placed a trembling forefinger on his lips.
“Y-y-yessir.”
“Then go to your room. I’ll attend to you later. You talk too much.”
Ashton Sanborn followed the thoroughly frightened Kolinski across the wide hall and into the library. It was empty, but a bright fire blazed on the hearth at the other end of the room. Shades were drawn over the windows. The room felt stuffy, and oppressively warm. Kolinski retired without a word. The unseen master’s voice had apparently withered his power of speech.
Sanborn stood with his hands clasped behind his back, gazing about the room, waiting for Professor Fanely to appear. The four walls were lined to the ceiling with books, and the place was austerely furnished. Sanborn felt uneasy, not only in Kolinski’s behalf, but somehow obscurely, in his own. There was something sinister in the very atmosphere. The wheezing voice and its unspoken menace echoed in his brain....
Five minutes passed. He wondered if Bill and Osceola were outside the windows, or whether they had been waylaid in the grounds by Fanely’s men. He took out his watch and looked at it. The five minutes extended to ten.
Ashton Sanborn began to fret at the delay. But the thought that this discourtesy was probably intentional somewhat curbed his impatience. He sat down in an armchair and pulled out his pipe and tobacco. If Professor Fanely chose to ignore his visit, then old Fanely would have to put up with breach of etiquette on his part. He was just on the point of lighting it, when a gentle, cultured voice spoke immediately behind him.
“That’s right, Mr. Sanborn. Make yourself at home!”
Ashton Sanborn swung round in his chair. Standing not three feet away, exuding goodwill with a benign smile, and rubbing his hands together, was the biggest man the detective had ever seen. Sanborn was startled, not so much at the man’s presence, but that he had not heard him enter the room. It seemed uncanny that such a huge man could move so quietly. The secret service man jumped to his feet.
“Good evening! I called to see Professor Fanely. My card, apparently, is not needed.”
“Oh, no, Mr. Sanborn. We—er—have heard of you, although, speaking for myself, I have never, to my knowledge, had the pleasure of seeing you before.” The big fellow stared down on Sanborn from his superior height. “Professor Fanely is not at home, Mr. Sanborn.”
“Out?”
“Ah! I’m afraid I express myself rather badly. I mean to convey to you that Professor Fanely is indisposed.”
“But I thought I heard him speak in the hall a moment ago?”
“Oh, no. No, that was certainly not Professor Fanely. Oh, dear me, no.” He laughed—an unpleasant sound, for all its softness. “That was Mr.—but his name does not matter. He is upstairs now, attending to Mr. Kolinski, our estimable butler. You must not place too much reliance on our Kolinski’s chatter, you know. He does not always tell the truth. In fact, to put it bluntly, Mr. Sanborn, Mr. Kolinski is not—er—unfamiliar with the inside of a jail!”
“I know that well enough. I’ve been instrumental in sending him up the river twice, myself.”
“Oh, dear me! Fancy that, now!”
There came a silence, during which Sanborn had the vaguely uncomfortable feeling that a third presence had somehow entered the room. Mechanically he lit his pipe, and, blowing the first mouthful of smoke upward, he carelessly subjected the ceiling to a covert scrutiny. Nothing doing. He stooped and tapped the bowl of his pipe on an ashtray which rested on a small table. No one on the left hand side of the room. He turned round quickly, ostensibly to adjust a cushion on his easy chair. A flutter of a curtain hanging near the door caught his eye. Then he seated himself and leaned back comfortably.
“Yes,” he answered the big man’s unspoken inquiry. “That is why I called—to warn you against Kolinski. But as you are already aware of his past delinquencies—well,—” he shrugged his shoulders and stood up. “This is beside the point, now, don’t you think? Perhaps you had better ring for the man so that I may place him under arrest.”
“They’ll never bring him in here!”
Bill Bolton swung the curtain back and stepped into the room, a revolver grasped in his gloved right hand. “Stick ’em up, Lambert,” he told the big man. “That’s right—stick ’em up and keep ’em up!”
“But Bill—” Sanborn began, his eyes on the man called Lambert who had complied with the curt order and was reaching toward the ceiling.
Bill shook his head impatiently. “No time for argument, sir. They are on to your visit and don’t intend to let you leave the house alive. Kolinski is their sacrifice in this deal. He’s probably been killed by this time.”
“Are you sure about this, Bill? How could you possibly learn—”
“We’ve got to hustle,” Bill cut him short. “Explain later. Oh, I’m sure enough, never fear!”
A colored rope was attached to the curtain. He disengaged it and tossed it to Sanborn.
“Now you—” he indicated Lambert, “take a walk to that chair and sit down.”
There was a murderous gleam in Lambert’s eyes as he retreated. He knew, of course, that these two were acting in conjunction, but could not understand these new secret service methods.
“Now tie him up. I’ll keep him covered. He’s got a gun. Better relieve him of it. His game was to shoot you just as soon as your back was safely turned.”
Ashton Sanborn did as he was told, cheerfully, albeit wonderingly. How Bill could have gained his information and what he was up to now were as yet unsolved mysteries. He took away the man’s gun, a blue-nosed automatic. Then, carefully, he tied Lambert’s arms to the back of the chair and roped his legs securely.
“Better lock the door,” was Bill’s next suggestion. “I’ll gag him.”
The detective hurried to the door. There was no key in the lock. He clutched the handle—rattled it—pulled—The door did not budge.
“What’s up, sir?” Bill’s voice betrayed his apprehension.
“_Locked!_”
“Then we’re in for it.” It was not so much the words as the way they were spoken that impressed the secret service man.
“But—if it’s trouble, Bill, we must find a way out,” he said calmly.
“There is no way. They’re likely to come in on us through that door any minute now.” Bill’s voice was steady, but Sanborn knew he was attempting to conceal his strong excitement.
“If the door’s locked on the outside, we’d better barricade it on the inside.” He looked round the room for a suitable means of fortification, and his eyes fell upon the huge Lambert.
The man’s face was pale, almost haggard, and beads of sweat stood out upon his forehead. He was afraid.
In spite of their potential danger, Sanborn smiled as the thought struck him. “Here, Bill, give me a hand.”
Young Bolton immediately saw the possibility. Together the pair dragged the mutely protesting Lambert to the door, and planted him firmly in his chair against the panels. Over two hundred-weight of solid humanity—an effective barrier.
“Now then, Bill. Where’s Osceola?”
“Outside the window. Or he was.” Bill’s voice was little more than a whisper. “We got here more than ten minutes before you drove up—legged it fast across the grounds, without running into a soul. The windows on this side of the house are too high to see into from the ground. Luckily Osceola spied a ladder leaning against an elm, on the way here, where some tree surgeon had left it, I guess. Anyway, it was just what we wanted, so we hiked over and toted it back. I climbed it and cut a hole in the glass just above the window-catch. I couldn’t see into the room because of the shade, but I could hear, all right. That big goop over there was talking with Professor Fanely. And by the way, there’s absolutely no doubt that old Fanely is the guy we’re after. His voice is the one I heard in the cupola. Osceola recognized it, too. Of course, when I got the piece of glass out of the window, they were in the midst of a conversation. I gathered that you’d been followed to New York today. Evidently they knew nothing about your conference, but the cabinet member was spotted going into the same office where you had been trailed. So, the old bird had figured out just about what did happen in New York. Take it from me, there are no flies on that old fellow! He guessed how you would be sure that he, Fanely, was the kidnapper from Deborah’s description, and how the lad from Washington would laugh at the idea. He even had the hunch that you would show up tonight! And while they were talking, Kolinski came in and said that a phone message had come through from the lodge, and that you were on the way up.”
“But I wonder how they guessed my identity?”
“Your car license—Kolinski said so. Those things seem to be working for both sides in this business. Kolinski, the poor chap, was scared to death, apparently. The old man had it in for him because he made the initial mistake of dropping that silver cartwheel out of his car, and making it possible for the girls to identify him. But he was only in the room a couple of minutes. When he’d gone, the Professor said that as soon as you came they’d go upstairs. They planned that after Kolinski had ushered you in here, they’d put him out of the way. And the next move was for Lambert to come down here and do the same for you. Of course, old Fanely thought you’d come armed, so he cautioned the big guy to watch his step. If it hadn’t been for that,—well, I guess I’d have been too late.” Bill bit his lip. “I don’t see how the old buzzard imagined he could avoid government suspicion by doing you in, as well as Kolinski—Well, that’s about all of it. When you rang the bell, they went out of here, so I unfastened the window catch and hopped in.”
“Good work, Bill. You’re the sort of a chap a man needs on a job like this—”
Bill grinned and shook his head. “I’m all right as far as I go, but I guess—“ he motioned toward the barricaded door—“I just didn’t go far enough. But Osceola’s outside somewhere, I thought he’d better stay on watch. So maybe—”
There was a knock on the door. They looked at each other and waited.
“Well, Lambert? Is the dear Mister Ashton Sanborn, alias Davis—er—_non compos_—I mean _hors de combat_?” A pause. “So, my dear Lambert, you have failed, eh?” A fierce menace in the words now.
The bound man’s face turned a sickly gray, and Sanborn felt a momentary pity for him. Then they heard whispered instructions outside the door, and the sound of running feet. Sanborn tried a bluff.
“Hi! you!—there’s a posse of police surrounding the house!”
A cackling laugh that ended in a snarl.
“Yes, I saw _him_ go!”
“So he got away all right? Thanks very much. He should be back by this time, with about thirty others.” Sanborn listened intently in an effort to ascertain whether or not his shot had gone home. Then—“They are only awaiting my signal.”
“Then why not signal, my dear Sanborn?”
A second later a shot rang out. Simultaneously a round hole, splintered at the edges, appeared in the upper panel of the door, and a bullet whistled past the detective and buried itself in the opposite wall. The hole in the panel was about two inches above Lambert’s head, and with protruding eyes the wretched man endeavored to shrink into the chair.
Bill and Sanborn dropped to all fours and were making for the window, when a second shot was fired. This time it came from outside the house and shattered the lower window sash. Both the detective and young Bolton went flat on the floor. Sanborn beckoned to Bill to move closer. As the lad wriggled over the carpet toward him, the older man spoke to him in a low whisper.
“Sorry I got you into this. When they rush the place, start firing. We may be able to fight our way out—one of us, anyway.”
“Maybe—but—too bad we’re a good four miles from town. If Osceola got away to telephone the police, it’s going to be a near thing before they get here. But all I want is to get one shot at old Fanely!”
As if in reply to his name, the high, wheezing voice spoke again from beyond the door. “You gentlemen in there,” and they heard a horrible chuckle, “will be interested to know that your friend Chief Osceola ran foul of my men, after all. He is now taking a well-earned rest in the lodge. Good night, my dear gentlemen. Pleasant dreams, and may you awake—in heaven!”
As if to place a period on this unanswered monologue, another shot splintered through the door panels.
Chapter XV THE SHOOTING FLAME
“And that’s that,” said Bill, still keeping his voice to a whisper. “Disgusting old beast! Let’s turn off the lights in here and try the window. Anything is better than lying here.”
“Wait a minute—I’ve an idea!” Sanborn pointed to the fireplace. Bill nodded and together they wriggled across the rugs.
The chimney, with its grate of glowing coals, was an old-fashioned structure. Although probably no older than this modern residence, it appeared to be a worthy monument of another generation. Wide at the base, it tapered toward the top, and on its inner walls a number of iron staples, rusty and covered with soot, led upward.
Sanborn stepped within the chimney and grasped the first staple. “Phew!” he gasped, jerking his hand away, “—_hot!_”
“And probably insecure.” Bill was beside him now. They were out of the line of fire from the door and windows. “I’ll tell you what—that ladder! Wait—” He picked up a small shovel from the hearth. “I’ll get these live coals into the scuttle. That should cool the chimney some.”
Sanborn helped with a tongs, and the coals were quickly transferred. Bill found a wall switch and turned off the light. Together they went to the window by which Bill had entered, and cautiously lifting the shade a couple of inches, they peered through the glass. Three men, revolvers in hand, were approaching the ladder across a flower bed.
“Get ’em in the legs,” whispered Sanborn.
Two shots rang out like one, and two of the attackers dropped in their tracks. The third, evidently deciding that distance lent enchantment, streaked for the shadow of the trees without returning their fire. They let him go.
Bill raised the window and they seized the topmost rung of the ladder and started to haul it into the library. It was half-way through the window when there came a flash from the corner of the house. The glass door of a bookcase was shattered, but neither Bill nor the detective paid any attention to it. A second more and the ladder was inside.
Sanborn mopped the perspiration from his brow. “Jiminy! That was close, Bill.”
Bill nodded and stuck his head out of the window. “Lucky they can’t see us, sir. They might try to snipe us from behind the trees.”
As though in answer to his challenge, without warning, the chandelier that hung from the ceiling in a spray of electric bulbs, sprang into light.
“Duck, Bill, duck!” A fusillade of shots rang out as the pair dropped to the floor.
Bill’s eyes fell upon the pile of black coal he had dumped from the scuttle before filling it with the hot ones from the grate. Motioning Sanborn to follow, he wormed his way to the hearth and picked up a good-sized piece of coal. He handed it to Sanborn and took a similar piece himself. Then he pointed to the electric bulbs, and winked cheerfully.
They hurled their missiles simultaneously. Bill’s was a bullseye but the detective’s fell short of the mark. With the “plop” and the tinkle of falling glass, one of the bulbs was out of action. Bill grabbed another coal and a moment later the room went dark again.
“Good shooting, Bill.”
“Not so worse. Now gimme a hand with the ladder, sir. We’ll push it up the chimney.”
It was easier said than done. The ladder was too long and the angle too acute.
“Never mind, Bill. We must chance it.”
Ashton Sanborn felt the staple he had tried before. It was still warm, but bearable to the touch. “I’ll go first. It’s a good thing you wore gloves.”
“Yes, but I wish they were leather, not cotton. Still, my hands feel all right.”
“That’s good. Got a handkerchief? Here’s mine. Stuff one inside each glove. They’ll protect the thin skin of your palms.”
“Thanks. Gee, this is a wild party, isn’t it? I didn’t expect to be throwing coal at light bulbs—or stuffing handkerchiefs in my gloves—but say, sir, what about Lambert?”
“Lord! I’d almost forgotten him. Here, lend me a hand with the ladder. It will be useful after all. We don’t want our friend to topple over with the chair and let them in that way.”
They placed the top of the ladder against the upper panel of the door and thrust the bound man’s head between two of the rungs. Then they jammed the foot of the ladder into one of the bookshelves, removing half a dozen books to make way for it. It fitted and held firmly.
“Good! Now, you keep the ladder nicely in position, Lambert,” warned the detective. “The chances are if they break down the door, they’ll break your neck. Sorry—but time means more than kindness just now. You weren’t too considerate of a certain young lady the other night, either. And it will probably save the state the price of a hangman—So long!”
They left the silent figure and again essayed the ascent of the chimney. The air was almost stifling, but the staples held. Through clouds of soot dislodged by their progress, the two made their way upward. There came a slope in the angle of the chimney, and a dim square appeared overhead, a shade less dark than the blackness that enveloped them.
Sanborn felt for his electric torch, then remembered he had left it in his car. Feeling in his pockets, he finally produced a box of matches. After considerable trouble, he managed to strike one. The draught immediately extinguished it. The nearer they got to the top, however, the less dark the chimney seemed. Meanwhile he had to feel round for every staple, sending showers of soot upon Bill with every movement.
Again Sanborn felt the wall. Yes, there was no doubt about it. A good twenty feet to go, and no more staples. Well, there was nothing for it except to travel mountaineering fashion, back braced against one wall, feet against the other. It seemed simple enough, but when he attempted it, the chimney proved too wide, and he all but crashed onto Bill just below.
A sudden gust of wind sent a cloud of smoke belching down the shaft. Sanborn shut his eyes and gripped the last staple. He could hear Bill coughing and spluttering down below, while the shaft slowly cleared. Then Sanborn discovered that just above his head the inlet of another chimney joined the main shaft. He decided that the smoke came from there. It must be passed, and quickly, for the air was foul enough without the addition of smoke. Again he tried to wriggle upward, but found that the heat and the fumes from the other shaft were too much for him. He eased down again to the comparative security of the staple. If he could manage to stand on that last staple, he might somehow get past the vomiting side vent. But even if the chimney narrowed above the other shaft, the smoke would be suffocating.
“Buck up, sir!” Bill’s voice sounded thick and weary. “What’s the trouble?”
Sanborn told him. “Guess we’ll have to go down,” he began, then stopped as the sound of splintering wood reached their ears from the library, and a crash. A moment later there was a rush of feet and a cry as Fanely discovered that their prisoners were missing. There was further scurrying, then that high, menacing voice.
“The chimney! That’s where they are!”
A moment’s silence, then the sound of a shot reverberated deafeningly up the shaft. The chimney immediately filled with particles of soot scattered by the percussion. Both Bill and the detective mentally blessed that change in the angle of the chimney.
“Ah!—” again that hideous voice,—“I have an inspiration—yes, an inspiration. We shall—er—relight the fire!”
Sanborn swore under his breath.
“Yes, yes, relight the fire. And I think a little gasoline is indicated. Lambert, you are well enough to phone the garage for a can or two? Jacques, go fetch some paper and wood. No, wait a moment. Shovels can be used, there is one on the hearth—to transport the fire from the dining room fireplace. Peter, you stand here and shoot them if they come down.”
For several minutes Bill and Sanborn clung to their precarious perches, each wracking his brain for a way out of this horrible snare.
“Listen!” cried Bill in a hoarse whisper. “Hold on tight. I’m going to climb up your body. Then I’ll get a foot on the top of the other shaft and haul you up. I can get on your shoulders again and get a grip on the top of the chimney. You can climb out and haul me after you. What do you think?”
“It’s a chance, Bill. And if we don’t smother in the attempt, it’s worth trying, anyway. Come ahead.”
Bill pulled himself upward and over Sanborn’s body until he stood on the detective’s broad shoulders. Then he gasped in astonishment. The heat and smoke from the other chimney had subsided and the air was now bearable. The explanation came like a flash. This must be the outlet from the dining room, from which the fire had been removed. There was not a moment to lose.
Dropping his legs into the dining room shaft, he lay bellywise across the junction of the two openings and reached down toward Sanborn.
“Hurry up, old sport,” he cried, gripping the detective’s extended hands. “That’s right—up you come!”
“But what—the smoke’s gone—”
“Never mind that now—drop down this shaft beside me. It’s narrow enough to brace with your back and legs. And make it snappy, too, or you’ll get singed.”
Ashton Sanborn swung back beside Bill. There was a subdued roar down the chimney. Then a sheet of flame shot upward.
Chapter XVI THE PROFESSOR TALKS
“That got the dear gentlemen!” There came a rasping chuckle from below. “Yes, that sent them to their happy hunting ground. Too bad the Indian wasn’t with them, but he will serve another purpose.”
“Beg pardon, Professor—” It was Lambert’s subdued voice this time. “If those two are really done for—burned to death, why don’t the bodies fall?”
“Caught on the staples, you silly fool! But just to prevent any chance of survival, you’d better ignite the other can.”
For a moment there was silence, then the two at the top of the dining-room flue heard the same roar down the chimney and again the white hot flame rushed past them.
“Now are you quite satisfied?” whined the wheezing treble. “They are burned to a crisp, I tell you. Tomorrow I’ll have the chimney cleaned and their remains brought down. It’s too late tonight. Well, Lambert,” the voice went on testily, “what have you got to say to that? For a man who makes bad mistakes, you have become exceedingly critical.”
“Very good, Professor. But may I be allowed to suggest that they may have climbed out the top of the chimney before we started the gasoline? Even now they may be hiding on the roof.”
“Oh, no, they are not hiding on the roof, my dear young man! I grant you that the youth Bolton was a midshipman in the Navy and can probably climb like a cat. But we were a little too fast for them, Lambert—a little too fast. Ever since I knew they had taken to the chimney, Otto and Henry have been watching on the roof. Inasmuch as I see them both standing in the doorway now, I think we may take it for granted, my dear Lambert, that the intruders have departed—not escaped.” There was a wealth of ugly sarcasm in the old man’s tone. “Now, Otto,” he added sharply. “How about it? What’s your report?”
“Nuthin’ come up, sir, but the flames, sir. Them two is burned to a frazzle!”
“You see, Lambert—you see!” Professor Fanely’s wheeze was triumphant. “Perhaps Lambert, you will permit me to run my own affairs in future without interference on your part. Just remember that you are my paid employee—nothing more.”
Bill nudged the detective. “That ought to hold friend Lambert for a while,” he whispered. “I certainly hope nobody remembers that this vent leads into the main chimney.”
“Sh—! There’s Otto again.”
“Beg pardon, sir.” The deep tones floated up the chimney. “What shall we do about the stiff upstairs?”
“Ah! The late Mr. Serge Kolinski! That was an unforeseen _contretemps_, was it not, Lambert? Well, the man had his uses. My plan, as you may have guessed, was to place him in the car with the late Mr. Ashton Sanborn. They would have been run down the road half a mile or so, the car wrecked and a revolver, with two empty chambers left in the hand of the secret service man. Tomorrow’s newspapers would have stated that I had turned over my butler to Mr. Sanborn. That the two must have fought in the car, with the result that in the struggle, both were shot with the same gun.” He stopped and blew his nose loudly. “But there again, Lambert, you stepped in and messed things up. Now we have Kolinski and two other bodies on our hands. Let me see—? Ah, yes, we will do it this way. Henry, tomorrow morning you will place the three bodies in the small plane. Put them in the luggage cockpit, and take Thomas along. Fly across the Sound and Long Island, and keep straight out to sea. When you are twenty-five miles from shore, have Thomas throw them overboard. You understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then see that there are no more errors made. By the way, Otto, speaking of Sanborn’s car—what has become of it?”
“We used it to carry the young Indian feller down to the lodge, sir. It’s parked down there.”
“Very well. Go to bed now. At four o’clock go down to the lodge. Get the Seminole and drive him up to the laboratory. Don’t forget to change the license plates, though. We’ve had enough trouble through Kolinski’s oversight. I will leave later in the Fokker, so will arrive before you. And while I think of it, Otto, don’t drive up there by way of Heartfield’s. The state police may be watching that route. Drive from here to Bedford and up through Brewster to Pawling. I know that the road to Mizzentop is a bad one, but it’s safer that way. And thanks to Mr. Lambert, we shall all have to play safe for some little more. Have you got that straight now, Otto?”
“Yes, sir, I have.”
“Then good night all. We must be about early in the morning, remember.”
“Good night, sir,” murmured a chorus of voices.
“Oh, Lambert! Don’t forget to take the A44 notes in the morning. I will leave Mizzentop early in the afternoon for Washington. The President dines with me, you know, and we will want to go over the papers later.”
“Very good, sir. I shall bring them.”
There came the sound of footsteps, then all was quiet below.
“We’ll give them an hour,” Sanborn whispered. “You haven’t a flashlight, Bill?”
“No—why?”
“There’s no other way of seeing the hands of my wristwatch to gauge the time. These matches blow out—”
“Don’t worry, sir. My dial is luminous. Wait till I rub some of the soot off—great grief! it’s after eleven! We’ve been here nearly two hours.”
“Well, we’ll wait until midnight. Let’s get up on the junction of the shafts, it will be more comfortable. My back and knees are half paralyzed.”
They pulled themselves up and squeezed into the narrow space, seated side by side.
“The old boy,” Bill observed, “certainly has a screw loose—but what do you think is in back of it all?”
“I don’t know, my boy. But I think we’d better be quiet. We might be heard if we keep on talking—and I’ve got to straighten out a lot of things in my mind and try to plan what our next three or four moves will be.”
“O.K. I’m terribly tired, guess I’ll snatch forty winks.”
Improbably enough, he did fall asleep right there, wedged between the sooty chimney wall and Ashton Sanborn’s shoulder. He was lost in the dreamless depths of exhaustion when a hand pressed his arm.
“Gee,” muttered Bill, “where am I? Oh, yes—is it twelve o’clock, Mr. Davis?”
The detective patted his arm lightly. “Yes, Bill, it’s exactly midnight. And Sanborn will do in the future, you know.”
The way down proved much easier than the ascent. Five minutes later they were standing in the dark library. Silently Sanborn went to the broken window and very slowly and carefully drew up the sash. Then he thrust his head outside, made sure that no one was about and nodded to Bill just behind him. They slid over the sill, dropped to the ground, and soon skirted the flower beds and reached comparative safety beneath the elms.
“Well! I’m sure glad we’re out of that dive!” sighed Bill. “Professor Fanely is the perfect host, I don’t think! What’s the next move? Get Osceola?”
“Yes, we must get him out of the lodge. I first thought of going to the nearest phone and calling in the Greenwich police. But Fanely seems to learn of our every move almost before we make it. He’s probably got someone watching police headquarters in Greenwich, and by the time enough men were rounded up to make the raid effective, Kolinski’s body would have disappeared and the old boy would certainly deny all knowledge of the affair. There’d be only our word against his, and seeing that Washington thinks I’m chasing a mare’s nest anyway, in trying to connect this prominent old man with crime—well, Fanely and his crew would get off scot-free.”
“And Ashton Sanborn would lose his job!”
“Exactly, Bill.”
They continued to head through the landscaped park toward the lodge, but kept well away from the drive. They were nearing the main entrance to the property before the secret service man spoke again.
“I’ve been thinking it over, Bill. The only way to get anything definite on that slippery old customer is to corral him in that laboratory he talked about. I’ve a hunch we’ll find evidence in plenty at Mizzentop. That laboratory, to my mind, is the center of this spider’s web.”
“Where is Mizzentop?”
“Why, Mizzentop was one of the fashionable resorts of this country, my boy, during the ’70’s and ’80’s. It’s up on the mountain above Pawling, New York, and nine or ten miles across the hills from Heartfield’s. The house Fanely blew up must have been purchased so that the Professor could have a hangout conveniently close by and yet not near enough to arouse suspicion if discovered. Mizzentop is really the name of the old hotel up there, from which the little settlement takes its name.”
They stepped behind a high bank of shrubbery, beyond which they could see the dim blur of the lodge in the darkness.
“That,” said Bill, “seems to me a queer place to locate a laboratory—right near a summer hotel, I mean.”
“Oh, the hotel isn’t running now—hasn’t been for thirty years or more. I was up there a couple of summers ago. It’s a huge frame building, three or four stories high, with wide verandas completely encircling it. It seemed to be in pretty good condition, then. Somebody was evidently taking care of the property, lawns kept up and so forth, but the place was untenanted.”
“I wonder—”
“What? Have you got an idea? Let’s have it then we’ll go after Osceola.”
“Well, I was just figuring,” Bill’s voice sounded thoughtful, “suppose Professor Fanely had bought that hotel and is using it for his laboratory, or whatever he calls it.”
The detective slapped his thigh sharply. “That is a new slant on it, Bill! Sounds like a good one to me. Just as soon as we get Osceola I’ll check up on it by telephone. In fact, I’ve a lot of phoning to do. Captain Simmonds and the State Police will have to be brought in now, Washington or no Washington!”
“But do you think Fanely will fly up there as he plans to do—when we’re found missing?”
“Certainly. Of course our disappearance will worry him quite a bit. He’ll probably decide that we slipped down the dining-room flue, when he finds out that it connects with the main chimney. But his line is absolute denial, and of course, he’ll have no idea that we overheard his talk in the library, or that we’re planning a raid on Mizzentop.”
“You’re right, I think. So here’s hoping the old boy takes his hop. Now we can go ahead for the Chief—”
He stopped short. The piercing shriek of a soul in mortal anguish rent the night. By common impulse Sanborn and Bill dashed for the darkened lodge.
Chapter XVII MIZZENTOP
Again that horrid shriek. This time there was no mistake from whence it came. Half breathless from their sprint, Bill and the detective reached the lodge and looked about for a means of entrance.
“Somebody,” whispered the secret service man, “is torturing Osceola!”
“Sounds like it, all right,” panted Bill, “but I’d have thought you could cut that Seminole into little pieces and never get a peep out of him! They must be monsters—There’s a light—window in the rear—come on!”
Bill in the lead, they dashed round the house, then stopped short. Through the kitchen screen door they caught a glimpse of a stranger lying on the floor, and Osceola’s figure bending over him. Careful as had been their movements, Osceola’s keen ears detected them, for he reached up quickly and switched off the hanging bulb.
“Speak or I’ll fire!” His order came like a shot.
Bill laughed shakily. “It’s only me, you wild Seminole—me and a pal of ours—we’ve come to _rescue_ you from your torturers—and by gosh!—here we find you, in reverse! What’s the idea, boy?”
“Wait a sec—I’m coming out.”
They saw the Chief’s tall form loom up beside them, although his approach had been made without a sound.
“What’s going on, anyway?” Sanborn’s nerves were badly shaken and his relief on seeing Osceola free and sound in body sharpened his tone.
“Yes, what’re you tryin’ to do—scalp the man?” added Bill.
Osceola chuckled. “My gosh, did you think that yell came from me? Why, no, Bill, I’m trying something a little harder than that. I was just about to learn something of interest to all of us, when you butted in.”
“But what on earth were you doing to the man?” asked Sanborn.
“Oh, the old match trick. But what have you chaps been doing to yourselves? You look like a pair of nigger roustabouts!”
“Roosting in a chimney—a nice sooty one, too.” Bill turned to the detective. “Those keen eyes of his have found us out. And the match trick, I believe, consists of placing a lighted match between the victim’s toes.”
“But we can’t have that—it’s torture!” exploded Sanborn heatedly.
Bill laughed.
“Shut up, this isn’t funny,” growled Osceola. “Do you want that guy in there to hear and spoil everything?” He leaned close to Sanborn. “It’s hardly ever necessary to let a low-class white feel the flame. This fellow screamed when I lit the match, and again when I put the _unlighted end_ between his toes. You see? You just make a lengthy explanation of what is going to happen to him before you start. His imagination does the rest.”
“But Osceola—there is a possibility of burning—and I don’t like it.”
“All right, sir. I’ll light one match and stick another, an unlighted one, between his tootsies! He’ll bleat just the same. You see, when I was tied up I heard this man and his wife talking about a laboratory or factory that the Professor runs up at a place called Mizzentop. And I heard just enough to make me curious—I—”
“Go ahead, then. Find out what goes on in that laboratory, and we’ll know the answer to the winged cartwheels. But don’t you think you’re taking chances in a lighted room with nothing between you and the night but a screen door?”
“Huh—” grunted Osceola, “that fellow hasn’t had a bath in months—it’s a warm night, Mr. Sanborn. I prefer taking chances with bullets to being asphyxiated!”
Sanborn chuckled. “Go to it, Chief—but no rough stuff, remember. Turn on the light again if you wish. Bill and I will keep watch outside. The people up at the big house have gone to bed, but it’s just as well to take precautions. And we can hear anything your friend may have to say from the shadow of the porch.”
They walked up to the porch and Osceola went inside the house. Then the light went on in the kitchen and the young Seminole started speaking.
“Well, Mr. Skunk! Some friends of mine are out back. They are also interested in hearing about Mizzentop. So, that being that, I’m going to light another match—”
“No, no! I’ll tell—I’ll tell!”
“Good enough. But calm yourself, bozo—there’s no need to shout the glad tidings all over Connecticut!”
“But the Professor, sir—he will—”
“The Professor is having his own troubles, my friend. Anyway, for some time to come, you and your amiable wife in the other room will be occupying nice little cells in a big, safe jail! Out with it now—or I shall become impatient.”
“Very well, sir, I’ll tell.” Still thoroughly frightened, the man spoke submissively. “Just what was it you wanted to know?”
“Everything that _you_ know about this silver dollar business, and the place up at Mizzentop. Make it snappy, though! I don’t want to hang around here all night.”
“Yes, sir. Professor Fanely is crazy—crazy on one subject. I noticed it coming on last year, and this spring, he got worse. ’Twas then he started this token bunk. Him and that big secretary of his, Lambert. Every one of us was handed out one of them stamped dollars, and we was all sworn to secrecy and given a number. Mine’s thirteen, and it’s brung me nuthin’ but bad luck.”
“—So you’re the guy that broke into the Boltons!”
“I was, sir—got in by a winder. But I didn’t get nuthin’—and I lost my token into the bargain. Professor raised the roof about it, and docked my pay, too.”
“That was just too bad,” declared Osceola sarcastically. “Now go ahead with the rest of it—this organization, and old Fanely’s crazy fancy.”
“It weren’t no fancy, sir. Professor Fanely, for all his friendliness with the big bugs down in Washington, hates the whole bunch of ’em like poison. He wanted to be President, but they wouldn’t let him run—too old to be considered, I guess. It’s been preyin’ on his mind ever since the last election, but the old boy was foxy, he kept it pretty much to himself. Lambert told me, though, he used to blow up to him. Well, last spring he made up his mind to get even with the government. Nobody but a crazy man would have thought up the plan. Me and some of the others that worked for him didn’t want to go into it. It wa’nt no use, though; we knew what we’d get in the end if we welshed. And he raised our pay then, you see—”
“I see. But what was this crazy plan?”
“He hired a lot of thugs and dope runners in the big city, sir. And he’s been importing big lots of cocaine from Europe. The old hotel up to Mizzentop was bought and fitted up as a kind of laboratory-factory, and the dope was stored up there. That house he blew up was where the factory super and some of his head men stayed. Professor Fanely, of course you know, is terrible wealthy. For years he’s been what they call a great phil—philan—”
“You mean philanthropist, I take it?”
“That’s it—couldn’t think of it for a minute, sir. Well,—his speciality is canned goods. He spends millions every year on ’em. Has ’em distributed to the poor and the near poor all over the United States. Even his friends get big cases of canned goods from him at Christmas time. It’s his hobby—he’s known the country over for it.”
“Yes, I’ve heard about it,” said Osceola, “I remember his yen for giving away canned goods. He even sent down a large shipment to my Seminoles in Florida last winter. I ate some of the stuff myself, and wrote him a letter of thanks. But what do his canned goods have to do with the cocaine smuggling?”
“Why, the Professor has made a solution of the stuff, that he says is impossible to detect.”
“Detect—in what?”
Unconsciously Ashton Sanborn and Bill moved to a position just outside the screen door.
“Detect in the canned goods,” Number 13 explained. “That stuff is concentrated at Mizzentop. Every can has a very small hole bored in the top, and the solution is squirted into the soup or fruit or whatever’s in the can, by a small syringe. This little bit of a hole—it’s just big enough to push the needle through—is closed up again. It’s all done by machinery that’s been installed in the old hotel at Mizzentop.”
“_Great guns!_” ejaculated the young Chief in horror. “Why, that will make dope fiends of thousands, perhaps millions of men, women and children!”
“That’s the Professor’s idea, sir. They’ll get the cocaine habit and never know how they done it. Professor Fanely says it’s the best way he knows of for getting even with a country that won’t have him for President. When I was up there yesterday, I seen a case of goods addressed to the White House. If he’s given enough time, he boasts he’ll have everybody in the United States, from the chief executive in Washington down, eating his free canned goods.”
Ashton Sanborn swung open the screen door and strode into the kitchen. “Look here!” he thundered. “How long have these shipments been leaving Mizzentop?”
“Oh—but the Professor has had such a job perfectin’ his cocaine solution that only the first boxes of the goods is ready to leave the factory.”
Sanborn mopped his brow. “Thank God for that! Then none of it has gone out yet?”
“That’s so, sir. I believe Mike intends to take the first truck loads down to the Pawling railroad station in the morning.”
“Well, now that we know, what are we going to do about it?” asked Osceola.
“Raid the place with State Police, of course. We’ll pile this man and his wife into the car with us, and light out for the Greenwich Police Station. I’ve got to get Captain Simmonds on the telephone at once. You fellows grab the woman. I’ll take care of this chap.” He swung the trussed figure over his shoulders and tramped out of the house.
“This couple tied you up, did they?” Bill asked the chief as they made their way toward the front room.
“They sure did. And chucked me into an empty coal bin down cellar. The idiots tied my hands in front of me, though. Gosh, how I hate the taste of hemp!”
“Gnawed through the rope, eh?”
“Yep, and found a hatchet in the cellar. When I came up here, Number 13 and his spouse were playing cards at the kitchen table. I guess they thought the whole Seminole Nation had arrived when I hurled the young ax and pinned 13’s coat sleeve to the table! Well, that’s that.”
“It is,” said Bill. “And what a prize you pulled! You know, it’s a gruesome ending. Funny thing—”
“It’s about the most awful thing you and I have ever been mixed up in, Bill. This canned food business is horrible!”
“I’ll say it is! Makes my bones feel like water just to think of it. But that isn’t what I meant—”
“What then?”
“Why, in every mystery book or detective story I’ve read, the tale ends when the mystery is solved.”
“And what’s that got to do with the price of doped canned goods?”
“Well, this mystery is solved, isn’t it? And yet we’ve got the hardest part of the whole thing ahead of us.”
“Catching old Fanely and pinning the cans to him?”
“That’s it.”
“This,” remarked Osceola, “is not a book, Bill. It’s a racket. Come along and give me a hand with the old woman.”
Chapter XVIII THE ELEPHANT GUN
Shortly after daybreak that morning, Bill Bolton spiralled his small two-seater down to a crosswind landing on a field back of Pawling, New York. The monoplane bumped onward over the rough stubble for a few yards and stopped.
Bill stripped off his headphone and turning in his seat, faced toward Osceola and Ashton Sanborn who were wedged into the rear cockpit. The field, though comparatively level, was high on the mountain side. From where he sat he had a lovely view of a wide valley and a village nestling amid the trees near the base of the mountain. But Bill ignored the view. He seemed rather put out this morning.
“Well, here we are,” he announced grumpily. “I hope you’re pleased. Orders are orders, but if you ask me, Mr. Sanborn, I think it’s the bunk.”
The two aft got out of the cockpit and Sanborn walked forward to Bill who was glaring at the instrument board.
“Sorry, old man,” the detective held out his hand. “Won’t you wish me luck?”
Bill turned his head quickly and smiled at his friend. “Of course I will, Mr. Sanborn,” his tones carried sincerity. “Here’s the best of luck to you, and a full bag!”
They shook hands. “I know,” said Sanborn, “that both you and Osceola feel badly about this. But you two fellows constitute our rear guard—and believe me when I say that you’re undertaking a very grave responsibility.”
Osceola came up and laid an affectionate hand on the older man’s shoulder. “Good hunting, boss. Neither Bill nor I are ever quite ourselves so early in the morning, and especially so after a heavy night.”
“Oh, I know I’m a grouch today.” Bill laughed, though not very convincingly. “But it’s a disappointment, after what we three have been through on this business, not to be in at the finish. Don’t apologize for me, Osceola. I know I’m acting like a spoiled kid—I’ll get over it after a while.”
“If the Professor spots my men and Captain Simmonds’ police,” said Sanborn, “his plane won’t land. Then it is up to you fellows to get after him, and I give you _carte blanche_—you can do as you like about it.”
“Force down the Fokker and capture the villain,” said Osceola. “If we can.”
“That’s the idea,” replied Sanborn cheerfully.
“Only,” said Bill, “Professor Fanely _won’t_ spot the secret service men and the police because they’ll be too well hidden. All that you and I will get out of it, Osceola, is a rotten view of the battle, half a mile away, from those trees over yonder. It’s a grand life, this secret service stuff—if you like it!”
“I’ll tell you one thing, Bill,” promised the detective, “if this raid is pulled off successfully, and we round up the cartwheel gang in their lair, the people of the United States will have you to thank for saving them from the most frightful menace that has ever threatened this land of ours. And I’ll see that you get full credit.”
Bill leaned over the side of the cockpit. “Why, that’s the bunk, too, Mr. Sanborn—and you know it. Osceola found the first winged cartwheel and—”
“And ran it to a dead end,” supplied the chief calmly. “You were the brains of this piece, Bill.”
“And you also put in plenty of grit and brawn,” amended the secret service man.
“Heck, no. How about yourself, Mr. Sanborn? You’ve been running the show.”
“But if you hadn’t saved my life last night, Bill, my boy, I wouldn’t be running anything. And as the Chief says, without your brains, the winged cartwheels mystery would have remained unsolved—and I would still be watching poor Kolinski, over at Heartfield’s. No, Bill, you’ve played the lead in this piece, there’s no disputing it.”
Bill grinned and shook his head. “Sorry I can’t agree with you.” He leaned back in his seat and twiddled the stick. “Here comes Captain Simmonds. I reckon it’s time you and I, Osceola, pushed this bus into the shade of those trees. No need to give any more publicity than we have to, to our whereabouts.”
The State Police Captain strode across the field. “Morning, everybody. The men are posted, Mr. Sanborn. We’ve got the Mizzentop hotel completely surrounded. When Fanely arrives we’ll rush the plane and the house at the same time.”
“You won’t, unless you hurry—” Osceola’s sharp ears had detected a distant hum in the air to the southeast, “here comes the Fokker now!”
Simmonds uttered an exclamation of fury.
“Tarbell is in charge. He’ll handle things all right.” Sanborn though seriously disturbed, was outwardly calm. “Stupid of us not to expect Fanely earlier. But you and I had better hop it, Captain.”
The big airplane appeared suddenly over the top of the mountain; then, just as suddenly went into a steep right bank.
“Wait!” Bill snapped out the order. “They’ve seen us! Swing this bus into the wind. If that Fokker gets away now, we’ll have it to do all over again.”
The three on the ground grasped the situation instantly. They took hold of the tailplane and slewed it round in a quarter circle, as Bill switched on the ignition. Almost immediately, the inertia starter set the propeller revolving, and Osceola taking a running leap half vaulted, half climbed into the rear cockpit. They were moving slowly over the rough ground now, the engine roaring.
With his feet on the rudder pedals and right hand on the stick, Bill adjusted helmet and goggles as the engine warmed up. Then he cut down the throttle speed and clapped on his phone set. A twist of the head told him that Osceola was secure, and he roared the engine into twelve hundred revolutions per minute. They were rolling in earnest now. Bill lifted his ship off the ground with the engine beating a steady tattoo. Then he opened her up wide and pulled back on the stick.
They climbed steadily, heading after the Fokker, which now was but a dot to the southward, and bucking a twenty mile wind from the sea. The air was slightly bumpy, and sharp knocks on the bottom of their fuselage gave the impression of rolling over cobble-stones. Far above the roaring plane, little clouds, like balls of fluff, swam in the light ether.
At fifteen hundred feet, the approximate altitude of the Fokker, Bill leveled off. The distant shape which had been growing smaller, now appeared to remain constant.
“We aren’t gaining any!” Bill heard Osceola’s voice through his ear phones.
“Oh, yes, we are! But you can’t notice the gain at this distance. That Fokker can’t do better than 118 m.p.h. high speed. I can squeeze 135 out of this crate.”
“But they’re miles ahead, Bill. If old Fanely takes a notion to have his pilot land him, all we’ll find is the deserted plane when we get there.”
“I know it, you old fusser—that’s why we’re going to climb again—Perhaps you aren’t aware that it’s bad business to change temperature too quickly?”
“But why go higher?” The young Seminole sounded annoyed. “We’ll lose speed climbing—and it will take us longer to land at the finish.”
“Think so? Well, it’s the only way we can possibly catch up with them in a hurry.”
“I can’t see that.” Osceola was frankly puzzled.
Bill pulled back the stick and sent them hurtling upward again. “See those clouds up there, Redskin?”
“Better than you, probably, Paleface. What about ’em?”
“Which way are they moving, dumbbell?”
“Toward the southeast—great snakes, that’s the way we’re flying, isn’t it! I thought we were bucking a stiff wind.”
“We are—but there’s another strata of air up yonder, and the current is blowing those clouds in the direction we want to go. If Fanely’s pilot had the sense of a louse he’d stick that wind on his tail as we will do, instead of bucking half a gale down here.”
“Thank you,” said the Chief. “Compliments are flying like airplanes this morning.”
“Don’t mention it, old top. I don’t think the Fokker is coming down yet awhile, though.”
“That’s good news. How do you figure it?”
“She’s over the Sound now, and heading for the Atlantic via Long Island.”
“That’s queer—they can’t be running off to Europe!”
“Not a chance—unless they’ve got extra fuel tanks aboard, and brimful at that.”
“What do you think the old bird’s up to?”
“How should I know?—Something nasty, without doubt. Got a rifle handy?”
“You bet.”
“Then get it out. See that your safety-belt is on tight, too. I’m going to worry them some when we catch up. Don’t fire unless I give the word, though.”
Osceola grunted something that Bill didn’t catch. The little Ryan was racing in level flight once more, roaring through the misty fluff balls with a thirty mile wind from behind. Far below, Long Island Sound appeared, a strip of dazzling silver between the Connecticut shore and the long narrow island from which it takes its name. Beyond, the blue Atlantic shimmered in the bright sunlight.
The Fokker, still flying at the same low altitude continued to head out to sea. Bill knew that he was lessening the distance between the two planes with every revolution of the Ryan’s propeller. He figured their ground speed at not less than one hundred and sixty-five miles per hour.
In amazingly short time the little ship closed up on the big one.
“Get ready for a nose over!” Bill’s voice was steady and strong.
_Zing!!!_
The streamline steel tubing of the forward wing strut on the port side buckled slightly.
“Fire at will,” barked Bill into his transmitter and pushed forward the stick.
Over nosed the Ryan and with throttle wide open, she roared down on the Fokker’s tail. From the rear and above came two deafening detonations, and Bill saw the stabilizer and elevator to port and starboard of the Fokker rudder disappear into thin air. For an instant the big bus reeled drunkenly, then shot nose first for the sea, fifteen hundred feet below.
With wings creaking, Bill brought the Ryan up on an even keel, then banked. On the surface of the ocean there rose a cloud of spray. The Fokker had disappeared from sight.
“Gosh!” cried Bill. “That was a quick one!”
“I’ll say so. They must have drowned like rats in a bucket—or do you think any of ’em will come up?”
“Not a chance. They died when she struck. Think of the speed they were traveling! I could hardly see her nose under. Well, they started the shooting. That’s why old Fanely led us out here.”
“Didn’t want a gallery from below watching eh?”
“That’s my guess. Gee whiz, you certainly got in a couple of pretty ones! What have you got in there—a three-pounder?”
“Your father’s elephant gun—” Osceola told him. “And explosive bullets. Another shot, and I’d have had the whole tailplane off.”
“Well, you’ve got no kick coming,” said Bill. “Let’s hike for home, shall we? Nobody will ever see Professor Fanely and Mr. Lambert again. You’ve saved the government a big expense this morning, Redskin!”
“Oh, there’ll be plenty of trials for the newspapers to grow rich on out of this business, Bill.”
“Yes, I reckon Sanborn and the police corralled a bunch of winged cartwheels at the factory while we were away on our joy-ride.”
“Sure—and _look! Look, Bill!_”
Their chase had led them miles to the southeast and now they were approaching New York City on their return toward Connecticut. They were speeding over the Narrows, heading up the harbor when Osceola uttered his exclamation. High over the Battery, and downtown Manhattan, a skywriter was at work. Together the lads watched the airplane spell out its gigantic smoke letters above the city.
“BOLTON SAVES NATION READ THE—”
“That’s enough—” cried Bill in a disgusted voice, and headed the Ryan over Brooklyn. “Fast workers, aren’t they? Well, it looks as if Mizzentop has fallen.”
“I guess it has. Remember what Ashton Sanborn said about you getting the credit?”
“Yes, I do. He’s kept his promise all right—confound him!” said Bill.
THE END
Transcriber’s Notes
--Copyright notice provided as in the original—this e-text is public domain in the country of publication.
--Silently corrected palpable typos; left non-standard (or amusing) spellings and dialect unchanged.
--In the text versions, delimited italics text in _underscores_ (the HTML version reproduces the font form of the printed book.)
End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Bill Bolton and the Winged Cartwheels, by  Noel Sainsbury, Jr.

= = = PG35858 = = =
BILL BOLTON—FLYING MIDSHIPMAN
BILL BOLTON _Flying Midshipman_
BY
_Lieutenant Noel Sainsbury, Jr._
_Author of_ _Bill Bolton and Winged Cartwheels_ _Bill Bolton and the Flying Fish_ _Bill Bolton and Hidden Danger_
THE GOLDSMITH PUBLISHING CO. CHICAGO
_Copyright_, 1933 _The Goldsmith Publishing Company_
MADE IN U. S. A.
_Dedication_
_To_ OLIVER TEMPLETON JOHNSON, JR. _known to his friends as “Buzz”—an_ _inveterate reader of my books._
CONTENTS
· CHAPTER I—THE HURRICANE
· CHAPTER II—THE KEY
· CHAPTER III—PRISONERS
· CHAPTER IV—THE INVITATION
· CHAPTER V—TAKEN FOR A RIDE
· CHAPTER VI—OSCEOLA
· CHAPTER VII—THE ATTEMPT
· CHAPTER VIII—WHAT HAPPENED IN THE SWAMP
· CHAPTER IX—WHAT HAPPENED IN THE COMPOUND
· CHAPTER X—WHAT HAPPENED IN THE MORNING
· CHAPTER XI—WHAT HAPPENED IN THE AIR
· CHAPTER XII—’TWIXT WIND AND WATER
· CHAPTER XIII—OSCEOLA FINDS A WAY
· CHAPTER XIV—IN THE DUGOUT
· CHAPTER XV—SEMINOLES
· CHAPTER XVI—THE ADVANCE
· CHAPTER XVII—THE ATTACK
· CHAPTER XVIII—BIG CYPRESS AGAIN
BILL BOLTON—FLYING MIDSHIPMAN
CHAPTER I—THE HURRICANE
“I can’t keep her in the air any longer, Dad!”
Bill Bolton shot the words into the mouthpiece of his headphone and pushed the stick gently forward. The amphibian which he was driving nosed into a long gliding arc toward the angry whitecaps of the Bay of Florida, a thousand feet below.
“Too much wind?” called back Mr. Bolton from his seat in the rear cockpit.
With a sharp bank Bill saved the plane a side-slip as an unusually heavy gust caught her.
“Too much wind is right. Those black clouds to the southeast mean a hurricane or I’m a landlubber. We’re soon going to be in for it good and plenty. It’s already kicked up a heavy sea below. I should have landed sooner.”
“If we crash, we’ll have a long swim,” was his father’s sole comment.
Bill cut his gun and having brought the plane into the teeth of the wind which was increasing in violence momentarily, he shot a quick glance overside. Row after row of spume-capped combers met his eye and his face became grim with determination.
At an altitude of perhaps twenty-five feet he began to draw the stick slowly backward, breaking his glide. Careful not to stall her, with his eyes on the water just ahead he allowed the nose to come gradually up until the amphibian was in level flight. In such a wind this proved a most difficult evolution, for savage squalls lashed the plane until she acted like a wild colt on a leading rope; and a crash seemed imminent.
Struggling to keep the plane on an even keel, Bill continued to pull back his stick, raising the nose and depressing the tail. Then with a final pull he stalled her, the heel of the step made contact with the top of a whitecap and amid a cloud of spray the amphibian skimmed ahead on the water. Before her nose could play off, Bill had the sea anchor overside and a moment later the heavy boat was tugging on the line to the collapsible canvas bucket that kept her head into the wind.
Bill whipped off his headphone and goggles. Then he made the pilot’s cockpit secure by cleating down a waterproof tarpaulin over the top, flush with the deck, and climbed into the rear cockpit which had seats for two passengers.
Vast clouds growing out of the southeast almost covered the heavens now, concealing the sun. And as it grew darker the wind’s velocity steadily increased.
“She’ll ride better with me aft,” he explained to his father, “and the tarpaulin will shed water like a deck. If the fore cockpit shipped one of those big seas, we’d fill up and go down like a plummet.”
“I admit that I’m not much of a seafaring man,” said Mr. Bolton, “but why you keep the plane heading into those combers is beyond me! Why not run before the gale? Wouldn’t we ride easier?”
“Possibly—but we can’t get into position to do that now. I threw over the sea anchor to keep her as she is.”
“Why did you do that?”
“Because if I hadn’t, she’d have nosed round broadside to the waves and foundered with the weight of the water pouring down on her lower wing sections. If I tried to bring her before the wind now, she’d do exactly that as soon as her head played off.”
In the white glare of a lightning flash which brightened the horizon for an instant, Mr. Bolton glimpsed his son, staring into the teeth of the storm.
“Then why didn’t you land the plane with the wind instead of heading into it?” he queried in a perplexed tone.
“All landings must be made directly into the wind, Dad,” Bill explained patiently. “A plane stalls when its speed through the air drops below a certain point. If there’s no wind its speed over the surface will be the same as its speed through the air. But any wind at once affects its velocity over the surface, which will be the composition of the speed of the plane through the air with the speed of the air over the surface. You see, a plane which stalls at forty miles an hour will, when landing into a fifteen-mile wind, make contact at twenty-five miles an hour. The same plane headed down-wind would land at fifty-five miles an hour. And that difference of thirty miles an hour in landing speed might easily spell the difference between a good landing and a wrecked plane.”
His father smiled in the darkness.
“You talk like a textbook, Bill. But you do seem to have learned something at Annapolis during the past year.”
“Learned that in flight training, before I entered the Naval Academy,” replied his son. He ducked his head as an unusually vicious wave swept over the forward decking, deluging the two in the cockpit with stinging spray. “This is going to be a wet vacation, by the looks of things.”
“Who’d have thought we’d be in this fix when we left Key West at four this afternoon! Now we’re stranded—somewhere in the Bay of Florida—and instead of dining cheerily with the Wilsons at Miami, and going on to that important business conference afterwards—”
“We’re likely to make good bait for the sharks in this neighborhood!”
“I don’t suppose there’s anything we can do, son?”
“Not a thing—but grin and bear it until this wind blows itself out.”
“And it will get worse before it gets better!”
“Sure! Cheer up, Dad—we’ll weather it yet.”
“Don’t mind me, Bill. I’m—that is, I’m not feeling quite myself. Haven’t since we came down, as a matter of fact. I’ve never been—seasick—before—” Mr. Bolton’s voice sounded rather feeble.
“It’s the motion, combined with the smell of gasoline, Dad. Every naval flyer knows that feeling, your son included, at this particular time. You’ll feel better when you’re empty.”
“I certainly hope so,” faltered Mr. Bolton.
“Just let your mind rest on a fatty piece of pork swimming in its own hot grease, for a starter,” Bill suggested, grinning to himself.
“Mmmm—” Bill’s father stood up suddenly and leaned far overside.
His son followed suit almost immediately.
Presently they returned to their places, weak and empty, but considerably more comfortable.
“I wonder why the thought of fat pork always gets one going,” mused Bill, handing his father the water bottle.
Mr. Bolton slaked his thirst and handed it back, whereupon Bill took a couple of long pulls.
“Feel better, Dad?”
“Yes, thanks.” He paused a moment, then continued in his normal tone. “The plane doesn’t seem to be pitching so wildly—”
“No, the wind is increasing steadily, and flattening out the water.”
“Isn’t there something we can do now?”
“Yes. It’s getting pretty wet in here. Give me a hand with this tarpaulin, please.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Batten down the cockpit cover.”
“But, my boy!” Mr. Bolton’s voice showed a trace of nervousness for the first time. “If we put the cover on the cockpit, we’ll be drowned like rats in a trap if the plane goes down. I confess I’m not keen on the idea.”
“If the plane founders, we’ll drown anyway,” was his son’s business-like reply. “No swimmer could live more than a minute in water like this. We’re in a tight fix, Dad, and our only chance is to ride out the gale. This plane will sink like a stone, once the real hurricane hits us, unless she is pretty near watertight overall. Let’s get busy before the wind makes the job impossible.”
“I guess you’re skipper,” Mr. Bolton replied, and he hastened to comply with Bill’s request.
It was difficult work fastening on the waterproof cover from the inside, but at last it was accomplished, and Bill flashed on his electric torch. With some trouble, because of the violent pitching and rolling of their little ship, he took down the two passenger seats which were collapsible, and stowed them in the luggage hold aft. It now became possible for father and son to sit upright on the flooring.
“We’re as snug as a couple of bugs in a rug, now,” breezed Bill with satisfaction as he made the last seat secure.
“More like nailing down the lid of our coffin,” observed his father. “I hope I’m not afraid to meet my Maker, but I’d much prefer doing so in the open. However, I am certainly proud of the way you’re handling things, my boy. From now on, I’ll stop grumbling. When you reach my age, you’ll find that an upset stomach paints everything else black.”
With startling suddenness, the howl of the wind stilled, and the two in the cockpit could hear plainly the splash of the waves against the hull. This eerie silence lasted for perhaps a minute, to be superseded by a dull roar that grew stronger and louder every split second.
“Hold fast! Here she comes!” shouted Bill. With his back against one wall and his feet against the other, he braced his body for the shock of the wind.
In a crescendo of thunderous warning the hurricane struck them. Down and still further down went the nose of the plane beneath the smashing wind.
Would she never come up? Would the anchor line hold? Bill wondered frantically. Then he caught his father’s twisted smile, and answered it with another. Dad was a real sport—true, he was a business man, and more at home in a swivel-chair behind a desk than in a pounding seaplane in a gale. But the old man was right there when it came to real pluck. That smile, with beads of perspiration standing out on his forehead proved it. Bill tingled with pride and satisfaction.
It was different, of course, with himself. He was a midshipman and a flyer, and it was his business to take risks. This was about the tightest fix he had been in so far, he thought. Never had he heard anything like the fearsome, shrieking roar of this wind.
Ah! The plane’s head was rising! He could feel it. Soon the sea would get up again. Would they be able to ride out the storm?
Mr. Bolton fished a notebook and pencil out of his pocket, and after writing a few words, passed them to Bill.
“Have you a map of these waters?” he had written.
Bill shook his head. “It’s in the forward cockpit,” he wrote. “We were about twenty-five miles south of Oyster Keys when we landed. The mainland is a few miles north of them. Uninhabited mangrove swamps, I think.”
He passed back the notebook and pencil. And after glancing at what he had written, Mr. Bolton scribbled a few more words and handed Bill the book again.
“How about Oyster Keys?” read his son.
The wind was making less commotion now, so Bill tried using his voice.
“Low-lying islets,” he shouted. “I don’t think anybody lives there. Even head on to the storm as we are, the plane is drifting toward the keys—sure to be.”
“That’s good,” shouted back his father. “Maybe we’ll make one of them by morning.”
“I hope not!” was Bill’s reply. “Not in the sea that will be running by then. We’d smash up sure in the breakers.”
Mr. Bolton made no answer to this announcement and Bill spoke again. “We may need this flashlight again before morning, Dad. The batteries are small. They won’t last forever. Sorry, but I’m afraid we’ll have to sit it out in the dark.”
Mr. Bolton nodded. “Goodnight—and good luck, son.”
Bill snapped off the light. For what seemed a long time he sat there in darkness so black that with a hand held close to his eyes, he was unable to see the faintest outline of it. The strain and excitement were beginning to make themselves felt. Bill began to realize that he was tired. He curled up into a more comfortable position and rested his head on his arms. Five minutes later he was sound asleep.
He was awakened from dreamless slumber as his head struck something hard and unyielding. His hand sought the electric torch in his pocket and drew it forth. By its light he saw his father sleeping on the flooring close to him. A glance at his wristwatch showed that it was five o’clock, and therefore daylight. He wound the watch, and without waking his father, undid a corner of the cockpit cover.
The wind had fallen to a fraction of its former strength. A grey, cloudswept sky met his gaze, and below it, towering waves which seemed bent on burying the small craft beneath tumbling torrents of angry water. The plane was probably leaking a bit, but that was to be expected after the beating she had been taking all night long, and was still taking. Staunch little bus!
Then he turned his head and involuntarily caught his breath. Dead aft and not a quarter of a mile away lay a long line of pounding breakers!
CHAPTER II—THE KEY
“Good morning, son,” said a voice behind Bill. “Reckon the Old Man got his wish. One of the Oyster Keys, isn’t it?”
“Shouldn’t be surprised,” returned Bill without enthusiasm. “We’ll soon know more about it. At the rate the plane is drifting backwards, we’ll be up to the breakers in about an hour.”
“How about starting the engine and—er—sheering off?”
“Not in a sea like this, Dad. She’d go down in a minute, just as soon as her head played off. Our only chance is that she drifts past that point over there to starboard. There may be a bay behind it and if we can make quieter water, we may win out yet.”
Mr. Bolton slapped him on the shoulder. “That’s the way to talk! You’re a great comfort to your old Dad. How about a little breakfast before rounding the point, eh?”
Bill laughed. “You’re on, sir,—if you’ll take off these cockpit covers, I’ll go below for the emergency rations!”
“Make it snappy, then. I’m hungry enough to eat a horse. Or fat pork swimming in its own grease, for that matter!”
By the time Mr. Bolton had the tarpaulins stowed away. Bill produced sandwiches and coffee hot from the thermos bottle.
“New life and no mistake,” Mr. Bolton remarked, munching contentedly. “What do you think of our chances now that you’re able to satisfy the inner man, Bill?”
“Not very good, sir. The tide is carrying us toward the point, but this wind is causing us to drift backward onto the breakers at a rate of at least three feet to the tide’s one.”
“I don’t see any signs of life on the island,” observed his father.
“No, if anybody lives on that key, the house is behind the cliffs. I’ve been watching for a sign of smoke, but haven’t sighted anything so far. Queer formation, those cliffs, for this part of the world. Most of the islands are so low and flat they’re covered with water at high tide.”
They finished their breakfast in a leisurely manner, and stowed away the remainder of the food.
“I guess we aren’t going to make the point,” said Bill when their tailplane lay not more than a quarter of a mile off the breakers. “I’ve got another idea, though. Stupid of me not to have thought of it before. It’s a ticklish job, but if I don’t swamp her, we ought to get round that promontory.”
“Anything is better than this inaction. What’s the good word?”
“I’m going into the fore cockpit and start the engine.”
“You mean we can pull in the sea anchor and taxi out of this dangerous position?”
“Hardly that. The old bus would pound to pieces in this sea if I tried to send her over these waves. The idea is to give her just enough headway to offset the wind drift that is driving her ashore. I want to keep her the same distance off the surf that she is now. The tide will then have a chance to carry us sideways round the point. There’s bound to be quieter water to leeward of that headland.”
“Sounds fine! Anyway, it gives us a chance. What can I do to help?”
“Crawl out on the nose, please. When I give the word, haul in the anchor line. If you try to get the sea anchor aboard from a cockpit the bus will slew to the side and I’ll never be able to keep her headed into the wind.”
Bill took his place at the controls in the fore cockpit and idled the engine until he was convinced everything was running smoothly. Then he placed his feet on the rudder pedals and motioned his father to proceed.
The huge white-capped rollers, aftermath of the hurricane, tossed the plane up and down as though each oncoming wave was bent on destroying her. Bill knew that his father’s task was no easy one. The decking forward of the cockpit was rounded and absolutely smooth. There were no handholds to prevent one slipping off its wet surface.
With a smile, the middle aged gentleman climbed out of the cockpit, lay flat on the deck and wormed his way toward the nose with a wriggling motion that allowed both his arms and his legs to hug the slick planking.
Arrived at the end of his short but perilous journey he sat up, and straddled the deck as though he were riding a very broad horse. Then with a hand on the anchor line, he looked back over his shoulder.
Bill was ready for him to start, and with his stick held well back of neutral to prevent the nose dipping under the waves and throwing spray into the propeller, he held up his free hand.
Mr. Bolton immediately started to haul in the line and Bill opened his throttle. Keeping just enough headway on the plane to be sure he could hold her pointed as he wished, he waited until the sea anchor was on board and his father safely aft in the passenger cockpit again, and then slightly accelerated the engine. Even this small burst of speed caused the amphibian to bury its nose in the combers; and all but foundered her under a torrent of sea water. Bill instantly idled down until the staunch little craft was moving through the water at the speed of a fast walk. He soon found that by keeping her going at this rate he prevented her drifting backward with the wind. Deviations from his heading were prevented by use of the throttle rudder and ailerons.
It was strenuous work, fighting waves in a heavy amphibian, and incomparably more tiring than driving her through the air. Moreover it took his whole power of will and concentration to keep her head from playing off and becoming the forerunner of sure disaster. His back and shoulders began to ache under the strain; and soon his leg muscles were an added source of torture because of the excessive pressure he was forced to use on the rudder pedals. He dared not shift his gaze aft, so when they had been travelling the monstrous treadmill grind for an hour by the clock, he hailed his father: “How are we making it?”
The roar of the propeller and engine almost drowned the words as the wind whipped them back to Mr. Bolton. Sensing, however, that his son wanted something, he donned a headphone and picked up Bill’s set on the other end of the line. He climbed out of the cockpit and leaned over Bill, adjusting the receiver and transmitter so that the busy pilot could talk to him.
“What did you say?” he asked from the rear cockpit once more.
“Want to know if we’ll round the point. If I turn to look, I’ll swamp her.”
“Sorry,” returned his father. “I hadn’t realized—— Yes, we’re abreast of the head now. There seems to be quite a large cove and quiet water beyond. Can’t make it out just yet. Anything else?”
“Yes. When we’re round, let me know what’s behind the head.”
For nearly ten minutes there was no further conversation. Then Bill heard his father’s voice in his ears again.
“We’re past now. That head is the western end of the island, and behind it is an almost landlocked cove. You’ll have to make a turn to the left to get in there. Think you can do it OK?”
“It’s a case of have to, I guess,” was Bill’s answer.
He closed the throttle and, careful to maintain sufficient speed for steerageway, allowed the plane to drift backward in the heavy wind until the mouth of the little harbor lay off his port quarter. Exerting pressure on left rudder, he allowed the plane’s nose to play off to port for the fraction of a second, then kicked her ahead and dead into the wind again, so as to take the advancing wave nose on.
Soon their slow progress to port was perceptible. As they drew closer into the lee of the headland, the wind was less violent, the waves though high lost their caps of white spume.
Bill gauged his distances to a nicety. His spurts to port became longer, until at last he manœuvered his craft, floating backward and sideways, to leeward of the narrow opening between the cliffs. Then with a vigorous burst of the engine, he swung round to port and sent the amphibian hurtling into the harbor.
“Splendid, son, splendid!” sang out Mr. Bolton, as Bill cut his gun and ripped off his headphone. “We certainly are in luck. This island is evidently inhabited, after all. Look over there!”
Bill was already scanning the cove with a gaze that grasped every detail. As the plane continued to float shoreward over the quiet water, he saw that the harbor was almost landlocked. Broad white beaches ended abruptly in steep cliffs, forty or fifty feet high. Directly ahead a long concrete pier jutted into the bay and nearby a large yacht and two big amphibians lay at their moorings.
“Yes, there are people here,” replied Bill. “That road zig-zagging up the cliffs probably leads to the houses. Funny that nobody has sighted us. I wonder what they’re doing with a sea-going yacht and a couple of planes?”
“Some millionaire’s hobby, no doubt. This key probably belongs to him. Hadn’t we better tie up to the dock and go ashore? We’ve had a strenuous time of it, and I frankly admit I’m dog tired. Clean sheets and a comfortable bed, for five or six hours, will make new men of us both.”
“I’m with you,” smiled his son and sent their plane skimming toward the pier. They made fast to a couple of ringbolts in the concrete and after securing the plane, picked up their suitcases and stepped ashore. Without further waste of time they breasted the winding road that led up the cliff.
“I hope you’re right about the millionaire,” remarked Bill, as he trudged beside his father. “That should mean a comfortable house and a good feed. Sandwiches are all right, but they don’t go very far when you’re downright hungry!”
“Well, this road cost a lot of money to build,” puffed Mr. Bolton. “It seems to me that this key is the winter home of some pretty wealthy people. Ah, here we are—top at last!”
The cliff they had just ascended evidently extended entirely around the shoreline of the key. Before them the ground sloped into a natural, bowl-like depression. This valley ran the length and breadth of the island, which was about five miles long by two miles wide. The road, gleaming white in the morning sun, ran straight down the valley, to a group of low white buildings, a mile or so away. A heavy growth of trees and shrubs covered the valley. There seemed to have been no attempt to cultivate the soil, and except for the road, the group of buildings and a large house that perched on a knoll in mid-valley, nature had been allowed to run its own pace.
“Quite a settlement,” commented Mr. Bolton.
“And quite a walk—in this hot sun,” grumbled Bill, shifting his loaded suitcase from one hand to the other.
“Oh, it will do us good to stretch our legs. Come along. Southern hospitality is famous, you know. We’re sure to get a warm welcome, especially in this out-of-the-way place.”
“It’s warm enough for me, right now,” retorted Bill. “Gee—what’s that!”
“Halt!” cried a rough voice. “Stand where you are, or I’ll fire!”
Two men sprang from behind the cover of a rocky outcropping near the roadside. Both of the newcomers held repeating rifles at the ready. They advanced down the incline toward the Boltons.
CHAPTER III—PRISONERS
The armed strangers were a swarthy, black-browed pair, clad in sleeveless cotton under-shirts and ragged cotton trousers of no particular hue. Both wore the floppy, broadbrimmed straw hats common in the tropics, both were barefoot and carried canvas cartridge belts slung over their left shoulders. A more villainous pair could not be found anywhere.
“Stick ’em up!” commanded the taller of the two.
Bill dropped his suitcase and defiantly thrust his hands into the pockets of his breeches.
“We’re not armed,” he said steadily, and ignoring the man’s angry growl, turned to his father. “If this is a sample of the famous hospitality you were talking about, Dad, a little of it is plenty!”
“Search ’em and search ’em good, Diego!” shouted the leader. “If they make a move ter pull a rod, I’ll drill ’em.”
“But, I say—— Hold on!” Mr. Bolton exclaimed indignantly as Diego relieved him of his watch and wallet.
“Hold up, you mean,” remarked Bill grimly. “A sweet gang of robbers we’ve fallen into if the rest of them on this key are anything like these two thugs.”
“Shut yer mouth, or it’ll be the worse fer youse!” snapped the highwayman. “Mebbe yer get dese tings back when yer goes up ter de big house, an’ mebbe yer don’t. Dat’s none o’ my business. It’s up ter de boss.”
“I’ll bet he’s a gentleman of the old school,” mocked Bill. “Tell me, Bozo, what do they call this place? Who is the hospitable owner?”
“Ain’t none o’ yer business,” snarled the man. “Gimme more o’ yer lip, an’ I’ll give yer de butt of dis rifle between de eyes. Pick up dem bags and march. Straight down de road—dat’s de way.”
Forced to obey, the Boltons took up their suitcases again and continued along the dusty highway, but this time accompanied by an armed rear guard.
“We’re arriving in style, anyway, with an armed guard,” Bill muttered to his father. “What sort of a dump do you suppose we’ve crashed into?”
Mr. Bolton, whose face was crimson with annoyance, shot a glance of reproof at the tall, broad-shouldered young fellow at his side.
“Whatever it is, you’ll only make things worse by trying to heckle these people. The men behind are quite evidently underlings. When we meet this boss they speak of, it will be time enough to demand an explanation. Why the owner of this place should treat strangers in this cavalier manner is beyond me, I confess.”
“If you ask me, Dad, I believe we are walking into a mess that has last night’s seance at sea beat forty ways to Sunday.”
“I hope you are wrong,” his father answered stiffly. “But if Diego and his loud-voiced friend aren’t criminals they should be, with faces like theirs. We certainly seem to have been blown out of the frying pan straight into the fire.”
Quarter of an hour’s walk brought them to the first of the buildings they had sighted from the hillside. Closer inspection proved it to be a long, one-storied affair with a flat roof and whitewashed stucco walls. It looked hot and stuffy, and the Boltons noted that the small windows set high up were barred with rusty iron.
“Looks like a Mexican jail to me,” declared Bill.
“I’ve never seen one,” his father replied. Mr. Bolton was in no state, physically or mentally, for facetious conversation.
“Neither have I, except in the movies—”
“An’ dis is where we stops. In yer goes!”
Diego’s partner appeared at Bill’s elbow and motioned toward the building with the muzzle of his gun. Diego, who so far had made no observation of his own, produced a key. The heavy door swung inward and the Boltons were rudely forced to enter.
They came into a fair-sized room, sparsely furnished with a chair and a few wooden benches. As they passed into a long corridor lined with cells, Diego’s pal relieved them of their suitcases, while Diego unlocked a door and motioned with his rifle for father and son to step into the cell.
“This is an outrage!” exploded Mr. Bolton.
Without a word, Diego slammed and locked the door behind them.
Bill, who feared that a show of resistance might cause the men to separate him from his father, cut in upon his parent’s fury.
“Hey, you, Diego!” he called.
Diego stopped and turned round.
“Speak English?” Bill pressed his face against the bars and stared at the man, who exhibited no sign that he understood.
“My Naval Academy Spanish won’t pass muster, so I reckon it must be English,” continued Bill ruefully. “Anyway, I’ll take a chance. Look here, Diego. Bring my father and me something to drink—something cool and wet—with ice in it if you can—and I’ll make it all right with you when the boss learns who we are and lets us go. If I’m talking too fast for you to follow, I’ll say it all over again. How about it, my lad, do you get me?”
A sour grin spread over Diego’s none too prepossessing visage.
“Youse an’ yer ole man go blow yer tops!” he replied in the best Bowery argot. “Whadda yer take dis joint for—de Waldorf?”
He spat his contempt on the filthy floor and passed out of sight.
“You never can tell when you’ll run into home-folks,” said Bill with a smile at Mr. Bolton.
Bill’s father looked hot and desperately weary. He spoke in a dejected tone. “I admire your cheerfulness, son, in this trying position. But if you will desist from buffooning the situation, it would be a relief to me. Of course, I realize our arrest is a mistake. And the owner of this island will surely make amends as soon as I tell him who we are. In missing that conference in Miami last night, my entire business interests were jeopardized. If I can’t get there before those men leave for the North, you and I, boy, are liable to suffer a heavy financial loss.”
Bill tossed his jacket on the dirty floor and sat down with his back to the wall. “Thanks, Dad—but I guess you know I’m not playing for admiration. I realize the seriousness of this mess we’re in just as fully as you do. And one thing I do believe: we’re going to have to shell out plenty of cash in a very little while, if you let the ‘boss’ over at the big house know you’re Bolton of the Bolton Sugar Corporation!”
His father looked at him sharply. “What do you mean?”
“I believe,” went on Bill, “that this is going to be a hold-up game from start to finish. If we haven’t dropped into the winter hangout of some Chicago beer baron or New York racketeer, I’m a ground hog!”
“Mmm—ransom, you mean?”
“I do. I shouldn’t be surprised at anything after meeting Diego and his bullying pal. Any man who would hire a couple of gunmen like those fellows is sure to be a bad egg. And we’re getting a taste of his generous hospitality right now. Of course, I don’t know what his particular game is, but it’s bound to be something pretty low. When he finds out you’re a power in the business world, he’s sure to bleed you.”
“I dare say you’re right,” his father returned gloomily. “I’ll have to keep my identity hidden. By thunder!” he slapped his knee in vexation. “The man knows _now_, exactly who I am. Those villains took my wallet! My cards and some valuable papers were in it, to say nothing of the currency I carried, though he can have that and welcome.”
“Tough luck, Dad—I never thought of that. Now we are in for it. Ugh! I wish those birds would bring us a drink. My mouth hurts, it’s so dry.”
“Filthy place, this—what with the stench and the heat—One of these days I’ll make it even hotter for the man who is accountable for this!”
“Sh!” cautioned Bill. “Here they come!”
Diego and the other man came into sight between the bars. Diego unlocked the cell door.
“On yer way!” he barked. “De big boss wants ter look youse over.”
“Anything’s better than this hole,” observed Mr. Bolton, and picking up his coat he preceded Bill out of the cell.
“Mebbe—and mebbe not,” said Diego’s partner, and they both chuckled hoarsely.
“How about some water to drink?” inquired Bill.
“Do I look like a soda fountain? Tell yer troubles to de boss. Servin’ drinks ain’t my job.”
The sun’s heat was terrific out on the road, and the glare was blinding. All wind from the sea was cut off by the valley, and the very trees seemed to shimmer under the broiling rays.
They passed several other buildings which looked like barracks and warehouses, but saw no people. If there were any, they remained indoors.
“This is a sweet place to pick for a winter home,” gasped Bill, mopping his streaming forehead. “The thug who runs things here must be a darned cold-blooded guy.”
“Very probably,” returned Mr. Bolton, “but the place, though hot, has its advantages, if he is what we surmise. It is quite out of the world, and except from the air, no one would guess that the island is inhabited.”
“Home at last,” remarked Bill after a few minutes, as they turned up the incline toward the white house on the knoll. “Thank heaven there’s a bit of a breeze up here. Whew! This bird certainly lives in style!”
The road swept up through beautifully kept flower gardens to the front of the house, which appeared to be a really huge mansion. Wide verandas surrounded the rambling building on three sides, and the cream stucco walls contrasted pleasingly with the dark green of its tile roof. Money had been spent here with a lavish hand. The place looked cool and inviting. The Boltons wondered what it would hold for them.
They were led into a spacious hall, panelled in mahogany. Here again, the Persian rugs scattered over the polished floor, the fine wood and carving of the furniture, and a number of excellent paintings on the walls, all bespoke the hand of wealth.
Bidding his prisoners remain where they were, Diego crossed the hall and knocked at a closed door.
“Come in,” called a man’s voice, and Diego disappeared into the room, closing the door behind him.
Bill started to make some comment on their surroundings to his father, but their other guard growled at him to keep quiet. Then Diego reappeared and beckoned them into the room.
This large apartment was handsomely furnished in the manner of a business office. Behind a huge, flat-topped desk sat a fat young man dressed in immaculate white linens. Blue-black hair and an olive complexion bespoke his Latin origin. Two other young men, clad also in white, and bearing a strong resemblance to the man at the desk, lounged in wicker arm chairs. All were smoking long black cigars.
“And what, may I ask, is the reason for this outrage?” began Mr. Bolton, walking up to the desk. “Is it your custom to have visitors to this island treated like criminals and thrown into jail?”
“It is,” the fat man remarked blandly, without removing the cigar from his lips.
Bill’s father was taken aback by this unadulterated candor, but neither by manner nor change of tone did he betray his surprise. “How much do you want to let us go?”
The man at the desk knocked the ash from his cigar.
“Why, it’s not a question of money at the present moment, Mr. Bolton. That will undoubtedly come later. Just now, my brothers and I have need of you in other ways.”
“You mean that we are to be kept here as your prisoners?”
“You have guessed the secret, Mr. Bolton. And my advice to you and to your son is to do exactly as you are told, without argument or question. Strangers on Shell Island have always found that to disobey commands here is a particularly unhealthy pastime. Obey on the jump—is our slogan. I hope for your sakes that neither of you forgets it.” He smiled at them affably and puffed on his cigar.
Mr. Bolton was about to speak his mind when Bill caught his arm. “Stow it, Dad,” he said. “That lad has us just where he wants us. I’d like to say what I think, too,—but what’s the use?”
Their host waved his hand and their guards led the Boltons out of the house.
Once on the road, tramping back toward the settlement below, Mr. Bolton passed his arm through Bill’s.
“Your Naval Academy training has put a head on your shoulders, son,” he said affectionately. “You have developed better control of your temper under stress than I have. I’m glad you stopped me. Ordinarily a man of my position in the world is in the habit of speaking his mind when provoked.”
Bill nodded. “One of these days,” he said grimly, “I’m going to get that fat slob in there—and when I do, there won’t be enough left of him for the state to burn. What’s his game? Have you any idea?”
Mr. Bolton shook his head. “Not the slightest glimmer. It doesn’t appear to be a case of ransom—or at least, not just yet. Whatever he is up to is obviously illegal. But we’ll probably learn about it before long. The man is an educated criminal. His actions prove it. Our position is certainly serious—very serious.”
“I vote we make a stab at getting out of that cell tonight,” suggested Bill. “If I can get hold of our bus or one of the other amphibians, we’ll get clear of Shell Island in short order.”
“We’ll spend the day thinking up a plan of operations,” agreed his father.
As they came into the settlement, Diego tapped Bill on the shoulder. “Come along with me, guy,” he ordered. “Not you—” he snarled at Mr. Bolton as he started to turn out of the road with his son. “Back to the lockup for yours!”
“Good bye, Dad, and good luck,” Bill called as Diego’s partner herded his father down the road.
“Good luck, and keep a brave heart,” answered Mr. Bolton.
He called out something else, but Bill could not catch the words, for Diego had him by the arm and forced him through the doorway of the barracks before which they had been standing.
He found himself in a large room where thirty or forty men quite as villainous-looking as his guard were lounging about, smoking, sleeping or playing cards. Diego hurried him through this apartment, and down a bare hallway to the open door of a small room. Bill saw that except for an unpainted table and a chair of the kitchen variety, the place was empty of furniture. Over the chair a coarse cotton shirt and a pair of cotton trousers were draped. Leg-irons and a pair of handcuffs lay on the table.
“Strip!” Diego pointed to the chair. “Them’s your clothes, guy. Get into ’em.”
“How about wearing my own?” Bill was fast losing his temper. Only the rifle which Diego held pointed in his direction prevented him from sending a right hand jab to the point of the thug’s chin and taking his chance with the others in the room beyond.
“Nuttin’ doin’, bo—” snarled Diego. “Dem’s de boss’s orders. Make it snappy. We gotta get out o’ here right away an’ I want to pin de jewelry on yer.”
“Where are we going?”
“I ain’t goin’ nowhere—but you are—” He grinned evilly at the lad—“youse is goin’ ter be took fer a ride.”
CHAPTER IV—THE INVITATION
Diego gave vent to a raucous laugh after making this announcement. He walked across the room, leaned his rifle against the table, and picking up the handcuffs inspected them critically. His prisoner was unarmed and too far away to offer an assault before he could snatch up his gun again. He did not fear Bill physically. But many people misjudged that slender body with the broad shoulders. The young midshipman was not yet seventeen; nevertheless he was star right end on the Navy team and as strong as a steel bridge. Now he saw his chance and took it.
Bending down as though to untie the pair of rubber soled sneakers he wore, Bill suddenly half straightened and his lithe form shot through the air. Before Diego could drop the handcuffs, one hundred and sixty pounds of bone and muscle struck him just above the knees and he crashed over backward beneath a perfect tackle. The unexpected jar and shock half-stunned him and before he could gather his faculties, Bill’s fist, backed by the venom of a sorely tried temper smashed him behind his left ear. All lights went out for Diego, gangster and gunman, right there.
Bill scrambled to his feet, ran to the open door and peered out. The corridor was empty. He closed and bolted the door and after a moment’s thought, he approached the unconscious gangster.
Five minutes later, a young man clad in cotton undershirt, ragged cotton trousers and rubber soled sneakers stepped through an open window on to the wide veranda which ran along the side of the barracks. On the young man’s head was a floppy broadbrimmed hat of straw. He carried a rifle. The owner of these articles lay on the floor behind the window, quite oblivious. When he came to again, he would find his wrists manacled behind his back, his right leg chained to the table, and a gag in his mouth. As Bill Bolton walked swiftly along the veranda, he conjured up the pleasing picture of Diego’s awakening, and grinned.
With the hat’s brim pulled well down and acting as a partial screen to his features, he ran down the broad wooden steps and out to the road. Not a soul was in sight. Then suddenly his heart missed a beat.
“Hey, you! Where you goin’?” called a voice from the porch behind him, and a man he had not seen before ran down the steps. Just then a large handbell was rung somewhere within the building.
“Come in and get yer chow,” called the man.
Bill felt that he would certainly cause suspicion if he refused to obey this suggestion. Moreover, he was thirsty and half famished. So he walked back to the steps.
“I reckon you’re one of the new hands on the yacht,” observed the man.
“That’s right,” admitted Bill.
“Thought so, when I seen yer beatin’ down toward the harbor just afore dinner time. The boss feeds us swell here. Has to, with this gang to look after. Men get easy discontented in a sweatbox like this here island. How’s the grub aboard the _Pelican_?. Useter be pretty bad.”
“I’ve eaten worse,” said Bill.
“Well, come along in and feed here today,” turning back up the steps with him. “It’s a hot walk along that shell road, and I’ll need yer to help herd some of them prisoners down there later on.”
Bill followed him into the building. This time he found the large room deserted, and passing through a doorway to the right, the two entered a big hall, down the middle of which ran two long, narrow tables.
The men were already seated at dinner, and nobody paid the slightest attention to the new arrivals. Bill’s companion took his place at the head of a table and motioned the lad to a vacant seat just below. A pitcher of what proved to be lemonade was within Bill’s reach. He filled and emptied his glass three times before he began to feel refreshed. A slatternly negress placed a plate piled high with fried chicken, rice and fried plantains before him and he dug into it with the relish of a starved man.
“Reckon the _Pelican’s_ chow ain’t so good, the way you tackle yer dinner,” laughed the man at the table’s head.
“If they have fried chicken aboard, it never gets for’ard of the cabin,” Bill grinned back. He knew that his identity might be discovered at any time and planned to make the most of the meal while he could.
“I run the commissariat and the men here at the barracks,” his new acquaintance informed him. “Y’ got to feed ’em right to keep ’em contented. The boss is liberal. ‘He knows his oats. Bum chow makes fer fights and knifin’s in this climate.”
Bill nodded and kept on eating. A man further down the table raised his voice above the clatter of cutlery on dishes and the hum of conversation.
“Did you hear about the two guys that blew in here on a plane this morning, Tom?” he asked the man at the end of the table.
“I sure did,” laughed that person. “I guess they didn’t know what they was bumpin’ into when they hit Shell Island. You guys won’t have to take so many trips to the mainland if suckers come here of their own accord, eh?”
The laughter became general. The men apparently enjoyed the joke.
“Where are they now?” inquired another.
“Tony and Diego’s got them over to the calaboose. They was up to the big house and Martinengo looked ’em over. It’s Bolton, the sugar millionaire, and his boy.”
“The boss could squeeze a bunch o’ kale outen that pair!”
“But then he’d have to let ’em go,” said Tom. “And that would blow the gaff. He’s shippin’ them up to the workin’s this afternoon with the rest of the bunch.”
“I bet there’ll be a holler raised, when old man Bolton doesn’t show up at home,” observed a voice far down the table. “That gang’s got influence and friends. Yer can’t cop a millionaire without runnin’ into trouble.”
“That’s where yer all wet, Zeppi,” called down Tom. “Bolton’s influence won’t count him nothin’ with the Martinengo boys; and his friends will think he’s dead. Went down with his son in the blow last night. There won’t be no comeback. The two of ’em will be dead soon. The workin’s ain’t no health resort.”
“I’ll say they’re not,” returned Zeppi. “Martinengo wouldn’t get me to stick ‘round that dump—double pay or no double pay.”
“Oh, yes, he would—and on the jump,” Tom contradicted. “You’re a new man, Zeppi. Y’ got a lot to learn, and the first thing is that the boss don’t ask—he orders—and so do I. Them what tries to make trouble is put on the spot. Get me?”
Tom turned to Bill. “Some o’ these boobs don’t know when they’s well off,” he remarked genially. “What do they call yer, young feller?”
“Bill,” said Bill. He finished the last bit of his food and poured himself another glass of lemonade.
“Well, Bill, if you hike back to the _Pelican_, that bo’sun will put you to swabbin’ decks or somethin’. I need you later and I’ll fix it up with him. You go into the bunk room and turn in with the rest of this crew. Gotta take yer rest now—the bunch o’ you’ll be up all night.”
Bill saw that he had no option but to obey, so when the men left the table he went with them. His plan had been to go to the jail, overpower Tony and release his father. They would then make for the harbor, take his amphibian or one of the others moored in the little bay and fly away. Now he realized that he must conform to circumstances as he found them. Nobody knew that he was not what Tom took him for, a deck hand on the yacht _Pelican_. If only Diego were not discovered, he would make another sortie in an hour or so, when the men were deep in their siesta.
No sound came from behind the closed door to the room where he had left the gunman, lying gagged and bound, as he trooped down the hall with the rest. The rear of the long corridor opened into a huge, airy apartment which ran the full width of the building. Screened windows opened on to verandas on three sides. The room looked like a hospital ward, with its long rows of cots. At the head of each bed was a wooden chest with a padlock for the owner’s belongings. A single sheet and a blanket were folded at the foot of the bed, under the pillow. Everything was neat, and evidently kept in the orderly arrangement of a military barracks. Framed signs on the four walls read, “Silence—No Talking.” Tom, though seemingly a genial soul, ruled with an iron hand.
Bill spread his sheet on the cot pointed out to him, and placed his pillow at the head of the bed. Then he kicked off his sneakers and lay down. Except for the sound of breathing and the buzzing of a bluebottle against a window screen, the place was absolutely quiet. It was hot, notwithstanding the ventilation, but the cot was comfortable, and try as he might, Bill could not fight off the drowsiness that assailed him.
He awoke with a guilty start to the loud clang of a ship’s bell and sat up on his cot. The hands of the clock on the wall opposite marked five o’clock. He had slept four hours.
“I reckon you had a good snooze by the look of them eyes o’ yourn,” remarked a jovial voice and Bill looked up to see Tom standing at the foot of the bed. “Make it snappy, now,” he continued. “Take yer gun an’ wait fer me on the front porch. I’ll be along in a minute and I’m puttin’ you on the detail that’s goin’ down to the harbor with them boys in the calaboose.”
Bill nodded and slipped into his sneakers. He jammed his hat on his head, and picking up his rifle, hurried from the room. He was angry with himself for having fallen asleep, and now that he had the chance, he meant to take it. Tom, when he came out, would not find him on the veranda. Bill made up his mind to beat the detail over to the jail and to follow out his original plan of rescuing his father and making their getaway before the men arrived.
He passed down the hall and on through the lounge room, and was running lightly down the piazza steps when a voice hailed him.
“Hey, youse! Where d’ you think yer headin’ for? Didn’t yer hear Tom tell yer to stick around with this detail until he came?”
Bill stopped and looked back. The man called Zeppi was leaning over the railing. Behind him ten or a dozen men were lounging in various indolent attitudes and laughing at this diversion. Bill saw that they all carried rifles.
“I guess youse ain’t been round dis dump long,” Zeppi was still speaking. “Let me tell yer, kid, t’ain’t healthy to disobey orders, ‘specially Tom’s. He’s a soft-speakin’ guy, Tom is—but I seen him shoot three guys in the last three weeks fer doin’ no more than you done just now. Get up on this porch before he shows up, if yer ain’t tired o’ livin’.”
Bill hid his disappointment and chagrin and ran up the steps.
“Thanks,” he said. “I’m half asleep, Zeppi. I didn’t think where I was going.”
“Okay with me, kid. I’m fair sick of seein’ guys put on the spot fer nuthin’ at all. Just remember that when yer told the _porch_, don’t go out in the road, or anywheres else, when they’s Tom’s orders.”
“Who’s talkin’ about me,” gruffed Tom from the doorway. “Oh, it’s you, Zeppi! Well, what’s the trouble now?”
With a sleight-of-hand motion, he jerked an automatic revolver from a holster under his left armpit and covered the man.
“Okay, Tom.” Zeppi dropped his rifle and raised his hands above his head. “I was just tellin’ the kid here that he should shake a leg when it come to takin’ your orders, or—”
“Oh, _that_ was it, eh?” Tom cut him short and put away the gun. “Sorry, Zeppi—I come near drillin’ you. I’m always a bit rough after a sleep—must watch myself. We’re losing too many men. Get into line, you bozos,” he commanded, “follow me by twos—march!”
Bill fell in beside Zeppi, who winked at him. The party clattered down the steps and started along the white road at a smart pace. He felt much as a man might who is being led to execution. His only hope was that Tony would remain inside the jail and that the detail would not be forced to enter.
When Tom turned into the place, motioning the others to follow him, Bill’s usually optimistic spirits fell. Tony was found pouring over a _Police Gazette_, his chair tilted back against the rough plaster wall.
“Hello, Tom,” he greeted, raising his eyes from the pages. Then his chair came down with a crash and he sprang to his feet.
“What’s that feller doin’ wid you, Tom?” he cried. “What’s he done wid Diego?”
“What feller? What you shoutin’ about, Tony?” growled the barracks boss.
Seeing that the game was up, Bill rested his gun against the wall and stepped forward.
“It’s me he’s talking about,” he said. “I’m Bill Bolton.”
CHAPTER V—TAKEN FOR A RIDE
The barracks boss stared at Bill in undisguised amazement, while the others fingered their rifles. Slowly a twinkle came into the man’s eyes and he broke into a roar of laughter.
“When it comes to cast-iron, dyed in the wool _nerve_?” he choked, “you’re sure a winner, Bill—Bolton! I took a fancy to yer when I first laid eyes on yer and I’m sorry for yer now. If I wasn’t,” he shot out venomously, “I’d certainly put a bullet in yer carcass. The joke has been on me, all right—now it’s on you. If you bumped Diego off, the boss’ll put yer on the spot. Them’s rules. What did yer do with him?“
“He’s lying in the room over at the barracks where he was about to handcuff me and put me into a pair of leg irons. He’s wearing them now, or was when I left him.”
“Did you bump him off?”
“No. His jaw may be broken where I socked him—otherwise, I guess he’s O.K.”
Tom took half a cigar from his pocket, thrust it into his mouth and chewed steadily for a minute or two.
“Well, you’re a smart kid, Bill,” he admitted, “but not quite smart enough for this outfit. Got the keys to them cuffs and leg irons?”
Bill handed over the keys without a word.
“Zeppi,” Tom ordered, “trot up to the barracks. Let that fool Diego loose and bring them things here.” He tossed him the keys and Zeppi hurried away.
“You men,” continued Tom, “go back to the cells with Tony and bring out them guys. Not old man Bolton, remember. Martinengo ain’t sendin’ him along with this batch. Take ’em out the back way and line ’em up in the road till I come. That’s all—beat it!”
Tony and the detail trooped into the corridor, closing the door behind them. Tom ejected a stream of tobacco juice on to the floor.
“I don’t know as how I can blame yer,” he said to Bill. “You’re in a bad way, kid, and I reckon you know it.”
“What about my father? Will Martinengo have it in for him because I tried to get away?”
“Naw—the boss is hot on discipline, but he’ll enjoy the joke, seeing as how nobody except Diego is the worse for it. That mug is sure to have a sweet time explaining but youse two won’t get strafed. The workin’s is bad enough punishment. He’ll let it go at that.”
“What are these workings you’re all talking about, Tom?”
The man shook his head. “You’ll find out soon enough,” he returned evasively. “Here comes Zeppi. Orders is orders, and you gotta get into that hardware.”
Bill was handcuffed and his ankles were locked into iron bands on either end of a short chain. This made walking possible, but scarcely comfortable, since he could not take a step over a foot in length. He shuffled out of the jail, accompanied by Tom and Zeppi, to find a group of twelve men in chains like himself, lined up by the roadside. Tom gave the word and the party and its guard filed off down the road toward the harbor.
From his place at the rear of the line Bill studied his fellow prisoners. They were a nondescript crew, negroes, Indians (Seminoles, from the Everglades, he thought) and poor whites. All were dressed as he was. They were dirty and unshaven, stumbling along quite evidently dispirited and hopeless.
The atmosphere was stifling and the white shell dust stirred by the tramping of many feet set them to coughing. Bill tried to show a brave front to his guards but the utter hopelessness of his position, the uncertain future and the separation from his father made him feel desperately blue and discouraged. He trudged along in the blinding dust and heat, almost praying that his troubles might be ended with a bullet.
But when they topped the rise and began to follow the zig-zagging road down the cliff, the sight of blue water below cheered him considerably. It was cooler out of the valley, and he somewhat regained his spirits. He spotted his own plane, moored out in the bay near the yacht _Pelican_. Tied up to the concrete pier was the larger of Martinengo’s two amphibians, a tri-motor plane of huge dimensions.
The shambling party drew closer and he saw that she was constructed with a windowed cabin forward to house pilots and passengers. Aft of this and having a separate entrance was a large freight hold. When carrying a capacity load, he fancied that her weight must be terrific. Now, with her retractible wheel landing gear drawn up to the metal covered hull, the big flying boat rocked gently at her mooring. A mechanic tinkered with her central engine. Two young fellows in smart white uniforms and gold-banded caps, who were smoking cigarettes on the wharf called a greeting to Tom as the party arrived. Bill realized that they must be pilot and assistant pilot of this craft. A short gangway led across from the pier to the freight cabin entrance and over this Bridge of Sighs the clanking prisoners were herded.
The interior of this large compartment of the air cruiser may have been originally designed for carrying freight. Bill now found that the remodeled hold served quite another purpose. At right angles to the entrance, a narrow corridor ran lengthwise down the middle of the cabin. Opening off this were tiny wooden cubicles with just enough space behind their barred doors for a man to sit on the narrow bench which served as the sole article of furniture in each tiny cell. The place reminded Bill of the eighteenth century prison hulks about which he had read. Light and air were let in through iron barred portholes and Bill was glad to find that the cell that housed him contained one of these small windows. By squeezing sideways on his seat, he got a restricted view of the bay.
Presently the door to the prison hold was shut and an armed guard took his seat at one end of the cell corridor. A few minutes later, Bill heard the engine idling and they floated away from the dock. The hum of the three motors soon increased to a roar and they started to taxi toward the mouth of the harbor.
Trained aviator that he was, Bill Bolton knew the exact instant that the pilot lifted his heavy bus on to her step. There came an increased spurt of speed, as the plane skimmed the surface of the bay and rose into the air with the smooth grace of a bird taking flight.
Her nose pointed toward the western horizon she sailed over the heads at the harbor’s mouth, gaining altitude every second. When she reached a height which Bill, staring out of the porthole, judged to be about a thousand feet, her pilot banked sharply to starboard. Again she swung back on an even keel; and now with throttle wide open the big flying boat roared into the northwest.
Bill saw that the round red orb of the sun was perhaps still an hour above the horizon. He craned his neck and the sea near at hand became visible. It looked smooth and calm. Here and there low islands, the dark green of their vegetation contrasting with the bluish green of the water, dotted the silken surface of the bay.
Bill straightened on his narrow, uncomfortable seat. Rather than stare at the poor fellow in the cell opposite, who was weeping, he closed his eyes. But this did no good, for he conjured up the dreadful picture of his father in the stifling calaboose on Shell Island.
Twisting round again, he sought relief from troubled thought in the view from his tiny porthole. They were traveling overland now. Fifteen or twenty miles away, he could make out the sea’s dim outline. But what interested Bill far more was the nature of the country below. Innumerable water-courses intersected a dense cloak of dark green foliage which seemed to be banded with a somber red along the waterways. Then as the plane’s pilot dropped her nose, seeking to avoid the increasingly strong headwind, Bill caught the sickening stench that he remembered so well.
“Mangrove!” he exclaimed aloud, his voice drowned in the roar of the engines. “We’re over the mangrove swamps of Florida, south of the Everglades! That red line along the banks of the streams—exposed roots, of course.”
He watched the swamp for some time, wondering what the pilot would do if a forced landing became necessary, and thanking heaven that the motors seemed to be running smoothly.
Then the amphibian sailed over wide water again. “Whitewater Bay, on a bet,” thought Bill, who remembered his map of Southern Florida. “Chuck full of mangrove islands, too. If I’m right, we’ll cross a strip of mainland soon, and if that pilot keeps to this north-by-west course, we’ll be over the Ten Thousand Islands in fifteen or twenty minutes!”
Bill’s guess was a good one. The bay gave way to swamp once more, and then they shot out over a weirdly beautiful stretch of water, studded again with countless islands. He knew now that the plane was paralleling the south-western border of the Everglades—that huge, swampy basin on the southern Peninsula which covers an area much the same as Connecticut. But unlike the populous New England state, the only human inhabitants of the Everglades are a few hundred Indians who thread its lonely water-paths in primitive dugout canoes.
Evidently the plane’s pilot did not intend to cross the Everglades. They were still heading north, but the amphibian’s nose had been swung to starboard. By the time they left the Ten Thousand Isles, Bill realized that they were traveling a point or two east of north. Could it be that they were making for those dark, watery woodlands known as the Big Cypress?
Bill had heard about the Florida Cypress Swamps, and knew them to be a trackless labyrinth of swamps, lagoons, creeks and low, fertile islands, all deeply buried in the shadows of a mighty cypress forest. Twilight was deepening over the earth now, as the red ball of the sun sank below the horizon. Bill thought he could just discern the first outlines of the big trees; then all was dark, and the amphibian roared on into the maw of black night.
He continued to gaze into the darkness. Perhaps fifteen minutes later, his vigil was rewarded by the sight of a pinpoint of red light far ahead and slightly to the left of the speeding plane. It was soon evident that the pilot recognized this signal, far below in the wilderness. The light disappeared from Bill’s view, and he knew the reason why. The plane’s nose was now headed directly for the light and therefore it was out of range from his porthole.
Down there in the trackless swamps of Big Cypress, someone was signalling the amphibian. Could this be their destination? Had they reached “the workings” that the men on Shell Island mentioned with such obvious loathing?
The big bus tilted forward and down. The three motors ceased to function and Bill knew that the plane was about to land.
CHAPTER VI—OSCEOLA
Bill was conscious of the amphibian’s upward swing as she leveled off preparatory to landing. Her tail dropped slightly and a second or two later she was gliding through smooth water propelled by her own momentum.
Electric lights flashed in the prison cabin, illuminating the place with blinding suddenness and making it impossible to see further into the black night outside the porthole.
The plane’s momentum decreased and she stopped with a slight jar. Orders were shouted. Men called to each other to pull on this rope and that. Then the door to the cabin swung open, the prisoners trooped from their cells, and marched up a gangway on to a large wooden dock.
Lanterns glowed in the darkness. Bill caught a glimpse of black water, then he found himself shuffling along a narrow corduroy road with the rest. Great trees arched intertwining branches overhead and cast an even deeper gloom on their path. From time to time the swaying lantern of a guard cast its beam on gnarled trunks covered with creepers which reared upward from black water. There was the rank stench of rotting vegetation in the humid air. Before Bill tramped the log road twenty feet, he was wringing wet with perspiration.
They swung to the right and up a sharp incline, halting before a high stockade. Thick plank doors in the wall of tree-trunks opened inward and the party entered the enclosure. Here arc lights on high wooden standards flooded the yard with brightness. Numerous one-story buildings were set about a large open square of hard baked earth. So far as Bill could see there were no trees within the stockade, nor had any attempt been made to beautify the place. Most of the buildings were of unpainted boards, although the squared logs of several of the largest proved them of more solid construction.
Few people were about. The enclosure was as bare and uninviting as a military training camp. It was toward one of the log buildings that the prisoners were hustled. A guard unbarred an ironbanded door and they were thrust within the building. With a clang the door slammed and at last the band from Shell Island were left to their own devices.
Bill looked about him. The only light came from the arc lights’ rays which shone through barred windows set high in the four walls. This meager illumination cast the place into somber twilight. Their new quarters consisted of a not too roomy, barn-like, rectangular space, the peak of whose slant roof was lost in the shadows overhead. The terrific heat, the reek of perspiring humanity added to the rank odor of the swamp was almost overpowering.
As Bill’s eyes gradually became accustomed to the gloom, he soon discovered that the newcomers were to have plenty of company. Dark figures sprawled in all sorts of attitudes on the damp earthen floor. Most of them seemed sunk in the slumber of exhaustion. A few talked in low tones as though the humidity had sapped all vitality from their voices. From a dark corner came the uncontrolled sobbing of a man in agony.
Bill picked his way over the huddled bodies toward one of the posts in the middle of the room, that helped to support the roof. The clanking chain that connected the ankle cuffs impeded his progress, caught on a projection and sent him headlong on top of another figure crouched on the ground near the post.
“Sorry!” apologized Bill, hauling himself off his victim. “I certainly didn’t—”
“No harm done,” replied a pleasant, though languid voice.
Bill leaned back against the upright and crossed his legs.
“Decent of you to take it that way,” he observed.
“Too much effort to fight,” remarked the unknown with surprising candor. “This beastly place saps one’s pep. After you’ve been here a while, you’ll feel that any unnecessary effort just isn’t worth while. Came in just now with that new batch, didn’t you?”
“That’s right—how did you guess it?”
“You’re still carrying the iron-ware. Those beasts will take it off in the morning. They always leave you weighted down the first night.”
The man’s voice was deep and resonant. He spoke with the accents of education which prompted Bill to continue the conversation.
“My name is Bill Bolton,” he said, by way of a starter.
“Not Bolton, the Naval Academy end?”
“You _are_ some guesser!” Bill’s tone showed his surprise. “I made the team last fall; but how did you happen to place me that way?”
“I played against you in the Carlisle game last year. I’ve got a number now, but before I came here I was Osceola, Chief of the Turtle Clan of the Seminole Nation.”
“Carlisle’s All-American half back! I remember you now—I should say I do. How in the world did you get here?”
“Pretty much the same way we all do. I was kidnapped. And the worst of it is that now these devils have got us, there’s no possible chance of escape.”
“What is this joint, anyway?”
“You mean you’ve no idea what you’re in for?”
“Not the foggiest. The men on Shell Island spoke of ‘workings’ somewhere—”
“These are the workings, Bolton—gold workings.”
“But I thought I was in Big Cypress.”
“You are.”
“But—surely you can’t have a gold mine in the middle of a swamp!”
“There you’re wrong. Martinengo not only has a gold mine, and a most profitable one, at that—he also runs suction dredges.”
“How come?” Bill was intensely interested.
“The rock floor of the Everglades and these cypress swamps is usually found at a depth not exceeding six feet; but in some places it is twice that far down,” replied the young Seminole chief. “There is gold in the rock below the swamp near here. Martinengo has workings in that rock.”
“Coffer dam?”
“Yes, a coffer dam has been built to keep the water out. The rock near the top is fairly soft and that is probably why the muck on the bottom of the swamp hereabouts contains gold. The colors or particles of the metal run very fine, but they are profitable to mine. At least Martinengo finds it so. For that work suction dredges are used. Oh, you’ll get better acquainted with the whole business soon.”
Bill said nothing for a minute or two. Presently he observed: “What I don’t understand yet, is why Martinengo kidnaps people and keeps them prisoners in this horrible place.”
“Because,” Osceola answered slowly, “the mines are made doubly profitable by using slave labor.”
“What!” exploded Bill, leaning forward.
“Slave labor, my friend. And you and I are two of the slaves. It is cheaper for that gangster Martinengo and his brothers to kidnap negroes, Indians and poor whites than to hire miners. The work is terrific and the climate frightfully unhealthy. These devils would have to pay a very high wage to legitimate workmen. As it is, we don’t live long, here. What with long working hours in a climate that approximates a Turkish bath, the cruelty meted out by the overseers, starvation rations, the general filth and the hopelessness of our position—well, two or three months of it is about as long as the average man can stand. Swamp fever, snake bite and other diseases usually cut the time shorter.”
“It’s deadly.” Bill’s voice, when it came, was very low. “And to think that this is going on in the United States of America! Surely, though, the government will eventually put a stop to it?”
“Maybe,” returned Osceola apathetically, “but it isn’t likely that you and I will live to see it. If the federal government has done anything to break up organized crime that’s terrorizing the country, I haven’t heard of it. By the way, how did these people get hold of you?”
Bill told him, and ended by stating his worries concerning his father.
“Martinengo probably means to get money out of Mr. Bolton before shipping him over here. He’ll never let him go free, no matter what he may promise. If the secret of Shell Island ever leaks out, it means an end to Martinengo’s profits here.”
“Were you taken on the Island?”
Osceola laughed contemptuously. “I was a fool, Bolton. My ambition since I was a small boy has been to do something for my people. Once we were great warriors, today we are a degenerate, ignorant race. White man’s fire-water and lack of education have made us go backward while the rest of the world has progressed. I meant to educate myself first, and when I had acquired knowledge, I felt I would then be fitted to take up my task. So I went to school and won a scholarship at Carlisle. I still have two more years to go there before graduation. Shortly after the summer holidays began this year,—I had gone back to my people—I took my gun to bring in some waterfowl.
“Well to cut the tale short, I ran into a man-hunting gang of Martinengo’s. They pretended they were lost and I offered to lead them back to Whitewater Bay. I suspected nothing. They took me off guard, carted me over to Shell Island with some other poor fellows—and eventually I was put to work here.”
“How long ago was that?”
“Six weeks ago yesterday. We Seminoles stand it better than the others. Most of us are fever-proof, probably because we have lived in the Everglades for generations.”
“Haven’t you tried to escape?” Bill asked him, and voiced the thought that had been uppermost in his mind ever since he left Shell Island.
“I’ve thought about it,” the young chief admitted, “especially when I first came here. Everybody does, I suppose, but the thing is next to impossible. Trackless swamp all around—it would be sure death to face it without a boat or canoe. And even if a craft of some kind could be obtained, you would starve to death. About a month ago, two men escaped but they were caught and brought back.”
“Punished?”
“They were.”
“What happened to them?”
“Condemned to two hundred lashes apiece with an overseer’s wirewrapped whip. We slaves were forced to witness the—execution.”
“Execution!”
“That’s what it amounted to. Both of the poor chaps were, mercifully, dead before the first hundred lashes could be administered. Human flesh and blood couldn’t stand it. The whips these beasts use cut a man to ribbons. We all get a taste of it, no matter how hard we work. I have no shirt any more. You’ll see my back in the morning.”
For a long while the two lay there on the filthy earthen floor without speaking. Most of the weary souls had found a temporary relief from their troubles in slumber. Except for the sound of their uneven breathing the place was still as a tomb. Through the barred windows came the occasional sound of a splash where some denizen of the great swamp slipped from a gnarled root into water, and once the scream of a bird sent echoes reverberating through the night.
Bill came to a decision.
“I’m going to take the first chance that offers,” he whispered.
“Chance to escape?”
“Yes, Osceola. This hopeless slavery is worth any risk.”
“I believe you are right—but think! Even if you can escape the guards, you will certainly die in the swamps.”
“Not if you will come with me?”
“But even I, who know the ways of swamps, can’t guide you to safety without a canoe—and there is absolutely no chance of securing one.”
“I’ve got the germ of an idea,” said Bill, “It still has to be worked out in detail. Also, it will, of course, depend on whether I am put to work on a dredge, or underground.”
“You’ll work on a dredge,” affirmed Osceola. “We all do in this prison house.”
“Good! And I am going to put the plan to test just as soon as I can. Tomorrow, if the opportunity offers. _Will_ you join me?” Bill’s tone was deadly earnest.
“Any death is better than this living one,” replied Osceola in a voice that matched the former’s.
“Then—it’s a go?”
“You bet it is!” whispered the Seminole, and the two, after sealing the bargain with a handclasp in the darkness, lay down again on the hard ground and fell asleep.
CHAPTER VII—THE ATTEMPT
The first faint rays of morning filtered through barred windows and there came a rattling of locks on the prison-house door.
“Up and out, you lazy dogs!” shouted a harsh voice.
The overseer’s whip cracked, bringing forth a scream from a weary wretch near him.
The slaves got to their feet and shuffled out of the evil-smelling place. Two of them, however, remained slumped on the floor. The overseer turned them over with his foot, then realized that these two would slave no more. He muttered a curse and followed the others into the square.
Here under the supervision of extra guards the slaves were drawn up in line. Bill, and the party who had arrived with him were unshackled and the woebegone crew was ordered to march on again.
Along the side of the square they stumbled, halted again at an open shed where a ship’s biscuit and a small crock of water were handed to each man as he filed past. The line of slaves swung round toward their prison house. Back there once more, they sank to the ground and partook of their morning meal. Bill noticed that files of other slaves were being herded out of buildings on the farther side of the square, toward the food shed.
“Knock the maggots out of your biscuit and soak it in the water,” advised Osceola, who was seated beside him. “You won’t find it fit to eat otherwise.”
Bill made a grimace. “I can’t eat this filthy stuff, Osceola. Why, it’s crawling with the beastly things.”
“You’ll get nothing more until one o’clock when we knock off for an hour,” returned his friend. “And at that the ship’s biscuits are better than the mess we get at noon. If you don’t eat, you’ll pass out in short order. Make it snappy, too—they don’t give us much time.”
Bill nodded and after ridding the biscuit of as many worms as he could find, gulped down half of the tepid water in his crock and dunked his breakfast in the remainder. While the stonelike substance was softening, he studied the young Seminole chief. By daylight, Osceola proved to be a tall, rangy fellow, with the finely cut features and the high cheek bones of his race. Like most of the slaves, he wore nothing but frayed trousers and Bill saw that his red-bronze back was crisscrossed with ugly welts from the lash.
When the biscuit was soft enough to eat, Bill crunched it between his teeth and forced it down with the rest of the water. The evil mess gagged him in spite of his hunger, but he could not afford to starve and lose his strength. By the time he had finished, the slave gang were ordered to their feet again.
Down to the shed they marched, and after depositing their empty water crocks on a table, they were crowded over to the wall of the compound. An overseer, armed with shortstocked whip and automatic revolver unbarred the double doors of the stockade and swung them inward. The guards, armed like their leader, took their places on either side of the long line, and two by two the slaves moved forward on to the corduroy road.
This time, instead of going down toward the lagoon and the dock where the amphibian lay moored, they turned off on a side road. This wound through the swamp between great cypresses whose dark green foliage was intertwined with the lighter green of vines and air-plants, and other parasites. Exposed roots of the trees, interlocked with the roots of their neighbors, looked like giant snakes twisting in and out of the muck and water. Though the sun was but half an hour high the steaming swamp seemed to sap every ounce of Bill’s vitality, and with it, the last shred of that hope to which he clung so desperately. In the cavernous gloom of the forest, the vile stench of rotting mangrove was nearly overpowering; and as they plodded on, the heat grew more and more oppressive.
The log roadway was never more than ten feet wide, and sometimes, where it was built to run between two mighty trees, it was even narrower. It wound an uneven passage through the swamp, until about a mile from the stockade, it came out on a lagoon, dotted with cypress-covered islands. Here, sunlight brightened the long stretches of open water, and Bill saw that lovely orchids bloomed on many of the trees, and that the matted upper branches of the cypresses were brilliant with masses of flowers. Then a black blob on a root near the road uncurled itself, one of the guards tossed a stick and a huge snake slid into the water.
The roadway extended along the lagoon’s edge for half a mile. Though it ended abruptly at this point, Bill saw that preparations were in view to extend it further.
“Those are the gold dredges,” affirmed Osceola, indicating three hulks which looked like crosses between coal barges and canal boats. “Those big funnels at the ends, sticking into the water, are the suction pipes.”
“How do the dredges work?” Bill inquired as they drew nearer.
“They are driven by stationary steam engines,” explained the young Chief. “Muck and water are sucked up from the lagoon’s bottom, then forced through screens and allowed to flow in shallow streams over wide inclined surfaces called tables. These tables are corrugated in such a way that all heavy substances in the silt, like fine particles of gold, are caught in the channels and washed down on to the blankets, while the lighter stuff passes over the side.”
“A bit too technical for me,” said Bill. “What are blankets?”
“I’m not much on mining, but here, blankets are just what they sound like. They are covered with quicksilver to which the gold particles become attached. Later the quicksilver is washed from the blankets, and the gold taken from it by some process I don’t know about. I may have missed a few details—probably have. I’ve only worked on the dredges three days.”
“Then we aren’t _all_ gold-miners?”
“Oh, no. Slaves do all the work of the camp. At present, some of the strongest of us are extending this road farther along the lagoon. But we’ve arrived—stop talking now, for it means the whip, during working hours.”
The line halted opposite the dredges moored to the bank, and a certain number of the slave gang were ordered aboard. Axes were passed out to others, who went on board flat-boats and poled out toward the young growths of the cypress islands.
Bill hoped that he would be one of this number, for, with an axe in his hands, many things might be possible. Instead, when his part of the line moved up to where the head overseer was issuing directions, the man pointed to a stack of iron wheelbarrows. After taking an empty barrow apiece, the two friends trundled them in a long line of barrow men down a planked incline to the muck heap formed by the gold dredges. Men with shovels were already stationed here and Bill found that with the impetus of the guards’ whips behind them, each man had his barrow filled with mud and rubble in less than no time.
As soon as his own was filled he trundled it up another series of planks to the roadway. Along this the continuous stream of sweating barrow-pushers led him to the end of the road. Here, under the direction of overseers, the loads were dumped into the virgin swamp. It looked to Bill as though the black water would swallow up all the mud they could carry and more, but before many trips had been completed, he could plainly make out the progress of the roadbed.
Soon the labor became a back-breaking, seemingly endless grind. Never once was the weary, sweating crew given a chance to rest. At the slightest lagging, the overseer’s wirebound lash descended upon the defenseless back of the transgressor. Loads were heavy and the strain on little-used muscles was terrific, especially on the stretch of planking from the incline up to the road. Before an hour had passed, Bill ached in every limb. Blisters quickly formed on his perspiring hands; he felt dizzy and sick.
All at once a red hot iron seared him across the back and shoulders, and with a yell of pain Bill sprang forward. From behind him came the guard’s warning:
“Snap into it, y’ lazy hound—or I’ll cut your liver out!”
To retaliate would be suicidal. The man carried an automatic besides this fearful, wirebound cowhide lash that laid open the bare flesh with every stroke. Bill’s anger blazed at the cowardly blow, but at the same time his hopes of escape sank to lowest pitch. What could unarmed men do against these beasts? An uprising of all the slaves would be practically an impossibility, quartered as they were in separate prisons. He also began to understand that even the uprising of one prison-house gang was not to be considered. By the end of the day, these worn out men were sure to be apathetic to any such proposal. The fearful punishment meted out for failure would stop all but the most courageous from joining a concentrated revolt against their masters—the slim chances of success would deter the others.
Bill discarded all thoughts of such a plan. If he and Osceola were to escape, they must go it alone. Yet how could it be accomplished? He was still cogitating the matter, when the head overseer raised a police whistle to his lips and blew a sharp blast. Barrows and shovels were immediately stacked and the men lined up for their noonday meal.
This time a greasy mess of vegetables and small pieces of rubber-like meat were ladled on to wooden platters from a barrel on wheels. With this went a slab of stale bread and a crock of water. The stew, if it could be called that, was lukewarm and so rancid as to be almost uneatable. But Bill wolfed it down, following the others’ example, only sorry that no more could be had.
The gang ate their dinner squatting on the corduroy road, and as soon as they had finished, most of the toilers fell fast asleep.
“They prepare this mess for us once a week,” Osceola informed Bill. “Today is Thursday, and by Saturday the heat has soured it to such an extent that hungry as we are, we leave it alone. No man’s stomach can hold it then.”
Bill finished his bread and the last drop of his water.
“I should think it would pay Martinengo to feed us better,” he muttered wearily. “No wonder the men die off quickly, forced to such labor and undernourished this way.”
“It costs him little to kidnap new slaves,” grunted the Seminole. “All supplies have to be flown here by plane from Shell Island. But I’m too tired to talk, Bill. Better get what rest you can—the afternoon is always worse than the morning grind.”
He stretched out on the logs of the roadway, and a couple of minutes later, his regular breathing told that he was asleep.
Bill lay down, too, but his aching muscles, the smart of his back where the guard’s lash had cut the flesh, and his blistered hands made slumber an impossibility. Myriads of buzzing, stinging mosquitoes added to his discomfort and he was not sorry when the overseer’s whistle brought the men staggering to their feet again.
Instead of a wheelbarrow, now, Bill and Osceola were given shovels for the afternoon’s work. At first, Bill welcomed the change but soon found that it was quite as arduous as the morning’s toil. There was absolutely no let up. As soon as one barrow was filled, another took its place. The wet mud was slippery, the mosquitoes by the water even more tenacious. He began to feel that death was preferable to endless days of this kind of thing.
To make matters even worse, the overseer in charge of the shovelers used his lash without mercy at the first sign of flagging. Bill felt its burning pain several times during those hours, as did every other man on the muck-heap.
The woodcutters returned late in the afternoon and began carting their logs up the incline where they were dumped on the mud at the end of the corduroy to solidify the foundation of the extended roadway. The tree trunks were heavy and the men so weak that it took eight or ten of them to carry a single log.
Slowly the sun sank toward the western end of the lagoon and Bill knew that within five or ten minutes they would be forced to knock off for want of light. Then Osceola slipped in the muck and fell flat.
Before the poor youth could get to his feet, the overseer’s lash felled him again. But instead of desisting in his cruelty, the man continued to rain blows on the prostrate and half-unconscious body of the Indian.
This was too much for Bill. As the wicked lash descended for the third time, he dashed toward the guard and swinging his shovel like a club, brought it down on the man’s skull. The overseer dropped in his tracks and Bill helped Osceola to his feet.
“Follow me,” he shouted, “it’s now or never!”
Osceola, half dazed, ran with him through the crowd of amazed workmen to the far edge of the muck heap. There came two splashes as the lads dove. Revolvers barked, men shouted orders and the lagoon’s glassy surface was churned with bullets.
CHAPTER VIII—WHAT HAPPENED IN THE SWAMP
The water closed over Bill’s head. The shock of the plunge put new heart into him and he struck vigorously out keeping well under the surface. His plan was to make for one of the small islands of the lagoon, trusting that oncoming darkness would cover his escape. What he would do after reaching the island must depend upon circumstances.
The green depths of the lake were surprisingly clear. He could see myriads of small fish dart away as he forged ahead. Then a long dark body swept alongside of him. Osceola’s sinewy arm caught him by the shoulders and swung him round to the left. The Indian swam ahead, keeping parallel with the bank, his actions showing Bill that he wished him to follow.
By this time, Bill’s lungs were nearly bursting and his head throbbed with the strain of remaining under water. Feeling that he must have air or drown, he turned on his back and rose, careful that no more than his nose and mouth appeared above the surface. Two or three life-giving breaths, and he sank again, with the muffled sound of revolver shots in his ears. After another spurt under water in the direction indicated by Osceola, he came up to the surface again, sinking as soon as he had filled his lungs with air.
Rising for the third time, he was surprised to find the young Seminole at his side. Osceola was floating with his head just above the water.
“It’s safe to stay up now,” he murmured. “Make no sound—and follow me.”
The Indian turned on his side and glided forward with the speed and silence of an otter. Bill understood that a splash might be fatal in advertising their whereabouts, and followed in his wake. Though a strong swimmer and a fast one, he could not keep up with the Chief.
Then the sun, already low on the horizon, sank out of sight. Osceola’s sleek head disappeared under the canopy of overhanging boughs that lined the lagoon’s swampy shore. Soon Bill glided beside him, into the deep shadow under the branches, and although he could not see his friend, he heard his low voice.
“Give me your hand, Bill. We’ve got to get out of this. They will come here when they find no sign of us in the lagoon.”
“Lead on, old sport,” answered the white youth. “You’re a better man than I am if you can navigate in this gloom.”
“Oh, I’ve got eyes like a cat,” chuckled Osceola. “Come on now—there are roots below us—stand on them.”
Bill found a foothold on the slimy roots and hand in hand they scrambled out of the water. Osceola led him round the base of a huge tree and onto the sprawling roots of another forest giant.
“This is the one—I’ve had my eye on it ever since we’ve been working this end of the lagoon. There’s a cleft in the trunk, about thirty feet up that will hold us nicely.”
“Mmm—after we get there!” was Bill’s unenthusiastic reply.
“Oh, that’s not so difficult. There are plenty of vines.”
Bill followed Osceola a few steps round the trunk, then felt his hand touch a thick stem that clung to the bark of the tree.
“Follow that straight up,” directed the Seminole. “I’ll go ahead, for I can see.”
“I wish I could,” said Bill. “I’m as blind as a bat in this darkness!”
“You’ll get accustomed to it,” Osceola assured him. Then Bill’s hand was released from the Indian’s grasp and he heard the other moving upward. “Follow me,” he went on, when he was just above Bill’s head, “and if you get into trouble, grab my foot until you can find a toehold.”
The thick stem of the vine proved a comparatively easy means of ascent, and especially so to an Annapolis midshipman. Up he went, hand over hand, his rubber-soled shoes gripping the bark’s rough surface.
“Here we are,” said Osceola’s soft voice presently, “give me a hand—that’s right. Now step in here and squat down. Not so bad, eh?”
“Could be a lot worse,” agreed Bill, finding a seat next to his friend in the wide cleft. “If those guys can’t see any better than I can in this murk, they’ll have a time locating our hideout.”
“They’ll have torches to give them all the light they need,” replied Osceola. “But they’re not counting on their eyes to find us.”
“Listen!”
Across the swamp sounded the deep bay of a dog.
“Bloodhounds?”
“They keep four of the brutes in kennels over at the stockade.”
“Think they’ll be able to track us?”
“I doubt it. We were walking on roots under water until we started to climb. Of course we left a trail up the tree trunk, but the hounds are not likely to scent it.”
“Then you think we’re O.K. for a while?”
“We can’t stay here forever. When daylight comes, the guards can spot us easily from the end of the road. This tree isn’t more than thirty yards from there.”
“The question being—where do we go from here?”
“Well, where do we go! We’ve got neither food nor a boat. What with snakes, alligators and other pleasant companions, we won’t get very far on a hike through the swamps. You spoke of a plan some time ago. How about it?”
“Just a germ of one,” sighed Bill. “It needs working out—but with luck you and I will be able to get away from this vile place and go pretty much where we like. It all hangs on whether we can—”
“Hush!” warned Osceola. “They’re coming this way. Look over your shoulder!”
Bill did more than that. He twisted round in the niche and stared into the black opaqueness toward the corduroy road.
Lights, twinkling pinpoints of red, dotted the black night in wavering clusters which advanced along the road. And again the damp, lifeless air was burdened with the deep-throated cry of bloodhounds.
“Those lights will discover us if the searching party leaves the road and comes over this way,” whispered Bill.
“There’s only one thing to do,” admitted his companion. “And we’d better do it now.”
“What’s that?”
“Crawl out on one of these branches and lie flat. You take that one nearest you and I’ll lie on the one that parallels it. Don’t move if they come underneath us. Some of those guards have ears like their hounds.”
Bill had no difficulty in performing this feat, for the branch was thicker than his own body and he wriggled along until he lay fifteen or twenty feet from the trunk of the tree. His eyes had at last grown used to the inky darkness of this forest in the swamp. Peering down through the heavy screen of foliage and vines, the gnarled roots, underbrush and stagnant water below became dimly visible. To the left, possibly ten feet away and slightly above him, was the branch on which his Indian friend lay. Of Osceola he could see nothing, but he heard the Seminole’s muffled warning as he twisted his body to get a better view and in doing so, cracked a twig.
The lights of the searching party were steadily moving nearer. For a few minutes they seemed to hesitate at the spot where the road ended. Then they came on again and he could plainly hear the dogs splashing noisily about in the swamp. Still nearer—and the glare of pine torches made it possible for Bill to see that the party were poling canoes—three of them. The flares lit up the swamp, sending weird shadows here and there as the canoes advanced.
“Them dogs is tryin’ t’ climb in this here canoe,” sang out a rough voice. “There ain’t no scent on th’ water fer them t’ follow.”
“Let’s go back, Pete,” argued another voice, “if dose guys is in dis swamp dey’ll have t’ stay put till mornin’. Den we can catch ’em easy.”
“Sez you!” returned Pete with a snort. Bill recognized his surly voice as that of the overseer he had felled with his shovel. “Them two can see in daylight just the same as us. An’ one of ’em is an Indian, don’t forget. They’s round here somewhere now an’ with sunup, they’ll hike it.”
“Oh, yeah?” sneered the other. “They ain’t got no boat nor grub. What’s de use of rustlin’ in here now, Pete? Them hounds ain’t no good. What we need is water-rats.”
“Shut yer trap—and step on it with dat pole!” Pete’s ire seemed to be at the boiling point. “Long as I’m bossing this job, we goes on—see? You bums is pushin’ yer faces into de wrong picture when yer bumps up against me. Scram now—an’ _shut yer traps_!”
Bill held his breath. The canoes were now directly underneath the spreading branch of the cypress where he and Osceola lay hidden. He hugged the limb close, praying that the blazing flares below would not disclose his whereabouts to the trackers.
Suddenly a sharp hiss sounded in his ear. Thinking that Osceola wished to attract his attention, he turned his head toward the neighboring branch. To his horror he saw a huge snake lower its long black body from the branch above. The reptile’s furiously hissing head was not over a foot from his face. Disturbed by the lights, the angry creature was bent on attack!
Bill clung frozen to his branch. If he moved, the men beneath the tree would be attracted by the sound, and would probably sight him at once. Far better a swift death in the gloom of the cypress than slow torture for Osceola as well as himself if they were discovered.
All this shot through his mind with the speed of light. Then a branch cracked, there came a swishing sound through the air and the snake slid downward, missing him by inches. He saw Osceola draw back the stick with which he had lashed the moccasin, and the air was rent with a terrified scream from below.
Peering down, Bill saw a horror which he would never forget. Twined around Pete’s throat and head was the viper that a moment before had nearly caused his own death. The frenzied overseer leapt shrieking to his feet and lurched into the water. The canoe capsized and its two other occupants were precipitated into the swamp with their leader.
For several minutes, bedlam reigned. Dogs barked, men shouted hoarsely, their yells awakening the forest birds whose cries of alarm echoed and reechoed throughout the night.
Pete’s companions splashed aimlessly about in the muck and water for a time, then with the help of the other two crews, their canoe was righted and they climbed aboard. The overseer’s body did not come to the surface.
“Youse guys can do what yer like,” declared one of the dripping men when the uproar had subsided, “Me——I’ve had enough. I’m goin’ back.”
“I’m wid ye,” agreed a voice from one of the other canoes. “Let’s fish Pete out an’ go home.”
“Say! If youse expects me ter wade round in this muck, lookin’ fer a stiff, wid dat snake ready ter bite and plenty more of ’em in dis here swamp, youse got another think comin’——” snarled the first man with profane emphasis. “Dis baby’s goin’ to catch some sleep before sunup—er somebody else is goin’ on de spot ‘long wid Pete. Hey dere, bozo—turn dis boat round. I want t’ get me feet on solid ground again before sumpin else falls outen de trees ter croak a guy!”
Grunts and shouts of approval greeted this lengthy speech. The canoes headed back toward the road. The trackers, by common consent, were through for the night.
When the lights of the party had disappeared in the distance, Osceola spoke to Bill.
“Come back to the niche on the trunk. Those chaps are off till morning. We’ve got to plan, now.”
Bill scrambled backward along his limb, and found Osceola before him at their perch. He grasped the young Indian’s hand and wrung it.
“You saved my life, Osceola! I thought I was a goner. Some day perhaps I may be able to show you that I appreciate what you did for me.”
“Oh, that’s all right!” Osceola’s voice showed his embarrassment. “And you did more than that for me on the muck heap this afternoon. Pete’s out for good now—and I must confess I’m not sorry.”
“Here, too.—You spoke of plans just now. Got any?”
“Not a single idea—but what about yours?”
“Well, I was tired and sleepy a while back. Couldn’t think. But that snake woke me up—and how!”
“What are you thinking of?”
“That we wait here for an hour—then hike over to the compound.”
“But—you mean—to give ourselves up?” Osceola cried in astonishment.
“Give ourselves up—nothing! I’m going to get us out of this rotten cypress swamp for good and all. But to get away from here we’ve got to go back there first.”
Osceola grunted. “What you are saying probably means something to you—to me it is as plain as mud. Sounds like a minstrel gag. Tell me, Mr. Bones, when and why we must go in there in order to get out of here!”
Bill laughed for the first time since his arrival at the workings.
“You’re a sketch, Osceola! But I guess you’re right. My plan in a nut-shell is just this. You may not believe me, but if we live, you and I are going out of here by plane—and I’m going to fly it. Do you see now?”
“The amphibian is here, all right,” affirmed the Seminole. “She won’t fly back to Shell Island until tomorrow. But there’s no stealing her, young fellow. First, she’s locked up tight. Second, she’s too well guarded.”
“Just so,” Bill declared, grinning in the darkness. “But my plan is not to steal the _plane_, you know.”
“What then?”
“Steal the pilots, my hearty!” This time Bill laughed outright.
CHAPTER IX—WHAT HAPPENED IN THE COMPOUND
“How about it?” asked Bill an hour later. “Time to travel?”
“I guess those lads behind the stockade should be pretty well off to bye-bye by this time,” yawned Osceola, getting stiffly to his feet. “In more ways than one, I hate to leave the shelter of this good old tree. It certainly has proved a help in time of need!”
Bill likewise stood up and balanced himself on their airy perch in the darkness. “Well, I can see your point,” he answered, “but I’m not getting sentimental about it. Ever since that filthy snake poked his nose at me, I’ve been waiting for his wife or brother or sister to drop on me. I can’t see in the dark like you. So the sooner we make the road, the happier I’ll be.”
Notwithstanding the urge that prompted Bill to hasten, it took the two some time to reach the corduroy road. Osceola took the lead. He seemed to have no trouble in discerning obstacles quite invisible to Bill. At the base of the tree, he caught his white friend’s hand, and after a few words of caution, started forward.
To Bill the trip seemed endless. They had not gone far when he lost all sense of direction. Along slimy roots, first above and then below water, they made their way. It was impossible to pierce the inky shadow under the trees. If it had not been for Osceola’s uncanny power, half instinct, half sight, Bill would have floundered into the soft mud of the swamp and been sucked down into the ooze. How long the journey took, Bill could never figure out when later he thought about it. The actual distance was not great, but the time taken to travel it seemed years.
“Here we are,” exclaimed Osceola at last. “Step on to that log, and be careful. It runs up the side of the dump at the end of the road.”
Bill felt with his foot in the darkness, touched one of the tree trunks thrown down to act as road ballast. A scramble up the steep incline followed, the Indian still guiding him by the hand, and they were standing on the corduroy.
They were now no longer under the forest canopy and above their heads the heavens were studded with stars. Without a word, the youths broke into a trot. Fifty yards from the stockade gates they halted. There came a whispered conference, and then two dark figures entered the shadow cast by the trees and crawled forward along the roadside.
Just before they reached the gates they turned to the right. Following the log wall, they continued to creep on until they arrived midway between two of the flood lights which illuminated the compound. These were placed on high poles, perhaps ten feet above the twelve-foot stockade.
Bill grasped more firmly the short, thick stick he carried, and placed his mouth close to Osceola’s ear. “Lucky Martinengo never thought that prisoners might want to get _into_ this place, rather than break out of it,” he whispered. “If those lights faced this way, we’d sure be out of luck.”
The Seminole grunted a low assent.
“Stand with your back to the wall,” Bill continued, “and give me a hand up. When the guard comes along, I’ll bean him with this club. Then I’ll pass him over to you.”
“Okay. But after you drop him over, get on this side of the wall again, while I’m tying him up with the creepers. One of those devils inside is likely to spot you, otherwise.”
“Good idea—I’ll do that. Ready?”
For, answer, Osceola got to his feet and walked over to the stockade. Here he turned, placed his back against the wall and made a stirrup of his clasped hands.
Bill stuck the club into his waistband and a moment later was standing on his friend’s broad shoulders. Up went his hands and he chinned himself to the top of the wall. A broad sentry-bench ran along the inside of the stockade. Lounging with his back to the logs, sat a guard, every feature of his unpleasant face made plain by the blazing floodlights.
Bill lowered himself onto Osceola’s shoulders and leaned forward.
“He’s sound asleep!” he whispered tensely.
“Fine. We’ll leave him alone, then. Get an arm over the top and stand by for my weight when I hoist myself up.”
Bill obeyed and the Indian caught his leg. Then came a moment of severe strain—and Osceola clung to the wall at his side.
Up and over they went together. Bare feet touched the sentry-bench, tiptoed to the edge and the lads disappeared beneath it. They had reached their first objective in less than two minutes.
Safe for the moment from outside observation, Bill followed Osceola as the young Indian skirted the wall in the deep shadow below the sentry-bench. No word was spoken. Each knew exactly what he must do, and kept his mind focussed on that performance. True, the first part of their plan was working out far better than they had expected, but the second and third stages of their enterprise were far more dangerous. Although they were elated by their success so far, neither was overconfident.
Osceola stopped short and pointed to a building that stood possibly twenty yards away. Smaller than most of the houses, it was a bungalow, with wide verandas extending round the entire structure. It was shingled, and topped with a low-eaved roof of attractive green tiles. The contrast between this comfortable-looking dwelling and the barn-like quarters of the slaves was as pronounced as day and night, or the contrast between home and prison. Bill had not slept in a comfortable bed for some time. Then and there he determined to finish out the rest of the night in that bungalow!
Between the sentry-bench and the house there was no shelter of any kind. Floodlights streamed down on the hardbaked clay of the compound, bringing every rut or small unevenness of the surface into clear relief. Moreover, the ground was within the direct line of vision of the sentries.
“Do we crawl—or make a dash for it?” hissed Osceola.
“The sooner, the quicker. We’re more likely to attract attention moving fast, but we’re harder to hit!”
The Seminole nodded. “Ready if you are.”
“Let’s go!”
Together they sprinted across the open space. Each moment Bill expected the drilling pain of a rifle bullet between his shoulders, and it took considerable will power not to crouch and slacken his pace. Their naked feet made no sound at all on the hard earth and rather less than a second later, the two vaulted the veranda railing and sank down behind it.
Certain that so far their presence within the compound had not been discovered, Bill got to his feet again. With Osceola at his heels, he crossed the piazza to a screened door, pulled it open and entered the house.
They found themselves in a kitchen where a gas stove stood in one corner, across from a large sink. Polished pans and cooking pots hung below long shelves stacked with cans of food, packages of cereal and the like.
“Too bad we can’t help ourselves to a meal,” whispered Osceola. “I’m famished, aren’t you?”
“Sure am. But come on now, when we’ve finished the job ahead, it will be time to think of food. I prefer starving a bit longer—it’s one better than dying by the lash! Through that door is our way. Quiet! if those lads in there wake up before we want them to, you and I are out of luck.”
Osceola opened the door indicated by Bill and they slipped through it, closing it softly behind them. They were now in a hall which ran forward bisecting this part of the house. There were two open doors on their left. Bill pointed to the nearer and they tiptoed to the sill.
Thin rays from the floodlights filtered in through half open blinds. By this dim light Bill and Osceola made out the figure of a man sprawled on a cot by the window. A small bureau, two straight chairs, a wardrobe trunk and grass matting on the floor completed the room’s furnishings. On one of the chairs lay a small pile of clothes; on the other, close to the head of the bed was an automatic revolver and a gold-faced watch.
Osceola passed like a shadow across the intervening space and grasped the gun. Bill closed the door to the hall. Neither made the slightest sound. Then Bill nodded to his friend. Osceola promptly kicked the side of the cot and the sleeper awoke to find himself looking into a blue-black muzzle.
“One peep out of you and I’ll blow your head off!” remarked the Indian in a low, dispassionate voice. “Turn on your face and put your hands behind your back.”
A single glance into his captor’s eyes was enough for the fellow on the bed. Those smoldering fires of pent-up hate won the battle before it was begun. The young man hastened to comply with instructions.
Bill came over to the bed and while Osceola continued to cover their prostrate prisoner with the automatic, he tore a sheet into long strips. With these the fellow on the bed was scientifically bound and gagged. Then the two friends moved on to the next room.
In there, exactly the same thing happened. Ten minutes after entering the bungalow, Bill and his Seminole friend were masters of the place.
“I don’t suppose this house has a cellar,” mused Bill. They were in the kitchen, preparing a much needed meal.
“Not a chance,” said Osceola, from the stove. “You’ll strike water a foot down anywhere in this compound. Haven’t you got those cans of corned beef open? This skillet is piping hot.”
Bill tossed him the cans, placed a bowl of eggs within reach of the cook and commenced to slice bread.
“I asked, because we’ve got to stow those aviators somewhere. Perhaps the joint runs to an attic. That will do just as well.”
“Well, we’ll find a good place for them,” replied the Seminole, intent on his cooking. “Confound them! These aviators of Martinengo’s live like kings. A house to themselves, all kinds of good things to eat, and we poor devils pigging it a stone’s throw away!—Better break open some more of those cans. I see tomatoes, corn, asparagus and cherries on that shelf. Let’s sample them all. I haven’t had a decent meal, let alone half enough to eat for weeks. How about it? Have you got an appetite?”
“_Have_ I!” Bill began opening the other cans and dumping their contents on plates which he placed on the kitchen table. “I’ll tell you one thing and that is, we eat the rest of this as is. I can’t wait for cooking. Bring over that skillet of eggs and corned beef. I’ll get the coffee. The smell of this stuff has turned me ravenous!”
Half an hour later, the two lads drained the last dregs of their coffee and grinned sleepily at each other across the table.
“Some feed!” Bill yawned and raised his arms above his head. “I bet we’ve got away with three days’ rations. Gosh! One more crumb and I’ll bust! Do you think it’s safe, now, to turn in? I could go to sleep standing up.”
Osceola rose slowly to his feet. “Of course it’s safe, Bill. I wouldn’t take a chance—not at this stage of the game, you know.”
“But how about the lad who cooks for our aviator-friends? He’ll mosey along here in the morning, and when he finds _us_ sleeping here, there’ll be the devil to pay!”
“Oh, no, there won’t! I know the man who acts as their servant, luckily enough. He’s a sort of trusty—been here a long time—but he is locked up in our prison house every night. That chap is just as keen to get back to his home and his people as we are. There won’t be a peep out of Sam. Our worries will begin again when we leave this place in the morning——But sufficient unto the day——”
“Good enough!” enthused Bill, also leaving the table. “That being the case, I vote we put the careless aviators in a good safe place. Then me for bye-bye P.D.Q.!”
“If you think,” grinned Osceola, “that _I’m_ going to stay up and wash dishes ...” he yawned, “you’ve got see-vee-rial thinks coming!”
CHAPTER X—WHAT HAPPENED IN THE MORNING
“Eight o’clock, suh! A fine hot day—an’ yo’ baf is runnin’.”
Bill opened his eyes and stared upward from a soft pillow into the grinning face of an ancient negro.
“Ise Sam. Reckon Marse Osceola done tell yo’all ‘bout me. Yessuh—yo’ baf is runnin’.”
Bill stretched and sat up in bed. “Pinch me, Sam,” he yawned. “Did you really say ‘bath’—or am I still sound asleep?”
“No, suh, yo’ sure is awake, Marse Osceola has just got out o’ the tub. He done tol’ me to wake yo’all.” The old darkey seemed a bit flustered. “Ef yo’ll kindly tell me how yo’ likes yo’ eggs, Marse Bolton, I’ll go on in de kitchen and dish up breakfast.”
“Sam,” said Bill, springing out of bed. “You’re a sight for sore eyes, and your voice is music. Lead me to that bath you mentioned, and lead me quick. Real soap and clean water! Gee—it’s wonderful!”
“An’ de eggs, suh?”
“As long as they are fresh and there’s plenty of them, you cook them any way your heart desires.”
“Yessuh——I will, suh. De bathroom’s through dat door over yonder.”
Thirty minutes later, two spruce young fellows in freshly laundered uniforms of white duck met at the breakfast table in the dining room of the bungalow.
“Is it really the wild Seminole chief, Osceola?” grinned Bill as he stood and gazed admiringly at his friend.
Osceola grinned back at him. “It sure is,” he laughed and took his seat at the table. “They tell me that clothes don’t make the man, but—well, I’d never have known you for the chap I said good night to a few hours ago.”
“I feel like a million dollars!” Bill unfolded a snowy white napkin, while Sam filled his coffee cup. “Rest, good food and decent clothes, not to speak of a bath, sure do make a difference. These uniforms fit as if they’d been built for us, too.”
Osceola nodded. “These white shoes I’ve got on pinch a bit, but even so, I’m probably a darn sight more comfortable than the lad who owns them. It must be getting pretty hot under the roof by this time.” He motioned toward the ceiling.
“They’ll be found and released later on,” said Bill, his mouth full of buttered toast. “In fact, I’ll leave a note on the table here, when we go, telling where we’ve hidden them.”
“They don’t deserve it,” returned Osceola, “but you’re the boss. Do as you like about it.”
“What time is the plane scheduled to shove off?”
“She generally takes the air about ten. We’ve plenty of time.”
“O.K. We’ll finish breakfast, then I’ll write the note, and we’ll go down to the dock. I want to get to the plane early. A helmet and goggles for each of us will be a grand help to this disguise. What’s worrying me is the getting down there. If the guard at the gate happens to know those lads upstairs, and smells a rat, things are likely to become rather unpleasant.”
“They are,” said Osceola with conviction. “If we are stopped, there’s nothing for it but to shoot our way out and beat it down to the plane. Maybe we’ll make it and maybe we won’t—— Anyway, we’ll have lived like human beings again for a few hours—and that’s something!”
“You’re right there, old man!” Bill pushed back his chair. “Come in here, Sam,” he called. Then as the darkey appeared through the swinging door, “How’d you like to take a hop, Sam?”
“Oh, suh,—if you on’y could take me with you!” The old man’s voice was husky with excitement and longing.
“If we go, you go,” declared Bill.
“God’ull bless yo’all for dis, Marse Bolton. ‘Deed he will. I done give up all hope o’ seein’ Lize an’ de chilluns long ago. I——”
Bill stood up and clapped him on the shoulder.
“That’s all right, uncle. If things go as we hope, we’ll all be seeing our folks soon. Go into the room I slept in. There’s a suitcase in there, and there’s one in the other bedroom, too. Pack them with anything you please, and follow us down to the dock with both bags when we leave here. Carry them aboard the plane and forget to come ashore. I’ll find a place you can stow away, never fear.”
He cut short the old darkey’s thanks and sent him hurrying off to pack. Then, after rummaging about, he found paper and pencil. A moment or two later he tossed the note he had written on to the table, for Osceola to read.
“I don’t suppose there’s much of a chance we’ll have the bus to ourselves?”
“Hardly. She only runs three times a week and from what I’ve heard, there are always passengers to be taken to Shell Island. Where will you head for?”
“Miami, I guess. Any town with a police station and a jail for our passengers! But Dad and I have slews of friends in Miami, and we may need friends badly before we’re clear of this business. How does that suit you?”
“It’s as good a spot to land as another. I want to see this place and Shell Island cleaned out before I go home.”
“Just one thing more, Osceola.”
“What’s that?”
“If there’s trouble aboard the amphibian—with the passengers, I mean—well—I’m not coming back unless I can bring a posse.”
“You’ll crash her first?”
“Just that—agree?”
“Of course I agree to it. I’d a thousand times rather be dead than live the life of the last few weeks over again. If there’s no other way out, crash her. That’s a quick end—but to be brought back here means death by inches for both of us.”
Sam appeared in the doorway, carrying a couple of suitcases. “I’se all ready, gennulmen, when yo’all is.”
“That being the case,” smiled Bill, “my vote goes for a speedy departure. Ready, Osceola?”
“Rearing to go.” He picked up his gold braided cap and clapped it on his head. “It always sets me on edge to wait—for danger.”
“So you rush into battle so as to get it over with, eh?” Bill laughed.
“Something like that. To tell the truth, I think we’re both just a bit beyond ourselves at present. Let’s get out of here.” He walked to the front door and flung it open.
Bill caught up his cap and followed Osceola, with Sam at his heels.
Sun from the cloudless sky poured down on the unlovely prospect before them in a deluge of steaming, tropical heat. The compound, except for a mangy cur or two and a remarkably thin cat, was deserted. The members of Martinengo’s company who were not driving his slaves in the swamp preferred the shade afforded by their quarters rather than this blistering sunlight. Presently the little party came to the closed gates of the stockade.
A man shambled out of the guardhouse with a huge key in his hand.
“Youse high-flyers certainly have the life,” he grumbled and rattled the padlock that held the gates. “Nuthin’ ter do but take nice breezy rides and have niggers to wait on you. And me sweatin’ blood ter let you in and out of this here stockade!”
He pushed open the heavy doors just far enough for one man to pass through at a time, stood aside and scowled at them.
“So much obliged, Oswald, old chap,” beamed Bill. “Sorry I’ve got nothing smaller than a demi-grand. Sam, if the worthy turn-key insists on a tip, hand him a cake of soap. He’ll smell the sweeter for it.”
He passed out of the stockade behind Osceola, with Sam grinning from ear to ear, bringing up the rear. Through the closing gates came a torrent of sizzling invective.
“Kind of risky, wasn’t it, Bill?” The Seminole waited for his white friend, then paced beside him down the winding corduroy road.
Bill grinned. “Maybe,” he admitted. “But he seemed to expect an exchange of courtesies. He’s used to getting an earful from the pilots, I’ll bet. And returning it with interest, for that matter. Well, here we are at the dock—and there’s the old bus waiting for us!”
“And nobody around yet but our own sweet selves!” exulted his friend. “But I’m a blushing rose today when it comes to showing my lovely phiz. Me for a helmet and goggles as soon as possible. Let’s get aboard.”
They slid back the door to the cabin and passed inside. The long apartment was equipped with comfortable passenger seats, five on each side of the narrow central aisle. Big observation windows ran the length of the cabin, and a door at the rear led direct to the prison hold in which Bill had made the trip from Shell Island. Investigation proved that the wooden bars of the cells had been removed and piled at the farther end. Neatly stacked in bins arranged for the purpose were a goodly number of small canvas sacks. Each bag was padlocked.
Bill lifted one of the sacks. “Gold!” he cried. “Nothing else could be so heavy. The Martinengos certainly are making a fortune out of these diggings if this is a sample shipment!”
“They’ll not get a chance to lay their filthy paws on that lot if I can help it,” said Osceola grimly. “Let’s go up front. I haven’t seen a hole a mouse could hide in so far, much less Sam. Perhaps that door with the window in it, at the other end of the passenger cabin will solve the problem.”
“I can tell you now that it opens into the pilot’s cockpit.” Bill started forward.
Upon reaching it, he slid open the door to find himself in a roomy cockpit, fitted with two pilots’ seats and complete dual control of the wheel and column type. A three piece glass windshield gave such protection that Bill knew goggles would not be necessary under normal flying conditions.
“It’s a swell boat,” he remarked. “Luxurious devils, these slave drivers.”
Osceola nodded. “Looks pretty nice to me. Certainly is a big ship. Do you know anything about her? I mean to say, can you fly this kind of an airplane?”
Bill smiled good humoredly at the Seminole’s worried expression. “This bus is a tailor-made job—no stock model was ever built like this. But I can fly her all right, once I’ve seen that her tanks are full and tested her three engines. The man who assembled this ship knew what he was doing. There’s nothing better for commercial work than the 200 horsepower, air-cooled radial engines she’s equipped with.”
“I’ll take your word for it, old man. But why not get busy and take off right now? If there are any passengers, they’re likely to spot us for what we are. I’m not eager to shirk a fight, you know, but things are sure to become hectic when they find out we’re not bound for Shell Island.”
“True,” said Bill. “But I reckon we’ve got to go through with it. Your idea’s a good one, Osceola, but it just won’t work. I thought of the same thing on the way down here. Cast your eye yonder, old sport. Martinengo’s minions are taking no chances with pilots pulling anything phoney on their own hook!”
Both Osceola and old Sam glanced in the direction indicated by Bill. On a broad mound of earth, half way up the incline toward the stockade, the ugly nose of a field gun could be plainly seen, Beside the gun stood a sentry.
“That gun would blow this bus to kingdom come if I ‘got busy’—as you call it. I’m going to give the ship a looking-over now, but that’s all, till I get word to shove off.”
Osceola’s face was a study in chagrin and gloom.
“You’re right, of course, Bill. I’d forgotten about that gun. Tell me—what are we going to do with Sam?”
“Oh, he can stay in this cockpit. Crawl in behind the pilot’s seat, Sam. Lie down on the deck, and curl up so your legs don’t show. The partition will screen you from the passengers. Better hop in there now—there’s no telling when they’ll be along.”
“Yassuh, boss, Ise a-gwine dar now. I ain’t takin’ no chances.”
Sam wriggled into his hideaway and Bill turned to Osceola.
“Slip into that jumper and put on your helmet,” he suggested. “It looks no end professional. There’s nothing for you to do but sit in that seat. You can’t very well put down your goggles until just before the take off. So if anyone shows curiosity, pretend to be fixing something on the instrument board. You’ll find a screwdriver in the locker, I guess. That ought to help the picture fifty percent at least,” he grinned, then went on—“But if you love your life, don’t unscrew or tighten anything! There are some men coming down the road now. I’ve got an inspection to make and then—I’ve got to get out on the dock and meet them.”
“Can’t you stick around here, get the motors started or something?” Osceola’s voice was muffled by the jumper he was pulling over his head.
“I’d like to,” Bill assured him. “But it would look queer and somebody would be sure to smell a rat. There’ll be a guy down here to give me orders, all right. From what we know, the pilots of this outfit keep pretty much to themselves. Here’s hoping I don’t run into any of their pals.”
“I’ve got my gun handy, and you’re wearing one,” said Osceola pointedly, as he adjusted the chinstrap of his helmet. “If it comes to a pinch, we’ll shoot it out—field gun or no field gun.”
“That’s the way to talk!”
Bill slapped his friend’s shoulder and went into the cabin.
CHAPTER XI—WHAT HAPPENED IN THE AIR
Then there came the sound of tramping on the wooden planks of the dock. Bill took a deep breath and stepped out of the cabin into the bright sunshine. He counted seven—seven men approaching him.
“Morning,” he greeted affably as the leaders drew near. “All passengers?”
“All but me—fer the island,” announced the man in advance of the rest, a cadaverous person with a Vermont twang in his voice. “I got too much to do round here to go joy ridin’. Guess I ain’t seen you before. Funny, but I thought Thompson piloted the plane up last night.”
“Not this plane, Mr.—?”
“Weed’s my name, youngster. Who be ye anyway?”
Bill smiled at the matter-of-fact Mr. Weed. “First pilot of this amphibian,” he answered calmly.
Several of the other men chuckled. “That’s one fer ye,” exploded one, “what’s his moniker matter, so’s he can fly the plane?”
“That’s my business,” growled the Vermonter. “Shut yer face, Pete! You’re too goldarned mouthy!”
“Who sez so?” Pete scowled at him and laid a hand on the revolver he carried in a holster under his left arm. “Not you, you nosey hayseed—cut yer cackle and let’s get goin’. I’m fed up to the eyes with you and this stinkin’ swamp.”
He beckoned to the others to follow and the party filed aboard the amphibian.
Weed splashed the dock with tobacco juice. “Guess you must be one of them new aviators the boss has hired,” he observed in his nasal twang.
“I guess you’re right,” said Bill. “Made my first trip yesterday. Any orders?”
“Nope—no orders. You’ve got a bunch of gold aboard—be careful of it, that’s all. What’s become of Thompson? He wasn’t so goldarned stuckup as most of you fellers.”
“Search me—I’m not wet nurse to every bum pilot Martinengo hires,” Bill shot back carelessly. “If that’s all, I reckon I’ll say bye-bye and shove off. The big boss doesn’t pay me to argue with slave drivers.”
“Is that so?” snapped Weed. “Well, let me tell you, young feller, that I’m boss of this camp. What I say here _goes!_”
“Good!” said Bill. “That’s just what I’m going to do now!”
He cast off the lines that moored the plane to the dock. Then he sprang aboard and slid the cabin door shut and locked it amid a torrent of abuse from the camp boss.
Without a word to the grinning men seated in the cabin, he went forward and into the pilot’s cockpit shutting this door after him as well. With a wink at Osceola he slipped into his seat behind the wheel and after giving the plane’s three engines a short test, he let in his clutch.
The big ship, which had been slowly drifting away from the dock and the irate Mr. Weed, began to gather headway. Bill taxied her round in a wide half circle until he got her head into the light wind with a long stretch of open lagoon ahead. A slight widening of the throttle sent the big bus hurtling down the straight-away. Then Bill jerked her onto the step and a moment or two later she was in the air.
Bill climbed until the altimeter on the instrument board marked four thousand feet. Then he leveled off and after a slight bank to port, headed the big amphibian due east. Flying conditions were excellent. A light wind blew out of the southeast, but the air was smooth, without a ripple. A cloudless sky of light blue dipped to a sharply defined horizon; and near the rim of the inverted bowl the pale green of the Everglades contrasted with the darker foliage of the cypress swamps. Here and there and everywhere, lakes, lagoons and wandering streams sparkled and danced in the sun glare like uncut brilliants on a bed of green velvet.
With his free hand, Bill unhooked a headphone set from the side of his seat and adjusted it. At the same time he motioned Osceola to don the set at the other end of the cord.
“So far, so good,” he spoke into the transmitter which hung on his chest. “I don’t think we’ll have trouble with our passengers for a while yet, anyway. They seem to have no suspicion but what we are Martinengo’s pilots.”
“But you do expect trouble?”
“Bound to have it. We are off the regular course to Shell Island now. Those lads aft probably won’t smell a rat until we get over the Everglades. Then they’ll want to know the reason why.”
“What can we do about it?”
“Stall ’em off somehow. I’ll think of some gag to tell them. When we get nearer Miami, I can wire the chief of police to bring some of his men and meet the plane at the airport.”
Osceola’s tone was not encouraging. “I wonder,” he said.
“Wonder what?”
“I’m afraid you’re too sanguine, Bill. I know this type of bully and scoundrel we’re up against. What is more—several of those men back there in the cabin know me—I bear the marks of their whips on my back.”
“Umm!” grunted Bill, his fingers drumming a tattoo on the wheel. “They’ll have to smash the cabin door to get out here. I shot the bolt when I came forward.”
“But that door won’t hold them if they once get going,” he argued. “They’ll probably bust through—stick a gun to your head and force you to fly them to the Island.”
“But they won’t shoot,” replied Bill with conviction. ”They’ll know that that would mean a crash and pretty certain death.“
“How do you figure that? If they don’t recognize me in this rig, they’ll think I can take over from you and fly this ship—after your lights have been put out. I tell you, Bill, we’re up against it, good and plenty!”
“I reckon you’re right,” sighed Bill, and was silent.
Presently he spoke again. “A captain should stay with his ship to the last,” he murmured, as if giving vent to his secret thoughts. “But there are exceptions to every rule.”
“What are you saying?” Osceola was puzzled.
Bill hesitated for a moment, then went on with sudden energy.
“Open the locker under this seat. There are three or four parachutes stowed away there. I saw them when I first came aboard. Pull out three of them—one for each of us. When you and Sam have got into yours, I’ll put on mine.”
“How are you going to fly the plane and do that, too?”
“Get yours on and I’ll show you.”
Osceola brought forth two of the parachutes and passed one over the seat to Sam. A motion or two from Bill gave them an idea of how to adjust the harness, and presently Osceola brought out the one for Bill. That young gentleman laid it on his wheel and began to issue further instructions.
“Place your feet on your rudder pedals, Osceola, and keep her nose pointed just as she is. That’s right. Now take hold of your wheel. No—don’t clamp onto it that way. Hold it lightly—that’s better. This wooden yoke to which your wheel and mine are attached controls the elevators, those horizontal planes on either side of the rudder—Push your wheel forward and with it the yoke—your plane flies downward. Pull back your wheel and she flies upward.”
“I didn’t expect to be given flight instruction today—”
Bill laughed. “That isn’t the half of it, boy. I’m telling you this much just so you can guide the ship while I put on my parachute. But here’s some more dope. These wheels are attached by wire cables to the ailerons, those hinged surfaces at the end of each wing. Their function, as they say in the Air Service, is primarily to impress a rolling movement to the airplane; just as the elevators are to impress a pitching movement. You see, in flying a plane, one not only has to steer it and balance it for the roll to either side like riding a bicycle,—the plane has to be balanced for the pitch fore and aft as well.”
Osceola nodded his understanding. “I get you. Balance for the roll sideways by turning this wheel in the opposite direction from which she’s tipping.”
“Right-o!”
“To raise the nose, I pull back the wheel; to lower it, I push it forward.”
“Go to the top of the class,” grinned his friend. “You’re letter perfect, at least.”
“Good enough. But those gauges on the instrument board?”
“You can keep half an eye on the inclinometer and fore-and-aft level if you want to; but I always think it is better to learn by the feel of the plane.”
“I’ll do my best,” asserted Osceola, intent now on what was before him.
“Good fella! Some day I’ll start giving you real flight instruction. This is just a makeshift. Oh, I forgot—this plane is a bit noseheavy. Don’t let it worry you. Keep pulling back on your wheel as she dips. All ready to take over?”
“—Ready’s brother!”
“Okay. She’s yours. Fly her!”
With an eye on his assistant, Bill gave up the controls and busied himself with the parachute. That job completed he made sure the release cord was in working order and spoke to Osceola.
“You’re doing fine. I’ll take her back now. There’s something else I want to say. We’ll be over the Everglades in a few minutes. And those guys in the cabin will be getting nervous. When the trouble comes, it will come fast. If the ship gets out of control—don’t stay with it—jump! And don’t forget to pull the release cord on your parachute. Pass the word to Sam and tell him to stand up. And, by the way, if I should wave a hand above my head, jump anyway—don’t wait for me—get that?”
“You bet.”
Osceola pulled a pencil and small pad from the pocket of his jumper. He wrote a few lines and passed the slip of paper to Sam.
“Just one thing more and then we’re set,” added Bill into the transmitter on his chest. “Have your gun handy—and don’t be afraid to use it. Good luck, old skate.”
“Good luck, Bill.”
“Get rid of your phone set now. We won’t need it for the present. The cord might get tangled in things if there’s a rough-house.”
He stripped his own headgear and turned his full attention to guiding the amphibian.
They were past the Big Cypress now, and far below lay the Everglades. This western edge of the great lake was dotted with uncounted islands, some large, some small, and all covered with a luxuriant forest growth. High sawgrass hid the water, save in numerous little channels wandering in a network, sometimes coming to a blank end, sometimes broadening into clear spaces abloom with pond lilies. This flat, rather monotonous landscape spread on and out as far as the eye could see.
Bill had decided that it would be well to head farther into the north, when he felt the vibration of a sudden jar. His head snapped round as the cabin door crashed open and two men sprang into the cockpit. Both held revolvers and behind them crowded the other passengers.
Instinctively he pushed his wheel forward, then pulled it sharply toward him. The plane nosed over and with increased momentum from the dip it shot upward at a precipitous angle. The result so far as her passengers were concerned was much as though they had been standing on the broad back of a steady circus horse who suddenly metamorphosed into an outlawed bronco—and bucked! Losing their balance as the amphibian nosed over, the gangsters were hurled backwards by the second maneuver and landed in a sprawling heap by the door, and along the cabin aisle.
A bullet crashed into the instrument board. It had missed Bill’s head by the fraction of an inch. And although he knew that the duration of his life would probably be a matter of seconds, he stuck to his post. Forward went his wheel again, the plane leveled off and with a glance at the calm-eyed Indian beside him, he held up his right hand.
CHAPTER XII—’TWIXT WIND AND WATER
Osceola stood up and gave Bill a questioning glance which said plainer than words—“Further directions, please?”
Bill motioned toward the lower wing section on Osceola’s side of the plane, mouthed the word “jump,” and patted the pull ring on his own parachute harness.
Osceola scrambled out of the cockpit onto the wing. For a moment he clung to an interplane strut and beckoned Sam to follow. Sam hurried after him, although from the expression on the negro’s face, it was evident that he was terrified. Bill saw him crawl across the wing to the rear edge where Osceola stood. Then as the old man got to his feet, still clinging frantically to the strut, the Seminole, facing forward, gave a tug on his pull ring. The seat pack parachute bellied out behind him and he disappeared from sight.
At the same instant, Bill felt a heavy hand on his shoulder, and the blue-black muzzle of an automatic was pushed into his face. Instinctively he leaned forward to dodge the gun. The wheel went with him, and bucking like a frightened cow pony, the big plane shot into a nose dive.
This maneuver sent Bill’s antagonist sprawling onto the wooden yoke to which both wheels were attached, forcing it forward as far as it would go. The gangster’s head smashed into the instrument board and he lay inert. Himself thrown forward by the amphibian’s dive, Bill caught at the seat to save his own head. The man’s unconscious body prevented any manipulation of elevators or ailerons. The plane was beyond his control, and racing earthward with wide open throttle at a hair-raising rate of speed. He must save himself if he could: within a second or so the big aircraft would be but a twisted mass of burning wood and metal flaming in the swamp below. Luckily, the pilot’s cockpit had no roof. Bill dragged himself on to the back of his seat, which, now due to the plane’s almost vertical position, had become a small, horizontal platform. With a hand on the pull ring of his parachute pack, he dived head first over the cockpit’s cowl into the open ether.
The approved types of parachutes are the manually operated free type. A “free” type parachute is one that is complete in one unit, strapped to the person of an aviator by a suitable harness, and one that has no attachments whatever to the aircraft. A “manually operated” parachute is one that will unpack automatically when the wearer gives a slight pull on the ring located in a readily accessible place on the harness. The aviator can open his parachute just when clear of the disabled airplane or he can make a long free drop away from burning wreckage or a pursuing enemy plane before he pulls the ring.
And this is why Bill did not pull the ring on his manually operated, free parachute before diving out of the amphibian. Should the body or air bag of the chute come in contact with the plane, he would naturally crash with it.
Bill was not a trained parachute jumper. That part of an aviator’s training is usually confined to those who specialize in lighter-than-air craft, and Bill was a heavier-than-air pilot. The sensation of diving into the air, several thousand feet above the earth was anything but a pleasant one. But his nerves were steady. He kept his head.
“One,” he said to himself, as he sprang outwards and down...
“Two—” He felt his body twisting in his fall. He knew he was catapulting earthward at a falling speed of nearly 400 miles per hour.
“Three!” He jerked on the pull ring. Would the chute open? Would it be capable of withstanding the shock incurred by the weight of his body falling at this terrific rate of speed? (He knew that the average time required for an air chute to open and assume normal descent is approximately one and three-fifths seconds after the rip cord has been pulled). But that mere second and a fraction seemed interminable. He was falling ... falling...
There came a sudden jerk that wrenched every muscle in his tense body. His projectile-like speed decreased with uncomfortable suddenness, and he was swung round and upward to find himself sitting in what amounted to a swing, with webbing representing the ropes on either side of his aching body. Looking up, he saw that slightly above his head and within reach, the webbing divided into two, and that the shrouds or small cords leading to the outer edge of the parachute were here attached to the harness he wore, in four places. He was swaying wildly. In an effort to prevent that, he pulled the ropes, first on one side, then on the other.
All this had happened in an inconceivably short space of time. Three, possibly four seconds had elapsed since Bill had sprung out of the doomed amphibian. For the moment, his mind had been intent upon his own particular troubles, but now that he swung safely in his harness, memory came back. He turned his eyes earthward.
Almost directly below him, a column of black smoke smudged the clear green of the swamp grass. At the very base of the dark cloud, red tongues of flame shot skyward. Bill turned his gaze elsewhere. His former passengers were undoubtedly as cold-blooded, black-hearted a band of villains as had ever lived; still, they were, or had been human beings. And Bill had no desire to watch their cremation and the demolition of a splendid plane.
His eyes swept the horizon. Yes, over there perhaps a mile to westward two parachutes, one far below the other, were floating down toward earth. Even as he looked, the farther one disappeared behind tall trees on an island.
“Confound it all! I clean forgot to tell those two innocents anything about landing. Hope they don’t get into trouble—it’s my fault if they do!”
He knew that the average rate of descent is sixteen feet per second, and unless one knows how, a broken leg or worse may be the outcome of an inexperienced landing. But their luck had held so far, apparently. Osceola and Sam were both sinewy, well-muscled fellows—they would probably come out all right. For all their sakes, he hoped so. A disabled companion in the middle of the Everglades, with no means of transport other than one’s two legs, would prove a problem that Bill did not care to contemplate.
Then he saw Sam disappear with his parachute in the high sawgrass. He was coming close to earth himself. In a very few minutes, he would land, and his gaze switched to the terrain directly below.
Osceola had landed on the firm ground of a large island. Sam had not been so lucky, for Bill knew that the Seminole name for the Everglades is Grassy-Water, and that sawgrass does not grow on dry land. He himself was floating over the island, but he soon saw that the wind-drift would carry him, too, into the grass unless he could prevent it.
Up went his hands, and getting a good grip on the parachute shrouds, he pulled down hard on the ropes to windward. The chute immediately bellied in and sideslipped into the wind. He dared not overdo the business, and presently righted the chute by the simple expedient of releasing the shrouds. In a fall of one hundred feet, Bill figured he had sideslipped ten. He had seen men spin their parachutes in order to swing aside from some building or other obstacle. He knew that the trick is done by pulling down on one side, then releasing the pressure with a sort of flipping motion. He attempted it, without success; after a few failures gave it up in favor of the easier sideslips.
He was almost down now, and delighted to see that due to his system of sideslipping, the parachute would land him on the island.
Down he came, swaying slightly, onto a patch of soft green turf, dotted with wildflowers. Knowing that the body should relax in landing, he made no effort to stand erect, and endeavored to absorb the shock of his fall to some extent by rolling over in the direction that he was drifting. Consequently, his tumble did him no harm; the parachute rolled into a large cypress at the edge of the open space and came to a stop. The jump was over.
Bill got out of his harness, repacked it, and throwing the bundle over his shoulder, set off to find his two companions. Over to the west, a mile or more from the island, the burning amphibian sent its tower of thick black smoke mushrooming skyward.
Bill walked for half a mile along the edge of the sawgrass, and then he saw two familiar figures appear from out a clump of trees.
“Osceola! Sam!” he called, and ran forward to meet them.
His friends waved to him, but did not quicken their pace. The old negro seemed to be leaning heavily on Osceola’s arm, and as he drew nearer, Bill saw that their clothes were dripping wet.
The young Seminole grinned as he came up. “You look as fresh as a daisy!” His tone was cheerful, though it held a hint of weariness. “I certainly hated to leave you up yonder in the plane with that bunch of cutthroats. Sam did too. We’ve been talking about it. Until I saw your parachute open up, I was darned worried, I can tell you.”
“Well,” beamed Bill, grasping their hands, “it sure is good to see you both again, I’m okay, but I take it you made bad landings. My fault, too,—I should have explained more about it before you jumped.”
“Dat’s all right, Marse Bill,” piped up Sam. “It’s me what brung de trouble. Marse Osceola, he sure am a born parachuter! He done landed fine on dis island—but dis old nigger crabbed everything. Come down in de grass out yonder. Dem sharp-tooth edges sure cut me pretty bad. And I ain’t no hand at dis jumpin’ business nohow. Like to drownded myself if Marse Osceola hadn’t come in an’ drug me out. Got all tangled up in de grass and dem ropes, wif de big umbrella down on top of me, tryin’ t’ smudder me to death. I sure is obliged to you gentlemen for gettin’ me away from de workin’s—but I’d rather stay put there all my born days than go through all dat again. Not _me_, suh!”
The old man sat down suddenly, and began to shake all over.
“Take it easy, Sam,” cautioned Bill. “Just don’t think about it for a while. Everything will come out all right.”
“I hope so, Marse Bill.” Sam’s tone, though gloomy, was much less excited. “Dis heah airplane stuff an’ parachutin’ may be all right fo’ white folks—but if I must do a loop-de-loop, let mine be roun’ some chicken coop.” He grinned appreciatively at his own joke. “Thank goodness I’m down here where I’s gwine to stay. I ain’t gwine to be a-oozin’ round de sky no mo’—Dis heah nigger ain’t got too proud to walk. Nobody ain’t gwine to ketch Sam a-flirtin’ wif de sun no mo’. Unh—unh! Not _me!_”
Both lads burst out laughing. “You’ve got more nerve than the rest of us put together, Sam,” declared Osceola.
“You sure have!” Bill knelt at his side. “Osceola is a warrior and a gentleman, but he can’t bandage for a tinker’s hoop. Let me fix those things. And how about this ankle—you were limping, uncle?”
“It ain’t no sprain, suh. I kin walk on dat foot—but she sure do hurt po’werful bad.”
“You’ve wrenched and strained it.” Bill’s deft fingers were lightly pressing the old man’s ankle. “We’ll bind it up tighter and keep you off your feet for a couple of days, and you’ll be able to do your hundred yards in ten flat!”
“Help him off with his wet clothes, Bill, while I get rid of mine,” Osceola suggested. “They’ll soon be dry in this sun.”
“That’s a good idea. While you two are drying, I think the best we can do is to have a meeting of the Ways and Means Committee. We’re still an awful longways from anywhere.”
Sam nodded his head vigorously. “You done said a mouf-ful, suh. I hope I ain’ no gloom—but we sure is in a bad fix. Dese heah Glades is a mighty bad place to git stranded in widout a boat. I don’t know but what dem fellers what come down in de airplane wasn’t de lucky ones!”
CHAPTER XIII—OSCEOLA FINDS A WAY
The young Seminole spread his dripping uniform on the grass to dry and dropped to his full length on the sward near Sam and Bill.
“We’ve got to build a boat of some kind,” he declared. “Otherwise there’ll be no leaving this island. Let’s see what we can scare up between us in the way of tools.”
“I got a big clasp knife what belonged to one of dem pilots,” volunteered Sam.
“And I’ve got the same chap’s automatic, and a knife I picked up in the kitchen,” added Osceola. “How about you, Bill?”
“Another automatic and a dry box of matches are the limit of my contributions,” returned that young man. “Not much of an assortment, eh? If we could get out to the plane we might be able to find an axe or something.”
Osceola shook his head. “I doubt it. The smoke has almost disappeared, which means that the amphibian or what’s left of her is sinking in the swamp. Anyway, without something to float on we can’t leave this island. The rock floor of the Everglades basin lies from six to twelve feet down in the muck and water. Even with a boat, traveling is no joke. That grass grows ten feet high in some places. You’ve seen what its saw-tooth edges have done to Sam. That’s nasty stuff to fool with—take it from me!”
Bill stared gloomily over the prairie-like monotony of the Glades. Smoke from the wreck had now entirely disappeared. He shuddered as his mind dwelt for an instant on the horrible fate of its gangster-passengers. Then his eye caught the deeper green of trees in the far distance.
“There seem to be a lot of islands in this big swamp,” he said. “Many of them inhabited, Osceola?”
“Not in this part of the Glades, Bill. My people are practically the sole inhabitants of this part of the world. And they live on islands, of course. But a long, long way from here.”
“Have you any plan?”
“Yes—I think so.”
“Well, spring it then, old top. You’re in command from now on. I know as little about this kind of thing as—”
“As I do about flying,” supplemented Osceola with a grin.
“Rather less, if you ask me. Let’s hear what you propose, Chief.”
The young Seminole did not reply at once. His bronzed forehead was corrugated in a frown. For several minutes he seemed lost in thought.
“There are just three things we’ve got to have,” he said suddenly. “And we’ve got to have them right away.”
“Water, food and a boat,” Bill suggested.
“Right. If we’re forced to, we can drink Glades water, but it’s dangerous, and would probably make us ill. There ought to be a spring or two on this island; I reckon you’re elected to the job of locating fresh drinking water, Bill, and bringing it into camp.”
“Aye, aye, sir.”
“Food, next,” mused Osceola. “Sam—do you think you can hobble round well enough to attend to the commissariat?”
“I sure can,” grinned the old darkey. “If I ain’t mistook, I done catch a glimpse of half a dozen blue heron back yonder. Dey ain’t chicken, a-course, but dey sure is a mighty fine eatin’. Loan me dat shooter of yourn, Marse Bill, and dis heah nigger will provide dinner.”
Bill passed over his revolver. “I’ll trade you for your knife, Sam, while you get into your clothes. I’ve got to have something to make a water container—that is, when I find the water.”
He pulled his parachute toward him and commenced to untie the pack.
“Reckon I’ll mosey along,” announced Osceola. “I’ve got to manufacture a boat of some sort.”
“You ain’t a-gwine to get far with dat knife o’ yourn in makin’ a dugout, Marse,” broke in Sam.
“But that’s not my idea,” the Seminole said quietly, but without giving any further information about his plans. “Bill, when you get through totin’ water, look me up, will you? I’m going along there to the east. You’ll find me near the shore—and I’ll probably need your help.”
“Okay,” sang out Bill, pulling his parachute from the pack. “I’ll join you as soon as I can.”
Osceola departed, and presently old Sam, after watching Bill for a moment, hobbled off in the opposite direction.
Bill spread out the parachute on the ground and proceeded to cut off a large circular piece of the fabric. Next he cut a piece from the shroud, and painstakingly unravelled strands from the rope. That completed, he cut off three green branches from a nearby sapling—trimmed them, and cut two to a length of approximately eighteen inches and the third somewhat shorter. After notching their ends, he laid the two longer ones side by side and bound the ends together with strands from the parachute rope. The next operation was to bend them outward and apart at the center and to slip the shorter notched stick crosswise between them. When its ends were bound to the other poles to keep it firm and in place, he found himself possessed of an oval wooden frame.
Bill now laid this aside and picked up the piece of fabric he had cut. The outer edge of this he lapped over his oval frame. Then with his knife blade he punched eyelets through the double lap of cloth, and by passing strands of the rope through them, shortly managed to bind the edges of the fabric to his frame. The result was an open-mouthed bag-like container or bucket, which, inasmuch as the fabric was waterproof, would carry any liquid he placed in it.
His task was now completed, so sticking the open knife in a log where Sam on his return would be sure to see it, he set off with his collapsible pail to find drinking water.
The island, which Bill found to be about two miles long by half a mile wide, was covered with a heavy growth of cypress. Some of these trees were very old. He came across many whose trunks and branches were smooth and white, crowned with feathery foliage of a dazzling golden green. These beautiful trees usually grow amid clumps of dark evergreens such as bay, magnolia, and myrtle, and the effect was very striking. The small jungle was tropical in nature: stately palmettos raised their plumed heads toward the brilliant blue sky, and the forest glades were painted bright with flowers.
Bill followed one of the green aisles which wandered through the trees toward the middle of the island. Twice he heard the dull intonation of a distant revolver shot and wondered what luck Sam was having with his substitute for chicken. The wood was alive with birds. All seemed quite tame, and paid no attention to this unusual visitor to their sylvan haunts.
Presently he found the marshy ground that he was looking for; and in a little hollow nearby, a bubbling spring of cold, sweet water. Bill refreshed himself with a long drink of the life-giving liquid. Then he filled his fabric pail and went back to the spot where the conference had been held.
Here he found Sam, who already had a fire going and was plucking the feathers from a big, long-legged bird. On the turf beside him lay another. Bill recognized the great blue heron, familiarly known to the natives of Florida as “the Major.”
“I didn’t know that those things were good eating,” he observed as he hung the waterbucket on a branch in the shade. “Dad shot a couple last year which he has had stuffed. They were pretty skinny—bags of bones, that’s all.”
“Dere warn’t no moon, I reckin,” Sam said, busy with his plucking.
“Moon—what do you mean?”
“De moon am full now.” Sam’s grin disclosed two perfect rows of snow white teeth. “Dat’s de reason, Marse Bill.”
“Oh, quit your kidding, Sam!”
“I ain’t a-kiddin’ you, suh. Feel dis heah Major.”
Bill lifted the bird from the old darkey’s knees. It was plump and heavy.
“Well, I’ll be jiggered!” he exclaimed. “That’s sure a surprise to me, Sam. But I still can’t see what the moon’s got to do with its being fat.”
Sam’s laugh awoke the forest echoes. Evidently he was enjoying the joke. He reached for the heron and went on denuding it of feathers.
“Reckin eddication ain’t everything,” he chuckled. “Dis nigger never had no schoolin’, but he know dat de Major only eats when de moon am full. Twelve times de year he am fat an’ twelve times de year he am lean.”
“Well, I’ve got to hand it to you, all right,” laughed Bill. “Now I’m going to shove off and give Osceola a hand. So long!”
“So long, suh. When yo’all hears me whistle—come to dinner.”
Bill found Osceola near the marsh half a mile away. Close by stood a giant cypress whose straight stemmed trunk must have measured at least twelve feet where the tall shaft sprang from the buttressed base of the tree, and rose perhaps a hundred and fifty feet in the air, topped by a wide-spreading head of great limbs and branchlets. At the Indian’s feet lay one of these limbs and a glance at its five foot butt showed Bill that the big branch was hollow.
“Hello!” greeted Osceola. “Find your spring?”
“You bet-cha,” returned his friend. “There’s a bucket of fresh water in camp now.”
“That’s fine. We’re in luck all way round the circle.” He pointed to the hollow limb. “There’s our dugout. Nature is a great help when you lack tools. She’s half built already.”
“How did you happen to find it?”
“Well, you see, I knew exactly what I was looking for, and headed toward the biggest cypress in sight. An immense tree like that one is very, very old. It’s been here for a thousand to two thousand years, I suppose.”
“Whew!” Bill stared up at the towering giant with an interest that was almost reverence.
“Yes, it was an old tree when Ponce de Leon was looking for his fountain of youth in these Glades,” continued the Seminole. “But for hundreds of years it has been dying, and these old cypresses die backward, or downward, during a period of one to four centuries. The heart decays and the last stage is generally a hollow cylinder. A hurricane from the Gulf brought down this limb, of course.”
“But surely you don’t expect to fashion a canoe out of that with a knife!”
“What we can’t cut, we can burn. And after dinner, we’ll have Sam’s help and his knife.”
“Gosh—it looks to me as if it will take a year!”
“Two days at the most,” countered the Indian. “The wood, though very strong, is not heavy, except when it’s green; and a dead branch like this is easy to work on. Break off some of the smaller branches and get a fire going in that hole I’ve just finished digging under the limb—see it?—halfway down its length, there.”
Bill went to work, collecting dry wood and twigs for the fire.
“Aren’t you afraid we’ll burn up the whole thing?” he asked, after a moment or two.
“Oh, no, that’s easily prevented,” Osceola replied. He had whittled a flat spade wherewith to dig the fire hole and now he began to pack moist earth round the trunk on the side of the hold nearest to the butt of the log. “Of course she’ll burn a bit inside,” he went on, “but I’ve plugged the butt with moss and dirt. Mighty little air can get in through that end.”
For the next hour or so the lads were kept busy; the one adding to the pile of burning brush heaped completely around the limb, the other preventing the spread of the fire toward the butt of the log. By the time Sam’s shrill whistle announced dinner, the hollow shell had been burned clear of its upper end and they were able to roll the twenty-foot log clear of the fire.
It was delicious fare Sam had waiting for the lads by the camp fire. True, it consisted of but one dish, roast heron, washed down with spring water. But all three diners voted it a success, for a keen hunger is the best of all appetizers, and anyone who has eaten “the Major” when roasted, knows that this great bird is worthy of any feast.
The meal over, the three adventurers repaired to the hollow cypress log. Bill and Osceola got to work cutting horizontal grooves along the trunk on lines that marked the top of the gunwales. Their progress was slow, but the dying wood was not over-hard and they made fair headway, despite the inadequacy of their tools.
Stones of any kind were a rarity on the island, and it took Sam all of two hours to find one that would be suitable for an ax-head. This he bound to a wooden shaft with strips of cloth cut from Bill’s jumper. When he finished the job to his liking, the ax or hammer resembled those Indian curios one sees in the museums of our large cities.
Toward sundown the mosquitoes which had been pestering them all day, seemed to take on a new lease of life. Clouds of the vicious, blood-thirsty insects swarmed about the toilers, at last making further work impossible. By a vote of mutual consent they left the half-completed dugout to the tender mercies of the stinging pests, and hastened back to the camp fire.
While Sam removed the second heron from the hanging bucket and commenced its preparation over the fire for the evening meal, Bill trudged over to the spring. Upon his return with a brimming bucket, he found that Osceola had built a line of smudge-fires in a circle around the fire, and that once within the ring, there were no mosquitoes.
When Bill suggested that a series of small fires would have been easier to build than a solid circle of flame, the Indian had smiled good-humoredly.
“Maybe so. But then, you know, snakes like warmth and seek it. We’ve got to sleep on the ground tonight, and there are several species in this neck of the woods, that I’m not keen to have for bedfellows. They won’t cross fire or hot embers, though—‘Quod erat demonstrandum,’ as the geometry books have it.”
“My error,” laughed Bill. “After this, I shall refrain from criticizing my elders and betters.”
When the moon rose, Sam left them, while the lads lay back on their beds of evergreens and conversed. Several times they heard the report of his gun, but when the hunter returned, carrying three heron and a brace of duck he found them deep in the slumber of exhaustion.
CHAPTER XIV—IN THE DUGOUT
Old Sam was up with the sun, but it was not until the big gourd he had found the night before was steaming with a luxurious duck stew that he awoke the tired lads.
“How in the world did you concoct this stew, Sam?” Bill waved his wooden spoon—handmade by the old darkey—toward the savory-smelling gourd, which was their common pot.
“But how come, Marse Bill?”
“This stew is boiled isn’t it?”
“Dat’s right, suh, it am.”
“Well, what I want to know is how you were able to make a stew over the fire without burning the gourd.”
“Dat stew was made in the gourd, jes’ as you say,” he chuckled. “But de gourd warn’t over the fire, Marse Bill.”
“Quit your kidding, Sam—and tell me.”
“I done hung the gourd on a low branch yonder, suh, after I put in the meat an’ water. Nex’ I heated two stones over the fire and when dey was real hot, I dropped dem in the stew. Soon as dey got cool, I put in two mo’ hot stones—”
“And that,” broke in Osceola, “is the oldest method of heating water known to man!”
Bill shook his head. “Well, when we left the workings, I thought I was supposed to run this show,” he said gravely. “Guess I was a bit high-hat about it, too. And now, everywhere I turn, you two teach me something new. I’ve certainly learned my lesson.—Let’s get to work—I can use brawn if not brain!”
There followed a day of strenuous labor for all of them. The top of the log above the long grooves they had cut the afternoon before, was beaten in with the stone hammer. When it was at last removed, Bill took his wooden adze that he had hardened in the fire, and began to scrape the rotten wood from the inner shell of the canoe. Meanwhile Osceola and Sam whittled out two blocks of soft wood wherewith to plug the ends of the open log. These were wedged into place and moss hammered into the seams. Then, thwarts were fitted and the canoe sunk in shallow water to give the seams at bow and stern a chance to swell. After supper, all three busied themselves making paddles.
Next day they were up before dawn and hauled out their canoe. After a night’s submersion, she appeared to be absolutely watertight. At an early hour, they got aboard, with the remains of their slender store of provisions, and pushed out through the saw grass.
Bill took his place amidships, with Sam in the bow, and the young Seminole wielded a paddle in the stern. “I know that you’re skipper of this cruise, Osceola,” he flung the words over his shoulder, “but I think we ought to go out to the wreck of the plane before we leave this locality for keeps. What do you say?”
“It’s okay with me. I don’t expect we’ll find much. The water is pretty deep in this part of the Glades.”
“Do you think you can find the spot? It’s more than I could do.”
“Oh, yes, easily enough. I was raised in these swamps, remember. I know exactly where the amphibian nosed in.”
He swung the dugout to the left, and a few minutes later they came out of the high saw grass on to one of the myriad water leads that crisscross the Everglades in every direction. The grass near the Island had not been particularly dense; but now they noticed that the growth which lined the lane of open water was a ten-foot jungle of stiff, saw-toothed stems. Even the lead they were following was not free from obstruction, for huge patches of water lilies choked the way, and the power needed to force the canoe through the tangled masses of blooms came only by back-breaking effort.
“Bill, I think we’ll have to pass up the wreck,” declared Osceola from the stern of their little craft. “It would take us all day to push our way through the grass and we’d probably get some bad cuts into the bargain. It isn’t worth it.”
“I thought we might be able to salvage something,” said Bill, resting his paddle on the side of the dugout.
“No chance of that, anyway. The chances are that nothing but the tailplane is above water after her nosedive. These swamps are dangerous to wade about in, even if there is a high bottom over there, which I doubt.”
“He means de ’gators and snakes,” Sam explained fearfully. “We alls been lucky so far, but let me tell you, Marse Bill, dese Glades is sure plumb full o’ vipers. Dis nigger ain’t gwine to do no mo’ wadin’ unless he has to. Unh-unh! Not _me!_”
Bill grinned. “I retire under force of argument,” he said with mock resignation. “Let’s be on our way again. I think I can see clear water ahead.”
For the next half hour they slaved through the lilies, and in the stretch of open water finally reached, Bill spoke again.
“I know you’re making for the southeast, Osceola. And I suppose you’ve got a plan. But I should have thought you’d point north. Isn’t there an automobile causeway that crosses the Everglades somewhere up there?”
Osceola nodded. “There is, Bill, but I am going to make for the home of my people. I figure that we can get down there in three or four days, if our luck holds. It would take us much longer to reach the causeway.”
“Good enough! Swell plan, I should say.”
“But that’s only half the plan, Bill.”
“What’s the other half?”
“I’ll tell you when I’ve talked with my people. I’m not trying to be cagy, but I’ll need their consent to put it over—and I don’t want to get up false hopes, you know. You don’t mind, if I keep it to myself till I’m more certain?”
“Of course not. I’ve been doing a little thinking on my own. And maybe I can spring mine when you come across with yours. If these all-fired pond lilies would only—”
Bill never finished that sentence. There was a stirring among the lilypads just aft of Bill’s paddle. He caught a fleeting glimpse of what he took to be a gnarled tree trunk among the blooms overside. Then the stern of the dugout rose in the air, toppled over, and clutching wildly at the gunwale, he catapulted into the lilies.
“‘Gator!” yelled a voice which he took to be Sam’s, and the water closed over his head.
Bill landed on the small of his back, but just as soon as he was able to get his balance under water, he struck upwards with both hands and feet. If a rising alligator had been the cause of the canoe’s capsizing, he wasn’t staying in that unlikely spot!—not any longer than needful.
But instead of shooting to the surface, as he naturally expected, Bill found himself held fast in an interminable network of stems and roots. The horrible sensation of strangling sent all thought of ’gators, poisonous snakes out of his head. Air—he must have air. Nothing else mattered now. He tore at the tangled stems with the vicious energy of a madman.
At last, his lungs bursting, his head popped up through the pads. As he shook the water from his eyes, Sam’s black pate appeared above the surface.
“Whar de ’gator?” he spluttered.
“Search me,” gasped Bill. “I didn’t even see him.”
The dugout floated bottom upwards a few yards away. From beyond it came Osceola’s voice.
“Hey, you two! This is no swimming pool. Quit swapping yarns and give me a hand with this canoe!”
“You go, Marse Bill,” begged Sam. “I’se afraid dese here chaps will sink.” With an effort he raised his right hand above the water, and Bill saw that it grasped a duck. “I done tied dese here birds all together fore we shoved off,” explained the darkey. “Dey’s de first thing I grabbed when dat ol’ ’gator come up underneath de boat and turn us over. Dey like to drownded me down in de weeds, an’ it ain’t likely I’se gwine to turn ’em loose now to fix no dugout. Unh-unh! Not _me!_”
Bill, with an amused grunt, started swimming for the canoe in the middle of this narrative. But by the time he reached it, Osceola had righted it, and worked his way aboard by pulling himself up the rounded stern. When waist-high to the counter, he seemed to spring forward on his hands, spreading his legs at the same time so as to straddle both bulwarks. A second later he was sitting on the low thwart, holding out a helping hand to Bill.
“Gee, you’re an ace in the water, all right,” gasped Bill, once he was aboard. “Some day you’ve got to teach me that trick, Osceola.”
The Indian chuckled. “It takes little more than muscle, Bill, and a certain nicety of balance. You’ve got plenty of the first requirement, and the other is only a matter of practice.”
“Look, here comes the commissary—he’ll take a bit of hoisting!”
Osceola leaned overside and took the string of birds from Sam. “How you managed to hang on to these in the upset is beyond me,” he said, depositing them in the bottom of the canoe.
Sam was helped aboard.
“You can’t keep dis nigger from his dinner,” he grinned. “Dat is, no ’gator can’t. Did you see him, Marse Osceola? He was sure a big ol’ feller.”
“He sure was, Sam. Reckon he was as surprised as we were when the bunch of us came splashing in on top of him. I was glad to get out of the water, though. It’s not my idea of a happy death to form a meal for an alligator. It didn’t seem to worry you much. The way you and Bill were holding pleasant conversation out yonder was a temptation to any ’gator or his friends.”
“So that’s why you asked for help in righting the canoe?” Bill asked.
“You’ve guessed it. I’ve got my paddle, and while I collect the other two, I suggest that you clean the guns, Bill. Lucky they were strapped to us.” He ripped off the tail of his shirt and passed it over. “That will soon dry in the sun, and a gat that shoots is worth somebody else’s shirt any day in the week.”
“There’s one thing about traveling light,” admitted Bill, “and especially when your canoe turns over. If you haven’t anything to lose, you can’t lose it.”
“You is forgettin’ the grub, suh,” chimed in Sam.
“But you clung to that like a hero,” grinned Bill. “When we get to wherever we’re getting, I’ll pin a medal on you, Sam. Just now, I’m out of pins.”
“I know you is kiddin’ me,” returned the darkey, showing his teeth in a wide smile. “Some day mebbe I’ll hold you to dat promise, Marse Bill.”
“Okay, Sam. Pass over any hardware you may be toting. I want to clean it.”
That night, after, a weary day of paddling, they camped on an island which embraced several miles of dry land. Here Osceola shot a small deer, which they found a welcome change in diet, from the fish-tainted flesh of birds.
“There are just two things queer about this place,” remarked Bill as they rested beside the fire after supper.
“What are they?” asked the young Seminole chief.
“In every picture I’ve ever seen of the Florida swamps, they have snakes hanging in festoons from the trees—great, big fellows. Yet, so far, I haven’t seen a single one.”
“That’s because they don’t happen to roost in trees. Not in this state. That is, except in the artist’s imagination. There are plenty of snakes, though—rattlers, moccasins and the like. Never go into high grass on these islands, or you are not likely to come out alive. What’s the other queer thing?”
Bill stretched his arms above his head, and lay back comfortably on the warm earth. “Last night,” he yawned, “the mosquitoes nearly drove me crazy. Today there were very few, and tonight, I haven’t felt one. There’s been no wind to speak of—they can’t have been blown away.”
Osceola laughed. “These glades aren’t such bad places to live in. They have some advantages. Of course, it is a snake infested wilderness, but there is such a dearth of stagnant water that few breeding places are furnished for insects. You won’t find mosquitoes except along the borders. We are well into the interior of the Everglades, now, that’s why they’ve disappeared.”
“Three cheers and a tiger,” Bill applauded in a sleepy voice. “Good night, everybody—I’m off to bye-bye.”
The next three days were counterparts of the first, except that the party met with not a single mishap. Whenever possible they kept to the waterleads, and Bill soon grew sick of the sight of pond lilies. But at times it was necessary to pole their way through the sawgrass. Often the grass had to be cut away in front, and all three suffered from wounds made by its sharp-toothed edges.
About five o’clock on the fourth day of their journey, they came through half a mile of grass on to an open lead, free for once from lilies. This led toward a large island, little more than a mile away.
“Well, we’re here at last,” announced Osceola, as they rested from their labors.
“_Here_ is right—but where?”
“Some of my people live on that island. We’ll be—home—in half an hour.”
“You certainly are a wonder!” cried his friend. “I never really thought you would be able to locate them in this wilderness.”
“If you asks me,” broke in Sam, “I says, let’s go! I never did think we’d get dis far without bein’ cotched back to those workin’s. But now, oh boy! Deer meat is all right an’ so am bird flesh. But I likes my vittles varied. Too much of a good thing am nothin’ more than too much. Let’s go—cause I’m hungry!”
CHAPTER XV—SEMINOLES
The three weary paddlers sent their dugout skimming down the open waterway toward the island. As they approached, Bill saw that Osceola was steering for an encampment that covered about an acre, in a clump of palmettoes near the water. He soon noticed that the dwellings were built of six upright poles, three on a side, and had gabled roofs of palmetto thatch. Later he was to learn that the floors were made of earth, and the main articles of furniture were large tables which nearly filled the interior. On these tables the Indians ate and slept. Usually there were chests that held their clothing and tools and firearms. Barrels and boxes for provisions and, in rare cases, a sewing machine, completed the essentials. An old sheet or blanket is generally hung at one side of the dwelling to keep out the wind and rain.
Soon the inhabitants of this colony began to crowd to the waterside, waving friendly greetings. A few of the men were dressed in store clothes, but most of them seemed to have an antipathy for trousers. The habits of the Seminole are so amphibious, they are in and out of the water all day long, so that they invariably prefer bare legs. The majority were costumed in the old Seminole manner, in knee-length tunics of banded red and yellow, tied with a sash at the waist. The heads of the braves were covered with red bandanna turbans.
The squaws were easily recognizable by their long calico dresses of blue or brown, gaily striped in red and yellow, and they all wore long strings of small beads, usually turquoise and crimson. Silver coins beaten into various designs decorated their head-dresses, and were worn as bracelets and necklets. The elder children were dressed exactly like their parents. The younger ones wore what nature had given them and nothing more.
The canoe drew closer to the bank. Osceola stood up in his place and shouted some words in a strange tongue. Immediately there came a change in the demeanor of the waiting Seminoles. The mild curiosity in the arrival of strangers, turned to shouts of jubilation as they recognized their Chief. The braves rushed into the shallow water, and raised the dugout with its occupants to their shoulders. Amid cries of welcome the men carried their heavy burden up the bank and into the center of the village.
Here Osceola made them a short speech. There was much handshaking, in which both Bill and Sam participated. Meanwhile, the women rushed off to a circular shed nearby where the cooking for the camp was done. There was a great clattering of pots and pans by the fire, from which logs radiated like the spokes of a wheel, and soon the appetizing odor of food was wafted to the tired travelers’ nostrils.
“My people understand and speak English readily enough,” Osceola told his friends. “But they like me to speak to them in the mother tongue. I’ve informed them that you are my friends, that we are weary and hungry and in need of sleep. Come now, we can make ourselves comfortable while the women prepare us a meal.”
“An’ whatever it is they’s fixin’, it sure do smell good—yes, mighty fine to _dis_ heah chile!”
Sam grinned at Bill happily as they followed their host toward a dwelling somewhat larger and apart from the rest.
“Some of dem squaws sure is grand women,” chortled Sam, hobbling along in high glee at Bill’s side. “Dis is what I likes, Marse Bill—good eatin’s plenty of it, and a fine, strong woman to cook an’ work for you.” He waved at a two hundred pounder, and when the squaw waved back, he deliberately closed one rolling black eye in a wink.
“Why, you old rascal!” Bill broke into a shout of laughter. “I thought you told me you had a wife and family somewhere!”
Sam shook his woolly pate in mock pathos. “Done had, Marse Bill, done had. My ole woman b’leeve I’m dead years ago. If she’s alive she’s married, dat am certain. Liza were a sure goodlooker an’ a fine cook—an’ dat kind never am neglected—not for long anyhow.”
“Take my advice and stop flirting with the Seminole squaws, just the same, or some brave will bounce a tomahawk off that skull of yours.”
Sam spread his palms upward in a gesture of apology. “’Tain’t my fault, Marse Bill, really it ain’t.”
“Whose then?”
“It’s de wimmen, Marse Bill.”
“How do you make that out?”
Sam chuckled and brought his head near Bill’s.
“They’s always a-botherin’ the goodlookin’ men,” he whispered.
Osceola, who had the ears of a cat, turned and winked at the old darkey. “Well, that lets you out, Sam,” he laughed. “Come inside my house, and rest. Tomorrow or the next day, there is work to be done. After that you can come back here, Sam, and loaf for the rest of your life. And if you still want a squaw to look after you, I’ll see about it.”
Osceola’s house was in reality no different from the other shelters in the camp, except that it was larger, and more solidly constructed. They entered, and Osceola swung himself onto the central table, and the other two followed suit. A semi-circle of Seminole warriors squatted on the ground a few yards distant and talked together in low tones.
Presently two women came in, carrying a large kettle that swung on a stick between them. They placed this on the table, and from its open mouth protruded a single large spoon.
“When in Rome, you know—” smiled Osceola. “Help yourselves—take some, Bill, and pass it on. If you must have knife and fork and plate, they can be produced, but when I am with my people I like to conform to their customs. Hope you don’t mind.”
“The community spoon for me, old top,” and Bill reached for it. “Is this the national dish?”
“I reckon so. It’s a meat stew thickened with vegetables and meal. You ought to find it pretty good.”
“I do,” sighed Bill, blowing on a piece of hot meat. “This is the best grub I’ve tasted for a month of Sundays.”
“An’ could you all please hurry up an’ pass dat spoon,” Sam broke in eagerly. “My mouf sure am waterin’ for dat stew and my stummick he say ‘hasten, brother, hasten’!”
All three enjoyed the feast immensely and it is to be feared that as the stew grew cooler, fingers were quite as often in use as the common spoon. Although it was still broad daylight when they found the bottom of the pot, they turned in, on the table, and slept like logs, rolled up in blankets, until morning.
The early sun came streaming in through the open front of Osceola’s house. It shone in Bill’s face and woke him. He stretched, yawned and sat up. The young chief and Sam were going through the same motions at opposite ends of the table.
“Morning, men!” he saluted them, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. “Am I still dreaming, Osceola, or has your village grown during the night? There seem to be three or four times as many people around.”
The chief swung off his table bed. “There are probably five times as many,” he answered. “The villages of my people are small, but there are many of them. Last night, while we slept, signal fires flashed the news of my return. Come along, and let’s get a wash before breakfast. Afterward, there will be a big pow-wow. I am going to put my plan up to the warriors. You can do likewise.”
“But I can’t speak Seminole,” Bill reminded him as they started toward the shore.
“Don’t worry, this conference will be held in English. You see,” he explained, “our villages only run to a few families because an island can support only a few people. Over there, beyond those trees, you will find a clearing where our crops are raised; corn, squashes, sweet potatoes, sugar-cane and so on. As you may have noticed, chickens and razor-back hogs run about wild.”
“Oh, yes, and in all the big cities of Florida, too,” said Bill with a straight face. Then they both roared with laughter at Sam’s perplexed frown.
“Humph! You tryin’ to joke dis nigger,” the darkey rolled his eyes, “but dat’s over my head, suh, over my head!”
“You think it is now, but you’ll see!” warned Bill with a twinkling grin. Then he joined Osceola in his morning ablutions.
An hour after breakfast, the men of the tribe gathered in the open space between the shore and the village. They sat in a wide circle on the ground, with their squaws and children in the background. Bill and Sam, led by Osceola, were escorted to places in the center of this group. The young chief lighted a long pipe of tobacco, took a puff of the pungent smoke and passed it to his white friend. Bill choked over the pipe, then handed it to Sam. From the old negro it went the round of the braves.
When the pipe was laid aside, a deep silence fell over the gathering, broken only by the raucous call of birds in the treetops, or the sudden splash of a leaping fish. This lasted for fully ten minutes, then Osceola arose and with quiet dignity began to speak. This time he used English, and in simple words, but with the art of the born story-teller that seems inherent in all tribes of North American Indians, he told the tale of his disappearance from the village.
First he spoke of his capture by the Martinengo gang, and how he had been taken to Shell Island. Then came his trip by plane with other prisoners to the gold diggings in the Cypress Swamp. In graphic language he told of his slavedom and of the pitiless cruelty of his taskmasters.
Outwardly calm, the warriors of his tribe sat listening with faces devoid of all expression. Yet if one looked closely, one saw clenched fists and tightened muscles, and could realize that this stoic behavior was but a poise that was part and parcel of their tribal training. Actually these Seminoles resented keenly the insult which had been placed upon their young chief. Sometime in the future their deeds would prove their loyalty—now, he must not be interrupted, he had more to tell.
Osceola then went on to describe the coming of Bill, the feeling of the overseer, their subsequent escape and the crash of the amphibian.
“My white brother who sits beside me here,” he concluded, “downed the man who struck me, thereby risking not only death for his act, but the terrible torture of the lash. He is an officer in the White Father’s great navy, a flyer of airplanes, a person of importance among his own people; yet he did that for a Seminole he had known less than a day. Without his knowledge of flying, escape from the Great Cypress would have been impossible: and again, when death at the hands of those gangsters stared us in the face aboard the flying ship, he arranged for the safety of this black man and myself while he stayed behind to battle with them. That is why I take him by the hand now and thank him in the name of the once-great Seminole nation!”
“How! how!” chanted the warriors, while Osceola bent down and grasped Bill’s hand.
“Now,” he continued, his thrilling tones chaining the eyes of his audience to him, “what are we going to do? Are we going to sit quietly on our islands, and let these devils incarnate continue to enslave our brothers and other defenseless people? Have we become women now that the number of our braves is small? Have we forgotten the deeds of our heroes in the past? Are we content to stand aside, content to let this scum from the big cities offer insult day by day to our once proud nation? Answer me—are we men—or something more pitiful than the weakest of women?”
“We are men!!” shouted the braves, a hundred hands beating the air while their voices rang resonantly in the stillness. “Lead us, Great Chief. We will follow!”
“Good. Go to your homes now. Come back here on the third day from this. Let every man come armed for battle and let him come with food that will last for a week. Go now my brothers, warriors of the Great Seminole Nation—I have spoken.”
Without a word, the men got to their feet, collected their wives and children, and launched their dugout canoes.
“Now let’s hear your plan of campaign,” suggested Bill, as he and Osceola stood watching the departing flotilla. “That was some speech you made just now, even though you did lay it on a bit thick about me. I’m keen to know exactly what you intend to do, now that you’ve got your little army in back of you.”
CHAPTER XVI—THE ADVANCE
“I told those chaps of mine not to come back here until the third day,” said Osceola, “because they will need a couple of days at least to prepare for an expedition of the kind I have in mind.”
“I shouldn’t think it ought to take them that long—what have they got to do?”
“Oh, paint themselves for battle, for one thing. Have a war dance or two, and a lot of the same. You must remember that my people are only semi-civilized. The only way that anyone can control them is to let them go their own way, when it comes to tribal customs, that do no one any harm. Buck that sort of thing—and you are out of luck—good and plenty!”
“What do you mean?”
“Simply that if I tried to ‘convert’ them, they’d have little use for me—dead or alive.”
“You mean they’d do away with you?”
“Literally, yes.” Osceola laughed at the expression on Bill’s face. “But don’t worry—I understand them, and so long as I let them alone, they’ll love me. Anyway, you and Sam and I can do with a couple of days’ rest, you know, before we start out for the Big Cypress.”
“I agree with you on that. Gee, this sun is getting hotter than hot. How about going up to your abode? I haven’t sprung my idea yet.”
“Why, that’s so, old man. Certainly, come along—I want to hear what you’ve got to say.”
Once in the dim shelter of the chief’s house, the two sat cross-legged on the central table and Bill opened the conversation.
“Where’s Sam?”
Osceola shook his head amusedly. “Gone off to see how the squaws make that stew. We don’t need him. Spill the good old beans, Bill.”
“Well—your plan is to take your fighting men across the Glades and clean out the diggings, isn’t it?”
“That’s right. Of course the details must still be arranged, but we have plenty of time to work them up before we start. Have you any suggestions to make?”
“Why not tackle the island first?”
“Yes, I thought of that. But it’s a bigger and harder job than the workings. Over in the cypress swamps we can come down on the stockade at night and surprise them. Shell Island is quite another proposition. There’s only one entrance to the place,—the bay. And the Martinengos keep it well guarded. The rest of the coastline is one continuous palisade of unscalable cliffs.”
“But that’s where you’re wrong!” cried Bill. “There is a spot where the cliffs can be climbed—_and, not even the Martinengos know of it!_”
Osceola looked his amazement. “How did you get on to it?”
“Through Sam. He was a house servant, he tells me, for the bosses on Shell Island for several years. Gradually he became a trusty. They gave him the run of the island, and while off duty one day he discovered this place in his rambles. He says that there is a small, sandy beach at the foot of the cliff, and that any active man can climb up or down without a great deal of trouble. He has done it himself, so he ought to know.”
“Well, that throws a little different light on the picture. I’d certainly like to clean out that nest of cutthroats—but it’s a big job. I hadn’t contemplated doing anything like that. My plan was to free those poor devils who are slaving in the Big Cypress—but——”
“Why not do the thing up brown, while we’re at it? Of course, I needn’t tell you my main motive is to release my father. And incidentally to be revenged on the brains of this outfit—the Martinengos. By Jove, man, I’ve hardly dared think about Dad—let alone mention him—when I picture him in that filthy dungeon——” Bill’s voice broke and he clenched his fists on his knees.
“Naturally, Bill, I understand that. And I am with you every bit of the way. But I feel that we must reason it out very carefully—we dare not fail, either way.”
“But how can we? With Dad free and Shell Island in our hands, we could clean up the other place properly!”
Osceola shook his head thoughtfully. “It’s a long, long hike from the island to the gold workings—twice as far from there as it is from here. Even if we are able to capture the island, some of the men are sure to slip through our hands, get away in one of the planes, perhaps and by the time we travel on to Big Cypress, that gang there will have been warned, they’ll be ready and waiting for us. The chances are, in that case, we’d be cleaned out. A surprise attack is one thing, Bill, but a pitched battle with trained gunsters—I’d simply be throwing away the lives of my men who trust me. No, I can’t see it.”
Bill slid off the table and stood facing his friend. “But you are leaving Dad out of the picture!”
“What do you mean?”
“Dad has influence in Washington. The President is a personal friend of his. Our job is to clean up the island. Then he will get the U. S. government to step in—and they will attend to the Big Cypress business themselves. You see? I should have told you this in the beginning, but I guess I was sort of hazy when I got thinking about Dad.”
The Seminole clapped him on the shoulder. “That,” he said heartily, “is a bird of another color, Bill! And I was worried about my men. Your plan is approved and accepted without question! Now, let’s forget the whole business until my Seminoles come back here. I don’t think I’ve ever been quite so tired as I am at this minute. Just remember that those workings are not any health resort. I’m all in—and I’m going to sleep until I’m called for dinner.”
“And I’m going to do the same thing. Isn’t that a hammock over there between those palms? Me for it. You may find a wooden table comfortable to retire on, but as Sam says—‘Unh-unh! Not _me!_’ Your hospitality is lavish—but after last night I ache from head to foot. Does the mighty chief mind if his humble servant retires to the hammock?”
“If I had a shoe I’d throw it,” laughed Osceola. “For goodness’ sake, take the hammock, and anything else you want. On your way—I’m sound asleep!”
Sunrise two days later saw a flotilla of Indian dugouts drawn up on the shore of the Seminole’s island. The squaws of the little community had been up half the night cooking, and now the warriors were busily consuming what would probably constitute their last hot meal for some time to come.
There were about sixty braves all told. Gone now were their brightly colored tunics and head-dresses. The entire band had stripped to a loin-cloth, and the face and body of each man was painted in designs of his own fancy. All heads were shaven clean except for the scalp lock, which was decorated with a single feather of the red heron. Each brave carried a rifle, knife and tomahawk.
After they had eaten their fill, Osceola lined them up on the shore and spoke a few words to them in their own language. Bill stood beside him and viewed the little army with keen interest. Never had he seen such a fearsome group. They brought to mind pictures of the frontier days in the old West. If these fellows were really as fierce as they looked, he thought it boded ill for the Martinengos and their gunmen.
When Osceola had finished his harangue, the band of warriors commenced to board their canoes.
“Where in the world is Sam?” Bill asked the chief as they walked toward the handsome dugout that was Osceola’s private property.
“Here I is, suh!”
A painted savage broke from the embrace of a squaw twice his size and girth, and came running up to them.
“Good Lord, Sam! Where are your clothes?” The chief stared at him in open-mouthed astonishment.
“Ise a Seminole brave, now!” proudly announced the darkey. “Lil Eva, she done fix me up last night!”
“Little Eva!” exploded Bill. “That squaw must weigh two hundred and fifty!”
“Yas, suh! Fine woman. We gwine to git married when I come back from killin’ off dem gangsters. She say dat I’m her fightin’ man now—an’ I b’leeve I cert’nly do look like one.” He admired his painted chest, grinning from ear to ear.
Bill and Osceola looked at one another and roared with laughter. “Well, it’s okay with me, Sam,” declared the chief. “Hop aboard with your armory. It’s time we were on our way. Lucky there are some blankets in the canoe,” he added as he shoved off and sprang in after them, “you’ll probably need several before we get through with this picnic.”
The chief’s dugout, with Bill, Sam and Osceola wielding the paddles, shot swiftly down the waterway. The flotilla of canoes closed in single file behind. At last the expedition was under way.
The journey south through the Everglades seemed but a repetition of their former trip to Bill. The same endless stretches of sawgrass, intersected by lily-choked waterleads swept out to a low horizon. Occasional islands covered with a dense jungle of brilliant green provided the only variation in the monotonous landscape. The sun swam in cloudless skies, pouring down a heat that burned Bill’s flesh and sapped his vitality. The others, if they minded the terrific discomfort, appeared to ignore it. But Bill was thoroughly glad when at the beginning of the third day, they left the Everglades behind and paddled slowly down the broad bosom of a winding bayou.
That night the little army camped on the shore near the mouth of this arm of the sea.
“We’ll rest up tomorrow and plan the details,” said Osceola, as they sat by their campfire that evening. “Shell Island lies out there—about fifteen miles away. So far, so good. I, for one, am going to turn in now.”
“Call me at noon,” grunted Bill. “This may be my last sleep on earth—and it’s going to be a good one.”
CHAPTER XVII—THE ATTACK
For some hours earth and water had been bathed in the semi-darkness of a misty night when the Seminole canoes issued from the broad mouth of the bayou. The stench of the mangrove swamps behind them still hung heavy in the lifeless air, and as they advanced, a thick gray fog crept in from the sea. Soon the trailing folds of vapor rolled in opaque clouds along the water, and hovered, damp and billowing, over the moving flotilla.
Osceola shouted an order in Seminole and a moment later, the bow of a canoe nosed beside the stern of the leading dugout.
“Stop paddling!” he commanded, and his two companions obeyed. “I told the men to close up in single file,” he explained to Bill and Sam. “It is easy to go astray in a fog like this.”
“You said a mouthful,” returned Bill. “And the first thing you know we’ll be heading back to the mainland. There’s not a compass in the whole outfit.”
“Don’t worry about that. I’ll see that we get to Shell Island all right.”
“Well, you’ve got your hands full,” retorted his friend. “How do you expect to guide us? I can’t see three feet overside.”
“By instinct—an extra sense, perhaps, you would call it. No man of my race ever loses his bump of direction.”
From the fog behind them came the hoot of a nightbird.
“All set—let’s go!” Osceola dipped his paddle. “No talking, please, from now on. Voices carry a long way over the water, you know.”
For the better part of the next three hours, the long line of dugouts forged ahead through the heavy blanket of sea fog. Once more, the journey seemed endless to Bill. His nerves were tingling with the thought of the night’s work ahead. Would Osceola be able to guide them to the island? The chief paddled steadily onward, seemingly never at a loss as to the direction his little craft should take.
Gradually this confidence was imparted to the white lad. They would succeed ... they must. Yet these Seminoles were but untrained aborigines at best. Would they be able to overcome the white men, professionals, only too well versed in all the exigencies of gang warfare? To the Seminoles this expedition meant merely a matter of revenge, an insult to wipe out. To Bill it meant the life and liberty of his father. They must succeed, he told himself desperately, for the twentieth time—they _would_ succeed.
The fog grew less dense. A few straggling wisps of mist played round the line of canoes and were gone. From out the murk came the dull roar of surf breaking on a rocky shore. Then suddenly the grayish white of cliffs loomed up straight ahead.
From Osceola’s throat came the raucous screech of an owl. As one man the flotilla stopped moving.
“Shell Island,” the chief whispered. “The path up the cliffs is yonder, to the left. You go to the right, Bill. You know my plans, and I know yours.”
“O—and likewise, K.” Bill’s voice was husky with excitement, though he strove to keep it casual. “Good luck and good hunting, old man.”
“Good luck, Bill.”
They clasped hands, and an instant later, the canoe following drew alongside. Bill immediately changed places with the Indian who had been paddling in the stern. He placed his rifle carefully on the bottom of the canoe and grasping his paddle, swung the craft round to the right. Three more canoes fell into line behind him, and the four left the main flotilla and headed off to the westward, keeping the cliffs and the pounding surf off their port quarter.
Bill’s canoes pushed swiftly ahead over the long ground swell until three quarters of an hour later, the narrow entrance to the bay was in sight. Now their pace slackened, the dip of their paddles in the quiet water became barely perceptible, and hugging the deep shadow of the cliff, the canoes glided into the bay like dark water wraiths on a jet black background.
The sky was overcast, the visibility poor, but Bill could make out the night lights of Martinengo’s yacht. Nearby floated a large amphibian, evidently a sister ship of the one wrecked in the Glades. Tied up to the concrete pier was a smaller seaplane.
For a moment they rested on their paddles. Then at a sign from Bill, the other three canoes made off silently for the yacht.
Bill pointed his own craft for the amphibian. He doubted that a harbor watch would be kept aboard the plane, and in this he found his surmise correct. Drawing alongside, he made the canoe fast to an interplane strut, and motioned to his two companions to climb aboard.
While the Seminoles searched the hull, Bill busied himself with the engine. He removed two spark plugs, and disconnected the joints in the pipe line at both the fuel tank and carburetor. When he had finished the Seminoles reported that there was no crew aboard.
Bill nodded his satisfaction and the Indians followed him back into the canoe. Their next port of call was the seaplane, moored to the pier, where the same performance took place. When this aircraft had also been put out of commission, they turned their attention to the yacht.
As his canoe slid close to the long, black hull of Martinengo’s palatial craft, Bill dimly discerned the dark blotches on the waterline below the overhang of the stern. An instant later, his canoe nosed in among the Indian dugouts.
Not a word was spoken. Except for the lap of wavelets against the yacht’s hull, and stentorian snores from somewhere above their heads, the night was peculiarly silent. From afar came the dull boom of the surf. Then they heard the _pop-pop_ of rifle fire from the interior of the island, more than a mile away.
Bill faced about. “If these gunsters show fight, shoot to kill!” he hissed in a tense whisper. “But if a man throws down his arms, he is to be bound and held prisoner. I will have no murdering of unarmed men. And anyone who disobeys this order will be shot out of hand by me. Am I understood?”
He was answered by a low chorus of grunts.
“Then—let’s go!”
Leaving but one man to guard the canoes, the little band swarmed over the low bulwarks and on to the yacht’s deck. The sailor on watch was roused from his slumbers to find himself held fast by painted savages. Before he was sufficiently awake to shout for help an oily rag was thrust into his mouth. Then while one Seminole knotted a scarf about his face to keep the gag in place, he was trussed up with rope from the coil on which he had been sleeping. His bonds were further secured to a ringbolt in the decking and then he was abandoned.
At a word from Bill, four Indians entered the companionway amidship, while he and the others hurried on to the forecastle entrance. He found the door closed, jerked it open and ran down a steep flight of steps. His hand groped along the wall in the darkness, there came the click of a switch and the quarters of the crew sprang into view. A table ran down the middle of the long, narrow cabin, and twelve bunks lined the walls, six on either side. Eight of these were occupied.
Bill’s words came sharp as the crack of a pistol.
“Hands in the air! Legs overside—and stay put!”
The man in the second bunk on the right reached stealthily under his pillow, and flashed an automatic into sight, while Bill’s eyes raked the other side of the cabin. But before the sailor could crook his trigger finger, Bill felt an object whizz past his head from the rear, and to his astonishment, he saw the man crumple as though struck by lightning. The dead body fell to the floor. Imbedded in the middle of the man’s forehead was a Seminole tomahawk.
This summary piece of justice evidently cowed the other forecastle hands, for they offered no resistance. They were led on deck and effectively bound with rope and laid in a row beside the deck watch.
Bill did not wholly trust his Seminoles to keep to the promise he had extracted from them. In their eyes this night’s work was a vendetta, war to the death, vengeance to be atoned by blood alone. They had come here to kill or be killed. He felt almost certain that they would murder these prisoners if given the slightest provocation. Therefore he remained on deck until the last gunster was laid beside his fellows, before going below. As it was, he met the men he had sent down to the cabins as he entered the companionway.
“Anybody down there?” he asked brusquely.
“Great Chief, there _were_ three white men,” the leader said slowly.
“Where are they?”
“They were foolish enough to fight, Great Chief. They have gone to the Happy Hunting Ground. We have brought their scalps.”
Bill turned away in disgust. Yet there was nothing he could do. Censure at this stage of the game would be sure to provoke mutiny. If he upbraided these savages for acts which according to their code were acts of justice, they would probably throw off his leadership and massacre the remaining prisoners.
“Yellow Wing!” he beckoned to a subchief. “You and Long Snake will stay here with these men. You will be accountable to Chief Osceola for their safety. The rest of us will take three of the canoes and go ashore.”
Bill knew that this order did not please the two Indians, but they made no comment, and he led his group overside.
At the concrete pier he left another Indian on guard, and then, followed by the remainder of his band, hastened up the road to the top of the cliff. Ever since they had heard the report of the first gun, the firing in the middle of the island had been practically continuous. Occasionally it would lessen for a few seconds, to break out in fresh bursts directly afterward. Now, as they ran along the road which led down into the broad valley of the island, the firing became more intermittent, and at last died away altogether.
They entered the belt of woods and were traveling along the winding roadway at a trot when the sound of rifles broke out afresh. This time, the volleys seemed to come from the woods ahead. The party stopped and listened.
“They’re getting nearer,” muttered Bill, after a moment.
“White Man retreating along this road, Red Man following, Great Chief,” declared an elderly Seminole at Bill’s side.
“How do you know they are White Men, Straight Arrow?”
“Those nearest us wear white men’s boots, Great Chief. No Seminole makes noise like that when he runs.”
Bill could hear nothing except the firing, but it never occurred to him to doubt the keen-eared Indian’s word.
“Into the woods!” he commanded. “And don’t fire until you hear me whistle!”
The dark shadows of his savage allies seemed to melt into the forest. Bill slid behind the trunk of a palm, from where he had an unobstructed view of the turn in the road beyond. He could hear the sound of running footsteps now. The reports of rifles came nearer and nearer.
Finally a band of fifteen or twenty men appeared around the bend. In the darkness of the dense woods it was difficult to distinguish objects clearly, but Bill saw that four of the men bore a burden, and as they got well past the turn in the road, they stopped and lowered it to the ground. Immediately afterward the trip hammer detonations of a machine gun shattered the night.
There came a flash and a sharp report from the woods on the opposite side of the road. The machine-gunner fell sideways, clutching his shoulder. Another took the wounded man’s place. Before Bill could purse his lips to whistle, first one side of the road, then the other were raked with a hail of lead.
Bill could hear the bullets pinging into the soft palm that sheltered him. He dropped to the ground and lying flat, opened fire with his rifle, while the gangsters’ bullets went on singing above his head. Flashes lit the woods continuously in every direction now, and the night was made hideous by the bloodcurdling yells of the Seminoles.
Then another and heavier burst of firing came from the bend of the road. The machine gun was suddenly silenced. The few gangsters that were left turned and fled toward the bay.
Out of the woods leapt painted demons, shouting war cries. The cornered gunmen wheeled and fought like frenzied rats. No quarter was asked or given. Presently the Indians returned to the machine gun.
Bill stood in the middle of the road, his rifle at the ready.
“The first who touches one of these wounded gets a bullet from me!” He shouted menacingly at the Seminoles, who, he knew were bent on taking their trophy.
“And I’m with you on that, Bill!”
Osceola ran up, accompanied by his band of painted henchmen, and immediately reeled off a series of fiercely shouted gutterals in Seminole.
“That will hold them for a while,” he added in English to Bill. “There’ll be no scalping if I can stop it.—Sam! Where’s that nigger?” he raised his voice.
“Here I is, Marse Osceola. Here I is, suh. ’Fore de Lord, I ain’t scalped a prizner!”
“Oh, shut up, and pass over that electric torch you’ve been carrying for me. I want to get an idea of the damage done here.”
“Yas, suh, boss! Here it am, suh.” Sam was still stuttering as he handed Osceola the flashlight. “Truly, I ain’t done no scalpin’ tonight, Marse——”
“Keep still—or I’ll scalp you!” The chief switched on the light. “Well, if you caught the lads afloat,” he said to Bill, “this is the last of the gang ashore.”
“You mean they’re all wiped out?”
“Well, hardly. Some are, of course, a good number, too. But the live ones are under lock and key in the jail.”
“But Osceola—did you find Dad?” Bill’s voice was trembling with eagerness.
“Sorry, old man—he’s not on the island.”
“What! Don’t tell me he’s dead?”
“No, no. Nothing like that. I captured the barracks boss, who seems to be a pretty sound egg. He says that Martinengo left for the workings in Big Cypress—it seems he is a trained pilot. He took your own plane, and forced your father to go with him.”
CHAPTER XVIII—BIG CYPRESS AGAIN
Three o’clock on the afternoon of the next day found the two young men standing on the concrete pier, watching the narrow entrance to the bay. Beside them stood the old negro, Sam, an incongruous figure in his war paint, and armed to the teeth.
“Here they come!” cried Bill, as two wicked-looking destroyers, belching smoke from their squat funnels, glided into the harbor. “The old U. S. Navy is pretty prompt, once it gets started, eh? That isn’t bad time at all from Key West!”
“Lucky we were able to reach them by phone. That second ship is letting go her anchor. The one in the lead seems to be making for this pier.”
“I told them there was plenty of water,” said Bill, and they waited where they were until the destroyer laid alongside and made fast. A young man whose smart white uniform bore the black and gold shoulder stripes of a lieutenant-commander ran lightly across the gangway. He was followed by a chief petty officer and a file of men carrying rifles. Bill and Osceola stepped forward to meet them.
“Who’s in command here?” inquired the officer.
“I am, sir.” Bill stood stiffly at attention. He did not salute. It is not Naval etiquette to do so unless one is in uniform, wearing one’s cap.
“Mr. Bolton, I take it,” smiled the officer. “My name is Bellinger. If it’s okay with you, Mr. Bolton, I’ll take over now?”
“Please do.” They shook hands.
Bill then introduced Osceola and gave Commander Bellinger a brief report of his experiences during the past ten days.
“We’ve buried the dead gunsters,” he ended, “and the live ones are safely housed in their own jail.”
“My word!” exclaimed the Commander. “You chaps have certainly put in an interesting summer vacation—if not a very pleasant one! You’ve seen more scrapping in a few days than I have since the Armistice!”
“The Seminoles were a bit difficult to control, sir,” Bill went on rather hesitantly.
Commander Bellinger nodded. “I’ll bet they were. Probably scalped a few of the gunmen, eh? Well, what I don’t know won’t go into my report. The fortunes of war, you know. But I want you to understand now, Bolton, that the report won’t do _you_ any harm with the Superintendent of the Naval Academy—quite the reverse, in fact. Both you and Chief Osceola have done well—very well indeed. And,” he added, “I think we’d better look over this gangster outfit. You’ll want to start your hop soon, I suppose.”
Bill nodded as they walked toward the hill.
“I have orders to meet a squadron of seaplanes from Pensacola Air Station at four o’clock in Whitewater Bay, sir.”
“How long will it take you to fly over there?”
“Something under an hour, sir. With your permission I’d like the small Loening moored out yonder, and take Chief Osceola with me.”
“That’s okay with me, Bolton. But we’ll have to get going with this inspection. Before you leave I’ll give you the admiral’s orders, and another envelope which you will turn over to Commander Thomson when you meet the seaplane squadron.”
“Aye, aye, sir,” answered Bill, and the three breasted the winding road up the cliff.
————
Bill pushed forward the stick, at the same time he cut his gun and the Loening amphibian he was piloting shot downward. Far below, the island-studded waters of Whitewater Bay sparkled in the summer sunlight. Lying on its quiet bosom like great waterbugs with wings spread were the five seaplanes of the Navy Squadron moored in simple V-formation. Even at that distance, Bill could make out the difference in design of the flying boats.
“Three Boeing PB-1’s,” he announced into the mouthpiece of his headphone. “The other two are PN-10’s.”
“I’ll take your word for it,” answered Osceola. “It’s all Greek to me. But how can you tell them apart at this distance?”
“Easily enough—knowing their construction. The PB boats have a tandem engine mounting, for one thing. Can’t talk now—this has got to be a good landing. We’ve a bunch of experts watching us.”
He brought his stick slowly backward, bringing up the nose to level. Then he applied right aileron and simultaneously increased right rudder considerably. When the desired bank was reached, he checked the wing with the ailerons and at the same time eased the pressure on the rudder.
When the plane swung round so that it headed directly into the wind, Bill applied left aileron and left rudder. With wings level once more, he neutralized the ailerons and applied a normal amount of right rudder to steady her.
Once more he nosed over, and this time the Loening sped downward on a straight path into the wind, at an angle of 45 degrees. At a point equidistant from the two rear seaplanes of the moored squadron, Bill leveled off. A moment later, with hardly a splash his plane caressed the water and glided forward under its own momentum until it came to rest directly aft of the squadron’s leading seaplane.
Bill loosened the chinstrap of his helmet, as a figure in a monkeysuit walked out on the lower wing section of the big PB boat, and waved.
“That you, Bolton?”
“Good afternoon, Commander. I’ve got the admiral’s orders aboard.”
“Good enough,” returned Commander Thomson. “Nose that Loening over here and let me have them. That was a smart landing you made just now. You’re a credit to your old instructor!”
“Aye, aye, sir,” replied Bill, with a wink at Osceola, and did as he was bid.
“And I notice you haven’t lost your nerve, either,” smiled the Commander as he took the long blue envelope that Bill handed him. “Cheek is a better word, perhaps.”
“I never try to correct my superior officer,” laughed Bill, and they shook hands.
Commander Thomson slit the envelope and read the message.
“The Old Man says you are to lead us over,” he announced. “And I take it you know what to do when we get there.”
“Yes, sir. Received instructions from Commander Bellinger. I’ve got the letter in my pocket. He sent his best regards to you, sir.”
“Good old Pat. I bet he’d give half a stripe to be with us. We’ll shove off directly. Run your boat up to thirty-five hundred and retain that altitude until you zoom the stockade. Then climb until you are above us and don’t land until you see me on the water. Got that?”
“Aye, aye, sir.”
“Let’s go, then. Good luck!”
“Same to you, Commander.”
Bill returned to the cockpit of his plane and presently the Loening was taxiing ahead, preparatory to her take-off.
Once in the air, he climbed to the prescribed thirty-five hundred feet. A sharp flipper turn brought the little amphibian on a compass course slightly west of north. Directly on his tail came Commander Thomson’s PB-1, with the other four planes of the squadron bringing up the rear in V-formation.
Bill, of course, did not know the exact location in Big Cypress of Martinengo’s gold diggings, but here Osceola’s uncanny bump of direction came into play once more. Not ever did the young Seminole appear at a loss. On they sped, straight as an arrow shot from a bow.
The sun was three-quarters down the horizon when they caught sight of the lagoon in the cypress swamp, with the stockade close beside it. They had timed their arrival to a nicety. The prisoners had just been locked up for the night and their guards were going to supper.
Forward went Bill’s stick and he dived for the buildings with a wide open throttle. He caught a fleeting glimpse of figures running on the open quadrangle that seemed rushing up to meet him. Then back came his stick again. The Loening bucked like a frightened bronco and zoomed upward a bare fifty feet above Mother Earth. As she rose, a weighted letter was dropped overboard.
Again Bill climbed, until his plane reached an altitude of possibly a hundred feet above the squadron, which had changed its formation and was now flying in a continuous circle, high above the stockade. Bill leveled off and sent his plane into a series of reverse control turns known as figure eights.
Less than five minutes later, the two in the Loening saw a procession of men form in front of the bosses’ headquarters. From there they marched two by two out of the stockade and down the corduroy to the dock. One of the leaders carried a white flag.
Bill reached for a pair of fieldglasses and clapped them to his eyes.
“Martinengo’s in front, with the flag!” he cried into the mouthpiece of his phone, nearly deafening Osceola in his excitement. “And yes—that’s Dad—beside him! Gee whiz! If I was a Frenchman, I could kiss the old Admiral! His letter did the trick, Osceola. That old boy is some humdinger!”
“Wonder what he said in it. It certainly brought them out in a hurry.”
Bill laughed. “Bellinger let me read it. Short and to the point—that’s the Navy. It read: ‘You are through, Martinengo. Walk down to the dock with your men—unarmed. Bring Mr. Bolton with you. My planes are bombers. Charles S. Black, Rear Admiral, U. S. N.’”
“Short and sweet, and very _much_ to the point!” laughed Osceola. Two seaplanes glided down out of the circular formation below them.
“There goes the skipper,” exclaimed Bill. “It’s about time we went down and you were introduced to Dad.”
“Okay, boy, but watch your step. We don’t want to crack up now when everything’s turned out so beautifully.”
“Unh-unh—Not me!” grinned Bill, and nosed her over.
————
Those who have liked this story will be interested in the next book of this series, _Bill Bolton and the Flying Fish_.
The End.

= = = PG48377 = = =
BILL BRUCE ON FOREST PATROL
E-text prepared by Roger Frank
Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 48377-h.htm or 48377-h.zip: (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/48377/48377-h/48377-h.htm) or (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/48377/48377-h.zip)
[Illustration: Bill worked his way backward toward the tail group.]
BILL BRUCE ON FOREST PATROL
by
MAJOR HENRY H. ARNOLD
Air Corps
Author of
“Bill Bruce and the Pioneer Aviators,” “Bill Bruce, the Flying Cadet,” “Bill Bruce Becomes an Ace,” “Bill Bruce on Border Patrol,” “Bill Bruce in the Trans-continental Race,” etc.
A. L. Burt Company Publishers—New York Printed in U. S. A.
*      *      *      *      *      *
THE AVIATOR SERIES
ADVENTURES OF A YOUNG AIRPLANE PILOT
FOR BOYS 12 TO 16 YEARS
By MAJOR HENRY H. ARNOLD AIR CORPS
Bill Bruce and the Pioneer Aviators Bill Bruce, the Flying Cadet Bill Bruce Becomes an Ace Bill Bruce on Border Patrol Bill Bruce on Forest Patrol Bill Bruce in the Trans-continental Race
Copyright, 1928 By A. L. BURT COMPANY
BILL BRUCE ON FOREST PATROL
Made in U. S. A.
*      *      *      *      *      *
CONTENTS
I A VACATION IN THE WOODS II THE FORESTRY SERVICE III WOOD LORE IV DRAFTED TO FIGHT A FOREST FIRE V A FOREST FIRE VI BACK TO ARMY DUTIES VII WORKING WITH THE ARTILLERY VIII NARROW ESCAPES IX AN UNEXPECTED DUTY X CLOUDS ON THE SISKIYOUS XI INTO THE SMOKE PALL XII A FOREST PATROL BASE XIII THE AERIAL FIRE PATROL XIV DOWN IN THE TIMBER XV ON FOOT MILES FROM ANYWHERE XVI A LOOKOUT STATION IN THE MOUNTAINS XVII BACK AT EUGENE XVIII THE WEATHER CHANGES XIX FISHES LARGE AND SMALL XX MORE ABOUT FISH XXI THE EUGENE AIRDROME XXII TRAPPED IN MIDAIR XXIII A NEW OUTBREAK OF FIRES XXIV HUNTING A FIREBUG XXV THE END OF THE FIRE SEASON
CHAPTER I—A VACATION IN THE WOODS
“Wake up, Bill, there’s a big fish on your line.”
“I should worry,” replied Bill as he lay on his back on the bank of the McKenzie River. “Let him do the worrying. I am having a marvelous time just lying here thinking how wonderful it is to be here in the Oregon woods. Perhaps in a day or two I will get sufficiently accustomed to the big outdoors, the gigantic trees and the wildlife to get enthusiastic over a fish. In the meantime, let him bite.”
Bill Bruce and Bob Finch were officers in the United States Army Air Service. They had been boyhood friends in Flower City, Long Island. At the outbreak of the World War they had enlisted as Flying Cadets and had been sent to the Ground School at the University of California, at Berkeley. They had both finished the ground work and then completed their flying training at the aviation field near Lake Charles, Louisiana.
A West Indian hurricane broke the monotony and routine of their training at the flying school and Bill was sent as a test pilot at an airplane factory. Bob had been sent to the aviation field at Mineola. Bill’s new duties required that he test out the latest type airplanes produced for the squadrons in France. It was here that he ran afoul of the dastardly work of a German sympathizer.
While Bill had been at Berkeley, another cadet by the name of Andre had become rabidly jealous of Bill. Andre had tried to discredit Bill and make out that Bill had cheated in an examination. Andre was fired. While at the airplane factory Bill had several narrow escapes, when airplanes which he was testing were found to be maliciously damaged. Andre was the culprit. He was caught, convicted, and was being taken to the penitentiary, but escaped.
Later Bill was sent to France, presumably with plans of the latest type airplane being produced, the Le Pere. While on board the ship, as Adjutant, he made frequent inspections to insure that the regulations concerning lights on deck were being carried out. On several instances he escaped being assaulted on the dark decks by a very narrow margin. His cabin was searched and it was quite evident that someone was endeavoring to secure the plans.
Finally, as the ship was nearing the coast of Ireland, Bill saw someone flashing lights from the deck. He tried to catch the miscreant, but was not successful on account of the darkness. The next day the ship was torpedoed. As the small boats were floating around, the sub came to the surface and took someone from one of the boats aboard. It was Andre. The Germans then tried to find Bill Bruce, but were prevented by the timely arrival of the U. S. destroyers.
Bill served at the front in the 94th Pursuit Squadron with Freddie Rickenbacker. He shot down his first plane, however, before joining up with the squadron. He was shot down between the lines in No-Man’s-Land and had several thrilling escapes during combats in the air, but came out of the war with a wound, several decorations and the title of “Ace.”
Following the war, Bill served on the United States-Mexican border with the Ninth Squadron. The work of the squadron required that they make frequent aerial patrols to prevent the smuggling of liquor, dope and aliens into the United States. Here again they ran afoul of Andre, who was masquerading under the name of Andrajo. Andre had organized a large gang of cut-throats for the one and only purpose of smuggling.
The squadron helped the border officials materially in uncovering this work. They were assigned the part of the border extending from San Diego, California, to Yuma, Arizona. Captain Lowell Smith was commanding the squadron and Bill Bruce was his senior flight commander. The pilots had been able to catch an airplane in the act of transporting dope, had broken up Andre’s attempt to make a forcible entry into the United States with four hundred Chinese, and thus had broken up the gang of renegades.
In the Fall, Bill had entered the trans-continental airplane race from San Francisco to New York and return. Bill met Andre again before and during the race. Andre sneaked across the line at El Centro and removed all the safety wires and cotter keys from the controls of Bill’s plane. For a while it looked as if Bill would not be able to get to San Francisco in time to participate, but he arrived the evening before the start.
Once in the race, Bill thought that he was entirely out of Andre’s reach, but on the return trip Bill’s plane was completely burned at Buffalo. Andre had again shown his hand. Bill secured authority to fly another plane, and after many difficulties and much hard flying won the race in spite of the fact that he landed at the finish with a dead engine. It had been a most spectacular and uncertain race from start to finish. Bill had won it by inches.
After the race the Ninth Squadron was relieved from border duty and sent to San Francisco for duty. Here they established a new airdrome along the shores of the bay almost within hailing distance of the Golden Gate. During the Winter and Spring, the pilots had been kept very busy with routine flying. It was now June and Bill Bruce and Bob Finch had taken a few days’ leave to get away from military routine. They had driven to Oregon by automobile and were spending their time fishing along the McKenzie River.
“A fine young fisherman you are,” said Bob as he ran over and grabbed Bill’s rod. “Did you come up here to fish or to day-dream?”
“Both,” answered Bill as he watched Bob struggle with the fish.
It was very evident that it was an unusually large fish, for it was putting up a hard fight. The rod bent almost double when the fish made a run for freedom. Bob was forced to let out more line to keep the fish from breaking the leader or snapping the rod. Bill was entirely satisfied to watch Bob’s endeavor to land the fish.
The stream was in general clear of snags and rocks, but there was one large tree trunk with several branches in the water toward which the fish always headed. To make matters more complicated, the banks of the river were lined with small bushes.
“I should say that it was a large fish,” said Bill after Bob had vainly tried for several minutes to bring it in. “It will get away from you yet.”
“Why don’t you come here and take your own rod then?” asked Bob.
“You are getting along very well. I wouldn’t think of depriving you of the pleasure of landing the first trout,” said Bill as he stood up and walked over to the place where Bob was working with the rod.
“Get the net,” called Bob. “I am getting it in close enough for you to catch him.”
The bank had a drop of about five feet. Bill took the net and stood looking for a place to get down to the water’s edge without getting his feet wet. He walked a short distance upstream and then slowly worked his way down to the water.
“You poor boob,” said Bob. “How can you get the fish way over there? There are a dozen bushes between us.”
“Swing your rod around this way,” called Bill.
“Come closer, I am not fishing with a telegraph pole.”
“Give me time,” said Bill. “This bank is slippery and I am liable to get wet.”
“Hurry up,” answered Bob. “I can’t keep working this fish forever.”
Once more the fish gave a violent pull on the line and Bob had to give it more line. Then he had the job of gradually reeling in the line as fast as he could while the fish darted around in large circles in the water. Once it made straight for the old tree trunk and both young aviators were sure that the line would get afoul of one of the branches, but by careful manipulation Bob managed to get the fish back into open water.
Bill meanwhile worked his way along the bank toward Bob. The point where the line entered the water came closer and closer to the shore. Bill reached out with his net, but could not quite stretch far enough.
“Bring it in a bit,” called Bill.
“Your rod is almost bent double now,” replied Bob. “Do you want me to break it?”
“Well, you’re the fisherman of this crowd,” said Bill. “It was you who suggested a vacation in the Oregon woods. I admit that I don’t know how to use this net. What do you do with it, immerse it gently in the water under the fish or make a wild swoop with it and scoop up the fish?”
“How do I know?” replied Bob. “I never saw one before.”
“I would rather have a shotgun and then I would be sure of getting the fish,” said Bill. “Don’t slow up on bringing him in while you are talking, for now that you have him this far, we ought to have fried trout for lunch.”
Bill stood on a stone near the bottom of the bank. There was just room enough for one of his feet. The other was dangling over the water. He was holding on to a small bush with one hand and leaning out over the water with the net in his other. Bob gradually worked the fish in closer to the shore.
“Bring him in closer. Reel in on your line,” called Bill. “I can’t stand down here forever.”
“I am trying to,” replied Bob. “There he is; catch him.”
The fish was now in close enough to be seen. It was a large fellow and must have weighed about two or three pounds. For a while Bill could do nothing but watch it as it worked its way back and forth against the taut line.
“Well, do something,” called Bob.
Bill then gave a violent swing with his net. As it hit the water with a splash, Bill lost his balance and fell prone into the water. For a while, line, net, fish and Bill were all tangled up in one small space. Bob did not know what to do. If he slackened up on the line, the fish would escape. If he didn’t, Bill would probably break the line.
“Get out of there, you will make me lose the fish,” yelled Bob.
The water was not deep and Bill came up after the splash in a kneeling position. He blew the water out of his mouth and nose and looked around. It was at that moment that Bob had called to him.
“You don’t think that I am here because I am enjoying it, do you?” he replied.
Then it was that Bob realized that the tension on his line had ceased. The fish was gone. Evidently the splashing around in the water had been enough to slacken the line and the fish had taken advantage of the opportunity to make its getaway.
“Well, the fish is gone,” said Bob. “You are a fine help. Come on out of the water.”
“What’s going on here?” called a deep voice from the bank.
Bob looked around to see who had asked the question. He saw a tall, lithe, dark-complexioned man in a grayish-green uniform. He wore a broad-brimmed felt hat, with the crown coming to a peak, and had a badge on his shirt.
“We’re fishing, and Bill fell into the water,” said Bob.
In the meantime Bill scrambled up the bank.
“I am the District Forester. My name’s Cecil. Have you a fishing license? Have you a campfire permit?”
“What I should have had was a bathing permit,” remarked Bill as he started to wring the water out of his clothes.
CHAPTER II—THE FORESTRY SERVICE
“I am Lieutenant Finch, and this is Lieutenant Bruce. We both are members of the Army Air Service,” said Bob when Bill had ceased speaking. “We have fishing licenses, but no campfire permits. We just arrived here this morning and haven’t had occasion to light a fire so far.”
“Babes in the woods,” remarked Cecil. “It is obvious that this is your first visit in a National Forest. No one is permitted to light a fire for any purpose in a National Forest during the forest fire season without a campfire permit. It is fortunate that I ran into you when I did, otherwise you might have been picked up by one of my rangers and then it would have cost you something as a fine. First I will fix up the permits, and then I will tell you something about these forests.”
Cecil then made out campfire permits for each of the two young aviators. He then gave them a large size “Help prevent fires” slogan to put on the windshield of their car.
“Let’s sit down,” said Cecil.
“You are both officials of the United States Government and, as such, should know something about our forestry service and what it does,” he continued after they had seated themselves on a log overlooking the river. “As you look at these giant trees around you, they probably don’t mean much to you. That Douglas fir over there is close to two hundred years old. Some of those pines close by are just as old. You can see that the lowest branches are over a hundred feet above the ground. The tops of those trees are over three hundred feet above us. An entire forest of those trees can be destroyed in a few hours through the carelessness of a man who is enjoying a vacation in the woods.”
“I never knew that trees grew so large,” said Bill. “I have seen the giant Redwood trees in California, but I thought that they were freaks of nature—that they were abnormal in timber life.”
“These trees are not as large in diameter as the California Redwoods, but there are a great many more of them,” replied Cecil. “We have mile after mile of trees as large and larger than these in Oregon and Washington. In order to protect these trees, the government has set aside certain forest preserves which are called National Forests. There are 152 National Forests in the United States. Each of these National Forests has a supervisor in charge. He has under him wardens, rangers and lookouts. These men all work to detect and suppress fires.”
“That is a large organization,” said Bill. “Why are so many men needed?”
“The forests in the United States cover a large area,” replied Cecil. “About twenty-nine per cent of the land area of the United States is covered with timber. This timber is valued at six billion dollars. Think of that. The Forestry Service has as its duty the protection of that government property.”
“I never knew that there was so much timber in this country,” said Bob. “We saw quite a lot as we drove up here, but six billion dollars’ worth is way beyond my comprehension.”
“There is a vast amount of timber here in the Northwest,” said Cecil. “In fact about one fourth of all the timber in the United States is located in Oregon and Washington. In spite of the fact that this timber is worth money, most of the fires in the forests are caused by the carelessness of man.”
“You don’t mean that they deliberately set the woods on fire, do you?” asked Bill.
“They don’t mean to, but the results are the same,” replied Cecil. “A camper forgets to put out his fire, he throws away a cigarette butt without extinguishing it, or he lights a cigar or pipe and throws the match down on the ground and the spark ignites the surrounding dried leaves. Then a fire is started in the woods. That is the reason for the campfire permits. It gives us a check on the people who come into the forests. We also have a chance to warn them about the dangers of forest fires and caution them as to the means that they should adopt to eliminate any chances of fires.”
“That’s very interesting,” said Bill Bruce. “Heretofore all that these woods have meant to me was just so many trees. Now I see the whole timbered area in a different light. Can you tell us how you go about locating a fire and what you do to put it out?”
“We have established lookouts on the highest peaks,” said Cecil. “Each of these lookouts has a map. As soon as he observes a column of smoke in the forest, he takes a sight on the fire and notes its bearing. The adjacent lookout does the same thing. As a result we have an intersection of two lines which gives the location of the fire. In the case of a small one, the local warden will gather together a few men and go and put it out. In the case of a large one, the forest supervisor mobilizes as many men as he can from the surrounding country and they try and localize it. In this way it burns itself out.”
“What do you mean by a small fire and a large one?” asked Bill.
“A small one is usually caught as soon as it starts,” replied Cecil. “A large one may cover thousands of acres and take hundreds of lives. The Hinckley fire in Minnesota burned over 160,000 acres, destroyed property valued at twenty-five million dollars and took the lives of four hundred and eighteen people. That was an unusually large fire. The Idaho fire covered larger acreage, but did not take as many lives. That fire burned over two million acres and burned eighty-five people to death. Recently we have managed to get the fires under control before they get anywhere near that large.”
“What per cent of fires are caused by carelessness?” asked Bob.
“About eighty-five per cent of the 28,000 forest fires occurring each year are due to human carelessness,” explained Cecil. “Each year we hope that the number will be smaller, but the automobiles are bringing more campers into the woods all the time. We are trying to educate our visitors up to the point where they will consider the trees their property as citizens of the United States and will guard against their destruction just as if they were privately owned. You probably have noticed the signs posted up everywhere cautioning people to use every care to prevent fires.”
“Can you always extinguish a fire with man power?” asked Bill.
“It is sometimes very hard in the case of some of the larger fires,” replied Cecil. “At times when we are about to throw up our hands in despair, a providential rain will save the day. Then, on the other hand, we may have a bad thunder storm and find as many as twenty or thirty new fires burning where trees have been struck by lightning.”
Cecil took out a pipe and lighted it. After he had the tobacco burning, Bill noticed that before throwing the match away, he broke it into two pieces.
“Why did you break that match?” asked Bill. “I noticed that it was no longer burning, and yet you seemed to be particularly careful to break it before throwing it to the ground.”
“All real woodsmen use that means of being sure that they are not dropping a spark when they think that the match is entirely extinguished. There is no doubt of the match being out by the time that you have broken it in half. That’s another thing, during certain extra dry seasons, we do not allow any smoking at all in the forests. I have bored you enough with this shop talk. May I join you in a little fishing?”
“By all means,” said Bill. “We don’t know much about it. In fact, do not know the kind of fish that we are trying to catch other than they are trout.”
“You are liable to catch steelhead, rainbow, locklaven or brook trout in the river here,” said Cecil. “What kind of flies are you using?”
“We aren’t using flies, we were using worms,” replied Bob.
“That’s no way to go trout fishing,” said Cecil. “It is not sporting. Give the fish a chance. You can get your limit with flies, so why use worms?”
“We didn’t catch any with worms,” replied Bill. “I thought that we were going to, when I fell into the river, but the big one that we had hooked broke away. We have some flies, but we did not know which to use.”
“That’s a rather hard question to decide,” remarked Cecil. “Trout are particular creatures. One can never tell at what they will strike. Some days they will strike at flies similar to those you see flying over the water. That is, if white flies are flying low over the water, use an artificial white fly. However, that rule doesn’t always hold good. I have been fishing when there were millions of live white flies all over the water and the trout would not even rise for the one on my line, but when I put a dark one on, I caught all kinds of fish.”
Cecil walked back to the trail along the river and secured his rod and line from his car. Bill and Bob watched him carefully as he put on the reel, wet his leaders in the water and then threaded his line along the rod.
“I think that I will try a dark fly,” he said, as he attached a leader to the line.
Both of the aviators were astonished when Cecil cast his line out onto the river. The line went out with his casts at gradually increasing distances until it was dropping his fly a good sixty feet from the shore. The fly landed on the water without the semblance of a splash. In fact, it alighted on the water very similar to the live flies which occasionally dropped to the water’s surface. It rested for a moment and then Cecil brought it back with a slight movement of the arm and cast to another place. Bill was too much interested to do anything but stand and watch. Bob, on the other hand, watched for a few moments and then went some distance down the river and tried to emulate Cecil’s graceful casting.
“One of the most important things to remember when fishing for trout, is to stay out of sight,” said Cecil. “Trout are wary creatures and can see you long before you can see them.”
There was a splash in the water near his fly and Cecil started to play the fish. He did it entirely different from the way that Bob had. He allowed the fish a certain amount of run, but consistently brought it closer into shore and then finally threw it onto the bank with a slight flip of his arm.
“Not so bad for a start,” said Cecil, as he unhooked the fish and held it up for Bill to see. “A three-quarter pound rainbow. A few more of these and we will have enough for lunch.”
“It looks easy enough when you do it,” remarked Bill. “I think that I will try my luck.”
“You can never learn by watching someone else,” said Cecil.
“I will go upstream a little way,” said Bill. “You will have lunch with us, won’t you?”
“Thanks very much,” replied Cecil. “I’ll meet you here at twelve o’clock. Watch out for the steelheads. You will need a net if you get a real large one on your hook.”
Bill walked a distance upstream and started to fish. He picked out a place on the bank where the bushes were low and sufficiently open for him to try casting. At first he had nothing but grief. His line became tangled in the bushes and overhanging branches from the trees. It kept him busy for quite some time disentangling his line. Once it was so badly tangled that he had to cut off part of it. Finally he managed to get it out on the water, but it landed with a splash and then only a short distance from the river bank.
The more he tried, the worse it seemed, and then he managed to make a good cast. His fly landed thirty feet or more out in the water. It had no sooner struck the water than a small trout grabbed the hook. Bill had a real thrill as he reeled the fish in. He brought it in so that he could see it swimming around in the water. Then evidently he became over-anixous, for he tried to throw it out on the bank, but instead jerked the fish loose and it was gone.
Later when he looked at his watch and saw that it was time to return, he had four small trout in his creel. He wound up his line as he walked back to the automobile. Long before he arrived he saw the smoke from a fire. Cecil was already starting lunch.
“How many did you get?” asked Cecil.
“Four,” replied Bill. “How many did you get?”
“The limit,” said Cecil. “Some of them are fair-sized fish. Some of them not so large, but just the right size for eating. Have you ever built a fire in the woods according to the approved method, which eliminates all possibility of starting a forest fire?”
“No, I never have,” replied Bill.
“You should know how,” said Cecil. “You are going to stay here in the woods for a while and it may save you a lot of trouble. I will show you now.”
CHAPTER III—WOOD LORE
“Here comes Bob,” said Bill Bruce as they walked toward the campfire. “I wonder if he had any more luck than I did.”
“How many did you get, Finch?” asked Cecil when Bob joined them.
“I managed to catch seven, but you should have seen the big fellow which broke away just as I was about to land him,” replied Bob.
“That’s the usual fisherman’s story,” said Cecil. “You already have acquired one of the prime requisites of a regular fisherman. The largest fish always gets away. Let’s see what you caught.”
“That’s a fine rainbow,” he continued, as Bob pulled the fish, one at a time, from his creel. “That one is a salmon trout. When we eat it for lunch you will see that it is different from the others in that it has salmon-colored meat. You caught a variety: rainbow, salmon, brook and locklaven. Where were you fishing?”
“I must have walked five miles down the river,” said Bob. “I followed up several streams for short distances, but I never seemed to catch more than one fish in any one place.”
“That’s natural,” said Cecil. “I imagine that you were not very careful about showing yourself over the edge of the bank. You probably were seen by the fish before or as soon as they saw your fly.”
“Mr. Cecil is going to show us how to build a safe and sane campfire,” said Bill.
“That’s a good idea,” said Bob. “If we are going to be in the woods as long as we have planned, we ought to know how to build a fire that will not start a forest fire.”
“I am glad to see that you have brought a shovel and axe with you,” remarked Cecil. “You can never tell when you will need one or both in the woods. Some Forest Supervisors require all campers to be equipped with shovels and axes before they are allowed to enter a National Forest.”
“Campfires are mighty easy things to start, but unless they are built properly, you can never tell when they are completely extinguished. The bed of pine needles, dried leaves and partially decayed wood in all forests burn very easily, and it is extremely hard to be certain that the fire has not worked its way under the surface. Many times people have left their campfires believing that they were completely extinguished when the entire area was honeycombed with sparks beneath the surface. The campers left their fire thinking that they had done their duty in regard to the rules and regulations concerning forest fires. Shortly after they had gone, the sparks would burn through to the surface and trouble would start for the fire-fighters. Such occurrences are not confined to tenderfeet alone, for some men with years of hunting and camping experience have been guilty of the same neglect.
“In building a campfire, the first thing that should be done is to dig up and clear away all the inflammable material in the vicinity of the bed of the fire. If possible, the fire should be laid on hard soil or rocks. Then a narrow trench toward the wind will furnish a draft. If you notice, I have not much wood on that fire. A lot of wood is not necessary for a hot flame. A small amount placed properly and renewed as required will give a concentrated heat. Never allow the flame to blaze higher than is needed for the cooking. When you have finished and are leaving the vicinity, if only for a couple of hours, be sure that the fire is out. You cannot put a fire out in the woods by throwing dirt on it. Go to the nearest stream and get enough water to thoroughly quench all signs of fire. The water must sink down below the surface in soil like this and extinguish any sparks which may have worked under the surface.”
“I see that you have your trout all ready for the pan,” said Bill. “I think that I will clean mine.”
“Do you know how to do it as a woodsman does?” asked Cecil.
“I never cleaned one in my life,” replied Bill.
“I’ll show you how,” said Cecil. “It is the easiest way and also takes much less time. Bring your fish down to the river.”
“There are lots of ways to clean a trout,” remarked Cecil when they reached the water’s edge. “From the forester’s point of view, there is only one right way. Take the fish in your hand with its belly up. Cut a slit across just in back of its gills. Then all that you have to do is to put your finger into the slit, grab a hold of the center of the belly with the finger and your thumb and give a slight pull toward the tail. The trout is cleaned. Three movements are all that are necessary.”
“It looks quite easy the way that you do it,” said Bill. “Now I’ll try it.”
Neither Bill nor Bob could do it anywhere as smoothly as Cecil when they first tried it, but they became more expert as they practiced. Soon they lost their awkwardness and took but a few seconds for each fish.
“Now you have the idea,” said Cecil. “It’s a good thing to remember, for it takes but a couple of seconds for each trout. However, don’t try it on fish of a coarser type, for it will not work.”
“We have a steak that we brought with us,” said Bill when they returned to the fire. “It probably will not keep much longer. We will have to cook it, too. Bob, you had better get another pan ready.”
“Why not swing the steak?” asked Cecil.
“What do you mean, ‘swing a steak’?” asked Bill. “Is that a way to fix it so that it will keep?”
“No, that’s a way to cook it,” said Cecil. “It always seems to taste better after being cooked that way. I don’t know whether it is imagination or whether the fragrance of the burning wood really does permeate into the meat. Have you a griddle? If you have, we will try it.”
“I’ll get the griddle,” said Bill.
Cecil took the griddle and suspended it by three wires so that it hung in a horizontal position. He then attached the wires to a tripod made from some saplings. By the time that he had finished, the trout had been fried and were placed along side the fire to keep warm. Cecil took the tripod and placed it over the fire. The steak was placed in the griddle and gently swung back and forth just above the tops of the flames.
“Get a stick, Bruce,” said Cecil. “You can swing this while I do something else. As soon as the bottom starts to get brown, turn the steak. That will keep the juice in the meat. It begins to look as if we are going to have a real meal. I am sorry that some of my Oregon friends did not happen along with a venison mince pie. If we had one of them, we would be sitting on the top of the world.”
“It is nothing more than mince pie made out of venison instead of regular meat,” he continued when he saw the surprised expression written on the faces of the young aviators. “These Oregon people make them during the Fall and Winter. If you ever get a chance, be sure and taste one.”
In the meantime, Cecil was busy arranging the plates, knives, forks and spoons on an improvised table on the top of an old tree trunk. Smaller logs were brought up for chairs. So it was that Bill and Bob ate their first meal in the woods. Trout, baked potatoes, bread, butter, jam, coffee and, best of all, the steak. It was as Cecil had said, “Better than when cooked in the ordinary manner.” It seemed to have absorbed some of the pungent aroma of the burning wood.
Overhead the sun was masked by a roof formed by the thickly matted trees. The smell of the timber land permeated the air, a smell which one can only find in the forest. It seemed as if they were in the wilderness, where they were the pioneers blazing the trail for others to follow. To Cecil it may have been an old story, but to Bill and Bob it was the thrill that only comes with a new and enjoyable experience.
“It seems a shame that civilized people should be responsible for the destruction of such a place as this,” said Bill after a while. “It’s all so beautiful, so entirely different from what we are accustomed to. I’ll bet that the Indians never burned the forests intentionally.”
“I am not so sure about that,” commented Cecil. “According to the best advices which we have, the Indians in some instances used to burn out the woods so that they would not be bothered by the underbrush when they were hunting. Once they started a fire, they never tried to put it out. It always burned until it reached a natural barrier and then burned itself out. However, ordinarily the Indians were very much afraid of a forest fire, as it destroyed their villages. So it seems that they liked to have the fires under certain conditions, but they wanted to apply the torch themselves.”
“There must have been some mighty bad fires in those days,” said Bob.
“The lightning has always been responsible for many bad fires as far back as we have any records,” said Cecil. “Then, again, the early pioneers were not as careful as they might have been. There is one case on record where a young fellow was returning home after calling on a young lady who lived several miles away on another clearing. It was almost dark when he started home. He was either afraid to go home in the dark or was uncertain as to the proper trail to take. In any event, he set a match to a long burr of a sugar pine. That made a very good torch and served its purpose exceptionally well. However, when the first one burned so low that it was about to scorch his fingers, he lighted another one and threw the partly consumed one down alongside the trail. He continued this all the way home, and as a result there were many small fires, about equally spaced, burning through the forest.
“That young fellow was quite proud of his achievement. He had found a new means of illuminating the trail at night, but the early settlers were not so pleased with his accomplishment. There were not many of these pioneers in the locality and they had a mighty hard time in putting out those fires. The pine needles along the trail burned fast and furious for quite a while.”
“How can you tell the age of a tree?” asked Bill.
“That can’t be done until the tree is cut down,” said Cecil. “Each year during the life of a tree a complete coating of fibre is formed around the trunk of a tree underneath the bark. These coatings take the form of rings and are called ‘Annual Rings.’ They are formed in regular sequence around the center. By counting the rings the age of the tree is determined.”
“Why go to all that trouble?” asked Bob. “If there is one ring for each year and the rings are all the same size, why not measure the diameter of the tree and divide by the distance between the rings?”
“It would be much simpler if we could do it that way, but unfortunately the distance is not the same in any two different kinds of trees, or even in the same tree,” replied Cecil. “There are many things that affect the growth of trees. For instance, if a young tree is crowded for light and room, the rings will be very close together. Then if the surrounding trees dies or are cut down and the crowded condition relieved, the young tree will grow much faster and the distance between two rings may be the same as that between seven or eight rings during the period of slow growth. Two trees growing side by side, although they may be of the same species, may have entirely differently spaced annual rings.”
“How large do trees get?” asked Bill.
“That depends upon the species,” replied Cecil. “One of the giant trees in the Sequoia National Park was undermined by a creek a short time ago and fell. That, as you know, was a Redwood. They made a cross section of that tree seventy feet above the base and it measured eleven feet in diameter. The tree was 280 feet tall and had a base diameter of twenty-one feet. The annual rings showed it to be 1,932 years old. Of course those trees are the oldest living things in the world.
“Other species do not get so large in the trunk but grow higher. You yourself remarked about that flagpole at San Francisco. That tree must have been over five hundred feet tall when it was standing here in these woods, and yet its trunk probably did not measure over fifteen feet in diameter. You can see some of the large Douglas fir and pines over there. They have not such large trunks but their tops are well up in the air. The average is well over three hundred feet. Take the Juniper, for instance; it is rare that we find one over ten feet in diameter. The foresters in Nevada made quite a news item out of one they found up in the mountains at the head of Broncho Creek. It was located at an altitude of about eight thousand feet and was a monster of its kind. For its diameter near the base was fifteen feet. It is rarely ever that we find a black walnut over fifty inches in diameter when fifty years old. An inch a year is a rapid growth for that tree.
“Well, boys, this is all very pleasant, but I must be moving along,” he continued. “It looks as if this is going to be a bad summer for fires. The woods, as you can see, are well dried out, for we have not had any rain for several weeks. If fires start, they will be mighty hard to put out. As you may judge, I am a regular bug on this forest fire business. I like the woods and am always working to protect it. Nothing would suit me better than to be able to continue with you on your fishing trip, where I could really enjoy the woods, but I have to get up to the Supervisor’s headquarters in the Cascade Forest. They had a bad fire there yesterday and it may be burning now. I may see you on the way back. Much obliged for the lunch. Don’t forget to put out your fire.”
“We are much obliged to you for starting us out right,” said Bill as Cecil walked over to his car. “I hope that you can stop over with us. Good-bye.”
The boys cleaned up after their meal and sat for a while loafing under the trees.
“Where will we spend the night?” asked Bob.
“Let’s go up the river a little farther,” said Bill.
They poured water on their fire and were packing their equipment in the car when Bill stopped working. He had caught the smell of burning wood. There was no smoke coming from his campfire, but the odor was unmistakable.
“Bob, there’s a fire somewhere around here. I can smell it.”
CHAPTER IV—DRAFTED TO FIGHT A FOREST FIRE
“There’s no fire, Bill,” said Bob. “You smell the smoke from our fire. When we put it out, it smoked terribly and the odor is all around us.”
“No, Bob, our fire has been out too long. There’s a fire somewhere near here sure as shooting. I can’t see the smoke, but I can surely smell it.”
“Well, what shall we do about it?” asked Bob.
“There’s nothing that we can do for the present,” answered Bill. “Let’s pack up and get going. We ought to pick out some place above here on the river where we can make a good camp for the night.”
They packed their equipment in their car and started up the road. The river was beautiful with the large trees on both sides. The sun was still high in the sky and here and there, where the road came out into the open, it seemed as if they had emerged from a tunnel. Everything was so much brighter. There was practically no wind and they came to long reaches where the river ran along for a considerable distance without a ripple. At other places the river ran over rapids and the splashing, bubbling water presented a decided contrast to the placid surface of the other parts of the river.
As they continued, the river became narrower, the valley in which they were traveling more confined, the sides of the mountains steeper and the vegetation thicker. They were gradually ascending into the mountains. Here and there they obtained a view through the trees of the country ahead or behind. The mountain sides were thickly covered with trees, which formed a beautiful green covering that followed the contour of the ridges and valleys. Once in a while they saw an area which had been burned over at some previous time. The snags, tall, gaunt, white skeletons of what had been magnificent trees, were scattered through the second growth timber. Nature was trying to remove all traces of the fire with the small trees, but the snags stood there as grim reminders of the forest’s former grandeur.
Here and there a pioneer had taken out a homestead and had cleared the ground in the immediate vicinity of his crude buildings. Usually some attempt had been made to cultivate part of the cleared area, but there were always a few sections still covered with the stumps of trees which had been cut. A couple of horses, several cows and some pigs roamed through the clearing as the nucleus of future herds of live stock. Bill marveled at the bravery of the men bringing their families to such a wild section of the country.
They came out on an open space where the river made a sharp curve. The road had been built on top of a steep cliff. Ahead of them was a narrow cut in the mountains through which the river flowed. Beyond the cut Bill saw what he thought to be a cloud of smoke. It seemed to be as thick and dense as a rain cloud. Bob stopped the car when Bill pointed at it.
“There must be a whopping big fire ahead of us,” said Bill. “I guess that Cecil must have arrived there right in the thick of it.”
“You must have an awful good nose, if you could smell that from where we were, five miles down the river,” said Bob. “It’s a fire all right, and looks as if it were a big one.”
“Let’s go on up and see it,” suggested Bill. “It must be an awful but fascinating thing to see.”
“All right, we are on our way,” said Bob, as he started the car again.
As they drove farther along the road the cleared spaces became less frequent. The timber closed over the road and shut out the rays of the sun almost completely. There was no doubt now as to the presence of the smell of burning wood in the atmosphere. Finally they reached a point where they were under the smoke. The sun was almost entirely obliterated from view. It was just like traveling on a cloudy day. Prior to their reaching the smoke cloud, the sun had reflected itself from the bright leaves of the trees, but now there was just a red glow which marked the position of the sun.
“We must be getting close to it now,” said Bob after a while. “The smoke is so thick that one could cut it with a knife.”
“It’s probably farther off than we think,” replied Bill. “The wind is blowing from the East and bringing the smoke toward us.
“I think that we had better stop here,” said Bob. “I don’t want to lose this car, and if we get too close the fire may burn it up before we can get it out.”
“We will probably run into the fire-fighters long before we get within the danger zone,” said Bill. “With Cecil present, they probably have certainly gathered a large bunch of men together to fight the fire.”
“We will go along a little farther and see what develops,” replied Bob.
The road wound through the trees and followed the curve of the river so that they could not see very far ahead. The visibility was further restricted by the high bushes which bordered the road and the river. They were driving slowly along a particularly narrow curving section of the road, when Bob saw another car coming around a bend just a short distance ahead. Bob slammed on his brakes. It looked as if there was going to be a collision, for the other car was approaching very rapidly. There was no room to pass, for the river was close on one side and the other side was marked by large trees.
Bill and Bob could do nothing as their car had already stopped, but the other was still moving forward. Bill at first thought of jumping out, but he saw that the other car was slowing up and decided to stick with Bob. The other car came to a stop just as the bumpers hit.
Neither Bill nor Bob had looked at the occupants of the car, as they were too busy trying to make up their minds just how hard the two cars were going to hit. Consequently they were watching the car rather than the occupants. When they did look up, they saw Cecil at the wheel.
“Wait a minute,” said Bob. “I’ll back up and you can pass.”
“All right,” said Cecil. “That was rather close. This road is not very wide and it is far from straight. I am sorry that I did not see you sooner, but I was thinking about other things.”
Bob found it rather difficult to back his car along the winding road, but he finally reached a point where there was room enough for the cars to pass. Cecil stopped his car as he came abreast.
“Where’s the fire?” asked Bill.
“It’s about four miles up the road,” replied Cecil. “It’s burning down the west slope of the next ridge.”
“We thought that we would go up and see it,” said Bill.
“I am afraid that you will do more than that,” interjected Cecil. “You will have to go up and join the fire-fighting crew.”
“We don’t know much about fighting fires,” said Bob. “But we will do what we can.”
“You will never learn any younger,” said Cecil. “Then, again, it is one of the accepted laws of the Northwest woods that anyone can be drafted to fight forest fires. We need all of the help that we can get on this one, as it has the earmarks of developing into a rip-snorter. Continue on this road for another three miles and then you will come to Sam Crouch’s clearing. Turn there and leave your car at his place. Then take your shovel and axe and follow a trail that runs almost due east from his place. Out on the trail about a mile you will see the first of the fire-fighters. Report to the forest warden, Earl Simmons. He will give you something to do and tell you how to do it. I am on my way back to Portland. It seems that several fires have broken out in other parts of this district. I have to get back on the job. I am sorry that I will not be able to go fishing with you again on this trip. Good luck to you.”
Cecil had gone almost before he had finished speaking. Bill and Bob watched the car disappear around a turn in the road and then all was quiet for a moment.
“There goes our fishing trip,” said Bob. “I had hopes of finding a nice place somewhere along here where we could fish for a couple of hours and then make camp for the night.”
“We thought that we were getting away from the constraining requirements of Army life, but we have apparently run into another service which has just as rigid demands,” announced Bill. “I guess that our fishing trip will be postponed for a while. Let’s go and see what it’s all about.”
Once more they started up the river road. The next three miles were covered very slowly as the road was not very wide and the curves were almost continuous. For a while they were afraid that they would not know Sam Crouch’s place when they came to it, but they were soon disabused of the idea, for they did not come to any clearing. They were passing through almost virgin woods.
Bob watched the speedometer with a view of checking up on the distance. It showed that they had traveled three miles, but there was not a sign of a clearing. Bob stopped the car.
“Here’s the three miles, but where’s the clearing?” he said.
“Shove along a little farther,” suggested Bill. “Perhaps your ideas of three miles from your speedometer and Cecil’s idea are not synchronized.”
“I don’t want to run right into that fire,” replied Bob. “The road may lead right through it. We are so close now that I think that I hear the flames crackling. Can you hear them?”
“I not only hear them, but also imagine that I can see them,” replied Bill. “The fire is not far off, but drive around that next bend.”
They turned the next bend and came out at the clearing. Bob drove into the cut-over area and stopped his car near the house.
“It’s the right place, all right,” said Bill. “I saw the name ‘S. Crouch’ on the mail box by the road.”
There was not a soul around the house. The chickens and live stock, the growing vegetables in the garden and the farm implements in the yard indicated that the owner could not be far away, but he was nowhere in the immediate vicinity.
“Is anyone home?” called Bill at the top of his voice.
There was no answer.
“I guess that it is up to us to find that trail leading east from here without assistance,” said Bill. “There is no doubt about our being near the fire now, is there?”
“You get the shovel and I’ll get the axe,” said Bob. “Let’s see if we can find the trail.”
“There appear to be a flock of trails leading out of here,” said Bill as they walked along. “We are going toward the fire, and I hope that we are on the right one.”
The trail wound around as it mounted the ridge. It was just wide enough for one man, so that Bill walked in front and Bob followed. The smoke became much denser, the crackling of the burning wood much stronger, and it seemed as if any moment they would walk right into the fire.
“Cecil said that it was only a mile from the Crouch house,” said Bob.
“Well, we haven’t walked a mile yet,” replied Bill as he quickened his pace.
They reached the top of the ridge and rounded a turn in the trail. Bill stopped short, for directly ahead of him was a small, rotund man standing with his back toward them.
“Is Mr. Simmons anywhere near here?” asked Bill
“You bet your neck he is,” replied the man. “I am Mr. Simmons. What can I do for you before you start work on this fire?”
“Nothing,” replied Bill. “Mr. Cecil sent us up to help you.”
CHAPTER V—A FOREST FIRE
“You are just in time,” said Simmons. “I am sending out a crew to try and limit the southern movement of the fire. Have either of you ever fought a forest fire before?”
“Neither one of us,” replied Bill.
“You’ll soon learn,” said Simmons. “Most tenderfeet coming up here for a vacation find it rather hard work and soon tire out, but you will be a help as long as you last.”
Simmons turned and Bill noticed three other men standing by.
“Sam,” called Simmons, “you can take these two youngsters and do that job. I will send those other men over to help Ridley.”
“This is Sam Crouch,” said Simmons as Crouch came toward them. “He will be in charge of you. All that you have to do is to follow his instructions. You had better get going, Sam.”
“Go over to that pile of tools and get another shovel,” said Sam. “One axe ought to do for both of you.”
They started out down the side of the ridge. Sam Crouch had a shovel, some gunny-sacks and an axe; Bill was carrying the same load. Bob followed along with a shovel. Bill was rather put out that he had been called a tenderfoot. He was determined that he would show them that he had the strength and endurance of any of these so-called woodsmen. He would show them when they started to work on the fire.
Crouch soon left the trail and struck directly through the woods. He walked with a long swinging stride that covered ground rapidly. Bill found that it took everything that he had to keep up. The bushes were up to their necks. The branches caught the shovels and axes, but Sam never slowed down a bit.
The footing was none too good. They were going down hill and the pine needles were slippery. When they were not traveling on the needles, they were forcing their way through dense underbrush with tangled vines and ferns which caught in their feet and tripped them. At times Bill had difficulty in keeping Sam Crouch in sight. When Bill stopped to release his feet from a vine, Sam disappeared ahead, and then Bill had to hurry to catch up. Sam never showed the slightest indications of slowing down. It was always on, on, down the mountain side.
Occasionally they would encounter a tree trunk which extended across their line of march. If it was comparatively small, Sam would jump over it. If it was too large to climb over, he would turn along the trunk and go around the end. Bill had to admit that he was getting tired.
The mountain side seemed endless. Bill was sure that Sam had lost his way and was wandering about through the forest aimlessly. He could not see the direction that they were following, for the underbrush and trees overhead limited his view to the immediate surroundings. He saw Sam stop a short distance ahead. Now they were certainly going to have a rest. When he came up to the woodsman he found out his mistake. They had reached an extra large tree trunk bordering on a steep, rocky cliff which took some maneuvering to pass.
The sun was completely hidden by the smoke, but the heat was stifling. The crackling of the burning timber sounded as if it were a few feet distant. Bill jumped backward when he heard the first falling tree. The tree dropped with a crash which resounded throughout the valley. He could not imagine what had caused the noise at first, for it had come so unexpectedly. It reminded him of the first bomb that he had heard when the Germans bombed the airdrome from which he was flying in France—no advance warning, nothing to herald its approach, just the crash and “wham” of the exploding bomb. After thinking it over, he was sure that it was a falling tree which had caused the noise. There was nothing else around which could have caused the same shattering roar. It must have been a large tree, too.
They came out into the open and Bill obtained a view of the valley below and the opposite ridge Crouch stopped to study the fire and make up his plan for fighting it. He stood awestruck, watching the terrible sight across the small valley. Bob came up and joined him. Both were tired, but the sight held them spellbound.
The fire seemed to reach from the bottom of the valley to the top of the ridge, and from one end of the mountain to the other. The exact limits were not discernible on account of the thick foliage. Smoke was boiling up with a rush over an area of about eight hundred acres. Down along the McKenzie there had not been much wind, but here around the fire a strong east wind was driving the smoke and fire before it. At times the flames shot up into the air at least a hundred feet and then died down and disappeared below the foliage. The smoke poured up incessantly.
Although they were still at least a quarter of a mile away from the near edge of the fire, the noise was deafening. Bill was watching a large tree in the midst of the fire. The fire had evidently been burning around it for some time, and it must have weathered prior fires which weakened its trunk, for it suddenly fell with a crash that sent a cloud of smoke and fire upwards with a roar. He could not tell which was the louder, the shattering crash of the tree or the roar of the flames. When the wind struck that column of smoke and fire, it scattered sparks in all directions and new fires seemed to start in parts of the forest hitherto untouched.
The fire had reached the tree tops in one section of the woods. Crouch called their attention to that particular area. It was a sight which would never be forgotten by either Bill or Bob. They were looking at one of the most terrifying of all kinds of forest fires—a crown fire. The flames seemed to be alive. They acted as if guided by some diabolical hand as they carried their destruction onward. They leaped from tree top to tree top with an incredible speed. At times their motion was almost too rapid for the eye to follow. A sheet of flames covered the tops of all the trees in that particular part of the forest so completely that the green foliage below was completely hidden.
“It’s a wonderful but appalling sight,” said Bill. “It fascinates me, but makes me shudder to see such widespread destruction. It is almost human in its method of operating. Think of the wasted force and power. Those giant trees are stripped and destroyed as if they were match sticks.”
“I don’t see what can be done to stop that,” said Bob. “It is far beyond control. It’s a monster of a fire!”
“Just stick around and you will be surprised,” said Sam. “Oak Tree Creek runs along the south end of that ridge. It has a wide meadow along portions of its banks. We will try and keep the fire from crossing that creek. I think that we can get away with it. Let’s go.”
They were off again. Bill was not so sure that he would be able to keep up with Sam. He was setting a mighty fast pace. If Sam worked as rapidly as he walked, Bill knew that it would take everything that he had to hold up his end. Once more they were tramping through the thick underbrush. The walking was hard, but it did not last very long, for they soon came out along a small creek.
The creek did not come up to Bill’s expectations. He had visioned a wide expanse of meadow land with a creek winding its way through the tall grass. What they actually found was a narrow creek which followed a natural cut through the woods. Here and there it ran through a small open space where the trees did not meet. These open spaces were the meadow land.
“I am going to start some backfires along this creek,” shouted Sam to make himself heard above the deafening roar of the fire. “We will have to watch them closely to see that they do not spread over to the other side of the creek. If the sparks blow across, put them out at once with wet gunny-sacks. I believe your name’s Bill?”
“That’s me,” said Bill.
“Well, Bill, you stay here and work along up the creek. I will drop Bob off up the creek about fifty yards. In some cases you may have to dig shallow trenches to stop the fire. In others the fire will stop itself when it reaches the green grass. We can keep the backfires under control and head them at the other fire. When the two meet our work is done. Get the idea?”
“How about the fire spreading west?” asked Bill.
“This creek runs into Cow Creek a couple of rods down,” said Sam. “Simmons has a whole flock of people working along Cow Creek.”
The backfires were started. To keep them headed in the right direction, Bill in some places cleared away the dried leaves, but in others it was not necessary, as the fires were started along the creek bank. At times he found entirely different conditions where he had to dig shallow trenches to confine the fire. Bob and Sam disappeared into the woods, leaving a trail of smoke and flame to mark their trail. Bill was alone. He was terribly tired, so tired that he could hardly move.
He threw himself on the ground to rest. It was cool lying there and so hot working with the shovel digging trenches. The walk had not been an easy one, either. For a few seconds he took things easy and enjoyed the cool shade by the stream. Then a burning snag fell to the ground a short distance away. It was so close that Bill could see the column of sparks mount almost indefinitely into the sky. The crash of that snag jerked Bill to his feet and back to his job.
The fires were now all along the creek and the smoke was blinding. At times the backfires became unruly and he had to work at full speed to keep them under control. The heat became intense and everything that he had on was soaking wet. His arms and shoulders were so fatigued that he could hardly move them, but he kept on working.
Bill looked down the stream toward where he had started and saw that the fire was dying out. This gave him confidence in the work that he was doing. He could see that he was getting results from his tiring efforts.
His hands, face and arms were covered with black from the flying ashes and partly burned particles of wood or leaves. His skin was burned by the heat of the fire. His hands were a mass of blisters from the shovel and axe. It was the hardest work that he had ever done. How long he had been at it, he did not know. It seemed as if hours had passed since Sam and Bob had disappeared in the smoke.
One after another of the backfires joined with its neighbor. They gradually extended farther and farther away from the creek until there was a broad black belt separating the creek from the main fire. The backfiring had been a success in that area if not in any other. The main fire could not get across a space which had already been burned.
Bill continued to work up the stream. Soon he came to a place where someone else had obviously worked on a backfire. When he was sure that there was a continuous line of burned ground along the stream in his area, he went back again to be sure that no new fires had started while he was gone. Everything was as he had left it. His first fire-fighting had been a success.
The main fire was much nearer, but Bill no longer felt any danger from that. Let it come, it could not pass the wall which he had built across its front. Bill sat down along the creek to cool off and rest while waiting for Sam and Bob to return.
CHAPTER VI—BACK TO ARMY DUTIES
It had been a long, hard day for Bill Bruce. He had fished all morning and had rested a while after lunch, but since the time that Cecil had left, he had been working hard. The automobile trip to Couch’s ranch had been only ten or fifteen miles and had lasted but a comparatively few minutes, but the hike through the woods and the fire-fighting were much different.
Exhausted by the hard hike through the underbrush and bushes, the manual labor of fighting the fire had completed the job and there was not a muscle in Bill’s body which did not ache and pain. He had no idea as to the time of day. The smoke had obscured the sunlight so that he could not estimate the hour, and he was too tired to even look at his watch. He didn’t care much, either.
As a matter-of-fact, it was late in the afternoon when he finally returned and sank down alongside the creek bank after his last patrol along the fire line. How long he had been sitting there he did not know, but it was beginning to get dark when he heard voices. The fire was gradually burning itself out. The sharp, ear-splitting crackling of the flames was much less audible. The smoke was just as thick as ever, but the terrifying aspect of the fire was gone. Simmons had done his job well. The fire had been conquered.
Bill recognized the voices as those of Crouch and Bob. He could not see them, but heard them talking as they approached the place where he was sitting. Bill jumped up in spite of his aching muscles.
“We left Bill along here somewhere,” said Crouch.
“Hello, Bill,” called Bob.
“Here I am,” replied Bill.
“Well, we did our part,” said Crouch when he came to where Bill was standing. “It looks to me as if the fire has lost all its dangers now. The men with Simmons can handle it from now on. Where is your car? If I remember correctly, you said that you were tourists.”
“Our car is down at your place,” said Bill.
“That’s fine,” remarked Crouch. “I know a trail through the woods along Oak Creek that leads out into the main road. By going that way we will not have to climb the ridge we came down.”
“The sooner the better,” said Bob. “You can’t get back to your place too soon to suit me.”
“What will we do with the forestry service tools?” asked Bill.
“Just bring them along,” said Crouch. “They will stop by my place and collect them when they come out.”
It was so easy to say, “Just bring them along,” but every added pound made Bill’s aching body feel like an open sore. He did not say anything, but raised the shovel and axe to his shoulders and stood ready to start. It was quite dark by this time, and following Crouch along the narrow trail was quite a task. The trail turned at all sorts of unlooked-for places. Limbs of trees and small bushes scratched his face and hands as they walked along. Once he ran into a tree before he saw it when the trail turned sharply.
Bill’s feet seemed so heavy that he doubted his ability to walk another step. He turned around to look at Bob and could not see him in the semi-darkness. That made him feel better. Bob must be as tired as he was. Sam Crouch was walking along with the same swing that he had used when they first met. The man was not human. It was physically impossible for a man to work as hard as they had for a whole afternoon and part of the evening and then be as fresh and energetic as Crouch was.
The trail through the woods seemed endless. Finally they reached the road and Bill hastened his steps to walk alongside of Crouch.
“Don’t you ever get tired?” asked Bill.
“Son, I have been doing this ever since I was seven years old,” replied Crouch. “This is just a routine day for me. I like the woods and am always waiting for an excuse to get away from people and communities. I probably would be better off if I didn’t spend so much time hunting and fishing, but the different game seasons come so close together that I don’t seem to have much time to do much else. Right now it is good fishing season. That will last pretty nearly all Summer. Then the salmon will start running up the river. Down in the valley we have good pheasant shooting. Occasionally we have wild pigeon shooting. In the Fall there is always good deer hunting. Then Winter comes along and I go out after bear and mountain lions. The snows shut me in for a while after that and I am forced to stay home for a few weeks. Taking it all in all, I do not have much time to work on my clearing.”
“That’s what I would call an ideal existence,” said Bill.
As they talked, Bob came up and walked along with them. It did not seem half as tiring when they were talking as when they apparently covered mile after mile in silence.
“Have you ever seen the salmon run?” asked Crouch.
“No, I never have,” replied Bill.
“If you get a chance, don’t miss it,” said Crouch. “By the way, where do you two fellows come from?”
“We are stationed in San Francisco,” replied Bill.
“You ought to get good fishing around there,” said Crouch.
“We haven’t been there long enough to get any fishing,” explained Bob. “We were stationed down in the Imperial Valley until a few weeks ago.”
“What are you fellows, anyway?” asked Crouch.
“We are in the Army,” said Bill. “We are in the Air Service.”
“Do you fly airplanes?”
“That’s our job,” replied Bob.
“I’d rather hunt bears,” said Crouch. “The highest that I want to get is up on the ‘poop deck’ of a horse. That’s far enough for me to fall. Well, here we are at the shack. What are you going to do now?”
“Take our car and hunt for a place to camp,” replied Bill.
“No use of your doing that. I am here all by myself. I haven’t any beds, but I can give you a room and you can spread out your blankets on a couple of old mattresses that I have and sleep in comfort. You must be tired and ought to get a good night’s rest. I can cook up some grub for supper and then you can turn in. What do you say?”
“It’s too good to be true,” said Bill. “If you hadn’t asked me to sleep in your house, I would have rolled up in my blanket out here by the car and slept on the ground. I am just that tired. That was a mighty big fire, wasn’t it?”
“Just a baby,” replied Sam. “Only about eight or nine hundred acres. Why some of them cover that many thousand acres and we have several at the same time.”
“I’ll get out blankets and bags while you help get supper,” said Bob to Bill as they reached the house.
Supper, the laying of their beds and the short talk after supper were like a dream to Bill. Both he and Bob were asleep as soon as they landed between their blankets.
“Say, are you fellows going to sleep all day?”
Bill sat up. The sun was shining into the room. It was late in the morning. His muscles were sore and he was stiff all over. Every movement that he made started new pains through his body.
“I thought that we might go fishing this morning,” said Crouch.
“That’s an idea at that,” said Bill. “Bob, wake up, we are going fishing.”
“You go fishing and let me sleep,” said Bob drowsily.
“Come on, breakfast is on the table,” said Crouch.
“All right, if I must,” replied Bob. “I don’t feel much like it, though.”
“All the stiffness and soreness will be gone after we have been out for a few minutes,” said Crouch.
So the days passed. The young aviators stayed several days with Sam Crouch and learned more about wood life and the art of fishing than they could have learned in several months by themselves. Finally the time came when they wanted to push farther up into the woods. It was hard to say good-bye to Sam, but they finally did, promising to look him up again whenever they came back that way.
“Here’s something to take with you,” said Sam as they were about to start away.
Sam handed them a glass jar. Bill looked to see what it contained, but could not determine anything from its appearance. Obviously it was some kind of dried meat. Sam saw the inquiry in Bill’s expression.
“It’s jerkey,” explained Sam.
“What’s that?” asked Bill.
“You don’t know what jerkey is?”
“Never heard of it,” replied Bob.
“I can’t eat all the deer meat that I get during the hunting season, so I dry it for future use,” said Sam. “This is dried venison. I think that you will like chewing it while you are fishing.”
“Thanks very much,” said Bill and Bob in unison as they started away.
That night they camped several miles away from Sam Crouch’s clearing. As far as they could see, there was no settlement within miles. The fishing was good and they were more than satisfied when they finished their supper.
“This is really our first night out,” said Bill. “We started out with the idea that we would camp every night, but have never done it before. What will we do with our stuff?”
“Just leave everything as it is until morning,” replied Bob. “There’s no one anywhere around here.”
“I don’t know whether that is the proper thing to do,” replied Bill. “I guess that it doesn’t make any difference, though, for we have to start back home tomorrow.”
The boys rolled up in their blankets and were soon asleep. Bill was later awakened by the sound of something moving around his clothes. He sat up and threw the beam of his flashlight around. It finally rested upon an animal the likes of which he had never seen before. The animal was eating or nibbling one of his leggins. Bill jumped up, and with the movement there was no doubt as to the identity of the animal. It raised its quills until it looked like a large thistle.
“Bob,” called Bill. “Here’s a porcupine.”
“Where?” asked Bob as he sat up.
The porcupine made no attempt to move away in spite of all the noise. It sat quietly as if it were in its own domain. The only difference was that it had stopped nibbling on the leather leggins. The aviators knew that they could not catch it in their hands, so looked around for something to wrap around it. While they were searching, the porcupine ambled away and was soon lost in the darkness.
“Well, he got away,” said Bill, as they again rolled themselves in their blankets.
“He would have made a good mascot for the squadron,” said Bob.
“Unique but rather sticky,” said Bill as he dropped off to sleep.
About an hour later Bill was awakened again. He had the feeling that there was something rummaging in the camp equipage. He threw his flashlight in the general direction of where the supplies were piled and was almost frozen stiff with fright at what he saw.
A large brown bear was mauling among the boxes and cans trying hard to find something to eat. Not far off another bear was delving in the garbage pit. Then there was a terrible crashing and smashing as the first bear vented its rage against the pots, pans, and kettles. This woke Bob.
“What’s all the noise?” asked Bob.
Bill didn’t know whether to answer or to keep quiet. The bears were but a few feet away. If he said anything, it might attract the attention of the bears. If he didn’t, Bob might call out again and then that would attract them. At the present time they were busily engaged in wrecking the camp and were not interested in either the flashlight or Bob’s talking.
Bob did not need to get an answer to his question, for he looked in the beam of the flashlight and saw what was going on. What was to be done now? Neither one of the two young airmen could answer the question. Bill finally decided that something must be done, so jumped up and began clapping his hands and shouting.
The bear at the garbage pit stood up, but stayed where it was. It looked as large as a house to Bill, so he stopped in his tracks wondering whether to run toward or away from the bear. The other bear ambled off a few feet and then turned around to watch the proceedings. For a long time both Bill and the bear stood watching each other.
Bill again started shouting and then made another short dash after the nearest bear. It walked slowly away for a few more feet and then stopped and turned around. Bill began to lose his bravery just then, for the bear seemed to look him straight in the eye. The effect on the second bear was entirely different, for it made a dash to get away. The direction it took was rather unfortunate for Bob, for the bear headed right at Bob.
Evidently it did not see Bob stretched out on the ground, but Bob saw the bear coming and dropped down flat in his blankets. The bear did not have any designs against Bob, however, for it cleared him with a bound and was off in the woods. The shout that Bob gave as the bear reached his blankets was too much for the first one and it ambled off and disappeared in the thickets.
“This is no place for a white man,” said Bob after the bears had both gone. “I am in favor of packing up and getting out right now.”
“That’s all right with me,” replied Bill. “But I don’t think that they will come back. I think that they are gone for the night.”
“You can stay here if you want to, but not for mine; I’m on my way,” said Bob.
“Well, we might as well move on,” said Bill after looking at his watch. “It’s only a couple of hours until daylight and that will give us a good start.”
“Our vacation in the woods is over,” said Bob “Now we go back to our routine flying.”
“We have had a wonderful time, though, and I am coming back,” said Bill. “I am going to find out from Sam the next time, though, what to do when bears invade our camp.”
They started back to San Francisco very much impressed with the life in the forests. Each was determined to return as soon as he could, but neither realized that they would return almost as soon as they joined their squadron, but with an entirely different reason for the visit.
CHAPTER VII—WORKING WITH THE ARTILLERY
“How did you enjoy your life in the woods?” asked Captain Smith when Bill Bruce and Bob Finch reported for duty at the flying field at the Presideo at San Francisco.
“We had a fine time and found it very educational,” replied Bill. “I never knew that there were so many different kinds of trees. We were very fortunate in meeting Mr. George Cecil, the District Forester. He is in charge of all the National Forests in Oregon and Washington. We probably would have run into all kinds of trouble if he hadn’t given us a start in the customs and manners of life in the woods. Then we were drafted to fight a forest fire, and say, boy, if you want to get action, join a forest fire-fighting gang. It is hard work, but the terrifying, destructive grandeur of a forest fire is beyond description.”
“You didn’t enjoy it any more than I did when those bears raided our camp when we were asleep,” interjected Bob. “I wasn’t the only one who was ready to start back home.”
“I must admit that our education was not quite complete in that respect,” admitted Bill. “Before I go out again, I am going to get someone to tell me what to do when a bear romps through your camp after dark.”
“What did you do?” asked Smith.
“Just what a normal man would do,” replied Bill. “I was scared to death when I saw the first bear and more scared when I saw the second one, but I tried not to show it.”
“You have been having a vacation, and now you will have to get back to work,” said Captain Smith. “We are observing the fire of the coast defense guns this morning. Bruce will take the first shoot and Finch, you take the second one. Sergeant Breene can use the radio, but you had better give him your sensings of the positions of the shots with reference to the target before he sends them down. You can get some idea as to the distance the shot falls from the target by the length of the cable between the target and the tug. You will shove off in half an hour. Your plane is having a new engine installed so that you will have to use Batten’s.”
“I don’t know much about artillery adjustment,” said Bill. “During the war I was a pursuit pilot.”
“Now’s the best time to learn then,” replied Smith.
“Why the trick leggins?” asked Kiel, the Commander of the Second Flight in the Ninth Squadron.
“I had no choice,” replied Bill. “A porcupine started to eat my best ones while I was up in Oregon. All my others need cleaning too badly to wear. These wrapped leggins are comfortable, even though they take more time to put on.”
“I thought that everyone threw away those leggins as soon as they could after the war,” said Kiel.
“It’s a good thing that I saved these,” replied Bill. “If I hadn’t, I would have been waiting in my quarters now for my others to be shined and repaired. Then you would have had to take this mission. From my point of view, I would rather have had it that way.”
“Well, Sergeant, how’s the old bus percolating?” asked Bill when he came out onto the line and met Sergeant Breene.
“A new engine is being installed in yours,” replied Breene.
“I know that, but how is Lieutenant Batten’s? That’s the one that you and I are going to take out on this artillery mission.”
“I don’t know anything about his plane,” replied Breene. “His crew chief takes care of it.”
“Well, get your flying togs, for we take off as soon as we can get the bus warmed up.”
In a few minutes they were flying around over the reservation while they checked their radio with the ground station at the airdrome. The antenna wire hung two hundred feet below the plane and formed an arc with the lead “fish” at the end of the wire. The fish was a weight shaped in a stream line form so that the wire would ride steadily through the air and hang well down below the plane.
Breene sent out the call letters and then Bill and his observer watched for the O. K. panels. As soon as they appeared, Bill headed his plane out over the Coast Artillery radio station. Once more Breene sent out the call letters of the station. This was acknowledged by the panel signal, “understood.” Then the airplane sent down a message giving the number of the plane, the pilot’s and observer’s names and the information that they were ready to observe the fire of the guns. Each item was repeated so that the ground station would be sure to get it. Finally the ground crew placed the panels in the position which indicated “battery ready to fire.” Then Bill headed his plane out over the ocean.
It is a sort of lonesome feeling to fly out over the ocean in a land plane. The pilot always realizes that if his engine quits, he must land on the water, and that his plane will float for not more than four hours after hitting the water. Accordingly, Bill wanted to get as much altitude as he could and at the same time accurately observe the falling shots. If his engine quit, he would then be able to glide at least part way back to shore. There is always the possibility of having to swim after a forced landing in the water, as boats are not always conveniently available for rescue work.
Bill climbed until he reached five thousand feet. The tug and target were about twelve thousand yards from shore, and they looked absurdly small. He wondered how the twelve-inch guns could ever make a hit on the small pyramidal target built up on the float. The entire area over which the target would be moved had been cleared of ships. Off to the north there were two steamers running into the Golden Gate, and a third leaving by way of the ship channel. As far as Bill could see, there was no other sign of life between the shore and the Farallone Islands, some fifteen miles out.
Bill had barely reached his position abreast of the target when he saw the splash of a shell as it hit the water. The shell struck just short of the target and then ricocheted and made another splash beyond the target. It then bounded along the water’s surface with ever diminishing leaps until it finally sank beneath the water’s surface. Bill was so much interested in watching the shot that he forgot to hand back a sensing to Breene.
Bill was brought back to the business in hand when Breene tapped him on the shoulder. “Two hundred right, eight hundred short,” Bill wrote on a slip and handed it to Breene. After a couple of circles around the tug and target, another shot splashed, but this time much closer. “One hundred left, two hundred over,” wrote Bill on the slip that he handed back. Thus it went for some time with the shots making a group around the target, which was moving along at a rate of about ten knots an hour.
It was interesting work and Bill enjoyed it. He was doing his best to send down corrections which would make it possible for the gunners to make a hit on the target, but either its motion through the water or the normal dispersion of the spots due to the ammunition would not permit of a direct hit being made. The tug cruised back and forth in the cleared area. The wind and tide evidently made it move faster in one direction than in the other, for the shots did not fall the same distance away during the two runs.
Occasionally Bill would fly the plane back over the shore to see if any additional instructions were being sent up to him by the panels. Each time the same panels were displayed, “Battery ready to fire.” That being the case he must place his plane so that he could see the shots when they fell. Once he was sure that the guns had been fired but he had not seen the first impact with the water. The only location of the shell that he secured was after its first bounce from the water. He then sent down, “lost.” This indicated to the firing battery that the observer had not seen the last shot.
Bill was out well beyond the tug when his engine started missing and then quit altogether. He wanted to glide into shore, but knew that he could not make it from five thousand feet. He had another chance for a quick rescue, and that was to land as close to the tug as he could. However, in order to do that he would have to glide through the section through which the shells were flying. He did not know what to do. Should he take a chance with the flying shells, or should he land in a safe sector on the water and trust that the tug would see him drop and come to his rescue?
He guided his plane in wide circles as he lost altitude. As he descended he could see that the battery had fired on the data sent in from Breene’s last report. Would the battery stop firing when they failed to perceive any additional data, or would it keep on firing? Their last report had indicated that the battery was firing very close to the target.
Bill decided that he would not take a chance of getting hit by a thousand pound projectile. He would land as close to the tug as he could and stay out of the danger zone. As he dropped lower, he could see that the sea was rough. He had not been able to pick up the high waves from his high altitude, but now they were apparent. That would take skillful piloting or the plane would be completely wrecked when it came into contact with the water.
As he glided over the waves, Bill made up his plan for landing. The wind was in the same direction as the moving waves. He could not land in the trough between two crests, for that would require a crosswind landing. He would try and set the plane down between two crests.
The wheels were now just missing the peaks of the waves as the plane soared along. Just ahead was a rather high wave. Bill expected to drop his wheels into the water just beyond that crest. The plane dropped out from under him quite unexpectedly and the next thing that he knew he was swimming around in the water. Breene was not in sight. Bill came in closer to the fusilage and waited. Soon Breene appeared in the water in front of the wings.
“Can you swim?” called Bill.
“Not so much,” replied Breene.
“Come around here and climb up on the fusilage,” said Bill.
The lower wing of the plane had been torn almost all the way off. As far as they could see, the fusilage was still intact. The heavy 800-pound engine caused the nose of the fusilage to sink into the water. Thus the only parts of the plane above the surface were the tail surfaces, the top wing and the fusilage between the rear of the wings and the tail group.
Breene worked his way around the wreck until he reached the tail surfaces. Bill gave him a lift and Breene was soon sitting on the empennage almost entirely out of the water. Bill could swim well and stayed in the water, supporting himself by the rudder surfaces.
“This water is getting cold,” said Bill. “Can you see anything coming this way to help us?”
The plane at that time was down in a trough and the crests towered twenty or more feet above them.
“Not a thing in sight,” replied Breene.
“Wait a minute,” he shouted as the plane rose up on a wave. “The tug is coming toward us full speed ahead. I hope that it has dropped its cable and is not pulling the target.”
“It ought to get here before the old crate sinks,” said Bill. “I am going to take off my shoes and leggins so that I can swim better if I have to.”
Bill had just unwrapped about two coils of his leggins when he was interrupted by an extra heavy wave which almost submerged him. The plane was gradually sinking and he wanted to be ready for anything that might occur. He might have to support Breene if the plane went down before help arrived. In struggling to regain his grip on the plane, he lost the loose end of his leggins.
Just then the tug came into sight and dropped a small boat. Bill insisted that Breene be taken off first. Breene had no more been rescued than the plane gave a lurch and sank beneath the water. Bill turned loose the rudder surface but felt himself being dragged down. The loose end of his leggin was caught in the wires of the empennage.
CHAPTER VIII—NARROW ESCAPES
When Bill Bruce felt the pull of the sinking airplane on his leggin, he knew that he had to do some fast moving and some faster thinking to escape being dragged to the bottom of the ocean. He was submerged before he knew it. His only salvation lay in his ability to release himself from the leggin or in the cloth band breaking. In the meantime he was going farther and farther beneath the water’s surface.
It suddenly occurred to him that he might be able to unwrap the leggin by rotating his foot about the taut part extending upward from the plane. This procedure proved to be a success and in a few seconds he emerged. When his head came above the water he coughed and spit until he got rid of most of the salt water which he had swallowed. He had not been under the water long, but it seemed much, yes, very much longer than it actually was. He had been through a terrible ordeal and his escape had been a narrow one.
When Bill had brushed the salt water from his eyes, he looked around and saw the tug with its small boat standing near by. He swam to the small boat and was taken aboard. In a few minutes they were back on the tug and headed for the target.
“I want to pick up that target again,” said Lieutenant Small, the Artillery officer in charge of the tug. “If you are all in, however, I will head into the harbor and dock. If you can wait for a while, I will pick up the target and cable and then we will steam back to the dock.”
“I can wait for a while,” said Bill. “I am all right. I swallowed a lot of salt water, but that won’t hurt me any. How did you get to the plane so soon?”
“As soon as we saw your plane going down, I knew that something was wrong,” said Small. “Ordinarily you fellows don’t get down that low while you are out here. Then when you kept on going down, I told the crew to cut the target cable. They hacked it off with an axe and we went full steam ahead for the spot where you hit the water.”
“It’s lucky that you did, too,” replied Bill. “I was under the impression that a land plane would stay afloat for about four hours, but I know now that it won’t when it is damaged when it hits the water. That old bus did not float more than thirty minutes, if that long.”
“We timed it,” said Small. “It was just twenty minutes after you hit that we launched the small boat. Eight minutes later the plane was out of sight. I figure out that twenty-eight minutes covers the entire time that it was afloat.”
“The plane must have been more badly damaged than I thought,” commented Bill. “The landing gear must have torn off some of the fusilage when it hit. In any event, I am glad that you arrived when you did.”
The tug had almost reached the target by this time. The crew maneuvered until they came along side the target and then caught the loose end of the cable. It was a long, tedious job to pull the end of the cable from the bottom of the ocean, but was finally accomplished. Once more the target was being drawn through the water at the end of the cable and the tug headed back toward the bay.
“What did you do with my plane?” asked Batten when Bill arrived at the aviation field.
“Don’t you know?” asked Bill.
“We received a radio message from Breene telling us that you were going to land, but why pick out the ocean?” responded Batten.
“You talk as if I had landed in the water eight miles from shore through choice,” said Bill, somewhat peeved.
Bill was wet and most uncomfortable. He had been through a trying, nerve-racking experience and could not see that Batten was joking with him.
“It was a good plane, anyhow,” replied Batten. “Now I will have to break in another one. You had a mighty lucky escape and showed good headwork in getting away with nothing more than a wetting. I would hate to have to swim around in that cold water and wait for a slow old tug to come up and pick me up.”
The days followed along with regular squadron work. More artillery observation, aerial gunnery and bombing and the maintenance of the equipment. Then one morning Captain Smith told the officers that they would have searchlight practice with the anti-aircraft artillery that night.
Night flying was not a new thing to any of the officers of the squadron, but none of them had ever before gone up with the one purpose of dodging the searchlights. The drill was to give the searchlight men practice in locating airplanes and holding the beam on them at night.
Early in the evening the planes were all out on the line but Bill’s. The mechanics had not quite finished the work incidental with the installation of the equipment. Bill had just received a new airplane prior to his return from Oregon. The old engine had been replaced with a new one and then the radio, machine guns and bomb racks were put in place. Bill hoped that his plane would be ready for the night’s flying. Sergeant Breene was sure that it would.
The searchlight truck was placed at one end of the field and the flood lights on the hangar were tested out. When it became dark, the lights were turned on and the airdrome was as light as day. Beyond the ridge, at the end of the flying field, the anti-aircraft searchlights were throwing their beams into the sky. It made a beautiful sight. Occasionally the beams from two lights would cross in the sky. The operators would throw the beams from one side to the other, sweeping the sky from the horizon in the north to the horizon in the south.
Smith took the first mission and his plane disappeared in the darkness. It was not until he turned on his navigating lights that the men at the flying field could locate him. He climbed his plane to an altitude of over five thousand feet and then turned off the red and green wingtip lights. As soon as he turned them off, the game of hide-and-seek commenced. The searchlight beams were thrown around in an endeavor to locate the plane.
Once in a while the plane would be caught in a beam and Smith would dive, slip or make a quick turn. This made it necessary for the searchlights to locate him again. It seemed as if they could not hold the plane, for it was very seldom that they kept it in the glaring light. When he flew with his navigating lights turned on, the operators had no difficulty in keeping the plane in the beams, but as soon as he turned them off, things were different.
Each one of the pilots took his turn after Smith had completed his flight. Some of them were not as adept in handling their planes as Smith had been and the beams played on their planes longer. After talking with the other pilots as they came down, Bill was convinced that this aerial hide-and-seek at night must be wonderful sport. He was eager to get his turn.
“How about it, Breene, will we be able to get up tonight?” he asked.
“Everything will be ready in about fifteen minutes,” replied Breene. “I have very little more to do. I had to connect up the bomb racks so that we could take up some parachute flares.”
“That is not entirely necessary,” said Bill. “The lights here on the airdrome will be sufficient to land by. However, I guess that we better have them. In case of a forced landing we might need the flares.”
“You are scheduled to go up next,” said Captain Smith to Bill. “Will your plane be ready?”
“Yes, sir,” replied Bill.
“All right then, you will have the last flight, for it will be too late for any more when you get down.”
Bill secured his flying equipment from the office and returned to his plane. Breene had finished his part of the work and the other mechanics had completed theirs. One of the men was climbing out of the pilot’s cockpit when Bill started to get in.
The engine was warmed up and the lights tested. Everything was working in A-1 condition. Breene climbed in the observer’s cockpit and the plane was ready to start. Bill taxied down to the far end of the field and turned the plane around. The beam from the field lighting set illuminated the ridge beyond the buildings so that the minutest details could be seen. Bill opened his throttle and took off.
The plane rolled a few yards and then was in the air. It climbed steadily and crossed the ridge with lots of room to spare. Bill turned back over the bay to get more altitude. The view which he saw was like a touch of fairyland. Directly beneath him lay San Francisco. The streets were outlined with their lights and could almost be recognized by name. The trolleys could be seen traveling through the city.
Here and there ferryboats threw their lights across the waters of the bay. The lighthouse on Alcatraz Island sent out its rotating beam, which illuminated the shore line all around that portion of the bay. The outline of the water was marked by the lights of the various cities and small villages located along its shore.
On the far side of the bay Bill could see several railroad trains coming into or leaving the station at Oakland. Beyond the Berkeley Hills the lights of the cities in the Sacramento Valley broke the darkness like stars in the sky. It was a beautiful sight, but Bill had other things to do. He headed his plane back toward the ocean front.
His course was farther south than he wished and he tried to change it by putting on right rudder. He soon realized that something had happened to the plane—something was wrong with the rudder controls. Bill was in a quandary as to what he should do. He kicked hard with his right foot but could not get any response from the rudder bar. It was solid in its position. He was now afraid to use his left rudder for fear that it also would get caught. If he kept flying on his present course, he would travel out over the ocean. That was not to be thought of. On the other hand, suppose that when he used his left rudder, the controls would lock in that position and he would have to keep turning to the left. The situation was critical.
Bill pressed slightly with his left foot and the plane responded. Furthermore, the rudder bar returned to a neutral position. He tried to get some right rudder, but it was just as solid as formerly. By this time the lights of the city were well behind him. He judged that he was about five or six miles out over the ocean.
The one thought that entered Bill’s mind was that his controls might lock in place. If that happened, he would have to follow the course which the airplane took. Once more Bill shoved slightly with his left foot and the plane responded. He held the foot in place with a view of making a wide circle to get back to the landing field. He realized that the circle with such a small amount of rudder would be a very large one, but he could not take any chances of having the controls lock and the movement of the plane thus be limited to a small circle.
Landing fields were scarce in the bay region. The city of San Francisco was on a peninsula with the ocean on one side and the bay on the other. The land between was thickly settled and built up. It would be difficult to pick out a landing field in the day time and almost impossible at night. Bill’s one chance lay in his being able to jockey his plane, crippled as it was, back to the airdrome.
CHAPTER IX—AN UNEXPECTED DUTY
The bay with its lights along the water’s edge had now lost its beauty for Bill. The night had become an agent which seemed to add further dangers to the perils which already seemed to conspire against him. Bill’s one idea now was to get his plane back to the landing field as soon as he could. He then would try and jockey his plane into a position which would eliminate the use of any right rudder in making his landing.
The circle which he was flying was an exceedingly wide one. It took him down the bay as far as San Mateo and he was loathe to make it smaller. There was always the chance that his rudder bar should lose all of its remaining mobility. He cut across the end of the bay and approached Alameda. He could see the lights on the field and wondered if he would make them safely.
The circle took him over the ferries plying between San Francisco and the East Bay cities. Goat Island revealed itself by the lights of the various buildings and the Naval Training Station. He was directly in line with the landing field. He felt more secure now, for, with everything going all right, he would not have to use any rudder to make the landing.
Bill throttled the engine and started to glide to the ground. He hoped that he would miss the three hundred foot flagpole standing somewhere between his plane and the field. That caused him some anxiety for a while, and then he realized that he must have passed it. His plane was now a short distance from the lighting truck.
Bill leveled off and let his plane sink to the ground As the wheels hit, he felt the plane veer to the right Bill gave it all the left rudder that he could. The turn to the right ceased, but he had over-controlled and a left turn started. He tried his right rudder and found it to be ineffective as formerly. The plane turned rather sharply and ended in a ground loop.
Fortunately they were not traveling very fast when the ground loop took place, so that no damage was done. Bill did not even attempt to taxi up to the line. He stopped his engine and turned to Breene.
“What in the name of all that’s good and holy did you do to this plane?” he shouted.
“What was the matter, Lieutenant?” asked Breene in reply.
“Try the right rudder and see what you think,” responded Bill.
“Fry me for a porterhouse steak! What do you know about that?” said Breene after trying the rudder. “The left rudder works all right, but the right rudder just isn’t.”
“That’s no news to me,” replied Bill. “I found that out soon after we left the ground. What I want to know is what’s the matter with it.”
By this time the other pilots and mechanics had arrived at the plane. When Bill ground-looped in the beam of the searchlight everyone on the field saw the plane make the abrupt turn. They naturally thought that he had blown a tire or crushed a wheel as a result of turning too sharply.
“Is that the way that you were taught to land an airplane?” asked Bob Finch as he stepped up to the plane.
“Can’t you even make one good landing on your home field?” asked Kiel.
“We thought that we might have to order the meat wagon out,” said Goldie.
“How about this night flying, do you like it?” asked Batten. “I will give you instructions in landing at night if you want.”
“Don’t let him do it,” interjected Goldy. “He might lose his way and land you up at Sacramento. I’ll teach you.”
“Go ahead and rag me, you bums,” replied Bill. “One thing is sure, if I find the rat that has been tampering with my rudder control, I’ll kill him on the spot.”
“What’s the matter with your rudder?” asked Captain Smith, who had come up during the conversation.
“I have no right rudder at all. I haven’t had any since just after I left the field.”
“Get out and let me see what the trouble is,” said Smith.
Bill climbed out and Smith took his place in the cockpit. The others stood silently by while Smith tried out the controls. Finally Smith tried to see into the cockpit with the instrument lights, but found they were not powerful enough.
“Has anyone a flashlight?” he asked.
“Here’s one,” replied Sergeant Barney, the Chief Mechanic.
“That’s the most peculiar thing that I ever saw,” said Smith after throwing the beam into the cockpit and trying the rudder. “I wonder how that come to be put there?”
“What is it, Captain?” asked Bill.
Smith did not answer, but instead went head first into the cockpit. He squirmed around for a while with his feet in the air and then started working his way back again.
“Here it is,” he said when he had resumed his normal position.
He held a small board in his hands.
“What has that to do with it?” asked Bill.
“That board evidently fell or was placed in front of the rudder bar,” said Smith. “When it dropped in place, it exactly fit the space between the right side of the bar and the front cross members of the fusilage. The result was that you could not have pushed your right foot forward without breaking the cross members of the fusilage.”
“I wonder where it came from?” asked Bill. “Breene, who was working on this plane with you?”
“Corporal Grabo and a recruit. I don’t know the recruit’s name. Who was he, Barney? You sent him over.”
“Dixon,” replied Barney.
“I wasn’t in the cockpit at all,” said Grabo. “Let’s get Dixon and find out what he knows.”
“I sent Dixon in to do some K. P. work,” said Barney. “He was in the way out here and balled up everything that I gave him to do. Roll the plane back to the hangar, you men.”
“One of you men go to the barracks and bring Dixon to the office,” said Smith as he walked away.
Captain Smith was in his office when Bill arrived. He sat down and waited as he was interested to learn why that piece of board was in the plane.
“Come in, Dixon,” said Captain Smith after a while, and Dixon entered.
“Dixon, did you ever see this board before?” asked Captain Smith as he handed the board across the desk.
“I can’t say that I have, Captain,” replied Dixon.
“Were you working in the cockpit of Airplane Number 1 this evening?”
“Yes, I was,” replied Dixon. “Come to think of it, I did have a piece of board with me, but I don’t know if that’s the one, for I left it in the cockpit.”
“Why did you leave it there?” asked Smith.
“Barney told me to clean out the cockpit and I couldn’t find a dustpan,” said Dixon. “I took a piece of board with me to gather up the dirt. I had just started to look for the dirt when Sergeant Barney called me. I left the board there so that it would be handy when I returned. I didn’t know that anyone wanted the board or I would have put it back where I found it. It looked like a piece that someone had thrown away.”
“Now listen to what I say,” said Smith. “Hereafter, don’t you ever leave anything in any airplane which doesn’t belong there. This little piece of board came near wrecking an airplane tonight. It might have caused the pilot and a mechanic to lose their lives had it not been for good headwork on the part of the pilot. Just remember that. That’s all.”
Dixon was obviously too astounded to speak. He was a recruit and knew nothing about airplanes or their workings. To him a piece of board was just a piece of wood, and there was no more harm in leaving it in the plane than there was in leaving it in the old farm wagon back home. He saluted and withdrew.
“Well, there’s the whole story,” said Smith. “There’s nothing more to be done about it as far as I can see. It is unfortunate that there are such things as recruits, but we can’t have old soldiers without their first being recruits.”
“I hope that the next recruit practices on someone else’s plane,” said Bill.
As Bill left the office he stopped to read the notices on the bulletin board. Aerial gunnery the next day, all pilots to be on the field at eight o’clock. Bill liked aerial gunnery and looked forward with pleasure to the next day’s missions.
Seven-thirty the next morning found all the pilots at their planes. Each was testing out his engine or standing by while the mechanics checked up on the synchronizing gear and guns. The targets which were to be used were pieces of floating wood in Drakes Bay. Other pilots were designated to do shadow shooting—that is, shoot at the shadow of their own or another plane on the water.
Three planes of Bill’s flight were scheduled to take off first. The planes, engines and guns were ready, ammunition had been placed in the boxes and the pilots were sitting in their cockpits waiting for the starting time. One of the planes had already commenced moving across the field for the take-off when a messenger ran out onto the field and stopped it.
The plane returned to the “dead line.” The pilot stopped his engine and climbed out. Bill Bruce was in his plane and noticed the proceedings. What it was all about, Bill could not imagine. The operations order had been explicit in time and what was to be done. The time for starting was passed. Smith was exceedingly particular about missions starting on time and yet the flight was held up. Bill decided to find out why.
“What did that messenger say to you, Bob?” asked Bill when he reached Bob Finch’s plane.
“Told me it was the Captain’s orders that we stay on the ground until further orders,” replied Bob.
“Did he say why or when we would go up?” asked Bill.
“He just said what I told you and nothing more,” said Bob.
“I will go over to headquarters and see what I can find out,” said Bill as he walked away.
“Where’s Captain Smith?” asked Bill as he entered the Adjutant’s office.
“He left for Corps Area Headquarters a few minutes ago,” replied the Adjutant. “He gave instructions just before he left to hold your planes on the ground until he returned.”
“What’s it all about?” asked Bill.
“I don’t know anything more than you do,” replied Maxwell.
Bill returned to the planes and gave instructions for the pilots to shut off their engines. There was nothing more to do but wait until Captain Smith returned. The officers sat around and each gave his version as to why they were held on the ground. Finally, after a wait of about three-quarters of an hour, Smith returned in a motorcycle side car and went into his office. Bill hurried over to the office to get such information as he could.
“Take a look at this,” said Smith as Bill came in.
He handed Bill a telegram to read.
“Salem, Oregon.
“Request airplanes for use in detecting and preventing forest fires stop Over two hundred fires now burning in northwestern part of state stop More breaking out all the time stop Smoke pall so bad that regular lookouts can not see through stop Unless help is secured I am afraid that most of timber in state will be burned stop
Olcott, Governor.”
CHAPTER X—CLOUDS ON THE SISKIYOUS
“Orders are being issued for the Squadron to leave for Eugene, Oregon, where we will establish temporary headquarters,” said Smith. “We will leave tomorrow morning. That is, part of the Squadron will leave in the morning. The motor transport will leave at daybreak. I will take off with ‘B’ Flight at soon after daybreak as we can get away. Bruce, you will leave with your Flight when you have straightened up the airdrome. We will probably be gone all Summer, so make arrangements accordingly. Some of the planes will probably operate from other places than Eugene, but just where I cannot determine until I have a conference with the forestry officials after my arrival. Everybody make the necessary plans to carry out the instructions just outlined.”
That was all there was to the orders. The Squadron Commander of “B” Flight would take off, the enlisted men would leave with the motor transport and “A” Flight would follow as soon as it had closed up the buildings and made the necessary preparations for the safety of the property. Bill Bruce had no idea how long these preparations would take, but he hoped that he would be able to get away on the same day as the rest of the Squadron.
For the remainder of the day the Squadron personnel were busy with the multitudinous details attendant to their departure. Their first task was the removal and storage of the bombs and ammunition which had been installed in the planes for the gunnery practice. The machine guns were taken off and packed away. The radio sets were tested to insure their perfect working condition.
It was no easy job to select the proper equipment and clothing which should be taken along. The personnel did not know the conditions under which they would live in Oregon and accordingly had a very sketchy idea as to what would be required. In this they could get help from no one and each worked out the details according to his own ideas.
The transportation was thoroughly inspected and the necessary spares put aboard each truck. It was decided to leave the searchlight truck at the home station, as it was far too heavy for mountain roads and bridges. The radio trucks were taken along, and with them all ground radio sets. Everyone realized that radio communication would have to be used continuously between the planes and any bases which might be established.
The next morning Bill found that the truck train had departed long before his arrival. All of the Squadron messing facilities, tools and spares for the airplanes and engines, officers’ and men’s personal equipment and surplus flying equipment were in the trucks. A short time afterwards Captain Smith left with “B” Flight.
Bill Bruce immediately started to work, using the officers and men of his Flight to clean up the airdrome and close the hangars and other buildings. It was a long, tedious task, but was finally completed. At eleven o’clock the planes were lined up ready for the take-off. Bill taxied his plane to the end of the field and the others joined him in proper position for taking off in formation. He had five planes in his Flight. One of his pilots was absent on leave and would join the Squadron at Eugene at a later date.
The Flight took off and, once in the air, the planes swung into their proper places. Bill was leading and the other planes placed themselves along the sides of a large “V.” Each plane was slightly above and uncovered the one in its front so that the Flight looked like a flock of ducks as it flew across San Francisco Bay.
The first part of the trip took them to the north end of the bay. They passed over a portion of the fertile Napa Valley and then crossed the coast range at an altitude of about five thousand feet. Here they obtained their first extended view of the broad Sacramento Valley. They flew for miles over the level floor of the valley. Here and there they saw or passed over a small village or a railroad, but the greater portion of the flight was over large ranches.
Their course brought them closer and closer to the Sacramento River. At first it had been well off to their right and could be distinguished only by the trees along its banks, but as they progressed they gradually came closer to it and could make out the bridges over which the roads and railroads passed. They noticed that the towns became more numerous as they flew parallel to the river and railroad.
The Sierra Mountains, with their snow-capped peaks, marked the eastern boundary of the valley. Mount Lassen, the only active volcano in the United States, thrust its head well above the surrounding mountains. Straight ahead of them Mount Shasta seemed to stand as a direction post indicating the proper course for them to fly.
They reached the rough, broken country at the head of the valley and crossed the Sacramento River. Bill here changed his course slightly so that they would pass to the west of Shasta. The hills beneath them became higher and higher and their slopes were thickly covered with rocks. The river wound its way through the hills far to the west, only to appear unexpectedly beneath them as they climbed for more altitude to pass over Castle Crag.
The terrain rose abruptly from the river to the top of Castle Crag. This enormous mass of rock thrust itself almost vertically into the air and culminated in numerous pinnacles of solid rock. It was easy to see how it had obtained its name, for the general impression obtained when looking at it was that of a gigantic stone castle. Its peak was composed of many sharp needle-like points some seven thousand feet above sea level.
On the northern side of the Crag the country dropped abruptly into Shasta Valley. They were close to Mount Shasta by this time, and although flying along at about eight thousand feet, they had to look up into the air to see the snow cap of that peak, which was some fourteen thousand feet above sea level. The sides of the mountain were covered with trees for the first five or six thousand feet above the floor of the valley, but beyond that the timber thinned out until the mountain was bare for the last three or four thousand feet.
At the foot of Mount Shasta they passed over a logging camp nestled in the thick forest. Ahead of them stretched the floor of Shasta Valley, but they could not see the far end as it was covered with clouds. For the next fifty miles Bill wondered what he would do when he reached those clouds. He knew that the valley ended at the range of mountains along which the Oregon-California boundary extended. He could not cross those mountains unless he could get at least four or five thousand feet altitude.
Bill led the Flight toward the railroad, for he knew that it made its way through the mountains and he hoped to follow it. The planes reached the clouds and dropped down to thirty-five hundred feet to get under them. From that point on Bill followed the tracks. On both sides the mountains rose well above the railroad.
As they progressed the ground rose and tended to meet the clouds until they were soon flying along with barely any space between the planes and the timber-covered mountain sides. The railroad tracks followed the course of the stream, which flowed down the valley. The valley became narrower and the tracks climbed higher up on the mountain sides. At one point they passed a train standing on a siding waiting to pass another coming from the opposite direction. The passengers were standing in the vestibules or looking out of the windows at the planes as they passed. The pilots passed so close that they could see the minutest details of the people on the ground. It seemed to Bill that he could almost have touched the train as he passed.
The valley was gradually getting narrower—the trees were higher and the planes had less room for maneuvering. Bill turned around to see how the other members of his Flight were getting along. He was following the middle of the valley and had plenty of space for maneuvering, but the flank planes were too close to the trees for comfort. The Flight was limited in its movements by the clouds above and the V-shaped cut through the mountains below.
As they gained altitudes the valley twisted and turned. Each twist and turn had to be followed with great care by the pilots. The Flight began to string out on account of the confined space in which they were flying, the danger of hitting a mountain side or of running into one of the other planes. The curves of the railroad and the stream became more abrupt until Bill found it difficult to anticipate the next turn he would have to make with his plane.
It was getting harder and harder to follow the railroad. Bill thought that they should soon reach the crest of the mountains and start to go down the other side, as the railroad by this time was almost in the low clouds.
All of a sudden Bill saw that the tracks made a complete one hundred and eighty degree turn ahead of him. The tracks had been steadily climbing to gain altitude, and now in order to gain more they turned back on themselves. Bill knew that he had led his Flight into a blind valley. He must turn around and follow the tracks, but where did they lead?
Bill had to make a wing overturn and come back, head on, at the other planes. Each plane in turn slid over to the side of the valley as Bill approached, but it looked as if he would surely collide with one of them before he passed the last. However, he cleared by inches and was maneuvering to pass the last plane when he saw that the railroad went into a tunnel.
It is bad enough to have to follow a railroad through a twisting, winding valley with barely enough room to handle the plane, but when that railroad runs into a tunnel, then the leader of the Flight is up against it to know just what to do. Bill had this situation confronting him. He did not want to back-track down the valley, for the clouds by this time might have settled down and shut off all possibility of getting out. Something had to be done, however, and must be done at once. The mouth of the tunnel was getting closer and closer.
The side of the mountain disappeared in the clouds above the tunnel. There was no way to tell how high that mountain extended above the bottom of the clouds. Bill could see the trees with their trunks below the clouds and their tops hidden, but that did not help any. He saw a deer, standing at first in an opening between the trees, suddenly turn and bound out of sight when it overcame its fright of the throbbing engines. Bill right there wished that he could change places with that deer.
He headed his plane straight at the mouth of the tunnel and then, just before reaching it, pulled back on the stick and went up into the clouds. Once in the mist, with all view of the ground cut off, he hesitated about what to do next. If he leveled off too soon he would crash against the sides of the mountain. If he held his plane in a climbing position too long, it would fall off into a spin. He tried to hold it at the same angle at which he had entered the clouds and hoped that it was sufficiently steep to follow the contour of the abrupt slope below him.
Bill held his plane in the climb for an appreciable period of time. He thought that he must have crossed over the crest of the Siskiyou Mountains and, accordingly, pushed forward on the stick. One of two things lay below him, either the side of the mountain or a level valley. In one case he would crash into the mountain, but in the other he would come out safely into the open. Which it would be, Bill had no means of knowing.
CHAPTER XI—INTO THE SMOKE PALL
When Bill Bruce went up into the clouds and disappeared from the view of the other pilots in his Flight, for a moment the men in the planes following were stupefied. It took some time for them to realize why this seemingly unnecessary dangerous maneuver had been performed. Then they came to a point where they saw the mouth of the tunnel and they could visualize what was ahead. They had no time to question the motives or judgment of their leader, for the tunnel was in their immediate front and other planes were thundering in their rear. They had no choice but to follow Bill Bruce. If they tried to turn, they would run the chance of colliding with the following planes. So each pilot in turn zoomed his plane into the clouds.
The Siskiyou Mountains run almost east and west, separating the Shasta Valley from the Medford Valley. Their crest conforms for that short distance, almost exactly with the boundary between Oregon and California. The railroad winds and twists in all manner of bends as it makes its roundabout way to the crest of the range. To one flying above the tracks, the curves seem unusually abrupt, but there is no other route for the tracks to follow in crossing the mountains. The only alternative is an exceedingly long tunnel through the base of the mountains. The expense of such a tunnel would be prohibitive on account of its great length, while the tunnel now used through the crest is really a very short one.
The railroad passes between two peaks. On one side is Pilot Knob, a trifle over six thousand feet high and exactly on the border between the two states. This peak received its name from the old pioneers who used it as a landmark to guide them over the Oregon-California trail. It stands well above the surrounding mountains and has a peculiar shape which makes it unmistakable after once having been seen. On the other side of the tracks is Ashland Peak, seven thousand feet high.
Bill Bruce saw from his map that these two peaks were somewhere nearby, but their exact location he did not know on account of the clouds. In order for him to get down into the Medford Valley safely, he must pass between these two almost prohibitive obstacles. The sides of all the mountains in that area are covered with large rocks, which are interspersed with scattered trees. Such was the country over which Bill Bruce was leading his Flight through the clouds.
As long as he continued in the direction which he was traveling when he entered the clouds, he would be all right. However, if he deviated from that course the slightest, he would surely crash into the sides of the mountains. Such was the most hazardous situation into which Bill had led his Flight. Bill had gone into the clouds blindly, but once in them he realized the many obstacles into which he had unintentionally led his Flight. He himself might make it through with little trouble, but could the other members of his Flight also do it?
Bill came out into the Medford Valley and breathed a sigh of relief. As far as he was concerned, he had passed through the dangerous zone safely, but the others were still in the clouds. He wondered if he should start flying in a circle and wait for the other planes; but such a maneuver was unnecessary, as he had no more made his entrance into the valley than the first two of the following planes came into view. They were flying with the same distance and interval between as when they had entered the clouds. They were followed almost immediately by the other two and the Flight was soon in formation again, headed toward their destination.
The clouds broke ahead of them and they had glimpses of clear sky. They passed over Ashland and Medford, the two largest towns in the valley, and saw the extensive orchards covering the valley. Ahead Bill saw another range of mountains barring his way to the north, but he did not anticipate any difficulties in crossing them. His planes were now light on account of the gasoline that they had used in coming from San Francisco, and they had a clear sky ahead.
Bill led the Flight on a direct compass course for Eugene. If everything went along smoothly he would make it, but if he encountered head winds, some of the planes might run out of gas before they arrived. The pilots climbed steadily to cross the mountains ahead, while the railroad disappeared to the west and entered the Rogue River Valley at Gold Hill. When he reached an altitude of seven thousand feet, Bill made an inspection of the country ahead.
There was nothing but mountain peaks as far as the eye could reach. The sides of the mountains were covered with timber, and that timber made a never-to-be-forgotten impression on Bill. It spread over the undulating ground like a rich, velvety, green rug. Clearings were few and far between. The streams and rivers wound their way through the valleys, making the rolling green covering even more beautiful. It was hard to believe that the trees over which he was flying were two or three hundred feet high.
Here and there the smooth surface of the timber was broken by small clearings. Each of these marked the place where some hardy homesteader had settled in the woods and was making a home for himself and perhaps his family. For the most part they were along stream beds where they could get water. Some of the clearings had evidently been worked for longer periods than others, for they were much larger. The houses and barns which had been erected appeared quite diminutive on account of the large trees standing near by.
Then other open spaces in the velvety green stood out to greet his eye. These were also in many cases the work of man, but from such far different causes. Large white snags stood like gaunt tombstones marking the glory of once mighty trees. These snags could have resulted from only one thing—forest fires. Where the fires were of recent occurrence, the ground was still burned black, but in the older fire areas the second growth timber had made its appearance and the ground was covered by the small trees with which nature hoped to restore the forests to their former grandeur.
Then, again, there were areas where man had left entirely different marks resulting from his activities. The second growth timber had covered the bare places, but there were no snags present. These were places where the land had been cut over for lumber. In some cases the sawmills were still operating and Bill could see the smoke coming from the stacks of the boilers. He could make out the tracks of the narrow gauge which hauled the large logs to the mill and the donkey engines working some distance from the mill, furnishing the power by which the logs were snaked to the narrow gauge tracks or to the slides.
When slides were used to send the timber down the mountain sides, they showed up in a distinct, straight brown streak through the timber. Bill saw one of these slides operating later an and was astonished at the speed at which the enormous logs thundered down the track. The logs passed with express train speed and the friction with the track was so great that many of them were smoldering from the heat when they reached the bottom.
Here and there Bill saw what he thought was the smoke of a forest fire. There was no mistaking a fire when it was large, but there were other columns of smoke ascending which Bill could not identify. They might be coming from other sawmills or they might be small fires.
Off to the right stood Mount McLoughlin, thrusting its head well above any of its neighbors. Later on, during the patrol, many times Bill was to welcome the sight of that peak. It was ninety-five hundred feet high and its top was almost always covered with a snow cap.
Suddenly Bill became aware of the fact that he could not see very far ahead. There did not seem to be any clouds in the sky, but the visibility became extremely limited. Gradually the haze grew thicker around them. It had the distinct odor of burning timber. The Flight had entered the dense smoke pall which covers the Northwest section of our country during the forest fire season. It has not the appearance of clouds, but is just as impenetrable to the eye. Clouds vary in color from white, through gray to black. At times they have a distinctive greenish tinge which always is indicative of hail being present. The smoke pall has a dirty, grayish brown color which tends toward a golden hue when the sun shines on it.
By this time Bill had led his Flight quite some distance from the railroad. He had not seen any possible landing fields since leaving the Medford Valley. The smoke pall had taken away some of his self-confidence. He wanted to get back closer to civilization. Bill changed his course so that he would soon meet the railroad again.
The Flight had now been in the air for over three hours. The tanks held gasoline for a trifle over four hours. Bill knew that they would soon have to land for gasoline. He looked to his left for the railroad, but could see no signs of the usual open country which bordered the tracks. As the country beneath them was wild and thickly wooded, Bill headed the Flight still farther toward the west to reach those tracks.
The smoke pall did not have a definite lower surface as clouds have, but gradually changed into a haze and thinned out close to the ground. Bill was gradually losing altitude and suddenly, through the haze, he saw a small town. He flew towards it and then circled around to pick up the landing field. He studied his map and knew from the configuration of the town, the river flowing by, that he had reached Roseburg. Another circle and he saw the landing field. Bill gave the signal for breaking formation and landed.
A gasoline tank truck was waiting for the planes when they taxied to the end of the field. Apparently they were expected, but how did anyone know that they were going to land there, when Bill himself did not know it? Bill set out to satisfy his curiosity.
“How did you know that we were going to land here?” he asked the driver of the truck.
“Captain Smith told me that you would probably get in some time about three o’clock,” replied the driver.
“What time did Captain Smith come through?” asked Bill.
“It must have been around eleven o’clock. It was before lunch anyhow. They all went into town for lunch and left here about one-thirty.”
“The lucky dogs,” said Bill. “We haven’t had any lunch so far, and from all indications we will not get any. Fill us up as soon as you can, for I want to make Eugene this afternoon.”
In a short time the pilots and mechanics were busily engaged in filling the tanks in the planes. Some pumped gasoline into the tanks, while others put in oil. The water in the radiators was checked, inspections made of the various parts of the planes and everything possible done to insure a safe trip into Eugene.
“How long a hop to get in?” asked Bob Finch.
“Just sixty miles,” replied Bill. “We ought to make it in forty minutes easily. There’s nothing to the trip now, for we can follow the railroad if we have to.”
“I surely was surprised when you went into the clouds back there,” said Bob. “I was following right on your tail and looked around to see how close the other planes were. When I again looked to see your plane, it was gone. Then I saw that tunnel and I didn’t know what had become of you. I soon figured it out that you had hopped the ridge. I had no idea how high that range was when I went into those clouds, but I hoped for the best.”
“I couldn’t very well turn around,” said Bill. “There wasn’t room enough. I had no other choice.”
“The planes are all serviced,” said Batten, who had just walked along the line of planes.
“We will take off in ten minutes. Same formation,” replied Bill.
They followed the tracks for the greater part of the trip to Eugene. The country was fairly open along the railroad, with many small towns at intervals. Streams and creeks ran down from the timbered hills and crossed the tracks to join large rivers which emptied into the Pacific. The farther north they flew, the more dense became the smoke. Appearances would indicate that the Governor was right when he said that there was danger of the whole timbered area burning.
Bill saw the Willamette Valley open up ahead just as he reached Cottage Grove. It was the first real open country that he had seen since leaving the Medford Valley. The other valleys had been so narrow that they looked entirely too small to amount to much from the airman’s point of view, but Willamette was wide and had numerous farms, orchards and open spaces. It was a real valley, but after their flight from San Francisco to Roseburg the pilots knew that such wide-open spaces would seldom be found in the Northwest woods.
Almost immediately after losing sight of Cottage Grove, Bill saw several railroads converging and knew that Eugene was not far off. A little later he jumped his plane over a small ridge and the city lay almost at his feet. He saw the airdrome with the other Squadron ships and led his formation low toward the flying field. He made a circle of the town and then gave the signal for landing.
The planes came down to the ground, the pilots and mechanics jumped out of the cockpits and the planes were lined up with those from the other Flight. The Squadron was united again. It was ready for the strenuous work of aerial forest patrol.
CHAPTER XII—A FOREST PATROL BASE
That night the officers and enlisted men secured living accommodations in the town. After the truck train arrived, the enlisted personnel would all be quartered in tents on the aviation field. In the meantime they must occupy temporary billets in the hotels.
The next morning the Squadron personnel were out at the aviation field quite early, for there was much work to be done. The only available buildings on the field were a large frame structure which was to be used as a storehouse, and a small one which was to be used as headquarters. The officers were installing the furnishings required to change the frame shack into an office. The mechanics were working on the planes, performing the necessary maintenance and servicing required after a flight.
Batten, the Engineering Officer, was making arrangements to insure the planes being in serviceable condition the next day. Maxwell, the Operating Officer, was busily engaged in plastering maps of Oregon all over the walls of his office. Liggett, the Radio Officer, was checking radio sets on the planes and supervising the erection of a radio hut some distance away from the landing field proper.
Bill was inspecting the planes of his Flight when he heard someone say, “Hello, old-timer, who would have expected to see you here?”
Bill turned and saw Earl Simmons, the corpulent forest supervisor from the Cascade National Forest.
“I never expected, when you drafted me as a fire-fighter, that I would make it a profession, either,” replied Bill, as he shook hands with Simmons. “How did they pry you away from your bailiwick in the woods?”
“We are going to have a conflab here to determine how you people can help us save what’s left of the timber,” replied Simmons. “Cecil is or will be here, and Elliot, the State Forester, will represent the state. I am glad that you came up and hope that you can stop this run of fires that we are having.”
Just then an orderly came up and said: “Captain Smith presents his compliments and requests that you report to him in his office.”
“I guess that this is the conflab,” said Bill. “You had better come along.”
Upon arriving at the office, Bill saw that Smith, Kiel, Maxwell, Cecil and another man, probably Elliot, were already assembled. After introductions and greetings all around, the group settled down to business.
“Gentlemen,” said Cecil, “the fire situation in this state is more serious than it ever has been before. Every day new fires are breaking out, and the old ones are getting larger. The smoke pall is so dense that the lookouts cannot see through it. Accordingly new fires get very large before they are reported and we send out a crew to fight them. Smith, what can you do to help us out?”
“I am not very well acquainted with the fire situation, how you handle the problem, or the organization which you have to work with,” replied Smith. “I suggest that you outline to me on the map your present working organization. Then I will have something to guide me when I make a proposal. If I suggested anything now, it would be like shooting in the dark.”
Cecil and Elliot then outlined on the map on the wall the limits of the National Forests, and marked the location of the forest supervisors’, rangers’ and wardens’ headquarters and the lookout stations.
“The lookout stations, as you can see, are located on the highest points in the vicinity,” said Cecil. “All such stations are connected to the nearest headquarters by telephone. A fire is located from two or more stations. They make intersections on the smoke and read the azimuth. This is reported to headquarters and a fire-fighting crew is immediately collected to go out and fight the fire. If it is an exceptionally large one and is hard to get under control, either the supervisor or warden usually makes a reconnaissance of the fire to determine the best means of fighting it. That must be done on horseback or foot and takes, in some cases, several days. At the present time the lookouts are not of much use on account of the smoke.”
“As I see it,” said Smith, “we can help you in detection and suppression of fires, but not much in the prevention.”
“I am not so sure about that,” said Cecil. “As soon as it is known that the airplanes are patrolling the forests, people will be more careful not to start the fires. The planes will have a great psychological value.”
“Perhaps so,” replied Smith. “The first thing that I want is a liaison officer from your service to stay right here and represent your department. We cannot talk your language and you can’t talk ours. In a short time the liaison officer will be able to talk both.”
“That’s all right,” said Cecil. “I think that I will have Simmons stay to start you out right and later replace him with someone else. Does that suit you, Earl?”
“Suits me O. K.,” replied Simmons.
“With Simmons here,” said Smith, “we can start a set of maps which will show the fire situation at a glance. All the fires can be marked on the map in different colors.”
“I have a suggestion to make in that connection,” said Cecil. “In order that a standard set of colors be used, we should all have red pins to designate new fires that are verified; yellow pins for new fires not verified; green pins for permanent smokes such as logging camps, sawmills, etc., and black pins for fires that are burned out. In that way there will be no confusion.”
“So be it,” replied Smith. “So much for the maps and the liaison officer. Now my next suggestion is that we send out two patrols a day from here, one going south to Medford and the other north to Portland.”
“That will be all right,” said Cecil, “provided that these patrols cover the areas having the greatest fire hazard. Let’s work it out on the map.”
It took some time to work it out satisfactorily, as Cecil wanted to get the patrol to cover the greatest possible amount of timbered area and Smith had to be sure that the routes covered areas where there were at least an occasional emergency landing field; that the routes would normally take but two hours to cover; and that they would end near a sub-base where the planes could be serviced with gas and oil. The patrols finally agreed upon were:
1. From Medford over the Cascades to Eugene and return over almost the same route.
2. From Eugene over the coast range to the west of the Willamette Valley and end at Medford. To return over approximately the same route in the afternoon.
3. From Eugene over the Cascades in the morning to Portland, and back over the coast range in the afternoon.
As the period of greatest fire hazard was during the middle of the day, it was agreed that the patrols should start out at nine o’clock each morning and land at the sub-base about eleven, and taking off again about one o’clock, be back home at about three.
“How will you send in the information that you get?” asked Cecil.
“By radio,” replied Smith. “I also have a suggestion on that. I am bringing up several extra sets. Why can’t you hire some amateurs and have them run sets in each forest? In that way the Forest Supervisor would get the fire data as soon as it was sent. We would save a lot of time if we did.”
“An excellent idea,” said Cecil. “We will do it. When will your sets be available?”
“As soon as the truck train gets in,” replied Smith. “Probably the day after tomorrow.”
“What data will be in the message?” asked Cecil.
“We might just as well fix up a code now as any time,” said Smith. “We will have a standard sequence for all messages. All data to be in code if possible. KA starting the message would be the attention call. Then VAI or the call letters of the ground station being called. FFF signal that a fire was discovered. NF or OF meaning a new or old fire. T followed by the number of the township. R followed by the range number. A followed by the estimated size of the fire in acres. W followed by the estimated strength of the wind in miles an hour, and abbreviation of direction, as N for north or SE for southeast. PA followed by the number of the patrol, and finally AR, meaning the end of the message. How does that suit you? That is my Radio Officers’ idea. Liggett gets the credit for that if it is accepted. A complete message would be received KA KA KA VAI VAI VAI FFF NF T26 R7 A300 W15 NW PA3 AR AR AR. Then station VAI would know that a new fire in Township 26, Range 7, burning over 300 acres. The wind was 15 miles an hour from the northwest and Patrol Number 3 was reporting it.”
“Its all right for us,” said Cecil. “It gives us all the information that we need.”
“The patrols will send in messages every five minutes regardless of the number of fires that they discover,” said Smith. “That will enable us to keep track of their whereabouts. I don’t want any planes landing in the timber and not knowing approximately where they are.”
“I also suggest that the Liaison Officer should send in a complete report of all fires discovered by telephone as soon as the plane has landed,” said Cecil. “I will have additional liaison officers at Medford and at Portland.”
“That’s all right,” said Smith. “I am going to establish ground radio stations at both those places in addition to the one here to receive the messages that come in and check them when the plane lands.”
“When can we get started?” asked Cecil.
“We can make patrols tomorrow,” said Smith. “There will be no radio on the ground to receive any messages, though. I would suggest that you send up some of your men in the planes tomorrow to act as observers and check on the fires now burning.”
“That will be fine,” replied Cecil. “I am not so sure that we have located all of the fires now burning. That reminds me, how about special planes occasionally for special patrols to enable my men to get data as to how best to fight large fires? They could surely make the tour of a fire by plane in thirty minutes to two hours that now would take us several days on horseback or on foot.”
“Whenever you want one,” said Smith. “We will always have one plane in the airdrome waiting for such service.”
“You may not appreciate it, but that is going to be a big help,” said Cecil. “In order to fight a fire efficiently, we must know the topography of the country. That enables us to efficiently locate our fire lines. It is always better to stop a fire on a natural barrier such as a stream, the crest of a mountain, a road, or an already burned-over area than in the middle of a forest. The forester in the plane can also get the wind direction and nature of the wood burning. It makes a big difference if the fire is in second growth timber, virgin woods or brush.”
“That is an easy request,” said Smith. “A plane will be ready any time. Bruce, I am going to send Goldy and two planes from your Flight down to operate from Medford. You make all the necessary arrangements. The rest of the Squadron will operate from here. Simmons, you had better get Goldy and tell him what it’s all about from your viewpoint. The first patrol will start out at nine tomorrow. Bruce, you take the south patrol, and Kiel, you take the north one. Goldy will start for Medford at the same time and patrol the Cascades on the way down.”
“I will have my men here at that time,” said Cecil. “I will send down a liaison officer with Goldy in one of the planes.”
“Can’t be done,” said Smith. “Two mechanics will have to go down to work on the planes.”
“I’ll pay the transportation of one of them on the railroad,” said Cecil. “He can go down on the evening train.”
“That will fix it,” said Smith. “I don’t care how the mechanic gets there, so long as he is there to service the planes.”
“Well, Simmons,” said Bill as they left the office, “it looks as if you had bought yourself a job.”
“One thing is certain,” replied Simmons. “I will know a lot more about airplanes when this Summer is over than I do now.”
“And I will know a lot more about your forests,” replied Bill.
CHAPTER XIII—THE AERIAL FIRE PATROL
Bill Bruce had no conception of the size of the State of Oregon until he started out on his patrol the next morning with Forester Kotok. His patrol route covered the Siuslaw and Umpqua National Forests. Starting southwest from Eugene, it led to Marshfield on the Pacific Ocean and then turned to the southeast to Medford. On the return trip the turning point was almost due west of Medford and then direct to Eugene. Both the outgoing and return flights covered a distance of about two hundred miles. Normally it could be expected that a two hours’ flight would be sufficient for the two hundred miles.
When a pilot is flying a forest patrol, he cannot always fly the direct route. He diverges from his course to accurately locate and secure the limits of each fire which he sees. Then, again, the smoke pall may obscure the tops of the mountains and require for safety’s sake that the plane be flown through valleys or around peaks to reach the destination. Thus on most patrols, while the flight could be made in two hours if the sky was clear and there were no fires located, during the fire season the plane might be out as long as three or even three and a half hours.
The general elevation of the terrain over which Bill was to fly was about four thousand feet, but here and there mountain peaks stood above the five thousand foot mark. The area was almost entirely devoid of habitations and completely covered with a dense growth of timber except where logging companies had operated or fire had left its terrible scars.
Before leaving the ground, both Bill and Kotok provided themselves with maps of the southwest corner of the state. These maps were mounted on boards so that they could be easily handled in the plane. Kotok desired to accurately plot the limits of every fire seen during the flight so that a record could be made of the fires then burning. Accordingly, Bill looked forward to a flight of three hours, if not more, before they reached Medford.
They had no sooner left the ground and headed over the large expanse of unbroken timber before Bill realized that he was going to find it rather difficult to accurately locate himself on the map. There was a strange similarity between the different sections of that area. The mountains were all covered with timber, roads were few, there were no railroads at all after leaving the immediate vicinity of the airdrome and the details of the ground all looked the same. He realized that he would have to orient himself by the rivers and streams or become hopelessly lost.
The smoke pall made it practically impossible to distinguish the few landmarks which were present. Everything was considerably dimmed by the smoke. He had the choice of flying under the smoke and skimming the tree tops or of flying above the smoke and dropping down through when a fire was sighted. During the first part of the patrol Bill flew under the smoke.
The first forest fire was sighted before they had been twenty minutes out of Eugene. The smoke rising from the burning timber joined to that already hanging in the air made an impenetrable barrier ahead of the plane. Bill guided the machine around the area, while Kotok obtained data as to its size, nature of material burning and the limiting natural features. Bill then flew a short distance north to the railroad in order to accurately locate the fire. It was a rather small fire, covering between two hundred and three hundred acres.
After getting the data concerning the first fire, they continued on their patrol. They picked up one fire after another. Some were quite large and evidently had been burning for a considerable time. Others were small, which would indicate that they had started but recently. At times it was necessary for Bill to fly right over the fires as they were bounded by high mountains with peaks extending into the smoke pall.
While flying over the burning timber, Bill thought that he could hear the crackling fire above the deafening roar of his engine. The trees sent pillars of sparks and smoke high into the air when they fell. The heat was intense and the air so rough that it was terrifying. The air conditions put a severe nervous strain on Bill, for there was always the possibility of his engine cutting out. If that had happened the plane would have been forced to land right in the midst of the burning trees, for with the limited ceiling the plane was just clearing the tree tops.
The bumps threw the plane around so violently that Bill was kept busy continuously working the controls. One wing dropped and Bill threw the stick across to bring it up. Before he had the plane level, the nose went down and the plane dropped at a terrific speed right toward the burning inferno below. Several times they missed the tree tops by inches. However, Kotok, at first more or less nervous on account of the conditions under which they were flying, was soon hard at work making his notes.
The heat from the fire finally sent the plane up with a bound into the smoke cloud overhead. Once in the cloud, the fire became a glow against the haze and then finally disappeared. Bill turned and looked at Kotok for instructions as to what was to be done next. If Kotok was through with that fire, they could continue the trip. If not, Bill must dive through the smoke and brave the turbulent air above the burning timber again. Kotok gave a sign which Bill interpreted as meaning that he was through. Bill headed his plane along the patrol route.
Gradually climbing, they soon emerged above the smoke cloud. They had reached an altitude of seven thousand feet. The ground was hidden, except when occasional mountain peaks penetrated through the cloud. For a while they flew along above the cloud, following the compass course. Then Kotok pointed to the right and Bill turned in that direction.
There was a peculiar hemispherical hump protruding above the general level of the upper surface of the smoke cloud. It looked like a mushroom thrusting its top through the ground. As they came nearer they could see that there was a violent disturbance of air around that hump. The smoke had a golden glow which indicated a fire beneath. The much needed data could never be obtained without dropping through the cloud. With the troubles and dangerous flying conditions which Bill had encountered above the last fire still fresh in his mind, Bill hesitated about plunging down into the unknown.
As long as they remained above the smoke, Bill could see what was ahead of the plane and all dangers of crashing into mountain sides was eliminated, but driving a plane down into that thick smoke was different. They had been sent out to get information, however, and that data could not be obtained without seeing the fire. Accordingly Bill pointed the nose of his plane down and hoped that they would not run into anything before emerging from the smoke into the murky air beneath.
Bill was not so sure that he was going to like forest patrol flying if it necessitated much of this blind navigating. A little of it was not so bad, but when a pilot was required to fly for mile after mile through the muck and haze of countless fires, it put a different aspect on the subject. Bill endeavored to get a glimpse of the ground beneath as he circled down to the fire, but it was impossible. He was up against a proposition of putting his entire trust in Lady Luck. If she was with him, they would come out all right. If not, then it would be too late to worry.
Lady Luck was kind and the plane came out into a small timber-covered valley. The fire was some distance away and Bill turned his plane towards it. He had enough ceiling under the smoke to fly around the fire without any appreciable danger. The first impression they had was that only a small area was in flames, but as they flew around it was apparent that this was a large fire. Bill had no idea how Kotok was going to locate it on his map. Just where they were, Bill did not know. He had lost his location when they went up through the smoke twenty or more minutes before.
Judging from the manner in which Kotok jotted down notes, he knew the location accurately. He may have obtained it from the small river which twisted around between the mountains, or it may have been the bald, rocky peak on one of the mountains which oriented him. In any event, this district was entirely similar to all the others as far as Bill was concerned. Bill had to admit that he was lost. He knew that the ocean was off to the west thirty or so miles and he could reach it by flying a compass course. In the same way he could reach the railroad by flying in the opposite direction, but that did not help in getting the accurate location of such a fire as this one was. Bill estimated that it covered at least two thousand acres.
When Kotok had completed his work, Bill again headed in a southwest direction. Suddenly they came out over a small bay opening into the ocean. Bill made several circles to get the lay of the land. He saw a railroad crossing the bay and continuing to the south along the bay shore. He located himself at last. They had reached Coos Bay.
Bill reluctantly left the low ground along the bay shore and headed back into the timber-covered mountains. The smoke pall was not so thick as they progressed to the south. There were fewer fires and accordingly they made better time; with the decrease of the haze, Bill was able to fly at a higher altitude and thus they could cover a much greater strip of the forest in their search. That was more like the flying that Bill had depicted that aerial patrol would be.
They skirted a mountain and came out into a valley. A stream and railroad ran along side by side in the valley. From there on the flight was easy. The railroad led into Medford and they landed about thirty minutes after picking up the railroad. The flight had taken three hours and a half, but even at that they were both on the ground removing their flying equipment before Goldy’s plane came into sight.
“How many fires did you locate?” asked Bill when Goldy had climbed out of his plane.
“We picked up twenty-four,” replied Goldy. “How many did you get?”
“Eleven,” replied Bill. “I can’t very well see how fires can be started in the country we came over. We must have flown for a hundred miles without seeing a single sign of any habitations.”
“I guess you are right at that,” commented Kotok. “The area we flew over and will go over again this afternoon is perhaps the least explored of any in the United States. The southwestern part of Oregon has practically no settlements and there is no excuse for anyone going into it unless he is a timber cruiser or a hunter. A man could get lost there and he never would be found. He would have to find his own way out.”
“What’s a timber cruiser?” asked Goldy.
“A man whose business it is to make estimates of the amount of timber in a woods,” replied Kotok. “The logging companies usually have timber cruisers go over a section before they start operations. Thus they can form an idea of the amount of lumber they will be able to get out.”
On the return trip Bill and Kotok flew deeper than ever into that little-traveled section of the state. The afternoon sun threw its beams onto the leaves and made the green carpet of trees passing beneath the plane seem like a beautiful picture. The fires were very few for the first part of the trip and the flight very pleasant, but after they reached Rusty Butte and turned to the north, conditions changed. It was there that they ran into the smoke cloud again and had more dirty flying.
They reached the Umpqua River and had but fifty more miles to do when they saw an enormous fire The ceiling was so low that they had to fly along just above the tree tops, and from that low height could see the men working around the fire. It also was apparent that the fire was confined to a bend in the river where the river turned almost back on itself. Thus by building a fire lane across the bend the fire would soon burn itself out. Bill at once saw the great value that an airplane reconnaissance would be to the man in charge of a fire crew there. In a rough section like that, a man would take hours to work his way through the timber and over the mountains to get that information. Kotok undoubtedly saw in a few minutes the proper place to place the fire break.
They picked up a few more fires before reaching the Siuslaw River. Most of them were small and apparently under control. They had reached the area adjacent to the Willamette Valley. Here there were a few old fires about burned out, but none of those blazing furnaces which threatened the entire forested area like the larger ones farther away.
Bill landed his plane on the airdrome and was glad to be back at the base. It had been hard flying with the thought continuously in his mind that if his engine stopped he would have to land in the trees. It would not have been so bad had the ceiling been unlimited so that he could have gained sufficient altitude to at least try and glide to a burned-over area or land in some second growth timber, but the thought of making a landing in the tops of trees which were two or three hundred feet above the ground was not so pleasant.
“Did you get them all?” asked Bill as they walked to the operations office.
“I think so,” replied Kotok. “My map shows twenty-three fires.”
“How did you locate them without any landmarks?” asked Bill.
“You may not realize it, but I have been operating in this country for a long time,” explained Kotok. “I have been fighting fires here for the past seven years. These mountains all mean something to me and they all have different shapes, covering of trees or rocky formations by which each is distinguished from the others.”
“They all looked alike to me,” said Bill. “Perhaps, before the season is over, I will be able to tell one from the others, but not now.”
CHAPTER XIV—DOWN IN THE TIMBER
The patrols over the forest continued day after day. As the planes landed, the master map in the operations office became more and more spotted with its colored pins. The number of pins constantly increased, but the colors changed with the condition of the fire. Everyone was working to have the pins all black as soon as possible, for black pins meant that the fire was out and therefore presented no further danger.
The truck train arrived and the added equipment which it carried made operations easier for everyone. The enlisted men pitched a camp in a grove of trees adjacent to the flying field. The tents were all in the shade. A large tent with a fly covered the kitchen and storeroom. Wooden tables and benches were built for messing. A large tent fly was erected over the tables to provide shade and keep out rain, if any should come.
Radio stations were established at Eugene, Portland and Medford. With the establishment of these stations, the reports of fires were almost instantly received and sent to the forest supervisor concerned. The smaller sets were sent out to the forest headquarters for use of the amateurs. This further expedited the reporting of fires, as it was no longer necessary to rely on the telephone lines, which in some cases might lead through as many as five or six centrals.
The amateurs operating the sets in the forests were usually boys on vacation from school or college. They were eager to get out into the woods and much interested in the radio. Their enthusiasm and interest materially assisted in the efficiency of the radio. Accordingly, it was very seldom that an amateur station was reported as being out of order or the operator not on the job.
The number of new fires decreased each day and the fires reported were controlled much sooner than before the Squadron arrived. However, the crying need was rain, and lots of it. The woods were dry as tinder and a single spark was sufficient to start an enormous fire. This was especially true in the sections well out beyond the line of habitations bordering the valleys. A general rain would dampen the ground in the forests and at least tend to prevent fires from starting.
The hot Summer days also increased the fire hazard by driving more vacationists into the woods. In spite of everything that the Forest Service did, some of these campers would go away leaving their campfire burning or throw burning matches or cigarette stubs into the woods. It was a constant fight to try and secure conformity to the fire rules and regulations.
Simmons returned to his forest for a short time and returned with a story which showed the psychological value of the airplane patrol. He was in his office one morning when a camper came in and asked for the forester in charge.
“I am he,” replied Simmons.
“I came in to give myself up,” said the camper.
“What for?” asked Simmons.
“I left my campfire burning this morning when I left my camp, and that airplane patrol flew over a little later,” replied the camper. “I know that he saw the fire, and I also know that he saw me coming down the trail. He would catch me sooner or later, so I am giving myself up.”
“We will go right back and put out that fire,” said Earl.
As it happened, the airplane observer had caught the fire and reported it by radio. Simmons and the camper returned to the camp site and the camper extinguished the fire. Then Earl escorted him to the county seat, where a judge fined the camper for not extinguishing his fire. It was all over within a few hours, but the camper had learned a lesson.
The airplane observer might or might not have been able to see the camper going down the trail in his automobile, but that did not enter into the case. The whole proceeding showed that the average camper knew of the airplane patrol and was accordingly more careful.
Some time later Goldy was on patrol from Medford. He had not been out for more than twenty minutes when he picked up the smoke of a new fire. The location and size were sent in by radio and picked up by an amateur at the supervisor’s headquarters in the Umpqua Forest. The warden left immediately for the location reported and found a homesteader burning slashings.
After extinguishing the fire, the warden escorted the woodsman to the nearest judge. The case was tried, the man found guilty and the fine imposed without delay.
The airplane observers picked up the smoke five minutes after the fire was lighted. The amateur operator picked up the message and notified the warden almost immediately. Twenty minutes later the warden was on the scene and the fire was extinguished. Another half hour and the case was being heard in court and sentence pronounced. Thus within an hour after the fire was started the man had been convicted and had paid his fine. He never knew how the fire was discovered and why the warden had arrived so quickly until it was all over. It mystified him, for things had happened so quickly. The warden explained to him how the observers were flying overhead with all-seeing eyes and could discern even the smallest of slashing fires. It was rather a bitter pill for the woodsman to swallow, but he had learned that when forest regulations were published it was expected that they would be obeyed.
“Bruce,” said Captain Smith one day, “I want you to go out on a special patrol. There are a few fires along the crest of the Cascades which we are not getting. Fly a course from here to Mount Thielsen, turn there and then go direct to Medford. Return over the same route. If you start now, you will get into Medford about eleven o’clock.”
“Who will I take along as observer?” asked Bill.
“All the regular observers are on routine patrols,” replied Smith. “You will have to take one of the mechanics who can operate radio.”
“I’ll take Sergeant Breene, then,” said Bill.
“That’s all right. Go ahead,” agreed Smith. “Your patrol number will be five.”
“Get your flying togs,” said Bill Bruce to Breene. “We leave in five minutes.”
“What do we take in the plane?” asked Breene. “I have not made any of these trips yet.”
“You put the equipment in the plane every time that it goes out,” said Bill. “Why ask me that?”
“That was different,” replied Breene. “I didn’t have to go on any of those trips.”
“Two canteens filled with water, two emergency ration outfits, two revolvers and ammunition,” ordered Bill. “I will take care of the maps and pencils.”
In a few minutes they were on their way. For some time the low smoke cloud had made it necessary that they follow the Middle Fork of the Willamette River. The sky cleared materially by the time that they reached Diamond Peak, but did not allow them to get as much altitude as Bill would have liked. They picked up several small fires, which were sent in by radio after Bill gave Breene the data in code form. It was too much to expect that a mechanic could accurately report on forest fires while flying over absolutely strange country. Breene was now finding it just as hard to locate himself accurately as Bill did on his first trip.
All traces of the smoke had disappeared when they reached the Umpqua River and Bill climbed to the nine thousand foot level. The mountains to the south stood out distinctly in the sky. Directly in their path were Mount Thielsen, ninety-one hundred feet, and Mount Bailey, eighty-three hundred feet high. Mountains with their tops above the seven thousand foot level were numerous. To the east the visibility was almost unlimited and one range after another sloped off from the Oregon High Desert further to the east.
Before reaching Mount Thielsen, they passed over Diamond Lake. It was located in a valley between Thielsen and Bailey. Just why lakes should nestle in the valleys along the crest of this high mountain range, Bill could never understand. In California there is a long chain of lakes which extends from the middle of the state to the Oregon line. These lakes are also located amidst the highest peaks of the Sierras. It is a topsy-turvy condition of topographical features that allows water to be plentiful among the mountain peaks where it should run off, and have extremely arid land down in the plains.
Bill’s thoughts were far afield from his engine as he cruised along over Diamond Lake. He had about ninety-five hundred feet altitude and everything was running smoothly. There was no reason why he should think of his plane. Also there was no reason for looking for forest fires, as they had not seen any for the last twenty or thirty minutes of the flight. Bill was brought back to the business at hand with a jerk. His engine started an intermittent miss.
He looked under the plane for a possible landing field. There was none. The lake was out of the question as the timber came right down to the water line. He had no idea of the nature of the country ahead of him and reasoned that it might be even worse than that which he had already passed over. He had no option, he must turn back.
With the start of the turn, the missing increased alarmingly. The engine was now giving just enough power to keep the plane in level flight. Bill tried to retain the altitude that he had, for, seemingly, he had a long distance to go before he could find any kind of a place to land his plane. He remembered having flown over a burnt-over area some distance back and headed in that direction. The area was covered with snags and second growth timber, but it was better to take a chance in that then in the towering trees which covered the ground under him.
The engine sputtered and spit as if showing its displeasure at being made to work when not in perfect condition. The R.P.M.’s steadily dropped until it was doubtful if any power at all was being obtained. Meanwhile the plane continuously lost altitude. Bill scanned the terrain ahead, vainly seeking the burnt-over area. He knew that if it did not show up soon that he could never make it, for they were now gliding along with an almost dead engine.
Bill tried to picture the results if they were forced to land on top of the giant trees. He pictured the plane supported by the mass of limbs some two or three hundred feet above the ground. Suppose that it turned out that way, how could they get down? The lowest limbs were usually a good hundred feet from the ground. They did not have any ropes of any kind with them in the plane. He thought that they might use the wire controls from the plane in an emergency, but he hoped that he wouldn’t have to. Then the thought came to him: suppose that they became stranded on the tree tops and could not get down. They would starve to death.
In the meantime they dropped below the surrounding peaks and were gliding over the valleys. The burnt-over area came into view as a small speck in the distance. It was a big question whether or not they had altitude enough to make the distance.
Down, down, down dropped the plane. The trees came closer and closer to the landing gear and the distance to the burnt-over area decreased slowly. If they made it, the margin would be a scant one. Bill pulled back on his stick so as to save every foot that he could. The plane seemed to be barely moving forward, but they were not dropping so fast.
It was nip and tuck all the way, but they finally cleared the trees along the near edge by inches. Bill tried to pick out the most likely place to land, but it was a problem, for there was no likely place. Large, grotesque, weather-beaten snags stood up everywhere. Then Bill saw a small section with the snags widely separated and made for it. The plane missed some tree trunks, skimmed over the second growth timber for a few yards and then settled down until the wheels hit. When the landing gear became entangled in the small branches, the plane went up on its nose and then dropped down bottom side up.
CHAPTER XV—ON FOOT MILES FROM ANYWHERE
As the plane started to turn over on its back, Bill debated as to whether or not he should unfasten his safety belt. The somersault of the plane had come so suddenly that he did not have time to do much debating and had left it fastened. When the plane came to rest, he was glad that he had.
Both Bill and Breene were suspended head downwards from their cockpits. While they hung there the loose articles in the plane showered all around them, falling to the ground. Bill then looked carefully around and saw that they were some six or seven feet above the ground. It was too great a distance to fall on one’s head, and therefore great care had to be exercised in loosening the belts.
“Be careful when you loosen your belt,” said Bill. “You will hurt yourself if you fall that distance on your head.”
“But, Lieutenant,” replied Breene, “I can’t hang here forever. The blood is rushing to my head. I am not a blooming monkey.”
“Let your conscience be your guide,” said Bill. “I am going to try to get down feet first.”
“Just how does one get his feet past his body from a position like this?” asked Breene.
“That’s what I am trying to figure out,” replied Bill.
With the plane upside down, there was nothing for the hands to grasp to support the weight of the body. The cockpit was so small that Bill could not force his head and shoulders alongside his waist. Then again, gravity working against his every move, made it more difficult. Finally Bill hooked his feet under the rudder bar and opened his belt. The force of his weight falling that short distance pulled his feet from the bar and he found himself doing just what he had tried to prevent—falling head first.
“Be sure and go down feet first, Lieutenant,” he heard Breene say as he dropped.
Bill stretched out his hands and landed on them. The force of the fall was taken up on his arms and shoulders. He was out of the plane O. K. Breene watched Bill fall and then opened his belt. As he dropped he doubled up like a ball. He hit on his shoulders and rolled over on his back. Both were out without any physical injuries.
“Lieutenant, I have been flying with you for some time,” said Breene, “and I must say that you have picked out better landing fields than this one.”
“Depends upon the way that you look at it,” replied Bill. “Compared with the rest of the country hereabouts, I think that this is probably the best landing field in the vicinity. In fact I am glad to have had the opportunity of trying it out.”
“Which way do we hike?” asked Breene.
“All I know is that it is a long way to civilization,” replied Bill. “We will take our canteens, emergency rations, pistols and the airplane compass. With the compass and the map, we ought to be able to hit the Umpqua River. We can follow it down until we reach some sort of habitation.”
“How are we going to get the compass?” asked Breene. “Everything but the compass seems to be here on the ground waiting to be picked up.”
The compass was just beyond their reach, even though they stretched to their utmost. Finally Bill stood on Breen’s back while the sergeant was on his hands and knees and was able to get his hands around the compass. He yanked, twisted and pulled, but the instrument board was stoutly built and the compass could not be budged. All this time Bill was moving around on Breene’s back with the heels of his shoes digging into Breene. Breene stood it as long as he could and then squirmed. Bill lost his balance but clung to the compass. When the confusion was over Bill was sitting on the ground with half the instrument board in his hands. They had secured the compass.
“No matter which way we go, we are going to have some rough traveling,” said Bill, as they stood by the plane. “We can follow the creek off to the east and hit the river, or we can head to the west and hit another creek and follow it to the river. The latter route is shorter, but I doubt if we find any trails either way.”
“You are the boss,” said Breene. “You select the route and it will be all right with me.”
“We are on our way,” said Bill, and headed out through the underbrush to the west.
Each had his canteen, emergency rations and pistol. Breene carried the compass and Bill had a map mounted on a board.
“By the way,” said Bill before they had gone far enough to lose sight of the plane, “did you send in any radios?”
“Sure I did,” replied Breene. “I sent in one when the engine first started to cut out. I sent one every few minutes afterward. The last one I sent said that we were about to land in the timber.”
“Did you give them any location at all?”
“I told them that we were over a lake when the engine started missing. Then I told them that we had turned around. They were the only locations that I knew anything about. I never saw this country before, Lieutenant.”
“Perhaps they will be able to figure about where we went down, and perhaps they won’t,” said Bill as he started ahead again.
The traveling was rough, for the woods were practically devoid of trails. Once in a while they would come across a game trail, but these animal paths seldom led in the direction which the two marooned aviators wished to go. The high hills and mountain sides prevented them from selecting a compass course and sticking to it. They were continually turning and veering around to miss obstacles.
Bill figured that they should reach a stream running to the north about five miles from their plane. It was about eleven o’clock when they started walking and they had not reached the stream by one. The five miles shown on the map as the distance to the creek was in a direct line, but just how many miles Bill and his mechanic had walked, neither one had any idea. However, the stream had not been reached.
Finally they arrived on the top of a ridge and sat down to rest. They could see that the ridge pointed east and west. Accordingly the streams in the vicinity must run the same direction. Where was that stream toward which Bill had been heading?
He studied his map as they sat there and was convinced that the plane had landed several miles farther north than he thought. Actually it made no difference, for all of the streams in the district flowed into the Umpqua. After a short rest they started down the end of the ridge and came to a stream. No matter what happened now, they were assured of water.
The going was harder along the stream bank than through the timber. Streams have a habit of picking out the most impossible places to cut through hillsides, wash away soft ground and form ravines or deposit large stones and boulders. If the airmen were not floundering around in mud, they were slipping over rocks or climbing up steep banks. All of these obstacles were in addition to those normally found in a forest, such as tangled vines under foot, thick underbrush, numerous tree trunks and a myriad of ferns. It was a case of forging ahead as best they could.
Both of the airmen still wore their helmets and summer flying suits. The helmets protected their heads from the sharp points on the branches, and the flying suits protected their uniforms. Bill tried to follow their route down the stream on his map, but had to give up. There were too many small streams in that country which were not indicated on the map. About sundown they stopped for a longer rest period.
“When do we eat?” asked Breene.
“Right now if you want to,” replied Bill.
“What will I eat?” asked Breene.
“You have an emergency ration, eat some of that.”
“I am not that hungry,” said Breene. “I tried one of those some time ago and it tasted like sawdust mixed with sausage finely ground and then baked. I’ll save mine until tomorrow.”
“It probably won’t do either one of us any harm to go without eating tonight,” replied Bill. “We still have a long distance ahead of us before we get to civilization. I think that we may as well stay right here and shove on tomorrow.”
“How far do you figure that we are from the railroad?” asked Breene.
“About fifty miles air line,” replied Bill.
“I think that you are right, Lieutenant. We can’t get there tonight.”
“I have never tried sleeping on pine needles,” said Bill. “As I did not bring any mattress or blankets along, I think that this will be a good time to see how soft a bed pine needles make. My feet are sore after that walk. I am going to soak them in the river.”
They took off their shoes and soaked their swollen feet in the water. The rough ground had left its mark of blisters and rubbed spots on their feet. Neither one was wearing shoes fitted for hiking through the mountains and neither one could have walked much farther that day.
Bill picked out a place in the woods where the rocks stood out above the ground and built a fire. He had just gotten it well started when he heard a shot back in the woods.
“Did you shoot, Breene?” he called.
“Just getting my supper,” replied Breene, who appeared a few seconds later with a mountain grouse.
“That looks much better to me than the emergency ration,” said Breene, as he held the grouse up for Bill’s inspection.
They cleaned and plucked the bird, and then Bill was about to put it on a pointed stick to toast when Breene interrupted him.
“Wait a moment, Lieutenant,” said Breene. “We must have salt on our meat.”
“Where are we going to get it?” asked Bill.
“Right here,” replied Breene as he fished in his pocket.
“How come the salt in your pocket?” asked Bill.
“I have never forgotten the time that you and I were lost in Mexico without any salt,” explained Breene. “No offense to you, but I always carry it now when we go out together.”
“I am glad that you did this time,” said Bill.
“Slide this stick through the bird,” said Breene. “Now we can hold it over the fire and rotate it so that the bird will cook on all sides and not burn.”
They sat in silence while the bird sizzled and cooked over the fire. Occasionally Breene would take a sharp stick and test the meat to see if it was sufficiently cooked. Finally it met his requirements and he removed it from over the fire.
“I hope that we do not run out of the grouse country until we reach the railroad,” said Bill as he ate the meat off half the breast.
“I don’t find this hard to take at all,” remarked Breene. “It gets dark quickly down in the valley, doesn’t it? A few minutes ago I could see the sun shining on that peak across the way, and now it is almost dark. I am going to dig a hole in these pine needles, get a drink from the river and turn in.”
“That walk tired me out, too,” said Bill. “I am going to do the same. I think that we had better keep the fire burning, for I don’t want any more bears using my camp as a thoroughfare like they did the last time I was up here in these woods.”
“Are there bears here?” asked Breene.
“Lieutenant Finch and I only saw about three,” replied Bill.
“I don’t think that I will go to bed,” said Breene.
“They won’t hurt you if you do not hurt them,” said Bill.
“You may know that, I may know it, but do the bears know it?” asked Breene. “No, sir, I am going to sit right here by the fire all night.”
“Suit yourself,” said Bill, and curled up in the pine needles.
CHAPTER XVI—A LOOKOUT STATION IN THE MOUNTAINS
Bill found it rather hard to get to sleep. The pine needles were not as soft as they seemed at first. Then there were the usual noises that are ever prevalent in the forests. The creaking trees, falling branches, small animals wandering through the darkness hunting for food, and occasionally a larger animal coming down to the river for water. Each in turn gave Breene a start and he was continually calling to Bill.
“What’s that?” asked Breene on one of these instances.
“What and where?” asked Bill sleepily.
“There,” replied Breene, pointing into the darkness.
Bill looked in the direction which Breene pointed and saw a pair of shining eyes. They had the bright shine and green tint of a cat’s eyes. Coming out of the darkness they looked as large as two baseballs. Bill was wide awake after looking a short time into those luminous spots standing out against the otherwise dark background. The impression that he received as he looked into those eyes was both fascinating and terrifying. They must belong to one of the various species of mountain lions, thought Bill.
“Maybe this will make him stop staring at us,” said Bill as he aimed at the eyes with his pistol and pulled the trigger.
The roar of the explosion echoed back and forth through the woods and broke the stillness of the night. Immediately following the sound of the pistol the woods became alive with moving creatures. Apparently the campfire had attracted all manner of animals which, at the sound of the pistol, found business elsewhere which would tolerate no delay. The shining eyes were gone.
“Go out and take a look to see if I hit him,” said Bill.
“Not on your life,” replied Breene. “I have a distinct aversion to cats at night, more especially in the dark. It can wait until morning.”
“I haven’t lost anything out there either,” said Bill as he moved a bit closer to the fire.
Breene did not sleep much that night. Bill tried to sleep, but did not have much luck as his bed was rather uncomfortable. Both were glad to see the light break over the hills and know that the mysterious noises of the forest would no longer bother them.
“I don’t know what you are going to do, Sergeant,” said Bill, “but I am going to take one of the cakes of chocolate from my emergency ration and make myself a cup of chocolate to drink.”
“I would greatly prefer coffee for breakfast, but I can stand chocolate,” replied Breene.
They used the cups from their canteens and heated up their drinks. It was rather a slim breakfast, but was better than none. A few minutes later they were striking through the brush along the stream bank. The stream became much larger as they progressed and they also encountered an old trail which they found passable in spots. It was much better than struggling through the virgin woods.
They had been traveling some four or five hours since leaving their camp when Bill heard the drone of an airplane engine. He stopped and listened. The stream they were following was deep down in a valley with high hills on both sides. He could not possibly see that plane unless it flew directly overhead. Bill thought that if he could get a glimpse of the plane he could form an estimate of his present location. It would not do much good in regard to cutting down the distance which they still had to go but it would satisfy his curiosity. The airplane apparently was still some distance away.
“Breene, I am going up on this mountain to see the course that plane is flying,” said Bill. “You wait for me here at this stream junction. I will be back in a short time.”
“I would have thought that you had seen enough airplanes in your life without climbing mountains to see another,” said Breene. “I will wait for you right here.”
Bill climbed up to the top of the ridge. He was afraid that he would not reach the summit in time. The airplane was not far off when he had first heard it and would probably be out of sight before he reached the crest of the ridge. Bill crashed through the underbrush like a scared deer. He reached the top of the ridge out of breath. He had not stopped on the way up to listen for the plane, so had no idea whether or not it was still within sight. He came out into an open space which had recently been burned off and saw the plane.
The airplane was circling around a mountain top but a short distance away. At first Bill could not figure out why it was circling. There were no signs of forest fires, but when he studied that mountain the reflection of the sun on a highly polished surface met his eyes. In a few seconds it disappeared. He examined the top of the mountain very carefully and was sure that there was a lookout station on the top of that ridge. Bill wished that he had brought the airplane compass with him so that he could get the bearing of the mountain. He estimated the distance to the lookout to be anywhere from four to six miles, but distances looking across depressions are very deceptive. Perhaps it might be ten or twelve miles the way they would have to travel. In any event, he was glad that the plane had circled the lookout to drop its message, whatever it might have been. Perhaps the pilot was throwing over a bundle of newspapers. Bill himself had often done that while on patrol.
After carefully studying the topographical features of the mountain on which the lookout station was located, Bill descended the ridge to join Breene.
“Sergeant, there is a forestry lookout station not over ten or twelve miles from here,” said Bill. “I think that we will head for that.”
“As far as I can see, that is more than we have been heading for during the past twenty-four hours,” replied Breene. “Let’s go.”
They worked their way around the bottom of the ridge in an endeavor to reach the opposite side without climbing to the top. Several times Bill doubted the wisdom of the proceeding, but once having started, was reluctant to change his plan. He found that he could not tell when he had reached the other side, for there were so many small valleys and gullies coming down from the top. Finally they reached the bottom of a hog-back which Bill thought pointed in the direction in which the lookout lay.
“Give me the compass, Breene,” said Bill. “I am going up on this hog-back and get a bearing to the lookout.”
“I thought that you might ask for the compass when I hurled it at a wild creature which was about to invade our camp last night,” replied Breene. “I had every intention in the world of getting it this morning, but with the making of chocolate and everything, I forgot all about it, just the same as you did about that big cat which you shot at last night.”
“I didn’t come within a mile of that cat when I shot last night,” said Bill.
“I probably didn’t, either, when I hurled that compass,” replied Breene.
“A fine woodsman you have turned out to be,” said Bill as he started up the hill. “Wait for me right where you are.”
Once having reached the top of the ridge, Bill found it difficult to find a space sufficiently open to get a good view. He tried one place after another, but could not get a clear view through the trees. Finally he thought that he had the lookout spotted, but was not sure. The mountain upon which it was situated did not look the same from his present position.
“I am not sure that I have it spotted,” said Bill when he returned.
“I know how we can get in touch with them,” said Breene.
“How?”
“Start a forest fire,” explained Breene.
“Yes, and pay a fifty-dollar fine,” said Bill. “Not for mine. Come on, let’s go.”
Once more they started through the tangled underbrush. Bill tried to keep the sun in the same relative position so that he could keep the proper course. He was glad that the smoke pall did not extend over this section of the state. He led Breene over ridges and valleys, streams and gullies, and never deviated from what he thought was the direct line to the lookout.
They reached the highest point on a ridge and Bill stopped. He wanted to check up on his course. Once again he hunted for an open space and came upon a rocky stretch where there was no foliage. He looked in all directions, but could see no signs of the station.
He was lost. The station had disappeared as if by magic. He started his search all over again. He made a careful scrutiny of the mountain peaks in front of him, but could see no signs of the lookout. He was about to give up and start for the Umpqua River when Breene called to him from the other side of the ridge.
“That’s a funny-looking place for a homesteader to live,” said Breene as Bill came up.
“Where?” asked Bill.
Breene pointed it out. Bill examined it carefully.
“Why, that’s the lookout!” he exclaimed. “It’s in exactly the opposite direction from where I expected it to be.”
“Is that what you were hunting for?” asked Breene. “Why, I saw that a quarter of an hour ago.”
“You would have saved me a lot of worry if you had told me when you first saw it,” said Bill. “We can’t miss it now. Let’s go.”
The station was just across a valley and the going was not so difficult, as they found a trail in the bottom of the valley which led to the top of the mountain. It was late in the afternoon when they came out into the open space which surrounded the lookout station. They saw two buildings, the lookout tower and a small shack, evidently used as living quarters. They walked up to the tower and Bill called out, “Is anybody home?”
“There sure is; come right in,” replied a voice from within, but it was a woman’s voice.
Bill and Breene entered the small one-room shack and saw a woman sitting at a large table. The sides of the building were open, enabling her to overlook the forest for miles in all directions.
“I believe that the lost are found,” she said when she turned and saw Bill and Breene. “Are you the two aviators who dropped into the woods near Diamond Lake yesterday? How did you find this place?”
“We are the same,” replied Bill. “I saw something shining in the sunlight when I was on a mountain top about ten miles back there.”
“I have been receiving all kinds of messages about you ever since you fell into the woods,” the lookout replied. “Telephone first and then the airplane patrol came over this morning and dropped a message concerning your disappearance at the same time he dropped my papers. The shining light that you saw was from my hand mirror. I sent reflections on the mountain sides on a chance that you might see them. Sit down while I telephone in that you are O. K.”
While she was telephoning, Bill tried to remember her name. He had heard that there was one woman lookout in the Forestry Service, but had not paid much attention when he heard the name. Now it was gone. The lookout gave him no clue when she telephoned. Her message was simple: “Lookout on Black Rock Mountain speaking. The two aviators who fell into the woods near Diamond Lake just reported in here. Neither one hurt. I will start them down tomorrow morning. Send out someone to meet them on the Tiller trail. Did you get that O. K.? Good-bye.”
“I don’t imagine that you have had much to eat,” she said. “One of you sit here and watch for fires and I will get you some supper. I am about famished myself.”
“I’ll take care of the station,” said Bill. “Breene, you help with getting supper.”
When they had left the tower, Bill studied the map. He located Black Rock Mountain and Tiller. They were safe as far as hunger was concerned, but were still many miles from civilization. Just how long it would take them to get back to Eugene he did not know, but he was going to get something to eat soon. That was the big thing right now—food. The trip down the mountains to the railroad could take care of itself. Then Bill remembered the lookout’s name. It was Mollie. Lady Luck was riding with him again, for they had found a lookout station in the midst of the wilds of the forest. If Mollie had not been throwing reflections with her hand mirror, he and Breene would now be facing a cheerless, foodless night in the woods.
CHAPTER XVII—BACK AT EUGENE
“Come and get it,” shouted Breene when the supper had been prepared.
“How about someone watching for forest fires?” asked Bill.
“There’s no use watching any more today,” said Mollie. “Most of the fires start during the middle of the day. It is very seldom that I can pick a new one after sundown. There are exceptions to the rule, though. Several years ago there was a maniac who went from one place to another in the forest starting fires. They would break out in the most unexpected places at the most unusual times. It was weeks before we were sure that they were being willfully started, but there was no other explanation which would explain the succession of fires at most extraordinary times. We finally caught the miscreant and that ended further trouble from that source.”
“What kind of a man was it who would deliberately set these woods on fire?” asked Bill.
“He was crazy,” replied Mollie. “He thought that he had a grievance against one of the foresters and took that means of getting even.”
“You must pardon my inquisitiveness,” said Bill. “I am trying to learn something about the woods. What kind of a grievance could anyone have against a forester?”
“That’s all right,” said Mollie. “Ask all the questions that you want. This fellow had a fairly large herd of cattle and used to graze them in the forests on the mountain sides during the Summer months. By doing this he derived several benefits. The cattle were high up on the mountains, where it was much cooler than down in the valleys; there was considerably more grass and other green vegetation in the forests, and the cattle were out of the fly-infested areas of the lowlands. The Forestry Service charges a nominal fee per head for this privilege. The charge varies for cattle and sheep. The half-demented fellow had availed himself of the privileges of the Summer grazing in the forests for several years without our knowing it, but when we found out that he was grazing his herd in the woods, we sent him a bill.
“Even at that, he was getting out light, for the bill only covered the charge for the current year. He took the stand that he never paid before and therefore he had the right to graze in the woods free. He considered it his privilege as a taxpayer. Naturally the Forest Service denied him the privilege of sending his cattle into the forests without paying for it.
“I guess that the poor fellow brooded over the matter for some time and then became a nut on the subject. The only way that he knew of getting back was to set fires in the woods. It was such an unnatural thing to do that we did not suspect him for quite a while. Finally the evidence was piled sufficiently high to convict him.
“He is the only person whom I have ever heard of who has maliciously set fires in the woods. Others have started them through carelessness or have been negligent, but to deliberately burn down the trees of the forests, why I cannot conceive of such a thing.”
Bill studied Mollie as he ate the supper of baked beans, potatoes, coffee, bread and jam. He figured that she was about forty years old. The outdoor life had bronzed her skin so that she had almost the coloring of an Indian. Her duties, where she was entirely on her own, far from the help of others, had made her exceedingly quick of thought and action and self-reliant.
“How does it happen that you have the position of lookout?” asked Bill.
“My husband had the position first, and he was killed in fighting a fire,” she explained. “I then took the examination and secured the position. I liked the woods so much that I could not give it up. I can think of nothing more beautiful than the sunlight on the leaves of the forest. This is my lifework and I will never willingly give it up.”
“Do you stay up here all year around?” asked Breene.
“No,” replied Mollie. “That would be too much of a good thing. This peak is cut off from the valley lands after the first hard snow in the Winter. I usually come up during the last of May or the first of June, depending on how hard the preceding Winter was. Sometimes we have had to blast the snow out of the roads with dynamite to get through in June. That is more particularly true of the Sierras down in California than up here.”
“Did you have a lookout in California?”
“I had one near Tahoe for a long time, but I decided that I wanted a change and was transferred up here,” replied Mollie.
“Don’t you get awfully lonely?” asked Breene.
“Never. There is always something to occupy the time. If it isn’t forest fires, it is the wild life of the woods. I have seen deer, mountain lions, porcupine, coons, grouse, eagles, and I don’t know what else right out here in the open near my shack. Once I saved a fawn from a fire and made a pet out of him. I put a bell on his neck and he stayed around for quite a while. When he was about two years old he started wandering about the forests. He would come back here occasionally, but his visits were shorter and shorter. I haven’t seen him now since last Fall. I hope that no one has shot him.”
“Have you picked up many fires this season asked Bill.
“This has been the worst season that I have known for many years,” answered Mollie. “We haven’t had any rain since the middle of May and the woods are awfully dry. It doesn’t take much to start a fire. Most of those that I have picked up have been small ones, which were quite easily put out. We are lucky down here in that the smoke pall hasn’t reached us yet. It will be down here before the season is over, though, unless we have rain.”
They washed up the supper dishes and sat in front of the shack on a bench where they could see the clear sky. The sounds of the woodland wild life which had so excited Breene that night before were ignored by him now. The mere fact that there was a building close by was sufficient to make him disregard everything but his own weariness.
“How often do you go down for supplies?” asked Bill.
“I never go down more than once or twice after the season opens,” replied Mollie. “I have a country storekeeper down the trail a piece who brings my supplies up. I think that it is time to turn in, as you boys must be tired. I have nothing to offer you but a couple of blankets. You can roll up in them either on the office floor or out here in the open. Take your choice.”
“I think that I will take the open air,” said Bill.
“I will, too,” remarked Breene.
It was not light the next morning when Mollie woke the two airmen. They were dead tired and slept well. Mollie had breakfast ready when they arose.
“Why didn’t you call us sooner so that we could have helped with breakfast?” asked Bill.
“You needed the sleep and I didn’t,” said Mollie. “You have a long hike ahead of you, while I haven’t.”
“Follow that trail all the way down the mountain,” said Mollie as she started them out after breakfast. “About the time that you reach Boulder Creek, the trail will widen considerably. You will probably meet someone from the Forest Supervisor’s office along about noon. Good luck to you.”
“Thanks for helping us out,” called Bill and they started down the ridge.
The trail was easy to follow and not hard on the feet. Occasionally other small trails would join theirs and they would be doubtful as to which was the proper one, but by keeping moving in a general southwest direction they came to Boulder Creek without losing their way. Here the trail widened and could almost be considered an unimproved road. They rested a while at the creek and then started on.
They had been traveling but a few minutes when they heard horses approaching. Soon they saw them come around a bend in the trail. A mounted man was leading two saddled horses. He stopped as he came up to the two airmen.
“Well, you must have started early,” said the horseman. “It is only noon and you have crossed Boulder Creek. I expected to meet you on the other side. My name’s Robins. I work in the Forest Supervisor’s office.”
Bill introduced himself and Breene.
“Well, climb aboard, unless you are hungry,” said Robins. “I stopped for a while down the trail and watered the horses and ate my lunch. I also got an early start.”
“We can eat the sandwiches which Mollie gave us as we ride along,” said Bill as he mounted.
“I don’t know much about these creatures,” said Breene, as he struggled to get his legs afork the saddle.
“Neither one will run away with you,” said Robins.
The rest of the trip was very pleasant. They reached Tiller in the late afternoon and then pushed on to Perue, where they spent the night. The next day they hit the main road at Canyonville and then rode into Myrtleville, where they reached the railroad.
“This is some country,” said Breene to Robins. “It took us just a little less than two hours to get to that place in the woods where we landed, and here it has already taken us almost four days to get this far back, and we aren’t home yet.”
“You don’t waste much time when you travel in your airplanes,” said Robins. “I cannot imagine getting to Diamond Lake in less than two hours. Every time I have gone up there it has taken several days. I guess that you can find your way home from here. I will start back. Good luck.”
“Thanks for the buggy ride,” said Breene, and Robins left them standing on the station platform.
A couple of hours’ wait for the train and then they were en route to Eugene. The train trip seemed endless, as they were both eager to get back to their quarters so that they could change their clothing.
“You had us worried for a while,” said Captain Smith as he greeted Bill at Eugene. “We did not know whether you had made a safe landing or had cracked up.”
“I did both,” replied Bill. “I made a safe landing, for neither one of us were even scratched, and I cracked up a perfectly good ship so that it will never be flown again. I set it down in the only open space that I could see within miles. That place wasn’t any too open. The second growth timber was eight or ten feet high.”
“Batten flew down there and saw the plane and noted the character of the country in which you had landed,” said Smith. “He also said that had you not selected the spot which you did, your plane would probably be hanging to the tree tops a couple of hundred feet from the ground. We were all much pleased when Mollie, the lookout, ’phoned in that you were O. K. I have already sent down for another plane for you. Batten and Goldy are taking some game to San Francisco. They got a late start but hope to get in tonight. They will bring your plane back with them tomorrow.”
“Just think of it,” said Bill. “You casually remark that Batten and Goldy are going to fly from here to San Francisco today and come back tomorrow. On that trip they will cover a distance of about nine hundred or a thousand miles. Breene and I have been five days covering a little less than four hundred miles. Give me the airplane every time.”
CHAPTER XVIII—THE WEATHER CHANGES
During the next few weeks the patrols became monotonously routine. The hot, dry weather continued and the fires broke out with a regularity which nonplussed the foresters and the aviators. New fires were picked up in spite of the smoke pall, but it was mighty hard work. The aviators were having their fill of flying over the forests, but with each patrol they became more experienced and could locate the fires with an accuracy that was astonishing. It was a question as to how much longer they could stand the strain, for the constant flying over timberland, where landing fields were conspicuous by their absence, showed its effect on the smooth flying of the pilots. The Flight Surgeon had already sent several of them into the woods on vacation to rest, something that they would not do while at the base.
The critical fire situation which existed in the woods was shown by one patrol on which Kiel carried Forester Oglesby over a particularly bad area. They discovered four new fires all within six miles of a lookout station. One covered four hundred acres and another over two hundred acres, and yet the lookout could not see them on account of the smoke pall. When Kiel thought that he had about half completed the patrol, he handed Oglesby a note asking which direction he wished to go to finish the patrol. Oglesby then returned the paper to Kiel. On it he had written, “Take me home. I have counted thirty-one fires and have seen all that I can stand for one day.” Rain was needed, and needed badly to save the woods.
The Weather Bureau predicted rain, and the appearance of clouds indicated that there might be some precipitation, but in the meantime the clouds made the situation further complicated by decreasing the already limited visibility. The smoke and clouds joined together into an impenetrable mass of murky haze. That made the flying much more difficult, but did not assist in limiting devastation of old fires nor in preventing new ones from starting.
“I wonder how much longer this dry weather can continue?” asked Simmons of Bill as they stood out in the airdrome looking into the sky. “There are plenty of clouds, but not much rain that I can see.”
“The weather map gives every indication of rain within a short time,” replied Bill. “One day’s good soaking would put out all the fires that are now burning. It would also wet the woods so that new ones could not start so easily.”
“I hate to admit that anyone could be so mean and despicable as to deliberately set the woods on fire, but it certainly looks that way to me,” said Simmons. “The fires are breaking out with too much regularity to be accidentally or carelessly started.”
“I can’t imagine anyone being so malicious,” replied Bill.
“I said that I hated to admit that I had such a thought, but I have it just the same,” explained Earl Simmons. “You must have studied the fire map and seen how the fires start in one place and then new ones start just a short distance away. This procedure has been continuing now for several days.”
“Captain Smith presents his compliments and directs that you report to his office,” said an orderly who came up to where they were standing.
“Both of us?” asked Bill.
“Yes, sir, both of you,” replied the orderly.
“Something gone haywire somewhere, or Smith would not send for both of us,” said Earl as they started toward the office.
“Come in and sit down,” said Smith when they entered. “Goldy started a patrol from Medford, but had to turn back on account of engine trouble. Just before he turned he thought that he had spotted an extra large fire between Abbott Butte and Rogue River. He could not verify it. He picked up what he thought was large columns of smoke arising from the timber and then his engine started acting up. He went back. Landed O. K. at Medford. I would like you two to go out and verify that fire.”
“We haven’t much ceiling,” said Earl.
“The fire won’t stop burning just because there is a low ceiling,” replied Smith. “If it is as big as Goldy thinks it is, it must be a corker. We haven’t had any reports of any fires in that vicinity prior to this.”
“We’ll take off in ten minutes,” said Bill. “Can you be ready, Earl?”
“I’ll be there waiting for you at the plane,” replied Earl.
Bill wondered how he would get to that location and either verify or determine definitely the absence of that fire. The mountains were several thousand feet high. The clouds in the Willamette Valley were but a couple of thousand feet high. He would have to follow the different valleys which headed in that direction and hope that the clouds did not drop down in front of the plane and block his way. He studied the map and made plans accordingly.
Bill secured his flying togs and went out to the plane. Earl was already in the cockpit. Breene was warming up the engine. As soon as Breene was satisfied that everything was functioning properly, he throttled the engine and climbed out of the cockpit. Bill got in and the plane started on its way across the airdrome.
Soon after leaving the airdrome Bill found that the flying conditions were exactly as he had anticipated. The smoke joined with the clouds to form a brownish gray mass of mist and haze that prevented his getting more than three thousand feet above the floor of the valley. If the ceiling did not get any higher than that, he would never be able to make the jump over the passes from one valley to another. However, he would make a good try at it and do the best that he could. He headed the plane toward the Middle Fork of the Willamette River.
The valley was wide enough so that he had no trouble in navigating up to the time that they reached Fall Creek, but beyond that whisps of clouds seemed to drop below the main mass and threatened to cut them off from the upper valley. When he could, Bill went under the low-hanging clouds, but after a while they hung right on the tree tops. Even at that he sometimes went through, but he could never tell what he was liable to meet on the other side. It was a dangerous proceeding, but could not be helped. Bill’s mission was to get to the reported fire, and if it was humanly possible he would do it.
The old Military Road ran alongside the river. This road had been constructed years before when the covered wagons were bringing settlers out over the Oregon Trail. While Bill found the going rather hard, he thought of the greater troubles that the old pioneers had when they traveled the same route. They had no idea what they would find when they reached their destination. Indians might ambush them anywhere along the trail, the trail might become so impassable that they might have to abandon their wagons and proceed on foot, but they forced their way ahead in spite of all obstacles. Bill watched the road turning and twisting its way through the river valley and tried to imagine that he saw a wagon train coming down the valley toward him.
The wagon train in actuality was another low-hanging cloud, and Bill had plunged his plane into it before he came back to the present from the past. He dropped down as low as he dared in an endeavor to see the ground beneath, but the mist must have been right on the ground. Then he emerged from the cloud as suddenly as he had entered it. Below them was a small village called Lookout. They were getting fairly well up into the mountains.
He reached Oakridge, the last town along the road. Beyond the town, the valley turned and twisted with almost unbelievable abruptness. Bill had to keep a sharp watch ahead to prevent the plane colliding with the hills along the valley. He followed its broad sweep to the south. Soon he would reach the place where he had planned to leave the Willamette Valley and cut across the mountains to the Umpqua Valley on the side.
The clouds seemed to remain at about the same altitude above the trees, in spite of the general rise in the ground. He reached the entrance to Staley Creek Canyon and hesitated before entering it, for it looked impossible. He made a circle and then started up the canyon. The plane had gone but a short distance up the Staley Creek Valley before they ran into a terrific rain storm. They could not see sufficiently far ahead to insure their safety. Bill turned back and started down the Willamette again.
Once again he found his path barred. The river valley was completely closed ahead of them by a mist that lay right on the ground. Bill knew that the valley had so many sharp turns that it would be folly to try and fly blindly through that mist. He was in a pocket with no chance of getting out. In the meantime there was the added danger of the rain storm driving down into the area in which he was flying.
Bill searched the terrain and saw another canyon leading to the south. He turned his plane into that and found that it was much narrower than any of the others that he had flown through. The fog seemed to hang higher. Perhaps he might get through. The air became much rougher and with the rough air came a slight rain. Bill flew through the rain and found that the floor of the valley was gradually getting closer to the plane. He could not climb any higher, as the clouds were just above his top wing. In fact at times he flew through the lower patches of mist.
Finally he reached a point where he was missing the tree tops by inches and, before he knew it, the ground had started dropping from beneath the plane. They had reached one of the small creeks which empty into the Umpqua. Bill did not even realize it at the time, for he was busy fighting the bumps in an endeavor to keep his plane from striking the mountain sides. Then all of a sudden it seemed as if the flood gates of the heavens had opened on them, and, to make matters worse, the lightning flashed and blazed all around the plane.
Bill hoped that they would escape being hit by lightning. He had never heard of a plane being hit by lightning and did not want to be an interested party in the first of such cases on record.
The rain fogged his goggles so that he could not see. He wiped the water off with his gloves, but was compelled to use one hand continuously for that purpose in order to see at all. At best he could see only a few feet from the plane. There was no place to land anywhere in sight. In fact, he had not seen a place where even a crash landing could have been made for the past forty minutes. His safety and that of Earl Simmons in the rear cockpit was dependent upon his getting through into the open.
The ground was surely dropping beneath them and Bill was certain that they had now crossed the divide. A steep ridge projected abruptly into the valley. Bill had but a few seconds to make up his mind which way to turn to avoid it. If he turned one way, he would run into the main mountain. If he turned the other, he would come out into the clear. He swung the plane around to the right and hoped for the best.
Then he saw that he had taken the right route, for the valley opened up with another creek coming in to join the one they had been following. For several minutes Bill was busy banking the plane in one direction or another to miss the tree-covered sides of the ravine through which they were flying. The rain continued to fall in torrents. There was one consolation: the forest fires would surely be quenched by this downpour. That thought was consoling, but it did not help Bill in his present situation. He did not know how much longer he could continue to see the ridges ahead sufficiently far to miss them with the plane. He hoped that the rain would cease, the clouds would raise or an open space large enough to land the plan would make its appearance while he still had control of the plane.
CHAPTER XIX—FISHES LARGE AND SMALL
That flight up the Willamette and down the Umpqua was ever afterwards a nightmare to Bill. There were so many times when the difference between life and death rested upon his moving that heavy three thousand pound plane in a fraction of a second. Sometimes he missed an unusually high tree by a fraction of an inch when he was sure that he would hit it. Once he did not miss a tree, but was fortunate in that the landing gear merely smashed its way through the small top branches. Other times he was forced to jump up into the clouds to escape colliding with a hill which suddenly loomed up ahead. It was tough going all the way, with no let-up.
By the time that they reached Steamboat Creek the rain had slackened somewhat and the clouds had risen. The flying was easier, but as far as being safe was concerned, they were far from being out of the woods. The valley still had many sharp bends which could not be foreseen. Bill had to fly that plane all the way and fly it every minute.
They came to a place where the river made a turn of almost a complete circle. For a while Bill was sure that he had turned up one of the tributaries to the river. He did not see how such a large river could meander around so much. Just as he was about to turn back, he saw an exceptionally bright area ahead. River or no river, he would get into that section and get away from the abominable weather that he had been flying through.
Suddenly the valley opened and Bill saw a railroad track stretching across his path. He was out of the mountains and somewhere near Roseburg. Bill turned along the railroad and instantly searched the ground for the landing field at Roseburg. The rain was now falling steadily, but not so hard. The town came into his view and he circled it several times before he could locate the landing field through the falling rain. Another circle and he dropped his plane onto the ground.
The plane stopped rolling and both Bill and Earl jumped out.
“What a ride,” exclaimed Earl.
“Let’s put on the cockpit covers and then get out of the rain,” said Bill.
“O. K., let’s go,” replied Earl.
They fished out the canvas covers and put them over the engine and cockpits. Then they crawled under the wings of the plane to get out of the rain.
“I never want another ride like that one,” said Bill.
“I will never know how you missed some of those ridges and hills,” said Earl Simmons. “Sometimes I never saw them until you had turned the plane and they were under the wing. Then when that extra heavy flash of lighting whizzed past the plane, I thought that we were surely hit. It didn’t miss us by more than ten feet.”
“The worst part of it was that it blinded me so that I did not see a hill directly ahead,” replied Bill. “I came near running into that hill without knowing that it was there. I rubbed my eyes to get them back to normal and there it was almost on top of us. The old bus certainly came around beautifully when I kicked her over.”
An automobile drove up to the side of the field and someone started across the field toward the plane.
“I never thought that we would have any spectators a day like this,” said Bill.
The man approaching had on a raincoat and large hat, so that they could not see his features. Furthermore, neither one was interested in the identity of the man, as they did not expect to see any friends on such a miserable day.
“Hello, birds,” said the visitor. “Where did you hail from?”
There was something about the man’s voice which sounded familiar to Bill, but he could not place it. The wing shielded his face from view and Bill edged over to make a more complete scrutiny.
“Came down from Eugene,” replied Earl.
“Do you know a chap by the name of Bruce up there?” asked the man.
“If it isn’t Sam Crouch,” exclaimed Bill. “What are you doing down here? I thought that you were upon your clearing on the McKenzie.”
“I also have a shop down here,” replied Sam. “I am glad to see you again. How about a fishing trip? You can’t fly in this weather, and this rain will continue for several days. What do you say?”
“I am game,” said Bill. “How about you, Earl?”
“Nothing would suit me better,” said Earl.
“We couldn’t get away from here today, anyhow,” said Bill. “Let’s go into town and we will talk it over.”
They rode into town and Bill sent a wire telling where they had landed and that they were held up by bad weather. He ended it by saying that unless there was some urgent need for them back at Eugene, they would stay at Roseburg for a couple of days.
“The fires will be out by tomorrow,” said Bill. “They don’t need us now, and will not for a couple of days.”
“The lightning may start a few new ones,” said Earl. “However, no patrols can be made as long as it rains like this, and we will get back before they start in again. The weather man says that we are in for several days of rain.”
“Bring on your fish,” said Bill. “When do we start, Sam?”
“First thing in the morning,” replied Sam. “I will stop at the hotel for you. The salmon have started to run and we can get some salmon eggs for bait. We ought to have a wonderful trip. We will go up by the hatchery. I will see you in the morning. I have to go and round up some tackle.”
“Can’t we help?” asked Earl.
“No, thanks, I have all afternoon to do it,” replied Sam as he went out the door of the hotel.
Late that night Bill received a telegram from Bob Finch at Eugene. It read: “Wait for me. I’ll be there in the morning. Bob.”
“It looks as if we will get a late start tomorrow,” said Bill to Earl after he had read the wire. “I wonder what time the morning train gets in?”
“I think that there is a train that leaves Eugene this afternoon,” said Earl. “By taking it, Finch could get here quite early tomorrow.”
As a matter of fact, Bill was awakened the next morning by Bob pounding on the door of his room at the hotel.
“How did you know that we were going fishing?” asked Bill after Bob had entered.
“With Earl Simmons along and the hunting season not opened, what else could you do with a couple of days here?” replied Bob.
“Well, you will never guess who is going to take us out,” said Bill.
“I give up before I start,” said Bob. “Who is it?”
“Sam Crouch. He has a store down here and met us at the aviation field.”
“It looks like a put-up job to me,” said Bob. “You and Earl, one of the most ardent fishermen in the state, start out for Medford and end at Roseburg, where you meet Sam Crouch, another fish enthusiast. I’m glad that I could horn in.”
In a short time they were all in Sam’s automobile headed up the Umpqua River. They drove about fifteen or eighteen miles up the river and stopped at the hatchery. Neither Bill nor Bob had ever seen a hatchery before and immediately began asking questions.
“Tell me something about the hatchery and what it is for?” asked Bill.
“I hardly know where to start,” said Earl.
“Why do they have hatcheries?” asked Bob.
“To increase the number of fish which are incubated from the eggs,” replied Earl. “The salmon lay their eggs in the sand and gravel in the bottom of the rivers and creeks. The eggs stay there until they hatch out. While they are incubating the other fish eat them, in spite of the fact that the large salmon try to conceal them by covering the eggs with sand. Then, again, as soon as the small fish comes out of the eggs, they are in turn prey for the larger fish. You can accordingly see why a very small part of the eggs ever bring forth fish which grow to any size. The hatcheries take the eggs and hatch them out, as you will soon see, in small basins. They hold the small fish for some time and then plant them in the streams. In this way the young fish, called fingerlings, have more of a chance for their white alley.”
“How do they get the salmon to come to the hatcheries?” asked Bill.
“They don’t have to,” replied Earl. “Salmon have a peculiarity which makes it easy for the hatchery people. When spawning time comes, salmon always return to the place where they were born. The young ones gradually work their way down to the sea and go out into the ocean. Just where they go, no one knows, but after a period of three to five years they come back up the streams in swarms. They never mistake the streams, but always come up the one which they went down years before. The Fishery Department has determined this by tagging the salmon and then catching the same ones years afterwards.”
“Let’s go over to the river and let them take a look at the fish coming upstream,” said Sam.
They walked over to the river and Bill and Bob were astounded at the sight. There were thousands of fish working their way upstream. It looked as if a person might walk across the river on fish.
“What happens to all these fish?” asked Bill.
“In the bygone days the Indians used to spear them as they came upstream to spawn,” said Earl.
“If you went downstream a ways you would probably find people spearing them now,” interjected Sam.
“After they spawn the large fish die,” continued Earl. “The banks of all the streams in the Northwest are literally covered with dead fish after the run is over.”
Earl led the way to the racks where the fish were caught. The racks were so arranged that the fish could get upstream through the bars, but could not get downstream. Inside this large area there were thousand of salmon which soon enter the hatchery to have the roe removed.
They then went into the hatchery and saw pool after pool so arranged that there was a continuous stream of fresh water running through each one. In some were the eggs. In others there were fish of various sizes. It seemed to Bill that there could not be that many fish in the entire world. The small fish just hatched out were so small that they looked more like young tadpoles than fish. Outside in the racks the salmon were of various sizes, from three feet in length up to four or even five feet. Some of them were tremendous. It was hard to realize that just a few years before these giant fish were as small as the minute wiggly things in the pools in the hatchery.
“Have you seen enough?” asked Earl after a while.
“I think so,” replied Bill.
“Come on, then, and we will go fishing.”
They left the hatchery and went downstream to a point where a small creek emptied into the river.
Here Earl handed Bill a three-pronged hook and told him that they must get some salmon eggs for bait.
“Put that hook on your line and I will tell you which of the fish to snag. Then you bring it in to shore and we will get the roe.”
Bill assembled his rod and threaded his line. He attached the hook and announced himself as being ready.
“See that large fish out there just holding herself against the current?” asked Earl. “Her top fin is just a few inches below the surface of the water. Cast your line over and snag her.”
Bill made a cast and missed. He tried again and the hook caught in the top fin. He reeled in on his line and looked around for further instructions, only to see Earl and Sam sitting down on the bank laughing at him. He knew that he had been caught at a tenderfoot trick, but just what it was he did not know.
CHAPTER XX—MORE ABOUT FISH
“What are you fellows laughing about?” asked Bill. “I caught the fish, didn’t I?”
“Bring it into shore,” said Sam.
Bob Finch was as much in the dark as to the cause of the merriment as was Bill. Bill tried to reel in his line, but the fish would not respond. He fought against every move on Bill’s part. Bill soon saw that he had a task in front of him. The fish was snagged in the middle of the body and, accordingly, could use all its power against the pull on the line. If he pulled hard against the fish, he would break his line or snap his rod. If he didn’t pull, the fish would run downstream and take the line with him.
It seemed as if every move that he made was anticipated by the fish. Try as he would, he could not get that fish closer to shore. It was about twenty feet from him when he snagged it, and it was still twenty feet away. The fish started to run and Bill gave a yank on the line. The rod bent almost double and then the tip broke with a snap.
“Bring him in,” yelled Earl between peals of laughter.
“Don’t let him get away,” yelled Sam.
“I thought that you said he was a she,” said Bill.
“We must have made a mistake,” said Earl. “You have snagged the largest buck salmon in the stream. You have to bring him in now or you will lose your rod and line.”
It was all clear to Bill now. They had picked out the largest buck that they could see and had him cast the hook to catch it. They knew that the chances were ten to one against his landing it. Bill made up his mind that he would bring that fish into shore even if he broke every section of his rod.
It was not such an easy job, but little by little he worked that buck salmon into shore. The closer it came, the more astonished he was that he could move it in the water. Finally he had it in close enough for Bob to catch in his hands. Bob picked up the struggling fish and was covered with a shower of water.
“What shall I do with it?” asked Bob.
“Take out the hook and throw it back,” said Earl. “We can’t get any eggs from him.”
Bob released the fish and it went scurrying through the water to join the numerous others which were moving upstream.
“You did better than most of the other tenderfeet who come up here,” said Earl. “Ordinarily they break their rods and lose their lines and never bring the fish anywhere near the shore. You landed your fish and you ought to be proud of it. We will get a boat here and go fishing.”
They walked a short distance down the river and came to a place where a boat was tied up to shore. A man was standing by the boat.
“Tom,” said Sam, “drive the car down to the highway bridge. We will meet you there some time this afternoon. Did you bring the rifle?”
“Here it is, Sam,” replied Tom.
“We’ll see you later then,” said Sam.
“What are you going to do with the rifle?” asked Bob after they had started to float down the river.
“Get some salmon eggs for bait,” replied Sam.
“You can’t fool me again,” said Bill. “I’ll let Bob shoot the salmon eggs.”
“This is no joke this time,” said Earl. “It is the easiest way to get them.”
“Do you want to shoot first, Bob?” asked Sam.
“I’ll bite, but what do I shoot at?” asked Bob.
“I’ll pick out the fish and you shoot it,” said Sam.
He handed Bob the rifle and pointed to a fish near the boat.
“Get that one,” he said.
The fish was within four feet of the boat. It seemed to Bob that he could touch it with the muzzle of the rifle. He aimed at the fish and fired. Just where the bullet went was a mystery to him. The fish never even budged from its position. One thing was certain: he had not made a hit.
“I aimed right at that fish,” said Bob, “but never hit it. Are there any bullets in the gun?”
“Look at this one before you load,” said Sam as he handed Bob a cartridge.
Bob examined the cartridge. Apparently it was all right. Once again he aimed at the fish and fired. Another miss. Bill was just as mystified as Bob. There was no doubt that the bullet went into the water, but it certainly did not hit that fish.
“Let me try it,” said Bill.
Bob handed the rifle to Bill and sat down to watch the proceeding. Bill loaded the rifle and took careful aim. The boat was steady, so that there was no reason why he should not make a hit. He aimed right at the fish and carefully squeezed the trigger. He watched expectantly for the fish to show some signs of being hit, but it didn’t.
“Give me the rifle,” said Earl.
Earl took the rifle and apparently did not aim at all. He fired, and almost immediately the fish began to struggle in the water and then floated to the surface. Sam pulled it into the boat.
“Now you see that it can be done quite easily,” said Sam.
“It’s easy enough if you know how,” replied Bill. “One thing is sure: either we have phony ammunition or we don’t know how.”
“You are absolutely right, it is easy enough if you know how,” said Earl. “It’s like cutting a pencil with a dollar bill. Everything is not done exactly the way it looks. Maybe the pencil is actually cut with the dollar bill and maybe it isn’t. The chances are ten to one that it isn’t, but it looks as if it was during the act. You don’t aim at where the fish seems to be, for it isn’t there. The water makes it look where it isn’t. Accordingly, you must shoot where the fish really is, and not where it appears to be.”
“Take this oar and put the end in the water. Now does it look straight? No. It appears to be bent. The water causes the light rays to change their angle and you always see a thing much closer to the surface than it really is. Therefore you must aim under the object which you expect to hit.”
“I should have known that,” said Bill. “That is simple physics, but I never thought of it.”
“We have the salmon eggs and now can start fishing,” said Sam.
They cut open the salmon and took out the eggs. They put them into a can and then rowed the boat out into the center of the river. Here they allowed the boat to drift while they fixed their lines and baited their hooks. It was a most pleasant way to fish. There was no labor connected with it. The boat floated slowly down the stream with the lines drifting behind.
It had been drizzling slightly ever since they had been out, but so much of interest had happened that neither Bill nor Bob had noticed the rain. Occasionally someone would get a strike. They had caught several small trout, but no large ones. Earl was the first to get a real strike.
“Reel in your lines, for I have a fish that is a fish,” he cried suddenly.
Sam was not fishing at the time and he took hold of the oars so that he could maneuver the boat while Earl played the fish. Bill and Bob were trying so hard to reel in their lines that they snarled them. Everything was in a mess, but Earl managed to keep the fish out of the tangled lines. It began to look as if the tangled lines might have to be cut. Sam could not always move the boat so that the fish would clear them, and Earl could not play his fish to keep it clear forever.
“What’s the matter?” asked Sam. “Can’t you get your lines in?”
“We have them untangled now,” said Bill as he started to reel in again.
It was quite evident that Earl had quite a large fish on his line. It played around the boat in large circles. Once it ran right at the boat and Sam was quite busy keeping the boat in such a position that it would not run under the keel. If it had done that, the chances were that the line would have parted or the leaders broken.
Finally Earl brought the fish up to the side of the boat.
“Where’s the net?” asked Bill.
“We don’t need a net,” said Sam. “That’s what we brought the rifle for. See if you can hit it.”
Once again Bill took the rifle and aimed at the new target. It was not as large as the salmon, but it was a magnificent trout. Bill aimed at a point about four inches below the trout and fired—another miss.
“This fish is closer to the surface,” said Sam. “Wait until it stops moving so rapidly and try again.”
This time Bill did not aim so much below and when he fired the fish came to the surface, belly up.
“Now you see that there’s no, trick to it, don’t you?” said Earl. “All you have to do is to aim where the fish is and not where it isn’t.”
So the morning was spent, drifting slowly down the Umpqua River. The forest fires, the fight for their lives in the clouds the day before, the other troubles which had bothered them during the routine performance of their duties, the drizzle which made them wetter and wetter, were all forgotten.
“How about pulling in for this island for lunch?” asked Earl as they came abreast of a large island in the river.
“I am ready to eat,” said Sam. “How about the rest of you fellows?”
“I am ready any time,” said Bill and Bob together.
A fire on the shore in the lee of a large tree trunk, baked potatoes, roasted corn, Earl swinging a steak—what more could a man desire? No wonder Sam liked the outdoor life in the woods. They had not seen anyone but their own party since leaving the shore near the hatchery. It was like being out in the wilderness.
After lunch they fished for a while from the shore of the island and then continued their trip down the river. Bill realized that the salmon were not as numerous in the water as they had been near the hatchery.
“Where have all the salmon gone?” he asked.
“This is the first part of the run,” said Sam. “The racks cause a block in the river and there is a congestion at that point. A little later, if there is a large run this year, the river will be full of them all the way up to the hatchery. There’s the bridge ahead of us. I guess that our day’s sport is over.”
“I am of the opinion that we have had about enough,” said Earl. “I am soaked through, and as I have no other clothes with me, I will have to go to bed until these dry.”
“It will be about time to go to bed anyhow when we get to the hotel, so what’s the difference?” said Sam.
They reached the bridge and shoved the nose of the boat ashore. Tom was waiting with the automobile. They had caught a fine lot of fish. The catch included steelhead, rainbow and salmon trout. The largest was a fine fat fellow, twenty-three inches long, which weighed about six pounds.
“I think that we ought to move the squadron up here for station,” said Bill after they reached the hotel. “It’s much more fun going down the Umpqua River in a boat than being hauled out of the cold waters of the Pacific by the crew of an Artillery tug.”
CHAPTER XXI—THE EUGENE AIRDROME
The three days’ vacation at Roseburg passed much too rapidly for Bill and Bob. They would have liked to stay there for a much longer period. Earl Simmons wanted to get back to Eugene. He liked this form of recreation as much as either Bill or Bob, but his real interest in life was the protection of the forests.
Each day along the Umpqua gave additional surprises to the two young aviators. It seemed that there were no end to the things that the oldtimers in the Northwest woods knew and the tenderfeet from San Francisco had to learn.
The day before they returned to Eugene, they were fishing along the river and casting out into the water from the banks. It required quite a bit of practice before either Bill or Bob could make their dry fly land in the water with the ease and grace of an expert fisherman. Finally they became sufficiently adept to get occasional strikes.
Bill had been fishing a pool which was surrounded by large rocks. Every time that he made a cast, a large fish struck at the fly. Somehow Bill could not hook the fish. The longer this game of “catch if you can” lasted, the more determined Bill became to land that fish. The other members of the party watched him for a long time and then left to fish in other places, but Bill stayed right there.
It was most discouraging not to be able to hook that trout, for from the violence with which it came after the fly, it was sure to be a large one. Bill finally made his best cast of the day. The fly sank lightly onto the water and then, by slightly jerking his rod, Bill made the fly skim across the water. That was too much for the trout. He seized that fly and started out across the river with it. Bill flipped the end of his rod upward to send the hook home and the struggle was on.
The line left the reel sounding a tune which all real fishermen know so well. It went out so rapidly that Bill wondered if he would lose all the line before the fish stopped its run. At that stage of the game Bill was decidedly nervous. He had never before snagged such a fish as this one was. He knew that if he tried to stop the trout too suddenly, the line would break. Bill applied gradually increasing pressure on the reel until the rush was stopped.
The trout made several mad rushes after the first one, but none were as fast nor as long as the first one. Once in a while Bill would get a glimpse of the fish as it darted through the water, but the fish was out of sight again almost immediately. The thought uppermost in Bill’s mind now was, “Could he net that fish before it broke the line?” The rushes became shorter, and it was apparent that the fish was getting exhausted. At times it would allow Bill to bring it in almost to the rock where he was standing, and then without the slightest warning it would sink to the bottom of the pool with a speed that bent the rod double while the line was going out.
The fish finally came up and Bill worked it around to where he could use the net. In his excitement of netting the trout, he almost lost his rod and line, but he never risked the loss of the fish. Bill was so elated that he did not try to remove the fish from the net or the hook from its mouth. He carried the rod, net, and fish back to the road and waited for the other members of the party. He was still sitting there holding the netted fish when Sam Crouch came up.
“What have you there?” asked Sam.
“You tell me,” said Bill. “I finally caught it, but what kind it is I do not know.”
“It’s a nice big brook trout,” replied Sam. “I guess that you have the largest one caught this day. I have several that I thought were large, but none to compare with that one.”
The others returned and Bill felt quite proud of his accomplishment as each in turn admired his fish. They returned to the hotel and unloaded their fishing gear.
“You had better take this fish, Sam,” said Bill. “We leave tomorrow, and I cannot use it.”
“Let me see that fish,” said a stranger who came up as Bill was handing the trout to Sam. “I think that you have a gold button trout there. We will take it into the hotel and measure and weigh it.”
“What’s a gold button trout?” asked Bill. “Do you have to pay a fine for catching one? Is it unlawful?”
Both Sam and Earl burst out laughing at Bill’s questions.
“You poor boob,” said Earl, “that means that you have probably caught the largest trout reported during the fishing season. The Portland _Oregonian_ has a contest each year and gives a gold button for the largest trout caught.”
The fish weighed seven pounds and two ounces and was twenty-six inches long.
“My name’s Pratt,” said the stranger. “I am a reporter on the _Oregonian_. I will send your story in to the paper and you will be notified later if you get the gold button.”
The story of the catch was recounted and with it ended the fishing excursion at Roseburg. Bill could not quite understand why anyone should get a prize for going out and enjoying himself. Later in the season he received the gold button. Two short periods of fishing in the Oregon woods had elevated Bill from the rankest kind of an amateur fisherman to one whose catch was broadcast all over the state.
Bob Finch left that same night by train for Eugene after vainly trying to get Bill to agree to have both Earl and Bob ride to Eugene in the rear cockpit. Bill settled that question when he called attention to Earl’s rather portly figure and asked how they could both get in the cockpit. Bill and Earl left by plane early the next morning, Earl anxious to get back to work and Bill reluctant to leave.
“Thanks for the good time, Sam,” called Bill, and the plane started on its homeward journey.
The rains had cleared the sky of all the dense smoke. Here and there small fleecy clouds stood out as reminders that there had been a rain storm, but the visibility was such that the occupants of the airplane could see for miles in all directions. As they flew along Bill obtained his first clear view of the high peaks which marked the crest of the Cascade Mountains. Although these peaks were a good forty miles away, the air was so clear that they were plainly visible. The Three Sisters, a large, massive mountain with three peaks quite widely separate, came into view just as they sighted Eugene. The tops of all three of these peaks stood well above ten thousand feet. It seemed remarkable to Bill that he had never been able to get a glimpse of them before, as they were decidedly the most conspicuous mountains of the entire southern part of the range.
“Well, we have another job on our hands,” said Smith when Bill reported. “The city of Eugene wants to establish this as a municipal airdrome. In order to do it, they are going to float a bond issue. We are going to lend our support by having a field day here tomorrow. We will have aerial and ground events. Dignitaries from all over the state will be present. Among others, Governor Olcott will be here.”
“What part am I to play?” asked Bill.
“You had better go in and work that up with Maxwell,” replied Smith. “When you have finished your draft of the events, I will go over it and either approve or disapprove.”
“Well, here I am, Buddy,” said Bill as he sat down, by the desk in the operations office. “Captain Smith said that I was to help you draw up the list of events for the field day tomorrow.”
“It’s a fine time for you to be showing up after I have all the hard work completed,” said Maxwell. “I think that I will pick out a real job for you.”
“Go to it,” said Bill. “I have had such a good time during the past few days that I can stand anything now.”
“Do you mean that?” asked Buddy.
“Sure I do,” replied Bill. “What have you on your mind?”
“We will go over the list of events as they appear on the program,” said Maxwell. “In the morning the squadron baseball team will play the local team. In addition there will be a trap-shooting competition in which both an officers’ and enlisted men’s team will compete against anything that the local people bring on. Then we will have an early lunch given by the Chamber of Commerce, during which the celebrities will tell why Eugene should have an airdrome. In the afternoon we will have some formation flights, a radio demonstration in which someone will broadcast from an airplane through a loudspeaker, and finally you will jump from a parachute.”
Bill did not know whether Maxwell was joking or not. He looked at the paper on the desk and, sure enough, the last event was for a parachute jump. As far as Bill knew, there were no parachutes in the squadron. The only ones that he had ever seen were those used during the war. All balloonists were equipped with them and the crews of the German airplanes wore them. In fact, Bill had the distinct recollection of having seen a German plane shot down and the observer jump with his parachute, thereby escaping with his life. To the best of Bill’s knowledge, the only parachutes for airplanes in the United States were those still in the experimental stage.
It looked to Bill as if Maxwell were playing a joke on him. There would be no harm in agreeing.
“That’s all right with me,” said Bill.
“We will get Captain Smith to O. K. this and then we can arrange for the details,” said Maxwell.
“How are you getting along?” asked Smith, who came in about that time.
“Everything is all arranged, much easier than I thought possible,” replied Maxwell. “Here is a list of events.”
Much to Bill’s surprise, Buddy Maxwell handed the paper to Captain Smith with the parachute jump still included. He had made no attempt to erase that event. Perhaps they have obtained a parachute from somewhere.
Smith went over the list and commented upon each event as he came to it. He gave instructions as to how he wanted the details arranged.
“I want each Flight leader to lead his own Flight in the formations,” said Smith. “I will have Liggett take the radio demonstration.”
Then he saw Bill’s name entered for the parachute jump.
“Did you volunteer for the parachute jump?” asked Smith.
Bill was caught. There was no way out now. He had told Maxwell that he would jump, thinking that there were no parachutes. Obviously there must be some available now, or Captain Smith would have shown some surprise when he read the event. There was only one thing to do, and Bill did it.
“Sure, I volunteered,” he said.
“Have you ever jumped before?” asked Smith.
“Never in my life,” replied Bill.
“That makes no difference, you have to start some time,” said Smith. “Fortunately, Sergeant Ruhs has just arrived from Dayton with instructions as to how the parachutes shall be worn and how you get out of the plane with them on. You had better see him right away and get your instructions. I approve of the schedule of events.”
So there were parachutes, and a parachute jump was going to be part of the field day after all. Bill had never even seen one at close range. He had never had the slightest desire to try one out, and, furthermore, he realized that the thing he desired the least of anything in the world was to make that jump the next day.
CHAPTER XXII—TRAPPED IN MIDAIR
Bill left the headquarters building with a heavy load on his mind. As far as he could see, he had put himself in such a position that he had to make that parachute jump. He went to the supply building and found Sergeant Ruhs. Several parachutes were spread out on the floor and Ruhs was inspecting them.
“Sergeant, you never told me that we had received those parachutes,” said Bill.
“No, sir, I didn’t,” replied the parachute sergeant. “They came while you were down at Roseburg.”
“How many are there?” asked Bill.
“Enough to equip each plane with two and then have several for reserve,” replied Ruhs.
“Are they standard articles of issue now?”
“Regulations will soon come out requiring all Army pilots to put on a parachute for every flight,” replied Ruhs. “The orders will be very strict about it. As soon as the orders arrive, all pilots and observers will have to wear them every time they go up.”
“How can a pilot get into his plane and handle his controls with one of those bulky things strapped to his back?” asked Bill, whose idea of parachutes was limited to the large, bulky balloon type chutes.
“You evidently haven’t seen the latest model,” said the Sergeant. “This new type is called the seat pack. You sit on it in the plane just the same as you would a cushion. The straps fit over the shoulders just snug enough to operate satisfactorily, but not so tight as to be uncomfortable.”
“Well, I might as well break the sad news to you,” said Bill. “I volunteered to jump from a plane during the demonstration tomorrow. Tell me all that I must know beforehand.”
“I am sorry that you volunteered, Lieutenant,” replied Ruhs. “I was hoping to have that pleasure myself.”
Bill looked at the Sergeant in surprise. Ruhs had intimated that it would be a pleasure to jump from a plane.
“Have you ever jumped?” asked Bill.
“Several times,” replied Ruhs. “I rather like the sensation and take a jump at every opportunity.”
That statement changed everything for Bill. He would jump now to get the experience. If he had to wear a chute on all flights, he ought to know how to use it. Some day something might happen to the plane and he would have to jump. That being the case, he might as well eliminate all tendencies of hesitating to jump from the plane right now and not wait until circumstances made an immediate jump imperative.
“Tell me what I have to do, then,” said Bill.
The parachute Sergeant picked up a parachute and arranged it so that the pack was suspended from Bill’s back.
“This is a back type,” said Ruhs. “When you jump tomorrow you will have two chutes on, a back pack and a lap pack. That is to insure that at least one will open. While we have never had a failure, it is always well to be prepared for the unforeseen. These chutes are training type. That is, they are much larger than the service packs. The larger area gives a greater supporting surface and you will not hit the ground so hard. You can open both of them as you drop if you wish.”
“How hard do you hit the ground with one of these?” asked Bill.
“With the service type, it is about the same as jumping from a fifteen-foot wall. With the training type, the falling speed is much slower.”
By this time Bill had both chutes strapped to him. One pack was on his back and the other hanging down in front of him.
“Now what do I do when I want to jump?” he asked.
“Climb over the side of the plane and count three. By that time you will have cleared the wings, tail surfaces and landing gear. Then pull this ring. The parachute will fly out and open up. The best jumpers always bring their rings back with them.”
“How can you find that ring when you are flying through space?” asked Bill.
“It doesn’t make much difference whether you find it right away or not, for you will be sure to find it before you drop very far. I have found out that even though I am falling head first, I have had no difficulty in locating the ring.”
“Don’t you drop down feet first?” asked Bill.
“You start that way, but before you get the chute open you will have turned quite a few somersaults in the air. The main thing is to count three after leaving the plane, and then pull the ring far enough so that the pins holding the pack together are entirely removed from the lugs.”
“Is there anything more?” asked Bill.
“That’s all there is to it,” replied Ruhs.
Bill removed the chutes and started for town. If Sergeant Ruhs had made several jumps, there was no reason why Bill shouldn’t make one and get away with it.
Bill found that he could not concentrate on the various events which were taking place the next morning. He was nervous about the jump in spite of all attempts to view the matter in a matter of fact way. The morning dragged interminably. The Governor and all the other officials inspected the field and planes. The baseball games were played and the trap-shooting events took place, but Bill found it hard to concentrate on them.
There was a large crowd out at the field by the time that the luncheon was served. The speeches were finished and the pilots started for their planes.
“Here’s wishing you luck,” Bob Finch said to Bill.
“I am glad that I am to be the first officer in the Squadron to jump,” replied Bill. “Some of these days some of the rest of you may have to jump under circumstances not quite so favorable. At least I will know how it feels.”
“I will take mine when I have to,” said Bob. “It takes nerve to jump overboard just for the experience, and I can’t see myself doing it now.”
The afternoon’s flying events started with the two Flights leaving the airdrome in formation. Each was led by its Flight leader. The two formations went through various evolutions and then joined together into one large “V”. These planes had scarcely landed before the radio plane went up, and Lieutenant Liggett kept the crowd interested by telling stories, singing and giving information as to what he could see. He talked into the radio installed in the plane, and the monologue was repeated through the loud-speakers on the ground.
In the meantime Bill was getting his parachutes adjusted. Captain Smith watched him for a moment and started away, only to return.
“I think that I will fly the plane from which you jump,” he said. “I will take you up to two thousand feet and head into the wind. You must estimate the velocity of the wind so that you will drift back to the field after your chute opens. That shouldn’t be so hard, for the airdrome is quite large.”
“I would be very much pleased if you would pilot the plane,” said Bill.
“I will get the plane started now, and as soon as you get fixed up, we will take off,” said Smith as he went away.
“Are you sure that everything is all right?” asked Bill.
“I packed these chutes this morning,” said Ruhs. “They should function perfectly. Remember, do not pull the rip cable until after you have counted three. When you land, bend your knees slightly so that you will not get so much shock.”
“I’ll try and remember everything,” said Bill, and started for the plane.
He found it rather cumbersome walking on account of the two parachutes hanging from his shoulders and the web straps around his body. He came up to Smith’s plane and climbed in. Everything was ready for the jump.
The day was clear, not a cloud in the sky. A slight wind was blowing from the northwest, but not sufficient to drag Bill after he had landed with the parachute open. There was a big crowd assembled along the danger line in front of the plane watching the two airmen. Bill heard the loudspeaker report: “Bill Bruce is now about to take off to make his parachute jump. I think that Captain Smith is piloting the plane. I can’t see who it is from here, but it looks as if the plane’s number is ‘0’, and the Captain never allows anyone else to fly his plane.”
Smith taxied across the airdrome and the plane was soon in the air. They climbed until they reached the two thousand foot mark and then Smith headed into the wind and flew toward the airdrome. Bill watched the ground pass under the plane, but hesitated in plunging out over the side of the cockpit. He at once realized that it took more nerve to actually make the jump than it did to agree to make it while standing down on the ground.
Smith throttled the engine and gave Bill the signal to jump. Bill stood up in the cockpit and steeled himself for the ordeal. He wanted to make sure of having that ring in his hand when he had counted three, so he grabbed the ring before climbing out of the cockpit. He stepped up on the seat and held onto the side of the fusilage with one hand and the ring with his other. The hundred-mile wind made it hard for him to retain his balance and he swayed back and forth against it.
Bill put one leg over the fusilage and the wind pressure became more intense. It threatened to drag him back along the fusilage. In his efforts to stay in the cockpit, he pulled the parachute ring and the chute went out of its pack.
Fortunately Bill had one leg still in the cockpit and could retain his grip on the plane. More fortunate still, the parachute did not open but went out like a string and streamed straight to the rear just over the tail surface. Bill did not know what to do next, so he stayed right where he was.
Captain Smith was watching when Bill pulled the rip cord. He instinctively grabbed the collar of Bill’s flying suit to help hold him in the plane. They were now in a most perilous situation. If the parachute now opened, it would drag both of them through the tail surfaces and probably both would be killed. If Smith released his hold and the chute opened, Bill would be dragged through the same surfaces and he would be killed or severely injured. The tail surfaces would then be so badly damaged that the plane would be uncontrollable. In that case Smith would be out of luck, for he did not have a parachute on.
Both Smith and Bill had the same thoughts at identically the same time—they were in a mighty bad fix and could see no way out.
CHAPTER XXIII—A NEW OUTBREAK OF FIRES
Captain Smith at once saw that he was risking the lives of both Bill and himself by holding on to Bill’s flying suit. Accordingly he released his grip and confined his activities to the plane and began thinking of a possible way out of the dangerous situation they were in.
There was still a big chance of the parachute’s opening and dragging Bill from the plane. If that happened, Bill might or might not be carried through the tail surfaces. Then, again, the parachute might not open. Remote as that possibility was, they could not afford to take any chances. Every effort must be made to get the streaming chute away from the tail group. Smith immediately started to figure how it could be done.
Bill in the meantime saw that by staying where he was, he not only was risking his own life but was jeopardizing Smith’s as well. Bill realized that something must be done at once whereby he could fall free of the plane without being carried backward by the trailing chute.
Bill climbed over the side of the fusilage, being very careful while doing so not to increase the probability of the chute opening by giving it any unnecessary motion. He reached the top step safely and then stepped down to the lower one. From that position he could see that the streaming shroud lines were inside of the elevator horn and that it would take some little maneuvering to get them clear.
From Bill’s point of view there was but one way to do it. Somehow or other he must work his way back to the tail group and throw those shroud lines clear. He looked around to see how it might be done. To climb back on top of the fusilage was out of the question, as that would make it practically impossible to throw the chute clear. The only other method was for him to work his way back along the control cables which ran alongside the fusilage.
Bill immediately bent down and grasped the control cable with his right hand, while he held on to the fusilage with his left. When he was sure that he had a secure grip, he released his left hand and grasped the cable with it. At the same instant his foot slipped from the lower step and he found himself hanging from the control wire. The force of his fall had caused the cable to cut his hands severely, but he held on just the same.
In the meantime, while watching Bill, Smith was thinking out a method whereby he could so throw the plane through the air that the shroud lines would be cleared of the elevator horn. He thought that it might be done by slipping the plane through the air. During such a motion the plane would not have the same resistance to the air as the chute and might possibly move away from the chute. When that time came, Bill could drop with some degree of safety.
Thus it was that both Smith and Bill started working with the same end in view. Bill worked his way backward toward the tail group, stopping every once in a while to try and throw the shroud lines clear with one hand while he retained his grip on the cable with the other. Smith put the plane into a steep side slip and watched the parachute to see what effect the sideward motion of the plane was having.
Several times Smith slipped the plane with no apparent results. Meanwhile Bill Bruce was working his way farther and farther to the rear of the fusilage. Finally Bill reached a point within a few feet of the leading edge of the stabilizer. Here he again tried to throw the shroud lines clear with one free hand. Smith at the same time put the plane into an almost vertical slip. The shroud lines moved across the surfaces, jumped the horn and strung out clear of the plane.
As soon as he saw that the shroud lines were clear, Bill dropped off into space. The crowd on the ground saw all of these maneuvers, but could not imagine the reason for their taking place. They saw the streaming chute and knew that it should not be that close to the plane. They also saw that Bill was still in the cockpit when he should have been clear of the ship. None knew the perilous situation which confronted the two airmen. Everyone, however, realized that something had gone wrong and that the two men were fighting for their lives.
When Bill dropped from the plane, as far he could see, none of the rules and instructions which Sergeant Ruhs had given him before going into the air could possibly be put into effect. In the first place, one parachute was already open and it was not necessary to count three. Then, again, it would do no good to pull the ring of that chute now, no matter how hard he pulled it. Ruhs had said that the chutes always open. Would this one open or should he pull on the ring to open the other chute?
Bill had a hard time to think logically while falling through space with the string-like parachute streaming down after him. He was afraid that, as his body tumbled around while falling, the first parachute would wrap itself around the second one and keep it from opening. That being the case, the sooner he pulled the rip cord on the second chute, the better off he would be.
It was fortunate that Smith had climbed to about twenty-five hundred feet before giving Bill the signal to jump. Otherwise things might not have turned out so well for Bill. They had lost about five hundred feet while trying to get the chute clear of the tail group, and then Bill had fallen another thousand feet before he tried to open the second chute.
That drop of a thousand feet had taken scarcely any time at all, and Bill did not realize that he had fallen so far. He began to search for the other ring with one hand. At the time he was falling head downwards. He instinctively raised his hand toward his head to reach the ring, but it took what seemed to him to be hours before he found it. He gave the ring a pull, and kept on pulling until the wire was clear.
The pilot chute came out with a snap and then Bill felt his speed slacken with a distinct jerk. He looked up and saw that the second chute was open. The first was still in the form of a streamer. With the opening of the chute, Bill started a pendulum motion, his body swung in a large arc below the chute. The length of the arc gradually decreased until he was hanging suspended directly under the center of the silk umbrella-shaped chute. He looked up at it with astonishment, for he had no idea that it could possibly be so large.
While he was still looking upward the first chute opened, and each one forced the other out at an angle. Bill was hanging down between the two. Bill looked down at the ground. It seemed as if he was hardly falling at all, the drop was so slow. He found it rather a pleasant sensation—after the chutes had opened.
Bill had been too busy fighting for his life when he was about to leave the plane to think of anything else but clearing the chute from the elevator horn. He could not make up his mind whether or not he would have been a little afraid to jump under normal conditions. One thing certain, the thought of fear of jumping had not entered his mind after he had inadvertently opened the first chute.
The wind was drifting him across the aviation field. Evidently all the maneuvering in the air had taken but a very short time, although it seemed that hours had passed.
Bill watched the ground come closer and closer. He was aware of the fact that Smith was circling around in his plane, but Bill never looked at the airplane. Smith drew away as Bill came down close to the airdrome. Bill bent his knees slightly as he neared the ground and then he hit. It was not a violent jar, but the wind carried the chutes along while Bill was on the ground.
Two twenty-four foot parachutes afford a large surface for the wind to catch, and had the wind been much stronger, Bill would undoubtedly have been dragged along the ground. Ruhs arrived alongside almost as soon as Bill hit. He grabbed the top shroud lines and pulled them down. The chutes immediately became deflated and dropped to the ground.
Bill got up on his feet and the crowd cheered when they saw that he was not hurt. It had been a terrible ordeal, but both Bill and Smith had come off unscathed. Bill’s hands were cut from climbing along the cable, but that was not worth considering when there were so many worse things which might have happened.
Ruhs untangled Bill from the shoulder braces and said, “You can ride back in the ambulance if you want to.”
“Not for mine,” replied Bill. “It looked for a while as if I would be in no fit condition even for an ambulance, but I am all whole. I will walk.”
“How did your chute come to open up before you were clear of the plane?” asked Captain Smith when Bill reached the line.
“I was afraid that I would not be able to find the ring after I dropped into space,” replied Bill. “Accordingly I held on to the ring while I tried to climb out. I lost my balance against the wind pressure when I stood up, and, in trying to regain it, must have pulled open the chute.”
“Next time you had better wait until after you count before grabbing the ring,” said Smith. “I doubt if we will always be as lucky as we were today. I don’t understand now why that first chute did not open and drag you out of the cockpit.”
“Neither do I,” said Bill.
“Weren’t you scared to death up there when your chute fouled the plane?” Bob Finch asked Bill as they were returning to town that evening.
“Bob, I didn’t have time to be scared. There were too many things to do if I wanted to make a fight for my life. In a time like that it would have been fatal to be scared.”
The next day, when the operations office opened, there were several radios and telephone messages waiting. Those messages came from the various forests. The rain had put out all the large fires that had been burning before. The lightning had started quite a few new ones, but there were others which had started in districts where no lightning storms had been reported.
“I cannot account for all of these fires in the area to the southeast,” said Simmons as he placed pins in the map to show the approximate locations of the new fires reported. “However, these which are reported over in this area have me buffaloed. There is no rhyme or reason for their existence. There were no thunder storms anywhere near them. It rained hard enough for all the old fires to have been extinguished, and yet here is a string of new fires starting. Look at them, all in a row. What started them?”
“Perhaps there was a small local thunder storm over there,” suggested Kiel.
“How could that have been possible without the lookouts and the forest wardens knowing it?” replied Simmons. “That doesn’t sound reasonable to me.”
“Are you trying to infer that there is someone out in the woods deliberately setting fires?” asked Bill.
“That is exactly what I am driving at,” replied Simmons. “I thought so before the rains started, and I am more convinced than ever now. The fires are breaking out at too regular intervals and times to be resulting from carelessness. Furthermore, Bill Bruce, you and I are going out in a plane this morning and catch that firebug.”
CHAPTER XXIV—HUNTING A FIREBUG
“Why are you so sure that there is a firebug?” asked Bill.
“When we came back from Roseburg there were but twelve fires burning in the whole state,” replied Earl Simmons. “Eleven of them were new ones which had been started by lightning, and the twelfth was the large one over near Three Fingered Jack in the Sanitaur Forest. The air was entirely clear of smoke and it looked as if the fire season was over.
“The tourists have all cleared out of the forest with the rains, thereby eliminating any further trouble with them. It is too early for the hunters to start out, and accordingly we won’t have any need to worry about their carelessness for a while. The lightning fires were all under control on the day following their start. The large fire over in Sanitaur was almost extinguished by the rain and is now under control. That being the case, according to all past precedents, I was entirely justified in believing that the fire season was over.
“Now what happens? Without any reason new fires break out over in the Buck Peak—Mary’s Peak region. Are they like normal fires? They are not. The first one starts in the vicinity of Buck Peak and they break out at almost regular distances toward the north. It may be a coincidence that they are at regular distances, and each succeeding one starts at about the time that it would have taken a man to arrive from the last one. I don’t think so. I think that there is some maniac over there who is deliberately setting the woods on fire. Will you help me get him?”
“I am perfectly willing to go out and try,” replied Bill. “However, I don’t think that we will make as effective a team as if I had someone in the rear seat who could use the radio.”
“Who says that I can’t use the radio?” asked Earl. “I was a commercial telegraph operator for several years. Furthermore, I have had a radio of my own ever since they came into common use. Why, during the winter months I amuse myself by building them. If you don’t think that I can operate the set in the back of your plane, ask Liggett.”
“The joke’s on you,” remarked Liggett, who was standing by listening to the conversation. “Earl has been operating these sets ever since we arrived.”
“Then why the deuce didn’t you send out a few messages when we were making that special patrol and were caught in the storm?” asked Bill.
“Why didn’t you release the generator propeller before we started, and I would have,” replied Earl.
“I give up,” said Bill. “We will start out whenever you are ready.”
“I want to get together with you and study the map before we start,” said Earl.
“Will you go out on the regular patrol or be an extra one?” asked Captain Smith. “It is time for the regular patrol to start.”
“You had better let the regular patrol go out as usual and then we will not arouse the suspicions of the firebug if we get started a little late,” replied Earl.
“Here’s the way that I figure this thing out,” said Earl as he and Bill sat at a table with a map spread out in front of them. “This fellow, whoever he is, is traveling by auto. He either goes into the woods as far as he can with his auto and then travels a short distance on foot and starts these fires, or he gets out of his car and then starts the fires without walking any farther than is necessary to insure the safety of his car. Once he has started a fire, he gets into his car and travels north for a few miles on the nearest road and repeats the performance.”
“The location of the fires would indicate that something like that is happening,” replied Bill.
“Now, here’s my plan for catching him,” said Earl. “We will wait for the report of the patrol which is just starting. That will give us the location of any new fires. Once we plot them on the map, we can make a guess as to the place where he will probably start the next one. We can get there by plane almost as soon as he can by auto. Accordingly, if he works true to form, we will catch him in the act. That is, of course, providing that you are willing to fly low enough to see a single man running along a road.”
“I think that you have your nerve in even suggesting that I might not be willing to fly low over the timber after what we have been through together,” replied Bill.
“All right then,” said Earl. “As soon as we determine the spot where we think we will need help, I will notify the nearest forest headquarters equipped with radio. They will have some forestry men standing by in an auto who will be dispatched to the place where we direct them from our radio. From then on we will have to drop messages on the auto and direct them in the chase. How does it look?”
“Entirely feasible,” said Bill. “All we have to do now is to wait for the patrol plane to report the new fires, if any, in that district.”
The patrol had not been out for more than twenty-five minutes before it was sending in fire reports. The first ones were concerning the old fires spotted the day before. Then came data concerning a new fire. Even before the location had been given, Earl had its approximate location marked on the map. Earl missed the second new fire by about five miles, but it showed that the principle upon which he was working was correct.
“What do you say now?” asked Earl after the observer had stopped sending from the patrol plane.
“You hit the first one almost on the spot,” replied Bill. “The second one you missed a little, but not much. Let’s get going.”
“Wait until I send a message to the supervisor in the Mary’s Peak area,” said Earl.
“Is the plane all right?” asked Bill as he ran to get into the cockpit.
“First-class condition,” replied the mechanic.
“We will check in with the amateur station at Glenbrook on the way out. We can’t afford to waste any more time in getting to Elam,” called Earl as Bill motioned for the mechanics to remove the blocks from the wheels.
“O. K.,” replied Bill.
Bill did not try to gain any altitude for a while, as speed was essential to the success of their plan. His plan was to arrive over Glenbrook at about four thousand feet. He hoped that Earl would start sending to check the set long before they reached the place, and then the O. K. panel would probably be waiting for them when they flew over the station.
They were flying along at three thousand feet when they reached Ferguson. Then Bill felt Earl poking him in the back and, turning, saw that a note was being passed forward to him. Bill took the note and read it. “I can’t get any juice from the generators. Did you remove the safety wire from the generator propeller before you started?”
Bill shook his head, “No.” To land and take off the safety wire would consume a lot of valuable time. Something else must be done. It was necessary that the radio function. Otherwise, the plan could not succeed. Bill wrote a note and handed it to Earl: “Do your stuff as you have never done it before. Put that emergency stick into the socket in your cockpit. Follow the movements that I make as I pilot this plane. Learn what you can in the next few minutes, for I am going to climb out on the wing and kick the generator fan loose. You are going to pilot the plane while I do it. I don’t care if you never before have piloted a plane. That makes no difference. Get busy.”
Earl was perfectly willing to try and follow Bill’s instructions. At first he over-controlled just like any new student would. Then he seemed to be able to keep the plane on an even keel. Bill did not touch his stick for some time and the plane ran along perfectly all right. Bill then started to climb out onto the wing.
He had one leg outside of the fusilage and the plane started to veer to the right alarmingly. Earl was giving it too much right rudder. Bill motioned for the correction but had no success in making himself understood. He returned to his cockpit and put the plane on an even keel. Once more he was about to get both legs out of the cockpit, but this time the plane started to climb at such an angle that he knew it would stall. Bill was able to correct it by leaning in and pushing forward on the stick.
Bill learned by this time that Earl was so intent upon trying to fly the plane that he could not see any of the signals which Bill gave for correcting the position of the plane. It was up to him to get out on that wing, kick the fan loose and get back into his seat as soon as possible, and do it before the plane was entirely out of control.
Bill waited until the plane settled down into a level flight again and then started to climb out on the wing. He had both feet on the wing and was about to move forward to the leading edge when the nose of the plane again went up at decidedly too great an angle. Bill hesitated and tried to get Earl to push the stick forward. Earl would not even look at him. Earl had his eyes glued to the inside of the cockpit.
Bill decided that the same thing would happen every time that he left the cockpit. Accordingly it was just as safe to get the job done this time as it ever would be. Completely ignoring the dangerous angle at which the plane was climbing, he continued to work his way forward. By the time that he reached the leading edge of the wing, the plane had almost lost all flying speed. In a short time it would fall into a spin. He must get back to the cockpit as soon as he could. Otherwise the plane would certainly fall and be out of control during the fall.
Bill did not take much time to consider what was the proper thing to do. He was in a position now from which he could stoop down and give that fan a kick and break the safety wire. It was doubtful if he could ever get there again, judging from the erratic way in which the plan had traveled through the air during the past few moments.
The few seconds spent in kicking that fan loose might be the ones needed to save the plane from falling into a spin. On the other hand, it might fall into a spin before he could get back to the cockpit even though he did not try and release the fan. Apparently it made no difference.
Bill grabbed the front cross brace wires, stooped down and kicked the fan. He felt the safety wires break and knew that the fan was loose. The plane then went into an even steeper climb. Bill hoped that the old Liberty engine would keep on reliably pumping its four hundred horsepower into that propeller. He also hoped that the plane would maintain its present speed until he could get his hand on the stick again.
The plane was just staggering through the air. Any increase in the flying angle would surely send it into a spin. Bill started back toward the cockpit and in his hurry slipped on the smooth laminated wood which protected the wing surface. He caught himself in time to keep from slipping off, but lost several seconds. Once more he started moving back to the cockpit. If he could only make it before the spin started. A DH in a spin takes a considerable altitude to come out. Sometimes they do not come out regardless of the altitude at which they are flying. Bill had a scant two thousand feet when he started to climb out of the cockpit the first time. He had lost some altitude since that.
Could he get there in time to save the ship?
CHAPTER XXV—THE END OF THE FIRE SEASON
Bill lost no time in getting back into the pilot’s seat. He caught the plane as it was falling off onto one wing. By skillful manipulation of the controls, he changed the movement into a nose dive. He knew that they were now safe. A short drop and they would regain flying speed. The plane went down into the dive, gradually picking up speed, and soon Bill pulled it out into a level position and they were flying along normally. Once more they were headed toward Glenbrook, where they could check their radio.
They hopped over a few timber-covered foothills and the town of Glenbrook came into view. It was not much of a town, but a branch line of the railroad followed a small stream and terminated there. The forest headquarters was easily picked out on account of the panel already stretched out on the ground. Earl had started sending with the radio as soon as Bill had regained control of the plane. Bill picked up the O. K. panel and dipped his plane in greeting to the amateur operator who he knew would be watching from below.
Bill knew that the radio operator would immediately send word to the foresters waiting at Elam and Adler that the plane was on its way. He turned his plane to skirt Buck Peak and then crossed Beaver Creek. Here he saw the first of the fires, which were still burning and which circumstantial evidence indicated had been lighted by the firebug. Beaver Creek had proved too great a natural barrier for the fire to cross. To the south and southwest there was nothing to check its path, and it had spread rapidly in that direction. The fight made by the crew on the ground to bar its progress was clearly shown from the scene of desolation extending below them.
The fire had evidently started on a comparatively narrow front. Then the strong wind had spread it out over a broad area. The fire crew had attempted to stop it along the crest of a ridge, and had almost succeeded, for the width was appreciably narrowed down to almost a point. Then on account of the lack of men, or for some other reason, the fire had surged through that narrow opening and spread to an even wider area than before. From the viewpoint of the airmen, it looked as if that fire had almost been guided by human hands.
Sensing that it was hemmed in on all sides, the fire had taken advantage of that one small unguarded strip and had broken through with an irresistible rush, burning fiercer than ever. Bill and Earl could see the crew working ahead of the fire. These men were backfiring, making fire breaks, standing by natural barriers and doing everything humanly possible to vanquish that fire monster. Forest fires always left an indelible impression on Bill’s mind. They seemed to him to be magnificent and awe-inspiring on account of their relentlessness and the apparent unlimited power, but at the same time they were terrifying as he saw the area of complete destruction which followed in their wake. Thus, in a few minutes’ time, timber which had taken hundreds of years to mature was completely effaced, deliberately, or through carelessness by the hand of man.
Bill did not pause in his flight on account of the fire, but traveled along at his hundred-mile an hour pace. He picked up a second and then a third fire. He thought that the third fire might be the one near which they would find the firebug and looked around at Earl for instructions. Earl waved him on.
Off to their left was Mary’s Peak. Somewhere along the road which led down its sides the forest men were waiting. Bill was about to head that way in an endeavor to locate them when he saw a small smoke coming up through the timber almost directly ahead of them. He pointed the nose of the plane down and headed straight for that smoke. Gradually losing altitude, as his plane thundered along at an ever increasing speed, he was barely skimming the tree tops when he reached a point directly over the smoke.
He passed over that fire at a speed far too great to pick up any details on the ground, but Bill did get a fleeting glimpse of a road which ran close by the fire. He had come down so low that the radio antennae wire was torn off by the tree tops. In his anxiety to get to that fire as soon as possible, he had forgotten all about the antennae. From now on the radio was useless. All messages would have to be dropped.
Bill pulled his plane up into a reversement and was back over the fire almost immediately, but traveling at a much lower speed. He saw a man running through the underbrush in a cut-over area not more than fifty yards from the fire. It was up to him now to keep that man in sight until help arrived on the ground. Bill looked at Earl and knew by Earl’s smile that he, too, had seen the man. The mere fact that he was that close to the fire and was running when seen was sufficient in Bill’s mind to brand him as the man who had started the fire.
Another circle and they lost the suspect. Bill made a wider circle, always keeping the road on both sides of the fire in sight. Sooner or later the firebug must come out on the road to get away from the burning timber. Then Bill saw an automobile standing alongside the road several hundred yards from the fire. He flew slowly and low over the car and obtained sufficient data regarding it to enable him to write a good description of the auto.
Bill again circled the car and wrote: “Brown roadster on mountain road running southeast from Adler. Hold the driver. Roadster now headed toward Adler. Will keep you advised as to its location. Bruce.” He handed this note back to Earl.
The forester took the note and read it. He nodded his O. K. and Bill headed the plane toward Adler. If the foresters on the ground were at Adler, everything would be fine, but if they had gone up the mountain toward Elam, things might not work out so well. Just then Bill turned around and saw the firebug climb into his car and start down the mountain road.
Adler came into view after a few minutes’ flying. It was a small village, and standing in the middle of the street was an automobile. Bill flew low over the scattered houses and caught a glimpse of several men standing by the car. These men stretched out a white sheet on the ground. There was no doubt now but that they were the foresters. Bill made a quick turn and dropped back right over the car.
When they had almost reached a point over the car, Earl stood up in the cockpit and threw a message overboard. He had tied a piece of cloth and a stone to the message. The stone tended to make it drop straight downward and the streamer to make it visible from the ground. Earl, however, had misjudged the speed of the plane and the message dropped onto the roof of a nearby house.
Bill was almost frantic. Suppose that the firebug should run through the town while the foresters were climbing up to the roof to get that message. Something must be done at once. Bill made another circle and Earl tapped him on the back. Simmons was writing another message. When the message was completed, Bill made another dip over the car. As he passed, he saw a man on the roof of the house searching for the first message. The second one dropped at the feet of the men by the auto. While making a circle to see if they understood, Bill saw the other men jump into their car and start off toward the mountain road, leaving one of their number still on the roof of the house.
Bill headed his plane for the nearest point on that mountain road. He caught a glimpse of the brown roadster turning off the road into what seemed to be a deserted homestead. Bill then made wide circles around the deserted buildings so as to give the impression that he had not seen the firebug turn off the road.
The firebug stopped his car and ran around the first building, which appeared to be an old barn. He then disappeared from view on the other side. There was no way now of telling where he had gone. He might be in the old barn or he might have gone into the underbrush beyond. Bill continued his wide circles and wrote another message to the pursuers on the ground. It read: “Search abandoned homestead over which I will circle. Bruce.”
Earl received this message and, after reading it, nodded his approval. Bill continued his circling so that he could watch both the road and the building. The foresters’ car came into view, tearing up the mountain road. Bill flew low to attract its attention and then, when it had stopped, Earl again demonstrated his ability as an aerial marksman by dropping the weighted message into the edge of the woods alongside the car. Bill did not wait to see if they picked it up, for he did not want to lose track of that brown roadster.
He circled around over the old homestead. The car was still there, but there was no sign of the firebug. He might by this time be in any one of the three buildings or be in the woods a good distance away. Bill tried to catch a glimpse of anything moving under the thick trees, but came to the conclusion that if he did, it would be by the merest chance.
The foresters came up the road and stopped at the entrance to the deserted clearing. Four men jumped from the car and started toward the brown car. One of them stayed by the roadster while the others began a search of the buildings. I saw one of them enter the old barn and wondered if the firebug was armed. If he was and started shooting, he might get away before the foresters could surround him.
The time passed mighty slowly for Earl and Bill as they watched the developments from their aerial grand-stand seats. Neither one could get any idea of what was happening on the ground. The only one of the foresters whom they could see was doing something to the roadster, just what, neither one could make out. The others were still in the buildings. Both Earl and Bill were eager to be of some active assistance, but realized that it was impossible.
Just then they saw two of the foresters run toward the old barn. Evidently things were coming to a climax. The man by the car stopped his work and watched the old building. A cloud of smoke shot out of the roof of the barn. The firebug was true to form even when cornered: he had set fire to the old barn as a last resort. He hoped to escape under cover of the smoke and excitement when the fire started burning.
His ruse failed, for in a few minutes Bill saw four men emerge from the rapidly burning building. As they came out into the open some distance from the burning building, they stopped to make their captive fast to a nearby log and then the foresters returned to prevent the spread of the fire from the burning building.
Bill flew low over the tree tops. He wanted to get a look at this demon who had deliberately fired the woods. As he flashed by, the firebug raised his head and shook his fist at the plane. One glimpse was sufficient for Bill to establish the identity of this criminal. His old enemy, Andre, was again in the hands of the law. The forest fire season in Oregon was over.

= = = PG33570 = = =
BILL THE MINDER
Produced by Simon Gardner, Chris Curnow and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
"And pray why, sir?"
"We should have to be looking after them, sir, as much as they would be looking after us."
"Mr Barkins, allow me to assure you, sir, that the dishipline of the marines on board this ship is above reproach."
"Yes, sir.  Of course, sir.  I only thought that, after being on board the ship so long, sir, they might be tempted, sir."
"I hope that the men of Her Majesty's gunboat _Teaser_ are above all temptations, Mr Barkins," said the lieutenant harshly.  "There, upon second thoughts, I will not send a guard.  You can go."
The oars dropped with a splash on either side, and away we went among the hundreds of native boats of all kinds going up and down the river, and onward toward the crowded city, with its pagodas, towers, and ornamental gateways glittering in the morning sunshine, and looking wonderfully attractive to us prisoners, out for the day.
"Don't speak aloud," I whispered to Smith, who was gathering himself up for an oration respecting the first lieutenant's tyranny.
"Why not?"
"Because the men are listening, and one of 'em may report what you say."
"He'd better," said Smith defiantly.  "I'm not afraid to speak.  It was all out of his niggling meddlesomeness, so as to show off before the men."  But all the same he spoke in a low voice that could only be heard by our companion who held the lines.
"There, never mind all that bother," cried Barkins.  "I say, how would you like to live in one of those house-boats?"
"I call it pretty good cheek of the pigtailed humbugs to set up house-boats," cried Smith.  "They imitate us in everything."
"And we don't imitate them in anything, eh?" said Barkins.  "Hi! look out, old Chin-chin, or we shall run you down," he shouted to a man in a sampan.
"My! what a hat!" cried Smith.  "Why, it would do for an umbrella. Port, Barkins."
"All right; I won't sink him.  Pull away, my lads."
"I say," I cried, as we rowed by an enormous junk, with high poop and stern painted with scarlet and gold dragons, whose eyes served for hawseholes; "think she's a pirate?"
"No," said Barkins, giving a look up at the clumsy rig, with the huge matting-sails; "it's a tea-boat."
As she glided away from us, with her crew collected astern, to climb up and watch us, grinning and making derisive gestures, Barkins suddenly swung round the telescope, slipped the strap over his head, adjusted it to the proper focus, as marked by a line scratched with the point of a penknife, and raised it to his eye, when, to my astonishment, I saw all the Chinamen drop down out of sight.
"Yes, she's a tea-boat," said Double B decisively, "and heavily laden. I wish she had pirates on board."
"Why?" cried Smith.  "They'd kill all the crew."
"And then we should kill them, make a prize of the junk, and have a lot of tin to share.  Bother this glass, though!  I wish I hadn't brought it."
"Why?" said Smith; "we shall have some good views from up yonder, when we get to the hills at the back of the town."
"Ain't got there yet.  It's so heavy and clumsy, and the sun's going to be a scorcher."
"I'll carry it, Tanner," I said.
"You shall, my boy," he cried, as he closed it up, and rapidly slipped the strap off his shoulder again.  "Catch hold.  Mind, if you lose it, I value it at a hundred pounds."
"Say five while you're about it, Tanner," cried Smith.  "Why, it isn't worth twopence--I mean I wouldn't give you a dollar for it.  But I say, my lads, look here, what are we going to do first?" continued Smith, who was in a high state of excitement, though I was as bad.  "Start off at once for a walk through the city?"
"Shouldn't we be mobbed?"  I said, as I slung the heavy glass over my shoulder.
"They'd better mob us!" cried Smith.  "If they give me any of their nonsense, I'll take tails instead of scalps.  My! what fools they do look, with their thick-soled shoes, long blue gowns, and shaven heads!"
"That fellow in the boat is grinning at us, and thinks we look fools, I said."
"Let him!" said Barkins.  "We know better."
"But what are we going to do?"  I said.  "I hate being in a crowd."
"Oh, they won't crowd us," said Barkins contemptuously.  "Here, hi! you sir; mind where you're going.  There, I thought you'd do it!"
This was to a young Chinaman, in a boat something like a Venetian gondola, which he was propelling by one oar as he stood up in the bows watching us, and was rowing one moment, the next performing a somersault in the air before plunging into the water between the port oars of our boat with a tremendous splash.
I did not say anything, thinking that it was a case of running up against a man, and then crying, "Where are you shoving to?" but leaned over the side, and caught at the first thing I saw, which happened to be the long black plaited pigtail, and, hauling upon it, the yellow, frightened face appeared, two wet hands clutched my arm, and, amidst a tremendous outburst of shouting in a highly-pitched tone, boats crowded round us, and the man was restored to his sampan, which was very little damaged by the blow inflicted by our stem.
"Give way, my lads," cried Barkins, and we rowed on towards the landing-place, followed by a furious yelling; men shaking their fists, and making signs suggestive of how they would like to serve us if they had us there.
"I'm sorry you knocked him over," I said.
"Who knocked him over, stupid?" cried Barkins.  "Why, he ran right across our bows.  Oh, never mind him!  I daresay he wanted washing.  I don't care.  Of course, I shouldn't have liked it if he had been drowned."
Ten minutes later we were close in to the wharf, and Smith exclaimed--
"I say, why don't we get that interpreter chap to take us all round the place?"
"Don't know where he lives," said Barkins, "or it wouldn't be a bad plan."
"I know," I cried.
"How do you know?"
"He showed me when he was on board, through the little glass he wanted to sell you."
"Why, you couldn't see through that cheap thing, could you?"
"Yes, quite plain.  It's just there, close to the warehouses, with a signboard out."
"So it is," cried Smith, shading his eyes; and he read aloud from a red board with gilt letters thereon--
Ching Englis' spoken Interpret Fancee shop
Just then the boat glided up against the wood piles; we sprang out on to the wharf, ordered the men back, and stood for two minutes watching them well on their return for fear of any evasions, and then found ourselves in the midst of a dense crowd of the lower-class Chinese, in their blue cotton blouses and trousers, thick white-soled shoes, and every man with his long black pigtail hanging down between his shoulders.
These men seemed to look upon us as a kind of exhibition, as they pressed upon us in a semicircle; and I was beginning to think that we should end by being thrust off into the water, when there was a burst of angry shouting, a pair of arms began to swing about, and the owner of the "fancee shop," whose acquaintance we had made on board, forced his way to our side, turned his back upon us, and uttered, a few words which had the effect of making the crowd shrink back a little.
Then turning to us, he began, in his highly-pitched inquiring tone--"You wantee Ching?  You wantee eat, dlink, smoke?  Ching talkee muchee Englis'.  Come 'long! hip, hip, hoolay!"
CHAPTER TWO.
A PIECE OF CHINA.
Ching flourished his arms to right and left, forming a lane for us to pass along, and we followed him for the few dozen yards between the landing-place and his place of business; but it was like passing through so much human sand, which flowed in again behind us, and as soon as we were in the shelter of the lightly-built bamboo place, crowded round the door to stare in.
But Ching had regularly taken us under his protection, and, stepping into the doorway, he delivered himself of a furious harangue, which grew louder and louder, and ended by his banging to the door and fastening it; after which he turned to us with his little black eyes twinkling, and crying--
"Allee light.  Ching light man light place."
We all laughed, of course, and the Chinaman joined in.  Then, growing serious directly, he looked from one to the other.
"You likee dlink?"
"No, no, not yet," cried Barkins.
"No likee dlink?" said the Chinaman wonderingly; and then in a voice full of reproof, "Sailor boy likee dlink."
"Oh yes, by and by," cried Smith.
"Ah, you wantee buy fan, shawl, ivoly?  Fancee shop."
"No, no, we don't want to buy anything now," cried Barkins.  "We'll pay you--"
"Allee light," cried the man, brightening up, for he had looked disappointed, and he held out both hands for the promised pay.
"Oh, come, wait a bit," I said.  "We want you to take us and show us the shops."
"No, no.  Shop no good.  Bess shop--fancee shop, Ching."
"Oh yes; but we want to see the others too, and the streets."
"Stleet allee full dust--allee full mud.  No good."
"Never mind," said Barkins; "we want to see them, and the temples and mandarins' houses."
"Pliest shut up temple.  Want muchee money.  Mandalin call soldier man muchee, put all in plison.  No good."
"They'd better," cried Smith; "why, the captain would blow all the place down with his big guns."
"No blow Ching fancee shop down.  Englis' spoken.  Good fliend."
"Look here, Ching.  Shut up shop, and come and take us all round the town to see everything, and we'll each give you a dollar."
"Thlee dollar?" cried the man, holding his head on one side, and raising three fingers.
"Yes," we cried, and once more his hand went out.
"What can't you trust us?" cried Smith.
"No tlust.  All pay leady money.  Go 'board.  Fo'get."
"Oh no, we shan't," I cried.  "And look here, Ching, after we've been round the town we want to go to the theatre."
"'Top flee day to go to fleatre?" he said.
"Three days! no.  We must be back on board at sundown."
"No go fleatre--no time."
"Never mind the theatre, then," cried Barkins.  "Now then, off we go. And I say, boys, let's have something to eat first."
"Wantee something eatee?" cried Ching, making for a canister upon a shelf.
"No, no," cried Smith, "not that.  We want a good dinner.  Do you know what a restaurant is?"
"Lestaulant?"
The Chinaman shook his head.
"Wantee good din': eat muchee soup, fis', cakee?"
"Yes, that's right; come along."
The yellow-faced man went softly to the door and listened, while we glanced round at the collection of common Chinese curios, carvings, lanterns, sunshades, stuffed birds, bits of silk, and cane baskets which filled the place, till he came back to us with a cunning look, and his eyes twinkling, as Smith said, "like two currants in a penny bun."
"Too muchee men all wait," he whispered.  "No talkee talkee;" and, making a gesture to us to be very silent, he led us through the back of his shop into a smaller room, closed and fastened the door, and then led us through another into a kind of yard full of boxes and old tea-chests, surrounded by a bamboo paling.
There was a gate at the end of this, and he led us through, fastened it, and, signing to us to follow, led us in and out behind houses, where we sometimes saw a woman or two, sometimes children at play, all of whom took refuge within till we had passed.
"Big clowd outside, wait long time," said Ching, with a laugh; and directly after he led us along a narrow alley and out into a busy street, which was crowded enough, but with people going to and fro, evidently on business, and though all stopped to look, and some followed, it was not a waterside crowd of loafers, but of respectable people, moved by curiosity to watch the barbarian sailors passing along their street, but paying most heed to me with the heavy glass.
I'm getting an old man now, my lads--the old boy who is writing this log; but it all comes back as clear to my mind's eye as if it were only yesterday: the narrow, busy street, with men shuffling along carrying packages, baskets of fruit and vegetables or fish, cages too containing birds, and all in the same way slung at the ends of a stout bamboo placed across the bearer's shoulder, and swinging there as if the man were carrying curious-looking pairs of scales.
The shops were as bright and gay as paint and gilding laid on their quaint carvings could make them, while on their fronts hung curious lanterns, banners, and signs covered with Chinese characters, all of which I longed to decipher, and at which I was ready to stop and stare, till Ching bade me imperatively, "Come 'long."
"Chinaman no fond love English sailor allee same Ching.  Don't know better.  Come 'long."
This drew my attention to the fact that among the faces full of curiosity there were plenty which greeted us with a heavy, dull scowl, and, recalling the fact that we were only "foreign devils," according to their teachings, it seemed better to obey our guide, though we were all bitten by the same desire to stop and inspect the various shops and stores we passed.
Ching led us farther and farther away from the riverside, and past enclosures at whose gates stood truculent-looking, showily-dressed men, who carried swords hung from a kind of baldrick, and scowled at us from beneath their flat, conical lacquered hats.  And I noticed that our guide always hurried us past these gateways, peeps through which were wonderfully attractive, showing as they did glimpses of gardens which looked like glorified, highly-coloured representations of our old friends the willow-pattern plates.
One in particular was so open that Smith stopped short, heedless of the presence of three fierce-looking Chinamen, with showy robes and long pendent moustachios.
"Look here, boys," he cried.  "What a game!  Here's the old bridge over the water, and the cannon-ball tree, and the gold-fish pond, and--"
"Come 'long," whispered Ching hurriedly; and he caught our comrade by the arm, forcing him onward as the guards scowled at us fiercely.
"Here, what are you up to?" cried Smith, resenting the interference.
"Take velly much care of Englis' offlicers.  Big mandalin live there. Men sword velly sharp--cut off head."
"Bosh!" said Smith shortly; "they'd better."
"Oh no, they hadn't," cried Barkins.  "We don't want to take you on board without any head."
"But they daren't hurt us," cried Smith bumptiously.  "We're Englishmen, and our gunboat is in the river.  I'm not afraid.  Why, there'd be a war if one of these men interfered with us.  Our people would land and burn up the place."
"No," said Ching quietly.  "Send letter to mandalin.  Why you men cut off little offlicer head?"
"Here, who are you calling little officer, Pigtail?" cried Smith indignantly.
"Mean young offlicer," cried Ching hastily.  "Say, Why you men cut chop young offlicer head off?  Mandalin say, Velly solly.  He find out who blave was who chop young offlicer head, and give him lichi."
"You mean toco?" said Barkins.
"No; lichi."
"What's lichi?"  I said.
"Tie blave up along post, and man come velly sharp sword, cut him all in 'lit pieces while he live."
"And do they do that?"  I asked, in horror.
"Neve' find out blave who chop off head," said Ching, with a queer twinkle of the eyes.  "No find blave, no can give him lichi."
"Sounds pleasant, Poet, don't it?" said Barkins.
"Horrid!"  I cried, with a shudder.
"Moral: Don't try to peep into mandarins' gateways, Blacksmith," continued Barkins.
"Bosh! it's all gammon.  I should like to see one of them try to cut my head off."
"I shouldn't," I cried, laughing; "and he wouldn't."
"No," said Ching perfectly seriously.  "Velly bad have head chop off. Head velly useful."
"Very," said Barkins mockingly.  "Well done, Chinese Wisdom.  I say, Herrick, why is a mandarin like the Grand Panjandrum?"
"Because he plays at the game of catch, catch, can and can't catch the man who cuts off the English fellow's head," said Smith.
"Wrong!" cried Barkins.  "Now you, Poet."
"Because he's got a little round button on the top."
"Good boy, go up one," cried Barkins.
"Hallo! what place is this?"
"Velly good place, eatee drinkee.  All velly nicee nicee."
"Here, I say, Ching," cried Smith, "gently; any one would think we were babies.  Stow some of that nicee nicee."
"Yes!  Stow all along inside, like ship.  Allee good.  Come 'long."
For we had reached a showy-looking open-sided building, standing a little way back in a well-kept garden, with rockeries and tiny fish-ponds, clipped trees and paved walks, while the large open house displayed tables and neat-looking waiters going to and fro, attending upon well-dressed Chinamen, whose occupation was so much in accordance with our desires, that we entered at once, and Ching led the way to a table; one of the waiters coming up smiling as soon as we were seated.
"Now then," cried Barkins, who was full of memories of hard biscuit and tough salt beef, "what are we going to have to eat?"
"I don't know," I said, looking round uneasily.  "What have they got?"
"Here, let's make Ching order the dinner," cried Smith.  "Look here, old chap.  We can have a good dinner for a dollar apiece, can't we?"
"Velly good dinner, dollar piecee," he replied.
"That's right," said Barkins; "we don't have a chance every day to spend a dollar upon our dinner.  Go it, Ching.  Tell the waiter fellow, and order for yourself too.  But I say, boys, we must have birds'-nest soup."
"Of course," we chorussed, though Smith and I agreed afterwards that we rather shrank from trying the delicacy.
Ching lost no time in giving the orders, and in a very few minutes the man bustled up with saucers and basins, and we began tasting this and tasting that as well as we could with the implements furnished to us for the purpose, to wit chopsticks, each watching the apparently wonderful skill with which Ching transferred his food from the tiny saucers placed before him, and imitating his actions with more or less success-- generally less.
We had some sweet stuff, and some bits of cucumber cut up small, and some thick sticky soap-like stuff, which rather put me in mind of melted blancmange with salt and pepper instead of sugar, and when this was ended came saucers of mincemeat.
"'Tain't bad," whispered Barkins, as we ate delicately.  "Peg away, lads.  We're pretty safe so long as we eat what Pigtail does."
I did not feel so sure; but I was hungry, and as the food did not seem to be, as Barkins said, bad, I kept on, though I could not help wondering what we were eating.
"I say, Ching," said Smith suddenly, "when's the birds'-nest soup coming?  Oughtn't we to have had that first?"
"Eat um all up lit' bit go," replied Ching.
"What, that sticky stuff?"  I cried.
"Yes.  No have velly bess flesh birds'-ness for dolla'; but all velly good.  Nicee nicee, velly nicee."
"Don't!" cried Smith excitedly.
"Let him be, Blacksmith," said Barkins; "it's only his way.  Ah, here's something else!"
I looked at the little saucers placed before us, in which, neatly divided, were little appetising-looking brown heaps, covered with rich gravy, and smelling uncommonly nice.
"What's this?" said Barkins, turning his over with the chopsticks.
"Velly good," said Ching, smiling, and making a beginning.
"Yes; don't smell bad," said Smith.  "I know: it's quails.  There's lots of quail in China.  'Licious!"
I had a little bit of the white meat and brown gravy, which I had separated from a tiny bone with the chopsticks, and was congratulating myself on my cleverness, when it dropped back into my saucer, for Ching, with his mouth full, said quietly--
"No, not lit' bird--lat."
"What's lat?" said Barkins suspiciously.
"No lat," said Ching smiling; "lat."
"Well, I said lat.  What is lat?"
Smith put down his chopsticks.  I had already laid down mine.
"What's the matter?" said Barkins, who kept on suspiciously turning over the contents of his saucer.
"He means rat," whispered Smith in an awful tone.
"What!" cried Barkins, pushing himself back with a comical look of disgust upon his face.
"Yes, lat," said Ching.  "Velly good fat lat."
Our faces were a study.  At least I know that my companions' were; and we were perfectly silent while our guide kept on making a sound with his mouth as he supped up the rich gravy.
"Here, hold hard a minute," said Smith.  "I mean you, Ching."
"Yes?" said the Chinaman, with a pleasant smile; and he crossed his chopsticks, and looked at our brother middy inquiringly.
"What was that we were eating a little while ago?"
"Clucumber; velly good."
"No, no; before that."
"Birds'-ness soup; velly cost much.  Not all birds'-ness.  Some shark-fis' fin."
"I don't mean that, I tell you," cried Smith in an exasperated tone of voice.  "I mean that other brown meat cut up small into the brown sauce. It was rabbit, wasn't it?"
"Oh no," said Ching decisively; "no labbit.  Lit' mince-up pup-dog. Nicee nicee."
Smith turned green, and his eyes rolled so that he actually squinted; while Barkins uttered a low sound-like gasp.  As for me, I felt as I remember feeling after partaking meekly of what one of my aunts used to call prune tea--a decoction made by boiling so many French plums along with half an ounce of senna leaves.
"Oh gracious!" murmured Barkins; while Smith uttered a low groan.
"You both likee more?" said Ching blandly.
"No!" they cried so unanimously that it was like one voice; and in spite of my own disgust and unpleasant sensations I felt as if I must laugh at them.
"Oh, mawkish morsels!" muttered Barkins.
"You feel you have 'nuff?" said Ching, smiling.  "Oh no.  Loas' suck-pig come soon.  You eat velly much more."
"Not if I know it," whispered Smith to me.  "I don't believe it'll be pig."
"What then?"  I whispered back.
"Kid."
"Well, kid's nice."
"Get out!  I meant baby."
"Ugh!  Don't."
"It's too late to say don't," groaned Smith.  "We've done it."
"Hold up, old chap," I whispered.  "Everybody's looking at you."
"Let 'em," he groaned.  "Oh, I do feel so ill!"
"Nonsense!  Look at Tanner."
He turned his wild eyes upon Barkins, whose aspect was ludicrous enough to make him forget his own sensations, and he smiled a peculiarly saddened, pensive smile; for our messmate was leaning towards Ching.
"Don't eat any more of that," he said faintly.
"Eat um all up; velly good."
"Can one get a drop of brandy here?"
"Dlop blandy?  No.  Velly nicee 'lack."
"What's 'lack?"
"No, no 'lack! lice spilit."
"'Rack!"  I said--"arrack?"
"Yes, allack," said Ching, nodding.
"Let's have some--a glass each," said Barkins; "and look sharp."
Ching summoned one of the smiling waiters, and the order was given. Then for the first time he noticed that we had not finished the contents of our little saucers.
"No eat lat?" he cried.
I shook my head.
"Velly good!"
"We're not quite well," said Smith.
"Been out in the sun too much," added Barkins.
"Ah, sun too much bad!  Lit' dlop spilit make quite well.  No eat lat?"
"No, no!" we cried in chorus.
"Velly good," said our guide; and in alarm lest such a delicacy should be wasted, he drew first one and then the other saucer over to his side, and finished their contents.
Long before this, though, the attendant had brought us three tiny glasses of white spirit, which we tossed off eagerly, with the result that the qualmish sensations passed away; but no recommendations on the part of our guide could induce us to touch anything that followed, saving sundry preparations of rice and fruit, which were excellent.
The dinner over, Ching took us about the garden to inspect the lilies in pots, the gold and silver fish, fat and wonderfully shaped, which glided about in the tanks and ponds, and then led us into a kind of arbour, where, beneath a kind of wooden eave, an instrument was hanging from a peg.  It was not a banjo, for it was too long; and it was not a guitar, for it was too thin, and had not enough strings; but it was something of the kind, and evidently kept there for the use of musically-disposed visitors.
"You likee music?" said Ching.
"Oh yes," I replied dubiously, as I sat using the telescope, gazing right away over the lower part of the town at the winding river, with its crowds of craft.
"Why, he isn't going to play, is he?" whispered Smith.  "We don't want to hear that.  Let's go out in the town."
"Don't be in such a hurry," replied Barkins.  "The sun's too hot.  I say, our dinner wasn't such a very great success, was it?"
Smith shook his head, and just then Ching began to tune the instrument, screwing the pegs up and down, and producing the most lugubrious sounds, which somehow made me begin to think of home, and how strange it was to be sitting there in a place which seemed like part of a picture, listening to the Chinese guide.
I had forgotten the unpleasantry of the dinner in the beauty of the scene, for there were abundance of flowers, the sky was of a vivid blue, and the sun shone down brilliantly, and made the distant water of the river sparkle.
Close by there were the Chinese people coming and going in their strange costume; a busy hum came through the open windows; and I believe that in a few minutes I should have been asleep, if Ching had not awakened me by his vigorous onslaught upon the instrument, one of whose pegs refused to stay in exactly the right place as he kept on tuning.
@@@@
Then a little more screwing up.
_Peng_, _peng_, _pang_--_pong_.
Ching stopped, nursed the instrument upon his knee as if it were a baby, pulled out the offending peg as if it were a tooth, moistened the hole, replaced the peg, and began again--screw, screw, screw.
@@@@
Just a quarter of a tone out still, and he tried again diligently, while my eyes half closed, and the Tanner and Blacksmith both nodded in the heat.
@@@@
Right at last; and Ching threw himself back so that his mouth would open to the widest extent, struck a chord on the three strings, and burst forth with celestial accompaniment into what was in all probability a passionate serenade, full of allusions to nightingales, moonbeams, dew-wet roses, lattice-windows, and beautiful moon-faced maidens, but which sounded to me like--
"Ti ope I ow wow, Ti ope I ow yow, Ti ope I ow tow, Ti ope I ligh."
The words, I say, sounded like that: the music it would be impossible to give, for the whole blended together into so lamentable a howl, that both Barkins and Smith started up into wakefulness from a deep sleep, and the former looked wildly round, as confused and wondering he exclaimed--
"What's matter?"
As for Smith, he seemed to be still half-asleep, and he sat up, staring blankly at the performer, who kept on howling--I can call it nothing else--in the most doleful of minor keys.
"I say," whispered Barkins, "did you set him to do that?"
I shook my head.
"Because--oh, just look! here are all the people coming out to see what's the matter."
He was right as to the people coming, for in twos and threes, as they finished the refreshment of which they had been partaking, first one path was filled and then another, the people coming slowly up and stopping to listen, while Barkins stared at them in blank astonishment.
"Here Nat--Poet," he whispered, "look at 'em."
"I am looking," I said.  "Isn't it just like a picture?"
"It's like an old firescreen," he said; "but I don't mean that.  Look! Hang me if the beggars don't seem to like it.  Can't you stop him?"
"No, of course not."
"But how long will it be before he has run down?"
"I don't know," I whispered.  "But look, aren't those like some of the men we saw by the gates?"
I drew his attention to about half-a-dozen fierce-looking men in showy coats and lacquered hats, who came up to the garden, stared hard at us, and then walked in.  Each of them, I noticed, wore a sword, and a kind of dagger stuck in his belt, and this made me at once recall their offensive looks and contemptuous manner towards us, and think of how far we were away from the ship, and unarmed, save for the ornamental dirks which hung from our belts, weapons that would have been, even if we had known how to use them, almost like short laths against the Chinamen's heavy, broad-bladed, and probably sharp swords.
"I say, Gnat," whispered Barkins, "those must be the chaps we saw at the mandarin's gate.  Never mind; we'll ask them to have something as soon as old Ching has finished his howling."
But that did not seem likely to be for some time, and I began to think, as I sat there noticing how the men were gradually closing in upon us, that our position was not very safe, right away from the landing-place, and that we had done wrong in stopping so long where we were.  I knew that the Chinese were obsequious and humble enough so long as they were face to face with a stronger power, but if they had the upper hand, cruel and merciless to any one not of their own nation, and that it was wiser to give them a wide berth.
Then I began to think that the captain had been too ready to believe in our prestige in giving us leave to go, and that we should have been wiser if we had stayed on board.  Finally, I had just come to the conclusion that we ought to stop Ching in his howling or singing, which grew more and more vehement as he saw that his audience was increasing, when Smith jogged my elbow.
"I say," he whispered, "let's get away from here."
"Why?"  I said, to get to know what he thought.
"Because I'm afraid those chaps with the swords mean mischief."
"I say, lads," said Barkins, leaning towards us, "aren't those chaps crowding us up rather?  What do they mean?  Here, I'm senior, and the skipper said I was to take care of you youngsters.  We'll go back to the wharf at once."
"What's the good?" said Smith.  "The boat won't be there to fetch us off till sundown."
"Never mind, let's get away from here," said Barkins decisively; "we don't want to get in a row with the Chinese, and that's what they want."
"But they're quiet enough," I said, growing nervous all the while.
"Yes, they're quiet enough now," whispered Barkins; "but you look at that big fellow with the yellow belt, he keeps on making faces at us."
"Let him; that will not hurt us."
"I know that, little stupid," he cried, "but what follows may.  Look at him now."
I looked up quickly, and saw the man turn away from looking at us, and say something to his fierce-looking companions, who glanced towards us and laughed.
"There," said Barkins, "I'm not going to be laughed at by those jolly old pigtailed heathens.  Here, Ching, old chap, we want to go."
As he spoke he gave our guide a sharp nudge, which made him turn round and stare.
"Ti--ope--I--ow!"
"Do you hear?  We want to go!"
"Ti--ope--I--ow!" howled Ching, beginning again.
"Yes, we want to go," I said anxiously.
"Ti--ope--I--ow!" he howled again, but as he gave forth his peculiar sounds he suddenly struck--purposely--a false, jarring note, lowered the instrument, seized one of the pegs as if in a passion, and began talking to me in a low, earnest voice, to the accompaniment of the string he tuned.
"Ching see now,"--_peng_, _peng_, _peng_--"bad men with swords,"--_pang_, _peng_--"look velly closs,"--_pang_, _pong_--"wantee fightee,"--_pang_, _pang_--"you no wantee fightee,"--_pung_, _pung_.
"No," I whispered anxiously; "let's go at once."
"No takee notice,"--_pang_, _peng_, _peng_.  "All flee, walkee walkee round one sidee house,"--_pang_, _pong_--"Ching go long other sidee,"--_peng_, _peng_.  "No make, hully--walkee velly slow over lit' blidge,"--_ping_, _ping_, _ping_, _ping_, _pang_, _pang_.
The little bridge was just behind us, and I grasped all he said--that we were to go slowly over the bridge and walk round the back of the house, while he would go round the front and meet us on the other side.
_Bang_, _jangle_, _pang_, _pang_, _ping_, _ping_, _peng_, _peng_, went the instrument, as Ching strummed away with all his might.
"Wait, Ching come show way," he whispered.  And as I saw that the mandarin's men were coming nearer and evidently meant mischief, Ching raised his instrument again, and, after a preliminary flourish, began once more, to the delight of the crowd.  My messmates and I slowly left our places and walked round the summer-house towards the little bridge over one of the gold-fish tanks, moving as deliberately as we could, while Ching's voice rang out, "Ti--ope--I--ow!" as if nothing were the matter.
The little crowd was between us and the mandarin's retainers, but it was hard work to appear cool and unconcerned.  Above all, it took almost a superhuman effort to keep from looking back.
Smith could not resist the desire, and gave a sharp glance round.
"They're coming after us," he whispered.  "We shall have to cut and run."
"No, no," said Barkins hoarsely.  "They'd overtake us directly.  They'd come down like a pack of wolves.  We must be cool, lads, and be ready to turn and draw at the last.  The beggars are awful cowards after all."
We went on over the bridge, and, in spite of my dread, I made believe to look down at the gold-fish, pointing below at them, but seizing the opportunity to look out for danger.
It was a quick glance, and it showed me that the crowd from the eating-house were taking no notice of us, but listening to Ching, who had left his seat, and, singing with all his might, was walking along one of the paths towards the front of the low building, while we were slowly making for the back, with the result of crowding the mandarin's men back a little, for the whole of the company moved with our guide, carefully making room for him to play, and thus unconsciously they hampered the movements of our enemies.
The distance was not great, of course--fifty yards altogether, perhaps, along winding and doubling walks, for the Chinese are ingenious over making the most of a small garden, but it was long enough to keep us in an intense state of excitement, as from time to time we caught sight of the men following us.
Then we saw that they had stopped to watch which way we went, and directly after we knew that they were only waiting for us to be behind the house to go back and hurry round and meet us.
At last we had passed to the end of the maze-like walk, and were sheltered by the house from the little crowd and our enemies, with the result that all felt relieved.
"I say," said Smith, "isn't this only a scare?"
"Don't know," said Barkins.  "P'raps so; but I shan't be sorry to get on board again.  They think nothing of cutting a fellow to pieces."
"Let's make haste, then," I said; and, nothing loth, the others hurried on past the back of the house, where the kitchen seemed to be, and plenty of servants were hurrying to and fro, too busy to take any heed of us.  Then we turned the corner, and found that we were opposite to a gateway opening upon a very narrow lane, which evidently went along by the backs of the neighbouring houses, parallel with the main street, which was, however, not such a great deal wider than this.
"Here's a way for us to go down, at all events," said Barkins, after we had listened for a few moments for Ching's song, and the wiry notes of his instrument.
"Yes, let's cut down at once," said Smith.
"Where to?"  I said excitedly.  "We can't find our way without Ching."
"No; and those beggars would hunt us down there at once," said Barkins. "Won't do.  I say, though, why don't they give us better tools than these to wear?"
"Hark!"  I said; "listen!"
We listened, but there was nothing but the murmur of voices in the house, and not a soul to be seen on our side, till all at once I caught sight of something moving among the shrubs, and made out that it was the gay coat of one of the men from whom we sought to escape.
"Come on!" said Smith excitedly, and he threw open the gate leading into the narrow lane, so that in another moment we should have been in full retreat, had not a door behind us in the side of the house been opened, and Ching appeared.
He did not speak, but made a sign for us to enter, and we were hardly inside and the door thrust to--all but a chink big enough for our guide to use for reconnoitring--when we heard the soft pat-pat of the men's boots, then the rustle of their garments, and the tap given by one of their swords as they passed through the gateway and ran down the narrow lane.
"All gone along, catchee you," whispered Ching.  "Come 'long other way."
He stepped out, made us follow, and then carefully closed the door.
"Now, come 'long this way," he said, with his eyes twinkling.  "No walkee fast.  Allee boy lun after."
We saw the wisdom of his proceedings, and followed him, as he took us by the way our enemies had come, straight out into the main street, down it a little way, and then up a turning, which he followed till we came to another important street parallel to the one by which we had come, and began to follow it downward toward the waterside.
"Muchee flighten?" he said.
"Oh, I don't know," growled Barkins, who had the deepest voice of the three.  "It was startling.  Did they mean mischief?"
"Mean chop chop.  Allee bad wick' men.  No catchee now.  Ching velly much flighten."
He did not look so, but chatted away with open, smiling face, as he pointed first on one side then on the other to some striking-looking shop or building, though he never paused for a moment, but kept on at a good rate without showing a sign of hurry or excitement.
"How are we to get on board when we get to the river?"  I said, as we went on.  "There'll be no boat till sundown."
"Ching get one piecee boat low all aboard ship."
"Can't you keep us in your place till our boat comes?"
The man shook his head.  "Mandalin boy come burn um down, makee all lun out.  So velly hot.  No stay.  Get boat, low away."
"How far is it, do you think?" asked Smith.
"I don't know," said Barkins.  "We seemed to be walking for hours in the hot sun coming up.  How far is it, Ching?"
"Velly long way.  No look at garden now."
He pointed to one of the handsome gateways about which a party of armed retainers were hanging, and, whispering to us not to take any notice, he walked us steadily along.
But we were not to get by the place without notice, for the loungers saw us coming, and strode out in a swaggering way--three big sturdy fellows in blue and scarlet, and pretty well blocked the way as they stood scowling at us.
"Look out," whispered Barkins, "ready with your toasting-forks, and then if it comes to it we must run."
"You'll stick by us, Gnat," whispered Smith in a hasty whisper.
"I'll try," I said.
"Keep velly close," whispered Ching.  "No takee notice.  No talkee closs.  Ching speakee."
He said something in Chinese to the men, and led us in single file between the two most fierce-looking, our prompt action taking them somewhat by surprise, and, as we gave them no excuse for taking offence, they only turned to gaze after us.
There were plenty of people in the street ready to stand and look at us, and we met with no interruption from them, but I could not help seeing the anxiety in Ching's face, and how from time to time he wiped his streaming brow.  But as soon as he saw either of us looking at him he smiled as if there was nothing the matter whatever.
"No velly long now," he said.  "Lot bad men to-day.  You come walkee walkee 'gain?"
"It's not very tempting, Ching," I said.  "Why can't they leave us alone?"
He tightened his lips and shook his head.  Then, looking sharply before him, he hurried us along a little more.
"Wish got ten--twenty--piecee soldier man 'longside," he whispered to me, and the next minute he grasped my arm with a spasmodic snatch.
"What's the matter?"  I said.
He did not speak, but looked sharply to right and left for a means of escape.  For, in spite of the cleverness of our guide, the mandarin's men had been as cunning.  They had either divined or been told that we had made for the other street, and had contrived to reach the connecting lane along which we should have to pass.  Here they had planted themselves, and just as we were breathing more freely, in the belief that before long we should reach the shore of the great river, we caught sight of them in company with about a dozen more.
We were all on the point of halting, as we saw them about fifty yards in front, but Ching spoke out sharply--
"No stoppee," he said firmly.  "Lun away, all come catchee and choppee off head.  Go 'long stlaight and flighten 'em.  Englis' sailor foleign debil, 'flaid o' nobody."
"There's something in that," said Barkins.  "Right.  Show a bold front, lads.  Let's go straight by them, and if they attack, then out with your swords and let's make a fight for it."
I heard Smith say, "All right," and my heart was beating very fast as I said the same.
Frightened?  Of course I was.  I don't believe the boy ever lived who would not feel frightened at having to face death.  For it was death we had to face then, and in the ugliest shape.  But Smith's words sent a thrill through us.
"I say, lads," he said, "we've got to fight this time.  If we begged for our lives they'd only serve us worse; so let 'em have it, and recollect that, if they kill us, the old _Teasers'll_ come and burn their town about their ears."
"'Fraid, Ching?"  I whispered; for he and I were in front.
"No 'flaid now," he whispered back.  "Plenty flighten by and by."
He smiled as he spoke, and led us straight on to where the four mandarin's men and the rough-looking fellows with them blocked the road, and if for a moment we had shown any hesitation, I believe they would have rushed at us like wolves.  But Ching kept his head up as if proud of acting as guide to three British officers, and when we got close up he nodded smilingly at the men in the mandarin's colours, and then, as if astounded at the little crowd standing fast, he burst out into a furious passion, shouting at them in a wild gabble of words, with the effect of making them give way at once, so that we passed through.
Then I heard him draw a panting breath, and saw that he was ghastly.
"Walkee walkee," he whispered.  "Not velly fast.  'Top I say lun, and lun fast alleegether."
At that moment there was a loud shouting behind, then a yell, and, turning my head, I saw that the mandarin's men had their great blades out, and were leading the men after us, shouting to excite themselves and the little mob.
"Now lun!" cried Ching.  "I showee way."
"No!" shouted Barkins.  "Draw swords and retreat slowly."
We whipped out our weapons and turned to face the enemy, knowing full well that they would sweep over us at the first rush, while a feeling of rage ran through me, as in my despairing fit I determined to make the big fellow opposite to me feel one dig of English steel before he cut me down.
Then they were upon us with a rush, and I saw Ching dart in front and cleverly snatch one of the clumsy swords from the nearest man.  The next moment he had whirled it up with both hands, when--
_Boom_--_Crash_!
There was the report of a heavy gun, whose concussion made the wooden houses on each side jar and quiver as it literally ran up the narrow street, and, to our astonishment, we saw the little mob turn on the instant and begin to run, showing us, instead of their fierce savage faces, so many black pigtails; the mandarin's men, though, last.
"Hooray!" we yelled after them, and they ran the faster.
"Now, velly quick," panted Ching.  "Come back again soon."
We uttered another shout, and hurried along the lane to the principal street, turned at right angles, and began to hurry along pretty rapidly now, Ching marching beside us with the big sword over his shoulder.
But the scare was only temporary, the tremendous report was not repeated, and before a minute had elapsed, our guide, who kept glancing back, cried--
"Now, lun velly fast.  Come along catchee catchee, and no big gun go shoot this time."
He was quite right, and we took to our heels, with the yelling mob close at hand, and so many people in front, that we felt certain of being run down long before we could reach the waterside.
"And no chance for us when we do," muttered Barkins from close behind me.  "Oh, if a couple of dozen of our lads were only here!  Why didn't they send 'em?" he panted, "instead of firing as a signal for us to go back on board."
CHAPTER THREE.
CUTTING IT CLOSE.
My messmate uttered these words close to my ears in a despairing tone as we dashed on, and now I saw Ching strike to his right, while I made a cut or two at my left, as men started from the sides and tried to trip us up.
I was growing faint with the heat down in that narrow, breathless street, my clothes stuck to me, and Barkins' heavy telescope banged heavily against my side, making me feel ready to unfasten the strap and let it fall.  But I kept on for another fifty yards or so with our enemies yelling in the rear, and the waterside seeming to grow no nearer.
"Keep together, lads," cried Barkins excitedly.  "It can't be far now. We'll seize the first boat we come to, and the tide will soon take us out of their reach."
But these words came in a broken, spasmodic way, for, poor fellow, he was as out of breath as any of us.
"Hoolay!  Velly lit' way now," cried Ching; and then he finished with a howl of rage, for half-a-dozen armed men suddenly appeared from a gateway below us, and we saw at a glance that they were about to take sides with the rest.
"Lun--lun," yelled Ching, and, flourishing his sword, he led us right at the newcomers, who, startled and astounded by our apparent boldness, gave way, and we panted on, utterly exhausted, for another fifty yards, till Ching suddenly stopped in an angle of the street formed by a projecting house.
"No lun.  No, no!" he panted.  "Fight--kill."
Following his example, we faced round, and our bold front checked the miserable gang of wretches, who stopped short a dozen yards from us, their numbers swelled by the new party, and waited yelling and howling behind the swordsmen, who stood drawing up their sleeves, and brandishing their heavy weapons, working themselves up for the final rush, in which I knew we should be hacked to pieces.
"Good-bye, old chap," whispered Barkins in a piteous tone, his voice coming in sobs of exhaustion.  "Give point when they come on: don't strike.  Try and kill one of the cowardly beggars before they finish us."
"Yes," I gasped.
"Chuck that spyglass down," cried Smith; "it's in your way."
Gladly enough I swung the great telescope round, slipped the strap over my head, and as I did so I saw a sudden movement in the crowd.
In an instant the experience we had had upon the river flashed across my brain.  I recalled how the crew of the great tea-boat had dropped away from her high stern when Barkins had used the glass, and for the first time I grasped why this had been.
My next actions were in a mad fit of desperate mischief more than anything else.  For, recalling that I had a few flaming fusees in my jacket pocket, I snatched out the box, secured one; then, taking off the cap, which hung by a strap, I pulled the brass and leather telescope out to its full extent, presented the large end at the mob, uttered as savage a yell as I could and struck a fusee, which went off with a crack, and flashed and sparkled with plenty of blaze.
The effect was instantaneous.  Mistaking the big glass, which had been a burden to me all day, for some terrible new form of gun, the swordsmen uttered a wild yell of horror, and turned and fled, driving the unarmed mob before them, all adding their savage cries of dread.
"Hoor-rah," shouted Barkins.  "Now, boys, a Yankee tiger.  Waggle the glass well, Gnat.  All together.  Hurrah--rah--rah--rah--rah!"
We produced as good an imitation of the American cheer as we could, and Ching supplemented it with a hideous crack-voiced yell, while I raised and lowered the glass and struck another match.
As we looked up the street we could see part of the mob still running hard, but the swordsmen had taken refuge to right and left, in doorways, angles, and in side shops, and were peering round at us, watching every movement.
"No' laugh!" said Ching anxiously.  "Big fool.  Think um bleech-loader. Now, come 'long, walkee walkee blackward.  I go first."
It was good advice, and we began our retreat, having the street to ourselves for the first minute.  My messmates supported me on either side, and we walked backward with military precision.
"Well done, gun carriage," panted Barkins to me.  "I say, Blacksmith, who says the old glass isn't worth a hundred pounds now?"
"Worth a thousand," cried Smith excitedly.  "But look out, they're coming out of their holes again."
I made the object-glass end describe a circle in the air as we slowly backed, and the swordsmen darted away to the shelters they had quitted to follow us as they saw us in retreat.  But as there was no report, and they saw us escaping, they began to shout one to the other, and ran to and fro, zig-zagging down the street after us, each man darting across to a fresh place of shelter.  And as the retreat went on, and no report with a rush of bullets tore up the street, the men gained courage; the mob high up began to gather again.  Then there was distant yelling and shouting, and the danger seemed to thicken.
"Is it much farther, Ching?" cried Barkins.
"Yes, velly long way," he replied.  "No' got no levolvers?"
"No, I wish I had."
"Fine levolver bull-dog in fancee shop, and plenty cahtlidge.  Walkee fast."
We were walking backwards as fast as we could, and the danger increased. In place of running right across now from shelter to shelter, the big swordsmen stopped from time to time on their way to flourish their weapons, yell, indulge in a kind of war-dance, and shout out words we did not understand.
"What do they say, Ching?" asked Smith.
"Say chop all in lit' small piece dilectly."
"Look here," cried Barkins, as the demonstrations increased, and the wretches now began to gather on each side of the street as if threatening a rush, "let's stop and have a shot at 'em."
"No, no," cried Ching, "won't go off blang."
"Never mind, we'll pretend it will.  Halt!"
We stopped, so did our enemies, and, in imitation of the big gun practice on board ship, Barkins shouted out order after order, ending with, Fire!
Smith held the flaming fusees now, and at the word struck one with a loud crackle, just as we were beginning to doubt the efficacy of our ruse, for the enemy were watching us keenly; and, though some of them moved uneasily and threatened to run for shelter, the greater part stood firm.
But at the loud crackle and flash of the fusee, and Smith's gesture to lay it close to the eye-piece, they turned and fled yelling once more into the houses on either side, from which now came an addition to the noise, in the shrill howls and shrieks of women, who were evidently resenting the invasion of all these men.
"Now, walkee far," cried Ching.  "No good no mo'.  Allee fun lun out. No be big fool any longer."
We felt that he was right, and retreated as fast as we could, but still backward, mine being the duty to keep the mouth of our sham cannon to bear upon them as well as the blundering backward through the mudholes of the dirty street would allow.
That street seemed to be endless to us in our excitement, and the feeling that our guide must be taking us wrong began to grow upon me, for I made no allowances for the long distance we had gone over in the morning, while now it grew more and more plain, by the actions of our pursuers, that they were to be cheated no more.  The dummy had done its duty, and I felt that I might just as well throw it away and leave myself free, as expect the glass to scare the enemy away again.
"We shall have to make a rush for it," said Barkins at last; "but it is hard now we have got so near to safety.  Shall I try the telescope again, Ching?"
"No, no good," said our guide gloomily.  "Hi, quick all along here."
He made a dash for the front of a house, which seemed to offer some little refuge for us in the shape of a low fencing, behind which we could protect ourselves; for all at once there was a new development of the attack, the mob having grown during the last few minutes more daring, and now began to throw mud and stones.
Ching's sudden dash had its effect upon them, for when he ran they set up a howl of triumph, and as we dashed after our guide they suddenly altered their tactics, ceased stone-throwing, and, led by the swordsmen, charged down upon us furiously.
"It's all over," groaned Smith, as we leaped over the low fence and faced round.
And so it seemed to be, for the next minute we were stopping and dodging the blows aimed at us.  It was all one wild confusion to me, in which I saw through a mist the gleaming eyes and savage faces of the mob.  Then, above their howlings, and just as I was staggering back from a heavy blow which I received from a great sword, which was swept round with two hands and caught me with a loud jar on the side, I heard a familiar cheer, and saw the man who had struck me go down backwards, driven over as it were by a broad-bladed spear.  As I struggled to my knees, I saw the savage mob in full flight, chased by a dozen blue-jackets, who halted and ran back to where we were, in obedience to a shrill whistle. Then--it was all more misty to me--two strong arms were passed under mine; I saw Smith treated in the same way; and, pursued by the crowd howling like demons, we were trotted at the double down the street to the wharf, which was after all close at hand, and swung down into the boat.
"Push off!" shouted a familiar voice, and the wharf and the crowd began to grow distant, but stones flew after us till the officer in command fired shot after shot from his revolver over the heads of the crowd, which then took to flight.
"What are we to do with the prisoner, sir--chuck him overboard?"
"Prisoner?" cried the officer in charge of the boat.
"Yes, sir, we got him, sword and all.  He's the chap as come aboard yesterday."
"Yes," I panted as I sat up, breathing painfully, "it's Ching.  He's our friend."
"Yes, flend, evelibody fiend," cried Ching.  "Wantee go shore.  Fancee shop."
"Go ashore?" said the officer.
"Yes, walkee shore."
"But if I set you ashore amongst that howling mob, they'll cut you to pieces."
"Ching 'flaid so.  Allee bad man.  Wantee kill young offlicer."
"And he fought for us, Mr Brown, like a brick," said Barkins.
"Then we must take him aboard for the present."
"Yes, go 'board, please," said Ching plaintively.  "Not my sword--b'long mandalin man."
"Let's see where you're wounded," said the officer, as the men rowed steadily back towards the _Teaser_.
"I--I don't think I'm wounded," I panted, "but it hurts me rather to breathe."
"Why, I saw one of the brutes cut you down with his big sword," cried Smith.
"Yes," I said, "I felt it, but, but--yes, of course: it hit me here."
"Oh, murder!" cried Smith.  "Look here, Tanner.  Your glass has got it and no mistake."
It had "got it" and no mistake, for the blow from the keen sword had struck it at a sharp angle, and cut three parts of the way through the thick metal tube, which had been driven with tremendous force against my ribs.
"Oh, Gnat!" cried Barkins, as he saw the mischief, "it's quite spoilt. What a jolly shame!"
"But it saved his life," said Smith, giving him a meaning nod.  "I wouldn't have given much for his chance, if he hadn't had that telescope under his arm.  I say, Mr Brown, why was the gun fired?"
"To bring you all on board.  Captain's got some information.  Look, we've weighed anchor, and we're off directly--somewhere."
"But what about Ching?"  I said to Barkins.
"Ching!  Well, he'll be safe on board and unsafe ashore.  I don't suppose we shall be away above a day.  I say, Ching, you'll have to stop."
"Me don't mind.  Velly hungly once more.  Wantee pipe and go sleepee. Velly tire.  Too much fightee."
We glided alongside of the gunboat the next minute, where Mr Reardon was waiting for us impatiently.
"Come, young gentlemen," he cried, "you've kept us waiting two hours. Up with you.  Good gracious, what a state you're in!  Nice addition to a well-dishiplined ship! and--here, what's the meaning of this?" he cried, as the boat rose to the davits.  "Who is this Chinese boy?"
"Velly glad get 'board," said the man, smiling at the important officer. "All along big fight.  Me Ching."
CHAPTER FOUR.
DOUBLE ALLOWANCE.
No time was lost in getting out of the mouth of the river, and as soon as the bustle and excitement of the start was over, we three were sent for to the cabin to relate our adventures to the captain, the first lieutenant being present to put in a word now and then.
"The brutes!" the captain kept on muttering from time to time, and Mr Reardon nodded and tightened his lips.
"Well, young gentlemen," he said, when Barkins, who as eldest had been spokesman, finished his recital, "I can do nothing.  If you had all three been brutally murdered, of course the Government could have made representations to the authorities, and your families would have secured compensation."
We glanced at one another.
"But as, unfortunately--I mean fortunately--you have neither of you got a scratch, I can do nothing."
"But they were so awfully savage with us, sir," said Smith.
"Yes, Mr Smith, so I suppose.  It is their nature; but we cannot punish an unknown mob.  We must try and administer the castigation vicariously."
"Please, sir, I don't understand you," said Smith.  "Do you mean--"
"Set a vicar to talk to them, Mr Smith?  No, I do not.  I mean, as we have very good information about three or four piratical junks being in the straits between here and Amoy, we must come down heavily upon them, and administer the punishment there."
Mr Reardon nodded, and rubbed his hands.
"This scrape of yours, though, will be a most severe lesson to me," continued the captain.  "It was very weak and easy of me to give you all leave for a run ashore.  I ought to have referred you to Mr Reardon. But you may take it for granted that I shall not err again in this way. You can return on deck."
"Oh, what a jolly shame!" grumbled Barkins.  "And there was old Reardon chuckling over it, and looking as pleased as Punch.  Who'd be a middy? It's like being in a floating prison."
But it was a very pleasant floating prison all the same, I could not help thinking, as we gradually got farther out from the land, over which the sun was sinking fast, and lighting up the mountain-tops with gold, while the valleys rapidly grew dark.  Every one on the clean white deck was full of eager excitement, and the look-out most thoroughly on the _qui vive_.  For the news that we were going up northward in search of some piratical junks sent a thrill through every breast.  It meant work, the showing that we were doing some good on the China station, and possibly prize-money, perhaps promotion for some on board, though of course not for us.
We had been upon the station several months, but it had not been our good fortune to capture any of the piratical scoundrels about whose doings the merchants--Chinese as well as European--were loud in complaint.  And with justice, for several cruel massacres of crews had taken place before the ships had been scuttled and burned; besides, quite a dozen had sailed from port never to be heard of more; while the only consolation Captain Thwaites had for his trips here and there, and pursuit of enemies who disappeared like Flying Dutchmen, was that the presence of our gunboat upon the coast no doubt acted as a preventative, for we were told that there used to be three times as many acts of piracy before we came.
And now, as we glided along full sail before a pleasant breeze, with the topgallant sails ruddy in the evening light, there seemed at last some prospect of real business, for it had leaked out that unless Captain Thwaites' information was very delusive, the Chinamen had quite a rendezvous on one of the most out-of-the-way islands off Formosa, from whence they issued, looking like ordinary trading-boats, and that it was due to this nest alone that so much mischief had been done.
A good meal down below, without dog or rat, as Barkins put it, had, in addition to a comfortable wash and change, made us forget a good deal of our weariness; and, as we were still off duty, we three loitered about the deck, picking up all the information we could regarding the way in which the news had been brought, in exchange for accounts of our own adventures, to insure credence in which Barkins carried about the nearly-divided telescope which had stood us in such good stead.
It was rapidly growing dark, when, close under the bulwarks, and in very near neighbourhood to one of our big bow guns, we came upon what looked in the gloom like a heap of clothes.
"What's that?"  I said.
"Chine-he, sir," said one of the sailors.  "We give him a good tuck-out below, and he come up then for a snooze.  Hi, John!  The gents want to speak to you."
There was a quick movement, and a partly bald head appeared from beneath two loose sleeves, which had been folded over it like the wings of a flying fox, and Ching's familiar squeaky voice said--
"You wantee me.  Go shore?"
"No, no; not to-night," cried Smith.  "We shall set you ashore when we come back."
"You go velly far--allee way Gleat Blitain?"
"No, not this time, Ching," cried Barkins, as we all laughed.
"No go allee way London?  Ching wantee go London, see Queen Victolia and Plince o' Wales."
"Some other time, Ching," I said.  "But I say, how about the fancy shop?"
"Allee light.  Ching go back."
"And how are you after our fight to-day?"
"Velly angly.  Allee muchee quite 'shame of mandalin men.  Big lascal, evely one."
"So they are," said Barkins.  "But I say, Ching, are you a good sailor?"
The Chinaman shook his head.
"Ching velly good man, keep fancee shop.  Ching not sailor."
"He means, can you go to sea without being sick?"  I said, laughing.
He gave us a comical look.
"Don'tee know.  Velly nicee now.  Big offlicer say jolly sailor take gleat care Ching, and give hammock go to sleep.  You got banjo, music-- git-tar?"
"One of the chaps has got one," said Smith.  "Why?"
"You fetchee for Ching.  I play, sing--`ti-ope-I-ow' for captain and jolly sailor.  Makee Ching velly happy, and no makee sea-sick like coolie in big boat."
"Not to-night, Ching," said Barkins decisively.  "Come along, lads.  I'm afraid," he continued, as we strolled right forward, "that some of us would soon be pretty sick of it if he did begin that precious howling. But I say, we ought to look after him well, poor old chap; it's precious rough on him to be taken out to sea like this."
"Yes," I said; "and he behaved like a trump to us to-day."
"That he did," assented Smith, as all three rested our arms on the rail, and looked at the twinkling distant lights of the shore.
"You give Ching flee dollar," said a voice close behind us, and we started round, to find that the object of our conversation had come up silently in his thick, softly-soled boots, in which his tight black trouser bottoms were tucked.
"Three dollars!" cried Smith; "what for?"
"Say all give Ching dollar show way."
"So we did," cried Barkins.  "I'd forgotten all about it."
"So had I."
"But you got us nearly killed," protested Smith.
"That was all in the bargain," cried Barkins.  "Well, I say he came out well, and I shall give him two dollars, though I am getting precious short."
"Flee dollar," said Ching firmly.  Then, shaking his head, he counted upon his fingers, "One, two, flee."
"It's all right, Ching," I said.  "Two dollars apiece.  Come on, Blacksmith."  I took out my two dollars.  "Come, Tanner."
"No, no," cried Ching; "tanner tickpence; two dollar tickpence won't do. Flee dollar."
"It's all right," I said, and I held out my hand for my messmates' contributions, afterward placing the six dollars in the Chinaman's hand.
His long-nailed fingers closed over the double amount, and he looked from one to the other as if he did not comprehend.  Then he unwillingly divided the sum.
"No light," he said.  "Flee dollar."
"The other for the fight," I said, feeling pleased to have met a Chinaman who was not dishonest and grasping.
"You wantee 'nother fight morrow?" he said, looking at me sharply. "Don't know.  Not aflaid."
"No, no; you don't understand," I cried, laughing.  "We give you six dollars instead of three."
Ching nodded, and the silver money disappeared up his sleeve.  Then his body writhed a little, and the arm and hand appeared again in the loose sleeve.
"Sailor boy 'teal Ching dollar?"
"Oh no," I said confidently.
"No pullee tail?"
"Ah, that I can't answer for," I said.  "Twist it up tightly."
"To be sure," said Barkins.  "It don't do to put temptation in the poor fellows' way.  I'm afraid," he continued, "that if I saw that hanging out of a hammock I should be obliged to have a tug."
Ching nodded, and stole away again into the darkness, for night had fallen now, and we were beginning to feel the waves dancing under us.
An hour later I was in my cot fast asleep, and dreaming of fierce-looking Chinamen in showy-patterned coats making cuts at me with big swords, which were too blunt to cut, but which gave me plenty of pain, and this continued more or less all night.  In the morning I knew the reason why, my left side was severely bruised, and for the next few days I could not move about without a reminder of the terrible cut the mandarin's retainer had made at me with his sword.
CHAPTER FIVE.
CHING HAS IDEAS.
Week had passed, during which we had cruised here and there, in the hope of falling in with the pirates.  Once in the right waters, it did not much signify which course we took, for we were as likely to come across them sailing north as south.  So our coal was saved, and we kept steadily along under canvas.
But fortune seemed to be still against us, and though we boarded junk after junk, there was not one of which the slightest suspicion could be entertained; and their masters, as soon as they realised what our mission was, were only too eager to afford us every information they could.
Unfortunately, they could give us none of any value.  They could only tell us about divers acts of horrible cruelty committed here and there within the past few months, but could not point out where the pirates were likely to be found.
Ching, in spite of some rough weather, had never been obliged to leave the deck, and had proved to be so valuable an acquisition, that he was informed that he would have a certain rate of pay as interpreter while he stayed on board; and as soon as he was made aware of this, he strutted up to me and told me the news.
"Captain makee interpleter and have lot dollar.  Muchee better keepee fancee shop."
This was after, at my suggestion to Mr Reardon, he had been sent out in one of the boats to board a big junk, and from that time it became a matter of course that when a boat was piped away, Ching's pigtail was seen flying out nearly horizontally in his eagerness to be first in the stern-sheets.
But it was always the same.  The boat came back with Ching looking disappointed, and his yellow forehead ploughed with parallel lines.
"Ching know," he said to me one evening mysteriously.
"Know what?"  I said.
"Plenty pilate boat hide away in island.  No come while big ship _Teasler_ here."
"Oh, wait a bit," I said; "we shall catch them yet."
"No, catchee," he said despondently.  "Pilate velly cunning.  See Queen Victolia ship say big gun go bang.  'Top away."
"But where do you think they hide?"
"Evelywhere," he said.  "Plentee liver, plenty cleek, plenty hide away."
"Then we shall never catch them?"  I said.
"Ching wantee catchee, wantee plenty money; but pilate won't come. Pilate 'flaid."
"And I suppose, as soon as we go away, they'll come out and attack the first merchantman that comes along the coast."
"Yes," said Ching coolly; "cut allee boy float, settee fire junk, burnee ship."
"Then what's to be done?"  I said.  "It's very disappointing."
"Ching go back fancee shop; no catchee pilate, no plize-money."
"Oh, but we shall drop upon them some day."
"No dlop upon pilate.  Ching not captain.  Ching catchee."
"How?"  I said.
"Take big ship back to liver.  Put big gun, put jolly sailor 'board two big junk, and go sail 'bout.  Pilate come thinkee catchee plenty silk, plenty tea.  Come aboard junk.  Jolly sailor chop head off, and no more pilate."
"That sounds well, Ching," I said; "but I don't think we could do that."
"No catchee pilate?" he said.  "Ching velly tire.  No good, velly hungry; wantee go back fancee shop."
I thought a good deal about what the Chinaman had said, for it was weary, dispiriting work this overhauling every vessel we saw that seemed likely to be our enemy.  It was dangerous work, too, for the narrow sea was foul with reefs; but our information had been that it was in the neighbourhood of the many islands off Formosa that the piratical junks had their nest, and the risk had to be run for the sake of the possible capture to be made.
"Ching says he wants to get back to the fancee shop," sad Smith one morning.  "So do I, for I'm sick of this dreary work.  Why, I'd rather have another of our days ashore."
"Not you," I said.  "But I say, look here, I haven't spoke about it before, but Ching says--hi, Tanner, come here!"
"That he doesn't," cried Smith.
"Hallo! what is it?" said Barkins, whom I had hailed, and he came over from the port side of the deck.
"I was going to tell Blacksmith what Ching says.  You may as well hear too."
"Don't want to.  I know."
"What! has he been saying to you--"
"No, not again."
"What did he say?"
"Ti-ope-I-ow!" cried Barkins, imitating the Chinaman's high falsetto, and then striking imaginary strings of a guitar-like instrument. "_Peng_--_peng-peng_."
"I say, don't fool," I cried angrily.
"Gnat!" said Barkins sharply, "you're a miserably-impudent little scrub of a skeeter, and presume upon your size to say insolent things to your elders."
"No, I don't," I said shortly.
"Yes, you do, sir.  You called me a fool just now."
"I didn't."
"If you contradict me, I'll punch your miserable little head, sir.  No, I won't, I'll make Blacksmith do it; his fists are a size smaller than mine."
"Be quiet, Tanner!" cried Smith; "he knows something.  Now, then, Gnat: what does Ching say?"
"That we shall never catch the pirates, because they won't come out when the gunboat is here."
"Well, there's something in that.  Tell Mr Reardon."
"Is it worth while?  He says we ought to arm a couple of junks, and wait for the pirates to come out and attack us."
"Ching's Christian name ought to be Solomon," said Smith.
"Thanky wisdom teeth," said Barkins sarcastically.  "I say, Gnat, he's quite right.  They'd be fools if they did come out to be sunk.  I daresay they're watching us all the time somewhere or other from one of the little fishing-boats we see put out."
"Well, young gentlemen," said a sharp voice behind us; "this is contrary to dishipline.  You can find something better to do than gossiping."
"Beg pardon, sir, we are not gossiping," said Barkins.  "We were discussing the point."
"Oh, indeed," said the first lieutenant sarcastically; "then have the goodness to--"
Barkins saw breakers ahead, and hastened to say--
"The Chinaman says, sir--"
"Don't tell me what the Chinaman says, sir!" cried the lieutenant fiercely.
"But it was about the pirates, sir."
"Eh?  What?" cried our superior officer, suddenly changing his tone. "Has he some idea?"
"Yes, sir.  No, sir."
"Mr Barkins!  What do you mean, sir?"
"He thinks we shall never catch them, sir," stammered my messmate, who could see punishment writ large in the lieutenant's face.
"Confound the Chinaman, sir!" roared the lieutenant.  "So do I; so does Captain Thwaites."
He spoke so loudly that this gentleman heard him from where he was slowly marching up and down, talking to the marine officer, and he turned and came towards us.
"In trouble, young gentlemen?" he said quietly.  "Pray what does Captain Thwaites?" he added, turning to the chief officer.
"I beg your pardon, sir.  I was a little exasperated.  These young gentlemen, upon my reproving them for idling, have hatched up a cock-and-bull story--at least Mr Barkins has."
"I beg pardon, sir; it was not a--not a--not a--"
"Cock-and-bull story, Mr Herrick," said the captain, smiling at my confusion, for I had rushed into the gap.  "Then pray what was it?"
I told him all that Ching had said, and the captain nodded his head again and again as I went on.
"Yes," he said at last, "I'm afraid he is right, Reardon.  It is worth thinking about.  What do you say to my sending you and Mr Brooke in a couple of junks?"
They walked off together, and we heard no more.
"Oh, how I should like to punch old Dishy's head!" said Barkins between his teeth.
"Don't take any notice," said Smith; "it's only because he can't get a chance to sink a pirate.  I don't believe there's one anywhere about the blessed coast."
"Sail ho!" cried the man at the mast-head, and all was excitement on the instant, for after all the strange sail might prove to be a pirate.
"Away on the weather bow, sir, under the land!" cried the man in answer to hails from the deck; and then, before glasses could be adjusted and brought to bear, he shouted--
"She's ashore, sir--a barque--fore--topmast gone, and--she's afire."
The _Teaser's_ course was altered directly, and, helped by a favouring breeze, we ran down rapidly towards the wreck, which proved to be sending up a thin column of smoke, and soon after this was visible from the deck.
CHAPTER SIX.
MY FIRST HORROR.
I was in a great state of excitement, and stood watching the vessel through my spyglass, longing for the distance to be got over and what promised to be a mystery examined.  For a wreck was possible and a fire at sea equally so, but a ship ashore and burning seemed to be such an anomaly that the officers all looked as if they felt that we were on the high road to something exciting at last.
In fact, we had been so long on the station for the purpose of checking piracy, but doing nothing save overhaul inoffensive junks, that we were all heartily sick of our task.  For it was not, as Smith said, as if we were always in some port where we could study the manners and customs of the Chinese, but for ever knocking about wild-goose chasing and never getting a goose.
"Plenty on board," cried Barkins.  "I say, Gnat, isn't he a humbug?  Ha, ha!  Study the manners and customs!  Stuffing himself with Chinese sweets and hankering after puppy-pie, like the bargees on the Thames."
"Oh, does he?" cried Smith.  "Who ate the fricassee of rats?"
"Oh, bother all that!"  I said.  "Here, Blacksmith, lend me your glass a minute; it's stronger than mine."
"Ho, ho!" laughed Barkins.  "His!  The wapping whacker!  Why, it's a miserable slopshop second-hand thing.  You should have had mine.  That was something like, before you spoiled it."
"Here you are," said Smith, lending me his glass.  "It's worth a dozen of his old blunderbuss."
I took the glass and had a good long inspection of the large barque, which lay heeled over on the outlying reef of one of the many islands, and could distinctly see the fine curl of smoke rising up from the deck somewhere about the forecastle.
"Make out any one on board, Mr Herrick?" said a sharp voice behind me, and I started round, to find that my companions had gone forward, and the first lieutenant was behind me with his spyglass under his arm and his face very eager and stern.
"No, sir; not a soul."
"Nor signals?"
"None."
"No more can I," my lad.  "Your eyes are younger and sharper than mine. Look again.  Do the bulwarks seem shattered?"
I took a long look.
"No, sir," I said.  "Everything seems quite right except the fore-topmast, which has snapped off, and is hanging in a tangle down to the deck."
"But the fire?"
"That only looks, sir, as if they'd got a stove in the forecastle, and had just lit the fire with plenty of smoky coal."
"Hah!  That's all I can make out.  We've come to something at last, Mr Herrick."
"Think so, sir?"  I said respectfully.
"Sure of it, my lad;" and he walked off to join the captain, while just then Ching came up softly and pointed forward.
"Big ship," he said.  "Pilate; all afire."
"Think so?"
Ching nodded.
"Hallo, Gnat, what does the first luff say?" asked Barkins, who joined us then.
"Thinks it's a vessel cast ashore by the pirates."
"Maybe.  I should say it's one got on the reef from bad seamanship."
"And want of a Tanner on board to set them right," said Smith.
"Skipper's coming," whispered Barkins; and we separated.
For the next hour all was eager watchfulness on board, as we approached very slowly, shortening sail, and with two men in the chains heaving the lead on account of the hidden reefs and shoals off some of the islands. But, as we approached, nothing more could be made out till the man aloft hailed the deck, and announced that he could read the name on the stern, _Dunstaffnage, Glasgow_.  Another hour passed, during which the island, a couple of miles beyond, was swept by glass after glass, and tree and hill examined, but there was no sign of signal on tree or hill.  All was bare, chilly, and repellent there, and we felt that the crew of the vessel could not have taken refuge ashore.
At last the crew of a boat was piped away, and, as I was gazing longingly at the men getting in under the command of Mr Brooke, a quiet, gentlemanly fellow, our junior lieutenant, Mr Reardon said, as he caught my eye--
"Yes; go."
I did not wait for a second order, you may be sure, but sprang in, and as the _Teaser_ was thrown up in the wind with her sails flapping, it being deemed unsafe to go any nearer to the barque, the little wheels chirrupped, and down we went, to sit the next moment lightly upon a good-sized wave which rose up as if to receive us; the falls were cast off, the oars dropped, and the next minute we glided away towards the stranded vessel.
"Quite a treat to get a bit of an adventure, eh Herrick?" said Mr Brooke.
"Yes, sir.  Been slow enough lately."
"Oh, you need not grumble, my lad.  You did have one good adventure.  By the way, how are your sore ribs?"
"My ribs, sir?  Oh, I had forgotten all about them.  But do you think this is the work of pirates, or that the ship has run ashore?"
"I'm not sure, my lad, but we shall soon know."
We sat watching the fine well-built barque, as the men pulled lustily at their oars, making the water flash and the distance grow shorter.  Then all at once my companion said shortly--
"Pirates."
"Where, where?"  I said eagerly, and my hand went to my dirk.
Mr Brooke laughed, and I saw all the men showing their teeth.
"No, no, my lad," he said.  "I meant this was the work of pirates."
"How do you know, sir?"
"Look at those ropes and sheets hanging loose.  They have been cut.  The barque has not been in a storm either.  She has just gone on to the rocks and the fore-topmast evidently snapped with the shock."
"And the smoke?  Is that from the forecastle?"
He shook his head, and stood up in the boat, after handing me the lines, while he remained scanning the vessel attentively.
"Hail her, Jones," he said to the bowman; and the man jumped up, put his hands to his mouth, and roared out, "_Ship ahoy_!"
This again and again, but all was silent; and a curious feeling of awe crept over me as I gazed at the barque lying there on the reef as if it were dead, while the column of smoke, which now looked much bigger, twisted and writhed as it rolled over and over up from just abaft the broken foremast.
"Steady," cried the lieutenant; "the water's getting shoal.  Keep a good look-out forward, Jones."
For all at once the water in front of us, from being smooth and oily, suddenly became agitated, and I saw that we had startled and were driving before us a shoal of good-sized fish, some of which, in their eagerness to escape, sprang out of the water and fell back with a splash.
"Plenty yet, sir," said the man in the bows, standing up now with the boat-hook.  "Good fathom under us."
"Right.  Steady, my lads."
We were only about a hundred yards from the barque now, and the water deepened again, showing that we had been crossing a reef; but the bottom was still visible, as I glanced once over the side, but only for a moment, for there was a peculiar saddening attraction about the silent ship, and I don't know how it was, but I felt as if I was going to see something dreadful.
Under the lieutenant's directions, I steered the boat so that we glided round to the other side, passing under the stern, and then ran alongside, with the bulwarks hanging over towards us, and made out that the vessel had evidently been in fairly deep water close by, and had been run on to the rocks where two reefs met and closed-in a deep channel.
How are we going to get on board?  I asked myself, as I looked upward; but I was soon made aware of that, for right forward there was a quantity of the top-hamper of the broken mast with a couple of the square sails awash, so that there was no difficulty about scrambling up.
"I don't think there is any one on board, Herrick," said Mr Brooke, "but sailors should always be on the _qui vive_.  Stay in the boat, if you like."
"I don't like, sir," I said, as soon as he had given orders to four men to follow us, and the next minute we were climbing up to stand upon the deck.
"No doubt about it," said Mr Brooke through his teeth.  "She has been plundered, and then left to drift ashore or to burn."
For there from the forehold curled up the pillar of smoke we had seen, and a dull crackling noise came up, telling that, though slowly, the fire was steadily burning.
We could not see much below for the smoke, and Mr Brooke led the way forward to the forecastle hatch, which lay open.
"Below!  Any one there?" cried my officer, but all was silent as the grave.
One of the men looked at him eagerly.
"Yes, jump down."
The man lowered himself down into the dark forecastle, and made a quick inspection.
"Any one there?"
"No, sir.  Place clear and the men's kits all gone."
"Come up."
We went aft, to find the hatches all off and thrown about anyhow, while the cargo had been completely cleared out, save one chest of tea which had been broken and the contents had scattered.
"No mistake about it, Herrick," said Mr Brooke; and he went on to the after-hatch, which was also open and the lading gone.
The next minute we were at the companion-way, and Mr Brooke hailed again, but all was still.  Just then the man peering over my shoulder sniffed sharply like some animal.
The sound sent a shudder through me, and Mr Brooke turned to the man sharply--
"Why did you do that?"
"Beg pardon, sir," stammered the man; "I thought that--as if--there was--"
He did not finish.
"Come on," said Mr Brooke sternly, while I shuddered again, and involuntarily my nostrils dilated as I inhaled the air, thinking the while of a butchered captain and officers lying about, but there was not the faintest odour, and I followed my officer, and then for a moment a horrible sickening sensation attacked me, and I shuddered.
But it all passed off, and, myself again directly, I was gazing with the others at the many signs which told us as plainly as if it had been written, that the crew of the unfortunate barque had barricaded themselves in here and made a desperate resistance, for her broken doors lay splintered and full of the marks made by axes and heavy swords.  The seats were broken; and bulkheads, cabin windows, and floor were horribly stained here and there with blood, now quite dry and black, but which, after it had been shed, had been smeared about and trampled over; and this in one place was horribly evident, for close up to the side, quite plain, there was the imprint of a bare foot--marked in blood--a great wide-toed foot, that could never have worn a shoe.
"Rather horrid for you, Herrick," said Mr Brooke in a low voice, as if the traces of death made him solemn; "but you must be a man now.  Look, my lad, what the devils--the savage devils--have done with our poor Scotch brothers!"
"Yes, I see," I whispered; "they must have killed them all."
"But I mean this--there, I mean."
I looked at him wonderingly as he pointed to the floor, for I did not understand.
The next moment, though, I grasped his meaning, and saw plainly enough what must have happened, for from where we stood to the open stern windows there were long parallel streaks, and I knew that, though they were partially trampled out by naked feet, as if they had been passed over dozens of times since, the savage wretches must have dragged their victims to the stern windows and thrust them out; any doubt thereon being cleared away by the state of the lockers and the sills of the lights.
Just then a peculiar hissing sound came to my ears, and I faced round quickly, as did Mr Brooke, for I felt startled.
For there behind me was one of our men--a fine handsome Yorkshire lad of three or four and twenty--standing glaring and showing his set teeth, and his eyes with the white slightly visible round the iris.  His left fist was firmly clenched, and in his right was his bare cutlass, with the blade quivering in his strong hand.
"Put up your cutlass, my lad," said Mr Brooke sternly; and the man started and thrust it back.  "Wait a bit--but I don't know how I am to ask you to give quarter to the fiends who did all this.  No wonder the place is so silent, Herrick," he added bitterly.  "Come away."
He led us out, but not before we had seen that the cabins had been completely stripped.
We did not stay much longer, but our time was long enough to show us that everything of value had been taken, and nothing left in the way of log or papers to tell how the barque had fallen in with the wretches. The crew had probably been surprised, and after a desperate resistance, when driven back into the cabin, fought to the last with the results we had seen.
"But surely they must have killed or wounded some of the pirates?"  I said.
"Possibly," replied Mr Brooke; "but there has been rain since; perhaps a heavy sea, too, has washed over the deck and swept away all traces here.  Let's hope they made some of them pay dearly for their work."
A short inspection below showed that the barque's planking was crushed in, and that she was hopelessly damaged, even if she could have been got off, so soon after Mr Brooke gave the word to return to the boat.
"I shall not touch the fire," he said.  "If the captain has any wishes the boat can return.  For my part I should say, let her burn."
The captain listened with his brow contracted to Mr Brooke's recital, when we were back on board; I being close at hand, ready to answer a few questions as well.
"Yes, let her burn," said the captain; and then he turned his back to us, but seemed to recollect himself directly, for he turned again.
"Thank you, Mr Brooke," he said.  "Very clear and concise.  You could not have done better."
Then turning to the first lieutenant, he said in a low voice--
"Reardon, I'm at my wit's end.  The wretches are too cunning for us. What are we to do?"
CHAPTER SEVEN.
BEING PRIMED.
There was a consultation in the cabin that evening, as we lay there about four miles from the stranded barque.  It had fallen calm, and, as there was no urgency, the captain preferred to spare the coals, and we waited for a breeze.
I heard afterwards from Mr Brooke all that took place during the discussion, during which the captain heard the principal officers' opinions, and then decided what he would do.
There had been doubts before as to whether we were on the right track for the pirates, who might be carrying on their murderous business elsewhere, but the day's discovery had cleared away the last doubt; it was plain that the information which had sent us up in the neighbourhood of Amoy was perfectly correct, that the wretches were there, and that our presence had kept them quiet till now.
The great difficulty, it was decided, lay in the manner of dealing with people who without doubt had plenty of spies out in native craft, who were passed unnoticed by us, and thus every movement was carefully conveyed to the enemy.  As, then, the appearance of the gunboat was sufficient to keep them in hiding, and also as the moment we were out of sight the pirates issued from their lair, only two ways of dealing with the fiends remained to us, and these means, after due consultation, were to be adopted--one or both.
Then it had been arranged that the next morning at daybreak a couple of boats were to be despatched to the Scotch barque, for a more thorough investigation as to whether, in Mr Brooke's rather hurried visit, he had passed over any cargo worthy of salvage, and to collect material for a full report for the authorities and the owners.
This had just been decided upon, when there was a shout from one of the look-out men.  It was quite unnecessary, for nearly every one on deck saw the cause of the cry.
We three companions had been watching the wreck with its spiral of smoke, which in the calm air rose up like the trunk of a tall tree, and then all at once spread out nearly flat to right and left, giving it quite the appearance of a gigantic cedar.  Then, as one of the witnesses of the horrors on board, I had had to repeat my story again; and, while matters were being discussed below, we in a low tone had our debate on the question, and saw too how the men gathered in knots, and talked in whispers and watched the barque.  And to us all one thing was evident, that could our lads only get a chance at the pigtailed, ruffianly scum of the east coast, it would go pretty hard with them.
"I'll bet many of 'em wouldn't go pirating again in a hurry," Barkins said; and we agreed.
Then we fell to wondering how many poor creatures had been murdered by them in their bloodthirsty career, and why it was that there should be such indifference to death, and so horrible a love of cruelty and torture, in the Chinese character.  All at once came the shout, and we were gazing at the cause.
For a bright, clear burst of flame suddenly rose from the direction of the ship--not an explosion, but a fierce blaze--and it was evident that the parts around the little fire had grown more and more heated and dry, and that the smouldering had gone on till some part of the cargo beneath, of an inflammable nature, had caught at last, and was burning furiously.
We expected that orders would be given for boats to be lowered, but we had drifted in the current so far away that there was a risky row amongst shoals, so no orders were given, the men gathering on deck to watch the light glow which lit up the cloud of smoke hovering overhead.
We three watched it in silence for some time, with the other officers near, and at last Smith said--
"I don't think I'm a cruel sort of fellow, but I feel as if I should like to kill some one now."
He did not say a Chinese pirate, but he meant it; and I must confess to feeling something of the kind, for I thought how satisfactory it would be to aim one of our big guns at a pirate junk taken in some cruel act, and to send a shot between wind and water that would sink her and rid the seas of some of the fiends.
I quite started the next moment, for Barkins said, in a low, thoughtful voice--
"How do you feel about it, Gnat?  Shouldn't you like to kill some of 'em?"
The question was so direct, and appealed to my feelings so strongly, that for some moments I was silent.
"Not he," said Smith; "old Gnat wouldn't stick a pin in a cockroach."
"Of course I wouldn't," I said stoutly, "but I'd crush it under my foot if I found one in the cabin."
"One for you, Blacksmith," said Barkins.  "Look here, Gnat, you would like to kill some of the piratical beggars, wouldn't you?"
I remained silent again.
"There," said Smith, "I told you so.  If we caught a lot, Gnat would give them a lecture, and tell them they had been very naughty, and that they mustn't do so any more or he would be very angry with them indeed."
"Punch his head, Gnat."
I made no reply to their flippant remarks, for just then I felt very solemn and thoughtful.  I hope I was not priggish.  No, I am sure I was not; every word I uttered was too sincere, though they chaffed me afterwards, and I have thought since that they felt more seriously than they spoke.
"You chaps didn't go on board that barque," I said quietly; "I did."
"Yes; old Dishy's making a regular favourite of you, Gnat," said Barkins.
But I went on without heeding, my eyes fixed on the burning vessel whose flames shone brightly in the clear air.
"And when I saw the splintered wood and chopped doorway, and the smears and marks of blood, it all seemed to come to me just as it must have been when the poor fellows shut themselves up in the cabin."
"Did they?" said Smith eagerly.
"Yes, that was plain enough," I said; "and they must have fought it out there till the pirates got the upper hand."
"I bet tuppence the beggars pitched stinkpots down through the cabin skylight, and half-smothered them," said Barkins excitedly.
"I daresay they did," I replied thoughtfully, "for I did see one of the lockers all scorched and burned just by the deck.  Yes, it all seemed to come to me, and I felt as if I could see all the fighting, with the Chinamen hacking and chopping at them with their long swords, the same as those brutes did at us; and all those poor fellows, who were quietly going about their business, homeward bound with their cargo, must have had friends, wives or mothers or children; and it gets horrible when you think of how they must have been in despair, knowing that those wretches would have no mercy on them."
"Yes, but how it must have made 'em fight," cried Smith.  "I think I could have done something at a time like that."
"Yes, it would make any fellow fight; even you, Gnat."
"I suppose so," I said, "for it made me feel as if there wasn't any room in the world for such people."
"There ain't," said Barkins.  "Oh, if our chaps could only get a good go at 'em!"
"And then I felt," I went on, "as if it couldn't all be real, and that it was impossible that there could be such wretches on the face of the earth, ready to kill people for the sake of a bit of plunder."
"But it's just precious possible enough," said Smith slowly.  "Why, out here in China they do anything."
"Right," said Barkins; "and I hope the skipper will pay them in their own coin.  My! how she burns."
"Yes," assented Smith, as the barque, after smouldering so long, now blazed, as if eager to clear away all traces of the horrible tragedy.
"You'll recollect all about that cabin, Gnat, if we do get at the beggars--won't you?"
"Recollect?"  I said, with a shiver; "I shall never be able to forget it."
Then we relapsed into silence, and stood resting our arms over the bulwarks, gazing at the distant fire, in which I could picture plainly all the horrors and suggestions of the wrecked cabin.  I even seemed to see the yellow-faced wretches, all smeared with blood, dragging their victims to the stern windows.  And my imagination then ran riot for a time, as I fancied I saw them seizing men not half-dead, but making a feeble struggle for their lives, and begging in agonising tones for mercy, but only to be struck again, and pitched out into the sea.
I fancy that I must have been growing half hysterical as the scene grew and grew before me, till I had pictured one poor wretch clinging in his despair to the edge of the stern window, and shrieking for help.  There was a curious sensation as if a ball was rising in my throat to choke me, and I was forgetting where I stood, when I was brought back to myself by the voice of my messmate Smith, who said in a husky whisper--
"Think we shall come across any of the poor fellows floating about?"
"Not likely," replied Barkins.  "Too many sharks in these seas."
My throat felt dry at this horrible suggestion, but I knew how true it was.  And then once more there was silence, and, like the rest--officers and men--we stood there watching the burning wreck hour after hour, not a soul on board feeling the slightest disposition to go below.
It must have been quite a couple of hours later, when I started in the darkness, for something touched my arm, and, looking sharply to my right, I could just make out the figure of Ching close to me, while on looking in the other direction I found that I was alone, for Barkins and Smith had gone forward to a group close to the bows.
"You, Ching?"  I said, "looking at the mischief your friends have done?"
"Fliends burnee ship?  No fliends.  Velly bad men.  Ching feel allee shame.  Velly bad men evelywhere.  Killee, get dollar.  No velly bad men, London?"
"I'm afraid there are," I said sadly.
"Yes; velly bad men, London.  Killee get dollar.  You choppee off bad men head?"
"No," I said; "but they kill them if they commit murder."
"Commit murder?  You mean killee get dollar?"
"Yes."
"Allee light.  Plenty bad men evelywhere.  Captain going kill pilate?"
"If we can catch them," I said.
"Yes, velly hard catchee catchee.  Captain never catchee in ship. Pilate allee lun away.  'Flaid of big gun.  Get two big junk, put plenty sailor boy where pilate can't see.  Then pilate come along kill and burnee.  Junk steal all along.  Jolly sailor jump up and cut allee pilate head off."
"Send that boy forward!" cried a stern voice, which made me jump again. "Who's that?"
"Herrick, sir," I said, touching my cap, for the captain came forward out of the darkness.
"Then you ought to know better, sir.  The scoundrel has no business in this part of the ship.  What does he want?"
"I beg pardon, sir; he came up to propose a way of trapping the pirates."
"Eh, what?" said the captain eagerly.  "Bah! absurd.  Send him below; I hate to see the very face of a Chinaman.  No; stop!  He ought to know something of their tricks.  What does he say?"
I told him, and he stood there as if thinking.
"Well, I don't know, Mr Herrick.  We might perhaps lure them out of their hiding-places in that way, with a couple of Chinese crews to work the junks.  But no; the wretches would be equally strong, and would fight like rats.  Too many of my poor lads would be cut down.  They would have us at a terrible disadvantage.  We must keep to the ship.  I can only fight these wretches with guns."
He was turning away, when a thought struck me, and, forgetting my awe of the captain, and the fact that a proposal from a midshipman to such a magnate might be resented as an unheard-of piece of impertinence, I exclaimed excitedly--
"I beg pardon, sir."
"Yes?"
"I think I know how it could be done."
"Eh?  You, Mr Herrick!  Pooh!  Stop," he said sharply, as, feeling completely abashed, I was shrinking away, when he laid his hand kindly on my shoulder.  "Let's hear what you mean, my boy.  The mouse did help the lion in the fable, didn't he?"
"Yes, sir."
"Not that I consider myself a lion, Mr Herrick," he said good-humouredly, "and I will not insult you by calling you a mouse; but these Chinese fiends are too much for me, and I really am caught in the net.  Here, send that man forward, and come into my cabin."
"Ching, go right up to the forecastle," I said.
"No wantee go s'eep," he said angrily.  "Makee Ching bad see ship burned."
"Never mind now; go and wait," I whispered; and he nodded and went off, while I walked hurriedly back to the captain, who led the way to his cabin.
Before I had gone many steps I had to pass Smith, who came quickly up to me.
"Hallo! old chap," he whispered, "what have you been up to now?  Wigging from the skipper?  I'll go and tell the Tanner, and we'll get clean handkerchiefs for a good cry."
CHAPTER EIGHT.
MY PLAN.
"Shut the door, Mr Herrick," said the captain, as he threw himself into a chair, and I obeyed and remained standing there.
"Come close up to the table, my lad, and I'll hear what you have to say, for I should be sorry to discourage a young officer who was in earnest about his profession, as I have noted that you seem to be."
"Thank you, sir," I faltered, as I walked forward to where the swinging lamp cast its full light on my face, making my eyes ache, after being so many hours in the darkness, while I noticed that the captain sat in the shade.
"Now, Mr Herrick," he said, "I talked of one fable, let me say a word about another.  I hope this is not going to be a case of the mountain in labour, and out crept a mouse."
This put me quite out of heart, my hands grew damp, and I felt a tickling sensation of dew forming upon my temples and at the sides of my nose.  My throat felt dry, and my lips parted, but no words came.
"There, there," he said kindly, "don't be afraid.  Speak out."
"Yes, sir," I said hastily.  "It was only this.  I think I read somewhere once, in a paper, about a Malay prahu being taken by the captain of a ship pretending to be helpless, and this made the prahu, which could sail twice as fast as his ship, come close up to attack him."
"Yes; and what then?"
"The captain sunk the prahu, sir."
"Humph!" said Captain Thwaites, frowning and leaning back in his chair. "That's what I should like to do to the piratical junks, Mr Herrick. But--"
He stopped, and I saw that he was watching me keenly.  But he had not ordered me out of the cabin, nor called me an impertinent puppy, so I felt better.  The plunge had been made, and I waited not quite so nervously for his next words.
"Yes--what I should like to do, Mr Herrick; but I am dealing with cunning Chinese, and not with bold Malays."
"No, sir," I said; "but could not we--you--I mean we--I mean--" I stammered.
"Come, come, Mr Herrick, there is no need for all this tremor.  Sit down, my lad."
"Thank you, sir; I would rather stand, please.  I think I could talk better."
"Very well, then," he said, smiling; "stand.  You have some notion in your head, then?"
"Yes, sir," I said eagerly, for the nervousness all passed away in the excitement I felt.  "I thought that if I could do as I liked, I'd take the _Teaser_ up some creek where she couldn't be watched, and then I'd close all the ports, send the men over the side to paint out the streak, and I'd paint the funnel another colour, and get yards all anyhow, and hide all the guns.  I'd make her look like one of the tea-screws, and get a lot of Chinamen on board for sailors."
I saw that he kept on bowing his head, and I was so excited that I went on.
"No, I know.  If you tried to get some Chinese sailors on board, it would be talked about, and perhaps the pirates would get to know, for they must have friends in some of the ports."
"Then down go some of your baits, my lad."
"No, sir.  I know.  You could make Ching--"
"That Chinese interpreter?"
"Yes, sir.  Make him do up some of our lads with pigtails made of blackened oakum, and in duck-frocks they'd do at a distance."
"Heads not shaven?"
"No, sir; but they could have their hair cut very short, and then painted white--I mean yellow, so that the pirates wouldn't know at a distance."
"Humph! anything else?" said the captain drily, but I did not notice it; I was too much taken up by my ideas.
"Yes, sir.  Ching could be going about very busily in all directions, showing himself a great deal, and there's no mistake about him."
"No," said the captain, "there is no mistake about him."
"And it wouldn't be a bad plan to be at anchor near the place where you thought they were, sir, with some of the spars down as if you were repairing damages.  That would make them feel sure that they were safe of a prize, and they'd come off in their boats to attack."
"And then you would let them board us and find out their mistake?"
"That I wouldn't, sir!"  I cried eagerly; and, oddly enough, my side began to ache where I had had that blow.  "I wouldn't risk any of our poor fellows being hurt.  I'd sink them before they got alongside."
"Humph!  Well, you're pretty bloodthirsty for your time of life, young gentleman," said the captain quietly.
"No, sir," I replied in confusion; "but I was with Mr Barkins and Mr Smith, and nearly killed by these people, and yesterday I saw what they had done aboard that barque."
"There?  So you did, my lad.  Well," he said, "what more have you got to suggest?"
"I think that's all, sir," I said, beginning to grow confused again, for my enthusiasm was dying out before his cool, matter-of-fact way of taking matters.
"Then we will bring this meeting to an end, Mr Herrick."
"Yes, sir," I said dolefully, for I was wishing intensely that I had not said a word.  "Shall I go now?"
"If you please, Mr Herrick."
"Good-night, sir."
"Good-night, Mr Herrick; and the sooner you are in your berth the better."
"Yes, sir," I said; and then to myself, as I reached the door, "and I wish I had gone there at once, instead of stopping on deck."
"Stop!"
I turned with the door-handle in my fingers.
"You had better not say anything about the communication you have made to me--I mean to your messmates."
"No, sir, I will not," I replied.
"Nor to any one else, least of all to that Chinaman."
"Oh no, sir, I'll be careful."
He nodded, and I slipped out, feeling, to use an old expression, "horrid."
"Tell anybody about what a stupid donkey I've been," I said angrily--"likely."  Then to myself, as soon as I was past the marine sentry, "Why, it would be nuts for Tanner and Blacksmith, and they'd go on cracking them for ever.  There was I all red-hot with what I thought was a good thing, and he was just like a cold codfish laughing at me."
I could not help smiling at the absurdity of my idea, for I recalled that I had never seen a cold codfish laughing.
I had no more time for musing then, for I received a sharp slap on the back from Barkins.
"Never mind, Gnat; we all get it some time."
I saw that Smith was hurrying up, for I caught sight of him by the light of one of the swinging lanterns, and had to be on my guard.
I did not want to deceive my messmates nor to be untruthful, but I could not open my heart to them and tell them all that had passed.
"What cheer, messmet?" whispered Smith.  "Had a wigging?"
I nodded my head sulkily.
"What had you been up to?  Skipper had you into the cabin, didn't he?"
"Let him alone, will you," cried Barkins.  "What do you want to worry the poor chap for?  The skipper's had him over the coals."
"Well, I know that, Bark.  But what for?"
"What's that to you?  Let him alone."
"But he might tell."
"Well, he isn't going to tell.  If you must know, the Grand Panjandrum came and catched him talking to Squeezums, hanging over the bulwarks together."
"Talking to who?"
"Well then, to Teapot, old Chinese Ching, and snubbed him for having the Yellow-skin so far aft.  Didn't he, Gnat?"
"Yes," I said, quite truthfully.
"Then I say it's too bad," cried Smith.  "As the snob speakers say, are we--er--serlaves?  Besides, `a man's a man for a' that,' ain't he, Tanner?"
"Chinamen have no business abaft the funnel," said Barkins.  "Did he give it to you very warmly, Gnat?"
"Pretty well," I said, glad to escape Smith's examination.  "I wasn't sorry to get out of the cabin."
"No, I should think not.  Why, what's come to the old boy--taking to bully us himself?  I thought he always meant to leave that to Dishy."
"He's getting wild at not catching the pirates, I suppose," said Barkins.  "Then all that badger gets bottled up in him, and he lets it off at us.  Well, I don't see any fun in watching the fire; I'm going down for a snooze."
"Wish I could," said Smith.  "The fellow who invented night-watches ought to have been smothered.  I daresay he was a man who had something the matter with him and couldn't sleep.  I hate it."
"Pooh!" cried Barkins, laughing.  "You haven't got used to it yet, old chap.  It's an acquired taste.  After a bit you won't care a dump for a regular night's rest, but'll want to get up and take your turn.  Won't he, Gnat?"
I laughed.
"I haven't got the right taste yet," I said.
"And never will," grumbled Smith, as we turned to have another look at the burning barque.
"How long will a ship like that be burning, Jecks?"  I said to one of the watch.
The man scratched his head, and had a good stare at the glowing object in the distance, as if he were making a careful calculation.
"Well," said Barkins, "out with it, Tom Jecks; we don't want to know to two minutes and a half."
"Well, sir," said the man very deliberately, "I should say as a wessel o' that size--"
"There goes her mainmast!" some one shouted, as a portion of the fire fell off to our left, and lay in the sea.
We stood gazing at this part for a few minutes, during which the light faded slowly out, quenched in the waves.
Then Jecks began again, speaking very oracularly--
"I should say as a wessel o' that size--"
"Yes," said Barkins, imitating him; "a wessel o' that size--"
"Yes, sir--might go on burning till 'bout eight bells."
"Or perhaps a little longer, Tom?"
"Well, yes, sir; little longer, perhaps.  'Morrow night, say."
"Or 'morrow morning, Tom?"
"Well, no, sir; because you see it's 'morrow morning now."
"I meant t'other 'morrow morning, Tom.  Nex' day."
"Well, yes, sir; she might last till then."
"Or even next day?"
"Well, sir, I hayve knowed 'em go on mouldering and smouldering for days and days."
"A week, perhaps?"
"Oh yes, sir, quite a week."
"Thankye, Tom," said Barkins, giving me a nudge with his elbow.  "I thought you'd know.  Nothing like going to a man who has had plenty of experience."
"No, sir, there ain't nothin' like it; and I should say as if you young gen'lemen was to stand here and watch, you'd finally see that there wessel give a bit of a roll to starboard and one to port, and then settle down and go out of sight all to oncet, like putting a stingwisher on a candle; and there! what did I tell yer?"
For all at once the blaze rose quite high, as if it were driven upwards by some explosion below.  We saw what looked like tiny sparks falling all around, and some of them floating upon the sea, and then there was the sound as of a puff of wind--heavy and short; and, where the barque had lain blazing and sending up its great waving tongue of fire, there was now darkness, save here and there a few dull specks of light, which went out one by one.
"The last act of a tragedy," said a voice close by us; and Mr Brooke, who had the watch, stood gazing at the dark waters for a few moments. Then in his quiet, decided tones--
"Now, Mr Barkins--Mr Herrick, it is not your watch.  You had better go below."
"Yes, sir; good-night, sir."
"Good-morning, you mean," he replied; and we two went down and turned in.
"I say, Gnat," cried Barkins in a sleepy voice; "old Tom Jecks'll be more chuckle-bumptious than ever."
"Yes," I said; "that happened just right for him."
"Yes, that's the luck that kind of bumble-head always gets.  He'll set up--now--for--_snore_--set up for--oh, how sleepy I am!  What say?"
"I didn't speak," I replied drowsily.
"Who said you did?  Oh, I remember now.  Tom Jecks'll set up for boss-- know--all now.  Look here--you help me, and we'll gammon him into--be-- believing--he ought to make an alma--alma--nick--nack,"--_snore_.
Barkins was fast asleep, and I was just thinking how suddenly a drowsy person dropped off, when all at once I seemed to be back in the cabin of the burned ship, where I was searching the lockers for pirates, and then some one hauled me out of my berth by one leg, and I raised myself on my elbow to stare wildly at Smith.
CHAPTER NINE.
PREPARATIONS.
"At last!" he cried.  "I began to think your eyelids were sewed up. Dress yourself, sir; do you hear?  Do you suppose that the junior officers of the _Teaser_ are kept here on purpose to set a bad example to the men?"
"Breakfast ready?"  I said, yawning.
"Of course it is, sir.  Kidneys and fried soles done to a shade.  Fresh water-cresses, hot rolls, and all kinds of don't-you-wish-you-may-get-'ems, waiting.  I say, look at old Tanner. Let's rouse him up."
I rose slowly, and, with the customary malignity of one rudely wakened from sleep, began to feel a grim satisfaction in seeing my messmate robbed of his repose in turn.
"Cold pig?" suggested Smith.
"No, no; don't," I said.  "It makes the place so wet."
"All right.  Come here, then."
I was about to join him, when the peculiar vibration going on made me turn sharply to Smith.
"Hallo!"  I said.
"What's the matter?"
"Under steam again?"
"Yes.  Orders came soon after daylight, and we're going south with our tail between our legs.  Skipper seems to think it's of no use trying any longer; and you mark my words, as soon as we're gone those beggars will come out of their creeks and begin murdering and burning every trading vessel they can catch."
"I am sorry," I said, as I recalled my interview with the captain.
"Sorry!  I should think you are.  So are we all.  It's a shame, that's what it is, Gnat."
"It seems to be a pity, because we might run against them some time."
"Run against them!  Why, of course.  The scent's hot now.  Oh, I only wish I was captain of this ship!"
"Wish you were, Smithy," said Barkins, yawning.
"Oh, you're awake at last, are you?"
"Of course I am.  Who's to sleep with you yelping about like that.  I say, if you were skipper, we'd share the cabin with you, and have a jolly time of it--eh?"
"Oh, would you?" cried Smith.  "We'd see about that.  I tell you what, though, if I was skipper, this gunboat shouldn't leave the station while there was a pirate on the east coast."
"Well, there won't be when we've done.  I say--oh dear me!--how is it the legs of your trousers will get tangled when you want to put 'em on in a hurry."
"'Cause you put 'em on with your eyes tangled up.  Hear that?"
"What, you gabbling?"
"No; the screw at work."
"Eh?  Yes.  What does it mean?"
"We're going back."
"No!"
"We are--full speed."
"Without yard-arming the beggars who took that ship."
"Yes; ain't it a shame?"
Barkins made no answer, but kept on dressing--snatching on his clothes, so to speak; and when we went on deck that bright, fine morning, there was a lowering look upon every face; and the officers were all snappish, the men discontented, and scowling at the two figures marching up and down the quarter-deck side by side.
I felt disappointed, for we had been looking forward to the exciting moments when we should first overhaul some piratical junk.  Of course I knew that there might be some danger, but I foresaw very little: our well-armed ship, with its strong, highly-disciplined crew, would over-ride every opposition offered by the half-savage Chinamen, I felt sure; and, like most people in the service, I felt that, if any one was hurt, it would be some one else.  And now there was to be no further search for the pirates.  We were going south again, probably to Hong-Kong; and I was sick of hot Hong-Kong, and doing nothing but drill.
I partook, then, of the general feeling of dissatisfaction that morning; and, feeling quite glum and vexed with myself, I leaned over the taffrail and gazed down at the bright, clear water in search of fish.
"I wish I hadn't spoken as I did last night," I said to myself later on; and I was going over the whole scene in the cabin, and thinking of what a noodle I must have looked, when I heard my name uttered in the captain's short, sharp voice.
I turned and saluted, to find that Mr Reardon had gone forward.
"I only want to repeat my caution to you, Mr Herrick," said the captain.  "You will not say a word to any one about your visit to me last night."
"No, sir," I said.
"You have not spoken to your messmates?"
"No, sir; not a word."
"But they asked you why I summoned you to my cabin?"
"Yes, sir; but they think it was to snub--reprove me, sir, for making so much of the Chinaman."
"Oh, I see.  But snub would have done, Mr Herrick.  Reprove sounds pedantic.  That will do, but bear in mind my wishes."
"Oh, there you are, Mr Herrick," said the first lieutenant, a few minutes later.  "I want you.  Find that Chinaman and the ship's tailor, and bring them both to my cabin."
"Yes, sir," I said, wondering; and I hunted them out, told them to follow me, and led the way to Mr Reardon's cabin.
"Shut the door," he said sharply.
I obeyed, and the lieutenant consulted a scrap of paper upon which he had pencilled a few memoranda.
"Now, tailor," he said, "you will have an order for a sufficiency of white duck."
"Yes, sir."
"And by this time to-morrow I want twenty loose frocks cut and made after the fashion of this man's blue cotton blouse thing."
"Couldn't be done, sir, in the time," said the tailor respectfully.
"They must be done, my man.  I don't care how roughly they are made, nor how badly sewn, but they must be cut to this pattern.  Get as many men as you require to sew, and begin work at once.  I'll send this boy to you soon, for you to get the pattern of his garment."
The tailor saluted, and went off wondering; while I wondered no less, as I stood waiting with Ching for what was to come; but for some moments Mr Reardon sat there studying his notes.
All at once he looked up sharply.
"Now, Ching," he said, "can you understand all I say?"
The Chinaman nodded.
"Then look here: I have ordered twenty duck-frocks, as you heard."
"Yes, sir.  Velly like Chinaman."
"Exactly.  Well, these are for twenty of our men to wear.  I want them to look like Chinese."
Ching shook his head.
"Blue flock," he said; "all blue, no white."
"We have no blue, and the white must do."
"Velly well."
"That point is settled, then.  Now, then, about their heads."
"Cut hair all off, and glow pigtail."
"That would take years, my man, and I wanted them ready to-morrow."
"How glow pigtail one day?" cried Ching scornfully; and pulling round his own, he held it out, fully four feet in length--a long black plait, with a bit of ribbon tying it at the end.
"Thi'ty yea' long," said Ching.  "No one day."
"You must get some oakum, and dye it black.  Plait it up, and fasten that on the men's heads."
"With bit o' stling," said Ching, nodding his head.  "Go act play--make fleatre 'board ship?"
"Yes, we are going to act a play," said the lieutenant sternly; and I felt the blood come into my face with excitement.
"Shave men's head--shave face; makee look allee same Chinaman."
"Oh, we can manage that," said Mr Reardon, giving me a meaning look. "You can pick out men and boys enough, Mr Herrick, to make twenty smooth-faced ones."
"Yes, sir, I think so," I said.
"Then something must be mixed up, whiting and tallow ought to do it."
"Yes, Ching see; makee head velly white."
"That will do, then."
"No," said Ching sharply.  "No tlouser, no boot?"
"That will not matter, my man, so long as they are right in their upper rigging."
"Light in upper ligging!" said Ching.  "Ah, you go cheat, gammon pilate?"
Mr Reardon gave him an angry look.
"You go and do--no, stop.  You are quite right, my man, but don't talk about it.  Get the work done."
"Ching see.  Make nineteen twenty men look like Chinese boy.  Pilate come along, say, `Big tea-ship.  Come aboard,' and get catchee likee lat in tlap."
"Yes, that's it, my man.  Do you think it a good plan, Mr Herrick?" he added drily.
"Oh yes, sir," I cried excitedly.  "May we begin at once?"
"Ye-es," said the lieutenant thoughtfully.  "I think that's all you can do.  Yes," he said decidedly; "take the job in hand, Mr Herrick, and help it along.  I want to have twenty men looking like a Chinese crew by to-morrow."
"Come along, Ching."
"Yes," he said.  "Do it velly well.  Chinese pilate velly cunning fellow.  You go gettee two junk, put men on board."
"You go and get the men ready," said Mr Reardon shortly.  "That will do."
Directly after I had Ching supplied from the purser's stores with plenty of fine oakum and a couple of bottles of ink.  This latter he made boiling hot and poured over the oakum, hanging it to dry by the cook's fire; and while he was doing this I arranged with the cook to have a bucket of tallow and whiting mixed ready for use when required, so that then all necessary would be to warm it up.
I was just going aft again when "Herrick" was shouted, and I turned, to see Barkins and Smith coming after me.  But Mr Reardon heard the hail, and came striding after us.
"You leave Mr Herrick to the business he is on, young gentlemen, and attend to your own," he cried.  "Go on, Mr Herrick.  This is no time for gossiping."
I hurried off, and began my next task, that of selecting twenty men without beards; and there was no difficulty, for I soon picked sixteen and four big lads, upon whose heads the ship's barber was set to work to cut the hair pretty short, the men submitting with an excellent grace, Jack being ready enough to engage in anything fresh, and such as would relieve the monotony of shipboard life.
They were ready enough to ask questions, but I had nothing to tell; and the preparations went merrily on, but not without my having learned that we were steaming right away out of sight of land.
But long before we had reached this pitch, I found that orders had been given, and the men were busy up aloft, lowering down the main-topgallant mast, and then laying the maintop mast all askew, as if it were snapped off at the top.  After which the yards were altered from their perfect symmetry to hang anyhow, as if the ship were commanded by a careless captain.  The engine was set to work to squirt water thickened with cutch, and the beautiful white sails were stained in patches, and then roughly furled.
Towards evening, when the sea appeared to be without a sail in sight, we lay-to; platforms were got over the side, and men hung over with their paint-pots and brushes, working with all their might to paint out the streak, while others smeared over the gilding and name at the stern, but with a thin water-colour which would easily wash off.
Then came the turn of the great funnel, which was painted of a dirty black.  The bright brass rails were dulled, ropes hung loosely, and in every way possible the trim gunboat was disfigured and altered, so that at a short distance even it would have been impossible to recognise her as the smart vessel that had started from the neighbourhood of the burned ship so short a time before.
But even then Mr Reardon did not seem to be satisfied, for he set the men to work hauling water casks from the hold, and make a pile of them amidships.  Lastly, a couple of the boats were turned bottom upward on improvised chocks placed over the deck-house and galley.
I have not mentioned the guns, though.  These were completely hidden, the lesser pieces being drawn back, and spare sails thrown over the two big guns forward.
"There," said Mr Reardon quietly to me; "what do you say to that, Mr Herrick?  Think this will deceive them?"
"There's one more thing I should do, sir," I said, as I looked aloft.
"One more?  Nonsense; there is nothing more to be done."
"Yes, sir," I said, smiling; "I'd have some shirts and trousers hung up in the rigging to dry, just as if the men had been having a wash."
"To be sure," he cried.  "What else?"
"It wouldn't be bad if we could catch a few big fish, and let them be hanging over the stern rail as if to keep them fresh."
"I'll set Mr Barkins and Mr Smith to try and catch some," he said eagerly.  "The idea's splendid, my lad; and if it turns out to be successful, I'll--there, I don't know what I won't do for you."
Soon after, I had the pleasure of seeing a lot of the men's garments hung on a couple of lines in the rigging, and Barkins and Smith hard at work fishing, in which they were so wonderfully successful that I longed to go and join them; but I was too busy over my task of disguising the twenty sailors, and consequently my two messmates had all the sport to themselves, dragging in, every few minutes, an abundance of good-sized fishes, which were at last strung upon a piece of stout line and hung over the stern rail.
That night the crew were all in an intense state of excitement, and roars of laughter saluted my party of sham Chinamen, some of whom were paraded in the newly-made frocks, two being in the full dress of whitened head and pigtail, and looked so exactly like the real thing at a short distance that no doubt was felt as to the success of this part of the proceedings.
Officers and men had been a little puzzled at first, but in a very short time they were all talking about the cleverness of the "captain's dodge," as they called it; and the low spirits of the morning gave place to eager talk about the adventures which all felt sure must come now.
The ship's head had been turned and laid for the islands we had so lately left; but our progress was purposely made exceedingly slow, the screw just revolving, and the water parting with a gentle ripple to right and left.
Meanwhile the tailor and his mates were hard at work by the light of the swinging lanterns, and, upon my being sent by Mr Reardon to make inquiries, the tailor answered that he should be up to time with the twenty Chinee gownds, and went on stitching again as if for his very life.
I was on the watch that night, and stood listening for long enough to the yarns of one of the men, who had not been in Chinese waters before, but "knowed a chap as had;" and he had some blood-curdling tales to tell of the cruelties perpetrated by the desperate gangs who haunted the coast in fast-sailing junks.
"But they're an awfully cowardly lot, arn't they, Billy?" said another.
"Well," said the man, "it's like this, messmet; they is and they arn't, if you can make that out.  They'll scuttle away like rats if they can; but if they can't, they'll fight that savage that nothing's like it; and if it is to come to a fight, all I've got to say is, as the chap as hasn't got his cutlash as sharp as ever it can be made 'll be very sorry for it."
"Oh, I don't know," said another; "there won't be much cutlashing; 'tain't like it used to was in the old days.  Most everything's done with the big guns now; and if they do get alongside to board, why, a man's cutlash is always stuck at the end of his rifle, just as if it was a jolly's bag'net growed out o' knowledge, and then it's all spick and spike."
"Maybe," said the man; "but you mark my words, they're a nasty lot when they gets wild, and you'll have to look pretty sharp if you don't want to get hurt."
It was not cheering, after a very wearying day and a very short night before, to listen to such talk, and I began to wonder whether the captain would take sufficient precautions to keep the Chinese off, for I felt that to properly carry out the plan, the fighting men must be kept well out of sight till the very last; but I soon came to the conclusion that I need not worry about that, from the spirited way in which everything possible to disguise the ship had been done.
Then, as I leaned over the side looking over the black water, in which a faint star could be seen from time to time, I began to smile to myself at the quiet, dry way in which my ideas had been taken up; but I frowned directly after, as I thought of what a little credit I was getting for it all, and that the captain or Mr Reardon might have said an encouraging word or two to show that they appreciated my efforts.
It was laughable, too, the way in which I had heard the captain's dodge discussed by Barkins and Smith, who never once associated my summons to the cabin with all that had been done.
The time was going along slowly, and I was beginning to feel very drowsy, so I had a walk up and down a few times, and then came suddenly upon something like a big bundle under the weather bulwark.
"Why, Ching," I said, "you here?"
"Yes; velly hot down below, no sleepee sleepee.  Come on deck, nicee cool.  You have fightee morrow?"
"I hope so," I said; but asked myself the next moment whether I really did hope so.
"Velly bad fightee, bad pilates come, and captain killee whole lot. Allee velly bad man, killee evelybody."
"Do you think they will come out of hiding?"
"Ching don'tee know.  Ching thinkee muchee so.  Now go sleepee.  Velly much tire."
He curled himself up, drawing his tail round out of the way, and seemed to go off directly; while I rejoined the officer of the watch, who happened to be Mr Brooke, and we walked right forward to the bows, and saw that the men were keeping a bright look-out.
"Well, Herrick," he said, "got your dirk sharp?"
"No," I said.  "Don't laugh at me, please, Mr Brooke."
"Oh no, I will not laugh at you, my lad," he said; "but as it is quite likely that we may have a bit of a scrimmage to-morrow, if the scoundrels are lured out of their holes, and grow desperate on finding that they have made a mistake, you had better keep out of the way."
"But--"
"Oh yes, I know what you are going to say; but you are very young yet, and what chance would you have against a great strong savage Chinaman-- for there are plenty of powerful fellows among these scoundrels.  You must wait a bit before you take to fighting."
I felt uncomfortable.  He seemed to be looking down upon me so, in spite of my being an officer; but I could not boast of my strength, and remained silent for a time.
"Do you think they are likely to get on board, sir?"
"Oh no," he said.  "We shall not give them a chance.  Once the captain is sure that they are the pirates, if we are lucky enough to lure them well out from the shore, the men will be ordered up to the guns, and we shall give them a few broadsides, and sink them."
"It sounds horrid, sir," I said.  "Then they'll never have a chance to fight us?"
"Not if we can help it, my lad.  But, as you say, it does sound horrid, and rather cowardly; but what would you do with a poisonous snake?  You would not give it a chance to strike at you first, if you met it and had a loaded gun in your hands?"
"Of course not, sir," I said quickly.
"Well, these wretches are as dangerous as venomous serpents, and, after what you saw on board that barque, you do not think we need be squeamish about ridding the earth of such monsters?"
"No, sir, not a bit," I said quickly.
"Neither do I, Herrick.  I should like to aim the gun that sends a shot through them between wind and water."
"Light on the port bow!" announced the look-out forward; and, upon using his night-glass, Mr Brooke made out the vessel, which showed the light to be a large junk, with her enormous matting-sails spread, and gliding along faster than we were, and in the same direction.
As we watched the light, it gradually grew fainter, and finally disappeared, while all through our watch the screw kept on its slow motion, just sending the gunboat onward.
Toward what?  I asked myself several times; and, in spite of my determination to acquit myself manfully if we did go into action, I could not help hoping that the next night would find us all as safe as we were then.  But all the same the thoughts of our preparations were well in my mind, and never once did I hope that we should not encounter the enemy.
All the same, though, when my watch was at an end and I went below, perhaps it was owing to its being so hot, as Ching said, for it was a long time before I could get off to sleep.
CHAPTER TEN.
THE ENEMY.
"Oh, I say, do wake up and come on deck.  It's such a lark."
"What is?"  I said, rolling out of the berth, with my head feeling all confused and strange, to stare at Barkins.
"Why, everything.  You never saw such a miserable old rag-bag of a ship in your life."
I hurriedly dressed and went on deck, to find the preparations complete, and I could not help thinking that, if the pirates mistook the _Teaser_ for a man-of-war now, they must be clever indeed.
For on the previous day I had only seen the alterations in bits, so to speak, but now everything was done, even to having a quantity of coal on deck, and the clean white planks besmirched with the same black fuel. The paint-pots had altered everything; the figure-head was hidden with tarpaulin; the rigging, instead of being all ataunto, was what Smith called "nine bobble square," and one sail had been taken down and replaced by an old one very much tattered, so that up aloft we looked as if we had been having a taste of one of the typhoons which visit the Chinese seas.  These preparations, with the men's clothes hanging to dry, the boats badly hauled up to the davits, and the fish hanging over the stern (after the fashion practised in west-country fishing-boats), completely altered the aspect of everything.  Then I found that the officers were all in tweeds, with yachting or shooting caps; the bulk of the crew below, and my twenty men and lads all carefully got up with painted heads and pigtails complete, under the charge of Ching, who was bustling about importantly, and he came to me at once and began whispering--
"Captain say, Ching takee care allee men, and show himself evelywhere."
"Yes, of course," I said.  "Yes.  You wanted to say something?"
"Yes, Ching want say something."
"Well, what is it?  Quick, I must go."
"Ching want you tell sailor boy be velly careful.  Take care of Ching when pilate come."
"All right," I said; "but they haven't come yet."
"Think big junk pilate."
"Which one? where?"  I said.
He pointed forward to where, about five miles off the lee-bow, a great junk was slowly sailing in the same direction as we were.
"Is that the one which passed us in the night?"  I said.
"Yes."
"Why do you think she is a pirate?"
"Ching tink why she no sail light away and not stop while man-o'-war clawl along velly slow.  You tellee captain."
I nodded, and found that there was no need, for the captain was carefully observing the junk from where he was hidden by a pile of casks, and Mr Reardon was with him.
"Here, Mr Herrick," he cried, "your eyes are young.  Have a look at that junk.  Take your uniform cap off, my lad, and, as soon as you have done, take off your jacket and put on a coloured suit."
I had a good look through the glass at the junk, and made my report.
"I think it's only a big trader, sir," I said.  "Looks like the boats we saw at Amoy, and as if she were going up to Wanghai."
"Yes, that's it, I think," said Captain Thwaites to Mr Reardon.  Then he sharply turned to me and gave me a dry look.  "Well, Mr Herrick, you see I have taken your advice, and put my ship in this disgraceful state."
"Yes, sir," I said eagerly; "and I hope it will prove successful."
"So do I," he said drily.  "That will do, Herrick.  Now, Mr Reardon, I think we will keep on just as we are, just about four knots an hour.  It gives the idea of our being in trouble; and if we keep on close outside the islands, it may draw the scoundrels--that is, if they are there."
"Yes, sir, if they are there," said the lieutenant.
"How long do you reckon it will take us to get abreast of the reef where that barque lay?"
"We ought to be there by noon, sir, I should say."
"That will do.  We shall seem to be making for Wanghai."
I heard no more, but went below, and directly after breakfast reappeared in white flannels and a cricketing cap, a transformation which satisfied the first lieutenant, but displeased Barkins and Smith, who had orders to keep below in uniform.
"I hate so much favouritism," grumbled Barkins.  "Who are you, Gnat? You're our junior; and here are we kept below, and my lord you parading about the deck, and seeing everything."
"Why, you're in the reserve," I said banteringly, "and will have all the fighting to do."
"Who wants all the fighting to do?" cried Smith.  "I don't.  I suppose if we do take a lot of pirate junks, you'll be promoted, and we shan't get a word."
"Stuff!"  I said.  "How can I get promoted?"
"But I want to know why you're to be picked out," cried Barkins.
"Go and ask the skipper," I said.  "Now, look here both of you; if you're not civil, I won't come and report everything.  If you are, I'll come down as often as I can to tell you all that is going on."
"Oh then, I suppose we must be civil, Smithy," said Barkins sourly, "but we'll serve the beggar out afterwards."
I went up on deck again to find that our speed had been slightly increased, but we drew no nearer to the junk, which sailed on exactly in the same course as we were taking, and that seemed strange; but beyond watching her through the telescopes, and seeing that she had only about a dozen men on board--all blue-frocked Chinamen--no further notice was taken of her.
Ching was seated right forward, with his blue frock showing well up against the grey white of one of the hanging-down sails, and he had been furnished with a pipe, which he smoked slowly and thoughtfully; half-a-dozen men were in the fore-rigging, making believe to repair damages up aloft; and soon after four more were sent up to begin tinkering at the topmast, which they made great efforts to lower down on deck, but of course got no further.
They had orders from the first lieutenant to take it coolly, and coolly they took it, looking like a lazy, loafing set of Chinese sailors, whose intentions were to do as little as they could for their pay.
Mr Reardon, in a shooting-suit and straw hat, went about giving orders, and the captain and Mr Brooke had cane seats on the quarter-deck, with a bottle and glasses, and sat sipping beer and smoking cigars, as if they were passengers.
Then came long hours of patient--I should say impatient--crawling along over the same course as we had followed the previous day, with no sail in sight but the big junk, which took not the slightest notice of us, nor we of it.
There was no doubt whatever, though, of her actions.  She kept sailing on at about the same rate as we steamed, evidently for the sake of being in company, and to have a European vessel close at hand to close up to in case of danger from the shores of the mainland, or one of the islands we should pass, for it was an established fact that the pirates seldom attacked ships that were in company.
All through the early part of the morning the novelty of the affair interested the men, and there was a constant burst of eager conversation going on, but as noon came, and matters were in the same position, and we still far away from the spot where the barque had been burned, every one grew weary, and I fidgeted myself into a state of perspiration.
"It will all turn out wrong," I thought, "and then they will blame me."
With these fancies to worry me, I kept away from my messmates as much as I could; and when by accident I encountered either of my superiors, I saw that they looked--or I fancied they did--very stern.
"All these preparations for nothing," I said to myself, as I saw the guns all ready, but covered over with tarpaulins, cartridges and shells waiting, and the crews armed and impatient.
Dinner had been long over, and I need hardly say that I did not enjoy mine.  Some of the men were having a nap, and the heat below must have been very great, for it was scorching on deck.
At last we were abreast of the rocky islands dotted here and there, and upon the reef I could just make out a few pieces of the burned vessel.
But as I swept the rocky islets and channels and then the horizon, I could not make out a sail, only our companion the junk, with her bows and stern high out of the water, sailing easily along that fine afternoon.
Another hour passed, and there were rocky islands on our starboard bow and two astern, but not a sign of inhabitant, only high bluffs, rugged cliffs, and narrow channels between reefs whitened by the constant breaking upon them of a heavy swell.
"Rather slow work, Reardon," said the captain, as they two came by where I was at the bulwark, using a small glass.  "See anything, Mr Herrick?"
"No, sir," I said.
"No, sir, indeed; of course you don't," cried the captain impatiently. "Nice trick you've played me, sir.  Made me dress up my men and the ship in this tomfool way.  There you are using your glass.  What have you got to say for yourself, eh?"
I could not tell whether he was speaking banteringly or really angrily, and, keeping my glass to my eye in the hope of seeing something to report, I mumbled out some excuse about meaning it for the best.
"Best, indeed!" he said pettishly.  "Nice objects we look.  What do you think the First Lords of the Admiralty would say to me if they could see Her Majesty's gunboat--the finest clipper in the service--in this state? Eh?  Why don't you answer, sir?"
"I suppose, sir," I cried desperately, "that they would say you were doing your best for the sake of trying to catch the pirates."
"Humph! do you, indeed?  Well?  Anything to report?  What's the use of holding that glass to your eye if you can't see anything?  Anything to report, I say?"
"Yes, sir," I cried breathlessly, and with my heart throbbing heavily, "the junk has run up a little pennon to her mast-head."
"She has?" cried Mr Reardon excitedly, and he raised his own glass. "Yes, you're right.  Well done, Herrick!  There, sir, I told you the lad was right."
"Right? when they are signalling to us for water or a bag of rice."
"When they have only to heave-to and let us overhaul them, sir," cried Mr Reardon, swinging his glass round and narrowly missing my head. "No, sir, they're signalling to the shore; and before long we shall see another junk come swooping out from behind one of those headlands, to take us in the rear.  If they don't, I'm a Dutchman."
"Then Dutchman you are, Reardon," said the captain, smiling.  "I only wish they would."
"Here they come, sir," I cried excitedly--"one--two--yes, there are three."
"What?  Where?"
"You can only see the tops of their sails, sir, over that flat, low island this side of the big cliffs."
"Eh! yes."
Only those two words, as the captain sighted the slowly-moving objects just indistinctly seen, but they were enough to send a thrill all through the ship.
For there was no mistaking the matter.  The junk that had been hanging by us all night was a pirate after all, and she had signalled to companions on shore.  I could see, too, that she was slightly altering her course.
The enemy was at last in sight.
CHAPTER ELEVEN.
THE FIGHT.
"Oh, if I only dared hooray!"  I said to myself; and then a flush of pride rose to my cheeks, for the captain gave me a smart clap on the shoulder.
"Bravo, Herrick!" he said in quite a whisper.  "I thought you were right, my lad, or I shouldn't have done all this.  Mr Reardon and I will make a fine officer of you before we have done."
"Shall I pass the word down for the men to be on the _qui vive_?" said the lieutenant.
The captain laughed, and nodded his head in the direction of the hatches, which were black with peeping heads.
"No need, Mr Reardon; there is not a soul on board who does not know. It is no time for making fresh arrangements.  We'll keep exactly to our plans.  Don't let a man show on deck, for depend upon it they will have a look-out aloft ready to give warning of danger, and we must not give them an excuse for signalling to their confederates to sheer off."
"Keep steadily on, then, sir?"
"Yes, steadily and stupidly.  Let the men go on as before up aloft, and let the rest of the men show their white heads and pigtails at the bulwarks as if they were wondering who the strangers were.  Good pressure of steam below?"
"Yes, sir, almost too much," said the lieutenant, after communication with the engine-room.
"Not a bit," said the captain, rubbing his hands.  "We shall want it soon."
My heart began to beat as they passed on, and I wondered what would be the first steps taken.  But I did not forget my promise.  My duties were about nil, and as soon as I had seen the men staring over the bulwarks, and noted that the sham repairs to the rigging were steadily going on, I ran down the companion-way, and breathlessly told Barkins and Smith.
"Then there are four of them, Smithy," cried Barkins.  "Look here, Gnat; he stuck out that there were only three.  But well done, old chap, you are a good one to come and tell us.  Here, don't go yet; I want to--"
I never heard what he wanted to, for there was too much exciting attraction on the deck, to which, being as it were licensed, I at once returned.
The captain and Mr Reardon were on the quarter-deck, conscious that savages as the Chinese or Formosan pirates were, they probably did not despise the barbarian instruments known as telescopes, and that most likely every movement on board the _Teaser_ was being watched.  Any suspicious act would be quite sufficient to make them sheer off, and consequently the strictest orders were given to the men to play their parts carefully, and make no movement that was not required.
Dressed as I was in flannels, my appearance was thoroughly in keeping with the assumed peaceful character of the ship, and hence I heard and saw nearly everything.
Just as I went on the quarter-deck the captain was saying to the first lieutenant--
"Don't be so excitable, man.  When I ask you a question, or give an order, take it deliberately, and dawdle off to see it done."
"Right through, sir?" said Mr Reardon petulantly.
"No," said the captain quietly.  "When I give the order, `Full speed ahead,' then you can act.  Till then you are mate or passenger, whichever you like, of this dirty-looking trader.  Ah, those three low junks, or whatever they are, can creep through the water pretty quickly."
"Yes; and the big junk too," said Mr Reardon, using his glass.  "It is astonishing how rapidly those great heavily-sailed craft can go.  She's full of men, sir," he continued; "I can see more and more beginning to show themselves.  Not much appearance of dishipline, though."
"So much the better for us," muttered Captain Thwaites, turning in his cane arm-chair, and looking in the direction of the islands again, from which the three smaller vessels were coming on rapidly.  "Yes,"--he said, as if to himself, "a head keeps showing here and there; they are full of men too."
I was not experienced, of course, that only being my third voyage, but I knew enough of navigating tactics to grasp the fact that the four vessels were carefully timing themselves so as to reach us together, and this evidently was their customary mode of procedure, and no doubt accounted for ship after ship being taken and plundered.  I felt startled, too, as I realised the strength of the crews, and what a simultaneous attempt to board might mean.  With an ordinary merchantman, even with a strong crew, undoubtedly death and destruction, while even with our well-armed men and guns I began to have doubts.  A slip in the manoeuvres, ever so slight a mistake on Captain Thwaites' part, or a blunder in the carrying out of his orders, might give one vessel the chance to make fast, and while we were arresting their onslaught there would be time for the others to get close in and throw their scores of bloodthirsty savages upon our decks.
Mr Reardon had strolled forward, and returned just as the captain said to me--
"You may as well fetch me my sword and cap from the cabin, Mr Herrick."
"Yes, sir," I said quickly, and I was off, but he stopped me.
"Not now, boy," he cried impatiently; "when the first gun is fired will be time enough.  Well, Reardon, men all ready?"
"Ready, sir? they want wiring down.  I'm only afraid of one thing."
"What is that?"
"That they will jam one another in the hatches in their excitement."
"Give fresh stringent orders, sir," said the captain sternly; "every man is to go quickly and silently to his post, as if on an ordinary drill. By George! they are coming on quickly; we shall have it all over by daylight."
"And they'll plunder the ship by lamplight, eh?" said Mr Reardon drily.
"Of course.  I think there is no need to feel any doubt now as to these being the men we want?"
"I don't know, sir," said the lieutenant quietly; "but there is no doubt about their meaning to try and take this peaceful merchantman.  Look, they feel sure of us, sir, and are showing themselves.  Why, they swarm with men."
"Poor wretches!" said the captain gravely.  "I don't like shedding blood, but we must do it now, to the last drop."
The enemy were now less than a mile away, and coming on rapidly, the smaller vessels helping their progress with long, heavy sweeps; and as I stood behind the captain's chair, and looked round the deck from the wheel, where one of our sham Chinamen stood, with another seated under the bulwarks apparently asleep, but ready to spring up and join his messmate at a word; round by the bulwarks where four or five stood stupidly looking over the side; and then up aloft to the men making believe to work very hard at the damaged spar--all looked peaceful enough to tempt the wretches, without counting the most prominent figure of all, Ching, as he sat high up, smoking placidly, and looking as calm and contemplative as a figure of Buddha.
"The men ought to be called up now, and the guns set to work," I said to myself, as every pulse throbbed with excitement, and in imagination I saw, from the captain's neglect or dilatoriness, our deck running with blood.
But I had to master these thoughts.
"They know better than I do when to begin," I said to myself, and, after a sharp glance at the coming vessels, I began to pity my two messmates who were cooped up below, and I thought of how excited they must be. Then I thought of Mr Brooke, and hoped he would not be hurt; and shuddered a little as I remembered the doctor, who would be all ready below, waiting to attend upon the first wounded man.
"See that, sir?" said Mr Reardon quickly.
"What?" said Captain Thwaites in the most unmoved way.
"That smoke on board two of them."
"On board all," said the captain.  "I noticed it a minute ago.  They are getting the stinkpots ready for us, I suppose."
"Yes, that's it, sir.  Do you think it necessary to have the hose ready in case of fire?"
"No; if any come on board, the firemen can be called up from the stokehole with their shovels.  I think we'll go now upon the bridge. You can come too, Mr Herrick.  I may want you to take an order or two."
And as he walked quietly towards the bridge, where the speaking-tubes and signals joined with the engine-room were, he was as calm and deliberate as if there was not the slightest danger menacing the _Teaser_; while for my part I could not help feeling that the position there upon the bridge was a highly-exposed one, and that I should have been much safer in the shelter of the bulwarks, or down below.
All this time we were gently forging ahead, and the junk was quietly manoeuvring so that we should pass her so close that she could just avoid our prow, and then close and grapple with us, for they were busy on her starboard quarter, and through my glass I could make out great hooks.
"Won't they think we are taking it too coolly, and grow suspicious, sir?" whispered Mr Reardon excitedly.
"I hope not," said the captain.  "Perhaps one might show fight now, but I am trusting to their believing that we are stupid, for I want to get them all, Reardon, if I can.  Now, silence, if you please."
Mr Reardon drew back a step or two and waited during those terrible minutes which followed, and I gave quite a start, for the enemy suddenly threw off all reserve as a yell came from the junk, which was answered from the other vessels, and, with their decks crowded with savage-looking desperadoes, they swept down upon us literally from both sides, bow and stern.
But still the captain did not make a sign; and, in the midst of the horrible silence on board, I saw the dressed-up men turning their heads to gaze at us anxiously, as if the suspense was greater than they could bear, and their eyes implored their commander to give the word before the wretches began swarming on board.
I glanced at Mr Reardon, whose face was white, and the great drops of perspiration stood upon his cheeks, while his eyes, which were fixed upon the captain between us, looked full of agony; for the great junk with its wild crew was apparently only a hundred yards ahead, and the others not much farther, coming rapidly on.
"It's all over," I thought, in my horror, "he will be too late;" and that I was not alone in my thoughts obtained confirmation, for, though the crew to a man stood fast, I saw Ching suddenly drop from his perch and look round for a place of retreat.
At the same moment the captain moved his hand; there was a sharp tinging of the gong in the engine-room, which meant full speed ahead; and, as the vibration rapidly increased, he then gave a sharp order or two, and in an instant almost the men came pouring up from the various hatches upon deck, but so quickly and quietly that the transformation was almost magical.
I don't think my eyes are peculiarly made, but I saw the various crews muster round the guns, and the marines range up, and the men with their rifles at their various posts, with each officer in his place, although all the time I was standing with my gaze fixed upon the great junk.
I saw, too, my twenty pigtailed men come sliding down the ropes from above, and snatch up the cutlasses and rifles laid ready beneath a tarpaulin; but all the time I was seeing, in obedience to orders, two parties of the crew going forward at the double, and I knew that the captain was communicating with the two men at the wheel.
Quick as lightning there was another order as we began to leave the three low vessels behind, and I involuntarily grasped the rail before me as all the men on board lay down--crews of the guns, marines, and those who had doubled forward under the command of Mr Brooke.
Hardly was the evolution performed, when there, right before us, were the lowering mat-sails of the great junk, and then, crash! there was a wild despairing yell, and we were into her amidships, the ponderous gunboat literally cutting her down and going right over her; while at a second command every man sprang up again, and for the next minute or two bayonet and cutlass were flashing in the evening sunlight as the wretches who climbed on board were driven back.
While this was going on, the bell in the engine-room rang out again and again, and we began to move astern to meet the three low junks, which, undismayed by the fate of their comrade, came at us with their crews yelling savagely.
Then there was a deep roar as the first gun belched forth its flame and smoke, with the huge shell hurtling through the air, dipping once in the calm sea, and crashing through one of the junks, to explode with a report like the echo of the first, far beyond.
Captain Thwaites turned quietly and looked at me.
"Yes, sir?"  I stammered.
"I said when the first gun was fired you could fetch my cap and sword, Mr Herrick," he said quietly, and I ran down just as the second big gun bellowed, but I did not see with what result.  I heard the sharp, short order, though, and another gun roared, and another, and another, as the junks came well into sight; for each gun I heard the crash of the shell hitting too, and the fierce yells of the men, as I dashed into the cabin, seized cap and sword, and then ran back to the bridge, eager to see the fight, and in my excitement forgetting to feel afraid.
But a heavy smoke was gathering over us and the junks,--two were indistinct, though they were close aboard of us.  Then, as the _Teaser_ glided astern, I saw that the third was smoking, while crash, crash, the others struck our sides, and their crews grappled, hurled their stinkpots on board, and began to swarm over the bulwarks.
But the guns were being steadily served with terrible effect; the few poor wretches who reached the deck were bayoneted, and in how long or how short a time I cannot tell, for everything seemed to be swept away in the excitement; we steamed away out of the smoke into the ruddy sunset, and there I saw in one place a mass of tangled bamboo and matting, with men clustering upon it, and crowding one over the other like bees in a swarm.  There was another mass about a quarter of a mile away, and I looked in vain for the third junk; but a number of her crew clinging to bamboos, sweeps, spars, and what looked to be wicker crates, showed where she had been.  The last of the four, with her great matting-sails hauled up to the fullest extent, was sailing away toward the nearest island, and on either side they had sweeps over with two or three men to each, tugging away with all their might to help their vessel along.
"The brutes!"  I thought to myself, as I watched the glint of the ruddy sun upon their shiny heads and faces, with their pig tails swinging behind, as they hung back straining at the great oars.  For their sole idea seemed to be escape, and not the slightest effort was made to pick up any of their comrades struggling in the water.
It was wonderful how quickly they went, and I began to think that the junk would escape.  Three miles would be enough to place her all amongst the reefs and shoals, where the gunboat dare not follow; and I was thinking, as we glided rapidly in her wake, that the _Teaser_ would chase her swiftly for about half the distance, and then lower the boats to continue the pursuit, but I was wrong; I saw that the captain gave Mr Reardon some order, then the gong rang in the engine-room, the way of the _Teaser_ was checked, a turn of the wheel made her describe a curve, and she slowly came to a standstill broadside on to the flying junk.
The next minute the crews were piped away to the boats with their complement of marines to each; and as they were lowered down a steady fire was maintained with shell upon the junk.
I stood watching the shots, and saw the first of the broadside from one heavy and three smaller guns strike the water close to the junk's hull, fly up, dip again, and then burst over the cliffs.
The second went wide to the left, while the third also missed; and I saw the captain stamp impatiently as the fourth went right over her.
"She'll get away," I thought; and it seemed a pity for this junk to escape and form a nucleus for another strong pirate gang.
The firing continued, another broadside being directed at the flying pirates, who seemed to be certain now of escape, for the junk was end-on to us, and moving rapidly, forming a very difficult object for our marksmen; the gunboat, of course, rising and falling all the time upon the heaving sea.
In the intervals between the shots I had caught a glimpse of Barkins and Smith climbing into two of the boats, but it was only a glimpse; and then I was watching the effects of the fire again, as the boats pushed off to go to the help of the floating men.
Shot after shot had been fired most ineffectively, and I heard expostulations and angry words used to the captains of the guns; while at every ineffective shell that burst far away a derisive yell rose from the crowded junk--the shouts increasing each time.
"Another broadside, Reardon," cried the captain; "and then we must run in as far as we dare.  Pick out half-a-dozen of the best men with the rifle to place on the bows to pick off the steersman."
"Ay, ay, sir," cried Mr Reardon; then directly, "All gone in the boats, sir."
Just then, as I was thinking that the junk must escape, one of our big guns was fired with a crash which made the deck vibrate.  There was a tremendous puff of smoke, which was drawn toward us so that I could not see the effect, but the shell seemed to burst almost directly with a peculiar dull crash, and another yell arose from the distant vessel. Only it was not a derisive cry like the last, but a faint startling chorus of long-continued shrieks, despairing and wild.
"That's got her, sir," cried Mr Reardon; and we waited impatiently for the smoke to float by.  But it still shut out the junk from where we stood, while it passed away from the men forward at the gun, and they gave us the first endorsement of Mr Reardon's words by bursting out into a hearty cheer, which was taken up by the crews of the other guns. Then we were clear of the smoke, looking landward to see a crowd of men struggling in the water, swimming about to reach planks and pieces of the junk, which had been blown almost to pieces by our great shell, and had sunk at once, while yet quite a mile from the nearest rocks.
"Ha!" ejaculated the captain, "a good evening's work!  Now, Reardon, down with the other two boats, and save every poor wretch you can."
"Only one left, sir," cried Mr Reardon; and in a few minutes, fully manned, she was about to be lowered down, when I looked quickly at the captain, and he read my meaning.
"Want to go?" he said, and then nodded sharply.
I dashed down, climbed upon the bulwark, seized the falls just as they were about to be cast off, and slid down into the stern to take my place.  Then the oars fell with a splash, and away we went over the ruddy sea to try and save all we could of the wretches upon whom so terrible a retribution had come.
One of the warrant officers was in command; he gave me a grim nod.
"Want to see the fun?" he said.
"I want to see the men saved," I replied; "I don't know where the fun comes in."
"You soon will," he said.  "Look out for yourself, my lad; and don't be too eager to help them."
"Why?"
"You'll soon see," he said gruffly.  Then turning to the four marines in the stern-sheets--"fix bayonets, and keep a sharp look-out."
I looked at him wonderingly, for fixed bayonets did not seem very suitable things for saving drowning men.  But I said nothing, only sheltered my eyes from the level rays of the sun as we rowed swiftly on, and gazed across the water at the despairing wretches fighting for their lives upon the blood-red surface of the water.
It was very horrible after a time, for, as I looked with my heart feeling contracted, I saw a man, who had been swimming hard, suddenly throw up his hands and sink.
It was too much for me.
"Row, my lads, row," I cried; "we may catch him as he comes up."
"No," said the warrant officer grimly, "we shall never see him again."
"But try, try!"  I cried.
"Yes, we'll try our best," said the officer sternly; "but it's their turn now.  Many a poor wretch have they seen drown, I know, and laughed at when he cried for help."
I knew it was true; but all the same there was only one thought besides in my breast, and that was to save all the poor wretches who were clinging to the pieces of wreck.
As we drew nearer, we came upon the first of quite thirty, clinging to a sweep which was under his left arm; while, to my horror, I had seen three more swimming without support go down without a cry, and not one rise again.
"Easy there," said the officer; "ready there, coxswain; can you reach him with the hook?"
The man who was standing in the bows reached out to hook the pirate, but just then the end of the floating sweep touched our boat, and turned right off, so that the coxswain missed his stroke, and the result was that the pirate glided aft.
The officer by my side leaned over, reached out, and, to my intense satisfaction, caught the Chinaman by his left sleeve to draw him to the boat; but in an instant the wretch threw his right arm out of the water, and I saw the flash of a long knife in his fingers, as, with his teeth grinning, he struck at my companion with all his might.
I was so taken by surprise that I sat as if paralysed; but I was conscious of a quick movement from behind, something red passed over me, and, all instantaneously, there was the flash of another blade, a horrible thud--the pirate was driven under water; and I wrenched, as it were, my eyes round from him to look up over my shoulder at the marine, who with a dexterous twist of his rifle withdrew his bayonet from the savage's chest.
"Hurt, sir?" he said.
"No thankye, marine.  Very quick and well done of you.  There, Mr Herrick; now you see why I told you to look out."
"The brutes!"  I cried excitedly; "they're not worth trying to save."
"No," he said; "but we must do it.  I suppose they don't believe much in the mercy they'll get from us; so there's no wonder.  Look at that!"
I turned my head in the direction in which he pointed, and saw what he meant.  Five men were clinging to a piece of floating wreck about fifty yards away, and three more left the plank to which they had been clinging as we approached, and swam to join them.
I looked at the first group, fully expecting to see them hold out their hands to help their comrades; but in place thereof, I saw one wretch, who occupied the best position on the floating mass of wreck, raise a heavy piece of bamboo with both hands, and bring it down with a crash upon the head of the first man who swam up.
"Yah, you cowardly beggar!" roared one of the boat's crew.  "I've marked you."
"Nice wild-beasts to save, Mr Herrick," said the warrant officer.  "I feel as if I should like to open fire on them with my revolver."
"It's too horrible," I panted.  "Look, look, Mr Grey!"
"I'm looking, my lad," said my companion.  "Give way, my boys; let's stop it somehow."
For there was a desperate fight going on at the piece of wreck; three men, knife in hand, were trying to get upon the floating wood, and those upon it stabbing at them to keep them off.
But, in their despair, the swimmers made a dash together, regardless of the blows, climbed on, and a terrible struggle began.
"Starn all!" roared Mr Grey; and the boat's progress was checked.  We were backed away just in time, for the pirates were all now on one side of the piece of wreck, thinking of nothing but destroying each other's lives, and heaped together in what looked like a knot, when the side they were on slowly sank, the far portion rose up and completely turned over upon them, forcing them beneath the water, which eddied and boiled as the struggle still went on below the surface.
"Give way, my lads," said the officer sternly; "let's try and save some of the others."
"Ay, ay," cried the man who had shouted before.  "These here arn't worth saving."
The boat swept round in a curve, and we pulled off for another group, kneeling and crouching upon what seemed to be a yard and a mass of matting-sail.
Mr Grey stood up.
"Now, my lads," he shouted, "surrender."
For answer they bared their knives and defied us to come on, yelling and striking at us with them.
Mr Grey looked round at me half-laughingly.
"Cheerful sort of prisoners to make.  If we go close in, some of us will get knifed."
"You can't go close," I said.
"If I don't they'll drown," he cried; "and the captain will ask me what I've been about."
"Hadn't you better let the jollies put 'em out of their misery, Mr Grey, sir?" cried one of the men.  "They arn't fit to live."
"No," cried another fiercely.  "They arn't men; they're tigers."
"Silence!" said the officer sternly.  "There is a man yonder about to sink; give way," he cried.
This man had left a barrel, to which he had vainly tried to cling, but it kept on turning round; and at last, in his despair, he had left it to try and swim to the nearest rocks.
His strength was failing, though, and he began to paddle like a dog, too much frightened to try and swim.
A few strokes of the oar took us within reach, and this time the coxswain succeeded in hooking his loose cotton jacket, and drawing him to the side.
Hands seized him directly, and he was hauled in to lie down trembling, and looking wildly from one to the other.
"Come; he's a quiet one," said the coxswain.  "Mind, sir!"
"Mind! look out!" roared the boatswain.
But he was too late.  One moment the Chinaman crouched, limp and helpless, in the bottom of the boat forward, with his hands hidden in his wet sleeves, the next he had made a frog-like leap at the coxswain, driven a sharp knife in the muscles of his back, and leaped overboard. Not into safety, though; for one of the men stood ready, and, as the wretch rose, brought down the blade of his oar with a tremendous chop across the head, and the pirate went down to rise no more.
I heard the boatswain utter a low fierce growl as he crept forward, and I followed to try and help, for the injured man had sunk upon his knees, with the boat-hook across the bows, and began to wipe the perspiration from his forehead.
"Much hurt, my lad?" cried Mr Grey.
"Tidy, sir, tidy; makes one feel a bit sicky-like.  Any one like to have the next turn with the boat-hook?  I'm going to miche a bit.--Do it bleed?"
All thought of saving the pirates was given up till the wound, which bled sharply, was carefully bandaged, and the man laid down in the bottom of the boat.  Then the crew looked at their officer.
"Hadn't we better polish 'em off, sir?" growled one of the men.
"The captain's orders were to pick up all the drowning men we could," said the boatswain sternly.
"But they won't be picked up, sir."
"Give way."
The men rowed to another floating group of four, and I stood up and called to them to surrender.
For answer they sprang into the water, and began to swim to some of their comrades on the next piece of wreck.
"This is a puzzling job, Mr Herrick," said the boatswain.  "I'm not a brute; I'd jump overboard to save any of the wretches, but it would be like giving my life, or the lives of any of the crew, to set them the job.  Those wretches will begin upon their mates, you'll see."
He was quite right, for the possessors of the next floating piece of wreck yelled to their comrades to keep off, and, as they still swam on, a fresh fight began of the most bloodthirsty nature, and one of our men said drily--
"Take it coolly, sir.  If we lay on our oars a bit, there won't be none to fish up."
The feeling of horror and pity for the drowning men began to wear off, and I was glad when Mr Grey suddenly ordered the men to row hard, and I saw him steer shoreward to cut off a little party of four, who, with a thick bamboo yard between them, were swimming for the rocks.
"They must be saved as prisoners or not at all," he said sternly; "not a man of them must land."
As soon as this last party saw us coming, we noticed that they drew their knives to keep us off, but energetic measures were taken this time.  We got between them and the shore; and then a rope was made ready, one of the men stood up and dexterously threw it right over a pirate's head, snatched it tightly to him, dragged him from his hold, and he was at last drawn to the side half-drowned, hauled aboard, and his hands and feet tied.
This successful plan was followed out with the others, with the result that we had four prisoners lying safely in the bottom, and then turned to capture some more in the same way.
But we had been so excited and taken up by this work that we had not seen what was going on seaward, where a gun was fired for our recall.
"Where's the next of them?" said Mr Grey.
I did not answer, as I stood up looking round to see a few fragments of wreck floating here and there, but there was not another pirate left to save.
CHAPTER TWELVE.
REPAIRING DAMAGES.
For some moments I could not believe it true, and I stood on the thwart and gazed carefully round, scanning every fragment of the wreck in the expectation of seeing some trick to deceive us--men lying flat with only their faces above the surface of the water, and holding on by sweep or bamboo with one hand.  But in a very short time we were all certain that not a living being was near; of the dead there were several, as we found on rowing here and there.  One, as he was turned over, seemed to be perfectly uninjured, but the others displayed ghastly wounds in face, neck, and breast, showing how horribly fierce had been the encounter in which they had been engaged.
Satisfied at last that our task was at an end, the word was given, and the men began to row back to the _Teaser_, which still lay so transformed in appearance, as seen from a distance, that I was thinking that it was no wonder that the pirates had been deceived, when one of the men, forgetful of all the horrors through which we had passed, of his wounded comrade, and the dangerous prisoners under his feet, burst out into a merry fit of laughter.
"Say, lads," he cried, "we shall have a nice job to-morrow, to wash the old girl's face."
The rest of the crew laughed in chorus, till the boatswain sternly bade them give way.
"I doubt it," he said in a low voice to me.  "I should say that the captain will do a little more to make her less ship-shape, ready for the next lot."
"But you don't think there are any more pirates, do you?"
"More!" he said, looking at me in surprise.  "Why, my lad, the coast swarms with them.  We never hear a hundredth part of the attacks they make.  It is not only European vessels they seize, but anything that comes in their way.  It strikes me, Mr Herrick, that we have only just begun what may turn out a very successful cruise."
Ten minutes later we were nearing the _Teaser_, and I saw the reason why we could not see either of the other boats.  They were swinging to the davits, and we were therefore the last.
Just then Mr Reardon hailed us.
"How many men hurt?" he shouted between his hands.
"Only one, sir; Barr--coxswain."
"Badly?"
"Oh no, sir," shouted the sufferer.  "Bit of a scrat on the back."
"How many prisoners?"
"Four, sir."
Then we were alongside, the boat was run up, and, after our wounded man had been lifted out, I stepped on board, eager to know the result of the action on the part of the other boats, and to learn this I went below, and found Barkins alone.
"Well," I cried, "how many prisoners?"
"Round dozen," he cried.
"Any one hurt?"
"Round dozen."
"I know, twelve prisoners," I said impatiently.  "I asked you how many were hurt."
"And I told you, stupid," he replied, "a round dozen."
"What! a man wounded for every prisoner?"
"That's it; and we shouldn't have taken any, the beggars were game for fighting to the last, if Mr Brooke hadn't given the word for them to be knocked on the head first with the thick end of the oars."
"To stun them?"
"Yes; and our lads got so savage after seeing their mates stabbed when trying to save the brutes' lives, that they hit as hard as they could. They killed two of 'em, or we should have had fourteen."
"How horrid!"
"Horrid?  Why, I enjoyed it," said my messmate.  "When I saw poor old Blacksmith--"
"What!"  I cried excitedly, "he isn't hurt?"
"Not hurt? why, one yellow-faced savage, when poor old Smithy held out his hand to pull him aboard, took hold of his wrist, and then reached up and stuck his knife right through the poor old chap's arm, and left it there."
"Poor old Smithy!"  I cried huskily, and a choking sensation rose in my throat.  "I must go and see him."
"No, you mustn't.  I've just been, and they sent me away."
"But where is he?"
"Doctor's got him, and been mending him up.  He has gone to sleep now."
"Was he very bad?"
"Stick a stocking-needle through your arm, and then square it, cube it, add decimal nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one, and then see how you feel."
"Poor old boy!"  I said; "I am sorry."
"Well, so am I," said Barkins sourly; "but I don't keep on howling."
"Did they take the blackguard prisoner?"
"Well, they did, and hauled him aboard, but he was no good, and they pitched him overboard again."
"Why?"  I said wonderingly.
"Why! because he was dead.  Bob Saunders, that red-haired chap, was in the stern-sheets helping to catch the beggars with hitches, and as soon as he saw the big yellow-faced wretch stick his knife into poor old Blacksmith, he let drive at the brute with the boat-hook, twisted it in his frock, and held him under water.  He didn't mean to, but he was savage at what he had seen, for the lads like Smithy, and he held the beggar under water too long."
I shuddered, and thought of the man being bayoneted from our boat, and Mr Grey's narrow escape.
"Your fellows behaved better, I s'pose?" said Barkins.
"Not a bit," I said.  "We've got a man stabbed just in the same way--" and I told him of our adventures.
"They're nice ones," said Barkins sourly.  "I don't think our chaps will want to take many prisoners next time.  But I say, what a crusher for them--all four junks, and not a man to go back and tell the tale."
"It's glorious," I cried, forgetting the horrors in our triumph.
"For you," said Barkins sourly.
"Why for me?  You and poor old Smith did your part.  Don't be so jolly envious."
"Envious?  Come, I like that," he cried.  "If you felt as if something red-hot was being stuck in your leg you'd feel envious too.  You're the luckiest beggar that ever was, and never get hurt or anything."
"No more do you," I said, laughing.
"Oh, don't I?  What do you call that, then?" he cried, swinging his legs round, for he was sitting with one of them under the table.
To my horror and astonishment, I saw that his leg was bandaged, and a red stain was showing through.
"Why, Tanner, old chap," I cried, catching his hand as my eyes were blurred; "I didn't know you were hurt."
He looked quite pleased at my weakness, and the emotion I showed.
"Oh, it ain't much," he said, smiling and holding on to my hand very tightly; "but it pringles and sticks a bit, I mean stingles--no, I don't!  My tongue's getting all in a knot, it tingles and pricks a bit. I say, Gnat, old chap, you don't think those chaps carry poisoned knives, do you?"
"What, like the Malays?  Oh no."
"I'm glad of that, because it made me feel a bit funky.  I thought this stinging might mean the poison spreading."
"Oh no, don't think that," I cried; "and some one told me a Malay prince said it was all nonsense about the knives being poisoned."
"He did?"
"Yes; he laughed, and said there was no need to poison them, they were quite sharp enough to kill a man without."
"That depends on where you put it in," said Barkins grimly.
"Yes," I said; "but what did the doctor say?"
"What about?"
"Your leg."
"He hasn't seen it yet."
"Why, Tanner," I cried, "you haven't had it properly bandaged."
"No; I felt so sick when I got on board, that I sneaked off here to lie down a bit.  Besides, he had poor old Blacksmith to see to, and the other chaps."
"But didn't he see the bandage when you went there?"
"No; there was no bandage then.  It's only a bit of a scratch; I tied it up myself."
"How was it?"
"I don't hardly know.  It was done in a scuffle somehow, when we had got the first prisoner in hand.  He began laying about him with a knife, and gave it to two of our lads badly, and just caught me in the leg.  It was so little that I didn't like to make a fuss about it.  Here, stop, don't leave a chap.  I want to talk to you."
"Back directly," I cried, and I hurried on deck so quickly that I nearly blundered up against Mr Reardon.
"Manners, midshipman!" he said sharply.  "Stop, sir.  Where are you going?"
"Doctor, sir."
"What, are you hurt, my lad?" he cried anxiously.
"No, sir, but poor Barkins is."
"Bless my soul, how unfortunate!  Mr Smith down too!  Where is he?"
I told him, and he hurried with me to the doctor, who was putting on his coat, after finishing the last dressing of the injured men.
"Here, doctor," cried Mr Reardon sharply, "I've another man down--boy, I mean."
"What, young Smith?  I've dressed his wound."
"No, no; Barkins has been touched too."
"Tut, tut!" cried the doctor, taking up a roll of bandage.  "Are they bringing him?"
"No, sir; he's sitting by his berth.  He tied up the wound himself."
Without another word the doctor started off, and we followed to where Barkins sat by the table with his back leaning against the side of his berth, and as soon as he caught sight of us he darted a reproachful look at me.
"Oh, I say, Gnat," he whispered, "this is too bad."  For the doctor had raised the leg, and, after taking off the handkerchief, roughly tied round just above the knee, made no scruple about slitting up the lad's trousers with an ugly-looking knife, having a hooky kind of blade.
"Bad?" said Mr Reardon anxiously.
"Oh dear, no," replied the doctor.  "Nice clean cut.  Sponge and water, youngster.  Ha, yes," he continued, as he applied the cool, soft sponge to the bleeding wound, "avoided all the vessels nicely."
"Gnat, old chap," whispered Barkins, as I half supported him, "pinch me, there's a good fellow."
"What for?"  I whispered back.
"Feel sicky and queer.  Don't let me faint before him."
"Here, hallo!  Barkins, don't turn like a great girl over a scratch-- lower his head down, boy.  That's the way.  He'll soon come round.  Ever see a wound dressed before?"
"No, sir," I said, repressing a shudder.
"Don't tease the boys, doctor," said Mr Reardon sharply; "get the wound dressed."
"Well, I am dressing it, arn't I?" said the doctor cheerily, and as if he enjoyed his task.  "I must draw the edges together first."
He had taken what seemed to be a pocket-book from his breast and laid it open, and as I looked on, feeling sick myself, I saw him really put in three or four stitches, and then strap up and bandage the wound, just as Barkins came to and looked about wonderingly.
"I didn't faint, did I?" he said anxiously.
The doctor laughed.
"There, lie down in your berth," he said.  "Let me help you."
He assisted my messmate gently enough, and then said laughingly--
"One can dress your wound without having three men to hold you.  I say, Reardon, isn't it waste of good surgical skill for me to be dressing the prisoners' wounds, if you folk are going to hang them?"
"I don't know that we are going to hang them," said the lieutenant quietly.  "Perhaps we shall deliver them over to the Chinese authorities at Wanghai."
"What?  My dear fellow, go and beg the captain to hang 'em at once out of their misery.  It will be a kindness.  Do you know what a Chinese prison is?"
"No."
"Then I do.  It would be a mercy to kill them."
"The Chinese authorities may wish to make an example of them so as to repress piracy."
"Let 'em make an example of some one else.  Eh?  Bandage too tight, my lad?"
"No, sir," said Barkins rather faintly.  "The wound hurts a good deal."
"Good sign; 'tis its nature to," said the doctor jocosely.
"But--er--you don't think, sir--"
"`That you may die after it,' as we used to say over cut fingers at school.  Bah! it's a nice clean honest cut, made with a sharp knife. Heal up like anything with your healthy young flesh."
"But don't these savage people sometimes poison their blades, sir?"
"Don't people who are wounded for the first time get all kinds of cock-and-bull notions into their heads, sir?  There, go to sleep and forget all about it.  Healthy smarting is what you feel.  Why, you'll be able to limp about the deck with a stick to-morrow."
"Do you mean it, sir?"
"Of course."
Barkins gave him a grateful look, and Mr Reardon shook hands, nodded, and left us to ourselves for a moment, then the doctor thrust in his head again.
"Here, lads," he said, "Smith's all right, I've made a capital job of his arm.  Your turn next, Herrick.  Good-bye."
This time we were left alone.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN.
A WILD-BEASTS' CAGE.
All doubts as to our next destination were set at rest the next morning, for it was generally known that we were making for Tsin-Tsin, at the mouth of the Great Fo river, where the prisoners were to be delivered over to the Chinese authorities.
I had been pretty busy all the morning with Barkins and Smith, going from one to the other, to sit with them and give them what news I could, both looking rather glum when I went away, for they were feverish and fretful from their wounds.  But I promised to return soon with news of the men, who were all together in a cool, well-ventilated part of the 'tween-decks, seeming restful and patient, the doctor having been round, and, in his short, decisive way, given them a few words of encouragement.
I saw their faces light up as I went down between the two rows in which they were laid, and stopped for a chat with those I knew best, about the way in which they had received their wounds, the coxswain of our boat being the most talkative.
"They all got it 'bout the same way, sir," he said.  "It all comes of trying to do the beggars a good turn.  Who'd ever have thought it, eh, sir?  Trying to save a fellow from drownding, and knives yer!"
They were all very eager to know what was to become of the prisoners, and upon my telling the poor fellows what I knew, I heard them giving their opinions to one another in a lying-down debate.
"Seems a pity," said one of the men.  "Takes all that there trouble, we does; captivates 'em; and then, 'stead o' having the right to hang 'em all decently at the yard-arm, we has to give 'em up to the teapots."
"How are you going to hang 'em decently?" said another voice.
"Reg'lar way, o' course, matey."
"Yah, who's going to do it?  British sailors don't want turning into Jack Ketches."
"'Course not," said a third.  "Shooting or cutting a fellow down in fair fight's one thing; taking prisoners and hanging on 'em arterwards, quite another pair o' shoes.  I says as the skipper's right."
"Hear, hear!" rose in chorus, and it seemed to be pretty generally agreed that we should be very glad to get rid of the savage brutes.
I was on my way back to where Smith lay, when I encountered the doctor, who gave me a friendly nod.
"At your service, Mr Herrick," he said, "when you want me; and, by the way, my lad, your messmate Barkins has got that idea in his head still, about the poisoned blade.  Try and laugh him out of it.  Thoughts like that hinder progress, and it is all nonsense.  His is a good, clean, healthy wound."
He passed on, looking very business-like, and his dresser followed, while I went on to see Smith.
"Good, clean, healthy wound!"  I said to myself; "I believe he takes delight in such things."
I turned back to look after him, but he was gone.
"Why, he has been to attend to the prisoners," I thought, and this set me thinking about them.  To think about them was to begin wishing to have a look at them, and to begin wishing was with me to walk forward to where they were confined, with a couple of marines on duty with loaded rifles and fixed bayonets.
The men challenged as I marched up.
"It's all right," I said.  "I only want to have a look at them."
"Can't pass, sir, without orders," said the man.
"But I'm an officer," I said testily.  "I'm not going to help them escape."
The marine grinned.
"No, sir, 'tain't likely; but we has strict orders.  You ask my mate, sir."
"Yes, sir; that's it, sir," said the other respectfully.
"What a bother!"  I cried impatiently.  "I only wanted to see how they looked."
"'Tain't my fault, sir; strict orders.  And they ain't very pretty to look at, sir, and it'd be 'most as safe to go in and see a box o' wild-beasts.  Doctor's been in this last hour doin' on 'em up, with depitty, and two on us inside at the `present' all the time.  They'd think nothing o' flying at him, and all the time he was taking as much pains with them as if they were some of our chaps.  They have give it to one another awful."
"Well, I am sorry," I said.  "I should have liked to see them."
"So'm I sorry, sir; I'd have let you in a minute, but you don't want to get me in a row, sir."
"Oh no, of course not," I said.
"My mate here says, sir--"
"Get out!  Hold your row," growled the other, protesting.
"Yes, what does he say?"  I cried eagerly.
"That if we was to shut 'em up close in the dark and not go anigh, sir, till to-morrow morning, there wouldn't be nothing left but one o' their tails."
"Like the Kilkenny cats, eh?"  I said, laughing; and I went back on deck with the desire to see the prisoners stronger than ever.
Captain Thwaites was on the quarter-deck, marching up and down, and the men were hard at work cleaning up, squaring the yards, and repainting. The spars were up in their places again, and the _Teaser_ was rapidly resuming her old aspect, when I saw Mr Reardon go up to the captain.
"I'll ask leave," I said.  "He has been pretty civil;" and I made up my mind to wait till the lieutenant came away.
"No, I won't," I said.  "I'll go and ask the captain when he has gone."
The next moment I felt that this would not do, for Mr Reardon would be sure to know, and feel vexed because I had not asked him.
"I'll go and ask leave while they are both together," I said to myself. "That's the way."
But I knew it wasn't, and took a turn up and down till I saw Mr Reardon salute and come away, looking very intent and busy.
I waited till he was pretty close, and then started to intercept him.
His keen eye was on me in an instant.
"Bless my soul, Mr Herrick!" he cried, "what are you doing?  Surely your duty does not bring you here?"
"No, sir," I said, saluting.  "I beg your pardon, sir; I've been going backward and forward to Mr Barkins and Mr Smith."
"Ho!  Pair of young noodles; what did they want in the boats?  Getting hurt like that.  Well?"
"Beg pardon, sir; would you mind giving me permission to see the prisoners?"
"What! why?"
"I wanted to see them, sir, and go back and tell my messmates about how they looked."
"Humbug!" he cried.  "Look here, sir, do you think I have nothing else to do but act as a wild-beast showman, to gratify your impertinent curiosity?  Let the miserable wretches be."
"Yes, sir."
"And be off to your cabin and study your navigation, sir.  Your ignorance of the simplest matters is fearful.  At your age you ought to be as well able to use a sextant as I am."
"Beg pardon, sir, I am trying."
"Then be off and try more, and let me see some results."
I touched my cap, drew back, and the lieutenant marched on.
"Jolly old bear!"  I muttered, looking exceedingly crestfallen.
"Herrick!" came sharply, and I ran up, for he was walking on, and I had to keep up with him.
"Yes, sir."
"You behaved very well yesterday.  I'm horribly busy.  Here, this way."
"Thank you, sir," I said, wondering what he was going to set me to do, and thinking that he might have given me the permission I asked.
"Now then, quick," he said; and, to my surprise, he led the way to the hatchway, went down, and then forward to where the two marines were on duty, ready to present arms to the officer who always seemed of far more importance in the ship than the captain.
"Let Mr Herrick pass in, marines," he said.  "Keep a sharp eye on your prisoners."
I gave him a look of thanks, and then felt disappointed again.
"Stop," he said; "fetch up two more men and a lantern, Herrick."
I gladly obeyed; and then the door was opened.  After a look in through the grating, and followed closely by three of the marines with their rifles ready, we walked in to where the prisoners were squatted upon their heels all round close up against the bulkheads, bandaged terribly about the faces and necks, and with their fierce eyes glowering at us.
I had expected to find them lying about like wounded men, but, bad as several were, they all occupied this sitting position, and glared at us in a way that told us very plainly how unsafe it would be to trust our lives in their keeping even for a minute.
"Beg pardon, sir," whispered the corporal of marines, who was carrying a lantern; "better be on the look-out."
"Oh yes," said Mr Reardon.  "We shall not stay.  I only wanted a look round.  Look sharp, Mr Herrick, and see what you want of them."
"Doctor was dressing that farthest chap's head, sir," whispered the corporal to me; "and as soon as he was about done, the fellow watched his chance and fixed his teeth in the dresser's arm, and wouldn't let go till--"
"Well?  Till what?" said Mr Reardon, gazing fixedly at the brutal countenance of one of the men right before us.
"We had to persuade him to let go."
"Humph!" ejaculated the lieutenant.  "Wild-beast."
"How did you persuade him?"  I whispered.
"With the butt-end of a rifle, sir; and then we had to wrench his teeth open with bayonets."
I looked round from face to face, all ghastly from their wounds, to see in every one a fierce pair of eyes glaring at me with undying hatred, and I was wondering how it was that people could think of the Chinese as being a calm, bland, good-humoured Eastern race, when Mr Reardon said to me--
"Nearly ready, Herrick?  The sight of these men completely takes away all compunction as to the way we treat them."
"Yes, sir; and it makes one feel glad that they are not armed."
"Ready to come away?"
"Yes, sir," I said; "quite."
"Come along, then."
He took a step towards the door, when the corporal said, "Beg pardon, sir; better back out."
"Eh? oh, nonsense!" said the lieutenant, without changing his position, while I, though I began to feel impressed with the glaring eyes, and to feel that the sooner we were out of the place the pleasanter it would be, thought that it would be rather undignified on the part of officers to show the wretches that we were afraid of them.
Just then Mr Reardon glanced sidewise to where one of the men on our left crouched near the door, and said quickly--
"The surgeon saw all these men this morning?"
"Yes, sir," said the corporal, "not half an hour ago."
"He must be fetched to that man.  The poor wretch is ready to faint."
"Yes, sir; he shall be fetched."
Mr Reardon bent down to look at the prisoner more closely.
"Hold the lantern nearer," he said.
The corporal lowered the light, which shone on the pirate's glassy eyes, and there was a fixed look in his savage features which was very horrible.
"Get some water for him," said Mr Reardon.
But hardly had the words left his lips when I was conscious of a rushing sound behind me.  I was dashed sidewise, and one of the prisoners, who had made a tremendous spring, alighted on the lieutenant's back, driving him forward as I heard the sound of a blow; the corporal was driven sidewise too, and the lantern fell from his hand.  Then came a terrible shriek, and a scuffling, struggling sound, a part of which I helped to make, for I had been driven against one of the prisoners, who seized me, and as I wrestled with him I felt his hot breath upon my face, and his hands scuffling about to get a tight grip of my throat.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN.
THE SEQUEL.
If ever I was active it was at that moment.  I struck out with my clenched fists, throwing all the power I possessed into my blows, and fortunately for me--a mere boy in the grasp of a heavily-built man--he was comparatively, powerless from loss of blood consequent upon his wounds, so that I was able to wrest myself free, and stand erect.
At that moment the corporal recovered the lantern, and held it up, showing that fully half the prisoners had left the spots where they were crouching the minute before, and were making an effort to join in the fray initiated by one of the savages of whom we had been warned.
It is all very horrible to write of, but I am telling a simple story in this log of what takes place in warfare, when men of our army and navy contend with the uncivilised enemies of other lands.  In this case we were encountering a gang of bloodthirsty wretches, whose whole career had been one of rapine and destruction.  The desire seemed to be innate to kill, and this man, a prisoner, who since he had been taken had received nothing but kindness and attention, had been patiently watching for the opportunity which came at last.  Just as Mr Reardon was stooping to attend to his fellow-prisoner, he had made a tremendous cat-like bound, driving me sidewise as he alighted on Mr Reardon's back, making at the same time a would-be deadly stroke with a small knife he had managed to keep hidden in the folds of his cotton jacket.
As I rose up I could see the knife sticking in the lieutenant's shoulder, apparently driven sidewise into his neck, while he was standing with his eyes dilated, looking in horror at his assailant, who now lay back, quivering in the agonies of death, literally pinned down to the deck.
My brain swam, and for a few moments everything looked misty, but that horrid sight forced itself upon me, and I felt as if I must stare hard at the pirate, where he lay bayoneted and held down at the end of the rifle by the strong arms of the marine sentry, who was pressing with all his might upon the stock.
The struggling went on for a few moments, then grew less and less violent, while a low hissing sound came from the prisoners around.  Then the quivering entirely ceased, and the marine gave his bayonet a twist, and dragged it out of the wretch's chest, throwing himself back into position to strike again, should it be necessary.  But the last breath had passed the pirate's lips; and, while the sentry drew back to his place by one side of the door and stood ready, his comrade fell back to the other, and the corporal and the fourth man seized the pirate, and rapidly drew him forth through the doorway; we followed, the place was closed and fastened, and I stood panting, as if I had been running hard, and could not recover my breath.
The next moment I was clinging to Mr Reardon, trying to hold him up, but he misinterpreted my action, and seized and gave me a rough shake.
"Don't, boy," he cried in an angry, excited tone.  "Stand up; be a man."
"Yes, yes," I gasped; "but quick, corporal! never mind--that wretch-- run--the doctor--fetch Mr Price."
"Bah!" cried Mr Reardon roughly, and trying to hide his own agitation, "the man's dead."
I stared at him in horror.
"He don't know!"  I gasped.  "Mr Reardon--sit--lie--lay him down, my lads.  Don't you know you are badly hurt?"
"I! hurt?" he cried.  "No; I felt him hit me, but it was nothing."
I reached up my trembling hand, but he caught it as it touched his shoulder, and was in the act of snatching it away, when his own came in contact with the handle of the knife.
"Great heavens!" he ejaculated, as he drew it forth from where it was sticking through the stiff collar of his coat; "right through from side to side--what a narrow escape!"
"I--I thought he had killed you," I cried faintly, and a deathly sensation made me feel for the moment as if I must fall.
"No, not a scratch," he said firmly now.  "A little memento," he muttered, as he took out his handkerchief and wrapped it round the blade before thrusting the knife in his breast-pocket.  "I must keep that for my private museum, Herrick.  Here, my lads, throw something over that wretch.  Sentry, I'll talk to you later on.  You saved my life."
"Officer's orders, sir," said the man, looking uncomfortable and stiff as he drew himself up.
"What, to save my life?" said Mr Reardon, smiling, and trying to look as if everything had been part of the ordinary business of life.
"No, sir; to keep my eye on the Chinees.  I had mine on that chap, for he looked ugly at you, and I see him pull himself together, shuffle in his blue jacket, and then make a jump at you, just like a cat at a rat."
"What?"
"Beg pardon, sir," said the man awkwardly; "I don't mean to say as you looked like a rat."
"I hope not, my lad."
"I meant him jumping like a cat."
"Yes; and you saw him springing at me?"
"Yes, sir."
"Well, what then?"
"Only bayonet practice, sir--point from guard, and he came right on it."
"Yes?"
"Then I held him down, sir."
I saw Mr Reardon shudder slightly.
"That will do, sentry," he said shortly.  "I will see you another time. Come, Mr Herrick."
I followed him on deck, and saw him take off his cap and wipe his forehead, but he turned consciously to see if I was looking.
"Rather warm below," he said drily.  "I'd better have kept to my first answer to you, my lad.  You see it's dangerous to go into a wild-beasts' cage."
"Yes, sir, I'm very sorry," I said; then, anxiously, "But you are sure you are not hurt, sir?"
"Tut, tut!  I told you no, boy.  There, there, I don't mean that.  Not even scratched, Mr Herrick.  You can go to your messmates now with an adventure to tell them," he added, smiling; "only don't dress it up into a highly-coloured story, about how your superior officer relaxed the strict rules of dishipline; do you hear?"
"Yes, sir, I hear," I said, and I left him going to join the captain, while I went down and told Barkins what had been going on, but I had not been talking to him five minutes before I heard a heavy splash as if something had been thrown over the side.
"What's that?" said Barkins, turning pale.
I did not answer.
"Sounds like burying some one," he whispered.  "Don't say poor old Blacksmith has gone?"
"No no," I said.  "I know what it is.  Wait till I've told you all I have to tell, and then you'll know too."
He looked at me wonderingly, and I completed my account of the scene in the black-hole place.
"Oh, I see," he cried; "it was the Chinaman?"
I nodded carelessly, but I felt more serious than ever before in my life, at this horrible sequel to a fearful scene.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN.
A DISAPPOINTMENT.
"Very jolly for you," said Barkins, as we cast anchor off Tsin-Tsin a couple of mornings later.  "You'll be going ashore and enjoying yourself, while I'm condemned to hobble on deck with a stick."
"I say, don't grumble," I cried.  "Look how beautiful the place seems in the sunshine."
"Oh yes, it looks right enough; but wait till you go along the narrow streets, and get some of the smells."
"Hear that, Smithy?"  I said to our comrade, who was lying in his berth. "Grumbles because he can't go ashore, and then begins making out how bad it is.  How about the fox and the grapes?"
"If you call me fox, my lad, I'll give you sour grapes when I get better.  Where's your glass?"
I took down my telescope, adjusted it for him, and pushed his seat nearer to the open window, so that he could examine the bright-looking city, with the blue plum-bloom tinted mountains behind covered with dense forest, and at the shipping of all nations lying at the mouth of the river.
"S'pose that tower's made of crockery, isn't it?" said Barkins, whose eye was at the end of the telescope.
I looked at the beautiful object, with its pagoda-like terraces and hanging bells, and then at the various temples nestling high up on the sides of the hills beyond.
"I say," said Smith, "can't you tell Mr Reardon--no, get the doctor to tell him--that I ought to be taken ashore for a bit to do me good?"
"I'll ask him to let you go," I said; but Smith shook his head, and then screwed up his white face with a horrible look of disgust.
"Oh, what a shame!" he cried.  "He gets all the luck;" for a message came for me to be ready directly to go ashore with the captain in the longboat.
It meant best uniform, for the weather was fine, and I knew that he would be going to pay a visit to some grand mandarin.
I was quite right; for, when I reached the deck a few minutes later, there was Mr Brooke with the boat's crew, all picked men, and a strong guard of marines in full plumage for his escort.
The captain came out of his cabin soon after, with cocked hat and gold lace glistening, and away we went for the shore soon after; the last things I saw on the _Teaser_ being the two disconsolate faces of my messmates at the cabin window, and Ching perched up on the hammock-rail watching our departure.
I anticipated plenty of excitement that day, but was doomed to disappointment.  I thought I should go with the escort to the mandarin's palace, but Mr Brooke was considered to be more attractive, I suppose, and I had the mortification of seeing the captain and his escort of marines and Jacks land, while I had to stay with the boat-keepers to broil in the sunshine and make the best of it, watching the busy traffic on the great river.
Distance lends enchantment to the view of a Chinese city undoubtedly, and before long we were quite satiated with the narrow limits of our close-in view, as well as with the near presence of the crowd of rough-looking fellows who hung about and stared, as I thought, rather contemptuously at the junior officer in Her Majesty's service, who was feeling the thwarts of the boat and the hilt of his dirk most uncomfortably hot.
"Like me to go ashore, sir, to that Chinesy sweetstuff shop, to get you one o' their sweet cool drinks, sir?" said one of the men, after we had sat there roasting for some time.
"No, thank you, Tom Jecks," I said, in as sarcastic a tone as I could assume.  "Mr Barkins says you are such a forgetful fellow, and you mightn't come back before the captain."
There was a low chuckling laugh at this, and then came a loud rap.
"What's that?"  I said sharply.
"This here, sir," said another of the men.  "Some 'un's been kind enough to send it.  Shall I give it him back?"
"No, no!"  I cried, looking uneasily shoreward; and at that moment a stone, as large as the one previously sent, struck me a sharp blow on the leg.
"They're a-making cockshies of us, sir," said Tom Jecks; "better let two of us go ashore and chivvy 'em off."
"Sit still, man, and--"
_Whop_!
"Oh, scissors!" cried a sailor; "who's to sit still, sir, when he gets a squad on the back like that?  Why, I shall have a bruise as big as a hen's egg."
"Oars! push off!"  I said shortly, as half-a-dozen stones came rattling into the boat; and as we began to move away from the wharf quite a burst of triumphant yells accompanied a shower of stones and refuse.
"That's their way o' showing how werry much obliged they are to us for sinking the pirates," growled Tom Jecks.  "Oh, don't I wish we had orders to bombard this blessed town!  Go it!  That didn't hit you, did it, sir?"
"No, it only brushed my cap," I said, as the stones began to come more thickly, and the shouting told of the keen delight the mob enjoyed in making the English retreat.  "Pull away, my lads, and throw the grapnel over as soon as we are out of reach."
"But we don't want to pull away, sir.  They thinks we're fear'd on 'em. There's about a hundred on 'em--dirty yaller-faced beggars, and there's four o' us, without counting you.  Just you give the word, sir, and we'll row back in spite o' their stones, and make the whole gang on 'em run.  Eh, mates?"
"Ay, ay!" said the others, lying on their oars.
"Pull!"  I cried sharply, and they began rowing again; for though I should have liked to give the word, I knew that it would not only have been madness, but disobedience of orders.  My duty was to take care of the boat, and this I was doing by having it rowed out beyond stone-throwing reach, with the Union Jack waving astern; and as soon as the stones fell short, and only splashed the water yards away, I had the grapnel dropped overboard, and we swung to it, waiting for the captain's return.
The men sat chewing their tobacco, lolling in the sun, and I lay back watching the crowd at the edge of the water, wondering how long the captain and his escort would be, and whether the prisoners would be given up.
"Hope none o' them pigtailed varmint won't shy mud at the skipper," said one of the men, yawning.
"I hope they will," said Tom Jecks.
"Why, mate?"
"'Cause he'll order the jollies to fix bayonets and feel some o' their backs with the p'ints."
The conversation interested me, and I forgot my dignity as an officer, and joined in.
"Bayonets make bad wounds, Jecks," I said.
"Yes, sir, they do; nasty three-side wounds, as is bad to get healed up again.  They aren't half such a nice honest weapon as a cutlash.  But I should like to see them beggars get a prod or two."
"It might mean trouble, Jecks, and a big rising of the people against the English merchants and residents."
"Well, sir, that would be unpleasant for the time, but look at the good it would do!  The British consul would send off to the _Teaser_, the skipper would land a lot on us--Jacks and jollies; we should give these warmint a good sharp dressing-down; and they'd know as we wouldn't stand any of their nonsense, and leave off chucking stones and mud at us. Now, what had we done that we couldn't be 'lowed to lie alongside o' the wharf yonder?  We didn't say nothing to them.  Fact is, sir, they hates the British, and thinks they're a sooperior kind o' people altogether. Do you hear, mates?--sooperior kind o' people; and there ain't one as could use a knife and fork like a Chrishtian."
"And goes birds'-nestin' when they wants soup," said another.
"Well, I don't fall foul o' that, matey," said Jecks; "'cause where there's nests there's eggs, and a good noo-laid egg ain't bad meat. It's the nastiness o' their natur' that comes in there, and makes 'em eat the nest as well.  What I do holler at, is their cooking dog."
"And cat," said another.
"And rat," cried the third.
"Yes, all on 'em," said Jecks; "and I don't want to use strong language afore one's orficer, who's a young gent as is allers thoughtful about his men, and who's beginning to think now, that with the sun so precious hot he'll be obliged to order us ashore soon for a drop o' suthin' to drink."
I laughed, and Tom Jecks chuckled.
"But what I do say about their eatin' and cookin' is this, and I stands by what I says, it's beastly, that's what it is--it's beastly!"
"Ay, ay," was chorussed, "so it is;" and then there was silence, while we all sat uneasily in the broiling sun.
"Wish I was a gal," growled one of the men at last.
"Ain't good-looking enough, matey," said Jecks.  "Why?"
"'Cause then I s'ould have a sunshade to put up."
"Ay, 'tis warm--brylin', as you may say.  Any on you know whether the Chinese is cannibals?  You know, sir?"
"I have heard that they cook very strange things now and then," I said, laughing.
"Then they is," said Jecks; "and that being so, they'll have a fine chance to-day.  Hadn't you better send word to some on 'em to lay the cloth, sir?"
"What for?"
"'Cause I'm nearly done, sir; and Billy Wakes looks quite.  Billy ought to eat nice and joocy, messmates."
"And old Tom Jecks tough as leather," cried Wakes.
"That's so, matey," growled Jecks, who began to pass his tongue over his lips, and to make a smacking sound with his mouth.
"My hye, matey, you do seem hungry," said one of the others.  "Look out, Billy, or he won't leave John Chinaman a taste."
"Get out!" growled Jecks; "that don't mean hungry, messmate--that means dry.  Beg pardon, sir, we won't none on us try to slope off; but a good drink o' suthin', if it was on'y water, would be a blessin' in disguise just now."
"Yes, Jecks, I'm thirsty too," I said.
"Then why not let us pull ashore, sir, and get a drink at one o' them Chinee imitation grog-shops yonder?"
"Because it would be a breach of discipline, my man," I said, trying to speak very sternly.  "I should look nice if the captain came back and found me with the boat and no men."
"Hark at that now!" cried Jecks.  "Just as if we'd be the chaps to get a good-natured kind young orficer into a scrape.  Look here, sir, put Billy Wakes ashore to go and fetch some drink.  My hye, what we would give for half-a-gallon o' real good cool solid old English beer."
"Ha!" came in a deep sigh, and I could not help feeling that a glass just then would be very nice.
"Will you give the order, sir?" said Jecks insinuatingly.  "Billy Wakes is a werry trustworthy sort of chap."
"Yes," I said; "but he'd forget to come back, and then I should have to send you to find him, and then the others to find you.  I know.  There, you can light your pipes if you like."
"And werry thankful for small mussies," said the old sailor, taking out his pipe.  "You won't want no matches, lads.  Fill up and hold the bowls in the sun."
They lit up, and began smoking, while I watched the long narrow street down which the captain and his escort must come.
"Think we shall have to land the prisoners, sir?" said Jecks, after a smoky silence.
"I suppose so," I replied.  "I expect that is what the captain has gone ashore about."
"Don't seem much good, that, sir.  We takes 'em, and they'll let 'em go, to start a fresh lot o' plundering junks."
"Thundering junks, matey?" said Billy Wakes.
"I said plundering, Billy, and meant it.  Your eddication ain't what it oughter be."
"No, Jecks," I said; "if the pirates are given up, they'll be executed for certain."
"Who says so, sir?"
"First lieutenant," I said.
"Well, he ought to know, sir.  Been on the Chinee station afore.  P'raps it's best, but I don't want 'em to be hung."
"Don't hang 'em here, Tommy," growled one of the two silent men.
"What do they do, then, old know-all?"
"Chops their heads off, I've heerd."
"Oh, well, I don't want 'em to have their heads chopped off.  How should we like it if we was took prisoners?"
"Oh, but we arn't Chinees," growled Billy Wakes.
"Nor arn't likely to be, mate; but we've got heads all the same.  I know how I should like to be executed if it was to-day."
The others looked up, and I could not help turning my head at the strangely-expressed desire.
"I'll tell yer," said Jecks, looking hard at me.  "I should like it to be same as they did that young chap as we reads of in history.  They drowned him in a big tub o' wine."
"Grog would do for me," said Billy Wakes.
"Or beer," cried the others.
"Ask the captain to let you have some tea," I cried, "Quick, haul up the grapnel!  Here they come!"
Pipes were knocked out on the instant, the grapnel hauled up, and oars seized; but, in spite of urging on the men, I saw to my vexation that the captain had reached the landing-place first, and I kept him waiting nearly five minutes in the broiling sun.
He did not say anything, only glared at me as he stepped in, followed by his escort.  The oars were dropped, and, as we began to row back to the _Teaser_, I saw that his face was scarlet with the heat, and he looked in a regular temper.
"I shall catch it," I thought to myself; but the very next moment my attention was taken to the shore, where a yell of derision arose from the crowd gathered to see the officers embark.
"Brutes!" muttered the captain; and then he sprang up in a rage, for a shower of stones came pattering into the boat, and splashing up the water all round.
He was so enraged by the insult, that he ordered the marines to load, and a volley of twelve rifles was fired over the people's heads.
The result was that they all ran helter-skelter, tumbling over each other, and by the time they returned and began throwing again we were out of their reach, but they kept on hurling stones and refuse all the same, and shouting "Foreign devils!" in their own tongue.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN.
AN INTERVIEW.
"Mr Herrick!  Come to my cabin," said the captain as he stepped on deck, and I followed him.
"You stupid fellow," whispered Mr Brooke as I passed him, "why didn't you keep the boat by the wharf?"
I gave him a comical look, and followed the captain; but I was kept waiting for a few moments at the door while the servant was summoned, and when I did go in my officer was lying back in his chair, with ice on the table, and a great glass of what seemed to be soda-water and brandy before him, but which proved by the decanter to be sherry.
"Oh," he cried angrily, "there you are, sir!  Why didn't you come at once, sir?"
"I did, sir; but was kept waiting till you were ready."
"Well, sir, don't answer in that pert way.  It sounds like insolence. That will not do, Mr Herrick, if you wish to get on in your profession. Now, sir, your orders were to stop by the landing-place, with the boat in charge, ready for my return, were they not?"
"Yes, sir; but--"
"Silence, sir!  How dare you interrupt me?  I go up through the broiling heat to have an interview with that wretched, stolid, obstinate mandarin, with his confounded button and peacock-feather; and when I do get back, perfectly exhausted by the heat, half-dead, I find no boat."
"No, sir; but--"
"Silence, sir!  Will you let me speak?  The consequence is that, because you choose to disobey orders, and take the men off to indulge in some of the disgusting drinks of this wretched country--"
"I beg pardon, sir," I cried; "I--"
"Mr Herrick! am I to place you under arrest?  Be silent, sir.  I say, I return with my escort from an important diplomatic visit, arranged so as to impress the people, and when I return, almost fainting with the heat, there is no boat, because you have allowed the men to impose upon you; and you are away drinking with them, I suppose?"
"No, sir; I--"
"Mr Herrick!" he roared, "I will not bear it.  I say there was no boat; and not only am I forced to submit to the indignity of waiting, and listening to the gibes of the low-class Chinese, and to see their scowls, but our delay there--through you, sir--results, I say results, in the miserable wretches taking advantage thereof, and, thinking me helpless, working themselves up to an attack.  When at last you do come crawling up with those four men, they are purple-faced from drinking, every one threatened by apoplexy--why, your own face is crimson, sir; and I could smell the men when I stepped on board."
"No, sir--the dirty harbour, sir," I said.  "Smells horrid."
"You are under arrest, sir.  Go!  No; stop and hear me out first, sir. I say that, through your delay, I am kept there on that wretched wharf; and when I do push off, I have--I, Her Majesty's representative, in the sight of these Chinese scoundrels--I have, I say, to suffer from the insult and contumely of being pelted, stoned, of having filth thrown at me.  Look at my nearly new uniform coat, sir.  Do you see this spot on the sleeve?  A mark that will never come out.  That was a blow, sir, made by a disgusting rotten fish's head, sir.  Loathsome--loathsome! While the insult to Her Majesty's flag called upon me to fire upon the mob.  Do you know what that means, sir?"
"Yes, sir; a good lesson.  They won't be so saucy again."
"You ignorant young puppy!" he cried; "it may mean a serious international trouble--a diplomatic breach, and all through you.  There, I was hot and bad enough before, now you have made me worse."
He stretched out his hand for the glass, but did not drink; and the sight of the cool liquid half-maddened me, for the heat and emotion had made my throat very dry.
"Now, sir," he cried, "I am your commanding officer, and no one on board Her Majesty's cruiser shall ever say that I am not just.  Now then, speak out; what have you to say?  How came you to let the men go away to drink?"
"I didn't, sir," I said huskily.  "They wanted to go, for they were choking nearly, but I wouldn't let them."
"What?  Don't seek refuge in a lie, boy.  That's making your fault ten times worse.  Didn't I see you returning to the wharf?"
"Yes, sir," I cried indignantly; "but the men had not been to drink."
"Then how dared you disobey my orders, and go away?" he roared, furious at being proved wrong.
"I went, sir, because it was my duty."
"What!"
"We stayed till the stone-throwing grew dangerous for us, and then I had the boat rowed out and anchored."
"Oh!"
"But I kept watch till you came in sight, sir; and we were as quick as we could be."
"The mob pelted you too, Mr Herrick?"
"Yes, sir," I said; "and we couldn't fire over their heads, nor yet row right away."
He looked at me angrily, and then his countenance changed.
"Pert, Mr Herrick," he said, "but very apt.  You have me there on the hop.  Dear me!  I've made a great mistake, eh?"
"Yes, sir," I said hoarsely.
"And you sat out there in the broiling sun, and the miserable savages pelted you as they did me?"
"Yes, sir."
"Tut, tut, tut! and the heat was maddening.  Terribly irritating, too; I felt excessively angry.  I really--dear me, Mr Herrick, I'm afraid I spoke very unjustly to you, and--I--ought a captain to apologise to a midshipman?"
"I really don't know, sir," I said, feeling quite mollified by his tone.
"Well, I think I do," he said, smiling.  "Decidedly not.  As Mr Reardon would say, it would be totally subversive of discipline.  It couldn't be done.  But one gentleman can of course apologise to another, and I do so most heartily.  My dear Mr Herrick, I beg your pardon for being so unjust."
"Pray don't say any more about it, sir," I cried.
"Well, no, I will not.  But all the same I am very sorry--as a gentleman--that I--as your superior officer--spoke to you as I did."
"Thank you, sir."
"And, dear me, my lad, you look terribly hot and exhausted.  Let me prescribe, as Mr Price would say."
He quickly placed a lump of ice in a tumbler, and, after pouring in a little sherry, filled it up with soda-water.
I grasped the glass, and drank with avidity the cool, refreshing draught to the last drop.
"Humph! you were thirsty."
"I was choking, sir," I said, with a sigh, as I placed the glass upon the table.
"And now, Mr Herrick, perhaps it would be as well not to talk about this little interview," he said quietly.  "I rely upon you as a gentleman."
"Of course, sir," I replied; and feeling, in spite of the severe wigging I had had, that I never liked the captain half so well before, I backed out and hurried to my own cabin.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.
WE LOSE OUR PRISONERS.
"Here he is," cried Barkins, who was resting his leg; while Smith was sitting by the open window so as to catch all the air he could.  "Got your promotion?"
"Got my what?"  I cried.
"Promotion.  I never saw such favouritism.  Always being sent for to the skipper's cabin.  I wonder Reardon stands it."
"Don't talk nonsense," I cried.  "Phew, isn't it hot?"
"Yes, for us.  Regular prisoners, while you have all the fun--"
"Of being roasted, and then stoned by the Chinese."
"That's right," said Smith sulkily, "make as little as you can of it. Did the skipper consult you about our next movement?"
"He gave me a good bullying for not having the boat ready when he wanted to come on board."
"Was that why you went in the cabin?" cried Barkins.
"Of course."
"Oh then, if that's the case, we'll let you off.  Eh, Blacksmith?"
"Well, I suppose so."
"Let me off what?"
"We had been discussing the matter," said Barkins, "Smithy and I, and come to the conclusion that as you were such a swell you were too good for us, and we were going to expel you; but, under the circumstances, I think we'll let you off this time.  Oh!"
"What's the matter?"
"My leg!  There's that horrible tingling and aching again.  I'm sure that knife was poisoned."
"Hi! look here," cried Smith just then; "here are two big row-boats coming out to us."
We both made for the window, and there, in the bright sunshine, were two large barges, gay with gilding and showy ensigns, coming pretty swiftly in our direction, while, as they drew nearer, we could see that their occupants were in brilliant costumes and fully-armed, swords and spears flashing, and gold and silver embroidery lending their glow to the general effect.
"Why, those must be all the big pots of the city," said Barkins--"these in the first boat."
"And the second is full of soldiers."
"I know," I cried; "they're coming to fetch the prisoners.  I must go on deck."
"And we shall see nothing of the fun again," cried Barkins.
"Why not?"  I said; "I'll help you on deck."
"Come on, then," cried Barkins eagerly.  "Oh, hang this wound!"
He caught hold of my shoulder, and with a little pulling and hauling I got him on deck, hurting him a good deal, I'm afraid, but he bore it like a martyr, till I had him seated upon a place near the starboard gangway.
I then turned to go and help up Smith, but found he had called in the aid of a couple of the sailors, and the next minute he too was seated by Barkins.
Meanwhile the drum had called the men to quarters, the officers were on deck in uniform, and the marines drawn-up to form a guard of honour, sufficiently smart and warlike, with the white-ducked Jacks, and big guns bright as hands could make them, to impress the barbaric party coming on board.
The boats were rowing very near now, and the captain came on deck, to stand under the awning which had been stretched out since the _Teaser_ had been restored to order.  Then the gangway was opened, the steps were lowered, and half-a-dozen Jacks descended to help the visitors to mount, while the marines stood at attention.
The boatmen managed to fall foul of the side, and nearly upset the barge, but our lads saved them from that disaster; and the mandarin and his suite, who had come off, soon mounted to the deck, to stand haughtily returning the salutes of the officers.
Then there was an awkward pause, for our officers only knew a few words of Chinese, while the mandarin's party, although they had had Englishmen in their city for nearly a hundred years, could not speak a word of our tongue, and they had brought no interpreter.
There was an awkward pause, broken by a high-pitched voice just outside the gorgeous-looking throng.
"You wantee Ching?"
"Yes," cried the captain; "tell these gentlemen that they are heartily welcome on board Her Majesty's ship."
Ching nodded, and, bowing down humbly, gazed at the white deck, and squeaked out a long speech to the contemptuous-looking Chinese official, who stood in front of his attendants, each in his long, stiff, embroidered silk dressing-gown; and what seemed the most comically effeminate was that the gorgeous officers, with rat-tail moustachios and armed with monstrous swords, each carried a fan, which he used constantly.
"He's putting an awful lot of fat in the captain's speech," whispered Barkins, who was just behind me.
Then the chief of the party said a few words, without condescending to notice the interpreter, and Ching backed away, to turn to the captain.
"His most noble excellency the big-buttoned mandalin has come on board the gleat fine ship with his genelals, and blavest of the blave, to fetch the most wicked and double-bad plisoners whom the gleat sea captain of the foleign devils--"
"Eh! what?" said Captain Thwaites.  "Did he say that?"
"Yes.  Come fetch allee bad bad plisoners velly much all together."
"Very well," said the captain; "tell him he can have them, and welcome."
Ching approached the mandarin again, in his former humble form, and made another long speech; after which the great official turned to one of his attendants and said something; this gorgeous being turned and spoke to another; and he went to the gangway and stood fanning himself as he squeaked out something to the soldiers in the second boat.
Then an order was given, and in a curious shambling way about forty soldiers came up the steps, and ranged themselves in a double row, something after the fashion of our drilling.
I was watching these men with their heavy swords and clumsy spears, when there was a clanking sound, and a dozen more men came on deck with quite a load of heavy chains, which at a word of command they banged down with a crash upon the deck, and then stood waiting.
At the same moment the captain gave an order, and our marine officer marched off with a strong detachment of his men right forward; and after a pause, during which Englishmen and Chinamen stood staring at each other and the grandees used their fans, the first prisoner was brought forward by a couple of marines, strolling along in a heavy, careless way till he was abreast of his fellow-countrymen.
Then at a word from an officer four soldiers seized the unfortunate wretch and threw him heavily down upon his face; two knelt upon him, and in a trice heavy chains were fitted to his legs and wrists, the latter being dragged behind his back.  Then, by one consent, the four Chinamen leaped up, and waited for the prisoner to follow their example, but he lay still.
"If he has any gumption he won't move," whispered Barkins, who like myself was an interested spectator.
Mr Reardon walked to us.
"Silence, young gentlemen," he said sternly.  "Let us show these barbarians what dishipline is.--Brute!"
This last applied to one of the Chinamen, who said something to the prisoner, who merely wagged his tail, and then received a tremendous kick in the ribs.
He sprang up then like a wild-beast, but he was seized by as many as could get a grip of him, bundled to the gangway, and almost thrown down into the barge, where other men seized him and dragged him forward to where some spearmen stood ready on guard.
By this time another had been thrown down and chained.  He made no scruple about rising and walking to the side to be bundled down.
Another followed, and another, the grandees hardly glancing at what was going on, but standing coolly indifferent and fanning away, now and then making some remark about the ship, the guns, or the crew.
Seven had been chained, and the eighth was brought forward by two marines, seized, thrown down, and fettered.  Then, instead of allowing himself to be bundled into the boat as apathetically as the others, he gazed fiercely to right and left, and I saw that something was coming.
So did the indifferent-looking Chinese, for one of the most gorgeously dressed of the party whipped out a heavy curved sword, whose blade was broader at the end than near the hilt, and made for him; but, active as a cat, and in spite of the weight of his chains, the man made a series of bounds, knocked over two of the soldiers, and leaped at the gangway behind them, reached the top, and fell more than jumped over, to go down into the water with a heavy splash.
Half-a-dozen of the men leaped on to the rail, and stood looking down, before the captain could give an order; while a few words were shouted from the barge below.
The officer returned his sword, and began fanning himself again; the soldiers seized the next prisoner and began chaining him, but no one stirred to save the man overboard, and we all grasped the reason why,-- twenty pounds of iron fetters took him to the bottom like a stone.
I saw the captain frown as he said something to Mr Reardon, who merely shook his head.
"Ain't they going to lower a boat, sir?"  I whispered to Mr Brooke.
"We could do no good," he said.  "There are twenty fathoms of water out there, Herrick, and the man could not rise."
The incident did not seem to discompose the Chinese, who disposed of the next prisoner.  And then I saw that the marines had charge of another, who suddenly made an attempt to escape, and our men only having one hand, at liberty, the other holding a rifle, he would have succeeded, had not six or seven of the soldiers rushed at and seized him, dragging him to the lessening heap of chains, when he suddenly threw up his hands and dropped upon his knees, throwing them off their guard by making believe to resign himself to his fate.
But before the first fetter could be dragged to where he knelt, he sprang up with the fire of fury in his eyes, and made a rush at the mandarin, seized him, and it would have gone ill with his gaudy costume, had not a couple of the officers dragged out their swords.
What followed took only a moment or two.  I saw the blades flash, heard a sickening sound, and saw the prisoner stagger away, while the second of the two officers followed him, delivering chop after chop with his heavy blade, till the unfortunate wretch dropped upon the deck, where he was at once seized and pitched overboard without the slightest compunction.
"Here, interpreter, tell the chief I cannot have my deck turned into a butcher's shamble like this," cried the captain angrily.
Ching shuffled forward, and advanced towards the mandarin, spoke at length; the mandarin replied with a haughty smile, and Ching backed away again.
"Gleat big-button mandalin say he velly much 'blige captain big fine ship, and he allee light, no hurtee 'tall by killee badee bad men."
"Bah!" ejaculated the captain, turning angrily away; and I saw Mr Reardon's face grow fixed, as if carved in wood, in his efforts to keep from smiling.
The last of the prisoners had been brought out of confinement, thrown down, chained, and bundled into the barge, half the soldiers followed, orders were given, and the second barge pushed off, when the captain once more had recourse to Ching's help.
"Ask the mandarin if he will come into the cabin and take a glass of wine."
But this was declined, and Ching communicated the fact that the great man "would not eatee dlinkee, but wantee velly much see ship."
He was taken round, the whole following keeping at his heels, and his officers and soldiers scowling fiercely, or looking about with supreme contempt, as they made a great display of their weapons, and acted generally as if they were condescending to look round, so as to be civil to the Western barbarians.
At last they went over the side, and the gorgeous barge was rowed away.
"Thank goodness, Reardon," I heard the captain say; and directly after, as I was passing, Tom Jecks' voice was heard in the midst of a group of the Jacks.
"Say, messmate," he said, "fancy, stripped and fists only, how many Chinese could you polish off?"
"Dunno," said a voice, which I knew to be that of Billy Wakes, a big manly-looking young Plymouth fellow.  "'Course I could do one, and I think I could doctor two on 'em; I'd have a try at three; and I'm blest if I'd run away from four.  That is about as fair as I can put it, messmate."
I was helping Barkins to the companion-way, and Smith was walking very slowly by us.  But as we heard this we stopped to laugh, just as Mr Brooke came up and asked what amused us.  We told him, and he laughed too.
"That means one of our fellows would try at four Chinamen.  He's too modest.  Four to one, lads! why, if it came to real righting, ten of them would follow me against a hundred of the enemy.  Ten to one.--News for you."
"News, sir; what?"  I said.
"We sail again directly.  There is another gang at work south, and we have a hint of the whereabouts of their nest."
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.
IN A TRAP.
"Ever feel at all uncomfortable about--that--Chinaman, Morris?"  I said one day, after we had been coasting along the shore southward for about a week.  I had not encountered that marine sentry alone since the terrible scene in the place where the prisoners were confined; and now, as soon as I saw him, the whole affair came back with all its shuddering horrors, and I felt quite a morbid desire to talk to him about it.
"What, bayoneting him, sir?" said the man quietly.  "Well, no, sir, it's very odd, but I never have much.  I was so excited when I see him with his knife ashining by the light o' the corporal's lantern, that all the bayonet practice come to me quite natural like, and, as you know, I give point from the guard, and he jumped right on it, and I held him down after as you would a savage kind of tiger thing, and felt quite pleased like at having saved the first luff's life.  After you'd gone all the lads got talking about it, and I felt as proud as a peacock with ten tails.  And I got wondering, too, about what Mr Reardon would do, for he said he would see me again.  It was all very well then, but that night when I turned in I felt quite sick, and I couldn't sleep a wink. The more I turned about in my hammock, the hotter and worser I got. There it all was before me, I could see myself holding that pirate chap pinned down, and there was his eyes rolling and his teeth snapping as he twisted about.  Ugh! it was horrid, sir; and I felt as I was in for it, and began to understand what one has read about chaps as commits murder always being haunted like with thoughts of what they've done, and never being happy no more.  Then it got worse and worse, and I says to myself, `If it was as bad as that for just doing your duty, and saving your officer's life, what must it be when you kills a man out o' sheer wickedness to get his money?'"
The man stopped then, and looked round to see if any one was within hearing, but we were quite alone, and he went on quietly--
"You won't laugh at me, sir, will you?"
"Laugh?"  I cried wonderingly.  "It's too horrible to laugh about."
"Yes, sir; but I meant, feel ready to chaff about it, and tell the other young gentlemen, and get thinking me soft."
"Of course not, Morris."
"No, sir, you ain't that sort.  You've got a mother, too, ain't you?"
"Yes; but I shouldn't have liked her to see all we saw that day."
"No, sir, you wouldn't.  I haven't got no mother now, sir, but I did have one once."
I felt ready to smile, but I kept my countenance.
"Seems rum of a big ugly fellow like me talking about his mother, sir; but, Lor' bless you! all us chaps has got a bit of a soft spot somewhere insides us for our old woman, even them as never talks about it; and do you know, sir, that night just when I felt worst as I rolled about in my hammock, and was going to get out and find the bucket of water for a drink, I got thinking about my old mother, and how she used to come and tuck me up in bed of a night, and kiss me and say, Gawd bless me, and then of how she used to talk to me and tell me always to do what was right, and, no matter what happened, I should feel at rest.  And then I got thinking as I must have done very wrong in killing that Chinee, to feel as bad as I did.  And I got arguing it over first one way and then the other for a minute or two, and the next thing I remember is it being tumble-up time, and till you spoke to me about it just now, I've never hardly thought about it since.  It was doing my duty, sir, of course; now, warn't it?"
"Of course, Morris," I said importantly; and the man nodded, looked satisfied, and then glanced to right and left again before unbuttoning his jacket and cautiously pulling out an old-fashioned gold watch.
"Why, hallo, Morris!"  I cried.
"Hush, sir; keep it quiet.  Mr Reardon give it to me the day afore yesterday, and said I wasn't to talk about it, for it was just between ourselves."
"It's a fine old watch," I said, feeling glad that the man we lads looked upon as such a stem tyrant could show so warm and generous a side to his nature.
"Said, sir, he gave it to me for attending so well to dishipline, as he called it, for he said if I had not attended well to my drill, there would have been no first lieutenant to give me a watch out of gratitude for saving his life."
"You must take care of that, Morris," I said.
"Yes, sir," he said dolefully.  "That's the worst of it.  Gold watch is an orkard thing for a marine, but I mean to try."
"And be very careful to wind it up regularly every night."
He looked at me with his face all wrinkled up.
"Would you, sir--would you wind it up?"
"Why, of course; what's a watch for?"
"Well, that depends, sir.  It's all right for a gentleman, but don't seem no good to me.  We allus knows how many bells it is, and the sergeants takes good care that we're in time for everything.  It's rather in my way, too.  Look here, sir; s'pose you took care of it for me to the end of the voyage?"
"Oh no, Morris.  You'll soon get used to having a watch," I said.  "Take care of it yourself."
He shook his head.
"I don't know as I can, sir," he said.  "If it had been a silliver one, I shouldn't so much have minded.  I was thinking of sewing it up in the padding of my jacket."
"No, no; keep it in your pocket and never part with it," I said.  "It's a watch to be proud of, for it was earned in a noble way."
"Thankye, sir," he cried, as I stood wondering at my own words; "that's done me good;" and he buttoned his jacket up with an intense look of satisfaction.
"I'm beginning to think the doctor was right, Gnat," said Barkins one morning.
"What about?"  I said.
"My wound; I don't think the knife was poisoned."
"Why, of course it wasn't; you fancied it all."
"Well, I couldn't help that, could I?  You wait till you get your wound, and then see how you'll begin to fancy all sorts of things.  I say, though, Smithy's getting right pretty quick.  The doctor's pitched him over.  I should have sent him back to his duty before, if I'd been old Physic.  He was all right yesterday."
"How do you know?"
"Because he was so nasty tempered.  Nothing was good enough for him."
"Oh, come, I like that," cried Smith, who overheard him.  "Why, I was as patient as could be; I appeal to the Poet.  Did I ever go fussing about telling people I was wounded by a poisoned knife?"
"No," I said; "you were both magnificent specimens of brave young midshipmen, and behaved splendidly."
"Oh, did we?" cried Barkins.  "Look here, Blacksmith, we'll remember this, and as soon as we're strong enough we'll punch his head."
"Agreed.  He's been growing as cocky as a bantam since we've been ill. We must take him down."
"Why, what for?"  I cried.
"Making game of your betters.  Sarce, as Tom Jecks calls it."
We had something else to think of three days later, and in the excitement both my messmates forgot their wounds, save when some quick movement gave them a reminder that even the healing of a clean cut in healthy flesh takes time.
For we overhauled a suspicious-looking, fast-sailing junk, which paid no heed to our signals, but was brought to after a long chase, and every man on board was chuckling and thinking about prize-money.
But when she was boarded, with Ching duly established as interpreter, and all notion of returning to the "fancee shop" put aside for the present, the junk turned out to be a peaceful trader trying to make her escape from the pursuit of pirates, as we were considered to be.
Ching soon learned the cause of the captain's alarm.  The day before he had come upon a junk similar to his own, with the crew lying murdered on board, and, judging from appearances, the wretches who had plundered her could not have gone long.
Mr Brooke was the officer in charge of the boat, and he told Ching to ask the master of the junk whether he had seen any signs of the pirates.
The man eagerly replied that he had seen three fast boats entering the Ayshong river, some thirty miles north of where we then were, and as soon as he found that we really were the boat's crew of a ship working for the protection of the shipping trade, his joy and excitement were without bounds, and showed itself in presents,--a chest of tea for the crew, and pieces of silk for Mr Brooke and myself; parting with us afterwards in the most friendly way, and, as Ching afterwards told me, saying that we were the nicest foreign devils he ever met.
Our news when we went on board made the captain change our course.  We were bound for a river a hundred miles lower down, but it was deemed advisable to go back and proceed as far up the Ayshong, as a fresh nest of the desperadoes might be discovered there.
By night we were off the muddy stream, one which appeared to be of no great width, but a vast body of water rushed out from between the rocky gates, and from the desolate, uninhabited look of the shores it seemed probable that we might find those we sought up there.
It was too near night to do much, so the captain contented himself with getting close in after the boat sent to take soundings, and at dark we were anchored right in the mouth, with the watch doubled and a boat out as well to patrol the river from side to side, to make sure that the enemy, if within, did not pass us in the darkness.
All lights were out and perfect silence was maintained, while, excited by the prospect of another encounter, not a man displayed the slightest disposition to go to his hammock.
It was one of those soft, warm, moist nights suggestive of a coming storm, the possibility of which was soon shown by the faint quivering of the lightning in the distance.
"Storm before morning," whispered Barkins.
"Yes," said Smith; "storm of the wrong sort.  I want to hear our guns going, not thunder."
From time to time the boat which was on the patrol duty came alongside to report itself, but there was no news; in fact, none was expected, for such a dark night was not one that would be chosen by vessels wishing to put to sea.
I had been disposed to ask for permission to go in the boat, but Mr Reardon's countenance looked rather stormy, so I had given up the idea, and contented myself with stopping on board with my two messmates, to watch the dark mouth of the river.
It soon grew very monotonous, having nothing to see but the shapes of the distant clouds, which stood out now and then like dimly-seen mountains high up above the land.  But by degrees the distant flickering of the lightning grew nearer, and went on slowly growing brighter, till from time to time, as we leaned over the bulwarks, listening to the faint rushing sound of the river, sweeping past the chain cable, and dividing again upon our sharp bows, we obtained a glimpse of the shore on either side.  Then it glimmered on the black, dirty-looking stream, and left us in greater darkness than ever.
Once we made out our boat quite plainly, and at last there came so vivid a flash that we saw the river upward for quite a mile, and I made out the low shores, but could see no sign of house or vessel moored anywhere near where we lay.
Another hour must have passed, during which we made out that the country on either side was flat and marshy, but we could see no sign of human habitation.  As far as could be made out, the river was about three hundred yards broad, and about this time we became aware that it must be very nearly low tide, for the stream which passed us was growing more and more sluggish, till at last it ceased ebbing, and the _Teaser_ began to swing slowly round, a sufficient indication that the tide had turned.
We had swung to our anchor till we were right across the stream, when from higher up a shot was fired, and, as if caused by the report, a dazzling flash cut right across the heavens, lighting up the river with its muddy sides, and there, not five hundred yards away, we made out two large junks that had come down with the tide, which had now failed them, just as they were close to the mouth.
All had been perfectly silent so far, but as the intense darkness succeeded the brilliant flash, there was a loud gabbling and shouting from the direction of the junks, then came the splashing of great oars, followed by their regular beating, and, as we swung further round with the men hurrying to their quarters, the boat came alongside, and was hoisted.
"Well, Mr Brooke?"
"Two large junks, sir; come down with the tide; they've put about, sir, and are going back."
"Sure?"
"Yes, sir, certain.  Hark!"
The hissing sound of the tide had recommenced, and above it we could hear the splash, splash of great sweeps, sounding hurried and irregular, as if the men at them were making all the haste they could.  Every now and then, too, came a curious creaking sound, as wood was strained against wood.
"Tide's setting in very hard, sir," said Mr Brooke.
"Yes," said the captain.  "Come on board; ha!"
There was another vivid flash, and we distinctly saw the great matting-sails of two junks for a moment, and again all was black.
"Come on board, Mr Brooke; they could not sweep those great craft out against such a tide as this, and there is no wind to help them even if they wished."
Then the falls were hooked on, after the coxswain had with some difficulty drawn the cutter up to where the light of a lantern was thrown down for his guidance, the men stamped along the deck, and the cutter rose to the davits for the men to spring on board.
Daylight found us lying head to sea, with the tide rushing up, a beautifully verdant country spreading out on either side, but no habitation in sight, and our men in great glee, for it was pretty evident that unless the junks should prove to be merchantmen, we had come upon a little-known river, up which we had trapped the pirates, who had been to land plunder at their nest, and were about to make their way again to sea.
CHAPTER NINETEEN.
UP THE RIVER.
The threatening of a storm had passed away, and the sun rose upon us, showing distant mountains of a delicious blue, and the river winding inland broader than at its mouth, and, as far as could be seen, free of additional entrances through which an enemy could escape to sea.
Steam was got up, the _Teaser's_ head swung round, and, after the lead had shown great depth and a muddy bottom, we began to glide steadily up with the tide.
Our progress was very slow, for, as you will easily understand, and must have noted scores of times in connection with some wreck, a ship is of immense weight, and, even if moving ever so slowly, touching a rock at the bottom means a tremendous grinding crash, and either the vessel fixed, perhaps without the possibility of removal, or a hole made which will soon cause it to sink.  Navigation, then, is beset with dangers for a captain.  If he is in well-known waters, matters are simple enough; every rock will be marked upon his chart, every mile near shore will have been sounded, and he will know to a foot or two how much water is beneath his keel.  But as soon as he ventures up some strange creek or river, paradoxically speaking, "he is at sea."  In other words, he would be journeying haphazard, if the greatest precautions were not taken.
These precautions were soon taken, a couple of boats being sent on ahead with a man in each taking soundings, while we had this advantage--we were journeying with a rising tide, and the river naturally grew deeper and deeper.
But we encountered no difficulty; we steamed on just fast enough to give the vessel steerage way, while the boats went on, the leads were heaved, and the result was always the same; plenty of water, and so soft and muddy a bottom, that even if we had gone aground, all that would have happened would have been a little delay while we waited for the tide to lift us off.
The course of the river was so winding that we could not see far ahead. Hence it was that a careful look-out was kept as we rounded each bend, expecting at every turn to see a kind of port to which the piratical junks resorted, and with a village, if not a town, upon the shore.  But we went on and on without success, the river, if anything, growing wider, till all at once, as we were slowly gliding round a bend, leaving a thick track of black smoke in the misty morning air, one of the men in the top hailed the deck.
"Sail ho, sir!"
"Where away?"
"Dead astarn, sir!"
"What?"
"Dead astarn, sir!"
Two of the men near me burst into a laugh, which they tried to hide as the first lieutenant looked sharply round.  But there, sure enough, were the tops of the junk's masts dead astern, for the course of the river proved to be just there almost exactly like that piece of twisted flat wire which ladies fasten on the backs of their dresses, and call an eye; the great stream forming first a small circle, and then going right away to form the large loop of the eye, while the junks were lying at the far side of the loop, so that to reach them where they lay, right across an open plain about two miles in width, we had to sail for some distance right away, apparently leaving them right behind.
A little use of the telescope soon showed that we were going quite right, though, and we went steadily on with the boats ahead sounding, and the men waiting to be called to quarters.
"I don't believe it's going to be a fight, Gnat!" cried Smith.
"Why not?"
"Can't smell anything like prize-money in it.  They're only a couple of big trading junks."
"Then why did they run away from us as they did?"
"Same reason as the one did last time.  Thought we meant mischief.  How stupid it is taking all this trouble to crawl up a muddy river."
"What's he talking about?" said Barkins, stepping over to our side for a moment before every one would have to be in his place, and unable to stir.
"Says they're trading junks."
"Then it's all up.  He knows.  Either his wound or the doctoring has made him go better.  He's awfully sharp now.  I'll go and tell the skipper to turn back."
"That's right; chaff away," cried Smith.  "Look at the place we're in! There isn't a sign of a town.  What would bring pirates up here?"
"Pirates don't want towns, do they, stupid?" cried Barkins; "they want a place to lay up their ships in, and here it is.  I'll bet anything those are pirates, but we shan't catch 'em."
"Why?"  I asked.  "Think they'll go up higher where we can't follow?"
"Could follow 'em in the boats, couldn't we, clever?  Hi! look! they're on the move!  They're pirates, and are going up higher because they see us.  But we shan't catch 'em.  If they are getting the worst of it, they'll run themselves aground, and get ashore to make a dash for it."
Barkins was right; they were on the move, as we could distinctly see now, and my messmate said again--
"Yes, it's all over; they'll follow this river right away to the other side, and come out in the Black Sea, or somewhere else.  We draw too much water to follow them farther."
But we did follow them a great deal farther, and found that on the whole, in spite of our careful progress, we gained upon the junks, getting so near them once from their position across a bend of the river that a discussion took place as to whether it would not be advisable to open fire at long range.
But no gun spoke, and we kept on slowly, carried by the tide, and with the screw revolving just sufficiently for steering purposes, till once more the course of the river grew pretty straight, and the junks were in full view, our glasses showing the men toiling away at the long sweeps, and that the decks were crowded.
This last was intensely satisfactory, for it swept away the last doubts as to the character of the vessels.  Up to this point it was possible that they might have been trading junks whose skippers had taken alarm, but no mercantile junks would have carried such crews as we could see, with their bald heads shining in the sun.
Just about that time Smith and I passed Tom Jecks, who gave me a peculiar look.
"What is it?"  I said, stopping to speak.
"Can't you put in a word to the skipper, sir, and get him to stir up the engyneers?"
"What for, Tom?"
"To go faster, sir.  It's horrid, this here.  Why, I could go and ketch 'em in the dinghy."
"Do you want the _Teaser_ stuck in the mud?"  I said.
"No, sir, o' course not; but I say, sir, do you think it's all right?"
"What do you mean, Jecks?"
"This here river, sir.  I ayve read in a book about Chinee Tartars and magicians and conjurors.  There was that chap in `Aladdin' as left the boy shut up down below.  He were a Chinee, wasn't he?"
"I think so, Tom; but what have the _Arabian Nights_ got to do with our hunting these pirates?"
"Well, that's what I want to know, sir.  If there was magic in them days in China, mayn't there be some left now?"
"No, Tom," I said.  "We've got more magic on board the _Teaser_ in the shape of steam, than there is of the old kind in all China."
"Well, sir, you've had more schooling than ever I've had, but if it ain't a bit magicky about them boats, I should like to know what it is."
"What's he talking about?" said Smith.  "What do you mean?"
"They're will-o'-the-wispy sort o' boats, sir," replied Jecks.  "Don't you see how they keep dodging on us?  Just now they was in easy shot, now they're two mile away.  What does that mean?"
"Physical conformation of the road," said Smith importantly.
"Oh, is it, sir?" said Jecks, scratching his head, with a dry smile on his face.  "Well, I shouldn't have thought as physic had anything to do with that, but I daresay you're right, sir.  Wish we could give them junks physic."
"I don't believe we shall get near enough to give them a dose," said Smith discontentedly.  "If I were the skipper, I'd--"
Smith did not say what he would, for just then there was a shout from the boat, the man with the lead giving such shallow soundings that we heard the gongs sound in the engine-room, and the clank of the machinery as it was stopped and reversed.
Then orders were given for soundings to be taken right across the river, but the result was always the same; the stream had suddenly shallowed, and it was at first supposed to be a bar; but sounding higher up proved that the shoal water was continuous, and though the lighter-draft junks had gone on, they had now come to a standstill, which suggested that they too had been stopped.
"Told you so," grumbled Barkins, joining us.  "All this trouble for nothing.  Why didn't the skipper open fire and blow 'em out of the water when he had a chance?"
"Go and ask him, Mr Barkins," said Mr Brooke, who overheard his remark.  "And if I were you, I'd ask him at the same time why it is amateurs can always manage better than the leader."
Mr Brooke nodded, and I saw that he looked very serious as he walked aft, and a minute later I knew why.
"Bah!" growled Smith, as soon as he was out of hearing.  "Shouldn't have listened."
"No," said Barkins.  "It isn't quite manly to play the spy.  Talk about snubbing, why is it officers should think it so precious fine to be always dropping on to their juniors?  Now, then, look out! there's orders coming.  The old _Teaser's_ going to waggle her tail between her legs, and we're going back again.  More waste of Her Majesty's coals."
"If we don't lie-to till the tide turns," I said.  "Oh, I say, you two look sharp and get quite well again; I didn't know that having wounds would make fellows so sour."
"Who's sour.  Here, let's get aft; quick, or we shall be out of the fun."
For the whistles were going, and the men springing to the boats, three of which were manned, and the one lying alongside being filled with a strong, well-armed crew.
We all three did press forward, in the full hope of being sent as well, and made ourselves so prominent that I saw Mr Reardon frown.  But no orders came; and at last, in a great state of excitement, Barkins seized the opportunity to speak.
"May I go in the longboat, sir?"
"You--lame still from your wound, sir?  Absurd!  No, nor you neither, Mr Smith."
He caught my eye just then, but turned away, and I could not help feeling disappointed, though I knew well enough that the risk would have been great.
"Oh, I do call it a shame," grumbled Barkins, as the order was given, the men cheered, and, under the command of Mr Brooke, the four boats pushed off, the oars dropped, the oily water splashed in the bright sunshine, and each boat with its colours trailing astern glided rapidly up-stream.
"Yes, it's too bad," grumbled Smith in turn, who unconsciously began nursing his arm as if it pained him.
"Why, it's worse for me," I cried.  "I'm quite strong and well.  I ought to have gone."
Barkins exploded with silent laughter, laid his hand on Smith's shoulder, and said huskily, as if he were choking with mirth--
"I say, hark at him!  What for?  There'll be plenty of mosquitoes up there to sting the poor fellows; they don't want a gnat to tickle them and make them fight."
"No," said Smith.  "Never mind, little boy, be good, and we'll take you on an expedition some day."
"All right," I replied; "I don't mind your chaff, only you needn't be so nasty because you are disappointed."
"Mr Herrick!  Where's Mr Herrick?" cried the first lieutenant.
"Here, sir," I shouted; and I could not help giving my companions a look full of triumph as I dashed aft.
"Oh, there you are, sir.  Now look here, I'm going to mast-head you. Got your glass?"
"Yes, sir."
"Then up with you, right to the main-topgallant cross-trees.  Notice everything you can."
My heart began to beat before I reached the main shrouds, and it beat more heavily as I toiled up the rattlins, reached the top, and then went on again, too much excited to think of there being any danger of falling, my mind being partly occupied with thoughts of what Barkins and Smith were saying about my being favoured in this way.
"Just as if they could have come up," I said half-laughing; "one with a game leg, the other with a game arm."
My thoughts ran, too, as much upon what I was about to see, so that beyond taking a tight hold, and keeping my spyglass buttoned up in my jacket, I paid little heed to the height I was getting, I reached the head of the topmast, and then began to mount the rattlins of the main-topgallant mast, whose cross-trees seemed to be a tremendous height above my head.
But I was soon there, and settled myself as comfortably as I could, sitting with an arm well round a stay, and one leg twisted in another for safety; but the wood did not feel at all soft, and there was a peculiar rap, rap, rap against the tapering spar which ran up above my head to the round big wooden bun on the top of all, which we knew as the truck.
For a moment or two I couldn't make out what the sound was.  Then I saw it was caused by the halyards, the thin line which ran up through the truck and down again to the deck, for hoisting our colours.  This doubled line, swayed by the breeze, was beating against the tall pole, but I checked the noise by putting my arm round it and holding the thin halyard tight.
I looked down for a moment or two at the deck which lay beneath, giving me a bird's-eye view through the rigging of the white decks dotted with officers and men, and the guns glistening in the sunshine.  There were several faces staring up at me, and I made out Barkins and Smith, and waved my hand.  But these were only momentary glances; I had too much to see of far more importance.  For there, spread out round me, was a grand view of the low, flat, marshy country, through which the river wound like a silver snake.  Far away in the distance I could see villages, and what seemed to be a tower of some size.  Beyond it, cultivated land and patches of forest; behind me, and to right and left, the shimmering sea, and straight in front the two junks; while almost at my feet, in spite of their hard rowing, there were our four boats, with the oars dipping with glorious regularity, and making the water flash and glitter, but not so brightly as did the bayonets of the few marines in each, as they sat in the stern-sheets with their rifles upright between their legs, and the keen triangular blades at the tops of the barrels twinkling at every movement of the boats.
It was a sight to make any one's heart throb, and in spite of my splendid position for seeing everything I could not help wishing I was there to help make a part of the picture I saw, with the men in their white ducks and straw hats, the marines glowing like so many patches of poppies, and the officers with their dark blue coats faintly showing a lace or two of gold.
How I longed to be with them bound upon such an exciting trip, and all the time how glad I was to be up there in so commanding a position, as, after watching the progress of the boats for a few moments, I opened and focussed my glass, rested it against a rope, and fixed it upon the junks.
The first thing I noticed was that one of them lay a little over to port, as if from being too heavily laden on one side; while, as I gazed, the other was evidently settling in the other direction.
I wondered what they were doing to them, and whether it meant changing heavy guns over to one side, when I grasped the fact,--they had gone as high up-stream as they could, and then run aground, and were fixed in the sticky mud of which the bottom of the river was composed.
"Ahoy! there aloft," shouted Mr Reardon.  "What do you make out?"
I did not take the glass from my eye, but shouted down to him--
"Both junks fast aground, sir.  Chinese crews running backwards and forwards, trying to work them off, sir."
An eager conversation ensued between Mr Reardon and the captain, during which I carefully scanned the two Chinese vessels, and could see the men swarming here and there, as if in an intense state of agitation, but they soon ceased trying to rock the junks, and, as I judged, they were waiting for the tide to rise higher and float them off.
There was nothing between to hinder my having a thoroughly good view of where they lay, just round a slight bend, but I felt certain that they could not see our boats, and I had proof that this was the case, on noticing that a group of men had landed, and were running towards a clump of tall trees, where they disappeared amongst the growth.
"Cowards!"  I said to myself, for I felt that they were deserters, and, after watching for their reappearance, I was about to turn the glass upon the junks again, when I noticed a peculiar agitation of the branches of one tree, which stood up far above the others.
"Well, Mr Herrick, I am waiting for your reports," cried the first lieutenant.
"Yes, sir," I shouted.  "Half-a-dozen men landed from one of the junks, and ran across to a patch of wood."
"Deserters?  Any more leaving the ship?"
"No, sir."
"Ah, they saw the boats coming, I suppose?"
"No, sir, but they soon will.  One of them is climbing a big tree, much higher than the junk's masts."
"For a look-out, eh?"
"Yes, sir, I think so," I shouted; and then to myself, "Oh, bother! It's hard work talking from up here.  There he is, sir, right up at the top.  You could see him from the deck."
"No, I can see nothing from here.  Well, what is he doing?"
"Making signals with his hands, sir, and now he's coming down again."
"Then you think he has seen the boats?"
"No, sir; they are following one another close in under the bank."
"Then they can't see them," cried Mr Reardon, "and Mr Brooke will take them by surprise."
He did not shout this, but said it to the captain.  Still the words rose to where I sat watching, till the Chinamen ran out from among the bushes at the foot of the trees, and I saw them making for the junks again.
I could not see them climb on board, but I felt that they must have jumped into a boat and rowed off to their friends, and, fixing my glass upon the deck of first one and then the other, I began to make out more and more clearly the actions of the crews, and, judging from the glittering, I saw some kind of arms were being distributed.
I announced this at first as a supposition, telling Mr Reardon what I thought it was.
"Yes, very likely," he replied; and a few minutes after I saw something else, and hailed.
"Yes," he said, "what now?" and I saw that, though he did not speak, the captain was listening attentively.
"They're burning something, sir."
"Confound them!  Not setting fire to the junks?"
"I don't know, sir; I think so," I replied, still watching intently; and, as I gazed through my glass, I saw black smoke rising in little coils from both junks, at first very thick and spreading, then growing smaller.
"I think, sir, they've set fire to the junks in several places," I said.
He asked me why, and I told him.
"Watch attentively for a few minutes."
I did so, and felt puzzled, for it seemed so strange that the fire should grow smaller.
"Well," he said, "are the junks burning?"
"The little curls of smoke are rising still, sir."
"Have the men left the decks?"
"Oh no, sir!  They're running here and there, and seem very busy still."
"Then they have not set fire to the vessels," he cried decisively. "Pirates, without a doubt.  Those are stink-pots that they have been getting ready.  Go on watching, and report anything else."
A noise below, familiar enough, with its rattle and splash, told me that an anchor had been dropped from the bows; and as the _Teaser_ slowly swung round from the force of the tide, I also had to turn, so as to keep the telescope fixed upon the enemy, who were as busy as ever, though what they were doing I could not make out.  The flashes of light came more frequently, though, as the sun played upon their weapons; and now I had something else to report--that they had both assumed a different position, being lifted by the tide and floated upon an even keel.
My first idea was, that now they would sail on beyond our reach; in fact, one moved a good deal, but the other stopped in its place, so that at last they were so close together that they seemed to touch.
"Make out the boats?" came from the deck.
"No, sir; they're close under the bank."  Yes, I caught a glimpse of the marines' bayonets just then.
"How far are they away from the junks, do you think?"
"I can't tell, sir; about a quarter of a mile, I think."
Mr Reardon was silent while I gazed intently at a patch of open water just beyond a curve of the bank, hoping to see the boats there, though I felt that as soon as they reached that spot, if the enemy had not seen them before, they would be certain to then, for beyond that the junks lay clearly to be seen from where I sat.
"Well?  See the boats?" came from the deck.
"No, sir, not yet."
I glanced down to answer, and could see that every one who possessed a glass was gazing anxiously aft, the only face directed up to me being the first lieutenant's.  Then my eye was at the glass again.
"More smoke from the junks, sir," I cried; but there was no sign of fire, and I felt that Mr Reardon must be right, for if they had set a light to the inflammable wood of the vessels, they would have blazed up directly.
"Can't you see the boats yet?" cried the first lieutenant impatiently, and his voice sounded as if he were blaming me.
"No, sir, but the junks are more out in the middle of the stream.  I can see them quite clearly now, away from the trees.  They are crowded with men, and--"
"The boats--the boats?"
"No, sir;--yes, hurrah!  There they go, sir, all abreast, straight for the junks."
"Ha!" came in one long heavy breath from below, as if all left on board had suddenly given vent to their pent-up feelings.
"How far are they away from the junks?" cried Mr Reardon.
"About two hundred yards, sir; you'll see them directly."
"Yes, I see them now, sir," cried Barkins, who was a little way up the mizzen-shrouds, where I had not seen him before.
"Silence!" cried the captain sternly.  "Go on, Mr Herrick; report."
"Smoke from the junks, sir--white," I cried, and the words were hardly out of my mouth when there came the report of guns--first one and then another; then two together; and I fancied that I could see the water splashing up round about the boats, but I could not be sure.
"Boats separating," I shouted.
"Go on."
"Pulling hard for the junks."
"Yes, go on; report everything."
I needed no orders, for I was only too eager to tell everything I saw.
"Two boats have gone to the right; two to the left.--More firing from the junks.--Boats separating more.--Two going round behind.--Both out of sight."
By this time, in addition to the sharp reports of the small guns on board the junks, the sharper crackle of matchlocks and muskets had begun; but so far I had not seen a puff of smoke from our boats.
"Are our men firing?"
"No, sir; the two boats I can see are pulling straight now for the junks.--Now the water splashes all about them."
"Yes?  Hit?"
"Don't think so, sir.--Now.--Ah!"
"What--what is it, boy?"
"Can't see anything, sir; they've rowed right into the smoke."
My hands which held the telescope were quite wet now with the excitement of the scene I had tried to describe to my superior officer, and I thrust the glass under my left arm, and rubbed them quickly on my handkerchief, as I gazed at the distant smoke, and listened to the crackle of musketry alone, for the guns had now ceased from fire.
This I felt must be on account of the boats coming to closer quarters, and then to the men boarding.  But I could see nothing but the smoke, and I raised the glass to my eye again.
Still nothing but smoke.  I fancied, though, that the firing was different--quicker and sharper--as if our men must have begun too.
"Well, Mr Herrick?" now came from below.  "Surely you can see how the fight is going on?"
"No, sir, nothing but smoke,--Yes," I cried excitedly, "it's lifting now, and floating away to the left.  I can see close up to the junks. Yes; now the decks.  Our right boat is empty, and there is a great fight going on upon the junk."
"And the other?"
"There are two boats close up, and our men are firing.  There is black smoke coming out of one boat.  Now the men are climbing up, and--now, the smoke is too thick there."
"Go on, boy; go on," shouted the first lieutenant, stamping about, while the captain stood perfectly still, gazing at the rising smoke, from the bridge.
"They seem to be fighting very hard, sir," I said, trembling now like a leaf.  "I can see quite a crowd, and that some of the people are in white."
"But who is getting the best of it?"
"I can't see, sir," I said sadly.
"Then for goodness' sake come down, and let some one else come up," roared Mr Reardon.
"Yes, sir."
"No, no; stay where you are, boy.  But use your glass--use your glass."
I tried my best, but I could only make out a blurred mass of men on board both junks.  They seemed to be swaying to and fro, and the smoke, instead of passing off, once more grew thicker, and in place of being white and steamy, it now looked to be of a dirty inky black, completely enveloping the vessels and our boats.
This I reported.
"They surely cannot have set them on fire?" said Mr Reardon.
"I can't see any flames, sir."
Silence again; and we found that the firing had ceased, all but a sharp crack from time to time, sounds evidently made by rifles.  But there was nothing more to see, and, in spite of the angry appeals of the lieutenant, I could report no more than that the black smoke was growing thicker, and hanging down over the water, hiding everything, to the bushes and trees upon the bank.
And now, as I gave one glance down, I saw that the captain was walking to and fro upon the bridge, evidently in a great state of excitement, for there was not a sound now; the firing had quite ceased; the black cloud seemed to have swallowed up our four boats and men; and a chilly feeling of despair began to attack me, as I wondered whether it was possible that our poor fellows had been beaten, and the boats burned by the stink-pots the pirates had thrown in.
The thought was almost too horrible to bear, and I stared hard through the glass again, trying to make out the junks beyond the smoke, and whether it was really our boats which where burning, and raising the black cloud which hid all view.
"I can see a boat now, sir," I cried excitedly, as one of them seemed to glide out of the end of the cloud; but my heart sank as I made the announcement, for I saw only that which confirmed my fears.
"Well, go on, lad," cried Mr Reardon, stamping with impatience, "what are they doing in her?"
"She's empty, sir, and floating away, with a cloud of black smoke rising from her."
"Ah!" he exclaimed, with quite a savage snarl, and I saw the captain stop short and raise his glass again, though I knew that from where he stood he could see nothing.
"We're beaten," I said to myself.  "Oh, our poor lads--our poor lads!"
A mist rose before my eyes, and I nearly dropped the glass, but I passed my hand across my face and looked again, sweeping the telescope from the left side, where the boat was gliding up-stream smoking more than ever, to the right and the shore.
"Hooray!"  I yelled.
"Yes! what?" roared the captain and Mr Reardon together.
"Chinese running in a regular stream away from the shore; making for the woods.  One down--another down."
At the same moment almost came a couple of volleys, then several men went down, and the crackle of firing commenced again.
"Go on, Herrick!" cried Mr Reardon.
"Our fellows ashore, and running Jacks and jollies together, sir. Stopping to fire.  Running again."
"And the enemy?"
"Running like deer, sir.  More of them down.  Making for the wood."
"One man stopped, sir, and returning."
"Yes, yes, that's good.  What now?"
"Boat out from the smoke, rowing after the other one, sir.  They've got it.  Yes, I can see.  They're throwing something out that smokes--now something more."
"Bah! stink-pots!" roared Mr Reardon.  "Now then, quick!--quick! Don't, go to sleep, sir.  What next?"
"I'll shy the spyglass at you directly," I muttered; and then aloud, "Fire, sir; both junks blazing."
"Hurrah!" came from the deck as the rest of the crew set up a tremendous cheer, for the smoke had suddenly grown less dense; and the junks gradually grew visible as it floated away; while even in the bright sunlight the flames were visible, and I could now make out that they were two floating furnaces with the great tongues of fire licking the broad matting-sails: and, best news of all, there, quite plainly, were our four boats, with the men just visible above their sides.
I reported this, and cheer after cheer rose again.  After which there was dead silence once more, so that my reports could be heard.
"Now, Mr Herrick, what now?" cried Mr Reardon.
"Two boats lying in mid-stream, sir; the others are rowing to the side."
"To pick up the men who were sent ashore, I suppose.  Good."
"Junks burning very fast, sir; and they're floating across to the other side.  The wind's taking them straight, for the smoke floats that way."
"Very likely," said Mr Reardon; and there was a long pause.
"One junk has taken the ground, sir," I said, "and--"
"Yes, well, what?"
"Her masts and sails have fallen over the side."
"And our boats?"
"Lying-to, sir, doing nothing."
But that was as far as I could see, for they were doing a good deal, as we afterwards heard.
"Other junk has floated over, sir, nearly to the same place."
"Good; burning still?"
"Oh yes, sir--very fast."
He need not have asked; for, as Barkins told me afterwards, they could see the flames from the deck, though our boats were invisible.
"Well, what now?" cried Mr Reardon, as I saw the captain quietly pacing to and fro on the bridge.
"Other two boats pushed off from the shore, sir."
"Ha! that's right.  See anything of the Chinamen?"
"No, sir; the forest goes right away for miles.  There isn't one to be seen."
"And the boats?"
"All rowing back, sir, close under the left bank."
"Can you see them?"
"Only three of them, sir," I replied.  "Now another is out of sight."
"Then, as soon as they are all invisible, you can come down," cried Mr Reardon.
"Yes, sir; all out of sight now."
"Then come down."
"Thankye for nothing," I muttered; and then aloud, "Yes, sir;" and I closed my glass, and wiped my wet forehead, feeling stiff and sore, as if I had been exerting myself with all my might.
"I suppose I'm very stupid," I said to myself, as I began to descend slowly, "but I did try my best.  What a height it seems up here!  If a fellow slipped and fell, he would never have another hour up at the mast-head."
I went on downward, with my legs feeling more and more stiff, and a sense of heavy weariness growing upon me.  My head ached too, and I felt a pain at the back of my neck, while mentally I was as miserable and dissatisfied as ever I remember being in my life.
"I hope he'll send old Barkins up next time," I thought.  "He wouldn't feel so precious jealous then.  Nice job, squinting through that glass till one's almost blind, and nothing but bullying for the result."
It seemed to be a very long way down to the deck, but I reached the remaining few rattlins at last, and I was nearly down to the bulwarks, meaning to go below and bathe my head, if I could leave the deck, when I was stopped short, just in my most gloomy and despondent moments, by the captain's voice, his words sounding so strange that I could hardly believe my ears.
For, as I held on to the shrouds, and looked sharply aft at the mention of my name, he said--
"Thank you, Mr Herrick; very good indeed;" while, as I reached the deck, Mr Reardon came up--
"Yes, capital, Mr Herrick.  A very arduous task, and you have done it well."
CHAPTER TWENTY.
AFTER THE FIGHT.
"Bravo, Gnat!  Well done, little 'un!" whispered Barkins the next minute, as I walked aft, feeling quite confused, while my headache and sensation of misery passed off as if by magic.  "Blacksmith would have done it better, of course; wouldn't you, Smithy?"
"Done it as well as you would," said my messmate sulkily; and there was a heavy frown on his brow; but, as he met my eyes, it cleared off, and he smiled frankly.  "I say: Well done our side!" he whispered.  "What would they do without midshipmen!"
"I say, though," said Barkins, "we've given John Pirate another dressing-down; but what about the plunder?"
"Ah, of course," said Smith.  "Junks both burned, and no swag.  What about our prize-money?  Eh, Gnat?"
"I wasn't thinking about that, but about our poor lads.  They must have had a sharp fight.  I hope no one is hurt."
My companion were silent for a moment or two.  Then Barkins said quietly--
"I thought it would be only the teapots that were broken.  Think our chaps were hurt?  You couldn't see?"
"I could see that there was a big fight going on; and look here!"
I nodded in the direction of one of the companion-ways, from which the doctor suddenly appeared with his glasses on, and an eager, expectant look in his eyes as he bustled up to us.
"I'm all ready," he said.  "Boats in sight yet?"  I shuddered, and I noticed that Smith looked white.  "Well, why don't you answer?  What's the matter, my lads?  Oh, I see."  He laughed.
"Horrible sort of person the doctor, eh?  But you didn't look like that when I tackled your wounds the other day.  But if you people will fight, the surgeon must be ready.  Oh, let's see: you were up at the cross-trees, Mr Herrick, with your glass, and saw all.  Will there be much work for me to do?"
"I don't know, sir," I said, trying hard to speak quietly.  "I couldn't see much for the smoke.  I hope not."
"So do I, boy, heartily.  I don't mind the wounds so long as they're not too bad.  It's painful to have fine strong lads like ours slip through one's fingers.  But we must do our best.  Any Chinese prisoners?  Sure to be, I suppose."
"I should think so, sir."
"And wounded.  Well, if there are, you three lads ought to come and be my body-guard with your dirks.  Like to see the operations, I daresay?"
"Ugh!"  I said, with a shudder.
"Bah!  Don't act like a great girl, Herrick," said the doctor scornfully.  "You would never have done for a doctor, sir.  I never shudder at the worst cases."
"But then you are hardened, sir," said Barkins.
"Hardened be hanged, sir!" cried the doctor indignantly.  "A clever surgeon gets more and more softened every time he operates, more delicate in his touches, more exact in his efforts to save a limb, or arrange an injury so that it will heal quickly.  Hardened, indeed!  Why, to judge from your faces, any one would think surgery was horrible, instead of one of the greatest pleasures in life."
"What, cutting and bandaging wounds, and fishing for bullets?" blurted out Smith; "why, sir, I think it's hideous."
"And I think you are an impertinent young coxcomb, sir," cried the doctor indignantly.  "Hideous, indeed!  Why it's grand."
He looked round at us as if seeking for confirmation of his words, but neither spoke.
"Hideous? horrible?" he said, taking off his glasses and thrusting his hand into his pocket for his handkerchief to wipe them, but bringing out something soft and white, which proved to be a piece of lint.  "Oh, I do call it cool.  If there's anything hideous it's your acts, sir; having those thundering guns fired, to send huge shells shivering and shattering human beings to pieces for the doctor to try and mend; your horrible chops given with cutlasses and the gilt-handled swords you are all so proud of wearing--insolent, bragging, showy tools that are not to be compared with my neat set of amputating knives in their mahogany case.  These are to do good, while yours are to do evil.  Then, too, your nasty, insidious, cruel bayonets, which make a worse wound than a bullet.  Oh, it's too fine to call my work horrible, when I try to put straight all your mischief."
"Here they are," cried Barkins excitedly, as a hail came from the top.
We ran aft to see the first boat come steadily along close in shore, which was being hugged so as to avoid the full rush of the tide.
Directly after the others came in sight, and glasses were all in use from the bridge and quarter-deck.
I adjusted mine directly, and saw at the first glance that there was plenty of work for Dr Price, for men were lying in the stern-sheets with rough bandages on limbs and heads, while several of those who were rowing had handkerchiefs tied round their foreheads, and others had horrible marks upon their white duck-frocks, which told tales of injury to them as well as to their enemies.
The third boat was given up to men lying down or sitting up together, leaving only just room for the rowers, while the fourth and largest boat was being towed; the thwarts, that in an ordinary way would have been occupied by rowers, now holding the marines, who sat with their rifles ready, and fixed bayonets, while the stern-sheets were filled with Chinamen, seated in three groups, and all in the most uncomfortable-looking way.  I could see that their hands were tied behind their backs, and it was horribly plain that several of them were wounded; but why they should have formed these three groups, and sat there with their heads laid close together, was what puzzled me.
A loud cheer rose from our deck as the boats came near; and this was taken up directly by the returning party, the men rowing harder as they shouted, and the little triumphant procession reached the side.
The first hail came from the captain.
"Mr Brooke--where's Mr Brooke?"
"Here, sir," cried that officer, standing up with a stained handkerchief about his head, and his uniform all black and scorched.
"Any fatalities?"
"No, sir; not one."
I saw the captain's lips move, but no one heard him speak.  I guessed, though, what he said, and I felt it.
Then as quickly as possible the boats were run up to the davits, and the uninjured men leaped on deck.  Next the wounded, such as could stir, descended from the boats, one poor fellow staggering and nearly falling as soon as he reached the deck.  After which the badly wounded were carefully lifted out and carried below, to be laid in a row to wait the doctor and his assistant make their first rapid examination, to apply tourniquets and bandaged pads to the most serious injuries.
"Good heavens, Mr Brooke, what a condition you are in!  The doctor must take you first."
"Oh no, sir," said the young lieutenant quietly.  "I'm not very bad; a cut from a heavy sword through my cap.  It has stopped bleeding.  My hands are a little bruised."
"But how was this?"
"As we advanced to board, they threw quite a volley of stink-pots fizzing away into us.  I burned myself a little with them."
"Chucking 'em overboard, sir," cried the boatswain.  "Splendid it was."
"Nonsense!" cried Mr Brooke.  "You threw ever so many.  But it was hot work, sir."
"Hot! it is horrible.  How many prisoners have you there?"
"Eighteen, sir; the survivors escaped."
"But you shouldn't have fired the junks, man," said the captain testily. "There may have been wounded on board."
"Yes, sir," said Mr Brooke, with his brow puckering; "wounded and dead there were, I daresay, thirty; but the enemy set fire to their vessels themselves before they leaped overboard, and it was impossible to save them: they burned like resin.  We saved all we could."
"I beg your pardon; I might have known," cried the captain warmly. "Come to my cabin.  Mr Reardon, be careful with those prisoners; they are savage brutes."
"Enough to make 'em, Gnat.  Look!  What a shame!"
I looked, but I could not see any reason for Smith's remark.
"Beg pardon, sir," growled one of the men, who had a bandage round his arm; "you wouldn't ha' said so if you'd been there.  They was all alike. The junk we took was burning like fat in a frying-pan, and me and my mate see one o' them chaps going to be roasted, and made a run for it and hauled him away--singed my beard, it did; look, sir."
Half of his beard was burned off, and his cheek scorched.
"Then my mate gets hold of his legs, and I was stooping to get my fists under his chest, when he whips his knife into my arm 'fore I knowed what he was up to.  But we saved him all the same."
"Here," cried Mr Reardon, as the marines descended from the third boat, and stood at attention in two parties facing each other; "who was answerable for this?  Why, it is an outrage.  Brutal!"
"S'pose it was my doing, sir," said the boatswain, touching his cap; "but I asked leave of Mr Brooke first, and he said yes."
"What, to tie the poor wretches up like that, sir, and half of them wounded!"
"Beg pardon, sir; there was no other way handy.  We lashed their arms behind 'em to keep 'em from knifing us, and then they kept on jumping overboard, and trying to drown themselves.  We haven't hurt them."
"Cast them loose at once."
"Yes, sir; I should like half-a-dozen strong chaps in the boat, though."
"Well, take them," said Mr Reardon, who was speaking less severely now. "I'll have the uninjured men in irons this time.  Be careful."
"And if I'd my way, I'd have 'em all in iron boxes, 'cept their hands."
The boatswain said this to me, with a nod, as the first lieutenant turned away, and, unable to control my curiosity, I sprang up on the bulwark to look into the boat.
"Let's have a look too," cried Smith, and he jumped up to gain a position much closer than mine, but quitted his hold and dropped back on deck, lost his footing, and came down sitting; for, as he leaned over the boat's gunnel, one of the prisoners made a sudden snap at him, after the fashion of an angry dog, and the marines burst into a roar of laughter.
Smith got up scowling and indignant.
"My hands slipped," he said to me aloud.  And then, to carry off his confusion, "How many are there, Herrick?"
"Three lots of six," I said, as I now saw plainly enough how it was that the prisoners were in such a strange position.  For they had been dragged together and their pigtails lashed into a tight knot, a process admirably suited to the object in hand--to render them perfectly helpless; and their aspect certainly did not excite my anger.
Meanwhile the boatswain had stepped into the swinging boat, and he turned to me, but looked at Smith as he spoke.
"Like to try whether either of the others will bite, Mr Herrick?" he said.
Smith coloured and frowned.
"No, thank you," I replied; "I'm satisfied."
"Now then, you two," said the boatswain, "stand by with your bayonets; and you, my lads, be ready as we cast them loose.  Get a good grip of each fellow by the tail; he'll be helpless then."
I stood looking on at the curious scene, and the next minute was conscious of the fact that the first lieutenant had returned to supervise the putting of the prisoners in irons himself; and, as the tails were unlashed, he took note of the men who were injured, and had them lifted out and laid on deck.
The others made no attempt to escape, for they were too firmly held; but, as the armourer fitted on the irons, I could see their wild-beast-like eyes rolling in different directions, and then become fixed with a look of savage hate on our men, who were certainly none too tender with a set of wretches who only waited an opportunity to destroy life without the slightest compunction.
At last they were all lying on the deck--nine with serious wounds, the other half for the most part injured, but only to a very slight extent, and these were soon after taken one by one between a file of marines to the place in the hold appointed once more for their prison.
Then the doctor came up for ten minutes, and, after a few words with the sergeant of marines, examined the nine prisoners, passing over six to the sergeant with orders, and having three laid aside for his own ministrations.
We three lads stood watching the sergeant, who had evidently had some practice in ambulance work, and skilfully enough he set to work sponging and bandaging injuries.  But all the time a couple of marines stood, one on either side, ready to hold the prisoners down, for each seemed to look upon the dressing of his wounds as a form of torture which he was bound to resist with all his might.
"Nice boys, Mr Herrick," said the boatswain drily.  "Do you know why we are taking all this pains?"
"To save their lives and give them up to the authorities at Tsin-Tsin, I suppose."
"Yes, sir."
"For them to be put on their trial for piracy on the high seas."
"Yes, sir, that's it; but it would be a greater kindness to let the wretches die out of their misery."
"But some of them mayn't be guilty," I said.
The boatswain laughed.
"I don't think there's much doubt about that, sir," he said.  Just then, as the last man was treated by the sergeant, the doctor came on deck with his assistants, both in white aprons and sleeves--well, I'm a little incorrect there--in aprons and sleeves that had been white.
"I've no business here," said the doctor hurriedly; "but these men cannot be left.  Keep an eye on them, my men, and don't let them do me any mischief.  I can't be spared just now."
The next moment he was down on his knees by the side of one of the prisoners, who, in his eyes for a few minutes, was neither enemy nor piratical Chinaman, but a patient to whom he devoted himself to the full extent of his skill, performing what was needful, and leaving his assistant to finish the bandaging while he went on to the next.
In another ten minutes he had finished, and rose from his knees.
"There, Mr Herrick," he said; "do you call that horrible? because I call it grand.  If those three ill-looking scoundrels had been left another hour they would have died.  Now, with their hardy constitutions, they will rapidly get well, perhaps escape and begin pirating again. Possibly, when we give them up--oh my knees! how hard that deck is!--the authorities will--"
"Chop off all head.  Velly bad men--velly bad men indeed."
The doctor laughed, and hurried away while the last prisoner was carried down below.
"There," said the boatswain, when all was over, "that job's done, Mr Herrick.  Nice fellows your countrymen, Ching."
"Not allee nice fellow," replied Ching seriously.  "Pilate velly bad man.  No use.  Why captain save him up?"
"Ah, that's a question you had better ask him.  But I say, Ching, those fellows came up here with cargo, didn't they?"
"Calgo?" said Ching.
"Yes; plunder out of the ships they took."
"Yes," said Ching.
"Then where is it?  There was none on board the junks."
"Ching know," said the interpreter, laying his finger to the side of his nose.  "You likee Ching show?"
"Yes, of course.  Prize-money, and you'd share."
"Ching likee plize-money.  You bling ship along, and Ching show."
CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.
IN THE CREEK.
Ching's announcement cleared up what had been somewhat of a mystery.  It had appeared strange to everybody that the junks had been up this river apparently for no purpose, and more strange that they should have been light, and not laden with the plunder of the vessels they had taken. And now, as without any need for taking soundings the _Teaser_ slowly steamed back, Ching pointed out a kind of landing-place in a little creek hidden amongst dense growth, so that it had been passed unnoticed on our way up.
The country here on both sides of the river was wild, and no trace of a dwelling could be seen; but about half a mile from the shore there was a low ridge, round one end of which the creek wound, and toward this ridge Ching pointed, screwing his eyes up into narrow slits, and wrinkling up his face in all directions.
"Velly bad man live along-along there.  Plenty plize-money; plenty tea, lice, silk; plenty evelyting.  Come and see."
The _Teaser_ was moored, and a couple of boats manned with well-armed crews, Ching looking on the while and cunningly shaking his head.
"No wantee big piecee sword gun.  Pilate all lun away and hide."
"Never mind," said Mr Reardon, who was going in command of the expedition; "we may find somebody there disposed to fight."
"Takee all along big empty boat; cally tea, silk, lice, plize-money?"
"Better see first," said the captain; "there may not be anything worth carriage.  Go with them," he said to Ching.  "They may want an interpleter."
"Yes, Ching interpleter.  Talk velly nice Inglis."
"You can come if you like in my boat, Mr Herrick," said the lieutenant; and I jumped at the opportunity, but before I reached the side I turned, and saw Barkins and Smith looking gloomily on.
"Well, what are you waiting for?" said Mr Reardon.
"Beg pardon, sir," I said; "I was only thinking that Mr Barkins and Mr Smith would be very glad to go ashore."
"Of course they would, but I suppose you don't want to give up your place to them?"
"No, sir," I said; "but I will."
"Oh, very well.  Here, Mr Barkins, Mr Smith; do you feel well enough to go in my boat?"
"Yes, sir," they cried together eagerly.
"Jump in, then."
"Thank you, sir," cried Smith, and he mounted into the first boat; but Barkins hesitated a moment.
"Thank you, old chap," he whispered, "but I don't like to go."
"Off with you," I said, and I hurried him forward.  "Shall I give you a leg up?"  I added, for he limped a good deal still.
"No, no; I don't want to let them see I'm lame.  But I say, Gnat, you go."
"Be off," I whispered.  "Quick!" and I helped him in.
"Here, Ching, you had better go in the second boat," said Mr Reardon sharply; and, as the Chinaman rolled out of the first boat, blinking and smiling, orders were given to lower away, and the first boat kissed the water.
I was looking down at my two messmates, feeling a little disappointed, but glad that they had a chance at last, when Mr Reardon looked up.
"Here, Mr Herrick," he cried.  "You had better come on in the other boat, and take charge of the interpreter.  Look sharp."
I did look sharp, and a few minutes later I was sitting in the stern-sheets, being rowed ashore.
"Plenty loom in littlee liver," said Ching, pointing to the creek. "Pilate take allee plize-money in sampan up littlee liver."
"Ching thinks the boats could go up the creek, sir, and that the pirates go that way."
"Try, then; go first, Mr Grey," cried the first lieutenant; and, ordering his boat's crew to lie on their oars, he waited till we had passed, and then followed.
"Ching going showee way," whispered the Chinaman to me.
"But how do you know there is a place up there?"  I said.  "Have you ever been?"
Ching shook his head till his black tail quivered, and closed his eyes in a tight smile.
"Ching interpleter," he said, with a cunning look.  "Ching know evelyting 'bout Chinaman.  Talkee Chinee--talkee Inglis--velly nicee."
"But talking English velly nicee doesn't make you understand about the pirates."
"Yes; know velly much allee 'bout pilate," he said.  "Velly bad men-- velly stupid, allee same.  Pilate get big junk, swordee, gun, plenty powder; go killee evelybody, and hide tea, silk, lice up liver.  One pilate--twenty pilate--allee do same.  Hide up liver."
"Perhaps he's right," said Mr Grey, who sat back with the tiller in his hand, listening.  "They do imitate one another.  What one gang does, another does.  They're stupid enough to have no fresh plans of their own."
By this time we were in the creek, which was just wide enough for the men to dip their oars from time to time, and the tide being still running up we glided along between the muddy banks and under the overhanging trees, which were thick enough to shade as from the hot sun.
The ride was very interesting, and made me long to get ashore and watch the birds and butterflies, and collect the novel kinds of flowers blooming here and there in the more open parts, the lilies close in to the side being beautiful.
But we had sterner business on hand, besides having the first lieutenant in the following boat, so I contented myself with looking straight ahead as far as I could for the maze-like wanderings of the creek, and I was just thinking how easily we could run into an ambuscade, and be shot at from the dense shrubby growth on the bank, when Mr Reardon called to us from his boat.
"Let your marines be ready, Mr Grey," he said, "in case of a trap.  If the enemy shows and attacks, on shore at once and charge them.  Don't wait to give more than one volley."
"Ay, ay, sir," said the boatswain; and the marines seized their pieces, and I looked forward more sharply than ever.
But Ching shook his head.
"No pilate," he whispered to me.  "Allee too velly much flighten, and lun away from foleign devil sailor and maline."
"But they might have come down to their place here," I said.
Ching smiled contemptuously.
"Pilate velly blave man, fight gleat deal when allee one side, and know sailor can't fightee.  When plenty sailor can fightee, pilate lun away velly fast, and no come back."
"Can you understand him, Mr Grey?"  I said.
"Oh yes, I understand him, and I daresay he's right, but there's no harm in being on the look-out;" and, to show his intention of following out his words, the boatswain took his revolver from its case, and laid it ready upon his knees.
"How much farther is this village, or whatever it is?" said Mr Reardon from behind.
"Do you hear, Ching?"  I said.
"Ching hear; Ching don'tee know; not velly far," was the unsatisfactory reply.
"I'm afraid we've come on a cock-and-bull hunt," said the boatswain, looking to right and left as he stood up in the boat, for the creek now grew so narrow that the men had to lay in their oars, and the coxswain also stood up and drew the boat onward by hooking the overhanging boughs.
"Do you think they do come up here, Ching?"  I said.
He nodded, and looked sharply about him.
"There can be no big traffic up here, Mr Grey," said the lieutenant. "What does the interpreter say?"
"Do you hear, Ching?"  I whispered; "what do you say?"
"Allee light," he replied.  "Pilate come along in littlee sampan; cally silk, tea, lice."
"Oh, bother!"  I said.  Then aloud to Mr Reardon, whose boat was half hidden by the growth overhead, "He seems quite sure they do come up here, sir."
"Well, then, go a little farther, but I feel far from sure.  Push right in at the next place where there's room for the boat, and climb up the bank."
"Yes, sir," I cried; and we went on again for another hundred yards, when all at once I caught sight of an opening where I could land, and pointed it out to Mr Grey.
"Yes," said Ching, "allee light.  That place where pilate land allee plize-money."
I laughed, and Mr Grey told the coxswain to draw the boat close to the bank, when, to my intense surprise, I found there was a broadly-trampled path, beaten into soft steps, and I turned in my glee and shouted--
"Here's the place, sir."
The boat glided rustling in; two men sprang out, and then we followed. The second boat came alongside, and five minutes later our sturdy little force was tramping along through a dense patch of wood by a well-beaten path, and in about ten minutes more were out at the foot of a low ridge which hid the river from our sight, and in face of a couple of dozen or so low bamboo huts, two of which were of pretty good size.
"Steady! halt! form up!" cried the lieutenant, and skirmishers were sent forward to feel our way, for no one was visible; but open doors and windows, suggested the possibility of danger in ambush.
A few minutes settled all doubts on that score, and the word to advance was given.  We went up to the front of the huts at the double, and examination proved that the places must have been occupied within a few hours, for the fire in one hut was still smouldering; but the people had fled, and we were in possession of the tiny village so cunningly hidden from the river.
Our men were pretty quick, but Ching surpassed them.
"Look at him running!" cried Barkins, as, with his tail flying, Ching ran from hut to hut, and finally stopped before the two more pretentious places, which were closely shut.
"Hong--warehouse," he cried to me, and an attempt was made to enter, but the doors of both were quite fast.
"Steady!" said Mr Reardon; "there may be some of the enemy inside;" and our men were so placed that when the door was burst in, any fire which we drew would prove harmless.
One of the sailors came forward then with a heavy flat stone, which looked as if it had been used to crush some kind of grain upon it, and, receiving a nod from the lieutenant, he raised it above his head, dashed it against the fastening, and the door flew open with a crash, while the sailor darted aside.
But no shot issued from within, and Mr Reardon stepped forward, looked in, and uttered an ejaculation.
"Look here, Grey," he cried; and the boatswain stepped to his side. Then my turn came, and there was no doubt about Ching's idea being correct, for the place was literally packed with stores.  Chests, bales, boxes, and packages of all kinds were piled-up on one side; bags, evidently of rice, on the other; while at the end were articles of all kinds, and crates which seemed to be full of china.
"Sentry here," said the lieutenant sternly; and, leaving a marine on guard, he led the way to the other store, whose door was burst in, and upon our entering, without hesitation now, this place proved to be choked with the cargo of different junks which the pirates had rifled, for everything of value had been packed in tightly, and the pirates' treasure-houses were no doubt waiting for some favourable opportunity for disposing of the loot.
"Sentry here," cried Mr Reardon again; and the man having been planted, we stood together in one of the huts, while the lieutenant made his plans.
"You wantee big empty boat?" said Ching suddenly.
"Yes, my man, and I wish we had brought one."  Then, after a few minutes' consideration, Mr Reardon decided what to do.
"Now, Mr Herrick," he said, "take a marine and one man with the signal flags, and go up to the ridge yonder.  Place your marine where he can command the plain, and he will fire if he sees the enemy approaching. The man is to signal for two more boats."
I started for the ridge after getting my two men, which was about two hundred yards away, the ground rising in a slope; and, as we went off at the double, I heard orders being given, while, by the time we were up on the top, I looked back to see our men going in a regular stream down to the boats, laden with bales of silk, the white frocks of the Jacks showing through the thick growth from time to time.
My sentry was soon posted in a position where he could command the plain for miles, and the Jack hard at work waving flags till his signal was answered from the ship, which seemed from where we stood to be lying close at hand.
Then we two returned, to find that one boat was already packed as full as it would hold; and Barkins and Mr Grey went off with it back to the river, while the second was rapidly laden, and in half an hour followed the first.  Then Smith and I followed the lieutenant into the store, with its low reed-thatched roof, and gazed about wonderingly at the richness of the loot upon which we had come.
"I say, Gnat, we shan't go home without prize-money this voyage," whispered Smith; and then, nothing more being possible, the sentries-- four, posted at different distances--were visited, and we all sat down in the shade to rest, and partake of the refreshments in the men's haversacks.
CHAPTER TWENTY TWO.
FRESH DANGER.
"They're a long time sending those boats, Herrick," said the lieutenant to me soon after we had finished our meal.
"It's rather a long way, sir," I ventured to suggest.
"Oh yes, it's a long way; but with the state of dishipline to which I have brought the _Teaser_ they ought to have been here by now.  Suppose we were surrounded by the enemy, and waiting for their help to save us!"
"We should think it longer than we do now, sir."  Mr Reardon turned to me sharply, and looked as if in doubt whether he should treat my remark as humorous or impertinent.  Fortunately he took the former view, and smiled pleasantly.
"So we should, Herrick, so we should.  But if they knew it was to fetch all this loot on board, they'd make a little more haste."
"They know it by this time, sir," I said.  "They must have met the first boat."
"Oh, I don't know," he said rather sourly.  "The men are very slow when I am not there."
"Here they are, sir!"  I cried; for the marine sentry down by the river challenged, and then there was a loud cheering, and soon after Mr Brooke appeared, followed by a long train of fully-armed Jacks.
"Why, I thought when we started that we had come to fight," cried Mr Brooke as he reached us.  "We met the two loaded boats.  Is there much more?"
"Come and look," said Mr Reardon; and we went first into one and then the other store, while our party of Jacks communicated our luck to the newcomers, the result being that, as we came out of the second long hut, the men cheered again lustily.
Then no time was lost; and the way in which the crew attacked those two stores of loot was a sight to see.  It was tremendously hot, but they laughed and cheered each other as those returning met the laden ones going down to the boats.  They would have liked to make a race of it to see which crew could load up their boat first, but Mr Reardon stopped that; and the strength of all was put to work to load one boat and get it off, so that there were two streams of men going and coming; and the first boat was deeply laden in an incredibly short space of time, the men leaving themselves no room to row, but placing the chests amidships to form a platform, and two smaller ones in the bow and stern.
They would have laden the boat more deeply still but for Mr Brooke, who superintended at the side of the creek, while Mr Reardon was at the stores.
Then the first of the boats Mr Brooke had brought was sent off, and by the time the next was loaded one of those we had previously sent off returned.
"Velly plime lot of plize-money," Ching said to me every time we met; and he toiled away with the rest, his face shining, and while our men grew red he grew more and more yellow.  But, in spite of the tremendously hard work of carrying down those loads, the men took it all as a party of pleasure; and when, later on in the day, after boatload after boatload had gone down the creek for hours, I had to go up to Mr Reardon with a message from Mr Brooke, I was astonished to see how the contents of the stores had disappeared.
It was getting close upon sundown when the last load was packed into the longboat.  Silk bale, tea-chest, rice-bag, crate, and box, with an enormous amount of indescribable loot, including all kinds of weapons, had been taken aboard; and the men who had come up for fresh burdens began cheering like mad as they found the task was done.
"That will do, my lads; steady--steady!" cried Mr Reardon.  "Fall in."
_Bang_!
It was not a loud report, only that of the rifle fired by the sentry on the ridge; and immediately the men stood to their arms, and were ready for what promised to be an interruption.
"See the sentry, Mr Herrick?" cried the lieutenant.
"Yes, sir," I said; "he's running in fast."
The next minute the man came up, breathless.
"Strong body of John Chinamans, sir, coming across from over yonder."
"Time we were off, then," said Mr Reardon; and, giving the word, we started away at the "double" from before the empty stores and huts, toward the creek.
Our run through the wood, though, was soon brought to a walk, for we overtook the last laden men, and had to accommodate our pace to theirs. But they hurried on pretty quickly, reached the boat just as another empty one returned; the loading was finished, and as soon as the boat was ready, an addition was made to her freight in the shape of a dozen Jacks and marines, and she pushed off just as a loud yelling was heard from the direction of the empty stores.
"They'll be down on us directly," muttered Mr Reardon; and we all crowded into the empty boat and pushed off after the loaded one, but had not descended the creek far before we were stopped by the loaded boat, and had to arrange our pace by hers.
"Now for a slow crawl," I thought, "and they'll be after us directly."
A loud bang behind us told that I was right, and the handful of rough slugs in the heavy matchlock flew spattering amongst the leaves overhead, cutting off twigs which fell into the boat.
"Lie down all who can," cried the lieutenant; and we waited for the next shot, which, to be rather Irish, was half-a-dozen in a scattered volley.
But though the twigs and leaves came showering down, no one was hit; and the coxswain steadily poled us along as fast as the progress of the other boat would allow.
I saw that Mr Reardon was on the _qui vive_ to order a return of the fire; but so far we could not see from whence it came, and it seemed as if nothing could be done but keep steadily on with our retreat.
"They might have given us another half-hour, Herrick," he said.  "I should like to get the boys on board unhurt."
"Think they can get on ahead, sir?"  I whispered.
"I hope not.  The forest on each side is so dense that I don't fancy they can get along any faster than we do.  Make haste, my lads, make haste," he said, almost in a whisper; "we shall have it dark here under these trees before long."
Crash came another volley, accompanied by a savage yelling, but we were so low down between the muddy banks that again the slugs went pattering over our heads.
"Would you mind passing the word to the other boat, messmate," said a familiar voice.  "Tell 'em not to hurry themselves, as we're very comfortable."
"Who's that?  Silence!" cried Mr Reardon.
No reply came to his question, but I could hear the men chuckling.
The next minute they were serious enough, for there was a burst of voices from very near at hand.
"Aim low, my lads," said Mr Reardon.  "You six in the stern-sheets, as near to where the shooting is as you can."
The rifles were levelled, three of the barrels being passed over our shoulders.  Then came the usual orders, and the pieces went off like one.
This silenced our pursuers for a few minutes, during which we continued our progress, snail-like at the best, for the boat in front looked like a slug.
"I'd give the order to them to draw aside and let us pass, Herrick," whispered the lieutenant, who now, in this time of peril, grew very warm and friendly; "but--ah, that's getting dangerous."
For another volley from very near at hand rattled over us, and was answered by our men.
"What was I going to say?" continued the lieutenant coolly, "Oh, I remember!  If we tried to get by them they might take the ground with all that load, and be stuck."
"And it would be a pity to have to leave that load, sir," I said.
"Velly best load--allee best silk!" cried Ching excitedly, "Good, velly good plize-money!"
There was a roar of laughter at this, and Mr Reardon cried--
"Silence!"
Then, sharply, "Fire, my lads, if you see any one following."
"Ay, ay, sir."
"Yes, it would be a pity," said the lieutenant thoughtfully; "but it's tempting.  If we could get in front, Herrick, we could tow the load, and it would shelter us all from the firing."
"Unless they got to be level with us, sir," I said.
"And--quick! right and left, my lads.  Fire!" cried the lieutenant; for there was the breaking of undergrowth close at hand on either side, and a savage yelling commenced as our pursuers forced their way through.
The men, who had been like hounds held back by the leash, were only too glad to get their orders; and in an instant there was quite a blaze of fire from both sides of the boat, the bullets cutting and whistling through the thick trees and undergrowth; and the movement on the banks, with the cracking and rustling of the bushes and tufts of bamboo, stopped as if by magic.
"Cease firing!" cried Mr Reardon; and then, as if to himself, "Every shot is wasted."
I did not think so, for it had checked the enemy, who allowed us to go on slowly another hundred yards or so.
"Allee velly dleadful," whispered Ching to me, as he crouched in the bottom of the boat.  "You tinkee hit Ching?"
"I hope not," I said.  "Oh no; we shall get out into the river directly."
"No," he said; "velly long way yet."
"But who are these?"  I said--"some village people?"
"Pilate," he cried.  "Allee come home not kill, and findee plize-money gone.  Makee velly angly.  Wantee chop off sailor head."
"Like to catch 'em at it," growled Tom Jecks, who had been very silent for some time.
"Silence there!" cried Mr Reardon sternly.  Then to me, "We seem to have checked them, Herrick."
At that moment there was a sudden stoppage in front, and our coxswain growled--
"Starn all!"
"What is it?" cried Mr Reardon, rising.
There was a rattle of matchlocks from our right, and Mr Reardon fell sidewise on to me.
"Hurt, sir?"  I cried in agony.
"Yes, badly--no--I don't know," he cried, struggling up with his hand to his head.  "Here! why has that boat stopped?"
His voice was drowned by the reports of our men's rifles, as they fired in the direction from which the shots had come; and just then a voice from the laden boat came through the semi-darkness--
"Ahoy!"
"Yes; what is it?"  I said, as I saw that a man had crawled over the stack-like load.
"There's a gang in front, sir; and we're aground."
"And the tide falling," muttered Mr Reardon.  "Herrick, I'm a bit hurt; get our boat close up; half the men are to come astern here, and check the enemy; the other half to help unload and get enough into our boat to lighten the other."
"Yes, sir," I said; and I gave the orders as quickly and decisively as I could.
The men responded with a cheer; and, with scarcely any confusion, our boat's head was made fast to the other's stern, and the men swarmed on to the top of the load, and began to pass down the bales rapidly from hand to hand.
Crash came a ragged volley from right ahead now; but this was answered by three rifles in the stern of the laden boat, and repeated again and again, while the strong party in the stern of ours kept up a fierce fire for a few minutes.
It was a perilous time, for we knew that if the enemy pushed forward boldly we should be at their mercy.  They could come right to the edge of the bank unseen, so dense was the cover; and, working as our men were at such a disadvantage in the gloom, which was rapidly growing deeper, there was no knowing how long it would be before the first boat was sufficiently lightened to float again; it even seemed to be possible that we might not keep pace with the fall of the tide, and then perhaps we should also be aground.
"Hurt much, sir?"  I said to Mr Reardon, who was now seated resting his head upon his hand.
"Don't take any notice of me, my lad," he said, pressing my hand.  "Hit by a bullet.  Not very bad; but I'm half stunned and confused.  The men and boats, Herrick; save them."
"If I can," I thought, as I hurried forward again, and gave orders to the men to pass the silk bales that were nearest to the bows.
"Ay, ay, sir," they shouted, as readily as if I had been the captain.
From here I went back to the stern, where I found that Mr Reardon was seated now in the bottom of the boat, supported by Ching, while the men were keeping up a steady fire at every spot from which a shot or yell came.
"We're hard at it, sir," said Tom Jecks, who was handling his rifle as coolly as if it had been a capstan bar; "but I don't think we're hitting any of 'em.  How's the first luff seem?"
"I don't know," I said excitedly.
"Well, sir, we're all right," said the man, "and are doing our best. You needn't stop if you can hurry the boys on forward."
It was a fact; I could do no good at all, so I hurried forward again. But even here I could do nothing; the men had their task to do of lightening the first boat, and they were working as hard as if they had been lying down in the shade all day, and just as coolly, though every now and then the rough slugs the pirates fired from their clumsy matchlocks went spattering through the trees overhead and sent down fresh showers of leaves and twigs.
But I was obliged to say something, and I shouted first one order and then another.
"That's your sort, lads," cried a cheery voice.  "Down with 'em, and I'll stow.  It's like bricklaying with big bricks."
"Who's that?"  I said sharply, for the man's back was towards me, and it was getting quite dark where we were.
"Me it is, sir--Bob Saunders, sir.  Beg pardon, sir."
"Yes; what is it?"
"Tide's going down very fast, sir, arn't it?"
"Yes; why?"
"'Cause we don't seem to get no forrarder.  Hi! steady there!  D'yer want to bury yer orficer?"
"Never mind me, man.  Stow away; she must soon be lightened enough to make her float."
"Then we'll lighten her, sir; but don't you go and give orders for any of the stuff to be chucked overboard.  It's too vallerble for that."
"Only as a last resource, Bob," I replied.
"Beg pardon, sir."
"Don't," I cried to the man who touched me.  "Never mind ceremony now; go on firing."
"Yes, sir; but Tom Jecks says, sir, would you like six on us to land and have a go at the beggars?"
"No," I cried.  "Keep together; we may be afloat at any moment."
"Right, sir; on'y we're all willing, if you give the word."
"I know that," I cried.  "But be careful, my lads.  It's a terrible position, with our chief officer down like this."
"So it is, sir," said the man, taking careful aim at a part of the bank where he thought that he saw a movement.  Then, almost simultaneously, there was a flash from the place, and another from his rifle muzzle.
"Either on us hit?" he said coolly, as I clapped my hand to my ear, which felt as if a jet of cold air had touched it.  "Don't think I touched him, sir, but he has cut off.  I can hear him going.  Not hurt, are you, sir?"
"No; a bullet must have gone close to my ear," I said.
"Oh yes; I felt that, sir.  It went between us.  But it's no use to take no notice o' misses."
"Well?"  I said; for one of the men behind me now touched my arm, and I found it was Bob Saunders.
"We're getting dead down at the head, sir; hadn't we better begin stowing aft?"
"Yes, yes, of course," I said excitedly, and feeling annoyed that I had not thought of this myself.
"Then, if you'll make the lads ease off to starboard and port, sir, we'll soon pack a row of these here little bales between 'em.  Or look here, sir! how would it be to bring 'em a bit amidships, and let us begin right astarn, and build up a sort o' bulwark o' bales?  They could fire from behind it when we'd done."
"Yes, capital!"  I cried, once more annoyed with myself because I, a mere boy, had not the foresight of an experienced man.
"No, no," I cried the next moment.  "How could we get at the tiller?"
"You won't want no tiller, sir; we can row aboard easy enough, once we get out o' this fiddling little drain."
"You are right, Saunders," I said.  "Go on."
All the while the men astern were keeping up a steady fire, which certainly had one effect, that of checking the enemy's advance.  And now Saunders came aft with a bale on his head, keeping his balance wonderfully as he stepped over the thwarts.
"Mind yer eye, Pigtail," he cried.
"Keep back!  Where are you coming?" growled a man who was loading.
"Here, matey," cried Saunders; and he plumped the bale down right across the stern.
"Hooroar!" cried Tom Jecks, stepping behind it, and resting his rifle on the top.
No more was said, the men easing off out of the way as bale after bale was brought and planted in threes, so that when six had been placed there was a fine breast-work, which formed a splendid protection for those in the stern, and this was added to, until we were fairly safe from enemies behind.  But once more we could hear them creeping nearer through the bushes on our right; the firing grew more dangerous, and there was nothing for it, I felt, but to order every man in the two boats to take his piece, shelter himself behind the bales, and help to beat the enemy back.
It was a sad necessity, for I knew that the tide was falling very fast, and that before long we should be immovable; but to have kept on shifting the load and allow the enemy to get close in over our heads on the densely-clothed sides of the stream would, I knew, be madness; and the men showed how they appreciated the common-sense of the order by getting at once under cover, and then the sharp rattle of our fire was more than doubled.
But, enraged by their defeat, and doubly mortified to find that we had discovered their treasure, the pirates seemed now to have cast aside their cowardice, and were creeping in nearer and nearer, yelling to each other by way of encouragement; and, in addition to keeping up an irregular fire, they strove, I suppose, to intimidate us by beating and making a deafening noise on gongs.
"They will be too much for us," I thought, when we seemed to have been keeping up the struggle for hours, though minutes would have been a more correct definition; and, with the longing for help and counsel growing more and more intense, I was about to kneel down and speak to Mr Reardon, and ask him to try and save himself.
But I started to my feet, for there was a louder yelling than ever, and the pirates made quite a rush, which brought them abreast of us.
"Cutlasses!"  I cried; and there was the rattle made in fixing them, bayonet fashion, on the rifles, when--_boom_!--_thud_!--came the roar of a heavy gun; there was a whistling shrieking in the air, and then somewhere overhead an ear-splitting crash, followed by the breaking of bushes and trampling down of grass and bamboo.
Then perfect silence, followed by a cheer from our men.
"Well done, _Teaser_!" shouted Tom Jecks.
It was a diversion which, I believe, saved us, for the enemy fled for some distance, and gave us time to go on lightening the foremost boat.
But before we had been at work many minutes there was a cheer from close at hand, and upon our answering it, another and another, with splashing of oars, and the next minute I heard Mr Brooke's voice from beyond the first boat.
CHAPTER TWENTY THREE.
SAVED.
"Look sharp, sir," I said, after going forward, and in a few words explaining our position.
"Right, my lad.  Get your men together in the stern of your boat, and keep up the fire, while we make fast and try and tow you off.  Hi! quick there!" he roared; and a cheer told us that another boat was close at hand.
But my work was cut out, the men placed well under cover, and we waited listening for the first sounds of the returning enemy, while from time to time Mr Brooke's clear, short orders came out of the darkness behind us, and we knew that he had sent a party into the fixed boat to rock it from side to side.  Then came a cheer, as the water rolled hissing and whispering among the reeds; there was the simultaneous plash of oars, and a creaking sound.
Then another sound from the bank of the creek, which I knew well enough.
"Say when, sir," whispered Tom Jecks.  "They're a-coming on."  To our astonishment, for the enemy had crept forward so silently that we had hardly heard a sound, there was a hideous yell, and a crashing volley, the bullets hissing over our heads again, and once more the gong-beating began.
"Fire!"  I said.
"Yes, fire, my lads, steady--where you see the flashes of their matchlocks."
The voice came from close to my ear.
"Mr Reardon!"  I cried in astonishment.
"Yes, Herrick; that bullet quite stunned me for a minute or two.  I'm better now.  But hasn't it grown dark rather suddenly?"
"Yes, sir," I said; for I felt in my excitement as if it would be impossible to enter into explanations then.
"But we're in motion."
"Hooray!"
Every one took up that cheer; for the combined efforts of the men who rowed the laden craft, and the tugging of two boats' crews of men straining with all their might at their stout ashen blades, had the required effect.  We were indeed in motion, and going steadily down the stream.
"Ahoy, there: Mr Reardon!"
"Answer him, Herrick," said Mr Reardon; and I hailed again.
"Can you keep them off with your fire?"
"Say, yes."
"Yes; all right," I cried.
"Then we'll tow you out as fast as we can."
"Thank Heaven," I heard Mr Reardon whisper, as he crouched there, listening to the yelling, gong-beating, and firing, and with our men replying from time to time whenever there seemed a chance.
And now the bullets from the matchlocks began to patter upon the bales; for the banks were growing lower and lower, and the trees more open, but not a man was hit; and after another quarter of an hour's sharp replying we heard fresh cheering, the overshadowing trees on the banks suddenly began to grow distant.  Then it became lighter still, with the stars twinkling over head and the lights of the _Teaser_ apparently close at hand.
But the enemy, enraged at our escape, now crowded down to the bank and began to fire rapidly, while the men replied till the _crack crack_ and _ping ping_ of the rifles was silenced,--the men stopping as if by mutual consent.  For there was a flash from the side of the _Teaser_ right in front of us, a shell whistled over our heads and crashed in among the trees where the petty firing of the matchlocks was kept up. Then--_crash_! the shell sent shrieking amongst them exploded, and all was still but the steady beating of our oars.
"Are you much hurt, sir?"  I said to Mr Reardon; but Ching took the inquiry to himself.
"Velly stiff; velly hungly," he said.
"I wasn't speaking to you," I cried angrily; for my temper seemed to have suddenly grown painfully acid, and a titter rose from among the men.
"No, Mr Herrick, scarcely at all.  The bullet struck my cap-band, just above my temple, and glanced off.  I can think more clearly now.  How many men are hurt in this boat?"
There was no reply; and as we at the same moment glided alongside, the question seemed to be echoed from the _Teaser's_ side high above our heads.
Still no reply, and the captain said sharply--
"Who is below there, Mr Reardon--Mr Brooke?"
"Ay, ay, sir," cried the latter.
"How many men did you find they had lost?"
"None, sir."
"Brought all off safely?"
"Yes, sir."
A tremendous cheer arose from the deck.
"I felt too giddy to speak just then, Herrick," said Mr Reardon.  "Not one man injured except myself.  It is marvellous, my lad.  But there; we had plenty of poor fellows wounded aboard."
Ten minutes later two of the boats were swinging at the davits, and our two were being towed astern, as the head of the _Teaser_ once more swung round, and we went down with the tide.  We anchored off the mouth of the muddy river till morning, to which time was put off the hoisting on deck of the rest of the loot, the account of whose amount and probable value did more, they said, toward helping on the wounded than any of Dr Price's ministrations.
But he had serious work with two of the wounded men, who tried very hard, as he put it, to go out of hand; but he wouldn't let them.  Two of the pirates did die, though, and were cast overboard, sewn up decently in hammocks, and with shot at their heels.
Seven days later we came to an anchor again off Tsin-Tsin, by which time Mr Reardon's right eye and temple were horribly discoloured, but in other respects he was quite well, and was present at what he called our second gaol delivery, for he came on deck to see the prisoners, wounded and sound, handed over to the Chinese authorities; but there was no such display of pomp as on the first occasion, one row-boat only coming alongside, with a very business-like officer, who superintended the chaining of the pirates, and bundled them down.
"Just as if they had been so many sacks," Barkins said; and he was very apt in his comparison.
I only said one word in allusion to the Chinese soldiery and their officers.  That word was--
"Brutes!"
CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR.
A SURPRISE.
I don't think the Chinese authorities were very grateful to us of the _Teaser_,--there, you see, I say _us_, for I did do something to help in routing out and destroying two nests of pirates; but the merchants, both Chinese and English, feted us most gloriously, and if it had not been for Mr Reardon we three middies might have always been ashore at dinners and dances.
"But," cried Barkins, "so sure as one gets an invitation he puts his foot down."
"Yes," said Smith; "and it is such a foot."
"But it's such a pity," grumbled Barkins; "for Tsin-Tsin is after all rather a jolly place.  Mr Brooke says the ball at the consul's last night was glorious, no end of Chinese swells there, and the music and dancing was fine."
"Don't be so jolly envious, Tanner," sneered Smith.  "You couldn't have danced if you had gone."
"Dance better than you could," cried Barkins hotly.
"No, you couldn't.  Fancy asking a young lady to waltz, and then going dot-and-go-one round the room with your game leg."
"You've a deal to talk about, Smithy; why, if you asked a lady to dance you couldn't lift your right arm to put round her waist."
"Couldn't I?" cried Smith.  "Look here."
He swung his arm round me, took three steps, and dropped on to the locker, turning quite white with pain.
"Told you so," cried Barkins, springing up.  "Waltz?  I should just think!--oh, murder!"
He sat down suddenly to hold his leg tightly with both hands, giving Smith a dismal look.
"Oh dear!" he groaned; "what a long time it does take a wound to get well in this plaguey country.  I know that knife was poisoned."
"Nonsense!"  I cried, unable to restrain my mirth.  "Why, you are both getting on famously."
"But Dishy might have let us go to the ball last night."
"Play fair," I said; "we've been out to seven entertainments."
"Well, what of that?  They've been to a dozen.  It's all old Dishy's way of showing his authority.  I'm sure we all work hard when we're on duty, and run risks enough."
"Go on, you old grumbler.  Aren't we to go up the river shooting on Thursday with Mr Brooke and the doctor?"
"Yes, that's right enough; but we shall be off again soon on another cruise, and get no more fun for long enough."
"I say, let's ask for a run ashore to-day."
"And get chivvied by the pigtails, same as we did down at that other place."
"Oh, but perhaps they'll be more civil here," I said.
Smith burst out laughing.
"Why, didn't they pelt you, and shy mud at the skipper?"
"Oh, if you're afraid, you can stop," I said.  "Tanner and I can go."
"Afraid!" cried Smith, doubling his fist and holding it within an inch of my nose.  "Say afraid again, you miserable insect, and I'll flatten you."
"Couldn't with that hand," I said, and I caught his wrist.
"Oh, don't!  Murder!" he roared.  "I say, you shouldn't.  It's like touching one's arm with red-hot iron."
"Then be civil," I said.
"Ah, only wait.  I say, Tanner, our day's coming.  As soon as we're both quite strong he has got to pay for all this, hasn't he?"
"Oh, bother!  I say, the skipper and Dishy are both going ashore to-day with an escort of Jacks and marines."
"Are they?"  I said eagerly.
"Yes; there's some game or another on.  Let's ask leave, and take old Ching with us."
"Want to try puppy-pie again?" said Smith, grinning.
"I want to do something for a change.  I know!  I'll go and see the doctor, and tell him we want a walk in the country to collect flowers, and ask him if he'll name them."
"Well, he can't give us leave."
"No; but he'll ask Dishy to let us off."
"Bravo!" cried Smith.  "Off you go.  I say, though, we must have old Ching too.  You see if he don't come out in his new gown!"
"What new gown?"  I said.
"Hallo! didn't you know?  He went ashore yesterday and bought himself a new blue coat.  Not a cotton one, but silk, real silk, my boy, and beckoned me to come and see it,--beckoned with one of his long claws. He's letting his fingernails grow now, and getting to be quite a swell."
"Oh yes; old Ching's getting quite the gentleman.  He says he wrote home to his broker to sell the fancee shop.  What do you think he said, Gnat?"
"How should I know?"  I replied.
"That it wasn't proper for a gentleman in Queen Victolia's service to keep a fancee shop."
"Murder!  Look at that!" cried Smith.  "Why, you yellow-skinned old Celestial, you were listening!"
Barkins and I picked up each something to throw at the round, smooth, smiling face thrust in at the door, which was held close to the neck, so that we saw a head and nothing more.
"No flow thing at Ching," the Chinaman said softly.  "Offlicer don't flow thing.  Ching come in?"
"Yes," said Barkins, "come in.  What is it?"
Ching entered looking very important, and gave his head a shake to make his tail fall neatly between his shoulders, and drew the long blue sleeves of his gown over the backs of his hands till only the tips of his fingers, with their very long nails, were visible.
He advanced smiling at us each in turn, and bowing his round head like a china mandarin.
"You all velly good boy?" he said softly.
"Oh yes; beauties," said Barkins.  "What's up?"
"You likee ask leave go for bit walkee walkee?"
"Don't!" roared Smith.  "Don't talk like a nurse to us.  Why don't you speak plain English?"
"Yes; Ching speak ploper Inglis.  No speakee pigeon Englis.  All ploper. Interpleter.  You likee go shore for walkee, see something?"
"You beggar, you were listening," cried Barkins.  "How long had you been there?"
"Ching just come ask young genelman likee walkee walkee."
"Yes, allee likee walkee walkee velly much," said Barkins, imitating the Chinaman's squeak.  "Why?  Can you give us leave?"
Ching shook his head.
"Go ask offlicer.  Go for walkee walkee, take Ching; you likee see something velly nice ploper?"
"Yes," I cried eagerly.  "Can you take us to see a Chinese theatre?"
Ching closed his eyes and nodded.
"You come 'long o' Ching, I showee something velly nice ploper."
"All right," I cried.  "Now, Tanner, go and try it on with the doctor."
"No, no.  Ask offlicer.  Doctor only give flizzick.  Velly nastee. Ugh!"
Ching's round face was a study as he screwed it up to show his disgust with the doctor's preparations.
Barkins went off and returned directly.
"Well," we cried; "seen Price?" and Ching, who was squatted on the floor, looked up smiling.
"No."
"Not seen him?"
"No; I ran against Dishy, and thought I'd ask him plump."
"And you did?"
"Yes."
"What did he say?"
"I know," cried Smith; "that we were always going out."
"That's it exactly."
"And he won't let us go?"  I said in a disappointed tone.
"Who says so?" cried Barkins, changing his manner.  "The old chap was in splendid fettle, and he smiled,--now, now, don't both of you be so jolly full of doubts.  On my honour as an officer and a gentleman, he smiled and clapped me on the shoulder."
"Yes, my lad, of course," he said.  "We shall be off again soon, and then it will be all work and no play again, and we mustn't make Jack a dull boy, must we?"
"He's going off his head," said Smith.
"Let him go, then," I cried, "if it makes him like this."
"Don't chatter so, Gnat," cried Smith.  "I say, did he really say we might go?"
"Yes; and that we ought to start at once before the day grew hotter, and that we were to take great care of ourselves."
"Hurra!"
"And be sure and wash our faces and our hands before we started," added Barkins.
"Get out; I can see where it joins," I cried.  "But did he say any more?"
"Only that we were to mind and not get into any trouble with the people, and that we had better take Ching."
"Yes," said that individual gravely.  "Much better take Ching.  Velly useful take care."
"To be sure," I cried, full of excitement at the idea of a run through the mazes of the quaint town, and the prospect of seeing a Chinese performance.  "I say, Ching," I cried, striking an attitude, "take us where you can give us a tune, `Ti--ope--I--ow.'"
"Yes; velly nicee music," he said, nodding and smiling.  "Ching takee see something velly good.  You leady?"
"In five minutes," cried Barkins.  "Gnat, go and tell them to have the boat ready.  Mr Reardon said we were to be rowed ashore."
"Ching leady in five minutes," said the interpreter, running towards the door.
"Eh?  Why, you are ready," said Smith.
"No.  Go put on new blue silk flock.  Leady dilectly."
Ten minutes later we were being rowed ashore, to be landed at the wharf where we met with so unpleasant an attack a short time before.  But there was no mob of idlers there now, and we stepped ashore, leaving the good-natured-looking crew smiling at us, and giving the shops many a longing look, as they pushed off and began to row back at once.
"Plenty time," said Ching.  "You likee fust go lestaulant--eatee, dlinkee, spend plize-money?"
"Can't spend what we haven't yet got, Ching," said Barkins.  "What do you say, lads?  I'm hungry again, aren't you?"
Smith sighed.
"I'm always hungry," he said.
"Of course you are.  I believe he's hollow all through, Gnat.  How do you feel?"
"As if I haven't had any breakfast," I said earnestly.
Ching smiled.
"Velly much nicee bleakfast all along o' Ching."
He led the way in and out among the narrow streets, apparently again as much at home as in his own city; and it was hard work to keep from stopping to gaze at the hundreds of objects which attracted and set me longing to make purchases to take home for curiosities.  But Ching bustled us along.
"No time now.  Come along get good bleakfast.  Wantee good bleakfast before go to see gland show."
"Here, what is it you are going to take us to see, Ching?" cried Barkins--"all right; I wasn't talking to you," he added, as a couple of Chinamen turned round to gaze at the young outer barbarian.
"You waitee," cried Ching, smiling; "all velly ploper gland.  You likee see the show."
"Oh, all right.  Where's the restaurant?"
"Nex' stleet," said Ching; and after a few minutes he turned into a showy-looking eating-house, where his blue silk gown and long nails seemed to command the most profound respect from the attendants; and where, after laying down the law very stringently to Ching, that we were to have neither dog, cat, nor rat, we resigned ourselves to our fate, and ate birds'-nest soup, shark-fin, and a variety of what Barkins called messes, with midshipmen appetites.
Ching smiled, and seemed to be very proud of our performance.
"You all eat dlink velly much," he said, as we gave up, defeated.  "You all velly quite full?" he said, rubbing his hands carefully, so as not to injure his long nails.
"Yes, full up, and the hatches battened down," cried Barkins.  "Now then, ask for the bill.  How much apiece?"
Ching smiled and nodded his head.
"You come have bleakfast 'long o' Ching.  Ching velly glad to see you; Ching pay."
"What? nonsense!" cried Smith, while we others stared.
"Yes; Ching plenty money.  Captain gave Ching plenty plize-money; make him velly happy to see young offlicer to bleakfast."
"Oh, but we can't let him pay for us, Smithy," cried Barkins.
"No, of course not," we chorussed.
"Ching velly much hurt you want to pay," he said, with dignity.
"But--" I cried.
"You ask Ching bleakfast like Chinese genelman another time, make Ching velly glad.  Come along, makee haste, see gland show."
"But the bill isn't paid," I cried.
"Ching pay long time 'go," he said, rising; and there was nothing for it but to follow him out and along three or four streets to where there was a dense crowd in front of a gateway in a high mud wall.
There were some soldiers there too, and Ching walked up full of importance, showed them some kind of paper, when one, who appeared to be their officer, spoke to those under him, and they cleared a way for us to pass to the gate.
Here Ching knocked loudly, and the gate was opened by another soldier; the paper was shown; and an important-looking official came up, looked at us, and made way for us to enter.
"It's all right," said Smith.  "Ching knows the manager.  It will be a private box."
The official pointed to our left, and Ching led the way behind a kind of barricade where there were seats erected, and, selecting a place, he smilingly made us sit down.
"Ching know gleat mandalin," he said.  "Askee let come see gland show."
"But what's it going to be?"  I asked, as I looked curiously round the square enclosure surrounded by a high wall, and with seats and pens on three sides.  "I thought we were coming to a theatre!"
"No," said Ching, smiling.  "Velly gland show; wait."
We waited, and saw that the space in front of us was neatly sanded, that posts stood up here and there.  In other places there were cross bars, and in two there were ropes hanging.
"I know!" cried Barkins; "he needn't make such a jolly mystery of it. It's Chinese athletic sports.  Look, there's the band coming."
He pointed to a military-looking party marching in with drums, gongs, and divers other instruments; and almost at the same time quite a crowd of well-dressed people entered, and began to take the different places reserved behind the barriers.
Then a body of soldiers, with clumsy spears and shields, marched in and formed up opposite the band, the place filling up till only the best places, which were exactly opposite to us, remained empty.
"You're right, Tanner," said Smith just then; "but they're military athletic sports.  I say, here come the grandees."
For in procession about twenty gorgeously-arrayed officials came marching in, and the next moment I gave Barkins a dig in the ribs.
"Look," I said.
"All right; I see.  Well, we needn't mind.  But I say, what a game if we hadn't got leave!"
"I say," whispered Smith, "look over there.  The skipper and old Dishy! This was where they were coming, then; they'll see us directly."
"Let 'em," said Barkins, as the party settled themselves.  "Now then, we're all here.  All in to begin.  We ought to have a programme.  Here, Ching, what's the first thing they do?"
"Ching no quite sure; p'laps lichi."
"Lichi?"  I said.
"You don't know?  You see velly gland--velly ploper for bad, bad man."
He turned away to speak to a Chinese officer close at hand, while we began to feel wondering and suspicious, and gazed at each other with the same question on our lips.
Ching turned to us again, and I being nearest whispered--
"I say, what place is this?  What are they going to do?"
"Bring out allee wicked men.  Choppee off head."
CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE.
THE ENTERTAINMENT.
I felt as it were a sudden jar run through me when I heard Ching's words.  It was as if I had been awakened by a sudden revelation.  This, then, was the grand show he had contrived for us as a treat!  It was all clear enough: our officers had been invited to the execution of the pirates we had taken, and conceiving, with all a Chinaman's indifference to death, that we three lads, who had been present at their capture, would consider it as a great treat to be witnesses of the punishment awarded by the Government, Ching had contrived to get permission for us to be present.
I glanced at the Tanner, who had grasped the situation, and was screwing his face up so as to look perfectly unconcerned; but it was a dismal failure, for I could see a peculiar twitching going on at the corners of his eyes, and he passed his tongue rapidly over his lips and went through the action of swallowing as if his mouth and throat were dry.
I next looked at Smithy, whose eyes showed more white than usual, and whose complexion was of a sickly-green, just as I had seen it during some very rough weather we had going down the Channel on first starting for this voyage.
How I looked I have only Barkins' word for, and he told me afterwards that I seemed as if I was waiting for my turn to suffer with the pirates.
After the sharp glance I gave at my fellows neither of us stirred, but sat there as if petrified.  I was horror-stricken, and there was a strong impulse upon me to jump up and run out, but shame and the dread of being considered cowardly kept me in my place.  In fact, as after-confessions made clear, we were absolutely stunned, and I don't think we could have stirred had we made up our minds to go.
Then I felt dizzy, and the brilliant group of officials and military magnates and judges opposite to where we sat grew blurred and strange-looking in the bright sunshine.
At last I felt as if I must argue out the question, and with my teeth set firm, and my eyes fixed upon the sandy ground of the enclosure, some such thoughts as these ran through my brain--"It is only just that these men should suffer for their horrible crimes, for they are more dangerous than venomous serpents, and I suppose that Captain Thwaites and Lieutenant Reardon are obliged to come as a kind of duty; but we three came under the idea that we were to see some kind of exhibition, and old Ching did it out of kindness, not knowing of what kind of stuff we were made.  I shan't stop."
There I paused to fight with other ideas.
"Tanner and Blacksmith will laugh at me and think I am a coward.  Well, let them," I said to myself at last.  "It isn't cowardice not to wish to see such a horror as this.  I didn't feel cowardly when they were shooting at us down in the creek, and it would be far more cowardly to sit here against my will without speaking.  I will tell them I want to go."
I should think that every lad of the age I then was, will pretty well understand my feelings, and what a bitter thing it was to turn and confess what they would jeer at and call "funk."  It was hard work indeed.
"I don't care," I muttered.  "I know they'll protest and say they don't want to come, but be very glad to come away all the time.  I will speak."
Just then that horrible Chinaman turned to me with his round fat face, all smiling and delighted.
"You velly glad you come?" he said.  "You feel velly happy?"
My mind was made up at this, and I spoke out.
"No," I said in a husky whisper.  "I didn't know we had come to see this.  I shall go."
"What?" said Barkins, with a forced laugh.  "Look here, Blacksmith, he's showing the white feather."
"Ho! ho!" laughed Smith.  "Come, Gnat, I thought you had a little more spirit in you.  Serve the beggars right."
"Yes, I know that," I said firmly enough now, as I looked at their faces, which, in spite of the masks they had assumed, looked ghastly; "and I daresay I haven't pluck enough to sit it out.  But I don't care for your grins; I'm not ashamed to say that I shall go."
"Oh, well, if you feel that it would upset you," said Barkins, in a tone of voice full of protest, "I suppose that we had better see you off, and go somewhere else."
"Poof!" ejaculated Smith in a low tone.  "Look at him, Gnat; he's in just as much of a stew as you are.  Well, it's too bad of you both, but if you must go, why, I suppose we must."
"You beggar!" snarled Barkins angrily.  "Why, you're worse than I am. Look at him, Gnat!  There, I will own it.  I felt sick as soon as I knew what was going to happen, but I won't be such a bumptious, bragging sneak as he is.  Look at his face.  It's green and yellow.  He wants to go worse than we do."
Smith did not seem to be listening, for his starting eyes were fixed upon the far right-hand gate, over which there was a kind of pagoda, and he rose from his seat.
"Come on at once," he whispered, "they're going to begin."
"Confessed!" whispered Barkins, pinching my knee.  "Come on then quick, Gnat, old man; it's too horrid."
We all rose together, and were in the act of turning when a low hoarse murmur rose from behind, and we saw that a crowd of angry faces were gazing at us, and that they were nearly all armed men.
But before we had recovered from our surprise, Ching had caught my arm and pressed me to my seat.
"No go now," he whispered, with a look of alarm in his face, and he leaned over me and dragged my companions down in turn.  "No can go now. Allee gate fasten.  Makee blave velly angly and dlaw sword; fightee fightee.  Ching velly solly.  Must stop now."
There was a low hissing noise all about us, and threatening looks, while a fierce man in embroidered silk said something in his own tongue to Ching, who answered humbly, and then tamed to us and whispered--
"Small-button mandalin say make big-button peacock-feather mandalin velly angly.  You no sit still.  Sh! sh!"
"We must sit it out, boys," I said, with a shudder; "but we need not look."
My words were quite correct to a certain extent, but as my companions, who now looked more ghastly than ever, sank back in their seats, I felt compelled to gaze across to where I could now see a red table exactly facing me.  Then a movement to the right caught my attention, and through the far gateway, and lowering it a little as he passed under the archway, rode an officer with a yellow silk banner, upon which were large black Chinese characters.  Behind him came some more showily-dressed officials; and then, in a kind of sedan chair, one whom I at once saw to be the chief mandarin, for whom we had been waiting.
He was carried across to the front, where he alighted and walked slowly across to the red table, followed by sword, spear, and matchlock men, who, as he took his place at the table, ranged themselves on either side facing us, and completing a spectacle that, seen there in the bright light, strongly suggested the opening of some grand pantomime.
I remember thinking this, and then shuddering at the horrible thought, and at the same time I began wondering at the intense interest I could not help taking in what was going on.
Two more grandees in chairs of state followed, and then there was a pause.  I could see that our officers were politely saluted, and that care was taken that no one should be in front of them.  And now came the more exciting part of the terrible exhibition.
Suddenly there was the loud booming of a gong, and the head of an escort of spearmen marched through the gateway, followed by a group of men in twos, each pair bearing a long bamboo pole, from which, hanging in each case like a scale, was a large basket, and heavily chained in each basket was a man, whom we knew at once to be one of the pirates we had captured, without Ching whispering to us--
"Velly bad men, killee evelybody.  They killee now."
My eyes would not close.  They were fascinated by the horrible procession; and I now saw, just in front of the bearers, a tall-looking bare-headed man carrying a large bright sword, curved in the fashion we see in old pictures of the Turkish scimitar, a blade which increases in width from the hilt nearly to the end, where it is suddenly cut off diagonally to form a sharp point.
Behind this man marched five more, the procession moving right to the front between us and the brilliant party whose centre was the principal mandarin.
I now saw, too, that every one of the miserable culprits was ticketed or labelled, a bamboo upon which a piece of paper was stuck being attached to his neck and head.
A low murmur ran round among the spectators, as, at a signal from the man with the great sword, who I saw now must be the executioner, the bearers stopped, and with a jerk threw the poles off their shoulders into their hands, bumped the baskets heavily down upon the ground, and shot the malefactors out as unceremoniously as if they had been so much earth.
I heard Barkins draw a deep breath, and saw Smith leaning forward and gazing wildly at the scene, while I felt my heart go _throb throb_ heavily, and found myself wishing that I had not shared in the capture of the wretched men.
The chief mandarin then turned to the officer on horseback, who carried the imperial yellow flag, said a few words in a low tone, and he in turn pushed his horse a little forward to where the executioner was waiting, and evidently conveyed the mandarin's orders.
Then suddenly the pirates, as if moved by one consent, struggled to their feet and began shouting.
Ching placed his lips close to my ear--
"Say, please no choppee off head.  Velly bad men, killee lot always; velly bad."
And now I felt that the time had come to close my eyes, but they remained fixed.  I could not avert my gaze from a scene which was made more horrible by a struggle which took place between the first pirate of the long row in which they stood and the executioner.
The man shouted out some words angrily, and Ching interpreted them in my ear, his explanation being in company with a strange surging noise--
"Say he come back and killee him if he choppee off head.  Oh, he velly bad man."
But quickly, as if quite accustomed to the task, two of the executioner's assistants rushed at the pirate; one of them forced him down into a kneeling position; they then seized his long tail, drew it over his head and hung back, thus holding the pirate's neck outstretched; lastly, I saw the executioner draw back, the sword flashed, I heard a dull thud--the head fell, and the body rolled over on one side.
Before I could drag my eyes from the horror there was the same terrible sound again, and another head fell upon the ground, while, with a rapidity that was astounding, the assistants passed from one culprit to the other in the long row, the miserable wretches making not the slightest resistance, but kneeling patiently in the position in which they were thrust, while _whish, whish, whish_, the executioner lopped off their heads at one blow.
"Allee done," said Ching.  "Execution man have velly much plactice."
He said this to me, but I made no reply, for the whole place seemed to be going round and round.
"You thinkee they all come back again and have junk?  Go kill shoot evelybody, pilate ghost-man?"
"No," I said hoarsely; "can we go now?"
"Velly soon.  Gleat clowd all along gate.  Lookee, Mis' Tanner go s'eep."
These words roused me, and I turned to Barkins, who was lying back with his eyes nearly closed and looking ghastly, while Smith sat staring straight before him, with his hands grasping the seat on either side, in a stiff, awkward position.
"Here, Smithy," I said, "quick, Tanner has fainted;" but he took no notice, and I whispered to him angrily--
"Get up.  It's all over now.  Come and help me.  Don't let these horrible people see Tanner like this."
He turned to me then, and let his eyes fall on our messmate.
"Can you get me a drink of water, Ching?" he murmured.
"Yes, d'leckly; wait lit' bit.  Po' Mr Barki' Tanner leg velly bad, makee sick.  You' alm velly bad still?"
"Very bad; it throbs," murmured Smith.
"Ah, yes!  Wait lit' bit and no clowd.  Ching take you have cup flesh tea, and quite well d'leckly.  You not likee execution?"
I shook my head.
"Velly good job cut allee head off.  No go killee killee, burn ship no more."
"We're not used to seeing such things," I said weakly, as I supported Barkins to keep him from slipping to the ground.
"You no go see execution when Queen Victolia cut off bad men's head?"
I shook my head.
"Ah, I see," said Ching.  "Me tink you have velly gleat tleat.  But I see, not used to see.  Velly blave boy, not mind littlee bit next time."
"What's the matter?  Don't, doctor.  It's getting well now."
It was Barkins who spoke, and his hands went suddenly to his injured leg, and held it, as he bent over towards it and rocked himself to and fro.
"Throbs and burns," he said, drawing in his breath as if in pain.  "I-- I--"
He looked round wildly.
"I remember now," he said faintly.  "Don't laugh at me, you chaps.  I turned sick as a dog as soon as that butchering was over.  I never felt like this over the fighting.  I say, Gnat, did I faint right away?"
"Yes, dead!"  I said; "I was nearly as bad."
"Enough to make you.  But oh, my leg, how it does sting!  I say, isn't it queer that it should come on now?  Did the fainting do it?"
"I dunno," said Smith hastily, "but my arm aches horribly.  I say, do let's get away from here, or I shall be obliged to look over yonder again."
"Yes, I'm all right again now," said Barkins quietly.  "Let's get away. I say, lads, it's of no use to be humbugs; we did all feel precious bad, eh?"
We looked at each other dolefully.
"Yes, let's get away," I said.  "I thought we were coming out for a jolly day."
Barkins shuddered and now stood up.
"Yes," he said; "I hope the skipper liked it.  Can you see him now?"
"Skipper?  Cap'n?" said Ching, whose ears were always sharp enough to catch our words.  "Gone along, Mr Leardon.  Make gland plocession all away back to palace.  You go sail, soon catch more pilate."
"I hope, if we do," said Smith, "that we shall not bring back any prisoners."
The enclosure was thinning fast now, as we walked toward the gateway by which we had entered, where a strong body of soldiers had been on guard over the barricades, in case of an attempt being made by the pirates' friends to rescue them, and we saw plainly enough that had we wanted there would have been no getting away.
"You likee go in and see plison?" said Ching insinuatingly.  "Plenty bad men lock up safe."
"No, thank you," I said eagerly.  "Let's get out of this, and go and have some tea."
"Yes, plenty tea.  Ching show way."
The Chinese soldiers stared at us haughtily as we walked by, and I drew myself up, hoping that no one there had witnessed our weakness, for if they had I knew that they could not feel much respect for the blue-jackets who hunted down the scoundrels that infested their seas.
Both Barkins and Smith must have felt something after the fashion that I did, for they too drew themselves up, returned the haughty stares, and Barkins stopped short to look one truculent savage fellow over from head to foot, especially gazing at his weapons, and then, turning coolly to me, he said, with a nod in the man's direction--
"Tidy sort of stuff to make soldiers off, Gnat, but too heavy."
The man's eyes flashed and his hand stole toward his sword hilt.
"'Tention!" roared Barkins with a fierce stamp, and though the order was new to the guard, he took it to be a military command and stepped back to remain stiff and motionless.
"Ha! that's better," cried Barkins, and he nodded and then passed on with us after Ching, whose eyes bespoke the agony of terror he felt.
"Come long quickee," he whispered excitedly.  "Very big blave that fellow.  Killee--fightee man.  You no 'flaid of him?"
"Afraid?  No," said Barkins shortly.  "There, let's have this tea."
Ching glanced round once, and we were about to imitate his example, but he said excitedly--
"No, no, don't lookee.  Big blave talkee talkee soldier, and tink Inglis offlicer 'flaid.  Walkee past."
He led us as quickly as he could get us to go towards the tea-house he sought, and I must own that I was only too anxious about the Chinese guards to help feeling in a good deal of perturbation lest they should feel that they had been insulted, and follow us so as to take revenge. Hence I was glad enough to get within the tea-house's hospitable walls, and sat there quite content to go on sipping the fragrant infusion for long enough.
I suppose we were there quite an hour and a half drinking tea, until we were satisfied, and then passing a look round to draw attention to our interpreter, who sat back with his eyes half closed, sipping away cupful after cupful, till Smith whispered to me that he thought he had kept correct account.
"How many do you think Ching has had?" he whispered.
"Don't know; nearly a dozen?"
"Fifty-three, or thereabouts," whispered Smith.
But I did not believe him, and I do not think he believed himself.
"Now, you likee go 'long see somethin' else?" said Ching, when he had really drunk tea enough.
"Yes," said Barkins, "I feel ready.  What do you say to going to see the _Teaser_, lads?" he continued.
"I'm willing," said Smith.  "I want to lie down."
"You ready, Gnat?"
"Oh yes," I replied.  "I don't feel as if I could enjoy anything to-day."
"Right, then.  No, Ching; back on board ship."
"You go velly soon?  Now?"
"Yes, directly."
Ching smiled--he had a habit of smiling at everything nearly, and we paid our reckoning and followed him down to the landing-place, to arrive there just in time to see the barge with the captain and his escort gliding rapidly away toward the ship.
"Too soon findee boat," said Ching.  "Tellee man come when sun go out of sight."
"Yes, and that means two hours good," said Barkins.  "Look here, Ching, hire a boat cheap.  Get a fellow with a sailing-boat, if you can."
"Yes," said the Chinaman, nodding his head in a satisfied way, "Good boat--velly nice boat--boat with velly big sail fly over water, eh?"
"Yes, that's it," said Barkins.  "And look sharp, for there are a lot of low blackguardly-looking fellows coming up, and we don't want another row."
Barkins was quite right, for, as in our own seaports, there were plenty of roughs about, and whether in blue frocks and pith boots or British rags, the loafer is much the same.  Ching saw at a glance that the sooner we were off the better, and hurried us a little way along the wharf till he saw a boat that seemed suitable.
"You all get in velly quick," he said.
"But we must make a bargain with the man."
"Plesently," he replied, as we hurried in, and he ordered the man in charge to put off.
The man began to protest volubly, but Ching rose up, and with a fierce look rustled his new coat and sat down again, with the result that the man loosened the rope which held his boat to the side, and the swift tide began to bear us away directly, the man hoisting up a small matting-sail and then meekly thrusting an oar over, with which to steer.
"Why, what did you say to him, Ching?"  I asked; and the interpreter smiled, and wrinkled up his eyes till he resembled a piece of old china on a chimney-piece.
"Ching say velly lit' bit; only shake his new coat till common man see it silk.  He feel velly much flighten all a same, as if big-button mandalin get in him boat."
"And what shall we have to pay him?"
"P'laps nothing 'tall."
"Oh, nonsense!"  I said.  "We must pay him the proper fare."
"Velly well, pay him ploper money."
I anticipated trouble, but when we got to the side and a dollar was handed to the man, his heavy round face lit up with pleasure, and he said something aloud.
"What does he say, Ching?"  I asked.
"Say velly glad, and didn't tink he get anything 'tall."
We made the best of our way below, fully expecting that, if the captain and Mr Reardon saw us, they would take us to task for being at the execution, and ask; us how we dared to follow them there.  But, as luck had it, they had been too much occupied by the horrible affair in progress, and our presence had escaped them.  But it was a long while before I could get the scene out of my head or think of our trip ashore that day as anything but a horrible mistake.
CHAPTER TWENTY SIX.
"MAN OVERBOARD."
It was a great relief to us all to find that our visit to the Chinese prison had not been noticed.  We of course kept silence about it, not even telling Mr Brooke, who was the most friendly of our officers, and we had the satisfaction of finding that Ching obeyed our orders, and kept his peace.
I used to be rather sorry for him, his position being so solitary on board.  For he could not make himself at home with the sailors in the forecastle, and though as frank, good-hearted fellows as ever lived, they seemed to look upon him only in one way, that of being a butt for their sharp witticisms, an object upon whom they were to play practical jokes.
Consequently I used often, when I found him standing alone by the bulwarks watching the shore, to edge up to him, and stop to talk; our conversation being directed by me toward some little unpleasantry in the forecastle, which if he had complained about to the first lieutenant, there would have been a severe reprimand.
I remember one of these occasions, when Ching came flying up out of the hatch, followed by a roar of laughter, and as he reached the deck, _clang-clang_ went something against the sides of the hatch; but Ching paid no heed, running forward till he was right up by the side of the bowsprit.
I followed quickly, feeling angry on the man's behalf.
"What's the matter?"  I cried.  "What have they been doing?"
"No know," he said rather pitifully, as he stood there trembling.  "Done something.  Thlow tin-kettle after."
"But what for?  What were you doing?"
"Doing? fass 'sleep, dleam 'bout big fly come and bite leg.  Jump up and lun.  Then thlow kettle after."
"Here, let's look," I said; for as he shook his head there was the same hollow sound again, just like that made by a tin sheep-bell.
"Why, they've tied it to you," I said sharply.
"Tie to Ching flock?  Don't matter.  Not bess blue silkee."
"Here, let me see," I cried.  "Turn round."
He turned sharply, and something banged against the bulwark.
"What a shame!"  I cried.  "They've tied the old canister to your tail."
"Tie canny all along Ching tow-chang?" he cried.
"Yes, and it's a rascally shame."
"Yes, allee lascally shame," he said, nodding his head.  "Not hurt velly.  Only flighten velly much, makee lun fass."
"Stand still, and I'll soon have it off," I cried, whipping out my knife.
"No, no," he cried, dragging the long plait from my hand; "mightee cut tow-chang, and that velly dleadful.  Take long time glow."
"Very well, then.  I'll unfasten it, and show it to Mr Reardon."
"What for? make Mis' Leardon velly angly, scold jolly sailor boy.  Then they not like Ching 'tall."
"But it's too bad; treating you just as if you were a dog."
"Jolly sailor boy tie tin-pot dog tow-chang?  No.  Mr Hellick make laugh.  Dog not got tow-chang."
"No," I said, trying very hard to get the pot off, "but dogs have got tails."
"Yes, got tails.  Don't tellee, make no good.  Didn't hurt Ching."
"But it's an insult to you," I said.  "Any one would think they were a pack of boys."
"Yes, jolly sailor boy.  You no makee come off?"
"No," I said.  "They've made a big hole through the bottom of the canister, pushed the end of the tail--"
"Tow-chang."
"Well, tow-chang, if you like to call it so--through into the inside, and then hammered the tin back round it and made it as fast as fast. Here, I shall have to cut it, Ching."
"No, no," he cried, seizing the canister.  "No cuttee piece of tow-chang."
"Then how are we to get it off?"
"Don't know, Mr Hellick; look velly bad?"
"Horrible--absurd; every one will laugh at you."
"Yes, velly bad.  Ching put it in pocket."
"Oh, you're there, are you?"  I cried, as Tom Jecks came cautiously on deck.  "I should have thought that a man of your years would have known better than to help torment this poor Chinaman."
"Not velly poor," he whispered.  "Ching got fancee shop.  Plenty plize-money now."
"Didn't have nought to do with it," growled Tom Jecks.
"Then who did, sir?"
"Dunno, sir; some o' the boys.  I was caulking till they wakened me wi' laughing."
"But you saw it done?"
"No, sir; it was all done aforehand.  They'd turned his tail into a bull-roarer, and if you was to swing it round now like a windmill, it would make no end of a row."
"Silence, sir," I cried.  "It's disgraceful."
"Lor', sir, they on'y meant it for a bit of a lark."
"Then they should lark among themselves, and not take advantage of a poor foreigner whom they ought to protect."
"Yes, sir, that's right enough.  But he were asleep, and it didn't hurt him till one on 'em stuck a pin in his leg to waken him up."
"Ah!"  I cried.  "Who did?"
"Well, sir," said Tom Jecks.  "Now you do puzzle me above a bit.  It was one o' the lads, because the pin must have gone into his leg, for he squeaked out and then run up the ladder with the tin-pot banging about right and left, but who it was stuck that pin in, it were so dark that I couldn't say."
"You mean that you won't say, Tom?"
"Well, sir, you're orficer, and I'm on'y AB, and I shan't contradict you; have it that way if you like."
"I shall say no more, but we'll see what Mr Reardon says when he hears about it."
"Why, Mr Herrick, sir, yo' wouldn't go and tell upon the poor lads, would you?  It were on'y a bit of a game, were it, Mr Ching?"
"No, only bit game," said the Chinaman.
"There, you hear, sir.  There wasn't no bones broke."
"Hold your tongue, sir."
"Cert'n'y, sir."
"And come here."
Tom Jecks stepped forward obsequiously.
"Look, the tin sticks all round fast into the tail as if it were a rabbit trap."
"Ay, sir, it do; and if I might say so, they managed it very cleverly."
"Cleverly?"
"Yes, sir.  If I'd been doing it, I should on'y have thought of tying it on with a bit o' spun-yarn; but this here tin holds it wonderful tight."
"How are we to get it off?"
"Oh, I can soon get it off," cried Tom Jecks, who seemed to be imbued with the same notion as Alexander of old, who unsheathed his sword to cut the Gordian knot.  For he hauled out his knife by the lanyard, opened the blade with his teeth, and took a step forward, but Ching held the canister behind him and dodged round me.
"Steady, my lad," growled Tom Jecks, "it arn't a operation.  Stand by."
"No, no, no!" shrieked Ching.
"Steady, my lad, I'll soon have it off.  I won't cut down to the bone."
"No, no!" cried Ching, who was excited and alarmed, and who now began chattering in his own tongue, all _pang ang nong wong ong_, and a series of guttural sounds, while I could do nothing for laughing, but had to stand like a post for Ching to dodge behind.
"Why don't you stand by, messmate?" growled Tom Jecks.  "You can't go through life with that there tin-kettle tied to your tail.  Fust one as see yer will be calling, `Mad dog.'"
By this time the watch had come to see what was going on, and I now began to feel sorry for the Chinaman.
"Here, Ching," I said.  "Come down below."
But he was too much alarmed for the moment to listen to my words, expecting every moment as he was that some one would make a snatch at his tail, to obviate which accident he was now holding the canister tightly beneath his arm, and looking wildly round for a way to escape.
"Hadn't we better have it took off, sir?" said Tom Jecks, and there was a roar of laughter.  "Let's ketch him and take him to the doctor."
"No, no!" cried Ching, dodging round me again, for Tom Jecks, to the delight of the others, made a snatch at him.
"You'll be a deal more comfortable, messmate--you know you will.  Here, let's have it?"
Tom Jecks made another snatch at him, but Ching avoided it, and to save him from further annoyance I too made a snatch.
Poor fellow, interpreter though he was, he misinterpreted my intentions. He tore away from my grasp and made a rush forward, but several men were coming in that direction, and he dashed back to find himself faced by Tom Jecks again.  In his desperation he charged right at the sailor, lowering his head as he did so, and striking him with so much force that Tom Jecks went down sprawling, and Ching leaped over him.
There was no way open to him for escape, as it seemed, and he made a rush for the side, leaped up, was on the bulwarks in an instant, and made a snatch at the foremast shrouds as if to climb up into the rigging, when either his foot slipped or his long loose cotton jacket caught in something, I don't know how it was, but one moment I saw him staggering, the next there was the terrible cry of "Man overboard" raised as I rushed toward the side, heard the splash, and got upon the bulwark in time to see the agitated water.
That was all.
It was rapidly getting dark, the tide was running swiftly seaward, and even if the Chinaman could swim it seemed very doubtful whether he could maintain himself long, hampered as he was by his loose clinging clothes.
But at the raising of the cry, "Man overboard," there is not much time lost on board a man-of-war.  A crew leaped into the boat; the falls were seized; and in a minute the keel touched the water, and I found myself, as I stood on the bulwark holding on by a rope, called upon to direct those who had gone.
"Which way, sir?  See him?"
I could only answer no, and then reply to Mr Reardon, who came up panting.
"Who is it?" he cried.  "Mr Herrick?"
"No, sir, I'm here," I shouted.  "It's the interpreter."
"And what business had he up on the hammock-rail?" roared the lieutenant as he climbed up there himself.  "Steady, my lads, he can't be far."
At that moment there was a flash, and a brilliant blue-light burst out on the surface of the black water, sending a glare all round from where it floated on the trigger life-buoy, which had been detached and glided away astern, while directly after a second blue-light blazed out from the stern of the boat, showing the men dipping their oars lightly, and two forward and two astern shading their eyes and scanning the flashing and sparkling water.
"Can't you see him?" roared the lieutenant.
"No, sir."
We leaped downward, hurried right aft where the captain and the other officers were now gathered, and the orders were given for a second boat to be lowered and help to save the poor fellow.
"He ought to float, sir," said Mr Reardon in answer to some remark from the captain.  "He's fat enough."
Then he began shouting orders to the men to row to and fro; and my heart sank as I vainly searched the lit-up water, for there was no sign of the unfortunate Chinaman.
"What a horrible ending to a practical joke!"  I thought, and a bitter feeling of disappointment assailed me, as I asked myself why I had not gone in the second boat to help save the poor fellow.
Perhaps it was vanity, but in those exciting moments I felt that if I had been there I might have seen him, for it never occurred to me that I had a far better chance of seeing him from my post of vantage high up on that quarter-deck rail.
"See him yet?"
"No, sir!"--"No, sir!"
The first hail loudly from close by, the other from far away where the blue-lights shone.
"Bless my soul!" cried Mr Reardon, with an angry stamp.  "I can't understand it.  He must have come up again."
"Unless his pockets were heavily laden," said the captain, going to where Mr Reardon stood.  "These men carry a great deal about them under their long loose clothes.  Some heavy copper money, perhaps.  A very little would be enough to keep a struggling man down."
"Ha!" ejaculated Mr Reardon, while I shivered at the idea of poor old Ching coming to so terrible an end.
"A glass here!" cried Mr Reardon, and one was handed up to him.
"Try the life-buoy," cried the captain.
"Bless me, sir, I was going to," retorted the lieutenant irritably; "but the idiot who uses this glass ought to be turned out of the service for being short-sighted.  I shall never get it to the right focus."
The captain gave a dry cough, and I turned round sharply, expecting to hear some angry exclamation.
"No," cried Mr Reardon, "he is not clinging to the life-buoy.  I wouldn't for anything that it should have happened.  Poor fellow!  Poor fellow!"
"Ay, poor fellow!" muttered Captain Thwaites.  "Any use to lower another boat, Reardon?"
"No, sir, no," cried the lieutenant, "or I would have had one down. Ahoy there!" he roared.  "Light another blue!"
"Ay, ay, sir!" came from far away, for the tide ran hissing by our sides in full rush for the sea, and the third blue-light which blazed out looked smaller and smaller, while those of the first boat and the life-buoy began to show faint, and then all at once that on the buoy seemed to go out.
"That blue-light ought to have burned longer on the buoy," cried Mr Reardon.
"They've picked up the buoy and laid it across the bows of the boat," said Mr Brooke, who was watching through his night-glass, and at that moment the light blazed out again like a star.
And still the halos shed by the lights grew fainter and fainter.  Then one light burned out, and the lieutenant stamped with anger, but there was no cause for his irritation.  Another flashed out directly.
The boats were too far away now for us to see much of what was going on, the heads of the men growing blurred, but we saw that they were zig-zagging across the tide, and we listened in vain for the hail and the cheer that should accompany the words--
"Got him, sir!"
The buzz of conversation among the men, who clustered on deck, in the shrouds and tops, grew fainter, and I was thinking whether I was very much to blame, and if I could in any way have saved the poor fellow. Then I began thinking of the men in the forecastle, and their punishment for being the cause, in their boyish way of playing tricks, of the poor Chinaman's death.
I wouldn't be Tom Jecks for all the world, I muttered, and then I turned cold and shuddered, as the hope, faint though it was, of Ching being picked up went out like one of the lights that now disappeared; for Captain Thwaites said sadly--
"I'm afraid we must recall the boats, Mr Reardon."
"Yes, sir," said the lieutenant in a husky voice.  "I don't think any one is to blame about the attempt to save the poor fellow, sir.  The life-buoy was let go, and the boat lowered promptly; the dishipline of the men was good."
"Excellent, Mr Reardon.  I have nothing to say there.  It would have been better perhaps to have lowered down the second boat sooner.  But I think we have done our best.  Can you make them hear from this distance?"
"Yes, I think so; a voice will travel far over the smooth water on a still night like this.  Shall I recall them?"
Captain Thwaites was silent for a full minute, and we all stood gazing aft at the faint stars on the black water, while to right and left were those that were more dim and distant, being the paper lanterns of the house-boats moored a short distance from the bank.
Then the captain spoke again, and his words re-illumined the parting light of hope which flashed up like an expiring flame.
"Do you think he has struck out straight for the shore?"
"He may have done so, sir," replied Mr Reardon, as we all stood in a knot together on the quarter-deck, "but he could never have reached it."
"Not in this mill-race of a tide!" said Captain Thwaites.  "Recall the boats."
But Mr Reardon made no sign.  He stood there gazing through the night-glass for some moments, and the captain spoke again.
"Recall the boats, Mr Reardon."
"I beg your pardon, sir," said the lieutenant, with quite a start. "Aloft there!  Who's in the foretop?"
"Ay, ay, sir; Jecks, sir."
I shivered.
"Hail the boats to come back."
The man did not answer for a moment, and Mr Reardon made an angry gesture, but just then Tom Jecks, with his hands to his mouth, sent forth a hoarse deep-toned roar.
Then there was a pause and a faintly-heard hail came from far away, the zig-zagging movement of the boats ceased, and we saw one of them, that is to say one of the lights, glide slowly toward the other, till one was apparently only a short distance in front, and the other following.
"Let me know when the boats come alongside, Mr Reardon," said the captain quietly.
"Yes, sir."
"And, by the way, I'll trouble you for my night-glass."
Mr Reardon gave a violent start.
"Your night-glass, sir?" he said.
"Yes, mine; you borrowed it."
The lieutenant handed the telescope without a word, and at another time we should all have had to turn away to smother the desire to burst out laughing, as we recalled the irritable remarks about the idiot to whom the glass belonged, and the wretchedness of his eyesight, coupled with an opinion that he ought to be dismissed the service.
But it was not a time for mirth: we were all too sad, and Barkins contented himself with whispering--
"I say, I'm jolly glad it wasn't I who said that.  Don't the skipper take it coolly now?  But he'll give old Dishy a talking-to for it when he gets him alone."
Mr Reardon's face was not visible to us, but we could see his movements, which were, so to speak, fidgety, for he began to walk up and down hastily, and once or twice I heard him mutter--
"How could I be such a fool?"
A dead chill had settled down upon the ship, and I felt as I stood there as if eight or nine years had suddenly dropped away from me--that I was a little child again, and that I should like to creep below somewhere out of sight, or sit down and cry and sob.
For it was such a horrible lesson to me of the nearness of death, and I felt as if it was impossible for it all to be true--that it must be some terrible dream.
And now for the first time it dawned upon me that I had a liking for the strange, simple-hearted Chinaman, who had always shown himself to be frank, honest, and brave in our service.  He had been comic and peculiar, but always devoted to me as a faithful servant; and now, just too as I was joining in the mirth against him, instead of being indignant on behalf of one who had been insulted by the men's horseplay, he was as it were snatched from life to death.
I was brought back to the present by a voice at my ear--
"Poor old Ching!  I am sorry, Gnat."
"Yes, and so am I."
I had not seen my messmates all through the trouble, and now they appeared close to me in the darkness in a way which made me start.
I turned to them, and I don't know how it was, but as we three stood there in the darkness, which was hardly relieved by a lantern here and there, Barkins held out his hand and shook mine, holding it tightly without letting go.  Directly after, Smith took my other hand to give it a warm, strong pressure; and then we three parted without a word more, Barkins going one way, Smith another, while I went to the stern rail and leaned my arms upon it, and then rested my chin upon my arms to gaze out over the rushing water at the two blue stars.
But they were not there now.  They had burned out some time before, and I could see nothing, only take it for granted that the boats were being slowly rowed back against the heavy tide, our anchor-lights acting as their guide.
"Is it possible that they have found him after all?"  I thought, and for a minute I was hopeful.  But once more the hope died out, for I knew well enough that if they had picked the poor fellow up they would have cheered.
CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN.
A SURPRISE.
That night had set in very dark.  The clouds were heavy overhead, and the river now looked intensely black, but toward the shore there were the dull lights of the Chinese town glimmering in the water, while from some building, whether on account of a religious ceremony or a festival, a great gong was being beaten heavily, its deep, sonorous, quivering tones floating over the place, and reaching my ears like the tolling of a church bell.
It only wanted that depressing sound to make my spirits at the lowest ebb, and set me thinking of home, the perils of the career in which I was engaged, and wondering whether I should ever see England again.
The watch had been set, and from time to time Mr Reardon came aft to look anxiously astern.
The last time Mr Brooke was with him, and they stopped near where I was standing.
"But they ought to be back by now," Mr Reardon said.
"It's a long pull," Mr Brooke replied, "and the tide is terribly sharp at this time."
"Yes, yes--it is; but I want to see them back.  Who's that?"
"Herrick, sir."
"Oh!  Looking out for the boats?"
"Yes, sir."
"That's right.  I like to see a young officer take an interest in the men."
They moved away to walk forward, while my face burned, for I did not deserve the praise, and my words had not been quite so honest as I could have wished.
All at once, from out of the blackness astern, I heard the regular dip of oars, and at the same moment one of the watch challenged and received an answer.  A minute later they were close up, and I shouted--
"Found him?"
"No, sir; not a sign of him anywhere."
I uttered a low groan, and the boats separated, one going to starboard and the other to port, to be hauled up to their quarters, and there was the customary trampling of the men going to their positions to run them up.
"Poor old Ching!"  I said aloud; and then I started back as if I had received a stroke, for my name was uttered from below in a sharp whisper.
"Mister Hellick!  Mister Hellick!"
"Ching!"  I cried, leaning over as far as I could reach, and gazing down at the water.  "Help!--help!"  I shouted.  "Here he is!"
Mr Brooke ran to me.
"What do you mean, my lad?"
"He's down here," I cried, "clinging to the chains."
"Nonsense! the boats would have seen him."
"But he is," I cried.  "He has just called me.  Below there!  Ching!"
"Yes; help!  Velly cold," came up in a piteous wail.
"Hold hard there!" shouted Mr Brooke.  "Port boat back here under the counter."
The falls were unhooked, and the boat drawn back by the coxswain till she passed round close to the rudder.
"Any one there?" cried Mr Brooke.
"Ay, ay, sir!" and a cheer broke out from the men hurrying aft.
"Help! help!" came in a sharp wail.  "No cut tow-chang!  No cut tow-chang!"
"Nobody's going to cut it, my lad.  All right, we've got you," came up from close under the stern windows, where even if it had been light we could not have seen.
"Found him?" cried the captain, who now came up.
"Ay, ay, sir!  Will you lower us down a lantern, sir?  He's tied up somehow to the chain and a ring-bolt.  We can't quite lee."
The next minute, as I stood there longing to lower myself down into the boat, a lantern was swung over to them; while the men came swarming up the hatchway, for the news had soon spread, and they came running as far aft as they dared.
"Now then, steady," came from beneath us.  "Let go; we've got you, I say."
"No cuttee tow-chang!  No cuttee tow-chang!"
"Then he must have caught at the rudder-chains as he was swept along the side," said the captain.  "Why didn't the fellow hail us, instead of letting the boats go on such a fool's errand?"
"Too much scared, sir," replied Mr Reardon.  "Below there!  Got him in the boat?"
"Got him, sir, and we can't get him," said one of the men.  "He's all twissen up round the chain in a knot somehow."
"What?"
"He's tied hisself up somehow."
"Well, then, cut him loose, man," cried Mr Reardon.
"No cuttee tow-chang!  No cuttee tow-chang!" cried Ching in a piteous wail.
"Not cut his toe?" said the captain in a tone full of disgust.  "What does he mean?  He can't have tied his foot to the chain."
"Hold still, will yer!" growled a deep voice; "I'm only untwisten on it. Nobody wants to cut yer pigtail."
"Oh, no cuttee tow-chang!" wailed Ching piteously.
"Tow-chang?" said the captain.
"Yes, sir; his tail," I said.
"Oh, I see!  They're very proud of the length."
"Well, I'm blessed if ever I see such a snarl," cried the man below. "That's it.  There you are.  Here, cut this hankychy thing."
"Got him now?"
"Ay, ay, sir! all right," came from the boat; and at this the men burst out cheering again like mad, while the boat was drawn along the side with difficulty till the falls were reached, hooked on, and with a stamp and a run she was hauled up, and I was close up to the side as she was swung in, and Ching lifted out dripping, and sank down in a heap as soon as the men tried to set him on his feet.
"Here, let me have a look at him," said the doctor.
"But first of all, why did you cling there instead of calling for help?" cried Mr Reardon angrily.
"Bah! don't worry the man, sir," said the doctor sharply.  "He's nearly insensible.  What's this canister doing at the end of his tail?"
"Bah!" ejaculated the captain angrily, and he said something to Mr Reardon, and then went down to the cabin.
"Look here," cried the lieutenant angrily, "I want the names of the men who played this blackguardly trick upon the poor fellow."
"Yes, afterwards," said the doctor.  "He's insensible, poor fellow. Here, one of you, a knife?"
Half-a-dozen jack-knives were opened and presented to the doctor, but I sprang forward.
"Don't do that, sir, please!"  I cried excitedly.
"Eh?  Not cut off this absurd thing?"
"No, sir.  The poor fellow went overboard to escape having the pigtail cut, and it would break his heart."
Mr Reardon turned upon me sharply, and I anticipated a severe reproof, but he only gave me a nod.
"Carry him below," he said.  And I walked beside the men to save the poor fellow from any fresh indignity, while half-an-hour later he had had a good rubbing and was lying in hot blankets fast asleep, partly from exhaustion, partly consequent upon having had a tumbler of mixture, steaming and odorous, which the doctor had administered with his own hands.
"Not to be taken every three hours, Herrick," he said, with a curious dry smile.  "Fine mixture that, in its proper place.  Know what it was?"
"It smelt like grog, sir," I replied.
"Oh, did it?  Now, do you for a moment suppose that when a carefully-trained medical man of great experience is called in to a patient suffering from shock and a long immersion he would prescribe and exhibit such a commonplace remedy as grog?"
"Don't know, sir," I said.  "But I should."
"Then, my good lad, as soon as you get back from this unpleasant voyage, the best thing you can do will be to go straight to your father and tell him that you have made a mistake in your vocation, and that he had better enter you for a series of terms at one of the universities, and then as a student at one of the hospitals."
"But I'm going to be a sailor, sir."
"Yes, a bad one, I daresay, my lad, when you might become a good doctor or surgeon."
"But I don't want to be one," I replied, laughing.
"Of course not, when it is the grandest profession in the world."
"But do you think he will come round all right, sir?"  I said anxiously.
"Oh yes, of course.  But you are not going to let that absurd thing stop on the end of his tail?"
"No, sir," I replied.  "I'm going to try and get it off directly."
"How?"
"Lay it on a stool and stamp upon it."
"Good! that will flatten it and make the opening gape."
It did, after the exercise of a fair amount of pressure; and then, by the help of Tom Jecks, who was wonderfully penitent now, and eager to help with a tool he brought--to wit, a marlinespike--the star-like points of tin were one by one forced out, and the tail withdrawn uninjured, except that the silk ribbon at the end was a good deal frayed.
"Ha!" ejaculated Tom.  "We've made an end of it at last.  My word, Mr Herrick, sir, it's truly-thankful-Amen I am that the poor chap's all right again."
"And so am I, Tom Jecks," I replied.
"O' course you is, sir; I never meant to cut his tail, only to frighten him a bit; but, poor heathen, he took it all as serious as seas.  Shall I go and chuck the tin-can overboard?"
"No; leave it here for him to find when he wakes up."
"Right it is, sir.  But what a fuss for a man to make about a bit o' hair.  He never howls about having his head shaved."
"No," I said; "but you see he would have given anything sooner than have his tail touched."
"And most got drownded, sir.  Well, that all come o' the lads skylarking.  If ever I'm skipper of a ship, no skylarking then.  I s'pose there'll be a reglar hooroar in the morning, and Mr Reardon wanting to know who started the game."
"And you'll tell him, Tom?"  I said.
"O' course, sir," he replied, with a solemn wink.  "I'm just the man to go and split upon my messmates."
"But you'll be punished if you don't tell.  You can't get out of it, because it's known that you were teasing him; and it wouldn't be fair for you to be punished and for them to escape."
"No, sir, it wouldn't; but sech is life.  Wrong chap generally gets the kick as some one else ought to have ketched, but 'tarn't your fault, and it's no use to grumble."
"But it is your fault, if you know who were the offenders and will not tell."
"Is it?  Humph!  S'pose it is, sir.  You're right.  That's where you gents as is scholards gets over the like of me.  I see it now; you are right, sir.  What a wonderful head you've got for arguing, sewerly!"
"Then you'll tell Mr Reardon in the morning?"
"I didn't say as I would, sir."
"No; but you will?"
"No, sir, but I won't!" he said emphatically.  "But I say, sir, do you think if I was to go overboard, and then hitch myself on to the rudder-chains till I was took aboard, the doctor'd give me a dose of that same physic as he give him?"
"Very likely, Tom," I said.  "But you'd rather be without, wouldn't you?"
He smiled.
"But it was physic?"
"Oh yes, sir, it was physic.  But then you see there's physic as he takes out of one of his little bottles with stoppers, and there's physic as he makes out of the ship's rum, hot with sugar.  I could take a dose now easy, and it would do me good."
"Nonsense!"  I said, after a glance at the sleeping Chinaman.  "But I say, Jecks, how did he manage?"
"Oh, easy enough, sir.  Tide would suck him right along the side, and he'd catch the chains."
"But how did he get in such a tangle?"
"Tied hisself on, sir, with a handkerchy round his left arm, to the chain; and then Dick Spurling says he twissened his tow-chang, as he called it, round and round, and tucked the canister in at the neck of his frock and buttoned it.  Dick had no end of a job, as you know, to get him undone."
"Yes," I said thoughtfully, "I know that; but a man couldn't hang by his hair."
Tom Jecks laughed softly.
"Oh yes, he could, sir.  There's no knowing how little a man can hang by when he's obliged.  Why, ain't you heard how we men hangs on to the yards when we're aloft?"
"Oh yes, I've heard," I said; "by your eyelids."
"That's it, sir," he said, with a dry grin; "and that's harder than a man hanging on by his hair."
Ching was still sleeping heavily, and our conversation did not disturb him, and after a few moments' thought I said--
"But I don't feel at all sure why he did not hail the boats when they were going off."
"Oh, I do, sir," replied Tom Jecks.  "I wouldn't ha' thought it possible, but the poor fellow was regularly scared, and wouldn't speak at first, because he thought that if he was hoisted on board the first thing we would do would be to go for his tail."
"Yes," I said, "that sounds likely; but he did hail after all."
"And enough to make him, sir; poor chap.  Do you know why?"
"Well, not exactly," I said.
"A'cause the first fright had gone, and the bigger one had come.  At first he was all in a squirm about losing his tail, but after a bit he got wacken up to the fact that if he didn't get took aboard he'd precious soon lose his life."
CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT.
CHING HAS A NOTE.
I suppose that Mr Reardon thought better of his threat, or probably he came to the conclusion that the expectation of punishment would prove as effective as the punishment itself.  At all events nothing was said, and the routine of the ship went on as usual.  The decks were scrubbed, the guns polished, and the marines drilled, till, as Barkins said, they could walk up to the top of a ladder and down the other side without touching.
The Jacks, too, had their gun drill and sword exercise, till their cutlasses flashed about with an exactness that promised to shave a head without cutting off an ear--promised: the performance might have been another thing.
As soon as I had an opportunity I started to go below and see Ching, but before I was half-way there I ran against Smith.
"Where are you going in such a hurry?"
"To see how Ching's getting on."
"Did you put on a clean shirt?"
"No," I said innocently.  "I can't stand one every day."
"Oh, come, this won't do!" cried Smith.  "Here, hi, Barkins!"
"What's the row?" said our messmate, coming up.
"Row enough.  Look here, this won't do.  The Gnat's going below to see His Excellency Ching Baron fancee shop, and Knight of the Tow-chang, without putting on a clean shirt."
"Go and report him to the captain.  Why, worse and worse, he hasn't shaved!"
"No, that he hasn't."
"Well, I haven't got any razors like you fellows have," I retorted.  "I say, Tanner, have you stropped yours up lately?  Smithy's are getting rusty with the sea air."
"You're getting rusty with the sea air," grumbled Smith, who was very proud of the possession of a pair of razors with Sunday and Monday etched on the blades.  He had once or twice shown them to me, saying that they were a present from his father, who was going to leave him the other five, which completed the days of the week, in his will.
I remember how I offended him at the time by saying--
"Well, that will be quite as soon as you want them."
"Look here," said Smith rather haughtily, after a look at Barkins; "we've been talking this business over, and it is time it was stopped."
"What do you mean?"  I said.
"Oh, you know well enough.  You came on board the _Teaser_ to take your place as an officer and a gentleman, and we your seniors received you in a gentlemanly way."
"Yes, you were right enough," I said.  "A bit cocky and bounceable at first, till you found that I wouldn't stand it, and then you were both civil."
"Well, I _am_ blessed!" cried Barkins, blowing out his cheeks and looking down at me.  "Of all the impudent little cockboats of boys you are about the most cheeky.  Pretty strong turn that for a Gnat, Smithy."
"Yes; we shall have to put him down, and the sooner the better.  Will you speak to him, or shall I?"
"Oh, I'm just in the humour for it," said Barkins; "so I'll give him his dose at once.  Look here, young fellow: as aforesaid, when you interrupted, we received you as gentlemen should, and have taken great care of you, and tried to smooth you down into something like a budding officer."
"Thank you," I said humbly; "I'm so grateful."
"And so you ought to be, sir.  But look here, what in the name of thunder do you mean by forsaking us and taking to bad company?"
"Who does?"
"Why, you do, sir.  Smithy and I talked it over last night, and we both agreed that you're never happy unless you're along with the forecastle Jacks, or sneaking about with old Ching."
"Get out!"  I said indignantly.
"None of your impudence, sir, because that won't do.  It's come to this: either you've got to give up low society, or high."
"Which is which?"  I said.
"What?"
"I said which is which?  Do you mean you two fellows are high society?"
"Do you hear this beggar, Smithy?"
"Oh yes, I hear him.  Isn't it awful to find so much depravity in such a small body?  But keep him to it, and make him speak.  He has got to choose."
"Yes, you've got to choose, Gnat.  We can't have a brother officer always associating with the low Chinee."
"Do you mean that I oughtn't to go and see the poor fellow now he's below ill?"
"Something of the sort: you're not a doctor.  Of course he ought to visit the men."
"So ought an officer when his men are in trouble."
"Yes; but not to make friends of them.  It won't do, Gnat, and we've made up our minds not to stand it.  That will do now.  You have heard what I had to say, and I hope you will profit by it."
I burst out into a roar of laughter, for Barkins' assumption of dignity was comic.
"What do you mean by that, sir?" he cried in an offended tone.
"Second-hand captain's rowing!"  I cried.  "Why, I heard him say those very words to you."
"Hi! stop!" cried Smith, as Barkins turned red with annoyance.  "Where are you going, sir?"
"Down below to see Ching," I replied coolly; and I descended the companion-ladder to where the man lay.
He was looking very yellow and gloomy, but as soon as he caught sight of me his face lit up.
"You come along see Ching?" he said in his high voice; and upon my nodding--"Velly glad.  Doctor say stop along, velly much, not gettee up to-day."
"But you are ever so much better?"
"Yes, quite well.  Not velly wet now.  Captain velly closs Ching tumb' overboard?"
"No, he hasn't said anything."
"Ching velly glad.  You go tell captain something?"
"What about?"  I said.
"Ching get lettee flom fliend."
"That's right," I said.  "How is he?"
"Velly glad you catchee pilate."
"Oh, he is, is he?"
"Yes, velly muchee glad, and send lettee."
"Yes, you said so."
"Allee 'bout pilates."
He took a piece of paper from somewhere and handed it to me.
"You no lead lettee?"
I shook my head as I glanced at the queer Chinese characters.
"No; what does he say about the pirates?"
"Say two muchee big junk in river going to sail, catchee tea-ship, lice-ship, silkee-ship."
"Going to sail from here?"  I cried.
"Yes."
"But how does he know?"
"Know evelyting.  Muchee big man.  Wantee catchee more pilate."
"But do you mean your friend knows of these junks sailing?"
"Yes."
"When did you get the letter?"
"Chinese coolie bling lettee in flesh-vegetable boat."
"What, this morning?"
"Yes, bling lettee."
"When are the junks going to sail?"
"No know.  Keepee watchee and catchee."
I sat thinking for a few moments, and I made up my mind to go and tell the first lieutenant, but found the Chinaman looking at me smiling the while.
"You likee this?" he said, holding out a tiny thin stoppered bottle, covered with Chinese characters.
"Like it?  No.  What for?"
"Velly good.  Headache: lub lit' dlop here.  Toothache: lub lit' dlop there.  Got pain anywhere, lub lit' dlop."
I took out the stopper and smelt it.
"Smell velly good; all nicee."
"Why, it smells of peppermint drops," I said carelessly.
"Yes, smell beautiful, all peppimint.  Velly gleat stlong.  Muchee lit' dlop, so."
He took the bottle, drew out the stopper, and covered the neck with one finger, turned the vial upside down, and then rubbed the tiny drop of moisture upon his temples, replaced the stopper, and gave it back to me.
"Thank you, Ching," I said, placing it in my pocket, but without valuing the gift in the slightest degree.  "I'm going now to tell the first lieutenant what you say."
"Yes, tell Mr Leardon watchee watchee, killee allee pilate."
"Yes," I said; and I hurried away, muttering, "Watchee watchee, killee. What stuff they do talk!  Any one would think they were all big babies, who had been taught to speak English by a nurse."
As I reached the deck I saw Barkins and Smith standing by the first lieutenant, and he was nodding his head.
"Why, they've been telling him about me," I thought as I went aft.  "No; they wouldn't be such sneaks."
But all doubt was at an end directly, for they came down to meet me, and Smith cried--
"Mr Reardon wants to speak to you directly, Herrick;" while, as I looked up and caught Barkins' eye, he coloured a little, and hurriedly avoided my gaze.
"Thank you, tale-bearer," I said to Smith.
"Don't you be insolent, sir, unless you wish me to give you a severe thrashing."
"With fists?"  I said.
"Yes, sir, with fists.  I suppose the rules of the service will not allow us to use such weapons as officers are accustomed to."
"Do you mean officers like you?"  I said contemptuously.
"Yes, sir; officers like me."
"Oh, you mean knives and forks, then," I said carelessly.  "I say, Barkins, I didn't think you could have been such a jerry sneak."
He turned upon me with an apologetic look, but his lips began to bluster.
"What do you mean, sir?"
"Oh, nothing; I am not going to quarrel with old Barkins.  He wouldn't have done this, if it had not been for Blacksmith."
"Go and obey the first lieutenant's orders, sir," said Smith haughtily. "We will talk to you later on."
"You go and show Doctor Price your arms and legs," I said contemptuously and spitefully; for, to use a common phrase, my monkey was up.  "Fight? With fists?  Where are your muscles?  Why, I could upset you both with a swab."
I hurried aft, and ran up the steps to the quarter-deck in time to encounter the first lieutenant, who was coming from the wheel with an angry look upon his face.
CHAPTER TWENTY NINE.
A QUEER QUARREL.
"I sent a message to you, Mr Herrick," he cried angrily, and I could then guess that he had been coming to see why I had delayed.  "I have something to say to you, sir, respecting the company you keep, and the society you affect, which I am given to understand is not that which conduces to good dishipline."
"Oh, that's what Mr Smith thinks, sir," I said coolly.
"Oh, indeed!" he cried sarcastically.
"Yes, sir; he said something about it to me this morning, but he does not know."
"Indeed!" he cried, growing black as a thundercloud; "then I am to take it, sir, that you do?"
"I hope so, sir; I try to know."
"Then you know, sir, possibly why it was that when I sent you a summons I am kept waiting?"
"Yes, sir; I was delayed a little--"
"Oh, thank you.  I am glad to hear that, Mr Herrick.  Perhaps you have something else of importance to communicate?"
"Yes, sir, very."
"Thank you.  I am sorry I cannot ask you to sit down."
"Don't name it, sir," I said quietly, while he began to breathe very hard.
"I was down with Ching the interpreter, sir, this morning--"
"Were you really, Mr Herrick?" he said sarcastically.  "Dear me, I hope he is much better?"
"Yes, sir, he's nearly all right.  I was coming to you when I met Mr Barkins, and Smith."  I couldn't say Mr Smith, I felt so exasperated against him.
"What a curious coincidence, Mr Herrick!  If I had known I might have spared myself the trouble of sending."
"Yes, sir."
"And pray, may I know for what reason I was to be honoured?"
"Of course, sir," I said coolly enough, for I was enjoying the way in which he was working himself up for an explosion to fall upon my unfortunate head.  "The fact is, sir--"
"Oh, it is a fact, is it?"
"Yes, sir--Ching has friends ashore."
"And wants leave of absence?  Are you his envoy?"
"Oh no, sir.  One of his friends sent him an important letter this morning by the vegetable boat."
"Eh? letter?" said Mr Reardon, beginning to grow interested.
"Yes, sir.  This friend is a kind of a merchant or something; and he has news of two big junks--piratical junks--lying in this very river."
"The dickens he has!  Here, Herrick, come down to my cabin."
He took my arm and marched me quickly to the ladder and down to his cabin.  On the way I caught sight of Barkins and Smith watching us, and I gave them a nod.
"Now, my lad, sit down," cried Mr Reardon excitedly.  "Let's hear."
I sat down, and he walked to and fro--two steps and turn.
"There's very little more to tell you, sir," I said; "but there are two very large junks assuming to be merchantmen.  They are anchored close by here somewhere."
"You don't know which two?"
"No, sir; but we shall know them by their sailing at once, and I should say by boats coming off to them with extra men directly after."
"Yes, that's good, Herrick--very good.  But you have no other information about them?"
"Only, sir, that they are just off on a cruise, and if we could catch them--"
"We will catch them, my lad.  But is that all?"
"Yes, sir, that's all; I thought it rather big news."
"So it is, Herrick--very big news.  Just what we wanted.  It's time we made another capture.  And to Ching has a friend on shore who sent this information?"
"Yes, sir."
"Not a trap, is it--to get us away?"
"Oh no, sir; Ching is as honest as the day."
"Humph, yes," said Mr Reardon, with his fingers to his lips.  "I think he is, for he seems to have taken to us and to be working hard in our service.  But he may have been deceived.  He is cunning enough; but so are his countrymen, and they would glory in tricking the man who has taken up with the English.  I don't know what to say to it, Herrick."
"But suppose we see two big junks setting sail, watch them with a boat, sir, and find that they take others on board, there could be no mistake then."
"Oh yes, there could, my boy.  We might follow these junks, seize them, and spend a long time in their capture and bringing back into port. Then we should apply to the authorities, and find that we had got into sad trouble, for we had seized two vessels which the occupants could prove were intended for peaceable pursuits.  We could not contradict them possibly, and all the time the scoundrels we wanted to take had sailed off upon a piratical expedition, consequent upon our absence. Now, sir, what do you say to that?"
I shook my head.
"I think Ching ought to know best," I said.
"Perhaps so," he replied.  "We shall see.  Come on now to the captain."
He opened the door, and I followed.  I had forgotten all about Barkins and Smith for the time, but now all that had passed occurred to my mind, and I felt certain that they would be waiting somewhere to meet me and make sport of the tremendous setting-down which I had had.
I was not wrong: they were talking together amidships, just where they could command the companion-way, and as soon as we appeared I saw Smith's features expand into a malicious grin, while Barkins remained perfectly stolid.
As we passed to the ladder Smith looked after us wonderingly, and I saw him turn and whisper something, which I felt sure was--
"Taking him to the skipper."
For the captain was not in his cabin, but walking up and down the quarter-deck with his hands clasped behind him, and the telescope which had made Mr Reardon so angry under his left arm.
As we reached the deck he was going aft, so we followed him, and timed our pace so that when he turned we had only a step or two to take to be facing him.
"Yes, Mr Reardon," he said in response to our salute, "anything fresh?"
"Yes, sir, something very fresh.  Will you listen to what Mr Herrick has to say?"
"Certainly," he replied, and he made room for me on his right Mr Reardon placed himself on my right, and as I narrated all I had said before as nearly as I could, they marched me up and down between them, from the binnacle to the end of the quarter-deck, turned and marched me back again.
As we approached the rail I could see Barkins and Smith watching us with all their eyes, and as we came in sight again they were still watching intently, evidently in the full belief that I was being, as we should have called it, wigged tremendously.  And certainly they had some excuse for this idea, for I had been summoned by the first lieutenant, taken into his cabin, talked to, and then marched off to the captain.  It almost looked like being dismissed from the ship in their eyes, and now I could see them scanning my features with intense interest for sight of my breaking down.
The captain heard me out, and then listened to Mr Reardon's objections.
"Yes," he said quietly at last, "that's very true, Mr Reardon, but we must not let an opportunity slip.  I was intending to sail to-morrow for the north; now we will sail which way the junks lead.  That will do for the present, Mr Herrick, and I thank you for your diligence in Her Majesty's service."
I touched my cap and went to the ladder, and as I descended there were my two messmates coming towards me.
Trying to make my face as mobile as possible, I stretched it here and there into wrinkles, and was walking straight along the deck looking the image of despair, when they stopped me.
"Serve you right!" said Smith exultantly.  "There, be off below, and don't let the men all see what a setting-down you have had."
I gave each of them a piteous look, turned as they had suggested, and hurried down to our cabin to have a good laugh all to myself.
To my surprise, though, they followed me, Barkins to seat himself on the table, and Smith to lean up against the door.
"Well, Skeeter," said the latter, "you've had it pretty hot.  Serve you right for being sarcy; you'll behave better next time."
"I hope so," I said meekly.
"Dishy gave you his lecture, then, and walked you off to the skipper, eh?"
"Yes," I said.
"Well, it's of no use for you to be grumpy.  You've had your lesson, and now you've got to behave yourself."
"Yes."
"And I am very glad to see you are so humble.  Aren't you, Tanner?"
"Yes," said Barkins gruffly.
"You see it won't do for a little gnat of a fellow to think he is going to do what he likes on board one of Her Majesty's ships.  It was quite time you were taken down a few pegs--wasn't it, Tanner?"
"I suppose so," said Barkins.
"Then I don't see that it's any use for us to jump upon him, and show bad blood."
"No, not a bit," cried Barkins, with more animation.  "We won't."
"No, I said we wouldn't; so look here, youngster: we're going to forgive you, if you promise to behave better and do as you're bid.  This isn't school, you know, where a boy can set himself up against his elders, but the Queen's service, where every one has his place, and has to keep it too--mind that.  There, that's all I've got to say."
"And very nicely said too," I replied.
He looked at me sharply, but my face was like marble, and he concluded that I had spoken seriously, for he turned to Barkins--
"There, Tanner, I've done; now it's your turn."
"What for?"
"To give him a few words."
"Oh, I don't think I want to say anything," said Barkins slowly.  "I'm sorry the poor little beggar got into such a row."
"It'll do him good."
"I hope so," said Barkins slowly and reluctantly, and there was rather a mournful look in his eyes as he spoke.
"You'd better give him a few words of advice," said Smith in an off-hand tone.
"Oh no, he's had enough jawing.  I shan't say anything."
"Thank you, Tanner," I said.
"Oh, all right," he cried, and he held out his hand and shook mine, brightening up the next moment, and looking as pleased as if he had just got a great trouble off his mind.
"You needn't be in such a jolly hurry to forgive him," said Smith in a remonstrant tone; "he has been a cheeky little beggar, and deserved all he got."
"But it isn't nice to be wigged, all the same," said Barkins sharply.
"No, but it don't matter if you deserved it.  Now then, Gnat, tell us what Dishy said."
"What about?"  I asked innocently.
"What about?  Why, your associating with Ching so much."
"Oh, that!"  I cried.
"Oh, that!" he said, mocking my way of speaking.  "Why, what did you think I meant?"
"I don't know."
"Well, what did he say?"
"Nothing at all."
"What! no lies now."
"Who's telling lies?  He didn't say a word about it.  We had something of more consequence to talk about."
"Now, Tanner, hark at that.  Did you ever hear such a miserable cheeky little beggar in your life?  It's of no use; we must give him a regular good towelling."
"Better tell us what the luff said, Gnat," growled Barkins, in so strange an accession of gruffness that I began to laugh.
"Why, what's the matter with you?"  I said.  "Don't gruff and grow hoarse like that."
"Can't help it; got a cold, I s'pose," he cried.  "But I say, stop it now; we want to be friends.  Tell us what the luff said."
"Precious little," I replied.  "I did all the speaking till we went up on the quarter-deck."
"Don't listen to him," cried Smith, growing wroth with me.  "I never saw such cheek.  One tries to be friends with him, but it's of no use; directly you open your mouth he jumps down your throat."
"Then you shouldn't have such a big mouth, Smithy," I said sharply, and then the storm burst.
Tanner roared with laughter, for the width of Smith's mouth had often been food for our mirth; and, as Barkins afterwards said, my remark came out so pat.
"Look here," cried Smith, "I'm not going to stand this sort of thing. You may be fool enough to put up with it, but I won't."
"If you call me a fool I'll punch your head, Smithy," growled Barkins.
"No, you won't," was the retort; "and that's the way you take sides against me, and encourage the miserable little beggar in his impudent ways?  Now then, you Herrick, you've got to go down on your knees and beg my pardon, and then tell me everything the skipper and the first luff said."
"When?"  I asked coolly.
"When?  Why, now, directly," cried Smith fiercely.  "Now then, no nonsense," he cried, seizing me by the collar; but I wrested myself away, and in the slight struggle sent him staggering against Barkins.
"Now then, keep off me, please," growled Barkins.
"Keep off yourself; why don't you get out of the way?"
"How was I to know that a blundering idiot was coming up against me?"
"It'll tell you when I've done with the Gnat," said Smith angrily; for I had unintentionally hurt his arm.  "Now you, Skeeter."
"Let him alone," said Barkins gruffly.
"When I've done with him," said Smith; "you could have had first go at him if you had liked."
"I don't want to hit the little fellow, I'm not overbearing like you are.  Let him alone, I say."
"I shall let him alone when I choose," retorted Smith fiercely.  "I'm not going to let our junior ride roughshod over me, if you're fool enough to."
"I shall be fool enough to kick you out of the cabin if you touch him," cried Barkins angrily.  "I won't have him bullied; and it was a mean sneaking thing to go telling tales as you did to old Dishy."
"Look here," cried Smith, "if any one is a sneak it's you, for harking back and taking the miserable little beggar's side."
"Never mind about that; you let him alone."
"Oh, I say, Tanner," I said, "don't quarrel with him about me.  What he said did no harm.  Mr Reardon was as friendly as could be."
"That's a cracker," cried Smith sharply.
At that moment a marine came to the door.
"First lieutenant wants to see Mr Herrick directly."
"Yes; where is he?"  I said, smiling--purposely, of course.
"With the cap'n, sir, on the quarter-deck."
"All right; I'll be there directly."
The man saluted and marched off, while I followed to the door, where I turned, thrust in my head, and said banteringly--
"Now be good boys and don't fight while I'm gone."
_Bang_!
A book off the table, flung by Smith, struck the door which I was holding half open, for I saw the missile coming, and dodged it.  Then I popped my head in again.
"Don't take any notice of him, Tanner," I cried; "he's bilious.  Thankye for sticking up for me.  Can I say a word for you to the captain?"
"Here, get up," cried Smith, with a snarl.  "Touch your hat to him. He's promoted; and they'll send poor old Brooke a step lower.  All hail, Lieutenant Skeeter!"
"All right!"  I cried, and I hurried away, leaving Barkins looking as if he could not believe his ears.
The next minute I was facing the captain and Mr Reardon.
CHAPTER THIRTY.
A FRESH START.
"Mr Herrick," said the captain, as I saluted, "I have decided that, as you know so much about this business, you shall go with Mr Brooke in one of the boats; but I wish you to observe what I say: the success of our expedition depends a great deal upon secrecy, so do not chatter anything about your mission in the hearing of the men."
"No, sir, certainly not," I said, wondering what the mission might be, and whether we were going to cut out the junks.
"That's right; you had better take the interpreter with you."
"To search for the junks, sir?"
"Hush; guard your tongue, sir.  You are ostensibly going up the river with Mr Brooke upon a little shooting expedition for wild-fowl, so get rid of your uniform.  I daresay we can lend him a gun, Mr Reardon?"
"If he'll take care of it, he can have mine, sir," said Mr Reardon.
"Then off with you, my lad, and be as observant as you can.  Mr Brooke will tell you, I daresay, all about his instructions."
I saluted, and darted away in time to see that Smith had been watching me, for he drew back as I approached, and I found him standing by where Barkins sat, looking exceedingly glum.
I daresay it was very petty, but Smith had been so malicious, and had so often made himself disagreeable, that I could not help feeling a delicious sensation of triumph as I bustled into the cabin and rushed to my locker, without taking any notice whatever of Smith, while I felt sorry for big burly Barkins, who I felt would not say an unkind word if it were not for Smith's influence.
I remember Charles Dickens saying in one of his tales something about it being hard enough to live with any one who had a bad temper in a large house, but to be shut up with the said person in a cart or travelling van was terrible.  Of course I am not giving his exact words, only making the allusion to illustrate the fact that it is quite as bad to exist with an ill-tempered person in the small cabin of a vessel at sea. For you may depend upon it there is no better--or worse--way of finding out a companion's peculiarities than that.
I acted pettily, but then I was only a boy; and now I am a man, getting on in years, I don't know that I am much better.  But it was very comic all the same to see those two fellows try to ignore my proceedings, poor old Barkins following Blacksmith's lead once more.  They did not want to know what I was going to do--not a bit.  And I laughed to myself as I hurriedly kicked off my shoes and put on a pair of strong boots, carefully took off my uniform jacket and replaced it by a thin tweed Norfolk, after which I extricated a pith helmet from its box, having to turn it upside down, for it was full of odds and ends.
Smith had taken up a book and pretended to read, while Barkins sat back on a locker with his hands in his pockets, and his lips thrust out and screwed as if he were whistling, but no sound came, and he stared hard at the bulkhead facing him.
But try how he would he could not keep his eyes fixed there--they would follow my movements; and twice over I caught Smith peeping round the side of the book with which he was screening his face.
I began to whistle as I rapidly made my preparations, and at last Smith could bear it no longer.
"What's the idiot dressing himself up for?" he cried contemptuously.
That started Barkins, and he burst out with--
"What's up, Gnat?  Shore leave?"
"Eh!  Didn't you know?"  I said coolly.  "Shooting."
"What!" they exclaimed in a breath, and Smith's eyes were more wide open than I had ever seen them.
"Shooting," I said coolly.  "Brooke and I are going after ducks."
"Gammon!" cried Barkins.  "Why, you have no gun."
"No," I said.  "Reardon is going to lend me his double breech-loader, central fire, number twelve."
Barkins gave his leg a sharp slap.
"We're going up the river; plenty of sport up there among the marshes."
"Going to walk?" said Barkins.
"Oh no; we're to have a crew and one of the cutters."
"Don't you believe him, Barkins, it's all gammon.  The little humbug can't deceive me."
"All right, call it gammon," I said, stooping to tighten my boot-laces. "Roast duck for dinner, Tanner, to-morrow."
Barkins rushed on deck, leaving me with Smith, and the next minute he was back again.
"It's all right, Smithy," he cried; "and they're shoving in a basket of prog for the beggars."
"What!" yelled Smith.  "Do you mean to say that Brooke and this--this-- thing are going off wasting Her Majesty's time shooting?"
"Yes; I saw Brooke, and he said it was so."
"Then I shall resign.  Hang me if I'll stop in a service where such beastly favouritism is shown.  Profession for gentlemen's sons, is it? I call it a mockery!"
"Oh, don't be so snaggy, Smithums," I said banteringly; "wait till his poor old wing's all right again, and he shall go a shooting too."
That was too much.  He made a rush at me, but Barkins flung an arm round his waist, and as they struggled together I dodged to the other side of the table and escaped from the cabin, but popped my head in again.
"Don't hit him, Tanner," I cried; "he ain't got no friends.  Good-bye, old chap, I wish you were coming too."
Our eyes met, and I suppose my tone and the look I gave him seemed sincere, for, as he held Smith, his arms tightly round him from behind, and his chin resting upon our messmate's shoulder, he gave me a friendly nod.
"All right, old chap," he said; "I hope you'll enjoy yourself."
"And I hope the John Teapots 'll get hold of you, you miserable little cad!" cried Smith.  "I shan't be there to help you this time."
I burst out laughing and ran on deck, to find the men mustered ready, and Mr Brooke standing there in sun helmet and gaiters, looking as unlike a naval officer as he could be.
"Oh, there you are, Herrick," he said, giving me a look over.  "Yes, that will do."
"But the men," I whispered.  "Oughtn't they to be armed?"
"All right, my lad; plenty of tackle in the boat under the thwarts."
"But my gun--I mean Mr Reardon's?"
"In the stern-sheets, with plenty of cartridges.  Where's Ching?"
"I don't--down below, I suppose."
"Fetch him up; we're off at once."
There was no need, for the interpreter appeared smiling and happy, looking as if he had not passed through such a terrible ordeal a short time before.
The captain and Mr Reardon came up then.
"Ready, Mr Brooke?"
"Yes, sir."
"Order the crew into the boat, Mr Reardon."
As the men sprang in, the captain came close to us.
"You'll keep up the appearance of a sporting expedition, Mr Brooke," he said in a low voice.  "I expect you'll find the junks in the river off some village.  The rest I must leave to you."
"Take them, sir, if I feel pretty certain?"
Captain Thwaites knit his brows, and stood as if thinking for a few moments.
"No," he said at last; "but that I leave all to your discretion.  Don't risk your men, if they are strong.  I'm afraid some of these mandarins are mixed up with the piratical expeditions, and share in the plunder, and I am certain that every movement we make is watched.  There, off with you; don't let Mr Herrick get hurt.  I trust you to do your best."
We sprang into the boat, which was lowered down; the falls were unhooked; and as Tom Jecks, who was coxswain, gave us a shove off, the tide, which was running up, bore us right aft; then the oars dropped with a splash, the rudder lines were seized, and away we went up-stream on as glorious a day as ever made a dirty Chinese city look lovely.
I looked back, and there were Barkins and Smith leaning over the side watching us, but I hardly noticed them, for something else caught my eye.
"Why, they're getting up steam, Mr Brooke!"  I said.
"Yes, my lad, they're getting up steam, and I hope your information may mean some good active service for us.  Here, Ching," he whispered, "you have not told the men anything about our business?"
Ching shut his eyes and shook his head solemnly.
"Velly muchee keepee mouf shut," he said, with the addition now of a few nods of the head.  "Nobody but Ching an' officer know."
CHAPTER THIRTY ONE.
GETTING WARM.
The men were in high glee, and, had they not been checked, would have sent the boat spinning up the river, in their delight to escape from the monotony of harbour-life, and the natural love there is in Englishmen for a bit of sport.
"Steady, my lads," said Mr Brooke quietly.  "Just give her headway, and back water the moment I speak."
I did not hear what one of the men whispered to his messmate, but I saw his face as he leaned forward, and it certainly suggested to me that he said--
"They mean some of the tame ducks to make sure."
"No, we do not, my man," said Mr Brooke, and I stared at him in astonishment, that he should have taken the same idea as I had.
The man coloured through his tan, and Mr Brooke; said in a low voice to me--
"Our work's cut out, Herrick; how are we to pick out the right two junks from all this crowd?"
"I don't know, sir," I said.  "But I don't fancy they would be down here where other people might talk about them.  I should think they would be up the river."
"Well, we must find them, my lad, so use our brains as much as you can, and if you see a junk with a very evil-looking lot aboard, just give me a hint as we pass."
"I'll ask Ching what he thinks, sir."
Mr Brooke nodded, and I turned to the interpreter, who was squatting in the bottom of the boat right aft, his eyes half shut, and apparently taking no heed of anything.
"How are we to know which are the junks we want, Ching?"  I said.
"Oh, velly soon find," he said.  "Ching look along.  Not these.  Pilate boat big and tall.  Empty.  No got big calgo aboard.  Stand high up now. Velly full and low down when full of plize-money."
"Then you don't think they are down here?"
He shook his head as he glanced at the various forms of trading-boat moored off the town, from the tiny sampan to the heavy, clumsy mat-sailed vessel, whose stern towered up, and whose great bamboo yards looked as if they must be perfectly unmanageable.
"What do you think we had better do, then--row about here and watch?"
"No good," he said; "makee men low fast light up liver, findee, pilate junk."
"But suppose we pass them?"  I said.
"No pass pilate boat: Ching here."
"And so you think you will know them?"
The Chinaman screwed his face up into a curiously comic smile.
"Ching know pilate when he see him."
"And you think it better to go right up the river?" said Mr Brooke, turning suddenly to join in the conversation.
"Yes; pilate junk long way."
"How do you know?"
He gave a cunning smile at us both, his little eyes twinkling in a singularly sly manner.
"You see vegetable boat come along mo'ning?"
"Yes, I saw the boat come alongside."
"Blought Ching 'nothee lettee, allee same fliend.  Say pilate boat long way uppee liver in big cleek, waitee come down along lunning water in the dalk."
"Then you pretty well know where they are?" said Mr Brooke.
"No; far uppee liver; in cleek."
"I suppose this is right?" said Mr Brooke to me.
"Yes, quite light.  Ching likee see Queen Victolia ship killee catch pilate."
"Give way, my men," said Mr Brooke, and the boat shot forward, while, relieved for the moment from the task of scanning the different boats, I sat gazing at the beautiful panorama of quaint houses, narrow streets debouching on the river, and the house-boats all along the edge of the river, while smaller boats were swinging here and there wherever there was room.
It was a wonderfully interesting sight, for, in addition to the curious shapes of the buildings, there was plenty of brilliant colour, and every now and then patches of brightest blue and vivid scarlet were heightened by the glistening gilding which ornamented some particular building. Then there were temples dotted about amongst the patches of forest, which fringed the high ground at the back of the city, and away beyond them the steep scarps of rugged and jagged mountains, which stood up looking of so lovely a pinky-blue, that I could for the moment hardly believe they were natural, and was ready to ask whether it was not some wonderful piece of painting.
The house-boats took my fancy greatly, for, in endless cases, they were of a variety of bright colours, pretty in shape, and decorated with showy flowers in pots and tubs; some had cages containing brightly-plumaged birds, and in most of them quaint bald-headed little children were playing about or fishing.
Higher up we saw men busy with nets which were attached to the end of a great bamboo pole, balanced upon a strong upright post fixed in the river's bottom, and by means of this balanced pole the net was let down into the depths of the river, and hoisted from time to time, sometimes with a few glittering little fish within the meshes, sometimes having nothing but weed.
"Yes, catchee fish; catchee velly big fish some time."
About ten minutes after, Ching pulled my sleeve and pointed to the other side of the river, where I caught sight of a very familiar old friend sitting in his boat, just as I had seen him in an old picture-book at home.
There he sat with a big umbrella-like sunshade fixed up over him on a bamboo pole, in front of him a kind of platform spread across the front of his moored boat, and upon it sat perched eight or nine of my old friends the cormorants, one of which dived into the river from time to time, and soon after emerged and made its way back to the boat with a fish in its beak.
"See that, Mr Brooke?"  I cried eagerly.  "I suppose we can't stop to watch them?"
"Not when on Her Majesty's service, Herrick," he said, with a smile, and we glided rapidly on, till the houses, which had long been growing scattered, finally disappeared, and we were following the windings of the river in company with a few small junks and sampans, which seemed bound for one of the cities higher up the great waterway.
"Shoot bird now," said Ching, in answer to an inquiring look from Mr Brooke.
"Yes; but do you think the junks are up here?"
"Oh yes, velly quite su'e.  Plenty eye in boat watchee see what Queen Victolia offlicer going to do uppee river."
"What does he mean?" said Mr Brooke, who was puzzled by this last rather enigmatical speech.  "Of course we have watchful eyes in our boat, but I don't see anything yet worth watching."
"He means that very likely there are friends of the pirates in one of these boats, and that we had better begin shooting, so as to take off attention from our real purpose."
"Yes, allee same; p'laps pilate fliend in lit' boat go and tell Queen Victolia foleign devil sailor boy come catchee."
"Oh, I see," said Mr Brooke.  Then, turning to me, "You do understand a little French, don't you?"
"Well, sir, I used to learn some at school," I replied, feeling very doubtful about my proficiency.
"I daresay you can understand my Stratford-atte-Bow French," said Mr Brooke, laughing.
"I'll try, sir," I said; and he said to me directly in excellent French--
"I feel doubtful about this man.  You have seen more of him than I have. Do you think he is honest, or leading us into a trap?"
"Honest, sir," I said, "I feel certain."
"Well, then, we will trust him fully; but if he betrays us, and I can get a last shot--well, then--"
"He'll be sorry for it, sir," I said, for Mr Brooke did not finish his remark.
"Exactly; get out your gun and put on your cartridge belt."
I followed his example, and Ching smiled.
"Velly good thing," he said.  "Now pilate fliend, see jolly sailor boy, and say--Come killee duck-bird, goose-bird to make nicee dinner, not come catchee catchee pilate."
"You hear what this man says, my lads?" said the young lieutenant, addressing the men.
"Ay, ay, sir."
"Then you understand now that we have not only come up to shoot?"
"Ay, ay, sir."
"Keep your rifles and cutlasses quite handy in case they are wanted.  No confusion, mind, but at the word be ready."
Mr Brooke's words seemed to send a thrill through the men, who pulled on now with a more vigorous stroke, while, with our guns charged, and the butts resting on our knees, we gave place to the coxswain, who took the tiller.
"We'll go forward, Herrick," said my companion; and he stepped over the thwarts into the coxswain's place, and I sat by him, watching alternately for birds, junks, and creeks, up which the latter might lie.
"Begin shootee soon," said Ching rather anxiously.
"Why?"
"Velly muchee sail boat behind think why we come."
"There goes something, Herrick," said Mr Brooke just then, and I looked up and saw a bird flying over the river at a tremendous rate.
I raised my piece quickly, fired, and as soon as I was a little clear of the smoke, fired again.
"You hit him, sir!" said our stroke-oar.  "I see him wag his tail."
"It was a miss," I said quietly.
"Velly good," whispered Ching.  "Allee men in other boat look see;" while I replaced the cartridges in my gun, and looked shoreward, to see that the land was level for miles, and that little flocks of duck or other birds were flying here and there.  Soon after a wisp of about a dozen came right over head, and as they approached the men rested upon their oars till Mr Brooke had fired, without result.
He looked at me and smiled, while the men pulled again, and we went merrily along, getting a shot now and then, but the result for the game-bag was very meagre indeed, at which I was not surprised on my own account, but I fully expected Mr Brooke to have done some good.
And still we went on along the great river, with the country, save for the distant mountains, looking wonderfully English, and making it hard to believe that we were in China.  In places where we were close to the shore I could see forms of growth different to our own, but at a little distance the trees, shrubs, and reeds looked much the same as those we should have encountered at home, and I confess to feeling a little disappointed.  Then all at once, as if he too were suffering from the same sensation, Mr Brooke spoke.
"They will laugh at us when we get back, Herrick," he said, "as far as our birds are concerned, but I am beginning to think that we shall find the pirate junks are somewhere up here."
"You think so, sir?  Look, a flock coming this way!"
"Of pirate junks?" he said drily.
"No, sir, ducks."
"Give it them, then, my lad--both barrels."
I took aim and fired both barrels quickly one after the other, but as I drew trigger I felt that I had done wrong, for I had aimed right in front of the swiftly-flying flock.
"Umbrellas up!" shouted one of the men.  "Rains geese!" and there was a cheer and a roar of laughter, as one by one five geese fell with a splash in the river, two to lie perfectly still while they were retrieved--the others, poor birds, to make desperate efforts to swim broken-winged away, but to be shot one by one by Mr Brooke, and after a sharp row dragged into the boat.
"Velly nicee," said Ching, smiling.
"Yes, I must take lessons in shooting from you, Mr Herrick," said the young lieutenant, smiling.  "It's my turn next."
I felt hot and uncomfortable, for my success seemed to be the result of pure accident, and I said so, but Mr Brooke laughed and shook his head.
"Never mind the birds, Herrick," he said; "I feel sure our other game is close by somewhere."
"Yes, up cleek somewhere," said Ching.
"Why do you say that?"
"No pointee--no look.  I tell you," said the Chinaman, taking up and pretending to examine the mottled brown wing of the goose he opened out. "Boat come behind, pilate fliend come see which way we go."
"Yes, I'm sure you are right," said Mr Brooke, taking up another of the birds; "and if I'm not very much mistaken, that other boat you see ahead has his eye upon us."
"Ching not velly sure, p'laps; only see one man look over side thlee times."
"There's a bit of a river runs off here, sir, to the right," said one of the men, nodding to his left, where there was an opening in a patch of forest which came down to the river, with fine timber trees overhanging the muddy banks, and their branches every here and there showing dead grass and reeds caked with mud, as if at times this part of the country was deeply flooded.
"Yes," said Ching very quietly; "p'laps plenty mud up there.  Go see."
"And while we are up a side branch of the river, they may come down the main stream and escape."
Ching shook his head.
"Fliend say pilate junk hide up liver in cleek."
"Yes, but--"
"Wait lit' bit," said Ching, with a cunning look.  "Go up lit' way, shoot birds, and no lit' boat come after, no pilate fliend.  If come after, plenty muchee pilate fliend, and junk not vellee far."
"He's right, Herrick," said Mr Brooke, nodding.  "Turn up the side branch, my lads.  Keep up the comedy of the shooting, and have a shot at something."
"But there's nothing to shoot at, sir," I said, feeling rather doubtful of the accuracy of Ching's ideas.
But as we turned up the narrow branch of the river--a creek not much wider than an English canal, I caught sight of a black-looking bird, which rose from the water and flew away paddling the surface with its feet.
I fired and dropped the bird, but it flapped along, and the men cheered and pulled in chase for two or three hundred yards before it was retrieved.
"It's a sort of moor-hen," I said, as I looked up from my captive.
"One of the pirate's hens, perhaps, Herrick," said Mr Brooke, smiling.
"Well, Ching, had we better go on?"
"Yes, go 'long," said the Chinaman rather huskily.  "Velly good place."
We rowed on for another three or four hundred yards, the branch winding a great deal, so that we seemed to be in a succession of lakes, while the trees on either side completely shut us in.
"Stream runs very fast," I said.
"Yes, velly fast," said Ching.
"There, I think we had better turn back now," said Mr Brooke, but Ching smiled in a curious way.
"What go turnee back?  Pilate fliend both come in cleek after, to see what Queen Victolia jolly sailor boy go to do."
"Are you sure?" said Mr Brooke excitedly.
"Yes, sir, I see the top of one of their sails," said Tom Jecks.
"Then, by George, we are in the right track," cried Mr Brooke, and, as my heart began to beat rapidly, "Give way, my lads," he cried, "give way."
CHAPTER THIRTY TWO.
A STARTLING.
"What are we going to do?"  I said, with my heart beating fast.
"Afraid?" said Mr Brooke in a whisper.
"I don't know, sir--a little," I replied.
"We're not going to fight, Herrick.  I shall go on and find the junks so as to know them again--take their portraits in our minds--and then go back for help.  They can't escape out of the river, and once we know them, our boats can soon follow and bring them to book."
The men pulled as if their hearts were in their work, and upon rounding a bend, there, about a quarter of a mile away, lay two large vessels, moored close up to the trees.
"We'll keep up the idea that we are shooting," said Mr Brooke.  "No, there is no need now.  We have kept it up long enough.  We must reconnoitre and go back.  They will think still that we are a shooting-party, and not know that we are making for them."
"Of course not," I said thoughtfully.  "How could they know we had heard?"
We rowed steadily on for a minute or two, and then Ching said quietly--
"One boat--two boat come behind."
We glanced back, and there, sure enough, were the sailing craft, which had been hanging about in front and aft, coming steadily along in our wake.  A moment or two later Ching spoke again--
"Look over boat side, see jolly sailor boy."
"Never mind those boats," said Mr Brooke impatiently.
"Steady, my lads, hold hard now; that's right," he continued, as the oars were held, and checked the boat's progress.  "Now, Mr Herrick, take a good look at them.  Do you think we should know them again if you saw them coming down the river?"
"Yes, sir," I said; "the stern of this one and bows of the other would be unmistakable.  I don't think I could make a blunder."
"No; almost impossible; pull starboard, back water, port side.  Now, we'll just turn and row gently back.  I don't see any men on board."
"All lie down flat," said Ching sharply.  "Plenty men aboard."
"Ah, well, it does not matter.  I'm not going to run risks by attacking the savages.  Lift your gun and look about, Herrick.  Let them keep in the same mind."
I stood up in the boat at this, and noted how rapidly the tide was running up as Mr Brooke gave the word to pull again.
The movement of the boat brought me in full view of the two sampans which had followed us, each with a man and boy aboard; and now, as I looked, I was surprised to see a yellow head raised and begin watching us.  Then another; and Ching said quickly--"Lot men in both boats."
I don't know how they had stowed themselves, but now, to our intense astonishment, head after head appeared, till Mr Brooke exclaimed--
"Why, the boats are packed full of men."
"Yes, and the junks too," I whispered hastily; for their decks, which a few moments before had appeared to be bare, were now crowded.
"Trapped, Herrick!" said Mr Brooke through his set teeth.  "Is this a trick on the part of Mr Ching?"
The men were looking hard at us, and they did not have long to wait.
"Arms ready, my lads?"
"Ay, ay, sir."
"That's right.  Now then, lay your backs to it, and row with all your might."
"Ay, ay, sir."
"What are you going to do?"  I said huskily.
"Run for it.  The junks can't follow against this tide.  We must row out into the river.  Keep your fire till I give orders.  They may not try to stop us.  If they do, I shall try and ram one.  We have four barrels for the other, without troubling the men."
"You don't think it's a false alarm?"
"No," he said sternly; "the falsity lies somewhere else."
"He means Ching," I said, but there was no time for much thought, not even to see a great deal.  The men grasped the situation as soon as the boat's head was straight, and Mr Brooke took the tiller in his left hand, his gun in his right, and cocked it, while I followed suit.
Then I felt disposed to laugh as Ching made a dive down, and began to crawl under the thwarts among the men's legs, but the laugh changed to a serious grin as Mr Brooke steered to pass between the two boats, when the course of one was changed so as to throw her right athwart our way, and quite a dozen men rose up in each, armed with clumsy swords, yelling at us, and dancing about as they gesticulated and seemed to be trying to frighten us back.
"Very well, if you will have it," said Mr Brooke between his teeth. "Be ready, my lads.  Cutlasses, if they try to board."
A sound like the exhaustion of a heavy breath escaped from the men, and Mr Brooke roared at them to pull, while I sat with my finger on the first trigger and the gun lowered a little, gazing wildly at the savage crew before us.
Those moments were like long minutes, but I could make out that, instead of frightening us, the men in the boat which crossed us were now frightened themselves, and they made an effort to give us room.
But there were too many of them--they got in each other's way.  Then there was a wild shriek, a crash, and the head of our fast cutter crashed into them, driving their bows round, partly forcing them under water, and the flimsily-built boat began rapidly to fill.
The second party held a little aloof, too much startled by the boldness of our manoeuvre to attempt to help their companions, so that we had only the first boat to tackle, as such of the men as could trampled over one another in their struggle to get on board us.
But the moment the crash had come our lads sprang up with a cheer, and, forgetting their proper weapons, let go at the enemy with their oars, using them as spears and two-handed swords, and with such effect that in less than a minute the wretches were driven back or beaten into the water, to swim to and cling to their half-sunken boat, whose light bamboos refused to go right down.
"Now pull--down with you--pull!" roared Mr Brooke, and, thanks to Mr Reardon's grand "dishipline," every man dropped into his place, and the boat, which had come to a standstill, now began to move forward, while the tide carried the enemy towards their junks, from whence came now as savage a yelling as that from the boats.
"Without firing a shot," cried Mr Brooke exultantly.  "Pull, boys. Now, a cheer! they can't follow us against this tide."
The men sent up a triumphant shout, and, as we swept round the next bend, we lost sight of the junks, and directly after of the two boats, the last I saw of them being that the crew of the second were dragging their companions of the first out of the water, and loading their own down to the gunwale edge.
"Now," cried Mr Brooke, "who's hurt?"
There was no answer for a moment or two.  Then one of the men said, with a grin--
"I arn't drownded, sir; but I shall ketch cold if something arn't done-- my feet's wet."
"Yes, so velly wet," cried a plaintive voice, and Ching struggled up from the bottom of the boat, and stood up, showing his blue cotton garments to be drenched with water.
"What, have we sprung a leak?" cried Mr Brooke.
"Yes, sir," said Tom Jecks, "she's got a hole in her skin here forrard; but if I might be so bold, sir, if you was to send Mr Ching to lean up agin it, we shouldn't hurt much."
"Pull--pull steady," cried Mr Brooke.  "Here, take the tiller, Mr Herrick."
He laid his gun behind us and handed me the rudder, before going right forward to the coxswain, while I sat envying the men their coolness as they sat pulling away nonchalantly enough, though the water was rising fast and nearly covered their bare feet and ankles, while it soon invaded the grating upon which my own boot-covered feet were placed.
"Much injured, sir?"  I shouted; and Mr Brooke gave me back poor Mercutio's answer to his friend, in _Romeo and Juliet_--
"'Tis not so deep as a well, nor so wide as a church door: but 'tis enough; 'twill serve."
"Here, my lads, one of you; I must have a frock."
"Right, sir, mine'll do," said the coxswain, unfastening and dragging his white duck garment over his head.
This was soaked and wrung out to make it softer, and then thrust into the hole in our bows.
"There, you must sit forward here, and plant both feet against it, my lad," said Mr Brooke.
"Ay, ay, sir.  Men never knows what he may come to.  Fancy my toots being used to caulk a leak!"
He, laughing, sat down on the forward thwart, and pressed his feet against the jacket.
"Now then, a man to bale," cried Mr Brooke, and the coxswain fished the tin baler out of the locker forward.  "No; pass it here," continued our leader.  "Pull away, my lads, and Mr Herrick and I will take it in turns to bale.  We must get out of this narrow creek as soon as we can."
"Me balee water out," squeaked Ching, who looked very wet and miserable.
"No, thank you," said Mr Brooke coldly.
"Beg pardon, sir; I've got nothin' to do but sit here like a himage," said the coxswain; "I can reach down and bale."
"Without shifting your feet?"
"Yes, sir; look here."
The man took the baler, and began to send the water, which still came in but slowly, over the side; while, after satisfying myself that we should not be obliged to run our boat ashore and tramp back to the city, I kept on directing anxious glances backward to see if we were pursued.
"We shan't sink, Herrick," said Mr Brooke, returning to my side; while, after glancing at my very serious, and at the young lieutenant's stern countenance, Ching crept forward under the oars to where the coxswain was baling, and, getting a second tin from the locker, he seated himself, tucked his loose things out of the way, and began meekly to toss out the water as fast as he could scoop it up.
"That fellow's a traitor," said Mr Brooke to me in a low voice, after a glance back by Ching.
"Oh no, I hope not, sir," I said.
"I wish I could hope so too, my lad.  There's a deal of cunning in his plans, and he tried hard to make it seem that he was all the time working upon our side; but I feel as if he has led us into a trap, and we were very nearly coming to our end in it without a man left to tell the tale."
"But why, sir?  What object could he have?"
"Plunder, for one thing; our boat, and weapons such as they cannot get. Yes, I believe that he is in league with those pirates."
"Oh, I can't think it, Mr Brooke," I cried.  "He has served us so well."
"Yes, to gain his own ends."
"But surely he wouldn't do such a base thing for the sake of getting a paltry share in these rifles and cutlasses?"
"He would have the satisfaction of seeing us massacred."
"But what satisfaction could that be, sir?"  I cried.  "We have always been his friends."
"The Chinese hate the outer barbarians and foreign devils, as they call us, my lad.  They are obliged to tolerate our presence, but the common people, as you know well, would feel an intense pleasure in murdering every European they came across."
"All the same, sir," I said, "I don't believe poor old Ching would do anything that was against us."
"Well, we shall see.  But what an escape, my lad!  What a trap we were in!"
"And how capital to get out of it without having a man hurt."
"It's splendid, my lad.  The captain will be delighted at that, and forgive me about the boat."
"But we had to run away, sir," I said.
"Rather strange running away to charge that boat as we did!  But don't you take it into your head, my lad, that it is cowardly to retreat at the proper time.  It is madness to go throwing away the lives of your men when you can do no good by fighting.  It might sound very grand and heroic for us to have fought both those boats, and then tried to capture the junks; but we must have been cut to pieces in the attempt, and what then--"
"We should have been able to say that we did not turn tail upon our enemies."
"No, we should not, my boy, because there would not have been a soul left to tell the story.  There, my lad, don't indulge in romance.  He is the best commander who gains victories at the smallest cost of blood to his country.--Ha, at last! how much longer the creek seems coming back than it did going up."
"Running against the tide, too," I cried; and the next minute we glided out into the big stream, crossed the river, and settled down to a quiet, steady row on the far side, where the eddy enabled us to make a very fine rate of speed.
But our rate did not satisfy Mr Brooke, who kept on looking at his watch as the time went on, and we found that the swift tide had carried us much farther than we thought for.
"We shall never get back at this rate," said Mr Brooke, "and it can't be very long before the tide turns, and then those scoundrels will come sailing down, perhaps pass us before we can get to the _Teaser_."
"Hardly," I ventured to observe.
"Well, no; you are right," he said.  "I am too impatient.  We have a good start, and must get to the gunboat long before they can."
Meanwhile Tom Jecks sat fast, pressing his feet against the jacket placed over the hole, and kept baling, while Ching took his time from him, and used his baler with enough skill to help get rid of a great deal of water, so that the boat was freed to an extent which set aside all danger of our sinking; but with all their efforts they never got beyond a certain point, for the water oozed in pretty constantly through and round the extempore plug.
At last, faint with heat and nearly exhausted, we came in sight of the first straggling houses, then they grew more close together, and fields and gardens gave place to the closely-packed habitations.  For we had reached the town, though even then we had quite a long row before we could reach the _Teaser_.
The final stretch came at last--just about a quarter of a mile to traverse, and then we should be alongside.
"Thank goodness!" said Mr Brooke, drawing a deep breath; "I don't know when I have felt so anxious.  Now, my lads, only another five minutes--a long pull and a strong pull, and all together."
The men cheered and pulled, sending the boat merrily along now, for the tide was close upon its highest point, and for some little time it grew more and more sluggish before the coxswain cried out--
"She's swung round, sir; tide's with us."
"Ha!" ejaculated Mr Brooke.  "Then we shall get to the _Teaser_ in time.  They couldn't start from the creek with those light junks till now."
"How much farther is it, sir?"  I said, as he stood up and shaded his eyes with his hand.
"It can't be many hundred yards," he replied.  "It must be just beyond that head where the boats lie so thick.  Yes, off that temple there up on the hill."
The men gave a cheer, and the boat sped on fast now, feeling the push given by the falling tide, and the short distance that lay between us; and the spot where we had lain at anchor so many days was soon traversed--the latter part in perfect silence, with Mr Brooke standing in the stern-sheets gazing straight ahead, and turning his eyes from side to side of the busy water thoroughfare.
"She has shifted her moorings," he said at last.
"Has she, sir?"  I replied, as I recalled how the furnace fires were going and the _Teaser_ was getting up steam when we started.
"Yes; how tiresome!" he muttered.  "Just, too, when we want to communicate at once."
"But you can see her, sir?"
"No, my lad, no," he cried.  "How can I see her if she is not here?"
"But I thought you said she had shifted her moorings, sir?"
"Yes, and gone down the river somewhere.  Hang it all, she can't have sailed without us."
"They wouldn't do that, sir," I cried, feeling quite startled at the idea of the ship leaving us with our small boat in the midst of strangers.  "Why, she must have had news of some other junks, sir, and gone in pursuit, or is it a mistake?  We can't have come far enough. No; this is the spot."
The men were looking at me inquiringly, just as men accustomed to be led lean on their superiors for orders, even if one of those superiors be a mere boy, while I, acting in precisely the same spirit, looked up to Mr Brooke, and listened excitedly for what he would say next.
It seemed to be a long time before he spoke, and then it was between his teeth and with angry vehemence, as he dropped down into his seat.
"After all this hard struggle to get back with our news," he muttered, in so low a tone that I only heard his words, while the men sat with their oars balanced gazing forward to see if they could make out the _Teaser's_ funnel and tall spars.  "They ought not to have stirred; it's playing at dog and the shadow.  Here have we brought the substance, and they are snapping at the reflection."
"Mr Brooke!"  I said in a whisper.
"All right, my boy; don't be down-hearted.  It's the fortune of sea life.  Here we are, tired, hungry, and hot, with a badly leaking boat, and a far from friendly place to land in and get her repaired."
"But they can't have gone far," I said.
"I don't know, my lad.  Had some news of pirates, perhaps.  All I know now is that they've left us in the lurch."
CHAPTER THIRTY THREE.
AN EXCHANGE.
"Now then," said Mr Brooke, after a few minutes' pause, "what's the first thing, Herrick?  We can't keep watch for the junks in this boat."
"The first thing is to get her mended, sir."
"Yes; but how?"
"Let's ask Ching."
"Ching!" said Mr Brooke angrily.
"You wantee Ching?" came in the familiar highly-pitched voice from forward.  "You wantee Ching go buy new boatee?"
He came hurrying aft, nearly tumbling once; while, left to his own power alone, the coxswain redoubled his efforts to keep down the water, and the tin baler went _scoop scroop, scoop scroop_, and _splash splash_, as he sent the water flying.
But the dark, angry expression of Mr Brooke's countenance repelled the Chinaman, and he stopped short and looked from one to the other in a pleading, deprecating way, ending by saying piteously--
"You no wantee Ching?"
Mr Brooke shook his head, and our interpreter went back over the thwarts, reseated himself, and began to bale again, with his head bent down very low.
"Give way, my lads," said Mr Brooke, bearing hard on the tiller, and the boat began to bear round as he steered for the landing-place a quarter of a mile away.
I looked up at him inquiringly, and he nodded at me.
"We can't help it, Herrick," he said; "if we stop afloat with the boat in this condition we shall have a serious accident.  But we shall lose the junks."
"Oh!"  I ejaculated, "and after all this trouble.  We had been so successful too.  Couldn't we repair the boat?"
"If we could run into a good boat-builder's we might patch it up, but we can do nothing here."
"Couldn't Ching show us a place?"
"I can't ask the scoundrel."
I winced, for I could not feel that Ching had deceived us, and for a few moments I was silent.  Then a thought struck me.
"May I ask him, sir?"
Mr Brooke was silent for a while, but he spoke at last.
"I hate risking his help again, but I am ready to do anything to try and carry out my instructions.  We ought to patrol the river here to wait for the junks coming down, and then follow them, even if it is right down to sea.  Well, yes; ask him it he can take us to a boat-builder's, where we can get some tarpaulin or lead nailed on."
I wasted no time.  "Ching!"  I cried; and he looked up sadly, but his face brightened directly as he read mine.
"You wantee Ching?"
"Yes; where is there a boat-builder's where they will mend the boat directly?"
"No," he said; "takee velly long time.  Boat-builder same slow fellow. No piecee work along.  Take boatee out water, mend him to-mollow, next week."
"Then what are we to do?"  I cried.  "We want to watch the junks."
"Why no takee other fellow big boatee?  Plenty big boatee evelywhere. Get in big sampan junk, pilate man no sabby jolly sailor boy come along. Think other piecee fellow go catch fish."
"Here, Mr Brooke," I cried excitedly; "Ching says we had better take one of these boats lying moored out here, and the pirates won't think of it being us.  Isn't it capital?"
Mr Brooke gazed sharply at us both for a few moments, and then directed the boat's head as if going up the river again.
"Where is there a suitable boat?" he said hoarsely, and speaking evidently under great excitement, as he saw a means of saving the chance after all.
"Velly nice big boat over 'long there," said Ching, pointing to a native craft about double the size of our cutter, lying moored about a hundred yards from the shore, and evidently without any one in her.
"Yes, that will do," cried Mr Brooke.  "Anything fits a man who has no clothes.  Pull, my lads--give way!"
The men dragged at the oars, and I saw that since Ching had left off baling the water was gaining fast, and that if more power was not put on it would not be long before the boat was waterlogged or sunk.
In a minute we were alongside the boat, one of a superior class, possibly belonging to some man of consequence, and Mr Brooke had run the cutter along her on the side farthest from the shore, so that our proceedings were not noticed, as we made fast.
"Now then, tumble in, my lads," he cried; "take the oars and everything movable.  Throw them in, our game and all.  Here, Herrick, take both guns."
Everything was transferred in a very short time; and this done, Mr Brooke stepped aboard the little junk-like craft, gave his orders, and a line was attached to a grating, the other end to one of the ring-bolts. Then the craft's anchor-line was unfastened, and our painter hitched on to it instead.  Next the grating was tossed overboard, with plenty of line to float it as a buoy and show where the boat had sunk, as it was pretty certain to do before long; and we, in our tiny junk, began to glide away with the tide, furnished with a serviceable boat, boasting of sails, even if they were not of a kind our men were accustomed to manage.
"Why, it is grand, Herrick!" cried Mr Brooke excitedly.  "We shall get them after all."
"And all Ching's doing, sir," I said quietly.
"Ah, yes, perhaps; he is repentant now he has been found out.  But we shall see--"
"That he is quite innocent, sir," I said.
"I hope so, my lad.  Now, let's make sail, and beat about here, to and fro.  We must keep a good watch for our two friends, and if they come down we can follow till we see the _Teaser_ in the offing.  We may, I say, capture them yet."
A sail was hoisted, and in a few minutes we found that the craft went along easily and well, answering to her helm admirably.  Her high bulwarks gave plenty of shelter, and would, I saw, well conceal our men, so that we had only to put Ching prominently in sight to pass unnoticed, or as a Chinese fishing or pleasure boat.
Just then I turned and found him close behind me, rubbing his hands.
"You ask Mr Blooke he likee Ching sit where pilate see him 'gain?" he said.
"I am sure he would," I replied.
He looked sad again directly, and just touched the sleeve of my Norfolk jacket with the long nail of his forefinger.
"Ching velly solly," he said.
"What about?"
"Mr Blooke think Ching fliends with pilates.  Velly shocking; Ching hate pilates dleadfully; hollid men."
"Yes, I am sure you do," I said.
The Celestial's face lit up again directly, and he rubbed his hands.
"Ching velly--"
"Yes?"  I said, for Mr Brooke called to me from the little cabin contrived for shelter in the after part of the vessel.
"Look here," he said, as I joined him, "we can keep below here, and command the river too, without being seen.  Why, Herrick, my lad, this is capital; they will never suspect this Chinese boat to be manned by a crew of Her Majesty's Jacks."
"Then everything has turned out for the best," I cried eagerly.
"Humph! that remains to be proved, my lad.  We've got to return and face Mr Reardon and the captain, and the first question asked of an officer who has been entrusted with one of Her Majesty's boats, and who returns without it, is--What have you done with the boat or ship?  We--yes, you are in the mess, sir--have to go back and say that we have lost it."
"Why, the captain owned to Pat that a thing couldn't be lost when you knew where it was."
"I don't understand you, my lad," said Mr Brooke.
"Don't you remember about the captain's tea-kettle, sir, that Pat dropped overboard?  It was not lost, because Pat knew where it was--at the bottom of the sea."
"Oh yes, I remember; but I'm afraid Captain Thwaites will not take that excuse."
"Why, she has gone down already, sir," I said, as I looked over the side for the boat we had left.
"Yes; but I can see the grating floating.  The coxswain took his jacket out of the hole."
He pointed to the stout piece of woodwork which we had turned into a buoy, but I could not make it out, and I thought it did not much matter, for something else had begun to trouble me a great deal just then, and I waited very anxiously for my officer to make some proposal.
But it did not come at once, for Mr Brooke was planning about the watch setting, so as to guard against the junks coming down the river and passing us on their way out to sea.
But at last all was to his satisfaction, one man keeping a look-out up the river for the descending junks, the other downward to the mouth for the return of the _Teaser_, whose coming was longed for most intensely.
Then, with just a scrap of sail raised, the rest acting as a screen dividing the boat, we tacked about the river, keeping as near as was convenient to the spot where the _Teaser_ had anchored, and at last Mr Brooke said to me, just in the grey of the evening--
"I'm afraid the lads must be getting hungry."
"I know one who is, sir," I said, laughing.
He smiled.
"Well, I have been too busy and anxious to think about eating and drinking," he said; "but I suppose I am very hungry too.  Here, my lad, pass that basket along, and serve out the provisions."
"You likee Ching serve out plovisions?"
Mr Brooke frowned, and the Chinaman shrank away.  I noticed too that when the food was served round, the men took each a good lump of salt pork and a couple of biscuits, Ching contented himself with one biscuit, which he took right forward, and there sat, munching slowly, till it was dark and the shore was lit up with thousands of lanterns swinging in shop, house, and on the river boats moored close along by the shore.
"Bad for us," said Mr Brooke, as we sat together astern steering, and keeping a sharp look ahead for the expected enemy.
"Why?"  I asked.
"Getting so dark, my lad.  We shall be having the junks pass us."
"Oh no, sir.  Ching is keen-sighted, and all the men are looking out very eagerly."
"Ah, well, I hope they will not slip by.  They must not, Herrick.  There is one advantage in this darkness, though: they will not find us out."
The darkness favouring the movement, and so as to save time, ready for any sudden emergency, he ordered the men to buckle on their cutlass-belts and pouches, while the rifles were hid handy.
"In case we want to board, Herrick."
"Then you mean to board if there is a chance?"  I said.
"I mean to stop one of those junks from putting to sea, if I can," he replied quietly.  "The _Teaser_ having left us, alters our position completely.  She has gone off on a false scent, I'm afraid, and we must not lose the substance while they are hunting the shadow."
Very little more was said, and as I sat in the darkness I had plenty to think about and picture out, as in imagination I saw our queer-looking boat hooked on to the side of a great high-pooped junk, and Mr Brooke leading the men up the side to the attack upon the fierce desperadoes who would be several times our number.
"I don't know what we should do," I remember thinking to myself, "if these people hadn't a wholesome fear of our lads."
Then I watched the shore, with its lights looking soft and mellow against the black velvety darkness.  Now and then the booming of gongs floated off to us, and the squeaking of a curious kind of pipe; while from the boats close in shore the twangling, twingling sound of the native guitars was very plain--from one in particular, where there was evidently some kind of entertainment, it being lit up with a number of lanterns of grotesque shapes.  In addition to the noise--I can't call it music--of the stringed instruments, there came floating to us quite a chorus of singing.  Well, I suppose it was meant for singing; but our lads evidently differed, for I heard one man say in a gruff whisper--
"See that there boat, messmate?"
"Ay," said another.  "I hear it and see it too."
"Know what's going on?"
"Yes; it's a floating poulterer's shop."
"A what?"
"A floating poulterer's shop.  Can't you hear 'em killing the cats?"
This interested me, and I listened intently.
"Killing the cats?" said another.
"Ay, poor beggars.  Lor' a mussy! our cats at home don't know what horrible things is done in foreign lands.  They're killing cats for market to-morrer, for roast and biled."
"Get out, and don't make higgerant observations, messmate.  It's a funeral, and that's the way these here heathens show how sorry they are."
"Silence there, my lads," said the lieutenant.  "Keep a sharp look-out."
"Ay, ay, sir."
Just at that moment, as the lit-up boat glided along about a couple of hundred yards from us, where we sailed gently up-stream, there was a faint rustling forward, and Tom Jecks' gruff voice whispered--
"What is it, messmate?"
"Ching see big junk."
There was a dead silence, and we all strained our eyes to gaze up-stream.
"Can't see nought, messmate," was whispered.
"Yes; big junk come along."
_Plash_! and a creaking, rattling sound came forth out of the darkness.
"It is a big junk," said Mr Brooke, with his lips to my ear; "and she has anchored."
Then from some distance up the river we saw a very dim lantern sway here and there, some hoarse commands were given, followed by the creaking and groaning of a bamboo yard being lowered, and then all was perfectly still.
What strange work it seemed to be out there in the darkness of that foreign river, surrounded by curious sights and sounds, and not knowing but what the next minute we might be engaged in deadly strife with a gang of desperadoes who were perfectly indifferent to human life, and who, could they get the better of us, would feel delight in slaughtering one and all.  It was impossible to help feeling a peculiar creepy sensation, and a cold shiver ran through one from time to time.
So painful was this silence, that I felt glad when we had sailed up abreast of the great vessel which had dropped anchor in mid-stream, for the inaction was terrible.
We sailed right by, went up some little distance, turned and came back on the other side, so near this time that we could dimly make out the heavy masts, the huge, clumsy poop and awkward bows of the vessel lying head to stream.
Then we were by her, and as soon as we were some little distance below Mr Brooke spoke--
"Well, my lads, what do you say: is she one of the junks?"
"No pilate junk," said Ching decisively, and I saw Mr Brooke make an angry gesture--quite a start.
"What do you say, my lads?"
"Well, sir, we all seem to think as the Chinee does--as it arn't one of them."
"Why?"
"Looks biggerer and clumsier, and deeper in the water."
"Yes; tlade boat from Hopoa," said Ching softly, as if speaking to himself.
"I'm not satisfied," said Mr Brooke.  "Go forward, Mr Herrick; your eyes are sharp.  We'll sail round her again.  All of you have a good look at her rigging."
"Ay, ay, sir," whispered the men; and I crept forward among them to where Ching had stationed himself, and once more we began gliding up before the wind, which was sufficiently brisk to enable us to easily master the swift tide.
As I leaned over the side, Ching heaved a deep sigh.
"What's the matter?"  I whispered.
"Ching so velly mislable," he whispered back.  "Mr Blooke think him velly bad man.  Think Ching want to give evelybody to pilate man.  Ching velly velly solly."
"Hist! look out!"
I suppose our whispering had been heard, for just as we were being steered pretty close to the anchored junk, a deep rough voice hailed us something after this fashion, which is as near as I can get to the original--
"Ho hang wong hork ang ang ha?"
"Ning toe ing nipy wong ony ing!" cried Ching.
"Oh ony ha, how how che oh gu," came from the junk again, and then we were right on ahead.
"Well," whispered Mr Brooke, "what does he say?  Is it one of the pirate vessels?"
"No pilate.  Big boat come down hong, sir.  Capin fellow want to know if we pilate come chop off head, and say he velly glad we all good man."
"Are you quite sure?" said Mr Brooke.
I heard Ching give a little laugh.
"If pilate," he said, "all be full bad men.  Lightee lantern; thlow stink-pot; make noise."
"Yes," said Mr Brooke; "this cannot be one of them.  Here, hail the man again, and ask him where he is going."
"How pang pong won toe me?" cried Ching, and for answer there came two or three grunts.
"Yes; what does he say?"
"Say he go have big long sleep, 'cause he velly tired."
Mr Brooke said no more, but ran the boat down the river some little distance and then began to tack up again, running across from side to side, so as to make sure that the junks did not slip by us in the darkness.  But hour after hour glided on, and the lights ashore and on the boats gradually died out, till, with the exception of a few lanterns on vessels at anchor, river and shore were all alike one great expanse of darkness, while we had to go as slowly as possible, literally creeping along, to avoid running into craft moored in the stream.
And all this time perfect silence had to be kept, and but for the intense desire to give good account of the junks, the men would soon have been fast asleep.
"Do you think they will come down and try to put to sea, Ching?"  I said at last, very wearily.
"Yes, allee 'flaid Queen Victolia's jolly sailor boy come steam up liver and send boat up cleek, fight and burn junks.  Come down velly quick."
"Doesn't seem like it," I said, beginning at last to feel so drowsy I could not keep my eyes open.
"So velly dark, can't see."
"Why, you don't think they will get by us in the darkness?"  I said, waking up now with a start at his words, and the bad news they conveyed.
"Ching can't tell.  So velly dark, plenty junk go by; nobody see if velly quiet.  Ching hope not get away.  Wantee Mr Brooke catchee both junk, and no think Ching like pilate man."
"Here, I must go and have a talk to Mr Brooke," I said; and I crept back to where he sat steering and sweeping the darkness he could not penetrate on either side.
"Well, Herrick," he said eagerly.  "News?"
"Yes, sir; bad news.  Ching is afraid that the junks have crept by us in the night."
"I have been afraid so for some time, my lad, for the tide must have brought them down long enough ago."
He relapsed into silence for a few minutes, and then said quietly--
"You can all take a sleep, my lads; Mr Herrick and I will keep watch."
"Thankye, sir, thankye," came in a low murmur, and I went forward to keep a look-out there; but not a man lay down, they all crouched together, chewing their tobacco, waiting; while Ching knelt by the bows, his elbows on the gunwale, his chin resting upon his hands, apparently gazing up the river, but so still that I felt he must be asleep, and at last startled him by asking the question whether he was.
"No; too much head busy go sleep.  Want findee allee pilate, show Mr Blooke no like pilate.  Velly 'flaid all gone."
How the rest of that night went by, I can hardly tell.  We seemed to be for hours and hours without end tacking to and fro, now going up the river two or three miles, then dropping down with the tide, and always zig-zagging so as to cover as much ground as possible.  The night lengthened as if it would never end; but, like all tedious times of the kind, it dragged its weary course by, till, to my utter astonishment, when it did come, a faint light dawned away over the sea beyond the mouth of the river, just when we were about a mile below the city.
That pale light gradually broadened, and shed its ghastly chilly beams over the sea, making all look unreal and depressing, and showed the faces of our crew, sitting crouched in the bottom of the boat, silent but quite wide-awake.
Then all started as if suddenly electrified, for Ching uttered a low cry, and stood up, pointing right away east.
"What is it?"  I said.
"Two pilate junk."
We all saw them at the same time, and with a miserable feeling of despondency, for there was no hiding the fact.  The river was wide, and while we were close under one bank they had glided silently down under the other, and were far beyond our reach.
CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR.
THE UNTRUSTWORTHY AGENT.
"Eaten, Herrick," said Mr Brooke in a low voice.
"Not yet, sir," I said.
I don't know how it was that I said those words.  They came to my lips and I uttered them, making Mr Brooke turn round upon me sharply, in the grey light of dawn.
"What do you mean by that, boy?" he said.
"Mean?  I don't--I--that is,"--I stammered; "I wouldn't give up yet, sir."
"What would you do? wait for them to come back?" he said bitterly.
"No," I cried, gaining courage; "go after them, sir."
"And attack and take them with this boat, Herrick?" he said, smiling at me rather contemptuously.
"Of course we couldn't do that, sir," I said, "but we might follow and keep them in sight.  We should know where they went."
"Yes," he said, after a moment's thought; "but we may be away for days, and we must have provisions.  What is to be done?"
"You likee me buy blead and fish, and plenty good to eat?" said Ching in rather a shrinking way.
"Yes," said Mr Brooke, turning upon the Celestial sharply.  "Where shall we land you?"
"There," said Ching, pointing to the shore about a mile up from where we lay.
"But it's going back, and we shall lose sight of the junks, Ching," I said.
"Plenty blead there.  Ching know the way."
"But one moment, Mr Brooke," I said; "are we sure that those are the right junks?"
"I feel sure," he said.  "What do you say, my lads?"
"Ay, ay, sir, them's right," chorussed the men.
"Yes, Ching velly sure those pilate junk."
"I know one on 'em, sir," said Jecks, "by her great yard.  I never see a junk with such a big un afore.  Talk about the cut of a jib--I says, look at the cut of her mainsail."
"Well, we must have food and water, if we are going out of the mouth of the river," said Mr Brooke, and he turned the boat's head shoreward.
"No makee haste," said Ching deprecatingly.  "Too soon, evelybody fas' asleep."
Mr Brooke gave an impatient stamp on the frail bamboo half-deck, but said no more for a few moments.
"We must wait if we are too soon, for it would be madness to go without food and water."
He was silent for a time, during which the men watched the distant junks, and as they stood out more and more boldly in the morning light, we compared notes, and made comments upon them, all growing more and more satisfied that these were the two of which we were in search.
"Yes, they must be," said Mr Brooke at last, after listening for some time to the men's conversation.  "The very fact of their sailing in company is suggestive.  Seems odd, though, doesn't it, Herrick?" he half whispered.
"What? their getting by us, sir, in the dark?"
"No; I mean, after making up my mind that this fellow Ching was a traitor, and that I would have no more to do with him, to find myself forced at every turn to rest upon him for help.  Lesson for you, lad."
"In what way, sir?"
"Not to have too much faith in yourself.  I am beginning to hope that I have been deceived about him, but we shall soon have proof."
"I feel sure you are misjudging him, sir," I said eagerly.
"Yes, with a boy's readiness to trust."
"But I feel sure he is honest, sir."
"Well, we shall soon see."
I looked at him for an explanation, and he smiled.
"I am going to give him some money, and send him ashore to buy provisions.  If he is dishonest he will not come back."
"But he will come back," I said confidently.
"We shall see, my lad," he replied; and once more he was silent, after handing the tiller to me, and looking back longingly at the two junks, which were apparently making no way, for the wind was blowing dead now into the mouth of the river.
Early as it was, there were people stirring as we approached the landing-place Ching had pointed out, and he nodded with satisfaction.
"Allee light," he said, smiling.  "Get plenty blead, meat.  You fillee big tub with water;" and he pointed to a large rough vessel, and another which was a great earthenware jar.
"But where are we to get the water?"  I said.
"Out o' liver.  Plenty water in liver."
"We can't drink that peasoup," I said, as I looked over the side in disgust at the yellow solution of mud.
"Velly good water.  Allee salt gone now.  Plenty clear by and by."
"We must make the best of it, Herrick," said my companion; and then turning to Ching, he said rather sternly--
"Here are eight dollars: buy as much bread and cooked meat as you can, and get back as quickly as possible, when we set you ashore."
Ching nodded and smiled.
"Be velly quick," he said; "and you take boat lit' way out, and stop till come back."
"Of course; trust us for that, my man."
Ten minutes later we ran alongside some rough bamboo piles, to which about half-a-dozen Chinamen hurried, to stand staring at us.  But Ching paid no attention to them.  He only made a leap from the boat when we were a couple of yards from the platform, landed safely but with tail flying, and his blue cotton garment inflating balloon-like with the wind.  Then he walked away among the houses, and one of our men pushed the boat off again, evidently to the intense wonder of the people, who stared hard to see a British sailor managing a native vessel; while two others, in a costume perfectly new to them, sat looking on.
Then our men were packed out of sight, some in the little cabin, others hidden at the bottom of the boat, beneath a matting-sail.
When we were about a hundred yards from the shore, a clumsy wooden grapnel, to which a heavy stone was bound with a twisted rope of bamboo, was dropped overboard, and then we lay in the swift tide, with the boat tugging at the line as if eager to be off on the chase the stern necessity concerning food kept us from carrying on at once.
"How these people do seem to detest us, Herrick!" said Mr Brooke, after we had been waiting patiently for about a quarter of an hour, impatiently another, but not quite in idleness, for, after tasting the river water to find that it was very slightly brackish now, the tub and the jar were both filled and left to settle.
"Yes, they're not very fond of us," I replied, as I noted how the numbers were increasing, and that now there was a good deal of talking going on, and this was accompanied by gesticulations, we evidently being the objects of their interest.  "They can't have much to do."
Mr Brooke made no reply, but moment by moment he grew more uneasy, as he alternately scanned the people ashore and the junks in the offing.
"Oh," I said at last, "if we could only see the _Teaser_ coming up the river!"
"I'd be content, Herrick," said Mr Brooke bitterly, "if we could only see the messenger coming back with our stores."
"Yes," I said uneasily, for I had been fidgeting a good deal; "he is a long time."
"Yes," said Mr Brooke, looking at me very fixedly, till I avoided his gaze, for I knew he was thinking of my defence of Ching.
"Perhaps the bakers' shops are not open," I said at last.
"Perhaps this is not London, my lad.  It's of no use for you to defend him; I begin to feel sure that he has left us in the lurch."
"Oh, wait a little longer, please, Mr Brooke," I cried; and I vainly scanned the increasing crowd upon the platform and shore, and could see, instead of Ching, that the people were growing more and more excited, as they talked together and kept pointing at us.
"I shall not wait much longer," said Mr Brooke at last.  "He has had plenty of time.  Look here, my lads, we have plenty of water, and the business is urgent.  You'll have to be content with a drink and a pull at your waistbelts."
"All right, sir," said the coxswain; "what's good enough for the orficers is good enough for us.  We won't grumble, eh, mates?"
There was a low growl here, but not of discontent.
"Then in another five minutes, if our Celestial friend does not come back, we shall start.  I'll give him that time."
"Beg pardon, sir; they're a siggling of us."
"Signalling! who are?"
"The Chinees, sir."
"Yes, look," I said; for, after a good deal of talking and shouting, one man was standing close at the edge of the landing-place, and beckoning to us to come closer in.
"Likely," I heard one of our men whisper.  "Ducks."
"Eh?" said another.
"Dill, dill, dill; will yer come and be killed?"
"What do they want, Herrick?  To inveigle us ashore?"
"I know, sir for the reason of their excitement now came to me like a flash, and I wondered that I had not thought of it before."
"Well, then.  Speak out if you do know, my lad."
"That's it, sir.  We've got a boat they know, and they think we're stealing it."
"Tut, tut, tut.  Of course.  That explains it.  Very sorry, my friends, but we cannot spare it yet.  You shall have her back and be paid for the use of it, when we've done with her."
The shouts, gesticulations, and general excitement increased, two men now beckoning imperiously, and it was evident that they were ordering us to come to the landing-place at once.
"No, my friends," said Mr Brooke, "we are not coming ashore.  We know your gentle nature too well.  But Ching is not coming, Herrick, so we'll heave up the grapnel and be off."
The crowd was now dense, and the excitement still increasing, but the moment they saw our coxswain, in obedience to an order given by Mr Brooke--in spite of an appealing look, and a request for another ten minutes--begin to haul up the rough grapnel, the noise ashore was hushed, and the gesticulations ceased.
"Five minutes more, Mr Brooke," I whispered; "I feel sure that Ching will come."
"Silence, sir," he said coldly.  "It is only what I expected.  The man knows he is found out."
By this time the boat was hauled up over the grapnel, and I shrank away in despair, feeling bitterly disappointed at Ching's non-appearance, but full of confidence in him--faith the stronger for an intense desire to make up to the man for misjudging him before.
Then the grapnel was out of the mud, and hauled over the side; the boat began to yield to the tide; and Mr Brooke stepped to the mast himself, being unwilling to call the men in the cabin into the people's sight.
"Come and take a hand at the rope here, coxswain," said Mr Brooke. "Mr Herrick, take the tiller."
But at the first grasp of our intention, as they saw the preparation for hoisting the sail, there was a fierce yell from the shore, and the people scattered to right and left.
"What does that mean?"  I said to myself.  But the next instant I knew, for they were making for different boats, into which they jumped, and rapidly began to unmoor.
"Humph! time we were off," said Mr Brooke.  "Hoist away, man, I cannot do it alone."
"I am a-hysting, sir, but the tackle's got foul somehow.  It's this here rough rope.  The yard won't move."
"Tut tut--try, man, try."
"All right, sir, I'll swarm up the the mast, and set it free."
"But there is no time, my man.  Haul--haul."
The man did haul, but it was like pulling at a fixed rope, and the sail obstinately refused to move, while to my horror there were no less than six boats pushing off, and I foresaw capture, a Chinese prison, and severe punishment--if we could not get help--for stealing a boat.
"All hands on deck," cried Mr Brooke, making use of the familiar aboard-ship order, and just as the first two boats were coming rapidly on, and were within a dozen yards, our Jacks sprang up armed and ready.
The effect was magical.  Evidently taken by surprise, the Chinamen stopped short, and the boats all went on drifting slowly down the stream.  But at the end of a minute, as we made no attack, but all stood awaiting orders, they recovered their confidence, uttered a shout to encourage one another, and came on.
"I don't want to injure them," Mr Brooke muttered, but he was forced to act.  "Give them the butts of your pieces, my lads, if they try to lay hold of the boat.  Mind, they must be kept off."
He had no time to say more, but seized the fowling-piece as the first boat was rowed alongside, and amidst a fierce burst of objurgations, in a tongue we could not understand, a couple of men seized the gunwale of the boat, while two more jumped aboard.
The men who caught hold let go again directly, for the butts of the men's rifles and the gunwale were both hard for fingers, and the Chinese yelled, and the two who leaped aboard shrieked as they were seized and shot out of the boat again.
But by this time another craft of about our own size had come alongside, and was hanging on to us, while four more were trying to get in, and others were pushing off from the shore.
We were being surrounded; and, enraged by our resistance, while gaining courage from their numbers and from the fact that we made no use of cutlass or rifle, they now made desperate efforts to get aboard.
Our men were getting desperate too, and in another minute there must have been deplorable bloodshed, the more to be regretted as it would have been between our sailors and a friendly power, when Jecks, after knocking a Chinaman back into his own boat with his fist, stooped and picked up the boat-hook we had brought on board from our now sunken cutter.  With this he did wonders, using it like a cue, Barkins afterwards said, when I described the struggle, and playing billiards with Chinese heads.  But, be that as it may, he drove back at least a dozen men, and then attacked one of the boats, driving the pole right through the thin planking and sending the water rushing in.
But we were still in imminent danger of being taken prisoners, and, as he afterwards told me, Mr Brooke was thinking seriously of sending a charge of small-shot scattering amongst the crowd, when two of our lads seized the sheet and began to try and hoist the matting-sail, and to my intense delight I saw it begin to go up as easily as could be.
I flew to the tiller, but found a big Chinaman before me, and in an instant he had me by the collar and was tugging me over the side.  But I clung to it, felt a jerk as there was a loud rap, and, thanks to Tom Jecks, the man rolled over into the water, and began to swim.
"Now for it, my lads," shouted Mr Brooke.  "All together; over with them!"
The men cheered and struck down with the butts of their rifles, the boat-hook was wielded fiercely, and half-a-dozen of our assailants were driven out of the boat, but not into the others, for they fell with splash after splash into the river.  For our vessel careened over as the sail caught the full pressure of the wind, and then made quite a bound from the little craft by which she was surrounded.
Then a cheer arose, for we knew we could laugh at our enemies, who were being rapidly left behind; and, while some dragged their swimming companions into their boats, the others set up a savage yelling; gesticulating, and no doubt telling us how, if they caught us, they would tear us into little bits.
"Well done, my lads," cried Mr Brooke.  "Splendid, splendid.  Couldn't have been better.  Excellent, Mr Herrick; ease her a little, ease her. We must have a reef in that sail.  All left behind, then; no pursuit?" and he looked astern as our boat rushed through the water, and then he frowned, for one of the men said--
"Yes, sir; here's one on 'em from the shore coming arter us full sail, and she's going as fast as we."
And once more, as I looked behind me, holding on the while by the tiller, I seemed to see the inside of a Chinese prison after we had been pretty well stoned to death; for it was a good-sized boat that was gliding after us at a rapid rate, and threatening to overtake us before long.
CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE.
MR. BROOKE'S ERROR.
"I did not see either of those craft with sails," I said to Tom Jecks, as we stood watching the following boat, which was evidently making every possible effort to come up with us.
"No, sir, 'twarn't neither o' them.  I see 'em put off from a bit higher up," said Jecks.  "My hye! they are in a hurry, sir.  You'd better tell Mr Brooke he must shake out a reef instead o' taking one up."
"No; leave it to him, he doesn't like interference."
"No, sir, orficers don't, and it is their natur' to.  But I say, sir, what a--_murder_!--what a wrench I give my shoulder."
"How?"
"Hitting one o' them pudding-headed Teapots, sir.  Didn't hurt my knuckles, because his head was soft.  Just like punching a bladder o' lard, but the weight on him wrenched the jynte."
"Wait till we get on board," I said, "and Mr Price will soon put you right."
"Bah! not him, sir," said the man scornfully.  "I shouldn't think o' going to a doctor for nothing less than losing my head.  It'll soon get right.  Exercise is the thing, sir, for a hurt o' that sort.  You and Mr Brooke give us a good job at them pirates out yonder, and I shall forget all about my shoulder."
"We'll try," I said laughingly.  "But what were you going to say just now?"
"I, sir? nothin', sir."
"Oh yes; when you broke off."
"I broke off, sir?"
"Yes."
"To be sure.  Yes, sir, I was going to say what a lesson it is for you, sir, as a young orficer, not to go pickling and stealing other folkses' boats.  This here all comes o' taking boats as don't belong to you."
"Better than sitting in another till she sinks, Tom Jecks."
"Not so honest, sir."
"Rubbish!  We haven't stolen the boat; only borrowed it."
"Ah, that's what them heathens don't understand, sir; and I don't know as I blames 'em, for it is rather hard for 'em to take hold on.  S'pose, sir, as you was in London town, and a chap was to take your dymon' ring--"
"Haven't got one, Tom Jecks."
"Well, s'pose you had one, and he took it and sailed away as hard as he could go, sir.  It wouldn't be very easy for you to tell whether he'd stole it or borrowed it, eh, sir?"
"Oh, bother I don't ask riddles now, we're so busy.  Here: over we go."
"Lie to the windward, all of you," shouted Mr Brooke, who was now at the tiller.  "More aft there; that's better."
For the boat had careened over to so great an extent that she had taken in a little water, and I felt that we were about to be capsized.
But she rose again and skimmed along rapidly for the mouth of the river, and I crept close to my officer again.
"Shall I take the tiller, sir?"  I said.
"No, Herrick, I'll keep it for the present.  I want to get all I can out of the boat, and keep up as much sail as possible without capsizing. It's wonderful what these clumsy things can do."
"Yes, sir, we're going pretty fast, but I'm afraid the one behind goes faster."
"She does, my lad, for her crew know exactly how to manage.  I don't want any more fighting if I can help it, but if they do overtake us I think we can soon send them back again.  Men seem much hurt?  Do they complain?" he whispered.
"Only about bruises, sir.  They seem to treat it as so much fun.  I say, how that boat does sail!"
"Yes, and we can do no more here but keep steadily on.  Yes, we can. Take a pull at that sheet, my lads, and flatten out the sail a bit."
"Ay, ay, sir;" and the sail was hauled a foot higher, and the sheet tightened, with the effect that we raced along with the water parting like a broad arrow before our prow, so that we seemed to be sailing along in quite a trough, and at times I wondered that we were not swamped.
But it was very exciting, and, like the others, I forgot all about a few contusions in the intense interest of the chase.
I went forward again to where Tom Jecks sat on the port gunwale, which was formed of one bamboo carefully lashed on with strips of the same material, and as there was nothing else to do, I shaded my eyes from the nearly level rays of sunlight, and had a good look at the distant junks.
"Yes, sir, that's them, sure enough," said the coxswain.  "Wish we was twice as many, and had a good-sized gun in the bows."
"Why, it would kick the boat all to pieces, or sink her," I said.
"Oh, that wouldn't matter, sir."
"But it's some one else's boat that we've borrowed," I said, with a laugh.
"Ay, so it is; I forgot, sir.  But we ain't got a gun, and I'm afraid we can't take them two junks alone."
"So am I, Tom Jecks," I said; "but we can follow them."
"Arter we've had another naval engagement, sir.  I say, look astern; I do like the impidence of these here savages, chasing on us like this, and they're gaining on us fast."
"No; only just holding their own."
"Gaining, sir."
"No."
"Yes, sir."
I took a long look back at the boat, and counted the black caps and flattened limpet-shaped straw hats of the blue-jacketed men on board.
"Seven of 'em," I said half aloud.
"Eight, sir; I counted 'em twice.  One on 'em is a-lying down now, but he was a-setting up a little while ago.  Afraid we shall open fire, I expect."
"And that's what we shall have to do," I said.  "A rifle bullet or two sent over their heads would make them give up."
"But they arn't pirates, sir, and you mustn't fire at 'em.  Look at that now."
The pursuing boat was about two hundred yards behind us, and one of the Chinamen now stood up in the bows, holding on by a stay, waving his straw hat and gesticulating furiously.
"All right, Mr Shing po Num, or whatever your name is," said the coxswain in a low voice, "can't stop this time, we're in a hurry."
The man kept on gesticulating.
"Can't you hear what I say?" continued Jecks in a whisper.  "We're in a hurry.  Say, sir, that's the chap as belongs to our boat--I mean his boat, and he's getting wilder and wilder now to see us carry it off. Say, sir, arn't it a bit--what you may call it--to take it away?"
"A bit what?"
"Well, sir, what do you grand folks call it when some one does what we're a-doing on?"
"Unkind."
"No, sir; it arn't an un-anything."
"Cruel?"
"No, sir.  Cause you see a boat arn't a beast."
"Oh, I don't know what you mean," I said impatiently.
"Yes, it is an un-something; I forgot, sir.  I meant undignified--that's the word."
"He shall have his boat when we've done with it, and be paid for it too," I said.  "English officers don't do undignified things."
"But it strikes me, sir, as there won't be no boat to pay for when the pirates have done with us.  If we go alongside, do you know what they'll do?"
"Shoot."
"No, sir; pitch ballast into us, and sink us, as sure as we're here."
"Don't talk so much," I said impatiently.  "Why, they've got another sail up, and are coming on faster."
"Yes, sir, that's right; and they'll be alongside on us in another ten minutes.  Shall I pass the word along to the lads to spit in their fists?"
"What?"
"I mean, sir, I s'pose it won't be cutlasses but fisties, sir, eh?"
"Mr Herrick, you had better come and take the tiller," said Mr Brooke just then.  "Don't attend to anything else.  Your duty is to keep the boat running; we'll do what fighting there is."
"Very well, sir," I said, and I felt disappointed as I took the tiller, but felt better a minute later as I felt how I could sway the racing boat by a touch.
"Now, my lads, cutlasses and rifles under the thwarts.  You take the oars to these men.  Don't attack them, they are ignorant of our power. Only keep them off with a few blows."
The men eagerly responded to the words of command, and stood and sat about in the boat, each man armed with a stout, strong ashen blade, a blow from which would have sent any one overboard at once.
The chase, with our boat playing the part of hare, was exciting enough before, but it grew far more so now, for the men in the other boat were evidently determined, and two of them stood up with clumsy-looking hooks, and another with a coil of rope ready to lasso us, as it seemed to me.  And as I sat there I felt how awkward it would be if the man threw a loop over my head or chest, and dragged me out of the boat.
Naturally enough, the thought of this alone was enough to produce in me an intense desire to stand up, instead of crouching down there holding the tiller, and forced into a state of inaction, wherein I was forbidden to move or raise a hand in my defence.
"I hope they'll give a thought to me," I said to myself, as I felt that in a very few minutes they would be alongside trying to leap on board, and from my position I knew that I must be in the thick of the fight, perhaps trampled upon, and pretty sure to receive some of the blows which came flying about.
I gazed firmly forward, knowing how much depended upon my keeping the boat's head straight, and determined, as I set my teeth, to do my duty as well as possible, but I could not help turning my head from time to time to look back at the pursuers, who began shouting to us, and jabbering in their own tongue, as they were evidently now at the highest pitch of excitement.
Not many yards behind now, and gradually lessening the distance.  All was ready on board, and I saw Mr Brooke looking stern, and the men as they grasped their oars grinning at one another, and then looking aft at the enemy.
And as we raced, the water foaming behind, the bamboo mast creaking and bending, the mat-sail cracking and making curious noises as the wind hissed through the thick stuff, the trough we ploughed through the water seemed deeper, and my temples throbbed and my heart beat, while from time to time the water lipped over the bows, but not enough to warrant any change of course.  And nearer and nearer the enemy came, their boat literally skimming over the water, six feet to our five, and I felt that the time had arrived.
One more quick glance over my shoulder at the eager faces of the Chinamen as they uttered a loud shout, another at the men ready for action; another over my left shoulder to see that the enemy was close upon us, and then I uttered a strange cry, and, bearing hard upon the tiller, threw the boat right up into the wind, the sail easing as we formed a curve in the water, our speed checked, and then we lay nose to wind, with the boat seeming to quiver and pant after her heavy run.
"Are you mad?" roared Mr Brooke, rushing at me, thrusting me aside so that I went down upon my back, and he was about to seize the tiller, when I shouted out, half-choking with laughter, panting too with triumphant delight--
"Don't, don't, don't!  Can't you see--it is Ching!"
CHAPTER THIRTY SIX.
REST AND REFRESHMENT.
Ching it was, and the men sent up a cheer as out pursuers grappled the side of our boat, held on, and our messenger came on board smiling.
"Velly muchee big job you catchee," he said.  "Why, what fo' you lun along so fast?"
"Why, Ching," cried Mr Brooke, "what does this mean?"
"No get away.  Muchee velly bad man.  No get to boat.  Allee fightee. Get 'nother boat, and come along."
"You couldn't get on board us again?"
"No; too many velly bad men.  Plenty blead; plenty fish; plenty meat. Velly nice.  All in boat.  Velly long time catchee."
Our men laid down the oars with a great deal of care and precision, as if it was important that they should not be a quarter of an inch wrong, and our coxswain doubled himself up to indulge in a good long comfortable chuckle, while I could not help whispering to the young lieutenant--
"I say, Mr Brooke, I wasn't very far wrong?"
"No, my lad," he said, with a smile; "I give in.  I was all prejudice against the poor fellow, but I was justified in a great deal that I said.  Appearances were dead against him.  There, I was too hasty."
Meanwhile the stores Ching had bought had been transferred to our boat, and he had told us a little about his adventures--how, when he had made his purchases, he had returned to the landing-place and found the crowd gathering, and heard the men declaiming against the foreign devils who had stolen the boat they were using.  The people were growing so much excited that he soon found it would be impossible for him to go off with his load to join us, and as soon as he heard the most prominent of the men shouting to us to come ashore, he felt that his first duty was to warn us not to.
"Catchee allee.  Takee off to plison.  In plison velly hard get out again," he said, and then went on to tell us how he felt it would be best to hire a boat to come off to us from higher up the river, but in spite of all his efforts he could not get one and his stores on board till he saw the other boats push off to the attack; and then, when his men willingly tried to overtake us, urged on by promises of good pay, they had been mistaken by us for enemies.
"But velly good boat, sail velly fast.  You tink it Ching coming?"
"No, of course not," I said.
"No, not tink it Ching.  Send boat 'way now?  Ching go?"
"No, no," said Mr Brooke eagerly.  "You will stop with us."
"You no velly closs with Ching now?"
"Cross?  No; very grateful."
"You no tink Ching like velly bad man pilate?"
"I think you a very good, faithful fellow," said Mr Brooke, and the Chinaman's face lit up.
"Send boat 'way now?"
"Stop; I must pay the men."
Ching shook his head.
"No, Ching pay.  Velly clebby pay money.  Two dollar pay men."
He went back into the other boat, and, producing some money from up his sleeve, he settled with the men, who nodded, smiled, and, as soon as Ching had returned on board, were about to push off, when Mr Brooke stopped them.
"Tell them we shall return the boat as soon as we have done with it."
"Yes; no go steal boat.  Plenty boat in steamy-ship.  Tell them capen give dollar, eh?"
"Yes, tell them that."
"You likee other boat and men?"
"Well, I don't know," said Mr Brooke, hesitating, as if he thought some use might be made of such a fast-sailing craft.
"Ching askee."
He entered into a short conversation with the boatmen, who smiled at first, then scowled, stamped, and gesticulated.
Ching nodded and turned to us.
"Say, go to big steamy-ship and Queen Victolia jolly sailor, but no to see pilate.  'Flaid cut off head."
"Then they must go; send them off."
The men laughed, nodded at us in the most friendly manner, then hoisted their sail and went back up the river.  Then, provisions being served out, our lads sat eating and chatting, while our boat sped seaward towards where the two junks lay windbound not many miles away, or else waiting for some reason, one which Mr Brooke decided at last to be for reinforcements.
"Yes," he said, as I sat munching away at some pleasantly sweet-tasted bread which Ching had brought on board, "depend upon it, we shall see boats or a small junk go out and join them by and by."
It is curious how old tunes bring up old scenes.  Most people say the same, but at the risk of being considered one who thinks too much of eating, I am going to say that nothing brings up old scenes to my memory more than particular kinds of food.
For instance, there is a flat, square kind of gingerbread which we boys used to know as "parliament."  I cannot ever see that without thinking of going to school on sunny mornings, and stopping by one particular ditch to bang the wasps with my school-bag, swung round by its string. It was only the seniors who sported a strap for their books; and in those days my legs, from the bottom of my drawers to the top of my white socks, were bare, and my unprotected knees in a state of chip, scale, and scar, from many tumbles on the gravelly path.
Then, again, pancakes will bring up going round the stables and cowhouse in search of stray new-laid white eggs, which I bore off, greatly to the disgust of the great black cock, with the yellow saddle-hackles and the tall red serrated comb.
Fish naturally bring up the carp in the muddy pond which we used to catch, and gloat over their golden glories; or the brazen small-scaled tench, with all the surroundings at Norwood, where the builder has run riot, and terraces and semi-detached villas--I hope well drained--cover the pool whence we used to drag forth miniature alligators with a worm.
I could go on for pages about those recollections, but one more will suffice:--Sweet cakey bread always brings up Mother Crissell, who must have made a nice little independence by selling us boys that sweet cake dotted with currants, some of which were swollen out to an enormous size, and lay in little pits on the top.  These currants we used to dig out as _bonnes bouches_ from the dark soft brown, but only to find them transformed into little bubbles of cindery lava, which crunched between the teeth.
And so it was that, as I sat sailing along at the mouth of that swift, yellow, muddy Chinese river, munching the sweet cakey bread Ching had brought on board, and gazing from time to time at the geese we had shot and had no means of cooking, memory carried me back to Mother Crissell's shop, and that rather bun-faced old lady, who always wore a blue cotton gown covered with blue spots and of no particular shape, for the amiable old woman never seemed to have any waist.  There was the inside of her place, and the old teapot on the chimney-piece, in which she deposited her money and whence she drew forth change.
And then, in a moment, I seemed to be back in the great playground; then away on to the common, where we hunted for lizards amongst the furze, and got more pricks than reptiles.  I saw, too, the big old horse-chestnuts round by the great square pond where you could never catch any fish, but always tried for them on account of the character it had of holding monsters, especially eels as big and round as your arm. I never knew any one catch a fish in that pond, but we did a deal of anticipation there, and watched the dragon-flies flit to and fro, and heard the rustle of they transparent wings.  Splendid ones they were. First of all, there came early in the summer the thin-bodied ones, some of a steely-blue, some dark with clear wings, and with them those with the wings clouded with dark patches.  Then came the large, short, flat-bodied, pointed-tailed fellows, some blue, some olive-green.  Late in the season, affecting the damp spots of the common among the furze bushes more than the pond, came the largest long-bodied flies, which hawked to and fro over the same ground, and played havoc among their prey.
You could hear the school-bell from there--the big one in the turret on the top of the great square brick mansion; and in imagination I saw that pond, and the dragon-flies, lizards, and furze, the shady finger-leaved chestnuts, and even heard that bell, while the sweet cakey bread lasted; and then I was back in the Chinese boat on the Chinese river, for Ching leaned over me with something in rice-paper.
"You likee bit piecee flesh meat?"
"What is it?"  I said, looking hard at the rather tempting brown meat with its white fat.
"Velly nice," he said.  "Got pep' salt.  Velly good."
"Yes," I said; "but is it good?  I mean something I should like to eat?"
"Yes; loast lit' piggee; velly nice."
He was quite right--it was; and after I had finished I went forward to see if I could get something to drink.  Jecks was inspecting the big earthen vessel with a tin baler, and I appealed to him.
"How is the water?"  I said.
"Well, sir, yer can't say quite well thankye, 'cause it arn't right colour yet, and it's got a sort o' fishing-boat flavour in it, as puts yer in mind o' Yarmouth market at herring time, but it ain't so pea-soupy as it were, and it might be worse.  Try a tot, sir?"
"Yes," I said; "I'm so thirsty, I must have a drop."
He dipped the baler in carefully, and brought it out dripping.
"Has anybody else drunk any?"  I said.
"Oh yes, sir, all on us; and I says to you as I says to them, you shut your eyes, sir, and think you've been eating bloaters, or codfish, or fried sole.  Then tip it down quick, and you'll says it's lovely."
"Ugh!"  I ejaculated, as I looked down into the baler, "why, it looks like a dose of rhubarb."
"Well, it do, sir, a little; but you're a spyling of it a deal by looking at it first.  You shut your eyes, sir, as I said; me and my mates thought as it's good strong water with a deal o' what some people calls nootriment in it."
"None for me, thank you," I said, handing back the tin.
"Bring me some water, Mr Herrick, when you've done," said Mr Brooke from where he sat holding the tiller.
"Yes, sir," I said; and, holding the baler to my lips, I took a hearty, hasty draught, for it was cool and refreshing to my dry mouth and throat, and, that done, I refilled the baler and took it aft.
"Humph! rather muddy, Herrick," said Mr Brooke, smiling; "but one can't carry a filter about at a time like this."
He tossed off the water without hesitation, gave one of the men the tin to take back, and then altered the course of the boat a little, so as to hug the shore.
"We must not let the pirates suspect that we are following," he said.
"What are we going to do, Mr Brooke?"  I said.
"You should never question your commanding-officer about his strategy," he replied, with a smile; and I was about to apologise, but he went on, "There's only one thing to do, my lad, keep them in sight, and I hope that at any time the _Teaser_ may appear.  When she does, she will in all probability run by those junks without suspecting their nature, then we come in and let them know the truth."
"But suppose the _Teaser_ does not come into sight?"
"Then our task is clear enough.  We must hang on to the track of the junks till we see where they go.  Depend upon it, they have two or three rendezvous."
"Think they have telescopes on board?"  I said.
"It is extremely doubtful; and if we keep Ching always well in sight, I don't suppose they will notice us.  They will take us for a fishing-boat, that's all."
By this time the sun was pouring down his beams with scorching violence, and we were glad to give up the tiller to one of the men, and get into the shelter of the cabin, just beyond which we found that Ching was busy at work plucking one of the geese.
"Why are you doing that?"  I asked.
"Velly good to loast."
"But we've got no fire."
"Go 'shore, make fi', loast all, and come back on board."
"Yes, it will be a good addition to our stock of provisions, Herrick," said Mr Brooke, smiling.  "Your friend Ching is going to turn out a benefactor after all."
CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN.
JACK ASHORE.
All was quiet on the junks, not a man being visible as we sailed out of the river and along the south shore of the estuary; and now, after a long examination, Mr Brooke declared that there couldn't be a doubt as to their being the ones we had seen up the branch river when we were in the trap.
"The rig is too heavy for ordinary traders, Herrick," he said; and he pointed out several peculiarities which I should not have noticed.
Ching had been watching us attentively, and Mr Brooke, who evidently wanted to make up now for his harsh treatment of the interpreter, turned to him quietly--
"Well, what do you say about it, Ching?"
The interpreter smiled.
"Ching quite su'e," he replied.  "Seen velly many pilate come into liver by fancee shop.  Ching know d'leckly.  Velly big mast, velly big sail, go so velly fast catchee allee ship.  You go waitee all dalk, burn all up."
"What! set fire to them?"
"Yes; velly easy.  All asleep, no keepee watch like Queen ship.  No light.  Cleep velly close up top side, big wind blow; make lit' fire both junk and come away.  Allee 'light velly soon, and make big burn."
"What! and roast the wretches on board to death?"
"Some," said Ching, with a pleasant smile.  "Makee squeak, and cly `Oh! oh!' and burn all 'way like fi'wo'k.  Look velly nice when it dalk."
"How horrid!"  I cried.
"Not all bu'n up," said Ching; "lot jump ove'board and be dlown."
"Ching, you're a cruel wretch," I cried, as Mr Brooke looked at the man in utter disgust.
"No; Ching velly glad see pilate bu'n up and dlown.  Dleadful bad man, bu'n ship junk, chop off head.  Kill hundleds poo' good nicee people. Pilate velly hollid man.  Don't want pilate at all."
"No, we don't want them at all," said Mr Brooke, who seemed to be studying the Chinaman's utter indifference to the destruction of human life; "there's no room for them in the world, but that's not our way of doing business.  Do you understand what I mean?"
"Yes, Ching understand, know.  Ching can't talk velly quick Inglis, but hear evelyting."
"That's right.  Well, my good fellow, that wouldn't be English.  We kill men in fair fight, or take them prisoners.  We couldn't go and burn the wretches up like that."
Ching shook his head.
"All velly funnee," he said.  "Shoot big gun and make big hole in junk; knockee all man into bit; makee big junk sink and allee men dlown."
"Yes," said Mr Brooke, wrinkling up his forehead.
"Why not make lit' fire and bu'n junk, killee allee same?"
"He has me there, Herrick," said Mr Brooke.
"Takee plisoner to mandalin.  Mandalin man put on heavy chain, kick flow in boat, put in plison, no give to eat, and then choppee off allee head. Makee hurt gleat deal mo'.  Velly solly for plisoner.  Bette' make big fi' and bu'n allee now."
Mr Brooke smiled and looked at me, and I laughed.
"We'd better change the subject, Herrick," he said.  "I'm afraid there is not much difference in the cruelty of the act."
"No, sir," I said, giving one of my ears a rub.  "But it is puzzling."
"Yes, my lad; and I suppose we should have no hesitation in shelling and burning a pirates' nest."
"But we couldn't steal up and set fire to their junks in the dark, sir?"
"No, my lad, that wouldn't be ordinary warfare.  Well, we had better run into one of these little creeks, and land," he continued, as he turned to inspect the low, swampy shore.  "Plenty of hiding-places there, where we can lie and watch the junks, and wait for the _Teaser_ to show."
"Velly good place," said Ching, pointing to where there was a patch of low, scrubby woodland, on either side of which stretched out what seemed to be rice fields, extending to the hills which backed the plain. "Plenty wood makee fire--loast goose."
I saw a knowing look run round from man to man.
"But the pirates would see our fire," I said.
"Yes, see fi'; tink allee fish man catch cookee fish."
"Yes, you're right, Ching.  It will help to disarm any doubts.  They will never think the _Teaser's_ men are ashore lighting a fire;" and, altering our course a little, he ran the boat in shore and up a creek, where we landed, made fast the boat under some low scrubby trees, and in a very short time after a couple of men were placed where they could watch the junks and give notice of any movement.  The others quickly collected a quantity of drift-wood, and made a good fire, Ching tucking up his sleeves and superintending, while Mr Brooke and I went out on the other side of the little wood, and satisfied ourselves that there was no sign of human habitation on this side of the river, the city lying far away on the other.
When we came back, Ching was up to the elbows in shore mud, and we found by him a couple of our geese and a couple of ducks turned into dirt-puddings.  In other words, he had cut off their heads, necks, and feet, and then cased them thickly with the soft, unctuous clay from the foot of the bank; and directly we came he raked away some of the burning embers, placed the clay lumps on the earth, and raked back all the glowing ashes before piling more wood over the hissing masses.
"Velly soon cook nicee," he said, smiling; and then he went to the waterside to get rid of the clay with which he was besmirched.
Mr Brooke walked to the sentinels, and for want of something else to do I stood pitching pieces of drift-wood on to the fire, for the most part shattered fragments of bamboo, many of extraordinary thickness, and all of which blazed readily and sent out a great heat.
"Makes a bit of a change, Mr Herrick, sir," said Jecks, as the men off duty lay about smoking their pipes, and watching the fire with eyes full of expectation.
"Yes; rather different to being on shipboard, Jecks," I said.
"Ay, 'tis, sir.  More room to stretch your legs, and no fear o' hitting your head agin a beam or your elber agin a bulkhead.  Puts me in mind o' going a-gipsying a long time ago."
"`In the days when we went gipsying, a long time ago,'" chorussed the others musically.
"Steady there," I said.  "Silence."
"Beg pardon, sir," said one of the men; and Tom Jecks chuckled.  "But it do, sir," he said.  "I once had a night on one o' the Suffolk heaths with the gipsies; I was a boy then, and we had hare for supper--two hares, and they was cooked just like that, made into clay balls without skinning on 'em first."
"But I thought they always skinned hares," I said, "because the fur was useful."
"So it is, sir; but there was gamekeepers in that neighbourhood, and if they'd found the gipsies with those skins, they'd have asked 'em where the hares come from, and that might have been unpleasant."
"Poached, eh?"
"I didn't ask no questions, sir.  And when the hares was done, they rolled the red-hot clay out, gave it a tap, and it cracked from end to end, an' come off like a shell with the skin on it, and leaving the hares all smoking hot.  I never ate anything so good before in my life."
"Yah!  These here geese 'll be a sight better, Tommy," said one of the men.  "I want to see 'em done."
"And all I'm skeart about," said another, "is that the _Teaser_ 'll come back 'fore we've picked the bones."
I walked slowly away to join Mr Brooke, for the men's words set me thinking about the gunboat, and the way in which she had sailed and left us among these people.  But I felt that there must have been good cause for it, or Captain Thwaites would never have gone off so suddenly.
"Gone in chase of some of the scoundrels," I thought; and then I began to think about Mr Reardon and Barkins and Smith.  "Poor old Tanner," I said to myself, "he wouldn't have been so disagreeable if it had not been for old Smith.  Tanner felt ashamed of it all the time.  But what a game for them to be plotting to get me into difficulties, and then find that I was picked out for this expedition!  I wish they were both here."
For I felt no animosity about Smith, and as for Tanner I should have felt delighted to have him there to join our picnic dinner.
I suppose I had a bad temper, but it never lasted long, and after a quarrel at school it was all over in five minutes, and almost forgotten.
I was so deep in thought that I came suddenly upon Mr Brooke, seated near where the men were keeping their look-out.  He was carefully scanning the horizon, but looked up at me as I stopped short after nearly kicking against him.
"Any sign of the _Teaser_ sir?"  I said.
"No, Herrick.  I've been trying very hard to make her out, but there is no smoke anywhere."
"Oh, she'll come, sir, if we wait.  What about the junks?"
"I haven't seen a man stirring oh board either of them, and they are so quiet that I can't quite make them out."
"Couldn't we steal off after dark, sir, and board one of them?  If we took them quite by surprise we might do it."
"I am going to try, Herrick," he said quietly, "some time after dark. But that only means taking one, the other would escape in the alarm."
"Or attack us, sir."
"Very possibly; but we should have to chance that."  He did not say any more, but sat there scanning the far-spreading sea, dotted with the sails of fishing-boats and small junks.  But he had given me plenty to think about, for I was growing learned now in the risks of the warfare we were carrying on, and I could not help wondering what effect it would have upon the men's appetites if they were told of the perilous enterprise in which they would probably be called upon to engage that night.
My musings were interrupted by a rustling sound behind me, and, turning sharply, it was to encounter the smooth, smiling countenance of Ching, who came up looking from one to the other as if asking permission to join us.
"Well," said Mr Brooke quietly, "is dinner ready?"
Ching shook his head, and then said sharply--
"Been thinking 'bout junks, they stop there long time."
"Yes; what for?  Are they waiting for men?"
"P'laps; but Ching think they know 'bout other big junk.  Some fliends tell them in the big city.  Say to them, big junk load with silk, tea, dollar.  Go sail soon.  You go wait for junk till she come out.  Then you go 'longside, killee evelybody, and take silk, tea, dollar; give me lit' big bit for tellee."
"Yes, that's very likely to be the reason they are waiting."
"Soon know; see big junk come down liver, and pilates go after long way, then go killee evelybody.  Muchee better go set fire both junk to-night."
"We shall see," said Mr Brooke quietly.
He rose and walked down to the two sentinels.
"Keep a sharp look-out, my lads, for any junks which come down the river, as well as for any movements on board those two at anchor.  I shall send and relieve you when two men have had their dinner."
"Thankye, sir," was the reply; and we walked back, followed by Ching.
"That last seems a very likely plan, Herrick," said Mr Brooke.  "The scoundrels play into each other's hands; and I daresay, if the truth was known, some of these merchants sell cargoes to traders, and then give notice to the pirates, who plunder the vessels and then sell the stuff again to the merchants at a cheap rate.  But there, we must eat, my lad, and our breakfast was very late and very light.  We will make a good meal, and then see what the darkness brings forth."
We found the men carefully attending to the fire, which was now one bright glow of embers; and very soon Ching announced that dinner was cooked, proceeding directly after to hook out the hard masses of clay, which he rolled over to get rid of the powdery ash, and, after letting them cool a little, he duly cracked them, and a gush of deliciously-scented steam saluted our nostrils.
But I have so much to tell that I will not dwell upon our banquet.  Let it suffice that I say every one was more than satisfied; and when the meal was over, Ching set to work again coating the rest of our game with clay, and placed them in the embers to cook.
"Velly good, velly nicee to-day," he said; "but sun velly hot, night velly hot, big fly come to-mollow, goose not loast, begin to 'mell velly nasty."
As darkness fell, the fire was smothered out with sand, there being plenty of heat to finish the cookery; and then, just when I least expected it, Mr Brooke gave the order for the men to go to the boat.
He counter-ordered the men directly, and turned to me.
"These are pretty contemptible things to worry about, Herrick," he said, "but unless we are well provisioned the men cannot fight.  We must wait and take that food with us."
Ching was communicated with, and declared the birds done.  This announcement was followed by rolling them out, and, after they had cooled a bit, goose and duck were borne down to the boat in their clay shells, and stowed aft, ready for use when wanted.
Ten minutes later we were gliding once more through the darkness outward in the direction of the two junks, while my heart beat high in anticipation of my having to play a part in a very rash and dangerous proceeding--at least it seemed to be so to me.
CHAPTER THIRTY EIGHT.
INFORMATION.
It was too dark to make out the junks, but their direction had been well marked, and Mr Brooke took his measures very carefully.
"Perfect silence, my lads," he said.  "Perhaps the lives of all here depend upon it.  Now, the sail half up; Jecks, hold the sheet; the others sit in the bottom of the boat.  Every man to have his arms ready for instant use."
There was a quick movement, a faint rattle, and then all still.
"Good; very prompt, my lads.  Mr Herrick, come and take the tiller, and be ready to obey the slightest whispered command."
I hurriedly seated myself by him in the darkness, and waited while our leader now turned to the last man to receive his orders.
"You, Ching," he said, "will go right forward to keep a good look-out, ready to give a whispered warning of our approach to the junks.  Do you know what a whispered warning means?"
"Yes; Ching say see junk so lit' voice you can't hear him."
The men tittered.
"Silence!  Yes, you understand.  Now go, and be careful.  But mind this, if our boat is seen and the pirates hail, you answer them in their own tongue; do you understand?"
"Yes; 'peakee Chinee all along."
"That will do."
Ching crept forward, and we were gliding along over the dark sea before a gentle breeze, which, however, hardly rippled the water.
"Keep a bright look-out for the _Teaser_, Jecks.  We may see her lights."
"Ay, ay, sir."
Then on and on in a silence so deep that the gentle rattle and splash of the sea against our bows sounded singularly loud, and I almost felt drowsy at last, but started back into wakefulness on Mr Brooke touching my arm and whispering--
"I reckon that we shall be very near them in another ten minutes.  I want to sail round at a little distance."
I nodded, but doubted whether he could see me in the intense darkness, for there was not a star to be seen, the sky being covered with low down black clouds, which seemed to be hanging only a short distance above the sea.  Right away behind us was a faint glow telling of the whereabouts of the Chinese city, but seaward there was no sign of the _Teaser's_ or any other lights, for it was like sailing away into a dense black wall, and I began to look forward more and more anxiously as I thought of the possibility of our running with a crash right on to the anchored junks.
But I was under orders, and waited for my instructions, keeping the light craft as straight on her course as I could contrive, and grasping the tiller with all my strength.
All at once there was a faint rustling, and suddenly I felt Ching's soft hand touch my knee, and I could just make out his big round face.
"Listen," he said.
Mr Brooke's hand was laid on mine, and the tiller pressed sidewise slowly and gently, so that the boat glided round head to wind, and we lay motionless, listening to the dull creak and regular beat of oars a short distance to the north.  Then came a faint groan or two of the oars in their locks, but that was all.  We could see nothing, hear no other sound, but all the same we could tell that a large boat of some kind was being pulled in the same direction as that which we had taken.
"Men going out to the junks," I said to myself, and my heart beat heavily, so that I could feel it go _throb throb_ against my ribs.  I knew that was what must be the case, and that the men would be savage, reckless desperadoes, who would have tried to run us down if they had known of our being there.
But they were as much in the dark as we, and I could hear them pass on, and I knew that we must have been going in the right direction for the junk.  Then I had clear proof, for all at once there was a low, wailing, querulous cry, which sent a chill through me, it sounded so wild and strange.
"Only a sea-bird--some kind of gull," I said to myself; and then I knew that it was a hail, for a short way to the southwards a little dull star of light suddenly shone out behind us, for the boat had of course been turned.
There was the answer to the signal, and there of course lay the junk, which in another five minutes we should have reached.
Mr Brooke pressed my arm, and we all sat listening to the beating of the oars, slow and regular as if the rowers had been a crew of our well-trained Jacks.  Then the beat ceased, there was a faint rattling noise, which I know must have been caused by a rope, then a dull grinding sound as of a boat rubbing against the side of a vessel, and lastly a few indescribable sounds which might have been caused by men climbing up into the junk, but of that I could not be sure.
Once more silence, and I wondered what next.
Mr Brooke's hand upon mine answered my wonderings.  He pressed it and the tiller together, the boat's sail filled gently once more, and we resumed our course, but the direction of the boat was changed more to the north-eastward.  We were easing off to port so as to get well to the left of the junks, and for some distance we ran like this; then the hand touched mine again, and the rudder was pressed till we were gliding southward again, but we had not gone far when Ching uttered a low warning, and I just had time to shift the helm and send the boat gliding round astern of a large junk, which loomed up above us like ebony, as we were going dead for it, and if we had struck, our fragile bamboo boat would have gone to pieces like so much touchwood, leaving us struggling in the water.
"I don't see what good this reconnoitring is doing," I said to myself, as I sat there in the darkness wondering what was to happen next; but sailors on duty are only parts of a machine, and I waited like the rest to be touched or spoken to, and then acted as I was instructed.  For from time to time Mr Brooke's hand rested upon mine, and its touch, with its pressure or draw, told me at once the direction in which he wished me to steer; and so it was that, in that intense darkness, we sailed silently round those junks, going nearer and nearer till I knew exactly how they lay and how close together.  But all the while I was in a violent perspiration, expecting moment by moment to hear a challenge, or to see the flash of a match, the blaze up of one of the stink-pots the junks would be sure to have on their decks, and then watch it form a curve of hissing light as it was thrown into our boat.
But not a sound came from the junks we so closely approached, and at last, with a sensation of intense relief, I felt Mr Brooke's hand rest on mine for some time, keeping the rudder in position for running some distance away with the wind, before the boat was thrown up again full in its eye, and we came to a stand, with the mat-sail swinging idly from side to side.
Hardly had we taken this position, when once more from the direction of the river came the low beat of oars.  As we listened, they came on and on, passed us, and the sounds ceased as before just where the junks were lying.
This time there was no signal and no answering light, the occupants of the boat finding their way almost by instinct, but there was a hail from the junk to our left, and we could distinguish the murmuring of voices for a time, and the creaking of the boat against the side as the fresh comers climbed on board.
"Ah, good information, Mr Herrick!" whispered Mr Brooke.  "We have seen nothing, but we know that they have received reinforcements, and now in a very short time we shall know whether they are going to sail or wait till morning."
"How?"  I said.
He laughed gently.
"Easily enough.  They will not sail without getting up their anchors, and we must hear the noise they make."
"But I don't quite see what good we are doing," I whispered.
"Not see?  Suppose we had stopped ashore, we should not have known of these men coming to strengthen the crews, and we should not have known till daylight whether they had sailed or were still at anchor.  This last we shall know very soon, and can follow them slowly.  Why, if we had waited till morning and found them gone, which way should we have sailed?"
"I'm very dense and stupid, sir," I said.  "I had not thought of that."
"Allee go to s'eep," whispered Ching; "no go 'way to-night."
"What's that mean?" said Mr Brooke in a low voice; and I felt his arm across my chest as he pointed away to the left.
I looked in that direction, and saw a bright gleam of light from the shore.
"Our fire blazing up, sir," said Tom Jecks softly.
"Yes, I suppose so," said Mr Brooke thoughtfully; and as we watched the bright light disappeared, but only to appear again, and this was repeated three times.
"That can't be our fire," said Mr Brooke.
"Fliends on shore tellee pilate what to do," said Ching, with his face close to us.
"What do you mean?" said Mr Brooke.
"Ching know.  Show big lamp.  Mean big junk going sail mollow morning, and pilate go long way wait for them."
"Why?  Couldn't they stay here and wait?"
"No; silk-tea-ship see pilate junk waiting for them, and come out lit' way and go back again.  'Flaid to sail away."
"Yes, that sounds reasonable," said Mr Brooke thoughtfully.
Then all at once there came over the black water a peculiar squeaking, grinding sound, followed by a similar noise of a different pitch.
"Pilate not going to s'eep; allee look out for light and go sail away d'leckly."
"Yes, we have not wasted our time, Herrick," whispered Mr Brooke. "They're getting up their anchors."
"And are we going to follow them, sir?"  I said softly.
"Yes, my lad; our work has only just begun."
CHAPTER THIRTY NINE.
TRICKED.
They were singularly quiet, these people on board the junks, I suppose from old experience teaching them that noise made might mean at one time discovery and death, at another the alarming of some valuable intended prize.
This quietness was remarkable, for as we listened there was the creaking and straining of the rough capstan used, but no shouted orders, no singing in chorus by the men tugging at the bars; all was grim silence and darkness, while we lay-to there, waiting and listening to the various faint sounds, till we heard the rattling of the reed-sails as they were hauled up.  Then we knew that the junks were off, for there came to us that peculiar flapping, rattling sound made by the waves against a vessel's planks, and this was particularly loud in the case of a roughly-built Chinese junk.
"Are you going to follow them at once?"  I said in a whisper.
"Yes, till within an hour of daylight," was the reply.  "Now, be silent."
I knew why Mr Brooke required all his attention to be directed to the task he had on hand--very little reflection was necessary.  For it was a difficult task in that black darkness to follow the course of those two junks by sound, and keep doggedly at their heels, so as to make sure they did not escape.  And then once more the slow, careful steering was kept up, Mr Brooke's hand guiding mine from time to time, while now for the most part we steered to follow the distant whishing sound made by the wind in the junk's great matting-sails.
All at once, when a strange, drowsy feeling was creeping over me, I was startled back into wakefulness by Mr Brooke, who said in an angry whisper--
"Who's that?"
I knew why he spoke, for, though half-asleep the moment before, I was conscious of a low, guttural snore.
"Can't see, sir," came from one of the men.  "Think it's Mr Ching."
"No; Ching never makee nose talk when he s'eep," said the Chinaman, and as he spoke the sound rose once more.
"Here, hi, messmate, rouse up!" said the man who had before spoken.
"Eh? tumble-up? our watch?" growled Tom Jecks.  "How many bells is--"
"Sit up, Jecks," whispered Mr Brooke angrily.  "Next man take the sheet."
There was the rustling sound of men changing their places, and I heard the coxswain whispering to the others forward.
"No talking," said Mr Brooke; and we glided on again in silence, but not many yards before a light gleamed out in front.
"Quick, down at the bottom, all of you!  Ching, take the tiller!"
We all crouched down; Ching sat up, holding the tiller, and the light ahead gleamed out brightly, showing the sails and hulls of the two great junks only fifty yards away, and each towing a big heavy boat.  There were the black silhouettes, too, of figures leaning over the stern, and a voice hailed us in Chinese, uttering hoarse, strange sounds, to which Ching replied in his high squeak.
Then the man gave some gruff order, and Ching replied again.  The light died out, and there was silence once more.
"What did he say?" whispered Mr Brooke.
"Say what fo' sail about all in dark?"
"Yes, and you?"
"Tell him hollid big gleat lie!  Say, go catchee fish when it glow light."
"Yes."
"And pilate say be off, or he come in boat and cuttee off my head."
Mr Brooke hesitated for a few moments, and then reached up, took the tiller, and we lay-to again for quite an hour.
"Only make them suspicious if we are seen following, Herrick.  Let them get well away; I daresay we can pick them up again at daybreak."
But all the same he manipulated the boat so as not to be too far away, and arranged matters so well that when at last the dawn began to show in the east, there lay the two junks about six miles away, and nothing but the heavy sails visible from where we stood.
We all had an anxious look round for the _Teaser_, but there were no tell-tale wreaths of smoke showing that our vessel was on her way back, and there seemed to be nothing for us to do but slowly follow on along shore, at such a distance from the junks as would not draw attention to the fact of their being followed, till we could catch sight of our own ship and warn our people of the vessels; or, failing that, lie in on the way to warn the junk which Ching believed would sail from the river before long.
Mr Brooke reckoned upon our being provisioned for two days, and as soon as it was light he divided the little crew into two watches, one of which, self included, was ordered to lie down at once and have a long sleep.
I did not want to lie down then, for the drowsy sensations had all passed away; but of course I obeyed, and, to my surprise, I seemed to find that after closing my eyes for two minutes it was evening; and, upon looking round, there lay the land upon our right, while the two junks were about five miles away, and the boat turned from them.
"Have you given up the chase, Mr Brooke?"  I said.
"Yes, for the present; look yonder."
He pointed towards the north-west, and there, some three miles distant, and sailing towards us, was another junk coming down with the wind.
"Another pirate?"  I cried.
"No, my lad; evidently the junk of which Ching told us."
"And you are going to warn her of the danger, sir?"
"Exactly; we can't attack, so we must scheme another way of saving the sheep from the wolves."
As we sailed on we could see that the fresh junk was a fine-looking vessel, apparently heavily laden; and, after partaking of my share of the provisions, which Ching eagerly brought for me out of the little cabin, I sat watching her coming along, with the ruddy orange rays of the setting sun lighting up her sides and rigging, and brightening the showy paint and gilding with which she was decorated, so that they had quite a metallic sheen.
"Take a look back now," said Mr Brooke.  "What do you make of the pirate junks?"
"They seem to be lying-to, sir," I said.
"Then they have seen their plunder, and the sooner we give warning the better.  She must turn and run back at once, or they will be after and capture her before she can reach port again."
Just then I saw him stand up and give a sharp look round, his face wearing rather an anxious expression.
"You can't see the _Teaser_, sir?"  I said.
"No, my lad; I was looking at the weather.  I fear it is going to blow a hurricane.  The sky looks rather wild."
I had been thinking that it looked very beautiful, but I did not say so. Certainly, though, the wind had risen a little, and I noticed that Tom Jecks kept on glowering about him in a very keen way.
Just then Mr Brooke shook out the little Union Jack which we had brought from our sinking boat, and held it ready to signal the coming junk, which was now only about a mile away, and came swiftly along, till our leader stood right forward, holding on by a stay, and waved the little flag.
"Three cheers for the red, white, and blue!" muttered Tom Jecks.  "Look at that now.  We in this here little cock-boat just shows our colours, and that theer great bamboo mountain of a thing goes down on her marrow-bones to us, metty-phizickly.  See that, Mr Herrick, sir?"
"Yes, Tom," I said excitedly; "and it's something to be proud of too."
For, in obedience to our signals, I saw one of the many Chinamen on board wave his hands as he seemed to be shouting, and the great vessel slowly and cumbrously rounded to, so that in a few minutes we were able to run close alongside.
"Tell them to heave us a rope, Ching," said Mr Brooke, and the interpreter shouted through his hands, with the result that a heavy coil came crashing down, and was caught by Tom Jecks, who was nearly knocked overboard.
"We said a rope, not a hawser," growled the man, hauling in the rope. "Better shy a few anchors down too, you bladder-headed lubbers!"
"Now, say I want to speak to the captain," said Mr Brooke.
A showily-dressed Chinaman leaned over the side of the huge tower of a poop, and smiled down on us.
"Are you the captain?" cried Mr Brooke, and Ching interpreted.
"Say he the captain," said Ching; "and you please walkee up top sidee big junk."
"Yes, it will be better," cried Mr Brooke.  "Come with me, Herrick. You too, Ching, of course.  There, keep her off a bit, Jecks, or you'll have the boat swamped."
He seized the right moment, and began to climb up the junk's side.  I followed, and Ching was close at my heels, the clumsy vessel giving plenty of foothold; and we soon stood upon the deck, where some dozen or so Chinese sailors pointed aft to where the captain stood, bowing and smiling.
We had a rough set of bamboo steps to mount to the clumsy poop-deck, and there found the captain and half-a-dozen more of his men waiting.
"Now, Ching, forward," I said.  But he hung back and looked strange.
"Don't be so jolly modest," I whispered; "we can't get on without you to interpret."
At that moment there came a loud hail from our boat, invisible to us from where we stood, and there was a tremendous splash.
"What's the matter?" cried Mr Brooke, making for the side; but in an instant the attitude of the Chinaman changed.  One moment the captain was smiling at us smoothly; the next there was an ugly, look in his eyes, as he shouted something to his men, and, thrusting one hand into his long blue coat, he made a quick movement to stop Mr Brooke from going to the side.
The various incidents took place so quickly that they almost seemed to be simultaneous.  One moment all was peace; the next it was all war, and the warnings I heard came together.
"Pilate! pilate!" shouted Ching.
"Look out for yourself, my lad!  Over with you!" roared Mr Brooke, as I saw him dash at the Chinese captain, and, with his left fist extended, leap at the scoundrel, sending him rolling over on the deck.
"Now!" cried Mr Brooke again, "jump!"
"Jlump! jlump!" yelled Ching; and with a bound I was on the great carven gangway, just avoiding three men who made a rush for me, and the next moment I had leaped right away from the tower-like stern of the huge junk, and appeared to be going down and down for long enough through the glowing air before striking the water with a heavy splash, and continuing my descent right into the darkness, from which it seemed to me that I should never be able to rise again.
At last my head popped out of the dark thundering water, and, blinking my eyes as I struck out, I was saluted with a savage yelling; the water splashed about me, and I heard shots; but for a few moments, as I looked excitedly round, I did not realise that I was being pelted with pieces of chain, and fired at as a mark for bullets.
But in those brief moments I saw what I wanted: Mr Brook and Ching safe and swimming towards me, and the boat not many yards behind them, with two of our men at the oars, and the others opening fire upon the people who crowded the side of the junk, and yelled at us and uttered the most savage throats.
"This way, Herrick, my lad," panted Mr Brooke, as he reached me.  "Ah! did that hit you?"
"No, sir, only splashed up the water; I'm all right!"  I cried; "the bullet didn't touch."
"Swim boat! swim boat!" cried Ching excitedly.
But our danger was not from the water but the sharp fire which the Chinese kept up now, fortunately without killing any of us.  Then the boat glided between us and the junk, ready hands were outstretched from the side, and I was hauled in by Tom Jecks, who then reached over and grasped Ching by the pigtail.
"No, no touchee tow-chang!" roared the poor fellow.
"All right; then both hands and in with you."
"Lay hold of the sheet, Jecks!" cried Mr Brooke, who sprang over the thwart to the tiller, rammed it down, and the sail began to fill, but only slowly, for the towering junk acted as a lee, and all the time the men yelled, pelted, and fired at us.
"Look out, my lads; give it to them now.  Make fast the sheet, Jecks, and get your rifle.  Ten pounds to the man who brings down the captain!" roared Mr Brooke.  "Here, Herrick, my gun!" he cried; and, handing it to him, I seized mine, thrust in two wet cartridges with my wet fingers, and, doubting whether they would go off, I took aim at a man on the poop, who was holding a pot to which another was applying a light.
The next minute the pot was in a blaze, and the man raised it above his head to hurl it right upon us, but it dropped straight down into the sea close to the junk, and the man staggered away with his hands to his face, into which he must have received a good deal of the charge of duck-shot with which my piece was charged.
Excited by my success, I fired the second barrel at a man who was leaning over the bulwarks, taking aim at us with his great clumsy matchlock, and his shot did not hit any one, for the man dropped his piece overboard and shrank away.
As I charged again, I could hear and see that our lads were firing away as rapidly as they could up at the crowded bulwarks, while Tom Jecks was making his piece bear upon the deck of the high poop whenever he could get a shot at the captain; and now, too, Mr Brooke was firing off his small-shot cartridges as rapidly as possible, the salt water not having penetrated the well-wadded powder enclosed in the brass cases.
By this time we were fifty yards away from the junk, and gliding more rapidly through the water, which was splashed up about us and the boat hit again and again with a sharp rap by the slugs from the Chinamen's matchlocks.
The men were returning the fire with good effect as we more than once saw, and twice over one of the wretches who sought to hurl a blazing pot of fire was brought down.
"They can't hurt us now," I thought, as I ceased firing, knowing that my small-shot would be useless at the distance we now were, when I saw a spark of light moving on the poop, and then sat paralysed by horror as I grasped what was going to take place.  It was only a moment or two before there was a great flash and a roar, with a puff of sunset-reddened smoke, hiding the poop of the junk; for they had depressed a big swivel gun to make it bear upon us, and then fired, sending quite a storm of shot, stones, and broken pieces of iron crashing through the roof of our little cabin, and tearing a great hole in our sail.
"That's done it!" shouted Tom Jecks, giving the stock of his rifle a heavy slap.
"You've hit him?" cried Mr Brooke.
"Yes, sir; I caught him as he stood by watching the cannon fired."
"Yes, that's right," cried Mr Brooke, shading his eyes and gazing hard at the scene on the high poop, where, in the last rays of the setting sun, we could see men holding up their captain, who was distinctive from his gay attire and lacquered hat, which now hung forward as the scoundrel's head drooped upon his breast.
"Cease firing!" said Mr Brooke, for we were a hundred yards away now, and rapidly increasing the distance.  "We can do no more good.  Thank you, Jecks.  Now then, who is hurt?"
There was no reply.
"What, no one?" cried Mr Brooke.
"Yes, sir: why don't you speak out, Tom Jecks?  You got it, didn't you?"
"Well, so did you; but I arn't going to growl."
"More arn't I, messmate.  It's nothing much, sir."
"Let me see," said Mr Brooke, as we sailed steadily away, while the junk still remained stationary; and, after a rapid examination, he plugged and bound a wound in the man's shoulder, and performed a similar operation upon Tom Jeck's hind-leg, as he called it, a bullet or slug having gone right through the calf.
I could not help admiring the calm stolidity with which the two men bore what must have been a painful operation, for neither flinched, but sat in turn gazing at his messmate, as much as to say, "That's the way to take it, my lad; look at me."
This done, Mr Brooke turned his attention to the wound received by the boat, where the charge from the swivel gun had gone crashing through the top of the cabin and out at the side.  It was a gaping wound in the slight planking of the boat, but the shot had torn their way out some distance above the water-line, so that unless very rough weather came on there was no danger, and we had other and more serious business now to take up our attention.
For Ching pointed out to us a certain amount of bustle on board the junk, which was explained by a puff of smoke and a roar, as simultaneously the water was ploughed up close to our stern.
"Not clever at their gun drill," said Mr Brooke coolly, as he took the helm himself now, and sent the boat dancing along over the waves, so as to keep her endwise to the junk, and present a smaller object for the pirate's aim.
"That's bad management under some circumstances, Herrick," he said, smiling.  "It's giving an enemy the chance of raking us from stern to stem, but I don't believe they can hit us.--I thought not."
He said this smiling, as the water was churned up again by another shot, but several yards away upon our right.
Another shot and another followed without result, and by this time we were getting well out of range of the swivel gun, a poor, roughly-made piece, and our distance was being rapidly increased.
"Going away!" said Ching, as we saw the great mat-sails of the junk fill.
"Or to come in chase--which?" said Mr Brooke quietly.  "It does not matter," he added; "we shall soon have darkness again, and I think we shall be too nimble for them then."
"Beg pardon, sir," said Tom Jecks.
"Yes, what is it?  Your wound painful?"
"Tidy, sir; but that warn't it.  I was only going to say, look yonder."
He pointed right away east, and, as we followed his finger with our eyes, they lit upon a sight which would have even made me, inexperienced as I was, think it was time to seek the shelter of some port.  And that something unusual was going to happen, I knew directly from Mr Brooke's way of standing up to shelter his eyes, and then, after gazing for some time in one direction, he turned in that of the great Chinese port we had so lately left.
CHAPTER FORTY.
ANOTHER ENEMY.
For as I looked towards the horizon away to the east, a curious lurid glow spread upward half-way to the zenith, and for the moment I thought that in a short time we should see the full-moon come slowly up out of the sea.  But a few moments' reflection told me that we were long past the full-moon time, and that it would be the last quarter late on in the night.  The sea, too, began to wear a singular aspect, and great frothy clouds were gathering rapidly in the south.  And even as I looked there was a peculiar moaning sigh, as if a great wind were passing over us at a great height, though the sea was only just pleasantly rippled, and a gentle breeze was sweeping us rapidly along and away from the great junk, which now seemed hazy and distant, while those we had watched so long were quite out of sight.
"Feel cold?" said Mr Brooke quietly.  "I ought to have told you to take off and wring out your clothes."
"Cold, sir!"  I said wonderingly.  "I hadn't thought about it; I was so excited."
"Yes; we had a narrow escape, my lad.  It is a lesson in being careful with these cunning, treacherous wretches.  You made sure it was a trader, Ching?"
"Ching neve' quite su'e--only think so," was the reply, accompanied by a peculiar questioning look, and followed by a glance over his right shoulder at the sky.
"No, I suppose not.  I ought to have been more careful.  They threw something down at the boat as soon as we had mounted: did they not, Jecks?"
"Yes, sir; I see it coming.  Great pieces of ballast iron, as it took two on 'em to heave up over the bulwarks.  I just had time to give the boat a shove with the hitcher when down it come.  Gone through the bottom like paper, if I hadn't.  But beg pardon, sir, arn't we going to have a storm?"
"Yes," said Mr Brooke quietly; "I am running for the river, if I can make it.  If not, for that creek we were in last night.  Take the tiller, Mr Herrick," he said, and he went forward.
"Going blow wind velly high.  Gleat wave and knock houses down," said Ching uneasily.
"Yes, my lad; we're going to have what the Jay-pans calls a tycoon."
"No, no, Tom Jecks," I said, smiling.
"You may laugh, sir, but that's so.  I've sailed in these here waters afore and been in one.  Had to race afore it with bare poles and holding on to the belaying-pins.  Tycoons they call 'em, don't they, Mr Ching?"
"Gleat blow storm," said Ching, nodding.  "Hullicane."
"There you are, sir," said Jecks.  "Hurricanes or tycoons."
"Typhoons," I said.
"Yes, sir, that's it, on'y you pernounces it different to me.  Don't make no difference in the strength on 'em," he continued testily, for his wound was evidently painful, "whether you spells it with a kay or a phoo.  Why, I seed big vessels arterwards, as had been blowed a quarter of a mile inland, where they could never be got off again."
"Yes, I've heard of that sort of thing," I said.  "They ride in on a great wave and are left behind."
"Lookye here, sir," whispered the coxswain, who seemed to ignore his wound; "I don't want to show no white feathers, nor to holler afore I'm hurt, but if I was you, I should ask Mr Brooke to run straight for the nearest shore--say one o' them islands there, afore the storm comes; you arn't got no idea what one o' them tycoons is like.  As for this boat, why, she'll be like a bit o' straw in a gale, and I don't want to go to the bottom until I've seed you made a skipper; and besides, we've got lots more waspses' nests to take, beside polishing off those three junks--that is, if they're left to polish when the storm's done."
"Stand up, Mr Herrick," cried the lieutenant.  "Look yonder, due north. What do you see?"
I held the tiller between my knees as I stood up and gazed in the required direction, but could see nothing for a few minutes in the dusk.
"Can't you see?"
"Yes, sir, now.  Small round black cloud."
"Yes, of smoke."
"Ay, ay, sir, I see it," said one of the sailors.  "Hooray! it's the _Teaser_ with the wind blowing hard astern and carrying the smoke of her funnel right over her and ahead."
"The _Teaser_ or some other steamer; and she's running fast for harbour. Let's see: those are the Black Gull Islands to port there.  Were you with us when the cutter's crew landed, Jecks?"
"Yes, sir; I rowed stroke-oar, sir."
"To be sure.  The second one from the north had the highest ground."
"Yes, sir; but you couldn't land for the surf and the shark-fin rocks, if you remember."
"Exactly; and we rowed along the south channel till we found a sheltered sand-cove, where we beached the cutter, and then explored the island. We must make for that channel, and try to reach it before the storm comes down.  We could not get half-way to the river, and, thank heaven, the _Teaset_ will soon be in safety."
"No, sir, you couldn't make no river to-night."
"It will be dark too soon."
"Not to-night, sir," said Jecks sturdily.
"Yes, man; there will be no moon."
"No, sir; but in less nor an hour's time the sea 'll be white as milk, and all of a greeny glow, same as it is some still nights in port. There won't be no difficulty, sir, about seeing."
"But you think it will be hard to make the channel?"
"I hope not, sir, but I'm afraid so; we can only try."
"Yes, we can only try," said Mr Brooke slowly, as he came and sat beside me.  "And we must try, Herrick--our best.  For this is no night to be out in almost an open boat."
"Then you think there is danger, sir?"  I said anxiously.
"No, Herrick," he replied, smiling; "sailors have no time to think of danger.  They have enough to think about without that.  We must get in the lee of that island to-night, and it the storm holds back, and the little boat spins along like this, we ought to do it."
"And if it doesn't, sir?"
"If it doesn't?  Ah, well, we shall see.  Stand by, two of you, ready to lower that sail at a moment's notice."
"Ay, ay, sir," was the ready reply as two of the men changed their places; and just then I looked at Ching, to see that his face was lit up by the reflection of the strange light on our right and behind, which grew more striking, while away before us the land disappeared, and we were gazing at a bank of clouds of an inky black.
The effect was very curious: behind us the dull coppery glow becoming fainter minute by minute, as the darkness increased the blackness before us; and one's instinct seemed to warn one to turn from the black darkness to sail away towards the light.  Tom Jecks took the same idea, and said, in an irritable whisper, exactly what I thought--
"Seems rum, sir, don't it, sir?--makes believe as that's the best way, when all the time the wussest looking is the safest."
Just then, after a glance round, Mr Brooke uttered another warning to the men to be ready, and settled himself down to the tiller.
"Sit fast, all of you; the hurricane may be down upon us at any moment now."
I looked at him wonderingly, for it was painfully still, though the darkness was growing intense, and the great junk seemed to have been swallowed up by the clouds that hung low like a fog over the sea.
"There will be such a turmoil of the elements directly," continued Mr Brooke in a low voice, but only to me, "that I don't suppose a word will be heard."  Then aloud, "Look here, my lads; I shall try and run the boat high upon the sands at the top of some breaker.  Then it will be every man for himself.  Never mind the boat--that is sure to be destroyed--but each man try to save his arms and ammunition; and if the two wounded men are in difficulties, of course you will lend a hand. Now then, one more order: The moment I say, `Down with the sail,' drag it from the mast, and two oars are to be out on either side.  The wind will catch them and send us along, and I want them to give a few dips to get on the top of a roller to carry us in."
"Ay, ay, sir."
"That's all."
His words in that terrible stillness sounded to me as almost absurd, for the sea was still calm, and save that sighing in the air of which I have before spoken, there was no further sound; and at last I said to him--
"Do you really think we shall have a hurricane?"
"Look at the sky, my lad," he replied; "and take this as a lesson to one who will have men's lives depending upon his knowledge and skill some day.  If ever there were signs of an awful night in the Chinese seas, it is now.  Hark at that!"
"Guns!  The _Teaser_!"  I exclaimed excitedly.
"Heaven's artillery that, my lad," he said solemnly.  Then in a whisper, "Shake hands!  I'll help you all I can, Herrick, but heaven knows how we shall be situated soon."
I felt a strange sensation of awe creep over me, as he gripped my hand warmly, and then snatched his away, and sat up firm and rigid, turning his head to the east as all now became suddenly black--so dark that I could hardly see the men before me and the sail.  But still we glided rapidly on over the long smooth rollers, on and on toward the islands, which lay a short distance from the mainland.
"It will be all guess work," whispered Mr Brooke.  "I am keeping her head as near as I can guess for the channel, but the breakers will soon be our only guide."
Then came the heavy roar again, which I had taken for guns, but it did not cease as before, when it sounded like a sudden explosion.  It was now continuous, and rapidly increasing.
"Thunder?"  I asked in a low voice.
"Wind.  Tremendous.  It will be on us in five minutes."
But even then it seemed impossible, for we were still sailing swiftly and gently along towards the channel between the islands, and the roar like distant thunder or heavy guns had once more ceased.
"We shall get to the shore first after all," I whispered.
"No."
At that moment there was a sensation as of a hot puff of air behind us. It literally struck my head just as if a great furnace door had been opened, and the glow had shot out on to our necks.
"Here she comes," growled Tom Jecks; "and good luck to us."
And then, as if to carry out the idea of the opened furnace, it suddenly grew lighter--a strange, weird, wan kind of light--and on either side, and running away from us on to the land, the sea was in a wild froth as if suddenly turned to an ocean of milk.
"Down with the sail!" shouted Mr Brooke, who had held on to the last moment, so as to keep the boat as long as possible under his governance; and quickly as disciplined men could obey the sail was lowered, and as far as I could see they were in the act of stowing it along the side, when it filled out with a loud report, and was snatched from their hands and gone.
"Any one hurt?"
"No, sir," in chorus.
"Oars."
I heard the rattle of the two pairs being thrust out.  Next Mr Brooke's words, yelled out by my ear--"sit fast!" and then there was a heavy blow, heavy but soft and pressing, followed by the stinging on my neck as of hundreds of tiny whips, and then we were rushing along over the white sea, in the midst of a mass--I can call it nothing else--of spray, deafened, stunned, feeling as if each moment I should be torn out of my seat, and as if the boat itself were being swept along like lightning over the sea, riding, not on heavy water, but on the spray.
Then all was one wild, confusing shriek and roar.  I was deafened; something seemed to clutch me by the throat and try to strangle me; huge soft hands grasped me by the body, and tugged and dragged at me, to tear me from my hold; and then, two arms that were not imaginary, but solid and real, went round me, and grasped the thwart on which I sat, holding me down, while I felt a head resting on my lap.
I could see nothing but a strange, dull, whitish light when I managed to hold my eyelids up for a moment, but nothing else was visible; and above all--the deafening roar, the fearful buffeting and tearing at me--there was one thing which mastered, and that was the sensation of being stunned and utterly confused.  I was, as it were, a helpless nothing, beaten and driven by the wind and spray, onward, onward, like a scrap of chaff.  Somebody was clinging to me, partly to save himself, partly to keep me from being dragged out of the boat; but whether Mr Brooke was still near me, whether the men were before me, or whether there was any more boat at all than that upon which I was seated, I did not know.  All I knew was that I was there, and that I was safe, in spite of all the attempts made by the typhoon to drag me out and sweep me away like a leaf over the milky sea.
It cannot be described.  Every sense was numbed.  And if any lad who reads this were to take the most terrible storm he ever witnessed, square it, and then cube it, I do not believe that he would approach the elemental disturbance through which we were being hurled.
There was a rocky shore in front of us, and another rocky island shore to our left; and between these two shores lay the channel for which we had tried to make.  But Mr Brooke's rule over the boat was at an end the moment the storm was upon us, and, as far as I could ever learn afterwards, no one thought of rocks, channel, saving his life, or being drowned.  The storm struck us, and with its furious rush went all power of planning or thinking.  Every nerve of the body was devoted to the tasks of holding on and getting breath.
How long it lasted--that wild rush, riding on the spray, held as it were by the wind--I don't know.  I tell you I could not think.  It went on and on as things do in a horrible dream, till all at once something happened.  I did not hear it, nor see it, hardly even felt it.  I only know that something happened, and I was being strangled--choked, but in another way.  The hands which grasped my throat to keep me from breathing had, I believe, ceased to hold, and something hot and terrible was rushing up my nostrils and down my throat, and I think I then made some effort with my hands.  Then I was being dragged along through water and over something soft, and all at once, though the deafening, confusing noise went on, I was not being swept away, but lying still on something hard.
I think that my senses left me entirely then for a few moments--not more, for I was staring soon after at the dull light of white water sweeping along a little way off, and breathing more freely as I struggled hard to grasp what it all meant, for I did not know.  I saw something dim pass me, and then come close and touch me, as if it sank down by my side; and that happened again and again.
But it was all very dream-like and strange: the awful, overwhelming, crushing sound of the wind seemed to press upon my brain so that I could not for a long time think, only lie and try to breathe without catching each inspiration in a jerky, spasmodic way.
I suppose hours must have passed, during which I stared through the darkness at the dull whitish phosphorescent glow which appeared through the gloom, and died out, and appeared and died out again and again, passing like clouds faintly illumined in a ghastly way, and all mingled with the confusion caused by that awful roar.  Then at last I began to feel that the rush of wind and water was passing over me, and that I was in some kind of shelter; and when I had once hit upon this, I had as it were grasped a clue.  I knew that I was lying on stones, and saw that rising above me was a mass of rock, which I knew by the touch, and this stone was sheltering me from the wind and spray.
"We must have reached the shore safely, then," I said to myself, for my head was getting clearer; "and--yes--no--I was not hurt.  We were all saved, then."
At that point a terrible feeling of dread came over me.  I was safe, but my companions?
The shock of this thought threw me back for a bit, but I was soon struggling with the confusion again, and I recalled the fact that I had felt some one touch me as he sank down by my side.
Arrived at this point, I turned a little to look, but all was perfectly black.  I stretched out my hand and felt about.
I snatched it back with a cry of horror.  Yes, a cry of horror; for, though I could not hear it, I felt it escape from my lips.  I had touched something all wet and cold lying close beside me, and I felt that it was one of my companions who had been cast up or dragged ashore--dead.
Shivering violently, I shrank away, and stretched out my hand in the other direction--my left hand now, with my arm numbed, and my shoulder aching when I moved it, as if the joint had become stiffened and would not work.
I touched somebody there--something cold and smooth and wet, and drew my hand away again, when, as it glided over the sand, it touched something else round and soft and long, and--yes--plaited.  It was a long tail.
"Ching!"  I ejaculated; and, gaining courage, I felt again in the darkness, to find that it grew thinner.  I tried again in the other direction, and once more touched the round wet object, which did not seem so cold, and then the next moment a hand caught mine and held it.
I was right; it was Ching.  I knew him by his long nails.
Not alone!  I had a companion in the darkness, one who was nearly as much stunned as I, for he moved no more, but lay holding on by my left hand, and for a time I was content to listen to the savage roar of the wind.  But at last, as my brain worked and I mastered the sensation of horror, I began to feel about again with my right hand, till I touched the same cold, wet object I had encountered before.
It was an arm, quite bare and cold; while now I could not withdraw my hand, but lay trembling and shuddering, till I felt that perhaps I was not right--that any one lying dead would not feel like that; and my hand glided down to the wrist.
I knew nothing about feeling pulses only from having seen a doctor do so, but by chance my fingers fell naturally in the right place in the hollow just above the wrist joint, and a thrill of exultation ran through me, for I could distinctly feel a tremulous beating, and I knew that my imagination had played me false--that the man was not dead.
CHAPTER FORTY ONE.
AFTER THE TYPHOON.
The repugnance and horror gave way to a sensation of joy.  Here was another companion in misfortune, alive and ready to share the terrible trouble with us, but who was it?
I tried to withdraw my left hand from Ching's grasp; but as soon as he felt it going, he clung to it spasmodically, and it was only by a sharp effort that I dragged it away, and turned to the side of my other companion, and began to touch him.  There was the bare arm, but that was no guide; the face helped me no more; but the torn remnants of his clothes told me it was not Mr Brooke, and my heart sank.  I felt again, and my hand encountered a drawn-up leg, and then I touched a bandage. It was Tom Jecks, who had been wounded by the fire from the junk.
I could learn no more.  I tried to speak; I shouted; but he made no sign, and I could not even hear my own cries.  The darkness remained profound, and the deafening roar of the wind kept on without cessation.
But, feeling more myself at last, I determined to crawl about a little, and find out whether any more of our crew were near us.  Then I hesitated; but, summoning courage, I crept on my hands and knees, passed Ching, and then crouched down nearly flat, for I had crept to where the shelter ceased, and to have gone on would have been to be swept away.
To test this I raised one hand, and in an instant I suffered quite a jerk, and each time I repeated the experiment I felt more and more that to leave the shelter meant to die, for the power of the blast was appalling.
Crawling back, I proceeded in the other direction, and found that I could go what I guessed to be quite a dozen yards, feeling more and more in shelter.  Then all at once I reached a point where the wind came through what afterwards proved to be a narrow pass between two masses of rock, and I shrank back disheartened at the barrenness of my search.
In that black darkness it was very difficult to find my former position, even in so confined a space, and I found myself completely going wrong, and into the rushing wind, the effect being horribly confusing again. But, after lying flat down on the sand, which kept flying up and nearly blinding me, I grew more composed, and, resuming my search once more, found where my two companions lay; and, after touching our wounded sailor, and finding him lying as I had left him, I began to think of what I could do to help him, but thought in vain.  To give help was impossible in the midst of that awful storm, and, utterly exhausted now, I sank back and reached out my left hand once more to try and touch Ching.
He was on the alert, and caught my hand in both his, grasping it firmly, as if, boy as I was, he would gladly cling to me for protection; while I, in my horror and loneliness, was only too thankful to feel the touch of a human hand.
Then, amid the strange confusion produced by the roar of the wind and thunder of the waves whose spray hissed over our heads, I lay wondering what had become of Mr Brooke and the others--whether they had reached the land, and were screened behind the rocks as we were; then about the _Teaser_--whether she had been able to make the shelter of the river before the typhoon came down upon them in all its fury.
I seemed to see the men at their quarters, with the spars lowered upon deck, the boats doubly secured, and everything loose made fast.  I fancied I felt the throb of the engines, and the whirr of the shaft, as it raced when the stern rose at some dive down of the prow; and the sharp "ting-ting" of the engine-room gong-bell struck on my ears above the yelling of the storm, for wild shrieks at times came mingled with the one tremendous overpowering roar.
Then I began thinking again about Mr Brooke, and whether, instead of lying there in shelter on the sand, I ought not to be striving with all my might to find him; and all at once the roar over my head, the thunder of the breakers somewhere near, and the hiss and splash of the cutting spray, seemed to cease, and I was crawling about the shore, over sand and rocks, and through pools of water, to find Mr Brooke, while Ching followed me, crying out in piping tones, "Velly long of you.  Windee blow allee way."  But still I toiled on, lying flat sometimes, and holding tightly to the rocks beneath me, for fear of being snatched up and sent whirling over the sea.  Then on again, to come to a mass of rock, up which I climbed, but only to slip back again, climbed once more and slipped, and so on and on till all was nothingness, save that the deafening roar went on, and the billows dashed among the rocks, but in a subdued far-off way that did not trouble me in the least.  For my sleep--the sleep of utter exhaustion--had grown less troubled, the dreamy crawl in search of Mr Brooke died away, and I slept soundly there, till the sun glowing warmly upon my face made me open my eyes, to find Ching's round smooth yellow face smiling down at me, and Tom Jecks nursing his leg.
I started up in wonder, but sank back with a groan, feeling stiff and sore, as if I had been belaboured with capstan bars.
"You feel velly bad?" said Ching.
"Horribly stiff."
"Hollibly 'tiff; Ching lub you well."
Before I knew what he was about to do, he seized one of my arms, and made me shout with agony, but he moved it here and there, pinching and rubbing and kneading it till it went easily, following it up with a similar performance upon the other.  Back and chest followed; and in ten minutes I was a different being.
But no amount of rubbing and kneading did any good to my spirits, nor to those of our companion in misfortune, whose wound troubled him a good deal; but he sat up, trying to look cheerful, while, with my head still confused, and thought coming slowly, I exclaimed--
"But the storm--the typhoon?"
"Allee blow way, allee gone," cried Ching, smiling; "velly good job. You feel dly?"
I did not answer then, for I felt as if I could not be awake.  I had been lying in the lee of a huge mass of rock, amid stones and piled-up sand, upon which the sun beat warmly; the sky overhead was of a glorious blue; and there was nothing to suggest the horrors of the past night, but the heavy boom and splash of the billows which broke at intervals somewhere behind the rock.
At last I jumped up, full of remorse at my want of thought.
"Mr Brooke--the others?"  I cried.
"We were talking about 'em, sir, 'fore you woke up," said Jecks sadly; and I now saw that he had received a blow on the head, while he spoke slowly, and looked strange.
"And what--"
"I'm afraid they're--"
"Allee dlowned; velly much 'flaid."
I groaned.
"I don't know how we managed to get ashore, sir," said Jecks faintly. "I think it was because there was so little undertow to the waves.  When the boat struck, it felt to me as if I was being blown through the shallow water, and I shouldn't have been here if I hadn't come up against Mr Ching, who was pulling you along."
"Then you saved me, Ching?"  I cried.
"Ching takee hold, and pullee here.  Velly pull wolk.  Him get hold of tow-chang, and pullee him both together."
"That's right, sir.  I snatched at anything, and got hold of his tail, and held on.  But you don't mind, Mr Ching?"
"No; mustn't cut tow-chang off."
"Let's try if we can find the others," I said; and, taking the lead, I walked round the mass of rock which had sheltered us, to gaze out at the heaving sea, which was rising and falling restlessly; but there was no white water, all was of a delicious blue, darker than the sky, and not a sail in sight.
To right and left extended a low cliff, at whose feet lay huge masses which had fallen from time to time; then an irregular stretch of sand extended to where the waves came curling over, the swell being very heavy, and the only trace of the storm to be seen was the way in which the sand had been driven up against the cliff, so as to form quite a glacis.
We could see about half a mile in either direction, but there was no sign of our companions, and my heart sank again.  There were, however, here and there, ridges of rock, running down like breakwaters into the sea, and about which it fretted and tossed tremendously; and, in the hope that one of these ridges might hide our friends from our view, I climbed to the top of the highest piece of rock I could reach, and took a long and careful survey.
"See anything, sir?" said Tom Jecks.
"No," I replied, "nothing.  Yes; about a quarter of a mile on there's a spar sticking up; it may be the boat's mast."
I came hurriedly down, and my announcement was enough to set my companions off, Jecks limping painfully through the loose sand, climbing rocks, and finding it no easy task to get over that so-called quarter of a mile, which, like all such spaces on the sea-shore, proved to be about double the length it looked, while the nearer we got the higher and more formidable the ridge seemed to grow, completely shutting out all beyond, where it ran down from the cliff at right angles into the sea.
All at once, as I was helping the coxswain over an awkward stone, the poor fellow being weak and rather disposed to stagger, but always passing it off with a laugh and an "All right, sir, I shall be better after breakfast," Ching uttered an ejaculation, and pointed to something that the sea had washed up, and was pouncing upon again like a cat to draw it back.
My heart seemed to stand still, but a horrible fascination drew me to the spot along with the Chinaman, for my first thought was that it was the body of Mr Brooke.
"Not jolly sailor boy," said Ching; and I felt a peculiar exaltation. "Not Mis' Blooke.  Pilate man dlowned.  Ching velly glad."
We turned away, and continued our route, for I shrank from going into dangerous breakers to try and drag the man out, and my companion was too weak.  As to its being one of the pirates, it seemed possible, for I knew that one, if not two, had gone overboard in the fight, and it was probably one of these.
We trudged on and reached the ridge at last, to find it bigger and more precipitous than I had expected.  It ran out evidently for hundreds of yards, its course being marked by foam and fretting waves, and I was just thinking what a fatal spot it would be for a vessel to touch the shore, when I reached the top and uttered a startled cry, which brought the others to my side; for there was the explanation of the presence of the drowned Chinaman!  Spreading away for a couple of hundred yards, the shore was covered with timbers, great bamboo spars, ragged sails, and the torn and shattered fragments of some large Chinese vessel; while, before I could shape it in my mind as to the possibilities of what vessel this could be, though certain it was not the _Teaser_, Ching said coolly--
"That velly good job.  That big junk blow all to pieces, and allee bad pilate man dlowned.  No go choppee off poor sailor head now.  No 'teal silk, tea, allee good thing, and burnee ship.  Velly good job indeed; velly bad lot."
"You think it was the junk which cheated us?"
"Yes, velly muchee same.  Look, allee paint, lacquee, gold.  Allee same junk; no use go find um now.  No get head chop off for killee sailo'. Allee bad pilate allee dlowned."
"Hold hard there, sir," whispered Tom Jecks.  "I can hear people talking.  Quick! squat, hide; there's a lot on 'em coming down off the cliff."
We had just time to hide behind some rocks, when a party of about twenty Chinamen came cautiously and slowly down on to the sands, and Ching whispered as he peeped between the fragments of rock--
"Not allee pilate dlowned.  Come along look at junk; take care; choppee off allee head; must hide."
Ching was quite right, and I was awake to the fact that we three were prisoners on a little desert island, and in company with a gang of as savage and desperate enemies as man could have.
CHAPTER FORTY TWO.
FOR DEAR LIFE.
It was all clear enough: the great junk which had so deceived Mr Brooke and Ching had been cast ashore and shattered, these men having escaped and been exploring the island, or perhaps they were only coming down now from the spot where they had taken refuge after being cast ashore.
"Why, Ching," I whispered, "perhaps there are more of them about!"
"P'laps," he replied.
We dared not move, but remained there watching; and it now became pretty evident that the men had come down to examine the wreck, for they began to hurry about, chattering away as they searched in all directions amongst the fragments, one or another setting up a shout from time to time, which brought others to him.  Then we saw them drag out now a chest from the sand in which it was bedded, now a cask; and soon after there was a burst of excitement over something we could not make out; but it was evidently a satisfactory find, for they bore it up from the sea to the soft, warm, dry sand, and all sat down round about it.
"Find something velly good to eat," whispered Ching.  "Now allee velly busy; come along, hide."
It was very good advice; and we followed him down from the ridge, and in and out at the foot of the cliff, seeking for some place of concealment; for I had not a doubt about our fate if we were seen.  In fact, I did not breathe freely until the great ridge and several masses of rock were between us; and only then, a good half-mile away in the direction from which we had come, did we venture to speak above our breath.
"Velly big pity," said Ching, whose face was all in wrinkles.  "Velly muchee wish back at fancee shop."
"Let's find a place before we talk about that," I said.
"Yes; soon findee place."
"Here, what is it, Jecks?"  I cried, catching our companion's arm; for he suddenly gave a lurch as we struggled through the loose sand, and nearly fell.
"Bit done up, sir," he said, with a piteous smile.  "Wound in my leg makes me feel sick, and the sun's hot.  Is there a drop o' water to be got at anywhere?"
I looked round at the glowing sand and rocks with a feeling of horrible despair coming over me.  Yes, there was water--hundreds and thousands of miles of water, blue, glistening, and beautiful in the calm morning, but none that we could give a parched and fainting man to drink.
"Try and creep along a little farther," I said.  "Let's get you in hiding, and then Ching and I will search for some and bring it--"
As I spoke I remembered that I had nothing that would hold water, and I felt constrained to add--
"Or fetch you to it."
"All right, sir," said the man, with a weary smile; "allus obey your officers."
Ching went to his other side, and supported him some fifty yards farther, our way now being through quite a chaos of rocks, which had been loosened in bygone times from the cliff above.  Then, so suddenly that we were not prepared, the poor fellow dropped with his full weight upon our arms, and we had to lower him down upon a heap of drifted sand.
"No go, sir," he said softly; "I'm a done-er."
"No, no; rest a bit, and we'll find a cool place somewhere.  I daresay we shall see a cave along here."
"Can't do it, sir," he said feebly; "I've kep' on as long as I could. It's all up.  Never mind me.  If those beggars see you, they'll have no mercy on you, so go on and try and get away."
"Yes; velly muchee makee haste.  Pilate come soon."
"Yes, sir; he's quite right, sir.  You two cut and run."
"And let them come and murder you, while we go?"  I said.
"Well, yes, sir," said the poor fellow faintly; "there's no good in having three killed when one would do."
"Look about, Ching," I said sharply.  "Is there any place where we can hide?"
"No," he replied disconsolately.  "Only place for lit' dog; no fo' man."
"You can't do it, sir," said our poor companion.  "Good-bye, sir, and God bless you; you've done all a orficer can."
"Oh, have I?  I should look well when Mr Reardon or the captain says, `What have you done with your men?'"
"Don't! stop a-talking, sir," he cried, clinging to my hand.  "You know what these beggars are, and you'll have 'em on to you, sir."
"Yes; and we shall have them on to you if we don't find a place soon. Here, Ching, don't run away and leave us;" for I could see the interpreter climbing up a gap in the cliff.
"He's quite right, sir; you go after him.  I tell you it's all over and done with me.  If you got me along a bit farther, I should only go off all the same.  It's all up.  Now, pray go, sir.  It's no use to stay."
"Hold your tongue!"  I cried angrily; for with the feeling on me strong that the pirates might be down on us directly, and the only thing to do was to set off and run for my life, the poor fellow's imploring words were like a horrible temptation that I was too weak to resist.
"I must speak, sir," he whispered, with his eyes starting, and his lips black and cracked by the heat and feverish thirst caused by his wound. "There, you see, Mr Ching's gone, and your only chance is to follow him."
I looked up, and just caught sight of one of the Chinaman's legs as he disappeared over the edge of the cliff to which, high up, he had crawled.  And once more the desire to escape came upon me, but with increased strength, that made me so angry at my weakness that I turned upon the poor fellow almost threateningly.
"Will you hold your tongue?"  I whispered hoarsely.
"Will you go, sir?" he pleaded.  "I tell yer it's all up with me, and the Teapots can't hurt me worse than what I've got now.  Arn't got your dirk, have you?"
"No; why?"
"'Cause it would ha' been an act o' kindness to put me out of my misery, and save me from being cut to pieces by them there wretches.  Now, sir, good-bye, and God bless you, once more!  Tell the skipper I did my duty to the last."
I broke down as I sank on my knees by the poor fellow; and I didn't know my voice--perhaps it was being husky from the heat-as I said to him, very chokily--
"And if you get away, tell the captain I did my duty to the last."
"Yes, sir; but do go now."
I jumped up again, ashamed of the blinding tears that came for a few moments into my eyes.
"Look here," I said; "if you weren't so weak, I'd kick you, old a man as you are.  Likely thing for a British officer to sneak off and leave one of his men like this!"
"But the beggars are coming, I'm sure, sir."
"Very well," I said gloomily, "let them come.  It's all very well for a full-moon-faced Chinaman to go off and take care of himself, but it isn't English, Tom Jecks, and that you know."
The poor fellow hoisted himself a little round, so that he could hide his face on his uninjured arm, and as I saw his shoulders heave I felt weaker than ever; but I mastered it this time, and knelt there with a whole flood of recollections of home, school, and my ambitions running through my brain.  I thought of my training, of my delight at the news of my being appointed to the _Teaser_, of my excitement over my uniform; and that now it was all over, and that in all probability only the sea-birds would know of what became of me after the Chinamen had done.
Then I thought of Ching's cowardice in leaving me alone with the poor wounded fellow like this.
"I knew he wasn't a fighting man," I said sadly; "but I couldn't have believed that he was such a cur."
At that moment there was a quick scrambling sound, which made me start to my feet, and Tom Jecks started up on his elbow.
"Here they come, sir," he gasped.  "Now, sir," he whispered wildly, "do, pray, cut and run."
"With you," I said resolutely.
He made an effort to rise, but fell back with a groan.
"Can't do it, sir.  Without me.  Run!"
I put my hands in my pockets without a word, and then started, for a voice said--
"You think Ching lun away allee time?"
"Ching!"  I cried, grasping his arm.
"Yes; no good.  Can't findee big hole to hide.  Ching tumblee down off rock, and hurt him."
"Much?"  I said.
"Yes, plentee plentee.  Time to go now.  Pilate all come along this way."
He passed his hand involuntarily straight round his neck edgewise, as if thinking about how a knife or sword would soon be applied.
"You saw them?"  I cried.
"Yes," he said sadly.  "Allee come along.  You lun away now with Ching?"
"I can't leave Tom Jecks," I said.  "Off with you, and try and save yourself.  Never mind us."
Ching looked at the injured sailor.
"You no get up, lun?" he said.
"Can't do it, mate," groaned the poor fellow.  "I want Mr Herrick to make a dash for his life."
"Yes, velly good.  You makee dashee you life, Mr Hellick."
"No, I stay here.  Run for it, Ching; and if you escape and see the captain or Mr Reardon again, tell him we all did our duty, and how Mr Brooke was drowned."
"Yes, Ching tellee Mr Leardon evelyting."
"Then lose no time; go."
"No; Ching velly tire, velly hot; wantee bleakfast, flesh tea, nicee new blead.  Too hot to lun."
"But I want you to save yourself," I said excitedly.
"Yes; allee save evelybody, alleegether.  Ching won't go leave Mr Hellick."
"Ching!"  I cried.
"Hush!  No makee low.  Lie down likee lit' pigee in sand.  Pilate come along."
His ears were sharper than mine; for, as I dropped down at full length in the sand upon my chest, I saw him drag a good-sized stone in front of his face to screen it, while I, in imitation, rapidly scooped up some of the sand and spread it before me, so as to make a little mound of a few inches high, just as a couple of the junk's crew came into sight about a hundred and fifty yards on our left, and as close down to the sea as the billows would allow.  Then a few more appeared; and at last the whole party, walking almost in single file, and looking sharply from left to right as they came.
There was a space of about sixty yards from the face of the cliff to the edge of the water, and the shore, after about twenty yards of perfect hard level, rapidly rose, the interval being a rugged wilderness of rock half buried in the driven sand.
It was up nearly at the highest part of this chaos of rocks, where we had been seeking along the cliff face for a cavern, that we three lay, many feet above the level strip by the sea; and there were plenty of rocks protruding from the sand big enough to hide us; but it could only be from a few of the men at a time.  To the others I felt that we must be so exposed that some one or other must of necessity see us if he looked our way.
There was no need to whisper, "Be silent," for we lay there perfectly motionless, hardly daring to breathe, but forced, fascinated, as it were, into watching the long procession of our enemies, walking along, chattering loudly, and every now and then stooping to pick up something which had been driven up by the sea.
At times I saw them gazing right in our direction, and then up, over us, at the cliff with its patches of grey-green vegetation; but fully half of them passed by without making a sign of being aware of our presence, and hope began to spring up of the possibility of their all going by without noticing us.
The next moment it seemed impossible, and my heart sank as one active fellow stepped toward us, apparently coming straight to where we lay, and appearing to be watching me all the time.
And now more strongly than ever came the feeling that I must leap up and run for my life, though I knew that if I did the mob of Chinamen would give chase, like the pack of savage hounds that they were, and never give up till they had run me down; and then--
I felt sick with the heat of the sun, and the horror of my position. There, say it was all from the latter cause; and the rocks, sea, pirates, all swam before me in a giddy circle, with only one clear object standing out distinct upon the sands--imagination, of course, but so real and plain before my dilated eyes, that I shuddered at its reality--it was myself, lying in the baking sunshine, after the pirates had overtaken me and passed on!
It was very curious in its reality, and so clear before me that I could hardly believe it true, when the man who was coming toward us suddenly stooped, picked up something, and then turned and went back to his position in the line.
For I had not calculated in my excitement upon the deceptive nature of the ground upon which we lay, with its large masses of rock and scattered fragments of endless shapes, some partly screening, some blending with our clothes as we lay motionless; and above all, upon the fact that our presence there was not expected.  Otherwise there might have been quite another tale to tell.
Even when I knew that they were passing on, I hardly dared to draw my breath, and lay still now, with my head pressed down sidewise in the sand; till at last I could keep from breathing no longer, and the dry sand flew at one great puff.
I lay trembling the next moment, fearing that the sound would bring the bloodthirsty wretches back, hot and eager to hack to pieces the foreign devil who had escaped from their clutches the day before; but the sound of their voices grew more and more faint, till the last murmur died away, and I raised my head slowly, an inch at a time, till I could gaze along the strand.
There was nothing visible but the scattered rocks, sun-bleached sand, and the dark, smooth surface over which the foaming water raced back each time a glistening billow curved over and broke.  And in proof that the enemy were some distance away, I could see the pale-feathered, white-breasted gulls passing here and there in search of food, while able at any moment to spread their wings and escape.
CHAPTER FORTY THREE.
OUR REFUGE.
"Oh deah me!" said Ching in his most squeaky tones, "I velly hungly. You like nicee bleakfast, Mis' Hellick?"
"Don't speak to me as if I were a baby, Ching," I cried angrily.
"No; speak like to offlicer, Mr Hellick.  You likee bleakfast-- something good eat?"
"I hadn't thought of it before, Ching," I said, feeling rather ashamed of my angry tone; "but I am faint, and I suppose that is through being hungry."
"Yes; Ching go down among locks and sand, see if he find something eat."
"No, no," I cried excitedly; "it would be madness."
"Eh? you tinkee Ching mad?" he said, with a smile.
"Oh no; but you would meet some of the pirates."
"No; allee gone 'long shore.  Not come back long time."
"But it is too risky.  Perhaps some of the wretches are waiting."
"No; allee velly wicked--velly bad men.  Feel 'flaid stop all alone. 'Flaid see men again headee chop off.  Pilate allee keep together.  No come long time; Ching go find something good eat."
"But if they come on the cliffs and look back, they might see you."
"Yes; might see Ching flom velly long way topside lock chop.  Then think--"
"Think, yes, of course."
"Not allee same you think.  See Ching?  Yes; see John Chinaman in blue flock allee torn, long tow-chang; that's all."
I did not grasp his meaning for a moment.
"Oh, I see," I cried at last; "you mean that if they did see you, they would think it was one of their own crew?"
"Yes; think one of own clew.  But Ching not pilate."
"Of course.  Then there would be no risk.  You shall go, but we must find some place where we can hide."
"Mis' Hellick help soon makee velly nicee place."
"Wait a minute," I said.  "Couldn't we climb up on the cliff like you did?"
"Yes, Mr Hellick climb, but no cally jolly sailor boy, Tom Jeck, allee way."
"No; we must make a place here if we cannot find one."
He walked up to the face of the cliff, but there was no spot at all likely to answer the purpose till he had gone about fifty yards, when he turned and signalled to me.
I crept close up to the cliff, and then stooped down, after a timid look in the direction taken by the pirates, and found Ching standing by a piece of the rock which had split away from above, fallen clear, and then its top had leaned back against the rock face, leaving a narrow rift between its base and the cliff, through which we could see the light dimly, some twelve or fourteen yards away, but it was only a faint gleam showing that the far end was nearly closed.
"Velly nice beautiful place; ought to come here last night."
"Yes, capital.  We can hide here; and once inside, if we had arms, we could keep the wretches at a distance."
"Don'tee want fight now," said Ching, quietly.  "No swold, no shoot gun, no jolly sailor boy.  Wantee eat and dlink."
"Yes; let's get poor Jecks here at once."
"You go fetch him; tly to walkee now: Ching go fetch eat, dlink."
He hurried off toward the ridge, while I went back to my wounded man, who seemed to be lying asleep, but he opened his eyes as I approached.
"We've found a place," I said.  "Do you think you can limp a little way?"
He tried to rise, and fell back with a moan, but upon my placing my arm under his, he made a fresh effort, and stood upright, taking step for step with mine, till I had him right up to the narrow opening of our shelter, into which he slowly crawled, and then spoke for the first time, but in a hoarse voice I did not know--
"Water."
"I'll try," I said; "don't stir from there till I come back."
Creeping along close under the cliff, I soon reached the ridge, and was about to mount, but dropped down and hid, for I saw something move in the direction taken by the pirates.
A minute's investigation, however, showed it to be some bird on the strand, and I began to climb, reached the top, took a careful observation in both directions, and then up at the cliff, and,--lastly, looked out for Ching.
I soon espied him running out after a retiring billow, then running in again, and continuing this several times as if he were a boy at play. Finally, however, I saw him go splashing in after a wave, and then come hurrying back dragging something, which he drew right ashore.
There he stopped, panting, and looking back, caught sight of me, and signalled to me to come.
I hurried down, reached him amongst the piles of broken timber and rubbish, and found that he had secured a wooden box, one end of which had been battered upon the rocks, laying bare the bright glistening tin with which it was lined; and I realised directly that he had found what for us was a treasure, if we could tear open the tin, for the case bore the brand of a well-known firm of English biscuit-makers, and doubtless it was part of the loot taken from some unfortunate British merchantman.
"You helpee me cally?" he said.
For answer I took hold of one end of the case, and we bore it right up, through the thick sand, close under the cliff, where we placed it behind a big stone.
"You gottee big stlong knife?" cried Ching.
I took out a big-bladed knife, opened it, and found no difficulty in thrusting it through the soft tin and cutting a long gash.  Then I cut another, parallel, and joined two of the ends, making a lid, which, upon being raised, showed that the biscuits were perfectly unharmed by the salt water.
"Fillee allee pockets," cried Ching; and I proceeded to do so, while twice as many as I could stow away disappeared under his garments.
"Now," I said, "we must find water and get back."
"Waitee minute; p'laps pilate come back; no have bliskit."
He dropped down upon his knees, and began tearing away the sand from behind the stone, after which he dragged the case into the hole, and tossed the sand over it at a tremendous rate, ending by completely covering it and looking up at me with a smile of satisfaction.
"Now for water," I said eagerly.
"Yes, Ching find water;" and we tramped back, the loose dry sand falling in and obliterating our footprints.
Ching led the way to a pile of tangled wreck-wood, and took out a jar covered with bamboo basket-work, and having a cross handle--a vessel that would probably hold about half a pailful.
"Ching find--float flom junk," he said; and then, with a knowing smile, he led the way to where the ridge joined the cliff; and, unable to contain myself when, he stopped and pointed down triumphantly, I fell upon my knees, and placed my lips to a tiny pool of clear cool water, which came down from a rift about forty feet above my head in the limestone rock, and, as I drank the most delicious draught I ever had in my life, the water from above splashed down coolly and pleasantly upon the back of my head.
"Ching hear can go _tlickle, tlickle_," he said, stooping in turn to get a deep draught before filling the vessel, and then leading the way back over the ridge, and out of the hot sunshine into the place where our poor companion lay upon his back, muttering hurriedly words of which we could not catch the import.
This was a fresh difficulty, for he could not be roused into sitting up to drink; and at last, in despair, I scooped up some water in my hand, and let it trickle upon his half-parted lips.
The effect was instantaneous; they moved eagerly, and, ceasing his muttering, he swallowed more and more of the water, till he must have drunk nearly a pint, and now sank into a more easy position fast asleep, and breathing easily.
"Ha!"  I exclaimed.  But I said no more, Ching's hand was placed over my lips, and he held me back, staring hard all the time towards the tall narrow outlet of our shelter.
For the moment I thought that this was some cowardly attack--one is so prone to think evil of people rather than good; but he stooped down, placed his lips to my ear, and whispered the one word--
"Pilate."
Then a loud burst of talking came upon us, sounding as it doubled by striking and echoing from the rocks.  My blood ran cold once more, for I thought that my exclamation had been heard, and that the enemy was talking about and watching the opening of our shelter.
Then the noise grew louder, and some dispute seemed to be on the way, while, what was worse, the sounds did not pass on, showing that the crew of the junk, for I felt that it must be they, had returned and stopped just in front of where we crouched.
Where we were was dark enough to keep any one from seeing us if he looked in from the bright sunshine; but I knew that, sooner or later, if the men stayed where they were, some one was sure to come prying about, and would see the place.  How long, then, would it be ere we were discovered, and had to meet our terrible fate after all?
"You thinkee get out other way?" said Ching at last, with his lips to my ear.
"I think not," I whispered back.
"Mustn't look out this way," he whispered again.  "You go light to end and look see if pilate going stop."
I was so eager to get an observation of the enemy, that I hurriedly crept along the narrow passage.  I say hurriedly, but my progress was very slow, for I had to worm my way over fallen stones, some of which were loose, and I was in constant dread of making a sound which might betray us.
But I got to the end in safety, and had to mount up over a large narrow wedge-like piece which filled up the end; the opening, dim and partly stopped with some kind of growth outside, being quite ten feet from the sandy bottom.
And all this while the murmur of voices from outside came indistinctly, till I was at the top of the wedge, when the talking grew suddenly louder.
I hesitated for a few moments, and then, feeling sure that I was safe, I placed my face to the opening, parted the tough plant a little, and then a little more, so as not to attract attention; and at last, with a bright yellow daisy-like growth all about my face, I peered out, to see that the enemy had quietly settled down there to smoke, not thirty yards from our hiding-place, while some were settling themselves to sleep, and again others to eat biscuits similar to those we had found.
They evidently meant to stay, and if our wounded companion began his delirious mutterings again, I knew that, although a fellow-countryman might be spared, my career was at an end.
I crept down cautiously, and told Ching all I had seen; whereupon he nodded his head sagely, and placed his lips to my ear.
"Plenty big stone," he whispered.  "Plenty sand; velly quiet; 'top up hole."
I shrank from making any movement, but, softly and silently, Ching crept nearly to the opening by which we had entered, and began moving the fragments embedded in sand, which formed the flooring of our narrow refuge, turning over peat shaley pieces, and laying them naturally between us and the light, and, after planting each heavy piece, scooping up the dry sand with both hands, and pouring it over the stone.  Then another piece and another followed, awkward bits so heavy that he could hardly lift them; and, gaining courage, I let to as well, pulling blocks from out of the sand where I knelt, and passing them to him.
He nodded his satisfaction, and we both worked on slowly and silently, building up till the erection became a breast-work, rapidly growing narrower as it rose higher; the sand poured in, filling up the interstices and trickling down on the other side, thus giving our rugged wall the appearance of being a natural heap, over which the dried sand had been swept in by the storm.
I was in agony as we worked on, expecting moment by moment to hear a stone fall, or a loud clap of one against another; but Ching worked in perfect silence, while the busy chattering of the men without kept on, and then by slow degrees grew more smothered as our wall arose; while as it progressed our shelter grew more gloomy.
There was plenty of material to have made a wall ten times the size, whereas, roughly speaking, ours was only about four feet in length from the fallen rock to the base of the cliff, and sloped inward till, at breast height, it was not more than two feet, and from there rapidly diminished till Ching ceased, and breathing hard, and wet with perspiration, he whispered to me--
"No leach no higher; can'tee find now."
It was so dark that we could only just see each other's faces, but in a short time we became so accustomed to the gloom, that we could watch the changes in Tom Jecks' countenance as he lay sleeping, by the faint rays which stole in over the top of our cavern, and through the tuft of herbage which grew high up at the other end.  But the heat was terrible in so confined a space, and, exhausted as I was with lifting stones and scooping up sand, there were moments when everything appeared dreamy and strange, and I suppose I must have been a little delirious.
I was sitting panting with the heat, resting my head against the rock, listening to the breathing of Tom Jecks, and wondering why it was that something hot and black and intangible should be always coming down and pressing on my brain, when I started into wakefulness, or rather out of my stupor, for Ching touched me, and I found that he had crept past Tom Jecks to where I had made my seat, and had his lips close to my ear.
"Hoolay!" he whispered.  "Flee cheahs!  Pilate all go away!  Go up see."
CHAPTER FORTY FOUR.
WITHIN AN ACE.
Ching's words sent a thrill of delight through me, rousing me, and bringing me out of my half-delirious state.
Without a word, I crept cautiously up to my look-out place, listening to the loud shouting and gabbling of the Chinamen as I got nearer to the tuft of greeny growth, which I parted without so much hesitation now, and, looking out, I could see that by the warm glow of the late afternoon sun which made me shrink back with my heart sinking, and creep down again to Ching.
"Yes?" he whispered.  "Allee going 'way?"
"No," I replied, with my lips to his ear; "they are carrying up boards and pieces of the wreck and sails, and making themselves a shelter. They are going to stay."
Ching drew his breath with a low hiss, and was silent for a few minutes. Then, quite cheerfully, he whispered--
"Velly bad job.  Don'tee want bad wicked pilate here.  Nevy mind: come, eat blisket, dlink watee.  Muchee best place.  Muchee better than pilate.  Then go have good long s'eep."
We stole back to where the biscuit and water vessel had been placed for safety; but when Ching handed me some biscuits I felt as if I could not eat, though a little water refreshed me.
"No dlinkee much; no get more till pilate gone."
I shuddered as I thought of the consequences of being without water in that stifling place, but the simple refreshments did me a wonderful amount of good, and, after dipping my handkerchief in the vessel and squeezing a few drops from time to time between Tom Jecks' lips as he began to mutter, he dropped off to sleep again.
I sat listening then to the smothered sounds from without, where the enemy were evidently very busy, and I was just dropping off again into an uneasy slumber, when I started into wakefulness, for there was a loud shout from the opening we had blocked up, and I felt that all was over. They had found the way in, and in a few moments we should be dragged out.
Directly after there was the babble of several other voices, and a discussion went on in Chinese, not a word of which could I understand. Then, to my utter wonder, the voices which had come over the top as if speaking close by me, suddenly ceased, and I could hear the _pad pad_ of bare feet on the sands.
"Velly neally catchee catchee, and choppee off head," said Ching softly. "Begin to be velly solly for poor Mis' Hellick.  Pilate say, `Heah good place, make hole s'eep in.'  'Nothee pilate say, `Big fool; allee wet damp; wildee beast live in hole, and allee 'tink.  Come back, makee better place.'"
It was a narrow escape, and it was long enough before my heart calmed down, left off throbbing, and I fell asleep.
Utter exhaustion had done its work, and my sleep was deep and dreamless. Once my eyes had closed, they did not open again till long after sunrise the next morning, when I lay there puzzled, and wondering where I was and what was the meaning of the murmur of voices apparently from somewhere overhead.
Ching's voice chased away the remaining mists.
"You had velly good s'eep?" he whispered.  "Feel muchee better?"
I did not answer, only squeezed his hand, and turned to see how Tom Jecks was, but he did not seem to have stirred, and we then ate sparingly of our biscuits, and drank more sparingly of the water.
"Must be velly careful," Ching said again; "no get more till pilate gone 'way."
That day went by like a portion of some feverish dream.  My head burned and throbbed; my thirst grew terrible in the hot, close place, and Ching owned to suffering terribly in the same way; but the faithful fellow never touched a drop of the water, save when the evening came, and we partook together of our rapidly-diminishing store of biscuits, the very touch of which on my lips increased the agony of my thirst.
And all the while we were awake to the fact that the Chinamen had an ample supply of food and water, for they kept dragging up to the camp they had formed casks and chests which had been washed up from the wreck of their junk; and when I climbed up and looked out, I could see them apparently settled down and resigned to their fate, until some friendly junk came along or they could surprise another, feasting away, or playing some kind of game with stones.
"Waitee lit' bit," Ching whispered.  "Allee s'eep, and Ching get eat dlink."
But I felt certain that he would be caught, and begged him not to go till we were absolutely driven by hunger and thirst; and so that day passed, with the rock growing hotter, and the air too stifling almost to breathe, while, to my horror, I found that Tom Jecks was growing more and more feverish.  At times he began to mutter so loudly that we were obliged to throw my jacket over his face to prevent the sounds from drawing the attention of the enemy.
I believe I was half-delirious all that day, and when the night came our little supply of water was running so low that Ching asked if he had not better climb over the wall and go and fetch some more.
"No," I said; "it means discovery.  We must wait."
I dropped soon after into a heavy stupor-like sleep, and this time I was the first to wake and see the sun's rays stealing in through the growth in the rift.  Ching was sleeping calmly enough, but Tom Jecks had been tossing about, and lay in a very peculiar position, which startled me-- it looked so strange.  But Ching woke just then, and, nodding and smiling, he helped me to turn our poor companion back, when we found him flushed and excited, muttering angrily, quite off his head.
"Nevy mind; pilate get tired; go to-day," whispered Ching.  "Get bettee soon.  Now have bleakfast.  Waitee bit: Ching makee butiful bleakfast, chicken, toast, egg, nice flesh tea.  There.  On'y 'nuff blisket for to-day.  Ching go out to-night get plenty blisket, plenty watee, plenty--plentee--oh, deah--oh, deah!"
"What is it?"  I whispered.
"Oh deah!  Not drop watee left.  You get up dlink allee watee?"
"No; did you?"
"No.  Ching see.  Pooh Tom Jeck knock over with arm."
It was only too evident, for the water vessel had been laid upon its side, and the sand beneath was soaked.
"Ching velly solly," said the Chinaman softly.  "No gettee more watee till quite dalk."
My head sank against the rock, and I hardly stirred the whole of that day.  Ching pressed me to eat some of the remaining biscuits, but I could not touch them, only rest my burning head there, and try to think of what was to come.  Ching would certainly be caught if he ventured out, for the enemy never all lay down to sleep together; and, what was worse, I felt convinced, though in a confused way, that sooner or later the delirious mutterings and talkings of Tom Jecks must be heard.
I can only remember patches of that day.  The rest is all burning heat and wandering away amongst grass and flowers and purling streams, whose trickling I seemed to hear.
It was getting well on in the afternoon, I suppose, that Tom Jecks' fever came to a height.  He muttered, and then began to talk angrily, but in an incoherent way, and his voice grew so loud that at last I roused myself and went up to the look-out, to watch whether it was heard without.
But the Chinamen heard nothing, only sat or lay about, talking or sleeping.  It was getting close upon evening, for the sunshine was warm and golden, and cast long shadows from the rocks and the cliff above us over the level sand.
How beautiful it all looked! that golden sea, with a distant sail here and there.  And now suddenly I found that there was a great deal of excitement amongst the Chinamen, who were talking loudly.
My head was hot and confused, but I soon saw the reason why, and hope began to revive, for about a couple of miles out I could see two junks standing in, and my heart throbbed again with excitement as I noted their rig, and could feel certain they were the pair we had watched through that strange night.
"I must go and tell Ching," I said to myself.  "Those junks will take the wretches off.  Only a few more hours, and we shall be safe."
"Stand by, my lads!  Look out!  Storm's coming down upon us.  Now then; every man for himself."
I turned cold with horror.  Just then, too, when we were so near to safety.  For the words were Tom Jecks', roared in a hoarse voice in the height of his delirium, and I saw that they were heard outside.
For the Chinamen who were sitting sprang up, sword or knife in hand; those who were looking out to sea or making signals faced round, stood staring at the cliff for a few moments as if startled, and then, as Tom Jecks' voice rose again, but in muffled tones, for Ching had thrown himself upon the poor fellow to stifle his utterances, the pirates uttered a yell, rushed to the opening, tore down the sand and stones, and Ching and Tom Jecks were dragged out on to the sand.
They had not seen me for the moment, but there was a shout directly, a man jumped up, caught me by the leg, and I was dragged along and out into the soft evening sunshine, to be forced down upon my knees close to where Tom Jecks lay, and Ching was being held, for he was struggling wildly with his captors, and talked excitedly to the fierce wretches who crowded round us.
Ching was evidently pleading for mercy, not for himself but for me.  I knew it, for he kept pointing to me; and finally he made a bound, got free, and leaped to me, throwing his arms about my waist.
"No killee; shan't killee," he cried wildly; and then, turning round, he yelled at our captors in his own tongue, abusing them in his rage, and threatening them with his clenched fist.
But it was all in vain: a dozen hands were at him; others seized and held me.  Ching was dragged away vociferating wildly, thrown down, and three men sat upon him, while another knelt down, twisted his hand in the poor fellow's tail, and held his head fast.
I don't think they meant to kill him, their rage being evidently directed at us; and I saw, with a peculiar kind of fascination, one man with a big sword come close to me; another, armed with a similar blade, go to where Tom Jecks lay, held down by three others.
I can hardly describe my sensations.  Five minutes before, I was horribly frightened; the cold perspiration stood upon my forehead; my hands were wet, and my legs sank under me.  But now, all the fear had gone.  I knew I was to die, and I remembered the execution I had seen in that great enclosure, when with one _whisk_ of the sword the executioner had lopped off head after head.  It would not take long, I thought, and a curious exaltation came over me as I began to think of home, and at the same time my lips uttered the word "Good-bye," which was followed by a prayer.
I did not cease muttering those words as I felt myself forced into a kneeling position, and saw that Tom Jecks was being treated in the same way.  And somehow, as I prayed, the thought would come to me that the poor fellow would not feel or know anything about what was going to happen.
Just then, as the man with the big sword approached Tom Jecks, and I was watching, I did not see but I knew that the other was close behind me and a little on my left.  But it did not trouble me any more than it did to know that the fierce wretches were all gazing excitedly at us, and in a high state of delight at being able to slay two of their foes.
It takes long to describe all this, but it happened very quickly.
The man had raised his sword to strike at Tom Jecks, and I shuddered and looked aside, to see the great shadow of a man on the sand at my feet, and there was a sword raised close by me.
At the same time Ching uttered a wild shriek, and the man who held his tail forced the poor fellow's head down in the sand, but in vain; he wrenched his head sidewise, raised it, and looked towards the cliff, while I flinched slightly, for the shadow moved, as he who made it drew back to strike.
_Crash_!
No: it was not the falling of the sword on my poor outstretched neck, but a volley from the top of the cliff, fired by twenty of our brave blue-jackets, and half-a-dozen of the pirates fell shrieking on the sands.
I turned faint, but I recovered my senses as I saw Ching spring up, rush at a man on the sand, snatch up his sword and run to me.
"Quick!" he cried; "jump up; fight!"
Almost mechanically I obeyed him, and snatched a knife from the hands of one of the fallen men to defend my life, just as a second volley rolled forth from the cliff, directed at the pirates as they ran toward the ridge.
For there was no need for us to fight--our enemies were in full retreat; and, as I looked up at the cliff, I could see our men drawn-up, and they were signalling evidently to some one out of sight.
The next minute we were hailed.
"Which is the way down?"
"This way," cried Ching excitedly; and he ran south, pointing to the rift by which he had climbed the cliff, while I stood there--giddy, helpless, and at last sank down on my knees beside poor Tom Jecks, who was still muttering something about the storm.
I recovered, however, enough to watch our men descending the rift--a perilous, break-neck place; but they did not hesitate, and in a few minutes all were down, formed up, and came toward us at the double.
And now for the first time, at the head of those familiar faces, I saw Mr Reardon, who thrust his sword into his sheath as he drew near and literally rushed at me.
"My dear boy!" he cried, giving me quite a fatherly hug; "thank God, we were just in time."
I could not speak--I was too giddy; but I tried to look my thanks.
"Not hurt, are you?"
"No, sir; only faint."
By this time the last of the pirates had passed over the ridge, and I felt irritated with Mr Reardon for not going in pursuit.  But he did not read my countenance; he called one of the men out of the line, made him give me some water from his bottle, and bent down on his knees by poor Tom Jecks.
"Ha!" he said; "fever from a wound.  Give him some water too, my lad."
He sprang to his feet then, and I understood why he had not gone in pursuit of our enemies, for just then there was a sharp volley from over the ridge somewhere.
"Ha! that's got them," said Mr Reardon, turning to me.  "We divided, my lad! half of us came along the top of the cliff, the other half along the shore."
There was another volley, and I saw Mr Reardon smile as he gave the orders, and out flashed the men's cutlasses, and were fixed with a quick tingling rattle on the muzzles of their rifles.
"Here they come, sir," cried the warrant officer at the far end of the line.
"Yes, my lad, and we're ready for them.  Now, one volley as soon as they are together, boys, and then the blades.  Bayonet every wretch who does not throw down his arms."
A low murmur ran along the little line, and I saw our men's eyes flash in the evening sun.
But the excitement was not complete, for, gathering strength now, and recovering from the shock I had received, I was watching the pirates scrambling over the ridge in haste, as if pursued, when there was a concussion of the air, a heavy boom, and I saw the _Teaser_ come into sight, passing through the channel south of where we stood.  Then there was a quick puff of smoke, another heavy boom, and I saw that she was going full speed, leaving a black stream of smoke behind her, in chase of the two junks, one of which was about a quarter of a mile away, the other about a mile farther.
They were evidently taken by surprise, for the men were hurriedly hoisting sail, and, as I learned afterwards, the _Teaser_ had been quite hidden till she rounded a little promontory at the mouth of the channel between the first and second islands--the channel for which we had so vainly steered on the night of the storm.
The firing went on steadily, the crash of the great shell following the report of the piece, but I had nearer and more exciting work to see close at hand; and once more my heart beat high, as the pirates gathered together, and, seeing the danger before them, paused for a moment or two at the foot of the ridge slope, looked to right to see only the perpendicular cliff, to left to see the sea, and then, uttering a savage yell, came tearing on.
"Fire!" roared Mr Reardon, when they were about fifty yards distant, and I saw several fall and others stagger and halt.
But the others continued their wild dash like men, and were met by our lads, who advanced with their cutlass-bayonets at the charge.
There was a loud cheer, a savage yelling, and I saw the blades flashing in the golden sunshine as they met.  Then a minute's fierce encounter, with men falling, and then half-a-dozen turned and fled back for the ridge, but only to stop and turn to their right, making for the sea.
For the ridge was lined with blue-jackets and marines, and shot after shot was fired at the flying men, who without hesitation plunged into the sea and swam out a few yards, while our lads pursued them, but only to halt on the hard wet sand, where the waves now gently rippled.
There was a strange fascination in the scene, and I watched the six shaven heads of the swimming pirates till the first threw up his hands, battled the air for a few moments, and went down.  The others turned and slowly swam shoreward till they could wade, when they approached our men and flung their weapons on the sand in token of surrender.
There was a triumphant shout at this, and then another--a loud and frantic cheer.  For the firing of the _Teaser_ had been going on rapidly, and all at once the first junk was seen to heel over, and gradually settle down, leaving the sea strewn with fragments of timber, to which the crew were left clinging; while the gunboat raced on, sending shell after shell rapidly at the other, till she was nearly alongside, when there was a tremendous roar, following the crashing into her of a shell, and the second junk flew up in fragments.
The shell had reached her little magazine of powder; and then the work of mercy began.
I was watching the boats being lowered when I heard a shout from behind, and, looking round, saw the second line of our blue-jackets advancing from the ridge.  To my great joy, I saw with them those whom we had mourned as drowned, while the next minute Mr Brooke had me by the hands, and I heard a strange gulping noise, ending in quite a howl.
I looked sharply round, and saw Ching seated on the sand, wiping his eyes with his sleeves.
"What's the matter, Ching--hurt?"  I asked.
"No, not hurt, Mis' Hellick; Ching so velly glad."
CHAPTER FORTY FIVE.
"HUZZA!"
By the time the _Teaser's_ boats had picked up those of the wretches who wished to be saved, I had learned from Mr Brooke how, when the boat struck, he and the others had clung to her and been swept along through the channel, the fierce current carrying them round the point, and at last into comparative shelter, where finally they reached the shore right on the far side of the island.
Thence, after a great deal of climbing, they made their way toward the channel to come in search of us; but they had to fly for their lives, finding that the island was in possession of the wrecked crew of the junk.
They lay in hiding all that day and the next.  That evening, in answer to signals, a fishing-boat picked them up, half-dead with thirst, and by the use of a few Chinese words and signs, and the showing of money, the men were prevailed upon to take them up to the river, where, to Mr Brooke's great delight, he found the _Teaser_ at her old anchorage uninjured, she having escaped the fury of the typhoon, just passing into the river before it came down in its full violence.
Captain Thwaites had been anxiously awaiting the return of the boat from up the river, for, in spite of all inquiries, he had been unable to get any tidings of her till just as Mr Brooke arrived, to find the owners of the boat he had taken, on board making application for payment.
They were dismissed with a promise of full restitution, and, while steam was being got up, a boat was lowered, the floating grating which acted as a buoy found, the cutter recovered, and then the _Teaser_ sailed for the river's mouth and came in search of us, Mr Brooke still clinging to the hope that we had escaped.  In the offing the two junks were seen and recognised, evidently on their way to pick up their shipwrecked friends.
First of all, the strong party of blue jackets and marines was landed, while the _Teaser_ went round the back of the island, to reach the channel and take the pirate junks by surprise.
Thorough success, as I have shown, attended the manoeuvre, and soon after we were on board, where, after a few congratulatory words from our busy captain, I found Barkins and Smith eager to welcome me back, and quite ready to forgive me for having what they called "such a glorious lot of adventures," on account of the share they had had in the sinking and blowing up of the two pirate junks.
"Yes," said Barkins, after I had told my experiences on the island, "that was all very well; but oh, my lad, you should have been here when we attacked those junks!  It was glorious--wasn't it, Blacksmith?"
"Lovely!  But don't say any more to the poor fellow; it will only make him mad."
We returned to the river, where our prisoners were landed, and we three lads had more than one spell on shore before we left that port, notably being in the city on the night of the Feast of Lanterns; but though we had several more brushes with pirates, they were all trivial affairs with small junks, the destruction of the last three being the crowning point of our achievements.  Indeed, this and the sinking of another in search of which, upon excellent information, Captain Thwaites had suddenly gone after we had set out on our shooting expedition, and in which engagement Smith assured me he had greatly distinguished himself, were such blows to the piratical profession that its pursuers were stunned for the time.
We remained upon the coast for another six months, and then: were ordered home, to the great delight of everybody but Ching, who parted from us all very sadly.
"You think Mr Leardon like to take Ching see Queen Victolia?" he said to me one day in confidence.
"I'm afraid not," I replied seriously.
"Ching velly solly," he said.  "Plenty lich man now! plenty plize-money! Ching wear silk evely day in Queen Victolia countly.  You no tink captain take Ching?"
"I'm sure he would not," I said.
"Ching velly good interpleter; velly useful man."
"Very; you've been a splendid fellow, Ching!"
He smiled, and a fresh idea struck him.
"You tink Queen Victolia like Ching teach lit' plince and plincess talk Chinese?"
Again I was obliged to damp his aspirations, and he sighed.
"What shall you do when we are gone, Ching?"  I said.
"Open fancee shop again.  Sell muchee tea, basket, shell, culios, fo' Inglis people.  Glow tow-chang velly long.  Wait till Mr Hellick come back with jolly sailo' boy, fight pilate."
And with that understanding, which was doomed never to be fulfilled, we parted.
For the next morning the men were singing--
"Huzza! we're homeward bou-ou-ound.  Huzza! we're homeward bound."
And homeward we all--including Tom Jecks, who soon recovered from his injury--returned in safety, HMS _Teaser_ steaming gently one summer day into Plymouth Sound; and this is her log--my log--written by a boy.  But that was years ago, and I'm an old boy now.
THE END.

= = = PG21719 = = =
BLUE LIGHTS: HOT WORK IN THE SOUDAN
Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England
BLUE LIGHTS, BY R.M. BALLANTYNE.
CHAPTER ONE.
HOT WORK IN THE SOUDAN.
THE FALSE STEP.
There is a dividing ridge in the great northern wilderness of America, whereon lies a lakelet of not more than twenty yards in diameter.  It is of crystal clearness and profound depth, and on the still evenings of the Indian summer its surface forms a perfect mirror, which might serve as a toilet-glass for a Redskin princess.
We have stood by the side of that lakelet and failed to note the slightest symptom of motion in it, yet somewhere in its centre there was going on a constant and mysterious division of watery particles, and those of them which glided imperceptibly to the right flowed southward to the Atlantic, while those that trembled to the left found a resting-place by the frozen shores of Hudson's Bay.
As it is with the flow and final exit of those waters, so is it, sometimes, if not always, with the spirit and destiny of man.
Miles Milton, our hero, at the age of nineteen, stood at the dividing ridge of his life.  If the oscillating spirit, trembling between right and wrong, had decided to lean to the right, what might have been his fate no one can tell.  He paused on the balance a short time, then he leaned over to the left, and what his fate was it is the purpose of this volume to disclose.  At the outset, we may remark that it was not unmixed good.  Neither was it unmitigated evil.
Miles had a strong body, a strong will, and a somewhat passionate temper: a compound which is closely allied to dynamite!
His father, unfortunately, was composed of much the same materials.  The consequences were sometimes explosive.  It might have profited the son much had he studied the Scripture lesson, "Children, obey your parents in the Lord."  Not less might it have benefited the father to have pondered the words, "Fathers, provoke not your children to wrath."
Young Milton had set his heart on going into the army.  Old Milton had resolved to thwart the desire of his son.  The mother Milton, a meek and loving soul, experienced some hard times between the two.  Both loved _her_ intensely, and each loved himself, not better perhaps, but too much!
It is a sad task to have to recount the disputes between a father and a son.  We shrink from it and turn away.  Suffice it to say that one day Miles and his father had a Vesuvian meeting on the subject of the army. The son became petulant and unreasonable; the father fierce and tyrannical.  The end was that they parted in anger.
"Go, sir," cried the father sternly; "when you are in a better frame of mind you may return."
"Yes, father, I will go," cried the son, starting up, "and I will _never_ return."
Poor youth!  He was both right and wrong in this prophetic speech.  He did return home, but he did not return to his father.
With fevered pulse and throbbing heart he rushed into a plantation that lay at the back of his father's house.  He had no definite intention save to relieve his feelings by violent action.  Running at full speed, he came suddenly to a disused quarry that was full of water.  It had long been a familiar haunt as a bathing-pool.  Many a time in years past had he leaped off its precipitous margin into the deep water, and wantoned there in all the abandonment of exuberant youth.  The leap was about thirty feet, the depth of water probably greater.  Constant practice had rendered Miles so expert at diving and swimming that he had come to feel as much at home in the water as a New-Zealander.
Casting off his garments, he took the accustomed plunge by way of cooling his heart and brain.  He came up from the depths refreshed, but not restored to equanimity.  While dressing, the sense of injustice returned as strongly as before, and, with it, the hot indignation, so that, on afterwards reaching the highway, he paused only for a few moments.  This was the critical point.  Slowly but decidedly he leaned to the left.  He turned his back on his father's house, and caused the stones to spurt from under his heels as he walked rapidly away.
If Miles Milton had thought of his mother at that time he might have escaped many a day of bitter repentance, for she was as gentle as her husband was harsh; but the angry youth either forgot her at the moment, or, more probably, thrust the thought of her away.
Poor mother! if she had only known what a conflict between good and evil was going on in the breast of her boy, how she would have agonised in prayer for him!  But she did not know.  There was, however, One who did know, who loved him better even than his mother, and who watched and guarded him throughout all his chequered career.
It is not improbable that in spite of his resolves Miles would have relented before night and returned home had not a very singular incident intervened and closed the door behind him.
That day a notorious swindler had been tracked by a red-haired detective to the manufacturing city, to which Miles first directed his steps.  The bills describing the swindler set forth that he was quite young, tall, handsome, broad-shouldered, with black curling hair, and a budding moustache; that he was dressed in grey tweeds, and had a prepossessing manner.  Now this chanced to be in some respects an exact description of Miles Milton!
The budding moustache, to be sure, was barely discernible, still it was sufficiently so for a detective to found on.  His dress, too, was brown tweed, not grey; but of course dresses can be changed; and as to his manner, there could not be two opinions about that.
Now it chanced to be past one o'clock when Miles entered the town and felt himself impelled by familiar sensations to pause in front of an eating-house.  It was a poor eating-house in a low district, but Miles was not particular; still further, it was a temperance coffee-house, but Miles cared nothing for strong drink.  Strong health and spirits had served his purpose admirably up to that date.
Inside the eating-house there sat several men of the artisan class, and a few of the nondescript variety.  Among the latter was the red-haired detective.  He was engaged with a solid beef-steak.
"Oho!" escaped softly from his lips, when his sharp eyes caught sight of our hero.  So softly did he utter the exclamation that it might have been a mere remark of appreciation addressed to the steak, from which he did not again raise his eyes for a considerable time.
The place was very full of people--so full that there seemed scarcely room for another guest; but by some almost imperceptible motion the red-haired man made a little space close to himself.  The man next to him, with a hook-nose, widened the space by similar action, and Miles, perceiving that there was room, sat down.
"Bread and cheese," he said to the waiter.
"Bread an' cheese, sir?  Yessir."
Miles was soon actively engaged in mechanically feeding, while his mind was busy as to future plans.
Presently he became aware that the men on either side of him were scanning his features and person with peculiar attention.
"Coldish weather," remarked the red-haired man, looking at him in a friendly way.
"It is," replied Miles, civilly enough.
"Rather cold for bathin', ain't it, sir?" continued the detective carelessly, picking his teeth with a quill.
"How did you know that I've been bathing?" demanded Miles in surprise.
"I didn't know it."
"How did you guess it then?"
"Vell, it ain't difficult to guess that a young feller 'as bin 'avin' a swim w'en you see the 'air of 'is 'ead hall vet, an' 'is pocket-'ankercher lookin' as if it 'ad done dooty for a towel, not to mention 'is veskit 'avin' bin putt on in a 'urry, so as the buttons ain't got into the right 'oles, you see!"
Miles laughed, and resumed his bread and cheese.
"You are observant, I perceive," he said.
"Not wery partiklarly so," returned Redhair; "but I do obsarve that your boots tell of country roads.  Was it a long way hout of town as you was bathin' this forenoon, now?"
There was a free and easy familiarity about the man's tone which Miles resented, but, not wishing to run the risk of a disagreement in such company, he answered quietly--"Yes, a considerable distance; it was in an old quarry where I often bathe, close to my father's house."
"Ha! jest so, about 'alf-way to the willage of Ramplin', w'ere you slep' last night, if report speaks true, an' w'ere you left the _grey tweeds_, unless, p'r'aps, you sunk 'em in the old quarry."
"Why, what on earth do you mean?" asked Miles, with a look of such genuine surprise that Redhair was puzzled, and the man with the hooked nose, who had been listening attentively, looked slightly confused.
"Read that, sir," said the detective, extracting a newspaper cutting from his pocket and laying it on the table before Miles.
While he read, the two men watched him with interest, so did some of those who sat near, for they began to perceive that something was "in the wind."
The tell-tale blood sprang to the youth's brow as he read and perceived the meaning of the man's remarks.  At this Redhair and Hook-nose nodded to each other significantly.
"You don't mean to say," exclaimed Miles, in a tone of grand indignation which confirmed the men in their suspicion, "that you think this description applies to _me_?"
"I wouldn't insinivate too much, sir, though I have got my suspicions," said Redhair blandly; "but of course that's easy settled, for if your father's 'ouse is anyw'ere hereabouts, your father won't object to identify his son."
"Ridiculous!" exclaimed Miles, rising angrily at this interruption to his plans.  The two men rose promptly at the same moment.  "Of course my father will prove that you have made a mistake, but--"
He hesitated in some confusion, for the idea of re-appearing before his father so soon, and in such company, after so stoutly asserting that he would _never_ more return, was humiliating.  The detective observed the hesitation and became jocose.
"If you'd rather not trouble your parent," said Redhair, "you've got no call to do it.  The station ain't far off, and the sooner we get there the better for all parties."
A slight clink of metal at this point made Miles aware of the fact that Hook-nose was drawing a pair of handcuffs from one of his pockets.
The full significance of his position suddenly burst upon him.  The thought of being led home a prisoner, or conveyed to the police-station handcuffed, maddened him; and the idea of being thus unjustly checked at the very outset of his independent career made him furious.  For a few moments he stood so perfectly still and quiet that the detectives were thrown slightly off their guard.  Then there was an explosion of some sort within the breast of Miles Milton.  It expended itself in a sudden impulse, which sent Redhead flat on the table among the crockery, and drove Hook-nose into the fireplace among the fire-irons.  A fat little man chanced to be standing in the door-way.  The same impulse, modified, shot that little man into the street like a cork out of a bottle, and next moment Miles was flying along the pavement at racing speed, horrified at what he had done, but utterly reckless as to what might follow!
Hearing the shouts of pursuers behind him, and being incommoded by passers-by in the crowded thoroughfare, Miles turned sharply into a by-street, and would have easily made his escape--being uncommonly swift of foot--had he not been observed by an active little man of supple frame and presumptuous tendencies.  Unlike the mass of mankind around him--who stared and wondered--the active little man took in the situation at a glance, joined in the pursuit, kept well up, thus forming a sort of connecting-link between the fugitive and pursuers, and even took upon himself to shout "Stop thief!" as he ran.  Miles endeavoured to throw him off by putting on, as schoolboys have it, "a spurt."  But the active little man also spurted and did not fall far behind.  Then Miles tried a second double, and got into a narrow street, which a single glance showed him was a blind alley!  Disappointment and anger hereupon took possession of him, and he turned at bay with the tiger-like resolve to run a-muck!
Fortunately for himself he observed a pot of whitewash standing near a half-whitened wall, with a dirty canvas frock and a soiled billycock lying beside it.  The owner of the property had left it inopportunely, for, quick as thought, Miles wriggled into the frock, flung on the billycock, seized the pot, and walked in a leisurely way to the head of the alley.  He reached it just as the active little man turned into it, at the rate of ten miles an hour.  A yell of "Stop thief!" issued from the man's presumptuous lips at the moment.
His injunction was obeyed to the letter, for the would-be thief of an honest man's character on insufficient evidence was stopped by Miles's bulky person so violently that the whitewash was scattered all about, and part of it went into the active man's eyes.
To squash the large brush into the little man's face, and thus effectually complete what his own recklessness had begun, was the work of an instant.  As he did it, Miles assumed the role of the injured party, suiting his language to his condition.
"What d'ee mean by that, you houtrageous willain?" he cried savagely, to the great amusement of the bystanders, who instantly formed a crowd round them.  "Look wot a mess you've bin an' made o' my clean frock! Don't you see?"
The poor little man could not see.  He could only cough and gasp and wipe his face with his coat-tails.
"I'd give you in charge o' the pleece, I would, if it wasn't that you've pretty well punished yourself a'ready," continued Miles.  "Take 'im to a pump some o' you, 'cause I ain't got time.  Good-day, spider-legs, an' don't go for to run into a hartist again, with a paint-pot in 'is 'and."
So saying, Miles pushed through the laughing crowd and sauntered away. He turned into the first street he came to, and then went forward as fast as was consistent with the idea of an artisan in a hurry.  Being utterly ignorant of the particular locality into which he had penetrated--though well enough acquainted with the main thoroughfares of the city--his only care was to put as many intricate streets and lanes as possible between himself and the detectives.  This was soon done, and thereafter, turning into a darkish passage, he got rid of the paint-pot and borrowed costume.
Fortunately he had thrust his own soft helmet-shaped cap into his breast at the time he put on the billycock, and was thus enabled to issue from the dark passage very much like his former self, with the exception of a few spots of whitewash, which were soon removed.
Feeling now pretty safe, our hero walked a considerable distance through the unknown parts of the city, before he ventured to inquire the way to thoroughfares with which he was familiar.  Once in these, he proceeded at a smart pace to one of the railway stations, intending to leave town, though as yet he had formed no definite plan of action.  In truth, his mind was much troubled and confused by the action of his conscience, for when the thought of leaving home and entering the army as a private soldier, against his father's wishes, crossed his mind, Conscience faithfully shook his head; and when softer feelings prevailed, and the question arose irresistibly, "Shall I return home?" the same faithful friend whispered, "Yes."
In a state of indecision, Miles found himself borne along by a human stream to the booking-office.  Immediately in front of him were two soldiers,--one a sergeant, and the other a private of the line.
Both were tall handsome men, straight as arrows, and with that air of self-sufficient power which is as far removed from arrogance as it is from cowardice, and is by no means an uncommon feature in men of the British army.
Miles felt a strong, unaccountable attraction towards the young private. He had not yet heard his voice nor encountered his eye; indeed, being behind him, he had only seen his side-face, and as the expression on it was that of stern gravity, the attractive power could not have lain in that.  It might have lain in the youthful look of the lad, for albeit a goodly man in person, he was almost a boy in countenance, being apparently not yet twenty years of age.
Miles was at last roused to the necessity for prompt and decisive action by the voice of the sergeant saying in tones of authority--
"Portsmouth--third--two--single."
"That's the way to go it, lobster!" remarked a shabby man, next in the line behind Miles.
The grave sergeant paid no more regard to this remark than if it had been the squeak of a mouse.
"Now, then, sir, your carridge stops the way.  'Eave a'ead.  Shall I 'elp you?" said the shabby man.
Thus admonished, Miles, scarce knowing what he said, repeated the sergeant's words--
"Portsmouth--third--two--single."
"Vy, you ain't agoin' to pay for _me_, are you?" exclaimed the shabby man in smiling surprise.
"Oh! beg pardon.  I mean _one_," said Miles to the clerk, quickly.
The clerk retracted the second ticket with stolid indifference, and Miles, hastening to the platform, sat down on a seat, deeply and uncomfortably impressed with the fact that he possessed little or no money!  This unsatisfactory state of things had suddenly burst upon him while in the act of paying for his ticket.  He now made a careful examination of his purse, and found its contents to be exactly seven shillings and sixpence, besides a few coppers in his trousers-pocket.
Again indecision assailed him.  Should he return?  It was not too late. "Yes," said Conscience, with emphasis.  "No," said Shame.  False pride echoed the word, and Self-will re-echoed it.  Still our hero hesitated, and there is no saying what the upshot might have been if the bell had not rung at the moment, and, "Now, then, take your seats!" put an end to the controversy.
Another minute, and Miles Milton was seated opposite the two soldiers, rushing towards our great southern seaport at the rate of forty miles an hour.
CHAPTER TWO.
SHOWS SOME OF THE CONSEQUENCES OF THE FALSE STEP, AND INTRODUCES THE READER TO PECULIAR COMPANY.
Our hero soon discovered that the sergeant was an old campaigner, having been out in Egypt at the beginning of the war, and fought at the famous battle of Tel-el-Kebir.
In his grave and undemonstrative way and quiet voice, this man related some of his experiences, so as not only to gain the attention of his companion in arms, but to fascinate all who chanced to be within earshot of him--not the least interested among whom, of course, was our friend Miles.
As the sergeant continued to expatiate on those incidents of the war which had come under his own observation, three points impressed themselves on our hero: first, that the sergeant was evidently a man of serious, if not religious, spirit; second, that while he gave all due credit to his comrades for their bravery in action, he dwelt chiefly on those incidents which brought out the higher qualities of the men, such as uncomplaining endurance, forbearance, etcetera, and he never boasted of having given "a thorough licking" to the Egyptians, nor spoke disparagingly of the native troops; lastly, that he seemed to lay himself out with a special view to the unflagging entertainment of his young comrade.
The reason for this last purpose he learned during a short halt at one of the stations.  Seeing the sergeant standing alone there, Miles, after accosting him with the inevitable references to the state of the weather, remarked that his comrade seemed to be almost too young for the rough work of soldiering.
"Yes, he is young enough, but older than he looks," answered the sergeant.  "Poor lad!  I'm sorry for him."
"Indeed!  He does not seem to me a fit subject for pity.  Young, strong, handsome, intelligent, he seems pretty well furnished to begin the battle of life--especially in the army."
"`Things are not what they seem,'" returned the soldier, regarding his young questioner with something between a compassionate and an amused look.  "`All is not gold that glitters.'  Soldiering is not made up of brass bands, swords, and red coats!"
"Having read a good deal of history I am well aware of that," retorted Miles, who was somewhat offended by the implication contained in the sergeant's remarks.
"Well, then, you see," continued the sergeant, "all the advantages that you have mentioned, and which my comrade certainly possesses, weigh nothing with him at all just now, because this sudden call to the wars separates him from his poor young wife."
"Wife!" exclaimed Miles; "why, he seems to me little more than a boy-- except in size, and perhaps in gravity."
"He is over twenty, and, as to gravity--well, most young fellows would be grave enough if they had to leave a pretty young wife after six months of wedded life.  You see, he married without leave, and so, even if it were a time of peace, his wife would not be recognised by the service.  In wartime he must of course leave her behind him.  It has been a hard job to prevent him from deserting, and now it's all I can do to divert his attention from his sorrow by stirring him up with tales of the recent wars."
At this point the inexorable bell rang, doors were banged, whistles sounded, and the journey was resumed.
Arrived at Portsmouth, Miles was quickly involved in the bustle of the platform.  He had made up his mind to have some private conversation with the sergeant as to the possibility of entering her Majesty's service as a private soldier, and was on the point of accompanying his military travelling companions into the comparative quiet of the street when a porter touched his cap--
"Any luggage, sir?"
"Luggage?--a--no--no luggage!"
It was the first moment since leaving home that the thought of luggage had entered into his brain!  That thought naturally aroused other thoughts, such as lodgings, food, friends, funds, and the like.  On turning to the spot where his military companions had stood, he discovered that they were gone.  Running to the nearest door-way he found it to be the wrong one, and before he found the right one and reached the street the two soldiers had vanished from the scene.
"You seem to be a stranger here, sir.  Can I direct you?" said an insinuating voice at his elbow.
The speaker was an elderly man of shabby-genteel appearance and polite address.  Miles did not quite like the look of him.  In the circumstances, however, and with a strangely desolate feeling of loneliness creeping over him, he did not see his way to reject a civil offer.
"Thank you.  I am indeed a stranger, and happen to have neither friend nor acquaintance in the town, so if you can put me in the way of finding a respectable lodging--a--a _cheap_ one, you will greatly oblige me."
"With pleasure," said the man, "if you will accompany--"
"Stay, don't trouble yourself to show me the way," interrupted Miles; "just name a house and the street, that will--"
"No trouble at all, sir," said the man.  "I happen to be going in the direction of the docks, and know of excellent as well as cheap lodgings there."
Making no further objection, Miles followed his new friend into the street.  For some time, the crowd being considerable and noisy, they walked in silence.
At the time we write of, Portsmouth was ringing with martial music and preparations for war.
At all times the red-coats and the blue-jackets are prominent in the streets of that seaport; for almost the whole of our army passes through it at one period or another, either in going to or returning from "foreign parts."  But at this time there was the additional bustle resulting from the Egyptian war.  Exceptional activity prevailed in its yards, and hurry in its streets.  Recruits, recently enlisted, flocked into it from all quarters, while on its jetties were frequently landed the sad fruits of war in the form of wounded men.
"Have you ever been in Portsmouth before?" asked the shabby-genteel man, on reaching a part of the town which was more open and less crowded.
"Never.  I had no idea it was so large and bustling," said Miles.
"The crowding and bustling is largely increased just now, of course, in consequence of the war in Egypt," returned the man.  "Troops are constantly embarking, and others returning.  It is a noble service!  Men start in thousands from this port young, hearty, healthy, and full of spirit; they return--those of them who return at all--sickly, broken-down, and with no spirit at all except what they soon get poured into them by the publicans.  Yes; commend me to the service of my Queen and country!"
There was a sneering tone in the man's voice which fired his companion's easily roused indignation.
"Mind what you say about our Queen while in _my_ company," said Miles sternly, stopping short and looking the man full in the face.  "I am a loyal subject, and will listen to nothing said in disparagement of the Queen or of her Majesty's forces."
"Bless you, sir," said the man quickly, "I'm a loyal subject myself, and wouldn't for the world say a word against her Majesty.  No more would I disparage her troops; but, after all, the army ain't perfect, you know. Even _you_ must admit that, sir.  With all its noble qualities there's room for improvement."
There was such an air of sincerity--or at least of assumed humility--in the man's tone and manner that Miles felt it unjustifiable to retain his indignation.  At the same time, he could not all at once repress it, and was hesitating whether to fling off from the man or to forgive him, when the sound of many voices, and of feet tramping in regular time, struck his ear and diverted his attention.  Next moment the head of a regiment, accompanied by a crowd of juvenile admirers, swept round the corner of the street.  At the same instant a forest of bayonets gleamed upon the youth's vision, and a brass band burst with crashing grandeur upon his ear, sending a quiver of enthusiasm into the deepest recesses of his soul, and stirring the very marrow in his bones!
Miles stood entranced until the regiment had passed, and the martial strains were softened by distance; then he looked up and perceived that his shabby companion was regarding him with a peculiar smile.
"I think you've a notion of being a soldier," he said, with a smile.
"Where is that regiment going?" asked Miles, instead of answering the question.
"To barracks at present; to Egypt in a few days.  There'll be more followin' it before long."
It was a distracting as well as an exciting walk that Miles had through the town, for at every turn he passed couples or groups of soldiers, or sailors, or marines, and innumerable questions sprang into and jostled each other in his mind, while, at the same moment, his thoughts and feelings were busy with his present circumstances and future prospects. The distraction was increased by the remarks and comments of his guide, and he would fain have got rid of him; but good-feeling, as well as common-sense, forbade his casting him off without sufficient reason.
Presently he stopped, without very well knowing why, in front of a large imposing edifice.  Looking up, he observed the words SOLDIERS' INSTITUTE in large letters on the front of it.
"What sort of an Institute is that?" he asked.
"Oh! it's a miserable affair, where soldiers are taken in cheap, as they say, an' done for," returned the shabby man hurriedly, as if the subject were distasteful to him.  "Come along with me and I'll show you places where soldiers--ay, and civilians too--can enjoy themselves like gentlemen, an' get value for their money."
As he spoke, two fine-looking men issued from a small street close to them, and crossed the road--one a soldier of the line, the other a marine.
"Here it is, Jack," exclaimed the soldier to his friend; "Miss Sarah Robinson's Institoot, that you've heard so much about.  Come an' I'll show you where you can write your letter in peace--"
Thus much was overheard by Miles as they turned into a side-street, and entered what was obviously one of the poorer districts of the town.
"Evidently that soldier's opinion does not agree with yours," remarked Miles, as they walked along.
"More's the pity!" returned the shabby man, whose name he had informed his companion was Sloper.  "Now we are getting among places, you see, where there's a good deal of drinking going on."
"I scarcely require to be told that," returned Miles, curtly; for he was beginning to feel his original dislike to Mister Sloper intensified.
It did not indeed require any better instructor than eyes and ears to inform our hero that the grog-shops around him were full, and that a large proportion of the shouting and swearing revellers inside were soldiers and seamen.
By this time it was growing dark, and most of the gin-palaces were beginning to send forth that glare of intense and warm light with which they so knowingly attract the human moths that constitute their prey.
"Here we are," said Sloper, stopping in front of a public-house in a narrow street.  "This is one o' the _respectable_ lodgin's.  Most o' the others are disreputable.  It's not much of a neighbourhood, I admit."
"It certainly is not very attractive," said Miles, hesitating.
"You said you wanted a cheap one," returned Sloper, "and you can't expect to have it cheap and fashionable, you know.  You've no occasion to be afraid.  Come in."
The arguments of Mr Sloper might have failed to move Miles, but the idea of his being _afraid_ to go anywhere was too much for him.
"Go in, then," he said, firmly, and followed.
The room into which he was ushered was a moderately large public-house, with a bar and a number of tables round the room, at which many men and a few women were seated; some gambling, others singing or disputing, and all drinking and smoking.  It is only right to say that Miles was shocked.  Hitherto he had lived a quiet and comparatively innocent country life.  He knew of such places chiefly from books or hearsay, or had gathered merely the superficial knowledge that comes through the opening of a swing-door.  For the first time in his life he stood inside a low drinking-shop, breathing its polluted atmosphere and listening to its foul language.  His first impulse was to retreat, but false shame, the knowledge that he had no friend in Portsmouth, or place to go to, that the state of his purse forbade his indulging in more suitable accommodation, and a certain pride of character which made him always determine to carry out what he had resolved to do--all these considerations and facts combined to prevent his acting on the better impulse.  He doggedly followed his guide to a small round table and sat down.
Prudence, however, began to operate within him.  He felt that he had done wrong; but it was too late now, he thought, to retrace his steps. He would, however, be on his guard; would not encourage the slightest familiarity on the part of any one, and would keep his eyes open.  For a youth who had seen nothing of the world this was a highly commendable resolve.
"What'll you drink?" asked Mr Sloper.
Miles was on the point of saying "Coffee," but, reflecting that the beverage might not be readily obtainable in such a place, he substituted "Beer."
Instead of calling the waiter, Mr Sloper went himself to the bar to fetch the liquor.  While he was thus engaged, Miles glanced round the room, and was particularly struck with the appearance of a large, fine-looking sailor who sat at the small table next to him, with hands thrust deep into his trousers-pockets, his chin resting on his broad chest, and a solemn, owlish stare in his semi-drunken yet manly countenance.  He sat alone, and was obviously in a very sulky frame of mind--a condition which he occasionally indicated through a growl of dissatisfaction.
As Miles sat wondering what could have upset the temper of a tar whose visage was marked by the unmistakable lines and dimples of good-humour, he overheard part of the conversation that passed between the barman and Mr Sloper.
"What! have they got hold o' Rattling Bill?" asked the former, as he drew the beer.
"Ay, worse luck," returned Sloper.  "I saw the sergeant as I came along lead him over to Miss Robinson's trap--confound her!"
"Don't you go fur to say anything agin Miss Robinson, old man," suddenly growled the big sailor, in a voice so deep and strong that it silenced for a moment the rest of the company.  "Leastways, you may if you like, but if you do, I'll knock in your daylights, an' polish up your figur'-head so as your own mother would mistake you fur a battered saucepan!"
The seaman did not move from his semi-recumbent position as he uttered this alarming threat, but he accompanied it with a portentous frown and an owlish wink of both eyes.
"What! have _you_ joined the Blue Lights?" asked Sloper, with a smile, referring to the name by which the religious and temperance men of the army were known.
"No, I ha'n't.  Better for me, p'r'aps, if I had.  Here, waiter, fetch me another gin-an'-warer.  An' more o' the gin than the warer, mind. Heave ahead or I'll sink you!"
Having been supplied with a fresh dose of gin and water, the seaman appeared to go to sleep, and Miles, for want of anything better to do, accepted Sloper's invitation to play a game of dominoes.
"Are the beds here pretty good?" he asked, as they were about to begin.
"Yes, first-rate--for the money," answered Sloper.
"That's a lie!" growled the big sailor.  "They're bad at any price-- stuffed wi' cocoa-nuts and marline-spikes."
Mr Sloper received this observation with the smiling urbanity of a man who eschews war at all costs.
"You don't drink," he said after a time, referring to Miles's pot of beer, which he had not yet touched.
Miles made no reply, but by way of answer took up the pot and put it to his lips.
He had not drunk much of it when the big seaman rose hurriedly and staggered between the two tables.  In doing so, he accidentally knocked the pot out of the youth's hand, and sent the contents into Mr Sloper's face and down into his bosom, to the immense amusement of the company.
That man of peace accepted the baptism meekly, but Miles sprang up in sudden anger.
The seaman turned to him, however, with a benignantly apologetic smile.
"Hallo! messmate.  I ax your parding.  They don't leave room even for a scarecrow to go about in this here cabin.  I'll stand you another glass. Give us your flipper!"
There was no resisting this, it was said so heartily.  Miles grasped the huge hand that was extended and shook it warmly.
"All right," he said, laughing.  "I don't mind the beer, and there's plenty more where that came from, but I fear you have done some damage to my fr--"
"Your _friend_.  Out with it, sir.  Never be ashamed to acknowledge your friends," exclaimed the shabby man, as he wiped his face.  "Hold on a bit," he added, rising; "I'll have to change my shirt.  Won't keep you waitin' long."
"Another pot o' beer for this 'ere gen'lem'n," said the sailor to the barman as Sloper left the room.
Paying for the drink, he returned and put the pot on the table.  Then, turning to Miles, he said in a low voice and with an intelligent look--
"Come outside for a bit, messmate.  I wants to speak to 'ee."
Miles rose and followed the man in much surprise.
"You'll excuse me, sir," he said, when a few yards away from the door; "but I see that you're green, an' don't know what a rascally place you've got into.  I've been fleeced there myself, and yet I'm fool enough to go back!  Most o' the parties there--except the sailors an' sodgers--are thieves an' blackguards.  They've drugged your beer, I know; that's why I capsized it for you, and the feller that has got hold o' you is a well-known decoy-duck.  I don't know how much of the ready you may have about you, but this I does know, whether it be much or little, you wouldn't have a rap of it in the mornin' if you stayed the night in this here house."
"Are you sure of this, friend?" asked Miles, eyeing his companion doubtfully.
"Ay, as sure as I am that my name's Jack Molloy."
"But you've been shamming drunk all this time.  How am I to know that you are not shamming friendship now?"
"No, young man," returned the seaman with blinking solemnity.  "I'm not shammin' drunk.  I on'y wish I was, for I'm three sheets in the wind at this minute, an' I've a splittin' headache due i' the mornin'.  The way as you've got to find out whether I'm fair an' above-board is to look me straight in the face an' don't wink.  If that don't settle the question, p'r'aps it'll convince you w'en I tells you that I don't care a rap whether you go back to that there grog-shop or not.  Only I'll clear my conscience--leastways, wot's left of it--by tellin' ye that if you do-- you--you'll wish as how you hadn't--supposin' they leave you the power to wish anything at all."
"Well, I believe you are a true man, Mister Molloy--"
"Don't Mister me, mate," interrupted the seaman.
"My name's Jack Molloy, at your service, an' that name don't require no handle--either Mister or Esquire--to prop it up."
The way in which the sailor squared his broad shoulders when he said this rendered it necessary to prop himself up.  Seeing which, Miles afforded the needful aid by taking his arm in a friendly way.
"But come, let us go back," he said.  "I must pay for my beer, you know."
"Your beer is paid for, young man," said Molloy, stopping and refusing to move.  "_I_ paid for it, so you've on'y got to settle with _me_. Besides, if you go back you're done for.  And you've no call to go back to say farewell to your dear friend Sloper, for he'll on'y grieve over the loss of your tin.  As to the unpurliteness o' the partin'--he won't break his heart over that.  No--you'll come wi' me down to the _Sailors' Welcome_ near the dock-gates, where you can get a good bed for sixpence a night, a heavy blow-out for tenpence, with a splendid readin'-room, full o' rockin' chairs, an' all the rest of it for nothin'.  An there's a lavatory--that's the name that they give to a place for cleanin' of yourself up--a lavatory--where you can wash yourself, if you like, till your skin comes off!  W'en I first putt up at the _Welcome_, the messmate as took me there said to me, says he, `Jack,' says he, `you was always fond o' water.'  `Right you are,' says I.  `Well,' says he, `there's a place in the _Sailors' Welcome_ where you can wash yourself all day, if you like, for nothing!'
"I do b'lieve it was that as indooced me to give in.  I went an' saw this lavatory, an' I was so took up with it that I washed my hands in every bason in the place--one arter the other--an' used up ever so much soap, an'--would you believe it?--my hands wasn't clean after all!  Yes, it's one the wery best things in Portsm'uth, is Miss Robinson's Welcome--"
"Miss Robinson again!" exclaimed Miles.
"Ay--wot have you got to find fault wi' Miss Robinson?" demanded the sailor sternly.
"No fault to find at all," replied Miles, suffering himself to be hurried away by his new friend; "but wherever I have gone since arriving in Portsmouth her name has cropped up!"
"In Portsmouth!" echoed the sailor.  "Let me tell you, young man, that wherever you go all over the world, if there's a British soldier there, Miss Sarah Robinson's name will be sure to crop up.  Why, don't you know that she's `The Soldiers' Friend'?"
"I'm afraid I must confess to ignorance on the point--yet, stay, now you couple her name with `The Soldier's Friend,' I have got a faint remembrance of having heard it before.  Have I not heard of a Miss Weston, too, in connection with a work of some sort among sailors?"
"Ay, no doubt ye have.  She has a grand Institoot in Portsm'uth too, but she goes in for sailors _only_--all over the kingdom--w'ereas Miss Robinson goes in for soldiers an' sailors both, though mainly for the soldiers.  She set agoin' the _Sailors' Welcome_ before Miss Weston began in Portsm'uth, an' so she keeps it up, but there ain't no opposition or rivalry.  Their aims is pretty much alike, an' so they keep stroke together wi' the oars.  But I'll tell you more about that when you get inside.  Here we are!  There's the dock-gates, you see, and that's Queen Street, an' the _Welcome's_ close at hand.  It's a teetotal house, you know.  All Miss Robinson's Institoots is that."
"Indeed!  How comes it, then, that a man--excuse me--`three sheets in the wind,' can gain admittance?"
"Oh! as to that, any sailor or soldier may get admittance, even if he's as drunk as a fiddler, if he on'y behaves his-self.  But they won't supply drink on the premises, or allow it to be brought in--'cept inside o' you, of coorse.  Cause why? you can't help that--leastwise not without the help of a stomach-pump.  Plenty o' men who ain't abstainers go to sleep every night at the _Welcome_, 'cause they find the beds and other things so comfortable.  In fact, some hard topers have been indooced to take the pledge in consekince o' what they've heard an' seen in this _Welcome_, though they came at first only for the readin'-room an' beds.  Here, let me look at you under this here lamp.  Yes.  You'll do.  You're something like a sea-dog already.  You won't object to change hats wi' me?"
"Why?" asked Miles, somewhat amused.
"Never you mind that, mate.  You just putt yourself under my orders if you'd sail comfortably before the wind.  I'll arrange matters, an' you can square up in the morning."
As Miles saw no particular reason for objecting to this fancy of his eccentric friend, he exchanged his soft cap for the sailor's straw hat, and they entered the _Welcome_ together.
CHAPTER THREE.
THE "SAILORS' WELCOME"--MILES HAS A NIGHT OF IT AND ENLISTS--HIS FRIEND ARMSTRONG HAS AN AGREEABLE SURPRISE AT THE SOLDIERS' INSTITUTE.
It was not long before our hero discovered the reason of Jack Molloy's solicitude about his appearance.  It was that he, Miles, should pass for a sailor, and thus be in a position to claim the hospitality of the _Sailors' Welcome_,--to the inner life of which, civilians were not admitted, though they were privileged, with the public in general, to the use of the outer refreshment-room.
"Come here, Jack Molloy," he said, leading his friend aside, when he made this discovery.  "You pride yourself on being a true-blue British tar, don't you?"
"I does," said Jack, with a profound solemnity of decision that comported well with his character and condition.
"And you would scorn to serve under the French flag, or the Turkish flag, or the Black flag, or any flag but the Union Jack, wouldn't you?"
"Right you are, mate; them's my sentiments to a tee!"
"Well, then, you can't expect _me_ to sail under false colours any more than yourself," continued Miles.  "I scorn to sail into this port under your straw hat, so I'll strike these colours, bid you good-bye, and make sail for another port where a civilian will be welcome."
Molloy frowned at the floor for some moments in stern perplexity.
"You've took the wind out o' my sails entirely, you have," he replied at last; "an' you're right, young man, but I'm troubled about you.  If you don't run into this here port you'll have to beat about in the offing all night, or cast anchor in the streets, for I don't know of another lodgin' in Portsm'uth w'ere you could hang out except them disrepitible grog-shops.  In coorse, there's the big hotels; but I heerd you say to Sloper that you was bound to do things cheap, bein' hard up."
"Never mind, my friend," said Miles quickly.  "I will manage somehow; so good-night, and many thanks to you for the interest you have taken in--"
"Avast, mate! there's no call to go into action in sitch a hurry.  This here _Sailors' Welcome_ opens the doors of its bar an' refreshment-room, an' spreads its purvisions before all an' sundry as can afford to pay its moderate demands.  It's on'y the after-cabin you're not free to.  So you'll have a bit supper wi' me before you set sail on your night cruise."
Being by that time rather hungry as well as fatigued, Miles agreed to remain for supper.  While they were engaged with it, he was greatly impressed with the number of sailors and marines who passed into the reading-room beyond the bar, or who sat down at the numerous tables around to have a hearty supper, which they washed down with tea and coffee instead of beer or gin--apparently with tremendous appetite and much satisfaction.
"Look ye here," said Jack Molloy, rising when their "feed" was about concluded, "I've no doubt they won't object to your taking a squint at the readin'-room, though they won't let you use it."  Following his companion, Miles passed by a glass double door into an enormous well-lighted, warm room, seventy feet long, and of proportionate width and height, in which a goodly number of men of the sea were busy as bees--some of them reading books or turning over illustrated papers and magazines, others smoking their pipes, and enjoying themselves in rocking-chairs in front of the glowing fire, chatting, laughing, and yarning as free-and-easily as if in their native fo'c's'ls, while a few were examining the pictures on the walls, or the large models of ships which stood at one side of the room.  At the upper end a full-sized billiard-table afforded amusement to several players, and profound interest to a number of spectators, who passed their comments on the play with that off-hand freedom which seems to be a product of fresh gales and salt-water.  A door standing partly open at the upper end of this apartment revealed a large hall, from which issued faintly the sound of soft music.
"Ain't it snug? and there's no gamblin' agoin' on there," remarked Molloy, as they returned to their table; "that's not allowed--nor drinkin', nor card-playin', but that's all they putt a stop to.  She's a wise woman is Miss Robinson.  She don't hamper us wi' no rules.  Why, bless you, Jack ashore would never submit to rules!  He gits more than enough o' them afloat.  No; it's liberty hall here.  We may come an' go as we like, at all hours o' the day and night, an' do exactly as we please, so long as we don't smash up the furnitur', or feed without payin', or make ourselves a gineral noosance.  They don't even forbid swearin'.  They say they leave the matter o' lingo to our own good taste and good sense.  An' d'you know, it's wonderful what an' amount o' both we've got w'en we ain't worried about it!  You'll scarce hear an oath in this house from mornin' to evenin', though you'll hear a deal o' snorin' doorin' the night!  That's how the place takes so well, d'ee see?"
"Then the _Welcome_ is well patronised, I suppose?"
"Patronised!" exclaimed the seaman; "that's so, an' no mistake.  Why, mate--But what's your name?  I've forgot to ax you that all this time!"
"Call me Miles," said our hero, with some hesitation.
"_Call_ you Miles!  _Ain't_ you Miles?"
"Well, yes, I am; only there's more of my name than that, but that's enough for your purpose, I daresay."
"All right.  Well, Miles, you was askin' how the house is patronised. I'll tell 'ee.  They make up about two hundred an' twenty beds in it altogether, an' these are chock-full a'most every night.  One way or another they had forty-four thousand men, more or less, as slep' under this roof last year--so I've bin told.  That's patronisin', ain't it? To say nothin' o' the fellers as comes for--grub, which, as you've found, is good for the money, and the attendants is civil.  You see, they're always kind an' attentive here, 'cause they professes to think more of our souls than our bodies--which we've no objection to, d'ee see, for the lookin' arter our souls includes the lookin' arter our bodies!  An' they don't bother us in no way to attend their Bible-readin's an' sitchlike.  There they are in separate rooms; if you want 'em you may go; if you don't, you can let 'em alone.  No compulsion, which comes quite handy to some on us, for I don't myself care much about sitchlike things.  So long's my body's all right, I leaves my soul to look arter itself."
As the seaman said this with a good-natured smile of indifference, there sprang to the mind of his young companion words that had often been impressed on him by his mother: "What shall it profit a man if he should gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?" but he made no reference to this at the time.
"Hows'ever," continued Molloy, "as they don't worrit us about religion, except to give us a good word an' a blessin' now an' again, and may-hap a little book to read, we all patronises the house; an it's my opinion, if it was twice as big as it is, we'd fill it chock-full.  I would board as well as sleep in it myself--for it's full o' conveniences, sitch as lockers to putt our things in, an' baths, and what not, besides all the other things I've mentioned--but the want o' drink staggers me.  I can't git along without a drop o' drink."
Miles thought that his nautical friend appeared to be unable to get along without a good many drops of drink, but he was too polite to say so.
"Man alive!" continued Jack Molloy, striking his huge fist on his thigh with emphasis; "it's a wonderful place is this _Welcome_!  An' it's a lively place too.  Why, a fellow hanged his-self in one o' the bunks overhead not long ago."
"You don't mean that?" exclaimed Miles, rather shocked.
"In course I does.  But they heard 'im gaspin', an cut him down in time to save him.  It was drink they say as made him do it, and they got him to sign the pledge arterwards.  I believe he's kep' it too.  Leastwise I know many a hard drinker as have bin indooced to give it up and stuck to it--all through comin' here to have a snooze in a comfortable hunk. They give the bunks names--cubicles they calls 'em in the lump. Separately, there's the `Commodore Goodenough Cot,' an' the `Little Nellie Cot,' an' the `Sunshine Cot'--so called 'cause it hain't got a port-hole to let in the daylight at all; and the `Billy Rough 'un'--"
"The what?"
"`The Billy Rough 'un'--arter the ship o' that name, you know--"
"Oh! you mean the _Bellerophon_."
"Well, young man, an' didn't I _say_ the `Billy Rough 'un'?  Then there's the--But what's your hurry?" said the seaman, as Miles rose.
"It's getting late now, friend.  If I'm to find another lodging I must be off.  Doubtless, I'll find some respectable house to take me in for the night."  Miles suppressed a yawn as he put on his cap.
"I don't believe you will," returned Molloy, also rising, and giving full vent to a sympathetic and vociferous yawn.  "Hows'ever, w'en a young feller insists on havin' his way, it's best to give him plenty of cable and let him swing.  He's sure to find out his mistake by experience.  But look ye here, Miles, I've took a fancy to you, an' I'd be sorry to think you was in difficulties.  If," he continued, thrusting a hand into his breeches-pocket, and bringing up therefrom a mass of mixed gold, silver, and copper--"if you don't objec' to accep' of a loan of--"
"Thank you--no, my friend.  It is very kind of you," said Miles quickly; "but I have quite enough for present necessities.  So good-night."
"All right," returned the sailor, thrusting the money back into his pocket.  "But if you should ever want a jaw with Jack Molloy while you're in this here port you've only got to hail him at the _Sailors' Welcome_, an' if he should happen to be out, they always can tell you where he's cruisin'.  Good-night, an' luck go wi' ye!"
Another tremendous yawn finished the speech, and next moment Miles found himself in the street, oppressed with a strange and miserable sensation which he had never before experienced.  Indeed, he had to lean against the house for a few minutes after coming out into the fresh air, and felt as if the power of connected thought was leaving him.
He was aroused from this condition by the flashing of a light in his eyes.  Opening them wide, he beheld a policeman looking at him earnestly.
"Now, then, young fellow," said the guardian of the night; "d'you think you can take care of yourself?"
"Oh! yes, quite well.  It's only a giddy feeling that came over me.  I'm all right," said Miles, rousing himself and passing on.
He staggered slightly, however, and a short "Humph!" from the policeman showed that he believed the youth to be something more than giddy.
Ashamed to be even unjustly supposed to be intoxicated, Miles hurried away, wondering very much what could be the matter with him, for he had not tasted a drop of strong drink, except the half-glass of beer he had swallowed before Molloy chanced to knock it out of his hand.  Suddenly he remembered that the sailor had said the beer was drugged.  If he could have asked the barman who had served him, that worthy could have told him that this was true; that the whole glassful, if swallowed, would, ere long, have rendered him insensible, and that what he had already taken was enough to do him considerable damage.
As he walked onward, he became rapidly worse; the people and the streets seemed to swim before him; an intense desire to sleep overpowered every other feeling, and at last, turning into a dark entry, he lay down and pillowed his head on a door-step.  Here he was found by a policeman; a stretcher was fetched, and he was conveyed to the station as "drunk and incapable!"
When brought before the Inspector the following morning, shame and reckless despair were the tenants of his breast.  Those tenants were not expelled, but rather confirmed in possession, when the Inspector--after numerous questions, to which Miles returned vague unsatisfactory replies--adopted the role of the faithful friend, and gave him a great deal of paternal advice, especially with reference to the avoidance of strong drink and bad companions.
Miles had the wisdom, however, to conceal his feelings, and to take the reproof and advice in good part.  Afterwards, on being set free, he met a recruiting sergeant, who, regarding him as a suitable subject for the service of her Majesty, immediately laid siege to him.  In his then state of mind the siege was an easy one.  In short, he capitulated at once and entered the Queen's service, under the name of John Miles.
We need scarcely say that his heart misgave him, that his conscience condemned him, and that, do what he would, he could not shut out the fact that his taking so hasty and irrevocable a step was a poor return for all the care and anxiety of his parents in years gone by.  But, as we have said, or hinted, Miles was one of those youths who, when they have once made up their minds to a certain course of action, fancy that they are bound to pursue it to the end.  Hence it was that he gave his name as John Miles instead of Miles Milton, so that he might baffle any inquiries as to what had become of him.
Once enlisted, he soon began to realise the fact that he was no longer a free agent--at least not in the sense in which he had been so up to that period of his life.  Constant drill was the order of the day for some weeks; for there was a demand for more troops for Egypt at the time, and regiments were being made up to their full strength as fast as possible.
During this period Miles saw little of his companions in arms personally, save that group of recruits who were being "licked into shape" along with him.  At first he was disappointed with these, for most of them were shy, unlettered men; some, raw lads from the country; and others, men who seemed to have been loafers before joining, and were by no means attractive.
The drill-sergeant, however, was a good, though stern man, and soon recognised the differences in character, aptitude, and willingness among his raw recruits.  This man, whose name was Hardy, made a powerful impression on our hero from the first; there was something so quiet and even gentle about him, in spite of his firm and inflexible demands in regard to the matters of drill and duty.  To please this man, Miles gave himself heart and soul to his work, and was soon so efficient as to be allowed to join the regiment.
And here he found, to his surprise and satisfaction, that the sergeant and young soldier with whom he had travelled to Portsmouth, were members of the company to which he was attached.  As we have said, Miles had taken a great fancy at first sight to the young private, whose name was William Armstrong.  Our hero was of an affectionate disposition, and would have allowed his warm feelings to expend themselves on a dog rather than have denied them free play.  No wonder, then, that he was attracted by the handsome manly countenance and deferential manner of Armstrong, who, although an uneducated youth, and reared in the lower ranks of life, was gifted with those qualities of the true gentleman which mere social position can neither bestow nor take away.  His intellect also was of that active and vigorous fibre which cannot be entirely repressed by the want of scholastic training.
The affection was mutual, for the contrasts and similarities of the two men were alike calculated to draw them together.  Both were tall, broad, square-shouldered, erect, and soldierly, yet, withal, modest as well in demeanour as in feeling, and so exactly like to each other in size and figure, and in the quiet gravity of their expressions, that they might well have been taken for twin brothers.  When, in uniform, the two strode along the streets of Portsmouth, people were apt to turn and look at them, and think, no doubt, that with many such men in the British army it would go hard with the foes of Old England!
The bond of union was still further strengthened by the fact that, while the comparatively learned Miles was enthusiastic and communicative, the unlettered Armstrong was inquisitive and receptive, fond of prying into the nature of things, and always ready as well as competent to discuss-- not merely to _argue_.  Observe the distinction, good reader. Discussion means the shaking of any subject into its component parts with a desire to understand it.  Argument has come very much to signify the enravelment of any subject with a view to the confusion and conquest of an opponent.  Both young men abhorred the latter and liked the former.  Hence much of their harmony and friendship.
"Will you come with me up town?" said Armstrong to Miles one day, as he was about to quit the barrack-room.  "I'm going to see if there's any news of my Emmy."
"I did not know you expected her," said Miles.  "Come along, I'm ready."
"I don't expect her yet," returned Armstrong, as they left the barracks; "I only look for a letter, because it was on Wednesday that I wrote telling her of my going to Egypt, and she can scarce have had time to get ready to come down, poor girl!  In fact I am going to engage a room for her.  By the way, I heard this morning that there's to be another draft for Egypt, so you'll have a chance to go."
"I'm rejoiced to hear it," returned Miles; "for, to say the truth, I had been growing envious of your good fortune in being ordered on active service."
"Hooroo, Armstrong, where away now?" cried an unmistakably Irish voice, as a smart little soldier crossed the street to them, and was introduced to Miles as Corporal Flynn, belonging to another company in his own regiment.
"My blissin' on ye, Miles.  John, is it?"
"Yes, John," replied our hero, much amused at the free-and-easy address of the little corporal.
"Well, John Miles," he said, "I don't know whether ye'll laugh or cry whin I tell ye that you'll likely be warned this evenin' for the draft that's goin' to Aigypt."
"I certainly won't cry," returned Miles, with a laugh.  Yet the news brought a sudden feeling into his breast which was strongly allied to the opposite of laughter, for the thought of parting from father and mother without bidding them farewell fell upon his spirit with crushing weight; but, like too many men who know they are about to do wrong, Miles hardened his heart with the delusive argument that, having fairly taken the step, it was impossible for him now to retrace it.  He knew-- at least he thought--that there was still the possibility of being bought off, and that his stern father would only be too glad to help him.  He also knew that at least he had time to write and let them know his circumstances, so that they might run down to Portsmouth and bid him good-bye; but he had taken the bit in his teeth, and now he resolved to abide the consequences.
Turning from his companions while they conversed, he looked into a shop-window.
"Your chum's in the blues," said the lively corporal, in a lower voice.
"Young fellows are often in that state after joining, ain't they?" returned Armstrong.
"True for ye--an' more shame to them, whin they ought to be as proud as paycocks at wearin' her gracious Majesty's uniform.  But good luck to 'ee!  I must be off, for I'm bound for Aigypt mesilf."
"I am glad that I shall have the chance of seeing your wife, for I've been much interested in her since your friend Sergeant Gilroy told me about her," said Miles, as they resumed their walk.  "Surely it is hard of them to refuse to let her go with the regiment."
"Well, it _is_ hard," returned the young soldier; "but after all I cannot find fault with the powers that be, for I married with my eyes open.  I knew the rule that those who marry without leave must leave their wives at home, for only a certain number of families can go abroad with a regiment--and that only in peace-time."
"It might have been well," continued Armstrong, slowly, while a sad expression clouded his face for a few moments, "if I had waited, and many a time has my conscience smitten me for my haste.  But what could I do?  Emmy most unaccountably fell in love wi' me--_thank God_! for I do think that the greatest earthly blessing that can be given to mortal man is the love of a gentle, true-hearted girl.  The wealth of the Indies cannot purchase that, and nothing else in life can supply the want of it.  Can you wonder that I grasped the treasure when within my reach?"
"I certainly cannot; and as certainly I do not blame you," returned the sympathetic Miles.
"Of course I fell in love with Emmy," continued the soldier, with a slightly confused look.  "I could no more help that than I could help growing up.  Could I?"
"Certainly not," said Miles.
"Well, you see," continued his friend, "as the affair was arranged in heaven, according to general belief, what was I that I should resist? You see, Emmy's father, who's a well-to-do farmer, was willing, and we never gave a thought to Egypt or the war at the time.  She will be well looked after while I'm away, and I'll send her every penny of my pay that I can spare, but--"
He stopped abruptly, and Miles, respecting his feelings, remarked, by way of changing the subject, that, the pay of a private soldier being so small, very little could be saved out of that.
"Not much," assented his comrade; "but, little as it is, we can increase it in various ways.  For one thing, I have given up smoking.  That will save a little; though, to say truth, I have never expended much on baccy.  Then I have joined Miss Robinson's Temperance Band--"
"Strange how often that lady's name has been in my ears since I came to Portsmouth!" said Miles.
"Not so strange after all," returned Armstrong, "when one reflects that she has been the means of almost changing the character of the town within the last few years--as far at least as concerns the condition of soldiers, as well as many of the poorer classes among its inhabitants-- so Sergeant Gilroy tells me."
As some of the information given by Sergeant Gilroy to the young soldier may be interesting to many readers, we quote a few of his own words.
"Why, some years ago," he said, "the soldiers' wives, mothers, and sisters who came down here to see the poor fellows set sail for foreign parts, found it almost impossible to obtain lodgings, except in drinking-houses which no respectable woman could enter.  Some poor women even preferred to spend a winter night under railway arches, or some such shelter, rather than enter these places.  And soldiers out of barracks had nowhere else to go to for amusement, while sailors on leave had to spend their nights in them or walk the streets.  Now all that is changed.  The Soldiers' Institute supplies 140 beds, and furnishes board and lodging to our sisters and wives at the lowest possible rates, besides reception-rooms where we can meet our friends; a splendid reading-room, where we find newspapers and magazines, and can write our letters, if we like, in peace and quiet; a bar where tea and coffee, bread and butter, buns, etcetera, can be had at all reasonable hours for a mere trifle; a coffee and smoking room, opening out of which are two billiard-rooms, and beyond these a garden, where we can get on the flat roof of a house and watch the arrival and departure of shipping.  There is a small charge to billiard-players, which pays all expenses of the tables, so that not a penny of the Institute funds is spent on the games.  Of course no gambling is allowed in any of Miss Robinson's Institutes.  Then there are Bible-class rooms, and women's work-rooms, and a lending library, and bathrooms, and a great hall, big enough to hold a thousand people, where there are held temperance meetings, lectures with dissolving views, entertainments, and `tea-fights,' and Sunday services.  No wonder that, with such an agency at work for the glory of God and the good of men, Portsmouth is almost a new place. Indeed, although Miss Robinson met with powerful opposition at first from the powers that be, her Institute is now heartily recognised and encouraged in every way at the Horse Guards.  Indeed, it has recently been visited by the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Cambridge, and highly approved of by these and other grandees."
While the two soldiers were chatting about the past and present of the Institute they arrived at its door.
"Here we are.  Come into the reception-room, Miles, while I make inquiry about my letters."
They entered the house as he spoke.  The reception-room is on the right of the passage.  Armstrong opened the door and looked in, but, instead of advancing, he stood transfixed, gazing before him open-mouthed as though he had seen a spectre, for there, in front of the fire, sat a beautiful, refined-looking girl, with golden hair and blue eyes, gazing pensively at the flickering flames.
Miles was not kept long in suspense as to who she was.
"Emmy!"
"Oh, Willie!"
These were exclamations which would have revealed all in a moment, even though Emmy had not sprung up and rushed into Willie's open arms.  How she ever emerged from the embrace of those arms with unbroken bones is a mystery which cannot be solved, but she did emerge in safety, and with some confusion on observing that Miles had witnessed the incident with admiring gaze!
"Never mind him, Emmy," said the young soldier, laughing; "he's a good friend, a comrade.  Shake hands with him."
The action, and the ease of manner with which Emmy obeyed, proved that grace and small hands are not altogether dependent on rank or station.
"Excuse me," said Miles, after a few words of salutation; "I'll go and have a look at the library."
So saying he quitted the room, leaving the young couple alone; for there chanced to be no other visitors to the reception-room at the time.  In the lobby he found several soldiers and a couple of sailors enjoying coffee at the bar, and was about to join them when a man came forward whose dress was that of a civilian, though his bearing proclaimed him a soldier.
"Hallo, Brown," exclaimed one of the soldiers, "d'ye know that a troop-ship has just come in!"
"Know it? of course I do; you may trust the people of this house to be first in hearing such news."
"Mr Tufnell told me of it.  I'm just going down to the jetty to boil the kettle for them."
As he spoke, two ladies of the Institute descended the broad staircase, each with a basket on her arm.
They entered into conversation for a few minutes with the soldiers at the bar, and it was abundantly evident to Miles, from the kindly tone of the former and the respectful air of the latter, that they were familiar acquaintances, and on the best of terms.
"Are you all ready, Brown?" asked one of the ladies of the soldier-like civilian, whom we have already mentioned.
"All ready, Miss; a man has already gone to order the bread and butter and light the fire.  I hear the vessel is crowded, so we may expect a full house to-night."
Miles pricked up his ears on hearing this, and when Brown went out, leaving the two ladies to finish their conversation with the soldiers, he followed him.
"Pardon me," he said, on overtaking the man.  "Did I understand correctly that a troop-ship has just arrived?"
"Right," said Brown.  "I am just going down to the embarkation jetty to get coffee ready for the men.  You seem to have joined but a short time, apparently, for though I am familiar with your uniform I have not seen yourself before."
"True, it is not long since I joined, and this is my first visit to the Institute."
"I hope it won't be the last, friend," returned Brown heartily.  "Every soldier is welcome there, and, for the matter of that, so is every sailor and marine."
"I have heard as much.  May I accompany you to this jetty to see the troops arrive, and this coffee business that you speak of?"
"You may, and welcome," said Brown, leading his companion through the town in the direction of the docks, and chatting, as they walked along, about the army and navy; about his own experiences in the former; and about the condition of soldiers at the present time as contrasted with that of the days gone by.
CHAPTER FOUR.
THE EMBARKATION JETTY--AND NIPPED IN THE BUD.
Bronzed faces under white helmets crowded the ports and bulwarks of the great white leviathan of the deep--the troop-ship _Orontes_--as she steamed slowly and cautiously up to the embarkation jetty in Portsmouth harbour.
On the jetty itself a few anxious wives, mothers, and sisters stood eagerly scanning the sea of faces, in the almost hopeless endeavour to distinguish those for which they sought.  Yet ever and anon an exclamation on the jetty, and an answering wave of an arm on the troop-ship, told that some at least of the anxious ones had been successful in the search.
"Don't they look weather-beaten?" remarked Miles to his companion.
"Sure it's more like sun-dried they are," answered a voice at his side. Brown had gone to the shed to prepare his coffee and bread against the landing of the troops, and a stout Irishwoman had taken his place. Close to her stood the two ladies from the Institute with baskets on their arms.
"You are right," returned Miles, with a smile; "they look like men who have seen service.  Is your husband among them?"
"Faix, I'd be sorprised if he _was_," returned the woman; "for I left him in owld Ireland, in the only landed property he iver held in this world--six futt by two, an' five deep.  He's been in possession six years now, an' it wouldn't be aisy to drive him out o' that, anyhow. No, it's my son Terence I've come to look afther.  Och! there he is! Look, look, that's him close by the funnel!  Don't ye see 'im?  Blissins on his good-lookin' face!  Hooroo!  Terence--Terence Flynn, don't ye recognise yer owld mother?  Sure an' he does, though we haven't met for tin year.  My! hasn't he got the hair on his lips too--an' his cheeks are like shoe-leather--my darlint!"
As the enthusiastic mother spoke in the tones of a public orator, there was a general laugh among those who were nearest to her; but she was forgotten immediately, for all were too deeply intent on their own interests to pay much regard to each other just then.
The great vessel was slow in getting alongside and making fast to the jetty--slow at least in the estimation of the impatient--for although she might leap and career grandly in wanton playfulness while on her native billows, in port a careless touch from her ponderous sides would have crushed part of the jetty into fragments.  Miles therefore had ample time to look about him at the various groups around.
One young woman specially attracted his attention, for she stood apart from every one, and seemed scarcely able to stand because of weakness. She was young and good-looking.  Her face, which was deadly pale, contrasted strongly with her glossy raven-black hair, and the character of her dress denoted extreme poverty.
The ladies from the Institute had also observed this poor girl, and one of them, going to her side, quietly addressed her.  Miles, from the position in which he stood, could not avoid overhearing what was said.
"Yes, Miss, I expect my husband," said the woman in answer to a question.  "He's coming home on sick-leave.  I had a letter from him a good while ago saying he was coming home in the _Orontes_."
"I hope you will find that the sea air has done him good," said the lady, in that tone of unobtrusive sympathy which is so powerfully attractive,--especially to those who are in trouble.  "A sea voyage frequently has a wonderful effect in restoring invalids.  What is his name?"
"Martin--Fred Martin.  He's a corporal now."
"You have not recognised him yet, I suppose?"
"Not yet, Miss," answered Mrs Martin, with an anxious look, and shivering slightly as she drew a thin worn shawl of many patches closer round her shoulders.  "But he wouldn't expect me to meet him, you see, knowing that I'm so poor, and live far from Portsmouth.  But I was so anxious, you see, Miss, that our kind Vicar gave me enough money to come down."
"Where did you spend the night?" asked the lady, quickly.
The poor woman hesitated, and at last said she had spent the night walking about the streets.
"You see, Miss," she explained apologetically, "I didn't know a soul in the town, and I couldn't a-bear to go into any o' the public-houses; besides, I had no money, for the journey down took nearly all of it."
"Oh, I am so sorry that you didn't know of our Institute," said the lady, with much sympathy in voice and look; "for we provide accommodation for soldiers' wives who come, like you, to meet their husbands returning from abroad, and we charge little, or even nothing, if they are too poor to pay."
"Indeed, Miss!  I wish I had known of it.  But in the morning I had the luck to meet a policeman who directed me to a coffee-tavern in a place called Nobbs Lane--you'll not know it, Miss, for it's in a very poor part o' the town--where I got a breakfast of as much hot pea-soup and bread as I could eat for three-ha'pence, an' had a good rest beside the fire too.  They told me it was kept by a Miss Robinson.  God bless her whoever she is! for I do believe I should have been dead by now if I hadn't got the rest and the breakfast."
The woman shivered again as she spoke, and drew the thin shawl still closer, for a sharp east wind was blowing over the jetty at the time.
"Come with me; you are cold.  I know Nobbs Lane well.  We have a shed and fire here on the jetty to shelter people while waiting.  There, you need not fear to miss your husband, for the men won't land for a long time yet."
"May I follow you, madam?" said Miles, stepping forward and touching his cap in what he supposed to be the deferential manner of a private soldier.  "I am interested in your work, and would like to see the shed you speak of."
The lady looked up quickly at the tall young soldier who thus addressed her.
"I saw you in the lobby of the Institute this morning, did I not?"
"You did, madam.  I was waiting for a friend who is a frequenter of the Institute.  One of your own people brought me down here to see the arrival of the _Orontes_, and the coffee-shed; but I have lost him in the crowd, and know not where the shed is."
"Here it is," returned the lady, pointing to an iron structure just behind them.  "You will find Mr Brown there busy with the coffee, and that small shed beside it is the shelter-room.  You are welcome to inspect all our buildings at any time."
So saying, the lady led Mrs Martin into the shed last referred to, and Miles followed her.
There was a small stove, in the solitary iron room of which the shed consisted, which diffused a genial warmth around.  Several soldiers' wives and female relatives were seated beside it, engaged in quieting refractory infants, or fitting a few woollen garments on children of various ages.  These garments had been brought from the Institute, chiefly for the purpose of supplying the wives and children returning from warmer climes to England; and one of them, a thick knitted shawl, was immediately presented to Mrs Martin as a gift, and placed round her shoulders by the lady's own hands.
"You are _very_ kind, Miss," she said, an unbidden tear rolling down her cheek as she surveyed the garment and folded it over her breast.
"Have you any children?" asked the lady.
"None.  We had one--a dear baby boy," answered the young wife sadly, "born after his father left England.  God took him home when he was two years old.  His father never saw him; but we shall all meet again," she added, brightly, "in the better land."
"Ah! it makes me glad to hear you say that God took him _home_.  Only the spirit of Jesus could make you regard heaven as the home where you are all to meet again.  Now I would advise you to sit here and keep warm till I go and make inquiry about your husband.  It is quite possible, you know, that he may be in the sick bay, and they won't let any one on board till the vessel is made fast.  You are quite sure, I suppose, that it was the _Orontes_ in which your husband said he was coming?"
"Yes, quite sure."
The lady had asked the question because a vague fear possessed her regarding the cause of the soldier's not having been seen looking eagerly over the side like the other men.
Hurrying from the shed, with her basket on her arm, she made for the gangway, which had just been placed in position.  She was accompanied by her companion, also carrying her basket.  Miles took the liberty of following them closely, but not obviously, for he formed only one of a stream of men and women who pushed on board the instant that permission was given.
While one of the ladies went in search of one of the chief officers, the other quietly and unobtrusively advanced among the returning warriors, and, opening her basket, drew therefrom and offered to each soldier an envelope containing one or two booklets and texts, and a hearty invitation to make free use of the Soldiers' Institute during their stay in Portsmouth.
A most bewildering scene was presented on the deck of that great white vessel.  There were hundreds of soldiers in her, returning home after longer or shorter absences in China, India, the Cape, and other far-away parts of the earth.  Some were stalwart and bronzed by the southern sun; others were gaunt, weak, and cadaverous, from the effect of sickness, exposure, or wounds; but all were more or less excited at having once again set eyes on Old England, and at the near prospect of once more embracing wives, mothers, and sweethearts, and meeting with old friends. The continual noise of manly voices hailing, exclaiming, chaffing, or conversing, and the general babel of sounds is indescribable.  To Miles Milton, who had never before even imagined anything of the sort, it seemed more like a vivid dream than a reality.  He became so bewildered with trying to attend to everything at once that he lost sight of the shorter of the ladies, whom he was following, but, pushing ahead, soon found her again in the midst of a group of old friends--though still young soldiers--who had known the Institute before leaving for foreign service, and were eagerly inquiring after the health of Miss Robinson, and Tufnell the manager, and others.
During his progress through this bustling scene, Miles observed that the soldiers invariably received the gifts from the lady with respect, and, many of them, with hearty expressions of thanks, while a few stopped her to speak about the contents of the envelopes.  So numerous were the men that the work had to be done with business-like celerity, but the visitor was experienced.  While wasting no time in useless delay, she never hurried her movements, or refused to stop and speak, or forced her way through the moving throng.  Almost unobserved, save by the men who chanced to be next to her, she glided in and out amongst them like a spirit of light--which, in the highest sense, she was--intent on her beneficent mission.  Her sole aim was to save the men from the tremendous dangers that awaited them on landing in Portsmouth, and bring them under Christian influence.
Those dangers may be imagined when it is told that soldiers returning from abroad are often in possession of large sums of money, and that harpies of all kinds are eagerly waiting to plunder them on their arrival.  On one occasion a regiment came home, and in a few days squandered three thousand pounds in Portsmouth.  Much more might be said on this point, but enough has been indicated to move thoughtful minds-- and our story waits.
Suddenly the attention of Miles, and every one near him, was attracted by the loud Hibernian yell of a female voice exclaiming--
"Oh, Terence, me darlin' son, here ye are; an' is it yersilf lookin' purtier a long way than the day ye left me; an' niver so much as a scratch on yer face for all the wars ye've bin in--bad luck to thim!"
Need we say that this was Mrs Flynn?  In her anxiety to meet her son she had run against innumerable men and women, who remonstrated with her variously, according to temperament, without, however, the slightest effect.  Her wild career was not checked until she had flung herself into the arms of a tall, stalwart trooper with drooping moustache, who would have done credit to any nationality under the sun, and whose enthusiasm at the happy meeting with his mother was almost as demonstrative as her own, but more dignified.
Others there were, however, whose case was very different.  One who came there to meet the strong healthy man, to whom she had said good-bye at the same spot several years before, received him back a worn and wasted invalid, upright still with the martial air of discipline, but feeble, and with something like the stamp of death upon his brow.  Another woman found her son, strong indeed and healthy, as of yore, but with an empty sleeve where his right arm should have been--his days of warfare over before his earthly sun had reached the zenith!
Whilst Miles was taking note of these things, and moralising in spite of his distaste just then to that phase of mental occupation, the other lady of the Institute appeared and spoke hurriedly to her companion.
"Go," she said, "tell Mrs Martin that her husband is _not_ on board the _Orontes_.  Let Tufnell, if he is at the shed, or our missionary, take her up to the Institute without delay.  Let them take this note to Miss Robinson at the same time."
The younger lady looked inquiringly at her companion, but the latter pushed on hurriedly and was soon lost in the crowd, so she went at once on shore to obey her instructions.
Being thus left to look after himself, Miles went about gazing at the varied, interesting, and curious scenes that the vessel presented.  No one took any notice of him, for he was only one soldier among hundreds, and so many people from the shore had been admitted by that time that strange faces attracted no attention.
We have referred chiefly to soldiers' friends, but these, after all, formed a small minority of the visitors, many of whom were tradesmen of the town--tailors, shoemakers, and vendors of fancy articles--who had come down with their wares to tempt the returning voyagers to part with their superfluous cash.  Even in the midst of all the pushing and confusion, one man was seen trying on a pair of boots; near to him was a sailor, carefully inspecting a tailor's book of patterns with a view to shore-going clothes; while another, more prompt in action, was already being measured for a suit of the same.
Descending to the 'tween-decks, our hero found that the confusion and noise there were naturally greater, the space being more limited and the noise confined.  There was the addition of bad air and disagreeable smells here; and Miles could not help reflecting on the prospect before him of long voyages under cramped circumstances, in the midst of similar surroundings.  But, being young and enthusiastic, he whispered to himself that he was not particular, and was ready to "rough it" in his country's cause!
In a remarkably dark region to which he penetrated, he found himself in the women's quarters, the disagreeables of which were increased by the cries of discontented children, and the yells of inconsolable infants-- some of whom had first seen the light of this world in the sad twilight of 'tween-decks!  Shrinking from that locality, Miles pursued his investigations, and gradually became aware that sundry parrots and other pets which the soldiers and sailors had brought home were adding their notes of discord to the chorus of sounds.
While he was looking at, and attempting to pat, a small monkey, which received his advances with looks of astonished indignation, he became conscious of the fact that a number of eyes were looking down on him through a crevice at the top of a partition close to his side.
"Who are these?" he asked of a sailor, who stood near him.
"Why, them are the long-term men."
"I suppose you mean prisoners?"
"Yes; that's about it," replied the tar.  "Soldiers as has committed murder--or suthin' o' that sort--an' got twenty year or more for all I knows.  The other fellers further on there, in chains, is short-term men.  Bin an' done suthin' or other not quite so bad, I suppose."
Miles advanced "further on," and found eight men seated on the deck and leaning against the bulkhead.  If his attention had not been drawn to them, he might have supposed they were merely resting, but a closer glance showed that they were all chained to an iron bar.  They did not seem very different from the other men around them, save that they were, most of them, stern and silent.
A powerful feeling of compassion rose in our hero's breast as he looked at these moral wrecks of humanity; for their characters and prospects were ruined, though their physique was not much impaired.  It seemed to him such an awful home-coming, after, perhaps, long years of absence, thus, in the midst of all the bustle and joy of meetings and of pleasant anticipations, to be waiting there for the arrival of the prison-van, and looking forward to years of imprisonment instead of reunion with friends and kindred.
At sight of them a thought sprang irresistibly into our hero's mind, "This is the result of wrong-doing!"
His conscience was uncomfortably active and faithful that morning. Somehow it pointed out to him that wrong-doing was a long ladder; that the chained criminals before him had reached the foot; and that he stood on the topmost rung.  That was all the difference between them and himself--a difference of degree, not of principle.
Pushing his way a little closer to these men, he found that his was not the only heart that pitied them.  His friend, the younger lady, was there speaking to them.  He could not hear what she said, for the noise drowned her voice; but her earnest, eager look and her gesticulations told well enough that she was pointing them to the Saviour of sinners-- with what effect, of course, he could not tell, but it was evident that the prisoners at least gave her their attention.
Leaving her thus engaged, Miles continued for a considerable time his progress through the ship.  Afterwards he observed, by a movement among the men, that a detachment was about to land.  Indeed he found that some of the soldiers had already landed, and were making their way to the coffee-shed.
Following these quickly to the same place, he found that innumerable cups of hot coffee and solid slices of bread and butter were being served out as fast as they could be filled and cut.  A large hole or window opened in the side of the shed, the shutter of which was hinged at the bottom, and when let down formed a convenient counter.
Behind this counter stood the two ubiquitous ladies of the Institute acting the part of barmaids, as if to the manner born, and with the same business-like, active, yet modest, ready-for-anything air which marked all their proceedings.
And truly their post was no sinecure.  To supply the demands of hundreds of hungry and thirsty warriors was not child's-play.  Inside the shed, Miles found his friend Brown busy with a mighty caldron of hot water, numerous packets of coffee, and immense quantities of sugar and preserved milk.  Brown was the fountain-head.  The ladies were the distributing pipes--if we may say so; and although the fountain produced can after can of the coveted liquid with amazing rapidity, and with a prodigality of material that would have made the hair of a private housewife stand on end, it was barely possible to keep pace with the demand.
At a large table one of the missionaries of the Institute cut up and buttered loaves at a rate which gave the impression that he was a conjurer engaged in a species of sleight-of-hand.  The butter, however, troubled him, for, the weather being cold, it was hard, and would not spread easily.  To overcome this he put a pound or so of it on a plate beside the boiler-fire to soften.  Unfortunately, he temporarily forgot it, and on afterwards going for it, found that it had been reduced to a yellow liquid.  However, hungry soldiers, rejoicing in the fact of having at last reached home, are not particular.  Some of them, unaccustomed, no doubt, to be served by ladies, asked for their supply deferentially, accepted it politely, and drank it with additional appreciation.
"We want more, Brown," said one of the ladies, glancing back over her shoulder as she poured out the last drop from her large jug; "and more buns and bread, please."
"Here you are, Miss," cried Brown, who was warm by that time in spite of the weather, as he bore his brimming and steaming pitcher to the window--or hole in the wall--and replenished the jugs.  "The buns are all done, an' the bread won't hold out long, but I've sent for more; it won't be long.  I see we shall need several more brews," he added, as he turned again towards the inexhaustible boiler.
"Shall I assist you?" said Miles, stepping into the shed and seizing a loaf and a knife.
"Thank you.  Go ahead," said Brown.
"Put another lump of butter near the fire," said the missionary to our hero; "not too close.  I melted the last lump altogether."
"A cup o' coffee for my Terence, an' wan for mesilf, my dear," exclaimed a loud voice outside.
There was no mistaking the speaker.  Some of the men who crowded round the counter laughed, others partially choked, when the strapping Terence said in a hoarse whisper, "Whist, mother, be civil; don't ye see that it's ladies, no less, is sarvin' of us?"
"Please, ma'am, can I 'ave some coffee?" asked a modest soldier's wife, who looked pale and weary after the long voyage, with three children to look after.
A cup was promptly supplied, and three of the newly-arrived buns stopped the mouths of her clamorous offspring.
"Can ye give me a cup o' tea?" demanded another soldier's wife, who was neither so polite nor so young as the previous applicant.
It is probable that the ladies did not observe the nature of her demand, else they would doubtless have explained that they had no tea, but a cup of coffee was silently handed to her.
"Ah! this is _real_ home-tea, this is," she said, smacking her lips after the first sip.  "A mighty difference 'tween this an' what we've bin used to in the ship."
"Yes, indeed," assented her companion.  Whether it was tea she had been accustomed to drink on board the troop-ship we cannot tell, but probably she was correct as to the "mighty difference."  It may be that the beverages supplied in foreign lands had somewhat damaged the power of discrimination as to matters of taste in these soldiers' wives.  At all events an incident which occurred about the same time justifies this belief.
"Mr Miles," said the missionary, pausing a moment to wipe his brow in the midst of his labours, "will you fetch the butter now?"
Miles turned to obey with alacrity--with too much alacrity, indeed, for in his haste he knocked the plate over, and sent the lump of butter into the last prepared "brew" of coffee!
"Hallo!  I say!" exclaimed Brown, in consternation.  "More coffee, Brown," demanded the ladies simultaneously, at that inauspicious moment.
"Yes, Miss, I--I'm coming--directly," cried Brown.
"Do be quick, please!"
"What's to be done?" said Brown, making futile endeavours to fish out the slippery mass with the stirring-stick.
"Shove it down and stir it well about," suggested Miles.
Whether conscience was inoperative at that moment we know not, but Brown acted on the suggestion, and briskly amalgamated the butter with the coffee, while the crowd at the port-hole politely but continuously demanded more.
"Don't be in a 'urry, Tom," cried a corporal, removing his pith helmet in order to run his fingers through his hair; "it's a 'eavenly state o' things now to what it was a few years ago, w'en we an' our poor wives 'ad to sit 'ere for hours in the heat or cold, wet or dry, without shelter, or a morsel to eat, or a drop to drink, till we got away up town to the grog-shops."
"Well, this _is_ civilisation at last!" remarked a handsome and hearty young fellow, who had apparently been ignorant of the treat in store for him, and who sauntered up to the shed just as the butter-brew was beginning to be served out.
"Why, I declare, it's chocolate!" exclaimed one of the women, who had been already served with a cup, and had resolved to "go in," as she said, for another pennyworth.
"So it is.  My! ain't it nice?" said her companion, smacking her lips.
Whether the soldiers fell into the same mistake, or were too polite to take notice of it, we cannot tell, for they drank it without comment, and with evident satisfaction, like men of simple tastes and uncritical minds.
We turn now to a very different scene.
In one of the private sitting-rooms of the Institute sat poor young Mrs Martin, the very embodiment of blank despair.  The terrible truth that her husband had died, and been buried at sea, had been gently and tenderly broken to her by Miss Robinson.
At first the poor girl could not--would not--believe it.  Then, as the truth gradually forced itself into her brain, she subsided into a tearless, expressionless, state of quiescence that seemed to indicate a mind unhinged.  In this state she remained for some time, apparently unconscious of the kind words of Christian love that were addressed to her.
At last she seemed to rouse herself and gazed wildly round the room.
"Let me go," she said.  "I will find him somewhere.  Don't hinder me, please."
"But you cannot go anywhere till you have had food and rest, dear child," said her sympathetic comforter, laying her hand gently on the girl's arm.  "Come with me."
She sought to lead her away, but the girl shook her off.
"No," she exclaimed, starting up hastily, so that the mass of her dark hair fell loose upon her shoulders, contrasting forcibly with the dead whiteness of her face and lips.  "No.  I cannot go with you.  Fred will be getting impatient.  D'you think I'll ever believe it?  Dead and buried in the sea?  Never!"
Even while she spoke, the gasp in her voice, and the pressure of both hands on her poor heart, told very plainly that the young widow did indeed believe it.
"Oh! may God Himself comfort you, dear child," said the lady, taking her softly by the hand.  "Come--come with me."
Mrs Martin no longer refused.  Her spirit, which had flashed up for a moment, seemed to collapse, and without another word of remonstrance she meekly suffered herself to be guided to a private room, where she was put to bed.
She never rose from that bed.  Friendless, and without means, she would probably have perished in the streets, or in one of the dens of Portsmouth, had she not been led to this refuge.  As it was, they nursed her there, and did all that human skill and Christian love could devise; but her heart was broken.  Towards the end she told them, in a faint voice, that her Fred had been stationed at Alexandria, and that while there he had been led to put his trust in the Saviour.  She knew nothing of the details.  All these, and much more, she had expected to hear from his own lips.
"But he will tell me all about it soon, thank God!" were the last words she uttered as she turned her eyes gratefully on the loving strangers who had found and cared for her in the dark day of her calamity.
CHAPTER FIVE.
DIFFICULTIES MET AND OVERCOME.
Miles and his friend Brown, after their work at the jetty, had chanced to return to the Institute at the moment referred to in the last chapter, when the poor young widow, having become resigned, had been led through the passage to her bedroom.  Our hero happened to catch sight of her face, and it made a very powerful impression on him--an impression which was greatly deepened afterwards on hearing of her death.
In the reception-room he found Armstrong still in earnest conversation with his wife.
CHAPTER XVI
A BIT OF SEALING WAX
The night grew clearer as the flying squadron advanced toward the imperial city of China.  The roads were rough in places, but the superb machines carried the boys and their companions at good speed.
It may well be imagined that the party created something of a sensation as it whirled along.  The constant popping of the engines, the strong lights which flashed ahead, and the voices of the marines brought many a sleepy-faced Chinaman to the door of his home.
Now and then the boys were hailed from the roadside, but little attention was paid to these calls.  Finally, however, a voice addressed the party in English.
"Where are you going?" it asked.
Ned instructed the Captain to proceed a few paces with his company and then halted to see what manner of man it was that spoke to him in that tongue. He found an old Chinaman, a wise-looking old fellow with a keen face, leaning over a rude gate in front of a small house.
"Did you speak?" he asked, advancing to the gate.
"I did," was the reply.  "I was curious to know where you were going in the middle of the night."
"You speak English remarkably well," Ned said, not in any hurry to satisfy the old fellow's curiosity.
"I ought to," was the reply.  "I have just come back from New York.  I owned a laundry there for a good many years."
"And have returned to China to live in peace and comfort?"
"I don't know about the peace," replied the Chinaman, with a sigh.
"You think there will be a war?"
The Chinaman nodded.
"The coming revolt," he declared, "was conceived more than two hundred years ago.  For fifty years organization has been going on.  For six years the revolutionists have been working as a whole."
"And they are strong?" asked Ned.
"Wherever in the world Chinamen live, in New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Boston, London, Berlin, St. Petersburg, anywhere, everywhere, there are funds being collected for the coming civil war."
Ned wanted to ask the loquacious old fellow what his private ideas about the justice of the struggle were, but he decided not to do so.  He thought he might find out in another way.
"And the revolutionists will win?" he asked.
"God forbid!" was the reply, and the boy had the answer he thought he would receive.
Still, he was not satisfied that the old fellow was telling the exact truth regarding his sentiments.  It was the revolutionists he had to battle with, and not the federalists.  This retired laundryman might know that!
"Anyway," the boy thought, "the fellow seems desirous of keeping me here as long as possible.  This, of course, may be because of a desire for the companionship of one of the race he has lived with so long, but I do not think so."
Pretending to be deeply interested in what the Chinaman was saying, he excused himself for a moment and beckoned to Jimmie.
"Lead your motorcycle noiselessly up that rise of ground," he directed, "and when you get there keep your eyes wide open."
"What for?" demanded the boy.
"For whatever comes in sight," replied Ned.  "Keep the line of vision from this house to whatever may be beyond unimpaired if it is possible to do so. If you observe anything unusual, report to me."
"All righto!" cried the boy.
Ned saw Jimmie making a noiseless progress up the little hill and turned back to the man at the gate.  Instantly the latter offered refreshments, for the entire party, and seemed disappointed when the offer was declined.
"You're going to Peking on business?" the Chinaman finally asked.
"Yes," was the short answer.
"Why do you ride in the night?"
"Because we must get there in the morning."
"But there is another day."
"Always there is another day in the Far East," Ned smiled, "but we of the West count only on what we can do before that other day arrives."
The two talked on for half an hour, while the marines muttered complaints and Frank and Jack rolled themselves in blankets and tried to pay a visit to Dreamland.  The previous night had been a hard one, and they felt the need of more rest than they had been able to get during the afternoon.
After a time Ned became anxious.  He had sent Jimmie on ahead with the notion that something was going to happen there within a short time. But all was still about the house and the small fields which surrounded it. Jimmie did not return.
"I wonder if the little scamp is in trouble again?" thought Ned.
This seemed to be the natural solution of the puzzle of his long absence, and Ned was about to send Frank on after him when the little fellow came up to him.
"The Captain wants you to get a move on," the boy said.
Ned saw that Jimmie had something to say to him which was not for the ears of the Chinaman, and walked away, followed by the urgent voice of the former laundryman, who besought him to return and partake of refreshments.
"In honor of old New York!" he added.
"Gee!" Jimmie muttered, as the boys stood alone together.  "I was thinkin' I'd struck the fourth of July."
"Where?"
"Up on the hill."
"So, they were using rockets?"
"Yes."
"Where did they ascend from?"
"From the other side of the hill, at this end, and from an old house at the other end."
Ned stood for a moment without speaking.  So the Chinaman had been holding him in conversation while his tools had been signaling to some one farther up the road!
This was practically what he had suspected.  From the first he had believed that the old fellow's purpose was to hold him there as long as possible.
Signals would naturally be the outgrowth of such a plan, and Ned had sent Jimmie on ahead--silently--in order to see where the other party answered the signals from, if they were answered at all.  As from the opening of the case, he had planned to secure his information from his enemies--from their actions and their presence or absence from the position he occupied.
Directing the marines to follow on slowly, Ned awoke Frank and Jack. The four climbed the hill slowly, watching the sky as they advanced. The clouds lay low to the east, but in the west was a patch of clear sky.
When they gained the summit of the rise, they saw a light in a little grove some distance away.  It seemed like a lantern moving out and in among the trees.
"There," Jimmie explained, "when I got to the top of the hill, I saw a rocket shoot out of that thicket.  It did not ascend the sky, but follow the line of the earth and died out in the road."
"Of course," Ned said.  "A rocket sent up in the usual way would have been visible from where we were standing."
"And, in a minute," the boy went on, "there came a rocket from that house, the house where the light was a minute ago.  That, too, followed the ground line."
"Talking together in low tones!" grinned Jack.
"They were talkin' together, all right," Jimmie said.
"Dollars to dumplings," Frank exclaimed, "that the funny chap we met in the old mud house at Taku has a room in that shack."
"He might have been hiding there," Ned said.
"An' that old stiff signaled to him to make his getaway?" asked the little fellow.
"Looks like it," Ned replied.
"Huh!" Jack objected.  "The signals might have told the men at the other end of the line to get their soldiers out and bump us off the continent."
"Which idea," responded Frank, "causes me to want to approach that house with all due caution and respect."
"Suppose we four surround it," suggested Jimmie.
"That's the idea!" Jack commented.
"Just what I was about to propose," said Wed.  "We'll leave the marines within call and go up to this temporary signal station and see what about it."
The Captain was communicated with, and then the four left the road and moved around toward the rear of the house, keeping in the shadows of the trees.  Not until they reached the very door of the place were there any signs of life there.
The lantern they had observed from a distance was seen no more.  The windows were dark and silent.  But when they came to the door they found it unlocked.
As the crude latch was lifted, with a very slight creaking sound, a movement was heard inside, and then a heavy body was heard striking the ground at the rear.  Then a was as silent as before.
"Someone jumped out of a window!" Jimmie whispered.  "I hope he broke his crust!"
There was to be no defense of the place, then!  Whoever the inmates had been, they were deserting the house.
Ned stationed Frank and Jack at the front and moved around to the rear with Jimmie close behind.  A rustle in the undergrowth told him that the former occupants of the place were still about.
Jimmie darted in the direction of the noise, but was back again in a minute.
"Might as well try to chase a ghost!" he said.
"Got clear away, did he?" asked Ned.
"You know it!" grunted the little fellow.
Frank and Jack were now heard in the house, and the rays of a searchlight showed at a window, showed very faintly in cracks, for there was a heavy wooden shutter to the window on the inside.  Ned tried the rear door.  It was not locked and he entered.
The house was deserted, but it was not unfurnished.  Indeed, articles of furniture scattered about the rooms, which were in great disorder, denoted not only wealth but a refined taste.
There were velvet rugs on the floors and great easy chairs and lounging divans.  A pantry revealed unwashed dishes, showing that food had been served there recently.
"Who was it that ran away?" asked Jack, as the boys met.
"A ghost!" replied Jimmie.  "I chased him until he hid in a tree."
"Why didn't you pull him out?" grinned Jack.
"Because he turned into a green cow with purple wings!" the little fellow replied.
Jack whirled his arms around in the manner of one turning a crank and laughed.  The boys delighted in such by-play.
"If it's all the same to you, boys," Frank was now heard saying, "I'll just devour such few things as are left here.  I see a ham and a box of canned vegetables.  Must have intended a long stop here, whoever he was."
Leaving the boys to search the remainder of the house, Ned entered what had evidently been a reading room and turned on his light.  The room was handsomely decorated, and there were scores of books lying around on tables and chairs.
Calling to the boys, he directed them to bring up the marines and station them around the house.
"I want to know that I'll not be disturbed," he said.
"Found somethin'?" asked Jimmie.
"Look at the books," Ned replied.
Jimmie read half a dozen titles and cast the volumes aside.
"They don't look good to me," he said.  "All about international law and treaties!"
"Exactly!" Ned said, and then Jimmie opened his eyes.
"I'll bet there's been some of them statesmen livin' here!" the little fellow almost whispered.  "Say, do you think you have run 'em down at last?"
"I don't know, son," was the reply.  "Look on that table and see what you discover."
"Bits of torn paper an' some red wax."
"The paper," Ned explained, "is parchment, such as is used in important official transactions, and the wax is of the kind used by lawyers and diplomats.  Here is a seal!"
Ned's face turned pale as he looked at the seal.  Could it be possible that the nation to which it belonged had been engaged in this conspiracy?  It did not seem possible.
Ned put the telltale seal away in his pocket without permitting Jimmie to see it and picked up some loose pieces of sealing wax which lay on the table near where the seal had been found.
"Do you see the fine work done with the seal which made this impression?" Ned asked.
"Fine seal!" Jimmie replied.  "Was that stamp made by the seal you just hid away?"
"No," Ned replied, "thank God it was not!"
Wrapping the wax very carefully, so that it would not crumble, and securing every bit of paper in sight, Ned made a little bundle and stowed it away in a pocket.  Then he began a search of the rug on the floor.
Jimmie was on his knees, in a moment.
"Finders keepers?" he asked.
"That depends!" Ned said.
"Well, some one's been payin' out money here," the boy went on.  "See what I found!"
What he had found was a gold piece of the denomination of twenty dollars. And it bore the stamp of the American eagle!
CHAPTER XVII
BOY SCOUTS IN A LIVELY MIXUP
Ned took the gold piece into his hand and examined it.
"It is American money, sure enough," he observed, "and was made at the San Francisco mint."
Frank and Jack now joined the little group in the library and regarded the piece with interest.
"What does it mean?" Frank asked.
"Why," Jack volunteered, "it means that some American man is mixed up in this dirty affair."
"Perhaps that gold came out of the wreck," Jimmie suggested.  "Say, are we ever goin' back after that gold?" he added.
"Ned's got all the gold he can attend to right here," commented Frank. "He's got to find out how that came here."
"Why, there was an American in the bunch, and he lost it out of his pocket," Jack ventured.
"That's the very point," Frank observed.  "What was an American doing in that bunch?"
"It might have been the American who planned to send the gold to the revolutionary leaders by way of a shipment to the Chinese government," Ned said, thoughtfully.   "You know some American had to send the gold."
"Of course."
"Well, suppose he is now here trying to get something in exchange for the gold which lies at the bottom of the Pacific?"
"He naturally would be doing business, with the revolutionary party," Frank exclaimed.  "What a trick that was!"
"I haven't got it through my head yet," Jack said.  "I don't know any more about the plot than a robin."
"Look here," Frank said, in a superior tone, "there are a lot of Chinese in the United States who want to assist the revolutionary party.  Got that?"
"You know it!"
"These men arrange with the Chinese government to send over a cargo of gold."
"That's easy.  What were they to get for the gold?"
"I don't know," Frank answered.  "But they arranged to send the gold right out of the subtreasury at San Francisco--or was it New York?--to the Chinese government."
"All right," laughed Jack.  "I see daylight."
"Then they notify the rebels-to-be that the gold will be shipped on such a vessel at such a time."
"Warmer!" grinned Jimmie.
"And the rebels undertake to have a ship ready to snatch off the gold when the right time comes.  So the Chinese government will have to pay for the yellow stuff and the rebels will have the good of it."
"Great scheme!"
"Yes, well, some other nation gets wise to what is going on, and sets out to burst up the combination."
"Naturally."
"So this foreign nation sends out a ship to ram the vessel carrying the gold."
"Oh!  I got that long ago!"
"And the vessel is rammed and the gold goes to the bottom.  Then this other government, thinking to kill two birds at one shot, gives it out, in certain diplomatic circles, that Uncle Sam shipped that gold directly to the Chinese government from the subtreasury, with the full knowledge that the rebels were to get it."
"Yes, I've heard about that."
"So Uncle Sam sends Ned over here to dig up that gold and see if the shippers didn't put documents in the bags or boxes which would prove out the whole transaction."
"An' Ned found the documents!" cried Jimmie.  "Good old Ned!"
"Yes, he found the documents which prove that the United States had nothing to do with the matter, but which do not show who started the slander.
"And then Ned is sent out to track the statesman who had been doing business with the rebels down to his hiding place.  It is thought that his nation is the one that tried to mix Uncle Sam in the matter."
"But why should this man be doing business with the rebels?" asked Jack.
"That is what we don't know," was the reply.  "Still, we know that he is allied with the rebels.  We met him at Taku.  Ned met him at the ruined temple.  He may be treacherously in the company of the men who lead the revolutionary party, but he is there."
"You have that figured out correctly," Ned cut in.  "If the man we are after had been doing business with the Chinese government, we would have had officers of the law after us at Tientsin and Taku, instead of men who ran when it came daylight."
"What national seal made that stamp on the wax you have in your pocket, Ned?" Jimmie asked.
Ned made no reply.
"Was the stamp made with the seal you have with you?" was the next question.
Still Ned did not answer.  He was in a quandary.  It did not seem possible that the two nations pointed out by the seal and the wax could be engaged in such dirty business.  He hoped to prove to his own satisfaction that they were not.
"The only way to find out what we want to know," he said, "is to go on to Peking."
"Your proof will assist you when you get there?" asked Frank.
"Yes, I'm afraid so," Ned answered, tentatively.
"I don't understand that reply," Frank observed, with a serious face. "You must have discovered something in this house which is not to your liking."
"Time will show," Ned said.
Captain Martin, of the marines, now entered the room where the discussion was going on.  His face was pale, and his eyes showed greater anger than Ned had ever seen reflected there before.
"Just a moment, Ned," he said, and the two stepped into another room. The Captain dropped into a chair.
"We have struck the hornet's nest," he said.
"Do you hear them buzzing?" asked Ned, with a smile.
"Worse than that," was the reply.  "I am feeling their stings.  Two of my men have been attacked in the dark."
"And wounded?"
"Yes; one of them seriously."
"I'm sorry for the poor fellow," Ned said.  "Do you think we can get him on to Peking?"
Captain Martin shook his head.
"It is a bad wound," he said.  "The man was on guard not far from the edge of the grove when a figure loomed up before him.  He challenged and was about to shoot, for no reply came, when he got the knife in his back.  He can't be moved."
"The trouble is," Ned replied, "that we got here too soon."
"What's the answer to that?"
"We did not give the plotters time enough to finish their business. When that old Chink, back there at the gate, signaled to them with his rockets, they cut and ran, leaving important evidence behind them."
"And you think they will hang about the flying squadron until they recover what they have lost?"
"They certainly will try to recover it.  Now you see the wisdom of the Washington people in sending me to Peking on a motorcycle!  You see that I was right in saying that we were being set up as marks for other nations to shoot at!"
"Yes," said Martin, "you never could have got to the fellows in the old way.  It was right to plan it so that they would come to you, although it was placing you in great danger."
"But the danger has rippled off our backs like water off the feathers of a duck!  If we meet no more peril than we have now encountered, we'll get back to New York fat and healthy."
"One thing I fail to comprehend," Captain Martin said, "and that is why a flying squadron was sent with you."
"To attract attention," laughed Ned.
"To get you out of scrapes, I should say," the Captain retorted.
"Well, then, both!"
"I don't get it yet."
"We might have reached Peking without our presence in the country being known to our enemies," Ned said, "but that was not the idea of the Washington people.  I have already explained to the boys that we were to do our real work in identifying the man we want while on the way."
"Oh, all right," replied the officer, "but it seems to me that you might have made the trip in a quieter way with the same result.  These chaps would have found you, depend on that."
"Yes, but we needed help," replied Ned, "and we got it in the nick of time. Guess the Secret Service people at Washington are all right."
"Perhaps," the Captain said, then, "we would better get the wounded men into the house and look after their wounds.  The others I'll leave on guard."
The injured marines were carried into the house and given such attention as could be bestowed in the absence of a surgeon.
"What next?" asked Frank.
"Peking!" answered Jack.  "We can't heal these wounds by remaining here, and we can help by going on and sending a surgeon back."
"But my orders are to remain with you," Captain Martin said.
"Then leave most of your men here and come on," Ned replied.
This plan was agreed upon, and would have been carried out at once had not something not on the program of the night intervened.  Captain Martin had detailed two men to sit with the wounded and stationed the others in a circle about the house when a shot was fired off to the east.
"I didn't think they would have the nerve to attack the house openly before we got away," Captain Martin remarked.
All listened intently, but there was no more shooting.
"That sounded to me more like a signal than anything else," Ned observed. "I wonder if they are out in force?"
"I think I'd better call the men in," Captain Martin remarked.
The words were hardly out of his mouth when a skulking form appeared in the dim light which now fell from the stars.  The fellow was creeping from the house outward.
"A spy!" Jack whispered.  "Shoot, some one.  I haven't my gun with me. Shoot!"
The skulking man appeared to hear the words, though they were spoken in a very low tone, for he sprang to his feet and dashed away at full speed.  In a second he was lost to view in the thicket.
"Say, but that chap is some runner!" Jimmie cried.  "He went so fast I never thought to wing him!"
"Where did he come from?" asked Frank.  "I'm certain he was not in the house.  Perhaps he was up to some deviltry."
"He wasn't here with any bouquets," Jimmie answered.  "I'm goin' out an' run around the house.  Perhaps I can find out where he was hidin', an' find his mate there."
No objections being offered to this, the little fellow left the group and started in on a tour around the old house.  He was gone perhaps two minutes, then came dashing back, his face white and horror-stricken in the circle of light which met him.
"Grab 'em!  Grab 'em an' get out!" he shouted.
"Where did you get it?" demanded Jack.
"You're scared stiff!" Frank laughed.
"Grab the wounded men an' beat it!" Jimmie repeated.  "This ranch will go up in the air in a second!"
"That's cheerful!" Jack cut in, half believing that Jimmie was up to another trick.
Jimmie dashed into the house, seized one of the wounded men by the shoulders and tried to drag him off the improvised bed on which he had been laid.
"All right!" he yelled.  "You boys may stay here an' get shot up into blue sky if you want to, but I'm goin' to get these men out."
"Why don't you tell us what the danger is?" demanded Ned, shaking the little fellow by the arm.
"You listen!" Jimmie replied.
There was dead silence for an instant.  Then, seemingly from underneath the floor, came a low, sinister hissing sound which every one of the boys recognized.
A great fuse was burning below, and might at any moment reach the explosive to which it was attached.  The Chinese tools of the man at the head of the conspiracy were taking desperate chances.
In order to destroy the clues which Ned had found in the house, and also to prevent the boy ever discovering any more, they were taking the long chance of murdering the soldiers of a friendly power and bringing on international complications.  Ned was by no means idle while these thoughts were swarming in his brain.
In fact, all the boys sprang to action instantly.  Captain Martin was told to order his men farther away from the point of danger.  In less time than the result of their activities can be written down the wounded men were lying in the grove, surrounded by their fellows, and the boys were waiting for what seemed inevitable, the complete destruction of the house.
CHAPTER XVIII
A BROKEN MATCH SAFE
"Why don't she go up?" asked Jack, as the boys crouched in the grove. "I don't mind seeing a little fourth of July!"
"She's coming," Frank answered.  "Do you see the light in the cellar? That's the fuse burning."
"It must be a long one," Jimmie said.  "Gee, but I was scared stiff when I saw it burnin' right under where you all were!"
"How did the sneak who set the fuse on fire ever get down there?" wondered Jack.
"Must have been there all the time," Jimmie volunteered.
"But he didn't have the powder, or the dynamite, or whatever thing he figured on blowing us up with, in his pockets, did he?" asked Jack.
"I guess the old Chink down the road, the fellow who kept me talking at the gate, had something to do with storing the explosive there," Ned remarked. "I presume the plot was laid to blow us up the minute the effort to destroy us at the ruined temple failed."
"Merry little time we're having," Frank laughed.  "Here, kid, where are you going?" he added, as Jimmie moved away.
"I'm goin' to see why that don't go bang!" answered the boy.
Ned tried to stop him, but the little fellow dodged away and disappeared around an angle of the house.
The boys waited in suspense for a moment, expecting every instant to witness the explosion, then Frank and Jack darted around the corner, in quest of Jimmie.
"Come back!" Ned called, but they paid no heed.
Both Ned and the Captain sprang after the lads, the latter expressing in very vigorous language his opinion of boys who would take such risks out of curiosity.
"I'd rather wait an hour for an explosion than go up to see why it didn't come off in time," he said.  "That Jimmie needs a good beating. He'll get it, too, if he doesn't behave!"
Ned laughed, serious as the situation was, at the thought of what would be apt to happen if the Captain should lay hands on the little fellow in anger.  He would have the other boys on his hands in a second!
When Ned rounded the corner he saw Jimmie's heels half blocking a cellar window.  Thick smoke was oozing out around him, and Frank and Jack were trying to pull him back.
"You let go!" they heard the little fellow shout.  "I guess I know what I'm doin'.  You let go!"
"Wait!" Ned said, then he stooped over and called out to Jimmie:
"Is the fuse out?"
"Sure!" was the reply.  "'Sure the fuse is out, but before it went out it set fire to something on the cellar bottom, an' the blaze is workin' its way up to the powder, or whatever it is.  Ouch!" he added, as Jack gave a pull at his foot.  "You let go!"
"Let him go," Ned advised.  "Perhaps he can get in there in time to prevent the explosion."
"The little gink!" Jack exclaimed, "I wanted to see the thing bust up. Now he's spoiled it!"
In a moment the boy was in the cellar, and Ned was not far away when the creeping flame was extinguished.  While Frank and Jack looked in at the window, shielding their eyes and faces from the smudge as well as it was possible to do, Ned called out to them:
"Tell Captain Martin to keep his men on guard around the house.  The scamps who did this may be up to some other trick.  They're determined that we shall never get to Peking!"
Frank crawled through the window and stood by Ned's side, searchlight in hand.  Just about underneath the center of the house, was a half barrel of gunpowder.
"That would have done the business," Frank observed, and Jimmie made a wry face.  "If this little nuisance hadn't seen the fuse burning, we might have been killed."
"Aw, go on!" Jimmie said.  "The fuse went out, didn't it?  Gave us a good scare, anyway.  I'm six inches shorter than I was before I saw the blaze creepin' along like a bloomin' snake!"
"How did it affect your appetite?" asked Frank.
"If you mention anythin' to eat," Jimmie answered, "I'll have a fit.  I don't know how people live in China, but I've been starved ever since I struck the country."
Flashlight in hand, Ned now devoted his whole attention to the floor of the cellar.  There were marks of shoes here and there, and half-burned matches.
"It looks as if whoever did this job did it in a hurry," Ned said.  "If the fuse had been set right it would have done its work.  Do you see why it went out?"
"Well, there's a break in it, and the break is over a damp spot on the floor.  The powder stuffed line burned to the break and there the flame went out.  It burned slowly, anyway, which probably accounts for our being alive at this time."
Ned took a rule from his pocket and measured the shoe tracks on the floor. There were numerous tracks, but one was very distinct.  This had been made by the man who rolled the half-barrel of powder to the place where it had been found.
The barrel had come upon a slight obstruction, and the man had evidently lifted and pulled at it until his shoe, by reason of the extra weight put upon it, had sunk deep into the light soil.
"That wasn't any Chink shoe," Jimmie said.
"No, it was a shoe made in America," Ned said.  "It is comparatively a new shoe, too.  I am wondering now why the American, or Englishman, or Frenchman, whatever he is, didn't hire some of the Chinks to do this work of laying the explosion."
"They're afraid," Jack volunteered.
There was a litter of half-burned matches near the barrel and Ned bent over and gathered them up.  As he did so something bright lying on the ground, caught his eye.  It was a gold rivet, or wire, not more than an inch long and about as thick as a knitting needle.
"What is it?" asked Frank.
"I should say," replied Ned, "that the fellow lost the cover to his match box here.  This looks like the rivet which served for a hinge. The cover itself may be here."
But a close search did not reveal the cover, nor anything else of moment, in fact, and the boys soon left the cellar.  Frank laughed as Ned placed the gold wire in his pocketbook.
"You are making quite a collection," he said.
"Yes," Jack added, "he has a state department seal, bits of broken sealing wax, and now a piece of a broken match safe.  He'll set a trap with them directly!"
"The trap is already set!" Ned replied.
The long delay at the house made high speed necessary during the remainder of the run to Peking.  The machines sparked and roared through that ancient land, bringing sleepy-eyed natives to doors and windows, and setting villages into whirls of excitement.
Captain Martin and one marine were with the boys, the rest having been left with the wounded men.
"My flying squadron is just beginning to fly," Ned said, as the machines rolled noisily down a hill from which the towers of the distant city showed.  "And the smaller it becomes as we approach the end of the journey!"
"Suppose the Chinks attack the men left behind?" asked Jack.
"No danger of that," Ned replied.  "They are not after the marines, but the Boy Scouts who had the nerve to cross the Pacific for the purpose of bringing a rascal to punishment."
This view of the case proved to be the correct one, as the marines were remarkably well treated by the natives, who gathered about them with many gestures and questions, all unintelligible to the warriors.  The boys who were slowly drawing a slowly closing circle around the guilty ones were the persons in demand!
It was the middle of the forenoon when Ned and his companions reached the suburbs of the wonderful city.  They attracted a great deal of attention as they wheeled through the straggling streets.  They had not yet come to the wall, so the population was principally agricultural. Maize and millet are the principal products of the soil here, as the staple crops, wheat and rice, do not flourish well.
They had no difficulty in passing the gate which gave into the southern or "Chinese City."  It is the northern part of Peking that is known to foreigners as "The Forbidden City."  Here the rulers live in wonderful palaces.  This is the old "Tartar City," too.
The second division of Peking is the business section.  Here the boys drew up at a most uninviting native inn and asked a clerk who claimed to speak English for an interpreter.  A snaky-looking fellow was finally produced, and Ned proceeded to question him about the show places of the town.
"Let him think we are American tourists," Ned said to his chums, "and we'll stand a better chance of getting into the diplomatic section of the town. Anyway, while we are here, we may as well see the sights."
After a midday luncheon Ned and Jimmie started out to look over the place. They were now in what is known as the general city, where the streets are from 140 to 200 feet wide.  The thoroughfares are mostly unpaved, and the shops which line them are continuous, some green, some blue, some red, but all bustling with business.
The shops in this section of Peking are decorated with huge, staring signs, resplendent with Chinese characters highly gilt.  Before the boys had traveled far they were forcibly reminded of the lower East Side of New York.  The great thoroughfares roared with the rush of commerce.
Shopkeepers, peddlers, mountebanks, quack doctors, pedestrians rushing to and fro, all reminded the lads of the lower part of the big city on Manhattan island.  The theaters and public places of amusement are situated in this part of Peking.
When Ned and Jimmie returned from the stroll they found Frank and Jack waiting for them with anxiety depicted on their faces.
"What have you been doing?" Frank asked.  "I thought you came here to interview the American ambassador."
"All in good time," Ned replied, with a smile.  "I want to pick up the American shoe print before I present my letter to the ambassador."
"Fine show you stand of picking up a shoe print in a crowd like that one out there!" Jack said.  "It's worse than Coney Island on a midsummer Sunday."
"Perhaps I didn't use the right words," smiled Ned.  "I might have said I was waiting for the American shoe man to pick me up."
"He's done that now, all right," Captain Martin said.  "You had not been out of the house five minutes before the spies were thick as flies in the old Eighth ward.  They are all about us now.  Watch and see if we are ever alone."
Ned glanced about carelessly and nudged Frank with his elbow.
"That waiter?" he asked.  "How long has he been loitering about the room?"
"Ever since we arrived.  The men who have been entertaining us on the way were evidently waiting for us."
The boys were not in a private room, but in a public apartment where there were tables and refreshments.
"But that chap belongs here," Ned replied.
"Well, if you watch him, you will see that he is attending strictly to the wants of this party.  If we call he'll wait on us.  If any one else calls, another waiter glides over to him.  Nice to be so exclusive, isn't it?"
"If you are right," Ned said, "it is time for us to move on."
"To the embassy?" asked Captain Martin.  "You see," the Captain went on, "I'm rather anxious to land you boys under the protecting folds of the American flag, for there my responsibility ends."
"No, not to the embassy," Ned replied.  "As yet I have nothing of importance to confide to the ambassador.  I can only tell him that we are here, that we had numerous nibbles on the road from Taku, but that all the fish got away."
"Holy smoke!" exclaimed Jack.  "I hope you don't think of staying out in the open until you can convey a couple of diplomats to the embassy!  You can't catch your man single handed.  You're not in New York now, but in a heathen town, a town where the life of a foreign devil is not worth a grain of rice."
"Just the same," Ned replied, "I'm going to stick around this town until I get what I want."
"In this dump?" asked Jack.
"No; there's an American hotel up the street--an American hotel operated by Chinks!  We'll go there and take rooms and wait for something to turn up."
So, in spite of the protests of Captain Martin, the change was made, and late that night Ned awoke to find himself sitting up on the edge of his bed, automatic in hand, listening to the steady boring of a tool of some sort around the lock of his door!
CHAPTER XIX
A BOY SCOUT SURPRISE PARTY
When Ned heard the assaults of the midnight visitor on his door he looked at his watch, then slipped over to the window facing the street. Twelve o'clock and the thoroughfare below still teeming with life. Peking has something over three millions of population, according to the records, but, as a matter of fact, no one knows the exact size of the town as to humanity, for the Chinese live in densely-packed districts, and there are no census reports given out.
The city is many centuries old.  It was a thriving capital three thousand years before Christ was born and during all the years of war and starvation and intrigue it continued to grow.
The hardy races from the North, which overran the country and kept a Tartar on the Chinese throne for centuries, are virile and pertinacious. It has been the fate of every civilization we know anything about to be wiped out by hardy races.  Rome went down before the Northmen, and England had its oversea conqueror.  Greece and Italy succumbed to the might of brawny arms, and civilization shrank back for hundreds of years.  So China fell before the men of the mountains, and her records were destroyed.
As in all large cities, there is a night side to the life of Peking.  If you traverse the streets at night you will find shops which have been closed all day opening for the trade of the night workers.  You will see people who have slept through all the daylight hours walking through the streets to their nightly toil.  You will see about the same things, only on a smaller scale, that you see in the daytime.
This night was no different from any other, except that there were more men who did not appear to have any particular business there lounging along the streets.  Now and then these loiterers, walking slowly along the business ways, slipped unostentatiously into alleys and narrow by-ways and so on into basement and garret halls where others of their kind were assembled.
When Ned looked out of his window, listening meanwhile to the steady boring sound at his door, he saw a light at a window opposite to the building in which he stood waving slowly to and fro.  There was a long vertical motion, and then the light moved from side to side again.
Ned counted the slow strokes.  Left to right, right to left, back again and yet again!
"Six," he mused, "and all in action!"
The mouse-like gnawing at his door continued, the sounds seemingly louder than before.  The intruder was evidently gaining courage!
Presently the boy leaned out of his window, which was on the third floor of the hotel, and watched the entrance below.  There appeared to be a great rush of customers at that time.  At least a score of natives passed in at the large door.
Then Ned turned to the right and studied the window of the room next to his own on that floor.  There was a light in that room, too, but it seemed to be a red light.  Then it changed to white, then to blue.
Ned laughed and began drawing on his clothes.  Still the boring continued, and Ned bent over to see if he could discover any holes in the stile of the door.
There being no light in his room and, presumably, one in the corridor outside, he thought he might be able to see when a cut through the stile had been made.  There were no indications of a break yet, and Ned settled back on his bed to wait.
Just at that moment he hardly knew what he was waiting for.  He had been very busy all the afternoon, laying plans and conferring with a man who came from the police bureau, and who appeared to be working under instructions from the boy.  Ned considered his plans as near perfect as any human plans can be, still he did not know exactly what would happen at a quarter past twelve.
At ten minutes past midnight the boy heard a rush of footsteps in the corridor.  They passed his door and the boring ceased.  Then they faded away in the distance and the gnawing was resumed.  There was a little more noise in the hotel than before.
Ned smiled at the crude efforts that were being made to enter his room. In New York man disposed to enter for the purpose of robbery would have a skeleton key.  He would be inside the room in three seconds after entering the corridor and finding the apartment he sought wrapped in darkness.
"But this isn't New York," the boy mused.  "This is the Orient, and the patience of the Orient, and the stupidity of the Orient!"
At exactly a quarter past twelve there was a commotion in the corridor. Several people seemed to be moving toward the door of Ned's room.  Once there was a little cry of alarm.
Ned looked out of his window.  The panes where he had observed the signals, across the street, were dark.  There was no light in the window next his own which had shown red, white and blue but a moment before.
The clamor in the corridor increased, and Ned walked to the door and undid the fastenings.  Then it swung open, almost striking Ned in the face.
Facing the boy, in the corridor, were six Chinamen, or men in native dress, rather.  Back of them were a score of stern-faced Chinese policemen.  To the right, and struggling with all their might to get into the room were Frank, Jack, and Jimmie, the latter with his nose wrinkled and wrinkling to such an extent that it resembled a small ocean with the wind undulating its surface.
"Trap's closed!"
That was Jimmie, of course.  Frank and Jack stood by laughing.  The faces of the six men who stood before the door were anything but pleasant to look upon.
They expressed hate, despair, desperate intents.  As they stood there Frank reached forward and snatched a queue-wig from the head of the man nearest him.
"There he is!" Jimmie cried.  "There's the old boy, Ned--the smooth gink we saw at Taku, at Tientsin, and at numerous places on the road.  I wonder how he likes the scene?"
Ned motioned to the six to step into the room.  Three of them objected, then swords flashed in the light of the corridor and they moved on.
They were followed by the three boys and half a dozen policemen, all with automatics in view.  At a motion from the leader of the officers the six were searched and ironed.  Jack nudged Frank in the ribs with his elbow as the handcuffs clicked on the wrists of the man who had so persistently followed them from the coast of the Yellow Sea.
"That's a good sport," he said.  "I like to see a fellow play the game!"
The prisoner turned a pair of treacherous eyes on the boys and a cynical smile curled his thin lips.
"You have the cards now," he said, in English, "but look out for the new deal.  I'll keep you busy yet."
"Go to it!" laughed Jack.  "Go as far as you like, only I fail to see how you're going to get into the game again.  Looks like you were all in, just now!"
"Wait!" said the other, scornfully.
There now came a knock at the door and Ned opened it to admit Captain Martin, who looked as if he had just left his bed after an unsatisfactory sleep.  He cast his eyes about the room with amazement showing in every glance.
"What does this mean?" he asked.
"Surprise party!" Jimmie cried.
"Who are these men?"
The Captain pointed to the six prisoners lined up against the wall of the room.
"Our friends from Taku, from the ruined temple, from Tientsin, from the farm house loaded with gunpowder, and from the tea house," laughed Ned. "Do you recognize the fellow with his disguise off?  Jimmie gave him a haircut and shave just now."
"And you have captured them?"
"It doesn't look as if they had captured us," Jimmie broke in.
"But how, when, why?"
"All of that!" grinned Jimmie.
Ned spoke a few words to the officer in charge of the squad and in a moment the room was occupied only by the handcuffed prisoners, the four boys, and Captain Martin.  The latter stood looking at Ned with a question in each eye.
"When you get time," he said, "I'd like to have you tell me how you brought this case to a close so suddenly."
Ned motioned to the man who had been stripped of his disguise to take a chair at the table.  The fellow did so reluctantly, turning his face this way and that, as if seeking some opportunity of escape.
"Well," he said.  "You have the floor.  Go On."
"You were at Taku?" asked Ned.
"I deny everything!"
"You will deny your own fingerprints, the shoeprints?" asked Ned.
"Well, supposing, for the sake of argument, that I was at Taku, what has that to do with this brutal and illegal arrest?"
"You placed the powder under the house where the wounded men lay?"
"No."
"I have something I want to show you," Ned said, taking a paper from his pocket.  "Have you a match?"
Almost involuntarily the fellow put his hand to his right vest pocket and brought forth a gold match safe.  Ned took it into his hand and touched the spring which lifted the top.
"There seems to be a new wire in the hinge," he said.
"Yes, the old one wore out."
Ned opened his pocketbook and took out the gold wire he had found in the cellar by the side of the powder.  The prisoner started violently when he saw it.
"Is this yours?" Ned asked.
"No!"
"All right!" Ned said.
With the point of his knife he pushed the sale and put the old new hinge from the match safe and put the old one in its place.
It fitted exactly.
"There!" Ned said, "you see the old one did not wear out entirely.  It wore away so that it dropped out.  Do you know where I found it, my friend?"
"It is immaterial to me where you found it."
"Even if I found it in a cellar by the side of a half barrel of gunpowder to which a lighted fuse had been attached?"
"Hadn't you better make your case--if you can make it at all--in the courts?" asked the prisoner.
Ned took the state department seal, the sealing wax, and the bits of parchment from his pocket.
"Who met you in the library at the house you attempted to destroy?" he asked.
There was no reply.
"Were these men present?" with a sweep of the hand toward the other prisoners.
"What has this to do with my case?"
"This," Ned replied.  "You were still conspiring to fix upon my government the crime of interfering in the private affairs of another nation--with the crime of providing, by a treacherous and despicable route, the money needed by the revolutionary party of China.  You were doing business in that house with the representatives of another nation. Who were they?  What nations did they represent, or pretend to represent?"
"I have nothing to say to that."
Ned held up the seal.
"This was not used?" he asked.
"It was not used."
"Why not?"
"Because the representative of that nation refused to consider the terms offered him."
Ned held forth the sealing wax.
"This shows that the seal of another nation was used.  Where is the paper to which the seal was attached?"
"Destroyed!"
"Is that true?" asked Ned.
"It is true, they all deserted me.  They all ran away when they knew you were in the country, but I brought them back, and held them until the incident at the house where you found those things."
"So you are now the only one to look to for the history of this bit of deviltry?"
"I stand alone," was the reply.  "Alone, with the exception of these men I who were arrested with me.  The plot has failed, and we know what to expect."
The prisoner was about to say more, but just then a clamor in the street below attracted the attention of all in the room.
CHAPTER XX
THE EMPEROR TAKES A HAND
Ned stepped to the window and looked out.  The street in front of the hotel was filled from curb to curb with an excited mob.
That the efforts of those below were directed toward the building and its occupants there could be no doubt.  Many a shaking fist was thrust up to the lighted panes where Ned stood.
The boy turned to Jimmie, spoke a few words in a whisper, and the little fellow left the room.  With him went the interpreter who had been engaged that day.
Shouts, howls and groans of rage now came up from the street, and Ned stepped away from the window.  As he did so the prisoner who had been making a partial confession when the uproar came, moved forward, as if to show himself to those below.
Seeing his intention, Ned seized him by the shoulder and hurled him to the back end of the room.  The prisoner smiled and again seated himself in the chair he had occupied before.
"Your friends are excited," Ned said, drawing the curtain at the window.
The other nodded in the direction of the window and smiled.
"My friends?" he asked.
"Certainly."
"Why do you attribute this outbreak to me?"
"Because those not in league with you and your cause would hardly threaten American tourists, in the face of the law."
"American tourists!" snarled the other, and Ned laughed.
Jimmie now came bustling into the room, his eyes staring with excitement. The interpreter was only a trifle less moved by the information which had been gained.
"What is it?" Jack asked.
"He's crazy with fear again!" Frank put in.
"Say," Jimmie cried, "you'd all better be gettin' out of this place. The people out there are goin' to raid it in a minute!"
The prisoner uttered a defiant laugh and again started for the window. Again Ned forced him back.
"What's the trouble?" asked Frank.
"Why," was the reply, "this gink here," pointing toward the prisoner whose disguise had been removed, "this gazabo hadn't much confidence in his own ability to win this fight, so he appealed to the revolutionary leaders."
"That's fine!" Jack said.  "We may have the luck to see a full-fledged revolution doing business."
"You are quite likely to."
This from the prisoner, now standing with the others at the back of the room.
"You arranged for this demonstration in case you should be taken?" asked Ned.
The prisoner snarled out some ugly reply.
"You planned this?" demanded Ned, resolved to know the truth.
"Yes," almost shouted the other, "and you will soon discover that it is something more than a demonstration."
The interpreter drew Jimmie aside and whispered in his ear.  Then the boy turned to Ned.
"This boy says he saw a signal given from a window as soon as this bunch was taken," he said.  "Then crowds began forming.  Say, but we'd better be gettin' out!"
"Save yourselves the exertion," the prisoner said.  "They will find you, wherever you go!"
"Possibly," Ned said.
Then he walked to the window and again looked out on the mob.  The street was packed.  Faces showing rage and desperate bravery were uplifted.  Fists were shaken at the window where he stood.  In a moment a stone came hurtling against the wall of the house.
Here and there, on the outskirts of the crowd, policemen in the funny uniforms the police of Peking wear, were seen trying vainly to force their way to the door of the hotel.  The main entrance seemed to be guarded, for the mob did not succeed in forcing its way in.
Presently, however, Ned saw long ladders being carried forward on the shoulders of the rioters.  Then they were dropped against the wall and men with bloody faces--bloody from the acts of their own fellows--fought to be first to climb.
"In three minutes," the prisoner said, "you will be torn limb from limb if I am not released."
"Your friends certainly do insist on something of the kind," Ned replied.
"Remove these irons and place me before the window," commanded the other. "That will quiet them."
"And make terms with a pack of rioters?" smiled Ned.
"You can save your life, and the lives of your friends, in no other way," insisted the other.
Ned went to the window again, although bricks and stones were flying quite freely.  The ladders swarmed with excited men, but no one seemed able to gain entrance at the windows which were attacked.
Instead, a ladder now and then went toppling backward, carrying dozens of rioters to death or injury.  When the ladders began falling the mob moved away from that side of the street.
"You see," Ned said to the prisoner, "that we were on the lookout for something like this."
"How could you have been?" gasped the other.
"Our interpreter heard some of the messages sent out by mouth by the revolutionists.  I connected your possible capture with the gathering. We were warned and made ready."
"But my men will soon be here!" shouted the other.  "They are sworn to go to death for the cause if necessary."
"But I don't see them doing anything of the kind," Ned replied.  "On the contrary, they seem to be taking pretty good care of their yellow old hides!"
"You'll see!" howled the other.
Directly the heavy beat of marching feet came up to the window, heard above the roar of the mob below.  Far down the street Ned saw the advancing line, bearing the colors of the Emperor.
The rioters saw the line, too, and the crowd in front of the hotel began to thin.  Then the soldiers arrived and the thoroughfare was empty save for their presence.  By this time the prisoner was in a condition of collapse.  He had planned this thing carefully, and was now in the meshes of failure.
The street below soon cleared of the few who gathered about to witness the arrival of the soldiers.  The few prisoners, who had been taken marched sullenly to prison.  In ten minutes the city of Peking was as quiet as if the machinations of the conspirators had never stirred the people to riot.
"Well?" Ned said, facing the prisoner.  "What do you think we ought to do with you?"
"After all," was the reply, "you have no charges against me.  My government alone can discipline me for what has been done."
"Your government will deny any knowledge of the conspiracy," Ned replied. "From this time on, you have no government."
"And yet I acted under instructions."
"What was the motive?" asked Frank, who saw a fine cablegram for his father's newspaper in the story.
"The purpose," replied the other, weakly, "was to so entangle your government that it would not dare lend aid to the revolutionary leaders."
"And you were engaged in it?"
A nod of the head was the only reply.
"Yet you pretended to be assisting the revolutionary party.  You were present at their councils.  Can it be possible that you were treacherous to both sides?"
There was no answer.
"Suppose," Ned said, "suppose I turn you over to the revolutionary leaders, with a statement of what you have just said?  What would be your fate? Remember that the men of the revolution were ready to fight for you not long ago."
Still no reply.  The prisoner only looked sullenly down at the floor.
"What government do you represent?" asked Frank.  "What nation is it that is protecting the imperial government of China?"
"You need not answer that question," Ned said, with a sigh.
Frank laughed.
"I see," he said.  "You don't want to further implicate matters by giving out the name of the power whose seal shows on the wax!  All right, old boy, I'll get it yet!"
"No good can come of a representative of the United States Government presenting charges of such a character against another power," Ned replied.
Captain Martin now arose from the chair where he had been seated for a long time.  He glanced keenly into the faces of the six prisoners and then turned to Ned.
"Shall I take them in charge?" he asked,
"That would be useless."
"Then what can be done with them?"
"I am going to turn them over to the authorities on the charge of attempted murder, based on the effort they made to kill us in the old house."
"Very well," the Captain said, "now will you tell me how you set this trap so, cleverly?"
"It was only a matter of detail," Ned replied.  "I took good care to let the native waiters here know that I had the clues I had found secreted in my room.  I also let it be known that I was a heavy sleeper.
"My interpreter, who is by no means as treacherous a chap as his looks would indicate, heard the robbery of my room planned.  He heard the hour fixed-a quarter past twelve.  So all the rest was easy."
"Oh, yes, easy, but how did you do it?"
"Frank, Jack and Jimmie helped," added Ned.  "Jack was at a window over the way.  He told me by signals just how many men were to take part in the attack on me.
"Frank, in the next room to mine, told me when the time came to be on guard.  I really do not wake easily, and he rigged a cord through the wall so I could rest comfortably until the time for action came.
"Then when all was ready, he told me by means of colored light that all the six were in the corridor, and that the officers I had engaged during the afternoon were on hand."
"And you went to sleep with all this on your mind and slept up to within a quarter of an hour of the time set for action?" asked the Captain in wonder.
"Why, certainly," was the reply.  "You see, we have been having some exciting nights, and I needed rest.  The other boys slept a good deal this afternoon, so I left them to wake me at night.  Nothing odd about that, is there?"
"Nothing save the nerve of it."
Two high officers now made their appearance in the room and beckoned to the prisoners.  All arose save the man from whom the disguise had been stripped.  He remained in the chair into which he had dropped, seemingly in a stupor.
"Come," said the officer.
The man arose, desperation in his eyes, and moved toward the door.  A few days before that miserable night he had been one of the leaders in the statecraft of the world.  Now he was being marched to a prison like any ordinary criminal.
The speaker was interrupted by a quick movement on the part of the prisoner, the man he had addressed as Count.  There was no one between he desperate man and the still  open window.  Ned was at the door, Captain Martin was out in the corridor, and Frank, Jack and Jimmie were talking together in a corner.
Handcuffed as he was, the Count leaped to the window and shot down to the hard pavement below.  There was a shrill cry as his body hurtled through the air, then a crash.
Below passersby drew away from what lay in a bloody heap on the pavement. A little crowd gathered, at a distance, but none knew that the body of one of the most distinguished statesmen in the world lay there.
"It is finished!" Ned said, with a sigh.  "The whole story of the conspiracy will never be told.  It is the story of a treacherous government and a treacherous statesman.
"The documents I have will fully prove that the United States had no hand in the gold shipment, and that is all that we care for.  The old world may take care of its own political messes."
"It is a mess indeed," Captain Martin, said.  "In less than a year China will be red with blood, and the streets of Peking will witness the retreat of the royal family."
How true this prophecy was the readers of the daily newspapers now know.
"Well," Jack said, with a yawn, as the boys and the Captain were left alone in the room together, "I presume it is us for little old New York to-morrow.  How do you like this motorcycle-flying-squadron business, boys," he added.  "We seem to have flown ahead of the flying squadron."
"Then we ought to fly back and look after the ones who were wounded on the road," Frank said.  "Suppose we all go back on our machines, and really see something of the country?"
This was agreed to, and the party separated for the night.  In the morning Ned paid his respects to the American ambassador, who greeted him courteously, but wanted to know all about the events of the trip from the coast.
"You have gotten Uncle Sam out of a bad mess," the ambassador said, when Ned had finished his narration, "and you will find that you will be well rewarded when you return to Washington."
The ambassador also requested the boys to visit the other legations, but they did not care to do so.
"Well," he said, then, "you must take a letter from me which may help you on your way.  I have been expecting you here all the week, but it seems that you completed your work without my assistance,"
"Just what I was figuring on," Ned replied.
"I worked under surveillance all the way here, and I desired to show that I could do something on my own account."
The boys left Peking early the next morning, and were not long in reaching the house where the powder trap had been set for them.  There they found Hans and Sandy!  The boys had followed them on from Tientsin in an automobile which an English merchant was taking through.
Both boys were riding motorcycles, and were already proficient enough to proceed with the others, using the machines which had been ridden by the wounded marines, who were sent on to Peking in charge of Captain Martin.
A week was spent on the road to Taku, and the lads enjoyed every minute of the time.  The letter given them by the American ambassador brought them every attention at Tientsin and Taku.
It was late in the fall when they reached New York.  On the night of their arrival there were many joyful meetings in the clubroom of the Black Bear Patrol.  The next day Ned went on to Washington to file his report.  When he returned it was with a very substantial reward.
"Now," he said, with a laugh, "I'm ready for the next trip.  I wonder where it will be?"
THE END
End of Project Gutenberg's Boy Scouts on Motorcycles, by G. Harvey Ralphson

= = = PG18952 = = =
BOY SCOUTS ON A LONG HIKE; OR, TO THE RESCUE IN THE BLACK WATER SWAMPS
Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
BOY SCOUTS ON A LONG HIKE or To the Rescue in the Black Water Swamps
By Archibald Lee Fletcher
Chicago M. A. DONOHUE & COMPANY
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Copyright 1913 M. A. DONOHUE & CO. CHICAGO
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CONTENTS
Chapter                                   Page
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BOY SCOUTS ON A LONG HIKE Or, To the Rescue in the Black Water Swamps
CHAPTER I
THE BOYS OF THE BEAVER PATROL
"They all think, fellows, that the Beaver Patrol can't do it!"
"We'll show 'em how we've climbed up out of the tenderfoot class; hey, boys?"
"Just watch our smoke, that's all. Why, it's only a measly little twenty-five miles per day, and what d'ye think?"
"Sure Seth, and what's that to a husky lot of Boy Scouts, who've been through the mill, and wear merit badges all around? Huh! consider it as good as done right now!"
Half a dozen boys who wore khaki uniforms, were chattering like so many magpies as they stood in a little group on an elevation overlooking the bustling Indiana town of Beverly.
Apparently they must have been practicing some of the many clever things Boy Scouts delight to learn, for several of the number carried signal flags; two had pieces of a broken looking-glass in their possession; while the tall lad, Seth Carpenter, had a rather sadly stained blanket coiled soldier fashion about his person, that gave off a scent of smoke, proving that he must have used it in communicating with distant comrades, by means of the smoke code of signals.
Besides Seth there were in the group Jotham Hale, Eben Newcomb, Andy Mullane, Fritz Hendricks, and a merry, red-faced boy who, because of his German extraction, went by the name of "Noodles Krafft."
The reader who has not made the acquaintance of these wide-awake scouts in previous volumes of this Series will naturally want to know something about them, and hence it might be wise to introduce the members of the Beaver Patrol right here.
Eben was the official bugler of Beverly Troop. He had been made to take this office much against his will, and for a long time had the greatest difficulty in getting the "hang" of his instrument, so that his comrades guyed him most unmercifully over the strange medleys he used to bring forth when meaning to sound the various "calls." But of late Eben seemed to have mastered his silver-plated bugle, and was really doing very well, with an occasional lapse excepted.
Andy was a Kentucky boy, but outside of a little extra touch of pride, and a very keen sense of his own honor, you would never know it.
Seth was the champion signal sender, and delighted to study up everything he could discover concerning this fascinating subject.
Fritz, on his part, chose to make an especial study of woodcraft, and was forever hunting for "signs," and talking of the amazing things which the old-time Indians used to accomplish along this line.
As for good-natured Noodles, if he had any specialty at all, it lay in the art of cooking. When the boys were in camp they looked to him to supply all sorts of meals that fairly made their mouths water with eagerness to begin operations long before the bugle of Eben sounded the "assembly."
Last of all the group, was Jotham Hale, a rather quiet boy, with an engaging face, and clear eyes. Jotham's mother was a Quaker, or at least she came from the peace-loving Friends stock; and the lad had been early taught that he must never engage in fights except as a very last resort, and then to save some smaller fellow from being bullied.
On one occasion, which no one in Beverly would ever forget, Jotham had proven that deep down in his heart he possessed true courage, and grit. He had faced a big mad dog, with only a baseball bat in his hands, and wound up the beast's career right on the main street of the town, while everybody was fleeing in abject terror from contact with the animal.
Because in so doing Jotham had really saved an old and nearly blind veteran soldier from being bitten by the terrible brute, he had been adjudged worthy to wear the beautiful silver merit badge which is sent occasionally from Boy Scout Headquarters to those members of the organization who have saved life at great peril to themselves.
But Jotham was not the only one who proudly sported a badge. In fact, every one of the eight members of the Beaver Patrol wore a bronze medal on the left side of his khaki jacket. This had come to them because of certain services which the patrol had rendered at the time a child had been carried away by a crazy woman, and was found, later on, through the medium of their knowledge of woodcraft.
Of course there were two more boys connected with the patrol, who did not happen to be present at the time we find them resting on their way home after a rather strenuous afternoon in the open.
These were Paul Prentice, the patrol leader, and who served as acting scout master when Mr. Alexander was unable to accompany them; and "Babe" Adams, the newest recruit, a tenderfoot who was bent on learning everything connected with the game.
They had gone home a little earlier than the rest, for reasons that had no connection with the afternoon's sport, each of them having a pressing engagement that could not be broken. "Babe" had been nick-named in the spirit of contrariness that often marks the ways of boys; for he was an unusually tall, thin fellow; and so far as any one knew, had never shirked trouble, so that he could not be called timid in the least.
"No use hurrying, fellows," declared Seth, as he flung himself down on a log that happened to be lying near the edge of a little precipice, marking the abrupt end of the shelf which they had been following, so that to descend further the scouts must pass around, and pick their way down the hillside.
"That's so," added Jotham, following suit, and taking great care not to knock his precious bugle in the least when making the shift; "for one, I'm dead tired after such a hard afternoon. But all the same, I want you to know that I'm in apple-pie condition for that long hike, or will be, after a night's rest."
"What d'ye suppose made Mr. Sargeant offer a prize if the Beaver Patrol could walk to Warwick by one road, and back along another, a distance of just an even hundred miles, between sunrise of four days?" and Fritz looked around at his five comrades as though inviting suggestions.
"Because he's fond of boys, I reckon," remarked Andy. "They tell me he lost two splendid little fellows, one by drowning, and the other through being lost in the forest; and when he learned what sort of things the scouts practice, he said he was in favor of encouraging them to the limit."
"Well, we want to get busy, and show Mr. Sargeant that we're going to give him a run for his money," said Seth.
"We've all seen the cup in the window of the jewelers in town, and it sure is a beauty, and no mistake," added Jotham.
"Don't anybody allow himself to think we can't cover that hundred miles inside the time limit. You know how Paul keeps telling us that confidence is more'n half the battle," Fritz went on to say.
"You pet we want dot gup, undt we're yust bound to get der same," observed Noodles, who could talk quite as well as any of his mates, but who liked to pretend every now and then, that he could only express himself in "broken English," partly because it pleased him and at the same time amused his mates.
"We're right glad to hear you say that, Noodles," declared Seth, with a wink in the direction of the others; "because some of us have been afraid the hike might be too much for you, and Eben."
"Now, there you go again, Seth," complained the bugler, "always imagining that because I seldom blow my own horn----" but he got no further than this, for there broke out a shout, from the rest of the boys.
"That's where you struck it right, Eben!" cried Seth, "because in the old days you seldom did blow your own horn; but I notice that you're improving right along now, and we have hopes of making a champion bugler out of you yet."
"Of course that was just a slip; but let it pass," remarked Eben, grinning in spite of the fact that the joke was on him. "What I meant to say was that because I don't go around boasting about the great things I'm going to do, please look back on my record, and see if I haven't got there every time."
"Sure you have," admitted Seth, "and we give you credit for bull-dog stubbornness, to beat the band. Other fellows would have thrown the bugle into the bushes, and called quits; but you kept right along splitting our ears with all them awful sounds you called music. And say, if you can show the same kind of grit on this long hike we're going to try, there ain't any doubt but what we'll win out."
"Thank you, Seth; you're a queer fish sometimes, but your heart's all right, underneath the trash," observed Eben, sweetly; and when he talked like that he always put a stop to the other's teasing.
"How about you, Noodles; d'ye think you're good for such a tough walk?" asked Fritz, turning suddenly on the red-faced, stout boy, who was moving uneasily about, as though restless.
"Meppy you don't know dot me, I haf peen practice on der quiet dis long time, so as to surbrize you all," came the proud reply. "Feel dot muscle, Seth, undt tell me if you think idt could pe peat. Gymnastics I haf take, py shiminy, till all der while I dream of chinning mineself, hanging py one toe, undt all der rest. Meppy you vill surbrised pe yet. Holdt on, don't say nuttings, put wait!"
He put on such a mysterious air that some of the boys laughed; but Noodles only smiled broadly, nodded his head, and made a gesture with his hand that gave them to understand he was ready and willing to let time vindicate his reputation.
"Hadn't we better be moving on?" remarked Andy.
"Yes, the sun's getting pretty low in the west, and that means it must be near supper time," said Fritz, who was the possessor of a pretty brisk appetite all the time.
"Oh! what's the use of hurrying?" Seth went on to say, shifting his position on the log, and acting as though quite content to remain an unlimited length of time. "It won't take us ten minutes to get there, once we start; fifteen at the most. And I like to walk in just when the stuff is being put on the table. It saves a heap of waiting, you know."
"That's what it does," Eben echoed. "Because, if there's anything I hate to do, it's hanging around while they're finishing getting grub ready."
"Here, quit walking all over me, Noodles!" called out Fritz, who had coiled his rather long legs under him as well as he could, while squatting there on the ground.
"I haf nodt der time to do all dot," remarked the German-American boy, calmly, "idt would pe too pig a chob. Oh! excuse me off you blease, Fritz; dot was an accident, I gif you my word."
"Well, don't stumble across me again, that's all," grumbled the other, watching Noodles suspiciously, and ready to catch him at his tricks by suddenly thrusting out a foot, and tripping him up--for Noodles was so fat and clumsy that when he took a "header" he always afforded more or less amusement for the crowd.
It was not often that Noodles displayed a desire to play tricks or joke, which fact made his present activity all the more remarkable; in fact he was developing a number of new traits that kept his chums guessing; and was far from being the dull-witted lad they had formerly looked upon as the butt of all manner of practical pranks.
While the scouts continued to chat, and exchange laughing remarks upon a variety of subjects, Noodles kept moving restlessly about. Fritz felt pretty sure that the other was only waiting for a good chance to pretend to stumble over his legs again, and while he pretended to be entering heartily into the rattling fire of conversation, he was secretly keeping an eye on the stout scout.
Just as he anticipated, Noodles, as though discovering his chance, lurched heavily toward him. Fritz, boylike, instantly threw out a foot, intending to simply trip him up, and give the other a taste of his own medicine.
Well, Noodles tripped handsomely, and went sprawling headlong in a ludicrous manner; but being so round and clumsy he rather overdid the matter; for instead of simply rolling there on the ground, he kept on scrambling, hands and legs shooting out every-which-way; and to the astonishment and dismay of his comrades, Noodles vanished over the edge of the little precipice, close to which the scouts had made their temporary halt while on the way home!
CHAPTER II
HELPING NOODLES
"Oh! he fell over!" shouted Eben, appalled by what had happened.
"Poor old Noodles! What if he's gone and broke his neck?" gasped Jotham, turning a reproachful look upon Fritz.
"I didn't mean to go as far as that, fellows, give you my word for it!" Fritz in turn was muttering, for he had been dreadfully alarmed when he saw poor Noodles vanish from view in such a hasty fashion.
"Listen!" cried Andy.
"Hellup!" came a faint voice just then.
"It's Noodles!" exclaimed Fritz, scrambling over in the direction of the spot where they had seen the last of their unfortunate chum.
"Oh! perhaps he's gone and fractured his leg, and our family doctor, meaning Paul, ain't along!" groaned Eben.
All of them hastened to follow after the eager Fritz, and on hands and knees made for the edge of the shelf of rock, from which in times past they had sent many a flag signal to some scout mounted on the roof of his house in town.
Fritz had more of an interest in discovering what had happened to the vanished scout than any of his comrades. Possibly his uneasy conscience reproached him for having thrust out his foot in the way he did, and sending poor Noodles headlong to his fate.
At any rate he reached the brink of the descent before any of the rest. They unconsciously kept their eyes on Fritz. He would serve as a barometer, and from his actions they could tell pretty well the conditions existing down below. If Fritz exhibited any symptoms of horror, then it would afford them a chance to steel their nerves against the sight, before they reached his side.
Fritz was observed to crane his neck, and peer over the edge of the shelf. Further he leaned, as though hardly able to believe his eyes. Then, when some of the rest were holding their breath in expectation of seeing him turn a white face toward them, Fritz gave vent to a hoarse laugh. It was as though the relief he felt just had to find a vent somehow.
Astounded by this unexpected outcome of the near-tragedy the others hastened to crawl forward still further, until they too were able to thrust out their heads, and see for themselves what it was Fritz seemed to be amused at.
Then they, too, chuckled and shook with amusement; nor could they be blamed for giving way to this feeling, since the spectacle that met their gaze was comical enough to excite laughter on the part of any one.
Noodles was there all right; indeed, he was pretty much in evidence, as they could all see.
In falling it happened that he had become caught by the seat of his stout khaki trousers; a friendly stump of a broken branch connected with a stunted tree that grew out of the face of the little precipice had taken a firm grip upon the loose cloth; and since the boy in struggling had turned around several times, there was no such thing as his becoming detached, unless the branch broke.
"Hellup! why don't you gif me a handt?" he was shouting as he clawed at the unyielding face of the rock, while vainly endeavoring to keep his head higher than his flying heels.
While it was very funny to the boys who peered over the edge of the shelf, as Noodles would have an ugly tumble should things give way, Andy and Seth quickly realized that they had better get busy without any more delay, and do the gallant rescue act.
Had Paul been there he would have gone about it in a business-like way, for he was quick to grapple with a problem, and solve it in short order. As it was a case of too many cooks spoiling the broth, one boy suggested a certain plan, only to have a second advanced as a better method of getting Noodles out of his unpleasant predicament.
Meantime the poor fellow was kicking, and turning, and pleading with them not to go back on an old chum, and leave him to such a terrible fate.
"Der rope--get quick der rope, undt pull me oop!" he wailed.
"That's so, boys, Noodles has struck the right nail on the head!" cried Seth. "Here, who's carrying that rope right now?"
"Noodles has got it himself, that's what!" exclaimed Eben.
"Did you ever hear of such rotten luck, now?" demanded Seth.
"Hold on!" interrupted Andy, "seems to me I remember seeing him lay something down over here. Let me look and find out. Whoop! here she is, boys! That's what I call great luck. Seth, suppose you see if you can drop the loop over his head."
"Pe sure as you don't shoke me, poys!" called out the dangling object below, in a manner to prove that he heard all they said.
"Get it over his feet, Seth; then we can yank him up. He won't mind it for a short time. Some of his brains will have a chance to run back into his head that way," suggested Eben.
"Make quick, blease!" wailed the unhappy scout, who was growing dizzy with all this dangling and turning around. "I hears me der cloth gifing away; or else dot dree, it pe going to preak py der roots. Hurry oop! Get a moof on you, somepody. Subbose I want to make some squash pie down on der rocks?"
But Seth was already hard at work trying to coax that noose at the end of the dangling rope to fall over the uptilted legs of the unfortunate scout.
"Keep still, you!" he shouted, when for the third time his angling operations were upset by some unexpected movement on the part of the struggling boy. "Think I c'n lasso a bucking broncho? Hold your feet up, and together, if you want me to get you! There, that's the way. Whoop-la!"
His last shout announced sudden success.
Indeed, the loop of the handy rope had dropped over the feet of Noodles, and was speedily drawn tight by a quick movement on the part of the operator.
The balance of the boys laid hold on the rope and every one felt that the tension was relieved--that is, every one but Noodles, and when he found himself being drawn upward, with his head down, he probably thought things had tightened considerably.
As the obliging branch saw fit to let go its tenacious grip about that time, of course Noodles was soon drawn in triumph over the edge of the shale, protesting more or less because he was scratched in several places by sharp edges of the rock.
"Hurrah for Scout tactics; they count every time!" exclaimed Eben.
Fritz was unusually solicitous, and asked Noodles several times whether he had received any serious hurt as a result of his strange experience. The German boy felt himself all over, grunting several times while so doing. But in the end he announced that he believed he was all there, and beyond a few minor bruises none the worse for his adventure.
"Put you pet me I haf a narrow escape," he added, seriously. "How far must I haf dropped if dot pully oldt khaki cloth gives vay?"
"All of twenty feet, Noodles," declared Andy.
"Dwenty feets! Ach, petter say dree dimes dot," asserted Noodles. "I gives you my word, poys, dot it seemed I was on der top of a mountain, mit a fine chance my pones to preak on der rocks pelow. Pelieve me, I am glad to pe here."
"I hope you don't think I did that on purpose, Noodles?" asked Fritz, contritely.
The other turned a quizzical look upon him.
"Tid for tad, Fritz," he remarked, "iff I had nodt peen drying to choke mit you meepy I might nodt haf met with sooch a shock. Petter luck nexdt time, hey?"
"I don't know just what you mean, Noodles, blest if I do," remarked Fritz, with a puzzled look on his face, "but I agree with all you say. This practical joke business sometimes turns out different from what you expect. I'm sure done with it."
But then, all boys say that, especially after they have had a little fright; only to go back to their old way of doing things when the shock has worn off. And the chances were that Fritz was far from being cured of his habits.
"How lucky we had the rope along," ventured Jotham, who was coiling up the article in question at the time he spoke.
"I always said it would come in handy," remarked Eben, quickly and proudly, "and if you stop to think of the many uses we've put that same rope to, from yanking a fellow out of a quicksand, to tying up a bad man who had escaped from the penitentiary, you'll all agree with me that it's been one of the best investments we ever made."
"That's right," echoed Seth, always willing to give credit where such was due.
"Ketch me ever going into the woods without my rope," declared Eben.
"Well, do we make that start for home and mother and supper right now; or are we going to stay here till she gets plumb dark?" asked Fritz, impatiently, moving his feet out of the way every time anyone approached too closely, as though possessed by a fear lest he be tempted to repeat his recent act.
"Come on, everybody," said Eben, making a start, "I refuse to hang out a minute longer. Seems like I c'n just get a whiff of the steak a sizzling on the gridiron at our house; and say, when I think of it, I get wild. I'm as hungry as that bear that came to our camp, and sent us all up in trees like a covey of partridges."
"If you're as hungry as that after just an afternoon's signal practice, think what'll happen when we've been hiking all day, and covered our little forty or fifty miles?" suggested Andy, chuckling.
"Oh! come off, Andy, you don't really mean that, do you?" called out Eben over his shoulder. "I'm good for twenty-five miles, I think; but you give me a cold feeling when you talk about fifty. And poor old Noodles here will melt away to just a grease spot, if the weather keeps on as warm as it is now."
"Don't let him worry you, Eben," sang out Seth. "I heard Paul telling how at the most we might try for thirty the second day, so as to get ahead a bit. But what is going to count in this test is regularity--keeping up an even pace each day of the four. And chances are we'll own that fine trophy by the time we get back to Beverly again."
"Didn't I hear something about our having to register at a lot of places along the way?" asked Jotham.
"Yes, I believe that's a part of the game," replied Seth. "It's only right, just to prove that we haven't cut across lots, and shirked any. Mr. Sargeant and the two members of the committee mean to wait up for us at each station, and kind of keep an eye on us. I guess they want to encourage us some, too, when we come in, dusty and tired and feeling pretty near fagged out.
"Some of the other fellows, Steve Slimmons, Arty Beecher, and two more, who expect to start our second patrol in the fall, wanted to go along with us; but Mr. Sargeant preferred to limit it to just the Beavers. He said we were seasoned scouts by this time, while the other fellows might be called tenderfeet; and it would be a pity to run chances of losing the prize, just because one of them softies fell down."
Fritz offered this explanation, and somehow at mention of Steve Slimmons' name a slight smile could be seen flitting across more than one face. For well did the scouts remember when this same boy had been accounted one of the toughest lads in all Milltown, as that part of Beverly across the railroad tracks was called.
At that time he had been called "Slick" Slimmons, and in many ways he deserved the name, for he was a smooth customer. But circumstances had arisen, as told in a previous volume of this series, whereby Steve had gone through a rather serious experience, and had his eyes opened to the fact that in leading such a wild life he was carrying the heavy end of the log.
He had broken with the tough crowd of which he had been a member up to then, and now was hand in glove with Paul Prentice and his scouts, in fact considered himself a member of Beverly Troop.
The active lads found little trouble in negotiating the descent leading down to level ground. Even Noodles had become many times more agile than before he donned the magical khaki of the scouts; for the various duties that had to be performed from time to time by every member of the patrol had done wonders for the slow moving German-American boy.
With their goal now in sight, the six scouts started off at a lively pace. If any of them felt in the least bit tired he was evidently determined not to show it to his comrades, or any one they might happen to meet on the road leading to Beverly. Pride is a great thing at certain times, and helps ride over many difficulties.
So, in due time they separated, each fellow heading toward his own home. And the last words they called back to each other were in connection with the great hike upon which they expected to start on the following morning, which would be Tuesday.
Many anxious looks were cast upward toward the blinking stars that night, and speculations indulged in as to the probable kind of weather that would be doled out to them while on the road.
And more than one scout lay awake long after he went to bed, trying to lift the curtain that hid the future, just a little way, so as to get a peep of what was waiting for the Beaver Patrol, but of course without the least success.
CHAPTER III
THE GENTLE COW
"Paul, how do we hold out for the third day on the hike?"
"Yes, and Paul, please let us know just how much further you expect to coax the leg weary bunch on today? Not to say that I'm tired; but then I know Noodles, and another scout not far away right now, are grunting like fun every little rise in the road we come to," and Seth gave his head a flirt in the quarter where Eben was anxiously gripping his bugle, as if in momentary expectation of getting a signal from the patrol leader to blow the call that would signify a halt.
"It's only four o'clock, fellows," began the acting scoutmaster.
Dismal groans sounded; but with a smile Paul went on to add:
"We've already made our twenty-five miles since sun-up, just this side of Warwick; but it's a fine day, and I did hope we might hang on a little while further, so as to cut down our last day's hike a few miles. It's always the hardest part of the whole thing, the finishing spurt. But of course, if any of you feel played out we can call it off right now."
Eben and Noodles braced themselves up at this, and tried to look as though they had no calling acquaintance with such a thing as fatigue.
"Oh! I'm good for a couple more miles, I guess," declared the former.
"Make idt tree, undt you will see how I holdt oudt!" proudly boasted the stout boy, who spent half his time mopping his red face; for the day had been a pretty warm one, so Noodles, who had to carry a third again as much weight as any of his companions, thought.
"Bully boy!" exclaimed impulsive Seth, "didn't I say they had the sand to do all we tried. You never would have believed Noodles here could have covered the ground he has. Scouting has been the making of him, as it will of any feller that cares to set his teeth together, and just try real hard."
"I suggest then," went on Paul, his face beaming with pleasure, "that we take a little rest right here, say of half an hour; and then march along again for three miles, as near as we can guess. And if we do that, fellows, it leaves only twenty more for the last day."
"I reckon that silver trophy is as good as won," remarked Andy Mullane.
"Barring accidents; and you never can tell when something may happen," added wise Seth.
"Then I hope it will be to you, and not to me," said Eben, who was rubbing his shin at a place where he had bruised it earlier in the day.
"Have we got enough grub along to last out?" queried Fritz.
All eyes were turned toward Noodles, who generally looked after this part of the business when they were abroad, either camping or tramping.
"I wouldn't say yes, if Fritz he puts der crimp in dot appetites off his," was what the cook announced, gravely.
"Then we'll see to it that he gets no more than his regular ration after this," Paul declared, pretending to look severe.
"Huh! that makes me feel real bad right away, let me tell you, fellers," Fritz remarked, touching his belt line with a rueful face. "However do you think I can fill up all this space here with just one ration? It's different with some of the rest of the bunch; take Noodles for example, he hasn't got room for more'n half a ration. I speak for what he can't make way with."
"Say, there's a chance right now for you to fill up ahead of time!" exclaimed Eben, as he pointed through the fence; and looking, the scouts saw a cow standing there, placidly chewing, her cud, and evidently watching them curiously as she attended strictly to business.
"Sure," Fritz went on to say, quickly, getting to his feet, "she's got plenty of rations, quarts and quarts of fine rich milk. I've got half a notion to step in there, and see how it tastes. See here, if I tied a nickel or a dime in a piece of paper, and attached it to her horn, wouldn't that be all right, Paul? Ain't scouts got a right to live off the country as they hike through, 'specially if they pay for what they take?"
"Well, if it was a case of necessity, now----" began the scoutmaster.
"It is," broke in Eben, who for some reason seemed to want to egg Fritz on, "our comrade's plumb near starved, you know, and we're talking of cutting his grub allowance down to half. But I don't think he's got the nerve to fill up on nice rich fresh milk, that's what. Some people talk pretty loud, but when you pin 'em down, they say they didn't mean it."
Of course that finished Fritz. If he had been joking before, he now took the matter in a serious light.
"Huh! that remark don't hit me, Eben," he said, disdainfully, "If it was a ferocious old bull I might hesitate about trespassing on his field, but a gentle cow, whoever knew one to act ugly? Here goes, after I've tied up this nickel in a piece of paper, with a string to it, to fix it on Sukey's horn. Anybody else feel milk thirsty? Don't all speak at once now, because I'm first."
Apparently no one else was hankering after fresh milk just then; at least none of the scouts gave any indication of meaning to accompany the bold invader.
"If you're really intending to go over the fence and try the milk supply," suggested Paul. "I'd advise you to leave that red neck scarf that you're so proud of wearing, behind you, Fritz."
"Yes, that's so," broke in Seth, "cows, as well as bulls, don't fancy anything red, I've been told. Better leave it with me, Fritz."
"Huh, think I ain't on to your little game, Seth Carpenter," declared the other, making no move to take off the necktie in question, "don't I know that you've always wanted that scarf? Ain't you tried to buy it off me more'n a few times? Not much will I let you hold it. That tie stays by me. If the poor old cow don't like it, she can do the next best thing. Now, watch me get my fill, fellers. Milk is the staff of life, more'n bread; and I always did like it fresh. Here goes."
He clambered up on the top of the fence, while all the other scouts watched to see how the operation turned out.
"Take care, Fritz," warned Eben, solemnly, "she's got her eye on you, all right, and she's stopped chewing her cud too. P'raps she may turn out to be a hooker; you never can tell about cows. And chances are, she's got a calf up in the barn. You see, a cow is always ugly when she thinks they're agoin' to steal her calf away, like they did lots of other times."
"Oh! rats!" sneered the valiant Fritz, drawing his staff over with him, so as to get a purchase on the ground within the field, and ease his intended jump.
"Listen, Fritz," added Jotham, "see that little enclosure just back of where she stands? Looks like it might have been fenced off to protect some fruit trees or something. Well, if I was in your boots now, and she made a jump for me, I'd tumble over that same fence in a hurry. A cow's got horns the same as a bull, and you'll be sorry if ever she tosses you."
But Fritz had evidently made up his mind, and would not allow anything to deter him. The more the other scouts threw out these hints the stronger became his determination to carry his clever scheme to completion. And when he said he was fond of fresh milk Fritz only told the truth; though the chances were he would never have accepted such a risk only for the badgering of Eben and Seth.
Using his long staff in a dexterous way he dropped lightly to the ground, and immediately started to walk toward the spot where the cow stood.
She had raised her head a little, and appeared to be observing his coming with certain suspicious signs.
"Go slow, Fritz; she don't like your looks any too much!" warned Paul, who had climbed to the top of the rail fence, the better to see what happened.
Perhaps Fritz himself may have felt a little qualm just about that time, for the actions of the cow were far from reassuring; but he was too proud to show anything that seemed to savor of the "white feather" before his chums, especially after making all the boasts he had.
And so he kept grimly on, even if his knees did begin to knock together a little, when he actually saw the cow suddenly lower her head, and throw up the dirt with those ugly looking short horns, to one of which he had so recently declared he meant to secure the coin he would leave, to pay for all the milk he expected to consume.
Paul had called out once or twice, words of warning. He also suggested that it would be wise for the adventurous one to turn back; because, if appearance went for anything the animal had a bad temper, and would be apt to give him more or less trouble.
But that had no effect on Fritz, who, having embarked on the venture, did not mean to back down until absolutely forced to do so.
And so the other five scouts, ranged along the fence, watched to see what would happen. Perhaps their hearts were beating just a little faster than ordinary; but if so, that was not a circumstance to the way Fritz felt his throbbing like a trip hammer, even while he kept steadily moving ahead.
He started to utter what he meant to be soothing words, as he approached the gentle bovine. He had heard farmers talking to their cows when starting to do the milking act, and thought it the proper caper. But Bossy must have finally made up her mind that this trespasser had a suspicious look, and meant to carry off the little calf that could now be heard calling away off beyond a rise where a farm house and stable evidently lay.
Suddenly she lowered her head, and started toward Fritz. Frenzied shouts arose from those who were watching the proceedings from a safe distance.
"Run, Fritz! she's coming!" bawled one.
"Remember the fence over there, Fritz, and what I told you!" cried Jotham.
Fritz did not take the trouble to reply. He could hardly have done so even had he so desired, for just then he was most actively employed.
At the time the cow made her abrupt plunge toward him the scout could not have been more than thirty feet away. He was wise enough to realize that should he attempt to make a wild dash for the fence surrounding the field, the active four legged animal would be able to overtake him before he could get half way there. And as the one way left to him Fritz jumped to one side, in order to avoid contact with those cruel-looking black horns.
His first act was one of impulse rather than anything else; he just sprang to one side, and allowed the animal to go surging past, so close that he could have easily reached out his hand, and touched her flank, had he chosen to do so.
Of course she would quickly realize that her attack had been a failure, and recovering, turn again to renew it. He must not be on the same spot when that time came. And as there was no better opening offered than the enclosure mentioned by Jotham, he started for the same, with the cow in full pursuit, and his chums shrieking all sorts of weird advice.
So close was the angry animal behind him that at first Fritz could not take the time to mount that fence. He chased around it, and as if accepting the challenge, Bossy did the same, kicking her heels high in the air, and with tail flying far in the rear.
Fritz managed to keep a pretty good distance ahead of his pursuer, and as there did not seem to be any particular danger just then, some of the boys allowed their feelings of hilarity to have full swing, so that peals of riotous laughter floated to the indignant ears of the fugitive.
Indeed, Eben laughed so much that he lost his hold, and fell into the meadow; but it was ludicrous to see how nimbly he clambered up again, as though fearful lest the cow take a sudden notion to dash that way, changing her tactics.
Meanwhile Fritz was laying his plans looking to what he would call a coup. When he had gained a certain distance on the circling cow, so that he would have time to scramble over the fence, he hastened to put this scheme into operation.
Fritz had dropped upon the ground, and was evidently panting for breath. At any rate, the boys, perched like a lot of crows on the distant fence, could see him waving his campaign hat rapidly to and fro, as though trying to cool off after his recent lively experience.
"Look at the old cow, would you?" burst out Eben, "she sees him now, I tell you! Say, watch her try and jump that fence, to get closer acquainted with our chum. Oh! my stars! what d'ye think of that now; ain't she gone and done it though?"
While the bugler of Beverly Troop was speaking, the angry cow made a furious dash forward. Eben had naturally imagined she meant to try and follow Fritz over the fence but he was wrong. There was a terrific crash as the head of the charging beast came in contact with the frail fence; and the next thing they knew the cow had thrown down an entire section, so that no longer did any barrier separate her from the object of her increasing fury.
CHAPTER IV
IN ALABAMA CAMP
Fritz was no longer sitting there taking things comfortably, and cooling himself off by using his hat as a fan.
With the terrific crash the scout was on his feet, ready for further flight, as he saw the head of the cow not ten feet away from where he stood.
This time he made straight for another section of the fence, and passed over it "like a bird," as Seth declared. But evidently fences had little terror for the aroused cow, since she immediately proceeded to knock down another section in about the space of time it would take to read the shortest riot act ever known.
This prompt act again placed her on the same side as the fleeing Fritz. The loud shouts of his chums warned him of her coming on the scene again, even if that suspicious crash had failed to do so.
Fritz was becoming used to clambering over fences by now; in fact it seemed to be something like a settled habit.
The cow saw his lead, and went him one better, for a third crash told how the poorly constructed fence had gone down before her rush, like a pack of cards in the wind.
All the while Fritz was changing his location. He calculated that if only he could hold out for say three more "climbs," he would be in a position to make a run for the border fence, which was made much more stoutly then the division one, and would probably turn back even a swooping bull.
After it was all over, Fritz would demand that his comrades give him full credit for his cunning lead. Meanwhile he was kept as busy as any real beaver; getting first on one side of the crumpling fence, and then on the other; while the cow kept on making kindling wood of the barrier.
Paul took advantage of the animal's attention being wholly centred upon Fritz, to run out upon the field, and pick up the cast-off staff of the busy scout. His intention at the time was to render all the assistance in his power; but discovering that Fritz was rapidly approaching a point where he could work out his own salvation, the scoutmaster thought discretion on his part warranted a hasty departure, unless he wished to take the place his comrade vacated.
The boys on the fence were shouting, and waving their hats, and doing all manner of things calculated to attract the attention of the "gentle cow," and cause her to ease up in her attack; but apparently she was not to be bought off so cheaply, and meant to pursue her advantage to the bitter end.
Then came the chance for which the artful Fritz had been so industriously working, when he made one more fling over the remnant of the enclosure fence, and upon reaching the outside, galloped away toward the road as fast as his legs could carry him.
Of course the cow chased after him again as soon as she had knocked down another section of fence; but Fritz seemed to have pretty good wind, considering all he had been through; and he showed excellent sprinting powers that promised to put him among the leaders at the next high school field sports exhibition.
And the other five scouts gave him a hearty cheer when they saw him nimbly take the high fence on the bound, with those wicked horns not more than five feet in his rear.
They soon joined the panting one, who greeted his mates with a cheery grin, as though conscious of having done very well, under such distracting conditions.
"But you've yet to know whether that milk is as rich as you hoped?" remarked Paul, smilingly, as he handed Fritz his staff.
"And chances are, you went and lost that blessed nickel you meant to tie to one of gentle Bossy's horns; what a shame, and a waste of good coin!" said Seth, pretending to be very much disappointed.
"Huh! getting off pretty cheap at that!" grunted Fritz. "Ketch me tryin' to milk any cow that's got a calf up in the barn. I'd rather face two bulls than one like her. Don't ever mention milk to me again; I know I'll just despise the looks of it from now on. Whew! but didn't she mean business; and if ever those sharp horns had got attached to me, it would have been a hard job to break away."
"If you feel rested, and have changed your mind about that same splendid milk," remarked Paul, "perhaps we'd better be getting along now. Three miles--why, Fritz, I wouldn't be much surprised if you covered all of that in the little chase you put up. All you needed to beat the record for flying was a pair of wings."
Fritz was wonderfully good-natured, and they could not make him angry. When other boys were apt to scowl and feel "grouchy," Fritz would come up smilingly after each and every round, ready to take punishment without limit.
And so they continued to walk along the road, chatting among themselves as cheerily as footsore and weary scouts might be expected to do when trying to encourage each other to further exertions.
Every step really meant a good deal to their success, for in the course of ten minutes Paul declared that another mile had been duly covered.
When they saw another cow inside a fenced enclosure the boys tried by every argument they could devise to tempt Fritz to try his hand once more, but he steadfastly declined to accept the dare.
"Say what you like, fellers," he remarked firmly, "me and cows are on the outs, for this trip anyway. It's somebody else's turn to afford amusement for the bunch. I've sure done my duty by the crowd. Let me be, won't you? Tackle Seth there, or Babe Adams. I happen to know that they like milk just every bit as much as I do. Water's good enough for me, right now; and here's the spring I've been looking for a long while."
At that they all hastened to discover some spots where it was possible to lap up a sufficient supply of the clear fluid.
This cooling drink seemed to invigorate the boys, so that when they started off again it was with a somewhat quicker step, and heads that were held up straighter than of late.
It enabled them to reel off another mile without any great effort.
"Only one more, and then we've just got to let up on this thing," said Paul.
"I really believe you're getting tired of it yourself, Mr. Scoutmaster?" ventured one of the boys, eagerly; for if Paul would only confess to this, they felt that they could stand their own weaknesses better.
"And that is no joke," laughed Paul, frankly. "You see, I haven't been hardening my muscles as much lately as when the baseball season was in full swing. But with two miles placed to our account, we shouldn't be much worried about how things are coming out. Will we try for that last mile, boys? It's for you to say!"
He received a unanimous shout of approval, which announced that the others were of a united mind. And so they kept along the road though some steps lagged painfully, and it was mainly through the exertions of the mind that the body was whipped into obeying.
Finally Paul turned to Eben, and made a quick gesture that the bugler was waiting for, since he immediately raised the shining instrument to his lips, puffed out his cheeks, took in a tremendous breath, and gave the call that was next to the "fall in for supper" signal, the most popular known to the scouts.
"Alabama! Here we rest!" cried Seth, turning aside into the woods after Paul, who evidently had his eye on a certain location, where he meant to pitch the third night's camp.
"That's a good idea," remarked Andy, always quick to seize upon anything that gave a hint concerning his beloved South, "let's call this Alabama Camp!"
"Put it to a vote," called out Fritz, "all in favor of the same say aye; contrary no. The ayes have it unanimously. Hurrah for Alabama Camp. Seems like that's a good restful name; and I hope we sleep right good here; for most of us are pretty well used up."
"Don't mention that same above a whisper," warned Seth, "because we've got two awfully touchy chums along, who're always carrying chips on their shoulders when it comes to the subject of being knocked out. Say, Paul, did you know about this camp site before; because it's the dandiest place we've struck on the big hike?"
"Just dumb luck," replied the other, shaking his head in the negative. "I thought it looked good this way, when I called for a halt. And you're just about right, Seth; it does fill the bill great. Here's our spring of clear cold water; and there you have a splendid place to start your fire, Jotham. Now, let's throw ourselves down for a little while, and then when we feel rested, we'll get busy doing things."
All of them were only too glad to do as Paul suggested. And when another ten minutes had slipped past, Jotham struggled to his feet to wearily but determinedly gather together some material with which to start a blaze.
When he had it going Noodles realized that it was now up to him to start getting some supper cooking. They had come in very light marching order, since Paul realized that if they hoped to win that lovely prize he must not load any of the boys down with superfluous burdens.
As a rule they depended on the farmers to supply them with such things as they needed, chiefly eggs and milk. The former they had along with them, several dozen eggs in fact, purchased from an obliging farmer earlier in the afternoon, and fortunately carried in other knapsacks than that of Fritz, who would have smashed the entire supply, had he been in charge of the same at the time of his exciting adventure with the cow.
Upon putting it to a vote they decided that they could just as well do without any milk for one night; especially after Fritz had shown them how difficult it sometimes was to accumulate a supply.
Of course a coffee pot had been brought along, for somehow a camp must always seem like a dreary desert without the delicious smell of boiling coffee at each and every meal that is prepared.
So Noodles made a grand big omelette, using sixteen eggs for the same, and the two frying pans that had been strapped, one to each pack of a couple of scouts.
Besides this they had some cheese and crackers, which would help fill the vacuum that seemed to exist an hour after each and every meal. Several potatoes for each scout were duly placed in the red ashes of the fire, and jealously watched, in order that they might not scorch too badly before being thoroughly roasted.
On the whole, there was no reason for being ashamed of that camp supper. Everything tasted just "prime," as several of the boys took pains to say; for they were artful enough to know that by showering words of praise upon the cook, they might secure his valuable services for all time to come, because Noodles was open to flattery.
And what was better still, there was an abundant supply for all of them, regardless of the difference in appetites; Fritz was not stinted in the least, for he actually declined a further helping, and had to be urged to clean out the pan just to keep "that little bit of omelet from being wasted."
Having no tent along, and only a couple of dingy old blankets which they expected to use for sending smoke signals, should the occasion arise, the scouts were compelled to resort to more primitive ways of spending the night than usual. But then Paul had shown them how to sleep with their heads away from the fire; and he also arranged to keep the small blaze going during the entire night, since it was apt to get pretty chilly along about two in the morning.
All these things had been arranged on the first night out, so that by this time the boys were pretty well accustomed to the novel way of sleeping. And on the whole they had taken to it fairly well, no one complaining save when the mosquitoes annoyed them in one camp near the water.
An hour after supper had been disposed of some of the boys were already beginning to nod drowsily. And when fellows are just dead tired it seems a sin to try and keep them awake, especially when there is no need of it.
So Paul announced that those who wanted to could turn in, while the rest were enjoined to keep quiet, doing their talking in whispers, so as not to disturb the sleepers; just as if the discharge of a six pound cannon close by would bother those weary scouts, once they lost themselves in the dreamland of Nod.
Babe Adams had just stepped over to get a last drink at the near-by spring, when the others were surprised to see him come tearing back again, evidently in great excitement.
"Paul, come over here with me, and you can see it!" he called out.
"See what?" demanded the scoutmaster, at the same time climbing to his feet.
"Looks like some farmhouse might be afire; because you c'n see the red flames jumping up like fun!" was the thrilling announcement made by the tenderfoot scout.
CHAPTER V
A HELPING HAND
"It's a fire, all right!" announced Paul, after he had taken a good look.
"No question about that," declared Seth, who was right on the heels of the others, for you could never keep him quiet when there was anything going on, because he always wanted to be "in the swim."
"Yes, either a house, or a barn ablaze," remarked Eben, sagely.
"Might be only a hay stack, you know," suggested Jotham.
"Don't burn like that to me; I seem to see something of a building every now and then, when the flames shoot up," Paul went on to remark, for he was always discovering things upon which to found a reasonable theory.
"How far away does it lie, dy'e think, Paul?" asked Andy.
"Not more than half a mile, I should say," came the reply.
"Just my idea to a dot," Jotham admitted.
"Why, you c'n even hear the crackle of the flames, whenever the night wind happens to blow this way," Babe Adams asserted; and they all agreed with him, for the same sound had come to their ears also.
"We might help the poor old farmer, if we only happened to be closer," Eben said, in the goodness of his heart.
"And if we didn't feel so bunged-up tired," added Andy.
Somehow the scouts began to show signs of nervousness. Those might seem like pretty good excuses to some fellows; but when a boy becomes a scout he somehow looks at things in a different way from in the old days. No matter how tired he may be, he eagerly seizes on a chance to be useful to others; to do some good deed, so as to experience the delightful glow that always follows a helpful act.
"Say, how about it?" began Jotham.
"Could we be useful if we did manage to trot over there, Paul?" Andy demanded.
"I'm sure we might," answered the scoutmaster, firmly; "and if we're going, why, the sooner we make a start the better. Seconds count when a house or barn is on fire. I feel pretty well rested, speaking for myself; and half a mile each way oughtn't to do us up. We're scouts on a long hike, and able to do lots of things that other fellows wouldn't dare attempt."
"Take me along, Paul!" cried Jotham.
"And me!"
"Hope you won't forget that I'm ready to be in the bunch," Seth exclaimed.
In fact, there was not one out of Paul's seven companions who did not vociferously inform the leader of the patrol that he was a subject for the draft.
"You can't all go," decided Paul, quick to decide; "and as two fellows ought to stay and look after camp while the rest are off, I'll appoint Noodles and Eben to that duty."
Groans followed the announcement.
"Oh! all right, Paul; just as you say," remarked the bugler, after giving vent to his disappointment in this manner; "we'll keep guard while the rest of you are having a bully good time.
"Perhaps something will happen along here to let us enjoy ourselves."
"If you need help let us know it," Paul called back, for he was already moving off in the direction of the fire, followed by the five lucky scouts.
"How?" bellowed Noodles; "do we whoop her up, Paul?"
"Sound the assembly, and we'll hurry back," came the answer, as the pack of boys disappeared in the darkness of the night.
They kept pretty well together, so that none might stray. Consequently, when one happened to trip over some log or other obstacle that lay in the path he would sing out to warn his comrades, so as to save them from the same trouble.
With such a bright beacon ahead there was no trouble about keeping on a direct line for the fire. And all the while it seemed to be getting more furious. Indeed, what with the shouts that came to their ears, the bellowing of cattle, and whinnying of horses, things began to get pretty lively as they approached the farmyard.
Presently they seemed to break out from the woods, and reach an open field. Beyond this they could plainly see the fire.
"It's a barn, all right!" gasped Jotham, immediately.
"Yes, and they seem to be afraid that the farmhouse will go, too," added Andy.
"They're throwing buckets of water on it, sure enough," sang out Babe Adams.
Now some of the boys could easily have outrun their mates, being possessed of longer legs, or the ability to sprint on occasion; but they had the good sense to accommodate themselves to the rest, so that they were still in a squad when drawing near the scene of the excitement.
A man and a woman seemed to be about the sole persons visible, and they were laboring like Trojans to keep the fire from communicating to the low farmhouse that was situated close to the burning barn.
The six scouts must have dawned upon the vision of the sorely pressed farmer and his wife almost like angels, for the pair were nearly exhausted, what with the labor and the excitement.
"Buckets--water--let us help you!" was what Paul exclaimed as they came up.
Cows were running this way and that, bellowing like mad, as though half crazed.
What with frightened chickens cackling, and hogs grunting in their near-by pen, the scene was one that those boys would not forget in a hurry.
"In the kitchen--help yourselves!" the farmer said, pointing as he spoke; and without waiting for any further invitation the scouts rushed pellmell into the rear part of the house, where they seized upon all sorts of utensils, from a big dishpan, to buckets, and even a small tin foot bath tub.
A brook ran close to the barn, as Paul had learned with his first comprehensive glance around. This promised to be a most fortunate thing for the would be fire-fighters.
Led by the scoutmaster, the boys dashed in that direction, filled whatever vessel they happened to be carrying, and then hurried back to the house. Here the water was dashed over the side of the building that seemed to be already scorching under the fierce heat of the blazing barn.
"Get us a ladder; that roof will be on fire if we don't throw water over it!" Paul shouted to the farmer, as he came in contact with the man.
"This way--there's a ladder here by the hen house!" was what he replied.
Several of the boys seized upon it, and before you could think twice they were rushing the ladder toward the side of the house. Paul climbed up, carrying with him a full bucket of water; and having dashed the contents of this in such a way as to wet a considerable portion of the shingle roof, he threw the bucket down to one of the boys below.
Another was quickly placed in his hands. Everybody was working like a beaver now, even the farmer's wife, carrying water from the creek, and getting it up to the boy on the ladder. It was pretty warm work, for the heat of the burning barn seemed terrific; but then boys can stand a good deal, especially when excited, and bent on accomplishing things; and Paul stuck it out, though he afterwards found several little holes had been burned in his outing shirt by flying sparks.
The barn, of course, was beyond saving, and all their energies must be expended on the house. By slow degrees the fire was burning itself out. Already Paul felt that the worst was past, and that if they could only keep this up for another ten minutes all would be well.
A couple of neighbors had come along by this time, to help as best they could. When a fire takes place in the country everybody is ready and willing to lend a hand at carrying out things, or fighting the flames in a primitive fashion; for neighbors have to depend more or less upon each other in case of necessity.
"I reckon the house ain't liable to go this time," Andy remarked, when Paul came down the ladder finally, trembling from his continued exertions, which had been considerable of a strain on the lad, wearied as he was with three days' tramping.
"That's a fact," remarked the farmer, who came hustling forward about this time, "and I owe you boys a heap for what you done this night. I guess now, only for you comin' to help, I'd a lost my house as well as my barn. As it is I've got a lot to be thankful for. Just put insurance on the barn, and the new crop of hay last week. I call that being pretty lucky for once."
He shook hands with each of the scouts, and asked after their names.
"I want to let your folks know what you done for us this night, boys," he said, "and p'raps you might accept some little present later on, just as a sort of remembrance, you know."
"How did the fire start, sir?" asked Paul.
"That's what bothers me a heap," replied the farmer.
"Then you don't know?" continued the scoutmaster, who felt a reasonable curiosity to learn what he could of the matter while on the spot.
"It's all a blank mystery to me, for a fact," continued the farmer, whose name the boys had learned was Mr. Rollins. "My barn and stable was all one, you see. My man has been away all day, and I had to look after the stock myself, but I finished just as dark set in, before supper, in fact, so there ain't been so much as a lighted lantern around here tonight."
"Perhaps, when you lighted your pipe you may have thrown the match away, and it fell in the hay?" suggested Paul.
"If it had, the fire'd started long ago; fact is, I'd a seen it right away. And to settle that right in the start let me say I don't smoke at all, and didn't have any occasion to strike a single match while out here."
Of course this statement of the farmer seemed to settle all idea of his having been in any way responsible for the burning of the barn.
"It looks like a big black mystery, all right," declared Fritz, who always liked to come upon some knotty problem that needed solving.
"Have you any idea that the fire could have been the work of tramps?" Paul went on to ask.
"We are never troubled that way up here," replied the farmer. "You see, it's away from the railroad, and hoboes generally follow the ties when they tramp across country."
"That makes it all the more queer how the fire could have started," Paul went on to remark, thoughtfully.
"Couldn't a been one of the cows taken to smoking, I suppose?" ventured Seth, in a humorous vein.
"One thing sure," continued the farmer, a little uneasily, "that fire must have been caused by what they call spontaneous combustion; or else somebody set it on purpose."
"Do you know of anybody who would do such a terrible thing; that is, have you any enemy that you know of, sir?" questioned Paul.
"None that I would ever suspect of such a mean thing as that," was the farmer's ready reply. "We're human around here, you know, and may have our little differences now and then, but they ain't none of 'em serious enough to tempt a man to burn a neighbor's barn. No, that's a dead sure thing."
"Well, I'm glad to hear it," the scoutmaster went on. "And I don't suppose now, you've missed any valuables, have you, sir?"
The farmer turned a shade whiter, and Paul could see that a shiver went through his frame.
"Gosh! I hadn't thought about that. Wait here a minute, will you, please?"
With that he dashed into the house, as though a sudden terrible suspicion had assailed him. The six scouts stood there awaiting his return. Mrs. Rollins was talking with the neighbors, as they watched the last of the barn disappearing in a bed of red cinders.
Hardly had a full minute passed before the boys saw the farmer come leaping out of the building again. No need for any one to ask a question, because his whole appearance told the story of new excitement and mystery. If ever a man looked worried and nearly heart broken the farmer did then.
"It's sure enough gone, every cent of it!" he groaned, as he reached the scouts.
"Your money, I suppose you mean?" Paul asked, sympathetically; while Fritz and Seth pricked up their ears eagerly at the prospect of another chapter being added to the little excitement of the evening.
"Yes, three thousand dollars that was to pay off my mortgage next week. I had it hid away where I thought no thief could even find it; but the little tin box, and everything has been carried off. And now I know why the barn was fired--so as to keep the missus and me out there, while the rascal made a sneak into the house, and laid hands on my savings. All gone, and the mortgage due next week!"
CHAPTER VI
THE HOME-COMING OF JO DAVIES
"Whew! that's tough!" observed Seth.
One or two of the other scouts whistled, to indicate the strained condition of their nerves; and all of them pressed up a little closer, so as not to lose a single word of what was passing.
"But if as you say, sir, that you had this money securely hidden, it doesn't seem possible that an ordinary tramp would know the place where you kept it, so that he could dodge right into the house, and in a minute be off with it; isn't that so?"
Paul was the greatest hand you ever heard of to dip deeply into a thing. Where most other boys of his age would be satisfied to simply listen, and wonder, he always persisted in asking questions, in order to get at the facts. And he was not born in Missouri either, as Seth often laughingly declared.
The farmer looked at him. There was a frown beginning to gather on his forehead as though sudden and serious doubts had commenced to take a grip on his mind.
"If he took my money I'll have the law on him, as sure as my name is Sile Rollins," Paul heard him mutter, half to himself.
"Then you've thought of some one who might have known that you had three thousand dollars under your roof, is that it, sir?" he asked.
"Y-yes, but it's hard to suspect Jo, when I've done so much for him these years he's been with me," admitted the owner of the farm; though at the same time his face took on a hard expression, and he ground his teeth together furiously, while he went on to say, "but if so be he has robbed me, I ain't called upon to have any mercy on him, just because his old mother once nursed my wife, and I guess saved her life. Jo has got to hand my money back, or take the consequences."
"Is Jo your hired man?" Paul asked.
The farmer nodded his head moodily; he was evidently a prey to mingled feelings, and close upon the border of a dazed condition. These calamities following so swiftly upon each other's heels had taken his breath away. But presently he would recover, and be eager to do something.
"You said just a bit ago that he was away today, and that you had to do the chores this evening, looking after the stock, and such things; wasn't that it, sir?" continued the scoutmaster.
"He asked to have this afternoon off; wouldn't say why he wanted to get away, either. And by ginger! now that I think of it, Jo did look kind of excited when he was asking me for leave. I can see why that should be so. He was figuring on this nasty little game right then and there. He wanted to be able to prove an _alibi_ in case he was ever accused. And this evening he must have put a match to the hay in the barn, and then watched his chance to creep into the house when both of us was busy trying to save the stock. Oh! it makes my blood boil just to think of it. And I never would have believed Jo Davies could have been so cold blooded as to take the chances of burnin' the animals he seemed to be so fond of."
"Did he stay here over night with you?" Paul asked.
"Not as a rule, Jo didn't. You see, he's got an old mother, and they live in a little cottage about a mile away from here toward town. So Jo, he always made it a point to sleep there. I had no fault to find, because he was on hand bright and early every morning. But this will kill his old mother; however could he do it? Chances are, he fell in with some racing men when we had the county fair, and has got to gambling. But I'll be ruined if I don't get that money back again."
"Could we help you in any way, Mr. Rollins? You know, Boy Scouts are always bound to be of assistance whenever they find a chance. We're on a great hike just now, and a little leg weary; but if we can stand by you further, please let us know. How about that, boys?" and Paul turned toward his chums as he spoke.
"That's the ticket, Paul!" replied Andy, promptly.
"Our sentiments, every time," said Seth.
And the others gave vigorous nods, to indicate that they were all of the same mind; which unanimity of opinion must have been a great satisfaction to the leader.
"Then let's go right away, boys!" remarked the farmer, eagerly. "P'raps now we might come up with Jo on the way, and ketch him with the goods on. If he'll only give me back my money I'll agree not to prosecute, on account of his poor old mother, if nothing else. But I'm as bad off as a beggar if I lose all that hard earned cash."
Without saying anything to Mrs. Rollins or the neighbors, they hurried away, the boys keeping in a cluster around the farmer. If any of the scouts began to feel twinges in the muscles of their legs, already hard pushed, they valiantly fought against betraying the weakness. Besides, the excitement acted as a tonic upon them, and seemed to lend them additional powers of endurance, just as it does in foot races where the strain is terrific.
"It looks bad for Jo Davies, I should think, Paul," Andy managed to say, as they pushed resolutely along.
"Well, he is the one fellow who may have known about the money," admitted the scout master, "and if the temptation ever came to him, he could easily watch his employer, and learn where he hid the cash. How about that, Mr. Rollins?"
The farmer had heard what was being said, and immediately replied:
"If Jo was bent on robbery, p'raps he could have watched me some time, and seen where I hid that little tin box away in the attic. I used to go there once a week to add some money to the savings that I'd foolishly drawn out of bank long before I needed 'em, just to see how it felt to be rich for a little while."
"When was the last time you went up there to look at it?" Paul asked.
"Let me see, when Web Sterry paid me for the heifer I sold him I put the money away; and that was just ten days back."
"And it was all there then, you say?" questioned Paul.
"Surely," replied the farmer.
"Was Jo working near the house then, can you remember, sir?"
Mr. Rollins appeared to reflect.
"When was the day we did some carpenter work on that extension--as sure as anything it was the day Webb paid me! Yes, I remember, now, that Jo came around from his work on the plane, and told me Webb was there."
The farmer's excitement was increasing. Things, under the clever questioning of the young scoutmaster, seemed to be fitting in with each other, just as a carpenter dovetails the ends of a box together.
"It looks as though Jo might have spied on you when you went up to the attic to put that new money away with the rest. If he suspected that you were keeping a large sum in the house that's what he would most likely do when he knew you had just taken in some more cash. Now, I don't know Jo Davies, and I don't like to accuse him of such a terrible crime; but circumstantial evidence all points in his direction, Mr. Rollins."
Paul measured his words. He never liked to think ill of any one; but really in this case it seemed as though there could be hardly any doubt at all; Jo Davies must be the guilty party.
"Are we gettin' near where Jo lives?" asked Jotham, trying to speak lightly, although there was a plain vein of anxiety in his voice; for when a fellow has covered nearly thirty miles since sun-up, every rod counts after that; and following each little rest the muscles seem to stiffen wonderfully.
"More'n two-thirds the way there," replied the farmer. "We'll see a light, like as not, when we get around this turn in the woods road. That'll come from the little cabin where he lives with his old mother. Oh! but I'm sorry for Mrs. Davies; and the boy, he always seemed to think so much of his maw, too. You never can tell, once these fast fliers get to running with racing men. But I only hope I get my own back again. That's the main thing with me just now, you know. And if Jo, he seems sorry, I might try and forget what he's done. It all depends on how things turn out. See, just as I told you, there's the light ahead."
All of them saw it; and as they continued to walk hastily forward through the darkness Paul was thinking how human Mr. Rollins was, after all; for it was only natural that his first thought should be in connection with the safe recovery of his hard earned money.
They rapidly drew near the cottage, and all of the boys were beginning to wonder what was fated to happen next on the programme. Doubtless they were some of them fairly quivering with eagerness, and hoping that the thief might be caught examining the stolen cash box.
"Hush! there's somebody coming along over there; stand still, everybody!" Paul gave warning, suddenly, and the whole party remained motionless, watching a lighted lantern that was moving rapidly toward the cottage from the opposite direction, being evidently carried by an approaching man.
It continued to advance straight toward the cottage. Then the unknown opened the door, and went in.
"That was Jo," muttered Mr. Rollins, "I seen his face plain as anything; but why would he be coming from the direction of town, instead of my place?"
"Oh! that might be only a clever little trick, sir," Seth made haste to say, as though to indicate in this way that scouts were able to see back of all such sly dodges.
"Say, he sure had something under his arm," broke in Jotham just then.
"Yes, I saw that, too," added Paul. "It was a small package, not much larger than a cigar box, I should say, and wrapped up in brown paper."
"P'raps my tin cash box?" suggested Mr. Rollins, in trembling tones.
"It might be, though I hardly think any one smart enough to play such a game as setting fire to a barn in order to draw all attention away from the house he wanted to rob, would be silly enough to carry home a tin box that would convict him, if ever it was found there."
Paul made this remark. They had once more started to advance, though by no means as rapidly as before. The fact that Jo Davies had arrived just before them, and not only carrying a lighted lantern, but with a suspicious packet under his arm, seemed to necessitate a change of pace, as well as a new line of action.
"Let's sneak up to the window, and peek in?" suggested Fritz, and somehow the idea appealed to the others, for without any argument they proceeded to carry out the plan of campaign.
It promised to be easy work. The shade seemed to be all the way up, as though the old lady who lived in the humble cottage had left a light near the window purposely in order to cheer her boy when he turned the bend below, and came in sight of home.
As noiselessly as possible, therefore, the six scouts, accompanied by the farmer, crept toward this window. The sill was not over four feet from the ground, and could be easily reached; indeed, in order not to expose themselves, they were compelled to stoop rather low when approaching the spot.
Some sort of flower garden lay under the window. Paul remembered stepping upon unseen plants, and somehow felt a pang of regret at thus injuring what had probably taken much of the old lady's time and attention to nurse along to the flowering stage. But this was an occasion when all minor scruples must be laid aside. When a man has been basely robbed, and by an employee in whom he has put the utmost confidence, one cannot stand on ceremony, even if pet flowerbeds are rudely demolished. And if the farmer's suspicions turned out to be real facts, Jo Davies' old mother was apt to presently have worries besides which the breaking of her flowers would not be a circumstance.
Now they had reached a point where, by raising their heads, they could peep into the room where the lamp gave such illumination.
As scouts the boys had long ago learned to be cautious in whatever they attempted; and hence they did not immediately thrust their heads upward, at the risk of attracting the attention of whoever might be within the room. On the contrary each fellow slowly and carefully raised himself, inch by inch, until his eyes, having passed the lower sill he could see, first the low ceiling, then the upper part of the opposite wall, and last of all the occupants themselves.
They were two in number, one an old woman with a sweet face and snow-white hair; the other a tall, boyish-looking chap, undoubtedly the Jo who had been farmhand to Mr. Rollins, and was now under the dreadful ban of suspicion.
When Paul first caught sight of these two they were bending over the table, on which something evidently lay that had been holding their attention. Jo was talking excitedly. Every minute he would pause in whatever he was saying, to throw his arms around the little old lady, who in turn would clasp her arms about his neck; and in this way they seemed to be exchanging mutual congratulations. But when they moved aside while thus embracing, Paul felt a cold chill run up and down his spine because _there upon the table were several piles of bank bills_!
CHAPTER VII
INNOCENT OR GUILTY?
Paul could feel the farmer trembling as he happened to come in contact with his person; and from this he guessed that Mr. Rollins had also discovered the pile of money on the table.
Was Jo Davies, then, such a silly fellow as this? It did not seem possible that anyone not a fool would rob his employer, and immediately hurry home, to throw the stolen money before his dear old mother, with some wonderful story of how he had found it on the road, perhaps, or had it given to him by a millionaire whose horse he stopped on the highway, when it was running away with a lady in the vehicle.
And somehow, from the few little glimpses Paul had caught of the young fellow's face he rather liked Jo Davies. If, as seemed very likely, the young man had been tempted to steal this money, it would cause Paul a feeling of regret, even though he had not known there was such a being as Jo Davies in the world half an hour before.
"Whoo! see the long green!" he heard Seth whisper. "Reckon he's gone and done it, worse luck!" and from the words and the manner of his saying them, Paul guessed that the speaker must have taken a fancy to Jo, as well as himself.
The window happened to be shut, and so this whisper attracted no attention on the part of those within the cottage. Indeed, they were so given over to excitement themselves that they were hardly apt to notice anything out of the common.
Paul could feel the farmer beginning to slip down, and it was easy to understand that the sight of all that money made him want to rush inside, to claim it, before the bold thief had a chance to hide his plunder somewhere.
And this was the only possible thing that should be done. While Mr. Rollins in the kindness of his heart might wish to spare the dear old lady all he could, he dared not take any chances of losing sight of his property.
"Come on, boys!"
That was quite enough, for when the other scouts heard Paul say these three simple words they knew that there was going to be something doing. And quickly did they proceed to fall in behind their leader and the farmer.
Under ordinary conditions, perhaps, it might have occurred to the patrol leader to throw some sort of guard around the cabin, so as to prevent the escape of the desperate thief. He did not think of doing such a thing now, for various reasons.
In the first place, one of the scouts could hardly hope to cope with such a husky young fellow as the farmhand, if once he wanted to break through the line.
Then again, it hardly seemed likely that Jo Davies would attempt to flee, when his old mother was there to witness his confusion; in fact, the chances appeared to be that he would brazen it out, and try to claim that the money belonged to him. The door was close at hand, so that it took only part of a minute for the eager farmer to reach the means of ingress.
He did not hesitate a second, after having set eyes on all that alluring pile of bank notes on the table, under the glow of the lamp.
And when he suddenly opened the door, to burst into the room, Paul and the other scouts were close upon his heels, every fellow anxious to see what was about to happen.
Of course the noise caused by their entrance in such a mass, was heard by those in the room. Jo Davies sprang to his feet, and assumed an attitude of defiance, one arm extended, as though to defend the little fortune that lay there exposed so recklessly upon the table.
Possibly this was the very first time in all his life that he had experienced such a sensation as fear of robbery. When a man has never possessed anything worth stealing, he can hardly know what the feeling is. So it must have been sheer instinct that caused Jo to thus stand on guard, ready apparently to fight, in order to protect his property, however recently it may have come into his possession.
No wonder that he felt this sudden alarm, to have the door of his home rudely thrown open, and a horde of fellows fairly tumbling over each other, in their eagerness to enter.
Then, the look of alarm seemed to pass away from the face of the young fellow; as though he had recognized his employer. Paul wondered whether this was real or cleverly assumed. He saw Jo actually smile, and advancing a step, half hold out his hand toward Mr. Rollins.
But the farmer was looking very stern just then. He either did not see the extended hand, or else meant to ignore it purposely, for he certainly made no move toward taking it.
"I've got back, Mr. Rollins," Jo said, his voice rather shaky, either from excitement, or some other reason; and he stared hard at Paul and the other khaki-garbed scouts, as though puzzled to account for their being there.
"So I see," replied the farmer, grimly.
"I hope you didn't hev too much trouble with the stock, Mr. Rollins," Jo went on to say, in a half hesitating sort of way.
"Well, if I did, they are all safe and sound; perhaps you'd like to know that now," the farmer went on to remark, a little bitterly.
Jo looked at him queerly.
"He either doesn't understand what that means, or else is trying to seem ignorant," was what Paul thought, seeing this expression of wonderment.
"I'm glad to hear that, sure I am, Mr. Rollins," the other remarked, slowly, "an' seein' as how you're dropped in on us unexpected like, p'raps I ought to tell you what I meant to say in the mornin.'"
"What's that?" demanded Mr. Rollins, unconsciously edging a little closer to the table where that tempting display of greenbacks could be seen; just as though he began to fear that it might suddenly take wings and fly away before he could put in a claim for his property.
"I've come in for a little windfall, sir," began Jo, proudly it appeared.
"Looks like you had," grumbled the farmer, as he flashed his eyes again toward the display so near at hand.
"And if so be you're of the same mind about that Thatcher farm, p'raps we might come to terms about the same, sir. I guess you'd just as lief sell it to _me_ as anybody else, wouldn't you, Mr. Rollins?"
"You seem to have a lot of money all of a sudden, Jo?" suggested the farmer, in a hoarse tone, so that he had to clear his throat twice while speaking.
"Yes, sir, that's so," declared the young farm hand, eagerly. "I never dreamed of such grand good fortune as an old aunt of mine dying up in Indianapolis, and leaving me all she had in bank. That's why I asked to get off this afternoon, Mr. Rollins, so I could run over, and get what was comin' to me."
The farmer was grinding his teeth a little; but so long as he believed he saw all his stolen hoard before him, within reach of his hand, he seemed able to control himself; he even waxed a trifle sarcastic, Paul thought, when, looking straight at his hired man, he went on to say:
"Perhaps now, Jo, I might give a pretty good guess about the size of this wonderful fortune you've come into so sudden-like. How would three thousand sound to you, Jo? Is that about the figure now, tell me?"
Jo turned a wondering face toward his old mother.
"Well, did you ever hear the beat of that, maw?" he cried, "Mr. Rollins has just guessed the size of my pile to a dollar, because it was just three thousand old Aunt Libby left me--a few dollars over p'raps. However did you know it, sir?" and he once more faced the sneering farmer.
"I'll tell you, Jo," continued Mr. Rollins, coldly, "I happen to have just had three thousand dollars in bills stolen from my house this very night, by some rascal who first of all set fire to my stable and barn, so that the missus and me'd be so taken up with saving our pet stock we'd leave the farmhouse unguarded. Yes, and there _was_ a few dollars more'n three thousand dollars, Jo. Queer coincidence I'd call it now, wouldn't you?"
Jo turned deathly white, and stared at his employer. His eyes were round with real, or assumed horror. If he was "putting on," as Seth would term it, then this farm hand must be a pretty clever actor for a crude country bumpkin, Paul thought.
"Oh! Jo, my boy, my boy, what does he mean by saying that?"
The little old lady had arisen from her chair, though she trembled so that she seemed in danger of falling; but Paul unconsciously moved a pace closer, ready to catch her in his arms if she swooned. But Jo, quick as a flash, hearing her voice, whirled around, and threw a protecting arm about her.
"It's all right, maw; don't you go and be afraid. I ain't done nawthing you need to be fearful about. This money's mine! Set down again, deary. Don't you worrit about Jo. He ain't agoin' to make your dear old heart bleed, sure he ain't."
And somehow, when Paul saw the tender way in which the rough farm boy forced the little old lady back into her chair, and caught the positive tone in which he gave her this assurance, he seemed almost ready to believe Jo _must_ be innocent; although when he glanced at the money his heart misgave him again.
"Now, Mr. Rollins, please tell me what it all means?" asked Jo, turning and facing his employer again, with a bold, self-confident manner that must have astonished the farmer not a little. "I just come up from town as fast as I could hurry, because, you see, I knew I was bringin' the greatest of news to maw here. I did see a sorter light in the sky when I was leavin' town, and thinks I to myself, that old swamp back of the ten acre patch must be burnin' again; but I never dreamed it was the stable and hay barn, sure I didn't sir."
The farmer hardly seemed to know what to say to this, he was so taken aback by the utter absence of guilt in the face and manner of Jo.
Before he could frame any sort of reply the young fellow had spoken again.
"You said as how you'd got all the stock out safe, didn't you, Mr. Rollins? I'd just hate to think of Polly and Sue and the hosses bein' burned up. Whatever d'ye think could a set the fire agoin'? Mebbe that last hay we put in wa'n't as well cured as it might a been, an' it's been heatin' right along. I meant to look into it more'n once, but somethin' always came along an' I plumb forgot it."
Mr. Rollins looked at him, and frowned. He did not know how to answer such a lead as this. He was growing impatient, almost angry again.
"Give me my money, Jo, and let me be going; I can't breathe proper in here, you've upset me so bad," he said, holding out his hand with an imperative gesture.
"But I ain't got no money of yours, Mr. Rollins," expostulated the other, stubbornly. "I'm awful sorry if you've gone and lost your roll, and I'd do most anything to help you find it again; but that money belongs to me, and I don't mean to turn it over to nobody. It's goin' to buy a home for me and maw, understand that, sir--your little Thatcher place, if so be you'll come to terms; but some other if you won't. That's plain, sir, ain't it?"
"What, do you have the nerve to stick to that silly story, after admitting that this wonderfully gotten fortune of yours tallies to the dollar with what has been taken from my house?" demanded Mr. Rollins, acting as though half tempted to immediately pounce upon the treasure, and take possession, depending on Paul and his scouts to back him up if Jo showed fight.
"I sure do; and I know what I know, Mr. Rollins!" declared the farmhand, with flashing eyes, as he pushed between the table and the irate farmer; while his little mother wrung her clasped hands, and moaned pitifully to see the strange thing that was happening there under her own roof.
It looked for a moment as though there might be some sort of a rumpus; and Seth even began to clench his hands as if ready to take a prominent part in the same; but as had happened more than a few times before when the storm clouds gathered over the scouts, Paul's wise counsel intervened to prevent actual hostilities.
"Wait a minute, Mr. Rollins," he called out. "This thing ought to be easily settled, one way or another. You understand that queer things may happen sometimes, and there is a chance that two sums of money may be almost exactly alike. Now, if Jo here has inherited a nice little fortune, he ought to be able to prove that to us by showing letters, or some sort of documents. How about that, Jo?"
To the surprise, and pleasure as well, of the scoutmaster, Jo's face immediately expanded into a wide grin, and he nodded his head eagerly.
"Say, maw, what did you do with that letter we had from the law firm over in Indianapolis, tellin' me to come and claim my property, and to bring along something to prove that I was the said Jo Albion Davies mentioned in Aunt Selina's last will and testament? In the drawer, you mean? All right, I'll get it; and let these gentlemen read the same. And there's Squire McGregor as went up with me to identify me to the lawyers, he'll tell you he saw me get this money from the bank, just before they closed this arternoon. There she is; now read her out loud, young feller."
CHAPTER VIII
"WELL, OF ALL THINGS!"
"All right; I'll be only too glad to do the same," said Paul, as he accepted what appeared to be a well thumbed letter from Jo.
One glance he gave at the same, and then a load seemed to have been lifted somehow from his boyish heart; because, after he had seen how Jo Davies loved that dear little white-haired mother, he would have felt it keenly did the circumstances make it appear that the young farmhand were guilty of robbing the man who trusted him so fully.
So Paul read out the letter. There is no need of giving it here, because it was rather long, and written in a very legal-like way, each sentence being enveloped in a ponderous atmosphere.
But it was upon the letter-head of a big law firm in Indianapolis, and in so many words informed the said Jo Albion Davies that his respected aunt, Selina Lee Davies, had passed out of this life, leaving him her sole heir; and that if he were interested, it would be to his advantage to come to the city as speedily as possible, to claim the little sum that was waiting for him in bank; and to be sure and bring some one along with him who would be able to vouch for his being the party in question.
Luckily Jo had taken Squire McGregor along, who happened to know one of the members of the big law firm; for otherwise the heir might have had some trouble in proving his identity, since he had forgotten to carry even the letter in his pocket, it seemed.
But of course after that Mr. Rollins could not say a word about claiming the tempting display of greenbacks that lay exposed upon the table. Jo was already engaged in tenderly gathering them up, as though meaning to secrete his little fortune either on his person, or somewhere else.
"Looks like I'm clean busted, don't it?" the farmer said, with a sigh, turning toward Paul, upon whom he had somehow come to rely in the strangest way possible.
"It does seem as though your money has gone in a queer way, sir," replied the young scoutmaster, "but honestly now, I find it hard to believe that a common hobo would be able to find it so quick, if you had it hidden away up in a corner of the garret, and hadn't been there for ten days."
Jo stopped gathering his fortune together; he had snapped several heavy rubber bands around it, evidently supplied at the city bank when he drew the money.
"I wonder, now, could that have anything to do with it," they heard him mutter, as he looked curiously at the farmer.
The words were heard by Mr. Rollins, who, ready to grasp at a floating straw, in his extremity, even as might a drowning man, quickly observed:
"What do you mean by saying that, Jo? I hope you can give me some sort of hint that will help me find my money again; because I meant to pay off my mortgage with it, and will be hard pushed to make good, if it stays lost."
"I'll tell you, sir," said Jo, readily. "It was just about a week ago that I'd been to town, you remember, and getting home along about midnight I was worried about one of the hosses that had been actin' sick like. So I walked over here, not wantin' to wait till mornin'. Just when I was agoin' back I seen a light movin' around over at the house, and I stopped a minute to watch the same."
"Yes, go on; a week ago, you say?" the farmer remarked, as Jo paused to catch his breath again.
"On Thursday night it was, Mr. Rollins," the other went on. "Well, just then I saw the back door open, and somebody stepped out. I seen it was you, and about the queerest part of it all was that it looked to me as if you might be walkin' around in your pajamas! Do you remember comin' outdoors on that night for anything, sir?"
"I don't even remember walking around that way," replied Mr. Rollins, hastily, and looking as though he did not know whether Jo were trying to play some sort of joke on him, or not, "but go on and tell the rest. What did I do? Did you stop long enough to see?"
"Well," continued the farm hand, "I saw you go over to the old Dutch oven that hasn't been used this twenty years, and move around there a bit; but it wasn't none of my business, Mr. Rollins, and so I went along home. I guess any gentleman's got the right to go wanderin' around his own premises in the middle of the night, if he wants to, and nobody ain't got any right to complain because he don't make the trouble to put on his day clothes."
The farmer looked helplessly at Paul. Plainly his wits were in a stupor, and he could not make head or tail of what Jo was telling him.
"Can you get a pointer on to what it all means?" he asked, almost piteously.
Paul had conceived a wonderful idea that seemed to give great promise of solving the dark puzzle.
"You just as much as said that you could not remember having come out of your house that night; and that you never knew yourself to walk around out of doors in your pajamas; is that so, sir?" he asked.
"That's what I meant; and if I was put on the stand right now, I could lift my right hand, and take my solemn affidavit that I didn't do any such thing--unless by George! I was walking in my sleep!"
"That's just the point I'm trying to get at, Mr. Rollins," said Paul, quietly. "Jo, here, says he _saw_ you as plain as anything, and yet you don't recollect doing it. See here, sir, can you ever remember walking in your sleep?"
"Why, not for a great many years," answered the farmer, somewhat confused, and yet with a new gleam of hope appearing in his expectant eyes.
"But you admit then that you _have_ done such a thing?" pursued the scoutmaster.
"Yes, as a boy I did a heap of queer stunts when asleep. They had to lock my door for a time, and fasten my windows. Why, one night they found me sitting on top of the chimney, and had to wait till I took the notion to come down; because, if they woke me, it might mean a nasty tumble that would like as not break my neck. But I haven't done anything in that line for thirty years."
"Until one night a week ago, Mr. Rollins," continued Paul, convincingly, "when dreaming that your money was in danger, you got out of your bed, went up and took it from the garret where you had it hidden, walked downstairs, passed outside, and stowed it nicely away inside the big old Dutch oven. And chances are you'll find it right there this minute."
"Oh! do you really think so, my boy?" exclaimed the delighted farmer, "then I'm going off right away and find out. If you'll go with me I'll promise to hitch up, and carry the lot of you back to your camp, no matter where that may be."
"What say, shall we go, fellows?" asked the patrol leader, turning to the others.
There was not one dissenting voice. Every boy was just wild to ascertain how this strange mystery would turn out. And as it would be just about as long a walk to Alabama Camp as going to the farmer's place, they decided the matter without any argument.
"And you just bet I'm going along, after what I've heard about this thing," declared Jo Davies, "maw, you ain't afraid to stay alone a little while longer, be you? You c'n sit on this blessed windfall while I'm gone, but don't go to fingerin' the same, because walls often have eyes as well as ears, remember."
When the six scouts started off in company with Mr. Rollins, Jo Davies tagged along with them. In his own good fortune the farm hand was only hoping that the money which his employer had missed might be found in the old Dutch oven, just like this smart Boy Scout had suggested.
They covered the distance in short order. You would never have believed that those agile lads had been walking for nearly twelve hours that day, if you could see how they got over the ground, even with two of them limping.
It can be easily understood that there was more or less speculation among the scouts as they hurried along. Would the farmer find his missing wad snugly secreted in the old Dutch oven, as Paul so confidently suggested? And if such turned out to be the case, wouldn't it prove that the scoutmaster was a wonder at guessing things that were a blank puzzle to everybody else?
So they presently came again to the farm. The ashes were still glowing where the big barn had so recently stood. Here and there a cow or a horse could be seen, nosing around in the half light, picking at the grass in forbidden corners, and evidently about done with their recent fright.
Straight toward the back of the house the farmer led the way, and up to the old Dutch oven that had been built on to the foundation, for the baking of bread, and all family purposes, many years back; but which had fallen into disuse ever since the new coal range had been placed in the kitchen.
Everybody fairly held their breath as Mr. Rollins dropped down on his hands and knees, struck a match, and half disappeared within the huge receptacle. He came backing out almost immediately; and before his head and shoulders appeared in view Paul knew that he had made a glorious find, because they could hear him laughing almost hysterically.
"Just like you said, my boy, it was there!" he cried, holding up what proved to be the missing tin box that held his hoard. "And to think that I stole my own cash while I was asleep! I guess my wife'll have to tie my feet together every night after this, for a while; or perhaps I'll be running away with everything we've got. Say, Jo, I hope you ain't going to hold it against me that I suspected you'd been and had your morals corrupted by some of them horse jockeys you met at the county fair this summer? And about that Thatcher place, Jo, we'll easy make terms, because nobody ain't going to have it but you and your maw, hear that?"
"Well, of all things," exclaimed the delighted Seth.
Jo evidently did not hold the slightest ill feeling against his old friend and employer, for he only too gladly took the hand Mr. Rollins held out.
"Turns out just like the fairy story, with everybody happy; only we don't see the princess this time," said Seth, after the scouts had given three cheers for Jo, and then three more for Mr. Rollins.
"Oh!" remarked Jo, with a huge grin, "she's comin' along purty soon now; and my gettin' this windfall'll hurry up the weddin' a heap. Drop past the Thatcher farm along about Thanksgivin' time, boys, and I'll be glad to introduce you to her."
"Say, perhaps we will," Seth declared, with boyish enthusiasm, "because, you see, we all live at Beverly, which ain't more'n twenty miles away as the crow flies. How about it, fellows?"
"We'll come along with you, Seth, never fear. And now, the sooner we get over to camp the better, because some of us are feeling pretty well used up," Andy went on to admit with charming candor.
"All right, boys, just give me a minute to run indoors, and put this package away, and I'll be with you. It won't take long to hitch up, because we managed to save the harness and wagons, me and the missus."
True to his word Mr. Rollins was back in a very brief space of time, and catching the two horses he wanted, he attached them to a big wagon.
"Tumble in, boys," he called out, as he swung himself up on the driver's seat, after attaching the lighted lantern to the front, so that he could see the road as they went along.
The scouts waited for no second invitation, but speedily secured places in the body of the vehicle. As there was half a foot of straw in it, they found things so much to their liking that on the way, at least three of the boys went sound asleep, and had to be aroused when the camp was finally reached.
Eben and Noodles were poor sentinels, it seemed, for both were lying on the ground asleep, nor did they know when the other returned until told about it in the morning. But fortune had been kind to the "babes in the wood," as Seth called them in derision, for nothing had happened while the main body of the patrol chanced to be away on duty.
And so it was another little adventure had come along, with wonderful results, and the happiest of endings. Really, some of the boys were beginning to believe that the strangest of happenings were always lying in wait, as if desirous of ambushing the members of the Beaver Patrol. Why, they could even not start off on a hike, it seemed, without being drawn into a series of events, the like of which seldom if ever befell ordinary lads.
During the hours of darkness that followed all of them slept soundly, nor was there any alarm given to disturb them. And as nothing in the wide world brings such satisfaction and contentment as good sleep, when at dawn they awoke to find the last day of the great hike at hand, every fellow declared that he was feeling especially fit to make that concluding dash with a vim.
Breakfast was hastily eaten; indeed, their stock of provisions had by this time gotten to a low ebb, and would not allow of much variety; though they managed to scrape enough together to satisfy everybody but Fritz, who growled a little, and wanted to know however a scout could do his best when on short rations?
Then to the inspiring notes of Eben's silver-plated bugle the boys of the Beaver Patrol left Alabama Camp, and started on the last lap for their home goal.
CHAPTER IX
THE RUNAWAY BALLOON
"Hey! look at all the crows flying over, would you?"
Seth called this out as he pointed upwards, and the rest of the patrol naturally turned their heads in order to gape.
"Whew! did you ever see such a flock of the old caw-caws?" burst out Eben.
"Give 'em a toot from your bugle, and see what they think?" suggested Jotham.
"For goodness sake, be careful," broke in Fritz, "because they might be so knocked in a heap at Eben's fine playing, they'd take a tumble, and nearly smother the lot of us. We'd think it was raining crow, all right."
"Are they good to eat?" demanded Babe, who was pretty green as yet to a great many things connected with outdoor life, "because, if we have time to stop at noon to cook a meal, we might--"
He was interrupted by a shout from several of the other and wiser scouts.
"Say, hold on there, Babe, we haven't got that near being starved as to want to eat crow," declared Andy.
"Can they be eaten at all, Paul?" persisted Babe, as usual turning to the scoutmaster for information; "seems to me I've heard something like that."
"Yes, and people who have tried say they're not near as bad a dish as the papers always make out," Paul replied. "I don't see myself why they should be, when most of the time they live on the farmer's corn."
"But can you tell where that bunch is coming from, and where bound?" continued Babe. "They all come out of that same place, and keep chattering as they soar on the wind, which must be some high up there."
"Well, I've heard it said that there's a big crow rookery somewhere back in the gloomy old Black Water Swamps; but I never met anybody that had ever set eyes on the same. Every day, winter and summer, that big flock comes out, and scatters to a lot of feeding grounds; some going down the river, where they pick up food that's been cast ashore; others bound for a meal in the corn fields."
"And they come back again in the night to roost there; is that it, Paul?"
"Yes, I guess if we stood right here half an hour before dark we'd see squads of the noisy things heading over yonder from all sorts of quarters. D'ye know, I've sometimes had a notion I'd like to explore the heart of that queer old swamp," and the young patrol leader cast a thoughtful glance toward the quarter from whence that seemingly endless stream of crows flowed continually.
"Hurrah! that's the ticket!" exclaimed Seth. "I've heard a heap about that same spooky old place myself. They say nobody ever has been able to get to the heart of it. And I heard one man, who traps quite a lot of muskrats every winter, tell how he got lost in a part of the swamp once, and spent a couple of pretty tough days and nights wandering around, before he found his way out again. He said it'd take a heap to tempt him to try and poke into the awful center of Black Water Swamps."
"But what's that to us, fellers?" ejaculated Fritz. "The boys of the Beaver Patrol ain't the kind to get scared at such a little thing as a swamp. Just because it's a tough proposition ought to make us want to take up the game, and win out. We fairly eat hard jobs! And looking back we have a right to feel a little proud of the record we've made, eh, fellers?"
Of course every scout stood up a little straighter at these words, and smiled with the consciousness that they had, as Fritz so aptly put it, a right to feel satisfied with certain things that had happened in the past, and from which they had emerged acknowledged victors.
"Just put a pin in that, to remember it, Paul, won't you?" said Andy.
"Why, sure I will, since a lot of you seem to think it worth while," replied the obliging scoutmaster, with a smile, "and if we haven't anything ahead that seems to be more worth while, we might turn out here later on, prepared to survey a trail right through the swamp. I admit that I'm curious myself to see what lies hidden away in a place where, up to now, no man has ever set a foot."
"Hurrah for the young explorers!" cried Eben, who seemed strangely thrilled at the tempting prospect.
They say the boy is father to the man; and among a bunch of six or eight lads it is almost a certainty that you will find one or two who fairly yearn to grow up, and be second Livingstones, or Stanleys, or Dr. Kanes. Eben had read many books concerning the amazing doings of these pathfinders of civilisation, and doubtless even dreamed his boyish dreams that some fine day he too might make the name of Newcomb famous on the pages of history by discovering some hitherto unknown tribe of black dwarfs; or charting out a land that had always been unexplored territory.
They looked back many times at the stream of flying crows that continued to issue from that one point beyond the thick woods. And somehow the very prospect of later on trying to accomplish a task that had until then defied all who had attempted it, gave the scouts a pleasing thrill of anticipation. For such is boy nature.
Strange how things often come about.
Just at that moment not one of the scouts even dreamed of what was in store for them. How many times the curtain obscures our sight, even when we are on the very threshold of discovery!
They tramped along sturdily, until they had covered perhaps two miles since departing from the place where the third night had been spent, and which would go down in the record of the big hike as Camp Alabama.
A couple of the scouts limped perceptibly, but even they declared that as they went on the "kinks" were getting out of their legs, and presently all would be well.
The sun shone from a fair sky, though now and then a cloud would pass over his smiling face; but as the day promised to be rather hot none of them were sorry for this.
"Hope it don't bring a storm along, though," remarked Babe, when the matter was under discussion.
"Well, it's got to be some storm to keep the boys of the Beaver Patrol from finishing their hike on time," declared Seth, grimly.
"That's so, Seth, you never spoke truer words," added Fritz. "I reckon, now, half of Beverly will turn out on the green this after noon to see the conquering heroes come home. There's been the biggest crowds around that jeweler's window all week, staring at that handsome cup, and wishing they would have a chance to help win it."
"And we'd hate the worst kind to disappoint our friends and folks, wouldn't we, fellers?" Eben remarked.
Somehow both limpers forgot to give way to their weakness, and from that minute on the very thought of the great crowd that would send up a tremendous cheer when the boys in khaki came in sight, was enough to make them walk as though they did not know such a thing as getting tired.
"Look!" cried Fritz, a couple of minutes afterwards, "oh! my stars! what's that big thing rising up behind the tops of the trees over there?"
"Somebody's barn is blowing away, I guess!" exclaimed Eben, in tones that shook with sudden alarm. "Mebbe's it's a cyclone acomin', boys. Paul, what had we ought to do? It ain't safe to be under trees at such a time, I've heard!"
"Cyclone, your granny!" jeered Seth Carpenter, who had very sharp eyes, and was less apt to get "rattled" at the prospect of sudden danger, than the bugler of Beverly Troop, "why, as sure as you live, I believe it's a balloon, Paul!"
"What! a real and true balloon?" almost shrieked Eben, somewhat relieved at the improved prospect.
"You're right, Seth," declared the scoutmaster, "it _is_ a balloon, and it looks to me right now as though there's been trouble for the aeronaut. That gas-bag has a tough look to me, just as if it had lost about half of the stuff that keeps it floating! See how it wabbles, will you, fellows, and how low down over the trees it hangs. There, it just grazed that bunch of oaks on the little rise. The next time it'll get caught, and be ripped to pieces!"
"Paul, do you think that can be a man hanging there?" cried Seth. "Sometimes it looks to me like it was; and then again the balloon tilts over so much I just can't be sure."
"We'll know soon enough," remarked the patrol leader, quietly, "because, as you can see, the runaway balloon is heading this way, full tilt. I wouldn't be surprised if it passed right over our heads."
"Say, perhaps we might grab hold of some trailing rope, and bring the old thing down?" suggested Fritz, looking hastily around him while speaking, as if desirous of being prepared, as a true scout should always make it a point to be, and have his tree picked out, about which he would hastily wind a rope, should he be fortunate enough to get hold of such.
"Whew! I wouldn't want to be in that feller's shoes," observed Eben, as they all stood there in the road, watching the rapidly approaching balloon.
"Solid ground for me, every time, except when I'm in swimming, or skimming along over the ice in winter!" Andy interjected, without once removing his eager eyes from the object that had so suddenly caught their attention.
It was a sight calculated to hold the attention of any one, with that badly battered balloon sweeping swiftly along on the wind, and approaching so rapidly.
All of them could see that there was a man clinging to the ropes that marked the place where the customary basket should have been; evidently this latter must have been torn away during a collision with the rocks or trees on the top of a ridge with which the ungovernable gas-bag had previously been in contact; and it was a marvel how the aeronaut had been able to cling there.
"Will it land near here, d'ye think, Paul?" asked Jotham, round-eyed with wonder, and feeling very sorry for the wretched traveler of the upper air currents, who seemed to be in deadly peril of his life.
"I hardly think so," replied the scoutmaster, rapidly measuring distances with his ready eye, and calculating upon the drop of the half collapsed balloon.
"But see where the bally old thing's heading, will you?" cried Seth, "straight at the place where them crows came out of. Say, wouldn't it be awful tough now, if it dropped right down in the heart of Black Water Swamps, where up to now never a human being has set foot, unless some Indian did long ago, when the Shawnees and Sacs and Pottawattomies and all that crowd rampaged through this region flat-footed."
The scouts stood there, and watched with tense nerves as the drifting balloon drew rapidly closer.
Now they could plainly see the man. He had secured himself in some way among the broken ropes that had doubtless held the basket in place. Yes, and he must have discovered the presence of the little khaki-clad band of boys on the road, for surely he was waving his hand to them wildly now.
Perhaps he understood that it was a safe thing to appeal to any boy who wore that well known suit; because every one has learned by this time that when a lad takes upon himself the duties and obligations of scoutcraft, he solemnly promises to always help a fellow in distress, when the opportunity comes along; and with most scouts the habit has become so strong that they always keep both eyes open, looking for just such openings.
Closer and closer came the wrecked air monster.
Just as one of the boys had said, it seemed about to pass very nearly overhead; and as the man would not be more than sixty or seventy feet above them, possibly he might be able to shout out a message.
"Keep still! He's calling something down to us!" cried Seth, when several of the others had started to chatter at a lively rate.
Now the balloon was whipping past, going at a pretty good clip. Apparently, then, it did not mean to get quite low enough to let them clutch any trailing rope, and endeavor to effect the rescue of the aeronaut. Fritz did make an upward leap, and try to lay hold of the only rope that came anywhere near them; but missed it by more than a foot.
"Accident--badly wrenched leg--follow up, and bring help--Anderson, from St. Louis--balloon _Great Republic_--report me as down--will drop in few minutes!"
They caught every word, although the man's voice seemed husky, and weak, as if he might have been long exposed and suffering. And as they stood and watched the balloon drift steadily away, lowering all the time, every one of those eight scouts felt moved by a great feeling of pity for the valiant man who had risked his life and was now in such a desperate situation.
"There she goes down, fellers!" cried Eben, excitedly.
"And what d'ye know, the bally old balloon has taken a crazy notion to drop right in the worst part of the Black Water Swamps, where we were just saying nobody had ever been before!"
CHAPTER X
DUTY ABOVE ALL THINGS
"Gee! whiz! that's tough!"
Fritz gave vent to his overwrought feelings after this boyish fashion; and his words doubtless echoed the thought that was in the mind of every fellow in that little bunch of staring scouts.
True enough, the badly damaged balloon had taken a sudden dip downward, as though unable to longer remain afloat, with such a scanty supply of gas aboard; and as Seth said, it certainly looked as though it had chosen the very worst place possible to drop--about in the heart of the swamp.
"Now, why couldn't the old thing have dipped low enough right here for us to grab that trailing rope?" demanded Jotham, dejectedly; for he immediately began to feel that all manner of terrible things were in store for the aeronaut, if, as seemed likely, he would be marooned in the unknown morass, with no means of finding his way out, and an injured leg in the bargain to contend with.
"Hope he didn't come down hard enough to hurt much," remarked Andy.
"Huh! if half we've heard about that place is true, little danger of that," declared Seth. "Chances are he dropped with a splash into a bed of muck. I only hope he don't get drowned before help comes along!"
"Help! what sort of help can reach him there?" observed Fritz, solemnly; and then once again did those eight scouts exchange uneasy glances.
"As soon as we let them know in Beverly, why, sure they'll organize some sort of relief expedition. I know a dozen men who'd be only too glad to lend a helping hand to a lost aeronaut," Andy went on to say.
"Wherever do you suppose he came from, Paul?" asked Eben.
"Say, didn't you hear him say St. Louis?" demanded Seth. "Better take some of that wax out of your ears, Eben."
"Whee! that's a pretty good ways off, seems to me," the bugler remarked, shaking his head, as though he found the story hard to believe.
"Why, that's nothing to brag of," Seth assured him. "They have big balloon races from St. Louis every year, nearly, and the gas-bags drift hundreds of miles across the country. I read about several that landed in New Jersey, and one away up in Canada won the prize. This one met with trouble before it got many miles on its journey. And he wants us to report that the _Great Republic_ is down; Anderson, he said his name was, didn't he, Paul?"
"Yes, that was it," replied the scoutmaster.
Paul seemed to be looking unusually grave, and the others realized that he must have something of more than usual importance on his mind.
"How about that, Paul," broke out Fritz, who had been watching the face of the patrol leader, "we're about eighteen miles away from home; and must we wait till we get there to start help out for that poor chap?"
"He might die before then," remarked Jotham seriously.
Again a strange silence seemed to brood over the whole patrol. Every fellow no doubt was thinking the same thing just then, and yet each boy hated to be the one to put it into words.
They had taken so much pride in the big hike that to even suggest giving it up, and just in the supreme moment of victory, as it were, seemed next door to sacrilege, and yet they could not get around the fact that it seemed right up to them to try and save that forlorn aeronaut. His life was imperiled, and scouts are always taught to make sacrifices when they can stretch out a hand to help any one in jeopardy.
Paul heaved a great sigh.
"Fellows," he said, solemnly, "I'm going to put it up to you this time, because I feel that the responsibility ought to be shared; and remember majority rules whenever the scoutmaster thinks best to let the troop decide."
"All right, Paul," muttered Seth, dejectedly.
"It's only fair that you should saddle some of the responsibility on the rest of the bunch," admitted Jotham, hardly a bit more happy looking than Seth; for of course every one of them knew what was coming; and could give a pretty good guess as to the consequences.
"That's a fact," added Fritz, "so out with it, Paul. When I've got a bitter dose to swallow I want to hurry, and get it over."
"It hurts none of you more than it does me," went on the scoutmaster, firmly, "because I had set my heart on winning that fine trophy; and there'll be a lot of people disappointed this afternoon when we fail to show up, if we do."
"Sure thing," grunted Seth, "I c'n see our friend, Freddy Rossiter, going around with that sickly grin on his face, telling everybody that he always knew we were a lot of fakirs, and greatly overrated; and that, like as not, even if we did show up we'd a been carried many a mile on some hay-wagon. But go on, Paul; let's have the funeral quick, so a feller c'n breathe free again."
"I'm going to put a motion, and every scout has a right to vote just as he thinks best. Only before you decide, stop and think what it all means, to that poor man as well as ourselves," Paul continued.
"Ready for the motion," mumbled Fritz, who looked as though he had lost his very last friend, or was beginning to feel the advance symptoms of sea sickness.
"All in favor of changing our plans, and trying to rescue the lost balloonist right now, say yes," the scoutmaster demanded, in as firm a tone as he could muster.
A chorus of affirmatives rang out; some of the boys were a little weak in the reply they made, for it came with an awful wrench; but so far as Paul could decide the response was unanimous.
He smiled then.
"I'm proud of you, fellows, yes I am," he declared heartily. "I think I know just what each and every one of you feels, and when you give up a thing you've been setting your minds on so long, and just when it looks as if we had an easy walk-over, I'm sure it does you credit. Some of the Beverly people may laugh, and make fun when we fail to turn up this afternoon; but believe me, when we do come in, and they learn what's happened, those for whose opinion we care will think all the more of us for doing what we mean to."
"Hope so," sighed Seth, who could not coax any sort of a smile to his forlorn looking face, "but because I talk this way, Paul, don't you go and get the notion in your head that if the whole thing depended on me I'd do anything different from what we expect to. There's such a thing as duty that faces every scout who's worthy of the name. For that he must expect to give up a whole lot of things he'd like to do. And you'll find that I can stand it as well as the next feller."
"P'raps when they know what happened, the committee'll be willing to give us a chance to make another try next week?" suggested Jotham.
"Good boy, Jotham, and a clever idea," cried Fritz.
Somehow the suggestion seemed to give every one a sensation of relief.
"I think myself that we'll be given another chance to show what we can do," was what Paul remarked. "We can prove that we had the victory about as good as clinched when this unexpected thing came along. And I know Mr. Sargeant will be pleased to hear that we gave up our chances of winning that trophy because a sudden serious duty confronted us."
"Then we're going to start right away to try and find the middle of Black Water Swamps--is that the idea, Paul?" inquired Seth.
"That's what it amounts to, it looks like, to me," replied the scoutmaster, as he stood there in the open road, looking long and steadily at the very spot where they had seen the last of the dropping balloon; just as though he might be fixing the locality on his mind for future use.
"Do we all have to go, Paul, or are you going to let several of us tramp along to Beverly?" some one asked just then.
"That depends on how you feel about it," was the answer the scoutmaster gave. "It won't do any good for a part of the patrol to arrive on time, because, you remember one of the rules of the game is that every member must fulfill the conditions, and make the full hundred miles hike. Do you want to go to town, while the rest of us are searching the swamps for the aeronaut, Eben?"
"I should say not," hastily replied the bugler.
"How about you, Noodles?" continued Paul.
"Nixey doing; me for der swamps, undt you can put dot in your pipe undt smoke idt," the one addressed replied, for there were times when the scouts, being off duty, could forget that Paul was anything other than a chum.
"Well," the patrol leader went on to say, laughingly, "I'm not going to ask any other fellow, for I see by the looks on your faces that you'd take it as an insult. So, the next thing to settle is where we'd better strike into the place."
Seth came to the front again.
"Well, you see, I talked a lot with that feller that got lost in there; and he told a heap of interesting things about the blooming old swamp, also where he always started into the same when trapping. You see, somehow I got a hazy idea in this silly head of mine that some time or other I might want to get a couple of chums to go with me, and try and see what there was in the middle of the Black Water Swamps."
"That's good, Seth," declared one of his mates, encouragingly.
"The smartest thing you ever did, barring none," added Jotham.
"It's apt to be of more or less use to us right now, and that's a fact," was the way Paul put it.
"I reckon," Andy remarked, looking thoughtfully at Seth, "that you could tell right now whether we happened to be near that same place. It would be a great piece of good luck if we could run across the entrance, and the trail your trapper friend made, without going far away from here."
"Let's see," continued Seth, screwing his forehead up into a series of funny wrinkles, as he usually did when trying to look serious or thoughtful, "he told me the path he used lay right under a big sycamore tree that must have been struck by a stray bolt of lightning, some time or other, for all the limbs on the north side had been shaven clean off."
"Well, I declare!" ejaculated Jotham.
"Then you've noticed such a tree, have you?" asked Paul, instantly, recognizing the symptoms, for he had long made a study of each and every scout in the troop, and knew their peculiarities.
"Look over yonder, will you?" demanded Jotham, pointing.
Immediately various exclamations arose.
"That's the same old blasted sycamore he told me about, sure as you're born," declared Seth, with a wide grin of satisfaction.
"The Beaver Patrol luck right in the start; didn't I say nothing could hold out against that?" remarked Fritz.
"Come along, Paul; let's be heading that way," suggested Jotham.
In fact, all the scouts seemed anxious to get busy. The first pang of regret over giving up their cherished plan had by this time worn away, and just like boys, they were now fairly wild to be doing the next best thing. They entered heart and soul into things as they came along, whether it happened to be a baseball match; a football scrimmage on the gridiron; the searching for a lost trail in the woods, or answering the call to dinner.
And so the whole eight hurried along over the back road, meaning to branch off at the point nearest to the tall sycamore that had been visited by a freak bolt from the thunder clouds, during some storm in years gone by.
Paul was not joining in the chatter that kept pace with their movements. He realized that he had a serious proposition on his hands just then. If so experienced a man as that muskrat trapper could get lost in Black Water Swamps and stay lost for two whole days, it behooved a party of boys, unfamiliar with such surroundings to be very careful in all they did.
But Paul had ever been known as a cautious fellow. He seldom acted from impulse except when it became actually necessary, in order to meet some sudden emergency; and then there were few who could do things more quickly than the patrol leader.
In a case of this kind, the chances were that they must take unusual precaution against losing their bearings; that is, they must feel that they had a back trail to follow in case forward progress became impossible, or inexpedient.
Paul had his theory as to the best way to accomplish such a thing; and of course it had to do with "blazing" trees as they went along. In this fashion all chances of making mistakes would be obviated; and if they failed to effect the rescue of the man who had dropped in the heart of the dismal morass at least the eight boys need not share his sad fate.
Leaving the road they now headed straight for the sycamore that stood as a land mark, and a specimen of the freaks of lightning. No sooner had they reached it than Paul's eyes were on the ground.
The others heard him give a pleased exclamation, and then say:
"It's all right, fellows; because here is a well beaten trail that seems to lead straight in to the place. And now, follow me in single file!"
CHAPTER XI
THE TRAIL IN THE SWAMP
When the eight scouts found that they were leaving solid ground, and actually getting to where little bogs surrounded them on almost every side, they had a queer feeling. Up to now none of them had ever had much experience in passing through a real swamp, because there were no such places nearer to Beverly than this one, and eighteen miles is quite too far for boys to walk on ordinary occasions, when seeking fun.
They looked around time and again, though none of them dared loiter, and Paul, as the leader, was setting a pretty good pace.
Just behind Paul came Seth. The scoutmaster had asked him to keep close at his heels, for since Seth had acquired more or less of a fund of swamp lore from the man who trapped muskrats for their pelts, in the fall and winter, if any knotty problems came up to be solved the chances were Seth would be of more use than any one of the other fellows.
Evidently they were in for some new and perhaps novel experiences. And there is nothing that pleases the average boy more than to look upon unfamiliar scenes, unless it is to run up against a bit of an adventure.
One thing Paul had made sure to fetch along with him when taking this big hike, and that was his little camp hatchet. Fritz had begged to be allowed to carry his old Marlin shotgun, under the plea that they might run across some ferocious animal like a wildcat, or a skunk, and would find a good use for the reliable firearm; but the scoutmaster had set his foot down firmly there.
But they would have to make numerous fires while on the way, and a little hatchet was apt to come in very handy.
And the feel of it in his belt had given Paul his idea about "blazing" the trees just as soon as they no longer had the trapper's path to serve them as a guide against their return.
It is a very easy thing to make a trail in this way; only care must always be taken to make the slices, showing the white wood underneath the bark, on that side of the tree most likely to be seen by the returning pilgrim. Great loss of time must result if one always had to go behind every tree in order to find the blaze that had been so carefully given, not to mention the chances of becoming confused, and eventually completely turned around.
That path twisted and turned in the most amazing and perplexing manner possible.
Although Paul had purposely warned the boys to try and keep tabs of the points of the compass as they passed along, in less than ten minutes after striking the swamp proper it is doubtful whether one of them could have told correctly just where the north lay, if asked suddenly; though by figuring it out, looking at the sun, and all that, they might have replied with a certain amount of accuracy after a while.
But then they felt sure Paul knew; and somehow or other they had always been in the habit of relying on the scoutmaster to do some of their thinking for them--a bad habit it is, too, for any boys to let themselves fall into, and one that Paul often took them to task for. They would cheerfully admit the folly of such a course, and promise to reform, yet on the next occasion it would be the same old story of depending on Paul.
"Path seems to be petering out a heap, Paul," remarked Seth, when another little time had crept along, and they had penetrated still deeper into the swamp, with a very desolate scene all around them, water surrounding many of the trees that grew there with swollen boles, such as always seems to be the case where they exist in swampy regions.
"Yes, I was thinking that myself," replied the other; "and it's about time for me to begin using my little hatchet, even if I don't happen to be George Washington."
"Let's stop for a breath, and listen," suggested Eben; "who knows now but what we might be nearer where the balloon dropped than we thought. P'raps we could even get an answer if we whooped her up a bit."
"How about that, Paul?" demanded Fritz, who could shout louder perhaps than any other boy in Beverly, and often led the hosts as a cheer captain, when exciting games were on with other school teams.
"Not a bad idea, I should say," was the reply, as the patrol leader nodded his head in approval. "Suppose you lead off, Fritz, and let it be a concerted yell."
Accordingly Fritz marshaled them all in a line, and gave the word. Such an outbreak as followed awoke the sleeping echoes in the swamp, and sent a number of startled birds flying madly away. Indeed, Jotham noticed a rabbit bounding off among the hummocks of higher ground; and Noodles afterwards declared that he had seen the "cutest little pussycat" ambling away; though the others vowed it must have been a skunk, and gave Noodles fair warning that if ever he tried to catch such a cunning "pussycat" he would be buried up to the neck until his clothes were fumigated.
"Don't hear any answer, do you, fellers?" remarked Seth, after the echoes had finally died away again.
Everybody admitted that there seemed to have been no reply to the shout they had sent booming along.
"Hope we didn't scare him by making such a blooming row," Seth went on to say.
"I'm bothered more by thinking that he may have been killed, or very badly hurt when the balloon fell down," Paul ventured to say.
The thought made them all serious again. In imagination they pictured that valiant fellow who had taken his life in his hands in the interest of sport, possibly lying there on the ground senseless, or buried in the slimy mud, which could be seen in so many places all around them. And it was far from a pleasing prospect that confronted those eight scouts, though none of them gave any sign of wanting to back out.
"Mebbe a blast from my horn would reach him?" suggested Eben.
"Suppose you try it, eh? Paul?" Fritz remarked.
"No harm can come of it, so pitch in Eben," the other told the troop bugler.
"And put in all the wind you c'n scrape together," added Seth.
Accordingly Eben blew a blast that could have been heard fully a mile away. He grew red in the face as he sent out his call; and doubtless such a sweet medley of sounds had never before been heard in that desolate looking place since the time of the ice period.
"No use; he don't answer; or if he does, we don't get it," Seth observed, in a disappointed tone.
"Then the only thing for us to do is to go ahead," Andy proposed.
"Paul's getting his bearings again," remarked Eben.
"I wanted to make dead sure," the scoutmaster observed, with a glow of determination in his eyes. "You see, we tried to note just about where the balloon seemed to fall; and it takes a lot of figuring to keep that spot in your mind all the while you're turning and twisting along this queer trail. But I feel pretty sure of my ground."
"Huh! wish I did the same," said Seth, holding up one of his feet, and showing that he had been in black mud half way to his knee, when he made some sort of bad guess about the footing under him.
Apparently Paul was now ready to once more start out. But they saw him give a quick hack at a tree, and upon looking as they passed they discovered that he had taken quite a slice off the bark, leaving a white space as big as his two hands, and which could easily be seen at some distance off in the direction whither they were bound.
That was called a "blaze."
If Seth thought he was having his troubles, they were slight compared with those that attacked one other member of the little band of would-be rescuers.
Noodles, besides being a good-natured chap, was more or less awkward. Being so very stout had more or less to do with this; and besides, he had a habit of just ambling along in any sort of happy-go-lucky way.
Now, while this might not be so very bad under ordinary conditions, when there was a decent and level road to be traveled over, it brought about all sorts of unexpected and unwelcome difficulties when they were trying to keep to a narrow and crooked path.
Twice already had Noodles made a slip, and gone in knee-deep, to be dragged out by some of his comrades. And he was glancing around at the gloomy aspect with a look approaching _fear_ in his eyes, just as though he began to think that they were invading a haunted region where respectable scouts had no business to go, even on an errand of mercy.
Such was the wrought-up condition of his nerves, that when a branch which some one had held back, and then let slip, came in contact with the shins of Noodles, he gave out a screech, and began dancing around like mad.
"Snakes! and as big as your wrist too! I saw 'em!" he called out, forgetting to talk in his usual broken English way, because of his excitement.
They had some difficulty in convincing him that it was only a branch that had caressed his ankle, and not a venomous serpent; for Noodles confessed that if he dreaded anything on the face of the earth it was just snakes, any kind of crawling varmints, from the common everyday garter species to the big boa constrictor to be seen in the menagerie that came with the annual circus visiting Beverly.
Again and again was Paul making good use of his handy little camp hatchet, and Seth took note of the manner in which the blazed trail was thus fashioned. It may be all very fine to do things in theory, but there is nothing like a little practical demonstration. And in all likelihood not one of these seven boys but would be fully able to make just such a plain trail, should the necessity ever arise. When one has _seen_ a thing done he can easily remember the manner of doing it; but it is so easy to get directions confused, and make blunders.
Paul was not hurrying now.
A mistake would be apt to cost them dear, and he believed that an ounce of prevention is always better than a pound of cure. If they could avoid going wrong, it did not matter a great deal that they made slow progress. "Be sure you're right and then go ahead" was the motto of the famous frontiersman, Davy Crockett, and Paul had long ago taken it as his pattern too.
Besides, it paid, for any one could see that they were steadily getting in deeper and deeper. The swamp was becoming much wilder now; and it was not hard to realize that a man getting lost here, and losing his head, might, after his bearings were gone, go wandering at haphazard for days, possibly crossing his own trail more than a few times.
It seemed a lonesome place. Animals they saw none. Perhaps there might be deer in the outer portions, but they never came in here. Although the scouts saw no evidences that wild-cats lived in the swamp, they could easily picture some such fierce animal crouching in this clump of matted trees or back of that heavy bush, watching their passage with fiery eyes.
The scouts found their long staves of considerable use from time to time. Had Noodles for instance been more adept in the use of the one he carried he might have been saved from a whole lot of trouble. Perhaps this might prove to be a valuable lesson to the boy. He could not help but see how smartly the others kept themselves from slipping off the narrow ridge of ground by planting their staves against some convenient stump, or the butt of a tree, anywhere but in the oozy mud.
"Wait up for me!" Noodles would call out every little while, when he fell behind, for he seemed to have a horror lest he might slip into that horrible bed of mud, and be sucked down before his chums could reach him. "It iss nodt fair to leave me so far behindt der rest. How wouldt you feel if you rescued der argonaut, and lose your chump; dell me dot? Give eferypody a chance, and--mine gootness, I mighty near proke my pack dot time," for he had come down with a tremendous thump, when his feet slipped out from under him.
But as a rule boys are not apt to give a clumsy comrade much sympathy, and hence only rude laughter greeted this fresh mishap on the part of Noodles.
"Nature looked out for you when she saw what an awkward chap you were going to be, Noodles," called back Fritz. "You're safely padded all right, and don't need to feel worried when you sit down, sudden-like. If it was me, now, there might be some talking, because I'm built more on the jack-knife plan."
"Oh! what is that?" cried Eben, as a strange, blood-curdling sound came from a point ahead of them; just as though some unlucky fellow was being sucked down in the embrace of that slimy mud, and was giving his last shriek for help.
As the other scouts had of course heard the same thing, all of the detachment came to a sudden halt, and looking rather apprehensively at one another, they waited to learn if the weird gurgling sound would be repeated, but all was deathly still.
CHAPTER XII
WHERE NO FOOT HAS EVER TROD
"Now whatever do you suppose made that racket?" demanded Seth.
"Sounded just like a feller getting drowned, and with his mouth half full of water. But I don't believe it could have been a human being, do you, Paul?" and Eben turned to the one in command of the troop.
"No, I don't," returned the scoutmaster, promptly. "More than likely it was some sort of a bird."
"A bird make a screechy sound like that?" echoed the doubting Eben.
"Some sort of heron or crane. They make queer noises when they fight, or carry on in a sort of dance. I've read lots of things about cranes that are hard to believe, yet the naturalists stand for the truth of the accounts."
Paul started off again, as though not dismayed in the slightest by the strange squawk, half human in its way. And his example spurred the others on to follow in his wake, so that once more they were making steady progress.
"I wouldn't care so much," grumbled Fritz, as he trailed along, "if only I had a gun along. But it's tough luck to be smooching through a place like this, where a sly old cat may be watching you from the branch overhead, and your trusty Marlin hanging on the nails at home."
"They say you always see plenty of game when you haven't got a gun; and so I guess we'll run across all sorts of things, from bobcats to alligators!" Paul went on to remark, whimsically, but there was one scout who chose to take his words seriously, and this was Noodles.
"What's that about alligators?" he called out from his place at the rear of the little procession. "Blease don't dell me now as we shall some reptiles meet up mit pefore we finish dis exblorations. If dere iss one thing I don't like, worser as snakes, dose pe alligators. I would go across der street to avoid dem. You moost some fun pe making when you say dot, Paul?"
"Sure I am, Noodles," replied the scoutmaster quickly, "because there are no alligators or crocodiles native to the state of Indiana. I believe they have a few lobsters over in Indianapolis, but they don't count. But the chances are we will run across some queer things before we get out of this place."
"What gets me," remarked Jotham, "is the way the thing came on us. Why, we'd just about said that we'd like to explore the old swamp, from curiosity if nothing else, when that balloon hove in sight, and settled down where we'd have to push right into the center of the place to find the man who was hanging to the wreck."
"Well, we had our wish answered on the spot, didn't we?" questioned the patrol leader, "and it came in such a way that we couldn't well back out. So here we are, up to our necks in business."
"I only hopes as how we won't pe up to our necks in somedings else pefore long," came a whine from the rear, that made more than one fellow chuckle.
A number of times Paul stopped, for one reason or another. Now it was some little imprint of animal feet that had attracted his attention in the harder mud at the side of the narrow ridge he was following; then again he wanted to listen, and renew his observations.
Seth was watching him closely. Somehow he was reminded of that grizzled old carpenter whom he had observed, when the addition was being put to their house, and who, after measuring a board three blessed times, and picking up his saw, made ready to cut it in twain, when, possessed of an idea that he must not make a miscalculation, laid down his saw, and went to work to measure it for the fourth time!
Paul was not quite so bad as all that, but he did like to make sure he was right before taking a step that could not be recovered, once it was gone.
"There's one thing sure," Seth could not help remarking, after he had watched Paul for some time, and noted how confident the other seemed with every forward step that was taken.
"What might that be, Seth?" demanded Babe Adams, when the other paused.
"If that feller I talked with, the one that hunts muskrats around here in the season, had been just half as smart as Paul, he never would a lost hisself in the swamps, and come near starving to death."
"So say we all of us!" added Jotham.
"That's as neat a compliment as I ever had paid me, boys; though I hardly think I deserve it, yet. Wait and see if we get lost, or not. The proof of the pudding's in the eating of it, you know. Talk is cheap and butters no parsnips, they say. I like to _do_ things. But honestly speaking, I believe we're getting through this place pretty smartly."
"But she keeps agettin' darker right along, Paul?" complained Noodles, taking advantage of a brief halt to pick up a stick and start to wiping the dark ooze from the bottom of his trousers.
"That only means we're pushing steadily in toward the center; and I'm beginning to lose my fear about getting there. Perhaps, after all, it may be an easy thing to put our feet where those of no other white man has ever trod."
Paul spoke with an assurance that carried the rest along with him. That had ever been one of his strongest points at school in the leadership of the class athletic and outdoor sports team.
It was getting more and more difficult for several of the scouts to follow their leader. The narrow ledge had been bad enough, but when it came to passing along slippery logs, with the water all around, and a bath sure to follow the slightest mishap, Eben's nerve gave way.
"If it's going to keep up like this, Paul, you'll have to drop me out, because I just can't do it, and that's a fact!" he wailed, as he clung with both hands and knees to an unusually slippery place, having lost his stick in making a miscalculation when trying to brace himself.
One of the other fellows recovered the staff, and then Eben was assisted across. Paul had been expecting something like this, and was not very much surprised. He felt pretty sure there was another who would welcome an order to stay there on that little patch of firm ground, and wait for the return of the rest.
"Well, I was just thinking of leaving a rear guard, to protect our line of communications," he proceeded to say, gravely, but with a wink toward Seth and Fritz, "and as it will be necessary for two to fill the position, I appoint Seth and Noodles to the honorable post. You will take up your position here, and if anybody tries to pass you by without giving the proper countersign, arrest him on the spot."
"Which spot, Paul?" asked Noodles, solemnly.
"Well, it doesn't matter, so long as you stay here and guard our line of retreat. And boys, keep your eyes on the watch for signals. Perhaps we may have to talk with you by smoke signs. So you can amuse yourselves by picking up some wood, and getting ready to start a smoky fire, only don't put a match to it unless we call you."
"All right, Paul," returned Eben, taking it all in deadly earnest, although the other fellows were secretly chuckling among themselves. "And then again, I've got my bully old bugle, in case I want to give you a call. Don't worry about Noodles; I'll be here to look after him."
"The blind leading the blind," muttered Seth as he turned his face away.
"There, you see now," broke in Fritz, "if we only had my gun along, Eben here could be a real sentry, and hold a feller up in the right way. Watch this second slippery log here, boys. You c'n easy enough push anybody into the slush if he gets gay, and refuses to give the password."
Then he in turn also followed after Paul, leaving the bugler and Noodles there, congratulating themselves that they could be doing their full duty by the enterprise without taking any more desperate risks.
And then when the six scouts had gone about fifty feet Eben was heard wildly shouting after them.
"Paul, O! Paul!" he was bellowing at the top of his voice.
"Well, what is it?" asked the scoutmaster.
"You forgot something," came the answer.
"What?"
"You didn't give us the password, you know; and how c'n we tell whether any fellers has it right, when we don't even know."
Paul just turned and walked on, laughing to himself; and those who followed in his footsteps were shaking with inward amusement. Either Eben had taken the bait, and gorged the hook, or else he was having a little fun with them, no one knew which.
However, all of them soon realized that Paul had done a clever thing when he thus coaxed the two clumsy members of the patrol to drop out of line, and allow those better fitted for coping with the difficulties of the slippery path to go forward; because it steadily grew worse instead of better, and neither Eben nor Noodles could have long continued.
Why, even Fritz began to feel timid about pursuing such a treacherous course, and presently he sought information.
"Don't you think we must be nearly in the heart of the old bog, Paul? Seems to me we've come a long ways, and when you think that we've got to go back over the same nasty track again, perhaps carrying a wounded man, whew! however we are going to do it, beats me."
Paul stopped long enough to give a tree a couple of quick upward and downward strokes with that handy little tool of his, and then glance at the resulting gash, as though he wanted to make sure that it could be seen a decent distance off.
"Well, that's a pretty hard question to answer," he replied, slowly. "In the first place, we don't know whether the man fell into the heart of the Black Water, or over by the other side. Fact is, we haven't come on anything up to now to settle the matter whether he fell at all."
"Great governor! that _would_ be a joke on us now, wouldn't it, if we made our way all over this beastly place, when there wasn't any aeronaut to help? We'd feel like a bunch of sillies, that's right!" burst out Fritz.
"But we acted in good faith," Paul went on to say, positively. "We weighed the matter, and arrived at the conclusion that he had fallen somewhere in here; and we agreed, _all of us_, mind you, Fritz, that it was our duty to make a hunt for Mr. Anderson. And we're here on the ground, doing our level best."
"Ain't got another word to say, Paul," Fritz observed, hastily, "you know best; only I sure hope it don't get any worse than we find it right now. I never did like soft slimy mud. Nearly got smothered in it once, when I was only a kid, and somehow it seems to give me the creeps every time I duck my leg in. But go right along; only if you hear me sing out, stop long enough to give me a pull."
"We're all bound to help each other, don't forget that, Fritz," said Seth. "It might just as well be me that'll take a slide, and go squash into that awful mess on the right, or on the left. Don't know whether to swim, or wade, if that happens; but see there, you can't find any bottom to the stuff."
He thrust his long Alpine staff into the mire as far as it could go; and the other scouts shuddered when they saw that so far as appearances went, the soft muck bed really had no bottom. Any one so unfortunate as to fall in would surely gradually sink far over his head, unless he were rescued in time, or else had the smartness to effect his own release by seizing hold of a low-hanging branch and gradually drawing his limbs out of the clinging stuff.
Then they all looked ahead, as though wondering what the prospect might be for a continuance of this perilous trip which had broken up their great hike.
"I guess it's about time to make another try with a shout or so, Fritz," said Paul, instead of giving the order for an advance.
"All right, just as you say," returned the other, "we've come quite some distance since we made the last big noise; and if he's weak and wounded, yet able to answer at all, p'raps we might hear him this time. Line up here, fellers, and watch my hands now, so's all to break loose together."
It was a tremendous volume of sound that welled forth, as Fritz waved his hands upward after a fashion that every high school fellow understood; why, Seth declared that it could have been heard a mile or more away, and from that part of the swamp half way out in either direction.
Then they strained their ears to listen for any possible answer. The seconds began to creep past, and disappointment had already commenced to grip hold of their hearts when they started, and looked quickly, eagerly, at one another.
"Did you hear it?" asked Fritz, gasping for breath after his exertions at holding on to that long-drawn school yell.
"We sure did--something!" replied Jotham, instantly, "but whether that was the balloonist answering, Eben or Noodles calling out to us, or some wild animal giving tongue, blest if I know."
And then, why, of course five pair of eyes were turned on Paul for the answer.
CHAPTER XIII
THE OASIS IN THE SWAMP
"Was that another fish-eating bird like a crane, Paul?" asked Seth.
"Sounded more like a human voice," Jotham put in.
"And that's what it was, or else we're all pretty much mistaken," was the verdict of the scoutmaster.
They turned their eyes toward the quarter from whence the sound had appeared to come; and while some thought it had welled up just in a line with this bunch of bushes, or it might be a leaning tree, still others believed it had come straight up against the breeze.
Although there might be a few points difference in their guesses, still it was noticeable that on the whole they were pretty uniform, and pointed almost due east from the spot where they stood.
"How about the prospect of getting through there?" queried Jotham, anxiously.
"Huh! couldn't be tougher, in my opinion," grumbled Seth.
"But if you look far enough, boys," remarked Paul, "you can see that there seems to be some firmer ground over there."
"Well, now, you're right about that, Paul," interjected Fritz, "I was just going to say the same myself. Made me think of what an oasis in a desert might look like, though to be sure I never saw one in my life."
"Solid ground, you mean, eh?" said Babe Adams, gleefully, "maybe, now, we won't be just tickled to death to feel the same under our trilbies again. This thing of picking your way along a slippery ledge about three inches wide, makes me feel like I'm walking on eggs all the while. Once you lose your grip, and souse you go up to your knees, or p'raps your neck, in the nasty dip. Solid ground will feel mighty welcome to me."
"Do we make a bee line for that quarter, Paul?" asked Andy.
"I'd like to see you try it, that's what," jeered Seth. "In three shakes of a lamb's tail you'd be swimming in the mud. Guess we have to follow one of these crazy little hummocks that run criss-cross through the place, eh, Frank?"
"Yes, you're right about that, Seth; but I'm glad to say I think one runs over toward that spot; anyway, here goes to find out."
The young scoutmaster made a start while speaking, and the balance of the boys lined out after him.
"Keep close together, so as to help each other if any trouble comes," was what Paul called out over his shoulder.
"Yes, and for goodness sake don't all get in at once, or we'll be drowned. Think what an awful time there'd be in old Beverly, if six of her shining lights went and got snuffed out all at once. Hey, quit your pushin' there, Jotham, you nearly had me overboard that time."
"Well, I just _had_ to grab something, because one of my legs was in up to the knee. Oh! dear, what a fine time we'll have getting all this mud off us," Jotham complained, from just behind.
But they were making pretty fair progress, all the same; and whenever any of the boys could venture to take their eyes off the faintly marked path they were following, long enough to send a quick look ahead, they saw that the anticipated haven of temporary refuge loomed up closer all the time.
At least this was encouraging, and it served to put fresh zeal in those who had begun to almost despair of ever getting across the acre of mud that lay between the spot where they had last shouted, and the Promised Land.
They were a cheery lot, taken as a whole; and what was even better, they believed in passing their enthusiasm along. So one, and then another, called out some encouraging words as the humor seized them.
Foot by foot, and yard by yard they moved along, Paul always cautious about venturing upon unknown ground; but finding a way to gain his end.
"Here's a little patch of solid ground, and we can rest up for a minute or so," was the welcome announcement that came along the line of toiling scouts, and of course brought out various exclamations of delight.
It was indeed a great relief to be able to actually stand upright once more, so as to stretch the cramped muscles in their legs. Some of the boys even started to dancing, though Seth scorned to do anything like this, and pretended to make all manner of fun of their contortions.
"Talk about them cranes doing funny stunts when they get together and dance," he remarked, "I guess, now, they haven't got anything on you fellers. Why, if anybody happened to see you carryin' on that way he'd sure believe the whole bunch had broke loose from some lunatic asylum. When I dance I like to have some style about it, and not just hop around any old way."
So Seth took it out in stretching his arms, and rubbing the tired muscles of his legs.
It was Jotham who made a discovery. In jumping around he had by chance wandered a dozen yards away from the rest, when he was heard to give vent to a cry; and the other boys saw him dart forward, as if to pick something up from the ground.
"What is it, Jotham?" several cried in an eager chorus; for their nerves had been wrought up to a high tension by all they had gone through, and they felt, as Seth aptly expressed it, "like fiddle strings keyed to next door to the snapping point."
For answer Jotham turned and came toward the rest. He was carrying some object in his hand, and seemed to regard it with considerable interest, as though he felt that he had made an important discovery.
As he reached the others he held it up before the scoutmaster; and of course all could see what it was.
"A piece of old yellow cloth!" exclaimed Seth, in disgust, "say, you made all of us believe that you'd run across something worth while."
"How about it, Paul?" appealed Jotham, turning to the one whom he fancied would be more apt to understand, "don't this tell a story; and ain't it a pretty good clue to run across?"
"I should say, yes," replied Paul, as he took the article in question in his own hands, and felt of it eagerly, "because, you see, Seth, this is really silk, the queer kind they always make balloons out of. And that ought to tell us we're on the right track. So you see it was an important pick-up, and ought to count one point for Jotham."
"Gee whittaker! you don't say?" ejaculated Seth, staring with considerable more respect at the foot of dingy yellow stuff which the scoutmaster was holding in his hands. "Well, if that's so, then I pass along the honors to Jotham. But if a piece of the bally old balloon fell right here, Paul, don't that tell us the wreck must a passed over where we're standing now?"
"Not the least doubt about that," asserted the confident Paul, "and I was just looking up to see if I could make out the course it took. Because it must have struck the top of a tree, to tear this piece loose."
"How about that one over yonder?" suggested Fritz, pointing as he spoke. "Looks to me like the top was broke some, and I just bet you now that's where the big gas-bag did strike first, when it started to drop in a hurry."
"Then following the course of the wind, which hasn't changed this last hour, it would be carried on straight east," Paul continued, logically.
"Sure thing," declared Seth, "and if you look close now, you'll glimpse where it struck that smaller bunch of trees just ahead, where we're going to land soon. And Paul, hadn't we better be trying our luck some more now? Guess all the boys must be rested, and if we've just _got_ to do the grand wading act, the sooner we get started the better."
"First let's call out again, and see if we get any answer. It would cheer the poor fellow up some, if he happens to be lying there badly hurt; and if he does answer, we'll get our bearings better. Hit it up, Fritz!"
They always turned to Fritz when they wanted volume of sound. That appeared to be his specialty, the one thing in which he certainly excelled.
Of course there was little need of any great noise, now that they had reason to believe the object of their solicitude must be close at hand; but then boys generally have plenty of spare enthusiasm, and when Fritz gave the required signal they let out a roar, as usual.
"There, that was certainly an answering call!" declared Jotham, proudly.
"Sounded like he said just two words--'help--hurry!'" spoke up Babe.
Somehow the rest seemed to be of about the same opinion, and the thought gave the scouts a strange thrill. Was the unfortunate aeronaut slowly bleeding to death, lying there amidst the bushes on that tongue of land? They had given up their dearly cherished plan in order to rescue him, and had undergone considerable in the line of strenuous work, so as to arrive in time, and now that they were so close to the scene of his disaster it would be too bad if they were held back until it was too late to do him any good.
"Can't we hit it up a little faster, Paul?" begged Andy, who was rather inclined to be impulsive, because of the warm Southern blood that flowed in his veins.
They had once more started on, and were really making pretty good progress; but when one gives way to impatience, it may seem that a fair amount of speed is next door to standing still.
Paul understood the generous impulse that caused the Kentucky boy to speak in this strain and while he knew that it was dangerous to attempt any swifter pace than they were then making, still, for once, he bowed to the will of the majority, and began to increase his speed.
All went well, for beyond a few minor mishaps they managed to get along. What if one of the scouts did occasionally slip off the wretched footing, and splash into the mud; a helping hand was always ready to do the needful, and the delay could hardly be noticed.
"There's the beginning of the firm ground just ahead!" Paul presently remarked, thinking to cheer his comrades with the good news.
"Oh! joy!" breathed Jotham, who often used queer expressions, that is, rather odd to hear from a boy.
Seth was the more natural one of the two when he gave vent to his delight by using the one expressive word:
"Bully!"
In a couple of minutes at this rate they would have reached the place where the slippery trail merged into the more solid ground.
Perhaps some of the others may not as yet have noticed strange sounds welling up out of the bushes beyond, but Paul certainly did, and he was greatly puzzled to account for the same.
That singular growling could not be the wind passing through the upper branches of the trees, for one thing. It seemed to Paul more like the snarling of an angry domestic cat, several times magnified.
For the life of him he could not imagine what a cat would be doing here in the heart of the dreaded Black Water Swamps. Surely no hermit could be living in such a dismal and inaccessible place; even a crazy man would never dream of passing over such a terribly slippery ledge in order to get to and from his lonely habitation.
But if not a cat, what was making that angry snarling?
Paul knew next to nothing about balloons, but he felt pretty sure that even the escaping of gas could hardly produce such a sound--it might pass through a rent in the silk with a sharp hiss, but he could plainly catch something more than that.
And then his foot struck solid ground; with a sigh of relief he drew himself up, and turned to give a hand to Seth, next in line, if it was needed.
So they all came ashore, so to speak, and delighted to feel able to stand in a comfortable position once more.
No time now for stretching or dancing, with that ugly snarling growing constantly deeper, and more angry in volume. Forward was the word, and Paul somehow felt glad that they gripped those handy staves, tried and true, with which every scout in course of time becomes quite adept. They would come in good play should there be any necessity for prompt action.
"Follow me, everybody," said Paul, as he started off.
"Count on us to back you up!" Seth declared, from which remark the scoutmaster understood that by now the others must have caught those suspicious sounds, and were trying to figure out what they stood for.
It seemed as if with every forward step he took, Paul could catch them more and more plainly. Nor was the snarling sound alone; now he believed he caught a rustling of dead leaves, and something that might be likened to low muttered words, as though the speaker were being hard pressed, and had little breath to spare.
Then, as he pushed through the last fringe of bushes that interfered with his view, Paul found himself looking upon the cause of all these queer noises.
CHAPTER XIV
JUST IN THE NICK OF TIME
"Holy smoke! look at that, would you?" exclaimed Seth, who had been so close on the heels of the scoutmaster that he sighted the struggling objects ahead almost as soon as Paul did himself.
"It's a big wildcat!" echoed Jotham, with a suspicious tremor in his voice.
Indeed, the animal in question was a sight well calculated to give any one more or less reason to feel a touch of alarm.
Evidently she must be a mother cat, for a couple of partly grown kittens stood there in plain sight, with every hair on their short backs erected, and their whole appearance indicating that they were "chips off the old block," as Seth afterwards declared.
The wounded aeronaut sat there with a stick in his grasp. This he was wielding as best he could, to keep the angry animal at a distance, although his efforts were growing pitifully weaker, and only for the coming of the scouts he must have been compelled to throw up the sponge in a short time.
Evidently the wildcat had come upon him there after he had been dropped amidst the wreckage of his balloon. Whether it was her natural hatred for mankind that tempted the savage beast to attack the balloonist, or the scent of fresh blood from some of his scratches, it would be hard to say, possibly both reasons had to do with her action.
Just how long the scrimmage had been going on Paul could only guess; but he did know that the beast must have ripped the clothes partly off the aeronaut's back, and in turn he could see that one of the animal's eyes was partly closed, from a vigorous whack which the desperate man had given with his cudgel, no doubt.
Paul instantly made straight for the scene of commotion, never so much as hesitating a second. This was one of those emergencies spoken of before now, when the scoutmaster did not allow himself to pause and consider, but acted from impulse only.
The man saw him coming, and gave expression to his satisfaction in a weak hurrah. As for the cat, at first it seemed ready to try conclusions with the whole troop of Boy Scouts, for it turned on Paul with the ugliest glare in its yellow eyes he had ever seen.
Every fellow was shouting vigorously by now, and the volume of sound must have had more or less to do with settling the question. Besides, the pair of kittens seemed to have been frightened off with the coming of the scouts, having slid into the friendly bushes.
So the mother cat decided that after all she could yield gracefully to superior numbers--seven to one was pretty heavy odds, and those waving staves had an ugly look she did not exactly fancy.
But all the same there was nothing inglorious in her retreat; she retired in perfect good order, keeping her face to the foe, and continuing to spit and snarl and growl so long as she remained in sight.
Several of the scouts were for following her up, and forcing the issue; but a word from Paul restrained them. He saw that the animal was furiously angry, and if hard pushed would undoubtedly make things extremely interesting for any number of fellows; flying into their midst, so that they could not well use their sticks, and using her sharp claws to make criss-cross maps across their faces.
Scratches from the claws of all carnivorous animals are dangerous. Blood poisoning is apt to set in, because of the fact that their claws are contaminated from the flesh of such birds or small game as have served them for a previous meal. And just then Paul had nothing along with him to prevent the possibility of such a dreadful happening taking place.
Seth in particular was exceedingly loth to give over. He looked after the vanishing wild cat, and shook his head in bitter disappointment. Only for his pride in obeying all orders that came to him from the scoutmaster, Seth very likely would have followed the cat, and probably rued his rashness when he had to call for help a minute or so later.
Meanwhile Paul had hurried to the side of the aeronaut, who raised his hand in greeting, while a smile broke over his anxious face.
"Welcome, my brave boys!" he exclaimed. "I never dreamed that you could ever get to me here, when I saw what a horrible sort of bog I had dropped into. And then, after that savage beast set on me I about gave myself up as lost. She kept walking around me, and growling for a long time before she made a jump. Oh! it was a nightmare of a time, I assure you. I've seen some scrapes before in my ballooning experiences, but never one the equal of this. I'm mighty glad to meet you all. But I'll never understand how you found me. After this I'll believe Boy Scouts can do about anything there is going."
Well, that was praise enough to make every fellow glow with satisfaction, and feel glad to know he wore the khaki that had won the sincere respect of this daring voyager of the skies.
"I hope you're not very badly hurt, Mr. Anderson?" Paul ventured, as he knelt at the side of the other.
"I don't believe it's serious, but all the same I'm pretty much crippled after all I've gone through with on this ill-fated trip. But I'm willing to exert myself to the limit in order to get out of this terrible swamp. You can't make a start any too soon to please me."
Paul drew a long breath. If it had been so difficult for active boys, used to balancing, and doing all sorts of stunts, to cross on those treacherous little hummock paths, how in the wide world were they ever going to get a wounded man out of this place?
He only hoped Mr. Anderson would prove to be the possessor of tenacious will power, as well as a reserve fund of strength; he would certainly have good need of both before he struck solid ground again, once the return journey was begun.
"Well, while my chums are getting their breath after our little jaunt, suppose you let me look at any cuts you've got, Mr. Anderson," he suggested, first of all, in a business-like way that quite charmed the aeronaut.
"What, you don't mean to tell me that you are something of a doctor as well as a leader of scouts?" he remarked, with evident pleasure, as he started to roll up one of the legs of his trousers, so as to expose his bruised ankle.
"I know just a little about medicine, enough to make the other fellows want me to take charge whenever they get hurt. Let me introduce my friends, sir."
And accordingly Paul mentioned his own name, and then in turn that of Andy, Babe, Jotham, Seth and Fritz; also stating that there were two more in the patrol whom they had left stranded about half way out of the swamp, to be picked up again on the return journey.
The pleased aeronaut shook hands heartily with each boy. He was experiencing a delightful revulsion of feeling, for all of a sudden the darkness had given way to broad daylight.
Paul on his part, after a superficial examination, was glad to find there was really nothing serious the matter. He had feared lest he might find a broken leg or even a few ribs fractured; but nothing of the kind seemed to be the case.
It was true that Mr. Anderson had a lot of black and blue places upon his person, and would doubtless feel pretty sore for some days to come, but really Paul could not see why he should not be able to keep company with his rescuers. He seemed to possess an uncommon share of grit; his determined defense against the savage wildcat proved that plainly enough; and on the whole, with what help the scouts might give on occasion, there was a fair chance of his getting out of the swamp inside of an hour or so.
"Now I'm ready to make a start, if you say the word," Paul observed, when perhaps five minutes had passed.
The gentleman had been helped to his feet. Trying the injured leg, he declared he believed he would be able to get along; even though he did make a wry face at the very moment of saying this.
Paul endeavored to explain to him what sort of work lay before them, passing along on such insecure footing.
"Well, I must get in touch with a doctor, and that as speedily as possible," remarked Mr. Anderson, "and I'll get out of this horrible place if I have to crawl every foot of the way on my hands and knees. But I don't imagine it's going to come to such a pass as that, yet awhile. I'm ready to take my first lesson, Paul, if so be you lead the way."
Already the aeronaut seemed to have taken a great fancy for the young scoutmaster; but then that was only what might be expected. Paul had led the relief expedition; and besides, there was something attractive about the boy that always drew people to him.
"Then please follow directly after me; and Seth, you fall in behind Mr. Anderson, will you?" Paul went on to say.
"Huh! hope you don't mean that the way you say it," grunted Seth, with a wide grin, "because, seems to me I've done nothing else but _fall in_ ever since I got on the go. I've investigated nearly every bog along the line, and found 'em all pretty much alike, and not to my likin' one single bit."
But all the same, Seth felt proud of the fact that the scoutmaster had selected him for the post of honor; for he knew that, coming just behind the wounded balloonist, he would be expected to lend a helping hand at such times as Mr. Anderson experienced a slip.
Just the consciousness of responsibility was apt to make Seth much more sure-footed than before. It is always so; and wise teachers watch their chances to make boys feel that they are of some consequence. Besides, experiences goes a great way and Seth, having tested nearly all the muddy stretches along the way, had in a measure learned how to avoid contact with them again.
In another minute the boys and Mr. Anderson were on the move. No doubt, if that savage mother cat and her charges were secretly watching from a leafy covert near by, they must have been heartily gratified because the menacing enemy had seen fit to quit the oasis in the swamp, leaving the remnants of the wrecked balloon to be pawed over by the frolicsome kittens.
"I see that you are true scouts, for you have blazed the way as prettily as I ever saw it done, Mr. Anderson remarked presently.
"That was Paul's doing," spoke up Seth, not in the least jealous.
"Oh! it's the easiest thing to do that anybody ever tried," declared the scoutmaster without even looking back over his shoulder, for he needed his eyes in front constantly.
"So I understand," continued Mr. Anderson, "but then, it isn't everybody who can be smart enough to do the right thing at the right time."
"How do you make out, sir?" asked Paul, wishing to change the conversation, for, strange to say, he never liked to hear himself praised, in which he differed very much from the vast majority of boys.
"Getting along better than I expected, Paul," replied the wounded balloonist.
"It's only a question of time, then, before we pass out of the swamp," the other went on to say. "And as we've got our trail all laid out, and Seth knows the best places to try the mud, I guess we'll make it."
He was already thinking deeply and seriously. A sudden wild hope had flashed into Paul's brain, and if all went well he meant to put it up to the other scouts after a while.
When he looked at his watch he found that it was now just a quarter after ten; and doing some lightning calculating he believed they could be out of the morass, discounting any serious trouble, by another hour.
Then, supposing it took them forty-five minutes to get Mr. Anderson to the nearest farm house, even though they had to make a rude stretcher, and carry him, that brought the time to exactly noon.
Could they really do it, make the eighteen miles that still lay between themselves and the field at Beverly, where they were expected to show up some time that day, if they hoped to win the prize?
Some how the very possibility of being put upon his mettle gave Paul a thrill. He had no doubts concerning his own ability to finish the great hike within the specified space of time, before the sun had vanished behind the western horizon, but it was a grave question whether some of the other scouts could accomplish the task. There was Eben for instance, never a wonder when it came to running; and then fat Noodles would be apt to give out before two-thirds of those eighteen miles had been placed behind them.
But if there was a ghost of a chance Paul was determined to take advantage of it, and he believed that even the laggards would be keen to make the attempt, once he mentioned the subject to them.
And so they kept pushing steadily along, Mr. Anderson showing wonderful pluck, considering the pain he must be suffering all the while from his numerous bruises and cuts.
CHAPTER XV
ON THE HOME-STRETCH
Perhaps they were becoming experts at the game; or it might be that the going back over familiar ground made the job easier, since they could see each slippery place where an accident had happened on the outward trip, and thus grow additionally cautious.
Be that as it might, they made very few missteps on the return journey. Even Mr. Anderson managed to do himself great credit, and Seth did not have to help him up on the narrow ridge more than three or four times; nor were any of his mishaps of a serious nature.
In due time, therefore, they came in sight of the place where Eben and Noodles had been left. Their voices must have warned the pair that they were coming, for they could be seen shading their eyes with their hands to shut out the glare of the sun, as they watched the string of figures slowly picking a path through the sea of mud and water.
Apparently they must have counted an extra form among the muddy group; and just had to give expression to their satisfaction; for Noodles yelped excitedly, while Eben sent out a series of blasts from his bugle, which, upon examination, seemed to bear some faint earmarks to "Lo, the Conquering Hero Comes!"
And when they landed at this half-way stage in their tiresome journey, Mr. Anderson had to be introduced to the remaining members of the Beaver Patrol. He also insisted on shaking hands with them, as he had done all the others, and letting them know his now exalted opinion about the ability of Boy Scouts to do wonders, all of which was sweetest music in the ears of the pair who had been cheated out of their share of the honors in the actual rescue party.
When the march was resumed--and Paul hastened matters as much as he could in reason--Noodles and Eben insisted on asking many questions as to just how they had found the balloonist. They grew quite excited when they heard about the mother wildcat and her savage little kittens; and even indulged in speculations as to what a great time they would have had defending themselves, had a trio like that paid them a visit.
Oh! it was certainly wearisome work, keeping up that strained position of the leg muscles so long. Paul began to fear that they would never be able to accomplish the other task beyond, for he heard Noodles take his regular plunges every little while, and judged that the stout boy must by this time be a sight calculated to make his mother shed tears, if ever she saw him in such a state.
But all things must come to an end, and finally Seth gave a shout, like unto the glad whoop a wrecked mariner might set up at sight of land ahead.
"There's the place where we started in, Paul; yes, and I can see that queer tree at the spot the trapper's path ended, and the fun began!" he exclaimed.
"Bless you, Seth, for those comforting words!" called out Eben from close to the rear of the procession.
"One last little bulge, and then victory for us!" Fritz remarked, and if the gladness expressed in his voice could be taken as an index to the feelings of his heart, then the scout must be a happy fellow just then, when the clouds rolled away, to let the sun shine again.
Of course they made it without any more trouble than Noodles giving a last try at the friendly mud, as though wanting to really find out whether it did have any bottom down below or not. And when they took some sticks, and scraped the worst of the sticky mess off his face, Noodles promised to be a sight indeed. But Paul assured him that they would stop at the first spring they came across, in order to allow him to wash some of the stuff off.
"Ain't we a nobby looking bunch of scouts now, though?" remarked Fritz, as he glanced ruefully down at his muddy uniform; for as a rule the boy had been quite particular with his clothes, having reformed after joining the organization.
"It's too bad you were put to such straits to help me," declared Mr. Anderson, heartily, "and I mean to do everything in my power to keep you from feeling sorry that you gave up all chances of winning that beautiful trophy today. It was a shame, and I regret having been the unfortunate cause of it more than I can tell you."
"Oh! perhaps there might be a _little_ bit of a chance left to us yet, sir," said Paul; at which every one of the other seven scouts pricked up his ears and crowded around.
"What d'ye mean, Paul, by sayin' that?" demanded Seth, his eyes opening wide as they became glued upon those of the scoutmaster, for knowing Paul as he did, he understood that the other must have some clever idea in mind.
"Yes, tell us what the scheme is?" pleaded Jotham, who had been really more disappointed of giving up the hike than any of the others; for he knew his mother, and a certain girl Jotham thought a good deal of, would be on the grandstand at the baseball grounds, waiting to cheer him as he passed by with his fellow scouts.
"It all depends on how long it takes us to get Mr. Anderson to the nearest farmhouse," Paul went on.
"Why, I remember seeing a house near the road just below where we left it to head for the swamp!" spoke up Fritz, eagerly, "and I guess we could carry him there in less'n half an hour if we had to."
At that the aeronaut spoke up.
"I protest. Please don't take me into consideration at all, boys," he hastened to say, "if there's the remotest chance for you to make your race, leave me right here, and start off. I'll find my way to the road, and then a farmhouse, where they'll take me in, and have me looked after. You've done wonders for me as it is, saved my life, I haven't the least doubt; and I'm going to remember it, you can depend, but I wish you'd let me take care of myself from now on."
But Paul shook his head. He understood the feeling that prompted the gentleman to speak in this vein; but he did not think Mr. Anderson was as well able to look out for himself as he would have them believe.
"We never do things by halves, sir," the scoutmaster said, steadily. "If you can hobble along with one of us on either side to help, we'll go that way; but if it's too much of an effort then I'll show you how smart we are about making a litter out of some of these saplings here on which we'll carry you."
Mr. Anderson looked pleased to hear Paul talk in this confident way; but would not listen to such a thing as treating him like a badly wounded man.
"Give me a shoulder to lean on, and I'm sure I can make it in decent time, boys," he declared.
So Paul ranged on his right, with sturdy Seth closing up on the left, and in this fashion they started out.
The road was no great distance away, it will be remembered; and in less than ten minutes they had reached it. Then turning toward distant Beverly, they commenced to cover the ground they had previously gone over.
There was no mistake about the farmhouse, in due time it was reached. Their arrival quite excited the little household, for the men had come in from the fields to their midday meal.
Paul did not want to stop to explain matters; all that could be left to Mr. Anderson. The odor of dinner did make more than one of the scouts raise his eyebrows, and exchange a suggestive look with another; but they realized that every minute was precious to them now, and that they just could not stay long enough to sit and partake, though the farmer cordially invited them.
They did accept a few things to munch at as they walked along; and promised to send word to a certain address which the aeronaut gave them; and in fact Paul was to notify a committee by wire that disaster had overtaken the _Great Republic_, but that the aeronaut was safe, and wished the news to be communicated to his wife at a certain hotel in St. Louis.
Of course all of the boys knew what the new hope that had come to Paul amounted to. He had, with his customary carefulness, shown them in black and white figures just the number of miles that still remained uncovered, about eighteen in all, and then they figured out when the sun would be setting at Beverly.
"Six full hours, and then some," Seth had declared, with a look of contempt; as though he could see no reason why they should not come in on time easily. "Why, of course we c'n do it, and then not half try. Now, you'd think I'd be feeling stiff after that crouching work in the swamp. All a mistake. Never fitter in my life. I could start on a run right now, and cover some miles without an effort."
"Well, don't do it, then," advised Paul, "you know what happens to the racer who makes too big an effort in the start. Get warmed up to your work, and there's a chance to hold out. Better be in prime condition for the gruelling finish. That's the advice one of the greatest all-around athletes gives. So we'll start at a fair pace, and later on, if it becomes necessary we'll be able to run some."
Of course Paul was thinking while he said this of the weak links in the chain, no other than Eben and Noodles. The latter was a wretched runner at best. He could walk fairly well, after a fashion, as his work of the last three days proved; and by judicious management Paul hoped to coax Noodles along, mile after mile.
As they walked they munched the sandwiches provided at the farm house where Mr. Anderson had been left. Thus they killed two birds with one stone, as Paul put it--continued to cover a couple of precious miles while securing strength and comfort from the food.
Whenever a chance occurred Noodles would get to work again scraping some more dirt off his garments. Fritz often declared the county would prosecute him for leaving so many piles of swamp mud along the pike; but after each and every operation the stout boy declared that he felt in far better trim to continue the journey, and that at least pleased all hands.
"I'm beginning to hope, Noodles," remarked Jotham, "that by the time we get to Beverly you'll look half way decent, and not make the girls ashamed to own us as we march through the town to the music of a band, mebbe."
"Put I don't want to be owned py any girl as I knows; so what differences does idt make, dell me?" was all the satisfaction he got from the other; who was evidently more concerned about the cost of a new suit, all to be earned by his own individual exertions, than anything else.
When the first hour had passed, and they found that they had made four miles as near as could be told, some of the scouts were exultant, and loudly declared it was going to be as easy as falling off a log.
"A regular picnic, believe me!" declared Seth.
"Like taking candy from the baby!" Fritz affirmed.
"A walk-over!" was Babe's style of expressing his sentiments.
"Well, it will be that, if we ever get to Beverly green before the sun drops out of sight," laughed Paul.
He was only concerned about Noodles, truth to tell, for he knew that Eben, while no great athlete, had a reserve fund in his stubborn qualities, and would shut his teeth hard together toward the end, plodding along with grim determination. Noodles must be watched, and coddled most carefully, if they hoped to carry him with them over the line in time to claim the glorious trophy.
And that was really why Paul asked him to walk along with him, so that he could from time to time cheer the other up by a few words of praise that would make him believe he was showing great improvement in his stride. It could be seen by the way his eye lighted up that Noodles appreciated this flattery; he had a real jaunty air as he walked on, and even cast an occasional glance of commiseration back at the fellows less highly favored than himself.
Besides, Paul, as a careful manager, wished to husband a certain portion of the other's strength for the last five miles. He knew that must be the sticking time, when probably Noodles would declare he could not go another step, and endeavor to drop down beside the road to rest.
Now Paul knew how far being diplomatic went in an affair of this kind. He remembered hearing a story about two gentlemen on a hunting trip up in Maine, carrying a couple of air rubber mattresses for sleeping purposes, and wondering how they could get the two guides, one a native, and the other a Penobscot Indian, to blow them up every night.
So during the supper one of them got to comparing the chests of the two men, and exciting their rivalry as to which had the larger lungs. When he had them fully primed he said he had means of testing the matter, and brought out the twin air mattresses. Eagerly then the guides lay flat on their stomachs, and at the word started to blow like two-horse power engines. The first test was declared a _tie_; and after that the guides could hardly wait for night to come to try out their lungs against each other.
And with this story in his mind the young scoutmaster determined to play the two weak members of the Beaver Patrol against each other, having in view the benefit that would result from such keen rivalry.
First he talked to Noodles about Eben's awakening talent in the line of pedestrian feats; and soon had the stout boy affirming that he could beat the best efforts of the bugler without more than half trying.
Then Paul found a chance to arouse the ambition of Eben in turn, by hinting at what Noodles had boasted. Thus Paul presently had the two lads jealously watching each other. They did not come to any open rupture, because they were good fellows, and fast friends, but did Eben happen to take a notion to go up a little in the line in order to speak to one of the others, Noodles clung to him like a leech.
Indeed, Paul had to restrain the eager pair more than once, for they were so determined to excel the record, each of the other, that they gave evidences of even wanting to run.
By carefully nursing this spirit of emulation and rivalry the patrol leader believed he was assisting the cause, without doing either of his chums the slightest injury. It was a case of simply bringing out all there was in a couple of lads who, as a rule, were prone to give up too easily.
And so they kept tramping along the turnpike leading toward home, jollying each other, and every now and then, when resting for a bit, trying to remove some of the dreadful evidences of black mud from their usually natty uniforms and leggins.
"P'raps they'll think it the biggest joke going," remarked Seth, "when they get on to it that we've been in the Black Water Swamps, and I guess Freddy's crowd'll laugh themselves sick, like a lot of ninnies, but just wait till we tell what took us there, and show the card Mr. Anderson gave us, with his message for St. Louis on the back. Then it seems to me the laugh will be on them."
They took great consolation in remembering what a gallant piece of work they had been enabled to carry out since leaving Camp Alabama that morning. It would perhaps be carried far and wide in the papers, when Mr. Anderson's story was told, and reflect new glory on the uplifting tendency of the Boy Scout movement. People who did not understand what a wonderful lot of good was coming out of teaching growing lads to be able to take care of themselves under any and all conditions, besides being considerate for others, brave in time of danger, and generous toward even their enemies, would have their eyes opened.
And so it was a happy and merry parcel of scouts that plodded along the road leading to Beverly town that afternoon, as the sun sank lower and lower toward the West.
CHAPTER XVI
"WELL DONE, BEAVER PATROL!"
They had struck along the road leading from Scranton, and reached the well-known Jerusalem pike, of which mention has been frequently made in previous stories of this series.
As they passed the Stebbens and the Swartz farms the scouts gave a cheer that brought a waving of handkerchiefs from the windows of the houses, which were in plain sight of the road.
Far down in the west the glowing sun was sinking; but Paul had calculated well, and he knew that, barring accidents, they could easily make the town before the king of day passed from sight.
Once they had halted for a few minutes' rest, the last they expected to enjoy, and Paul had taken advantage of the opportunity to start a smoky fire; after which he and Seth, the signal sender of the patrol, used the latter's blanket to send a series of dense smoke clouds soaring upward at certain intervals.
One of the boys who expected to join the second patrol in the early fall, Steve Slimmons, would be on the lookout for this signal that would announce the coming of the weary column; and when he caught sight of the smoke waves it would be his duty to announce that, after all, the scouts had not fallen down in their brave attempt to win that glorious trophy; but were coming right along, and hoped to be on hand in due time.
Well, there would be a good many suppers delayed in and around Beverly on that night, some of the scouts told each other.
They could easily picture the green swarming with people, all watching up the road for the patrol to turn the bend, and come in sight, with unbroken ranks, having fulfilled the conditions of the hike to the letter.
There was no longer any need for Paul to excite the slumbering ambitions of either Eben or Noodles. Why, after they passed the crossroads where the ruins of the old blacksmith shop lay, in which they had held their first meetings, but which had been mysteriously burned down, some thought by mischievous and envious town boys--after they had gone by this well-known spot, and sighted the Scroggins farm beyond, every fellow had actually forgotten such a thing as fatigue. They held themselves up straight, and walked with a springy step that would go far toward indicating that a hundred miles in four days was only play for such seasoned veterans.
And now the outlying houses of the home town began to loom up. Why, to several of the boys it really seemed as though they must have been away for weeks. They eagerly pointed out various objects that were familiar in their eyes, just as if they had feared the whole map of the town might have been altered since they marched away on their little four day tramp.
Seth in particular was greatly amused by hearing this kind of talk. He had been away from home so much that the novelty of the sensation of coming back did not appeal to him, as it may have done to Eben and Jotham for instance.
"You fellers," said Seth, chuckling while he spoke, "make me think of the little kid that took a notion to run away from home, and wandered around all day. When night came along he just couldn't stand it any longer, and crept home. His folks knew what was up, and they settled on punishing him by not noticing him, or saying a thing about his being gone. The kid tried to ketch the attention of maw, but she was sewing, and kept right along, just like he'd been around all day. Then he tried dad; but he read his paper, and smoked his pipe, and never paid the least attention. That boy just couldn't understand it. There he'd been away from home a whole year it seemed to him, since morning, and yet nobody seemed to bother the least bit, or make a fuss over him. And when he couldn't get a rise from anybody, he saw the family pussy sittin' by the fire. 'Oh!' he says, says he, 'I see you've still got the same old cat you had when I went away!'"
Even Eben and Noodles laughed at that. They knew the joke was on them; but just at that moment both were feeling too happy to take offense at anything.
"There's the church steeple!" cried Babe.
"Yes, you're so tall you c'n see things long before the rest of us do," declared Jotham, not maliciously, but with the utmost good humor, for he knew that in a very short time now he would see his dear little mother, proudly watching him march past; and perhaps also discover a tiny web of a handkerchief waving from the pretty hand of a certain little girl he knew; and the thought made Jotham very happy.
"Listen! ain't that boys shouting?" demanded Seth.
"Just what it is now," replied Andy. "They've got scouts at the bend of the road, and know we're coming."
"We've done what we set out to do, fellers!" cried Seth, gloatingly.
"And the trophy belongs to us; for right now we're in Beverly town, and there's the blessed old sun still half an hour high," Fritz observed with pardonable pride in his voice.
"And think of us getting that balloon man safe out of the Black Water Swamps; yes, and going to the middle of the patch, something that they say nobody ever did before! That's going to be a big feather in our caps, believe me," Seth went on to say, as he took a glance down at his stained khaki trousers and leggins.
Paul gave his little command one last look over, for they were now at the bend, and in another minute would come under the eyes of the dense crowd which, from all the signs that came to his ears, he felt sure had gathered to welcome the marching patrol home again after their long hike.
Then the curve in the road was reached; a dozen more steps and they turned it, to see the green fairly black with people, who waved their hats and handkerchiefs, and shouted, until it seemed to the proud scouts that the very foundations of the heavens must tremble under the roaring sound.
Chief Henshall was there, together with several of his men, keeping an avenue open along which the khaki-clad boys were to march, to a spot in front of the grand stand, where the generous donor of the trophy, together with a committee of prominent citizens of Beverly, waited to receive them.
It was perhaps the proudest moment in the lives of those eight boys when Paul, replying to the little speech which accompanied the passing of the silver cup, thanked Mr. Sargeant and the committee for the great interest taken in the formation of Beverly Troop; and in a few words explained just why he and his comrades came so near being unable to fulfill the obligations governing the hike.
When Mr. Sargeant read aloud the message which the wrecked balloonist was wiring to St. Louis, in which he declared that he owed his very life to the daring of the Boy Scouts, who had penetrated to the very center of the Black Water Swamps in order to rescue him, such a din of cheering as broke out had never been heard in Beverly since that never-to-be-forgotten day when the baseball nine came up from behind in the ninth inning, and clinched the victory that gave them the high school championship of the county for that year.
But the boys now began to realize that they were, as Seth expressed it, "some tired," and they only too willingly allowed their folks to carry them off home, to get washed up, and partake of a good meal. But no matter what each scout may have secretly thought when he sat down to a white tablecloth, with silver, and china, and polished glass around him, he stoutly avowed that nothing could equal the delight of a camp-fire, tin cups and platters, and simple camp fare, flanked by an appetite that was keener than anything ever known at home.
This work of four days was likely to long remain the banner achievement of the Beaver Patrol lads; but the vacation period still held out a few weeks further enjoyment, and it may be readily understood that such wide-awake fellows would be sure to hatch up more or less excitement before the call came to go back to school duties.
That this proved to be the case can be understood from the fact that another volume follows this story, bearing the significant title of "The Boy Scouts' Woodcraft Lesson; or, Proving Their Mettle in the Field." And the young reader who has become interested in the various doings of the scouts belonging to the Beaver Patrol can find in the pages of that book further accounts of what Acting Scoutmaster Paul Prentice and his seven valorous chums started out to accomplish, in order to prove that the education of a Boy Scout brings out the best there is in him, under any and all conditions.
The End
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Transcriber's Notes:
1. Punctuation has been normalized to contemporary standards.
2. corrections to typographic errors in original:
Table of Contents listed Chapter VIII on page 17, corrected to 71.
p. 11 "samee" to "same" ("But all the same, I want")
p. 26 "sup-up" to "sun-up" ("since sun-up")
p. 29 "fresk" to "fresh" ("hankering after fresh milk")
p. 41 "superflous" to "superfluous" ("superfluous burdens")
p. 48 "promises" to "promised" ("promised to be a most fortunate thing")
p. 73 "mortagge" to "mortgage" ("meant to pay off my mortgage")
p. 79 "befel" to "befell" ("seldom if ever befell ordinary lads")
p. 81 "alway" to "always" ("as the papers always make out")
p. 85 "trememduous" to "tremendous" ("tremendous cheer")
p. 101 "or" to "of" ("habit of relying")
p. 112 "susprised" to "surprised" ("not very much surprised")
p. 143 "commisseration" to "commiseration" ("glance of commiseration")
p. 146 "Jersualem" to "Jerusalem" ("well-known Jerusalem pike")
p. 149 "price" to "pride" ("with pardonable pride in his voice")
First advertising page ("Boys Copyrighted Books"): "Tayne" to "Jayne" ("Lieut. R. H. Jayne.")
Fourth advertising page ("Donohue's Plays"): "eveything" to "everything" ("everything that is fresh")

= = = PG31487 = = =
BOY SCOUTS ON THE GREAT DIVIDE; OR, THE ENDING OF THE TRAIL
Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
Boy Scouts on the Great Divide;
or, The Ending of the Trail
By Archibald Lee Fletcher
Chicago
M. A. DONOHUE & COMPANY
Copyright 1913
MADE IN U.S.A.
CONTENTS
I--A BOY SCOUT
II--THE RUNAWAY
III--THE CASE IS STATED
IV--A CHASE IN THE NIGHT
V--A DETECTIVE AND A ROBBER
VI--THE CALL OF THE BEAVER
VII--ARRESTED AS SPIES
VIII--A MIDNIGHT BEAR HUNT
IX--LYNCHING IS THREATENED
X--ONE DANGER TO ANOTHER
XI--A WYOMING HOLD-UP
XII--AN INTERRUPTED WIG-WAG
XIII--TOMMY GOES AFTER BEAR STEAK
XIV--A PAIR OF PRISONERS
XV--AN UNDERGROUND CHANNEL
XVI--CULLEN LOSES HIS STAR
XVII--A MEETING UNDER GROUND
XVIII--THE FINDING OF WAGNER
XIX--SHERIFF PETE'S WINK
XX--DETECTIVES IN TROUBLE
XXI--CONCLUSION
Boy Scouts on the Great Divide;
or, The Ending of the Trail
CHAPTER I
A BOY SCOUT CAMP
On a sunny September afternoon two shelter tents stood in a mountain valley, on the south bank of a creek which, miles and miles below, becomes the Sweetwater river.
Above the flap of each tent lifted a yellow pennant, in the center of which a blue beaver stood in an alert and listening attitude, his flat tail outstretched.
A campfire blazed in front of the two tents, and some distance away four bronchos fed noisily on the sweet grass of the valley. Tinned provisions and cooking utensils were scattered here and there in front of the blaze, and four boys wearing the khaki uniform of the Boy Scouts of America were busily engaged in preparing supper.
Those who have read the previous volumes of this series will require no introduction to Will Smith, George Benton, Charley (Sandy) Green, or Tommy Gregory. As will be remembered, they were all members of the Beaver Patrol, Chicago. Will Smith had recently been advanced to the important position of Scoutmaster, and George Benton had been elected to the position left vacant by the advancement of his chum, that of Patrol Leader. Besides carrying the badges of their offices and their patrol, the boys all wore medals showing that they had qualified in the Stalker, Ambulance, Seaman and Pioneer grades.
After rather striking adventures on Lake Superior and in the Florida Everglades the boys had been persuaded by Mr. Horton, a well-known criminal lawyer of Chicago, to undertake a mission in the interest of a client in whom he had become greatly interested. The lads had already arranged a vacation trip to the Great Divide, and it necessitated only a slight change in their program in order to make the investigation desired by the attorney, who had shown himself their friend on more than one occasion. In fact, the Superior trip had been taken at his expense.
Mr. Horton had presented the request which had changed the lads' vacation plans on the night before they left Chicago, and so no details whatever of the case had been given them. They had been asked to proceed to the city of Green River, in the state of Wyoming, and there secure burros, provisions and tents and travel to the valley lying south and west of Altantic peak.
The noted attorney had informed them on the morning of their departure that, in case further instructions did not reach them by wire before they came to Green River, a messenger would follow them into the mountains with full details, and also a history of the case in which they were to be employed. On this sunny afternoon they were awaiting the arrival of the messenger, no information having been received by telegraph.
The tents had been set up on the previous evening, and the boys did not think it possible that the messenger could be more than twenty-four hours behind them. While they waited for the supper to cook they watched the country off to the south anxiously.
"Last call for supper!" cried Sandy, spreading a great white cloth on the fragrant grass of the valley. "We can eat out-doors in this country without any danger of people butting in to see what we've got for supper."
"You say it well!" said Will, "but you can't prove it! For instance," he added, pointing to the south, "there's some one coming right now to see what we've got for supper!"
The figure pointed out was that of a tall and slender man who was climbing the slope to the southeast. He carried a long rifle over his shoulder and a cartridge belt was conspicuously displayed about his waist.
While the boys arranged their food on the table cloth, the man approached warily. When he came into the valley in which the camp was situated he turned away to the right as if about to circle the tents and the fire. Tommy stood up with a great slice of bread in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other and waved both at the stranger.
"Come on in!" he shouted. "The eating's fine!"
At this invitation the stranger came forward to the fire and stood for a moment without speaking, gazing at the boys with eyes strained to their utmost in an effort to make them look piercing.
"Thank you very much for the invitation!" replied the stranger, "I've had a long walk today and I'm both hungry and tired! My name is Katz--Joseph J. Katz, and I'm in business in a small way in Denver."
"I bought a burro at Green River," Katz went on, "but lost him twenty miles to the south. He got his foot in a prairie dog's hole or something of that kind and broke his leg so I had to shoot him."
"And you've been walking ever since?"
"Indeed I have!" was the reply. "And I'm afraid I'll have to ask you to extend your hospitality until morning. I have a friend who will be along sometime tomorrow with a couple of light tents and a couple of burro loads of provisions."
"Then you're going to camp in the mountains, I take it?"
"Yes," was the reply. "We're going farther in and take a rest and look for a good sheep valley while we do so."
"You're welcome to remain here until your friend comes in!" answered Will. "We have plenty of provisions."
"Then you are thinking of remaining in the mountains for some time?" asked the stranger. "In that case we may meet often."
"I hope so," replied Will. "We are boys from Detroit having a little vacation from the hills and it will be all the pleasanter if we have congenial company. But sit down and eat. You must be hungry."
Kata fell to with an appetite and Tommy saw that his plate was replenished as soon as it was emptied. While he was eating Sandy and Will arose from the cloth, excused themselves and passed into one of the tents, where Sandy stood regarding his companion with accusing eyes.
"Say," the boy asked, "are you getting to be such a liar that you just can't tell the truth?"
"What's the matter now?" demanded Will.
"Why did you tell that fellow we were from Detroit?"
"Because he lied to me!" was the rather indignant reply.
Sandy grinned and looked the question he did not ask.
"He told me he was from Denver," Will went on, "and Tommy says he's a Chicago detective. The kid says he saw a detective badge under the fellow's lapel. And I guess Tommy knows a detective badge," the boy continued with a wink. "I should think he would after the fun he's had with Chicago detectives, and the times he's been chased by them."
"You don't suppose he's come on here to pinch one of us, do you?" asked Sandy. "If he has, we'll pitch him into the stream that takes the longest road to Cape Horn."
"Of course not!" answered Will. "For all I know he may be the messenger sent by Mr. Horton."
"Then why should he lie about his home city?" asked Sandy.
"I don't know," answered Will. "He may be the messenger and he may not be. If he is a messenger, he's a fool, because he ought to know without further investigation that we're the boys he set out to find. If he isn't a messenger, he's a charter member of the Ananias club or Tommy's very much mistaken."
"I don't believe he's a messenger," Sandy answered and the two went out to the fire together.
"I have heard a great many stories of robbery and murder in this country," the boys heard Katz saying to Tommy, "but up to this time I have seen no unlawful acts committed."
"Oh, but they have a stage hold-up or some scrape of that kind every week or two!" replied Tommy with a wink at Will. "We remained over at Green River a couple of days and heard a good many stories about highway robbery. There is said to be gold in these mountains," the boy continued, "and there is also said to be a band of brigands who lie in wait for treasure hunters."
Katz appeared deeply interested in what the boy was saying. In fact he seemed rather excited, too, and the boys noticed that he reached out one hand to stroke the gun, which lay near his side, as he listened.
Sandy nudged George in the side and whispered:
"I'll bet Tommy's got him scared half to death!"
"I guess that's what the kid's telling him these stories for!" George ventured. "He's always up to tricks like that."
While the boys worked about the camp preparing beds for the night and clearing away the remains of the supper Tommy remained close to the side of the trench, asking of his experiences on the way in and telling many exciting stories of highwaymen, the most of which had origin in his own brain.
"Tommy'll have that fellow so scared that he can't sleep!" Sandy whispered to George.
"Then the fellow shouldn't get scared so easy!"
"I consider it very fortunate for you boys," they heard Katz saying after a time, "that I came along just as I did. If this country is as thoroughly infested with robbers and murderers as you seem to think it is, I may be of service to you before morning."
"Sure!" agreed Tommy. "We may have a battle with outlaws almost any time now! We're glad you're here to protect us!"
"Of course, one man can't fight a whole regiment," Katz went on rather boastfully, "but I'll do what I can to protect you in case the camp is attacked."
"I know you will!" answered Tommy with a sly wink at Sandy. "I knew you were a brave man as soon as I saw you!"
During the evening the boys taking the lead made by Tommy told numerous stories of train-robberies and murders in the mountains as they sat around the campfire. Katz listened attentively to them all and more than once the lads saw him involuntarily reach a hand back to his pistol pocket. On such occasions they nudged each other joyfully.
"I wish something would happen tonight," Tommy whispered to Will as they prepared for bed. "I'd just like to see how this Katz would act under fire. I've a good mind to make something happen!"
"You'd better cut that out!" replied Will. "The messenger we are waiting for may be here at any time now and we may have to move camp at any time. So we want to rest while we can."
"All right!" Tommy answered reluctantly. "I'm just as anxious to get a good night's sleep as you are."
"Who's going to stay awake?" asked Sandy stepping up to where the boys were talking.
"I don't think it's necessary for anyone to stay awake," cried Will.
"I don't believe we ought to all sleep at once!" Sandy observed. "Not with this stranger in the camp, anyway," he added.
"Aw, the stranger's all right!" Tommy exclaimed. "He's a bum Chicago detective out after some fugitive from justice and he thinks its foxy to lie about his occupation and his residence. Don't you think I know the earmarks of a Chicago detective?" he added.
"You ought to, considering the number of times you've been mixed up with them," laughed Sandy. "You certainly ought to know all about Chicago detectives."
"What makes you go certain this man is a Chicago detective?" asked Will. "I haven't seen anything that looks like Chicago about him!"
"Why," answered Tommy, "he's mentioned Harrison street and Desplaines street and Chicago avenue half a dozen times when talking about the police department of Denver! And he's been telling about police boats on the lake and on the North and South branches and giving himself away generally. Of course, he doesn't know we're from Chicago and so he doesn't think it necessary to be careful in his speech."
"All right, time will tell!" exclaimed Sandy.
It was arranged that Will, Tommy and George were to sleep together in one of the tents until midnight while Tommy stood watch, and from that time on, the other boys were to watch two hours apiece. Katz was to have the second tent all to himself.
For sometime after the lads and Katz went to their tents, Tommy sat by the fire listening to coyotes and grey wolves howling off in the mountains. Occasionally a coyote came within a few paces of the fire and set up a howl which must have been heard in the dreams of the sleepers.
Along near midnight the boy heard, very indistinctly, shouts to the west of the ridge which lay to the south of the valley. Still more faintly, return shouts were heard. The men, whoever they were, seemed to be advancing toward the camp. While the boy listened a volley of shots came from the west, followed by hoarse shouts and imprecations.
It now became plain that two horsemen were speeding toward the valley and that the shots which were being fired were directed at them. There was no moon as yet although there would be one later on, and little could be seen of the horsemen who were doubtless seeking refuge in the canons farther to the north, but the heavy breathing of the horses and the creaking of the saddles could be distinctly heard.
"I just went to the tent to wake Katz!" Tommy chuckled, "and saw him sneaking away making flat-footed for the hills!"
CHAPTER II
THE RUNAWAY
The horses came on at a swift gallop, to an accompaniment of rifle shots and the jingling of spurs. Directly they were in the circle of light about the fire, their frightened eyes showing red as they ran. The faces of the riders glared viciously down at the boys, but the weapons swinging threateningly from their hands were not discharged as they dashed through the lighted space and were gone.
"Now what do you know about that?" demanded Tommy, as the horses disappeared in the darkness and the gradually receding hoof-beats showed that they were still keeping their course to the north.
"Looks to me like some one was being chased," observed Sandy.
"It would seem that way to the unprejudiced mind!" added George.
Directly the sound of heavy boots scrambling over broken rocks, accompanied by private and personal opinions of that part of Wyoming, of rocky surfaces, and of midnight expeditions, came to the ears of the listening boys. As the sounds drew nearer they grouped closer together.
"Here comes the boys who did the shooting!" exclaimed Tommy.
"I hope they won't mistake us for the men they're after!" George suggested. "They look like rather tough citizens," he added, as the bearded faces and roughly-clad figures of half a dozen men swept into the firelight.
The men were all heavily armed, and it was clear that they were angry from the top of their heads to the soles of their feet. Three presented guns at the breasts of the boys while the other three stepped closer and began asking questions.
"Sure, we saw the ginks go by!" Tommy answered in reply to the first question. "I reckon they won't have anything to ride in about an hour if they keep up that gait."
"Did they stop or say anything to you as they passed?" was asked.
"I should say not!" replied Tommy. "They went by like Mexicans going to a bull-fight! They showed their guns, but they didn't say a word or do any shooting!"
"What does it mean?" asked Will, approaching the man who appeared to be the leader of the party.
"It means," was the reply, "that those two fellows are wanted down in Sweetwater county for holding up a train on the Union Pacific. A party of officers had them safe at Green River a couple of days ago, but they broke loose in some way and came north."
"It's a wonder they headed straight for our campfire!" Will suggested.
"That's what puzzles me!" the other said. "Until I saw you were only boys, probably out on a vacation, I thought the robbers might be associates of yours."
"I hope they won't think so, too," Will answered. "We expect to stay here two or three weeks, and we don't want to get into any mixup."
"They probably won't trouble you any," the officer remarked, "as they're undoubtedly headed for the Bad Lands in Big Horn county. If they get into that country we may as well give up the search."
"Well," Will suggested, "they won't have any horses to ride before morning, and you may be able to overtake them after they slow down."
"Oh, we're going to keep on in pursuit!" cried the officer, "But we have little hope of overtaking them. They're probably five miles in the lead right now. They've been riding while we've been walking."
"Why walking?" asked the boy.
"Because they shot our horses," gritted the officer.
After partaking of a midnight supper, including several cups of hot coffee apiece, the man-hunters continued on their way, looking longingly in the direction of the burros as they passed out of the light of the fire.
"Now that's what I call rotten!" Tommy exclaimed as the voices of the men died away in the darkness. "We've just made camp in a place that looks good to me, and here comes a band of train robbers and a delegation of lynchers ready to make us all kinds of trouble."
"I don't see why they should make us trouble," Sandy objected.
"Well, they will just the same," Will broke in. "They'll hang around the hills to the north, and officers will be chasing in after them, and, between them they'll give us a merry little time! If the messenger doesn't come tomorrow, we'll break camp and get into some other locality."
"I should say so!" exclaimed Tommy. "We went to Lake Superior and got into a nest of diamond smugglers, and we went to the Florida Everglades and got into a bunch of swamp outlaws and wreckers, and I've been counting on a nice quiet vacation this trip."
"We surely do have bad luck on our outing trips!" laughed Sandy. "But I rather enjoy the excitement after all!" he added, with a grin.
"Well, you wait until you get a band of train robbers shooting from one side, and a band of cowboys shooting from the other side, and you won't think it's so funny!" exclaimed George.
While the boys talked they heard a rustling in the long grass to the north and east, and directly a figure, crouching low and apparently walking with great caution, appeared in view.
"That's one now!" whispered Tommy.
"That's right!" returned Sandy. "That's one coward!"
"Oh, I see," Tommy whispered. "That's Katz!"
The stranger now approached the fire, swinging his rifle jauntily in his hand and throwing his shoulders back until his body swung forward with a decided strut. He looked from one boy to the other as he came closer, apparently seeking to learn from their expressions exactly what was in their minds. The boys' faces remained perfectly grave.
"It's no use!" Katz said in a moment, putting the butt of his gun down to the ground and leaning on the barrel. "It's no use whatever!"
The boys eyed the speaker suspiciously, but said nothing.
"I followed on as fast as I could!" Katz continued. "But they were on horseback, and I was on foot, so what could I do? Besides, it was too dark that I couldn't see to shoot," he went on.
"Oh, you went out after the robbers, did you?" asked Will, not caring to call the fellow's attention to the fact that he ran away to the north before the riders made their appearance.
"Why, yes!" was the reply. "What else could I do?"
The boys suspected that Katz had returned to the vicinity of the camp in time to hear the officer explain exactly what was going on. They were satisfied that he had not pursued the horsemen at all after they had passed him, but decided not to enter into any argument with him.
"Well," Will said in a moment. "If you'll all go to bed now, I'll sit up until morning. I don't suppose you boys care to be wakened if we have any more midnight visitors?" he asked tentatively.
"You needn't wake me up for any running race!" Tommy commented.
"If it's all the same to you," Katz suggested, "I prefer to sleep the remainder of the night. Of course," he went on, "if you need me for your defence, you need have no compunctions in waking me."
The boys laughed at the idea of calling upon the fellow to assist in defending the camp should necessity arise, and the object of their mirth glared at them suspiciously as he turned away to his tent.
In half an hour the camp was quiet again, with Will sitting in front of the fire reading. The coyotes and wolves, which had been frightened away by the shooting and the clatter of hoofs, now came forward again, and Will was thinking seriously of taking a shot at a great gray beast when a soft call came from the darkness.
"Hello!" the voice said. "Hello!"
"Come up and show yourself!" returned Will.
"Will you give me something to eat if I come up?"
"Sure I will," replied the boy with a grin. "Meals at all hours, you know! We usually run a hotel where we stop."
"Well you've got a customer right now!" came the voice from the darkness, and the next moment the figure of a lad of about fourteen made its appearance in the glow of the fire.
Will stood regarding the boy with open-eyed amazement for a moment and then swung his hand forward in the full salute of a Boy Scout.
"That's all right!" the strange boy cried. "I'm glad to see that you're a Boy Scout. I mean to be one some day, but I'm only a tenderfoot now! I haven't had any chance for advancement yet."
"What Patrol?" asked Will.
"Beaver, Chicago!" was the reply.
"That's my patrol!" exclaimed Will in amazement.
"You're the scoutmaster," the boy said, "I've seen you in Chicago."
"Strange I don't remember you!" replied Will.
"Oh, I'm only a tenderfoot," was the answer, "and of course, you don't know all the new boys!"
"What are you doing here?" asked Will.
"I'm running away!" was the reply. "You see," the boy went on, "I got tired of living in Chicago, and sleeping in alleys in summer and warm hallways in winter, so I just made up my mind I'd make a break for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."
"But how did you come to walk up into this country?"
"I started out to get a job herding sheep," was the answer, "and I kept travelling, and travelling, without getting any job, and so here I am, hungry, and ready to go back to Chicago on the slightest provocation!"
"What's your name?"
"Chester Winslow."
"Well, Chester," Will laughed, "it won't take me long to get you something to eat, and then you'd better go to bed. You'll have to double up with another stranger who came along earlier in the evening, but I guess you can sleep two in a bed, especially as the bed is made up on the ground and you can't fall out."
The boy ate a very hearty supper, and five minutes later Will heard him snoring. When daylight came and the sleepers arose, Katz stumbled out of his tent with angry exclamations on his lips.
"What's doing here?" he shouted. "Have I come into the home of the Forty Thieves? When I went to bed last night I had a police badge, and a rifle, and a revolver, and quite a lot of money! Now I haven't got a thing except the clothes I've got on! What kind of a game do you call this? If it's a joke, it's a mighty poor one!"
Will went to the tent Katz had occupied and looked inside. There was no one there, and he hastened back to the angry man.
"Where's the strange boy who slept with you last night?" he asked.
"Strange boy?" repeated Katz scornfully. "You can't work that game on me! You boys have taken my property, and you'd better be giving it up! If you don't there'll be trouble!"
"We're not afraid of any trouble from you!" Tommy said, with an angry snort. "If you go to accusing us of stealing your stuff, you'll get your crust caved in!"
Then the boy turned to Will with an interrogation point in both eyes. Will saw the question and answered it.
"Shortly after midnight," he said, "a boy who gave the name of Chester Winslow, his age as fourteen, his rank as Tenderfoot, came here and told a hard luck story about tramping from Chicago. I gave him something to eat and put him to bed with Mr. Katz."
"Then the fellow is a little thief! That's all I've got to say about it!" exclaimed Katz, not quite so aggressive, now that he saw that the boys were inclined to resent insults, and remembering that he had no revolver with which to enforce his demands!
Shortly after breakfast the figures of four burros, heavily laden, and two men appeared at the south, heading directly for the camp.
"There's my associate bringing in the burros and the provisions!" Katz shouted.
"And there's our messenger!" whispered Tommy to Will.
CHAPTER III
THE CASE IS STATED
"It may be that your messenger has come in with my associate," Katz blustered, as the little caravan came nearer to the camp, "but if I'm not very much mistaken, both men are here to assist me!"
"You must need a lot of assistance!" Tommy said, with a wrinkling of his freckled nose. "You look the part, too!"
"Now see here, young man," exclaimed Katz, angrily. "I don't want any lip from you boys. I've been robbed in this camp, and as soon as my men come up I'm going to know whether my property is here or not!"
"If you try any funny business with us," Sandy cut in, "you'll get your block knocked off!"
"We'll see about that when my men come up!" retorted Katz, defiantly. "I'm not going to submit to being held up by four boys who ought to be spanked and put to bed instead of being permitted to roam about the mountains robbing unwary travellers."
Tommy was about to make an angry reply, but Will motioned for him to remain silent. No more was said until the two men came up with their heavily-loaded burros. Katz was first to address the newcomers.
"Well, Cullen," he said, extending a hand to a short, heavily-built man with a dissipated-looking face, "I'm glad you came in on time. I am also glad that you brought a man in with you, and plenty of provisions," he added with a look of challenge at the boys.
"Why," replied Cullen, "I don't know anything about this fellow with me. He came out of Green River with his two burros just ahead of me, and so we decided to travel together. I should judge from what he said that he's looking for the camp we have just blundered into."
Katz stepped back as if annoyed at the statement, and finally drew Cullen away to one side, where they engaged in a whispered conversation.
In the meantime, the messenger advanced toward Will and extended a sealed envelope. He was a well-built young fellow with a clean-shaven face which gave every indication of intelligence and determination.
"I guess you're the boys I'm looking for," he said, with a smile, "I'm John Johnson, of Chicago, special messenger at this time for Mr. Horton."
"We're glad to see you," Will answered, shaking the young man's hand heartily. "We have been waiting for instructions, and, besides," he continued, "this cheap skate that you found here is trying to make us trouble over something which took place in the camp last night."
"You think he's a cheap skate, do you?" Johnson asked, with a significant smile. "Well, I don't think anything about it. I know it. That's Joe Katz, one of the rankest plain-clothes policemen on the Chicago force! The fellow who came in with me is Ed. Cullen, another imitation detective. Now tell me what took place last night."
Will related the story of the arrival of the boy and of the claim made by Katz in the morning. He explained how the detective had threatened them all when the loss of his property was discovered. Also, how he had renewed his threats when he believed that he would have the backing of both newcomers. Johnson smiled at the recital.
"Now, about this boy," he said, without referring to the two detectives or the threats. "I wish you would describe him to me as accurately as possible. Tell me exactly how he looked and how he talked."
Will gave as complete a description of the boy as possible, and also repeated the account the lad had given of himself. Johnson threw back his head and laughed until the echoes came back from the mountains.
"Well, boys," he said, "you seem to have lighted in a hornet's nest the first jump out of the box. And so the kid stole the detective's badge and weapons and money, did he?" he went on, with another roar of laughter. "That's about the best thing I've heard yet!"
"I don't see anything funny about it!" replied Will.
"You will directly," replied Johnson. "Read your instructions, and then I'll tell you all about this boy, and all about these two imitation detectives. Then you'll see how funny this incident is."
Will opened the sealed envelope and held up a sheet of paper which was entirely blank, except for eight words and a signature written in the middle of the page. The words were:
"Introducing Mr. John Johnson. He'll tell the story."
The signature was that of the famous criminal lawyer who had induced the boys to undertake the mission to the Great Divide.
"It won't take very long for me to read the instructions," Will laughed, as the other boys gathered around him. "It seems to be up to you to tell us what we want to know!"
"Yes, that's the idea!" replied Johnson. "Mr. Horton explained to me that he didn't care to put what he had to say to you into writing. But perhaps we'd better get rid of these imitation fly-cops," he added, nodding his head toward the two Chicago detectives. "We don't want them hanging around the camp while we are making our plans."
Katz and Cullen saw that they were being regarded with suspicion and at once came forward to where the boys stood.
"I've been talking the matter of the robbery over with Cullen," Katz said, with a smile intended to be conciliating, "and he says that he's heard of this boy before, and that he's a noted thief. And so," the detective continued, "I'm very glad to be able to apologize to you for anything I might have said at a time when I was excited over my loss. I am satisfied now that you boys are friendly to me, and I sincerely hope that we'll often meet while we are in the hills."
Tommy was about to make some angry reply, as the insincerity of the man was plainly discernible, but Will gave him a nudge in the back which caused him to change his mind.
"And now," Cullen began, "that everything is satisfactorily explained, perhaps we'd better be on our way!"
"That's a fact!" exclaimed Katz. "I'm very much obliged to the boys for their friendly shelter and their well-cooked meals, and I hope they'll all come and partake of our hospitality as soon as we make permanent camp. We'll take steps to let you know where we are," he added, as the two turned toward their burros and led off to the north.
Tommy could not give over the thought of landing an irritating observation as the men walked away by the side of their beasts.
"Remember," he cried, "that the two train robbers and the cowboy viligance committee went, in that direction last night! You fellows would better watch out, or you'll get mixed up with hold-up men!"
Katz turned an angry face toward the boy, muttered something to his companion, and went on without speaking.
"Those fellows won't dare to sleep a single night after that!" laughed Johnson. "They're scared right now!"
"I don't know anything about Cullen," Tommy answered with a grin, "but I know that the man Katz is a false alarm. You should have seen him take to his heels last night, when the train robbers rushed through the camp. I'd like to know what he's in here for, anyway!"
"That's the very thing I'm here to explain!" replied Johnson. "The story," he continued, "begins with the death of Thomas T. Fremont, a Chicago banker, some weeks ago."
"I remember the case," Will interrupted. "The police declare that the man was murdered, while his relatives insist that he might have committed suicide."
"That's exactly the point," Johnson went on. "The police are working on the theory that Fremont was murdered at his private room at the bank one hot night in July. The relatives declare that there was no reason whatever for him to have committed suicide, yet they insist that he must have done so. Now, understand me," Johnson continued, "the relatives are all interested in the defense of a disinherited son of the banker who is charged with the crime of murder. And so, you see, when the police ask them to point to some one fact substantiating the suicide theory they are unable to do so.
"The result of this peculiar situation is that the police insist that the relatives are advancing the suicide theory solely for the purpose of securing the acquittal of the son. To the average citizen, it would seem that the police are right. The son was always a thorn in the flesh of his father. He has squandered thousands of dollars in riotous living, and brought no end of disgrace on the family whose name he bears. And still the relatives insist that he is innocent, and are willing to spend a million in order to prevent his dying the death of a murderer. Mr. Horton represents the relatives."
"I begin to see daylight!" Will exclaimed. "I guess this case isn't such a little baby affair as we thought it might be!"
"Indeed it is no baby case!" exclaimed Johnson. "The family of the dead banker have a well-defined theory concerning the death of the old man which might help their case with the police if they would only present it to the chief. This, however, they refuse to do, declaring that the police would only take advantage of the confidence and use the information received to the prejudice of the prisoner."
"I don't blame them for doubting the honesty of the police!" declared Tommy. "The detectives are certainly a bum lot!"
"This theory," continued Mr. Johnson, "insists that there was a second person in the private office of the banker that hot July night. It is claimed that this person went to the office to secure financial help from the banker. It is said, too, that he possesses at this time positive proof, in the form of written documents, showing that Fremont committed suicide. The family believes this proof to be perfect."
"Then why don't they find this fellow and bring him forward?" asked Will.
"That is just what they are trying to do," replied Johnson. "That is just what you boys are expected to do!" he added with a smile. "You are expected to bring this witness forward, and so establish the innocence of the son. That's what you're here for."
"That's nice!" exclaimed Tommy. "That's an easy little undertaking for four school boys! When other means fail, hire Boy Scouts!"
"That's right!" replied Johnson.
"And we won't see him if those two imitation detectives get to him first!" the boy went on.
"And that's right too," Johnson answered. "For my part, I can't understand how the Chicago police department got wise to the whereabouts of Wagner at this time. When it was arranged to send you boys out here in quest of him, it was understood that the police had no clue whatever as to his whereabouts. In fact, we all believed that the officers had abandoned the search for the escaped convict."
"Well, they're here all right!" Sandy cut in. "And look here," he went on, "we've got something worse than imitation detectives in our midst! We've got a couple of train robbers, and a band of cowboy vigilantes!"
"Exactly!" Johnson agreed. "And you've got something equally dangerous for the purposes of our cause. You've got that fourteen-year-old Chester Winslow, whose name isn't Winslow at all, but Chester Wagner, son of the escaped convict!"
"Jerusalem!" exclaimed Tommy. "That boy didn't do a thing to Will, did he?" he added with a roar of laughter. "He told him a story about coming in on blind baggage, and sized up the camp, and stole the badge and the weapons and money of the detective sent in here to capture his father. Just think of the kid coming in here and stealing the detective's badge! He'd have taken his necktie if he'd 'a' thought of it!"
"I thought you'd see something humorous in the occurrence as soon as you found out about the boy!" laughed Johnson.
"The little rascal!" shouted Sandy. "The nerve of him! To come in here and steal the badge of the detective sent out to catch his father! Say," he went on, "I hope we'll run across that boy and make friends with him. I rather like his grit!"
"You won't be apt to find him as long as he thinks it necessary to keep his father in hiding!" Johnson suggested.
"He's an awful little liar!" exclaimed Will.
"I guess you'd lie, too," laughed Tommy, "if you had the same motive for lying that he had. He's standing by his father like a brick! And I won't lay it up against him if he tells lies enough to fill a book! He drew one friend in me when he stole that policeman's badge."
"These detectives," Will asked in a moment, "are here to take Wagner back to the penitentiary if they can find him, I suppose?"
"That's the idea! Unless some one of the relatives has leaked, the police do not understand that Wagner is a factor in the Fremont case. They are here to take him back to the penitentiary if they can find him and that's all they know about it."
"Well," Tommy exclaimed, "let them get him and take him back to the penitentiary! As soon as he gets run in for the remainder of his sentence he'll tell about being in the banker's private office that hot July night, and that will secure the release of the boy who is charged with the murder. It seems to me that the police are helping along this case."
"Not so you could notice it!" replied Johnson. "The fact is," he went on, "Wagner is entirely innocent of the crime for which he was convicted. He has had what the officers call a vindictive grouch on ever since the day he was sent to prison. In other words, he is at war with every person in the world except his son, the boy who told you such pretty fairy stories last night. If he is ever retaken and sent back to the penitentiary, he will never open his lips, not even if the accused son dies on the scaffold."
"And that's another beautiful little complication!" exclaimed Sandy.
"The friends of the accused man," continued Johnson, "must find Wagner and contract to establish his innocence. If the police get him first, we lose our case. I say this positively because there is no doubt that he will kill an officer or two before he is taken. Now you boys see exactly what you have undertaken to do."
"It's interesting, anyhow!" Tommy declared.
"Reads like a novel!" cried Sandy.
"Think of that little rat coming here and stealing the detective's badge!" laughed George. "It's a sure thing he'll lead those amateur officers a merry dance while they are in the hills! If I could just get hold of him, I wouldn't mind helping him along now and then!"
"Well, get hold of him then," advised Johnson.
"But how?" asked Will. "Why, from this time on, you might as well try to catch a flea in a load of hay as to get your hands on that boy! He can find you, but you can't find him!"
"But he was hungry last night!" Tommy explained. "And he may become hungry again!"
CHAPTER IV
A CHASE IN THE NIGHT
Shortly after dinner Johnson decided to make a start on his return trip at once. It would take him, he said, two days in addition to the half day to reach Green River, and he was due in San Francisco on the evening of the third day. One of the burros was relieved of his burden of provisions and the young man started away, leaving the boys feeling rather lonely and also rather overloaded with responsibility!
"Do you really think Wagner and the boy are out of provisions?" asked Tommy as twilight settled down over the camp.
"I don't see how they can procure provisions," Will suggested.
"We've just got to find out!" exclaimed Sandy. "You must remember," he continued, "that this Chester Wagner is a Tenderfoot in the Beaver Patrol, Chicago. He's afraid of us, but we've just got to help him out! We wouldn't be good Boy Scouts if we didn't! Suppose we put up a smoke signal for help and see if he'll come."
"Oh, yes, he'll come--not!" exclaimed Tommy.
"We can try it, anyway," insisted Sandy.
The lad carried embers from the campfire a short distance to the west and built another roaring fire. Then he set about gathering green grass in order to make a greater volume of smoke.
"You'll have to hurry with your telegraph apparatus," laughed George, "if you want the boy to read your signal by daylight. It'll be so dark in half an hour that he couldn't see a column of smoke fifty feet away! Perhaps he isn't near enough to see them, anyway!"
"If I do all I can," Sandy declared, "I won't be to blame if he doesn't see them. I believe we ought to find some way to help that kid!"
The fires were now burning at a great rate, and Sandy heaped huge armfuls of green grass on top of the blazing sticks, with the result that two great columns of white smoke lifted to the evening sky.
When the grass burned out and the smoke became thinner the boy put on more and sat listening patiently for some sound, watching intently for an answering signal from the hills.
"I guess it's no good!" Sandy declared, mournfully, as the third supply of grass burned down. "The chances are that the train robbers and the imitation detectives have frightened Wagner and the kid out of the hills."
"I don't believe he'll come if he does see it," Will declared.
After a time the boys permitted one of the fires to die out and began preparations for supper. Tommy went back to one of the tents for the knives and forks directly, and in a moment came rushing back without any knives or forks but with a folded paper in his hand.
"Look here," he exclaimed excitedly, "while I was entering the tent something hit me a clip on the back. When I turned around to see what foolishness you fellows were up to, I found a piece of rock lying on the ground at my feet and close beside it, this piece of paper."
"Do you think the paper was wrapped around the rock?" asked George.
"Of course it was!" replied Tommy. "You can see the folds now, and there's the place where a a corner of the rock cut a hole!"
Will turned a searchlight on the paper, now held outstretched in Tommy's hands, and burst into a laugh as he read the words written there:
"Nix on the help signal."
"The little rascal!" exclaimed Tommy, reading the sentence.
"He's wise, that boy!" declared Sandy.
"He thinks we're setting a trap for him," Will explained, "and I can't say that I blame him much for sending just that kind of a message."
"Anyway," Tommy went on, "it shows that he isn't far away. If he'll only hover around within reaching distance, we'll soon convince him that we don't mean him or his father any harm."
"I wonder if he took any provisions with him when he ran away this time!" laughed George. "I really hope he did. That is, if they haven't got any in their own camp."
The boys looked at the provisions which had been taken out for supper, and discovered that two loaves of bread and several tins of preserved meats had been taken.
"Good for him!" shouted Tommy.
After supper it was arranged that two of the boys should watch the camp until one o'clock, and then awake the others, who were to stand guard until morning. Tommy and Sandy were to take the first watch.
"I don't think there's much use of anyone standing guard!" exclaimed Will. "Our lovely burros over there will probably lift up their voices if any stranger comes nosing around in the dark."
"Anyhow," Tommy suggested, "we may be able to get sight of young Wagner if we keep watch all night."
Will and George were in bed by nine o'clock, and then Sandy and Tommy began planning the excursion into the hills which each one, independent of the other, had determined to make.
"Now it's just this way," Tommy began, "wherever those fellows are, they have a fire. It's September, but the nights are cold here, just the same. Now, you remain here and watch the camp and I'll make my way to one of the summits to the north and take a peep over the country. If I see a campfire, and it isn't too far away, I'll sneak down and see whether it belongs to Wagner, to the cheap detectives, to the train robbers, or to the cowboy vigilantes."
"That's quite a collection of interests to be assembled in one spot on the Great Divide!" laughed Sandy.
"Oh, we always get into some kind of a mess like this," grumbled Tommy. "We could have a nice peaceful time catching Wagner if the detectives, and the train robbers, and the cowboys had remained away. I hope the cowboys will catch the robbers and lug them out, anyway!"
"I have an idea that the detectives will soon get tired of wandering around in the hills and meeting grizzly bears, and rattlesnakes, and wolverines every half hour."
"Grizzly bears!" exclaimed Tommy. "What are you talking about grizzly bears for?"
"There are more grizzly bears in Wyoming," declared Sandy, "than in all the other western states put together. The Bad Lands are full of them, and up in the Yellowstone National Park, they have them trained to eat with a knife and fork!"
"All right!" exclaimed Tommy. "I'll take your word for it, but I don't believe it! I know there are rattlesnakes, all right, but I don't believe there's a grizzly bear within a hundred miles of this spot!"
The words were hardly out of the boy's mouth before a rumbling growl came to the ears of the watchers.
"There!" cried Tommy. "You've called the roll and that's the first response. But I'll bet he's the only one around here!" the boy added.
Sandy laid a hand on his friend's shoulder to invoke silence.
"Listen," he said, "that's no bear!"
"Perhaps it's a rattlesnake, then!" scorned Tommy.
"It's a boy!" declared Sandy. "That's what it is!"
Both lads darted into the darkness, waving electric searchlights as they advanced, and calling out in such words as a Boy Scout would be apt to understand. They ran for some distance, until they fell over a bit of rocky ground, and then stood looking toward a point in the darkness from which a sound of footsteps came.
"You go on back to camp," whispered Tommy to Sandy, "and make all the noise you can going, and talk to yourself, so he'll think we're talking together. I'll put out my light and follow that chump by the noise he makes. I guess I can do it all right!"
"Aw, let's both go," pleaded Sandy.
"One's got to go back to camp to put him off his guard!" insisted Tommy, "Run along, like a good little boy, now," he added with a grin.
Sandy departed, talking to himself, and trying his best to make noise enough for two boys, while Tommy turned off his light and crept forward in the darkness in the direction of the sounds he had heard.
For a time he seemed to gain on the person who was making his way some hundred yards or more ahead of him, but at last, try as he might, the sound of footsteps gradually died away, and there were only the sounds of the night in the boy's ears.
He paused, after a time, and threw himself down on the rocky slope. The campfire seemed to be a long distance away, now, and the boy had just decided to give over his search at that time and return to the camp.
When he started to rise, however, he found a heavy hand pressed down on either shoulder. His amazement was so great that for a moment he sat perfectly still.
But there were cowboy vigilantes, train robbers, and detectives somewhere in the hills, so the boy was not quite so sure of the personality of the other as he had been at the first instant of contact.
"Well?" he said in a moment.
"Who are you?" came the question, not in the voice of a boy, but in the gruff tones of a man who was taking no pains to make a good impression.
"A boy from the camp down yonder," Tommy answered.
The boy was thinking fast. This might be one of the detectives, or it might be one of the train robbers, or it might be one of the cowboys, or it might be the escaped convict himself.
"What are you boys camping there for?" was asked.
"Vacation!" was the reply.
"Which way did the cowboys go?" was the next question.
Tommy needed no further introduction to the man who was clinging to his shoulders with a grip that was positively painful. No one but the train robbers would be apt to be interested in the direction taken by the cowboys. Tommy declares to this day that he felt the hair rising straight up on his head when he realized that he was talking with one of the hold-up men. He also says that his teeth chattered with fright.
"The last we heard of the cowboys," he answered, "they were going straight north. I thought you went that way, too," he added.
"We couldn't get too far away from our base of supplies," replied the other with a cynical laugh. "We were just thinking of going back to your camp for a square meal when we heard you blundering up the slope. You'll have to feed us for a few days, young fellow!"
CHAPTER V
A DETECTIVE AND A ROBBER
Half way back to the camp, Sandy crouched down at the sound of approaching footsteps.
"I'll bet that's Tommy trying to give me a scare," was the boy's thought.
He listened intently for a moment, without hearing a repetition of the noise, and started on again.
"If I thought that really was Tommy," he mused, "I'd arrange a neat little surprise for him. He's always up to his tricks."
The sound of heavy breathing came to his ears directly, and, not having the least doubt that the approaching figure was that of his chum, he waited for an instant until the labored breathing seemed to be passing the spot where he stood and leaped forward.
Much to his amazement he struck a pair of broad, muscular shoulders instead of the slender shoulders of his chum and felt himself in the grasp of a pair of powerful hands.
"What are you prowling around in the night for?" was asked.
Sandy pulled away at the hand which was smothering him and taking the hint, his captor released him for a moment.
"I can't talk with my mouth and nose all stopped up!" returned the boy. "What did you want to go and do that for?"
"What are you prowling about in the night for?" repeated the other.
Sandy thought he recognized the voice as that of Katz, the plain-clothes policeman who had lied on the previous evening regarding his residence and his calling.
"I might ask the same of you," replied Sandy, mopping his face with his handkerchief. "What are you prowling around for?"
"Keeping an eye on your camp," replied the other gruffly.
"What for?" demanded Sandy.
"Because you're suspicious characters."
"You're Katz, aren't you?" asked Sandy.
"Who told you that?" snarled the other.
"John Johnson," was the reply.
"I recognized him as one of Horton's men," declared Katz.
"That's what he is!" Sandy answered.
"What has Horton got to do with you?"
"That's some more of our business!" replied the boy.
"Now, look here," the detective said in a moment, "we're here, as you probably know by this time, in search of an escaped convict. We have positive information that he is hiding somewhere in this district. We have brought in plenty of supplies, and intend to remain here until we find him. He's a slippery fellow, but we'll get him yet."
"That doesn't interest me any," suggested Sandy.
"But I'm going to interest you in just about one minute!" declared Katz. "The boy who stole my property and left your camp in the night is likely to return there at any time. We want that boy. Will you help us get him? If you don't, you're likely to get into trouble yourselves."
"I guess there isn't much chance of his coming back to us!" Sandy answered. "I guess you know that yourself."
"You know who he is?" ask the detective.
"We've been told," was the reply, "that he is the son of the man you're hunting for, but we don't believe it."
"Well, we've made up our minds that he is," Katz went on, "and we've also made up our minds to watch your camp until the boy shows up again. I'll teach him to steal my badge of authority!"
"When you catch him," Sandy requested, "just let us know. We want to see him ourselves. Will you do that?"
"I guess you'll see him before we do," replied Katz, gruffly. "And now, if you don't mind," the detective went on, "I'll just go over to the camp with you and see what the other boys say about him. And while I'm there, you might make me a couple of cups of coffee. I'm a long distance from my camp and quite hungry."
Notwithstanding the impudence of the request, the boy consented to the arrangement and the two were starting away together when the sound of approaching footsteps was heard.
"Gee whiz!" exclaimed Sandy. "This deserted country seems to me about like the corner of State and Madison streets tonight. There's always some one walking around in the dark."
"Suppose we wait and see who it is," suggested the detective.
Now, Sandy had an idea that one of the persons approaching was Tommy and that the other might possibly be Chester Wagner. He had no notion of assisting the detective to get his hands on the boy, and so hung back when Katz would have stepped forward to intercept those who were advancing toward him. Thinking this an attempt to break away, Katz caught the lad by the arm and held fast to him while the others went by.
Sandy was certain that he heard Tommy's voice as the two passed, but was not certain that he recognized the voice of his companion in the low reply which was made. The boy realized that he must have occupied considerable time in his return to camp, after leaving his chum.
"And so, one of your chums was prowling around in the darkness, too," snarled the detective. "Who is that person with him?"
"I don't know," answered Sandy.
"Yes you do know, too!" gritted Katz, "You just came from that direction yourself, and you probably left the two together when you came away."
"You're off there," Sandy answered.
"I'll tell you what I think," the detective went on, "and that is that you boys have been out after that Wagner kid. I believe he's going into the camp with your chum right this minute. Anyway, I'll take you in and find out about it."
As the two advanced toward the campfire they watched in vain for the two figures which had gone on ahead.
"You walk in there and see whether that boy thief is there or not," commanded the detective. "And remember," he went on, threateningly, "that I'm waiting here in the darkness with an automatic revolver in my hand, so you'd better not attempt any funny business!"
When he reached Tommy's side he saw that the boy was frying bacon and eggs and making coffee. The large skillet used by the boys contained at least half a dozen eggs and about half a pound of breakfast bacon.
"Where's your friend?" Sandy asked in a whisper.
Tommy laid a finger on his lips as a request for low-voiced conversation. All the time he kept busy with the skillet.
"He's back there watching us with a loaded automatic in his hand," whispered the boy. "I wish one of the boys would get up and put a bullet through his head. That's what he deserves!"
"Who is it?" whispered Sandy.
"One of the train robbers!" was the startling reply.
"Where'd you get him?"
"He geezled me out here on the slope!"
"And came in with you and ordered his dinner?"
"That's it!" was the reply.
Sandy sat down on the grass beside the fire and chuckled until he was red in the face. Tommy almost permitted the bacon to burn while he watched his chum with wide-open eyes.
"If that train robber should send a bullet out this way, you wouldn't think it so funny!" Tommy declared. "He's a mighty suspicious fellow. He wouldn't permit me to wake any of the boys to help get supper."
"Look here," whispered Sandy, "I've got that imitation detective out there waiting for me to tell him whether Chester Wagner is here or not. He says he's hungry, too, and insists that I give him a night lunch. Now I'll tell you what we'll do," the boy continued. "I'll go and steer the detective up against the train robber, and we'll see what he'll do."
Before Tommy could reply, Sandy was away in the darkness, whistling softly to the detective.
"Say," he said, when Katz came lumbering into the edge of the illumination, "the boy isn't there, but I've got good news for you, just the same. The man who went in with my chum is one of the train robbers the cowboys are in search of. There's ten thousand dollars reward offered for him, and all you've got to do is to walk in there, hold a gun to his head, and march him off to Green River. You ought to give me half the reward, though," the boy added, "for you wouldn't have caught him only for me."
"All right," whispered the detective in a shaking voice. "I'll creep back into the shadows and come up from behind. When you go back, point with your hand to where he is. I'll be right there with a gun on him in half a minute!"
"All right," replied Sandy, and the detective disappeared from view.
Then the boy walked back to Tommy's side and explained what sort of circus there would be there in about a minute.
CHAPTER VI
THE CALL OF THE BEAVER
"Oh, I don't believe there'll be any circus!" whispered Tommy.
"And why not?"
"Because Katz will get the fellow handcuffed so quick by that there won't be any fun in it! There's a big reward out for that fellow!"
"Huh!" grinned Sandy. "You didn't see how scared the detective was when I told him the train robber was here by our fire. It's a hundred to one that the train robber will give the detective a swift kick in the pants and go back to his own camp."
The boys listened and waited for a considerable length of time, but heard no evidence of the approach of the detective.
"Say," Tommy whispered, "this is a pretty nice supper I've been getting for that robber. It looks good enough for me to eat myself!"
"We can eat it after Katz takes the robber away," suggested Sandy.
"I don't see anything of Katz, do you?" asked Tommy with a wink.
"Je-rusalem!" exclaimed Sandy. "You don't think he's run away, do you? He wouldn't do that, I'm sure!"
"He wouldn't," laughed Tommy. "I'll bet that fellow's running away now with a face so pale it leaves a white streak in the night."
"Well, it takes him a long time to get here, anyway," admitted Sandy.
"You just wait a minute," Tommy chuckled, "and I'll fix this business all right. You just tend this skillet until I come back."
Tommy moved away toward where the robber sat on the ground, watching every move that was made, and keeping a particularly keen eye on Sandy, whose temporary absence from the camp had attracted his suspicions.
"Look here," Tommy whispered, "we're not anxious to see you boys get into trouble, and so we're going to give you a tip. Sandy went out a moment ago to steer away one of the detectives who came in from Chicago last night."
The hold-up man got softly to his feet and began moving out of the light of the fire. Tommy urged him by look and a motion to remain where he was for the present.
"I didn't know that there were any detectives from Chicago in here," he said. "They must have made a quick jump to get here!"
"I guess they did," replied Tommy. "One of them was here before you were yesterday. He chased you up the valley, but came back, saying that he couldn't get a shot."
"Pretty nervy kind of a fellow, eh?" asked the train robber.
"He looks to me," declared Tommy, "as if he'd fight a rattlesnake and give him the first bite. He may have a swarm of his men in the vicinity of the camp, and if I were you, I'd turn away to the east and get out of sight as soon as possible."
"I can't fight a whole army," declared the train robber, as, crouching low, he moved away.
"Wait a minute," whispered Tommy chuckling so that he was afraid the other would discover the merriment in his voice. "Why don't you wait and have some of the supper I've been cooking for you?"
The train robber did not even pause to hear the conclusion of the boy's remarks, and Tommy went back to the fire and lay down and rolled back and forth until Sandy threw a cup of water into his face.
"What do you think of that!" he exclaimed. "There's a bum Chicago detective chasing off to the north at a forty mile gait, because he thinks there's a train robber after him, and there's a a train robber chasing off to the east at a forty-mile gait because he thinks there's a Chicago detective after him! Some day," the boy added, "I'm going to make a motion picture scenario of that."
While the boys were enjoying the joke, Will and George came out of the tent where they had been sleeping. Both looked grave when the incidents of the night were related to them.
"It means," Will declared, "that we are suspected by the train robbers of harboring a detective, and suspected by the detective of harboring the convict and his son."
"Aw, they won't come back here again, any of them!" asserted Tommy.
"Don't you think they won't," replied Will. "Here," he added, as Tommy dipped into the skillet of bacon and eggs. "What are you boys doing with the third or fourth supper?"
"I cooked this for the train robber!" grinned Tommy, "How'd you like to have a few bites of it?"
"I don't mind!" declared Will.
"Of the four parties representing four diverse interests," Will said, at the conclusion of the meal, "two have been represented here tonight. Before morning we may receive a call from the cowboys and the escaped convict. The visits might not be very agreeable ones but, still, they would complete the roll-call."
"You remember that trip to the Florida Everglades, don't you?" asked Tommy, with a most satisfying yawn. "Well, if you haven't forgotten all about it, you'll remember that we didn't have any sleep there for a couple of nights, and that I actually began to grow thin because of being kept awake so much."
"It was your own fault," insisted Sandy.
"That may be," replied Tommy, "but, all the same, I'm not going to let anything like that happen on this trip. I'm going to bed right now, and there's nothing on the face of the earth that can get me out of bed again until morning."
"That's me, too!" declared Sandy.
The boys entered the tent recently vacated, drew down the flap and were soon in bed, and asleep. Will and George, sitting by the fire, discussing the unusual combination of circumstances, heard a succession of sounds which any member of the Beaver patrol, Boy Scouts of America, would have recognized instantly.
It was the beaver call which consists in slapping the open palms together violently in imitation of the play of the flat tail of the beaver upon the surface of the water.
"Slap, slap, slap!" came the challenge from the darkness.
"That's a Beaver!" exclaimed George.
"Slap, slap, slap!" went the reply from Will's open palms.
"Why doesn't he come in?" asked George in a moment.
"I guess I'll have to go and find out!" declared Will. "This, you see," he added with a smile, "is the third interest to be represented here tonight. There is no doubt but that we'll hear from the cowboys before morning. It never rains but it pours."
"Slap, slap, slap!" came the call from the darkness again.
Will gave a low whistle in recognition of the signal and stepped forward. An answering whistle directed his steps, and presently he saw the light of the fire shining on the pale face of the lad who had stolen the badge of office from the detective.
"Why didn't you come on in?" asked Will.
"Why," was the reply, "I wasn't afraid of you boys, but I didn't know who might be watching the camp. I've been loitering around here most of the time since dark and just got the courage to call you out. Some one chased me away once."
"Are you hungry?" asked Will. "If you are, now's the time to say so. Last call for dinner in the dining car!"
"Yes, I'm hungry," was the reply, "but I haven't got time to wait for supper. If you'll snatch a loaf of bread and can of something and come along with me, you'll do the greatest favor one Boy Scout ever did for another. You'll come, won't you?"
"Sure I will," was the reply, "and I'll bring something more than a loaf of bread and a can of something," he went on.
"You can't carry much," replied Chester, "for we've got a rocky road to climb, and we'll have to go fast, too!"
"You haven't told me what the trouble is, yet!"
"It's father!" the boy answered hesitatingly. "I suppose you know now that I didn't tell you the truth when I was at your camp. I saw John Johnson there after I stole that bum detective's badge and ran away, and I suppose he told you all about me."
"Yes, he did," replied Will, rejoicing inwardly that the very thing they had been wishing for had taken place.
All he had to do now was to win the confidence of the boy, find his way to the father, and so clear up the mystery of the Fremont case.
"Yes," Will went on, "he told me all about you and all about your father, and I've been wondering ever since how you, a Boy Scout, could find the nerve to make up such a mess of lies as you told to me."
"I wanted to find out what you were here for, and who you were, and get something to eat," replied the boy, "and so I told you the first thing that came into my head. And now," he continued, "I'm going to tell you something that I wish might be classed as a fairy tale later on."
"Go ahead," answered Will. "Two days ago I had no idea that I'd ever become mixed up in the Fremont case, but I'll tell you right now that I'm becoming interested in it."
"A few days ago," the boy began, "father fell from a ledge of rock near our hiding place and injured his head. I have taken as good care of him as I could, but it was impossible for me to remain with him all the time, because I had to fish and hunt and provide food for both of us."
"You're welcome to any provisions we have," said Will, feeling genuine sympathy for the boy.
"That isn't the point now," Chester went on.
"While I was in your camp last night waiting, for the chance to steal provisions to take back to father, he left the hiding place. I know he's out of his head, and so I believe him to be wandering about the hills in a demented condition. There's no knowing what will happen to him if he is not found and placed in hiding again. I want you to go and help me find him. The detectives who came in last night, or some time yesterday, are here to take him back to prison, and they're likely to get him at any minute if he continues to wander about while insane from the recent injury to his head. There's no one to help me but you. Will you go?"
Here was the very chance the Boy Scouts had been waiting for.
CHAPTER VII
ARRESTED AS SPIES
"Of course, we'll go with you!" replied Will, in answer to the boy's anxious question. "Do you think anything can be done tonight?"
"I think we ought to begin the search tonight," replied Chester. "One of father's hobbies is the campfire. It is my idea that if he has matches he will build himself a rousing fire, if he comes to dry wood. If he doesn't do this, he's likely to make his way to the first campfire he sees. I was in hopes that he'd come here."
Will called his chums into the tent for a general discussion of the matter, Chester remaining just outside the fire line. The boy seemed to have a mortal fear of being watched and followed.
Before entering fully into the conference, Will carried a liberal supper out to the hungry boy. Chester said that he had eaten very little since disposing of the provisions taken from the camp. Owing to the sudden disappearance of his father, he had not had time to hunt and fish. Will thought he had never seen a boy eat so industriously.
"Why don't he come into the tent," queried Tommy, as Will returned.
"He's afraid some one's watching the camp," was the reply.
"What if there is some one watching the camp," Tommy insisted, "they'll see something's going on and follow us when we go away with Chester. So he might just as well come on in!"
"Watch us when we go away?" repeated George. "Who do you think is going away with the boy in search of his father?"
"I'm going, for one!" declared Tommy.
"Not so you could notice it!" Will cut in. "You and Sandy have been doing all the scouting tonight, and now George and I will take a turn at it!"
Tommy winked slyly at Sandy but said nothing.
Will, however, caught the look which passed between the two boys, and declared that he meant to tie them both up before he left the camp.
"You boys are always running away, and always getting into trouble!" he declared. "You remember what a scrape you got us into down in the Everglades. If it hadn't been for the Seminole, you'd 'a' had us all under ground before we'd been there two days!"
"Aw, who said anything about leaving camp?" demanded Sandy.
"No one said anything about it," returned the other, "but I understand what you boys have in your minds, and I'll tell you right now that I don't think it's right for you to leave the camp until we return."
"Of course we won't!" declared Tommy.
"Well, I've said all I'm going to say about it!" Will went on. "Of course, you'll go if the notion comes into your heads, anyway, so what's the use? I hope you'll get into something that'll keep you home for a week if you do go out tonight."
"All right," laughed Tommy. "We know all about you! If we got into trouble anywhere, you'd be the first one to help get us out."
"And now about plans for the search," Will went on, without seeming to notice the last remark of the boy, "it is nearly midnight now, and we may not be back by morning, so perhaps we'd better take something to eat with us. We may be miles from camp at sunrise."
"And when we find Wagner, we may find a hungry man," George added.
"That's a fact!" cried Tommy darting away to the provision box.
In a very short time the boy brought a great package of egg and ham sandwiches to the two lads who were about to start away.
"Now, don't eat all this truck before sunrise," Tommy advised. "As George says, when you find Wagner, you'll find a hungry man."
After stowing the sandwiches away in their pockets, and seeing that their automatics and searchlights were in good condition, the boys went out to the place where they had left Chester and found him sound asleep in the long grass.
"The poor fellow is about all in!" exclaimed George.
"I wish we could get him to remain in camp while we make the search!" Will suggested. "He's in no shape to take a long trip into the mountains."
"And still," George began, "we haven't any idea where to look for his father. And the boy may have a very clear notion as to where to look first. I guess, after all, we'll have to take him with us!"
"I suppose so," Will agreed, "but I tell you what we can do. We can get him to tell us what he knows about his father's habits and inclinations, and then ask him to rest up while we investigate some of the points suggested. Perhaps he'll do that."
"I guess he'll have to!" smiled George. "He's so sound asleep now that we could carry him bodily into the tent and he'd never know it!"
It was quite a difficult task to wake the boy, but at last when he sat up rubbing his eyes he pretended, as all boys will, that he had just dozed off for a minute.
"I was pretty tired," he declared, "and I guess the supper I ate made me a little bit sleepy."
"Well," Will said, "we may as well be on our way. I suppose you'll take us first to the place where you and your father have been hiding."
"That was my intention."
The sky was clearing now, and the light of the stars made it possible for the boys to walk at a swift pace over the level valley and up the easy slope which led to the top of a low and rocky range of hills lying at the western foot of Atlantic peak.
When the boys finally reached the summit of the ridge, Chester led the way down an incline facing the east to a gulch which ran in between the great mountain and the lower range.
"Here's where we've been stopping," he said, pointing to what is known in that part of the country as a limestone cave. "It's quite comfortable in there if you have a fire near the entrance, and no one can see the blaze from the valley, so it's reasonably safe."
The boys stepped into the cavern and looked around. A rude couch had been made of the boughs of spruce and white pine, and saplings had been roughly hewn into a table and two chairs.
"You must have been here some time?" asked Will, pointing to the skins on the floor.
"Several long, dreary weeks," was the reply.
"Did you come here with your father?"
"Yes, we came together."
"Were you with him in Chicago just before he left for Wyoming?"
The boy opened his eyes wider.
"How did you know we were ever in Chicago?" he asked.
"We know more about your father and yourself than you think we do."
"Perhaps," said the boy suspiciously, "I have done wrong in asking you for assistance."
"Oh, you've come to the right shop for help," George cut in. "You'll find that we'll help you while you're in the hills, and continue to help you after you get out of the hills. You're a Beaver, you know."
It was on Will's lips to tell the boy exactly why they were there, and how glad they were that he had come to them in his trouble, but he refrained from doing so.
After half an hour's walk they came to the place where the gulch opened into a small valley.
"I think," Chester said, as they stepped into one of these openings, "that father may be hiding somewhere in this vicinity."
"Do you think so," asked Will, "because of that light in there?"
"I didn't see any light when I spoke," replied the boy, "but I see the reflection of a fire now. It must be some distance from this opening."
The boys moved forward softly until they came near a campfire which was in a passage connecting the cave they were in with one to the north. When they came close enough they saw three figures sitting before the fire. Chester clutched Will fiercely by the arm and declared that one of the men was his father. He was for rushing forward immediately, but the boys held him back.
"If the other fellows are the detectives," George suggested to Will, "it's all up with us, unless we can get him away."
"But they are not the detectives," replied Will.
"Those fellows are the men who are wanted for the Union Pacific train robbery!"
While the boys were advancing the three men at the fire disappeared as if by magic! The next moment the circle of light showed the figures of half a dozen cowboys darting hither and thither in search of the men who had taken themselves off so suddenly.
Believing that the cowboys might be induced to assist in the search for the missing man, the boys advanced toward the fire. As they did so the cowboys swarmed down upon them. Before they could utter a word of protest they were securely bound with ropes and dragged to the opening.
"We didn't get the robbers," the man who seemed to be leader of the party said, "but we can amuse ourselves lynching these spies!"
CHAPTER VIII
A MIDNIGHT BEAR HUNT
"I have heard," Tommy said with a wink, soon after the departure of the boys, "that the best time to get a grizzly bear rug for a Boy Scout club room in Chicago is at moonrise."
"I think I've heard something like that, too," Sandy answered, with a grin. "That is," he went on, "if you want to get a grizzly bear rug for a Boy Scout club room in Chicago in the month of September."
"Yes," Tommy admitted, "I think the month of September was mentioned in the information I received on the subject."
"And the best place to get a grizzly bear rug for a Boy Scout club room in Chicago," Sandy laughed, "is in a range of foot hills built mostly of limestone. You see," the lad continued, "water washes out limestone and leaves caves and holes which the bears occupy. Sometimes these caves and holes furnish accommodation for a whole family of baby bears, I have heard, so we may be able to take a pet cub back to Chicago with us. That would be pretty poor, I guess!"
"Well," Tommy said, rummaging the provision box, "if we start out to get a couple of grizzly bear rugs for a Boy Scout club room in Chicago, we probably won't get back before sunrise, so we may as well take a little something to eat with us."
"Trust you for always taking something to eat with you!" laughed Sandy. "It's a sure thing you'll never starve to death."
The boys provided themselves with plenty of sandwiches and a couple of cans of pork and beans and, after seeing that the fire was safe and not likely to spread to the tents and provisions, and after changing the feeding ground of the burros so that they had plenty of grass, started away toward the foothills.
"Of course," Tommy said as they walked along, "we may find Wagner while we are looking for bear, and Will and George may find bear while they're looking for Wagner. I've heard of such things before now."
The boys crossed the valley to the foothills and clambered up the slope not far north of the spot where their chums and Chester had gained the summit. They descended into the gulch, too, and turned to the left.
"Now," Tommy said, seating himself on the slope, "the moon ought to be up in half an hour. I've heard that at the time the moon comes up bears leave their beds in search of food. We'll just sit here on the slope and watch the line of foothills."
"And I suppose," Sandy scoffed, "that you've got a notion in your nut that a couple of grizzly bears will come walking out into the gulch, take off their hides, and make you a present of them in a nice little speech."
"Now don't get smart, Freshy!" exclaimed Tommy. "According to all accounts, the walls of many of these foothills are punctured with limestone caves. There's where the bears live. From where we sit we can see a long ways to the north, as soon as the moon rises and we may be able to catch sight of a grizzly coming out for an early lunch."
The lads were seated not very far from the entrance to the cavern which had been occupied by Wagner and his son, but they had no knowledge of the fact. It was not their purpose to investigate one cavern at a time, but to watch the valley for anything that might come out of any one of them.
They could see only a short distance when they halted but presently the moon lifted into the sky and diffused a faint light over the hills. It would be some minutes before the direct rays would, strike into the gulch, and so the boys waited, hiding in the shadows, for that time to come.
"I guess we've got one already," Tommy observed, whispering the words excitedly in his chum's ear.
"I don't see anything that looks like a grizzly."
"Can't you see that there's a movement in the shadows about a hundred feet, to the north?" asked Tommy.
"I see something moving but I can't tell what it is."
"It's a bear!" shouted Tommy, taking no pain now to control his voice.
"Yes," exclaimed Sandy, "and it's two bears, if anybody should ask you, and they're coming this way!"
"Then we'd better get back a little ways," advised Tommy.
"I should say so!" cried Sandy. "At least we want to get into a position where they can't get in behind us."
The boys turned back a few paces and sought a position where their backs would be supported by the almost perpendicular wall of the bluff to the west. Then Sandy grinned as he pointed to the south.
"I guess this is a bear convention," he said. "There's another grizzly old scout coming from the other way."
"Three bear rugs," chuckled Tommy.
"Say, look here!" Sandy exclaimed. "Do we stand here and let these brutes come up and smell of our clothes before we do any shooting?"
"We don't do any shooting from here," Tommy answered moving back to the south. "If we should wound those big brutes without shutting off their motive power, they'd chew us into rags, in about three minutes. We've got to get some place where we can run!"
"Then what'd you back up against this rock for?" demanded Sandy.
"I didn't know how many bears there were in the world," grinned Tommy.
The boys moved a few paces and stopped at the mouth of a cavern. Tommy threw his searchlight into the interior and saw only bare walls. On his right as he looked in, appeared to be some sort of connection with the cave beyond.
"Gee--whiz!" he exclaimed. "There seem to be passages and corridors in this big bear tenement building. I wonder if there isn't an elevator, too."
"I wouldn't mind going up a few hundred feet!" suggested Sandy.
The bears came lumbering along toward the cavern where the boys stood, apparently not much interested in the visitors. When the moon rose they snuffed about the crevices along the slope, and finally fixed their attention on the spot where the boys were standing.
Both boys, realizing that a mistake had been made, dashed into the cavern and kept firing as the animals came into view, rather sharply outlined now against the growing moonlight.
"Now you have done it!" cried Sandy.
"Aw, what have I done?" demanded Tommy. "We came out to get grizzly rugs for our clubroom in Chicago, didn't we?"
"Yes, and you went and fired without killing them, and now we've been chased into a hole! If they've got the sense to stand there and wait for us to come out, they'll have a feast of boy flesh in a few hours."
"Huh!" exclaimed Tommy, "I didn't see you bringing down any of the bears, and you shot as often as I did."
"It sure was bum shooting," admitted Sandy.
The bears were now out of view, but the boys knew that they were still watching the entrance to the cavern. Tommy's searchlight showed the entrance to the connection between the two caverns, and the boys lost no more in changing their position. Tommy looked out of the entrance to the hiding place and saw that the brutes had shifted their quarters and were watching from a new position.
"I guess we've got into the kind of a mess Will predicted," Tommy declared. "This looks like we'd have to stand a siege."
Tommy moved to the side of his chum and fired a couple of shots at the sentinel outside.
"Look here," Sandy advised. "You'd better save your bullets!"
"All right!" Tommy answered. "I suppose that's what we're here for--to save bullets!"
"Well, you needn't be throwing them away where there's no chance of hitting anything," grumbled Sandy.
Tommy retreated into the cavern and began investigating the wall with his searchlight.
"If we could only find another corridor in this steam-heated old collection of bear traps," he said, "we might get out of sight of the brutes. I wish we could find a hole leading up to the roof!"
The boys finally found a small opening which led into the wall on the south. After investigating and finding that it connected only with the cavern they had just left, the boys turned back.
Tommy, who was in the lead, sprang back when he came to the main cave with a suddenness which almost threw his chum to the floor.
"Now we've gone and done a fine thing!" he cried. "The bears are out there in the cave we're shut in good and tight!"
CHAPTER IX
LYNCHING IS THREATENED
"Spies!" repeated Will, indignantly, as the cowboys gathered around.
"Yes, spies!" exclaimed the leader of the party excitedly. "You thought you pulled the wool over our eyes down at your camp the other night, but you didn't! We have good reason to believe that the robbers have visited your camp every day and that you fed them!"
"That isn't true!" declared George angrily.
"If you're not in with these bandits, what are you doing here?" demanded another member of the party.
"Why, we came in search of--"
Will closed his teeth with a snap as he realized that on no account must he reveal the real motive for this night visit to the cavern.
"Go on!" shouted the leader.
Will glanced significantly at George and remained silent.
Chester seemed about to speak, but George gave him a nudge with his elbow and the boy remained silent.
"You said you came here in search of some one!" the leader demanded.
"I didn't say anything of the kind," Will contradicted.
"Well, out with it! What did you say?"
"I was about to say that we were prowling around just for the fun of the thing."
"Prowling around in the ante-room of a robbers' den in the middle of the night just for the fun of the thing!" laughed the leader.
"That story is so bald that it's funny!" laughed another member of the party. "You ought to make up something better than that!"
"It's the truth!" answered George.
"Look here!" the leader exclaimed. "If you boys'll tell us where those three men went to, we'll take you into Green River and see that you have a fair trial. If you don't, we'll string you up right here in the mountains!"
"We don't know where they went!" answered Will.
A member of the party who had been called Seth by his companions now stepped forward and began an examination of the Boy Scout badges which adorned the coats of the two lads.
"Where did you get them?" he asked.
"Chicago," was the reply.
"The Beaver Patrol, I see," the man went on.
"Yes, sir!" replied Will.
"You look like a young man," George cut in. "Were you ever a Boy Scout?"
"Hardly," was the reply, "but I have a son who is very much interested in the organization. He belongs to the Eagle Patrol, at Lander, and I hear nothing but Boy Scout rules, and tactics, and that sort of thing, from morning till night."
"Well, he must be a good lad if he's a faithful Boy Scout," Will suggested. "He certainly must be all right!"
"Indeed he is!" Seth answered. "He's a good boy, and I hope some day that he'll have the right to wear a badge like that," pointing to the Scoutmaster emblem on Will's hat.
"How many of these medals has he?" asked George, pointing to the Ambulance, Stalker, Seaman and Pioneer medals on his sleeve.
"Oh, I don't know," Seth laughed. "He comes home every day or two and says he's going to have a new one! Look here, lad," the man added glancing apprehensively back at his companions, "why don't you tell the truth and get out of this scrape in the easiest possible way?"
"We have told the truth," was the reply, "except that we didn't come out just for the fun of the thing. We came out for a purpose which we can't disclose at this time. We blundered on the train robbers, and have no more idea of where they went than you have."
"Look here Seth," the leader of the party exclaimed. "If you can't make those boys tell the truth, just cut out this conversation. We've got work to do tonight!"
"I think they are telling the truth!" Seth answered.
"Oh, I guess you know better than that!" laughed the leader. "You're interested in them because they claim to be Boy Scouts, and I suppose you're taking in everything they say."
"I think the boys are all right!" insisted Seth.
"It doesn't make any difference what you think!" replied the other angrily, "If they don't tell the truth, they're going to swing in less than half an hour!"
"I can't stand for that, Pete," Seth answered.
"Who's sheriff of this county?" demanded the man who had been called Pete. "I suppose you think you're boss of this expedition."
"I don't think anything of the kind," was the reply, "but I'm not going to see these Boy Scouts murdered without a hearing, and if you attempt anything of the kind, you'll never be sheriff of this county again! I can tell you that much."
The four other members of the party were now whispering together some distance away. As they whispered, they glanced furtively from the boys to the man who was trying to protect them.
"Look here, Pete," one of them said, as they all stepped forward, "we don't see any necessity for this halt in the proceedings just because Seth has a lad that belongs to the Boy Scouts."
"That's right," another member of the party declared. "Just you say the word and we'll string these boys up in a holy minute!"
"Not with my consent!" exclaimed Seth. "I'm not murdering babies! And if you fellows attempt anything of the kind, there'll be trouble!"
"Look here," the sheriff said, addressing Will. "You boys go off in a corner somewhere and talk this thing over. Here's a pretty decent kind of a fellow, a neighbor of mine, getting into trouble on your account. Now you go and talk the thing over, and see if you can't decide to tell the truth and help him out as well as yourself."
"Why can't you tell him the whole story?" asked Chester as the boys grouped themselves in a shadowy corner of the cave. "Why don't you tell him just why you came out tonight, and how we happened to come into the cavern. I don't believe they'll do us any harm if you tell the truth."
"Now, look here, kid," Will answered, "if we tell the cowboys that we came into the hills hunting for a demented man, they'll want to know who the demented man is, and why he came into the hills without any supplies. Can't you understand that?"
"If he does," replied Chester, "I'll tell him all about it."
"If you do," Will continued, "the cowboys will join in the search for your father, and when they catch him, they'll turn him over to the two detectives who are now in the hills searching for him."
Chester turned pale as death and shrank back against the wall of the cave. His voice was piteous as he asked:
"So you know all about that, too, do you?"
"Yes," answered Will, "and we don't want the officers to get hold of your father. If they do, it will spoil all our plans, because they'll take him back to the penitentiary, and that would make new trouble for our friend. We want to find him ourselves."
"But I don't understand--"
"I know that you don't understand," Will declared, "and this is no time nor place to give you the information you lack."
"But I'll see father taken back to prison before I'll see you two boys lynched!" insisted Chester.
"You'd better think the matter over carefully," Will advised. "The chances are that they won't believe anything we say to them now."
"Well!" the sheriff called out impatiently. "Have you boys reached a conclusion?"
"We have already told you everything which can possibly interest you!" Will answered. "We have nothing more to say!"
"Then bring out your rope, boys!" the sheriff shouted.
Seth threw a hand back to his pistol pocket and faced the sheriff angrily. The sheriff's eyes flashed vengefully.
"I protest against this murder!" Seth exclaimed.
"If you don't want to take a hand in the proceedings, get out!" ordered the sheriff. "We can do the work without you!"
"I don't propose to see these Boy Scouts murdered!" Seth declared.
Every member of the party now held a gun in his hand, and it seemed to the boys that a desperate battle must take place. They drew their own revolvers and stood side by side with their defender.
"Take those guns away from the kids," shouted the sheriff, addressing two of his men. "We ought to have attended to that before this!"
"Don't you try it!" Seth said calmly. "I'll shoot the first man that lays a hand on one of them!"
While the two parties stood facing each other, each ready to begin shooting at the slightest provocation, a volley of shots came from up the gorge. The angry men turned their eyes toward the entrance to the cavern and the sheriff threw up his hand in a command for an armistice.
"The train robbers may be out in the gulch shooting up some one now!" he exclaimed. "We ought to see about this!"
"Yes," Seth exclaimed, "there's no use of our coming to blows over this matter. If the robbers' hiding place can be found, we can make them tell whether these boys are mixed up in their affairs or not."
"That's right!" exclaimed another member of the party. "If the boys will give up their guns and promise to make no attempt to escape, we'll investigate this shooting and give them the benefit of every doubt there is in the case. Will you do that, boys?"
The lads handed their weapons to Seth and moved out toward the gulch. When the party passed out of the cavern they found no one in sight. While they stood listening and watching more shots came from the south and they all moved up in that direction. The moon was now shining brilliantly and the whole gulch was in view.
"Strange where that shooting is!" Seth exclaimed.
"It's in the caverns up to the north, and that means that the train robbers have been brought to bay!" exclaimed the sheriff.
As the party started up the gulch, Will drew Seth aside and whispered a few words into his ear.
CHAPTER X
ONE DANGER TO ANOTHER
"How do you know the bears are out there in the cave?" Sandy asked, as Tommy drew back into the smaller cavity.
"Just take a peek out, if you don't believe me."
Sandy did take a peek out, and sprang back with a face which looked as white as a sheet of paper under the rays of Tommy's electric searchlight.
"One of 'em took a swipe at me!" he said.
The boys turned their searchlights on the entrance and waited patiently for some moments for the bears to present themselves in the illuminated circle, but the animals seemed to understand that there was danger under the light, and remained around the angle of the wall.
"What are you going to do?" asked Tommy, presently.
"Blessed if I know!" answered Sandy.
"We might rush out and fill 'em full of lead," suggested Tommy.
"Not for me!" the other answered. "They'd get in one good crack at us before we could pull the trigger, and then it would be 'Good-night!'"
"How long do you think they'll stay here?" asked Tommy.
"The bear has the reputation of being a stayer," replied the other.
"Well, in time," Tommy said, "we'll have to make a break. We've got about enough provisions for breakfast, and after that, we'll be on the verge of starvation as long as we remain here. So far as I can see, we may as well make a break right now."
"I'm game for it," replied Sandy. "We'll dazzle their eyes with our searchlights, and fire a whole clip of bullets without stopping. Perhaps that'll bring them down or cause them to run away."
"All right!" Tommy agreed. "We'll round the corner together with our searchlights held in front and begin shooting."
"And don't make any mistake about shooting straight!" advised Sandy. "I don't want Will and George to know that we ever got into a mess like this. You know what they said about our coming away tonight, anyhow!"
"Sure, I know!" admitted Tommy. "And I'd rather have one of the bears bite off an arm than to have them know we got into a scrape we couldn't get out of without their help."
"Well, here goes, then!" cried Sandy.
Without waiting for his chum he sprang around the corner or the wall, his electric advanced, his automatic ready for instant use. As he turned the corner one foot caught on a loose rock and he half fell to the ground. As he did so, Tommy saw a hairy paw shoot out with vicious force and brush and scrape across the boy's shoulder.
Tommy heard the boy's coat ripping and tearing under the clutch of the great claws, and heard his chum utter a piercing scream as the wicked claws touched the flesh.
It seemed to Tommy that the figure of his chum, now lying prostrate on the floor of the cavern with the head extending outward, was being drawn away from him by the claw which still clung to the shoulder.
He raised his automatic to fire and pushed his searchlight forward. The bear's eyes closed for an instant under the strong finger of light, and the bullet caught him, exactly in the center of the forehead.
He dropped with a savage growl, scrambled, to his feet again and dashed toward Tommy, who fired shot after shot at the advancing animal, but apparently without avail. In a moment all three bears, doubtless excited by the smell of blood, sprang before the entrance to the little cave where Tommy stood. For the moment the animals paid no attention to Sandy, still, lying prostrate on the floor, blood oozing from the wounded shoulder. Tommy fired shot alter shot as the bears came on.
For the first time in his life Tommy realized that the next moment might be his last. He saw Sandy lying bleeding on the floor. He saw three savage, pain-maddened animals rushing upon him and worked the trigger of his automatic until the clip was spent. Then he hurled the useless weapon at the nearest animal and seizing Sandy by the feet, dragged him farther into the cavern.
"I guess it's all off now," he mused as the bears stood hesitating and apparently ready for a spring. "I wish we'd left a note for Will."
He heard the clatter of sharp claws on the rocky floor, saw the pig-like eyes of the animals shining red under the light, heard their spasmodic breathing, and was about to make a desperate rush forward when the outer cavern was flooded with a racing light which grew and grew as Tommy looked. Then he heard the sound of feet.
Next came a volley of shots, followed by the shouts of men and the call of a voice that he knew.
"Tommy!" the voice cried.
The boy did not answer instantly, for his eyes were fixed upon the squirming figures of the bears. They had fallen under the shots and were weaving about the floor, snarling and snapping at each other and at themselves in their blind rage.
Several more shots came, and then the animals lay still.
"Tommy!" came the voice again.
"That's Will!" said Sandy faintly.
"Cripes! Are you alive?" demanded Tommy.
"I wouldn't be talking if I was dead, would I?" asked Sandy, speaking in a very faint tone of voice.
"Sandy!" came the voice again.
"Hello!" called Tommy.
"Come on out!" cried Will.
"We're coming!" Sandy answered.
The next moment the flashlights carried by Will and George swept into the cavern, revealing the true condition of affairs.
The two boys sprang to Sandy's side and raised him into a sitting position. Sandy smiled weakly but said nothing.
"Where is he hurt?" asked Will, facing Tommy.
Tommy pointed to the boy's bleeding shoulder.
"One of the bears swatted him," he said.
The cowboys now gathered in front of the little cavern and gazed at the group with excited interest.
"What's coming off here?" the sheriff asked.
"This kid's coat's coming off, for one thing," answered Will, with a slight smile as he drew away at one sleeve. "He's been cut by the bear, and we want to see how badly he's wounded."
Seth stepped forward to assist in the removal of the coat, but the sheriff laid a hand on his arm and drew him back.
"If those two boys have guns," he said, "get them away from them!"
"What's that?" demanded Tommy, gazing at the sheriff indignantly.
"You're all under arrest," thundered the officer, "and I demand that you give up your weapons."
"You'll find my gun out there in the cavern somewhere," Tommy answered. "I threw it at the bears after the last bullet had been fired."
Will put his hand into Sandy's pocket as if feeling for a gun but found none there. "I dropped it in the cavern," the boy said. "There are no bullets in it, anyway. I shot 'em all at the bear."
Sandy's wound proved to consist only of several scratches in the flesh of the shoulder, but Will explained to the sheriff that it would be necessary to take him out to where water could be obtained in order that the injury might be properly dressed.
"Come along, then," the sheriff consented. "We've had enough of this underground hole, anyway."
Tommy looked longingly at the three dead bears as he passed out.
"I'm coming back here to get those rugs," he whispered to Will.
"And I'm coming back here and get some bear steak," George contributed.
"What are you boys talking about?" demanded the sheriff.
"Aw, what's eating you?" demanded Tommy, who did not at all understand the situation. "You want to keep your clam closed."
The sheriff turned back and eyed the boy with anger and amazement depicted on his rather heavy features.
"You're one of these Boy Scouts, I presume?" he snarled.
"Yes, sir," answered Tommy. "Proud of it!"
"Then perhaps you can tell me where those train robbers are hiding."
"I would if I could!" replied the boy.
"What are you kids out at this time of night for, anyway?" was the next question. "You ought to be in bed."
"We came out to gather a couple of bear rugs for a Boy Scout clubroom in Chicago," answered Tommy, with a slight grin in Will's direction.
"And what did those boys come out for?" the sheriff asked, pointing at Will and George and the boy in whose interest they had left camp.
Tommy had no means of knowing what stories the boys might have told regarding their presence in the mountains, and so he decided to dodge the question. This seemed the only safe way.
"Ask them!" he said after a short silence.
By this time the whole party was out in the gulch, standing full in the moonlight. The men conferred together for some moments, and then the sheriff turned to the other members of the party.
"Get your ropes, boys," he said. "We haven't got time to fool with these boys any longer."
"I protest against this action," shouted Seth. "You, Pete, are sheriff of this county, and it is your duty to enforce the laws. If you permit this lynching to take place in your presence, you'll be guilty of the crime of murder, and I warn you that you'll be prosecuted."
Tommy and Sandy looked at their chums questioningly. They did not at all understand what was going on. Will and George were binding up the wound with bandages which they had long carried for use on just such an occasion as this.
"I think I know my duty," answered the sheriff. "Wyoming officers are being made the laughing-stock of the whole world because of the frequency of these train robberies. In nearly every instance, lately, the outlaws have escaped, principally because of assistance given them by such people as we have here under arrest."
The men removed ropes from under their coat and began to unwind them. Seth drew his revolver and waited.
CHAPTER XI
A WYOMING HOLD-UP
The four men stepped forward toward the boys with the ropes in their hands. The boys stood facing the crowd with unflinching eyes.
"I warn you!" shouted Seth.
"Wait!" Chester cried, stepping forward. "If you're doing this because my friends won't tell why they are in the mountains of Wyoming, and why they are out in the hills tonight, you may as well hold your hands. I'll give you all the information on the subject you desire."
Will stepped forward and caught the boy by the arm.
"You know what it means to--to some one if you speak," he warned.
"But I'm not going to see you boys murdered before my eyes!"
"No more fairy tales go!" shouted a member of the sheriff's gang. "We have an unpleasant duty to perform here and we're not going to shirk it. As the sheriff says, outlaws are flocking to Wyoming because they are hidden and protected by such people as you."
"But I can satisfy you as to the honesty of these boys," pleaded Chester, "if you'll listen to me for five minutes."
"Nothing doing!" shouted the sheriff.
Again the men advanced with the ropes and again Seth lifted his revolver in warning. The situation was a critical one.
During the second of silence which followed, a clatter of stones came into the gulch from the rocky summit above, and all eyes were instantly turned in that direction. As they looked the sheriff and his men dropped their weapons to the ground and threw their hands into the air.
"That's right!" came a hoarse voice from above. "Throw down your weapons and drop your belts at your feet. Now line up there in a row, you baby snatchers! Never mind that funny business, there, you man with the red whiskers. You'll drop in your tracks if you make another move! You are the cowboy sheriff of the county, I understand, but you ought to be training puppies for a dogshow. That's about your size."
In a moment every member of the sheriff's posse, including Seth, was unarmed. As they stood meekly in a row the boys were ordered to take their own weapons from the heap on the ground and walk away over the ridge.
"Can you see who they are?" asked Will, as the boys moved slowly along.
"I can see only the outlines of their heads and the gleaming barrels of their rifles," George answered. "Say," the boy went on, "didn't the cowboys drop their weapons quick when they saw those shining muzzles?"
"They knew the other fellows had the drop on them, and I don't blame them," Tommy cut in.
"Do you really think they are the train robbers?" asked Sandy, who was being assisted up the slope by Will and George.
"They're the train robbers, all right!" insisted Tommy. "I can't see their faces any more than you can, but I remember that voice! You remember the night he was at our camp, and we were getting something to eat? Well, I heard quite a lot of his conversation that night. Some of it I liked and some of it I didn't, but I'm sure the man whose conversation I heard that night is the same man who ordered the cowboy officers to throw down their weapons."
"But why should they do a thing like that?" demanded Will.
"I don't know," replied George, "unless it is because train robbers have a continual and perpetual grouch against officers of any kind."
"That must be the reason," Will admitted.
"Well, I'm glad they got us away!" said Tommy, as the five boys reached the summit and looked down into the little valley, "but they sure put us in bad with the cowboys from this time on. The cowboys, apparently with good cause, were accusing us of standing in with the train robbers, and now the train robbers have proven the point by butting in for our protection."
"It's too bad," Will answered, "but I don't see how it can be helped. It is particularly unfortunate at this time, because with the cowboys opposing us we won't dare search the mountains for Chester's father."
"We'll find a way!" insisted Tommy. "We'll be sure to find a way."
When the boys turned down the slope which led to their camp, not very far away, daylight was growing in the sky. They could see the figures of the men who had rescued them creeping away to the south.
Shouts and exclamations of rage were coming over the ridge, and the boys understood very well that in a short time the cowboys would be at their camp, with stronger motive than ever for their destruction.
"We've got our guns," Will said as they walked along, "and we've got to fight. That's all there is to it."
When the boys came to the side of the dying campfire they found two men who seemed to be entire strangers sitting calmly in one of the tents, dividing the contents of a great tin of roast beef, and also sharing a huge loaf of bread. The light was still dim in the tent, and so Will turned his electric on the rather domestic scene.
"What are you men doing in there?" he demanded.
"Eating!" was the calm reply.
"I didn't know but you were getting a hair-cut," grinned Tommy.
"Where'd you come from?" asked George, as the boys all gathered in front of the flap.
"Look here, kids," one of the men said easily, "we've been traveling two days and two nights, and we're hungry and sleepy. Just let us fill up on this chuck and we'll tell you all about it."
"We really ought to go to sleep!" the other intruder suggested. "But, as you seem anxious to know why we're consuming your provisions, I'll relieve your minds of anxiety by saying that we met John Johnson half way to Green River and he sent us in to tell you that he would arrange for reinforcements for you as soon as he reached Green River. He said he mentioned the fact to you when he was here, but you didn't seem to like it, and so he said nothing more about it to you."
"He sent you in here just to tell us that?" demanded Will.
"Aw, tell him the truth," laughed the other.
"Well, then, I'll tell him the truth," replied the intruder, his mouth full of bread and meat.
"We met Johnson while he was on his way out, and he told us to look in on you boys as we passed and see if you were all right. He seemed to have a notion in his head that you'd be apt to get into trouble of some kind."
"Glad you came in," Will said, extending his hand, "I don't know how Mr. Johnson came to think of it, but your coming here just now is something in the nature of a miracle."
"Glad to be of any service!"
Then without explaining the purpose of their night mission into the mountains, the boys explained the situation to the two strangers, dwelling particularly on the fact that the sheriff's cowboys now had good cause for believing that the lads really were associating with the train robbers.
"I think the train robbers held the officers up more because they've got a grouch against all policemen than for any other reason," Will said. "I don't see why they should cut in order to save our lives. The sheriff will get good and even with them for that!"
"Just a grouch against all the officers in the world!" laughed one of the strangers. "All brigands feel that way."
"But you can see where it leaves us!" exclaimed George. "We can't have any fun in the mountains with those fellows chasing us all the time, and one of our friends is wandering around in the mountains nutty, with a broken head, and we can't even go out and find him if this hostile attitude of the cowboys continues."
"You think they'll follow you down to camp, do you?" asked one of the men. "Of course the outlaws wouldn't hold them very long."
"Yes, I think they'll follow us down to camp and they won't lose any time getting here, either," Will answered.
"Did you ever seen anything like it?" asked Tommy as, accompanied by George, he started toward the provision box.
"Like what?" demanded the other.
"Why, this lone mountain valley becoming the center of population of the United States!" exclaimed Tommy. "When we came in here, there wasn't a soul in sight in the valley. And then the robbers came, and the detectives came, and the cowboys came, and Johnson came, then we got next to Chester, and now these two strangers come butting in. If this isn't the center of population, I'd like to know where it is."
"It's a good thing we've got those old burros picketed out on the grass," George observed. "In about two days more, we'll have to set sail for Green River and load up with provisions. We've been running a public eating house ever since we struck Wyoming. I wonder how long these fellows are going to stay. If they remain more than one day, I'm going to charge 'em for board or send them out fishing."
"When you want any fish," Tommy exclaimed, "you needn't send any strange guys out to get 'em. I'll bring in all the fish you want!"
George chuckled, and Tommy threw an empty can at his head.
"When you go out fishing," George said in a moment, "just let us know, and we'll send a guard out with you."
"Oh, just because I had a little trouble up on Lake Superior and down in Florida, you think I can't catch fish!" complained Tommy. "You just wait until we get this rumpus with the cowboy officers settled and I'll show you whether I can catch fish or not."
"I wish we had some of that bear steak!" George suggested. "We're eating the ham and eggs all up, and we're right in the middle of a game country at that."
"Look here," Tommy suggested, "you go right on cooking ham and warming up those shoestring potatoes, and I'll sneak over the ridge and bring back about fifty pounds of bear." Besides, he went on, "I want to get those hides before the wolverines get them, or any one sneaks them off."
Just as Tommy disappeared up the slope the cowboy officers were seen rushing toward the camp, their weapons ready for use.
"I guess they think the train robbers are here," commented Will.
CHAPTER XII
AN INTERRUPTED WIG-WAG
The boys gathered in a little group not far from the fire and awaited, with what excitement and anxiety may well be imagined, the arrival of the officers. Their automatics were in their hands. A short distance from the camp the cowboys paused as if for a consultation, although the show of weapons made by the boys may have had something to do with their quick stop.
As the boys stood ready to defend themselves if attacked, they noticed that the two strangers who had recently arrived at the camp were creeping farther into the tent, at the flap of which they had been sitting. The lads saw weapons in their hands, but saw no evidence that the fellows intended using them. Sandy gave Will a nudge on the shoulder.
"Do you think those fellows are all right?" he asked. "Looks funny to see them crawling out of sight as soon as danger shows!"
"It does look strange," Will admitted, "but look here," he added, pointing to the boy's bandaged shoulder, "you ought to be in one of the tents yourself. You're not fit to be out here if any fighting takes place."
"Huh, I guess this bum shoulder won't prevent me from shooting straight!" declared Sandy. "Say," he continued, "I've a great mind to go in where those fellows are and ask what they're hiding away for."
"I just believe," George cut in, "that those fellows lied when they said Johnson asked them to come here. You remember how they told two stories, don't you? One that they had been told to tell us that reinforcements would be sent in, and the other that they had been asked to stop and see us on their way into the mountains."
"We're certainly in a nice box if we've got enemies in our own camp," Will grumbled. "In that case, as soon as the shooting begins we'll be between two fires. By the way," he went on, "where's Tommy?"
"Gone after bear meat for breakfast," answered George.
"He's always dodging away without any one knowing what's in his mind!"? declared Will, rather crossly. "I guess he's got some idea above bear steak for breakfast, right now. Anyhow," the boy added, "if Tommy is well armed these cowboy fly-cops will also be between two fires when the battle opens. That will help some."
"Perhaps there won't be any battle," suggested George. "Those fellows don't seem to be in any hurry about starting in, anyway."
"Oh, they'll never swallow the bluff they got from the train robbers," Will insisted. "As soon as the story is told outside they'll be roasted by the whole state. Just think of it!" the boy went on. "They come in here to capture two train robbers and get held up the first thing. If there's a live editor in the state he'll print a faked-up picture of the six men with their hands up in the air and their guns lying at their feet."
"Perhaps they saw the two strangers come in," suggested Sandy. "In that case they may be doing a little guessing as to whether the newcomers won't help us in case of trouble."
"But these two men were here before we returned," suggested George.
"Well, they may have seen them sitting in the flap of the tent eating our good pork and beans and roast beef," Will went on.
"If they knew that the two strangers were hiding in the back corner of one of the tents," George commented, "I don't think they'd hesitate much longer. These two visitors may be all right, but they don't look it!"
"Why don't you go and ask them if they wouldn't like to have us dig a hole to put them in?" demanded Sandy.
While the boys were puzzling over the situation, Seth, the deputy who had defended the Boy Scouts when they stood in grave danger of being lynched, separated himself from the group of officers and advanced toward the camp. There was a smile on the deputy's face as he approached but the other members of the party were scowling heavily.
The boys dropped the muzzles of their automatics as Seth came up to the fire. The deputy stood for a moment glancing keenly around at the tents, the burros, and the cooking utensils before speaking.
"Glad to see you so comfortably situated boys," he said, "and I'm glad, also," he went on pointing to the pennants which showed at the tops of the tents, "to see that you're not ashamed to show your colors."
"We're proud of being Boy Scouts!" Will declared.
"And we're proud of the Beaver Patrol!" George cut in.
"That's right, boys!" Seth said "Stick to Boy Scout laws and teachings and you can't go very far wrong."
"What are those fellows going to do now?" asked Will, nodding toward the cowboy officers, who had now thrown themselves down upon the long grass of the valley. "They didn't follow us here just for exercise."
"If those train robbers really are friends of yours," Seth replied, "they have done you, perhaps unintentionally, a great deal of harm. It is an old saying, you know," the deputy went on, "that one fool friend can work a man more mischief than a dozen open enemies."
"I suppose you people think now," Will said, "that we really do train with that bunch of robbers."
"I don't!" declared Seth. "I know you to be honest Boy Scouts, and no counterfeits, and I don't believe such lads mix up with train robbers."
"We don't at all events," Will answered.
"Look here," George interrupted, "the train robbers saw a chance to rub it into the officers and they did it. That's all there is to that! They would have protected the detectives who were searching the mountains, or even a band of burglars, just the same as they did us. You know very well that such fellows have a perpetual grouch against officers of the law. The only wonder is they didn't shoot when they had the cowboys unarmed."
"Even train robbers are averse to committing murder," replied Seth.
"Well, what are they going to do about it?" Will insisted.
"They want you to come out to Lander with me and stand trial."
"And if we refuse?"
"But you won't do that!"
"You are mistaken there," replied Will. "If they want us, they've got to come and get us."
"That isn't good judgment," declared Seth.
While the two discussed the situation, the others listening intently, the two visitors came slowly out of the tent and approached the spot where Seth and Will were standing. Seth regarded the two men quizzically for a moment and then extended both hands in greeting.
"Glad to see you, Gilmore!" he said. "How long have you been here?"
"Only a short time," was the reply. "At the request of a personal friend, an officer from Chicago, we dropped in for breakfast and also to see if the boys needed any assistance."
"Boys," Seth said, turning to the astonished group of youngsters, "this is Sheriff Gilmore of Sweetwater county, and this," pointing to the other, "is Doyle, one of his deputies. They are both good fellows."
"Did you say you knew John Johnson well?" asked Will, after greetings had been exchanged. "Was it the truth you said about his asking you to call and help us out if we needed assistance?"
"True as Gospel!" answered Gilmore. "I knew John Johnson when he was on a ranch over here in the Sweetwater country. I'm taking a little excursion into Pete's country in search of the train robbers. I met Johnson going out, and he asked me to call on his friends, the boys."
"So you can vouch for these lads, can you?" asked Seth, a smile of satisfaction coming to his face.
"I certainly can!" was the reply. "Johnson told me all about them, so I know what they're here for, and all about their movements."
Before speaking, Seth took off his hat and began waving it in the direction of the cowboy officers. Sheriff Pete and his deputies rose to their feet and walked toward the camp. Before reaching the fire, they recognized Sheriff Gilmore and came forward with extended hands. The situation was soon explained.
"Now see here, kiddo," Sheriff Pete said, as he drew Will to one side, "we don't know what you're in here for, but we know now that you're all right. We'll stand by you to the bottom of the deck if you'll just forget all about that little hold-up over in the other valley."
"That was funny, wasn't it?" Will said with a grin.
"I can't see anything funny in it!" said the Sheriff.
"Those train robbers looked pretty good to us just then," Will commented. "They came just in time!"
"You wouldn't have been harmed," said the sheriff, with a smile. "I was only putting in a little third degree work."
"All right," Will said, "you help us if it comes handy for you to do so, and we won't say a word about the hold-up."
The two sheriffs and their deputies discussed the situation thoroughly, and finally decided that the two train robbers were making for the Bad Lands in Big Horn county.
"If Tommy'd only come back now with that bear steak," Will suggested, "I could get all you boys a dinner that would put an inch of fat on your ribs! Seems to me it's pretty near time for him to be back."
"Suppose I go and hurry him up?" asked George.
"Go to it!" Will replied, "and I'll get out a lot of spuds and make a gallon of coffee, and we'll have a Sunday School picnic right here in the long grass! You've got to feed before you go away!"
"Everything looks mighty friendly here just now," Sandy answered, "but look up on top of the ridge, and see if you can tell what George is trying to say to us. That's Boy Scout wig-wag, all right!"
"Yes," replied Will, springing to his feet excitedly. "That's the Myer code, sure as you live, and he's got a big white pine bough he's using as a flag. Can you see what he is saying?"
"Sure!" replied Sandy, "He says he wants--now what do you think of that? He's stopped!"
As they looked the boy dropped to the ground
CHAPTER XIII
TOMMY GOES AFTER BEAR STEAK
Tommy started up the slope whistling gaily. At the summit he turned to look back at the camp. The cowboys were at that time standing some distance away and Seth was advancing toward the fire.
"That Seth is a good Indian!" declared the boy, "He'll fix things up all right, so there's no need of my going back. Gee!" he went on as he looked up and down the pleasant valley, warm and sweet under the morning sun. "It's a pretty good thing to be a Boy Scout! Here we find a man in the mountains of Wyoming ready to fight for us just because we are Boy Scouts. I should think every boy in the world would want to join!"
The lad stood for a moment watching the figures at the distant camp, and then hastened into the valley below. When he struck the rock-strewn gulch which lay to the south of the wide opening in the hills he paused and looked cautiously about.
"There may be plenty more bears here!" he mused.
But no bears or hostile animals of any kind were in sight, so the boy passed along to the cavern which George and Will had visited on the previous night--the cavern where the escaped convict and his son had made their home. Tommy glanced curiously into the opening in the rocky wall as he halted in front of it.
On the previous night he had passed this cavern in company with Sandy without observing it. At this time he was not certain that it was not the cave where he had met the bears, so he stepped inside after a moment's thought and advanced toward the rear wall.
A semi-twilight lay over the interior, and the boy brought out his searchlight. By its rays he saw a break in the rock of the north wall and stepped closer. The place was merely an alcove eight or ten feet in size, doubtless carved out by the action of water.
In the alcove the boy saw the embers of a fire. Then he turned about and inspected the outer cave more carefully. He saw the rude furniture which his chums had observed the night before, and the pitifully small supply of cooking utensils. Lying on the table was a generous supply of fresh meat, evidently taken from the carcass of one of the bears.
Tommy had heard little said concerning the cave which had been occupied by Wagner and his son, but quite enough to understand that he had stumbled upon the place.
What puzzled him now was the presence of the bear meat. He knew very well that neither Wagner nor his son had occupied the place since the disappearance of the father. He understood, too, that if there had been provisions in the cave at the time of the visit of his chums, they would have referred to the fact. Besides all this, the bear which had probably supplied the meat had been killed only a few hours before.
"I guess some one's moved in!" the boy mused.
He went into the alcove and examined the embers of the fire. It had been built of dry pine and spruce boughs and had evidently burned brightly an hour before.
"Now I wonder," the boy puzzled, "whether Wagner isn't hiding some where in the cave. It doesn't seem to me that any one else would take possession of the blooming old flat."
Resolved to return to the cavern later, the lad hastened outside and moved toward the south. He was not exactly certain of the location of the cavern where the fight with the bears had taken place, but he had no doubt that he could find it by peering into every opening he came to.
He had proceeded but a short distance when the face of Katz peered out at him from one of the minor caves. Cullen, the fellow's associate stood not far away with his cruel mouth stretched into a sardonic grin.
"Where are you going, boy?" Katz asked.
Tommy hesitated a moment and a twinkle of humor came into his eyes as he answered the gruff question of the detective.
"I'm looking after the train robbers you chased up last night."
The two men scowled angrily and drew nearer to the lad.
"I don't believe you told the truth about that train robber!" Katz said. "I was right on the ground and I saw no one."
"You beat him to it!" laughed Tommy. "You went one way and he went the other! You're both good runners, I guess, for you never came within a mile of each other," he added.
"None of your impudence, now!" snarled Katz.
"I think we ought to take this boy in out of the wet," suggested Cullen. "He's too fresh, anyway."
"You'd better confine your attentions to the train robbers, or the man you came in here to find," suggested Tommy.
"I don't believe there are any train robbers here!" declared Katz.
"Perhaps not," answered Tommy, "but about half the officers of Fremont and Sweetwater counties are loafing around these hills! Besides," he added, "I got a look at the train robbers last night."
The two detectives glanced at each other apprehensively.
"Was there a train robber at your camp last night?" asked Katz.
"Sure there was!"
"Is your camp headquarters for outlaws?"
"Not that I know of," replied Tommy, angrily.
"Don't you know that the boy who stole my property at your camp is connected with an escaped convict?"
"I don't know anything about the boy," declared Tommy, not telling the truth exactly. "He looks all right to me!"
"Do you know what I think?" Cullen demanded. "I think you boys came in here to set up a base of supplies for outlaws!"
"Aw, you don't know what you're talking about!" exclaimed Tommy.
"If you're not mixed up with this escaped convict," Katz demanded, "what are you doing here?"
"Early this morning," Cullen went on, "we found the cave where Wagner and his son had been living. That's it back there. The one you entered and looked over so carefully. Did you expect to find Wagner there?"
"Did you build a fire in there?" asked Tommy.
The detectives shook their heads.
"Did you take a big piece of bear meat in there?"
"We certainly did not!"
Here was another puzzler for Tommy. Who had built the fire in the cavern? Who had taken the bear meat there? The cowboys were not in that vicinity at the time the fire must have been built. The detectives declared that they had not built the fire, or carried in the meat.
"Did you find a fire burning in the cavern?" asked Katz.
Tommy nodded.
"And fresh meat there, too?"
Another nod from the boy.
"What do you make of it, Cullen?" asked Katz, turning to his companion.
Cullen shook his head, and a thought which brought a smile to his freckled face crept into Tommy's mischievous cranium.
"I'll tell you what I think," he said. "We were in this gulch last night, and saw the train robbers. They were on the summit, not far from the Wagner flat, as we ought to call it. If anybody has been living in that cave this morning, it's the train robbers. Say," he went on, with the idea of giving the detectives a good scare, "those train robbers are the fiercest fellows I ever saw. We saw 'em hold up six armed cowboys last night!"
The two detectives looked at each other apprehensively.
"If they should see you standing here," Tommy went on, "and were wise to the fact that you are Chicago detectives, they'd pump in the lead until your heads looked like a pound of Swiss cheese."
"You seem to know quite a lot about those train robbers, lad!"
"He knows too much," Cullen declared. "We'll just take him along with us and hold him for a few hours!"
"If you do, you'll get in trouble!" declared Tommy.
"No threats, now!" cried Katz.
"I'm not making any threats," declared Tommy who really was rather anxious to have the detectives take him away to their camp. "I think you're a couple of cheap skates, anyway, and I don't believe you're Chicago detectives. I live in Chicago myself, and I never saw bums like you on the force of plain clothes men."
The taunting words did exactly what Tommy had expected them to do. Katz seized him viciously by the arm and started away down the valley. The boy was perfectly willing to accompany the detective, for he believed that by doing so he might find out what steps they were taking for the capture of the escaped convict, but he pretended to feel great indignation as he was hurried along over the rough ground.
As the three moved away George swung up the slope on the other side and came into view on the summit. The boy had cut a white pine climbing staff from which the small boughs had not been trimmed away, and Tommy saw that he was using this as a wig-wag flag. It was plain to the boy that George thoroughly understood the situation below.
The detectives growled out several vicious oaths as they saw the boy swinging his staff from the summit. They whispered together for a moment, and then Katz, leaving Tommy threatened by Cullen's revolver, moved toward the summit and the signaling boy.
When, in a moment, George looked down the slope to the east, he saw the detective creeping stealthily toward him. The officer was some, distance away, yet the boy knew that he was in danger from the gun in his hand. He gave one last swing and dropped his staff.
"Come down here!" shouted the detective. "I want to see you!"
"Come up here, then!" answered George. "What are you doing to my chum? You're always butting in on us boys!"
"If you don't come down instantly," shouted the angry detective, "I'll fill your hide full of lead! I've got you covered!"
Seeing by the malicious look on the face of the detective that he was really in earnest, George dropped quickly to the ground.
CHAPTER XIV
A PAIR OF PRISONERS
Tommy saw his chum drop and, supposing that he had been injured in some way, started racing up the slope. Directly he found himself hampered by Cullen, who was clinging to the tail of his khaki coat.
As the boy drew up George rose from the ground and moved down the slope facing the east. Tommy saw that he was acting under instructions from Katz, who held a revolver in his hand.
In five minutes the boys, unarmed now, were walking along by the side of the detectives. A wink from George convinced Tommy that his chum had at least succeeded in attracting the attention of the people at the camp below. It might be that help would come before the detectives could lead them to a hiding place in the hills.
What the boys appeared to need just at that time was delay, so they asked all sorts of questions as they walked along, hoping that their captors would pause to answer them. However, the fellows plugged steadily along toward the opposite side of the ridge, and finally drew up on a shelf of rock from which the caverns to the west could be plainly seen. Here the officials sat down to watch and wait.
Directly a group of men came dashing over the summit and hastened down into the valley. The boys were certain that they recognized Will in the company. It was certain that Sheriff Pete was there, and the boys were positive that the two men who had been found in the camp on their return from the midnight expedition were also there.
The men separated at the foot of the slope and scattered up and down the gulch. It was clear that George's wig-wag signals had been seen, and that the men were in search of the two boys.
"Those signals of yours must be effective," snarled Katz as the members of the party across the gorge began exploring the caverns.
"You're right, they are!" answered George. "That's the Boy Scout wig-wag! You have to learn those things when you join the Boy Scouts!"
"What did you say?"
"I explained that we had been captured by the train robbers!" replied George, telling the untruth with a great deal of satisfaction as he saw the effect produced on the detectives.
"What'd you do that for?" demanded Cullen. "Because we want the cowboy officers to get hold of you fellows, and beat you up!" answered George. "They'll do it, too, if they lay hands on you! Those fellows are our friends!"
"Where's that boy who stole my property?" demanded Katz.
"He was down in the camp when I left," replied George.
"Do you think he's with that crowd on the other side of the gulch now? Or would he stay at the camp?"
"He probably would come out in answer to George's signal," Tommy cut in.
The detectives whispered together for some moments. Although the boys could not hear a word they were saying, they understood very well what all the whispering was about. They were discussing the possibility of capturing Chester and forcing him to lead them to his father's hiding place. They did not, of course, know that the father was wandering over the mountains in a demented condition.
After a time the party passed on down the valley much to the disgust of the two captive lads, and disappeared from sight. Then the detectives left the angle of the ledge which had concealed them and motioned the boys down the slope. The lads obeyed wonderingly.
Arrived at the bottom of the gulch once more, the detectives halted for another long consultation. Katz seemed to be in favor of following the party which had gone down the valley in the hope of getting hold of Chester, while Cullen was of the opinion that they might be able to capture the escaped convict himself by lingering around the cavern where the fire had been so mysteriously kindled.
While the two discussed, not without some show of anger, the situation, the two boys kept their eyes fixed on the opposite cavern. George knew positively that it was the one which had been occupied by the escaped convict and his son, and he believed that in time the father would return to it. It seemed to him that Cullen was clinging to an opinion which might cause himself and friends serious trouble.
"Gee!" he whispered to Tommy, "I wish we could get these flatties to follow the cowboys! I'm afraid they'll catch Wagner if they hang around that cave over there!"
"I'm afraid they will!" replied Tommy. "There's some one been there this morning, and it wasn't the cowboys or the detectives, either. It was either Wagner or the train robbers."
"Just as sure as you're a foot high," exclaimed George, "there's some one moving about in the entrance to that cavern now! I can see something moving, but I can't see any features."
"Well, don't look that way too steadily," Tommy cried. "If Wagner is over there we don't want to put these detectives wise to the fact. He's the man they're in here after, you remember!"
"Well, there's some one there, all right!" exclaimed George. "While you were talking, I saw a chalk-white face appear for a second at the entrance. I'll bet he's been hiding there ever since last night."
"He was with the train robbers last night," suggested Tommy. "At least we think he was, for there are only two robbers and we saw three men."
"He may be with the train robbers, now for all we know," George put in.
"Yes, they may be hiding over there," Tommy admitted. "If I thought they were, I'd steer these bum detectives up against them!"
"We'd better not take any chances!" advised George. "If Wagner is over there, he may be alone. In that case, these cheap flatties would geezle him and make for the Union Pacific railroad without stopping to say good-by to the hills. And once they get to the railroad, it's all off with the young man in Chicago who is soon to be tried for murder."
While the boys discussed the situation, Katz caught sight of the moving figure in the entrance to the cavern. The boys saw him pointing in that direction and about abandoned hope.
"There's some one over there," the boys heard Katz saying, "and we may as well go and see who it is. Have you got a pair of handcuffs with you?" he added, turning to his companion.
"Of course I have!" was the reply.
"Then use them on these two boys!" ordered Katz. "Tie them together so they won't be apt to go chasing off if we get into action."
Cullen did as requested, and the boys, unable to make resistance at that time, resolved that both officers should pay well for the indignity in the future. When the detectives started forward, they walked as slowly as possible, one of them frequently falling down, in order to give the person in the cavern, whoever he might be, plenty of time to observe the approach of the detectives.
"Gee!" exclaimed Tommy. "These fellows blunder along like a load of hay. If the man over there has any sense, he'll be a mile off before they get to the entrance! I hope the train robbers are there!"
"Well, I hope Wagner isn't there," George said.
There were no signs of light as the two detectives scrambled up the little slope which lay between the bottom of the gulch and the entrance to the cavern. The faint smell of burning wood reached their nostrils, but no one was in sight. They stepped inside boldly.
Following along behind, more as a matter of curiosity than because they felt obliged to do so, the boys saw the detectives standing in the twilight of the place looking about. Then they saw them drop their arms to their sides, heard the clatter of revolvers upon the rocky floor and realized that something unexpected was taking place inside.
Directly the detectives came out to the entrance and sat down on the hard floor, their backs against the south wall. The boys looked them over with pleased eyes, and Tommy went so far as to wrinkle his freckled nose at Katz, who frowned savagely but said nothing.
"Look here, you fellows," Katz finally blurted out. "I want you to understand that you're getting yourselves into trouble."
"Is that so?" came a hoarse and scornful voice from the darkness.
"I'm Detective Katz, of the Chicago force," continued the officer, "and I command you, in the name of the law, to return our weapons and let us depart in peace!"
"And I guess you don't know who we are!" came the voice from inside. "We're Red Mike of the Gulch and Daring Dan of the Devil's Dip, and we're out for blood! When we're at home in the Bad Lands, we feed on rattlesnakes!"
"Say," Tommy whispered to George, "that ain't so bad, is it? Those fellows know they've got the detectives buffaloed, and they're piling it on. I'll bet if we sat a little nearer, we could hear the detectives' teeth rattle!"
"The robbers certainly have a sense of humor," grinned George.
In a moment two muscular, bearded figures came out of the cavern and stood facing the two detectives. The boys at once recognized the men as the ones who had ridden so fiercely by their campfire on the night of their arrival. Tommy was certain that one of the men was the person who had been waiting for supper at the camp when informed of the presence of the detectives.
"Do you belong with this bunch?" one of them asked.
The boys held up their handcuffed wrists.
"Who's got the key?" demanded the outlaw.
Cullen held out a ring of keys and the robber promptly used one of them on the handcuff. When the manacles dropped from the boys' wrists, he threw the ring of keys into the gulch and tossed the handcuffs in the same direction.
"I've claimed all along that you boys belonged with these train robbers," Katz gritted as the handcuffs rattled down the slope.
"And now we know it!" Cullen cut in.
The two boys leaned against the north wall of the cavern and shook their sides with laughter. The fright of the two detectives was so absolute that it was pitiful.
"You certainly are a bum pair of detectives!" Tommy said.
CHAPTER XV
AN UNDERGROUND CHANNEL
Following along behind the two sheriffs and their deputies, Will and Chester finally came to the cavern which by mutual consent the boys now called the Cave of the Three Bears.
"Tommy was headed for this place!" exclaimed Will. "It's a mystery to me where George disappeared to so suddenly. Of course, we didn't see enough of his wig-wag to know what he intended to say, but we understand there's something amiss."
"There are plenty of caverns here in which one may hide," Chester answered. "There is one just north of this which has several good-sized rooms. Father and I thought of moving to that one."
They passed into the Cave of the Three Bears and found that one hide had been partly removed, and that a huge piece of meat had been taken away.
"I guess Tommy's been here all right!" Will suggested.
Chester stooped down and examined the carcass carefully.
"No," he said. "Tommy wanted the three skins for rugs. He never cut the hide like that to get at the meat."
"No, he wouldn't do that," Will admitted.
"Father may have been here," suggested Chester.
"We should have stopped at the cave where you two formerly lived," said Will. "For all we know, your father may be hiding there now."
"I know it," replied Chester, "but we came on so fast and in such a state of excitement that we didn't think of doing so."
"Well, we mustn't let the others get too far ahead of us," Will suggested. "They must be quite a ways off now!"
"Don't you think we can do a better job with them out of the way?" asked Chester. "They go roaring along like a herd of elephants."
"I presume we can," replied Will. "Anyway we can make an investigation of our own and then go back to camp. Sandy is alone there with his wounded shoulder, and almost anything is likely to happen."
"We'll go into the cave I spoke about a moment ago," Chester said, "and examine it thoroughly with the searchlights."
"What's the idea of that?" asked Will.
"Well, Tommy and George are in some one of these caves. They may be hiding from us or they may have been captured by the train robbers. If they are hidden away, they're quite likely to be in the large cavern I spoke of. It won't do any harm to look through it."
"Why, that must be the cave where we saw the three men last night!" Will exclaimed. "I have an idea that the three men we saw were the two train robbers and your father."
"That was my idea at the time," the boy replied, "but now I can't quite make up my mind that father would tie up with such a bunch."
"Bless your innocent soul," grinned Will. "Your father couldn't help associating with them if they insisted upon it! I can see no reason why they should want to molest him, but one can never account for the mental processes of train robbers."
"I believe this is the same place!" Chester cried as they stepped inside. "You know father often talked about moving to this cave, and I've got an idea that he knows more about the locality than I do."
"In what way?" asked Will.
"Well, I think he found some secret passage here. I believe he knows how to enter and leave this cavern without being seen. This whole ridge, you know, is honeycombed with caverns and tunnels. I have been told," the boy continued, "that the gorge and the valley to the east formed the basin for a great lake, hundreds of years ago, and that the water seeped through the limestone rock until there wasn't much left of it in some places. There are certainly plenty of caves here!"
"I should say so!" replied Will turning on his searchlight.
"Look here," Chester went on, "that would be a reason for the train robbers hanging to father, if they found him, wouldn't it?"
"I don't understand," replied Will.
"Why, if father knows a lot of passages and hiding places and empty river channels, in this section, he's just the man the train robbers would want to tie to."
"I understand now," Will replied. "And you remember, too," he continued, "how mysteriously the three men disappeared last night? Why, they got out of sight as quickly as if they had been painted on a slate and rubbed out."
"That's a fact!" replied Chester.
"There's one thing about it," Will argued, "the train robbers won't dare to go on into the bad lands, for they have no supplies, and their horses must be about used up. By remaining here, they may be able to steal supplies and, possibly get out to Lander and buy some."
"I guess we've got it doped out all right," Chester answered. "All we've got to do now is to go on and see whether we have or not."
The boys pressed on to the back of the first cavern and turned to the right into one which ran parallel with it. Their lights showed that a fire had been built in the tunnel connecting the two. There were also empty tin cans and cardboard food packages scattered about.
"This looks like population," grinned Will.
"Isn't this the spot from which the men disappeared?" asked Chester.
"Unless I am much mistaken," Will returned, "the three men were in front of a fire in this tunnel. Say, but they did get out of sight quick, didn't they? It was like the scene from the Black Crook."
"Then the passage they crawled into can't be far away," Chester volunteered, "at any rate, right here's where we want to make our search!"
"There's no knowing where this wrinkle leads to," Will said as the lights pierced the narrow channel. "If we get down there, we may never be able to get back."
"Father must have known of this place," Chester said, "and that's why he talked about moving our camp here."
"Well, if he used the passage, we certainly can!" replied Will.
"Are we going down now?" asked Chester.
"I'm game for it."
"Well, then, wait a minute!"
Chester ran to the entrance of the cavern and looked up and down the gorge and valley. When he returned there was a worried look on his face. He pointed to the dry channel and said:
"We may as well be getting down there. There's some one coming."
"Who is it?" asked Will.
"I couldn't distinguish faces," was the reply.
"Wasn't George and Tommy, was it?"
"No, two men. They're coming along fast, so we may as well get under cover. We don't know where we're going, but we're on our way," he smiled as he dropped down on his hands and knees and scrambled backward into what had once been the channel of a mountain stream.
Will followed in a moment and, after trying his best to draw the boulder into place, scrambled on after his chum.
"Did you get the rock fixed?" asked Chester as they came together on a little level place probably thirty feet down.
"Couldn't budge it!" was the reply.
"Well, then, we'll keep on going."
"Je-rusalem!" exclaimed Will. "I believe this thing runs clear through the ridge. And that would make it something like a mile long!"
"Of course it does," Chester answered. "This ditch was cut by water, and the water had to find an outlet somewhere."
"If your father knows all about this underground network of caverns and channels," Will said in a moment, "we'll have a happy old time finding him! He can dodge us here for a month."
"And those officers will have a fine old job getting the train robbers, too," Chester chuckled, "if they're acquainted with this underground system of highways. It strikes me," he went on, "that these train robbers have been here before."
"That may be!" answered Will. "In fact, it, occurs to me that your father searched out all these subterranean roads and rooms and showed them to the train robbers."
The boys proceeded downward for some distance and then stopped in a tolerably large chamber to rest and investigate.
"There's no use of our going on until we know whether the fellows you saw are coming in here," Will reasoned.
"I'm going up to the top again," said Chester, "and see what's going on there! The fellows I saw may be coming in."
Will waited for a long half hour for the boy's return, and when at last Chester slid down to him his face showed that he was frightened.
"They've got the combination to this channel all right!" he said.
CHAPTER XVI
CULLEN LOSES HIS STAR
"So these are the detectives, are they?" asked one of the train robbers, as the two men crouched against the wall of the cavern.
"That's what they say!" answered Tommy.
"What were they doing to you?"
"They had us pinched."
"What for?"
"They said we belonged to your gang."
The bandit laughed hoarsely.
"To our gang?" he said. "The perfectly correct gentleman of the road never has a 'gang'. He believes thoroughly in the old theory that 'he travels fastest who travels alone'."
"So they pinched you for being associates of ours, did they?" asked the other outlaw.
"That's what they said," replied Tommy.
"And that was the truth, too!" roared Katz.
"You seem to know all about these boys, and they know all about you. You've been seen at their camp, and one of the boys at the camp stole my property, too!" he went on with another roar of indignation.
"Chester stole his official star!" chuckled Tommy.
"That's a pious notion, too?" laughed the outlaw. "Have you got a star, too?" he asked, stepping up to Cullen. "If you have, hand it over. I don't think you're fit to wear a police badge!"
Cullen handed his star over with a scowl, and the outlaw passed it to Tommy. The boy put it in his pocket with a grin at the detective.
"Did you fellows have the nerve to come in here after us?" asked the robber.
"We came in after an escaped convict," was the reply.
"Did you get him?"
"Not yet, but we will get him."
"Well, I'd advise you both to go back home before the escaped convict comes up and steals your necktie. You're not large enough to be out alone after dark."
"We're going to take that escaped convict back with us," Katz boasted. "We'll get him if we stay here a year."
"We'll give you two days to get him," grinned one of the outlaws. "We'll turn you loose for two days. If you catch him in that time and get out, very well. If you don't catch him in that time, you'll get out anyhow. You stiffs are attracting altogether too much attention to this part of the country. It's getting so an honest train robber can't get a good night's sleep."
The outlaw pointed to the gulch below and motioned for the fellows to move along. They started but looked back pleadingly.
"Can't we have our guns?" Katz asked.
"And our badges?" pleaded Cullen.
"No," replied the outlaw. "You might injure yourself with the guns, and the badges are no good anywhere outside of Chicago. If you don't get out right now, we'll handcuff you to a tree and let the bears feed on you. You don't look good to us anyway."
"Look-a-here," Tommy said to the two outlaws as the detectives disappeared down the gulch. "Do you know that every person in the state of Wyoming will be believing that we really belong to your crowd if this thing keeps up? We're much obliged to you for bluffing the cowboys last night, and getting us out of the handcuffs just now, but you're getting us into trouble just the same."
"Any time we get a chance to bluff an officer out of a captive, we're going to do it!" laughed one of the outlaws. "We're not asking you whether you like it or not. We're pleasing ourselves in what we're doing."
"And here's another thing," the other outlaw said, with something like a scowl. "We've got the idea that you wouldn't be doing as much for us as we've been doing for you. The men who came in here to hunt us down make their headquarters at your camp. If you go back to your friends now, you'll tell them where you saw us, and describe everything that's taken place. Therefore, we're not going to let you go back to your camp right away. You're going to be our guests for a time."
"What's the good of that?" demanded Tommy.
"That's our business," replied the outlaw.
"We'll never mention you to our crowd," George added.
"Anyway," the outlaw insisted, "it's safer for us to keep track of you two kids. I'd rather have a dozen Chicago sleuths after me than three or four husky little Boy Scouts."
"Say," Tommy asked with a grin, "do you remember those plays where a shrinking maiden would be in the center of the stage one minute and be grabbed by the villain the next, and be grabbed back by the hero in the next, and be grabbed back by the villain in the next, and be grabbed back by the hero for the final curtain?"
"I remember something like that," said the outlaw with a laugh.
"That's us!" grinned Tommy. "That's George and me! We're here to be captured by cowboys, and bum detectives, and bearded train robbers, and I don't know what form our imprisonment will take next."
"When we get back to Chicago," George went on, whimsically, "we're going to write up a story of our capture by two bold, bad men who gave their names as Red Mike of the Gulch and Daring Dan of the Devil's Dip or something like that."
"Say," Tommy cut in, "when you called those names out of the darkness you certainly did have those detectives buffaloed!"
"You're a pair of nervy kids, anyway," laughed the outlaw.
"Oh, this is all right," laughed Tommy. "This will be one more experience. We've been chased by smugglers over the Pictured Rocks of Lake Superior, and we've been chased by alligators in the Everglades of Florida, and now we've been geezled by the bold, bad men who held up the Union Pacific pay car."
"How do you know we did?" demanded one of the outlaws.
"That's the dope that's been coming to us right along."
"Well, come on," the other outlaw said rather impatiently. "We've got to get out of sight! We can't expect to remain in the open in broad daylight without being seen by some one."
"Move along, boys," ordered the other.
"Where?" asked Tommy.
"Straight ahead."
"But where are you going to take us?"
"Oh, you'll know all about that soon enough," was the reply. "We've got a place over here where we can keep our friends in seclusion."
"It seems the place keeps you in seclusion," grinned George. "You've been in here about as long as we have, and we've been captured numerous times and you've never been taken at all. But you'll get it up your neck one of these days," he added.
"When we're captured," one of the men said grimly, "it won't be by a lot of tin-horn detectives from Chicago."
They all walked along for some distance, and then Tommy turned back and faced the two outlaws.
"If we've got far to go," he said, "I wish you'd stop in at some lunch counter and order something to eat. I haven't had anything this morning only wind sandwiches. I came out to get a piece of that bear meat for breakfast, and I'm here yet."
"And I came out to hurry you up," George cut in, "and I'm here yet!"
"All right," laughed one of the outlaws, accepting the humor of the request. "If we run across a free lunch sign anywhere, well take the two of you in. We're hungry ourselves."
"Have you got anything to eat in this secluded retreat of yours?" asked Tommy. "If you have, we'll hurry up."
"Not a thing!" was the reply.
"Then we'll walk slow!" declared George.
"Look here!" Tommy advised. "Why don't you go back and get some of that bear steak. It's only a little way back to the Cave of the Three Bears, and there's enough meat there to last the four of us a week if we can only keep it from spoiling."
"That's a bright idea," said one of the outlaws, stopping suddenly. "Suppose we do go back and load up with fresh steak."
"I'm for it!" answered Tommy, rubbing his stomach.
They all walked back to the Cave of the Three Bears, and when they left each carried quite a load of fresh meat.
"Have you got a place to cook it?" asked Tommy.
"Have you got any coffee?" asked George.
"I think we'll have to let you boys go pretty soon," one of the outlaws grinned. "If we don't you'll be apt to eat us out of house and home."
"We're some on the eat!" Tommy announced.
After a time the four came, without further incident, to the chain of caverns which Will and Chester had entered some time before.
They paused for a moment in the connecting tunnel, where the fire had been built on the previous night, and inspected the boulder, which lay a short distance from the opening to the dry channel.
"He's been here and gone on in," one of the outlaws said.
"Perhaps some one else has been here," the other suggested.
"The man who showed us where to enter this labyrinth is the only man in the mountains who knows anything about it!" declared the other. "I'm not certain that we didn't leave the stone out of place when we left this morning. But, if we didn't, our friend is certainly down stairs at this minute! I'll drop down and see, anyway!"
"Push the boys in first," advised the other.
"What do you think of this for an elevator?" demanded Tommy as he backed into the opening. "These fellows seem to be foolish--like a fox!"
George followed Tommy into the tunnel as the latter dropped down, and then the figure of one of the outlaws blocked the opening.
For only a minute, however, for the boys heard a succession of pistol shots, and then the sound of voices rang into the cavern they had just left.
The next instant the outlaws crowded into the tunnel, but instead of dropping down, waited near the entrance, weapons in hand.
CHAPTER XVII
A MEETING UNDER GROUND
"Some one's got the combination to this channel, all right!" Chester repeated as he joined Will in the larger cavern.
"Did you see them?" asked Will.
"Can't see anything," was the reply, "it's too dark!"
"Then how do you know there's some one coming?"
"We saw them coming toward the cave, didn't we?" asked Chester.
"Look here," Will exclaimed. "Did you see any one entering the mouth of this tunnel?"
"When the mouth of the tunnel is clear," Chester replied, "there's a faint mist of light visible. While I lay up there watching I heard whispering voices and the entrance was blocked."
"Perhaps they've rolled the boulder in front of it," suggested Will.
"You don't like the idea of being caught like a rat in a trap any more than I do," Chester said, "but I really believe that if we ever get out of here alive, we'll have to head toward the west and make our exit on that side of the range."
"I'd like to know how many people know about this hiding place!" Will grumbled. "If people walk out of the valley and drop down here, there may, for all we know, be others in hiding further down."
"That's a fact," Chester admitted.
"I wish we knew who the people are who are entering the tunnel," Will said. "It may be the robbers, or the detectives, or the sheriffs. It may even be your father, for all we know."
"Well, shall we move on down to see if we can find an outlet?" asked Chester. "That seems to me to be the best thing to do."
"It strikes me that that is the only thing we can do."
The boys were moving on down the almost level floor of the chamber in absolute darkness, for they did not consider it safe to show their electrics when they heard a chuckle in the darkness.
They drew up instantly and listened.
"That's Tommy!" declared Will.
"It can't be," replied Chester.
"Don't you suppose I know that chuckle?"
"Well, the boys weren't with the men I saw near the mouth of the cavern," declared Chester.
The boys listened again for some moments, and then caught sight of a finger of light far up the slope of the tunnel.
"That's a searchlight!" declared Chester.
"It surely is," agreed Will.
While the boys stood in the darkness, waiting and listening, they heard a voice which they had no difficulty in recognizing as that of Tommy.
"This is some basement stairway," the boy said.
The next moment George's voice was heard.
"We must be about nine stories under ground by this time," he said.
There was silence for a moment and then Tommy was heard to ask:
"What's become of our chaperons?"
"There's something doing out in the lobby," the boys heard George say, "and I guess they went back to defend their home and fireside."
"I hope they'll get a couple of bullets in their domes!" declared Chester. "They've helped us out several times, but they've never done it because they wanted to do us a favor!"
"Keep still a minute," Will suggested. "Let's hear what those boys are saying. I'd like to know who they're talking about."
"I haven't got much use for the detectives," they heard George saying, "but I hope they'll get these train robbers and get them good and plenty!"
"So it's the train robbers!" exclaimed Will.
"I don't believe the detectives will ever get within a mile of the robbers," the boys heard Tommy say. "If anybody catches the outlaws, it'll be the sheriff of Fremont county."
"The man at the head of the cowboys?" they heard George ask.
"That's the fellow!" Tommy replied.
"He hasn't got 'em yet," George declared.
"Oh, he's had hard luck, all right enough," Will and Chester heard Tommy say, "but he's a nervy sort of a chap, and he'll take them out with him when he goes."
"That's the fellow that wanted to lynch us!" George grumbled.
"That was a bluff!" Tommy said. "That's the kind of third degree business they go into out in the mountains. I guess that was all a by-play, anyhow. You don't catch no western sheriff lynching his own prisoners. And this sheriff of Fremont county will just get even with those train robbers for that hold-up!" the boy added.
The boys listened intently for a short time, not daring to show their light yet. From the conversation they had heard they understood that their chums had been placed in the tunnel for safe keeping, and they feared that their captors might appear at any moment.
After a time two shots came from the cavern end of the dry channel, and the close air of the place became almost stifling with the smell of powder smoke. Then the two watchers heard George and Tommy scrambling down to the place where they stood.
Will flashed his light but instantly closed it.
"Did you see that?" they heard Tommy ask.
"Sure I did!"
"What do you think it is?"
"I give it up!" replied George.
No one spoke for an instant and then the call of the Beaver came out of the darkness.
"Slap, slap, slap!"
"Do you mind that, now?" asked Will.
"I don't see how I could fail to recognize that!" Chester said.
"Of course not," Will agreed. "That's the call of the Beaver."
Will answered the challenge, and presently Tommy and George came tumbling down the tunnel into the larger opening and landed almost at the feet of their chums. In their joy at the meeting, the boys almost hugged each other, which they would not have done in daylight!
"So they got you, too, did they?" asked Tommy.
"I should say not," answered Will.
"But you're here, ain't you?"
"Yes, but we came here of our own free will," Chester cut in.
"How'd you ever find it?" asked George.
"Just blundered into it," was the answer. "We were looking for father, and thought we might find him in the cavern where the three men were seen around the campfire."
"So that passage out there is really the place where the mysterious disappearance took place? Where the three men went up in the air?"
"Where the three men came down into this dry channel!" corrected George.
"Who were the three men?" asked Will.
"If they leave it to me," George replied, "two of them were train robbers and the third was Chester's father."
"That's about the way we had it sized up," Will agreed.
"By the way, Tommy," asked Chester with a slight chuckle, "where's the bear meat you left the camp to get for breakfast?"
"I've got it out here in the cavern!" replied Tommy.
"Is that right, George?" asked Chester.
"We sure have a lot of it out in the vestibule!" agreed George.
"Let's see," Will said, nudging George in the ribs, "you went after Tommy to bring him back, didn't you?"
"Sure I did," answered George. "And I brought him back, didn't I?"
"You didn't bring him back to camp," Will answered.
"And you're the fellow who wig-wagged to us to come and escort the two of you home," continued Will, addressing George with a laugh.
"Sure I wig-wagged," replied the boy.
"Then why didn't you stay there until we came up and tell us what you wanted. You're a fine boy to wig-wag!"
"Circumstances over which I had no control intervened," replied George. "I got pinched."
Then the story of the adventures of Tommy and George were told and Will told of the doings of those who had left the camp in answer to the call for help.
"Then the sheriffs and their men are not far away?" asked Will.
"Why, they must be in the cavern," answered Tommy. "When the train robbers chucked us down into this dry sewer the sheriffs were entering the audience chamber on the outside."
"And where did the detectives go?" asked Will.
"I don't think they've got done going yet!" replied Tommy. "The train robbers took away their badges, and gave 'em two days in which to get out of town. Gee!" the boy continued. "That sounds like Harrison street station, don't it? Give 'em two days to get out of town. They make me sick!"
"So they're all centering around this little old ex-aqueduct," George said. "In about five minutes the two sheriffs'll be crawling into this old drain and taking the train robbers by the scruff of the neck."
"I'd rather the sheriffs would lug the detectives out of the country," Chester observed. "They're the people who are looking for father."
"You want to keep mighty quiet about any one looking for your father," Will advised. "We are sure to bunt into these two sheriffs before long and if they know that your father is now regarded as a fugitive from justice, they'll get him and ship him back to Chicago, all right!"
"The sheriffs got held up by the train robbers," Tommy went on, "but they can't be blamed for that, and they tried to put us through the third degree when they thought we were in cahoots with the robbers, but they're game all the same. If you ever see those fellows in action you'll know there's something going on."
"And we're going to see them in action right now!" cried George.
A succession of shots came from the entrance to the old channel, and the boys heard the defenders scrambling down toward the chamber where they stood.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE FINDING OF WAGNER
"Good night!" cried Tommy.
The heavy footsteps came on faster than before. The ping of bullets was in the air, and the old channel was filling with powder smoke. Now and then the flash of a gun lit the passage.
"Me for the tall timber," Tommy went on, springing up the tunnel.
"Here! Where are you going?" shouted Will.
"There's a hiding place up here!" answered Tommy. "We saw it when we came down! Me for the hiding place."
"That's a fact!" Will exclaimed turning to Chester. "You remember the old channel running in from the southeast?"
"We'll have to get somewhere right soon!" Chester answered. "Perhaps that is as good a place as any."
Bullets singing down the narrow passage indicated that the sheriffs and their men had already entered the subterranean channel from above.
The train robbers were defending the passage heroically, but the officers were coming bravely on.
Directly the boys came to the lead which cut the south wall of the main channel into the shape of a "W." They passed on up this dry channel just as the train robbers, retreating step by step, came to the entrance.
"Shoot to kill!" the boys heard one of the outlaws saying.
"Do you know the way to the other end?" asked the second outlaw.
"I've been told how to find it," was the answer, "but I never made my way through it. Those sheriffs are game to come crowding into a hole like this in front of two armed and desperate men."
"You get up against the real thing when you strike a Wyoming sheriff," the other outlaw declared.
"Throw up your hands!" a heavy voice came from above.
"Come and take us!" was the only answer.
Another storm of bullets was followed by a groan of pain.
"They got me!" the boys heard one of the men say.
"They got me, too!" said the other. "It's a wonder we haven't been cut into ribbons before this!"
"All we can do now is to lay down and shoot as long as we've got ammunition," the first speaker advised.
"You may as well surrender, boys!" They heard Sheriff Pete's heavy voice saying. "I'm coming down there after you!"
The only answer from the outlaws was a volley of bullets, punctuated with oaths. Tommy turned to Will with a low chuckle.
"This seems to be a nice quiet Boy Scout excursion, doesn't it?" he asked. "We come up on the mountains to have a pleasant vacation, and we butt into a scene that wouldn't be admitted to the stage of any theatre because the critics would say that it wasn't true to life!"
"We certainly do strike life in the raw!" replied Will.
"Are you going to surrender?" shouted the sheriff from above.
"I'll bet they don't," whispered George.
"You're on!" Tommy shouted. "I'll bet they do."
The boys listened anxiously for the reply.
"I'm coming down there now!" they heard Sheriff Pete say.
"There isn't one man in a million who would dare walk into a trap like this," Will mused. "I wonder if this sheriff we've been finding fault with will have the nerve to do it."
"You see if he hasn't got the nerve to do it," Tommy answered.
The outlaws fired once more, and then the boys heard their weapons clattering down the tunnel.
"That's the stuff, boys!" the sheriff said.
They heard him sliding and scrambling down the channel, and turned on their flashlights. The sheriff paused with an exclamation of surprise, but came steadily on in a moment, his deputies not far in the rear.
"Throw up your hands there, you with the light!" cried the officer.
"I ain't going to throw up my hands," Tommy called out with a chuckle, "but if it'll give you any satisfaction, I'll throw up my job as a man-hunter. I have no further use for it!"
"That must be the Boy Scouts," the voice of the Sweetwater sheriff said. "I wonder how they got here."
As the officers came on under the rays of the searchlights, the boys having now stepped into the main tunnel, the outlaws stumbled to their feet and stood leaning against the wall. They were wounded in several places and blood was flowing quite freely, but their jaws were set in lines of determination.
The sheriffs glanced keenly about and smiled as their eyes took in the boys grouped together in the tunnel.
"What about it?" asked Sheriff Pete.
"That's a long story," Will answered.
One of the outlaws now stepped forward, although he still held himself upright by one hand on the wall.
"You're a nervy chap, Sheriff," he said.
"Turn and turn about is fair play!" replied the officer. "It isn't so very long ago that you held me up."
"Any man can hold up another when he has a loaded gun in his face," said the outlaw.
"It strikes me," the sheriff said, "that you'd better be removed from this hole as quickly as possible. Your wounds probably need attention."
"We're not sobbing about the wounds," was the reply. "The only kick we've got coming is that our ammunition gave out."
"You would have been taken in time!" was the reply.
"I guess that's right, with a man like you on our track, I've been in a good many tight spots but I never saw a man walk into a storm of bullets and appear to like it as you have done today."
"Never mind that now," the Sheriff cut in. "We're going to get you out so you can do a little work for the state before you die."
"Say," Tommy exclaimed as the officers and prisoners started to climb the steep tunnel, "when you get to the top have one of the men start a big fire. I'm so hungry that I could eat my way out of this rock like it was cheese."
"What you going to cook?" asked Will.
"Bear steak," replied Tommy.
"That's a joke!" declared Chester.
"Joke is it?" exclaimed Tommy. "You wait till we get out there and see whether it is or not. I went out after bear steak for breakfast, didn't I? Well, I got it, didn't I?"
"Breakfast!" repeated George, rubbing his Stomach. "It must be afternoon, and I'm hungry enough to bite a corner off the Masonic Temple."
"One o'clock!" said Will, looking at his watch.
"Are you boys really going to cook breakfast in the cavern?" asked the sheriff. "Why not go to the camp?"
"Because we can't walk to camp without first acquiring sustenance!" chuckled Tommy. "I'm empty from the top of my head to the end of my big toe!"
"If you'll ask your men to gather a lot of dry wood," George suggested, "we'll have a lot of bear steak ready to eat in about ten minutes."
"But we haven't got any salt!" objected the sheriff.
"Don't you think we haven't got any salt," Tommy replied. "You never saw a Boy Scout go out into the woods without plenty of salt and matches. And don't you think we don't know how to build a fire with one match and broil a steak over coals in ten minutes."
"All right!" laughed the sheriff. "You boys seem to be able to take care of yourselves."
"You didn't seem to think so a few hours ago," Will answered.
"There's one thing about you boys I really like," the sheriff returned with a hearty laugh. "The third degree makes about as much impression on you as it would on the Sphinx or on the Goddess of Liberty in New York harbor."
"That was the third degree, was it, then?" asked Will.
"Do you think I'd string up a lot of babies?" demanded the sheriff.
"Run along, now!" Tommy exclaimed. "Run along, Mr. Officer, and tell your men to bring up a lot of dry wood."
The officers made their way out, followed by George and Tommy, but Will and Chester still remained under ground.
"Did you hear anything in this tunnel?" asked Chester.
"I thought I did hear a moan, but the sheriff was talking in that voice of his at the time and I wasn't certain."
"Well," Chester said, "I believe father's in here somewhere."
"Why do you think that?"
"I've told you about how he wanted to move to this cavern, haven't I? And how he spent considerable time here?"
"You certainly have."
"And about my suspicions that he informed the outlaws of the underground passages?"
"Yes, you told me all that."
"Then you heard what the robbers said about some one having moved the stone, or gone in during their absence?"
"I had entirely forgotten that!" declared Will.
"Well, then, don't you see," Chester continued, "that they must have been speaking of father? That's why I think he's in here."
"Perhaps we'd better follow this channel and see if we can find him," Will suggested. "It does seem as if he might be here."
The bed of the old channel was very steep, and the boys scrambled up it with difficulty. After proceeding a few paces they heard a low groan and their flashlight showed the figure of a man lying on a narrow ledge of rock on the south side.
Chester darted forward instantly, almost falling on his face in his eagerness to reach his father and bent over the figure.
"It's father!" he shouted back to Will.
"Alive?"
"I'm afraid not."
Will lost no time in gaining the boy's side.
The ex-convict lay with his face turned upward, his arms folded across his breast. At first there were no indication of life.
CHAPTER XIX
SHERIFF PETE'S WINK
"He can't be dead!" cried Chester, trying to lift the still figure in his arms. "The wound he received was not a serious one."
"I'll tell you what I think," Will replied.
"I think he's weak from lack of food and sleep I don't believe these train robbers have been very considerate of him."
"But I don't see why they should misuse him!"
"They probably didn't have enough to eat themselves," Will returned. "Don't you remember how one of them came to camp and set Tommy to cooking for him, and how we frightened him away by saying that the detectives were just beyond the circle of light?"
"That was the night I was loitering around the camp waiting to get to one of you boys in order to ask you to help me find father," Chester replied. "Don't you remember you chased me up that night, and I ran away in the darkness, and one of the boys came upon the train robber and the other came upon one of the detectives."
"That was Tommy and Sandy," Will answered. "George and I were asleep in our tent when all that took place."
"I guess he's about starved all right!" Chester said lifting his father into a sitting position. "We'd better get some of the men down here and have him carried into the cavern."
"But look here," Will warned, "there mustn't a word be said about the detectives coming in here after him!"
"Why not?" asked Chester.
"Because, as I have told you before, if the sheriff understands that your father was a fugitive from justice, he'll send him to Chicago under arrest. It will be his duty to do so, in fact."
"And what do you boys propose to do with him?"
"We're going to take him back to Chicago and keep him out of the reach of the police. He knows something about a case we're interested in which he will never tell if sent back to prison."
"If he's sent back to prison," Chester replied, "you may be sure that he won't be willing to help anybody."
"He is innocent of the crime of which he was convicted, isn't he?" asked Will. "In other words, he was jobbed!"
"That's the truth!" cried Chester.
"Well, what we've got to do is to prove that!" Will went on.
"Can you do it?" asked the son, anxiously.
"We think we can," was the reply.
"If you can, father will do anything he can for you, you may be sure of that," Chester answered warmly.
"But the whole success of our scheme depends on our keeping your father out of the clutches of the officers until we land him in Mr. Horton's office in Chicago. For the first time in our lives," Will continued, "we are opposing the officers of the law. As a rule that isn't a good thing for Boy Scouts to do, but we think we are fully justified in the course we are taking in this case."
"What is it you want father to testify to?" asked Chester.
"I don't think we'd better stop now to discuss that," Will answered.
"I'm sure it can't be anything dishonorable."
"It's nothing dishonorable," Will assured the boy. "We believe that your father's testimony will save the life of a young man accused of murder. That's all I can tell you now."
"You refer to the Fremont case?" asked Chester.
"Exactly!" answered Will. "To the Fremont suicide case."
"The police call it the Fremont murder case!"
"So you have been reading about that, too, have you?" asked Will.
"I read about it in the newspapers on the day following what took place at the bank," Chester answered, "and I couldn't help a feeling of contempt for the police when I understood how wrong they were."
"So you know about that, too?"
"I know all about it!" replied Chester.
Will could have hugged the boy. He had long been wondering whether the testimony of Mr. Wagner would be accepted in court after the wound which had rendered him mentally incompetent had been discussed by physicians. He knew that in many cases men so injured never fully recovered.
It seemed almost like a miracle that the escaped convict's son should know something of the matter, too. The boy knew that even if Mr. Wagner fully recovered from his injury the police would object to his testimony on the ground of previous insanity. If the boy could corroborate the statements made by his father, that would prove sufficient.
Will was about to ask the lad further questions when the escaped convict opened his eyes and looked about.
His gaze sought the searchlight first, and then rested on the face of his son. Chester drew nearer and bent over him.
"Did I have a fall?" the man asked weakly.
He put his thin hand to his head as he spoke and drew it away covered with blood.
"Why this seems to be a fresh wound," Chester exclaimed, anxiously.
"Yes," replied the father, "I remember of hearing the sound of guns, and sensing the odor of powder smoke, and started to run down the passage and fell. I remember a shooting pain in my head and that's about all until I heard your voices and saw the light."
"Do you know where you are?" asked Will.
The escaped convict looked inquiringly at his son.
"Who is this boy?" he asked.
"A friend who has come to establish your innocence," was the reply.
"That is impossible," replied Wagner. "Every police official in Chicago is convinced of my guilt. They jobbed me to prison in the first instance and they are bound to keep me there!"
"Who were the detectives?" asked Will.
"Katz and Cullen!" was the answer.
"I see," Will said musingly.
"But we mustn't permit father to remain here," Chester cut in. "All these questions can be answered at another time."
"That's right," Will agreed. "And I'll go to the cavern and ask some of the men to carry your father out."
The boy was back in five minutes with Sheriff Pete and Deputy Seth. The sheriff looked down pityingly on the wounded man for a moment and then took him in his arms as if he had been a child and carried him to the cavern, where the boys and the deputies were assembled around a roaring fire over which Tommy and George were broiling bear steaks.
"Say, that listens good to me," George exclaimed, as the wounded man was laid down near the rear. "It appears that we're closing this case up in jig time."
"I guess we've got it about closed up," Will answered.
"There's only one thing we've got to do now," George added, "and that is to get rid of those two bum detectives."
"Last call for dinner in the dining car!" cried Tommy.
They all flocked to the fire, and Tommy and George presented each with a bear steak with the explanation that more would be forthcoming. The two train robbers looked on longingly.
"You boys suggested the bringing in of this meat," Tommy said, after a time, "and so I'm going to cook each of you a two pound steak."
"I guess we can take care of them all right," one of the outlaws replied. "We've been hungry for about a week."
"Say, kid," the other outlaw cut in, "I'd like to be just your age, and be a Boy Scout, with all the medals you've got, and money enough to travel about the world looking for trouble and meeting it like a man!"
"You had a chance once," Tommy answered rather pityingly.
"Never," was the reply. "I was reared in the slums of New York, and became a criminal before I was six years old. There were no Boy Scout organizations in those days, and so I never had any one ready and willing to point out the road that would lead to a successful life."
"Well, if there were no Boy Scouts to help you along then," Tommy replied, "there are plenty now to show the right way."
"And they are doing it, too, so far as I can see," Sheriff Pete cut in. "They seem to be doing a lot of good in the world."
"We try to," Tommy said, and turned back to cook the steaks promised to the outlaws. "And most of the time we succeed," he added.
"What was it one of you boys said about these two detectives?" asked Sheriff Pete, as he stood talking with Will, busy at the same time with a slice of bear meat.
"Why," Will answered, "I guess the remark was that the next thing for us to do would be to get rid of those detectives. They think they own the whole state of Wyoming."
"Chicago men are they?" asked the sheriff.
"Yes," was the answer.
"Do they claim to be here on business?"
"Why," replied Will in a hesitating tone, "they claim to be here after a fugitive from justice, but I guess they're on a hunting trip."
"If they're here on official business," the sheriff said, "I should think they'd report to me."
"It may be," Will suggested, "that they are in some way associated with these train robbers."
The sheriff looked at the boy with wide open eyes for a moment, and then drew one eyelid down in a long, significant wink.
"You really think they stand in with these outlaws?" he asked.
"Why," replied Will, with an equally significant wink, "I think they ought to be taken out to Lander or Green River and made to give an account of themselves."
"Come to think about it," the sheriff said, with a smile, "I've noticed several suspicious circumstances lately, and I think it really might be a good thing to take them to the county seat and make them give an account on themselves."
CHAPTER XX
DETECTIVES IN TROUBLE
While the sheriff and the boy were talking, Katz and Cullen came tramping angrily into the cavern. They stood regarding the sheriff and his deputies with scornful glances for a moment and then, ignoring them entirely, strolled up to where Will was standing.
"You are under arrest," Katz said.
"What for?" asked Will, as the others gathered around him.
"For participating in the escape of a fugitive from justice."
"Where is the fugitive from justice?" asked Will.
"I can't place my hands on him at this moment," was the arrogant reply, "but I'm going to know where he is before I permit these men to depart. I've stood about all the impudence I care to."
"What's that making all that noise?" called Tommy, from the fire.
The two detectives turned toward the boy.
"You are under arrest, too!" Cullen shouted.
"Why don't you take some one of your own size?" asked Tommy. "Why don't you go on and arrest some of these men?"
"I'll do that if it's necessary!" Katz exclaimed. "And look here," he went on. "I command you all to assist me in the capture of a fugitive from justice named Warren W. Wagner, as escaped convict who is wanted in Chicago for the crime of murder!"
"Do you think this Wagner person is here?" asked Seth.
"I haven't a doubt of it," was the angry reply.
"Then, like a good little boy, you chase out and find him."
"I'll find him quick enough," retorted Katz, advancing toward the spot where Wagner lay. "I'll find him too quick to please most of you fellows! Perhaps you can tell me who this man is."
The Boy Scouts gathered about the detective and Chester even sprang forward as if to defend his father from the officer's touch. It was Sheriff Pete, however, who prevented the actual arrest of the escaped convict at that time.
As the two detectives moved forward, attempting to brush the boys rudely aside, the sheriff seized Katz by the shoulder and swung him over to Sheriff Gilmore. Then he grabbed Cullen by the scruff of the neck and sent him spinning into the arms of Seth.
"What do you fellows mean by coming here and taking possession of our camp?" he thundered. "I'll teach you to get fresh around here! Put the handcuffs on the fellows, boys!"
One of the wounded outlaws raised himself from the floor and chuckled viciously as the two men were adorned with the manacles.
"Say," Katz exclaimed, trying to move toward the outlaws, "how did you get here? I've a great mind to put you both under arrest for your treatment of me a few hours ago."
"You're under arrest yourself!" laughed the outlaw pointing to the handcuffs. "You're a pretty skate to talk about arresting me."
"I protest against this, sir," exclaimed Katz, turning to Sheriff Pete. "I am Joseph J. Katz, detective of Chicago, and this is Edward E. Cullen, my associate. We are here under protection of the laws of your state, in quest of a fugitive from justice and I protest against this outrage."
"Where are your extradition papers?" demanded the sheriff.
"We don't usually get extradition papers until we get the man," scoffed Katz. "You ought to know that, if you're an officer."
"I mean your authority from the Governor of Illinois," said Sheriff Pete angrily.
"You can wire to the Chief of Police at Chicago, and see if what we say is not true," Katz answered.
"But your papers," insisted the Sheriff.
"They were to be forwarded to us," replied Katz.
"I don't believe they're detectives at all!" Tommy cut in.
"I don't think they have any authority to make arrests," Will said, with a sly wink at the sheriff. "If they have, where are their badges?"
"They were stolen!" shouted Katz. "These Boy Scouts took mine, and those train robbers, who seem to be under arrest now, took Cullen's."
"You want to look out when you come down into Wyoming," said the sheriff with a chuckle. "I've known Chicago detectives to come down here and have their socks stolen off their feet!"
"Aw, they ain't detectives," argued Tommy. "They belong to this bunch of train robbers. I saw 'em talking with the robbers not very long ago. You just ask these robbers if these two men don't belong to their gang."
As Tommy spoke he turned to where the two robbers lay and gave a very grave and significant wink.
"They belong to our gang, all right enough," one of the outlaws stated, remembering various indignities they had received at the hands of detectives.
"That's a lie!" thundered Katz.
"Lie nothing!" replied the outlaw. "These fellows brought in two burros loaded with provisions for us, and we haven't been able to get to them yet. If you go back in the valley to the west, and travel north a few miles, you'll find where the burros and provisions are hidden away."
Tommy drew nearer to the outlaw and under pretense of picking something from the floor whispered in his ear:
"We'll see that you get a year off your sentence for that. We've just got to get rid of these imitation detectives."
"I don't believe you can make it stick, Katz," the other outlaw cried out, apparently in a very serious tone, although there was a wrinkle of humor about his grim mouth. "When we started out to rob the Union Pacific train you promised to see that we got provisions, and you didn't keep your word!"
The eyes of the two detectives stuck out, as Tommy afterwards expressed it, far enough to hang a coat and hat on. They almost foamed with rage as they stamped about the cavern, still linked together with the steel handcuffs.
"We're being jobbed!" Katz shouted.
"It's a frame-up!" echoed Cullen.
"Frame up nothing!" laughed one of the outlaws.
"Do you mean to say," said Sheriff Pete, turning to the two prisoners, "that these two men who claim to be detectives are actually connected with your gang?"
"That's what we'll swear to!" declared one of the outlaws.
"Two years off for that!" chuckled Tommy in a low tone.
"I tell you it's a frame up!" shouted Katz. "It's a dirty trick to get us out of the state without arresting this fugitive from justice."
"I'm sorry boys," Sheriff Pete said to them, with official gravity, although there was a twinkle in his eyes, "but under the circumstances, it's my duty to take you to Lander and give you a hearing before the grand jury. Personally, I have my doubts as to the truth of the charges made against you, but at the same time I've got to take ministerial cognizance of them. I'm sorry, but it's my duty."
"And in the meantime," yelled Cullen, "these Boy Scouts will get this fugitive from justice out of our reach!"
"I don't know anything about that!" said the sheriff, "but if they try to do anything of that kind, I'm afraid they'll succeed."
"Well," Gilmore, the Sweetwater sheriff said, "I presume we'd better be moving along with the prisoners. If it's true that these two alleged detectives, who now turn out to be train robbers," he added with a glance at the boys, "have a camp with plenty of provisions at the north end of the next valley, we'd better take the whole bunch there and get the provisions and pack the whole outfit over to Lander with us."
"Are you going back to camp now?" asked Sheriff Pete, turning to Will.
"Just as soon as Tommy gets filled up on bear steak, I think we'd better be moving."
Sheriff Gilmore and the deputies now started away with the four prisoners and the boys watched them sliding and scrambling down the slope to the gully.
Will reached out and took Sheriff Pete by the hand.
"You're a brick!" he said. "You not only know how to do things, but you know how to do them right. If you ever come up to Chicago, don't forget to call on Lawyer Horton, and he'll tell you where we are."
"I'll not fail to do so," the sheriff answered, "but, in the meantime," he went on, "it ought to take about a week or two for these detectives to establish their innocence, eh?"
"I should say about two weeks," replied Will. "And see here," the boy went on, "I hope you won't be too hard on those train robbers. They're pretty decent fellows after all."
"They're the first men that ever held me up!" laughed the sheriff.
"Forget it!" exclaimed Will.
"Oh, I don't lay that up against them!" the sheriff replied. "After all," he continued, "they were careful not to injure any one on the hold-up they're accused of, and I don't think they'll get more than five or six years."
The officers and the boys parted with feelings of mutual regret. They had not had much faith or confidence in each other at first, but in the end each group knew the worth of the other. The parting between the boys and Seth was particularly heartfelt. Although Sheriff Pete had been trying to reach information he sought in his own way, the deputy had faced him down when he believed that the boys were to be lynched. There was many a good laugh after that, in the room of the Sheriff at Lander.
When at last the boys reached their camp and the two men who had brought the escaped convict down had disappeared, Sandy came creeping out from under a pile of blankets in one of the tents.
"What do you know about that?" asked Tommy, pointing to the boy.
Sandy yawned and rubbed his eyes.
"Say, what time is it?" he asked.
"Four o'clock!" replied Will.
"Is it yesterday or today?" asked Sandy.
"It's the day after tomorrow!" grinned Tommy.
"Don't get funny, now," Sandy advised. "Whatever day it is, I've been asleep ever since you boys went away."
CHAPTER XXI
CONCLUSION
"You never have!" declared Tommy.
"Honest!" replied Sandy. "I filled myself up with provisions and crawled under the blanket and went to sleep just after you went away to get some bear steak for breakfast. Did you get the steak?" the boy added with a grin.
"You bet I did," answered Tommy, "and I brought it back with me," he added, stroking the waistband of his trousers. "How's your shoulder?"
"Fine as a fiddle," was the reply. "I'm not going to have any trouble with it after this! Did you find Chester's fond parent," he added, glancing in the direction of the escaped convict.
"Sure we did," replied Tommy. "And, do you know," the boy went on, "that we needn't have bothered about finding him at all. Chester knows everything about the Fremont case that the father does."
"Is that right, Chester?" asked Sandy.
"Now you come on over here to father," Chester said, "and we'll ask him what took place in the private room of Fremont's bank that night, and we'll see if his memory of the things which occurred there is the same as mine."
The boys now all trooped to the tent where Mr. Wagner had been placed and Chester asked:
"Do you know why these boys are here, father?"
"To take me back to prison, I suppose," was the almost sullen reply.
"They are here to establish your innocence," the son went on. "Do you know why?"
The father glanced keenly from his son to the others and finally asked, his voice trembling with excitement:
"Why should they take an interest in me?"
"Because," Will broke in, "you can help us, and we want to help you. We have information that you are innocent of the crime of which you were convicted, and we believe that you have information which will prevent the conviction of an innocent man."
"Do you refer to the Fremont case?" asked Wagner.
"Exactly," replied Will. "And I'd like to ask you now," the boy went on, "before anything more is said, why you never communicated with young Fremont's attorney. He advertised for you extensively, and you might have held conference with him without subjecting yourself to arrest."
"I saw the advertisement," was the reply, "but I thought it was only a trap set by the police. I was determined not to go back to the penitentiary. If I had been captured by the police, I would have killed myself. I had no money, no influence, and it would have been impossible for me to establish my innocence, so I decided to let young Fremont look out for himself. I know now that I was wrong."
"You were in the bank that July night?" asked Will.
"Yes, I was there with my son," was the reply.
The boys looked wonderingly at Chester.
"What took place?" asked Will.
"Fremont was working late in his private room, and the janitor and nightwatchman were moving about the building, from the deposit vaults in the basement to the ironclad room which enclosed the big safe.
"I went there to see Mr. Fremont in order to secure financial help. He had been an old friend of my parents, and I had every reason to believe that he would assist me if I could get to him. After a long time I attracted the attention of the night watchman, and he admitted me at a side door on the request of Mr. Fremont."
"Who else was in the building at that time?" asked Will.
"No one that I know of," was the reply. "I stated my case to Mr. Fremont in the presence of my son and he handed me one hundred dollars in small bills, advising me to remain in hiding until I could arrange for a new trial. He said when he gave me the money that the sum was more than he had left, but that he would never again feel that he needed money.
"I did not understand what he meant, and said so. He told me then that he had been plunging heavily in Wall street. He said that he had lost every dollar he had in the world, and that his interest in the bank would be taken from him the next day unless a wealthy friend he was depending on came to his assistance that very night."
"Did he tell you the name of the man he expected there that night?" asked Will.
"He did," replied the escaped convict, "but I do not now recall the name. I can't for the life of me bring it back to my mind."
"The name," Chester interrupted, "was Myron M. Douglass."
"A Chicago multi-millionaire!" exclaimed Will.
"I asked Mr. Fremont what course he intended to pursue, and he replied that there was only one thing he could do if the man he had appealed to refused to aid him. As he told me this he opened a drawer in his desk and pointed to an automatic revolver lying on top of a pile of papers."
"And you left it lying there?" asked Will.
"No," Chester answered, "I snatched the revolver out of the drawer and brought it away with me. When we left the private room by the side door, Mr. Fremont was standing beside his desk with a smile upon a very white face. He said he had another revolver in another drawer, and would use it if he did not hear from Mr. Douglass before midnight."
"Did you believe him to be in earnest?" asked Will.
"I did not think he would kill himself when it came down to the real point."
"Did you immediately leave the vicinity of the bank?" asked the boy.
"No," replied Chester. "We walked about the building until after twelve o'clock."
"Did you hear any significant sounds?" asked Will.
"Pistol-shots," was the reply.
"Then you knew what had taken place?"
"Yes, sir, we thought we did."
"What next?"
"While we stood at the side door of the bank, wondering what we ought to do, Mr. Fremont's son came running up the steps. At first I felt disposed to give him some intimation as to what had taken place, but I hadn't the courage to do so. He opened the side door with a key and entered, and we left the city and the state. We came here, and I was dazed by a fall, but this last hurt has corrected the injury done by the first one."
"There you are!" said Will. "The case is closed. The Boy Scouts may as well go back to Chicago now. There's one more mystery. Who built the fire in your old cave?"
"I did before the last fall," Wagner said.
"Of course, we can stay here and fish and hunt if we want to," laughed Will, "and I think it may be well to do so for a week or so, but right now we have come to The Ending of the Trail."
The boys spent two very pleasant weeks in Wyoming without further annoyance. When they returned to Chicago, Wagner and Chester went with them. The case against young Fremont fell to the ground as soon as the testimony of Wagner and his son was taken, and the innocence of the escaped convict was established so thoroughly to the satisfaction of the police that he was never tried again.
The boys saw both Wagner and Chester were provided with congenial situations. After the boys had been in Chicago a couple of weeks they met Katz and Cullen on Clark street. The detectives flamed red in the face at sight of the boys, but were very humble when addressing them.
"We have forgotten what took place in Wyoming," Katz said significantly.
"And so have we," replied Tommy. "No one here knows anything about it! It was rather a mean trick to play on you, but we had to do something to get Wagner to testify in the Fremont case."
"Forget it!" cried Katz, and the two went on their way, after receiving their badges from Tommy.
The boys had been in Chicago not more than a month when a letter from the famous criminal lawyer brought them to his office again.
"Are you boys ready to take a trip to the north?" he asked. "I want you to go way up into the Hudson Bay country and do a little work that a group of Boy Scouts can do better than any one else in the world."
"Sure, we'll go!" answered Will. "We were saying last night that we were getting tired of hanging around Chicago."
The boys started away the very next day. What they saw and did on the journey will be found in the next volume of this series entitled:
Boy Scouts in Northern Wilds; or, The Signal from the Hills.
The End.

= = = PG46477 = = =
BOY SCOUTS ON THE OPEN PLAINS; OR, THE ROUND-UP NOT ORDERED
Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
[Illustration: "But ain't yuh meanin' tuh pay me anything fo' shootin' up my pets thisaway?" Harkness demanded.]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
BOY SCOUTS ON THE OPEN PLAINS
OR
THE ROUND-UP NOT ORDERED
By
G. HARVEY RALPHSON
Author of
BOY SCOUTS IN THE CANAL ZONE BOY SCOUTS IN THE NORTHWEST BOY SCOUTS IN A MOTOR BOAT BOY SCOUTS IN A SUBMARINE
[Illustration]
Chicago M. A. DONOHUE & COMPANY
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright 1914 by M. A. Donohue & Co. CHICAGO
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Contents
I. OVER THE EDGE II. LUCKY JIMMY III. THE HELPING HAND IV. PICKING UP POINTS V. AROUND THE CAMP FIRE VI. THE WOLF PACK VII. EVERYBODY BUSY VIII. AN UNWELCOME GUEST IX. THE HOMING PIGEON X. AT DOUBLE CROSS RANCH XI. THE SHEEP AND THE GOATS XII. NIPPING A MUTINY XIII. AT WASHOUT COULIE XIV. STAMPEDING THE PRIZE BUNCH XV. JIMMY'S UNWILLING RIDE XVI. AFTER THE RUSTLERS' RAID XVII. THE SHREWD OLD FOX XVIII. MORE TROUBLE AHEAD XIX. AT BAY IN THE CANYON XX. SMOKED OUT XXI. IN THE HANDS OF THE RUSTLERS XXII. COMING OF THE REAL BOSS--CONCLUSION
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Boy Scouts on the Open Plains
CHAPTER I.
OVER THE EDGE.
"'Tis meself that calls this pretty tough mountain climbin', and me athinkin' all the while the road to Uncle Job's cattle ranch would take us along the bully open plain all the way!"
"Hold your horses, Jimmy; we've got to about the end of this hill climbing. After we cross this divide it's going to be the kind of travel you mention, all on the level. One more town to pass through, and then we strike out for the ranch. Any minute now we ought to glimpse the low country through this canyon that we've been following over the ridge."
"There it is right now, Ned, and let me tell you I'm glad myself that this hard work is nearly over with. Whew! did you ever see a prettier picture than this is, with the whole country spread out like a big map?"
"And that's where we aim to spend some little time, is it, boys?" asked a third one of the four boys who, leading a loaded pack burro apiece, had been climbing a range of rocky mountains away down in a corner of Nevada not a great distance from the Arizona border.
"Yes, that's going to be our stamping ground, Jack, for some little time to come. My uncle Job Haines has his ranch away over there somewhere or other, in the hazy distance. His partner, another uncle of mine, James Henshaw, is with him in the business--you know my mother was married twice, and this last gentleman is the brother of her first husband, which is how I come to have so many uncles. What d'ye say to resting up a bit here before we start down the grade, Ned?"
The way three of them turned toward the other young fellow was evidence enough in itself to show that he must be the leader of the little company, which was in fact the truth.
All of the mountain climbers were wearing rather faded but serviceable khaki suits, which with the leggins and campaign hats proved that they must belong to some troop of Boy Scouts. But it was many days' journey from their present surroundings to the scene of their home activities, for they belonged in New York City.
Those of our young readers who have had the pleasure and privilege of possessing one or more of the previous volumes connected with this series of stories will readily recognize the four lads as old and valued acquaintances. For the sake of the few who may not have enjoyed meeting the lively quartette before, a few sentences of introduction may be necessary before going on further. And while they are resting both themselves and their pack animals, at the same time drinking in the magnificent scenery that was spread out before them, looking toward the southeast, it would seem to be a fitting opportunity for this service.
The leader of the little party was Ned Nestor, who also served as assistant scout master of the troop, having duly qualified for the office according to the rules of the organization. He was a good hunter and tracker, and possessed a wide knowledge of woodcraft in its best sense.
Some time previous to this Ned had been given various chances to work for the Secret Service of the Government at Washington, and had conducted himself in such a manner as to win the confidence of the authorities. They realized that there were many opportunities when a bright lad might accomplish things unsuspected where a man would be apt to slip up. And judging from the success which had on most occasions followed Ned's taking up a case, it appeared as though this might have been a wise move.
One of the other boys, a short chap with red hair and a freckled face, often acted as Ned's assistant in these dangerous adventures. His name was Jimmy McGraw, and at one time he had been a regular tough little Bowery boy in New York, until he happened to meet Ned under strange conditions, and was virtually adopted by the other's father, so that he now made his home with the Nestors. Jimmy could not entirely shake off some of the old habits; and this accounted for his making use of a little slang now and then, when trying to express himself forcibly.
The third lad was named Jack Bosworth. Jack was a splendid chum, faithful as the needle can be to the pole, and as brave as he was robust. His father being a rich corporation lawyer and capitalist, the boy had been allowed to do pretty much as he chose. Fortunately Jack was a true scout in every sense of the word, and could be depended upon to keep out of mischief. He believed Ned Nestor to be the finest patrol leader that ever wore the khaki and was ready to follow his lead, no matter where it took him.
Harry Stevens, the fourth and last of the quartette, was inclined to be a student rather than a lover of the trail and hunters' camp. His hobby seemed to lie along the study of wild animals' habits, and also the history of the ancient Indian tribes that, centuries back, were known to have inhabited the southwestern portion of our country. He had kept harping all the while upon the subject of the strange Zunis, the Hopis, and the Moquis, all of whom he knew had descended from the original cliff-dwellers. And he hoped before going back home again to find a chance to investigate some of their quaint rock dwellings high up in the cliffs bordering the wonderful Colorado Canyon.
Harry was really on his way to the ranch of his uncles. Not being in any hurry he and his chums had first visited San Francisco, and then Los Angeles. While here they somehow conceived the rather singular idea of crossing the desert afoot, in order to have new experiences, and be able to say that they knew what it was to find themselves alone on a sandy tract that stretched as far as the eye could see in every direction.
What remarkable adventures had come their way while carrying out this scheme have already been set down in the pages of the volume just preceding this book, under the title of "Boy Scouts in Death Valley," so there would be no need of our repeating any of the exciting episodes here. They had purchased the four burros from a discouraged party of men who were prospecting for gold in the mountains to the west of the parched valley of the evil name.
Since they managed to escape from Death Valley, after almost leaving their bones there as the penalty of their rashness, some days had passed; in fact it was now a week later. They had done considerable traveling in that time, and overcome all obstacles with their accustomed ability.
All of them had grown weary of so much mountain climbing, and Jimmy really voiced the united sentiment of the party when he declared that he was yearning for a chance to see the open plain, with grass instead of the eternal blistering sand, and mottes of trees dotting the picture with pleasing bunches of green that would be a relief to their tortured eyes.
So they sat there and talked of the past, as well as tried to lift the veil that hid the immediate future, as though anxious to know what awaited them in the new life to which they were hastening.
Finally Ned Nestor arose and stretched himself, as he remarked:
"I think we'd better be on our way, fellows, if we hope to get down there to the level before night comes along. The sun's headed for the west, you notice, and as this ridge will shut him out from us early, we haven't any too much time."
"I guess you're about right there, Ned," commented Jack; "and for one I want to say I'd be right glad to make camp at the foot of the mountains. We can't say good-bye to these rocky backbones of the region any too soon to please me."
The four burros had rested after their arduous climb, and there was not the least difficulty about getting them started moving. In fact they seemed to already scent the grass of the plains below, so different from anything that had been encountered thus far on the trip, and were showing signs of a mad desire to reach the lowlands.
Several times Ned had to caution one of the others about undue haste.
"Hold your burro in more, Jimmy," he would say; "there are too many precipices on our trail to take chances of his slipping, and dragging you over with him. To be sure mules and donkeys are clever about keeping their footing and almost equal Rocky Mountain sheep, or the chamois of the Alps that way; but they can stumble, we know, and it might come at a bad time. They're wild to get down out of this; but for one I don't care to take a short cut by plunging over a three hundred foot precipice. Easy now, Teddy; behave yourself, old boy. That's an ugly hole we're passing right now, and we want to go slow."
Jimmy himself was apt to be a reckless sort of a chap; and many a time did Ned have to check his impatience in days gone by. Jack, too, often did things without sufficient consideration, though he could hold himself in on occasion; while Harry seldom if ever had to be cautioned, for he was inclined to be slow.
They often found themselves put to it to make progress, for while they followed what seemed to be a trail over the ridge, it had been seldom used, and many obstructions often blocked the way.
Once they had to get wooden crowbars and pry a huge boulder loose that had fallen so as to completely block progress. Fortunately it had been easy to move it a few inches at a time, until they sent it into a gulf that yawned alongside the trail, to hear it crash downward for hundreds of feet, and make the face of the mountain quiver under the shock.
In this fashion they had managed to get a third of the way down from the apex of the ridge, and Ned, comparing the time with the progress made, announced it as his opinion that he believed they would be easily able to make the bottom before night came on.
"That sounds all to the good to me, Ned," declared Jimmy, with a broad grin on his freckled face.
"Hope you're a true prophet, that's all," said Harry.
"I agree with Ned," Jack broke in with, "and say, we ought to make the foot of the range before night, the way we're going, unless we hit up against some bad spot that'll hold us up worse than we've struck yet."
"That isn't likely to happen," Ned observed, "because the further down we get the easier the going ought to be."
"But I notice that the holes are just as deep," Harry told him.
"And a fall would jolt a feller as hard too, seems like," Jimmy admitted as he craned his neck to look over at a place where the trail was only a few feet wide with a blank wall on the right and an empty void on the left.
Harry nervously caught his breath, and called out:
"Better be careful there, Jimmy, how you bend over and look down. You might get dizzy and take a lurch or the frisky burro give a lug just then and upset you. We all think too much of you to want to gather up your remains down at the bottom of a precipice."
Jimmy laughed and seemed pleased at the compliment. He did not again bother about looking over, but occupied himself with managing his pack animal, which kept showing an increasing desire to hasten. At one point Ned had stopped to tighten the ropes that held the pack on his burro, and in some manner Jimmy managed to get at the head of the little procession that wound, single file, down that steep mountain trail.
It was Ned's intention to assume the lead again at the first opportunity, when he could pass the others. Meantime he thought he could keep an observant eye on Jimmy, so as to restrain him in case he began to show any sign of rashness.
After all it was not so much Jimmy's fault that it happened, but the fact that his burro had quite lost its head in the growing desire to get down to the green pastures from which it had been debarred so very long, and for which it was undoubtedly hungering greatly.
That the unlucky animal should chance to make that stumble just at the time of passing another narrow place in the trail, where the conditions again caused them to move in single file, was one of those strange happenings which sometimes spring unannounced upon the unwary traveler.
Jimmy at one time even walked along with the end of the rope wound about his waist in a lazy fashion; but Ned had immediately told him never to think of doing such a thing again, when there was even the slightest chance of the burro slipping over the edge of the sloping platform and dragging his master along. But right then Jimmy had such a rigid clutch upon the rope that he did not seem to know enough to let go when the pack animal stumbled, tried to cling desperately to the rocky edge, and then vanished from sight into the gulf.
In fact Jimmy's first idea seemed to be a desire to drag the tottering animal back to safety, and it was because he was tugging for all he was worth on the rope that he was pulled over the edge himself.
The other three scouts seemed to be petrified with horror when they saw their plucky but rash chum dragged over. None of them could jump to his assistance on account of the burros being in the way and plunging and kicking wildly, as though terrified at the fate that had overtaken their mate.
Ned was at the end of the line, and Harry, though not far from the spot where the terrible accident happened, seemed to be too terrified to know what to do, until it was all over, and poor Jimmy had vanished from their view.
CHAPTER II.
LUCKY JIMMY.
"Oh! Ned, he's gone--poor Jimmy--pulled right over by that burro!" Harry was crying as he stood there almost petrified with horror, while his own pack animal acted as though it might be terrified by the fate that had overtaken its mate, for it snorted and pulled back strenuously.
Ned knew that unless the remaining three burros were quieted a still greater disaster was apt to overtake them.
"Speak to your animal, Harry; get him soothed right away! Easy now, Teddy, stand still where you are! It's all right, old fellow! Back up against the rock and stand still there."
Ned as he spoke in this strain managed to throw a coil or two of the leading rope over a jutting spur of rock. Then turning round, he crept on hands and knees to the edge of the yawning precipice and looked over, shuddering to note that while not nearly so high as that other precipice had been, at the same time the fall must be all of seventy feet.
There at the foot he could see the unfortunate burro on his back and with never a sign of life about him. Doubtless that tumble must have effectually broken his neck and ended his days of usefulness.
"Do you see him, Ned?" asked a trembling voice close by, and the scout leader knew that Jack too had crawled to the edge in order to discover what had become of poor Jimmy McGraw.
"Not yet," replied Ned, sadly; "he may be hidden under the burro, or lying in among that clump of bushes."
"But glory be, he ain't, all the same!" said a voice just then that thrilled them all. "If ye be lookin' over this way ye'll discover the same Jimmy aholdin' on with a death grip to a fine old rock that sticks out from the face of the precipice. But 'tis me arms that feel like they was pulled part way out of the sockets with the jerk; and I'd thank ye to pass a rope down as soon as ye get over the surprise of havin' a ghost address ye."
"Bully for you, Jimmy!" exclaimed Jack; "seems like you've got nearly as many lives as a cat. Hold on like anything, because Ned's getting a rope right now, and he'll heave it over in three shakes of a lamb's tail. Don't look down, Jimmy, but keep your eye on me. We'll pull you out of that in a jiffy, sure we will. And here comes Ned right now with the rope. He's even made a noose at the end, so as to let you put your foot in the same. Keep holding on, Jimmy, old fellow!"
In this manner, then, did Jack try to encourage the one in peril, so as to stiffen his muscles, and cause him to keep his grip on that friendly crag that had saved him from sharing the dreadful fate of the wretched burro.
Jimmy had fortunately kept his wits about him, and although the strain was very great, because he could find no rest for his dangling feet, he managed to hold his awkward position until the rope came within reach.
"Be careful, now, how you manage!" called Ned, from his position fifteen feet above the head of the imperiled scout. "Let me angle for your foot, and once I get the noose fast around it, you can rest your weight safely. But Jimmy, remember not to let go with one hand, because your other might slip. Leave it all to me."
Ned was already working the rope so that the open noose twirled slowly around, coming in contact with Jimmy's foot, which the other thrust out purposely. While no expert in such angling and more or less worked up with fears lest Jimmy suddenly lose his precarious hold, and go down to his death, Ned presently met with success. The noose passed over the waiting foot, and was instantly jerked tight by a quick movement from above.
By then Jack was alongside the scout master eager to lend his assistance when it came to the point of lifting Jimmy. Harry, too, hovered just behind them, unable to look over because it made him dizzy when so terribly excited, but only too ready to take hold of the end of the rope and bracing his feet against some projection of the rocky trail, throw all his weight into the endeavor to draw the one they meant to rescue to the safety of the path.
It was speedily but cautiously accomplished, for Ned would not allow himself to be needlessly hurried, knowing how disasters so often result from not taking the proper care.
Jimmy was looking a trifle peaked and worried as he came clambering over the edge of the narrow path, assisted by Ned, who as soon as he could get a grip on the other scout's jacket knew that all was well. No sooner did Jimmy realize that he was surely safe than he proceeded to indulge on one of his favorite grins, although they could see that a deep sigh of gratitude accompanied the same.
The very first thing he did was to turn around, and lying flat on his chest, look back down into that gulf from which he had just been dragged.
"Gee, whiz! but that was somethin' of a drop, believe me!" he remarked, trying to keep his voice from trembling. "And there lies me silly old burro on his back with never a sign of a kick acomin'. He's sure on the blink and whatever am I agoin' to do now, without any Navajo blanket to sleep in nights? Mebbe we might have ropes aplenty to lower me down there, so I could recover me valuables. 'Tis a piece of great luck I had me Marlin gun in me hands at the time and dropped it on the ledge, so I did."
"If we couldn't get the things any other way, Jimmy," announced Ned, "perhaps I'd agree to that spliced rope business, because we've got more than thirty yards of good line with us, but I'd go down myself and not let you try a second time. Still I don't think it'll be necessary. From what I see of the lay of the mountain we can reach that place after we leave this narrow trail."
Jimmy did not insist. Perhaps his nerves had been more roughly shaken by his recent experience than he cared to admit; and the possibility of again finding himself dangling in space did not appeal very strongly to him.
It was just as well that Ned decided the matter as he did, for they found that once the end of the narrow stretch of rock was gained it was no great task to creep along the side of the mountain to the place where the dead pack animal lay.
Ned and Jack made the little journey and in due time turned up again carrying with them all that had been upon the burro, save the water keg.
"We left that behind," explained Ned, "because as we are done with desert travel for this trip we won't find any need of such a thing. But here's your precious Navajo colored blanket, Jimmy; likewise we've saved what grub there was in the pack."
"Good for you, Ned; I'd hated to lose that blanket the worst kind, you know; and as for the food end of the deal, well, what's the use telling you how I feel about that when you all know that I'm the candy boy when the dinner horn blows."
Jimmy was a great "feeder," as Jack called it, and on many an occasion this weakness on his part had made him the butt of practical jokes on the part of his chums. But Jimmy was not the one to give up any cherished object simply because some one laughed at him on account of it. He was more apt to join in the merriment and consider it all a good joke.
The journey was now resumed, and the balance of the afternoon they met with no new hardships or perils worth recording. When the day was done and the shadows of coming night began to steal forth from all their hiding places where the bright sunlight had failed to locate them, the four scouts had reached the foot of the rocky mountain range and looked out upon the plain.
Here they made camp and passed a pleasant night with nothing to disturb their slumbers save the distant howl of a wolf, which was a familiar sound in the ears of these lads, since they had roughed it on many occasions in the past in more than a few strange parts of the world.
Although they had recently passed through some very arduous experiences these were only looked on as vague reminiscences by these energetic chums. The future beckoned with rosy fingers and that level plain looked very attractive in their eyes, after such a long and painful trip across the burning deserts and through that terrible Death Valley, where so many venturesome prospectors, gold-mad, have left their bones as a monument to their folly.
When morning came again they cooked breakfast with new vim. And the fragrant odor of the coffee seemed to appeal to them with more than ordinary force because of the bright prospect that opened before them.
"Ned says it might be only two more days before we get close to Uncle Job's ranch," remarked Harry, as he assisted Jimmy in getting breakfast; for since the latter was so fond of eating his comrades always saw to it that he had a hand in the preparation of the meals, to which Jimmy was never heard to offer the slightest objection.
"Then it's me that will have to be studying harder on all them cowboy terms so they won't take me for a greeny," Jimmy went on to say in reply. "You just wait and see how I branch out a full-blown puncher. Right now I c'n ride a bucking pony and stick in the saddle like a leech; and I'm practicin' how to throw a rope, though I must say I don't get it very good and sometimes drop the old loop over my own coco instead of the post I'm aimin' to lasso. But I'll never give it up till I get there. That's the way with the McGraws, we're all set in our way and want baseball championships and everything else that's good to own."
"Jimmy," called out Jack just then, "I think if you didn't talk so much we'd be getting our breakfast sooner, because you kind of cool things off. There, see how the coffee boils like mad whenever you hold up. How about it, Harry, isn't it nearly done? I'm feeling half-starved, to tell you the truth."
"Then I'm not the only pebble on the beach this time, it seems," chuckled Jimmy, who was so used to being made fun of on account of his voracious appetite that he felt happy to find that someone else could also get hungry on occasion.
"In three minutes we'll give you the high sign, Jack," Harry announced and he was as good as his word, for it was not long before the chums might have been seen discussing the food that had been prepared and making merry over the meal as was their usual custom.
Starting forth in high spirits they began to head across the plain and at about noon all of them were electrified on hearing the distant but unmistakable whistle of a locomotive, showing that they were approaching the railroad.
After their recent experiences in the dead lands this sign of civilization was enough to thrill them through and through. Jimmy was immediately waving his hat and letting off a few yells to denote his overwhelming joy; while even Ned looked around with more or less of a smile on his face.
"Sounds like home, don't it?" asked Jack, beaming on the rest. "Takes you back to good old New York, where you can sit down next to a plate of ice cream when your tongue feels thick from the heat and cool off. Seems like I'd never get my fill of cold stuff again."
Pushing on they presently sighted the railroad and also discovered that just as Ned had figured would be the case, they were approaching a town.
"That's where we ordered our mail to be sent on from Los Angeles, up to the tenth, and I hope we find letters waiting for us," Harry remarked; for he was quite a correspondent, though not in the same class with Frank Shaw, another member of the Black Bear Patrol, whose father owned a big daily in New York and who often contributed letters to its columns when he was away on trips with Ned.
Ned on his part was wondering whether he would receive anything in the way of business communications from the Government people in Washington, for it would be forwarded on from Los Angeles if such a message did come in cipher.
So anxious were the boys to reach the settlement on the railroad that it was decided not to stop for any lunch at noon but to push right along. If there was any eating place in the town they could get a bite before leaving; and the change from camp fare might be agreeable to them all.
At two o'clock they reached the place, which was hardly of respectable size, although it had a station and post office. The first thing the boys did was to head for this latter place and ask for mail, which was handed out after the old man had slowly gone over several packages. Strangers were such a novelty in that Nevada railroad settlement that the postmaster evidently was consumed with curiosity to know what could have brought four lively looking boys dressed in khaki suits very much on the same pattern as United States regulars, to that jumping-off place. But they did not bother themselves explaining and he had to take it out in guessing that the Government was so hard pushed for recruits now in the army that they had to enlist boys not fully grown.
While the other boys were eagerly devouring the contents of the various envelopes they had received, bearing the New York post mark, Ned, who had put his own letters in his pocket for later reading, sauntered over to the station to interview the telegraph agent, who was also the ticket man, express agent and filled various other offices as well after the usual custom of these small towns.
It was only a short time later that Jack, Harry and Jimmy, still devouring the long letters they had received, in which all the news of the home circles was retailed, saw Ned walking briskly toward them.
"He's struck something or other that's given him reason to chirk up," announced the observant Jimmy, as he took a shrewd look at Ned's face on the scout master drawing near. "Ten to one he's had word from the head of the Secret Service in Washington. It'd sure be pretty punk now if after comin' so far over deserts and the like to visit your uncle, we had to drop off here and take the train back to Los Angeles, so Ned could help gather in some gang of counterfeiters or look up a bunch of smugglers bringing the Heathen Chinese across the Mexican border while all that fighting is goin' on down there between Villa and Huerta."
Ned quickly joined them. They could see from the alert look on his face that something must have happened since he left them shortly before to arouse Ned. His eyes shone with resolution and he had the look that appears on a hunter's face when he discovers the track of the animal he had long wanted to bag.
"Did you find a message waiting for you here, Ned?" asked Harry.
"Just what I did," came the reply.
"Then it must have been from Washington?" suggested Jack, anxiously. "But let's hope for Harry's sake it won't call you off from this scheme we've got started."
"That's the strangest thing of it all," replied Ned; "because, you see, this message was meant to send me from Los Angeles straight down into this very section of the Colorado River country."
CHAPTER III.
THE HELPING HAND.
When Ned made this announcement the others exchanged looks in which wonder struggled with curiosity.
"Tell me about that, now," muttered Jimmy; "was there ever anything like the luck that chases after us all the while? Here we start out to visit Harry's uncle, so he might carry out a mission that his folks sent him on, and of course the Government must a guessed all about it, since they went and laid a game to be hatched out right in the same part of the Wild and Wooly West. Can you beat it?"
"Let Ned tell us what the game is, can't you, Jimmy?" demanded Harry.
"Yes, and please don't break in again with your remarks until he's all through," added Jack. "It bothers a fellow to make connections when you get started. If you must talk, why, we'll throw in and hire a hall for the occasion. Now, Ned, tell us what the Secret Service folks want you to do."
"I've had a message in cipher from my people in Washington, telling me that while I'm out in this section they'd like me to look up one Clem Parsons, who's been wanted for a long time on the charge of counterfeiting Government notes. When last heard from he was running a stage line somewhere in the country of the Colorado and doing a little in the way of fleecing unsuspecting travelers who come out here to see the wonders of the Canyon. So from now on we'll begin to ask questions and see whether we can get on the trail of this gentleman who's given some of the smartest agents in the Secret Service the call-down."
"And then they have to depend on Ned Nestor and his able assistant, Jimmy McGraw," remarked the last mentioned scout; "excuse me, fellers, but if you don't blow your own horn, who d'ye reckon'll be fool enough to do it for you? But Ned, if our luck holds as good as it generally does, chances are ten to one this same Clem Parsons will come tumbling right up against us. It seems like you might be a magnet and they all have to come our way sooner or later."
"Any description of what he looks like?" asked Jack, who had known Ned to get similar orders on previous occasions and could guess that it was not all left to his imagination.
"Yes, they tell me he is tall and thin and has a scar on his left cheek. He used to be a cow puncher at one time and might be working at his old trade now. That's a point to remember when we get to the Double Cross Ranch. Every puncher will have to run the gantlet of our eyes and if one of them happens to be marked with a scar on his left cheek, it'll be a bad day for him."
"Now, wouldn't it be queer if we _did_ run across the mutt there at your uncle's place, Harry?" remarked Jimmy. "But here we are again, Ned, uniting business with pleasure like we've done heaps of times before now. Mr. Clem Parsons, I'm sure sorry for you when this combination gets started to work, because you've _got_ to come in out of the wet and that's all there is to it!"
It might appear that Jimmy was much given to boasting; but as a rule he made good, so that this failing might be forgiven by those who knew him and his propensity for joking.
They moved out of town after getting a pretty poor apology for a lunch at the tavern. Jimmy declared that he would starve on such fare and announced his intention of immediately opening a box of crackers he had purchased at a local store so as to keep himself from suffering.
Ned, as was his habit, had interviewed about everybody that crossed his path, so as to improve upon the rude map he carried and which he had found to be faulty on several occasions, which fact caused him to distrust it as a guide.
"We ought to make the ranch by tomorrow evening, if all goes well," he told his three chums, as they walked onward over the plain, still heading almost due southwest.
"Not much danger of anything upsetting our calculations from now on," observed Jack, "unless we meet up with drunken punchers, run across some bad men who have been chased by the sheriff's posse out of the railroad towns and who try to make a living by holding up travelers once in six months; or else get caught in a fine old prairie fire."
"Say, that last could happen, that's right," Jack went on to exclaim, looking a little uneasily at the dead grass that in places completely concealed the greener growth underneath. "If a big gale was blowing and a spark should get into this stuff she would go awhooping along as fast as a train could run. That's something I've often read about and thought I'd like to see, but come to think of it, now that I'm on the ground, I don't believe I care much about it after all."
"They say it's a grand sight," Harry volunteered; "but according to my mind a whole lot depends on which side of the fire you happen to be. What's interesting to some might even mean death to others."
"Yes, I've read lots about the same," admitted Jack, "and of the trouble people have had in saving themselves when chased by one of these fires on the plains. If we do see one of the same here's hoping we are to windward of the big blaze."
When the sun sank that evening they were hurrying to reach what seemed to be a stream of some sort, judging from the line of trees that cut across the plain and which only grow where there is more or less water to be had.
The three burros must have scented the presence of water, for there was no keeping the animals within bounds. They increased their pace until they were almost on the run; and Jimmy threw away the fag end of a whip with which he had been amusing himself by tickling the haunches of the burro in his charge and urging him to move along faster.
One of the animals started to bray in a fashion that could have been easily heard half a mile or more away.
Hardly had the discordant sounds died away than the boys were considerably surprised to hear a shrill voice coming from directly ahead, as though the exultant bray of the pack animal had given warning of their presence to some one who needed assistance the worst kind.
"Help! Come quick and get me! Help--help!" came the words as clear as a bell and causing Harry and Jimmy to stare at each other as though their first thought might have been along the line of some deception that was being practiced upon them.
But there was Ned already on the jump and shouting over his shoulder as he ran:
"Jimmy, give your burro over to Harry to look after; you too, Jack and follow me on the run!"
"That suits me all right!" cried Jack; "here Harry, please look after my pack!" and with these words he was off at full speed.
Jimmy was close at his heels. He had only waited long enough to snatch his rifle from the top of the pack on the burro that had been given into his charge after his own had been lost in the mountain disaster. Jimmy was always thinking they might be attacked by Indians off their reservation or else run across some bad men who liked to play their guns on strangers just to see them dance. For that reason he seldom if ever allowed himself to be caught far away from his repeating Marlin these days.
When they had pushed into the patch of cottonwoods they found that Ned was already at work trying to lend the assistance that had been so lustily called for in that childish treble.
A figure was in the stream, although just his head and a small portion of his body could be seen. He was stretching out his hands towards Ned in a beseeching manner that at first puzzled Jimmy.
"Why, I declare if it ain't a little boy!" he exclaimed; "but what's he doin' out there, I want to know? Why don't he come ashore if the water's too deep. What ails the cub, d'ye think, Jack?"
"Don't know--might be quicksand!" snapped the other, as he once more started to hurry forward.
Ned was talking with the stranger now, evidently assuring him that there was no further need of anxiety since they had reached the spot.
"Can't you budge at all?" they heard him ask.
"Not a foot," came the reply; "seems like I mout be jest glued down here for keeps and that's a fact, stranger."
"How long have you been caught there?" asked the scout master.
"Reckon as it mout be half hour er thereabouts," the boy who was held fast in the iron grip of the treacherous quicksand told him; and so far as Jack could see he did not exhibit any startling signs of fright, for he was a boy of the plains and evidently used to running into trouble as well as perilous traps.
"But," Jack broke in with, "you never shouted all that time, or we'd have heard you long before we did?"
"Never let out a yip till I ketched that burro speakin'," the boy replied; "what was the use when I didn't think there was a single person inside o' five mile? I jest tried and tried to git out but she hung on all the tighter; and the water kept acreepin' up till it'd been over my mouth in ten minutes more I reckon."
"Well, we are going to get you out of that in a hurry, now," Ned told him in a reassuring tone; "Jack, climb up after me, to help pull. Jimmy, you stand by to do anything else that's wanted."
Ned, being a born woodsman, had immediately noted the fact that the limb of a tree exactly overhung the spot where the boy had been trapped in the shifting sand. This made his task the easier; but had it been otherwise he would have found some means for accomplishing his ends, even though he had to make a mattress of bushes and branches on which to safely approach the one in deadly peril.
Creeping out on that stout limb Ned dropped the noose of his rope down to the boy, who was only some six feet below him.
"Put it around under your arms," Ned told him; but as though he understood the method of procedure already, the boy in the sand was even in the act of doing this when Ned spoke.
"Tie the end around the limb and let me pull myself up, Mister, won't you?" the boy pleaded, as though ashamed of having been caught in a trap, and wishing to do something looking to his own release.
This suited Ned just as well, though he meant to have a hand in the pulling process himself and also give Jack a chance. So when he fastened the rope to the limb of the tree he did so at a point midway between himself and Jack.
"Get hold and pull!" he said in a low tone to his chum; for already was the boy below straining himself with might and main to effect his own release.
It would have proved a much harder task than he contemplated; but the scouts did not mean that he should exhaust himself any further in trying. They managed to get some sort of grip on the rope and then Ned called out cheerily:
"Yo heave-o! here he comes! Yo-heave-o! up with him, Jack! Now, once more, all together for a grand pull--yo-heave-o! Hurrah, he's nearly out of the sand!"
Five seconds later and the energetic boy was scrambling across the limb of the tree; and in as many minutes all of them had descended to the ground, the end accomplished and nobody much the worse for the experience.
"It was a close call for me, that's sure," the boy was saying, as he gravely went around and shook hands with each one of the scouts, not excepting Harry, who had meanwhile come up, leading the three burros; "an' I want you all to know I'm glad that donkey let out his whoop when he did. Why, I might a been all under when you got here; but say, I lost my gun and that makes me mad."
Looking at the boy more closely they were struck with the fact that while he did not seem to be more than nine years old, he was dressed like a cow-puncher and had a resolute air. How much of this was assumed in order to impress them with the idea that he had not been alarmed in the least by his recent peril, of course no one could say. Ned was wondering how the boy, brought up undoubtedly amidst such perils and on the lookout for danger all the while, could have fallen into such a silly little trap as this.
"What were you doing in the stream that you stood there and let the sand suck you in?" he asked as he proceeded to help the boy scrape himself off so as to appear more presentable.
"I was a little fool, all right," the kid immediately answered, with an expression of absolute disgust on his sharp face; "you see, I glimpsed a bunch of deer feeding just over yonder to windward and as they were headin' in this way I thought I'd lie low under the river bank and wait till they got inside easy gunshot. I tied my pony over in the thickest place of the timber and then walked out to where the water jest come to my knees, where I got low down to wait. Say, I was that taken up with watchin' them deer afeedin' up that I forgets all about everything else and was some s'prised to feel the water tricklin' around my waist like. After that I knowed the huntin' game was all up, and that less I wanted to be smothered I'd have to get out in a hurry. But it didn't matter much how I pulled, an' heaved and tried to swim I jest stuck like I was bolted down to a snubbin' post and somebody had cinched the girth on me. Then, after a while, when I was expectin' to swaller water, I heard that burro singin' and afore I could help it I jest hollored out. Guess you must a thought it was a maverick. I could a kicked myself right away afterwards 'cause I give tongue so wild like!"
Ned smiled. He realized that the cub had imbibed the spirit of the Indian warrior who disdains to display any weakness of the flesh. No matter how much he may have been frightened by his recent terrible predicament, he did not choose any one to know about it. Indians may _feel_ fear but they have learned never to show it by look or action and to go to their deaths, if need be, taunting the foe.
"Well," he told the small boy, "we intended to camp for the night here close to the river and we'd be glad to have you stay over with us. Plenty of grub for everybody and it might be much more pleasant than being by yourself. We are not Western boys but then we've been around more or less and know something about how things are done out here. Will you join us--er--"
"My name is Amos, Amos Adams, and I'll be right well pleased to stay over with you to-night, sure I will," the boy went on to say.
So it was settled, and out of just such small things as their meeting Amos in such a strange way great events sometimes spring. But none of the scouts so much as suspected this when they busied themselves preparing the camp, building the cooking fire, and seeing that all the animals were staked out to feed, after watering them.
CHAPTER IV.
PICKING UP POINTS.
"Ned, whatever do you imagine this kid is doing out here all by himself?"
Jack asked this question in a low tone. They had cooked supper, and disposed of it promptly; and there had been an abundance for the guest, as well as the four chums. And now the two scouts were lounging near the fire, while Jimmy and Amos cleaned up the tin dishes and cooking utensils; Harry meanwhile being busily engaged with some notes he wanted to jot down for future use, in comparing his recent experiences with those of others who had suffered tortures in the notorious Death Valley.
"Well, you've heard as much of his talk as any of us, Jack," replied the leader of the expedition, quietly, "and so far there's been nothing said about himself. I'm going to beckon to Amos to come over here, and put a few leading questions to him. Out here when a fellow is entertained at the camp fire, it's only fair that he give some sort of an account of himself. Besides, Amos looks so much like a kid, just as you say, that it makes the thing seem queer."
A minute later, catching the eye of the boy, he crooked his finger and nodded his head. Plainly Amos understood, for he immediately came across.
"Sit down, Amos," Ned told him.
The small boy in the cowboy suit did so, at the same time allowing a sort of smile to come upon his bronzed face.
"Want to know somethin' about me, I reckon?" he remarked, keenly.
Jack chuckled as though amused at his shrewdness; but Ned only said:
"Well, ordinarily out here on the plains I understand that men seldom express any curiosity about their chance guests; it isn't always a safe thing to do. But you see, Amos, in your case it's different."
"Sure it is; I get on to that, Mr. Scout Master," replied the boy, readily; for he had ere this noticed the emblem which Ned bore upon his khaki coat, and which stamped him as authorized to answer to this name, which would indicate that Amos knew something about the Boy Scout business.
"In the first place we chanced to be of some little assistance to you."
"A heap!" broke in the other, quickly.
"And then, excuse me for saying it, but you are such a kid that anybody would be surprised to run across you out by yourself, carrying a gun, riding a pony like the smartest puncher going, and after big game at the time you got stuck in that quicksand--all of which, Amos, must be our excuse for feeling that we'd like to hear something about you."
"That's only fair and square, Ned," the boy spoke up immediately; "Jimmy there has been telling me the greatest lot of stuff about what you fellows have been doing all over, that I'd think he was stuffing me, only he held up his hand right in the start, and declared he never told anything but the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help him. And I'm ready to tell you who I am, and what I'm adoin' out here."
"Not that we think you're anything that you shouldn't be, Amos," put in Jack.
"Well, my name's Amos Adams, just like I said, and all my life I've been around a cattle ranch. That's why I know so much about roping steers, and riding buckin' broncs. I guess I was in a saddle before my ma weaned me. There are a few things mebbe I can't quite do as well as some of these here prize punchers, but it's only because I ain't as strong as them, that's all."
Looking at his confident face the scouts believed that Amos was only speaking the plain truth.
"My dad's name is Hy Adams," continued the kid puncher. "I guess you ain't been around these diggin's much yet, or you'd a heard who he is. They call him the Bad Man of the Bittersweets, and when he raises his fog-horn of a voice lots of men that think themselves brave just give a hitch to their shoulders this way," and he imitated it to the life as he spoke, "and does what he tells 'em. That's when he's been drinkin'. But then there are other times--oh, well, I reckon, I hadn't ought to tell family secrets.
"We live in a cabin, 'bout ten miles away from here. My dad, he's in the cattle business, when he don't loaf. Sometimes he's 'round home, and agin he ain't, just 'cordin' to how things are agoin'. Mam, she's a little woman, but she knows how to run the house. I gotter sister, too, younger'n me, and her name it's Polly. I ain't gone to school any to speak of, but mam, she kinder teaches me, when I ain't ridin' out on the range, or totin' my gun on a hunt. That makes me mad to think I lost my gun in the drink there."
"No use hunting for it in the morning, I should think?" suggested Jack.
"Nary bit," the boy replied quickly; "it's down under that shiftin' sand long before now. But then she was an old gun, and I'm savin' up to git a new six-shot rifle, so it don't need to be long now before I'll be heeled agin."
"Is your father a rancher, then, Amos?" Jack went on to ask, idly.
The boy grinned and looked at him queerly.
"Well," he replied, with a quaint drawl that amused the scouts, "I don't know as you could call him that way, exactly. He's been cow puncher, and nigh everything else a man c'n be down thisaway to make a livin'. Me and my awful dad we don't git on well. That's one reason I gen'rally skips out when he takes a notion to lay 'round home for a spell. He knows right well I ain't afeard of him, if he has got the name of bein' a holy terror. I happen to belong to the same fambly. 'Sides, he ain't what you'd call my real and true dad."
"Oh! I see, you adopted him, did you, Amos?" Jack asked, laughingly.
"My mam she married agin after pop he was planted, and they went an' changed my name from Scroggins to Adams. I don't know which I likes best; but Scroggins that's honest, anyway, which Adams ain't--leastways some people around this region say it ain't. When I grows up I reckon I'll be a Scroggins, or else get a new name."
Again the scouts exchanged amused glances. Amos was certainly a most entertaining little chap, with his quaint sayings.
"Now, you see, dad never comes home alone any more, but fetches some of his cronies along with him, and there's unpleasant scenes ahappenin' all the time; which is one of the reasons why I skip out. They gets to drinkin', too, purty hard, till mam she has to douse a bucket of water over each puncher, and start 'em off. Mam she don't approve of the kinds of business that dad takes up. But he keeps amakin' these here visits to home further apart all the while, 'cause things ain't as pleasant as they might be. Some time mebbe he won't come no more. I'm bankin' on that, which is one reason I ain't never laid a hand on him when he gets roarin' like a mad bull. There are others, too, but I wont mention the same."
Amos had apparently been very frank with his new friends. He seemed to have taken a great fancy for them all, and, in turn, asked many questions concerning their expected visit to Harry's uncle on Double Cross Ranch, which place he knew very well.
The conversation by degrees became general, and finally the scouts went on to talk about their own affairs. During this exchange of opinions, it happened that the name of Clem Parsons was mentioned by Ned. Perhaps it would be hardly fair to call it "chance," when in reality the scout master wanted to find out whether the kid puncher seemed to be familiar with the name of the man whom the Government authorities in Washington wished him to round up.
The bait took, for immediately he heard Amos say:
"What's that, Clem Parsons? Say, I happen to know a man by that name, and he's been over to our house lots of times, too."
"Then he's a puncher, is he?" asked Ned.
"Well, I reckon he has been 'bout everything in his day, for I've heard him say so," came the reply. "He rides with my awful dad, an' they seem to git on together, which is some queer, because most of 'em is that skeered o' dad they tries to steer clear o' him."
"My! but this dad of yours must be a grizzly bear, Amos?" remarked Jimmy, who had been greatly impressed with what he heard the boy say.
"Just you wait till you see him, that's all," was what Amos told him. "Mam, she reckons as how 'twas this same Clem Parsons as had got dad to ridin' 'round the kentry doin' things that might git him into trouble, an' she hates him like pizen, for the same. Since they got to goin' together, dad he's allers showing plenty of the long-green, which he never handled before. But I ain't tellin' fambly secrets, and I reckons I'd better shut up shop."
He had said enough, however, to convince Ned and Jack that he strongly suspected his step-father of having joined forces with a band of cattle thieves who were stealing the fattest beeves neighboring ranchers owned, and selling them on the side.
There is always this temptation existing when cattle are raised on the range, often feeding for days and weeks many miles away from the ranch house, and scattered among the little valleys where the grass grows greenest. In the darkness of the night, a few of these experienced rustlers can cut out what they want of a herd, and drive them far away, effectually concealing the trail. Then the brands are changed adroitly, and the cattle shipped away to be sold in a distant market.
So long as this lawless business can be carried on successfully, it brings in big money to the reckless rustlers; but if discovered in the act they are usually treated with scant ceremony by the angry punchers and shot down like wolves.
To some men the fascination of the life causes them to ignore its perils. Then besides, the fact that money pours in upon them with so little effort, is a temptation they are unable to resist. So long as there are ranches, and cattle to be raised for the market, there will be men who go wrong and try to get a fat living off those who do the work.
It did not surprise Ned to learn that this clever rascal, whom he had been asked to look up and apprehend if possible, had for the time being forsaken the counterfeiting game and started on a new lay. Clem Parsons was no one idea man. His past fairly bristled with shrewd devices, whereby he deluded the simple public and eluded the detectives sent out by the Secret Service to enmesh him.
He had played the part of moonshiner, smuggler, and bogus moneymaker for years, and snapped his fingers at the best men on the pay roll of the Government. Now, if as seemed possible, he had turned cattle rustler, perhaps there might come a complete change in the programme; for if the irate ranchmen and their faithful punchers only got on a hot trail with Clem at the other end, the authorities at Washington might be saved much further anxiety; for a man who has been strung up to a telegraph pole and riddled with bullets is not apt to give any one trouble again.
Ned had learned some important facts that were apt to prove more or less valuable to him presently. Already he felt that they had been paid many times over for the little effort it had taken to rescue Amos from the sand of the shallow river.
Scouts are taught to do a good deed without any thought of a return; but all the same, it is pleasant to know that the reward does often come, and if any of the four chums had failed to find a chance to turn his badge right-side up that day, on account of having given a helping hand to some one, certainly they must feel entitled to that privilege after lifting Amos out of his sad predicament. Saving a precious human life must surely be counted as answering the requirements of the scout law.
When Amos, a little later, left them to saunter down to the brink of the river, in order to give his mottled pony a last drink before leaving him at the end of his rope to crop grass the remainder of the night, Jack turned to the scout master and gave expression to his convictions as follows:
"Well, it looks like your old luck holds good, Ned, and that you stand a chance of running across your game the very first thing after getting here. If this Clem Parsons Amos tells us about turns out to be the same man the Government wants you to tackle, he'll be walking into the net any old time from now on. Why, we may run across him tomorrow or the day afterwards, who knows?"
"He's the right party," said Ned, quietly. "I asked Amos if he had a scar on his cheek, and he said it gave Clem a look as though he was grinning all the time, a sort of sneering expression, I imagine. And as you say, Jack, I'm in great luck to strike a hot trail so early in the hunt. Given the chance, and I'll have Mr. Clem Parsons on the way to Los Angeles, by rail, with a hop, skip and a jump."
"He's a nifty character, all right," remarked Jimmy; "and trains with a hard crowd out here, so we'll all have to pitch in and help lift him. Four of us, armed with rifles as we are, ought to be enough to flag him."
"One thing in our favor," ventured Jack, "is that he'll never for a minute dream of being afraid of a pack of Boy Scouts. While he might keep a suspicious eye on every strange man he meets, and his hand ready to draw a gun, he'll hardly give us a second look. That's where we can get the bulge on Clem, and his ignorance is going to be his undoing yet."
"Perhaps we'd better be a little careful how we mention these things while Amos is around," Ned went on to say.
"But sure, you don't think that little runt would peach on us, do you?" demanded Jimmy, who had apparently taken a great liking for the diminutive puncher.
"Certainly not," answered Ned, "but you understand one of the things that goes to make a successful Secret Service operator is in knowing how to keep his own counsel. He's got to learn all he can about others, and tell as little about himself as will carry him through. So please keep quiet about my wanting to invite this Clem Parsons to an interview with the Collector in Los Angeles."
Jimmy promptly raised his hand.
"I'm on," he said. "Mum's the word till you lift the embargo, Ned. But it begins to look like we might have some interestin' happenings ahead of us, from what we know about this Clem Parsons, and what we guess is agoin' on between the ranchers and the cattle rustlers. I thought all the froth had blown off the top, after we quit that Death Valley, but now I'm beginnin' to believe we're agoin' to scratch gravel again right smart. Which suits Jimmy McGraw all right, because he's built that way, and never did like to see the green mould set on top of the pond. Keep things astirrin', that's my way. When folks go to sleep, give the same a punch, and start something doin'."
"Well," said Harry, looking up from his work close by, "if you have a few more narrow squeaks like that one to-day up on the mountain trail, it won't be long before they plant _you_ under the daisies," but Jimmy only laughed at the warning.
CHAPTER V.
AROUND THE CAMP FIRE.
It was a lovely night, with the moon looking almost as round as a big yellow cart-wheel when it rose in the east, where the horizon lay low, with the level plain and sky meeting.
Besides, it was not nearly as hot there on the plains as they had found it back where the sands of the Mojave Desert shifted with the terrible winds that seemed to come from the regions of everlasting fire, they scorched so.
The scouts appeared to be enjoying themselves so much that even Jimmy, usually the sleepy member of the party, gave no sign of wanting to crawl under his brilliant and beloved Navajo blanket.
Near by the three pack animals were tethered, along with the calico pony owned by Amos. They cropped the grass as though they could never get enough of the same. Everything seemed so very peaceful that one would find it difficult to imagine that there could come any change to the scene.
Amos had joined the circle again, and once more the conversation had become general. Ned asked numerous questions concerning the ranch which they expected to visit, and in this way they learned in advance considerable about the puncher gang, some of the peculiarities of various members of the same, as well as the floating news of the region.
When Amos was asked about the hunting he gave glowing accounts of the sport to be had by those willing to ride twenty miles or more to the coulies of the foothills, where a panther or a grizzly bear might be run across, and deer were to be stalked.
"How about wolves?" Jimmy wanted to know.
Jimmy always declared war on wolves. He had had some experiences with the treacherous animals in the past, and could not forget. There was a standing grudge between them, and every time Jimmy found a chance he liked to knock over a gray prowler.
Amos shrugged his narrow shoulders as though he took very little stock in such cowardly animals.
"Oh! the punchers they have a round-up for the critters every fall, an' so you see they kind of keep 'em low in stock. Then besides, ever since they took to payin' a bounty for wolf scalps, men go out to hunt for the same when they ain't got nothin' else to do. They ain't aplenty about this part of the country nowadays. I reckon as how that's why Wolf Harkness took to raisin' the critters."
"What's that, raising wolves, do you mean, Amos? Sure you must be kiddin'?" was the way Jimmy greeted this announcement.
"Not me, Jimmy; it's plain United States I'm giving you, sure I am," the other insisted.
"But there ain't no great call for wolf pelts, like there is for black fox and 'coon, and otter, and skunks and that sort of thing. How d'ye s'pose this Wolf Harkness makes it pay?"
"Oh! that's easy," replied Amos, carelessly. "You see, he kills off a certain number of his stock once in so often and sells the skins. Then later on they reckon that he collects the bounty for wolf scalps from the State."
"But say, that looks kind of queer for any man to raise pests, and then expect to make the State pay him so much for every one he kills," Jimmy remarked, shaking his head as though he found it difficult to believe.
"Don't know how he manages," the boy continued. "Heard some say that the law, it left a loophole for such practices, and that they couldn't stop him. Others kind of think he sells the scalps to some hunter, who collects for the same. But everybody just knows Harkness does get a heap of cash out of his queer business."
"Ever been to his pen and seen his stock?" asked Jimmy.
"Yes, once I happened that way, but the smell drove me away. There must have been thirty or more wolves in the stockade right then, and they looked like they was pretty nigh starved, too. I dreamed that night they broke loose and got me cornered in an empty cabin. I barred the door, but they pushed underneath and clumb through the broken windows, and everywhere I looked I saw red tongues and pale yellow eyes! Then I woke up, and was scared near stiff, for there was a pair of eyes in the dark right alongside me in the loft at home. But say, that turned out to be only our old black cat."
All of them laughed with Amos, as though they could fully appreciate the scare he must have received on that occasion.
The subject of the wolf farm seemed to have interested Jimmy intensely, for he went on asking more questions concerning the raising of the animals, what they were fed on, the price of wolf pelts, and a lot more along the same lines until finally Harry turned to Ned and complained.
"Tell him to change the subject, won't you, Ned? He'll have the lot of us dreaming we're beset by a horde of wolves. And you'd better make him draw all the charges out of his gun to-night, because he's sure to sit up and begin blazing away, to keep from being dragged off. Jimmy's got a big imagination, you know, and every once in a while it runs away with him."
"Tell me," announced Jimmy, rather indignantly, "who's got a better right to be askin' questions about the habits of the animals than me, who's a member of that same Wolf Patrol? How can you expect a feller to give the right kind of a _howl_ when he wants to signal to his mates, unless he finds out all these things."
"Oh! if that's the worst you are after, Jimmy, go ahead and find out," Jack was heard to say, condescendingly. "I thought you had a more serious scheme in that head of yours than just accumulating knowledge."
Jimmy turned and looked at him suspiciously.
"And what did you think I had up me sleeve, if it's a fair question?" he asked.
"Why, you see," began Jack, with a twinkle in his eye, "I was afraid that you might want to invest what money you've got saved in starting a wolf ranch of your own, or trying to buy this old man Harkness out. I supposed that was why you wanted to know the exact value of wolf hides, and what the State paid bounty on scalps. But I'm just as glad to find that you're not bothering your head over the business part of the game. Perhaps you'd like to meet up with this Harkness, thinking he might give you a chance to shoot his collection of hungry wolves. That would be a snap for a fellow who hates the beasts like you do, and has made a vow to never let one get past him, when he had a gun handy or a stone to heave."
Jimmy only grinned. He did not know whether Jack was joking or not, but there seemed to be something complimentary in his way of talking; and Jimmy was not at all averse to being known as a champion wolf killer.
"I only hope I get a chance to see this Harkness and his bunch of slick critters before we quit this neck of the woods," he remarked. "But as I ain't a butcher you needn't think that I'd ask him to let me cut down his list with my new Marlin gun. Out in the open I'm death on the sneakers every time; but it'd go against my grain to knock 'em over, when they hadn't got any show for their money. I never could do the axe business for a chicken at home, even when we were livin' in the country."
"Oh! well, you must excuse me for speaking of such a thing, Jimmy," said Jack, with assumed gravity; "I was mistaken, that's all, in sizing you up. Appearances are often deceitful, you know, and things don't always turn out as they seem. Now, few people looking at you would ever dream that they were gazing on a marvelous phenomenon. I guess you caught that trick from association with Ned, here," and Jack might have continued along that vein still further had he not been nudged sharply by the scout master, and heard Ned mutter:
"Mum's the word, Jack. Don't tell all you know!"
This brought him to his senses, for he remembered that there was a stranger present, and that it had been decided not to expose their full hand to the gaze of Amos, at least for the present.
In this fashion the time passed.
All of the scouts were in a humor to vote that one of the most delightful camps they had ever been in. Perhaps this partly arose from the great contrast it afforded when compared with recent nights passed under the most trying of conditions, when crossing the desert, and the terrible valley lying to the east of it.
Amos had a blanket along with him. Apparently the lad was accustomed to sleeping by himself on the open plain, and always went prepared. Things were not as pleasant as they might be at his cabin home, frequently enough; and besides this, he must be possessed of a wandering nature, feeling perfectly satisfied to take care of himself, and capable of doing it, too.
They were still lying around the dying fire, and each waiting for some one else to take the lead in mentioning such a thing as going to sleep, when Amos suddenly sat upright.
Ned noticed that he had his head cocked on one side, and appeared to be in the attitude of listening for a repetition of some sound that may have struck his acute hearing.
"There it comes again," Amos remarked. "You see, the wind has veered around that way more or less; but say, twelve miles as the crow flies is pretty hefty of a distance to hear that pack give tongue, seems to me."
Ned had caught it that time.
"You must mean the wolves that Harkness keeps shut up in his pen for breeding purposes, is that it, Amos?" he inquired.
"Nothing more nor less than that," came the reply.
"There, I caught it as plain as anything then!" acknowledged Jimmy, with a vein of triumph and satisfaction in his voice, as though he did not mean to be left at the post, when the whole bunch was running swiftly.
"Whew! they do make a racket, when they're excited, for a fact!" declared Jack.
"Is it the wolves you're talking about?" asked Harry.
"Don't you be hearing the noise beyond there?" Jimmy asked him. "P'raps now, meat is so scarce that the old man's put his pets on half rations, and the whoopin' we hear is meant for a protest."
"Well, what of that?" Jack wanted to know; "I guess you'd raise a bigger howl than that, Jimmy, if we tried to put _you_ on half rations. I can fancy how you'd be trying to lift the roof off, and they'd have to call the fire company out to soak you with their hose so as to make you stop. But don't get alarmed, Jimmy, because none of us have any intention that way."
They sat there and listened for several minutes. No doubt, Jimmy was endeavoring to picture in his mind what the den of trapped wolves must look like; and at the same time, he was promising himself once more to try and visit the Harkness place before leaving the country. He would like to be able to say he had set eyes on so strange a thing as a wolf ranch.
Harry began to yawn, and stretch tremendously.
"What ails you fellows; don't any of you expect to crawl into your blankets and pick up a little sleep? Talking may be all very well, but it doesn't rest you up any. Ned, why don't you tell Jimmy to sound taps, all lights out so the rest of us can adjourn? As long as Jimmy's afloat to do the grand talking act, it isn't any use trying to go to sleep, because you just can't."
Jimmy seemed ready to take up that challenge, and entered upon an argument calculated to prove that he was a mild mannered individual alongside of some people he could mention, though not wanting to give names. Ned, however, put his foot down.
"Harry's right this time, Jimmy, and you know it. So make up your mind to simmer down, and keep the rest for another time. We'll find a soft spot and see how well this ground lies. And we ought to make up some for lost sleep to-night, with that soft breeze blowing, and the air getting fresher right along."
At that plain invitation Jimmy began to make his blanket ready, for he never liked seeing any one crawl in ahead of him any more than he did to be the first one up in the morning.
Amos still sat there. Ned, looking at the boy, saw that there was a little frown on his forehead, as though he did not exactly like something or other.
"What's wrong, Amos?" he asked, quietly.
"The breeze, it is no stronger than before, you can see, Ned," the kid puncher replied, as he held up his wet forefinger, after the fashion of range riders and plainsmen in general.
"That's true enough," replied the scout master, always willing to pick up points in woodcraft, for he did not pretend to know everything there was going.
"But listen!" added Amos; "it is much louder now, you see."
Ned became intensely interested at once.
"You are right," he remarked, "the sound of that wolfish howling does come three times as loud as in the start, and yet the wind couldn't be the reason of that. Do you know what makes it, Amos?"
"I could give a guess, mebbe."
"As how?" continued Ned, while Jack and Jimmy and Harry all stopped their preparations for fixing their blankets to suit their individual wants, in order to hear what the kid puncher would say.
"When I was over there at the wolf ranch," Amos commenced, "I remember now that I noticed the pen looked old and weak. I asked the hunter about it, and he said it'd hold, he guessed; that wolves, they didn't have the intelligence of hosses, or even cattle, so as to make a combined rush at a weak place."
"Well?" Ned remarked, as Amos paused.
"It might be that somethin' happened to make that weak place in the big pen give way, and the whole pack is loose, acomin' for the river, hungry as all get-out, and ready to attack anything that walks on two legs, because they are nearly starved!"
When Amos gave this as his opinion, the scouts who had been getting their blankets ready for a quiet night's sleep seemed suddenly to lose all interest in the proceedings. Instead Jimmy started reaching around him for that new Marlin repeating rifle, which had already proven its worth on several occasions.
"Whew!" they could hear him saying, almost breathlessly to himself; "thirty hungry wolves, all at a pop, hey? That's what I call crowding the mourners. I may be set on knockin' over an occasional critter when I run across the same; but say, I ain't so greedy as all that. Think I'm in the wholesale line, do you? Well, you've got another guess acomin' to you, that's all!"
CHAPTER VI.
THE WOLF PACK.
"What can we do, Ned?" asked Jack.
Jimmy was not the only one now who had seized hold of his gun, for the other three scouts could be seen gripping their rifles. Only poor Amos was without his rifle, though he carried a revolver, cowboy fashion, attached to his belt.
"It's out of the question for us to get away," replied the scout master; "because we only have three poor burros, and they'd be overtaken before they'd gone a mile."
"Yes," added Jimmy, "and don't forget there's four of us, Ned, darlint."
"Amos could skip out if he feels like it, because his pony has fleet heels, and might outrun the wolf pack?" Jack suggested.
"But all the same Amos is agoin' to hang around, and take pot luck with the rest of the bunch," remarked the kid puncher, quietly.
"But how about the animals," asked Harry, nervously; "do we leave them to be pulled down by the savage beasts of prey? All of us could shinny up some of these trees, but burros can't climb."
"Huh, I've seen the time when I thought they could do everything but fly," grunted Jimmy; "and I wasn't so sure about that, either."
"We might bring them in close and stand guard over the poor things," Ned went on to say.
At that they hurried to where the four animals were tethered. Already something seemed to have told the burros and the calico pony that danger hovered in that breeze, for they were beginning to show signs of excitement, and it was not such an easy job after all to lead them in close to the dying camp fire.
Hastily they were firmly secured.
"Will the ropes hold if they get to cutting up?" Harry asked, after he had tied his as many as five different times, to make sure there would be no slipping of the knot.
"They are all good and practically new," Ned informed him, "and I think there's no doubt about their holding. Now to get ourselves fixed. Pick your tree, everybody, but let it be where you can keep watch over the animals, so as to knock over every wolf that makes a jump for them."
They caught on to the idea Ned had in mind. This was to occupy, say as many as three trees that chanced to grow in a triangle around the fire and the spot where the burros and pony had been fastened.
The bright moon would give them all needed opportunity to see any movement on the part of the assailants, and woe to the daring wolf that ventured to cross the dead line.
Ned waited to see which trees the others would pick out before choosing his own place of refuge. He did this because he thought it good policy to have their forces scattered, as by that means they could guard the camp more surely.
As they went on with these preparations, looking to the repulse of invading hosts of sleek gray-coated beasts of prey, they could hear the fiendish chorus of wolfish howls drawing steadily nearer all the while. There may have been a lingering doubt in the mind of Jack or Harry concerning the accuracy of that guess on the part of Amos, but it was gone by this time. Those constantly increasing howls had convinced them beyond all question.
Jimmy had picked out his tree easily enough. Indeed, it was a habit of his these times to settle in his mind just what tree would make the best harbor of refuge in case of a sudden necessity. This he always did as soon as a camp had been decided upon. Jimmy was wont to say with considerable pride that he was only following out the customary scout law "be prepared," which might cover the case, as it does many others.
He seemed to have little trouble about climbing into this tree, first pushing up his Marlin gun, and then the beloved Navajo blanket with its bright colors; for Jimmy did not mean to leave his personal possessions to the mercy of the thievish pack that had broken bounds and was wildly hunting for food.
He climbed after the rest, and it happened that no one else had picked on that particular tree for their refuge, so that Jimmy was going to have it all to himself.
The lower limbs grew rather close to the ground, Jimmy now realized; and he began to wonder whether he had after all been wise in choosing such a tree. Would he be in any danger from the sharp teeth and claws of the wolves when they came rushing up? Jimmy did not believe that wolves could climb trees; but all the same he did not feel altogether easy about it. Still, when he found himself clutching his trusty gun new confidence seemed to be born in his soul.
"Let 'em come if they want to," he said aloud, between his set teeth. "If they will have it, I guess I'll be able to take care of the lot. Every bullet ought to count for a victim; and, mebbe, now I'll be able to see if the bully gun can't send the lead through a couple at one time. It's passed through a six-inch tree, and that's goin' some, let me tell you. My stars! but don't they yap to beat the band. And say, they can't be more'n a mile away right now, I should think."
The thought was enough to make his blood leap through his veins with renewed excitement. In imagination, Jimmy already began to picture himself blazing away as fast as he could work the mechanism of his modern firearm; and, of course, bowling over a fresh victim with every discharge.
"Jimmy!"
That was Harry calling.
"Hello, there!" replied the one addressed.
"Did you think to grab up the grub and take it up with you?" continued Harry.
"Oh! thunder!"
Jimmy was all broken up by this sudden intelligence. The others had apparently expected him to look out for the food supply, because Jimmy was always ready to take this burden on his shoulders.
And now, alas, what had seemed to be everyone's duty had proved to be no one's; their precious supply of food was left unguarded at the foot of that central tree, close to which the burros and pony had been hitched.
Could he reach it, and get back before the advance gray runner arrived on the scene, bringing his appetite with him and, likewise, his teeth well sharpened for business?
Jimmy came to a conclusion almost instantly, and having a convenient crotch in which he could leave his gun and blanket, he dropped down from his perch.
"Hey! get back there!" shouted Jack; "don't you hear the pack coming along? They'll get you, Jimmy! Climb up again!"
But Jimmy, undismayed, was already making a bolt for the spot where he could see the pack he knew contained pretty much all the food they had left. He had to face one of two evils; and to Jimmy's mind, it was far worse to run the chances of being starved to death than to accept the risk of the wolves coming up before he could climb into his tree of refuge again.
Jimmy knew what it was to suffer the pangs of hunger; and as he had never yet been bitten by wolves, he decided according to his light.
There was surely need of haste, as he knew while bending over the package which he meant to save. The clamor of wolfish tongues was very close at hand, and with what seemed to be a full dozen joining in the yelping orgy it certainly went to make up a fiendish noise.
He could hear the rush of jumping forms through the underbrush as though those eager animals had already scented what they considered their prey, and were straining every nerve in the endeavor to beat each other to the spot.
Jimmy in turning after securing the bundle had the misfortune to catch his left foot in a projecting root and fall headlong. He felt a thrill of horror, under the impression that his foot might be gripped fast in the upturned root, and that he would be held in this position until the bounding beasts had reached him, no matter how the other boys poured in a hot fire.
But it was not so bad as that, and when he started to scramble to his feet again, Jimmy found that he could move all right.
He could have made much faster time had he obeyed the order which Ned called out to him, to abandon the packet and make for his tree haven with all speed. But there was that old spirit of obstinacy urging Jimmy to hold what he had, to the bitter end. What would he think of himself in times to come if he remembered that he had tamely submitted to conditions that were not of his own making and abandoned the entire visible food supply for himself and friends to those savage half-famished creatures?
On gaining his feet Jimmy again headed for his tree, gripping the bundle with both arms. That was a sight the other boys would not soon forget; but Ned was not very much surprised, for he knew the nature of his assistant, and had on other occasions witnessed just such specimens of his grit.
"Drop it, Jimmy!" shrieked Harry, afraid that something terrible was about to follow this action on the part of the other scout, because the rush of the coming wolves had increased to a pitch that was next door to terrible.
"Don't do it, Jimmy; we'll hedge you in, all right! Bully boy, Jimmy!" Jack was calling out, for Jack, being much more of a fighter than Harry, could better appreciate the daring feat Jimmy was carrying to a successful end.
Ned did not venture to say anything. He knew the weakness of Jimmy, and how easily he could be "rattled" when others were shouting conflicting appeals to him. And so Ned contented himself with sitting there, holding his gun ready for work and keeping a close watch, so as to discover the very first sign of the leading wolf of the coming pack.
Jimmy was now at his tree, but the next thing was to get the package of food safely lodged up among the limbs, where they formed crotches at the junction with the main trunk.
He tossed it upwards, but was compelled to stretch out his hands and catch it again, pretty much as an eager football player might smother the pigskin oval in his arms on occasion. That wasted just so many seconds, but although he heard the rushing sound coming steadily toward him, Jimmy was game to the core, and would not allow himself to think of giving up his part in the play.
A second time did he give the packet a toss, and this effort had more steam back of it, for the object of his attention went considerably higher. It must have struck a limb, for it rebounded back, and once again landed at the feet of Jimmy.
He saw a flitting figure shoot across a little open spot where the moon's rays fell upon the ground; and Jimmy knew full well that this must be the leading wolf, heading straight toward him, through the instinct that draws carniverous animals directly to their intended prey.
Nevertheless, he bent down and deliberately took the package of food in his possession once more, meaning to give a third trial, possibly under the belief that two good attempts deserve another.
This time luck did follow his effort. The packet managed to lodge somewhere among the branches, for certainly it failed to fall back again. And so Jimmy felt that having vindicated his reputation for courage, it was now up to him to look out for himself.
So he commenced to climb. Jimmy had never been one of the best climbers in the troop; for there were quite a number who could, as he would have said, "cut circles all around" him in the tree-tops. But this was a case where he was encouraged to exert himself to the utmost. There was something worth while at stake, for should those famished creatures ever reach him, he might expect them to make short work of their task.
Jimmy under other conditions would doubtless have climbed that tree more gracefully, but he could certainly not have done it in less time than on that present occasion. Speed was everything to him just then, and he was willing to sacrifice agility, grace and make-believe coolness to the one object of avoiding too close acquaintance with the cruel fangs, which he knew must already be snapping and grinding in anticipation of a feast.
Once he slipped and came very near falling back to the ground. He felt a cold chill pass through his whole frame at the bare horror of the thing; then his grip held its own, and he managed to give one more desperate heave that landed him up in the first crotch.
Even there he was not safe. It was too near the ground, and one of those agile jumpers might easily spring that high, with half an effort. So Jimmy, without even waiting to catch a fresh breath, put the spurs in and made another heave.
He had an indistinct view of some object flashing toward his tree, more like a streak of light than a living creature. It must be that leading wolf, crazy to be the first to seize upon the prey they had scented from afar.
Jimmy might have shouted at the beast, in hopes of sending him back in alarm; but, in the first place, he did not have much breath left with which to engineer such a programme. Then again he was not given half a show. Not that the wolf sprang up, and took hold of his shins, that being the part of Jimmy's anatomy extending further down the tree than any other. Oh! no, such a catastrophe did not happen at all, because there was no chance that it could with such vigilant guardians near at hand.
Ned had, meanwhile, sung out something to his other two chums. This was in the nature of the "I've got it!" of the fielder, when a high fly comes his way; for he wants to warn his neighbors in due time, so that they may not interfere with his play and make a mess of it all.
When Jimmy heard the sharp report of that rifle so close at hand, his heart felt glad within him; for he guessed who had pulled the trigger, and his faith in Ned's marksmanship was very great.
"How's that, Mr. Umpire?" he managed to call, shrilly; and Jack, apparently entering into the spirit of the thing, was heard to bawl lustily back, as though the appeal had been directed to him personally:
"Out at first!"
"Next batter up!" yipped little Amos; which was enough to tell the scouts that the great National game was no mystery to this diminutive cow-puncher, with the face and body of a child, but the head of a grown person.
Then the fun suddenly became fast and furious.
CHAPTER VII.
EVERYBODY BUSY.
"My turn next!" shouted Jack, as a further rushing sound announced the arrival of a second detachment of the escaped wolfish horde.
Ned had his shooting eye at its best when he sent the first leaden pellet toward that leading sprinter. The beast had come with a furious rush, and chanced to pass through a succession of shadowy patches, so that the scout master could not pull the trigger as quickly as he might have wished. The wolf had actually made one wild leap upward after Jimmy's retreating and plump form before the crash of the gun came.
It happened that Jimmy was looking back over his shoulder at the time, though he knew that must be a foolish thing to do, and cost many a fleeing hunter dear. He would not soon forget the picture that met his eyes, as that gaunt gray pirate of the herd came rising toward him with that splendid bound.
"Why," Jimmy was heard to say afterwards, when the shock of battle was a thing only of memory, "both his lamps looked like yellow fires, and that red tongue hung from his mouth, while I could see his long white fangs bared to beat the band. Then I heard the bang of Ned's gun, and that wolf fell back in a heap. When I saw the way he lay crunched up at the foot of my tree, I knew he'd gone and croaked. Gee whiz! but that was a pretty close shave for Jimmy McGraw, let me tell you!"
Jack got his turn and he found it no easy task to knock over a leaping wolf, as glimpsed in the deceptive light. The moon's rays dazzled his eyes, and when he saw the newcomer flashing through the bars of light and shade Jack pulled the trigger with no assurance that he had held positively on his target.
It was true that the beast took a header, which proved that he must have been hit by the bullet; but, even as Jack's nervous hands started to pump another cartridge from the magazine into the firing chamber of his rifle, he saw his intended victim scramble to its feet, utter one long howl, and then start to slink away.
"No you don't there; just hold on a bit!" cried Jack.
In his excitement, he fumbled more than he should with the mechanism of his gun, and thus lost a couple of precious seconds. Indeed, the wounded wolf might have vanished from view amidst the brush, only that Harry took it upon himself to "put his oar in," with the result that the bombarded beast crumpled up.
By that time even Jimmy was ready for business, having managed to snatch up his Marlin, and then look eagerly around for some target at which to fire.
"Don't forget the directions!"
That was Ned calling out. He knew the value of economizing ammunition when far from a base of supply; and, consequently, did not want the others to needlessly do anything of this sort. One bit of lead ought to be enough for each beast, if properly delivered.
This warning was really meant more for Jimmy than either of the others; for he had been known to get tremendously excited on other occasions, when peril threatened, and mix things up considerably.
As everybody had had a shot but Jimmy, it was now his turn, according to the order of events which had been arranged. Jack recognized this fact by advising him to "be prepared" as a true scout always should.
"Here they come with a whoop!" Amos was heard to exclaim, as there came a louder rush through the brushwood than at any previous time, proving that quite a bunch of the hungry animals must be at hand.
"Steady, Jimmy, and be quick to pick your game!" called Ned, thinking to thus keep the other from getting "rattled."
From the furious way in which the balance of the pack was coming on, it seemed evident that they did not realize what sort of a surprise awaited them near the river bank. Hunger and a keen scent was doing the business for them. They appeared to know that there was something worth while in the eating line around that particular part of the country, and evidently meant to make a bold bid for the same, regardless of consequences.
Jimmy was straining his eyes to discover the first sign of the oncoming pack. He had his faithful repeater up against his shoulder and was aiming at the spot he believed would speedily be occupied by a leaping wolf.
Jimmy was no sharpshooter, though he had done some fairly creditable work along the line of knocking over game in times past. As a rule, he preferred shooting at random into a bunch of quail and taking chances of making a fine bag. So now he indulged in the hope that several of the wolves would break cover in a heap, when he could just blaze away and, perhaps, knock over a couple with one shot; which he fancied would put a feather in his hat as a marksman who knew how to conserve his ammunition.
Then the time came to fire. He could see a confused mass tearing along through the spaces where those bars of light and shadow rather dazzled the eye; and, not daring to wait any longer, Jimmy let fly.
"Hurroo! did you see that beggar roll over? And listen to the other howl, like he had the toothache, and no dentist within twenty miles! Tell me about that, will you? Soak it to 'em, fellers, good and plenty!"
Of course, all this was pretty much lost, because, what with the racket created by howling, yelping and yapping wolves, and the banging of the guns in the hands of the scouts, a din had started that made it impossible to hear any single human voice.
Jimmy realized that if he wanted to have a further share in the disposal of the savage pack, he had better be getting busy again. So he up with his rifle, and looked eagerly for some target at which he could fire.
There never could be a more exciting affair than that battle with the escaped wolves that Harkness, the herder, had been feeding and keeping for breeding purposes. They were far from tamed by their recent confinement; indeed, Ned could not remember ever having run across a more savage pack in all his experience.
Afterwards, in commenting on this strange fact, he came to the conclusion that it was caused by a combination of two things: the animals had not been fed recently, and were almost crazy for food; and then, he learned that Harkness had ever been a cruel despot, using a black-snake whip with a long cutting lash to quiet his pack in their enclosure, whenever their howling annoyed him--always keeping well out of the reach of their fangs when plying the whip, it may be understood; for he had a species of "pulpit" built out far above the pen, in which he was free to swing that instrument of keen torture.
It was just slaughter, for the wretched wolves really had no chance at all to retaliate. Ned sickened of the business quickly, but what could they do otherwise? It was a condition that had been forced upon them. They had not invited the attack, and must defend themselves against the pack, no matter at what cost.
Before long there were dead and dying wolves lying all around, as "thick as blackberries in the good old summertime," as Jimmy put it. Others that had received wounds, and no longer felt the same furious desire to try conclusions with the enemies perched beyond their reach in the trees, began to slink away. Doubtless, they remembered old lairs in the distant hills to which they might fly; and, in some fashion, supply themselves with the necessary food, without taking such desperate chances.
"All gone, it looks like, Ned!" sang out Jack, "and just when I've gone and got the magazine of my gun charged again, too."
"Set 'em up in the other alley!" cried Jimmy. "I accounted for some of the victims, you can roll your hoop on that!"
"My stars! but that _was_ a warm session!" exclaimed Harry; "and I wonder now if you got any sort of picture, Jack, when you used your flashlight on the scrimmage?"
That was just what Jack had done, laid his rifle aside for a minute, and made a good use of his camera, prepared for the occasion. The sudden flare of the cartridge had illuminated the scene as might a flash of lightning; and, possibly, this had been one of the causes that frightened the balance of the pack away, for the attack weakened from that moment.
"Dast we get down now?" asked Jimmy.
While he was speaking, Amos Adams dropped from his perch, as though he could see no further reason for playing the part of a bird and perching there among the branches.
During the racket Ned had several times heard the lighter report of a six-shooter, and understood that the kid cow-puncher was trying to do his share of the work in diminishing the number of Harkness' pets. Whether success followed his efforts or not, Ned was unable to say, though he imagined the boy knew how to shoot the gun he "toted" in the holster at his belt.
As there was no reappearance of the wolves, the rest of the campers came down. The burros and the calico pony had acted as though frantic during the melee; but, as the boys had made sure to secure them properly, they were all there and by degrees quieting down, when they found that they were not going to be made a meal of by those savage beasts of prey.
The scouts counted just thirteen dead wolves scattered about. Two others were trying to crawl away, dragging their broken limbs after them.
"We must knock those fellows on the head," said Ned; "because they'll die anyway, and it's the duty of a scout to put an end to needless pain."
Although he had already had more than enough of the slaughter, Ned followed after the two escaping animals. They showed their venomous natures by turning on him and snarling furiously; but Ned stopped far enough away not to endanger himself from those glistening fangs exposed when the red lips were drawn back.
Two quick shots did the business, and then there were fifteen.
"Huh! Harkness' game is about up this time, and he won't raise any more young wolves to sell the skins for lap-robes and turn over the scalps to the State for bounty money," Jack observed, as they all gathered again near the fire, which was started up afresh; for they could not think of such a thing as sleep for some little time, after so much excitement.
"If there's even two dollars apiece, it would net a feller thirty plunks right now, to raise the hair of this bunch," speculated Jimmy.
"But we don't want to go into the wolf scalping business, do we, Ned?" expostulated Harry, who viewed the idea with considerable disgust.
"Certainly not," replied the scout master. "Let Harkness come and get his property if he wants, for all of us. We've saved him all the trouble of cleaning up his pack. He ought to thank us for it; but, if what Amos here says about him is true, I don't believe he will."
"Well," said Jack, frowning, "he'd better not get too gay and try to blame us for cleaning out the pack, because we won't stand any abuse. It was a case of give and take. They meant to pull us down and make a fine meal; and they got what was coming to them. Harkness had better go slow how he complains."
"I was wondering," mused Ned, as he settled down comfortably again, just as though nothing worth mentioning had happened to disturb him, "whether anything had come to Harkness?"
"How could there?" demanded Jimmy.
"Oh! of course, I don't know, but then it might be the wolves had caught him off his guard and torn him to pieces before they skipped out. If we have time, perhaps we ought to go around that way and see if there's anything wrong."
The others did not seem to look at it in the same light that Ned was doing.
"A waste of time, Ned," Jack declared, vehemently.
"That's what I say," added Harry.
"Can't see what it matters to us whether the old rascal has been hoisted by his own infernal machine or not!" grumbled Jimmy.
"But don't forget that we're scouts," Ned continued impressively, "and that we ought to follow the scout law which teaches us to do good, even to our enemies, if the chance opens up."
"After we've licked the same good and plenty, I admit," Jimmy spoke up, with one of his famous grins decorating his freckled face and a twinkle in his eye. "P'raps you're right, Ned; and, as we've upset the old man's business, we could call that a lickin' and let her go at that. If you're of the same mind in the mornin', tell me. But say, I b'lieve I could snatch a few winks right now, since things have calmed down."
Save for the distant mournful howling of several of the hungry wolves nothing was to be heard all around them. So after arranging for keeping "watch and watch," the scouts turned in. Amos snuggled down alongside them; while Jack, upon whom had fallen the choice for the first spell at playing sentry, settled his back up against a tree, laid his ready gun across his knees, and prepared to do his duty.
The fire burned brightly for a long time and Jack sat there thinking of many things connected with both the past and the immediate future. Doubtless, he felt that it began to look as though they were not yet through with hazards and adventures on this trip, when, on what was practically their first night out on the open plain, they had been so savagely beset by Harkness' escaped wolf pack.
By degrees even the distant howling of the few survivors died away, as they no doubt started for the distant mountains, afraid to come back to the scene of the recent carnage, even though the scent of blood must have tempted them dreadfully.
Jimmy had gone to sleep immediately he lay down, for he never knew the time when he could not forget his troubles in sweet slumber. Once or twice he managed to get on his back and aroused Ned by his heavy breathing. On these occasions the scout master was in the habit of giving the offender a sharp punch in the ribs and it seemed as though Jimmy understood what was wanted, even in his sleep, for he would inevitably turn over on his side.
Ned had just been through the third experience of this kind and was wondering whether he had not better suggest that they always tie Jimmy in a certain position as he lay down to sleep, when he heard a voice close by.
As Ned instantly sat up he recognized the tones as belonging to Pard Jack, who was evidently laying down the law to some party:
"Hold up your hands, you there in the bushes, and step right up to the fire, or I'll shoot; and, let me tell you, this gun goes straight! Lively now, Mister, and no foolishness! Oh! Ned! come here, will you? We've got a visitor!"
CHAPTER VIII.
AN UNWELCOME GUEST.
When Ned started toward the spot where he knew Jack was on guard, he could hear Harry groping for his rifle, and this told him the other would also be close on his heels. Harry, finding that Jimmy still slumbered peacefully, managed to give him a severe poke in the ribs as he passed that had an immediate effect.
"Here, who's doin' that now?" broke from Jimmy's lips, and then, no doubt, he suddenly realized that there was something up, for he saw Ned poking the fire, holding his gun in the other hand, and Harry also standing erect, armed in the same manner.
Accordingly, Jimmy made haste to discover his gun and follow after them. In the meantime, the dusky figure among the bushes which Jack was covering had stood erect and started to advance toward the fire, as ordered, holding his hands high above his head.
"It's Harkness!" cried out the kid puncher, who had been on his feet about as soon as Ned; and, somehow, no one was much surprised at the information thus conveyed.
Ned saw that Harkness was just about such a looking man as one might picture if asked to describe a wolf-raiser. He had grayish hair and a scraggy beard; his face was ugly, and his eyes, like those of a rat for keenness and audacity. Taken in all, he was as tough looking a character as the scouts had run across in many a day.
"Wot d'ye mean a holdin' a man up thisaway, when he jest natrally draps in to arsk who killed them pets o' his'n?" the wolf-herder blurted out, though careful not to take his hands down, for he knew that Jack was still covering him with that dangerous looking repeating rifle, and there was an air of business about the weapon that warned him not to get careless.
"Oh! you can lower your hands now, if you want," Jack sang out, "because we're all on deck and could riddle your hide with lead if you tried to use your gun. So just take things easy now, Mr. Harkness, if that's your name."
"It air!" growled the man, staring hard at each boy in turn, as though he did not know what to make of their khaki uniforms and was a little afraid he had run up against a detachment of United States regulars.
"And I reckon then that all these dead wolves belonged to you?" Ned went on to remark, as he swept his hand around.
The man said something hard under his breath.
"Ye gone an' busted up my bizness, thet's wot ye done, w'en ye laid out tuh kill the animiles!" he complained, as he gritted his yellow teeth very much as one of the wounded wolves had done at Ned's approach.
"That couldn't be helped, Harkness," the scout master told him. "Your wolves had broken out, and you couldn't expect to ever trap many of them again, at the best. They came at us like fury, and we had to defend ourselves, or we'd have been torn to pieces like a flash. And that's why this happened. We weren't out hunting for trouble; but you've lost you pack on account of a weak place in your pen."
"But ain't yuh meanin' tuh pay me anything fo' shootin' up my pets thisaways?" Harkness demanded, trying to look fierce, though keeping an eye on Jack with his ready gun.
Jimmy laughed out very loud.
"Would you be after hearing the nerve of him, fellers?" he exclaimed in derision. 'Tis meself that thinks it sounds like adding insult to injury. After lettin' the pack loose to make a square meal from us, then askin' pay, because we had to fight to save our precious lives. 'Tis a rare joke, it is--not on your tintype, Mister Harkness. Our principle is 'millions for defense, not a plunk for tribute.' So put that in your pipe and smoke it."
"You've got a lot of assurance, Harkness," Ned told him, severely, "to think of asking such a thing. Why, the boot is on the other foot, and we ought to be demanding that you pay us back for all the ammunition it took to clean up your pack for you. I'm half inclined to believe we could prosecute you for keeping such a lot of savage animals. You'd be wise to go mighty slow about trying to make trouble for any of us. We might take a notion to run you in."
The man's whole demeanor changed when he discovered that his bluster was not going to alarm the scouts.
"I hopes now," he went on to say in a whining tone, "thet yuh won't keep me from taking the pelts off my poor pets. They's worth sumpin' tuh me, likewise the scalps o' the same. I been bankin' on thet money this long time. Hit's all I got tuh see me through the winter. Don't be too hard on me, gents. I'm out o' the wolf raisin' line fo' keeps, arter this bust-up."
Ned consulted with his chums for a minute or two and then turned again to the intruder.
"Here's what we propose to have you do, Harkness," he remarked, with such an air of finality that the man knew he must yield to circumstances, "hand over that gun of yours to me; you'll get it again in the morning, when we break camp. Then lie down and go to sleep. One of us will be on the watch all the time, so if you try any monkey-doodle business, as Jimmy here would call it, better go slow, or something will happen. Do you understand that, Harkness?"
The man's ugly face grew as black as a thunder cloud, and then with an effort he tried to grin, though it only added to his unsavory appearance.
"Thar be times w'en a feller has tuh eat crow an' I reckons as how this be sech a time fo' me, younker," he said, slowly. "Oh! I hain't no 'jections tuh stayin' hyar alongside the fire; but I hopes as how yuh'll let me hev my pelts w'en mo'nin' comes 'long."
"Yes, we'll agree to that and, if you behave, you can take your property after we clear out in the morning. Perhaps we'll go so far as to invite you to breakfast, too, in the bargain, Harkness, to show that we have no bad feelings because your pack made us have a pretty hot session to-night. So that's settled. Your gun, please."
The wolf-herder handed it over, though with an ill grace. No doubt, he was what they call a "bad man" down in the Southwest, and this thing of being made a prisoner by a parcel of half-grown boys, as it seemed, galled him greatly.
After that he dropped down near the fire, clasped both arms about his knees and stared moodily into the flames.
"Jack, seems to me you've outstayed the time limit we set," Ned suggested, after taking a quick look up to where the moon was sailing through a star-decked sky; for scouts early learn to tell time from the positions of heavenly bodies, and the setting of a star will be almost as sure an indication that a certain hour has arrived as though a watch had been consulted.
"Oh! well, I thought you seemed to be sleeping so sound that I'd let it run on a little," the other made answer, for Jack was as generous as they make boys, "and then, you see, I got interested watching _him_ come creeping along like a snake, stopping every minute to examine one of the dead wolves, and saying something to himself each time, like he kept getting madder and madder."
"Well, I'm going on duty now, Jack, so just crawl over to your blanket and turn in," said Ned, in his quiet but positive way.
Amos was hovering near him at the time, as though he wanted to say a few words on the sly. He found the chance when Ned sat down, also leaning against the same tree that had supported the other vidette.
"I wouldn't think too much about hurtin' the feelings of that old mule-skinner if I was you, Ned," the kid cow-puncher went on to say, "he ain't near so mad as he puts on. Why, if it hadn't been for you and the rest, he'd never got a single pelt of all that pack. They were free and would a got clear away, if we hadn't rounded the same up here. Fifteen hides, and as many scalps, he gets, without wasting his ammunition. He's putting on--that's what. But keep an eye out for him, Ned. That was a smart trick to take his gun away; but you've only scotched the snake, not killed it."
Ned promised that he would watch the wolf-herder closely and not allow him to make any sort of suspicious move.
"I don't think he means to try any funny business, though," he added. "You see he stands to lose all his pelts if he pulls his freight and gives us the good-bye sign. And with five against him, the odds are too big; for a boy with a rifle can be just as dangerous as a full-grown man."
It was somewhere near one o'clock at the time of the alarm. The moon was high up in the heavens and even starting down her road toward the western horizon.
Ned kept watch and ward diligently. He did not mean to be caught napping by any unsuspected circumstance. It was hardly likely that Harkness could have any allies near by. Ned had been particular in asking about that, and Amos assured him that so far as he knew, the wolf-herder conducted his business alone, shunning the society of others, save on rare occasions when he came to town for a spree.
The night passed away without anything else happening to disturb the sleep of Jimmy. Harry awoke later on and insisted on taking his turn at keeping watch; so Ned secured his blanket and lay down close to him, having impressed it on Harry's mind that, at the least sign of a movement on the part of Harkness, he was to reach out a hand and shake him.
But just as Ned had said, the wolf man must have figured it out that he had everything to gain and nothing to lose by staying where he was and waiting for the boys to break camp, when his gun would be returned and himself left at liberty to rid those dead animals of their shaggy gray coats.
Jimmy was thoughtful to cook enough breakfast for an extra mouth, and so Harkness was given his full share of coffee, bacon, and fried potatoes, as well as all the crackers he could eat.
He said little or nothing, unless some question happened to be fired his way, when he would make a curt answer. All the while he kept his ears open and eyed the boys in a suspicious way, as though disturbed by their presence in the neighborhood. Those suits of khaki evidently puzzled Harkness, who could never have run across Boy Scouts before and knew nothing about their ways.
Noticing these looks on his part, and how he appeared to be listening intently, as though desirous of picking up certain information that might prove of value to him later on, Ned cautioned his chums against speaking of their affairs. This he managed to do, through certain gestures and nods, when the man's eyes happened to be turned in another direction.
Later on they made ready to pull up stakes and once more start on their journey toward the cattle ranch, which they expected to reach before sunset on this same day.
Harkness was eagerly waiting to be handed his gun, which Ned had taken the trouble to unload while it was in his possession. There was not much chance that the man would dare fire upon them, since he knew what the result would be and how apt to prove unpleasant for a fellow of his size; but, then, Ned believed in taking all precautions possible, and he certainly did not like the looks of that heavy face with its rat-like eyes, which Jimmy compared with the glittering orbs of a pet ferret he had at home.
He had already been busily engaged removing the hides of the slain wolves and seemed to be willing to accept what the fates had given him. All the same, Ned believed he was a treacherous character who would betray his best friend for a money consideration, and he did not mean to trust him too far.
When everything had been packed and they were ready to depart, Ned laid the rusty gun of the wolf-herder on the ground.
"There's your property, Harkness," he remarked casually, "just as I promised. And I want to say in parting company with you, that I think you're lucky to get about half your pelts, after losing the whole outfit. Of course, we don't expect you to thank us for saving half a loaf; but we'll be looking back as we leave here to see how you get on. And, Harkness, I wouldn't be in any too big a hurry to step over to where I laid your gun. So-long!"
The man said never a word in reply but if looks could kill, surely Ned must have met his finish then and there, to judge from the black scowl that settled on the heavy face of the wolf man.
In this fashion, then, they started out on what they hoped would be their last day's journey before arriving at the ranch of Harry's uncle. All of the scouts seemed to be feeling particularly merry on this bright morning. Perhaps it was because of the clever way in which they had escaped from the many perils that had lain in wait to ambush them since leaving the Coast.
"We're well out of gunshot distance by now," observed Jack, "and he's still working with his pelts, so it doesn't seem as though we'd have any trouble with that Harkness. Of all the tough looking characters I've ever run across, he sure takes the cake. I don't believe there could be anything worse made."
At that Amos was heard to chuckle.
"Oh! you think so, do you, Jack?" he remarked with lofty scorn, "just wait till you glimpse my awful dad, and then you can talk. He's a holy terror! Why, even the yellow curs in the town streets take to running with their tails between their hind legs when they see him coming along. His looks and his fog-horn voice have carried him through many a tight place; but there's one hole he always sticks in. My dad is as good as a whole regiment, to make men shake in their boots; but--" and again did the kid puncher pause in that strange way, while a mysterious smile crept over his dark face, as though certain recollections gave him more or less amusement.
Ned's curiosity had been aroused to a mild extent, but he would not ask questions, preferring to wait for time to unravel the mystery connected with these vague hints on the part of Amos Adams.
A short time later and they had lost all track of the previous night's camp in the hazy distance. And from that time forward, the scouts were interested only in what lay ahead; for somewhere far off they knew was to be found the cattle ranch to which they were bound and where a warm welcome, undoubtedly, awaited them, after their perilous hike across burning deserts, towering mountain ridges, and the valley with the evil name.
CHAPTER IX.
THE HOMING PIGEON.
"What are we turning aside for, Ned?" and as Jimmy asked this question he laid a hand on the arm of the scout master, having pushed up from behind, leading the pack animal that had been given over to his charge after his own was lost.
"Why," replied Ned, readily enough, "you see, Amos lives over among those trees, where there's a little stream, and he hinted pretty broadly that, while we were passing, he'd like us to meet up with his mother."
"Oh! that's all right," Jimmy asserted. "I've taken quite a liking for the kid and a little rest will do the bunch good, anyway. One thing I've made up my mind about, Ned, and I don't care who hears me say it."
"All right, pitch in, and let's get the glad news, Jimmy," remarked Jack, from a point near by.
"Never again for me to start our on a trip afoot while I'm here in this hot country!" Jimmy declared solemnly, holding up his hand, as though he were in the witness box. "What sillies we were not to have thought of that instead of putting our good cash into that bunco automobile that played out before it even got decently started."
"It seems that we've all learned our little lesson," Ned admitted, "and after this we ride, if we go at all. Cars may do very well, where there are half-way decent roads; but out on the sandy desert and on the plains give me a broncho every time.
"But say, are you fellows noticing how jolly this scenery is around here?" Harry wanted to know just then, from the rear. "Look at that sage brush on the slope of that low hill over to the right. It must be breast high to a horse, and seems like I could smell its fragrance away off here. How gray it looks, except where the wind waves it and then it seems nearly purple."
"Yes," added Ned, "and this must be what they call rattlesnake weed, though I don't know what it's got to do with the crawlers. You can see the grasshoppers jumping in that lush stuff where the ground's moist. And there's a king bird sitting on that high weed yonder."
"Listen to the gophers whistling a warning to their kind, when they see us coming," remarked Jack. "Yes, Harry, you're right, this is worth looking at. Why, I wouldn't be surprised now, if at night-time, you could hear the drowsy chirp of the crickets and the shrill rattle of katydids around here. A bigger contrast to what we went through in that desert you couldn't imagine."
"It's sure all to the good," asserted Jimmy, "and I don't blame that mother of Amos for pitching her dugout in this particular region. But mebbe she'll be sorry the boy didn't fetch any game home with him."
"Oh! Amos says he means to start out again in a different direction and knows where he's pretty sure to get an antelope, anyhow," Jack remarked.
They were now approaching the trees in which some sort of human habitation evidently had been constructed, for smoke was seen curling lazily upward.
It proved to be one of those half-dugout, half-building which is to be found in many parts of the Wild West where lumber is scarce. As there was practically no winter weather in this part of the country, it answered all purposes, though far from a thing of beauty.
Still, that mother of Amos' had brightened things up more or less, so that it could be seen the hand of a woman was around. A small garden lay back of the house, surrounded by a wire fence to keep animals from devouring the precious green stuff which was grown there.
Several dogs started toward them with yelps and deep-throated barking; and Jimmy unconsciously reached out a hand for the Marlin that was fastened to the pack of his burro. Jimmy's dislike for wolves was shared by dogs of all kinds. He said it must have been born in him, since he could not remember ever having had any desperate adventure with canine foes while a kid.
Amos, however, threw oil on the troubled waters and, at the sound of his voice, the fury of the dogs changed instantly to a noisy greeting. They jumped up and fawned on the kid in a way that told how much they loved him. And, doubtless, instinct told each beast that those in company of the young master must also be friends; for, when Ned whistled and snapped his fingers, one of the dogs immediately started to approach, wagging his tail in a neighborly way.
A small-sized woman had come out of the dugout and stood there with a hand shading her eyes, as though to see who might be approaching. Ned noticed that she carried a shotgun in her other hand, and it struck him that a woman who might often be left at home alone in this strange country had need of knowing how to use some sort of firearm.
She looked very meek and did not seem to have very much snap and go about her. When Amos introduced the boys and told what a great favor they had done him, she went around shaking hands in an odd way; but evidently Mrs. Adams differed from the vast majority of her sex, for she did not seem to have much to say.
"Gee! what a shame!" Jimmy muttered in Ned's ear.
"What is?" asked the scout master, also in a whisper.
"That's always the way it goes," continued the observing Jimmy, "seems like there never was a shrinking little woman, as timid as they make 'em, but what she had to go and link herself with some big bully of a blustering man. Opposites seem to attract in this world; you've seen a speck of a girl pick out the tallest feller she could find, and the other way, too."
"Yes, it does look like that, Jimmy," admitted Ned, as he tried to discover some trace of spunk about the little woman, and utterly failed.
"Chances are," Jimmy continued, in his reflective way, "that when this bad man of a Hy Adams, the worst case along the whole border, they say, gets on one of his tearin' fits, he just makes Rome howl. And say, I can just see that poor timid little thing cowering down like a scared puppy when it hears its master raging. But, then, mebbe Amos he hangs around to sort of protect his maw; though it don't seem as if a small chap like him could do much along that line."
"If he does, he didn't think it right to do any boasting that I can remember," Ned replied, again studying the mistress of the dugout, but without much success.
Mrs. Adams insisted on their resting a short while and taking a cup of coffee with her. Apparently, she had some means of her own, for there seemed to be plenty to do with in the place; and when the boys saw the bunks used for sleeping they pronounced them not at all bad. Indeed Jimmy promptly began yawning; and, if any one had invited him to test one of the bunks, the chances are he would have only too willingly complied.
There was little said during the meal, at least by the mother of Amos. Perhaps, as Jimmy suggested in an aside to Ned, the weight of her troubles in being mated to a human hurricane like Hy Adams had taken all the life out of her, and hence she evinced but little interest in whatever happened.
Amos, as if to cover up this lack of conversational gifts on the part of his mother, kept the boys busy telling some of their past adventures. And, finally, Ned advised that they had better be getting ready to pull out, as considerable territory remained to be covered before they could expect to reach the cattle ranch buildings.
"You'll sure look us up before long, Amos?" he said to the lad, as they shook hands at parting.
"I should say yes," added impulsive Jimmy; "because I'd hate to think I wasn't goin' to see you again."
Amos looked serious.
"I did promise you, didn't I?" he observed slowly, "and when I says a thing I nigh always keep my word; but I kinder reckon as how I mightn't be welcome over to the Double Cross Ranch."
"You mean, because you have the hard luck to be connected with a bad man like Hy Adams?" Harry remarked. "But don't bother about a little thing like that. My two uncles are the kind of men who judge a fellow by what he's done himself, and not by his relations. Why, we had a bad egg in our family once, and seems to me he was hung or something of the kind. But that's no reason I ought to be, is it?"
"Er, I don't know about that," muttered Jimmy, with a sparkle in his fun-loving blue eyes.
The good-byes were said, and the scouts started again toward the southeast. Amos had given them full directions, so that there was no possibility of their going wrong. And as the day was far cooler than many they had experienced of late, all of them were feeling in fine spirits.
They watched the buzzards lazily wheeling around high up in the heavens, apparently bent on finding out where they could get their next meal.
"What a fine view they must have of the plain up there," Harry happened to remark; "makes me think of when we went up with those aviators, who had the dirigible balloon near the border of Death Valley and were experimenting in dropping bombs down, just like will be done in the next big war between the Nations, when battleships must give way to aeroplanes and submarines."
"Watch that hawk, will you!" cried Jack, "see how he is chasing after that bird! I declare, it looks like he'd sure get his dinner."
"How I hate hawks!" exclaimed Jimmy, hotly, as he reached for his gun, "they're the pirates of the air, and just duck down on poor little birds whenever they feel like having a bite. Hey! he got the innocent that rush, didn't he? Oh! wouldn't I just like to get a shot at the murderer, though!"
Jimmy, of course, forgot this was the daily business of the hawk and that he only slew when he was hungry and not for pleasure. He also forgot that many men who call themselves _sportsmen_ persist in killing game or game fish long after they have reached the limit of disposing of the same for food and even throw the victims of their cruelty aside in heaps--the more shame to their claim to manhood.
"Well, perhaps you may have a chance to play the noble role of avenger," chuckled Jack, "that is, if you can shoot straight; because you notice the hawk has now flown with his prey to that dead treetop and alighted there. Jimmy, get your gun and show us what you can do."
"Just what I will," replied the other promptly.
It was a pretty long shot for Jimmy. He seemed to doubt his ability to do the needful, without having some sort of rest for his gun.
"Jack, will you do me a favor?" he asked.
"Sure I will, Jimmy; just name it," was the reply.
"Be my gun rest, won't you now; because I'd like to do for that pirate the worst kind, but 'tis thinkin' I am that it's a bit too far for me. What I've gone through lately has made me hand a little unsteady, like."
Jack was accommodating enough to back up in front of the intended sharpshooter and arrange himself in such fashion that Jimmy could rest his rifle on one of his shoulders.
"There you are," he remarked, placing fingers in both ears, so that the report might not deafen him. "I'll hold as steady as Gibraltar Rock, Jimmy, so if you miss you mustn't go and lay the blame on me, hear?"
"Easy now, and I'm off!" muttered the other, as he took aim.
The sharp report sounded a couple of seconds later.
"Bully for you, Jimmy!" shouted Jack, immediately.
"Did I get him?" cried the delighted marksman.
"Did you!" echoed Harry, "look at him circling down to the ground right now! You knocked him galley-west, I should say, if I was on a boat now. Go and get your game, Jimmy, and let's see the old buccaneer."
"Bring in the dinner he caught, too," remarked Ned, "I'm curious to see what it is; because it didn't look like any wild bird around here."
"And be careful how you handle the hawk, if he's only winged," warned Jack, "for they can fight like all get-out, and the first thing he'll try to get at will be your eyes. Knock him on the head, Jimmy, before you handle him."
"Shucks! tell me somethin' I don't know!" laughed the other, starting off, gun in hand, toward the trees growing along the same stream that passed the door of Hy Adams' dugout, some three miles away.
He came back after a little while carrying a dead hawk.
"It was a fine shot, for a fact!" admitted Jack, as he took the bird into his hands, the better to see where the bullet had struck.
"What's that you've got besides, Jimmy?" asked Harry.
"Me to the foolish house if it don't make me think of a pet pigeon I used to have long ago," Jimmy ventured.
"It _is_ a pigeon," said Ned, as he handled the dead bird that had been chased and captured by the hungry hawk.
"What's that, Ned; a tame pigeon out here on the plains?" Jack questioned.
"Well, there are no wild pigeons any more, all gone," Ned explained, "and this bird is a passenger pigeon or a carrier. You can see from the odd shape of its bill."
"What they call a homing pigeon, you mean, don't you, Ned?" asked Harry.
"Just that," was the reply, "and here, as sure as you live, there's a message tied with a thread to his leg, right now. Why, somebody must have been experimenting sending a message back home by this air post."
"Blast that old hawk, he spoiled the whole game!" muttered Jimmy, wrathfully.
"But stop and think, Jimmy," Harry told him, "if it hadn't been for the hawk you shot, we wouldn't have known about this thing at all. But there's Ned opening the little piece of tissue paper on which the message is written. Tell us about it, Ned, won't you?"
The scout master was staring at the thin piece of paper he had smoothed out, as though it contained certain information that interested him deeply.
And as the other three scouts gathered around him, eagerly waiting until he took them more fully into his confidence, they seemed to feel as though the very air was charged with a fresh supply of mystery.
CHAPTER X.
AT DOUBLE CROSS RANCH.
The first words spoken by Ned added to the puzzle, for he turned to his chums and propounded a question.
"Did any of you happen to notice which way the pigeon was flying, before the hawk darted out from the trees and chased it?"
"Yes," Jack informed him promptly, "I saw the bird coming away in the distance, and it was flying as straight as an arrow, when the hawk shot up out of the screen of the trees and made it swerve to try and escape; but it wasn't quick enough."
"Which way was it coming then?" asked Ned.
Jack pointed toward the southeast.
"Right yonder and in the same direction we're heading," he replied.
Ned frowned and looked even more serious.
"Then it begins to look as though this messenger pigeon might have been freed from somewhere about your uncle's ranch, Harry, and was making for its coop when the hawk killed it. You know they've been known to fly hundreds and hundreds of miles, even from New York to Pittsburgh, and arrive safe, tired, and half-starved after a couple of days."
"It always did beat my time how they did it," said Jack, "though what you say is true, every word of it, Ned. But what is there so stunning about the fact of this bird having been set loose at the ranch? Some puncher may be a homing pigeon fancier and sends a bird to his home, many miles away, once in so often. It would be a great little stunt, I should think."
"Yes, ditto here," added Harry, "so tell us why you think it's queer, Ned."
"On account of the message," replied the scout master.
"Well, we don't know what that is, so read it out!" urged Jack.
"All right, I will," Ned told them, and then glancing down once more at the thin piece of paper he held he continued: "'Some talk of both bosses going to W. soon. Be ready to act. Will let you know in time! Chances good for big sweep! We count five!'"
"Glory hallelujah! what's all that patter mean?" gasped Jimmy, who seemed unable to make head or tail out of the communication.
Jack and Harry, however, realized that Ned was about right when he said it looked as though there might be more in the message than appeared on the bare face.
"You notice that it says _two_ bosses, don't you?" asked Ned.
"Yes, and that must refer to my two uncles, Colonel Job Haines and James Henshaw?" Harry suggested.
"What does the W mean?" asked Jack.
"I think that must be a town on the railroad, where they ship the cattle in season," replied Ned.
"'Be ready to act,' it goes on to say," Jack continued, "which would make it appear as though the writer knew there was some sort of a raid contemplated."
"A raid!" echoed Jimmy, "faith, d'ye mean by rustlers?"
"That's the only kind of raid cattlemen fear nowadays, since the wild animals have been well cleaned out and the reds stick to their reservations pretty much all the time," Harry informed him, "but just to think of what this would stand for, if it's true."
"A traitor or traitors employed at the Double Cross Ranch," the scout master declared. "Well that wouldn't be the first time such a thing had happened. In fact, these cattle rustlers usually have means for learning all that is going on with the punchers. In that way, they manage to time their raids when most of the hands are away. Seems that there might be quite a bunch of the hounds, because he mentions the fact that the party he's sending the message to can count on five to muss things up at the time the raid is engineered."
Harry laughed grimly.
"Perhaps, now, my Uncle Job won't be tickled half to death to get hold of this telltale message!" he gurgled. "If only he can find who wrote the same, it'll turn out to be his Waterloo, believe me, if half I've heard about Uncle Job is true."
"And that ought to be easy," remarked Jack.
"You mean, he could tell from the handwriting?" Harry demanded.
"Yes, but there would be a better way than that," the other scout continued, as he gave Ned a knowing nod.
"'Tis the pigeon, you must mean!" exclaimed Jimmy.
"That's it," Jack acknowledged, "and surely a fellow couldn't keep birds like that and set one flying every once in so often, without others knowing about it. Find the puncher who's got the homing pigeon fancy and you'll have the leader of the spies at the Double Cross, if that's where the bird started from."
The scout master nodded his head approvingly.
"That was well figured out, Jack," he said, "and did your scout logic credit. A scout has got to keep his wits sharpened and not let anything slip past him, no matter how small it may seem. Of course, the owner of the pigeon must be guilty; and, just as you say, it wouldn't be easy for him to carry on with his birds unless most of the other punchers knew about it."
"But the message?" Jimmy objected.
"Oh! they didn't see this one, but another that the fellow would be smart enough to get up, and _pretend_ to fasten to the leg of the air traveler," Jack went on to say, in a way that showed how his mind had grasped the subject.
Ned carefully folded the tissue paper and put it safely away in his pocketbook.
"That was the luckiest shot you ever made, I take it, Jimmy," he remarked, turning to the freckled-faced chum, who immediately puffed his chest out in a ridiculous fashion and began to pretend to take on airs.
"Oh! the rest of you can do some stunts once in a coon's age," he told them, "but when it comes right down to taking the cake, you have to apply to your Uncle Jimmy. I managed to land there with both feet. Luck and me, we're bedfellers, you see. But then, far from me 'twould be to boast. It was a fair shot, Ned, I admit it. And the McGraw luck held good."
"You'll have to let me in on a little of that, Jimmy," Jack told him, "because you happened to be using my shoulder at the time, remember. Only for that, chances are you'd have lost the hawk and we'd never have known that it was a homer he had caught for his lunch.
"Shake on that, Jack; you're in," Jimmy was quick to say.
"But we'd better be going on, hadn't we?" Harry asked. "Because I'm more anxious now than ever to pull up at the ranch house."
"Yes," Ned informed them, "we've got a long walk ahead of us yet. I'll do up the pigeon and the hawk to show your uncle, on the quiet, when there's no one else around. You see, he's apt to think we may be yarning, because it's a queer and fishy story, come to think of it; and the more proof we have the better."
"Takes you to look away ahead," declared Jack; "now, like as not, I'd have tossed both birds away and then wished I hadn't later on. An ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure, they say. The fellow who can think ahead takes the cake."
"Then I'm goin' to get busy and be that feller," Jimmy assured them, "because I always did like cake."
The forward march was resumed, with the three burros plodding along after their accustomed slow method of travel. They had to be urged frequently, with the tickle of a whip. The only times they showed traces of eagerness were when approaching places where water could be had, and then they almost ran.
As the afternoon wore along, the scouts knew that they were drawing near a cattle ranch. Many things told them this pleasing news. They found tracks of droves all about them on the grassy plain, and three times had they glimpsed a feeding herd in the swale, where some low hills joined the more level ground.
"I can see houses among the trees ahead there!" announced Ned, after he had had the field glasses up to his eye for a short time.
All of them wanted to take a look, then, and great was the rejoicing when it was found to be true.
"About two miles more of this weary hiking, and then good-bye to it!" Jack gave as his opinion, in which the other joined.
They took a fresh start after that, and it was not long before Jimmy declared he could see a bunch of riders starting out from the trees and heading toward them.
"They've sighted us," asserted Ned, "and, of course, wonder who we can be; because Harry here thought to take his uncles by surprise and didn't tell them when to expect us, except to say, we'd probably drop in on the ranch if down this way."
"You see," Harry went on to explain, "when I wrote last, it was from Los Angeles; and, about that time, I didn't feel so sure we'd ever get through alive."
"First time I knew you felt worried," Ned told him. "All of you seemed so dead set on carrying out the programme that I couldn't say what I thought."
"You must mean," Jack said, "that it looked silly and foolish to think we could cross the deserts and mountain canyons in that old rantankerous automobile?"
Ned laughed.
"Never mind what I thought," he remarked. "It's too late now to cry over spilt milk. We got through, didn't we? And we've had experiences that will always stay with us. That's enough. And, at last, we can see our goal just ahead."
"Hurrah for the Double Cross Ranch!" exclaimed Jimmy.
The half-dozen cowboys came whirling toward them, shouting, swinging their hats, and riding as only punchers on the plains can.
"Remember, everybody," warned Ned, "not a word about that hawk and pigeon episode."
"We understand what you mean, Ned," Harry replied.
Presently the mad riders came galloping up in a cloud of alkali dust.
"Told you so, boys!" cried a tall rangy fellow, who sat his pony as though he might be a part of the animal--one of those Centaurs of old. "Ketch on to the scout togs, would you? Say, are you Harry Stevens?"
He had unconsciously picked out Ned when asking this question, because he must have somehow seen that he was the leader; perhaps, it was partly from his looks; and, then again, the fact that Ned had no burro to take care of, while all his companions did, may have had something to do with it.
"No, but I'm his chum, Ned Nestor. That's Harry over yonder, and I reckon now that we're glad to be at the Double Cross."
"But where'd you come from, pard?" demanded the cowboy, who had thrown one leg over his saddle, the better to talk.
"Los Angeles," replied Ned, indifferently.
At that the punchers stared and even exchanged various winks and nods.
"Not with them lazy burros, I opine, pard?" ventured the spokesman.
"Oh! no, we picked these up in the hills, buying them from prospectors, who had had enough and were meaning to go home," Ned informed him.
"That was after our automobile broke down and had to be abandoned, in the middle of the Mojave Desert," Harry volunteered.
The cow-puncher gave a whistle to indicate his surprise. Ned noticed that his manner had changed somewhat, too. Doubtless, because these boys were from the East and somewhat green with regard to ranch ways, he may have imagined, in the beginning, that they were genuine tenderfeet.
He knew better now. Any party of boys who could by themselves cross that terrible Mojave Desert and make their way down to this country bordering the Colorado River, must surely be made of the right stuff.
"Get up behind me, Ned, and ride the rest of the way; proud to have you join us. And we reckons as how we'll give you the time of your life while you're at the old Double Cross Ranch."
Ned promptly accepted this invitation on the part of the lanky puncher, whom he heard called "Chunky," probably because he was just the opposite; while a real fat roly-poly sort of a rider answered, when they addressed him as "Skinny," which made it look as though these boys might have drawn the wrong slips out of the hat at the ranch christening.
Jack, Harry and Jimmy were all similarly accommodated with seats, while two other punchers promised to see that the pack animals got in.
A wild ride they made of those two miles. The scouts clasped their arms around their new friends and held on for dear life; but none of them fell off and presently they found themselves in front of the ranch house.
"Sorry to tell ye, Harry," announced the lanky puncher, "that both your uncles, together with a couple of the boys, has headed for the railroad, to fetch home a bunch of imported stock they sent for, meaning to improve the breed of our long horns. So ye'll have to wait two days or so before you see 'em; but Aunt Mehitabel, she's inside, and will make you all welcome, sure thing."
With that the four punchers were off again, doubtless to attend to some of the duties they were hired to perform.
The four boys stood there exchanging significant looks, as the sun drew near the distant western horizon.
"Looks some serious, don't it?" remarked Harry.
"Both bosses have gone away just as that message said," Jack observed. "I wonder, now, if these conspirators will try to send another communication to their rustler friends."
"I'm afraid that has already been done," Ned told them, "and we were powerless to stop it. Because just as we rode up, I saw a pigeon flying in by circles high up in the air; then, as if it had gotten its bearings, it went off on a straight line into the northwest. That bird must have carried the news that the time to strike had come."
CHAPTER XI.
THE SHEEP AND THE GOATS.
The scouts were now confronted by conditions calculated to keep them guessing at a lively rate. With both owners of the ranch away, to whom were they to communicate their alarming news? How could they know that in this telling the story, they might not be giving themselves away to one of the suspects?
It was a situation calling for considerable head work and reasoning, so that a serious mistake might not be made in the start.
What made it still more difficult to manage was the fact, which Harry seemed to be aware of, that there was no real foreman on the place; Colonel Job himself filling that position, while James Henshaw took other duties upon his shoulders.
"How about telling your Aunt Mehitabel about it, Harry?" Ned asked, as they exchanged views and seemed to get no nearer a definite arrangement.
"Just what we'll have to do," replied the other chum, "and say, if only she'll agree to let us have a free hand, and tell the boys to do what we want, p'raps we might find some way yet to upset the game of the rustlers."
"You just bet we will that!" said Jimmy, with all the confidence of one whose lexicon knew no such word as fail.
"The first thing we must do," ventured Ned, seriously, "is to find out who it is sends these treacherous messages to parties that have evil designs on the herds of the Double Cross Ranch."
"Them, you mean, don't you, Ned," added Jack, "because that message spoke of there being five all told who would look out and see that things were made easy picking."
"Well," spoke up Jimmy, with a cunning leer, "sometimes you think I'm sleepy, but I notice that now and then I manage to wake up long enough to do my little stunt. His handle, it's Ally Sloper, by the same token."
"Who's that?" asked Harry.
"The dub that owns the homing pigeons," came the ready reply, which caused Ned to smile and nod his head in approbation.
"Good work, Jimmy!" he remarked, "you must have asked the fellow you rode in behind?"
"Just what I did, Ned," Jimmy told him. "I mentioned the fact that we had seen a pigeon flying, and then he says as how this same Ally Sloper he had got about five birds from a feller over in Kingman, on the railroad beyond the Opal and the Blue Ridge Mountains down in Arizona. He was told to let one go every little while, to see if they'd get safe home again. But, fellers, that place lies to the southeast as you know, and we saw that pigeon away off to the _northwest_ of here, which says Ally Sloper he just lies!"
"That's a fine start," commended the scout master. "We know who the chief spy is, and it ought to be an easy thing to learn who his close pals seem to be, for like as not he'd stick only to those who are in the same boat with him."
"Sounds well to me, Ned," Jack remarked, after apparently turning the matter over carefully in his mind.
"What's the game?" asked Jimmy.
"Here's the way it stands," remarked Ned, soberly. "That second message must have been sent to tell the gang that both bosses are away, and conditions looking good for a raid to-night."
"Whew! so soon as that?" ejaculated Jack, drawing a long sigh, for he was pretty tired and had calculated on getting rested up between sunset and another dawn; if, as they suspected, there were going to be great goings-on around the cattle ranch before many hours, it was possible that they might be on the jump all night; but then, Jack was a fellow who could stand considerable punishment without throwing up the sponge, and that intake of breath might simply mean a resolution to do his part in the drama.
"If there was only some way now to round the cattle up and drive them into the stockades or corrals, so they could be guarded," Ned continued, as though he might have been doing more or less planning before the critical moment arrived, "why, we might hold the fort until morning and not lose any of the herds."
"Do you suppose it could be done?" Harry wanted to know.
"I see no reason why not," came the sturdy reply. "It looked to me like the herds were grazing within a few miles of here, though there may be some further off. Now, if the punchers only got the fever on them, I've no doubt they could round the steers and cows up and get them in the stockade long before the rustlers would think of coming along."
"There's one bully thing about it," ventured Harry, smilingly. "We're going to have a full moon to-night, and a cattle drive will be a picnic. If it was pitch dark, or stormy, it might be a different story. The scout luck holds good. Things may look a bit gloomy for a while, but we get there in the end."
"I'll tell you one reason why it's important that we should find out just who the cronies of this Ally Sloper are," continued Ned. "It would be a bad thing now if we sent the whole five out in a batch, because, believing their game was up and that it would be unsafe for them to ever come back here, chances are they would take advantage of their opportunity to run off a herd while about it."
"Might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb--is that what you mean, Ned?" Jack asked.
"Yes, about that way," the scout master replied. "On the other hand, if they are broken up, and only one sent out with each bunch of punchers to corral the herds, these spies will not be able to work anything crooked. We'll draw their claws, as you might say, and make them harmless."
"Here comes my aunt," Harry broke in with, as a large woman brushed out of the doorway of the commodious ranch house and approached them.
She was an amiable woman, they could see at first glance; but Ned fancied that, in an emergency, Aunt Mehitabel would not prove capable of gripping the reins. No doubt, during all her married life she had depended on her able husband to manage things on the outside, being content on her part to see that things moved along regularly within doors, and that meals came on time.
She greeted Harry warmly and was also delighted to meet his chums, all of whom she urged to go inside the house with her.
But the occasion was so serious that Ned did not wish to waste any more time than was absolutely necessary.
"We've come to make you quite a little visit, ma'm," Ned remarked, after she had urged them to make themselves at home, and do whatever they pleased, "and later on we expect to have a great time riding around the country and seeing things. But it is unfortunate that neither one of Harry's uncles is home right now, because we've got some very important news."
The lady of the house looked worried at once, just as Ned had anticipated would be the case.
"Oh! what can it be?" she asked, her voice showing traces of nervousness.
"On the way our chum, Jimmy here, happened to shoot a hawk that had pounced down on a flying pigeon. Wrapped around one of the pigeon's legs was a piece of tissue paper, and bearing a message. I have it here with me, and both the hawk and the pigeon are in one of our packs on the burros. This message was not signed, but it plainly announced that there are five untrustworthy men employed on this place who are in league with cattle rustlers."
"Mercy on us, you don't say! And the colonel away, too! Whatever will become of us now?" Mrs. Haines started to wail, when Ned smilingly went on to soothe her by remarking:
"But here are four stout boys, ready to do their level best to upset the plans of these cattle thieves, if given half a chance, ma'm. Now, in this message, it is promised that if the conditions look favorable, another line will be sent, the same way as this was. And as we came up we saw a pigeon flying into the west, so we take it for granted that has been done, and the rustler crowd will get busy between now and sun-up."
"The herds are all out on the range, unfortunately, and it is too late now to get them in," the lady went on to say, dejectedly. "Oh! how unfortunate that you did not arrive a few hours ago, when my husband would have been here to take charge of things, for we have no foreman, you know."
"It may not be too late, even now, to get the herds rounded up and brought in to the corral where the boys can guard them," Ned told her.
She looked at him admiringly, doubtless impressed, as many others had been before then, with his manly bearing and the resolute look on his face.
"I really believe that if any one could manage it, you could, my son!" she said, with a simplicity and ardor that caused the warm glow to spread over Ned's face.
"With what assistance you might give us, Mrs. Haines, we believe we can save the cattle from this threatened raid," he continued, calmly. "And first of all it is of the utmost importance that we learn just who these other four punchers may be who are hand in glove with Ally Sloper--the man who has sent the pigeon messenger."
"Oh! so he is the one?" she cried, "and I never could bear the sight of his face, because of the cast in that evil eye of his. But Job always laughed at me, and said Ally Sloper was one of the best men he had on the place. What do you want me to do, for you said I could help you win out?"
"First of all, in the absence of your husband and Harry's other uncle," began the scout master, just for all the world, Jimmy thought, like a great general, such as Napoleon or Grant, laying out his campaign, "it seems as if the men would take orders from you. Am I right there?
"Yes, it has happened a few times, but I would not have known a thing about what to do, only for Chunky's advice," she told him.
"Oh! you can rely on Chunky then, can you?" asked Ned, quickly, for that was one of the points he wanted settled, because a great deal depended on it.
"Always. My husband would trust him with his life. If ever we do have a foreman at the Double Cross, Chunky will be the one."
"I'm glad to hear that, because I rode in behind him, and somehow I fancied he would be the one to confide in. Please send out for him as soon as you can, ma'm, because we have little time to waste. I hope to learn from Chunky just who the other four traitors are, for he will have noticed how this Ally Sloper picks out his friends. Birds of a feather flock together, you know; and these fellows would feel safer if they kept in constant touch with each other."
The other scouts approved of what Ned was doing, as their manner of nodding at different times indicated. They knew that their leader was equal to running things, even though he might not know so much about the working of a cattle ranch. And in times gone by they had seen him pitted against what seemed to be overwhelming odds, to win out in the end; so that they had unbounded confidence in whatever he started to do.
The rancher's wife left them for a minute, and presently came back to say that she had sent out the Chink cook, Chin-chin Charlie, to find Chunky, and tell him to come right to the house on important business.
"We'll get this working pretty soon, I think," Jack declared, with animation.
"And they'll just have to hunt up some broncs for the lot of us to straddle, too," added Harry.
"Tell me about that," chuckled Jimmy. "How glad I'll be to mount a fiery charger and dig me heels into his flanks, after all this terrible walkin' the lot of us have been doin' lately. I do be wishin' Chunky'd hurry. If he's gone off now, and couldn't be found at the bunkhouse, we'll be in a nice pickle, sure."
"Don't worry, because I think he's coming," Ned told him.
Just as he said, this lanky puncher came up on the verandah of the ranch. He was quickly put in possession of the facts, and expressed himself in forcible terms concerning the alleged treachery of Ally Sloper and his four allies.
"I c'n put a hand on the hull blooming lot," he declared, "because it happens as how that same Ally has been keepin' company with jest four punchers. They are Lefty Louie, Coyote Smith, Bob Caruso that the boys calls Robinson Crusoe, and Tinplate George--all clever punchers, but mighty slick articles at that. If Miss Haines sez as how we take our orders from you, Ned, just give the word, and you'll see them warts arounded up like grease."
"Oh! well, we ought to go to extremes only as a last resort, I think," said Mrs Haines, who dreaded lest there be some shooting in making the arrest, and that some of the boys who were her favorites would get hurt. "Ned has a plan that might answer the same purpose. Tell him about it, Ned, please."
So the scout master unfolded his scheme.
"How many herds are there on the range just now, Chunky?" he asked.
"Four, all told, with a smattering of others that don't 'mount to much."
"Suppose, then, you make me out a list of the punchers, so that there will be one of these suspects with every bunch, not counting Ally Sloper," Ned continued.
"Hello! I'm beginnin' to tumble to the game and, let me say, it fills the bill first-class," was the quick comment of the lanky one.
He gave the names to Ned as rapidly as the other could write them down; and it was speedily arranged, so that of the four parties one of the conspirators had been designated to accompany each. As for Ally himself, it did not matter much what he did, though they must keep him under surveillance, lest he upset all their cleverly laid plans by cutting the corral or, in some other fashion, rendering it impossible to keep all the hundreds of longhorns near the ranch house, where they could be guarded.
All this was fixed up in a very short space of time and then Ned declared they ought to get busy. The sun was sinking toward the western horizon; but they knew there was going to be no period of darkness, because the moon was full, which meant that it would rise exactly at sunset.
"We can eat after we've got those herds rounded up and safe in the corral, not before," was Ned's ultimatum, when Mrs. Haines spoke about supper; and this caused one long face to make itself seen among the scouts, for Jimmy dearly loved his feed.
CHAPTER XII.
NIPPING A MUTINY.
Once Chunky knew what was expected of him, and he proved that he could do things with a hurricane rush. Most cow-punchers are of his stripe, and speed is a mania on the range.
"First thing I'll run out some ponies for you young fellers to mount," he told the scouts, as he turned to leave the verandah where the short talk had taken place.
"Me for a piebald mustang!" called out Jimmy, "I've somehow had that in my mind ever since I set eyes on that speckled pony belongin' to Amos. Fix me up that way, if you want to see me happy, Mister Chunky."
And greatly to Jimmy's delight, he was later on given just such a mount as he called for; though as for Ned, he did not wholly fancy the peculiar whitish eyes that were a feature of the fancy looking beast. He imagined that the animal had an ugly temper, if crossed, and hoped that Jimmy might not rue the day he yearned for a mottled cow pony.
Meanwhile the big bell had been clanged that would serve as a signal to tell all on the place that their presence was immediately desired. They came trooping out of the bunk house and from the direction of the corral, where it chanced they had been busily engaged at the time.
Curiosity could be seen stamped on most of their bronzed faces. Ned looked for the man called Ally Sloper, and who had been described to him so cleverly that he fancied he could pick him out among the throng.
Even if he had not been advised beforehand, he knew he could have settled upon the man; because, while nearly all the others seemed jolly and carefree, his face bore a dark frown.
Ned believed the man suspected something; that he feared this hasty and unusual summons might interfere with the cunning scheme engineered for that night. And while not appearing to watch the puncher at all, Ned could easily see that he made frequent signals, when he thought himself unobserved, to several others, whom Ned also marked down as the secret allies of the rustler's spy.
These things, while seemingly unimportant, were really of considerable consequence, because much depended on their keeping the traitors from communicating with their friends in the hills.
"Is that Sloper with the hat on the back of his head?" he asked Chunky, in a low tone, as the men were coming up.
"Yes, and the one with him is Lefty Louie; that sneak trailin' along at his heels is Coyote Smith. Bob Caruso is the feller larfin' right now, and which makes him look like he could swallow a heifer easy; and Tinplate George is at the end of the bunch, limpin' some, 'count of a fling he got yesterday with a buckin' broncho. Got 'em all sized up now, have ye, Ned?"
"Yes, and tell Mrs. Haines to start the circus right away, Chunky," was the reply.
The rancher's wife had been nervously waiting for a sign. She now stepped forward and held up her hand, so that all noise ceased, and the men listened eagerly, for their curiosity had been greatly excited.
"During the absence of Colonel Haines and Mr. Henshaw, you are to take your orders from this young man here, Ned Nestor, and through Chunky, who will act as temporary foreman. An emergency has arisen, making it very necessary that all our herds be rounded up immediately and driven into the big corral, where they can be guarded to-night. Ask no questions, but do your duty as employees of this ranch. That is all I wish to say, and I feel sure that every one of you will understand that I am in consultation with those I have put in charge and that it is my wishes they are carrying out."
The punchers stared at each other. They could, of course, give a pretty good guess what this must mean, for the only real danger that could be feared at this time of year would be from rustlers.
As a rule, they were a jolly lot of carefree fellows, willing to work double one day and loaf the next, as the occasion arose; it was all in the line of business with them.
Ned had been watching Ally Sloper out of the tail of his eye. He saw the man scowl like a pirate of the Spanish Main. Of course, this was going to interfere seriously with all the well-laid plans between the spies and their rustler allies. They may have waited a long time for this very chance, when both proprietors of the ranch would be away at the same time; and, now that it had come, to be balked in their designs was enough to throw such a tempestuous man into a fury.
"He's going to make trouble right away, Ned," whispered Jack in the ear of the scout master.
"Let him try it, and see what he runs up against, that's all," Ned replied, as he watched Ally Sloper pushing his way to the front.
Somehow the other four did not follow him. They were wise enough to realize that such a move might expose them to suspicion. If Sloper chose to protest against being sent out on the range at this late hour of the day, that was his privilege; but there was no necessity for them to show their hand so early in the game. They knew what the anger of cow-punchers was like and had a healthy respect for it.
Before the advancing man could get near enough to say anything, Chunky began to speak as though he did not notice this aggressive movement.
"I'll head one party, and with me will go Arizona Tom, Dutchy, Ally Sloper and two of the visitors at the ranch. Skinny will take another party to bring in the herd from the alfalfa prairie," and so he went on apportioning the men, placing one he could positively trust at the head of each detachment, and making sure that each squad held a "suspect."
It had all been well laid out, and in the strongest bunch, consisting of seven riders, two of the unfaithful lot had been included. Each party had been given a particular herd to manage, so that the work could be carried out in systematic order.
Of course, Chunky intended to give the several leaders a quiet tip before they started out, so that they could keep an eye on the suspects and thwart any move that looked as though they meant to slip away, or send warning to their friends in the hills.
Sloper had stood and listened to what Chunky said. Evidently it confirmed what suspicions he may have already had concerning the breaking up of their plot. And he would have been a stupid man not to have connected the coming of the scouts with this sudden move, looking to a round-up that had not been ordered by the proprietors of the big ranch.
Some of the men had started to hurry away; others stood there in a half-hesitating way, as though they had noticed the belligerent attitude of Ally Sloper and wished to see what he meant to do. He may have given trouble on other past occasions and was only kept on account of his acknowledged skill as a puncher.
"Hold on there, Chunky, I want to say as I aint agoin' out on the range with ye this time. I reckons as how I've done a good hard day's work a'ready. 'Sides that, take it from me straight that I don't mean to look to a _kid_ like this here newcomer for my boss. I'm alayin' down on the job for onct, see?"
"No, I don't see, Sloper," returned the emaciated puncher, facing the other, a gleam in his eyes that was not nice to watch. "Are you sick?"
"What, me? Did ye ever know me to be sick? No, 'taint that. I jest don't keer to work any more to-day. I'm agoin' to the bunk house an' lie down to smoke."
"You're goin' out on the range with me, Sloper, hear that?" gritted Chunky, as he faced the other defiantly. "You heard the rancher's wife give her orders; and, also, the fact that she says as how we are all to look to this young chap as her representative; likewise that I'm to advise him, seein' as how he ain't well up in range ways. I've selected _you_ to be in my party. I want you for a good many reasons, one o' which are that you ain't got anything on me when it comes to roundin' up longhorns. So make up your mind you're agoin' out and help git that prize herd in from the Washout Coulie."
"I don't take my orders from any snip like that, I tell you, and I ain't agoin' to stand for you bein' foreman here, Chunky, understand that!" the mutineer rasped, while four other punchers moved a little closer and waited to see how their ally came through, before they tried to copy his tactics; if he succeeded, they could follow suit; whereas, should he make a failure, they were at liberty to draw back and hold their horses for a more convenient season.
"Oh! is that so, Sloper?" remarked the tall puncher, quickly, "an' tell me how you expect to keep from goin' out on the range with my party?"
"I throw up my job right here, see?" almost shouted Sloper. "You get what I says, don't you? You can't order me around, when I'm a free agent. And I ain't workin' for the Double Cross people any more. I'm done."
"Oh! yes, you are," sneered Chunky. "We'll just look into that, Sloper. I reckons as how Colonel Job fixed things so he could count on _your_ services a certain time. You're under contract here. Mrs. Haines, kin you tell me how much longer Sloper's agreement to work for the owners of the Double Cross Ranch, or whoever they chose to app'nt foreman here, has to run?"
"Just two months more," replied the colonel's wife, who kept the books of the ranch and, therefore, knew all about the dealings with all the hands.
"That settles it then, Sloper," said Chunky. "We need your services right bad to git them cattle into the stockade. And let me tell you right here, you're agoin' out on the range with us now and work alongside the rest of the boys, or somethin' is likely to happen right suddent."
He carelessly let his hand slip around to the butt of his gun while saying this. Jimmy and, perhaps Harry, anticipated seeing some fireworks, because they thought Sloper was a gunfighter; but Ned could read character better and he had already decided that the man had a craven soul back of all his bluster. So he was not at all surprised to see him quail before the steady gaze of Chunky.
"This is a raw deal you're givin' me, Chunky!" he muttered.
"I'm doin' jest what Colonel Job'd do if he was on the spot, and one of his contract men tried to lay down on him," retorted the other positively. "After he gits back, if you care to take it up with him, ye kin do it. But while I'm runnin' things, alongside o' this younker here, you'll do your part, or I'll know the reason why. Now, boys, git your ponies and we'll be off. Thar's a heap o' hard work to do afore we kin take things easy."
He managed matters so that he could say a few words to Skinny and the other two dependable punchers who had been placed in charge of the third and fourth parties.
They were told to keep a watchful eye on the suspected ones, though there was no time to explain just why. But, after all, there could be but one reason for giving this warning, and Skinny, as well as the other leaders, were able to figure it out. They had already guessed that news had come concerning a contemplated foray on the part of rustlers and that these men were suspected of being hand in glove with the lawless night runners of cattle.
There was presently a bustling scene as the punchers saddled their ponies and prepared for hard work out on the range.
Chunky managed to keep close to Ally Sloper all of the time and the man, seeing this, did not dare venture anything like flight, lest he be followed by a shower of bullets.
Orders were given for ponies for the four scouts and it was not long before they found themselves mounted on frisky bronchos, which it took all their skill to manage. But fortunately all of them had done considerable riding in times past, so that they did themselves credit. And doubtless the punchers had picked animals that, according to their way of thinking, were exceedingly docile, though quite lively enough to suit Ned and his chums.
There was Jimmy grinning from the back of a beautifully spotted animal, and apparently as happy as any one could be. He had found a way to sling his gun, so as to have both hands free to manage the mount; and, truth to tell, there were times when Jimmy was apt to wish he had a third hand in the bargain, for the calico pony proved to be the most unruly one of the quartette.
All this was done in a comparatively short time, because each puncher looked out for himself. Harry and Jack were to accompany Skinny's bunch, while Jimmy and Ned meant to be with Chunky. This arrangement satisfied the scout master, who felt that if there was anything going on it was apt to be in connection with that detachment which had Ally Sloper on its roll call. And, as usual, Ned wanted to be on the firing line when things were happening.
Owing to various causes Chunky's bunch was the last to get away. In three separate directions could be seen little clouds of alkali dust in which the reckless riders had vanished, heading for the feeding grounds of the herds, to which they had been assigned.
As these lay some miles away, and the task of rounding up the cattle, as well as driving them on the return trip, would consume considerable time, it was not expected that the first of the herds would reach the stockade until the moon was several hours high.
When Ned and Jimmy galloped forth, keeping close to the other four riders, they turned in the saddle to wave to the stockman's wife, who stood on the piazza, to see the last of them off, with the Chinese cook close by, and also a couple of women, who were also employed in the house.
The scout master believed he had reason to feel satisfied, because he had been allowed to balk the treacherous designs of those who would have sacrificed the property of their employer by sending word to the cattle rustlers. But as his eye wandered over to where the sullen Ally Sloper sat his saddle, Ned knew that this was hardly the end. A man of his double nature was not apt to throw up his hands and acknowledge himself beaten, just because he had been knocked down in the first round.
"He'll bear close watching," was Ned's mental comment, "and even then chances are he may find a way to slip us, when the excitement of rounding-up the steers and the cows is on. But once we get the herd started home, I don't believe he'd be able to do us any great harm, if he did skip out. Still, Chunky is dealing with the hound and I mustn't interfere."
CHAPTER XIII.
AT WASHOUT COULIE.
"Is it very far we have to go for our herd, Ned?" asked Jimmy, as he galloped along briskly at the side of his chum, managing the calico pony pretty fairly for one who had never been used to range riding and knew very little about the tricks of cow ponies.
"Yes, I believe further than any others of the lot," Ned told him.
"I heard some mention of a Washout Coulie; is that where we're headin' right now; and why d'ye reckon they give it such a funny name?" Jimmy continued.
"We're making for a place of that name, I understood Chunky to say," the accommodating scout master replied, "and he spoke as though their best herd might be using that section for a feeding ground just now; but why they call it Washout Coulie, I'm unable to say."
"A coulie is always connected with some sort of hill, isn't it, Ned?"
"Strikes me that way, Jimmy, and, as you know there _are_ hills over this way, for we could see them when we came from the west and struck the ranch. It might be the name came from a washout that happened some time ago. They don't get much rain in this region, but once in a long time there's a regular cloudburst and a flood."
Jimmy might have tried to keep the conversation going, for there were a number of things he wanted to ask the scout master; but it happened that the obstreperous calico pony developed a streak of ugliness just about that time and, consequently, Jimmy had all he could do to manage the beast so as to keep his seat in the cowboy saddle.
The sun had set shortly after they started away from the ranch, and the sky took on the brightest red colors that could be imagined. But neither of the boys felt in a humor to admire the view. They had business on their hands of a nature to engross their every thought--Jimmy, with the control of his vicious mottle mount; and Ned, in calculating what the ill-natured suspect might attempt, in order to outwit those who were pitted against him.
Night settles down promptly after sunset in this far southern country, there being very little gloaming, such as people living in more northern latitudes are accustomed to. But as the moon was due to peep above the eastern horizon in short time this was not apt to give them any trouble.
Besides, Chunky and his riders knew every rod of the plain and could easily avoid such places, where the prairie dogs had their underground homes and which have been the means of breaking the legs of many valuable horses.
Ned had already noticed how careful Chunky was to keep in a certain position on the gallop. Here he could watch Sloper and at the same time be ready to draw quickly upon him should the suspect attempt any crooked business.
"He doesn't trust the man any further than he can see him," Ned was telling himself, as he noticed this game that was being played between the two men; and, at the same time, he meant to try and keep his own eye on the slippery customer, in so far as the conditions would allow.
The evening star shone in the western sky and they were making in a straight line away from it, Ned noticed. This told him what the course was. While Jimmy was apparently paying not the least attention to such things, content to trust himself in the hands of the puncher guide, Ned believed in knowing for himself. There might arise an occasion where he would be thrown on his own resources; and, in such an event, it would be a valuable asset to know just which way to head, in order to fetch up at the ranch house.
That was scout tactics and scout practice--being prepared against possible need.
And now over the low rim in the far east, where the squatty hills lay against the sky line, a yellow glow began to appear. It was the moon rising to fulfill a night's vigil as sentinel while men slept.
Ned greeted it as an old friend, and Jimmy, too, expressed his satisfaction over seeing it come upon the scene, for Jimmy and darkness never did agree, and that was one reason he always wanted to keep the fire burning through the night while in camp, during the period when there was no moon.
As they drew closer to the hills, Ned began to calculate just about how many miles they would have to drive the herd once they managed to round it up and get it on the run for home. He knew from what he had been told that what had taken them not more than an hour to cover, as the crow flies, would mean at least four times that length of time with the cattle.
Perhaps, they would not be in until midnight had come and gone. And who could say what might not happen in the long interval.
He wondered how far the rustlers were ready to go, in order to run off a herd that had excited their cupidity and, whether in case they happened to come up while the punchers were busily engaged, they might not attempt something like a stampede, hoping to frighten the few cowboys off, when they could make way with the cattle.
"I'm glad we brought our rifles along with us," Ned was telling himself, as he studied out these things and tried to imagine what it would seem like to actually find himself engaged in a regular battle with cattle thieves.
He urged his pony forward enough to bring him close to Chunky.
"How much further do we have to go, Chunky?" Ned inquired.
"Be there in about ten minutes or so," came the reply. "Gotter kinder sheer off a bit hereabouts on 'count of them ornery marmots what makes it unsafe for a pony to run over their holes. Been tryin' to clean this village out a long time, but they seem too smart for the hull lot o' us. If so be ye wanter practice usin' a rifle ye'll find plenty to shoot at in knockin' these little runts over; and do the stockmen a big favor in the bargin."
"We'll remember that," Ned told him, though he rather fancied that during their stay at Double Cross Ranch he and his three chums would want to do most of their hunting for larger game than poor little harmless prairie dogs.
Jimmy had forged ahead slightly, or rather his impatient and ambitious mount had taken the bit in its mouth and pulled a little harder than usual. It may have been accident, but to Ned it seemed as though Ally Sloper must have some vicious idea in his mind when he suddenly flung his quirt vigorously out, apparently intending to give his own pony a cruel cut, and then struck the calico mount ridden by Jimmy.
Perhaps he thought to create a little excitement if the beast ran away with its rider, during which he might find a chance to slip off unobserved. Ned, as quick as a flash, dug his heels into his own pony, and was alongside Jimmy almost as soon as the spotted beast started to leap wildly forward under the impetus of that blow from the quirt, something he had never stood for in the past.
When he bent down and seized hold of the bridle close to the pony's mouth Ned was uttering soothing words. Between his efforts and those of the rider, the pony was kept from bolting, though it snorted and acted ugly.
"I'm afraid you'll have to pay dear for picking out that calico nag, Jimmy," Ned told his chum, when they were riding along side by side after the little matter had been settled for the time being.
"'Tis too late to make any difference," replied the other scout; "and do you remember tellin' me once that it's no time to change mounts when crossin' a stream? Now that I've started on this painted pony I'll stick to the same through good winds and foul. If the little cayuse c'n dump me, he's welcome to try, that's all."
Evidently Jimmy's old stubborn nature was on deck again. He did hate to give anything up the worst kind; though he admitted that there were some exceptions to this rule and one of them was whenever he found himself on a sickening heaving sea.
"I hope the cattle will be found feedin' in the place they called a coulie?" Jimmy went on to say a minute later, as he strove earnestly to make out the conformation of the low hills they were approaching.
Now Ned had just been wondering on his own account what Chunky expected to do in case the herd had wandered away. Would he start to follow them, making use of his training as a tracker in order to stick to the trail the animals would have left behind them?
Ned believed so. He had studied the lanky puncher well, and found evidences of great pertinacity in his make-up. Chunky would not be the one to quit easily. On the contrary, Ned felt positive he would keep moving if it took the remainder of that night.
"Chances are they'll not wander far away, Jimmy," he told the other scout, who was evidently beginning to cross bridges before he came to them, as was his habit, and so attempt more or less unnecessary work.
"But I don't hear any signs of the critters, do you, Ned?" continued Jimmy.
"Why no, and you couldn't hardly expect to, what with all the noise we're making," Ned replied, shortly; "though the wind is coming almost in our faces, and seems like we might hear if a bull bellowed. But leave all that to Chunky. He knows what to do, Jimmy. Just look out for your pony, and keep close by; that's all you've got to do."
Gradually the hills assumed more shape, and they could even make out the trees that covered their sides in most quarters.
"That dark place ahead must be the coulie opening," Ned suggested.
"Just what it is," replied the lanky rider, "You foller it up a ways and all of a sudden-like you drop in on one of the finest little valleys that cattle ever nosed about in, knee-high in grass that ain't the buffalo stripe neither, and with a fine spring that sends its water down the hull place. We ain't got anythin' ekal to it for a harbor for cattle this side o' the Colorado. That's why we turned our prize herd in here, to pick up a little fat before the Kunnel he ships the same off to a show."
That was quite a long talk for Chunky to make. He was a man of few words as a rule and bit his sentences off as though it pained him to run on for any great length of time.
Ned understood. And he was glad that he had come with the man who was now temporarily in charge of Double Cross Ranch. Where Chunky happened to be things were more apt to take place than elsewhere.
Now it was very likely that the waiting rustlers must have known all about this unusually fine herd. Even if they had failed to locate it on their own account, while galloping around the country, Ally Sloper would have put them wise.
If they were figuring on making way with any portion of the Double Cross property shortly, it stood to reason that they would turn their attention first of all to this valuable drove.
The moon had risen above the horizon and was pouring a flood of light upon the scene. Ned could not remember when it had appeared more radiant. He fancied that they would have very little trouble in making the round-up and drive, if only nothing happened to break up their well laid plans.
No doubt when they had arrived at the bottom of the coulie Chunky would order a short halt, in order to let the ponies get their wind again. And during that time they could be using their ears to catch any sounds that might come from up the gully, such as the mooing of cows that had calves, the bellowing of a bull, or the clashing as horns beat against horns in a fierce fight for possession.
Sloper was still in line. He had not turned his face once toward Chunky since starting from the ranch, and it was natural that he should be laboring under a high tension, possibly arranging scheme after scheme, only to cast them away when he discovered weak points.
Ned believed the fellow was only waiting to see what circumstances would do for him; and he felt that should the opening come he would be as quick as a flash to avail himself of it.
Well, here they were now at the foot of the hills, and apparently their fast gallop must be near its end. Jimmy would not be sorry. He was sore with being bounced about in that hard saddle, though no one could have forced him to admit that he was having anything but a glorious time. But Jimmy was always full of grit, and disdained to call for help unless it could not possibly be avoided. He would master that fancy calico pony, or know the reason why.
"Hold up!"
When Chunky called this out every one drew rein. They were undoubtedly in the mouth of a coulie, which was merely a gully through which at various times in the ages that had passed floods had swept down the side of the hills, and following a set course washed this bed clear. Later on bushes and even trees had managed to obtain a foothold and seemed to thrive.
The horses were breathing heavily, as the six riders sat in their saddles and listened eagerly to catch any sounds that might come down from the feeding plateau above.
There was no lack of noise, as the two scouts quickly understood. And if cattle made all those sounds while feeding Ned wondered what it would be under stress of excitement and panic, when stampeded by a storm, or from some other cause.
He could hear much trampling, low bellowing, the mooing of cows fearful lest they be separated from their calves, and a confusion of other sounds of which, being more or less of a greenhorn on the range, he could make nothing.
But it was different with Chunky and the other punchers. Their trained ears, accustomed to detecting even uneasiness in feeding stock, and guessing the cause, instantly picked up several things that told them the startling truth.
When Ned himself plainly heard the neigh of an excited horse, and then what appeared to be a half suppressed shout, he jumped to a sudden conclusion that very nearly took his breath away.
Something not down on the hills was certainly going on up there, where the prize herd fed. There were men there and they were stirring up the cattle, for the snap of whips could be heard together with various other sounds such as Ned fancied might accompany the start of a drive.
He could give a pretty good guess what it all meant, and did not have to wait for Chunky to pass the information along. Some other persons besides themselves had taken a notion to start a round-up that was not ordered, and right then were busily engaged in getting things moving.
Apparently the punchers had not arrived any too soon, for the rustlers were undoubtedly abroad; and had the range riders been delayed another half hour they must have arrived at Washout Coulie to find the feeding grounds bare, and discover that the herd had mysteriously vanished!
CHAPTER XIV.
STAMPEDING THE PRIZE BUNCH.
"Steady, Ally, and don't try it!" Chunky was saying in a low but tense voice. He seemed to have suspected that the treacherous puncher would be greatly excited over the fact that his friends were at work above, and might take considerable chances in order to let them know the men from the Double Cross had arrived on the scene of action unannounced.
They gathered in a little clump. The other two punchers must have guessed why Chunky was acting in this way toward Sloper, for they eyed the latter suspiciously, and Ned could see that Arizona Tom had his heavy gun in his hand, as though ready to use it promptly should the other try to dash away without authority.
"Seems like we didn't get here any to soon, hey, Ned?" ventured Jimmy, with one of his hoarse whispers.
"Same old luck keeps after us," was the reply of the scout master; "as long as that holds good I should worry more for the other fellow than on our account."
"It's them pesky rustlers that have hit up a hot pace, and got on the ground ahead o' us," Chunky was growling; and then, as though his humor changed, he went on to add: "but say, mebbe we won't give 'em the surprise o' their lives."
"Then you'll tackle the bunch, even if they number more than we do?" asked Ned, seeking information while they waited for a move on the part if those who were so busily engaged up the coulie.
"Shucks! it wouldn't stop us if they was three to our one," Chunky answered, with the freedom from concern that usually marks the true cowman. "If we can surprise the critters the advantage'll lie with us. And let me say right now that it won't be safe for any feller to get gay, and give a yip, or let his gun go off by accident, 'cause another is apt to drop into the habit, which is a bad one."
That last was undoubtedly meant for Ally Sloper. He could be heard gnashing his strong white teeth in sullen anger, but he did not venture to let out a warning whoop so as to tell his friends they were up against it.
Ned could not blame him, for he fancied that it might have been the last shout Ally would ever make, because this was a serious business, betraying the interests of his employer, and should he be shot no blame would ever be attached to the one carrying out the punishment.
"Move over this way a leetle," said Chunky, presently, as though he knew just how the cattle and their drivers must issue forth from the mouth of the coulie when the time came, and meant to set the trap so as to take the rustlers off their guard.
"Whew! tell me about this, will you?" Jimmy was breathing in the ear of his companion scout, as they tried to keep their ponies quiet, sitting in the shadow of the trees, and listening to all the clamor that arose further up the slope of the hill.
"If you think this is exciting, Jimmy," remarked Ned, "wait till the climax comes along, and then see what happens. To think of our getting in a lively affair like this the very first night we're at the ranch. And somebody said all the fun was in the past. Looks like we find it wherever we go."
"Well, you never spoke truer words, Ned," admitted Jimmy; "and honest now, I'm tremblin' all over right at this minute, not because I'm scared a whiff, for you know I ain't, but just on account of the strain. Oh! I hope they don't take a notion to slip away up the coulie 'stead of droppin' down and takin' their medicine like men."
"Listen! they're coming, I do believe, Jimmy!"
"Sounds like it, Ned. I never had the pleasure of handin' it out to a cattle rustler, but I've heard they are pretty tough citizens; and in case I do have to puncture a few with disabling wounds it needn't keep me awake nights. Them longhorns has got to be saved, and we're here to do it."
"Stow your gab, Jimmy, and be ready to do what you're told. Chunky gives the orders for the entertainment, remember, and be quick to act. Yes, the cattle have been headed this way. They're running down the coulie right now!"
With the increasing noise the excitement grew apace. Both scouts shut their teeth hard together, and awaited the breaking of the crisis. The oncoming herd was drawing closer with every second that passed. Undoubtedly those who were driving them out of the feeding ground knew that this was the only way by means of which the herd could be started, because further up the coulie merged into a blind canyon that must have proven a trap.
If there had been the slightest doubt in any one's mind before now concerning the truth, it would have been dissipated when the loud voices of men came floating down, with the crash of many cloven hoofs and the protestations from the unwilling cattle, doubtless preparing to settle down for the night when this drive was started.
Chunky must have been aware of the fact that it would be next to impossible to keep watch over Ally Sloper when the crisis dawned. Perhaps he really did not care so much, whether the other escaped or not, since he could no longer upset the plans they had laid, by giving warning.
And on his part Sloper may have figured that he could not afford to openly prove himself a traitor by fleeing. He could not know that they had any positive proof of his double dealing, and just suspicion he could live down. So he might even act as though he were an honest man and carry out his part in the work of saving the threatened herd. His life counted for more than the success of his allies in the raid. He could make new connections with other schemers; but once he had been strung up to a telegraph pole by furious punchers he could not get a new life.
The noise grew more distinct, and at any minute now Ned expected to see a mass of moving animals come out of the dark mouth of the coulie.
He took it for granted that the cattle raiders were to be treated harshly, for he knew what a contempt honest punchers felt toward those who would carry off four-footed property belonging to others, and changing the brand, sell it as if it were their own.
That meant more or less gunfire; it might be that wounds would be received as well as given, for these rustlers were a dare-devil lot, and no doubt ready to fight desperately before giving up their ill-gotten gains.
This did not cause Ned to quail. He had received his baptism of fire long ago, and for one of his age had been through so much of excitement that he might almost be called a veteran. Nevertheless he was thrilled with the thought of surprising the thieves, and his heart beat much more rapidly than usual as he sat in his saddle, keeping a firm grip on his pony, and holding his rifle ready for quick action.
Yes, they are coming very fast now. The clatter of cloven hoofs, and all those other accompanying sounds, told this plainly. Ned wondered how many of the raiders there might turn out to be. He tried to count the different kinds of shouts and whoops, but found this next to impossible.
"What does it matter," he told himself, finally; "just as Chunky said, if we take them by surprise the advantage is all with us? Five or ten, we'll send them flying over the plain, thinking they've run foul of the whole Double Cross outfit. Jimmy, when the time comes to cut loose yelpt like a Fiji Islander, or anything else that makes a big noise; get that?"
"You wait," was all Jimmy replied, but there was a world of meaning back of the words, and Ned knew he would do his duty.
"There they come!" said one of the cow punchers just then.
Out from the shadows of the coulie burst a string of cattle on the run. They had been started with difficulty, but once the excitement began to work there would be no restraining them until weariness caused them to stop their flight.
Chunky was eagerly watching to see how they turned. He doubtless anticipated that one or more of the rustlers would be seeking to head off, and then would be the time to open fire, so as to create a small-sized panic among the cattle raiding crowd.
"Gee whiz! but I'm awonderin' what this beast'll do when I let go with the gun right over his head!" Jimmy remarked just about that time, which seemed to indicate that he believed he had cause for worry.
"Keep a tight hold of your bridle; that's all you can do," the scout master advised, without removing his eyes from the picture that was enlarging with each passing second, as more cattle came running out of the coulie, and followed the leaders.
From the midst of the lowing herd there suddenly burst two horsemen. They were swinging their hats, waving their arms, and evidently shouting at the top of their shrill voices, with the object of turning the running herd in the direction they wished it to go.
Many miles lay between Washout Coulie and the ranch buildings, and there was little danger that this racket might be carried there on the wings of the wind; even though it were faintly heard, chances were that the punchers would conclude not to bother, under the impression that it must be a round-up on some neighboring stock farm.
"Now! give'em Hail Columbia!"
Ned could hear Chunky shouting these words, or something that sounded very similar. He was paying little attention to anything that was said, however, for his whole mind seemed to be taken up with following the rapid drama that was being unfolded before his eyes.
There began to sound the discharge of firearms. Arizona Tom, Dutch and Chunky each took a shot, and Jimmy not to be outdone, managed to get his gun half-way to his shoulder before he pulled the trigger. Then his calico pony began to act in such an extraordinary manner that it took all Jimmy's attention, and for the time being he did not care a particle whether the two rustlers ran away, or were made to bite the dust, for it was a case of winding his arms around the neck of that bucking broncho or else measuring his length on the ground, after flying for a dozen or two feet through the atmosphere.
The rustlers might never have known they were being fired upon if it depended on the noise alone; but then there was the flash of the several discharges; and the whistle of flying lead past their ears to warn them of the fact that they were in the danger zone.
They looked that way and must have made a discovery that was far from pleasant. Still they were not ready to give up so easily, when it had seemed that everything was coming their way.
"They mean to make a fight for the prize!" Ned told himself, when the saw a sudden flash from the spot where the two rustlers had been mixing with the herd, and which must mean that one of them was using his gun.
At that he raised his rifle. Others of the lawless tribe would be pushing into view shortly, and it was policy to scatter them in the start, so as to cut down the advantage they would have from greater numbers.
Ned had never learned how to shoot from the back of a prancing pony; but he was able to use good judgment, and pull the trigger when there was a temporary lull in operations.
He must have managed to strike the mount of one of the rustlers, much to his regret, for immediately it started madly off, despite all efforts of the rider to hold the beast in. The other man finding that he alone faced the fire of the enemy made haste to tum and flee.
This, however, was only the beginning. There were others near by, and loud yells attested that they were about to burst into view, when the whole operation must be repeated.
Meanwhile the cattle continued to pour in a living stream out of the coulie. No wonder these reckless rustlers had taken great chances in order to secure this bunch, which consisted of the pick of the Double Cross herds. They had undoubtedly been kept in close touch with all that was going on by the spies who were employed on the ranch, and doubtless knew the number and value of each separate herd.
Then came whooping riders, this time some half dozen, scattered about so as to cover considerable ground. In the bright moonlight the picture was a thrilling one, and Ned believed he must often recall it in future days. The surging longhorns, the active cow ponies and their riders keeping up a continual racket, which seemed to be an essential part of the performance--all these impressed Ned greatly.
Then he heard a loud explosion close to his head.
"Give it to the night riders! Let 'em have hot lead! Show 'em how the boys of Double Cross Ranch can stand up for Kunnel Job!"
With each short sentence Chunky was discharging his gun; and as the others kept pace with his activity there was a warm session around that quarter. Even Ally Sloper added to the din by shooting several times, and yelling, though Ned saw if none of the others did, that he aimed high, apparently not caring to take the chances of hitting one of his friends.
The utmost consternation attacked the surprised rustlers. They must have fancied that the whole force of the ranch was upon them, if noise counted for anything.
One man was seen to sway in his saddle, so that another had to help hold him in his seat. Ned himself felt sure that with one of his shots he had wounded another rustler in the arm, for he changed the bridle grip to the other hand, and dashed off at full swing, plainly demoralized.
There was no holding them, because they knew they were in the wrong, and that if their identity chanced to be discovered, in spite of the bandanas with which the lower part of their faces were concealed, the law would step in and deal with them harshly.
And so it came about that the raid on the Double Cross herd turned out to be a fizzle; though only for the prompt way in which the defenders of the prize herd started out to meet the situation there must have been a different story to tell.
"Get the cattle headed for home!" was the slogan that went the rounds; and with Chunky still keeping close to the suspect this difficult job was undertaken. Being experts at the rounding-up process they soon had the herd headed off, and started on a new tack, now making in the direction of the ranch home.
Ned had meant to lend a hand at this work, but something that came up kept him from taking any great interest in the driving of the steers and cows. This was the strange disappearance of his chum, Jimmy McGraw!
CHAPTER XV.
JIMMY'S UNWILLING RIDE.
There was reason for alarm, Ned thought, when he made this discovery. The last he could remember seeing Jimmy was just at the time the second detachment of the cattle rustlers came bursting out from the coulie, with shouts and all the wild clamor cow punchers indulge in when driving stock.
At that time Jimmy seemed to have tamed down his calico pony enough to once more think of using his Marlin on the enemy; but strive as he might Ned could not remember having heard its suggestive "cough" to tell that Jimmy had actually pulled the trigger.
It must have been at that exciting moment, when everything was confused, and Ned had his attention fastened on the movements of the cattle poachers, that the thing happened.
He knew Jimmy too well to even suspect that the other would run away voluntarily, for Jimmy dearly loved a "scrap," though trying to conform to scout rules, and avoid seeking trouble. This would of course mean that the frantic calico pony with the white eyes and furious temper had taken the bit between his teeth, and actually run away with the scout.
How could they tell which way the animal had gone in making his headlong flight? Would he be apt to head for home, or else try and join the horses of the fleeing rustlers?
Ned determined to speak to Chunky about it. The puncher might be able to offer good advice in the matter, seeing that he had spent all his life on the plains, and knew the habits of these tricky bronchos from the ground up.
Chunky, however, was a difficult man to approach just then, for he certainly had his hands full in getting the big herd turned toward the ranch house, and at the same time trying to keep the suspect under his eyes.
If Ned had only had his little electric torch with him he would have gotten down and examined the soil, endeavoring to get some pointers by learning in which direction the calico pony had fled.
All he could really do was to help drive the cattle home, and make up his mind that if poor Jimmy failed to show up during the remainder of the night, he would return again in the morning and do his best to follow the trail of the runaway.
He pictured the scene, with Jimmy, who was not in the class of champion riders at all, clinging to the neck of his mount, and trying to soothe the frantic beast by soft words, which must, however, have fallen on deaf ears.
When before leaving the spot Ned discovered some object shining amidst the bunches of buffalo grass, and jumping down found that it was indeed Jimmy's prized repeating rifle, he knew that his guess must be close to the truth.
Unless he wanted to be left behind he must be moving, for already had the energetic Chunky and his mates managed to turn the cattle in the right direction and the whole mass was swinging toward home. The herd, however, went unwillingly, doubtless disliking to quit their pasturage, and suspecting it was to be followed by some sort of irksome confinement, remembered only too well from times past.
Ned would not soon forget that long and tiresome drive.
Not only did the punchers have their work cut out for them in keeping the herd compact, and constantly moving toward the region where the building would finally heave in sight, but they had another duty at the same time.
There was no telling what the discomfited rustlers might not attempt. If after their temporary panic they managed to get together and compare notes, doubtless they would realize that they outnumbered the punchers who had taken the prize herd away from them so neatly and expeditiously.
In their anger they might even follow, and start hostile operations on a more savage and determined scale, with the intention of recovering their lost plunder. These cattle thieves had been getting bolder than ever of late, and there could be no telling what they might not attempt.
Consequently Chunky had given orders to his men to keep their guns "on tap," and to make quick use of the same, given any opportunity. They were thus compelled to keep on guard all the while they shouted, and chased after such steers or cows as manifested a desire to break away from the main herd.
Once he caught the spirit of the thing Ned was in his element, and the puncher afterwards admitted that the boy acted as though he had been accustomed to driving herd all his life.
Of course, with so few hands, and such a wide field to cover, it now became practically impossible for Chunky to keep close to Ally Sloper. He saw that the other appeared to be engaging in the diversion with all his accustomed vim, and it had to go at that. If the man failed to turn up when they reached the stockade, why they would be well rid of a faithless employee, that was all. It was too late now for any traitor to spoil their work by hunting up his allies and telling what he knew.
Apparently Sloper must have been figuring things out, and concluded to risk it further by sticking to the Double Cross outfit. He did not know just how far suspicion may have gone; but if he disappeared now his guilt would be taken for granted, and his usefulness as a spy gone.
So Ned noticed every little while that the man was working with all his accustomed zeal, as though to counteract any suspicion that might have been aroused concerning his loyalty.
Indeed, Ned more than once took pattern from the actions of Sloper, who had few equals and no superiors at the work. It seemed a shame that so expert a cowman should ruin his career by playing a double game with his employers.
It took them several hours to get the herd near home, for as a chain is only as strong as its weakest link so cattle may be driven only as fast as the cows and calves can run.
The strain eased up considerably when they drew nearer the ranch buildings, for the possibility of their being pounced upon became less. At a distance of ten or twelve miles the dashing rustlers could afford to take chances; but not so near home. Once that hard-riding bunch of punchers started in their wake and the cattle thieves knew what was bound to follow; for saddles would be emptied ruthlessly, and no quarter shown. To the cattleman they were looked upon as snakes in the grass, and treated accordingly.
Ned had lots of time to indulge in serious reflections as he rode along, now urging his pony to the right, and again to the left, as occasion demanded, in order to keep the main body of advancing cattle intact.
Besides thoughts of the lost chum, Jimmy, he found himself wondering whether the man whom the Government officials had asked him to look out for, Clem Parsons, could have been one of those whom he saw wildly chasing the stolen cattle; also if the deep-throated voice that had bellowed out from time to time belonged to the awful Hy Adams, step-father to Amos, and ferocious mate to the shrinking little woman he and the other scouts had met and pitied so much.
If this were so he began to speculate as to just how he might get in touch with the man who was wanted on many back charges by the Secret Service people. Doubtless these cattle thieves had a secret den somewhere among the hills, to which they repaired between daring raids. If Clem Parsons had indeed cast his fortunes in with the gang it began to look as though of a necessity Ned would have to look up this hiding-place, risky proceeding though that would seem.
Then his mind would turn again to Jimmy. What if the latter had fallen in with some of the defeated rustlers, would they treat him decently, or be apt to vent their spite upon his head because of their recent bitter disappointment?
Ned found himself wishing again and again it were all over, and that he knew the worst. The closer they drew to the stockade the more he found his nerves quivering with suspense. If Jimmy were not there he realized he was in for a very bad night, and that sleep was not apt to visit his eyes.
The moon was now high up in the star-dotted sky, showing that some hours must have elapsed since the encounter with the bold cattle thieves.
Every chance Ned got he strained his eyes to learn if there were any hopeful signs ahead. But bright though the moon may seem, so that one could even read fine print in a newspaper held close to the eyes, it is always deceptive, and low-lying objects fail to disclose themselves until they are quite near.
It was a moving light that finally told Ned how close the herd was to the ranch buildings. Then he caught answering shouts, and eagerly he listened in the hope of distinguishing the well-known voice of Jimmy among the whoops; but although once or twice he thought he detected it, he could not be sure.
The gates of the big enclosure were open and ready to receive the cattle, with the Chinese cook in attendance. It only required a little expert work in getting the leading steers to enter, and after that the job was easy.
Seeing that his services were no longer required, and with an aching heart, Ned wheeled his pony and started for the long building known as the bunkhouse, beyond which lay the other structures.
As he did so he discovered a moving figure advancing hastily toward him. Hope grappled with doubt, and he was held in this mixture of suspense until suddenly he heard a loud sound that sent a spasm of joy to his heart.
It was a fair imitation of the long-drawn howl of the wolf; and so many times had he drilled Jimmy in making this signal of the patrol to which both of them belonged that he knew his missing chum was safe and sound, or he would not be advancing toward him so sturdily.
"Jimmy," he shouted in a transport of joy.
"Whoopee! on deck, Ned, and mighty glad it is to see you comin' back after that hullaballoo of a time!" came the answer; and in another minute the two scouts were shaking hands with considerable vim.
"I picked up your gun, Jimmy," remarked Ned, the first thing, "and here it is fastened to my saddle."
"Glory be, but that's good news," declared the other, exultantly; "d'ye know I've been feelin' mighty sorry about that same gun, for fear I'd lost it; and you know what I think of the shootin'-stick. It was either drop everything, and get me arms tight around the neck of that blasted broncho, or else find myself standin' on me head. Gee whiz! but it was a mad race the little villain gave me before he fetched up here at the ranch house."
"I'm sorry you didn't have some of the fun of driving the herd home," remarked the scout master; "but glad it was no worse than a runaway. When I saw the white in the eyes of that pretty calico pony I knew he had a nasty temper. I suppose you'll want another horse after this?"
"What, me?" ejaculated Jimmy, bristling up instantly; "is that the opinion you've got of your old chum, Ned Nestor? Did you ever know me to give anything up first pop? Well, I'll break that spotted little fiend in, or else he'll break my coco for me. And say, he's goin' to pay up for the run he took this night. I'll keep him goin' till he's ready to drop, and will eat out of me hand. That's Jimmy McGraw's way of doin' things. The McGraws never say die as long as there's anything to eat in the house."
"Well, let's get back to the house, after I've turned my pony loose in the corral where they keep the saddle band. None of the others shown up yet?" Ned continued.
"Not yet, though I think one of the herds must be close by now, for I caught a whoop or two a while back, and it didn't come from your quarter either," Jimmy replied, walking beside his chum, who had jumped to the ground, glad of the chance to stretch his cramped legs after such a tedious ride, to which he was not accustomed.
"You must have made record time getting here, then, Jimmy?" the scout master observed, and if he smiled at picturing the sight of his companion hanging desperately to the neck of the frantic runaway, Jimmy was not aware of the fact.
"'Tis meself that beat the score that time," he remarked, proudly. "When I look back, all I seem to remember is a rush, me arms fast around the neck of the flying steed, and then him entering the corral like a whirlwind. It was whist, bang, and there I was miles away from the fight with me heart near broke because I'd been cheated out of the best part of the game."
When Ned remembered the arduous drive that followed, with his voice husky from shouting, and how his arms ached from waving his hat, and managing his lively mount, he secretly thought Jimmy had been a lucky chap, though he did not say so.
"And you couldn't find a mount to come back on, I suppose?" he asked.
"That I couldn't," replied Jimmy. "The saddle horse corral was plumb empty; and there wasn't a puncher around to lend me his broncho. I even thought to walk out and meet ye on the way, but was afraid I'd get lost and give heaps of trouble. But glory be, you won the day, and saved the prize herd, which ought to please the Colonel when he hears about the same."
Having disposed of his mount Ned, together with Jimmy, started for the house, intending to settle down in an easy chair and not move until he went to bed.
There could be no doubt but what one of the other herds was coming in, for the clamor of the drive was in full swing. It had been thought that Chunky and his party might be the last to arrive, as they had further to go; but unexpected difficulties must have delayed the others, or else they found themselves unable to push their herds as rapidly as Ned's party had done.
Jimmy was laughing softly to himself as they sat there, waiting the turn of events.
"What strikes you as so funny, Jimmy?" asked Ned.
"Well," replied the other scout, "I was only thinkin' how little we can see further than our noses. Now, only a bit ago some of us began to complain that the excitement was all in the past. But say, look what we've run up against before we've been in this country of the cattle rustlers a single day. Can you beat it?"
And Ned, as he looked back at the strange events marking the last twenty-four hours, was compelled to admit that Jimmy was right; for they had certainly never met with a more thrilling series of happenings than those which had come their way. And it also seemed as though the end was not yet; for there still remained to be carried out his business affair in connection with the man who was wanted so badly by the Secret Service people at Washington.
As they sat there and exchanged remarks, the noise grew in volume, and presently from three quarters at once moving objects began to loom up, that soon developed into the expected droves. From which it would seem that success had accompanied the Double Cross punchers in every round-up, and that the herds were all safe.
CHAPTER XVI.
AFTER THE RUSTLERS' RAID.
As the other herds came in the excitement grew intense. Cattle were lowing, men shouting and horses whinnying at such a rate that the two boys changing their mind, had to make their way out to the corral to see the last of the great drive by moonlight.
By degrees things quieted down, though there would be more or less uneasiness manifested among the impounded cattle throughout the night.
The punchers were a noisy lot. Dozens of questions flowed in upon Chunky, Dutch and the other two who managed to bring in the prize herd. This was after the news was circulated that the rustlers had been in the act of making off with the cattle in Washout Coulie at the time the Double Cross boys arrived on the scene.
There was much bitter lamentation heard among the unlucky ones, because they had been cheated out of all the fun. They could have a drive at any time, but a genuine encounter with the bold rustlers was something worth while.
Ned saw that Ally Sloper was playing his part as though he meant to rehabilitate himself in the good graces of the owners of the ranch after his recent unfortunate break. He even boasted of having wounded at least a couple of the cattle thieves with his fire; though Ned knew only too well that this was untrue, since the other had shot too high for any such damage to follow.
"He's got his nerve with him, seems like," Jimmy had remarked, as having been joined by Harry and Jack, he and Ned stood there watching the last of the cattle being driven into the big enclosure that would be patrolled during the remainder of the night, so that nothing could happen to break the corral fence and scatter the inmates over the plain.
"That's more than Lefty Louie had then," remarked Jack.
"He went out with your crowd, didn't he?" Ned asked.
"Went out, yes, but he didn't come back with us," replied the other scout.
"Huh! I just thought that sneak would beat it, given half a chance," said Jimmie.
"One of the first things I did," Harry spoke up, "after getting in was to hunt around to see if the other three came back; and not a sign can you find of one of the bunch."
"You mean Coyote Smith, Bob Caruso and Tinplate George?" Ned inquired.
"All slipped away the first chance they got," Harry continued, in a disgusted voice. "I guess they must have seen that the game was up, and thought they might have to swing from some telegraph pole if the punchers took a notion they'd played fast and loose."
"Can you blame them?" asked Ned.
"Well, perhaps not so much; and besides, it cleans out the sneaky element among the punchers of the Double Cross outfit," Harry admitted. "But Uncle Job will have a heap to hear when he gets back from his journey. You don't think those men will dare come close in here and try to steal the cattle right out of the corral, do you, Ned?"
"I should say there wasn't one risk in a thousand that way," answered the scout leader, immediately; "they know that we'll be on guard, and chances are they've got too healthy a respect for the shooting abilities of these scrappy Double Cross punchers to want to get into a regular fight with them."
"But all the same Chunky means to keep on the watch; he'll have the stockade well guarded, won't he, Ned?" Harry continued.
"That has all been arranged for," Ned told him; "and you can make up your mind there'll be nothing doing until morning. Fact is, I'm more suspicious that Ally Sloper being up to some sly trick than that his friends will dare pounce down on the ranch in the night.
"I hope Chunky hasn't changed his mind about that snake!" Jimmy ventured. "Just because he helped drive the herd, and goes around boasting how he did such great shakes in shooting up the rustler gang, isn't any proof that he's reformed."
"Chunky is on to his capers, never you fear, Jimmy," declared Jack, "and ten to one he means to have Sloper watched every minute of the time till dawn. If he tries to slip away, he'll run up against a snag right off. It may be a piece of lead that stops his exit, or the loop of a lariat. You can count on seeing him among us when the call to breakfast comes."
"Oh! I wish it was now!" Jimmy was heard to mutter, "all this work seems to have made me as hungry as a wolf; and it's been an _awful_ long time since they flagged me to a meal."
"Cheer up, Jimmy," Ned told him, "because I've got some good news for you."
"Did the lady tell Chin Chin Charley to give the boys some grub after they came in from the drive, Ned; is that the good news you want to tell me?" Jimmy eagerly demanded, looking anxiously at his chum.
"There goes the big gong right now," interrupted Jack, "and the boys are trooping for the grub tent as if they know what to expect after doing night duty. So get a move on, Jimmy; if you don't want to find everything cleared out and only a bare table left."
Jimmy was off like a flash. When the other scouts entered the place where meals were served, they discovered him busily at work.
"Saved you places alongside me!" he called out; "and say, there's plenty of chow for everybody. That Chink knows his business, and I'm goin' to be great friends with him all the time we're here."
"It takes you to make up to the cook, Jimmy," laughed Jack.
"That's all right," replied the other, with a broad grin, "sure it's a wise boy that knows which side of his bread is buttered. And Chin Chin Charley is the boss cook, let me tell you right now. I ain't much in that line myself, but then I know a good thing when I run across it. And don't the rest of you get jealous if you see how thick me'n him are expectin' to be; ain't we, Chin Chin?"
The slant-eyed Mongolian must have already taken quite a liking for jolly, good-natured Jimmy, for upon being thus appealed to he nodded his head until his pigtail bobbed up and down, smiled affably, and was heard to murmur:
"Much good frien's, Jimmy, me; heap like Melicanboy; much eat; come back more many times, alle samee!"
Apparently Jimmy was in for a good time while staying at the Double Cross Ranch, and he believed in starting things right by making sure that the food supply would be unlimited.
After the midnight supper had been disposed Of the punchers strolled forth again. Ned and Chunky were in consultation, for the puncher, knowing that Mrs. Haines had somehow conceived the idea that the young scout leader had a long head for a boy and could be depended on in an emergency, realized that it was the right thing to put certain things up to him. Of course, Chunky knew best what should be done, and Ned quickly told him to exercise his own judgment in the matter of guarding the big stockade in which the cattle had been shut up.
The boys were all tired after such a long and arduous experience. Even Jack, who as a rule could stand for almost anything, admitted that he could hardly put one foot in front of the other, he felt so stiff.
"That's because I'm not used to being so long in the saddle and playing the game they have out here," he acknowledged, "but given a chance, and we'll show our friends, the punchers, that scouts can ride pretty decently. I'm going to pick up all the kinks of the job while I'm on it; and before we leave here we ought to know how to throw a rope, drop a steer, use the branding iron on his flank, and ride the trickiest broncho there is to a stand-still."
"That's me," asserted Jimmy, like a flash. "He's a spotted little devil, too, and his name, sure it's Satan, or if it ain't it ought to be. He beat me out in the first clash and run me all the way home, like a blue streak; but there's another day acomin', don't you forget it; and that score between Jimmy McGraw and Satan has got to be rubbed out. I'm on to his curves now and I'll sting him, or it's me chased to the tall timber. You hear me warble, boys!"
"Then we'll expect to have lots of fun out of the circus, Jimmy," said Harry, "because they've been telling me that calico pony has got the meanest name around here. Some of the boys heard you boasting about how you could manage any animal, and they just couldn't help running that beast in on you. But if Uncle Job had been here I don't think they'd have dared to take the risk. You might have been killed."
"He didn't get me off and that's some comfort," muttered Jimmy, grimly, "I'm a good sticker, you see."
"Yes, I noticed that it was hard work to get you away from that table," Jack remarked, with a chuckle.
They had been given comfortable quarters on the ground floor, for the ranch house really boasted of two stories in part. Cots took the place of beds, but they seemed to be all that might be desired; and, as Jack said, were a thousand per cent better than the hard ground, or the hot sand of the desert, which had been their resting place ever since they left Los Angeles, in that ramshackle automobile that had played them false on the journey and had to be abandoned.
It was expected that the two owners of the ranch would possibly return by the following afternoon, when the stirring news could be told. Until then Ned had considered that, perhaps, no action should be taken in connection with Ally Sloper, except that the suspect must be kept under surveillance, so that he might not damage the property in any way. The Colonel would know how to deal with him though in all probability a discharge would be the limit of his punishment.
The night passed without any alarm.
"Sure they had a lesson they won't forget for some time," Jimmy declared in the morning, as the four scouts were talking matters over.
They had had considerable trouble in coaxing the said Jimmy to get out of his comfortable bed. He declared in a sleepy voice that he had been cheated out of much repose lately, and needed rest the worst kind. Argument and pleading seeming to have no effect, Ned finally solemnly assured him that they would eat up every bit of breakfast, no matter how they suffered afterwards for it, unless he immediately started dressing. That did the business, for Jimmy believed Ned meant what he threatened, and that there would be a famine in the land.
It was a fine morning and they enjoyed looking out at the scene from the wide and long verandah. The many buildings, the stockade now filled with hundreds of the impounded stock, the horse corrals where the ponies roamed when not in use, or out grazing on the range--all these and more made up a pleasant picture that seemed to promise the boys a most enjoyable time while at Double Cross Ranch.
Of course, Harry had some important business to transact with his uncle but it was not going to interfere at all with their having a great time. It seemed that they had interested Mr. Stevens in the ranch and its possibilities of enlargement, with greater capital; and the well-to-do automobile maker of New York City had sent his son out to see what he thought of the idea, depending wholly on Harry's report as to whether he went into the scheme or not.
This being the case it was plain to be seen that Harry was bound to be treated like a young prince while he and his chums were at the ranch and that nothing would be deemed too good for them.
As breakfast was not ready when the boys issued forth, much to the disappointment of Jimmy, who acted as though he had not eaten for two days, they started to look around a little.
"We might as well get acquainted with the lay of things," said Jack, "because it looks as if we were going to hang out here some little time now. And I want to say, in the beginning, that I expect to be feeling right sore when the time comes to tip our hats to Double Cross Ranch."
Jimmy gave a grunt at hearing that.
"That's nothin'," he asserted, with a twinkle in his blue eyes, "seems to me all of us are pretty much that way right now. And is it to be wondered at, when we took a twenty-five mile run last night without bein' seasoned to the saddle. But given time, and we'll get as tough as any puncher around. I think we've done right well for a pack of greenhorns."
"There, your mentioning that word pack makes me think of our burros and their loads," remarked Ned. "I wonder what became of them."
"I remember seeing one of the punchers leading the donkeys into the stable," Harry went on to say, "and p'raps we might find them there. Let's stroll in and see if Teddy'd know us again, the rascal."
And as the others were agreeable, they sauntered over to the stable where some of the cowboys' mounts were kept at times, and which usually housed the saddles and other trappings of the puncher band belonging to the ranch.
It just happened by accident that all of the scouts stopped talking as they approached the long, low building, outside of which could be seen the stout rail at which throughout the day ponies could be seen hitched, sometimes as many as a dozen or a score at a time.
Ned was in the van, and as he stepped into the doorway of the stable he came to a sudden stop and held up his hand in a warning way that the others instantly recognized as a signal for them to halt in their tracks.
No one said a single word, only Jimmy, who was lagging along in the rear, pushed forward as though anxious to get in line, so as to see what it was that had excited the attention of the scout master.
A number of ponies were in the stalls, as well as the donkeys that the boys had brought all the way from Death Valley, and which they had purchased from a party of dejected prospectors desirous of returning home.
There was a man there also, whose back was turned toward them, but whom they immediately recognized as Ally Sloper, the suspected ally of the rustler gang. He had taken down the three packs that came with the burros and belonged to the scouts, and appeared to be eagerly searching the same, evidently bent on learning what they might contain.
It happened that just at the very moment the scouts stood there in the open doorway, Sloper made a discovery that caused him to give vent to a low cry of anger and amazement.
When Ned saw what he held in his hand he did not wonder that the spy was shocked. It was nothing more nor less than the dead homing pigeon the hawk had pounced on, and which with its fateful message had afterwards fallen into the possession of the four scouts, thus putting them wise to the fact that there was treachery afloat at the cattle ranch.
When Ally Sloper saw the nature of his find he understood how it came that his clever game had gone against him so heavily, with the prize herd saved from the rustlers' raid.
CHAPTER XVII.
THE SHREWD OLD FOX.
"He's wise to the game!" Jimmy whispered close to Ned's ear, as they all stood and stared at the puncher who held the dead carrier pigeon in his hands.
It must have been a great shock for Ally Sloper. For the first time he realized just how suspicion had come to fall upon his head; and with the note which he had sent out fastened to the leg of that same messenger bird in their possession, those in charge of Double Cross Ranch during the absence of the owners knew to a certainty of his guilt.
Some movement on the part of the scouts must have told him he was being observed, for he suddenly turned his head and looked straight at them.
Ned knew there was danger of the baffled conspirator becoming furiously angry and attempting something wicked. He might be ready to take all sorts of chances, if he could but vent his rage upon those whom he suspected must have been the main cause of his defeat.
It happened that Ned was holding his rifle in his hands at the time, being about to clean it, and he instinctively threw the muzzle of it forward, so that he covered the puncher.
Although Sloper had known that he was under the ban, and suspicion directed toward him, as yet no one had thought to take his gun away. The weapon hung from his side where it could be reached in a fraction of a second, should an occasion suddenly arise calling for action.
Knowing the clever way these cowmen have of using their tools, Ned did not mean that he and his chums should be made victims to the ungovernable rage of a "caught in the trap" schemer.
"Hold up your hands, quick now, Sloper!" was what he told the other; and if he had taken a page from the life of a cowboy Ned could not have put his demand in plainer language, for this was the customary salutation of one puncher meeting another whom he had cause to believe had evil designs on his life.
The man hesitated at first. He looked on the scouts as tenderfeet, and it galled him terribly to have to submit to being ordered around by a mere boy. But there was something about Ned's way of speaking, not to mention the businesslike air of his frowning rifle, that warned him it would be a pretty risky thing to defy the scout master.
Besides, there were three more fellows in khaki close behind Ned, doubtless with other guns that could be brought to bear on him like a flash, if so be he ventured to disobey. And treacherous scoundrel though he might be, Ally Sloper valued his miserable life.
So he dropped the bird and elevated both hands above his head, showing that he surrendered to superior force and conditions which he was powerless to change.
"Jack!" called out Ned, keeping his eyes riveted on the man and never swerving that threatening rifle a fraction of an inch.
"On deck, Ned," came the answer, close to his shoulder.
"Step out there and relieve Sloper of his gun. Be careful not to get between us, remember. If he's going to be allowed to walk around till Harry's uncle comes back to settle his case, I don't think it's wise he should go armed. Men sometimes get mad and do things they're sorry for afterwards. You hear what I'm saying, Sloper. There's no harm going to come to you until Colonel Job comes back; but it's just as well that your claws are trimmed. And if you know what's good for you, don't try any kind of slippery trick on us. I can shoot to hit, and I will. Get that?"
"Oh! that's all right," replied the other, in an apparently careless tone, though his face was drawn with anger and his eyes blazed with the venom of a panther at bay, "keep right along with your little circus. It gives you some fun and it don't hurt me any. Somebody's been killin' one of my birds, and that's what I'm huffy about."
Ned waited until Jack had stepped forward and whipped the heavy revolver out of its leather holster before he went on to say anything further. When this had been accomplished he proceeded to tell the man something more.
"A hawk was your undoing, Sloper. It pounced on your bird and was going to make a meal of it, when one of my chums used his gun to knock the pirate over. Then we found a little note fastened to the bird's leg. I have that note here, and mean to give it to the Colonel when he gets back. I won't say what it contains; there's no need of it with you. But we expect that Colonel Haines will have little trouble in fastening the guilt on the right party, after he sees the handwriting and compares it with that of the punchers working for him. And then it'll be good-bye for some one."
"Yes," declared Jimmy, hotly, determined to have his say in the matter, "and the same feller ought to thank his lucky stars if he gets away from here without being treated to a rope necklace, or given a coat of tar and feathers. I've heard that men have been up against that sort of medicine out here for less things than tryin' to turn the herds of their employers over to the cattle rustlers."
The puncher looked at Jimmy, and his upper lip drew back with what was more like a snarl than anything else.
"You got to prove a thing first," he snapped. "It's easy to say that a man's gone bad, but my word's as good as the next one. Wait and see what the Kunnel thinks. You're all down on me, I know, but you don't see me shakin' in my boots, do ye? Somebody hooked one of my birds, I'm asayin', and used it to send a message with. That's all there is to the thing. It ain't agoin' to bother me any, I'm atellin' ye."
"Oh! Chunky told us you'd give us that sort of a yarn," Jimmy declared, "but it don't go down one little bit. We're on to your curves, Mr. Sloper, let me tell you. You'll sing small when the Colonel comes home."
"Rats! Nobody'll be gladder to meet him than me!" asserted the other, with a great showing of effrontery that Ned knew was only assumed.
Ned felt that the chances were anything he said in trying to show the man what an offense he had been guilty of in betraying his employer would be wasted; but he could not resist the temptation to tell him something about scout law, and how boys are being taught in these days to be faithful to their trust above all things. What he took it upon himself to say, in the most pleasant way he could, may have glanced off the other's thick hide, just as water does from a duck's back. Still, there could be no telling; and at some future time possibly some of the plain truths spoken by the scout master on that occasion were liable to rise up in the mind of Ally Sloper to haunt him.
He did not make any reply when Ned finished, only to scowl and remark:
"S'posen I c'n trot along now, without anybody borin' me in the back?"
"As if a scout would ever be guilty of shooting anybody in the back!" Jimmy indignantly burst out with.
"Yes, go about your business, Sloper," Ned told him, "and if I was you I'd have as little to do with the boys as possible the balance of the day. They're talking some about you, and it might be your wisest policy not to wander away to any lonely place, because I wouldn't put it past them to take things into their hands before the Colonel comes back."
The look that appeared on the puncher's face was as black as a thundercloud. Instinctively he clapped his hand at his side and then gritted his teeth when it only came in contact with an empty holster. A cowboy without his ready gun is somewhat of a helpless individual, from the fact that he has come to depend wholly on it in times of trouble.
"If I was heeled I wouldn't ask favors o' any man," he grumbled, "and as it is I reckons I'll have to cave and fight shy of the crowd. The lot's set agin me anyhow, and I'll have to change my berth, no matter what the Kunnel says."
With that he turned on his heel and strode away. Jimmy looked after him, and then drew a long breath.
"Huh! talk to me about nerve," he exploded, "that dub has got them all beat half a mile, and then some. But say, d'ye really think he'll hang around till the Colonel comes home?"
"Chances are he'll beat it before the afternoon gets old," Jack asserted.
"Ought we to let him sneak away, Ned?" asked Harry. "Why not lock him up somehow, and keep him from skipping out?"
"Well, in the first place, it isn't our business to play keeper to Sloper," the scout master replied. "There are plenty of fellows here to attend to his case and I feel that I've done my whole duty when I warned him not to try and leave the ranch until your uncle gets home, Harry. If Chunky and Skinny and the rest think his room would be better than his company or take a notion to give him a warm coat of tar and feathers, it's none of our affair."
"Yes, I can see you sitting around and doing nothing while such a nasty job is on," Jack remarked, with a shake of his head. "I know you too well for that, Ned. If you saw them taking Sloper out and carrying a bag and a kettle along, I'm justly certain you'd call a halt on the operation and stand between the skunk and the boys who wanted to give him what he deserved."
Ned made no reply to this accusation. Perhaps he knew there was considerable of truth back of it, and that, if such a case did come about, he would be strongly tempted to try and restrain the angry and indignant punchers.
The boys loitered around all morning. No one seemed able to do any particular work, save look after the cattle in the stockade, carrying water and seeing that they had some hay to keep them quiet. When the two stockmen returned from the station they would have to decide whether it were safe to drive the herds to the feeding grounds again, and watch them for a while, so as to guard against further trouble.
So noon came and went. Jimmy had no complaint to make on the score of lack of food. He told his chums he was making up for lost time; and the grinning Chinese cook was only too well pleased to dance attendance on the scout, whom he seemed to fancy more than any of the others.
Half of the afternoon dragged away, and it was understood that possibly in two more hours they could expect the absent owners of the ranch to show up, unless detained by something not down on the bills.
It was a very hot afternoon, and as they had not been oversleeping of late, the four scout chums found themselves nodding as they sat on the shady side of the verandah. Jimmy had crawled into the one hammock and refused to budge. He declared that his sleep had been so wretched lately that he had a whole lot to make up.
Now and then one of them would arouse enough to ask some drowsy question, after which they would relapse into silence once more.
This sleepy condition of things was suddenly disturbed by loud shouts, and what seemed to be a rushing about on the part of excited cow punchers.
Even Jimmy raised his fiery head from the hammock to call out:
"What's the bloomin' row about now? Is that the way they always act when the Colonel shows up in the distance? Well, I ain't agoin' to climb out of this snug hammock to go gallopin' over the hot plain just to yell and swing my hat. You'll have to excuse me, fellers."
"But I don't believe it's the Colonel coming at all!" declared Jack. "Look at the way the boys are jumping for their horses, will you? And there's some snatching up belts with guns, and ropes as well. It's something else that's happened."
"I wouldn't be much surprised if that Sloper's nerve had begun to fail him as the time drew near for my uncle to come back, and that he's skipped out, taking chances of being overhauled and strung up, rather than to face Colonel Job."
"Whoop! you're right, Harry, for there he goes lickety-split right now!" cried Jimmy, eagerly pointing with an extended hand.
Looking in that direction they could all see a solitary figure on horseback, speeding over the sun-kissed plain with all the haste possible. It was undoubtedly Ally Sloper, who had finally reached the conclusion that as he would be kicked off the place anyway after his employer had been convinced of his guilt, perhaps he had better not wait upon the order of his going but take a hasty departure.
He was spurring his pony "for keeps" as Jimmy observed. Shortly afterwards a bunch of the punchers broke away from the saddle corral and went swiftly in the wake of the fleeing reprobate.
"Look at him wavin' his hat at the crowd!" exclaimed Jimmy. "Sure I'd hate to be in his boots right now. There must be some hosses just as good in that bunch, and look at 'em ride, will you? I kind of think Ally will be sorry for showin' such a lot of hurry to clear out. He must a got cold feet athinkin' of facin' his boss. He's made a big mistake, I'm tellin' you."
Ned said nothing, but he had read the treacherous puncher as a shrewd rascal, and had an idea Ally Sloper must know what he was doing.
"He gave 'em a good run for their money, boys," Jimmy loudly declared, "just look how tired their poor old ponies seem to be, aholdin' their heads hangin' low, like they'd covered forty miles. But I don't see our friend, Ally, among them. And I guess now he must have got his medicine."
"Wait and ask Skinny there, who's heading the lot," Jack advised him; for he noticed the little smile on Ned's face and believed the scout master was not so positive as Jimmy seemed to be regarding the outcome of the mad race.
Skinny looked gloomy and, indeed, there were few smiles among the seven who had so gleefully started out in his company to overhaul the fugitive and give him a little token of their warm regard.
"Did you overtake him, Skinny?" Harry called out as the returning band trotted past, their ponies lagging fearfully.
"Not so's you could notice the same, sir," replied the stout puncher who answered to so misleading a name.
"Then his broncho was better than any of your mounts, I suppose?" Harry continued.
The cow punchers started grumbling at a great rate, and said some pretty ugly things about the absent one.
"Seems like he was too slick for us, sir," Skinny went on to say, dejectedly. "Co'se we might a cort up with Ally if things'd a been right and proper; but say, it wasn't long before he started to run away from the hull outfit, and we reckons as how the old fox he must a doped all the ponies but his own mount!"
CHAPTER XVIII.
MORE TROUBLE AHEAD.
It turned out that what the dejected Skinny had said was the truth. Even the ponies that had not taken part in the chase of Ally Sloper were found to be showing plain signs of being sick. There could be no doubt but what the sly fox had laid his plans carefully, and also found an opportunity to carry the same out. He must have managed to give each broncho something in his feed that would within a certain time weaken him, especially if subjected to any violent exercise calculated to start the animal sweating freely.
Those who had pursued the fleeing puncher had kept their own for a short time, and then noticed that no matter how they urged their mounts on they were being slowly distanced. The extravagant gestures of derision on the part of Sloper also aroused suspicion; and when their ponies began to show unmistakable signs of playing out, what seemed to be the truth dawned upon them.
"It was a mighty clever ruse, I'm thinking," Jack remarked, as he and his chums went out to see the sick ponies.
"Are they poisoned and will they all die?" Harry asked one of the punchers, with keen regret in his voice, as he watched the actions of the sick animals.
"Oh! we reckons it ain't so bad as that there," replied the cowboy, "they been locoed with some weed that Ally, he must a carried around with him, meanin' to use the same when the right time came along. But Miss Haines she give us some stuff outen the Kunnel's medicine chest, 'case, yuh see, he's somethin' o' a vetranary surgeon; and they seem to be pickin' up a bit a'ready."
An hour later the expected party was discovered heading for the ranch buildings, but not a solitary puncher went circling out to meet them. This fact must have given rise to considerable wonder on the part of the two stockmen, who knew the ways of cow punchers so well. Their astonishment was unbounded when they arrived at the stockade and saw the herds penned up.
First of all, they greeted the scouts warmly. As Harry was the representative of his father, whom the stockmen hoped to induce to join them in putting more money into their enterprise, so as to enlarge the scope of their business, it was only natural that he should be shown the utmost consideration, in order that a favorable report be taken back when he returned home.
But then Harry was the nephew of both stockmen, so to speak, and they would have welcomed him warmly for that fact alone.
When they heard all that had happened and how the lucky finding of the dead homing pigeon with its telltale message had betrayed the plans of the conspirators, they could hardly express their feelings toward the scouts.
Of course there followed the hasty moonlight ride out on the range, the round-up of the cattle that was not ordered, the fight with the rustlers, and last, but not least, the clever way in which Ally Sloper had made his escape so as to avoid facing his late employers.
It was soon decided to keep the herds confined until the following morning, when they would be driven forth once more to their several grazing grounds. They must be guarded day and night for the time being, and orders were given to all hands to shoot straight in case another raid were attempted.
Colonel Haines was very angry over the way things were going. He feared that if those reckless rustlers were allowed to hold forth in the strip of land bordering the Colorado, they would continue to take toll from the herds of the Double Cross Ranch, and that this might in some way serve to make Harry carry an unfavorable report back to his rich father.
And so the stockmen put their heads together and decided that the time had come to make a determined effort to rid the country of the lawless cattle thieves. In the morning they would send a messenger to the nearest town with a note to the sheriff, demanding that he come straightway out with an armed posse and begin a systematic search for the hiding place of the gang. It must be war to the knife after this between the cow-punchers and the rustlers, who must be made to realize that it would be too hot for them in that "neck of the woods."
In the morning everyone was up before sunrise, for there was plenty to be attended to on this day. The four scouts determined to ride out in a bunch with Chunky and see the prize herd taken back to the vicinity of Washout Coulie. Then they could employ the balance of the day to suit themselves, perhaps in looking for game that was to be found in the hills near by.
The ponies had all recovered from their sickness. Whatever it had been that the treacherous puncher had dosed them with, either the effect had worn off or else the horse medicine which Mrs. Haines had taken from her husband's chest must have counteracted the drug. No one was more pleased to learn this fact than Harry, who had a very tender heart and disliked to see even animals suffer.
Jimmy enjoyed that morning ride greatly. He soon caught the spirit of the range, and mounted on the back of his calico pony he drove this way and that, shouting louder than any seasoned puncher, slapping his quirt and doing bravely in assisting to keep the cattle bunched on the drive.
Everything seemed to be quiet around the coulie that had been the scene of their spirited engagement with the rustler gang some thirty hours and more previously.
After the severe lesson that had been taught the thieving pack, it was firmly believed they would remain in hiding for some time now, waiting for the excitement to blow over and the punchers to get careless again.
At the same time, when the scouts started to leave the coulie, bent on skirmishing around to see if they could scare up anything worth while in the shape of game, Chunky thought it his duty to warn them to keep their eyes about them all the while.
"They're a slick article, boys," he remarked, seriously, for he had already come to like the chums exceedingly, while the feeling of interest was just as warm on their part; "and since they know by now from Ally that 'twas you as spoiled their plans, they might have it in for you. If so be you run up against any strange punchers, don't have anything to do with the same. They might be rustlers, 'case you know all these here cattle thieves has been on ranches, some time 'r other, and got fired because they didn't play fair. Keep your eyes peeled all the time."
"That's what all scouts mean to do, Chunky," advised Jimmy, promptly. "Their motto is 'be prepared,' even if they don't always live up to the same. But we'll try to keep our eyes on the watch for signs of trouble. See you later, boys! So-long!"
Jimmy was rapidly picking up range ways. All he needed to make him a regular puncher, he imagined, was a cowboy suit with sheepskin chaps and a real range hat, to take the place of the campaign headgear that as a scout he always wore.
Already the calico pony was showing signs of being conquered. Jimmy had a masterful way about him, being a bit reckless, and the animal, no doubt, began to understand that, as his new rider seemed bent on keeping up the fight to the bitter end, it might be the best policy to seem to yield. But Ned, still having in mind the white eyes that struck him as treacherous, warned Jimmy not to trust his mount too far.
They rode for miles along the foot of the hills. Ned never failed to keep track of the distance and the points of the compass. When they considered that it was time to head toward home they could depend on the scout master to tell them just where the ranch buildings lay, and about how much distance separated them from home.
Up to that time they had not come across any signs of game, a fact that caused Jimmy to express himself as very much disappointed; for their lunch had been a scanty one, according to his mind, and he indulged in high hopes that if they could only knock over an antelope or a deer while the rest were resting, he could start a cooking fire and fix up a little snack to allow him to hold out until suppertime arrived.
Ned, who had been closely observing their surroundings for some little time now, gave it as his opinion that they might find something in the shape of quarry if they left the plain and turned into the scrub that covered the slope of the hills.
"It looks like our last chance for to-day, boys," he announced, "and because our chum, Jimmy here, has set his heart so much on taking home some game, we might make one more try. If nothing shows up in half an hour we'll call the hunt off for to-day and come again some other time. Are you all agreeable?"
There was no dissenting voice.
Half an hour may have seemed like a very short time to Jimmy, who disliked to give anything up on which he had set his heart; but he realized that Ned was always a better judge of things than he could ever hope to be. Besides, their ponies had begun to exhibit slight signs of weariness, not having fully recovered from the effects of the weed they had eaten, and which had made them sick. As the ranch buildings were a good many miles away, they must not force the ponies too hard if they hoped to be home by sunset.
This was only the first of many trips the scouts had planned to cover during their stay at the cattle ranch. They meant to exhaust the resources of the country for good times, and Jack was figuring on adding largely to his collection of wild animals' pictures while there. He had interested Jimmy in the matter, so that he could count on company and assistance in his excursions by day and night in search of fitting subjects.
They turned their ponies at the brush and started to comb it, being constantly on the watch for signs of a leaping deer aroused from a noonday nap in the shade.
The going was inclined to be rough, so that they had to be careful not to let their mounts trip and throw them.
Ned knew that what little air there was stirring came in their faces, which was a favorable sign; but it is doubtful whether any of the others noticed this fact, as they were not in the same class as the scout master when it came to understanding the elements that go to make a successful stalk.
Still no game obliged them by jumping out of some shady covert, which Jimmy considered mighty mean, when his stomach was fairly clamoring for food. When the nature of their surroundings showed a considerable change, and instead of mere brush and a scraggy growth of trees they found rocks surrounding them, with miniature canyons opening up all around, Ned began to think they had gone far enough.
He yielded, however, to Jimmy's pleading when the latter suggested that they fasten the ponies in a thicket and advance a short distance on foot.
"It looks good to me up yonder," Jimmy was saying feverishly. "I'm most sure now I glimpsed somethin' movin', which might have been a browsin' Rocky Mountain big horn sheep, if they have such down here; or, again p'raps, it was a grizzly bear, or a four-legged venison feedin'. Let's take a turn up there and if we don't raise a solitary thing, why, I'll give in and go back home empty-handed, feelin' like a dog with his tail between his legs."
Ned certainly would not think of letting Jimmy make that little excursion alone, nor did he feel like allowing only one other to accompany the would-be mighty hunter. Chunky had warned them particularly against getting scattered while exploring the country roundabout.
"Where one goes all must follow!" he said, positively.
"Bully for you, Ned," Jimmy declared joyously. "The more the merrier they say; and Jack and me'll be glad to have the whole bunch along."
"How about the ponies, Ned; do you think it is safe to leave them here?" Harry wanted to know, a little anxious about the safety of their mounts; because a twelve-mile hike did not appeal to him just then.
"I don't think anything or anybody would be apt to bother them," Jack remarked, although no one had asked his opinion on the subject.
"Sure they won't," asserted the eager Jimmy, making his jaws work as though in imagination he were already enjoying a tender venison steak alongside of a splendid camp fire.
"We'll have to risk a little," Ned admitted, as he dismounted, and once more looked to see that his rifle was in condition for immediate use.
They found places where the ponies could be tied, and the animals evidently did not object to the rest in the least, if their actions were any judge.
"'Tis meself that's thinkin' the dope Ally Sloper gave Spot here, as I've renamed Satan, must have taken the heart out of the critter, because he's been as gentle as you please all day," Jimmy remarked, as he patted the calico pony; but Ned only shook his head without making any reply, for he had seen the ears flattened and noted the half-inclination on the part of the pony to bite at the hand that was caressing its wet neck and withers.
Presently they started up the canyon toward the spot where Jimmy still declared he believed he had seen an object move, which must be game of some sort. All conversation having been positively tabooed by Ned, Jimmy could only take it out in sundry grins and vigorous nods of his head as they proceeded.
Everybody was tuned up to a tense state of excitement as they reached the bend of the rock wall and then carefully crept around the same. Unless Jimmy had made a mistake, or was willfully deceiving them, they must speedily discover the animal he claimed to have sighted. All sorts of speculations were doubtless rife in their minds concerning its nature; one hoped it would prove to be a deer; another may have had a monster grizzly in view while caressing his repeating rifle; while Jack, who carried his little camera along with him, would have been highly pleased could he have snapped off a big-horn sheep in the act of leaping from crag to crag somewhere up there along the high canyon walls.
Nothing loomed up, though Ned went further than his prudence dictated, in order to satisfy Jimmy. The latter's face had fallen forty-five degrees, and he was shaking his head gloomily as he stared around, looking in vain for favorable signs.
Ned was even about to open his mouth and give the order that would take the little party back to where they had left their mounts tied, when he heard something like a stone falling back of him.
Remembering that the canyon had narrowed there, like the neck of a bottle, Ned turned suddenly on his heels. If he expected to discover any sort of wild game slinking off, he was greatly in error. What he did see caused a spasm of alarm to dart through the scout master's brave heart.
Up on a shelf of rock, just over the narrow part of the defile, several figures of men could be seen. They looked like ordinary cowboys, but when Ned recognized Ally Sloper and Coyote Smith, yes, and Lefty Louie as well among them, he understood that instead they were a part of the rustler gang that he and his chums had been instrumental in cheating out of their intended prey!
CHAPTER XIX.
AT BAY IN THE CANYON.
"Dodge back!" suddenly snapped Ned, as he seized hold of Jimmy and half-pulled him along; while Harry and Jack, although they did not understand what it was all about, made haste to tumble pellmell in the direction the scout master was dragging the fourth chum.
A gun cracked and chips of stone flew up very close to their feet. This was quite enough to tell the others what sort of danger menaced them. It doubtless acted as a spur to hasten their departure from the open, for in another moment they were to be seen huddled under a shelf of rock, each fellow eagerly handling his rifle as though ready to give a good account of himself.
"Was it just one man made us skip out like all that?" Jimmy wanted to know, for he was proud, and the thought would have come back to him many times later on, to cause heartburnings and keen regrets.
"No, there was a bunch of them there," Ned informed them. "I recognized Ally Sloper, Coyote Smith and Lefty Louie. There was another big man along, a regular giant, with a bushy head of hair and the look of a terror!"
"Wow! I wonder now if that wasn't Amos's awful dad?" Jimmy exclaimed.
"But what are we going to do about it, Ned?" Harry wanted to know. "Here we are, caught in a little rat-trap, seems like. If we start to run out of this canyon, how do we know what they'll do? They've shot once already and, perhaps, stand ready to give us a volley. This is a bad job, seems to me. See what your everlasting teasing of Ned gets us into, Jimmy."
"Well, we ain't all dead yet, are we?" the other naively wanted to know, "and our guns ought to shoot just as straight as the ones they handle, which I reckon now are only the kind punchers carry, and no good at a distance. Chirk up, Harry, and listen to what Ned's goin' to say."
Instead of speaking Ned crept cautiously forward a little ways, and when he returned again, reported that so far as he could see the men on the ledge had disappeared.
"But that's not saying they're gone, is it?" asked Jack.
"I'm afraid not," replied the scout master. "You see, they command the passage from up there on that ledge. If we try and go out, they can drop rocks down and give us a volley from their guns, while we wouldn't be able to sight them."
"Two might stay here and keep the ledge covered while the others went out," suggested Harry, "and play the game that way. With our rifles we'd make things so warm for the bunch they'd hardly dare show themselves. And after the first two got out, why, they could hold the fort for the others. How's that, Ned?"
"Not bad," replied the one addressed, "only I'm afraid there may be others near by. I heard some one shout just then, which I take it must be a signal. There goes another yell from across the canyon."
"By jinks! I believe we're surrounded!" ejaculated Jimmy, and strange as it might seem, there was something not unlike a vein of gratification in his voice, as though the boy really felt pleased to know they were in for another spell of action.
"We're going to have a fight, that's certain!" announced Jack, handling his weapon with nervous fingers, in sharp contrast to Ned's steady ways.
"Well, this ought to make a pretty fair sort of a fort, I should think," Harry remarked, as he indicated the slanting rock under which they had crawled, and which sheltered them fairly well from any peril that might be hovering above.
"But if they once get up above us in the canyon, and below as well, they could pour in what is called an enfilading fire, and make it mighty unpleasant under our rock mushroom fort," Jack explained.
"Which will be apt to happen, sooner or later, if they mean to give us trouble," assented Ned.
"Then we'd better get a hustle on and see if we c'n side-step any," Jimmy was heard to remark.
"Keep watching, up and down, and shoot at any moving thing you glimpse," Ned told them, as he started to creep further under the shelf.
"Where are you going, Ned?" Harry asked, filled with curiosity.
"To see what chance there is of our finding a safer refuge than this," replied the scout master. "Somehow, I seem to have a notion that there's a sort of crevice in the canyon wall close by. If it turns out that way and it's big enough for us to crawl in, why, we'll be better fixed to stand that crowd off."
"Good luck to you!" Jimmy called after him.
"Don't watch what I'm doing, but keep guard in front!" were the last words Ned sent back over his shoulder.
A minute later and Jack announced that he believed there was some one moving up amidst some scraggy bushes growing in a spot where earth had fallen down into the rocky cut.
"I've got half a mind to send a shot up there and rout him out," he declared.
"Cut her loose then," Jimmy told him.
"If it doesn't do anything else," Harry observed, "you'll publish plain warning of our intention to fight back and give as good as we take. When they hear the crack of a rifle, perhaps, they'll make up their minds they don't want to bother us as much as they thought they did in the start."
So Jack pressed the trigger of his weapon, which promptly went off with a roar, owing to the fact that at the time he was crouching in a confined space under the shelf of rock.
"Look at that, would you?" cried Jimmy.
A man had jumped into momentary view, in the midst of the leafless bushes, and making a wild spring, vanished back of a neighboring spur of rock.
"He thought it was too hot out in the open," said Harry. "I wonder if you winged him with that shot, Jack?"
"I'd like to believe I did," came the answer, as Jack worked the mechanism of his rifle, so as to send out the useless brass shell, and shoot another cartridge from the magazine into the firing chamber; "but from the way he jumped, in didn't look much like he'd been struck. Don't forget to watch the other side, too. If they get started coming in on us, we'd be in a peck of trouble."
He had hardly spoken when a gun sounded, and they heard the splash of the bullet mushrooming against the stone close by.
"Wow! that's getting pretty close, let me tell you!" cried Jimmy, stooping to pick up the rough-edged, flattened circle of lead, and then immediately dropping it with a cry: "Say, that's as hot as anything! It burned my fingers to beat the band. And there goes another shot down the canyon. They're meanin' business this time, boys! If one of us gets in line with a bullet, his name will be Dennis."
In the temporary absence of the scout master Jack thought that the duty of looking after their safety devolved on him.
"Here, creep back more, everybody!" he ordered, "and snuggled down the best you can behind any stones you find. Make yourself as small as anything, while that lead's singing around here."
"Wish I could find a chance to bang away back at the nervy crowd," grumbled Jimmy, as he sprawled out like a huge frog and listened to several shots from as many different quarters. "What's sauce for the goose ought to be sauce for the gander, too. It's a poor rule, I always heard, that don't work both ways."
Try as hard as he would, however, Jimmy seemed unable to find a chance to discharge his gun with anything like a prospect of results. The bullets continued to flit around them, making all sorts of queer and blood chilling noises. There were several narrow escapes, too; and once Harry actually felt a tug at his arm that, upon investigation, showed him a slit in the khaki material of which the sleeve of his coat was made, proving that a passing bullet had almost drawn blood.
Several minutes had passed since this bombardment commenced, and it showed no signs of slackening. If it continued much longer there was a chance that one of the scouts might stop a bullet, and the prospect did not seem very pleasant, to say the least.
While this was going on, and all hands were grumbling, because they found so little use for their trusty rifles, Jack heard some one gently calling his name.
"Hello! is that you, Ned?" he asked joyfully, for he felt sure that the return of the scout master would mean a new rift in the clouds.
"Yes, tell the other boys to back in here after you!" the other scout went on to say.
"Yes, it's here, but hurry and get started!" Ned continued, from the darker depths beyond.
Of course, when the others heard that there was an opportunity to creep out of the fire zone they lost no time in making a move. Jimmy was declaring at the same time that it certainly gave him a pain to be compelled to "take water" in that way, and without having inflicted any material damage that they knew of on the enemy.
"If we'd only knocked half a dozen of the skunks off their pins, it wouldn't be so bad," he lamented; "but I ain't had any chance. It ain't fair, that's what; and me just crazy to try my Marlin on that lot of mutts. But wait, that's all; my time's agoin' to come yet, and then, look out, that's what!"
When they had backed some ten feet or more they came to the wall of the canyon. Ned was waiting to show them where he had found a fissure into which he must undoubtedly have crawled some little ways, seeking to find out what sort of a haven of refuge it would turn out to be.
"I struck a match," he told his comrades, as they pushed into the split in the wall, "and as near as I could make out, there's a little cave right here. We'll take possession and hold the fort against a hundred enemies."
"Hurrah! that's right, we will!" shrilled the irrepressible Jimmy, always quick to seize upon any excuse for giving tongue.
Already they seemed to have passed beyond the reach of the flying bullets, although, of course, the ambitious rustlers did not know that and were still banging away right merrily.
"If only they'd keep that up until they'd fired away every scrap of their ammunition, wouldn't it be just fine," Harry suggested, "then we could go out and do a little holding-up on our own hook."
Ned lighted another match, so that all of them might see what manner of refuge had been found in this emergency. It turned out to be a fair-sized cavity, nothing unusual, but capable of answering their needs.
There was, of course, no way of blocking the entrance, but with four guns to stand guard there did not seem to be much reason to fear that the enemy could ever rush their fortress.
"But it makes me clear mad to think that while we're cooped up here, like rats in a trap, that crowd can hunt around for our ponies and get away with the lot," Jack complained.
At that Jimmy raised a row.
"And that'd be the last I'd see of my calico broncho, just when I was growing attached to him, too!" he bleated.
"But from what you told us," Jack remarked, bitingly, "there was a time when you had to throw your arms around his neck in order to become _attached_ to him. But never mind, Jimmy, the rustler that gets your Spot will be sorry for it, if I'm any judge of tricky horses. It may be the best thing that ever happened to you. Some times blessings come in disguise; and, if the pony's stolen, it may save you from getting a broken collarbone."
The shooting presently ceased. Whether the rustlers considered that they had accomplished the end they had in view and utterly demoralized the enemy; or, discovered the change of base on the part of the four scouts, no one was able to more than guess.
"Seems to me I can hear somebody talking close by," Jack remarked, when some time had passed without any renewal of the bombardment.
"Get ready to repel boarders, then!" urged Harry, "for they must have discovered where we've crawled. Do you think they'll try to carry the fort by assault, Ned?"
"I don't believe so, if they're the kind of men I take them to be," replied the scout master. "It would take more than a dozen desperate men to get in here past the hot fire we'd start playing on them, and I reckon there isn't that many in the bunch. No, if they do anything at all, look out for some trick."
"But they can't drop down on us, because there's only one entrance and we've got that covered," Jack asserted. "It's dark enough in here, but we could see if anybody came against that line of light, and pepper him in a jiffy. I don't see what way they could fool us, Ned."
"I hope I'm mistaken, that's all," the other returned, but his vigilance did not relax a particle, nor was he at all sanguine as to the rustlers going away and leaving them to make their escape as they pleased.
The minutes dragged along. Every little while Jimmy would declare that he caught those low voices again, or it might be a rustling sound that puzzled him. Some of the other scouts admitted that they heard something of the same sort, though unable to explain what it might mean.
These things kept them constantly on the alert. Their nerves were held up at a high tension all the while they crouched there, keeping continual watch and ward.
Jimmy had several times grumbled that it seemed like a shame, that four able-bodied scouts should be bottled up in this silly way, and begged Ned to think up a plan that would change the situation around, giving them a chance to play the aggressor.
He was about starting in for the third time to vent his disgust, when the others heard him begin to sniff.
"What's the matter, Jimmy; think you smell dinner cooking?" jeered Jack.
"No, I don't, more's the pity; but I did get a whiff of the most disagreeable smoke that ever was, or could be. There she comes again, with the breeze sendin' the same right into this little snuggery, hot-footed. Oh! my, don't that take the cake, though? Whatever can they be burnin' and how does it happen to get in here?"
"It's the trick I told you they'd be playing on us, Jimmy," said Ned, seriously. "That's what they call the stink weed, and the smoke'll drive us out of here yet."
CHAPTER XX.
SMOKED OUT.
What Ned had said appalled them all. The situation had seemed peculiar and distressing before, because they could not see far enough ahead to even guess how it might turn out; it became positively terrifying now.
They had heard some of the punchers speak about the powerful agency of the weed mentioned by the scout master. One man had told how it was often used to force wolves from their rocky dens. When set to smouldering, it produced a smoke that was quite irresistible, and which overpowered man or beast.
"Why can't we find a way to keep it out of the cave?" Jack presently demanded, when they found themselves rubbing their eyes, in spite of themselves, and beginning to feel half choked in the bargain.
"The opening is too wide to think of closing it, more's the pity," Harry answered, with deep regret in his voice.
"And even then we couldn't keep the smoke out," Ned told them; "because we'd have to get air, and where that can enter the smoke could too."
"This is sure the worst deal I ever struck!" gasped Jimmy. "It takes your breath away like fun, and makes you think your eyes are bored in your head. They call it by the right name, I tell you, for it certainly does smell rank. Whew! somebody fan me, or I'll go under."
Nobody took the trouble to oblige Jimmy. The fact was they all felt it just as badly as the freckled-faced scout; and each fellow was trying the best he knew how to get temporary relief.
"How's it going to end, Ned?" asked Jack, and his voice sounded very queer, for he was talking between his teeth, not wishing to open his mouth wider than he could possibly help.
"One of two ways," returned the scout master, gloomily.
"You mean we'll just have to hoist the white rag and give up?" continued Jack, in deep disgust.
"Either that or be overcome here; and nobody wants to let that happen, because some of us might suffocate. Anything would be better than that, it strikes me," was what the leader told Jack.
"What if we rushed out and started to fight our way through?" suggested Harry, who had been listening to what his comrades said; and the surprise of it all was that he, the peace-loving member of the little band, should so suddenly display such ferocity; but then it could be laid to the terrible fumes that were driving them all nearly distracted.
Ned shook his head, though, of course, none of them saw this, for it was next door to dark under the protecting ledge, and particularly in the little cave that Nature had scooped out of the solid rock.
"It would be useless," he told them.
"Yes, I reckon they're all ready to meet us with a hot fire and some of us would go under," Harry admitted, sadly. "But we can't stand this much longer, Ned. Oh! if only there was another opening to the cave, how fine it would be to slip out and leave them doing their grand smoking act."
"But there isn't, I'm sorry to say," admitted Ned. "I took the trouble to explore it through and through, and there's not the first chance to find another crack."
"Have you any plan, Ned?" pleaded Jimmy, who was choking at a terrible rate and seemed half-blinded already.
"Only a half-way idea," replied Ned. "Here it is for what it's worth. Three of us will surrender, by walking out and shouting that we give in. Jack must manage to hide somewhere in here and stand for it a little while longer. There's just the smallest chance going that they'll skip him; and, if it happens, he can hang around and help us out later."
"I'm afraid it won't work, Ned; because they must have seen that there were just four in our bunch, all told; and they'll never be happy till they root me out," was the opinion Jack expressed.
"All the same it may be worth trying," Ned declared; "and even if you're found out we can be no worse off than if we all gave up. This is a case that needs quick action."
"Then just as you say, Ned, we'll try it," Jack agreed. "I'll see if I can stand this rank smell a little while longer. Perhaps it may seem so bad that none of the rustlers'll care to crawl in and look around. You can kind of give them to understand that one of your crowd has keeled over earlier in the fight. There's just a little hope it may pan out. Now, for goodness' sake get a move on as soon as you can. I'll find a place behind some loose stones to lie down and play dead. Hope when the time comes for me to crawl out I won't be too weak to move."
Each of the other scouts squeezed Jack's hand. He was a prime favorite in the troop, and they disliked leaving him behind more than they could tell; but there seemed little choice and Jack was always so willing to sacrifice himself for the good of others.
Ned took the lead.
"Keep close behind me," he told Harry and Jimmy, as they started to crawl over to where they knew the exit must be; for the smoke was now getting so dense that even the faint light was shut out.
Reaching this place Ned shouted, though he found himself so hoarse that he hardly knew his own voice; and several times choked, as though he was close to the border of having a fit.
"Hello! hello out there! we want to surrender! We're choking, and can't stand it any longer. Don't fire on us, and we'll come out! Hello! hello!"
There came an answering hail, close at hand.
"All right, come along, but be sure and hold your hands up over yer heads, or you might get hurt! understand that, kids?"
"Yes we're nearly all in! Here we come!"
With that Ned led the way, and staggering weakly, the three scouts groped their passage through the haze of bitter smoke toward the faint gleam of daylight that they could begin to see through the pall.
While they were still engulfed in this mantle they felt their guns rudely jerked from their hands and fierce clutches taken upon their garments. But the relief was so great when they reached the blessed air in the canyon, almost free from the acrid fumes of that terrible stink weed, that for the moment they could think of nothing else.
Each of them stood there, blinking, and rubbing their smarting eyes. Rude laughter jarred on their nerves, and they began to observe that a circle of lawless punchers stood around, apparently quite amused at the sight of their agony.
"Seems ter me thar was four o' the tenderfeet kids; how 'bout that, Ally?" one of the rustlers observed in a voice that sounded like the grumble of thunder.
Ned managed to look at the speaker, and he just seemed to know without being told that this giant must be the "awful dad" of the lad Amos, whom they had helped out of the quicksand. He was indeed a striking figure, and must inspire terror in almost any man who happened to run counter to his will. When Hy Adams growled his dislike for anything, plans were apt to be hastily changed, and in a fashion calculated to suit his whim.
There was another alongside who caught Ned's especial attention, too. He had only to take note of the fact that this tall party bore a scar on his left cheek to feel confident that this must be the rustler chief, Clem Parsons, who had played fast and loose with the United States Government, so that his apprehension by the Secret Service officers was apt to put quite a feather in the cap of the one fortunate enough to cause his arrest.
"There was four of 'em," Ally Sloper observed, as he pushed forward at this juncture and faced the prisoners; and raising his voice he turned to Ned and added: "Where'd that other feller skip out to? Was he knocked over by our fire? We know that he never got away, we had the canyon blocked with a cork in the neck of the bottle."
"We've lost him, somehow," Ned replied, brokenly, as though deeply grieved by the fact; "and we hope you'll look around and find our chum, who may be bleeding to death somewhere in the canyon behind a rock."
His eagerness to have them search seemed to allay any suspicion that may have started to arise.
"Oh! we'll give a sort of look when we're getting out of this hole," the man Ned took to be Clem Parsons observed carelessly; "but it's too unpleasant around these diggings right now to stay any longer than we have to. Later on, if we happen to think of it, we may come back and look him up. Get a move on now, boys, and we'll strike for the upper camp."
Those who had hold of the three prisoners urged them forward, and it was evident that they meant to leave the vicinity of the recent fight. When Ned was sure of this he allowed himself to have a most violent fit of coughing, and managed to mix in several significant signals that were not unlike the howl of the wolf in the stillness of a night on the open plain.
This he knew must be heard by the suffering scout inside the cave. It would tell Jack they were going, and that he could immediately make a start looking toward relief from the overpowering fumes.
Ned would have been better satisfied could he have received a return sign from the devoted chum, to assure him all was well; but of course that was utterly out of the question. He could only hope that dear old Jack would not by this time have become so weak from his sufferings as to be unable to make his crawl out to the pure air, and then follow after them.
The three scouts looked quite dejected at first. They were so accustomed to having things come their way that this thing of being made prisoners galled them. Jimmy in particular bewailed the circumstances attending their capture. He seemed to think that it was next door to a disgrace because they had not been able to put up a desperate resistance, and at least disable several of the foe before yielding to superior force.
"'Tis a shame, that's what it is," he kept on muttering, grimly, "to have to put up your hands like we did without knockin' the stuffin' out of a few of the enemy. I'll never be able to look myself in the face again, sure I won't."
"Oh! yes you will, Jimmy," Harry assured him; "I expect to live to see the time when you sit beside a fire, gobbling your rasher of bacon and fried potatoes, and telling the story of this adventure to some of the other boys in the troop."
"Now, that's adding insult to injury!" declared Jimmy, sadly; "when you go and make my mouth water tellin' about breakfast stuff. Chances are they'll try to starve us while they hold the lot for ransom."
Ned gave him a punch in the side when he said this.
"Let up on that kind of talk, Jimmy," he whispered sternly; "don't put the notion in their heads. If they once knew who Harry was, and what he came out here to do, they'd think up some scheme to get even with Colonel Job. Even Ally Sloper didn't hear what our mission was, and thinks we're just on the plains to have a good time. And keep up your spirits. Leave it to Jack; he's our best hope just now."
They were walking by themselves at the time, the rustlers forming a sort of cordon around them though separated by a dozen or two feet; and hence the scouts found an opportunity to exchange a few remarks in whispers without being overheard.
After that Harry and Jimmy did pluck up a little more hope. So long as Jack was free to move around they might expect assistance, though none of them could give more than a vague guess what shape it might take. Jack was to decide upon his own course. He might think it best to follow them up, and then, after seeing where the cattle thieves had their secret camp, make his way back to where the ponies had been left, mount, and head for the ranch at top speed in order to bring a rescue party to their relief.
How they hugged that hope to their hearts as they climbed upward after those of their captors who were in the van. Ned was wideawake all the while. He believed that Jack must surely follow them, and in order to make his task as easy as possible the scout master was trying in every way he knew how to leave plain indications of their having passed along this way.
All this had to be done in a fashion calculated not to attract the attention of the rustlers. If they realized that he was purposely turning over stones every now and then by pretending to stumble, they would know what this implied; consequently the rustlers would lay a trap for the comrade who was expected to follow; and hence Jack, when coming creeping along the trail, might walk into an ambush, so that he too be taken prisoner.
An hour passed, and all of the scouts were becoming very weary of climbing, much against their will, when indications ahead told them they must be getting close to the rustlers' camp.
It was hidden in the most isolated part of the mountain range, and where there did not seem to be one chance in ten that any cow puncher would ever stray in search of lost steers. Faint wreaths of smoke first told the sharp-eyed Ned that the camp was near by; then he heard a dog bark, and a horse neigh, as well as sounds very similar to the rattle of steers' horns when being driven from one pasturage to another.
Ten minutes later and they were walking into the camp. They boys observed everything closely, for they never expected to again find themselves in the midst of a gang of reckless rustlers, and it was their policy to "make hay while the sun shone."
Strange to say they had not been searched up to now for any valuables, though the man who was leader of the rustlers had looked to make sure they were not armed with any weapons besides their rifles and hunting knives, both of which had been taken away from them.
Harry wished now he had thought to ask Jack to lend him his little camera, for the spectacle of that camp was one they must often wish to remember in future days. Still, as those who dwelt in the heart of the mountains were mostly fugitives from justice, it was hardly likely they would permit any one to snap off a picture that must prove of value to the officers who were often looking for them far and wide.
The afternoon was pretty well done by now. Had their original plans been carried out the boys would have been entering camp by this time. Instead they found themselves in one of the most distressing situations in their career; prisoners among the lawless rustlers, who must know that much of their recent defeat was due to the coming of these Boy Scouts to the cattle ranch bordering the Colorado country.
CHAPTER XXI.
IN THE HANDS OF THE RUSTLERS.
As the night came on the spirits of the three scouts seemed to sink considerably. Somehow the passing of the sun and coming of darkness before the rising of the moon brought with it a new sense of being at the mercy of these rough men, who snapped their fingers at the law, and did about as they pleased.
Ned at first wondered why they had been brought here to the camp, the location of which had long been a mystery to outsiders. He even feared that circumstance meant something terrible to himself and two chums, because now that they held the secret of the hide-out of the rustlers, it did not seem likely they would be allowed to depart, even if they swore never to betray the fugitives from justice.
Then he noticed certain signs, being a most observant lad, as we already know, that told him another story. The rustlers for some reason or other were getting ready to make a change of base. Perhaps they believed that the vicinity of the Double Cross Ranch was likely to become too warm for them after what had happened, for Ally Sloper must have brought considerable news when he joined the gang.
The boys were allowed to sit together on a blanket. They had been tersely warned by the hoarse-voiced giant that if they so much as tried to escape they were sure to be shot down like coyotes; and there was that in his ferocious manner that made Harry shiver with apprehension; while Jimmy was seen to clench his fists and grit his teeth, as though his fighting blood had been aroused.
Ned had to smile, though, when he looked at the fearful difference between the two; one a giant and the other not far from being a dwarf. It reminded him of a little bantam defying a great barnyard rooster, or of David, armed only with his puny sling, facing Goliath, the mighty man of the Philistines.
Fortunately Jimmy had sense enough not to open his mouth, thanks to the shove Ned gave him with his elbow. Had he dared say anything bold and saucy to the big bully, the chances were he would have rued the day, for Hy Adams could have easily seized him by the nape of the neck and swung him around his head six or seven times, just for a lark.
"I wonder now do we get any?" Jimmy was saying, rather plaintively, as he sniffed the odors of supper cooking.
Jimmy could have stood for almost anything save starvation, or being deprived of his regular feed. If he had known that he had to run the gauntlet in the morning, or be toasted at the stake, the chances were that he would have let out a howl to the effect that he hoped they would at least fill him up with something to eat before making him lie down for the night.
"I wonder where he can be right now?" Harry was whispering, as he managed to cast his eyes around the bordering rocks, without doing it in such an open manner as to invite suspicion, in case any of the rustlers were watching them.
"Of course you mean dear old Jack," the scout master went on to say; "and I'm hoping he's at the ranch by this time, telling his story to the Colonel."
"I can shut my eyes and see the riot there'd be in that case," mused Harry, with a sigh; "every puncher would be wanting to join the rescue bunch, and the herds might go hang for one night. But Ned, perhaps he followed us up here?"
"Yes, that might be so," admitted the other scout.
"Meaning to try and get us loose all by himself," added Harry, huskily, as if the very thought of such a thing caused him to tremble with eagerness.
"It would be a great feat if Jack could manage it," admitted Ned, longingly, "and I've got a lot of faith in our chum; but somehow I hope he's chosen to make for the ranch and get the boys started this way."
"Queer they didn't bother doing much hunting for Jack, did they?" pursued Harry.
"Oh! you heard what the leader said, that it was too smoky and unpleasant down in the canyon, and that they'd come back in the morning to look him up. Little do they care whether he's living or dead. They're a heartless bunch; and I'd like to see them caught in a net. You can see they've got some of their women folks along, and that this is like a regular border village. There's a pack of dogs, and over in that cabin I've counted as many as four children--all with hair that looks like it had never known a comb and clothes that would shame an Indian squaw. But the men are a tough lot, and all they seem to care for is playing cards, drinking, smoking and stealing cattle."
The night had settled down by now. It was dark at first, because the moon would not rise until a little later, being now past its full.
Greatly to the relief of Jimmy one of the women brought them over some supper, such as it was. They were hungry enough to forget its shortcomings, though Jimmy did complain a little that they saw the bottom of the kettle too soon to suit him, and that he just knew he'd wake up feeling starved long before dawn. But then Ned and Harry were so used to hearing their comrade let out this sort of a wail that they let it pass by, without extending him any sympathy.
"Now for a night of it!" Harry said, later on, after they had been sitting there, watching the strange scene until they began to feel sleepy.
"But how are we goin' to sleep without our blankets?" Jimmy wanted to know.
"We might ask for some," Ned told him, "but honest now, I'd feel a little queer about snuggling down in some of the coverings I've noticed around here."
"Same with me," added Harry, shuddering, "because I'm silly enough to be a little particular about the blanket I get my face down in. If they'd only let us crawl in out of the night air, that tumbledown cabin close by would suit the bill. Suppose you beckon to that leader fellow and ask him, Ned?"
So when Ned managed to catch the eye of the party he believed to be the much wanted Clem Parsons, he invited him to come over to where they sat, which the man did, though with a frown on his scarred face and an ugly look in his eye that the boys did not like any too well.
"It gets pretty cool toward morning and as we haven't any blankets, would you mind if we crawled inside that deserted cabin there to sleep?" Ned asked.
"So you can get your heads together and try to skip out, is that what you're after?" the rustler demanded, harshly. "Well, this place is as good as anything you'll get, so make the most of it. Tomorrow we're meaning to fix you up, so as to let old Colonel Job know what we think of him. Perhaps he'll have a special cage built to keep his prize fowls in when you get back to Double Cross Ranch. We owe him a long bill, and think we see a chance to pay it before we quit this region for our new location down in Arizona. Now shut up and don't give us any bother, or I'll let Hy Adams loose on you. He wanted to have a quirt jubilee right away, with you boys tied to stakes, and every puncher being allowed three cuts at your bare shoulders. But I said, 'Wait till morning for the fun.'"
With that he turned on his heel and left them, Jimmy with wide-open mouth and trembling with indignation.
"D'ye think now he meant that, or was he playin' hocus-pocus with us boys?" was what Jimmy asked, as soon as he could catch his breath.
"I'd like to believe it was in the nature of a joke," Ned told him, "and that he was only trying to make us feel bad during the rest of the night; but from all I've heard about Clem Parsons, he's a cold-blooded scamp, and I'm afraid he means to do something to us, Harry, that will make your Uncle Job furious. He said they meant to leave this part of the country, and on that account it's likely they'll go further than if they expected to stay around here right along."
"Gee! I'm sorry to hear that," Harry observed, and it could be seen that the boy must be considerably worked up, for Harry seldom used slang of any kind.
As for Jimmy, he ground those strong white teeth of his and muttered to himself in a fashion that told how excited he was.
"There he is talking with that big rustler now," Harry remarked, a minute later; "the one you think must be Hy Adams, and who hurried over to join the leader after he saw him leave us. See the giant swinging his arms, and hear him growl like thunder in the distance. Now, what d'ye think he can be asking of Clem Parsons, Ned? D'ye expect he wants to have that nice little practice whipping-bee right away, and not wait for morning to come?"
"I don't know, but something's bothering him--that's sure--for he keeps pointing this way and wagging that great big head of his, like he'd shake it off. Seems to me as though he's winning his point, too, because the other man isn't objecting as much as he did before."
"There, he shrugs his shoulders and turns away, just like he told him to do as he wanted and that as for him, he washed his hands of the whole business. Oh! what if they do start in to use those cruel quirts on our backs, Ned?"
Ned Nestor turned a little white himself at the very thought; but he clenched his teeth in that determined way of his and said, slowly:
"That would be pretty tough, boys, and I hope it doesn't strike us; but if it should, remember that we're scouts, and supposed to be able to stand pain, like the Indians were taught, without wincing or crying out."
All of them were watching Hy Adams with uneasy eyes. They seemed to know from the triumphant glare with which the terror of the hills observed them that he must have carried his point with the leader, and was now only figuring on how he had better proceed.
"Oh! if only I had my Marlin here right now, mebbe I wouldn't put him on the blink in a hurry, though?" Jimmy was sighing; "I'd hold up the camp and let you fellers find your own guns. Then we'd pick out the ones we wanted to keep, and tell the others to clear out. But that's all a dream, because here I am with only me two fists to back me up, and they wouldn't count against that hog!"
Hy Adams was now talking with several of the most dissipated looking of the men. Whatever he might be telling them it seemed to please the others immensely, for they laughed harshly; and one fellow immediately stepped over to take down his quirt from where it hung alongside the door of a shack.
"There, did you see that?" demanded Harry, "it means whips after all, Ned! Oh! to think of their cruel hearts. Just like we lived down in Delaware, where they have the whipping post going. Can we do anything to get them to let up on the game?"
"I'm sorry to say not," responded Ned. "Seems as if they'd got to the point where they must see the blood flow to satisfy their desire for revenge. We spoiled their little scheme for getting your uncle's best herd of prize cattle that he means for exhibition purposes and this Adams has it in for us on that account."
"Did you ever see such a terrible brute in your born days?" Harry asked, with a shiver of dread, for there were three punchers now who had laid hold of quirts and amused themselves, cracking the lashes at the ends of the whips as though desirous of inspiring additional fear in the hearts of the prisoners by making such suggestive sounds.
"Amos was right when he said his step-father was the biggest terror along the border," Ned admitted. "I've seen some bad men, but never one that struck you as the howling storm does, and that describes Hy Adams. I'm feeling sorry for Amos, who must get in the way of that ham of a fist every once in so often. And that little woman who calls Hy Adams her husband, just think of how she must suffer when he rages like a bull in a china shop?"
"Now he's heading this way, Ned," Harry said half inaudibly, for he was tremendously excited.
"Well, try your level best to show a brave front, Harry, no matter what happens. We've been in lots of tough places and, somehow, always seem to get out before the worst we've been expecting comes along. I'll try and talk him out of doing this cowardly thing. Sometimes I seem to be able to swing people around to my way of thinking, you know, Harry."
"Yes, that's so, Ned, you nearly always can; but you're up against it this time, I'm afraid. He's only a big brute, and chances are he'll strike you in the mouth if you try and talk him out of doing a thing he wants to carry out. We certainly are in the worst fix of our lives right now."
"Talk to me about the silver linin' of the cloud," burst out Jimmy, "I'd like to see what that means. Here we're in a black hole and the ladder's been took away. I'm feeling pretty punk myself; but c'n stand it if the rest of you do."
"They always say it's darkest just before dawn, Jimmy," advised Ned, seeking to buoy up the spirits of his two chums more than that he could himself see any reason for hope.
The giant, accompanied by a crowd of men and women, advanced toward the spot where the three scouts stood awaiting their coming, for the boys had scrambled to their feet, anxious to know the worst.
"Peel off!" roared the bulky leader, with some pretty strong additions to the order that no doubt he fancied were apt to strike terror to the hearts of the trio of khaki-clad boys who had fallen into their hands. "Strip them ere jackets oft in a hurry, 'case we's agwine tuh warm yuh up some. Fear'd ye'd git cold in the night, was yuh? We'll fix it so't you won't need tuh worry 'bout feelin' the chill o' the night air. Quick now, git bare down tuh the waist, er we'll hev tuh help ye strip!"
Ned did not say a word of protest. He realized then and there that such a thing would be on the same principle as waving a red flag in front of an enraged bull.
He looked at Harry and Jimmy and then began to unbutton his faded khaki coat, while the impatient giant started to snap his quirt viciously close to their ears, as though he could hardly wait until the time came to use it on their shrinking flesh.
They did not dare linger too long, and yet it was without any heart that the chums began to disrobe. Who could blame them for their hesitation and the beseeching looks they fastened on the red face of the big bully of the camp. But water falling on the rock would make as much impression as these looks seemed to do on Hy Adams.
They were down to the last garment when Harry uttered a little cry.
"Look, oh, look, Ned, who's coming into camp!" he whispered; but Jimmy must have also caught the words, for he immediately added:
"Sure, it's little Amos and his poor maw; mebbe they know the camp's agoin' to be busted up and they got orders from the boss to come here, so's to travel along with the rest. But shucks! Little Amos and his maw can't help us any. They just come in time to see the circus--that's all!"
And yet, strange as it might seem, a tiny glow of hope struggled up in Ned's heart; just as though the coming of those two helpless ones might be the straw that was meant to swing the balance again in their favor, he knew not how!
CHAPTER XXII.
THE REAL BOSS--CONCLUSION.
Ned saw Amos, who was leading a couple of burros loaded with stuff apparently from the cabin on the creek, stop and stare at them. Then he dropped the ropes by which he was leading the pack animals, and clutching his mother's dress pointed excitedly toward the spot where the drama was being conducted.
Just what he may have said Ned did not know, but to his astonishment both Amos and his "maw" started toward them, almost running in their eagerness to get there.
Some one among the rustlers must have seen them coming, for Ned discovered that broad smiles were spreading over the faces of the men nearest him, and he wondered why this should be.
He knew very soon.
Hy Adams was bustling around and roaring as was his wont, because he saw the boys ceasing their efforts to disrobe, as he had ordered.
"I done tole yuh what yuh'd git 'less yuh hurried, and take that!" he shouted at the top of his terrible voice, as he aimed a vicious cut at the nearest scout, who happened to be Jimmy.
The quirt struck him squarely across his shoulders, and as there was only a thin garment to protect the skin, Jimmy gave utterance to an involuntary yell, though there may have possibly been more of anger in the outcry than distress.
Then something unexpected happened. That stinging quirt was snatched from the uplifted hand of the bully, and, as he whirled to see who dared interfere with his pleasure, he seemed rooted to the spot to discover the blazing face of a wiry little woman thrust close up to his.
"What's all this mean, Hy Adams, you big hulking coward!" she shrilled in tones that could be heard all over the camp; "here you darin' to whip the brave boys that saved our Amos from bein' drawed down in a quicksand! I told 'em when they stopped in to see me that I'd do anything I could to pay 'em back, and seems like the time has come sooner'n we thought it would. Jest drap them whips--all of ye! There ain't agoin' to be any fun like that to-night, you hear me, Hy Adams? Tell the pack to clear out. Hurry up now, and do what I say, or I'll humble you afore the hull crowd!"
There never was such a complete change in a man as had come over the giant. In that apparently meek little woman he knew of old that he had his boss. Ned understood now plainly enough what Amos meant every time he mentioned his step-father as being such a bully that men jumped to do his bidding; and, on each occasion, wound up with a few mysterious words that, at the time, had piqued his, Ned's, curiosity very much.
Hy Adams glared at his wife for a full minute; but if anything her snapping eyes blazed with more fire than ever. Then he wilted, as a starched linen collar is likely to do on a hot summer day.
"Shore, it's all right, Belinda, if yuh sez so," he said weakly, "we was jest agivin' 'em a little skeer tuh pay up fur them havin' knocked us out o' a bully lot o' prize steers. But I sure reckons as how they been punished enough. Turn around, boys, and let it go till mornin', when we'll kerry out our plans."
"Not if they mean any harm acomin' to these boys, just put that in yer pipe and smoke it, Hy Adams," his wife told him, as she shook her fore finger under his nose; then she suddenly thrust her whole hand against his face, and continued: "Now, make yerself skeerce, 'cause I wants to talk with these boys. But I'll be awatchin' you, Hy Adams, don't forgit that. And I allers keep my word, you know."
Then Ned understood what Amos had meant when he said there were "high old times" at home every time this big step-father of his came around, and that his visits were getting less numerous.
After that the boys had it easier. Mrs. Adams even got out several blankets of her own from the bundles on the pack animals and loaned them to the scouts; but all of them wished she hadn't been so kind, for they felt that now they must of necessity make use of the coverings, and it hurt some.
By degrees the camp quieted down. Jimmy was long since fast asleep, but then Jimmy could get in that condition with only half a chance. Harry had remained wakeful quite a while, but Ned believed he, too, must have crossed over, for at times he was able to catch the regular breathing of his chum that seemed to tell of slumber and oblivion, so far as worries went.
Ned could not manage to forget himself. He turned from side to side and assumed all sorts of fresh attitudes, but his brain seemed too entirely active, for even when he closed his eyes he kept on thinking of everything under the sun.
So midnight came and went.
The small hours of the night had now arrived and, sure enough, a coolness began to spread about that made Ned draw that blanket up closer to his face, much as he disliked doing so.
Once, as he was turning to avoid some small object that felt like a root and bored into his ribs under the double blanket, he saw something moving over among the bushes. Looking a second time, Ned was sure it must be a handkerchief. Then it vanished and something else took its place, which he made out to be the face of a man.
Evidently the party must have been trying to catch his attention, for immediately he looked in that direction he saw the other make a warning gesture and then drop down again out of sight.
Ned was thrilled, for he understood from this significant sign that help must be at hand. Who the man was he could not positively say. It may have been Colonel Job; then again he rather fancied that it was Chunky, the lanky puncher, for whom all the scouts had conceived such a liking.
Lying there Ned waited to see what was going to happen.
He could hear the pawing of ponies that were secured near by. A dog bayed the moon, as his kind have a weakness for doing at a certain time of each month. Other sounds there were, too, such as might be expected in a camp like that of the roaming cattle thieves.
Then Ned began to notice movements here and there. He fancied that the camp was being surrounded, and how his heart thrilled with rapture at the thought. Unable to keep the secret to himself, he kicked Harry in the shins, and before that worthy could voice an indignant protest, Ned was whispering the inspiring truth in his ear.
In turn Harry told Jimmy, so that presently the three chums were lying there trying to catch fugitive glimpses of what was going on without exciting the suspicion of the cattle poachers.
Then there was a sudden loud cry of alarm. A woman, it turned out, had discovered the lurking shadowy figures in the bushes, when she awoke feeling feverish in the night, and started for the spring close by in order to quench her thirst.
After that it was like a volcano when the whole top blows out. There were loud shouts and yells and screams; there came the quick detonation of firearms and the shrieks of women and children.
The rustlers were taken quite by surprise, and besides a bunch of the Double Cross punchers the sheriff and his big posse was on hand, bent on wiping out the reproach that had so long existed in his territory, so that the camp was pretty well surrounded on every side.
In spite of all precautions, however, when the turmoil and excitement were at their height, some of the men managed to break away and escape, at least for the time being.
Neither Hy Adams nor the leader, Clem Parsons, were among these lucky ones. Ned himself had been quick to act. He had noticed so many things since coming to the rustlers' camp that he could put his finger on the spot where his rifle as also the weapons of his chums had been stowed. And his first act was to fling himself into that tent with all the eagerness of a hungry hawk.
He had met a man crawling out and collided with him in such a clever way that the fellow was knocked senseless, while the only damage Ned sustained was a lump on the side of his head, which later on yielded to treatment and witch hazel.
No sooner had he found his rifle than Ned was off, in hopes of running across the leader of the rustlers, Clem Parsons, the man who had one of the most checkered careers back of him known to Secret Service officials.
Once again luck was with Ned, for he came upon the tall man with the scar on his left cheek just as he was making headlong for the neighboring rocks. If he had once passed from the sight of those who were busily engaged capturing the camp, there was every reason to suspect that the foxy rascal would not be come up with in a hurry again.
"Halt! throw up your hand, Clem Parsons. I've got a warrant for your arrest. The Government wants you at Washington, and I've been asked to fetch or send you there. This rifle shoots true, and my finger is on the trigger, so go slow if you know what's good for you!"
The rascal saw that he was in a trap and that so long as that gun bore on him he would be next door to crazy to attempt any hostile move. So Ned called to Jack, whom he saw close by, to come and tie the hands of Clem Parsons behind his back until he could borrow a pair of steel handcuffs from the sheriff.
Hy Adams was also in limbo. He had fought like a tiger, for he was possessed of a spirit of ferocity that could stand up before anything but the will of his little meek-looking wife; but a glancing blow from a clubbed gun knocked him out, and the sheriff had him fastened up so all his enormous strength was of no avail by the time his wits came back to him again.
Some of the rustlers managed to escape, but the gang was broken up for good as both leaders had fallen into the grip of the law. To finish with Clem Parsons it might be said that the scouts found a chance to send him on to where he was wanted and that in due time he received a long sentence.
Hy Adams is still in a Nevada penitentiary, and will be considerably older if he lives to complete the sentence he received, as a stealer of cattle and horses. Amos and his mother removed to a town, where the boy could attend school. Colonel Job and his wife interested themselves in Mrs. Adams and saw that she was placed in a position where she could earn a good living doing sewing for the people of the neighboring ranches. Amos expects to soon take his place as a regular puncher on the pay roll of the Double Cross, for boy that he is he has proven to be as expert at rounding up and branding cattle as any veteran might be.
Of course, having carried out his mission, Ned could enjoy all that followed with a free heart. And Harry, too, soon came to the conclusion that it would be a very good and profitable investment; so that his accounts of what the ranch was capable of producing soon convinced his father, who had every faith in the boy's judgment. Of course, Colonel Job and Mr. Henshaw were delighted with the glowing prospect that opened out before them.
What glorious times Ned and his three scout chums did have during the period of their stay on the plains. They explored every nook within three days' journey, and even took a run over to the famous Colorado Canyon, where Harry was able to feast his eyes to his heart's content on the strange rock homes of those cliff dwellers, the Moqui Indians; and Jack took myriads of pictures of what they saw while in the gigantic cleft that is reckoned one of the seven wonders of the world.
The vacation was all too short, and in the joy of the present they could even, for the time being, forget the terrible suffering they had endured while making their way across country from Los Angeles, first by automobile and then with pack mules purchased from a prospecting party that was starting back home disgusted with the hard luck that had pursued them.
When the time came to say good-bye to the Double Cross Ranch and the punchers who had come to think so highly of the scouts, Ned and his three chums felt almost broken hearted. They would never forget all they had gone through with on this wonderful trip; and what with the copious notes taken on the way, while the stirring incidents were still fresh in their memories, and the abundance of fine pictures Jack carried back with him, it would seem as though less fortunate members of the troop might get a pretty good idea of what had happened to their four comrades.
Of course, Ned and his chums were bound to see other stirring adventures, and we only trust that it may be our privilege to write some of them up for the pleasure of those boys who delight to read of brave hearts and intrepid souls among the wearers of the khaki.
THE END.
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= = = PG48947 = = =
BOY SCOUTS ON THE TRAIL
Produced by Stephen Hutcheson, Rick Morris, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net. Thanks to the Nolan family for access to the printed source.
A hundred yards from shore he hazarded a backward glance, and saw the wind sweeping across the bay, a line of turbulent tossing spray. (Page 60) Frontispiece.
BOY SCOUTS ON THE TRAIL
BY JOHN GARTH
_PUBLISHED WITH THE APPROVAL OF THE BOY SCOUTS OF AMERICA_
PUBLISHERS BARSE & CO. NEW YORK, N. Y.    NEWARK, N. J.
Copyright, 1920 by BARSE & CO. _Printed in the United States of America_
CONTENTS
BOY SCOUTS ON THE TRAIL
CHAPTER I THE CAMP ON LONG POINT
Stout Harry Ritter gave a sudden chortle of glee and looked up from the copy of the “Long Point Snort” he was languidly perusing in the shade of some cedars behind Tent Four.
“Say, fellows, have you seen this stuff about Bull Taggart?” he demanded joyously.
“How could we when you hog the paper the minute it comes out?” inquired Ted Hinckley sarcastically. He had sent in a poem the day before and for ten minutes or so had been waiting with ill-concealed impatience to see whether it had found favor with the editors. “Well, what is it?” he went on impatiently. “Why don’t you get it off your chest? What kind of bull has he been throwing now?”
“He’s been chased by a shark,” chuckled Ritter fatly. “Monster fifteen feet long pursued his boat for over a mile out in the Sound. Tried to upset him by bumping its nose against the keel. This is rich! Four rows of teeth sharp as razors.... Gleaming white belly—stomach would have been more refined, seems to me. Remember Dolly Wade, who called ’em blue-_stomach_ crabs. Where was I? Um-um. Oh, yes. Monstrous dorsal fin cutting the water like a knife. Gee-whiz! Bull will kill me dead one of these days. I s’pose he’s training to be an author when he grows up. You can have it, Ted; I’m through.”
He tossed the sheet lazily to Hinckley and lounged indolently against the trunk of the cedar.
“Does he pretend he really saw it?” asked Steve Haddon, linking brown, muscular fingers about an equally brown knee; “or is it meant to be just—er—fiction?”
“Oh, he saw it, of course,” said Ritter with a giggle. “No fiction about that. Recognized it as a regular man-eater, too, by something or other about its expression, didn’t he, Ted?”
“Eh?” Hinckley started guiltily and hurriedly shifted his gloating eyes from the five-line verse which, even in crude mimeograph, thrilled him with the pride of authorship. “What’s that? Oh! Why, sure! It—its teeth, it was.”
“Showed ’em in a glistening smile, I s’pose,” chuckled Ritter. “I shouldn’t think any self-respecting shark would lick his chops over Bull Taggart. Even served up on toast, he wouldn’t make a good, respectable bite.”
There was a responsive chuckle from the half-dozen fellows lounging in the shade; then Haddon glanced questioningly at the tall, striking-looking chap whose handsome head lay pillowed on Billy McBride’s knee, while his well-knit body stretched out comfortably on the sand.
“There aren’t any—man-eating sharks as far north as this, are there, Cavvy?” he asked.
“Of course not. I should think you’d know better than that.” Jim Cavanaugh’s tone was positive and a little impatient. “They’re only found in the south. The sharks around here are nothing but big dogfish; I don’t believe Bull even saw one of those. He’s the most unmitigated— Well, Midget, what’s your trouble? Don’t you know any better than to come in without knocking?”
An exceedingly small boy with snapping blue eyes, a shock of sunburned hair and an amazing self-possession of manner, darted around the tent and paused in their midst, somewhat heated with his haste.
“Trouble?” he repeated, scowling. “There’s plenty of trouble, let me tell you. What do you know about their cutting us out of the Sound and making us swim in the _kid’s place_?”
“Wa—hat!” came in an incredulous chorus; and then: “Cut out the fancy touches, Midge. You’ll be as bad as Bull Taggart if you’re not careful.”
“Fancy touches!” snorted the infant with cold scorn. “That’s what you think, is it? Huh! Well, it’s up on the bulletin board in black and white. ‘Until further notice all swimming will be restricted to the north side of the point,’ and signed J. P. Wendell as big as life. That’s the kid’s place, ain’t it? And because why? It’s that nut Taggart shooting off a lot of bull about seeing a shark in the sound. He—makes—me—sick!”
If it was his purpose to stir up the group so comfortably taking their ease in the heat of early afternoon, Midge Willett was entirely successful. With one accord six boys sat up abruptly, their faces expressing varying degrees of surprise, incredulity and indignation. And for a space the air resounded with shrill question, heated comment and fragments of argument which satisfied even the small Willett’s inordinate fondness for attention.
“It’s true, all right,” he declared, spreading his feet apart and rocking back and forth on his heels. “The stuff’s all in the _Snort_; you must have seen it.”
“So we have, Shrimp,” admitted Cavanaugh. “We’ve also seen yarns of his before. You don’t mean to tell us that Mr. Wendell takes any stock in it?”
“That’s what Marshall says. He heard ’em talking in Headquarters tent. Bull sticks to it that it’s true. He says he really saw a shark and that it bumped into his boat.”
“What if it did?” demanded Cavanaugh, irritably; “though I don’t believe it for a minute. Why, the sharks up north here are as harmless as kittens. They’d no more tackle a man than—than one of those stupid blow-fish.”
“Well, the chief don’t seem to think so. Bob says he didn’t know whether to believe Bull or not, but he and Mr. Cartwright talked it over and decided to cut out swimming in the Sound till they find out something for sure. And then they stuck up that notice, and now we’ve got to go into that rotten hole where you can’t dive and it takes half an hour to wade out to any decent depth. I—I’d rather stay ashore.”
A concerted groan went up in which stout Harry Ritter joined heartily. Exertion of any sort was distasteful to him, and it made little difference whether he undertook his languid splashings in the shallows, or in the wider, more varied waters of the Sound. But he liked to criticize and seldom lost an opportunity.
As for the others there was some excuse for their annoyance. The scout camp was located at the base of Long Point, which thrust its sandy nose diagonally out into the Sound. Off the southern side lay the open water, wide, deep, and full of interest and variety. Here the older fellows and proficient swimmers had always gone, while the novices were limited to the wide, shallow cove on the other side into which the tide had swept such quantities of sand that for over a hundred feet from shore it was not more than waist deep.
“Midge is about right,” sniffed Hinckley, as the diminutive Willett departed to spread his news. “A lot of fun there’ll be wallowing around over there. Bull ought to have his head punched.”
“The big chump!” exclaimed Cavanaugh bitterly. “He’ll get his if I have anything to say about it.”
He stood up abruptly and shook off the sand. The khaki shorts and sleeveless gym shirt he wore showed off his fine figure and well-developed muscles to uncommon advantage. Even the scowl failed to detract noticeably from his good looks, which were remarkable—the good looks of clean-cut features, clear skin, glowing red under the tan, blue eyes set wide apart, and wavy blond hair.
Haddon watched him for a moment or two in silence, his rough-hewn face oddly wistful.
“I suppose he—he might have thought it was true,” he said hesitatingly. “Whatever he saw he might have thought—”
“Oh, gee whiz, Steve!” interrupted Cavanaugh impatiently. “Don’t try to make excuses for the nut. He just naturally can’t tell the truth. Who’s coming for a walk? I’m tired of sitting here.”
They all arose briskly, even Ritter bestirring himself. Walking was no particular pleasure to him, but he rarely declined an invitation from Jim Cavanaugh.
“We may as well stroll around by the bulletin board and see if Midge got things straight,” remarked Hinckley as they moved away.
“Nothing to it!” declared Cavanaugh decidedly. “I haven’t seen the beastly thing, and I’m not going to know anything about it till I have to. At least we can get one more decent swim before the lid’s clamped on.”
“You mean you’d go in anyhow?” asked McBride interestedly.
“Why not? There hasn’t been any official announcement. Willett’s no town crier that we should take everything he says as gospel. If we should happen to go over on the sound side at three-thirty and went in there as usual, they couldn’t very well call us down.”
“We’re supposed to undress in the tents and wait for the whistle,” remarked Champ Ferris doubtfully. “They’ll think it’s sort of funny if—”
“Oh, well, if you’re looking for trouble you’ll find it,” cut in Cavvy shortly. “You don’t have to come, you know. But if we hang around here much longer some other busybody is sure to come along and tell us about the notice. I’m going to start.”
CHAPTER II FORBIDDEN FRUIT
He led the way around the back of the tent, which was the last one in the row, and struck into a clump of cedars bordering the clearing. The others followed closely; Cavvy was somehow the sort others generally did follow. Steve Haddon, bringing up the rear, found himself thinking about this, and for the first time in their brief acquaintance he was a little troubled.
“I suppose he just doesn’t look at it in that way,” the big chap said to himself as they came out into the open and turned along the shore. “Maybe I’m too fussy. He’s really a corking fellow—corking!”
In this fashion he tried to excuse the other and dismiss the subject from his mind, but during the stroll which followed he was conscious of a vague discomfort that made him even more silent and repressed than usual.
From the first day at camp, little more than a week ago, he had been attracted by the handsome, accomplished fellow and in his shy, awkward manner had even “made up” to him a little. To his surprise Cavanaugh responded to a certain extent, and the two became friends as well as tent-mates. Steve could not understand what there was about himself to interest a chap so brilliant and so generally a favorite. It never occurred to him that his own sturdy, steadfast strength might have been the magnet which, consciously or unconsciously, attracted Cavvy’s more mercurial personality. He would have laughed incredulously had anyone suggested such a thing. As it was he speedily gave up trying to make head or tail of it and accepted gratefully the thing which at first had seemed incredible. There was always, to be sure, just the faintest touch of tolerance in Cavanaugh’s manner toward the big, black-browed, quiet fellow whose admiration he could not help but notice. It was the sort of attitude which said, almost as plainly as words, “Of course, I know he’s dull and heavy and not thrillingly interesting, but he’s a good hearted chap, and I like him.”
If Steve noticed this he gave no sign. To him Cavvy was a hero who could do no wrong. His allegiance had never wavered until this moment; and even now, troubled as he was and seeking excuses and explanations for Cavanaugh’s behavior, he could not find that his liking had in any way lessened.
Following the shore line, with the wide, glinting stretch of water spread out before them, the talk of the boys almost inevitably turned on sharks, and presently waxed so argumentative that none of them seemed to notice Haddon’s silence. Nobody knew very much about the subject, but that did not prevent them from taking side and debating hotly. Hinckley and Champ Ferris supported Cavanaugh’s argument that the species found in Northern waters was entirely harmless, and probably there were none in the neighborhood of the camp anyway. Taggart had seen something else, or made up the whole story, they declared. Ritter and McBride opposed them as a matter of principle, and upheld their side with such hair-raising anecdotes of things they had heard and read that they actually succeeded in scaring themselves, besides arousing a certain amount of nervous apprehension in the minds of the other two. Cavanaugh alone laughed them to scorn. When they returned to the forbidden bathing beach, which was hidden from the camp by a thick screen of evergreens, it was plain that he meant to carry out his purpose.
“Guess we won’t have time to go back to camp,” he remarked seriously, but with a twinkle in his eyes, “so we might as well peel right here. Funny there’s nobody else around.”
Hinckley chuckled and shrugged his shoulders. Haddon felt a little sting go through him. Was this the sort of thing Cavvy meant to get off when they were discovered, as they surely must be? He would rather have had his friend openly break the camp rules.
“Well, I hope you’ve thought of the risk you’re taking,” said Ritter, settling himself comfortably on the sand. In spite of his airy tone there was a touch of seriousness in his voice.
“Not going to join us?” queried Cavanaugh, kicking off one sneaker. “You would make an awful tasty morsel for a shark, that’s a fact. If you’d only go in the rest of us would be quite safe. What’s the matter, Steve? You haven’t got cold feet, too, have you?”
“N—o; I just don’t feel like it, that’s all.”
Cavvy paused, one stocking half off, and stared intently at the boy’s serious face. Suddenly his color deepened and his lips curled a little at the corners.
“Oh!” he murmured. “I see.” And then he laughed unpleasantly. “I forgot we had with us the only really perfect Scout in captivity. I’m surprised you could bring yourself to associate with such a bunch of hardened sinners—or did you hope by your virtuous example to win us back to the straight and narrow path?”
Steve shrank back as if he had been struck. His face turned white and then a dull crimson.
“I don’t—” he stammered. “I didn’t say—”
“Of course not,” sneered Cavanaugh. “You didn’t have to say anything. You’re so goody-goody it sticks out all over you.” He yanked off his stockings petulantly and dropped the rest of his clothes in a heap on the sand. “Better stick around awhile till you’ve made sure we’ve broken the rules and then you can hustle back to camp and report us.”
“Cavvy!” cried Haddon sharply. “You’ve no right— You know I wouldn’t—”
He broke off suddenly, biting his lip. Without replying, Cavanaugh had turned his back and was trotting out on the narrow spring board. For a moment the shapely white body stood poised against the deep blue sky. Then it flashed out and downward, cleaving the water in a perfect dive.
Steve watched him with blurred eyes and a dull hurt in his heart. The onslaught had been so brutal and so unexpected that it dazed him. He did not realize that Cavanaugh’s own mental discomfort might have had much to do with the flare-up. Conscious that he wasn’t doing the right thing, but too stubborn to draw back, it was not unnatural to vent his irritation on the fellow who seemed to be showing more strength of character than himself.
Haddon did not think of this. In that moment it seemed to him as if the friendship which had meant so much to him had toppled into ruins like a fallen house of cards. Rather, it had never existed save in his own mind. If Cavvy really cared for him, even in his careless, tolerant fashion, he could never have deliberately hurt him so without a shadow of reason or excuse. Surely Steve had not shown himself the prig Cavanaugh made out. He had not said a word against the others going in. He had even been conscious of an awkward sense of embarrassment at not joining them himself.
Suddenly, out of the turmoil of hurt and longing and regret, came the desire to win back at any cost what he had lost. If he went in with the rest wouldn’t Cavvy realize that he had been too hasty, and perhaps make amends? It wasn’t too late. McBride and Hinckley, who had stripped more leisurely, were even now moving slowly toward the spring-board. If he hurried—
Instinctively the boy bent down and untied his shoe laces with a jerk. Then he straightened slowly, face flushed and jaw squaring. He couldn’t do it. Something within him made the thing impossible—the action of a coward and a weakling. What sort of a Scout would he be to deliberately fling overboard his principles and do a thing he felt to be wrong for the sake of winning another’s approval? And what was that approval worth which could be won in such a fashion?
Downcast, motionless, the boy stood fighting out his brief mental battle. He was unaware of the curious glances and low-voiced comment of Ferris and Ritter, sitting together a little to one side. For a space he did not even notice the three fellows in the water save to be conscious of their splashings and sputterings and occasional peals of laughter—laughter which grated somehow, and made him feel like one apart. Then Cavanaugh’s voice, still sharp and a little pettish, brought his head up and his troubled gaze sought out the fellow who had been his friend.
“I’m sick of this fooling,” he heard Cavvy say. “I’m going for one last decent swim.”
“Better not go out too far,” advised Hinckley joshingly. “Remember the shark.”
Cavanaugh disdained reply. Already he was heading out from the shore, cleaving the water with a swift, overhand stroke. Steve watched him wistfully, and presently a faint touch of uneasiness began to grip him. Spectacular as he was at diving and other water “stunts,” Cavvy had never showed up very well when it came to long distances. He explained this once to Haddon by saying that several times he had been attacked by cramps and had learned to be careful. Suppose a cramp should seize him now with scarcely anyone around to help, thought Steve, and instantly his uneasiness changed to acute worry. In troubled silence he watched the fellow draw further away from shore until at length he could not restrain himself.
“Why doesn’t he turn back?” he exclaimed aloud. “He’s crazy to go out so far.”
“He’s got more nerve than I’d have,” commented Ritter. “Suppose that shark should show up now? Where would he be then, I’d like to know.”
“I wasn’t thinking of that,” returned Haddon, who had been inclined to agree with Cavvy’s side of the shark argument. “But he’s liable to cramp, and if he should be—”
He broke off with a sharp intake of his breath. Out in the Sound Cavanaugh had turned suddenly about and was making for shore with a wild splashing haste which told instantly of something wrong. For a second Steve stood rooted to the spot. Then he ran toward the spring-board, pulling off his shirt and jerking at the buckle of his belt. As he paused a moment to kick off his shoes and slide out of the scanty shorts, a shrill, inarticulate cry of horror from Ritter urged him on. It was the cramp, then, just as he had feared. But Cavvy was still keeping up. He was even making progress shoreward in spite of that frantic splashing which wasted so much strength. If he only kept his head—
“_The shark!_” screamed Ferris suddenly behind him. “_The shark!_”
CHAPTER III THE SHARK
Steve’s feet were on the plank before the meaning of the words stung into his consciousness. As he ran, his startled gaze swept over the glinting water and for an instant his blood froze. Beyond the struggling Cavanaugh, but much nearer to him than the latter was to shore, something thrust up above the water—something thin, triangular, erect, dull gray in color, that cut through the little waves with swift, smooth, gliding ease.
To Haddon it seemed as if the plank slid backward under his feet. His dive was purely instinctive but it was a fine one, wide and shallow, that carried him well out. As he shot to the surface he almost collided with Ted Hinckley, but he was quite unconscious of the other’s nearness. Out of that numbed daze of horror and dismay but one thought, one motive, rose to dominate him. He must reach Cavanaugh before the shark.
What he could do then he did not know. But as he tore through the water with that powerful overhand stroke which had won him many a race, his sturdy self-control began slowly to return. Little by little scraps of things came back to him, things he had read and heard, some of them part of that very discussion on the beach so short a time ago. Noise! That was the thing. Sharks were afraid of noises. If he could only reach Cavvy in time there might be a chance—
His hands struck the water with an even, rythmical slap-slap. Though he had not slackened his stroke, it seemed as if he were merely crawling. The temptation to increase his speed was almost irresistible, but he conquered it by deliberate effort. Already he was breathing hard, and he knew that unless he kept back some of his strength he would be helpless at the crucial moment.
At almost every third stroke his dripping face flashed up out of the water and his desperate gaze searched the wide expanse for a sight of that ominous fin. Twice he found it; once circling off to the left of where Cavanaugh was swimming, whereat he was thrilled with hope that the creature had abandoned the pursuit. But the next time it was cutting through the ripples straight toward Cavvy, and the sight made Haddon throw caution to the winds.
With every remaining ounce of strength he lunged forward. His muscles ached, his lungs were bursting. But still he managed to send his weary body sizzling through the water at a racing speed. Then Cavanaugh’s face flashed up before him, strained, white, panic-stricken, and he slowed down.
“Keep on, old man,” he gasped. “Go straight ahead. I’ll stay—”
He did not finish. Already Cavvy had passed him and was laboring shoreward. Steve gulped in the precious air, took a few long strokes forward and stopped with a sudden gasp. The fin had disappeared!
The moments that followed were like nothing that he had ever known. Cold horror gripped him by the throat and choked him—that horror of the unknown which is so potent and so paralyzing. The shark had dived and was swimming under water. At any moment he might feel—
For an instant he came close to screaming wildly, to beating the water with that mad frenzy which comes to drowning men. But just in time his teeth dug cruelly into his under lip and he jerked himself back into a semblance of sanity. And then he began to shout and beat the water, but with a set purpose. Noise was what the creature dreaded. He could not hope to outswim the monster, but in this fashion he might hold it off till Cavanaugh was safe, and perhaps himself.
Ceasing his clamor he swam shoreward a dozen strokes and then paused again to splash and shout. Again and again he did this, and each time it was harder to make that deliberate pause. He was possessed by a panicky desire to speed ahead, trusting to his swiftness. Once he did let himself go and swam perhaps a score of strokes without stopping. When he finally forced himself to halt and glanced back over one shoulder, he seemed to glimpse under the water not a dozen yards away, a great gray-blue shape that struck terror to his soul. He splashed frantically and shouted hoarsely, and the thing slid away from his vision. But he knew it was there, lurking, waiting for a chance, and the remnants of his courage began to drain. Six strokes was all he dared to take now, and even those were halting and full of dread.
He had lost all track by this time of Cavvy; he did not even know how near or far he was himself from shore. Presently he saw the creature again, nearer this time. As he strove to shout his voice seemed a mere croak; there was scarcely strength in his numbed arms to lash the water.... A sudden splash near him brought a strangled sob to his lips; the touch of something against his body made him cringe.
“All right, Steve,” said a voice in his ear. “Just let yourself go.”
With a long-drawn, sobbing sigh, the boy’s weary muscles relaxed and his eyes closed. He was vaguely conscious of being propelled swiftly through the water, of the clamor of shrill voices, of a constant, irregular splashing all around him. Presently his dragging feet touched bottom and he made an instinctive effort to stand erect. But now there was a muscular arm about him which not only held him up but urged him forward. Finally he felt himself lowered gently to the sand and a moment later he opened his eyes.
Stripped to the waist and dripping wet, Mr. Wendell was bending over him. As he met Steve’s glance, his lips curved in a curious smile that somehow thrilled the boy. There was pride in it, tribute, appreciation, but when the man spoke his voice was low and matter-of-fact.
“Better lie still for a minute or so,” he said quietly. “You’re about all in.”
Steve nodded and his glance wandered over the beach. It was thronged with boys, all talking excitedly and many of them still hurling missiles at the water. A sudden thought struck him.
“Did Cavvy—” he began, raising his eyes. And then he stopped.
The scoutmaster had moved aside; it was Cavanaugh who stood beside him holding some garments in his hands. His face was drawn and haggard, and in his eyes was a look which neither Haddon nor anyone else had ever seen there.
“Steve!” he said at length, in a low, uneven voice. “I—I—” He paused, his lips trembling. Then his jaw squared. “I’m a beast, Steve, a perfect beast!” he went on rapidly. “I’ve been a beast from—from the very first. You’re— When I think of what a chum you might have been, and I was fool enough— You’ll never want to—to have anything to do with me again, but I had to tell you—”
“Don’t!” Haddon sat up abruptly. His physical weariness had suddenly left him. All the regret and longing and mental soreness of the afternoon had vanished. “Why can’t we—we just forget all that and—”
He paused. A sudden flash like sunlight swept into Cavvy’s face, wiping away the haggard lines. His eyes met Haddon’s longingly, incredulously.
“You don’t mean you’d ever—”
Steve laughed happily.
“Why not?” he asked.
Cavanaugh made no answer in words, but impulsively his hand went out and caught Steve’s. To the onlooker it seemed as if he were merely helping the other fellow to his feet, but Haddon knew there was a good deal more than that in the action. Cavvy’s grip, and the look in his eyes were both more eloquent than speech. Then Mr. Wendell appeared beside them, his face puzzled and a little stern.
“Feeling all right again?” he asked Haddon. “That’s fine. Well, I guess we’d better get back to camp; there seems to be nothing more doing here.” He turned abruptly to Cavanaugh. “Perhaps you can explain this business,” he said rather curtly. “I can’t seem to make head or tail out of what Hinckley and McBride have to say. How did you come to go in over here when there’s a notice up forbidding it for the present?”
CHAPTER IV THE MAN IN THE DORY
Cavvy hesitated for an instant, a slow flush creeping up into his face. Then his eyes met Haddon’s and his lips tightened.
“It was my fault, sir,” he said quickly. “The other fellows aren’t to blame; they’d never have gone in but for me. You see, I didn’t believe Bu—er—Taggart really saw a shark at all, and I wanted to get one more decent swim before I saw the notice.”
The scoutmaster’s face cleared. “Oh, then you didn’t see the notice,” he said, turning toward the camp. “That makes a difference, though I still don’t understand—”
“I didn’t _see_ it,” interrupted Cavvy, “but one of the fellows told us about it. I hadn’t any excuse at all. I was just sore and—”
The words died away as the two moved off together, leaving Steve to hurry through his dressing alone. He got into his clothes swiftly, a little anxious to know what penalty was being meted out to Cavvy, but in his heart there was nothing but gladness at the realization that he hadn’t been mistaken in his friend after all.
He was given little time to think of this or to speculate on the possibilities that Cavvy’s changed attitude opened up before him. He had not even got his shoes on before he was surrounded by a throng of boys, all jabbering excitedly and full of eager inquiries as to how near the shark had come, what it looked like, how he felt, and a thousand other questions.
Haddon answered them all good naturedly, turning aside with a shrug and a laugh the words of praise and admiration which followed. As soon as he was dressed he headed for the camp, to find Cavanaugh standing in front of their tent.
“Well?” he questioned eagerly as he came up. “How about it? What did he give you?”
Cavvy grinned.
“Not as much as I expected,” he said. “He was pretty decent, considering. I’ve got to stick around the camp limits for a week, that’s all. He didn’t even cut out my swimming. Guess he thought going into the cove wouldn’t be any too much of a treat.”
He laughed; then his face grew suddenly serious. “I never even thanked you, old man,” he said in a low tone, “or said a word about the corking way you—you went in after me, and—”
“Don’t do it,” interrupted Haddon, smiling a little. “You’d have done the same for me, and more. Let’s cross it off the books and not think about it again. There’s one thing I’d like awfully to know,” he want on quickly. “Was it really a man-eater, or just a big dog fish? How close did he get to you, anyhow? How much of him did you see?”
“How close?” repeated Cavvy slowly. “I don’t know exactly. It must have come within twenty-five feet, though. It was a sort of blue-gray—different from a dog fish. And big! Man!” His eyes widened and he shuddered a little. “Of course I was scared,” he confessed, “and maybe the reflection on the water sort of magnified it, but—”
“I don’t know about that,” put in Haddon as he paused. “It looked like a whale of a thing to me. Say, Harry,” he called, to Ritter who was loitering nearby, “how much did you and Champ see of the brute?”
But it appeared that they had only seen the fin, and no one else had glimpsed of the creature. Next morning, however, the matter was settled beyond a doubt, and very satisfactorily. About an hour after breakfast Shrimp Willett came tearing into camp with the news that some fishermen whose nets were out about a mile from shore were having trouble.
“They’re having the dickens of a scrap with something in the nets, fellows,” he panted. “They’ve got three boats out there and the men are stabbing and hitting with boat hooks and things, and the water’s shooting up all around in regular geysers. I’ll bet it’s the shark.”
He turned and rushed away again, and with a chorus of excited yells every boy within earshot streamed after him up the beach. The scoutmaster was away in the motor boat for supplies, but Bruce Cartwright, hearing the commotion, snatched up a pair of field glasses and followed the crowd.
The nets were set off shore about half a mile above the scout camp, and it was plain that something unusual was happening there. By the time the boys had reached the rough little dock opposite there were no “geysers” spouting, or other signs of strenuous activity. But the three fishing boats were clustered in a bunch, their occupants bending over the sides busy attaching tackle to something in the water which was invisible even through the glass. Presently the engines started, the boats separated, and headed for the dock.
The foremost chugged slowly and behind it streaked the distinct wake of a heavy tow. On tiptoe with excitement the boys watched eagerly as it drew nearer and nearer. When at length a great blue-gray shape could be made out, they set up a shout and poured a volley of shrill questions at the man in the stern.
“It’s a shark, all right,” answered that individual shortly. “I ain’t seen one of ’em around these parts for years. He got caught in the net and pretty near tore it to bits, drat him!”
He spoke with considerable heat and the other two men were scowling. But to the scouts mere damage to nets was as nothing compared with the thrill of seeing the great creature close at hand. They hovered around as close as Mr. Cartwright would let them, and when the shark was finally hoisted to the dock they were allowed to examine it to their hearts’ content, take measurements, make photographs or do anything else they chose.
The length of the creature from snout to tip of tail was a little over fifteen feet, and the mouth, though small and undershot, was powerful with its double row of razor-like teeth. Even lying there still and motionless, the body covered with a score of wounds from boat hooks and an old sword fish spear one of the men had fortunately had aboard, it was an evil looking specimen. As Steve Haddon thought of their experience of the day before he could hardly suppress a shudder.
“No, they ain’t native to these parts, praise be!” said the fisherman to whom Cartwright was talking. “If they was we’d about have to go out of business. They breed in the south, but once in a while one strays up this way. I dunno why. Hungry, mebbe; or it might be jest accident. Well, fellers, what say we get them nets in an’ start repairin’ damages? We got a good two days’ work ahead of us, hang the brute!”
Naturally the capture of the shark affected the swimming situation at camp. Mr. Wendell did not at once remove his restrictions, but when a day or so passed with no signs of any more about, he relaxed the new rules a little. The scouts were allowed to go in at the old place provided they did not venture out too far. Two guards were also appointed who rowed back and forth about a hundred yards from shore, keeping a constant lookout for danger.
Cavanaugh enjoyed these swimming periods extremely, for though he made no complaint, he found restriction to the camp limits very dull. He had quite recovered his spirits and also a good deal of that old good natured, easy air of leadership. With Haddon, however, there was a marked difference. He still joked and chaffed the big, slow-speaking chap, but the chaff was all good-natured now, with a subtle touch of affection in it. Instead of Steve’s making advances, it was Cavvy who sought the other out, who moved his seat at table, who found a place beside his friend in the wide circle around the evening camp-fire.
There was nothing forced or obtrusive in his actions. He simply sought Haddon’s companionship in the direct, matter-of-fact manner he went after anything he wanted, and yet he was not selfish in his seeking. That, perhaps, was the most marked feature of the moral change which was taking place within him. In the old days if he liked a fellow he was apt to monopolize him regardless of the other’s feelings in the matter. Now, though Steve would have been perfectly content to spend all his time within the camp limits with Cavvy, the latter refused to allow it.
“No reason why you should stay cooped up here just because I have to,” he said one afternoon in his quick, decisive manner. “You’ve spent three days hanging around doing nothing; it’s time you had a change. If you hustle you can get off with that bunch fishing.”
“But I don’t give a hang about fishing,” protested Haddon.
Cavvy grinned. “Well, get a canoe, then, and find someone to take a little exploring expedition with you,” he suggested. “I’m going to write letters and don’t want to be bothered.”
Steve laughed, shrugged his shoulders and walked away. He saw through his friend perfectly, for Cavanaugh never wrote letters if he could help it. But after all perhaps it would be better for them to separate for the afternoon. One can have too much of almost everything, and Haddon had no wish to endanger the association which meant so much to him.
He secured his canoe—it was the last one to be had; but when it came to finding a companion, all the fellows he particularly liked had departed on other expeditions, so he decided to go alone. He was an expert paddler and enjoyed it thoroughly. He also liked poking about in new places, and when he rounded the point and pushed out into the Sound, he turned unhesitatingly westward.
Long Point thrust out its blunt nose from a stretch of rather wild, deserted beach on the south shore of the Cape. Amongst the sand dunes to the eastward were a few fishermen’s huts. Several miles in the other direction lay the village of Shelbourne, and beyond it, along both sides of a wide estuary, sprawled the raw, staring buildings, the many dry docks and numberless other appurtenances of the big, new Government ship building plant. But between the village and the camp the shoreline cut abruptly inland for upwards of a mile, forming a wide, deep harbor which did much toward isolating the camp site from the rest of the world.
Across the mouth of this harbor and reaching well out into the Sound itself, there lay a multitude of small islands, some mere jutting rocks to which a few scraggly pines clung tenaciously, others larger and thickly wooded. All of them were steep and rocky, and between them the tide rushed ceaselessly in queer, erratic, frequently dangerous currents. It was a fine place for fish of many sorts, but little more could be said for it, though on one or two of the larger islands duck shooters had put up rough huts which they used in the late fall and early spring when the season was on.
Steve had never happened to visit these islands. He had, in fact, seen no more of them than was visible from Shelbourne the day they made an inspection of the shipyard over a week ago. And as he headed the canoe toward the nearest one, he looked forward with increasing eagerness to an afternoon of exploration. They looked interesting, and as he drew nearer he got attractive glimpses of little coves and miniature harbors, of wooded points, rocky slopes masked with green, of turbulent, rushing channels, and a dozen other features which thrilled him, and made him regret his wasted opportunities.
The reality quite equalled his expectations. He went from islet to islet, clambering about the rocks, pushing through trees and undergrowth, poking into everything to his heart’s content. There was a touch of the wilderness in it which appealed to his imagination. It seemed, indeed, a perfect paradise to the furred and feathered wild things many of whom were heedless or oblivious to his presence, and their presence added greatly to his enjoyment.
It was already fairly late when he first saw the great blue heron. It was later still when, having followed the bird across the small island to the edge of another—one of the largest of the group he crouched amongst some bushes amusedly watching the solemn, awkward, long-legged creature stalking sedately away from him along a narrow strip of beach.
Suddenly with a great whir and flapping of wings, the heron arose and sailed out of sight. At the same instant Steve was conscious of the popping of a motor’s exhaust coming rapidly nearer, and turned curiously to see what it might be.
Swiftly the boat came into sight, a dingy, unpainted dory propelled by an auxiliary of unusual power. In the stern sat a single figure, bare headed and clad in rough fishing clothes. Almost unconsciously, Steve had not emerged from the bushes, and as the dory passed his hiding place scarcely a dozen feet from him, he had for an instant a clear, unrestricted view of the man’s face.
He gave a start and frowned; raised himself partway and then dropped back on his haunches. The boat swept on and disappeared around a jutting point, the sound of the motor grew rapidly fainter—ceased. Still the boy crouched amongst the bushes, staring blankly at the spot where the craft had left his vision.
When he stood up a little later and moved slowly toward his canoe, there was a puzzled, troubled expression in his face. And in his narrowed eyes was the look of one groping blindly through his memory for something which he cannot find.
CHAPTER V PERPLEXED
A shout of laughter went up from the group of fellows gathered in the cook shack. There was a regular cook attached to the camp, but every other evening supper was prepared by the boys themselves as a means of perfecting themselves in the culinary art. Usually these occasions were marked by an earnest seriousness, for there was great rivalry between the various tents; but to-night a spirit of levity undoubtedly prevailed.
“But why shouldn’t he have been in the dory, you old lobster?” asked Billy McBride, from where he bent over the frying pan.
Steve Haddon shrugged his bulky shoulders and ran his fingers through an already much towsled mop of brown hair. “Well,” he said hesitatingly, “because he wasn’t—he wasn’t—”
“Wasn’t what?” demanded three or four voices, as the big fellow paused.
“Well, he wasn’t the sort of person who’d be in—in that sort of a boat.”
Another shout of laughter rang out. Jim Cavanaugh, still chuckling, thumped Haddon on the back.
“You’re certainly lucid, Steve,” he exclaimed. “Just what do you mean by that? What sort of a person was he, anyhow? One of those swell city guys who came down to fish, all dolled up in dinky knickerbockers and that sort of thing?”
Steve was grinning good naturedly, but the color had deepened faintly under his tan; he shook his head slowly. “He wasn’t dolled up at all,” he told them. “He had on—well, just ordinary old things; I didn’t notice his clothes much. He might have had a rod, though he wasn’t fishing when I saw him.”
“What was he doing, then?” asked Ted Hinckley rather sharply. “He must have been doing something out of the way to set you against him like this.”
Again Haddon shook his head. The smile had faded and his lips straightened into a firm line. “He wasn’t doing anything except just running the dory past that big island—Loon Island, I think they call it,” he returned. “You wouldn’t understand, Ted. It—it was his face—”
Hinckley laughed again, but not so uproariously this time. During their ten days at camp together, he as well as most of the others, had discovered that while they could usually josh “good old Steve” to the limit, a curious, stubborn tightening of jaw and chin was a sign that this limit had been reached. And because, for all their banter, they liked him so well, they were generally quick to notice and respect that sign as Hinckley did now. His laughter trailed off into a comfortable chuckle and he turned to assist the cook. Cavanaugh flung one arm across Haddon’s shoulder.
“So you didn’t like his face, eh?” he smiled. “It must have been _some_ face to work you up like this, old man. What the dickens takes you so long with those eggs, Micky? I’m starved.”
“They were mislaid, that’s the trouble,” returned McBride without batting an eyelash.
A groan went up and one or two made as if to lay violent hands upon the cook. But the responsibility of his position saved him, and ten minutes later the meal had been served up and was being consumed with an appetite and dispatch characteristic in a crowd of healthy, active boys whose afternoon has been spent more or less strenuously in the open. And as they ate they kept up a running fire of josh and fun and banter which flowed from most of them with the ease and fluency of second nature.
One of the exceptions was Steve Haddon. He did not often joke, and when he assayed a pun it had much the effect of an elephant trying to dance. It wasn’t that he lacked a sense of humor. He thoroughly enjoyed the badinage which went on about him, even when he himself, as was often the case, became the butt for another’s humor. But he had never acquired the trick of answering back in kind, and appeared always more or less deliberate in thought and speech.
To-night, both at supper and later when they had gathered around the camp fire, he was even quieter than usual, for he was thinking about the man he had seen that afternoon in the dory. He realized that, with characteristic clumsiness of expression, he had given the fellows an idea that something about the man’s face had prejudiced him. As a matter of fact it wasn’t so at all, though he made no effort to correct himself. He had had but a single good look at the stranger, but that look was enough to rouse in the boy a strong conviction that he had seen the man before—seen him, too, under conditions and surroundings so totally different that the stranger’s mere presence on this out of the way stretch of New England coast seemed at once incongruous and puzzling.
What those conditions had been he could not, unfortunately, remember. Though he had tried his best all the way back to camp to drag out of his brain some further details of that former meeting, Steve had failed utterly. That there had been one he was quite certain. But how or where or when it had taken place remained a mystery. He felt, however, that it must have been of the most casual sort, and also that it could scarcely have taken place very recently, else surely he would have remembered.
“Very likely it was at home in Washington some time,” he thought, after they had settled down lazily around the fire. “Though it might have been when I visited Uncle Joe in New York last fall. Oh, hang it all. I’m not going to bother my head about it any more.”
But this was a resolution more easily made than kept. For a short space Steve did succeed in detaching his thoughts from the annoying puzzle. Lying there on the sand with Cavvy’s head pillowed on his stomach, he grinned in silent appreciation of Micky’s airy monologue, and presently began to hum under his breath the air Champ Ferris was laboriously coaxing from a much harassed guitar. Then, unconsciously, his glance swept past the lounging figures of his friends and out across the wide stretches of shadowy water vaguely luminous under the stars. Back of those shadows Loon Island lay, with all the other rocky little islets that crowded the entrance to Shelbourne harbor. And, perhaps, on Loon Island—
Suddenly Steve awoke to a realization of where his thoughts had carried him, and moved abruptly with an impatient squirm.
“Easy, boy, easy,” murmured Cavvy drowsily.
Grinning shame-facedly, Steve reached down and ruffled the other’s hair. A perfunctory scrimmage followed. But Cavanaugh was too drowsy to carry this far. And very shortly Mr. Wendell’s orders sent the crowd staggering sleepily tentwards.
A little later, crawling into his blankets, Steve reached a sudden, abrupt decision. Since he could not seem to rid his mind of the problem which had been raised there, why not make an effort to solve it? Very likely the answer would be a simple one not worth his trouble, but at least it would be an answer. Suppose he got another look at the perplexing stranger? If he saw him again that stubborn memory might awake.
“I’ll take a trip to Loon Island to-morrow,” he said to himself. Then he turned over and went to sleep.
CHAPTER VI LOON ISLAND
Steve said nothing to anyone next day of his determination. He knew he would be laughed at, for he felt himself that it was a rather foolish proceeding, and it would be difficult or impossible for him to explain in words the curious intensity of his interest in the matter. So he did not even take Cavanaugh into his confidence, merely explaining that he was going for another little trip in the canoe. Cavvy’s approval was prompt, but there was just a touch of disappointment in his manner which made Steve a little troubled.
Was he making a fool of himself or not, he wondered, as he slid out into the Sound from behind the point. A portion of Loon Island was visible now and he glanced speculatively in that direction. For all he knew the stranger whose face had so puzzled him might not be in the neighborhood again for days or weeks. His presence yesterday could easily have been the result of a chance excursion never to be repeated. Nevertheless, once started, he had no thought of giving up the trip, for he was not the sort to turn aside readily from something he had once set his mind upon. So he dismissed his doubts and sent the canoe forward resolutely.
The surface of the Sound was smooth—almost too smooth, in fact. There was an oily look to the long, easy swells which rolled the canoe ever so slightly as it cut across them. Once or twice Steve glanced back and frowned a little at the smoky, golden haze hugging the eastern horizon. But he paddled steadily, keeping fairly close to shore; and when he came opposite the group of islands and headed his craft across the half-mile stretch which separated the nearest one from the mainland, the storm signals had not increased.
“I guess it’s going to hold off for a while,” he decided. “Anyhow, at the worst I’d be stuck on the island over night—which wouldn’t kill me.”
Presently he came abreast of the first little islet and passed it, passed the next one, and then turned into a narrow, rock-bordered channel along the north side of Loon Island. The tide ran swiftly here, but it carried him with it and without much effort he managed to circle the lower end of the island and reach the point where he had landed the day before. Here he stepped ashore, and pulling up the canoe, hid it in a thicket of juniper. It was still fairly early—an hour and a half earlier, in fact, than when Steve had glimpsed the man in the dory yesterday afternoon. But he had planned for this deliberately. He wanted to take a look over the island before returning to the point to watch for the stranger.
Back of the point the rocks rose steeply, with stunted pines, scrub oak and a tangle of scraggly bushes growing from every conceivable crevice and earth-pocket. It was far from easy going, but Steve pushed his way through the undergrowth with only an occasional pause, keeping as close to the shore as possible.
Presently he came upon a gully, slid into it, climbed the other side and finally, pushing through a grove of wind-tossed trees, stepped out into a narrow, open space. Then he paused abruptly.
On either hand steep, smooth masses of rock jutted up, shutting in the place completely. Less than a score of yards apart, they shelved down into the water, forming a tiny, sheltered cove toward which the ground sloped gently. It was a snug spot, shielded from storms, and also from observation, and a rough shack of weathered boards seemed a natural part of the gray, rock-strewn landscape. But Steve had not been expecting to find a hut here, and his first thought as he stared at it, motionless and a little tense, was to connect it, somehow with the man he was seeking.
For several minutes he stood there alert, his glance fixed curiously and intently on the cabin. It was one of the duck shooters’ huts, no doubt, of which the boys had told him. It must have stood there for some time, too, judging from the dingy, weathered look of the planking. But it seemed odd, with the duck season so far away, that the shutter of the single small window at the rear should be swinging open. Surely any one leaving it for a year or more would have made things more secure against intrusion.
Steve waited a little longer, turning over various possibilities in his mind, and then moved slowly forward. The stillness of the place, coupled with a certain instinct hard to define, made him feel that the shack was at the moment unoccupied. When he reached the window and looked in, he found that instinct had served him well. The place was empty, and after a brief survey, he moved around to the front and opened the door, which was merely on the latch. Instantly his eyes fell upon a raw, splintered spot where a lock had been and he bent to examine it closely.
“Huh!” he grunted. “I thought so. Somebody’s broken in.”
Thoughtfully he straightened up and looked around. There was little doubt in his mind as to who had made the forcible entry, but the object of it was as great a puzzle as the identity of the mysterious stranger. And presently he discovered that there was more than one in the marauding party.
In each of the four rough bunks at one end of the cabin were blankets. Also, scattered over the rude plank table in the middle of the room, were four tin plates and as many cups, all of which had been lately used.
“This is no place for me,” decided Steve as he took in these details. “If they should come back and find me here, I—”
The words clipped off and he whirled about with widening eyes as the muffled beat of an engine’s exhaust smote suddenly on his ears.
“Jimminy!” he gasped, and leaped for the door.
He was half way through it when he saw the bow of a dory sliding into view past the rocks at the end of the cove. Jumping back like a flash, he jerked the door shut and latched it noiselessly. For an instant he hesitated, heart pounding in his throat. Then he moved swiftly to the window, pulled himself up, squeezed through and plunged into the fringe of undergrowth about a dozen feet away.
But as he gained the shelter he realized that the popping of the engine had ceased and he heard the sound of voices. He dared not pause here, but sped on over the rough ground. It was not the same way he had come, but he cared nothing for that. The closeness of his escape had shaken him considerably, and he was trembling. It was not until he had pushed through the woods for a hundred feet or more that he began to slow down and recover himself.
“What a nut I am!” he muttered, wiping his forehead with the back of one hand. “They’ll never come here.”
And then, being what he was, he grew angry at himself for that panicky flight. If he had stayed at the edge of the woods he might have had a good look at the stranger without any special risk. He might even have gained some hint as to what the party was doing here. He had just about decided to turn and retrace his steps, when he stumbled and almost fell, saving himself only by a quick snatch at an overhanging branch. Then, looking down to discover what had tripped him, he saw the tins!
At first glance, indeed, they did not look like tins, but more like square, rectangular boxes covered with canvas. It was only by pressing one with his fingers that he felt the distinctive give of thin metal. There were a dozen or more in all, piled neatly in a cavity among the rocks and covered over with leaves and dead branches.
Filled with curiosity, Steve punched and prodded the top one inquiringly and ran his fingers exploringly over its surface. He was on the point of lifting it to test the weight, when the sound of voices behind him brought him upright with a gasp.
CHAPTER VII THE LIGHTNING FLASH
For the barest second Haddon stood listening. Then he bent down again and made a frantic, scrambling effort to cover the tins. But as the voices came steadily nearer and the scuffling of feet began to sound in the dead leaves, he abandoned the attempt and darting a few steps to one side flung himself down behind a thick, low-growing mass of laurel. In a space so brief that he felt they must have heard him, the bushes were thrust aside and the footsteps ceased.
“—a rabbit, I guess, or maybe a bird,” said a voice. “It don’t matter, anyway. Here’s the stuff, half uncovered, too. Hang that Peters! I told him to— Here, catch hold, will you? We haven’t much time.”
“Want it in the boat?”
“Sure! The chief is going to leave in about an hour. We’ll land at Cobb’s Point and wait there till dark. Here’s a couple for you, Jansen. We’ll take the rest in another trip.”
Flat on the ground behind the laurel clump, Steve listened intently to their departing footsteps. Not daring to stir, he had failed to get even a glimpse of the three men, but he missed no word of their brief conversation which left him in a state of bewildered doubt and speculation. He could make nothing out of it at all. What was in those tins? and why were they being taken secretly to Cobb’s Point, that lonely strip of sand dunes the other side of Shelbourne?
As he lay there waiting, a good many possibilities flashed through the boy’s mind. He could not rid himself of the feeling that the men were up to nothing good. Yet on the other hand he realized that even the broken door and the hidden tins might have some harmless explanation. There was a fish hatchery, for instance, at Shelbourne, and it came upon him with a sudden sense of chagrin, that he had seen the young fish shipped from there in just such tins as these.
Nevertheless, the feeling of suspicion remained uppermost, even though the men, on their second trip, let fall no enlightening words. When they finally departed, he emerged from hiding, a look of determination on his square jawed face, and headed for the spot where he had left the canoe.
At least it was in his power to follow up the matter if he chose; and he did choose. He knew where they were going, and he knew Cobb’s Point. He could reach it before they did, and by concealing himself among the dunes, he might get a chance not only to glimpse again the face of the man he so wished to see, but also to learn something further of the party’s purpose.
As he hurried along, Steve realized that through the woods shadows were deepening on every hand, while in the glades and open spots the light had a curious greenish-saffron tint that urged him to his utmost speed. Emerging finally on the shore he saw that there was no time to lose. The sun had disappeared. Above him the sky glowed with an unnatural light, while piled up in the east were great banks of black, ragged looking clouds.
For a moment Steve hesitated, measuring with his eye the distance of those clouds. Then he dragged out the canoe, dropped it hastily into the water, climbed in and thrust away from shore. Among the islands the current was swift, but even there he did not spare his paddle. And every little while he glanced backwards apprehensively.
As he left the shelter of the islands and faced a mile-wide stretch of open water, the cloud-bank was half way up from the horizon with long, ragged streamers stretching out before it. He thrust his paddle deep and sent the canoe leaping across the oily swells; but like the tentacles of an octopus, those cloud streamers seemed to reach after him, dragging the black, ominous bulk behind. Half a mile he made, the sweat standing out on his face, his breath coming in gasps. Another quarter mile. He was paddling with every scrap of strength and skill he had, yet the clouds were overhead now, reaching out and onward inexorably.
A hundred yards from shore he hazarded a backward glance and saw the wind sweeping across the bay, a line of turbulent, tossing spray. It caught him with incredible swiftness, hurled the canoe forward, whirled it about, and before Steve could realize what was happening, he found himself struggling in the water.
He lost his paddle, but managed to retain a grip on the canoe, and swimming in a sort of daze, he finally dragged himself and it ashore. There, utterly done up, he flung himself face downward on the sand and lay for he knew not how long, drawing in the air in long, gasping gulps.
At length, still panting, he raised his head and slowly gained his feet. The surface of the bay was torn into a sea of angry, tossing whitecaps. The wind shrieked past him, driving gusts of fine spray into his face. Darkness was falling fast, relieved now and again by a vivid flash of lightning.
Uncertain whether the men would venture across in the teeth of the storm, Steve felt that if they did make the attempt they might appear at any moment. So he made haste to drag the canoe back of a mass of beach grass.
It was as well he did. Scarcely had he flung himself down beside the upturned keel and hunched his shoulders against the driving rain which had begun to pelt him, when out of the curtain of mist and shadow the dory flashed suddenly into his startled consciousness. He heard nothing of the engine; the shrieking of the wind and the first rattle of thunder drowned every sound. He simply saw, by the aid of the lightning and his straining vision, the bow of the dory, billows of foam spreading out on either side, cleaving the waves not fifty feet from shore. In another moment he heard the crunch and grating of the boat beaching, followed by a confused mingling of voices.
It was not yet absolutely dark and by this time his eyes were accustomed to the scene. Presently he could make out a number of shadowy figures bunched together and bending over. They were dragging the dory up the beach; he could tell that by their strained attitudes and their slow approach. Nearer they came to the screen of grass and nearer still, for not so much by chance as from the extreme narrowness of the point, they had landed at almost the same spot as Steve. Now he could make out the party quite clearly, black silhouettes against the grayish black of the sea behind them.
They had halted now, not half a dozen feet from his hiding place, and were bending over the dory taking out the tins. Their backs were toward him, but as Steve lay there blinded by the flashes of lightning and deafened by the rolls of thunder, he felt, somehow, that on the contents of those tins hung the solution of his mystery. If he could only find out that, and the identity of the man who had drawn him hither, he would know something of where he stood.
Though he could distinguish nothing save their outlines, his eyes had not left the four men for an instant. He even raised himself a little and parted the screen of beach grass in an effort to keep track of their movements. Presently he saw that they had straightened up. Apparently they had removed all the tins, and he wondered eagerly what would be the next step. Then, of a sudden, as they stood there, another jagged fork of light flashed through the dark storm clouds, and Steve caught his breath and narrowly escaped crying out in sheer amazement.
The blinding glare showed him two of the men erect and partly facing him; but it did more than that. It awakened memory at last. And as the blackness settled down again, thick and stifling, the rain, the wind, the whole wild, storm-swept strip of coast vanished. The darkness remained, but it was the tempered darkness of a street in Washington the night of that thrilling day over a year ago—the day after the declaration of war. Back of some iron palings loomed the outlines of the German embassy. Beside the curb stood a limousine from which two men had just alighted. As Steve, hurrying home from a belated engagement, came opposite them, their faces were illumined brilliantly for a moment by the glare of a passing headlight. One of those men was the German Ambassador himself. The other—
No wonder Steve Haddon had almost betrayed himself at what that lightning flash revealed. No wonder he asked himself breathlessly, excitedly, what sinister business could have brought that other—here.
CHAPTER VIII THE PLOT
Mechanically Steve put up one hand and brushed away the water that trickled down from his soaked hair. He was wet to the skin, but he fairly tingled all over with the thrill of his discovery. He was not mistaken; he could not be. That mental picture was much too clear to admit any doubt.
He was still ignorant of the man’s actual identity. But his presence with the ambassador that night, the friendly touch of the latter’s hand upon his shoulder, the earnest undertone of their conversation carried on in German, all pointed to an unusual degree of intimacy. And many months ago the ambassador, his staff and all his other associates, official and otherwise, were supposed to have left the country or to be safely interned.
This one had evidently escaped the net. Steve wasted no time speculating how he had done it, or where he had spent the intervening time. He was a spy, doing a spy’s work; everything pointed to that. His objective must be the shipyard, too, for there was nothing else worth destroying within a score of miles. Inwardly Haddon bitterly blamed his own stupidity in not having thoughts of that before. The tins contained powerful explosive, no doubt; enough, perhaps, to blow up both buildings and dry docks. They had planned the thing with their usual infernal care, waiting, perhaps for this very night of storm and blackness to make the attempt doubly sure. And they would succeed, the boy told himself with a dry sob of mingled rage and nervousness, unless he could outwit them.
He ground his teeth in helpless fury. He ought to be up and away immediately to carry the warning. But the plotters were so close that he could scarcely stir without detection. There was a chance that by edging back cautiously he might safely reach a point where he could take to his heels, but so much depended on him that he dared not risk it. He must wait until they moved away a little and then, by speeding down the opposite side of the point, he might gain the mainland and the shipyard ahead of them and give the alarm.
Presently another lightning flash showed up the group again, and Steve’s eyes widened in astonishment. Instead of four men there were six. Where the other two had come from he did not know, but it seemed as if they must have made their way out along the beach. So he was faced by a new difficulty. There might be others still, stationed along the way, and if he tried to reach the shipyard ahead of the gang, he was as likely as not to run straight into hostile arms.
Nevertheless, he meant to try it, for by this time he was desperate with anxiety and impatience. He was about to creep back without further waiting, when suddenly there came one of those curious lulls which occur sometimes at the very height of a storm. Abruptly the shriek of the wind died down and he could hear the voices clearly.
“—all in the guard house. As long as the storm holds there won’t be a soul around.”
“But the rain!” put in another voice with a harsh, guttural accent. “Will not that eggtinguish the fire?”
“Not this fire,” returned another confidently, and Steve recognized one of the voices he had overheard that afternoon. “There ain’t enough water up above to drown this stuff once she gets started. Besides, it’s letting up. By the time we get things going it won’t be more than a drizzle; and if the wind holds the whole shebang will go up in smoke. What we want is to get busy right—”
The rest was inaudible, scattered by the storm, which broke out again with a fresh strength. But Steve had heard enough. Fire, then, was to be their weapon, and not explosives. The tins must contain gasoline, or some even more powerful inflammable. But it made little difference in the result, for the destruction would be as great or greater. With sudden decision the boy made up his mind to delay no longer.
His every muscle tense, he waited impatiently for the next flash. The instant it had come and gone, he began to edge backward, slowly, silently, with infinite care, over the wet, yielding sand. It took a long time to worm past the length of the canoe, but after that he made better progress. At length, a hundred feet or more from the end of the point and on the opposite side, he rose to his feet and hurried along the beach toward the mainland.
Anyone who has tried walking in the dark will realize something of his difficulties. Actually Steve could not see his hand before his face, and he had not gone twenty feet before he found himself splashing in the water. He edged away from that and presently tripped and almost fell over a hummock of beach grass. Then, very swiftly, all sense of direction left him. His only guidance was the splash of waves about his ankles and the tingle of salt spray against his face.
It was a nightmare, that blind struggle through the storm; a nightmare of pelting, lashing rain, of stumbling, falling, wading through surf, of pounding over hard sand. And like a nightmare little things grew big and big things little; time seemed to stand still or stretch out into infinity. Worst of all was the blackness, thick and suffocating, that pressed upon his eyeballs and tangled about his feet. And behind that blackness there was fear. Not fear for self so much; he was past that now. The thing that dominated and urged him on, that kept him going in spite of weariness and doubt and panting breath, was fear lest he should be too late to reach his goal before the others. And in the end he was too late!
His first inkling of it was the sight of those three spots of light twinkling low over to the left. At first they meant nothing to his weary brain. Then, watching them dazedly, he realized all at once that they were electric flashlights, and with a sudden, bitter pang he understood.
The men were almost opposite him, moving rapidly along the other side of Cobb’s Point, which here was some two hundred yards across. Unhampered by the darkness, they had caught up to him, were really ahead of him, in fact, for Steve had to cross the base of the point to reach the shipyard a mile or more to the westward.
With a discouraged droop to his shoulders, the boy plodded on mechanically for a little way and then halted. The spots of light had suddenly shifted. He could still make out a faint, luminous glow, but it was obscured by moving shadows. And then it came to him that for some minutes past he had felt no water sloshing around his feet.
“It’s the mainland,” he muttered. “They’ve left the point and turned up the other shore.”
It was no time for caution and delay, and Steve went after them at once. Though his attempt to reach the shipyard first had failed, there was still a chance, though not nearly so sure, of gaining his end by following close behind the plotters and giving the alarm before they had time to carry out the details of their plan.
In the brief interval of waiting a number of other possibilities had flashed through his mind, only to be discarded. He might make his way back to Shelbourne and get help. There was a good road leading through the woods from the village which was used by workmen going to and from their quarters; a motor car could make the distance in five minutes. But Shelbourne was quite as far from Cobb’s Point as the shipyard, and there were sure to be delays in rousing people and getting out a car. He thought, too, of pushing straight through the woods from where he was and trying to hit that road, but the chances of getting lost in even that short stretch of scrub and tangled undergrowth were too great to be risked. The open beach was really the only sure way, and Steve took it without hesitation.
With stumbling, uncertain steps he felt his way across the point and gained the other shore. Far, far ahead of him, it seemed, wavered the faint glow of the flashlights, and their apparent distance startled him. He had planned to follow as close behind the plotters as he dared; it had not occurred to him that they might outdistance him altogether. With a sharp catching of his breath, he plunged forward and began to run. A moment later the lights blinked out abruptly.
CHAPTER IX THROUGH STORM AND DARKNESS
Steve fell twice and a thorny branch lashed him across the face with painful force before he got the better of that panicky dash. One of two things must have happened. Either the flashlights had been extinguished, or else the men had passed around a bend which hid the sight of them from view. The latter was perhaps the more likely; but it was the possibility that they had heard him and were lurking ahead in the darkness, awaiting his approach, that turned him cold.
It was the first time his nerve had been really shaken, but it was shaken now. The darkness or the plotters, taken separately, he could face without tremors. It was the combination of the two, the combination of the unknown, the unseen, the suspense of uncertainty, which made him shiver and brought out a clammy perspiration on his forehead.
It set him to thinking, also, of the camp and wishing with a desperate sort of longing for the presence of some of the fellows to back him up. If only Cavvy were here, with his cool head and ready wit; his sturdy fearlessness would be a tower of strength. Why, even little Shrimp Willett would be a comfort.
But they were all back there in camp with lights and warmth and cheerfulness about them, while he was here—alone. And he must go forward alone, too, no matter what that beastly blackness held in store for him. He dug his teeth into his under lip. Then his chin went up abruptly.
What had got into him? What was he thinking of? Why, at this very instant men were facing with a smile things a thousand times worse than this. Black wastes of shell-torn barrenness, tangled with barbed wire, littered with unknown pitfalls, loomed into his imagination. There were shadows brightened ominously by the flare of signal rockets or the flash of hand grenades; silences shattered by the thunder of big guns or the whining ping of sharpshooters’ bullets. And in imagination that worst horror of all—the deadly poison gas—caught him for an instant by the throat and choked him. Yet over there men looked hourly into the face of such a death and laughed, while he was afraid to take a little risk—for them!
A burning flush flamed into the boy’s face and he clenched his hands spasmodically. From his lips came a sound of mingled shame and fury and determination.
“What a cur I am!” he grated scornfully. “What a beastly coward to be downed by a little dark and wet! And I won’t be!”
Doubt and hesitation thrown aside, he sped on along the beach. Once or twice the thought of what might be waiting for him slipped past that mental barrier of resolution, but he flung it fiercely back. And when he had gone two hundred yards or so he began to breathe more easily. They could scarcely have been much further off than this when the lights vanished. Another hundred yards and he was quite certain. It was impossible in the darkness to tell where the shoreline curved, but he had a feeling that it must be about this point. A few minutes later the faint, distant gleam of light ahead confirmed his guess.
“All that stupid fuss about nothing,” he growled. “Now it’s up to me to catch up with them.”
But though he did his best, he was still a hundred yards behind when, as nearly as he could guess, they reached the wide estuary of the shipyard. There was a dock here where supplies and materials were landed, and from it a well-used road led through the regular lines of store houses, machine shops and countless other buildings.
Almost at the edge of this road the lights winked out again, but this time Haddon felt no uneasiness. Though it was still blowing hard, the rain had lessened noticeably. Some of the guards, more zealous than the rest, might venture forth, and the twinkle of strange lights would inevitably raise an alarm.
Steve paused for an instant and stared ahead, trying to penetrate the darkness. To his right, among the buildings, a few scattered electric lights shone obscurely, but they did little toward relieving the general gloom. Slipping along from shadow to shadow, the plotters would have no difficulty in gaining any part of the yard they chose for their incendiary purpose. But this same condition was a corresponding aid to him.
Having visited the yard, he knew the general direction of the guard house. Now, when the men ahead vanished into the gloom, Steve turned abruptly to his right across an open space of recently cleared land. He found it far from easy going. There were stumps and roots to trip him up; hollows and other pitfalls to avoid. With the spies so near, a fall or even a noisy stumble might ruin everything. But the boy crept on, feeling his way forward, chafing at the sense of precious minutes flying, until the dark bulk of the first building loomed before him.
Speeding a little, he passed along the rear of it, crossed a slightly brighter space, and gained the shadow of the next one. But as he reached the further corner a sound, slight yet unmistakeable, brought him to a sudden halt, breathless and tingling. The sound was the faint splintering of wood, and close upon its heels came the noise of a window being slowly lifted. With nerves like taut-strung wires, Steve crept forward and peered around the corner.
In front of the third building in the row hung one of the temporary electric globes that were dotted sparsely over the shipyard. At this distance it served merely to lighten the gloom a trifle. But Haddon, staring intently into the shadows, presently made out one which seemed darker than the rest—a shadow that moved slightly, to merge a moment later into the blacker darkness of an open window.
Just a second the boy stood petrified. From the first it had been his plan not alone to prevent the catastrophe, but to try and bring about a capture of the plotters. But the sight of one of them actually entering the building shocked him to a realizing sense of how much more vital it was to prevent the fire from getting headway. In a flash he had left his hiding and headed for the guard house on the run.
Racing across the open space between the two buildings he sped through the shadows back of the third one, circled it, and gained the open road. Instinctively he kept to the darker side of this. The padding of his sodden shoes made scarcely any sound on the hard dirt, and there was a chance that he might escape detection.
Presently the lighted windows of the guards’ bunk house loomed ahead like a beacon. There was a swift, final spurt along the silent, deserted road, a nervous, backward glance which revealed only the placid darkness unlighted by the sinister glare he feared. Then he gained the steps, stumbled up them, and flung open the door which yielded to his touch.
CHAPTER X HIS BIT
For a moment Steve leaned panting against the door, blinking in the glare of the long, brightly lighted room. He was conscious of dozen faces turning toward him, and of a man in khaki rising swiftly from a table close at hand. In that first instant he could not seem to find his voice, but his sodden, dripping, mud-caked figure, his white face, streaked across one cheek with red, his wide, dilated eyes, evidently were eloquent, almost, as speech.
“What is it?” snapped the man, moving quickly toward him. “What’s the matter?”
“Fire!” gulped Haddon thickly. “Six men—out there—” he waved one arm. “They’ve got cans of gasoline—or something. I followed them—from Loon Island. They’re spies. I—heard them plotting to—burn the yard.—”
A babel of exclamations drowned his voice. There was a noisy scrape of many chair-legs. As the men leaped up, cards dropped from laxed fingers and fluttered to the floor. A chair fell backwards with a crash.
“A plot to burn the yard!” gasped the man before him. His face paled beneath the tan; then flushed. Across one temple a tiny vein began to throb. “That can’t be so! Why—”
“It’s true, I tell you!” cried the boy desperately. “I heard them planning it. The leader’s a German spy. I saw him with von Bernstorff in Washington a year ago. One of them’s already broken into a building down the road. Unless you hurry it will be too late. You _must_ believe me!”
The man stared silently at him for an instant, one hand mechanically gripping the butt of a Colt that swung at his hip. Then he whirled around.
“Get busy, fellows,” he ordered with crisp decisiveness. “It may be a false alarm, but the kid seems pretty sure of his facts.” He turned to Steve again. “Which building is it? Third from the dock on the left? Good. The rest of ’em may be anywhere. Charley, take eight men and slip along by the dry docks. Look into every shop, but don’t waste time. The rest of you come with me. Switch on the search lights, Dick. Hold up, though. Wait about three minutes and then throw the switch. That’ll give us time to spread around. Hustle, boys!”
The admonition seemed scarcely necessary. Before he had ceased speaking each man had seized a rifle, buckled on a revolver and stood ready. Except for that first moment of startled surprise, there had been no stir or tumult. They were well disciplined and apparently realized the need for speed and caution, for when the leader issued forth, they followed him silently and swiftly.
Like twin lines of phantoms, the two squads glided into the open and sped away to their positions. It was as if they meant to make up now for the relaxed vigilance which had made this danger possible. Without a word the smaller body disappeared into the darkness toward the water front, and at a whispered command two men hurried off to take their stand at the limits of the yard nearest the village. The remainder, under the leader whose name was Kelly, scattered among the buildings to the left of the road.
Steve went with this party and presently found himself with Kelly and another man speeding toward the building near the end of the row which he had seen the spy enter. From a broken sentence or two he learned that the system of search lights had just been installed, but not formally received from the contractor, and hence had not been turned on. That explained the first darkness of the yard. But there was little time for conversation and there was to be even less. For as they dashed up to the front of the building, the windows which before had been mere patches of blackness were sharply outlined now with the lurid, flickering glow of fire.
A savage snarl came from Kelly’s throat and he leaped for the door, master key in hand. The other man ran past him, pulled up at the corner, and yanked out his gun. Twice it spat fire, the echoes of the shots crashing through the silent yard with sharp distinctness.
“Get him?” snapped Kelly, flinging open the door.
“I did,” was the grim reply.
But it passed unheeded. Steve himself only recalled it afterward; for as the door swung open a cloud of smoke belched forth and behind it they could see a leaping, quivering wall of flame. At almost the same instant there came a blinding flash and the whole yard was bathed suddenly in a flood of clear, white light.
“The extinguisher, Joe—quick!” grated Kelly. “We’ve got to stop it before this wind takes hold.” He whirled on Steve. “Chase back to the bunkhouse, kid, and tell Dick to start the pumps and sound the alarm. Run!”
Steve ran, and long afterwards he had only to close his eyes to bring back every detail of that strange scene—for it was strange beyond description. The search lights had come on, and the wide road flanked with buildings was as brilliant as the busy street of any city, but as silent as the grave and as empty of any signs of life. And yet, to the boy, that surface emptiness and silence fairly pulsed with life—vivid, vital, elemental life, which might flame up, white hot, at any instant like the fire of a volcano bursting its thin crust of ashes. And as he ran Steve waited tingling, almost breathless, for that outbreak.
It came just as he reached the bunkhouse steps—a pistol shot, sharp and snapping. There was another and another still, and out of the tail of his eye he glimpsed indistinctly the swift dash of some figures past the rear of a building across the road. Racing up the steps, Steve panted out his message. In a moment more the piercing wail of a siren screamed shrilly through the night, followed quickly by the dull throbbing of machinery.
Back in the road again, the boy paused for an instant, his heart beating fast with excitement. The sense of empty quiet had vanished utterly. Above him, from the engine-house stack, the high, piercing note of the siren rose and fell shrieking a clamorous warning. From somewhere in the yard a rifle shot came sharply to his ears. Ahead of him several guards were thudding down the road towards the clouds of red-tinged smoke which poured from the burning building with increasing volume.
He ran a few steps in that direction, slowed down for a lagging second or two, spurted again, and ducked around the corner of a big machine shop on the left of the road a little below the guard house. Back of this ran the completed portion of a high board fence topped with barbed wire which would ultimately encircle the entire yard. A moment before he had glimpsed, slipping along that fence, the figure of a man whose furtive movements roused instant suspicion. He might just possibly be one of the guards, but to Steve, remembering the three he had seen running that same way a little while before, it seemed much more likely that he was one of the spies heading for the end of the fence and freedom.
There was little time to think or plan or be afraid. It was pure instinct which sent him flying to cut the creature off—instinct, and a consuming fury against the treachery of these villains. He reached the rear of the building at almost the same instant of his quarry. There was no pause, no word; only a sob of exulting recognition jolted from Steve’s lips as the whole weight of his solid bone and muscle struck the fellow and they went down together.
In falling, he gripped the man about the body. Almost instantly he realized that his hands were more than full. The play of steel muscles beneath his fingers told him that much, even before those furious writhings began, or the fierce blows which fell upon his head and shoulders. Twice his hoarse cry for help rang out before he ducked his head defensively under the other’s arm, and tightened the clutch of interlacing fingers against the hollow of the fellow’s back.
Blows began to fall upon his neck and shoulders, fierce, heavy blows that shook his whole body and jolted the wind in gasps through his clenched teeth. The man heaved up almost to his full height, dragging the boy by sheer strength over yards of roughstones and stubble, but still he failed to loose that grip. Something sharp like the upturned spike in a forgotten piece of planking tore through Steve’s clothes and bit deeply into his thigh; his face, scraped by the rough pressure against the man’s coat, burned like fire. But he hung on doggedly in spite of pain and weariness and failing breath.
Then came a blow upon his neck, a cruel, dazing blow which made his senses reel and brought tears of pain into his eyes. Would they never come? he wondered dully. He could not strike back without loosening his hold. He tried to move his head a little to protect his neck, but again that iron fist beat down on his quivering flesh and wrenched from him a moan of agony.
His senses swam; he felt his muscles laxing. Now searching fingers slid across his shrinking neck and clutched his throat. Before the choking grip had tightened a muffled cry of pain and dull fury burst from him—a cry which, even to his dazed brain, seemed strangely echoed and prolonged. Then came an instant winking out of everything. When consciousness returned he could breathe again, but persistent hands were busy prying loose the grip of his cramped fingers.
“You can’t do it!” he panted stubbornly. “I won’t—”
“Easy, boy, easy!” said a roughly soothing voice. “Let go, son; it’s all right now. We’ve got him.”
Steve’s muscles relaxed instinctively, and as the spy’s body was drawn from his grasp, his bruised shoulders dropped back wearily against a supporting knee. Blinking, he stared upward at a vaguely familiar face bending over him. It was a moment or two before he recognized it as the face of the guard called Dick. Two others stood nearby and between them sagged the body of the prisoner, whose limpness proclaimed no gentle handling.
“Don’t let him—get away,” murmured Steve. “He’s—he’s the leader of the bunch.”
“No fear, son,” Dick assured him grimly. Then his face changed. “Are you hurt bad?” he asked anxiously.
A crooked smile twisted the boy’s lips, and he shook his head. “Not—much,” he said slowly. “I—I’ll get up—in a second. Did—did the fire get away from them?”
“Not yet,” answered the big guard. “They’re fighting it hard. At the worst it’ll take only the two buildings to windward.”
He slid an arm around Haddon and lifted him to his feet, supporting him carefully as they moved slowly back to the road. “Pure grit,” he remarked over one shoulder. “The beast had him near murdered.”
A faint flush crept up into Steve’s face, but he was not thinking of the praise, though this meant much to him. His mind had leaped a gap of many thousand miles; and in imagination he saw a battered band of men in khaki returning from a foray. Again that twisted smile curved his dry lips. He was not one of them—might never be. But he had done his best for them, and in his heart there glowed a sudden sense of humble comradeship which was its own reward.
CHAPTER XI THE LAST NIGHT
Back on the main thoroughfare of the shipyard, Steve stared about him with widening eyes. How could he ever have thought the place quiet or empty he wondered? The siren still wailed shrilly from the engine stack. But added to it now was the dull, hoarse clamor of many voices rising and falling, the roar and clatter of arriving motor cars, the thud of hurrying feet.
Along the road as far as he could see ranged a long line of empty automobiles, and fresh ones were constantly arriving. Workmen and mechanics belonging to the yard, fishermen from Shelbourne, farmers from the surrounding country who had heard and answered the alarm, poured from the cars and were marshalled into line and sent to the danger points by a file of soldiers.
“Where on earth did they come from?” the boy asked, staring at the latter.
“It’s Major Whitcomb’s bunch,” explained Dick. “He got here about five minutes ago and took charge. Come ahead in; he’ll want to see you.”
Steve was about to protest, but remembering that he would probably have to tell his story sometime, he gave way with a shrug. Dick pushed through the throng, followed by the two guards with their prisoner. A moment later the group halted before a big table in the bunk house behind which sat the officer who had charge of constructing the shipyard. He answered Dick’s salute smartly; then Steve caught the gimlet stare from a pair of cool gray eyes.
“Two more?” the officer questioned curtly.
“No, sir; only one,” returned Dick. “This is the lad who brought us warning of the plot He’s just caught the fellow, here, who he says is leader of the whole gang.”
Major Whitcomb’s face changed abruptly. The gray eyes softened a bit, and under the crisp mustache his lips laxed something of their sternness.
“You’re just the one I want to see, then,” he said in a friendly voice. “You look done up, too. Bring a chair and sit down here. Sergeant, take this man in charge and don’t let him out of your sight. Now,” he added when Steve had brought over a chair, and dropped down in it, “tell me all about it. Who are you? and how did you get mixed up in this business?”
Steve obeyed, telling his story as briefly and as clearly as he could. The officer listened intently, making an occasional note and asking many questions. When Haddon had finished, the man bent forward and clapped him on the shoulder.
“That was splendidly done, and I congratulate you,” he said warmly. “You’ve rendered a great service to the country. I needn’t tell you what an enormous amount of damage and delay would have resulted if the fire had gotten a start; you seem to have realized that perfectly. You’re quite certain of your identification of the man you saw in Washington?”
“Quite, sir. I’d be willing to swear to it.”
“You may have to later when the secret service men take hold,” said Major Whitcomb. “It’s a fine bag,” he added grimly, his glance sweeping the further end of the room where several sullen-faced men stood guarded by half a dozen soldiers and two lay helpless on mattresses with doctors bending over them. “We’ve got all six, thanks to you. Well, you’ll be wanting to get back to your friends; they’ll be anxious about you. I’ll send you over in my car at once.”
He called the sergeant and gave a crisp order. Then, with a cordial word or two of farewell, he dismissed the boy and Steve left the building. Five minutes later he was leaning back in the officer’s car speeding toward Shelbourne.
Now that there was nothing more for him to do, the inevitable reaction had come, and he could scarcely hold his head up. Every muscle ached; the cut in his thigh and that other lesser one across his face, burned and stung. With head back and eyes half closed, he listened vaguely to the remarks of the soldier at the wheel, but the mere answering of the man’s occasional question seemed like the most tremendous effort.
They had reached the outskirts of the village, and the car was just turning into the lighted main street, when a sudden shout halted the chauffeur, who slowed down and stopped. A moment later the car was surrounded by a mob of excited boys and before Steve realized what was happening, he was dragged from his seat by a dozen hands, while a score of voices poured question after question into his dazed ears.
It was Mr. Wendell who came to his rescue and to whom he conveyed the information that the fire was under control and everything practically all right. Seeing the boy’s state of exhaustion, the scoutmaster did not press him further, and the whole crowd turned back to the docks, with Haddon in the center. It was not human nature to refrain from asking questions, and little by little during their trip back to camp the essential incidents of Steve’s adventures were extracted in scraps and disjointed sentences.
The details followed next morning. A night’s rest put new life into the boy and though he hated talking about himself, he very soon found that he would have no peace until he had answered every question. It was Cavanaugh, in fact, who suggested to Mr. Wendell soon after breakfast that Haddon might as well tell his story to the assembled crowd and get it over with.
“I guess you’re right, Jim,” agreed the scoutmaster. “We really ought to save the yarn for the council fire to-night, but I don’t suppose the fellows can wait that long. As a matter of fact I feel a sort of hankering myself to know just how it all came about.”
And so, in the shade of the mess tent, with the scouts gathered about him in a close circle, Steve told his tale. He was stammering and embarrassed at first, but gradually he warmed to the narration, losing his self consciousness in the interest of recalling the strenuous hours on Loon Island and in the pursuit along the beach through the storm. To be sure, he quite failed to do himself justice and only persistent questioning brought out the details he slurred over. But Cavvy, who sat beside him, saw to it that those questions were asked and answered, and when it was over the two strolled off together.
“And to think that we laughed that night you told us about the man in the dory,” remarked the blond fellow whimsically after a brief silence.
“I suppose it sounded awfully silly the way I put it,” said Steve quickly.
“_We_ were the silly ones—regular nuts, in fact.” Cavvy sighed. “I wish to thunder I’d been with you, old kid.”
Steve laughed a little. “I wish you had. I never wanted anything more in my life when I was stumbling along that beach through the dark. I was scared then, all right. Now, if you’d only been along—”
“We’d have been scared together, I guess,” chuckled Cavvy. “Well, I wasn’t, and that’s an end to it. How does it feel to be a celebrity? You’ll have your name in the paper, and be thanked by the Government, and—”
“Slush!” Steve pounded his friend on the back and when the brief tussle subsided, he hastened to change the subject.
This was not difficult, for there were plenty of other topics to occupy them. With two weeks of camp gone, the third and last one seemed crowded with various contests and scout activities for which there had not been time before. That very afternoon an aquatic meet was scheduled, and to-morrow would be taken up by the track events which would go far toward deciding who was going to win the coveted camp emblem for the year. An all day picnic to Loon Island was also being considered, and after that the day of departure loomed disagreeably near.
It came all too soon for everyone—the end of those three golden weeks which, at the beginning, had seemed almost as if they were going to last all summer. Scarcely a boy in the crowd but longed to stretch them into six, and it was no small tribute to their new-found sense of responsibility and willingness to serve, that not one of them even made the suggestion.
They had their work to do at home—on farms, in gardens, in the woods and along the country roads searching out black walnut trees for the Government. There were War Saving stamps to sell, and all those other duties which the war had brought home to them. It had been understood in the beginning that three weeks was the utmost which could be taken from those tasks, and even around the council fire on that last evening there were no complaints.
“But just think of the years when we had a whole three months’ vacation,” sighed Cavvy whimsically, after the last song had been sung and they were moving slowly tentwards. “Those were the good old days, all right. You never appreciate what you’ve got—till you haven’t got it.” He sighed. “I s’pose you couldn’t change your mind, old man, and stay a couple of weeks with me before you go home?” he added, to Steve Haddon.
“I’m afraid not,” the big chap said regretfully. “Dad hasn’t been away from Washington even over a Sunday. He says he’s nearly driven to death and is counting on me to help him out with clerical work. I wish I could, though.”
“You don’t wish it any more than I do. But if you can’t, you can’t. Lord knows we’re doing little enough to help. Gee! but I wish I was old enough to enlist.”
“I’m going into the Navy if this war lasts two years more,” volunteered Haddon.
“You are? Same here. That’s funny, isn’t it? I hope— Well, no I don’t, either. Nobody wants it to last any longer than it has to, but I would like to get into it some way besides grubbing with a hoe and selling Liberty Bonds. See here; if you can’t come now, will you promise to visit me during Christmas vacation?”
“Sure—if you’ll spend part of it with me.”
“That’s a bargain.” In front of the tent their hands met in a firm clasp. Then Cavvy groaned. “Reveille at four—and two hours’ hard work striking tents!” he murmured. “Guess we’d better hit the hay.”
CHAPTER XII “WHAT IS SCOUTING FOR?”
A week later the camp on Long Point was only a memory—something to discuss pleasantly, perhaps, at odd moments, but of little real importance compared with the ordinary work and play of the crowd who had been there.
Work decidedly predominated with most of them. Back at Wharton, where the majority lived, they took up their self imposed duties with conscientious vigor, if not with complete enthusiasm. For it must be confessed that the average youngster hates work. There are those who believe, or imagine they do, that there is nothing a boy loves more than to be out in the dewy freshness of a summer morning, turning the “fragrant earth,” or leading an enthusiastic attack on the enemy weed.
Let such persons inform themselves from life. Early rising is only popular amongst the young when an adventure is on foot. Nine-tenths of our youthful population detest weeding, and to them the hoe is an implement of torture strangely and inexplicably neglected by the Inquisition.
It was to their credit, therefore, that the scouts of Wharton devoted themselves so conscientiously to the tasks at hand, which happened to be mainly rural. The town itself lived principally by, and for, the great mines. But in the surrounding country were many and excellent farms, and the fact that the great bulk of unenlisted men were working in shaft and smelter made the services of boys on the land more than usually welcome. Even Harry Ritter did his part, though with a good deal of surface grumbling and complaint. And Cavvy, out on his grandfather’s farm, resolutely took his share of work as it came, finding some additional comfort in the realization that the hardening muscles and increasing girth of chest would be of no small benefit to him on the football field that fall.
Of course it wasn’t all unadulterated slavery. On the contrary there were a good many relaxations. They had the weekly scout meetings to look forward to, and Mr. Wendell worked hard to make these especially attractive. Now and again they took a day off to hike through the woods in search of walnut trees. And through it all there was undoubtedly a strong feeling of satisfaction that, with the whole world working earnestly toward a single great end, they were doing something concrete to help in its attainment.
In this wise came September and the opening of school. Most of the troop attended the Wharton High School, or were in the eighth grade, and saw each other every day. Cavanaugh greatly missed Steve Haddon, who had long ago returned to his home in Washington, but he found compensation in the companionship of Bill McBride, who was a near neighbor, and had many similar tastes. Besides, between lessons, football and duties connected with the troop, he had little time to waste in lamenting the absence of even so good a friend as Haddon had come to be.
Cavvy, as senior patrol leader, was very keenly interested in the welfare and development of the troop. His ambition was to make it the best and biggest in the county, and to this end he worked hard and constantly, and was of no little aid to Mr. Wendell. There were times, however, when their ideas were very much at variance.
Had anyone asked Cavvy what he considered the qualifications of a good scout, he would probably have enumerated “pep,” keenness to get on, interest in the troop and the work generally, and the like. But back in his mind, unvoiced perhaps even to himself, he held something of the standard by which men are picked for college fraternities. He preferred the members of the troop to be more or less of good family, to be prominent in school or athletics, to be good fellows, quick, amusing, capable, and of his own class. Perhaps the scoutmaster sensed something of this. He had a quiet way of sizing up one’s mental processes which was sometimes rather disconcerting. At all events at a meeting of the troop leaders, he brought the discussion around to that very point and ended with a little lecture on the subject.
The meeting was held as usual in the scout master’s study, a room of comfortable chairs, book-lined walls, and interesting souvenirs and relics of many sorts. There were swords and daggers from the East, old flint-locks, Indian pottery, old bronzes and a multitude of other curious things which the boys were never tired of looking over. In cold weather a fire always glimmered on the broad hearth, and to-day, though this was empty, they had from force of habit gathered around it.
“One of the things I’ve noticed about a good many troops,” said Mr. Wendell, leaning back in his chair, “is a tendency to be just a little clannish. It’s perfectly natural, of course. A fellow wants his own particular friends in the troop and in proposing a member he naturally picks a boy he knows, who’s in his class, or on his team or lives next door. That’s human nature, but the result is narrowing and to my mind it defeats one of the great fundamental objects of Scouting—democracy. Take our own troop, for instance. We’ve got a corking bunch of fellows who work well and play well together. But there’s a whole great class in Wharton that we haven’t even touched.”
He paused and the boys glanced doubtfully at one another. Cavanaugh’s forehead was crinkled with a little frown.
“You mean— You think we ought to take in fellows from the—mine families?” he asked.
Mr. Wendell smiled.
“Why not?”
“But they’re mostly Da—er—Italians and Poles and all that,” protested Cavvy.
The scoutmaster’s smile deepened.
“Well, what of it?”
Cavanaugh flushed faintly.
“But they’re mostly an awful lot of roughnecks. Besides, they don’t know anything about scouting, and I don’t believe they’d want to belong if they were asked.”
Mr. Wendell crossed his legs and linked his strong, brown fingers around one knee.
“I think you’re mistaken—just a little,” he said quietly. “And even if you’re right—even if they don’t know or care anything about it, I think we ought to make an effort to take scouting to them. The majority are boys from poor families. Some of them work in the mines all day. They haven’t many pleasures or relaxations except what they find on the street corners at night. The scouting program would be a revelation, and I feel sure would save many of them from getting into idle, useless, even vicious ways.”
His eyes twinkled and a smile curved the corners of his mouth.
“I don’t want you to think I’m preaching. I know perfectly well that none of you look on the troop as a missionary work, or a means of reformation—and it isn’t. The normal fellow joins because he thinks he’s going to have a good time, or because he’s interested in some particular feature of the program. That’s as it should be; I’ve no kick coming there. As you get into it, you grow more and more interested, and end by doing willingly what before you’d probably have thought a beastly bore. We’ve got through a lot of hard work together this summer, and yet I think we’ve had some pretty good times.
“Don’t misunderstand, either, what I’ve just said. The troop is yours, and you have the right of taking in or turning down any one you choose. I’d just like to have the doors a little wider open. Personally I don’t believe you’d find a single drawback in taking in some of these fellows. Human nature is the same everywhere, and a boy from the shaft or the smelter has in him the makings of just as good a scout as one from—High School.”
He glanced at the clock and then stood up. “I guess there’s nothing else to-day. Just think over what I’ve said and discuss it amongst yourselves. Next meeting you’ll have a chance of voting on that young Tallerico chap who applied two weeks ago. I suppose it was he who put this into my head. But remember this: whatever you do, do it because you feel you want to and it’s right, and not because you think I’d like you to.”
CHAPTER XIII THE TALLERICO KID
The little group of scouts filed out of the room and left the house quietly enough, but once in the street their tongues were loosened.
“I think he’s wrong,” declared Cavvy, in his impulsive, rather positive manner. “You know what kind of a bunch that mine gang is. I’ll bet a soda you couldn’t haul one into the troop with a rope.”
“Still, it’s just as Mr. Wendell says,” remarked Clay Marshall. He was tall and rather quiet, and took his new position as leader of the Owl Patrol very seriously. “They’ve never had a chance.”
“They’ve never asked for one,” returned Cavanaugh. “This—er—Tallerico is the first one I ever heard of who showed the slightest desire to belong.”
Bill McBride laughed.
“Well, I don’t know as you can blame them for that. You know how much the fellows run in sets in this town. I don’t suppose even those chaps would try and push themselves in where they think they’re not wanted.”
Cavvy frowned impatiently.
“That’s not the point,” he retorted. “They haven’t tried; anyway they’re not the sort we want. Can you imagine Red Garrity a scout?” he added triumphantly.
There was a momentary silence and into the minds of those present there flashed a picture of the ragged, red-haired, pugnacious young tough in question. A leader of his kind, he smoked and swore and lost no chance to jeer openly at the scouts whenever they crossed his path.
“Humph!” grunted Ted Hinckley. “At present he don’t seem very promising. But I’ll tell you this, old man; if he ever got the scout bug, he’d make a crackerjack.”
“You make me sick,” sniffed Cavvy. “He’d never get the scout bug, as you call it—never in a thousand years.”
By this time they had reached the center of the town and paused in front of the Post Office.
“Well, that don’t apply to Tallerico,” remarked Harry Ritter. “He has applied and he wants to get in.”
“I can’t say I want him either,” declared Cavanaugh stubbornly. “What does a wop like that care about scouting, I’d like to know.”
Ritter pursed up his lips. He rarely lost a chance of arguing.
“None of us knew much about it when we first joined,” he returned. “We picked it up afterwards. He doesn’t seem half bad to me, even if he is a foreigner.”
“That’s just it!” Cavvy caught him up hotly. “He _is_ a foreigner. What do you s’pose he knows or cares about the flag, or patriotism or anything like that? Those fellows don’t give a hang about this country. Dad says they all come over here just because they can make more money than at home. As soon as they’ve saved up enough they hustle back to spend it over there. They’re not Americans and never will be, even if a few of them do get naturalized. We don’t want that kind in the troop.”
A brief silence fell upon the boys, some of whom looked convinced, others doubtful. Jim Cavanaugh’s statements, even when slightly illogical as at present, frequently carried the crowd, for he was the type which dominates by sheer force of temperament. Besides, his father was superintendent of the iron mines, and one whose opinion carried weight. Nevertheless, Ritter refused to relinquish his stand so readily.
“Maybe that’s true of some of them, but why shouldn’t this fellow be an exception,” he persisted. “I was talking to him last night and he doesn’t seem like a foreigner. He speaks English all right, and he’s got some good ideas about scouting. Besides, you know what Mr. Wendell said.”
Cavvy frowned impatiently. He had an uncomfortable feeling of being somehow in the wrong, but opposition always roused all that was stubborn and contentious in his disposition.
“Of course I do,” he snapped. “I was there, wasn’t I? You’ll remember, perhaps, that he also said the troop was our own and that we have the right to take in or keep out whoever we choose. Of course you fellows can do as you please, but I know what I’m talking about and how I’m going to vote. Come ahead, Micky; the whistle blew five minutes ago.”
Without waiting for a reply, he turned away and with Bill McBride, walked briskly down the street. His temper was distinctly ruffled, the more so, perhaps, from the realization that his arguments had been far from strong. He was also annoyed and disgruntled at Mr. Wendell for having brought up the subject at all, and particularly for the attitude he had taken. For a time he walked on silently. Then he glanced at his companion.
“Fat’s such an ass,” he remarked.
McBride smiled and shrugged his shoulders.
“He does love to hear himself talk,” he chuckled. “He likes it almost as well as eating. Still, of course there is a little something in what he said. I suppose we might broaden out some without hurting ourselves. A roughneck like Garrity would be the limit, but this—”
He broke off with an exclamation of interest. “There he is now!”
“Huh? What—who?”
“That Tallerico kid over there in front of the old Jessup house.”
Cavvy frowned and glanced quickly across the street. Their short cut home took them through the older portion of town—a region of ancient, tumble-down houses, once the abode of wealth and fashion, but long since given over to laborers and workmen in the mines.
Amongst these dingy, decrepit tenements the Jessup house stood forth with a faded, forlorn distinction. In its simple, dignified proportions, in the graceful fanlight above the door, and in certain delicate bits of molding and carving, there remained traces of the colonial mansion where General Washington had slept more than once in the early winters of the Revolution.
On the threshold, one hand resting on the latch, stood a boy of fourteen or so, short, square-built, with dark, wavy hair and olive skin warmly tinged with red. His lips were half parted and his dark eyes rested eagerly on the faces of the two across the street, whom he had apparently just noticed. But as their glances quickly shifted, a shadow swept across his face and jerking open the door, he disappeared within.
Cavanaugh felt a sudden twinge of conscience, and to elude it he burst into abrupt denunciation.
“It’s a darn shame about that house!” he exclaimed hotly. “Think of a place where Washington slept let go to rack and ruin that way and turned into a tenement for dagos! Any other town would buy it and keep it up decently. They’d be proud of it. Look at those windows—every blooming one broken and patched up with paper and stuff. It’s disgusting!”
“There’s two whole ones,” remarked McBride—“up-stairs to the left.”
“What do they amount to?” sniffed Cavvy. “It’s an accident they’re not busted like the rest, that’s all. I’ve half a mind to get after dad and see if he can’t wake up the mayor or somebody to do something about it. Why, when I was down at Mount Vernon last year—”
But Micky wasn’t particularly interested in Mount Vernon. He had heard all about that trip once and was more intent now on getting home to lunch than working up indignation on any subject. He listened carelessly, occasionally punctuating Cavvy’s tirade with a joke, but when they paused at his gate his mind had veered to another subject altogether.
“Come on down after lunch and bring your football,” he called, from half-way up the walk. “We’ll round up the bunch and have a little practice.”
“All right,” returned Cavanaugh absently.
Intent upon his new-born project, he presently burst into the Cavanaugh dining room, smoothing his rebellious crop with one hand and wiping the back of the other—which had escaped the towel—against his coat.
“Where’s dad?” he exclaimed, stopping short. “He hasn’t gone yet, has he?”
“He couldn’t get home to lunch to-day,” explained his mother quietly. “He telephoned that he’d have to stay at the mine.”
“That’s funny.” The boy dropped into his chair and unfolded his napkin. Almost never, except at the time of the big cave-in three years before, had his father failed to run home in the car for their mid-day meal. “There hasn’t been an accident, has there?”
“No; it’s something about the men. There’s been some trouble amongst them for several days, and—”
“Ginger!” Cavvy straightened up. “Maybe it’s those anarchists. Why don’t they run them out of town? All they do is to try and upset everything and make trouble for the Government. I bet they’re paid by the Germans!”
Mrs. Cavanaugh smiled. She was used to her son’s outbursts.
“Running them out of town isn’t as easy as it sounds,” she said. “Unfortunately, some of them belong here and have their rights like any other citizens.”
“Well, the mayor might do something,” contended Cavvy, applying himself to his lunch. “Does dad think there’s going to be trouble?”
“He didn’t say, but I’m afraid he’s a little worried. They’re to have some kind of a mass meeting this afternoon, and you know how easily those foreigners are sometimes swayed. We’ll hope for the best, though. They’ve always been well treated and seemed contented, and with all this extra work ahead I don’t see how they can possibly complain.”
Her anxiety, and the desire to keep it suppressed, caused her to forget for the moment her intention of forbidding Jim to go near the mine that afternoon. When the omission occurred to her, ten minutes after lunch was over, the boy was nowhere to be found. He had been expecting something of the sort, and had lost no time in departing quietly by the side door. A convenient lane brought him quickly to the rear of the McBride house, where a yodel summoned Micky.
“Hustle,” said Cavvy briefly. “There’s something doing down at the mine and we want to be in on it.”
McBride nodded.
“I heard ’em talking it at lunch. Do you s’pose they’re going to have a strike, or something?”
“Don’t know; they’ll be fools if they do. Anyhow, there’s going to be a mass meeting this afternoon, and maybe they’ll decide then.”
CHAPTER XIV QUICK WIT AND COURAGE
Departing in haste, with ears purposely dulled against possible parental voices, the boys headed for the mine by the shortest possible route. The streets were singularly bare for a Saturday afternoon. Here and there a woman talked anxiously to another over a fence-rail, or there was a glimpse of children playing in a back yard. But there were scarcely any men to be seen.
“Gee! I hope we’re not too late,” commented Cavanaugh, as they turned the last corner and started up a steep, narrow street leading to the open space in front of the mine property. Suddenly he stopped. “Listen!” he said abruptly.
For a long moment they stood motionless. Down the narrow thoroughfare swept the dull, low, pulsating murmur of many voices rising and falling. The windows of the houses at the end of the street were filled with people all staring in the same direction.
They were vaguely stirred and a trifle uneasy. What little they had heard of the disturbances of the past week had passed mostly over their heads. Cavvy merely knew that certain outside agitators had been haranguing the men for the last few days. As they panted up the slope and reached the level they paused, startled at what lay before them.
The wide, open space was packed with men. Hundreds and hundreds in their greasy, ore-grimed working clothes, a week’s stubble, darkening their already swarthy faces, stood shoulder to shoulder in close-packed masses. That ominous rumble of voices had ceased. Only here and there sounded sibilant whispers or hoarse, low-voiced comment. For the most part they were listening intently to a speaker who stood on a box over by the big flag pole in the center of the space.
Cavvy could not see the man clearly, nor could he get the thread of what the fellow was saying. But there was a quality of harsh, sneering dominance in the stranger’s voice to which he took an instant dislike. He glanced at Micky, who had drawn closer to him.
“Come on over to those steps where we can see something,” he whispered, and, turning quickly, he began to skirt the crowd.
McBride nodded silently. The steps in question were already pretty well filled with late comers, but by dint of a little squeezing the two boys managed to gain a foothold where they could overlook the crowd.
The square was a familiar spot transformed. Every window was filled with heads. Every foot of standing room was occupied by that close-packed mass of men, oddly silent in contrast to the shouting, gesticulating orator. And suddenly, to Cavvy’s wrought up imagination, instead of an ordinal crowd of workmen, many of whom he knew by sight if not by name, the throng became a mob of strangers waiting now only the word to launch into ravening destruction.
For a moment it all seemed incongruous, impossible. Mechanically his eyes travelled up the tall, white pole and rested dazedly on the Stars and Stripes rippling in the hot September sun just as it had gleamed there yesterday and the day before. Only that seemed real. His heart swelled unaccountably, then leaped driving the blood into his face as a phrase from the man on the box below stung into his consciousness.
“That flag up there—what does it mean to you?” the fellow shouted, with an upward fling of one long arm. “Does it stand for _your_ country, or for a government _you_ have any share in? No! A thousand times no! It’s like the Union Jack, or the French Tricolor—a symbol of tyrants who take the bread out of your mouths and fatten like leeches on your toil.”
He paused to sweep a long lock of dark hair out of his eyes. Then he reached out and dexterously loosened the rope halliards. Cavvy caught his breath.
“You’re dirt to them, that’s all,” continued the speaker loudly. “They work you for their own selfish ends and when you cry out, what do they tell you? It’s for the flag! Bah!” He was manipulating the ropes skillfully. Aghast, incredulous, Cavvy saw the flag quiver, dip and droop into a crumpled mass as it was dragged swiftly downward.
“The flag—look at it!” screamed the agitator, deftly loosening the bunting from the halliards and crushing it in both hands.
A startled murmur rose from the crowd, but Cavvy did not hear it. He bent forward, face white and strained, eyes glittering. Unconsciously the fingers of one hand dug into McBride’s shoulder until the boy winced.
“Look at it!” repeated the hateful voice triumphantly. “The symbol of tyrants! There’s no real flag but the emblem of universal brotherhood. This thing—this rag, is fit for nothing but the dirt, to be ground under foot.”
“No!” cried Cavvy hoarsely. “Stop!”
The words which had so infuriated him were scarcely spoken when out of the crowd packed around the flag-pole there leaped a boy—short, square-built, olive skinned. Like a flash he reached up and snatched the crumpled bunting from the hands of the startled orator, ducked under the arm of a burly miner who was too surprised to stop him, and disappeared into the throng.
Cavvy caught his breath and straightened. From his point of vantage he could follow the progress through the crowd of this new actor in the drama. Ducking, squirming, wriggling, the boy eluded a dozen hands stretched out to stop him. Away from those immediately surrounding the agitator, his progress was easier. So swift had been his action that many of those on the outskirts of the crowd had not even seen it. They did not know what it was all about. Suddenly Cavanaugh clutched McBride and dragged him down the steps.
“He’s getting away with it. It’s that Tallerico kid. Come ahead, quick. Maybe he’ll need some help.”
Their progress toward the point where Cavvy thought the Italian boy would merge was more or less hindered. The crowd was suddenly in motion, roughly pushing in to gain a nearer view of what was going on about the flag-pole. A bedlam of voices chattering half a dozen tongues took the place of that former tense silence.
At last, bursting from the crowd, Cavanaugh caught a glimpse of Tallerico darting down an alley, and impulsively he followed. Several half-grown mine boys were headed in the same direction, and he determined grimly that if they meant to stop the Italian they would not do it unhindered.
Down the alley he ran with Micky at his elbow. They passed the mine boys and presently emerged unopposed into the street beyond in time to see Tallerico disappearing through the doorway of the Jessup house.
“He’s got away,” said Cavvy with a sigh of relief.
He slowed down, and McBride paused with him.
“Some kid!” exclaimed the latter. “Took nerve to put across a stunt like that.”
Cavanaugh did not answer. He moved slowly on, and at the door of the old house he paused, a curious expression on his face.
“I’m going in,” he stated abruptly, a touch of defiance in his glance.
The hall was dark and rather smelly. In the days of Washington it had been spacious and beautiful, but it could scarcely be called so now. Dirt streaked the walls; odds and ends of broken furniture cluttered the door. Four doors opened out of the hall, all of which were closed, and Cavvy hesitated doubtfully at the foot of the graceful, curving, battered staircase.
Then from above, punctuating the stillness, came faintly the sound of suppressed panting. Cavvy took the stairs at a run, McBride following at his heels. An instant later he paused on the threshold of a room so different from anything he had expected that he was fairly speechless with surprise.
It was long and low, with three windows, two looking out on the street. The glass in them was clear and unbroken; instinctively he realized that these must be Micky’s “two whole windows” of that morning. The woodwork shone immaculate in its creamy whiteness; the floor was clean. A table and a few chairs were ranged against the wall. There were other things, but just now Cavvy had no eye for detail.
From the wall above the white mantel—aloof, majestic, a touch of kindliness about the eyes, a hint of world-weariness in the tight-lipped mouth—looked down the face of Stuart’s Washington. Below the picture, startled, defiant, a little afraid, stood the Tallerico kid, the rescued flag still clutched tightly in his arm.
As recognition dawned, his tense expression faded. His eyes softened, and with a long, relieved sigh his lips parted in a flashing smile.
“Oh!” he said. “It’s—it’s _you_!”
Cavvy gulped.
“Yes, it’s us,” he answered, oblivious of grammar. “We thought you might need some help, but—” He broke off and moved swiftly toward the boy. “It was great—simply great!” he exclaimed a little incoherently. “We got there late and were away on the outside. When that—that _beast_ grabbed the flag, I—I—”
“I heard you,” said Tallerico simply. “It—it helped.”
Cavvy stared. “Helped?”
“Yes,” nodded the other, smiling. “It came sudden, you know. I had not thought the—the _faccino_ would do the thing he did. When you cry out it—it wake me up. I know you were too far away to help; and so I did quickly what you would do if you were near.”
A slow flush crept up into Cavvy’s face. He bit his lip, and then one hand reached out and caught the smaller boy by the shoulder. For an instant he stood there silent. Then:
“Let’s fold up the flag,” he said rather gruffly. “And while we’re doing it you can tell me about this room. It’s got me guessing.”
“It is the room of the great Washington,” explained Tallerico promptly—“his special room. He was here in the Revolution. You see, my father says General Washington is the greatest man in the world, and when he find out about this room he fix it up and keep it nice. Sometimes—” He hesitated and then went on rather shyly. “Sometimes, when I come here by myself and read the history and look at his picture, it makes it all so real as if, almost, I could turn around and—and see him standing by the window, or—” He broke off with an embarrassed laugh. “Maybe that sounds foolish to you.”
Cavanaugh shook his head; there was a very curious expression on his face.
“No,” he said slowly at length, “it doesn’t. I’ll tell you what I do think, though,” he went on briskly. “You’re one good scout, Tallerico. There isn’t a fellow in the troop who’ll beat you.”
The dark eyes glowed. “You mean—”
“Sure thing!” Cavvy’s lips parted in a friendly grin. “There’s a troop meeting next Friday, and— Well, I guess he’ll see, won’t he, Micky?”
CHAPTER XV THE SCOUT RALLY
Mr. Wendell clamped some papers carefully together and laid them within the covers of his troop record book.
“Now that we’ve gone over the matter of the Liberty Loan,” he said, leaning back in his chair, “there’s one more piece of business before we take up our final practice for the rally to-morrow. I mean the application of young Frank Tallerico for membership in the troop. I don’t think I need say much about him. He’s been present for several meetings and you’ve had time to size him up and talk over the matter amongst yourselves. There is just one thing, though. You know I don’t wish to influence you in any way, but for some time it has seemed to me we might very well broaden out and take in more fellows like Tallerico—boys who work or who come from laboring families. I’ve already talked about this with the troop leaders, so I won’t say any more now. The meeting is open for nominations.”
As he ceased speaking there was a little stir amongst the scouts seated on a long row against the opposite wall. The scoutmaster, apt at reading expressions, sensed a slight feeling of tension and was prepared, as he had expected to be, for a marked difference of opinion. Clay Marshall, serious and full of responsibility, seemed on the point of getting on his feet. But before he or any one else had time to make a move, Jim Cavanaugh sprang up.
“I nominate Frank Tallerico for membership,” he said abruptly.
“Second the motion,” echoed McBride, from his place at the head of the Eagle Patrol.
There was a murmur of surprise from several quarters. Stout Harry Ritter’s jaw gaped.
“Well, of all the fakes,” he muttered to Ted Hinckley beside him. “Why, not more than a week ago he wouldn’t listen to such a thing.”
John Wendell’s face expressed neither his surprise nor his gratification.
“You’ve all heard the nomination,” he said. “Will you have a standing vote, or ballot?”
“Standing vote,” suggested several voices at once.
“Very well. Those in favor of the nomination please stand. Those opposed remain seated.”
With a stir, a rustle and much scraping of feet, the entire troop arose. The scoutmaster smiled.
“Fine,” he said. “I think you’ve done the right thing, fellows. I’ve an idea you’ll find Tallerico has the makings of a good scout.”
“He has,” said Cavanaugh emphatically. “May I say a word, sir? It’s just this,” he added with some embarrassment, his glance traveling swiftly over the line of scouts. “As Fa—er—Ritter says, not very long ago I didn’t want him in the troop at all. He’s a foreigner, and I didn’t think he knew or cared anything about scouting for the flag or—or anything. I was dead wrong. You all know about what happened in front of the Smelter buildings last Saturday. A beastly anarchist was gassing the crowd and he pulled down the flag and was going to tramp on it. Very likely you’ve heard that a boy jumped out of the bunch and grabbed the flag and got away with it. It broke up the meeting and afterward the men ran the fellow and his gang out of town. Well, that boy was Tallerico, and if he don’t make as fine a scout as anybody here, I’ll—I’ll—”
Just what Cavvy would have done in that event remained unknown. A roar of applause, punctuated by stamping feet and whistling, broke from the troop and drowned his voice. Long before order was restored, Cavanaugh had resumed his seat and recovered his usual composure.
“I suppose you’re going to train him yourself for the Tenderfoot exams,” commented Ted Hinckley slyly.
“He don’t need it,” returned Cavvy coolly. “He’s pretty near ready for the second class, which is more than _some_ people can say.”
There was another laugh and then Mr. Wendell intervened. In a few words he expressed his pleasure and appreciation of Tallerico’s act, which, he said, any of those present would have been proud to have performed, and then took up the practice for the rally.
This was to be a small affair confined to members of the troop. With so much war work, and the Liberty Loan so near, there was no time for anything elaborate. The several patrols were simply to compete together in various scout stunts on the village Green, and there would also be two or three combined maneuvers with staves and first aid materials for the entertainment of any onlookers who might be present.
Naturally there was a lot of good natured rivalry amongst the patrols. Each leader was determined that his particular group should come off with the most honors, and there had been considerable secret practicing at odd moments for two weeks past. The meet was scheduled for three o’clock, and there were no late comers.
The events were started with a dressing race in which there were six entrants, two from each patrol. A distance was marked off and divided into six narrow imaginary lanes, along which at regular distances the contestants laid their shoes, leggins, coat, belt and hat. At a given signal each scout started down the course, putting on his things in the order named. The one to reach the tape first, provided he was properly dressed and his equipment in perfect order, was the winner.
Naturally a good many ludicrous happenings occurred and evoked much laughter both from the scouts and the people lining the course. Bill McBride came in third, and Shrimp Willett, also a member of the Eagle Patrol, took first honors. He was small, wiry and quick as chain lightning, and the way he seemed to slide into his garments as if they had been oiled, provided much entertainment to the bystanders.
“That kid don’t need much time in the morning,” commented one of the latter. “Believe me, he could get dressed on the way down stairs.”
McBride, who was standing near the line, smiled unconsciously at the man’s amusement. A moment later he heard a voice behind him sneer:
“Baby’s tricks! Gee-whiz! Ain’t they got nothing better to do with their time?”
Turning abruptly, he met the contemptuous stare of a slouching, shabbily dressed fellow a year or two older than himself, who lounged indolently against a tree. A faded cap perched rakishly on a mop of brilliant red hair; his eyes were blue and hard and wide open. From one corner of his mouth there dangled the butt of a cigarette.
Micky flushed, and his lips parted for a swift retort. But at that moment the signal sounded for the next event and he had to hurry off.
When he passed near that portion of the Green again the obnoxious “Red” Garrity was gone. Another boy stood there, however, whom McBride had sometimes noticed in his company. He frowned, and then he caught an odd, almost wistful questioning in the other’s eyes which puzzled him. None of that crowd of roughnecks had ever shown the slightest interest in scout doings except to hoot and jeer at the troop when they met in the street. There had been more than one case of solitary scouts or small boys in pairs who had been roughly treated by the hoodlums under the leadership of the red haired chap. With this in mind, Micky was just turning away when the other boy took a quick step forward.
“You—you didn’t win that last race, did you?” he said hesitatingly.
The remark was obviously made for the sake of creating talk. But McBride was naturally a friendly chap, and just now he was a little curious to know what was in the other’s mind. So he answered pleasantly, and quite a little conversation ensued.
“Hanged if he don’t seem really interested,” thought the patrol leader, as he went off presently to oversee his candidate for the firelighting contest. “He certainly talks that way. I don’t know why he shouldn’t be, either. Those fellows don’t seem to have much to do except bum around street corners, and I can’t see any fun in that.”
Twice afterwards he paused to chat with the boy, whose name was Conners. Then came the final exhibitions, and when it was all over Micky had to hurry home to look after some chores which must be done before supper.
His patrol had won out by a narrow margin, and he was in high spirits as he took a short cut through a rather slummy part of town. Swinging briskly along the narrow street, he entertained himself by recalling some of the amusing happenings of the afternoon. Fat Ritter had been particularly funny in the one-legged race, and Micky was thinking how he would josh the fellow next time they met, when he suddenly realized that a few hundred yards ahead three figures were lined up against a factory wall, watching him intently.
One of them was Conners; another he did not know by name. The third was swaggering Red Garrity. There was something unmistakably ominous in their attitude of quiet waiting. Things he had heard of as happening to scouts at the hands of this red haired hooligan and his followers flashed into Micky’s brain, and for a second his pace faltered and he almost stopped.
Then abruptly his head went up and his jaw squared. Swiftly he resumed his stride and came on steadily. His lips were firm, his eyes set straight ahead; and though it must be confessed that his heart was beating rather rapidly, he did not show it.
CHAPTER XVI ROUGHNECK GARRITY
When Red Garrity left the Green, he sauntered down a side street to a small tobacco store where he bought a package of cheap cigarettes. Outside the door he met Shrimp McGowan and the two lounged on a corner for half an hour or so before deciding to indulge in a soda. This also took some time and when it was finally over they strolled toward the section of town that was filled with factories and cheap dwellings in a languid search for Chick Conners.
In the end it was Conners himself who did the finding. Speeding homeward from the Green, he overtook the two cronies dawdling along in front of a factory. His appearance met with slightly aggrieved inquiries.
“Where you been all afternoon?” demanded Garrity.
“Yes,” chimed in McGowan, “we’ve been looking all over town for you.”
Conners sniffed. “You couldn’t have looked very hard,” he commented. “I just come from seeing the boy scouts on the Green.”
Garrity hitched up a frayed suspender and sneered.
“Boy scouts!” he repeated in a scornful tone. “You must be terrible hard up, Chick, to go hanging around that bunch of dubs.”
Conners flushed a little.
“Aw, I wasn’t hanging around ’em,” he protested. “I was just watching ’em do them stunts.”
“Stunts! Do you call them loony kid games stunts? Taking off their clothes and then seeing which can put ’em on quickest! I ain’t very shy of time, but would you catch me wasting it on that rot? Nix!”
Conners’ thin lips expanded in a grin.
“If you wasn’t watching ’em yourself how’d you get wise to what they was doing?” he countered.
Garrity took a long pull at the butt of a cigarette and flicked it into the street. Then he turned on Conners, chin thrust out aggressively.
“I don’t need no lifetime, like some guys, to catch on to what’s doing,” he remarked. “A glance while I was passing along the Green was plenty. Besides, I seen enough of ’em long before I come to this slow burg—parading around in their cute little uniforms an’ peddling stamps an’ the like. New York’s full of ’em.”
He pronounced it New Yoick. And as he swaggered there with legs wide apart, hands thrust deep into trousers’ pockets, shabby cap cocked on one side of an untidy mass of carroty hair, it was not hard to guess where he hailed from. Chick Conners eyed him with the admiring gaze of a satellite, beneath which was a touch of doubt and a little hint of protest.
“Maybe that’s right when they’re all dolled up with their coats on an’ everything,” he said. “But they ain’t always like that. A guy was telling me they had darn good fun at their meetings, and in summer they go off to camp, and—”
“Listen at him, Shrimp!” cut in Garrity with a loud laugh. “Don’t he talk up nice. You might think he was hankering to be a boy scout himself.”
Conners flushed scarlet, hesitated, and then his shoulders squared.
“Well, s’posing I was,” he retorted with a sort of uneasy defiance. “I don’t see what difference it makes to you.”
Garrity bent suddenly toward him, chin thrust out, eyes angry and threatening.
“You don’t, eh?” he snorted. “Well, let me tell you something, Conners. You go fooling around them boy scouts, and you’re all off with me. I don’t pal around with that kind of a softy. You’d look good in one of them play soldier suits, you would. Here comes one of ’em now. Ain’t he cute? Don’t forget to s’lute your brother scout, Chick.”
With mouth still sneering, he stepped back beside McGowan who lounged against the wall. After a moment’s hesitation Conners ranged himself with the others, and with varying degrees of expression they watched the approach of the boy in khaki who had just swung the corner half a block away.
He was about fifteen, younger and slighter than Red Garrity, but with a trim, erect carriage which was in marked contrast with the other’s slouch. On his left sleeve was a first class patrol leader’s badge. His clothes were neat and well brushed and his whole equipment immaculate.
He walked briskly with an easy, springy stride, the corners of his lips curving in a reminiscent smile. Suddenly he saw them. The smile vanished; a look of surprise and uncertainty came into his face; he almost stopped. Then he came on again, but with lips pressed tightly together and much of the spring gone from his movements.
"It will not speak; then I will follow it," Hamlet was just remarking on the stage.
"O-o-o-h-h-h!" responded Ethan, in something more pronounced now than a sigh. His voice trembled and quavered, and seemed to gather force as on it went.
"Wake him up, Jock," whispered Ben.
"Stick a pin in him. He'll spoil the play," whispered Bert.
Jock turned to shake the boatman lightly and strive to restore him by gentle means, but his efforts were not required; for one of the small boys seated directly behind Ethan acted promptly, and at once produced results as startling as they were unexpected.
CHAPTER XXIX.
AFTER THE TRAGEDY.
The mischievous lad had been one of those who had been regaling themselves during the performance with peanuts, and the mark which Ethan presented was more than his youthful spirit could resist. Leaning forward, he quickly dropped into the wide-open mouth of the slumbering boatman one of his choicest bits, and before Jock could touch the man, the explosion came.
Ethan was instantly awake, and coughing, almost strangling, stared wildly about him. For a moment even the somewhat pessimistic views to which Hamlick was giving utterance on the stage were ignored by the audience, and the noisy boatman was the observed of all observers.
His efforts were so violent that either strangulation or relief was bound to result, and as the latter came, Ethan turned sharply and looked behind him. The demure face of the lad who had been the means of his somewhat sudden awakening did not even glance at him, and after a brief pause Ethan solemnly resumed his seat, and Hamlick proceeded with his misty surmisings.
Perhaps the play by this time had gained full headway, and nothing could interfere with its progress. At all events, no further interruptions occurred, save those of a minor character, and after a time the end came. The audience then solemnly filed out from the room, and soon few were left besides our party and those who had taken part in the play.
In spite of the ludicrous events which had interfered somewhat with the solemnity of the occasion, the boys were impressed with the amount of study which Tom and some of his companions had bestowed upon the parts assigned them. As Hamlick himself came forth from behind the scenes he was warmly greeted by Jock, and complimented upon the success he had attained.
"And do you really think we did it all right?" inquired Tom, eagerly.
"We have had a most enjoyable evening," replied Bob, soberly. "I can't understand yet why it was that you selected such a play for a popular audience."
"That was the schoolmaster's doings," said Tom. "I thought myself it was almost too difficult a piece; but he told us to get something good while we were at it, and something it would pay us to remember, so we chose 'Hamlet.' We give something almost every year, you see. Last year we gave the trial scene from 'Pickwick Papers,' but the folks here didn't seem to see the fun in it. They took it all in sober earnest, and never laughed from the beginning to the end. So this year we thought we'd try something in the tragedy line."
"Where do you get all the books you read, Tom?" inquired Bob.
"Some of them are in our school library and some the minister lends to us. We don't have very much besides history. I'm grateful to you," he added, turning to Bert as he spoke, "for hearing me speak my part up in the camp. It did me a sight of good."
"Don't mention it," said Bert, hurriedly.
Tom's reading had become a serious matter with our boys. His attainments had been so unlooked for, and, as far as the solid work was concerned, he had done so much more than they, that no one was inclined to belittle him now, no matter how much the young boatman's lack of familiarity with the manners and customs of "city folks" had impressed them upon their arrival at the camp.
"Heow was it? Pooty fair, I judge," said Ethan, who now approached the group, asking and answering his own question at the same time.
"The young people are to be congratulated upon the serious study they have given Shakespeare's masterpiece," said Mr. Clarke, before any of the boys could reply.
"Glad to hear ye say it," responded Ethan, who, in spite of his apparent contempt for Tom's studies, was nevertheless interested far more deeply than he cared to show. "I don' know much abeout sech things myself," he continued. "I never read one o' Dickens's plays, nor Shakespeare's neither, for that matter. I had to work fur a livin' in my young days; but Tom here, he has lots o' time, and he jist keeps his nose in a book pretty much all winter. What d'ye think o' it? Will it do him any harm?" he inquired of Mr. Clarke, somewhat anxiously.
"Not a bit, not a bit," replied Mr. Clarke, cordially. "In fact, I think I know of some young people who might profit by his example."
"I never did think there was sech a sight o' difference between city folks and country folks. Neow ye've seen this same performance in the place where you live, I take it?"
"Yes," replied Mr. Clarke.
"An' ye really think the young folks here hev done it abeout as well as the folks down to New York, do ye?"
"There were differences, of course. You must expect that."
"Of course; of course," said Ethan, delightedly. "Mebbe ye'd like to go over to Mis' Brown's. The young folks have gone there. They're to have some ice cream, I b'lieve. 'Twon't cost ye much, fur it's only eight cents a dish, two fur fifteen."
As it was not late, the invitation was eagerly accepted, an added zest being given when it was learned that the profits from the sale of the cream were to be added to those of the play, and that all were to be expended for the improvement of the walks in the little hamlet. The party accordingly made their way down the rough stairway and along the street, Tom having previously left them, and soon arrived at "Mis' Brown's," or the "Widow Brown's," as she was familiarly called by her neighbors.
Her establishment was found to be a unique one. A small "store" was in the front of the building, and on the few shelves were seen jars containing some toothsome, though apparently venerable, sticks of candy. Slate pencils, a few forlorn articles of "fancy work," spools of thread and such like necessities were the other parts of her stock in trade, but the sounds of revelry which came from an inner room left no doubt in the minds of the visitors as to the place where the ice cream was to be had, or as to the occupation which was then going on at the time.
Ethan boldly led the way, and as the door was opened, two long tables were seen, upon which were dishes of the famous article for which our party had come, and upon which the "young folks" already there were feasting. The unexpected entrance brought a solemn hush upon the room, and one young fellow who was standing near the head of one of the tables suddenly sank into his seat again.
"That's Tim Wynn," whispered Ethan. "He's been cuttin' up for the young folks, I s'pose. He's awfully funny, an' they all like to have him 'round."
"There doesn't seem to be any place for us," suggested Mr. Clarke. "Perhaps we'd better not stop to-night."
"I'll fix ye out in a minit," said Ethan, hastily. "Here's the widow, now. Mis' Brown, can't ye find a place for these folks? They want some o' yer ice cream, an' every one counts neow. Mebbe they'll buy enough to get another plank or two for the walks."
The hint was not to be lost, and speedily another table was prepared by placing two planks across some "horses," and as soon as chairs had been brought, the party all seated themselves and were speedily served, Ethan himself taking one of the chairs upon Mr. Clarke's invitation.
Miss Bessie whispered to Ben, who was seated beside her, that "it wasn't ice cream at all, it was only frozen corn starch;" but whatever the name may have been, the dishes were speedily cleared, Ethan's disappearing the most rapidly of all, as with heaping spoonfuls he swallowed the treat, apparently unmindful of its chilling temperature.
"I guess ye don't get nothin' better'n that deown to New York," he remarked with satisfaction, as he glanced up at Mr. Clarke.
"We never have anything just like this," replied Mr. Clarke, kindly. "Have some more, Ethan?"
"Thank ye, sir. I don' mind if I do, if it's all the same to you. Here!" he suddenly added, as if he had been struck with a sudden thought, "there's some lemingade, too. It's only three cents a cup, and I'll stand treat for the crowd."
"Permit me," said Mr. Clarke, quickly; and "lemingade" was at once added to the replenished dishes.
"Your young people are to be congratulated, Ethan," said Mr. Clarke, when all at last arose from the table. "You have quite a good-sized fund for your village improvements. Have you any idea how much they have made?"
"I don't s'pose they can tell jest yet. Prob'ly fifteen or twenty dollars."
"You can add this to the sum, with my compliments, then," said Mr. Clarke, as he slipped a ten dollar bill into the astonished boatman's hand.
Almost too surprised by the gift to express his thanks, Ethan responded to their "good night," and the party at once departed for their yacht.
It was a glorious summer evening they discovered when the boat moved out from the dock and began to speed over the silent river. In the moonlight the rushing waters glimmered like silver, and the low-lying shores cast shadows which were reflected almost as in the light of day. The silent stars twinkled in the clear heavens, and the air of eternal peace seemed to rest over all.
The young people were enjoying themselves too keenly to be silent long even amidst such surroundings, and as the experiences of the evening were recounted, in every way so novel and different from anything they had ever seen before, their laughter rang out over the great river, and seemed to be caught up and sent flying by the very rocks and shores which they passed.
At last Miss Bessie started a song: "And every little wave has his night-cap on," and for a time all other things were forgotten; while Mr. and Mrs. Clarke joined in the spirit of the frolic as if they, too, were as young as their young companions.
Altogether the evening had been such an enjoyable one that it was almost with a feeling of disappointment that the boys at last perceived in the distance the white tents on Pine Tree Island. The songs had ceased now, and Bob said:--
"Mr. Clarke, I meant to have asked you to tell us the rest of that story about the pirate of the St. Lawrence."
"Who? Bill Johnston?" asked Mr. Clarke.
"Yes, I believe that was his name."
"Oh, well, that story will keep until next time."
"Yes, but the summer is almost gone now, and there won't be many 'next times.' We'll be going home soon."
"Not for some weeks yet, I trust. September is the most glorious of all the months on the river. When the leaves begin to turn, and the nights are so cool that you need a fire on the hearth in your cottage, and the air is so bracing that it is a delight just to breathe it, and the ducks begin to come, and you can vary your fishing with gunning, why, that's the best time of all the year. My nearest neighbors have even stayed here all winter, once or twice."
"It must be a wild sight here then," suggested Jock. "When the ice is so thick you can drive over it with a horse and sleigh, and the wind sweeps down the river at the rate of sixty miles an hour, it must be great fun to be here, and feel that you've got a good warm snug place, and can still see it all."
"Better to see it than feel it, I fancy," laughed Mr. Clarke. "I enjoy the river as much as any one, but I know where to draw the line. Still, if I could bottle up some of the September air and take it back to town with me, to use when occasion demanded, I should not object."
Miss Bessie and Ben had been taking no part in the general conversation, apparently being much more interested in one of their own.
"I want to ask you a question," she had said to Ben, who was seated next to her.
"Say on," responded Ben. "I'm all ears."
"Not quite all," replied the girl, glancing at Ben's long form as she spoke. "But what I want to know is whether you are really going to enter the canoe races next week?"
"Why?"
"Because."
"Oh, well, I'll have to tell you, you have such good reasons for asking. No one in the world, or at least in the camp, knows it; but I am going in."
"Aren't you afraid?"
"Afraid of what?"
"Oh, of falling into the water, or being beaten, or I don't know what."
"That remains to be seen," said Ben, sitting suddenly erect. "Now one good turn is said to deserve another, so as you've had a turn at me, I'll take mine now."
"What do you mean?"
"Are _you_ going into the races?"
"Yes," replied Miss Bessie, after a brief hesitation. "That is, if my father is willing; but I don't want you to tell any one about it, either."
"Madam, I shall be silent. Do you recall the words of the immortal 'Hamlick' to-night on that subject?"
"No. What were they?"
"'Let us go in together; And still your fingers on your lips, I pray.'"
"Agreed," responded Miss Bessie. "I'll not tell about you, and you're not to tell about me."
"Oh you'll not tell," retorted Ben. "I never saw a girl yet who would do that."
The conversation was suddenly interrupted, for the yacht was now approaching the dock. To the surprise of the boys, they discovered that some one was in the camp, and hastily bidding their friends good night, they all turned and ran swiftly toward the tents.
CHAPTER XXX.
BEN'S DISCOVERY.
It is doubtful whether Pine Tree Island, since the days when the red men had dwelt upon its shores, had heard such a shout as went up from our boys when they discovered that the visitor was Jock's father. When the lad learned that his mother was at Alexandria Bay, and that she and his father had come from New York that very day, nothing would satisfy him but to return to the hotel.
Before they departed, Jock's father explained that he had come over to the camp in the early evening with a boatman, but when he discovered that no one was there, he had decided to remain until they returned. As it was now after ten o'clock, he had begun to feel somewhat uneasy; but the fact that all were gone, and that everything about the camp seemed to be in good order, had led him to believe that they could be in no danger, at all events, and so he had waited until the time when his patience had been amply rewarded.
After the messages from the other homes had been delivered, and Mr. Cope had satisfied himself that all were well, he said, "I think we'd better go back to the hotel now, my boy. Your mother will be uneasy about me, to say nothing of you."
"Do you think it will be safe for Jock to go?" inquired Bob, soberly.
"Safe? Why, yes. Why shouldn't it be safe?"
"Oh, I don't know. We've been living here in primitive style, you know, and whether Jock will remember how to behave is a question."
"It's time he reviewed his lessons, then," was the reply. "Good night, boys," he added, as he started toward the dock.
The campers followed Jock and his father to the dock, and as they were about to put off, Bob called out, "I say, Jock, don't forget to use your fork when you go into the dining room to-morrow."
"I'll try not to," promised Jock.
"And if I'm not mistaken they have napkins there, too."
"Good night, fellows. I'll see you in the morning," called Jock; and the skiff soon disappeared in the darkness.
Few words were spoken by the remaining campers that night as they prepared for bed. Perhaps the presence of Jock's father, and the eagerness of their friend to see his mother, may have produced similar longings in their own hearts; but if it was so, no one referred to them, and soon the great pile of logs was sending its ruddy glow over the shadows of the silent river, and the sounds which came from the tent indicated that any possible feeling of homesickness had at least been forgotten for the time.
When Bert awoke early in the following morning, he speedily discovered that he was alone in the tent. As he dressed himself hastily, and ran forth toward the bank of the river, he discovered the long form of Ben paddling in his canoe not far away, but Bob was nowhere to be seen.
It was such an unusual occurrence for Bob to be awake so early in the morning that the sturdy Bert was at a loss to account for his absence. As a rule, Bob was the last to appear for breakfast, and not infrequently a dash of cold water had been required to make him fully aware of the hour; and now to find him gone was, to say the least, surprising.
Ethan and Tom arrived, but still Bob did not appear. Ben came in from his daily task, but he, too, had not seen the missing Bob, and declared that he had left him sleeping in the tent when he himself had departed. The absence certainly was strange, and the boys were just beginning to feel uneasy as to the missing boy's whereabouts, when the lad in question was seen approaching the camp. But he was coming from among the trees, and his eager friends hailed him with the question,--
"Where have you been, Bob?"
"Out taking a peep at the rising sun."
"You've been taking more than that," exclaimed Ben, quickly, as he perceived that Bob's garments were all dripping wet. "You've been in the water."
"The early dew is heavy here," replied Bob, evasively, as he turned to the tent to change his clothing.
It was evident that Bob did not intend to disclose the purpose of his early rising, and Ben's suspicions were at once aroused. He concluded that his friend was practising for the race in which he himself was to enter. He did not refer to his surmise, however, and in a few minutes Bob came forth and took his seat at the table with his friends.
Soon after breakfast, Jock, accompanied by his father and mother, returned to the camp, and the greeting which Mr. Cope gave his old schoolfellow, Ethan, was one which warmed the heart of that worthy boatman.
"I thought mebbe ye'd forgotten yer old friends since ye've got so rich," said Ethan, soberly.
"Forgotten them? Why, man, they're the best part of my life. I've a painting of the old red schoolhouse hanging in my dining room, and I never see it without thinking of the boys and girls who were there years ago, and the good times we used to have."
"Got a pictur of it? Ye don't say so!" exclaimed Ethan, in surprise. "Well, I never thought nobody'd want a pictur o' that place. It's most gone to rack an' ruin now. I'm afeard we'll have to fix it up purty quick or it'll fall down o' itself."
"That's too bad; I should think the district would keep it in repair."
"The deestrict hain't got no money. The only folks hereabouts what has any money are mostly those who've gone off deown to New York. Seems as if 'most any fool could make money deown there. The' say as how Homer Perkins's boy has gone deown there, an' is a-gettin' a dollar an' a half a day the whole year through, an' all he has to do is to drive a hoss car."
Mr. Cope laughed as he replied, "I'm telling you the truth, Ethan, when I say I never worked so hard in my life as I do now. I used to pick up stones on the old farm, and haul and chop wood, and get up at four o'clock in the morning and milk eight or ten cows before breakfast, and then carry the milk to the factory, and that was before the day's work was supposed to have begun; but all that's as nothing compared with the way I have to work now."
Ethan was evidently incredulous, and said, "What time do ye get up in the mornin' now?"
"About eight o'clock."
"And I s'pose ye don't get down to yer store till abeout nine?"
"I usually go down to the office about that time."
"An' when do ye shut up?"
"Anywhere from half-past four to six."
"An' ye call _that_ workin' harder 'n ye did on the old stone hill farm, do ye?"
"Yes, a good deal harder. It's true I used to get tired and go to bed some nights feeling as if every bone in my body ached, but I would go to sleep right away and forget it all, and next morning I'd be all ready for another day. Now I have to carry my load day and night, and there is no escape. I have hundreds, yes, thousands, of men dependent on me. When hard times come, and it sometimes seems to me that they come pretty often, I carry a good many of these men through just for the sake of their families, and when good times come they seem to forget all about it, and some of them are always ready to make trouble. There are times, Ethan, when it seems to me my load is heavier than I can bear. I almost never have a day off, and sometimes I long to return to the old farm, and am hungry for its peace and quiet."
"I guess there ain't nuthin' to hinder ye from comin' back if ye want to," grunted Ethan. "The old place is for sale, an 'twon't cost over twenty-five or thirty dollars an acre. Ye can stand that much, can't ye? Yer boy here says he guesses ye're worth more 'n five thousand dollars."
Mr. Cope's cheeks flushed slightly, and he glanced reprovingly at Jock; but evidently wishing to change the subject, he said, "I fancy, Ethan, that most of the boys and girls who used to go to school with us are gone now."
"Pretty much."
"What's ever become of Hiram Munsell? Hi Munsell we called him."
"Oh, he went out to the state o' Milwaukee. He's got rich too, they say."
"Went where?"
"The state o' Milwaukee. He's a policeman an' gets a thousan' dollars a year, or leastwise that's what the report is. You know as much as I do about whether it's true or not. I hev my doubts, myself. Hi always was one to stretch it pooty good, as you may recommember yerself."
Mr. Cope glanced again reprovingly at the boys, who for some strange reason appeared to be highly delighted at the reference to the "state" to which the wealthy Hi had gone, and said quickly,--
"Well, Ethan, I want to talk over old times with you some more, and I want to go over to the old schoolhouse, too; but I'm to have only a day or two here, and I fancy the boys are more interested in my putting that to good use than they are in our reminiscences, so if you're agreed, we'll try the sport for a time. Can you take us fishing now?"
Ethan responded that he could, and when the two skiffs were made ready it was discovered that Bob was not to go with them. Ben said nothing, though his suspicions were at once aroused, and at first he, too, was inclined to remain in camp; but Jock's evident disappointment was so marked that he hastily recalled his words, and said that he would go, making one proviso, that he should be permitted to take his canoe with him.
Mrs. Cope was to remain in the camp, declaring that she wished to look after some of the belongings of the boys, which she said were in a "sad state," though just what she meant by the expression she did not explain, and that she was not in the least afraid of being lonesome. The party soon set forth in the skiffs, from one of which Ben's ever present canoe was towed, and Ethan directed the way to a spot where none of them had as yet been. Mr. Cope apparently was most enthusiastic of all. Whatever may have been his inability to cast aside his pressing problems when he was at home, here certainly they were not to be found, and he entered into the sport with all the zest of the boys themselves.
Their former successes in no way seemed to interfere with the eagerness of the campers in the present experience, and when at last Ethan and Tom rowed ashore to prepare dinner, they had all had a degree of success which corresponded with their most ardent desires.
After dinner the sport was resumed, but about the middle of the afternoon Ethan rowed his skiff close in to the other, and Mr. Cope called out: "Boys, we've decided to land over here and go up to the old schoolhouse, which isn't more than a mile and a half from the shore. Jock wants to go; and if you would like to go too, we should be glad to have you. What do you say?"
Ben looked at Bert a moment, and then said, "Thank you, Mr. Cope, Bert would like to go and so should I, but I ought to go back to the camp."
"Why? What's wrong?" inquired Mr. Cope, quickly.
"There isn't anything wrong, only I've something I ought to do. I was just thinking that I would take my canoe and go back, and leave you all here anyway. I didn't want to break up your sport."
"He wants to write a letter, I guess," said Jock. "Well, Bert, you come along, and let Ben go back if he wants to."
The proposal was agreed to, and Tom was to wait on the shore and guard the skiff while his companions were gone to visit the scene of Mr. Cope's and Ethan's earlier days. Ben did not wait, but hoisting his little sail began to speed over the river in the direction of Pine Tree Island.
What the urgent duty was which had induced him to depart from his companions became apparent when he approached within a half mile of the camp. He then lowered his sail and carefully scanned the river before him.
Apparently satisfied with the inspection, he took his paddle and began to send the light canoe swiftly over the water, but instead of making his way to the dock he paddled around to the opposite side of the island.
There he landed, and lifting his canoe, bore it up the shore and carefully concealed it among the bushes. Satisfied that he had not been seen, he cautiously made his way toward the shore of a sheltered bay not far away. As soon as he had arrived at a place from which the waters of the bay could be seen, he halted for a moment and peered cautiously about him.
Evidently not satisfied with what he saw, he began to advance again, stepping carefully from tree to tree, and at last arrived at a sheltered spot from which he could see both the shore and bay. Instantly he was deeply interested in something he there discovered, for he peered farther out from behind the tree, and watched Bob, who now could be seen near the shore.
"The rascal! He thought he'd fool us all," muttered Ben, as he watched his friend, who plainly was unaware that his actions were observed.
"What's that he's doing?" he suddenly added. "If that doesn't beat anything I ever saw before!"
So interested was Ben that he remained in the secluded spot for more than an hour, watching the movements of Bob, who was in sight all the time. Occasionally the watching Ben almost laughed aloud, and frequently uttered exclamations expressive of his astonishment or pleasure,--any one who might have heard him could hardly have told which,--but at last he retraced his way through the woods to the spot where he had left his canoe.
Speedily embarking, he paddled back around the island, and soon afterward approached the dock; and the first person he discerned there was Bob himself, seated on the edge and lazily swinging his feet out over the water.
CHAPTER XXXI.
THE RACES.
Ben did not refer to his discovery, and after he had explained the reasons why he had returned alone to the camp he joined Mrs. Cope, who was seated in a camp-chair on the high bluff, and delightedly watching the constantly shifting scene which the great river presented. The pleasure Jock's mother felt in the marked improvement in her son's appearance was certainly shared by his two friends, and Bob demurely remarked that he even had hopes that Ben and Bert would also "improve," a wish which Ben laughingly declared was destined to be blighted.
As the shadows of evening began to appear, the return of the absent members of the party at once drew the attention of all to them, and while Ethan and Tom prepared supper, Mr. Cope described his visit to the old schoolhouse, and the enjoyment he had experienced in revisiting the scenes of his boyhood. His wife declared that she believed he had regained some of his boyish spirits too, for it had been long since she had seen him so animated and enthusiastic.
Just as Ethan announced that supper was ready, a skiff was seen approaching the dock, and a messenger-boy advanced with several telegrams, which Mr. Cope had left word at the hotel should be forwarded to the camp.
As Mr. Cope tore open the yellow envelopes, Ethan curiously observed his old-time friend, and when the telegrams had been read, said,--
"I hope ye haven't had any bad news, Jock?"
Mr. Cope laughed as he replied, "Rather bad for me, I fear. I shall have to return to New York to-night. You see, Ethan, I can't have more than a day off. I almost envy you your freedom."
"Did they send ye word in the telegrams?" inquired the boatman.
"Yes. They are about important business engagements."
"Bus'ness!" exclaimed Ethan. "I didn't s'pose any one ever telegraphed jist about bus'ness. I thought nobody ever telegraphed unless somebody was dead. Hi Perkins once telegraphed to his ma when he thought he was goin' to die with the pewmony; but it costs four shillin' for ten words, I'm told. Must be mighty important business what would make anybody send ye five or six on 'em."
"It is important; so important that I shall have to go back to the Bay and start for home to-night. I'm sorry, too. But then, if a business man doesn't have very much outside pleasure in life, his wife and children can have it, and he must take his in knowing that."
Soon after supper Mr. Cope bade good-by to the boatman and boys, and with Mrs. Cope and Jock departed for Alexandria Bay. Jock was to remain at the hotel for the night, but was to return to the camp in the morning, though his mother was to stay at the hotel until the boys should be ready to break camp and go home with her.
Apparently Jock's mother enjoyed the experience of the days which followed as much as did the boys themselves. Every day she was rowed over to Pine Tree Island, and sometimes the boys were persuaded to return with her for a dinner at the hotel, or to be present of an evening when something of special interest was occurring in the parlors.
Her friends, the Clarkes, also did much to add to the pleasure, for with their yacht they made various trips among the islands, or planned for picnics which were a never failing source of delight to all.
At last came the great day of the canoe races, and as it had been arranged that all the friends should go on Mr. Clarke's yacht to the place selected, and take a position on the river from which the races could be seen from beginning to end, the occasion had been looked forward to with great anticipations.
When the happy party stopped at the dock for Mrs. Cope and the boys, the greetings were unusually enthusiastic, for a more perfect day had not been seen since the campers had come to Pine Tree Island.
A few masses of silver clouds could be seen in the sky, but the sun was shining clear and strong. A gentle breeze ruffled the surface of the river, and the air was delightfully cool and bracing. Life was indeed worth living now, and as the light-hearted members of the party assembled on board the yacht, their laughter and joyous expressions seemed all a part of the day.
When Ben quietly picked up his canoe and placed that too on board, a shout greeted him; but as all already knew that he was determined to enter the contest, for he previously had entered his name, no one was surprised; but when, a moment later, Bob came, bringing with him a dress-suit case, evidently heavily laden, a fresh shout of surprise was given him.
"Oh, I knew Ben would fall into the water," he declared, "so I have brought a change of clothing for him. I'm very tender-hearted. It's my nature, though, and I can't help it, so you needn't bestow any praise on me."
"I shouldn't be surprised if you needed a change yourself," rejoined Ben, "before you've finished your race."
"Whom are you talking about?" demanded Bob, in surprise. "I haven't had any time to practise. I've been too busy."
"I know all about your busy-ness," retorted Ben, sharply.
Bob glanced up quickly, but Ben was looking out over the river now, and it was impossible to catch his eye. The yacht was free from the dock by this time, and was speeding swiftly down the river. For a time, apparently, all other things were forgotten in the joy of the morning. Other parties could be seen on the river, and it was evident that they too had started for the same destination, and as the voyage continued, the number of the boats steadily increased. Canoes, skiffs, steam-yachts, launches, sailboats, all were there, some draped with bright colors, all displaying flags, and every one carrying eager-hearted spectators who were acting as if life never had known a care or sorrow.
At last our party arrived at the place where the races were to be held, and bright-colored buoys, indicative of the course, could be seen on the water. Patrol boats kept the course free, and Mr. Clarke soon selected a favorable place and his yacht was anchored.
Ben now prepared to take his canoe and start for the head of the course, where all those who were to participate were to assemble. As he lowered the canoe into the water, Bob approached him, and said soberly,--
"I think I'll go with you, Ben. I've got your clothes here, and you'll need some one to look after you. I'm the kind-hearted friend to do that very thing."
"I was expecting you to say that," replied Ben. "I was wondering why you didn't speak up before. Where's your craft, Bob?"
"My craft! Why, I haven't any here, and you know it;" but a peculiar twinkle in Ben's eye caused him to approach, and a whispered conversation at once followed.
No one of the others could hear what was said, but the result was apparent when Ben consented to his friend's going with him, and in a brief time both boys were in the canoe, and Ben was ready to push off.
"You'll not forget that we have some luncheon on board, boys," called Miss Bessie. "You'll surely be back in time to have some of that."
"Don't be alarmed," laughed Ben. "I never knew Bob to be late for anything of that kind. I trust you have enough; for he'll be hungry, I can promise you."
A cheer followed the boys as Ben dipped his paddle in the water, and the canoe darted forward under his powerful strokes. His long form was not particularly graceful, but the speed of his canoe promised well, and Jock turned to the others and said,--
"I shouldn't be surprised if Ben did get a place in the finals to-day. He's improved wonderfully. The way he has kept at it is a lesson for us all. I wish he might win. I wonder what Bob really went with him for? Do you know I half suspect he's got a scheme of some kind of his own."
No one replied, for the sound of a pistol was now heard, and the first of the races was begun. It was a contest between cat-boats, and as the beautiful little crafts swept into sight and dipped low before the strong and favoring breeze, the shrill whistles of the steam-yachts, the waving of handkerchiefs, and the shouts of the people welcomed them.
As no one in our party was acquainted with any of the participants in this race, their interest naturally was not as keen as it was to be in some of the contests which were to follow, but they nevertheless were enthusiastic observers of the man[oe]uvres of the skilfully handled boats. On they came, keeping well in line, their white sails and whiter sides glistening in the sunlight, and presenting a wondrously beautiful spectacle as they swept down the river.
As Mr. Clarke now discovered that most of the yachts were not anchored, but were free to follow the contestants outside the buoys, he, too, took his anchor on board and steamed down the river so that they could watch the boats all the way. The shores of the islands were lined with interested spectators, and the waving of bunting, and the cheers of the people, as the fleet boats approached, redoubled.
At last the stake was turned, and the boats started on the home stretch. They were not bunched as they had been, but three had gained over their rivals, and, well together, were tacking and striving each to gain an advantage over the others. It could be seen now that one was more skilfully handled than the other two, and soon it was distinctly gaining upon both. On and on they came, and finally the _Thistle_, bending gracefully before the breeze, swept first across the line, the men on board swinging their caps and shouting in their delight, while the screams of the whistles and the cheers of the spectators sounded shrilly in response. It certainly was a very inspiring sight, and the party on board Mr. Clarke's yacht, though they were strangers to the winners, were cheering as lustily in their delight as if it had been one of their own company who had secured the first prize.
A race between canoes equipped with double bat-winged sails followed, and the stirring scene was again enacted. The whistles blew and banners were waved, and the winning boat was as lustily cheered as the successful one in the first contest had been.
Then followed a contest between canoes with a single bat-wing sail, and once more the interest of the spectators voiced itself in the same expressive manner which had been used before.
The excitement on the yacht very markedly increased when it was learned that the next race was to be between canoes with one paddler in each.
In the row of beautiful little canoes which took their places in line, Ben's long form could be easily distinguished. As the party hailed his appearance with a cheer, Ben turned and discovered them, and while striving to wave his cap in response, almost destroyed his balance, and was very nearly thrown into the river.
There was no disposition among his friends to laugh now, and the girls uttered a little cry of dismay at the threatened mishap; but as Ben speedily regained his balance, they all became silent as they watched him intently. His long arms were bare, and his bright red sweater was to be easily distinguished in the line. In a moment the pistol sounded, and the racers were off.
There were seven contestants, and their paddles struck the water together. For a few minutes the line was almost unbroken; then it could be seen that three or four were pulling ahead of their rivals, and among the number was Ben. Faster and faster swept the frail little barks, and the interest of the spectators was evidently much keener than it had been in the other contests. The forms of the paddlers seemed to move like clock-work. The paddles were dipped rapidly and steadily, and the race between the leaders was very close. Slowly Ben gained upon his nearest rival and passed him, and then, with longer, swifter strokes, strove to gain upon the two who were still in advance of him.
Inch by inch, foot by foot, the distance decreased. Soon only about twenty yards remained between him and the end. Once more the determined boy bent to his task. His body swayed back and forth, the paddle was driven deeper into the water, and the light canoe seemed to gain increased speed. People were cheering wildly all about him, and a cloud of banners seemed to be waving on every side.
Again Ben responded, and was striving to use all his remaining power. He was not directly behind his competitors, being several yards to their left, and now he was not more than two feet in their rear. If only the course were a little longer, he thought, he would surely win; but shutting his teeth firmly together, he doggedly resolved to do his best. His eyes were almost closed, and his breath was coming in gasps.
Suddenly there was a moment of intense silence, as the shouting abruptly ceased, but Ben was oblivious of it all. In a moment, however, the shouting redoubled, there was a shrill screech of the whistles, and Ben knew that he was across the line and alone.
As he turned about he discovered that his competitors had met with a mishap, and that one, in his zeal, had paddled directly into the other, and both canoes had been capsized in the collision. Their misfortune had left Ben the winner.
The yacht speedily approached, and as the girls waved their handkerchiefs and his friends called out their approval, Mr. Clarke assisted him to come on board.
"I can congratulate you on winning the race," said Mr. Clarke, cordially.
"Oh, I haven't won it," replied Ben, his flushed face beaming with pleasure. "That's only the preliminary. The finals are to come off this afternoon."
Somewhat disappointed, the party was headed up the river again, and soon approached the starting-place. They all laughed when they learned that a tub race was now to take place, and the astonishment of all except Ben was great when they discovered that one of the contestants was none other than their missing friend, Bob.
CHAPTER XXXII.
CONCLUSION.
A tub race was a decided novelty to all the members of our party except the young ladies, who had seen one in the preceding summer, but there were special reasons now why they were as interested as their friends in the contest which was to take place. There were tubs large and small, some new and some evidently having seen hard service, and the paddles were of various sizes and ages. There were at least fifteen of the contestants, and Bob's sturdy form could be easily distinguished, for he was the fourth from the end nearest our friends.
The report of the pistol rang out sharply, and in a moment the race was begun. The scene which followed was one that beggared description. The observant crowd of spectators shouted and cheered and laughed, and it almost seemed as if pandemonium itself reigned supreme. Meanwhile the contestants entered into the struggle with apparently all the zeal that had been manifested by their predecessors. The paddles were driven deep into the water and some of the men were making desperate efforts to outstrip their fellows. But the control of the awkward crafts was no simple matter. At times, for some unaccountable reason, the tubs would begin to turn and whirl, and, despite the efforts of the paddlers, would go in a direction apparently opposite to that which was desired. One poor fellow had already been thrown into the water, and as he was speedily drawn forth by his waiting friends, shouts of laughter seemed to be his only reward.
Bob was moving steadily with the current, and although several tubs were in advance of him, he did not appear to be troubled. He was not exerting himself as were most of the others, his foremost desire being to keep his tub from whirling and within the current.
Suddenly one of the tubs was seen to be headed directly toward Bob. The occupant struggled desperately to prevent a collision, but his efforts only served to increase his helplessness.
"Look out!" called Bob, sharply. "Keep off, or you'll hit me!"
The man endeavored to change his course, but his increased exertions only deprived him of what little control he still had, and in a moment the twisting, awkward craft came straight toward the alarmed Bob.
The lad was watchful, however, and as the tub came within reach he gave it a sudden push with his paddle and the peril was averted. The effect almost destroyed Bob's own balance, and for a moment it seemed as if he must be capsized, but as he righted himself he glanced at his rival, who was now in a sad state. He had raised his own paddle to return the thrust the anxious Bob had given him, but his zeal had not been wisely directed. The tub leaned dangerously to one side and as the boatman strove to right it, he threw himself too far to the other side, and after "wabbling" for an instant, it suddenly capsized and threw its occupant into the water. As he came to the surface he hastily swam to the upturned tub, and was soon rescued by the men who were skirting the racers for that very purpose.
Bob, however, had no time to waste upon his unfortunate competitor, and was carefully guiding his own treacherous craft. He could see that some of the desperate men about him were going sidewise or backward, and were striking out wildly with their paddles, striving to change the method as well as the direction of the procedure. Others were whirling and spinning about in a manner to make even an observer dizzy, to say nothing of the struggling paddler himself. Bob was not striving for speed, and was trusting much to the swiftness of the current to bear him on toward the coveted goal, and as he drew near the end, the wisdom of his course became apparent. Those who had been in advance of him were losing the advantage they had gained by some unfortunate stroke of their paddles, which sent their unwieldy tubs to whirling madly, and speed and control were soon both lost.
On and on moved the few tubs which still were in the race, bobbing up and down, and frequently stopping and whirling madly about as if some sudden and irresistible impulse had seized them. The confusion increased as the goal could be seen, and the first prize lay between Bob and two rivals.
Slowly and carefully Bob increased his stroke, and now only ten feet yet remained to be crossed. The three tubs were close together, and bunched for the final effort. Suddenly Bob drove his paddle far down into the water, and exerting all his strength, sent his tub forward with his final effort; but directly in front of him one of his rivals had drifted, and in a moment they struck together. The other contestant, to save himself, had instantly grasped Bob's tub and "wabbling," careening, threatening every moment to capsize, the two crossed the line together, and their mutual rival was a full yard behind them.
Instantly the whistles and shouts announced the end of the race, and Bob's rival turned good-naturedly to him and said,--
"I've got the first prize and you the second, though you wouldn't have had it if I hadn't towed you over the line."
"That's for the judges to decide," laughed Bob. "I think you fouled me and held me back with your hands, or I'd been first."
The boats now swarmed in, and, amidst the laughter of the people, it was decided that the first prize should be divided, for the two tubs had crossed the line after the manner in which the Siamese twins had moved through life, together.
"It's another case of 'united we stand, divided we fall,'" remarked Bob, as the decision was announced.
But there was no opportunity for further conversation, for Mr. Clarke's yacht now steamed close in, and Bob and his tub were received on board.
"A wise man of Gotham who went to sea in a bowl," said Miss Bessie, as Bob quietly took his seat. "I congratulate you."
"Thank you," replied Bob. "Did you say you had had your luncheon?"
"No, we've been waiting for the victor. We'll have it now."
As she departed to look after the various baskets, Jock said, "Bob, you're the greatest fellow I ever saw. You never seem to be working much, but yet you always come out all right. It's the same way with your studies. You don't work as hard as I do, but you always beat me. I don't understand it."
"Don't you believe that Bob doesn't work," interrupted Bert. "I know him better than you do. It's the thing he doesn't do that helps Bob, as much as what he does do. Now I watched him out there in the race. Most of the other fellows were striking out with their paddles in every direction, but Bob here just watched the current and let that do most of the work. It's the same way with his studies. Most of the fellows spend half their time in fussing around and getting ready, and then breaking in on their work after they've once begun. But you never saw Bob do that. He never makes a false move, or an unnecessary one, and when he starts, he just keeps at the necessary things and lets the others go. Bob does so well because he makes everything count."
"That's the secret of success, young man," said Mr. Clarke. "The reason why so many men fail in life is because they waste their time and strength in unnecessary things, and don't learn what not to do."
"I think our luncheon is ready now," said Miss Bessie, as she rejoined the group. "I had a basket of fruit I was going to give you," she added, speaking to Bob, "but I'm afraid it's spoiled."
"Never mind. To the victors belong the spoils," said Ben. "Give it to him just the same."
A groan followed Ben's pun, but the sight of the welcome baskets speedily banished all other thoughts, and for a time the scene on board the yacht was one in which all who were there certainly rejoiced. The perfect summer day, the sight of the many boats moving about over the river, the bright colors to be seen on every side, the animation and happiness of those on board the yacht, were sufficient to inspire all, and certainly the party in which we are particularly interested was not one that required much beyond the youth and health which were theirs to make them have an enjoyable time.
Their delight was increased when in the "finals" for the canoe races Ben was able to secure third prize. He himself was more than content with the award, for he had been compelled to enter the lists against some who had had the practice and experience of many summers, and he had had but one. His long arms, and, above all, his persistence in the face of all obstacles, had availed; and when our boys returned to camp they were highly delighted with the achievements of the day, as we may be well assured were the other members of the party.
On the way home Mr. Clarke had related the further story of the exploits of the "pirate," Bill Johnston, but it is doubtful whether any of the party retained a very clear recollection of the dark doings of the aforesaid Bill, and even Bob himself had only a dim impression that after various brilliant-hued deeds, in the so-called patriot war, he had been captured and taken to Albany, but had soon procured a release and returned to the Thousand Islands, where among his various occupations he had been keeper of one of the lighthouses to the day of his death.
Miss Bessie had not entered the canoe races, as her father had objected, but she had expressed her willingness to race with Ben whenever he felt disposed to enter into a contest with her. Whether it was her challenge or not, I cannot say, but in the days which followed there were many hours spent by our boys at "The Rocks," or in coursing over the river in Mr. Clarke's fleet yacht.
And what days they were! Every morning brought its own fresh experiences, and it was the regular thing for the boys to declare at night when they returned to the camp and prepared for bed, that _this_ was the best day yet.
But all things are said to have an end, and certainly the camp on Pine Tree Island proved to be no exception to the rule. The September days had come, and though the crowds about the river became decidedly thinned, our boys still remained, and Jock's mother was still at the hotel at Alexandria Bay. Only one week remained before the beginning of the fall term in college, and it was at last decided that on the morrow the camp should be broken.
It was with special pleasure the last evening in camp that Jock broached a subject to Ethan and Tom in which he had been deeply interested, and concerning which he had had much correspondence with his father, and that was the promise of a position for Tom in Mr. Cope's office in New York.
Ethan at first was inclined to demur, but at last gave his consent, inasmuch as the position promised to be one which eventually might yield even more than the marvellous "dollar and a half a day," to which he had made such frequent references during the summer.
The last visit to the Clarkes had been made, the last sail taken in Ethan's catboat, the last spin enjoyed in the canoes, and now the boys were seated together for the last time before the roaring camp-fire, which in honor of the occasion had been made even larger than usual. Far out over the river the flickering lights cast their shadows. The moaning in the tree tops was more pronounced, as was only fitting in a September evening and before the departure of the boys. The sound of the laughter in the camp was more subdued, and all seemed to feel the sadness of parting, even from such inanimate objects as the rushing river and the green-covered islands.
For a time the boys were silent, then Ben, who could not long refrain from talking, said, "It's been a great summer, Jock. I don't know how we'll ever repay you."
"You have done that already," replied Jock. "I'm glad you fellows have had a good time. I know I've enjoyed it."
"There's been only one drawback," suggested Ben.
"What's that?"
"That volume of C's in the Cyclopædia. Cartier, Champlain, Cavon, Cortereal, Chimney Island--"
"Oh, that's all right, too," replied Jock, laughing. "We've been on _The Trail of the Early Discoverers_, haven't we? Well, we ought to know something about them. We haven't had enough to spoil us."
"I trow not," interrupted Bob, solemnly.
"I say, fellows," said Jock, as a sudden thought seemed to strike him, "wouldn't it be a great thing to keep on with this! We've been on this trail this summer; now, why shouldn't we keep on and follow them into other places next summer?"
"A colossal idea," said Bert, "if it can be worked out."
"I'm going to fix that," said Jock, decidedly. "Come on now, fellows, it's time we were in bed. Let's fire off the cannon for the last time."
In a moment the roar of the cannon awoke the echoes, and then silence rested over the camp and the river.
*       *       *       *       *
BOOKS BY EVERETT T. TOMLINSON.
THE WAR OF 1812 SERIES
[Illustration]
Six volumes  Cloth  Illustrated by A. B. Shute  Price per volume reduced to $1.25
No American writer for boys has ever occupied a higher position than Dr. Tomlinson, and the "War of 1812 Series" covers a field attempted by no other juvenile literature in a manner that has secured continued popularity.
The Search for Andrew Field The Boy Soldiers of 1812 The Boy Officers of 1812 Tecumseh's Young Braves Guarding the Border The Boys with Old Hickory
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Our old friends, "Bob," "Ben," "Jock," and "Bert," having completed their sophomore year at college, plan to spend the summer vacation cruising on the noble St. Lawrence. Here they not only visit places of historic interest, but also the Indian tribes encamped on the banks of the river, and learn from them their customs, habits, and quaint legends.
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FOLLOWING THE BALL
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Here is an up-to-date story presenting American boarding-school life and modern athletics. The scene will readily be recognized as at Exeter. Of course football is an important feature, and in tracing the development of the hero from a green player to an expert it might serve as a guide. Other branches of athletics are also finely dealt with. But it is far more than a football book. It is a story of character formation told in a most wholesome and manly way. In this development athletics play an important part, to be sure, but are only one feature in carrying the hero, "Dick Melvin," on to a worthy manhood.
"A seasonable school and football story, by a writer who knows the game and knows boys as well. It is of the 'Tom Brown' type, an uplifting as well as a lively story."--_Advance_, Chicago, Ill.
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MAKING THE NINE
[Illustration]
The cordial reception of the great football story, "Following the Ball," which had the distinction of so fine a spirit in its development of the hero's school life that not only the boys but their elders were enthusiastic over it, has led to this second book, in which baseball is sufficiently prominent to suggest the title. It is a pleasure for a publisher to present such a book as this, in every way worthy to continue the success of the previous volume. The special points of excellence are that the story is lively and worth telling, and the life presented is that of a real school, interesting, diversified, and full of striking incidents, while the characters are true and consistent types of American boyhood and youth. The athletics are technically correct, abounding in helpful suggestions, soundly and wisely given, and the moral tone is high and set by action rather than preaching.
LEE & SHEPARD, Publishers, Boston
TOM WINSTONE, "WIDE AWAKE"
By MARTHA JAMES
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Large 12mo. Cloth. Illustrated by W. Herbert Dunton. Price $1.00
[Illustration]
"Another book equally worthy of a place in our Sunday-school libraries is TOM WINSTONE, 'WIDE AWAKE,' by Martha James. It is a thorough-going boy's book of the right sort,--full of life, bubbling over with high spirits and noble ambition; a most intelligent interpretation of boy life and character. The young hero of this narrative, equally efficient in athletics at school and in the harder school of manly sacrifice, is a character well worth knowing."--_Pilgrim Teacher, Boston._
"The young hero of the story, equally efficient in athletic sports and in noble deeds, is well worth the acquaintance of every healthy boy reader."--_Boston Transcript._
"Any healthy boy will delight in this book."--_Living Church, Milwaukee, Wis._
"Another excellent story for boys is TOM WINSTONE, 'WIDE AWAKE,' by Martha James. Here is a recital of adventure, with much account of boyish sport, in a pure tone and with Christian teaching."--_Fall River News._
"This is a real 'boy's story,' full of incidents and interesting characters drawn to the life, while the tone is wholesome and genuine."--_Portland Press._
"The author has done a good work for the lads of the generation, and her effort will doubtless meet with the popularity it deserves."--_Indianapolis Sentinel._
_For sale by all booksellers, or sent postpaid on receipt of price by the publishers._
LEE & SHEPARD, Publishers, Boston
Young Heroes of Wire and Rail
By ALVAH MILTON KERR
Illustrated by H. C. EDWARDS, J. C. LEYENDECKER, and others
_12mo    Cloth    Price $1.25_
[Illustration]
This is a book of wonderfully vivid stories of railroad life, portraying the heroism of trainmen, telegraph operators, and despatchers, each story a complete drama in itself, with thrilling climax, and yet too truthful to be classed as sensational. It is by Alvah Milton Kerr, formerly a train-despatcher of long experience, and now a justly noted writer of railroad stories, who has brought together from many sources the most striking acts of heroism performed during the last quarter of a century of railroad activity, and has cast them in stories of singularly intense interest.
Most of these stories first appeared in "McClure's Magazine," "The Youth's Companion," "Philadelphia Saturday Evening Post" and "Success;" which fact is a very strong guarantee of merit. No one who begins reading these stories in this finely printed, illustrated, and bound book will be likely to allow anything to interfere with their completion.
"An ideal book for a young boy is 'Young Heroes of Wire and Rail,' and, indeed, the older folks who begin to read will continue to the end."--_Episcopal Recorder, Philadelphia._
"The tone of the work is healthful and inspiring."--_Boston Herald._
"They teach more bravery, unselfishness and forethought in a page than can be imparted in an hour of 'ethical' instruction in school."--_New York Times._
"The tone of the stories is fine, showing unexpected bravery and courage in many of the characters."--_Delineator, New York._
"A book that not only yields entertainment and healthy excitement, but reveals some of the possibilities always confronting railroad workers and train despatchers."--_Christian Register, Boston._
"They are calculated to inspire boys to become manly, and incidentally they contain considerable valuable information."--_Newark News._
_For sale by all booksellers, or sent postpaid on receipt of price by the publishers._
LEE & SHEPARD, Publishers, Boston

= = = PG33343 = = =
CAMPMATES: A STORY OF THE PLAINS
Produced by David Edwards, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
CAMPMATES
_A Story of the Plains_
By KIRK MUNROE
_Author of_ "THE FLAMINGO FEATHER," "WAKULLA," "DORYMATES," "DERRICK STERLING" ETC.
_Illustrated_
HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS NEW YORK AND LONDON
[Illustration: "IT WAS A LIVE BABY."]
CONTENTS.
I. A WEARY RIDE
II. A RUDE BAPTISM
III. A BOY WITHOUT A BIRTHDAY
IV. "I JUST HATE TO STUDY"
V. SWIMMING INTO A FRIENDSHIP
VI. RECEIVING AN OFFER AND ACCEPTING IT
VII. ACROSS THE MISSISSIPPI
VIII. GLEN RUNS A LOCOMOTIVE
IX. KANSAS CITY IN EARLY DAYS
X. AT WORK WITH THE ENGINEER CORPS
XI. ALMOST TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE
XII. STARTING ACROSS THE PLAINS
XIII. BINNEY GIBBS AND HIS MULE
XIV. ON GUARD AT NIGHT
XV. THE SUSPICIOUS MOVEMENTS OF CERTAIN COYOTES
XVI. IN THE HANDS OF THE CHEYENNES
XVII. ATTACKING A STAGE RANCH
XVIII. BUFFALO AND THEIR USES
XIX. GLEN'S ESCAPE FROM THE INDIANS
XX. A PRESENT THAT WOULD PLEASE ANY BOY
XXI. LAME WOLF, THE YOUNG CHEYENNE
XXII. GLEN AND BINNEY GET INTO TROUBLE
XXIII. FIGHTING THE FINEST HORSEMEN IN THE WORLD
XXIV. CROSSING THE QUICKSANDS
XXV. SWEPT AWAY BY A FRESHET
XXVI. RUNNING THE LINE
XXVII. "COVERED WITH MUD AND GLORY"
XXVIII. LOST IN A MOUNTAIN SNOW-STORM
XXIX. PLUNGING INTO A LAKE OF ICE-WATER
XXX. DOWN THE LONELY CAÑON
XXXI. KIT CARSON'S GOLD MINE
XXXII. A NEW MEXICAN WEDDING
XXXIII. IN THE VALLEY OF THE RIO GRANDE
XXXIV. BAITING A WOLF-TRAP
XXXV. EL MORO
XXXVI. ZUÑI, THE HOME OF THE AZTECS
XXXVII. A PRACTICAL USE OF TRIGONOMETRY
XXXVIII. DYING OF THIRST IN THE DESERT
XXXIX. CROSSING THE SIERRA NEVADA
XL. A HOME AND TWO FATHERS
ILLUSTRATIONS.
"IT WAS A LIVE BABY"
"TWO STALWART WARRIORS SEIZED HIM BY THE ARMS AND RAISED HIM BETWEEN THEM AS THEY SWEPT PAST"
"THE STRANGE CRAFT WAS BORNE SLOWLY DOWN STREAM"
"'HEAD FOR THAT DARK SPACE, IT MARKS A VALLEY.... IF YOU FIND WATER, FIRE YOUR PISTOL'"
_CAMP MATES._
_A Story of the Plains._
Chapter I.
A WEARY RIDE.
Slowly and heavily the train rumbled on through the night. It was called an express; but the year was long ago, in the early days of railroading, and what was then an express would now be considered a very slow and poky sort of a train. On this particular night too, it ran more slowly than usual, because of the condition of the track. The season was such a wet one, that even the oldest traveller on the train declared he could not remember another like it. Rain, rain, rain, day after day, for weeks, had been the rule of that spring, until the earth was soaked like a great sponge. All the rivers had overflowed their banks, and all the smaller streams were raging torrents, red, yellow, brown, and sometimes milky white, according to the color of the clays through which they cut their riotous way. The lowlands and meadows were flooded, so that the last year's hay-stacks, rising from them here and there, were veritable islands of refuge for innumerable rabbits, rats, mice, and other small animals, driven by the waters from their homes.
And all this water had not helped the railroad one bit. In the cuts the clay or gravel banks were continually sliding down on the track; while on the fills they were as continually sliding out from under it. The section gangs were doubled, and along the whole line they were hard at work, by night as well as by day, only eating and sleeping by snatches, trying to keep the track in repair, and the road open for traffic. In spite of their vigilance and unceasing labor, however, the rains found plenty of chances to work their mischief undetected.
Many a time only the keen watchfulness of an engine-driver, or his assistant, the fireman, saved a train from dashing into some gravel heap, beneath which the rails were buried, or from plunging into some yawning opening from which a culvert or small bridge had been washed out. Nor with all this watchfulness did the trains always get through in safety. Sometimes a bit of track, that looked all right, would suddenly sink beneath the weight of a passing train into a quagmire that had been formed beneath it, and then would follow the pitiful scenes of a railroad wreck.
So nobody travelled except those who were compelled to do so, and the passenger business of this particular road was lighter than it had been since the opening. It was so light that on this night there were not more than half a dozen persons in the single passenger coach of the express, and only one of these was a woman. Another was her baby, a sturdy, wholesome-looking little fellow, who, though he was but a year old, appeared large enough to be nearly, if not quite, two. He had great brown eyes, exactly like those of his mother. She was young and pretty, but just now she looked utterly worn out, and no wonder. The train was twelve hours late; and, instead of being comfortably established in a hotel, at the end of her journey by rail, as she had expected to be before dark that evening, she was wearily trying to sleep in the same stuffy, jolting car she had occupied all day and had no hope of leaving before morning.
There were no sleeping-cars in those days, nor vestibuled trains, nor even cars with stuffed easy-chairs in which one could lie back and make himself comfortable. No, indeed; there were no such luxuries as these for those who travelled by rail at that time. The passenger coaches were just long boxes, with low, almost flat roofs, like those of freight cars. Their windows were small, and generally stuck fast in their frames, so that they could not be opened. There was no other means of ventilation, except as one of the end doors was flung open, when there came such a rush of smoke and cinders and cold air that everybody was impatient to have it closed again.
At night the only light was given by three candles that burned inside of globes to protect them from being extinguished every time a door was opened. There were no electric lights, nor gas, nor even oil-lamps, for the cars of those days, only these feeble candles, placed one at each end, and one in the middle of the coach. But worst of all were the seats, which must have been invented by somebody who wished to discourage railroad riding. They were narrow, hard, straight-backed, and covered with shiny leather.
In a car of this description the young mother, with her baby, had travelled a whole day, and nearly a whole night. It is no wonder then that she looked worn out, or that the baby, who had been so jolly and happy as to be voted a remarkably fine child by all the passengers, should have sunk into an exhausted sleep, after a prolonged fit of screaming and crying, that caused the few remaining inmates of the car to look daggers at it, and say many unkind things, some of which even reached the ears of the mother.
During the day there had been other women in the car, travelling for shorter or longer distances. To one of these, a lady-like girl who occupied an adjoining seat for some hours, and who was greatly interested in the baby, the young mother had confided the fact that this was his birthday, and also part of her own history. From this it appeared that she was the wife of an army officer, who was stationed with his regiment in the far West. She had not seen him for nearly a year, or just after the baby was born; but at last he had been ordered to a fort on the upper Mississippi River, where he hoped to remain for some time. Now his young wife, who had only been waiting until he could give her any sort of a home with him, had bravely set forth with her baby to join him. He had written her that, on a certain date in the spring, a detachment of troops was to start from St. Louis by steamboat for the fort at which he was stationed. As one of the officers of this detachment was to take his wife with him, he thought it would be a fine opportunity for her to come at the same time. She wrote back that she could not possibly get ready by the date named, but would come by a later boat. After she had sent the letter, she found that she could get ready; and, as the aunt with whom she was living was about to break up her home and go abroad, she decided to start at once for St. Louis. There she would join her husband's friends, travel with them to the far-away fort, and give the lonely soldier a joyful surprise. There was no time to send another letter telling him of her change of plan, and she was glad of it, for a surprise would be so much nicer.
The early part of her journey had been accomplished quite easily. There had been no rains in the East, such as were deluging the whole Ohio valley. If there had been, it is not likely the soldier's wife would have undertaken to travel at that time, and expose her precious baby to such terrible risks, even to carry out the surprise she anticipated so joyfully. From her aunt's house, in New York city, she had travelled by steamer up the Hudson to Albany. From there she took cars to Buffalo, and a lake boat to Cleveland. Now she was travelling by rail again, across the flooded state of Ohio towards Cincinnati. There she intended taking a steamboat down the Ohio River, and up the Mississippi to St. Louis, where she expected to join her husband's friends, on the boat that would carry them all to their journey's end.
The details of this plan were fully discussed by the occupants of the adjoining seats in the car, and when it came time for the one who was not going through to leave the train, and take another at a small junction, she had become so greatly interested in her new acquaintance that she begged the latter to write to her, and tell her how she got along. She wrote her own name and address on a bit of paper, just before leaving the car, and gave it to the soldier's wife; but, in her hurry, neglected to make a note of the name given her in return, and afterwards, when she tried to recall it, was unable to do so.
The tediousness of the weary day had been so much lessened by the making of this pleasant acquaintance, that for some time after her departure the young mother remained light-hearted and cheerful. The baby, too, was bright and happy, and a source of constant amusement, not only to her, but to all those about him.
After a while, though, when it grew dark, and the feeble candles were lighted, and most of the passengers had left the car, and the baby at first fretted and then screamed, refusing to be quieted for more than an hour, the exhausted young mother grew nervous and frightened. Only the thought of the glad meeting, and the great happiness awaiting her at the end of this tedious journey, enabled her to bear it as bravely as she did.
At length the babe cried himself to sleep, and the tired arms that had held him so long gladly laid him down in a nest made of shawls and his own dainty blanket on the opposite seat. This blanket had the initials "G. E." embroidered in one corner, though these did not stand for the baby's name. In fact, he had no first name, nor had he yet been christened. This ceremony having been postponed until both the father and mother could take part in it; the question of a name had also been left undecided until then. The young mother wanted her boy called "Gerald," after his father, and she had even embroidered the initial "G." on his blanket to see how it would look. Thus far, however, the baby was only called "baby," and had no right to any other name.
As the child slept quietly in spite of the jar and jolt and rumble of the train, the fair young head of the mother who watched so fondly and patiently over him gradually drooped lower and lower. The brown eyes, so like the baby's, closed for longer and longer intervals, until at length she, too, was fast asleep, and dreaming of the joy that awaited her journey's end.
Chapter II.
A RUDE BAPTISM.
There were others on that train equally weary with the young mother, and even more anxious; for they knew better than she the ever-present dangers of that water-soaked road-bed, and they bore the weight of a fearful responsibility.
The conductor, looking grave and careworn, started nervously at every lurch of more than ordinary violence, and kept moving uneasily from end to end of his train. He never passed the young mother and her sleeping babe without casting sympathetic glances at them. He had done everything possible for their comfort, but it was little enough that he could do, and for their sake, more than anything else, he wished the trip were ended.
All through the long, dark hours, the brake-men stood on the platforms of the swaying cars, ready at a moment's warning to spring to the iron brake-wheels. This crew of train hands had only come on duty at nightfall, and had little knowledge of the through passengers.
In the locomotive cab, gazing ahead with strained eyes, were the engine-driver, Luke Matherson, and his fireman. Every now and then the latter found a change of occupation in flinging open the furnace door and tossing chunk after chunk of wood into the glowing interior. As he closed the door he would stand for a moment and look inquiringly at his companion, who sat motionless, with his hand on the throttle, and his eyes fixed steadily on the lines of track gleaming in the light of the powerful headlight. Occasionally, without turning his head, he exchanged a few words with the fireman.
"It's a nasty night, Luke," remarked the latter.
"Yes. It wouldn't take many more such to make me give up railroading."
"What do you think of the Beasely cut?"
"I'm afraid of it, and wish we were well through it."
"Well, we'll know all about it in five minutes more, and after that there's nothing serious but Glen Eddy creek."
The silence that followed was broken, a few minutes later, by two piercing blasts from the whistle. The fireman had already seen the danger, and sprung to the brake-wheel on the tender behind him. On every car the brakes were grinding harshly, set up by nervous, lusty young arms. The train did not come to a standstill an instant too soon; for, as it did so, the cow-catcher was already half buried in a slide from one of the treacherous banks of the Beasely cut.
An hour's hard work by all the train hands, and some of the passengers, with shovels and spades, cleared the track, and once more the express proceeded slowly on its uncertain way.
Now for the Glen Eddy bridge. Between it and the city that marked the end of the line was the best stretch of road-bed in the state. It was a long one, but it presented no dangers that a railroad man need fear.
The gray dawn was breaking as the train approached Glen Eddy creek. In the summer-time it was a quiet stream, slipping dreamily along between its heavily wooded banks. Now it was a furious torrent, swollen beyond all recognition, and clutching spitefully at the wooden piers of heavy crib-work that upheld the single span of the bridge.
The train was stopped and the bridge was examined. It seemed all right, and the conductor gave the word to go ahead. It was the last order he ever issued; for, in another minute, the undermined piers had given way, and the train was piled up in the creek a shapeless wreck.
From that terrible plunge only two persons escaped unharmed. One was Luke Matherson, the engine-driver, and the other was the baby. When the former felt his engine dropping from under him, he sprang from it, with desperate energy, far out into the muddy waters, that instantly closed over him. On coming to the surface, the instinct of self-preservation forced him to swim, but it was wildly and without an idea of direction or surroundings. For nearly a minute he swam with all his strength against the current, so that he was still near the wreck, when his senses were again quickened into action by a smothered cry, close at hand. At the same time a dark mass drifted towards him, and he seized hold of it. As the cry seemed to come from this, the man's struggles became directed by a definite purpose. Partially supporting himself by the wreckage, he attempted to guide it to the nearest bank; but so swift was the current that he was swept down stream more than a mile before he succeeded in accomplishing his purpose.
Finally his feet touched bottom, and he drew his prize to shore. It was a car seat, torn from its fastenings. Tightly wedged between it and its hinged back was a confused bundle, from which came a smothered wailing. Tearing away the wrappings, Luke Matherson stared for a moment, in a dazed fashion, at what they had held so safely. He could hardly believe that it was a live baby, lying there as rosy and unharmed as though in its cradle.
The sun had risen when the engine-driver, haggard, exhausted, with clothing torn and muddy, but holding the babe clasped tightly in his arms, staggered into the nearest farm-house, two miles back from the creek.
After his night of intense mental strain, the shock of the disaster, his plunge into the chilling waters, and his subsequent struggle to save the only surviving passenger of the train, it is not surprising that even Luke Matherson's strong frame yielded, and that for several weeks he was prostrated by a low fever. All this time the baby was kept at the farm-house with him, in order that he might be identified and claimed; but nobody came for him, nor were any inquiries made concerning the child. He was called "the Glen Eddy baby" by the few settlers of that sparsely populated region, who came to gaze at him curiously and pityingly. Thus those who cared for him gradually came to call him "Glen" for want of a better name; and, as the initials embroidered on the blanket saved with him were "G. E.," people soon forgot that Glen Eddy was not his real name.
Although several bodies were recovered from the wreck of the express, that of the young mother was not among them; and, as there was no one left alive who knew that she had been on the train, of course her death was not reported. Thus the mystery surrounding the Glen Eddy baby was so impenetrable that, after a while, people gave up trying to solve it, and finally it was almost forgotten.
When Luke Matherson recovered from his fever, nothing could induce him to return to his duties as engine-driver on the railroad.
"No," he said, "never will I put myself in the way of going through another such night as that last one."
He went to Cincinnati as soon as he was able to travel, and while there was offered a position in the engine-room of a large mill at Brimfield, in western Pennsylvania, which he accepted. The people of the farm-house where he had been ill were willing to keep the baby; but Luke Matherson claimed it, and would not give it up.
The babe had been given to him, if ever one had, he said; and, if no one else loved it, he did. Of course, if anybody could prove a better claim to it than his, he would be the last one to dispute it; but, if not, he would keep the child and do the very best by him he knew how. He had no folks of his own in the world, and was only too glad to feel that one human being would grow up to care for him.
The farm-house people lost track of Luke Matherson when he left Cincinnati. Thus when, some four months later, a broken-hearted man, who had with infinite pains traced his wife and child to that line of railroad, reached that part of the country, he could gain no further information except that a baby, who might have been his, was saved from the Glen Eddy disaster, but what had become of it nobody knew.
Chapter III.
A BOY WITHOUT A BIRTHDAY.
"It's no use, Glen," said the principal of the Brimfield High School, kindly, but with real sorrow in his tone. "Your marks in everything except history are so far below the average that I cannot, with justice to the others, let you go on with the class any longer. So unless you can catch up during the vacation, I shall be obliged to drop you into the class below, and we'll go all over the same ground again next year. I'm very sorry. It is a bad thing for a boy of your age to lose a whole year; for this is one of the most important periods of your life. Still, if you won't study, you can't keep up with those who will, that's certain."
The boy to whom these words were spoken was a squarely built, manly-looking chap, with brown curling hair, and big brown eyes. He was supposed to be seventeen years old, but appeared younger. Now his cheeks were flushed, and a hard, almost defiant, expression had settled on his face.
"I know you are right, Mr. Meadows," he said, at length. "And you have been very kind to me. It's no use, though. I just hate to study. I'd rather work, and work hard at almost anything else, then I would know what I was doing; but as for grinding away at stupid things like Latin and geometry and trigonometry and natural philosophy, that can't ever be of any earthly use to a fellow who doesn't intend to be either a professor or an astronomer, I can't see the good of it at all."
"No, I don't suppose you can now," replied the principal, smiling, "but you will find even those things of use some time, no matter what you may become in after-life. I will try and talk with you again on this subject before I go away; but now I must leave you. I hope for your sake, though, that you will think better about studying, and not throw away your chance to do so now, while it is comparatively easy. To win success in life you must study some time, and if you had stood anywhere near as high as Binney Gibbs I might have managed to offer you--"
"Excuse me, Mr. Meadows, but I must speak with you just a moment," here interrupted a voice, and put an end to the conversation between the principal and the boy who had allowed his distaste for study to bring him into disgrace.
As he walked away from the school-house, carrying all his books with him, for the term was ended and the long vacation had begun, the flush of mortification, called to his cheeks by Mr. Meadows's remarks, still reddened them. He felt the disgrace of his position keenly, though he had told the other boys, and had tried to make himself believe, that he did not care whether he passed the examinations or not. Now that he had failed to pass, he found that he did care. What was it that Mr. Meadows might have offered him? It couldn't be _that_, of course; but if it should have been! Well, there was no use in crying over it now. Binney Gibbs had been honored, and he was disgraced. It was bad enough to realize that, without thinking of things to make it worse. He was thankful when he reached home and had closed the front door behind him; for it seemed as though everybody he met must know of his disgrace, and be smiling scornfully at him.
He was a sensitive chap, was this Glen Eddy; for that was his name, and he was the same one who, as a baby, was rescued by Luke Matherson from the railroad wreck so many years ago. Most people called him Glen Matherson, and on the school register his name was entered as Glen Eddy Matherson; but, ever since his last birthday, when Luke had told him that he was not his real father, and had fully explained their relations to each other, the boy had thought of himself only as Glen Eddy.
The master mechanic of the Brimfield Mills, for such Luke Matherson now was, had meant to keep the secret of the boy's life to himself, at least for some years longer. Glen had, however, heard rumors of it, and had on one occasion been taunted by an angry playmate with the sneer that he was only a nobody who didn't belong to anybody, anyhow.
Glen had promptly forced this tormentor to acknowledge that he did not know what he was talking about; but the taunt rankled all the same. A few days afterwards, which happened to be the one that was kept as his seventeenth birthday, he told his father of it, and asked what it meant.
Then Luke Matherson, greatly troubled, but seeing that the secret could not be kept any longer from the boy, told him what he knew of his history. He ended with, "It is fifteen years ago this very day, Glen, that the terrible wreck took place; and, as you were then thought to be about two years old, I have called this your birthday ever since."
The boy was amazed and bewildered. No idea that the one whom he had always called "father" was not such in reality had ever entered his head; but now that the truth was told him, it seemed strange that he had not always known it instinctively. He had known that Mrs. Matherson was not his own mother, for he was five years old when she assumed that position, and of course he had always known that the two children were not his own sisters, though he loved them as dearly as though they were. But now to find out that he did not really belong to anybody was hard.
Who were his real parents? Were they alive? Could he find them? were questions that now began to occupy the boy's mind most of the time.
One of the strangest things about this state of affairs was to discover that his birthday was not his birthday after all. It seemed as though some foundation on which he had rested in absolute trust of its security had suddenly been swept from under him, and left him struggling in a stormy sea of uncertainty.
The idea of a boy without a birthday! Who ever heard of such a thing? How the other fellows would stare and smile if they knew it! Glen had been so proud of his birthday, too, and it had been made so much of at home. His favorite dishes were always prepared for the meals of that day, his tastes were consulted in everything that was done, and his father always made a point of giving him a more valuable present then than even at Christmas. Why, on the last one, the very day on which the boy first learned how unreal the whole thing was, his father--no, his adopted father--had given him the dearest little silver watch that ever was seen.
Many times since learning such a sad lesson in the uncertainties of life, Glen had pulled this watch from his pocket, simply to assure himself of its reality, and that it was not a make-believe like his birthday.
But for his natural force of character and sweetness of disposition, Glen would have been a spoiled boy; for Luke Matherson had never been able, since the moment he first saw him lying helplessly on the floating car seat, to cross him in anything, or deny him whatever he asked if it lay in his power to grant it. With his own children Mr. Matherson was rather strict; but with the orphan lad who had shared with him the greatest peril of his life, he could not be.
Thus Glen had grown up to be somewhat impatient of restraint, and very much inclined to have his own way. He was also a brave, generous boy, and an acknowledged leader among his young companions. Was he not the best swimmer, the fastest runner, the most daring climber, and expert horseback-rider in Brimfield? Was he not captain of the baseball nine? and did not all the fellows admire him except one or two, who were so jealous of his popularity that they sought to detract from it?
One of those who were most envious of him was Binney Gibbs, son of the wealthy owner of the Brimfield Mills. He was taller than Glen, but was no match for him in anything that called for muscle or pluck. It was he who had flung the taunt of Glen's being a nobody at the boy. Binney had never been noted for his studious habits until both he and Glen entered the High School at the same time. Then, realizing that he could not excel at anything else, he determined to beat the other at his studies. To this end he strained every nerve with such effect that he not only outranked Glen in his own class, but, by working all through two long vacations, gained a whole year on him. So now, while poor Glen was threatened with being turned back from the second class, Binney Gibbs had just graduated at the head of the first, and was ready to enter college. And the worst of it all was that everybody believed him to be a whole year younger than Glen, too.
To be sure, Binney was pale and thin, and no stronger than a cat. Why, he couldn't even swim; but what of it? Had he not beaten the most popular fellow in town away out of sight in this scholarship race? To crown his triumph another thing had happened to make Binney Gibbs the envy of all the boys in Brimfield, but particularly of Glen Eddy.
On that last day of school the diplomas had been awarded, and Binney's had been handed to him the first of all. As he was about to return to his seat, amid the loud applause of the spectators, Mr. Meadows asked him to wait a minute. So Binney stood on the platform while the principal told of a wonderful exploring expedition that was being fitted out at that moment, to go across the plains through the almost unknown territories of New Mexico and Arizona to California. It was to be the most famous expedition of the kind ever sent into the far West; and, as it was to be partly a government enterprise, all sorts of political influence was being used to obtain positions in it. It was to be commanded by a noted general, who was an old friend of Mr. Meadows.
"Now," said the principal, "the general writes that he will give a position in this party to the boy who stands highest in my school this year, or, if I cannot recommend him, or he does not choose to accept it, to any other whom I may name." Here Mr. Meadows was interrupted by prolonged applause.
When it had subsided, he continued. "There is no question as to which pupil of the school ranks highest this year. He stands before you now, with his well-earned diploma in his hand [applause], and it gives me great pleasure to be able to offer to Master Binney Gibbs a position in the exploring-party that will start from St. Louis two weeks from to-day, under command of my friend General Lyle. I hope that he may be induced to accept it, and that his parents may permit him to do so; for I cannot imagine a more fascinating or profitable way of spending a year at his time of life."
Chapter IV.
"I JUST HATE TO STUDY."
Mr. Meadows's remarks in regard to the famous exploring expedition, about to be sent across the Western plains, were received with tremendous applause, and Binney Gibbs at once became an object of envy to every boy in the school--to say nothing of the girls. What a chance to have offered one just for doing a little hard study! If the other boys had known of it, how they, too, would have studied! Binney Gibbs would have been obliged to work harder than he had for his position! Yes, sir! ten times harder!--only think of it! Indians and buffalo and bears, and the Rocky Mountains, and all the other enchanted marvels of that far-away region. Why, just to contemplate it was better than reading a dime novel!
While these thoughts were racing through the minds of his companions, and while they were cheering and clapping their hands, the lucky boy himself was talking with Mr. Meadows, and telling him how much he should like to join that expedition, and how he hoped his father would let him do so.
Mr. Gibbs left his seat in the audience and stepped up to the platform, where he talked for a moment with Mr. Meadows. Then he spoke to Binney, and then, as he faced the school, they saw that he had something to say to them.
It was that he was proud of his son--proud of the honor shown to the school and to Brimfield through him--and that he should certainly allow Binney to accept the offered position.
So it was settled; and all the boys cheered again. To Glen Eddy it seemed that he would be willing to forego all the other good things that life held for him if he could only have the prospect of one such year of adventure as was promised to Binney Gibbs. For the first time in his life he was genuinely envious of another boy.
It was that same day, after everybody else had gone, that he had the talk with Mr. Meadows, in which the latter told him he must go back a whole year on account of not having studied; though, if he had, he might have been offered--And then came the interruption. Glen was too heart-sick and miserable to wait and ask what the offer might have been. Besides, he thought he knew, and the thought only added to his distress of mind, until it really seemed as though no boy could be much more unhappy than he.
Mr. Matherson knew how the boy stood in school, for the principal had thought it his duty to inform him; and that evening he and Glen had a long and serious talk.
"It's no use, father; I just hate to study!" exclaimed Glen, using the same words that had caused Mr. Meadows to look grave earlier in the day.
"I fancy we all hate a great many things that we have to do in this life," replied the master mechanic, "and you have certainly had a striking example to-day of the value of study."
"Yes, that's so," admitted Glen, reluctantly, "and if I had known that there was anything of that kind to be gained, perhaps I might have tried for it too."
"If I had been given your chance to study when I was young," continued the other, "and had made the most of it, I would have a better position to-day than the one I now hold. As it is, I have had to study mighty hard, along with my work, to get even it. I tell you, my boy, the chances come when you least expect them. The only thing to do is to prepare for them, and be ready to seize them as they appear. If one isn't prepared they'll slip right past him--and when once they have done that, he can never catch them again."
"But aren't there working chances just as well as studying chances, father?"
"Of course there are, and the study must always be followed by work--hard work, too--but the first is a mighty big help to the other. Now I will gladly do all that I can to help you on with your studies, if you will study; but if you won't, you must go to work, for I can't afford to support you in idleness, and I wouldn't if I could."
"Well, I'll tell you what, father," said Glen, who was more inclined to take his own way than one proposed by somebody else, "if you can help me to the getting of a job, I'll try the work this summer, and when it comes time for school to open again, I'll decide whether it shall be work or study."
"All right, my boy, I'll do what I can to get you a place in the mill or in Deacon Brown's store, whichever you prefer."
Now that a definite kind of work was proposed, it did not seem so very desirable after all, and Glen doubted if he should like either the mill or the store. Still he did not say so, but asked for a day longer in which to decide, which was readily granted him.
At about the same time that evening, Binney Gibbs was saying to his father, with a self-satisfied air,
"Isn't it a good thing that I have stuck to my books as I have, and not wasted my time playing ball, or swimming, or doing the things that Glen Matherson and the other fellows seem to consider so important?"
"Well, yes," replied Mr. Gibbs, a little doubtfully, "I suppose it is. At the same time, Binney, I do wish you were a little stronger. I'm afraid you'll find roughing it pretty hard."
"Oh, yes, I suppose physical strength was the most important thing when you were young, father; but nowadays its brain-work that tells," answered Binney, with a slight tone of contempt for his father's old-fashioned ideas. Binney was not a bad-hearted fellow--only spoiled.
The next day Glen did not feel like meeting any of his young companions. He wanted to think over the several problems that had been presented to him. So he wandered down to the river, where a fine new railroad-bridge, in the building of which he had been greatly interested, was now receiving its finishing touches. As he walked out towards the centre of the graceful structure, admiring, as he had a hundred times before, the details of its construction, its evident strength and airy lightness, he saw the engineer who had charge of the work standing, with a roll of plans under his arm, talking with one of the foremen.
Glen had visited the bridge so often that the engineer knew him by sight, and had even learned his name, though he had never spoken to him. He was, however, especially fond of boys, and had been much pleased with Glen's appearance. Several times he had been on the point of speaking to him, but had been restrained by the diffidence a man is so apt to feel in the presence of a stranger so much younger than himself. It is a fear that he may do or say something to excite the undisguised mirth or contempt that so often wait upon the ignorance of youth.
Without suspecting these feelings in him, Glen had been strangely attracted towards the engineer, whose profession and position seemed to him alike fascinating and desirable. He wished he could become acquainted with him, but did not know how to set about it. He, too, was diffident and fearful of appearing in an unfavorable light before the other, who was evidently so much older and wiser than he. But he did long to ask this engineer a great many questions.
Now he stood at a respectful distance and watched the young man, whose name he knew to be Hobart, and, wondering whether his position had been reached by study or work, wished he could think of some good excuse for speaking to him.
The floor of the bridge on which they were standing was about twenty-five feet above Brim River, the deep, swift stream that it spanned. Glen had swum and fished in it, and boated on it, until he knew its every current and slack-water pool. He knew it as well as he did the road to the village, and was almost as much at home in the one as on the other.
In order to consult a note-book that he drew from his pocket, Mr. Hobart laid his roll of plans on a floor-beam, at his feet, for a moment. Just then a little whirling gust of wind came along, and in an instant the valuable plans were sailing through the air towards the sparkling waters, that seemed to laugh at the prospect of bearing them away far beyond human reach.
The engineer tried in vain to clutch them as they rolled off the floor-beam, and uttered an exclamation of vexation as they eluded his grasp.
As he looked around to see what could be done towards their recovery, a boyish figure, without hat, jacket, or shoes, sprang past him, poised for an instant on the end of the floor-beam, and then leaped into space. Like a flash of light it shot downward, straight and rigid, with feet held tightly together, and hands pressed close against the thighs. A myriad of crystal-drops were flung high in the air and glittered in the bright sunlight as Glen, striking the water with the impetus of a twenty-five-foot fall, sank deep beneath its surface.
Chapter V.
SWIMMING INTO A FRIENDSHIP.
Although Glen found no difficulty in coming to the surface, almost at the spot where the roll of plans floated, and grasping it, he did not find it so easy to bring it safely to shore. To begin with, the roll occupied one hand, so that he had but one for swimming. Then the current was strong, and the banks steep. He was very near the middle of the river. Any other Brimfield boy would have been in despair at finding himself in such a situation. But, then, no other boy in Brimfield would have taken that leap.
For a moment Glen wondered what he should do. Then he remembered the "back-set" at the Bend, a quarter of a mile below the bridge. It would put him right in to the bank, at a place where it was low, too. The anxious watchers on the bridge wondered to see the boy turn on his back and quietly drift away with the current, at the same time holding the roll of plans, for which he had dared so much, clear of the water.
They shouted to him to swim towards one or the other bank and they would fling him a rope; but Glen only smiled without wasting any breath in answering. Most of the men ran to one end of the bridge, because it looked to them as though the boy were nearer that bank than the other; but Mr. Hobart, who had studied the river, remembered the Bend, and hurried to the other end. When he reached it he ran down along the bank, towards the place where he felt certain the boy would attempt to land. He got there in time to see Glen swimming with all his might to get out of the main current and into the "back-set." With two hands he would have done it easily; but with only one it was hard work. Then, too, his clothing dragged heavily.
Mr. Hobart shouted to him to let go the roll. "Drop it and make sure of your own safety," he cried. "They are not worth taking any risks for." But Glen was not the kind of a boy to let go of a thing that he had once made up his mind to hold on to, so long as he had an ounce of strength left.
So he struggled on, and at last had the satisfaction of feeling that something stronger than his own efforts was carrying him towards shore. He had gained the "back-set," and, though its direction was rather up along the bank, than in towards it, the swimmer had still strength enough left to overcome this difficulty.
A tree, growing straight out from the bank, overhung the stream, so that Glen at length drifted under it, and caught hold of a drooping branch. He had not strength enough to pull himself up; but it was not needed. With the activity that comes from a life spent in the open air, the engineer had run out on the horizontal trunk, and now, lying flat on it, he could just reach the boy's hand. In another minute the strong arms had drawn Glen up to a secure resting-place, where he might regain his breath and drip to his heart's content.
"Here are the plans, Mr. Hobart," he said, shyly, and at the same time proudly. "I hope they are not spoiled by the water. I held them out of it as much as I could."
"I hope you are not spoiled by the water, Glen Matherson," laughed the engineer, as he took the wet roll from the boy's hand. "You have done splendidly, and I am sincerely grateful to you for rescuing my plans, which are indeed of great value. At the same time I wouldn't do such a thing again, if I were you, for anything less important than the saving of life. It was a big risk to take, and I should have suffered a life-long sorrow if anything had gone wrong with you."
Although it was a warm June day, and Glen laughed at the idea of catching cold, he had been in the water long enough to be thoroughly chilled. So, when they regained the bank, Mr. Hobart insisted that he should take off his clothes, wring them, and let them dry in the hot sun. In the meantime a workman had come down from the bridge with the boy's hat, jacket, and shoes. He lent him his overalls, and, thus comically arrayed, Glen sat and talked with the engineer while his clothes were drying.
How kindly the brown-bearded face was, and with what interest the man listened to all the boy had to say. How pleasant was his voice, and, in spite of his age (he was about thirty-five) and wisdom, how easy it was to talk to him! It was so easy, and he proved such a sympathetic listener, that before Glen knew it he found himself confiding all his troubles and hopes and perplexities to this new friend. It began with his name, which he told the engineer was not Matherson, and then he had to explain why it was not.
Then they wondered together what sort of a man Glen's real father could be, provided he were alive; and if, by any strange chance, he and his son would ever meet and know each other. Mr. Hobart did not think it at all likely they ever would. From this the boy was led to tell of his dislike for study, and into what trouble it had led him. He even told of the decision reached by his adopted father and himself the evening before, and the undesirable choice of work that had been presented to him.
"And so you don't think you would fancy either the mill or the store?" asked Mr. Hobart.
"No, sir, I do not. Each one, when I think of it, seems worse than the other, and they both seem worse than most anything else."
"Worse than studying?"
"Just as bad, because either of them means being shut up, and I hate to stay in the house. I should like some business that would keep me out-of-doors all the time."
"Ploughing, for instance, or driving a horse-car, or digging clams, or civil-engineering, or something nice and easy, like any of those?" suggested Mr. Hobart, gravely.
"Civil-engineering is what I think I should like better than anything else in the world!" exclaimed the boy, eagerly. "That's what you are, isn't it, sir?"
"That is what I am trying to be," answered Mr. Hobart, smiling; "and if, by years of hard work, hard study, and unceasing effort, I can reach a generally recognized position as an engineer, I shall be satisfied with my life's work."
"Do you have to study?" asked Glen, in amazement.
"Indeed I do," was the answer. "I have to study continually, and fully as hard as any schoolboy of your acquaintance."
Glen looked incredulous. It is hard for a boy to realize that his school is only the place where he is taught how to study, and that his most important lessons will have to be learned after he leaves it.
"I think I should like to be a civil-engineer, anyhow," he remarked, after a thoughtful pause, "because it is an out-of-door business."
"Yes," admitted the other, "it is to a great extent."
Then they found that Glen's clothing was dry enough to be worn, and also that it was dinnertime. So, after Mr. Hobart had shaken hands with the boy, and said he hoped to see him again before long, they separated.
That afternoon Glen, still wearing a perplexed expression on his usually merry face, walked down to the mill and looked in at its open door. It was so hot and dusty and noisy that he did not care to stay there very long. He had been familiar with it all his life; but never before had it struck him as such an unpleasant place to work in, day after day, month after month, and even year after year, as it did now. How hard people did have to work, anyway! He had never realized it before. Still, working in a mill must be a little harder than anything else. At any rate, he certainly would not choose to earn his living there.
Then he walked down to Deacon Brown's store. The deacon did a large retail business; this was a busy afternoon, and the place was filled with customers. How tired the clerks looked, and what pale faces they had. How people bothered them with questions, and called on them to attend to half a dozen things at once. How close and stuffy the air of the store was. It was almost as bad as that of the mill. Then, too, the store was kept open hours after the mill had shut down; for its evening trade was generally very brisk. It did not seem half so attractive a place to Glen now as it had at other times, when he had visited it solely with a view of making some small purchase. Perhaps going to school, and keeping up with one's class, was not the hardest thing in the world after all.
So the poor boy returned home, more perplexed as to what he should do than ever, and he actually dreaded the after-supper talk with his adopted father that he usually enjoyed so much.
When the time came, and Mr. Matherson asked, kindly, "Well, my boy, what have you decided to do?" Glen was obliged to confess that he was just as far from a decision as he had been the evening before.
Chapter VI.
RECEIVING AN OFFER AND ACCEPTING IT.
"Well, that is bad," said the master mechanic, when Glen told him that he had been unable to arrive at any decision in regard to going to work. "It is bad, for I can't see that there is anything open to you just now, except one of the two things we talked about last evening. At the same time, I hate to compel you, or even persuade you, to do anything that is hard and distasteful. If you were a year younger, I should say, 'Spend your vacation as you always have done, and have as good a time as you know how, without worrying about the future.' At seventeen, though, a boy should begin to look ahead, and take some decisive step in the direction of his future career. If he decides to study, he should also decide what he wants to study for. If he decides to work, he should have some object to work for, and should turn all his energies in that direction. I declare, Glen, I hardly know how to advise you in this matter. Do you think of any particular thing you would rather do, or try to be? If so, and I can help you to it, you know how gladly I will, in every way that lies in my power."
"It seems to me I would rather be a civil-engineer than anything else," answered the boy, a little hesitatingly.
"A civil-engineer!" exclaimed the other, in surprise; "why, Glen, lad, don't you know that it takes the hardest kind of study to be that?"
Just then their conversation was interrupted by the arrival of a visitor, who, to Glen's surprise, was none other than Mr. Hobart, the engineer whose position he had been thinking of as one of the most desirable in the world.
After a few moments' pleasant chat the visitor asked Mr. Matherson if he could have a private business talk with him. So Glen left the room, and wandered restlessly about the house, filled with a lively curiosity as to what business the engineer could have with his adopted father.
In the meantime Mr. Hobart was saying, "I have known your son for some time by sight, Mr. Matherson, and took a fancy to him from the first. We only got acquainted to-day, when he performed an act of daring in my presence, and at the same time rendered me an important service. I find him to be exactly such a boy as I supposed he was; a generous-hearted, manly fellow, who is just now unhappy and discontented because he has no particular aim in life, and does not know what he wants to do."
"Yes," said Mr. Matherson, "that is just the trouble; and the worst of it is that I don't know what to advise him."
"Then, perhaps, I am just in time to help you. My work here is about finished, and in a few days I am to leave for Kansas, where I am to take charge of a locating-party on one of the Pacific railroads. If you are willing to let Glen go with me, I can make a place for him in this party. The pay will only be thirty dollars per month, besides his expenses; but, by the end of the summer, I believe he will have gained more valuable knowledge and experience than he could in a year of home and school life. I believe, too, in that time I can show him the value of an education and the necessity of studying for it. Now, without really knowing anything about it, he thinks he would like to become a civil-engineer. After a few months' experience in the unsettled country to which I am going he will have seen the rough side of the life, and can decide intelligently whether he desires to continue in it or not."
Mr. Matherson could hardly restrain his delight at the prospect of such an opening for the boy whom he loved so dearly; but he was too honest to let him start out under false colors; so he said,
"I can never tell you how grateful I am for this offer, sir; but I don't want you to think that my boy is any better than he really is. He is not a good scholar, and seems to lack application. Even now he is in danger of being turned back a whole year in school because he has failed to keep up with his class."
"I know all that," replied Mr. Hobart, smiling; "and it is one of the reasons why I want him to go with me. I was very much such a boy myself, and think I understand his state of mind perfectly. He has reached the most trying period of his life, and the one where he most needs encouragement and help. He has a sufficiently good education to build on, and is bright enough to comprehend things that are clearly explained to him. As for his having no knowledge of the peculiar studies necessary for an engineer, I am glad that he hasn't. I believe that it is better for all boys to gain some practical knowledge of the business they intend to follow before they really begin to study for it. A few months or a year of practice shows them in what they are deficient and what they need to learn. I could get plenty of young fellows to go out to Kansas with me who are crammed with theoretical knowledge of surveying and engineering, but who are ignorant of its practice. Such chaps think they know it all, and are impatient of criticism or advice. I can get along better with one who knows little or nothing to begin with, but who is bright and willing to learn. In the end I will guarantee to make such a one the more valuable engineer of the two."
"It is a new idea to me," said Mr. Matherson, reflectively, "but I believe you are right."
"There is another reason why I fancy your boy, and think I can make an engineer of him," continued Mr. Hobart. "His physical condition seems to me to be perfect. As they say of prize animals, he seems to be sound in wind and limb, and without a blemish. Now, the life of an engineer, particularly in unsettled countries, is a hard one. He is exposed to all sorts of weather; must often sleep without a shelter of any kind, and must work hard from early dawn until late at night, sometimes on a scanty allowance of food. It is as hard as, and in many cases harder than, active service in the army. It is no life for weaklings, and we do not want them; but, from what I have seen of your boy, I do not believe that even you can point out any physical defect in his make-up."
"No, I certainly cannot," replied Mr. Matherson, heartily, glad of a chance to praise his boy without qualification, in at least one respect. "I believe him to be physically perfect, and I know that there is not a boy of his age in town who is his match in strength, agility, or daring."
"So you see," laughed the engineer, "he is exactly the boy I want; and if you will let him go with me I shall consider that you have conferred a favor."
"Of course I will let him go, sir, and shall feel forever grateful to you for the offer."
Thus it was all settled, and Glen was summoned to hear the result of the few minutes' conversation by which the whole course of his life was to be changed. By it, too, he was to be lifted in a moment from the depths of despondency and uncertainty to such a height of happiness as he had not dared dream of, much less hope for. The moment he entered the room he was assured, by the smiling faces of its occupants, that their topic of conversation had been a pleasant one; but when its nature was explained to him he could hardly credit his senses.
Would he like to go out to Kansas for the summer?--to a land still occupied by wild Indians and buffalo? The idea of asking him such a question! There was nothing in the whole world he would like better! Why, it was almost as good as the position offered to Binney Gibbs; and, certainly, no boy could ever hope for anything more splendid than that. In two respects he considered himself even more fortunate than Binney. One was that he was to go with Mr. Hobart, whom he had come to regard with an intense admiration as one of the wisest and kindest of men. The other was that they were to start on the third day from that time, while Binney would not go for nearly two weeks yet.
What busy days the next two were! How Glen did fly around with his preparations! How interested Mr. Hobart was, and how he laughed at many of the excited boy's questions! Ought he to have a buckskin suit and a broad-brimmed hat? Should he need any other weapons besides a revolver and a bowie-knife? Would it be better to take long-legged leather boots or rubber-boots, or both? How large a trunk ought he to have?
His outfit, prepared by Mr. Hobart's advice, finally consisted of two pairs of double blankets, rolled up in a rubber sheet and securely corded, two pairs of easy, laced walking-shoes, and one pair of leather leggings, three flannel shirts, three suits of under-clothing, and six pairs of socks, one warm coat, two pairs of trousers, a soft, gray felt hat, half a dozen silk handkerchiefs, and the same number of towels. Of these he would wear, from the start, the hat, coat, one of the flannel shirts, one of the two pairs of trousers, a suit of under-clothing, one of the silk handkerchiefs knotted about his neck, and one of the pairs of shoes. All the rest could easily be got into a small leathern valise, which would be as much of a trunk as he would be allowed to carry.
He would need a stout leather belt, to which should be slung a good revolver in a holster, a common sheath-knife, that need not cost more than thirty cents, and a small tin cup that could be bought for five.
Besides these things, Mrs. Matherson, who loved the boy as though he were her own, tucked into the valise a small case of sewing materials, a brush, comb, cake of soap, tooth-brush, hand-glass, and a Testament in which his name was written.
On the very day of his departure his adopted father presented the delighted boy with a light rifle of the very latest pattern. It was, of course, a breech-loader, and carried six extra cartridges in its magazine. In its neat canvas-case, Glen thought it was the very handsomest weapon he had ever seen, and the other boys thought so too.
With them he was the hero of the hour, and even Binney Gibbs's glittering prospects were almost forgotten, for the time being, in this more immediate excitement.
Of course they all gathered at the railway station to see him start on the morning of the appointed day. It seemed as though almost everybody else in the village was there, too. Binney Gibbs was among the very few of Glen's acquaintances who did not come. So, amid tears and laughter, good wishes and loud cheerings, the train rolled away, bearing Glen Eddy from the only home he had ever known towards the exciting scenes of the new life that awaited him in the far West.
Chapter VII.
ACROSS THE MISSISSIPPI.
Never before, since he was first carried to Brimfield as a baby, had Glen been away from there; so, from the very outset, the journey on which he had now started, in company with Mr. Hobart, was a wonderful one. In school, besides history, he had enjoyed the study of geography, being especially fond of poring over maps and tracing out imaginary journeys. In this way he had gained a fair idea of the route Mr. Hobart and he were to pursue, as well as of the cities and other places of interest they were to see. There was one place, however, for which he was not prepared. It was early in the first night of the journey, and the boy had just fallen into a doze in his sleeping-car berth. As the night was warm, and there was no dust, the car door was open, and through it came a sudden shout of "Glen Eddy! Glen Eddy!"
As Glen started up, wide awake, and answering "Here I am," the train rumbled over a bridge. Then it stopped, and the meaning of the shout flashed into the boy's mind. He was at the very place where, so long ago, he had lost a father or mother, or both. All the details of that awful scene, as described by his adopted father, appeared vividly before him, and he seemed to see, through a gray dawn, the mass of splintered wreckage nearly covered by angry waters, the floating car seat with its tiny human burden, and the brave swimmer directing it towards land.
The train stopped but a moment, and then moved on. As it did so, Glen, who was in an upper berth, heard a deep sigh, that sounded almost like a groan, coming apparently from a lower berth on the opposite side of the car.
Directly afterwards he heard a low voice ask, respectfully, "What is it, Governor? Are you in pain? Can I do anything?"
"Nothing, Price, thank you. I had a sort of nightmare, that's all," was the reply, and then all was again quiet.
Glen wished he might catch a glimpse of the person who spoke last, for he had never seen a governor, and wondered in what way he would look different from other men. He would try and see him in the morning. Thus thinking, he fell asleep.
The next morning he was awakened by Mr. Hobart, and told to dress as quickly as possible, for they were within a few miles of East St. Louis, and would soon cross the Mississippi. This news drove all other thoughts from the boy's mind, and he hurried through his toilet, full of excitement at the prospect of seeing the mightiest of American rivers.
There was no bridge across the Mississippi then, either at St. Louis or elsewhere. Great four-horse transfer coaches from the several hotels were waiting for passengers beside the train where it stopped, and these were borne to the opposite bank by a steam ferry-boat with a peculiar name and of peculiar construction. The _Cahokia_ looked like a regular river steamer, except that she had no visible paddle-wheels, not even one behind, like a wheelbarrow, as some of the very shoal-draught boats had. For some time Glen could not discover what made her go, though go she certainly did, moving swiftly and easily across the broad expanse of tawny waters towards the smoky city on its farther bank. He would not ask Mr. Hobart, for he loved to puzzle things out for himself if he possibly could. At length he discovered that the boat was double-hulled, and that its single paddle-wheel was located between the two hulls. Glen was obliged to ask the object of this; but when he was told that it was to protect the wheel from the great ice-cakes that floated down the river in winter, he wondered that he had not thought of that himself.
So he forgot to look for his governor, or ask about him until they reached the hotel where they were to get breakfast and spend a few hours. Then he was told that the person in whom he was interested was probably General Elting, who had just completed a term of office as governor of one of the territories, and who was now acting as treasurer of the very railroad company for which he was to work.
Glen regretted not having seen the ex-governor, but quickly forgot his slight disappointment in the more novel and interesting things that now attracted his attention. He had never been in a city before, and was very glad of a few hours in which to see the sights of this one; for the train that was to carry them to Kansas City would not leave until afternoon.
As the offices of the company by whom Mr. Hobart was employed were in St. Louis, he was obliged to spend all his time in them, and could not go about with Glen. So, only charging him to be on hand in time for the train, the engineer left the boy to his own devices.
Glen spent most of his time on the broad levee at the river's edge, where he was fascinated by the great steamboats, with their lofty pilot-houses, tall chimneys, roaring furnaces, and crews of shouting negroes, that continually came and went.
This seemed to be their grand meeting-point. On huge placards, swung above their gang-planks, Glen read that some of them were bound for New Orleans and all intermediate ports. Then there were boats for the Red, Arkansas, Yazoo, Ohio, Illinois, Missouri, and a dozen other rivers, tributary to the great Father of Waters. Still others were bound for Northern ports, even as far as distant St. Paul, in Minnesota.
Two o'clock found the boy at the railway station, standing beside the car in which all his belongings were already safely deposited, waiting anxiously for Mr. Hobart. Just as the train was about to start, that gentleman rushed into the station.
"Jump aboard, Glen," he said, hurriedly, "and go on to Kansas City with the baggage. Here is your pass and a note to Mr. Brackett. Report to him at the Kaw House. I am detained here by business, but will join you to-morrow or next day. Good-bye."
The train was already in motion, and in another moment the boy had lost sight of his only friend in that part of the world, and was whirling away towards an unknown destination. He felt rather lonely and forlorn at thus being cast upon his own resources, but at the same time he felt proud of the confidence reposed in him, and glad of an opportunity to prove how well he could take care of himself.
For several hours he was interested in watching the rapidly changing features of the landscape; but after a while he grew weary of this, and began to study his fellow-passengers. There were not many in the sleeper, and the only ones near him in whom he took an interest were a little girl, five or six years old, who was running up and down the aisle, and a lady, evidently the child's mother, who sat opposite to him. As he watched the little one she tripped and would have fallen had he not sprung forward and caught her. The child smiled at him, the mother thanked him, and in a few minutes he found himself playing with the former and amusing himself in entertaining her.
She told him that her name was Nettie Winn; but that her papa, who lived a long way off, and whom she was going to see, called her "Nettle." She was a bright, sunny-haired little thing, who evidently regarded elder people as having been created especially for her amusement and to obey her orders. As, in obedience to one of these, the boy carried her in his arms to the forward end of the car that she might look out of the window in the door, a fine-looking middle-aged gentleman spoke to him, remarking that he seemed very fond of children.
"Yes, sir, I am," answered Glen, "for I have two little sisters at home."
They exchanged a few more words, and Glen was so attracted by the stranger's appearance and manner that after the tired child had gone to sleep with her head in her mother's lap, he again walked to the end of the car in hopes that the gentleman might be inclined to renew their conversation. Nor was he disappointed; for the stranger welcomed him with a smile, made room on the seat beside him, and they were soon engaged in a pleasant chat.
It is not hard for a man of tact to win the confidence of a boy, so that, before long, the gentleman knew that this was Glen's first journey from home, and that he was going to Kansas to learn to be an engineer.
"Do you mean a civil-engineer?" he asked, "or an engine-driver?"
"Oh, a civil-engineer, of course!" answered the boy; "for I can run a locomotive now, almost as well as father, and that used to be his business."
Then he explained that his father, who was now a master mechanic, had given him careful instruction in the art of running a pony switch engine that belonged to the Brimfield Mills, and that once, when the engine-driver was ill, he had been placed in charge of it for a whole day.
"That is a most useful accomplishment," remarked the gentleman, "and one that I should be glad to acquire myself."
When the train stopped at an eating station they went in to supper together, and Glen began to think that, in his new friend, he had found a second Mr. Hobart, which was the very nicest thing he could think about anybody.
The boy did not forget to carry a cup of tea and a glass of milk into the car for Mrs. Winn and Nettie, for which act of thoughtfulness he was rewarded by a grateful smile and hearty thanks.
He wondered somewhat at the several men who every now and then came into the car and exchanged a few words in low tone with his other train acquaintance, and also wondered that the gentleman should leave the car and walk towards the forward end of the train every time it stopped at a station.
Glen was so tired that he had his berth made up and turned in very early; but for a long time found himself unable to sleep, so busy were his thoughts. At length, however, he fell into a sound, dreamless slumber, that lasted for hours, though he knew nothing of the passage of time.
He was suddenly awakened by a loud noise, and found himself sitting bolt upright in his berth, listening, bewildered and half frightened, to a confused sound of pistol-shots, shouts, and screams. The train was motionless. The screams were evidently those of fright, and came from the car he was in, while the other and more terrifying sounds reached his ears from some distance.
Chapter VIII.
GLEN RUNS A LOCOMOTIVE.
Springing from his berth, Glen began hastily to put on his shoes and the few articles of clothing he had laid aside. Several other passengers were doing the same thing, and each was asking the others what had happened; but nobody knew. All the alarming sounds had now ceased, even the women who had screamed being quiet, in the hope of discovering the cause of their terror.
Glen was the first to leave the car, and, seeing a confused movement of lanterns at the forward end of the train, he began to run in that direction. It was still dark, though there were signs of dawn in the sky. The train was not stopped at a station, but in a thick woods. As the boy reached the baggage-car, he was horrified to see that several men were lifting a limp and apparently lifeless body into it. The sight made him feel sick and faint. He stood for a moment irresolute. Then, two men, one of whom carried a lantern, came rapidly towards him.
"Here he is, now!" exclaimed one of them, as the light from the lantern fell on the boy's face. Glen recognized the voice. It was that of his recent acquaintance. Now he was coatless and bare-headed. In his hand was a Colt's revolver. The other man was the conductor of the train.
"This gentleman says you can run a locomotive. Is that so?" asked the conductor, holding up his lantern and scanning Glen's face keenly.
"Yes," answered the boy, "I can."
"Well, it looks like taking an awful risk to trust a boy as young as you; but I don't know what else we can do. Our engineer has just been killed, and the fireman is badly wounded. Two more men are hurt, and we've got to get them to a doctor as quick as we can. It's fifty miles to Kansas City, and there's only one telegraph station between here and there. It's ten miles ahead. We'll stop there, and send a despatch. Will you undertake to run us in?"
"Let me look at the engine first, and then I'll tell you," answered Glen, his voice trembling with excitement in spite of his efforts to appear calm.
The three went to the panting locomotive and swung themselves up into its cab. Glen shuddered as he thought of the tragedy just enacted in that cab, and almost drew back as he entered it. Then, controlling himself by a determined effort, he gauged the water, tested the steam, threw the lever over and back, opened the furnace door, glanced at the amount of fuel in the tender, and did it all with such a business-like air and appearance of knowing what he was about as to inspire both the men, who were watching him closely, with confidence.
"Yes," he said at length, "I'll take her in; but we shall need some more water."
"Good for you, son!" cried the conductor. "You're a trump! and I for one believe you'll do it."
"So do I," said the passenger; "and I'm thankful we've got such a plucky young engine-driver along."
"But who will fire?" asked Glen, hardly hearing these remarks, though, at the same time, sufficiently conscious of them to feel gratified that he had inspired such confidence.
"I will," replied the passenger, promptly.
"You, general!" cried the conductor in astonishment.
"Certainly! Why not I as well as another?"
"Very well," responded the conductor, "I'm only too glad to have you do it, if you will; then let us be off at once." And, springing to the ground, he shouted, "All aboard! Hurry up, gentlemen, we are about to move on."
But Glen would not start until he had taken a flaring torch and the engine-driver's long-nosed oil-can, and walked all around the locomotive, examining every part of the huge machine, pouring on a little oil here and there, and making sure that everything was in perfect working order.
Then he again swung himself into the cab, pulled the whistle lever for one short, sharp blast, opened the throttle slowly, and the train was once more in motion.
It had hardly gone a hundred yards before two rifle-shots rang out of the forest, and one ball crashed through both windows of the cab, but without harming its occupants. Glen started; but his hand did not leave the throttle, nor did his gaze swerve for an instant from the line of gleaming track ahead. He had no time then to think of his own safety. He was too busy thinking of the safety of those so suddenly and unexpectedly intrusted to him.
The new fireman glanced at him admiringly, and murmured to himself, "That boy is made of clear grit. I would that I had a son like him."
This man, who was heaving great chunks of wood into the roaring furnace with the strength and ease of a trained athlete, formed no unpleasant picture to look upon himself. He was tall and straight, with a keen, resolute face, an iron-gray, military moustache, and close-cropped hair. He looked not only like a soldier, but like one well accustomed to command. At the same time he obeyed promptly, and without question, every order issued by the young engine-driver on the opposite side of the cab.
As the train dashed along at full speed there was no chance for conversation between the two, even had they felt inclined for it. Both were too fully engaged in peering ahead along the unfamiliar line of track to pay attention to aught else.
Presently the conductor clambered over the tender from the baggage-car, and stood in the cab with them, to post Glen as to the grades and crossings.
It lacked a few seconds of fifteen minutes from the time of their starting, when they slowed down for the telegraph-station, the lights of which were twinkling just ahead. Here, while the conductor roused the operator, and sent his despatch, the locomotive was run up to the tank, and a fresh supply of water was taken aboard.
Then they were off again--this time for a run of forty miles without a stop or check. Daylight was coming on so rapidly now that the track was plainly visible by it, and thus one source of anxiety was removed.
Up to this time Glen had no idea of what had happened, nor of the cause of the shooting that had resulted so disastrously. Now, though he did not turn his head, he learned, from the conversation between the conductor and his fireman, whom the former called "General," that an attempt had been made to rob the train of a large sum of money that the latter had placed in a safe in the express-car. He had received secret information that such an attempt would probably be made, and had engaged two detectives in St. Louis to guard his treasure. When the train was stopped in the woods by a danger signal waved across the track, the engine-driver had been ordered by the would-be robbers, who had cut the express-car loose from those behind it, to go ahead. His refusal to obey them had cost him his life, and the fireman an ugly wound.
The general, who left the sleeper, and ran ahead at the first alarm, had shot and severely injured two of the robbers, and with the aid of his men had driven the rest to the shelter of the forest after a few minutes sharp fighting. The three wounded men, together with the body of the dead engine-driver, were now in the baggage-car; while the train-load of passengers, thanks to the practical knowledge of a sixteen-year-old boy, and the pluck that enabled him to utilize it, were rapidly nearing their journey's end in safety.
An anxious crowd was gathered about the Kansas City station as the train rolled slowly up to its platform. The general wrung Glen's hand warmly as he said,
"God bless you, boy, for what you have just done. I will see you again in a few minutes. Now I must look after the wounded men."
Thus saying, he sprang to the platform, leaving Glen in the cab of the locomotive; but when he returned, fifteen minutes later, the boy had disappeared, and was nowhere to be found.
Chapter IX.
KANSAS CITY IN EARLY DAYS.
The reason that Glen Eddy disappeared after running that engine so splendidly, and bringing the night express safely to its destination, was that he was diffident and nervous. Now that the strain was relaxed and he had time to think of the terrible risks run by that train while under his inexperienced guidance, he was seized with a sudden fright. Queerly enough, he felt almost guilty, as though he had done something wrong, or to be ashamed of. Suppose somebody should try to thank him. Suppose the crowd, now surging about the door of the baggage-car, should turn their attention to him, and come to gaze at him as a part of the show that had attracted them. What should he do in either case? It would be unbearable. He must make good his escape before either of these things happened.
The wounded men were being carefully lifted from one side of the baggage-car. Everybody's attention was for the moment directed to that spot. So Glen slipped down from the locomotive cab on the opposite side, and ran back to the sleeper in which were his belongings. The car was deserted and empty. Its passengers, and everybody connected with it, had either gone up town or joined the curious throng about the baggage-car. Thus nobody saw the boy, as, securing his valise and rifle, he slipped from the rear end of the car and walked rapidly away. He plunged into one of the tunnel-like streets running back from the railroad, not knowing, nor caring, where it would lead him. His only idea was to escape, he did not even know from what. It had so taken possession of him, that he almost felt as though he were being pursued, with the danger, at any moment, of being overtaken, and dragged ignominiously back to be--thanked and made a hero of.
Kansas City, which has since enjoyed such an astonishing growth and prosperity, was at that time very young. It was still burrowing through the high and steep bank of stiff red clay that separated its river front from the main street of the newer portion perched on the bluff. Several cross streets, connecting these two parts of the city, had been dug out with infinite labor, to a great depth through the red clay, and it was up one of these that Glen now walked.
He was so far below the level of the airy building-lots on either side that he could not see whether they were occupied or not. Only an occasional long flight of wooden steps, leading up from the street, led him to suppose they might be. He was beginning to wonder where the city was, or if there were any more of it beyond the straggling business street that bordered the railroad, when he came to the main thoroughfare of the new town, and gazed about him with amazement. Although it was yet so early that the sun had only just risen, the broad avenue presented a scene of the most lively activity.
In Brimfield the erection of a new house, or building of any kind, was a matter of general interest that afforded a topic of conversation for weeks. Here were dozens, yes, scores of them, springing up in every direction. A few were of brick; but most of those intended for business purposes were long and low, though furnished with pretentious false fronts that towered as high again as the roof itself. Everywhere was heard the din of hammer and saw, or the ring of the mason's trowel, and in every direction Glen could see the city growing, spreading, and assuming new aspects as he gazed.
At length a pang of hunger recalled him to his present situation, and he inquired of a man, who was hurrying past, the way to the Kaw House.
"Up there a piece," answered the man almost without pausing, and pointing vaguely up the street. "There comes the surveyor's wagon from there now," he added, nodding his head towards one, drawn by two mules, that was dashing in their direction at that moment.
The surveyor's wagon. Then, perhaps, Mr. Brackett was in it, thought Glen. Acting on the impulse of the moment, he sprang into the middle of the street, and waved his rifle in the faces of the advancing mules. The driver reined them in sharply, and the team came to a standstill. "Hello, young fellow, what do you want now?" he shouted.
"I want to know if Mr. Brackett is in this wagon," answered Glen.
"Yes, he is, and that's my name," said a pleasant-faced young man, dressed in a red-flannel shirt, a pair of army trousers tucked into his boot-legs, and what had once been a stylish cutaway coat, who sat beside the driver. "What can I do for you?"
For answer Glen handed him Mr. Hobart's note, which the young man glanced quickly through.
"I see by this that you are to be a member of our party," he said, as he finished reading it, "and that the chief will not be here for a day or two yet. I am very glad to make your acquaintance, Mr. Matherson. Boys, this is Mr. Glen Matherson, our new--Well, we will see what position he will occupy later. Now, Matherson, we are off for our day's work. Would you rather accompany us into the thick of the fray, or will you wend your weary way to the hotel, and while away the hours until our return, surrounded by its gloomy grandeur?"
"I think I would rather go with you, sir," replied Glen, who did not know whether to laugh or not at Mr. Brackett's words and tone.
"'Tis well, and go with us you shall. So tumble into the chariot, and stow yourself away wherever you can find room. Then let us on with speed."
"But I left Mr. Hobart's things and some of my own on board the train," said Glen, hesitatingly, "and here are the checks for them."
This difficulty was settled by the hailing of a dray, and instructing its driver to get the articles called for by the checks, and carry them, together with Glen's valise, to the hotel. The boy could not bear to trust his precious rifle out of his sight, and so carried it with him.
They had hardly started, when Mr. Brackett turned to Glen and asked him if he had been to breakfast.
This was a question in which the boy was greatly interested just at that moment, and he answered very promptly that he had not.
"Well, here's a go!" exclaimed the other. "A rule of this party is, Matherson, and I hope I shall never be obliged to repeat it to you, that if a man hath not eaten, neither shall he work. It is now too late to return to Delmonico's, so we must intrust you to the tender mercies of the Princess, and may she have mercy upon your appetite. Joe, drive to the palace."
The "palace" proved to be a patchwork shanty of the most unique and surprising description. It was constructed of bits of board, pieces of boxes and barrels, stray shingles and clapboards, roofing-paper, and a variety of other odds and ends. Its doors and windows had evidently been taken from some wrecked steamboat. It was overrun with roses and honeysuckles; while within and without it was scrupulously neat and clean.
As the surveyor's wagon with its noisy load drew up before this queer establishment, its mistress appeared at the door. She was a fat, jolly-looking negress, wearing a gay calico dress, and a still more brilliant turban, and she was immediately greeted with shouts of "How are you, Princess?" "Good-morning, Princess!" "How's her royal nibs to-day?" etc., to all of which she smiled and bowed, and courtesied with the utmost good-nature.
The moment he could make himself heard, Mr. Brackett said, "Princess, we have here a fainting wayfarer. Can you provide him with a cup of nectar?"
"Yes, sah."
"A dish of peacock's tongues?"
"Sartin, sah."
"And a brace of nightingale's eggs on toast?"
"In about free minutes, sah."
"Very well, hasten the feast and speed our departure; for we must hence, ere many nimble hours be flown."
While waiting for his breakfast to be prepared, Glen had a chance to examine his new companions somewhat more closely than he had yet done. There were eight of them, besides the driver of the wagon, mostly young men, some of them hardly more than boys; but all strong, healthy looking, and brown from long exposure to sun and wind. Their dress was a medley of flannel, buckskin, and relics of high civilization. They were as merry, careless, and good-natured a set of young fellows as could well be found, always ready for hard work in its time, and equally so for a frolic when the chance offered. They all seemed to be on a perfect equality, called each other by their given names, and played practical jokes upon one another with impunity. As their wagon clattered out of town in the morning, or dashed in again at dusk, its occupants generally sang the most rollicking of college or camp songs, at the top of their voices, and everybody had a kindly word or an indulgent smile for the young surveyors.
Foremost in all their fun was their temporary chief, whom Glen only knew as Mr. Brackett, but who was called "Billy" by all the others. He was about twenty-five years old, and his position was that of transit-man; though, until Mr. Hobart should join the party, he was in charge of it. To Glen, who had thus far only seen him off duty, it was incomprehensible that so frivolous a young man as "Billy" Brackett appeared should hold so responsible a position.
The party had recently returned from the front, where they had been locating a line of new road since earliest spring. Now, while waiting to be sent out again, they were engaged in running in the side tracks, Y's, and switches of what has since become one of the greatest railroad yards in the world. It was on the state line, between Kansas and Missouri, about an hour's drive from the Kaw House, where the surveyors made their headquarters.
In less than five minutes Glen found himself drinking the most delicious cup of coffee he had ever tasted; while into his hands were thrust a couple of sandwiches of hot corn-pones and crisp bacon. These, with two hard-boiled eggs, furnished a most acceptable meal to the hungry-boy. Mr. Brackett tossed a quarter to the "Princess," and the wagon rolled merrily away with Glen eating his breakfast, as best he could, _en route_.
Chapter X.
AT WORK WITH THE ENGINEER CORPS.
The "Princess" was a character of those early days, and was celebrated for her _café au lait_, which "Billy" Brackett said meant "coffee and eggs;" but which was really the best of coffee and the richest of goat's milk. Her husband was steward on one of the steamboats that plied up and down the Missouri, and her exertions, added to his, enabled them to accumulate a small property, with which they afterwards made some successful investments in real estate. The boys of the engineer corps were quick to discover the "Princess" after their arrival in the place, and with her they were prime favorites.
Glen had hardly finished his breakfast when the party reached the place where they were to begin work. Here the boy obtained his first knowledge of the names and uses of the various objects that had attracted his curiosity as they lay in the bottom of the wagon.
From their neat wooden boxes were taken two highly polished brass instruments, each of which was provided with a telescope. One of these was a transit, for laying off lines, angles, and curves on the surface of the earth; and the other was a level for measuring the height of elevations or the depth of depressions on this same surface. As these instruments were lifted carefully from their boxes they were screwed firmly to the tops of wooden tripods, that supported them at the height of a man's eyes.
Then came the long rod, divided into feet and the decimal fractions of a foot, that was to be used with the level, and two slender flag-poles painted red and white, so as to be seen at long distances. At their lower ends these poles were tipped with sharp iron points, and at the other they bore small flags of red flannel. They went with the transit, and were to designate the points at which the sights were to be taken through its telescope.
There was a one-hundred-foot steel chain, having links each one foot long, with which to measure distances. With it went ten slender steel pins, each eighteen inches long, to the tops of which bits of red flannel were tied, so that they could be readily seen. The head chainman carried all of these to start with, and stuck one into the ground at the end of each hundred feet. The rear chainman gathered them up as he came to them, and thus, by counting the number of pins in his hand, he always knew just what distance had been measured.
The man having charge of or "running" the transit was called the transit-man; the one running the level was called the leveller; while the other members of the party were designated as rodman, front and back flagmen, or "flags," chainmen, and axemen. There were generally two of these last named, and their duty was to clear away timber, brush, or other obstructions on the line, and to make and drive stakes wherever they were needed.
As the several members of the party were preparing for their respective duties, Mr. Brackett put Glen through a sort of an examination, to discover for what particular task he was best fitted.
"I don't suppose, Matherson," he began, "that you care to run the transit to-day?"
"No," laughed Glen, "I think not to-day."
"Nor the level?"
"No, sir. I'd rather not try it."
"Well, I guess you'd better not. You might get it out of adjustment. Can you read a rod!"
No, Glen could not read a rod.
He proved equally ignorant of the duties of flagman, chainman, and axeman, which Mr. Brackett said was very fortunate, as all these positions were already so capably filled in his party that he should really hate to discharge anybody to make room for the new arrival. "But," he added, "I have a most important place left, that I believe you will fill capitally. Can you reproduce the letters of the alphabet and the Arabic numerals on a bit of white pine with a piece of red chalk?"
Somewhat bewildered by this banter, Glen answered rather doubtfully that he believed he could.
"Good! Then you shall stay with the wagon to-day, and mark stakes with this bit of 'kiel'" (red chalk).
So Glen's first day's duty as a civil-engineer was to mark stakes with figures to denote the distance measured, or with various letters, such as P. T. (point of tangent), P. C. (point of curve), etc., for the transit party, and B. M. (bench mark), C. (cut), F. (fill), G. (grade), etc., for the levellers.
Mr. Brackett explained the meaning of these signs patiently and clearly to the boy, whose quick wit enabled him readily to comprehend all that was told him. By noon he was furnishing stakes, properly marked, for the various purposes required, as well as though he had been engaged in this business for a month. It was not a very important position, to be sure; but he filled it to the very best of his ability, which is the most that can be expected of any boy.
One of the things by which the new member was most strongly impressed, during this first day's experience, was the great difference between Mr. Brackett on duty and the same gentleman during his hours of relaxation. While at work he was grave and dignified, nor did he tolerate any familiarity from those who obeyed his orders. And they did obey them promptly, without question or hesitation. He was no longer "Billy;" but was carefully addressed as "Mr. Brackett" by every member of the party. It was evident that he not only thoroughly understood his business, but as thoroughly understood the temper of his men. It was clear, also, that they were well aware that he was not a man to allow his authority to be questioned or trifled with. With this mutual understanding the work progressed smoothly and satisfactorily.
All this was a study in character of which Glen was wise enough to learn the lesson; and perhaps it was the most valuable one of that day's schooling. The discipline of a well-drilled engineer corps is very similar to that maintained on board ship; and, while at certain seasons it may be greatly relaxed, it can, and must, be resumed at a moment's notice, if the authority necessary to produce the best results is to be respected.
The same merry, rollicking party rode back into Kansas City that evening that had left it in the morning; and, though Glen was very tired, he had become well enough acquainted with them to enter heartily into the spirit of the fun. Thus, whenever they sang a song he knew, his voice was heard among the loudest.
At the hotel they learned for the first time of the attempt to rob the train Glen had come on, and wondered that he had said nothing of the affair. When they questioned him, he did not know how to talk of it without proclaiming his share in the night's work, and so only said that, as he was asleep when the fight took place, he had seen nothing of it.
Long after Glen had gone to bed that night, Mr. Brackett, the leveller, and the rodman sat up hard at work on the maps and profiles of the lines they had run that day. If Glen had seen this he would have realized what he afterwards learned, that while the work of most men ends with the day, that of an engineer in the field only ends with bedtime, and sometimes a late one at that.
For two days longer Glen worked with this congenial party, gaining valuable knowledge with each hour, and thoroughly enjoying his new life.
On the third day Mr. Hobart came, and it seemed to Glen like seeing one from home to meet him again. After their first greeting, the engineer said,
"Well, my boy, what other wonderful deeds have you been performing since you and the governor ran the locomotive?"
"The governor!" almost gasped Glen. "Was he a governor?"
"Certainly he was, or rather had been. Didn't you know it? He was General Elting, the ex-governor whom you were inquiring about in St. Louis, and who is now the treasurer of our road. He returned to St. Louis almost immediately from here, and there I heard the whole story from his own lips. He was greatly disappointed at your disappearance, and much pleased to find out that I knew you; for of course I recognized you from his description. He hopes to meet you again some time, and I have promised to see that you do not indulge in any more mysterious disappearances."
While they talked of that night, and its tragic incidents, Mr. Hobart suddenly interrupted himself with,
"By the way, Glen, I am not going to take charge of this locating-party, after all, and so cannot give you a position in it."
Glen felt his face growing pale as he repeated slowly and incredulously,
"Not going to take charge of it?'
"No; I have been relieved of my command, and am going to engage in another kind of work," replied the engineer, smiling at the boy's startled and distressed expression.
Chapter XI.
ALMOST TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE.
If Glen had detected that smile on Mr. Hobart's face, he would have been spared a few moments of very unhappy reflections. He would have known that his brown-bearded friend could not smile while dashing his high hopes, and that there must be something pleasant back of it all. But as the engineer, who could not resist the temptation to try the effects of a disappointment on the boy's temper, turned away his face at that moment, his words were heard, while the smile was not noticed.
Like a great surging wave, the thought of an ignominious return to Brimfield, and a picture of the mill and the store as he had last seen them, swept over the boy's mind. Then came the more recent picture of the happy out-of-door life he had been leading for the past three days. How could he give up the one and go back to the other? Of course, if Mr. Hobart said he could no longer have work with the surveying-party, it must be so. There could be no appeal from that decision. And he had tried so hard to do well whatever had been given him to do, and to make himself useful! It was too bad! But surely there must be other work in this big, bustling, wide-awake West, even for a boy. With this thought his clouded face cleared, and a look of settled resolve overspread it.
"I'm awfully sorry, sir," he said; but the tone was almost cheerful, and Mr. Hobart's face was now the one that expressed surprise. If he had been able to examine Glen's mind, he would have seen that the boy had simply decided not to go back, at least not until the summer was over, but to stay where he was, and attempt to solve the bread-and-butter problem alone.
"My new orders came very unexpectedly," continued the engineer, "and have completely upset my plans. It seems that the company has decided to send me through to the Pacific with General Lyle's exploring expedition."
A lump rose in Glen's throat. General Lyle's expedition! Why, that was the one Binney Gibbs was to accompany. Was all the world going on that wonderful trip except himself? It almost seemed so. "It will be a fine trip, sir," he said, trying to choke down the lump.
"Yes, I suppose it will; but it will also be a hard and dangerous one, such as a great many people would not care to undertake. I don't suppose you would, for instance?" and Mr. Hobart looked quizzically at the boy.
"Wouldn't I! I'd just like to have somebody offer me a chance to go on that expedition, that's all!"
"Very well," replied the engineer, quietly, "I'll offer you the chance, just to see whether you will accept it or not. Will you go with me on this long trip?"
For a few seconds Glen gazed into the brown-bearded face without answering. Was he awake or dreaming? Had the words been spoken? "Do you really mean it, sir?" he almost gasped, at length, "or are you only making fun of me!"
"Mean it? of course I do," was the reply. "I generally mean what I say, and if you really care to explore Kansas and Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, and Southern California in my company, I shall be most happy to have you do so. I am also authorized to offer you a position, a humble one, to be sure, but one that will pay the same salary that you would have received as a member of the locating-party, in the division I am to command. I don't suppose there will be many chances for you to run locomotives out there; but I have no doubt there will be plenty of swimming to be done, as well as other things in the line of your peculiar abilities. But you have not answered my question yet. Will you accept my offer, or do you wish a few days in which to consider it?"
"Oh, Mr. Hobart!" cried the boy, who was standing up in his excitement. "It seems almost too good to be true! I can't realize that this splendid chance, that I've been trying so hard not to think about, has really come to me. Why, I'd rather go on that trip than do anything else in the whole world, and if you'll only take me along, in any position, I don't care what, I'll be grateful to you all my life."
"But what do you think your father will say? Do you suppose he will let you go?" inquired the engineer, soberly.
Glen's face became grave again in an instant. "Oh, yes, he's sure to," he replied, "but I'll write this very minute, and ask him.
"There won't be time to receive an answer," said Mr. Hobart, "for we must start from here to-morrow; but perhaps this letter will make things all right. You see," he added, "I thought it was just possible that you might care to accept my offer, and so I took the liberty of writing and asking your father if he were willing to have you do so. I also asked him not to say anything about it in Brimfield until after we had started, for fear I should be flooded with applications from other boys, who might imagine I had the power to give them positions. Your father's answer reached me here an hour ago, and with it came this letter for you."
No own father could have written a kinder or more satisfactory letter to a boy than the one Mr. Matherson sent to his adopted son. It readily granted the required permission, and congratulated Glen upon the splendid opportunity thus opened to him. At the same time it told him how they already missed him, and how they hated the thought of not seeing him for a whole year. It closed with the information that Binney Gibbs was making extensive preparations for his departure to the far West, and that the famous expedition, of which he was to be a member, was the all-absorbing topic of conversation in Brimfield.
Mr. Hobart watched the boy's glowing face as he read this letter with genuine pleasure; for he had taken a real liking to him, and was not only glad of this opportunity for affording him such unalloyed happiness, but also that they were to be companions on the proposed trip.
Matters being thus happily settled, the engineer told Glen that they would start the following evening for the end of the track, nearly two hundred miles west of that point, where the expedition was to rendezvous, and where he was to establish a camp for their reception.
The information that interested and pleased Glen the most, though, was that Mr. Brackett was to be assistant engineer of the new division, and that most of the members of the party with whom the boy was already on such friendly terms, were also to join it.
Being dismissed by Mr. Hobart, with orders to be on hand bright and early in the morning, for the morrow would be a busy day, the happy lad rushed away to find those who were to be his fellow-explorers, and talk over with them the wonders and delights of the proposed trip. To his surprise not one of them was anywhere about the hotel, and he was told that the entire party had gone down town a few moments before. Too excited to do anything else, Glen immediately set out to find them. For some time he searched in vain; but at length, attracted by the sound of great shouting and laughter, he joined a throng of people who were gathered about one of the few barber shops of the city, and seemed to be vastly entertained by something taking place inside.
Recognizing "Billy" Brackett's voice above all the other sounds that came from the shop, Glen pushed himself forward until he finally gained a position inside the door. All the engineers were there. Three of them occupied the three chairs that the shop boasted, and were having their hair cut. Another, standing on a table, so that he could overlook the crowd, was superintending the operation. But for his voice and his unmistakable costume, Glen would never have recognized in him the dignified young engineer under whom he had been at work but an hour before. Every spear of hair had disappeared from his head, and he was as bald as a billiard cue. Seated on the table, contentedly swinging their legs, were two other bald-headed figures, whom Glen with difficulty recognized as the leveller and rodman.
When the three victims in the chairs had been reduced to a similar state of baldness, their places were instantly occupied by the remaining members of the party. The whole performance was conducted amid the most uproarious fun, of which the recently promoted assistant engineer was the ruling spirit.
As the chairs became empty for the third time, and the nine bald-headed members prepared to depart, each declaring that the others were the most comical-looking objects he had ever seen, they suddenly caught sight of Glen, and a rush was made for him. In another moment, despite his struggles, he too was seated in a barber's chair, and was rapidly growing as bald as his fellow-explorers.
"You'll look worse than a boiled owl, Glen," remarked "Billy" Brackett, encouragingly.
"And be a living terror to Injuns," cried another.
"It'll be the greatest comfort in the world, old man, to feel that though you may be killed, you can't be scalped," shouted a third.
Realizing that resistance was useless, Glen submitted to the shearing process with as good a grace as possible. A few minutes later, wearing a very loose-fitting hat, he was marching up the street with his jovial comrades, joining with the full strength of his lungs in the popular chorus of
"The bald-headed man, who's been always in the van Of everything that's going, since the world first began."
Chapter XII.
STARTING ACROSS THE PLAINS.
Transforming themselves into a party of bald-heads was the last of the absurd pranks with which the young engineers entertained the good people of Kansas City for many a long day. At the same hour on the following evening they were well on their way towards the far West in a dilapidated passenger-coach attached to a freight train loaded with tents and supplies of every description for their long trip.
By the next noon, after a hard, rough ride of nearly two hundred miles, the end of the track was reached. It was on a treeless prairie, sweeping away as far as the eye could see on all sides. Here was spread a thick green carpet of short buffalo grass, and into this carpet were woven exquisite patterns of innumerable flowers. The place was at the junction of the Kaw River with one of its numerous branches, and where but a few weeks before wild Indians had camped and vast herds of buffalo had pastured, a railroad town of several hundred rough frame houses, shanties, and tents had already sprung into existence.
Here the overland stages took their departure for the distant mining town of Denver, and here the long trains of great freight-wagons were loaded for their toilsome journey over the Santa Fé trail to the far-away valley of the Rio Grande. Here, on side-tracks, were the construction-cars, movable houses on wheels, in which lived the graders, track-layers, and other members of the army of workmen employed in the building of a railroad. Railroad men, soldiers, teamsters, traders, Indians, and Mexicans, horses, mules, and oxen mingled here in picturesque confusion. Nearly every man carried a rifle, and it was rare to meet one who did not wear one or more revolvers strapped to his waist.
It was by far the most novel and bustling scene Glen had ever looked upon; and, as he stepped from the last railroad-car he was to see for many months, and stretched his cramped limbs, he gazed about him in astonishment. But there was no time for idling, and Glen had hardly given a glance at his unfamiliar surroundings before Mr. Hobart's voice, saying, "Come, boys, there's plenty to do, and but a few hours to do it in," set the whole party to work in the liveliest possible manner.
There was a fine grassy level about a hundred yards from the railroad, on the opposite side from the settlement. It was skirted by a clear but sluggish stream, fringed by a slender growth of cottonwood-trees, and was so evidently the very place for a camp that Mr. Hobart selected it at once. Here the young engineers worked like beavers all through that long, hot afternoon, and by nightfall they had pitched twenty wall-tents, arranged in the form of an open square. One of these was reserved for Mr. Hobart, while Mr. Brackett and the leveller were given another, and two more were allowed to the other members of the party. Into these they had removed all their personal belongings, while in two other tents, carefully ditched and banked to keep out the water in case of rain, were stored all the instruments, implements, blank-books, and stationery provided for the expedition.
Heartily tired after this novel but interesting labor, how Glen did enjoy his tin-cup of black coffee without milk, the fried bacon and hard-tack, that constituted his supper, when, at sundown, one of the axemen, who had been at work for an hour over a fire, announced that it was ready! He would have scorned such fare at home; but, with his present appetite, and under the circumstances, it seemed as though nothing had ever tasted better.
As the darkness came on, how cheerful the tent, that had now become his home, looked in the light of a lantern hung from its ridge-pole! What a pleasant hour he passed listening to the stories and experiences of his three tentmates, as they lay luxuriously outstretched on their blankets, enjoying their well-earned rest! The entire stock of blankets was used to make one wide, comfortable bed for the four. All the rubbers were, of course, placed underneath, next the ground, and Glen was greatly pleased at the praise bestowed upon his rubber-sheet, which was twice as large as an ordinary blanket, and which he had followed Mr. Hobart's advice in procuring.
After the others had finished their evening pipes and dropped off to sleep, and after the light had been put out, the novelty of this first night under canvas kept Glen awake for some time. What a fortunate fellow he felt himself to be, as he lay there recalling the events of the last ten days, and trying to picture the immediate future! To think that he, the worst scholar in his class, a boy without an own father or mother, so far as he knew, nor even a birthday that he was sure of, should be away out here on the Plains, and about to start on an expedition that every boy in the country would be thankful to join if he could. It was simply wonderful; and he resolved that, if hard work and the promptest possible attention to duty could render him worthy of such good-fortune, neither of these things should be lacking.
By daylight the camp was astir; but Glen was the first to roll out of his blankets, and he had been down to the creek for a plunge in its cool waters before breakfast-time. Then followed another hard day's work. The train of twenty heavy canvas-topped army-wagons, each drawn by six mules, the three four-mule ambulances, and the drove of spare animals furnished to the expedition by the government, arrived during the morning. These wagons had to be loaded with the vast quantity of provisions and various supplies brought thus far by rail. Then the tents already up had to be ditched, and still others erected for the use of the engineer-in-chief and other officers of the party who were now hourly expected to arrive.
A flag-pole was planted in front of the headquarter tents, and that evening, when a train came in bringing General Lyle and about half the members of the expedition, an American flag was run to its top. Both it and the general were greeted with a volley of rifle-shots and a hearty cheer, while at the same time the encampment was christened "Camp Lyle."
Glen's youthful appearance attracted the chief's attention as soon as he caught sight of the lad, and he was inclined to doubt the advisability of allowing such a mere boy to accompany the expedition. A few words from Mr. Hobart satisfied him, however, that Glen would prove a credit to the party, and after that the general watched the boy with interest.
With the chief-engineer came a geologist, botanist, surgeon, photographer, private secretary, quartermaster, the two other division commanders, and, what was of more immediate interest to all the young engineers, several good camp-cooks. Thus, on the second night of its existence, with this large increase in the number of its occupants, Camp Lyle presented a most cheerful and animated appearance.
Early the following morning another train arrived from the East, bringing the remaining members of the expedition. A few minutes after its arrival Glen was awakened by hearing a voice that sounded very familiar, calling,
"Hello! I say! Some of you fellows come out here and help me!"
As he sat up in his blankets, wondering who could be speaking with such a tone of authority, and whether he ought to answer the summons or not, a head was thrust into the tent-door, and the demand was repeated.
It was Binney Gibbs, who had passed as completely out of Glen's mind as though he had never existed. He did not recognize Glen's bald head; but, when the latter stepped from the tent with his hat on, saying, "Hello, Binney, old man, what can I do for you?" the prize scholar of the Brimfield High School stood for a moment speechless with amazement.
"You here?" he finally stammered. "What on earth does it mean?"
"It means," replied Glen, laughing at the other's incredulous expression, "that Brimfield is to have two representatives on this expedition instead of one, and that I am going through to the Pacific with you."
Binney had always been jealous of Glen, but at that moment he felt that he almost hated him.
In spite of this, he allowed his former schoolmate and another stout fellow to bring his heavy trunk from the railroad into camp. When the quartermaster saw it he said that, as there would be no room for trunks in the wagons, the owner of this one must take from it what would fill a moderate-sized valise, and either dispose of the trunk with the rest of its contents or send them back home. To this Binney angrily replied that he would see General Lyle about it.
The new arrival gave further offence that morning by turning up his nose at the breakfast prepared by one of the camp-cooks, and declaring it unfit for white men to eat. He also refused, point-blank, to help unload a car when requested to do so by one of the division engineers, saying that it was not the kind of work he had been engaged to perform.
He was only brought to a realizing sense of his position by a severe reprimand from General Lyle himself, who declared that, upon the next complaint brought to him of the boy's conduct, he should discharge him. He also said that only the fact of Binney's having been sent there by his old friend Mr. Meadows prevented him from doing so at once. The chief closed his remarks by advising Binney to take the other Brimfield boy of the party as an example worthy of copying. Thereupon all the prize scholar's bitterness of feeling was directed against unsuspecting Glen, and he vowed he would get even with that young nobody yet.
Chapter XIII.
BINNEY GIBBS AND HIS MULE.
The effect on Binney Gibbs of General Lyle's reprimand was good, inasmuch as it brought him to a realizing sense of his true position in that party, and showed him that, if he wished to remain a member of it, he must obey orders, even when they were issued in the form of polite requests. So, after that, he made a virtue of necessity, and obeyed every order with a scrupulous exactness, though generally with an injured air, and a protesting expression of countenance as though he were being imposed upon. It was a great mortification to him to be obliged to send home his trunk, and more than half his supply of clothing, together with a number of other cherished luxuries, such as a rubber bathtub, a cork mattress, a rubber pillow, half a dozen linen sheets, several china plates, cups, and saucers, besides some silver and plated ware, all of which he relinquished with a heavy heart and many lamentations.
The only thing in the shape of a valise, with which to replace his trunk, that he could purchase in the railroad settlement, was one of those cheap affairs made of glazed leather, such as are often seen in the hands of newly landed immigrants. As Binney brought this into the camp, it at once attracted universal attention. The boys crowded about him, begging to be allowed to examine his new and elegant "grip-sack;" and, from that day forth, he was known as "Grip" by the entire party.
For a week longer the expedition remained at Camp Lyle, waiting for settled weather, and preparing for its great undertaking. It was divided into four divisions, three of which were regularly equipped surveying-parties who were to run transit and level lines from a point near the Colorado border to the Pacific Ocean. The fourth, or headquarter division, was composed of the commander and his immediate staff, together with the scientific men and their assistants.
As Glen hoped and expected, he was assigned to the second division, of which Mr. Hobart was engineer in charge, and Mr. Brackett was assistant. He was a little disappointed that the only position found for him in the division was the very lowest of all in rank and pay. It was that of tapeman, and his duties were to assist the topographer of the party in measuring distances to, or taking the bearings of, prominent objects along the line. Neither could Glen help wishing that Binney Gibbs had not been assigned to the same division as himself. On account of his brilliant record for scholarship and skill with figures, Binney was made rodman, a position that far outranked Glen's and commanded twice his pay. Still, Glen strove hard not to feel envious of this other Brimfield boy. He was altogether too proud of being a member of the expedition on any terms to have room for any other feeling, and he was anxious to be on a friendly footing with Binney, as he was with everybody else. So, when the positions were announced, and the prize scholar was found to hold such a fine one, Glen was the first to tender his congratulations.
Binney received them coldly, merely remarking that they could not very well have given him any lower position, and that he should not have accepted anything less if it had been offered.
Glen only smiled at this, and thought how fortunate it was that he did not feel that way.
As a rodman Binney was allowed the use of a saddle-animal, and a very small mule was assigned to him as his mount. When he went down to the wagons to inspect his new acquisition, he thought he had never seen a more dangerous-looking animal. It laid back its ears and bit at him when he attempted to pat it on the nose, and manifested every other sign of mulish antipathy towards its new master. In spite of all this, the teamster having it in charge assured Binney that it was a perfect lamb, and the rodman, anxious to prove his ability to ride a mule, which some of the boys had doubted, ordered the animal to be saddled.
The man who held the beast while Binney climbed awkwardly into the saddle winked at some of his fellows who were watching the operation, and thrust his tongue derisively into his cheek.
For a few moments the mule did prove a veritable lamb, ambling along so gently that Binney's spirits rose, and he began to imagine himself the rider that he claimed to be. Elated by his success, he even dared to give the bridle reins a shake, say "Get up!" and finally to touch the side of his steed with the spur that, in his pride, he had fastened to one of his boot-heels.
The effect was electrical. In an instant Binney found himself hatless, with both feet out of the stirrups, clinging for dear life to the pommel of the saddle, and wishing himself anywhere but on the back of a mule dashing madly, at full speed, directly into camp.
"Help! help!" he shouted, breathlessly. "Head him off! stop him somebody!"
Once inside that square of tents, the mule did not seem to realize the possibility of again passing beyond them, but tore frantically round and round the inner side of the square, as though it were a circus-ring. Everybody dropped his work and rushed out to witness the comical spectacle.
"Freeze to him, Grip!" cried one.
"Give him his head!"
"What made you leave Barnum's?"
"Stand up on his back!"
"Don't abuse the poor mule! It's a shame to make him run so!"
These, and a hundred similar cries, mingled with shouts of uproarious laughter, greeted poor Binney from all sides; while not the slightest attention was paid to his piteous entreaties that somebody would stop the mule.
At length these cries seemed to attract the attention of the animal himself; for he suddenly planted his fore-feet and stopped so abruptly that Binney was flung over his head as from a catapult. Then the mule lifted high his head and uttered a prolonged ear-splitting bray of defiance.
Glen had sprung forward and caught the animal's bridle almost the instant he stopped. Now leading him to where Binney sat, dazed but unhurt, he asked, soberly, "Do you want to try him again, Binney?"
"Try him again!" shouted the rodman, angrily. "No, I never want to see him again; but if you think he's easy to ride, why don't you try him yourself?"
"Yes, try him, young 'un! Give him another turn around the ring, Glen!" shouted the spectators, anxious to have their fun prolonged, but having no idea that this boy from Brimfield could ride, any more than the other.
Glen borrowed a pair of spurs, soothed the mule for a moment, sinched the girth a trifle tighter, and, with a sudden leap, vaulted into the saddle. For an instant the animal remained motionless with astonishment; then he bounded into the air, and came down with all four legs as stiff as posts. The shock would have been terrible to the boy, had he not lifted himself from the saddle and supported his whole weight in the stirrups. The mule repeated this movement several times, and then began to plunge and kick. But the saddle in which Glen sat was a deeply hollowed, high-pommelled, Mexican affair, built for just such occasions as this, and so the plunging might have been kept up all day without disturbing the rider in the least.
The mule laid down and tried to roll, while the boy, who had jumped from his back, stood quietly by, and allowed him to discover the folly of the attempt. The high pommel of the saddle again interfered; and as the disgusted animal scrambled to his feet, he again found his burr-like rider as firmly seated on his back as ever.
For a moment the mule hung his head in a dejected manner, as though thinking out some new plan. Suddenly his meditations were interrupted by a yell directly in one of his long ears, and a sharp pain felt in both sides at once. He sprang forward to escape these annoyances; but they clung to him as close as did his new rider. Faster and faster he flew, while harder and harder spurred Glen, and louder grew his yells. All at once the animal stopped, as short as on the former occasion; but this time the rider did not fly over his head. The fact is, the mule was now so thoroughly frightened and bewildered that he had no idea of stopping until his lower jaw was jerked back so sharply that had it belonged to any other kind of an animal it must have been dislocated. Even Glen had no idea of the power of that cruel Mexican bit, and was almost as greatly surprised as the mule at its sudden effect.
Then came more yelling, more spurring, and more frantic dashing around that tiresome square. At length the mule spied the opening through which he had entered, and, rushing through it, he sped away over the open prairie, thankful to be rid of those bewildering tents and shouting spectators, even though his rider still clung as close as ever to that Mexican saddle.
When the two returned to camp, half an hour later, it was evident that the most perfect understanding existed between them; but the mule was so crest-fallen by his humiliation that for a long time even Binney Gibbs could ride and abuse him with impunity.
As for Glen, his reputation as a horseman was firmly established, and from that day until he got a horse of his own there was always somebody willing and anxious to place a mount at his disposal.
Chapter XIV.
ON GUARD AT NIGHT.
A few mornings after Glen's experience with the mule, the white tents of Camp Lyle were struck; and at sunrise the long slow-moving trains of wagons had covered the first mile of the many hundreds lying between it and the Pacific. The last railroad had been left behind, and the sound of its whistle was heard no more. Already our young explorer was learning, from his more experienced comrades, to distinguish an Indian pony and lodge-pole trail from that of a buffalo, and a buffalo wallow from an ordinary mud-hole. Already he had seen his first prairie-dog town, and had gazed curiously at several bleached skulls of the mighty bison, some of which were still partially covered with shaggy hair. Already, too, he was filled with that sense of glorious freedom and boundless possibility that can only be breathed with the air of unlimited space. Glen was surprised to find that, instead of being level, as he had always thought them, the Plains rolled, in vast undulations, having a general north and south direction, so that, as the wagons were moving west, they were always ascending some long slope, or descending its farther side. He was almost startled, too, by the intense silence brooding over them, and unbroken at a short distance from the train, save by the plaintive song of meadow-larks.
But nobody was allowed to stray far from the wagons, even to note the silence of the Plains, for fear lest it might be broken by very unpleasant sounds. All the "horse Indians" of the country were leagued together, that summer, to fight the whites. North of the Platte, Sioux, Blackfeet, and Crows had smoked the peace-pipe, and united to harass the builders of the Union Pacific. South of that river, Cheyennes, Kiowas, Comanches, and Arrapahoes were waging common war against those who were turning the buffalo pastures into farms, and making such alarming inroads into the vast herds upon which they depended for meat. The Indians were well armed, well mounted, and determined. Custer, with the Seventh Cavalry, was ranging the Platte valley, and the country between it and the Republican, so that, in that vicinity, Indians were becoming scarce. South of that, however, and particularly along the Smoky Hill, the valley of which General Lyle's expedition was ascending, Indians had never been more plentiful or troublesome than now.
Every day brought its rumors of murdered settlers, captured wagon-trains, besieged stage stations, and of the heavily guarded stages themselves turned back, or only reaching their destinations after fierce running fights, riddled with bullets, and bearing sad loads of dead and wounded passengers. Along the entire Smoky Hill route, from the end of the railroad to Denver, a distance of four hundred miles, were only three small forts, with garrisons of three or four companies each; and the strength of these garrisons was constantly weakened by the demand for escorts to stages and emigrant trains. Thus the exploring expedition was forced to depend largely on its own resources, and must fight its way through as best it could. Arms were therefore supplied to all its members who did not possess them, and, from the outset, a strong camp guard was posted each night.
At the end of a day's march the wagon-master, or "wagon-boss," who always rode ahead of the train mounted on a sleek saddle mule, would select a camping-ground, generally where wood, water, and grass were to be had, and, turning from the beaten trail, would lead the way to it. Where he halted the first wagon also stopped. Then he would move on a short distance, and the second wagon would follow him, until it was ordered to wheel into line with the first. When all thus occupied their designated positions, they either formed a semicircle on the bank of the stream, with their poles pointing inward, were arranged in two parallel lines facing each other, or, if the place was very much exposed, they would form a complete circle, with each tongue overlapping the hind-wheels of the wagon before it.
The minute the train halted, all the stock was unharnessed or unsaddled, and, under guard of two mounted teamsters, were allowed to graze on the sweet buffalo grass, within sight of camp, until sunset, when they were watered and driven in. Then each team was fastened to its own wagon and given its ration of corn. All the saddle animals and spare stock were securely picketed within the line of wagons, thus leaving the smallest possible chance for an Indian to get anywhere near them.
While the animals were being thus attended to, the men were hard at work pitching tents, getting out blankets and such baggage as might be needed, collecting fuel for the camp-fires, fetching water for the cooks, and, if the location of the camp was considered especially dangerous, in digging rifle-pits in which the guards for the night would be posted. All this work was performed by regular details, changed each day, and announced each morning at breakfast-time. Thus, one day Glen would find himself on the detail for pitching headquarter tents, and the next answering the cook's imperative demands for water. Or, provided with a gunny-sack, he might be scouring the immediate neighborhood for a supply of dry buffalo chips, with which to eke out the scanty stock of fire-wood. He always performed these tasks cheerfully and faithfully; not that he liked them, but because he realized their necessity, and saw that all the others, below the rank of assistant engineer, were obliged to do the same things.
Binney Gibbs, however, considered such duties irksome and demeaning. He thought it very hard that the son of a wealthy man, a prize scholar, and a rodman, such as he was, should be compelled to act as a cook's assistant. To show his contempt for the work he performed it awkwardly and with much grumbling. The cooks were not slow to discover this; and, as a cook is a power in camp as well as elsewhere, they began to make things as unpleasant as possible for him. It was wonderful how much more water was needed when it was his turn to keep them supplied than it was when any one else was on duty. Then, too, while Glen's willingness and good-nature were rewarded by many a tidbit, slyly slipped into his tin plate, it chanced that Binney always got the toughest pieces of meat, the odds and ends of everything, and, whenever he asked for a second helping, was told that there was none of that particular dish left. He tried to retaliate by complaining of the cooks at headquarters; but, as he could prove nothing against them, the only result of this unwise measure was that he got less to eat than ever, and but for a hard-tack barrel that was always open to everybody would have been on a fair way to starvation.
Another thing Binney hated to do was to stand guard. This duty came to each one in turn, every three or four nights, according to the number of sentinels required, and on a night of duty each one was obliged to keep watch "two hours on and four off." That is, if Binney or Glen went on duty at six o'clock, he would be relieved at eight, and allowed to sleep until midnight, when he would stand guard again at one of the several posts beyond the camp limits, until two. Then he might sleep until six, when, if camp was not already broken, he must again go on duty until it was, and the wagon-train was in motion.
Binney declared this was all nonsense. It was well enough, he said, to talk about Indians attacking a small party, or a stage station here and there; but as for bothering a large, well-armed party like this, they simply wouldn't think of doing such a thing. There was as much danger of their attacking Fort Riley! The idea of waking a fellow up at midnight, and sending him out on the prairie to listen to coyotes and screech-owls for two hours! It was ridiculous! He might as well be enlisted in the army and have done with it! So he growled and grumbled, and tried, in every way possible, to shirk this guard duty, though generally without success.
Even Glen wondered if it were necessary to keep so many men on guard, and if the disagreeable duty did not come oftener than it need. At length, however, something happened to convince these boys that no guard against the wily foes surrounding them could be too strong or too carefully kept.
They had been out a week, and were in the heart of the Indian country, far beyond the most advanced settlements, when, one evening, camp was pitched on a level bit of valley, bounded on one side by bluffs that separated it from the higher plains. On the other side flowed a creek bordered by a growth of cottonwoods, red willows, and tall, rank grass. Beyond the creek rose still other bluffs, forming the eastern boundary of this pleasant valley. From time immemorial the place had been a favorite resort of Indians, as was shown by the abandoned wick-i-ups, lodge-poles, and quantities of bleached buffalo bones found in a grove of great cottonwoods a short distance up the stream. There was, however, nothing to indicate that they had occupied the place recently, and so, though the one topic of conversation about the camp-fires at supper-time was Indians, it was rather of those belonging to other times and places than to the present.
Suddenly, from the top of the bluff behind the camp, came half a dozen shots, and the sentinel who had been posted there rushed in, shouting, "Indians! Indians!" This time the enemy proved to be two overland stages, loaded with mails and troops, who had fought their way through from Denver. These had mistaken the sentinel for an Indian, and fired at him, while he, thinking from this that they certainly must be Indians, had fired back.
Late that same night the camp was again alarmed by a shot from one of its sentries. Everybody sprang from his tent, rifle in hand, and for a few minutes the excitement was intense. It was succeeded by a feeling of deep disgust when it was discovered that sentry Binney Gibbs had fired at a coyote that the light of the newly risen moon had disclosed prowling about the camp.
When, therefore, at two o'clock in the morning, Glen went on duty, and was stationed on the edge of the slope leading down to the stream, Mr. Brackett, who was officer of the guard, charged him not to fire at anything unless he was absolutely sure it was an Indian.
Glen answered that he certainly would not give an alarm without good cause for so doing; and Mr. Brackett, promising to visit him again at the end of an hour, went softly away to inspect the next post on his round.
When, at the end of an hour, the officer of the guard returned to the post where he had left Glen, the boy was not to be found. In vain did Mr. Brackett call his name, at first in low tones, and then louder. In vain did he question the other sentries. They had neither seen nor heard anything more suspicious than an occasional coyote. In vain was the whole camp aroused and a search made through its tents and wagons. Not a trace of the boy, who was so universally liked, was to be found. He had disappeared as absolutely, so far as they were concerned, as though the earth had opened and swallowed him.
Chapter XV.
THE SUSPICIOUS MOVEMENTS OF CERTAIN COYOTES.
When Glen was left lying on the ground, with his rifle beside him, peering into the black shadows of the undergrowth, he certainly did not anticipate seeing any thing more dangerous to his own safety, or that of the sleeping camp, than coyotes, and he had already learned what cowardly beasts they were. How absurd it was of Binney Gibbs to fire at one. He might have known what it was. No wonder the fellows were provoked. He would like to know as much as Binney did about some things; but he should hate to be as silly as he in others. How many coyotes there were to-night anyhow. He had already heard their short, sharp barks, and long dismal howls from the bluffs behind him, and from those on the opposite side of the stream. Now another of the weird sounds came floating down on the damp night air from the direction of the old Indian camping-ground. Perhaps that fellow was howling because he couldn't find any meat on those bleached buffalo bones. Well, no wonder. Glen thought he would be inclined to howl, too, over such a disappointment as that.
It was not absolutely dark; for, though the moon was in its last quarter, it gave considerable light when the clouds would let it; but they were scurrying across the sky at such a rate that they kept it hidden most of the time. As Glen was facing the east, it lighted the spot where he lay whenever it was allowed to light any thing, and made the darkness of the underbrush, at which he gazed, blacker than ever. It was forlorn and lonely enough without the moonlight; but Glen thought that perhaps it was better to be in darkness than to be lighted up while enemies might possibly be gazing at him from the safe cover of those impenetrable shadows. How easily a rifle-shot from those bushes could pick him off during one of those uncomfortable little spells of moonlight.
All at once Glen saw another light, apparently on the edge of the opposite bluffs. It showed yellow and steady for a second, and then disappeared. Was it an Indian signal, or a newly risen star suddenly obscured by clouds? This was a question calculated to keep even a sleepy boy wide awake. Perhaps if he watched closely he would see it again. He had heard a great deal about Indian signals lately, and knew that, by flashes of fire at night, smokes, waving blankets, and mirror flashes by day, they could transmit intelligence across the plains almost as readily as white men could do the same thing by telegraph. How he wished he understood their signals, and how he would like to see them using them.
Glen was very curious concerning Indians--real wild ones--and hoped he should at least catch a glimpse of some before the trip was ended. It would be too absurd to return to Brimfield, after crossing the Plains, and to be obliged to confess that he had not met any.
Hallo! How near those coyote howls were coming. Wasn't that one of the brutes now, skulking in the shadow of those willows? Certainly something was moving down there. Now there were two of them. With what an ugly snarl they greeted each other. Still, that snarl was a comfort; for it proved them to be really coyotes. At least so thought Glen. Just then the boy sneezed. He couldn't have helped it to save him, and at the same moment the moon shone out. The coyotes had disappeared. Perhaps they thought he would fire at them, as Binney Gibbs had. But they needn't be afraid. He wasn't going to alarm the camp on account of coyotes.
Another cloud swallowed the moon, and again Glen thought he could distinguish a black object moving through the shadows. Although he strained his eyes, and watched intently, almost holding his breath in his excitement, he could see only one object, and it certainly was moving towards him. Where was the other? If he only dared fire at that one! The boy clutched his rifle nervously. The coyote came sneaking on, very slowly, frequently stopping and remaining motionless for several seconds; but Glen never took his eyes from it. If he only had, just long enough to give one look at the human figure creeping noiselessly towards him from behind; but no thought of danger from that direction entered his head.
As the Indian, gliding up behind the young sentry, reached a point from which he could distinguish the outlines of the recumbent figure before him, he cautiously raised himself on one knee, and fitted a steel-headed arrow to the bow that had been slung on his back. In another instant it would have sped on its fatal mission, and Glen's career would have ended as suddenly as the snuffing of a candle-flame. He was saved by a gleam of moonlight, that caused the Indian to sink, like a shadow, into the grass. The coyote also remained motionless. Then the moon was again obscured, and the Indian again rose to a crouching posture. He had evidently changed his plans; for he no longer held the bow in his hand. That gleam of moonlight had showed him that the sentry was only a boy, instead of the man he had supposed, and he determined to try for a captive instead of a scalp.
The next instant he sprang forward with the noiseless bound of a panther, and the breath was driven from Glen's body as the Indian lighted on his back, with one hand over the boy's mouth. The coyote rose on its hind-legs, and leaped forward at the same moment. In a twinkling its skin was flung over Glen's head, and so tightly fastened about his neck that he was at once smothered and strangled. He tried to cry out, but could not. He did not even know what had happened, or who these were that, swiftly and with resistless force, were half dragging, half carrying him between them.
For a moment he entertained the wild hope that it was a practical joke of some of the boys from camp. That hope was speedily dispelled; for, as his captors gained the shelter of the trees on the bank of the stream, they halted long enough to secure his arms firmly behind him, and to loosen the coyote-skin so that he could breathe a trifle more freely. Then he was again hurried forward.
After travelling what seemed to the poor boy like an interminable distance, and when he was so faint and dizzy with the heat and suffocation of that horrible wolf-skin that he felt he could not go a step farther, it was suddenly snatched from his head, and the strong grasp of his arms was let go. The boy staggered against the trunk of a tree, and would have fallen but for its support. For a few moments he saw nothing, and was conscious of nothing save the delicious coolness of the air and the delight of breathing it freely once more.
The halt was a short one; for already a faint light, different from that of the moon, was stealing over the eastern bluffs, and the Indians must have their prisoner far away from there by sunrise. There were three of them now, as well as some ponies and a mule. Glen could also see a great many white objects scattered about the ground. They were bleached buffalo bones. As he recognized them, he knew he was at the old Indian camping-ground he had visited the evening before, and from which one of those coyote howls had seemed to come. So it had; but it had been uttered by the young Cheyenne left there in charge of the animals, in answer to the howls of the two other human coyotes, who, prowling about the engineers' camp, had finally made Glen a prisoner.
They were Cheyenne scouts, belonging to the Dog Soldier band, at that time the most famous fighters of that warlike tribe. They had been sent out from their village, on the American Fork, two days before, to find out what they could concerning General Lyle's exploring expedition, rumors of which had already reached the ears of their chiefs. So successfully had they accomplished their mission that they had not only discovered all they wanted to know about these new invaders of their territory, but had actually taken one of their number prisoner. Besides this they had stolen three fine saddle ponies, and a powerful white mule, from the corral of a stage station some twenty miles up the trail. Now, therefore, as they swung their captive on the back of the mule, and secured him by passing a thong of raw-hide about his ankles and beneath the animal's belly, their hearts were filled with rejoicing over their success.
Chapter XVI.
IN THE HANDS OF THE CHEYENNES.
Especially happy was the youngest of the three Indians, who was a boy of about Glen's age. This was the first scout he had ever been allowed to go on; and, as he reflected upon the glory of their return to the village, with that prisoner, those stolen ponies, and all the valuable information they had acquired, he wondered if there was any happier or prouder boy living than he. He even had a kindly feeling towards the white boy, who, by allowing himself to be captured, had contributed so largely to the honors that would be showered upon him, and he grinned good-humoredly in Glen's face as soon as the growing daylight enabled him to see it plainly. Up to this time the Cheyenne boy had only been known as "Blackbird;" but he had set forth on this scout with the firm determination of winning a name more worthy of a young warrior. Had he not already done so? His companions had complimented him on his carefully executed imitation of a coyote's howl, and one of them had suggested that he must have a veritable wolf's tongue in his mouth: "Wolf-Tongue!" There was a fine name for a young Dog soldier. What if he should be allowed to keep it for his own? There was not another boy of his age in the village with such a name as that. Now he began to make some curious motions with his hands, and poor Glen, who, in spite of his own wretchedness, could not keep from watching him with some curiosity, wondered what the young Indian was up to. Dropping the bridle on his pony's neck, the boy lifted both hands to the level of his shoulders with the first two fingers of each extended upward and forward, while the thumbs and other fingers were tightly closed. At the same time he stuck out his tongue. He was spelling out his new name in the Indian sign language, just to see how it would look.
The boy only held his hands in this position for an instant, and then dropped them to clutch a gun that was slipping from his knees, across which he had laid it. The movement attracted Glen's attention to the gun, and his face flushed angrily as he recognized his own precious rifle, in which he had taken such pride and delight. It was too bad. Then the thought flashed into his mind, would he ever again care for a rifle or anything else in this world? What did Indians do with prisoners? Tortured them, and put them to death, of course. Did not all the stories he had ever read agree on that point? Could it be possible that he, Glen Eddy, was to be tortured, perhaps burned at the stake? Was that what coming out on the Plains meant? Had life with all its hopes and joys nearly ended for him? It could not be! There must be some escape from such a horrible fate! The poor boy gazed about him wildly, but saw only the endless sea of grass stretching to the horizon on all sides, and the stern faces of his captors, one of whom held the end of a lariat that was fastened about the mule's neck.
They all carried bows and arrows slung to their backs, as well as rifles that lay across their knees. They wore moccasins and leggings of buckskin, but no clothing above their waists. Their saddles were simply folded blankets, which would be their covering at night. In place of stirrups they used strips of buffalo hide with a loop at each end. These were thrown across the blanket saddles, and the feet of the riders were supported in the loops. One of them had a pair of field-glasses slung by a strap from his shoulders.
Until nearly noon they pushed westward across the trackless undulations of the prairie, and Glen became so faint from hunger and thirst, and so stiff from his painful position, that he could hardly retain his seat. His mule was a long-limbed, raw-boned animal, whose gait never varied from an excruciatingly hard trot. Finally, the boy's sufferings reached such a point that it was all he could do to keep from screaming, and he wondered if any torture could be worse.
At length they came to a tiny stream, fringed with a slender growth of willows, and here a long rest was taken. Glen could not stand when his ankles were unbound, and he was allowed to slip from the mule's back, but fell heavily to the ground. The Indian boy said something to his companions, one of whom replied with a grunt, whereupon the lad unbound the prisoner's arms, and helped him to reach the edge of the stream. He was wonderfully revived by plunging his head into the cool water, and the young Indian, who seemed a good-natured sort of a chap, assisted to restore the circulation in his wrists and ankles by rubbing them vigorously. The men smiled scornfully at this; but the boy rubbed away with a hearty good-will, and smiled back at them. He wanted to get this prisoner into the village in as good a condition as possible, and was perfectly willing to be laughed at, if he could only accomplish his object. He even went so far as to kindle a small fire of dry, barkless wood, that would make but little smoke, and heat a strip of dried buffalo-meat over its coals for the prisoner to eat, though wondering at a taste that did not find raw meat just as palatable as cooked. Then he tried to converse with Glen; but, as the latter did not understand either Cheyenne or the sign language, and as the only English word Wolf-Tongue knew was "How," this attempt proved a failure.
How Glen wished he could talk with this Indian boy. Why were not white boys taught the Indian language in school, so as to be prepared for such emergencies? It would be so much more valuable than Latin. He wondered if he would have studied it any harder than he had other things, if it had been included in the Brimfield High School course. How far away Brimfield seemed! What wouldn't he give to be there at this moment? How would they feel at home if they could see him now?
At length it was time to go on again. The animals, which had been hobbled to prevent them from straying, left the juicy grasses of the bottom-land with reluctance; and, with a heavy heart and still aching body, Glen again mounted his mule. His saddle was the coyote-skin that had been thrown over his head when he was captured. Now he was given a pair of raw-hide Indian stirrups; while, though his hands were again tied behind his back, his feet were left unbound. He therefore rode much more comfortably now than before, and Wolf-Tongue, who seemed to consider the prisoner as his especial property, was allowed to hold the end of his lariat.
All the movements of these scouts were as carefully guarded as though they were surrounded by enemies. They avoided soft places where a trail might be left, and whenever they ascended a swell of the prairie they halted just before reaching the top. One of them, dismounting, would then creep cautiously forward, and, without exposing his body above the crest, would gaze long and searchingly in every direction. Not until he was satisfied that no human being was within range of his vision would he show himself on the summit, and beckon his comrades to join him.
The afternoon was half gone, when, on one of these occasions, the scout who had just crept to the top of an elevation was seen by the others to gaze long and steadily in a particular direction through his field-glass. At length, apparently satisfied with what he saw, he stood up, and flashed a dazzling ray of sunlight from a small mirror that he held in his hand. Again and again did he send that flash over miles of prairie, before he saw the answering flash for which he was watching. Then he called the others up; they talked earnestly together for a few minutes, and, having reached some conclusion, they galloped rapidly away, almost at right angles to the course they had been following.
Glen wondered what this movement meant; but it was not until they had ridden for nearly an hour that his unasked questions were answered. Then, as though by magic, so unexpectedly did they appear, a score or more of Indians seemed to spring from the ground and surround them. It was a Cheyenne war-party. Their ponies, under watchful guard, grazed in a slight depression to one side of them, and their scouts kept a keen lookout from a rise of ground beyond.
While these warriors were exchanging greetings with the new-comers, and regarding the prisoner with unconcealed satisfaction, two white men, utterly unsuspicious of their presence so near them, were lounging in front of the Lost Creek stage station, less than a mile away. From this station the scouts had stolen their ponies and the white mule two nights before.
The ranch and stable stood side by side, and were low, one-story buildings, with walls of a soft sandstone, quarried near by, and roofs of poles covered with sods. Behind them was a corral enclosed by a low stone wall. The ranch and stable were connected by a narrow subterranean passage, and another led from the house to a "dug-out," or square pit, some ten yards from it. This "dug-out" had a roof of poles heavily covered with earth and sods; while, just at the surface of the ground, port-holes opened on all sides. A similar pit, on the other side, could be reached from the stable, and another, in the rear of the station, was connected with the corral.
Lost Creek Station had suffered greatly at the hands of Indians that summer. Its inmates had been killed, and its stock run off. Now but two men were left to guard it. This afternoon they were watching anxiously for the stage from the east, which was some hours overdue.
Suddenly, as they gazed along the distant wagon trail, there came a thunderous rush of hoofs from behind the station. But the men had heard the sound before, and did not need to look to know what it meant.
"They're after us again, Joe!" exclaimed one, in a disgusted tone, as they sprang into the ranch and barred its heavy door behind them. A moment later they were in the "dug-out" behind the corral, and the gleaming barrels of two rifles were thrust from two of its narrow port-holes.
"I swear, Joe! if one of them hasn't the cheek to ride old Snow-ball, and he's in the lead, too. You drop him, and I'll take the next one."
There were two reports. A white mule pitched heavily forward and its rider was flung to the ground. A wounded Indian clung to his pony. Then the whole band wheeled and dashed back to where they had come from, taking both their wounded warrior and the one who had been flung to the ground with them.
"Did you notice that the fellow I dropped had a white man's hat on?" asked Joe, as the two men watched the retreat of their foes.
"Yes, and white men's clothes on, too. I wonder who he murdered and robbed to get 'em?"
Chapter XVII.
A CHEYENNE WAR-PARTY.
The war-party, detected by the wonderful eyesight of the Cheyenne scout while they were yet miles away from him, had been for more than a week engaged in attacking stages and wagon-trains on the Smoky Hill Trail. Hiding behind some slight elevation, or in a cottonwood thicket near the road, with keen-eyed scouts always on the lookout, they would burst like a whirlwind on their unsuspecting victims, pour in a withering volley of bullets and arrows, and disappear, almost before a return shot could be fired. Sometimes they would maintain a running fight for miles with a stage, their fleet ponies easily keeping pace with its frantic mules, and many a one thus fell into their hands. Its fate was always the same. If any of its defenders survived the fight they were either killed or reserved for the worse fate of captives. Its mail-sacks were ripped open and their contents scattered far and wide. Finally it was set on fire and destroyed.
Sometimes the stages escaped; in which case their passengers had marvellous tales to tell. One of these, that reached the safety of General Lyle's wagon-train just in time to avoid capture, had but one living passenger, a woman who was not even wounded during the almost continuous storm of arrows and bullets of a ten-mile running fight. Four dead men, one of whom was her husband, were inside the coach, and another was on the box with the driver. The latter was wounded, and the mules fairly bristled with arrows. The stage itself was shivered and splintered in every part by the shower of lead that had been poured into it, and many a blood-stained letter from its mail-sacks afterwards carried a shudder into distant Eastern homes.
This, then, was the work of the war-party who were gathered about Glen Eddy; and, even now, they were impatiently awaiting the appearance of the stage from the east that was due that day. For this occasion they had planned a new form of attack. It was not to be made until the stage reached the ranch. There, while its mules were being changed, and its occupants were off their guard, the Indians proposed to dash out from the nearest place of concealment and attempt the capture of both it and the station at the same time. It was a well-conceived plan, and might have been successfully carried out, but for the arrival of the three scouts, who were now so proudly exhibiting their prisoner and telling the story of his capture. Before they had half finished, a few dazzling flashes of light from the mirrors of the distant lookouts announced that the eastern stage was in sight.
A minute later the warriors were mounted and riding cautiously towards a point but a short distance from the ranch, where they could still remain concealed from it until the moment of making their final dash. The three scouts, being on other duty, were not expected to take part in the fight, nor had they any intention of so doing, much as they would have liked to; but they could not resist the temptation to witness it. So they, with their prisoner, followed close behind the others to their new place of concealment. When they reached it, these three, with Glen, stood a little apart from the rest, so as not to interfere with their movements.
Up to this moment, the boy had not the least idea of what was about to take place, nor where he was. There was nothing to indicate that a stage ranch and a well-travelled wagon road lay just beyond the ridge before him. He wondered what these Indians were up to; but he wondered still more when they would go into camp, and give him a chance to dismount from the back of that hard-trotting mule; for his aches and pains had again become very hard to bear. In spite of his thoughts being largely centred upon himself, Glen could not help noticing the uneasy movements of his steed, and his impatient snuffings of the air, that began as soon as they came to a halt. The scouts noticed them, too, and watched the mule narrowly.
Suddenly the animal threw up his great head, and in another instant would have announced his presence to all the country thereabout by a sonorous, far-reaching bray. Before he could open his mouth, however, one of the scouts sprang from his pony and seized him by the nose. In the struggle that followed, the end of the lariat held by Wolf-Tongue was jerked from his hand. At the same moment the mule succeeded in shaking off the scout with such violence that he staggered for nearly a rod before recovering his balance. Then, so quickly that Glen was very nearly flung from his back, the animal sprang to the crest of the little ridge, and dashed, with astonishing speed, towards the corral that had been his home for so long, and which he had scented so plainly the moment he reached its vicinity.
Of course the entire body of Indians was in instant pursuit--not of the mule, but of the prisoner that he was bearing from them. Like a thunderclap out of a clear sky, they rushed down that slope, every pony doing his best, and their riders yelling like demons. From the first, Wolf-Tongue took the lead. It was his prisoner who was escaping, his first one. He must have him again. He would almost rather die than lose him. So he lashed his pony furiously with the quirt, or Indian riding-whip of raw-hide fastened to his wrist, and leaned far over on his neck, and yelled, and beat the animal's sides with his moccasined feet, until he had gained a lead of all the others and was almost within reach of the mule. Another moment and he would have that trailing lariat in his hand.
Glen, too, was kicking the sides of his ungainly steed, and yelling at him in a perfect frenzy of excitement. He saw the stage ranch, the winding wagon trail, and the shining river beyond the instant he was borne over the crest of the ridge, and knew what they meant for him. To reach that little clump of buildings first, meant life, liberty, and restoration to his friends. He must do it, and he fully believed he could. He leaned as far as possible over the mule's neck, and shouted encouraging words into his ears. What wonderful speed the long-legged animal was showing! Who would have thought it was in him?
"Well done, mule!" yelled Glen. "A few more seconds and we'll be there! They can't catch us now!"
Then came a burst of flame from the earth in front of him. The white mule gave a convulsive bound and fell dead in his tracks, while poor Glen was flung far over his head to the ground, which he struck so heavily as to partially stun him.
Without checking the speed of their ponies in the least, two stalwart warriors bent over, and, seizing the boy by the arms, raised him between them as they swept past. A moment later the entire band, minus only their white mule, had again reached their place of concealment, and poor Glen, breathless, bruised, and heart-broken with disappointment, was more of a prisoner than ever. Besides this, Wolf-Tongue, the only one amid all those stern-featured warriors who had shown the least particle of pity for him, was wounded--a rifle-ball having passed through the calf of one of his legs.
[Illustration: "TWO STALWART WARRIORS SEIZED HIM BY THE ARMS AND RAISED HIM BETWEEN THEM AS THEY SWEPT PAST"]
This sudden derangement of his plans caused the leader of the war-party to abandon them altogether, and decide upon a new one. It would be useless to attempt to surprise the stage and station now. Besides, it might be just as well to leave the trail in peace for a few days, in order that the large party of white men, of whom the scouts had just brought information, might come on with less caution than they would use if constantly alarmed. He would send runners to the villages of the Kiowas, Arrapahoes, and Comanches, and tell them of the rich prize awaiting their combined action. In the meantime he would return to his own village and raise a war-party that, in point of numbers and equipment, should be a credit to the great Cheyenne nation.
So the runners were despatched, and the rest of the party set out in a northwesterly direction towards their distant villages on the American Fork.
Shortly before the Indians halted for the night, even Glen almost forgot his heartache and painful weariness of body in the excitement of seeing his first buffalo, and witnessing an Indian buffalo-hunt on a small scale. It was just at sunset, when the scout, who rode ahead, signalled, from the top of an elevation, by waving his blanket in a peculiar manner, that he had discovered buffalo.
Obeying a command from their leader, half a dozen warriors at once dashed ahead of the party; and, joining the scout, disappeared over the ridge. As the others gained the summit, they saw that the plain beyond it was covered with a vast herd of buffalo, quietly feeding, singly or in groups, and spreading over the country as far as the eye could reach. There were thousands of them, and Glen was amazed at the wonderful sight.
Those nearest to the advancing Indians had already taken the alarm, and in less than a minute more the whole vast mass was in motion, with loud bellowings and a lumbering gallop, that, shaking the earth, sounded like the rush and roar of mighty waters. The fleet war-ponies speedily bore the hunters into the thick of the flying mass, so that for a few seconds they were swallowed up and lost to view in it. Then they reappeared surrounding, and driving before them, a fat young cow, that they had cut out from the rest of the herd. They did not use their rifles, as the reports might have attracted undesirable attention to their presence. From their powerful bows arrow after arrow was buried in the body of the selected victim, some of them even passing completely through it, until at length the animal fell, and the chase was ended.
Chapter XVIII.
BUFFALO AND THEIR USES.
If the Cheyennes had been on a regular hunt they would have killed scores of the mighty beasts before desisting from their bloody work; but buffalo were too valuable to the Plains Indian to be wasted, or killed for mere sport. In fact, their very existence, at that time, depended upon these animals. Not only did their flesh form the chief and almost the sole article of Indian food, but with the skins they covered their lodges, and made boats, ropes, lariats, trunks, or _par fléche_ sacks, saddles, shields, frames for war bonnets, gloves, moccasins, leggings, shirts, gun-covers, whips, quivers, knife-scabbards, cradles, saddle-bags and blankets, beds, bridles, boots, glue, and a score of other necessary articles.
From the hair they made ropes and pillows; while the horns provided them with spoons, cups, dishes, powder-flasks, arrow-heads, and even bows. Buffalo sinews gave the Indians thread and twine for innumerable purposes; while certain of the bones were fashioned into axes, knives, arrow-points, and implements for scraping the hides or dressing robes. The ribs were formed into small dog sledges, and the teeth into necklaces and rattles. Buffalo chips were a most important article of fuel on the almost treeless plains, and this is only a partial list of the useful articles furnished to the Indians by this animal. At that time buffalo roamed, in countless thousands, from the Missouri River to the Rocky Mountains, and from Mexico up into British America. Since then they have been ruthlessly slaughtered and exterminated by skin-butchers, emigrants, and an army of so-called sportsmen from all parts of the world.
While the hunters were cutting up the cow they had killed, the rest of the party went into camp on the bank of the stream, near which the vast herd had been feeding. Here Wolf-Tongue's wound, that had only been rudely bandaged to check the flow of blood, was carefully dressed and attended to.
There was no lack of food in the camp that evening, and the warriors were evidently determined to make up for their days of hard riding and fighting on scanty rations, by indulging in a regular feast.
Glen was disgusted to see the liver and kidneys of the buffalo eaten raw, as was also a quantity of the meat while it was yet warm. Still there was plenty of cooked meat for those who preferred it. Over small fires, carefully screened by robes and blankets, so that their light should not attract attention, ribs were roasted and choice bits were broiled. Even the prisoner was unbound and allowed to cut and broil for himself until he could eat no more.
Wolf-Tongue's wounded leg was smeared with melted tallow; and, though it was so lame and stiff that he could not use it, his appetite was in no wise impaired by his wound, nor did it dampen his high spirits in the least. It rather added to them; for, as he ate buffalo meat raw or cooked, as it was handed to him, at the same time laughing and chatting with those of the younger warriors who were nearest his own age, he felt that an honorable wound had been the only thing needed to crown the glories of this, his first warpath. Now he would indeed be greeted as a hero upon his return to the village. He felt more assured than ever that he would be allowed to keep the fine name of "Wolf-Tongue." Perhaps, but it was only just within the range of possibility, the head men might commemorate at once his success as a scout, and the fact that he had received a wound in battle, by conferring upon him the distinguished name of "Lame Wolf." Such things had been known. Why might they not happen to him?
When the feasting was ended, and the entire band began to feel that to sleep would be far better than to eat any more, they extinguished their fires and moved noiselessly away, a hundred yards or so, from the place where they had been. Here in the tall grass, at the foot of the cottonwood-trees, or in red willow thickets, the tired warriors laid down, each man where he happened to be when he thought he had gone far enough for safety. Each drew his blanket over his head, and also over the rifle that was his inseparable bedfellow. The ponies had already been securely fastened, so that they could be had when wanted, and now they were either lying down or standing motionless with drooping heads. The camp was as secure as an Indian camp ever is, where every precaution is taken to guard against surprise, except the simple one of keeping awake.
Wolf-Tongue, who was unable to touch his foot to the ground, was carried to his sleeping-place with his arms about the necks of two of his stalwart friends. Now, with Glen's rifle clasped tightly to him, and with his head completely enveloped in a blanket, he was fast forgetting his pain in sleep.
Poor Glen was forced to lie without any blanket, either over or under him, with his wrists bound together, and with one of his arms fastened, by a short cord, to an arm of one of the scouts who had captured him. The latter fell asleep almost instantly, as was proved by his breathing; but it was impossible for the prisoner, weary as he was, to do so. His mind was too busily engaged in revolving possible means of escape. For a long time he lay with wide-open eyes, dismissing one project after another as they presented themselves. Finally he decided that, unless he could first free his hands and then release his arm from the cord that bound him to the scout, he could do nothing.
To accomplish the first of these objects, he began to gnaw, very softly, at the raw-hide thong by which his wrists were secured. How tough and hard it was. How his jaws ached after he had worked for an hour or more, without accomplishing his purpose. Still he could feel that his efforts were not altogether fruitless. He knew that he could succeed if he were only given time enough.
He was obliged to take several rests, and his work was often interrupted by hearing some wakeful Indian get up and walk about. Twice the scout wakened, and pulled at the cord fastened to his prisoner's arm to assure himself that he was still there.
At length the task was concluded, the hateful thong was bitten in two, and Glen's hands were free. They were cold, numb, and devoid of feeling; but after a while their circulation was gradually restored, and the boy began to work at the knot that secured the cord about his arm. It was a hard one to untie, but in this, too, he finally succeeded. Just as it loosened beneath Glen's fingers, the scout woke and gave the cord a pull. Fortunately the boy still held it, and the other was satisfied that his prisoner was still beside him. Glen hardly dared breathe until he felt certain that the Indian again slept. Then he fastened the cord to a bit of willow, that grew within reach, in order that there might be some resistance if the scout should pull at it again, and cautiously rose to his feet.
Which way should he go? How should he avoid stepping on some recumbent form if he moved at all? For a moment he stood irresolute. Well, whatever he did he must do quickly, for the short summer night was far advanced. He had not a moment to lose. If he only dared take a pony! If he could drive them all off and leave his pursuers without a horse on which to follow him! It was a thought worthy of a Cheyenne scout, and Glen realized in a moment that, hazardous as the undertaking would be, it offered the only means of ultimate escape. He thought he knew where the horses were, and began to move with the utmost caution, feeling his way inch by inch, in that direction.
Twice he just discovered a motionless human form in time to avoid stumbling over it, and each time his heart seemed to leap into his mouth with the narrowness of his escape. Several times, too, he changed his course in order to avoid some real or fancied obstacle, until at length he was completely bewildered, and obliged to confess that he had no idea of what direction he was taking. Still he kept on, trembling with nervousness, until at length he felt certain that he must be at least well outside the circle of sleeping Indians, if not at a considerable distance from them. He began to move more rapidly, when suddenly a human figure rose up before him, so close that he could not avoid it. He sprang at it with a blind fury, hoping to overthrow it, and still effect his escape. Then there came a wild cry, a deafening report, and Glen found himself engaged in a furious struggle with an unknown antagonist.
Chapter XIX.
GLEN'S ESCAPE FROM THE INDIANS.
As Glen struggled desperately, but well-nigh hopelessly, with the assailant who had risen so unexpectedly to bar his escape, there came a crashing volley of shots, a loud cheer, and a rush of trampling feet through the willows and tangled undergrowth. The boy only dimly wondered at these sounds as he was flung to the ground, where he lay breathless, with his arms pinned tightly to the earth, and expecting that each instant would be his last. Then he became strangely conscious that his antagonist was talking in a language that he understood, and was saying,
"Yez would, would ye? An' yez tho't ye could wrastle wid Terence O'Boyle? Ye murtherin' rid villin! Bad cess to it I but oi'll tache ye! Phat's that ye say? Ye're a white man? Oh, no, me omadhoon! yez can't fool me into lettin' ye up that way!"
"But I am white!" cried Glen, half choked though he was. "Let me up, and I'll prove it to you. Can't you understand English?"
Very slowly and reluctantly the astonished Irishman allowed himself to become convinced that the assailant he had failed to shoot, but whom he had overcome after a violent struggle, was not an Indian. It was some minutes before he would permit Glen to rise from his uncomfortable position, and even then he held him fast, declaring that nothing short of an order from the captain himself would induce him to release a prisoner.
The explanation of this sudden change in our hero's fortunes and prospects is that, while the Cheyennes were engaged in their buffalo-hunt the evening before, they had been discovered by a Pawnee scout. He was attached to a company of cavalry who were on their way back to Fort Hayes, on the Smoky Hill, from an expedition against the Arrapahoes. The captain of this company had determined to surprise the Indians thus unexpectedly thrown in his way, at daybreak, and had made his arrangements accordingly. Their movements had been carefully noted by the scouts, and, having made a start from their own camp at three o'clock that morning, the troops were cautiously surrounding the place where they supposed their sleeping foes to be.
The attack would undoubtedly have proved successful, and the Cheyennes would have sprung from their grassy couches only to fall beneath the fire from the cavalry carbines, had not Glen Eddy run into trooper Terence O'Boyle and been mistaken for an Indian by that honest fellow. Upon the alarm being thus prematurely given, the soldiers fired a volley and charged the Cheyenne camp, only to find it deserted. With one exception, the Indians had made good their escape, and it was never known whether any of them were even wounded by the volley that gave them such a rude awakening. The one who failed to escape was the young scout who hoped to be known as "Wolf-Tongue," and who, on account of his wound, was unable to fly with the rest.
He managed to conceal himself in a thicket until daylight. Then he was discovered by one of the Pawnee scouts, who dragged him out, and would have put him to death but for the interference of Glen Eddy, who was just then led to the spot by his Irish captor.
An hour later Glen was enjoying the happiest breakfast in his life, in company with Captain Garrett Winn, U.S.A., who was listening with absorbed interest to the boy's account of his recent thrilling experiences.
"Well, my lad," said the captain, when Glen had finished his story, "I consider your several escapes from being killed, when first captured, from the bullets of those fellows at the stage ranch, from the Indians, and, finally, from being killed by that wild Irishman, as being little short of miraculous."
Soon afterwards the trumpet sounded "Boots and Saddles," and Glen, mounted on a handsome bay mare--which, with several other ponies, had been left behind by the Indians in their hurried flight--trotted happily away with his new friends in the direction of Fort Hayes. In his hand he grasped his own rifle, which was recovered when Wolf-Tongue was captured, and behind him, mounted on a pony led by one of the troopers, rode that wounded and crest-fallen young Indian himself.
The future looked very black to Wolf-Tongue just now; for, totally ignorant of the ways of white men, he expected nothing less than death as soon as he should reach the fort. He realized that Glen had saved him from the knife of the Pawnee scout, and wondered if the white boy would interfere in his behalf with the warriors of his own race, or if they would listen to him in case he did. He wished he knew just a little of the white man's language, that he might discover what those soldiers on each side of him were talking about. Perhaps they were even discussing him and his fate. But he only knew one word of English, and now he began to think he did not understand the meaning of that; for, though he heard the soldiers say "how" several times in the course of their conversation, they did not seem to use it at all as he would. So the Indian lad rode along unhappily enough; but, though his thoughts were very busy, no trace of them was allowed to exhibit itself in his impassive face.
In the meantime he was the subject of a conversation between Glen and Captain Winn, as they rode side by side. The former had a very kindly feeling towards the young Indian, who had tried to be kind to him when their present positions were reversed, and now he wanted in some way to return this kindness if possible.
"What will be done with him do you think, sir?" he asked.
"I'm sure I don't know," replied the captain, carelessly. "I suppose he will be kept as a prisoner at some one of the forts until we have whipped his tribe and put it on a reservation, and then he will be sent back to it."
"But what will become of him then?" persisted the boy.
"Oh, he will grow up to be one of the regular reservation beggars, living on government charity, until he finally drinks himself to death or gets killed in some quarrel. That's the way with most of them on the reservations. You see they haven't anything else to do, and so they drink and gamble, and kill each other just to pass away the time."
"Don't you suppose he could learn to live like white folks if he had the chance?"
"Yes, I suppose he could. In fact, I know he could, if he had the chance; for these Indian boys are about as bright as they make 'em. But I don't know where he'll get the chance. The government would rather pay a thousand dollars to keep him on a reservation, or even to kill him, than a hundred to give him an education, and I don't know of anybody else, that is able to do anything, who will take an interest in him."
There the conversation ended; for, after riding some time in silence and trying to think of a solution of this perplexing Indian problem, Glen all at once found himself nodding so that he almost fell off his horse. He was so thoroughly wearied and sleepy that it did not seem as though he could hold his eyes open another minute.
Noticing his condition, the captain said, kindly,
"You look just about used up, young man; and no wonder, after what you've gone through. The best thing for you to do is to hand your pony over to one of the men, crawl into the wagon back there, and take a nap."
Glen thought this such good advice that he immediately followed it. Two minutes later he was lying, in what looked like a most uncomfortable position, on top of a pile of baggage in the only wagon that accompanied the troops, more soundly asleep than he had ever been before in all his life. He did not even know when the wagon reached the fort, a few hours later, nor did he realize what was happening when he was lifted from it and led by the captain into his own quarters. There the boy was allowed to tumble down on a pile of robes and blankets, and told to have his sleep out.
Not until the rising sun streamed full in his face the next morning did that sleep come to an end. Then he awoke so hungry that he felt as though it would take a whole buffalo to satisfy his appetite, and so bewildered by his surroundings that, for some minutes, he could not recall what had happened. He had no idea of where he was, for he could remember nothing since the act of crawling into the wagon and finding a bed on its load of baggage.
Chapter XX.
A PRESENT THAT WOULD PLEASE ANY BOY.
Through the open window, by which the sunlight was streaming in, Glen caught a glimpse of a line of cottonwood-trees, which, as he had long ago learned, denoted the presence of a stream in that country. To a boy who dearly loved to bathe, and had not washed for two whole days, nothing could be more tempting. Nor was Glen long in jumping from the window, running down to the cottonwoods, throwing off his clothes, and plunging headforemost into the cool waters.
With that delicious bath disappeared every trace of his weariness, his aches, and everything else that remained to remind him of his recent trials, except his hunger. When he was at length ready to go in search of something with which to appease that, he walked slowly back towards the house in which he had slept. He now noticed that it was built of logs, and was the last one in a row of half a dozen just like it. He also heard bugle calls, saw soldiers in blue uniforms hurrying in every direction, and wisely concluded that, in some way, he must have been brought to Fort Hayes.
As he stood irresolute near the house, not knowing which way to go or what to do, a door opened and a little girl, followed by a lady, came out. The child stopped and looked at the boy for a moment. Then running back to her mother, she exclaimed,
"Look mamma! look! It's the very same one we knew on the cars!"
Glen had recognized her at once as his little acquaintance of the railroad between St. Louis and Kansas City, and now the lady recognized him as the boy who had run the locomotive so splendidly that terrible night, and had then so mysteriously disappeared.
It was truly a very happy party that gathered about Captain Winn's hospitable breakfast-table that morning. They had so much to talk about, and so many questions to ask, and so many experiences to relate, and Nettie so bubbled over with delight at again finding her play-fellow, that the meal was prolonged for more than an hour beyond its usual limits.
After breakfast Glen asked if he might go and see the prisoner, to which the captain replied, "Certainly you may." As they walked across the parade-ground in the direction of the guard-house, Glen was introduced to several officers, who seemed to take a great interest in him, and shook hands so cordially, and congratulated him so heartily on his escape from the Cheyennes, that the boy began to think his rough experience was not without its compensations after all.
In the guard-house they found the young Indian peering disconsolately out between the gratings of his cell window, and looking very forlorn indeed. He gazed sullenly at the visitors, and wondered why they should come there to stare at him; but when Glen stepped up to him with outstretched hand, and said "How?" the boy's face brightened at once. He took the proffered hand, and answered "How" with an evident air of pleasure, for he could comprehend the other's sympathetic expression, if he could not understand his language. Pointing to himself, the white boy said, "Glen," which the other repeated as though he thoroughly understood what was meant. Then Glen pointed to him, with an inquiring look, as much as to ask, "What is your name?"
The boy understood; but hesitated a moment before drawing himself up proudly and answering in his own tongue; but the name was so long and hard to say that Glen could not repeat it.
"I wish I could understand what he says, for I should so like to have a talk with him," said Glen.
"There is an interpreter who speaks Cheyenne somewhere about the place," answered Captain Winn, "and, if you like, I will send for him."
When the interpreter came, Glen found out that what the boy had said in Cheyenne was that his name was "Lame Wolf;" but when the young Indian tried to repeat it in English, after Glen, he pronounced it "Lem Wolf," which is what he was called from that day.
After they had held quite a conversation, that greatly increased Glen's interest in the boy, he and the captain took their departure, the former promising to come again very soon.
Then Captain Winn led Glen down to the corral, in which were a number of horses, ponies, and mules, and, pointing to one of them, asked the boy if he recognized it.
"Of course I do," answered Glen. "It's the one I rode yesterday."
"And the one I hope you will ride for many days to come," said the captain with a smile; "for I want you to accept that pony as a present from my little girl."
"Really?" cried the delighted boy; "do you really mean that I am to have it for my very own?"
"I really do," laughed the captain, "and," he continued more soberly, "I wish I could offer you something ten times more valuable, as a slight memento of the service you rendered those so dear to me not long ago."
"You couldn't give me anything I should value more," exclaimed Glen, "unless--" Here he hesitated, and his face flushed slightly.
"Unless what?" asked Captain Winn.
"Unless you could give me that Indian boy."
"What on earth would you do with him?" cried the captain, his eyes opening wide with surprise at such an unheard-of request.
Then Glen unfolded a plan that had formed itself in his mind within a few minutes; and, when he had finished, the captain's look of surprise still remained on his face, but he said, reflectively:
"Well, I don't know but what it might be done, and if you succeed in carrying out your part of the scheme, I will see what I can do with the rest of it."
This matter being disposed of, Glen asked if he might try his pony.
"But you tried her yesterday," laughed the captain, who enjoyed the boyishness of this boy as much as he admired his manliness.
"Yes, sir; but she wasn't mine then, and you know everything, even a horse, is very different when it is your own."
"So it is, and you may try her to your heart's content, only don't ride far from the post unless you wish for a repetition of your recent experience."
With this the captain beckoned to a soldier, who stood near by, and ordered him to saddle the bay mare, and to tell the stable-sergeant that she belonged to this young gentleman, who was to take her whenever he pleased. He also told Glen that the whole outfit of saddle, bridle, and picket rope, then being placed on the mare, were included in his present.
The mare was so well fed, and so thoroughly rested, that she was in high spirits; and, the moment she found Glen on her back, tried her very best to throw him off. She reared, and bucked, and plunged, and sprang sideways, and kicked up her heels, to the great delight of a number of soldiers who were witnesses of the performance; but all to no purpose. Her rider clung to the saddle like a burr, and all her efforts to throw him were quite as unsuccessful as those of Binney Gibbs's mule had been some days before.
When Glen, with the breath nearly shaken out of his body, but thoroughly master of the situation, reined the mare up beside the captain, and asked his permission to name her "Nettle," the latter readily granted it, saying, "I think it will be a most appropriate name; for it is evident that she can only be mastered by a firm and steady hand."
Then the happy boy rode over to Captain Winn's quarters, anxious to display his new acquisition to the child after whom she had just been named. As he did so he passed the guard-house, and was moved to pity by the sight of a sad-looking young face pressed against the grating of one of its windows, and gazing wistfully at him. That pony had belonged to Lame Wolf but the day before.
After an hour's riding in the immediate vicinity of the fort, Glen was fully satisfied that no horse in the world had ever combined so many admirable qualities as this bay mare, or given an owner such complete cause to be satisfied with his possession.
As he was about to return her to the corral, his eye caught the gleam of sunlight on a moving white object, a mile or so distant, along the wagon-trail leading to the east. Watching intently, he saw that it was followed by another, and another, until the wagons of a long train were in plain sight, winding slowly along the road towards the fort. When he was certain that he could not be mistaken, the boy uttered a joyous shout, clapped spurs to Nettle, and dashed away to meet them.
A group of mounted men rode ahead of the train, and they gazed wonderingly at the reckless rider who approached them with such headlong impetuosity. Their surprise became incredulous amazement as he reined sharply up within a few paces of them, and, politely lifting his hat, disclosed the shaven head and flushed face of the boy whose mysterious disappearance had caused them such sincere grief and distress. They had devoted half a day to scouring the country near the camp from which he had been lost; and, finding plentiful traces of Indians in the creek bottom, had come to the conclusion that, in some way, he had fallen into their hands, and would never again be heard from. Now, to meet him here, safe, and evidently in high spirits, was past comprehension.
Mr. Hobart was the first to ride forward and grasp his hand. "Is it really you, Glen?" he exclaimed, his voice choked with feeling; "and where, in the name of all that is mysterious, have you been?"
"It is really I," answered the boy, "and I've been a prisoner in the hands of the Cheyennes, and had a glorious time."
It really did seem as though he had had a good time, now that it was all over with, and he was the owner of that beautiful mare. Besides, he could not fully realize the nature of the fate he had escaped.
Then the others crowded about him, and General Lyle himself shook hands with him, and wanted to hear his story at once. While he was telling it as briefly as possible, the joyful news of his appearance flew back through the train, and the boys came running up to see him, and shake hands with him, and nearly pulled him off his horse in their eagerness to touch him and assure themselves that he was really alive.
"Hurrah for the Baldheads!" shouted the irrepressible Brackett; "they don't get left! not much!"
Even Binney Gibbs came and shook hands with him.
That evening, after the camp was somewhat quieted from its excitement, and after Glen had told his story for about the twentieth time, he disappeared for a short while. When he returned he brought with him an Indian boy, who limped painfully, and seemed very ill at ease in the presence of so many strange pale-faces.
"Who's your friend, Glen?"
"Where are the rest of the ten little Injuns?" shouted the fellows as they crowded about this new object of interest.
When at length a partial quiet was restored, Glen begged them to listen to him for a few minutes, as he had something to propose that he was sure would interest them, and they shouted,
"Fire away, old man, we are all listening!"
Chapter XXI.
LAME WOLF, THE YOUNG CHEYENNE.
"Look here, fellows," said Glen, as he stood with one hand on the shoulder of the young Indian, and facing his companions, who, attracted by curiosity, were gathered to hear what he had to say. "This chap is a Cheyenne, and is one of the three by whom I was captured; but he was mighty kind, and did everything he could think of to make things easy for me. So you see he is my friend, and now that he is in trouble, I am bound to do what I can to help him. His name is Lame Wolf--" (here the young Indian stood a little straighter, and his eyes flashed. He had succeeded in having that name recognized as belonging to him, at any rate), "and he's the son of a chief, and the only English word he knows is 'How?' Captain Winn says that if he only had a chance he'd learn as quick as any white boy, and I believe he'd learn a good deal quicker than some--" At this point Glen became somewhat confused, and wondered if Binney Gibbs had told how he had been dropped from his class. "He says, I mean Captain Winn says, that the only thing for him to do out here is to go on a reservation and become a worthless good-for-nothing, and get killed. Now that seems a pretty poor sort of a chance for a fellow that's been as good a friend to me as Lame Wolf has, and I want you to help me give him a better one.
"I want to send him back to my home in Brimfield, and let him live with my folks a year or two, and be taught things the same as white boys, and have the same chance they have. Captain Winn says he thinks he can fix it with the folks at Washington about letting him go; but he don't know where the money to pay his expenses is to come from. I didn't tell him, because I thought I'd speak to you first; but I was pretty sure it would come from this very party. I've only got five dollars in cash myself, but I'll give that, and I'll save all I can out of my pay for it, too. Now, what do you say, fellows? Shall Lame Wolf have a chance or not?"
"Yes! yes! of course he shall! Hurrah for Lame Wolf! Hurrah for Glen's little Injun! Give him a chance! Put me down for half a month's pay! And me! and me!" shouted a dozen voices at once.
"Billy" Brackett jumped up on a box, and, calling the meeting to order, proposed that a committee of three be appointed, with Mr. Hobart as its chairman, to receive subscriptions to the Lame Wolf Fund. "All-in-favor-say-aye-contrary-mind-it-is-a-vote!" he shouted. Then somebody else nominated him and Glen to be the other members, and they were elected without a dissenting voice.
While all this was going on the fellows were crowding about the young Indian, eager to shake hands with him, and say, "How! Lame Wolf, old boy! How!"
All at once Glen found that the boy was leaning heavily on him, and reproached himself for having allowed him to stand so long on his wounded leg. He got his charge back to the guard-house as quickly as possible, and then, leaving him to enjoy a quiet night's rest, hurried back to camp.
Here he found "Billy" Brackett presiding, with great dignity, over what he was pleased to call the "subscription books." They consisted of a single sheet of paper, fastened with thumb-tacks to a drawing-board that was placed on top of a barrel in one of the tents. Mr. Hobart, who had consented to serve on the committee, was also in the tent, and to him were being handed the cash contributions to the Fund.
Glen put his name down for five dollars a month, to be paid as long as he should remain a member of the present expedition. Then he started for his own tent to get the five dollars in cash that he had promised, out of his valise.
As he was hurrying back with it he was stopped by Binney Gibbs, who thrust a bit of paper into his hand, saying,
"I want you to take this check for your Indian, Glen. Father sent it to me to buy a horse with, but I guess a mule is good enough for me, and so the Indian chap can have it as well as not. You needn't say anything about it."
With this, Binney, who had spoken in a confused manner, hurried away without giving Glen a chance to thank him.
What had come over the boy? Glen had never known him to do a generous thing before. He could not understand it. When he reached the tent, and examined the check, his amazement was so great that he gave a long whistle.
"What is it, Glen? Give us a chance to whistle too," shouted "Billy" Brackett. "Our natural curiosity needs to be checked as well as yours."
"Binney Gibbs has contributed a hundred dollars," said Glen, slowly, as though he could not quite believe his own words to be true.
"Good for Grip! Bravo for Binney! Who would have thought it? He's a trump, after all!" shouted "Billy" Brackett and the others who heard this bit of news.
Far beyond the tent, these shouts reached the ears of a solitary figure that stood motionless and almost invisible in the night shadows. They warmed his heart, and caused his cheeks to glow. It was a new sensation to Binney Gibbs to be cheered and praised for an act of generosity. It was a very pleasant one as well, and he wondered why he had never experienced it before.
The truth is that this rough life, in which every person he met was his equal, if not his superior, was doing this boy more good than any one had dared to predict that it would. Although he was a prize scholar, and the son of a wealthy man, there were many in this exploring-party who were far better scholars, and more wealthy than he. Yet even these were often outranked in general estimation by fellows who had neither social position, money, nor learning. At first Binney could not understand it. Things were so different in Brimfield; though even there he remembered that he had not been as popular among the other boys as Glen Eddy. Even in this party, where Binney had expected to be such a shining light, the other Brimfield boy was far better liked than he. For this Binney had hated Glen, and declared he would get even with him. Then he began, furtively, to watch him in the hope of discovering the secret of his popularity. Finally it came to him, like a revelation, and he realized for the first time in his life that, in man or boy, such things as unselfishness, honesty, bravery, good-nature, generosity, and cheerfulness, or any one of them, will do more towards securing the regard, liking, and friendship of his fellows than all the wealth or book-learning in the world.
Perhaps if Glen had not been captured by the Cheyennes, Binney would not have learned this most valuable lesson of his life as quickly as he did. In the general grief over his schoolmate's disappearance, he heard his character praised for one or another lovable trait, until at length the secret of Glen's popularity was disclosed to him. Then, as he looked back and recalled the incidents of their Brimfield life, he realized what a manly, fearless, open-hearted boy this one, whom he had regarded with contempt, because he was not a student, had been. Now that he was gone, and, as he supposed, lost to him forever, Binney thought there was nothing he would not give for a chance to recall the past and win the friendship he had so contemptuously rejected.
For two days these thoughts exercised so strong a sway on Binney's mind, that when, on the third, Glen Eddy appeared before him as one risen from the dead, their influence was not to be shaken off. Although he did not know exactly how to begin, he was determined not only to win the friendship of the boy whom he had for so long regarded as his rival, but also to make every member of the party like him, if he possibly could.
His first opportunity came that evening; but it was not until after a long struggle with selfishness and envy that he resolved to contribute that one-hundred-dollar check to the Lame Wolf Fund. He knew that he cut an awkward figure on his mule, and imagined that a horse would not only be much more elegant, but easier to ride. Then, too, Glen had such a beautiful mare; beside her his wretched mule would appear to a greater disadvantage than ever. He could buy as fine a pony as roamed the Plains for a hundred dollars. Then, too, that was what his father had sent him the money for. Had he a right to use it for any other purpose? To be sure, Mr. Gibbs had not known of the mule, and supposed his son would be obliged to go on foot if he did not buy a horse.
So poor Binney argued with himself, and his old evil influences strove against the new resolves. It is doubtful if the latter would have conquered, had not the sight of Glen coming towards him brought a sudden impulse to the aid of the resolves and decided the struggle in their favor.
Thus generosity won, but by so narrow a margin that Binney could not stand being thanked for it, and so hurried away. But he heard the shouts and cheers coupled with his name, and it seemed to him that he felt even happier at that moment than when he stood on the platform of the Brimfield High School and was told of the prize his scholarship had won.
So the money was raised to redeem one young Cheyenne from the misery and wickedness of a government Indian reservation; and, when the grand total of cash and subscriptions was footed up, it was found to be very nearly one thousand dollars. Glen was overjoyed at the result, and it is hard to tell which boy was the happier, as he crept into his blankets that night, he or Binney Gibbs.
Chapter XXII.
GLEN AND BINNEY GET INTO TROUBLE.
The next day, when Glen announced the successful result of his efforts to Captain Winn, that officer informed him that he expected to be ordered East very shortly on special duty, when he would be willing to take charge of the Indian boy, and deliver him to Mr. Matherson in Brimfield. Nothing could have suited Glen's plans better; and he at once wrote a long letter to his adopted father, telling him of all that had happened, and begging him to receive the young Indian for his sake. He also wrote to Mr. Meadows and asked him to announce the coming of the stranger to the Brimfield boys. Then he hunted up the interpreter, and went to the guard-house for a long talk with his captive friend.
Lame Wolf was glad to see him, and at once asked what the white men had talked of in their council of the evening before. Glen explained it all as clearly as he knew how. The young Indian was greatly comforted to learn that he was not to be put to death, but also seemed to think that it would be nearly as bad to be sent far away from his own country and people, to the land of the Pale-faces. In his ignorance he regarded the place of his proposed exile much as we do the interior of Africa or the North Pole, one only to be reached by a weary journey, that few ever undertook, and fewer still returned from.
He was somewhat cheered by Glen's promise to join him at the end of a year, and that then, if he chose, he should certainly return to his own people. Still, it was a very melancholy and forlorn young Indian who shook hands, for the last time, with the white boy at sunrise the next morning, and said, "How, Glen," in answer to the other's cheery "Good-by, Lame Wolf. Take care of yourself, and I hope you will be able to talk English the next time I see you."
Then, after bidding good-bye to the Winns and his other friends of the post, the boy sprang on Nettle's back and dashed after the wagon-train that was just disappearing over a roll of the prairie to the westward.
All that morning Glen's attention was claimed by Mr. Hobart, or "Billy" Brackett, or somebody else, who wished to learn more of the details of his recent experience; but late in the afternoon he found himself riding beside Binney Gibbs. For the first time in their lives the two boys held a long and earnest conversation. From it each learned of good qualities in the other that he had never before suspected; and by it a long step was taken towards the cementing of a friendship between them.
So engaged were they in this talk, that the animals they were riding were allowed insensibly to slacken their pace, until they had fallen a considerable distance behind the train. They even stopped to snatch an occasional mouthful of grass from the wayside, without opposition on the part of their young riders. These knew that, whenever they chose, a sharp gallop of a minute or two would place them alongside of the wagons, and so they carelessly permitted the distance between them and the train to become much greater than it should have been.
Suddenly a dazzling ray of light flashed, for the fraction of a second, full in Glen's eyes, causing him to start, as though a pistol had been fired close beside him. He glanced hurriedly about. Not a wagon was in sight; but he knew the train must be just over the rise of ground he and Binney were ascending. At that same moment the mule threw up its head and sniffed the air uneasily. Glen's second glance was behind him, and it revealed a sight that, for an instant, stopped the beating of his heart. The whole country seemed alive with Indians.
Half a mile in the rear, hundreds of them, in a dense body, were advancing at the full speed of their ponies. A small party, evidently of scouts, were coming down the slope of a divide at one side, in the direction of the mirror-flash that had first attracted his attention. But the worst danger of all lay in two fierce-looking warriors who had advanced upon the boys so silently and rapidly that they were already within bow-shot.
Fortunately, Glen was close beside his companion. With a quick movement he grasped Binney by the collar and jerked him to one side, so that he very nearly fell off his mule. At the same instant the two arrows, that he had seen fitted to their bowstrings, whizzed harmlessly over the boys' heads. As Nettle and the mule sprang away up the slope, several rifle-balls, from the little party of Indians on the right, whistled past them; while from behind them rose a howl of mingled rage and disappointment. The first two Indians had used the noiseless arrows, in the hope of killing the boys without betraying their presence to the rest of the party, as the moment for the grand charge, that they hoped would be such a complete and overwhelming surprise, had not yet arrived. Now that they had failed in this, there was no longer any need for caution, and they fired shot after shot from their rifles after the fugitives.
Glen had seen the Cheyennes dodge from side to side, as they rode away from the stage-ranch three days before, to disconcert the aim of its defenders; and now he and Binney employed the same device.
Nettle was so much fleeter than the mule that Glen could have gained the top of the slope in advance of his companion if he had so chosen; but he rather chose to be a little behind him at this point. So, instead of urging the mare to do her best, he faced about in his saddle and returned the rifle-shots of the two Indians who were nearest, until his magazine was emptied. It is not likely that any of his shots took effect; but they certainly weakened the ardor of the pursuit, and gave Binney Gibbs a chance to cross the ridge in safety, which he probably could not have done had not Glen held those Indians in momentary check.
With his last shot expended, and no chance to reload, it was evidently high time for Glen to test the speed of his mare to its utmost. His life depended wholly on her now, and he knew it. There would be no taking of prisoners this time. Even at this critical moment he reflected grimly, and with a certain satisfaction, upon the difficulty the Indians would find in getting a scalp off of his shaven head.
All this riding and shooting and thinking had been done so rapidly that it was not two minutes from the time of that first tell-tale mirror-flash before Nettle had borne her rider to the top of the ridge, and he could see the wagon-train, not a quarter of a mile from him.
Binney Gibbs was already half-way to it; and, as Glen caught sight of him, he was amazed at a most extraordinary performance. Binney suddenly flew from his saddle, not over his mule's head, as though the animal had flung him, but sideways, as though he had jumped. Whether he left the saddle of his own accord or was flung from it the effect was the same; and the next instant he was sprawling at full length on the soft grass, while the mule, relieved of his weight, was making better time than ever towards the wagons.
Glen had left the trail, thinking to cut off a little distance by so doing; and, a few moments after Binney's leap into the air, he performed almost the same act. On his part it was entirely involuntary, and was caused by one of Nettle's fore-feet sinking into a gopher burrow that was invisible and not to be avoided.
As horse and boy rolled over together, a cry of dismay came from one side, and a wild yell of exultation from the other.
Chapter XXIII.
FIGHTING THE FINEST HORSEMEN IN THE WORLD.
It did not take many seconds for both Glen and Nettle to scramble to their feet after the tremendous header caused by the gopher-hole. Badly shaken though he was, the boy managed to regain his saddle more quickly than he had ever done before. But seconds are seconds; and, in so close a race for the most valuable of all earthly prizes, each one might be worth a minute, an hour, or even a lifetime. Glen had not more than regained his seat, before the foremost of his pursuers, who had far outstripped the other, was upon him. With an empty rifle, Glen had not the faintest hope of escape this time, though Nettle sprang bravely forward. He involuntarily cringed from the expected blow, for he had caught a fleeting glimpse of an uplifted tomahawk; but it did not come. Instead of it, he heard a crash, and turned in time to see the Indian pony and its rider pitch headlong, as he and Nettle had done a minute before. They were almost beside him; and, as he dashed away, he was conscious of wondering if they too had fallen victims to an unseen gopher-hole.
He had not noticed the figure running to meet him, nor heard one of the shots it was firing so wildly as it ran. If he had he might have realized that his salvation had not depended on a gopher-hole, but on one of those random shots from Binney Gibbs's rifle. By the merest chance, for it was fired without aim and almost without direction, it had pierced the brain of the Indian pony, and decided that race in favor of Glen.
When, to Glen's great surprise, the two boys met, he sprang from Nettle's back and insisted that Binney should take his place, which the other resolutely refused to do. So Glen simply tossed the bridle rein into Binney's hand, and started off on a full run. In a moment Nettle, with Binney on her back, had overtaken him, and the generous dispute might have been resumed had not a party of mounted men from the wagon-train just then dashed up and surrounded the boys. They were headed by "Billy" Brackett, who cried out,
"Well, you're a pretty pair of babes in the woods, aren't you? And you've been having lots of fun at the expense of our anxiety! But jump up behind me, Glen, quick, for I believe every wild Injun of the Plains is coming down that hill after us at this moment."
Just before the first shots were heard, some anxiety had been felt in the train concerning the boys who had lagged behind, and "Billy" Brackett had already asked if he had not better look them up. Then, as the sound of firing came over the ridge, and the boys were known to have got into some sort of trouble, he rode back at full speed, followed by a dozen of the men. All were equally ready to go, but the rest were ordered to remain behind for the protection of the train. Then the wagons were quickly drawn up in double line, and the spare stock was driven in between them.
These arrangements were hardly completed before "Billy" Brackett and his party, with the two rescued boys, came flying back, pursued by the entire body of Indians. As the former gained the wagons they faced about, and, with a rattling volley, checked for an instant the further advance of the dusky pony riders.
But those Cheyennes and Arrapahoes and Kiowas and Comanches were not going to let so rich a prize as this wagon-train and all those scalps escape them without at least making a bold try for it. If they could only force the train to go into corral, while it was a mile away from the nearest stream, they would have taken a long step towards its capture.
So they divided into two bands; and, circling around, came swooping down on the train from both sides at once. The Plains Indians are the finest horsemen in the world, and their everyday feats of daring in the saddle would render the performance of the best circus-riders tame by comparison. Now, as the two parties swept obliquely on towards the motionless wagons, with well-ordered ranks, tossing arms, waving plumes and fringes, gaudy with vivid colors, yelling like demons, and sitting their steeds like centaurs, they presented a picture of savage warfare at once brilliant and terrible.
At the flash of the white men's rifles every Indian disappeared as though shot, and the next moment their answering shower of bullets and arrows came from under their horses' necks. The headlong speed was not checked for an instant; but after delivering their volley they circled off beyond rifle-shot for a breathing-spell.
As they did so, the wagon-train moved ahead. A few mules had been killed and more wounded by the Indian volley; but their places were quickly filled from the spare stock. By the time the Indians were ready for their second charge, the train was several hundred yards nearer the coveted water than before.
Again they halted. Again the young engineers, inwardly trembling with excitement, but outwardly as firm as rocks, took their places under and behind the wagons, with their shining rifle-barrels steadily pointed outward. Some of them had been soldiers, while others had encountered Indians before; but to most of them this was the first battle of any kind they had ever seen. But they all knew what their fate would be if overpowered, and they had no idea of letting these Indians get any nearer than within good rifle-shot.
"If you can't see an Indian, aim at the horses!" shouted General Lyle, from his position on horseback midway between the two lines of wagons. "Don't a man of you fire until I give the word, and then give them as many shots as possible while they are within range."
The chief had not the remotest thought of allowing his train to be captured, nor yet of being compelled to corral it before he was ready to do so.
The second charge of the Indians was even bolder than the first, and they were allowed to come much nearer before the order to fire was given. The same manoeuvres were repeated as before. One white man, a member of Mr. Hobart's division, was killed outright, and two others were wounded. More mules were killed than before, and more were injured; but still the train moved ahead, and this time its defenders could see the sparkle of water in the river they longed so ardently to reach. How thirsty they were getting, and what dry work fighting was! The wagon mules sniffed the water eagerly, and could hardly be restrained from rushing towards it.
But another charge must be repelled first. This time it was so fierce that the Indians rode straight on in the face of the first and second volleys from the engineers' rifles. When the third, delivered at less than two rods' distance, finally shattered their ranks, and sent them flying across the level bottom-land, they left a dozen wagon mules transfixed with their lances.
The Indians left many a pony behind them when they retreated from that charge; but in every case their riders, killed, wounded, or unhurt, were borne off by the others, so that no estimate of their loss could be formed.
Before another charge could be made, the wagons had been rushed forward, with their mules on a full gallop, to a point so close to the river-bank that there was no longer any danger of being cut off from it. Here they were corralled, and chained together in such a manner as to present an almost impregnable front to the Indians. At least it was one that those who viewed it, with feelings of bitter disappointment, from a safe distance, did not care to attack. After they had noted the disposition of the train, and satisfied themselves that it was established in that place for the night, they disappeared so completely that no trace of them was to be seen, and the explorers were left to take an account of the losses they had sustained in this brief but fierce encounter.
Only one man killed! What a comfort it was that no more had shared his fate, and yet how sad that even this one should be taken from their number! Glen had known him well; for he was one of those merry young Kansas City surveyors, one of the "bald heads," as they were known in the party. An hour before he had been one of the jolliest among them. He was one of those who had gone out so cheerfully with "Billy" Brackett to the rescue of the boys. He had been instantly killed while bravely doing his duty, and had suffered no pain. They had that consolation as they talked of him in low, awed tones. His body could not be sent home. It could not be carried with them. So they buried him in a grave dug just inside the line of wagons.
The last level beams of the setting sun streamed full on the spot as the chief-engineer read the solemn burial service, and each member of the expedition, stepping forward with uncovered head, dropped a handful of earth into the open grave. Then it was filled, and its mound was beaten to the level of the surrounding surface. After that, mules and horses were led back and forth over it, until there was no longer any chance of its recognition, or disturbance by Indians or prowling beasts.
None of the wounded suffered from severe injuries; and, though the bodies of the wagons were splintered in many places, and their canvas covers gaped with rents, no damage had been sustained that could not be repaired.
Chapter XXIV.
CROSSING THE QUICKSANDS.
As soon as Glen found a chance to talk to Binney Gibbs he asked him how his mule happened to throw him in such a peculiar fashion.
"He didn't throw me," answered Binney, with a look of surprise; "I jumped off."
"What on earth did you do that for?"
"Because he was running away, and I couldn't stop him. I saw that your pony couldn't keep up with him, and, of course, I wasn't going to leave you behind to fight all those Indians alone. So I got off the only way I could think of, and started back to help you. It was mighty lucky I did, too. Don't you think so?"
"Indeed I do!" answered Glen, heartily, though at the same time he could not help smiling at the idea of Nettle not being able to keep up with Binney's mule. He would not for the world, though, have belittled the other's brave act by saying that he had purposely remained behind to cover his companion's flight. He only said, "Indeed I do, and it was one of the finest things I ever heard of, Binney. I shall always remember it, and always be grateful for it. You made a splendid shot, too, and I owe my life to it; for that Indian was just lifting his hatchet over my head when you rolled him over. I tell you it was a mighty plucky thing for anybody to do, especially--" Glen was about to say, "especially for a fellow who has never been considered very brave;" but he checked himself in time, and substituted, "for a fellow who never had any experience with Indians before."
Binney knew well enough, though, that the Brimfield boys had always thought him a coward; for they had never hesitated to tell him so. Now, to be praised for bravery, and that by the bravest boy he had ever known, was a new and very pleasant sensation. It was even better than to be called generous, and he mentally vowed, then and there, never again to forfeit this newly gained reputation.
There is nothing that will so stimulate a boy or girl to renewed efforts as a certain amount of praise where it is really deserved. Too much praise is flattery; and praise that is not deserved is as bad as unjust censure.
While the boys were thus talking they received word that General Lyle wished to see them. They found him sitting, with Mr. Hobart, in an ambulance; for it had been ordered that no tents should be pitched in that camp. When they stood before the chief-engineer he said, kindly:
"Boys, I want both to reprimand and thank you. I am surprised that you should have so disobeyed my positive orders as to lose sight of the train when on a march through an Indian country. This applies to you, Matherson, more than to your companion; for your late experience should have taught you better. I trust that my speaking to you now will prevent any repetition of such disobedience. Your carelessness of this afternoon might have cost many precious lives, including your own. That is all of the reprimand. The thanks I wish to express are for your timely warning of the presence of Indians, and for the individual bravery displayed by both of you during our encounter with them. That is all I have to say this time, and I hope next time the reprimand may be omitted."
As the two boys, feeling both ashamed and pleased, bowed and took their departure, the chief, turning to his companion, said: "They are fine young fellows, Hobart, and I congratulate you on having them in your division. Now let us decide on our plans for to-night."
This last remark referred to the decision General Lyle had formed of placing the river between his party and the Indians before daylight. He knew that the Indians of the Plains, like all others of their race, are extremely averse to undertaking anything of importance in the dark. He also knew that their favorite time for making an attack is when they can catch their enemy at a disadvantage, as would be the case while his wagons were crossing the river and his men and animals were struggling with its probable quicksands. Another serious consideration was that, during the summer season, all the rivers of the Plains are liable to sudden and tremendous freshets, that often render them impassable for days. Thus it was unwise to linger on the near bank of one that was fordable a moment longer than necessary. He had, therefore, decided to make the crossing of this stream that night, as quietly as possible, and as soon as darkness had set in. For this reason none of the baggage, except the mess-chests and a sack of corn, had been taken from the wagons, so that a start could be made at a few minutes' notice.
With the last of the lingering daylight the chief, accompanied by Mr. Hobart and the wagon-master, crossed the river on horseback, to discover its depth, the character of its bottom, the nature of the opposite bank, and to locate a camping-ground on its farther side. They found the water to be but a few inches deep, except in one narrow channel, where it had a depth of about three feet. They also found the bottom to be of that most treacherous of quicksands which is so hard that a thousand-pound hammer cannot force a post into it, yet into which that same post would slowly sink of its own weight until lost to sight, and held with such terrible tenacity that nothing short of a steam-engine could pull it out. Such a quicksand as this is not dangerous to the man or animal who keeps his feet in constant motion while crossing it, but woe to him if he neglects this precaution for a single minute. In that case, unless help reaches him, he is as surely lost as though clasped in the relentless embrace of a tiger.
The only place on the opposite bank where teams could emerge from the water was very narrow, and a team striking below it in the dark would almost certainly be lost. Thus the problem of a safe crossing at night became a difficult one. It would be unsafe to build fires or use lanterns, as these would surely draw the attention, and probably the bullets, of the Indians.
Finally the plan was adopted of stretching a rope across the river, from bank to bank, on the lower side of the ford, with a line of men stationed along its entire length, so that no team could get below it. These were charged, as they valued their lives, to keep their feet in constant motion, and on no account to let go of the rope.
First the ambulances were put across. Then the spare stock and saddle-animals were led over, and securely fastened. Six spare mules, harnessed and attached to a loose rope, were held in readiness, on the farther bank, to assist any team that might get stalled in the river. Then, one by one, the heavily laden wagons began to cross, with two men leading each team. There was little difficulty except at the channel, where the mules were apt to be frightened at the sudden plunge into deeper water.
A mule hates the dark almost as much as an Indian; he dislikes to work in water, and above all he dreads miry places or quicksands, for which his small, sharp hoofs are peculiarly unfitted. He is easily panic-stricken, and is then wholly unmanageable. A team of mules, finding themselves stalled in a stream, will become frantic with terror. They utter agonized cries, attempt to clamber on one another's back, and frequently drown themselves before they can be cut loose from the traces and allowed to escape.
In spite of all the difficulties to be overcome, the wagons were got safely over, until only one remained, and it had started on its perilous journey. Those members of the party who stood in the water holding the rope were becoming thoroughly chilled, as well as wearied by the treadmill exercise necessary to keep their feet from sinking in the quicksand. Thus, though they still stuck manfully to their posts, they were thankful enough that this was the last wagon, and noted the sound of its progress with eager interest. They were all volunteers, for nobody had been ordered to remain in the river, and this fact added to the strength of purpose with which they maintained their uncomfortable positions.
Among them were Glen Eddy and Binney Gibbs, who, when volunteers were called for to perform this duty, had rushed into the river among the first. Now they stood, side by side, near the middle of the stream, and close to the edge of the channel. They rejoiced to see the dim bulk of the last wagon looming out of the darkness, and to know that their weary task was nearly ended.
The mules of this team were unusually nervous, splashing more than any of the others had done, and snorting loudly. The rope had been cast loose from the bank the party had so recently quitted, and all those who had upheld it beyond Glen and Binney had passed by them on their way to the other side. They, too, would be relieved from duty as soon as the team crossed the channel.
But there seemed to be some difficulty about persuading the mules to cross it. As the leaders felt the water growing deeper and the sandy bank giving way beneath them, they sprang back in terror, and threw the whole team into confusion. The wagon came to a standstill, and everybody in the vicinity realized its danger. The driver, feeling that the need for silence and caution was past, began to shout at his mules, and the reports of his blacksnake whip rang out like pistol-shots.
In the excitement of the moment nobody noticed or paid any attention to a gleaming line of white froth that came creeping down the river, stretching from bank to bank like a newly formed snow-drift. Suddenly a rifle-shot rang out from the bank they had left, then another, and then a dozen at once. The Indians had discovered their flight, and were firing angrily in the direction of the sounds in the river. The teamster sprang from his saddle, and, cutting the traces of his mules, started them towards the shore, leaving the wagon to its fate.
"It's time we were off, too, old man," said Glen, as he started to follow the team.
"I can't move, Glen! Oh, help me! I'm sinking!" screamed Binney, in a tone of inexpressible anguish.
Glen dropped the rope, and sprang to his companion's assistance.
At the same instant there came a great shout from the bank, "Hurry up, there's a freshet coming! Hurry! Hurry, or you'll be swept away!"
With both arms about Binney, Glen was straining every nerve of his muscular young body to tear his friend loose from the grasp of the terror that held him. He could not; but a wall of black water four feet high, that came rushing down on them with an angry roar, was mightier even than the quicksand, and, seizing both the boys in its irresistible embrace, it wrenched them loose and overwhelmed them.
Chapter XXV.
SWEPT AWAY BY A FRESHET.
The rush of waters that wrenched Binney Gibbs loose from the grasp of the quicksand which had seized him as he remained motionless for a minute, forgetful of his own danger in the excitement caused by that of the team, also flung the rope they had been holding against Glen Eddy. He held to it desperately with one hand, while, with the other arm about his companion, he prevented him from being swept away. As the mad waters dashed the boys from their feet and closed over them, it seemed as though Glen's arms must be torn from their sockets, and he would have had to let go had not Binney also succeeded in grasping the rope so that the great strain was somewhat relieved. Gasping for breath, they both rose to the surface.
A huge white object was bearing directly down on them. They could not avoid it. Glen was the first to recognize its nature. "It's the wagon!" he shouted. "Grab hold of it, and hang on for your life!"
Then it struck them and tore loose their hold of the rope. They both managed to clutch it, though Binney's slight strength was so nearly exhausted that, but for Glen, he must speedily have let go and sunk again beneath the foam-flecked waters. Now the other's sturdy frame and athletic training came splendidly to his aid. Obtaining a firm foothold in the flooded wagon, he pulled Binney up to him by the sheer strength of his muscular young arms. For a moment they stood together panting for breath, and the weaker boy clinging to the stronger.
But the water was still rising; and, as the heavily laden wagon could not float, it seemed likely to be totally submerged. "It's no use, Glen. We'll be drowned, anyhow," said Binney, despairingly.
"Oh, no, we won't. Not just yet, anyway," answered the other, trying to sustain his companion's spirits by speaking hopefully. "We can get out of the water entirely, by climbing up on top of the cover, and I guess it will bear us."
It was a suggestion worth trying; and, though the undertaking was perilous and difficult in the extreme, under the circumstances, they finally succeeded in accomplishing it, and found themselves perched on the slippery, sagging surface of the canvas cover, that, supported by stout ash bows, was stretched above the wagon.
All this time their strange craft, though not floating, was borne slowly but steadily down stream by the force of the current. Every now and then it seemed as though about to capsize; and, had it been empty, it must certainly have done so; but its heavy load, acting like ballast in a boat, kept it upright. It headed in all directions, and at times, when its wheels could revolve on the bottom of the river, it moved steadily and rapidly. It was when it got turned broadside to the current that the two shivering figures, clutching at their uncertain support, became most apprehensive, and expected it to be overturned by the great pressure brought to bear against it.
[Illustration: "THE STRANGE CRAFT WAS BORNE SLOWLY DOWN STREAM."]
How slowly the minutes and hours dragged by! It was about midnight when the freshet struck them and they started on this most extraordinary voyage; but from that time until they saw the first streaks of rosy light in the east seemed an eternity.
More than once during the night the wagon brought up against some obstruction, and remained motionless for longer or shorter intervals of time; but it had always been forced ahead again, and made to resume its uncertain wanderings.
Now, as the welcome daylight crept slowly over the scene, it found the strange ark, with its two occupants, again stranded, and this time immovably so. At length Glen exclaimed, joyfully: "There's the western bank, the very one we want to reach, close to us. I believe we can swim to it, as easy as not."
"But I can't swim, you know," replied Binney, dolefully.
"That's so; I forgot," said Glen, in a dismayed tone. "But look," he added, and again there was a hopeful ring to his voice, "there are the tops of some bushes between us and it. The water can't be very deep there. Perhaps we can touch bottom, and you can wade if you can't swim. I'm going over there and take soundings."
Binney dreaded being left alone, and was about to beg his companion not to desert him, but the words were checked on his lips by the thought of the reputation he had to sustain. So, as Glen pulled off his wet clothing, he said, "All right, only be very careful and don't go too far, for I think I would rather drown with you than be left here all alone."
"Never fear!" cried Glen; "swimming is about the one thing I can do. So, here goes!"
He had climbed down, and stood on the edge of the submerged wagon body as he spoke. Now he sprang far out in the yellow waters, and the next moment was making his way easily through them towards the bushes. The swift current carried him down-stream; but at length he caught one of them, and, letting his feet sink, touched bottom in water up to his neck.
"It's all right!" he shouted back to Binney. Pulling himself along from one bit of willow to another, he waded towards the bank until the water was not more than up to his waist. Then he made his way up-stream until he was some distance above the place where the wagon was stranded, and, two minutes later, he had waded and swum back to it.
Binney had watched every movement anxiously, and now he said, "That's all well enough for you; but I don't see how I am going to get there."
"By resting your hands on my shoulders and letting me swim with you till you can touch bottom, of course," answered Glen.
He could not realize Binney's dread of the water, nor what a struggle against his natural timidity took place in the boy's mind before he answered, "Very well, if you say so, Glen, I'll trust you."
While he was laying aside his water-soaked clothing and preparing for the dreaded undertaking, Glen suddenly uttered an exclamation of dismay. He had spied several horsemen riding along the river-bank towards them. Were they white men or Indians? Did their coming mean life or death?
"I'm afraid they are Indians," said Glen; "for our camp must be ten miles off."
Binney agreed with him that they must have come at least that distance during the night, and the boys watched the oncoming horsemen with heavy hearts.
"I'd rather drown than let them get me again," said Glen.
But Binney had not had the other's experience with Indians, and to him nothing could be more terrible than water.
Long and earnestly they watched, filled with alternate hopes and fears. The riders seemed to move very slowly. All at once, Glen uttered a shout of joy. "They are white men!" he cried. "I can see their hats;" and, seizing his wet shirt, he began to wave it frantically above his head.
That his signal was seen was announced by a distant cheer, and several shots fired in quick succession. A few minutes later, six white men reined in their horses on the bank, just abreast the wagon. They were hardly able to credit their eyes as they recognized, in the two naked figures clinging to it, those whom they had been so certain were long ago drowned, and for whose bodies they were searching. As they hurriedly consulted concerning how best to effect a rescue, they were amazed to see both boys clamber down from their perch, and drop into the turbid waters, one after the other. When they realized that Glen and Binney were swimming, and trying in this way to reach the shore, they forced their horses down the steep bank and dashed into the shallow overflow of the bottom-land to meet them.
At that moment Binney Gibbs, by trusting himself so implicitly to Glen's strength and skill, in an element where he was so utterly helpless, was displaying a greater courage than where, acting under impulse, he sprang from his mule the day before, and ran back to fight Indians. The bravest deeds are always those that are performed deliberately and after a careful consideration of their possible consequences.
As "Billy" Brackett, who was the first to reach the boys, relieved Glen of his burden, he exclaimed,
"Well, if I had the luck of you fellows I'd change my name to Vanderbilt and run for Congress! We were sure you were gone up this time, and the best I hoped for was to find your bodies. Instead of that, here you are, hardly out of sight of camp, perched on the top of a wagon, as chipper as a couple of sparrows after a rainstorm."
"Where is camp?" inquired Glen, who was now wading easily along beside the other's horse.
"Just around that farther bend, up there."
"What made it come so far down the river, and off the road?"
"It hasn't. It's right at the ford, where we crossed last night."
"But I thought that was at least ten miles from here."
"Ten miles! Why, my son, you must have imagined you were travelling on a four-wheeled steamboat all night, instead of an old water-logged prairie schooner. We are not, at this minute, quite a mile from the place where you started on your cruise."
It was hard for the boys to realize the truth of this statement; but so it was; and, during those tedious hours of darkness they had only travelled rods instead of miles, as they had fancied.
After the short delay necessary to recover the boys' clothing from the wagon, they were triumphantly borne back to camp by the rescuing-party. There the enthusiasm with which they were received was only equalled by the amazement of those who crowded about them and listened to the account of their adventure.
By means of a double team of mules, and some stout ropes, even the wagon on which they had made their curious voyage was recovered, and found to be still serviceable, though the greater part of its load was ruined.
The river was still an impassable stream, as wide as the Mississippi at St. Louis, and was many feet deep over the place, on its farther side, where they had camped at sunset. Thus there was no danger of another attack from Indians. Two hours after sunrise the explorers were again wending their way westward, rejoicing over their double escape, and over the recovery of the two members who had been given up as lost.
Chapter XXVI.
RUNNING THE LINE.
After this day and night, crowded so full of incident, four days of steady travel brought General Lyle's expedition to a point close to the boundary-line between Kansas and Colorado, where their surveys were to begin. The last hundred miles of their journey had been through a region studded with curious masses of sandstone. These were scattered far and wide over the Plains, and rose to a height of from one hundred to three hundred feet, resembling towers, monuments, castles, and ruins of every description. It was hard to believe that many of them were not the work of human hands; and to Glen and Binney they formed an inexhaustible subject for wonder and speculation.
They were now more than three thousand feet above the sea-level; the soil became poorer with every mile; there were fewer streams, and along those that did exist timber was almost unknown.
The first line of survey was to be a hard one; for it was to run through the very worst of this country--from the Smoky Hill to the Arkansas, a region hitherto unexplored, and known only to the few buffalo hunters who had crossed it at long intervals. The distance was supposed to be about seventy miles, and there was said to be no water along the entire route. But both a transit and a level line must be run over this barren region, and the distance must be carefully measured. A good day's work for a surveying-party, engaged in running a first, or preliminary, line in an open country, is eight or ten miles; and, at this rate, the distance between the Smoky Hill and the Arkansas rivers could be covered in a week. But a week without water was out of the question, and General Lyle determined to do it in three days.
On the night before beginning this remarkable survey, every canteen and bottle that could be found was filled with water, as were several casks. Everybody drank as much as he could in the morning, and all the animals were watered the very last thing. Everything was packed and ready for a start by daylight, and long before sunrise the working-party was in the field. The first division was to run the first two miles. Its transit was set up over the last stake of the old survey that had been ended at that point, and the telescope was pointed in the direction of the course now to be taken. The division engineer, with his front flagman, had already galloped half a mile away across the plain. There they halted, and the gayly painted staff, with its fluttering red pennon, was held upright. Then it was moved to the right or left, as the transit-man, peering through his telescope, waved his right or left arm. Finally, he waved both at a time, and the front flag was thrust into the ground. It was on line.
Now the head chainman starts off on a run, with his eyes fixed on the distant flag, and dragging a hundred feet of glistening steel-links behind him. "Stick!" shouts the rear chainman, who stands beside the transit, as he grasps the end of the chain and pulls it taut. "Stuck!" answers the man in front, thrusting one of the steel pins that he carries in his hand into the ground. Then he runs on, and the rear chainman runs after him, but just a hundred feet behind.
Two axemen, one with a bundle of marked stakes in his arms, and the other carrying an axe with which to drive them, follow the chain closely. At the end of each five hundred feet they drive a stake. If stakes were not so scarce in this country, they would set one at the end of every hundred feet. It does not make much difference; for these stakes will not remain standing very long anyhow. The buffalo will soon pull them up, by rubbing and scratching their heads against them. At the end of every half-mile, a mound of earth--or stones, if they can be found--is thrown up; and these the Indians will level whenever they come across them. Perhaps some of them will be left, though.
While the chainmen are measuring the distance to that front flag, and the axemen are driving stakes and throwing up mounds, the transit-man, mounted on a steady-going mule, with the transit on his shoulder, is galloping ahead to where the front flag awaits him. Only the back flagman is left standing at the place from which the first sight was taken.
The front flagman thrust a small stake in the ground, drove a tack in its centre, and held his flag on it before he waved the transit-man up. Now the transit is set over this stake so that the centre of the instrument is directly over the tack; and while it is being made ready the front flag is again galloping away over the rolling prairie, far in advance of the rest of the party.
The transit-man first looks through his telescope at the back flag, now far behind him, and waves to him to come on. Then the telescope is reversed, and he is ready to wave the front flag into line as soon as he stops.
The leveller, with two rodmen, all well mounted, follow behind the transit-party, noting, by means of their instruments, the elevation above sea-level of every stake that is driven.
So the work goes on with marvellous rapidity--every man and horse and mule on a run until two miles have been chained and it is time for the breathless first division to have a rest.
Mr. Hobart has watched their work carefully. He has also made some changes in his force, and is going to see what sort of a front flagman Glen Eddy will make. This is because Nettle has proved herself the fleetest pony in the whole outfit.
"Two miles in fifty-two minutes!" shouts Mr. Hobart to his men, as the stake that marks the end of ten thousand five hundred and sixty feet is driven. "Boys, we must do better than that."
"Ay, ay, sir! We will!" shout the "bald heads," as they spring to the places the first-division men are just leaving.
Mr. Hobart, Glen, and a mounted axeman are already galloping to the front. They dash across a shallow valley, lying between two great swells of the prairie, and mount the gentle slope on its farther side, a mile away. It is a long transit sight; but "Billy" Brackett can take it.
The boy who rides beside the division engineer is very proud of his new position, and sits his spirited mare like a young lancer. The slender, steel-shod, red-and-white staff of his flag-pole, bearing its gay pennon, that Glen has cut a little longer than the others, and nicked with a swallow-tail, looks not unlike a lance. As the cool morning air whistles past him, the boy's blood tingles, his eyes sparkle, and he wonders if there can be any more fascinating business in the world than surveying and learning to become an engineer. He thinks of the mill and the store with scorn. It beats them away out of sight, anyhow.
As they reach the crest of the divide, from which they can see far away on all sides, Mr. Hobart, using his field-glass to watch the movements of "Billy" Brackett's arms, directs Glen where to place his flag. "Right--more--more--away over to the right--there--steady! Left, a little--steady--so! Drive a stake there! Now hold your flag on it! A trifle to the right--that's good! Drive the tack! Move him up--all right, he's coming!" Then, leaving the axeman to point out the stake, just driven, to the transit-man, the engineer and his young flagman again dash forward.
"Two miles in thirty-eight minutes! That is quick work! I congratulate you and your division, Mr. Hobart." So said the chief-engineer as the men of the second division, dripping with perspiration, completed their first run, and, turning the work over to those of the third, took their vacant places in the wagon that followed the line.
The morning sun was already glowing with heat, and by noon its perpendicular rays were scorching the arid plain with relentless fury. Men and animals alike drooped beneath it, but there was no pause in the work. It must be rushed through in spite of everything. About noon they passed a large buffalo wallow, half filled with stagnant water, that the animals drank eagerly.
That evening, when it was too dark to distinguish the cross-hairs in the instruments, the weary engineers knocked off work, with a twenty-one-mile survey to their credit. They were too tired to pitch tents that night, but spread their blankets anywhere, and fell asleep almost as soon as they had eaten supper. There was no water, no wood, and only a scanty supply of sun-dried grass. It was a dry camp.
The next day was a repetition of the first. The tired animals, suffering from both hunger and thirst, dragged the heavy wagons wearily over the long undulations of the sun-baked plain. Occasionally they crossed dry water-courses; but at sunset they had not found a drop of the precious fluid, and another dry camp was promised for that night.
As the men of the second division drove the last stake of another twenty-one-mile run, and, leaving the line, moved slowly in the direction of camp, the mule ridden by Binney Gibbs suddenly threw up its head, sniffed the air, and, without regard to his rider's efforts to control him, started off on a run.
"Stop us! We are running away!" shouted Binney; and, without hesitation, Glen gave spurs to Nettle and dashed away in pursuit.
"What scrape are those young scatter-brains going to get into now?" growled Mr. Hobart.
"I don't know," answered "Billy" Brackett; "but whatever it is they will come out of it all right, covered with mud and glory. I suppose I might as well begin to organize the rescuing-party, though."
Chapter XXVII.
"COVERED WITH MUD AND GLORY."
As "Billy" Brackett predicted they would, the two boys did return to camp in about fifteen minutes, covered with mud and glory. At least Binney Gibbs was covered with mud, and they brought the glorious news that there were several large though shallow pools of water not more than half a mile away. Binney's mule having scented it, there was no stopping him until he had rushed to it, and, as usual, flung his rider over his head into the very middle of one of the shallow ponds. Glen had reached the place just in time to witness this catastrophe, and to roar with laughter at the comical sight presented by his companion, as the latter waded ruefully from the pond, dripping mud and water from every point.
"You take to water as naturally as a young duck, Binney!" he shouted, as soon as his laughter gave him a chance for words.
"No, indeed, I don't," sputtered poor Binney. "But somehow water always seems to take to me, and I can get nearly drowned when nobody else can find a drop to drink. As for that mule, I believe he thinks I wouldn't know how to get off his back if he didn't pitch me off."
In less than a minute after the boys got back with their report of water, half the men in camp were hastening towards it, and the entire herd of animals, in charge of a couple of teamsters, was galloping madly in the same direction. The ponds were the result of a heavy local rain of the night before; and, within a couple of days, would disappear in the sandy soil as completely as though they had never existed; but they served an admirable purpose, and the whole party was grateful to Binney Gibbs's mule for discovering them.
So refreshed were the men by their unexpected bath, and so strengthened were the animals by having plenty of water with both their evening and morning meals, that the survey of the following day covered twenty-four miles. It was the biggest day's work of transit and level on record, and could only have been accomplished under extraordinary circumstances.
This was the hardest day of the three to bear. The heat of the sun, shining from an unclouded sky, was intolerable. As far as the eye could reach there was no shadow, nor any object to break the terrible monotony of its glare. A hot wind from the south whirled the light soil aloft in suffocating clouds of dust. The men of the three divisions were becoming desperate. They knew that this killing pace could not be maintained much longer, and the twenty-four mile run was the result of a tremendous effort to reach the Arkansas River that day.
From each eminence, as they crossed it, telescope, field-glasses, and straining eyes swept the sky-line in the hope of sighting the longed-for river. Late in the afternoon some far away trees and a ribbon of light were lifted to view against the horizon by the shimmering heat waves; but this was at once pronounced to be only the tantalizing vision of the mirage.
So, in a dry camp, the exhausted men and thirsty animals passed the night. The latter, refusing to touch the parched grass or even their rations of corn, made the hours hideous with their cries, and spent their time in vain efforts to break their fastenings that they might escape and seek to quench their burning thirst.
But even this night came to an end; and, with the first eastern streaks of pink and gold so exquisitely beautiful through the rarefied atmosphere of this region, the surveyors were once more in the field. There was no merriment now, nor life in the work. It went on amid a dogged silence. The transit and level were lifted slowly, as though they were made of lead. The chain was dragged wearily along at a walk. It was evident that the limit of endurance was nearly reached. Scouts were sent out on both sides to search for water. There was no use sending anybody ahead to hunt up that mirage, or at least so thought General Lyle. His maps showed the river to be miles away; but they also showed a large creek, not far to the westward; and towards this the hopes of the party were turned. On the maps it was called "Sand Creek," a name made infamous forever by a massacre of Indians, mostly women and children, that took place on its banks in November, 1864. Then it had contained water; but now it was true to its name, and the dispirited scouts, returning from it, reported that its bed was but a level expanse of dry, glistening sand.
As this report was being made, there came a quick succession of shots from the front, and a thrill of new life instantly pervaded the whole party. What could they indicate, if not good news of some kind. The first division had completed its two miles, and the second was running the line. "Billy" Brackett was preparing for one of his famous mile sights at the front flag, with which Glen Eddy, riding beside Mr. Hobart, was wearily toiling up a distant slope. Gazing at them through his fine telescope, the transit-man could not at first understand their extraordinary actions as they reached the top. He saw Glen fling up his hat, and Mr. Hobart fire his pistol into the air. Then Glen waved his flag, while the division engineer seemed to be pointing to something in front of them.
"Well, quit your fooling and give me a sight, can't you?" growled "Billy" Brackett to himself, but directly afterwards he shouted to those near him, "I believe they've found water, and shouldn't wonder if they'd located the Arkansas itself." Then he got his "sight," waved "all right," mounted his mule, shouldered the transit, and galloped away.
He was right; they had located the Arkansas, and the alleged mirage of the evening before had been a reality after all. That night of suffering had been spent within five miles of one of the largest rivers that cross the Plains.
As Glen and Mr. Hobart reached the crest of that long slope they saw its grassy valley outspread before them. They saw the scattered timber lining its banks, and, best of all, they saw the broad, brown flood itself, rolling down to join the distant Mississippi. By shots and wavings they tried to communicate the joyful intelligence to those who toiled so wearily behind them, and "Billy" Brackett, watching them through his transit, had understood.
They waited on the ridge until he joined them, and then hastened away towards the tempting river. When the next foresight was taken Glen's flag was planted on the edge of that famous old wagon-road of the Arkansas Valley known to generations of Plainsmen as the Santa Fé Trail.
Glen had hardly waved his "all right" to the transit, before the wagons came tearing down the slope with their mules on the keen run. The perishing animals had seen the life-giving waters, and it was with the greatest difficulty that they were restrained from rushing into the river, wagons and all. The drivers only just succeeded in casting loose the trace-chains, when each team, with outstretched necks and husky brayings, plunged in a body over the bank and into the river, burying their heads up to their eyes in the cooling flood. It seemed as though they would drink themselves to death, and when they finally, consented to leave the river and turn their attention to the rich grasses of its bottom-lands, they were evidently water-logged. It would be hours before they were again fit for work.
But nobody wanted them to work. Not until the next morning would the wagons move again. The splendid runs of the last three days had earned a rest for men and animals alike. So it was granted them, and no schoolboys ever enjoyed a half-holiday more. What a luxury it was to have plenty of water again, not only to drink, but actually to wash with and bathe in! And to lie in the shade of a tree! Could anything be more delicious?
At sunrise the line was resumed; and, still working together, the three divisions ran it for fifty miles up the broad valley of the Arkansas.
A few days after striking the river they passed Bent's Fort, one of the most famous of the old Plains trading-posts built by individuals long before troops were sent out to occupy the land.
Its usefulness as a trading-station had nearly departed, for already the Indians were leaving that part of the country, and those who remained were kept too busy fighting to have any time for trading. Its stout log stockade was, however, valuable to its builder as a protection against attacks from Indians led by one of his own sons. Their mother was a Cheyenne squaw, and though they, together with their only sister, had been educated in St. Louis, the same as white children, they had preferred to follow the fortunes of their mother's people on returning to the Plains. Now the Cheyennes had no more daring leader than George Bent, nor was there a girl in the tribe so beautiful as his sister. The little fort, admirably located on a high bluff overlooking the river, was filled with a curious mixture of old Plainsmen, Indians, half-breed children, ponies, mules, burros, and pet fawns. It was a place of noise and confusion at once bewildering and interesting.
At the end of fifty miles from the point at which they entered the Arkansas Valley, the explorers caught their first glimpse of the Rocky Mountains, two white clouds that they knew to be the snow-capped summits of the Spanish Peaks, a hundred miles away.
Here the expedition was divided. The first and third divisions were to cross the river and proceed southwesterly, by way of the Raton Mountains and Fort Union, to Santa Fé; while Mr. Hobart was to take the second still farther up the Arkansas Valley, and almost due west to the famous Sangre de Cristo Pass through the mountains, just north of the Spanish Peaks. For two weeks longer they worked their way slowly but steadily across the burning Plains, towards the mountains that almost seemed to recede from them as they advanced; though each day disclosed new peaks, while those already familiar loomed up higher and grander with every mile. Finally they were so near at hand that the weary toilers, choked with the alkaline dust of the Plains, and scorched with their fervent heat, could feast their eyes on the green slopes, cool, dark valleys, and tumbling cascades, rushing down from glittering snow-fields. How they longed to be among them, and with what joy did they at length leave the treeless country of which they were so tired and enter the timbered foot-hills!
Now, how deliciously cool were the nights, and how they enjoyed the roaring camp-fires. What breathless plunges they took in ice-cold streams of crystal water. How good fresh venison tasted after weeks of salt bacon and dried buffalo meat, and how eagerly they ate raw onions, and even raw potatoes, obtained at the occasional Mexican ranches found nestled here and there in the lower valleys.
"I tell you," said Glen to Binney Gibbs, who had by this time become his firm friend, "it pays to go without fresh vegetables for a couple of months, just to find out what fine things onions and potatoes are."
Chapter XXVIII.
LOST IN A MOUNTAIN SNOW-STORM.
A week was spent on the eastern slope of the mountains, running lines through the Mosca and Cuchara passes. Finally, a camp was made in a forest of balsam-firs, beside a great spring of ice-water, that bubbled from a granite basin at the summit of the Sangre de Cristo, nine thousand feet above sea-level. To Glen and Binney, who had always dwelt in a flat country, and knew nothing of mountains, this was a new and delightful experience. They never tired of gazing off on the superb panorama outspread below them. To the east, the view was so vast and boundless that it seemed as though the distant blue of the horizon must be that of the ocean itself, and that they were spanning half the breadth of a continent in a single sight. At their feet lay the Plains they had just crossed, like a great green map on which dark lines of timber and gleams of light marked the Arkansas and its tributary streams, whose waters would mingle with those of the Mississippi.
On the other hand, they could see, across the broad basin of the San Luis Valley, other ranges of unknown mountains, whose mysteries they were yet to explore. Through this western valley, flowing southward, wound the shining ribbon of the Rio Grande. Both north and south of them were mountain-peaks. To climb to the very summit of one of these was Glen's present ambition, and his longing eyes were turned more often to the snow-capped dome that rose in solemn majesty on the south side of the pass than in any other direction. He even succeeded in persuading Binney Gibbs that to climb that mountain would be just a little better fun than anything else that could be suggested. Still, he did not see any prospect of their being allowed to make the attempt, and so tried not to think of it.
On the first evening, after camp had been pitched on the summit of the pass, he sat on a chunk of moss-covered granite, gazing meditatively into the glowing coals of a glorious fire. He imagined he had succeeded in banishing all thoughts of that desirable mountain-top from his mind, and yet, all of a sudden, he became aware that it was the very thing he was thinking of. He gave himself a petulant shake as he realized this, and was about to move away, when "Billy" Brackett, who sat on the end of a log near him, spoke up and said,
"Glen, how would you like to try a bit of mountain climbing with me to-morrow?"
"I'd like it better than anything I know of," answered the boy, eagerly.
"All right, it's a go, then; you see the chief is going off on an exploration with the topographer; and, as we can't run any lines till he comes back, he asked me if I'd take a couple of fellows and measure the height of that peak."
"Do you mean to chain from here away up there?" asked Glen, in astonishment, glancing dubiously up at the dim form towering above them.
"Chain! Not much, I don't!" laughed Brackett. "I mean carry up a barometer, and measure with it."
"How?" asked Glen, to whom this was a novel idea.
"Easy enough. We know that, roughly speaking, a barometer varies a little less than one tenth of an inch with every hundred feet of elevation. For instance, if it reads 21.22 where we now are, it will read 21.14 a hundred feet higher, or 20.40 at an elevation of a thousand feet above this. There are carefully prepared tables showing the exact figures."
"Can't you do it by boiling water, too?" asked Binney Gibbs, who had approached them unobserved, and was an interested listener of this explanation.
"Certainly you can," answered "Billy" Brackett, looking up with some surprise at the young scholar. "By boiling water we have a neat check on the barometer; for, on account of the rarefication of the air, water boils at one degree less of temperature for about every five hundred feet of elevation."
"Then what is the use of levelling?" asked Glen.
"Because these figures are only approximate, and cannot be relied upon for nice work. But where did you learn about such things, Grip?"
"At the Brimfield High School," answered Binney with some confusion; for he was not really so boastful of his scholarship as he had once been.
"Well, how would you like to join our climbing-party? I'm going to take Glen along for his muscle, and I'll take you for your brains if you want to go."
"I think I'd like to try it, though perhaps I won't be able to get to the very top," answered Binney.
The modesty that this boy had learned from his rough Plains experience would have surprised his Brimfield acquaintances could they have seen it.
"Very well, then, we will start at sunrise in the morning. We'll each carry a hatchet, a knife, matches in water-tight cases, and a good bit of lunch. I'll carry the barometer, Glen shall take charge of the thermometer, and 'Grip' shall bring along his brains. Now I'd advise you both to turn in, and lay up a supply of rest sufficient to carry you through a harder day's work than any we've done on this trip yet."
The sun was just lifting his red face above the distant rim of the Plains, and its scant beams were bathing the snow-capped peak in a wonderful rosy glow, as the three mountain climbers left camp the next morning. Each one bore the light weight allotted to him, and, in addition, Glen carried a raw-hide lariat hung over his shoulders.
Having noted the compass bearings of their general course, they plunged directly into the dense fir forest with which this flank of the mountain was covered to a height of a thousand feet or so above them. For several hours they struggled through it, sometimes clambering over long lanes of fallen trees, prostrated by fierce wind-storms, and piled in chaotic heaps so thickly that often, for half a mile at a time, their feet did not touch the ground. Then they came to a region of enormous granite blocks, ten to thirty feet high, over many of which they were obliged to make their way as best they could. Now they began to find patches of snow, and the timber only appeared in scattered clumps.
From here their course led up through an enormous gorge, or cleft, that grew narrower as they ascended, until it terminated in a long, steep slope of boulders and loose rocks. Here they encountered the first real danger of the ascent. Every now and then a boulder, that appeared firmly seated until burdened with the weight of one of them, would give way and go crashing and thundering down with great leaps behind them until lost in the forest below.
It was noon when they emerged on a narrow, shelf-like plateau above the gorge. Here stood the last clump of stunted trees. Above them stretched the glistening snow-fields, pierced by crags of splintered granite. Rock, ice, and snow to the very summit. Here Binney said he could go no farther; and here, after building a fire and eating their lunch, the others left him to await their return.
A sheer wall of smooth, seamless rock, hundreds of feet in height, bounded one side of the shelf, and a precipice, almost as sheer, the other. For half a mile or so did Glen and his companion follow it, seeking some place at which they might continue their ascent. Finally it narrowed almost to a point, that terminated in an immense field of snow sloping down, smooth and spotless, for a thousand feet below them, to a tiny blue-black lake. Beyond the snow-field the ascent seemed possible; and, by cutting footholes in it with their hatchets, they managed to cross it in safety.
For two hours longer they struggled upward; and then, within a few hundred feet of the summit, they could get no farther. In vain did they try every point that offered the faintest hope of success, and at last were forced to give it up. They noted the reading of the barometer, and with a few shavings and slivers cut from its outside case they made a tiny blaze, and, as Glen expressed it, boiled a thermometer in a tin cup.
They were now as impatient to descend as they had been to climb upward, and even more so; for the brightness of the day had departed, and ominous clouds were gathering about them. The air was bitterly cold; and, with their few minutes' cessation from violent exercise, they were chilled to the bone. So they hastened to retrace their rugged way, sliding, leaping, hanging by their hands, and dropping from ledge to ledge, taking frightful risks in their eagerness to escape the threatened storm, or at any rate to meet it in some more sheltered spot. If they could only reach the shelf-like ledge, at the farther end of which Binney Gibbs awaited them, they would feel safe. They had nearly done so, but not quite, when the storm burst upon them in a fierce, blinding, whirling rush of snow, that took away their breath and stung like needles. It seemed to penetrate their clothing. It bewildered them. It was so dense that they could not see a yard ahead of them. They had already started to cross that long, sloping snow-field, beyond which lay the rocky shelf. To go back would be as dangerous as to proceed. They could not stay where they were. The deadly chill of the air would speedily render them incapable of maintaining their foothold.
The assistant engineer was leading the way, with his companion a full rod behind him. The former dared not turn his head; but he shouted encouragingly that they were almost across, and with a few more steps would reach a place of safety.
Then came a swirling, shrieking blast, before which he bowed his head. He thought he heard a cry; but could not tell. It might only have been the howl of the fierce wind. He reached the shelf of rock in safety, and turned to look for his companion; but Glen was not to be seen.
Blinded by that furious blast, the boy had missed his footing. The next instant he was sliding, helplessly, and with frightful velocity, down that smooth slope of unyielding snow, towards the blue lake hidden in the storm-cloud far beneath him.
Chapter XXIX.
PLUNGING INTO A LAKE OF ICE-WATER.
As "Billy" Brackett turned and missed the companion whom he supposed was close behind him, his heart sank like lead. In vain did he shout. Not even an echo answered him. His loudest tones were snatched from his lips by the wind, torn into fragments, and indistinguishably mingled with its mocking laughter. It was barely possible that Glen might have turned back; and, with the slender hope thus offered, the engineer retraced his perilous way across the snow-field to the place where they last stood together. It was empty and awful in its storm-swept loneliness. A great terror seized hold upon the man's stout heart; and, as he again crossed the treacherous snow, he trembled so that his reaching the rocky shelf beyond was little short of a miracle.
Then he hastened to the place where Binney Gibbs anxiously awaited the return of his friends. He had kept up a roaring fire, knowing that it would be a welcome sight to them, especially since the setting-in of the storm. Its coming had filled him with anxiety and uneasy forebodings, so that he hailed "Billy" Brackett's appearance with a glad shout of welcome. It died on his lips as he noted the expression on the engineer's face; and, with a tremble of fear in his voice, he asked, "Where is Glen?"
"I don't know," was the answer.
"Do you mean that he is lost on the mountain in this storm?" cried Binney, aghast at the terrible possibilities thus suggested.
"Not only that, but I have not the faintest hope that he will ever be found again," replied the other; and then he told all he knew of what had happened.
Although, for their own safety, they should already be hurrying towards camp, Binney insisted on going to the place where his friend had last been seen. The snow-squall had passed when they reached it, but the clouds still hung thick about them; and Binney shuddered as he saw the smooth white slide that vanished in the impenetrable mist but a few rods below them. In vain they shouted. In vain they fired every shot contained in the only pistol they had brought with them. There was no answer. And, finally, without a hope that they would ever see Glen Eddy again, they sadly retraced their steps and reached camp just as the complete darkness, that would have rendered their farther progress impossible, shut in.
No one was more loved in that camp than Glen, and no loss from the party could have been more keenly felt. It was with heavy hearts that they sought their blankets that night; and, the next evening, when the search-party, that had been out all day without finding the faintest trace of the missing boy, returned, they talked of him in low tones as of one who had gone from them forever.
The following morning the camp in the pass was broken, and two days later a line had been run down the western slope of the mountains, to the edge of the San Luis Valley, near Fort Garland--one of the most charmingly located military posts of the West.
In the meantime Glen Eddy was not only alive and well, but, at the very minute his companions were approaching Fort Garland he was actually assisting to prepare the quarters of its commandant for a wedding that was to take place in them that evening.
For a moment, after he missed his foothold on the upper edge of the treacherous snow-field, and began to shoot down the smooth surface of its long slope, he imagined that he was about to be dashed in pieces, and resigned all hope of escape from the fearful peril that had so suddenly overtaken him. Then the thought of the blue-black lake, with its walls of purple and red-stained granite, that he had seen lying at the foot of this very slope, flashed into his mind. A thrill shot through him as he thought of the icy plunge he was about to take. Still, that was better than to be hurled over a precipice. The boy had even sufficient presence of mind to hold his feet close together, and attempt to guide himself so that they should strike the water first.
He might have glided down that slope for seconds, or minutes, or even hours, for all that he knew of the passage of time. He seemed to be moving with great speed, and yet, in breathless anticipation of the inevitable plunge that, in fancy, he felt himself to be taking with each instant, his downward flight seemed indefinitely prolonged.
At length the suspense was ended. Almost with the quickness of thought the boy passed into a region of dazzling sunlight, was launched into space, and found himself sinking down, down, down, as though he would never stop, in water so cold that its chill pierced him like knives, and compressed his head as with a band of iron.
Looking up through the crystal sheet, he could see an apparently endless line of bubbles rising from where he was to the surface, and, after a while, he began to follow them. With a breathless gasp he again reached the blessed air, and, dashing the water from his eyes, began to consider his situation. He was dazed and bewildered at finding himself still alive and apparently none the worse for his tremendous slide. Although he was in bright sunlight, the mountain-side down which he had come was hidden beneath dense folds of cloud, out of which he seemed to have dropped.
Gently paddling with his hands, just enough to keep himself afloat, Glen looked anxiously about for some beach or other place at which he might effect a landing, but could discover none. The upper edge of the snow-field, that bounded the lake on one side, projected far over the water, so that, while he might swim under it, there was no possibility of getting on it. On all other sides sheer walls of rock rose from the water, without a trace of beach, or even of boulders, at their base.
In all this solid wall there was but one break. Not far from where Glen swam, and just beyond the snow-field, a narrow cleft appeared; and from it came an indistinct roar of waters. Glen felt himself growing numbed and powerless. He must either give up at once, and tamely allow himself to sink where he was, or he must swim to that cleft, and take his chances of getting out through it. He fully expected to find a waterfall just beyond the gloomy portal, and he clearly realized what his fate would be if it were there. But whatever he did must be done quickly. He knew that, and began to swim towards the cleft.
As he approached it, he felt himself impelled onward by a gentle current that grew stronger with each moment. Now he could not go back if he would. He passed between two lofty walls of rock, and, instead of dashing over a waterfall, was borne along by a swift, smooth torrent that looked black as ink in the gloom of its mysterious channel.
Ere the swimmer had traversed more than fifty yards of this dim waterway, the channel turned sharply to the left, and the character of the lower portion of its wall, on that side, changed from a precipice to a slope. In another moment Glen's feet touched bottom, and he was slowly dragging his numbed and exhausted body ashore.
Although the sun was still shining on the mountain-side, far above him, it was already twilight where he was, and he had no desire to explore that stream farther in darkness. It would be bad enough by daylight. In fact, he was so thankful to escape from that icy water that, had the light been increasing instead of waning at that moment, he would probably have lingered long on those blessed rocks before tempting it further.
Now, as he gazed about him in search of some place in which, or on which, to pass the long hours of darkness, his eye fell on a confused pile of driftwood not far away. Here was a prize indeed. He had matches, and, thanks to "Billy" Brackett, they were still dry. Now he could have a fire. He found the driftwood to be a mass of branches and tree-trunks, bleached to the whiteness of bones, and evidently brought down by some much higher water than the present. They were lodged in the mouth of a deep water-worn hollow in the rock, and converted a certain portion of it into a sort of a cave. Creeping in behind this wooden wall of gnarled roots, twisted branches, and splintered trunks, the shivering boy felt for his hatchet; but it had disappeared. His knife still remained in its sheath, however, and with it he finally managed, though with great difficulty on account of the numbness of his hands, to cut off a little pile of slivers and shavings from a bit of pine.
In another moment the cave was illumined with a bright glow from one of his precious matches, and a tiny flame was creeping up through the handful of kindling. With careful nursing and judicious feeding the little flame rapidly increased in strength and brightness, until it was lighting the whole place with its cheerful glow, and was leaping, with many cracklings, through the entire mass of driftwood.
Before starting that fire, it seemed to Glen that no amount of heat could be unwelcome, or that he could ever be even comfortably warm again. He discovered his mistake, however, when he was finally forced to abandon his cave entirely, and seek refuge in the open air from the intense heat with which it was filled. Not until his pile of wood had burned down to a bed of glowing coals could he return.
His couch that night was certainly a hard one, but it was as warm and dry as a boy could wish. If he only had something to eat! But he had not; so he went to sleep instead, and slept soundly until daylight--which meant about an hour after sunrise in the world beyond that narrow cañon.
If he was hungry the night before, how ravenous he was in the morning. He even cut off a bit of the raw-hide lariat which he still retained, and tried to chew it. It was so very unsatisfactory a morsel that it helped him to realize the necessity of speedily getting out of that place and hunting for some food more nourishing than lariats.
Chapter XXX.
DOWN THE LONELY CAÑON.
Glen had been conscious, ever since reaching his haven, of a dull, distant roar coming up from the cañon below him; and now, after an hour of scrambling, climbing, slipping, but still managing to keep out of the water, he discovered the fall that he had anticipated, and found himself on its brink. It was a direct plunge of a hundred feet, and the body of water very nearly occupied the whole of a narrow chasm between two cliffs similar to those at the outlet of the lake. A few feet of the rocky dam, where Glen stood, were bare of water; but its face fell away as steep and smooth as that over which the stream took its plunge. Only, in the angle formed by it and the side of the cañon, a mass of débris had collected that reached about half-way up to where Glen stood, or to within fifty feet of the brink. On it grew a few stunted trees, the first vegetation he had seen since taking his slide. Below that place the way seemed more open, and as though it might be possible to traverse. But how should he get down? He dared not leap; he could not fly. But he still had the lariat. It was forty feet long. If he could only fasten it where he stood, he might slide down its length and then drop.
Vainly he searched for some projecting point of rock about which to make his rope fast. There was none. All was smooth and water-worn. There was a crack. If he only had a stout bit of wood to thrust into it he might fasten the lariat to that. But he had not seen the smallest stick since leaving his sleeping-place. Some unburned branches were still left there; but the idea of going back over that perilous road, through the gloom of the cañon, was most unpleasant to contemplate. He hated to consider it. Still, before long it would be much more unpleasant to remain where he was, for he was already realizing the first pangs of starvation.
So he wearily retraced his steps, procured a stout branch, and, after two hours of the most arduous toil, again stood on the brink of the waterfall. Forcing the stick as far as possible into the crack, and wedging it firmly with bits of rock, he attached the raw-hide rope to it, and flung the loose end over the precipice. Then, hanging over the edge, he grasped the rope firmly and slowly slid down. As he reached the end he hesitated for a moment, and glanced below. His feet dangled on a level with the top of the upmost tree. He dreaded to drop, but there was nothing else to do, and the next moment he was rolling and scrambling in the loose gravel and rounded pebbles of the heap of débris. At last he brought up against a tree-trunk, bruised and shaken, but with unbroken bones.
He had now overcome the most difficult part of his hazardous trip; and, though the way was still so rough as to demand the exercise of the utmost care and skill and the use of every ounce of strength he possessed, it presented no obstacles that these could not surmount.
Finally, some time in the afternoon, he came to a narrow strip of meadow-land, where flowers were blooming amid the grass, and on which warm sunlight was streaming. Here, too, he found a few blueberries, which he ate ravenously. What should he do for something more substantial? He was close beside the stream, which here flowed quietly, with pleasant ripplings, when he was startled by a splash in it. It must have been a fish jumping. Why had he not thought of fish before? How should he catch them?
Necessity is the best sharpener of wits, and, in less than half an hour, Glen was fishing with a line made of fibres from the inner skin of spruce bark, a hook formed of a bent pin, baited with a grasshopper, and the whole attached to a crooked bit of branch. Not only was he fishing, but he was catching the most beautiful brook-trout he had ever seen almost as fast as he could re-bait and cast his rude tackle. There was no art required. Nobody had ever fished in these waters before, and the trout were apparently as eager to be caught as he was to catch them.
Glen had not neglected to light a fire before he began his fishing, and by the time half a dozen of the dainty little fellows were caught a fine bed of hot coals was awaiting them. The boy knew very little of the art of cooking, but what he did know was ample for the occasion. His fish were speedily cleaned, laid on the coals for a minute, turned, left a minute longer, and eaten. When the first half-dozen had disappeared he caught more, and treated them in the same way. He had no salt, no condiments, no accessories of any kind, save the sauce of a hunger closely allied to starvation; but that supplied everything. It rendered that feast of half-cooked brook-trout the most satisfactory meal he had ever eaten.
When, at last, his hunger was entirely appeased, the sun had set, and another night without shelter or human companionship was before him; but what did he care? As he lay in front of his fire, on an elastic, sweet-scented bed of small spruce boughs, with a semicircle of larger ones planted in the ground behind him, and their feathery tips drooping gracefully above his head, he was as happy and well-content as ever in his life. He had conquered the wilderness, escaped from one of its most cunningly contrived prison-houses, and won from it the means of satisfying his immediate wants. He enjoyed a glorious feeling of triumph and independence. To be sure, he had no idea of where he was, nor where the stream would lead him; but he had no intention of deserting it. He realized that his safest plan was to follow it. Eventually it must lead him to the Rio Grande, and there he would surely be able to rejoin his party, if he did not find them sooner.
He was in no hurry to leave the pleasant strip of flower-strewn meadow the next morning, nor did he, until he had caught and eaten a hearty breakfast, and laid in a supply of trout for at least one more meal.
The third night found him still on the bank of his stream, which was flowing happily, with many a laugh and gurgle, through a narrow but wonderfully beautiful valley, carpeted with a luxuriant growth of grass and dotted with clumps of cedars. For this night's camp he constructed a rude hut of slender poles and branches, similar to the Indian wick-i-ups he had seen on the Plains. In it he slept on a bed high heaped with soft grasses and cedar twigs that was a perfect cradle of luxury.
As Glen emerged from his hut at sunrise he was almost as startled at seeing a herd of several black-tailed (mule) deer, feeding within a hundred feet of him, as they were to see him. Pausing for a good stare at him, for the black-tailed deer is among the most inquisitive animals in the world, they bounded away with tremendous leaps, and disappeared behind a cedar thicket. A minute later Glen was again startled; this time by the report of a rifle from some distance down the valley. He had just been wishing for his own rifle, the sight of deer having suggested that venison would be a very pleasant change from a steady fish diet, and now he hurried away in the direction of the shot.
He walked nearly half a mile before coming so suddenly upon the hunter who had fired that shot, and was now engaged in dressing one of those very black-tailed deer, that the latter discovered him at the same moment, and paused in his work to examine the new-comer keenly. He was a man past middle age, squarely built, of medium height, and, as he stood up, Glen saw that he was somewhat bow-legged. His hair was thin and light in color, and his face was beardless. It was seamed and weather-beaten, the cheek-bones were high and prominent, and the keen eyes were gray. He was dressed in a complete hunting-suit of buckskin, and the rifle, lying beside him, was of an old-fashioned, long-barrelled, muzzle-loading pattern. He looked every inch, what he really was, a typical Plainsman of the best kind, possessed of an honest, kindly nature, brave and just, a man to be feared by an enemy and loved by a friend. He gazed earnestly at Glen as the latter walked up to him, though neither by look nor by word did he betray any curiosity.
"I don't know who you are, sir," said the boy, "but I know I was never more glad to see anybody in my life, for I've been wandering alone in these mountains for three days."
"Lost?" asked the other, laconically.
"Well, not exactly lost," replied Glen. Then, as clearly and briefly as possible, he related his story, which the other followed with close attention and evident interest.
"You did have a close call, and you've had a blind trail to follow since, for a fact. It sorter looks as though you'd showed sand, and I shouldn't wonder if you was the right stuff to make a man of," said the hunter, approvingly, when the recital was ended. "How old are you?"
"I think I am about sixteen," answered the boy.
"Just the age I was when I first crossed the Mississip and struck for this country, where I've been ever since. What are you going to do now?"
"I'm going to ask you to give me a slice of that venison for my breakfast, and then tell me the best way to rejoin my party," answered Glen.
"Of course I'll give you all the deer-meat you can eat, and we'll have it broiling inside of five minutes. Then, if you'll come along with me to the fort, I reckon we'll find your outfit there; or, if they ain't, the commandant will see to it that you do find them. You know him, don't you?"
"No, I don't even know who he is. What is his name?"
This question seemed, for some reason, to amuse the hunter greatly, and he laughed silently for a moment before replying: "His name is, rightly, 'Colonel Carson,' and since he's got command of a fort they've given him the title of 'General Carson;' but all the old Plainsmen and mountainmen that's travelled with him since he was your age call him 'Kit Carson,' or just 'Old Kit.' Perhaps you've heard tell of him?"
Indeed, Glen had heard of the most famous scout the Western Plains ever produced; and, with the prospect of actually seeing and speaking to him, he felt amply repaid for his recent trials and sufferings.
Chapter XXXI.
KIT CARSON'S GOLD MINE.
While the hunter was talking to Glen, he was also preparing some slices of venison for broiling, and lighting a small fire. Anxious to be of use, as well as to have breakfast as soon as possible, the boy set about collecting wood for the fire. This, by the hunter's advice, he broke and split into small pieces, that it might the sooner be reduced to coals; and, while he was doing this, he told his new friend of his experience in cooking trout.
"I reckon that was better than eating them raw," said the latter, with an amused smile, "but if we had some now, I think I could show you a better way than that to cook them, though we haven't got any fry-pan."
"Perhaps I can catch some," suggested Glen, pulling his rude fishing-tackle from his pocket, as he looked about for some sort of a pole. "And I think I could do it quicker if you would lend me your hat for a few minutes. You see mine got lost while I was coasting down that mountain-side, or in the lake, I don't know which," he added, apologetically.
Here the hunter actually laughed aloud. "You don't expect to catch trout with a hat, do you?" he asked.
"Oh, no, indeed. I only want it to catch grasshoppers with. It's such slow work catching them, one at a time, with your hands; but, with a hat as big as yours, I could get a great many very quickly," and the boy gazed admiringly at the broad-brimmed sombrero worn by the other.
The stranger willingly loaned his hat to Glen, who seemed to amuse him greatly, and the latter soon had, not only all the grasshoppers he wanted, but a fine string of fish as well. By this time the fire had produced a bed of coals, and the slices of venison, spitted on slender sticks thrust into the ground, so as to be held just above them, were sending forth most appetizing odors.
Obeying instructions, Glen cleaned his fish, and gathered a quantity of grass, which he wet in the stream. The hunter had scooped out a shallow trench in the earth beside the fire, and had filled it with live coals. Above these he now spread a layer of damp grass, on which he laid the fish, covering them in turn with another layer of grass. Over this he raked a quantity of red-hot embers, and then covered the whole with a few handfuls of earth.
Ten minutes later the trout were found to be thoroughly cooked, and Glen was both thinking and saying that no fish had ever tasted so good. After eating this most satisfactory breakfast, and having hung the carcase of the deer to a branch where it would be beyond the reach of wolves until it could be sent for, Glen and his new companion started down the valley. As they walked, the latter explained to the boy that, many years before, while trapping on that very stream, he had discovered gold in its sands. Recently he had employed a number of Mexicans to work for him, and had started some placer diggings about a mile below where they then were.
This interested Glen greatly; for all of his dreams had been of discovering gold somewhere in this wonderful Western country, and he was most desirous of learning something of the process of procuring it. As they talked, they came in sight of several tents and brush huts, standing near the inner end of a long sand-bar, that extended diagonally nearly across the stream. A rude dam built along its upper side had diverted the water from it, so that a large area of sand and gravel was left dry. On this a dozen men were at work, digging with shovel and pick, or rocking cradles. Glen had heard of miners' cradles, or "rockers," but he had never seen one. Now he laughed at the resemblance between them and the low wooden cradles babies were rocked in.
They were rough boxes mounted on rockers, of which the one at the forward end was a little lower than the other, so as to give the cradle a slight slope in that direction. Each had an iron grating placed across its upper end, and a few wooden cleats nailed crosswise of its bottom. A hole was cut in its foot-board, and a handle, by means of which it was rocked, was fastened to its head-board. There were two men to each cradle: one to shovel dirt on to its grating, and the other to rock it and pour water over this dirt to wash it through. The grating was so fine that only the smallest pebbles could pass through it. As the dirt and water fell to the bottom of the cradle, and ran through it to the opening in the foot-board, the fine particles of gold sank, of their own weight, and lodged against the cleats. From these it was carefully gathered several times each day by the white overseer who had charge of the diggings, and sent to Fort Garland for safe-keeping.
Glen's guide also showed him how to wash out a panful of gold-bearing earth, as prospectors do. He picked up a shallow iron pan, filled it with earth, and, holding it half immersed in the stream with its outer edge inclined from him, shook it rapidly to and fro, with a semi-rotary motion. In a minute all the earth had been washed out, and only a deposit of black sand, containing a number of yellow particles, was left on the bottom. The hunter said this black sand was iron, and could be blown away from about the gold after it was dry, or drawn away with a magnet.
The boy was greatly pleased to be allowed to attempt this operation for himself, and felt quite like a successful miner when told that the gold yielded by his first panful was worth about thirty cents.
While he was thus engaged a swarthy-complexioned soldier, evidently a Mexican, though he wore a United States uniform, came riding up the valley, raised his hand in salute to the hunter, and exchanged a few words with him. The latter hesitated for a moment, and then, after speaking again to the soldier, who immediately dismounted, he said to Glen, "I find that I must return to the fort at once. So if you will take this man's horse, and ride with me, I shall be glad of your company." His own horse was standing near by, and in another minute they were riding rapidly down the little valley, with the mining camp already out of sight.
After a mile or so the stream that Glen had followed for so long led them into the broad expanse of the San Luis Valley, up which they turned, and speedily came in sight of the low white walls of Fort Garland, surrounding a tall staff from which an American flag floated lazily in the warm, sun-lit air.
Although Glen did not know much about soldiers, or the meaning of military forms, he was somewhat surprised to see the guard at the main entrance of the fort turn hurriedly out and present arms as they clattered in past them. He quickly forgot this incident though, in his admiration of the interior, now opened before him. It was a large square, enclosed on all sides by low comfortable-looking buildings of adobe, neatly whitewashed, and in some cases provided with green blinds and wide piazzas. A hard, smooth driveway ran in front of them, and the middle of the enclosure was occupied by a well-turfed parade-ground, at one end of which stood a battery of light field-pieces. The chief beauty of the place lay in a little canal of crystal water, that ran entirely around the parade-ground. It was as cool and sparkling as that of its parent mountain stream, flowing just beyond the fort, and the refreshing sound of its rippling pervaded the whole place.
Riding to the opposite side of the enclosure, the hunter and his companion dismounted in front of one of the houses with blinds and a piazza. This the former invited Glen to enter, and at the same moment an orderly stepped up and took their horses. In a cool, dimly lighted room, Glen's new friend asked him to be seated and wait a few moments. In about fifteen minutes the orderly who had taken the horses entered the room, and saying to Glen that General Carson would like to see him, ushered him into an adjoining apartment. For a moment the boy did not recognize the figure, clad in a colonel's uniform, that was seated beside a writing-table. But, as the latter said, "Well, sir, I was told that you wished to see the commandant," he at once knew the voice for that of his friend the hunter, and, with a tone of glad surprise, he exclaimed,
"Why, sir, are you--"
"Yes," replied the other, laughing, "I am old Kit Carson, at your service, and I bid you a hearty welcome to Fort Garland."
Then he told Glen that one of his daughters was to be married that evening to an officer of the post. They had been engaged for some time, but there had been nobody to marry them until that day, when a priest from Taos had stopped at the fort on his way to the upper Rio Grande settlements. As he must continue his journey the next morning, the colonel had been sent for, and it was decided that the wedding should come off at once.
Thus it happened that Glen was assisting to decorate the commandant's quarters with flags and evergreens when Mr. Hobart and "Billy" Brackett, who had come on a little in advance of the rest of the party, rode up to pay their respects to Colonel Carson. He went out to meet them, and, being fond of giving pleasant surprises, did not say a word concerning Glen; but, after an exchange of greetings, led them directly into the room where he was at work. The boy was standing on a box fastening a flag to the wall above his head, as the men entered. The light from a window fell full upon him, and they recognized him at once.
Chapter XXXII.
A NEW MEXICAN WEDDING.
For a moment the amazement of the two men at again beholding the lad whom they were fully persuaded was dead would neither allow them to speak nor move. Then "Billy" Brackett walked softly over to where Glen was standing, and gave one of his legs a sharp pinch.
The startled boy, who had not noticed his approach, leaped to the floor with a cry of mingled pain and surprise.
"I only wanted to be sure you were real, old man, and not a ghost," said "Billy" Brackett, trying to speak in his usual careless tone; but the tears that stood in the honest fellow's eyes, as he wrung the boy's hand, showed how deeply he was affected, and how truly he had mourned the loss of his young friend.
Nor was Mr. Hobart less moved, and, as he grasped Glen's hand, he said, "My dear boy, I honestly believe this is the happiest moment of my life."
They did not stop to ask for his story then but insisted on taking him at once out to the camp that was being pitched just beyond the fort, that the rest of the party might share their joy as speedily as possible.
The boys were so busily engaged with their evening duties that the little party was not noticed until they were close at hand. Then somebody, gazing sharply at the middle figure of the three who approached, cried out, "If that isn't Glen Matherson, it's his twin brother!"
Everybody paused in what he was doing, and every eye was turned in the same direction. For a moment there was a profound silence. Then came a great shout of joyful amazement. Everything was dropped; and, with one accord, the entire party made a rush for the boy whom they all loved, and whom they had never expected to see again.
How they yelled, and cheered, and failed to find expressions for their extravagant delight! As for Binney Gibbs, he fairly sobbed as he held Glen's hand, and gazed into the face of this comrade for whom he had mourned, and whom he once thought he hated.
Although, at first sight, it seems almost incredible that so many adventures should happen to one boy on a single trip, it must be remembered that, with the exception of Binney, Glen was the youngest of the party, and consequently more likely to be reckless and careless than any of the others. He was also one of those persons who, while everybody around them is moving along quietly and soberly, are always getting into scrapes, and coming out of each one bright, smiling, and ready for another. Then, too, he was a stout, fearless fellow, with perfect confidence in himself that led him into, and out of, situations from which such boys as Binney Gibbs would steer clear.
An amusing feature of Glen's adventures was, that while his companions were ready to sympathize with him on account of his sufferings and hardships, it never seemed to occur to him that he had had anything but a good time, and one to be remembered with pleasure. Thus, in the present instance, according to his own account, his slide down the mountain-side had been the jolliest coast he ever took. His swim in the lake had been cold, but then it had not lasted long, and he had enjoyed the fire and the warmth of the cave all the more for it. As for his subsequent experiences, he related them in such a way that, before he finished, his listeners began to regard him as one of the most fortunate and to-be-envied fellows of their acquaintance. They seemed to be crossing the Plains and mountains in the most prosaic manner, without doing anything in particular except work, while, to this boy, the trip was full of adventures and delightful experiences. Would these incidents seem so pleasant to him if he were as old as they? Perhaps not.
They were all to enjoy one novel experience that very evening, though; for Glen brought an invitation from Colonel Carson for them to attend the wedding, and of course they promptly accepted it. As it was to be an early affair, they hurried to the fort as soon as supper was over, and found the guests already assembling in a large room, from which every article of furniture had been removed. It was a motley gathering, in which were seen the gay uniforms of soldiers, the buckskin of trappers, the gaudy serapes of Mexican Cabelleros, the flannel shirts and big boots of the engineers, and the blanketed forms of stolid-faced Ute Indians, for whom Kit Carson was acting as agent at that time.
The company was ranged about three sides of the room, close against the walls; and, when they were thus disposed, a door on the vacant side opened, and a Mexican woman, bearing a large basket of candles, entered. Giving a candle to each guest, and lighting it for him, she indicated by signs that he was to hold it above his head. So the guests became living candlesticks, and, when all their candles were lighted, the illumination was quite brilliant enough even for a wedding.
Everything being ready, the door through which the candles had been brought again opened, and the bridal party entered. First came the priest, then Kit Carson and his wife, who was a Mexican woman from Taos. Behind them walked the couple who were to be married. The bride was a slender, olive-complexioned girl, dressed very simply in white, while the groom wore the handsome uniform of a lieutenant of cavalry. The rear of the procession was brought up by a bevy of black-haired and black-eyed señoritas, sisters and cousins of the bride.
The priest read the wedding service in Latin, and the bride made her responses in Spanish, so that the few English words spoken by the groom were all that most of the spectators understood. As "Billy" Brackett afterwards remarked, it was evidently necessary to be liberally educated to get married in that country.
At the conclusion of the ceremony the entire wedding-party, with the exception of the bride's father, disappeared, and were seen no more; while Colonel Carson led his guests into a neighboring room, where the wedding supper was served. Here the famous scout, surrounded by the tried comrades of many a wild campaign, entertained the company by calling on these for one anecdote after another of the adventures that had been crowded so thickly into their lives. This was a rare treat to the new-comers, especially to Glen Eddy and Binney Gibbs, to whom the thrilling tales, told by the boy trappers, scouts, hunters, and soldiers who had participated in them, were so real and vivid that, before this delightful evening was over, it seemed as though they too must have taken part in the scenes described.
In spite of the late hours kept by most of the engineers that night, their camp was broken by daylight, and at sunrise they were off on the line as usual, for September was now well advanced, and there were mountain ranges yet to be crossed that would be impassable after winter had once fairly set in. So, leaving the pleasant army post and their hospitable entertainers in it, they picked up their line, and, running it out over the broad San Luis Valley to the Rio Grande, began to follow that river into the very heart of New Mexico.
Glen was more than glad to find himself once more on Nettle's back, and again bearing the front flag in advance of the party. He was also surprised to find what a barren place the valley that had looked so beautiful and desirable from the mountains really was. Its sandy soil only supported a thick growth of sage brush, that yielded a strong aromatic fragrance when bruised or broken, and which rendered the running of the line peculiarly toilsome. It was a relief to reach the great river of New Mexico, and find themselves in the more fertile country immediately bordering on it. Here, too, they found numbers of quaint Mexican towns, of which they passed one or more nearly every day.
These were full of interest to the young explorers. While looking at their low flat-roofed houses, built of adobe, or great sun-dried bricks of mud and straw, it was hard to realize that they were still in America and traversing one of the territories of the United States. All their surroundings were those of the far East, and the descriptions in the Bible of life and scenes in Palestine applied perfectly to the valley of the Rio Grande as they saw it. The people were dark-skinned, with straight, black hair; and while the young children ran about nearly naked, their elders wore loose, flowing garments, and, if not barefooted, were shod with sandals of raw hide or plaited straw.
The square houses, with thick walls, broken only by occasional narrow unglazed windows, were exactly like those of the Biblical pictures. Inside, the floors were of hard-beaten clay, and there were neither tables nor chairs, only earthen benches covered with sheep-skins or gay striped blankets. Some of the finer houses enclosed open courts or plazas, in which were trees and shrubs. The cooking was done in the open air, or in round-topped earthen ovens, built outside the houses.
The women washed clothing on flat rocks at the edge of the streams, and young girls carried all the water used for domestic purposes in tall earthen jars borne gracefully on their heads. The beasts of burden were donkeys, or "burros," as the Mexicans call them. Grain was threshed by being laid on smooth earthen threshing-floors, in the open air, and having horses, donkeys, cattle, and sheep driven over it for hours. Wine was kept in skins or great earthen jars. The mountains and hills of the country were covered with pines and cedars, its cultivated valleys with vineyards and fruit orchards; while the raising of flocks and herds was the leading industry of its inhabitants.
At this season of the year, though the sun shone from an unclouded sky of the most brilliant blue, the air was dry and bracing in the daytime, and crisp with the promises of frost at night. It was glorious weather; and, under its influence, the second division ran a line of a hundred miles down the river in ten days. As the entire party had looked forward with eager anticipations to visiting Santa Fé, which is not on the Rio Grande, but some distance to the east of it, they were greatly disappointed to be met by a messenger from General Lyle, with orders for Mr. Hobart to come into that place, while his party continued their line south to Albuquerque, eighty miles beyond where they were.
Glen was intensely disappointed at this, for Santa Fé was one of the places he had been most anxious to visit. His disappointment was doubled when Mr. Hobart said that he must take somebody with him as private secretary, and intimated that his choice would have fallen on the young front flagman if he had only learned to talk Spanish. As it was, Binney Gibbs was chosen for the envied position; for, though he, like the rest, had only been for a short time among Mexicans, he was already able to speak their language with comparative ease.
"I don't see how you learned it so quickly," said Glen, one day, when, after he had striven in vain to make a native understand that he wished to purchase some fruit, Binney had stepped up and explained matters with a few words of Spanish.
"Why, it is easy enough," replied Binney, "to anybody who understands Latin."
Then Glen wished that he, too, understood Latin, as he might easily have done as well as his comrade. He wished it ten times more though, when, on account of it, Binney rode gayly off to Santa Fé with Mr. Hobart, while he went out to work on the line.
Chapter XXXIII.
IN THE VALLEY OF THE RIO GRANDE.
Near the close of a mellow autumn day Glen and "Billy" Brackett sat on a fragment of broken wall and gazed with interest on the scene about them. On one side, crowning a low bluff that overlooked the Rio Grande twelve miles below Albuquerque, was the Indian pueblo of Isletta, a picturesque collection of adobe buildings and stockaded corrals, containing some eight hundred inhabitants. On the other side were extensive vineyards; beyond them were vast plains, from which flocks of bleating sheep were being driven in for the night by Indian boys; and still beyond rose the blue range of the Sierra Madre. The air was so clear and still that through it the sounds of children's voices, the barking of dogs, the bleating of sheep, the lowing of cattle, and the cracked tones of the bell in the quaint old mission church came to the ears of Glen and his companion with wonderful distinctness. The Indian women were preparing their evening meals, and the fragrance of burning cedar drifted down from the village. Never afterwards could Glen smell the odor of cedar without having the scene of that evening vividly recalled to his mind.
Mingled with this fragrance was another, equally distinct and suggestive. It was that of crushed grapes; and the two explorers were watching curiously the process of New Mexican wine-making, going on but a short distance from them. Clumsy ox-carts, constructed without the use of iron, and having great wooden wheels that screeched as they turned on their ungreased wooden axles, brought in loads of purple grapes from the vineyards. On top of the loads, as though the grapes were so much hay, rode Indian men or boys, armed with wooden pitchforks. With these they flung the grapes into a great vat of green ox-hides, supported, about ten feet from the ground, by four heavy posts. The sides of this vat were drawn to a point at the bottom, where there was a small outlet left, through which the grape-juice might flow into a second vat, placed directly beneath the other. It was similar in all respects to the first, except that it offered no opening for the escape of its contents.
When a load of grapes had been pitched into the upper vat, two naked Indians clambered up, and, springing on top of them, began to tread them with their feet. For hours they continued this performance, while a steady stream of blood-red juice flowed from the upper vat into the lower. From there it was dipped into huge earthen jars, and set away to ferment.
"Well," said 'Billy' Brackett, at length, as he rose and started towards camp, "I've seen all the native wine-making I want to. If those beggars had only washed themselves first it wouldn't be so bad, but I honestly believe they only take a bath once a year, and that is in grape-juice."
"It is pretty bad," laughed Glen, "though I don't know as it is any worse than their milking." This was a sore point with him, for he was very fond of fresh milk; but, after once witnessing a New Mexican milking, and seeing cows, mares, asses, sheep, and goats all milked into the same vessel, he preferred to go without it.
It was surprising to see what a tall, broad-shouldered fellow Glen was getting to be; and a single glance was sufficient to show what crossing the Plains had done for him. His eyes had the clear look of perfect health; his face, neck, and hands were as brown as sun and wind could make them, while his hair had entirely recovered from its Kansas City shearing, and was now plainly visible beneath the broad sombrero that replaced the hat lost on the Spanish Peak. A heavy blue flannel shirt, a pair of army trousers tucked into the tops of cowhide boots, a leather belt supporting a revolver and a sheath-knife, and a silk handkerchief loosely knotted about his neck, completed his costume.
"Billy" Brackett was dressed in a similar fashion, except that he still clung fondly to the shiny cutaway coat in which he was introduced to the reader, and to which he was deeply attached.
As they walked towards camp, he and Glen discussed the topic now uppermost in their minds, namely, that of their future movements. Since going to Santa Fé, Mr. Hobart had not rejoined them, though a note received from him at Albuquerque promised that he would do so at Isletta, to which place he ordered the line to be run. Now they had been for two days at the Pueblo, but where they were to go next, or whether they were to go any farther, they did not know, and were anxious to find out. They had heard vague rumors that General Lyle was to return to the States, and that all the plans of the expedition might be changed. Thus, when Mr. Hobart galloped into camp just after supper that evening, he was heartily welcomed.
"Where is Binney Gibbs?" was the first question asked.
"Promoted to be private secretary to General Elting, the new chief," was the reply.
"Where is General Elting?"
"He is still in Santa Fé, but is going across with the other two divisions by the Gila route."
"And where are we going?"
"Going to run a one-thousand-mile line from here to the Pacific Ocean, in just the shortest time we can accomplish it."
"Good enough! Hurrah for the Pacific! Hurrah for California!" shouted every member of the party but one. He was the leveller; and when Mr. Hobart, after explaining the dangers and hardships of the trip before them, said that anybody who did not care to encounter them would be furnished with free transportation from that point back to the States, this man decided to accept the offer.
Little, did Glen Eddy imagine, as he bade him good-bye the next day, what an effect upon his future the decision thus suddenly reached by the leveller was to have. In the stage from Santa Fé the latter met a gentleman and his wife who were greatly interested in his description of the explorations in which he had just taken part. Among other things, he described Glen Eddy Matherson's remarkable adventures; and the lady, who seemed struck by the boy's name, asked many questions concerning him. Fortunately, the leveller was able to answer most of them, and thus she learned, what Glen had never attempted to conceal, that he was an adopted son of Luke Matherson, of Brimfield, Pennsylvania, who had saved him from a railroad wreck in Glen Eddy creek when he was a baby. She did not explain why she asked these questions, and soon changed the conversation to other topics.
The most immediate effect upon Glen of the leveller's departure was to promote him and increase his pay. As it was impossible, in that country, to engage men of experience to fill places in an engineer corps, Mr. Brackett was obliged to take the level, while Mr. Hobart himself took charge of the transit; and, when the former was asked who he would like as rodman in place of Binney Gibbs, he promptly answered, "Glen Matherson."
In speaking to Glen of this change of position, the division engineer asked the boy if he was sure he wanted to go through to the Pacific.
"Of course I do, sir!" answered Glen, in surprise at the question.
"It is going to be a trip full of danger and all sorts of hardships, possibly including starvation and freezing. I don't know but what you really ought to go back."
"Oh, sir, please don't send me back!" pleaded Glen, earnestly. "I should feel awfully to have to go home with the trip only half finished."
"Then you are willing to face all the hardships?"
"Yes, sir, I'm willing to face anything, rather than going back."
"All right!" laughed Mr. Hobart; "I suppose I shall have to take you along. I proposed to the general to take Binney Gibbs with him, or else send him back to the States, because I did not consider him strong enough to endure what is ahead of us; but I don't see how I could urge that in your case, for I actually believe you are one of the toughest among us."
How Glen rejoiced in his strength as he heard this! Perhaps it was going to prove as valuable to him as a scholarship, after all.
"Mr. Brackett is going to run the level, and wants you for his rodman," continued Mr. Hobart. "The pay will be double what you are now receiving, and you can soon fit yourself for the position by a little hard study; for Mr. Brackett is a capital instructor. I have told him that he may take you on trial, and see what he can do with you. I also told him of your aversion to study, and gave him to understand what a difficult job he had undertaken."
Glen flushed at this, and gazed at the ground for a moment. Finally he said, "Studying seems very different when you can look right ahead and see what good it is going to do."
"Yes," replied Mr. Hobart, "I know it does. Still, in most cases we have to trust the word of those who can look ahead when we can't. I've no doubt but what you were told at school that a knowledge of Latin would aid you in learning many other languages; but you were not willing to believe it until you saw for yourself how it helped Binney Gibbs pick up Spanish."
Glen did not make any promises aloud in regard to fitting himself for his new position, for he believed in actions rather than words; but he made one to himself, and determined to keep it.
They remained in camp at Isletta one day longer, to prepare for their arduous undertaking, and to engage several new axemen to fill the places of those who had been promoted; but on the second morning the transit was set up over the last stake they had driven, and its telescope was pointed due west.
At first Glen missed the excitement of riding in advance of the party with the front flag. On a preliminary survey, the level can hardly keep up with the transit; and it was not so pleasant to be always behind, striving to catch up, as it had been to be in the lead.
To "Billy" Brackett the change of positions came even harder than to Glen, because in taking the level he had gone back a step rather than forward; but he never showed it. Indeed, by his steady cheerfulness and unceasing flow of good spirits the new leveller soon banished even a shadow of regret from the mind of his young rodman, and taught him to feel a real interest in his new work.
So they slowly climbed the western slope of the Rio Grande Valley, crossed the barren plateau of the divide between it and the Rio Puerco, followed that stream and its tributary, the San José, on the banks of which they saw the ancient pueblos of Laguna and Acoma, into another region of rugged mountains, and, in about two weeks, found themselves at the forlorn frontier post of Fort Wingate, where they were to obtain their final supplies for the winter.
Chapter XXXIV.
BAITING A WOLF-TRAP.
At Fort Wingate the real hardships of the trip began in an unexpected manner. Instead of being plentifully supplied with provisions, as had been reported, the post was found to be very poorly provided, and all that could be spared to the engineers were condemned quartermaster's stores. The party must take these or nothing; and when Mr. Hobart left it to his men whether they should accept the damaged stores and push on, or go back to the Rio Grande, they unanimously said, "Go on!" So, for the next two months, they made the best of half-spoiled hams and bacon, hard-tack filled with white worms, and sugar abounding in little black bugs, that fortunately floated on top of the coffee and could be skimmed off.
The men provided themselves with a number of little luxuries at the sutler's--the last store they would see for months--and "Billy" Brackett bought a cheese. This was considered a very queer purchase; but Glen's was queerer still, for it was a small quantity of strychnine. He only procured this after giving assurances that he did not propose to commit suicide and making many promises to be very careful in its use. What he proposed to do with the poison he did not confide to anybody except his friend "Billy" Brackett, who agreed with him that it was a capital plan.
A run of twelve miles from Fort Wingate brought the party to a camp, in a forest of the most stately yellow-pines they had ever seen, beside a great spring of ice-cold water--known as the Agua Fria (cold water). Here, as soon as supper was over, Glen proceeded to put his great plan into execution. The nights were now very cold, and the boy generally woke before morning to find himself shivering beneath his insufficient covering of blankets. Every night, too, since entering the mountains the party had been annoyed by the sneaking visits and unearthly howlings of wolves that hung on the outskirts of the camp from dark to daylight, every now and then making a quick dash through it, if the guard was not watching sharply, and snatching at bits of food or at anything made of leather that lay in their path. So Glen thought he would teach the wolves a lesson, which should at the same time add some of their skins to his bed-clothing; and it was for this purpose he had procured the strychnine.
Now, with "Billy" Brackett's help, he dragged out from one of the wagons a gunny-sack, containing some kidneys, lungs, and other refuse animal matter, obtained from the Fort Wingate butcher, and these he smeared with the deadly powder. Then they prepared several torches of pine slivers, and, amid the unanswered questionings of their companions, left camp, carrying the sack of meat between them. Beginning at a point a few rods from the tents, they strewed the poisoned bait for half a mile along the banks of the little stream flowing from the spring. It was an exciting task, for they seemed to hear suspicious sniffs, and the soft pattering of feet on both sides of them; while Glen felt certain that his torchlight was reflected from gleaming eyeballs more than once. So greatly did these things work upon their imaginations that when, as they started back towards camp, their last torch suddenly went out, leaving them in blackest darkness, they both took to their heels, and raced breathlessly for the distant light of the friendly camp-fire. When they reached it, in perfect safety, they burst out laughing in one another's faces, and wondered what they had run from.
Glen was disappointed, as he lay shivering in his blankets that night, not to hear so many wolves as usual, while the few howls that did reach his ears seemed to come from a distance. Still, he comforted himself with the reflection that dead wolves couldn't howl, and doubtless all those that had ventured near the camp had eaten the poisoned meat, and had their howlings effectually silenced.
It seemed to him that he had hardly dropped asleep when he was rudely awakened by being pulled, feet foremost, out of his blankets, under the side of the tent, and into the open air. At the same moment "Billy" Brackett's laughing voice cried, "Come, Glen, here it is broad daylight, and high time we were gathering in our wolves."
Whew! how cold it was! and in what a hurry Glen sprang from the frozen ground, to rush back into the tent for his boots and army overcoat. He had everything else on, for there was very little undressing at night in that party. As for being sleepy, the biting air had awakened him as effectually as a dash of ice-water.
As they left camp, "Billy" Brackett shouted back to one of the Mexican axemen to follow after them, and the man answered that he would be along in a minute. It was light enough, when they reached the place where they had left the first of the poisoned meat, for them to see it if it had been there; but it was not. Neither was there any dead wolf to be found in the vicinity. It was the same along the whole line, where they had scattered their bait. They could neither discover meat nor wolves.
"Hello!" exclaimed "Billy" Brackett softly, as they were about to turn back, "I believe the wolves are cooking their meat;" and with that he pointed to a thin column of blue smoke rising through the trees at some distance farther down the stream.
"Perhaps they are Indians," suggested Glen.
"Perhaps they are. Let's go and find out. We can take a look at them without being seen. Besides, the Indians hereabout are peaceful now."
So they crept cautiously towards the smoke, until at length they were lying flat on the ground, on the edge of a low bank, with their heads hidden in tufts of grass, peering into a small encampment of Indians just below them. They had hardly gained this position when Glen, uttering a cry of horror, sprang down the bank, rushed in among the Indians, and, snatching a piece of meat from the hands of one of them, who was raising it to his mouth, flung it so far away that it was snapped up and swallowed by a lean, wolfish-looking cur, that had not dared venture near the fire.
At Glen's sudden appearance the Indian women and children ran screaming into the bushes, while the men, springing to their feet, surrounded him with angry exclamations and significant handlings of their knives. They received a second surprise, and fell back a little as "Billy" Brackett, who had not at first understood Glen's precipitate action, came rushing down the bank after him, shouting, "Stand back, you villains! If you lay a hand on him, I'll blow the tops of all your heads off!"
At the same time Glen was making all the faces expressive of extreme disgust that he could think of, and saying, as he pointed to a pile of meat lying in a gunny-sack beside the fire:
"_Carne no bueno! Muy mal! No bueno por hombre!_" which was the best Spanish he knew for, "The meat is not good. It is very bad, and not at all good for a man to eat."
But the Indians could not understand. The meat might not be good enough for white men, who were so very particular, but it was good enough for them. The white men had thrown it away and they had found it. They meant to eat it, too, for they were very hungry. Now, if these uninvited guests to their camp would not clear out and let them eat their breakfast in peace, they must suffer the consequences.
This is what they said; but neither Glen nor "Billy" Brackett understood a word of it. They were preparing to defend themselves, as well as they could, from the scowling Indians, who were again advancing upon them with drawn knives.
Both Glen and his companion had their rifles, and now, as they stepped slowly backward, they held them ready for instant use.
"We won't fire," said "Billy" Brackett, "unless they point a gun or an arrow at us; for the first shot will be the signal for a rush, and if they make that we haven't got a living show."
All this time the Indians, to the number of a dozen or so, advanced steadily, taking step for step with the whites, as they fell back, and watching for a chance to get past or around the black muzzles of those rifles.
Chapter XXXV.
EL MORO.
To Glen Eddy and "Billy" Brackett the situation looked serious, and almost desperate, as they confronted that crowd of angry savages who advanced towards them so steadily, and with such unmistakable meaning.
"It's a tough outlook for us," muttered the latter.
"Yes," answered Glen, "it is, but--" Here the boy clinched his teeth, and clutched his rifle more firmly.
"Look out!" cried the other, noticing that the Indians were gathering themselves for a rush. "They're coming!" and he raised his rifle.
In another instant he would have fired, and their fate would have been sealed. But their time had not yet come; for, at that same moment, another figure bounded down the low bank, and stood beside them facing the Indians, and speaking angrily to them in Spanish. They evidently understood him, and hesitated. He was the Mexican axeman.
"What is the trouble, Mr. Brackett?" he asked hurriedly, in English.
With a few words they made the situation clear to him, and he, in turn, quickly explained to the Indians that these white men had merely tried to save their lives by preventing them from eating poisoned meat.
"Tell them to look at the dog!" cried Glen, pointing to the poor animal that had swallowed the very bit of meat he had snatched from the Indian, and which was evidently dying.
The sight was a powerful argument, worth more than all the words that could have been spoken.
The Indians sullenly returned to their fire and sat down, while our friends, casting many watchful glances over their shoulders as they went, made good their retreat in the direction of their own camp.
"What kind of Indians were they?" asked Glen, of the Mexican, when they had lost sight of their unpleasant acquaintances.
"Navajos," was the answer.
They were indeed a wretched band of the once wealthy and powerful tribe who claimed that whole country as a pasture-land for their countless flocks and herds. For many years they had been hunted and killed, their flocks driven off and their growing crops destroyed wherever found, until now the main body of the tribe was being slowly starved out of existence on a small reservation in Eastern New Mexico. It was so small that no more Indians could be crowded into it, and the miserable remnant, who still lurked in the fastnesses of their own country, despoiled of all means of procuring a livelihood, prowled about like so many hungry dogs, gleaning the offal from white men's camps, and hunted like wild beasts by all whom they were unfortunate enough to meet.
This band had probably followed Mr. Hobart's party for the sake of what might be picked up in their abandoned camps, and had evidently regarded the poisoned meat, discovered that very morning, as a perfect godsend.
"I reckon we'll have to manage somehow to get along without any wolves," said "Billy" Brackett.
"Yes," replied Glen, regretfully, "I suppose we shall."
Ten miles of line were run that day, through the solemn pine forest, and darkness overtook the party on the very summit of the great Continental Divide. They were crossing the Sierra Madre Mountains, through Zuñi Pass. As Glen subtracted the last reading of his rod for the day from the last height of instrument, and found that it gave an elevation of 7925 feet, he uttered a shout. For weeks the elevations above sea-level had been steadily mounting upward. This one was a foot lower than the last.
"Hurrah!" he cried, "we are on the Pacific Slope."
It was hard to realize that water, on one side of where they stood, would find its way into the Rio Grande, and so on into the Atlantic, while that but a few feet away would flow through the Colorado into the Pacific. The country did not look any different, but it seemed so. They actually seemed to be breathing the air of the mighty sunset ocean, and this one day's run seemed to place the States, and everything eastern, farther behind them than all the rest of their journey. About the camp-fires that evening the conversation was wholly of California and the golden West, and they sprang to their work the next day with an added zeal.
Fifty miles west of this point they came to Zuñi, one of the most picturesque and by far the most interesting of American towns. First, though, a few miles east of Zuñi, they halted beside the magnificent pile of El Moro, or Inscription Rock, that lifted its frowning battlements, like those of some vast Moorish castle, four hundred feet above the plain. Its base is covered, on all sides, with Indian hieroglyphics, Spanish inscriptions, and English names. Curiously, and almost reverently, our explorers bent down the brushwood near its left-hand corner, and searched until they found the most ancient inscription of all:
"Don Joseph de Basconzeles 1526."
There is nothing more, and this is the sole existing record of Don Joseph's having lived and explored this country while Cortez was still occupying the city of Mexico. Where he came from, who he was, what companions he had, and whither he went will never be known; but through all the centuries that have passed since he carved his name on El Moro's base, the great rock has faithfully preserved the record of his presence.
The next inscription was made nearly one hundred years later, and is a Spanish legend that is translated into, "Passed by this place with despatches, April 16, 1606." There is no name signed, and who passed by on that day can never be told. Then follows innumerable names of Spanish dons, captains, bishops, soldiers, and priests, with varying dates that come down as late as the beginning of the present century.
The first English inscription is, "O. R., March 19, 1836." Then came Whipple, in 1853, followed by many other American soldiers and gold-seekers. Now Glen Eddy and "Billy" Brackett added their names beneath those of the others of Mr. Hobart's party. Then they, too, passed on, leaving a new page of history to be preserved by El Moro for the eyes of future generations.
For some hours before reaching Zuñi they could see it crowning the hill that uplifts it conspicuously above the level of the surrounding plain. It was the "Cibola" of the earliest Spanish explorers, the chief of the seven "golden cities" that they believed to exist in that region, and whose alleged riches led them to undertake the conquest of the country. They called it "Cibola" until they reached it. Then they adopted the native name of Zuñi (pronounced _Zoon-ya_), by which it has been known ever since.
The town, or city, contained some twelve hundred inhabitants, and the hill on which it is built slopes gently up from the plain on one side, but falls away in a precipitous bluff to the narrow waters of the Zuñi River on the other.
"Billy" Brackett had read up on this ancient city of Cibola, and had imparted so much of his information to Glen as to arouse a curiosity in the boy's mind regarding the place fully equal to his own. So, as soon as they reached camp, which was on the plain at the foot of the hill, they hurried off to "do" the town.
Chapter XXXVI.
ZUÑI, THE HOME OF THE AZTECS.
As the leveller and his rodman ascended the slope on which Zuñi is built, they saw that the town reached entirely across it, and seemingly presented a blank wall of irregular heights, containing only two or three low arched openings. A ladder, here and there, reached from the ground to a flat terrace on top of the wall; but evidently the means of entering the place were few, and could readily be made less. Outside of the wall were long ranges of corrals, fenced with poles, set close together, and fixed firmly in the ground. These poles, which were of all lengths, and the tops of ladders projecting everywhere above the roofs of the town, gave the place a peculiarly ragged and novel appearance. Glen wondered at the height of the buildings, most of which were of five or six stories, and what the ladders were for.
Seeing no other way of gaining an entrance, they followed an Indian, who led a burro bearing an immense load of fagots on his back, into one of the dark arched passages through the wall. It was just wide enough to admit the laden donkey, and so low that, as they followed him, they were obliged to stoop to avoid striking their heads against its roof. It was so long that it evidently led beneath an entire block of houses.
Finally they emerged from its darkness into one of the most novel plazas, or squares, of the world. It was surrounded by buildings of several stories in height, but very few of them had any doors, while the tiny windows of the lower stories were placed high up, beyond a man's reach. On the flat roof of the lower house, or first story, a second house was built; but it was so much narrower than the first as to leave a broad walk on the roof in front of it. Above this second house rose a third, fourth, fifth, and often a sixth, each one narrower than the one beneath it, so that the whole looked like a gigantic flight of steps.
These houses were built either of adobe or of stone, plastered over with adobe mud; and nearly all those on the ground floor were entered, as Robinson Crusoe entered his castle, by climbing a ladder to the roof, and descending another that led down through a skylight. Thus, if an enemy should succeed in forcing his way through the narrow tunnel into the plaza, the people would merely retire to their house-tops, draw up their ladders, and he would find it as hard to get at them as ever.
The upper tiers of houses had doors opening on the roofs of those below them; but ladders were necessary to climb up from one terrace to another, so that they were everywhere the most prominent feature of the place.
There were but few of the inhabitants in the plaza, or in the narrow lanes leading from it to other open squares; but they swarmed on the flat house-tops, and gazed down on our friends as eagerly as the latter gazed up at them. Americans were curiosities to the people of Zuñi in those days.
"Hello!" exclaimed Glen, as they stood in the middle of the plaza, wondering which way they should go. "Here come some white fellows dressed up like Indians. I wonder who they can be?"
Sure enough, two young men, having white skins, blue eyes, and yellow hair, but wearing the leggings and striped blankets of Indians, entered the square as Glen spoke. He shouted to them, both in English and Mexican, but they only glanced at him in a startled manner, and then, hurriedly climbing the nearest ladder, they joined a group who were curiously inspecting Glen and his companion from a roof.
"Well! that is queer," said the former. "Who do you suppose those chaps are?"
"I shouldn't be a bit surprised if they were two of the white Indians I have read of," answered "Billy" Brackett; "and, if so, they are the greatest curiosities we'll see in this town."
"I never heard of them," said Glen. "Where did they come from?"
"That's more than I can tell, or anybody else. All we know is that the earliest Spaniards found a race of white people living among the Pueblo Indians, whom they describe as being exactly like these chaps grinning at us from that roof. In one respect they are a distinct race, as they have never been allowed to marry with the dark-skinned Indians; but in every other respect they are thorough Puebloes, and there is no tradition going back far enough to show that they were ever anything else. I believe that the race is nearly extinct, and that they are now so few in number as to be rarely seen."
In this "Billy" Brackett was correct; for at that time there were but three of those white Indians in Zuñi, two men and a woman.
Before leaving this remarkable town of curious people, Glen discovered that they kept eagles for pets, and were also very fond of snakes, especially rattlesnakes, which they did not hesitate to handle freely and even to hold in their mouths. He saw the entire population turn out on the flat roofs of their houses at daybreak, and, facing the east, patiently await the coming of Montezuma, whom they firmly believed would appear some morning in the place of the sun. He heard of, but was not allowed to see, the perpetual fire, lighted by Montezuma, that has been kept burning for ages by a family of priests, set apart and supported by the people for that particular purpose. He saw women grinding corn into fine white meal between two stones, and baking it into delicious thin cakes on another. He saw them weaving blankets, of sheep's wool, so fine that they will hold water for a whole day, and so strong that they will last a long lifetime. He ate some of the white dried peaches and other fruits that these Indians raise in such abundance and prepare with such skill. And what pleased him more than anything else was that, in exchange for two flour-sacks and a small piece of bacon, one of the Indians made him a fine buckskin shirt, very much adorned with fringes, that he wore all the rest of the winter.
It certainly was a most interesting place, and the whole party would gladly have lingered there longer than the three days that could be spared to it. But it was now November, and they must be beyond the San Francisco Mountains before the passes were blocked with heavy snows. So they bade good-bye to Zuñi and New Mexico, and, taking their way past Jacob's Well, where a fine spring bubbles up at the bottom of a funnel-shaped pit, six hundred feet across at the top, and a hundred and fifty feet deep, they entered the little-known region of Northern Arizona.
For three months they toiled through that wild country, as lost to the view and knowledge of white civilization as though they were running their line through Central Africa. Then they emerged on the bank of the mighty Colorado, and, looking across its turbid flood, saw the barren wastes of the Great Colorado Desert; but they gave a shout of joy at the sight, for, with all its dreariness of aspect, that was California, and beyond it lay the Pacific, the goal of their hopes.
The last three months had been filled with toil, hardships, and adventure. Although in that time they saw no white men, nor men of any kind beyond catching occasional glimpses of the stealthy Apaches, who hung on their trail for weeks, and with whom they exchanged more than one rifle-shot, they were never without evidences that this whole vast country had once been occupied by a mighty people. Hardly a day passed that Glen did not hold his rod on the ruined foundation-wall of some huge structure of long ago, or stumble over heaps of broken pottery graceful in form and design, or gaze wonderingly at the stone houses of ancient cliff-dwellers perched on ledges now inaccessible, or walk in the dry beds of crumbling aqueducts, or select choice specimens from piles of warlike implements fashioned from shining crystal or milk-white quartz, or, in some way, have his attention called to the fact that he was traversing a country in which had dwelt millions of his kind, who had long since passed away and been forgotten. He had puzzled over miles of hieroglyphic inscriptions and rude pictures, drawn on the smooth black walls of rugged cañons, and learned from them fragmentary tales of ancient battles or of encounters with savage beasts.
Then, too, he had known hunger and thirst and bitter cold. His Christmas dinner, eaten during a short pause from work on the line, had been a bit of spoiled bacon and a couple of wormy hard-tack, with which, in honor of the day, he had his full share of "Billy" Brackett's treasured cheese, brought out at last to grace this feast. Not only were their provisions nearly exhausted at that time, but it was the fifth day on which they had been unable to wash, for want of water. Two weeks before, a wagon had been sent to the mining-camp of Prescott, nearly a hundred miles away, and they had nearly given up all hopes of its safe return. That night it came into camp, and that night, too, they found a number of rock cisterns full of water. In the darkness of that same evening, while hastening from the pool in which he had been bathing, to get his share of the Christmas supper, poor Glen had run plump into a gigantic cactus, and filled his body with its tiny, barbed thorns. Altogether it was a memorable Christmas, and one he will never forget.
On the last night of December they built a gigantic bonfire of whole trees, and welcomed in the new year by the light of its leaping flames.
They had passed through vast tracts of wonderful fertility and beauty, unknown to white men, and through regions abounding in game that they had no time to hunt. From the summit of the Aztec Pass they had gazed, with dismay, over the boundless expanse of the Black Forest, and then had plunged into its dark depths. They had threaded their way through labyrinths of precipitous cañons, the walls of which rose thousands of feet above their heads, and had known of others still more tremendous.
They had waded through the snows of the San Francisco Mountains, and revelled in the warmth and beauty of the superb Val de Chino, where snow and ice are unknown. They had dodged the crashing boulders hurled down on them in Union Pass by the Hualapi Indians, posted on the inaccessible heights far above them. Here they had lost a wagon, crushed to splinters by one of these masses of rock; but no lives had been sacrificed, and their number was still the same as when they left the Rio Grande. Now they were on the bank of the Colorado, with only one desert and one range of mountains yet to cross. These seemed so little, after all they had gone through; and yet that desert alone was two hundred and fifty miles wide. Two hundred and fifty miles of sand, sage-brush, and alkali; the most barren region of country within the limits of the United States. If they could have looked ahead and seen what the crossing of that desert meant, they would have entered upon the undertaking with heavy hearts and but faint hopes of accomplishing it. How fortunate it is that we cannot look ahead and see the trials that await us. We would never dare face them if they should all appear to us at once; while, by meeting them singly, and attacking them one by one, they are overcome with comparative ease.
But neither Glen nor his companions were thinking of the trials ahead of them as they came in sight of the Colorado River. They were only thinking of those left behind, and what a glorious thing it was to have got thus far along in their tremendous journey. The transit-party had run their line to the river's bank and gone to camp a mile or so below, when the levellers came up, and Glen held his rod, for a final reading, at the water's edge.
He had just noted the figures in his book, and waved an "All right" to "Billy" Brackett, when he was startled by a rush of hoofs and a joyous shout. The next instant a horse was reined sharply up beside him, while its rider was wringing his hand and uttering almost incoherent words of extravagant joy at once more seeing him.
Chapter XXXVII.
A PRACTICAL USE OF TRIGONOMETRY.
It was Binney Gibbs who had come up the river from Fort Yuma several days before, with General Elting, to meet the second division, and guide them to "The Needles," the point at which the line was to cross the Colorado. The other divisions, which had followed the Gila route, and crossed the Colorado at Fort Yuma, where the desert was narrower, had reached the Pacific ere this, and gone on to San Francisco. The hardest task of all, that of running a line over the desert where it was two hundred and fifty miles wide, had been reserved for Mr. Hobart's men, who had proved themselves so capable of enduring and overcoming hardships.
Binney had waited impatiently in camp until the transit-party reached it, expecting to see Glen ride in at its head with the front flag. Then he had borrowed a horse, and set forth to find the boy whom he had once considered his rival, but whom he now regarded as one of his best friends.
After the first exchange of greetings, they stood and looked at each other curiously. Glen's hair hung on his shoulders, and the braid that bound the brim of his sombrero was worn to a picturesque fringe, matching that of his buckskin shirt. He was broader and browner than ever; and though his face was still smooth and boyish, these last three months had stamped it with a look of resolute energy that Binney noticed at once.
He, too, was brown, though not nearly so tanned as Glen, in spite of the burning suns of the Gila Valley; for his work had kept him under cover as much as Glen's had kept him in the open air. As General Elting's secretary, Binney had spent most of his time in the ambulance, that, fitted up with writing-desk and table, was the chief-engineer's field-office, or in temporary offices established in tents or houses wherever they had halted for more than a day at a time. He had evidently met with barbers along the comparatively well-travelled Gila; while, as compared with Glen's picturesquely ragged costume, his was that of respectable civilization. Although he, too, was the picture of health, his frame lacked the breadth and fulness of Glen's, and it was evident at a glance that, in the matter of physical strength, he was even more greatly the other's inferior than when they left Brimfield.
Glen could not help noting this with a feeling of secret satisfaction; but, as they rode towards camp together, and Binney described his winter's experiences, Glen began to regard him with vastly increased respect. He thought he had studied hard, and done well to master the mysteries of adjusting and running a level, perfecting himself as a rodman, and learning to plot profile; but his knowledge appeared insignificant as compared with that which Binney had picked up and stored away. Not only had he learned to speak Spanish fluently, but he had become enough of a geologist to talk understandingly of coal-seams and ore-beds. He had the whole history of the country through which he had passed, from the date of its Spanish discovery, at his tongue's end. He spoke familiarly of the notable men to whom, at General Elting's dictation, he had written letters, and altogether he appeared to be a self-possessed, well-informed young man of the world.
Poor Glen was beginning to feel very boyish and quite abashed in the presence of so much wisdom, and to wonder if he had not been wasting his opportunities on this trip as he had those of school. His thoughts were inclining towards a decidedly unpleasant turn, when they were suddenly set right again by Binney, who exclaimed, "But, I say, old man, what a fine thing you fellows have done this winter! The general declares that you have made one of the most notable surveys on record; and it's a thing every one of you ought to be proud of. You should have heard him congratulate Mr. Hobart. He asked at once about you, too, and wants to see you as soon as you get in. He seems to take a great interest in you, and has spoken of you several times. I expect, if you choose to keep on in this business, you can always be sure of a job through him. He seems to think it queer that you should be a year older than I am; but I told him it was certainly so, because I knew just when your birthday came."
Glen was on the point of saying that, if Binney knew that, it was more than he did, but something thing kept him silent. He hated to acknowledge that he knew nothing of his real birthday, nor how old he really was, but he wondered if he could truly be a year older than this wise young secretary.
At this point the conversation was interrupted by their arrival at camp, and by General Elting stepping from his tent to give Glen a hearty handshake as he exclaimed,
"My dear boy, I am delighted and thankful to see you again. I tried to persuade our friend Mr. Hobart, when I last saw him at Santa Fé, that, in spite of your performance on that railroad ride you and I took together last summer, you were too young to make the trip I had laid out for him. He said he didn't know anything about your age, but that you were certainly strong and plucky enough for the trip. I made him promise, though, to try and induce you to go back from Isletta; but he doesn't seem to have succeeded."
"No, sir," laughed Glen, "and I'm awfully glad he didn't, for it's been the most glorious kind of a trip, and I have enjoyed every minute of it."
"I am glad, too, now that it is all over; but I must tell you that, if I had not been assured that you were a whole year older than my young secretary here, I should have insisted on your going back, for I considered it too hard and dangerous a trip for a boy so young as I had supposed you to be until then."
Here was another good reason why Glen was glad he had remained silent on the subject of his birthday.
"Now what do you think of running a line across the desert ahead of us?" continued the chief-engineer; "are you as anxious to undertake that as you were to cross Arizona?"
"Yes, indeed, I am, sir," replied Glen, earnestly. "I am anxious to go wherever the second division goes; and if anybody can get a line across that desert, I know we can."
"I believe you can," said the chief, smiling at the boy's enthusiasm, "and I am going along to see how you do it."
The Colorado was so broad, deep, and swift that Glen wondered how they were going to measure across it, and had a vague idea that it could be done by stretching a long rope from bank to bank. He asked "Billy" Brackett; and when the leveller answered, "By triangulation, of course," Glen showed, by his puzzled expression, that he was as much in the dark as ever.
"You have studied geometry and trigonometry, haven't you?" asked the leveller.
Glen was obliged to confess that, as he had not been able to see the use of those studies, he had not paid much attention to them.
"Well, then, perhaps you'll have a better opinion of old Euclid when you see the practical use we'll put him to to-morrow," laughed "Billy" Brackett.
Glen did see, the next day, and wondered at the simplicity of the operation. The front flag was sent across the river in a boat, and on the opposite side he drove a stake. While he was thus engaged, a line a quarter of a mile long was measured on the bank where the rest of the party still remained, and a stake was driven at each end of it. The transit was set up over one of these stakes, and its telescope was pointed first at the other and then at the one across the river, by which means the angle where it stood was taken. It was then set over the stake at the other end of the measured line, and that angle was also taken. Then Mr. Hobart drew, on a leaf of his transit-book, a triangle, of which the base represented the line measured between the two stakes on his side of the river, and one side represented the distance across the river that he wished to find. He thus had one side and two angles of a triangle given to find one of the other two sides, and he solved the problem as easily as any boy or girl of the trigonometry-class can whose time in school has not been wasted as Glen Eddy's was.
It was a simple operation, and one easily performed, but it involved a knowledge of the four fundamental rules of arithmetic, of proportion, or the rule of three, of geometry, of trigonometry, and of how to use a surveyor's transit; all of which, except the last, are included in the regular course of studies of every boy and girl in America who receives a common-school education.
Glen had also been sent across the river, where he held his rod so high up on the bank that the cross hair in the telescope of the level cut just one tenth of an inch above its bottom. Then, when "Billy" Brackett came over, and went on beyond Glen, he set the level up so high on the bank that, through it, he could just see the top of the rod, extended to its extreme length. So they climbed slowly up out of the Colorado Valley, and began to traverse the dreary country that lay between it and the Sierra Nevada.
For the first hundred miles or so they got along very well, so far as water was concerned, though the mules and horses speedily began to grow thin and weak for want of food. The patches of grass were very few and far between, and the rations of corn exceedingly small; for in that country corn was worth its weight in gold, and scarce at that.
Chapter XXXVIII.
DYING OF THIRST IN THE DESERT.
Matters were bad enough by the time Mr. Hobart's party reached Camp Cady, nearly half way across the desert; but, from there on, they became much worse. The line could no longer follow the winding government trail, but must be run straight for the distant mountains, that were now plainly to be seen.
This experience vividly recalled that of the preceding summer, when they were crossing the Plains towards the Rocky Mountains, and longing so eagerly to reach them. But this was infinitely worse than that. There they generally found water that was sweet and fit to drink, and always had plenty of grass for their stock. Here they rarely found water, and when they did it was nearly always so strongly impregnated with salt, soda, and alkali as to be unfit to drink. Here, too, instead of grass, they found only sand, sage brush, greasewood, and cacti. To be sure the greasewood was a comfort, because it burned just as readily green as dry, and in certain of the cacti, round ones covered with long curved spines, they could nearly always find a mouthful of water, but none of these things afforded any nourishment for the hungry animals. They became so ravenous that they gnawed off one another's manes and tails, chewed up the wagon covers, and every other piece of cloth they could get hold of. Then they began to die so fast from starvation and exhaustion that some dead ones were left behind with every camp, and each day the number was increased.
At nearly every camp, too, a wagon was abandoned, and for miles they could look back and see its white cover, looming above the dreary expanse of sand and sage, like a monument to the faithful animals that had fallen beside it. At length but one wagon and the two ambulances were left. Tents, baggage, clothing, all the bedding except one blanket apiece, and the greater part of their provisions, had been thrown away, or left in the abandoned wagons. Within forty miles of the mountains they gave up work on the line. The men had no longer the strength to drag the chain or carry the instruments. They still noted their course by compass, and the height of various elevations as they crossed them, by the barometer. They were even able to measure the distance from one sad camping-place to another, by means of the odometer, an instrument that, attached to a wagon-wheel, records the number of revolutions made by it. This number, multiplied by the circumference of the wheel, gave them the distance in feet and inches. Everybody was now on foot, even the chief's saddle-horse, Señor, and Glen's Nettle being harnessed to one of the ambulances.
At last, when the mountains appeared tantalizingly near, but when they were still nearly twenty miles away, it seemed as though the end had come. For two days neither men nor animals had tasted a drop of water. At the close of the second day, a slight elevation had disclosed a lake lying at their feet, glowing in the red beams of the setting sun. With feeble strength they had rushed to it, and flung themselves into its tempting waters. They were as salt as brine, and, with this bitter disappointment, came despair. They lighted fires and made coffee with the brackish water that oozed into holes dug in the salt-encrusted sand, but it sickened them, and they could not drink it.
Their lips were cracked, their tongues swollen, their throats like dry leather, and their voices were hardly more than husky whispers.
As the moon rose that evening, and poured its cold light on the outstretched forms grouped about the solitary, white-sheeted wagon, a hand was laid on Glen's shoulder, and the chief's voice bade the boy rise and follow him. Leading the way to the ambulance in which Binney Gibbs slept the sleep of utter exhaustion and despair, and to which the horses Señor and Nettle were fastened, the general said,
"There is but one hope left for us, Matherson. It is certain that some of the party have not strength enough to carry them to the mountains, and equally so that, without water, the teams can never reach there. In the valleys of these mountains are streams, and on these streams are ranches. If we can get word to one of these, the entire party may yet be saved. I am going to try and ride there to-night, and I want you to come with me. Our horses, and yours in particular, are the freshest of all the animals. I have told Mr. Hobart; but there is no need of rousing any of the others to a sense of their misery. Will you make the attempt with me?"
Of course the boy would go; and, for a moment, he almost forgot his sufferings, in a feeling of pride that he should be selected for such an undertaking.
A minute later they rode slowly away, and the desert sands so muffled the sound of their horses' hoofs that their departure was not noted by those whom they left.
With fresh, strong animals, and without that terrible choking thirst, that night ride over the moonlight plain would have been a rare pleasure. Under the circumstances it was like a frightful dream. Neither of the riders cared to talk; the effort was too painful; but both thought of the last ride they had taken together in the cab of a locomotive on a Missouri railroad, and the man looked tenderly at the boy, as he recalled the incidents of that night. For an hour they rode in silence, their panting steeds maintaining a shambling gait through the sand, that was neither a trot nor a lope, but a mixture of the two. Then they dropped into a walk, and, for another hour, were only roused to greater speed by infinite exertions on the part of their riders. At last Señor stumbled heavily, recovered himself, and then fell.
"There is no use trying to get him up again," said the chief. "I'm afraid the poor old horse is done for; but you must ride on, and I will follow on foot. Head for that dark space. It marks a valley. I shall not be far behind you. If you find water, fire your pistol. The sound will give me new strength. Good-bye, and may God prosper you."
[Illustration: "'HEAD FOR THAT DARK SPACE. IT MARKS A VALLEY.... IF YOU FIND WATER, FIRE YOUR PISTOL.'"]
"But I hate to leave you, sir."
"Never mind me; hurry on. A moment wasted now may be at the price of a life."
So Glen went on alone, trying, in husky tones, to encourage his brave little mare, and urge her to renewed efforts. She seemed to realize that this was a struggle for life, and responded nobly. She even broke into a lope, as the ground became harder. The sand was disappearing. Water might be nearer than they thought.
Five miles farther Nettle carried her rider, and then she staggered beneath his weight. She could not bear him a rod farther, and he knew it. A choking sob rose in the boy's parched throat as he dismounted and left her standing there, the plucky steed that had brought him so far and so faithfully; but he could not stay with her, he must go on. He could see the opening to the valley plainly now, though it was still some miles away; and, summoning all his strength, he walked towards it.
At half the distance he was skirting a foot-hill, when down its gravelly side, directly towards him, rushed two animals, like great dogs. They were mountain-wolves at play, one chasing the other, and they came on, apparently without seeing him. When, with a hoarse cry, he attracted their attention, they stopped, and, sitting on their haunches, not more than a couple of rods away, gazed at him curiously.
He dared not fire at them, for fear of only wounding one and thus arousing their fury. Nor did he wish to raise false hopes in the mind of General Elting, who might hear the shot and think it meant water.
Some one had told him of the cowardice of wolves. He would try it. Picking up a stone, he flung it at them, at the same time running forward, brandishing his arms, and giving a feeble shout. They sprang aside, hesitated a moment, and then turned tail and fled.
Soon afterwards Glen reached the valley, which was apparently about half a mile broad. On its farther side was a line of shadow blacker than the rest. It might be timber. With tottering footsteps the boy staggered towards it. As his feet touched a patch of grass he could have knelt and kissed it, but at the same instant he heard the most blessed sound on earth, the trickling of a rivulet. He fell as he reached it, and plunged his head into the life-giving water. It was warm and strongly impregnated with sulphur; but never had he tasted anything so delicious, nor will he ever again.
Had it been cold water, the amount that he drank might have killed him; as it was, it only made him sick. After a while he recovered, and then how he gloated in that tiny stream. How he bathed his hands and face, and, suddenly, how he wished the others were there with him. Perhaps a shot might bear the joyful news to the ears of the general.
With the thought he drew his revolver, and roused the mountain echoes with its six shots, fired in quick succession. Then he tried to walk up the valley in the hope of finding a ranch. It was all he could do to keep on his feet, and only a mighty effort of will restrained him from flinging himself down on the grass and going to sleep beside that stream of blessed water.
A few minutes later there came a quick rush of hoofs from up the valley, and in the moonlight he saw two horsemen galloping towards him. They dashed up with hurried questions as to the firing they had heard, and, somehow, he managed to make them understand that a party of white men were dying of thirst twenty miles out on the desert.
The next thing he knew, he was in a house, and dropping into a sleep of such utter weariness that to do anything else would have been beyond his utmost power of mind or body.
Chapter XXXIX.
CROSSING THE SIERRA NEVADA.
When Glen next woke to a realizing sense of his surroundings, the evening shadows had again fallen, and he heard familiar voices near by him. All were there, General Elting, Mr. Hobart, "Billy" Brackett, Binney Gibbs, and the rest, just sitting down to a supper at the hospitable ranch table. It was laden with fresh beef, soft bread, butter, eggs, milk, boiled cabbage, and tea, all of them luxuries that they had not tasted for months. And they had plates, cups and saucers, spoons, knives, and forks. Glen wondered if he should know how to use them; but he did not wonder if he were hungry. Nor did he wait for an invitation to join that supper-party.
He was dirty and ragged and unkempt as he entered the room in which his comrades were assembled; but what did they care? He was the one who had found help and sent it to them in the time of their sore need. Some of them owed their lives to him, perhaps all of them did. Every man in the room stood up, as the chief took him by the hand and led him to the head of the table, saying,
"Here he is, gentlemen. Here is the lad who saved the second division. Some of us might have got through without his help; others certainly would not. Right here I wish to thank him, and to thank God for the strength, pluck, and powers of endurance with which this boy, to whom we owe so much, is endowed."
And Glen! How did he take all this praise? Why, he was so hungry, and his eyes were fixed so eagerly on the table full of good things spread before him that he hardly knew what the general was talking about. If they would only let him sit down and eat, and drink some of that delicious-looking water! He came very near interrupting the proceedings by doing so. At length, to his great relief, they all sat down, and in a moment Glen was eating and drinking in a manner only possible to a hearty boy who has gone without water and almost without food for two days.
A little later, seated before a glorious camp-fire of oak logs outside the ranch, Glen learned how the two ranchmen, after getting him to the house, had loaded a wagon with barrels of water and gone out on the desert. They first found General Elting, nearly exhausted, but still walking, within a couple of miles of the valley, and afterwards discovered the rest of the party dragging themselves falteringly along beside one of the ambulances, which, with the notes and maps of the expedition, was the only thing they had attempted to bring in.
And Nettle! Oh, yes; the brave little mare was also found, revived, and brought in to the ranch. She needed a long rest; and both for her sake and as a token of his gratitude, Glen presented her to one of the ranchmen. The settlers went out that same night after the other ambulance and the wagon, abandoned on the shore of the salt lake. When they returned, General Elting traded his big, nearly exhausted army mules for their wiry little bronchos, giving two for one, and thus securing fresh teams to haul all that remained of his wagon-train to the coast.
The party spent three days in recruiting at this kindly ranch, to which they will always look back with grateful hearts, and think of as one of the most beautiful spots on earth. Then, strengthened and refreshed, they passed on up the valley, which proved to be that of the Tehachapa, the very pass towards which they had directed their course from the moment of leaving the Colorado.
How beautiful seemed its oak-groves, its meadows, its abounding springs of cool, sweet water, and its clear, bracing air! How they ate and slept and worked and enjoyed living! What grand camp-fires they had, and how much merriment circulated about them! And had they not cause for rejoicing? Had they not toiled across half the width of a continent? Had they not traversed vast plains and mountain-ranges and deserts? Had they not encountered savage men and savage beasts? Had they not suffered from hunger, thirst, cold, and hardships of all kinds? Had they not conquered and triumphed over all these? Were they not left far behind, and was not the journey's end in sight? No wonder they were light-hearted and excited, and no wonder they seemed to inhale champagne with every breath of that mountain air!
General Elting left them at the summit of the pass, and, taking Binney Gibbs with him in his private ambulance, hastened on to Los Angeles to make arrangements for the transportation of the party, by steamer, up the coast to San Francisco; for there were no railroads in California in those days.
The rest of the engineers travelled leisurely down the western slope of the Sierras into a region that became more charming with each mile of progress. It was spring-time. The rainy season was drawing to its close, and the Golden State was at its best. The air was filled with the sweet scents of innumerable flowers, the song of birds, and the music of rushing waters. The bay-trees wore their new spring robes of vivid green, from which the soft winds shook out delightfully spicy odors. The trunks of the manzanitas glowed beneath their wine-red skins, while the madronos were clad in glossy, fawn-colored satins. To the toil-worn explorers, just off the alkaline sands of the parched and verdureless desert, the old mission of San Gabriel, nestled at the base of the western foot-hills, seemed the very garden-spot of the world. Here were groves of oranges, lemons, limes, pomegranates, and olives. Here were roses and jasmines. Here were heliotrope and fuchsias, grown to be trees, and a bewildering profusion of climbing vines and flowering shrubs, of which they knew not the names.
But they recognized the oranges, though none of them had ever seen one growing before; and, with a shout of joy, the entire party rushed into the grove, where the trees were laden at once with the luscious fruit and perfumed blossoms. There was no pause to discuss the proper method of peeling an orange in this case, for they did not stop to peel them at all. They just ate them, skin and all, like so many apples. It was such a treat as they had never enjoyed before, and they made the most of it.
Not long after leaving San Gabriel, as they were making a night march towards Los Angeles, Glen suddenly became aware of a strange humming sound above his head; and, looking up, saw a telegraph wire. With a glad shout he announced its presence. It was the most civilized thing they had seen since leaving Kansas.
At Los Angeles they could not make up their minds to endure the close, dark rooms of the Fonda, and so camped out for the night in the government corral beside their wagon.
The following day they made their last march over twenty miles of level prairie, dotted with flocks and herds, to San Pedro, on the coast. It was late in the afternoon, and the sun was setting, when, from a slight eminence, they caught their first glimpse of the gold-tinted Pacific waters. For a moment they gazed in silence, with hearts too full for words. Then everybody shook hands with the one nearest to him, and more than one tear of joyful emotion trickled down the bronzed and weather-beaten cheeks of the explorers. As for Glen Eddy, he never expects to be so thrilled again as he was by the sight of that mighty ocean gleaming in the red light of the setting sun, and marking the end of the most notable journey of his life.
That night they made their last camp, and gathered about their final camp-fire. Glen and "Billy" Brackett had shared their blankets ever since leaving the Rio Grande, and had hardly slept, even beneath a canvas roof, in all those months. Now, as they lay together for the last time, on their bed of grassy turf, which is of all beds the one that brings the sweetest and soundest sleep, and gazed at the stars that had kept faithful watch above them for so long, they talked in low tones until a gentle sea-breeze set in and they were lulled to sleep by the murmur of distant breakers, a music now heard by both of them for the first time in their lives.
The next day they turned over their sole remaining wagon and their ambulance to a government quartermaster. Then, having no baggage, they were ready, without further preparation, to embark on the steamer _Orizaba_ for San Francisco, to which place General Elting and Binney Gibbs had gone on, by stage, from Los Angeles, some days before.
As the great ship entered the Golden Gate and steamed up the bay, past Tamalpias, past the Presidio, past Alcatraz Island, and into the harbor of San Francisco, Glen Eddy found it hard to realize that it was all true, and that this young explorer, who was about to set foot in the city of his most romantic day dreams, was really the boy who had started from Brimfield ten months before, without an idea of what was before him.
Chapter XL.
A HOME AND TWO FATHERS.
Of course they all went to the Occidental, for everybody went first to the Occidental in those days. As they drove through the city, in open carriages, their long hair, buckskin shirts, rags, in some cases soleless and toeless boots, and generally wild and disreputable appearance attracted much amused attention from the well-dressed shoppers of Montgomery Street; and, when they trooped into the marble rotunda of the great hotel, they excited the universal curiosity of its other and more civilized guests.
But they did not mind--they enjoyed the sensation they were creating; and Glen, who was one of the wildest-looking of them all, rather pitied Binney Gibbs on account of the fine clothing he had already assumed, as the two met and exchanged hearty greetings once more.
"Come up into my room, Glen," said Binney, eagerly, "I've got a lot of Brimfield news, and there's a pile of letters for you besides. Only think, Lame Wolf is playing short-stop on the ball nine, and they say he's going to make one of the best players they've ever had."
The last news Glen had received from home was in the letters Mr. Hobart had brought from Santa Fé nearly five months before. He had learned then of Lame Wolf's safe arrival at Brimfield, and of his beginning to study English; but now to hear of his being on the ball nine! That was making progress; and the boy felt very proud of his young Indian. But there was more startling news than that awaiting him. In one of the letters from his adopted father, which, though it bore the latest date, had already been waiting in San Francisco more than a month, he read, with amazement, the following paragraphs:
"I have just received a note from a lady who writes that she met a gentleman in New Mexico who told her all about you. She was intensely interested, because she thinks she knew your mother, and travelled with her and you on the day the train was wrecked in Glen Eddy creek, when you and I were the only survivors. She also says that the mother with whom she travelled said her baby was just a year old, and that day was his birthday. So, my dear boy, if it should happen that you and the baby she mentions are the same, you are a year younger than we have always thought you, and are just the age of Binney Gibbs. In conclusion, the lady writes that she believes your real father to be still alive, and she thinks she knows his name, but prefers not to mention it until she hears from me all that I know of your history. I, of course, wrote to her at once, and am anxiously expecting an answer. I never loved you more than now, and to give you up will well-nigh break my heart; but, if there is anything better in store for you than I can offer, I would be the last one to stand in the way of your accepting it.
"Now, my dear boy, come home as soon as you can, and perhaps you will find two fathers awaiting you instead of one. We are full of anxiety concerning you. Be sure and telegraph the moment you arrive in San Francisco."
Over and over did Glen read this letter before he could control himself sufficiently to speak. Binney Gibbs noticed his agitation, and finally said,
"No bad news, I hope, old man?"
For answer the boy handed him the letter, which Binney read with ever-growing excitement. When he finished he exclaimed, "It's wonderful, Glen, and I do hope it will come out all right. I always felt sorry for you at not knowing who you were, even when I was so meanly jealous of you for being stronger and more popular than I, and now I congratulate you from the bottom of my heart. What a lucky thing it has been though, over and over again, not only for you, but for me, and the whole second division, that you were stronger than I!" he added, with a hearty sincerity that he would not have exhibited a year before. "I tell you what, this trip has opened my eyes to some things, and one of them is that a fellow's body needs just as much training as his mind."
"It has opened mine too," said Glen, earnestly. "It has taught me that, no matter how strong a fellow is, he can't expect to amount to much in this world unless he knows something, and that he can't know much unless he learns it by hard study. If ever I get a chance to go to school again, you better believe I'll know how to value it."
"And if I ever get another chance to learn how to swim, you may be sure I won't throw it away in a hurry," laughed Binney.
"Only see what a splendid fellow 'Billy' Brackett is," continued Glen, "just because he has trained his muscle and his brain at the same time, without letting either get ahead of the other. And, speaking of 'Billy' Brackett, I must go and show him this letter, because he is one of the best friends I have got in the world, and I know he'll be glad to hear anything that pleases me."
First, Glen stopped at the telegraph office in the hotel, and sent the following despatch to Brimfield.
"Just arrived, safe and sound. Start for home first steamer," for which he paid eight dollars in gold.
Then he went to "Billy" Brackett's room, where he found that young engineer struggling with a new coat that had just been sent in from a tailor's, and lamenting, more than ever, the loss of his shiny but well-loved old cutaway that had been eaten by one of the hungry mules on the desert.
He was as interested as Glen knew he would be in the letter, and as he finished it he exclaimed:
"Well, you are in luck, my boy, and I'm glad of it! Here I am, without a father to my name, while you seem likely to have two. Well, you deserve a dozen; and if you had 'em, each one would be prouder of you than the other."
After a week spent in San Francisco, during which time the barber, tailor, and various outfitters made a marvellous change in Glen's personal appearance, he, together with General Elting and Binney Gibbs, boarded one of the great Pacific Mail Steamships for Panama. Mr. Hobart, "Billy" Brackett, and the other members of the second division, had decided to remain for a while on that coast, and most of them had already accepted positions on some of the various engineering works then in progress in California; but they were all at the steamer to see the homeward-bound travellers off. As the great wheels were set in motion, and the stately ship moved slowly from the wharf, the quieter spectators were startled by the tremendous farewell cheer that arose from the "campmates" who remained behind; and the cries of "good-bye, general! we'll be on hand whenever you want us again! Good-bye, Grip! Good-bye, Glen, old man! We won't forget the desert in a hurry! Good-bye!"
The run down the coast was a smooth and pleasant one; while the several Mexican and Central American ports at which they touched were full of interest and delightful novelty to the Brimfield boys. They thoroughly enjoyed crossing the Isthmus, and would gladly have lingered longer amid its wonderful tropic scenery. Not until they were on the Atlantic, however, and steaming northward, did they realize that they were fairly on their way home.
One day, as the two boys were sitting on deck, in company with General Elting, gazing at the coast of Cuba, which they were then passing, Binney Gibbs broke a long silence with the remark, "Doesn't it seem queer, Glen, to think that when you get home you will be just the age you were when you left it, and perhaps your name won't be 'Glen Eddy' after all?"
General Elting had not heard of Glen's letter from his adopted father, nor had he ever heard him called "Glen Eddy" before; and now he asked Binney what he meant by such a curious speech.
When it was explained, he sat silent for several minutes, looking at Glen with such a peculiar expression that the boy grew uneasy beneath the fixed gaze. Then, without a word, he rose and walked away, nor did they see him again for several hours. He talked much with Glen during the remainder of the voyage, and frequently puzzled him by his questions, and the interest he manifested in everything relating to his past life.
As he was going to St. Louis, he took the same train with the boys from New York; and, though he bade them good-bye as they neared Brimfield, he said that he hoped and expected to see them again very shortly.
How natural the place looked as the train rolled up to the little station, and how impossible it was to realize that they had crossed the continent and sailed on two oceans since leaving it!
"There's father!" shouted Glen and Binney at the same instant.
"And there are all the boys! Who is that dark, good-looking chap with them? It can't be Lame Wolf! But it is, though! Did you ever see such a change for the better? Bully for Lame Wolf!"
"Hurrah for Glen Eddy! Hurrah for Binney Gibbs!" shouted the Brimfield boys, wild with the excitement of welcoming home two such heroes as the young explorers were in their eyes. The very first to grasp Glen's hand was the Indian lad, and he said in good English, though with a Cheyenne accent, "How Glen! Lem Wolf is very glad. Lem Wolf is short-stop now. He can play ball."
Binney Gibbs disappeared in his father's carriage; but Glen walked from the station with his adopted father, and everybody wanted to shake hands with him, and ask him questions, and throng about him, so that it seemed as though they never would reach home.
It was a happy home-coming, and Glen was touched by the interest and the kindly feeling manifested towards him; but how he did long to reach the house, and be alone for a minute with Mr. Matherson. There was one question that he was so eager, and yet almost afraid, to ask. Had his own father been discovered? But he could not ask it before all those people, nor did he have an opportunity for a full hour after they reached the house. Some of the neighbors were there, and they had to have supper, and everything seemed to interfere to postpone that quiet talk for which he was so anxious.
At length he could wait no longer, and, almost dragging Mr. Matherson into the little front parlor, he closed the door and said breathlessly, "Now tell me, father; tell me quick! Is he alive? Have you found him?"
"Yes, my boy, he is alive, or was a few months ago, and I think we can find him. In fact, I believe you know him very well, and could tell me where to find him better than I can tell you."
"What do you mean?" cried Glen. "Oh, tell me quick! What is his name?"
There was so much confusion outside that they did not notice the opening of the front gate, nor the strange step on the walk. As Mr. Matherson was about to reply to the boy's eager question, the parlor door opened, and one of the children entered, with a card in her hand, saying, "Somebody wants to see you, papa."
As Mr. Matherson glanced at the card he sprang to his feet, trembling with excitement.
"Gerald Elting!" he cried. "Why, Glen, that is the name of your own father!"
"And here is his own father, eager to claim his son," came from the open doorway, in the manly tones that Glen had long since learned to love.
The next moment the man's arms were about the boy's neck, as, in a voice trembling with long-suppressed emotion, he cried,
"Oh, my son, my son! Have I found you after all these years? Now is my long sorrow indeed turned to joy."
THE END.
Books by KIRK MUNROE

= = = PG36241 = = =
CANADIAN FAIRY TALES
Produced by David Edwards, Josephine Paolucci and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net. (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive.)
CANADIAN FAIRY TALES
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
CANADIAN WONDER TALES With Illustrations in Colour by GEORGE SHERINGHAM and a Foreword by Sir WILLIAM PETERSON.               Crown 4to.
McGILL AND ITS STORY, 1821-1921 Illustrated.                                          Demy 8vo.
THE BODLEY HEAD
*       *       *       *       *
[Illustration: AND MANY OTHERS CAME, BUT THEY MET THE SAME FATE]
CANADIAN FAIRY TALES
BY CYRUS MACMILLAN
With Illustrations by MARCIA LANE FOSTER
And an Introduction by JOHN GRIER HIBBEN
[Illustration]
TORONTO: S. B. GUNDY LONDON: JOHN LANE THE BODLEY HEAD LTD
FIRST PUBLISHED IN 1922
_Printed in Great Britain by_ Butler & Tanner, _Frome and London_
*       *       *       *       *
TO
THE MEMORY
OF
MY FATHER
DESCENDANT OF CANADIAN PIONEERS WHO UPHELD THE OLD TRADITIONS AND USED THE ANCIENT SPEECH.
INTRODUCTION
Professor Macmillan has placed all lovers of fairy tales under a deep debt of obligation to him. The fairy tale makes a universal appeal both to old and young; to the young because it is the natural world in which their fancy delights to range, and to the old because they are conscious again of the spirit of youth as they read such tales to their children and grandchildren over and over again, and rejoice in the illusion that after all there is not a great difference of age which separates the generations.
The fairy tale makes this universal appeal because it deals with the elemental in our natures that is the same in every age and in every race. In the Canadian Tales which Professor Macmillan has so admirably gathered from Indian sources, we find the same types of character and scenes of adventure that we do in the tales of the German forests, of Scandinavia, England or France.
There is in us all an instinctive admiration for the adventurous spirit of the fairy tale which challenges the might that is cruel and devastating, and for the good offices of the fairies which help to vindicate the cause of the noble in its conflict with the ignoble, right with wrong.
The origin of the fairy tale is to be traced always to the early stages of civilization, and it is very gratifying to be assured from time to time that man possesses certain natural impulses which spring from an inherent sense of honour, and the desire to redress the wrongs of the world.
Professor Macmillan has been successful in presenting the Indian folk-lore in a most engaging manner. The stories have all the delightful charm and mystery of the Canadian forests; they have penetrated into the heart of nature, but also into the heart of man.
JOHN GRIER HIBBEN.
PREFACE
The tales in this collection, like those in "Canadian Wonder Tales," were gathered in various parts of Canada--by river and lake and ocean where sailors and fishermen still watch the stars; in forest clearings where lumbermen yet retain some remnant of the old vanished voyageur life and where Indians still barter for their furs; in remote country places where women spin while they speak with reverence of their fathers' days. The skeleton of each story has been left for the most part unchanged, although the language naturally differs somewhat from that of the story-tellers from whose lips the writer heard them.
It is too often forgotten that long before the time of Arthur and his Round Table these tales were known and treasured by the early inhabitants of our land. However much they may have changed in the oral passing from generation to generation the germ of the story goes back to very early days beyond the dawn of Canadian history. Canada is rich in this ancient lore. The effort to save it from oblivion needs no apology. Fairy literature has an important place in the development of the child mind, and there is no better fairy lore than that of our own country. Through the eyes of the Indian story-teller and the Indian dreamer, inheriting his tales from a romantic past, we can still look through "magic casements opening on the foam of perilous seas in fairy lands forlorn"; we can still feel something of the atmosphere of that mysterious past in which our ancestors dwelt and laboured. The author's sincerest hope in publishing this volume is that to the children of to-day the traditions of our romantic Canadian past will not be lost in our practical Canadian present.
MCGILL UNIVERSITY, _May, 1921_.
CONTENTS
PAGE
HOW GLOOSKAP MADE THE BIRDS                                1
RABBIT AND THE GRAIN BUYERS                               10
SAINT NICHOLAS AND THE CHILDREN                           19
THE FALL OF THE SPIDER MAN                                31
THE BOY WHO WAS CALLED THICK-HEAD                         40
RABBIT AND THE INDIAN CHIEF                               47
GREAT HEART AND THE THREE TESTS                           58
THE BOY OF THE RED TWILIGHT SKY                           67
HOW RAVEN BROUGHT FIRE TO THE INDIANS                     73
THE GIRL WHO ALWAYS CRIED                                 82
ERMINE AND THE HUNTER                                     89
HOW RABBIT DECEIVED FOX                                   96
THE BOY AND THE DRAGON                                   104
OWL WITH THE GREAT HEAD AND EYES                         112
THE TOBACCO FAIRY FROM THE BLUE HILLS                    122
RAINBOW AND THE AUTUMN LEAVES                            127
RABBIT AND THE MOON-MAN                                  134
THE CHILDREN WITH ONE EYE                                140
THE GIANT WITH THE GREY FEATHERS                         146
THE CRUEL STEPMOTHER                                     153
THE BOY WHO WAS SAVED BY THOUGHTS                        160
THE SONG-BIRD AND THE HEALING WATERS                     167
THE BOY WHO OVERCAME THE GIANTS                          172
THE YOUTH AND THE DOG-DANCE                              180
SPARROW'S SEARCH FOR THE RAIN                            187
THE BOY IN THE LAND OF SHADOWS                           195
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS IN COLOUR
And many others came, but they met the same fate            _Frontispiece_
TO FACE PAGE
And the children all came to him each asking for a boon               6
So Duck crawled under the over-turned basket and sat very still      14
They stood for a time in the shadow of the great trees before the door and made ready to blow together                             24
He came one day upon a man clad in scarlet sitting on the side of a rocky hill tying stones to his feet                        60
The coat of Ermine was replaced by a sleek and shining white coat as spotless as the new snow in winter                           94
Then Fox untied the bag and let Rabbit out and got into the bag himself                                                             100
The giant frowning angrily, the woman carrying the stick, and the boy leading the dog                                         148
For some days the boy lay in terror in the nest ... and far out on the ocean he could see great ships going by                  162
"Strike hard," said the boy, "or it will do you no good"            178
And they sat down together on the edge of the lake                  182
Then the old man gave the boy a large pipe and some tobacco         198
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS IN BLACK AND WHITE
TO FACE PAGE
He said farewell to the sky-country and let himself down to earth by one of his own strands of yarn                              32
That night an old Wolf came through the forest in search of food     44
He went to Beaver's house by the stream, hobbling along with a stick                                                         56
And she makes to him an offering of tiny white feathers plucked from the breasts of birds                                            70
Then Raven asked Mole to try, but Mole said: "Oh no, I am better fitted for other work. My fur would all be singed"                   78
And with his magic power he changed her into a Fish-Hawk, and sent her out to the ocean                                            86
The man gave him another pair of mocassins in exchange for those he was wearing                                                108
Wolf trotting along like a little horse, and Rabbit laughing to himself, sitting in the saddle                                   116
Suddenly a large flock of birds, looking like great black clouds, came flying from the blue hills                                     124
Throughout the long winter months Deer looked longingly for Rainbow                                                         128
He sat very quiet, waiting for the man of the long foot to appear                                                              136
The boy went into the forest with his bow and arrows.... He had not gone far when he saw a fat young deer, which he killed      142
The bull rushed at the mountain with all his force                  158
Then the young man lay down to sleep, and the Fox stood guard beside him                                                    170
CANADIAN FAIRY TALES
HOW GLOOSKAP MADE THE BIRDS
Once upon a time long before the white men came to Canada there lived a wicked giant who caused great trouble and sorrow wherever he went. Men called him Wolf-Wind. Where he was born no man knows, but his home was in the Cave of the Winds, far in the north country in the Night-Night Land, and there men knew he was hiding on calm days when the sun was hot and the sea was still, and on quiet nights when not a leaf or a flower or a blade of grass was stirring. But whenever he appeared, the great trees cracked in fear and the little trees trembled and the flowers bent their heads close to the earth, trying to hide from his presence. Often he came upon them without warning and with little sign of his coming. And then the corn fell flat never to rise again, and tall trees crashed in the forest, and the flowers dropped dead because of their terror; and often the great waters grew white and moaned or screamed loudly or dashed themselves against the rocks trying to escape from Wolf-Wind. And in the darkness of the night when Wolf-Wind howled, there was great fear upon all the earth.
It happened once in those old times that Wolf-Wind was in a great rage, and he went forth to kill and devour all who dared to come in his path. It chanced in that time that many Indian families were living near the sea. The men and women were fishing far off the coast. They were catching fish to make food for the winter. They went very far away in small canoes, for the sea had long been still and they thought there was no danger. The little children were alone on shore. Suddenly as the sun went down, without a sign of his coming, out of the north came Wolf-Wind in his great rage looking for prey, and roaring loudly as he came. "I am Wolf-Wind, the giant," he howled, "cross not my path, for I will kill all the people I meet, and eat them all up." His anger only grew as he stalked along, and he splashed and tossed the waters aside in his fury as he came down upon the fishermen and fisher-women far out to sea. The fishers had no time to get out of his reach or to paddle to the shore, so quick was Wolf-Wind's coming, and the giant caught them in his path and broke up their boats and killed them all. All night long he raged over the ocean looking for more fishers.
In the morning Wolf-Wind's anger was not yet spent. Far away in front of him he saw the little children of the fishers playing on the shore. He knew they were alone, for he had killed their fathers and mothers. He resolved to catch them and kill them too, and after them he went, still in a great rage. He went quickly towards the land, roaring as he went and dashing the waters against the rocks in his madness. As he came near the beach he howled in his anger, "I will catch you and kill you all and eat you and bleach your bones upon the sand." But the children heard him and they ran away as fast as they could, and they hid in a cave among the great rocks and placed a big stone at the mouth of the cave and Wolf-Wind could not get in. He howled loudly at the door all day and all night long, but the stone was strong and he could not break it down. Then he went on his way still very angry and still roaring, and he howled, "I will come back and catch you yet. You cannot escape from me."
The children were very frightened and they stayed long in the cave after Wolf-Wind had gone, for far away they could still hear him howling and crashing in the forest. Then they came out. They knew that Wolf-Wind had killed their fathers and mothers on the sea. They ran away into the forest, for they thought that there they would be safe. They went to the Willow-Willow Land where they found a pleasant place with grass and flowers and streams. And between them and the north country where Wolf-Wind lived were many great trees with thick leaves which they knew would protect them from the giant.
But one day Wolf-Wind, true to his promise, came again in a rage to find them. He came into the land killing all he met in his path. But he could not catch the children, for the trees with their thick leaves kept him away. They heard him howling in the forest far distant. For many days in the late summer he tried to find them but their home was close to the trees, and the great branches spread over them and the thick leaves saved them, and only the sun from the south, coming from the Summer-Flower country, could look in upon them. Try as he could with all his might old Wolf-Wind could not harm them although he knew that they were there; and they were always safe while they lived in the Willow-Willow Land.
Wolf-Wind was more angry than ever because of his failure, for he liked to feed on his little children, and rage knew no bounds. He swore that he would have vengeance on the trees. So he came back again and he brought with him to aid him another giant from the north country who had with him a strange and powerful charm, the Charm of the Frost. And the two giants tried to kill the trees that had saved the little children. But over many of the trees they had no power, for when they came, the trees only laughed and merely swayed and creaked and said, "You cannot harm us; we are strong, for we came at first from the Night-Night Land in the far north country, and over us the Charm of the Frost has no power." These were the Spruce and the Fir, the Hemlock and the Pine and the Cedar. But on the other trees Wolf-Wind had vengeance as he had vowed. One night when the harvest moon was shining in the sky he came without warning, and with the help of the giant bearing the Charm of the Frost he killed all the leaves that had kept him from the children, and threw them to the ground. One after one the leaves came off from the Beech and the Birch, the Oak and the Maple, the Alder and the Willow. Some fell quickly, some fluttered slowly down, and some took a long time in dying. But at last the trees stood bare and cold against the sky and there was stillness and sadness in the forest. And Wolf-Wind laughed and played in silence through the leafless branches with the giant from Night-Night Land. And he said, "Now I have overcome the leaves that kept me away, and now when I please I can kill the children." But the children only moved closer to the strong and sturdy trees that had come at first from the far north country and over which the Charm of the Frost had no power, and Wolf-Wind could not reach them and they were still for ever safe from the giants.
The children were very sad when they saw what Wolf-Wind had done to their friends and protectors, the trees. Summer had gone back to the Southland following as she always did the Rainbow Road to her home in the Wilderness of Flowers. It was lonely now in the forest and silent; there was not a whisper in the trees; there were no leaves, for it was autumn and Wolf-Wind had killed them all.
At last it came to that time of year when Glooskap, who ruled upon the earth and was very great in those days, gave his yearly gifts to little children. And he came into the land on a sled drawn by his faithful dogs to find out for himself what the children wished for. And the children all came to him each asking for a boon. Now Glooskap had great power upon the earth in that old time. He could always do what he willed. And the little children whom Wolf-Wind had tried to harm in his rage came to Glooskap, the Magic Master of gifts, and they were all very sad because the leaves had gone.
"What do you wish?" said Glooskap. "We wish nothing for ourselves," said the children, "but we ask that the leaves that were killed by Wolf-Wind because they saved us from his rage be brought back to life and put back again in their old home in the trees." Glooskap was silent for a long time and he sat and thought as was his custom, and he smoked hard at his mighty pipe, for he was a great smoker. Now in that time there were no little forest birds upon the earth, for Glooskap had not yet brought them into being. There were only the birds that dwelt near the sea and over whom Wolf-Wind had no power--Sea-gull and Crane, Wild-duck and Loon, Kingfisher and Brant and Curlew. These only laughed at the giant in his rage and screamed in mockery as they flew from him and hid when he came, among the shallows or the rocks or the thick grass in the marshes. And there were also the sturdy birds that dwelt with men and worked for them, giving them eggs and food. These were Hen and Goose and Duck and Wild Turkey. They gave men food, but they were not fair to look upon; they waddled along and could not fly well and they made no sweet music upon the earth, for their song was a quack and a cackle.
[Illustration: AND THE CHILDREN ALL CAME TO HIM EACH ASKING FOR A BOON]
Glooskap decided to bring other birds into the world, not to give food but to bring happiness to the children on the days when summer dwells in the land, with their pretty feathers and their pleasant songs. So after he had smoked long in silence he hit upon a plan. And he said to the children asking for their yearly gifts, "I cannot bring back to the trees the leaves that Wolf-Wind has killed and stripped off, for it is now too late. But I will take the fallen leaves and change them into little birds. And the birds shall never forget how they were born. When autumn comes they shall go with summer far away to the Summer-Flower Land, but in the spring-time they shall always come back and they shall live as close as they can to the leaves from which they have sprung. And they shall nest, most of them, in the trees under the leaves, and even those that nest in the grass shall love the trees and linger in them. And they shall all be beautiful in colour like the leaves that gave them birth; and they shall have power to rest at times upon the air like a leaf fluttering; and the voice of the air and the laughing waters shall be in their throats and they shall sing sweet songs for little children. And I give the children charge over them to keep them from harm just as the leaves which gave them birth have saved the little children from the giants. And I will give the trees that Wolf-Wind has stripped power to bring forth new leaves every spring-time so that when Summer comes back from the Wilderness of Flowers the trees shall not be bare. And although Wolf-Wind may strip them off when the Giant of the Frost comes with him from the Night-Night Land they shall always be replaced in the spring-time. And I will take away much of Wolf-Wind's power so that he can no longer harm little children as wickedly as he has done before."
Glooskap waved his magic wand as was his custom, and at once great flocks of little birds sprang from the ground where the fallen leaves had lain. And they twittered and sang in a great chorus and flew back to the trees. They were of beautiful colours like the leaves that had given them birth. There were Robin Red-breasts and Thrushes all brown and red, from the red and brown leaves of the Oak. And there were Finches and Humming-birds all yellow and green and brown from the leaves of the Alder and the Willow, and they glowed like willows in the sunlight and fluttered like a leaf upon the air. There were Yellowbirds and Canadian Warblers from the golden Beech and Birch leaves. And there were Scarlet Tanagers and Orioles and Grosbeaks all of changing colours, red and purple and brown, from the leaves of the Canadian Maple. And they all sang to the children and the children were all very happy again.
Then Glooskap sent the little birds all away to a warm country until the rule of the Giant of the Frost from the Night-Night Land was over, for it was winter in all the land and it was very cold. But in the spring-time the little birds always come back from the Summer-Flower Land. And they build their nests among the trees as close as they can to their kindred, the leaves from which they came. And all day long they sing among the leaves for little children. At day-break they wake the children with their choir of dawn, and at twilight they lisp and twitter to lull the children to sleep. And at night they hide among the leaves from Wolf-Wind and are very still with never a twitter or a song. For they do not forget that they are the children's gift from Glooskap and that they came from the leaves stripped from the trees by Wolf-Wind because the leaves saved the little children from the giant long ago.
RABBIT AND THE GRAIN BUYERS
Once long ago when the Indians lived in Canada before the white men came, Rabbit was very lazy. He had worked long for Glooskap, the great ruler of the people, as a forest guide, but his toil was not appreciated or rewarded. He saw all the other animals idling their time away, taking their ease all day long, and doing nothing but filling their bellies with food, and sleeping all the afternoon in the hot sunshine. And he said, "Why should I work for other people when nobody works for me? I will take mine ease like all the other animals." So he sulked in his little house for a long time and could not be coaxed or driven to do any work. But as he was a lonely fellow who always lived by himself with very few friends in the world except little children, he soon got tired of this lazy life. For by nature he was industrious and energetic and he always liked to be doing something or prowling alone in the forest. So he said, "I must find some work to do or I shall surely lose my wits. But it must be labour that brings profit to myself and not to other people."
For a long time Rabbit puzzled his brains thinking on a business or a profession to follow. But nothing seemed to be to his liking. At last one day he saw some Indians trading skins and knives. One was selling and others were buying and they seemed to be making a great deal of money without doing very much work. Rabbit thought that here indeed was an easy way to make a living. Then he saw Duck coming along carrying a basket of eggs. He said to Duck, "How do you get along in the world? You seem to do nothing but eat and cackle and swim in the pond. You never seem to work." And Duck said, "I lay eggs and sell them in exchange for corn. Why don't you lay eggs? It is all very easy." But Rabbit knew that Duck was only laughing at him, and that he was not meant to make a living in that way.
Then he met Bee on the forest path and he said, "How do you make a living, you wandering bee? You do nothing but gad about all day long, going from flower to flower dressed in your good clothes of yellow and black and always singing your tuneless song?" And Bee said, "I make honey and wax and sell them. I have a great store for sale now. Why don't you do as I do? I am always happy. I always sing at my work, and what's more, my song is not tuneless. And just for your impudence, take that." And so saying he stung Rabbit on the nose and went on his way, singing his droning song. Rabbit rubbed his nose in the earth to ease his pain and he swore vengeance on Bee, for he knew that Bee too was only laughing at him. But he could think of no way to make an easy living, for he had nothing to sell but his coat, and he could not very well barter that, for winter would soon be coming on. He was very angry and troubled and he envied Duck and Bee their good fortune because of their eggs and honey and wax.
At last he thought of the Indians he had watched buying and selling skins. "I have it," he cried, "I have it. I will become a great merchant. I will be a great trader. I will live on a farm where they grow corn and vegetables, and I will steal them and sell them to the other animals and thereby make a great store of money. I shall be very rich in a short time." So, very happy, he went to a field near which was a vegetable garden. And in it were growing Indian corn and all kinds of grain which he knew the other birds and animals would gladly buy. So he made a sign and put it up in front of his house, and it said, "Buy Rabbit's corn, the best in all the land; it will grow without rain; there is only a small quantity left. Orders taken here." Then he sat in his house and waited.
Soon many buyers began to arrive. They were curious, and they wanted to see what kind of a merchant Rabbit would make. Rabbit explained to them that he was only an agent, that they must pay him their money, and he would take it to the farmer, and deliver their grain at his house one week from that day. The buyers paid him the money and went away, for they were afraid the farmer would kill them if they went themselves for the corn. They left a great store of money with Rabbit. That night when the moon rose over the hills Rabbit went to the field of corn near-by. But the farmer had spied him thieving that afternoon, and he had placed around his corn a fence of strong netting which poor Rabbit could not get through. And he had also placed around the field many watch-dogs which growled and snarled and frightened thieves away. Night after night Rabbit tried to slip into the field, but without success, and the week passed and still he had no corn for the customers who, he knew, would soon be arriving for their goods. And meanwhile he had spent all their money and he knew they would all fall upon him and kill him if he failed to keep his word and deliver their purchases.
At last when the day agreed on arrived, he saw his customers coming for their grain. And he hoped that his tricks would save him as they had saved him many times before. He sat in his yard playing his flute, when Earth-Worm, the first customer arrived. "Good day," said Rabbit. "Good day," said Earth-Worm, "I have come for my corn, for a week has gone by." "Very good," said Rabbit, "but first we shall have dinner. It will be ready in a few minutes. You must be hungry after your long journey." As they sat waiting for their dinner they saw Duck, another customer, waddling up the path with her basket on her neck. And Rabbit said, "Will not old Duck who comes here want to eat you up?" And Earth-Worm said, "Yes, yes, where shall I hide?" and he was much excited. "Hide under this clam-shell," said Rabbit. So Earth-Worm crawled under the clam-shell and sat very still, trembling for his life.
When Duck arrived, Rabbit said, "Good morning." "Good morning, Mr. Merchant," said Duck, wishing to be polite. "I have come for my corn, for it is the appointed day of delivery." "True, true," said Rabbit, "but first we shall have dinner. It will be ready in a few minutes. It will be an honour for me to have you dine with me." As they sat waiting for their dinner, Rabbit said, "Would you care to eat an Earth-Worm before your dinner? It would be a good appetizer for you." And Duck said, "Thank you very much. I am very fond of Earth-Worms." Rabbit lifted the clam-shell and poor Earth-Worm was quickly gobbled up by Duck. And Rabbit, laughing to himself, thought, "Now I am getting rid of my customers."
As Rabbit and Duck sat talking, they saw Fox trotting up the path. He was another customer coming for his corn. And Rabbit said courteously, "Madam, I see your old enemy Fox approaching. He will probably wish to eat you up; you had better hide." And Duck with her feathers all ruffled with excitement said, "Yes, yes, where shall I hide?" And Rabbit said, "Hide under this basket." So Duck crawled under the over-turned basket and sat very still.
[Illustration: SO DUCK CRAWLED UNDER THE OVER-TURNED BASKET AND SAT VERY STILL]
Fox soon came in and said, "Good day, Rabbit. I have come for my corn, for I am in sore need of it to catch chickens, and the seven days have passed." "You are very punctual," said Rabbit, "but first let us have dinner. It will be ready in a few minutes. It will make you stronger to carry your heavy load." As they sat waiting for their dinner, Rabbit said, "Listen, Fox. Would you care to eat a fat Duck now? It would be a tasty bit for you before you dine." And Fox said, "You are very kind. I always like to eat a Duck before my dinner." Rabbit knocked over the basket and Fox quickly devoured poor Duck until not a feather remained. And Rabbit laughed to himself and said, "Surely I am getting rid of my customers very easily."
As Rabbit and Fox sat talking over old times in the forest, they saw Bear coming lumbering up the path, tossing his head from side to side, and sniffing the air. And Rabbit said, "Bear is in a bad temper to-day. I wonder what can be the cause." And Fox said, "This morning I stole all his honey and he saw me running away." "He scents you here," said Rabbit, "will he not kill you if he finds you? Perhaps you ought to hide." "Yes, yes," said Fox, "but where shall I hide?" "Hide in this box," said Rabbit, and Fox sprang into the box, and Rabbit closed down the lid.
When Bear arrived he said gruffly, for he was in a bad temper, "Good day, Rabbit. I have come for my corn and I must have it quickly, for I must be on my way. It is the appointed time." "It is indeed the appointed time," said Rabbit, "but first we shall have dinner. It will be ready in a few minutes and I never let a wayfarer leave my house without first taking nourishment. I have to-day a dish of fresh fish which you like very well, and we have never yet dined together." And Bear agreed to wait and his gruffness left him at the thought of his good meal, for he was a great fish-eater, and he talked pleasantly. Then Rabbit said, "I have a secret to tell you. Let me whisper it." He put his mouth close to Bear's ear and said, "Old Fox, the sly thief who stole all your honey this morning is hiding in the box by your side. He came here to boast about his theft and he laughed loudly to me as he told me how easily you were cheated. He called you Lack-Brains." Bear was very angry and at once he knocked the lid from the box and killed Fox with one blow of his powerful paw. And Rabbit said to himself, "What luck I am having; there is another of my customers gone." But he wondered how he was to get rid of Bear, and he scratched his head in thought.
While Bear and Rabbit sat talking, they saw Rabbit's last customer, the Hunter, coming along. Bear would have run away, but it was too late. "Will the Hunter not want to kill you?" said Rabbit, glad to think that here was the end of poor Bear. "Indeed he will," said Bear. "Oh dear, oh dear, where shall I hide?" "Hide under my bed in my house," said Rabbit. Poor Bear quickly dashed into the house and crawled under Rabbit's bed with great difficulty for he was very fat and the bed was very low and he had to lay himself out flat on the floor, but he was comfortable in the thought that he would soon escape. When Hunter arrived he said, "Good day, Rabbit, I have come for my corn, for my children need bread." "You shall have it," said Rabbit. "But first we must have a bite to eat. I have not very much to offer you, but I can give you in a few minutes some hot pancakes and fresh maple syrup." The Hunter was well pleased with the thought of such a good meal and he said he would be glad to wait. Then Rabbit said, "Would you like some bear meat for your children, and a good warm bear skin for your hearth?" And the Hunter said, "Indeed I would. But in these days such luxuries are hard to find." And Rabbit said, "Oh no, they are not; under my bed in my house, a good fat bear is hiding. He is lying flat on his back, and you can easily kill him." The Hunter hurried to the house, and sure enough there he found Bear hiding under the bed, flat upon his back. He killed him with a blow and skinned him and cut him up into small pieces and put the meat and the skin into a bag to take home to his children. But while he was about it, Rabbit slipped away into the forest, saying to himself, "Now I have got rid of all my customers and I am safe. But the life of a merchant is not to my liking. I will not be a trader any more. I will gather corn for myself, but not to sell to others." And he ran quickly away and hid himself in a dense thicket.
When the Hunter went to look for Rabbit, he could not find him, nor was he able to find his grain. And although he thought he had fared pretty well by getting so much bear meat, he swore vengeance on Rabbit for his deceit, and to this day he searches for him, and if he meets him, he will not let him escape. And Rabbit lives by himself and keeps away from the Hunter as far as he can, for he fears him because of the trick he played upon him in the olden days.
SAINT NICHOLAS AND THE CHILDREN
Two little children lived with their old grandmother in a remote place in the Canadian forest. They were twin children--a boy and a girl, Pierre and Estelle by name--and except for their dress it was not easy to tell them apart. Their father and mother had died in the spring-time, and in the summer they had left their old home because of its many sad memories and had gone to live with their old grandmother in a new home elsewhere. In this new home in the forest where they now lived they were very poor, but they were not unhappy. Times were hard, and there was very little food to be had no matter how well their old grandmother worked; but they caught fish in the streams and gathered berries and fruit and birds' eggs on the wooded hills, and somehow throughout the summer they kept themselves from want. But when late autumn came and the streams were frozen over and the berries were all gone and there were no eggs, for the birds had all flown south, they were often hungry because they had so little to eat.
Their grandmother worked so hard to provide for herself and the children that at last she fell very sick. For several days she could not leave her bed. And she said, "I want meat broth to make me well and I must have good meat to make it. If I do not get meat I can have no broth, and if I do not get broth I shall not get well, and if I do not get well I shall die, and if I die you two children will surely starve and die too. So meat and meat alone can save us all from starvation and death." So the two children, to keep themselves and their grandmother alive, set out one morning in search of meat to make the broth. They lived far from other people and they did not know where to go, but they followed the forest path. The snow lay deep on the ground and sparkled brightly in the sunlight. The children had never before been away from home alone and every sight was of great interest to them. Here and there a rabbit hopped over the snow, or a snowbird hovered and twittered overhead, all looking for food like the children. And there were holly-berries growing in many places, and there was mistletoe hanging from the trees. And Pierre when he saw the holly-berries and the mistletoe said, "Saint Nicholas will be soon here, for the trees are dressed and ready for his coming." And Estelle said, "Yes, Saint Nicholas will be soon here." And they were both very glad thinking of his coming.
As they went along in the afternoon, they came upon an old man sitting at the door of a small house of spruce-boughs under the trees close to the forest path. He was busy making whistles, whittling willow wands with a knife and tapping gently on the bark until the bark loosened from the wood and slipped easily off. The children stood and watched him at his strange work, for he had merry twinkling eyes, and a kindly weather-beaten face, and thick white hair, and they were not afraid.
"Hello," said the old man.
"Hello," said Pierre, "why are you making willow whistles?"
"I am making them for Saint Nicholas," said the old man; "he is coming soon for his yearly visit; indeed he is already in the land; when he makes his rounds he always gives whistles, among other things, to good children, and I must have a great store of them ready for him when he comes, for there are many children to supply."
Then he went on whittling busily with his knife. The children watched him for a long time in silence, and they thought what a fine thing it must be to work like the old man for Saint Nicholas, in his little house of boughs under the forest trees. Then the old man said, "You are very small children; what are you seeking so far away from people?" And Estelle answered, "Our old grandmother is very sick, and we are looking for meat to make broth to make her well." The old man was sorry he had no meat, for he lived on other food. He told them that some distance farther along there was a butcher who always kept meat; but the butcher, he said, was a very wicked fellow and sometimes little children who entered his shop never came out again. The children were very frightened when they heard what the old man said and they wondered if they had better go back home. But the old man thought for a long time in silence as he whittled his willow wands, and then he said, "I will give you each a whistle, and when you blow it, Saint Nicholas will always hear it; you must never blow it except when you are in great trouble or distress, and when Saint Nicholas hears it he will know that you are coming to grief or that harm is already upon you and he will come himself or send some one to your assistance. But you must blow only one blast. The whistle should be given only by Saint Nicholas himself when he comes at holly-time into the land. But you are good children and your old grandmother is sick, and you are trying to make her well, and I know that Saint Nicholas will not say that I have done wrong." So he gave the children each a whistle, and then fear left them, for they knew they could now come to no harm if they had the aid of Saint Nicholas.
It was growing late in the afternoon and the children set out on their way to find the wicked butcher. But they had many misgivings, and as they went on they grew faint of heart, for they wondered if the old man had told them the truth about the whistles or if he was in reality a secret agent of the wicked butcher trying to lure them to their death. They resolved to search for meat elsewhere and to keep away from the butcher's shop.
For a long time they searched, but without success. There was no meat to be had in all the land at any of the places they stopped to ask. Soon they came in sight of the butcher's shop. They were very frightened. But the sun had already gone down behind the trees, and night was coming on, and they had still no meat. And they knew that if their old grandmother was to get well she must have meat to make broth. The shop, too, looked very pleasant and attractive in the cold winter evening. Warm light was shining from a fire through the door, and in the windows were sausages, and fat birds, and big yellow pumpkins and cakes with red berries on the top. The children were hungry and wished for something to eat by the warm shop fire. They decided to enter the shop notwithstanding their fear, to buy some food, and to get meat for their grandmother's broth as quickly as they could. But before they entered the shop they thought it would be well, in order to be safe, to blow a blast on their whistle as the old man had told them so that Saint Nicholas would know that they were in dread of harm. They stood for a time in the shadow of the great trees before the door and made ready to blow together. Pierre gave the signal and blew a long soft blast. But Estelle could not get her whistle from her pocket and Pierre had finished his blast, all out of breath, before she was ready to blow. "Don't blow now," he said, "you are just like a girl, always too late." But blow she would, as the old man had told her, and before Pierre could stop her she blew a long soft blast on her whistle. Pierre was very cross, for he thought that now no good could come of it, as two blasts had sounded, but with his sister he entered the butcher's shop.
The wicked butcher was in his shop, but not another person was about the place. It was all very quiet. The man was very glad to see the children and he seated them by the warm fire, and gave them food, and although he shut the door tight behind them, their fear soon vanished. After they had eaten well and were warm again, they asked for meat to make broth for their old grandmother, and the butcher said he would give them plenty of good meat although it was very scarce in all the land. There was a barrel standing in one corner; in another corner was a large hogshead reaching almost to the ceiling, and the butcher said that both of these were full of meat.
Now the butcher was really the friend and partner of a wicked giant who lived in the forest. The giant's greatest delight was to eat little children. He liked no meal so well as a meal of little children, two at a time, pickled first in brine. He ate them always when he could get them, but he was not always successful in his search, for children were scarce in the land. He was a great hunter and he was able to kill many animals in the forest and to secure much meat, so great was his strength, and once a week regularly he brought a great load of meat to the butcher and traded it for any little children the butcher managed to entice into his shop. So the butcher got much meat at little cost. And the old man of the house of boughs was right when he said that many little children who entered the shop never came out again.
[Illustration: THEY STOOD FOR A TIME IN THE SHADOW OF THE GREAT TREES BEFORE THE DOOR AND MADE READY TO BLOW TOGETHER]
The butcher was very glad when he saw the two pretty little children. He was expecting the giant that evening on his weekly visit, and he thought gleefully of the great load of meat he would get from the giant in exchange for the children, for he would ask a big price, and he knew the giant would give all the meat he had for so good a meal. And he thought too of all the money he would get for the giant's load of meat. So he resolved to kill the children and pickle them in brine to await the giant's coming.
When the children had finished their meal and had warmed themselves by the fire they made ready to go home and they asked for their meat. The butcher said he would get it for them. They looked up at the shelves, laden with more food than they had ever seen before--hams and cabbages and strings of onions. And the little children said, "There are good onions up there; we will buy some and take them home to our grandmother to put in her broth." The butcher said, "There are many kinds of onions in the box on the high shelf. You must pick out the kind you want. I will lift you up to the shelf so that you can see for yourselves." So he caught them each by the coat between the shoulders, and because of his great strength he lifted them high until they could look into the box and pick out the onions they wanted. As he took them down he thrust them straight out from his body at arm's length and held them there and they laughed because of his great strength. Then he brought them together with terrible force so that their heads struck one against the other and they were stunned by the cruel blow. Then he threw them head first into the barrel in the corner which was filled with brine, not with meat as he had said, and he left them there to pickle well. He was greatly pleased with the fine load of meat he would get in exchange from the giant, who, he knew, would appear before many minutes had passed.
Soon the giant arrived. He carried on his back a great load of meat and he also drew a sled heavily laden with many dressed carcasses of animals he had killed. "What cheer for me to-night and what fortune?" he said to the butcher as he entered the warm shop with his load. And the butcher said, "Good cheer and fine fortune. I have a good fat pair for you to-night already pickling in the brine." Then he uncovered the barrel in the corner and showed the giant the two little children sticking head first in the pickle. The giant smacked his fat lips and chuckled and rubbed his great hands, so pleased was he with the sight of so good a meal. And he said, "We will let them steep well in the brine until to-morrow. I always like them very salt." They covered up the barrel, and then they bargained about the purchase of the meat.
The giant agreed to give the butcher all his meat in exchange for the children. Then they sat by the fire drinking and eating until far on into the night. And the giant said that before they went to bed he would take another look at the children to see how they were pickling. So they went and uncovered the barrel.
Now it chanced that Saint Nicholas was in the land at that time, as the old man of the House-of-boughs had said. He had come into the land to bring his yearly gifts to little children. In the evening he was many miles away from the butcher's shop. But he heard the long soft blast of a whistle, borne on the still evening wind. He knew it to be one of his own whistles, and it told him that little children were in danger. But it was followed by another soft blast--the late blast of Estelle's whistle--and the two blasts meant that the danger was not yet very near to the children, that indeed it was far off, so he thought that there was no need to hurry to the children's aid. Moreover, Saint Nicholas was just then leaving tiny dolls for little babies in many little houses in the forest and he decided to take his time and finish the giving of all these gifts before he set out to the place from which the whistle-blast had come.
At last he was able to go on his way. The snow lay deep in the forest, and travelling was hard, but the white winter moon was shining, and the path was bright and Saint Nicholas moved along quickly on his snow-shoes. Far on in the night he reached the butcher's shop from which he knew the children's note of fear had come. As he entered the shop, the giant and the butcher were just taking their last look before going to bed at the children sticking in the barrel of brine. They did not know Saint Nicholas, but when they saw him they quickly placed the cover on the barrel and were very much confused. Saint Nicholas was suspicious that they were about some wickedness, and he knew well that in some way or other the barrel was connected with the dreaded harm of which the children's whistle had told him, and he thought that perhaps the children were hidden in it. So he said, "I have come for meat. I want meat that has been pickled in brine. I should like a piece from that barrel." But the butcher said, "It is not good meat. I have better meat in the inner room, and I will get it for you." So the butcher and Saint Nicholas entered the inner room and closed the door behind them while the giant sat on the barrel in the corner, trying to hide it with his great fat legs.
In the inner room was a barrel filled with brine, but with only a small piece of meat at the bottom. Saint Nicholas said he would take that piece. The butcher bent far into the barrel to reach down in search of the meat. But as he did so, Saint Nicholas picked him up by the legs and pushed him head first into the barrel of brine. He spluttered and kicked, but he stuck fast in the barrel, and could not get out. Saint Nicholas placed the cover on the barrel, with a great weight on top of it, and that was the end of the wicked butcher.
[Illustration: "STRIKE HARD," SAID THE BOY, "OR IT WILL DO YOU NO GOOD"]
Then Saint Nicholas returned to the shop where the giant was waiting, still sitting on the barrel. He told the giant that he wanted a piece of meat that lay in the bottom of the large hogshead of pickle in the other corner. He asked the giant to get it for him, as the hogshead was so high that neither he nor the butcher could reach down into it.
The giant bent far into the hogshead and began groping for the meat at the bottom. Saint Nicholas took a large bone that lay on the floor, and standing on a box beside the hogshead he struck the giant a powerful blow on the head. The giant was only slightly stunned, but in his surprise he lost his balance, and fell head first into the brine. He yelled and kicked for a time, but his huge shoulders stuck fast. Saint Nicholas covered the hogshead, leaving the giant sticking fast in the pickle, and that was the end of the giant.
Then Saint Nicholas uncovered the barrel in the corner into which he had seen the butcher and the giant looking when he had first entered the shop. There were the two children standing on their heads in the pickle with their feet sticking out at the top. He caught them by the legs and pulled them out and by his magic power he soon brought them back to life. He gave them food and warmed them by the fire and soon they were none the worse for their hour in the barrel of brine.
Then he gave them meat and brought them back to their grandmother. And they made broth for her and soon made her well, and they were all happy again. And the land was troubled no more by giants, for Saint Nicholas never again allowed great harm to come to little children if they always kept his whistle near them and blew softly upon it when they were in trouble or distress.
THE FALL OF THE SPIDER MAN
In olden times the Spider Man lived in the sky-country. He dwelt in a bright little house all by himself, where he weaved webs and long flimsy ladders by which people went back and forth from the sky to the earth. The Star-people often went at night to earth where they roamed about as fairies of light, doing good deeds for women and little children, and they always went back and forth on the ladder of the Spider Man. The Spider Man had to work very hard, weaving his webs, and spinning the yarn from which his ladders were made. One day when he had a short breathing-time from his toil he looked down at the earth-country and there he saw many of the earth-people playing at games, or taking sweet sap from the maple trees, or gathering berries on the rolling hills; but most of the men were lazily idling and doing nothing. The women were all working, after the fashion of Indians in those days; the men were working but little. And Spider Man said to himself, "I should like to go to the earth-country where men idle their time away. I would marry four wives who would work for me while I would take life easy, for I need a rest."
He was very tired of his work for he was kept at it day and night always spinning and weaving his webs. But when he asked for a rest he was not allowed to stop; he was only kicked for his pains and called Sleepy Head, and Lazy-bones and other harsh names, and told to work harder. Then he grew angry and he resolved to punish the Star-people because they kept him so hard at work. He thought that if he punished them and made himself a nuisance, they would be glad to be rid of him. So he hit upon a crafty plan. Each night when a Star-fairy was climbing back to the sky-country, just as he came near the top of the ladder, the Spider Man would cut the strands and the fairy would fall to earth with a great crash. Night after night he did this, and he chuckled to himself as he saw the sky-fairies sprawling through the air and kicking their heels, while the earth-people looked up wonderingly at them and called them Shooting Stars. Many Star-people fell to earth in this way because of the Spider Man's tricks, and they could never get back to the sky-country because of their broken limbs or their disfigured faces, for in the sky-country the people all must have beautiful faces and forms. But Spider Man's tricks brought him no good; the people would not drive him away because they needed his webs and he was kept always at his tasks. At last he decided to run away of his own accord, and, one night when the Moon and the Stars had gone to work and the Sun was asleep, he said farewell to the sky-country and let himself down to earth by one of his own strands of yarn, spinning it as he dropped down.
[Illustration: HE SAID FAREWELL TO THE SKY COUNTRY AND LET HIMSELF DOWN TO EARTH--BY ONE OF HIS OWN STRANDS OF YARN]
In the earth-country he married four wives as he had planned, for he wanted them to work for him while he took his ease. He thought he had worked long enough. All went well for a time and the Spider Man was quite happy living his lazy and contented life. Not a strand did he spin, nor a web did he weave. No men on earth were working; only the women toiled. At last, Glooskap, who ruled upon the earth in that time, became very angry because the men in these parts were so lazy, and he sent Famine into their country to punish them for their sins. Famine came very stealthily into the land and gathered up all the corn and carried it off; then he called to him all the animals, and the birds, and the fish of the sea and river, and he took them away with him. In all the land there was nothing left to eat. Only water remained. The people were very hungry and they lived on water for many days. Sometimes they drank the water cold, sometimes hot, sometimes luke-warm, but at best it was but poor fare. The Spider Man soon grew tired of this strange diet, for it did not satisfy his hunger to live always on water. It filled his belly and swelled him to a great size, but it brought him little nourishment or strength. So he said, "There must be good food somewhere in the world; I will go in search of it."
That night when all the world was asleep he took a large bag, and crept softly away from his four wives and set out on his quest for food. He did not want any one to know where he was going. For several days he travelled, living only on water; but he found no food, and the bag was still empty on his back. At last one day he saw birds in the trees and he knew that he was near the border of the Hunger-Land. That night in the forest when he stopped at a stream to drink, he saw a tiny gleam of light far ahead of him through the trees. He hurried towards the light and soon he came upon a man with a great hump on his shoulders and scars on his face, and a light hanging at his back, with a shade on it which he could close and open at his will. The Spider Man said, "I am looking for food; tell me where I can find it." And the humped man with the light said, "Do you want it for your people?" But the Spider Man said, "No, I want it for myself." Then the humped man laughed and said, "You are near to the border of the Land of Plenty; follow me and I will give you food." Then he flashed the light at his back, opening and closing the shade so that the light flickered, and he set off quickly through the trees. The Spider Man followed the light flashing in the darkness, but he had to go so fast that he was almost out of breath when he reached the house where the humped man had stopped. But the humped man only laughed when he saw the Spider Man coming puffing wearily along with his fat and swollen belly. He gave him a good fat meal and the Spider Man soon felt better after his long fast. Then the humped man said, "You are the Spider Man who once weaved webs in the sky. I, too, once dwelt in the star-country, and one dark night as I was climbing back from the earth-country on your ladder, carrying my lamp on my back to light the way, when I was near the sky you cut the strands of the web and I fell to the earth with a great crash. That is why I have a great hump on my back and scars on my face, and because of this I have never been allowed to go back to the sky-country of the stars. I roam the earth at nights as a forest fairy just as I did in the olden days, for I have my former power still with me, and I still carry my lamp at my back; it is the starlight from the sky-country. I shall never get back to the star-country while I have life. But some day when my work on earth is done I shall go back. But although you were cruel to me I will give you food." The Spider Man remembered the nights he had cut the ladder strands, and he laughed to himself at the memory of the star-fairies falling to earth with a great crash. But the man with the light knew that now he had his chance to take vengeance on the Spider Man. The latter did not suspect evil. He was glad to get food at last.
Then the humped man said, "I will give you four pots. You must not open them until you get home. They will then be filled with food, and thereafter always when you open them they will be packed with good food. And the food will never grow less." The Spider Man put the four pots in his bag and slinging it over his shoulder he set out for his home, well pleased with his success. After he had gone away, the humped man used his power to make him hungry. Yet for several days he travelled without opening the pots, for although he was almost starving he wished to do as the humped man had told him. At last he could wait no longer. He stopped near his home, took the pots out of the bag and opened them. They were filled with good food as he had been promised. In one was a fine meat stew; in another were many cooked vegetables; in another was bread made from Indian corn; and in another was luscious ripe fruit. He ate until he was full. He covered the pots, put them back in the bag, and hid the bag among the trees. Then he went home. He had meanwhile taken pity on his people and he decided to invite the Chief and all the tribe to a feast the next evening, for the pots would be full, and the food would never decrease, and there would be enough for all. He thought the people would regard him as a very wonderful man if he could supply them all with good food in their hunger.
When he reached his home his wives were very glad to see him back, and they at once brought him water, the only food they had. But he laughed them to scorn, and threw the water in their faces and said, "Oh, foolish women, I do not want water; it is not food for a great man like me. I have had a good meal of meat stew and corn bread and cooked vegetables and luscious ripe fruit. I know where much food is to be found, but I alone know. I can find food when all others fail, for I am a great man. Go forth and invite the Chief and all the people to a feast which I shall provide for them to-morrow night--a feast for all the land, for my food never grows less." They were all amazed when they heard his story, and the thought of his good meal greatly added to their hunger. But they went out and summoned all the tribe to a feast as he had told them.
The next night all the people gathered for the feast, for the news of it had spread through all the land. They had taken no water that day, for they wished to eat well, and they were very hungry. They were as hungry as wild beasts in search of food. The Spider Man was very glad because the people praised him, and he proudly brought in his bag of pots. The people all waited hungrily and eagerly. But when he uncovered the first pot there was no food there; he uncovered the second pot, but there was no food there; he uncovered all the pots, but not a bit of food was in any of them. They were all empty, and in the bottom of each was a great gaping hole. Now it had happened in this way. When the humped man, the Star-fairy, had given the pots to the Spider Man, he knew well that the Spider Man would disobey his orders and that he would open the pots before he reached his home. He chuckled to himself, for he knew that now he could take vengeance on the web-weaver who had injured him. So when the Spider Man had left the pots among the trees, the humped man used his magic power and made holes in the pots, and the charm of the food was broken and all the food disappeared. When the people saw the empty pots they thought they had been purposely deceived. The remains of the food and the smell of stew and of fruit still clung to the pots. They thought the Spider Man had eaten all the food himself. So in their great hunger and their rage and their disappointment they fell upon him and beat him and bore him to the ground, while the humped man with the lamp at his back hiding behind the trees looked on and laughed in his glee. Then the people split the Spider Man's arms to the shoulders, and his legs to the thighs, so that he had eight limbs instead of four. And the humped man--the star-fairy named Fire-fly--came forth from behind the trees and standing over the fallen Spider Man he said, "Henceforth because of your cruelty to the star-people you will always crawl on eight legs, and you will have a fat round belly because of the water you have drunk; and sometimes you will live on top of the water. But you shall always eat only flies and insects. And you will always spin downwards but never upwards, and you will often try to get back to the star-country, but you shall always slip down again on the strand of yarn you have spun." Then Fire-fly flashed his light and went quickly away, opening and closing the shade of his lamp as he flitted among the trees. And to this day the Spider Man lives as the humped man of the lamp had spoken, because of the cruelty he practised on the star-fairies in the olden days.
THE BOY WHO WAS CALLED THICK-HEAD
Three brothers lived with their old Indian mother in the forest near the sea. Their father had long been dead. At his death he had little of the world's goods to his credit and his widow and her sons were very poor. In the place where they dwelt, game was not plentiful, and to get food enough to keep them from want they had often to go far into the forest. The youngest boy was smaller and weaker than the others, and when the two older sons went far away to hunt, they always left him behind, for although he always wished to accompany them they would never allow him to go. He had to do all the work about the house, and all day long he gathered wood in the forest and carried water from the stream. And even when his brothers went out in the spring-time to draw sap from the maple trees he was never permitted to go with them. He was always making mistakes and doing foolish things. His brothers called him Thick-head, and all the people round about said he was a simpleton because of his slow and queer ways. His mother alone was kind to him and she always said, "They may laugh at you and call you fool, but you will prove to be wiser than all of them yet, for so it was told me by a forest fairy at your birth."
The Chief of the people had a beautiful daughter who had many suitors. But her father spurned them all from his door and said, "My daughter is not yet of age to marry; and when her time of marriage comes, she will only marry the man who can make great profit from hunting." The two older sons of the old woman decided that one of them must win the girl. So they prepared to set out on a great hunting expedition far away in the northern forest, for it was now autumn, and the hunter's moon had come. The youngest boy wanted to go with them, for he had never been away from home and he wished to see the world. And his mother said he might go. His brothers were very angry when they heard his request, and they said, "Much good Thick-head can do us in the chase. He will only bring us bad luck. He is not a hunter but a scullion and a drudge fit only for the fireside." But his mother commanded them to grant the boy's wish and they had to obey. So the three brothers set out for the north country, the two older brothers grumbling loudly because they were accompanied by the boy they thought a fool.
The two older brothers had good success in the chase and they killed many animals--deer and rabbits and otters and beavers. And they came home bearing a great quantity of dried meat and skins. They each thought, "Now we have begun to prove our prowess to the Chief, and if we succeed as well next year when the hunter's moon comes again, one of us will surely win his daughter when she is old enough to marry." But all the youngest boy brought home as a result of his journey into the game country was a large Earth-Worm as thick as his finger and as long as his arm. It was the biggest Earth-Worm he had ever seen. He thought it a great curiosity as well as a great discovery, and he was so busy watching it each day that he had no time to hunt. When he brought it home in a box, his brothers said to their mother, "What did we tell you about Thick-head? He has now surely proved himself a fool. He has caught only a fat Earth-Worm in all these weeks." And they noised it abroad in the village and all the people laughed loudly at the simpleton, until "Thick-head's hunt" became a by-word in all the land. But the boy's mother only smiled and said, "He will surprise them all yet."
The boy kept the Earth-Worm in a tiny pen just outside the door of his home. One day a large Duck came waddling along, and sticking her bill over the little fence of the pen she quickly gobbled up the Worm. The boy was very angry and he went to the man who owned the Duck, and said, "Your Duck ate up my pet Worm. I want my Worm." The man offered to pay him whatever price he asked, but the boy said, "I do not want your price. I want my Worm." But the man said, "How can I give you your Worm when my Duck has eaten it up? It is gone for ever." And the boy said, "It is not gone. It is in the Duck's belly. So I must have the Duck." Then to avoid further trouble the man gave Thick-head the Duck, for he thought to himself, "What is the use of arguing with a fool."
The boy took the Duck home and kept it in a little pen near his home with a low fence around it. And he tied a great weight to its foot so that it could not fly away. He was quite happy again, for he thought, "Now I have both my Worm and the Duck." But one day a Fox came prowling along looking for food. He saw the fat Duck tied by the foot in the little pen. And he said, "What good fortune! There is a choice meal for me," and in a twinkling he was over the fence. The Duck quacked and made a great noise, but she was soon silenced. The Fox had just finished eating up the Duck when the boy, who had heard the quacking, came running out of the house. The Fox was smacking his lips after his good meal, and he was too slow in getting away. The boy fell to beating him with a stout club and soon killed him and threw his body into the yard behind the house. And he thought, "That is not so bad. Now I have my Worm and the Duck and the Fox."
That night an old Wolf came through the forest in search of food. He was very hungry, and in the bright moonlight he saw the dead Fox lying in the yard. He pounced upon it greedily and devoured it until not a trace of it was left. But the boy saw him before he could get away, and he came stealthily upon him and killed him with a blow of his axe. "I am surely in good luck," he thought, "for now I have the Worm and the Duck and the Fox and the Wolf." But the next day when he told his brothers of his good fortune and his great skill, they laughed at him loudly and said, "Much good a dead Wolf will do you. Before two days have passed it will be but an evil-smelling thing and we shall have to bury it deep. You are indeed a great fool." The boy pondered for a long time over what they had said, and he thought, "Perhaps they are right. The dead Wolf cannot last long. I will save the skin."
So he skinned the Wolf and dried the skin and made a drum from it. For the drum was one of the few musical instruments of the Indians in those old times, and they beat it loudly at all their dances and festivals. The boy beat the drum each evening, and made a great noise, and he was very proud because he had the only drum in the whole village. One day the Chief sent for him and said to him, "I want to borrow your drum for this evening. I am having a great gathering to announce to all the land that my daughter is now of age to marry and that suitors may now seek her hand in marriage. But we have no musical instruments and I want your drum, and I myself will beat it at the dance." So Thick-head brought his drum to the Chief's house, but he was not very well pleased, because he was not invited to the feast, while his brothers were among the favoured guests. And he said to the Chief, "Be very careful. Do not tear the skin of my drum, for I can never get another like it. My Worm and my Duck and my Fox and my Wolf have all helped to make it."
[Illustration: THAT NIGHT AN OLD WOLF CAME THROUGH THE FOREST IN SEARCH OF FOOD]
The next day he went for his drum. But the Chief had struck it too hard and had split it open so that it would now make no sound and it was ruined beyond repair. He offered to pay the boy a great price for it, but the boy said, "I do not want your price. I want my drum. Give me back my drum, for my Worm and the Duck and the Fox and the Wolf are all in it." The Chief said, "How can I give you back your drum when it is broken? It is gone for ever. I will give you anything you desire in exchange for it. Since you do not like the price I offer, you may name your own price and you shall have it." And the boy thought to himself, "Here is a chance for good fortune. Now I shall surprise my brothers." And he said, "Since you cannot give me my drum, I will take your daughter in marriage in exchange." The Chief was much perplexed, but he had to be true to his word. So he gave his daughter to Thick-head, and they were married, and the girl brought him much treasure and they lived very happily. And his brothers were much amazed and angered because they had failed. But his mother said, "I told you he was wiser than you and that he would outwit you yet although you called him Thick-head and fool. For the forest fairy said it to me at his birth."
RABBIT AND THE INDIAN CHIEF
Long ago an Indian Chief was living with his people far in the Canadian forest. Life was good and food was plentiful and the people were all very happy. But one day a wicked giant and his old witch wife came crashing into the land from a far country beyond the prairies. They devoured all the food they could lay their hands on and soon there was little left to eat in all the country; and often they carried off little children to their hiding-place and ate them up until not a trace of them remained. Somewhere far in the forest they dwelt in a hidden cave; they slept all day long, but at night they always stalked forth in search of plunder. The Chief was much troubled, and with his warriors he tried in every way to discover their hiding-place, but no one ever succeeded in finding it. For by the use of their magic power the giant and his old witch wife could make themselves invisible when they walked abroad among men and they could not be caught. The Chief called all his warriors to a council, and he said, "Who can rid me of this pest? Who can kill the giant?" But not a man replied. And when he saw his people's store of food rapidly growing smaller and the little children of his tribe slowly disappearing, he was greatly puzzled as to what he should do.
One night of bright moonlight Rabbit was prowling through the woods, as was his custom, in search of some one on whom he could play a prank, for he was a great joker. Suddenly he came upon the giant and his old witch wife standing by an opening in the side of a low mountain. He watched them for a long time from the shadow of a great tree, and at last he saw them enter a large hole in the side of the hill. He knew now that he had hit by accident upon the giant's cave and he was well pleased by his discovery. But he kept his secret to himself, for he thought, "Here is a good chance for me to win fame. I will kill the giants by a crafty trick and I will then be looked upon as a great warrior, the foremost in all the land, for all the Chief's men have failed to find the giants."
So he went to the Chief and said, "Oh, Chief, I know where the giants live and I swear to you that I am going to kill them. It is I alone who can rid you of these pests." "You!" said the Chief in great surprise; "little harm the like of you can do to giants; they will eat you up in one mouthful," and he laughed loudly at Rabbit's boldness. And he called to his warriors saying, "See what a stout fighter we have here! Little Rabbit says he can do what we have failed to do; he swears that he will kill the giants; he is better fitted to kill a mouse!" And they all laughed loud haw-haws at Rabbit's vanity.
Poor Rabbit's pride was deeply hurt by the Chief's scorn and the warriors' cruel laughter, but it all made him more determined than ever to slay the thieving giants. So he went to an old woman who lived near-by and said, "Give me an old faded dress and a ragged old shawl and your coloured spectacles and a hat with a feather in it." The old woman wondered what tricks he was up to now, but she gave him what he asked for. He put on the tattered old dress and the battered old hat with a red feather sticking from the top, and he wrapped the old shawl about his face, and he wore the woman's coloured spectacles and he carried a crooked stick. And dressed in this fashion he set out towards evening for the giants' home. When he reached the mouth of the cave, he stood still and waited, leaning on his crooked stick, for night was coming on and he knew that the giants would soon be going out on their plundering rounds.
After a time when it was quite dark except for the moonlight, the giant's old witch wife came out of the cave. When she saw Rabbit in the dim light she said gruffly, "Who are you, standing there in the shadows?" "Oh, my dear niece," said Rabbit, "I have found you at last. I am your poor old aunt. I thought I had lost my way. I have come to see you from your home in the far country. It was a long journey and my poor old legs and back are stiff and sore, and I am very hungry and tired;" and he moved slowly towards the woman, hobbling along with his crooked stick. The giant woman was deceived, and she threw her arms around Rabbit and kissed him, and she did not feel his whiskers or his split lip because of the old shawl that was wrapped around his face. "I have a pain in my jaw from sleeping out of doors," said Rabbit, "and I must keep my face wrapped up."
"Come in and rest, and you will soon feel better," said the giant woman.
"You will have to lead me in," said Rabbit, not wishing to take off the shawl, "for my eyesight is very bad."
So she led Rabbit into the warm cave, which was so dark that they could scarcely see each other, and she called her husband and said, "Here is my dear old aunt who has come all the way from the far country beyond the prairies." And the giant, believing Rabbit to be his wife's kindred, for he could not see him very clearly, treated him very kindly. And they showed him the bed where he was to sleep.
The woman then gave Rabbit a large piece of dried meat to eat. But Rabbit said, "I cannot eat it, for I am old and I have lost all my teeth. Give me an axe to cut it up small." So the woman brought him a sharp axe and he chopped the meat into small pieces and ate it all up. And he said, "I will keep the axe by me, for I shall need it at all my meals," and he placed it beside his bed. The giant said, "We are going away to see some friends, but we shall be back before midnight." But before they went away Rabbit said to the woman, "I hope your husband sleeps soundly; I have a bad cough and I sometimes moan because of the pain in my face and head and I do not wish to disturb him."
And the old giant woman answered, "He slumbers too well. When we sleep we both snore loudly, and when you hear us snoring you may cough as much as you please, for then you will know that we are sound asleep." Then the man and his witch wife went away.
When the giants came home, Rabbit pretended to be fast asleep. They brought back with them much food which they hid in a secret place at the side of the cave. Rabbit watched them through the holes in the old shawl around his head. Soon they went to bed, drowsy after their fat meal. When Rabbit heard them snoring loudly like a great waterfall, "chr-r-r, chr-r-r," he arose very quietly and crept softly to their bedside. With two blows of his axe he killed the giant and his wife, one after the other. Then he ran away as fast as he could, carrying with him his old dress and hat and shawl, for he thought he might need them again.
In the morning he went to the Chief's house and told the Chief what he had done. The Chief laughed scornfully and he would not believe it until Rabbit brought him to the cave and showed him the slain giants cold and stiff in their bed. The Chief's men then took back to the village the great store of food the giants had hidden in the secret place. But the Chief and his warriors, although they were glad to be rid of the thieves, were angry at heart because Rabbit whom they had laughed at had done what they had failed to do, for they were very jealous of Rabbit's power.
One day soon afterwards the Chief called all the birds and the animals to a council, and he said, "Now that the giants who robbed us of our food are dead and gone, and that we shall never again want for nourishment in my country, I am going to let each animal and bird choose the kind of food he would most like to live on if he could get it. And they shall never want for that kind of food if it can be provided." And he called on each to make the choice. And the birds said "Grain and seeds and worms," and the Squirrel said "Nuts," and the Fox said "Chickens," and the cat said "Milk," and the dog said "Meat and bones," and the weasel said "Eggs," and the wolf said "Lambs," and the bear said "Fish from the frozen sea," and so on until each animal was called upon and declared his liking. And the Chief said, "It shall be as you have chosen." But the Chief had purposely neglected to summon poor Rabbit to the council, and Rabbit was absent on a long journey. When he came home, he was very angry when he heard what had happened, for only the left-over in the world's food remained for him to choose. So he went to the Chief and said in great wrath, "This is a fine return for ridding your land of giants. But that is a way you have; you always reward good deeds with evil."
The Chief was very angry because of Rabbit's insolence, and he said, "You are telling lies again." But Rabbit called as witnesses to the truth of what he said Sheep and Goat and Duck who chanced to be passing by and who stood listening to the quarrel. And old Sheep said, "Rabbit has spoken truly. When I was young I gave the Chief much wool to make clothes for his back and he used me well. But now that I am old he is going to kill me and eat me up. That is my reward." And old Goat said, "Rabbit has spoken wisely and justly. I served the Chief well in my time and gave him milk, but now that I am old and have no more milk he is fattening me and getting me ready for slaughter. That is my reward." And old Duck said, "That is a true saying of Rabbit. Once upon a time I gave the Chief many eggs and young ducklings, but now that I have stopped laying he is soon going to roast me in a pot. That is my reward." The Chief could make no answer to these charges, for he knew them to be true, and he offered to do what was in his power for Rabbit. But Rabbit refused to make choice of food, for he said the best was already gone. He sulked for many months and lived alone by his own efforts as best he could.
At last he decided to take vengeance on the Chief. And he hit, as was his custom, on a crafty trick. The Chief had an old Bear which he prized very highly, for the Bear did for him many wondrous tricks and brought laughter to him and his warriors when he danced at their feasts. In those olden times Bear had a long bushy tail of which he was very proud. One day as Rabbit sat on the ice fishing--for it was now winter--Bear came along. There was to be a feast that night and he was going to dance for the Chief, and he was in very good spirits. "Where did you get all the fine fish?" he asked, for he was a great fish eater. "I caught them through the hole in the ice," said Rabbit. "It is very easy. Just drop your tail down through the hole and it will soon be covered with fine big fish."
Bear did as he was told, and he sat on the ice for a long time waiting for his prey. He sat so long that the hole froze up, for it was very cold, and in it was frozen poor Bear's long bushy tail. "Now," said Rabbit, "jump quick, for many fish are hanging to you." Bear jumped with all his might, but his tail was held fast in the ice and it broke off close to the root. Rabbit laughed in great glee and ran away. And poor Bear howled with pain and shame. He could not dance at the feast because his stub of a tail was sore, and the Chief and the warriors were very angry at Rabbit because he had harmed their dancing pet. And since that time Bear has had a short stubby tail which to this day he tries to wag feebly.
Rabbit then hid for some days far from the Chief and his warriors. Then he decided to try another trick. The Chief's wood-cutter was old Beaver, who lived in a little house of reeds on the bank of a stream. He was very busy now cutting down trees for the Chief, for it was near to spring-time and the people were in need of logs for building roads over the rivers. One day Rabbit went to Beaver and said, "The Chief sent me to you to bring you to a great tree he wishes you to cut down at once." So Beaver went along with him. But when Beaver was busy at his task cutting down the tree, Rabbit hit him a savage blow on the head with a big stick hoping to kill him and thus again to anger the Chief. Poor Beaver fell to the ground and Rabbit ran away. But Beaver was only stunned. He got up after a time and went home muttering to himself and rubbing his sore head. Soon Rabbit came back to the tree and found Beaver gone. He knew that his blow had failed. Then he put on again his tattered old dress and his ragged shawl and his coloured spectacles and the hat with the red feather sticking to the top, and he went to Beaver's house by the stream, hobbling along with a stick. "The Chief sent me to you to bring you to a great tree he wishes you to cut down at once," he called. And Beaver said, "I have already tried to cut a great tree for him to-day and I should have finished it had I not been beaten with a stick until I was stunned by the blow." "Who struck you?" asked Rabbit, laughing to himself. "Rabbit struck me," answered Beaver. "He is a great brigand and a liar and a thief," said Rabbit. "He is all that," said Beaver, rubbing the lump on his head. So Beaver went along with Rabbit. And Rabbit asked as they went along, "How is it that you are alive after that cruel blow?" And Beaver said, "Rabbit hit me on the head. If he had hit me on the back of my neck he would have killed me, for there I keep the secret of my life."
When Beaver was busy again at his task cutting down the tree, Rabbit hit him a powerful blow on the back of the neck and poor Beaver fell down dead. Then he cut off his tail that was made like a file, and went away happy, for he knew that the Chief would be very angry when he found what had happened to his wood-cutter.
[Illustration: HE WENT TO BEAVER'S HOUSE BY THE STREAM, HOBBLING ALONG WITH A STICK]
When the Chief learned that Beaver had been killed, his wrath knew no bounds, for he could ill afford at this time to lose his best wood-chopper. He blamed Rabbit for the deed, but he could not be sure that his suspicions were well-founded. Rabbit kept out of the Chief's sight for some weeks. But one day in early summer he was very hungry. He saw all the other animals filling their bellies with their favourite food, and he decided to forget his sulks and to ask the Chief for help. So he went to the Chief and said haughtily, "I want you to give me food for my own special use as you have done with the other animals. You must do it at once or I will do you much harm." Then the Chief remembered what Rabbit had done to his dancing Bear, and he thought of the death of Beaver, for which he blamed Rabbit without proof, and he grew red with anger. He seized Rabbit by the heels and said, "Henceforth the dogs will always chase you, and you will never have peace when they are near. And you will live for the most part on whatever food I throw you into now." Then he whirled Rabbit around his head by the heels, and he threw him from him with great force, hoping to drop him in a great black swamp near-by. Poor Rabbit went flying through the air for a great distance, farther than the Chief had hoped, and he dropped with a thud into a field of clover on the edge of which cabbages and lettuce were growing. And since that time the dogs have always chased Rabbit and he has lived for the most part on cabbages and lettuce and clover which he steals on moonlight nights from farmers' fields.
GREAT HEART AND THE THREE TESTS
Somewhere near the sea in olden times a boy was living with his father and mother. He had no brothers or sisters. His father was a great hunter and the boy inherited something of his power, for he was always very successful in the killing of game. And his mother said, "Some day he will be a great man, for before his birth a vision came to me in the night and told me that my son would win wide fame. And fairy gifts were laid by the fairies in his cradle." And his father, listening to her boasting, said, "Time will tell; time will tell; but if he is to be a great man it is his own deeds and not your boasting that must prove it." As the boy grew up he became strangely beautiful and he had great strength. And his father said, "It is time he set out to seek his fortune. I was in the forest doing for myself when I was no older than he." And his mother said, "Wait a little and be not so impatient. He is yet young and there is yet much time." So the boy remained at home a while longer.
Now it happened that far away in a distant village there lived a young girl of very great beauty and grace. Her father had been a great Chief, but he was now dead. Her mother too was dead, and she was all alone in the world. But her parents had left her vast lands and a great store of goods and many servants, and because of her treasures and her great beauty she had many suitors. But she was not easily pleased by men and on all who came to seek her hand she imposed severe feats of skill to test their sincerity and their worth. She was carefully guarded by an old woman and many servants who kept troublesome and meddlesome people away.
Soon the fame of the girl's wealth and beauty spread through all the land. It reached the sea coast village where the young man dwelt. His father thought to himself, "Here is a good chance for my son to prove his worth." So he called his boy to him and said, "It is time you were setting out to seek your fortune in the world and to find a wife, for your spring-time is passing and your summer of life will soon be here, and before you know it your autumn will be upon you and your winter will be near. There is no time to lose. Seek out the beautiful girl of the rich treasures in the distant inland village and try to win her as your wife." And his mother gave him the fairy gifts which had been laid in his cradle at his birth, and he said good-bye to his parents and set out on his long journey. He had no misgivings, for he was very vain of his beauty and he was sure, too, of his strength.
As he travelled inland he came one day upon a man clad in scarlet sitting on the side of a rocky hill tying stones to his feet. "Hello," he said to the man, "why are you tying these heavy rocks to your ankles?" "I am a hunter," replied the man, "but when I follow the deer I run so fast that I am soon far in front of them instead of behind them, and I am putting heavy weights on my feet so that I will not run so rapidly." "You are indeed a wonderful man," said the boy; "but I am alone and I need a companion. Let us go along together." "Who are you?" said the man. "I am Lad of the Great Heart," said the boy, "and I can do great deeds and I can win for you great treasure." So the Scarlet Runner went along with him.
Towards evening when they were now far inland, they came to a large lake. Among the trees on the fringe of the lake a large fat man was lying flat on his stomach with his mouth in the water drinking as hard as he could. For some time they watched him, but still he drank and the lake grew smaller and smaller and still his thirst was not quenched. They laughed at such a strange sight, and as they approached him the boy said, "Hello! Why do you lie there drinking so much water?" "Oh," answered the fat man, "there are times when I cannot get enough water to drink. When I have drunk this lake dry I shall still be thirsty." "Who are you?" asked the boy. "I am Man of the Great Thirst," said the fat man. "That is well," said Great Heart, "we two need a third companion. We can do great deeds and we can win for you great treasure." So the three went along together.
[Illustration: HE CAME ONE DAY UPON A MAN CLAD IN SCARLET SITTING ON THE SIDE OF A ROCKY HILL TYING STONES TO HIS FEET]
They had not gone far when they came to a wide open plain where they saw a man walking along with his face raised upwards, peering at the sky. He moved along rapidly and seemed to find his way without his eyes, for he gazed steadily at the heavens. "Hello," said Great Heart as the sky-gazer rushed past him and almost knocked him over, "what are you looking at so intently?" "Oh," said the man, "I have shot an arrow into the sky and I am waiting for it to fall. It has gone so far that it will be some time before it drops." "Who are you?" asked the boy. "I am the Far-Darter," said the sky-gazer. "We three need a fourth companion," said the boy. "We can do great deeds and win for you much treasure. Come along with us." So the four went along together.
They had gone but a short distance across the plain to the edge of a forest when they came upon a man lying down at full length with his head upon his hand. The edge of his hand was on the ground and it was half closed around his ear, which rested upon it. As he saw the four men approaching him he placed a finger of his other hand upon his lips and signalled to them to keep quiet. "Hello," said Great Heart in a whisper, "what are you doing there with your ear to the ground?" "I am listening to the plants growing far away in the forest," he answered. "There is a beautiful flower I wish to find, and I am trying to hear it breathing so that I may go and get it. Aha! I hear it now." So saying he rose from the ground. The boy said, "Who are you?" "I am Keen Ears," said the listener. "We four need another companion," said Great Heart. "We can do great deeds and win for you much treasure. Come along with us." So the four men and the boy went along together, Keen Ears, and Scarlet Runner, and Far Darter, and Man of the Great Thirst, and Lad of the Great Heart. Then Great Heart unfolded to the others his plan to win the beautiful girl who lived with her treasures in the distant village. And they gladly agreed to help him in his dangerous undertaking.
When they reached the village, the people were all very curious when they saw the five strangers. They marvelled at Great Heart's beauty. But when they heard that he wished to marry the daughter of the former Chief they shook their heads gravely and said, "It will never be. She places hard conditions on all who seek her hand. He who fails in the tests is doomed to death. Many suitors have tried and failed and died." But Great Heart was not alarmed, and with his four companions he went to the girl's home. The old woman who guarded her met him at the door and he made known his wishes. She laughed scornfully when she saw his great beauty, and she said, "You look more like a girl than like a warrior. You cannot endure the tests." But the young man insisted on making the trials.
The old woman said, "If you fail in the tests you will die," and Great Heart said, "It is so agreed." Then the woman said, "If you wish to win the maiden you must first push away this great rock from before her window. It keeps the sunlight from her in the mornings." Then Great Heart, calling to his aid the fairy gifts of his cradle, placed his shoulder against the huge stone which rose higher than the house, and he pushed with all his strength. With a mighty crash it rolled down the hill and broke into millions of pieces. The bits of rock flew all over the earth so great was the fall, and the little pebbles and stones that came from it are seen throughout the world to this day. The sunlight streamed in at the window, and the maiden knew that the first test had been successfully passed by a suitor.
Then came the second test. The old woman and her servants brought great quantities of food and drink and bade the strangers consume it all at one meal. They were very hungry, for they had eaten nothing all day and they easily ate up the food. But when Great Heart saw the great barrels of water, his spirits sank, and he said, "I fear I am beaten." But Man of the Great Thirst said, "Not so fast, my friend. The spell of great stomach-burning is again upon me. I am very dry as if there was a fire in my belly. Give me a chance to drink." He went from barrel to barrel and in a twinkling he had drained them all of every drop. And the people wondered greatly.
But there was still another test. "You must have one of your party run a race," said the old woman to Great Heart. And she brought out a man who had never been beaten in running. "Who is your choice of runners?" she asked; "he must race with this man, and if he wins you may have the maiden for your wife and all the treasure with her, for this is the final test. But if he loses the race you shall die." Great Heart called Scarlet Runner to the mark and told the old woman that this was the man selected. Then he untied the rocks from the runner's feet, and when all was ready the race began. The course lay far across the plains for many miles until the runners should pass from sight, and back again to the starting point. The two runners kept together for some distance, talking together in a friendly way as they ran. When they had passed from sight of the village the maiden's runner said, "Now we are out of sight of the village. Let us rest here a while on this grassy bank, for the day is hot." The Scarlet Runner agreed to this and they both stretched out on the grass. Now this was an old trick of the maiden's runner, who always won by craft rather than by speed. They had not lain down long on the grass when Scarlet Runner fell asleep under the hot sun, just as his rival had hoped. When the latter was sure that his rival was sound asleep, he set out for the village, running as fast as he could. The people soon saw their runner approaching far off on the plains, but there was no sign of the stranger, and they thought that the new suitor for the girl's hand had at last failed like all the others before him.
Great Heart was much puzzled when Scarlet Runner did not appear, and as he saw the maiden's runner coming nearer, he said, "What can have happened? I fear I am beaten." But Keen Ears threw himself flat on the ground and listened. "Scarlet Runner is asleep," he called; "I hear him snoring on the plains far away." And with his keen sense of sound he located the exact spot where the runner was lying. "I will soon wake him," said Far-Darter, as he fitted an arrow to his bow-string. The people all thought him mad, for they had never seen an arrow shot so great a distance beyond their sight. But Far-Darter was not dismayed. He quickly shot an arrow from his bow to the spot which Keen Ears had indicated. His aim was so true that the arrow hit Scarlet Runner on the nose and aroused him from his sleep. But when he rose to his feet he found that his rival was gone and he knew that he had been deceived. So in a great rage because of the trick and the pain in his nose, he set out for the village running like the wind. His rival had almost reached the end of the race, but by putting all his strength into his effort, Scarlet Runner quickly over-took him and passed him near the winning-post and won the race. And the people wondered greatly at these great deeds of the strangers.
Then the old woman said to Great Heart, "You have won the maiden as your wife, for you alone have succeeded in these tests." So the two were married with great ceremony. Great Heart gave much treasure to his companions, and they promised to help him always in his need. Then with his wife and her servants and her great store of goods he went back to his native village by the sea. His father and mother were glad to see him again and to hear of his success, and his mother said, "I told you he would win great fame because of the fairy gifts that were laid in his cradle at his birth." And they all lived together and were henceforth very happy.
THE BOY OF THE RED TWILIGHT SKY
Long ago there dwelt on the shores of the Great Water in the west a young man and his younger wife. They had no children and they lived all by themselves far from other people on an island not far from the coast. The man spent his time in catching the deep-sea fish far out on the ocean, or in spearing salmon in the distant rivers. Often he was gone for many days and his wife was very lonely in his absence. She was not afraid, for she had a stout spirit, but it was very dismal in the evenings to look only at the grey leaden sky and to hear only the sound of the surf as it beat upon the beach. So day after day she said to herself, "I wish we had children. They would be good company for me when I am alone and my husband is far away."
One evening at twilight when she was solitary because of her husband's absence on the ocean catching the deep-sea fish, she sat on the sand beach looking out across the water. The sky in the west was pale grey; it was always dull and grey in that country, and when the sun had gone down there was no soft light. In her loneliness the woman said to herself, "I wish we had children to keep me company." A Kingfisher, with his children, was diving for minnows not far away. And the woman said, "Oh, sea bird with the white collar, I wish we had children like you." And the Kingfisher said, "Look in the sea-shells; look in the sea-shells," and flew away. The next evening the woman sat again upon the beach looking westward at the dull grey sky. Not far away a white Sea-gull was riding on the waves in the midst of her brood of little ones. And the woman said, "Oh, white sea bird, I wish we had children like you to keep us company." And the Sea-gull said, "Look in the sea-shells; look in the sea-shells," and flew away.
The woman wondered greatly at the words of the Kingfisher and the Sea-Gull. As she sat there in thought she heard a strange cry coming from the sand dunes behind her. She went closer to the sound and found that the cry came from a large sea-shell lying on the sand. She picked up the shell, and inside of it was a tiny boy, crying as hard as he could. She was well pleased with her discovery, and she carried the baby to her home and cared for him. When her husband came home from the sea, he, too, was very happy to find the baby there, for he knew that they would be lonely no more.
The baby grew very rapidly, and soon he was able to walk and move about where he pleased. One day the woman was wearing a copper bracelet on her arm and the child said to her, "I must have a bow made from the copper on your arm." So to please him she made him a tiny bow from the bracelet, and two tiny arrows. At once he set out to hunt game, and day after day he came home bearing the products of his chase. He brought home geese and ducks and brant and small sea birds, and gave them to his mother for food. As he grew older the man and his wife noticed that his face took on a golden hue brighter than the colour of his copper bow. Wherever he went there was a strange light. When he sat on the beach looking to the west the weather was always calm and there were strange bright gleams upon the water. And his foster-parents wondered greatly at this unusual power. But the boy would not talk about it; when they spoke of it he was always silent.
It happened once that the winds blew hard over the Great Water and the man could not go out to catch fish because of the turbulent sea. For many days he stayed on shore, for the ocean, which was usually at peace, was lashed into a great fury and the waves were dashing high on the beach. Soon the people were in need of fish for food. And the boy said, "I will go out with you, for I can overcome the Storm Spirit." The man did not want to go, but at last he listened to the boy's entreaties and together they set out for the fishing grounds far across the tossing sea. They had not gone far when they met the Spirit of the Storm coming madly from the south-west where the great winds dwelt. He tried hard to upset their boat, but over them he had no power, for the boy guided the frail craft across the water and all around them the sea was calm and still. Then the Storm Spirit called his nephew Black Cloud to help him, and away in the south-east they saw him hurrying to his uncle's aid. But the boy said to the man, "Be not afraid, for I am more than a match for him." So the two met, but when Black Cloud saw the boy he quickly disappeared. Then the Spirit of the Storm called Mist of the Sea to come and cover the water, for he thought the boat would be lost if he hid the land from the man and the boy. When the man saw Mist of the Sea coming like a grey vapour across the water he was very frightened, for of all his enemies on the ocean he feared this one most. But the boy said, "He cannot harm you when I am with you." And sure enough, when Mist of the Sea saw the boy sitting smiling in the boat he disappeared as quickly as he had come. And the Storm Spirit in great anger hurried away to other parts, and that day there was no more danger on the sea near the fishing grounds.
The boy and the man soon reached the fishing grounds in safety. And the boy taught his foster-father a magic song with which he was able to lure fish to his nets. Before evening came the boat was filled with good fat fish and they set out for their home. The man said, "Tell me the secret of your power." But the boy said, "It is not yet time."
[Illustration: AND SHE MAKES TO HIM AN OFFERING OF TINY WHITE FEATHERS PLUCKED FROM THE BREASTS OF BIRDS]
The next day the boy killed many birds. He skinned them all and dried their skins. Then he dressed himself in the skin of a plover and rose into the air and flew above the sea. And the sea under him was grey like his wings. Then he came down and dressed himself in the skin of a blue-jay and soared away again. And the sea over which he was flying was at once changed to blue like the blue of his wings. When he came back to the beach, he put on the skin of a robin with the breast of a golden hue like his face. Then he flew high and at once the waves under him reflected a colour as of fire and bright gleams of light appeared upon the ocean, and the sky in the west was golden red. The boy flew back to the beach and he said to his foster-parents, "Now it is time for me to leave you. I am the offspring of the sun. Yesterday my power was tested and it was not found wanting, so now I must go away and I shall see you no more. But at evening I shall appear to you often in the twilight sky in the west. And when the sky and the sea look at evening like the colour of my face, you will know that there will be no wind nor storm and that on the morrow the weather will be fair. But although I go away, I shall leave you a strange power. And always when you need me, let me know your desires by making white offerings to me, so that I may see them from my home far in the west."
Then he gave to his foster-mother a wonderful robe. He bade his parents good-bye, and soared away to the west, leaving them in sadness. But the woman still keeps a part of the power he gave her, and when she sits on the island in a crevice in the dunes and loosens her wonderful robe, the wind hurries down from the land, and the sea is ruffled with storm; and the more she loosens the garment the greater is the tempest. But in the late autumn when the cold mists come in from the sea, and the evenings are chill, and the sky is dull and grey, she remembers the promise of the boy. And she makes to him an offering of tiny white feathers plucked from the breasts of birds. She throws them into the air, and they appear as flakes of snow and rise thickly into the winds. And they hurry westward to tell the boy that the world is grey and dreary as it yearns for the sight of his golden face. Then he appears to the people of earth. He comes at evening and lingers after the sun has gone, until the twilight sky is red, and the ocean in the west has gleams of golden light. And the people then know that there will be no wind and that on the morrow the weather will be fair, as he promised them long ago.
HOW RAVEN BROUGHT FIRE TO THE INDIANS
Many ages ago when the world was still young, Raven and White Sea-gull lived near together in Canada, far in the north country on the shores of the Great Water in the west. They were very good friends and they always worked in harmony and they had much food and many servants in common. White Sea-gull knew no guile; he was always very open and frank and honest in his dealings with others. But Raven was a sly fellow, and at times he was not lacking in treachery and deceit. But Sea-gull did not suspect him, and the two lived always on very friendly terms. In these far-back times in the north country all the world was dark and there was no light but that of the stars. Sea-gull owned all the daylight, but he was very stingy and he kept it always locked up in a box. He would give none of it to anyone else, and he never let it out of the box except when he needed a little of it to help himself when he went far away on his journeys.
After a time Raven grew envious of Sea-gull's possession. And he said, "It is not fair that Sea-gull should keep the daylight all to himself locked up in a box. It was meant for all the world and not for him alone, and it would be of great value to all of us if he would sometimes let a little of it out." So he went to Sea-gull and said, "Give me some of your daylight. You do not need it all and I can use some of it with advantage." But Sea-gull said, "No. I want it all for myself. What could you do with daylight, you with your coat as black as night?" and he would not give him any of it. So Raven made up his mind that he would have to get some daylight from Sea-gull by stealth.
Soon afterwards Raven gathered some prickly thorns and burdocks and scattered them on the ground between Sea-gull's house and the beach where the canoes were lying. Then he went to Sea-gull's window and cried loudly, "Our canoes are going adrift in the surf. Come quickly and help me to save them." Sea-gull sprang out of bed and ran half-asleep on his bare feet. But as he ran to the beach the thorns stuck in his bare flesh, and he howled with pain. He crawled back to his house, saying, "My canoe may go adrift if it pleases; I cannot walk because of the splinters in my feet." Raven chuckled to himself, and he moved away, pretending to go to the beach to draw up the canoes. Then he went into Sea-gull's house. Sea-gull was still howling with pain; he was sitting crying on the side of his bed and he was trying to pull the thorns from his feet as best he could. "I will help you," said Raven, "for I have often done this before. I am a very good doctor." So he took an awl made from whale-bone and he caught hold of Sea-gull's foot, with the pretence of removing the thorns. But instead of taking them out he only pushed them in farther until poor Sea-gull howled louder than ever. And Raven said, "It is so dark I cannot see to pull these thorns from your feet. Give me some daylight and I will soon cure you. A doctor must always have a little light." So Sea-gull unlocked the box and lifted the cover just a little bit so that a faint gleam of light came out. "That is better," said Raven. But instead of picking out the thorns he pushed them in as he had done before, until Sea-gull howled and kicked in pain. "Why are you so stingy with your light?" snapped Raven. "Do you think I am an owl and that I can see well enough in the darkness to heal your feet? Open the box wide and I will soon make you well." So saying he purposely fell heavily against Sea-gull and knocked the box on the floor. The cover flew open and daylight escaped and spread quickly over all the world. Poor Sea-gull tried his best to lure it back again into the box, but his efforts proved fruitless, for it had gone for ever. Raven said he was very sorry for the accident, but after he had taken all the thorns from Sea-gull's feet he went home laughing to himself and well pleased because of the success of his trick.
Soon there was light in all the world. But Raven could not see very well, for the light was too bright and his eyes were not accustomed to it. He sat for a time looking towards the east, but he saw there nothing of interest. The next day he saw a bit farther, for he was now getting used to the new conditions. The third day he could see distinctly a line of hills far in the east, rising against the sky, and covered with a blue mist. He looked long at the strange sight. Then he saw far away towards the hill a thin column of smoke lifting heavenwards. He had never seen smoke before, but he had often heard of it from travellers in strange places. "That must be the country of which I have been told," he said. "In that land dwell the people who alone possess Fire. We have searched for it for many ages and now I think we have found it." Then he thought, "We now have the daylight, and what a fine thing it would be if we could also have Fire," and he determined to set out to find it.
On the following day he called his servants together and told them of his plans. He said, "We shall set out at once, for the distance is far." And he asked three of his best servants, Robin, Mole and Flea, to go with him. Flea brought out his little wagon and they all tried to get into it, but it was much too small to hold them. Then they tried Mole's carriage, but it was much too frail, and it had scarcely started to move when it broke down and they all fell out in a heap. Then they tried Robin's carriage, but it was much too high and it toppled over under its heavy load and threw them all to the ground. Then Raven stole Sea-gull's large strong carriage, for Sea-gull was asleep, and it did very well, and they started on their journey, taking turns pushing the carriage along with a pole over the flat plain.
After a strange journey in queer places they reached the land of the people who owned Fire, guided along by the thin column of smoke. The people were not people of earth. Some say they were the Fish people, but that, no man knows. They sat around in a large circle with Fire in their midst, for it was autumn and the days and nights were chill. And Fire was in many places. Raven looked on for a while from afar thinking of the best plan to obtain Fire. Then he said to Robin, "You can move faster than any of us. You must steal Fire. You can fly in quickly, pick it up in your bill and take it back to us and the people will not see nor hear you." So Robin picked out a spot where there were few people, and he darted in quickly and picked up fire in a twinkling and flew back unharmed towards his companions. But he had only taken a very little bit of it. When he got half-way back to his friends, Fire was so hot in his bill that it gave him a strange pain and he had to drop it on the ground. It fell to the earth with a crash and it was so small that it flickered faintly. Robin called to his companions to bring the carriage. Then he stood over Fire and fanned it with his wings to keep it alive. It was very hot, but he stood bravely to his task until his breast was badly scorched and he had to move away. His efforts to save Fire were of no avail, and before his companions reached him Fire had died, and only a black coal remained. And poor Robin's breast was singed, and to this day the breasts of his descendants are a reddish-brown colour because he was scorched while trying to steal Fire ages ago.
Then Raven asked Flea to make the attempt to steal Fire. But Flea said, "I am too little. The heat would roast me to death; and, further, I might miscalculate the distance and hop into the flame." Then Raven asked Mole to try, but Mole said, "Oh no, I am better fitted for other work. My fur would all be singed like Robin's breast." Raven took good care that he would not go himself, for he was a great coward. So he said, "There is a better and easier way. We will steal the baby of the Chief and hold him for ransom. Perhaps they will give us Fire in exchange for him," and they all thought this was a very good idea. Raven asked, "Who will volunteer to steal the baby?" for he always made the others do all the work. Flea said, "I will go. In one jump I will be into the house, and in another jump I will be out again, for I can hop a great distance." But the others laughed and said, "You could not carry the baby; you are too small." The Mole said, "I will go. I can tunnel a passage very quietly under the house and right up to the baby's cradle. I can then steal the baby and no one will hear me or see me." So it was agreed that Mole should go. In a few minutes Mole made his tunnel, and he was soon back with the baby. Then they got into their carriage and hurried home with their prize.
[Illustration: THEN RAVEN ASKED THE MOLE TO TRY, BUT MOLE SAID, "OH, NO, I AM BETTER FITTED FOR OTHER WORK,--MY FUR WOULD ALL BE SINGED"]
When the Chief of the Fire people discovered the loss of his child he was very angry. And in all the land there was great sorrow because the Chief's heir, the hope of the tribe, had gone. And the child's mother and her women wept so bitterly that their tears fell like rain on all the land. The Chief said he would give anything he possessed to find his child. But although his people searched far and near, they could not find the baby. After many days a wayfarer who had come far from the Great Water in the west brought them news that a strange child was living far to the westward in the village by the sea. He said, "He is not of their tribe. He looks like the children of your village," and he advised them to go to see him for themselves. So the Chief sent his men to search for them guided by the wayfarer. When they reached Raven's village they were told that a strange baby was indeed there; the child was described to them, but he was kept out of sight, and Raven would not tell how he had happened to come there. And Raven said, "How do I know he is your Chief's child? People tell strange lies these days. If you want him you can pay for him, for he has caused us much trouble and expense." So the messengers went back and reported to the Chief what they had heard. From the description, the Chief knew that the child was his, so he gave the messengers very valuable presents of pearls and rich robes and sent them back again to ransom his boy. But Raven, when he saw the presents, said, "No, I do not want these gifts; they do not pay me for my trouble," and he would not part with the baby. The messengers again reported to the Chief what had happened. Then the Chief gave them still richer gifts, the best he had in all his land, and sent them back. But again Raven said, "No, your gifts are valueless, compared with my trouble and expense. Say this to your Chief."
When the Chief heard this from his messengers he was sore perplexed, for he had offered the best he had, and he thought that he had reached the end of his resources. So he said, "Go back and ask the people to demand what they wish in exchange for my boy and they will receive it if it can be provided." So the messengers went back to Raven and spoke as they had been commanded. And Raven said, "Only one thing can pay for the child, and that is Fire. Give me Fire and you can take the baby." The messenger laughed and said, "Why did you not say so at first and save us all this trouble and anxiety? Fire is the most plentiful thing in our kingdom, and we hold it in no value." So they returned happy to the Chief. And he sent back much Fire and received his child unharmed from Raven in exchange. And he sent Raven two small stones which the messengers taught Raven how to use. And they said, "If you ever lose Fire or if it dies for lack of food you can always call it back to life with these two little stones." Then they showed him how to make Fire with the two little stones and withered grass, and birch-bark and dry pine, and Raven thought it was very easy. And he felt very proud because he had brought Fire and Light to the earth. He kept Fire for himself for a long time, and although the people clamoured loudly for it, he would not give any of it away. Soon, however, he decided to sell a quantity of it, for he now had the power of making it. So he said to himself, "This is a good way to get many wives," and he announced that he would only sell some of his fire in return for a wife. And many families bought his fire and in exchange he received many wives. And to this day he still has many wives and he still moves about from place to place with a flock of them always around him. But the Indians when they arrived took Fire away from him. Thus Fire came to the Indians in the olden days. And when it has died, as it often does, they still sometimes use Raven's flint stones to bring it back to life.
THE GIRL WHO ALWAYS CRIED
On the bank of a stream far in the West, Owl-man lived long ago in a little house under the ground. He had very strange habits. He always kept away from the Great Water and he dwelt for the most part in the forest. He had very few friends, and he usually went hunting by himself. He lived on toads and frogs and flies. He would say but little, and when other people sat around him talking pleasantly, he was always silent, gazing into space with wide-open eyes, and trying to look wiser than he really was. Because of this, people thought he was very queer, and strange stories about him soon spread far and wide. It was said that he was very cruel, and that he was silent because he was always brooding over his past wickedness or thinking about some evil deed he was soon going to do. And when children were troublesome or disobedient, their mothers always frightened them into goodness by saying, "The Owl-man from the stream will come and take you if you do not mend your ways." And although the Owl-man was a solitary fellow he thus had great influence in all the land.
Not far away lived a man and a woman who had one adopted daughter. Because she was the only child in the house she was much petted, and she was never satisfied, and she cried and fretted all the time, and kept always asking for things she could not get. She disturbed all the neighbours round about so that they could not sleep because of her constant wailing and complaining. At last her foster-parents grew tired of her weeping and they said, "The Owl-man will carry you off if you do not stop crying." But still she pouted and fretted. And the old man of the house said, "I wish the Owl-man would come and take her away." Now the old man was a great magician, and as he wished, so it came to pass.
That evening it happened that the people were gathered at a feast of shell-fish on the beach by the bright moonlight, as was their weekly custom. But the sorrowful girl would not go with the others. She stayed at home and sulked. As she sat alone in the house, old Owl-man came along carrying his basket full of toads and frogs. The girl was still crying when he came in. "I have come for you," he said, "as the old man wished." And he put her in his basket with the toads and frogs and carried her off. She yelled and kicked and scratched, but the lid of the basket was tightly closed and Owl-man laughed to himself and said, "Now I have a wife at last. I shall be alone no more, and the people will not now think I am so queer." So he took her to his underground house by the stream. That night the people noticed that the girl's cries were no longer heard and they said, "What can have cured Sour-face; what can have pleased Cry-Baby into silence?" And the girl's foster-mother wondered where she had gone. But only the old man knew that it had happened as he had wished, because of his magic power, and that Owl-man had taken her away.
The girl was not happy in her new home, for she would not be happy in any place. She still kept up her caterwauling and there was no peace in the house. Owl-man was a great hunter. Every day he went out hunting with his big basket on his arm, but he always locked his wife in the house before he went away. He was always very successful in the chase, and each night he came back with his basket full of toads and frogs and field-mice and flies. But his wife would eat none of them and she threw them in his face when he offered them to her, and said in a bad temper, "I will not eat your filthy food. It is not fit food for gentle-folk." And Owl-man said, "Gentle-folk indeed! You should find a more suitable name; you are not gentle; you are a wild evil thing, but I am going to tame you." And the girl wept again and sulked and stamped her feet in her temper.
At last the girl became very hungry, for there was little to eat except the food that Owl-man brought home for himself. He gathered a few berries for her, but even these did not satisfy her hunger. So she thought out a plan of escape. One day when Owl-man was away, she took some oil she found in the house and rubbed it all over her face and hair. When Owl-man came home in the evening, he said, "You are very pretty to-night. What have you done to make yourself look so sleek and shiny?" And she answered, "I have put on my face and hair gum which I picked from the trees last night when I went walking with you." And he said, "I should like to put some on too, for perhaps it would make me beautiful." The girl told him that if he would go out and gather some gum she would put it on his face and hair for him. So he went out and gathered a great store of gum from the trees and brought it back to her. She melted it on a hot stove until it was balsam again and would pour easily out. Then she said, "Shut your eyes so that it will not harm your sight, and I will make your face and hair beautiful and shining like mine." Owl-man shut his eyes, and the girl soon covered his face and head with the soft gum. She put it on very thick, and she said, "Keep your eyes shut until it dries or it may blind you." Owl-man did as he was told, but when the gum dried he could not open his eyes, and while he was trying to rub it off, the girl slipped out the door and ran back to her parents, far away by the Great Water.
Owl-man scraped the gum from his face and head as best he could, and when he could open his eyes again and could see pretty well, he went out into the night in search of his wife. And as he went along he cried, "Oh, oh, oh, where is my wife? Where is my girl? I have lost my wife. I have lost my girl. Oh, oh, oh." And when the people heard him calling they thought they would play a trick on him. So they said, "She is here, she is here." But when he entered their houses, the woman they showed him was not his wife, and he went away sorrowful. And the people all laughed at his confusion, and said, "Owl-man is getting queerer each day. He is far gone in his head." Owl-man went from house to house, but he could not find his wife. Then he went to the trees and searched among the branches. He pulled the trees up by the roots, thinking she might be hiding underneath. And he looked into the salmon-traps in the rivers, and kicked them to pieces in his frenzy. But nowhere was his wife to be found.
Then he went to the girl's house, where she was hiding, and he yelled, "Oh, oh, oh, give me my wife. Give me my girl. I know she is here. Oh, oh, oh." But the girl's foster-mother would not give her up. Then he began to tear down the house over their heads, for the old man of the house was away and there was no one else strong enough to stop Owl-man in his rage. When the woman saw her house in danger of falling about her ears, she cried, "Stop; your wife is here." And she brought forth the girl from her hiding-place. When Owl-man saw her, his rage left him and he was happy again.
[Illustration: AND WITH HIS MAGIC POWER HE CHANGED HER INTO A FISH-HAWK AND SENT HER OUT TO THE OCEAN]
But just then the old man of magic power came home. He had heard the hub-bub from a distance. When he came in and saw the great holes in the roof and the side of his house where Owl-man had torn away the logs, he was very angry and he said to himself, "I will punish both Owl-man and the girl for this night's work." And he hit upon a plan. He said to Owl-man, "We must give you a hot bath to melt the gum and take it from your hair, for it will do you no good, and it will take all the hair off your head." And Owl-man gladly agreed. So they filled a great bark tub with water and heated it by placing at the bottom of it many red-hot stones, after the fashion of Indians in those old days. But the old man put so many hot stones in the water that it was soon almost boiling with the heat, and when they put Owl-man into the tub he was almost scalded to death and he yelled loudly in pain. Then the old man said, "Now I will take vengeance. You will trouble me no more. You have broken my house. Henceforth you will be not a man but an Owl, and you will dwell alone in the forest with few friends, and you will live always on frogs and toads and field-mice, and people will hear you at night crying for your wife all over the land, but you shall never find her." Then with his magic power he changed him to an Owl and sent him on his way.
He said to the girl, "You have done me much harm too, and you have brought all this trouble upon me. Henceforth you will be not a girl but a Fish-Hawk, and you will always cry and fret and scream as you have done before, and you will never be satisfied." And with his magic power he changed her into a Fish-Hawk, and sent her out to the ocean. And there she screams always, and she is a great glutton, for she can never get enough to eat. And since that time, Owl and Fish-Hawk have not dwelt together and have not been on friendly terms. They live far apart, and Owl keeps to the forest and the mountains, while the other keeps to the sea. Thus was the old man avenged, and thus was the weeping maiden punished for her tears. And the cries of Owl and Fish-Hawk are still heard in many places, one calling for his wife, the other screaming unsatisfied for something she cannot get.
ERMINE AND THE HUNTER
Far away in the Canadian North Country an old man lived with his wife and children. They lived far from other people, but they were never lonely, for they had much work to do. The old man was a great hunter, and in summer he and his wife and children lived on the fish and game he captured in the winter. In the spring-time he gathered sap from the maple trees, from which he made maple syrup and maple sugar with which to sweeten their food. One day in summer he found three small bears eating his stock of sugar. When he came upon them, his sugar was all gone, and he was very cross. With a stout club he killed the little bears and skinned them and dried their meat. But his wife said, "No good can come of it. You should not have killed the three little bears, for they were too young for slaughter."
The next day the old Bear came along, looking for his lost children. When he saw their skins hanging up to dry he knew that they had been killed by the hunter. He was very sad and angry, and he called to the hunter, "You have killed my little motherless cubs, and in return for that wickedness, some night when you are off your guard I will kill your children, and then I will kill you and your wife, and I will devour all your food." The old man shot at him with his arrows, but the arrows did not harm him, for he was Brown Bear of the Stony Heart, and he could not be killed by man. For many nights and days the old man tried to trap him, but he met with no success. And each day he saw his store of food growing smaller, for Bear of the Stony Heart stole it always in the night. And he thought, "We shall all surely starve before the winter comes, and game is plentiful again."
One day in despair he resolved to look about him for some one who would tell him how to kill the Bear. He went to the bank of the river and sat there in thought and smoked long at his pipe. And he called to the God of the River and said, "Oh, River-God, help me to drown Bear when he comes to fish." The river came from the Lime Stone country far back among the rocks, and it was flowing rapidly to the sea. And the River-God said, "My water cannot tarry. There are millions of oysters down on the ocean shore waiting for shells, and I am hurrying down there with the lime to make them," and he rushed quickly past.
Then the old man called to the Spirit of the Wind, and he said, "Oh, Spirit of the Wind, stay here with me to-night and help me to kill Bear of the Stony Heart. You can knock down great trees upon his back and crush him to the earth." But the Wind Spirit said, "I cannot linger. Many ships with rich cargoes lie silent on the ocean waiting to sail, and I must hurry along with the force to drive them." And like the River-God he hastened on his way.
Then the old man called to Storm Cloud, which was just then passing over his head, and he said, "Oh, Spirit of the Storm Cloud, stay here with me to-night and help me to kill Bear of the Stony Heart, for he seeks to destroy my children. You can send lightning and thunder to strike him dead." But the Storm Cloud said, "I cannot loiter on the way. Far from here there are millions of blades of corn and grass dying from thirst in the summer heat, for I see the heat waves rising on the earth, and I am hurrying there with rain to save them." And like the River-God and the Wind Spirit he hurried along on his business. The poor old man was in great sorrow, for it seemed that no one would help him to rid the land of Bear of the Stony Heart.
As he sat wondering what he should do, an old woman came along. She said, "I am very hungry and tired, for I have come far. Will you give me food and let me rest here a while?" And he said, "We have very little food, for Bear of the Stony Heart steals it from us nightly, but you may share with us what little we have." So he went away and brought back to her a good fat meal. While she was eating her dinner he told her of his troubles with Bear, and he said that no one would help him to get rid of the pest, and that Bear could not be killed by man. And the old woman said, "There is a little animal who can kill Bear of the Stony Heart. He alone can save you. You have done well to me. Here is a wand which I will give you. Go to sleep here, soon, on the bank of the river. Wave this wand before you sleep and say what I shall teach you, and when you awake call to you the first animal you see when you open your eyes. He will be the animal of which I speak, and he will rid you of the Bear." She taught him a little rhyme and gave him a wand which she took from the basket on her arm; then she hobbled away, and the old man knew that she was the weird woman of the Fairy Blue Mountain, of whom he had often heard. He marvelled greatly, but he resolved to do as she had told him.
After the old woman had gone, the man waved the little wand three times, and cried:
"Animal, animal, come from your lair, Help me to slaughter the old Brown Bear! Make with my magic a little white dart, To pierce in the centre old Bear's Stony Heart!"
He repeated the rhyme three times. Then he felt himself getting drowsy and sleep soon came upon him. He slept but a short time when the heat woke him up, for the hot sun beat down upon him. He rubbed his eyes and looked about him. Watching him from behind a tree was a little animal with a shaggy brown coat. The old man thought to himself, "Surely the weird fairy woman of the Blue Mountain has played a trick on me. That scraggy little animal with the dirty coat cannot kill the Bear." But he resolved to test her word. He repeated his rhyme again, and the little animal came quickly towards him. "Who are you?" said the man. "I am Ermine," said the little animal. "Are you the animal of which the fairy woman of the Blue Hills has told me?" asked the man. "I am indeed the same," said Ermine. "I have been sent to you to kill the Bear, and here I have the little darts made powerful because of your magic wand." He pointed to his mouth and showed the old man his sharp white teeth. "So now to your task," said the old man in high spirits. "Oh, not so fast," said Ermine, "you must first pay me for my work." "What can I do for you?" asked the man. "I am ashamed of my dirty brown coat, which I have worn for a long time," said the animal; "you have great magic from the wand you received from the fairy woman of the Blue Hills. I want a sleek and shining white coat that I can wear always, for I want to be clean." The man waved his wand again and wished for what the animal had asked him, and at once the shaggy brown coat of Ermine was replaced by a sleek and shining white coat as spotless as the new snow in winter. Then the animal said, "I have one more condition to impose on you. You must promise never to kill a bear's young cubs when they are still following their mother in the summer time. You must give them a chance to grow strong, so that they may be able to fight for their own lives." And the man promised, placing his hand upon the wand to bind his oath. Then, when he looked again, the wand had vanished from his hand. It had gone back through the air to the fairy woman of the Blue Hills.
[Illustration: THE COAT OF ERMINE WAS REPLACED BY A SLEEK AND SHINING WHITE COAT, AS SPOTLESS AS THE NEW SNOW IN WINTER]
Then Ermine set out on his search for Bear. The afternoon was very hot, and the forest was still, and not a leaf or a blade of grass was stirring, and there was not a ripple on the stream. The whole world was drowsy in the dry summer heat. But Ermine did not feel the heat, he was in such high spirits because of his new white coat. Soon he came upon Bear, stretched out at full length on the bank of the river, taking his afternoon nap, as was his custom after his fat midday meal. He was lying on his back, and his mouth was open wide, and he was snoring loudly like a waterfall. "This is your last sleep," said Ermine, creeping softly to his side, "for you are a dangerous thief; you shall snore no more." And with a bound he jumped down Bear's throat, and in an instant had pierced with his teeth his strong stony heart, which the arrows of the Indians could never reach. Then as quickly as he had entered the Bear's mouth Ermine jumped out again and ran from the place. Bear snored no more; he was quite dead, and the land was rid of his thefts and terrors. Then Ermine went back to the old man and told him that the deed was done; and that night was a great feast night in the old man's home. And since that time Ermine in the North Country has worn a sleek white coat as spotless as the new snow in winter. And to this day the hunters in the far north will not kill, if they can avoid it, the young Bear cubs while they are still following their mothers through the forest. They give them a chance to grow up and grow strong, so that they may be able to fight for their own lives, as the fairy woman of the Blue Hills had asked.
HOW RABBIT DECEIVED FOX
Long ago in Indian days in Canada, when Rabbit worked for Glooskap as his forest guide, he was a great thief. He liked most of all to steal by moonlight, and he crept quietly into gardens and fields where Indian vegetables were growing, for he was very fond of cabbage and lettuce and beans. Not far from his home there lived alone an old widow woman who had no children. She could not hunt game because she was a woman, and she had never been trained to the chase, so she kept a little garden from which she made a good living. All day long from dawn until sunset she toiled hard, tilling her little garden, watering her vegetables and keeping them free from weeds. And she grew green cabbages and red carrots and yellow beans and big fat pumpkins and Indian corn, which she traded with Indian hunters in return for fish and meat. In this way she always had plenty of food, and she lived very well on good fare. But Rabbit, going his rounds one day, discovered her garden, although it was deep in the forest, and every night by moonlight or starlight he robbed it, and grew sleek and fat from the results of his thefts. And morning after morning the old widow woman found that many cabbages and carrots were missing and that much harm had been done to her plants. She had an idea that Rabbit was the pilferer, for she had heard that he was a great thief, but she was not very sure. She watched many nights, but she was never able to catch the robber, so stealthily did he come, and it was not easy to see him in the shadows. So she said to herself, "I will set up a scarecrow, a figure in the shape of a little man, and I will place it at my garden gate, and it will frighten away the robber, whoever he may be, for I must save my vegetables or I shall starve when the cold winter comes."
She picked from the spruce and the fir trees close by a great store of gum and balsam. This she formed into a figure in the shape of a little man. She made two eyes from glass beads that would shine like fire in the starlight, and a nose from a pine cone, and hair from the corn tassels and yellow moss. Then she placed the figure at the entrance to the garden where she knew the robber would come. "Now," she thought, "I will scare away the thief."
When night fell and the moon rose above the trees, Rabbit came along, as was his custom, to steal his nightly meal. As he came near the garden very softly, he saw in the moonlight what he thought was a man standing in the path by the garden gate. The moon hung low over the forest, and there was a thin grey mist on the earth, for it was near to autumn and the nights were already cool; and the figure of the little man looked larger than human in the misty light, and it cast a long black shadow like that of a giant on the grass. Rabbit was much afraid and he trembled like an aspen leaf, but he stood quiet behind a tree and watched the strange figure. For a long time he stood still and watched and listened. But the strange figure did not move, and not a sound did Rabbit hear but the chirp of a cricket. Then with great caution he came closer. But still the figure did not move. Then his fear left him and he grew bolder, for he was very hungry, and he could smell the vegetables and the wild honeysuckle in the still night air. So he walked bravely up to the little dummy man and said, "Get out of my way and let me pass." But the man did not move. Then Rabbit struck the man a sharp blow with his fist. But still the figure did not move. Rabbit's fist stuck fast in the gum and he could not pull it away. Then he struck out with his other fist, and it too, like the other, was held firm. "I shall kick you," said Rabbit in a rage. "Take that," and he struck out wildly with his foot. But his foot, like his fists, stuck fast. Then he kicked with the other foot, but that too was held in the gum. Rabbit was now very cross, and in his anger he said, "Now I shall bite you," but when he bit the little man, his teeth, like his feet and hands, stuck fast. Then he pushed with his body with all his might, hoping to knock the little man down, but his whole body stuck to the dummy figure.
He cried out loudly, for he was now beside himself with fear, and the old woman, when she heard his yells, came running out of her house. "Aha!" she said, "so you are the robber who has been stealing from my garden. I will rid the world of a pilfering pest, for I will kill you this very night." Then she pulled him away from the gum figure and put him in a strong bag and tied the mouth of the bag with a stout string. She left the bag on the path by the garden gate and went to look for her axe to kill Rabbit. While Rabbit lay there wondering how he was going to escape, Fox came prowling along. He stumbled over the bag, for he did not see it in the shadows, and he plunged forward headlong to the ground with a great thud. He got up and rained kicks upon the bag. He was mad because he had been tripped. He kicked poor Rabbit's back until Rabbit cried in pain. "Who are you in the bag?" asked Fox when he heard the cries. "I am your friend Rabbit," was the answer. "What are you doing, hiding in the bag?" asked Fox. Then Rabbit suddenly thought of a way of escape. He knew that Fox had long been looking for a wife, but that no one would have him as no one trusted him because his fame for treachery and slyness was so great. "I am not hiding," he said. "The old woman who owns this garden wants me to marry her grand-daughter, and when I refused to do it she caught me and shut me up in this bag; she has just gone to bring the girl from her house, for she is determined to make me marry her here in the moonlight this very night. I don't want to marry her, for she is very big and fat, and I am very small and lean." Then he cried "Boo-hoo-hoo" again, and Fox said, "I have been looking for a wife for a long time, and I like fat people. Let me get into the bag in your place, and I will marry the grand-daughter instead, for the old woman will not know me in the shadows." And Rabbit gladly agreed. Then Fox untied the bag and let Rabbit out and got into the bag himself, and Rabbit tied up the mouth of the bag and hurried away as quickly as he could.
Soon the old woman came back, carrying her axe. She sharpened it on a stone and said, "Now I will kill you, and you will thieve no more in my garden. A poor woman must live untroubled by such pilfering rogues." When Fox heard these words and the sound of the stone upon the axe, he knew that he had been deceived by Rabbit, and when the old woman opened the bag he sprang nimbly out with a sudden bound and was away before she could catch him. He swore by the Starlight that he would have vengeance on Rabbit. All night long he searched for him and all the next day, but he could not find him. At last in the gathering twilight he came upon him in an open space in the forest, on the other side of a stream, eating his fill of wild vegetables. Fox tried to coax him across the stream to his side, for he himself was afraid of the water, but Rabbit would not go. "Why don't you eat some cheese?" said Rabbit; "there is a big round cheese in the stream." Fox looked into the stream where Rabbit pointed, and there he saw the reflection of the big round yellow moon. He thought it was a round cheese, and he plunged in after it, for he was very fond of cheese. Rabbit hoped he would be drowned, but the stream was shallow and Fox climbed out with no cheese and with only a bad fright and a wet coat for his pains. He was very cross, for he knew that Rabbit wished to do him harm, but he kept his anger to himself. Rabbit was still eating contentedly.
[Illustration: THEN FOX UNTIED THE BAG AND LET RABBIT OUT AND GOT INTO THE BAG HIMSELF]
"What are you eating?" said Fox, trying to hold him in talk until he could think of a plan to catch him. "I am eating good ripe fruit," said Rabbit. "I am eating Indian melons." "Throw me one," said Fox, for he was hungry. Rabbit threw him a large round wild cucumber all covered with green prickles. "Swallow it whole at a mouthful," said Rabbit; "it is very good that way." It was night and the moon shone dimly through the trees, and Fox could not see what he was eating. He swallowed the cucumber at one gulp, as Rabbit had told him, but the prickles stuck in his throat and he almost choked to death. And while he was choking and spluttering and trying to cough up the cucumber, Rabbit ran away as fast as he could, laughing heartily to himself. Fox knew that he had been tricked again, and this time he swore he would kill Rabbit as soon as he could find him; he resolved that when next he saw him he would not give him a moment to live.
Rabbit hid among the dry underbrush all the next day. But when the day went down and the sky was red in the west and the wind was very still, he sat on a log, as was his custom, and played softly on his flute, for he was a great player on the Indian pipe. While he was playing, Fox suddenly came upon him unawares. Rabbit saw him watching him through the trees close at hand, but although taken by surprise, he was not to be outdone. Fox was just about to spring upon him when Rabbit said, "The Chief's daughter has just been married to a great warrior, and the wedding party will soon be along this way. They asked me to sit here and make music for them with my flute as they pass by. They have promised to pay me well, and they have invited me to the wedding feast. Come and join me and play too, and you will be well paid, and we will go to the wedding feast together and get good things to eat." Fox thought he would let Rabbit get the pay he had been promised, for he was a very greedy fellow; then he would rob him and kill him, and he would take his flute and go to the wedding feast alone, and his vengeance would then be complete. So he decided to let his anger cool for a little time. And he said, "I have no flute, and I cannot therefore make music; but I will sit with you to see the wedding guests go by." But Rabbit said, "Take my flute. I have another at home. I will go and get it, for there is yet time."
So Fox took the flute and began to play loudly, and Rabbit slipped hurriedly out of sight, pretending to go for his Indian pipe. But he resolved to make an end of Fox, for he feared for his own life, and instead of going home, he set the underbrush on fire. He kindled the fire at many places all around the log on which Fox sat. Fox could not hear the fire crackling because of the loud music of his flute, and he thought the light was but the bright light of the moon. And the fire was almost upon him before he knew that he was in danger. Then he tried to get away, but on all sides his escape was stopped by the flames and he could not find an opening. At last, in despair, to save his life, he jumped through the ring of fire. He escaped with his life, but his eyelids were singed, and his sleek black coat with its silver spots was scorched to a red-brown colour. He was in great pain. He concluded that Rabbit was too clever for him to cope with, and he resolved to leave him alone and to forego his revenge, for he was glad to get away with his life. But he decided never again to live on friendly terms with Rabbit. And since that night Rabbit and Fox have never hunted together. And to the present day the descendants of this Fox have red eyes and a red-brown coat, because Rabbit scorched their ancestor in the olden times.
THE BOY AND THE DRAGON
Once, long ago, before the white man came to Canada, a boy was living with his parents in a village near the ocean. As he had no brothers or sisters, he was often lonely, and he longed for adventure and companionship. At last he decided to set out to seek his fortune elsewhere. He was just on the point of leaving his home when it was noised abroad one day that there had come into the land a great dragon, who was doing great havoc and damage wherever he went. The country was in great terror, for the dragon carried off women and children and devoured them one by one. And what was still more mystifying, he had power to take on human form, and often he changed himself into a man of pleasing shape and manner and came among the people to carry out his cruel designs before they knew that he was near. The Chief of the tribe called for volunteers to meet the dragon-man, but none of his warriors responded. They were strong and mighty in combat with men, but it was a different matter to encounter a dragon.
When the youth heard this dreadful story and saw the terror of his people, he said, "Here is my chance to do a great deed," for somehow he felt that he had more than human power. So he said good-bye to his parents and set out on his adventure. He travelled all day inland through the forest, until at evening he came to a high hill in the centre of an open space. He said, "I will climb this hill, and perhaps I can see all the country round about me." So he went slowly to the top. As he stood there, looking over the country which he could see for many miles around, a man suddenly appeared beside him. He was a very pleasant fellow, and they talked together for some time. The boy was on his guard, but he thought, "Surely this man with the good looks cannot be the dragon," and he laughed at his suspicions and put them from his mind.
The stranger said, "Where are you going?" And the boy answered, "I am going far away. I am seeking adventure in the forest for it is very lonely down by the sea." But he did not tell him of his real errand. "You may stay with me to-night," said the new-comer. "I have a very comfortable lodge not far from here, and I will give you food." The boy was very hungry and tired, and he went along with the man to his lodge. When they reached the house the boy was surprised to see a great heap of bleached bones lying before the door. But he showed no fear nor did he comment on the horrible sight. Inside the lodge sat a very old and bent woman, tending a pot. She was stirring it with a big stick, and the boy saw that it contained meat stew. When she placed the stew before them, the boy said he would rather have corn, for he feared to taste the meat. The old woman fried some corn for him, and he had a good meal.
After they had eaten, the man went out to gather wood for the fire, and the boy sat talking to the old woman. And she said to him, "You are very young and beautiful and innocent--the most handsome I have yet seen in this place. And because of that, I will take pity on you and warn you of your danger. The man whom you met in the forest and whom you supped with to-night is none other than the dragon-man of whom you have often heard. He cannot be killed in ordinary combat, and it would be folly for you to try. To-morrow he will kill you if you are still here. Take these moccasins that I will give you, and in the morning when you get up put them on your feet. With one step you will reach by their power the hill you see in the distance. Give this piece of birch bark with the picture on it to a man you will meet there, and he will tell you what next to do. But remember that no matter how far you go, the dragon-man will overtake you in the evening." The youth took the moccasins and the birch bark bearing the mystic sign and hid them under his coat, and said, "I will do as you advise." But the woman said, "There is one more condition. You must kill me in the morning before you go, and put this robe over my body. Then the dragon-man's spell over me will be broken, and when he leaves me, I will rouse myself with my power back to life."
The youth went to sleep, and the dragon-man slept all night beside him so as not to let him escape. The next morning, when the dragon-man was out to get water from the stream some distance away, the boy at once carried out the old woman's orders of the night before. First of all he killed the old woman with a blow and covered her body with a bright cloak, for he knew that when the dragon-man would leave the place she would soon rise again. Then he put the magic moccasins on his feet and with one great step he reached the distant hill. Here, sure enough, he met an old man. He gave him the piece of birch bark bearing the mystic sign. The man looked at it closely and smiled and said, "So it is you I was told to wait for. That is well, for you are indeed a comely youth." The man gave him another pair of moccasins in exchange for those he was wearing, and another piece of birch bark bearing another inscription. He pointed to a hill that rose blue in the distance and said, "With one step you will reach that hill. Give this bark to a man you will meet there, and all will be well."
The boy put the moccasins on his feet, and with one step he reached the distant hill. There he met another old man, to whom he gave the birch bark. This man gave him another pair of moccasins and a large maple leaf bearing a strange symbol, and told him to go to another spot, where he would receive final instructions. He did as he was told, and here he met a very old man, who said, "Down yonder there is a stream. Go towards it and walk straight into it, as if you were on dry ground. But do not look at the water. Take this piece of birch bark bearing these magic figures, and it will change you into whatever you wish, and it will keep you from harm." The boy took the bark and did as he was told, and soon found himself on the opposite bank of the stream. He followed the stream for some distance, and at evening he came to a lake. As he was looking about for a warm place to pass the night, he suddenly came upon the dragon-man, now in the form of a monster dragon, hiding behind the trees. The old woman's words had come true, for his enemy had overtaken him before nightfall, as she had said. There was no time to lose, so the boy waved his magic bark, and at once he became a little fish with red fins, moving slowly in the lake.
When the dragon-man saw the little fish, he cried, "Little fish of the red fins, have you seen the youth I am looking for?" "No, sir," said the little fish, "I have seen no one; I have been asleep. But if he passes this way I will tell you," and he moved rapidly out into the lake.
[Illustration: THE MAN GAVE HIM ANOTHER PAIR OF MOCCASINS IN EXCHANGE FOR THOSE HE WAS WEARING]
The dragon-man moved down along the bank of the lake, while the youth watched him from the water. He met a Toad in the path, and said, "Little Toad, have you seen the youth I am looking for? If he passed this way you would surely have seen him." "I am minding my own business," answered the Toad, and he hopped away into the moss. Then the dragon-man saw a very large fish with his head above water, looking for flies, and he said, "Have you seen the boy I am looking for?" "Yes," said the fish, "you have just been talking to him," and he laughed to himself and disappeared. The dragon-man went back and searched everywhere for Toad, but he could not find him. As he looked he came upon a musk-rat running along by the stream, and he said angrily, "Have you seen the person I am looking for?" "No," said the rat. "I think you are he," said the dragon-man. Then the musk-rat began to cry bitterly and said, "No, no; the boy you are looking for passed by just now, and he stepped on the roof of my house and broke it in." The dragon-man was deceived again. He went on and soon came upon old Turtle splashing around in the mud. "You are very old and wise," he said, hoping to flatter him, "you have surely seen the person I am looking for." "Yes," said Turtle, "he is farther down the stream. Go across the river and you will find him. But beware, for if you do not know him when you see him, he will surely kill you." Turtle knew well that the dragon-man would now meet his fate.
The dragon-man followed the lake till he came to the river. For greater caution, so that he might be less easily seen, he changed himself to a Snake. Then he attempted to cross the stream. But the youth, still in the form of a fish and still using the power of his magic bark with the mystic sign, was swimming round and round in a circle in the middle of the river. A rapid whirlpool arose where he swam, but it was not visible on the surface. As the Snake approached it, he saw nothing but clear water. He failed to recognize his enemy, and as Turtle had told him, he swam into the whirlpool before he was aware of it, and was quickly drawn to the bottom, where he was drowned.
The youth fished him up and cut off his head. Then he changed back to his own form. He went to the dragon-man's lodge to see how the old woman had fared, but she had gone with her bright robe, and the lodge was empty. Then the youth went back to his home and reported what he had done. And he received many rich gifts from the Chief for his brave deed, and the land was never troubled again by dragons. But from that time the snake family was hated because its shape had concealed the dragon-man, and to this day an Indian will not let a snake escape with his life if he meets one of them in his path. For they still are mindful of the adventure of their ancestor in the old days, and they are suspicious of the evil power the snake family secretly possess.
OWL WITH THE GREAT HEAD AND EYES
Long ago, when Glooskap was the ruler of the Indians in Eastern Canada, and when the animals all worked for him and talked like men, Wolf was one of Rabbit's enemies. On the surface they seemed to be friends, but each was afraid of the other and each suspected the other of treachery. Rabbit was very faithful to his work as the forest guide who showed people the way to far places. But he was also a great trickster, and he delighted to play pranks on every one he met. He liked more than all to pester Wolf, for he had a hatred for his cruel ways, and he was always able to outwit him.
It happened that Rabbit and Wolf lived close together, deep in the Canadian forest. Some distance from them, in a little house, lived a poor widow woman who had only one daughter. She was a very beautiful girl, with hair as black as the raven's wing, and with eyes like the dark of the underwater. Rabbit and Wolf each fell in love with her, and each in his own way sought her as his wife. Rabbit tried hard to win her love. When he went to her house he always dressed himself in a soft brown coat, and he put a bangle around his neck and bells upon his feet. And often he played sweetly on his flute, hoping to charm her with his music, for he was a great player upon the Indian pipe. And he tried to grow a moustache to hide his split lip; but he had little success, for his whiskers would not grow thick, and he has the thin scraggy moustache of a few hairs to this day. But no matter what Rabbit did to adorn himself, the girl gave him cold looks, and old Wolf seemed to be deeper in her favour, for she liked his willowy form and his sleek and bashful ways. And poor Rabbit was sore distressed.
One fine day in the spring-time, Rabbit came upon the girl and her mother gathering May-flowers among the moss. He crept close to listen to their talk. He heard the mother say, "I have no stomach for little Rabbit, but Wolf pleases me well. You must marry Wolf. They tell me he is a great hunter, and if you marry him we shall never want for food."
When Rabbit heard this he was very sad; he determined that on no account should Wolf marry the widow's daughter, and that he must use all his power to prevent it. That night he went alone to the girl's house. He spoke sneeringly of Wolf, saying with a bitter frown, "Wolf is no hunter; he never catches any game because he is lazy and has no brains; I always have to feed him to keep him from starving; he is but a beast of burden; I always ride upon his back when I go to a far country, for he is good for nothing else." The girl's mother wondered greatly, and she was very startled by this news, for she did not want her daughter to marry a good-for-nothing; but she was not sure that Rabbit spoke the truth, for she had heard that sometimes he told great lies. So she said, "If you will ride Wolf over here I will believe you, and he shall not marry my daughter, and you shall marry her yourself." And Rabbit went home well pleased and sure of a happy ending to his trick.
The next day Rabbit purposely met Wolf in the forest, and he said, "Let us go together to see the widow's daughter." And Wolf was glad to go. They had not gone far when Rabbit began to cry. Then he lay down on the ground, and rolled and moaned and rubbed his belly as if in great distress. "I have a sharp pain in my belly," he sobbed, "I cannot walk any farther. If I walk I shall surely die, and I cannot go on unless you carry me on your back." Wolf willingly agreed, for he wanted to see the beautiful girl, and he was very sorry for poor Rabbit in his pain; and Rabbit, laughing to himself, climbed on Wolf's back. Wolf ran along, not feeling the load, for Rabbit was very light. They had not gone far when Rabbit cried again and said, "I cannot ride without a saddle, for your bare back hurts me and gives me blisters." So they borrowed a little saddle from a field by the way and put it on Wolf's back. Soon Rabbit said, "This is fine fun; let us play that you are a horse and that I am a great rider. I should like to put a little bridle on you, and to wear spurs on my feet and to carry a whip." And Wolf, wishing to please Rabbit to make him forget his pain, gladly agreed. So they borrowed a little bridle and spurs and a whip from another field near by, and did as Rabbit asked, and together they went to the girl's home, Wolf trotting along like a little horse, and Rabbit laughing to himself, sitting in the saddle, with his spurs and his whip, holding the bridle reins. When they drew near the house, Rabbit made a great noise so that the mother and her daughter might look out to see where the shouting came from. He called loudly, "Whoa, Whoa." And the girl and her mother opened the door and looked out at them in wonder. Then as they were looking on, Rabbit, chuckling to himself, struck Wolf a stinging blow with his whip, and stuck his spurs deep into Wolf's sides and called him loudly a lazy beast. Wolf jumped and plunged and kicked because of the prick of the spurs and the sting of the whip; he was very cross, but he said nothing.
Some distance away, Rabbit tied Wolf to a tree, saying, "Stay here and I will send the girl to you." Then he went to the house, and he said to the woman, "Now you will believe that Wolf is a beast of burden, for I have ridden here on his back." And the woman believed him. She told him to give Wolf some corn or grass. But Rabbit said, "He doesn't eat corn or grass; he eats only fresh meat," for he knew well that Wolf would be quite contented if he got a good meal of meat. Then she gave him some fresh meat, which he brought to Wolf. And Wolf was happy, and his anger disappeared, and he forgot the pain of the spurs and the whip, and he thought it was fine fun to get a good meal so easily. The woman promised that Rabbit should marry her daughter, and when night fell Rabbit went home well pleased, leaving Wolf still tied to the tree. It was so dark that Wolf did not see him leaving the house, and for a long time he thought he was still inside, and he waited long in the starlight. At last he grew tired waiting, for he was hungry and he was cold standing still in the chill night air of early spring. He cut with his teeth the bridle rein that tied him to the tree, and then he went to the woman's house. But the woman would not let him in. She told him to go away, that she never wished to see him again, and she called him a lazy beast of burden. He went home in great anger, for he knew now that he had been tricked, and he swore that he would have vengeance on Rabbit.
The next day Rabbit learned from the woman that she had spurned Wolf from her door, and he knew that Wolf realized he had been deceived. He was somewhat frightened, for he dreaded Wolf's vengeance, and for several days he hid among the trees. Then hunger drove him out and he went forth to look for food. One evening he entered a garden in search of cabbage, and he was busy robbing it, when the people who owned the garden spied him. And they said, "Here is the thief who has been stealing our vegetables. We will catch him and teach him a lesson." Before Rabbit knew it, they were upon him, for he was eating heartily, he was so hungry, and they caught him and bound him fast to a tree and went to get scalding water to pour upon his back to teach him not to rob their garden again. But while they were away Wolf came along. He, too, was very hungry, for he had eaten no meal for many days, but he was glad when he saw Rabbit, for now he thought he would have his revenge. Rabbit saw him at a distance, and he resolved to try another trick on him, and to hail him as if he thought he was still his friend. And he cried out to him, "Help me, Wolf! Help me! The people here asked me to eat up a nice little lamb, and when I refused to do it, they tied me up to this tree, and they have gone to bring the lamb to me."
Wolf was too hungry to be cautious, and he forgot all about Rabbit's tricks, for spring lamb was his favourite food. And he said, "I will eat up the little lamb," and he smacked his lips as he spoke, and thought of the nice tender meal he would have. Then Rabbit said, "Untie me and take my place, for the people will soon be here with the lamb." So Wolf untied him, and Rabbit in turn bound Wolf fast to the tree, and laughing to himself because he had again outwitted stupid Wolf, he ran rapidly away. Far off he hid behind the trees to see what would happen. Soon the people came back, carrying the pots of scalding water. Wolf saw them coming, and he was in high spirits, for he thought the lamb he was to eat was in one of the pots. It was moonlight, and in the shadow of the great tree the people could not see very clearly, and they thought Wolf was Rabbit, still bound fast where they had left him. So they poured the scalding water on his back and kicked him and knocked him on the head with a big stick, and they said, "Now, thief, we have taught you how dangerous it is to rob gardens in the spring moonlight." Wolf howled with pain, for his back was blistered and his head was sore, and Rabbit heard him, and he sat on a log and shook with laughter because of the success of his prank.
Then the people untied Wolf and let him go. He went away wearily among the trees. And he again swore vengeance on Rabbit, and he resolved to kill him as soon as he set eyes upon him, for he knew he had been tricked a second time. For several days he searched for his enemy. At last, one night of bright moonlight, he came upon Rabbit sitting in a patch of Indian tobacco plants, eating his fill and contentedly chewing the tobacco leaves. Rabbit's mouth was full of tobacco, but he laughed loudly when he saw Wolf's back bound in bandages because of the blisters, and his sore head tied up in a cloth. But when he saw Wolf's angry eyes he was frightened, and he ran away into the woods. The moon was shining in the forest, and Wolf could catch a glimpse now and then of his brown coat among the trees, and he chased him for a long time. Rabbit tried all his tricks to shake him from his tracks, but without avail. At last, when Rabbit was almost worn out, he took refuge in a hollow tree, into which he slipped through a small hole, where Wolf could not follow him. And Wolf said, "Now I have him in my power. I will kill him; but first I must go home to get my axe to cut down the tree and to chop off his head." Then he looked around for some one to keep watch over the tree while he was gone, so that Rabbit could not escape. At last he saw Owl sitting quietly on a branch near. He called to him and said, "Watch by this hole until I get back, and do not let Rabbit get away." So Owl came down and sat by the hole and promised to keep guard over the prisoner, and Wolf went away to look for his axe.
But Rabbit was not caught yet; he had another trick left. After Wolf had gone away, he called to Owl sitting by the hole, and said, "Owl, come and see what a nice little room I have here in the tree." But Owl replied, "It is too dark, I cannot see." Then Rabbit said, "Open your eyes wide and put your face close to the hole, for I have a light here and you can see easily." Owl did as he was told, for he was a curious fellow. Rabbit had a great mouthful of tobacco juice from the Indian tobacco leaves he had been chewing, and when Owl put his face close to the hole he squirted the juice into Owl's eyes. Owl screamed loudly, for his eyes were smarting and he was blinded by the juice; he ran around the tree and stamped and shrieked and rubbed his eyes, trying to relieve them of their pain. And while he was about it, Rabbit slipped out of the hole and ran away, and Owl did not know he was gone.
Soon Wolf came back, carrying his big sharp axe. And he said, "Now I shall kill him at last." And Owl was afraid to tell him about his sore eyes; they were still open wide, and he could not close them. At once Wolf chopped down the hollow tree. Then he split it open from end to end. But there was no sign of Rabbit. Wolf then thought Owl had tricked him, and that he had helped Rabbit to escape. But Owl said he had not. He sat with his eyes wide open, staring stupidly and moaning and making strange noises because of his pain. Wolf thought he was laughing at him and taunting him, for he did not know the meaning of Owl's strange cries, and in his rage he fell to beating him over the head with his axe-handle until poor Owl's head was swollen to a great size. And Owl cried, "Hoot, Hoot, Hoot," and his eyes stared from his swollen head even larger than before. Then Wolf went on his way, resolved to keep away from Rabbit. And since that time Owl has cried "Hoot, Hoot, Hoot" at night, for he still remembers his pain; and his head is still swollen and bigger than that of other birds because of the beating Wolf gave him with his axe-handle; and his eyes are still large and they stare stupidly, and he cannot look at light, and he is blind in the daylight because of the tobacco juice Rabbit squirted into his eyes. And since that night Rabbit and Wolf have avoided each other, and they have not lived in the same place, and they have never since been friends.
THE TOBACCO FAIRY FROM THE BLUE HILLS
A man and his wife and two little children were living long ago on the shores of a lake surrounded by large trees, deep in the Canadian forest. They lived very happily together, and as game was plentiful, they wanted for nothing. As the children grew up they became each day more beautiful and gentle, until the old women of the tribe said, "They are too good and lovely for this world; their home is surely elsewhere in the West." Before they grew to maturity a cruel plague spread over the land and carried them off with its ravages. Their mother was the next to go, slowly growing weaker, and wasting away before the eyes of her husband, who was powerless to save her.
The man was now left all alone upon the earth. The joy of his life had gone with his wife and children, and he went about in great loneliness and sorrow. Life was long to him and dreary, and often he wished that he too was dead. But at last he roused himself and said, "I will go about doing good. I will spend my life helping others, and perhaps in that way I can find peace." So he worked hard and did all the good he could for the weaker and the poorer people of his tribe. He was held in high esteem by all the people of the village, and in their affection for him they all called him "Grandfather." He grew to be very old, and because of his good deeds he found great happiness. But he was still very solitary, and the days and evenings were long and lonely, and as he grew older and his work grew less, he found it hard to pass away the time, for he could only sit alone and dream of his vanished youth and of his absent friends.
One day he sat thinking by the lake. Many people of the village were around him, but as usual he sat alone. Suddenly a large flock of birds, looking like great black clouds, came flying from the blue hills in the distance toward the shore of the lake. They wheeled and circled about, and hovered long over the trees, uttering strange cries. The people had never before seen such large birds, and they were much afraid and said, "They are not ordinary creatures. They foreshadow some strange happening." Suddenly one of the birds fluttered for an instant and fell slowly to the earth with an arrow in its breast. No one in the village had shot at the flock, and where the arrow had come from no man knew. The mystery frightened the people still more, and they looked to the old man for counsel, for they knew that he was very wise.
The fallen bird lay fluttering on the ground, seemingly in pain. The other birds circled about it for a short time, uttering loud cries. Then they screamed and called to each other and flew back to the distant blue hills, leaving the fallen bird behind them with the arrow sticking in its breast. The old man was not frightened by the sight. He said, "I will go to the stricken bird; perhaps I can heal its wound." But the people, in great fear, said, "Do not go, Grandfather, the bird will do you harm." But the old man answered, "It can do no harm to me. My work is ended and my life is almost done. My sky is dark, for I am full of sorrow, and with me it is already the twilight of time. I am alone in the world, for my kindred have gone. I am not afraid of death, for to me it would be very welcome. What matters it if I should die?" And he went to the stricken bird to see if he could help it.
As he went along, his path suddenly grew dark, but as he drew nearer, a bright flame suddenly swept down from the sky to the place where the bird was lying. There was a flash of fire, and when the old man looked he saw that the bird had been completely burned up. When he came to where it had lain, nothing but black ashes remained. He stirred up the ashes with his stick, and lying in the centre he found a large living coal of fire. As he looked at it, in a twinkling it disappeared, and in its place was a strange little figure like a little man, no bigger than his thumb. "Hello, Grandfather," it called, "do not strike me, for I have been sent to help you."
[Illustration: SUDDENLY A LARGE FLOCK OF BIRDS, LOOKING LIKE GREAT BLACK CLOUDS, CAME FLYING FROM THE BLUE HILLS]
"Who are you?" asked the old man.
"I am one of the Little People from the distant blue hills," said the tiny boy. Then the old man knew that the little fellow was one of the strange fairy people of the mountains, of whom he had often heard. "What do you want?" he asked.
"I have been sent to you with a precious gift," answered the little man. The old man wondered greatly, but he said nothing.
Then the fairy from the blue hills said, "You are old and lonely. You have done many noble deeds, and you have always gone about bringing good to others. In that way you have found peace. And because of your good life, I have been sent to bring you more contentment. Your work is done, but your life is not yet ended, and you have still a long time to dwell upon the earth. You must live out your mortal course. You are longing always for your dead wife and children, and you are often thinking of your youth, and with you the days are long and time hangs heavy. But I have been sent to you with a gift that will help you to pass the time more pleasantly."
Then the little man gave him a number of small seeds and said, "Plant these at once, here, in the ashes from which I have just risen." The old man did as he was told. At once the seeds sprouted and great leaves grew from them, and soon the place where the bird had been burned up became a large field of Tobacco.
The fairy then gave him a large pipe and said, "Dry these leaves and place them in this pipe and smoke them. You will have great contentment, and when you have nothing to do it will help you to pass the time away, and when no one is with you it will be a companion. And it will bring you many dreams of the future and of the past. And when the smoke curls upwards it will have for you many visions of those you loved, and you will see their faces in the smoke as you sit alone in the twilight."
The old man was very thankful for the fairy's gift. But the little man said, "Teach other old men how to use it, so that they, too, may possess it and enjoy it."
Then the fairy quickly disappeared, going towards the distant blue hills, and he was never seen in the village again. And with his pipe and his tobacco the old man went back to his dreaming, with more contentment than before. In this way Tobacco was brought to the Indians in the old days.
RAINBOW AND THE AUTUMN LEAVES
In olden days, long before the Indians came to Canada, all the animals talked and worked like men. Every year after midsummer they held a great council at which they were all present. But it happened once in the summer before the council met, that they all wanted to go to the sky to see what the country up there was like. None of them could find a way to go. The oldest and wisest creature on all the earth was Turtle. One day he prayed to the Thunder God to take him to the sky, and his prayer was soon answered. There was a great noise, as if the earth had been split asunder, and when the people next looked for Turtle he was nowhere to be found. They searched everywhere without success. But that evening, when they looked upwards, they saw him in the sky, moving about like a black cloud. Turtle liked the sky so well that he decided to live there always and to send his descendants, later, to the earth. And the sky-people agreed to keep him. They asked him, "Where do you want to dwell?" And he answered, "I should like to dwell in the Black Cloud, in which are the ponds and streams and lakes and springs of water, for I always dwelt near these places when I was young." So he was allowed to have his wish. But when the Great Council of the animals met on earth in the time of the harvest-moon, he was always present. He came in the Black Cloud, but he always went back to the sky after the Council was ended. And the other animals envied him his good fortune, and they wished that they could go with him.
After a time the animals were greatly distressed and angered by the rumour that a new race of creatures was coming from far over the ocean to inhabit their land. They talked it over very carefully, and they all thought how fortunate it would be if they could all go to the sky with old Turtle, and live like him, free from fear and trouble and care. But they were puzzled to know how to get there, for Turtle had never told any of them the way.
One day Deer, wandering about alone in the forest, as was his custom, came across Rainbow, who often built a path of many colours to the sky. And he said to Rainbow, "Carry me up to the sky, for I want to see Turtle." But Rainbow was afraid to do it, for he wished first to ask the Thunder God for permission, and he put Deer off, and to gain time he said, "Come to me in winter, when I stay for a time on the mountain near the lake. Then I will gladly carry you to the place where Turtle dwells."
[Illustration: THROUGHOUT THE LONG WINTER MONTHS DEER LOOKED LONGINGLY FOR RAINBOW]
Throughout the long winter months Deer looked longingly for Rainbow, but Rainbow did not come. Life was growing harder on the earth, and the animals were in terror of the new race that was soon to come to their land, and Deer was very timid and impatient. At last, one day in the early summer, Rainbow came again, and Deer hastened to meet him. "Why were you false to me?" he asked; "I waited for you all winter long on the mountain by the lake, but you did not come as you promised. I want to go to the sky now, for I must see Turtle." Rainbow answered, "I cannot take you now. But some day, when there is a Fog over the lake, I shall come back to drive it away. Come to me then, and I shall take you to the sky and to the place where Turtle dwells. This time I will not deceive you."
Rainbow consulted the Thunder God, and received permission to do as Deer wished. Soon afterwards the Fog one day rolled in a thick bank across the lake, and Deer hurried out to wait for Rainbow. Sure enough, Rainbow came down, as he had promised, to drive the Fog away. He threw his arch of many colours from the lake to the blue hills far away, and the Fog at once disappeared from the place. And he said to Deer, who stood watching him, "Now I will keep my promise. Follow my many-coloured path over the hills and the forests and the streams, and be not afraid, and you will soon reach Turtle's home in the sky." Deer did as he was told, and soon he reached the sky. Turtle was glad to see him, and Deer liked the country so well that he decided to stay for ever. And he roamed over the sky everywhere, moving like the wind from place to place.
When midsummer had passed and the harvest-moon had come and the Great Council again met together, Deer was absent for the first time in his life. The animals waited long for him to appear, for they needed his advice, but he did not come. They sent the Birds out to find him. Black Hawk and Woodpecker and Bluejay all sought him in the forest, but they could not find a trace of him. Then Wolf and Fox scoured the woods far and near, but they came back and reported that he could not be found anywhere. At last Turtle arrived at the meeting of the Great Council, as was his custom, coming in his Black Cloud, in which were the ponds and lakes and streams and springs of water. And Bear said, "Deer is absent from the Council meeting. Where is Deer? We cannot meet without him, for we need his advice." And Turtle replied, "Deer is in the sky. Have you not heard? Rainbow made a wonderful pathway for him of many varied colours, and by that he came to the sky. There he is now," and he pointed to a golden cloud scurrying across the sky overhead.
Turtle advised that the animals should all go to the sky to live until they could be sure that the new race of creatures would bring them no harm. And he showed them the pathway that Rainbow had made, stretching from the earth in wonderful colours. The animals all agreed at the Great Council to take Turtle's advice. But they were all very angry at Deer for leaving them without warning, for they thought that all the animals should either stay together faithfully on the earth or go all together to the sky. Bear showed the greatest anger and annoyance. Because of his great strength, he had no fear of the new race that was said soon to be coming, and he had always been inclined to look with scorn on Deer's timid and impatient ways. "Deer has forsaken us," he said; "he deserted us in the hour of our danger, and that is contrary to forest laws and to our code of defence." And he thought to himself, "I shall punish him for this when the time comes."
In the late autumn, the time agreed upon came for the animals to leave the earth, and Rainbow again made his bright path for them to the sky. Bear was the first to go up because he was the leader, and because with his great weight he wanted to test the strength of the bridge of burning colours over which they had to pass. When he had almost reached the sky, he met Deer on the path waiting to welcome the animals to their new home. And he said to him in anger, "Why did you leave us behind, without warning, for the land of the Turtle? Why did you desert the Great Council? Why did you not wait until all could come together? You are a traitor to your comrades, and you have been false to our faith." And Deer answered, also in anger, "Who are you to doubt me or my faith? None but the Wolf may ask me why I came or question my fidelity. I will kill you for your insolence." Deer had grown very proud since he had gone to live in the sky, and he was no longer timid as he had been on earth. His eyes flashed in his fury, and he arched his neck and lowered his antlered head, and rushed madly at Bear to push him from the path.
But Bear was not afraid, for he had often tested his strength with Deer upon the earth. His low, hoarse growls sounded all over the sky, and he prepared to fight. They came together with a shock. For a long time they battled, until the bridge of burning colours trembled and the heavens shook from the force of the conflict. The animals waiting by the lake at the end of the path looked up and saw the battle above them. They feared the results, for they wanted neither Bear nor Deer to die. So they sent Wolf up to the sky to put a stop to the contest. When Wolf reached the combatants, Bear was bleeding freely, for Deer with his antlers had pierced his neck and side. Deer, too, was bleeding where Bear's strong claws had torn a great wound in his head. Wolf soon stopped the battle, and Bear and Deer went away to dress their wounds. Then the other animals went up to the sky over Rainbow's flaming path. And they decided to live in the sky and to send their descendants back to earth when the new race of creatures should come. And they can still sometimes be seen, like clouds hurrying across the sky, in the shape they had on earth.
But the blood of Bear and of Deer dropped from them as they moved to the sky from the scene of their battle along the Rainbow road. It fell freely upon the leaves of the trees beneath them, and changed them into varied colours. And every year when autumn comes in the north country, the leaves take on again the bright and wondrous colours given to them by the blood of Bear and Deer when they fought on the Rainbow path ages and ages ago. And Bear and Deer have never since been friends, and their descendants no longer dwell together in peace, as they did in the olden days.
RABBIT AND THE MOON-MAN
Once, long ago, Rabbit lived with his old grandmother deep in the Canadian forest, far from all other people. He was a great hunter, and all around, far and near, he laid snares and set traps to catch game for food. It was winter, and he caught many little animals and birds. He brought them home daily to feed himself and his old grandmother, and he was well pleased with his success. But after some weeks had passed he was unable to catch any game. He always found his traps and snares empty, although many tracks were always around them, and there were many signs that animals were prowling about. He knew then that he was being robbed nightly, and that a thief was pilfering his traps. It was very cold and the snow lay deep in the forest, and Rabbit and his old grandmother were in dire need of food. Every morning Rabbit rose very early and hurried off to his traps, but always he found them empty, for the thief had been ahead of him. He was greatly puzzled, for he could not think who the thief was.
At last one morning, after a new fall of snow, he found the mark of a long foot near his traps, and he knew it was the foot of the game-robber. It was the longest foot-print he had ever seen, long and narrow and very light, like a moonbeam. And Rabbit said, "Now I shall rise earlier in the morning, and I shall go to my traps ahead of the thief and take my game, so that they will all be empty when he comes." Each morning he rose earlier to catch the thief, but the man of the long foot was always there before him, and his game was always gone. No matter how early Rabbit got up, the thief was always ahead of him and his traps were always empty.
So Rabbit said to his old grandmother, "The man of the long foot, who robs my traps, is always up ahead of me, no matter how early I rise. I will make a snare from a bow-string, and I will watch all this night, and I will surely catch him." He made a trap from a stout bow-string and set it beside his snares, and took the end of the bow-string some distance away to a clump of trees, behind which he hid. He hoped that the thief would step into the trap; then he would pull the bow-string and tie him fast to a tree. He sat very quiet, waiting for the man of the long foot to appear. It was moonlight when he set out, but soon it grew very dark in the forest. The Moon suddenly disappeared. But the stars were all shining on the white snow and there were no clouds in the sky, and Rabbit wondered what had happened to the Moon. He waited very still and a little frightened in the starlight.
Soon he heard some one coming, sneaking stealthily through the trees. Then he saw a white light which dazzled his eyes. The light went towards the snares, until it stopped just at the trap Rabbit had set. Then Rabbit pulled the bow-string, closed the trap as he had hoped, and tied the string fast to a tree. He heard sounds of a struggle, and he saw the white light move from side to side, but he knew that he had his prisoner fast and that the man of the long foot was caught at last. He was much afraid of the white light, and he ran home as fast as he could and told his old grandmother that he had caught the game-robber in the trap, and that he did not know who he was, for he was too frightened to look. And his grandmother said, "You must go back and see who it is, and tell him he must stop robbing your snares." But Rabbit said, "I do not want to go until daylight, for the Moon has gone down and the forest is very dark." But his grandmother said, "You must go." So poor Rabbit, although he was very frightened by what he had seen, set out again for his traps.
[Illustration: HE SAT VERY QUIET, WAITING FOR THE MAN OF THE LONG FOOT TO APPEAR]
When he drew near to his snares he saw that the white light was still shining. It was so bright that his eyes were dazzled and he had to stop far from it. Then he approached nearer, but his eyes soon became very sore. There was a stream flowing beside him, and he bathed his eyes in the cold water, but it brought him no relief, and his eyes felt hot and red, and tears fell from them because of the dazzling light. Then he took great handfuls of snow and threw snowballs at the light, hoping thereby to put it out. But when the snowballs came near to the light they melted and fell down like rain. Then, with his eyes still smarting, Rabbit in his rage scooped up great handfuls of soft black mud from the bottom of the stream, and forming it into balls, he threw them with all his force at the white light. He heard them strike something with a dull thud, and he heard loud yells from the prisoner--the man of the long foot--behind the shining light. Then a voice came from the light, saying, "Why did you snare me? Come and untie me at once. I am the Man in the Moon. It is near to the morning, and before dawn I must be on my way home. You have already spotted my face with mud, and if you do not loose me at once I shall kill all your tribe."
Poor Rabbit was more frightened than before, and he ran home and told his old grandmother what had happened. And his grandmother was also very frightened, for she thought that no good could come of it. And she told Rabbit to go back at once and untie the Man in the Moon, for the night was almost spent, and the dawn would soon be breaking. So poor Rabbit, trembling in his fear, went back to his traps. From a great distance he cried, "I will untie you if you will never again rob my snares, and if you will never come back to earth." And the prisoner in the trap promised, and said, "I swear it by my white light." Then Rabbit approached very carefully. He had to shut his eyes and grope his way because of the bright light, and his lip quivered because of the great heat. At last he rushed in and cut the bow-string snare with his teeth, and the Man in the Moon hurried on his way, for he could already see the dawn in the East. But Rabbit was almost blinded while he was about it, and his shoulders were badly scorched. And ever since that time Rabbit blinks and his eyelids are pink, and water runs from his eyes when he looks at a bright light; and his lip always quivers; and his shoulders are yellow, even when he wears his white winter coat, because of the great light and heat on the winter night long ago when he loosed the Man in the Moon from the snare. And since that night the Man in the Moon has never come back to earth. He stays at his task in the sky, lighting the forest by night; but he still bears on his face the marks of the black mud which Rabbit threw at him. And sometimes for several nights he goes away to a quiet place, where he tries to wash off the mud; and then the land is dark. But he never succeeds in cleaning himself, and when he comes back to his work the marks of Rabbit's mud-balls are still upon his shining face.
THE CHILDREN WITH ONE EYE
Two little children, a boy and a girl, lived long ago with their widowed mother in the Canadian forest. The woman was very poor, for her husband had long been dead and she had to work very hard to provide food for herself and her children. Often she had to go far from home in search of fish and game, and at times she was absent for many days. When she went on these long journeys she left her children behind her, and thus they were allowed to grow up with very little oversight or discipline or care. They soon became very unruly because they were so often left to have their own way, and when their mother returned from her hunting trips she frequently found that they would not obey her, and that they did pretty much as they pleased. As they grew older they became more headstrong and disobedient, and their mother could do very little to control them. And she said, "Some day they will suffer for their waywardness."
One day the woman went to visit a neighbour not far away. She left a large pot of bear-fat boiling on the fire. And she said to the children, "Do not meddle with the pot while I am gone, for the fat may harm you if it catches fire." But she was not gone long when the boy said to the girl as they played around the pot, "Let us see if the fat will burn." So they took a burning stick of wood and dropped it into the fat, and stood looking into the large pot to see what would happen. The fat sputtered for an instant; then there was a sudden flash, and a tongue of flame shot upwards from the pot into the faces of the children. Their hair was burned to a crisp and their faces were scorched, and they ran from the house crying with pain. But when they reached the outer air, they found that they could not see, for the fire had blinded their eyes. So they stumbled around in darkness, crying loudly for help. But no help came.
When their mother came home she tried every remedy she thought might restore their sight. But all her medicine was unavailing, and she said, "You will always be blind. That is the punishment for your disobedience."
So the children lived in darkness for a long time. But they were no longer headstrong and unruly, and although they could no longer see, they were less trouble to their mother than they were when they had their sight, for they did not now refuse to do her bidding.
One day, when their mother was far away hunting in the forest, an old woman came along and asked the children for food. And they brought good food to her as she sat before the door. After she had eaten, she said, "You are blind, but I can help you, for I am from the Land of the Little People. I cannot give you four eyes, but I will give you one eye between you. You can each use it at different times, and it will be better than no sight at all. But handle it with great care and do not leave it lying on the ground." Then she gave them an eye which she took from her pocket, and disappeared. So they used the one eye between them, and when the boy had the eye and the girl wished to see anything, she would say, "Give me the eye," and her brother would carefully pass it to her. When their mother came home she was very glad when she found that they had now some means of sight.
[Illustration: THE BOY WENT INTO THE FOREST WITH HIS BOW AND ARROWS. HE HAD NOT GONE FAR WHEN HE SAW A FAT YOUNG DEER, WHICH HE KILLED]
One day when their mother was away again, the boy went into the forest with his bow and arrows. He carried the eye with him. He had not gone far when he saw a fat young deer, which he killed. The deer was too heavy for him to carry home alone. So he said, "I will go and get my sister, and we shall cut it up and put it in a basket and carry it home together." He went home and told his sister of his good fortune, and he led her to where the deer lay, and they began to cut up the body. But they had forgotten to bring a basket or a bag. He called to his sister saying, "You must weave a basket into which we can put the meat to carry it home." And his sister said, "How can I make a basket when I cannot see? If I am to weave a basket, I must have the eye." The boy brought the eye to her and she made a large basket from green twigs.
When she had finished making the basket the boy said, "I must finish cutting up the meat. Give me the eye." So she brought him the eye, and he proceeded to chop up the meat and to put it in the basket. Then he said, "Why can we not have a meal here? I am very hungry." His sister agreed that this was a good idea, and he said, "You cook the meal while I pack the meat." The girl made a fire, but she was afraid she would burn the meat, so she said, "I cannot see to cook. I must have the eye." By this time her brother had finished packing the meat into the basket, and he brought her the eye and she went on with her cooking. The fire was low and she said, "I must have some dry wood. Bring me some dry pine." The boy wandered off into the forest in search of wood, but he had not gone far when he stumbled over a log and fell to the ground. He called to his sister in anger, saying, "You always want the eye for yourself. How can I gather dry pine when I cannot see? Give me the eye at once."
His sister ran to him and helped him up and gave him the eye. She found her way back to the fire, but as she reached it she smelled the meat burning on the spit. She shouted, "The meat is burning and our dinner will be spoiled. Give me the eye at once, so that I may see if the meat is cooked." The boy was some distance away, and in his anger he threw the eye to her, saying, "Find it. I am not going to walk to you with it if you are too lazy to come and get it." The eye fell to the ground between them, and neither of them knew where it lay. They groped for it among the dead leaves, but as they searched for it, a wood-pecker, watching from a branch of a tree near by, swooped suddenly down and gobbled it up and flew away.
As they were still searching for it, the old woman who had given it to them came along. She had been hiding among the trees, and she had seen the wood-pecker flying away with her gift. She said, "Where is the eye I gave you?" "It dropped from my head," answered the boy, "and I cannot find it in the grass." "Yes," said the girl, "it dropped from his head, and we cannot find it." "You have lied to me," said the old woman, "and you have disobeyed, and for that I shall punish you." And with her magic power she changed the boy into a mole and the girl into a bat, and said, "Now live blind upon the earth, with only your sense of sound to guide you." At once the boy and the girl were changed. And so the Mole and the Bat appeared upon the earth.
THE GIANT WITH THE GREY FEATHERS
Once long ago, when the Blackfeet Indians dwelt on the Canadian plains, there was a great famine in all the land. For many months no buffaloes were killed, and there was no meat to be had at any price. One by one the old people dropped off because of a lack of food, and the young children died early because there was no nourishment, and there was great sorrow everywhere. Only the strong women and the stronger warriors remained alive, but even they gradually grew weaker because of the pinch of the hunger sent into the land by famine. At last the Chief of the tribe prayed that the Great Chieftain of the Indians might come into his territory to tell the people what to do to save themselves.
[Illustration: FOR SOME DAYS THE BOY LAY IN TERROR IN THE NEST ... AND FAR OUT ON THE OCEAN HE COULD SEE GREAT SHIPS GOING BY]
The Great Chief was at that time far away in the south country where the warm winds were blowing and the flowers were blooming. But one night he heard the Chief's prayer borne to him on the winds, and he hastened northward, for he knew that his people on the plains were somehow in dire distress. Soon he arrived at the village of the hungry tribe. "Who has called me here?" he asked. "It was I," answered the Chief. "My people are all starving because there are no buffaloes in the country, and if you had not come we should soon have all perished." Then the Great Chief looked upon his people and he noticed that the old folks and the little children had disappeared; only a few children were left and they had pinched cheeks and sunken eyes. And he took pity on them and said, "There is a great thief not far distant. He is probably a wicked giant, and he has driven all the buffaloes away. But I will find him and soon you shall have food." And the people were all comforted, for they knew that the Great Chief would keep his word.
Then the Chief took with him the young Chief's son and set out on his quest. The people wanted to go with him, but he said, "No! We shall go alone. It is a dangerous duty, and it is better that, if need be, two should die in the attempt, than that all should perish." They journeyed westwards across the prairies towards the Great Water in the West, and as they went, the youth prayed to the Sun and the Moon and the Morning Star to send them success. Soon they came to the rolling foot-hills covered with sweet-grass and scrubby pine. But still they saw no signs of buffalo. At last they reached a narrow stream, on the bank of which they saw a house with smoke coming from the chimney. "There is the cause of all our troubles," said the Chief. "In that house dwells the giant Buffalo-thief and his wife. They have driven all the animals from the prairies until not one is left. My magic power tells me it is so!" Then by his magic power he changed his companion into a sharp-pointed straight stick, while he himself took the shape of a dog, and they lay on the ground and waited.
Soon the giant and his wife and their little son came along. The boy patted the dog on the head, and said, "See what a nice dog I have found. He must be lost. May I take him home?" His father said, "No, I do not like his looks. Do not touch him." The boy cried bitterly, for he had long hoped for a dog of his own, and his mother pleaded for him so hard that at last the giant father said, "Oh, very well. Have your own way, but no good can come of it." The woman picked up the stick and said, "I will take this nice straight stick along with me. I can dig roots with it to make medicine." So they all went to the giant's house, the giant frowning angrily, the woman carrying the stick, and the boy leading the dog.
The next morning the giant went out and soon came back with a fat young buffalo, all skinned and ready for cooking. They roasted it on a spit over the fire and had a good meal. The boy fed some meat to the dog, but his father, when he saw what the boy was doing, beat him soundly, and said, "Have I not told you the dog is an evil thing? You must not disobey me." But again the woman pleaded for her boy, and the dog was fed. That night when all the world was asleep, the dog and the stick changed back to their human form and had a good supper of what was left of the buffalo-meat. And the Chief said to the youth, "The giant is the Buffalo-thief who keeps the herds from coming to the prairies. It is useless to kill him until we have found where he has hidden them." So they changed back to the shapes of dog and stick and went to sleep.
The next morning the woman and her boy set off to the forest near the mountain, to gather berries and to dig up medicine roots. They took the dog and the stick with them. At noon, after they had worked for some time, they sat down to have their luncheon. The woman threw the stick down on the ground, and the boy let the dog run away among the shrubs. The dog wandered to the side of the mountain. There he found an opening like the mouth of a cave. Peering into the place he saw many buffaloes within, and he knew that at last he had found the hiding place of the giant's plunder. He went back to the woman and the boy and began to bark. This was the signal agreed on with his companion. The woman and her son thought he was barking at a bird, and they laughed at his capers as he jumped about. But he was in reality calling to his comrade. The stick understood the call and wiggled like a snake through the underbrush to the dog's side, unseen by the boy and his mother. They then entered the large cave in the side of the mountain, and there they found a great herd of buffaloes--all the buffaloes that had been driven from the prairies. The dog barked at them and snapped at their heels, and the stick beat them, and they began to drive them quickly out of the cavern and eastward toward the plains. But they still kept the shape of dog and stick. When evening came, and it was time for the boy and his mother to go home, the boy searched for the dog and the woman looked for her stick, but they could not find them, and they had to go home without them.
Just as the woman and her son reached their house on the bank of the river, the giant-thief was coming home too. He chanced to look to the east, and there he saw, far away, many buffaloes running towards the foot-hills where the sweet-grass grew. He was very angry, and he cried loudly to his son, "Where is the dog? Where is the dog?" "I lost him in the underbrush," said the boy; "he chased a bird and did not come back." "It was not a bird he chased," said the giant; "it was one of my buffaloes. I told you he was an evil thing and not to touch him, but you and your mother would have your way. Now my buffaloes are all gone." He gnashed his teeth in a great rage, and rushed off to the hidden cave to see if any buffaloes were left, crying as he went, "I will kill the dog if I find him." When he reached the cave the Chief and the youth, still in the form of a dog and a stick, were just rounding up the last of the buffaloes. The giant rushed at them to kill the dog and to break the stick, but they sprang upon an old buffalo and hid in his long hair and, clinging on tightly, the dog bit the buffalo until the old animal plunged and roared and rushed from the cave, bearing the Chief and the youth concealed on his back. He galloped eastward until he reached the herd far away on the prairie, leaving the giant far behind to make the best of his anger. Then the Chief and the brave youth took their old form of men, and in high spirits they drove the herd of buffaloes back to their hungry people waiting patiently on the plains.
The people were very pleased to see the Great Chief and the youth returning to the village with the great herd of fat buffaloes, for they knew now that the famine was ended. But as they drove the animals into a great fenced enclosure, a large grey bird flew over their heads and swooped down upon them and pecked at them with its bill, and tried to frighten them and drive them away. The Great Chief knew by his magic power that the grey bird was none other than the giant-thief who had stolen the buffaloes, and who had changed himself into a bird to fly across the prairies in pursuit of them. Then the Chief changed himself into an otter and lay down on the bank of the stream, pretending to be dead. The grey bird flew down upon him, for he thought he would have a good meal of fat otter. But the Chief seized him by the leg, and changing back to his own form, he bore him in triumph to his camp. He tied him up fast to the smoke-hole of his tent and made a great fire inside. The giant cried, "Spare me, spare me, and I shall never do you more harm." But the Chief left him on the tent pole all night long while the black smoke from the fire poured out around him. In the morning his feathers were all black. Then the Chief let him down. And he said, "You may go now, but you will never be able to resume your former shape. You will henceforth be a raven, a bird of ill-omen upon the earth, an outlaw and a brigand among the birds, despised among men because of your thefts. And you will always have to steal and to hunt hard for your food." And to this day the feathers of the raven are black, and he is a bird of ill-omen upon the earth because of his encounter with the Great Chieftain long ago.
THE CRUEL STEPMOTHER
Once long ago, when the Blackfeet Indians dwelt on the Canadian prairies, a poor Indian and his two children, a boy and a girl, were living near the bank of a great river. The children's mother had long been dead and they had long been left to the care of their father. Their father did not think it was right that they should grow up without a woman's kindness, and he decided at last to take another wife. So he went far away to a distant village and there he married a queer woman of another tribe. Soon times grew hard in the North Country, and it was very difficult to get food. The family lived for many days on roots and berries, and often they were very hungry because there was no meat. Now it happened that the woman the man had married was a very wicked witch-woman, who was capable of doing many evil deeds. She had no love for her stepchildren, and she treated them very cruelly. She blamed them for the lack of food in the house, and beating them soundly, she said, "You gluttonous brats; you always eat too much. It is little wonder that we cannot keep the house supplied with food." The man saw his wife's cruelty to the children, but although it made him sad, and at times angry, he did not interfere, for he thought the woman should rule her home.
One night in the early spring, as the man slept, his first wife appeared to him in a dream, and said, "Hang a large spider web across the trail in the forest where the animals pass and you will get plenty of food. But be good to my children. Their cruel stepmother is planning to kill them." And she told him where to look for the magical spider web. The next day the man found the large spider web, and he went far away into the forest and hung it from the trees over the trail where the animals passed. That evening when he went back to the web he found many animals entangled in its meshes, for it had magical power. He killed the animals and brought them home, and that night they had a good fat supper of roast deer meat. Day after day the magical spider web gave him great numbers of rabbits and deer, as the vision of his dead wife had told him in the night, and from that time on the family did not want for food.
But the man's success in hunting only angered his witch-wife. She had now no cause for complaint against the little children, and she could no longer scold them and say that because of them there was no food in the house. Her hatred for them grew stronger each day, and at last she decided to kill them and to kill their father as soon as she could. Their father was going away on the morrow in search of wood to make arrows for his bows, and she thought she would have a good chance to kill them while he was gone. Then she would kill their father when he returned. So she laid her plans. But that night the vision of his first wife came again to the man as he slept, and it said, "Your present wife is a witch-woman. She plans to kill the children to-morrow when you are away, and when you come home she will kill you, too. You must kill her while there is yet time. Remember my little children."
When the man awoke in the morning he was much alarmed because of the story told him by the vision of the night. He no longer trusted his witch-wife and he decided to get rid of her. But he feared she would attack the children before he could prevent it. So when the witch-wife went out to get water from the stream to make breakfast, he gave each of the children a stick, a white stone, and a bunch of soft moss, and he said, "You must run away from here and stay away until I can find you, for you are in great danger. You will find these three things I give you of great use. Throw them behind you if any evil thing pursues you, and they will keep you from harm." The children in great fear at once ran away into the forest. Then the man hung his magical spider web over the door of the house, and sat quietly inside waiting for his wife to come back. In a little while she came home, carrying a pail of water, but she did not see the web with its fine strands hanging across the door, and when she walked into it she was at once entangled in its meshes. She struggled hard to get free, but her head was inside the door while her body was outside, and the web held her fast around the neck. Then the man said, "I know now that you are a cruel witch-woman. You will beat my children no more." With his stone-axe he struck her a mighty blow which completely severed her head from her body. Then he ran from the house as fast as he could and went towards his children, who were watching him not far away.
But the man was not yet done with the cruel witch-woman. As he ran from the house her headless body, freed from the spider web, ran after him, while her severed head, with eyes staring and hair flying, followed the children, sometimes bumping along the ground and sometimes rising through the air. The father thought it would be well to go in a different direction from the children, and he went west, while they went east. The children were very frightened when they saw the horrible head behind them, slowly gaining upon them. Then they remembered their father's magic gifts. When the head was close upon them, they threw their sticks on the ground at their backs and at once a dense forest sprang up between them and their pursuer. The children said, "Now we will rest here for a while, for we are nearly out of breath. The wicked head cannot get through that dense forest." And they sat on the grass and rested.
Soon, however, the pursuing head emerged from the thick trees. The children got up and ran as hard as they could, but close behind them came the severed head, rolling its eyes and gnashing its teeth in a great frenzy, and uttering terrible yells. It was very near to them, when the children again remembered their father's gifts. They threw the white stones behind them, and at once a high mountain of white rock rose between them and their enemy. They sat on the ground and rested, and said, "Oh dear, oh dear, what shall we do? We have only one means of safety left, these little bits of moss." The wicked head hurled itself against the mountain, but it could not get through. A big buffalo bull was feeding on the grass near it, and the head called to him to break a road through the mountain. The bull rushed at the mountain with all his force, but the mountain was so hard that it broke his head and he fell down dead. Some moles were playing in the soft earth near by, and the head called to them to make a passage through the hill. So the moles searched and found a soft earthy place in the midst of the rock and soon they tunnelled a hole to the other side of the mountain, through which the head was able to pass. When the children saw their pursuer coming out of the moles' tunnel they cried loudly and ran away as fast as they could. At last, after a very long chase, the head was almost upon them, and they decided to use their last means of protection. They threw the wet moss behind them, and at once a long black swamp appeared where the moss had fallen, between them and their wicked follower. The head was going at such a great speed, bumping over the ground, that it could not stop. It rolled into the swamp and disappeared into the soft mud and was never seen again.
[Illustration: THE BULL RUSHED AT THE MOUNTAIN WITH ALL HIS FORCE]
The children then went home to wait for their father. It was a long journey, for they had run far. But their father never came. Months and months they waited, but he did not come, and they grew up to be great magicians and very powerful among their tribe. At last, by their magic power, they learned what had happened to their father. Their stepmother's body continued to follow him as he ran towards the west. It followed him for many days. Then by his magic power, which the vision of his dead wife had brought to him, he changed himself into the Sun, and went to live with his wife in the sky-country. But the old witch-woman also had magic power, and she changed herself into the Moon and followed him to the land of the stars. And there she still pursues him. And while he keeps ahead of her and she cannot catch him, night follows day in all the world. But if she overtakes him she will kill him, and day will disappear and night shall reign for evermore upon the earth. And the Blackfeet of the plains pray that he will always keep in front in the race with his former witch-wife, so that there may be always Night and Day in succession in all the land.
THE BOY WHO WAS SAVED BY THOUGHTS
A poor widow woman once lived near the sea in Eastern Canada. Her husband had been drowned catching fish one stormy day far off the coast, and her little boy was now her only means of support. He had no brothers or sisters, and he and his mother, because they lived alone, were always good comrades. Although he was very young and small, he was very strong, and he could catch fish and game like a man. Every day he brought home food to his mother, and they were never in want.
Now it happened that the Great Eagle who made the Winds in these parts became very angry because he was not given enough to eat. He went screaming through the land in search of food, but no food could he find. And he said, "If the people will not give me food, I will take care that they get no food for themselves, and when I grow very hungry I shall eat up all the little children in the land. For my young ones must have nourishment too." So he tossed the waters about with the wind of his great wings, and he bent the trees and flattened the corn, and for days he made such a hurly-burly on the earth that the people stayed indoors, and they were afraid to come out in search of food.
At last the boy and his mother became very hungry. And the boy said, "I must go and find food, for there is not a crumb left in the house. We cannot wait longer." And he said to his mother, "I know where a fat young beaver lives in his house of reeds on the bank of the stream near the sea. I shall go and kill him, and his flesh will feed us for many days." His mother did not want him to make this hazardous journey, for the Great Eagle was still in the land. But he said to her, "You must think of me always when I am gone, and I will think of you, and while we keep each other in our memories I shall come to no harm." So, taking his long hunting knife, he set out for the beaver's home in his house of reeds on the bank of the stream near the sea. He reached the place without mishap and there he found Beaver fast asleep. He soon killed him and slung him over his shoulder and started back to his mother's house. "A good fat load I have here," he said to himself, "and we shall now have many a good dinner of roast beaver-meat."
But as he went along with his load on his back the Great Eagle spied him from a distance and swooped down upon him without warning. Before he could strike with his knife, the Eagle caught him by the shoulders and soared away, holding him in a mighty grip with the beaver still on his back. The boy tried to plunge his knife into the Eagle's breast, but the feathers were too thick and tough, and he was not strong enough to drive the knife through them. He could do nothing but make the best of his sorry plight. "Surely I can think of a way of escape," he said to himself, "and my mother's thoughts will be with me to help me." Soon the Eagle arrived at his home. It was built on a high cliff overlooking the sea, hundreds of feet above the beach, where even the sound of the surf rolling in from afar could not reach it. There were many young birds in the nest, all clamouring for food. Great Eagle threw the boy to the side of the nest and told him to stay there. And he said, "I shall first eat the beaver, and after he is all eaten up we shall have a good fat meal from you." Then he picked the beaver to pieces and fed part of it to his young ones.
For some days the boy lay in terror in the nest, trying to think of a way of escape. Birds flew high over his head, and far out on the ocean he could see great ships going by. But no help came to him, and he thought that death would soon be upon him. And his mother sat at home waiting for him to return, but day after day passed and still he did not come. She thought he must surely be in great danger, or that perhaps he was already dead. One day, as she was weeping, thinking of her lost boy, an old woman came along. "Why do you cry?" she asked. And the weeping woman said, "My boy has been away for many days. I know that harm has come upon him. The men of my tribe have gone in search of him, and they will kill whatever holds him a prisoner, but I fear he will never come back alive." And the old woman said, "Little good the men of your tribe can do you! You must aid him with your thoughts, for material things are vain. I will help you, for I have been given great power by the Little People of the Hills." So the woman used her thoughts and her wishes to bring back her boy.
That night the boy noticed that the beaver had all been eaten up and that not a morsel remained. He knew that unless he could save himself at once he would surely die on the morrow. The Great Eagle, he knew, would swoop down upon him and kill him with a blow of his powerful beak and claws. But when the boy slept, he saw his mother in his slumber. And she said to him, "To-morrow when Great Eagle goes from the nest, brace your knife, point upwards, against the rock. When he swoops down to kill you his breast will strike the knife, and he will be pierced to death. You are not strong enough to cut through his feathers with your knife, but he is powerful enough to destroy himself." The next morning when Great Eagle went out, the boy did as the vision of the night had told him. He braced his sharp hunting-knife, point upwards, against the rock and sat still and waited. Then he heard the young eagles making a great noise and crying loudly for their breakfast. He knew that his hour had come. Soon the Great Eagle, hearing the screams of his young ones, came flying back to the nest to kill the boy. He circled around above him with loud cries and then with great force swooped down upon him, hoping to kill him with his beak and claws. But instead, he struck the blade braced upwards against the rock. The knife pierced far into his breast, and with a loud scream he rolled over dead into the nest. The boy then killed the young eagles, and he knew that now for a time he was safe.
But he did not know how to get down from the Eagle's nest, for it jutted out like a shelf far over the beach, and behind it was a wall of rock around which he could not climb. He had no means of making a ladder, and his cries would not be heard upon the beach because of the constant roaring of the surf. He thought he would surely starve to death, and that night he cried himself to sleep. But in the night he again saw his mother in his slumbers. And she said, "You are a foolish boy. Why do you not use the thoughts I send you? To-morrow skin the eagle and crawl inside the skin. If the wide wings can hold the Eagle in the air they can likewise hold you. Drop off from the cliff and you will land safely on the beach." The next day the boy did as the vision of the night had told him. He carefully skinned the Great Eagle. Then he crawled inside the skin and thrust his arms through the skin just above the wings, so that his extended arms would hold the wings straight out beneath them. Then he prepared to drop down. But when he looked over the cliff, he was very frightened, for the sight made him dizzy. On the beach, men looked like flies, they were so far away. But he remembered the promise made to him in his slumbers. So he pushed himself from the cliff and dropped down. The wings of Great Eagle let him fall gently through the air and he landed safely and unhurt upon the beach. He crawled out of the skin and set out for his home. It was a long journey, for Great Eagle had carried him far away, but towards evening he reached his home safely, and his mother received him with great gladness.
The boy began to boast of his adventure, and he told how he had killed Great Eagle and how he had dropped down unscathed from the cliff. He spoke of himself with great pride and of his strength and his shrewdness. But the old woman from the Land of the Little People, the fairies of the hills, who was still present with his mother, said, "Oh, vain boy, do not think so highly of yourself. Your strength is nothing; your shrewdness is nothing. It was not these things that saved you, but it was the strength of our thoughts. These alone endure and succeed when all else fails. I have taught you the uselessness of all material things, which in the end are but as ashes or as dust. Our thoughts alone can help us in the end, for they alone are eternal." And the boy listened and wondered at what the old woman from the Land of Little People had said, but he boasted of his strength no more.
THE SONG-BIRD AND THE HEALING WATERS
Once when the snow lay very deep on the ground and the days were grey with frost, there was great sorrow in an Indian village. A dreadful plague had come upon the place and had carried away many of the people. Neither old nor young were proof against its ravages, and the weak and the strong fell helpless before its power. The people tried every means to get rid of the plague, but they had no success. And they prayed to all their good spirits to help them, but no help came. In the tribe was a young warrior who had lost his parents and all his brothers and sisters because of the dreaded disease. Now his young wife fell sick, and he was in great sorrow, for he thought that she would soon follow his parents into the Land of the Shadows. And so he went about in great fear, not knowing when the end would come.
One day he met an old woman in the forest. "Why do you look so sorrowful?" she asked him. "I am sad because my young wife is going to die," he answered; "the plague will carry her off like the others." But the old woman said, "There is something that will save your wife from death. Far away in the East is a bird of sweet song which dwells close to the Healing Waters. Go until you find it. It will point you to the spring, the waters of which alone can heal." And the young man said, "I must find the Healing Waters. Wherever they may be upon the earth, I must find them." So he went home and said good-bye to his friends, and set out eastward on his quest.
All the next day he searched eagerly for the Waters, listening always for the bird of the sweet song. But he found nothing. The snow lay deep in the forest and he moved along with difficulty. He met a rabbit in his path and he said, "Tell me where I shall find the Healing Spring?" But the rabbit scurried away over the snow and made no answer. Then he asked a bear, but he met with the same rebuff. Thus for many days and nights he wandered on, crossing rivers and climbing steep hills, but always without success.
Then one day he emerged from the snow country and came to a land where the airs were warmer and where little streams were flowing. Suddenly he came upon the body of a dead man lying across his path. He stopped and buried the body, for he thought that it was not right to leave it lying bare upon the ground for the birds to peck at. That night as he went along in the moonlight he met a Fox in his path. "Hello," said the Fox. "What are you looking for so late at night in the forest?" And he answered, "I am looking for the bird of the sweet song, who will show me the way to the Healing Waters." And the Fox said, "I am the spirit of the man you buried yesterday by the forest path, and in return for your kindness to me I shall do a kindness to you. You have always been good to the animals and the birds, and you have never killed them needlessly, nor when you did not require them for clothing or for food. And you have always been careful of the flowers and the trees, and you have often protected them from harm. So now they want to be good to you, and I am going to guide you. But first you must rest, for you are tired from your long journey."
Then the young man lay down to sleep and the Fox stood guard beside him. As he slept he dreamed. And in his dream he saw his wife pale and thin and worn, and as he looked he heard her singing a song of wonderful melody. Then he heard a waterfall rippling near him and it said, "Seek me, O warrior, and when you find me your wife shall live, for I am the Healing Waters." In the morning the Fox led him but a short distance through the forest and on the branch of a tree he heard a bird singing a song of wonderful melody, just as he had heard in his dream of the night before. He knew now that this was the bird of the sweet song of which the old woman in the forest had spoken. Then, as he listened, he heard the sound of a waterfall rippling not far away. He searched for it, but he could not find it. And Fox said, "You must seek it; you must not despair; it will not come to you unless you search." So he searched again, and soon he thought he heard a voice speaking beneath his feet. "Release us," it called, "set us free and your wife and your people shall be saved." He seized a sharp stick and dug rapidly into the earth where he had heard the voice. He worked eagerly and quickly, and he had not dug far when the spring gushed forth and boiled upwards carrying to the world its healing power. And the young man knew that at last he had found the cure for his ills. He plunged into the spring and bathed himself in the water, and all his weariness left him and he was strong again.
Then the young man moulded from the soft earth a large pot. He baked it in the fire until it was quite hard. "Now," said the Fox spirit, "I will leave you. Your kindness has been rewarded. You will need me no more, for you have found the Healing Waters." And he disappeared as mysteriously as he had come. The young man filled his clay pot with the sparkling water and hastened back to his home, running through the forest with the speed of the wind, because of his renewed strength.
[Illustration: THEN THE YOUNG MAN LAY DOWN TO SLEEP AND FOX STOOD GUARD BESIDE HIM]
When he reached his native village, the people met him with sad faces, for the plague was still raging and they told him that his young wife was about to pass to the Land of the Shadows. But he hurried to his home, and he forced some of the Healing Waters between his wife's parched lips, and bathed her hands and her brow until she fell into a deep slumber. He watched by her side until she awoke, and when sleep left her she was well again. Then with his Healing Waters he cured all the people in the village, and the cruel plague left them and there was no more sickness in the land. And since that time no plague has spread among his tribe. In this way the Mineral Springs, the places of Healing Waters, came upon the earth, bearing health and happiness wherever they rise, and accompanied always by the songs of birds.
THE BOY WHO OVERCAME THE GIANTS
Once long ago, before the white man came to Canada, an orphan boy was living alone with his uncle. He was not very happy, for he had to work very hard, and tasks more fitted for a man's shoulders than for a boy's were often placed upon him. When his parents died and left him without brother or sister, his uncle took him to his own home because there was no one else to take care of him. But he treated him very cruelly and often he wished to get rid of him. It mattered not how well the boy did his work or how many fish and animals he caught, his uncle was never satisfied, and often he beat the boy harshly and with little cause. The boy would have run away but he did not know where to go, and he feared to wander alone in the dark forest. So he decided to endure his hardships as best he could.
Now it happened that in a distant village near the sea there lived a Chief who was noted far and wide for his cruelty. He had a wicked temper, and he was known to have put many people to death for no reason whatsoever. More than all else, he hated boastfulness and he had scanty patience with anyone who was vain of his own strength. He pledged himself always to humble the proud and to debase the haughty. The boy's uncle had heard of this wicked ruler, and he said, "Here is a chance for me to get rid of the boy. I will tell lies about him to the Chief."
It chanced just at this time that three giants came into the Chief's territory. Where they came from, no man knew, but they dwelt in a large cave near the sea, and they caused great havoc and destruction in all the land. They ate up great stores of food, and all the little children they could lay their hands on. The Chief used every means to get rid of the giants, but without success. Night after night his best warriors went to the cave by the ocean to seek out the giants, but not a man returned. A piece of birch bark bearing a picture of a warrior with an arrow in his heart, found the next day at the Chief's door, always told him of the warrior's fate. And the giants continued their cruel work, for no one could stop them.
Soon all the country was in great terror. The Chief wondered greatly what was to be done. At last he thought, "I will give my daughter to the man who can rid me of these pests." His daughter was his only child and she was very beautiful, and he knew that many suitors would now appear to seek her hand, for although the task was dangerous, the prize was worth while. When the wicked uncle in the distant village heard of it, he thought, "Now I can get rid of the boy, for I will tell the Chief that the boy says he can kill the giants." So taking his nephew with him he went to the Chief's house and begged to see him. "Oh, Chief," he said, "I have a boy who boasts that before many days have passed he can free your land from the giants." And the Chief said, "Bring him to me." The man said, "Here he is." The Chief was surprised when he saw the small boy, and he said, "You have promised that you can rid my land of giants. Now we shall see if you can do it. If you succeed you may have my daughter. If you fail, you will die. If you escape from the giants, I will kill you myself. I hate vain boasters, and they shall not live in my land."
The boy went and sat by the ocean, and cried as hard as he could. He thought that he would surely die, for he was very small and he had no means of killing the giants. But as he sat there an old woman came along. She came quietly and quickly out of the grey mist of the sea. And she said, "Why are you crying?" And the boy said, "I am crying because I am forced to attack the giants in the cave, and if I cannot kill them I shall surely die," and he cried louder than before. But the old woman, who was the good fairy of the sea, said, "Take this bag and this knife and these three little stones that I will give you, and when you go to-night to the giants' cave, use them as I tell you and all will be well." She gave him three small white stones and a small knife, and a bag like the bladder of a bear, and she taught him their use. Then she disappeared into the grey mist that hung low on the ocean and the boy never saw her again.
The boy lay down on the sand and went to sleep. When he awoke, the moon was shining, and far along the coast in the bright light he could see an opening in the rocks which he knew was the entrance to the giants' cave. Taking his bag and his knife and the three little stones, he approached it cautiously with a trembling heart. When he reached the mouth of the cave he could hear the giants snoring inside, all making different noises, louder than the roar of the sea. Then he remembered the old woman's instructions. He tied the bag inside his coat so that the mouth of it was close to his chin. Then he took one of the stones from his pocket. At once it grew to immense size, so heavy that the boy could scarcely hold it. He threw it at the biggest giant with great force, and it hit him squarely on the head. The giant sat up staring wildly and rubbing his brow. He kicked his younger brother, who was lying beside him, and said in great anger, "Why did you strike me?" "I did not strike you," said his brother. "You struck me on the head while I slept," said the giant, "and if you do it again I will kill you." Then they went to sleep again.
When the boy heard them snoring loudly again, he took a second stone from his pocket. At once it grew great in size and the boy hurled it with great force at the biggest giant. Again the giant sat up staring wildly and rubbing his head. But this time he did not speak. He grasped his axe, which was lying beside him, and killed his brother with a blow. Then he went to sleep again. When the boy heard him snoring, he took the third stone from his pocket. At once it grew to great size and weight, and he hurled it with all his force at the giant. Again the giant sat up with great staring eyes, rubbing the lump on his head. He was now in a great rage. "My brothers have plotted to kill me," he yelled, and seizing his axe he killed his remaining brother with a blow. Then he went to sleep, and the boy slipped from the cave, first gathering up the three stones, which were now of their usual small size.
The next morning when the giant went to get water from the stream, the boy hid in the trees and began to cry loudly. The giant soon discovered him and asked, "Why are you crying?" "I have lost my way," said the boy, "my parents have gone and left me. Please take me into your service, for I would like to work for such a kind handsome man, and I can do many things." The giant was flattered by what the boy said, and although he liked to eat little children, he thought, "Now that I am alone, I ought to have a companion, so I will spare the boy's life and make him my servant." And he took the boy back to his cave, and said, "Cook my dinner before I come home. Make some good stew, for I shall be very hungry."
When the giant went into the forest the boy prepared the evening meal. He cut up a great store of deer meat and put it in a large pot bigger than a hogshead, and made a good meat stew. When the giant came home in the evening he was very hungry, and he was well pleased to see the big pot filled with his favourite food. He seated himself on one side of the pot, and the boy seated himself on the other side, and they dipped their spoons into the big dish. And the boy said, "We must eat it all up so that I can clean the pot well and ready for the corn mush we will have for breakfast." The stew was very hot, and to cool it before he ate it the giant blew his breath on what he dipped out. But the boy poured his own share into the bag under his coat, and said, "Why can't you eat hot food--a big man like you? In my country men never stop to cool their stew with their breath." Now the giant could not see very well, for his eyesight was not very good, and the cave was dark, and he did not notice the boy putting the stew in the bag so quickly. He thought the boy was eating it. And he was shamed by the boy's taunts because he was so much larger than the boy, so he ate up the hot stew at once in great gulps and burned his throat badly. But he was too proud to stop or to complain.
When they had eaten half the potful, the giant said, "I am full. I think I have had enough." "No, indeed," said the boy, "you must show that you like my cooking. In my country men eat much more than that," and he kept on eating. The giant was not to be outdone by a boy, so he fell to eating again, and they did not stop until they had consumed the whole potful of stew. But the boy had poured his share into the bag and when they had finished he was swelled out to an immense size. The giant could scarcely move, he had eaten so much, and he said, "I have eaten too much; I feel very full, and I have a great pain in my belly." And the boy said, "I do not feel very comfortable myself, but I have a way to cure pains." So saying he took his little knife and thrust it gently into the side of the bag and the stew oozed out and he was soon back to his normal size. The giant wondered greatly at the sight, but the boy said, "It is a way they have in my country after they have had a great feast." "Does the knife not hurt?" asked the giant. "No, indeed," said the boy, "it brings great relief." "My throat is very sore," said the giant, for the hot stew had burned him. "You will soon feel better," said the boy, "if you will do as I have done." The giant hesitated to do this, but soon he felt so uncomfortable that he could bear it no longer. He saw that the boy was feeling quite well. So he took his long knife and plunged it into his stomach. "Strike hard," said the boy, "or it will do you no good." The giant plunged the knife into the hilt, and in an instant he fell dead.
Then the boy took the stones and the bag and the knife which the Woman of the Mist had given him and went and told the Chief what he had done. The Chief sent his messengers to the cave to make sure that the boy spoke the truth. Sure enough, they found the three giants lying dead. When they told the Chief what they had seen, he said to the boy, "You may have my daughter as your wife." But the boy said, "I do not want your daughter. She is too old and fat. I want only traps to catch fish and game." So the Chief gave the boy many good traps, and he went into a far country to hunt game, and there he lived happily by himself. And his wicked uncle never saw him again. But the land was troubled no more by giants, because of the boy's great deeds.
THE YOUTH AND THE DOG-DANCE
Once long ago, when the Indians dwelt in the country in the north-west, a youth went far away from his native village to catch birds. His people lived near a lake where only small birds nested, and as he wanted large and bright-coloured feathers for his arrows and his bonnet he had to go far into the forest, where larger birds of brilliant plumage lived. When he reached the Land of Many Feathers far in the north country, he dug a pit on the top of a high hill. Then he covered the pit with poles and over the poles he spread grass and leaves so that the place looked like the earth around it. He put meat and corn on the grass, and tied the food to the poles so that the birds could not carry it away. Then he climbed down into the pit and waited for the birds to come, when he could reach up and catch them by the feet and kill them.
All day long and far into the night the youth waited for birds, but no birds came. Towards morning he heard a distant sound like that of a partridge drumming. But the sound did not come nearer. The next night, as the youth watched and waited in the pit, he heard the same sound, and he said, "I will see where the noise comes from and I will discover the cause, for it is not a partridge, and it is very strange." So he climbed out of the pit and went in the direction of the sound. He walked along rapidly through the forest until he came at dawn to the shore of a large lake. The drumming came from somewhere in the lake, but as he stood listening to it, the sound suddenly stopped. The next night the youth heard the drumming louder than before. Again he went to the lake. The sound was again distinct as it rose from the water, and when he looked he saw great numbers of birds and animals swimming in the lake in the moonlight. But there was no explanation of the strange sound. As he sat watching the animals and birds, he prayed to his guardian spirit to tell him the cause of the drumming. Soon an old man came along. He was old and bent and wrinkled, but his eyes were kind. The youth gave him some tobacco and they sat down together on the edge of the lake and watched the swimmers in the dim light, and smoked their pipes.
"What are you doing here?" asked the old man. "I am trying to learn the cause of the strange drumming," said the youth. "You do well indeed to seek it," said the old man, "and to seek to know the cause of all things. Only in that way will you be great and wise. But remember there are some things the cause of which you can never find." "Where have you come from?" said the boy. "Oh," said the man, "I lived once upon a time like you in the Country of Fancy where great Dreams dwell, and indeed I live there still, but your dreams are all of the future while mine are of the past. But some day you too will change and your thoughts will be like mine." "Tell me the cause of the drumming," said the boy. And the old man said, "Take this wand that I will give you and wave it before you go to sleep, and maybe you will see strange things." Then he gave the boy a wand and disappeared into the forest and the boy never saw him again. The boy waved the wand and fell asleep on the sand as the old man had told him. When he awoke he found himself in a large room in the midst of many people. Some of them were dancing gracefully, and some sat around and talked. They wore wonderful robes of skins and feathers, of many different colours. The boy wished he could get such feathers for his own clothes and his bonnet. But as he looked at the people he was suddenly aware that they were none other than the animals and birds he had seen for two nights swimming in the lake in the moonlight. They were now changed into human form, through some strange and miraculous power. They were very kind to the youth and treated him with great courtesy.
At last the dancing ceased and the talking stopped, and one who seemed to be the Chief stood up at the end of the room and said, "Oh, young stranger, the Great Spirit has heard your prayers, and because of your magic wand we have been sent to you in these shapes. The creatures you see here are the animals and birds of the world. I am the Dog, whom the Great Spirit loves well. I have much power, and my power I shall give to you, and I shall always protect you and guard you. And even if you should treat me with cruelty I shall never be unfaithful to you, nor shall I ever be unkind. But you must take this Dance home with you and teach it to your people and they must celebrate the Dance once a year." Then he taught the youth the secrets of their Dance.
When the youth had learned the Dance, the Chief turned to his companions and said, "My comrades and brothers, I have taught the young stranger the secrets of the Dance. I have given him my own power. Will you not have pity on a creature from earth and give him some of the power of which you too are possessed?"
For a long time no one spoke, but at last Owl arose and said, "I too will help him. I have power to see far in the darkness, and to hunt by night. When he goes out at night I will be near him and he shall see a great distance. I give him these feathers to fasten in his hair." And the Owl gave him a bunch of feathers, which the youth tied to his head.
Then Buffalo came forward and said, "I too will help him. I will give him my endurance and my strength, and my power to trample my enemies underfoot. And I give him this belt of tanned buffalo-hide to wear when he goes to war." And he gave the youth a very wondrous belt to fasten around his waist.
The animals and birds, one after the other, gave him gladly of their power. Porcupine gave him quills with which to decorate his leather belt and his bonnet, and he said, "I too will aid you, and when you make war I will be near you. I can make my enemies as weak as children, and they always flee when I approach, for they fear the shooting of my quills. When you meet your foes you will always overcome them, for I give you power as it was given to me."
And Bear said, "I will give you my toughness and my strength, and a strip of fur for your leather belt and your coat. And when you are in danger, I will not be far away."
Then Deer said, "I give you my swiftness so that you may be fleet of foot. And when you pursue your enemies you will always overtake them, and should you flee from them, you will always out-run them in the race."
Then the birds spoke again, and Crane said, "I give you a bone from my wing to make a war-whistle to frighten your enemies away or to summon your people to your assistance when you need them. And I give you my wings for your head-dress."
The giant Eagle then spoke and said, "Oh, youth, I will be with you wherever you go, and I will give you my strength and my power in war. And even as I do, you will always see your enemies from afar, and you can always escape them if you so desire." And he gave him a large bunch of wonderful eagle feathers to tie in his hair as a token of his fidelity.
And finally, Wild-Cat said, "I give you my power to crawl stealthily through the grass and the underbrush and to spring unexpectedly on your foes and take them unawares. And I give you too my power of hiding from my enemies." And he gave him strips of his fur to decorate his clothing in token of his friendship.
From all the animals and the birds the youth received power and gifts. Then he waved his magic wand and lay down to sleep. When he awoke, he found himself on the shore of the lake, and far in the east the dawn was breaking. But he could see farther than he had ever seen before, and away in the distance he could make out blue hills and smoke rising from far-off villages. And he knew that strange power was upon him. But not a sound came from the lake, and the drumming had for ever ended.
The youth took his magic wand and his gifts and set out for his home. And he told his people what had happened and he taught them the secrets of the Dance which was to make them strong and victorious in war. And among his people it became a great ceremony and was practised for long ages, and was known as the Dog-Dance. And since that time, the animals and birds have been friends to the Indians, and the Indians have acquired much of their cunning and skill and power. And ever after the night of moonlight by the lake when the youth with the magic wand received the strange gifts, the Indians have decorated their war clothes with fur and quills and feathers from the animals and the birds. And in the far north country, the Dog-Dance is still held at intervals out of gratitude for the gifts, for the Indians do not forget the promise of long ago.
[Illustration: AND THEY SAT DOWN TOGETHER ON THE EDGE OF THE LAKE]
SPARROW'S SEARCH FOR THE RAIN
Long ago, in a village near the sea, many Indian people were living. Among them was a very nice old warrior who had been given great power at his birth, and who, therefore, could do many wonderful deeds. There was nothing that was beyond his understanding, for he knew all things. His wife had long been dead, but he had one daughter. She was very beautiful and gentle, and she was as nearly perfect as any woman could be. She took no interest in frivolous things and she lived a very quiet life, but all the people liked her well, and she was always welcome wherever she went. Her old father was very proud of her, and he said boastfully, "She has inherited much of my wisdom, and some day she will marry a great man." But the girl on her part had little thought of marriage or of men, for she said they had small minds, and she would rather live alone than listen always to their boastfulness and their foolish chatter.
Soon the daughter's fame spread far and wide through the sea-coast villages, and many suitors came seeking for her hand. But her father said, "I have nothing to say. She will make her own choice. She must please herself. For to-day children please themselves and not their parents." And she said, "I will marry only some one who can amuse me and interest me and keep me company. I have scant liking for dull people." One day Loon came to see her. He was very good looking although he was somewhat tall and skinny, and his neck was a bit longer and more scrawny than ordinary, but he wore good clothes and he had great skill as a fisherman. He came because he thought he was very handsome, and he believed that his good looks would win the maiden. But she had no love for Loon, for he had not a word to say. When she talked to him he only stared, and at last he burst out into loud and foolish laughter. Then the maiden said, "You have a small mind like the others," and in disgust she withdrew from his presence.
Then Fox came in an effort to win the maiden as his wife. And for a whole day he cut capers, and chased his tail round and round in a circle, trying to amuse the serious girl. But he did not succeed very well, and like Loon he departed in despair. And many others came, but they met the same fate, and at last the girl decided to see no more of them, but to live alone with her father. The young men of the village were all very angry because the girl had spoken of them all so scornfully, and often they talked among themselves of her proud and haughty air. "She calls us Scattered-Brains," said one. "She says we have small minds," said another. "She must pay for these insults," said a third. So they vowed that they would somehow break her proud spirit and bring her sorrow because of her ideas and her decision to stay single all her life. One of the great men of the village was Whirlwind. He could make himself invisible, and he was often guilty of many wicked pranks. So the young men went to him and asked his aid in humbling the pride of the haughty maiden. As they were talking to him, they saw the girl approaching not far off. And quite unawares, Whirlwind rushed towards her and knocked her down in the mud and tore her hat from her head and swept it into the sea. The young men looked on at her plight and they all laughed loudly, and the girl was very much ashamed. She went back home and told her father what had happened, and showed him her soiled clothes and her blown hair falling about her face. Her father was very angry, and he said, "Whirlwind must pay for this. He shall be banished at once."
Then her father went to the Chief and made complaint against Whirlwind, and the Chief decreed that Whirlwind must leave the village forthwith. He did not consider very carefully what the result of this decree might be, and he acted hastily and without thought, for he feared to differ from the wise man. So Whirlwind prepared to leave the place. Now his best friend was Rain. Rain had been born without eyes. He was black blind, and Whirlwind always had to lead him along wherever he wished to go. So Rain said, "If you are leaving the village, I want to leave it too, for I cannot live here without you. I will be helpless if I have no one to lead me." So the two set out together, Whirlwind leading old Rain along by his side. Where they went no man knew, for they had told nobody of their destination. They were gone for many months before the people missed them very much. Then their absence began to be felt in all the land, for there was no wind and there was no rain.
At last the Chief summoned a council, and the decree of banishment against Whirlwind was revoked. The people decided to send messengers to the two wandering ones to tell them what had happened and to bring them back. So they first sent Fox out on the quest. Fox went through the land for many weeks, running as fast as he could over many roads, in and out among marshy lake shores and over high wooded mountains. He searched every cave and crevice, but he had no success. Not a leaf or a blade of grass was stirring, and the country was all parched and the grass was withered brown and the streams were all getting dry. At last, after a fruitless search, he came home and shamefully confessed that his quest had failed.
Then the people called on Bear to continue the search. And Bear went lumbering over the earth, sniffing the air, and turning over logs and great rocks with his powerful shoulders, and venturing into deep caverns. And he made many inquiries, and he asked the Mountain Ash, "Where is Whirlwind?" But Mountain Ash said, "I do not know. I have not seen him for many months." And he asked the Red Fir, and the Pine, and the Aspen, which always sees Whirlwind first, but they were all ignorant of his whereabouts. So Bear came home and said, "Not a trace of either of them have I found."
The Chief was very angry because of the failure of Fox and Bear, but the wise man said, "The animals are useless in a quest like this. Let us try the birds. They often succeed where the animals fail." And the Chief agreed, for the land was in great distress. Many fishing-boats lay silent on the sea near the coast unable to move because Whirlwind was away, and the wells and streams were all dry because Rain was absent, and the grass and the flowers were withering to decay. So they called the birds to their aid. The great Crane searched in the shallows and among the reeds, thrusting his long neck into deep places, and Crow looked among the hills, and Kingfisher flew far out to sea, but they all came back and said, "We, too, have failed. The wandering ones are nowhere on the land or upon the sea." Then little Sparrow took up the search. Before he set out, he plucked from his breast a small down-feather and fastened it to a stick no bigger than a wisp of hay. He held the stick in his bill and flew off. For many days he went towards the south-land, all the time watching the feather hanging to the stick in his bill. But it hung there motionless. One day, after he had travelled a great distance, he saw the down-feather moving very gently, and he knew that Whirlwind must be not far away. He went in the direction from which the feather was blowing. Soon he saw beneath him soft green grass and wonderful flowers of varied colours, and trees with green leaves and many rippling streams of running water. And he said to himself, "At last I have found the wanderers." He followed a little stream for some distance until it ended in a cave in the hills. In front of the cave many flowers were blooming and the grass was soft and green, and the tall grasses were nodding their heads very gently. He knew that those he was seeking were inside, and he entered the cave very quietly. Just beyond the door a fire was smouldering and near it lay Rain and Whirlwind both fast asleep. Sparrow tried to wake them with his bill and his cries, but they were sleeping too soundly. Then he took a coal from the fire and put it on Rain's back, but it spluttered and fizzled and soon went out. He tried another, but the same thing happened. Then he took a third coal, and this time Rain woke up. He was much surprised to hear a stranger in the cave, but he could not see him because he was blind. So he woke up Whirlwind to protect him.
Then Sparrow told them of the great trouble in the north country and of the great hardship and sorrow their absence had brought to the people, and of how sadly they had been missed and of the decision of the council to call them back. And Whirlwind said, "We shall return to-morrow if we are so badly needed. You may go back and tell your people that we are coming. We shall be there the day after you arrive." So Sparrow, feeling very proud of his success, flew back home. But when he arrived after many days, he went first to his own people to tell them the good news. And the Sparrow-people all gathered together and held a feast of celebration, and they twittered and danced and made a great hub-bub in their excitement because Rain was coming back on the morrow. Then Sparrow went to the Chief and said, "Oh, Chief, I have found Rain and Whirlwind and to-morrow they will be here," and he told the story of his flight to the south and of his discovery. And the Chief said, "Because of your success, you will never be hunted for game or killed for food."
The next morning the two travellers who had been so long away came back to the land. Whirlwind came first and great clouds of dust foretold his coming, and the sea dashed high against the rocks, and the trees shrieked and tossed their heads, all dancing gaily because of his return. When Whirlwind had passed by, Rain came along following close, because of his blindness. For several days Rain stayed with the people and the flowers bloomed and the grass was green again and the wells and streams were no longer dry. And since that time Wind and Rain have never long been absent from the Atlantic Coast. And to this day the Sparrow-people know when Rain is coming, and to signal his approach they gather together and twitter and hop along and make a great hub-bub, just as they did when their ancestor found him by means of his down-feather in the olden days. But the Indians have been true to the Chief's promise, and they will not hunt Sparrows for game nor kill them for food or for their feathers. For they remember that of all the birds it was old Sparrow who long ago searched successfully for the Rain.
THE BOY IN THE LAND OF SHADOWS
Two orphan children, a boy and a girl, lived alone near the mountains. Their parents had long been dead and the children were left to look after themselves without any kindred upon the earth. The boy hunted all day long and provided much food, and the girl kept the house in order and did the cooking. They had a very deep love for each other and as they grew up they said, "We shall never leave each other. We shall always stay here together." But one year it happened that in the early spring-time it was very cold. The snow lingered on the plains and the ice moved slowly from the rivers and chill winds were always blowing and grey vapours hovered over all the land. And there was very little food to be had, for the animals hid in their warm winter dens and the wild-geese and ducks were still far south. And in this cruel period of bad weather the little girl sickened and died. Her brother worked hard to provide her with nourishing food and he gathered all the medicine roots he thought could bring her relief, but it was all to no purpose. And despite all his efforts, one evening in the twilight his sister went away to the West, leaving him alone behind upon the earth.
The boy was heart-broken because of his sister's death. And when the late spring came and the days grew warm and food was plentiful again, he said, "She must be somewhere in the West, for they say that our people do not really die. I will go and search for her, and perhaps I can find her and bring her back." So one morning he set out on his strange quest. He journeyed many days westward towards the Great Water, killing game for food as he went, and sleeping at night under the stars. He met many strange people, but he did not tell them the purpose of his travels. At last he came to the shore of the Great Water, and he sat looking towards the sunset wondering what next to do. In the evening an old man came along. "What are you doing here?" asked the man. "I am looking for my sister," said the boy; "some time ago she sickened and died and I am lonely without her, and I want to find her and bring her back." And the man said, "Some time ago she whom you seek passed this way. If you wish to find her you must undertake a dangerous journey." The boy answered that he would gladly risk any dangers to find his sister, and the old man said, "I will help you. Your sister has gone to the Land of Shadows far away in the Country of Silence which lies out yonder in the Island of the Blest. To reach the Island you must sail far into the West, but I warn you that it is a perilous journey, for the crossing is always rough and your boat will be tossed by tempests. But you will be well repaid for your trouble, for in that land nobody is ever hungry or tired; there is no death and no sorrow; there are no tears, and no one ever grows old."
Then the old man gave the boy a large pipe and some tobacco and said, "This will help you in your need." And he brought him to where a small canoe lay dry upon the beach. It was a wonderful canoe, the most beautiful the boy had ever seen. It was cut from a single white stone and it sparkled in the red twilight like a polished jewel. And the old man said, "This canoe will weather all storms. But see that you handle it carefully, and when you come back see that you leave it in the cove where you found it."
Soon afterwards, the boy set out on his journey. The moon was full and the night was cold with stars. He sailed into the West over a rough and angry sea, but he was in no danger, for his canoe rode easily on the waters. All around him he saw in the moonlight many other canoes going in the same direction and all white and shining like his own. But no one seemed to be guiding them, and although he looked long at them not a person could he make out. He wondered if the canoes were drifting unoccupied, for when he called to them there was no answer. Sometimes a canoe upset in the tossing sea and the waves rose over it and it was seen no more, and the boy often thought he heard an anguished cry. For several days he sailed on to the West, and all the time other canoes were not far away, and all the time some of them were dropping from sight beneath the surging waters, but he saw no people in them.
At last, after a long journey, the sea grew calm and the air was sweet and warm. There was no trace of the storm, for the waves were quiet and the sky was as clear as crystal. He saw that he was near the Island of the Blest of which the old man had spoken, for it was now plain to his view, as it rose above the ocean, topped with green grass and trees, and a snow-white beach. Soon he reached the shore and drew up his canoe. As he turned away he came upon a skeleton lying flat upon the sand. He stopped to look at it, and as he did so, the skeleton sat up and said in great surprise, "You should not be here. Why have you come?" And the boy said, "I seek my sister. In the early spring-time she sickened and died, and I am going to the Land of Shadows in the Country of Silence in search of her." "You must go far inland," said the skeleton, "and the way is hard to find for such as you." The boy asked for guidance and the skeleton said, "Let me smoke and I will help you." The boy gave him the pipe and the tobacco he had received from the old man, and he laughed when he saw his strange companion with the pipe between his teeth. The skeleton smoked for some time and at last, as the smoke rose from his pipe, it changed to a flock of little white birds, which flew about like doves. The boy looked on in wonder, and the skeleton said, "These birds will guide you. Follow them." Then he gave back the pipe and stretched out again flat upon the sand, and the boy could not rouse him from his sleep.
[Illustration: THEN THE OLD MAN GAVE THE BOY A LARGE PIPE AND SOME TOBACCO]
The boy followed the little white birds as he had been told. He went along through a land of great beauty where flowers were blooming and countless birds were singing. Not a person did he meet on the way. The place was deserted except for the song-birds and the flowers. He passed through the Country of Silence, and came to a mysterious land where no one dwelt. But although he saw no one he heard many voices and he could not tell whence they came. They seemed to be all around him. At last the birds stopped at the entrance to a great garden, and flew around his head in a circle. They would go no further and they alighted on a tree close by, all except one, which perched on the boy's shoulder. The lad knew that here at last was the Land of Shadows.
When he entered the garden he heard again many low voices. But he saw no one. He saw only many shadows of people on the grass, but he could not see from what the shadows came. He wondered greatly at the strange and unusual sight, for back in his homeland in that time the sunlight made no shadows. He listened again to the voices and he knew now that the shadows were speaking. He wandered about for some time marvelling greatly at the strange place with its weird unearthly beauty. At last he heard a voice which he knew to be his sister's. It was soft and sweet, just as he had known it when they were together on the earth, and it had not changed since she left him. He went to the shadow from which the voice came, and throwing himself on the grass beside it, he said, "I have long sought you, my sister. I have come to take you home. Let me see you as you were when we dwelt together." But his sister said, "You have done wisely to keep me in your memory, and to seek to find me. But here we cannot appear to the people of earth except as shadows. I cannot go back with you, for it is now too late. I have eaten of the food of this land; if you had come before I had eaten, perhaps you could have taken me away. Who knows? But my heart and my voice are unchanged, and I still remember my dear ones, and with unaltered love I still watch my old home. And although I cannot go to you, you can some day come to me. First you must finish your work on earth. Go back to your home in the Earth Country. You will become a great Chief among your people. Rule wisely and justly and well, and give freely of your food to the poor among the Indians who have not as much as you have. And when your work on earth is done you shall come to me in this Land of Shadows beyond the Country of Silence, and we shall be together again and our youth and strength and beauty will never leave us."
And the boy, wondering greatly and in deep sorrow, said, "Let me stay with you now." But his sister said, "That cannot be." Then she said, "I will give you a Shadow, which you must keep with you as your guardian spirit. And while you have it with you, no harm can come to you, for it will be present only in the Light, and where there is Light there can be no wickedness. But when it disappears you must be on your guard against doing evil, for then there will be darkness, and darkness may lead you to wrong."
So the boy took the Shadow, and said good-bye for a season and set out on his homeward journey. The little white birds, which had waited for him in the trees, guided him back to the beach. His canoe was still there, but the skeleton-man had gone and there was not a trace of him to be found upon the sand. And the Island of the Blest was silent except for the songs of the birds and the ripple of the little streams. The boy embarked in his canoe and sailed towards the east, and as he pushed off from the beach the little white birds left him and disappeared in the air. The sea was now calm and there was no storm, as there had been on his outward journey. Soon he reached the shore on the other side. He left his canoe in the cove as the old man had told him, and in a few days he arrived at his home, still bearing the Shadow from the Country of Silence.
He worked hard for many years but he did no evil, and in the end he became a great Chief and did much good for his people. He ruled wisely and justly and well, as his sister had commanded him. Then one day, when he was old and his work was done, he disappeared, and his people knew that he had gone to join his sister in the Land of Shadows in the Country of Silence far away somewhere in the West. But he left behind him the Shadow his sister had given him; and while there is Light the Indians still have their Shadow and no harm can come to them, for where there is Light there can be no evil.
But always in the late autumn the Shadows of the Indian brother and sister in the Country of Silence are lonely for their former life. And they think of their living friends and of the places of their youth, and they wish once more to follow the hunt, for they know that the hunter's moon is shining. And when their memory dwells with longing on their earlier days, their spirits are allowed to come back to earth for a brief season from the Land of Shadows. Then the winds are silent and the days are very still, and the smoke of their camp fires appears like haze upon the air. And men call this season Indian Summer, but it is really but a Shadow of the golden summer that has gone. And it always is a reminder to the Indians that in the Land of Shadows, far away in the Country of Silence in the West, there are no dead.
THE END

= = = PG21888 = = =
CANOE BOYS AND CAMPFIRES; OR, ADVENTURES ON WINDING WATERS
Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
[Illustration: THE JOLLY ROVERS WERE OFF AT LAST _Canoe Boys and Camp Fires_]
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[Illustration: THE FIVE MILE WALK WAS A TRIFLE TO THE BOYS--Page 110]
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CANOE BOYS AND CAMPFIRES
Or, Adventures on Winding Waters
BY WILLIAM MURRAY GRAYDON
Author of "From Lake to Wilderness," "With Puritan and Pequod," "The Camp in the Snow," etc.
ILLUSTRATED
THE WORLD SYNDICATE PUBLISHING CO. CLEVELAND--NEW YORK
Made in U. S. A.
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Copyright, 1907, by Chatterton-Peck Company
PRESS OF THE COMMERCIAL BOOKBINDING CO. CLEVELAND
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CONTENTS
CHAPTER                                     PAGE
I. INTRODUCING THE BOYS                  9
II. PLANNING THE TRIP                    17
III. THE CRUISE BEGINS                    23
IV. ADRIFT IN THE DARKNESS               32
V. DISAPPEARANCE OF NUGGET              40
VI. THE LOST FOUND                       48
VII. BATTERS AND JOE                      57
VIII. HOW THE DAY DAWNED                   74
IX. A SAFE SHELTER                       82
X. A TRAMP ACROSS COUNTRY               90
XI. SEARCHING FOR THE CAMP               99
XII. OVER THE CLIFF                      107
XIII. WHAT CLAY SHOT                      116
XIV. CAUGHT IN THE WHIRLPOOL             125
XV. RANDY'S PROPOSITION                 133
XVI. A SHATTERED DELUSION                142
XVII. THE STORM BREAKS                    149
XVIII. AT THE MERCY OF THE TEMPEST         156
XIX. ADRIFT ON A LOG                     163
XX. MR. DUDE MOXLEY                     170
XXI. A MYSTERIOUS WARNING                178
XXII. AN INSOLENT DEMAND                  185
XXIII. A DARING ATTEMPT                    192
XXIV. AN UNEXPECTED ENCOUNTER             200
XXV. THE SIEGE BEGINS                    207
XXVI. BUG'S PROPOSITION                   215
XXVII. THE BURNING OF THE MILL             222
XXVIII. A GOOD DEED                         229
XXIX. RANDY GOES SAILING                  236
XXX. A NIGHT ALARM                       243
XXXI. STORMY WEATHER                      250
XXXII. THE BROKEN DAM                      257
XXXIII. AN UNDERGROUND CRUISE               264
XXXIV. DESPAIR                             270
XXXV. NUGGET DISCOVERS A LIGHT            275
XXXVI. HOME AGAIN                          280
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CANOE BOYS AND CAMPFIRES
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCING THE BOYS
"I say, Ned, this is beginning to grow wearisome," drawled Randy Moore as he tipped his chair against the wall, and crossed his feet on the low railing in front of him. "Clay promised to be here half an hour ago," he went on in an injured tone, "and if he doesn't come in a few minutes I'm going to have a spin on the river. It's aggravating to sit here and do nothing. I can count a dozen boats between the railroad bridge and Bushy Island."
"I wouldn't mind being out myself," said Ned Chapman, "but we have important business to transact to-night, Randy, and I think it would be wiser to let boating go for once. I have everything planned out in ship shape fashion, and it only wants the seal of approval from you and Clayton."
"Oh! you have, have you?" exclaimed Randy with a sudden show of interest. "That's good news, Ned. If Clay knew the momentous question was to be settled at last, he would stir himself to get here, wherever he is. I'll give him ten minutes' grace."
"You'll give him as many minutes as he needs," rejoined Ned. "There must be some reason for his delay. It's new for him to be late. He's always the first to keep an engagement."
"We'll know when he comes," said Randy wisely. "Stop talking now. I want to count the boats. I never saw so many on the river before."
The two boys were sitting on a narrow balcony that projected from the second floor of a neat but unpretentious boathouse. The rear end of the edifice was built against the sloping base of the river bank.
From the park above a flight of steps, with a single hand rail, led down to the main entrance, which was on the second floor. The other end of the apartment opened on the balcony and faced the Susquehanna river.
From the lower floor, which held a number of boats and canoes, a plank walk sloped to the water's edge, ten or fifteen yards away.
Randy Moore was the fortunate owner of this snug little piece of property. The Harrisburg boys envied him his gun, his dog and his pony, but they would have fairly bowed down before him if by so doing they could have been put on the list of those favored ones who made free and daily use of the boathouse.
A "luck fellow" was the general verdict concerning Randy, and it was a true one. His father was wealthy and never refused to gratify any reasonable desire of his only son. In consequence Randy was somewhat spoiled and self willed, but in other ways he was really a sensible lad.
The fact of his own superior position in life never occurred to him in relation to his companions. He gave himself no airs, and expected no homage or adulation.
His chief fault was a strong and uncurbed will, and he unfortunately had a quick temper. He was just sixteen years old, and was strong and hardy. He had dark eyes and hair, and a pleasing, attractive face.
Randy's most intimate friend, Ned Chapman, differed from him in every respect, and made an admirable foil for the other's impetuous temperament. Ned's father was a merchant in moderate circumstances, and he had just reason to be proud of his son's bringing up.
Ned was a steady, sensible lad, with very rigid ideas of right and wrong. Not that there was anything "priggish" about him. On the contrary, he was always the foremost in any undertaking that provided a little sport.
He was intensely fond of outdoor life, and was an acknowledged authority on everything relating to fishing, hunting, canoeing, and boating. But he did not allow recreation to interfere with his studies.
He and Randy were pupils at the academy, and both stood high in their classes.
Ned was a year older than Randy and half a head taller. He had brown hair, grayish brown eyes, and a deeply bronzed complexion, the result of living much in the open air and under the burning glow of the summer sun.
His face wore an expression of habitual good humor, and he had a rare command of his temper.
His grave displeasure was more dreaded than a passionate outburst would have been.
And now that two of the characters have been introduced to the reader, we must resume the thread of the story.
Randy's stipulated ten minutes had gone by, and five additional ones, when a shrill whistle was heard in the rear of the boathouse.
Both doors were open, and when the boys turned in their chairs and looked through they saw their tardy companion descending the steps that led from the top of the bank.
"It's Clay at last," exclaimed Randy.
"And some one with him," added Ned, as a second figure came into view.
At that instant the lad in the rear slipped, plunged head foremost down the remaining half dozen steps, knocking Clay to one side, and sprawled out in the doorway like a flattened frog.
Ned and Randy sprang up and hurried through the room.
"Why, it's Nugget," they exclaimed in great surprise. "Where did you come from, old fellow? We're awfully glad to see you."
Nugget, otherwise known as Nugent Blundell, rose painfully to his feet and glared at the boys.
"Why don't you ask me if I'm hurt?" he demanded wrathfully. "I believe you fellows greased those steps on purpose."
"See here, Nugget, you don't believe anything of the sort," said Ned. "I'm sorry you fell, and I'm glad you're not hurt. Come, old fellow, shake hands."
Nugget's face assumed a mollified expression, and he accepted a hearty handclasp from Ned and Randy. Then he began to brush the dust from his neat gray suit and patent leather shoes.
Meanwhile Clayton Halsey had been fairly choking with stifled mirth in a dark corner of the room. He now came forward, trying hard to assume an expression of gravity.
He was a short, thickset lad, with a beaming countenance, red cheeks, blue eyes, and light curly hair. He was in the same class at the academy with Ned and Randy, and their constant companion on all occasions. His father was a prominent lawyer.
"What kept you so long?" asked Randy in a slightly aggrieved tone.
"That," replied Clay, pointing at Nugget. "He arrived in town this afternoon, and came to the house after supper. I knew you fellows would be glad to see him, so I brought him along. But what do you think?" added Clay, winking slyly at Ned and Randy, "Nugget says he's going canoeing with us."
This piece of information produced a startling effect. Ned puckered his lips and gave a low whistle. Randy stared at Clay for an instant and then burst into a laugh.
Why this avowal on Nugget's part was received in such a peculiar way will be more clearly understood if a few words be said about that young gentleman himself.
Nugget was a New York boy, greatly addicted to cream colored clothes, white vests, patent leather shoes, high collars, gorgeous neckties, kid gloves, and canes.
He was about seventeen years old, and was tall and slender.
He had gray eyes, a sandy complexion and straight flaxen hair, which he wore banged over his forehead. A vacuous stare usually rested on his face, and he spoke in a slow, aggravating drawl.
Nugget had made the acquaintance cf the boys during the previous summer, which he spent with his uncle in Harrisburg. He was a good enough fellow in some ways, but the several occasions on which he had been induced to go on fishing and boating excursions, had resulted in disaster and ridicule at poor Nugget's expense.
"What Nugget doesn't know about swell parties, and dancing, and operas isn't worth knowing," Clay Halsey had said at that time; "but when it comes to matters of sport he doesn't know any more than a two days' old kitten."
The truth of this terse remark was readily appreciated by Clay's companions, and their present amazement and consternation on learning that Nugget wanted to go canoeing with them, can be easily conceived.
"Are you in dead earnest, Nugget?" asked Randy after a pause.
"Of course I am," was the aggressive reply. "I don't see anything funny about it though. I haven't been very well lately, and father let me stop school a month ahead of time, and come over here. I know he'll let me go canoeing if I write and ask him."
"But canoeing is vastly different from the kind of trips you made with us last summer," said Ned. "There is a good deal of hardship about it. You remember what a fuss you used to make over the merest trifles."
"You'll have to wear rough flannels and old clothes," added Randy. "You can't take kid gloves and patent leathers with you."
"And you'll have to sleep on the ground," put in Clay, "and eat coarse food. No chocolate cake and ice cream about canoeing."
"Oh, stop your chaffing," drawled Nugget sullenly. "I understand all that. I'm not as green as you think. If you fellows can stand it I can. Besides I've been practicing on the Harlem River this spring. I paddled a canoe from the Malta boathouse clear to High Bridge and back. And I didn't raise a single blister."
"I'll bet you wore gloves," said Clay mockingly.
Nugget flushed with anger and confusion, but said nothing.
"It's time to stop that now, Clay," said Ned authoratively. "If Nugget wants to go along I don't see any serious objections. No doubt the trip will do him lots of good. But that question can be settled later. Give us some light, Randy, and I'll show you what I've got here."
CHAPTER II
PLANNING THE TRIP
It was not yet dark outside but Randy lit the handsome brass lamp that stood on the square oaken table, and the yellow glow shone into every corner of the room.
The apartment was furnished in the manner most dear to the hearts of boys. The polished floor was strewn with soft rugs, and the walls were hung with pictures and amateur photographs. In the corners and over the mantels were fencing foils and masks, fishing rods, baseball bats, creels, and several pairs of crossed canoe paddles which showed traces of hard usage.
When the boys had dragged chairs to the table and seated themselves, Ned drew a little bunch of papers from his pocket, and opened them with a flourish.
"When the question of a canoe trip came up a month ago," he began, "I told you it would be better fun to cruise on some small stream than on the Susquehanna. I knew what I was talking about, because I paddled the whole distance last year, from Lake Otsego to the bay.
"I suggested the Conodoguinet Creek as the best cruising ground we could find around here, and promised to get all the information about it I could. I have kept my promise.
"Here is a map of the Cumberland Valley on a large scale, showing the entire course of the creek, and all its windings. You can examine that at your leisure. First I want to tell you what I have learned.
"Of course you knew that the Conodoguinet was about the most crooked stream in existence. We have evidence enough of that near home. You remember the big bend above Oyster's Dam--three miles around, and one field's length across. Well, there are bigger bends than that further up the valley.
"From the mouth of the creek to Carlile is just eighteen miles in a straight line. By the windings of the creek it is ninety miles. The distance was accurately measured and surveyed a number of years ago.
"Oakville is twenty miles beyond Carlile, and from there I propose that we should start. The upper part of the creek is not quite so crooked, but we are sure of a cruise of not less than one hundred and fifty miles. The creek is navigable all the way from Oakville, and there are not more than twelve or fifteen dams in the whole distance.
"The water is deep, and the current is swift in some places, sluggish in others. The channel winds through heavy timber lands and between high, rocky cliffs. The mountains are not far away. The fishing is splendid, and woodcock and snipe are plentiful."
Here Ned laid down the bundle of notes from which he had been reading.
"It will be a delightful trip," he added eagerly. "The Susquehanna can't compare with it. Instead of having to paddle our twenty or thirty miles a day in the broiling sun, and camp on gravel bars or grass flats, we can drift leisurely in the cool shade of the overhanging trees, stop when we please and as long as we please, and take our pick of a hundred beautiful camping places. In fact it will be a camping trip and canoe trip combined.
"And what's more we will be the first to navigate the creek. No canoe, or boat either, has ever made the winding journey from the head waters to the mouth. It is unexplored territory, except to the farmers and a few stray fishermen. You can take your choice now. Which is it to be? The Susquehanna or the Conodoguinet?"
Ned put the papers in his pocket and sat down.
"I say the creek, by all means, boys," exclaimed Randy.
"Same here!" echoed Clay.
"Aw, yes! that must be a beautiful stream, don't you know," drawled Nugget, in such a serio-comic tone that his companions burst out laughing.
When quiet was restored the map became the center of attraction, and Ned gladly pointed out places of interest and volunteered all sorts of information. As the hours went by the boys waxed enthusiastic over the proposed cruise. The details were mostly planned out, and then a long discussion ensued over the choice of a name for the club.
Many titles were suggested and rejected, but finally Ned struck a happy combination, and the organization was unanimously christened the "Jolly Rovers."
At ten o'clock the boat house was locked up, and the boys climbed the bank, and went down through the city to their respective homes.
Now that the cruise was a settled fact the Jolly Rovers threw all their energies into needed preparations. In the evening, and between school hours they were always to be found at Randy's boat house.
Ned looked forward to the trip with the keen delight of one who had already tasted the joys of canoeing. Clay and Randy--who had not been permitted to accompany Ned down the Susquehanna the previous summer--had bright anticipations to be realized, while Nugget was just as eager as his companions. It had required much persuasion and many promises on Nugget's part to win the desired permission, and when the question was finally decided the new member of the Jolly Rovers was put on a severe course of training.
This embraced rowing, paddling a canoe, and swimming, and before the month of June was over Nugget was fairly proficient in all three. He purchased a second hand canoe which Ned picked out for him, and without the knowledge of his companions he wrote to his father in New York for a canoeing outfit.
The box duly arrived and was opened one evening in the boathouse. The boys feasted their eyes on the array of treasures--fishing rods of spliced bamboo, a portable set of camp dishes that fitted into each other, a pair of brass lanterns, rubber blankets, and several other articles that were of no practical use on a canoe trip.
In the bottom of the box were four shirts of the softest flannel, two pairs of long black woolen stockings, and a canoeing suit of stout brown cloth--knickerbockers, blouse, and a yachting cap.
It was a fine outfit, and the boys good naturedly envied Nugget his luck.
The date of departure was fixed for the first week in July. When the academy closed on the 25th of June little or nothing remained to be done in the way of preparation--thanks to Ned's good generalship.
The four canoes lay in the lower section of the boathouse, radiant in new coats of paint. In the big closet on the upper floor were packed the varied assortment of dishware, lanterns, axes, bottles of oil, cement, cans of white lead, strips of oiled canvas, rolls of blankets, a new A tent, jointed poles for the same, and a bundle of iron stakes.
Such provision as could be taken along--oatmeal, rice, sugar, coffee and flour--had been ordered from a grocer, to be packed in waterproof jars.
Ned Chapman had been very properly chosen commodore of the club, and a couple of days before the start Randy's sister Mary presented the Jolly Rovers with a pennant of crimson and gold satin. The proper place for it was at the bow of the commodore's canoe, so it was yielded to Ned.
With the exception of Randy's single barreled shotgun, no firearms were to be taken along. The boys demurred to this at first, but were finally won over by Ned's sensible arguments. Canoeists cruising through a peaceful country seldom need weapons of defense.
CHAPTER III
THE CRUISE BEGINS
The first day of July fell on Thursday, and that afternoon the boxes containing the dishes, provisions and other traps, and the four canoes carefully wrapped in coffee sacking, were shipped to Oakville by freight.
On the following morning the Jolly Rovers departed by the seven o'clock train, and a ride of an hour and a half through the beautiful Cumberland Valley brought them to their destination. The canoes were found to be in good condition, and after a brief delay the services of a farmer and his team were engaged.
The inhabitants of the little village gazed with wonder and curiosity on the strange procession as it passed along the straggling street. The boxes and the gayly painted canoes completely filled the bed of the wagon. Nugget was perched on the seat beside the farmer, resplendent in his brown uniform. He held the pennant in his right hand, and waved it in the breeze from time to time.
The others marched with military precision behind the wagon. Randy bore his gun on his shoulder, and Ned and Clay carried paddles. All three wore knickerbockers and Norfolk jackets, and their faces were protected from the sun by canvas helmets with large visors.
For two miles and a half the road wound through a hilly, open country. Then it dipped into a wooded ravine, turned aside to follow a barely perceptible path through a heavy forest, and finally ended at a fording on the edge of the Conodoguinet.
"Here you are, boys," cried the farmer, as he pulled up his horses within a few feet of the water. "I reckon you couldn't have a better day for your start. The creek's in prime condition, too."
Nugget leaped down from the wagon and joined his companions. For a moment or two the boys quite forgot the work that had to be done.
With exclamations of delight they gazed on the narrow blue channel as it poured swiftly around a bend in the woods above and vanished from sight beneath the crooked arches of a mossy stone bridge a quarter of a mile below. The opposite shore was rocky and lined with pine trees, and over their tops could be seen against the horizon the jagged crest line of the Kittatinny Mountains.
"Come on now and get to work," said Ned finally. "My arms are itching to take hold of a paddle."
"So are mine," exclaimed Randy. "Let's be off as soon as possible."
With the farmer's aid the canoes were speedily taken from the wagon and placed on the grass close to the water's edge. They were built on somewhat different lines, but all were serviceable and well adapted for speed. The framework and the canvas were both light, and the average weight was about eighty pounds, unloaded. The canoes were aptly named. The Water Sprite belonged to Randy. It was light and graceful, and owing to its flat bottom drew very little water.
Clay owned the Neptune, a broad decked craft, built somewhat on the order of the primitive Rob Roy. The Imp was narrow and rakish, with a low cockpit and a high bow and stern. Nugget regarded it with the affection that one feels for a favorite dog.
The Pioneer, in which Ned had cruised down the Susquehanna, was a heavy but neatly proportioned craft, and showed traces of wear and tear. They all contained spacious hatches fore and aft.
The boxes were unpacked, and under Ned's supervision the contents were judiciously distributed and stowed away in the different canoes. Then the seats and back rests were arranged in the cockpits, and the canoes were gently shoved into the water.
"Do you fellows expect to reach the river in them flimsy things?" exclaimed the farmer when he saw the four canoes swinging lightly with the current. "I reckon you'll repent it afore you get many miles from here."
"Not much danger," replied Ned laughingly. "A good canvas canoe will stand as much as a rowboat any time. There are no obstructions in the way, are there?"
"I dunno," replied the farmer. "It's a wild and lonesome bit of country that this creek runs through, and I've heard tell of bad water an' whirlpools. The channel winds worse than any serpent. Why, it must be all of two hundred miles to the Big River."
"I hope you are right there," said Ned heartily, as he climbed out on his canoe and fixed the pennant securely on the bow. "Take your seats now," he added to the boys. "Everything's ready for the start."
They obeyed with a rush and a scramble, and Nugget very nearly got a ducking at the outset by thoughtlessly trying to stand up in the cockpit.
Good wishes and farewells were exchanged with the friendly farmer. Then four double paddles dipped the water and rose flashing with silvery drops, four canoes skimmed gracefully out on the swift blue surface of the creek. The Jolly Rovers were off at last.
When they were twenty or thirty yards down stream they turned and waved their paddles to the farmer, who was still standing in open-mouthed wonder beside the empty packing cases. Then a cross current, setting toward the right shore, whisked them out of sight of the spot.
Randy struck up the chorus of a popular boating song, and the others joined in with eager voices. Their jubilant spirits had to find a vent somewhere.
What a glorious thing it was to be drifting haphazard with the rippling current, free as the very air, and the birds that were singing sweetly in the bushes! The narrow vista of the creek brought vividly to mind the pleasures that lay in wait along the twisted miles of its channel--the gamy bass lurking in the deep, shady holes, the snipe and woodcock feeding among the reeds, the tent and campfire with the savory odor of coffee and crisp bacon.
That less pleasant things than these were destined to fall to the lot of the Jolly Rovers ere they should paddle from the mouth of the creek into the broad Susquehanna, occurred to none, else a shadow had marred their bright anticipations at the start.
Side by side the four canoes darted under the middle arch of the old stone bridge, and then Ned took the lead, for it was not seemly that the pennant should be anywhere but in front while the club was on a cruise.
The current soon became sluggish, and the channel wound between thick woods, where the trees almost met overhead. The boys drifted along leisurely, stopping now and then to explore some tempting nook.
At one place, where the water was deep and a great rock jutted from the shore, they put their fishing rods together, and procured worms by pulling up great clods of grass. In half an hour they caught a beautiful string of sunfish and chubs.
About the middle of the afternoon Ned went up to a farmhouse that was visible among the hills and came back with a pail of butter, a loaf of bread and two apple pies. The boys had already lunched on crackers. So they concluded to keep these supplies for supper.
They paddled slowly on, crossing from shore to shore as something new took their attention. A sudden shadow, caused by the sun dipping beneath the hill top, reminded them that evening was at hand. The banks were closely scanned for a camping place, and an admirable one was soon found--a grove of big trees, through which filtered a tiny stream.
The boys landed and dragged the canoes partly out on the grassy slope.
"The tent is the first thing," said Ned, as he lifted the big roll of canvas from the cockpit of the Pioneer, where it had served as an admirable seat.
Randy unlashed the poles from the fore deck of his canoe, and joined them together.
This was a clever invention of Ned's. Each pole was in two parts, and could be put together like the joints of a fishing rod. The ferrule of the ridge pole, which had to endure the most pressure, was longer and stouter than the others. The poles were very light but strong, and the entire six pieces made no perceptible burden when lashed on a canoe.
Five minutes sufficed to raise the tent, and drive the iron stakes at the four corners. Then what articles would likely be needed were taken from the canoes and carried inside.
Ned hunted up two large stones, and placed them a foot apart. He laid four iron rods across them, and proceeded to build a fire underneath.
"That's the best cooking arrangement ever invented," he said. "We used it altogether on the Susquehanna last summer. If I prepare the supper you fellows must do the rest. Clay, you clean those fish. Bring me the salt, pepper and lard, Randy, and then peel some potatoes."
"Can I assist in any way?" drawled Nugget, as he emerged from behind the tent, where he had been slyly brushing off his clothes and shoes.
"Why, certainly," replied Clay. "Clean these fish for me, that's a good fellow."
Nugget rapidly opened and closed his mouth two or three times. "I--I--really--I'm afraid--" he stammered.
"Let him alone, Clay," cried Ned sharply. "Clean the fish yourself. Suppose you set the table, Nugget," he added kindly. "Arrange the plates and knives and forks on some grassy level place, I mean."
While his companions were performing the duties assigned to them, Ned went down to the stream and filled the coffee pot.
"This is spring water, as cold as ice," he exclaimed in surprise. "The source can't be far away."
The sun was now out of sight, and it grew darker and darker as the preparations for supper went on. Randy finished his own work, and helped Nugget arrange the dishes on an outspread square strip of canvas. He lit one of the lanterns and placed it in the center, and a few moments later Ned made the welcome announcement that supper was ready.
The coffee pot and the pans of fried fish and potatoes were gingerly carried over, and then the boys seated themselves at the four corners, crossing their legs under them, tailor fashion.
The ruddy flames mangled with the yellow glow of the lantern, dancing on the bright tinware, and casting the shadow of the tent far into the forest. The brook rippled softly through the ravine, and away up the creek the melancholy cry of a whippoorwill was heard.
"This is what I call glorious," said Ned, as he opened a can of condensed milk and passed it around. "Nothing equals a life in the open air, and no other sport has the same fascination."
"You're right there," stuttered Randy, with his mouth full, "I'd like to live this way half the year round."
"It beats New York," said Nugget decidedly, as he raised a pint cup of coffee to his lips. The next instant he uttered a howl of anguish, and made a frantic grab at the pail of cold water.
"Was it hot?" asked Clay.
"Try it and see," retorted Nugget indignantly as he buried his nose in the pail.
For a little while the silence was broken only by the clatter of knives and forks. Then Ned said slowly, "It does a fellow lots of good to get away from the rush and noise of town life. We are safer here to-night than we would be at home. No peril can come near us. Our only neighbors are the simple, kind hearted farmers--" he paused abruptly, and turned his head to one side.
A strange rustling noise was heard back in the forest It grew more distinct with every second, and the boys looked at each other with fear and wonder. Then a gruff angry bark rang out on the night air, and the elder bushes across the glade swayed violently.
CHAPTER IV
ADRIFT IN THE DARKNESS
Before the frightened boys could realize what was coming, a big yellow dog shot into view and rushed at them with a ferocious snarl. Under other circumstances the Jolly Rovers would have courageously faced the foe, but the attack was so sudden as to preclude the possibility of defense.
The supper party broke up in ignominious confusion. Ned bolted for the nearest tree and went up the trunk like a cat. Randy fled down the slope to the creek, and Clay sought shelter in the bushes on the far side of the rivulet. Nugget stared hopelessly about for an instant, and then, with a shrill cry of fear, he dived through the flaps of the tent.
The dog rushed across the table, tramping the dishes, and unfortunately upsetting the coffee pot. The hot liquid scalded the brute's paws, and snarling with rage and pain, he bolted into the tent after Nugget.
For a second or two there was a terrible outcry. Nugget's appeals for help mingled with the dog's angry barking. Then the tent shook violently and toppled to the ground.
At this interesting juncture the owner of the dog emerged from the bushes--a burly farmer with a very stern cast of features. He carried a lantern in one hand, and a short, thick club in the other.
The fallen tent first attracted his attention. It was wriggling about as though endowed with life, and from underneath came strange, muffled sounds.
The farmer lifted one end of the canvas, and gave it a vigorous jerk, thus liberating the dog, who began to prance about his master. A second pull revealed Nugget's legs thrashing wildly about on the grass. The dog immediately made a dart at them, but the farmer caught him by the scruff of the neck and dragged him back.
The boys had witnessed the whole affair from their hiding places, and now they dropped from the tree, and came timidly forward. At the same moment Randy crept out of the shadows and joined them.
The farmer caught sight of the boys and took a step toward them, still keeping a tight hold on his dog. "What do you mean by trespassin' here, you impudent young rascals?" he demanded savagely. "Get out of this as quick as you can, or I'll give you a taste of this."
He shook his club menacingly.
"I'm very sorry if we have offended you," said Ned quietly. "We did not suppose there would be any objection to our camping here. I don't think we have done any damage."
"Damage!" growled the farmer. "No, I reckon not. You hain't had time for that yet. It was only last night I run two thieving rascals off my land. They hed a camp a little ways down the creek, an' fur two whole days they were livin' at my expense, stealing applies, an' eggs, an' chickens, an' whatever else they could lay their hands on. You people are all alike. You don't have no regards fur a farmer's rights."
"I'm very sorry you have such a bad opinion of us," said Ned. "I assure you we don't deserve it. If you will let us stay here to-night we will go quietly away in the morning."
"No," snarled the farmer. "You can't stay. I won't have it. Pack up at once and git out. And mind you don't stop anywhere within half a mile. I own the land that fur on both sides of the creek."
Just then a diversion was created by the dog. He tore loose from his master and rushed at Nugget, who had meanwhile crawled out from the fallen canvas, and was standing with open mouth and eyes, listening eagerly to the conversation.
"Here, Bowser," shouted the farmer sternly. "Come here, I say."
The brute reluctantly obeyed, while Nugget sought shelter in a young tree.
The angry man turned to the three boys--for Clay had by this time joined the others.
"Get out as quick as you can," he resumed. "I can't stand here all night."
For an instant no one replied. Ned was bent on making another appeal, and was thinking how he could best word it. The chances were that a little persuasion would have induced the farmer to relent, and permit the boys to remain where they were until morning.
But Randy's unfortunate temper blazed up just then, and made a breach that was too wide to be healed.
"It's a confounded shame to turn us off at this time of night," he muttered angrily. "I wouldn't treat a dog that way. If this is a sample of country breeding I'm glad I don't--"
"Keep quiet, Randy," whispered Ned; "you're only making things worse."
The warning came too late.
"You audacious sauce box," cried the farmer. "I'll learn you manners. Take that--and that."
He seized Randy by the collar, and cuffed him soundly on the ears three or four times. Then he dropped him and turned to the others. "Now git out o' here, or I'll treat you-uns the same way," he snarled.
Randy was boiling with rage, but he dared not open his mouth again. Ned and Clay realized that further entreaty was now useless. Without a word they began to pack up, and were finally assisted by Randy and Nugget.
The farmer stood at one side, watching the operation keenly. In a brief space of time the tent and the unwashed dishes were tumbled into the hatches. Then the boys pushed the canoes into the water, and took their seats.
The farmer came down to the shore to see them off.
"Mind what I told you," he said; "no stoppin' within a good half mile."
"Don't say a word," whispered Ned.
His companions wisely obeyed, and in utter silence they paddled out from the shore and headed down stream. Soon a curve in the channel hid from view the dying embers of the campfire and the twinkle of the farmer's lantern.
"Wouldn't I like to get square with that old curmudgeon!" exclaimed Randy; "my ears sting yet. For half a cent I'd go back and trample down his grain or break his fences."
"I wish you'd poison the dog," drawled Nugget. "The brute gave me a horrid fright. The falling of the tent was all that saved me from being chewed up."
"See here, Randy," said Ned in a grave tone. "If you had kept your temper down and your mouth shut, things would have turned out all right. A little reasoning would have pacified that farmer. I thought you had more sense. You heard what the man said, didn't you?
"Two men--tramps or fishermen, probably--had been camping on his land, and doing all the damage they could, and naturally enough he was inclined to take out his spite on us. I don't blame him much. Such a thing would rile any farmer. Most people have an idea that when they get in the country they can do as they please, and for what these ignorant fools do the innocent ones have to suffer. We are finding that out ourselves just now."
"But the old brute might have seen that we didn't belong to that class of people," growled Randy, "and besides he didn't pay any attention to what you said."
"I had no chance to explain who we were," replied Ned. "You spoiled that for me by your impudence. I have no doubt the man was fair enough at heart. If we get in any more scrapes of that kind you must keep your temper down. I'm speaking for your own good, Randy. This isn't the first time your tongue has got you into trouble."
"It would be a good idea to keep his mouth tied shut except at meal times," suggested Clay laughingly.
"If you say that again I'll hit you with my paddle," threatened Randy. "I won't stand any nonsense from _you_, Clay Halsey."
"No quarreling, boys," said Ned. "That's enough now. We'll let the matter drop."
Clay subsided, and so did Randy. The latter stood a little in awe of Ned's rebukes, and whether he felt the justice of this one or not, he wisely made no more allusions to the farmer.
Indeed there were other things to think about now. The night was dark and gloomy, and it was difficult to perceive the outlines of the shores. The boys were tired and sleepy, but they feared to stop and hunt up a camping ground, lest the farmer should come down and rout them out again. A light would betray them, but without it they could do nothing.
There seemed to be no current at all, and in the dead sluggish water half a mile meant a wearisome paddle.
"I'm awfully hungry," said Nugget in a plaintive tone. "I didn't have ten bites of supper."
"We're all hungry, for that matter," returned Ned, "and sleepy as well. We must find a camping place."
"You had better hurry then," observed Clay. "I believe it's going to rain. The air feels sultry, and there isn't a star in sight."
Almost as he spoke a sullen peal of thunder echoed among the hills, and an instant later a jagged flash of lightning blazed on the surface of the creek.
The boys huddled a little closer together and nervously discussed the situation. A storm was bad enough when they had a snug tent to shelter them, but in their present plight, adrift on the water in pitch darkness, there was no telling what disaster might happen.
"I wish I was home," said Nugget. "I'm awfully afraid of thunder and lightning."
No one laughed at this candid confession. The occasion was too serious for mirth.
"I hardly know what would be best to do," began Ned. "If there is going to be much lightning we will be safer on the water than among the trees on shore. But here comes a gale, if I'm not mistaken. That will make things lively for us."
Ned's prediction was correct. The trees on shore suddenly began to rustle and creak. The water was lashed into short, choppy waves, which turned to white capped billows as the wind waxed stronger. It was evident that this part of the creek occupied an exposed position.
"Keep your canoes trim," shouted Ned. "The wind will drop as soon as the rain comes."
It is doubtful if his companions heard the warning. The force of the tempest had already driven the canoes apart.
For two or three minutes Ned was tossed about at will, momentarily expecting his frail craft to upset. He could see no trace of his companions in the darkness, and when he shouted the roar of the gale almost drowned his voice.
Suddenly he felt a severe shock, and then the canoe stood still. As he partially rose, and peered to right and left, a dim object glided swiftly by him. A second later it disappeared with startling abruptness, and a frantic cry for help rang out hoarsely above the fury of the storm.
CHAPTER V
DISAPPEARANCE OF NUGGET
Ned knew that the dim object must have been a canoe, but its sudden effacement, and the loud cry for help, were mysteries too deep for immediate comprehension. He shouted with all the power of his voice full half a dozen times, but no answer came back.
Then a happy thought flashed into his mind. When he had satisfied himself by shaking it violently that the canoe was firmly lodged on some object--probably a rock--he leaned forward and took his lantern from the hatch. By holding it low in the cockpit he had no difficulty in lighting the wick.
The lantern was a bullseye, and as soon as Ned turned the flashing glare on the surrounding darkness the mystery was solved. The Pioneer was lodged in mid channel on a timber dam. The bow projected a foot or two over the edge, but could go no further owing to lack of water. None was running over at all at this point, and the slimy timbers protruded six or eight inches above the level of the creek.
While Ned was making these investigations the wind ceased, and he heard close at hand a steady roaring noise, like the furious patter of rain on a tin roof. But it was not rain that produced the noise, though big drops were even then beginning to fall.
A twist of the lantern to the left sent a luminous bar of light along the breast of the darn, and revealed a jagged break, fully six feet wide, through which the freed water poured with the speed of a millrace. The chasm was barely a dozen feet from where the Pioneer had lodged, and Ned's first thought was one of gratitude for his own escape. Then he remembered with a thrill of horror what had happened a moment or two before. Which of his companions had been carried through the break, and where was the unfortunate lad now?
As Ned stood with the lantern turned on the fatal spot, a shout rang out behind him, and the next instant the Water Sprite grounded on the edge of the dam beside the Pioneer.
"I'm glad you lit that lantern, Ned," exclaimed Randy breathlessly. "I came pretty near paddling back up the creek. But where are the other fellows?"
Ned pointed to the broken dam and huskily related what had occurred.
Randy was horror stricken.
"I heard that cry for help, too," he said, "but I had no idea what it meant. Are you sure one of the boys went through?"
"I saw the canoe plainly," replied Ned. "There was just one cry for help, and after that I could get no answer when I shouted."
"We'll hope for the best," said Randy stoutly. "Perhaps he made the plunge all right, and is half a mile down the creek by this time. Great Cæsar! I hope both the boys didn't go through. No, there's a light now on the left shore. It's either Nugget or Clay with a lantern."
"Paddle over and bring him back with you," directed Ned. "If he tries to come himself he'll go through the break. Be sure to keep away above the dam though, and when you return don't let my lantern mislead you, because I intend to wade along the breastwork and have a look at that hole. If you head for a dozen feet this side of the light you'll likely land where you are now."
Randy promised obedience, and departed in haste. Ned watched him anxiously until he was out of sight. Then he sounded the water with his paddle, and finding it quite shallow he climbed carefully out of the canoe.
Holding the lantern in one hand, and clutching the projecting edge of the dam with the other, he moved along foot by foot, submerged to his waist. It was well that he had this support, for his feet were on the sloping, mud incrusted planks.
When the broken place was three or four feet away the water began to deepen. Ned stopped and flashed the light on the lower side of the dam. He saw little there to comfort him.
The fall was about six feet, and at the bottom of the long, glassy sheet of water which plunged through the break at a frightful speed, great foam crested waves began, and rolled and tumbled in awful confusion as far as the gleam of the bullseye could reach. That a canoe could go through such a place without capsizing seemed an utter impossibility.
There was no sign of one, however, in the quiet eddies on either side of the raging channel, and with this dismal scrap of comfort Ned retraced his perilous journey to the canoe. He had hardly gained it, and climbed in, when Randy and his companion paddled their craft alongside. That companion was Clay. Nugget, then, was the missing Jolly Rover.
"Discover anything?" demanded Randy.
"No. It looks bad for poor Nugget, boys. If the canoe had gone through all right he would have paddled to shore, and been making a big outcry by this time."
"He can't be drowned. I won't believe it," cried Randy. "See here, Ned, isn't it likely that Nugget caught hold of the canoe when it upset, and clung to it? The roar of the water would account for your not hearing his cries."
"It may be," said Ned reflectively, as he dashed a tear from his eye. "If that's the case we will soon overtake him--provided he doesn't let go his hold. Let's have a look at the right hand corner of the dam."
"Yes, that will be the most likely place," added Clay. "The race is on the other side. I nearly blundered into it."
The boys paddled to shore, following the line of the dam, and a brief search with the lantern revealed an easy path by which the canoes could be carried around.
There was no sign of a house, and Clay reported none on the opposite side, so the mill was probably some distance below.
Under the excitement of the moment the boys scarcely felt the weight of the heavily laden canoes. They carried them, one at a time, up a sloping bank, and then down through the bushes to the water.
When they embarked, and paddled out through the quiet shallows to the swift channel in midstream, the wind had nearly subsided and the rain was falling in a desultory fashion which promised only a brief continuance. In fact stars were visible here and there through rifts in the black clouds. The storm seemed to have gone off in another direction.
A short distance below the dam the water became very sluggish, and the boys knew that if Nugget was ahead of them they must speedily overtake him. So they paddled hard, forgetful of weariness and hunger, and at frequent intervals shouted loudly and called their companion by name.
The lanterns were exposed to view so that Nugget could not fail to see the light if he was anywhere near.
For half an hour the three heartsick lads paddled on steadily, and in that time hardly a word was exchanged. They were in no mood for conversation.
Finally the track of yellow light which shone ahead from Ned's bullseye revealed a bit of an island in mid-channel--a strip of gravel and reeds, with a few stunted bushes growing in the center.
Ned drove the Pioneer on the upper point and stepped out. His companions did the same, and Randy asked wearily: "What are you going to do here?"
"Wait for daylight," said Ned. "It's the only thing we _can_ do. We are a good mile and a half below the dam, and if the canoe was drifting in that sluggish water, we passed it long ago. It has probably lodged on some bar, or along the shore, and will be found in the morning."
"Then you think that Nugget is--is drowned?" asked Clay huskily.
Ned stooped and pulled the canoe up on the bar.
"I don't know," he said in a broken voice. "If Nugget was alive he would surely have heard our shouts or seen the lights. We won't know anything positively until morning. It could do no good to paddle up the creek again in the darkness, so we had better wait here as patiently as we can."
No objection was made to this plan, and the boys crawled in among the bushes and sat down with Clay's lantern between them. The passing storm had not cooled the sultry atmosphere, and no fire or blankets were needed.
All seemed stupefied by the terrible misfortune that had happened, though as yet they hardly realized its full significance. They purposely refrained from talking about it, though each knew in his own heart how wildly improbable was the hope that Nugget was still alive.
The hours of that dark, dismal night wore slowly on. There was plenty to eat in the canoes, but no one was hungry now. A lantern was kept burning at the upper point of the island, and from time to time one of the boys went down to the shore and shouted till the echo rang far among the hills. They must have known that it was but a hollow mockery, and yet there was a scrap of consolation even in pretending that hope was not entirely gone.
Ned insisted that his companions should lie down and sleep. This seemed impossible at first, but after a while drowsiness and fatigue asserted their sway. Randy went down to the canoes and returned with three blankets. He and Clay wrapped themselves up, and chose a soft spot among the bushes. In five minutes they were sleeping soundly.
Ned remained where he was for a long while, keeping solitary vigil over his companions. Then he began to pace up and down the island, and finally he pulled the blanket about his shoulders and sat down on the upper end of the bar with his back against the side of the canoe.
It was his intention to remain awake, but unconsciously his eyelids drooped, and after a feeble struggle or two he sank into a deep slumber.
He knew nothing more until he woke in the gray dawn of the morning. For a few seconds his surroundings seemed familiar. Then the bitter truth flashed into his mind, and he rose with an aching heart. He was stiff and shivering, and the cool breeze that blew down the creek, scattering the light, vapory mists over the surface of the water, made him keenly conscious of the pangs of hunger.
He went up in the bushes and wakened Clay and Randy. They followed him stiffly down to the shore, and after dipping their feet in the cool, rippling water, all sat down on the grass and ate a few crackers. Ned offered to build a fire and make some hot coffee, but the others protested that they did not care for it.
The sun was just peeping above the horizon when the boys pushed their canoes into the water and embarked on the dreaded journey up the creek. Both shores were thickly timbered, and to make the search more thorough Ned kept close to the right bank, while Clay and Randy followed the left.
They paddled with leisurely strokes, maintaining a sharp watch on every patch of reeds and every little inlet. In the first mile there was nothing to reward the searchers--not the slightest trace of the missing canoe or its occupant.
Then the channel made a sharp curve, and when they paddled around it they saw, nearly half a mile above, a gray, weather worn mill, standing in a grove of willows on the right hand shore. The dam was visible a hundred yards or so beyond, and the sunlight was dancing on the foaming torrent that poured through the break.
CHAPTER VI
THE LOST FOUND
Without lessening their vigilance the boys paddled on against the increasing current. When the mill was very near Ned signaled the others to join him.
They quickly crossed to the right shore, and the three canoes were run into a quiet little nook close to the swirling mouth of the race. The mill was twenty yards above, and a little to the right of it a cozy frame house, overgrown with trailing vines, peeped above the willow trees.
"I thought we had better stop here on account of the swift water," said Ned. "We will go up to the dam on foot, and take a look at the deep holes under the breastwork."
Before Clay or Randy could reply a man came briskly through the trees--the miller beyond a doubt, for his clothes and hat were white with flour. He greeted the boys with a smile and a cherry nod.
"I guess you're the chaps I was just starting out to find," he said. "T'other young chap was getting anxious about you, and not much wonder. He feared you were all drowned, and I guess you thought the same about him. It was lucky I run across him this morning. You see I went down to the creek at daybreak to look for a stray cow, and when--"
"Did you find a boy called Nugget?" interrupted Ned in great excitement.
"And a green and white canoe called the Imp?" shouted Randy, as he tossed his cap into the air.
"That's about the way of it," responded the miller. "But come up to the house and see for yourselves. You look as if you were nearly starved."
The boys needed no second invitation. With eager steps and light hearts they followed their guide through the trees, and across the little garden to the rear of the house.
The miller threw open the door, and they rushed in with cries of delight. There sat Nugget at the kitchen table, making a fierce onslaught on ham and fried potatoes. He was rigged out in a suit of clothes three times too big for him, and his brown uniform was drying before the fire.
The boys were so glad to see him that they first laughed and then cried almost, while the miller and his wife looked on in wonder.
Nugget took things very coolly.
"Where did you fellows spend the night?" he asked, after the first greetings were over.
"Where did _you_ spend it?" exclaimed Ned. "You gave us a pretty scare, Nugget. We never expected to see you again."
"Let him spin his yarn while you're eating breakfast," interrupted the miller. "Lizzie, set three more plates out."
A moment later the boys were attacking the food with keen appetites, and as Nugget was now through, he proceeded to relate his adventures.
"When the wind came up and separated us," he began, "I got pretty badly scared. I was afraid it would rain hard, so I took out my canvass apron and buttoned it over the cockpit, close up to my waist."
"Good for you!" said Ned. "If I'm not mistaken that was what saved you."
"Perhaps it was," resumed Nugget. "I paddled on for a little while, trying to find you fellows. All at once I heard an awful roar, and the canoe made a jump as though it was going to stand on end. I gave one yell, and the next thing I knew big waves were jumping all around me."
He paused to shiver at the recollection.
"And what then?" asked Randy breathlessly.
"Then I was more scared than ever," continued Nugget in a reluctant voice. "So I crawled under the apron and snuggled up in the cockpit. There was plenty of room, and the cushion made a nice soft pillow, and--and--I fell asleep."
"Fell asleep!" ejaculated Ned in amazement. "You don't mean it?"
"Why, yes," said Nugget. "I was awfully tired, you know, and I couldn't keep my eyes open. The next thing I remember is that man there helping me out. It was daylight, and the canoe was in a little channel with thick bushes all around."
The boys were not slow to appreciate the ludicrous side of Nugget's adventure, and they laughed long and heartily.
Then the miller told how he found the canoe in a stretch of back water that ran a few yards in from the creek, and how surprised he was when he pulled the apron off the cockpit and saw Nugget fast asleep.
"I noticed that inlet," said Ned, "but I didn't see anything of the canoe."
"Because I pulled it out in the bushes," replied the miller. "The current has a natural drift toward the place, and clogs it up with rubbish sometimes. The lad had a narrow squeeze of it when he went through that hole in the dam. I intend to fix it as soon as the water goes down a little."
"I don't want to go through any more such places," said Nugget. "I suppose that apron was what kept the water out. I shipped a little bit, though I didn't know it until this morning, when I found my clothes all wet. My extra suit is in your canoe, Randy. I had dry shirts, though. Say, wouldn't I look nice marching down Fifth Avenue in this rig?"
The boys laughed at the idea, and then drew their chairs away from the table, and chatted for half an hour with the miller, relating all that had happened on the previous night, and telling him of their proposed trip to the Susquehanna. He, in turn, gave them much interesting information about the creek, where to camp and where to fish.
Ten o'clock came before any one realized it, and the boys prepared to depart, in spite of their host's earnest invitation to stay for a day or two. Nugget changed his clothes, and started for the inlet with the miller, while the others embarked in their canoes, after thanking the miller's wife for her hospitality.
The inlet was half a mile down the creek. The boys reached there first, and were joined by the others two or three minutes later.
Fortunately Nugget's paddle was not lost. He had found it stranded along the shore while on his way to the mill that morning.
The boys lingered a moment to shake hands with their kind hearted friend, and thank him for his services.
"That's all right," said the miller, "only too glad to oblige you. Be sure and stop when you pass here again. My name is John Kling."
"We'll spend a week with you next time," returned Ned, as he grasped his paddle.
"Please have the dam mended before then," drawled Nugget.
The miller laughed and waved his hand, and amid a chorus of "good-byes" the Jolly Rovers paddled away from shore. The shadow of misfortune was forgotten, and the future was full of bright anticipations, as before.
The birds sang among the leaves, the fish leaped in the ripples, and the sunlight danced on the blue water.
The little island, where the boys had spent such a wretched night, was soon far behind, and they entered upon a more beautiful stretch of country than they had yet seen. The water was very sluggish, and on each side were great hills densely covered with pine and spruce trees.
The temptations to stop were so frequent that by mid-afternoon the boys were scarcely five miles from the mill--that is to say by water. It was probably less than half that distance in a straight line.
"I'm really hungry again in spite of that big breakfast," said Clay. "Can't we stop and have lunch?"
"I second that," cried Randy.
The others were of the same mind, and as a very pretty spot happened to come within view about that time, they paddled across to it and landed.
Closer inspection only added to the charms of the place.
It lay on the right shore, at the mouth of a deep, dark ravine. A beach of smooth pebbles sloped back to a grassy bank three or four feet high, and on the plateau above were a dozen or more massive girthed pine trees, whose fragrant needles carpeted the ground. A fair sized brook gurgled through the center over a bed of mossy stones, and emptied into the creek.
"We might travel a good many miles and not find such a place as this," said Ned. "Suppose we stay here for a day or two. Tomorrow is Sunday and we would have to stop then anyhow."
This suggestion was adopted without a dissenting word and the boys became enthusiastic over the prospect. Randy wanted to begin fishing at once, while Nugget proposed an exploration of the ravine. A few sensible words from Ned cooled their ardor, and they started in with a will to arrange the camp.
The tent was staked in a carefully selected spot, and then the canoes were unloaded and placed on the beach in a row, bottom up, so what little water was in them might drain out.
While Nugget and Clay carried the provisions and other articles up to the tent, Ned and Randy washed the dirty dishes of the night before. Then the blankets were put to air on a stout line stretched between two trees, and a great heap of firewood was collected.
"That's all for the present," said Ned, as he finished tying the pennant to the front tent pole. "You can do a little fishing now if you want to. Don't venture far away from the camp, because I'm going up the ravine to look for a farmhouse."
Randy declared that he was tired and would rather stay by the tent, so Nugget and Clay prepared their rods and went down the creek a short distance to a jutting point of rock. With a diminutive hook they caught a couple of minnows, which they used for bait.
For a long time their patience was unrewarded, but finally Nugget had a strike, and after a severe struggle he landed a fine bass that could not have weighed less than a pound. Clay caught a smaller one, and after that the fish stopped biting.
At sundown they put up their rods and went back to camp. Ned had just returned, bringing with him a pair of dressed chickens and a pail of milk.
"These will make us a good dinner to-morrow," he said. "I had a hard time finding the farmhouse. It was more than a mile away, and the path led through the woods for nearly the whole distance. I suppose you are pretty hungry by this time. If you all pitch in and help we'll soon have supper."
In a short time the fire was blazing merrily. Ned was as good as his word, and the _menu_ he set before the boys that night was a tempting one. It included fried bass, ham and eggs, and baked potatoes, with milk and pie for desert.
As the night was warm all indulged in a delicious swim after the supper dishes were cleared up. At nine o'clock they turned in and tied the tent flaps shut. Even this precaution was felt to be unnecessary, since the very loneliness of the place was a protection against harm.
Randy, who occupied the proud position of log keeper to the Jolly Rovers, sat up for a while to jot down the events of the cruise in a blank book. He finally extinguished the lantern with a sigh of satisfaction, and was soon sleeping beside his companions.
Sunday dawned bright and clear, but the boys did not get up until nine o'clock. The pine needles made a couch that was hard to leave. The day was observed in a spirit of proper regard. Its monotony was somewhat alleviated by the dinner of fried chicken, but all were glad when night came.
CHAPTER VII
BATTERS AND JOE
Ned was up with the sun on Monday morning. He pulled the tent flaps wide open, so that the cool air would stream in and awaken his companions. Then he threw a towel over his shoulder and marched down to the mouth of the brook to wash his face and hands.
But this laudable purpose was quite driven from his mind by the discovery which greeted his eyes when he arrived there. On the spit of jutting sand which had formed at the junction of the creek and the brook was the deep imprint of a boat's keel, and close by were half a dozen large footsteps.
They looked quite fresh, and had evidently been made by two persons. Some were long and pointed; others square toed, and shod with nails or pegs.
As Ned gazed on these evidences of a nocturnal visit, he felt pretty much as did Robinson Crusoe when he discovered the print of naked feet on his island.
It was impossible to tell where these strangers had been, since the gravel beach and the grassy soil beyond it left no traces.
Ned washed his face and hands and returned to the tent with a troubled mind. The boys were awake by this time, and he told them of his discovery.
"Hullo! that explains something," exclaimed Clay. "I got awake last night, and struck a match to find the pail of water that was standing outside the tent. I thought I heard a noise down by the creek, but I was too sleepy to bother about it, and went back to bed."
"Then you must have scared these fellows off," said Ned. "That accounts for nothing being stolen. Everything of value was in the tent, however, and I don't suppose they cared to meddle with the canoes."
"Do you think these are the same men that the farmer chased off his land?" asked Randy.
"Very likely," replied Ned. "I'm sorry now that I didn't inquire more about them. The best thing we can do is to break camp and put about ten miles between us and this place."
"That would be cowardly," exclaimed Randy. "We have no reason to be afraid of these fellows. They'll get a warm reception if they meddle around camp again. Let's stay here for one day anyhow. We won't find many prettier places, and besides, I'm anxious to do some hunting and fishing."
Clay seemed disposed to side with Randy, while Nugget favored both sides of the question. He wanted to go, and he was just as anxious to catch some more bass down at the point of rocks.
Ned hesitated for a moment. He knew that it would be the more prudent plan to break camp at once, but the same time he was not inclined to insist upon it, and thus incur the ill will of his companions.
"I see that the majority is against me," he said good naturedly. "But if we get in any kind of a scrape you fellows will shoulder the blame, that's all."
The boys appeared to be satisfied with this arrangement. They trooped off to the brook to wash, while Ned turned aside to make the fire.
After breakfast Randy shouldered his gun and started down the creek in search of snipe or woodcock. Clay and Nugget caught a pailful of minnows and departed for the point of rocks, for this was the time of day when the bass would probably bite best.
Ned did not accompany them. He had the true appreciation of outdoor life, and was never happier than when doing odd bits of work around the camp. He occupied himself in this way for an hour or two--arranging the interior of the tent, hanging the blankets out to air, stacking the wood neatly by the fireplace, and scrubbing the frying pans and the outside of the coffee pot with sand and gravel.
He was scooping out a little fish pond at the mouth of the brook when Randy returned.
"What luck?" he asked, looking up from his work.
"Not a thing," answered Randy in a disappointed tone. "The snipe are all on the other side of the creek. I'm going after them now in my canoe. I tramped along the shore for at least a mile, Ned, and I didn't see a trace of anybody, either on this side or on the other. Our midnight visitors must have cleared out for good."
"I hope they have," said Ned. "What luck are the boys having?"
"Four bass, and one of them is a big fellow. Help me up with my canoe now, will you?"
Ned rendered the desired assistance.
"Don't stay too long," he told Randy.
"I'll be back inside of an hour," was the reply, as the other paddled swiftly down the creek.
Ned finished the fish pond to his satisfaction, and feeling a little tired, he climbed up the slope and threw himself down in a clump of high grass behind the tent. He was gazing dreamily up the creek with his head resting on his outstretched arms, when a boat containing two persons came suddenly into view around the bend.
Ned crept a little deeper into the grass, where he could see without being seen. The boat was now out of sight behind the trees, but when it reappeared a moment later, directly opposite the camp, a single glance satisfied Ned that it was not the same craft which had landed at the mouth of the brook during the previous night.
This was a rude affair known as a "flat." It was long and narrow, with square ends and sides, and from its cranky motion evidently had no keel.
The occupants were young fellows of twenty or thereabouts. They were roughly dressed, and their general appearance was by no means favorable. They stopped paddling in amazement when they caught sight of the camp, and after a brief conversation, which Ned did not catch, they ran their craft on shore a few yards below the mouth of the brook.
Ned shifted his position, and watched their movements curiously. The strangers evidently intended to pitch a camp of their own, for they made frequent trips up the slope, carrying blankets and tin pails, and various other articles. Then they chopped down a number of fine shoots, and constructed, in a brief space of time, a snug lean-to between two big trees.
Having placed their things in this--casting suspicious glances all the while at the tent--they went back to the boat, climbed in, and paddled swiftly down the creek.
Ned rose to his feet, and looked after them in amazement. As the boat vanished around the sharp curve that the creek made immediately below the camp, he noticed for the first time a bait box trailing on behind.
"I understand it now," he muttered. "Those fellows are out for a fishing trip, and they're going down to the rocks to set their lines. I hope they won't get into a row with Clay and Nugget."
The possibility of such a thing made Ned uneasy. He stood in perplexity for a moment or two, and had just made up his mind to go down and look after the boys, when the sound of loud, angry voices reached his hearing.
He hesitated no longer, but leaped down the slope and ran at full speed along the beach. Bursting through a covert of reeds and tall bushes, he emerged within a few yards of the rocks.
On the outermost bowlder, close to the swirling current, were Nugget, Clay, and the two strangers. The flat was drawn out on shore.
As Ned put foot on the nearest rock the taller of the strange lads struck Nugget violently on the arm with a paddle. Clay immediately hit the cowardly fellow in the breast, and in the struggle that followed the latter lost his balance and rolled backward into the swift current. His companion pounced on Clay, and they came down together on the rock, while Nugget stood by, holding his injured arm and shouting for help.
Ned took in the situation at a glance. He saw that the lad in the water was a poor swimmer, and could make no headway against the current. Without stopping to count the cost he threw off his coat, and ran to the edge of the bowlder.
"Bring the boat quick!" he shouted to Clay and his assailant, who had fallen apart and were glaring wrathfully at each other.
Then Ned put his arms together and dived head first into the foaming water. He came to the surface half a dozen yards below, and struck out vigorously for the struggling lad, who was by this time on the point of exhaustion.
Ned was an admirable swimmer, and absolutely fearless in the water.
"Keep cool, and don't struggle," he shouted, as he reached the fellow and put on hand on his collar.
The other had sense enough to obey, and both floated down stream together.
It was out of the question for Ned to reach the shore immediately with his heavy burden, and as Clay and the other lad were slow about launching the boat, the affair might have ended seriously. But just at that time Randy came paddling up the creek in his canoe, and spied the drifting figures.
He was soon alongside, and as the stern of the Water Sprite swung toward them, Ned and his companion each threw an arm over it.
Then Randy paddled for the shore, and landed about sixty feet below the rocks.
Clay and the other stranger reached the spot in the boat just as Ned and the lad he had so nobly rescued, waded out on the beach. The latter shook the water from his clothes and hesitatingly approached Ned.
"I dunno' how to thank you for what you did," he said sheepishly. "I'm mighty sorry I hit that chap. Me and Joe were downright mad because you'uns were fishing thar in our place. You see we come here from the mountains every now and then, and ketch a lot of bass, and sell 'em back at Newville. I reckon it ain't our place anyhow, an' you'uns can fish thar as much as you please. My name is Jim Batters--Batters they allus calls me--and that's my brother Joe there."
"I'm glad to know you, Batters," said Ned, holding out his hand. "You are welcome to your fishing ground. We are going away to-morrow anyhow. As for the quarrel--we'll just let that drop. You had better go up to camp now and dry your clothes."
Batters was not satisfied, however, until he had apologized all around, and made Joe do the same. Nugget had arrived by this time, and he declared that his arm no longer pained him.
Then the whole party went up the creek, some on water and some on land. The two mountaineers were tall, lanky youths with expressionless faces, surrounded by shocks of yellow hair.
They wore homespun clothes and high boots. They were speedily on intimate terms with Jolly Rovers, and gladly accepted Ned's invitation to dinner. They asked many curious questions, and lost themselves in admiration over the canoes.
Ned told them about the nocturnal visitors of the previous night, and inquired if they had seen anything of the men. Both stoutly replied in the negative, but a swift, covert glance that passed between them did not escape Ned's attention.
During the remainder of the day he remembered it more than once. When dinner was over they all went down to the rocks, and Batters and Joe proudly displayed their skill at fishing. In two hours they caught fifteen large bass. For bait they used crabs and lizards, which they had brought from the mountains.
In the evening Randy entertained the country lads with a mouth organ performance, and at ten o'clock the visitors went to their camp on the other side of the brook.
It had been a long day, and the Jolly Rovers were glad to get to bed. They were too drowsy to think about the possibility of another visit from the mysterious boat, and in a very few minutes all were sound asleep.
About midnight--as nearly as he could judge afterward--Ned sat up with a start, firmly convinced that some danger was at hand. As he listened with a wildly throbbing heart, soft footsteps cracked on the pine needles outside, and then the tent flap was torn open, revealing against the lingering embers of the campfire the semblance of a human form.
"Hi! you chaps in thar!" whispered a gruff and unfamiliar voice. "Get awake, quick!"
The words had a soothing affect on Ned's fears, and satisfied him that the visitor--whoever he was--had come in the guise of friendship. He drew a match from his pocket and rubbed it on his trousers. It ignited, and revealed the pale face of Batters, framed between the tent and flap.
"Great Cæsar! Is it you?" exclaimed Ned. "What's wrong?"
"Hush! not so loud," whispered Batters. "Put that light out, quick!"
Ned obeyed in haste.
"Now rouse the other chaps, and do it quietly, so they don't make no noise."
This was a pretty stiff order, and Ned had some fears for the result. Happily all went well, and in two or three minutes an audience of four trembling and well nigh panic stricken lads was sitting in the darkness, listening to Batter's ominous tale.
"Joe waked me up a little while ago," he began, "an' said there was a strange boat, an' two men in it, down by the mouth of the run. I tole Joe ter stay an' watch our stuff. Then I sneaked along the shore an' seen the fellows sittin' on the beach along side the canoes.
"I didn't dare go close enough to hear what they was sayin', so I come right up to the tent. I reckon you uns had better make a move afore the canoes get carried off. I'll do what I kin fur you. If we all take paddles and run out yellin' an' screachin' mebbe the fellars will get scared and make tracks without showin' fight."
This proposition rather staggered the boys.
"The thieves probably want more than the canoes," said Ned. "It's very likely they are right outside the tent now. I hardly know what we ought to do."
"Let's give them our money and watches, and anything else they want," suggested Nugget. "If we don't they'll surely cut our throats."
"Keep quiet!" whispered Clay savagely. "If you don't I'll throw you out of the tent."
At this awful threat Nugget subsided and buried his head in his blanket.
Meanwhile Randy, whose temper was beginning to rise at the thought of being robbed, had quietly reached for his gun, and was fumbling with it under cover of the darkness.
An unlucky move dashed the stock against his lantern, and the crash of broken glass followed. At the same moment Batters called in a loud whisper, "Here they are. I see them movin' among the trees."
At this startling news a wailing cry broke from Nugget, and an instant later a gruff voice called distinctly:
"Come out of that one at a time, young fellars. Move lively, an' you won't be harmed."
There was dead silence for a few seconds, and then the command was repeated in a more peremptory tone.
"They ain't got no shootin' weapons," whispered Batters; "only short sticks. I can see 'em by the firelight."
On hearing this, Randy was seized with a sudden access of courage. Gun in hand, he dashed by his companions to the front of the tent.
Batters saw the glint of the weapon and made a futile grab at it.
"Don't do no shootin'," he whispered hoarsely.
The warning came too late. Randy stepped out from the flaps and raised it to his shoulder.
"Make tracks, you villains," he shouted, "or I'll put daylight through you." (This was a favorite expression of Randy's purloined from the life of Kit Carson.) Then, as retreating footsteps were heard, he lowered the weapon a little and pulled the trigger.
The thunderous report was followed by a yell of pain, and two voices hissed out dire threats of vengeance as the baffled men went hastily down the slope.
As Randy turned toward his companions Batters sprang at him and wrenched the weapon from his hands.
"Didn't I tell you not to shoot?" he cried. "Now you've gone an' hit Bug. I kinder feared it might be him, but I wasn't certain. That's him swearin' this very minute. Oh! I'll fix you for this."
Pushing Randy to one side and dashing the gun on the ground, Batters vanished in the darkness, yelling at the top of his voice, "Bug! Bug! it's me!"
The boys were overcome with terror and amazement. Who in the world was Bug, and why should Batters be so anxious about him?
"Why did you do that?" demanded Ned sternly. "If you have shot any one don't expect us to shield you."
Randy did not reply. He staggered into the tent and rolled over in helpless mirth.
"It--it was--a salt cartridge," he finally was able to gasp. "I had--three or four of them. I read how to make them--in a book. Didn't I pepper their legs nicely though.
"I don't care what it was," exclaimed Ned angrily. "You ought to be ashamed of yourself. You'll break up this trip yet with your foolishness."
Randy sobered down in a moment or two, and when he joined the others outside the tent he was disposed to take a less humorous view of his smart performance. A light was visible at the mouth of the brook, and four figures could be seen around it.
Joe had evidently joined his brother. The conversation that was carried on was for the most part inaudible, but now and then a threatening sentence could be heard, or a few words of entreaty.
"Serious trouble will come out of this," said Ned. "For half a cent I'd deliver you over to those fellows, Randy. The worst of it is that they were going away when you fired."
"Dodging behind trees, that's all," replied Randy.
"Not a bit of it," exclaimed Ned angrily. "They were running toward the creek."
As Clay stoutly backed up this assertion, Randy lapsed into sullen silence. He was more frightened than he chose to let appear.
After what seemed a painfully long interval to the waiting boys, Batters came softly out of the gloom and stood before them.
"I reckon there ain't no more danger," he said. "It wasn't Bug what was hit; the other fellow. He's sittin' down thar on the stones now, a pickin' lumps of salt out of his legs with a knife blade. He's mad as blazes too, an' me an Bug had all we could do ter keep him from comin' back here.
"I tole Bug how you saved my life, an' when he heard that he put his foot down an' swore you chaps shouldn't be harmed. Bug ain't bad at heart, he ain't. As soon as the other fellow gits all the salt out they're both going away. They hev a camp somewhere's down the creek."
"But who are these men, Batters, and what do you know about them?" asked Ned.
The lad hesitated for a moment.
"I reckon I might as well make a clean breast of it," he said in a pitiful tone. "Don't you-uns think bad of me an' Joe though, cause we've been brung up different, 'deed we have--."
"Look here, Batters, you needn't tell us if you don't want to," interrupted Ned sympathetically.
He had an inkling of the true state of affairs, and wished to spare the lad what was evidently a painful recital.
"No, I'd better tell," responded Batters. "It's just this way. Bug is big brother to me and Joe, only he's about six years older than us. You see when he was a little chap dad an' mammy lived down near Middlesex, an' Bug he got in bad company. When dad moved up to the Gap, Bug was toler'ble bad, an' since then he's been gittin' worse.
"He was in Carlisle jail twict fer stealin', an' in summer he jest lives shiftless like along the creek, helpin' hisself to the farmers' stuff. Now he dassent come home no more, for dad says he won't own him fur a son. Mammy cries heaps an' says her heart's broke.
"You see dad an' mammy are honest, if they are poor, an' they made me an' Joe promise we'd never take nothin' what don't belong to us. Mammy says she wants us ter grow up the right way, an' not be bad an' wuthless like--like Bug--."
Here Batters broke down and began to cry softly. His sad little tale--alas! only too common in all walks of life!--had deeply moved his hearers, and more than one of the boys had tears in their eyes.
Ned walked over and threw his arm around the weeping lad.
"Don't cry, Batters," he said softly. "Some day Bug will find out his mistake and begin to do better. We don't think any the less of you and Joe on his account. Stick to your mother, and do what she says, and you'll be sure to grow up the right kind of men."
Batters was consoled by this boyish sympathy. He wiped his eyes and looked gratefully at Ned.
"Here, take this," said Nugget, holding out a handsome pocket knife. "It's got four blades, and a corkscrew, and a file."
Batters looked doubtfully at the treasure. Randy had just lighted a lantern, and the rays flashed on the mother of pearl handle.
"I want you to have it," said Nugget, "my father will send me plenty more from New York."
The temptation was too much. Batters took the knife with a smile, and incoherently tried to thank the donor.
All at once the creaking of oars was heard, and a moment later Joe joined the party.
"They've gone," he announced. "T' other fellow got tired pickin' the salt out. Bug tole him he ought to be glad cause now he was well seasoned. Then the fellow jabbed at Bug with a knife. Missed him though."
"Well, I'm 'glad the affair is over," said Ned. "We'll be able to get some sleep now. Batters, suppose you and Joe come in our tent? There is room enough."
Batters hesitated and gave an awkward hitch to his trousers.
"I reckon you'd better not do any more sleepin' here," he said uneasily. "Bug pulled me aside, and said I should tell you-uns to light out afore daybreak, 'cause the other fellar will surely come back an' lay fur the chap what shot him. I dunno where Bug picked him up, or who he is. He looks like a tramp, with his dirty beard and wicked eyes. H's a mighty bad man when he gits riled, Bug says. It's a pity that chap shot him, 'cause they were both running away."
"I know that," replied Ned, "and I'm awfully sorry it happened. It was a mean, contemptible trick under the circumstances. But what had we better do now?"
"Well, I reckon it would be better to pack up and start," advised Batters. "You see Bug and the other fellar have a camp about two mile down the creek. You can slide right past it in the darkness, and if you keep on fur a good ways the fellar what was shot won't find you again. Bug tole me they didn't intend to go much further down the creek. You needn't be afraid to travel by night, 'cause there ain't any bad water near here, an' the first dam is twelve mile away."
Ned was inclined to act promptly on Batters' suggestions, and It goes without saying that the others were of the same mind--especially Randy, who had conceived a mortal fear of Bug's companion.
It was between one and two o'clock when the boys began the work of breaking camp, and as Batters and Joe rendered useful assistance, the heavily laden canoes were in the water half an hour later. The start was made in darkness and silence. Ned thanked Batters for the important service he had rendered that night, and added a few words of comfort and sympathy.
Hands were shaken all around, and hopes expressed of meeting again. Then the Jolly Rovers paddled noiselessly away in the gloom, and Batters and Joe went up the beach to their shelter of pine boughs.
CHAPTER VIII
HOW THE DAY DAWNED
It was with no pleasant sensations that the boys found themselves for the second time adrift in the darkness. Not that they had any fears of the journey that lay before them; that was a trifling matter compared to the loss of sleep and the indignity of being routed out of their snug beds through no fault of their own.
There was no open complaint, however, and for ten or fifteen minutes the silence of the night was disturbed only by the low swish of the paddles, as the four canoes moved abreast down midstream.
"This thing is getting monotonous, and I hope it won't happen again," remarked Ned finally, in a very grave voice. "If you fellows had listened to me this morning we would be sound asleep this minute in some place down the creek, instead of floating here in the dark with a forced paddle of ten miles ahead of us."
"It's hard luck, that's a fact," muttered Clay.
"No luck about it," retorted Ned. "It's pure recklessness, and Randy is chiefly to blame."
"No more than the rest of you," growled Randy. "I wasn't the only one that wanted to stay."
"I don't mean that," said Ned, "though of course the trouble began there. I refer to your foolish act a little while ago. If you hadn't fired that salt cartridge the men would have gone quietly away, and we could have remained where we were until morning. Now you have made a bitter enemy, and if he don't give us future annoyance it will only be through the intercession of Batters' brother--provided he has enough influence over his companion.
"I feel glad in one way that we stayed. Batters and Joe are good hearted fellows, if they _are_ rough on the outside, and it was a pleasure to become acquainted with them. I hope their brother Bug will turn over a new leaf some day, and be allowed to go home.
"But that wasn't what I started in to talk about," resumed Ned after a brief pause. "The fact is, Randy, that you must be more careful in future. You have been to blame for every one of our scrapes so far, and if you intend to keep this up we may as well abandon the cruise and go home. This is the second warning I've had to give you. The other one don't seem to have done much good."
"I think you are getting pretty meddlesome, Ned Chapman," exclaimed Randy in a sullen tone; "when I want any advice from you I'll ask for it."
"Don't give way to your temper, now," returned Ned quietly, "I'm talking for the common good, and you know it in your heart."
"Ned's right," exclaimed Clay. "This cruise has been a chapter of misadventures from the start, and every one of them lies at your door."
Randy drove his paddle into the water with furious strokes, and was soon a dozen yards ahead of his companions.
"I'll give you fellows a chance to get out of the dumps," he called back angrily. "I hope you'll be in a better humor when we meet again."
Then he drove the canoe forward so rapidly that the dip of the paddle was soon faint in the distance.
"Let him go," said Ned. "He can't come to any harm, and it will give him a good chance to cool down. That's the main trouble with Randy. Up comes his temper at the least word of rebuke, and though he knows that he is wrong, his self will and anger won't let him admit it. I believe he will take this warning to heart though."
Clay and Nugget did not reply. The former's conscience was a little bit uneasy, for he knew that his imprudent utterance had started Randy off in anger.
The three boys paddled on silently for a while, and then Nugget managed to ground the Imp on a concealed ledge of rocks. It required the united efforts of his companions to dislodge it, and even then it was a labor of nearly five minutes' duration. A canvas canoe must be handled very carefully when among the rocks.
About this time the moon came out from a bank of fleecy clouds, and the light--feeble though it was--enabled the boys to make better speed, and to keep a watch ahead for shoals.
A moment later they wished with all their hearts that the moon was on the other side of the globe, for a bend in the channel revealed a fire on the right bank, a short distance below. The flames were partly screened by a fringe of bushes, but not sufficiently to prevent the ruddy light from flashing far across the water.
"That must be Bug Batters's camp," whispered Ned.
"It will be a ticklish operation to get by if the men are on the watch. We can manage to, though, if we are prudent and don't lose our heads. Don't breathe a word or make any noise with your paddles. Just stick close to me."
Ned headed for the left bank, which was thickly wooded, and paddled slowly and noiselessly along the very edge. The others followed his example, and in a short time the three canoes were directly opposite the fire. Two dark figures squatting beside it could be plainly seen. The dancing reflection of the flames revealed the boat pulled partially out of water, and stretched far beyond mid channel.
It was a thrilling moment. Discovery at first seemed inevitable, for the men were facing the creek. But as no alarm came, and the canoes crept deeper into the friendly gloom, the boys began to breathe more easily.
They did not relax their caution until the fire was two or three hundred yards in the rear. Then Ned signified that the danger was over by paddling boldly and swiftly toward mid-channel.
"I hope we have seen the last of Bug Batters and his companion," he said, "and I really believe that they won't give us any more trouble."
"I'm glad to hear you say so," replied Clay. "That's my opinion, too. If we put about ten miles between us and them we ought to feel safe."
"Better make it twenty," remarked Nugget uneasily. "Then we will be twice as safe."
"Oh, that won't be necessary," laughed Ned. "I say, fellows, it must have been a pretty stiff ordeal for Randy to go by that fire, within sight of the man he peppered with salt."
"Well, I should say so," returned Clay. "When we catch up with him we'll ask him how he felt."
"But that won't be for some time to come," said Ned, "unless we move a little faster. Try to keep up with me, and don't lag behind."
He started off with short, quick strokes, and after a brief race the others settled down abreast of him.
The moon outlined the limits of the creek very distinctly, shining first from one side, then from the other, as the channel followed its tortuous course. The water continued deep and fairly swift, and during the next hour and a half the boys must have paddled no less than six or seven miles.
Nothing was seen of Randy, but this fact was easily explained, since he had gained considerable on his companions at the start, and had moreover a light and easily running canoe.
Presently the sky to the eastward became faintly streaked with gray, and the close night air was succeeded by a fragrant and delicious breeze. Dawn came on apace, heralded by the singing of birds, and the splashing of fish in search of the early insect. The mist began to rise from the water, and in some distant barnyard hungry cattle lowed.
"There is some compensation in night travel," said Ned. "It will be a treat to see the sun come up. Two or three miles more and then we'll hunt a snug camping place, and have a plunge in the creek, and a good breakfast on top of it, and sleep until afternoon. I don't feel very tired just now, but I'm ravenously hungry."
"So am I," echoed Clay and Nugget in one breath.
As the daylight advanced the boys paddled on with light hearts. In the long level stretch that was now ahead of them no sign of Randy was visible. As the next bend--an unusually sharp one--drew near, a dull, roaring sound was heard.
"That must be a bit of swift water," observed Ned; "I hope it's long enough to give us a good spin."
"But won't it be dangerous?" asked Nugget uneasily.
"Of course not," replied Clay. "There couldn't be any danger on a small stream like this, and besides Batters told us everything was smooth for twelve miles ahead."
It is more than probable that when Batters made this statement he had in mind his own safe and bulky craft, which could have stood any amount of rough usage without upsetting. But this version of the matter did not occur to the boys. They confidently paddled on, hoping to find a stretch of swift water that would give them a lift on their journey.
Just at the commencement of the curve a spit of rocks and trees jutted out from the right shore. As the boys were whirled swiftly around this, the first brief glimpse of what lay beyond proved far from satisfactory.
The creek narrowed to half its former width, and the greater part of even this contracted channel was rendered unnavigable by a long bar of gravel and grass, over which an inch or so of water crawled sluggishly. The main channel--only half a dozen feet wide--headed abruptly to the right, and swept at breakneck speed in a perfect half circle under the outwardly projecting base of a steep and wooded hill. Here and there the bushes hung down to meet the madly tossing waves, and swayed violently.
It was already too late to turn back, and it was equally out of the question to cut across the swift rushing current and gain the shallow bar. Speedy disaster would have resulted from _that_ step.
Ned was half a canoe's length in advance, and without a second's delay he swung the bow of the Pioneer around to meet the curve of the channel.
"Paddle toward the left!--the left!" he shouted hoarsely to his companions. "Keep your heads down when you come to the bushes."
Ned had no chance to say more. His own affairs required his undivided attention. With a dizzy jerk he swung into the half circle, rising and falling with the huge waves. A few tremendous paddle strokes deflected him to the left, and fortunately he cleared the outer fringe of bushes.
Just when the worst seemed to be over the Pioneer ran broadside on a submerged rock, tipped instantly, and out went Ned head over heels.
He was dragged clear to the bottom of the rapids before he could gain a foothold. Then, waist deep in water, he grabbed the Pioneer as it drifted by him, and waded with it to a narrow landing place at the base of the hill.
Even less fortunate was Nugget. The dizzy whirl of the current and the jolting motion of the waves so terrified him that he dropped his paddle and clutched the combing with both hands. Then, as the bushes directly ahead caught his eye, he threw up his arms and seized them.
The next instant the canoe was whisked from under him, leaving him clinging to the frail support, shrieking with terror and bobbing up and down on the waves. He remained in this position only a few seconds. Clay's canoe struck him obliquely, and the concussion caused it to swing broadside and upset. Both lads were rolled over and over to the foot of the rapids, where Ned helped them and their canoes to shore.
CHAPTER IX
A SAFE SHELTER
For a moment the three wrecked Jolly Rovers could only stare blankly at their dripping clothes, and at one another. The whole thing had taken place so quickly that they did not as yet realize the extent of the misfortune.
Finally Ned and Clay broke into a hearty laugh, while Nugget sat down on a rock and wiped the tears from his eyes.
"Hullo, there!" cried a familiar voice, as Randy appeared from behind a patch of bushes a few yards down the shore. "Great Cæsar! what a mess you fellows are in!"
"Thanks to you," replied Ned. "Why didn't you come up the creek and warn us?"
"That's just what I was on my way to do, 'pon my honor it was. I couldn't get here a minute sooner. I upset in that beastly place myself, and was carried down below those bushes. Look at that!" Randy pointed to his muddy feet and wet clothes. It was evident that he was speaking the truth.
"Well, what's done can't be undone," said Ned. "We must make the best of it. I'm afraid, the water has spoilt a good deal of our stuff."
"You can count yourselves lucky if your canoes aren't injured," rejoined Randy. "The rocks tore the keel nearly off of mine, and it leaks like a basket."
"Then we are in for a long delay," exclaimed Ned vexatiously. "It's unfortunate just at this time, when we ought to be four or five miles farther down the stream."
"You won't think so when I show you the place I've found," replied Randy. "We could camp there for a month, and no one would be any the wiser. It's over on the left shore where the current first landed me. I had a look at the spot and then waded to this side with the canoe."
"The first thing is to get dry clothes on," returned Ned. "The morning air is too cool for comfort."
"Down below here is just the place you want then," said Randy. "A big gravel bar. The sun shines on it beautifully."
This statement brought a smile even to Nugget's face, and without delay the boys proceeded down the creek.
As it was impossible to get any wetter they waded, pushing the canoes ahead of them. The gravel bar was twenty yards below, in mid-channel, and sure enough the first rays of the sun fell full upon it.
The canoes were speedily denuded of everything they held, and the gravel was soon strewn with water soaked bread, crackers, blankets, fishing rods, writing paper, and envelopes. The other provisions, being incased in jars, were uninjured; and so also were the extra clothes, thanks to the oiled canvas bags in which they were wrapped.
The boys quickly made the change, and stretched out their wet garments to dry. The canoes were placed bottom up to drain, and after satisfying himself that the Water Sprite was damaged beyond immediate repair, Ned suggested that Randy should point out the place he had discovered.
The latter was only too willing, and when the boys had followed his instructions by rolling their trousers above their knees, he led them through the shallow water toward the left shore.
As they advanced nothing was visible but the low bank, densely covered with bushes and young timber. Randy was several yards in advance, and all at once he stooped and disappeared. The others followed his example, and when they had waded with bent backs under a heavy screen of bushes, they were amazed to find themselves in the mouth of a good sized stream.
The water was knee deep, and flowed gently over a bed of sand and pebbles. For a distance of sixty or seventy feet inland the stream was three or four yards wide; then came a deep circular pool fed by a brawling waterfall that dashed impetuously down a mossy incline of rocks. On all sides were inviting clumps of bushes, and slender trees bending over their weight of foliage, while from branch to branch swung foxgrape vines.
Near the head of the pool was a grassy open spot shaded by half a dozen monster shellbark trees--a perfect little Eden. In fact the whole scene was so entrancing to these lads, who well knew how to appreciate Nature's most charming moods, that they stood still with the cool water surging against their knees, to look and listen.
The sunlight filtered obliquely through the leaves, gleaming here and there in the dark thickets like stray gold, and shimmering on the eddies of the pool. The air was fragrant with the scent of wild flowers, and from every direction came the music of birds and the busy chattering of squirrels.
"I knew you fellows would fall in love with the place," said Randy. "Just think of spending two or three days here--or maybe a week. There's nothing to prevent it. Under those shellbark trees is a grand place for a tent, and here is water enough to float fifty canoes. The bushes completely hide the entrance, and when we are all fixed snug I'll defy Bug Batters or any one else to find us in a month. What do you say, Ned? Do you think it's necessary now to go farther down the creek?"
Ned drew a long breath.
"I think this is the most beautiful spot I ever saw," he replied. "I'll stay here a week if the rest are willing."
The rest _were_ willing--emphatically so. Clay immediately began to indulge in visions of trout fishing farther up the stream, which must have its source in the mountains. Nugget declared it was a good place to rest, while Randy expressed an opinion that game was plentiful in the vicinity.
Having waded to the edge of the pool, where the water deepened abruptly, the boys returned as they had come, and were soon back on the gravel bar. They were too hungry to go to the trouble of making a fire, so they breakfasted on damp crackers and dried beef, and found them very palatable, too.
Then, as the sun had already dried the things, the canoes were loaded and pushed up the mouth of the stream. The boys took good care to remove every trace of their presence from the bar, and to deftly rearrange the screen of bushes after passing through.
The tent was soon staked under the shellbark trees, and the canoes were carried out beside it. The Jolly Rovers now felt as safe as though they were fifty miles down the creek. Being pretty well exhausted by the interruption of the previous night and by their long paddle, they made pillows out of their blankets, and went to sleep on the grassy floor of the tent.
But it is not an easy matter to turn day into night, and so the boys found it. Ned awoke about noon, and threw the flap open so that the sun could stream into the tent--as much of it at least as came through the thick foliage. It was sufficient to rouse Randy and Nugget. Clay was missing, but as his fishing rod had also disappeared, no alarm was felt over this fact.
Of course, dinner immediately suggested itself, so Ned started to make the fire, while Randy inspected the supplies to see what was available.
"Damp crackers and cold meat are about all we can count on," he announced dismally. "There are only a half a dozen potatoes here. You might boil some oatmeal, though."
"We must get along with what we have," replied Ned. "This afternoon some of us must make a foraging expedition. We can't be very far from a farmhouse."
The fire was soon blazing merrily, and just as Ned placed the coffee pot on the bars, a cheery whistle rang through the woods, and Clay appeared at the head of the pool.
"See what you lazy fellows have missed," he exclaimed, holding up a string of speckled brook trout. "I caught all those in the last two hours, and tramped more than a mile up stream to get them."
The boys were delighted at this unexpected addition to their dinner, and the spotted beauties were soon ready for the frying pan. Hunger made a piquant sauce, and the crackers, meat and fish vanished in short order.
"I intend to let you fellows wash the dishes this time," said Ned, when the meal was concluded. "I'm going after supplies. We certainly need them badly enough. Did you see any signs of a farmhouse when you were up the stream, Clay?"
"No indeed. The woods are thick in every direction, and I have no doubt they stretch clear to the mountains. It's awfully wild and lonesome along the stream."
"No use in trying that direction then," replied Ned. "I think I'll go down the creek in my canoe."
"Let me go with you," said Randy. "You may have a big load to carry back you know."
Ned hesitated an instant, and then gave his consent. He really preferred to be alone, but he saw that Randy was very sorry for his recent ill conduct, and wanted to make what amends he could.
Clay loaned Randy his canoe, and promised to repair the Water Sprite during the latter's absence. Then the foraging expedition paddled out into the creek, equipped with tin pails and canvas sacks.
Clay and Nugget were at no loss to find occupation. It required a good half hour to wash and dry the dishes, and after that a big stack of firewood was piled up. Then the Water Sprite was placed across two logs, and Clay proceeded to make the needed repairs. Having screwed the keel firmly in place, he thrust cotton under its whole length with his knife blade, and then put on a plentiful coating of white lead.
"There!" he exclaimed, as he surveyed his own work with satisfaction. "That canoe won't leak a drop in the morning. I say, Nugget, let's go fishing a little while. It's only five o'clock, and the boys won't be back for an hour or two yet."
Nothing could have pleased Nugget more. He made the proviso, however, that Randy's gun should be taken along.
"I don't know what you're afraid of," said Clay; "but I'll humor you anyhow."
He shouldered the weapon, first looking to see that it was loaded, and started up the stream. Nugget trudged behind with the two fishing rods.
Half a mile from camp the boys stopped by a deep pool that presented a very tempting aspect. The bushes and trees were dense all around it.
"This is where I caught my first fish this morning," whispered Clay, as he put a nice fat worm on the hook and dropped it in the water.
Almost instantly the line tightened, and the slender rod bent. Clay gave a quick pull, and something shiny whizzed through the air, landing with a dull flop some yards behind the boys.
"That was a big fellow," exclaimed Clay. "It flew clear off the hook. Get it for me, Nugget, will you? I want to catch another."
Nugget obligingly dropped the hook he was baiting, and crawled on hands and knees into the thicket.
A few seconds later he burst out, yelling wildly for help, while a crackling of bushes behind him told plainly that something or someone was in close pursuit.
CHAPTER X
A TRAMP ACROSS COUNTRY
Nugget dashed by Clay without stopping, and crossed the stream, close to the lower end of the pool, in two or three frantic leaps.
Clay was frightened himself, but observing that the rustling noise in the thicket had ceased, he boldly stood his ground, taking the precaution, however, to exchange his fishing rod for the gun.
"What's wrong?" he demanded, turning warily toward Nugget, who was on the opposite side of the stream with one hand clasping the low boughs of 3 pine tree.
"There's some wild animal in there," cried Nugget hoarsely. "It looked at me with its shining eyes, and then growled. Shoot it quick, before it comes out."
Just then the rustling in the thicket recommenced, and with wonderful celerity Nugget disappeared into the heart of the tree.
But the creature, whatever it might be, was going in the opposite direction from the pool. This emboldened Clay, and without hesitation he started in pursuit, paying no attention to Nugget's appealing cries. Guided by the threshing of bushes he pushed on for ten or twenty yards.
Then it suddenly occurred to him that the animal might be a wildcat or even a bear, that had strayed down from the mountains. A close encounter of this nature was by no means to Clay's liking. He stopped, and was just about turning back, when he saw a dark object passing through a break in the thicket about thirty feet away.
The shadows were too deep to afford a good glimpse of the animal, but Clay did not hesitate. Drawing the gun to his shoulder he took quick aim and fired.
When the smoke cleared the creature had vanished, but from a distance came a queer grunting noise mingled with the hasty crashing of the bushes.
"I believe that was a bear," muttered Clay, "and unless I'm greatly mistaken I put a few shot into his hind quarters."
He stood listening until the sounds had died away, and then retraced his steps toward the pool, satisfied that no more trouble was to be apprehended from the unwelcome prowler.
Nugget was still in the tree, and came down very reluctantly, even when he knew what had happened. Then the boys shouldered their fishing rods and hurried back to camp, arriving there just as Ned and Randy paddled up the mouth of the stream.
Clay's adventure--which he related with conscious pride--caused somewhat of a sensation. Randy and Nugget wanted to break camp at once, and Clay was more than inclined to side with them.
"Nonsense!" exclaimed Ned. "I don't believe it was a wild animal at all, and even if it was it would hardly come near here again after being shot at."
"Then what could it have been?" demanded Clay a little sharply.
"Some stray domestic creature, as likely as not," answered Ned.
Clay did not reply. He was far from unwilling to accept this version of the affair, though he still had his doubts.
The others were reassured by Ned's words, and when the fruits of the foraging expedition were taken from the canoes all else was forgotten but supper.
"Won't we have a feast?" said Randy. "Just see here, fellows. Fresh, yellow butter, a pail of milk, three pies, two loaves of bread, a cup of cheese, a picked duck, and potatoes and apples! We had a time to get them, though--a mile and a half down the creek, and half a mile over the fields."
It was nearly dark when supper was ready, and the meal was eaten with such slow enjoyment that nine o'clock arrived before the last of the dishes were washed and put away. Then the tired boys went to bed, after securing the tent flaps with more than usual care.
No alarm disturbed their sleep that night. Wednesday dawned clear as a whistle. Before the sun was fairly up the boys took a plunge in the cool depths of the pool, and the result was such a crop of voracious appetites that Randy predicted another foraging expedition before the day was over.
After breakfast Ned sat down on a stone, and spreading a lengthy paper on his knees, began to study it intently.
"What have you there?" asked Randy.
"A map of the Cumberland Valley," replied Ned. "Do you know, we almost forgot about our mail arrangements? It's a good thing I remembered it this morning. If this stream we are camping on now is Otter Run--and according to the-map it is--then West Hill is only half a dozen miles due east of us.
"That is the first place we were to expect letters, and we won't get any nearer to it than we are now. I think I'll walk over. You may go with me, Clay, if you like. The distance is too much for Nugget, and it's Randy's turn to stay in camp."
No objection was made to this arrangement, and all hurriedly produced paper and pencils and sat down on the grass to write letters home.
"I'm asking for a cake," said Randy. "Where shall I have it sent?"
"Carlisle," answered Ned. "We will be there next week. Tell them to make it a big one."
"And not to forget to put icing on it," added Clay.
"Oh, that goes without telling," said Randy laughingly. "They know what I like."
In half an hour all the letters were sealed and addressed. Then Ned and Clay brushed off their clothes and put on neckties, greatly to Randy's amusement.
"What are you laughing at?" exclaimed Ned. "Don't you know that we may be invited out to dinner at West Hill? I wish I had a dress suit with me."
"What a pity you haven't," said Randy mockingly. "Nugget will lend you his yachting cap."
"Of course I will," said Nugget in all seriousness. "Say, Ned," he whispered, coming up close, "I--I have a white shirt in my bag and a dotted vest. I thought they might come in handy. You are quite welcome to them, you know, if--"
Nugget's indiscreet confession went no further. Ned rolled on the ground, choking with laughter. He actually couldn't help it.
Clay and Randy had heard every word, and poor Nugget was finally obliged to take refuge in the tent.
"This won't do," said Ned, struggling to keep a sober face. "We must be off. I hope you won't get in any fresh scrapes while we are away, Randy. You had better stay about camp. You may look for us back some time this afternoon--not later than four o'clock."
"Oh, I won't have time to get in mischief," laughed Randy. "It will take all day to write my log book up to date. I haven't touched it since night before last."
It was about half past nine o'clock when the boys started. They paddled across the creek and landed at the foot of the hill. Randy accompanied them in the Water Sprite, so that he could tow the canoe back with him.
"Just you fellows sing out," he said. "I'll hear you and come across."
"All right," returned Ned, as he commenced the steep ascent of the hill, with Clay at his heels.
Reaching the summit they turned and waved their hands to Randy, who was slowly paddling toward camp, far below them.
Of the camp itself not a vestige could be seen, even from this elevation.
Then the boys set their faces toward the east, and strode briskly through the pine forest that covered the level plateau. For a mile or two the land was very rugged and lonely. Then open fields began to appear here and there, and an occasional farmhouse nestled amid orchards in a valley, or standing boldly against the sky from a hill top.
Such implicit faith did Ned place in his map that he shunned the roads, and did not think it worth while to stop at any of the farmhouses to ask information. With a view to reaching the village in the most direct manner, he cut straight across country, skirting fields of grain and corn, it is true, but taking everything else as it came--hills, ravines, orchards, and meadows.
And all this time the boys were making one of the most foolish blunders that can well be imagined--taking into consideration, of course, the peculiar nature of the creek and the constantly shifting scenery through which they were passing. Later on, when the consequences of their thoughtlessness stared them in the face, they wondered how they could have been so blind.
When the farmhouse bells began to clang from distant points the boys knew that it was half past eleven o'clock.
"We have surely covered six miles in two hours," said Ned. "West Hill can't be far away. No doubt we will see it from that next ridge."
But when the ridge was gained no village was in sight. Something else was visible, however--a narrow country road, running at right angles to the direction from which the boys had come; and nailed to the fence was a sign post, inscribed in crooked black letters as follows:
To West Hill 3 Miles.
There was nothing for it but to go on, and that they did in a weary, dispirited manner.
"The map can't be wrong," said Ned, "the trouble is that we veered a little too far south in our course. We'll make a nearer cut of it on the return trip. Walk a little faster, Clay; it will be a tight squeeze to reach camp by four o'clock."
It wanted a little less than three hours to that time when the boys reached the little cluster of six houses which comprised West Hill. The signboard had probably told only half the truth in regard to distance--as country signboards usually do.
The postoffice was, of course, combined with a produce store. At this time of day its only occupants were the proprietor and a grizzled old farmer puffing at a corncob pipe.
The letters were soon mailed, and in response to Ned's inquiry he was handed a weighty hat box addressed to Randolph Moore, and a batch of half a dozen letters.
"I'll bet a dollar that's a cake," said Clay. "It will tickle Randy."
"It wouldn't tickle him if he had to carry it about nine miles," replied Ned ruefully, "and the box says 'handle with care,' too."
However, the cake could not be left behind, and the boys agreed to carry it by turns.
"How far is Otter Run from here in a straight line?" inquired Ned of the storekeeper.
"'Bout eleven mile," was the reply. "Ain't that kerect, Bowser?"
"It's mor'n that by road," said the old farmer, taking his pipe from his lips. "It's a good thirteen mile to Tanner's Dam, an' the run comes in just below the mill race."
The boys exchanged glances of dismay.
"That map fooled me after all," muttered Ned. "The camp can't be anywhere near Otter Run."
He then explained the situation to the two men, describing as minutely as possible the location of the camp. Both wagged their heads dubiously.
"I can't fix it to a sartainty," said the storekeeper.
"Nor kin I," observed Mr. Bowser. "There air heaps of jest sich runs, an' high hills an' bits of bad water--same as you chaps tell about."
It was evident that no positive information could be obtained, so the boys said "good day," and left the store.
"Under the circumstances we won't risk making a bee line for camp," said Ned. "If we had any landmarks to go by it would be different."
"Then must we go back the way we came?" asked Clay.
"Exactly; we have nine weary miles to tramp. I'm sorry, but it can't be helped. Just think of a good supper and a snug bed, Clay, and you won't mind the distance so much."
"It's this confounded box that worries me," muttered Clay. "I believe I'd sooner carry a feather bed. The crazy thing jerks when I stick it under one arm, and if I hug it to my breast it hits me on the chin every few seconds. It's so heavy that the cords cut my hand if I try to carry it that way. I wish I could balance it on my head."
Clay did not exaggerate the perverse and obstinate nature of that hat box. It changed bearers no less than six times before the mendacious signpost was reached, and then its victims were so exhausted that they had to lie down on the grass and rest.
CHAPTER XI
SEARCHING FOR THE CAMP
It was already past three o'clock when the boys resumed their tramp, abandoning the road and heading across country along the same course by which they had come.
For the first two or three miles they did not pay any special attention to the scenery around them; they were kept busy climbing fences and hills, and taking care of the refractory cake box, which became more and more of a burden every moment. Finally as they were descending a long wooded slope, Ned was amazed to discover that the mountains, instead of being straight ahead, lay off to the right.
"That's a funny mistake," he said. "I wonder how long we have been moving parallel with the creek instead of toward it? Some of those snaky ravines we passed through must have turned us around without our knowing it."
"I hope we haven't lost the path," returned Clay. "Nothing about here looks familiar to me, but then I didn't pay much attention to the scenery this morning."
"Neither did I," replied Ned uneasily, "and I'm afraid that's just where we made a big mistake. If we had only noted some landmarks as we came along, we would not be in this fix now. It really is a pretty serious fix, Clay. You see we can't tell how long we have been traveling in this wrong direction. The only thing we can do now is to head straight for the mountains, and run the chances of striking the creek in the vicinity of the camp."
"That's true," assented Clay. "I hope we'll reach it before dark. Randy and Nugget will be pretty badly scared if we don't."
They started off again, headed this time in the proper direction. Of course the mountains were visible only at rare intervals, and this added to the perplexity of the situation, since it is very difficult to keep on a straight line unless some guiding point is constantly in view.
It was soon evident that the boys were far astray from the path they had followed that morning. The country was more lonely and rugged--a continual succession of steep hills and dense bits of forest. Few farmhouses were visible, and those only at a distance.
The sun sank lower and lower as they trudged wearily along. The many miles already covered that day were beginning to tell on them severely. They were hungry, too, having eaten nothing since breakfast.
"I wish we had bought some crackers and cheese at the store," said Ned; "I thought about it when we were nearly a mile away, but it was too late then to go back."
"We have Randy's cake," replied Clay. "I'm going to break into it if we don't soon reach camp. I don't remember when I was so hungry as I am now."
"Wait a little while," said Ned. "The creek surely can't be far away. The chances are that it lies beyond that next hill."
The hill to which he had reference was a good half mile distant, and the pine trees on its crest loomed sharply against the blue sky. Ere reaching it the boys were destined to be deprived of their burden in a very aggravating manner--and just when they had begun to appreciate its value as a means of satisfying their hunger.
As they emerged from a copse of hazel bushes on a narrow country road, a big black dog bounded from the step of a little cabin a few yards away, and came at them in a most ferocious manner. The boys darted across the road and into a clover field through a broken place in the fence.
The dog followed, paying not the least attention to the loud commands of a woman who stood in the cabin door. When Ned wheeled around the brute was within a dozen feet of him, growling savagely, showing his fangs and teeth, and coming on at a pace which meant business.
Shouting had no effect whatever, and as not a stick or a stone was within reach, the boy's situation was far from pleasant. But he had the cake box in his arms, and on the impulse of the moment he lifted it over his head with both hands and dashed it with all his might at the advancing brute.
It struck him fairly on the nose, breaking open with the force of the blow, and turning the angry snarls into a shrill yelp of pain. Ned did not wait to see the result, but dashed across the field to overtake Clay.
When they turned and looked back from a safe distance, the dog was greedily devouring the broken cake.
"We won't be troubled with that any more," said Ned. "I had to do it, or the brute would have bitten me. I don't think Randy will blame me much."
"It means good-by to our supper though," replied Clay, "and from the way that dog eats, his appetite won't be more than half satisfied when he finishes the cake. We had better be moving on."
This was prudent advice, and the boys made quick time across the field, not feeling thoroughly safe until they were in the shelter of the woods. The ground now began to ascend, and a few moments later they gained the top of the hill and saw the silvery thread of the creek shining far below them.
It took some time to descend, owing to the steepness of the slope, and the rocks and bushes that obstructed the way. When they finally reached the water's edge the duskiness of twilight had come, and they knew that darkness would follow in a short time.
"I haven't the faintest idea where we are," said Ned uneasily; "of course we are above the camp, no doubt of that; but just how far, is the important question. I feel like kicking myself for making that awful blunder to-day. It would be a nice thing if we had to tramp all night."
"You don't think the camp is that far away?" exclaimed Clay in alarm.
"Oh, no," replied Ned reassuringly. "We'll probably strike it before long. The only thing we can do is to follow the creek until we reach it."
Ned's words were far from expressing what was really in his mind. He knew that the camp might be very close in a straight line, and yet miles away by the tortuous windings of the creek. And the latter was the only possible course to take. If they attempted the former they would almost certainly become hopelessly lost.
It was soon evident that the worst might be expected. In the deepening gloom the boys hurried along the shore as fast as their weary feet would take them. Then the blackness of the night settled down on the water and the forests, and they were compelled to move cautiously; for trees and bushes were thick, and here and there a ravine had to be crossed, or a brawling stream.
Ned bravely kept up his spirits, and did his best to cheer Clay.
"It can't be much farther," he would say now and then; "keep your ears open for the roar of those rapids. That will tell us when we are near camp."
But the night lengthened without bringing the welcome sound, and at last the boys found their progress abruptly barred by a steep bluff that fell abruptly into the water. It was not the hill that lay in the vicinity of camp, else the rapids could surely have been heard. The night was very still, except for an occasional noise in the forest that made the boys start.
They were confronted now by two equally unpleasant alternatives--either to remain where they were until morning, or to make a detour around the hill, and try to reach the creek on the lower side.
They chose the latter, and started up through the woods hand in hand. They might have foreseen what would happen. The night was very dark, and after floundering about through the bushes they became hopelessly lost, and knew not which way to turn in search of the creek.
Clay was quite in despair, but Ned persuaded him to move on, and after tramping for ten or fifteen minutes without the least idea which way they were headed, they reached a fence that separated the woods from an open field. As they mounted the top bar and perched themselves there for a short rest, Ned uttered a cry of delight, and pointed out a flickering yellow gleam far across the field.
"Hurrah! that must be the camp," exclaimed Clay, springing impetuously from the fence. "Come on; let's run for it. I don't feel a bit tired now."
"Not too fast," cried Ned warningly. "You're jumping at a rash conclusion now, Clay. That light is in the window of some farmhouse. It stands to reason that it can't be at our camp."
Clay stopped and retraced his steps.
"I was dead sure it was the campfire," he said dismally. "I thought our troubles were over."
"Perhaps they are," replied Ned slowly. "We'll go up to that farmhouse and find out exactly how the land lies. If the camp is not far off, we'll borrow a lantern and push on--otherwise we'll ask for a place to sleep until morning."
This arrangement was thoroughly satisfactory to Clay, and the boys started briskly across the field. They found an orchard at the farther end, and after passing through this and rounding the corner of the barn, they saw the house in front of them.
It stood in a good sized yard inclosed by a picket fence. The light was in one of the upper front rooms, where some late retiring member of the family was no doubt preparing for bed.
"It won't do to make any racket," said Ned, "because there may be a dog around. We'll go quietly in and rap on the door."
The boys softly opened the gate and entered the yard. In spite of the utmost caution their feet made a crunching noise on the gravel path, and the consequence was that before they were half way to the house a dog began to bark furiously. Worse still, the sound came from between them and the fence, so that escape was cut off.
"This way," cried Ned, dashing toward the corner of the house. "We may find shelter in the outbuildings."
He had taken but a dozen steps when his feet clattered on some loose boards. These gave way with a crash, and after a brief drop through empty space, he plunged into ice cold water, going clear under the surface.
The noise of the splitting wood that followed warned Clay of his danger. He stood stock still, trembling in every limb.
The dog did not appear to be coming any nearer, and his shrill barking was now mingled with the clank of chains. All at once Clay comprehended the situation. The brute was fastened to his kennel somewhere near the gate, and was therefore powerless to do harm.
Clay's presence of mind quickly returned. He drew a match from his pocket and struck it on his shoe just as a feeble cry for help came apparently from the bowels of the earth.
As the blaze flared up Clay saw the partially covered mouth of a well just in front of him. The gap between the planking showed where Ned had fallen through.
Clay was terribly alarmed, but he had sufficient presence of mind to kneel beside the orifice and hold the match down.
"Are you hurt, Ned?" he cried huskily. "Can you hold out for a moment or two?"
"I'm all right so far," came the reply in a feeble, chattering voice. "I can't stand it long, though. The water is over my head, and I'm holding on to the cracks in the wall. Waken the family, quick!"
CHAPTER XIII
OVER THE CLIFF
Ned's last injunction was quite unnecessary. The loud outcry of the dog had already roused the family.
Heads were poked from two or three windows, and a shrill feminine voice was shouting: "Get the gun, pap, get the gun!"
Meanwhile Clay continued to call for help at the top of his voice, finally drowning out the ferocious barking of the dog, and after what seemed an interminable length of time the door of the house opened and the farmer appeared on the threshold, attired in shirt and trousers.
He had a gun in one hand and a candle in the other. Behind him were two good sized lads armed with clubs, while the flutter of a petticoat was visible on the stairway.
"Hurry! hurry!" cried Clay. "There's some one down the well."
The farmer crossed the yard with provoking calmness, holding his gun ready for use.
"Why, it's only a boy!" he exclaimed, on catching sight of Clay. "What are you doing here, you young rascal?"
"Don't stop to ask questions now," implored Clay. "Get my friend out of the well, or he will be drowned."
The farmer uttered an exclamation, and peeped through the broken boards. Then he seized the bucket that was suspended by a windlass over the well and quickly lowered it.
"Catch hold down there," he shouted gruffly.
"All right, go ahead," came the sepulchral response, a moment later.
The farmer and his two sons threw their weight on the handle of the windlass, and after considerable creaking and groaning Ned was brought to the surface and helped out on the ground. His face and hands were blue and his teeth chattered violently.
"Bring the poor fellow right in," called the farmer's wife from the porch, where she had witnessed the whole affair. "I'll go light the fire."
"The rascal don't deserve it," muttered the farmer, but nevertheless he led the boys into the house, and thence to a large room containing a stove, a table, a huge settee and half a dozen chairs. A lamp was burning on the mantel, and a pleasant faced old lady was bustling about the stove.
Ned's wet clothes were quickly stripped off, and he was rolled in blankets and made to lie down on the settee. Presently the old lady brought him a bowl of steaming camomile tea, and after he had swallowed most of the nauseous mixture he began to feel quite himself again. Then, seeing that the farmer was suspicious and anxious for an explanation, he insisted on talking, and related the whole story in such a clear and concise manner that his hearers were thoroughly convinced.
The farmer thawed out, and showed himself in his true colors--a genial, kind-hearted old man. He told the boys his name was Adam Plunkett, and laughingly apologized for mistaking them for thieves.
When Mrs. Plunkett heard that they had eaten nothing since breakfast she immediately began to set the table--in spite of the fact that it was then half past ten o'clock. Ned refused to be treated as an invalid any longer, so Mr. Plunkett gave him a suit of clothes to wear while his own were drying.
The food was soon ready, and the famished boys did it full justice.
"I reckon you'll want to go to bed now," said Mr. Plunkett; "you must be worn out after all that tramp. In the morning I'll tell you how to find your camp. I recognize the place from your description. It's about five miles and a half from here by road, and a good bit further by the creek."
The boys gasped with amazement. It was hard to realize that they had strayed so far out of their way.
"I'm afraid our companions will be greatly worried," said Ned. "That's all I'm thinking about."
"A little worry won't hurt 'em," asserted Mr. Plunkett cheerfully. "It'll do 'em good, and make them more glad to see you in the morning."
This bit of philosophy had its effect on the boys, and the last trace of anxiety vanished when their host conducted them to the room they were to occupy. It was the typical country "spare bed-chamber." Home spun carpet covered the floor, and on the walls were cardboard mottoes in walnut frames, a sampler yellow with age, and portraits of George and Martha Washington. The bed was a huge four poster, and stood so high that the boys had to give a spring in order to climb in.
They fell asleep almost instantly, and found it difficult to get up in the morning when the farmer banged on the door with his heavy fist.
Mrs. Plunkett had a delicious breakfast ready when the boys came down stairs, and after they had eaten their fill the farmer carefully instructed them how to reach their camp--or rather how to reach a certain point on the creek which was less than a quarter of a mile above the rapids.
The boys had read the character of their hosts sufficiently well to know that it would be regarded as an insult if they should offer them money. So they thanked them profusely for their generous treatment, and said "good-by," promising to stop if they ever chanced to be in that vicinity again.
After a good sleep and a good breakfast the five mile walk was a trifle to the boys. They had no difficulty in following the directions, and about half past ten o'clock they turned aside from the road and entered a piece of woods.
Ten minutes later they stood on the bank of the creek, listening to the familiar sound of the rapids below them. The steep hill began at this point, making it impossible to follow the shore, so they began the ascent and reached the crest after a pretty stiff climb. The camp was now directly opposite, though entirely concealed by the huge shellbark trees.
"Let's give them the yell," said Ned. He placed his hand to his mouth and uttered a regular Indian war whoop that woke the echoes for a long distance. Clay did the same, and they both stopped to listen.
A minute went by in silence, and then another. No glad shout of welcome rang out from the trees. No graceful canoe parted the fringe of bushes that concealed the mouth of the run.
What was the matter? Were the boys sleeping so soundly that the signal could not rouse them? This seemed the only possible explanation, so Clay and Ned shouted more vigorously than ever, and kept it up until they were hoarse.
Not a sound came back. The silence of the morning was absolutely unbroken.
The boys looked at each other with pale and frightened faces. They dared not even whisper the terrible thoughts that were in their minds. Then, by tacit consent, they scrambled down the ragged face of the hill, and at great peril to life and limb gained the bottom in three or four minutes.
They partly undressed to wade to the gravel bar, for the water was more than waist deep. Here they stopped a moment to put on their clothes, and then, with trousers rolled high up, they waded to the mouth of the stream, and pushed eagerly through the screen of bushes.
The scene that met their gaze filled them with dread and amazement. _The glade was deserted. Every vestige of the camp had disappeared._
For a moment the boys could scarcely believe the evidence of their own eyes. They hurried forward and inspected every foot of the ground.
Absolutely nothing had been left behind. The downtrodden grass, where the tent had stood, was the only evidence to show that a camp had recently been here.
"This is a bigger mystery than I can see through," said Ned as he bent over the blackened stones of the fireplace. "The boys must have left here some time yesterday, for these ashes are cold. It looks as though they had to leave in a hurry, too, for if they had any time to spare they would surely have placed a message where we could see it. I have examined all the trees and bushes, and there is no sign of any."
"It's a bad business," replied Clay. "The boys would not have broken camp without some cause. I only hope that Bug Batters and his companions had nothing to do with it."
The same fear was in Ned's mind just then, and it was very natural that it should be. How else could the disappearance of the boys be accounted for?
"We can't tell anything about it," he answered evasively, "and it would be very foolish to jump at the worst conclusions. It will be our best plan to start down the creek at once, and I have no doubt we'll find the camp before very long. It's not at all likely the boys have moved far away."
"But they may have concealed themselves somewhere," said Clay, "and besides we don't know which bank they are on."
"We'll keep a sharp lookout on both sides," replied Ned. "If we shout every now and then I don't think we can miss them. We had better start right away. I'm getting tired of wandering about the country in this fashion. It will feel awfully good to climb in a canoe again."
Clay warmly assented to this, and after a last lingering glance at the shady thickets and the eddying surface of the pool, the boys plodded off through the woods.
For a time they experienced no difficulty in following the edge of the creek, and thus scrutinizing the opposite shore as well as the one they were on. Occasionally they shouted; first at rare intervals, then more frequently as they advanced farther along the creek.
At the expiration of an hour and a half they had traveled three or four miles, and rounded a couple of large bends without getting any response to their calls, or finding the least trace of the missing boys.
Then a precipitous hill blocked the way, extending a considerable distance along the creek, and leading sheer to the water from a variable height of forty to sixty feet.
"No use in going around it, Ned. We'll follow the crest so we can watch the opposite shore."
They easily gained the summit, and found a sort of open path between the edge of the thick pine forest and the verge of the cliff. It was half a dozen feet wide and had quite a downward slope. There was quite an element of danger connected with the ascent, since it was slippery with a coating of pine needles. The boys did not think of this, however. Of course they kept close to the trees, but as their gaze was fixed on the opposite shore, which was in plain view far below them, they could not pick out their footing as carefully as they should have done.
Pine needles are treacherous things, even on level ground, and when Clay happened to step on a particularly thick bunch his foot slipped and he was thrown quickly on his side. Before he could realize his danger he slid to the verge of the precipice--where there was nothing to stop him--and vanished from sight.
Ned was horror stricken, and had to clutch the nearest tree for support. Half a dozen seconds passed, but the splash that he dreaded to hear did not come. Then he made his way cautiously to a rock that jutted from the cliff half a dozen-feet from where Clay had fallen. Ned threw himself flat on his breast and peered down.
Clay was twenty feet below him clinging to a bunch of stout bushes that grew in a crevice of the cliff. His feet rested on a tiny ledge no more than six inches wide, and below him was a clear drop of thirty feet to the dark surface of the creek.
Ned realized his utter inability to render aid, and his agony found vent in a sharp cry.
Clay turned a white, pitiful face upward.
"You can't help me," he gasped hoarsely. "The bushes are tearing loose. If the water is deep I stand a chance. Try to get--"
His feeble voice was smothered by a sharp ripping noise, and the next instant he plunged downward, attended by a shower of dirt and stones.
CHAPTER XIII
WHAT CLAY SHOT
We must now take the reader back to the previous morning, and see what befell Randy and Nugget after their companions had started for West Hill. Nugget amused himself until dinner time by fishing at the mouth of the run, and caught a number of sunfish and chubs.
When he returned Randy had just finished entering the events of the cruise in the log book. Then they started in to get dinner, and Randy proved himself no novice in culinary affairs by frying a delicious panful of fish and boiling some excellent coffee.
The distasteful work of washing the dishes was duly performed, and then they began to consider what they should do next. Randy wanted to go away up the stream for trout, but Nugget was unwilling to trust himself in the woods after his experience of the previous evening, and was equally determined not to remain alone in camp.
This obstinate conduct roused Randy's temper, and indications pointed a lively quarrel.
"I never saw such a coward," he exclaimed angrily. "You're a nice fellow to go on a canoe trip, I must say."
"I'm not a coward," returned Nugget hotly. "I'm not afraid of you, anyhow, and if you call me any more names I'll show you something."
Randy laughed scornfully, and was about to make a bitter reply when a trampling noise was heard in the woods behind the tent, followed by a violent agitation of the bushes. A few seconds later a big brindle cow appeared on the scene, followed by a small boy shouting "Hi! hi!" at the top of his voice.
The cow was evidently in no mood to listen to argument; she pranced at the tent with lowered horns, knocked it flat, and trampled with dirty hoofs over the clean canvas.
Then she rushed at Nugget with a vicious bellow, and after pursuing him a few yards in the direction of the creek, she suddenly changed her mind, and charged on Randy and the small boy, who were standing by the edge of the pool. The latter escaped by dodging nimbly to one side, but Randy was not agile enough, and as the cow brushed by him her revolving tail lashed him smartly over the face, and tumbled him into the pool.
He emerged dripping wet, and mad as a hornet, just in time to see the cow retreating in the direction she had come, with the small boy in pursuit.
"Look here," cried Randy, "what do you mean by letting a vicious animal like that run loose? Look at that tent, and look at the condition I'm in. For half a cent I'd get my gun and shoot the brute."
The boy stopped at the edge of the bushes and looked back. He was quite a little fellow, with sunburned legs and face.
"That cow has more right here than you-uns," he said sullenly. "My uncle Dan owns this land. He knows you-uns are here, and he's comin' down pretty soon, too. He says you-uns will be sorry you shot that calf afore he gits done with you."
Randy stared at the lad in amazement, and then a sudden light broke on his mind.
"That explains the bear story," he muttered, and then added to Nugget, who had just ventured to come forward: "You fellows have got us in a pretty mess. It was a calf that Clay shot last night. I'm glad it's not my fault this time."
"A calf!" exclaimed Nugget. "I don't see how it can be possible. It had shiny eyes."
"The calf was shot, anyhow," said the boy. "It got astray yesterday afternoon, and our hired man found it this morning. It ain't hurt very bad, an Uncle Dan thinks it'll get well. That's the reason the cow is so cross, 'cause she can't have the calf with her. She broke the fence down this morning an' got into the woods. I'll have a hard time gittin' her home again."
"You say your uncle is cross about the calf?" asked Randy.
"He's hoppin' mad," said the boy. "He's going to give you all a lickin', an' then hev you locked up for trespassin'."
"But suppose we explain to him that it was all a mistake, and offer to pay the damages," continued Randy, "wouldn't that satisfy him?"
The boy shook his head.
"Uncle Dan ain't that kind. When he gets mad nobody kin stop him, I reckon he'll lick you chaps pretty hard."
"I reckon he won't," said Randy, decisively. "Not if we know ourselves. Pitch in and help, Nugget; we must light out of this as quick as possible."
Nugget was only too willing to lend his aid, and the tent was speedily rolled up, and deposited in the cockpit of the Pioneer, where it belonged.
"Uncle Dan may be here any minute," said the boy. "You-uns had better wait."
"Say, you'd like to see us licked, wouldn't you?" inquired Randy. "I'm sorry we can't oblige you by staying. Here is a dollar for your uncle to square up the damage to the calf. Just say to him that it was a mistake, and that he needn't come after us, because we are going straight through to Harrisburg."
The lad pocketed the money, and after looking on for a little while in silence he went away to hunt the refractory cow.
The boys worked with feverish energy--not forgetting to keep a sharp eye on the woods--and in scarcely more time than it takes to tell everything was in the canoes.
"It goes hard to leave here," said Randy, "but it can't be helped. It would be a nice ending to the canoe trip if we got locked up for trespassing. I hope the dollar will satisfy that man."
"What are we going to do about Ned and Clay?" asked Nugget.
"I'll attend to that," replied Randy, as he stepped into the Water Sprite and tied its stern to the bow of the Pioneer.
The other two canoes were arranged in the same way, and then the boys paddled quickly out of the stream.
They first crossed to the other side of the creek, where Randy wrote a short explanatory note for Ned and Clay, instructing them to follow the creek down about three or four miles.
"It won't be safe for us to stop short of that distance," he remarked as he pinned the big white document to a tree at the base of the hill.
"The boys can't miss this when they come down to the water. They ought to be here in about two hours."
Having arranged their means of communication, Randy climbed back into the canoe, and led the way down stream. Progress was necessarily tedious, since the current was sluggish, and each had an additional canoe in tow. They felt more at ease when they had passed round the first bend, and after paddling for two or three miles--as nearly as could be judged--they began to search for a good camping place.
They did not find one that suited their requirements for some time, but finally, while drifting along the base of a precipitous cliff, they came to a good sized cleft or hollow. It was half a dozen yards wide. It sloped gradually upward, narrowing as it went, until it terminated in a ravine which seemed to continue on to the top of the hill.
The beach was hard and stony ground, with a few stunted bushes, but there was ample room for a tent, and moreover on each side was a sheer wall of rock towering forty feet in the air.
The boys landed, and with much difficulty dragged the canoes out of the water.
"This place just suits us," said Randy. "There is no danger of the farmer finding us here, if we _are_ on his side of the creek. And we need not be afraid to keep a fire going, because these rocks will shut out the light."
It was now half past four o'clock, and when the tent had been pitched--a difficult piece of work for two persons--and the canoes unloaded, the boys began to prepare a good supper in readiness for Ned and Clay.
Six o'clock came, and then seven, but the anxiously expected ones did not appear on the other side of the creek.
Randy and Nugget were too hungry to wait any longer, so they ate their supper by twilight. When it grew a little darker they built a roaring fire at the edge of the water. There was an abundance of driftwood farther up the slope, which had been left there at various times by the high water.
When nine o'clock came the boys were seriously alarmed, and all sorts of dreadful possibilities occurred to them. They found it impossible to sleep, and all through the long hours of that night they sat about the fire, constantly piling on wood, and keeping a huge blaze going to guide the missing ones to the camp.
The first glimmer of dawn found them worn out by sleeplessness and despair. It was impossible to maintain their vigil any longer, so they stuck the pennant in the sand close to the edge of the water, and crawling into the tent, went to sleep side by side.
A cannon shot could hardly have wakened them then. The sun rose higher and higher until its direct rays beat fiercely down upon the tent from a cloudless sky above, but still they slumbered on.
The heat finally became intolerable, and Randy turned drowsily over and opened his eyes. As he sat up with an effort, struggling to clear his mind, he heard a tremendous splash, and then a loud, shrill cry.
He was thoroughly awake now, and jerking Nugget to an upright position, he turned and ran out of the tent. He gained the shore and looked up stream.
A thick mass of bushes was drifting leisurely along the base of the cliff a dozen feet above, and something behind it--as yet invisible--was making a great commotion in the water.
Then a head appeared, and a pair of struggling arms, and to his joy and amazement Randy recognized Clay. The lad's strength barely sufficed to reach the shore, and Randy helped him out on land just as Nugget came running from the tent.
Clay staggered up the slope and dropped down in the bushes.
"I fell off the cliff," he stammered with chattering teeth. "Ned is up there; call to him."
Randy and Nugget shouted with all their might, and a reply was heard instantly. Then Ned appeared far up on the cliff and waved his hand. He vanished at once, and a moment later came impetuously down the ravine, leaping rocks and bushes in his haste.
His face was paler than the boys had ever seen it, and tears stood in his eyes. He hurriedly clasped hands with Randy and Nugget, and approached Clay.
"Are you hurt, old fellow?" he asked huskily. "That was a wonderful escape. I thought it was all up with you."
Clay smiled faintly.
"I'll be all right in a little while. I'm suffering from the shock, that's all. I don't think there is a bruise on me."
A fire was quickly made, while Ned explained to his companions the catastrophe that had happened on the cliff. Then Clay was stripped and rubbed down with a coarse towel, and after his dry clothes were on he declared he felt as well as ever.
A good dinner was prepared, and when all were seated around the flat rock that served for a table, Ned produced the packet of letters and gave a minute account of the wanderings and adventures which it had cost to obtain them. The story of Randy's cake provoked much laughter, and Randy assured Ned that he had done the proper thing under the circumstances.
Then the other side of the story was told, and listened to with even greater interest. Clay was chaffed unmercifully about the calf, and Nugget also came in for a goodly share of ridicule.
The failure of the boys to find Randy's letter was a mystery at first, but Ned finally suggested that it had been blown into the water, which was no doubt the case.
CHAPTER XIV
CAUGHT IN THE WHIRLPOOL
About three o'clock the boys broke camp. They were now thoroughly rested, and eager to be on the water again. Moreover the cleft among the rocks--though admirably adapted for a hiding place--had none of the qualifications which a good camping site should possess.
A paddle of two miles brought the party to Tanner's Dam, and when they had carried the canoes around and embarked on the lower side they passed the mouth of the real Otter Run. This enabled Ned to fix their bearings definitely on the map, and he resolved to keep close track of the topography of the creek in the future.
About six o'clock a beautiful place to camp was found on the left shore of the creek; shade was abundant, and the soil was level and grassy. A few yards up the beach a spring bubbled and spurted from a nest of rocks.
As the boys landed a flock of wild ducks flew up with a great splashing, and winged their way down the creek. Along the opposite shore, which was flat and marshy, yellow-legged snipe were running to and fro, a couple of gray herons standing contentedly on one leg, were gobbling minnows from the shallow pools.
This was now Thursday evening. It would be a week on the morrow since the Jolly Rovers had started on their cruise. They were so pleased with the location of the camp, and the opportunities it seemed to offer that they concluded to remain for a while, and here they spent Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday.
The keen and peaceful enjoyments of those four days were in vivid contrast to the turbulent, adventurous life the boys had led during the past week. They looked back upon it afterward as the brightest period of their cruise.
Sunday was spent quietly in camp, but the remainder of the time was filled up with all sorts of occupations. Randy shot numerous snipe and woodcock. Clay and Nugget gave their attention to fishing, and caught altogether some thirty or forty large bass--not counting the trout which they snared in a neighboring brook.
Ned found his keenest enjoyment in wandering over the country from farmhouse to farmhouse and bringing back tempting supplies. He was a born forager, and well understood the art of making bargains with the farmers.
The boys lived on the fat of the land, and at very slight cost. The diet of fish and game was constantly varied by green corn, new potatoes, sometimes peaches or melons, and occasionally a plump duck or chicken. Only on one day did it rain, and this merely served to make the fish bite better.
But each and every one of the Jolly Rovers had the true instinct of the canoeist, and when Monday's sun dropped redly behind the hills they were eager to start afresh on their wanderings. Their arms tingled to grasp the paddle and drive the graceful canoe over the blue water; they longed to explore the great unknown territory that lay in front of them, to seek new camping grounds and new adventures.
At eight o'clock on Tuesday morning the crimson and gold pennant stood stiffly against the breeze as it led the little fleet from the spot where so many happy hours had been spent.
It was a glorious day--a day when all living things should have been happy. So it seemed to the boys as they paddled lazily down mid-channel with the slanting sunbeams on their bronzed and radiant faces.
But the business of life went on just the same around them. The hungry bass with his piratical black fin just cutting the surface, scattered the shoals of minnows, and sadly lessened their numbers. The kingfisher scooped occasionally from his perch to return with a shining morsel, and the gray heron stalked among the pools like a duck on stilts, searching the muddy bottom for tender young frogs.
Back in the forest the crows and the blue jays were waging a bitter squallish conflict, and here and there weary toilers among the yellow grain dropped their scythes to watch the canoes drifting by.
But the problem of life cast no shadow on the Jolly Rovers, and they paddled on contentedly, finding something new to admire every few minutes.
Nugget was more than usually happy that morning. The past few days had taught him the bright side of canoeing, and he fondly hoped to find the future just as smooth and free from snags.
He was dipping his paddle from side to side in a leisurely way when his eyes chanced to rest on the bottom of the cockpit. Right between his knees was a flat little head with two bead-like eyes and a red tongue that darted quickly in and out. Attached to the head was a long gracefully coiled body, mottled like the skin of a brook trout.
The yell that burst from Nugget's lips would have done credit to a Sioux warrior. It scared the snake half out of its wits, and the reptile wriggled under the bottom board.
"Help! Murder! Snakes!" roared Nugget, partly rising and clutching the combing with both hands. "Help me, help me! I'll be bitten. I'll die."
"Where is it?" cried Ned, paddling alongside.
"Stamp on it," shouted Randy. "Throw it out and I'll shoot it."
Nugget only yelled the more and shook the canoe so violently by his antics that it threatened to tip over.
"Be careful," Ned warned him. "You will upset. Paddle to shore and we'll take the snake out for you."
"I can't, I can't," shrieked Nugget. "My paddle fell overboard. There it goes."
Ned and Clay started simultaneously for the drifting paddle, but they had hardly taken a dozen strokes when the snake thrust his head out of a crevice in the bottom boards.
This proved too much for Nugget. Uttering yell after yell he sprang to his feet and tried to climb out on the foredeck of the canoe. The Imp refused to stand such treatment, and tipped over instantly, throwing Nugget head first into the water.
Fortunately the creek was shallow at this point, and after going under a couple of times, and swallowing a quantity of water--owing to his persistent yelling--Nugget gained a foothold without the aid of his friends, and waded shoulder deep for the nearest shore.
Amid all the confusion the snake escaped in some manner from the overturned canoe, and swam rapidly down stream. Ned and Clay went in pursuit, but the reptile was too swift for them, and safely gained a patch of reeds.
The Imp was quickly righted and towed to shore. The contents were little damaged, and Nugget made haste to change his clothes.
"I'd like to know how that snake got in my canoe," he said angrily. "It was a beastly mean trick."
"I don't believe it was a trick at all," exclaimed Ned laughingly. "The snake must have crawled in when the canoe was lying on shore, bottom up. It no doubt thought it had found a nice snug place to live."
"That's the way it happened, of course," said Randy. "No one would have been mean enough to put it in on purpose."
Clay said nothing, but turned abruptly aside and began to busy himself with his canoe.
The delay was of brief duration, and the Jolly Rovers were soon afloat again. Nugget had stretched his wet clothes across the fore and rear deck of his canoe, so that the sun would quickly dry them.
About noon, while the boys were paddling through a deep and narrow part of the creek, Ned called attention to a bunch of ducks that were feeding in the reeds some distance down the right shore. All eyes were turned in that direction, and consequently no one happened to glance toward the opposite bank.
Clay had fallen a little behind his companions, and was three or four yards to the left of them. He was drifting along with his gaze fixed on the ducks, when all at once his canoe began to twist and oscillate in a most alarming manner.
He turned quickly to see what was the matter, and the first glance sent a chill of fear to his heart. He was on the edge of a violently agitated patch of water that kept moving round and round in constantly narrowing circles until it ended in a funnel shaped aperture that went beneath the surface, and was itself whirling in dizzy revolutions.
Even as he looked his canoe drifted into the second circle, and mounted toward a great rock fifty or sixty feet high that rose straight from the water on the left shore.
Clay realized his situation instantly. He was caught in the whirlpool which some of the farmers had spoken about in a vague manner, as though they doubted its existence. There was no doubt about it now. The whirlpool was a stern reality, and he was fast in its embrace.
Without calling his companions, Clay tried to paddle away from the circling current. But to his horror and consternation the canoe was unmanageable. The violent paddle strokes simply made it swing around on its keel.
Then Clay became terribly frightened, and shouted for help. It was indeed high time. He had already drifted to the base of the rock where the whirlpool terminated, and was now swinging back toward the center of the creek.
The appeal for help--though its meaning was not comprehended at first--brought the other boys to Clay's assistance. That is to say they paddled toward the dangerous spot and were within an ace of getting in the same fix, when Clay frantically warned them back.
"Keep away! keep!" he shouted. "You must find some other way to help me."
Ned was the first to grasp the situation. During the last few days he had heard more than one tale about this dreaded whirlpool with its merciless undertow, and now it made him sick and faint to see Clay's peril, and yet be unable to devise a way of helping him.
For so it seemed then. It would be simple folly and madness for the others to trust themselves near the rapacious current; yet how else could help reach the imperiled lad?
The whirlpool was thirty feet in diameter, and while Randy and Nugget were looking on with white, scared faces, and Ned was vainly trying to plan a means of rescue, Clay was slowly drifting around the circle, coming nearer each time to the gurgling funnel in the center--and this in spite of the most strenuous paddling. Each stroke, in fact, only deflected the canoe sideways, as though it had no keel, and increased the risk of upsetting.
None realized the danger more than Clay himself and the horror of those few short minutes--they seemed more like hours--he never forgot.
It was not likely of course that the heavy canoe could be dragged clear under water; the whirlpool was no such gigantic thing as that. But it was absolutely certain that when the canoe reached the funnel shaped aperture in the center it would instantly be overturned, and just as surely Clay would be sucked into the black depths below, and whirled off by the fierce undercurrent with no possible chance of reaching the surface.
This was the awful fate that stared him in the face; and all that while he drifted nearer and nearer the end, crying vainly for help, and beating the frothy water with his paddle.
CHAPTER XV
RANDY'S PROPOSITION
At the moment when Clay's situation seemed most hopeless--and while his horrified companions were looking on with the silence of despair--Nugget leaned forward in his canoe, opened the hatch, and drew out a big ball of cord.
"Ned! Ned!" he shouted eagerly, "can you do anything with this outline? I forgot I had it."
Ned's face flushed with joy, and paddling alongside of Nugget he snatched the cord.
"Follow me to the shore," he cried, "and you too, Randy."
An instant later the three lads were standing on the gravel beach, separated from the whirlpool by no less than sixty or seventy feet.
Ned waved his hand to Clay, and shouted hoarsely: "Fight hard, old fellow! We'll save you in a minute."
Then turning quickly to his companions he demanded: "How long is this line?"
"One hundred and forty feet," answered Nugget. "The man I bought it from, said so."
Ned tied the end of it to a ring in the stern of the Pioneer, and ran down the beach, unrolling the ball as he went. Sixty feet away he stopped and cut the cord, then he hurried back with the remainder in his hand. He tied a short stick to the end of the ball, and throwing both into his canoe scrambled after them.
"Now you fellows keep tight hold of that," he directed, pointing to the cord that lay outstretched on the beach. "Pay it out as I go, and when I give the word pull with all your might."
Randy and Nugget began to understand now, and they allowed the line to trail through their fingers as Ned paddled furiously away, heading for a point a little above the whirlpool.
It was a critical and intensely exciting moment. Clay had divined what Ned intended to do, and with this gleam of hope to animate him, he was fighting desperately to keep away from the gurgling hollow which was slowly sucking him into its embrace.
There was scant time to spare when Ned ceased paddling a few feet above and to the right of the whirlpool, and allowed the canoe to drift down stream broadside. But he was wonderfully cool headed and self-possessed, as, with deft fingers he unwrapped the ball of cord and coiled it between his knees. Then he twisted one end about his left hand, and with the right seized the short, heavy stick.
He was now directly opposite Clay, and measuring the distance with a quick eye, he flung the stick straight out. It rose in the air, dragging the cord gracefully after it, and fell across the combing of Clay's canoe.
Ned uttered a sigh of relief, and Randy and Nugget cheered wildly from the shore.
But the danger was not over yet, though Clay had instantly seized the line. The canoe would upset at once if an attempt were made to drag it broadside out of the whirlpool.
Clay comprehended this, and he was quick witted enough to solve the problem. Though his canoe was now verging on the trough of the whirlpool, he calmly tied the line around one blade of his paddle and pressed this with all his might against the big screw eye that was set in the bow of the canoe.
"All right," he shouted hoarsely.
Ned turned and waved his hand to Randy and Nugget. They understood the signal, and instantly began to haul on the line.
The Pioneer moved slowly toward shore, and the next instant the strain reached Clay. It was concentrated in the right place, too, and after a couple of refractory tugs, as though the whirlpool was loath to surrender its victim, the Neptune headed about and slowly followed the Pioneer.
This was, if possible, a more exciting moment than any that had preceded it. So much depended on the two lines. If either broke disaster would follow.
But the cords did their duty nobly, and soon Clay was beyond the swirling circles. A few seconds later the Pioneer touched shore, and then three willing pairs of hands dragged the Neptune in so forcibly that a great wave rolled before the bow.
The boys had to help Clay out and prop him against a tree; and for nearly five minutes he sat there so white and helpless that they feared he would faint. A drink of water seemed to revive him some, and finally the color came back to his cheeks.
"I'm all right now," he said, as he got up and walked a few steps. "For a little while I felt like keeling over, and no wonder, after what I went through out there."
"It was a close call," asserted Ned. "Nugget didn't remember about that line a minute too soon. The credit of your rescue belongs to him."
"No it doesn't," said Nugget bashfully. "You did the work."
Clay looked from one to the other, and then held out his hand to Nugget.
"It was your outline and your suggestion," he said in a low voice. "You saved my life. Will you forgive me, old fellow? I put that snake in your canoe this morning, and am awfully sorry I did it."
Nugget hesitated an instant. Then he blushingly accepted the proffered hand and said:
"We'll let the matter drop, Clay. I know you won't do anything like that again."
"No, I won't," replied Clay earnestly. "I'm done with practical jokes. It was only a garter snake, though I caught it with a forked stick."
Ned and Randy had been at first inclined to pitch into Clay, but seeing that he was sincerely repentant they wisely concluded to ignore his fault, hoping that the lesson would really prove beneficial, and cure him of the fondness for playing tricks.
After a light lunch the Jolly Rovers started off again. They were anxious to get as far as possible from the whirlpool. During the early part of the afternoon they paddled and drifted by turns, for Clay was still a little weak from his experience.
Between three and four o'clock a bend of the creek brought into view an old wooden bridge. The piers were mossy and crumbling to ruins, and the roof and sides had been guiltless of paint for many a long year.
Just below the bridge the Creek widened to a kind of pool. At the foot of a ledge of rocks on the left shore sat three men holding long fishing poles. Their attention seemed to be given to a fourth man, who was sitting in a boat near by, talking earnestly, and pointing from time to time out on the creek.
A spring was visible a little above the fishermen, and as the boys happened to be thirsty they paddled over to it.
The canoes immediately became objects of interest, and a friendly conversation was started.
The man in the boat stepped out, and picked up Randy's gun.
"That's a purty nice weapon," he observed in a mournful voice. "It ain't unlike the one I lost, only mine was longer, and a leetle bit lighter. It was a muzzle loader, though, and this is one of them new fangled kind."
"How did you lose yours?" inquired Randy.
"It sunk out there," replied the man, pointing toward mid-channel. "I was driftin' along when I seen a muskrat in the reeds on t'other shore. I stood up to reach the gun, an' just as I got holt of it my foot slipped on a wet board, an' down I come. The weapon went overboard, an' that was the end of it. It riles me bad, 'cause that gun belonged to my old daddy."
"When did this happen?" asked Randy.
"'Bout half an hour ago; anyway not much mor'n that."
"But the gun surely isn't lost for good. Why don't you dive after it?"
The man thrust his hands into his pockets and stared blankly at Randy. The three fishermen smiled and nudged each other.
"Why don't you dive after it?" repeated Randy. "If you can tell me the exact location I'll get it for you."
"You will, will you?" exclaimed the man impressively. "Waal, I reckon you'd have a stiff contract. Did you fellows never hear of Rudy's Hole? Thar it lies right in front of you, and there ain't no bottom to it."
"Hold on, Mose Hocker," exclaimed one of the fishermen. "There must be bottom somewheres, of course, but it's mighty far down."
The boys looked at one another incredulously and smiled. The idea of a bottomless hole in the Conodoguinet was ridiculous.
At that moment an old man with bent back and white hair hobbled down the path from the road above, leaning heavily on his cane, which was his constant companion.
"Good afternoon, Daddy Perkiss," exclaimed Mose Hocker. "I'm glad you come along. I lost my gun out in the Hole a while ago, and this chap here offers to dive arter it. You've lived around these parts nigh onto eighty years. Tell him how fur down he'll have to go to reach that weapon."
"Ho! Ho!" cackled Daddy Perkiss, as he tremblingly sat down on a drift log, "the lad wants to dive in Rudy's Hole, does he? Well, let him try, let him try."
The old man was silent for a moment, and his bleary eyes had a far away expression as though they were looking into the dim past.
"It be sixty years since Jonas Rudy were drowned out here," he mumbled in a shrill voice, "an they ain't found the body to this day. I were away at the time, drivin' a teamster's wagon to Pittsburg, but I mind hearin' the story when I come home. Many a time I've heard tell how they tried to find bottom the next spring after Jonas was drowned.
"Mike Berry, the blacksmith over at Four Corners, brought his anvil, an' the men made the women folks give up their clotheslines. Then they went out on the hole in the old ferryboat, and let down the anvil. There was two hundred feet of line in all, an' when half of it were out the men lost their grip. The rest went like greased lightnin', an' the end got coiled around Mike Berry's yaller dog, an' took it along. The poor beast never came up again."
Daddy Perkiss paused for sheer want of breath, and looked around to note the effect of his story.
"That yarn was started years ago," whispered Mose Hocker, coming close up to the boys, "an' Daddy has told it so many times that he believes every word. I reckon the most of it's true though. It would take more'n one clothesline to reach bottom out here."
"But has the place never been sounded?" asked Ned. "Have you never tried it yourself?"
Mose Hocker shook his head vigorously. "What would be the use?" he replied. "Nobody doubts it. Why, Rudy's Hole is known an' dreaded for miles around."
Evidently regarding this argument as a clincher he turned aside, and began to talk to Daddy Perkiss.
About this time Randy was doing a good deal of thinking. He had listened with incredulous interest to the old man's narrative, and knowing how prone country folk are to accept any fanciful story--especially a long standing tradition--without ever attempting to verify it, the conviction had forced itself upon his mind that Rudy's Hole was a myth--in other words that its depth was nothing extraordinary.
Randy was a good swimmer, but a far better diver. He was long winded, and his staying qualities under water had always been a source of admiration and envy to his companions.
It now occurred to him, with irresistible fascination, what a fine thing it would be to recover Mose Hooker's gun, and show these people what a delusion they had been laboring under all their lives.
It took Randy but a short time to make up his mind, and walking over to Mose Hocker, he asked abruptly: "Could you tell me just where your gun fell in?"
"I reckon I could if there was any need of it," was the drawling reply. "I happened to notice my bearings at the time. I was straight down from that rock out there, and straight out from the big button wood tree on yonder shore--right over the deepest part of the Hole."
"All right!" said Randy quietly. "Now if you will lend me your boat for about ten minutes I think I can restore you your gun."
CHAPTER XVI
A SHATTERED DELUSION
The burst of derisive laughter that greeted his proposition in no way disconcerted Randy. He waited quietly until it was over, and then repeated his request.
"Ho! ho!" cackled Daddy Perkiss; "is the lad tired of livin', or kin he breathe under water like a fish?"
"He's a stout hearted chap," cried Mose Hocker, "and sense his mind's bent on takin' a good long dive I reckon he kin have the boat. There ain't no undercurrent out there as I know of, so he ain't likely to come to harm, and besides I'm mighty anxious to git my gun back."
Here Mr. Hocker winked slyly at Daddy Perkiss and the fishermen.
The old man failed to appreciate the joke.
"It's temptin' Providence," he cried shrilly, pounding his cane on the beach. "If you ever sees that weapon agin, Mose Hocker, I'll give you ten pounds of the best plug terbacker that Bill Smith has in his store."
"That's a bargain," exclaimed Mose. "You fellows can testify to what he said."
Then turning to Randy he added with a laugh, "Don't fail me now, lad. Ten pounds of terbacker ain't picked up every day."
"Just give me a fair show and I'll astonish you all before long," replied Randy, moving toward the boat. "Ned, will you go with me?" he added.
Ned willingly agreed, much to the amazement of Clay and Nugget, who expected him to oppose Randy's project with all his might. The truth of the matter was that Ned, being a sensible fellow, shared Randy's view, and was rather anxious to see the tables turned on the credulous rustics.
He was satisfied from the smooth and sluggish appearance of the water that a dive would not be attended with danger.
In some unaccountable manner the news seemed to have spread through the neighborhood, and when Ned and Randy embarked, the crowd had been augmented by three men and two bare-footed urchins. A wagon containing two farmers had stopped at the entrance of the bridge, and the occupants were tying the horse preparatory to coming down.
Mose Hocker's boat was a large, heavy craft, built on the order of a bateau, and was admirably adapted to Randy's purpose. The boys paddled up stream a little until they were directly below the rock Hocker had designated. Then, while the boat drifted down with a barely perceptible motion, Randy hastily undressed.
"It's a pity we didn't bring a fishing line along," observed Ned. "I could ascertain the depth for you in a minute."
"We don't need it," replied Randy. "I was never in better wind than I am now. If there's a bottom at all I'll find it."
The boat was now one hundred feet below the rock, and a stroke or two of Ned's paddle put it in line with the big buttonwood tree on the right shore.
"This is just about the exact spot," said Randy, surveying with a critical eye the rock and then the tree. "Hold the boat steady, Ned. I'll be ready in a second or two."
This was not a difficult task, for the water was as smooth as a mill pond and almost as motionless.
Clay and Nugget had by this time paddled out in their canoes to witness operations, and the little group on the shore were waiting in breathless silence.
Randy was prepared now, and suddenly he mounted the broad stern seat, and stood on the outer edge.
An audible murmur came from the shore, and Daddy Perkiss mumbled shrilly: "They're right over the middle of the Hole."
"Paddle down a little," said Randy in a quiet tone to Clay and Nugget. "You obstruct the view. Still in the right location, are we?" he inquired of Ned.
"Yes, as near as possible," was the reply. "Be careful, old fellow!"
Randy smiled and glanced at the expectant crowd on the shore. Then he drew a long breath, pressed his hands together and dived gracefully into the cloudy blue water. It was done so quickly and cleverly that no loud splash followed, nor was the boat violently shaken.
As the seconds passed on not the least sound broke the stillness; every eye was fixed on the spot where the lad had disappeared, and every heart was beating tumultuously.
The seconds grew almost to a minute, and still the smooth surface remained unbroken. Ned's hand trembled as he kept the boat in position, and Clay and Nugget exchanged frightened glances.
"I knew it," cried Daddy Perkiss in a cracked voice. "That lad will never be seen again. He's gone down to meet Jonas Rudy."
This ill boding prophecy had scarcely left the old man's lips, when Randy shot into view a few feet to the left of where he had disappeared. Half a dozen strokes brought him to the boat, and with Ned's assistance he scrambled over the side.
His hands were empty.
A burst of laughter came from shore, and Daddy Perkiss cried triumphantly: "Where's the gun, lad? Did you find bottom?"
Randy only waved his hand in reply. He was panting a little for breath, but his face wore a very peculiar smile--a smile that quite baffled the three eager boys.
"What luck?" queried Ned excitedly. "How far down were you? Did you find anything?"
"You will know before long," replied Randy with aggravating calmness. "Keep the boat in the same place, Ned. One more stroke. There, that's it Here goes for another."
He quickly mounted the seat again, and drew in his breath.
"Hold on, young fellar," cried Mose Hocker in a loud voice, "Don't risk your life a second time. I kin stand the loss of that terbacker."
Randy laughed, waved his hand, and went under head foremost.
The suspense was now greater than on the previous occasion. Ned began to count, and when the half minute expired his face grew pale.
Thirty-five--forty--three-quarters of a minute! No sign of the reckless diver. Had some undercurrent dragged him far down in those blue depths?
When the forty-ninth second had expired a loud murmur rose from the people on shore, and just a second later it changed to a deafening burst of applause as Randy shot above the surface holding in his right hand--_Mose Hacker's gun_.
His face was fairly purple for want of breath, and he had scarcely enough strength to gain the side of the boat. He threw the gun over first and then, with Ned's aid, rolled into the bottom, where he lay for a moment, panting for breath.
Cheer after cheer came from shore, and the boys joined in heartily. Randy was all right in a moment, and as Ned paddled across the creek, he hurriedly pulled on his clothes.
When the boat landed by the rocks such a scene ensued as no pen can describe. The men crowded about Randy with eager congratulations, and fairly pumped his arms off.
Mose Hocker snatched the gun and waved it triumphantly before Daddy Perkiss.
"What do you think of that?" he cried. "The lad brought it clean up from the bottom of Rudy's hole. I'll take that ten pounds of terbacker, Daddy, as soon as you please."
"Shoo, now! thar's some trick about the thing," mumbled the old man petulantly. "You can't make me believe that Rudy's Hole ain't two or three hundred feet deep."
"But here's the gun to prove it," said Mose, "an' we all saw the lad bring it up. Let him speak for himself, and say whether he touched bottom or not."
"Of course I touched bottom," returned Randy with a slight shiver at the recollection. "It was the biggest dive I ever made. The water must be fifteen or twenty feet deep. It's not any more than that, though. I thought I'd never come to the top the second time. I was just ready to burst when I found the gun, and the weight of it kept me from coming up rapidly."
Daddy heard the lad through, and then, with a contemptuous sniff, he rose and hobbled up the path.
"Don't forgit the terbacker," Mose Hocker shouted after him.
The old man made no reply, and was soon out of sight.
"It's a hard blow for Daddy," said one of the fishermen, "an' the same in fact fur all of us, I reckon. I've been brung up from a lad in the full belief that Rudy's Hole were well nigh bottomless."
"And I," "and I," cried half a dozen voices.
"It will be most amazin' news to the whole community," said Mose Hocker, "an' mebbe it'll teach folks to investigate things. I'm kinder sorry for Daddy Perkiss. It was his chief delight to tell that story to every stranger what come along, an' now he won't dare to open his lips about Rudy's Hole. When I get the terbacker I'll give you fellows a plug apiece."
Three or four of the men laughed at this, as though they had their doubts on the subject.
"Oh, I'll keep Daddy to his word," resumed Mose. "He kin easily afford it." Then turning to the boys he said abruptly, "I want you boys to come down the creek and spend the night at my place. I'll try to treat you well. The recovery of that gun means a good deal to me, and I want to do what I kin in return."
Several other invitations of a similiar nature were extended to the Jolly Rovers, but they accepted Mose Mocker's without hesitation. A few moments later they paddled down the creek, cheered loudly by the admiring spectators.
CHAPTER XVII
THE STORM BREAKS
The Jolly Rovers were agreeably surprised when they reached Mose Hocker's "place." Instead of the farmhouse, which they had confidently expected, it proved to be a snug little cabin standing in a dense bit of woods along the creek, and distant from Rudy's Hole about one mile.
Mose was a tall, wiry, middle aged man, with a smooth shaven face.
"I've always been fond of hunting and fishing," he explained to the boys, "an' about two year ago I built this place, an' moved in. It stands on my own land. I have a farm back yonder, but after my wife died I put a tenant on my property. The life didn't agree with me, somehow or other."
"I reckon I've got a streak of my daddy's wild blood. He was a great hunter in his day, and that's why I prize this gun so much. It was made in London by John Armstrong in 1874--so that silver plate on the breech says--and if it is old fashioned it kin shoot. You chaps ought to be here in the fall when the ducks and geese are moving--I'd show you some sport."
Mr. Hocker proved himself a delightful host. His cabin was crammed full of curious contrivances for catching fish and trapping game, the various uses of which he took delight in explaining to the boys. He was an adept at cooking--as the bountiful evening meal proved--and he possessed a fund of adventurous stories that made the hours pass quickly until bedtime.
He spread blankets and pillows on the floor for his guests, and after the wearisome events of the day they slept soundly until dawn.
A plunge in the creek was first in order, and then came a warm breakfast. An hour later, with many sincere expressions of regret at parting, the Jolly Rovers resumed their cruise. Mr. Hocker pressed them to stay a couple of days, but they deemed it best to push on, since they were yet many miles from home.
Little did they think as they paddled away from the cabin, that they and their friendly host would meet again under far different circumstances in the near future.
All that day--which was Wednesday--the boys paddled steadily. They camped in the evening at the water works dam, one mile out from Carlisle, and while Clay and Randy prepared supper, Ned and Nugget went to town for mail. Fortunately they visited the express office as well, and found a cake there addressed to Randy. They brought it triumphantly back to camp--a straight road precluded the possibility of losing the way on this occasion--and had a glorious feast before going to bed.
Thursday was a repetition of the previous day. Nothing occurred worthy of special mention. The boys covered ten or fifteen miles in spite of the dams that frequently blocked the way.
About four o'clock in the afternoon, while passing through a lonely and beautiful strip of country, they came upon five tiny islands grouped together in mid channel. The largest was not more than a dozen yards long. All were grassy and shaded by trees, and they made a pretty picture with the water rippling softly through the narrow winding channels that separated them.
As the bushes and timber on both banks of the creek were very dense, the boys chose one of the islands for a camping place--the left hand one of two that lay a little farther down stream than the others. It was two or three feet above the surface of the creek, level and grassy on top, and contained seven or eight good sized trees.
The largest of these--a massive buttonwood--stood at the extreme lower end, and its whitened, far stretching roots had been laid bare by the current that came sweeping down each side, formed a shallow swirling eddy.
Here the boys landed, and seeing that the steepness of the bank would make it a difficult task to carry the canoes up--if indeed there was room to spare above--they tied them in a bunch to the roots of the tree. Then stripping off their shoes and stockings, they waded about in the shallow water unloading what articles they wanted, and carrying them up on the bank.
The tent was staked in the center of the island, and the boys did not discover, until too late, that the entrance faced up stream.
"Let it go," said Ned. "It's a little unhandy for the canoes, that's all. We must be careful not to trip over the ropes, though."
There was another reason why the tent should have faced the opposite way. It was exposed, in its present position, to any storm that might come up from the west.
But this did not occur to the boys, and very naturally, since the sky was cloudless and the air but moderately warm. It had not been such a day as usually brews July thunderstorms.
After considerable searching, two stones suitable for the fireplace were found in the eddy. There was an utter lack of fuel on the island, so Ned and Randy paddled to shore and loaded their canoes with driftwood.
Two weeks of camp life had now familiarized each lad with the duties that were assigned to him, and by working in unison supper was soon prepared.
The boys lingered over the meal a good while, and it was quite dark when the dishes were washed and put away.
At nine o'clock all were sleeping soundly behind the tightly drawn tent flaps, and the fire was mingling its red flashes with the moonlight glow on the rippling surface of the creek.
Ten o'clock came--eleven--twelve. Not a breath of air was stirring; a dead, oppressive calm, like the sultriness of noonday, had settled down on land and water. Half an hour later the west was inky black with massed storm clouds and fleecy forerunners of the coming tempest were straying one after another across the moon.
All unconscious of impending danger the boys slept peacefully, nor did they awake until the storm was upon them in all its fury. Dazed and terrified they crouched close together, watching the jagged purple flashes that turned night into noonday, listening to the furious patter of the rain and the crashing of thunder, and shivering where the oozing drops fell in their faces from the saturated canvas.
Streams of water were trickling across the ground, and the tent was tugging, like a thing of life, to free itself from the iron stakes.
Ned groped about until he found the lantern, and with great difficulty he lit it. Nugget was trembling like a leaf, but the others were, so far, more disgusted than frightened. A possible ducking, and the loss of a night's sleep, was the most they dreaded.
But soon the presence of a real and actual danger made itself known. The wind rose to such a point of violence that it was little short of a hurricane. Trees began to go down here and there, and the passage of the gale through the forest on each shore was like the whirring flight of myriads of quail.
The tent was slightly protected by the timber on the upper point of the island; otherwise it must have yielded to the first onslaught of the storm.
"This is terrible," whispered Ned. "If it grows any worse I'm afraid we will fare badly. The tent is strained to its utmost now."
"Even the iron stakes won't hold it if the wind gets through the flaps," said Randy in a dismal tone.
They were silent for a moment, listening to the increasing fury of the gale.
"Oh! this is awful," wailed Nugget. "The water is running down my neck, and I'm sitting in a big puddle. It's coming in all around me."
"You ought to be thankful you're not sitting in the open air," muttered Clay. "That may be the next thing."
At Ned's suggestion--which, strange to say, had not occurred to any one before--the boys overhauled their clothing bags and put on their rubber coats. Each was provided with one of those useful articles.
As they sat about the flickering flame of the lantern a more furious gust than any that had preceded came shrieking down the creek. In the midst of its passage a great crash was heard, so loud and so near that the very ground seems to tremble.
The boys could not repress a cry of terror. A tree had fallen close by, and they dreaded lest another would crush the tent.
"Gracious! what if that was the big buttonwood!" cried Randy. "Our canoes--"
His agitated face finished the sentence more plainly than words could have done.
Ned rose, pulling his coat close about him, and seized the lantern.
"I must see about that," he said hoarsely. "Stay right here. I will be back in a moment."
Before the others could utter a word of protest, he lifted the rear end of the canvas half a foot, and, with lantern in hand, squirmed through like a snake, leaving the tent in utter darkness.
CHAPTER XVIII
AT THE MERCY OF THE TEMPEST
The wind was so violent that Ned dared not stand erect. He crossed on hands and knees the brief stretch that separated the tent from the lower end of the island.
The buttonwood was still standing--much to his relief--and the canoes were so far uninjured, though the gale was knocking them together pretty forcibly.
Bracing himself against the buttonwood, Ned turned the lantern in all directions, and soon discovered the tree which had caused such alarm by its fall. It lay prostrate on the other island, but as a channel barely half a dozen yards wide separated the two, it was not surprising that the crash should have sounded very near.
The storm still raged with unabated fury. The lightning played incessantly over the heavens, and the thunder was continuous.
Ned took advantage of a lull in the wind to start on his return, but he had scarcely left the tree when the lantern slipped from his hand, and was extinguished by the fall. He found it after a short search, and as he could see plainly enough without a light, he pushed on toward the tent, bending his body forward to escape the cutting rain.
A sudden fierce blast of wind compelled him to crouch close to the ground, and just as he rose a jagged flash of lightning turned the blackness into a purple glare. Ned's eyes happened to be resting on the channel between the two islands, and in that brief instant of light he saw a boat gliding swiftly down the current, cutting gracefully through the great waves that rose to meet it.
On the rear seat, paddle in hand, sat a man. A dark slouch hat, pulled far down, concealed his features. He seemed perfectly at home, and in no wise discomfited by the storm that was raging around him.
As the vivid light faded away Ned ran back to the buttonwood tree, and watched the blurred shape of the boat as it came down the channel. He breathed a sigh of relief when it passed out from the islands and continued on through the gloom, for his first thought had been that some danger menaced the camp.
Why a man should voluntarily expose himself to such a pitiless storm, and at such an hour of the night, was a mystery too deep for Ned's comprehension. It was certain, at all events, that the stranger was abroad for no good purpose.
Either his errand was in no wise connected with the Jolly Rovers, or else he had passed close by the tent without seeing it--even when the flash of lightning made the night as bright as noonday.
Ned waited beside the buttonwood tree until another flash gave him a brief glimpse of the boat far below the island. Then he hurried back to the tent and crawled under the rear end. The boys immediately besieged him with questions, and their anxiety was quickly allayed.
"The canoes are safe," said Ned, as he relighted the lantern. "The tree that fell was on the other island. I don't think the storm can last much longer, I believe the wind is subsiding a little now."
He was about to tell them of the strange boat and its occupant that had passed down the channel, when a terrific blast checked the words on his lips. The tent swayed to and fro, and just at this critical moment one of the front flaps tore free of the strings that held it to the pole.
The gale instantly swept under the canvas, lifted the tent bodily, and whirled it through the air, leaving the amazed boys exposed to the driving rain.
Ned snatched the lantern and ran down the island. The others followed him, and when they reached the buttonwood tree they saw the tent floating limply on the waves twenty feet beyond the canoes.
"We must recover it at all hazards," cried Ned hoarsely. "Our cruise is ruined if we don't. Who will go with me?"
"I will," replied Randy.
"And I," added Clay.
"One is enough," said Ned. "I'll take Randy. If the wind prevents us from getting back don't you fellows be alarmed. Keep out of the rain as much as possible, and if your clothes get wet put on dry ones."
There was no time to lose, for the tent had drifted into the fierce current below the island, and was already out of sight. There was great danger of its sinking as soon as the canvas became thoroughly soaked.
Hastily untying their canoes from the roots of the tree, Ned and Randy paddled away in the darkness, leaving Clay and Nugget to make the best of their desertion.
It was a bad night to be on the water. The storm was still raging, and the surface of the creek was lashed with great foamy billows. The boys did not find the tent immediately.
In fact the wind and the current together drove them a quarter of a mile down stream before they could control their canoes sufficiently to head them around. And even when they accomplished this they found it out of the question to return. Not one inch could they gain in the teeth of the blast, though they paddled hard and fast.
Fortunately the canoes were empty, and this rendered them safe and buoyant, so that they rose lightly on the crest of every wave. They would surely have swamped had the usual loads been in the hatches.
"We stand a poor show of getting back to the island this night," cried Randy in a loud enough tone for his companion to hear. "I'll be satisfied if we find the tent. Do you think it is still afloat?"
With a half a dozen desperate strokes Ned then brought the Pioneer alongside the Water Sprite.
"I don't know," he replied. "If the tent is still on the surface it must have drifted pretty near by this time. We've been trying to force our way up stream for nearly ten minutes. Keep a sharp lookout on your side, Randy, and I'll do the same on mine."
This was by no means an easy matter. It was difficult to see with any clearness at a distance of ten yards, and though Ned still had the lighted lantern in his cockpit, it was impossible to make use of it and to paddle at the same time.
For a few moments longer the boys continued the futile struggle with the wind and current. The rain was still falling in torrents, but their rubber coats kept them fairly dry, and the canvas aprons buttoned tightly over the cockpits, prevented the canoes from filling.
At last, when both lads were quite in despair, a flash of lightning revealed the tent a few yards to the left, rising and falling with the waves.
When the difficult operation of turning the canoes down stream was safely performed, the tent was some yards away. It was still dimly visible and the boys soon caught up with it.
It threatened at first to be a sort of white elephant on their hands, for the three poles were still in position, and the canvas was hopelessly tangled about them.
Had the boys been in a boat their task would have been comparatively easy. As it was they had to be very cautious for fear of upsetting.
Finally, by getting the unwieldy mass between them and employing their paddles instead of hands they succeeded in dragging a portion of it upon the fore deck of each canoe. The center still sagged in the water, but it was impossible to make any better arrangement.
"Paddle very carefully now," was Ned's caution. "We will run into shore at the first opportunity, and if the storm abates one of us can go up for Clay and Nugget. The island can't be more than half a mile away."
This project, simple as it sounded, was quite impracticable at the present time. The wind had fallen some, but the waves were still so violent that the only safety for the heavily encumbered canoes lay in keeping parallel with the current. A flank movement toward shore would have brought speedy disaster.
The boys realized this and stuck to mid-channel. The continued speed of the current mystified them considerably, and they were quite at a lost to account for it until Ned raised the lantern, and turned it on the surface of the creek.
"Good gracious!" he cried. "The water is yellow with mud. The creek is rising. No wonder it runs like a mill race. This same storm must have deluged the upper end of the valley before it reached here."
Proof of Ned's assertion was not wanting, for that instant the canoes rustled through the protruding grass of a submerged island.
The water Sprite stuck fast on what was probably the crest, and the Pioneer instantly swung around with the current, shaking off the folds of the tent.
Randy turned sideways to see how his companion was faring, and his face suddenly blanched.
"Look! look! Ned," he cried in a hoarse, frightened voice. "What is that?"
Randy's alarming cry was called forth by the discovery of a long dusky object that was bearing rapidly down upon the canoes.
The same chilling fear entered the hearts of both lads they watched its noiseless approach. They believed it to be an upturned canoe--a message fraught with tidings of disaster.
CHAPTER XIX
ADRIFT ON A LOG
An instant later the shadowy object assumed the unmistakable form of a huge drift log, and before Ned could realize his peril or deal a single paddle stroke, the current whirled the heavy mass upon him, and the blunt end pounded broadside into the Pioneer. The canoe was bowled over like a tenpin, and Ned went head first into the yellow flood. He came to the surface a dozen feet below, and when he found he was out of his depth he made a valiant effort to swim up to Randy, who was fighting hard to drive the Water Sprite off the island, so that he might hasten to his friend's rescue.
Half a dozen strokes convinced Ned of the utter futility of breasting such a current. As he ceased struggling, and allowed himself to drift at will, he saw the log bearing down upon him. It had swung clear around after capsizing the canoe, and was shooting along at a rapid pace, as though to make up for lost time.
With scarcely an instant's deliberation Ned decided what to do. His canoe was floating toward him from above, but being still broadside to the current, its movements were painfully slow.
Moreover, it offered doubtful security in its inverted position, and was likely to sink if any weight was put upon it.
A few vigorous strokes brought Ned alongside the drifting log as it swung past him. He straddled it a little beyond the middle, holding on with both hands.
It sank a little with his weight, causing the front end to tip upwards, but his head and shoulders were clear out of water. Turning cautiously around, he saw to his dismay that Randy was still aground on the island.
"Push off as soon as you can," he shouted. "Overtake my canoe and paddle for the left bank. I'm safe for the present, and will try to reach land."
"All right!" came the reply an instant later. "I'll do my best."
The words had a vague, far away sound, for already the distance had widened considerably. The log went swiftly on its course, heading straight through mid-channel, and leaping and plunging in the turbid water.
Ned clung to it with might and main. He was not a little worried by his strange and perilous position. The yellow flood stretching on all sides of him was a terrifying sight.
The thunder and lightning had almost entirely ceased, and the wind had fallen, leaving the creek as smooth as a millpond; but the rain still poured with a steady persistency that threatened a long continuance.
Ned did not mind this much. The air and the water were both warm, and he felt fairly comfortable.
He was more concerned for his companions than for himself. It would be a difficult matter, he reflected, for Randy to manage the two canoes and the tent.
He wondered how Clay and Nugget were faring--whether they still remained on the island, or had ventured to embark in search of their companions, now that the violence of the storm was past.
Meanwhile Ned was not oblivious to his own danger. While these things were passing through his mind, he was striving to guide the log toward shore by paddling with his left hand and leg. At first he seemed to make no progress.
The current was running swift, and the log remained obstinately in mid-channel. The flood was rising, too. Plain proof of it was seen in the _débris_ that floated on all sides--patches of grass and bushes, broken limbs, and here and there a fence rail.
The sky was still overcast with dark clouds, and the gloom behind him showed Ned no trace of Randy or the canoes. He worked harder and harder to gain the shore, and finally he discovered to his great delight that he was getting the log under control.
It steadily pursued a diagonal course, veering constantly nearer to the left shore. Occasionally a swirl of the current pitched it toward midstream, but a little perseverance put it right again.
The scene of Ned's capsize was now a good mile in the rear, and he was satisfied that he would reach the bank in a short time--unless some unforseen event occurred.
This was exactly what destiny had in store for the lad. A moment later a sharp bend--unseen until too late--cast the log in the very center of the creek, and while the sting of this misfortune was still fresh, Ned heard a dull booming noise--the certain herald of either rapids or a dam. The sound, though not loud, came from no great distance.
Its subdued tone showed that if rapids were ahead, they were not very bad ones; if a dam, that it could not be high, else the falling water would make a greater noise.
But Ned had no desire to tempt his fate in either. With what strength was left in his numbed limbs he tried hard to drive the log shoreward.
Had a little more time been granted him he might have succeeded, but the ruthless current swept him on with unceasing speed, and when the log was still fifty feet from the left bank he saw the smooth stretch of water before him merge into a seething line of turbulent waves and tawny foam.
The rude outline of a mill suddenly appeared on the left, proving conclusively the existence of a dam.
All hope of reaching the shore was gone now. It was some slight consolation to know that the dam was not a high one, and Ned boldly faced the ordeal by swinging the log around until it pointed straight to the line of foam. Then he hugged it closely to him and waited.
The suspense was brief. One swift rush to the brink, a quick slide down a glistening slant of water--and then a headlong plunge into the seething waves.
The log rushed on nobly, now under the billows, now high on their crest until it struck a rock endwise, and turned broadside in the twinkling of an eye. Ned parted company with it then and there--he couldn't help it--and struggled on alone. He was in comparatively shallow water now, and though the force of the current and the waves was terrific, he finally gained a foothold on the slippery rocks, and waded waist deep toward shore.
The water soon shallowed, and with a grateful heart he staggered out on a stony beach.
He sat down for a moment to recover from his exertions, and then went up the slope to the building, which was only a few yards away. It proved to be a saw mill, and even in the somber gloom Ned could see that it was very ancient and rickety, and had probably not been in use for many years.
The locality was a wild and lonely one. Steep wooded hills lay on both sides of the creek.
Further investigation showed Ned that the saw mill abutted on the corner of the dam, and that a narrow sluiceway conducted the water to the machinery. He could hear the splash and gurgle of the torrent as it swept under the rotting timbers of the mill and rushed on to freedom through the wasteway beyond.
As the depth of the latter was uncertain Ned crossed the sluice by a shaky plank that spanned the sides, and found himself among thick bushes at the foot of a steep hill. He was tempted to go back and seek shelter in the mill, for his limbs ached with weariness, and his wet clothes chilled him at every step.
But first it was important that Randy should be found, so he pushed along the edge of the creek in the rain until he obtained an open view of the channel for some distance ahead.
The first glimpse rewarded him for his pains. He spied a bulky dark object about fifty yards up stream. It was approaching at a rapid pace and hugging the shore closely.
Ned put two fingers in his mouth and emitted a shrill, piercing whistle. It was answered in a similar manner, and a moment later the dark mass resolved itself into Randy, the tent, and the two canoes.
"By jove, I'm glad to see you," exclaimed Randy in husky tones, as Ned helped him to land. "I thought you were a goner this time, old fellow."
Ned hastily related his experience.
"It was a close shave," he concluded; "too close to be pleasant. But how did you manage to get here with this heavy load?"
Randy laughed. "I had a time of it, I can tell you. I jumped out in the water--it was only knee deep on that island--and dragged the whole tent on the foredeck of my canoe. Then I paddled after the Pioneer, and caught up with it near another submerged bar, where both the canoes stuck again.
"This gave me a chance to right the Pioneer and throw most of the water out of it. Then I slung the tent across both of them, tied the cockpits together, and started off. Of course I could only paddle on the right side, but I got along fairly well. The best of it is that I found your paddle on the way down. The lantern is gone, but I have a candle here, if we need it. It was in the pocket of my rubber coat."
"That's exactly what we _do_ need," replied Ned. "It will help us to find some dry wood in the mill. But first of all we must drag the canoes and the tent on shore."
This proved a difficult task, but it was finally accomplished. The canoes were turned bottom up, and the tent was stretched over a clump of bushes. Then Ned led the way down stream to the saw mill.
CHAPTER XX
MR. DUDE MOXLEY
When the boys reached the corner of the dam Ned produced his waterproof match box and lighted the candle. This enabled them to cross the sluiceway in safety, and after noting with some alarm that the creek was still coming up rapidly, they entered the saw mill at the upper end, where the floor was level with the breast work of the dam--or rather a few feet above it.
The lower end was twelve or fifteen feet higher than the wasteway, and was supported by an open network of huge beams.
With the greatest caution the boys scrutinized their surroundings. The first floor contained nothing but _débris_--heaps of sawdust, strips of bark, and a few partially sawed logs. The machinery had all been removed.
There was great danger of falling through into the swirling torrent beneath, for in several places the flooring lacked entire planks, and those that remained were loose and rotten.
The light of the candle revealed a rickety flight of steps in the upper right hand corner, and without hesitation the boys mounted to the second floor. This apartment was in remarkably good condition. Not a drop of rain had penetrated through the roof or sides.
The floor was strewn with sawdust and shavings. A carpenter's bench stood on each side, and in the center was a huge old-fashioned sheet iron stove, with a pipe running straight to the roof. The room was lighted by three windows--one at each end, and one on the side facing the creek.
"This is what I call luck," exclaimed Ned. "A stove ready and waiting for us, and fuel lying about in plenty! We won't have to endure our wet clothes long."
"The owner may object to our taking possession, though," said Randy. "We don't want to get in any more scrapes."
"No one but a crusty old brute would refuse to let us dry ourselves," replied Ned. "And besides, I don't believe the owner lives anywhere within a mile. He probably uses this work room in winter--when there is hardly any farm work to do--and doesn't come near it in summer. The reason I think so is because the tools have all been taken away."
Ned's supposition was probably correct. At all events the boys did not scruple to make a blazing fire in the stove, and very pleasant the warmth felt after their long tussle with the storm.
Ned was soaked through and through in spite of his rubber coat, but Randy was only wet to the middle. They stood as near as possible to the stove, and so powerful was the heat of the wood fire, that in half an hour their clothes were entirely dry.
It was rather a risky undertaking, but both lads were hardy and vigorous and had no fear of taking cold.
As the fire burnt itself out the pale light of day shone through the windows. Friday morning had dawned.
"Still raining a little," said Ned, "and the sky is cloudy. We must start up the creek without delay now. My mind will feel a good deal easier when I know that Clay and Nugget are safe. They must be feeling pretty wretched if they stayed on the island all night in the rain."
"I don't think they would venture to leave after the directions you gave them," returned Randy. "Unless the island became flooded. I never thought of that before."
Ned walked quickly to the side window and looked out.
"The water is still on the rise," he said gloomily. "It is backing into the wasteway and crawling up the slope toward the mill. You can hardly see anything of the dam. To tell the truth, Randy, I believe the creek is quite high enough to cover that island."
Randy turned pale.
"What has become of the boys then?" he asked. "Could they have passed down the creek while we were drying ourselves?"
"Hardly," said Ned. "You forget the dam. But pull on your coat and we'll be off. It's not raining enough to hurt us."
Randy hastily obeyed, and after satisfying themselves that the lingering embers of the fire could do no damage, the boys went down the shaking flight of steps to the lower floor. With great care they crossed the rotten planks, and were half way to the door when a burly figure darkened the threshold--a roughly dressed man with a gun on his shoulder and a partially filled grain sack in his hand.
The boys stood still, half frightened, half astonished, but the stranger came quickly forward, lowering his gun as he did so.
"Good morning, my lads," he said in a gruff, mocking voice, "so the storm has driven you to my humble retreat. You are welcome--quite welcome. Make yourselves at home. This is an unexpected honor. I am sorry I was absent when you called."
The boys exchanged startled glances. There was an unpleasant ring to the stranger's voice that boded no good intentions.
"If you own this mill we are much obliged to you for the use of it," said Ned. "We got wet in the storm and came here to dry ourselves. We took the liberty of making a fire in the stove up stairs."
As he spoke he moved toward the door with Randy at his heels.
"Not so fast," muttered the man, pushing the boys forcibly back. "You can stay a while and keep me company. I've taken a fancy to you chaps, and want to get better acquainted with you. Over there is the portion of this domicile that I occupy at present. It ain't very palatial, but I reckon I can give you a log to sit on."
There was no choice but to obey, and the boys reluctantly crossed the rickety floor to the lower corner of the mill. Here was a great heap of sawdust, and two or three logs. The man sat down on the former--between the boys and the door--and motioned his companions to one of the logs.
It was now fully daylight, and the stranger's position, facing one of the broad windows on the creek side of the mill, gave the boys an opportunity to examine him closely.
He wore a dirty, greasy suit of tweed, patched here and there with different colored cloth. His shoes gaped at the toes, and his coat collar was buttoned tightly about his throat--no doubt in default of a shirt.
His face might have been handsome at one time, but it was now marred and brutalized by a life of dissipation. His nose and cheeks were purple, his eyes bloodshot, and a matted growth of brown hair strayed from beneath a ragged slouch hat.
Little wonder that Ned and Randy cowered fearfully before the gaze of this evil looking ruffian. They knew now that he was a tramp, and never before had they seen a worse specimen.
It suddenly occurred to Ned that this was the same man who had passed the camp in a boat on the previous night, and the knowledge by no means added to his peace of mind.
Immediately on sitting down the stranger had taken a short black pipe from his pocket, and filled and lighted it. But during the performance of this operation he was not oblivious to the keen scrutiny of his companions.
"I hope you chaps will know me again," he said in a sarcastic tone. "Or were you just admiring my beauty? Dude Moxley is what my friends all call me, because I dress with such taste, and take such good care of my complexion."
Suddenly changing his voice he demanded gruffly, "Where are the other two chaps?"
"Why--why--how did you know there were two more?" exclaimed Ned, thrown off his guard by the question.
Mr. Moxley smiled complacently. "I seen the canoes and the tent up yonder along the shore. As the canoes happened to be empty I judged the rest of the party were on behind somewhere. I just guessed at their bein' two more of you, but it seems I hit it."
This was a very lame explanation, but the boys were too greatly worried to notice its defects.
"I may as well tell him all," thought Ned. "Perhaps he will relent and let us go."
Acting on this impulse he related the occurrences of the previous night, and described the perilous situation of Clay and Nugget on the island.
"Won't you let us go and look for our companions now?" he asked. "If the island is flooded they are in great danger."
Ned had risen in his eagerness, and now he made a step toward the door.
"Sit down!" thundered Mr. Moxley. "If you lads try to escape I'll put a hole through you."
He lifted the gun and patted it significantly, and that instant Ned recognized the weapon. It was Mose Hocker's property--the identical muzzleloader which Randy had brought up from the depths of Rudy's Hole. Ned could see the silver plate set in the breech, and could partially read the inscription: "John Armstrong, Maker."
Randy was equally quick to recognize the gun. He gave a little gasp of astonishment and looked at Ned.
The agitation of the boys was not observed by the ruffian.
"Just sit still now," he growled. "If you don't you'll be the worse off. You needn't be alarmed about your friends. I reckon they'll be along this way purty soon."
While speaking Mr. Moxley happened to glance toward the upper end of the mill, and through a gaping crevice between the boards he saw something that caused a sudden wave of excitement to spread over his face.
Rising quickly to his feet, he seized both boys in an iron grasp and dragged them several yards across the floor to a big closet that occupied the corner of the mill. He unbolted the door and shoved his captives roughly inside.
"Don't you dare to whimper," he hissed savagely. "Mind that, my lads. Dude Moxley ain't to be trifled with."
The ruffian slammed the door and bolted it, and the next instant his heavy retreating footsteps shook the rotten floor.
CHAPTER XXI
A MYSTERIOUS WARNING
It is quite unnecessary to give a minute account of how Clay and Nugget spent the night on the island. As the absence of their companions was more and more prolonged they became worried and anxious, and gave but little thought to their own miserable plight.
The rubber coats shielded them from the rain, and by crouching under the trees they avoided the fury of the wind. Nugget faced the situation with remarkable fortitude, and uttered but few complaints.
After the gale subsided, and the thunder and lightning became less frequent, the boys made occasional trips to the buttonwood tree to see how the canoes were faring, and in this way they soon discovered that the creek was rising. So rapidly did the flood advance that on the fifth visit they found the roots of the buttonwood submerged, and the yellow tide within a few inches of the trunk.
At Clay's suggestion the canoes were dragged out on the island, and all the baggage was stowed in the hatches. When the task was completed the canoes were so heavy that the boys could scarcely lift them; and little wonder, since they held just double their usual load.
The water soon began to trickle over the island, and when it was three or four inches deep, the boys tied the canoes side by side to a large tree, and climbed into their seats. Here they sat, protected by rubber coats and canvas aprons until morning dawned.
The broad yellow expanse of the creek, as it whirled swiftly by the island with its burden of _débris_ and driftwood, satisfied Clay that the absent ones had found it impossible to paddle back.
"There is no use in waiting here any longer," he said to Nugget. "The boys may have been carried far down the creek, and are probably looking for us at this minute."
"You think they are safe then?" asked Nugget.
"I hope so," replied Clay dubiously. "We'll know to a certainty before long. Hand me your knife till I cut the ropes. I tied them in a knot."
"Here you are."
An instant later the canoes drifted off the island, and plunged into the swirling flood. Their heavy loads caused them to sink almost to the gunwales, and this the boys noted with serious alarm.
"We must keep along shore," said Clay. "If we upset then the danger won't be so great."
With extreme caution the boys paddled diagonally to the left bank, where they found the current considerably less rapid. They were drifting along side by side when a man suddenly appeared from behind a tree a few yards ahead, and beckoned them anxiously with his finger.
"Come in here a minute, you fellows," he whispered hoarsely, when the canoes were close to him.
The boys ceased paddling, but hesitated to obey.
"I don't mean any harm," added the man. "It's for your own good."
"I wonder what he wants," said Clay. "Perhaps it's something about the boys. Let's talk to him, Nugget."
They ran the canoes into a shallow inlet where dry land had been but a few hours before, and the stranger came quickly toward them. His appearance was not calculated to cause the boys any alarm.
He looked to be about six and twenty. He was poorly dressed, and his rather boyish face was covered with a stubbly growth of light hair. Something in his features seemed to wake a chord of recognition in Clay's heart, and he struggled with his memory to account for it.
The man came close to the canoes, and after casting a furtive glance up and down the shore, said in a low voice:
"You needn't get out. I won't keep you long. Where are the other two chaps that belong to your party?"
This unexpected question amazed the boys, and they regarded the stranger with sudden suspicion.
"I don't mean any harm to you, indeed I don't," he added. "It's just the other way."
There was unmistakable sincerity in his words and manner, and after a brief deliberation Clay told him how the other boys had started after the tent, and had not come back.
"I thought you wanted to tell us something about them," he concluded. "Did you just come up the creek?"
"Yes," replied the man. "I was as far down as the next dam, but I didn't see a sign of your friends. I reckon they're below that somewheres, so you'd better push on and find them. I want to give you chaps a warning. Keep your eyes open for a big man with a purple face. If you run across him get out of the way as quick as you kin. He's somewhere about this neighborhood, too, for I seen his--"
The man stopped abruptly, and after another cautious survey of the woods, resumed in a whisper:
"If you fellows do chance to get in trouble through this party, why mebbe I'll be near at hand to help. It ain't certain, mind, because he may easily give me the slip again. If I kin find him afore he gets away this time, it ain't likely he will give you any trouble."
"I don't quite understand," said Clay in a perplexed tone. "Who are you, and who is this man that you are warning us about? Why should we be afraid of him?"
The stranger shook his head.
"It ain't quite the thing for me to tell," he said slowly. "You see nothin' may come of it after all. Just you fellows mind what I say, and keep your eyes open. When you find your friends paddle on down the creek for a good way before you camp. Good-by, I'm off."
He turned abruptly away, and hurried through the woods toward the base of the hill.
Clay called him two or three times, but in vain. He was already out of sight.
The boys looked at each other for a moment with unspeakable amazement.
"It's the queerest thing I ever heard of," exclaimed Clay. "I don't pretend to understand it. The man was serious in all he said, too."
"There was something familiar about his face," observed Nugget. "At least I thought so when I first saw him."
"Why, that's just what struck me," replied Clay eagerly. "I never saw _him_ before, but I have seen some one that looks like him."
"That's about the way of it," assented Nugget. "We'll keep a sharp lookout for that purple faced man, anyhow."
"We certainly will," replied Clay. "Now then, let's be off. The fellow won't return again."
They backed out of the inlet and paddled on down the creek. Hardly a word was spoken. The mysterious stranger's warning had taken a deep hold upon both lads, and they were so deeply engrossed in puzzling over it that they failed to see the dam until it was close to them. The falling water made but little noise since the breastwork was almost submerged.
It was a weird and lonely scene that the boys gazed upon now--the broad yellow flood under a leaden sky, the gray crumbling mill looming through a pall of drizzling rain, and beyond, where the mists deepened, the foaming thread of the creek, visible for a brief stretch before it was lost among the steep, pine clad hills.
"What a desolate place!" exclaimed Clay. "I don't believe there is a human being within a mile. The boys must be farther down, and ten to one they shot the dam in the dark. It doesn't look very dangerous, but I hardly think we'll risk it, Nugget. That corner by the mill seems a likely place to carry around."
"So it does," assented Nugget. "Come ahead, we'll try it."
With cautious strokes they paddled on until a sudden glimpse of the sluiceway leading under the mill caused them to pull up short. They headed straight for shore, and as they scrambled out at the foot of the hill, and pushed through the bushes, intending to see what the chances were for a portage, they blundered into the two missing canoes and the tent.
"Here's luck!" cried Clay. "Ned and Randy must be--"
The sentence was never finished, for that, instant the bushes rustled, parted, and a big burly man with a purplish red face stepped out.
The blank amazement and fear on the faces of the two lads was a study for an artist. Before them was the living verification of the mysterious warning. There was no mistaking that ruddy countenance.
The stranger spoke first.
"You're just the lads I'm looking for. Your friends are lying in yonder mill. They went over the dam in their canoes this morning at daybreak.
"I happened to see them and saved their lives. They were pretty near drowned, but I managed to bring them around all right. They ain't able to walk yet, so they asked me to go up the creek and hunt you fellows. Come right along and I'll take you to them."
Was Mr. Dude Moxley's brain muddled that he should have inserted such a gross error in his otherwise plausible little story? Perhaps he did not have time to plan it thoroughly in his hasty advance from the mill, or had calculated on finding his new victims at any other place than this.
Frightened as the boys were they noted the discrepancy, and it opened their eyes to the seriousness of the situation. "If our friends went over the dam this morning," asked Clay with a touch of scorn, pointing to the canoes and the tent, "how do these come to be here?"
CHAPTER XXII
AN INSOLENT DEMAND
A dangerous glitter in the man's eyes showed that Clay's question was not at all to his liking.
"How them canoes got here is none of your business," he answered emphatically, "and I don't want no argument about it. Step lively now in the direction of that mill."
The mask was off, and the boys realized that they were prisoners. Their captor's sullen features and the gun that he bore on his shoulder forbade any attempt at escape.
With sinking hearts they trudged along the shore a few feet in advance of the ruffian. They had no doubt that their companions were confined in the mill, and it was some consolation to know they were going to join them. Why they had been captured at all, and what object was to be gained by it was a mystery too deep for comprehension.
From time to time the tramp uttered a brief order, and in this way he drove the boys before him, across the sluiceway, and then over the rickety floor of the mill to the lower corner. He unbolted the closet door and shoved them roughly in.
It was not by any means a joyful reunion for the Jolly Rovers, but they were very glad to be together again nevertheless. A crevice in the door admitted some light to the closet, and at the same time afforded a view of Mr. Moxley, who was then sitting on the sawdust heap, examining the contents of his grain bag.
He drew out two dead chickens, half a dozen ears of corn, and a quantity of apples and pears--a sure proof that he had secretly been plundering some farmer. He began to munch one of the apples, and the boys took advantage of the opportunity to narrate their adventures in low, whispered tones.
When all had been told the mystery was no nearer solution than before--in fact it was even more complex.
"I can't imagine why this fellow has gone to such trouble and risk to capture us all," said Ned. "I hardly think he will do any harm. We must wait patiently and see what happens."
"I can't understand that warning Nugget and I received," added Clay. "I hope the man will keep his word and help us out of this scrape."
"I wouldn't count on that," replied Ned; "and yet there may be more in it than we suppose."
"Hush!" whispered Randy with his eyes to the crevice. "Here comes the tramp."
Moxley rose and approached the closet. He partially opened the door, and then walked back a few paces behind one of the logs.
"Now step out, you chaps," he commanded sternly. "I have a little business to attend to, and I want it done quietly."
The boys tremblingly obeyed, and when they were grouped before the door the ruffian added, "Now go through your pockets and lay everything you have on this log. See that you don't keep anything back."
It was hard to submit to this audacious robbery, but there was no alternative. Moxley had the gun in his hands.
The boys deposited all they had about them on the log--watches, money, keys, fishing tackle, and handkerchiefs. The fellow made them turn every pocket inside out, and when he was satisfied that all were empty he appropriated the money, watches, and keys. The other articles he contemptuously rejected, and allowed the boys to take them back.
Then he drove his prisoners into the closet and bolted the door--much to their surprise and consternation, for they had confidently expected to be turned loose.
"No racket now," he growled. "I ain't going so far away but what I kin hear you. It won't do to yell or kick, for the door is too strong to break, and there ain't another living creature within a mile."
He tramped heavily across the floor and left the mill.
The loss of their valuables had made the boys so angry and indignant that they were little inclined to regard the warning. They soon came to the conclusion, however, that escape was really impossible.
The door was stoutly built, and rendered still stronger by heavy cross bars. The hinges and the bolts were massive. The combined efforts of all four failed to make any impression, and they soon abandoned the attempt.
"Great Cæsar! I see it all now," exclaimed Ned suddenly. "That scoundrel is going to carry off our canoes, and leave us to get out the best way we can!"
No one doubted that Ned was right. The boys stared at each other in speechless consternation.
It was bad enough to lose their watches and money, but now they were about to be deprived of everything--clothes, canoes, and tent. It meant the sudden termination of the cruise, and an ignominious return home.
"Let's pound and kick with all our might," suggested Clay. "The door can't hold out forever."
Before any one could reply a heavy tread was heard, and looking through the crevice Ned made the startling announcement that the ruffian had returned.
The boys hardly knew whether to be glad or sorry at this piece of news. They feared a greater misfortune than the loss of all their property.
Crowding close to the crevice--which extended upward the length of the door--they peered eagerly into the room. Moxley had not returned empty handed. He had employed his brief absence in rifling the canoes, and was laden with their entire contents, excepting the dishes and the fishing rods.
He deposited his burden on the sawdust and sat down beside it. Very slowly and attentively he ransacked the bags of clothes, the packets of provisions, and the little japanned tin boxes in which the boys kept paper and envelopes, stamps, fishing tackle, and various other articles.
Then he took the empty grain sack and stuffed it with the clothes, and a large portion of the provisions. He appropriated all the stamps he could find, and pushed the tin boxes aside.
Having completed his arrangements he walked over to the closet and opened the door. Then he sat down on a log facing the boys with his gun across his knee.
"I think I have you chaps pretty tight," he said, wrinkling his face into an ugly smile. "I have a very particular engagement about twenty miles from here, and it was my first intention to start away this morning. But seein' as the rain is still coming down I have changed my mind and will give you the pleasure of my company fur a few hours longer.
"The fact is I've taken quite a fancy to you chaps--quite a decided fancy. There's one young gentleman in your party I'm 'specially anxious to see. I've had a cherished memento of him fur the last ten days, and it's quite a load on my mind because I haven't given him anything in return. It keeps me from sleepin' sound at nights."
Here Mr. Moxley threw out his right leg, and turned the trousers up a few inches, revealing half a dozen red scars on his ankle.
"That's the memento I speak of," he said. "It's a purty one, isn't it?"
There was a breathless pause. The boys turned pale before the ferocious glance of the scoundrel. The mystery was clear as daylight now.
Their captor was none other than Bug Batters's desperate companion. From sheer love of revenge he must have been tracking the Jolly Rovers ever since that momentous night nearly two weeks previous.
Moxley gloated over the consternation and the dread that were depicted on the faces of his prisoners. He did not speak for a moment, but gazed at the boys with a cruel smile that was more terrible than a manifestation of anger.
"Well," he said finally, "I reckon you know who I am by this time. I'll give you just five minutes to point out the lad who peppered me with salt. If you're sensible chaps you'll do it without hesitation. If you try to make a fool out of me I'll serve you all the same way I intend to serve him. I'm a fair minded man, and don't want to punish the innocent with the guilty if I kin help it."
The boys looked at one another without speaking. If Randy was a shade paler than the others it escaped the notice of Mr. Moxley, although he was scanning all the faces intently, with a view to picking out the guilty one by his own powers of perception.
"The allotted time is slipping away," he said grimly. "The right party had better speak up quick. Oh! you needn't look out of the windows. No one comes near this place in the summer, and there ain't a house within three quarters of a mile. I've got you right in my power, and there ain't no hope of escape."
"I hardly think you will get the information you want," said Ned in a firm but husky voice. "I for one shan't tell you, and I advise my friends to do the same. It's not likely we would put one of our companions in your power after the threats you have made. If you wish to avoid trouble in the future you will be satisfied with robbing us, and will let us go without any worse treatment. As for the shooting--no one was to blame but yourself. You had no business to attack our camp that night."
CHAPTER XXIII
A DARING ATTEMPT
Moxley's face turned a deeper shade of purple, and he made a threatening step toward Ned.
"You're a bold lad," he said with a harsh laugh. "There are not many would dare to speak to me in that way. But it wasn't you who fired the gun that night. I can tell by your actions that you're anxious to screen one of your companions."
He paused a moment and then went on: "You'll find out before long that Dude Moxley ain't to be trifled with. I'll get what I want out of you obstinate pig headed chaps if it takes a week. I know how to bring you to terms. Back you go in that closet now, and there you stay until you can listen to reason. When you hand over the lad I want the rest of you can go free, and so can the other one for that matter--when I'm through with him.
"Perhaps when he finds his companions are suffering for what he did, his conscience will make him confess. But mark you now, if this affair ain't settled by to-morrow's dawn I'll chop up your canoes and burn the tent. I'll do more than that, too. I'll bind and gag you, and leave you here alone. And not a bite do you get to eat, either."
With this ultimatum Mr. Moxley rose, and bolted the door. Then he sat down on the sawdust, and sorting out some crackers and jerked beef from the provisions began to eat greedily.
He was evidently quite satisfied to spend another night at the mill, for the rain was coming down faster than ever. What he had told the boys about the loneliness and security of the place was no idle boast, else he would have made haste to leave the locality with his plunder.
Meanwhile a very excited discussion was being carried on in whispers behind the closet door.
Randy, stricken with remorse for the troubles in which he had involved his companions, was resolved to admit the shooting.
"I'd sooner stand the punishment than see you fellows starving here," he said. "It will save the canoes and the tent, too. I don't believe the man will dare to harm me. He is only trying to scare us."
"Not a bit of it," replied Ned stoutly. "He's a thoroughbred villain, and will certainly take some revenge on you. Your resolve does you lots of credit, Randy, but it won't do. You might repent it all the days of your life."
Clay and Nugget were of the same mind, and earnestly urged Randy to abandon his rash intention.
"Help may be nearer than we think," said Clay. "The man who stopped us up the creek this morning was certainly Bug Batters, and it looks very much to me as though he has been following this Moxley on purpose to keep him from doing us any injury. He may feel grateful to us, you know, because we saved his brother--or rather you did, Ned."
"And Bug Batters knew that Moxley was in the vicinity," whispered Nugget. "That's who he was looking for when we met him."
"I have no doubt that the stranger was Bug Batters," said Ned, "and I think he is trying to prevent his old companion from carrying out his revenge, as Clay suggests. But what has become of Bug Batters now? That is the important question. I am afraid he has strayed off in some other direction. If he came near the mill he could not help finding the canoes."
"He told us he had been down the creek just before we met him," remarked Clay, "but he could not have been all the way to the mill, for the two canoes and the tent were there then, and he did not say anything about them."
"And when he left us he struck back toward the base of the hill," added Nugget.
"It looks very much as though he had lost the trail entirely," said Ned. "He may be three or four miles away. It would be very foolish to count on getting help from him, anyhow."
"Then we don't stand a ghost of a chance," muttered Randy. "You had better let me have my own way. I'll throw myself on that fellow's mercy."
"You won't do anything of the kind," said Ned firmly. "We won't let you. If anything serious happened we would have to shoulder the blame. If you are really sorry for being the cause of this scrape, prove it by dropping your foolish project."
"You take things coolly enough," grumbled Randy. "Do you want us to stay cooped up here for a week, and lose everything we have? Go ahead, then. I won't say any more."
In truth Randy was glad enough to give up his resolve. Remorse had prompted him to make the offer, and he had secretly hoped that his companions would refuse to accept the sacrifice.
"I don't intend that we shall stay here a week, or even a night, if I can help it," said Ned, after a pause. "I have a little plan in my head, but it won't work until evening. If that fails we still have a slim chance left.
"The farmer from whom those chickens were stolen may stray down here in search of the thief, and it is not impossible that Mose Hocker is somewhere about here. This man certainly stole that gun from Hocker's cabin, and if he took the boat at the same time--which I believe he did--Hocker will surely try to recover his property, and will naturally look for it along the creek."
Ned's reasoning--and especially his intimation of a plan to escape--put the boys in a more cheerful mood. They were all thoroughly exhausted for want of sleep, but that was of little consequence compared with the pangs of hunger and thirst they were enduring. They had eaten nothing since the previous evening, nor had a drop of water touched their lips. And it was now past noon.
It was aggravating, nay, maddening, to know that their store of provisions was so close. Well they realized the futility of appealing to their merciless captor.
He had said they should have no food, and they knew he meant it. No doubt he would deny them water also, and they did not venture to ask it.
They could see the fellow plainly. He was sprawled in a lazy attitude on the sawdust, pulling at his foul black pipe. Occasionally he took a flat, greenish bottle from his pocket and tasted the contents with a satisfactory smack of the lips. The fumes of bad tobacco and whisky began to permeate the closet.
So the long afternoon wore on. Moxley seemed quite unconcerned about his prisoners. He was well content to lie on the soft sawdust with his bottle and his pipe, secure from the pelting rain that was falling outside.
Ned kept a close watch upon him, noting with satisfaction that he had frequent recourse to the bottle. His potations would likely induce sleep.
It seemed to the impatient boys that night would never come, but at last the gray light faded from the crevice, and the dusk of evening deepened the shadows in the old mill.
Before it was fairly dark Moxley lighted one of the lanterns that he had brought from the canoes and put it on a log. It was a bullseye, and he so trained it that the yellow glare shone on the sawdust heap.
Perhaps he fancied it an excellent substitute for sunlight, which all tramps love so dearly. At all events he basked in it while he smoked a couple of pipes, and then, after several ineffectual efforts to sit straight, he rolled over on his back.
A moment later heavy snores came from his parted lips. He was undoubtedly asleep.
It may be imagined with what anxiety Ned had been watching this little scene through the crevice.
"The time has come," he whispered to his companions. "Moxley won't wake in a hurry now. But to make sure, suppose you mount guard there, Randy."
"What are you going to do?" asked Randy, as he crouched down on the floor. "Break the door open?"
"Not much. I'll show you in a moment."
The closet in which the boys were confined was built right against the rear end of the mill. Its dimensions were ample--eight feet long and about four wide. Underneath was the wasteway, but its usual roar was now subdued by an influx of water from the flooded creek.
Ned had been quietly examining the situation during the day, and had noted the shaky condition of the floor planks. He now directed Clay and Nugget to stand close to the door. Then kneeling down he inserted both hands in a crevice between two of the planks and pulled with all his might.
A ripping noise, a sharp crack--and the worm eaten plank came free of the beams, leaving a gaping orifice in the very center of the floor, four feet long by a foot and a half wide.
Ned trembled like a leaf.
"Is it all right?" he whispered eagerly.
"Yes," replied Randy. "The rascal is sound asleep. He didn't budge."
"I'm glad of that."
The boys looked timidly down the hole, and crouched closer to the wall. Far below, through the network of crossed beams, they could see the eddying flood. It looked immeasurably distant.
"You don't expect us to go down there, I hope," queried Clay.
"No, but I intend you to lower _me_ through," answered Ned. "If I can reach one of those rafters I will be all right. It won't be a difficult matter to get out on land. Then I will hurry around to the door, liberate you fellows, while Moxley is sleeping, seize his gun--and then away for freedom."
Ned drew a long breath at the prospect.
"Now this is what I want you to do," he resumed in a calmer tone. "If the rafters are too far below me you must let me down to them by one of your coats. Brace yourselves now so you can stand the strain."
The boys obeyed and Randy stripped off his coat in case it should be needed.
Then Ned lowered himself at one end of the hole, and swung clear down.
He pulled himself up, and clung by his elbows. "No good," he whispered hoarsely. "The nearest rafter is a foot below. Let me have the coat. It will be safer than trusting to your hands. I might drag you down with me."
The three boys braced themselves around the hole, and took a firm grasp of the upper part of the coat.
"All right," whispered Randy.
By a dexterous movement Ned transferred his hold from the planking to the more precarious support and slipped downward, hand over hand. An instant later his feet touched a broad, solid beam.
CHAPTER XXIV
AN UNEXPECTED ENCOUNTER
The instant the tension relaxed the boys drew the coat up.
"All right!" came Ned's voice from the darkness. "Put the plank back in place now and keep very quiet. Wait a moment," he added quickly. "Something just occurred to me. I may be right and I may be wrong, but at all events don't you fellows be scared if you hear a big splash."
"We won't," whispered Randy.
Then the plank was dropped noiselessly over the hole.
Ned straddled the rafter--it was too dark to risk an upright position--and made his way to the nearest end, which terminated in one of the walls of masonry that formed the sides of the sluiceway, and on which the mill partially rested. Then he turned around and crept to the other end, where he found the same state of affairs.
His fears were now confirmed. The mill rose fairly from the two stone walls, and there was no way of escaping overhead, even had the other rafters been within reach. His only chance lay in the flooded waterway underneath.
Ned had more than half expected this, and was therefore prepared for the emergency. Without hesitation he swung from the rafter and dropped through eight feet of space into the turbid flood.
He went clear under, but came to the surface quickly, and swam with vigorous strokes down the wasteway. Both the air and the water were warm, and he felt little discomfort.
Between the reflex current from the creek on top, and the undertow from the sluiceway beneath, he was buffeted about considerably before he succeeded in emerging on the spit of land between the mill and the creek. He squeezed the water from his clothes as well as he could, and started up the slope through the stones and bushes. A misty drizzle of rain was still falling.
He redoubled his caution as he neared the upper end of the mill. Creeping on hands and knees to the door, he peeped cautiously over the threshold. He was hardly prepared for what met his gaze.
He had confidently expected to find Moxley sound asleep, and instead of that the fellow was sitting upright with his gun across his knees, and his bottle in one hand. Perhaps the splash made by Ned's drop into the wasteway had wakened him without arousing his supicions. He had no present intention of going to sleep, for he moved a little closer to the light of the lantern, and filled his pipe.
For a moment Ned felt the disappointment keenly. He knew what a severe blow it must be to his companions. It was out of the question to rescue them now, for Moxley was directly between the door and the closet.
Ned had been so sure of effecting his plan without hindrance, that it had not occurred to him what step to take in case of failure. But a brief consideration of matters raised his spirits, and he resolved to seek the nearest farmhouse and obtain help.
"That is a far better plan anyhow," he reflected with satisfaction. "Moxley will be captured, and we will recover our watches and money. And we won't have to start down this flooded creek in the dark, either, I must be quick, though, for Moxley might happen to open the closet and discover my absence. I wish there was some way of letting the boys know what I am going to do."
This was manifestly impossible, so Ned crawled away from the door and crossed the sluice to the foot of the hill. He could not withstand the temptation to go up the creek and have a look at the canoes.
He found them all safely out of reach of the flood, for Moxley was too shrewd a man to let them go adrift, and perhaps cause an investigation that would frustrate his plans.
As Ned was turning away his eye caught a sudden gleam from the cockpit of Clay's canoe, and on making an investigation he was surprised to find Randy's gun. Moxley must have overlooked it.
The weapon was useless, for the ammunition had been carried off, but Ned shouldered it and started briskly down the creek. At the sluiceway he found a well trodden footpath, and followed it along the rear side of the mill, and thence by the base of the hill to a wagon road which began abruptly at the edge of the wasteway, where there was no doubt a fording to the opposite neck of land.
Ned concluded that the road led to the home of the man who owned the mill, and he was about starting off in haste when his eyes fell on a boat that protruded from a clump of bushes a few yards down the shore.
On going close he recognized it instantly by the peculiar arrangement of the seats. It was Mose Hocker's boat. Moxley had carried it off when he stole the gun.
"I say, young fellow, don't be quick with that shootin' iron; I want to talk to you."
The voice came from a thicket a few feet up the bank, and as Ned stood still with fear and amazement, a man slipped out and stood before him.
Ned instantly guessed the identity of the newcomer.
"You are Bug Batters?" he asked quickly.
"Yes, I'm Bug Batters, and I reckon you are one of them canoein' chaps. I took you fur some one else at first--fur the man what put this boat here."
"You mean Dude Moxley," said Ned. "Well, I can tell you where he is. In spite of your warning we all fell into his hands, and I'm the only one that's free so far."
He went on with his story and quickly made the situation clear.
Bug was amazed to learn how close his old companion was.
"It's a purty bad fix," he said slowly, "but I reckon we can't get your friends out of it. It's a pity you have no loading fur that gun. You see, Moxley is a bad man and won't listen to argument. We'll have to think over the matter a little bit, and meanwhile I'll tell you how I come to be here."
Both sat down on the boat, and Bug began his narrative.
"I'm a purty rough customer, but I've got a heart like other men, and I'm grateful to you because one of you saved my brother from drowning. Moxley was awful mad when you gave him the slip, but he didn't think of going after you at first. Two or three days later he heard accidentally that you fellows was camping some place along the creek--I furget the name of it now--and knowin' from this that you weren't in any hurry he got into his head to go after you.
"I tried to talk him out of it, but it weren't any use, so then I let on I was agreed to it, meanin' all the time to stand by you fellows. Well, we traveled down the creek fur a couple of days until a rock knocked the bottom out of our boat and sunk it."
Bug hesitated briefly, and then resumed in a faltering voice: "We picked up another boat that night, and started off again, but I reckon Moxley must have suddenly got suspicious of me, for when morning came he gave me the slip and that was the last I seen of him. Knowin' that he meant mischief, and knowin' that you chaps couldn't be far away, I follered the creek on down.
"Before daylight this morning I found the boat here. I went up the creek then lookin' fur Moxley, and that's when I met two of your party and warned them."
"But where have you been all day?" interrupted Ned. "We thought you had gone off in some other direction."
"I'll tell you where I've been," muttered Bug angrily. "I had a streak of hard luck this morning. After I left your fellows I struck over the hill to the nearest farmhouse, thinkin' Moxley might be prowlin' around for something to eat. I reckon he'd been there before me, because the first thing I knew a big ugly farmer and his hired man had me fast. They swore I'd been stealin' chickens an' corn, and wouldn't let me say a word. They penned me up in an outbuilding, intending to lug me to Carlisle jail in the morning. But I broke out about an hour ago, and came straight down here, and when I seen the boat I knew Moxley must be somewhere around yet."
"That _was_ hard luck," said Ned, smiling at the recollection. "Moxley had a whole bag of chickens, and corn, and fruit in the mill. The farmer thought you were the man that stole it. It was awfully kind of you to go to all this trouble and risk on our account. There are not many men who would have done it."
"You saved my brother's life," replied Bug doggedly. "It takes a good deal to square a debt of that kind. There's one thing I'd like to say though. It goes agin the grain to serve an old pal an ill turn--no matter how bad a man he is. I'm willing to get your friends free, an' save your money, and watches, an' everything else, but I ain't goin' to be the means of puttin' Moxley in jail--if I can help it. I'm afraid, for one thing, because he'd hunt me down as soon as he got out."
"Well, I'll leave the whole affair in your hands then," replied Ned. "I was just on my way to the farmhouse when you stopped me. What do you think we had better do? Wait for Moxley to go to sleep again, or try to capture him with this empty gun?"
Before Bug could open his lips to reply a slight noise was heard in the bushes, and three men suddenly appeared on the other side of the boat.
"We have you at last, you scoundrel," cried a harsh voice.
CHAPTER XXV
THE SIEGE BEGINS
The unexpected appearance of the three strangers stupefied Ned, but Bug turned like a flash and started to run. Two of the men instantly overhauled him and threw him roughly to the ground, while a third hastily opened the slide of a dark lantern that was strapped to his waist and cast a flood of light upon the scene.
Ned uttered a gasp of amazement. The man with the lantern was Mose Hocker.
The recognition was mutual.
"You here!" cried Hocker in a pained voice. "I didn't expect this. Is it possible that you lads came down to my cabin and stole the gun and the boat? I wouldn't have believed it of you without the evidence of my own eyes."
"And this here's the same feller I had locked up in the smoke house," exclaimed one of Bug's captors. "I'll bet he don't steal any more chickens for a while."
Ned stood pale and agitated before his accuser--quite at a loss for words to explain.
"I'm sorry for you," resumed Hocker, "but I must do my duty an' hand you over to constable Jeffries. Where are the rest of your party?"
The words came with a rush now as Ned eagerly denied his guilt and explained away the incriminating circumstances.
Then, while the others clustered about him, he commenced the story at the beginning, and went through with it thread by thread.
His excitement caused him to speak a little inarticulately; and he missed a few details, but by adroit cross questioning his hearers obtained a clear understanding of the whole situation--starting with the rescue of Bug's brother and ending with the events that had recently transpired at the mill.
Ned was so anxious to procure Bug's release that he quite forgot his suspicions of a few moments before--namely, that Bug was equally guilty with Moxley of the theft of the boat and the gun.
"Won't you let him go?" he pleaded. "It's all a mistake. He had nothing to do with stealing those things from the farmer. He was doing all he could to help us."
But Hocker had formed his own opinion after hearing Ned's story, and so had constable Jeffries and Mr. Zinn, the farmer.
"I'm mighty glad to know you lads ain't guilty," said Hocker, "and I ax your pardon for my wrong suspicion. As for this fellow, I ain't so sure about him. I don't doubt that he's really been trying to get you chaps out of a scrape though, and I promise you he'll get full credit for it. Meanwhile we'd better make sure of him--just as a matter of form, you know."
He nodded to Jeffries and the latter slipped a pair of bracelets on Bug's wrists.
Ned was surprised and indignant. He saw no reason for such a step.
"Don't be worried, lad," remarked Hocker soothingly. "He may be turned loose later on. You see I can't afford to let the guilty parties escape after the hard chase they've given me. Why, Jeffries and I have been scourin' all along the creek in a buggy. We happened to strike Zinn's farm this evening, and stopped fur information. Zinn told us he had a man locked up in the smoke house, but when we went to look the fellow was gone.
"I suspected it was the party I wanted, an' knowin' that in that case the boat couldn't be far away, we hurried down to the creek. And it's well we did for your sake as well as mine. The next thing is to rescue the lads and capture the rascal. We had better be quick or he will take alarm and leave the mill."
"Moxley is the fellow's name, is it?" said the farmer. "It has a kind of familiar ring to my ears."
"I know the man," spoke up Jeffries. "Dude Moxley he goes by, but that ain't his real name. He comes from a good family up the valley, and was well educated when a lad. Drink ruined him, and now he's one of the greatest scamps unhung. I know this other chap, too," added the constable. "His folks are sober, respectable people over at the Gap, but he ain't much better than Moxley. We've met more than once before. How is it, my man?"
Bug hung his head but said nothing.
The scene was inexpressibly painful to Ned, and he was greatly relieved when the conversation turned on the rescue of his companions. He little dreamed that the most exciting incidents of this already eventful night were yet to come.
"We had better cross to the neck of land in your boat, Hocker," suggested Zinn. "The plank over that sluiceway makes a lot of racket, and the scoundrel may hear us and slip away."
This happy idea was carried out. The entire party embarked, and landed a moment later about ten yards below the mill. The rain had ceased some time before, and the moon was now peeping through a rift in the scudding clouds.
As the men crept up the stony slope they saw through the gaping crevices of the mill the yellow gleam from Moxley's lantern. Suddenly it vanished, and a creaking noise was hear.
"The rascal is escaping. We must run for it," whispered Hocker. He bounded forward with Jeffries at his heels. Zinn fell behind, leaving Bug in charge.
The men swiftly turned the upper corner of the mill just as the door was slammed and bolted in their faces. Hocker began to kick savagely and wrench the handle.
"That won't do any good," exclaimed Zinn, as he reached the spot. "I made a strong job of that door, and it will take more than a little to break it down. There are plenty of other places that can be forced in."
A brief pause followed, and then a sullen voice issued from behind the door.
"I'll put a hole through the first man that tries to enter this mill. I mean what I say. Dude Moxley ain't to be trifled with."
The men hastily withdrew, first taking the precaution to remove the plank that covered the sluiceway.
"The rascal must have seen us coming up the slope in the moonlight," muttered Hocker. "I suppose he thought we had the place surrounded and every avenue of escape cut off. He's a desperate fellow, and may stand a long siege."
In truth Moxley seemed to be preparing for that very thing. He boldly drew in the shutters of the two windows that the faced the creek, and a moment later he began to roll logs about, evidently fortifying the weak places in the wall.
"That may be only a ruse," said Jeffries. "Is there any way of escape from the other side?"
"Of course there is," exclaimed the farmer. "He can easily drop from the second story window to the foot of the hill. Lend me that empty gun," he added, turning to Ned. "I'll cross the wasteway in the boat and get behind the trees a few yards up the hill. If the rascal attempts to crawl out the window I'll scare him back."
Ned handed over the gun, and the farmer departed in haste. Hocker and Jeffries moved aside and carried on a whispered conversation.
Bug was left to his own devices. He could not escape, for the removal of the plank from the sluiceway made the place literally an island. He sat down on a big stone, with his manacled hands resting on his knees. Ned was restless and heartsick, and the prolonged suspense grew more intolerable every moment. He was afraid that Moxley would vent his anger on the boys, and perhaps do them an injury.
Hocker divined the lad's thoughts.
"Don't be downhearted," he said. "Your friends are safe enough. The scoundrel won't dare to hurt them. By and by, if the siege threatens to last, we'll find a way to get them out of the mill."
"I hope you will succeed," said Ned. "It's hard to tell what that ruffian will do. And none of us have had anything to eat since last evening at supper time."
Hocker was thunderstruck on hearing this, and hastily produced a double handful of crackers from the capacious pocket of his coat.
"That will take the edge off your hunger," he said. "I bought them at a country store as we drove by this morning. When Zinn's hired man comes down to see where his master is--as he surely will before long--I'll send him back for food. If we can't get your friends out of the mill we can at least send them something to eat through that loose board. By means of the boat one of us can climb into the rafters."
This plan seemed feasible, and Ned felt no compunctions about eating the crackers. Nothing had ever tasted so good to him before.
Meanwhile Hocker and Jeffries had been quietly holding another consultation, and now the latter advanced to the side of the mill.
"Moxley," he called in a loud voice, "if you know what's best for you, you will quietly hand out that gun, and deliver yourself up. The more trouble you give us, the harder it will be for you in the end. You can't possibly escape, and your capture is only a question of time. We are well armed, and won't stand any fooling. Come out now and we'll make it as easy for you as possible."
There was a brief pause, and then creaking footsteps were heart as Moxley approached the wall.
"You can talk all night," he shouted hoarsely, "but it won't do any good. Don't you come too close, Bill Jeffries, or I might draw a bead on you. We have more than one old score to settle. As for getting me out of here, you and ten like you can't do it. I have plenty of ammunition and plenty to eat, and this place will hold me as long as I want to stay. You can't take me inside of a week. I have four prisoners in here, and not a mouthful of food will they get, not a sup of water, as long as you fellows are prowling around. I mean what I say, Jeffries, and you know it. For your own good I warn you to get out of this. I'll shoot the first man that enters the mill."
To enforce this hostile declaration Moxley thrust the muzzle of his gun through a crevice, and Jeffries hastily retreated.
CHAPTER XXVI
BUG'S PROPOSITION
There was dead silence for a while. It was only too evident that Moxley meant what he said, and though Jeffries and Hocker were brave men, they were reluctant to engage in a struggle with all the odds against them.
Accompanied by Ned and Bug they moved down to the edge of the water--a distance of less than thirty feet in the present condition of the creek--and ensconced themselves in some thick bushes. There was no slight risk that Moxley would shoot through the crevices if the moonlight afforded him a tempting chance.
"If we can wait in patience the game will fall into our hands," said Jeffries. "The rascal has been drinking, and the fiery stuff has given him false courage. After a while he will either fall asleep or become helpless from intoxication."
"I wonder if the boys know that help is outside," remarked Ned, "I wish I could get a few words with them."
"Of course they know it," replied Hocker. "They heard every word that was said, and they have too much sense to make any outcry. We'll get them out of the scrape before long, never fear."
Just then the farmer's shrill voice rang out distinctly from the hillside behind the mill:
"Keep back, you rascal. If you crawl out that window I'll drop you quick as a wink."
"Moxley is trying to escape from the second floor," muttered Hocker. "Wait a moment. I'll be back right away."
He crept down the shore of the creek, and crossed the slope to the wasteway.
"Is it all right, Zinn?" he called out.
"Yes," came the reply. "The rascal stuck his ugly head out of the winder a moment ago, but I scared him back. He can't escape on this side."
Hocker was about to rejoin his companions when a dark figure came down the road and passed through a strip of moonlight which served to reveal his identity. It was Abner Peck, the farm hand.
In response to a whispered command from Hocker the man jumped into the boat and pulled hastily across the wasteway. Hocker briefly explained the situation, and after a little further conversation Abner recrossed to the main land, while Hocker hurried back to his companions and related what had occurred.
"I sent him up to the house for provisions and a rope," he concluded, "and when he returns we'll try to get the lads out of the closet."
This piece of news cheered Ned considerably, and helped him to endure the suspense with fortitude. Nearly an hour passed by without a sound from the mill or the alert watcher on the hillside.
The creek was still rising by slow degrees, but the sky was rapidly clearing and gave every promise of continued fair weather.
Finally a low whistle was heard, and Hocker noiselessly disappeared. He returned in less than five minutes, and announced that Abner was waiting with the provisions and the rope.
"Now I have an idea for working this little scheme," he added. "Jeffries, you go to the other end of the mill and open a conversation with Moxley--let on you want to reason with him some more. Keep him talking as long as you can, and meanwhile me and this lad will slip up the wasteway in the boat and try to get the lads free. If anything goes wrong, whistle."
Jeffries was quite satisfied to take the part assigned to him. He moved off in one direction, while Hocker and Ned took the other. Bug was left alone in the bushes.
Jeffries was already in conversation with Moxley when his companions reached the wasteway. They could hear the voices of the two men indistinctly.
Hocker motioned Ned to the rear seat beside Abner; then seizing the oars he pulled the boat swiftly into the deep shadows under the mill. The next step was a more difficult one.
Bidding Abner take the oars, and keep the boat in the same position if possible, he tossed the rope over the very beam to which Ned had descended, and catching the end, tied it to the main part of the rope in such a way as to form a sort of swinging loop, which could not slip. By standing on the seat he managed to get one foot in this loop; then clutching both parts of the rope he drew himself quickly up, and after swaying to and fro for an instant, threw one arm over the rafter. An instant later he was straddling it, and pulling the rope after him he untied the loop.
"Now, lad," he whispered, "call your companions. They won't know my voice."
But this was rendered unnecessary by a sudden rasping noise above, as the loose plank was carefully lifted from its place.
"Randy! Randy!" whispered Ned. "It's all right. We're going to rescue you."
A glad murmur of voices was heard, and Randy incautiously replied: "Hurry up then. Now's your time, for Moxley is at the other end of the mill talking."
"Not so loud, lad," whispered Hocker. "Hold steady now and look out for the rope end."
But before Hocker could throw it footsteps came hastily over the floor above, and then a loud shrill whistle was heard--Jeffries's signal.
An instant of breathless suspense was followed by the sudden thrusting of a shiny object through a hole in the floor a little to one side of the closet.
"No you don't," cried Moxley in a savage voice. "You can't play that game on me. Get out of that at once, or I'll riddle you with buckshot. In ten seconds I shoot."
It was not a time to hesitate or parley. The plank dropped into place, and by a reckless swing and drop Hocker landed fairly in the center of the boat, very nearly capsizing it. Abner dropped the oars, and the current whirled the craft swiftly down the wasteway.
It was a bitter disappointment, especially to Ned. Jeffries hastened to the spot as the party landed.
"I'm awful sorry," he said, "but it couldn't be helped. The rascal must have heard some noise you made."
"It's hard luck, that's a fact," muttered Hocker. "I'll square accounts with that scoundrel afore I'm many hours older. The idea of his threatenin' to shoot me with my own gun; that's what riles me most. It's a pity we didn't get the food up. The boys'll have to starve a little longer, I reckon."
"It will be only a little, too," replied Jeffries grimly. "I don't intend to stand any more nonsense. We'll think over the matter and decide on some kind of a move. Moxley has got to come out of that mill. That settles it."
The party went slowly back to the bushes, and Ned satisfied his hunger with the bread and cold meat Abner had brought, while Jeffries and Hocker carried on a low, earnest discussion.
Presently the quiet was interrupted in an unexpected manner. Being restless and unhappy Bug wandered up toward the mill, and unwittingly strayed into a patch of silvery moonlight.
Moxley must have been on the watch, and the sight of his old chum put him into a fury. He was ignorant of Ned's escape, and naturally attributed his misfortunes to Bug.
"You black hearted dog," he cried savagely. "I'll get square with you. If I go to jail you'll go with me. It was all your fault anyhow. You persuaded me to go after these boys, and it was you who broke into the cabin and stole the gun and boat. I tried to keep you from it, but you wouldn't listen.
"Oh, you'll pay up for your treachery. I'll swear to all these things--and a good many more--in court. That is if I get there--which ain't at all likely. And if I _do_ get out of this hole I'll hunt you down, if it takes a year."
Moxley's rage was so violent that Bug prudently retreated to the bushes.
The ruffian kept up his abuse and called Bug all manner of vile names until he was compelled to stop for sheer want of breath.
Bug came down to Hocker and Jeffries and stood before them.
"Look here," he said hoarsely, "what that rascal says ain't true--at least the most of it ain't. What part I had in stealin' the boat I've made amends fur already, and now I'm willing to do a good deal more. A little while ago I felt kinder sorry for Moxley because me an' him has been together a good part of the summer. But when a man goes back on an old friend, an' calls him bad names, an' tries to get him into trouble by lyin', then I'm done with that man fur good.
"I'd sooner see him in jail now than runnin' loose, an' if you give me a fair show an' take these irons off, I'll find a way to get into that mill and capture the mean rascal. He's more'n half drunk now, and I'm a good deal stronger than I look. When the chance comes I'll know how to use it. I'm talkin' on my honor now, an' mean what I say. You needn't be afraid to turn me loose. I can't escape if I'd want to. You know that."
CHAPTER XXVII
THE BURNING OF THE MILL
There was no mistaking the sincerity of Bug's proposal, and coming, as it did, at a time when Hocker and Jeffries were unable to decide on any feasible plan of action, they were disposed to give a favorable answer.
"It ain't a bad idea," said Jeffries. "But how do you expect to get in without being seen?"
"I'll find a way," returned Bug. "There air plenty of holes an' loose boards."
"An' Moxley is watchin' them all, too," remarked Hocker. "Your plan ain't very definite so far."
Bug hesitated, and before he could reply something occurred that totally changed the situation.
"I see you again, you rascal," came the farmer's voice from the hillside. "You can't fool me. Get away from that winder now."
Hocker and Jeffries exchanged glances of mutual understanding. The latter quickly unlocked the bracelets and freed Bug's wrists.
"Now's your chance," he whispered. "Moxley is on the second floor. Slip in before he comes down. There's a loose board just below that middle window. There ain't time for more than one to get in or we'd follow you. When you need us sing out. Here, take this."
He pressed a pistol into Bug's hand, and the latter bounded noiselessly up the slope. He reached the mill, drew the lower end of a loose plank a foot from its place, and vanished through the orifice.
Let us follow Bug on his perilous quest. Not until he was fairly inside, and crawling on hands and knees over the rickety floor, did he realize the great danger that lay in what he had undertaken to do. For an instant he trembled with fear, and then the memory of his wrongs steeled his heart and nerves.
A sudden noise overheard caused him to crouch midway on the floor. A moment later the stairway creaked, and Moxley began to descend. His progress could be noted as he passed the crevices in the wall.
Bug lay motionless, wondering what he should do next. The possibility of being discovered made him tremble violently. He quite forgot that he had a pistol.
Moxley had now reached the floor, and with cautious steps he moved along the wall toward the lower corner.
Suddenly there was a sound of a heavy fall, followed by a volley of profanity, and the next instant something flew against the wall, and was shivered to fragments that fell with a tinkling noise.
"He's tipped over a bottle," thought Bug, "and now he's smashed it because he's mad. That's like Moxley."
This haphazard guess was absolutely correct. All was silent for a second or two after the glass had fallen; then Moxley grumbled in an audible tone: "Confound the luck! I hope that wasn't my whisky bottle. It ain't in my pocket."
Of such dire import did the question seem to the ruffian that he ventured to strike a match--little dreaming what the impulse would cost him.
Bug's heart beat wildly when he heard the crack and saw the light flash through the darkness. He jammed the pistol into his pocket and rose on his hands and knees.
Moxley was standing before the sawdust heap with his face to the wall. As the match flared up he dropped the gun and seized a greenish bottle that was lying at his feet.
"Here's luck!" he muttered contentedly. "It was the oil bottle I brought from the canoes that got in my way."
He lifted the fiery poison to his lips, still holding the burning match between the fingers of his other hand, and remained in this attitude for a brief moment.
Bug stood erect and moved across the floor with the caution of a creeping tigress. Nearer and nearer he came, and when less than four feet separated him from his intended victim, Moxley heard some slight noise and wheeled around.
Bug was on him with one spring, and down they fell with a great crash, and rolled in furious strife over the shaking floor--Bug crying for help at the top of his voice, Moxley uttering hoarse threats and imprecations.
Blinded with rage they did not observe that the burning end of the match had fallen on the very spot where the widely scattered kerosene oil was most plentiful. Even when the hissing blue flames spurted up and licked the rubbish on all sides with greedy tongues, they fought on desperately, now one uppermost, now the other, as they verged toward the center of the floor.
When Hocker and Jeffries burst into the mill, followed by Ned and Abner, the conflagration was beyond control. The flames were devouring the planking of the wall with a great roaring and crackling, spreading on each side and to the floor above.
The scene was one long to be remembered. The cries of the struggling men on the floor mingled with the furious kicking and shouting that came from the imprisoned boys in the closet, and amid all the din and confusion the farmer rushed down from the hillside and battered his way into the mill with the butt end of his gun.
Fright gave Moxley the strength of a madman, and by a determined effort he tore loose from his plucky assailant, and springing to his feet started to run. He struck Hocker, who jumped in front of him, a furious blow that sent him reeling backward, but before he could make use of his advantage, he tripped on a log, and came down heavily.
As he partially rose Bug leaped upon him, and both men rolled over to the edge of a gaping hole in the floor. They struggled an instant on the brink, and then fell through, landing with a terrific splash in the flooded wasteway far below.
Hocker and Jeffries rushed precipitately from the mill to head them off, while the farmer insanely attempted to check the conflagration by tramping through the _débris_ that was burning here and there on the floor.
The whole affair had taken place in a very few seconds, and Ned was at first so dazed by the confusion and the flames that he was quite incapable of doing anything. The terrified cries of his companions roused him from his stupor, and he dashed through the intense heat to the closet door.
A quick jerk threw the bolt open, and the frightened boys poured out. The lurid glare of the flames and the spark laden volumes of smoke were more than they could stand. One and all bolted for the nearest aperture in the creek side of the mill, and fortunately reached it without falling through the gaps in the floor.
Ned would gladly have followed their example, but he suddenly bethought him of the plunder Moxley had packed up to carry away. Such a loss would be irreparable, and without hesitation he dashed toward the burning wall.
The heat was intense, but he managed to get near enough to snatch the bag. One end was badly scorched. He suddenly spied Hocker's gun, and knowing how the owner valued it, he made another rush and carried it off in triumph.
Thus laden down he tottered across the floor in imminent fear of dropping through to the wasteway, and overwhelmed at times by the suffocating smoke and fiery sparks. When his courage and endurance were all but spent he reached a broken place in the wall and staggered into the refreshing outer air. How good it seemed!
Abner had long since preceded him, and the farmer made his appearance a moment later, still grasping Randy's blackened gun. The boys had been waiting on Ned in terrible suspense, afraid to venture back into the mill, and when he appeared with his burden their joy knew no bounds.
They were ignorant of the disaster that had befallen Bug and Moxley, and when Ned told them, the whole party started off on a run.
They searched the wasteway just as Jeffries and Hocker landed from the boat, pushing Moxley before them, and followed by Bug. The ruffian's hands were already manacled. With the exception of dripping clothes neither of the men seemed the worse for their struggle and subsequent fall.
"They were still locked together when we pulled them from the water," said Jeffries. "That little fellow is a plucky one. He deserves great credit for raising the siege. We've got our man at last, and bitterly he'll rue this night's work."
"It's a bad job fur me, too," observed the farmer. "The old mill will soon be a heap of ashes. It's insured fur about what the lumber's worth, but that ain't much consolation. I hate to see it go after standin' here fur nigh onto seventy years."
"It's hard," muttered Hocker, "that's a fact."
Then all were silent, watching the flames as they rose higher and higher, and licked every corner of the doomed building. It was a grand sight while it lasted, but in twenty minutes nothing was left save a few blackened beams and smoldering heaps of ashes.
"That ends the fireworks," said Jeffries. "We may as well be moving along. It's past two o'clock in the morning."
He drew a second pair of handcuffs from his pocket, and to Ned's wrath and indignation, clapped them suddenly on Bug's wrists.
CHAPTER XXVIII
A GOOD DEED
Ned was the only one who showed any surprise at the constable's action, and quite naturally, since he alone was acquainted with all the facts in the case. Hocker had already taken Moxley to the boat and seated him; the ruffian had lost his defiant manner, and was cowed and sullen. Jeffries now started to follow with Bug, but was stopped by a detaining touch on the arm.
"I beg your pardon, Mr. Jeffries," said Ned, trying hard to control his feelings, "but you surely don't intend to carry off Bug to jail after all he has done to-night? We owe everything to him."
Jeffries looked at the lad half sternly.
"Law is law," he replied in a pompous tone. "I am an officer of justice, and must do my duty. This fellow was clearly concerned in the theft of Mocker's gun and boat, and what he did before or after that don't wipe out the crime. Why, if I'd turn him loose now I'd be compoundin' a felony. Of course I'll speak a good word for him when he comes up for trial--I'll promise you that--and it may lessen his sentence."
"Jeffries is right," said the farmer. "If a man will commit crimes he must suffer for them. Both fellows air guilty, no doubt."
Bug threw a grateful glance at Ned, and then turned appealingly to Hocker.
"I don't deny that I was with Moxley when he broke into your cabin," he said huskily, "but I was only with him because I wanted to help these boys. I couldn't leave him without spoilin' my plans, and I couldn't persuade him to let the cabin alone, though I tried hard enough. He gave me the slip next morning, as it was, an' I had to tramp it down the creek the rest of the way. It's purty hard fer a feller to get into a scrape like this under them circumstances."
Hocker's face wore a perplexed expression as he replied slowly:
"I'm sure I don't know what to say. Jeffries has the law at his finger ends, and it ain't fur me to contradict him. I reckon things will have to take their course."
Bug's hopeless looks and attitude went straight to Ned's heart, and he resolved to make a final appeal in his behalf. He was satisfied that Hocker would help him if he could be made to see the matter in its proper light, so he drew him aside and told all he knew about Bug in a simple, earnest way--dwelling especially on the fact that Bug's desire to keep the boys out of a scrape was the sole cause of his own misfortune.
The appeal carried conviction with it, and Hocker's sympathies were aroused.
"I reckon I can fix this matter," he said after a little consideration. "I owe you lads something anyhow, and this is a good time to pay the debt."
Hocker was as good as his word. He walked over to the boat and surprised Jeffries by saying in a grave tone, "Look here, old man; I've sorter veered round on this thing. Now that I've got Moxley safe and sound I don't intend to prosecute the other chap. I reckon what he says is true, an' you know yourself what he did fur us to-night--more than you or me would have done. He deserves to go free."
"Well, if you're determined not to make a charge, why that settles it," replied Jeffries a little stiffly. "I have nothing agin him personally, and I hope he'll take warning by this affair and keep out of bad company."
He turned around and quickly removed Bug's handcuffs.
"You're a free man now," he said. "See that you stay free and justify the clemency of the law by leadin' a respectable life in future."
Bug was dazed at first by the unexpected transition from despair to hope. He stammered out a few inarticulate words of gratitude to Hocker and Jeffries and then approached Ned.
"This is your doin'," he said brokenly. "You saved me from goin' to jail. I shan't forget it--" He choked and broke off short.
Ned drew him down the wasteway to a little clump of bushes, out of earshot of the others.
"Bug," he said earnestly, "if you are really grateful to me for saving you from a term in prison, I'll tell you how you can prove it. Your brother told me the whole story of your life, and what a shadow it has cast on your home. You are breaking your mother's heart, and even your father feels the disgrace keenly, and would welcome you back if you came prepared to lead a different life. Go home, Bug, and make them all happy. You will never regret it if you do. You are not bad at heart, I know, and evil company has been the cause of all your trouble. Let Moxley's fate be a warning to you. Turn over a new leaf from to-night. Will you do it, Bug? Will you go straight home and lead an honest, respectable life?"
Tears were standing in Bug's eyes, and he brushed them away with his coat sleeve.
"I'll do it," he said in a firm, but husky voice. "I've been wantin' to go home fur a long time, but I didn't dare to. I'm sick enough of livin' in this way, an' what you've done an' said to-night will make a different man of me. I mean it all, and I'll stick to it. I'll do no more lyin' or stealin', and I'll keep away from bad company. I'll stay at home and work. Here's my fist on it."
Ned warmly shook the proffered hand, and then both went slowly back to the boat.
Bug's appearance was the signal for a most outrageous burst of profanity and threats from Moxley, and when Jeffries had finally subdued the ruffian by strong measures, the whole party crossed the wasteway, and moved up to the farmhouse, which was half a mile distant.
Mrs. Zinn spread a huge table with all sorts of tempting food, and the starved boys attacked it with a vigor that made her open her eyes in amazement. The others were almost as hungry after all they had gone through that night, and did ample justice to the viands. Moxley's bracelets were taken off and he was allowed to eat his fill with the rest.
It was four o'clock on Saturday morning before the tired crowd got to sleep. The four boys were given a room containing two large beds, and the adjoining apartment was occupied by Hocker and Jeffries, and their prisoner. Bug was accommodated with a cushioned settee in the kitchen.
The boys woke up, refreshed in mind and body, about three o'clock in the afternoon. They came down stairs just in time to see Hocker and Jeffries drive away in a buggy with the sullen faced prisoner between them. Hocker had made arrangements with the farmer to take the boat back to the cabin in a wagon.
Moxley had been compelled to disgorge his plunder, and the boys were highly gratified when Jeffries handed over the watches and money the tramp had so coolly taken from them.
Half an hour after the trio had departed for Carlisle jail Bug took an earnest farewell of the boys, and struck across the country in a bee line for his home at the Gap. His last word to Ned was a renewal of the promise to stay at home and lead an honest life, and Ned sincerely believed that he meant it.
"That load of salt I put into Moxley's legs turned out for the best after all," said Randy in a roguish tone. "If I hadn't pulled trigger that night Bug Batters would still be treading the path of wickedness, with no hope of a reformation."
"Your foolishness had one good result, I'll admit," replied Ned. "But don't try the experiment again. It's too costly."
The boys tacitly agreed with Ned. Even Bug's conversion was rather a high price to pay for the fright and indignities they had endured at the hands of Mr. Dude Moxley. They remembered also that the burning of the mill was indirectly due to Randy's foolish shot.
The certain prospect of the insurance money effectively silenced any resentment that Mr. Zinn might otherwise have felt toward the boys. He warmly invited them to stay over Sunday, and the invitation was promptly accepted. They went down after supper to examine the canoes, and allowed them to remain where they were on the farmer's assurance that nothing could happen to them. The grain bag containing the greater part of the baggage had been taken up the house the night before. The tin boxes had perished in the flames, but this was a trifling loss, and did not trouble the boys much in the light of what might have been.
Sunday was a day of peaceful enjoyment after the turbulent events of the past week.
"Three square meals were not to be sneezed at," as Randy irreverently expressed it; and not the least pleasing incident of the day was the five mile drive to a country church with the farmer's family, on which occasion Nugget braved the ridicule of his companions, and proudly wore his linen shirt and piqué vest.
Monday morning dawned clear as a whistle, and after a hearty breakfast the boys trudged down to the creek laden with all manner of country produce, for which the good natured farmer would accept only a beggarly recompense.
Half an hour later the gold and crimson pennant fluttered proudly in the breeze as it led the Jolly Rovers down the swift and turbid channel--for the creek was still a few feet above low water mark.
CHAPTER XXIX
RANDY GOES SAILING
Monday and Tuesday of that week were rather uneventful days. The boys paddled steadily, and with the aid of the rapid current covered a good many miles.
On both evenings they found suitable camping places, and had some excellent sport fishing for catfish and eels by night.
The creek was almost at its normal level now, but Wednesday morning dawned amid conditions that promised a speedy repetition of the high water. The sky was hidden by murky gray clouds that hung far down toward the earth. So thick were they that no mist that blurred the hills and the windings of the faintest glimmer of the sun could peep through. A creek was in the air, and the east wind had a keen, biting touch that was more in harmony with November than July.
Some discussion ensued at first on the question of breaking camp under such circumstances, but it was finally decided in the affirmative.
"This place won't shelter us very well if a heavy rain comes on," said Ned. "The chances are that it won't rain before afternoon or night, so we had better make the most of what time we have by choosing a better spot."
The value of Ned's advice had been tested on many previous occasions, so preparations to start were hastily commenced. This was about eight o'clock in the morning, after breakfast had been eaten and the dishes cleared away.
Randy was the first one up that morning, and much to the mystification of his companions he had been working since daybreak in a thicket of young timber not far behind the camp. Just as the tent was being rolled up he made his appearance with a lurking smile on his face, and under his arm a bundle that resembled a red flannel seine wrapped tightly on its sticks.
"Hullo, Randy, what have you there?" queried Nugget.
"What is it?" exclaimed Clay, in a tone that implied some doubt as to whether he referred to Randy or the object under his arm.
But Randy was not disposed to be communicative just then.
"You'll know what it is in good time," he replied, and then turning to Ned he asked: "Can I have one of the tent poles?"
"What do you want with it?" demanded Ned. "Has it anything to do with that piece of tomfoolery?"
"Yes, it has," replied Randy aggressively. "That piece of tomfoolery, as you call it, is a sail. I'll make you fellows open your eyes after a while."
"I don't doubt it," exclaimed Ned laughingly, "There will be lots of sport in watching you try to sail on a stream like this. And what a sail, too! Why, it's made out of a red blanket! What put the notion into your head, Randy?"
"Oh, you can make all the fun of it, you please," replied Randy; "you'll all wish you had one like it after a while. Just look at that breeze blowing straight down the creek. In an hour from now it will be twice as strong, and then I'll leave you fellows so far behind that you can't overtake me in a week."
"It doesn't occur to him that the creek changes its course about every half mile," reflected Ned as he resumed his work. "If he tries the thing on he'll come to grief."
Randy was troubled by no such misgivings. He appropriated one of the jointed tent poles and lashed it on the fore deck of his canoe beside the queer looking sail. The Water Sprite, it may be said, had been built with a view to sailing, and it contained a mast hole and block just forward of the cockpit.
Not until the Jolly Rovers had been afloat an hour or two did Randy's opportunity come, for during that time the channel was one succession of short, jerky curves that encountered the wind every which way. But his patience was finally rewarded by a clear half mile stretch of water, licked into tiny undulations by a crisp down breeze.
Randy discreetly grounded the canoe on a little grass bar in mid-channel, and proceeded to rig up. His sail was merely a light weight blanket with each of its narrow ends sewed to a trimmed sapling--just like a banner, in fact. He attached this to his improvised mast, fastened each end securely, and drove the latter into the mast hole.
The Water Sprite was quite transformed by the addition. It presented a quaint, foreign appearance, for the high square sail was exactly like that of a Chinese junk, while its flaming red color was irresistibly suggestive of the craft that ply in Venetian lagoons.
So Randy thought, anyhow, and he was more than pleased with his handiwork. He applied the finishing touches by tying a cord to each lower corner of the sail, and by this device he proudly hoped to control the movements of the canoe.
Randy was considerably overestimating his skill as a sailing master, but no one could have made him believe it at the time. He proudly seated himself, and with a shove of the paddle freed the canoe from the bar.
The breeze quickly bulged out the thirty square feet of sail, and away went the Water Sprite like a Chinese pirate in chase of booty. It gained speed with every instant, and swept by the sluggish little fleet of canoes under full pressure.
Randy turned around to laugh and wave his hand. He had to admit to himself that he was very glad the boys were now in the rear, for the sail hung so low that he could see no further than the prow of his canoe. Still more disconcerting was the fact that the cords were useless, since the least jerk to right or left threatened to capsize the canoe instantly.
"I must keep a sharp eye on the shores if I want to stay in mid-channel," thought Randy. "I'm good for half a mile of this, anyhow, before the wind changes."
But his calculation did not embrace any possible obstructions that might lie in the way, and Randy was considerably surprised to find himself grounded on a ledge of rocks before five minutes had passed. It was hard work to get the canoe free, and just as he succeeded the boys caught up with him.
"Better take the sail down now," suggested Ned. "You'll surely run into something if you don't."
"No danger," laughed Randy. "I'll stop before I get to the curve. This is great sport. You fellows just ought to try it."
He sent the Water Sprite off again by a touch of his paddle and skimmed swiftly away from his half envious companions, leaving a trail of foam behind him.
It was aggravating to be thus outstrippped and the boys started to paddle with all their might. For a little while they actually seemed to gain on Randy, but a lively puff of wind came down the creek, and the Water Sprite took a spurt that made the chase hopeless.
The wind had veered a slight degree, and without knowing it Randy was now paddling straight for a bushy point of land that jutted out from the left shore exactly where the channel made its abrupt bend. Just below this little promontory, and in midstream, was anchored a long, squarely built flatboat.
It had three occupants. On a low stool in the very center sat a tremendously stout man in a blue flannel shirt and wide brimmed straw hat. Beside him was a lean, scrawny man sitting on an upturned bucket. The other end of the boat was occupied by a yellow dog, whose eyes were fixed with intent longing on a lunch basket a few feet distant.
The big fat man held in one hand a light, slender fishing rod, while the little lean man supported on his knees a twenty foot pole that looked like a young tree denuded of its branches. Both were waiting patiently for a bite--as was also the dog--and under the circumstances it did not occur to them to look around.
Meanwhile the Water Sprite swept onward to the jutting point of land, and missed it by little more than a hair's breadth, just as Randy turned pale with the sudden discovery of his danger. He breathed easier as the canoe passed swiftly on toward mid-channel. He could see nothing ahead, and was therefore blissfully ignorant of the obstruction that now lay in his path.
Just at this moment the three boys, coming on behind, caught a glimpse of the anchored boat and were quick to grasp the situation.
"Look out, Randy!" cried Ned at the top of his voice. "Danger ahead! Paddle to the right, quick!"
Randy turned around and looked stupidly at his companions for an instant. Then he seized the paddle and tried hard to follow Ned's advice. Too late! The Water Sprite was forging ahead now under full pressure, and was not to be diverted from its course.
The two occupants of the boat had heard Ned's warning cry without catching the words, but they did not turn around because each happened to have a bite at that moment.
Then the little man jerked out a plump catfish, and as he reached for the line, which had swung behind him, he saw the flaming red sail looming almost overhead. He had barely time to spring to his feet and utter a terrific yell, when the collision came.
The shock tossed the fat man off the stool and threw him across the edge of the boat. As the little man was knocked down at the same instant, the one sided pressure naturally caused the boat to tip, and over it went, throwing fishermen, dog, and all into the water.
CHAPTER XXX
A NIGHT ALARM
By that strange destiny which oftentimes frowns on the good and lends a helping hand to the evil, Randy experienced no very disastrous results from the collision. The canoe rebounded a few feet, and the sail fell from the mastpole into the water.
He was terribly shaken up, it is true, but far greater was the shock when he realized what he had done. At first nothing was visible but the upturned boat and a yellow dog paddling on all fours for the nearest bank.
It was manifestly impossible that the dog could have been the only occupant of the boat, and besides Randy had heard a shrill cry just before the collision. He was much relieved therefore when a head shot above the water a few feet below the boat.
This belonged to the little man, and an instant later his fat companion came to the surface. The latter had lost his hat, and the top of his head was as white and shiny as a billiard ball.
The little man sounded for bottom, and not finding it, swam vigorously for shore. The fat man tried the same experiment, and being a good head and a half taller than his companion, obtained footing at a depth which brought the water almost to his chin. Having thus strengthened his position, he spat the water from his mouth and turned his head around to see what occult power was responsible for his misfortune.
When he saw Randy quietly sitting in the canoe a few yards above his face purpled with rage.
"You'll pay for this outrage," he stuttered hoarsely. "I'll beat you black and blue when I get hold of you. I'll give you six months in the county jail at hard labor, you brainless young ruffian--you audacious wooden headed idiot, you--"
Just then the angry gentleman's string of epithets was cut short in a summary manner, for the wet folds of the blanket sail, which had somehow managed to drift around the corner of the boat, slapped him on the mouth, and the unexpected shock caused him to lose his balance and slip under water.
Such an opportunity was not to be neglected, and with quick, furious strokes Randy paddled around the upturned boat and headed down stream, bent on escaping the promised chastisement.
The fat man came up directly beneath the sail, and consequently had to go under for a second attempt. This time he was all right, and the moment his head was out of water and his feet planted on the bottom he caught sight of Randy, who was just gliding by at a distance of half a dozen feet.
"Stop, you rascal, stop!" he yelled hoarsely.
Randy did not obey; he only paddled the faster.
The irascible old fellow glared at him in helpless rage for a second, and then his face lit up with an awful smile as he saw the big fishing pole floating on the water within reach. The line was fastened in some way to the boat.
It was the work of an instant to snatch the pole and tear it free. Then lifting it overhead the man made a furious stroke at the rapidly receding canoe.
Whisk! whisk! came the elastic end with stinging force against Randy's back and shoulders. Maddened by the pain he partially rose and leaned forward. At the second blow he reeled to one side, stumbled against the combing, and went out of the canoe backward without upsetting it.
His enemy was by no means satisfied with what punishment he had already inflicted. He dropped the pole, and made haste to join the little man and yellow dog on the bank.
"Ebenezer," he cried angrily, "pursue that young rascal. Chase him down the creek. If you catch him I'll give you a five dollar bill."
More from fear of disobeying than from any hope of earning the reward, the little man started off on a run with the yellow dog at his heels.
Just at this moment Ned and his companions reached the scene of the disaster. The fat man stopped wringing the water from his trousers to shake his fist at them.
"You're all alike," he growled, "all alike! I never saw a boy that wasn't a born reprobate. I wish I had you out on shore; I'd teach you a lesson."
Ned tried to explain that the upsetting of the boat was a pure accident, but the angry man refused to hear him.
"Don't tell me," he muttered, "I know better."
Realizing that further argument would be futile, the boys made what amends they could by chasing the two fishing rods and the hat, and then lifting the anchors of the boat and pushing it to shore.
The fat man acknowledged these favors with a surly nod of his head, and so threatening was his manner that the boys hastily retreated from the bank, and paddled down stream, stopping on the way to recover the sail.
Meanwhile Randy had quietly swum down the creek some distance, pushing the canoe ahead of him, and landed on the left shore. The boys could see him plainly as he stood on a rock wringing the water from his clothes.
Having no inclination to swim the creek, Ebenezer had given up the chase and was now returning along the right bank. When he came opposite the boys Ned called out:
"Say, tell me who that stout gentleman is, will you?"
The little man hesitated before replying. "That's Judge Gibson, of Carlisle," he said finally in a very impressive tone. "You fellers may be glad you ain't sittin' afore him in the dock this minute--especially that chap down yonder. O, my! wouldn't you get salty sentences though!"
A loud summons from the judge started the little man off in a hurry, and the conversation came to an abrupt ending.
The boys soon joined Randy, and finding him in a decidedly bad temper, they made as little allusion as possible to what had occurred. It was evident from the way he shrugged his shoulders that the blows of the fishing pole had left a good deal of a sting.
Not knowing what might be expected of Judge Gibson, the boys concluded to be on the safe side, and as soon as Randy had changed his clothes they paddled away from the vicinity.
About one o'clock a halt was made for lunch, and as the air was disagreeably damp and cutting, Ned boiled a pot of coffee.
The cruise was resumed an hour later, and during the afternoon a close watch was kept for suitable camping places. The indications all presaged bad weather, and there was no doubt that rain would set in by morning--if not sooner.
About four o'clock a camping ground was discovered that met with general approval--a sheltered spot amid great pine trees on the right bank. In the rear was a steep hill, and a limestone spring was conveniently close.
The boys spent just one solid hour in arranging things to their satisfaction, for their stay was likely to be a protracted one, and they wanted everything snug and comfortable before the rain came.
The tent was staked with more than ordinary care, and then a ditch was dug around all four sides and the dirt thrown on the edges of the canvas. A stone fireplace was built between two trees and within easy reach of the tent door.
A layer of fragrant pine boughs was spread on the floor of the tent, and both front corners were piled with firewood. The arrangements were completed by dragging the canoes to the top of the bank and removing all that they contained.
"That is what I call snug," said Randy complacently. "I won't mind staying here two or three days. How are we fixed for provisions?"
"Bread will run short to-morrow, but we have plenty of everything else," replied Ned. "No doubt there are farm houses near."
This satisfactory report encouraged the boys to prepare a more than usually sumptuous supper. They washed the dishes by firelight, and just as the last one was dried the rain began to fall--at first in pattering drops, then in a steady, persistent sheet.
A great log was thrown on the fire, and after a short chat in its warm glow the boys drew the tent flaps, and were soon sleeping soundly on the soft pine boughs.
Some time in the night Ned awoke, and feeling thirsty sat up and reached for the pail of water and tin cup which were always kept just outside the tent door.
He took a drink and was in the act of putting the cup down when he heard distinct footsteps outside. They passed the tent and went on toward the creek. Whoever the nocturnal stroller might be he was taking no pains to conceal his presence.
"Say Ned, is that you?" came in a startled whisper from the rear of the tent.
Ned recognized Randy's voice.
"Are _you_ awake?" he exclaimed in surprise. "Don't make any noise. Some one is walking about outside."
"I know it," replied Randy. "That's what wakened me. My gun is missing. I had it right beside me, and now it's gone."
"By Jove! this looks serious," muttered Ned. "Wait a moment," he added. "I'll take a peep outside. It's pitch dark and I can't be seen."
He quickly lifted one flap of the tent and crawled under. A few seconds passed--full of terrible suspense to Randy--and then came a clattering noise followed by a brief red flash and a stunning report.
CHAPTER XXXI
STORMY WEATHER
It was Ned's intention, when he crawled out of the tent, to dodge behind the nearest tree, where he could see without being seen. But as he rose to his feet a dark figure suddenly obscured the faint embers of the fire, and a second later came the fall and the report which struck such a terror to Randy's heart as he waited in the darkness of the tent.
Ned understood the situation instantly. The unknown prowler had stumbled over the fireplace in his retreat, and the stolen gun had been exploded by striking the stones.
For two or three seconds there was nothing to indicate that the thief had been hit by the charge. Then a shrill yell rang through the woods and another and another in rapid succession.
"Randy! Randy! Come out here!" shouted Ned in a terrified voice. "Light the lantern and waken the boys."
The next instant Randy burst through the flaps.
"Here is the lantern," he gasped. "I have no matches. Good gracious! but you scared me. I thought you were shot."
"_I'm_ not, but I fear some one else is," replied Ned as he hastily struck a match and applied it to the wick of the lantern.
That instant Clay hurried out of the tent, and the three boys advanced timidly to the fireplace. The supposed robber had ceased his outcry, and was propped in an upright position against a heap of stones. Ned turned the lantern on his face and staggered back with a cry of amazement.
"_Why, it's Nugget!_" he exclaimed. "What under the sun does this mean?"
It was indeed Nugget, and he looked the very picture of fright as he rolled his eyes wildly from one to the other of his friends. It was several seconds before he could speak.
"Where am I?" he gasped. "Who put me out here in the rain? I thought I heard a gun go off."
He was evidently not injured--the position of the gun proved that--and the boys began to appreciate the ludicrous side of the situation.
"You've been walking in your sleep," exclaimed Ned, as a sudden light broke on his mind. "I'll bet a dollar that's just it. Did you ever do such a thing before, Nugget?"
Nugget hesitated and passed his hand over his forehead.
"Yes," he said reflectively; "I used to walk in my sleep sometimes, but that was long ago. I thought the habit was broken."
"Don't you remember anything about this affair?" resumed Ned. "You must have taken Randy's gun and left the tent without waking us."
"Yes; I have a sort of recollection of it," answered Nugget sheepishly. "I guess I must have been dreaming. I thought I was in Central Park at home, and the animals broke out of the menagerie. I had a gun in my hand, and when a big lion ran after me I ran away. Then I fell over a bench and the gun went off--and--and I don't think I remember any more. It was an awful dream. I thought the lion would eat me up."
This story was more than the boys could stand. They laughed so long and heartily that Nugget recovered from his scare and got angry instead.
"You fellows would laugh the other way if that gun had been pointed toward the tent when it went off," he said sullenly; "and besides there is no fun in having such a dream."
"Nugget is right," exclaimed Ned. "The affair is too serious for ridicule. It's almost a miracle he was not shot. And by the way, Randy, I've told you often not to keep that gun loaded. Think what might have happened to-night in consequence of your folly."
Randy looked penitent, and for a wonder accepted the rebuke quietly.
"I forgot, Ned, indeed I did," he said earnestly. "I put a shell in for snipe this afternoon, and never thought about it again. After this I'll examine the gun every night."
"If it was accidental that alters the case," replied Ned. "And now suppose we turn in. There is no use in standing here in the rain any longer."
The boys went back to the tent, and to prevent a second attempt at sleep-walking they made Nugget take the middle place. Five minutes later all were sleeping as soundly as before the alarm.
The next morning it was raining hard, and in fact it continued to rain at intervals all of that day and the next. The boys found the time hang a little heavy, although they sallied out in rubber coats, and had some excellent sport fishing for catfish.
Cooking was not interfered with, since the fireplace was in a sheltered position, and the tent was at all times snug and waterproof, in spite of some of the heaviest showers that the boys had ever known.
Rain was still falling at daybreak on Saturday, but about ten o'clock the sky cleared, and the sun came out--greatly to the delight of the Jolly Rovers.
As the next day was Sunday, and the camp was in such a good location, they decided to remain until Monday morning. This turned out to be a wise decision, for shortly after dinner a thunder storm swept down the valley, and for several hours the rain fell in torrents. By evening not a cloud was in sight, and indications pointed to a spell of clear weather.
Of course the creek was by this time very high and muddy, and was still on the rise. The water had crept three feet up the slope on top of which the tent was pitched, but as three feet more remained to be covered the boys felt no uneasiness.
There was still higher ground behind them on which they could take refuge if the necessity came.
After supper Ned got out his map, and began to study it with great care.
"Has it occurred to any of you fellows that we are drawing near home?" he asked finally. "We passed Honck's dam on Wednesday afternoon, and our present camp is very near Sporting Green. There are only four more dams between us and the Susquehanna, and the distance can't be much over thirty miles."
The others were rather surprised to hear this, and could not make up their minds at first whether to be glad or sorry.
"I can hardly realize it," said Randy. "The time has certainly slipped by very quickly, and yet it was three weeks yesterday since we started."
"I hate to think that the cruise is nearly over," remarked Clay, "but all the same it will be nice to get home again."
Ned laughed as he folded up the map and put it in his pocket.
"I know just how you feel," he said. "It will be very nice to sleep in a soft bed, and eat off a table again, and sit out on the boathouse porch in the evenings; but about a week after you get home you'll wish with all your heart you were back on the creek with the grass for a bed and a rock for a table. Canoeing is like ice cream--when you once taste it you are always wanting more. It reminds me of what I read about a famous African explorer. He was always glad to get back to civilization for a little while, and then he was more anxious than ever to return to his wild life. It seemed as though he couldn't breathe right anywhere but in Africa."
"I hope canoeing _is_ like that," said Randy. "Then we will make lots more trips together. I feel just as you do about it, Ned. I don't like to see the cruise end, but it will be very nice in some ways to get home. Won't the other boys be envious when they see how sunburnt we are, and hear all about the exciting adventures we have had?"
"When will we reach the end of the creek?" asked Nugget with a rapturous expression. "Monday?"
"Hardly," replied Ned. "It will take longer than that. But why are you so anxious to get home, Nugget?"
"He wants to put on a suit of cream colored clothes," exclaimed Clay with mock gravity, "and a boiled shirt and high collar. He is longing to encase his lily white hands in kid gloves, and his dainty feet in patent leathers."
As Nugget blushed an angry red, and made no reply, it is to be presumed that Clay's remark contained more truth than fiction.
"You fellows are all counting your chickens too soon," said Ned. "A good many miles separate us from home, and as likely as not there are more rough times in store for us."
Lightly spoken and lightly meant were these words, but Ned recalled them under thrilling circumstances a day or two later.
All day Sunday the creek continued to rise slowly until it was just a foot from the top of the bank. It was stationary at nine o'clock in the evening, and when it began to fall two hours later the boys turned in, satisfied that the danger was over.
The water receded a foot and a half during the night, but when Monday morning dawned with a clear sky the flood was still a sight to behold as it rolled swiftly by the camp, its smooth yellow surface dotted with tangled grasses and driftwood.
As far as the boys could see was high and hilly land, but there was no doubt that the lowlands were inundated far on each side of the creek. The rains had been unusually heavy.
CHAPTER XXXII
THE BROKEN DAM
By nine o'clock the Jolly Rovers were afloat--adrift would be a better word, since the swift current made the paddles unnecessary, except for a guiding touch now and then. It did not occur to the boys to delay their departure on account of the flood. They were tired of the camping place, and moreover the high water would likely be a help rather than a hindrance.
They found it keenly exhilarating to lean lazily back in their canoes and be carried at a whirling pace around bend after bend. There was just enough danger from submerged islands and reefs, and floating _débris_, to add spice to the enjoyment.
Here and there, where the creek passed through low country, the fields were inundated, and only the tops of the fences could be seen above the water.
A mile or two below camp a sudden sweep of the channel brought into view a red wooden bridge. The creek, being wide at this point, the bridge was supported in the center by a narrow, squarely built pier.
As the boys came closer they saw that the pier had been shattered by some terrific power. The whole face of it was torn away, and the frail portion that remained seemed in danger of being carried off by the yellow flood that was surging against it. Two men had climbed down from an opening in the bridge, and were busy among the loose stones, evidently trying to fit them into place again. From the left shore a little knot of people was watching the operation.
Naturally the boys were curious to know what it meant, and when they drew near they slackened the speed of the canoes by backing water vigorously with their paddles.
"Did the flood do all that damage?" asked Ned.
"No," answered one of the men, stopping work to look up, "the ice did it last winter, and the commissioners neglected to have it repaired. A pretty bill they're likely to have to pay for their carelessness. It's too late to do anything now."
"That's so," assented the other man; "we may as well stop work and get out of this."
"But what danger are you afraid of now?" resumed Ned. "The pier has stood the worst of the flood and the water is going down."
The first speaker jerked his finger up the creek. "They say that Honck's dam is liable to break at any minute," he answered slowly. "It's a mighty old dam, and has been threatenin' to give 'way fur the last ten years. It's a big high one, too, and has a heap of timber in it. Just as surely as that mass of stuff comes down the creek with a volume of water behind it, this pier will go to pieces and down will come the bridge."
"Do you really think the dam will break?" asked Ned.
"It's ten to one," was the reply. "They say the edges are giving way now. You fellows had better get off the creek afore it's too late. Them cockleshell boats won't stand much."
With this warning the speaker climbed up the pier, followed by his companion, and both disappeared in the bridge. The boys lifted their paddles from the water and went swiftly on with the current for the time being.
"These rustics have exaggerated the danger, I'll bet anything," said Randy. "If Honck's dam was going to break it would not have waited until the flood was half way down."
"I don't know about that," replied Ned. "The danger may be very real."
He had given the dam some attention while the canoes were being carried around it on the previous Wednesday, and he now remembered with secret uneasiness that it was very high and rotten, and held in check a vast volume of water. Terrible would be the consequences if this were suddenly to be freed.
"What are we going to do?" asked Nugget uneasily.
"That man warned us to leave the creek, and he knew what he was talking about."
"We can't very well take his advice now," replied Ned, "for there is no landing place in sight."
"There is no use in stopping at all," exclaimed Randy, "if the object is to wait for the dam to break. We might be detained for a week, and then find that the dam was as strong as ever. And besides we could hear the noise in time to get out of the way. All we need to do is keep our ears open and look behind from time to time."
"Even if the dam should break the chances are that with such a current as this we could keep ahead of the flood," suggested Clay. "Don't you think so, Ned?"
"I'm afraid that's doubtful," replied. Ned. "At all events I don't think I should care to run a race with the flood even on a start of half a dozen miles. For the present we had better follow Randy's advice and keep our eyes and ears open. If we find a suitable place I am in favor of stopping for an hour or two. We are too near home to risk disaster."
This arrangement was satisfactory to all except Nugget, and he made no outward remonstrance.
For the next two hours all went well, and mile after mile was swiftly traversed. The boys kept in mid-channel so as to reap the fullest advantage from the current.
They looked back from time to time, but neither saw nor heard anything alarming. The smooth yellow flood glided between the wooded banks with scarcely a murmur.
About midday the creek turned a sharp angle, and headed due north in a straight course of fully half a mile. Beyond the steep hills that terminated this stretch the boys could see the distant blue line of the mountains.
The fears of the morning had vanished, and all were in buoyant spirits. The home-coming loomed brightly before them now, for with such a current the Susquehanna would soon be reached.
On the left hand side of the creek stretched a sloping hill, wooded for a distance of two or three hundred yards as it receded from the water, and then merging into open fields. On the right was a rugged cliff full of limestone rocks and scrawly pine trees.
The boys did not pay much attention to their surroundings, but when they were nearly half way to the bend, Randy happened to glance toward the left, and on the very crest of the hill, a good quarter of a mile from the water, he saw a little white farmhouse.
There was nothing in this to attract his attention, but as his gaze lingered he saw a man come out on the porch and glance up the creek, shading his eyes with his hand. Then he turned toward the house, and an instant later two women and another man appeared and looked in the same direction.
This was growing interesting, and Randy called the attention of his companions to the farmhouse. What happened next was stranger still. The little group on the porch suddenly caught sight of the canoes far below them, and one of the men darted quickly into the house. He reappeared a second or two later with a shiny object in his hand, and placing it to his mouth he blew a shrill discordant blast that echoed far over the hills.
He repeated this twice, and then all of the group began to shout and wave their hands.
The boys glanced at one another in amazement. What was the meaning of such an idiotic performance?
Suddenly Ned turned pale.
"Great Scott!" he exclaimed. "The dam must have broken, and those people can see the flood somewhere up the creek. They are warning us to get out of the way."
The boys instinctively turned to look behind, but the first glance revealed no cause for alarm.
"All right so far," cried Randy. "The current seems to be getting swifter though, and I actually believe the water is rising."
He had hardly spoken when Ned uttered a startled cry. "Look! look! there it comes!"
Around the sharp curve above swept a sloping volume of water, yellow with mud and foam, black with timber and uprooted trees. It came on with a rush and a swelling roar, and as the frightened boys watched it with terrible fascination, a section of a wooden bridge painted red hove in sight.
The imminence of the danger drove the Jolly Rovers into a helpless panic. Even Ned was frightened out of his self possession.
The right shore was the nearest, and the boys paddled for it with furious strokes, not remembering for an instant that it offered the least chance of safety. The swift current whirled the canoes down stream for nearly a hundred yards before it would suffer them to glide into the calmer waters along the bank.
Randy and Clay, being on the outer side, had more to overcome, and were swept beyond their companions. Ned and Nugget drifted against a precipitous wall of rock that rose twenty feet before its surface was broken by the tree or brush.
They looked hopelessly around them, vainly seeking a chance of escape, while louder and louder in their ears sounded the hissing roar of the oncoming flood. At the base of the cliff the water was already boiling and tossing.
CHAPTER XXXIII
AN UNDERGROUND CRUISE
"Paddle on, quick!" cried Ned in an agony of fear. "We may reach a break in the cliff."
Nugget, who was half a canoe's length in advance had sufficiently presence of mind to obey. He paddled off with desperate strokes, and Ned crowded him closely.
A few yards down stream the wall of rock jutted out slightly and then receded. As the canoes rounded this a great heaving wave--the vanguard of the flood--tossed them high on its crest and cast them, like a stone from a catapult, straight toward a black, semi-circular hole in the base of the cliff. A furious current swept in the same direction, and even had the boys realized the nature of this new peril they could have done nothing to help themselves.
Nugget dropped his paddle with a cry of terror and clutched the combing. The next instant he shot into the gaping hole, scraping his cap from his head by contact with the top, and disappeared from view.
Ned was dazed by what he had just witnessed, and his turn came before he realized it. He had hardly time to twist his paddle around longwise and duck his head when the current sucked him under the cliff. He heard a quick, grating noise, and then the dim gleam of light faded, leaving him in utter darkness.
The canoe pitched and tossed dizzily, and by the cold air that surged on his face, and the spray that spattered him, Ned knew that he was moving at rapid speed. Suddenly a cry rang in his ears with the sharpness of a pistol shot and reverberated through the cavern. An instant later he felt a violent concussion on the right, and reaching out his hand he touched the combing of Nugget's canoe.
He clung to it with all his might and managed to keep the two canoes side by side as the current whirled them on through the darkness.
Nugget was not aware of this at first, for he uttered another piercing cry for help. It was impossible to carry on any conversation owing to the confused booming noise made by the water, but Ned leaned to one side and shouted at the top of his voice: "Cheer up, Nugget. I'm here beside you. We'll find a way out of this."
Nugget must have heard and understood, for he was silent after that.
It was characteristic of Ned to cheer his companion. He was thoroughly unselfish, and was always more concerned about others than himself. In this case his consoling words meant nothing. He was still dazed by the overwhelming calamity that had befallen him, and had not begun to realize its extent.
He remembered the lantern that was in the forward hatch and the match safe in his pocket, but the former was out of reach and the latter was on his right side. He could not get it with his left hand, and he was afraid to trust the holding of the canoes to Nugget. So a light was out of the question at the present time.
The painful suspense of the next few minutes made them seem like hours. The canoes whirled on and on with a dizzy swaying motion, but not the faintest ray of light broke the intensity of the darkness.
Ned cautiously thrust his paddle out to the left, and it struck something hard with a ringing noise. He did not repeat the experiment for fear of upsetting.
All at once the roar of the water seemed to deepen, and the canoes settled into a swift, steady rush that made the air fairly sing about Ned's ears. What followed was never very clear to him afterward. He remembered a dash of icy spray in his face, and then a terrible collision that landed him somewhere on his hands and knees.
He was stunned and dizzy for a little while, and when finally he staggered to his feet his first thought was of Nugget. He called him by name, and a hollow groan was the only reply. Even that was better than silence, and with a trembling hand Ned drew out his match box and struck a light.
Both canoes lay upset at his feet, and between them was Nugget leaning on his elbows with a very dazed expression on his face.
Three more matches enabled Ned to right the Pioneer, procure his lantern, and light it. Then, seeing that Nugget was uninjured, he scrutinized his surroundings more closely.
He understood at once what had happened. The underground stream made a sharp curve at this point, and the force of the current had thrown the canoes far out on a sandy beach. From above, the yellow flood came roaring and tossing through a passage some twenty feet wide, and nearly the same in height. Below the angle it plunged on under the same conditions.
The beach was about ten yards long, and sloped back half that distance to a slimy wall of rock. On the opposite side of the stream the wall fell sheer into the water, and overhead was a jagged roof that glittered and sparkled in the rays of the lantern.
Ned formed his own conclusions as to the nature of the place, and they were not entirely unfavorable, for the speed and impetuosity of the muddy stream had given him a good deal to think about. He dismissed his reflections until a more favorable time, and placing the lantern on the sand turned to Nugget, who was in a pitiable state of fright.
"Are you hurt any, old fellow?" asked Ned, "or only a little stunned?"
"Oh, I don't know, I don't know," moaned Nugget. "What awful place are we in, Ned? It seems like a dream. I hardly remember what happened. And where are Clay and Randy?"
"I hope they are safe," replied Ned evasively. "In fact, I really think they are, Nugget. They landed some distance below us, and no doubt found a place to climb out before the flood caught them."
"And what happened to us, Ned? Didn't the current drag us into a hole in the cliff?"
"Yes," said Ned, "that's it exactly, and we are now in an underground cavern. Don't be alarmed," he added quickly, noting the sudden pallor on his companion's face, "our situation is not so terrible after all. Caverns of this sort are always found among limestone hills, and they usually have two outlets. This one is no exception to the rule, and I'll tell you why I think so. In the first place you must remember that the creek was nearly four feet high before that dam broke. The extra volume of water is what makes this terrific current through the cavern and the very fact that the water goes on through without damming up proves to me that it has an outlet.
"When the creek is at its normal level I don't believe any water flows into the cavern at all, and even with a four foot raise I don't think much goes through. It was the first rush of the flood that carried us into the hole. And now do you see what I am driving at? As soon as the back water from Honck's dam has spent itself--and it can't take very long--the stream in front of us will become shallow, and then all we need to do is to follow it down to the outlet. It probably cuts across some bend and re-enters the creek. And we have penetrated such a distance from the mouth that the outlet can't be far away. I can't swear to all this, Nugget, but I am pretty well convinced that I am right. A very short time will settle the question one way or another."
"I hope what you say will come true," replied Nugget dolefully. "This is a horrible place to be in. It gives me the shivers to think of it. But if all the water runs out, won't we have to leave our canoes behind?" he added quickly.
"We won't wait that long," said Ned. "Don't be downhearted. There is surely a way out of this cavern, and we'll find it. Our situation might be far worse than it is. We have matches and a lantern, and there are crackers in my canoe."
"Are there?" exclaimed Nugget eagerly. "I think I'll eat a few. You're an awfully good fellow, Ned. I don't feel half as bad now."
"It's a good sign to be hungry," replied Ned laughingly. He brought some of the crackers, and both ate them as they sat side by side on the sand.
CHAPTER XXXIV
DESPAIR
In the course of an hour Ned's prediction began to be verified. The roar of the flood ceased entirely, and the water receded from the beach until the stream looked as shallow and quiet as a meadow brook. Ned waded clear across to the opposite wall without going over his knees.
"The flood from the dam has spent itself. I'm afraid we'll have to wade through and pull the canoes after us. I can see shoals and ledges not far below. I'll lead the way with the lantern."
This proposition was far from pleasing to Nugget, but he uttered no remonstrance. He had implicit faith in Ned by this time.
The canoes were pulled into the water, and without delay the boys started down the gloomy channel. They pushed the canoes ahead of them, and in this way supported themselves and lessened the danger of slipping.
For a while they made fair progress and encountered but few shoals. The stream was nowhere more than knee deep.
Under these favorable circumstances Ned relaxed his caution, and the consequence was that his feet slipped on the smooth stone, and down he went into a pretty deep hole. The lantern fell from his hand was extinguished, and the canoe shot ahead of him.
Nugget's cry of alarm was the first thing that Ned heard when he recovered his footing, and he found himself almost breast deep in water. He was shivering with cold--and with something else as well, for he realized the full meaning of the disaster, and for a moment he was sick and faint.
"I'm all right, Nugget," he shouted. "Stay where you are. Don't move a foot."
Then he waded cautiously forward until the channel was knee deep again, and shaking the water from his hands as well as he could, he drew out the precious match and struck a light.
His canoe had lodged on a reef a few feet down stream, but the lantern was gone beyond recovery. The situation was serious. Nugget's lantern was in Randy's canoe, and worse than all, only four matches remained in the box.
"It's a bad fix," thought Ned; "but we must make the best of it. Nugget," he added aloud, "push your canoe along the right side. I think the water is shallow there."
Nugget obeyed, and joined his companion without difficulty.
"Have you any matches?" asked Ned.
"Not a single one." Nugget went through his pockets to make sure, and turned a shade whiter when he saw Ned's scanty stock, two of which were already exhausted.
"This is terrible," he exclaimed huskily. "What can we do now?"
"Not very much," replied Ned. "Keep your spirits up, though; that's the important thing. Here, take these, and burn one at a time."
He handed the match box to Nugget, and quickly drew the canoes side by side. He took a stout fishing line from his pocket and tied them together at bow and stern.
Then he rummaged the hatches in a vain search for something that would burn. Even the paper that was around some of the bundles was damp from spray and leakage.
"Well, Nugget, we must make the best of it," he said. "All we can do is to push on in the dark. Is that the last match?"
"One left," answered Nugget dolefully, and heaved a long sigh.
"Don't use it, then. It may come in handy later on. The situation is not as bad as it looks. We can stick close together and push the canoes ahead of us. In that way we won't run any risk of striking the wall. Of course we can't move very rapidly, but our getting out of the cavern is only a question of time."
"I hope it won't take long," said Nugget. "A day or two of this would drive me mad."
Just then the match he was holding burnt to the end and fell in the water. He restored the box to Ned, and taking hold of the canoes at the stern ends, they moved slowly through the darkness.
No words can adequately describe the suffering and thoughts of the two lads during the next hour. Nugget could not repress an occasional complaint, and even the stout hearted Ned felt at times as though he must cry out.
The fate of Clay and Randy weighed almost as heavily upon him as his own misfortunes. He knew their chance of escape had been very slight, and he feared they had not been able to take advantage of it. Little wonder then that he looked forward with almost equal dread and joy to reaching the end of the cavern.
That ordeal, however, promised to be long delayed. It was a painfully laborious task to accomplish even a snail-like progress through the dark passage.
What lay before them the boys could only imagine, and they constantly feared some calamity. It was impossible to keep the canoes straight. They veered to right and left, striking the rocky sides of the channel, which actually seemed to be growing narrower.
Every few moments they stuck fast on a shoal or submerged reef, and then Ned had to feel his way to the front with his paddle, and dislodge them by main force. The water was of variable depth, and half a dozen times the boys suddenly plunged breast deep into a hole, but fortunately did not let go of the canoes.
At the end of an hour the situation was unchanged. As yet not a ray of light was visible ahead. Ned cheered his companion with hopeful words, and both struggled on and on, straining their eyes through the gloom to catch the first glimpse of light.
They felt that their powers of endurance would soon be spent. They were intensely weary, and chilled to the bone by their dripping clothes. Contact with the rocks had bruised their hands and feet, and every step was a torture.
At last the canoes grounded on some yielding surface and refused to budge. Ned staggered forward and found their prows imbedded in what he judged to be a bar of sand and gravel stretching across the channel. He walked on a few steps to ascertain its width, and was amazed and frightened by coming in contact with a solid wall of rock.
"Come here, quick, Nugget!" he called hoarsely.
Nugget waded alongside the canoes, and was soon on the bar.
"What is it?" he cried. "Anything wrong?"
For answer Ned took the last match from the little metal box, and lighted it.
As the little blaze flared up the boys looked curiously about them. One brief glimpse revealed the awful truth. The sandy bar was in reality the end of the passage. Beyond it rose a smooth, slimy wall, and overhead was a low jagged roof dripping with moisture. The canoes lay in a quiet pool of water that was as dead and void of current as a mill pond.
CHAPTER XXXV
NUGGET DISCOVERS A LIGHT
The half-burned match fell from Ned's trembling fingers, and went out on the sand. Then there was silence for nearly a minute--a terrible, oppressive silence.
It was broken by a sharp cry from Nugget that echoed far through the cavern. He seized Ned by one arm and clung to him, trembling from head to foot.
"Is there no hope?" he wailed pitifully. "Must we stay in this awful place until we die? I can't stand it, Ned, indeed I can't. Oh! do something quick, won't you?"
Ned was at a loss to reply. His own heart was full of misery and despair. What word of comfort could he give his companion? Would it be wise to give him any--to excite hopes that might never be realized?
He put his arm about Nugget, and this seemed to comfort the lad a little.
"We will surely find a way to escape, Ned?" he asked in a calmer tone. "Don't you think so?"
"It shan't be our fault if we don't," returned Ned. "You must be brave, Nugget--brave and patient. We are worn out and exhausted now, and must have rest before we can do anything more."
"I was awfully tired a minute ago," said Nugget, "but I feel now as though I could push on all day if I was sure of finding the way out of this cavern. Do you think we will have to go all the way back--to the place we entered by, I mean?"
"I hope that won't be necessary," replied Ned. "The simple truth is that we have blundered into a side passage, that has no outlet. It can't be very long since we got off the right track, for I remember the current against my legs. We will go back after a while and find the turning."
"In this pitch darkness?" exclaimed Nugget.
"We will feel our way along the wall," said Ned, "and if the canoes are in the road we'll abandon them. We won't start now though. Sit down and take a good rest. You will need it."
Nugget obediently climbed into his canoe, and Ned did the same. For a long while they sat thus, side by side, without speaking. Ned's courage was almost at the breaking point. In spite of his sanguine words he felt that the chance were terribly adverse. Without a ray of light to guide them it would be a difficult matter to find the main channel of the stream again, and follow it to the outlet which must certainly exist. There was danger of falling into deep holes, of striking sharp rocks, or blundering into other side passages with which the cavern was doubtless honeycombed.
Oppressed with such sad reflections Ned let the time go by unheeded, and at length, through very fatigue, he fell into a kind of doze. How long he remained thus he did not know, but he was suddenly roused to consciousness by a shrill cry from Nugget:
"Look, Ned, a light! a light!"
Ned first believed that his companion was either dreaming or in delirium, but when he glanced along the passage he saw a yellow flickering glare, and outlined against it a tall black figure.
"It's a man with a torch," cried Ned hoarsely.
"And he's going away from us," exclaimed Nugget, "call him, quick!"
The boys made the cavern ring with loud shouts, and when a quick response came they were almost frantic with joy.
The torch was motionless for an instant. Then it came nearer and nearer, casting a ruddy light on the slimy walls of the passage, until the boys could see plainly the tall bearded man who carried it.
"Found at last!" exclaimed the stranger in a cheery voice as he waded out on the beach. "This will be good news for them other chaps."
"Are our friends safe?" cried Ned eagerly. "Did they escape the flood?"
"Yes," replied the man. "Didn't even get wet or lose their canoes. Come right along now, an' I'll take you to them. I wouldn't let them enter the cavern for fear of accidents. This ain't the time to explain things. All that will come later. My name is Jonas Packer, an' I'm the man what blowed that horn this morning when I seen you chaps down on the creek."
In view of Mr. Packer's evident anxiety to get out of the cavern as soon as possible the boys repressed their desire to ask more questions. Pain and fatigue were forgotten as they entered the water and pushed the canoes back along the passage. While their guide preceded them, holding the blazing torch over his head.
Five minutes later they reached the main channel, and turning a sharp angle found themselves in swiftly running water once more.
"This is where you boys got astray, I reckon," said Mr. Packer. "It's good you sung out when you did, because I was going right on to the front end of the cavern. I didn't think about this side pocket at the time."
"Are we near the rear end?" inquired Ned.
"Purty close," was the reassuring reply. "You'll know when you come to it."
For half an hour longer the boys pushed on through the narrow winding passage, finding the stream as rugged and full of difficulties as it had been earlier in the day. With Mr. Packer's aid, however, they readily skirted the deep pools and pulled the canoes over the obstructing ledges and shallows.
Then, somewhat to their consternation, they saw a jagged wall of rock towering before them. This was undoubtedly the termination of the cavern, but where was the outlet?
"Hold this over your head and stay right here," said Mr. Packer, handing Ned the torch. "I'll be with you in a minute."
He waded toward the wall, pulling the canoes after him, until the water was above his waist. Then, one at a time, he shot the canoes into a long, low crevice at the base of the cliff, and they vanished with a grating noise.
He waded back to the boys and led them to a narrow strip of sand on the right of the passage. Without a word he climbed nimbly up the rocks and entered a circular hole where the space was so contracted that Ned and Nugget had to bend almost double and hold their arms in front of them.
They made several sharp turns, slipped down a slide of moist, sticky clay--and emerged suddenly into the warm, sultry air of the outer world.
A glad cry fell from the boys' lips. A few yards distant lay the surface of the creek, and in the angle formed by the shore and a rocky hillside that fell sheer to the water, was a snowy tent, and a campfire behind it, and two slim figures standing in the flame light. The next instant the Jolly Rovers were united, and with joy too deep for words they clasped hands.
Mr. Packer slipped quietly away, and jumping into a boat paddled after the two canoes which had emerged from under the cliff a moment before, and were now sliding swiftly down stream.
CHAPTER XXXVI
HOME AGAIN
It was some time before the boys could talk coherently. A dry change of clothes and the good supper their companions had prepared in readiness, made Ned and Nugget feel pretty much like themselves again, and sitting about the camp fire they told the thrilling story of their adventure.
Then Clay and Randy related their escape from the flood, telling how they had reached a break in the cliff--a steep, bushy slope--up which they dragged their canoes in time to avoid the sudden deluge.
The missing links were supplied by Jonas Packer.
"I seen you two fellows shoot into the cavern," he said, "and as soon as the flood went down a little, I took my boat and went across to the other chaps, who were pretty badly scared about that time. Knowin' all about the cavern, I relieved their minds a little and persuaded them to paddle around the bend with me to the place where the cavern came out. Then we all went inside and waited and waited for two or three hours, I reckon. You see I kinder expected you boys to come straight through without upsetting.
"I was afraid then to wade up the channel for fear of more high water. But when evening come, an' no signs of you yet, the thing began to look serious. So I told those lads to h'ist the tent an' get supper ready--more to cheer them than anything else--an' then I lit the pine torch I'd brought along, and struck into the cavern, bent on going clear through if I could, and the rest of my story you fellows know. It was a narrow escape, I tell you."
"It was the worst adventure I ever had," said Ned. "The time we were in there seemed like days instead of hours. Is the cavern very long?"
"Not more'n half a mile. It took you a good while to come through though. It was about eight o'clock in the evening when I found you. You see the cavern cuts straight under the hill, and enters the creek again below the bend. To go around by land it's a good mile and a half.
"In low water both ends of the cavern are high and dry, and you can go all the way through on foot. Indian Cave is what they call it because the Indians used to hide there more'n a hundred years ago."
Mr. Packer related several interesting reminiscences of the cavern, until he saw that the boys were getting sleepy. Then he left for home promising to rig up a paddle in place of the one Nugget had lost, and also to bring him an old hat.
A few moments later the Jolly Rovers were sleeping soundly in the tent, and the dying camp fire was gleaming on the muddy surface of the creek. Tuesday was a clear, sunny day, but the boys decided to defer their departure until the next morning. Ned and Nugget felt the need of a little rest.
After breakfast Jonas Packer returned, bringing quite a respectable paddle on which he had been working since daybreak, and a broad brimmed straw hat, which Nugget regarded as a very poor substitute for his trim yachting cap.
Harvest work required the good natured farmer's immediate return. The boys parted from him with genuine regret, and only with the greatest difficulty could they induce him to accept pay for the paddle--the very least of the services he had rendered them.
The greater part of the day was spent in furbishing up clothes and camp equipments and scrubbing the collected dirt and scum of three weeks from the decks and sides of the canoes. The boys realized that the cruise was about ended, and they hoped by the aid of the high water and an early start to reach home on the morrow.
There was no longer any temptation to linger by the way, since the lower reaches of the creek with which they had been familiar for some years past, were only a few miles distant. The chief charm of canoeing is to explore strange waters.
The Jolly Rovers were up bright and early on Wednesday morning, and in default of bread or crackers they made some cakes out of flour and water, and relished them, too. It was a strange coincidence that the provisions should have lasted just until this time. With the exception of a little oatmeal the jars were quite empty.
About half past seven the Pioneer led the way down stream, proudly shaking the faded pennant to the breeze, and soon the mouth of Indian Cave was far behind. The creek was now barely a foot above its normal level, but this was quite sufficient to make a swift current, and the mile after mile, bend after bend fell behind the flashing paddles of the Jolly Rovers.
At ten o'clock they reached the first familiar landmark--Roop's Dam--and the home coming began to seem a reality indeed. The Susquehanna was six miles distant as the crow flies, but almost thrice six by the snaky curvatures of the channel down which they were making their way.
Midway on the breast of the dam was lodged a section of the red bridge, and it recalled vividly to the boys the circumstances under which they had last seen it.
They found an easy portage for the canoes, and were off again without delay. While the sunny afternoon slowly lengthened they paddled on through a now familiar country, passing Sporting Hill--a famous place for bass--about four o'clock, and reaching Oyster's Dam--endeared by many boyish memories--just an hour later.
Another portage, and then away at full speed between wooded banks and green islands, to the nail works dam, where the air rang to the clatter of big hammers and pitchy black smoke was vomited skyward from huge stacks.
A brief dash through foaming shallows and rapids, with the hamlet of Fairview on one side and the wooded bluffs of Bunker Hill on the other, a swift glide into the shadows of the old Red Bridge--and then the Jolly Rovers were on the broad bosom of the Susquehanna. They shouted and laughed and waved their caps in the air for very joy.
A mile across the tide were the upper suburbs of the city, and diagonally down stream, three miles away, was the great yellow dome of the capitol, and beyond it, faint in the golden haze of sunset, the piers and spans of five mighty bridges, capped by clustered spires and roofs.
Soon the Jolly Rovers rounded the upper point of Independence Island and paddled on by the city shores until the porch of Randy's boat house hove in view.
Ned was first to reach the float, and stepping out of his canoe he seized the pennant and waved it aloft. "The cruise of the Jolly Rovers is ended," he cried. "May we make another like it!"
"And never a shorter one!" added Randy. "It will be four weeks on Friday morning since we started."
They give three loud cheers together, and with eager hands carried the canoes into the boat house. Then they climbed to the top of the bank, and marched homeward through the city with the proud step and mien of a conquering army. Far more to be prized than spoils of victory were their healthy, bronzed faces.
And so the wonderful cruise came to an end--in one way at least, though the memories of it will never be forgotten. Apart from its keen enjoyments, and thrilling adventures, and the freshened vigor of health that it imparted, the boys learned more than one lesson that will prove of service in after life. From that time Randy was less self willed, and better able to curb his temper, for his eyes had been opened to the serious consequences that may result from these faults.
Clay had learned to regard practical jokes and mocking words in a more serious light than they had ever appeared to him before, while Nugget was more self reliant and less timid after the rugged experiences he had passed through.
Even Ned--to whose constant cool headedness and knowledge of out door craft the success of the cruise was mainly due--had profited by lessons of patience and endurance. And he was happy--with that happiness which comes to one who has benefitted his fellow man--in the consciousness that he had helped Bug Batters to the commencement of a new and a better life.
The boys are yet far from the cares and responsibilities of manhood, and they will probably make more than one cruise in the happy summer vacations to come, but it is doubtful if brighter memories will ever dim the cherished wealth of affection they feel for the faded pennant, the scarred and battered paddles, and the water soaked log book, which now hangs on the boathouse wall--mute mementoes of the time the Jolly Rovers paddled down the winding waters of the Conodoguinet.
THE END
End of Project Gutenberg's Canoe Boys and Campfires, by William Murray Graydon

= = = PG19489 = = =
CANOE MATES IN CANADA; OR, THREE BOYS AFLOAT ON THE SASKATCHEWAN
Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
[Illustration: Once he had to paddle like a madman to keep from being sucked into the largest whirlpool along the course. (Page 12)]
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CANOE MATES IN CANADA OR THREE BOYS AFLOAT ON THE SASKATCHEWAN
By ST. GEORGE RATHBORNE
Author of "THE HOUSE BOAT BOYS," "CHUMS IN DIXIE," "THE YOUNG FUR TAKERS," Etc.
M. A. DONOHUE & CO., Chicago
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CANOE AND CAMPFIRE SERIES
Four Books of Woodcraft and Adventure in the Forest and on the Water that every Boy Scout should have in his Library
By ST. GEORGE RATHBORNE
CANOEMATES IN CANADA; or, Three Boys Afloat on the Saskatchewan.
THE YOUNG FUR-TAKERS; or, Traps and Trails in the Wilderness.
THE HOUSE-BOAT BOYS; or, Drifting Down to the Sunny South.
CHUMS IN DIXIE; or, The Strange Cruise of a Motor Boat.
CAMP MATES IN MICHIGAN; or, With Pack and Paddle in the Pine Woods.
ROCKY MOUNTAIN BOYS; or, Camping in the Big Game Country.
In these four delightful volumes the author has drawn bountifully from his thirty-five years experience as a true sportsman and lover of nature, to reveal many of the secrets of the woods, such as all Boys Scouts strive to know. And, besides, each book is replete with stirring adventures among the four-footed denizens of the wilderness; so that a feast of useful knowledge is served up, with just that class of stirring incidents so eagerly welcomed by all boys with red blood in their veins. For sale wherever books are sold, or sent prepaid for 50 cents each by the publishers.
Copyright, 1912, M. A. Donohue & Co.
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CONTENTS
CHAPTER                              PAGE
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CANOE MATES IN CANADA
or
Afloat on the Saskatchewan
CHAPTER I.
A PLUNGE DOWN THE RAPIDS.
Kneeling in a "bullboat," fashioned from the skin of an animal, and wielding a paddle with the dexterity only to be attained after years of practice in canoeing, a sturdily-built and thoroughly bronzed Canadian lad glanced ever and anon back along the course over which he had so recently passed; and then up at the black storm clouds hurrying out of the mysterious North.
It was far away in the wilderness of the Northwest, where this fierce tributary of the great Saskatchewan came pouring down from the timber-clad hills; and all around the lone voyager lay some of the wildest scenery to be met with on the whole continent.
Here and there in this vast territory one might come across the occasional trading posts of the wide-reaching Hudson Bay Company, at each of which the resident factor ruled with the arbitrary power of a little czar.
It might be he would discover the fire of some Ishmaelite of the forest, a wandering "timber-cruiser," marking out new and promising fields for those he served, and surveying the scene of possible future bustling logging camps.
Otherwise the country at this time was a vast unknown land, seldom penetrated by human kind, save the Indian fur gatherers.
Considering that he was in so vast a wilderness this adventurous lad appeared to have scant luggage in his well battered bullboat--indeed, beyond the buskskin jacket, which he had thrown off because of his exertions, there did not seem to be anything at all aboard the craft, not even a gun, by means of which he might provide himself with food while on the journey downstream.
This singular fact would seem to indicate that he might have had trouble of some sort back yonder.
Indeed, the occasional glances which he cast over his shoulder added strength to this possibility; though the look upon his strong face was more in the line of chagrin and anger than fear.
Now and then he shook his curly head, and muttered something; and once a name passed his lips in anything but a friendly fashion--that of Alexander Gregory.
Swifter grew the current, giving plain warning to one so well versed as this lad must be in the vagaries of these mad rivers of the Silent Land that presently it would be racing furiously down a steep incline, with razoredge rocks on every side, apparently only too eager to rend asunder the frail canoe of the adventurous cruiser.
Still Owen Dugdale continued to ply the nimble paddle, weaving it in and out like a shuttle.
He kept to the middle of the river when it would seem to at least have been the part of wisdom had he edged his craft closer to either shore, so that he might, in time, make a safe landing in preference to trusting himself to the mercy of the wild rapids, in which his frail bullboat would be but as a chip in the swirl of conflicting waters.
Already had the vanguard of the storm swept down upon him.
An inky pall began to shut out the daylight, and when a sudden flash of lightning cleft the low-hanging clouds overhead the effect was perfectly staggering.
The roar of thunder that followed quick upon its heels was like the explosion of a twelve-inch gun as heard in the steel-jacketed turret of a modern battleship.
Again and again was the rushing river, with its grim forest-clad shores lighted up by the rapid-fire electric flashes.
All around crashed the loud-toned thunderclaps, rumbling and roaring until the whole affair became a perfect pandemonium; and brave indeed must be the soul that could gaze upon it without dismay and flinching.
It was just then, before the rain had begun to descend, and while the artillery of heaven flashed and roared with all the fury of a Gettysburg, that Owen Dugdale found himself plunging into the dangerous rapids, ten times more to be feared under such conditions than ordinary.
Possibly he may have regretted his rashness in sticking to the middle of the channel until it was too late to change his course; but apparently the solitary young Canuck was at the time in somewhat of a desperate frame of mind, and recked little what might be the result of his mad act of defiance to the combined powers of tempest and boiling rapids.
At least he showed no signs of shrinking from the consequences.
Beyond shifting his weight a trifle, as if to settle himself better for the desperate work that faced him, he remained just as before, on his knees.
Crouching amidships, lie held his paddle poised as if ready to thrust it into the swirling water at a second's notice, to stay the progress of the canoe as it lunged toward a threatening rock, or glided too near a roaring whirlpool, where disaster was certain to follow.
Owen Dugdale was no novice at shooting rapids, though never before could he have undertaken such a fierce fight as the one in which he was now engaged, for the combination of the elements made it simply appalling.
The stirring scene might have appealed to the instinct of an artist; but so far as the lad was concerned he had only eyes for the perils with which he was surrounded, and his whole soul seemed wrapped up in the prompt meeting of each emergency as it flashed before him.
A dozen times he would have met with sudden disaster but for the instantaneous manner in which his hand followed the promptings of his brain.
Even then it was a mighty close shave more than once, for the boat rubbed up against several snags in whirling past, any one of which would have sunk the frail craft had it been a head-on collision.
Once he had to paddle like a madman to keep from being sucked into the largest whirlpool along the course; which seemed to reach out eager fingers, and strive to the utmost to engulf him in its gluttonous maw.
Thanks to the almost incessant lightning, Owen was enabled to see these perils in time to take action, else he must have been speedily overwhelmed in the fury of the rushing waters.
While the time might have seemed an eternity to the brave lad who battled for his very life, in reality it could not have been more than a couple of minutes at most that he was shooting down that foamy descent, dodging hither and thither as the caprice of the rapids or the impetus of his paddle dictated.
Just below him was the finish of the dangerous fall, and as so often happens, the very last lap proved to be more heavily charged with disaster than any of those above, even though they appeared to be far worse.
Being a son of the wilderness, Owen Dugdale had probably never heard of the kindred terrors that used to lie in wait for the bold mariners of ancient Greece--the rock and the whirlpool known as Scylla and Charybdis--if they missed being impaled upon the one they were apt to be engulfed in the other--and yet here in the rapids of this furious Saskatchewan feeder he was brought face to face with a proposition exactly similar to that of mythology.
He strove valiantly to meet the occasion, and his sturdy sweep of the paddle did send him away from the ugly pointed rock; but the last whirlpool was so close that he was not enabled to fully recover in time to throw his whole power into the second stroke; consequently his canoe was caught in the outer edge of the swirl, and before one could even wink twice it capsized.
This was not the first time Owen had met with such a disaster while shooting rapids and he had his wits about him for all of the confusion that surrounded him there.
His very first act was to clutch hold of the canoe, and throw all his energies into the task of avoiding the deadly suction of the whirlpool, for once he fell into its grip there must be only a question of seconds ere he reached its vortex and went under.
Fortune, aided by his own violent efforts, favored him, and as a result he managed to swim down the balance of the rapid, and reach the smoother waters below, still hanging on with a desperate clutch to his poor old boat, while his other hand gripped the paddle.
The canoe was full of water, but it did not sink, being buoyant enough to keep on the surface; but Owen found it as much as he could do to push the unwieldly thing along when he began to make for the nearest shore.
Exciting as this adventure had been, it was only an episode in a life such as he had spent up in this vast region, where the first lesson a boy learns is to take care of himself, and meet peril in any guise.
There was not the least doubt with regard to his ability to gain the nearby shore with his wrecked canoe, even if left to himself.
Nevertheless, when his ears caught the sound of encouraging shouts, and he realized that his perilous descent of the rapids had been witnessed by sympathetic eyes, it gave Mm a thrill to know that friends were near by, and waiting to assist him, if such were necessary.
But young Dugdale was an independent lad, accustomed to relying altogether upon his own endeavors, as one must always do whose life is spent in the heart of the Great Lone Land of the Far Northwest.
Hence, he kept on swimming with his boat until he could wade, and in this way came out of the river dripping, temporarily held in check by his misfortune, but not in the least dismayed.
Two figures hurried to meet him, though they arrived too late to give him a helping hand in effecting a landing.
Owen looked at them in amazement--he had at the most anticipated that those whose encouraging shouts had reached his ears while in the water must be some timber-cruisers who chanced to be camping at the foot of the rapids for the fishing to be found there; or it might be several of the halfbreed _voyageurs_ employed by the Hudson Bay Company to carry furs from far distant posts to some station on the railroad; but he found himself gazing upon neither.
Two boys confronted him, neither of them much older than himself, and utter strangers at that.
Owen had never had a chum; and indeed, his life had been a lonely one, burdened by responsibilities that had made him much older than his years--his scanty associations had been with hardy lumbermen or _voyageurs_, so that the presence of this twain struck him as the most mysterious and remarkable thing in all his experience.
And they seemed so solicitous concerning his welfare, insisting upon taking hold of the boat and pulling the same clear of the water, that he almost began to fancy he must be dreaming.
"Now," exclaimed the taller of the two, when this job had been finished, "come right up to our tent, where we have a bully fire that will dry you off in a jiffy. And our coffee is just ready, too--I rather guess that'll warm you up some. Eli, it's lucky you made an extra supply, after all. Looks as if you expected we'd have company drop in on us. I'll carry the paddle--good you hung on to it, for it's a tough job to whittle one out, I know. Here we are, old chap, and believe me, you're a thousand times welcome!"
CHAPTER II.
THE CAMP UNDER THE HEMLOCKS.
Young Owen Dugdale's heart thrilled within him.
In all his life he could not exactly remember a single time when he had been thus warmly welcomed to any camp. Why, it was almost worth shooting the rapids and meeting with disaster to hear such words, and feel that every one was meant.
Who were these lads, and why were they here in this faraway land?
His astonished eyes fell upon the craft that had evidently carried them up the river from some hamlet, scores, perhaps hundreds, of miles away.
Such a dandy canoe Owen Dugdale had never dreamed existed in the whole wide world, for it was of varnished cedar, and with its nickeled trimmings, glistened there under the hemlocks in the flash of the lightning, and the glow of the protected campfire.
He seemed to feel somehow that this apparent calamity upon the river had been the "open sesame" for him to enter upon a new and perhaps delightful experience; rather a rough introduction perhaps, but then he knew only such in the range of his past.
And the delicious odor of that supper was enough to arouse the dormant appetite of one who had foresworn all cookery, one of these modern cranks determined to exist upon nuts and fruit, which our young friend of the bullboat certainly was not.
Both lads bustled about trying to make him comfortable near the cheery blaze, and then filling a pannikin with the canoeist's stew of corn beef, succotash and left-over potatoes, they invited him to set-to, nor wait for them a second.
Owen could not have restrained himself, once his nostrils became saturated with those delicious odors, and he started to eat like a starving chap; as indeed, he came very near being, seeing that he had not partaken of a mouthful of food for almost twenty-four hours, and then but scantily.
Then came a cup of such coffee as he had never before tasted, with condensed milk to mellow the same, and close at his hand was placed a package of crackers into which he was expected to dip as the humor seized him.
Boys never like to talk while hungry, and no matter how strong the curiosity on both sides might be, nothing was said beyond the usual courtesies necessary in passing things, until one and all declared themselves satisfied.
But, although their tongues were silent during this half-hour, their eyes did double duty, and Owen found a thousand things at which to wonder.
The canoe had been enough to excite his curiosity, but everything he saw about the camp was in keeping with such luxury.
The dun-colored tent was a beauty, and doubtless positively waterproof, for the rain that had been beating down ever since they commenced eating had found no inlet; and the fly over the fire sufficed to keep it from being extinguished.
He saw several warbags of the same kind of canvas, evidently used for the storage of clothes and provisions; and in addition there were a couple of guns, rubber ponchos, gray blankets that peeped out of two expensive sleeping bags, and a couple of black japanned boxes the contents of which he could not picture, unless they might be something in the way of surveyors' instruments; for Owen had once seen a party of these gentry running a line through the forest, and hence his vague application now.
These things had been taken in with a few glances around; but the two boys themselves occupied most of his attention, and he found himself trying to study out what they were--the taller one he understood immediately must be in command, for his whole appearance indicated it, while the shorter chap was of the calibre not unlike himself, bronzed from a life in the open, and with a cheery manner that drew the waif toward him from the start.
Both were dressed for business, with no unnecessary frills; and it was evident that if the leader of the mysterious expedition was possessed of unlimited means he also had enough common sense to deny himself luxuries when upon such a long cruise.
When every one declared that not another bite could be taken, Eli pulled out a pipe, being evidently addicted to smoking, and his comrade, finding that the newcomer had dried out pretty thoroughly, hunted up a spare jacket from one of the bags, which he insisted upon Owen donning, since the storm, now a thing of the past, had been followed by a cool wave that made the fire doubly pleasant.
"Now," said the tall lad, with one of his winning smiles, that drew Owen to him so wonderfully, "let's exchange confidences a bit, just as far as you care to go and no further. First of all my name is Cuthbert Reynolds, and I'm from across the border, a Yankee to the backbone; and this is Eli Perkins, also an American boy, a native of the lumber regions of Michigan, and with his fortunes bound up in mine."
"And I'm Owen Dugdale," said the other, knowing the pause was intended for him to break in with the mention of his name; "a native Canuck, and at home in this timber region--my parents were of Scotch descent I believe. And the first thing I want to say is that I'm mighty glad to be here with you just now. I was just about as hungry as a bear, and only for you I don't see what I could have done, after that ducking, for my matches must have been wet, and I would have gone to sleep hungry and cold."
The tall lad hastened to interrupt him, evidently not fancying being thanked for doing what was apparently the greatest pleasure in the world to him.
"Hold on, please; we understand all that. You're a thousand times welcome, and I tell you right now nothing could have happened to please me better than meeting up with you. You can bet there's something besides chance in it. Now, naturally you're wondering what in the dickens two fellows of our stripe are doing wandering about up here in the Far Northwest like a couple of nomads.
"Well, perhaps when you learn the actual truth you'll wonder harder than ever how it is one of us has escaped landing in a lunatic asylum up to this time; but as some of my friends say to me, youthful enthusiasm is responsible for many queer things, and so long as my wonderful ambition is to copy after Stanley in the line of exploring, why, they don't worry.
"They say I have more money than I know what to do with, anyway, and if it must be blown in somehow, why, this is a harmless way of doing it, dangerous only to myself, and any other foolish chap whom I may influence to accompany me on my mad expeditions," and as he spoke he glanced affectionately in the direction of the homely, freckled but good-humored Eli, who returned the look with a grin and an emphatic nod of approval.
"Now, you see, Eli has been with the lumbermen all his life, and is as hardy as they make them. What he doesn't know about the woods isn't worth telling; and so we make a pretty good team, for I've picked up a little knowledge about camp life during my canoeing days in the East, and manage to fill in the gaps in Eli's education, along the line of woodcraft.
"I might as well make a full confession in the start, for you're bound to get on to my weakness if we see much of each other, and I hope we will. Ever, since I was knee-high to a grasshopper I've been inoculated with the exploring bee, read everything ever printed in that line, and pictured myself doing wonderful stunts like Livingstone and Stanley."
It was only to be expected then that when I was left my own master at the death of my father, I would pursue my hobby to the limit; and I rather guess I have been on the jump for two years. Haven't made myself famous yet, and a little of my enthusiasm in that line has dribbled away; but I'm just as determined to work in the field of research as ever; only age is beginning to tone down my earlier wild notions, and after this last and crowning folly I think I shall hitch up with some veteran who knows it all, and be content to work up from the ranks.
"I started out on this expedition with great notions of making such a trip as no man had ever before attempted, passing up a branch of the Saskatchewan, making a portage with the assistance of the Crees or Chippewas to some convenient branch of the Athabasca River, and voyage on to the lake of that name by fall, winter there perhaps at the Hudson Bay Post, and in the spring by means of the chain of lakes and rivers that I understand connect the Athabasca Lake with Hudson Bay, arrive at that vast sheet of water in time to be picked up by some whaler and carried home a winner.
"Makes you smile, I guess--well, it strikes me as funny, now that I've been navigating this country for several months, and only gotten this far; but when I laid out the trip it was a serious business for me, and I couldn't see anything but success ahead of me. I've had my fun, and I'm ready to call the game off. This is a man's work, I understand now, and I'm out of the exploring business for the time, only now that we're up so far Eli and myself want to see all we can of the country; and Eli has some notions in the line of discovering rich copper ledges that he means to work while wandering about this unknown land, eh, old man?"
In this boyish, familiar manner did he address his comrade, and Eli as usual laughed good-naturedly and nodded his head--evidently he had a fund of humor in his make-up that could not be disturbed by any amount of "joshing."
Cuthbert halted in his explanations; he did not hint at such a thing, but evidently it was up to Owen to tell something at least in connection with his presence in the neighborhood, and how he came to be rushing down the dangerous rapids at the time the storm broke, when it would appear the part of wisdom for one who knew the peril involved as well as he did, to land and portage around the troubled water.
The lad acted a little as though confused, not knowing just how much he should tell in connection with himself; but taking a brace he finally spoke up--Eli was adding some wood to the fire from a stock they had laid in dry when the storm was seen approaching, while Cuthbert busied himself in making his seat more comfortable, though in reality it was done in order not to appear to be noticing the coloring-up of the guest, about whom he seemed to realize that there was a bit of a mystery.
"I told you my name was Owen Dugdale, and that I had always lived up in this country. Well, that is hardly so, for when I was a little chap I remember being in Montreal with my parents for a spell; but they came back here and I've never gone out of the woods since.
"My mother taught me all I know, for she was a lady, and had been educated in a convent school in that city. My father was used to the life of the woods, and I learned everything connected with that from him. I lost my mother two years ago, and my father later. That's about all there is in connection with me. I--I had some trouble up the river at the post, and was making my way down with the intention of leaving this country forever when this accident happened. I'm glad it did happen, because it's thrown me in with two such good fellows. You'll be surprised when I tell you that I've never had a boy friend in all my life; and--well, it's mighty fine to be sitting here and talking with you both. I wish I could do something to return the favor, that's what."
"You can--stay with us a while, and let us have some of the benefit of your knowledge of the country. We'd like nothing better; and if you have no other place to go, why make a third member of the crowd. You have a boat, and as for grub and such, why, we're loaded down with it. Don't decide just now, but think it over and tell us in the morning. We won't take no for an answer, remember."
Owen turned his head away as if to look at something he fancied moved along the edge of the camp; but it was to conceal the tears that came unbidden into his eyes--the genuine warmth of this invitation stirred his heart, and as some resolution sprang into life he gripped his hands and set his teeth hard.
CHAPTER III.
COMRADES.
The young Canadian sat for a few minutes mute, as though turning over this proposition of Cuthbert's in his mind; then suddenly raising his eyes he looked his new friend straight in the face and said:
"That's awfully white of you, and I'm going to accept your invitation. I'll be only too glad to stay with you, for a time at least, and serve you as guide. And if you still persist in your determination to ascend the river further, to see all you can while in this country, who should know that region better than myself. Let come what will, I am going back!"
The impulsive American, after his kind, was bound to seal the bargain with a hearty handshake; and Eli, not to be outdone in the matter, also thrust out his broad "paw" as he called it, squeezing that of the other with a strength that made Owen wince a bit.
At the same time the observing Cuthbert could not but note the gritting of Owen's teeth when he declared that he was ready to go back into the country from which he had apparently just come; it would appear as though some recent experience up the river did not linger fondly in his memory, and that when he came paddling downstream in his battered old bullboat it might have been with the idea of quitting the country for good.
Naturally this aroused a little curiosity in the other's mind, though he was not addicted to this failing overly much.
What could there be in the depths of the wilderness to bring about this aversion on the part of young Dugdale?
If Cuthbert had allowed himself to ruminate upon this subject all sorts of suspicions might have been aroused; but he was by nature too frank and generous to judge a stranger before he had been given a chance to explain; and the more he looked in the face of the lad, and noted the calm depths of his gray eyes the stronger grew his conviction that Owen Dugdale, as he called himself, could not descend to anything wrong.
Some persons carry their character in their faces, and he was of the number. So Cuthbert made up his mind to chase all suspicion from his mind; if in his own time the Canadian chose to confide in him, well and good; until then he would forget what he had seen of first anxiety and then grim determination, stamped upon that young face.
Both of the would-be explorers were cast in somewhat of a merry mould, and it was impossible to be in their company long without partaking of their happy-go-lucky spirit.
To the sober Owen this was about as fine a thing as could ever have happened, for he found it utterly out of the question to ponder gloomily upon the bitter past while these two chaps were whipping jokes back and forth, and insidiously drawing him into the conversation, until greatly to his astonishment he even burst out into a hearty peal of laughter, the first expression of merriment that had sprung from his heart for many a day.
Perhaps a benign Providence had taken pity upon him, and was now bent on sending sunshine where hitherto there had been little save clouds and storm.
The more he saw of these cousins from over the line the better he liked them.
It was a favorite joke of Cuthbert's to compare himself with that wonderfully humorous character of Spanish literature, who took himself so solemnly even while he furnished merriment for everybody--Don Quixote, the Knight of La Mancha--this wild expedition into the depths of the Northwestern Unknown Land was now, in the originator's mind, about as weird and ridiculous a proposition as any of the adventures of the crazy knight; and he never tired of cracking broad jokes upon the subject.
Of course, as was natural, honest Eli must pose for the faithful squire, Sancho Panza; and long since he had been told the whole story, so that he was now acquainted with most of the peculiarities of that worthy, and even at times managed to tickle his friend and employer by carrying out the idea in some manner.
Owen was not ignorant as to the facts, for it chanced that he had read the book, having found an old copy in his cabin home, the property of his mother; so that he was in a condition to enjoy the joke whenever there happened to be a reference made to the ancient couple.
The storm had long since passed away down the river, growling in the distance for quite a time; but gradually the stars came peeping out in the broad blue dome overhead, and while the woods dripped with the moisture the prospect for a good day on the morrow seemed propitious.
There was room in the tent for three, with a little good-natured crowding; and while Owen protested against intruding he was turned down instantly, and compelled to take his place.
Never in all his life had he been drawn to any one as he was toward these two big-hearted fellows from across the border; and when he lay down finally, after busying himself for half an hour about the fire, he felt like a new boy; such is the confidence generated in the human heart by comradeship.
Owen had intentionally chosen a position near the exit of the tent, for, seeing that he had spent his life under similar conditions, and it was second nature with him to attend to a fire during the night, he would not hear of either of his new friends attempting it.
In spite of his getting up several times between that hour and the breaking of dawn Owen slept sounder than he had done for many a day; he seemed to feel a new confidence in himself, as if matters had taken a turn for the better, and in this accidental meeting with his benefactors his fortunes had begun to assume a less gloomy aspect.
Once, as he was about snuggling down under the extra blanket which had been assigned to him he rested his head upon his hand, his elbow being on the ground, and surveyed the two sleeping lads, for the firelight crept through the opening of the tent, and revealed the interior.
It was difficult for him to believe that he had only known these good fellows a comparatively few hours; so strong a hold had they taken upon his heart that it seemed as though he must have met them in his dreams, for they appeared to be occupying a space in his affections that was theirs by right.
So the morning found them.
When Cuthbert awoke he discovered that the new addition to the exploring party was already busily employed in getting things ready for breakfast; whereupon there arose a friendly argument as to whose duty it was to hustle things for the morning meal.
This was finally settled by arranging matters so that the three of them could take turns about in the daily duties; and Owen chose to begin then.
The others were not adverse to letting him have a whack at the culinary department, for they had been going together for a long time now, and both had about exhausted their repertoire in the line of cookery, so that a change would really be a delightful diversion; for almost every camper has his favorite dishes upon which he prides himself, and when two such come together there is always more or less of a friendly rivalry to see which can outdo the other.
By degrees such a party comes to recognize the particularly strong points of each member, so that in the end they make a fine team, every one being a star in his favorite line.
Breakfast was eaten with more or less good natured chaff, such as boys will always indulge in, and older campers as well; for when in the woods it seems as if being brought close back to Nature makes children of us all, showing that it is only the care and worry of a strenuous battle for wealth or power that forces men to appear aged and serious.
After that came a portage, for the canoes and all the camp duffle had to be transported above the rapids.
Eli now seemed to notice for the first time that their new friend had virtually nothing but his boat and paddle, and loudly he bewailed the wretched misfortune that had caused everything to be swallowed up in the hungry maw of the swift rapids.
At this Owen smiled in a curious manner, and openly confessed that the only damage he had sustained besides getting wet, was the loss of his jacket; and he surely had little regret for that missing garment since Cuthbert had so kindly clothed him with a spare one of his own.
Eli may not have been as able to grasp the true significance of this frank declaration as his comrade; but even he realized that the subject must be a sore one with Owen, and that it was not wise to ask questions or seem curious, so he immediately turned to other matters.
Really, he could not be blamed for this wonder, since it was indeed a strange thing to meet with a wanderer in this vast territory so far from the outposts of civilization entirely destitute of the commonest necessities for comfort or the procuring of food--no blanket, cooking utensils, food, and even a gun missing--well, there surely lay back of this a story of unusual interest; and for one Eli hoped their new friend would soon take them into his confidence, at least so far that they might be able to help him.
After some hard work all the stuff was carried to a point above the rapids, where they could readily launch their craft without being carried down into the hungry maw of the swirling flood.
The river had risen somewhat after the rainstorm of the previous night, and evidently there would be no lack of water above; this is always a welcome fact to those who navigate toward the headwaters of rivers, since it is no sport to track canoes over almost dry beds of streams, making "shoes" for the boats in order to prevent their being torn by sharp rocks during the passage.
Owing to the current, which was particularly swift in the region of the rapids, they had to bend to the paddle with considerable vim when the start was eventually made; but the cruisers were young, and their muscles well seasoned by more or less hard work, so that they gradually drew away from the vicinity of Owen's mad voyage among the rocks and sucking whirls of the drop in the river; and the further they went the easier the paddling became.
The morning was cool and invigorating after the storm, so that it was not to be wondered at that our young friends felt joyous, and presently Eli broke out in a lumberman's "chanty" that he had picked up while in camp--Cuthbert joined in the chorus, and unable to withstand the seductive strains, Owen found himself also lifting his voice and adding volume to the merry sound.
CHAPTER IV.
THE THREE SMOKE SIGNALS.
Cuthbert was delighted when he heard the Canadian lad's voice, for he realized that it was one of rare sweetness as well as power; and being fond of singing, and knowing scores of college songs, he promised himself he would in good time teach them to Owen, for their voices would blend admirably, while Eli's had a certain harshness about it that rather swamped his own baritone.
And he was also aware that the _voyageurs_ of the Canadian wilds have numerous French boating songs of their own, that are wonderfully adapted to the rhythm and swing of the paddle; possibly Owen would know some such, and might be induced to sing them on occasion, all of which would add to the delight of their advance over the waters, onward into further depths of the wilderness where mystery brooded and the unknown abounded, for them, at least.
They had managed to make a few miles, but the current was mighty difficult to buck up against, and when finally Cuthbert suggested that they take advantage of an alluring point where the trees hung over the water and the situation seemed especially adapted for a campfire, Eli greeted the proposal with a grunt of unaffected delight, while even the well seasoned Owen felt that something to eat would not come in amiss.
To most of us the time to eat is ever a welcome one, especially when we know there are good things in the larder; and with boys this thing of appetite is an ever present reality, and the point of sufficiency seldom reached.
Soon a cheery fire had been started, and Owen persisted in taking charge of the preparations for lunch, giving them a species of flapjack that neither had ever seen before, and which they pronounced fine.
Owen's eyes alone told that he appreciated their praise, for he uttered no word to betray the fact. He was a singularly quiet lad, and Cuthbert, who made it something of a fad to study human nature wherever he found it, felt certain that his past life had been mixed up with considerable of sorrow.
All that morning they had not met a solitary human being upon the river, and when Eli commented upon this, their new comrade assured them that it was no unusual thing to go for several days thus, especially at this time of year, when the Indians and halfbreeds who trapped for the fur company were hunting back in the forests, laying in venison to be "jerked" or dried for consumption during the winter months, when attending to their traps far up the small branches of the Saskatchewan, or the Athabasca.
In the spring the posts of the Hudson Bay Company are busy places, with these various companies of _voyageurs_ and trappers coming in with their loads, for which they are paid, partly in cash and the balance in store goods. It is then that the resident factor has to exercise his wisdom in handling so varied an assortment of characters, and keeping them from getting into fierce fights, since they are bound to get hold of more or less liquor, and the closing of a successful season, with a period of rest before them, is apt to make them hilarious.
Cuthbert asked many questions along this line, being sincerely desirous of obtaining information at first hands; but while Owen answered readily enough, and explained any point that seemed a bit hazy to his listeners, it might have been noted that he did not offer to launch out into a voluntary description of life as it was to be seen at one of these posts--Cuthbert even fancied that the subject was not wholly pleasing to the lad, and came to the conclusion that whatever of trouble Owen might have met with recently, it must have had some connection with one of these posts.
They were delayed for some time after eating, for Cuthbert was desirous of attending to some little thing that needed fixing about the canoe; and Owen, who had never set eyes on a cedar boat of this delicate character, willingly lent a hand to the accomplishment of the task, satisfied to just handle such a dainty wizard craft, which in his eyes, accustomed to canoes of birch, or even dugouts, and others made of animal skins, assumed the character of something almost too pretty to be touched.
They paddled for just about three hours that afternoon, and met one Indian in a birch bark canoe, shooting downstream.
Both Cuthbert and Eli greeted him heartily; but they noticed that he looked at their new companion in something of a strange manner, though not saying a word to Owen, who seemed to pay no attention to the copper-skinned voyager.
If the scowl upon the face of the lone paddler was any indication of his feelings, there could not possibly be any love lost between them; and noticing that one of the fellow's eyes seemed swollen, the idea thrust itself into Cuthbert's mind, ridiculous as it might seem, that possibly Owen might have had something to do with that catastrophe.
Cuthbert had kept his eyes on the alert for a good spot where they could pass the next night, and it lacked half an hour to sunset when he gave utterance to a shout, and pointed with his paddle at the shore ahead.
"There's the very place, boys, and it's no use going any further. Just an ideal spot to pitch the tent, and the background will make a dandy picture when I get my camera in focus on it in the morning, for the sun must rise, let's see, over across the river, and shine right on the front of the tent. I've been baffled so often in trying for that same effect that I don't mean to miss this opportunity if I can help it. So here's looking at you, and we'll head in, if you please."
Owen opened his mouth as if tempted to say something, but caught himself in time, and silently acquiesced, sending his boat shoreward with vigorous dips of the paddle that told how little his energy had been exhausted by the day's work.
It was a fine spot, too, and Eli was loud in his delight; though, knowing his capacity for stowing away food from long experience, Cuthbert was secretly of the opinion that much of his enthusiasm sprang from the fact that a halt just then brought dinner closer, rather than an artistic appreciation of the surroundings.
That had always been the "fly in the ointment" with those two strangely assorted companions--one of them was of a romantic disposition, and inclined to seeing the elements in a glorious sunset that appealed to his soul, while with Eli, it only meant that the following day would, in all likelihood, be a fine one.
And that was one of the reasons why Cuthbert welcomed the coming of Owen, for somehow he fancied that the young Canadian might be built along his own lines, and able to sympathize with him as the good-hearted but crude Eli never could, since it was not in his nature to go beyond the substantial and matter-of-fact.
Nevertheless, he was a "bully good fellow," as Cuthbert was wont to declare, and in time of stress and difficulty could be depended on to the utmost, being honest, willing and obliging, three necessary elements in a camping comrade that go far to make amends for any little shortage in artistic temperament.
The whole three of the cruisers were soon busily engaged, for there is always plenty for all hands to do when pitching camp, what with the raising of the tent, the making of a fireplace upon which coffee pot and frying pan will rest cozily, the digging of a ditch on the higher ground back of the shelter, if there seems the slightest possible chance of rain before morning--well, every one who has been there knows how the opportunities for doing something open up to a willing campmate, so there is hardly any use in enumerating them here.
When darkness finally fell upon them all these things had been taken care of, and they were in fine fettle for the stay, whether it be of long or short duration, even to a pile of firewood close at hand.
Supper was next in order, but that was a pleasure in which all insisted in taking a share in preparing as well as demolishing; and it was wonderful how speedily things were managed with so many cooks eager to assist the chef.
During their afternoon trip upstream they had trolled with a couple of lines back of the boat, and fortune had smiled upon them sufficiently to provide them with fish for the evening meal, which Owen cooked in the manner most favored in this region, where trout may be looked on as a common, everyday article of food, and not in the line of luxury.
Of course, there is no necessity to tell how perfectly delicious that dinner turned out to be, for every one knows that fish are at their best when eaten in the very spot they are taken from their native element; and that being placed on the ice for hours or days takes their delicate flavor away, and renders the flesh soft and crumbly and next to tasteless.
And Owen confessed that the cup of Ceylon tea which he drank was the first he had tasted for a year; and he also gave his companions to understand that he had been brought up by a Scotch mother to look upon tea as nectar fit for the gods.
After the feast they lay back and took life easy, all of them being actually too surfeited to think of such a thing as cleaning up the pots and pans for the time being, that little task being left until later, when they would possess more energy and ambition.
Eli apparently had something on his mind, and as he filled his pipe, preparatory to enjoying his customary after-dinner smoke, he opened the subject by remarking:
"I say, boys, did either of you notice that line of smoke down the river, just at the time we were heading for the shore? I was going to call your attention to it, but something that was said about the spot for this camp drew my attention, and I clean forgot it till now."
"I didn't notice anything--in fact, I was so much taken up with looking for a jolly place to bunk tonight that I reckon I never once glanced back. How about you, Owen?" asked Cuthbert, turning to the new comrade.
He knew the other had seen the smoke even before Owen spoke, because something like a flash spread over his swarthy face, though his eyes looked straight at Cuthbert without a sign of flinching.
"Yes, I saw it--in fact, I had turned my head a dozen times in the last half-hour, expecting something of the sort," he remarked, composedly.
"It wasn't a forest fire--not near dense enough for that; and yet it looked queer for a campfire--as near as I could make out there were several of 'em, all in a row, and climbing straight up like columns," declared Eli, wagging his head mysteriously.
"Just three," added Owen, gloomily, and yet with a gritting of his teeth that excited Cuthbert's curiosity more than a little.
"Three smokes in a row--I declare, that sounds like a signal; the Indians down in Florida always communicate in that way, and have a regular code, so that they can send long messages across the swamps and pine forests," he remarked.
"That's just what it was, a smoke signal; and the Cree Indian we met on the river sent it to others of his race upstream," observed the young Canadian.
Cuthbert immediately remembered that he had seen the lone paddler turn a look that was a mingling of surprise and displeasure upon Owen when the canoes passed in midstream, and his former thought that these two had met before, and that the husky lad might even have had to do with the mournful black eye of the aborigine, came back with added force just now; still, he was not the one to ask questions, and unless the other chose to take his new friends fully into his confidence, whatever the mystery that lay in his past must always remain so.
"Yes," went on Owen, bitterly, "it was meant to give notice to one who is interested in my movements that I had apparently changed my mind, and did not intend to leave the neighborhood as speedily as had been expected--that's all."
CHAPTER V.
THE FALSE CHART OF DUBOIS.
No more was said just then; but naturally enough both Cuthbert and Eli could not get the matter out of their minds. The duties of the hour had occupied their attention upon first landing--the pitching of the waterproof tent, gathering of fuel, and kindred occupations incident to getting things ready for the coming night, so that now they could take things easy.
Cuthbert had some sort of rude map of the region, which he had purchased from an old French-Canadian _voyageur_ during earlier stages of his trip; he did not know how reliable it might prove to be, though thus far the young explorers had not found it amiss to any very great extent.
When he found a chance he meant to drag this document out from its place of hiding among the various charts of the Hudson Bay country which he carried along, and get Owen's opinion as to its trustworthy character.
This would give him an opportunity to renew his acquaintance with the lay of the land above, and in some way it might cause their strange new friend to open his heart, and take them more fully into his confidence with relation to his previous connections here.
Cuthbert was pretty positive that there was some sort of a Hudson Bay trading post on this same stream, situated in an isolated quarter--most of them went under the name of a fort, and indeed, they were built to resist any attack that might be made upon them by Indians or disorderly half breeds; for there were at times vast quantities of valuable plunder held in these posts, in the shape of rare peltries, and the many things the trappers took in part payment for their winter's catch, so that a clean-out of a distant post would mean a serious loss to the great company that for scores of years had carried on this business of gathering the precious skins of silver foxes, lynx, badger, mink, otter, fisher, marten, opossum, beaver, bear, wolves and muskrats.
The meal was, as we have seen, soon prepared, and partaken of with that keen relish known only to those who live in the open.
As usual the boys had grouped themselves around the fire at the time the question of the smoke signals arose, each bent upon doing some individual task, that had been upon his mind; for it is the natural habit after dining heartily to desire to rest from strenuous exertion, and take up little matters that require possibly only the manipulation of the hands, or the action of the brain.
Eli seemed deeply interested in some specimens he had picked up close to their noon camp, and which held forth alluring promises of copper--it was the chief fad of his life to run across a lode of the valuable metal in this far-North country; and make his everlasting fortune that way; for in secret the Michigan lad hugged certain plans for future worldwide travel to his heart, all of which, while extremely visionary at present, would be easily possible when his "ship came home," and that rich copper deposit cropped up before his eager eyes.
Few boys there be who fail to have a hobby of some sort--with some it is the pretty general craze for stamp collecting, others go in for coins, autographs, birds' eggs, specimens of birds, weapons of worldwide people, rabbits, pigeons--well, the list is almost inexhaustible, when you come to think of it.
Cuthbert's weakness, as has already been seen, lay in the line of travel and exploration, and the chances were that as he grew older he would develop into a bona fide Livingstone or a Stanley, eager to see faraway lands where the feet of a white man had probably never before wandered, and the mystery of which he might be the very first to unearth.
With Eli it was copper, morning, noon and night; he asked a thousand questions about the ore, where it had been found, what the character of the rocks peculiar to the region, and all such things, making copious notes the while, until as his comrade Cuthbert said, he should be about one of the best posted fellows in that line in the country--still, up to this day he had not met with such a measure of success as to turn his head; though Eli was a most determined chap, and bound to hold on after the manner of a bulldog, once he had taken a grip.
Perhaps Owen also had his particular hobby; but if so the others had as yet been granted little opportunity of realizing what it was.
Given time and it would no doubt develop itself.
Cuthbert had a good deal of patience, and prided himself on his waiting qualities, so that he made little effort to hasten matters.
As he had planned, however, while he sat by the glowing fire, which felt very good on this cool night, he drew out the bunch of charts, and began to absorb himself in the maze of lines and figures, anticipating that when Owen saw what he had before him he must evince more or less curiosity concerning the same, and offer to pass upon their genuine value.
The Canadian lad sat for some time staring into the fire, as though lost in self-communion; and Cuthbert could easily imagine that affairs connected with his life in this country were engrossing his attention.
Many a sly look did Cuthbert flash over that way, for somehow there seemed to be a wonderful fascination about Owen's personality that appealed strongly to him, though he found it utterly impossible to analyze this feeling, in order to make out whether it was pure sympathy toward one who had evidently rubbed up against the hard places of life while to him had been given the "snaps;" or on the other hand if it might be the realization that in this waif of the Unknown Land his soul had discovered the mate or chum for which he had looked so long and so far--perhaps it might be a commingling of the two.
Twice had Owen risen, and the other imagined he was about to come around to his side of the fire to glance over his shoulder at the charts; but both times young Dugdale had simply stepped to the pile of wood and, taking up an armful, tossed it upon the dying blaze.
Cuthbert was beginning to fancy he would have to make a move himself to draw the other's attention to what he was doing, so wrapped up did Owen seem in his own personal affairs; when suddenly he discovered that those wonderfully keen gray eyes of the rover were glued upon the papers he held upon his lap.
Then it was that Owen did come around to his side of the fire, and the disturbed look upon his face gave way to a bright smile as he remarked:
"I didn't notice what you had there, before. I was so bound up in my own affairs. I suppose those are maps of this country you have; perhaps I could be useful in telling you whether they are accurate or not, for I rather guess I've picked up considerable information during these years of wandering in the woods here. If you don't mind me looking at them--"
"Why, to tell the truth that's just what I was wishing you would do, old chap, but I hated to break in on your brown study. Here's a supposed-to-be reliable chart of this region, which I paid a man a good sum to get up for me; but already I've found it more or less crooked, and have begun to lose confidence in its accuracy. Perhaps you could show up the faults, and set me right, so that if the time ever comes when I have to depend on the thing I won't get astray; for truth to tell it would be no fun to find oneself lost on these upper reaches of the great Saskatchewan. Sit right down here, and squint your optic over this set of hen-tracks, made by the halfbreed, Dubois."
"Dubois, you say--why, I know the fellow well. He ought to be able to make a decent map of this country, for he's spent many years roaming over it, though I think he was more concerned about stealing some honest trapper's pelts than anything else. Why, see here, he's made an awful botch of this thing right around this quarter, where he certainly knows every foot of ground. I suspect that the greasy old rascal had some object in misleading you--I wouldn't put it past him to plan so that you might be lost up here, when he and some companions just as unscrupulous as himself, would come on the scene and demand a big sum to get you out of the scrape. I know of several things he has done as bad as that," remarked Owen, with indignation in his voice.
So he began to point out the false lines in the map, and at Cuthbert's suggestion he erased the pencil lines and made new ones as he went along, so that at the end of an hour that particular chart was entirely changed, presenting so new an aspect that the explorer was aroused to declare that the miserable deceiver, Dubois, would hear something not to his liking in case they ever met again.
"This Hudson Bay post which you have marked on the river above us--what is the name it is known by--he did not identify it except as a station?" asked Cuthbert, putting a finger on the cross.
"Fort Harmony," replied Owen, with a twitch about the corners of his mouth that seemed to be along the sarcastic order, as if deep down in his heart the lad thought the name might be a misnomer, according to his own experience.
"I suppose it is something of a store, being so far up in the wilderness; and is in charge of--a factor, I believe they call the boss?" pursued Cuthbert.
"Oh, yes. He is a grizzled old Scotchman, Alexander Gregory by name, who has been in the employ of the company most of his life, and is known as their most trusted agent. He is believed to be very rich; but though he is scrupulously honest and knows how to drive those under him to their best abilities, he is a harsh, cold-blooded man, seeking no companionship, making no warm friends, and apparently bent only on accumulating wealth and doing his full duty to the company he has served so long a time."
Cuthbert could easily read the strong tinge of bitterness in the other's voice while he was thus talking, and he knew that whatever Owen's troubles might be, they were connected in some way with this man of iron, who for years had ruled after the manner of a despot in this distant country along the upper branches of the Saskatchewan.
He was glad to know even so much about the man Gregory, whom he found himself beginning to dislike most cordially, even though he had never as yet set eye on his grim face, just because he believed the other had abused Owen in some way.
Owen seemed to remember himself just there, and would say no more along those lines, though quite willing to talk as long as his friend wished in connection with the country, and the best route for them to follow.
Another half-hour passed thus in communion, and Cuthbert picked up considerable information that was apt to prove of benefit to him in the future--just how valuable he did not then suspect.
Eli had some time back given up his studies of the specimens he had found, and joined in the general conversation; and his views were usually as shrewd as they seemed quaint, for he possessed many of the traits generally accredited to the Yankee from Down-East; and a natural keenness had been further sharpened by his constant rubbing up against all manner of men in the great logging camps of the Michigan peninsula.
It was getting near the time for them to fix the fire for the night, and seek the shelter of their blankets, when Owen, whose hearing was phenomenally keen, held up his hand, and remarked, with some show of excitement:
"Somebody coming this way through the woods--not from the direction of the post, but the other way. Perhaps it would be just as well to be prepared, for you never know who to trust up here until he proves himself to be a friend!"
CHAPTER VI.
THE TIMBER-CRUISER.
Neither of the boys whom Owen addressed showed any particular signs of alarm at his rather startling words, though Cuthbert quietly reached out and drew his faithful ally, the little Marlin repeater, somewhat closer, as though he felt safer thus; and Eli looked up to where the shotgun, which was his especial charge, leaned against an adjacent tree, within easy reach.
Both of them had been around considerable, and could not be considered green in the ways of the woods; and it is habit as well as disposition that makes men cool in the face of peril.
Plainly now the footfalls could be heard, for evidently the party approaching did not want to arouse suspicion on the part of the campers, and be met by a hostile shot.
His figure loomed up presently in the semi-gloom beyond the range of the firelight, and Cuthbert, when he first saw the tall, bulky form of the pilgrim, was of the opinion that no word could do the newcomer better justice than just the expression "loomed," for he was pretty much of a giant.
He was roughly dressed for the work of the woods, and carried a rifle of necessity, for a man would be several sorts of a fool who wandered about these wild parts without that mainstay to back him up, and lacking which he must of necessity starve in the midst of plenty.
Cuthbert looked keenly at the fellow's face, being, as has been said before, something of a reader of character.
He instantly decided that he did not fancy the man--not that he was on the surface other than a rough woods rover, with a laugh like the roar of a bull alligator, and a heartiness that seemed genuine enough; but something about his eyes caused the explorer to believe him double-faced.
Eli could not see deep enough for that, and was ready to take the fellow for just what he appeared, a big, rough-and-ready woodsman, full of coarse jokes, perhaps, but honest withal, a diamond that had never been chipped.
"Wall, bless my soul if it ain't three boys in camp here! Who'd a suspected sich a thing, away up in this kentry, too. Lots o' pluck to come so fur, fellers; how's the huntin' now, and I hopes as how ye ain't settin' up in business as rivals ter me, ha! ha! In course I seen yer blaze jest a ways back, an' thinks I, what's the use in bunkin' alone ternight, Stackpole, yer old timber-cruiser, when thar's companionable chaps near by who won't object p'raps ter sharin' ther fire with ye? So I tolddled along a little further, an' here I be. Jest say as I'm welcome, an' let me enjoy the hospertality o' the occasion. Thunder! but the blaze is mighty fine tonight, fellers. Guess it won't be far from frost by mornin' the way it is now. Hello! that you, Owen--well, who'd a thought I'd run acrost ye here; ain't set eyes on ye this long spell."
Owen made no reply, but there was a little curl to his upper lip that Cuthbert noticed, and he knew that the young Canadian held no very good opinion of the giant timber-cruiser.
The name Stackpole was not entirely unknown to Cuthbert, since it had been mentioned by several people when speaking of the Far Northwest and those who were to be met with there--and if his recollections were correct he was of the impression that the same Stackpole had been held up as an example of a somewhat lawless character, who made a pretense of cruising about looking for valuable timber in places where the lumbermen, soon to come, could float the logs down a river to a market; but who was suspected of other practices of a less honest character.
At any rate Cuthbert scented trouble of some sort, and was greatly disgusted in that the other had discovered their camp, as he had declared, by accident, for as yet there was no reason to suspect he had any design in joining them.
He hardly knew what to do in the matter, for it would seem to be the height of foolishness to warn Stackpole off, and refuse him the little favor he asked, of spending the night by their fire, to enjoy their company--people who roam the woods have peculiar ideas of hospitality, and it is a serious infraction of the unwritten rules to deny a wanderer the privilege of the camp for a night.
Surely they could stand his unwelcome presence for that short time; and if they maintained their usual custom of standing watch-and-watch alike, there would seem to be little chance of his doing them an evil turn.
Accordingly Cuthbert allowed his face to appear pleasant, as though he might even be delighted to have this wandering timber spy with them for a space, to enliven things a bit.
"Sit down and make yourself quite at home. You're right, it is getting sharp and I wouldn't be at all surprised to see signs of frost, the first of the season, in the morning. We're up here knocking about a little, partly to hunt, but mostly because I've a penchant, that is, a weakness for exploring out-of-the-way places. Stackpole, did you say your name was?--well, mine's Cuthbert Reynolds, this is my friend, Eli Perkins, and, you seem to know Owen, so I won't try to introduce him. Have you had supper--if not there's something in the pot that wouldn't taste bad if warmed up a bit?"
That was the way Cuthbert spoke, for he was naturally genial and generous, ready to divide anything he had with one in distress; only in this case he felt that it was along the line of casting pearls before swine, for that ugly little gleam in the corner of Stackpole's shifty eye warned him against trusting the fellow too far.
"That sounds good, and I'm goin' ter take ye up on the proposition, young feller. I ain't had ary bite since noon, an' then 'twas a snack only. Coffee--why, I've plumb forgot how she tastes, fact, it's been so long since I had a cup. An' stew, my, that smells prime. Say, it was a mighty lucky streak that made me come along the river here, headin' fur the post. Thought I'd keep right along till I got thar, but 'twas tryin' business, an' I'd jest determined ter bunk down till mornin' when I ketched a glimpse o' this yer fire. Guess my old luck ain't petered out yit."
He was evidently something of a talker, and liked to hear the sound of his own voice; but Cuthbert was of the opinion that the presence of Owen had rather upset the big chap, and that some of this patter was intended to hide his confusion, and allow him to figure out his standing there.
The mystery surrounding Owen seemed to be growing deeper all the while, and the more these peculiar things came about the greater the desire on Cuthbert's part to help the Canadian lad by all means in his power.
He awaited his chance to see the other alone, so that he might ask a few pertinent questions concerning Stackpole.
This came in a little while, when, the coffee and stew having been warmed, the giant timber-cruiser was busily employed in disposing of the same.
Owen was down by the river's edge, apparently looking after the two boats, so they would be safe for the night--he never missed an opportunity to handle the wonderful cedar canoe, running his hands over its smooth sides, and admiring its beautiful lines, so that this was not a peculiar occupation for him.
Nevertheless, Cuthbert was rather inclined to believe that Owen wanted him to saunter over that way, in order that he might say something he could not well communicate in the presence of the unwelcome guest.
So he got up, busied himself with a few things for a minute or two, and then walked in the direction of the boats, conscious at the same time that Stackpole had his shrewd eyes fastened upon him; and he could imagine the sneer upon the boarded face of the woodsman, betraying how readily he saw through the little game.
"I imagine you know what sort of fellow he is, Owen. Now, I don't just fancy his looks, and even if you weren't here to tell me about him I'd keep an eye on Mr. Stackpole during his stay in camp," was what Cuthbert said in a low tone, as he sat down on the upturned cedar boat alongside his friend.
"Well, that's the whole thing in a nutshell--it's a wise thing to keep watch of that man when he's near anything valuable, for he's got a reputation for being light-fingered, and I know he's been accused of lots of mean things up in this country. Most men are afraid of him, for he can be an ugly customer in a scrap, and under that jolly laugh he has the temper of a devil. And to tell you the truth, he doesn't like me worth a cent. There's a story connected with it which I'll be glad to tell you at the first chance, that is if you care to hear anything concerning my wretched and unhappy past. I think we'd better act as if we didn't suspect anything, only let him see we are here. Perhaps he'll go away in the morning, but I don't believe that he's heading for the post, because there's been bad blood between him and the old factor for a long while; and I guess Mr. Gregory is the only man in all these parts Stackpole really has respect for."
All of this Owen muttered into the ear of his comrade, meanwhile keeping his eyes fastened upon the burly figure squatted in the camp beside the genial fire, and noting how often Stackpole's glance wandered suspiciously toward them, as if the fellow wondered what he, Owen, might be telling the young fellow, whom he had already decided, if he did not know it before, to be the ruling spirit of the expedition, and who evidently held the purse, a very important consideration in the mind of a man like the said Stackpole.
"Yes, when you get good and ready to tell me I'd consider it a privilege to know something more of your life here, old chap; and if anything I can do will be of benefit, you understand that you're as welcome to it as the sunlight after a week of rain," pursued Cuthbert; at which the other, overcome with emotion (for he had led a lonely life and never knew what it was to have the counsel of a genuine friend) and unable to express his feelings in words, simply allowed his hand to creep along the keel of the cedar canoe until it met that of the generous-hearted Cuthbert, when his fingers were intertwined with those of his new chum; nor were these latter loth to meet him half-way.
There was a whole world of words in that eloquent handgrip, for soul spoke to soul; and the communion of interests that had been slowly drawing them together ever since their strange meeting was cemented then and there.
They busied themselves around the boats for a short time, more to make it appear that they had really sought the spot with the intention of fixing things cozily for the night than because there was need of their labor; and during the minutes that elapsed Cuthbert managed to ask numerous questions about Stackpole, for when he learned from Owen that in times past this fellow and the halfbreed Dubois, from whom he had secured the unreliable chart, had been boon companions, a disturbing thought was born in his mind that possibly there might have been more of design than accident in the coming of the timber-cruiser on this night.
The peace and charm that had up to this period marked the stay of himself and honest Eli in the wilderness seemed in a fair way to be dissipated; and who could say what sort of storm and stress lay before them--for one thing, he was glad that Owen had crossed his path, nor did he mean that the other should ever go out of his life again--come what would, he was bound to look forward to a future shared in common by both, whether in American wilds or some far-distant country where wonderful things were awaiting discovery.
CHAPTER VII.
OWL AND TIMBER WOLF.
When the two friends returned to the fire Stackpole was taking his ease and smoking furiously, Eli having possibly supplied him with tobacco of a brand far beyond any to which he may have been accustomed in his wanderings.
Evidently, no matter what his suspicions may have been, the gaunt timber nomad was resolved to seem quite at his ease; indeed, his was a nature not easily disturbed by possible trouble--he found the vicinity of the fire comfortable, and did not mean to forsake it in a hurry unless there was urgent reason for decamping.
Eli, in his wild life among the lumberjacks, had met with too many characters just like Stackpole, not to size the fellow up for just what he must be; and while he carried on in a seemingly friendly way, he was watching the other, with the idea of guessing his business in this particular region; for he judged that Stackpole seldom made a move without some suspicious object back of it.
When a lad is thrown upon his own resources at a very early age he soon learns to analyze people and their motives in a manner equal to a Sherlock Holmes, and Eli had always delighted in trying to read the various types to be met with in the wilderness.
Cuthbert was uneasy.
The presence of this hulking rover took away from all the pleasure of the camp, and he was provoked to think they should be compelled to entertain one who was not only a stranger, but possessed of an unsavory reputation.
Still, he had been in the woods enough to be aware that there is an unwritten law governing hospitality around the campfire; and no matter how unpleasant the presence of this timber-cruiser might be to him, he did not wish to appear in the light of a boor.
They were three to one, and having been forewarned they could keep a jealous eye on the said unwelcome guest so long as he remained; but Cuthbert vowed to himself that with the break of day, and the morning meal over, their paths must lie in opposite directions.
Stackpole was no fool, and it did not take him long to discover that each of the three lads kept his gun within reach of his hand all the time; which fact announced as plain as words could have done that they entertained suspicions concerning him, and did not mean to be caught napping in case he tried to make trouble of any sort.
Now, while Stackpole was a fellow equal to two if not three of the boys, with regard to physical abilities, death and the possession of firearms levels all such distinctions, and a bit of lead would sting just as much from one of their guns as if it had come from the weapon of a six-footer; hence, he made up his mind to walk a straight line while among the possessors of all this hardware.
His avaricious eyes wandered frequently toward the splendid Marlin repeater owned by Cuthbert, and the fact was very evident that he envied him the possession of such a dandy gun, compared with which his battered Winchester looked like "six cents," as Eli remarked to himself when he correctly gauged the meaning of those sly glances.
"He'll steal if he can, the skunk," muttered the young logger, shaking his head in his pet peculiar manner, which he always did when angered or puzzled.
And then and there Eli determined that he would not allow himself a wink of sleep that whole night; and that if Stackpole attempted any "funny business" he would round him up with a sharp turn.
They talked of many things while sitting there around the campfire; and the man managed to make himself fairly agreeable; for he certainly was mighty well posted in everything connected with the country Cuthbert, in his enthusiastic simplicity had come so far to explore; and had he been built upon a different plan, Stackpole might have proven a valuable man to tote along--he had penetrated further in the direction of Hudson Bay and the Arctic shores beyond than any other man in the Northwest Territory, and proved this by describing many of the things encountered by a well known explorer with whose work Cuthbert was quite familiar, and whose sole companion Stackpole claimed to have been.
There is something more than mere knowledge to be desired in a companion on a long tramp, and this is reliance in his fidelity, cheerful disposition, and readiness to shoulder at least half of the labor--without these qualities in a campmate much of the pleasure is missing.
Finally the boys began to find themselves yawning, for the day's toil had been severe, with a strong current in the river to buck against, and they had been up since peep of day.
So they started to make preparations for sleeping.
The giant timber-cruiser watched them get their sleeping-bags ready, that is, Cuthbert and Eli, with more or less curiosity, for evidently he knew little or nothing about such Arctic necessities, even though he had accompanied an explorer for many hundred miles into the great unmapped region beyond Hudson Bay--at least he claimed to have done so.
Perhaps there was also a bit of envy in the looks he bent upon these evidences of comfort, for he could appreciate the value of such contrivances during a Northern winter, especially to a man whose business was apt to take him outdoors, regardless of the weather.
He had an apology for a blanket in his pack, and this he proceeded to spread upon the ground, selecting a spot close to the fire, where he could toast his feet while he slumbered, a favorite attitude with such nomads, as our young friends all knew.
Owen, of course, had his third of the tent, but it had been already arranged between the trio that all through the night one of them should stand guard, not because there appeared to be impending danger from without, but on account of the unwelcome guest they entertained at their fire.
Not one of them grumbled, being built in a manner to meet such emergencies cheerfully, and wrestle with difficulties in the same spirit as they would accept favors, a splendid combination in woods chums.
No doubt Stackpole noticed that Owen, having made his bed ready, showed no disposition to occupy the same; but if he understood just why, he at least made no comment, in which he displayed his good sense.
He turned in "all standing," simply lying down, rolling himself up in his faded blanket, and with his pack-bag for a pillow, losing himself to the world, so far as the boys could tell; though they noticed that he had pulled his slouch hat so far down over his face that it was utterly impossible to see whether his keen eyes were closed or watching every movement of his entertainers.
Inside the tent our friends found a chance to confer, and thus a plan of campaign for the night was laid down.
Then Cuthbert and Eli crawled into their sleeping-bags, for the night was inclined to be frosty, and there is a world of comfort in these modern contrivances, under such conditions; while Owen walked down to the canoes, and with an arm thrown caressingly across the keel of the precious cedar craft began his long and lonely vigil.
He thought nothing of such a little hardship, having been accustomed to the vicissitudes of the woods from childhood--to him the various sounds of the wilderness, after nightfall had come, were as familiar as the cackling of hens to a farmer's lad, and what was more to the point he read these signs so well that they one and all possessed a significance far beyond any surface indications.
But these forests of the Silent Land bear little comparison with the depths of a tropical jungle, or the dense growth of an African wilderness where a multitude of animals make the air vibrate with their roaring during the entire period of darkness.
Sometimes in the daytime not a sound can be heard save the moaning of the wind among the tops of the pines, or the gurgle of some meandering stream, all around being absolute silence, deep and profound.
At night it? is not quite so bad, for then the hooting of a vagrant owl, or it may be the distant howl of a prowling timber wolf, that gray skulker of the pine lands, is apt to break the monotony; but even in the midst of summer there is lacking the hum of insects and the bustle of woods life--at best one hears the weird call of the whip-poor-will, called by the Indians, the "wish-a-wish," or if near a marsh the croaking of gigantic bullfrogs.
Owen apparently had many things to engage his thoughts as he kept watch and ward over the camp of his new-found friends; and judging from his repeated sighs his self-communion was hardly of a cheerful character, for several times the boy gritted his teeth savagely, and clinched his fist as though rebelling against some decree of fate that had temporarily upset his calculations.
Once a name escaped his lips, and it was that of the old factor in charge of the Hudson Bay trading post further up the river; and almost in the same breath he murmured the word "mother," tenderly, as though his thoughts had flown backward to happy scenes so greatly in contrast with his present forlorn conditions.
Nevertheless, Owen did not forget why he was on guard, not for a minute.
He had so placed himself when leaning his back against that adored cedar boat that he could keep watch over the camp, and particularly that portion of it where Stackpole's elongated frame, rolled up like a mummy in his blanket, was to be seen.
So often did the eyes of the lad fall upon the recumbent timber-cruiser that the other could not have moved without attracting his notice.
Stackpole was apparently sleeping like a log, for ever and anon his stentorian breathing arose into something approaching a snore, that sounded tremulously, like a mysterious note from a harsh Eolian harp set in the wind.
Possibly, upon noting that Owen was to have the first watch the shrewd chap had made up his mind there would be nothing doing thus early in the night, his chances being better later on when the "greenhorn," as he erroneously denominated Cuthbert on account of his fine name and genteel appearance, had charge.
Thus time crept along, midnight came and went, with young Dugdale still holding the fort, as if he intended remaining there until dawn.
Once only did he detect a movement on the part of the suspicious party; and then Stackpole twisted about as though desirous of assuming a new position, and at the same time he raised his head and took a sweeping glance around, just as any woodsman might during the night, a habit born of eternal watchfulness; yet under the circumstances it was more or less suspicious to see how the fellow completed his hasty survey by a quick look in the direction of the boats, as if quite conscious of the fact that Owen was still there on guard.
He immediately dropped back, and presently was heard the same pulsating sound of asthmatic breathing, sometimes ending in a snort--if Stackpole was still awake and pretending sleep he knew how to imitate the real article right well, Owen thought, shaking his head dubiously.
If the Canadian lad thought to usurp the privilege of the others in extending his watch, he counted without his host, for Cuthbert came crawling out of the tent shortly after the time he had set.
CHAPTER VIII.
THE CALL OF THE WILD.
First of all the explorer stopped by the fire and tossed several heavy bits of fuel upon the embers, doing this with the air of one who looked upon such an act as second nature.
Perhaps, if Stackpole were watching from under the shade of his hat brim, he might alter his opinion with regard to the novice act, and begin to understand that a fellow need not necessarily be raw to the ways of the woods because he possesses means, and chooses to supply himself with certain comforts that are apt to come in handy--the best of moccasins, a modern quick-firing rifle that carries a small bullet calculated to spread in mushroom shape upon striking the quarry and do the work of a gun of much larger caliber, a sleeping-bag, a compact kerosene stove for the inevitable wet time in camp when the wood will not burn--a veteran is apt to turn up his nose at such innovations, and growl that the simple life suits him as it did his forebears; but, when the rainy spell arrives he is just as willing to cook upon the little stove he derided as the next one; and of a cold night, with the wind howling around like a fiend, give him an opportunity to snuggle down inside that cozy bag which had excited his contempt, and ten to one you will be hardly able to divorce him from it at dawn.
Cuthbert had tried both ways, and, like the sensible chap he was, decided that a man would be a fool to choose the old method with its lack of comfort when able to afford these modern luxuries.
He stalked over to the boats, trailing his gun along, as Owen saw with grim pleasure, for it told him Cuthbert had not changed his mind with regard to the character of their guest, and would undoubtedly keep a close eye on Stackpole while his watch lasted.
The other dropped down beside him, with a few words of greeting.
Owen thought he detected a slight movement of the recumbent form, and believed Stackpole must be awake--he made no effort to sit up and look around, which in itself was somewhat suspicious, for a veteran of his caliber must have so educated his faculties that not a movement, however slight, could take place in a camp where he was sleeping without his knowing it.
The boys sat there and conversed in low tones for quite a long spell; indeed, Cuthbert had to almost drive Owen to the tent, so contented did the Canadian lad seem to be in his company--lonely enough had his life been since the loss of those he held dear, and there was something infinitely precious to him in the cheery radiance of this optimistic Yankee who had crossed his path at a period when he desperately needed a friend.
Cuthbert settled himself down for a good siege when finally he had seen the other crawl into the tent, for he was not to arouse Eli, who slept like a log, until it was after three by his little silver watch.
He had made up his mind that if this pilgrim to whom they had given shelter and food as become generous campers, showed any disposition to pilfer he would treat him in a summary manner, and chase him into the woods, just as any rascal should be made to decamp; and the fact of Stackpole's gigantic figure made not a particle of difference in his calculations.
Whatever the fellow may have planned to attempt during the silent watches of the night, his nerve evidently failed him, for he did not venture to make the least move; possibly the combination of these three determined-looking lads awed him more than he could care to admit, or it might be he had other schemes up his sleeve whereby the same end could be accomplished without taking so much risk--at any rate Cuthbert sat his watch out, and after fixing the fire again, aroused Eli, who in turn sauntered over to the boats, carrying his patron's cherished gun, which he as dearly loved to fondle as a girl might a kitten.
And if Stackpole saw this, as he evidently must under the shelter of that hat brim, he knew it would be a signal for trouble with a big T if he tried any queer business with these wideawake lads.
Cuthbert was almost positive he heard him give a disgusted grunt as he settled back for another snooze, and they heard nothing farther from him until morning, when he arose, yawning and stretching his huge bulk, as though he had been dead to the world from the moment he lay down.
They treated him decently and gave him an abundance of breakfast, which the big timber-cruiser gulped down with the eagerness of a hungry wolf; for it had been a long day since he tasted such delicious bacon and coffee with flap-jacks to "beat the band," as Eli said, made by Owen, who had proved to be superior as a cook to either of his new friends, the gift being a legacy from his mother, he confessed.
Nevertheless, there was an air of restraint about their associations with the woodsman, which he could not but feel, and therefore he made up his bundle soon after, saying he must be on his way, and while they were engaged in stowing the tent he took his departure, grunting some sort of thanks for the many favors he had received at their hands.
If what Owen told them of the fellow's nature was actually so, this generosity on the part of the young explorer would not count for a row of pins when occasion arose whereby the temptation came to Stackpole to appropriate some of the expensive outfit his envious eyes had gloated over during his stay with them.
Our friends did not hasten their departure, for they wished to let him have a long lead; for he had left the camp going in a direction that, if persisted in, would land him at Fort Harmony in due time.
Owen had not changed his mind since the preceding night, when he asserted so positively that it was his opinion, judging from what he knew of the relations existing between this rover of the mighty woods and the chief factor of the region, Stackpole would hardly turn up at the post, since there had long been bad blood between these men, and the cruiser was too shrewd to put himself in the power of so strenuous an enemy as the grim old Scotch trading master, who ruled affairs in this stretch of country as though he were king.
"I think he only started in that direction to blind us; and that after going a mile or less he will break off the trail and head where he was aiming for last night when he saw our fire, and thought there might be something worth picking up here, or else keep watch of our movements," said Owen, as he pulled the cords tight around the bag that held the waterproof tent, while the others were doing the same duty for the smaller bags in which food and extra clothes had been thrust.
Cuthbert chuckled as though greatly tickled.
"Well, if that was his hope, I'm afraid he was bitterly disappointed in his calculations, that's all. We kept him under cover, all right, and perhaps he's mentally kicking himself now over having wasted so many hours peeping out from under that hat brim when he might just as well have been snoozing."
Eli professed to be greatly disappointed, for he remarked dejectedly:
"Thought I might get a chance to try your gun, and I had just made up my mind like which leg I'd pepper if he tried to sneak anything away. Well, p'raps we may run across the critter again, and I'll just keep it in mind that it was the left leg I chose--he's got somewhat of a limp in the right one now, and you see that'd sort of even things up. I don't like to see a lopsided feller nowadays."
"Yes, I believe you're something of a philanthropist, Eli, always looking out to do somebody good, even if you have to force it into them with a hypodermic syringe or a shotgun. For my part, I don't care if we never set eyes on old Stack again, for I fancy the fellow mighty little. There is something about his eyes that goes against my grain, a shifty look that you see in a wolf. He's welcome to all he stowed away, but I hope he doesn't fancy he has a standing invitation to drop in frequently to supper."
CHAPTER IX.
TRAPPER LORE.
While the other two boys were finishing the packing of their stores Owen had wandered up the bed of a creek that joined the river at a point just above the site of their late camp.
He had evidently noted something that aroused his interest, for the others noticed him peering closely at the banks and examining a number of things.
"Now what in the world do you imagine he sees?" asked Eli, who was possessed of a good lively streak of curiosity in his composition, and could not observe these things without commenting on the same.
"I was wondering somewhat along that vein, myself, and had come to the conclusion that Owen's trapping instinct has been aroused by certain signs of the furry game for which every man in this region is always on the alert. Nothing else I can think of would interest him so," returned Cuthbert.
"Well, here he comes back again, and from the smile on his face I imagine he wants us to take a look, too."
"I'd just like to, for I've heard so much about the fur business since striking this wild country that it seems a shame not to be better posted. I know a lynx from a common everyday bobcat, and can tell an otter when I see it; but there are a thousand or two little things connected with the trade of a trapper that are just so much Greek to me. You notice I've been pumping him every chance I got, and perhaps he sees an opening to make a demonstration. We're in no big hurry today, and I'd be only too willing to hold over a bit if I could add to my pump of practical knowledge."
"Me, too," echoed Eli, who, although a woods dweller all his life, had never made a practice of taking furs; and unless one goes into this business at first hand the result is always disappointing.
One week with an everyday trapper along the lines of his traps will do more toward giving a novice a fair insight into the strange business of outwitting the cunning bearers of fur coats than all the guides ever written.
For once Cuthbert had made a bullseye guess.
When Owen reached them he was holding some little object up for observation.
"Do you know what that is, boys?" he asked.
Both of them took a good look.
"Looks like a bunny's paw," said Eli, dubiously.
At this Cuthbert laughed.
"Down in my section of Old Virginny the coons like to get rabbit's foot for a charm; it is said to keep the evil spirits away, especially if taken from a graveyard rabbit. Can it be possible there are fellows up in this benighted region of the same mind? But that is not a rabbit's foot, I think, Owen," he said.
"What then?" asked the Canadian.
"I don't know for certain, but if I made a guess I should say mink."
"Good enough for a hap-hazard guess. Mink it is, and the little animal just gnawed it off himself, last night, for you can see it is quite fresh."
"Gnawed it off himself, did you say? What in the world would he be fool enough to do that for?" demanded Cuthbert looking closely to see whether the other gave any signs of joking, but failing to find any.
"Well, for one thing, he could not find anybody to do it for him."
"Oh! and was it so very important that Mr. Mink should drop one of his little footsie-tootsies in that way? Is it the habit up here for these animals to go around cm three legs?"
"No; but you see he was silly enough to believe that it was better to go along the balance of his natural life with three feet rather than to give up his nice soft pelt to grace the back of some lady in Montreal or New York or London," returned Owen, gravely, twirling the little reminder around between his fingers, and looking at it as though he believed it could tell a sad story if only it were gifted with the power of speech.
"Now I see the reason. The mink had been caught in a trap, and after twisting and turning until it had torn its leg fearfully, as is seen right there, in desperation it finished the amputation itself; not that it was afraid of decorating some high born dame's back, but because it was threatened with starvation if it sat there in the trap indefinitely. How's that, brother?" he declared.
"About as near the facts as any one could come, for that is just what happened to our poor little friend here. He'll have to hobble around on three legs for the balance of his natural life; but that's better than knocking under now. And, of course, some trapper, an Indian, probably, is out a valuable skin through his carelessness."
"But how does it come that more of the little beasts, all of them, in fact, don't do the same thing? I should think it would be necessary to guard against it," remarked the Virginian.
"That is just it. I said this trapper was out a skin through sheer carelessness, for it is a slovenly way of trapping to let a nice mink like that get away. If you care to step this way with me I'll show you something which perhaps neither of you have ever seen before, and is worth remembering."
They were only too willing, for already what Owen had said was arousing much curiosity within their minds, and they could not bear to let a chance to have this gratified pass by without taking advantage of the same.
He jumped down into the gully through which the little creek ran, coming from the hills far away, and winding in and out through the timber, often being fairly choked with brush, so that an expert would find it difficult to make headway.
Still, down near its mouth it was more open, and they could wander along for quite some distance without great effort.
The banks were sloping in places, and rather inclined to be precipitous in others, but at no place more than half a dozen feet in height.
After going up for some little distance Owen stopped.
"Here is where our little friend lost his foot and there is the trap that helped to take it off," he said, pointing to a rusty Newhouse No. 2 that was lying in full view, chain and all, by the edge of the water.
Stooping over Cuthbert saw that the jaws were marked with a stain, and bits of fur, proving the truth of Owen's assertion.
"Sure as you live it did, and there was no surgeon's fee for that amputation, either. Now go on and tell us why this happened, and what is to prevent it being the rule, rather than the exception," he said eagerly.
"First of all, I must explain how mink are located, and something of their habits, or you will not understand. They are nearly always found along the banks of a small stream that empties into a larger, just as in this case.
"The female mink have settled places of abode, while the male are rovers, and roam up and down the creek for a distance of about two miles in either direction. Now, when a trapper has made up Ms mind that a certain stream is the home of a considerable number of mink he comes out in the early fall, some time before the regular trapping months open, and gets things ready for his season.
"Along the edge of the little bluff near the water line he digs holes about three feet back into the bank and some nine inches across the front, throwing water about the place to kill the scent of his presence, and a little driftwood in and around the hole, so that it will seem natural to the suspicious animal.
"These holes are made about a hundred feet apart, and are then left for a couple of weeks, and when you go back to set your traps you will be surprised to discover that almost every hole shows marks of mink having gone in and out, searching for mates.
"When they set the traps it is the regular thing to fasten the end of the chain out just so far in the water, where it is deep enough to drown the mink; once the trap snaps upon the leg of the animal its instinct causes it to spring into the creek, and being weighed down by the trap, it is soon drowned; this saves needless suffering, does not injure the fur, and prevents the mink gnawing off its own foot in the mad desire to escape."
"Say, that's mighty interesting, now," declared Eli, bending down to examine the trap again; "I didn't know there was so much to the pesky business--had an idea all you had to do was to find where the animals held out, stick a trap there, and go out the next day and grab your fur."
Owen laughed heartily at this.
"I'm afraid such a trapper would not get enough mink, otter, fox, or even muskrat skins to buy his tobacco in a season. Why, these little varmints are just chain lightning when it comes to cleverness, and they can sometimes outwit the smartest old trapper who ever drew breath. There are a thousand secrets connected with the business, and no one man carries them all. Many of these have been handed down from some of those old fellows who used to spend their lives trapping for the Hudson Bay and the Northwest Fur Companies at the time these two were great rivals over the whole of the fur country. You'd find it a most interesting subject if you ever chose to dig into it. Of course, I've picked up quite a few of these secrets and can do my share of a season's work, though it never did appeal to me strongly enough to carry it on as a business. If you went along up this stream you'd find a dozen traps or more, some of them perhaps with a mink or, it might be, an otter in their jaws, but always drowned. Now, I'm going to leave this foot just where I found it. This man ought to be more careful. In the eyes of a first class worker it's a sign of poor business to find a foot in a trap. Perhaps he'll take warning and improve his methods. I hope so, for I don't like the idea of a number of these poor little beasts hopping around on three legs for the balance of their lives."
"I can see that nature never intended you for a trapper, Owen," remarked Cuthbert, sagely; "for you have too much sympathy in your composition. I imagine a man has to harden himself to all such things before he can become a successful fur gatherer; but then it is necessary that there should be some people follow such an occupation, else what would all our lovely girls do for wraps? After all, the taking of furs does not compare in cruelty with the shooting of herons and other birds by the tens of thousands, just to pluck an egret or plume and toss the body away. That is a cruel deed that ought to make every woman blush who ever wears an egret on her hat or bonnet. But what you've been telling us is mighty interesting, do you know? I am determined to learn all I can about this strange business while here on the spot. Nothing like getting things at first hand. Are other animals taken in the same way?"
"To some extent. Whenever it is a water animal they are drowned when caught. Even beaver have to be treated that way."
"But these animals live under the water, don't they? Then how can they be so easily drowned?" asked Cuthbert; but immediately adding: "Of course, I know they have to come to the surface at stated intervals to breathe. I suppose the trap holds them down beyond their allotted time, and then they suffer, just as a fellow might after a minute had passed. Now, foxes are caught on the land--are they ever know to gnaw their foot off to get free?"
"Oh, yes. Trappers look more closely to their fox traps, you see, for they are always hoping to catch a silver, and that means a fortune," said Owen.
"I suppose by that you mean a silver or black fox. I have heard they were worth a big sum of money, and quite rare. What do the pelts bring as a usual thing?" asked Cuthbert.
"I believe as high as two thousand dollars for one fur, but that must have been a mighty fine one. I knew one man who received eight hundred, and I suppose the fur trader who bought it from him sold it again for a thousand anyway. Some men have been lucky enough to take several silvers during the whole of their trapping lives, while others have waited for forty years and never caught a single one. But every fur gatherer lives in hopes, even the Crees and Ojibwas indulging in these anticipations that may never be realized. It is the highest priced skin to be found ashore. A sea-otter may bring more, but I doubt it."
"You've seen the pelts then?" asked Eli, whose eyes were sticking out at this intelligence, for it seemed to him just then that a brisk trade in silver foxes was even more to be desired than a copper mine.
"Oh, yes, often, at a post where they were brought in. Some are only seconds or thirds and worth far less than a first class article. I remember one case that was pretty rough. A trapper had a beautiful skin, that would have brought him a little fortune; but when the factor came to examine it he found it almost worthless on account of being torn by a charge of shot at close quarters."
"That was a shame," declared Cuthbert, who was eagerly listening to all these remarks on the subject of trapping; "but if silver fox pelts are so very valuable I should think some enterprising fellow with an eye to business would start a farm and raise them for the market."
"Just what I was going to say. There would be big money in the deal if a fellow had the right ground, and bought a pair to begin with," exclaimed Eli.
"It's easy enough to get the ground. Others have succeeded to some extent with red foxes, though at first they lost every one, for the cunning rascals burrowed under the fence; but a way was found to prevent that by digging down a yard, filling it with stones, and running a heavy wire mesh back several feet. Of course the foxes kept on burrowing along the fence, but seemed to lack sense enough to start in five feet back so as to avoid the obstruction. Their cunning has a limit, and beyond that they're as stupid as any animal."
"But how about the silvers--what is the obstacle that stands in the way of making such a fox farm a success? Perhaps they refuse to breed in captivity--I've heard of animals acting that way, even skunks at times," said the Virginian.
"No trouble in that line particularly, I believe. The great obstacle to success lies in the fact that the silver fox is not a distinct type at all, but a freak," smiled Owen.
"A freak--that is, it can't be depended upon to reproduce its like?"
"Never does, in fact. From a pair of silvers you will get red foxes, that's all. It's been proven again and again, and yet I've heard of several parties with more money than brains starting a silver fox farm. Don't you ever allow yourself to be tempted to put cold cash into such a game, either of you," continued the young Canadian, tossing the severed foot of Mr. Mink down by the cruel trap that had been instrumental in relieving the poor animal of his useful extremity.
The trapper would find it there, and understand just what had happened, doubtless profiting by his blunder and setting the trap right next time.
All might have been avoided had he staked the end of the chain far enough out in the water, so that the animal when caught would have been drowned by the weight of the steel trap.
Cuthbert seemed loth to give over questioning the boy who knew about the various ways of circumventing these cunning little varmints of the wilds; he found himself deeply interested in the matter and could not hear enough on the subject.
To his mind there must ever be a halo of romance connected with the lives of those old-time French-Canadian voyageurs who, in early days, used to paddle all the way from Montreal to Fort William on the northern shore of the "big water," Superior, to collect the great and valuable bundles of pelts brought in to the post in the Spring by the many trappers connected with the company, some of them white, but mostly full-blood Indians or halfbreeds speaking French.
He had read considerable of their doings before making this trip into the region of the mighty Saskatchewan, being desirous of posting himself on the subject; but interesting as it may have seemed then, when seated in his luxurious apartment in a New York hotel, it was doubly so now that he was on the ground.
Why, these very woods must have witnessed many a scene such as those described, and he could easily picture the flotilla of batteaux moving up or down the river, propelled by the muscular arms of the husky voyageurs, while upon the still air rang out their famous Canadian boat songs.
It thrilled him to even think of it, and the surroundings assumed a new aspect in his eyes; perhaps those days were gone, never to return, and the trappers of today might prove to be merely ordinary Indians, or such rascally fellows as Stackpole and Dubois; but Cuthbert did hope that once at the post he might be able to hear some of the songs that have come down from the old days, filled with the romance of the pines, the birches, the larches, and the hemlocks that hung over those early pioneer camps in the wilderness.
"I'd like to ask you one thing," said Eli, as they slowly walked back in the direction of the camp.
"All right. A dozen if you like, and I'll be only too glad to answer them if I can. There are some things that even a fellow who has spent years up here, and kept his eyes and ears open all that time, couldn't answer. Go on, Eli," said Owen promptly.
"I've taken a few animals myself over in the Peninsula, but not having had any advice I guess I bungled the job somewhat. Anyhow, they said down in St. Louis, where I sent my bunch, that they were misfits, and I suppose it must have been so, if a fellow was to judge from the size of the check they sent on. Since then I've been told that all animals can't be skinned alive. Is that so? I just sliced 'em down, and peeled off the jackets in the best way I could. Of course I knew enough to have thin boards to fasten the pelts to when drying, and they seemed to be all hunk when I shipped 'em; but somewhere I biffed it. Now, what d'ye s'pose was wrong with my work?"
Owen smiled as if he knew instinctively.
"When they said the furs were misfits they meant that you had not taken them off the right way. Some skins have to be cased, that is removed entire, or turned inside out, and not cut down the belly first, which injures their sale. All skunk, marten, mink, fox, 'possum, otter, weasel, civet, lynx, fisher and muskrat have to be treated this way. Other animals should be cut open, such as the beaver, wolf, coyote, 'coon, badger, bear and wild cat. They cut off the tails only of such chaps as have a rat-like appearance--'possum and muskrat. In all other cases the tail is a part of the fur, and a valuable one, too, as I have found out to my cost. The bone is of course taken out, which can be done with only a small split."
"All this is mighty interesting to me," remarked Cuthbert.
"You can just bet it is. What else, Owen? Is there any difference about the way skins are fastened to the drying boards? I might have blundered there too, and that would help make a misfit, eh?" ventured Eli, grinning.
"Well, it would, without a doubt. It is just as well for any young trapper to get thoroughly posted on these subjects before he tries to take any fur, or all his work during the winter may go for nothing. I've seen packs of pelts ruined by just that thing--they were cased the wrong side out and could not be remedied. Some have to be cased with the fur side out, and others with the pelt exposed to the air. Those that are better with the fur out are fox, weasel, lynx, fisher, otter, marten and wolf. The others must have the pelt outward so that the air can get to it in plenty. And then again some trappers spoil their catch in part by drying near a fire or in the sun. The best way is to hang them in the open air in the shade, and let them have plenty of time, making sure to clean them thoroughly of all fat and bits of meat."
"There's one thing that strikes me about this business, and the more I hear about it the firmer grows my conviction that after all the taking of furs and curing the same is an art. Who'd think there was so much that is interesting in the capture of wild animals, and preparing their skins for the market. Then again I suppose these big houses that buy in bulk have ways of handling the furs that increases their value a great deal. The fur we see on the shoulders of our fine ladies has mighty little resemblance to the pelt the poor trapper brings in to the post, and trades for tobacco, powder and shot, tea, sugar, coffee and such indispensables, not to mention whiskey," suggested Cuthbert, wisely.
At this Owen shrugged his shoulders.
"There you have me. I have a limit to my knowledge, and it stops with the capture and drying of the pelts. What takes place after they get in the hands of the dealer I know nothing about, only that they have mighty cute ways of dyeing many of the cheaper grades, and calling them something else. A skunk would not sell for as much under its own name as some high sounding one; for you know there is always an unpleasant association connected with the skunk."
"You just bet there is," avowed Eli, heartily, as with the conviction of one who knows whereof he speaks; "it associated with me for a whole week once, up in a lumber camp, and by ginger, it was the only thing that would associate with me till my new clothes came along and I could bury the old ones. After that my curiosity about the cunning little striped beast that used to slink across the tote road was satisfied, and whenever I saw one I'd give a whoop that could be heard a mile away and run for my life! They got to know that yell, and whenever any of the boys heard it they'd laugh and say: 'There's that fool Eli huntin' polecats again.' But I wasn't, not by a jugful; I was giving him a wide berth, and taking off my hat to him in the bargain. Oh! ever since that day I've had the greatest respect you ever heard tell of for the ornery little critters."
By this time they had arrived at the mouth of the little creek, and climbed out upon the upper level.
"I'd think the fur bearing animals would be pretty well cleaned out along here, so close to the post," remarked Cuthbert, still harping on the subject.
"They are as a rule; but when a place is let alone a few years they increase again; and I guess that's what has happened here. In the last fifty years this creek may have been cleaned out a dozen or two times, and then let alone for a spell to grow up again. This year it's being gone over again, and from certain signs I noticed, the trapper is reaping quite a little harvest. He was an Indian, too," said the other.
"I suppose you can tell from signs whether a white man or an Indian is working along a stream; no doubt they have different ways of doing things. I thought the only way to know was to look at the moccasin tracks, as an Indian toes in, while a white man walks with his toes out," pursued Cuthbert.
Owen laughed as though pleased.
"That's an old and exploded theory. Why should a white man brought up in the wilds toe outward, as though he wore shoes? With moccasins on his feet, and used to them from a baby, he walks just like a red. But there are many ways of telling whether it is a white or Indian at work. Only long practice will do this. I could not explain it, but if the chance comes I'll promise to show you what I mean."
And with this they rested content, having learned considerable about the art of fur gathering and curing in this little talk.
CHAPTER X.
MAGIC IN THE BERRIES.
The sun was just peeping above the horizon, but the air still remained chilly after the long night; to husky boys this amounted to little, and as soon as the camp was abandoned they would soon warm themselves up with paddle exercise, for it was no childish work battling against that swift current.
"Anyhow, it was a mighty comfortable camp," remarked Cuthbert, as they moved away, and his eyes rested fondly upon the scene of their last night's experience; so it ever is with those who live the life in the open, for the unconscious things appeal to their affections, and a staunch boat, a favorite paddle, a gun, knife, belt hatchet, or even the spot where they found comfort and built their shrine at which they temporarily worshiped, the campfire, arouses emotions in their hearts that cannot be fully appreciated by those not of the mystic guild.
Owen led the way in his bullboat.
He was more than usually silent after his talk over the trap and the poor little mink's foot up the creek, and Cuthbert wondered what it might be that affected him--could the coming of Stackpole have had anything to do with it--the idea was not impossible, for he had evidently known the gaunt timber-cruiser before, and if the story of the boy's sad past were known the gigantic woodsman might occupy a place in it.
Still, upon reflection, Cuthbert was of the opinion that there must be another reason for his thoughtfulness this morning.
He remembered what hints Owen had let fall concerning the old factor connected with the Hudson Bay post, and that there had been trouble between them; many things gave Cuthbert the opinion that the other had been fleeing from the region at that time they made his acquaintance so strangely, not in terror, but rather in anger, and he felt sure strange happenings had been taking place at the post on the day preceding the storm.
If so, then it was the fact that he must evidently soon face the stern factor again that disquieted Owen so; the way in which he tried hard to throw off his morose mood, and answer the sallies of his comrades in a spirit of frolic proved that he was fighting against his nature, and had laid out a course which he was determined to tread, no matter what pain or distress it brought in its train.
At any rate, it would soon appear what ailed the lad, and Cuthbert, greatly as he wished to know Owen's story, had too much delicacy to influence him in the telling; he had promised to open his heart to this new and sympathetic chum, and all would come when the spirit moved.
About an hour after leaving camp they suddenly came upon two bullboats that were descending the river swiftly, in each of which a trio of Cree Indians sat or knelt, wielding the paddles after the deft manner of those with whom the art has become second nature.
Cuthbert did not anticipate any trouble from these fellows, who were evidently in the employ of the fur company; but he was keen to notice how they took the presence of the young Canadian in the company of strangers, realizing that they must in all probability know him, and be acquainted with whatever of trouble had hovered around him of late.
Just as he expected, they seemed surprised at sight of Owen, and hasty words were passed among them; but they made no motion to interfere with the forward progress of the two boats, and answered the civil salutation of Cuthbert with a series of "how-hows" until the current had swept them past; but it might have been noticed that not once did their shrewd black eyes leave the figure of the young Canadian squatted in his old boat, and sweeping his spruce blade back and forth methodically, as he urged his craft against the stream.
"They know him all right, and are more than surprised to see him with a party of strangers, heading upstream. Now, I wonder if they were sent out to look for a fellow of his description? Gee, but this is a conundrum, all right," whispered Cuthbert to his fellow paddler, at which Eli grunted and nodded assent.
The young Canuck guide in the lead did not so much as turn his head after the boats containing the Indians had passed, but continued to dip his paddle in and out with the methodical rhythm so characteristic of the voyager who has spent his life amid these scenes.
No so Cuthbert, whose curiosity had been excited in connection with the untutored sons of the wilderness--ever and anon he twisted his head around so that he could secure a survey of the river below; and on such occasions Eli kept his eager eyes on the face of his comrade, knowing full well that should there be anything happening he would discover it reflected there.
About the fifth time Cuthbert turned thus he gave vent to a little exclamation, whether of satisfaction or annoyance it would have been difficult to say, and immediately whispered to Eli:
"They're coming all right, just as I expected, old fellow. That proves my idea correct, and that they had been sent out from the post, to find what had become of the youngster. He knows they are coming after us just as well as I do, but he's too proud to give them a single look. I like his grit, and between you and me, he's going to show us something before long. I'm in a fever to set eyes on that same old Tartar, Alex Gregory. Already I seem to dislike him immensely, and possibly I'll end by hating him good and hard. He's more than a little to blame for Owen's troubles, whatever they may be. Say nothing, Eli, but keep your eyes open."
"What if the copper-skinned critters attack us--I've got my gun handy, and I give you my word there'll be the very old dickens to pay if they start rough-housing it with us," answered the young logger; and it was not in a boastful spirit that he spoke, for Eli usually showed a modest disposition; only he, too, had taken a great fancy to the new chum who had been sent to them by such a freak of fortune, and Cuthbert's intimation that the other must be the victim of oppression rather riled him.
"Oh, I have no idea they will try any funny business; they know we are armed, and besides they have their orders from the head boss. You'll find that they only mean to tag after us, keeping on our heels until sure we mean to go to the post. These chaps possibly saw that smoke signal the other Cree we met downstream sent up, and they knew Owen was somewhere around. You noticed that they just stared at him all the time, and paid little attention to us. Well, let it go at that; we'll be apt to know a heap more than we do now when another day comes along. One thing I'll wager a lot on, and that is he's worth sticking to through thick and thin, eh, Eli?" ventured the explorer, earnestly.
"You bet!" was the laconic but expressive answer he received, and Cuthbert, who knew the logger so well, understood all that was implied.
Eli also glanced back just before they turned a bend, and as there was quite a little stretch of clear water back of them ere the stream twisted its way around a big bunch of birch trees that stood like sentinels on a projecting knoll, he was able to see the two bullboats come around the curve, and follow grimly in their wake, the occupants evidently making no effort at speed, for had they chosen they could have given our youngsters a warm proposition in the way of a race, their muscles being inured to the monotonous labor of the paddle.
Cuthbert began asking questions of Owen, who allowed the other boat to gain a position alongside, so that conversation might be the more easily carried on. Thus he learned that, proceeding leisurely they would readily make the Hudson Bay post ere nightfall; had there been any reason for haste this time might have been shortened by several hours; but it suited all of them to arrive around the sunset hour.
Having an abundance of time they went ashore at high noon, built a fire and had quite a healthy little lunch, washing it down with a pot of coffee, the delightful aroma of which must have reached the nostrils of the Cree paddlers who had drawn their boats ashore just below, for the wind lay in that quarter.
Cuthbert expected to hear from those who were playing this comical game of tag, and, indeed, he had purposely caused the coffee to boil madly in order that the appetizing scent might be wafted with the breeze; consequently when Eli declared one of the Indians was advancing toward the fire, the explorer grinned as though he might be patting himself on the back over having accomplished a rather pretty piece of strategy.
The fellow came directly up to where they sat finishing their meal.
Cuthbert did not altogether like his looks, but then he realized that he was hardly capable of judging a good Indian from a bad one, since he had only a limited experience with the natives--what appeared to be a scowling phiz to him might seem only the natural expression to be found upon the dusky faces of these Saskatchewan dwellers of the woods, when viewed by Owen.
As he drew near the Indian made certain mysterious motions with his hands, which Cuthbert understood must be the peace signs, and he began to imitate the other, not wishing to be outdone in politeness.
"How," said the copper-colored intruder, with a rising inflection.
"How," repeated Cuthbert, in just the same tone of voice.
"You camp boss?" pursued Mr. Lo, keenly eyeing the young fellow, as though he might be dubious concerning this fact.
"Well, perhaps you might call me that, seeing this is my outfit; but just say that I'm an Easy Boss, and let it go at that. Now, what can I do for you?" remarked the explorer, who was as yet unknown to fame, but who had aspirations.
"Huh, you got um coffee--we smell um good--can stand no more--s'pose you give Injun drink, him be glad, much so--no have coffee many moons--set um up in other alley--how?" was what followed, much to the amusement of both Cuthbert and Eli, for evidently the fellow had seen a bowling alley in Winnipeg, or some other city.
"Well, I like your nerve, my copper-colored friend, which I see you carry with you all the time; but after all I don't know that I can blame you asking, for the smell of good coffee is enough to set any chap wild. What is your name, may I humbly inquire?" ventured Cuthbert, keeping a very straight face, though he could hear Eli chuckling, and wanted to laugh outright himself; for it was evident that while music is said to have "power to soothe the savage beast," the aroma of the subtle coffee bean in the process of cooking seemed capable of subjugating the savage man himself, and bringing him to "eat humble pie," as Eli put it.
"Name all same Springing Elk--son of Chief Wolf-killer, him same head of Crees on big river Saskatch. You say we have coffee--ugh, much good, and we not forget," and not waiting to receive additional assurance he raised his hand to his mouth and gave vent to a series of sharp barks or yelps that must have been an eagerly awaited signal conveying good news to his mates, for immediately the whole bunch started for the campfire of the three boys.
Cuthbert, in an aside, asked Owen if they need fear any danger from the Crees; but the young Canuck shook his head in the negative, answering back:
"Not at all. The only failing they have is a weakness for appropriating anything that strikes their fancy, when they think no one is looking, and I think we can avoid that by being on guard all the time until we embark again. They are crazy about coffee, and would go to great trouble to get a drink of the stuff."
Nevertheless, Eli, though hearing what was said, did not feel disposed to take any great stock in the pacific intentions of the heathen; he had read stories of their treacherous nature, and heard men speaking so derisively about the "only good Indian being a dead Indian," that he felt it his bounden duty to maintain a watchful eye upon the sextette while they were present, all the while keeping his gun in his clasp, ready to meet any emergency that might arise.
But then Eli had led a hard life, and there was considerable excuse for his suspicious nature--we are often creatures of circumstances and environment, and his school had been the rough logging camps, where the worst that is in men usually crops out.
Cuthbert busied himself in making a new pot of coffee, an operation which the group of bucks watched with glistening eyes; and when a little later the steam began to pour out from the nozzle of the pot, and the aroma struck their olfactory nerves, really several of them could not stand it, but had to walk away, those more masterful standing on one foot and snuffing the air, while their expressions in anticipation would have done credit to so many children.
They each had two big tin cups of the decoction, steaming hot, and undefiled by either sugar or condensed milk, showing that they possessed the proper taste for the beverage of the gods, according to the ideas of those who grow the royal berry, and know how it should be drunk.
Cuthbert had accommodated the untutored sons of the forest partly because he had a warm heart, and again with the half-formed idea that possibly his little party might benefit from the act in the future--frequently the old saying of "bread cast upon the waters returning after some days" comes true.
Still, there was a limit to his indulgence; and he certainly did not intend to allow this thirsty crowd of skin-hunters to become regulation camp-followers; his supply of coffee would not long stand the strain, even if his patience did.
So as soon as the last cups were drained of every drop of the delicious fluid the boys captured the same, deposited them in the receptacle where they belonged, thrust this into the cedar canoe, and then Cuthbert, as master of ceremonies, cried out:
"Yo-ho, all aboard!"
In another minute the canoes of the expedition began to cleave the waters, headed upstream.
The Indians also tumbled into their boats, nor were they longer satisfied to hang back one or more hundred yards as formerly--that elixir had quite captured their hearts, and they scrambled to keep in close proximity to the magical "floating coffin," as they denominated the cedar canoe, as if they could scent future feasts along the line of that which they had just enjoyed.
Cuthbert laughed over the situation more than a few times, and declared that he need fear no evil from the copper-faced denizens of the timber country so long as a shot remained in their locker--a grain of Java in their caddy.
But the Indians after a while struck a faster gait and vanished around a bend above, nor did they see them again for several days, when they arrived at the trading post.
They paddled leisurely, with Owen leading the way as before, for being familiar with the region he would know how to time matters so that they should reach the vicinity of the post.
As the afternoon waned Cuthbert could see that the other was struggling with some strong emotion, and he understood that it must be connected with the return trip he was making to the post, which he had evidently abandoned for good at the time of his hasty run down the river.
He fancied that Owen might take occasion to give them some inkling as to how matters stood with him here, for he had promised to reveal the secret of his lonely life at the first favorable opportunity; but somehow he did not appear to be in the humor just then, being wrapped up in his own gloomy reflections.
'Well, it could not long be delayed now, and Cuthbert, being built along the lines of a patient and philosophical lad, felt that he could wait.
CHAPTER XI.
A BREAK IN THE CHAIN.
About the middle of the afternoon Cuthbert's eye caught a situation on the shore that seemed to appeal particularly to him as a place where he would like to spend a night in camp.
He was subject to these little freaks, and hated to pass an ideal camping spot after a certain hour of the day; indeed, Eli could recall many experiences along this order.
Nor was the Virginia lad loth to explain the reason wherefore.
It seemed that in cruising down some river in the States on a certain winter, with a single companion, he was playing Scullion to the Cook of his more experienced comrade; and consequently what the other said generally went.
The Cook was of a most ambitious disposition, and desirous of making just as much time each day as though their lives depended on reaching a certain city in the Southland by a settled date--and yet they had the whole winter before them, with time to kill.
Many a time and oft, as Cuthbert reminiscently remarked, they had come upon a delightful looking spot for a camp an hour or less before dark, and he found the inclination strong within him to go ashore, rest up, get the tent pitched, and be ready for a night's campaign before the curtains were drawn shut.
But that sort of thing did not fit in with what the boss of the expedition considered proper; and consequently they must utilize the hour of daylight that remained in pushing forward.
As a result, when darkness actually compelled their going ashore they frequently had to put up with mean accommodations and suffer for hours.
The lessons that are brought home to us by bitter experience are the ones that remain the longest; and Cuthbert had never forgotten the bitterness of spirit that haunted him on that cruise.
He had learned his lesson thoroughly, and two things stood out above all others as the right and proper course for an intelligent cruiser to do--never pass a fine site for a camp when the afternoon sun was more than half way down its course; and upon starting out in the morning always manage to get a good breakfast, as there could be no telling when another meal would come along.
Eli was willing to go ashore, as usual, and Owen made no comment.
So the boats were drawn up on the shingle, and the little party disembarked.
Cuthbert had made no mistake about the location, for it was a charming spot, and the view out on the river absolutely unique; since with little effort one could see both up and down for a long distance.
And others had in times gone by utilized this same ground as a stopping place; for there was to be seen a fireplace made of stone in just the proper spot, where the prevailing wind would fan the blaze as the meal cooked.
In camping there are scores of little wrinkles which come perfectly natural to the experienced hand, but are totally unknown to the novice; the only way to learn is to ask questions just as boldly as though claiming Missouri for one's native State.
Cuthbert had one particularly favorite dish, which every now and then he insisted upon foisting upon his comrades; and from the way Eli's eyes glistened whenever he saw the Virginia canoeist starting to make preparations looking toward this compound it might be surmised that the infliction was not unbearable and could be endured about every day in the week.
He called it the Homeric kabab, and claimed that it had been handed down from the days of the old Grecian writer and philosopher; which, if true, proved that Homer knew a delicious thing when he tasted it.
It surely was a thing to conjure with.
Having made ready a glowing bed of coals, he set up two notched sticks at either end, and across this hung a strong withe of willow or some other wood, strung with inch pieces of meat, whether lamb, beef, venison or rabbit it mattered not, since the state of the larder must decide that matter; but it was of the utmost importance that alternating with each bit of meat there should come a strip of eggplant or onion, or both, if so fortunate as to have them.
This withe was to be kept turning, spit-fashion, until its weight of provender was deliciously browned and sending forth an aroma that would make the mouth of a wood nymph water. After that all that was needed was to give thanks and partake.
When Owen has his first taste of this favorite canoeist's dish his eyes told of the keenest enjoyment.
Plain fare had been his portion most of his life, and it was a question of quantity more than quality with his folks; appetite made up for a lack of delicacies, and doubtless with that as a background even common corn pone may assume the properties of a Delmonico planked steak.
Eli had seemed to be as hungry as usual when they landed; but having finished his task of erecting the tent he had picked up Cuthbert's splendid repeating Marlin and said something about taking a little stroll, with a hope that perchance he might sight game worthy of a shot.
Cuthbert had made no remark, for he knew that it was a weakness on the part of his comrade to get off now and then with that gun, just for the sake of handling it, and feeling for a short period that he owned the whole world.
It afforded the Virginia lad great pleasure to know that he had it in his power to bring joy to honest Eli's heart; and while he valued the gun, even its loss would not have caused a single cloud to cross his brow.
He was gifted with a splendid nature, and never so happy as when conferring pleasure upon some one else.
By the time supper was all ready Cuthbert remembered that the boy from Michigan had not yet turned up.
"Do you remember having heard a shot some time back?" he asked Owen.
"Yes, but it was pretty far away, further than Eli could have gone, I think; though now that you speak of it the report did come from up the wind, and that was the direction he took on starting out. Are you anxious about him?" replied the other, turning around from the job that had been occupying his attention, and which was connected with placing hemlock browse under the blanket he meant to use when the time to lie down arrived, as well as alongside the sleeping bags of his two companions.
"Why, no, I don't think there's any reason for that. Eli had been accustomed to roaming the woods all his life, for he was brought up in the lumber camps; and it would be funny if he went and lost himself up here, where the forest is so open. I was just thinking how fond he is of my pet dish, and what a disappointment it would be to him if you and I developed such ferocious appetites as to lick the platter clean before he showed up. But I reckon there's plenty all around, and we'll try and keep his share warm. Pull up here on this log, Owen, and try that platter. The coffee is ready too, ditto the hard-tack."
And with keen appetites the two certainly did ample justice to the meal.
By hard-tack Cuthbert really meant the regular ship biscuit used on all sailing vessels along the seashore and the lakes--there are two brands; one a bit more tasty than the other, and this is supposed to be for the officers' mess; but in a pinch both fill the bill admirably, as myriads of canoeists are willing to testify with upraised hand.
When supper had been finished, and both lads were ready to cry out enough, it was dark.
And still no Eli.
Even then Cuthbert did not worry, for he had the utmost confidence in the woodsman qualities of his stocky chum, and could not believe that anything serious had happened to him.
Perhaps he had wandered far afield, and chancing upon a deer a mile or more from camp had secured his venison; under such conditions it would require some time to cut the animal up, and then "tote" what he wanted of the meat over the intervening territory.
Nevertheless, he looked around at every sound as if hoping to see Eli stalking into camp, with a proud look on his homely phiz, and a burden of fresh meat upon his shoulder.
Now it was a playful and venturesome 'coon that prowled around in the vicinity of the camp, hoping to pick up some titbits from the supper of the strange bipeds who periodically occupied this favorite site; then again it might be a mink come up from the river to investigate what all this illumination meant; but as the minutes passed Eli remained only conspicuous by his absence.
Owen had occupied himself in rubbing up several steel traps which the boys had brought along, thinking they might prove useful in some way; but which, having been neglected, were inclined to be very rusty.
This was a familiar thing in the hands of the Canadian lad, for many a time in the days long gone by he 'tended a line of traps in the country where fur grows longest and best, and mink, otter, muskrat, fisher, marten, skunk and even raccoon and opossum skins bring a good price.
Cuthbert never lost an opportunity to acquire information, when he could obtain it at first hand, and hence as they sat beside the fire, watching the rosy flames dance and play at tag, he put many more questions to the backwoods boy concerning the secrets of the profession, and learned various new things that up to this time he had never dreamed existed.
So it is that in knocking about one may discover how limited a vocabulary has been their portion; and observation with a traveler means a widening of the horizon that broadens the mind.
Owen was free to explain the numerous methods of capturing the wary wild animals of his native land; and it gave him the keenest pleasure to satisfy this desire for knowledge on the part of the new chum who had been so good to him.
He told of the astonishing care that was needed in order to circumvent the wise and sharp-scented mink; how the traps were so arranged, as Cuthbert had seen, that the animal upon being caught would jump into the water, where the weight of the trap would drown the captive; otherwise the little fellow in desperation might gnaw his foot off and escape, to be a cripple the rest of his days, like the one whose foot they had handled that morning; what bait was used to attract him to the vicinity of the trap, for an artificial scent has been found marvellously effective in arousing the mating instinct of the animal and causing him to venture in places which otherwise he might avoid--all these and many other things did Owen talk about as he handled the rusty traps; and Cuthbert sat there entranced, drinking in the mysterious knowledge that trappers have learned through succeeding generations, and handed down to their successors.
So the time passed, and yet there was no sign of Eli.
Cuthbert finally sat up straight, and a look of growing concern could be seen upon his fine manly face as he said:
"There's no use talking, my boy, I'm really afraid something has happened to Eli Perkins. He couldn't get lost if he tried, and the fact that he's not here makes me think he's tumbled into trouble with a big T. Now, the question is what can we do about it?"
CHAPTER XII.
ON THE TRACK OF ELI.
Owen tossed the trap aside.
Evidently he had been expecting some such remark from the other and was not at all surprised at being called on for assistance.
"I think that if anything has happened to Eli we can lay it to that ungrateful dog, Stackpole," he remarked, frowning a trifle, as if his memories of the timber-cruiser were not of the most pleasant character imaginable.
"You don't like that fellow one little bit, I can see; and do you know the thought struck me when I saw him curl his lip on seeing you with us that at some time in the past you two must have been at loggerheads," observed Cuthbert.
"Which is true, every word of it. If you had looked closer you might have noticed a little notch in the fellow's left ear. I was the cause of that, and it happened some years ago, when I was much smaller than I am now, and less able to take care of myself. But I was born in the woods, and brought up with a rifle in my hands, so that I learned early in life to shoot straight."
"Yes," interrupted Cuthbert, "I saw that you were a dead shot when you tried my pet Marlin and brought down that hawk on the wing. I thought I had some little ability in that line myself, but when I saw you trim that buccaneer of the air so easily as if you were not half trying, I gave up thinking myself in it. But please go on, Owen."
"Where we lived was a lonely section. My father had offended some one high in authority marrying my mother, and he felt this influence more or less all his life; but I did not mean to speak about that just now, only to explain how it was we chanced to be so far removed from other people.
"Once in a while some wandering timber-cruiser like Stackpole would drop in on us, and you can understand that as a general thing they were mighty welcome, for they brought us news of the outer world.
"But if there was one man I detested, it was Stackpole, and he had often riled me as a kid, by his leering ways, and his sneaking method of hanging around when my father was out looking after his traps.
"I don't know what put it into my head, but somehow I seemed to finally believe the fellow had been actually sent up into the wilderness by some one high in authority at the post just to annoy my father and bring him to his knees, which nothing had been able to do in the past.
"So I came to follow Stackpole when he did not dream I was around, and pretty soon I found that he was trying to steal my father's stock of furs during his absence, having arranged it with a halfbreed Cree to pull his chestnuts out of the fire, and avoid responsibility.
"I had been afraid that his evil eye had been turned upon my pretty mother, so that, after all, it was something of a relief to find that he only wanted to take the bundle of valuable furs that would mean a living for us during the next summer; but I've never believed anything else than that he was sent there by old Alexander Gregory to reduce us to a state where my parents would have to knuckle down, swallow their Scotch pride, and accept favors at his hands, something father had sworn he would die before doing.
"Well, I caught the rascal in the act of carrying the furs off, though he always swore that I wronged him, and that he had in reality rescued them from a thief of a Cree who had snatched the lot; but I notched his ear with a shot, and put another in his right leg--you remember Eli noticed that he had a decided limp on that side.
"They had to nurse the old villain all through his spell, and he never forgave me for the double dose I gave him, though pretending it was all right, and that, thinking as I did, I had done the proper thing. Stackpole kept shy of our place after that, but I knew he would never forgive me, and if the time ever arrived when he could get even he would take the chance gladly. That was why I kept an eye on him all the time he was with us, and warned you to look out, for the fellow is really a thief, and has a bad reputation all over the region of the Saskatchewan."
"And you really think he may be the cause of Eli staying away? After we treated him so well, too. The skunk has no gratitude in his make-up, then, that's all I can say. Catch me giving him another cup of our lovely Java; it's like casting pearls before swine," declared the other, disgusted.
"Of course," continued Owen, "there is always a chance that Eli may have gotten twisted in his bearings. Any fellow might do that under stress of excitement, no matter what his knowledge of woodcraft may be. I've been there myself, and as all my life was spent in the timber I ought to be free from such a trouble if any one might. So, perhaps it would be wise, before we try to sally out and look for signs of our comrade, to shoot off a gun a few times, and see whether he makes any reply. What do you say?
"Just what I was about to propose myself. Three shots is the usual signal, but with Eli's shotgun we can only knock out two. Nevertheless, here she goes."
So saying he blazed away with both barrels, allowing a margin of a few seconds to occur between the shots.
Then both lads bent their ears and listened carefully.
The night breeze was sighing among the pines and hemlocks, but it carried no answering sound to their waiting ears.
When several minutes had gone by Cuthbert thrust a couple more shells into the barrels of the gun and once more let go.
Again silence alone repaid their anxious attention.
If the missing one heard those signal shots he was in no condition to reply, and that would mean, of course, that he must be in trouble.
Cuthbert looked at his friend.
"It doesn't seem to be of any use. After that I can't doubt but what something uncomfortable has happened to Eli. He's a jolly fellow, and I think the world of him. If any harm came to pass I'd feel wretched, for it was my foolish idea that brought him up here," he said disconsolately.
"Oh, I wouldn't feel that way about it. A fellow like Eli must run a certain amount of risk, no matter where he is. If he wasn't here he'd be logging, and taking his life in his hand every hour, with trees falling in the wrong direction, log jams occurring in the spring rise and the lumber jacks risking death in the effort to free the king-pin that holds the jam. Oh, no, Eli has no fault to find with the way you've treated him; indeed, he's had a snap, and knows it. But we must be doing something, if you feel too anxious to wait until morning."
"It must now be ten o'clock, and that would mean many hours. Can anything be done in the night? How could we follow his trail without a hound? What wouldn't I give to have a good dog just now, such as my old Bunker down home in Virginia. You take charge, and order me around as you see fit. I'm ready to do anything."
Owen smiled, and thought what a fine thing it was to have a chum built along these lines; the conviction that Cuthbert would be just as anxious if it had been he who was lost carried with it a thrill of pleasure he had never known in all his life before.
"Why, of course we can follow his trail slowly by the aid of that hunting jacklight of yours. Suppose you get it going, while I attend to some other things. If we abandon the camp even for a while it might be wise to hide the boats, especially yours; for that lovely creation would tempt almost any wanderer to carry it off. And your stores would be very acceptable to some of these chaps who live on roasted navy beans for coffee and hard tack with their venison."
So saying the young Canadian busied himself.
In ten minutes he had thoroughly hidden all their possessions, and in such a clever way it would never be suspected that such things could be lying around loose in the bushes beyond.
Meanwhile Cuthbert had fastened the jack to his hat and lighted the same.
On some occasions in the past he had shot deer by means of this same little lantern, though its use is now frowned down on in many states, since what appears to be a mean advantage is taken of the innocent deer when they come down to drink at the lake or stream, and stare at the strange glow upon the water, allowing the sportsman to push close enough to make dead sure of his quarry.
Now it would not have been carried needlessly all this way into the wilderness if it was destined to prove valuable in following the trail of the missing Eli.
Although Cuthbert had not voiced his worst fear, he was thinking that possibly poor Eli might be lying somewhere in the vast woods badly injured; for there were various ways in which such a thing could come about.
He knew nothing could have happened on account of the rifle, for his faith in that marvel of the gunmaker's craft was unbounded; but Eli was inclined to be a bit clumsy, and might have stumbled into some hole, striking his head and rendering himself unconscious; or there was a chance that he had wounded a stag which had thereupon charged vigorously upon him, as wounded bucks are apt to do; so that Eli, not being accustomed to working the mechanism of the repeating rifle, might have been caught napping and tossed down.
Well, they were now off, and would know something about the matter ere long, for the tracks of the young hunter were plainly marked, as seen in the light of the jack.
Owen must have had considerable experience in this thing of following a trail, for he picked it up in a wonderful fashion; that is, it seemed so in the eyes of his companion, who was quite willing to keep at his side and bring the illuminating qualities of the little lantern to bear.
Finally, thinking that it would be best that Owen had the jack upon his hat, he insisted on turning it over to him, contenting himself from that moment with falling in behind, carrying the shot gun in the hollow of his left arm, and with finger upon a trigger.
They walked for an hour in this way, and never once did Owen seem to be in doubt.
Such clever ability to follow tracks in the night time was an education to Cuthbert, always ready to learn new things; and he watched the manner in which it was done, wondering if he could ever in the course of years possess the sagacity that seemed to come so naturally to his friend.
In and out among the great trees they wound their way, just as Eli must have done when wandering along, watching for a sight of game ahead.
Now they came to where he had evidently struck some sign, for he bent down as he advanced, Owen showing the other just how he knew this from the marks; since three times had Eli dropped to his knee, only to rise again and go on, eager to get still closer to the quarry.
Finally Owen paused and pointed.
"Here he fired--only one shot," he declared, and picked up the brass jacket of a long cartridge that had been ejected from the repeater when Eli worked the combination.
Cuthbert looked anxiously about.
"I don't see him lying anywhere around, that's one thing that pleases me," he said, in a relieved tone.
"No, he rushed forward--see, here are his tracks, and yonder the remains of the deer he shot. But Eli is not here. Something happened to him. Give me five minutes and I'll tell you what it was," declared the woods boy, soberly.
CHAPTER XIII
BIRDS OF A FEATHER.
When Eli Perkins left the camp on that memorable afternoon with Cuthbert's fine rifle on his shoulder, he did have a card up his sleeve, so to speak.
Not that Eli was not intent on securing game for the pot, and meant to keep an eye out for anything in the shape of a deer that he could bag; for he had long desired to shoot that dandy gun, the envy of his soul, and as yet the opportunity to use it on a gallant stag had not been forthcoming, though he had often carried it forth when the time seemed propitious.
But Eli had been looking around ever since they landed, and it was his settled conviction that the country in that section had all the color of a copper region.
Copper was Eli's little god.
He eternally dreamed of some day finding a ledge of such incredible richness as would make all previous discoveries sink into utter insignificance; and from his delightful share of the profits from the mine he meant to satisfy that yearning for seeing foreign lands; for long had he looked forward to the time to come when he could visit Egypt, Turkey, Russia, Germany and all those countries he had read so much about.
His only prospect of ever getting there, in his mind, lay in this discovery of copper, and copper haunted him day and night.
Cuthbert knew all about his yearning, and in his own mind had long since arranged it so that Eli would share his next trip abroad; but the other knew not what luck was awaiting him and so he kept thinking of this happy find, and his eyes were constantly on the watch for "signs."
And now more than ever before he was convinced that he must be in a country where there was undiscovered copper veins.
That no one has as yet stumbled upon them did not strike the lad as strange, for he knew that those who stalked through this wilderness were, for the most part, ignorant trappers or Indians, who would not know the value of a find if they fell over the richest outcropping ever found.
Eli had studied up the subject in his leisure hours for some years past, and was fully posted on all that pertained to its various branches.
So while he was walking ahead and looking with one eye for big game his other optic was on the alert for any signs of an outcropping of the rich metal that had been given the place of honor in his heart.
This accounted in some measure for his eccentric advance; for many times he turned aside to bend low over some suspicious spot where his keen eye had detected symptoms of a deposit.
Although disappointment came again and again Eli never despaired, for he was certain he would sooner or later come upon that which he meant to have, and the delay, while aggravating, could not crush his spirits.
Twice later on he found reason to believe he was getting nearer the object of his ambition, for the signs were certainly growing stronger; and thus he was being lured further and further away from the camp.
Then came the moment when he sighted the deer through the bushes, and all his hunter instinct was aroused by the sight.
He began to creep forward, his finger upon the trigger of the gun, and a sense of delicious uncertainty thrilling his nerves.
Just as the observant Owen later on declared, he did get down on one knee several times, intending to shoot; but finding that the deer had not shown any indication of alarm, he had concluded to advance a bit further, in order to make doubly certain.
Eli knew that he was sure of that buck, for he had perfect faith in his own abilities as a marksman, when within such short range; and as for the quality of Cuthbert's pet rifle, that went unquestioned.
Finally he took a quick aim and fired.
It had been the report of his gun that floated away back to the camp, and was heard by his two comrades about half an hour before dark.
Eli deliberately pumped another cartridge into the chamber with one speedy movement of his hand, as he had done many times in practice, and then ran forward to where he had last seen the deer.
He knew full well that it had gone down in a heap, for he had seen as much while he was in that instant placing the rifle in condition for further work; and hence he was not in the least surprised to find the noble animal kicking its last when he arrived upon the spot.
Eli was not an enthusiastic hunter; indeed, as a usual thing, he had been pretty well satisfied to let Cuthbert do most of the shooting and fishing of the trip; but when it came to disposing of the cooked product while they sat around the camp fire, he was right in the game, for Eli's one weakness was his appetite, and he never seemed to have enough.
He placed the rifle against a neighboring tree, and, drawing his hunting knife, proceeded first of all to bleed the deer, after which he started to work cutting it up, for it was too heavy by long odds to think of trying to carry the whole carcass to camp, now more than a mile distant.
So busily engaged was he in this work that he paid not attention to what was taking place around him, and consequently did not see the shadowy figure that came flitting from tree to tree like a wraith of the great pinelands, finally reaching the oak against which Eli had leaned his gun.
Then a gnarled hand was stretched out and eagerly seized upon the beautiful little Marlin, which was quickly withdrawn from view.
Just then Eli was startled to hear a gruff "Ahem" from a point in front of him, and glancing up hurriedly from his work he discovered a man standing leaning on a long-barreled rifle and surveying him with a sneer on his face.
It was the same fellow who had bunked with them and drank their elegant Java with such gusto--Stackpole, the timber-cruiser.
Eli had not liked his looks when he was in camp, and he certainly saw no reason to change his mind concerning the fellow now, for Stackpole did have a piratical appearance when he scowled or looked scornful.
Instinct compelled Eli to reach out his hand for his gun, even while not removing his eyes from the interloper with the evil cast of features.
When his groping hand failed to connect with the rifle he was compelled to turn his head quickly and saw, to his dismay, that the gun no longer occupied the spot where he had placed it.
At the same moment a second man stepped into view, having his own rifle hung over his shoulder with a strap, while the repeater belonging to Cuthbert was resting in his grimy hands.
Eli recognized this worthy immediately, nor was he very much surprised to see him there, since Owen had declared it to be his belief that they might run across him sooner or later.
He remembered how they had met him some weeks earlier, and also how he had made up that chart for Cuthbert, for a consideration, which since that time had proven so very unreliable, and which the Canadian lad pronounced utterly worthless.
It was Dubois, the greasy woods-ranger, fit comrade for the ungainly and grinning Stackpole.
He stood there looking at the boy and nodding his head.
"Well, well, if it ain't Eli Perkins alive and in ther flesh! Who'd ever a thort tew see yer up hyer? I allowed thet p'raps yer boys mighter come part way, but it does beat all how some fools air taken keer ov. Thank yer kindly fur this yer purty little gun, Eli. Reckon I kin soon git ther hang o' the way ye work thet pump bizness. Anyhow, I'm willin' ter larn. Hold on, now, jest keep yer distance, er somethin' not down on ther bill'll happen ter ye, boy!" was the way Dubois addressed him.
Of course, Eli felt angry, but he saw that they had him trapped neatly enough, and he was not the fool the other would try to make out.
At least he had had considerable experience with just such fellows as these and knew how far one could go in conducting negotiations with their breed.
Eli had a streak of caution and also a bit of cunning in his make-up; doubtless he had found need of both in his dealings with the huskies to be met with in the Michigan lumber camps, where brute strength counts for more than education.
It evidently behooved him to play "lame duck," just as the mother mallard does in order to deceive the wandering egg hunter, and lead him away from her nest.
So Eli simply chose to look foolish, and stood there grinning and saying not a word.
He was a good hand at playing the game of "wait," and perhaps in time his chance would come to knock up their hand, and call the deal.
"I see yer hev cut up ther deer all hunky-dory, Eli. Now, sence we old fellers is a bit troubled with rheumertism s'pose ye shoulder ther bag o'game an' come erlong wid us. My ole friend Dubois hes got er shack not werry far off, an' we kin hold our hungry feelin's in till we git thar. Up she goes, boy, an' don't yer dare ter scowl at me like thet again, less ye wanter feel ther toe o' my moccasin. Wy, I've sliced a feller's ears orf fur less'n thet. I'm a holy terror wen I'm riled up, ain't I, Dubois?" said Stackpole.
And this was the man whom they had entertained at their camp and given the best meal of his whole life!
Eli made a note of the fact for future reference.
There would perhaps come a day of reckoning, and the account, however long, could be adjusted.
He took up the pack of meat and followed Stackpole, while Dubois walked along a little distance behind.
Perhaps it was accidental, this meeting with the two woodsmen, but Eli doubted it, preferring to believe that they had been watching him ever since he left the camp, with the idea of effecting his capture should the opportunity arise.
With such men this was not a difficult thing to do.
What puzzled him, however, was the trouble they were taking on his account.
If it was simply that coveted gun they wanted, why not turn him adrift after securing possession of the firearm, rather than make a prisoner of him; surely they could not be doing this for the mere sake of compelling him to "tote" the venison to their camp, for that would be slipping up on a point, since he must know where they held out and could carry the information to Cuthbert when released.
Now had it been the young Virginian who was captured, he could readily understand their reason, for Cuthbert had money in abundance, and would pay a round sum to be set at liberty; but who under the sun cared whether he, Eli Perkins, lumber-jack from the Michigan pine woods, were free or a prisoner, living or dead?
And poor Eli was wrestling with these puzzling questions as he trudged wearily after Stackpole; nor did he seem to get any nearer a solution, though approaching the matter from all sides.
Darkness overtook them while they were still tramping through the woods, having covered some miles since leaving the spot where the deer was shot.
And then by degrees Eli began to guess what they had in view in holding him.
It would be only natural for the two worthies to try and hide their trail when thus passing through the woods and bound for the place where according to Stackpole the other had some sort of a dugout or shack.
To the surprise of Eli not only did they fail to take any precautions in this respect but on the contrary actually seemed to leave as plain a trail as possible.
It took Eli some time to understand the meaning of this, and then it broke upon him like a thunderclap--these fellows were laying a trap, and expected Cuthbert to walk into the same just as the fly enters the web of the spider.
Of course in due time Cuthbert and Owen would feel it necessary to look him up, and as the latter was a good trailer they would follow the course now being taken by himself and his captors, follow it until the door of the trap was sprung shut, making them also prisoners.
Eli grunted his disgust when he saw all this spread out before him.
Eli was so utterly helpless to prevent it.
And while he walked he was busying his mind in the endeavor to invent some clever scheme whereby he might get the better of the twin rascals and turn the tables upon them.
But Eli did not possess a very brilliant mind and suggestions came slowly to him; all his life he had been in the habit of allowing some one else do his thinking for him, and when thrown upon his own resources he found it difficult to fully grasp the situation and conjure up any possible remedy.
At the same time he was stubborn by temperament and not given over to despair, no matter how black the circumstances seemed.
Perhaps presently things might take a turn; all he wanted was to keep his eyes about him, and his wits sharpened, so that if the occasion arose he would be in shape to reap the benefit.
Stackpole must have been joking when he said the shack was close by, or else they had purposely made a circuit in their walk, for it was a full hour before they arrived at their destination.
Whoever had originally built the cabin in the wild section where the rocks cropped up amid the stunted trees, it had evidently been abandoned many years, until of late Dubois took possession of the same.
A light through what seemed to be a window without glass was the first indication they had that they were approaching the end of the trail; Eli showed some sign of interest when he saw this, for it meant that there might be another member of the party, and his curiosity was excited.
Could it be possible that there was a regular league of these lawless rovers of the great timber belt, organized to prey upon their fellows, and eager to milk such prizes as Cuthbert Reynolds would prove to be, if once he fell into their clutches?
If so, this could hardly be their headquarters, for it was too near the Hudson Bay post; and from what he had heard about the stern old factor, he would never allow such an organization to get a footing within his territory--if he was a martinet and a stickler for fealty to the company, he was also an honest man, with a hatred for rascality that made him the terror of evil doers.
Stackpole brushed open the door and strode within.
"Follow yer leader, kid," ordered the man in the rear, and accordingly Eli passed over the threshold.
Once within, the boy was ordered to prepare supper, and knowing the folly of resistance he obeyed.
All the time he was on the watch for a chance to do something that would render the guns of the timber cruisers useless. They were both old style rifles of the breech-loading type, and given a chance Eli knew how to fix them so that it would require the assistance of a gunsmith to place them in serviceable condition again.
Once Dubois went out and called to Stackpole, evidently desirous of conferring with his partner over something he did not wish the boy to overhear.
Eli saw his chance, and though his heart seemed to be in his mouth, he carried out his hastily formed plan.
Stackpole had taken the repeating rifle with him, as if not fully trusting the prisoner. But Eli could wait. Besides, he was hungry, and that was his venison, so he felt entitled to some of it.
While they ate the two men occasionally joked the boy in their rough way. But Eli only grinned, knowing that his time had almost come.
"Now git a hustle on and clar up the muss, younker!" said Stackpole, as he lighted his pipe.
Eli coolly snatched up the little Marlin repeater. He heard the angry cries of the men as they reached for their own guns.
Then Eli laughed.
"The joke is on you, Stackpole. Couldn't shoot them guns in a week, for I doctored 'em all right. Stand back now or take the consequences, you!"
They were cowed by the sudden and complete change. Neither of them dared move a hand even when Eli opened the door of the cabin, having slung some of the venison across his shoulder.
"Next time, gents, don't leave a timber boy alone in a cabin with your guns," he remarked, and waving his hand mockingly he closed the door.
Five minutes later one of the men ventured to open the door, when a gun sounded, and the bullet struck so close to him he slammed the barrier shut again.
Then Eli hurried off, having taken his bearings. Half an hour later he discovered the glow of the little headlight torch, and to the delight of his chums hailed them.
Although Cuthbert and Owen were indignant at the action of the timber cruisers, they thought best to let the incident pass. No doubt the men would leave the country now, since they must fear lest their unlawful act get to the ears of the old factor and cause them trouble.
So our three boys returned to the camp and spent the remainder of the night in peace.
CHAPTER XIV.
WITHOUT AUTHORITY.
Several times during the late afternoon of this day they heard gunshots ahead, and from this judged that they were drawing very near the post; which, like all such important places belonging to the great fur company, must present quite an animated appearance with trappers and hunters, whites, Indians and halfbreeds, coming and going.
Few went downstream, since the points of interest and profit were further up in the wilderness; which accounted for the fact of their having seen only a couple of boats during the whole afternoon, one of these being manned by some _voyageurs_ belonging to the post, for they wore picturesque uniforms, consisting of leather coats lined with flannel, belts of scarlet worsted, breeches of smoked buckskin, and moose moccasins, and carried shawls of Scotch plaid, as well as fur caps with ear-flaps for the cold weather that was liable to visit the Northwest country at any day now--at the bow of the large boat floated the well-known blue and white flag of the Hudson Bay Company, showing that this craft had undoubtedly carried a load of supplies to the post, and was now taking back to civilization packages of belated furs that had been brought in by trappers from the Arctic regions.
Cuthbert knew considerable about this vast concern which has had almost a monopoly of the fur-gathering business in America for two centuries--really it dates back to 1670, when a license to trade in furs in the Hudson Bay region was granted to an English company.
Knowing that he would be likely to come in contact with the agents of this corporation during his travels in the Saskatchewan country, Cuthbert had taken pains to learn all he could about what history had to say of their doings; and he found that in the far past they had been merciless and unscrupulous in their dealings with their employers; though, of course, much of this high-handed style of conducting business is not tolerated nowadays.
The shadows were beginning to gather as the canoes rounded a bend in the stream, and the post stood out before them in the clearing, with the last glow in the western sky as a background.
The Union Jack had been hauled down with the setting of the sun, for at these posts along the distant border something of military discipline has to be maintained, lest those in charge find their rough wards and employes breaking loose from their authority; for they have to deal with reckless spirits at times, and, of course, liquor frequently brings about trouble, just as in logging camps and all similar places.
Their coming had undoubtedly been signaled long before they arrived within hailing distance of the fort, for there was quite a crowd down at the landing to see them come in, a mixture of whites, natives and halfbreeds, all of them no doubt connected in some manner with the great fur company.
Some of these gave a noisy greeting to a boat load of Indians landing about the same time as our friends, after the custom of their kind, boisterous, but good-natured; but Cuthbert noticed that not one had a word to say to his little party; which pleased him very much, since he had worried over what they should do if the crowd proved unruly.
He understood from what Owen had let fall that the old factor ruled his camp with a rod of iron, and that there was not a man who dared go against his expressed wish--doubtless he had given his followers to understand that they were to keep aloof, and let him do the honors of the occasion.
So our young friends shoved their boats upon the shelving beach, sprang out, and pulled the canoes up far enough to keep them safe from the current of the river; Owen had already told them that a code of honor existed at the post, and whatever they left in the boat would be perfectly safe, for should so much as a trap be stolen, the vigilant factor would visit the thief with punishment of a drastic nature--his Scotch blood would not stand for such a breach of hospitality.
They knew that it was their duty to seek an audience with the commander of the post immediately, explain their mission to these wilds, and, if it could be done in a diplomatic manner, ingratiate themselves in his favor by making him some sort of a present--Owen had hinted that the factor's one weakness was a love for tea, which he used at every meal with quite as much pleasure as the veriest old maid gossip at a sewing circle; and as luck would have it this happened to coincide with a leaning of his own, for he had made sure to fetch considerable of the very finest that money could purchase in New York--Ceylon, Young Hyson and Orange Pekoe.
Hence, when he told Eli that it was up to them to make a bee-line for the headquarters of the factor, and announce their arrival, his first act was to gather up a package he had prepared, consisting of a pound each of the several kinds of tea carried by the expedition.
Thus armed and equipped, he sallied forth, under the belief that he was able to propitiate the powers that be, without a single carnal weapon, and loaded only with a gentle persuader.
Owen had pointed out the position of the lodge where the factor had his office as well as his habitation; and indeed, even had they not a friend at court, it would have been easy to determine the location of this, since it turned out to be the largest building within the stockade, and in front of which arose the tall pole that had evidently held the Union Jack up to sunset.
No one followed them, but various were the curious glances cast in that direction by the many personages who had a connection with the busy post.
At the door stood a man, who appeared to be a guard, for he carried a rifle, and stirred at their approach, as though it might be his business to make inquiries of those who asked for an audience with the "little czar" within.
"Is the factor, Mr. Gregory, in?" asked Cuthbert, pleasantly.
"He is--walk right inside," came the reply, and they obeyed.
The office of the trading post was a sight to Cuthbert, who had often read of such a place, but never as yet, set eyes on one; a thousand articles seemed to be crowded into the apartment, so that there was little spare room on either side of the passage leading straight up to the great desk, where the factor held his court, flanked by account books that doubtless would have been rich reading to anyone interested in figures connected with the prices paid the Indians for furs.
Through a door Cuthbert could see an adjoining room that was evidently used for a general audience chamber in the wintry season, perhaps a bunkroom also, for it had an enormous stove that was well calculated to warm things when started.
Only a cursory glance did he bestow upon these inanimate things, for his attention was immediately wrapped up in the lone figure sitting back of the big desk, the factor of the whole region, Alexander Gregory, the mysterious man whose past seemed to be connected in some way with that of their new Canadian chum, Owen Dugdale.
Cuthbert rather prided himself on his ability to read faces, and it was in this spirit that he approached the Scotch resident boss.
He saw a bearded face, with the sandy hue thickly sprinkled with gray--a face marked with strong individuality, and passions such as were common in the days of the Bruce and the Wallace of whom we read; indeed, just such a sturdy character as he had expected to discover in this strange man of the Northwest, judging from all the stories he had heard.
And yet he quickly discerned a bit of a twinkle in the corners of those cold gray eyes that told Cuthbert the other was not wholly a man of iron--there was another vein to his character not often seen by his fellows, but which could be played upon by touching the right chord, if one but knew what that was.
In that one moment of time Cuthbert knew that here was a man worthy of his best efforts in the line of study, and that perhaps before he quitted this faraway post on the frontier he would be able to see the strong elements constituting Alexander Gregory's make-up unmasked.
Cuthbert was something of a diplomat, and he knew just how best to address a man of authority whom he desired to placate; accordingly he gave his name as well as that of his companion, told of the folly that had brought him to the wilderness, and that he desired to see a genuine trading post of the great company, now that he found himself in the neighborhood, and that he was pleased to meet the factor, of whom he had heard so many things in connection with the building up of the company's trade.
Alexander Gregory listened, and it might be noticed that his face seemed to relax a trifle of its grim aspect; when the precious packets of tea were placed before him on the desk he could not refrain from smiling, and thrusting forth his hand, with words of warm welcome that quite tickled the young diplomat, for he knew that he had won a point in the game.
CHAPTER XV.
SCENTS A MYSTERY.
Alexander Gregory was a Scotchman, but he had spent most of his life in the Canadian bush, and while there was a distinct "burr" in his manner of speech, he very seldom used any of that broad dialect so characteristic of his race; and then generally when much excited.
He seemed particularly amused at the harum-scarum idea that had tempted our young explorer to these distant fields, for few men knew more about the fearful difficulties awaiting the venturesome nomad in those lonely wastes beyond than did the veteran factor, since many a time and oft he had roamed toward the arctic circle in search of new opportunities, and had the humor seized him he could have told thrilling stories of what he had seen and endured there.
Seldom did he have the chance to interview so fresh and interesting a character as Cuthbert, for his work brought him into daily contact with only rough, strenuous men, and in time this had undoubtedly hardened his own nature more or less.
He asked many questions and examined the lad's charts with interest.
Just as Owen had done he condemned the map made by the halfbreed, Dubois, and declared that the fellow had undoubtedly purposely deceived him, with some object in view that could only be guessed.
"That's just what Owen said," exclaimed Cuthbert, without stopping to think, and no sooner had the impulsive words passed his lips than he remembered that this was supposed to be a tabooed name in the hearing of the old factor, though just why he had no means of understanding.
Involuntarily he looked up hastily as if to see what effect the mention of Owen's name had on his host, but he only discovered a slight start, followed by a flitting frown, and then a grim smile.
"Oh, he did, eh?" he remarked, quietly; "well, it would seem that the fellow has some sense about him, which I had begun to doubt, after he refused to meet me half way in burying the bitterness of the past. But speaking of this Dubois, he is a rascal beyond any doubt, and he appears to have entered into some sort of partnership with Stackpole, a fellow of his own stripe, though hardly as bold in his way of doing things. These scoundrels have been playing fast and loose for a long time in this region, but the worst they've been guilty of up to the present has been the robbery of traps. Still, they have the spirit in them to attempt almost any unlawful game, once the opportunity offers, and I suppose they thought it had appeared in you. I've about made up my mind that the time has come to drive them out of the region, or hand them over to the mounted police, who will see to it that they are put in jail. In this region we often have to take the law in our own hands, you understand, lad. Aye, I've seen some desperate things done in my day, and more often than I like they come up before my mind in the still watches of the night. Mine has been a rough life of it, taken altogether, and not an enviable one. It is anything but a paradise up here when the long winter settles down. But it is the only life I know, and has its charms to a man of my nature, though there be times when I have longings for civilization and all that it carries with it."
The factor sighed as he spoke in this meditative way, and Cuthbert could read between the lines, knowing what a wasted life it must seem to look back upon, with the monotony broken only by scenes of violence, when Indians went upon the warpath or halfbreeds became rebellious, as during the great uprising along the Saskatchewan, when the ugly front of war made this region its battle ground.
Eli was awed by the frown of the factor, and hardly spoke a word unless addressed in person; but he, too, felt considerable curiosity concerning the relation of Owen to this grim personage, and spent much time in propounding questions to himself with the object of finding out the truth.
On the whole Cuthbert was impressed rather favorably.
He believed that Mr. Gregory, while appearing to be a forbidding character, was less of an ogre than surface marks would indicate; indeed, Cuthbert rather took a fancy to the old chap, and could, in a measure, realize how he must have yearned for the pleasures of that outer life from which his fate barred him.
He made up his mind to question Owen at the first opportunity and learn what it was that stood between this czar of the wilderness and himself, for the mystery not only piqued his imagination, but he began to feel that his new-found friend might, in some way, be managing his case unwisely, and that the advice of a sympathetic comrade would prove of value in the matter.
You see, Cuthbert was a bit shrewd and already suspected something of the truth, for he could see through a millstone that had a hole in the center, and it had flashed upon him suddenly that there was more than an accidental resemblance between the young Canadian lad and this stern master of the post.
Now, it chanced that the American, while devoted to his chosen profession of wandering through countries where the foot of a white man had never before trod, had other traits of character, and like most fellows, liked to dabble in a bit of a mystery, especially when he thought he could see a chance to improve the conditions surrounding a friend of his, and accordingly he puckered up his lips as though about to whistle, though no sound escaped him, and inwardly he was saying something after the nature of this:
"By George, I believe I have it now--this old martinet, who rules the whole country of the Saskatchewan with a rod of iron, and Owen are related somehow or other, and in the past there must have been trouble between the two branches of the family--the Scotch are famous for such things, and can hate just as hard as they can love. Here's a pretty kettle of fish. Owen's being knocked out of something that is his by rights, and I'm going to turn my talents to account so as to see that he gets all that's coming to him. What relation could Aleck bear a youngster like Owen but that of grandpa, eh? Why, it promises to be about as good as a play. But I mustn't let on that I've guessed the riddle, for I don't understand why they're at daggers' points--what has Owen done--why did he skip down the river without even his gun? H'm, there's lots to unravel even here, and perhaps I'd better get Chum Owen to confide in me before I go any further."
The factor was plainly eager to test the virtues of his new tea, for he put a kettle of cold water on the stove, thereby proving that he was an adept at the art of brewing the fragrant herb, since it requires fresh water, brought to a boil, and not stale stuff, to extract the delightful aroma and flavor.
Cuthbert took the hint, though Mr. Gregory asked the lads to stay and drink a cup with him, a common enough invitation across the big pond, though altogether unknown among Americans, whose invitations are apt to include something stronger.
When they declined he bade them consider themselves asked to dine with him later on that evening, but Cuthbert saw an opportunity to put in an entering wedge and reluctantly said that they would have to decline, since they had a comrade and would not feel like leaving him alone.
The factor opened his mouth as if to say something and Cuthbert expected that he meant to include Owen in his invitation, but he simply nodded his head, smiled whimsically, and bent over to look at the fire.
So they passed out.
Eli was completely muddled up with regard to the state of things, for he had not the shrewdness of his companion, and as yet saw no reason to suspect that there was a relationship between those who were so antagonistic.
He meant to make friends with some of the halfbreeds who lounged about the post, and by asking questions anticipated getting close to the truth; perhaps his way, while less elevated than the plan of Cuthbert, might bring results in a more speedy manner.
They found Owen where he had promised to await them, which was in a corner of the stockade, just outside the main enclosure--a rather secluded place, which the other evidently knew quite well.
He had the tent up, and was arranging things for comfort, just as though unaware how long their stay might be.
Owen asked no questions, but he looked curiously into Cuthbert's face, as if he might discover something there; but the other had decided to wait for a more fitting opportunity ere springing the question he had in mind.
Some of the loungers gathered around.
They were naturally curious concerning the outfit of the young explorer, for he carried things such as they had never in all their lives seen; some of these were apt to excite the ridicule of such old and rough campaigners, accustomed to looking upon the earth as their bed, and the canopy of heaven as their roof; but when in lieu of a cooking fire Cuthbert set up his little "Juwel" kerosene stove, and in less than ten minutes had water boiling furiously, when he could make a big pot of coffee, the remarks in French patois were almost wholly favorable to the little brass contraption, as both the Americans knew; for these fellows recognized how handy such an affair must prove on a wet day when it was almost impossible to find dry wood to burn, and some warm drink was needed to tone up the system.
But it was ludicrous when the coffee began to boil to see those chaps elevate their noses and begin to sniff the fragrance as only wretched beings may who have long been strangers to the delicious decoction.
Evidently they had been told by the three Indians how the boys had treated them to a cup of the beverage, and they made bold to hover about in the hope that history would repeat itself.
Nor were they disappointed.
Cuthbert was too shrewd a general to miss so good an opportunity to make many friends out of these rough spirits; so, after the campers had enjoyed their cup apiece and eaten some supper, Cuthbert deliberately filled the aluminum receptacle, added condensed milk, with sugar, and then gravely presented it to the fellow whom he judged was the boss of the outfit, a big, raw-boned French-Canadian _voyageur_, with a beard like a pirate.
His eyes almost danced with delight, and he allowed the aromatic compound to gurgle down his capacious throat slowly, while he held back his head to gaze upward toward the first stars that had appeared in the blue arch overhead.
Twice he stopped and looked at his companions with a smirk, unable to refrain from tantalizing them; and it was ludicrous to see the way in which they scowled and shook their heads ominously--had it been any one but this strapping leader he might have found himself in trouble very soon.
However, in good time they one and all had a chance to taste and enjoy the results of Cuthbert's brewing; and he realized that his act had been a masterstroke so far as making friends of the gathering was concerned--the insidious coffee bean had proven more mighty than an army in changing the current of their thoughts.
And yet Cuthbert, who saw everything, could not help but notice that not one of these men of the post said anything to Owen, though all of them, from time to time, cast curious glances his way, as though he might be a puzzle they could not solve.
CHAPTER XVI.
A LITTLE WITCH.
After that the post loungers had the good sense to leave our young friends alone, though when they sauntered away most of them either thanked Cuthbert in a courteous French manner for his little treat, or else waved a hand to him, with a broad grin that stood for the same thing in the rough ways of their class.
Still, Owen asked no questions concerning what they had seen and heard when at the office of the old factor; it looked as though he were determined to exhibit not a sign of curiosity, no matter how much he would like to hear all.
So Cuthbert took it upon himself to relate much that had been said, even to the remark made by Mr. Gregory with relation to Owen himself--watching out of the corner of his eye, he saw the other turn rosy red and then grit his teeth firmly, as though repressing his feelings.
"Evidently he will have to be drawn out, for I can see that nothing tempts him to open up of his own free will; and yet he said a while back that he meant to confide his story to us. Now, this thing has gone quite far enough, and if we are to be Owen's best friends and chums it's only right that we know who and what he is, and also how he and the Big Mogul have fallen out. So here goes while the coast is clear, and no stragglers around."
So saying, Cuthbert turned to the Canuck and, smiling, said:
"Owen, my boy, you promised to tell us something about your troubles when an opportunity came. Now, I said then that I didn't want to intrude on your private affairs, but you insisted that we had a right to know; and since we've taken you into the combine as a fellow chum, and you're going to wander with me over a good part of this old planet in time, why, if it's just the same to you, I wouldn't mind hearing all you've got to say now. I confess your coming to this place has excited my curiosity, old chap, because I realize that there's been trouble of some sort between you and Aleck over yonder. Now, he strikes me as not so bad a tyrant as I had somehow imagined, and perhaps the matter might be patched up between you. Remember, we don't want to hear anything that you'd prefer to keep secret--just tell us as much or as little as you think fit. You know we stand ready to give our full sympathy, and back you up to the limit. Now, hit it up, my boy."
Owen drew a big breath, as though he had to nerve himself to speak of these things to strangers; for he had hugged his troubles to his own breast these many years, and they had evidently become sensitive subjects with him.
But the ready sympathy which he saw upon the countenances of his comrades was a new sensation to the lonely lad, and he had no further hesitation about opening his heart to them.
"Don't make any mistake in the start, boys, for the trouble that lies between Alexander Gregory and myself can never be patched up, though if he had his way it would be. But I can never forget that his iron will embittered the whole of my poor mother's life. I've seen her cry many the time, and under my breath I cursed that hard-hearted old Scotchman, who, because his daughter married a man against whom he chanced to have a spite, refused to forgive. He's a cold-blooded monster, that's what he is, and I would tell him so to his face."
"I suspected that he bore that relationship to you--grandfather--there's considerable about your faces that gives the secret away," remarked Cuthbert.
"I may look like him in face, but thank Heaven I'm a true Dugdale in my feelings. I know you'll forgive me if I make the story short, because it rouses up the old feelings inside, and sad memories always make me hate him more and more.
"After my mother and father died, which was less than a year ago, he heard of it somehow, and has tried to make up with me ever since, sending messages with letters, asking me to come and live with him; but his repentance came too late, for she was not here to know that he was sorry; and I utterly refused to even hold any correspondence with the man who would have let his own child go hungry or freeze to death because she would not come and ask his forgiveness, something my father would never hear of.
"Well, what do you think, finding that I wouldn't come to him of my own free will, this domineering ruler of the Saskatchewan sent a party of his halfbreeds up to the region where I was trapping and kidnapped me outright--yes, I was carried a prisoner in their boat to this post, and actually confined in a cabin as if I had been guilty of a crime. He had the nerve to send me word that it had all been done without his knowledge, his men thinking they were doing him a favor, and that he would see me in the morning, when he hoped explanations might bring about an understanding between us--if I persisted in my determination to have nothing to do with him, I would then be at liberty to depart.
"I never so much as sent him an answer, I was so furious at being dragged to his post like a wretch who had robbed traps; but during the night I found a way to escape from the cabin, and taking an old canoe, I fled down the river. The rest you know already. That is my story in a nutshell, boys. I could talk for hours, and even then fail to tell you all I've gone through since I was a little shaver, for I soon learned the sad story of my mother, and how she had suffered because her father refused to forgive.
"My father was only a timber-cruiser, a man with little education, but an honest man at that. He was never able to make much more than a living, and we have many times gone hungry, while he was storing up treasures year by year, to be lavished upon his one other daughter, who married to please him. But we'd rather died there in the bush than ask a favor of him, my dad was that proud, and hated Alexander Gregory so for his injustice.
"You understand now what I risked in coming back here; but when I reasoned it all out in cold blood I saw that he could not keep me against my will, for he's never been appointed my guardian that I know of; so I determined to come, and stick with you, no matter what happened."
"You mentioned another daughter--is she with him still?" asked Cuthbert, who had a reason for the question.
"No, I understand that she was also taken away several years ago; her husband turned out to be a bad man, and had to get out of the country, because Mr. Gregory had sworn to shoot him on sight for good reasons. So, you see, that stubborn will of his, that wanted to bend everything his way, has not brought him very much of happiness. Still, it's just what he deserves, and I'm not sorry one bit."
"Did the other daughter have any children?" pursued Cuthbert.
"I don't know; but what makes you ask?" said Owen, raising his eyes quickly, to look his comrade in the face.
"Because, unless I am very much mistaken, I heard a girl's laugh in that big cabin where he has his home, a merry laugh that somehow made me feel as if I wanted to join in with a ha-ha of my own. If that is so she's your cousin, Owen."
That was indeed a master stroke on Cuthbert's part, and well played, too.
Owen looked startled.
"Cousin--a girl--related to me," he muttered, as if unable to quite grasp the immensity of the thing; then a flush crept over his swarthy face, as though the new thought was more or less pleasing to him; for, poor lad, he had of late believed himself to be utterly alone in the big world, saving this hard-hearted grandfather, whom he refused to recognize.
This gave him new food for reflection; and the young philosopher who had shot the shaft fancied that the intelligence might have more or less influence in determining his future relations with the factor--the human heart craves sympathy above all things, and this can seldom come so well from strangers as from those of the same family--blood is ever thicker than water.
Owen went about the preparations for the night, arranging the cots for his two comrades, and his own humble blanket bed; but evidently he was wrapped in deep thought, and Cuthbert believed he had set a current in motion that was bound to have much influence over the other's future.
If he could only arrange to have Owen meet the owner of that merry laugh, he fancied the rest would be easy.
With this idea in his mind he sauntered in the direction of the factor's headquarters, half-meaning to secure another interview with the other, at which, perhaps, matters might be threshed out, and light let in where all was darkness now.
He changed his mind, however, when he saw that Mr. Gregory was busy with some of his employes, who had come down the river in a big batteau while the boys were eating their supper, and evidently had brought news of considerable importance, since they immediately sought an interview with the chief; and when Cuthbert glanced in through the open door their heads were close together over some sort of a map which one of them was explaining.
Nevertheless, Cuthbert could not refrain from keeping his eyes about, in the hope that by a lucky chance he might discover the one who laughed; and just as he was about to turn back to the camp of his friends he did catch a sound that immediately fastened his attention, only instead of merriment, it was rather a lugubrious little song, sung half under the breath--a song that possibly had the power to bring before the mind of the singer the face of the dear mother who had taught her to sing it, a song that affected even Cuthbert as he stood with bowed head and harkened.
Presently the sound ceased, and he heard a flutter near by, when looking that way he caught a glimpse of a little figure passing into the rear of the cabin; as the door was open he could see what appeared to be a girl of some six or seven, slight of figure, and with the golden hair and the face of an angel.
Cuthbert laughed to himself as he looked, for he was thinking of his friend Owen, and what a change would come over him when he made the acquaintance of this little fairy of the wilderness.
He now sauntered over to where some of the trappers and _voyageurs_ had a fire, at which they had evidently cooked their supper earlier in the night and about which they were now reclining, smoking pipes, and exchanging stories connected with the wild life led by all.
No one paid any particular attention to the lad, save to give him a place at the fire and offer him a tobacco pouch, which, of course, he declined, saying to the amazement of these inveterate smokers that he had never learned the art of indulging in the weed.
He understood enough of the French _patois_ to follow what was said, and felt more or less interest in the weird tales they spun concerning the astonishing wonders of the Great Lone Land, which he, in his audacity, had been tempted to venture into alone, bent on exploration--he realized now that it would surely have proven his tomb had he been allowed to proceed thither, convoyed only by the faithful Eli, who was ready to follow him to the uttermost parts of the earth without question.
Presently, when he had broken the ice by becoming a little familiar with his neighbor on the right, a rather pleasant-faced fellow in the picturesque uniform of the Hudson Bay Company, he ventured to ask about the sweet little singer, whose voice had charmed his ear; and, as he suspected, it turned out that she was a child of the factor's younger daughter, her name, Jessie (which was Scotch enough to please Cuthbert's romantic fancy) and that she had always been at the post, a gleam of sunshine, for whom any of them would willingly have died.
Cuthbert was more than pleased with his discoveries, for he believed that it would, after all, not be so very difficult to bring about some sort of a reconciliation between the young Canadian and his ancestor, the old factor, whose heart had lost much of its flinty nature long since under the ministrations of this little golden-haired witch, and was really hungering to remedy his conduct of the past as far as possible.
If he did nothing more than joining these two, Cuthbert could congratulate himself that his mission to the great Saskatchewan region had not been in vain.
He hunted Eli up at once, determined to form some sort of plan whereby such a desirable end might be attained.
Fortunately, Eli was alone in their tent, and when the other questioned him before speaking, not wishing Owen to hear them discussing his affairs, Cuthbert learned that the third member of the party had gone out quite a while before, saying that he would return by the time they were thinking of retiring.
Cuthbert fancied that it was the mention of the little cousin that had affected him so; perhaps even at that moment Owen was hovering about the headquarters of the factor, in the hope of getting a glimpse of the owner of the sweet voice.
So Eli was placed in possession of all the facts as learned by his chum, and as of old they discussed the situation, for while the boy from the lumber regions lacked the education and polish that were Cuthbert's birthright, he did possess a shrewd mind and had homely ideas of what was good and true--this had been the very thing that attracted the Virginian to him in the start, and the more he saw of Eli the stronger grew his affection, until it bade fair to become another David and Jonathan relationship.
On his part Eli was more excited than usual, because he had made a discovery during his friend's absence, which was to the effect that certain specimens of ore which he had somehow managed to pick up and thrust into his pockets while in the woods were very rich with a greenish mineral which Eli knew well enough to be virgin copper, and he felt convinced that he had at last struck the bonanza for which he had so long been searching--a genuine copper lode.
When they had partly arranged their intended plan of action and fixed matters so that on the morrow they could open the game, the two young conspirators began to get ready for turning in.
There was certainly no need of keeping watch here, for they were in the stockade bounds of the fort and within a biscuit toss of the factor's headquarters; surely no prowler would dare molest them here, and if he did there would always be the chances of his running up against a 30-30 from the forceful little Marlin repeater that must discourage his sneaking propensities.
Once they had heard a great disturbance around on the other side of the main building, with many loud excited voices chiming in, but Cuthbert, believing that the affair did not concern them and was probably only a dispute among some of the unruly employes of the trading company, restrained the impulsive Eli, who was for bolting out and learning the cause of the fracas.
Where could Owen be?
Surely the boy would not sneak away, after so boldly accompanying them to the Hudson Bay post--he had as much as promised to stick by them up to the time they expected to return to civilization, and if Cuthbert was any judge of human nature Owen Dugdale was not the one to go back on his word.
And it was very unlikely that anything could have happened to him off in the dense forest, where he was so much at home--the men connected with the post were now aware that the factor frowned upon such a thing as kidnapping one who showed the utmost reluctance to visit his relative, and consequently they would leave him severely alone from this time on, and as for the timber cruiser, he knew the bond of blood existing between the lad and the stern old factor, and with the inevitable consequences staring him in the face if he raised his hand again toward Owen, he would not dare arouse the ire of Alexander Gregory for anything.
CHAPTER XVII.
SEEN THROUGH THE OPEN DOOR.
Owen Dugdale had been more deeply affected by what his friend had said about the little witch of the fort than even Cuthbert suspected.
Somehow the lonely lad had never conceived of such a possibility as having a cousin to love, and when he heard of it for the first time he was staggered by the change this seemed to make in affairs.
Unable to properly ponder over the matter within the tent where Eli would naturally be wanting to ask ordinary questions that must disturb his mental scrutiny, he determined to go by himself and spend an hour or so threshing matters out once and for all.
This hatred for the old factor had become so much a part of his nature that he was able to only see one side of the case, and for the first time in his life he found himself beginning to entertain a slight suspicion that he had purposely blinded his eyes to facts that might present a different aspect to things.
Memories of his sainted mother arose to haunt him; perhaps the incident of little Sallie and her conception of her "duty" by her brute of a father, just because she had promised the mother who was gone to watch over him, had awakened these thoughts afresh, for Owen, too, had promised to try and overcome his hard feelings for the old factor, though as yet without making any progress.
Still, tonight he seemed to be in a more amiable mood than for a long time.
Before his mind arose the last scene, when he knelt beside his widowed mother, and heard her whispered prayer that he might grow up to be a noble man, free from the accursed Gregory spirit that had helped to make her own life unhappy.
Had he made an earnest effort that way?
Owen felt conscience-stricken when he remembered that he never once thought of his angel mother without a feeling of bitter animosity toward the unrelenting parent who had driven her forth when she married against his will.
And now a new factor had been sprung upon him in the shape of this cousin!
Who was she and what could she be like?
He knew there had been another daughter, just as he had told Cuthbert, who had married the man her father picked out, only to suffer as all ill-used wives do; until matters went too far and Alexander Gregory had driven him out of the region.
This daughter then had enjoyed all that money could secure for her during the few years she lived after her child came, so that the little one must be looked upon as the heiress of all the old factor's wealth; and he was said to have accumulated much of this world's goods during his life on the Saskatchewan.
But this interested Owen not a particle, for he was quite free from any desire to share in the old man's money.
Whoever this girl might be, she was welcome to all the factor possessed, for he would never touch a penny, he was bound.
It made him writhe a little to think, however, that the child of one daughter was rolling in wealth, so to speak, while he, the only issue of the other marriage, was like the foxes and had hardly more than a hole wherein to lay his head.
Still, she was a girl, while he as a hardy boy felt no need of comfort--given a gun and some provisions and he feared not the desolate places of the Great North Land; he had wrested many of Nature's secrets from her bosom and could hold his own in the blizzard's blast as well as the animals.
But he must get by himself to think all this over and fight the battle again, this time for good and all--it might make a difference if there were some one else besides the stern old factor, in whose veins ran the same blood; yes, that was something he had never considered before.
So muttering some sort of an excuse to Eli he had wandered forth into the night.
He, too, had heard of the arrival of the batteau from above, and catching some casual words that were dropped knew there was trouble ahead for the immediate future, since a company of rival fur gatherers had swooped down upon ground that came within the jurisdiction of the Fort Harmony post, though often in dispute, and refused to leave when threatened by the agents of Gregory.
That might mean bloody war, for it so happened once in a while; and in times past scenes of violence had marked many a meeting of these rival companies.
Even this fact did not interest Owen to any extent just now.
At another time he might have felt his pulses thrill with eagerness, for having spent his whole existence in this region, he was naturally impregnated with the spirit that dominated the lives of those who depended upon the gathering of furs for their living, and Owen besides had inherited some of the Gregory combativeness.
He was thinking of that cousin and feeling an eagerness he could not overcome to set eyes on her for himself.
What was she like?
If she looked at all a Gregory he felt sure he could never care for her, since his feeling of intense dislike toward Alexander the factor was too deep-rooted to be easily cast out.
What was to hinder his wandering around near the big house used as an office and storeroom as well as the residence of the factor?
If Cuthbert had done so without attracting attention surely he could, and perhaps he might also be favored with just a little glimpse of the girl.
Even while allowing himself to be lured into this sort of thing by some strange feeling within, Owen was curling his lip sarcastically at the idea of his ever being reconciled to the grandfather who had ruined the lives of his parents, making them so much harder and bitter than would otherwise have been the case.
But with all his animosity toward Dugdale, the timber cruiser who had won the heart of his favorite child, the factor had not been able to fully mar their lives, and Owen knew that true love had reigned in that humble cabin far away beyond the jurisdiction of old Gregory up to the time death took the father and husband away.
Presently he found his footsteps had carried him near the large building and he avoided the office end, as he did not wish it to appear that he was at all curious concerning the grave news brought in by the scouts who had come with the batteau from the upper reaches of the river.
It was in the hope of hearing the same voice which had attracted Cuthbert that brought him close to the rear of the building, where the wing was used as a home by Mr. Gregory.
Lights abounded in various parts of the house, which, being built for the most part of huge logs, weatherbeaten from long years of service, but still substantial, gave evidence of being a comfortable abode; and it was not long ere Owen felt a thrill pass through his being as he caught a sudden burst of childish song, which ceased almost as quickly as it had begun, as though the singer just had to give utterance to her buoyant feelings in such little snatches of music.
Eagerly he waited, hoping that she would again lift up her sweet voice, for it had sounded like the trill of birds in the woodland to his enraptured ear.
Years had passed since this lad had heard a little child's voice in song; or, indeed, any music, for his mother's sad life had not been conducive to merry feelings, and one has to be at least fairly happy to sing.
And when the child again broke forth and caroled a little French lullaby, as though singing to her dolly, Owen stood there, nervously opening and closing his hands, as though enthralled beyond measure.
When the song had died away he could no longer resist the temptation to feast his eyes upon the singer.
This would not be difficult to do, for the door was open, and all that seemed necessary was for him to move still closer and bend forward.
He did not fancy being seen in such an act, no matter how honorable his intention, for these rough dwellers in the wilds have a peculiar code of their own, and spying of any kind is severely frowned down upon.
Nevertheless he could not let the opportunity pass unimproved; and so Owen began to move forward, trying to keep beyond the strongest path of light that flowed from the open door.
When he thrust his head forward and saw the interior of the room he stood there as if frozen into a pillar of ice.
If the spectacle of that little witch with the golden locks had held Cuthbert spellbound, imagine how it affected this lad, who knew he was looking on the only close relative he had in the wide world, saving the factor--who did not count, anyway. He felt as though he could not tear himself away, there was something so fascinating about the small maid and her cunning ways, as she rocked her dolly and went through all the necessary operations required to put a real flesh and blood baby to sleep.
And what made it all the more entrancing to Owen was the unmistakable fact that it seemed to him he must be looking upon the face of his own dearly loved mother when she was a child; for the sister's little one had, as is often the case, resembled the one so much in her anxious mind, rather than herself.
Looking thus upon such a charming picture, was it strange that Owen found himself thinking along certain lines that up to now he would have cast from him with scorn, as an evidence of weakening?
Cuthbert had made no mistake when he concluded that, sooner or later, through the means of this little peacemaker, must the vendetta existing between Owen and his grandfather be brought to a close.
When she had laid her doll carefully down and stroked it gently, just as a real mother might do with her sleeping babe, the child tiptoed about the room, casting many an anxious glance toward the crib, as though fearful lest she awaken the inanimate bundle reposing there--it was so natural that Owen could not smile, even while he was feeling a sudden yearning to know this charming little relative at closer quarters.
In that time he stood there all danger of his wanting to fly once more from the stockade vanished forever; and he even wondered whether his grandfather may not after all have had some such scheme in mind in inviting him to visit him, believing that the presence of this midget, and the fact that she was his own true cousin, would have a wonderfully soothing effect upon the truculent spirit of the boy.
Now she approached the door, as though either drawn by some subtle spirit, or a desire to glance out at the heavens to see what the weather might be.
Owen dared not move for fear lest such action must attract the very attention he was seeking to avoid; so he stood there as though he might be a post, and awaited the outcome with mingled feelings of anxiety and delight.
It was not long in coming, the discovery.
He felt, rather than saw, her gaze fall upon him, and she seemed to stand there in some vague sense of terror at first, as though fearing that the eavesdropper might mean her harm--afterwards Owen understood why she should have this feeling better than he did just then, but it pained him to think that his presence should bring fear to her gentle little heart, and so he smiled.
Although he did not know it himself, when Owen smiled, his face took on an expression that must have given confidence to a skeptic, for as is the case with all persons naturally grave, his countenance was lighted up with the sudden burst of radiance that sprang from his very soul.
The child saw it and immediately her fear seemed to take flight, and she even smiled back at him.
"Come in, boy, and see my new dolly," she said, eagerly; and that was an invitation Owen Dugdale could not have declined under any conditions.
So he who had sworn never again to set foot under the roof of the resident factor walked into his house only too willingly.
CHAPTER XVIII.
OWEN FINDS HIMSELF A PRISONER.
The little girl, with that wonderful intuition that leads children to know who are in full sympathy with their hearts, seemed to need no other guide than that one look into his smiling face, and she was ready to trust him fully. Owen held out his hand impulsively.
"I am your cousin, Owen Dugdale. Perhaps you may have heard of me; and I want to say I'm awful glad to make your acquaintance, Jessie Ferguson. I didn't know I even had a cousin until just a short time ago this night; and I came out on purpose to see what you were like. Look! I carry a picture of my mother in this little waterproof case fastened around my neck. That is what she looked like when she was a very little girl; and you are her image. I'm glad I came back here now; something seemed to whisper to me that it was best, and I know it was her dear spirit speaking to my heart."
The child took the little locket and glanced at the face it contained, at the same time uttering a cry of delight.
"Why, it is my picture. But you said it was your mother--that must have been my Aunt Jessie! And you are my cousin, then? I have heard grandpapa speak of you. But you don't look bad, and he said----" and there she suddenly stopped, while Owen's face flushed angrily with a sudden wave of resentment.
"What did he say--I want you to tell me?" he asked imperiously.
"I wish I hadn't spoken--he said you were a willful, headstrong boy--there; but I think he didn't know you," she answered, clinging to his hand in a confiding way that gave Owen the joy of his life.
With that he laughed, this time aloud.
"I guess he knows the Gregory spirit all right. I am headstrong; yes, and willful, too, for I wouldn't be a Gregory otherwise. But don't let us talk any more about that. Show me your new dolly. I don't know anything about dolls, and never had one in my hands in all my life, for you see we didn't have a little girl in our home, and the neighbors were miles off. But I'd like to know your dolly. I heard you singing her to sleep. Ain't you afraid all this talking might wake her up?" he went on.
"Oh, no. She sleeps so soundly you see. I can do anything with her and she never cries. There, take her for a little while, Cousin Owen. How funny it is to know a real and true cousin. I never met one before; but I wanted to. I get awful lonely sometimes, for you see it's only me and grandpapa at the table; and he is so busy he can't play much with a little girl like me. Won't you stay here and be my real cousin? I don't think I'd mind it much if there was only somebody like you to talk with me. I get so tired being alone; and dolly won't answer me; she lets me do all the talking."
This ingenuous manner of speech, perhaps a trifle oldish in its way for a wee lassie of less than eight, acted like magic upon the heart of the desolate boy, who had known no home ever since his mother passed over to the Far Beyond; he then and there mentally vowed that he would settle this business before he turned in that night; and it was already a foregone conclusion as to what his decision must be--he could not bear the thought that he would never see this little fairy again.
"I'll think of it, Jessie--you'll let me call you cousin, won't you?" he said.
"Why, of course; we are cousins, ain't we? And you must be sure to say you'll stay, because I know grandpapa wants you; he told me so. He is getting old, and we worries a lot about me, just as if anybody would want to run away with a poor little child like me; but I heard him say that if Owen was only here to be with me he'd feel so much more contented. So you see you must stay, because grandpapa wants you to, and I want you ever so much, and dolly--don't hold dolly that way, boy. All the blood will run to her head, poor thing. I'll show you how you must do it," and like a wise little mother she took the imperiled one in her arms, held her close to her heart and began crooning so sweetly that Owen was enraptured more than ever. Here was a revelation, and it had come upon him as suddenly as a shooting star bursts upon the vision of the night watcher, and goes swiftly speeding down the heavens amid the spangled hosts of other worlds.
Owen had not felt so happy in the whole course of his life, for he saw before him a wonderful change in his miserable existence, and a future home amid surroundings so pleasant that he could hardly believe it could be meant for him.
Having quieted the imaginary disturbed dolly she tucked the object of her anxious care into its crib, as if doubting the expediency of allowing her in the clumsy grip of this newly found cousin until he had been given a few lessons on the way to hold little girls' babies.
"Now," she said, having patted the clothes that covered the object of her solicitude with a careful hand, "we can talk a little, if you will be sure not to speak too loud. Grandpapa often wakes her when he comes in, his voice is so awful gruff; but then he never means to and is always so sorry. He grabs us both up, but he kisses me more than he does my poor dolly."
Owen thought grandpapa was a very sensible old man, after all, and that given the opportunity he believed, indeed, he knew, that he would show the same partiality.
He was not quite ready to face the old factor as yet; before that came about he wanted to be by himself and look the matter calmly in the face, so as to decide once and for all, though deep down in his soul the boy knew that this self-scrutiny must be pretty much of a farce, since he would never be content to go away now and see this cunning little fairy cousin no more.
Still, he did not want Alexander Gregory to come in suddenly and find him there, so he considered that, having made the acquaintance of Jessie, he had better leave.
If she chose she could tell the old man of his visit and that would break the matter gently, so that when it came time for Owen to face his grandfather the factor would be prepared to extend the olive branch, if so inclined.
"Now I must be going, Cousin Jessie; I'm glad to have made the acquaintance of your wonderful dolly, but more than that to know you, and I hope to see you again tomorrow. Kiss your dolly for me when she wakes, won't you?" he said, with another of those smiles that had quite won the heart of the demure little maid.
"Why, of course, if you give me one for her," she remarked, without the slightest affectation, and as if it were the most natural thing for one cousin to thus salute another on parting.
Well, he did, with the greatest pleasure he had ever known without any exception, and if the kiss were a bit bunglingly given that could be excused on the plea of lack of experience.
And with the pressure of those rosebud lips against his went the last lingering gleam of Owen's former resolution to hold resentment against the factor, because of his harsh treatment of the mother whose memory he treasured.
So he went out again into the night air, but it was no longer the same Owen as of yore who looked up to the star-bedecked sky--many a time and oft he had found sighs welling from his heart as he contemplated the heavens and speculated upon what little of hope the future held for him; but now he was thrilled with joy and peace such as he had never known.
He sauntered around for a time trying to collect his thoughts, but there were so many things to distract his attention within the great stockade that he concluded it would be advisable to walk outside, where he could be really alone with his reflections.
Before doing so, however, he could not resist the temptation to steal back once more for another glimpse of the little fairy under the factor's roof, so that he could carry the picture with him while he settled the momentous question.
Perhaps he felt a vague sense of its all having been a dream, and wished to thus reassure himself as to the reality.
Be that as it might, some subtle power took him back to the vicinity of the door through which he had first caught his glimpse of Jessie, the flower of Fort Harmony. For the first time he believed the post to be well named, after all.
All seemed to be quiet in that part of the stockade, and as he did not wish any one to see what he was doing, Owen carefully made out to avoid contact with such of the habitues of the post who might still be wandering about.
Thus he came to where he could look through the still open door.
The child was there, and seemed to be holding her precious dolly in her arms as she rocked to and fro in a little chair; and Owen smiled to see that every now and then the diminutive maid would bend down and kiss the inanimate face with the greatest vigor.
Perhaps she was keeping her word and giving dolly the salute this new and "awfully nice" cousin had left for her.
The picture was something worth while carrying with him as he went out to commune with his thoughts and decide on his future.
Owen was just about tearing himself away, much against his will, when he became aware of a strange thing.
Apparently some one else was hovering around that darkened part of the stockade with the express purpose of peeping in at the door and feasting their eyes on the pretty picture disclosed, for he discovered a head between himself and the opening and which certainly did not belong to the old factor by any means.
The man wore a skin cap and must belong to the brigade of trappers working for the company, else why should he be here; but what right had he prowling around at the back of the factor's dwelling at this time of night?
Owen felt indignation taking hold of him, and this was increased tenfold when to his surprise he saw that the individual was actually beginning to glide noiselessly through the doorway.
It may be all very right for a _cousin_ to do this, especially when invited by the little lady of the room to enter and make the acquaintance of her new doll, but in another it must appear a crime.
So Owen stood there, quivering with suspense and indignation, hardly knowing what he ought to do under the circumstances.
Who was this individual and by what right did he dare to enter here?
When the light fell upon his face Owen saw that so far as he was concerned the other was a stranger, and a man with gray streaks in his beard; but that put the boy no wiser than before.
Unconsciously Owen began to advance closer to the open door, as if he believed it might devolve upon him to act as the child's protector, although in one sense it seemed ridiculous to suspect that danger could menace her, here in the domain of her grandfather, the factor, whose word was law.
The man glided forward and seemed to speak to the child, for Owen saw her turn and survey him wonderingly; then it seemed as if she shrank back when the man put out his arms, still speaking in a wheedling tone, and Owen could see Jessie shaking her little head in a decided negative in answer to his questions--evidently the intruder was well known to her, but at the same time she seemed to have no good opinion of him, and again and again repulsed his advances, each time more decidedly, until the man lost all discretion and proceeded to show a different side to his nature.
CHAPTER XIX.
FOR SO IT WAS WRITTEN.
Without warning the man suddenly sprang forward and seized the child in his arms; evidently fearing lest she scream and betray his presence, he instantly clapped one hand over her mouth.
She struggled desperately, but was as an infant in his clutch; and turning, he started to leave the room, evidently expecting to be able to get out of the stockade without being seen, since the hour to close the big gates would not arrive for some little time.
Owen, bursting with indignation and anger, sprang to intercept the man, who up to this very moment had not been aware of the fact that his attempt at kidnapping had been witnessed.
When he felt the hands of the boy upon him the fellow uttered a low but venomous oath, and seeing that he could not defend himself against this enemy with both his hands employed in holding the child, who had now swooned in her terror, he dropped little Jessie to the floor and turned upon his antagonist like an enraged lynx.
Owen was only a half-grown lad, but he had lived a strenuous life, and his muscles were developed to a point where he was almost equal to a man in strength, so that it was no weakling the fellow tackled when he thus fiercely tried to tear himself free so that he could escape ere the factor or some of his minions arrived upon the scene, attracted by the sound of the scuffle.
He struggled desperately, but Owen still clung to him like a leech, bent upon holding him until help came, for he believed this wretch should be punished for his vile attempt to kidnap the sweet child.
Finding that he was having more trouble to break away than he had expected the man resorted to other means of influencing the boy besides brute strength.
"Let go of me, you fool! I am that child's father, Angus Ferguson, d'ye hear? Is it a crime for me to want to see my own? Let go, or by heaven I'll murder you, boy. I know you--I heard the men talking about you, Owen Dugdale, and ye should be the last to try and hold me for that devil, Alexander Gregory. Let go, I say! Do ye not hear them coming? Shall I kill ye here and now?" he cried, hoarsely, as he put forth all his great power to break the other's hold.
Yes, Owen did hear them coming, men on the run, men who were calling out to each other and to the factor to hasten; and he was more than ever determined that this wretch should not escape.
What if he were the father of little Jessie, she and her mother had long ago repudiated him, and his mission here could not but menace the child with evil.
No matter who he was, he must remain to give an account of his intentions to the czar of the region around the Saskatchewan.
So Owen continued to hang on, harkening not to the grumbled threats of the desperate man with whom he wrestled.
All the other now considered was escape, and to that end he was exerting every atom of strength he possessed; twice had he brought his clenched fist into contact with the boy's head; but at such close quarters the blow was not nearly so effective as it would have otherwise been, and at any rate, it only caused him to clench his hands the more rigidly, until it seemed that, like the grip of the bulldog, only death could make him let go.
And it was thus they were found when several men belonging to the company rushed in at the door, headed by the factor himself.
They precipitated themselves upon the struggling couple immediately and tore them apart, the factor staring hard first at Owen and then at the other, who was breathing hard from his exertions, yet glaring in rage at the grizzled Scotchman.
One look Gregory took at the figure of little Jessie on the floor and he seemed to comprehend the whole of the man's iniquity.
"Angus Ferguson here! And ye would have kidnapped the child given to me by the court's decree, ye villain! It's nae gude ye would have been intendin' to the wee bairn. I thought ye dead ere now, but its scotched and not killed ye must hae been by that forest fire twa year back. But now I'll see to it that ye do no mair harm in this section. I hae got ye whar I want ye at last, ye contemptible dog," exclaimed the factor, unconsciously in his excitement reverting back in some degree to his brogue.
"Can ye blame the fatherly instinct that urged me to come here, knowing as I did that I took my life in my hand?" growled the other, sullenly.
"Fatherly instinct be hanged. Ye never knew what it was in the past. Always hae ye been a rogue, with a double tongue in your head. Fatherly instinct, in faith, I hae a gude idea ye meant to carry off the child, if naething more than to stab me, whom ye hate like poison?" said Gregory, and his words burned like a scorpion's sting, for the man burst out into a string of oaths.
"And I would have succeeded if it hadn't been for this meddling young fool, this son of the daughter you thrust out of your flinty heart. He held me here, curse him! I defy you, Gregory! Do your worst with me. Not another word do you get out of me now," and he shut his teeth hard as if the tortures of the Inquisition might not force him to speak.
The factor shot one look at Owen, a look that was benign, even full of hearty thanksgiving, and it was evident that by his act of that night the lad had fully bridged the gulf that had lain between them; he held the whip hand now, and it would be his grandfather who would be suing for forgiveness ere another sun had gone down.
"Fatherly love ye say, Angus Ferguson? I do not believe it. There was another motive that brought ye here the night. My scouts hae told me that ye were with the crowd that camps on our land, and so I know ye are hand and glove with those who are at war with me. It was as a spy ye came here to see what we meant to do. If it were war times ye should meet death for such an act; as it is, the law has a claim on ye, and I'll do my best to see that it is satisfied. Ye shall be kept close in the dungeon under this house until I have a chance to send ye to the headquarters of the mounted police. Men, take him away and see that he is properly searched before ye leave him. I would not put it past the scoundrel to fire the house and burn us all in our beds if so be he could."
While some of the hardly trappers were dragging the prisoner away to confine him according to the directions they had received, Gregory bent over the form of the little girl, whom he took tenderly in his arms and kissed with a passion that told of the hold she had upon his heart.
Jessie was coming to and opened her blue eyes at this moment, shrinking closer to her grandfather and hugging her arms about his neck; then she peeped timidly around as if in search of the bad parent who had tried to get her to desert this precious home she loved so well.
Owen, seeing that she was unharmed, turned to leave, but her eyes caught sight of him and she called his name.
"Cousin Owen, please get my dolly for me; she's afraid to be alone," she said; and obediently the lad stepped forward to obey, while old Gregory smiled to see that the little queen of the post had found another loyal subject who was ready to cater abjectly to her petty whims.
"Boy," he said, as Owen flashed him a glance ere going out; "I must see you in the morning. You must not think of going hence, for here you belong to this little girl and to me! Stay with us; let us show by our love what sorrow for the past has done for me. Your act this night has bound you to us in chains that must not be lightly broken. Owen, lad, you will find that the old iron spirit can be easily bent now. Do not leave us; we need you, both Jessie and I."
Owen felt a lump in his throat, and tears in his eyes, which seemed to him such a childish sensation that he could not bear they should notice it; so abruptly wheeling he dashed from the room. But as he went he heard that sweet childish voice calling after him:
"Cousin Owen, say you will stay, please; we want you, dolly and me!"
He was shaking with the emotion that had almost overpowered him and yet his boyish heart seemed to be filled with satisfaction and delight over the way all things had come about.
That strong and desperate man had not been able to make him yield an inch, and yet here he was ready to fall down and admit himself a prisoner, simply because a child had called him "cousin."
He felt that he could not go back to the tent while in such a disturbed state of mind, and accordingly wandered away to where he might be alone, with the quiet stars looking down upon him from above.
How many times in the past had he stood under this same starry heavens and wrestled with the problems that beset his way; but never with the tingling sensation of new-found happiness that now filled his whole being.
As he stood there in the stillness some distance away from the outer walls of the grim stockade Owen seemed to feel that the spirit of his gentle mother was with him again, and he knew she would approve of the resolve he had made since learning about the cousin, of whose existence up to now he had never known.
And while he stood there a star swept like a glorious meteor across the wide expanse of the night sky, filling his soul with awe, for it seemed to him as though he had thus been given a sign from heaven that his course met with approval there among the shining ones above.
Long he stood there and pondered, not that he had need to take himself to task, because his course was already mapped out, but the gates of the past had been opened by these discoveries, and he could in imagination see his mother walking about these scenes she had so often described to him, a fair young girl, with golden hair and blue eyes, so like the cherub who was doubtless still in the loving arms of her doting grandfather, the stern czar of the Hudson Bay post.
So had it all come out right, events being guided by some mysterious power that shaped them to the best end, and Owen was satisfied.
When he finally turned about, since the hour was getting very late, and started to once more enter through the gates which would soon be closed, he heaved a sigh, but not of anxiety or grief; rather did his spirit rejoice that the long battle with his better nature was over at last and that the right had won out.
How wonderful were the ways of Providence after all, and how small must the plans of mortal man seem in comparison; he had been brought back to the post really against his will, and yet see what had come of it; already had he been enabled by his presence to save the sweet child from falling into the hands of her unscrupulous father, and thus won the heart of the old factor as he could have done in no other way.
And Owen had not a single regret as he turned in at the gate, and headed for that corner of the stockade where the tent that was to serve them as a shelter had been erected earlier in the evening.
CHAPTER XX.
THE TENT DWELLERS.
Somehow Cuthbert could not get to sleep.
He was constantly thinking of Owen and his fortunes, weaving castles in the air that might be fulfilled, providing the sturdy young Canuck could be convinced that it was right and proper for him to become reconciled with his grandfather, and let bygones be forgotten.
So an hour or two passed.
Cuthbert finally arose and cast his blanket aside, for he had not made use of his sleeping bag on this night.
Stepping out of the tent he looked around; the night was fair and not a sign of trouble could be detected in atmosphere or sky, for the heavenly monitors shone overhead with their usual brilliancy, and there was not much of a tang in the drowsy night wind.
Cuthbert thought it suspiciously quiet, knowing how it often grows calm before a storm.
Really he was beginning to feel worried a bit about the non-appearance of Owen, when he caught the soft sound of footsteps and the object of his solicitude appeared close by.
"Hello, keeping watch?" he asked, a little surprised to find one of his companions up and looking around.
"No, I just happened to wake up, and not finding you in the shack, crept out to take a peep around, and see if there was any sign of your coming. I had begun to fear our mutual friends, Stackpole and Dubois, might have waylaid you, old fellow; but now I see I was wrong. You've been taking a bit of exercise, no doubt--didn't get enough on our way here, eh? It did me up, all right, and I was glad to drop down and rest. Now you're in camp I'll resume my nap," answered Cuthbert, leaving it to the other as to whether he wanted to explain.
Owen seemed a trifle confused, but he was a straightforward fellow and without a trace of guile in his make-up.
"To confess the truth, Cuthbert, I hung around for a long time to get a glimpse of that little cousin you spoke of, and fortune was kind enough to let me see her several times. Just as you say, she looks like a fairy and somehow made me think of a picture I have of my mother when she was young. I had quite a little talk with her, too, which made it very pleasant. And while I'm about it I might as well own up that the sight of her, together with the thoughts swarming into my mind, caused me to finally wander off into the woods, where alone I could fight the whole thing out and come to such a conclusion as the mother I loved would have had me do. It's been a hard tussle, I tell you, but I think I've won out," he said, with a quiver in his voice, and it was easy to see that the lad had been recently racked by emotions that for some time he had succeeded in keeping under restraint.
Cuthbert understood better than words could have told him what the nature of that battle under the stars must have been, and to show his sympathy for this new but dear chum he impulsively thrust out his hand and gripped that of Owen.
"I'm awful glad to know it--say no more, old fellow, for I can give a pretty good guess how it turned out. Come, tumble into your blankets and get some of your beauty sleep. There's another day coming, when I hope all of these twists and misunderstandings may be smoothed out and everything look bully. Now, crawl in and feel for your nest--it's on the side to the right, first blanket."
"Wait a bit," said Owen, "there's something else you ought to know. Perhaps you heard all that racket awhile ago. Well, I was partly the cause of that," and then he went on to tell the wondering Cuthbert what a strange thing had occurred while he was still lingering near the room that held Jessie Ferguson.
The Virginia lad was also pleased, because he knew the reconciliation could not be much longer delayed, and presently he lay down once more to sleep.
Owen was accustomed to turning in all standing, as a sailor would say--that is, with simply pulling off his boots or moccasins, whichever he chanced to be wearing, for a life in the woods does not allow of the customary preparations for bed; even the other two boys only removed their outer garments, though when the weather had been milder Cuthbert had indulged in the delight of pajamas; but the first frost had chilled his ardor in that line, and he had gradually come to copying Eli, who had the habits of the loggers of the great Michigan woods and waived all ceremony.
When ten minutes had passed Cuthbert fancied from the regular breathing that came from the spot where the Canadian lad lay that he was far along the road to the Land of Nod, and giving a satisfied grunt, he himself turned over, to let himself slip away on the tide.
Those who spend much time in the woods, in camps are restless during the night, and rarely sleep through without once or twice arousing, lifting their head to listen through habit or caution, or even crawling out to renew the fire.
True, there was no need of these things now with our boys, but nevertheless Cuthbert seemed to rest under the impression that it would not be a good thing to break a settled habit, and so along about one o'clock in the morning he poked his head out of the tent to take a perfunctory look around, just as an old and tarry sailor, from habit, jerks his head up while passing along the street of a city, not so much to survey the skyscrapers that tower above him, but from sheer habit of glancing aloft at the shivering sails of the old hooker upon which he labors twenty hours of the day.
He found that the sky was covered with clouds, and there was beginning to be quite some wind--indeed, it may have been a corner of the tent which was whipping monotonously in each rising gust that had aroused him.
Anyhow, he bent down and secured the flapping end, so that it would not awaken the others with its antics, after which he took another survey of the situation and again crawled under cover, convinced that by the dawn they might anticipate a storm of some kind.
It was a bit pleasant to know that they were now in such a decent sort of shelter and could keep quite dry, no matter how the rain came down, and if it so happened that the first real touch of winter was sprung upon them, why surely it would not be hard to keep cozy, with plenty of wood to burn and a storehouse so close at hand, from which any amount of provisions could be obtained, since he possessed the "open sesame" in the way of cash.
He thought he heard Owen move as he crawled back into the tent again, but was not quite positive, and he did not want to arouse both of the others, in case they were asleep, by asking questions.
The last he remembered after that for some time was of lying there and listening to the increasing moan of the wind among the tops of the great hemlocks that stood close by the corner of the stockade; it seemed after a time like a lullaby soothing him to sleep, for Cuthbert was too old a hand at this sort of game to allow himself to grow nervous over the coming of a little whirl, such as this no doubt would prove to be.
Then he lost consciousness and slept heavily, unmindful of the wind, the mournful hoot of a great northern owl in the dead tree nearby, or even the howls of big gray timber wolves grown bold with the nearness of winter.
CHAPTER XXI
AT DEAD OF NIGHT.
Some one, violently shaking him, brought Cuthbert once more to his senses, and he aroused to the fact that it was Eli, who kept shouting in his ear:
"Wake up--wake up, there's the dickens to pay--pile out and help, old man--they need us bad--get up, I say, get up!"
That was certainly quite sufficient to thoroughly arouse any one, no matter if he had been a sluggard, and surely Cuthbert could never be called that; so, with a toss of the blankets, he scrambled to his feet; then, remembering that he was in his socks, he hastened to snatch up his boots and pull them on.
All this only took a few seconds of time, but during the brief period Cuthbert was dazed with the awful clamor that was making the welkin ring without, for it seemed as though every known sound had been accumulated to help carry out the idea that Gabriel was blowing his last trumpet, with the end of the world close at hand.
He knew men were shouting madly, and from the voices it was plain that those who thus gave tongue were both Cree Indians and Canadian _voyageurs_, for the latter had gone back to their French tongue with the advent of excitement--then it struck the Virginia lad that another sound which he had heard was very much along the line of the roaring flames, and immediately the conviction forced itself upon him that in some manner the forest close by had been fired, perhaps by some enemy of the factor, such as Dubois or Stackpole, and that there was danger of the conflagration leaping the barrier and attacking the houses within the compound.
No sooner had he thrust his nose outside the tent than he gave utterance to an exclamation of mingled surprise and consternation.
It was a fire all right, but not of the species he had suspected--the roaring sound was produced by the wind whipping the flames into the angry flood, but it was hewn timber, not erect trees, that were ablaze, one of the houses, in fact, with an end a seething mass of flames.
Cuthbert knew not what to think, save that possibly some enemy had done this; but he was quick to lend his aid to save whatever the contents might be.
Accordingly he hastened in that quarter.
Already he had discovered that while he slept a storm had swept down upon the region of the Saskatchewan, and was howling through the forest and over the waters with demoniac glee, though as yet not a drop of rain had fallen, or a flake of snow descended, though one or the other must come in time.
But that mad breeze was a bad thing for a fire, since it would whip the flames until they tore loose from all human control, to carry ruin in their train.
Cuthbert was not alone in his rush toward the burning building, since from various directions human figures were to be seen centering in that quarter, for the employes of the fur company were certainly loyal and willing to do all that men might in order to save property or lives.
At first Cuthbert imagined that it was the storehouse, and while the burning of its contents might cause some inconvenience, there was still time to replenish the stock before winter set in fully, so that it seemed to be only a question of a money loss at the most.
But as he advanced, his eyes trying to pierce the cloud of smoke that hung all about the burning building, he began to sense the import of the wild cries that were being uttered about him, a Cree shouting to a _voyageur_, or it might be one of the French halfbreeds to a fellow, and as the nature of their shouts broke in upon his intelligence, he felt a new thrill of alarm.
It was not the store building, but the residence portion that was afire, and Cuthbert remembered like a flash that the little cousin of Owen had her quarters there, as well as the old factor.
He looked around hurriedly, expecting to see both close by, but to his horror failed to do so.
What could it mean--where was the sturdy head of the post, the Scotchman, who, despite his age, had seemed to the boys so like an oak--was it possible, after all, there could be something fiendish back of this conflagration, and that Alexander Gregory had been first of all stricken in his house before the match was applied?
It was an awful thought, enough to make Cuthbert's blood run cold, but before he could communicate his fears to any one he heard a roar as of a lion, and saw the factor come tumbling through smoke and flame--he rolled over upon the earth once or twice, while the Virginia lad fairly held his breath in suspense, fearing that the valiant old chap might have received his death wound while battling with the flames; then, to the delight of Cuthbert, the factor struggled to his feet and began to hobble around as if he had a broken leg, meanwhile shouting out orders in that foghorn voice that made men spring to obey.
But the little one. Where was she? The factor evidently believed Jessie must have come forth some time back, for he was not ordering the men to _try_ and save the stricken building, but to devote their energies toward keeping the flames away from the storehouse.
Even as Cuthbert watched as in a dream he saw the factor try to walk, but immediately fall down, to be assisted to his feet again by a couple of the men.
Then came a flying figure up to his side--it was Owen, who had once vowed never to speak to this relative again so long as he lived, but whom Cuthbert knew had just recently repented of this resolution and was ready to meet his grandfather half way in the morning.
He seemed to seize upon the old man and shout something at him--just what it was Cuthbert could not hear, so furious was the whoop of the wind and the roar of the sweeping flames; but he guessed it to the dot, for he knew beyond a doubt that the Canadian lad was demanding to be told where the girl slept, for she had not been seen since the fire broke out.
Old Gregory became a frantic man on the spot, for his whole life was wrapped up in the little fairy; he tried to rush forward himself, but went down in a heap, struggled to his knees, with Owen gripping his arm fiercely and continuing to shrill that question into his ear, until at last in despair the old factor thrust out his hand and with quivering finger pointed at the end of the burning domicil, being utterly unable to frame a single word, speech failing him.
It was quite enough for Owen.
Like an arrow shot from the bow he sped straight into the smoke and flame.
Cuthbert gave a gasp and feared he had seen the last of his new chum, but he felt a thrill of admiration because of the daring act--it was worth while to realize that his first estimation of the Canadian lad had been correct, and that when the occasion called for an exhibition of valor Owen had risen to meet it in a way that must excite admiration among all men who honored true bravery.
The picture was one that would never fade from the mind of Cuthbert--leaning up against one of the palisades Alexander Gregory seemed turned into stone, as he watched the spot where the lad had vanished, wringing his hands in the intensity of his anxiety--twice he made a spasmodic movement as though intending to hobble forward and plunge into that vortex of fierce flame himself, but each time a groan was forced from his lips when he discovered that his leg was really useless, the sprain being serious.
Cuthbert wished he knew of something that he could do to assist, but since the other had vanished there was no sign, and to simply follow after him would mean a triple tragedy, an altogether useless sacrifice.
Eli was at his elbow and together they pushed as close to the burning walls as possible, eagerly scanning the windows above for the first sign of Owen and meanwhile shouting at some halfbreeds, who were staggering under the weight of a ladder which they had found close by and guessed might be useful in some sort of an emergency.
Cuthbert held his breath.
He really had very little hope of ever seeing his new friend again, for there did not seem to be one chance in a dozen for any one to issue forth from that fiery furnace alive, since this was not the day of miracles.
It was like an age to him, though in all probability but a minute had really crept by since Owen vanished through the doorway, and yet during that interval the fire had gained more headway, despite all efforts of the gathered employes of the Hudson Bay Company to smother it with water, pumped through a hose and by means of an old hand engine kept against just such an emergency.
A hand gripped Cuthbert's arm and turning his head quickly he found that it was Eli who had thus unconsciously caught hold of him--possibly the tremendous excitement had weakened the backwoods lad, so that he clutched at support; but he was staring upward toward one of the windows, as though some movement might have caught his attention there.
His campmate naturally enough cast his eyes in the same quarter, as if sudden hope had sprung into existence; but it was to see the flames shoot out of the window in a manner that must have utterly precluded the possibility of Owen making an exit there.
Cuthbert groaned aloud, filled with dismay--it was a horrible thought thus thrust upon his mind, for there is something unusually agonizing in a death by fire; and it seemed as though the last chance had gone when the demon of the flames thrust his grinning visage out of that window.
Then Eli gave vent to a sudden shout close to his ear, so that he heard what was said even above the frightful roar of the wind and crackle of flames:
"The roof--look up yonder over the eaves--hurra, he's got her--bully for Owen, I say!" was what Eli shrieked.
Wonderful to say, the brave Canadian lad had indeed pushed out through some sort of trap or scuttle in the sloping roof, the presence of which seemed to be unknown to him; and just as Eli had declared, he was carrying a little limp figure in his stout and willing arms, none other than his cousin Jessie, the darling of the old factor's heart.
Cuthbert was stricken dumb for the moment, it all seemed so like the hand of Providence directing things so that the wandering boy might come into his own.
Gregory gave out a cry that was more like a roar of exultation, for he had been down in the depths of despair, and the sight of his lissome lassie still in the land of the living acted like a spur upon him--he stretched out his arms in the direction of those upon the roof, and again endeavored to hasten toward them, only to fall over once more helpless upon the ground.
Then Cuthbert awoke to the fact that while his chum had done a bold thing, and for the moment cheated the flames of their intended sacrifice, he was not yet safe, for all around the flashing tongues of fire gathered for a last effort at accomplishing the dread work, so that the twain above seemed hemmed in.
So Cuthbert shouted to those who carried the hose, and forced them to turn the stream of water upon one spot where the fire was weakest; rushing at those who were staggering forward bearing the ladder, he seized hold of the blessed thing and urged them to raise it against the wall at that particular point.
CHAPTER XXII.
CONCLUSION.
Eli was determined to be in the game, too, and while his chum was thus engaged in creating a chance for the escape of the two upon the roof, the boy from the timber region hustled several men forward, bearing armfuls of pelts that others had just drawn from the lower floor of the house--they were especially costly skins, and the lot might be worth a duke's ransom; but at the moment, with those two precious lives in peril, to the anxious factor they were as dross, and he would only too willingly have stood the loss of the whole kit could he by this means have saved the one so dear to his old heart.
With these Eli meant to fashion some sort of buffer, that would break the fall should the couple above find themselves compelled to jump; and it was a splendid scheme to be formed on the spur of that dreadful moment, one that Cuthbert never could forget, or cease to praise.
Meanwhile, he was pretty busily employed at his own affair, placing the ladder against the building, and directing those who had held the hose to keep the stream of water chasing up and down that particular quarter.
Owen could not see everything that was being tried; but he knew fairly well what they intended he should do, and once assured of the presence of the ladder, he did not hesitate about using the same.
What if the fiery fingers did snatch after him as if furious at being cheated of their prey--the blessed stream of water, cold with the frosty breath of the approaching winter, showered about him, and saved them both from even a serious burn.
Cuthbert was waiting at the foot of the ladder, ready to spring up and render quick assistance if it was necessary; but Owen still remained in possession of his powers, and gripped the little girl securely in his arms.
It was as if a new life had suddenly opened up to the lonely lad--this one whom he had saved from the deadly gas and fire was his own kith and kin, daughter of his mother's sister; and the very touch of the girl's senseless form was able to send a thrill of exultation through him.
Cuthbert did not attempt to take the burden from him, for he understood just what it meant for Owen to bring the girl to her grandfather by himself; so he fell in behind, calling to the men to desist with their stream, to turn it upon the storehouse, while others gathered up the costly skins that had been thrown down with such good intent.
Alexander Gregory had struggled to his feet again--little did he heed the pains that accompanied his sprain, even though the misadventure crippled him for the time being, and rendered it difficult to stand without help; for his attention was wholly taken up with that still little form that Owen was hugging in his stalwart and affectionate arms.
Jessie had been almost smothered by the smoke; but her rescuer, knowing how perilous such a thing might be, had been careful to wrap something around her head, so that after that the atmosphere reached her less permeated by noxious gases; and when Owen gained the ground she had so far recovered as to struggle enough to free her head from this enveloping mantle, and make a movement as though desirous of being released.
But Owen, partly overcome himself by the smoke he had taken into his lungs, did not fully understand, and staggering up to the old factor he held out his burden, gasping:
"Here she is, grandfather, safe and sound!"
Cuthbert held his breath, and then suddenly gave vent to a shout of joy; for just as he hoped, even if he did not wholly expect it to occur, the factor, wild with delight and thankfulness, simply stretched his arms and gathered into his embrace both girl and lad.
Owen was a wanderer no more; but had found his own in the heart of his grandsire. It was a splendid ending to the little forest drama, and Cuthbert was the happiest fellow on the face of the earth at that moment; for he had in the short time he had known Owen grown to feel very warmly toward the manly young Canadian, and nothing that could have happened to himself might have given him one-half the pleasure that this final scene did.
Eli was a demonstrative chap, and he just squatted down on the spot and cried for very joy; while he did not know the satisfaction of a home himself, still he could rejoice over the fact that his friend had ceased to belong to the grand order of nomads.
There was still considerable to do, in order to keep the fire within bounds, for while the living quarters of the factor had gone too far to be saved, there remained other buildings, some containing stores of great value, and unless the employes of the company were smart the post would be practically wiped out.
So Cuthbert led them to the assault, and fought fire as valiantly as ever any member of an engine company in a crack tournament could have done in order that his town might win the grand prize offered.
The hose proved valuable enough; but only for the assistance of the wind possibly there might have been another story to tell when the fire finally ceased its mad antics through lack of fuel--it chanced that the breeze was blowing away from the other buildings, and while the stockade caught, it could be easily extinguished.
Of course the factor had met with quite a serious loss; but he seemed to care mighty little about this, since his precious darling had been spared; as far as the other things went they could be easily duplicated before the rigor of winter had fully settled down upon the Saskatchewan country, and he was well able to stand the penalty in dollars and cents.
Then there was the pride he took in the valiant rescue work of Owen; his eyes were continually turning toward the lad with a softened light in their depths, and it was evident that his heart had become exceedingly tender with respect to this wandering son of his daughter.
He several times called Owen to him to ask if he were certain that he had not received serious burns while within the blazing house; to Cuthbert it was plain that this was in part a subterfuge to have the other near him, since his sprained ankle prevented him from moving about.
When morning came he would have a heart-to-heart talk with the lad, and never again must there be a cloud allowed to rise between them--these three were all that were left of the family, now, and they must stick together.
The factor told Cuthbert what might be done to insure them some degree of comfort during the remainder of the night, and with the assistance of the other lads he saw that it was carried out.
An hour later the excitement had all died away; the spot where the house of the factor had stood only contained a pile of ruins, still smouldering, with an occasional tongue of fire shooting upward; but ere dawn this was fully extinguished by a fall of rain.
They never fully settled how the fire had caught; it may have been an accident, but there were those who believed that the prisoner had taken a hint from Alexander Gregory's bitter words and really fired the house; at any rate he had disappeared utterly, whether finding safety in flight or meeting death in the flames none could say.
Mr. Gregory was well enough inside of a week to accompany the boys down the big Saskatchewan to the nearest town where he could obtain those supplies which were needed to replace what the fire had devoured; they had a fine time of it swinging along with a couple of great batteaus, manned by the French-Canadian _voyageurs_, who sang their boat songs as they rowed, and made things merry around the fire at night time.
Cuthbert and Eli hated to part from the chum who had so quickly won his way to their hearts, and they readily promised to come back again to this charming country, when another year rolled around--Eli had his mind set upon working that copper mine, and Cuthbert had promised to see that the necessary capital was secured with which to provide all the paraphernalia such as is used to advantage--if his chum was of the same mind after he had roamed around the world with him.
Owen's little cousin had accompanied grandpa to town, since a "woman's judgment" was considered essential in choosing some of the household effects; and the last glimpse our twain had of dear old Owen, the erstwhile lad, was standing with his arm about Jessie, while the proud factor beamed upon them both, and waved his hat with just as much enthusiasm as the youngsters.
Eli after all never found a chance to develop his copper mine, but with such a chum as Cuthbert ever with him there promised to be small need of his looking to that source as a means of travel; together they have seen nearly all the countries on the map of the world, and at present are doing South America.
Stackpole and Dubois had sense enough to cruise in other timber than that surrounding the trading post.
So Cuthbert after all had found much pleasure in the great Saskatchewan region, even though he failed to map out a new route to Alaska, or learn any of the wonderful secrets hidden in the wide stretches of barrens between the country of the Crees and the Chippewas, and the lonely Hudson Bay.
Many times would his memory go back to the scenes that embraced Owen, the stern old factor, and sweet little Jessie; and again he would live over those days and nights when they were "Canoemates in Canada."
THE END.
End of Project Gutenberg's Canoe Mates in Canada, by St. George Rathborne

= = = PG62301 = = =
CANOEMATES: A STORY OF THE FLORIDA REEF AND EVERGLADES
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[Illustration: SUMNER AT HOME. (Page 18)]
CANOEMATES
A Story of the Florida Reef and Everglades
by
KIRK MUNROE
Author of "The Flamingo Feather" "Derrick Sterling" "Dorymates" "Campmates" etc.
Illustrated
[Illustration]
New York Harper & Brothers, Franklin Square 1893
Copyright, 1892, by HARPER & BROTHERS.
All rights reserved.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER                                                    PAGE
ILLUSTRATIONS.
SUMNER AT HOME                                   _Frontispiece._
"HE RETURNED TO THE BUOY, ON WHICH THE RECENT FUGITIVE WAS NOW SITTING"               "         30
THE "CUPID" AND "PSYCHE" START ON THEIR CRUISE                                       "         32
TORCH-FISHING FOR MULLET                           "         40
THE CANOES ARE GONE                                "         48
"'SOME ONE WAS TRYING TO PULL MY GUN AWAY'"        "         64
A GREAT DISCOVERY                                  "         78
QUORUM IS HAPPY                                    "         84
"TWO PAIRS OF POWERFUL ARMS DRAGGED HIM INTO THE BOAT"                                 "         94
"AS HE STEPPED ASHORE A PLEASANT-FACED YOUNG MAN ADVANCED TO MEET HIM"                    "        108
QUORUM RESIGNS HIMSELF TO FATE                     "        126
QUORUM DANCES A BREAK-DOWN                         "        136
REPAIRING THE "PUNKIN SEED"                        "        168
"HIS WRISTS WERE UNBOUND, AND THE CLOTH THAT ENVELOPED HIS HEAD WAS SNATCHED FROM IT"                                  "        220
"THEY WERE SUDDENLY CONFRONTED BY AN INDIAN ARMED WITH A RIFLE"                      "        248
"THE ORDEAL OF FIRE LASTED BUT A MINUTE"           "        272
SUMNER AND WORTH IN THE SEMINOLE CAMP              "        282
SUMNER RESCUES KO-WIK-A                            "        310
_CANOEMATES._
_A Story of the Everglades._
CHAPTER I.
IN THE FAR SOUTH.
"Really, mother, it doesn't seem as though I could stand it any longer! Life in this place isn't worth living, especially when it's a life of poverty, and what people call 'genteel poverty,' as ours is. Our struggle is for bare existence, and there doesn't seem to be any future to it. If you'd only let me go to New York, I'm sure I could do something there that was worth the doing, but I can't do anything here, and I'd almost rather die than live here any longer!" With this Sumner Rankin flung himself into a chair, and his flushed face was as heavily clouded as though life held nothing of hope or happiness for him.
"Why, my dear boy," exclaimed his mother, standing beside him and smoothing his tumbled brown curls with her cool hands, "what is the matter? I never knew you to speak so bitterly before."
Mrs. Rankin still looked so young and pretty that she might almost be taken for an elder sister of the handsome, seventeen-year-old boy over whom she now bent so tenderly.
To the casual observer the Rankins' home was a very pleasant one. It was a pretty, broad-verandaed cottage nestled in the shadows of a clump of towering cocoanut palms, on the far southern island of Key West. It stood on the outskirts of the town, and so close to the beach that the warm waters of the Mexican Gulf rippling on the coral rocks behind it made a ceaseless melody for its inmates. Jasmine-vines clambered over it, glossy-leaved myrtles, a hedge of night-blooming cereus and other sweet-scented tropical shrubs perfumed the air about it. Through these, looking out from the shaded coolness of the verandas, the eye caught fascinating glimpses of blue waters with white sails constantly passing, and stately men-of-war swinging idly at their moorings. It looked an ideal home; but even in this tropical Eden there was one very large serpent, besides several that were smaller though almost equally annoying. The big one was poverty, and it held the Rankins in its dread embrace as though with no intention of relaxing it.
Mrs. Rankin was the widow of a naval officer who had been stationed at Key West a few years before. He had sent his wife and only child north to escape a dreadful summer of yellow-fever, while he had stayed and died at his post. Shortly before his death Commander Rankin, believing that Key West property was about to increase rapidly in value, had invested all that he had in the little jasmine-clad cottage, expecting to be able to sell it at a handsome profit when his term of service at that station should expire. Thus it was all that remained to his family, and to this haven Mrs. Rankin, sad-eyed and wellnigh broken-hearted, had returned with her boy. The fever had caused real estate to become of so little value that there was no chance of selling the cottage; so they were forced to live in it, and the widow eked out her scanty pension by letting such rooms as she could spare to lodgers. During the pleasant winter season she rarely had difficulty in filling them, but through the long, hot summer months desirable lodgers were few and far between, and the poverty serpent enfolded them closely.
One of the lesser serpents against which the Rankins had to contend was the lack of congenial society; for, with the exception of a few government employés and those whose business compels them to live there, the population of Key West is composed of spongers and wreckers, Cuban and negro cigar-makers. Another was the lack of good schools, and the worst of all was the lack of suitable business openings for Sumner, or "Summer," as his Chinese nurse had called him when he was a baby, and as he had been called ever since on account of his bright face and sunny disposition. He would have loved dearly to go through the Naval Academy and follow the profession that had been his father's, but the Rankins had no political influence, and without that there was no chance. He could not go into a cigar-factory, and though his boyish love of adventure had led him to take several trips on sponging vessels, it was not the business for a gentleman.
Born in China, the boy had, with his mother, followed his naval father to many of the principal ports of the world. Both his father and mother had devoted all their spare time to his education, and thus he was well informed in many branches of which the average boy knows little or nothing. He loved the sea and everything connected with it. From his babyhood he had played with and sailed boats. Now there was no better sailor in Key West than he, nor one more at home among the reefs of those southern waters. He knew the secrets of boat-building from keel to truck, and from stem to stern, while his favorite employment was the whittling out of models, the drawing of sail plans, and the designing of yachts. But nobody wanted yachts in Key West, nor did its sailors care to have improved models for their fishing-boats or sponge-vessels. So Sumner was considered a dreamer, and people said he ought to be doing something besides whittling and idling about home. The boy thought so himself, but what to do and how to set about it were problems the attempted solution of which caused him many an unhappy hour.
On the perfect winter day that he had come home in such a despairing frame of mind, his own life had just been presented in vivid contrast to that of another boy who seemed to have the very things that Sumner most longed for. He had been down to the wharf to see the _Olivette_, the West Indian fast mail-steamer from Tampa, come in. There he had been particularly attracted by a boy somewhat younger than himself, standing with a gentleman, whom Sumner supposed to be his father, on the after-deck. As the steamer neared the wharf this boy amused himself by flinging silver coins into the water for the fun of seeing little negroes dive after them.
"Only think, mother!" exclaimed Sumner in relating this incident, "he threw money away as I would so many pebbles, and didn't seem to value it any more. Just imagine a boy having money to waste like that! And some of those little rascals who dived for it made more in a few minutes than I have to spend in months."
"But, Sumner," said Mrs. Rankin, gravely, "I hope your unhappiness does not arise from jealousy of another's prosperity?"
"Yes, it does, mother," replied the boy, honestly; "though it isn't only because he could throw money away; it is because he has the very thing that I would rather have than anything else in the world--the prettiest, daintiest, cedar sailing canoe that ever was built. I never saw one before, but I've read of them, and studied their plans until I know all about them. She is as different from my old canvas thing as a scow is from a yacht."
"But you thought your canvas canoe very nearly perfect when you built her."
"I know I did, but I have learned better since then, and now it seems as though I should never care to look at it again."
Yet this same despised canvas canoe, which Sumner had built himself the year before without ever having seen one, had been considered both by himself and his friends a masterpiece of naval construction, and he had cruised in her ever since with great satisfaction.
"You have yet to learn, dear, that it is ever so much harder to be satisfied with the things we have than to obtain those for which we long, no matter how far beyond our reach they may seem," said Mrs. Rankin, gently.
"I suppose it is, mother, and I know it is horrid to come to you with my miserable complainings; but I wish I had never seen those canoes--for there were two of them just alike--and I wish wealthy people wouldn't come to Key West with such things. They don't do us any good, and only make us feel our poverty the more keenly. Why, there they are now! Turning in here too! What can they want with us, I wonder? I won't see them at any rate. I've no more use for wealthy snobs than they have for me."
So saying, Sumner left the room by a rear door, and the steps of the approaching visitors sounded on the front veranda.
CHAPTER II.
THREE CANOES, AND THE FATE OF ONE.
As Sumner's mother opened the door, she saw that the gentleman who, politely lifting his hat, asked if she were Mrs. Rankin, was too young to be the father of the boy by his side.
"May I introduce myself as Mr. Tracy Manton, of New York?" he said, when she had answered his question in the affirmative; "and my nephew, Master Worth Manton? We have called to see if we can engage rooms here for a week or so. We will take our meals at the hotel; but we have two canoes that we propose fitting out here for a cruise up the reef, and we want to find a place close to the water where we can keep them in safety, and at the same time be near them. Mr. Merrill advised us to come here, and it looks as though this were exactly the place of which we are in search. So if you can accommodate us we shall esteem it a great favor."
With the remembrance of Sumner's last words, Mrs. Rankin hesitated a moment before replying; whereupon Mr. Manton added: "I trust you are not going to refuse us, for I have set my heart on coming here, and will gladly pay full hotel rates for the accommodation."
"If my vacant rooms suit you I shall be pleased to let you have them at my regular rate, which is all they are worth," answered the widow, quietly, as she reflected on the poverty which would not allow even a mother's feelings to interfere with honorable bread-winning. "Will you step in and look at them?"
"We are in luck, my boy, and our little expedition has begun most prosperously," said Mr. Tracy Manton an hour later, as he and his nephew sat in one of the two pretty back-rooms that they had engaged, surrounded by their belongings, and looking out on the sparkling waters of the Gulf. On the grass of the palm-shaded back yard, and in plain sight from the windows, lay the two canoes that had so excited Sumner's admiration and envy. They were indeed beauties as they lay there divested of their burlap wrappings, and that they were fresh from the builder's hands was shown by their unscratched varnish and gleaming metal fittings. They were fifteen feet long by thirty inches wide amidships, were provided with folding metal centre-boards, metal drop-rudders, foot-and-hand steering gear, water-tight compartments fore and aft, and were decked, with the exception of their roomy cockpits. These were surrounded by stout oak coamings three inches high, sharp-pointed, and flaring outward at the forward ends, but cut down so as to be flush with the deck aft. Beside them lay the confused mass of paddles, sails, spars, canoe tents, rubber aprons, cushions, and cordage, that completed their equipment. They were simply perfect in every detail, and the most beautiful things Sumner Rankin had ever set his eyes upon. At least he thought so, as, returning from a long tramp on which he had tried to walk off his unhappiness, he found them lying in the yard. In spite of his surprise at seeing them there, and a return of his unwelcome feeling of envy, he could not help stopping to admire them and study their details.
"Hello!" exclaimed Mr. Manton, again looking from his window. "There's a chap down there staring his eyes out at our boats. I shouldn't wonder if he were our landlady's son--the one, you know, we were advised to engage as a guide. You wait here while I run down and find out."
So Worth waited and watched from the window to note the result of his uncle's negotiations.
At a first glance one would have said that Worth Manton was an effeminate boy, with a pale face, blue eyes, and fair hair. If, however, the observer looked long enough to note the square chin, the occasional compression of the thin lips, and flash of the eyes, he might form a different opinion. He was the son of Guy Manton, the great Wall Street operator who had made a fortune out of western railroads, and he had all his life been accustomed to lavish luxury. He was rather delicate, and it was largely on his account that his parents had decided to spend a winter at St. Augustine. The boy had taken but slight interest in the gayeties of the Ponce de Leon, nor had he gained any benefit from the chill rain-storms driven in from the ocean by the east winds of midwinter. The doctor had advised his going farther south; and when his uncle Tracy proposed that they make a canoe trip up the great Florida Reef, which lies off the most southerly coast of the United States, Worth had eagerly seconded the proposition, and had finally won the reluctant consent of his parents.
He knew nothing of canoeing, nor did his uncle know much more; but the latter was a good yachtsman, and Worth had had some experience of the same kind, so they felt confident they could manage. They intended to devote some time to studying their craft, and learning their possibilities in the waters about Key West; so two canoes, completely equipped, were ordered from the builder by telegraph. Worth's father promised to charter a yacht, sail down the coast in it, and meet them at Cape Florida about the first of April, and the two would-be canoemen started for Key West full of pleasant anticipations.
Sumner Rankin started at being asked if that were his name, for he had not heard Mr. Manton's step on the grass behind him, and answered rather curtly that it was.
"Well," said the young man, plunging into business at once, as was his habit, "I have been told that you are a first-class sailor, as well as a good reef pilot. My nephew and I are going to cruise up the reef, and I should like to engage your services as boatman and guide. I am willing to pay--"
"It makes no difference what you are willing to pay," interrupted Sumner, with flushed cheeks and flashing eyes. "My services as boatman are not for hire at any price."
With this assertion of his pride, or, as he imagined, of his independence, the boy turned and walked into the house.
"Whew!" whistled Mr. Manton, gazing after the retreating form in amazement. "There's a bit of dynamite for you! Pride and poverty mixed in equal parts do make a most powerful explosive. However, I haven't forgotten my own days of poverty, and can fully appreciate the boy's feelings. I'll try him on a different tack as soon as this little squall has blown over. He and his mother must be different from the majority of the people down here, for they are the first we have met who don't seem to want to make money out of us."
Mr. Tracy Manton had no idea of giving up his purpose of engaging Sumner to accompany them on their trip, for he was the kind of a man who wins his way by sticking to whatever plan he has decided upon, in which respect his nephew Worth strongly resembled him. So the next time he met the lad, which was in the afternoon of the following day, he held out his hand and said: "I beg your pardon for my unintentional rudeness of yesterday, and my forgetfulness of the fact that a gentleman is such, no matter where he is found. Now, I want you to forgive me, forget my offence, and do me a favor. I can't make head or tail of our sails, and they don't seem to me right somehow. If you will come and look at them I shall be greatly obliged."
By this time Sumner was so heartily ashamed of his conduct of the day before that he was only too glad to accept this overture of friendship, and a few minutes later the two were busily discussing the sails of the _Cupid_ and _Psyche_, as the Mantons' canoes were named. The spars were much heavier than they need be, while the sails were of the ill-shaped, unserviceable pattern generally furnished by canoe builders, and these defects were quickly detected by Sumner's experienced eye. When he pointed them out to Mr. Manton, the latter readily comprehended them, but was at a loss how to make the improvements that were evidently demanded.
In order to explain more thoroughly the idea that he wished to convey, Sumner dragged out his own canvas canoe, stepped her masts, and hoisted her sails. They were of a most ingenious and effective lateen pattern, such as Mr. Manton had never before seen.
"Where did you get hold of that idea?" he asked, after studying them carefully a few moments. "It is a capital one."
"I got it partly from an Arab dhow that I once saw off Madagascar, and partly from the feluccas at Civita Vecchia."
"Madagascar and the Mediterranean!" repeated Mr. Manton, in astonishment. "If you have visited both of those places you must have travelled extensively."
"Yes," answered Sumner, quietly, but with a twinkle of amusement in his eye. "The son of a naval officer who attempts to follow his father about the world is apt to see a good bit of it before he gets through."
Mr. Manton, who had known nothing of Sumner's history, no longer wondered that he had been offended at being taken for a boatman whose services could be hired. He was, however, too wise to make further mention of the subject, and merely said,
"Then you have had a splendid chance to study sails." And again turning to the subject under consideration, he asked, "Would you be willing to help us cut out some for our canoes after your models?"
Sumner answered that he would not only be willing but glad to lend every aid in his power towards properly equipping the two canoes for their trip.
In the mean time the sun had set, and the sky was black with an approaching squall that caused them to watch with some uneasiness for Worth's return. He had gone out in one of the canoes, an hour before, for a paddle, and had not since been seen. Just as the storm broke he appeared around a point and headed towards the little landing-place near which they were standing. As his course lay directly in the teeth of the wind, his struggle was long and hard. They watched him anxiously, and more than once Sumner offered to go to the boy's assistance; but his uncle said he wished Worth to learn self-reliance more than anything else, and this was too good a lesson to be spoiled. Finally the young paddler conquered, and, reaching the landing-place in safety, sprang ashore. He was either too exhausted or too careless to properly secure his canoe, and as he stepped from it a spiteful gust of wind struck it full on the side. In another moment it was beyond reach and drifting rapidly out to sea.
Both the Mantons were confused by the suddenness of the mishap. Before they could form any plan for the recovery of the runaway, Sumner had shoved his own canvas canoe into the water, jumped aboard, and was dashing away in pursuit of the truant. He was almost within reach of his prize, and his tiny sail was almost indistinguishable amid the blackness of the squall, when the watchers on shore were horrified to see another and much larger sail come rushing down, dead before the wind, directly towards it. Then the tiny canoe sail disappeared; and as the larger one seemed to sweep over the spot where it had been, the Mantons gazed at each other with faces that betokened the dread they dared not put into words.
CHAPTER III.
SUMNER RECEIVES A SECOND OFFER.
For a few minutes Sumner Rankin's peril was most imminent. He was almost within reach of the drifting canoe, which he had been watching too closely to take note of any other object, when he became conscious of the clumsy, wood-laden schooner rushing down on him before the squall. She was manned by a crew of two negroes, and by the manner in which she yawed, heading one moment this way and the next another, he saw that they had but little control of her movements. In vain did he shout to them to lookout. His voice was lost in the shriek of the wind, and they did not hear him. He tried to cross their bows, and might have succeeded in so doing, but at that moment their main-sail gybed over with a crash, and the heavy craft, looking as large as a man-of-war in comparison with his cockle-shell, headed directly for him. With the next send of the sea the canvas canoe was crushed beneath the ponderous bows, and blotted from existence as though it had been a drifting leaf.
[Illustration: "WITH THE NEXT SEND OF THE SEA THE CANVAS CANOE WAS CRUSHED BENEATH THE PONDEROUS BOWS."]
As Sumner saw the black mass towering above him, and before it could descend, he rose to his feet, and taking a straight header, dived deep into the angry waters. When he again came to the surface he was swimming in the foaming wake of the schooner, and drifting down towards him from the windward was the beautiful cedar canoe which was the cause of all the trouble, and which he had passed in his effort to save his own from destruction. A few strokes took him to her, and with a feeling of devout thankfulness he clutched her gunwale.
Worth Manton, or any other inexperienced canoeman, would have attempted to climb up over the bow or stern, and, sitting astride the slippery deck, to work his way into the cockpit. Such an attempt would have been almost certain to roll the light craft over and fill her with water, in which case she would become wholly unmanageable. But Sumner knew better than to do such a thing. He had practised capsizing so often in his crank canvas canoe that to get into this comparatively broad-beamed and stable craft was the easiest kind of a performance. Seizing hold of the coaming directly amidship, he placed his left hand on the side of the cockpit nearest him, and reaching far over, grasped the other side with his right. Then kicking in the water behind him until his body lay nearly flat on its surface, and bearing as much weight as possible on his right hand, he drew himself squarely across the cockpit, and in another moment was seated in it, without having shipped a drop of water over the coaming.
There was no paddle in the canoe, and though she rode the waves like a cork, she was entirely at the mercy of the wind and tide. Although the squall was passing, the darkness of night was rapidly shutting out all familiar objects, and Sumner was on the point of resigning himself to a night of aimless drifting, with an interesting uncertainty as to when he should be picked up, when a distant shout, that sounded exceedingly like his own name, was borne to his ears. He sent back an answering cry, the shout was repeated, and a few minutes later the shadowy form of the _Psyche_, with Mr. Manton wielding a double-bladed paddle, shot out of the darkness.
"I never was so glad to find any one in my life!" exclaimed the new-comer. "We were afraid that clumsy schooner had run you down. I tell you what, boy, the last ten minutes have been the most anxious I ever passed, and I wouldn't go through with them again for all the canoes in the world. But what has become of your own boat?"
"She has gone to the bottom, like many a good ship before her," replied Sumner; "and it wasn't the fault of those lubbers on the schooner that I didn't go with her. Have you an extra paddle with you?"
"No; I neglected to bring one, and I shall have to take you in tow."
They had already drifted down past the fort that commands the harbor from the south-west point of the island, and as they could not hope to make their way back against wind and tide, they were compelled to work in behind it, and make a landing on the south beach a mile or more from where they started. Here Mr. Manton remained in charge of the canoes, while Sumner ran home to announce his own safety, obtain a change of clothing and another paddle.
He found his mother and Worth in a terrible state of anxiety concerning him; but he made so light of his recent adventure that it was not until after the canoes were brought safely back, an hour later, that they learned the full extent of his recent peril.
This incident seemed to cement a firm friendship between Sumner and the Mantons, and while the former stubbornly refused to accept the recompense for his lost canoe that Mr. Manton tried to force upon him, declaring that it was only his own carelessness in not keeping a sharper lookout, the latter made up his mind that, in spite of his pride, the boy must and should be rewarded in some way for what he had done.
The following week was busily and happily spent in making new sails for the two canoes, rerigging them, and in teaching Worth how to manage his. It struck Sumner as a little curious that, even after the new sails were made, Mr. Manton was always too busy to go out on these practice trips with his nephew, and invariably asked him to take the _Psyche_ and act as instructor in his place. Of course he could not refuse to do this, nor did he have the slightest inclination to do so; for what boy who loved boats would not have jumped at the chance of sailing that dainty craft? How Sumner did appreciate her speed and seaworthy qualities! He raced with every sponger and fisherman in the harbor, and caused their eyes to open with amazement at the ease with which he beat them. How fond he became of the canoe that bore him to so many victories! How, with all his heart, he did wish he were going in her on the cruise up the reef, for which such extensive preparations were being made! Much as he wished this, however, he was very careful not to express the wish to any person except his mother, to whom he always confided all his hopes, fears, and plans. After his refusal of Mr. Manton's offer to accompany them as guide, he would not for anything have let that gentleman know how eagerly he longed to have the offer repeated in such form that his pride would allow him to accept it. Still, as he had no canoe now, it would be impossible for him to go, and there was no use in thinking of it.
So he tried to make the most of his present opportunities, and gain all the pleasure that they held. Nor did he neglect Worth, but instructed him so thoroughly in the art of canoe-handling, that at the end of a week the boy was as much at home in his canoe as he had ever been on a yacht.
One day, as the two beautiful craft, with their perfect setting lateen-sails, were glancing in and out among the anchored sponge fleet on the north side of the island, like white-winged sea-birds, a young sponger, named Rust Norris, called out from one of the boats, "Say, Sumner, come here a minute, will yer?"
As the latter sailed alongside and asked what he wanted, the sponger answered: "I want to try that fancy trick of yourn. Let me take her a few minutes, will yer?"
"No," replied Sumner; "I can't, because she isn't mine to lend. Besides, as you are not accustomed to this style of craft, you couldn't sail her, anyhow; and you'd upset before you had gone a length."
"Oh, I would, would I? Well, I'll bet I can sail anything you can, or any other landlubber that thinks he knows it all because his daddy belonged to the navy."
Then, as Sumner, with a flushed face, but disdaining any reply, sheered off and sailed away, he added, "I'd jest naturally hate myself if I was as mean as you be, Sumner Rankin, and I won't forget your disobligingness in a hurry, neither!"
In the mean time Mr. Manton had studied Sumner's character carefully, and the more he did so the more he was pleased with the boy. He found him to be proud and high-tempered, but also manly, straightforward, and honest to a fault, as well as prompt to act in emergencies, self-reliant, and a thorough sailor. In the course of several conversations with the boy's mother he learned much of Sumner's past history and of his dreams for the future. To her he finally confided a plan, formed on the day that Sumner saved Worth's canoe at the expense of his own, and after some discussion won her assent to it.
It was nothing more nor less than that Sumner should take his place on the proposed cruise up the reef, and act the part of guide, companion, and friend to the younger canoeman.
"I shall not for a second time be guilty of the mistake of trying to hire you to take this cruise," said Mr. Manton, smiling, as he unfolded this plan to Sumner; "but I ask you to do it as a favor to both me and Worth. Indeed, it will be a great favor to me," he added, hastily, as he saw an expression of doubt on the lad's face; "for I really ought to be in New York at this very minute, attending to some important business, which I was only willing to neglect in case Worth could not take this trip without me. Now, however, I am confident that he will be safer with you than he would be with me alone, and if you will take my canoe and accompany him to Cape Florida, where I shall try to meet you about the first of April, you will place me under an obligation. Will you do it?"
CHAPTER IV.
TEACHING A THIEF A LESSON.
Was there ever such a chance to do the very thing he most longed to do offered a boy before? Sumner did not believe there ever had been, and with a quick glance at his mother's smiling face, in which he read her assent to the plan, he answered:
"I don't know how to thank you, sir, for making me such a splendid offer, and not only will I gladly accept it, but I promise to do everything in my power to make Worth have a good time, and see that no harm befalls him. But I wish you were going too. I hate to think of taking your place and depriving you of all the pleasure of the trip."
"My dear boy," replied Mr. Manton, "you must not look at it in that way, for, as I said before, you will be doing me a real favor in taking my place. I am more of a yachtsman than a canoeman anyway, and I look forward with fully as much pleasure to cruising down the Indian River from St. Augustine in the yacht that my brother proposes to charter, and meeting you at Cape Florida, as I should to running up the reef in a canoe. There is one more thing, however. I must insist upon your sailing your own canoe, for I make it a rule never to lend my boats to any one, and you will have enough responsibility in looking after Worth, without having the added one of caring for another person's canoe. So, from this moment, the _Psyche_, and all that she contains, is yours."
"Oh, Mr. Manton!"
"That will do. Not another word," laughed the young man. "I am as obstinate as a mule when I have once made up my mind to a thing, and so there is nothing for you to do but take the canoe, and make the best use you can of her."
Sumner's protests against this generosity were but feeble ones, and were quickly disposed of by Mr. Manton, who simply refused to listen to them. He cut them short by saying, "Now that this matter is settled, and everything is in readiness for a start, I propose that you get off in the morning, for I want to take to-morrow night's steamer for Tampa."
That night, after everybody had gone to bed and the house was still, Sumner lay wide awake, thinking over the good-fortune that had befallen him. At length he could not resist the temptation of getting up, partly dressing himself, and slipping out for a look at his canoe, his very own! the most beautiful craft he had ever seen, and such a one as in his wildest dreams he had never hoped to possess.
The two canoes had been drawn up on the grass not far from the water's edge, and covered with some bits of old canvas. Although it was a moonlit night, the moon was occasionally obscured by drifting clouds, and when Sumner left the house everything was in shadow from this cause. He moved very quietly, for he did not wish any one to know of the weakness that led him to look at something with which he was already familiar, merely because it had acquired the new interest of possession.
To his amazement, when he reached the place where the canoes had been left, he could find but one of them. In vain did he lift the canvas that had covered them both, and look hurriedly about the little yard. One of them was certainly gone, and no trace of it remained. As the boy stood irresolute, wondering what he ought to do, he was startled by a slight splash in the water. At the same moment the cloud passed from the face of the moon, and by the light thus afforded Sumner saw the figure of a man seated in the missing canoe, and cautiously paddling from the shore.
Without an instant's hesitation he slid the remaining canoe over the grass and into the water, sprang into it, seized a paddle, and started in pursuit. Of course the paddler in the first canoe might be one of the Mantons, but Sumner did not believe it was either of them. He thought it more than likely that the stranger was some one who only desired to try the canoe, but it might be a thief. At any rate, the boy determined to discover who he was, and what he meant by his stealthy performance before they were many minutes older.
The stranger did not realize that he was pursued until Sumner had shoved off from shore, and was urging his own craft forward with vigorous strokes of his double-bladed paddle. When, by a glance over his shoulder, he discovered this, he redoubled his efforts to escape, and by his clumsy splashings proved himself a novice in the art of paddling. Still he made fair headway, and it was not until they were several hundred yards from shore that Sumner overtook him.
Here was anchored an immense mooring-buoy, with a round, slightly conical top, having in its centre a great iron ring. It did not rise more than a foot from the surface of the water, and in trying to watch Sumner, the occupant of the leading canoe did not notice it until his light craft struck it a glancing blow, and very nearly upset. The next instant an effort to recover his equilibrium had precipitated the fellow into the water, and as Sumner shot past him he was wildly clutching at the buoy, with desperate efforts to gain its upper surface.
Satisfied that he could not drown so long as he clung to the buoy, Sumner first picked up the drifting canoe. With it in tow he returned to the buoy on which the recent fugitive was now sitting, clinging tightly to the iron ring, and presenting a comical picture of misery.
"Don't leave me here, Sumner!" he cried, in an imploring tone, in which the boy at once recognized the voice of Rust Morris. "I didn't mean no harm. I only just wanted to try the trick, and I meant to put her back again where I found her. Honest I did!"
[Illustration: "HE RETURNED TO THE BUOY, ON WHICH THE RECENT FUGITIVE WAS NOW SITTING."]
"Well, I don't know," replied Sumner, who could not help laughing at the other's plight, in spite of his anger at him for taking the canoe without leave, and his suspicion that it would not have been returned so promptly as Rust claimed it would. "You look quite as comfortable as you deserve to be; besides, you will have a nice quiet chance out here to learn the lesson that it is better to leave other people's property alone than to take it without permission. So, on the whole, I think I will leave you where you are for a while. I did think of having you arrested for stealing, but I guess this will do just as well."
Thus saying, the boy began to paddle towards shore, and at the same time Rust changed his pleading tone to one of bitter invective, uttering loud threats of what he would make Sumner suffer in the future.
Without paying any attention to these, the young canoeman continued on his way to the shore. From there he watched until he saw the dim form of a fishing-boat come silently drifting down the harbor with the tide. As she neared the spot where he knew the buoy with its unwilling occupant to be, he heard shouts, saw the boat alter her course, and stop for a minute. As she again proceeded, and he was satisfied that his prisoner had been rescued, Sumner again went to bed, this time to sleep soundly until morning.
When he related this adventure at breakfast-time, Mr. Manton said he had served the rascal right; but Mrs. Rankin was fearful lest some future mischief should come of it. At this Sumner laughed, and said he thought the lesson would teach Rust Norris to let his things alone in the future, also that he was not afraid of anything the young sponger could do anyhow.
The morning was spent in loading the canoes and in making final preparations for the start. By noon all was in readiness, and after a hasty lunch the two young canoemates stepped aboard their dainty craft. Then, amid a waving of handkerchiefs and a chorus of hearty good-byes from the group of spectators assembled to see them off, they hoisted sail, and bore away on the first reach of what was to prove one of the most eventful and exciting cruises ever undertaken up the Florida Reef.
[Illustration: THE "CUPID" AND "PSYCHE" START ON THEIR CRUISE.]
CHAPTER V.
THE GREAT FLORIDA REEF.
The great Florida Reef, up which our young canoemates had just started on their adventurous cruise, is about 230 miles long. It extends from Cape Florida, on the Atlantic coast, completely around the southern end of the peninsula, and far out into the Gulf of Mexico on the west. The island of Key West lies some 70 miles off the main-land, and about the same distance from the Dry Tortugas, which group of little coral islets forms the western extremity of the reef. Between Key West, on which is a city of the same name containing nearly 20,000 inhabitants, who live farther south than any one else in the United States, and Cape Florida, 150 miles east and north, a multitude of little keys or islands, covered to the water's edge with a dense growth of mangroves and other tropical trees and shrubs, stretch in a continuous line. Between these keys[A] and the main-land lies a vast shallow expanse of water known as the Bay of Florida. Outside of them is the narrow and navigable Hawk Channel, running along their entire length, and bounded on its seaward side by the almost unbroken wall of the outer reef. This rarely rises above the surface, and on it the busy coral insects pursue their ceaseless toil of rock-building. Beyond the reef, between it and the island of Cuba, eighty miles away, pours the mighty flood of the Gulf Stream.
[A] The word "key" is a corruption of the Spanish _Cayo_ or island. Thus Key West was originally "Cayo Hueso," or Bone Island, so called from the quantity of human bones found on it by the first white settlers.
For nearly 300 years these peaceful looking keys, with their bewildering net-work of channels, kept open by the rushing tide-currents, and coral reefs were the chosen resorts of pirates and wreckers, both of whom reaped rich rewards from the unfortunate vessels that fell into their hands. Now the pirates have disappeared, and the business of the wreckers has been largely taken from them by the establishment of a range of light-houses along the outer reef, at intervals of twenty to thirty miles. The first of these is on Loggerhead Key, the outermost of the Tortugas. Then comes Rebecca Shoal, half-way between Loggerhead and Sand Key Light, which is just off Key West. From here the lights in order up the reef are American Shoal, Sombrero, Alligator, Carysfort, and Fowey Rocks, off Cape Florida.
With this chain of flashing beacons to warn mariners of the presence of the dreaded reef, the palmy days of wreckers and beach-combers have passed away, and they must content themselves with what they can make out of the occasional vessels that are still drawn in to the reef by the powerful currents ever setting towards it. Consequently most of those who would otherwise be wreckers have turned their attention to sponging in the waters behind the keys, which form one of the great sponge-fields of the world, or to the raising of pineapples and cocoanuts on such of the islands as afford sufficient soil for this purpose.
There are four ways by which one may sail up the reef. The first is outside in the Gulf Stream, or by "way of the Gulf;" the second is between the reef and the keys, through the Hawk Channel; the third is through the narrow and intricate channels among the keys, or "inside," as the spongers say; and the fourth is the "bay way," or through the shoal waters behind the keys.
Of all these, the third, or inside way, was the one chosen by Sumner as being the most protected from wind and seas, the most picturesque, the one affording the most frequent opportunities for landing, the most interesting, and in every way best adapted to canoes drawing but a few inches of water.
As the _Psyche_ and _Cupid_ are running easily along the north shore of the key before a light southerly breeze, there is time to take a look at the "duffle" with which they are laden. In the first place, each has two lateen-sails, the long yards of which are hoisted on short masts rising but a few feet from the deck. These sails can be hoisted, lowered, or quickly reefed by the canoeman from where he sits. The two halves of the double-bladed paddles are held in metal clips on deck, on either side of the cockpit. Also on deck, securely fastened, is a small folding anchor, the light but strong five-fathom cable of which runs through a ring at the bow, and back to a cleat just inside the forward end of the coaming.
On the floor of each canoe is folded a small tent made of gay-striped awning-cloth, and provided with mosquito-nettings at the openings. Above these are laid the pair of heavy Mackinaw blankets and the rubber poncho that each carries. These, which will be shelter and bedding at night, answer for seats while sailing.
Under the deck, at one side of each cockpit, hangs a double-barrelled shot-gun; and on the other side are half a dozen tiny lockers, in which are stowed a few simple medicines, fishing tackle, matches, an alcohol lamp (Flamme forcé), loaded shells for the guns, etc. In the after-stowage lockers are extra clothing and toilet articles. The _Psyche_ carries the mess-chest, containing a limited supply of table-ware, sugar, coffee, tea, baking-powder, salt, pepper, etc., and a light axe, both of which are stowed at the forward end of the cockpit. The _Cupid_ carries in the same place a two-gallon water-keg and a small, but well-furnished tool chest. The provisions, of which bacon, flour, oatmeal, sea-biscuit, a few cans of baked beans and brown bread, dried apples, syrup, cocoa, condensed milk, corn-meal, rice, and hominy form the staples, and the few necessary cooking utensils, which are made to fit within one another, are evenly divided between the two canoes and stowed under the forward hatches. By Sumner's advice, many things that the Mantons brought with them have been left behind, and everything taken along has been reduced to its smallest possible compass. Besides the shot-gun that Mr. Manton had given him as part of the _Psyche's_ outfit, Sumner was armed with a revolver that had been his father's.
Late in the afternoon they passed the eastern point of the island of Key West, and crossing a broad open space, in the shoal waters of which, but for Sumner's intimate knowledge of the place, even their light canoes would have run aground a dozen times, they approached the cocoanut groves of Boca Chica, a large key on which they proposed to make their first camp.
The western sky was in a glory of flame as they hauled their craft ashore, and from the tinted waters myriads of fish were leaping in all directions, as though intoxicated by the splendor of the scene.
"We will catch some of those fine fellows a little later," said Sumner, as they began to unload their canoes and carry the things to the spot they had already chosen for a camp.
"But it will be dark," protested Worth.
"So much the better. It's ever so much easier to catch fish in the dark than by daylight."
There was plenty of drift-wood on the beach, and in a few minutes the merry blaze of their camp-fire was leaping from a pile of it. While waiting for it to burn down to a bed of coals, each of them drove a couple of stout stakes, and pitched their canoe tents near a clump of tall palms, just back of the fire, looped up the side openings, and spread their blankets beneath them.
"Now let's fly round and get supper," cried Sumner, "for I am as hungry as a kingfish. You put the coffee water on to boil, while I cut some slices of bacon, Worth, and then I'll scramble some eggs, too, for we might as well eat them while they are fresh."
With his back turned to the fire, the former did not notice what Worth was doing, until a hissing sound, accompanied by a cry of dismay, caused him to look round.
"I never saw such a miserable kettle as that!" exclaimed Worth. "Just look; it has fallen all to pieces."
For a moment Sumner could not imagine what had caused such a catastrophe. Then he exclaimed: "I do believe you must have set the kettle on the coals before you put the water into it."
"Of course I did," answered Worth, "so as to let it get hot. And the minute I began to pour water into it, it went all to pieces."
"Experience comes high," said Sumner, "especially when it costs us the loss of our best kettle; but we've got to have it at any price, and I don't believe you'll ever set a kettle on the fire again without first putting water or some other liquid inside of it."
"No, I don't believe I will," answered Worth, ruefully, "if that is what happens."
In spite of this mishap, the supper was successfully cooked, thanks to Sumner's culinary knowledge, and by the time it was over and the dishes had been washed, he pronounced it dark enough to go fishing. First he cut a quantity of slivers from a piece of pitch-pine drift-wood, then, having emptied one of the canoes of its contents, he invited Worth to enter it with him.
"But we haven't a single fish-line ready," protested Worth.
"Oh yes, we have," laughed Sumner, lighting one end of the bundle of pine slivers, and giving it to Worth to hold. "You just sit still and hold that. You'll find out what sort of a fish-line it is in a minute." Then he paddled the canoe very gently a few rods off shore, at the same time bearing down on one gunwale until it was even with the surface of the water. "Look out, here they come!" he shouted.
[Illustration: TORCH-FISHING FOR MULLET.]
CHAPTER VI.
PINEAPPLES AND SPONGES.
The next instant Worth uttered a startled cry and very nearly dropped his torch, as a mullet, leaping from the water, struck him on the side of the head, and fell flapping into the canoe.
"Never mind a little thing like that," cried Sumner. "Hold your torch a trifle lower. That's the kind!"
Now the mullet came thick and fast, attracted to the bright light like moths to a candle-flame. They leaped into the canoe and over it, they fell on its decks and flopped off into the water, they struck the two boys until they felt as though they were being pelted with wet snowballs; and at length one of them, hitting the torch, knocked it from Worth's hand, so that it fell hissing into the water.
The effect of this sudden extinguishing of the light was startling. In an instant the fish ceased to jump, and disappeared, while the recent noisy confusion was succeeded by an intense stillness, only broken by an occasional flap from one of the victims to curiosity that had fallen into the canoe.
"Well, that is the easiest way of fishing I ever heard of," remarked Worth, as they stepped ashore, and turning the canoe over, spilled out fifty or more fine mullet. A dozen of them were cleaned, rubbed with salt, and put away for breakfast. Then the tired canoemates turned in for their first night's sleep in camp.
Sumner's eyes were quickly closed, but Worth found his surroundings so novel that for a long time he lay dreamily awake watching the play of moonlight on the rippling water, listening to the splash of jumping fish, the music of little waves on the shell-strewn beach, and the ceaseless rustle of the great palm leaves above him. At length his wakefulness merged into dreams, and when he next opened his eyes it was broad daylight, the sun had just risen, and Sumner was building a fire.
"Hurrah, Worth! Tumble out of bed and tumble into the water," he called at that moment. "There's just time for a dip in the briny before this fire'll be ready for those fish." Suiting his actions to his words, he began pulling off his clothes, and a minute later the two boys were diving into the cool water like a couple of frisky young porpoises.
Oatmeal and syrup, fresh mullet, bread-and-butter (which they had brought from home), and coffee, formed a breakfast that Sumner declared fit for a railroad king.
The sun was not more than an hour high before they were again under way, this time working hard at their paddles, as the breeze had not yet sprung up. Having left their first camp behind them, they felt that their long cruise had indeed begun in earnest.
For the next three days they threaded their way, under sail or paddle, among such numberless keys and through such a maze of narrow channels, that it seemed to Worth as though they were entangled in a labyrinth from which they would never be able to extricate themselves. Whenever a long sand-spit or reef shot out from the north side of one key, a similar obstruction was certain to be found on the south end of the next one. Thus their course was a perpetual zigzag, and a fair wind on one stretch would be dead ahead on the next. Now they slid through channels so narrow that the dense mangroves on either side brushed their decks, and then they would be confronted by a coral reef that seemed to extend unbrokenly in both directions as far as the eye could reach. Worth would make up his mind that there was nothing to do but get out and drag the canoes over it, when suddenly the _Psyche_, which was always in the lead, would dash directly at the obstacle, and skim through one of the narrow cuts with which all these reefs abound.
For a long time it was a mystery to Worth how Sumner always kept in the channel without hesitating or stopping to take soundings. Finally he discovered that it was by carefully noting the color of the water. He learned that white water meant shoals, that of a reddish tinge indicated sand-bars or reefs, black water showed rocks or grassy patches, and that the channels assumed varying shades of green, according to their depth.
They camped with negro charcoal-burners on one key, and visited an extensive pineapple patch on another. Having heard this fruit spoken of as growing on trees, Worth was amazed to find it borne on plants with long prickly leaves that reached but little above his knees. The plants stood so close together, and their leaves were so interlaced, that he did not see how any one ever walked among them to cut the single fruit borne at the head of each one; and when he tried it, stepping high to avoid the bayonet-like leaves, his wonder that any human being could traverse the patch was redoubled.
"I would just as soon try to walk through a field covered with cactus plants," he said.
"So would I," laughed Sumner, "if I had to walk as you do. In a pineapple patch you must never lift your feet, but always shuffle along. In that way you force the prickly leaves before you, and move with their grain instead of against it."
Although the crop would not be ready for cutting much before May, they found here and there a lusciously ripe yellow "pine," and after eating one of these, Worth declared that he had never before known what a pineapple was. He did not wonder that they tasted so different here and in New York, when he learned that for shipment north they must be cut at least two weeks before they are ripe, while they are hard and comparatively juiceless.
At the end of three days an outgoing tide, rushing like a mill-race, swept the canoes through the green expanse of "The Grasses," that looked like a vast submerged meadow, and into the open waters of the Bahia Honda, or, as the reef-men say, the "Bay o' Hundy." Here they first saw spongers at work, and devoted an entire day to studying their operations.
Worth had always supposed that sponges were dived for, but now he learned his mistake. He found that in those waters they are torn from the bottom and drawn to the surface by iron rakes with long curved teeth attached to slender handles from twenty to thirty feet in length. The sponging craft are small sloops or schooners, each of which tows from two to six boats behind it. When a sponge bed is discovered, two men go out in each of these boats. One of them sculls it gently along, while the other leans over the gunwale with a water-glass in his hands, and carefully examines the bottom as he is moved slowly over it. The water-glass is a common wooden bucket having a glass bottom. This is held over the side of the boat so that its bottom is a few inches below the surface of the water, or beyond the disturbing influence of ripples. With his head in this bucket, the sponger gazes intently down until he sees the round black object that he wants. Then he calls out to the sculler to stop the boat, and with the long-handled rake that lies by his side secures the prize. It is black and slimy, and full of animal matter that quickly dies, and decomposes with a most disgusting odor. To this the spongers become so accustomed that they do not mind it in the least, and fail to understand why all strangers take such pains to sail to windward of their boats.
When the deck of a sponge boat is piled high with this unsavory spoil of the sea, she is headed towards the nearest key on which her crew have established a crawl, [B] and her cargo is tossed into it. The crawl is a square pen of stakes built in the shallow water of some sheltered bay, and in it the sponges lie until their animal matter is so decomposed that it will readily separate from them. Then they are stirred with poles or trodden by the feet of the spongers until they are free from it, when they are taken from the crawl, and spread on a beach to dry and whiten in the sun. When a full cargo has been obtained, they are strung in bunches, and taken to Key West to be sold by the pound at auction. There they are trimmed, bleached again, pressed into bales, and finally shipped to New York.
[B] Crawl is a corruption of corral, meaning a yard or pen.
Sponges are of many grades, of which the sheep's wool is the finest, and the great loggerheads the most worthless. As spongers can only work in water that is smooth, or nearly so, half their time is spent in idleness; and though they receive large prices for what they catch, the average of their wages is low.
One hot afternoon at the end of a week found our canoemates half-way up the reef, and approaching a key called Lignum Vitæ, which is for several reasons one of the most remarkable of all the keys. It is a large island lifted higher above the surface of the water than any of the other keys, and it contains in its centre a small fresh-water lake. It is covered with an almost impenetrable forest growth, and concealed by this are ancient stone walls, of which no one knows the origin or date.
Sumner had told Worth so much concerning this key as to arouse his curiosity, and they both looked forward with interest to reaching it. All day they had seen it looming before them, and when they finally dropped sail close beside it, Worth proposed that they take advantage of the remaining daylight to make a short exploration before unloading their canoes and pitching camp. To this Sumner agreed, and as they could not drag the laden boats up over the rocky beach, they decided to anchor them out and wade ashore. So the _Psyche's_ anchor was flung out into the channel, the _Cupid_ was made fast to her, and a light line from its stern was carried ashore and tied to a tree. Then, taking their guns with them, the boys plunged into the forest.
When, an hour later, they returned from their exploration, bringing with them a brace of ducks and half a dozen doves that they had shot, they gazed about them in bewildered dismay. The canoes were not where they had left them, nor could any trace of them be discovered.
[Illustration: "THE CANOES ARE GONE!"]
CHAPTER VII.
MYSTERIOUS DISAPPEARANCE OF THE CANOES.
"The canoes are gone!" cried Worth.
"It looks like it," replied Sumner, in an equally dismayed tone.
"Are you sure this is where we left them?"
"Yes; sure. There is the stern line that we made fast to the _Cupid_, or what is left of it."
Sure enough, there was a portion of the light line still fast to the tree, and as Sumner pulled it in, both boys bent over to examine it. It had been broken, and not cut. From its length it must also have been broken close to the canoe.
"Oh, Sumner, what shall we do?" asked Worth, in a tone of such despair that the former at once realized the necessity of some immediate action to divert his comrade's thoughts.
"Do?" he cried. "There's plenty to do. First, we'll go down to that point and take a look to seaward; for, as the tide is running out, they are more likely to have gone in that direction than any other. It would be a comfort even to catch a glimpse of them. Then, perhaps, they have only drifted away, and are stranded on some bar near by. Besides looking for the canoes, we must build some kind of a shelter for the night, cook supper, and discuss our plans for the future. Oh yes, we've plenty to do!"
While he spoke, the boys were making their way to the point in question, and when they reached it, they eagerly scanned every foot of water in sight. Diagonally to the right from where they stood stretched the long reach of Lower Metacumba, desolate and uninhabited as they knew. Almost directly in front, but several miles away, rose the palm-crowned rocks of Indian Key, with its two or three old shed-like buildings in plain view. These had been used and abandoned years before by the builders of Alligator Light, the slender tower of which they could see rising from the distant waters above the outer reef. Diagonally on the left was the tiny green form of Tea Table Key, and dimly beyond it they could make out the coast of Upper Metacumba, which Sumner said was inhabited. In all this far-reaching view, however, there were no signs of the missing canoes.
"I'm glad of it!" said Sumner, after his long searching gaze had failed to reveal them. "It would be rough to have them in sight but out of reach."
Already the sun was sinking behind the tree-tops of Lower Metacumba, fish were leaping in the placid waters, and a few pelican were soaring with steady poise above them. Every now and then these would swoop swiftly down, with a heavy splash that generally sealed the fate of one or more mullet off which the great birds were making their evening meal. A flock of black cormorants, uttering harsh cries, flew overhead with a rushing sound, returning from a day's fishing to their roosts in the distant Everglades. With these exceptions, and the faint boom of the surf on the outer reef, all was silence and desertion. Besides the light-house tower there was no sign of human life, not even the distant glimmer of a sail. While the boys still looked longingly for some trace of their canoes, the sunset, and a red flash, followed at short intervals by two white ones, shot out from the vanishing form of Alligator Light.
"Come!" cried Sumner, heedful of this warning. "Night is almost here, and we have too much to do in every precious minute of twilight to be standing idle. I'll take the bucket and run to the pond for water, while you cut all the palmetto leaves you possibly can, and carry them to the place where we landed."
"The bucket?" repeated Worth, looking about him inquiringly. "Where are you going to find it?"